The Yasnaya Polyana Award’s 2020 Shortlist

The Yasnaya Polyana Award jury announced a six-book shortlist yesterday. I can’t say I think this list is especially inspiring or exciting – in large part because many of the titles are familiar from other award lists – though I can’t say I found this year’s YP longlist especially inspiring or exciting, either, for the same reason! Repetition. If you’re interested in jury views, Mikhail Vizel’s piece on the Год литературы site offers bits of commentary from jury members. And so here we go, in Russian alphabetical order by surname:

• Andrei Astvatsaturov’s Не кормите и не трогайте пеликанов (Don’t Feed or Touch the Pelicans), a novel concerning an urban neurotic who goes to London and gets suck(er?)ed into some sort of real-life (but fictional) detective story, was already a NatsBest shortlister.
• Sergei Belyakov’s Весна народов (Springtime of the Peoples or Spring of Nations are among the many variants for this title wording [edit]) isn’t concerned with European revolutions in 1848 but rather the Russian Revolution of 1917, which (borrowing from the book’s description) led to the establishment of various governments, including multiple entities in Ukraine. The book’s subtitle mentions Russians, Ukrainians, Bulgakov, and Petlyura.
• Ksenia Buksha’s Чуров и Чурбанов (Churov and Churbanov) is the only book on the list that I’ve read in full (previous post). It’s very good, a genuine bright spot in this year’s reading: it’s funny, smart, and skillfully constructed. Also a Big Book finalist.
• Sophia Sinitskaya’s Сияние “жеможаха” (which, sorry, I’m going to continue calling The “Zhemozhakha” Shining since the title’s more understandable word is the same as the Russian title of a certain Stephen King book) has already hit the NatsBest and Big Book shortlists, too. I still need to return to this one after having gotten stuck (twice!) in the first novella in the book, which is also the first novella in another Sinitskaya book. (!) It’s good, it’s interesting, I love the details and atmosphere… but somehow it just hasn’t held together for me, doesn’t impel me to read.
• Sasha Filipenko’s Возвращение в Острог (Return to Ostrog, where “Ostrog” is apparently a toponym; the word means “prison”) is a welcome surprise: I thought Filipenko’s Hounding, a Big Book finalist a few years ago, was very good (previous post) and have been meaning to read more of his work. This novel is apparently about a town where a prison is the primary institution.
• Evgeny Chizhov’s Собиратель рая (Collector of Heaven or Collecting Heaven?), which I read in part and have been known to call “good-natured,” is a slow, meandering novel about a woman with dementia and her son, who loves flea markets. Although it didn’t hit me (particularly after Chizhov’s truly wonderful The Translation), I do understand its appeal.

 

Up Next: Inga Kuznetsova’s Промежуток. Potpourri books still await, and who knows what else might pop up!

 

Disclaimers and Disclosures: The usual, which includes having translated two Yasnaya Polyana jury members’ books and having enjoyed talking with a couple of this year’s award finalists.

The 2020 NatsBest Short List

The National Bestseller Award announced its six finalists the week before last. (Yes, I’m still a little slow here!) Given the current uncertainties in just about everything due to COVID-19, it’s unclear when, exactly, the winner will be chosen and announced in the fall.

On the positive side, that means there’s plenty of time to read the finalists. Here they are, listed with the number of points the first jury awarded.

• Mikhail Elizarov’s Земля (Earth) (13 points) (previous post) tells, over more than 750 packed pages, of life, death, and the Russian funeral industry. And that’s only volume one! This is the only book on the list that I’ve read so far.
• Olga Pogodina-Kuzmina’s Уран (Uranium) (9 points) is apparently a documentary novel about events at and around the Sillamäe uranium plant in 1953. This one definitely interests me.
• Andrei Astvatsaturov’s Не кормите и не трогайте пеликанов (Don’t Feed or Touch the Pelicans) (6 points) concerns an urban neurotic who goes to London and gets sucked into some sort of real-life (but fictional) detective story.
• Sofia Sinitskaya’s Сияние “жеможаха” (Oh, woe is me on this title!) (6 points) contains three interconnected novellas that I suspect are probably connected with her Мироныч, дырник и жеможаха, which also has a difficult title. I started reading that first book at exactly the wrong time, late this winter, when I was just too distracted to appreciate it. I’m eager to start over.
• Kirill Ryabov’s Пёс (The Dog) (6 points) sounds like a short novel about deep desperation – if not for the book description noting hope, it might sound like The Dog is чернуха, that dark, dark realism I used to read so much of. Maybe it’s part of what I see as the new wave of chernukha, though.
• Bulat Khanov’s Непостоянные величины (Inconstants [? This title appears to play on the mathematical term for “constants.”) (5 points) is about a young teacher of Russian language and literature who graduates from Moscow State University and goes to teach in Kazan, challenging himself to see how long he can stand teaching in an ordinary school.

Up Next: More award news, a potpourri post of books read, including Turgenev’s On the Eve, which may not be my favorite Turgenev but which held my attention quite nicely.

Disclaimers and Disclosures: The usual, plus having translated a novel by the NatsBest secretary, excerpts from one of the finalists, and having met a couple of the finalists.

Potpourri: Astvatsaturov and Shargunov, Rossica Awards

Back at last: it’s been quite a month of May! This week I have quick—and rather awkward, since their genres aren’t my usual reading—summaries of books by two writers who will be in New York soon for Read Russia and BookExpo America events, plus aging news on two awards, plus a bit about upcoming posts…

First the books... Andrei Astvatsaturov’s Люди в голом (People in the Nude), labelled a novel, is a book of what I’d call vignettes—some feel especially essayistic and/or autobiographical—that Astvatsaturov links with the motif of nudity, psychological and physical. I only read Part One, which I loved for its humorously biting accounts of childhood and its absurdities. Little Andrei Astvatsaturov, for example, isn’t allowed to use a local swimming pool because he talks with a friend, though the pool lady tells his mother it’s because he’s not strong and athletic enough. The friend who lent me People in the Nude especially liked a passage where Andrei and another friend communicate, wordlessly, during a field trip to a Lenin museum: the friend moves his shoulder and mouths “хрусть, хрусть” (“crack, crack”), referencing their interest in skeletons, which arose out of some poetry, drawing, and the idea of skeletons climbing the stairs to Lenin… trust us, it’s funnier and more wonderful than I can make it sound here. (I Googled because I was curious to see if anyone else liked that passage: it’s quoted here in Власть.)

Economical communication is Astvatsaturov’s strength as a writer, too: his portrayals of being a kid—playing at home alone, say, and taking a phone message—are brief but feel richly (arche)typical, with a combination of could-be-anywhere themes plus details, like involving imported beer cans in play, that feel distinctly Soviet-era. I gave the home alone dialogue to my first-year Russian students: the language was simple enough that they could read and enjoy some real Russian. (Bonus: They loved the book’s cover!) I’ll read Part Two later, if I can renew my book loan… it feels different from childhood, beginning with reflections on writing then moving on to a scene where a literary “dama,” smoking a cigarette, tells Andrei, “У вас не проза, Аствацатуров... а огрызки из отрывок” (literally “You don’t have prose, Astvatsaturov… but bits of excerpts.”) True enough, but his blend of invention and apparent autobiography were funny enough that I laughed out loud. Many times.

Reading Sergei Shargunov’s Книга без фотографий (A Book Without Photographs) immediately after People in the Nude certainly emphasized stylistic differences: where Astvatsaturov’s leisurely descriptions blend real life and invention, Shargunov composes a terser, more straightforward memoir that methodically barrels through episodes in his life, linking them through photographs and photography. Shargunov also covers childhood and young adulthood, beginning as the child of a priest and not joining the Pioneers, then winning the Debut Prize, becoming a political activist, and visiting political hot spots, including Chechnya, as a journalist. I thought the quick pace suited the material well, given Shargunov’s writings about politics, including the October 1993 Events, his attempt at elected office, and mentions of where he’s not allowed to photograph. A Book Without Photographs reads easily, as a perceptive personal history of the late Soviet and early post-Soviet eras. I enjoyed Shargunov’s combination of toughness and honesty, which—again!—contrasts with Astvatsaturov, whose book also feels very honest, though People in the Nude has more of a feel of irony and vulnerability than toughness.

Rossica Awards. Better late than never on this information! Academia Rossica announced last week that John Elsworth won the 2012 Rossica Translation Prize for his translation of Andrei Bely’s Petersburg, and Gregory Afinogenov won the Rossica Young Translators Award for his translation of excerpts of Viktor Pelevin’s S.N.U.F.F. Congratulations to both.

What’s Coming Next: A guest post from Olga Bukhina about books for children and teenagers written by writers who usually write for adults. Her post is especially topical since two of the writers she chose—Dmitry Bykov and Boris Minaev—will be in New York next week. Award information: the Big Book short list is coming very soon, and the National Bestseller winner will be announced on June 3. Then Zakhar Prilepin’s Black Monkey. I’ll be in New York for a week, attending Read Russia events and BookExpo America… let me know if you’ll be there, too!

Disclaimers: The usual. And I am working on Read Russia.