One of the books I brought back from Moscow last September is
a big, thick collection of short stories and not-very-long novels by Valery
Zalotukha, whose gigundo novel Свечка (The Candle) was a Big Book Award runner-up
among jury and reader’s choice voters in 2015. Zalotukha’s publisher gave me the
collection and recommended I read the novella Мусульманин (The Muslim), which served as the basis
for a 1995 film of the same
name, directed by Vladimir Khotinenko. The movie won a special jury prize at the
Montréal World Film Festival that year and won a (Russian) Nika Award for best screenplay
in 1996. Zalotukha, who passed away in 2015, was a well-known screenwriter: he also
wrote Makarov, which Khotinenko also directed,
and which also won awards.
The Muslim is
brief—around 80 pages—and written very clearly. It’s dated 1994 and feels almost
like an early example of чернуха, that dark-dark-dark realism I’ve written about so many
times; it is village-based. Zalotukha tells the story of Kolya, who has returned to his hometown from
the war in Afghanistan, where he was MIA. Lots changed during those years: Kolya’s
father committed suicide, his bully of a brother (Fedya) was released from
prison, and Kolya himself has converted to Islam and uses the name Abdula.
You can read Dennis Grunes’s excellent detailed
summary (with spoilers!) of the film version of The Muslim, which appears to be very close to the novella, so I won’t
waste time outlining the plot, particularly since the simple use of the word чернуха above tells you that many things
can and will go wrong after Kolya’s return. What made the novella particularly interesting
for me was the 1990s atmosphere that Zalotukha creates: villagers sniff
American dollars, collective farms are changing, one character speaks in advertising
slogans, and there’s a mention of the ubiquitous Mexican soap opera The
Rich Cry, Too, which sucked in millions of Russian viewers. There’s
also a bit of a carnival feel when lots of dollars get loose…
At the core of the story are cultural differences and otherness.
Kolya stands out from his family and townspeople not just because of his new
name: he also refuses to take part in certain rituals, like drinking vodka at
his father’s grave or accepting free, essentially stolen, feed grain. There’s a
particularly sharp contrast between Kolya and Fedya because Kolya has a strong work
ethic and Fedya, though initially loyal to his brother, is prone to heavy drinking
and violence. The Muslim features another
other, a mysterious visitor, an outsider who comes to town. Though The Muslim’s ending felt a bit more
obvious—and perhaps more sudden—than I might have hoped for, the novella kept
me thoroughly engaged, both because of my interest in the 1990s and because I
always enjoy reading about cultural clashes that include figures like the all
too typical Fedya.
Zalotukha’s Последний коммунист (The Last Communist),
which is dated 1999 and was a Russian Booker Prize finalist in 2000, was less
satisfying. The Last Communist is a
family drama of sorts, too, and it also tells of a son’s return. This return
feels less monumental: Ilya Pechenkin returns from school in Switzerland to his
wealthy family in southern Russia. The 1990s are still in full force here, too,
and it feels like Papa Pechenkin, who made his fortune in agriculture, owns the
town. (I wonder if it’s a coincidence that his initials work out to VIP if they’re
shown as first name, patronymic, surname?) It’s Ilya who wants to be the last
communist and foment some sort of revolution, and Zalotukha works in plenty of family conflict—there are father-son
relations, of course, as well as VIP’s extra-marital activity with a modest
schoolteacher—as well as lots of reminders of the many sociopolitical and
sociocultural aspects of generation gaps. Although Ilya makes friends with some
peculiar characters who inspire Zalotukha to include martial arts poses at the market
and a conversation about why people love McDonald’s (no swearing or barfing
there, to which I would add clean and calm, pluses in the 1990s), it’s VIP, with
his preference for movies over reality and his utter cluelessness about
everything and everyone around him that caught me most.
I could stick lots of labels on The Last Communist—absurd, farcical, tragicomic, among them—and there
are little gusts of classics blowing through the book, too, what with references
to Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment (my
reread, which is slow but steady, is paying off already!) and Ostrovksy’s How the Steel Was Tempered. Despite wonderfully
absurd situations in The Last Communist
that lend the novel a humor that feels peculiarly poignant—all the more so for
having met people who were a bit like VIP—the plot was a bit too madcap and even
confused at times for my taste, making me appreciate the clarity, brevity, and,
yes, even the obviousness of The Muslim
even more. I always admire stories and novels that are straightforward but
difficult to put down, usually for reasons I can’t quite explain. What’s strangest
about reading Zalotukha (this includes The
Candle, too) is that I find myself wanting to read more even when his storytelling
isn’t as sharp as it might be: I suspect that’s both because his writing is generally
very energetic, which I appreciate, plus it almost always feels as if the
Russia that fascinates Zalotukha is the same Russia that fascinates me.
Disclaimers: Thank
you to publisher Vremya for my copy of this Zalotukha
collection! It’s a huge book so there’s still plenty more to read. Including
Makarov.
Up Next: A short
novel set in Baku by Afanasy Mamedov.
