Russia

When I entered last thursday to my local library and saw this title: “Metro Stop Dostoevsky, Travels in Russian Time” (Bengis, Ingrid, North Point Press, New York, 2003), I opened the first page and read the epigraph:

“Russia is a Sphinx! Exultant and afflicted,
Drenched in blackest blood,
She gazes, gazes, gazes into you,
Yes, with hatred and with love.
-Alexander Blok, ‘Scythia’ ”

I couldn’ resist borrowing that book and start reading it avidly.

Here is a paragraph out of the Preface:

“The daugther or Russian emigres, Ingrid Bengis, grew up wondering whether she was American or, deep down, “really Russian”. In 1991, naively in love with Russia and Russian literature, she settled in St. Petesburg, where she was quickly immersed in “catastroika” (…) As Bengis takes part in Russian life –becoming a reluctant entreprenour, undergoing surgery in a St Petesburg hospital, descending into a coal mine- she becomes increasingly aware of its Dostoyevskian duality, never more so than when she meets the impoverished, importuning grea-great-granddaughter of the writer himself.”

Then, these:

“She almost never ask questions. That’s one thing she doesn’t like about people from the West, always asking questions, always thinking there must be answers. What is going to happen to Russia? they ask. What will the future be? How should I know? B says. What will happen with his Dutch girlfriend? Will he marry her? How should I know? B says again. We will see. For me, this would never be enough. I want to know definitely. But nothing is ever definite in Russia. Besides, people who have grown accustumed to reading between the lines never ask direct questions. People who are used to being overheard in restaurants or even in their own aparments certainly never do it. What about the famous Rusian directness? I ask. Ah, that is different. That isn’t asking questions. That is saying what you feel. Americans don’t say what they feel. Instead they ask questions.” (p. 41)

“Whenever anyone is testy or spiteful or irritable in a bus or a store or a restaurant, I just think, Aha, there’s a real Dostoyevsky character for you, easily humiliated, grandiose, socially powerless, filled with spleen as well as surprising bursts of warmth, humility, kidness. Sometimes, while waiting for my rendezvous with literature, I think that I have died and gone to heaven and I am living in Dostoevskyland.” (p. 47)

“A year ago, Russian opera singers visiting Maine for the first time went with members of our opera company to an American ice-cream parlor. We asked them what kind of ice cream they wanted. A hurried, intense conference in Russian followed. “Ice cream,” was the final, universally agreed-upon answer. “But which kind?” on of the Americans persisted. “Doesn’t matter,” the Russians said. “But you have a choice,” the American insisted. B lookeed him straight in the eye. “For what?” she asked, by which she meant, “For what reason?” It was the end of the conversation. Everyone ate vainilla.” (p. 50)