“The Russian world should not turn into a civil war between the Kremlin towers”

“I am well acquainted with Konstantin Kevorkian and his political and ideological position, with his articles,” says another modern Russian writer Eduard Limonov about the author. – I met him in Crimea, where he now lives. He makes a great impression on me: an energetic and strong person.”

The book “Brothers and non-brothers. History Lessons” by Konstantin Kevorkian is dedicated to the events in Ukraine after the coup in the winter of 2014. The author, in a sharp, journalistic manner, examines the background of the issue, analyzes the most likely ways out of the crisis, devotes time to a satirical depiction of reality, and also shares his own impressions and memories.

Overall, the work makes a very good impression and, I think, will find its enthusiastic reader.

At the moment, the publication can already be purchased in the network of bookstores “Bukvoed”, “World of Books” and others, as well as ordered on the Internet.

The editors of PolitNavigator, with the permission of the author, publish a short excerpt from the book dedicated to Nikolai Gogol and St. Petersburg.

Petersburg notes

I spent a long time looking at furniture from the Catherine era in the Russian Museum. My confusion was resolved by a passing tour. It turns out that the backs of the chairs were specially made with uncomfortable decorative details, so that the people of the noble class sitting on them would not relax, but would maintain their posture.

St. Petersburg is akin to an uncomfortable chair for nobles - it forces them to maintain their posture. And the St. Petersburg residents themselves are strict, smart, and polite. In order for them to turn into ordinary Russian people, they need vodka. Here she is a salvation from the chilly wind from the Neva, and from the harshness of the tunnel streets, and from the grief of a lost brilliant era. Oh, these St. Petersburg girls with whitish eyes, falling into reading poetry from vodka, and Leningrad homeless people quoting Dostoevsky from memory...

“We all came out of Gogol’s The Overcoat,” Fyodor Mikhailovich used to say. Yes, it is in this city that you especially acutely feel the torment of the unfortunate, robbed Akaki Akakievich Bashmachkin. Windswept, desperately freezing, I understood why Russian literature emerged from Gogol’s “Overcoat” and did not jump out, like a circus hare, from Pushkin’s top hat. Although it seems strange: the heat-loving Gogol is a visiting provincial Little Russian, and Pushkin is the local nobility, accepted by the sovereign, a metropolitan celebrity. But only those who experience first-hand the dank melancholy of a small person in a huge northern city will understand Russian literature.

Reflecting on Gogol’s work, the outstanding Slavophile Konstantin Aksakov wrote: “Another important circumstance is associated with the appearance of Gogol: he is from Little Russia. Her deep-lying artistic character is expressed in her numerous, soft-sounding songs, lively and tender, rounded in size; this is not the character of the Great Russian song... Now, with Gogol, the artistic character of Little Russia emerged from its beautiful Little Russian songs, its wonderful artistic beginning, and finally the Russian genius arose, when the general life of the state embraced all its members and allowed it to manifest itself in a colossal volume; a new element of art has flowed widely into the life of art in Russia..."

Aksakov instinctively felt the enormous importance of the humanity of the South, organically reviving the endless depression of the North and its snow-covered landscape. The southern word is juicy, cheerful, warm, flowing from the very liveliness of the people's character. It ultimately makes all Russian literature not an academic collection of works by hypochondriacs, but a lively, witty and soul-stirring conversation. Chekhov, Korolenko, Akhmatova, Ilf, Petrov, Babel, Bulgakov, Paustovsky, Kulchitsky, Olesha, Slutsky, Limonov... There are countless representatives of the South Russian school of Russian literature. And at the origins is Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol.

Russian literature is a phenomenon of the world order and, in fact, the nation’s main contribution to the treasury of world culture, comparable only to Italian opera or German philosophy. And a good half of this literature was created by Little Russians and immigrants from Little Russia. It cannot be swept off the table with an indifferent wave of the hand of a government official - it is the essence of the Fatherland. And its roots are in Kyiv, and its great prose is from Gogol, and Ukrainians are an integral part of it. To forget about Ukraine means to forget about national shrines and saints, to erase the genius of Gogol and Bulgakov from oneself, and to hand over millions of one’s own compatriots to desecration. It’s easy to dishonor yourself - just start measuring everything in terms of profit and rent.

And St. Petersburg still remembers the time when people fought duels over honor. Here they are still confident that there is no separate Ukraine, and it is still part of the Empire. But beware of losing a living tradition behind outdated geographical maps, be afraid of losing Ukraine in yourself - alive, burning, funny. Having plunged into the cold abstraction of geopolitical games, do not forget about Gogol’s compassion for a small person, squeezed by the millstones of circumstances. Without all this, the Russian world you proclaimed will turn into an endless feud of Kremlin towers - brick, insensitive, cynical.

Yes, the conquerors even visited the Kremlin and trampled the shrines with the boot of the infidel. But it never occurred to a truly Russian person to give Moscow up forever to the Poles or the French, to leave the Motherland in the enemy’s clutches. Those who say that all of Southern Rus' should be left to the invaders are playing into the hands of the enemy. How can you throw away part of your own soul, how can you cure a disease with indifference?

Kyiv was liberated many times, and this is repeatedly described in great Russian literature: “The Petliurists fled without firing a single shot, abandoning their guns and weapons. And the same “fabulous” old men who had tenderly exclaimed “glory!” in the morning were now shouting from balconies and sidewalks, shaking their fists in rage, “Ganba!”, which means “shame.” But the Petliurites did not pay attention to these cries and ran, looking around and hastily stuffing something into their pockets as they ran.”.

“...Putting it in his pockets” - how correctly Paustovsky noticed this petty trait! Fussy looting is a typical feature of a temporary worker, an occupier. But any occupation is not eternal if you work every day, stubbornly and honestly for victory.