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An Armenian Sketchbook, by Vasily Grossman, trans. Robert & Elizabeth
Chandler. MacLehose Press, £12
Near the end of his road, the author of `Life and Fate' found beauty
and solidarity in a strange land
MASHA KARP
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/an-armenian-sketchbook-by-vasily-grossmantrans-robert--elizabeth-chandler-maclehose-press-12-8803068.html
SATURDAY 07 SEPTEMBER 2013
Vasily Grossman found himself in Armenia less than a year after the
KGB had confiscated his novel Life and Fate. Scared by the scale of
the row around Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago in 1958, the Soviet
authorities decided to act differently in Grossman's case three years
later. They prevented the novel from being published abroad and its
author from becoming famous. `They strangled me in a dark corner,' was
Grossman's own response to this.
`I need the money and I feel terrible,' he said in a letter. In the
circumstances he was glad to accept an invitation to translate a
1400-page novel by an Armenian writer, Hrachya Kochar, although, as he
had no Armenian, this meant a huge task of turning what he called `the
awful, illiterate literal version' into readable Russian. However, as
joint ventures of this kind were supposed to cement `the friendship of
the peoples', it was common practice to give translators the chance to
work with the author and to see the republic, at the expense of the
Writers' Union. So Grossman was off to Armenia for two months.
This was how An Armenian Sketchbook came about - an extraordinary
lyrical account of his acquaintance with the country. His friend
Semyon Lipkin, who saved the manuscript of Life and Fate, called it
Grossman's `Armenian poem'. A poignant foreboding of imminent death is
present in the book (during this trip Grossman, unknowingly, felt the
first signs of cancer), but this doesn't overshadow his excitement at
discovering unfamiliar landscapes and architecture or his admiration
and warmth for people working hard in a stony country.
There is a lot of subtle irony too, especially when those of a higher
social rank are depicted. For example, a `stunningly beautiful' monk
is described in the following way: `the god of kindness and compassion
had not even touched his wonderful countenance'.
Instead, kindness and compassion overflow Grossman's own notes,
whenever he talks about people. But the sketchbook also contains
persistent reflections on life in the Soviet Union and on the issues
of nationalism and inter-ethnic relations which were always acute
there. At the very end, while describing a village wedding, he comes
to a subject very close to his heart: addressing him, his hosts speak
about Jews and Armenians and `how blood and suffering had brought them
together'.
With the Holocaust never officially mentioned in the USSR, Grossman,
whose mother was murdered by the Nazis, was particularly moved by this
expression of solidarity coming from Armenian peasants: `I bow down in
honour of their words about those who perished in clay ditches,
earthen pits and gas chambers, and on behalf of all those among the
living in whose faces today's nationalists have contemptuously flung
the words `It's a pity Hitler didn't finish off the lot of you'.'
However, when An Armenian Sketchbook was ready for publication, it was
precisely these lines, together with another half a dozen, that were
marked for deletion by a vigilant censor. This was something Grossman
was not prepared to compromise on. Thus yet another book of his
became unpublishable. It first appeared in print in 1965, after
Grossman's death and with numerous cuts. Only in 1988 was the full
version published in Russian. This has now been beautifully translated
by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler.
Chandler. MacLehose Press, £12
Near the end of his road, the author of `Life and Fate' found beauty
and solidarity in a strange land
MASHA KARP
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/an-armenian-sketchbook-by-vasily-grossmantrans-robert--elizabeth-chandler-maclehose-press-12-8803068.html
SATURDAY 07 SEPTEMBER 2013
Vasily Grossman found himself in Armenia less than a year after the
KGB had confiscated his novel Life and Fate. Scared by the scale of
the row around Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago in 1958, the Soviet
authorities decided to act differently in Grossman's case three years
later. They prevented the novel from being published abroad and its
author from becoming famous. `They strangled me in a dark corner,' was
Grossman's own response to this.
`I need the money and I feel terrible,' he said in a letter. In the
circumstances he was glad to accept an invitation to translate a
1400-page novel by an Armenian writer, Hrachya Kochar, although, as he
had no Armenian, this meant a huge task of turning what he called `the
awful, illiterate literal version' into readable Russian. However, as
joint ventures of this kind were supposed to cement `the friendship of
the peoples', it was common practice to give translators the chance to
work with the author and to see the republic, at the expense of the
Writers' Union. So Grossman was off to Armenia for two months.
This was how An Armenian Sketchbook came about - an extraordinary
lyrical account of his acquaintance with the country. His friend
Semyon Lipkin, who saved the manuscript of Life and Fate, called it
Grossman's `Armenian poem'. A poignant foreboding of imminent death is
present in the book (during this trip Grossman, unknowingly, felt the
first signs of cancer), but this doesn't overshadow his excitement at
discovering unfamiliar landscapes and architecture or his admiration
and warmth for people working hard in a stony country.
There is a lot of subtle irony too, especially when those of a higher
social rank are depicted. For example, a `stunningly beautiful' monk
is described in the following way: `the god of kindness and compassion
had not even touched his wonderful countenance'.
Instead, kindness and compassion overflow Grossman's own notes,
whenever he talks about people. But the sketchbook also contains
persistent reflections on life in the Soviet Union and on the issues
of nationalism and inter-ethnic relations which were always acute
there. At the very end, while describing a village wedding, he comes
to a subject very close to his heart: addressing him, his hosts speak
about Jews and Armenians and `how blood and suffering had brought them
together'.
With the Holocaust never officially mentioned in the USSR, Grossman,
whose mother was murdered by the Nazis, was particularly moved by this
expression of solidarity coming from Armenian peasants: `I bow down in
honour of their words about those who perished in clay ditches,
earthen pits and gas chambers, and on behalf of all those among the
living in whose faces today's nationalists have contemptuously flung
the words `It's a pity Hitler didn't finish off the lot of you'.'
However, when An Armenian Sketchbook was ready for publication, it was
precisely these lines, together with another half a dozen, that were
marked for deletion by a vigilant censor. This was something Grossman
was not prepared to compromise on. Thus yet another book of his
became unpublishable. It first appeared in print in 1965, after
Grossman's death and with numerous cuts. Only in 1988 was the full
version published in Russian. This has now been beautifully translated
by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler.