What do the writers themselves read? What authors, plots and characters make a particularly strong impression on them? Every month, famous writers answer questions from Psychologies.
1. What are you reading now?
I am finishing the two volumes of Alexander Markov’s Human Evolution (Corpus, 2011). I am very glad to read this, because it frees thinking. More precisely, it allows structuring it by understanding that the metaphysical content of the universe and its physical content are in a state of refined and balanced parity. Now the boundaries between them are much clearer, and this is very inspiring.
2. What book will you turn to in a difficult moment of your life?
First of all, I would name «Ecclesiastes» and «War and Peace». In the first, there is consolation in the thought that everything can be experienced. The second is just a lot of life. It warms.
3. Which writers and poets have especially influenced you?
Influence, in my understanding, is associated with setting a mark to which one should be guided. It is a very difficult task to realize where this mark is located. And even more difficult to accept it in your course. My favorite writers: Chekhov, Coetzee, Platonov, Faulkner, Kafka, Pushkin, Lermontov, Olesha, Babel and many others. In poetry — , Milos, Parshchikov, Philip Levin.
4. What is reading books for you in general, why do you need it?
Literature is the production of freedom of meaning. The choice point must be generated within the novel, like a dew point. Literature satisfies man with the authenticity of his existence. Literature is not obliged to teach, it is obliged to teach freedom. The existential experience of making choices is the reward of reading. This is where the powerful sense of freedom comes from in Anna Karenina. The novel, nourished by the reader’s faith, like ocean waves, breathes broadly and highly with the space of human existence. The novel says more about the world than the world itself can tell — to anyone. It’s good when a novel is more than a way of knowing.
5. With which of the deceased or living authors would you like to communicate personally?
You don’t have to deal with writers. Completely pointless exercise. But I miss Alexei Parshchikov. Because he is not only my teacher, but also my friend. And you miss your friends. I haven’t seen Vladimir Gubailovsky for a hundred years. But we’ll fix it.