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Russian
00:00:04
Some of them do it
in all sincerity,00:00:06
some are trying to
suppress their own doubts.00:00:08
Our planning horizon
today is two days max.00:00:12
In the best case;
it’s a lot of time.00:00:15
People are scared,
and you can’t blame them for that.00:00:18
And what would I do if I had to
choose between saving my honor00:00:23
and saving my kids’ lives?00:00:24
You can close the borders, but you
can’t make people stop thinking.00:00:28
Maybe our problem is that we don’t
have the proper language yet.00:00:32
I don’t believe people want
their children to die in Ukraine.00:00:37
Do we ourselves have
enough fortitude...00:00:39
to survive and still
keep our dignity?00:00:43
If you spread the guilt over the whole
crowd, there isn’t anyone to blame.00:00:46
We must keep doing our job,
this is the only sure-win strategy.00:00:51
Tell Gordeeva00:00:52
Irina Prokhorova00:01:06
Hello00:01:07
Hello00:01:08
You look fantastic.00:01:09
Make your haters jealous.00:01:10
Good, good.00:01:18
Jesus, it’s a nightmare.00:01:20
You wake up every morning hoping
all this is just a bad dream.00:01:22
But it isn’t.00:01:24
You didn’t leave the country.
Why?00:01:28
I don’t know. ...
Too many responsibilities.00:01:34
Do you think you’ll be
able to fulfill them?00:01:36
I don’t know.
Let’s wait and see.00:01:45
What is your
attitude these days?00:01:48
It’s a philosophical question.00:01:50
Yes. Do you want a detailed
report or the larger picture?00:01:53
The larger picture.00:01:54
You know, it would have been bizarre
to get into boring details here.00:01:58
I have the same thoughts00:02:00
about the tragedy as everybody
else who comprehends the situation.00:02:03
Naturally, the first days
were total dread and despair.00:02:07
But man is a weird creature;00:02:11
he can adapt to everything.00:02:13
In some way, I realize that
life as we knew it is over.00:02:21
The thirty years of our attempts to
build a democratic Russia are over.00:02:28
Once and for all.00:02:30
The thought doesn’t make it easier,
but in a sense it makes you understand00:02:35
that we are stepping
into a totally new era –00:02:40
difficult, tense and probably
tragic for the civic society.00:02:46
We just have to face up to it,
stop wailing and wringing our hands.00:02:52
Piero’s antics are a
bit out of place here.00:02:55
What we need is to be stoic and00:03:00
stop mourning the last thirty
years of our lives which were,00:03:03
as we see now,
a beautiful time...00:03:08
You mean, all those things we
didn’t like were actually beautiful?00:03:11
You know, when the world
around you is shattering,00:03:14
you start seeing everything
in a different light.00:03:16
I don’t idealize
these thirty years;00:03:20
they were full of
rough and sad moments,00:03:24
and they brought us to the
tragedy we’re having now.00:03:26
Nevertheless,
when you suddenly realize that00:03:28
you’ve been living a
peaceful life until now,00:03:30
you understand that even that
imperfect life was beautiful.00:03:37
You could make plans
for the future.00:03:40
Our planning horizon
today is two days max.00:03:44
In the best case;
it’s a lot of time.00:03:46
We live day to day. You wake up
in the morning, you read the news00:03:49
from the “Special Operation” fields,
you start figuring out your next step.00:03:55
Frankly,
I think it’s time to stop weeping.00:04:00
Facebook is a marker here.
People ceased crying00:04:04
“OMG”, “It’s my fault”,
“that’s awful...”00:04:07
But there is no
Facebook anymore.00:04:09
Why, it works, I read some
friends’ and colleagues’ posts.00:04:14
I’ll say it again: as a
former Soviet citizen, I know00:04:18
that every such thing always manages
to function somehow against all odds.00:04:24
It’s getting obvious that this is
an adaptation and survival tactic,00:04:30
form of resistance developed
through many years of suppression.00:04:33
In a bizarre way, the experience
let us find some ways and moves00:04:36
to keep on living.00:04:38
I am not prone to blank
despair or pessimism.00:04:43
It is counterproductive.
Well, I could sob my heart out but00:04:47
what good would it do?
I’d have just wrecked my nerves.00:04:51
Did you have a moment
of blank despair?00:04:52
Of course, I did.00:04:54
On the 24th?00:04:55
Yes, probably.00:04:56
Or on your birthday
a few days later?00:04:58
No, by my birthday it was all
right already. I even posted00:05:02
on Facebook asking everybody
to keep on doing their jobs.00:05:05
Our publishing house
must publish books.00:05:09
It doesn’t matter that today it
looks like a bizarre extravagance.00:05:14
But I’m a cultural historian.00:05:16
In the Soviet time I was00:05:19
studying Language and
Literature in the University.00:05:21
Taking course in
History of Literature,00:05:24
I couldn’t help
noticing how many books00:05:28
translated from
Ancient Greek or Latin00:05:31
as well as medieval or
even Renaissance treatises00:05:34
were marked with words
“Academia Publishing House”.00:05:40
The publishing house’s life was
very short, it was created in 1920s00:05:43
and was duly destroyed in 1930s.00:05:50
All those books survived.00:05:52
Moreover,00:05:54
none of them were republished
until after the Perestroika.00:05:58
Those early impressions,00:06:02
the realization that they managed
to publish so many good books00:06:06
in such a short time...00:06:08
Was there any sense in their work?
Today we know that yes, there was.00:06:11
There was a lot of sense;00:06:13
several generations of scholars
were raised on those books.00:06:17
They wouldn’t have become
scholars without them.00:06:19
Who knows, maybe this revelation
turned me into a publisher.00:06:23
The books we have published00:06:26
and the books we will
publish from now on...00:06:29
Probably many will
think: “How is this00:06:31
book relevant to our
current situation?”00:06:33
But I am absolutely sure that
after some period of time00:06:36
all this knowledge
will be in high demand.00:06:39
You know,
it is time to stop thinking about00:06:42
past and start
thinking about future.00:06:44
To remember that this is
symbolic, intellectual basis00:06:49
we’ll have to stand on to
develop new and different00:06:54
vision of our future.00:06:57
All this will be
in demand some day00:06:59
because you can’t create
anything from nothing.00:07:01
We must keep doing our job,
it’s the only sure-win strategy.00:07:17
My greatest concern
is the question00:07:21
whether I will persevere.00:07:25
I can’t guarantee anything.
I don’t know.00:07:29
I don’t know.00:07:31
And what would I do if I had to
choose between saving my honor00:07:36
and saving my kids’ lives?00:07:39
For the sake of argument; just
in case I face such situation.00:07:42
And it might easily happen.00:07:46
And this is the truth
we must discuss now.00:07:51
Will we be able to stand up to
the hardships of this life or not?00:07:55
To put it crudely,
do we have a right to judge people?00:08:00
Can we provide them with
any kind of protection?00:08:03
Comfort? Support to keep
them from breaking down?00:08:06
And this is the
question of solidarity,00:08:09
of the vestiges of the civil society
that still survive in this country.00:08:13
Let’s not forget that
the last two generations00:08:16
were raised in a comparative freedom.
They are different people.00:08:20
Notwithstanding all
their misplaced beliefs00:08:24
and even the fact they
support the invasion.00:08:28
In their everyday life they got
used to a different way of life.00:08:33
We don’t take it
into account too.00:08:36
How will the people
feel in the situation00:08:40
when they are being brought
back to the archaic age?00:08:42
Not only in ideology but in everyday
life which is not easier at all.00:08:48
It’s a serious question.
I am afraid00:08:53
the fabric of our life’s00:08:56
ethics shrinks away and
changes dramatically.00:09:01
We’ll have once more to resolve
the “accursed questions”00:09:05
the Soviet people
had to resolve.00:09:10
The old ethics, ethics of survival and
resistance gets very important again.00:09:18
This is very dangerous actually.00:09:21
Maybe even more dangerous
than an applied pressure00:09:25
because you position against
the last is perfectly clear.00:09:28
The important thing is
what’s going on inside us.00:09:30
Don’t you think that
all that’s happening now00:09:33
as well as Russia’s
impending future in some way00:09:37
reduces to null all
our past efforts?00:09:40
Yes.
There is such sentiment now.00:09:43
You know, when you read00:09:46
Rosanov and other writers
who saw that breakup of 1917,00:09:54
you see the true
despair, but their00:09:56
situation probably was
much more terrifying00:09:59
and much more catastrophic.00:10:00
People emigrated without
any possessions, just ran00:10:04
for their lives into
uncertain future.00:10:06
It felt strange to think that00:10:10
a year before that people
lived normal lives.00:10:14
But in Lidia Chukovskaya’s
novel “Sofia Andreevna” t00:10:17
he main female character00:10:20
finds a pre-Revolution
photo of herself in00:10:24
a beautiful dress.00:10:25
She looks at the photo
in 1920s or 1930s00:10:29
and can’t believe there
ever was a life like that.00:10:31
Is it possible that we lived like
this, wore dresses like this?00:10:34
By that time,
it was just a legend.00:10:36
Let’s look at our perspective
from historical point of view.00:10:40
People wrote their books in
exile for some imagined readers,00:10:44
talking to nobody – and
all their books came back.00:10:50
They returned to Russia.00:10:52
It leaked out to
the USSR anyway.00:10:55
Later, in the end of
1980s all those books00:10:57
were printed in
millions of copies.00:11:00
So, they did it just
trying to dull the pain,00:11:06
in a secret hope that they
could return to Russia00:11:09
because the Bolshevistic regime would
collapse – and it never collapsed.00:11:13
They died before they
could see the changes.00:11:15
Nevertheless,
all that they left after them,00:11:19
the material heritage,
since book is a material product,00:11:23
all that survived.00:11:25
So, the illusion that our life is
over, and nothing ever comes back...00:11:31
a lot of good things
will come back.00:11:33
We can see that
everything’s going according00:11:35
to a plan we could
not apprehend.00:11:37
Who, tell me, who didn’t say that the
“Special Operation” was not possible?00:11:43
And it was possible
as we see now.00:11:45
We find ourselves in a
totally new reality now;00:11:47
and the whole world finds itself
in a totally new situation too.00:11:51
Of course, we could cover
ourselves with a white sheet,00:11:53
lie still and say,
“It’s the end of everything”.00:11:57
But I think that
the first thing that00:12:00
could save you from
despair is your work.00:12:02
Then, again, you should take
into account the basic laws00:12:07
of human psychology.00:12:09
Of the way it works.00:12:12
It helps us realize that demiurgic
powers always win in the end.00:12:25
A question.
These days, I often think00:12:29
of that moment in your life00:12:32
when your brother ran for
President, and you were his advisor.00:12:36
And everyone told you,00:12:37
“Irina Dmitriyevna,
please run for President.”00:12:41
Do you ever think of that?00:12:44
I don’t ask if you regret you didn’t
do that, but do you ever think of it?00:12:49
First, I never wanted to
be a President or anything.00:12:54
I’ll tell you frankly,00:12:56
to have an eloquent tongue00:12:57
is not enough to take
such high-level position.00:13:00
It calls for quite
different competencies.00:13:04
Listen, it doesn’t matter now.
Let me00:13:08
tell you a story.00:13:10
For the last seven years or so00:13:14
I’ve been witnessing our country
spiral down to autocracy.00:13:19
I couldn help asking myself why the
civil society which is not so small...00:13:25
it is large,
far larger than we usually think...00:13:29
why couldn’t it consolidate and
stand up to the autocratic trends?00:13:35
I think00:13:37
to blame ourselves, like “we are
useless, we are bad” is totally wrong.00:13:43
I’ve always thought that00:13:48
we just can’t find an
alternative agenda.00:13:50
That is what Vaclav
Gavel said long ago,00:13:53
after the Soviet troops
invaded Czechoslovakia00:13:56
and set on a military regime...00:13:58
He wrote splendidly that it
was high time to stop blaming00:14:04
the Government,00:14:05
that the opposition should
create an alternative agenda of00:14:07
their own that the Government
wouldn’t be able to appropriate.00:14:09
The agenda that would be in sync00:14:12
with the ideas, expectations,
and secret hopes00:14:16
of a large part of society,00:14:18
even the people who have nothing
to do with political activism.00:14:21
Look for yourself.00:14:22
We can’t say there were
no efforts to resist,00:14:27
but all our symbolic
actions from White Ribbons00:14:31
to I-don’t-know-what were easily
appropriated by our adversaries.00:14:35
It means,
it wasn’t an alternative agenda.00:14:38
With all my respect and
sympathy to Navalny,00:14:41
the war against corruption
is easily appropriated.00:14:43
“We too send corrupt officials to
jail,” the State would tell you,00:14:47
“Look how many governors
we have imprisoned.”00:14:50
For many years we thought that
charities were the alternative agenda,00:14:53
but even charity became
an official agenda,00:14:57
with presidential grants and
an official fund Krug Dobra.00:15:00
You know, I think this is
a very promising trend.00:15:03
If the State starts
appropriating those initiatives,00:15:08
this is a big step forward.
About three years ago00:15:12
I invited a few
well-respected, good people,00:15:16
let me not tell you their names.00:15:18
I told them, “Dear colleagues,
look where we are now.00:15:24
Let’s try and establish a very
broad-based social movement.00:15:28
Not a party,
not anything like that.”00:15:31
My attitude was like this:00:15:33
the so-called Third Sector00:15:37
is in fact the First Sector,00:15:40
and it is the very new
support environment f00:15:45
or this alternative agenda,
humanitarian agenda.00:15:49
I think that every
political mode of living00:15:54
has its own Achilles' heel.00:15:56
Democracy has one too,
but we won’t discuss it now.00:16:00
The Achilles' heel of
autocracy and totalitarianism00:16:03
is a pathologic intolerance
for humanism, dare I say it.00:16:07
Mercy, humanity,00:16:10
all that builds up a humanitarian
attitude towards life and man.00:16:13
They can’t appropriate
this agenda.00:16:16
Please notice that
in the Soviet time00:16:20
all the State repressed
and ridiculed most of all00:16:23
the so-called
“bourgeois humanism”00:16:26
which was nothing else but
the humanitarian agenda.00:16:29
They coined a new term
“proletarian humanism”00:16:32
and declared, “All enemies
must be put against the wall,00:16:34
but we must love our
own with all heart”,00:16:37
but please check whether those
“our own” truly deserve our love.00:16:40
I remember how they taught us
in school to see the difference00:16:43
between that
“proletarian humanism”00:16:45
and the humanism of
the “decaying West.”00:16:49
There is a clear sign:00:16:51
as soon as the state starts
introducing terms like00:16:54
“Managed Democracy”,
“Sovereign Democracy”00:16:57
or “Liberal Empire”, you know00:17:00
there is a part of life they
cannot include in their agenda.00:17:05
And I think here we see00:17:08
the basis we should build our
new humanitarian tradition on.00:17:14
We already have such
tradition in Russia.00:17:15
Over centuries lots of people,
let me say it, pushed for humanism.00:17:22
Once I told to a colleague of
mine, “Let’s try00:17:26
to articulate the
idea of humanism.00:17:30
It should lay in the very basis00:17:35
of the philosophy of
this alternative agenda.”00:17:41
I even joked, “Let’s call00:17:44
the movement Soyuz Miloserdnykh (The
Union of Tender-Hearted), or SMS.”00:17:48
For a year,
we got together regularly, talked,00:17:53
were going to write an appeal
but it all came to naught.00:17:58
What was the main obstacle?
Fear?00:18:02
No, there wasn’t any fear.
There wasn’t any fear yet.00:18:06
I think... my colleagues...00:18:10
either I couldn’t articulate it
properly or we were not ready yet...00:18:14
they didn’t understand me.00:18:15
By that time, the March of Mothers
already happened, do you remember it?00:18:19
There were many sporadic actions00:18:23
that showed us that the society taken
as a whole is against aggression.00:18:29
The civil society strives for
civil peace and normal human life.00:18:34
Wait a minute. Aren’t you
overestimating our society?00:18:36
Maybe we are discussing
two different societies?00:18:38
According to opinion polls,
most of the Russians approve the...00:18:43
how will we call it...00:18:45
Special Operation. We’ll call it
how they ordered us to call it.00:18:49
They approve the Russian
troops’ maneuvers in Ukraine.00:18:52
Let me say.
I am a former Soviet citizen.00:18:54
I don’t believe
in those surveys.00:18:57
But you do use the
subway, buy groceries...00:19:00
Yes, many people parrot the
words they are fed by TV.00:19:05
Some of them do it
in full sincerity,00:19:06
some trying to suppress
their own doubts.00:19:10
In Russia,
we have a colossal gap between00:19:13
the rhetoric and the
real way of life.00:19:16
At important protests,00:19:18
at book-fairs people used
to come up and talk to me.00:19:26
Sometimes they started
arguing aggressively about00:19:29
how splendid our life was and how
they’d put everybody against the wall.00:19:32
But when you ask them how they
do, how are their kids and so on,00:19:37
you suddenly understand
that actually they live00:19:41
as they could live in
a democratic society00:19:43
and don’t want to change
their way of life.00:19:46
So don’t hurry to pillory them,00:19:51
especially those who don’t
have access to information,00:19:53
and this is often the case.00:19:55
If we look into these numbers,00:19:59
we’ll see a totally
different picture.00:20:01
I am talking about
the Third Sector00:20:05
and a new social stratum,
maybe even a new class.00:20:09
The NPOs, the charity organizations
etc. embrace a multitude of people,00:20:15
and only a fraction of
them are protesters.00:20:21
Actually, a lot of people are
ready to approve anything,00:20:24
but at the same time
they work in hospices.00:20:27
But the NPOs made a
compromise with the State,00:20:30
probably in hope they let them to
continue helping people, isn’t it so?00:20:33
In this case, I
suppose, the compromise00:20:36
was justified to some extent.00:20:38
But didn’t it bring us to
the place we are in now?00:20:40
Let’s say,
we’ve found the culprits.00:20:42
No, no, no way.00:20:43
No, no, no.
That is a classic story –00:20:44
to look for culprits where
there is none of them.00:20:47
I do remember those awful
bulling campaigns against00:20:50
Nyuta Federmesser,
Chulpan Khamatova,00:20:54
and a few others.
It always made me sad. People who00:20:58
mostly had no idea how those
organizations functioned00:21:03
got on a high horse and
bullied them savagely.00:21:07
Those charities and people who
supported them did a colossal work.00:21:12
A compromise is justifiable as long
as the charities can help people.00:21:17
If they cannot do it anymore, there
is no place for a compromise anyway.00:21:22
Let’s take a
humanitarian position.00:21:25
And what terrifying compromises
did the philanthropists00:21:28
who accepted money
from the State make?00:21:31
They helped sick children.00:21:34
They didn’t pocket the money.00:21:35
They didn’t help
themselves to the money.00:21:37
The State gives them that money,00:21:39
and this is an
awfully good sign.00:21:41
It means, notwithstanding its own
cannibalistic rhetoric, the State00:21:45
does understand what
the real situation is.00:21:47
The state might easily
destroy all NPOs.00:21:51
No problem for them.00:21:53
But the interesting moment is00:21:56
that the State probably
wouldn’t do it.00:21:58
By contrast with the USSR,00:22:00
they have no intention to take
on the social responsibilities.00:22:05
Our State’s abandoning
the social sector.00:22:07
The NPOs cannot disappear.00:22:10
If they do, the State’s going
to be alone in the field00:22:12
of social assistance.00:22:14
I’ll say it again:00:22:15
it is an enormous army.00:22:17
People can have their
differences in political views.00:22:21
I won’t be surprised to find
that some hospice workers00:22:25
put Stalin’s portraits
on the walls.00:22:27
We can shed a tear
over their illusions,00:22:29
but if they provide real
help to dying people,00:22:31
I will forgive
them their errors.00:22:34
Probably,
they will understand later00:22:37
that the real person
had nothing to do00:22:39
with that idea of a
stern but fair ruler.00:22:42
I often visit hospices,00:22:46
but I’ve never met anyone who puts
a Stalin portrait on the wall.00:22:48
Listen, I just want to say
that I’ve seen lots of people00:22:52
whose political
declarations are alien to me00:22:57
but in real life they00:22:59
cultivate science, and work
on some very important things.00:23:02
There is a paradox here.00:23:04
You see, this is the question:00:23:07
what our support base is,00:23:10
and how big it could be00:23:12
if our alternative agenda were
the humanitarian paradigm.00:23:19
Our care is an individual,00:23:22
and we deem an individual’s
life, dignity, health etc.00:23:26
as the most important things.00:23:27
It gives us a kind of goal and
calls for action and understanding.00:23:32
This philosophy00:23:35
could get over the artificial
ideological barriers00:23:38
and consolidate a far
greater number of people.00:23:42
People may profess a
pro-Government ideology,00:23:44
but it would be superficial and
just a product of the propaganda.00:23:48
Let’s not underestimate the effect
of many years of propaganda. Really.00:23:51
It seeps in through the pores.00:23:54
We still have not strong,
consolidated opposition to autocracy.00:24:00
It can be partly
explained by the fact that00:24:03
we, individuals with
an active position,00:24:05
cannot give people a more
attractive model of the future...00:24:10
or past, name it as you like,
than the official propaganda offers.00:24:16
The official propaganda utilizes the
familiar traditional imperial models.00:24:22
And an empire as a vision
is a very attractive thing.00:24:26
Maybe it is not
so for you and me00:24:28
but for a great number
of people it is.00:24:29
This is the basis of the
existence of a modern state00:24:32
for the last 400 years.00:24:34
We have a tectonic
task to complete.00:24:41
We must develop a new
anthropologic model,00:24:45
call it as you like.00:24:46
What do we have to set against
the idea of a Great Empire?00:24:50
Wait a minute.
This is very important.00:24:52
You’re saying all this
while living in a country00:24:53
where the airspace is closed.00:24:56
A country that is hardly possible
either to enter or to leave.00:25:00
A country where the
retailer chains people00:25:02
got used to are
closing one by one.00:25:04
A country involved into an armed
conflict with another country00:25:09
and is despised by almost all
other countries in the world.00:25:11
Don’t you feel like you
are standing on the ruins00:25:15
of a city and tell us how
beautiful it could have been?00:25:18
I’m not telling how beautiful it could
have been but how beautiful it can be.00:25:21
Because you can
close the borders,00:25:24
but you can’t make
people stop thinking.00:25:27
And if we accept that
we must keep living in00:25:32
this unhappy,
disoriented and probably00:25:36
devastated in the
nearest future country,00:25:39
we should think it
through carefully.00:25:42
The current model,
as we know too well, is hopeless.00:25:46
It destroys the country.00:25:49
Regrettably,
we are turning back to00:25:52
the unfortunate history
of the 20th century.00:25:55
Many people reflected on this problem
in the most terrifying conditions,00:25:58
in the midst of the WWII.00:26:00
All this could look like
a total nonsense to them,00:26:03
not worth of any attention.00:26:05
Nevertheless, their experience
and in-depth analysis00:26:09
of the tragedy laid the foundation
of the post-war Western world.00:26:14
Then, again, we don’t know anything.
We assume it’s going to take decades,00:26:18
but we have no idea
what can happen here.00:26:20
Imagine that00:26:22
we wake up and lo and behold,00:26:25
there is none of the
people we didn’t like.00:26:29
What would you
say to the people?00:26:31
What would you offer to them?00:26:33
Actually,
this alternative agenda00:26:36
is a very strong
philosophic basis.00:26:40
A stimulus to many people.00:26:43
How will we recreate our life?00:26:45
How do we see our
country in the future?00:26:46
And we’ll have to
persuade citizens.00:26:48
Slogans? Slogans affect
not too many people.00:26:52
We see today’s big words
don’t work too well.00:26:55
It is easy to say that our
nation is not good enough.00:26:57
Our nation is never
good enough for anybody.00:27:01
The State is angry that the
nation is not good enough,00:27:03
the opposition is angry that
the nation is not good enough.00:27:06
Our unfortunate nation
can’t satisfy anyone.00:27:09
Possibly, our00:27:12
focus is too narrow.00:27:15
We can’t see growing points00:27:18
because they drop off the grid
of our traditional paradigm.00:27:21
We fail to notice many individuals
who could support our ideas.00:27:27
I do not press the case.00:27:29
But let’s think of the sequence
of events in the late 1980s.00:27:35
Who were the people the
reformists could rely on?00:27:40
I include Gorbachev here.00:27:42
Whom did he rely on?00:27:43
The scientific and technical
intelligentsia in the first place.00:27:46
The intelligentsia00:27:47
was the driver and the
kernel of that revolution00:27:52
that went almost
without any bloodshed.00:27:54
Unfortunately, the social
stratum later disintegrated.00:27:57
We didn’t save it though it was
the basic of the new way of life.00:28:03
But the stratum was
hit hardest by reforms.00:28:05
Exactly so.
We could ask the reformists00:28:09
if they could support those people.
Did they think of them at all?00:28:12
Did they understand who
their prime supporters were?00:28:15
I’m afraid we are
looking for a supporter00:28:17
stratum that doesn’t
exist anymore.00:28:19
I am no judge here.00:28:21
The time is coming.
The unspeakable time of survival.00:28:24
We’re going to see
enormous quantity of people00:28:26
who will accept a compromise.00:28:28
And there will be
more of them than now?00:28:30
Undoubtedly.
The time of threats is over.00:28:34
They will be sending
people to jail.00:28:36
We already see this.00:28:37
The lawmakers will tighten the
screws on the slightest provocation.00:28:41
Frankly,
I am no judge for those people.00:28:45
Again, let’s think of this
country’s history in 20th century.00:28:51
How that life broke people.00:28:55
It will bring us back to
a Soviet ethic of a kind.00:28:59
“Who is a decent guy? –00:29:01
The one who doesn’t inform
on anyone on his own accord.”00:29:04
There was such sad
joke in the time.00:29:07
You see,
that is why terror is so dreadful.00:29:13
We don’t know how
far it’s going to go00:29:16
but the trends show that we are
stepping in a very cruel time.00:29:21
Will we ourselves be strong enough?
It’s a big question.00:29:24
First, we should pose this
question to ourselves.00:29:27
Do we ourselves have
enough fortitude...00:29:30
to survive and still keep our dignity?00:29:35
Lots of people will have no
choice but to accept a compromise.00:29:39
It will be a big problem.
How will we find the line00:29:43
between a compromise and
a total moral defeat?00:29:48
The line is constantly moving.00:29:51
In some sense, the toughness
we acquired in the Soviet time00:29:54
helps us to realize the
scape of the tragedy now.00:30:01
I don’t know. It is a really terrible
ordeal for the society of Russia.00:30:06
How will it find a way
out of this situation?00:30:08
I admire the people who
continue their social work00:30:13
even though they know how harsh
the State’s reaction will be.00:30:18
The most important question is
what kind of future’s awaiting us.00:30:21
What will people who keep working
in the organizations like theaters,00:30:26
state agencies do now?00:30:30
Will they fight for their colleagues
whom authorities intend to fire,00:30:34
or will they applaud the
injustice because out of fear?00:30:39
Fear is a powerful catalyst...00:30:48
how would I put it...
of compromises.00:30:50
Really. Do we have any
moral right to call00:30:54
out people who are
losing everything,00:30:56
who are under great pressure,
who are taking great risks?00:31:03
They can’t or won’t stand
up against the State because00:31:06
they want to protect their
families or something.00:31:08
Can we blame them?00:31:10
This is a situation where you are the
one who gets the blame in any case.00:31:15
If you didn’t yield up,
you put all your colleagues at risk.00:31:22
People will blame
you for their problems.00:31:27
For going without a
raise, for example,00:31:29
or for the risk of
losing their jobs.00:31:31
This is the way collective
responsibility works.00:31:35
A person was afraid for
their loved ones’ lives00:31:38
and accepted an
unspeakable compromise.00:31:41
Or maybe they just weren’t strong
enough to suppress their terror.00:31:45
This is the nerve center of00:31:49
the tragedy of a
Soviet intellectual.00:31:53
This can be said about
all Soviet people too.00:31:59
Should you stay friends with
one who fell from grace?00:32:02
Or is it too dangerous and you
should avoid them by all means?00:32:06
Should you raise voice to support
them or better keep quiet?00:32:10
Before,
we had at least a little freedom00:32:14
and could shame people from a
position of moral authority.00:32:16
Now we are in a situation when
the truth may cost us too much.00:32:23
Moreover,
we are not God Almighty00:32:26
and cannot say how we’re going to
behave in the deteriorating reality.00:32:32
Don’t you think that the
current situation in Russia,00:32:36
and I mean the serious
rift in the society,00:32:41
can result in an enormous
controversy on internal level,00:32:46
to say nothing about the
international conflicts?00:32:49
You’re talking about a civil war and
similar horrible things, aren’t you?00:32:53
I don’t know.
I hope very much it won’t happen.00:32:58
I think, in some mysterious way, the
nation still remembers the Civil War.00:33:05
Probably it was the Russian
society’s nastiest trauma,00:33:08
even worse than the
trauma of the WWII.00:33:15
In the World War people knew
their enemy, it was Nazi Germany.00:33:20
The society consolidated
against an obvious adversary.00:33:24
Civil Wars are the worst
because they divide the nation.00:33:29
The wound stays
raw for many years.00:33:32
Please notice that the
aggressive rhetoric00:33:35
pouring out of our TVs
for years and years00:33:38
is a civil war rhetoric.00:33:41
And that is very dangerous.00:33:44
They can get carried
away with their own game.00:33:46
And a war of this kind is
an absolute catastrophe.00:33:49
I’m still sure our society must
find and will find a way to stop it.00:33:56
30 years can’t go
down the plughole.00:34:01
Aren’t you trying
to comfort yourself?00:34:02
Not at all.
I am a born optimist.00:34:06
You can yell that the
glass is half-empty...00:34:09
It’s me.00:34:10
I think pessimism
demagnetize us.00:34:16
History teaches us that in the
most tragic and horrible situations00:34:22
people did find a way
out if they did try to.00:34:25
And again, the experience of living
in a comparatively free society00:34:30
can’t dissolve.00:34:32
Take the Soviet time.
The horrible purges00:34:36
of 1930s destroyed
several social classes,00:34:40
peasants included.00:34:43
Nothing could be more cruel.
But the memory of them is still alive.00:34:47
In some mysterious way it
was passed on to the future.00:34:51
For a long time, I dreamt00:34:54
to publish a book00:34:57
about the great cultural
stand-off in the Soviet time.00:35:01
There were 50 years after
the abolition of serfdom.00:35:04
50 years, not 30.00:35:06
There were two or three
generations of people00:35:09
who lived in a very
different paradigm.00:35:12
After the Revolution a lot
of people left the country.00:35:16
Lots of people perished
in the Civil War.00:35:19
And still,00:35:21
numbers of engineers,
land-surveyors,00:35:24
teachers, the very people who
presented the intelligentsia,00:35:29
stayed in the country,
as well as bits and pieces00:35:33
of the destroyed prosperous
nobility and peasantry.00:35:37
All those people
stayed in the country.00:35:39
Look at our splendid cultural
figures of the 1960s.00:35:45
Behind each of them there
always is at least one teacher00:35:50
who somehow managed to give them
idea of different cultural norm.00:35:56
Naturally,
there could be no propaganda.00:35:59
But the very way those
people carried themselves...00:36:02
Called herself
“a pre-Soviet human”.00:36:04
Exactly so.00:36:06
People in totalitarian system are
susceptible to dissenting esthetics,00:36:11
even to a dissenting
tone of voice.00:36:13
The people of the Sixties
were a wonderful generation.00:36:18
We underestimated the hardships
they suffered in their childhood.00:36:22
It is a miracle that they could tear
away the omnipresent cobweb of lies.00:36:26
It was a colossal
intellectual work;00:36:28
far harder than the
work we have to do now.00:36:31
We don’t live in a total
isolation and hardly will00:36:35
because of all
modern technologies.00:36:36
And how are you going to live
without independent media?00:36:42
Independent media are a light cavalry.
They will work around it.00:36:49
I’ll get back to what
I’ve been saying.00:36:51
It was passed on all the same
– a different experience,00:36:55
public norms,
concealed literature etc.00:37:00
And it happened when the
country was in total isolation.00:37:04
I’m talking about
creative effort here.00:37:07
As a historian of culture...00:37:09
I understand I sound
too idealistic now.00:37:12
Let it be. Let it be.
Let me sound like this.00:37:15
People need something
to rely upon.00:37:17
That is why we decided
to tape our interviews.00:37:26
There are some
shocking accounts,00:37:29
especially from the
post-WWII times...00:37:33
Lidia Ginzburg
wrote about that...00:37:37
when those horrendous repressions
and campaigns set on...00:37:40
how people in their desperation
ate each other alive.00:37:43
Those nasty broils between
colleagues and friends.00:37:49
People were so desperate
that tried and found someone00:37:53
to blame in the most
unlikely places.00:37:56
I think this is the most dangerous
thing. It will be awful if00:37:59
a comparatively large community
of people who share their values00:38:05
start drowning each other.00:38:07
We’ve seen those so-called
srach shitshtorms in Facebook.00:38:13
Lots of them,
and it saddened me a lot,00:38:16
even more than the
political environment.00:38:19
Because such shitshtorms
kill friendships.00:38:22
And human connections are what help
us survive in situations like this.00:38:32
As a historian of culture,
you, naturally, are00:38:35
aware of the hard experience
post-war Germany had,00:38:38
and how difficult it was
for the German society00:38:41
to integrate back in
the world community.00:38:44
What does await Russia now?00:38:48
Right now, I’d recommend writing00:38:52
nice joint letters to
our colleagues abroad.00:38:59
Today they express
their outrage against00:39:04
the aggression breaking
all connections with us.00:39:09
Western publishers start
taking about severing00:39:13
any connection with
Russian publishing houses.00:39:18
A lot of Western universities
are breaking their00:39:21
relationships with
our universities.00:39:24
I think they are terribly wrong.00:39:29
On emotional level, I understand them.
Everybody is00:39:33
eager to state
their position now.00:39:35
But in result, they ruin not the00:39:39
Regime’s life but ours.00:39:43
I’d say that first of all
we should try and explain00:39:46
to our colleagues that if they
leave us in full isolation,00:39:50
they will bring a colossal gift
to the enemy they hate so much.00:39:57
We are the last bastion
of the civil society.00:40:01
We’re striving to bring to the people
new and important thoughts and ideas.00:40:05
Our colleagues should
understand that what00:40:08
they do now is the
worst thing to do.00:40:09
They are going to make
us exist in vacuum.00:40:13
We won’t die,
we’ll keep live on.00:40:16
But we’ll have to be secretly digging
out some scrapes of information.00:40:22
We had to live this way
before, and it was extremely00:40:24
harmful because there
was no system knowledge,00:40:27
the knowledge was concealed.00:40:28
We were lucky that there were
people who knew at least something.00:40:30
In 1990s we had to
discover how dreadfully00:40:34
we were set back in
terms of human sciences,00:40:37
my own field included.00:40:39
How many years we had lost.00:40:40
Those 30 years allowed us
to catch up on many things.00:40:43
I think, human sciences in Russia had
just finished their apprentice course.00:40:50
It was time for new schools
of thought to appear,00:40:55
new and interesting
discoveries to happen.00:41:02
And then the collapse happens.00:41:05
Of course, it will affect00:41:08
the whole of the education system, and
the human sciences in the first place.00:41:13
That is why, in my opinion,
the most important thing is00:41:16
to talk to our foreign
colleagues and ask them to stop.00:41:19
I’m talking about a trauma.00:41:20
About what you feel
when you find out that00:41:22
you are the aggressor,
not the victim.00:41:25
Listen,
we talked a lot on Facebook00:41:28
about our guilt.00:41:30
We tried to figure out whether
we must feel guilty or not.00:41:33
It is a very complicated
question indeed.00:41:35
I can speak for myself.
I undoubtedly feel responsible00:41:40
for what is happening.
I am the citizen of this country.00:41:43
I can’t pretend this has
nothing to do with me.00:41:47
But talking about guilt...00:41:49
I don’t know.
I am very unhappy about all that,00:41:54
but I can’t say that
I’m ready to pound00:41:56
my chest and cry,
“It’s all my fault”.00:41:58
There must be some common sense here.00:42:01
I think of some marvelous
story from 1990s,00:42:06
and there was a lot of freedom
in Russia then as we see now.00:42:09
At that time, we can’t imagine not
only the things that are happening now00:42:12
but even the things that happened
in, say, 2010.00:42:15
I remember some get-together.00:42:17
It was late, we were drinking.00:42:19
I don’t remember why but we started
discussing Stalin’s repressions.00:42:26
A young man suddenly00:42:29
began ardently advocating00:42:33
the Soviet regime.00:42:35
We were astonished. He’d seemed to us
to be quite reasonable before that.00:42:41
I asked him, “What about all that
slaughtering of innocent people?”00:42:44
He said, “They felt
responsible for the country.”00:42:46
I said, “Listen,
a responsible government00:42:49
official who brought the country
to the brink of destruction00:42:52
must in the least resign.”00:42:54
That is a responsible act
because he failed his mission.00:42:57
Commencing terror to silent all00:43:00
disaffected has nothing
to do with responsibility.00:43:05
It has to do with a shameless
fight for power and nothing more.00:43:11
The discussion went on for some time.
Everyone was a bit drunk by then.00:43:14
At last,
and this is quite interesting,00:43:17
he said suddenly, “But,
after all, everybody is guilty,00:43:19
that is why the Soviet
regime survived for so long.”00:43:21
I asked, “What do you mean?”00:43:22
He answered,
“But you were a Young Pioneer00:43:24
and a Komsomol
member, weren you?00:43:26
So, you supported
the regime,” he said.00:43:29
I said, “All right,
I was a Young Pioneer00:43:31
and a Komsomol member, I was a Soviet
citizen. There was no way out of it.00:43:35
Maybe it was politically wrong.
But what do you imply?00:43:39
That I am responsible to the
same extent, as, say, Beria was?00:43:42
He controlled the levers of the state
power and herded people in GULAG.00:43:45
And I was a rank-and-file Yong
Pioneer and Komsomol member.00:43:47
No, friend,
I won’t agree with you.00:43:49
Stop spreading the guilt00:43:51
of people who were
responsible for the terror00:43:53
over the ordinary people who
had nothing to do with it.00:43:55
I never informed on my friends.00:43:59
I never bulled anyone at the
official meetings, on the contrary,00:44:03
I tried to defend the victims.00:44:06
I wasn’t a dissident of course
but I never did a vile thing.00:44:11
I feel no guilt here.00:44:13
Excuse me,
I won’t agree with you.”00:44:15
And I still maintain
my position.00:44:19
We know that if you spread the
guilt over the whole crowd,00:44:21
there isn’t anyone to blame.00:44:23
They want us to be their
partners in their bloody crimes.00:44:26
Maybe I haven’t done
enough in my own00:44:29
professional field to
prevent what’s happened.00:44:32
But in no way am I
going to beat my chest00:44:34
and cry that all
this is my fault.00:44:37
The guilt should be in
proportion with one’s options.00:44:43
I mean, the closer you are to
the levers of the state power00:44:46
the more you are responsible
for the situation we are in.00:44:52
But do you never think, “We
didn’t do this, we didn’t do that,00:44:54
we didn’t raise our voices
as we should have done,00:44:56
we didn’t take to the streets...”00:44:57
You may be right.00:44:59
From the other hand, today many
onlookers hold it against our00:45:01
people that they didn’t take
their protest to the streets.00:45:03
But we know too well
why they didn’t.00:45:04
By the way, many of our Western
colleagues ask, “And where are your00:45:08
protest marches of many thousands?
Why? Look at Berlin,00:45:11
half a million people
took to the streets...”00:45:12
My answer will be,
“Come here and take to the streets.00:45:14
Yes, I hear you, but
guys, people are scared.”00:45:19
People are scared,
and you can’t blame them for that.00:45:23
I admire those who do take
protest to the streets.00:45:25
They get arrested brutally00:45:27
and registered by the police.00:45:28
Later the police
start visiting them,00:45:29
and in the end they
may be put in jail.00:45:31
Hosanna to those
hundreds and thousands00:45:34
who do take their
protest to the streets.00:45:37
Yes, we are responsible.00:45:38
We may regret that we
haven’t done enough.00:45:41
All right, let’s discuss
what we could do but didn’t.00:45:44
Jot it down for future use00:45:47
and try and figure
what we can do now.00:45:50
Since an open protest
is not possible anymore,00:45:53
let’s find a new paradigm.00:45:58
Let’s figure out what
we should tell people.00:46:00
For example,
we’ll have to explain them why00:46:02
they have to renounce
their imperial ambitions00:46:04
and believe that the republican
system is way cooler.00:46:06
It is not enough just to tell
them that republic is better.00:46:08
Nobody will pay any attention
to those economic graphs.00:46:11
I’m talking about
social metaphors.00:46:13
Why are people so
susceptible to propaganda?00:46:16
What methods does the
propaganda use to make00:46:20
people believe those things
at least for a while?00:46:25
I suppose,
in this situation we should think of00:46:28
what our people’s
historical experience is,00:46:30
what trauma they sustain.00:46:32
What is the attitude of the
social groups we can appeal to?00:46:37
How to address their
life experience?00:46:39
How to get our message across in
a language they can understand?00:46:44
Maybe our problem is that we don’t
have the proper language yet.00:46:47
I don’t believe people
want their children to die00:46:51
in Ukraine or at any other war.00:46:54
It doesn’t matter
what people declare. A00:46:57
s soon as it gets to their own
sons, people see the light.00:47:03
I don’t believe that our
society is so full of war,00:47:05
that people are ready
to brandish their clubs00:47:07
and chase and kill somebody.00:47:09
The question is...00:47:12
Our problem and
maybe our guilt is00:47:15
that we don’t have
the language yet.00:47:17
We don’t have a language to
address a wider social stratum.00:47:20
It means we must find it.00:47:22
Again, this is a powerful
intellectual process.00:47:25
I usually take as example00:47:29
the way democratic ideas
developed in Western Europe.00:47:34
I’m talking about man
against the State dilemma,00:47:37
about relationship between
society and the state.00:47:39
We all remember that ever
since 17th century philosophers00:47:42
argued about this problem.00:47:44
It was a handful of people.00:47:47
They talked about the Leviathan
State and social interconnections.00:47:50
Who would listen to them?00:47:52
Peasants who toiled the land00:47:53
and whose Dark Ages lasted well
into 18th and even 19th centuries?00:47:57
Did they know a thing
about the Leviathan State?00:47:59
You might wonder what
those philosophic00:48:03
and scholastic discussions
had to do with the real life.00:48:05
But in time it became clear
that the scholars developed00:48:09
the mightiest of ideas that
later took hold of society.00:48:12
It was a winning ideology.00:48:15
It was an attempt to legitimize00:48:18
a new and developing
social system00:48:22
and the very idea of
democratic freedoms.00:48:25
It was totally
illegitimate at the time.00:48:30
There was the Monarch figure,00:48:31
and those very philosophers
and politicians00:48:33
were fighting the idea
of its divine origin.00:48:37
There also were subjects, and their
duty was to worship the monarch.00:48:40
Nevertheless,
the ideas born in a laboratory l00:48:44
ater enraptured the
changing society.00:48:50
But they had to be translated into
the language of political ideas.00:48:54
They were not those hard to
grasp, often00:48:56
written in Latin philosophic
theories anymore.00:48:59
I mean, if an intellectual idea00:49:01
manages to get into this form,00:49:05
it could be transferred to
many social strata later.00:49:09
We haven’t found the form.
What was achieved00:49:13
in 30 Soviet post-war years00:49:16
has been taken down.00:49:18
But the ideas of social
humanism developed00:49:23
by the Sixtiers and the next
generation did not disappear.00:49:26
By the way, for the last few
years I find it very interesting00:49:31
to surf the Internet00:49:33
and read comments people00:49:37
leave under all kinds of videos,00:49:39
especially under
Soviet era movies.00:49:42
The films are
watched by millions,00:49:44
Gaidai and other
nice Soviet films.00:49:49
The comments are
extremely interesting.00:49:52
The common theme is how
good-hearted those movies were.00:49:58
“Not the sheer evil,
bloodshed, and disemboweled00:50:02
guts they’re feeding
us today” etc.00:50:04
There are lots of funny
and bizarre comments.00:50:07
But the main theme is
this longing for humanism.00:50:11
They are a bit naïve to
associate the past with humanism,00:50:16
but if we look at the best masters
of the Soviet culture, we’ll see00:50:21
that they fought the
cruel totalitarian State,00:50:24
made attempts to bring
in humanistic ideas,00:50:27
to work them around the censorship,
and sometimes they did succeed.00:50:31
People long for the humanism00:50:34
but can’t find it anywhere.00:50:37
The State bombards them with
ideas and narrative of violence,00:50:41
and we don’t have any new humanistic
ethics to set against them.00:50:48
And to solve this problem is our most
important task. What else can we do?00:50:52
This is the only thing
we were taught to do.00:50:54
We can think and
speak, so let’s do it.00:50:57
What are your
chief emotions now?00:51:00
The five emotions inside you?00:51:06
I don’t know. The despair has gone.
It’s been here.00:51:12
A kind of anger.00:51:18
A kind of summoning
up the strength,00:51:23
like, “stop sobbing, care is no cure”00:51:31
And some...
it’s hard to describe...00:51:36
a kind of determination00:51:41
to live on,
do my job as much as I can and keep00:51:45
the values I deem important.00:51:48
Let’s wait and see.00:51:49
It’s a stoic philosophy of a sort.00:51:53
Yes.00:51:54
It is always the best
philosophy for our country.00:51:57
You have no choice but to be a stoic.
From the other hand,00:52:01
Life always defeats Death by a
method unknown to the science.00:52:05
I think,
you must not go to wreck.00:52:11
Because if you do, you start
communicating your despair to others00:52:14
thus commencing a
rolling blackout of life.00:52:20
Yes, a catastrophe has happened.00:52:22
So what? Let’s look for a way00:52:26
to keep our dignity under
the circumstances – if00:52:28
there still is a possibility
to live and survive.00:52:31
We have some big,
hard intellectual work ahead of us.00:52:35
We’ll have to reconsider our past
errors, and achievements too.00:52:38
Starting from the late 1980s,
lots and lots of people00:52:41
were involved into
creative effort.00:52:43
Doesn’t it get devalued now?00:52:46
No, I don’t think
it gets devalued.00:52:48
Focused actions
cannot be devalued.00:52:52
Something might be lost and
destroyed, that is true.00:52:55
Listen, frankly, let’s get back to
the history of the Soviet regime.00:53:00
The Soviet regime for 70 years
stuffed it’s face with the things00:53:04
that were created during 50 years
after the abolition of serfs.00:53:08
The USSR used and destroyed
that human capital.00:53:11
Nevertheless, those people
passed down some of their values.00:53:15
When someone began to ardently
defend the Soviet idea,00:53:22
I’d say, “All right.
There are certain cultural markers.00:53:26
Symbolic markers of the level
of cultural development.00:53:32
Name one Soviet time museum00:53:36
that can be compared to
pre-Revolution museums.00:53:42
Museums present the whole
of the culture in hard00:53:47
well-established forms.00:53:49
We don’t talk the Lenin
Museum and other trash here.00:53:53
Name me one museum we can compare
to, say, the Pushkin Museum,00:53:56
to say nothing
about the Hermitage.00:53:58
Name at least one Soviet
era museum that is so rich,00:54:03
purposeful,
and convincing and at the same time00:54:08
presents the achievements
of the Soviet culture.”00:54:13
I usually got a dead
silence for an answer.00:54:17
Several generations
of Soviet people were00:54:20
raised on things that
were created long before.00:54:23
And we never moved on
from this heritage.00:54:26
However strange it is,
it was enough to provide00:54:30
a decent education
to lots of people.00:54:32
In this sense,
creative effort cannot be annihilated,00:54:36
it lives on in culture.00:54:39
So, let’s do what we can.00:54:41
This is a kind of
solace, isn’t it?00:54:43
This is my solace,
and it calls to active efforts.00:54:48
It is not escapism.
There will be00:54:51
a lot of escapism of course.00:54:54
It is not that bad.00:54:55
Many books are already published,
many good movies downloaded.00:54:59
We’ll have time to
read over all the books00:55:01
we’ve skimmed over and
get the feel of them.00:55:04
I don’t believe that all creative
activity in this country will die out.00:55:22
The book you should read
as an act of escapism.00:55:25
Prince Charles-Joseph de LigneLetters
to Russian correspondents00:55:27
A reading material
for the hard times.00:55:36
The highest on the agenda book.
Two volumes.00:55:39
By Lev Gudkov.00:55:41
Funny. All those worm-eaten
classics we read in the Soviet Union00:55:46
and were ready to forget
are getting important again.00:55:51
Because good
literature lives long.00:55:56
Books can drop from
reading lists for a time,00:55:58
but they always return.00:56:01
Please make your choice.
Mercy or justice?00:56:05
I don’t split
these two concepts.00:56:08
Mercy does not exclude justice.00:56:11
In my opinion,
mercy is the keystone of justice.00:56:14
Justice without mercy is
an indubitable injustice.00:56:19
Freedom or stability?00:56:22
Again, there can’t be any
freedom without stability.00:56:25
Those are false contrapositions
that were imposed on us.00:56:28
Stability without freedom
is stagnation that00:56:32
we’ve been witnessing
for the last decade,00:56:36
in the pre-Special Operation period.00:56:39
Truth or safety?00:56:42
Again, there is no
safety without truth.00:56:46
I mean, maybe our top
priority is to deal with those00:56:53
false notions and
false paradigm that,00:56:57
however strange it
is, keep affecting us.00:57:01
There is no contraposition.00:57:03
The true contraposition is00:57:05
between narrative of violence
and narrative of mercy.00:57:08
The two systems
are irreconcilable.00:57:11
At last! At last, I meet someone who
answers these questions just the way00:57:15
I’d answered them.00:57:17
I’ve hoped to find an interlocutor
who’d say that there is00:57:21
no contraposition in these notions.00:57:23
I think it is obvious.00:57:25
No one has said it to me.00:57:26
Where and in what circumstances
will we meet in a year?00:57:30
I assume, even God
Almighty doesn’t know that.00:57:33
It reminds me of a Prigov poem
about the Battle of Kulikovo –00:57:38
who we should fight for,
the Tartars or the Russians.00:57:41
And then, we’ll wait and see.00:57:44
I don’t know.00:57:45
I’d be happy to meet again
in the editor’s office00:57:50
and drink not only tea00:57:52
but something stronger00:57:55
to the success of our
not-hopeless-at-all task.00:57:58
Thank you.00:58:11
Irina Prokhorova00:58:12
PublisherDescription:
Ирина Прохорова – издатель, мыслитель и интеллектуал. И – героиня нового выпуска специального формата «Скажи Гордеевой». Говорим с Ириной Дмитриевной о том, как сохранить себя, когда всё вокруг рушится, что значит в нынешней ситуации остаться порядочным человеком и как жить, если кажется, что смысл жизни утерян. Сердечно благодарим нашего современника, выдающегося пианиста Григория Соколова за возможность использовать в выпуске Suite in D Minor-Major, RCT 1 - II. Les tendres plaintes Рамо в его исполнении. Содержание: 0:00 Почему Ирина Прохорова так хорошо выглядит? Назло врагам! 1:45 «Надо перестать рыдать и заламывать руки» 4:08 «Надо продолжать делать своё дело. Оно всегда беспроигрышное» 7:17 «Для меня самый большой вопрос: А я то выстою?» 9:31 «Всё развивается по сценарию, который мы не предсказывали» 12:24 Жалеет ли Прохорова, что не стала президентом России? 14:49 «Общество в целом не приемлет агрессию» 18:34 «В России большой разрыв между риторикой и жизненными практиками» 23:42 «Пропаганда базируется на привычной имперской модели» 26:14 «У нас народ никогда не удовлетворяет ничьим требованиям» 28:19 «Сейчас мы увидим большое количество людей, которые идут на компромисс» 32:32 «Пессимизм размагничивает» 36:36 «Независимые СМИ — это лёгкая летучая кавалерия» 38:32 «Если вы оставляете нас в полной изоляции, то вы делаете подарок своему врагу» — о санкциях против России 41:19 «Не надо размазывать вину людей, ответственных за террор. Если вина размазывается на всех, то нет виноватых» 44:52 «Приезжайте и выходите» — о критике протестов в России 48:58 «Люди хотят гуманности, но они нигде её не находят» 50:57 «Жизнь побеждает смерть неизвестным науке способом» 56:01 «Противопоставление только одно: апология насилия и апология милосердия» Издательство «Новое литературное обозрение» https://www.nlobooks.ru/ Ирина Прохорова https://www.facebook.com/irina.prokhorova.96 Катерина Гордеева https://www.instagram.com/catherinagordeeva/ Телеграм: https://t.me/skazhigordeevoy Инстаграм: https://instagram.com/skazhigordeevoy ТикТок: https://www.tiktok.com/@skazhigordeevoy Вконтакте: https://vk.com/skazhigordeevoy Сотрудничество: Максим +7 926 058 5167 (Telegram, Whatsapp)
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