Трепанация черепа

by Sergey Gandlevsky, Сергей Гандлевский

Сергей Гандлевский – поэт, прозаик, эссеист. Окончил филологический факультет МГУ. Работал школьным учителем, экскурсоводом, рабочим сцены, ночным сторожем; в настоящее время – редактор журнала “Иностранная литература”. С восемнадцати лет пишет стихи, которые до второй половины 80-х выходили за границей в эмигрантских изданиях, с конца 80-х годов публикуются в России. Лауреат многих литературных премий, в том числе “Малая Букеровская”, “Северная Пальмира”, Аполлона Григорьева, “Московский счет”, “Поэт”. Стипендиат фонда “POESIE UND FREIHEIT EV”. Участник поэтических фестивалей и выступлений в Австрии, Англии, Германии, США, Нидерландах, Польше, Швеции, Украине, Литве, Японии. Стихи С. Гандлевского переводились на английский, французский, немецкий, итальянский, голландский, финский, польский, литовский и японский языки. Проза – на английский, французский, немецкий и словацкий.

Genres: Russia

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Sergey Gandlevsky (Russian: Сергей Гандлевский) was born in Moscow in 1952. He graduated in Russian literature at the University of Moscow and has been writing poetry since he was eighteen. One of the most prominent among the Russian poets, he is a complete author: beside poetry he has been writing short stories, novels, essays, critical writings and plays. In the 70’s, he was one of the founders and participants of the group of poets “Moscow Time” (Московское время) along with Alexei Tsvetkov, Aleksandr Soprovski and Kenzheiev Bakhit, and the group “The intimate conversation” (Задушевная беседа) – later “The Almanac” (Альманах) – together with Dmitri Prigov, Timur Kibírov, Lev Rubinstein and others. At present, he is a member of the club “Poetry” and collaborates with the journal “Foreign literature» (Иностранная литература). In 1991, he was admitted to the Union of Russian Writers.

Reviews

[Nicole Finlay · Rating 1 out of 5]

Read this to see if I could get more information for my dissertation on Trepanation practices but found it incredibly difficult to get through. The translation was clear enough but the language was just so dark and it didn't seem particularly pleasant. Very few actual details on trepanation practices in Russia for anyone thinking of reading for that reason. Also, the dude hates his kids and sounds like an asshole the entire time, however, he's honest about his flaws and the way others view him and his actions so that's a good thing.

[Philip · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having translated Sergey Gandlevsky's poetry, I can testify firsthand the challenges of translating this highly allusive and wryly comical writer. Kudos to Susanne Fusso, whose translation of this quasi-autobiographical novel is elegant and compellingly readable. The work captures the hothouse world of underground poets in the late Soviet period, and tells the story of the coming-of-age of Lev Krivorotov, whose bright spark of talent and hope never flares into flame. The only reason that I didn't give a five-star rating is that the book's ending left me feeling somewhat numb--as if the narrator's ironic self-gibes concealed his true pain.