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Московский гамбит
Юрий Витальевич Мамлеев - признанный классик современной русской литературы, основоположник жанра "метафизический реализм", писатель, поэт, философ.
Роман "Московский гамбит" - одновременно блистательное описание тайной, подспудной жизни в Советском Союзе в 1960-70-е годы и художественное изложение метафизических идей.
Роман "Московский гамбит" - одновременно блистательное описание тайной, подспудной жизни в Советском Союзе в 1960-70-е годы и художественное изложение метафизических идей.
301 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1983
2 people are currently reading
58 people want to read
About the author
Yuriy Mamleev
39 books41 followersBorn in 1931 in Moscow, Yuri Mamleyev began writing in the 1960s. During that time, the author led a “double life.” By day, he taught mathematics, but in the evenings he hosted a secret circle of intellectuals. Discussing Indian and German philosophy, theosophy and psychoanalysis, the members of this undercover literary and philosophical circle called themselves “sexual mystics.”
Mamleyev’s works could only be sold in Russia through Samizdat and in the 1980s began to appear in the West. In 1974, Mamleyev emigrated to the U.S., and later lived in Paris. He returned to Russia in 1993 and, today, alternates between Moscow and Paris. Younger Moscow writers such as Vladimir Sorokin or Victor Yerofeyev venerate him as “the heir to both Gogol and Dostoyevsky.”
In 2000, Mamleyev was awarded the Pushkin Prize by the Alfred Toepfe Foundation and the International PEN Club, and he was a scholar at the German Foundation, Preußische Seehandlung.
Mamleyev is considered the “most Russian” writer in Russia today. He founded a new literary current called “metaphysical realism.” Vladimir Spakov wrote of Mamleyev in The Petersburg Book Journal:
“His prose is devoid of actual events… but it holds something else instead: an eternal thing that has forever been part of man, but which nobody likes to be confronted with. The mirror he holds up to us has turned black, reflecting our dark side. To do so, it needed a writer capable of standing at the abyss without falling and of telling the more frightful among us who pretend to be ‘civilized': There are monsters hiding in you!”
Mamleyev’s heroes are often characterized as “idiots”, “feeble-minded”, or “dopes” – but in fact they are all in love with being and dream of immortality. They want to understand the incomprehensible, and find answers to questions beyond the realm of human reason. They have entered a prohibited area. While Mamleyev’s figures seem to emerge from a grotesque and evil fairy tale, he places them into a realistic context. And that is why his prose is both unbelievably credible and merciless.
From: http://www.hauteculturebooks.com/yuri...
Mamleyev’s works could only be sold in Russia through Samizdat and in the 1980s began to appear in the West. In 1974, Mamleyev emigrated to the U.S., and later lived in Paris. He returned to Russia in 1993 and, today, alternates between Moscow and Paris. Younger Moscow writers such as Vladimir Sorokin or Victor Yerofeyev venerate him as “the heir to both Gogol and Dostoyevsky.”
In 2000, Mamleyev was awarded the Pushkin Prize by the Alfred Toepfe Foundation and the International PEN Club, and he was a scholar at the German Foundation, Preußische Seehandlung.
Mamleyev is considered the “most Russian” writer in Russia today. He founded a new literary current called “metaphysical realism.” Vladimir Spakov wrote of Mamleyev in The Petersburg Book Journal:
“His prose is devoid of actual events… but it holds something else instead: an eternal thing that has forever been part of man, but which nobody likes to be confronted with. The mirror he holds up to us has turned black, reflecting our dark side. To do so, it needed a writer capable of standing at the abyss without falling and of telling the more frightful among us who pretend to be ‘civilized': There are monsters hiding in you!”
Mamleyev’s heroes are often characterized as “idiots”, “feeble-minded”, or “dopes” – but in fact they are all in love with being and dream of immortality. They want to understand the incomprehensible, and find answers to questions beyond the realm of human reason. They have entered a prohibited area. While Mamleyev’s figures seem to emerge from a grotesque and evil fairy tale, he places them into a realistic context. And that is why his prose is both unbelievably credible and merciless.
From: http://www.hauteculturebooks.com/yuri...
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 23, 2025
Moscow Gambit… Stagnation of the seventies… Esoteric underground… Poets, writers, artists, mystics… Partying and drunken talks…
Somewhere there is a mysterious man possessing secret knowledge… And he must show the way… The protagonist and his friends were promised to be introduced to him… The underground atmosphere was gravid…
Idealists… Daydreamers… Weirdos… Oddballs… Intellectual freaks… They dream about the absolute but exist in squalour…
In this world there isn’t a single person who doesn’t have some, however foolish, faith.
Again, some explosive voices were heard, someone was arguing, someone was pouring vodka, someone was kissing.
“They don’t believe me, they never believe me,” was heard somewhere to the side, but it all merged with other voices. “Why mock yourself so meanly… And I envy myself… No, no, let’s run away from here, I want to go to the pub, the children are crying there... Either we will all be saved, or it’s the end: we will all perish. Because there are no longer any righteous people or saints on earth, it has become dark – either we will all perish, or we will all be saved… Yes, no, no, I love you... Wow, this booze is great…”
Somewhere there is a mysterious man possessing secret knowledge… And he must show the way… The protagonist and his friends were promised to be introduced to him… The underground atmosphere was gravid…
The spiritual underground grew incredibly, private libraries with rare books appeared from somewhere, books, translations, reprints began to circulate from hand to hand… So no reading rooms in public libraries of Moscow could accommodate those who were searching: everyone crawled away to apartments, circles, dachas…
Interests were mainly humanitarian: art, literature, religion, metaphysics, occultism, and so on.
Idealists… Daydreamers… Weirdos… Oddballs… Intellectual freaks… They dream about the absolute but exist in squalour…
“Art will triumph. Our monuments must stand opposite each other in the squares of the future Moscow.”
“To hell with the monuments. Where will we ourselves be then, in what worlds, in what cycles – that’s what matters most. I’m afraid we won’t have time for these monuments…”
“Naturally… Yes, that’s it. It will be hard to contemplate your own monument from hell.”
In this world there isn’t a single person who doesn’t have some, however foolish, faith.
February 27, 2022
Нелучшее начало знакомства с Мамлеевым, которое по итогу как ушат грязи вываливается на чтеца не оставляя никаких моментов за то, чтобы зацепиться глазом. Имена, шатания бесцельные, поверхностные размышления о высших материях, закольцованные истории и крайне безалаберное компонование текста
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews