Мемуары

by Emma Gerstein, Эмма Герштейн

`Мемуары` выдающегося писателя и историка литературы Эммы Герштейн (1903г.р.) посвящены Осипу Мандельштаму, Анне Ахматовой, Борису Пастернаку, Льву Гумилеву, Николаю Харджиеву и другим литераторам и ученым, без которых мы не можем представить XX век русской культуры. Под полемическим пером Э.Герштейн возникают не только `картины литературного быта` Москвы и Ленинграда 20-60-х годов, полные драматизма, но и появляется ушедшая эпоха великих потрясений в своей трагической полноте.

Genres: Memoir, Russia, Nonfiction

521 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Э́мма Григо́рьевна Герште́йн

Reviews

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Of the four poets considered the greatest of the Russian post-revolutionary age, Emma Gerstein was very close to two (Osip Mandelstam and Anna Akhmatova) and knew Boris Pasternak as well. She was involved with Akhmatova's son and a frequent visitor to the Mandalstams. She was also a student of literature, clearly diligent and, from the evidence presented here, quite talented, unearthing information in the archives about Lermontov and his circle. This put Gerstein in a very awkward position. Decades later, as the Soviet Union shuffled toward liberalization and eventually into the past, these three poets took on a quasi-heroic, even moral stature beyond the great merits of their work: Pasternak for "Doctor Zhivago" and the controversy of his Nobel; Akhmatova for losing a son to the camps and his father to the firing squad, and making deeply moving poetry of the experience, especially in "Requiem"; Mandelstam, for his vicious poem about Stalin, for his wife Nadezhda's memoirs, and for perishing in the camps.
Gerstein knew them well enough to see them as humans, and we do not always care for that side of the story. All three spent some time, even as Stalin amassed power, writing toadying poetry for him. Pasternak actually phoned Stalin about Mandelstam, which seems to have delayed the inevitable for a bit. Gerstein reveals very little about whatever existed between her and Lev Gumilyov's son, except for the way she was often disappointed that he would not stay in touch with her. Perhaps a Russian reader would have illuminating context about what she expected from him; here all we have are those expectations and her periodic disillusion. What is clear that Gumilyov was curt and self-centered, qualities that might be forgiven since he was an intelligent man with limited possibilities as the son of an executed man and a glittering poet come to less. Akhmatova comes off less clearly, burdened by her son and her straightened circumstances, fierce about her papers and reputation, a trait that does not seem unusal when compared to other writers of her accomplishments. Nadezhda and Osip Mandelstam come off less well. Perhaps of greatest importance, the Mandelstams entrusted Gerstein with the memory of the Stalin poem, telling her she would be alone in preserving it, only to wander around town reciting it in public and "entrusting" it to others as well. The large number of people who knew the poem makes it seem almost as though the Mandelstams pursued arrests and perhaps death (Nadezhda seemed surprised that she was not arrested with her husband), heedless of the fact that they were ruining others with them. When interrogated, Mandelstam of course named names.
They suffered exile but expected everyone else up to Akhmatova to drop everything and do their bidding. Gerstein reports, but does not harp on, Nadezhda's duplicity (Gerstein takes issue with some of the accounts in the widow's memoirs) and what can only be described as Mandelstam's cruelty: he apparently was most productive as a poet when he could verbally abuse his wife. He was cutting when Gerstein rejected his advances and there is a hint, including, according to Gerstein, in the poetry, of sadism. (For her part, Gerstein says that Nadezhda was a lesbian and implies that she was either something of a voyeur or enjoyed a good menages a trois, probably both).
The picture that emerges though, from this view of Russia in the thirties, is how different it is from expected. Stalin is still consolidating his power. But Russia is still a bit of a small society, with Stalin as sensitive to what poets wrote about him as Nicholas II was about what Pushkin was doing. Some of the details, especially about living quarters, as the old mansions were divided up into tiny apartments--Gerstein's family in particular had to defend their last rooms in a place they had owned from a national medical instituted. And, eventually, there are show trials for Lenin's companions, and ordinary people are interrogated, sent to camps, tortured. (In one memorable story, a torturer runs into his victim on the street and tries in a friendly town to exculpate himself, relying on the "orders were given" excuse).
None of this diminishes the poetry (Mandelstam's touches of cruelty aside) or, really, the tragedies that these lives, which Gerstein makes immediate. And over all of it is the menace of Stalin, touchy about his reputation to the point of persecuting the doctors who attended his wife's suicide, convinced of his own insane theories and merciless in their execution. My Mexicans have a word for that kind of personality--"desalmadlo", beyond "shameless" or "merciless." It means not having a soul.

[Shakiba Bahrami · Rating 3 out of 5]

اما که به نحوی عروس‌بعدازاینِ آخماتووا بود، در کتاب خاطرات مسکو از عشقش به پسر او و اتفاقات بین نویسندگان و شاعران قرن بیست شوروی می‌گوید.

اول از همه می‌خواهم درمورد ویراستاری ضعیف کتاب غر بزنم و بعد هم ترجمه‌اش! از کلماتی همچون همجنسباز که بگذریم، می‌رسیم به اسامی. کتابی که در مورد تاریخ ادبیات روسیه است، از انگلیسی ترجمه شده و حتی منِ دانشجوی ادبیات روسی هم نمی‌فهمیدم بغضی کلمات از کجا آمده‌اند که حداقل سرچ کنم.

اما در مورد محتوای سخنان اما گرشتین:

کتاب جدای از ارزش تاریخ-ادبیاتی‌اش، نمی‌دانم بابت ترجمه یا پراکنده‌گویی‌های گرشتین، حوصله‌سربر است. نمی‌دانم چطور اما کتاب را نه می‌توانم درست و یک نفس بخوانم و نه می‌توانم ولش کنم.

بخشی از کتاب:

/ هر فردی تصور می‌کرد که فقط خودش می‌ترسد اما همه می‌ترسیدند.

کتاب را که بیشتر خواندم کنجکاو شدم بدانم اِما و لیووا چندساله بوده‌اند. لیووا تقریبا ۲۵ ساله(متولد ۱۹۱۲) و اِما ۳۴ ساله(متولد ۱۹۰۳) بود. برایم عجیب بود که این عشق در قرن بیست چگونه بود: ممنوعه یا طبیعی؟ شاید هیچکدام.

بخشی از کتاب:

/ ما همیشه گله می‌کردیم که چطور سانسور در دوره پوشکین، مانع نوشتن او می‌شد. آن‌ها امروز چه بلایی سر نویسندگان ما می‌آورند. آیا این وضع مثل سابق نیست؟

رنج یک مادر نیز در این کتاب به خوبی ترسیم شده است، مخصوصاً جایی که پسر آخماتووا چنین با او خداحافظی می‌کند:

/ موقع خداحافظی لیووا شعر بلاک را خوانده بود: «من نه نخستین جنگاورم و نه آخرین آن‌ها / میهنم دیرزمانی در رنج خواهد بود...»

این بخش از کتاب هم جالب بود:

/ استالین باعث نزول اخلاق، نه تنها در بین مردم بی‌گناهی که به آن‌ها اجازه‌ی بقا می‌داد، بلکه حتی در بین افرادی شد که در پلیس مخفی خدمت می‌کردند. البته افرادی که تمایلات سادیستی داشتند جذب کار می‌شدند، اما بقیه را خود رژیم به سوی این بی‌رحمی و درنده خویی می‌کشید و شریک جرم خودش می‌کرد. به عقیده‌ی من، آن‌ها هم قربانیان استالین بودند.

[Illiterate · Rating 2 out of 5]

These memoirs of poets in difficult times are all the more affecting for the inclusion of their flaws.

[Akram Khatam · Rating 4 out of 5]

خاطراتی از یکی از انقلابیون در باره سرکوبهای دگر اندیشان در دوره استالین که در ۱۹۹۰نوشته شده
با توجه به خواندن منابع دست اول این سرکوبها از جمله کتاب امید علیه امید از همسرماندلشتام و اثار ایزیا برلین قبلا از ان بنظرم کتاب نکته بکر و نا گفته ای نداشت (less)

[Derek · Rating 5 out of 5]

A perfect window into Moscow’s intelligentsia under Stalinism. Just wish more of her literary criticism were available in English.

[Shervinrmz · Rating 3 out of 5]

هرچند بخشی از کتاب واقعا حوصله‌سره و دیتاهاش جذابیتی نداره، اما در کل به خاطر شرح و توصیفاش از زندگی روزمره آنا آخماتوا ارزش خوندن رو داشت

[Bahman Bahman · Rating 2 out of 5]

اما گرشتين هر آنچه را كه امروز هولناك و باورنكردني به نظر مي‌آيد، بر اساس خاطرات و ديده‌هاي خود نوشته است. او خود از دوران نوجواني با احكام سنگين قضايي در يك نظام توتاليتري آشنا شد؛ يكي از پسرعموهايش در سال 1922 از سوي بلشويك‌ها به اعدام محكوم شده بود. او شاهد تبعيدها، مهاجرت‌ها، بگير و ببندها و انواع ارعاب و تهديدهاي روسيه دوران استالين بوده و در اين كتاب از همنشيني‌ها و همراهي‌هايش با شاعران و روشنفكران روس گفته است. وي در سال 1928 با اوسيپ و نادژدا ماندلشتام آشنا شد و سرآغاز كتاب نيز همين‌جاست. اوسيپ ماندلشتام همان شاعري است كه با سرودن يك شعر، تحت تعقيب قرار گرفت، دستگير و سپس تبعيد شد و شعيد ادبي لقب گرفت. اما گرشتين خاطرات خود را سال‌ها بعد در دهه 1990 ميلادي نوشت تا مشاهدات خود را از فجايع رفته بر روشنفكران روسيه در دوران تاريك استاليني بازگو كرده باشد. اين كتاب هم‌چنين روابط ميان ادباي روسيه را به خوبي تشريح مي‌كند و نحوه فعاليت و زيست آن‌ها را در اين دوران دشوار بازتاب مي‌دهد.