What matters above all

What matters above all is to celebrate joy for the eyes and the mind. It is much easier to terrorize than to charm.   - Rene Magritte    

When the world seems to be crashing down on us from all sides, it can be hard to fathom that stories about “little people” or non-Earth-shattering events are worth spending time on. As Natalya Antonova says in our article on her newspaper in Karelia, “people get used to the idea that their lives are unremarkable and typical."

But what if it is precisely at times like these that we benefit most from focusing on the small, hidden, seemingly unremarkable stories that surround us? What if, as the writer Thomas Merton mused, we need to “come alive to the splendor all around us and see the beauty in ordinary things”?

War and terrorism are headline-grabbing horrors, and we cannot and should not ignore or diminish them, but too we should give time to appreciate the vast scope of peaceful, productive, hopeful human activity taking place all around us. As it turns out, and as you will see in this issue of our magazine, there is heroism and bravery in the modest editorial efforts of a Karelian newspaper, in countless Russian classrooms, on the roads to Norway, Georgia, and certainly in Russian courtrooms and on city streets. And in a little known bicycle ride from a century ago.

Yes, Russia is falling swiftly into an oppressive dictatorship, less and less distinguishable from the Kremlin’s objects of bromance, China and North Korea. And it is hard not to feel helpless that there is nothing one can do about that, sad about places or people one may never see again.

But perhaps we can be encouraged by the optimism and hope expressed by the political prisoner Alexei Navalny (see Readings, page 4), after he was handed down an additional 19-year prison sentence: “sooner or later Russia will rise again,” he said. And how it looks when it stands up after “the twenty-first century’s most stupid and senseless war” has yet to be determined. It will depend on if and how Russians decide to act, to resist, to defend what is truly important.

And, we like to think, it will also depend on the stories we tell during this dark age.