Three Books and a CD

PU-239 and Other Russian Fantasies

By Ken Kalfus

Milkweed Editions (800-520-6455)

290 pages, hardcover, $22

It is exceptionally difficult for a foreigner to write fiction about Russia and get it right. Ken Kalfus gets it right. Again and again.

In this new collection of short stories (his second), Kalfus excavates the subtleties of the Russian psyche and soul with understanding and sympathy. And a fair measure of irony.

The stories are at once entertaining and provocative. There is the doggedly loyal nuclear station worker who, after becoming contaminated in an accident, tries to sell plutonium to two-bit mobsters in a woeful effort to look after his family after he is gone. Or there is Yuri Gagarin, engaged in very human endeavors on the eve of his incarnation as a Soviet superhuman. And there are dissidents, idealists and a wonderfully poignant fable called “Salt,” that should have been illustrated by Bilibin.

What makes these stories work is a crafty—often absurd—combination of reality and fiction. And a gift for describing telling details:

The family lived on the eighth floor of a weather-stained concrete apartment tower with crumbling front steps and unlit hallways. In this rotted box lay a jewel of a two-bedroom apartment that smelled of fresh bread and meat dumplings and overlooked a birch forest. Laced with ski tracks in the winter and fragranced by grilled shashlik in the summer, home to deer, rabbits, and even gray wolves, the forest stretched well beyond their sight, all the way to the city’s double-fenced perimeter.

The authentic flavor of Kalfus’ tales comes from his four years living in post-Soviet Russia. Their polish comes from his talent as a writer.

Russsia Abroad

By John Glad

Hermitage Publishers (201-894-8247),

736 pp., hardcover, $59.50

If one were to compile the list of Russian émigrés’ contributions to American culture, society and the US economy, the record would be lengthy and, for most, very surprising. From helicopters to medicine to television to music, Russian émigrés have made huge contributions to America.

And yet, with few exceptions (e.g. the translations of Solzhenitsyn, Aksyonov and Tolstaya) the contribution of Russian émigré writers to our literature has been largely insignificant. As Glad quotes Vladimir Nabokov (who stopped being a “Russian” writer when he began writing in English), émigré writers live an “odd but by no means unpleasant existence,” separate, yet among us. We are to them “as flat and transparent as figures cut out of cellophane.” Between us there is “no real communication.” Not that this should be surprising, of course, since we don’t speak the same language ...

In fascinating detail, Glad traces the 1000 years of history of Russian émigré writers (no, emigration did not begin in 1917), cut off from their homeland yet not entirely separate; he tracks the trends and personalities, the political and ideological debates, providing ample historical background. As Glad notes, most of these stories are so vivid they virtually write themselves. Which of course is needless self-deprecation; Glad has crafted an invaluable reference work on a world little-known even to knowledgeable Russian Studies types, and he has consciously made it accessible to non-academics. One hopes that it will be read by publishers looking for new (or seasoned) literature for translation and infusion into American letters.

The Golden Age of the Russian Guitar

Oleg Timofeyev

Dorian Records, $16

This wonderful new CD opens up a window on a century-old repertoire of classical Russian guitar music. Apparently, 150 years ago, the 7-string guitar was a very popular instrument for public performance. As a result, arrangements and compositions for this wonderful acoustic instrument blossomed. But much of this art was lost in later decades.

Oleg Timofeyev’s soothing and elegant compositions bring back the flavor of this lost repertoire. This is music to make thick winter soup by. Borshch perhaps?

The Crime of Olga Arbyelina

By Andrei Makine

Arcade Publishing

248 pages, hardcover, $24.95

Andrei Makine can hardly be called a Russian writer. A Russian émigré who writes in French, he writes about Russia and Russians. His first book, Dreams of My Russian Summers, was a beautifully lyrical novel about growing up in Siberia. To get the book past chauvinist French reviewers, Makine claimed to have written it in Russian, after which it was translated into French. When a publisher called his bluff, Makine translated the book—from French to Russian—in an overnight fury. But Makine’s efforts were justified: Dreams went on to win both of France’s two most prestigious literary prizes.

Indeed, what is so amazing about Makine is how well his books read in translation. They do not sound or feel like anything other than books written in English. This may be a tribute to his translators, but one also suspects that it is because Makine’s prose is so poetic that it largely translates itself.

In this newest novel, Makine forays outside Russia for the first time. But he does not stray far afield—the main characters are Russian émigrés in France. And his revelatory character studies, awash in rich descriptions of his fictional background—natural or otherwise—are also here.

The moon was melting on the lid of the piano; the furniture and objects seemed to be in suspense, interrupting the existence they had been leading a moment before.

At the book’s core are the mysteries of a beautiful Russian woman’s past and how she ended up (at the beginning of the book) soaking wet at the side of a lake, alongside a dead body. It is a careful peeling back of Olga’s tattered history, an examination of her painful loneliness and isolation, despite her deep sensitivity and beauty.

Solving Olga’s mysteries is clearly not a matter for the erudite Poirot or the deductive Holmes ... A slower, more emotional reconstruction is required. But that does not make the final revelations is any less interesting or surprising. Only Russian. — Paul Richardson

Items reviewed which do not have a publisher phone number listed can be obtained through Access Russia (800-639-4301)