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Russian holidays and celebrations Part 3
By Vlada 16 January 10
More country info from a Russian tutor, or something you might find interesting but may not learn in a Russian course
In previous blog posts, I described the Russian public holidays of the first half of the year. In summer, we don’t really have any public holidays, apart from one, not a very well established one, the so-called “Day of Russia”.
The Day of Russian Independence (The Day of Russia) – the 12th of June
This is one of the “youngest” public holidays in the country. The Day of Russia, or the Day of Russian Independence, as it was first called, was established in 1994 by Boris Eltsin, the first Russian (and not Soviet!) president. Before that, Russia was one of the Soviet republics and not an independent state, but after perestroika and the collapse of the Soviet Union all the Soviet republics, one by one, became independent countries. So the 12th of June celebrates this significant moment in history for Russia.
Because this is a new holiday, there is no tradition of celebrating it. So most people just enjoy a day off in summer, without attaching any significance to it.
The 1st of September – “The day of Learning”
The 1st of September is traditionally the first day of the school year, for children and all students. It is not a public holiday but a high profile day in the life of the country which has a strong tradition of education. Kids come back to school (usually reluctantly!) after a three month long summer holiday, carrying bunches of flowers for their teachers. There are festive speeches and presentations, usually in the school yard in the open air, and not much learning is done. It’s a day of introduction to school life, of settling admin questions and meeting new teachers and classmates.
For college and university students it’s the beginning of the new academic year which is divided into two semesters and ends in June. For young people, this day symbolises the end of summer (everyone’s favourite season), and return to “normal life” after a long summer break. For their parents it’s the start of numerous worries related to the kids’ education. On the whole, it’s a cheerful occasion, which, paradoxically, is not looked forward to by anyone!
The day of National Reconciliation: the 4th of November
This, again, is a new holiday, the meaning of which is obscure to most people. I suspect that the real purpose of this public holiday is to fill the gap that appeared when the 7th of November (the Day of the October Socialist Revolution) was scrapped after perestroika. It used to be a huge public holiday, with a big military parade in Red Square (with the famous missiles and tanks intended to scare the rest of the world), an occasion consisting of 2 days off. However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the complete change of state ideology, the communist revolution celebration was abolished. But no one wanted to lose a public holiday, so a new one had to be invented around the same time. It must have been quite tricky, because the holiday that finally replaced Revolution Day celebrates something that happened a long time ago and most people who didn’t pay much attention in history lessons do not know much about it.
According to the church calendar, the 4th of November is the day of the Kazan (a city in Russia) icon of the Virgin and it used to be a public holiday in Russia from 1649 until the communist revolution. So strictly speaking, it’s not a new holiday, but a well forgotten old one! On this day in 1612 the People’s Militia led by two civilians – a commoner Minin and a prince Pozharsky ¬ liberated Moscow from the Polish occupants who had to seized the city and put their own Tzar on the throne. The people’s militia in those days was the manifestation of the nation’s unity in the face of danger, of everyone making an effort for the country regardless of their social status, religion or age. So the new holiday, established in 2005, was called “The Day of National Unity”.
Having mentioned all these public holidays, I should mention that the most important celebration for Russians is not a public one! The most important celebration of the year, with the biggest gifts and parties, is one’s birthday. Russians get rather surprised and often disappointed when they discover birthdays are not as important in the UK. So if you deal with Russians on a personal or business level (especially a personal one), try to find out the important date and treat it as a special occasion.
Russian holidays and celebrations Part 2
By Vlada 30 November 09
More country info from a Russian tutor, or something you might find interesting but may not learn in a Russian course
In the previous blog post, I described Russian public holidays of the first half of the year. After the New Year celebration marathon, the next long holiday “spree” is in May – from May Day to Victory Day. But before that, one little cheeky informal celebration creeps in:
April’s Fools Day – the 1st of April
This is not an official public holiday and not a day off but Russians love it. It’s a chance to be foolish and tell silly lies trying to shock and surprise people. The motto of the day is “Pervoye Aprelya – Nikomu Ne Ver’!” (It’s the 1st of April, don’t believe anyone!”) Practical jokes are played and ingenious lies are told among friends, colleagues and families. In newspapers and on the telly there are fictitious stories about all sorts of things, with pictures and video footage: hairy fish are caught in the Moskva river (I saw that particular news item myself, with quite convincing footage of a furry carp being caught), Big Ben in London will be rebuilt from scratch because it’s falling down, there is a dog in a remote village that can talk, etc. Sometimes the jokes are so plausible that it’s impossible to tell them apart from the other news items, so the next day the papers admit which stories were the April Fools. On the 1st of April people tell each other that they are changing jobs, getting divorced, moving out of the country – you name it! You are supposed to be on alert all day and stop the pranksters with the phrase “Pervoye Aprelya – Nikomu Ne Ver’!” I used to do it a lot in my jollier and younger days, and foreign friends proved to be especially gullible: one seriously believed that I was going to give up teaching to become a dog trainer in a circus…
So if you happen to be in Russia on the 1st of April and someone tells you that your house is on fire or your boss has fired you (or, even better, or maybe worse, has fallen in love with you) you know what to say!
May Day – the 1st of May
The 1st of May is a traditional Soviet holiday, still very much loved. Originally, it was called “The International Day of Worker Solidarity” in Soviet times and celebrated the workers’ liberation from the capitalist regime. Because of the bulky name, it is best known as simply the 1st of May.
The 1st of May was first celebrated on the territory of the Russian empire as early as 1890 in Warsaw, and in 1891 the celebration came to the capital – St Petersburg. Obviously, before the revolution of 1917 it was celebrated secretly, in the Bolshevik “underground”, persecuted by the authorities.
During the Soviet period it was a big celebration with a traditional parade in Red Square, televised for the whole country: not the famous November military parade, but the “workers’” one, with people from different state enterprises with a lot of flags and huge fake flowers walking past the Lenin Mausoleum where the leaders of the country stood and greeted them. I took part in one or two with my father when I was a kid and of course loved it! I was given an enormous bunch of some red paper flowers unknown to botanists, which was much taller than me, and I had fun running around with it, singing and shouting “Hurray” all the way across Red Square. I would assume now that the grown ups around me who were doing the same were all drunk, but I couldn’t tell at the time. And then in the evening there were (and still are) huge fireworks all over the cities fired high up into the sky by the famous military “Katyusha” machines, multiple barrel rocket launchers. I must say, when I first saw the Guy Fawkes Day fireworks in the UK, I was surprised with how small and tame they were in comparison to Russian ones!
At present, the official name of this holiday is “The holiday of Spring and Labour”, and people get 2 days off work, using them mostly to do some gardening (it’s that time of the year!). So most city dwellers who have dachas go there for a long weekend to clear up the post-winter mess and plant some crops and flowers for the new season. The streets of Moscow are usually quite empty on those days because everyone has gone to the country.
Whatever it is called, this day is associated with Spring and the awakening of Nature from the winter gloom (after all, in most of Russia proper spring doesn’t start until May), and that’s why people love it: it’s the grand opening of the season of picnics, dachas, and outdoor living.
Victory Day – the 9th of May
This public holiday is very close to the previous one, May Day, so predictably lots of people take a couple of days off in between and have a whole spring holiday season, going to the country – whether to have fun or plant potatoes. The 9th of May is associated with spring, good weather and beautiful flowers: daffodils, tulips, lilacs and lily of the valley which people bring from their dachas.
Victory Day is dedicated to the Soviet victory over the Nazis in 1945 and the end of the Great Patriotic War – the part of the Second World War that took place on Soviet territory and directly involved the Soviet Union. It was the bloodiest war in Russian history (rich in wars and revolutions!) that claimed the lives of over 20 million Soviet people. On this day in 1945 two ordinary Red army soldiers, a Russian and a Georgian, put up a red flag on top of the Reichstag in Berlin, symbolising the end of Hitler and his empire. Every Russian family, including my own, has a member or a relative who was killed in that war, so this celebration has always been a slightly sad one. However, as time goes by and generations change, there are fewer and fewer people who remember the war, so it’s now a less emotional occasion than it used to be.
As ever, there used to be a parade in Red Square – this time a military one, but without any heavy missiles to scare the world, just different regiments of the Army marching along, with music, slogans and the ever present members of the government on the Mausoleum. This tradition continues up to the present day, with the recent big celebration of the 60th anniversary of the victory in 2005 when lots of world leaders came to Red Square to take part.
The festive atmosphere is brought into the evening with huge fireworks, just like on the 1st of May.
My personal recollection of Victory day (Soviet style) is great weather, people sporting summer outfits and enjoying it after the long winter, and some old pensioner veteran always sitting on a bench near the block of flats playing the accordion, a very Russian instrument, badly but enthusiastically, war movies on the telly all day and concerts of the Red Army choir at night. It is still reassuringly the same, apart from the war veterans being seen around because there are fewer and fewer of them left…
To be continued.
Russian holidays and celebrations Part 1
By Vlada 28 October 09
More country info from a Russian tutor, or something you might find interesting but won’t learn in a Russian course.
In Russian lessons, students often ask me about traditional Russian holidays and celebrations. So here are a few facts:
Russians like a good celebration – any excuse to have one is welcome! If you look at a traditional Russian calendar you will see that almost every day is dedicated to someone or something: there is a day for medical workers, a day for teachers, scientists, computer programmers – every profession and sphere of activity is celebrated. On top of that, there are religious Orthodox holidays and days commemorating various historical events – so plenty of reasons for celebration! Not all these days are public holidays of course. If they were, people would not have any time to work! But generally there are more days off in a Russian working person’s year than in most other countries. And we like our days off to be a cause for celebration, not just “bank holidays”. We even have holiday “spree” times when the whole country comes to a standstill. The biggest one is the New Year celebration; it’s the first holiday of the year, so it will be the first one on my list.
The New Year, Christmas and the “Old New Year”
This is the longest holiday “spree” of the year. Most people start celebrating on the 25th of December (the Western Christmas, a working day in Russia, but a good pretext to start a holiday season), and carry on till the so-called “Old New Year” on the 13th of January. From the 31st of December till the 10th of January most businesses and state institutions are closed, children are on school holidays, and if you need to get something done in Russia, this is not the time to go.
The New Year (and not Christmas) is the biggest celebration of the year. The New Year (Novy God) is traditionally a home celebration, when families and close friends stay at home, eat, drink, exchange gifts and watch a lot of television. The traditional food includes Russian salad (called “salat Olivier” in Russian), as well as several other salads, pies, a meat course with vegetables and a lot of sweets and desserts. In all kitchens across the country people frantically chop salads and watch one particular movie, a new year romantic comedy which has been shown every New Year Eve for the last 30 years. (It’s a very good film called “Ironiya Sud’by, ili S Legkim Parom!” It used to be really funny until everyone learned it by heart… and now it’s become a tradition to show it.) A couple of minutes before midnight the president appears on TV with a short speech, in which he outlines what happened in the country in the last year and wishes all Russians a happy new one. The Kremlin clock (the Russian equivalent of Big Ben) strikes 12, at which point glasses should be filled with champagne and people make their secret wishes for the New Year while the clock is chiming… The New Year begins with a glass of champagne and the most entertaining TV night of the year. All TV channels go out of their way to prepare the best New Year programme, inviting all the most popular pop stars, comedians and presenters, who sing, dance and joke all night.
Some people, mostly young ones, go out for the night to restaurants and clubs, or walk outside and launch fireworks. Fireworks are a relatively new trend which makes the noise unbearable and sleeping impossible. In Moscow, lots of people gather in Red Square to see the New Year in.
On the 1st of January, most of the adult population of the country wakes up very late with a hangover. Streets are empty, everything is closed. Some slight signs of life return on the 2nd, with most shops opening and more people waking up.
The period from the 1st till the 10th of January is the official New Year time off. It’s marked, apart from the traditional Christmas/New Year decorations, by the presence of Grandfather Frost (Ded Moroz), the Russian Santa Claus, and his assistant the Snow Maiden (Snegurochka) in the streets and at numerous children’s New Year performances. Grandfather Frost is a tall old man with a huge white beard, dressed in a satin coat trimmed with fur, with a magic walking stick that can turn anyone into a block of ice. His assistant (PA!) Snegurochka is his granddaughter, a pretty blond girl who was originally made of snow and became alive with the help of the same magic stick. The two of them go around delivering presents to children and lighting Christmas trees. There are, as you can imagine, numerous jokes about the pair and the fact that they sometimes become confused after having a few drinks.
Russian Christmas comes on the 7th of January because of the difference between the Gregorian (new style) and Julian (old style) calendars. Russia used to follow the old Julian calendar until 1918, being two weeks behind Europe! When the calendar was changed, the Russian Orthodox Church wouldn’t accept it, and all religious celebrations follow the old calendar to this day. Christmas is a religious occasion, and although it’s a public holiday, it is observed mostly by believers, and it is not as commercialised as in the West.
The most curious occasion of this holiday marathon is the “Old New Year”, the 13th of January. It’s the date of the New Year celebration before the calendar was changed in 1918, and it’s not a significant date but usually a day to remember old friends and see one’s family. This day is the last chance to celebrate the New Year, also welcomed by religious people who observe a Christmas fast. Also, there is a tradition of divination on the old New Year Eve, in order to try and see what the New Year will be like. Dreams on that night are deemed to be significant.
Men’s Day – the 23rd of February
This day was introduced as a celebration of the Red Army and Navy in 1918 and was, for many years, strictly the Army Day. But because there is compulsory military service for all men in Russia, this day gradually became associated with all men, regardless of whether they have served in the army or not. It wasn’t a day off until recently, but now it’s a public holiday. All men receive little gifts, cards and congratulations. This occasion is the male counterpart of Women’s day, one of Russia’s favourite public holidays, celebrated on the 8th of March. Women’s day has always been a public holiday, so men felt that they deserved one too! At present the 23rd of February is officially called the Day of the Country’s Defender, so the Army connection is still there but it has become more vague.
If you are in Russia around the 23rd of February, you’ll see men getting cards and gifts from their wives, girlfriends, daughters and colleagues. And if you are foreign and have absolutely nothing to do with the Russian army, women will still wish you a Happy Men’s Day!
Women’s Day – the 8th of March
This day was originally introduced as a feminist and communist celebration. It was celebrated for the first time in 1911 in four countries: Austria, Germany, Denmark and Switzerland, on different days, to celebrate the struggle for equal rights for women. It came to Russia in 1913 but was forgotten at the time of the 1st World War. 1914 was the only year when it was celebrated in several European countries on the same day, the 8th of March. After the revolution of 1918 the Soviet government introduced this day as a public holiday, to celebrate women’s equal rights and their contribution to the communist cause. Also, it was a day to distract the Soviet people from religious holidays of the Spring, such as Easter.
In 1975, at the request of the Soviet delegation at the UN congress, the 8th of March was officially pronounced International Women’s Day.
The 8th of March has become one of everyone’s favourite national holidays. Just as with Army day, it has lost connection with its ideological roots. It’s a day when all women, regardless of age or status, get flowers, gifts and a lot of compliments (not only from men, but from other women as well) and the whole country has a day off. This day is associated with the beginning of Spring, and its first flowers, mimosas, daffodils and tulips. Being a teacher, I used to receive a lot of flowers from my students on this day, so I do miss this particular holiday living in England!
To be continued.
Learning Russian Literature: – it’s a woman’s world? Part 3
By Vlada 5 September 09
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or something you may be interested to know but may not learn in Russian lessons.
My students doing advanced Russian lessons often ask me about modern Russian literature: What is it like? Who are the most best-selling authors and which of them are “readable” from the point of view of foreign learners of Russian? In the previous blog article I talked about 2 of the most popular modern Russian writers – Dina Rubina and Ludmilla Ulitskaya.
Today I would like to continue the same blog and talk about two more leading ladies of modern Russian literature – Victoria Tokareva and Ludmilla Petrushevskaya.
Victoria Tokareva is famous for her short stories. She was born in Leningrad; she is a musician and a script-writer by education. She published her first short story called “A Day without lying” in 1964 and has written a lot of best-selling books since. In 1995-96 she was among the 10 most published authors in Russia. She is the script writer of some very popular Soviet films which are still loved and watched in Russia, such as “Mimino” and “Gentlemen of Fortune” (“Dzhentlmeny Udachy”).
Tokareva’s stories are easy to read (I often recommend them to students doing advanced courses of Russian for home reading), they depict human types which are totally recognisable and exist in real life around us. Her stories are often called “female prose” because they concentrate around lives of women in modern Russia, their problems and destinies. Needless to say, the majority of Tokareva’s readership are women. This prompted some foreign commentators to label her prose ‘feminist’ – which is absolutely not the case if they mean feminism as it is known in the West. The books are just clever and often ironic descriptions of ordinary women’s lives in ordinary circumstances.
The majority of her characters seem dull and incapable of strong feelings, sad and unable to escape from the monotonous grinding routine of their lives. And when they try to break free from the routine, they become even unhappier. However, traditionally for Russian literature, love is the thing that changes everything and turns them into stronger and better people. “Because I was in love I touched immortality and became younger”, says one of her characters.
Reading Tokareva’s prose gives you a good warm feeling – and that’s probably the secret of their popularity. Her stories have open endings, without any conclusions or moralising, and the readers can make (or not) their own judgements.
One of the foreign critics of her works wrote: “Tokareva’s stories are as identical, prosaic and monotonous as life itself, if you see life as a routine; and as exciting as life if you want to look deeper into its underlying mechanism.”
Her most well-known collections of stories are:
Den’ bez vranya (A Day Without Lying)
Zvezda v Tumane (A Star in the Fog)
Mezhdu Nebom i Zemley (Between Heaven and Earth)
Kazino (Casino)
Etot luchshiy iz Mirov (The Best of Worlds)
Strelets (Saggitarius)
Odna iz mnogikh (One of Many)
Samyi schastlivyi Den’ (The Happiest Day)
Salto Mortale (Sommersault)
O lubvi (About Love)
Ptitsa Schastya (The Bird of Happiness)
A iz nashego Okna (From our Window)
Tokareva’s stories have been translated into several foreign languages, but I would strongly recommend reading them in the original for those students of Russian who are interested in modern Russian life and its characters.
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya was born in Moscow; she is a journalist by training who published her first short story in 1970s. She has written a lot of short stories and plays, as well as “fairy tales” – little allegorical sketches about the people and their way of life. Her works were not published much in Soviet times because they were regarded as too gloomy, describing the “shadow” side of life, as well as too experimental and untraditional, so she became known only at the end of the 80s, after Perestroika.
Her short stories, as with Victoria Tokareva, are mostly about women of different ages in different circumstances, a feature that attracts female readers to her books. However, unlike Tokareva’s stories, they do not leave you with an easy and warm feeling; they feel rather heavy and can be depressing.
There is no doubt that Petrushevskaya is a talented author and a significant figure in modern Russian literature. However, I should say that she is not one of my personal favourites. Most of her stories are written in a very colloquial “spoken” style, perhaps too spoken and informal for my liking. When you read her prose, you feel like you are talking to a real person, perhaps a neighbour or a friend (and not a very sophisticated one, at that) rather than reading a book. I can see how some people may like it but I personally find it a bit irritating. Also, readers accuse her books of being too dark and gloomy and call her prose “chernukha” (black stuff), and I am afraid it is true of some of her stories. Petrushevskaya herself says that only people who do not understand her work may call it black, and if so, I am one of those… On a more positive note, her fairy tales, especially the ones about animals with human names and features, are very funny and are written in a sparkling, amusing and inventive idiom (but full of slang and made up words, so not really suitable for students of Russian!)
Her most well known collections of stories are:
Vremya Noch’ (The Time is Night)
Zhizn’ eto Teatr (Life is a Theatre)
Svoy Krug (Your Own Circle)
Boginya Parka (Parca the Goddess)
Malen’kaya Devochka iz Metropolya (A Little Girl from the Metropol)
Most Waterloo (Waterloo Bridge)
Tayna Doma (A Mistery of a House)
Some of her books (not mentioned here) are experimental and hard to read, so despite my great respect for the author I couldn’t recommend using her works for reading in Russian lessons!
Learning Russian Literature: – it’s a woman’s world? Part 2
By Vlada 5 July 09
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or something you may be interested to know but may not learn in Russian lessons.
My students doing advanced Russian lessons often ask me about modern Russian literature: what is it like? Who are the most famous best-selling authors and which of them are “readable” from the point of view of foreign learners of Russian? In the previous blog article I talked about 2 of the most popular modern Russian writers – Boris Akunin and Tatiana Tolstaya.
Today I would like to continue the same blog and talk about two more leading ladies of modern Russian literature – Dina Rubina and Ludmila Ulitskaya.
Dina Rubina started publishing her short stories in the 80-s in literary magazines. I was not aware of her work at that time but my friends tell me that she was popular even then. Her books are a pleasure to read: her writing style leaves you in no doubt that she’s a good old-fashioned professional author. Her Russian is flawless; she knows how to grip the attention of the audience and keep it throughout the book, she creates characters who seem real, living next door to us. I am sure some of them are, and lots of her books are based on the lives of people she knew.
Interestingly, Dina Rubina moved to Israel quite a while ago but writes in Russian only and is a best-selling author in all Russian speaking countries. She has recently published a couple of books of sketches about the life of Russian emigrants in Israel: they are funny, ironic and reveal a whole world of cross-cultural differences that Russian “repatriants” have to deal with in their daily lives. A lot of her stories and novels are about creative, “bohemian” people: artists, writers, performers. She herself has a musical education.
Her main books are:
“Na Solnechnoj Storone Ulitsy” – “On the Sunny Side of the Street”, a novel about an artist who grew up in post war Tashkent and went through life living in different countries ever grateful for the sunshine and the wonderful people who surrounded her in those years.
“Na Verkhney Maslovke” – “In Verkhnya Maslovka” (it’s a street name), a rather depressing story about a troubled love-hate relationship between a very old renowned sculptor and her much younger disciple. There is a screen version of this novel which, according to reports, is even more depressing than the novel… but at least the book is very well written.
“Dvoynaya Familiya” – “A Double-barred Surname”, a rather complicated and sad story of a family.
Dina Rubina wrote a lot of short stories. A couple of recent collections include: “Neskolko Toroplivyh Slov Lubvi” – “A few Quick Words of Love”; “Tsyganka” – “A Gypsy” and others.
Her last novel “Pocherk Leonardo” – Leonardo’s Handwriting” was advertised by some newspapers as an answer to Dan Brown’s “Da Vinchi Code” – but it’s not. It’s a mystical story about a girl with supernatural abilities and her journey through life as a circus artist. I don’t think it’s Dina Rubina’s best novel: I found it a bit fragmented, so it’s difficult to follow the plot, but nevertheless fascinating.
Ludmilla Ulitskaya is a heavyweight of modern Russian literature. She has been awarded various prestigious prizes, and her novels have been turned into films and TV shows. She writes in slow, slightly heavy but beautifully constructed long sentences, which make you want to take the book and sit with it in a quiet place, taking a break from the hustle and bustle of the world, thinking about what you are reading. It’s good holiday read, because you need time to think about the text. It’s deep and complicated and yet not boring. It requires thinking but doesn’t make your brain tired, which is a rare quality and a sign of a talented author.
Her most well – known novels are:
“Kasus Kukotskogo” – “The Case of Kukotsky” – the story of a brilliant doctor and his career in Soviet-era medicine, a novel which is sometimes compared to “Doctor Zhivago” not without reason. I found it fascinating, both because of the medical details and the story line. Ulitskaya is a biologist by education, and I am sure she must have had a medical consultant or done a lot of research when she wrote this book, as to me it seems very believable, and yet it has some mystical moments that make it very interesting.
“Veselye Pokhorony” – “A Jolly Funeral” – a story about Russians living in America.
“Medea i yeyo Deti” – “Medea and her Children” – the life story of a woman from a big Greek-Russian family living in the south of Russia.
“Iskrenne Vash, Shurik” – “Sincerely Yours, Shurik” – yet another life story.
“Ludi Nashego Tsarya” – “Our Tsar’s People” – a depressing collection of stories, all doom and gloom, in the best traditions of the Russian psyche.
Ulitskaya’s collections of short stories include:
“Devochki” – “Girls”; “Skvoznaya Liniya” – “A Line Running Through”; “Bednye Rodstvenniki” – “Poor Relatives”.
One thing that I noticed about Ulitskaya’s books is that she is rather anti-men, intentionally or not. In all her novels men come out as either pathetic and misguided or unpleasant characters, whose mistakes and misdeeds are left for the women around them to pay for.
Her last novel, “Daniel Stein, Perevodchik” – “Daniel Stein the Translator” is said to be less good. I was warned against reading it by a friend whose tastes I trust. She took this book to read on a sea cruise holiday, anticipating the pleasure, but after struggling with it for a while and getting more and more bored and disappointed, she got so frustrated that she threw it into the ocean from the boat… So it must have been pretty painful reading. But as we know, tastes differ.
To be continued!
Learning Russian Literature: it’s a woman’s world? Part 1
By Vlada 28 May 09
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or something you may be interested to know but may not learn in a Russian course.
My students doing advanced Russian lessons often ask me about modern Russian literature: what is it like? Who are the most famous best-selling authors and which of them are “readable” from the point of view of foreign learners of Russian? So here are some facts and comments about contemporary Russian authors and their works.
Present day Russian literature is dominated by women, and I don’t quite know why. Are modern women more creative or just more active in the world of publishing fiction? The best known modern Russian writers are: Tatiana Tolstaya, Ludmilla Ulitskaya, Lundmila Petrushevskaya, Dina Rubina, Victoria Tokareva. There is one major exception from this female company, though: Boris Akunin, a hugely successful and charismatic writer who has managed to produce a large number of best-selling novels written in really good Russian. So I am going to ignore the polite “ladies first” principle and talk about him first.
Boris Akunin (real name – Grigory Chkhartishvili) appeared on the Russian literary scene about 8-10 years ago and conquered the reading public instantly. A specialist in Oriental studies (Japanese language and culture; apparently his penname means “villain” in Japanese), he is a master of brilliant plots with a refined writing style. He combines real historical facts with fictional plots so skilfully that it’s sometimes hard to tell the fact from the fiction. His novels are a winning combination of interesting facts, fascinating (mostly detective) plots and impeccable Russian. His first novels were about a super-detective Erast Petrovich Fandorin, a late 19th-early 20th century sophisticated Russian gentleman working as a very successful private investigator: dashing, lucky, hard working, loved by women and envied by men, with a mysterious past (obviously a must for this type of character), with a loyal Japanese servant called Masa who happens to be a former Ninja. In a whole series of novels, Erast Fandorin, and later his descendants living in present day Russia, as well as his ancestors living 300 years ago, go through turbulent times in the history of Russia, solve mysteries, fall in love, win and lose and keep the reader glued to the page. Needless to say, some of the adventures take place in Japan where an exotic world of Japanese culture is revealed to us by the author.
I must say, although I can cynically dissect a work of fiction to see how it is put together, and I don’t like detective stories, I became one of Akunin’s faithful readers. Not only can he write beautifully in his own idiom, he can also imitate the styles of famous writers, both Russian and foreign. Thus, in one of his novels entitled “FM” he created mock parts of “Crime and Punishment” by Dostoevsky, which, according to the plot, were accidentally found in an unknown manuscript – and it looked remarkably like Dostoevsky. In another project, a collection of stories called “Nefritovye Chetki” – “Nephritis Worry Beads” he recreated the styles of famous world writers, such as Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie and others without naming them, thus offering the reader a chance to guess whom he’s imitating.
In one of his newspaper interviews Akunin said he had managed to realise the eternal Russian national dream: have a lot of fun and make money out of it! It looks like he succeeded, although it took him about 10 years to have his first book published.
His most popular novels are: “Azazel”, “Statsky Sovetnik”, Smert Achillesa”, “Osobye Poruchenija”, “Leviafan”, “Koronatsiya”, “Lubovnik Smerti”, “Lubovnitsa Smerti”, “Almaznaya Kolesnitsa”.
My personal favourite is a collection of short stories called “Tales from Graveyards” (“Kladbishenskiye Istorii”) where he gives interesting facts about the most famous cemeteries in the world, and tells a fictional tale related to each of them.
A couple of Akunin’s books are translated into English, and I even saw people on the tube in London reading them, but I don’t know if the translation is as good as the original.
As a downside I should mention that some of his novels, especially the later ones, are so full of miracles and crazy plot lines that they made me wonder whether it’s some kind of self-parody, not intended to be taken seriously. His latest novel “Quest” written in the form of a computer game, I didn’t like at all (but then, I hate computer games!)
My friend Julia who introduced the first book by Akunin to me, said “Don’t take any notice of the fact that it looks like a common detective story – just start reading, and you won’t be able to leave this book till you read it from cover to cover!” And she was right! So I would recommend Akunin to anyone who wants to read something interesting in Russian, whether a student learning Russian, or a native speaker.
Now, back to the ladies:
Tatiana Tolstaya is an accomplished intellectual related through her family to writers, academics and translators of foreign classical literature. She is a philologist by education and speaks several foreign languages. She is witty, sarcastic, clever and ruthless. She wrote several collections of short stories about lives of ordinary people in modern-day Russia, as well as some journalistic essays about modern Russian and Western life, covering topics such as the peculiarities of usage of the Russian language, political correctness in the West, and the Russian national character. She also published one novel with a rather strange title “Kys’ – an invented word which does not exist in real Russian – an apocalyptic but at the same time funny story about a post-nuclear war society on the territory of a city which used to be called Moscow before the catastrophe. It’s satirical, scary and gripping. The way she plays with language in this novel is the most admirable thing about it: she creates a whole new lingo for survivors who return to a primitive state of existence but have the same ambitions and personal problems as their more advanced ancestors. Some of the words created by the author are so juicy that you want to start using them. The word “gribyshi” instead of “griby” (“mushrooms”), for example, is especially good. But, as a result of these linguistic experiments, as you can imagine, this novel would be extremely difficult (if not impossible) to read for a non-native Russian speaker, even a very advanced student of Russian. Generally, her style of writing is very “grown-up” and sophisticated – a real pleasure to read, but not an easy kind of reading.
Her most well known collections of stories are: “Day” (“Den’), “Night” (“Noch”), “Raisins” (“Isum”), “Reka Okkervil” (“The Okkervil River”), plus the novel “Kys’” which is my personal favourite. I may be abnormal but this book cheered me up for some reason, instead of being depressing – perhaps because it is so brilliantly written. I sometimes read her essays with my advanced students, especially the ones about the Russian language, but all her books are difficult to read for foreign learners of Russian.
It looks like she is not writing much at the moment, because she has become a TV celebrity, participating in a TV talent show as a judge and co-hosting an intellectual talk show on one of the TV channels (unfortunately it is shown at 1 am!) called “The School of Scandal” (“Shkola Zlosloviya”). Her co-host is another writer called Dunya Smirnova; they invite famous people to the programme and ask them difficult questions about life, politics, philosophy, taking every opportunity to kill them with sarcasm.
Well, modern Russian literature is a huge subject which deserves to be spoken about, so this blog is to be continued…
Russian Television
By Vlada 14 March 09
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or things you may want to know but will not learn in a Russian course
In Soviet times, TV was boring beyond belief. The choice was usually between Brezhnev (or another ancient leader) painfully reading some party report, a concert of classical music (not that I don’t like classical music but you can have too much of a good thing, believe me!), a documentary about a Soviet farm with lots of statistics and happy farmers reading reports written for them, and a chess lesson. All news was good news: we lived in a country of blissfully happy people, where there were plenty of good guys as role models. When a popular movie was shown, it was a big event and the streets of cities became empty. Cartoons for children were an enormous treat and missing them was a big disappointment. Performances of foreign pop stars were shown twice a year: at about 3 am on New Year’s night (a good incentive for staying awake) and on Easter night, to stop young people from going to church!
So why do so many Russian people remember old time telly with nostalgia? Partly, of course, because everything always seems better in the good old days. But partly for good, practical reasons.
I did watch a lot of Russian telly recently (I was stuck in Moscow ill) and the picture is not really very inspiring. If you come to Russia without knowing much about it and watch telly all day, you’ll get the idea that the whole country is populated by complete bastards. Here is what happens through the day to an average screen character: in the morning TV series he nicks somebody’s money or cheats on his wife, or even worse, kills somebody. At lunchtime his offence will be discussed in detail in a TV trial (or several trials!), with witnesses, in the presence of a jury and judge (all actors, pretending to be real people) and he will be sentenced to a couple of years in prison or a large fine. Towards evening, our character will find himself in a talk show revealing his dark side, falling out with friends and family, confessing to seducing stepdaughters, mothers-in-law, poisoning the neighbour’s dogs, stealing and cheating. In between those programmes, on the news, the character (this time somebody real, unfortunately) will be shown covering his face to hide from journalists who are trying to find out more about his crimes and who are eagerly reporting to the public what awful things he has done. And finally, at night – an official horror movie, just to finish you off and guarantee nightmares. TV is dominated by crime stories, police and hospital dramas, TV trials and scandalous talk shows.
As a result, TV of course has become more interesting, but at the expense of being human… It’s probably normal for commercial TV because no one would watch a boring story about the life of a normal family! But people miss the “gentleness” of the old Soviet TV where it was prohibited to kill anyone in children’s cartoons or make the bad guys the main characters of films. They also miss the impeccable Russian language which was insisted upon for television, as well as the ban on swearing, sex and violence.
I, of course, miss the language most! You could learn perfect Russian from any TV programme and be sure that the presenters would always get even the most complicated language points right. TV was the model to follow. You could get your advanced Russian lessons from it (although you would be bored to death by the content!) In my memory, there was only one scandal with swearing when during a crucial football match a well known sports commentator used a four letter word in the heat of excitement, live on air. The whole country talked about it the next day. Naturally the episode wasn’t commented on officially and was censored. The presenter was severely reprimanded.
Now I switch on the telly and (being a Russian teacher) I want to correct mistakes all the time, give everyone bad marks and send them home to do their Russian homework properly! But maybe it’s good that people on the telly now speak any way they like – it’s more realistic, although no longer a decent role model.
Another thing is that TV has become very globalised. You can find exactly the same shows on Russian TV now as you see in the UK: “Dancing with the Stars”, “Who Wants to be a Millionaire”, “Changing Rooms”, “What not to Wear”, etc. The only difference is the language and of course some cultural peculiarities. In the “Millionaire”, for example, people gamble without even thinking for a second about it, and hardly ever win anything. “Dancing on Ice” went mad and every channel seems to have its own version running throughout the year: Russians love skating.
All this said, there are of course good quality programmes too: interesting journalistic investigations and documentaries, funny shows, some interesting series. But according to a recent poll, most people prefer to watch old Soviet movies. Perhaps we are just a nostalgic nation…
Learning Russian style of communication:
By Vlada 14 February 09
10 notes from a Russian teacher in London, or things you may be interested to know but may not learn in a Russian course.
This winter, for various reasons, I was plunged straight back into Russian life and settled in Moscow for a few weeks socialising with a lot of professional people and strangers every day. I’ve lived in the UK for 10 years and although no one in Russia ever suspects me of being foreign, I feel it a bit. I couldn’t help observing and making mental notes all the time about how people interact. So here are some of my observations and recommendations for students who are learning Russian and will be dealing with Russians on a daily basis in business or social situations:
1.First Impressions. When you first meet people, they look very serious and often gloomy. This is not a reflection of their state of mind and doesn’t mean that they are clinically depressed. Simply, in the Russian culture, smiling and joking with strangers is not a done thing. The concept of smiling as a matter of politeness is still foreign to us, and people only smile if they are genuinely amused or really like you. If you manage to charm them they soon relax and start being smiley and jokey in their turn. They just need to know that you will take them seriously and treat them with respect even if you giggle together!
2.Small Talk. People often get down straight to business, without any niceties such as doing small talk for a few minutes first. So they may come across as rude to an Anglo-Saxon person. In fact, it only shows you that the situation is formal and professional and they don’t know you well enough to talk about anything other than business. Which takes us to the next point:
3.It’s personal. Every relationship is personal. Even a professional one. The saying “nothing personal, just business” would not work in Russia at all. You have to get to know your business or professional partners on a personal level and acknowledge them as a human being rather than just someone to do business with. If you want to succeed in dealing with Russian partners, you’ve got to treat them as a friend.
4.Addressing people. If you are Russian, it’s important to remember people’s names and patronymics and use them all the time. It can be really difficult if you are dealing with a lot of new people in professional situations. I sometimes have to write them down not to get them wrong! However, if you are foreign, you can be exempt from that custom and allowed to use first names only.
5.Compliments. Paying compliments is an important part of social interaction. Politically correct concerns do not exist, so women get compliments on their appearance from men all the time. If you want to befriend a Russian, start with a few compliments and don’t be afraid to be too personal. We love it!
6.Greetings. Shaking hands when meeting is the usual thing to do for men but not for women. Some women shake hands, some prefer not to. I think the rule is that a woman should offer her hand for a handshake first. Shaking hands between two women would be very unusual. Some more old-fashioned men like to kiss a woman’s hand. It’s a sign of respect, and nothing more suggestive or personal. Contrary to popular opinion, Russians do not greet each other by kissing or touching, unless they are very close friends or family. The western European tradition of kissing strangers when greeting them and saying good-bye would be viewed as very strange.
7.Being grateful. When someone does you a favour, it’s important to be grateful and show it. Russians do not write thank you cards and do not like communicating in writing at all, but they do like giving and receiving gifts, flowers (for women), bottles of posh booze (for men), chocolates and other tokens of gratitude. Flattery and compliments are very common.
8.It’s good to talk! If you need to get hold of someone, give them a call. As I said in the previous section, Russians do not like writing letters, cards, e-mails and even text messages. People ignore texts and can’t be bothered to reply because they find it fiddly and time consuming. They would rather call and talk. Again, it makes communication more personal. So make sure you cover telephone vocabulary in your Russian lessons!
9.We are all big softies… When you have managed to make friends, you will discover that under their harsh appearance most Russians (especially men) are very soft, fragile and often romantic. I think Russians are the only nation left in the world that really appreciates (and creates) poetry.
10.Personal space. And last but not least: Russian culture is “communal” (it must be something to do with the cold climate!) and people are unaware of the concept of personal space. On public transport you might be squashed very closely against total strangers (not a pleasant experience most of the time!) and people will come very close to you while queuing and sometimes talking. So it’s quite likely that your personal space will be invaded in crowded places – it’s not personal, we just like to flock together!
Learning Russian names
By Vlada 1 November 08
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or things you may have to know but may not learn in a course of Russian lessons
Sasha, Sashka, Aleksandr Alexandrovich, San Sanych, Shurochka, Shurik, Sashok, Sashen’ka! Could it be the same guy? I am afraid so… and some of those names can even belong to a girl. I am sure foreigners are often confused by Russian names. I would be. How do you know, when reading a Russian book, that Mikhail Ivanovich on page 10 is the same guy as Misha on page 12? Names are usually not given much attention in textbooks or Russian language lessons, and at the same time the ability to understand them and to use them properly is so important for successful socialising and building up relationships!
The general system of Russian names is quite logical. Every Russian has three names: First name, patronymic (middle name, derived from one’s father’s first name) and surname. First (Christian) names are usually traditional. They come from the Bible, or can be of Greek (most names, in fact), Latin or old Slavic origin. For example, Pyotr (Peter) is Biblical and Greek, Viktor is Latin, and Olga, Boris or Vladimir are Slavic. I personally think that the most common Russian male name is Sasha (Alexandr) and most common female one is Natasha (Natalya). There are a few unisex names in which we just change the ending to make them masculine or feminine – the most common pairs are Alexandr and Alexandra, Valentin and Valentina, Valery and Valeria.
Almost every full Christian name has a diminutive form, not necessarily shorter, but affectionate, used by friends and family of a person. And that’s where the confusion may arise because sometimes a diminutive looks nothing like the full name! Alexandr is Sasha, and Alexey is Lyosha, Dmitry can be both Dima and Mitya, and Margarita is Rita. Although, to be fair, diminutives are usually very similar to the full name. One more interesting thing is that, apart from the “official” diminutive, there can be lots of affectionate “unofficial” names created out of the full first name. The Russian language is very creative and lends itself easily to making all sorts of silly sounding sweet little words, it’s rich in diminutive suffixes and very good for expressing affection. So Tatiana can be Tanya (“official” diminutive), Tanechka, Tanusha, Tanushechka, Tatyanochka, Tanura (all more affectionate than the usual diminutive), whatever someone fancies! And then there is Tanka – the suffix “ka” implies familiarity and sometimes a lack of respect!
The patronymic is one’s middle name. To form a patronymic, you need to take your father’s first full name and add “ovich” or “evich” to it if you are a man, and “ovna” or “evna” if you are a woman. So, a son of Ivan will be called Ivanovich and a daughter will be called Ivanovna. Patronymics are used in combination with first full names and imply respect and distance between grown up people. So, for example, it’s traditional to address your boss, a doctor, a teacher, a senior colleague, parents-in-law using their name plus patronymic. When I taught English in Moscow my students called me Vladilena Anatolyevna. If any of them had dared to call me Vlada I would have been scandalised and would have had to tell them off! But this tradition is rooted so deeply in the culture that people wouldn’t even think of calling a teacher by the first name… Only once some guy who was not even my student came to the staff room and asked for Vlada. So I turned around and said “It’s me, but I am not Vlada. I am Vladilena Anatolyevna!” These were the days…
All this said, foreigners are of course exempt from using patronymics, because everyone understands that they are difficult to pronounce and to remember. So for those who are doing Russian lessons in order to work with Russians or travel in Russia, it’s not necessary to learn and use people’s patronymics. Using the first full name will be quite enough.
When I tell my students about Russian names, they sometimes ask: what happens if a kid’s father is not around or unknown? In that case, the mother can choose the patronymic she likes. It is usually her own patronymic, so the child gets the middle name from granddad.
The last name is the surname. Typical Russian surnames end in “ov” for men and “ova” for women: Ivanov and Ivanova, Smirnov and Smirnova. Another common ending is “in” and “ina”, such as Eltsin and Eltsina, or “skiy” and “skaya”, such as Chaikovskiy and Chaikovskaya. Russia has always been an agricultural country rich in forests and animals, so lots of Russian surnames come from words for animals, fish, birds, crops, creatures of the forest and the river. Medvedev(a) is “bear”, Zaitsev(a) is “hare”, Lisov(a) is “fox”… And, of course, some people have foreign names, or names from other Slavic languages, Ukrainian, Polish, etc.
Just like in all other countries, names are influenced by fashion and pop culture. For example, in the 90-s a lot of Mexican and other south American soaps made their way to Russian TV, so there were cases when people called their babies Louisa or Ricardo… And when I was a student one of the teachers was called John Ivanovich. How’s that for a clash of cultures!
And finally, if someone hates their name or part of it, it can be officially changed at the passport office. Sometimes surnames are derived from unpleasant sounding words or even swear words! Women usually get around that problem by adopting a married name, and men sometimes take their wife’s surnames for the same reason… I was once working in the university admissions team, helping applicants to fill in forms, before they go through with entrance exams. One of the points on the form was “mother’s maiden name”, and one guy came to me and asked – “Can I put in my father’s maiden name instead?” – “What?!”- “But he is the one who changed his surname”!
A few tips on etiquette, or how to be polite in Russian?
By Vlada 16 August 08
More info from a Russian teacher in London, or things you may have to know but may not learn in a Russian course.
“Come here quickly! Pick up that thing! Go into the kitchen and bring me a plate! Go, go!! Quickly!!” Translated into English, it may sound like commands in prison… but that’s how my 7 year old niece is spoken to by her elders. And I am afraid it sounds absolutely normal to me! How else do you talk to a child?!
Yes, Russians are very direct and they like to use imperatives. Combined with “please” – “pozhaluysta”, it sounds absolutely polite and appropriate even in formal situations. So in a restaurant people usually say “Bring us another bottle of water!” or “Give us the bill!” and in a shop – “Show me that thing”, or “Wrap it up please!” We wouldn’t normally use “could you” or “would you” or “do you mind”, unless we want to be super careful and thoughtful towards the person we are dealing with.
So you always have to adjust your Russian-English or English Russian translation to the customs of the language. Polite English expressions translated literally into Russian sound very over the top and as if you feel guilty and unsure of what you are doing. And the other way round, Russian imperatives in English translation sound rude and abrupt. It’s easy to get it wrong when you don’t want to think about it too much. I am afraid I am guilty myself of giving orders in English (fortunately, usually to people who know why I talk like that!) and being over-polite in Russian. When shop assistants in Moscow start giving me funny looks, it means it’s time to switch into imperatives and stop saying “please” all the time!
An Anglo-Saxon polite smile is a strange concept for Russians. Smiling at strangers in public places is not a good idea. A popular Russian belief is that smiling for no apparent reason is a sign of being stupid. So if you start smiling at strangers in lifts and on public transport, they may think that either something is wrong with you, or you are about to chat them up. Do Russians smile? Of course they do, but only when they mean it and not out of politeness. That is why everyone in public places usually looks so gloomy. It’s important to look serious to be taken seriously, and does not mean that everyone is miserable! When McDonalds opened its first restaurant in Moscow in 1990, they tried to encourage (or maybe even make?) their staff smile at customers. It lasted a few months, I think, during which people formed huge queues to get it, in order to see: a) unusual American fast food, and b) smiling cashiers! And then everyone reverted to type and stopped smiling…
In a friendly conversation, we like to put across our opinions directly and not beat around the bush trying to be polite. It’s acceptable to say “I think you are completely wrong!” especially if you explain why. In a work place, the relationships between people are rather hierarchical and the boss usually has the right to say things directly and bluntly.
But it’s not all that ruthless… Bits of negative information given to strangers in a formal polite situation are usually preceded by the expression “you know (vy znaete)…” which more or less corresponds to the English “I am afraid”. “May I talk to Ivan?” (direct translation – “Please call Ivan to the phone!”)- “You know (“Vy znaete”), he is out of the office”). And if you want to ask a question, making it negative will make it sound polite – “Vy ne znaete, gde stantsiya?” – “You don’t happen to know where the station is?”
When meeting someone, the question “How are you?” usually presumes genuine interest, and requires a real answer. When this is not the case, people just get straight down to business. So you wouldn’t ask a shop assistant you meet every day in your local shop, or your bank manager how they are today, unless they become your friends. I remember reading in one of the interviews with a famous Russian actress her story of working and travelling in America and meeting a lot of people at receptions and parties. All of them asked her how she was, but none were really interested or expecting a real answer. So once, being at yet another party, when she was asked by a lady she’d never met before, “How are you?” she quickly said “My husband drowned himself this morning!” The lady either couldn’t believe what she had just heard, or didn’t listen, and answered “Ok, good!”
Deciding when to start using “ty” (the singular “you”), as opposed to “vy” (the formal polite “you”) can be tricky. It makes me cringe when my students in Russian lessons start calling me “ty”! I understand that it is because they think it sounds friendlier than “vy”, but I never know how to tell them that to a Russian, especially someone who has worked as a teacher all her life and is used to a polite form of address, it sounds completely inappropriate! “Ty” should be reserved for friends, and not for teachers and other professionals you deal with. “Vy” is a sign of respect among grown up people who do not know each other very well, so it’s best to stick to it.
All this said, a foreigner who is just learning Russian will of course be exempt from all these intricacies of politeness. People will appreciate any effort you make to speak Russian to them, and making it too polite (and sometimes even not polite enough!) will only make it more charming!