Eduard Limonov and Natalya Medvedeva in LA Photograph by Alexander Polovets
When Eduard Limonov died on March 17, 2020, Russian literature lost one of its most controversial, undeniably original voices. Due to his despicable behavior during the Siege of Sarajevo, Limonov’s pugnacious, affecting, explosively funny novels are no longer sold in the English-speaking world; his poems are completely unknown. He had only himself to blame, of course, but it’s a loss for all of us… There’s nothing quite like his writing. Never mind — I come to bury Limonov, not to praise him. And to recount an adventure in Los Angeles.
Around 1981, after half a decade of slumming with punks and plotting with Trotskyists in New York, the exiled Limonov wound up in LA, where he met the love of his life, Natalya Medvedeva. You may not recognize her name, but you’ve likely seen her face — here…
I am staring through an orange film. It’s the coloured layer around the Lucozade bottle which attends my high temperature. For reasons no longer clear to me I am in my parent’s bed listening to seagulls overhead. My mother is anxiously awaiting Dr M’s arrival on the ground floor where she has been making up Brussel sprout bags. Dr M is the son of the even more highly regarded “old Doctor M” and the chief G.P. of the practice in the Market Place just around the corner from my Grandfather’s shoe mender’s shop- opposite the church in St Ives. The downstairs in the practice there is crowded in the summer with lobster coloured visitors suffering from painful sunburn.
Then there was dear Doc B. Gentle by nature and with a reassuring voice. He was the preferred doctor from my mother’s viewpoint and mine too. In those days the result of the home visit always seemed to be the deep red sugary liquid or lobelline. In more severe cases with itchy rashes and high temperatures it was likely to be M and B. Dear DrB was one of two doctors who had served in the Navy during the War. Thus should the maroon go off and the Lifeboat go out, there would usually be one of these ex-navy doctors on board.
There was a general feeling that any illness was due to the moral failure of the afflicted. It was expressed though as “I told you not to go out in that wind with your duffle coat not properly done up”. In adolescence after overindulgence it would be expressed as- “I told ee you can’t afford to play ducks and drakes with your health”. Or even – “No wonder you have ended up like that and I haven’t seen you take out one of your books to study properly since Christmas”.
Unfortunately I cannot tell you more about the admirable Doctor B as I got to become close friends of his son and his family. They all intrigue me still and their love of sailing, their faith and their company on New Year’s Eve and forbearance for my attempts at Scottish Dancing. I am touched when I recall Dr B insisting in paying me in guineas for helping tutor his son with his A-level Physics. The memory now reminds me of the early parts of “The Garden of the Finzi-Continis”- the tennis and the sunshine.
Then there was DrS – a very different kettle of fish. Seemingly rather austere , quite tall with a head of curly hair that resembled the that of the distant Shakespeare academic Frank Halliday, he tootled through the already numerous crowds on his home visits. Rather taciturn, whilst not greatly welcomed to my childhood bedside visits was of greater support during adolesence. I remember seeing him in bookshops reading advanced ideas of art and French Existentialism. Indeed he was fascinated by living amongst a community of writers and artists.
Those younger doctors were at that time, the only persons in the community to afford cine cameras. These were used to record everything from the incident where the crew of HMS Wave were rescued by breeches buoy to family outings past Seal Island. DrS spent time both conducting audio recordings of important historical events and producing high quality photographs of members of the various art societies in that productive post-war period.
I shall discuss a little more of my personal impressions of preachers and artists in forthcoming posts
It seems that in the current Zeitgeist that an interest has developed in just how our attitudes and perception can be governed by the stories we tell ourselves. Though some of these stories may be phantasy rather than fantasy, as pertly unconcious.
The Chinese-born writer Yiyun Li has been on my radar for a while, ever since her 2019 novel Where Reasons End popped up in my Twitter timeline with recommendations from readers I trust. Published last year with equally positive reviews, The Book of Goose is my first experience of Li’s work, but hopefully not my last. It’s a strange, compelling, captivating novel, full of different layers and ideas. On one level, we have a story about childhood friendship, devotion, manipulation and the power dynamics of relationships; but on another, the novel digs deep into the power of storytelling and the games children play to escape boredom – how fantasies can become truths if we pursue them too avidly, blurring the lines between the real and the imaginary. There’s so much to absorb with this one, and I’ll probably be thinking about it for a long time to come…
Stepan Fedorovich Kolesnikov (Russian, 1879-1955), Russian peasant women, signed in Latin (lower right), gouache on artist’s board, 49.5 x 64cm (19 1/2 x 25 3/16in), Image Source: Bonhams
Das bürgerliche Theater, das Brecht tendenziell mit dem Theater überhaupt verwechselte, der simple, einsträhnige Bühnen-Thriller, der die Welt im Namen von Einheit, Ganzheit und Abgeschlossenheit von den Brettern verbannt, die sie bedeuten sollen und allen Akzent auf Spannung und Einfühlung legt – er repräsentiert nur einen Ausschnitt der europäischen Theatertradition. Diese ist mehrheitlich: „episch“, vieldimensional, „antiaristotelisch“, selbstreflexiv.
Schon die antike Bühne setzte auf das Mit- und Nebeneinander von Szene und Orchester, gesprochenen und gesungenen Partien, Handlung und Reflexion, Action und Besinnung. Das Theater späterer Zeiten kannte Prologfiguren, Zwischenspiele, allegorische Chöre, auch Figuren wie den halb innerhalb, halb außerhalb der Handlung stehenden Narren. Oder es ließ, als »teatro des mundo«, durchblicken, dass die Welt nichts als ein Theaterstück mit feststehenden, zuvor festgelegten Rollen sei: ein Arrangement, in dem die Handelnden sie selbst nicht sind, sondern spielen. Mit ihnen kann man sich nicht identifizieren. Diese Künstlichkeit steigert sich noch in den multimedialen…
Which is really about all you could do with one, eh?
Not alone in this. All over the world there are people who read books. They are catered for by people who write them, publish them, and stock them in shops and libraries. Don’t think all the action takes place on a lighted screen…a great deal of the world’s thought uses paper.
The books I fish out of the local libraries are stocked there by librarians, who are largely of the female persuasion. As a consequence, many of the works are what appeal to them, and would appeal to other females. I would say ladies, but some of the novels were not written by, nor evidently intended, for the better classes. How they get past the prim minders is another question that I do not propose to either pose or answer. I value my head.
Gustave Loiseau (1865-1935), Le cathédrale de Rouen, signed ‘G Loiseau’ (lower right), oil on canvas 18 1/8 x 15 in. (46 x 38.1 cm.), Painted in 1927, Image Source: Christie’s
penwithlit 