Well-known Russian satirist, writer, writer and publicist Viktor Shenderovich said that “travel abroad, Soviet Jew could get to the West only when he came to Riga or Tallinn”. Now the situation has changed.
“Now I’m probably banned, because there may be in new York, Berlin, as many around the world, but with concerts in Moscow, Petersburg, the big cities are the problem. It is political problem. So for me, as the former can not travel abroad with thirty-forty years distance it looks funny, because in Tokyo at University, I acted, and in Vladivostok I was not allowed”, — he said in an interview with DELFI.
Baltic tour Russian writer and satirist began with a visit to the editorial office DELFI in Vilnius, where in the course of the online conference he answered the questions of journalists and readers.
According to Viktor Shenderovich, Russia has already formed a generation of people who grew up under President Vladimir Putin, and not think of the country without him. However, he noted that the national idea of Russia is Alexander Pushkin, and not what I’m trying to think of the Russian government. Describing the situation in Russia as a gloomy, he did not intend to leave the country because of his criticism of the situation there is much more convincing than from abroad.
In addition, he noted that the population of Russia are brainwashed by propaganda, the strength of which was underestimated, and the population will support the aggression of the authorities outside the country, if such plans of the Kremlin there is a need.
DELFI: Readers interested in where you find it easier to organize concerts in Russia or abroad?
Viktor Shenderovich: of Course, outside of Russia do not begin repairs on the day of my concerts, not off the electricity breaks the pipe, and I brought misfortune on the housing sector in Russian cities. In the days of my concerts have been in some kind of trouble. After some time, when the government ceased to be shy, simply ceased to lease halls to rent, so no problems with performance around the world I have, wherever Russian… Although now there is such a weird word “Russian”. Russian, because all the people who read as a child Pushkin — they are Russian. Where there are people who read the same books that I read, I speak from Sydney to Seattle. In a huge number of she is in Russia, but they won’t let me. And of course, it is much easier to spend it outside.
— You mentioned Pushkin, is a kind of code for the Russian people. If we talk about the audience in the Baltic States, did you consider its specificity in the preparation of his speech?
— No. I have a literary programme, it is not political. Short prose, plays, poems. This literary part of my job, ironic short prose, satire, irony, lyrics. I read the same thing around the world. And here there is no difference, are you in Jerusalem, new York or Naryan-Mar, because you’re the same people who read the same books. My audience is determined by the libraries that are home. And I feel at home anywhere you have these libraries.
— One of the readers asked what still binds us and that could link in the future?
— If we are talking about the Russian culture and language, it is the common denominator. Poor Russian administration is sucking the thumb of some national idea or simply forgets that there is a Pushkin, which is our national idea, that’s the only name that will unite all. Prokhanov, me, anyone — right, left, Dugin. Pushkin created the language. Pushkin immediately illuminate our face with smile and happiness. That is a national idea. Inside Pushkin has it all: patriotism and Europeanism, liberalism, and conservatism. It brings together, language unites our classics together.
Speaking about Lithuania, as with all neighbor relationships and close difficult. And we all know that neighbors relationships can be very jealous, because it connects not only good. Of course, in the history of all the neighbors have pages that I want to forget. To forget them is not necessary, but should not especially and specially to comb. Need to find some balance. And of course I like people from Russia feel some responsibility for the past.
— Arrived from Russia, both here and in Riga, and in Tallinn you will meet many Russians who moved here to live. It is now some kind of “pale”.
— Understanding of the full extent of your irony, I would have said that it has no relationship to the national question. It was a political emigration, and to compare this process with the processes of a century ago, when, after the revolution, three million people fled from the Communists. Now do not run literally from the killings, while some are fleeing from massacres in Vilnius and live a dozen of my friends who left for political reasons from Russia and Belarus (these are political refugees, in the literal sense). But there are just people who go from the regime, and it already amounts to millions. Went to Putin’s times — it is millions of people, and I see increases my audience in America and those cities to which I never get. This is a new emigration, people left in a free country from an unfree country, which is today Russia.
— Can you talk about some of the new code of Russians who were born in 1990-e years? Over the last 10-12 years people have become else to say, other manners, landmarks, which is absolutely discordant with what it was before the 1990s.
— It’s natural. Who Confucius called at times of change, in which I do not advise anyone to live. It’s a new generation. Every generation changes the code. Inside the Soviet authorities appeared hipsters, someone else. The sixties were quite unlike their parents, although technically it was all within the same ideology. Every generation cries out that “we are not”. It’s everywhere. It’s not political, it is a normal human phenomenon, in no way connected with politics.
— And if to speak about political reality…
— If to speak about Russia, of course, from my point of view, though this someone happy rose of the Putin generation. Still, he’s 17 years in power and therefore people for 20 years, and they can’t remember anything except Putin’s Russia, can’t imagine my life without him. This is very dangerous, their heads shaped by propaganda, the effectiveness of which, we admit, for a long time underestimated. And that’s really dangerous for Russia, and, of course, for those around. In 2014 it moved in the acute phase, when the Weimar syndrome in Russia ended with the beyond. The country to the horror of the others gets up from his knees. Unfortunately, the analogy with the thirties in Germany is much larger than the Soviets.
On January 27, the day of memory of victims of the Holocaust is painful for the Baltic States the theme. Here is the reflection for this reason. It is appropriate to recall playwright Marius of Ivaskevicius (he now works in Russia) who called on all to come out to March in molėtai, where they were exterminated virtually all the Jews. As this is the situation in Russia?
— Bad is the case with reflection, and no Marius.
But there is Mr. Fat…
— Is Mr. Tolstoy. Not by itself, and the image of the Vice-speaker of the State Duma. Here it is necessary to say that Russia, a Soviet reflection of the most painful. Besides the fact that we exterminated neighboring peoples, we cut off and your own. And attempts at reflection, of course, is. Share “Last known address” is the analogue of the German signs in the streets. And it is gaining momentum. This is a very important thing, but it is still very private. The state prefers the subject not to touch or Vice versa just to trample, because the current Russian official offers to pride in the Stalinist past, a country we’ve lost, recognizing some kinks, but nostrils on the importance of this time. Unfortunately, we are not out of your XX century, Russia really did not start this movement. Until we understand the twentieth century as a disaster, we will not move from the spot.
— But Peter Tolstoy apologized…
Is an inaccurate message. We have still not Himmler in power, and decided appropriate this topic is not to inflate, and he kinda handed back. Us through his lip it was said that okay, we will not let you burn in the ovens, let’s gloss over this topic. No apology was not. He said that his words fanned by journalists. This is not an apology. He is a liar and anti-Semite, but that’s not the problem, there are such people everywhere, the problem is that he is a statesman. And this is very alarming not only for Jews because anti-Semitism is a reliable marker. Where anti-Semitism becomes state policy, bad after some time becomes everything. It’s been proven. And it was not even the case that the state-Semite was safe for its citizens. The Jews warm up, then you take all “four-eyes”, all the educated…
— Readers interested, after what you said about Ramzan Kadyrov, Vladimir Putin — you are not afraid for their health?
— Well, scary, but well now. I mean, God, before these questions were of a speculative nature, but for Putin-Kadyrov time, is rapidly shifting in the direction of Kadyrov, if I start to bend his fingers with the names of dead opponents of Putin and Kadyrov on two hands, we barely fit. And no one is punished. This question ceased to be languid. Yes, fear, but there is an answer to this: do what you must, come what may. In this case, you must either be quiet, or to fit into their system and to take the surname Solovyov, Tolstoy, Kiselev, or to emigrate and hide.
© RIA Novosti news Agency, said tsarnayev | go to photobacteria of the day of Russia
Abroad now working and Boris Akunin, and Artemy Troitsky and Oleg Kashin, You see the opportunity?
— Rabelais said: I’m ready to defend my beliefs until the fire, but not inclusive. I have no Messianic feelings on my account, but, of course, wants to live. I leave and return to Russia. Moscow is my city, not the city of Putin, I’m going back home. But the tragic gap between the homeland and the state — Yes, you come home and you fall into the hands of the state. And no rights and you understand that you can do anything. Exclude: did I leave? No, do not exclude, but still possible, I’ll stay. My genre — satire, when I talk about Putin to “echo of Moscow” in kilometre from the Kremlin that the price is different than if I said the same thing from new York. If you want a vaccination and I, and all the others. The problem is that standards go down, down the placket, where the boundary lies. For them all the more for us less.
I do what I must do and insist that this is normal behavior. Our problem is that we go on the first whistle, sometimes in advance, they still only took a deep air, to give the command, and we have already run to go to the boot. It’s terrible and shameful. And bosses, like any dog, doing, getting bolder when it senses that the owner is weaker than her. But they very quickly come to life when they start speaking in a different tone. They are first facing myself, they know exactly what they are criminals. That Putin must hide it for him a dozen criminal cases, but not for me. Imagine that we start talking when we get on TV! They know exactly what they have to hide, not us, and we need to support them in that feeling. That’s why I’m going back to Moscow.
— Wondering how long will continue such a situation?
Before the end of the life of Vladimir Putin, because he crossed the line, and from the power he leaves. For my taste, he crossed the line in 2012, after the Bolotnaya square case. It was the seizure of power, it is illegitimate. Its legitimacy is not above the legitimacy of Lukashenko. No election in the European sense, was not long ago. Therefore, from the authorities he will not leave, and after the Bolotnaya case, Ukraine, Donbass, he knows that in two or three weeks after he loses power, he will be asked to come to testify and then to change the measure of restraint. And he very closely monitors the fate of colleagues ranging from Milosevic to Gaddafi. Last moments of Gaddafi, I think he remembers. Like any tyrant — the end of life.
— Vasily Livanov were advised to look to the skies and see the answer to the question about the election?
— There is an old joke that when you talk to God is prayer, when God is with you, that’s schizophrenia. So I would prefer the scope of the Constitution, which Putin has violated, is already a third term, and there is still and fourth. No, we will not call the election what will be in 2018. He will remain in power, know it all.
— A forecast of the weather, I mean. And what’s the weather in Europe?
Not so good forecast, because a few years ago the advent of populists to power in Hungary was perceived as a separate excess. But here in Poland the populist rule in full and are on Putin’s footsteps by leaps and bounds. And now trump has broken the glass ceiling for populist and vulgar. It turns out that with this vocabulary, this rudeness, rude appeal to the lower classes, the lumpen, with contempt for intelligence, “four eyes” checked the lumpen manners can win elections in the STATES!
— Why is it working now?
— The Bacillus is always in the body. While the body is strong, it does not take. Trump won because America is disappointed in their own elite. Trump is grave symptoms. If the patient survives this vaccine, it will be healthier. America has been through a lot, experiencing and trump, but he set to work very smartly. And the earth ball, which both Cox trump, Putin, Erdogan, alpha males, contemptuous of the law and intelligence, relying on the lumpen, and hence to external aggression as a way to improve ranking is very unsafe. Europe is now in a very shattered state.
Is it easier in this case to convince Europe and the West in General, Russia has its special way?
— No United the West, as there is no any special way in the sense that each country has a special way. Next question in the Toolkit. When under special way means a rejection of the democratic system, there is nothing special in the way there. Typical Of Uzbekistan.
In Lithuania fear and talking about the threat from Russia. If that hypothetical threat happens, the population of Russia will support it?
— Support. In the Crimea it was still possible to think of something, mythical protection of Russian, although Hitler had much more reason to enter the Sudetenland than Putin has in Crimea. Putin no Russian was not killed in the Ukraine. I think the population will support, it’s zombie propaganda, and he’ll explain every action Putin. Enemies to invent a second and disappear. In Putin’s time, the enemies were Norway, Estonia, Ukraine, Poland. It disappears, the Ukrainian theme was replaced by a Syrian, nobody even noticed. But the enemies will constantly, that people are not asked what the hell Putin is sitting in power. The reality of such a threat, I recently looked at their texts. I said that Russia will try to tear at the Donbass economic methods. Never came otherwise. So now there is a (aggression — DELFI) comes to mind. Nothing new, defense of the territory, people. Actually, Hitler fought for peace, if you read German Newspapers of the 1930-ies, it is a continuous struggle for peace.
Where, in your opinion, ends satire and freedom of speech?
— Restrictions on the freedom of speech is legal, it is moral. Legal — different countries in different ways. If we talk about ethical, the laughter over the strong legitimate. Laughing at the weak, the sick — no. Satire is addressed to the strong, arrogant. No limits, the harder the better, from my point of view.
Literary concert by Victor Shenderovich in Vilnius will take place on February 4 in the hall of the House of Polish culture in Vilnius.
