Ilya Stogov is known as a man who rose from the bottom of St. Petersburg, a writer who strives to shock the public. But, appearing in front of a conference room filled with people in one of Tallinn's luxury hotels, he seemed to be a little confused at first and began to flirt.
First of all, Stogov complained that they didn’t like him in St. Petersburg and didn’t invite him anywhere: “I’m a lonely person, I sit at home and don’t see anyone.” Currently, Ilya is unemployed because he writes a column for “a free newspaper that is distributed in the subway and does not pay royalties.” After this, the phrase “I have long come to terms with the fact that my place is in the underground” sounded very natural: after all, the metro is the same basement, only larger. And the underground is always associated with basements.
But the first impression turned out to be deceiving. Stogov was not flirting; in fact, oddly enough, he was worried for some reason. His excitement was revealed by the sweat stains on his T-shirt.
About the writers
A guest from the northern Russian capital spoke about his work, saying that he considers himself not a “cult” writer, but a “youth” writer. Although he prefers to introduce himself as a journalist, because “ideally a journalist writes the truth” and “without journalism there is no field for discussion.” And “a writer usually has no thoughts,” but “a person differs from an animal in that he can think.” Stogov is convinced that a good journalist will never become a “writer’s writer.”
Nevertheless, Ilya Stogov himself already wanted to become a writer at the age of 20. He realized this dream at 27, when in nine days he wrote his first novel, which he could not get published in a publishing house for two years. Maybe because in Russia every three days a brilliant new book appears, and, according to Stogov, “all of them are Tolstoys and Dostoevskys.” Ilya also “pushed” his now famous “Macho” for a long time through the publishing house, where he “worked” as a press secretary.
Probably, to complete the picture, Ilya Stogov added that “if you throw a grenade into the literary life of Russia, then this life will become better.” By his own admission, he is “alone in this world” and cannot read “almost any of the monsters of modern literature.” At the same time, Ilya considers himself a peace-loving person who does not wish harm to anyone: “We must start perestroika with ourselves, then writers, officials and other unpleasant people, punished by the very fact of their squalor, will dissolve and turn into mist.”
Why then did Stogov himself join the cohort of writers and journalists? Ilya answered in his usual style, honestly and innocently: “Because I don’t know how to do anything. It was my conscious choice." In general, all this is nonsense, he said, since soon there will come “a new 13th century, when only a narrow circle of people who need it due to their occupation will be able to read.”
About pain points
Speaking about the pain points of our time, as well as about what worries his contemporaries most of all today, living both in Estonia and Russia, Ilya Stogov said that a person should look for the truth within himself, and not in the external tinsel of our world. He reacted with demonstrative disgust to political issues, emphasizing that “in St. Petersburg it is not customary to have a good understanding of politics.”
At the same time, Stogov expressed bewilderment at the brilliant political career of his fellow countryman Dmitry Medvedev: “It’s not clear how he got out!” But in general, Ilya approached this issue philosophically: “There should be one leader, because this is a very familiar model for Russia. And everything else follows from this. In Russia, everything exists in a single copy within a radius of two bus stops from the Kremlin. This system was not created by the communists; it has existed since the time of Ivan the Terrible. In modern Russia I do not feel the totalitarian pressure. Freedom of speech is not being curtailed. I always wrote and said whatever I wanted. Freedom of speech stems from an inner sense of freedom. In Russia, one type of unfreedom always replaces another type of unfreedom. And it’s impossible to change this, but you can change yourself.”
Nevertheless, Stogov called Putin good for recently meeting with selected Russian writers. Ilya himself was not invited there. Well, it’s not necessary, since he “was already busy that day.” Nevertheless, Ilya Stogov could not resist making a caustic comment to his colleagues: “I personally know most of the writers that Putin had. Individually they are normal, but when they all come together, something strange happens to them.”
About the meaning of life
Apparently, Ilya Stogov began to change himself at a certain non-state university with a spiritual bias. Although his path to the temple turned out to be thorny: “In my youth, the priest’s inventions were not close to me. I did not succumb to clerical propaganda. But at the theological university, after graduating from the theological department, I understood what was what. Now I’m just a Christian guy, not a clergyman, I go to church on Sundays.”
Answering a question about the meaning of life, Ilya Stogov honestly admitted that he “does not understand how this life works.” And the meaning of life “certainly is not to turn into a pump for transferring money from one cash register to another.” “The problem is not making more money, but spending less. I really value the right to laziness, which is more important to me than freedom of speech,” the writer added.
After this, Ilya Stogov unexpectedly spoke about love, which “everyone lacks”: “We are all people wounded in the soul who need love, because man was created to be loved. I believe in these things."
Throughout the meeting, Ilya Stogov kept remembering his St. Petersburg patriotism: “St. Petersburg is a kind of hierarchy of values. Muscovites are subject to mimicry of opinions, but St. Petersburg residents never are. Petersburg is a contagious disease, people born there are especially twisted. Eventually they all go underground."
In general, Ilya Stogov behaved rather modestly, saying that he did not have a special mission: “I just published a few books. And what I say interests a small number of people.”
PRIVATE BUSSINESS
Writer and journalist Ilya Stogov, who has the pseudonyms Ilya Stogoff, Victor Banev, [email protected], Georgy Operaskoy, was born on December 15, 1970 in Leningrad.
After leaving school, he worked as a sports bicycle salesman, a street currency exchanger, a school teacher, a cinema cleaner, the editor-in-chief of an erotic magazine, a translator, a press secretary for a casino and publishing house, a security guard, an editor for a Catholic radio station, a music reviewer, a bartender, a TV presenter and a publisher.
He graduated from one of the private theological educational institutions in St. Petersburg, where he received a theological education and a master's degree. Believer, Catholic. In 1995, he represented Russia at the V World Forum of Catholic Youth, held in the Philippine capital of Manila. As part of this event, he received an audience with the then Pope John Paul II.
Stogov's first novels were published in 1997-1998. He is credited with inventing a literary genre called masculine prose. For the novel “Macho Men Don't Cry” he was awarded the title “Writer of the Year” in 2001. The following books also gained popularity among the reader. In addition to works of fiction, Ilya Stogov has published several documentary novels and essays. The total circulation of the writer's books, translated into fifteen European and Asian languages, is approaching one and a half million copies.
In 2004-2005, Ilya Stogov worked as the artistic director of the television program “Week in the Big City” (TV channel “St. Petersburg - Channel 5”), which at the Eurasian Teleforum 2005 was recognized as “Best entertainment project in the CIS”.
Married, has two children.
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Ilya Stogoff: “I don’t know how to do anything in life.”
When the St. Petersburg writer Ilya Stogov was just beginning his literary career in the mid-90s, some at the Amphora publishing house doubted: would he go, would they read him? Time has shown that Stogov not only went, but went with a bang. To date, Ilya has published more than thirty books, the total circulation of which has long exceeded one million. However, Stogov doesn’t have that many actual “writer’s” books. Perhaps the most sensational of them is the novel “Macho Men Don’t Cry,” after which Stogov’s name began to sound not only in St. Petersburg. Most of what Ilya wrote can be classified as a journalistic genre - pocket guides to history, astronomy, religion, portraits of modern Russian rock musicians, essays and reports on trips abroad, etc. This despite the fact that Stogov has neither a journalistic nor a literary education. He is a Master of Theology. Believer of the Catholic Church.
Moreover, Ilya is a convinced Catholic: the “Catholic” view of Russian reality is undoubtedly felt in all his works.
Before becoming a writer, Stogov changed a dozen professions, including a bicycle salesman, a street currency exchanger, a security guard, a cinema cleaner, and a school teacher.
At the beginning of our conversation, I asked Ilya if he had a desire to quit the routine work at the keyboard for a while and remember his youth?
“Who told you,” the writer answers, “that my job is to sit at the keyboard?” The good thing about being a writer is that it allows you to constantly change your role. The year before last I wrote about the latest wave of Russian rock and roll. And for this, I got a job as a stagehand in one of the groups and traveled half the country with the guys. And in the past I wrote about archaeologists: I spent the whole summer on excavations. Over the past five years, I have changed half a dozen professions in this way: I went with the police to make arrests, in India I helped cremate the dead, I hosted a radio program, and I did everything else.
— Ilya, you have published about thirty books. And yet you continue to engage in journalism. Why? In general, can a writer survive without journalism now?
- You see, I never called myself a writer. Heir to the traditions of Dostoevsky and Chekhov. I write non-fiction and documentary novels not out of poverty, not because I want to make money, but because that’s the only thing that interests me. I actually think that we live in a wildly interesting era. And to miss at least something, not to record it in time, means to impoverish the nation’s cultural piggy bank. I am interested in guest workers, and Moscow billionaires with their long-legged companions, and domestic hip-hop, and the life of Orthodox monasteries, and whether there will be a war with Georgia, and in general everything that happens every day. But putting all this into the form of a novel is not at all interesting to me.
These dishes should be served as is: smelling of street truth. And not to shove antediluvian novel forms into dead ones. Therefore, I personally cannot survive without journalism. And I’m not ashamed of this, but on the contrary, I’m puffed up with pride.
— Didn’t you want to go to Moscow for a long journalistic ruble?
- I, you know, am a St. Petersburger. I think my city is the only one in the country where moving to Moscow is viewed not as a step in growth, but as a hopeless fall from grace. And if you really want long rubles, then you can write for rich Muscovites without leaving my own city.
— What is this story with the failed film adaptation of your novel in the kingdom of Bhutan?
- No no. It was not Bhutanese filmmakers who tried to film it, but ours, but in Bhutan. This, if you don’t know, is somewhere in East Asia. The company that bought the film rights grabbed a large budget and, as I understand it, planned to cut it thoroughly. In general, people come with proposals for film adaptations all the time. I don’t refuse anyone, but I’ve never gotten around to a finished painting. In my opinion, Russian cinema is such a self-sufficient world that neither the viewer nor anyone else needs it. They find money, live on it and talk about their successes on TV. There is no time left to fool around with filming pictures.
—Which of your books do you consider the most successful?
“And I don’t have anyone I don’t like: they’re all good.” If we count by the number of copies sold, then two are approaching half a million: “Machos Don’t Cry” and mASIAfucker. If for some personal feeling, then I value a little book that went almost unnoticed: “The Passion of Christ.” It seems to me that there I was able to find words that had not yet been used in Russian about the suffering of the Savior.
— Did the critics appreciate it?
— What has Russian criticism ever appreciated? Critics live in their own world, writers in their own, and readers live in places where both of these worlds have never been heard of. Have you personally seen at least one adequate review of at least one of the main modern books? Starting with “Chapaev and Emptiness” and ending with Minaev’s “Spiritless”? Who was able to conduct a clear analysis of the novels written by me or Oksana Robski? Critics need to get off Olympus and see what people are actually reading today. And if so, then is it surprising that the weight of criticism today is not even zero, but some negative values.
— How do you feel about literary hackwork?
- What do you have in mind? Thank God, I don’t have to “hack” (in the sense of writing contrary to my own desires for the sake of money). I never wanted to earn a lot. On the contrary, I think that it is worth refusing big earnings: this will help preserve the human appearance. Several years ago, colleagues of businessman Oleg Tinkov wanted to give him a gift for his anniversary and tried to order me his biography. Moreover, so much money was offered that at that time I could buy an apartment. But why do I need another apartment? Clear-red I refused. As for the unauthorized use of my texts, I also don’t mind. All my novels are on the Internet and distributed as audiobooks. In neither case, I again do not receive money, and I do not want to receive it.
— Many people do not understand your passion for Catholicism. How did a person involved in the St. Petersburg underground suddenly come to the Catholic faith? Maybe someone from your family influenced you?
“I wouldn’t call my relationship with the Catholic Church a “hobby.” For me, this is a conscious and thoughtful step. I am absolutely Russian by nationality: my peasant grandparents had names like Ivan or Evdokia and could barely even write. And, of course, at first I was going to be baptized in the Orthodox Church. I think that if a guy like me had found at least some place there, at least some chance to catch on and hold on, then I would still have become Orthodox. But, without breaking myself, without ceasing to be myself, I never managed to enter the fold of the Russian Orthodox Church. And “Catholic” is translated like this: “universal”. There was a place in this church even for someone like me.
— How do your littsekh colleagues feel about your religion? Were there any misunderstandings or clashes on this basis?
- Who cares? And then St. Petersburg is a cosmopolitan city. In Moscow the issue of religion can be discussed, but here we cannot.
— Do you, as a Catholic, have any complaints about Russian literature?
— As a reader, I have complaints about modern Russian literature. Prizes, thick magazines, critiques, a lot of writers. Where are the real achievements? All these modern novels are of interest to a very narrow circle of connoisseurs. Like, say, Latin American dancing. Well, yes: it seems like something is happening. But, on the other hand, this is not at all interesting to anyone except the participants in the process.
— Do you have any relationships with the older generation of St. Petersburg writers? Who would you like to highlight?
- You see, I didn’t grow up on the novels of our “hillbillies”, but on the detective stories of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Soviet writers have never been an authority for me. So I don't have any relationship with them. Of the professional writers, I communicate only with the so-called “St. Petersburg fundamentalists” (Krusanov, Nosov, Sekatsky). Previously, when I was still drinking alcohol, it was nice to cut myself half to death with these guys and then discuss how it all went. And so: the collapse of the USSR is a watershed. Those who remained on the other side will never come here to us. In general, I have nothing to talk about with classics like Daniil Granin or Boris Strugatsky. Moreover, they most likely have no idea about my existence.
— Do you communicate with Vyacheslav Kuritsyn, who recently moved to St. Petersburg? Or are you not on the same page with former apologists of postmodernism?
— Vyacheslav Kuritsyn has been drinking so heavily lately that it’s really hard to communicate with him. In general, there are no non-drinkers among writers. But not everyone can drink like Slava.
— According to your personal feelings, is literary life in the city today a boiling cauldron or a stagnant swamp?
- There is no single life. There are thousands of tiny worlds: poets read poetry to each other, playwrights rush around with plays to directors, essayists extort fees from magazines, novelists drink vodka and twirl their mustaches. If someone starts telling you that not much happens in St. Petersburg, it means that he simply ended up in the wrong world.
— According to you, a person reads until he is thirty, and then only re-reads. I wonder what you are re-reading today?
- I just continue reading. Every week I discover something new. And from what I re-read over the past year, the one who truly shocked me was Korotkevich, who once wrote “The Wild Hunt of King Stakh.” I reread it and was amazed: the real Belarusian Umberto Eco. And completely underrated!
— Which of the Russian literary awards, in your opinion, is the most prestigious and not biased? In other words, what prize do you dream of winning?
— You know, about a hundred years ago Kipling was going to be awarded some wildly honorable British order. And for this they even invited him to an audience with the king. However, he refused and wrote on the invitation: “Your Majesty! Let me live and die simply as Kipling." Modern literary awards cause me nothing but despondency. Neither National Best, nor the Big Book, nor even more so the ridiculous Russian Booker. The jury of these awards missed everything that was interesting in recent years. The prize was not given to Robski, Alexey Ivanov, Krusanov, or Danilkin. And if they gave it to Bykov and Prilepin, it was for some completely absurd books. So personally, I would like to live and die simply as Ilya Stogov.
— Judging by your statements, the main drawback of Russia is the lack of freedom in it. How do you manage to live in captivity for so many years? Reveal the secret.
“I don’t think I phrased it exactly like that.” Who is silencing the press today? Who tramples my civil rights into the asphalt with forged boots? Nobody! Recently, for the sake of sport, I went to a political rally for the first time in my life. Please! Shout as much as you like! Another thing is that three and a quarter people took part in this rally. It's not about freedom, but about total indifference. Russians have always delegated their rights to the top without any doubt: decide for yourself, I don’t care. If they tell me to go to war, I’ll go and die. If they tell me to go to a rally, I’ll go there too. If they tell me to disperse the same rally, I will disperse it. Indifference and humility, Asian contempt for life (both one’s own and that of others) - this is what seriously surprises me in my own country.
— By the way, you have visited about fifty countries. Which state, according to your observations, has the most freedom?
- I think more than fifty. Although I never counted it. But measuring freedom by countries is, in my opinion, a dubious idea. Countries are not free, only individuals are. It is believed, for example, that representatives of the Leningrad underground (all these Brodskys and Dovlatovs) lived under conditions of harsh communist pressure. However, these people were absolutely free. So free, as neither today's Russians nor today's Americans have ever dreamed of.
— You have written many books about Russian rock music. What bands will you still be listening to in twenty years?
“You know, when I was fifteen years old, I listened to those who were then in their early twenties, and they seemed like creepy old men to me.” And today I’m almost forty and I already seem like an old man at rock and roll concerts. But at the same time, I prefer to listen to those who, again, are in their early twenties. It is there that the heart of Russian poetry beats today: Feo from the group “Psyche” and Assai from the group “Krec” speak words about today’s world that you will not find anywhere else. I hope that when I reach sixty, I will still start listening to the guys who will then be in their early twenties.
— What new book are you going to launch at the autumn Moscow book fair?
“What I’ve never thought about is timing the release of any of my books to coincide with the fair.” It's more like Moscow. Let my publisher think about advertising strategies and good sales. It will be enough for me to think that the book itself is good.
— In one of your recent speeches in the newspaper “Metro - St. Petersburg” you once complained that (I quote verbatim) “the two thousandth turned out to be a hangover. My eyelid is completely drained." What is the reason for such a pessimistic statement?
“I recently went to South America, and when I returned, it turned out that in the jungle I had picked up some very unpleasant infection. Everything seemed to work out fine, the tests were good, but throughout the past year I was constantly thinking about death. I'm almost forty. I didn't think I would live to this age. And if in childhood death seemed unimportant, insignificant, now I finally began to understand that we were talking about my own death. About the fact that other people will continue to live, and my personal body will be buried in the ground. This doesn't make me feel very happy.
— And yet, despite the hangover present, what are your plans and hopes for the future?- Don't know. In the near future I will go to Transcaucasia, and from there, probably, to Denmark. By September I’m thinking of launching another book series and maybe I’ll be able to make a radio program. And then, really, I don’t know. God will give you the day, God will give you food for thought.
Pavel Smolyak
Olga Zakharova
Ilya Stogov, without any modesty, but, of course, without boasting, talks about the time when everyone was talking about him. Each magazine was packed with his interviews, advice, and reflections. Popular writer, witty journalist, TV and radio presenter. Years go by, but Stogov is still relevant. Ilya happily shows off the volumes lying around in his bag. There are four books at once, but I’m starting with Kupchino.
Ilya, I found out that you left Kupchino and moved to the city center. The news floored me. I admit, I don’t really like this island of St. Petersburg, but you somehow brightened up the area, it was less black and white. You say “Kupchino” and remember Stogov. What happened, why did you leave the “center of the Universe”?
Some novel described the struggle of blacks for their rights. Blacks rebelled in New York and shot back there. And when the policeman came, he discovered that they were just white people who had painted their faces with shoe polish. I am the same defender of Kupchino. Until I was thirty, I lived in the house to which I have now moved. I'm not a real merchant boy. I was born on the Neva embankment. The fact is that in 2004 I worked on Channel Five. Since there was a shortage of stories there, and by the way, I didn’t film them at all, I was the presenter, so I said: “Let me film that you’re worried.” And I made the plot. Usually it takes three days to remove it, but I finished it in 40 minutes. We took a couple of shots of Kupchino and edited them with footage from Star Wars, like Kupchino is an area of the future. Well, that's it, pipe. For the next five years my phone didn’t stop ringing at all; they thought that I was the main specialist in Kupchino. It's not that I don't like him, it's just a joke. She was funny a few years ago, but now she's not funny at all, so I moved.
I didn't know it was a joke. He took everything seriously.
I am not ready to spend my whole life adhering to something that I am not. Previously, it seemed to me that there was some kind of trend in this, this is how a St. Petersburg gentleman should live: a green neighborhood, good ecology. Here's Kupchino for you. But one day I didn’t have the book that I usually read on the road. I got into the minibus, started looking out the window, and the closer we got to Kupchino, the worse I felt. We drove up, and there were some nasty ghouls naked to the waist in sweatpants, then some Uzbek women in hijabs, I felt like I was plunging into hell. Worse and worse. I got home and thought: “Dear mom, where do I live?”
You are experiencing continuous changes in your life. Both personal and professional. We left Kupchino and moved to a normal area. On Channel 5 you are broadcasting again. Radio shows, new books are coming out, old ones are being republished. You have suddenly become in demand.
There was a time when I couldn’t breathe at all. I came with my wife to a hypermarket, there was a healthy rack with magazines. I say: “Let’s bet that I’ll open any magazine and there will be a photo of me in it.” My wife took some left-wing magazine about car tuning, and there was a photo of me there. This was a long time ago, now, on the contrary, there is a feeling of some kind of deja vu. I had a good program on television, now it’s crap, not a program. I'm not the one doing it. I always want to quit, but I don’t have the money. I'm poor. I have to work for money.
Why immediately “shit”? Do you write your own questions or what? How much freedom do you have on air?
It’s not me who invites people to the show. Some man comes, I would have punched him in the face instead of asking him questions. For example, someone says that people descended from dolphins or that a person can live at minus sixty and walk naked. Not interested. I don’t care at what temperature a person can walk naked. This is not a topic for conversation, but I have to talk.
When you were called to host the “Night” program, did you immediately agree? After all, the program was hosted by writer Vyacheslav Kuritsyn before you. I won’t say that I was delighted, but he conducted the program at the same level. You knew that they would constantly compare you with him, without going into the meaning of who is visiting you?
Kuritsyn at one time became a replacement for me...
In the literature that is not ashamed to be shown on TV, only you and Vyacheslav remain. Is that how it works?
I have this friend, a fucking noble European aristocrat. He lived in St. Petersburg, and then disappeared. I ask him: “Mark, where are you?” He says - in Moscow. And why? He answers that when he came here in the early nineties, St. Petersburg was a fucking city, it was on par with London. Then he became not very cool, but in comparison with Moscow he became completely provincial. We have catastrophically few people. Slava Kuritsyn may be responsible for all St. Petersburg literature, but then woe to literature.
By the way, you wrote about this in the book “2010 A.D.”, if I’m not mistaken. The hero arrives in St. Petersburg after a long journey, sees that nothing has changed, everything is worse and worse, and goes to the capital.
"2010" is a bad book.
Yes, outright hackwork, to tell the truth, it’s immediately obvious that they wrote for the sake of money.
You know, I don’t work for money and I’m proud of it. This is not what I wanted to write. I don't work for money, but I don't work without money either. It's just that money is not the main motivation for me. The book is weak, but I think if it had been Sadulaev’s book, it would have been Sadulaev’s best book. It's just a bad book for me.
Don't like German Sadulayev?
I feel very good about him, but it’s just that each of my next books was better than the previous one, but this one is not. All the techniques have been used ten times by me in other books. These thoughts have been expressed elsewhere.
The idea of the book, let’s say, is clear to me. As I understand it, you wanted to show a certain projection of time, to write a chronicle of our reality. Major Evsyukov and so on.
No normal course was found. I would like to write a book about doing well and doing well. And doing bad is bad. Dear reader, do not do bad, but do good. You need to find some way, but it didn’t work out with this book. A lot of things didn't work out.
Okay, how about you with envy towards your colleagues? Still, your circulation has fallen. New books are coming out, but six to ten thousand copies each. Too little for Stogov. Do you not share the opinion that someone with, for example, a circulation of 50,000 copies is a bad author, an ordinary project? I have a thousand, but what a thousand!
I have no envy. I am an underground author, but among the underground I have a fairly large circulation. Among commercial literature, I have a high social status, I am not Daria Dontsova. I can tell her: “Show me at least a line that would be written like mine, and then talk to me.” I have no one to envy.
I wanted to know about the new books that you have coming out...
Have you read the last Limonov?
He writes almost nothing.
And what he writes is complete bullshit. He is good, but there is a market idea. If you take up literature, you will write books until you are old. If you have something to say, say it, no, remain silent. Well, of course, since childhood I was sure that I would become a writer. Then I published two books somewhere in the nineties. There was one detective, the second book was called “Kamikaze”. No one read them, no one paid attention. And then I worked at the Amphora publishing house. The writer Pavel Krusanov was there. I drank with him like never before with anyone in my life. We celebrated the year two thousand, everyone said, let’s remember the year that passed, but I understand that I can’t remember anything. It hasn't been a year. I remembered the mailbox that hung near the Amphora publishing house. Nearby is the entrance to the store. Pasha has already bought a bottle, put it on the mailbox and is waiting for me. We spent a year and a half with this box. But then I saw the whole world of St. Petersburg literature and was horrified, because I had never seen big fuckers in my life.
So you started talking about the nineties in your life. Don't you think that nineties fashion is now coming back? They remember and say how good it was there.
Don't know. The system has changed radically. It's like remembering yourself in the womb, we are too different. We lead a different life. I don't see any fashion yet.
I’m a religious guy, but not in the sense of an idiot - like the priest said, I’ll break my forehead. But in the way of a limitless ego, there must be limits so that you can look at yourself in the mirror, like, dude, you did bad today. And there are many such people in my life.
You are a religious guy, but not an Orthodox guy. What is your attitude towards the Russian Orthodox Church?
I don't really believe in such generic names. For example, when we say Russian, we say such a general name. Russians are one hundred and forty million people who do not know each other. The Orthodox Church is a million or fifty thousand people who are strangers to each other. Among them there is a crazy grandmother from Penza who is ready to bury herself in the ground, there is a patriarch, the head of the bureaucratic structure, there are blue-eyed girls from Novgorod. Soon all the girls will be wearing headscarves and Converse sneakers.
Are your children believers?
We go to church. On Sunday. The youngest son is approaching his first communion; this is a big holiday in Catholic families.
Have you ever thought that you need to protect children from religion? Let them grow up and choose their own religion. Maybe they don't want to be Catholic.
Of course, children generally don’t want much. They don't want to brush their teeth, they don't want to wipe their butts when they go to the toilet. They don't want a lot of things. They are not yet people, they are semi-finished products of people. Everyone becomes human over the years. Children want to stick their fingers into electrical sockets, walk on the fourteenth floor balcony, and only eat at McDonald's. And we parents say: “It is in your interests to listen to me. Then you can, if you really want, eat at McDonald’s,” but now you have to understand that there are healthier foods.”
Unfortunately, I don’t know what the right books are. I’m not saying that I’m the most famous writer, but journalists call me regularly twice a day. And with this question: how to teach the younger generation to read... Should the younger generation read “Glamorama”? There's just so much there. Or there is another book about skinheads, I don’t remember the name, but it’s a well-known American one, such a modern Orwell, about the victory of the national revolution in the world. The Jews took over the world, and only a small team of skinheads led the resistance and won. Africa was wiped off the face of the earth, and China was bombarded with nuclear bombs. Do you think that all books should be read?
I was once walking down the street in the city of Chernivtsi, I saw my grandmother selling books, and I approached. crests, by the way, almost never read books; publishing is the most unprofitable business in Ukraine. I didn't see a single person reading anything there. And now on the grandmother’s table there is all sorts of computer literature and - bam! - "Mein Kampf". I bought it for thirty hryvnia. I sat on a train in the beautiful city of Chernivtsi - and it was Jewish and suffered greatly in World War II - and read Mein Kampf.
The book, by the way, was banned in Russia.
There is no need to prohibit anything. I always got my books on time. They, however, sometimes led to such paradoxical results. At the age of 14 or 15, I found a book by Nietzsche, a pre-revolutionary edition, with my dad. And he began to read. I don't remember what exactly I read, but I realized from the book that you don't have to be good. After that I stopped doing well at school, and within a week I lost my virginity. Not because the girl got caught, but because Nietzsche. Therefore, I understand what the power of words means. A word can explode your brain so much that everything around you will splatter. Or maybe it won't explode. 8 or 20 years after Nietzsche, I read Chesterton and was baptized. I learned about Jesus not from the Gospel, but from Chesterton. All the books I read made me who I am. But I’m unlikely to advise anyone to read Mein Kampf, my friend. No. Everyone has their own path. I, like many of my colleagues, am the sum of the books I have read.
My traditional question: what awaits Russia?
There is no Russia, there are one hundred and forty million people who do not know each other. Someone at the moment understood the most important moments in life, someone fell and broke their face into blood. And the majority ate dumplings and went to bed. Russia is a generalization behind which there is nothing. Medvedev - who is this? I turn on the TV, they show the Russian businessman Abramovich, it’s funny to me, he’s been a British businessman for a long time, not Russian. The rich are getting richer, and their world is not divided into Russia, Germany, Japan. There is a world of the poor - it is international. I think many St. Petersburg residents would find common themes with Ethiopians. They have similar problems. They live in a world of the poor. There is a world of smart people - you and I have something to talk about. Now, if a Brazilian and a Korean came here, they would be happy to join in the discussion of the prose of the Chechen Sadulayev. There is a world of sports fans. Here I work at Radio Zenit, and this is some kind of through the looking glass. The answer to the question “Who are you?” does not imply nationality. Who are you? Russian. This is not an answer. Who are you? I am businessman Abramovich. And I'm a Liverpool fan. And it doesn’t matter what my nationality is. Something is probably waiting for Russia, but I don’t live in Russia. But this does not mean that I do not love my country, the level of generalization does not interest me, just like that.
When the St. Petersburg writer Ilya Stogov was just beginning his literary career in the mid-90s, some at the Amphora publishing house doubted: would he go, would they read him? Time has shown that Stogov not only went, but went with a bang. To date, Ilya has published more than thirty books, the total circulation of which has long exceeded one million. However, Stogov doesn’t have that many actual “writer’s” books. Perhaps the most sensational of them is the novel “Macho Men Don’t Cry,” after which Stogov’s name began to sound not only in St. Petersburg. Most of what Ilya wrote can be classified as a journalistic genre - pocket guides to history, astronomy, religion, portraits of modern Russian rock musicians, essays and reports on trips abroad, etc. This despite the fact that Stogov has neither a journalistic nor a literary education. He is a Master of Theology. Believer of the Catholic Church.
Moreover, Ilya is a convinced Catholic: the “Catholic” view of Russian reality is undoubtedly felt in all his works.
Before becoming a writer, Stogov changed a dozen professions, including a bicycle salesman, a street currency exchanger, a security guard, a cinema cleaner, and a school teacher.
At the beginning of our conversation, I asked Ilya if he had a desire to quit the routine work at the keyboard for a while and remember his youth?
“Who told you,” the writer answers, “that my job is to sit at the keyboard?” The good thing about being a writer is that it allows you to constantly change your role. The year before last I wrote about the latest wave of Russian rock and roll. And for this, I got a job as a stagehand in one of the groups and traveled half the country with the guys. And in the past I wrote about archaeologists: I spent the whole summer on excavations. Over the past five years, I have changed half a dozen professions in this way: I went with the police to make arrests, in India I helped cremate the dead, I hosted a radio program, and I did everything else.
— Ilya, you have published about thirty books. And yet you continue to engage in journalism. Why? In general, can a writer survive without journalism now?
- You see, I never called myself a writer. Heir to the traditions of Dostoevsky and Chekhov. I write non-fiction and documentary novels not out of poverty, not because I want to make money, but because that’s the only thing that interests me. I actually think that we live in a wildly interesting era. And to miss at least something, not to record it in time, means to impoverish the nation’s cultural piggy bank. I am interested in guest workers, and Moscow billionaires with their long-legged companions, and domestic hip-hop, and the life of Orthodox monasteries, and whether there will be a war with Georgia, and in general everything that happens every day. But putting all this into the form of a novel is not at all interesting to me.
These dishes should be served as is: smelling of street truth. And not to shove antediluvian novel forms into dead ones. Therefore, I personally cannot survive without journalism. And I’m not ashamed of this, but on the contrary, I’m puffed up with pride.
— Didn’t you want to go to Moscow for a long journalistic ruble?
- I, you know, am a St. Petersburger. I think my city is the only one in the country where moving to Moscow is viewed not as a step in growth, but as a hopeless fall from grace. And if you really want long rubles, then you can write for rich Muscovites without leaving my own city.
— What is this story with the failed film adaptation of your novel in the kingdom of Bhutan?
- No no. It was not Bhutanese filmmakers who tried to film it, but ours, but in Bhutan. This, if you don’t know, is somewhere in East Asia. The company that bought the film rights grabbed a large budget and, as I understand it, planned to cut it thoroughly. In general, people come with proposals for film adaptations all the time. I don’t refuse anyone, but I’ve never gotten around to a finished painting. In my opinion, Russian cinema is such a self-sufficient world that neither the viewer nor anyone else needs it. They find money, live on it and talk about their successes on TV. There is no time left to fool around with filming pictures.
—Which of your books do you consider the most successful?
“And I don’t have anyone I don’t like: they’re all good.” If we count by the number of copies sold, then two are approaching half a million: “Machos Don’t Cry” and mASIAfucker. If for some personal feeling, then I value a little book that went almost unnoticed: “The Passion of Christ.” It seems to me that there I was able to find words that had not yet been used in Russian about the suffering of the Savior.
— Did the critics appreciate it?
— What has Russian criticism ever appreciated? Critics live in their own world, writers in their own, and readers live in places where both of these worlds have never been heard of. Have you personally seen at least one adequate review of at least one of the main modern books? Starting with “Chapaev and Emptiness” and ending with Minaev’s “Spiritless”? Who was able to conduct a clear analysis of the novels written by me or Oksana Robski? Critics need to get off Olympus and see what people are actually reading today. And if so, then is it surprising that the weight of criticism today is not even zero, but some negative values.
— How do you feel about literary hackwork?
- What do you have in mind? Thank God, I don’t have to “hack” (in the sense of writing contrary to my own desires for the sake of money). I never wanted to earn a lot. On the contrary, I think that it is worth refusing big earnings: this will help preserve the human appearance. Several years ago, colleagues of businessman Oleg Tinkov wanted to give him a gift for his anniversary and tried to order me his biography. Moreover, so much money was offered that at that time I could buy an apartment. But why do I need another apartment? Clear-red I refused. As for the unauthorized use of my texts, I also don’t mind. All my novels are on the Internet and distributed as audiobooks. In neither case, I again do not receive money, and I do not want to receive it.
— Many people do not understand your passion for Catholicism. How did a person involved in the St. Petersburg underground suddenly come to the Catholic faith? Maybe someone from your family influenced you?
“I wouldn’t call my relationship with the Catholic Church a “hobby.” For me, this is a conscious and thoughtful step. I am absolutely Russian by nationality: my peasant grandparents had names like Ivan or Evdokia and could barely even write. And, of course, at first I was going to be baptized in the Orthodox Church. I think that if a guy like me had found at least some place there, at least some chance to catch on and hold on, then I would still have become Orthodox. But, without breaking myself, without ceasing to be myself, I never managed to enter the fold of the Russian Orthodox Church. And “Catholic” is translated like this: “universal”. There was a place in this church even for someone like me.
— How do your littsekh colleagues feel about your religion? Were there any misunderstandings or clashes on this basis?
- Who cares? And then St. Petersburg is a cosmopolitan city. In Moscow the issue of religion can be discussed, but here we cannot.
— Do you, as a Catholic, have any complaints about Russian literature?
— As a reader, I have complaints about modern Russian literature. Prizes, thick magazines, critiques, a lot of writers. Where are the real achievements? All these modern novels are of interest to a very narrow circle of connoisseurs. Like, say, Latin American dancing. Well, yes: it seems like something is happening. But, on the other hand, this is not at all interesting to anyone except the participants in the process.
— Do you have any relationships with the older generation of St. Petersburg writers? Who would you like to highlight?
- You see, I didn’t grow up on the novels of our “hillbillies”, but on the detective stories of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Soviet writers have never been an authority for me. So I don't have any relationship with them. Of the professional writers, I communicate only with the so-called “St. Petersburg fundamentalists” (Krusanov, Nosov, Sekatsky). Previously, when I was still drinking alcohol, it was nice to cut myself half to death with these guys and then discuss how it all went. And so: the collapse of the USSR is a watershed. Those who remained on the other side will never come here to us. In general, I have nothing to talk about with classics like Daniil Granin or Boris Strugatsky. Moreover, they most likely have no idea about my existence.
— Do you communicate with Vyacheslav Kuritsyn, who recently moved to St. Petersburg? Or are you not on the same page with former apologists of postmodernism?
— Vyacheslav Kuritsyn has been drinking so heavily lately that it’s really hard to communicate with him. In general, there are no non-drinkers among writers. But not everyone can drink like Slava.
— According to your personal feelings, is literary life in the city today a boiling cauldron or a stagnant swamp?
- There is no single life. There are thousands of tiny worlds: poets read poetry to each other, playwrights rush around with plays to directors, essayists extort fees from magazines, novelists drink vodka and twirl their mustaches. If someone starts telling you that not much happens in St. Petersburg, it means that he simply ended up in the wrong world.
— According to you, a person reads until he is thirty, and then only re-reads. I wonder what you are re-reading today?
- I just continue reading. Every week I discover something new. And from what I re-read over the past year, the one who truly shocked me was Korotkevich, who once wrote “The Wild Hunt of King Stakh.” I reread it and was amazed: the real Belarusian Umberto Eco. And completely underrated!
— Which of the Russian literary awards, in your opinion, is the most prestigious and not biased? In other words, what prize do you dream of winning?
— You know, about a hundred years ago Kipling was going to be awarded some wildly honorable British order. And for this they even invited him to an audience with the king. However, he refused and wrote on the invitation: “Your Majesty! Let me live and die simply as Kipling." Modern literary awards cause me nothing but despondency. Neither National Best, nor the Big Book, nor even more so the ridiculous Russian Booker. The jury of these awards missed everything that was interesting in recent years. The prize was not given to Robski, Alexey Ivanov, Krusanov, or Danilkin. And if they gave it to Bykov and Prilepin, it was for some completely absurd books. So personally, I would like to live and die simply as Ilya Stogov.
— Judging by your statements, the main drawback of Russia is the lack of freedom in it. How do you manage to live in captivity for so many years? Reveal the secret.
“I don’t think I phrased it exactly like that.” Who is silencing the press today? Who tramples my civil rights into the asphalt with forged boots? Nobody! Recently, for the sake of sport, I went to a political rally for the first time in my life. Please! Shout as much as you like! Another thing is that three and a quarter people took part in this rally. It's not about freedom, but about total indifference. Russians have always delegated their rights to the top without any doubt: decide for yourself, I don’t care. If they tell me to go to war, I’ll go and die. If they tell me to go to a rally, I’ll go there too. If they tell me to disperse the same rally, I will disperse it. Indifference and humility, Asian contempt for life (both one’s own and that of others) - this is what seriously surprises me in my own country.
— By the way, you have visited about fifty countries. Which state, according to your observations, has the most freedom?
- I think more than fifty. Although I never counted it. But measuring freedom by countries is, in my opinion, a dubious idea. Countries are not free, only individuals are. It is believed, for example, that representatives of the Leningrad underground (all these Brodskys and Dovlatovs) lived under conditions of harsh communist pressure. However, these people were absolutely free. So free, as neither today's Russians nor today's Americans have ever dreamed of.
— You have written many books about Russian rock music. What bands will you still be listening to in twenty years?
“You know, when I was fifteen years old, I listened to those who were then in their early twenties, and they seemed like creepy old men to me.” And today I’m almost forty and I already seem like an old man at rock and roll concerts. But at the same time, I prefer to listen to those who, again, are in their early twenties. It is there that the heart of Russian poetry beats today: Feo from the group “Psyche” and Assai from the group “Krec” speak words about today’s world that you will not find anywhere else. I hope that when I reach sixty, I will still start listening to the guys who will then be in their early twenties.
— What new book are you going to launch at the autumn Moscow book fair?
“What I’ve never thought about is timing the release of any of my books to coincide with the fair.” It's more like Moscow. Let my publisher think about advertising strategies and good sales. It will be enough for me to think that the book itself is good.
— In one of your recent speeches in the newspaper “Metro - St. Petersburg” you once complained that (I quote verbatim) “the two thousandth turned out to be a hangover. My eyelid is completely drained." What is the reason for such a pessimistic statement?
“I recently went to South America, and when I returned, it turned out that in the jungle I had picked up some very unpleasant infection. Everything seemed to work out fine, the tests were good, but throughout the past year I was constantly thinking about death. I'm almost forty. I didn't think I would live to this age. And if in childhood death seemed unimportant, insignificant, now I finally began to understand that we were talking about my own death. About the fact that other people will continue to live, and my personal body will be buried in the ground. This doesn't make me feel very happy.
— And yet, despite the hangover present, what are your plans and hopes for the future?- Don't know. In the near future I will go to Transcaucasia, and from there, probably, to Denmark. By September I’m thinking of launching another book series and maybe I’ll be able to make a radio program. And then, really, I don’t know. God will give you the day, God will give you food for thought.
How girls with manicures make book ratings, why the history of literature does not exist and how much you can earn from translating your book - presenter Fyodor Pogorelov and writer Ilya Stogov discussed on air [Fontanka.Office].
The first appearance of the writer Stogov on the project [Fontanka.Office]. We usually answer for such things - within the framework of the “Big Interview”, where every question is the same and in its place.
In preparation for the interview, I opened a list of the most popular books in Russia for 2015. It is headed by Donna Tartt with her novel The Goldfinch. And I’m surprised and don’t really understand how this is possible. Next come Akunin “God and the Rogue”, Prilepin “The Abode”, Lukyanenko “The Sixth Watch” and James “50 Shades of Gray” closes the top five. How much does this list reflect the state of mind in our wonderful society?
– What you are reading, I can imagine how it appeared. This girl is sitting there. I've already finished my manicure. Then I looked into the online store, looked at what my friends were reading - and this book hit parade appeared. Most of the names you mentioned mean nothing to every normal citizen in our country. Lukyanenko publishes an average of three novels a year, with a circulation of forty thousand. Prilepin’s “Abode” cannot be ahead of Lukyanenko, because it was released in a circulation of 2 thousand copies three years ago. This is a biased chart. A normal person does not read modern prose. If this were an objective hit parade, then the first place would be the collection of Lermontov, Gogol... Why? Because the school curriculum. These are the books they buy. But these fashionable show-offs... that Zakharka Prilepin released “Obitel” and removed everyone - it’s a little strange for me to listen to.