You don’t have enough objectivity to evaluate Ehrenburg. I know that you evaluate him in light of one White Guard phrase about the national flag on an automobile, which he wrote in the Kiev Whites’ newspaper in a passing fit. After that, you refuse to countenance anything he writes.
This is not right. Ehrenburg is a great writer. Both The Second Day and Without Pausing for Breath are superb, masterfully written books. And such was the unanimous opinion of the Soviet critics. Ehrenburg is a writer of real complexity. He has internalized the technical skills of French literature, and he has introduced traditions of literary treatment of the written word into the Soviet literary tradition—which were always weak in our literary tradition, and wholly lacking in Ostrovsky. Ostrovsky doesn’t really write at all … It’s interesting to note that Ostrovsky finished writing his book in the evening, and in the morning sent it off by post. What naïveté!
And read Ehrenburg’s poetry. Poetry doesn’t deceive. He’s a poet of great sensitivity, a true one.
DECEMBER 28, 1935
My dear friend, I am forcing myself to sit down to write you a detailed letter. It pains me to have to write it. This postcard information exchange is so ice-bound, so slippery (in addition to being irresponsible).
But in the last postcard you informed me that you had already written a long letter, with an “analysis of our relations,” which was, moreover, cruel, in the tradition of “necessary cruelties.”
If you have not yet sent it, please do not. I do not need it; nor do you.
We have had a quarrel, a married couple’s quarrel. I want to resolve it, to end it, to put it behind us, to expunge it completely from the record. But you, on the other hand, want to explain things, to “teach me understanding.” I take everything back; I repent.
My unfounded apprehensions about you, my vain interrogations, my inappropriate advice—let’s assume I didn’t write any of it. They were empty words and phrases. But, please, I beg you, let’s leave behind the unpleasantness.
What was it that happened? In fact, it was trivial—something that in our former existence would have been resolved and forgotten momentarily. But here, at a distance, with miles and years interposed between us, a paltry thing becomes a large grievance.
But now it is gone, all is forgotten. Let’s begin anew. We will write to each other about ordinary, daily things, about the details of life; about joys, and our small tribulations, and the joys of our small tribulations (as Rolland would say).
JANUARY 19, 1936
My sweet friend, today I got up early, before eight, when it was still dark. I hurried out into the morning frost, under urgent physiological stimulus. I met up with the dog Roska, the unfortunate Roska. Every morning she is locked into a dark kennel, and in the evening they let her out. She never sees the light of day. She throws herself at me in greeting, and twists and twirls joyously. I always whisper the same words to her: “Poor dog, poor Roska.” If I come home late, she senses through the closed gate that it’s me and doesn’t bark. While I’m making my way over the fence, she again launches into her hysterical show of friendship. Once, in the darkness, she didn’t recognize me and started barking with hostility. When she got close enough to recognize me, she felt compunction and wanted me to understand that it was a mistake, that she didn’t mean it. She did her little somersaults and twirled around yelping and whining twice as much as usual. I whispered to her, “Poor little dog, poor little Roska, it’s all right, I’m not angry.”
I stand in the yard a long time, watching the predawn sky, which I usually don’t get to see. I know the evening sky well. I can pick out the constellations easily; but I don’t often see the morning sky. The Big Dipper is situated differently, almost showing off its rear end, right above my head. The stars shine with a particular morning brightness. You can see how the entire bulwark—the vault of the sky—shifted over half the sky during those eight hours when I wasn’t watching. What a magnificent book it is for those who know how to read it! One of the first books that humanity learned to read, before hieroglyphs and alphabets were invented.
Yesterday morning, I took part in a weekend concert broadcast on the radio. It was devoted to contemporary Soviet poetry. We have a well-educated consultant from the library here, a literary critic. They read the work of poets I don’t know welclass="underline" Antokolsky, Petrovsky (a LEF writer, reminiscent of Khlebnikov), and others. Some of the poems were set to music, which I played. And since it was impossible to choose the pieces beforehand, I boldly improvised. My musical accompaniment to Bagritsky’s poem “The Lay of Opanas” was very apt, in particular the gloomy melody I hit upon for Makhno. I still can’t get them out of my head. After the concert, there was a meeting about organizing musical programs for the radio. I was offered the position of music director, which I very eagerly accepted; but I’m not sure whether anything will come of it. Whatever I do, wherever I find myself, I am above all a “Kulturträger,” a culture bearer; I am very ardent and energetic about such matters, and if nothing gets done, it is not my fault.
In Fedin’s Brothers, there is a marvelous passage about German culture. I will cite it here from memory: “This musical culture achieved such heights because whole generations of unknown conductors, musical directors, and choirmasters, brick by brick, constructed the foundation of knowledge out of which the masterpieces of Bayreuth and Düsseldorf grew. And Nikita wanted to return to the native soil of his Chagin, where he had known his first love and his first hate, in order to put down his bricks.”
I’m not very good with bricks. At the STP I set down a brick, but here in Biysk I haven’t managed yet. Perhaps it will happen on the radio.
JANUARY 24, 1936
My dear friend and wife, your last letter, in which you write about celebrating the New Year, is a fine letter, from start to finish. Every line sings, beginning with the chintz garters, and ending with the tears you shed over pages of the newspaper. At last you’ve told me the issue in which your own work was printed. I immediately dashed down to the library. In two libraries, the entire set of Our Achievements had been sent off to be bound, so I’ll have to wait. In the third library, they don’t subscribe to it. And the fourth—I’ll visit tomorrow.
I read Rolland’s Musicians of Today and returned to an old idea: to write a textbook on the history of music. A textbook for schools, clubs, and radio listeners. I set to work with enthusiasm, although there’s precious little literature devoted to this subject. If you happen to come upon any music books from my library, send them to me. You don’t have to make a special effort, but anything you come across might help. The local library here has ordered a few dozen books from Moscow for me.
I’m already working on the first three chapters: (1) folk music, (2) European music which Vitya could not have known before Bach, and (3) Bach. The draft of the book will be ready by the end of this year. When I am able to use the big library, I’ll spend a few months making additions to it. The first chapter, on folk music, is virtually finished. I haven’t hit upon the proper style yet. My literary style surpasses my scholarly style; it sounds very dry at present. But I will revise it many more times. I like this task. No other such book exists yet. For me it is more than just another literary pastime. The Biysk library has initiated an inter-library-loan subscription with the Novosibirsk library, which receives a copy of every single book published in the Soviet Union. They arranged this especially for me. When it begins to function, I will be provided with all the books that come out, and I’ll be able to work more quickly and efficiently. The radio should also help—I need to listen again to dozens of composers. On my desk I have the radio program of all the concerts for the month. I’ve underlined the ones I need to hear.