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141 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1930
…on the face of each young Pioneer girl there remained a trace of the difficulty, the feebleness of early life, meagerness of body and beauty of expression. But the happiness of childhood friendship, the realization of the future world in the play of youth and in the worthiness of their own severe freedom signified on the childish faces important gladness, replacing for them beauty and domestic plumpness.
In the church burned many candles; the light of the silent, sad wax illuminated the entire interior of the building right up to the cupola above the hiding place of the sacred relics, and the cleanwashed faces of the saints stared out into the dead air with an expression of equanimity, like inhabitants of that other peaceful world – but the church was empty.
But sleep required forgiveness of past grief and the peace of a mind that trusts in life, whereas Voshchev was lying there in a dry tension of awareness, and he did not know whether he was of use to the world or whether everything would get along fine without him. A gust of wind blew from an unknown place, so that people would not suffocate, and a dog on the outskirts let it be known, in a weak voice of doubt, that it was on duty.
“The dog’s bored. It’s like me - living only thanks to its birth.”
Looking at the bear, all blackened and scorched, Nastya rejoiced that he was on our side and not on the bourgeoisie’s.
“He suffers too,” she said, “so that means he’s for Stalin, doesn’t it?”
“You bet it does!” replied Chiklin.
"Now we feel nothing at all - only dust and ashes remain in us." (104)I appreciate many forms of literature; three particular (and often interwoven) kinds occupy elevated spots: Russian literature, Soviet-era literature, and prison literature/literature of rebellion. Dostoevsky, Grossman, Solzhenitsyn, Shalamov, Koestler – I could go on naming favorite writers that combine some or all of these categories. One person who fits them rather swimmingly, and whom I had not previously read, is Platonov. I figured that I couldn't go wrong with The Foundation Pit, which his major novel and a damning allegory of the Soviet Russian state (Platonov was one of the first Russian thinkers to criticize as inhumane Stalin's plans for collectivization). It wasn't as good as I had expected, however. In particular, Platonov's prose was often clumsy and even difficult to bear in places. To offer just a small example: the words 'boring' and 'boringly' are repeated conspicuously and to eventual annoyance (and without consistency in meaning – referring here to boredom, there more to something like annoyance or even despair) throughout the text. The fact that the English was often awkward, and – to my mind – straightforward to corrected so as to read more smoothly, without apparent loss of meaning, points towards a poor translation; so I'll give Platonov the benefit of the doubt. I'll definitely read more of his work, and will try to avoid the Chandlers' translations.
"Perhaps the only writer to have advanced Russian prose beyond what had already been achieved by Chekhov.This claim is simply outrageous to me – at least based on the text of The Foundation Pit that I read. I'll have to read more by Platonov to be sure; but I highly doubt that his writing will overshadow the beautiful prose of Vasily Grossman, to name just one of the many great Russian writers since Chekhov.
"Without truth I simply feel ashamed to be alive." (34)
"كل الفلاحين الفقراء والمتوسطين عملوا مع مثل هذه الزمرة من الحياة كما لو كانوا يريدون العثور على الخلاص لأنفسهم إلى الأبد في هاوية حفرة الأساس"