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We’ve been independent from the start, which means we’re not connected with any academic institution, wealthy benefactor, or part of a larger publishing company. Kurkov’s translator, Boris Dralyuk, renders the warmth of Sergey’s inner voice from the original Russian without letting the earnestness creep into the saccharine . Als angeblicher Separatistenfreund wird Sergej angegriffen und aus dem ukrainischen Hinterland vertrieben. Graue Zone“ wird auch das Niemandsland zwischen den ukrainischen Truppen und den von Russland unterstützten Separatisten genannt, die sich im Donbass gegenüberstehen.
Sergeyich even still has a car, and eventually he decides to head for Crimea -- the part of Ukraine illegally (re)appropriated by Russia in 2014 -- as a sort of outing for his bees and also to try to reconnect with Akhtem, who had been Sergeyich's roommate at a beekeepers' conference a quarter of a century earlier. We believe that literature builds community—and if reading The Rumpus makes you feel more connected, please show your support! The village has completely emptied out, its inhabitants all fleeing, save for Sergeyich and one other local, Pashka Khmelenko. His is an effervescent presence that vibrates with the same purity of spirit as his bees, and this reader at least cannot help but feel soothed and enriched. In the latter he is a stranger and observing a religion not his own like ‘ a bee in an unknown hive,’—which is all viewed through the white gaze and the moments of him not understanding Muslim traditions are rather awkward despite best intentions—creating a common thread of humanity at odds with the overall conflict while also recognizing that marginalized groups are facing greater threats.In particular, he is attuned to the slightest variations in the behavior of his bees, such as the intensity of the buzzing emanating from their hives.
And while Sergeyich doesn’t see himself as concerned with the war, he ends up becoming more involved than he would like to, all the same.
El tudok képzelni egy olyan regényt, ami ugyanilyen remekbe szabott felépítmény - csak éppen nem az orosz világrend elutasításáig vezet el minket kézen fogva, hanem magába az orosz világrendbe. But now looking at the news, I’m not even sure whether the grey zone is still there or the Russian troops have moved in. The dreams—and the brief moments of friendship and conviviality Sergeyich enjoys while on his journey—offer needed respite, because the book is also filled with cruelty. This blog is dedicated to book reviews, everything related to literature, travel as well as reflections on art and slow living.
Sergeyich's experiences over the course of the novel are mostly of the fairly simple sort, and Kurkov wisely stays mostly away from the overtly political, Sergeyich very careful as to how he positions himself. There are Sergeyich’s bees of course who mean everything to him, and they happy hums make him a happy man. It is the middle of the night, but Sergeyich packs up his bees and heads to the Crimea, now occupied by Russia. He has been compared to Mikhail Bulgakov and Franz Kafka, with government paperwork and the absurdity of systems playing out in the background being a large theme that does invoke them, though I find the former a more apt comparison particularly with how frequently near-presceint dream sequences that dip into surrealism which inform the narrator’s logic and do a lot of the heavy lifting for the novel’s symbolism.There are many female characters throughout the book who always seem care for Sergeyich and symbolise the emotional strength during the times of the profound suffering caused by the war. Even though Sergeyich is treated well by the Tatar community as well as officials and local authorities, there is always this anxious atmosphere as he never knows how the ones in the power or from the other communities will react to him – a man from Grey Zone. A Guggenheim, Cullman, and Berlin Prize fellow, she is currently at work on a new translation of Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain. And, of course, the communal activity of the bees contrasts nicely with the much more discordant interactions among humans all around him . Silence of course is an arbitrary thing, a personal aural phenomenon that people adjust for themselves.
where nature not only serves people but dotes on them; where the sun waits to depart until people have finished their daily tasks; where the air rings with countless unseen bells; where one can be free and invisible; where every living thing — every tree, every vine — has its own voice.
he tuned his ears to the colourful sonorous silence of the world around him, the now silent flying-crying creature suddenly forgotten.
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