Dmitry Prigov (1940-2007)

Дмитрий Пригов

Пригов. Черномырдин. (D. Prigov. Chernomyrdin, Russian Prime Minister, 1938-2010 and Yogi Berra of Russia)

By the early sixties Russian poetry came to a standstill. It was dominated by shallow water philistinism or kukish v karmane―literally, middle finger in one’s pocket―covert bites against Soviet Communism, sometimes so obscure, that only the authors themselves could explain their purported civic message. Mandelstam and Kharms were long dead, proscribed and forgotten by everybody except a small band of standard-bearers (Oberiyt I. Bakhterev, and Chinar Druskin in the case of Kharms) and close personal friends (Mandelstam’s widow Nadezhda).  Pasternak was already in his grave, though, for preceding decade, his time and thoughts were occupied mainly by his prose projects. Anna Akhmatova, Grand Dame of Russian poetry was infirm and died soon. Mr. Brodsky, the future Poet Laureate of the United States, was becoming famous but more as an uncompromising rebel, than a top-notch literary figure, which he became in exile, a kind of overweight John Dean. Suddenly, from nowhere, there materialized a sculpture student, short even by the standards of Russian conceptualist: his gnomic silhouette was at least once used as the cameo in the flick “Taxi blues” by Pavel Loungin. 
          Many people at the time even thought that his legal name was a pseudonym, derived from the English prick.  His incessant narrations, clippings from the Soviet Newspeak, street mumblings, cycles studying a “subject”: God, People or Love, immediately took center stage in Soviet avant-garde. Prigov was the only modernist poet I can remember, whose poems were distributed, oh no, not in Samizdat even, but on recorder tapes read by the sardonic voice of their author. For Dima, the Bohr's eulogy that the world might remember Einstein as a great scientist but for his personal acquaintances he will always be remembered as a great friend would be equally applicable. 
          His conceptualist drawings consisting of lines, language fragments and monsters, and his tireless energy in organizing underground exhibitions, poetry readings and happenings of Soviet avant-garde changed Russian literary landscape forever and provided him a firm place among such catalysts of novel art in all its forms and shapes as Gumilev or Guillaume Apollinaire. But his poetry is exquisite, too. 

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Remarkably, out of his reported 33 thousand poems it is hard to select a few, which are representative or even comprehensible without inclusion in his monumental cycles like Милицанер (The Pollissman) or the series of his Obituaries. But this one was published on one remembrance site and is quite fit as his epitaph.


Сжигать все до последней птицы
И убегать в свою берлогу –
Такой вот партизанский принцип
И выше - партизанский логос
Не то, чтобы здесь всякий занят
Подобным, но мы партизане
Отчасти
Все
Отчасти
Кроме тех редких, кто
                                    полностью

To burn the everything till the last bird
And run to own lair--
This is a law of a guerrilla/partisan warfare
and higher still--its logos
Not even that is everyone is busy
As partisan as such
But some we all are
Partially
Everybody
Partially
Except for those rare who

                                   Entirely

This short poem about the battle of Kulikovo (1380)--a pivotal event in Russian history--is the most unusual (if such term can be applied to D. P.). It shows the battle from G-d perspective and, moreover, from the perspective of doubting and vacillating G-d. Battle of Kulikovo was won by the Russians but avenged by Tartars only two years later in a sack of Moscow. Yet, the victory of Kulikovo was a definitive event in a creation of the Russian nation from disparate Eastern Slavic tribes.


Куликовская битва

Вот всех я по местам расставил
Вот этих справа я поставил
Вот этих слева я поставил
Всех прочих на потом оставил
Поляков на потом оставил
Французов на потом оставил
И немцев на потом оставил
Вот ангелов своих наставил
И сверху воронов поставил
И прочих птиц вверху поставил
А снизу поле предоставил
Для битвы поле предоставил
Его деревьями уставил
Дубами-елями уставил
Кустами кое-где обставил
Травою мягкой застелил
Букашкой мелкой населил
Пусть будет все, как я представил
Пусть все живут, как я заставил
Пусть все умрут, как я заставил
Так победят сегодня русские
Ведь неплохие парни русские
И девки неплохие русские
Они страдали много, русские
Терпели ужасы нерусские
Так победят сегодня русские

Что будет здесь, коль уж сейчас
Земля крошится уж сейчас
И небо пыльно уж сейчас
Породы рушатся подземные
И воды мечутся подземные
И твари мечутся подземные
И люди бегают наземные
Туда-сюда бегут приземные
И птицы поднялись надземные
Все птицы-вороны надземные

А все ж татары поприятнее
И имена их поприятнее
И голоса их поприятнее
Да и повадка поприятнее
Хоть русские и поопрятнее
А все ж татары поприятнее

Так пусть татары победят
Отсюда все мне будет видно
Татары, значит, победят...
А впрочем — завтра будет видно

© Д.А.Пригов


The Battle of Kulikovo

I here put all them in place
These--to the right place
And others--to the left
I left all others for the future
The Poles I left for near future
The French I left for distant future
And also Germans for the future

I put my angels everywhere
And put the ravens over here
And other birds put over there
The field presented down here
The battle field is down here

I put the trees all over here
The oak, fir trees over here
And yet some bushes--here and there
The grass will soft be down there
The smallish bugs will crawl there
Let all it be as I perceived
Let all yet live as I conceived
Let all yet die as I conceived

Because they will win today, the Russians
Because they are fine lads, the Russians
And Russian girls are also fine
They suffered so much those Russians
They suffered horrors from non-Russians
So they must win today

What will here happen if this now
The Earth is crumbling here now
And sky is dusty even now
The ores are crumbling underground
The waters whirl in underground
And beasts are running underground
And people are running overground
All to and fro run near ground
And birds are flying over ground
All birds and ravens over ground

But tartars are a little bit nicer
Their names are also a bit nicer
Their voices are all over nicer
And their customs are much nicer
Though Russians are a kind-a neater
But tartars are nicer altogether

So let then tartars win today
I will see everything from here
The tartars shall get their victory...
However--we'll see tomorrow

This short poem was written when Perestroika threatened to destabilize a convenient totalitarian "paradise" with all its certainties. As always Prigov was absolutely right...


Нам всем грозит свобода
Свобода без конца
Без выхода, без входа
Без матери-отца

Посередине Руси,
За весь прошедший век
И я ее страшуся
Как честный человек

We're threatened by th' freed'm
The freed'm of no sense
Without even parents
Without means and ends

In midst of Mother Russia
For all the past eons
And I'm afraid of freed'm
As honorable man