Leonid TsypkinRezensionen

Der Berg Ararat, ein ruhender Vulkan im türkisch-armenisch-iranisch-aserbaidschanischen Grenzgebiet, ist das Ziel einer Auslandsreise von Boris Lwowitsch und seiner Frau Tanja. Aufgeregt sind sie ob der Eindrücke der Fremde, wo alles so anders verläuft als in der sowjetischen Hauptstadt, wo der Jurist und die Verwaltungsangestellte angesehene Leute sind. Aber was soll man auch erwarten, fernab des Machtzentrums, wo sich die Menschen verdächtig verhalten und sogar erdreisten Boris und Tanja kurzerhand aus dem Hotel zu werfen. Eine Reise mit Hindernissen, die jedoch auch zeigt, was möglich sein könnte, in einem anderen Land, in einem anderen Leben.

Der russische Mediziner und Autor Leonid Borissowitsch Zypkin schrieb weitgehend für die Schublade, nachdem sein Sohn und dessen Frau aus der Sowjetunion ausgewandert waren und der Autor mit einem Veröffentlichungsverbot belegt wurde. Sein bekanntester Roman „Ein Sommer in Baden-Baden“ musste über Bekannte außer Landes geschmuggelt werden und wurde in New York veröffentlicht, nur eine Woche bevor Zypkin einem Herzanfall erlag. „Die Winde des Ararat“ entstand unter dem Titel „Norartakir“ bereits in den 1970ern, jetzt erstmals in deutscher Übersetzung.

Eines der Kapitel ist mit „Rache“ überschrieben, was symptomatisch für den Roman ist. Boris und Tanja gehören zu jenen, denen es im sowjetischen Moskau gut geht, die sich Auslandsreisen erlauben können. Doch sie können nicht schätzen, welches Glück sie haben und so rächt sich die fremde Welt an ihnen. Das System, das sie noch verteidigen, wendet sich gegen sie und trifft sie mit voller Härte, indem sie ihr Zimmer für eine Gruppe unbedeutender Menschen räumen müssen und zu Bittstellern werden.

Das Buch als Ganzes kann als Rache des Autors gegen das Land gelesen werden, das ihm das Veröffentlichen untersagte. Das Land war festgefahren wie Boris und Tanja, begrenzt im Blick, unfähig sich zu öffnen und zu entwickeln.

Literatur aus dem inneren Exil, da das äußere verwehrt blieb. Heute ein lesenswertes Zeitzeugnis.

Bewonderenswaardig en koortsig boek waarin de ik-persoon tijdens een treinrit naar en bezoek aan Leningrad/Sint-Petersburg de dagboeken van Anna Grigorjevna Dostojevskaja leest, meer bepaald over de zomer van 1867, wanneer het echtpaar Dostojevski (het casino van) Baden-Baden aandoet. Dostojevski blijkt een kleinzerige, afgunstige, jaloerse, spilzieke, gokverslaafde, antisemitische, schreeuwerige, bijgelovige, paranoïde en haatdragende man te zijn, die niettemin gebiologeerd is door het lijden van de mensheid. Aangrijpend verslag van zijn laatste levensuren. Bijzondere stijl.

What a hidden gem this is. Tsypkin weaves together his own spiritual journey to Dostoevsky’s last house in St. Petersburg in the present with Dostoevsky’s travels abroad in the past, in particular to Baden-Baden, where the author was so famously addicted to gambling. His style is fast-paced and breathless, perfect to the feverish nature of the story, and he uses all the right touches, paying homage to Russian literature, but at the same time, remaining clear-eyed, sober, and accurate.

I’ll be frank: Dostoevsky is shown to be irritable, petty, jealous, obsessive, and an overall pain in the ass. He’s extremely awkward, and blurts out all the wrong things in social situations. His treatment of his second wife is poor, pawning off her things again and again to throw money away at the roulette wheel. His meetings with the polished and Westernized Turgenev are memorably described: “Tugenev’s eyes had followed him through the lorgnette extremely intently, as if the lorgnette’s owner were afraid he would be bitten by a mad dog at any moment…”. Each had some level of grudging respect for the other, but because of their personalities and differing views on the West, conflict was inevitable.

Dostoevsky had been humiliated in prison, suffered from epileptic fits, was afraid of being laughed at, and desperately wanted to be accepted. He knew what suffering was, and gave alms to every beggar he saw, almost to a comical degree. He knew the power of spirituality, but at the same time knew doubt, and channeled that into scenes like that of the Grand Inquisitor in The Brothers Karamazov. He once begged for a pardon for a drunk who had literally punched him in the face, and then paid the man’s fine when it was levied. He knew he was deeply flawed, and sought forgiveness and redemption.

Tsypkin’s own story is also quite touching. A doctor whose position was punitively reduced after his son and daughter-in-law emigrated to the United States in 1977s, he wrote in his spare time for the sake of writing, never expecting to be published in the Soviet Union. This book was smuggled out of the country in 1982 and published in America; Tsypkin got word of that from his son and “was an author” for seven days before having a heart attack and dying.

In one of the interesting bits of introspection, Tsypkin wonders why he and other Jews like Dostoevsky despite his anti-Semitism, even if it was pretty common in the 19th century. “…it struck me as being strange to the point of implausibility that a man so sensitive in his novels to the sufferings of others, this jealous defender of the insulted and injured who fervently and even frenetically preached the right to exist of every earthly creature and sang a passionate hymn to each little leaf and every blade of grass – that this man should not have come up with even a single word in the defence or justification of a people persecuted over several thousands of years – could he have been so blind? - or was he perhaps blinded by hatred?” And later: “what, in fact, was I doing here? - why was I so strangely attracted and enticed by the life of this man who despised me and my kind (and deliberately so or with his eyes wide open, as he liked to put it)? – why had I come here under cover of darkness, walking along these empty and godforsaken streets like a thief?...”

There are no simple answers, or really any answers, proffered. One suspects it’s appreciation for Dostoevsky’s tortured soul, his humaneness, and his great depth as an author. This book is certainly a must for any fan of Dostoevsky, or of Russian literature in general, and I wish I had read it while on my own spiritual journey to Dostoevsky’s House-Museum in St. Petersburg. However, the book speaks to such basic truths and is so well written, I would recommend it to anyone.

Quotes:
On humiliation:
“…and once again he was flying downhill, bruising himself painfully against things and feeling that he had nothing to hold on to – and that whole theory of his about falling was worthless – he had simply invented it to make his injuries less painful, presenting the wounds to himself and everyone else surrounded by the self-sacrificial halo of some great ‘idea’ – but do we not all do the same thing, deceiving ourselves time and again as we think up convenient theories designed to soften the blows continually rained on us by fate or to justify our own failures and weaknesses? – and is this not the explanation of the so-called crisis which Dostoevsky went through during his penal servitude? – could his morbid pride ever have become reconciled with the humiliations to which he was subjected there? – no, he had only one way out: to consider these humiliations as his just desserts – ‘I bear a cross, and I have deserved it,’ he wrote in one of his letters…”

On Pushkin, I found it insightful and likely true:
“…but you will probably never find as fierce and passionate an admirer of Pushkin as Dostoevsky, for whom Pushkin may have been just as unattainable an antithetical dream as Stavrogin, embodying as he did harmony of spirit (though it may only have appeared that way), a high sense of honour (did Dostoevsky know how loyally Pushkin used to bow to Count Orlov at the Mariinsky Theatre?), strength and constancy of character (did Dostoevsky realized that the Decembrists did not really trust Pushkin very much, considering him both unstable and indiscreet?) and finally the nonchalance of a seducer who always achieved success (here there is really nothing to add in brackets, as Pushkin’s perfection in this sphere was genuinely beyond dispute) – or perhaps the antithetical element lay elsewhere: Dostoevsky the prose-writer was perhaps the most passionate poet and romantic of his age, while Pushkin the poet was possibly the most sober realist of his – but the most important thing, however, was that they lived in different times so that Dostoevsky managed to avoid being the object of one of the poet’s sarcastic epigrams – and if had been, Pushkin would undoubtedly have been ranged with all the other literary enemies of Dostoevsky and might even have held a leading position.”

Lastly, this ending, which reminded me of another Doctor-Author, Anton Chekhov:
“…and the girl went on ahead, like a guide, or perhaps she was simply ashamed of her parents – and in the haloes around the street-lights on Svechnoy Lane snowflakes were slowly circulating – I was approaching the Ligovka, and somewhere behind me was a semi-dark, endlessly straight street all covered in snow which the wind was piling into drifts, lined with silent tenement buildings and with the darkest and most silent of all – at the corner.
A few minutes later I was already in the tram heading towards Gilya’s house, and half an hour later after that I was once again chatting with her, sitting on Mozya’s sofa, as she told me about the Blockade, about Mozya, about the year ’37, and outside lay the wintry Petersburg night, and each time a tram clattered past down below, the whole house together with Mozya’s lamp shuddered, like a ship straining at its moorings.”

This may well be the most extraordinary book I know. T. found his breathless style interweaving the past with the present, the inclusion of stark black-and-white photographs (reminiscent of Sebald), in isolation from contemporary world-literature. Living in the Soviet Union, a medical researcher by profession, Tsypkin wrote without hope of being published, solely for the drawer. We must thank Susan Sontag for rescuing this work. She tells us in the Introduction how she rediscovered an obscure edition, about Tsypkin’s life and much more: she calls the book an ‘I-novel’ known in the Japanese literature as shishosetsu : an autobiographical novel with fictional episodes - in the past: the summer Dostoyevsky spent in Baden-Baden, in the present: the narrator in search of Dostoyevsky. It is one of the rare books I like to re-read again and again. If you love Dostoyevsky don’t miss this book! (XII-15)

Zeer aardig verhaal dat helemaal draait rond de laatste vijftien jaar in het leven van de Russische schrijver Dostojevski. Het beschrijft de reis van de auteur met zijn tweede vrouw naar het Duitse kuuroord Baden-Baden, en uiteindelijk ook zijn laatste levensdagen, bijna 15 jaar later. We leren alle onhebbelijkheden van Dostojevski kennen: zijn gokverslaving, zijn paranoïde minderwaardigheidscomplex, zijn verachting voor Duitsers en joden, zijn onmogelijk karakter. Vooral de erg wisselende relatie met zijn tweede vrouw Anja wordt sterk in de verf gezet.
Leonid Tsypkin treedt op als 'ghostwriter', terwijl hij zelf per trein onderweg is van Moskou naar Leningrad (het huidige Sint-Petersburg), en daar ook de gebouwen bezoekt die aan Dostojevski herinneren.
Tsypkin springt over en weer tussen zijn eigen belevenissen en vooral die van de Dostojevski's. Zijn belangrijkste bron is het dagboek van Anna, de weduwe van Dostojevski, en dat kleurt natuurlijk het verhaal erg sterk. Bijzonder is de stijl van Tsypkin met zeer lange, periode-zinnen, zoals ik ze me alleen herinner uit mijn "Latijnse" tijd.
Het geheel is aardig, maar vooral toch te waarderen als je het oeuvre en het leven van Dostojevski goed kent.½

Written in a breathless, Thomas Bernhard-like style, every sentence a paragraph, sometimes lasting for pages--full of clauses and hyphens--describing Dostoevsky as compulsive, tortured by perceived slights and humiliations, and his wife as long-suffering yet infinitely patient, while the author himself is melancholic and transfixed.

Fraaie lange zinnen en knap verwoven levens van Dostojevski en de ik-figuur. Wel mist het verhaal inhoud en soms is de fantasie van de schrijver wat op hol geslagen.½

פנטזיה על דוסטוייבסקי ואשתו הטרייה בבאדן באדן

. סיפור על דוסטויבסקי ואשתו. ספר נשכח של מהפכן סובייטי נשכח שהתגלה במקרה על ידי סוזן זונטאג.

There are some books that are so good, that are so in tune with the reader’s current obsessions, that they create a conflict in the reader, a conflict between awe for the achievement of the author, and a kind of burning jealousy and sullen disheartenment that the author had the idea and executed it first. This is the book that I should have written, dammit!

This slim novel has two intertwined narratives and worlds. In the first, the narrator ‘Tsypkin’ is on a train journey from Moscow to Leningrad at some point during the late Soviet period. Day is waning, and it is deep winter. He is reading on his journey the Diaries of Anna Grigoryevna Dostoevskya, the writer’s second wife. He arrives in Leningrad, stays with an old friend, and in the morning goes to visit the Dostoevsky museum in Kuznechny Street. His impressions of his journey and his visit to Leningrad are interwoven with the impressions which arise in his mind engendered by the book he is reading, which form the second narrative.

In this narrative, the Dostoevskys are on their way to Baden Baden in the summer of 1867 to escape from the writer’s creditors. They stay in the spa town for a few months, where Dostoevsky is consumed with his passion for gambling and plagued by terrible fits of epilepsy, Anna is pregnant with their first child, they are harassed by money worries and ill treated by the natives of the town, and continuously insulted and humiliated.

This brief synopsis does little to convey the great power of this book, however, which lies chiefly in its prose style, and in its method...

Read the full review on The Lectern

Hooray! I loved this book so so so much. Such a wonderful style. And so ably translated, maintaining the long, looping sentence structure from the Russian. I cried when I read this. It was fantastic.

"I was on a train, traveling by day, but it was winter-time -- late December, the very depths -- and to add to it the train was heading north -- to Leningrad -- so it was quickly darkening on the other side of the windows -- bright lights of Moscow stations flashing into view and vanishing again behind me like the scattering of some invisible hand . . ."(Leonid Tsypkin, Summer in Baden-Baden, p 1).
So begins a literary doppleganger in the sense that there are two narratives, one of Leningrad and today and Leonid Tsypkin, and one of Petersburg and yesterday and Fedya and Anna. Tsypkin's novel mesmerizes with two stories that enthrall with emotion and truth. A taut gem of historical fiction that gets to the heart of Dostoevsky and appeals to all who have loved his work. The story clings to the real events of Dostoevsky's life torn form the pages of Anna's Diary and other sources that intertwine with Tsypkin's own modern journey. Among the themes of the book are those of all great Russian literature as seen through the painful experiences of Dostoevsky's own vices and the dreamlike desires of the narrator.
I was fascinated as the novel flowed back and forth between the first person I reflecting the narrator's memories and the third person scenes of fedya and Anna -- between past and present. The taut lyricism that keeps the novel short, even through the use of long sentences is difficult to compare with any other novel I have read. However, in its uniqueness I would place it with Rilke's Notebooks of Malt Laurids Brigge. Different in many ways but just as unique in its ability to haunt one's memory. Sadly, the author did not live to see the Engilsh-language publication of this novel. Like other great Russian authors he worked in the medical profession, but he left us a gift based on his passion for literature.

I'd long found the title of this novel very appealing, but decided I needed to read some Dostoevsky first as it is a fictionalised account of the time Dostoevsky and his young second wife, Anna Grigor'evna, spent in Germany in 1867.

It is a remarkable book in that it was written by Tsypkin some hundred years later purely out of a passion for Dostoevsky and not with the intention of having it published. In any case, it could not have been published in the Soviet Union. As the Dostoevskys travel first to Dresden and then to Baden-Baden, Tsypkin is on his way from Moscow to St Petersburg to visit the museum dedicated to the great writer and tread in his footsteps. These narrative threads interwine, also allowing us a glimpse of Soviet Russia, the boundaries of which Tsypkin never managed to cross, recreating Baden-Baden for us from his meticulous research (he was a medical researcher by profession, which no doubt accounts for his painstaking nature), including from Anna Grigor'evna's diaries.

Tsypkin's depiction of Dostoevsky as a passionate, short-tempered man haunted by memories of his exile and past and present humiliations helped me to understand those works of his I've read and will no doubt illuminate future reading of his books. He perceives insult everywhere and this, coupled with his hopeless gambling addiction, must have made him difficult to live with. Yet he and Anna Grigor'evna clearly adore each other. There is some lovely imagery of the couple 'swimming away together' at night.

The style is very striking - long, lyrical sentences where Tsypkin is prone to go off at a tangent, referring to past events in Dostevsky's life when describing the summer spent in Germany. But this is not as difficult for the reader to follow as it may sound - in fact it seems likely, from the portrayal of the writer in this book, that this is how his mind worked, horrible scenes of previous humiliation flashing before his eyes, interrupting the present. And you cannot help but lose yourself in this flow of thoughts and images. A wonderful book.

Wonderful book, if by "wonderful" you also mean claustrophobic, smelly, obsessive, unrewarding, culturally isolated, erudite beyond any point. This is a slightly fictional recreation of a summer Dostoevsky spent in Baden-Baden, written by a Russian author and Dostoevsky maniac (what is politely known as an "independent scholar") who is otherwise unknown, and now long dead. Susan Sontag attempts to raise this Lazarus of a manuscript, but it is really all about being dead: Dostoevsky's own life, on the edge of disaster; Tsypkin's life, cut off from the literary world and enslaved to his obsession; Sontag's literary resurrection project, doomed, now that she is dead, to the endless catalog of well-meaning introductions.

Stupendous book.

Leonid Tsypkin never saw his work published in his lifetime. For him, the posthumous SUMMER IN BADEN BADEN was a matter of honor that everything of a factual nature in the novel is true to the story and the circumstances of the real lives it evolves. It creatively proposes a two-fold narrative that travels back and forth in time from the start. The "presence" was wintertime. The narrator is on a train bound for Leningrad (once and future St. Petersburg) in mid April 1867. A flashback in time takes Tsypkin to the Dostoyevskys, who have just left St. Petersburg and were on their way to Dresden. Tsypkin, in what perspicacious and punctilious nature of a physician, thoroughly researched account of their travels and the passages where he described his own engagement are wholly autobiographical.

The originality of SUMMER IN BADEN BADEN lies in the way it swiftly moves from the dislocation of the narrator to the life of the peripatetic Dostoyevskys. Such dreamy nature does not clearly mark out a plot but delivers a sense of dreamy consciousness. The underlying framework is simple: Tsypkin, in his dream world, will stay in Leningrad for a few days, embarking on a solitary Dostoevsky pilgrimage that will end in a visit to the house where the writer died. In the other narrative, the newly wed Dostoevsky just began their impecunious travels.

SUMMER IN BADEN BADEN delivers a striking mental tour of Russian reality, making the novel a mere worship of Dostoevsky a rash understatement. Taken for granted were the sufferings of the Soviet era, from the Great Terror to the narrator's present: the purge of scholars, the unreasonable late-night arrest, the shortage of provisions, and inescapably the stories of the Leningrad Blockade. Tsypkin meticulously followed traces of Dostoevsky and his characters and summoned vivid memories from the past. He took pictures of the Raskolnikov house, of the old pawnbroker's house, of Sonechka's house and of buildings where Dostoevsky had lived during the darkest and most clandestine period of his life in the years immediately following threat of being stopped for filming unsuitable objects. Tsypkin even lingered around the spot where some drunken lout who punched him in the face overtook Dostoevsky. The victim begged the court to mitigate punishment on his assailant.

It is through the prism of Anna's excruciating grief that Tsypkin recreates the long deathbed hours in this book about love, married love and the love of literature. Dostoevsky had a difficult time believing that Anna Grigoryevna would become his wife and stenographer (taking down in shorthand words what he dictated to her) and remain in his house forever. She seemed to have yet felt the power she had already gained over and imbued into him. So much of Dostoevsky's debaucherous gambling had left Anna overwhelmed and frustrated. But the depth of the suffering and humiliation only galvanized and brought to the full actuality love and passion. Baden Baden became a symbol of nostalgia for the Dostoevskys.