Relatively recently in conversation with someone I wondered - what ways are there generally for a person who doesn't live in this culture to understand someone else's culture?
The first idea, of course, was to read books. You immerse yourself in an atmosphere you don't really have a chance to be in - that's the point of literature, isn't it?
The second question to myself was: "And what should a conditional Czech read to understand the Russian soul?"
We tell everyone endlessly about our deep soul, surely someone described it?
Not a single book came to mind where the plot was specifically this description of the soul, so I had to think further.
Decided to go from the opposite - what Czech thing did I read to understand the local people better. After which book did it become a bit easier and more interesting to live here?
Kundera's "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" came to mind.
Briefly - a book about '68 (what else, it's Czech Republic after all), about how good people suffered.
And here came the understanding that if you read this book in Russia, the only thing this book will be about is the Prague Spring.
If you read this book while being in Czech Republic for several years, the book starts playing with completely new colors.
I confess, I don't remember anything from the plot about '68, but I remember a lot about the experiences and philosophy of the characters. That's where the substance was - for a Russian reader the characters' character and motivation will be incomprehensible.
SPOILER ALERT
Click here at your own risk - if you haven't read "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" or "Crime and Punishment", below I talk about minor plot details.
Is the character and motivation of the plowboy-fuckboy understandable to Russians? Yes, absolutely. Only after reading it seems that all men in Czech Republic are like that. In reality, all men want to be like that but can't.
Same with the heroines - there are none like them here in life.
I remember 3 scenes that best describe the real Czech soul:
- the umbrella scene when Tereza was crossing the road (this is generally one of my favorite chapters in literature describing Czech Republic perfectly)
- how Tereza sniffed the smell of another woman's vagina in Tomas's hair
- the dying dog and normal human experiences about it
Same thing with "Crime and Punishment".
I started reading the book after seeing on one English-language site that it's a fucking awesome book, actually about crime and punishment.
Like its meaning is that after every crime you'll feel bad, no matter what.
Only I as a Russian, having read this book, see absolutely nothing about this. The whole book is just a description of that very "Russian soul".
The main crime was committed long before the murder, and it's a classic Russian one: poverty, being principled until a point and then shit hits the fan, overthinking. This crime made Raskolnikov a killer, Sonya a prostitute, her father a drunk.
The punishment isn't hard labor. The punishment is: Raskolnikov's reasoning about the trembling creature, Sonya who went to the bottom from which there's no rising, etc.
In other words, absolutely all punishments were committed before the book started - this is very difficult for a person far from Russian culture to understand. It seems it would be more correct to call the book "Punishment and Crime", but then you'd have to THINK WHY.
Well, if someone asked me what to read to understand the Russian soul quickly, for free and without SMS - it'll be the chapter about how the killer and the harlot discuss the Bible.
And yes, I have no fucking idea how I was supposed to understand this in school if it barely dawned on me at 30
Read books, fucking get smarter, fuck.