DDR: Patriot: A Memoir by Alexei Navalny

This book is stamped (day when library processed it) November 18, 2024. Today is November 25...and this book's been sitting in my HOLDS at the library for several days. How's that for hot off the presses?

I have three DDR projects hanging fire right now: The Complete Novels of Dostoyevsky, The Collected Essays of Thomas Huxley, and My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgård. (Four if you count The Complete Kafka, but I don't think I do, actually.)

But I need another break from Knausgård, and I really want to read this Navalny book, so there it is.

It's 479 pages, probably a 16 day commitment. 

So let's go.

Day 1 DDRD 2,583) November 26, 2024

Read to page 40.

Found out (Wikipedia, thanks) that this was Navalny's second book, the first being Opposing Forces: Plotting the New Russia, so I might have to take another "detour" if this fills my sails as I'm thinking / hoping it will.

In order to get a running start on this, I watched HBO's Navalny, which was interesting, terrifying, and, unexpectedly, funny. It definitely whether my appetite for the book.

The first 40 pages of which were very intense. It starts with Navalny's poisoning and near death, then circles round to his childhood. Even there, though, the "present" Navalny continues to comment, which I found to be a great relief from the usual "My great great grandfather was a pig turd farmer" approach.

Day 2 DDRD 2,584) November 27, 2024

Read to page 82.

Alexei mentions a couple of his favorite books, both of which sound interesting: Venedikt Erofeev's Moscow to the End of the Line (which is available,  but pricey--except on Internet Archive,  where it's F R E E ), and Alexei Yurchak's Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More (also expensive,  but not available at Internet Archive).

"...I went home and turned on the television to find out what was happening. The ballet Swan Lake was on. This was a sign any Soviet person would unerringly recognize as meaning something serious had occurred. Since I was little, I knew that if, instead of cartoons, there was a classical music concert on television, a leader must have died, and that would set off a deluge of public mourning." (72)

Boris Pugo, Minister of  Interior Affairs of the USSR 1990 and 1991.

Navalny describes Pugo as "the man with the strangest hairstyle in the world." (75)

This is quite an interesting book, and Mr. Navalny is a good writer: clear and to the point, but also possessed of a good sense of humor. I like him.

Day 3 DDRD 2,585) 🦃November 28, 2024🦃

Read to page 129.

"They [the Soviet people] cared little about international politics when there was no butter in their local store." (97) 

And that's pretty much it in a nutshell, isn't it?

If you focus on this, then you can see how Trump managed to win the election. He told people he would make their daily lives better. He was lying, but he spoke with conviction. Harris told people she would protect their freedoms. If it's a choice between butter and freedom, butter will win most times.

This hits close to home: "...now that we can see with our own eyes the "reformers of the 1990s" transmorgrified into Putin's / Trump's lickspittles, propagandists, oligarchs and bureaucrats, and all of them extremely rich, we should be honest, repudiating hypocrisy and any attempt to justify ourselves for our wasted years. We should admit that there never were any Democrats in power in Russia / the USA, in the sense of people with a genuinely liberal, democratic outlook." (116)

P.S. Ouch.

And this: "Yeltsin was devoid of genuine ideological motivation and driven only by a lust for power. He was an extremely talented individual, a truly intuitive politician who sensed the popular mood and knew how to exploit it. He was prepared to act decisively and boldly on occasion, but always in the interests of himself and his own power, rather than of the people or the nation." (118)

One of the (several) things that makes this book superior to My Struggle is that when Navalny tells a story about something shitty he did as a kid--like paying bribes to teachers so as to get good grades on tests he didn't even take--he steps back in from his current perspective to say he's ashamed of how he behaved then. Much more morally satisfying than letting the bad behavior sit there on its own, like a dog turd on the living room floor.

Day 4 DDRD 2,586) November 29, 2024

Read to page 200. Not sure how that (70 pages) happened, but it was effortless. Navalny's story of how he was gradually pulled into the world of politics is fascinating. Even at this point--about halfway through the book--he's only on the fringes of that world.

Day 5 DDRD 2,587) November 30, 2024

Read to page 260.

"The only moments in our lives that count for anything are those when we do the right thing, when we don't have to look down at the table but can raise our heads and look each other in the eye. Nothing else matters." (239)

Day 6 DDRD 2,588) December 1, 2024

Read to page 300...but I'll need to get back to this after some chores. At this point the book has switched to a series of diary entries as Navalny writes from jail.

Meanwhile, in Louisville, Kentucky:

Our first snowfall of this Winter.

P.S. only got back to a little. Read to page 309. Then football happened.

Day 7 DDRD 2,589) December 2, 2024

Read to page 380. Impressive given how much running around I've had to do today. So less than 100 pages to go now, which should be do-able in two days.

In talking about prisoners being sent to different units, Navalny refers to the Sorting Hat, and notes that "Everyone has been put in Slytherin House." (371)

Navalny mentions being interviewed by Maria Butina. He calls her "a parasite and political prostitute."

Day 8 DDRD 2,590) December 3, 2024

Read to page 436 as of 12:21 pm...and that's after a three hour volunteer stint at the hospital with Jacqueline...but I think I'm going to gave to read some more, maybe even finish it off today. After pottery class, of course.

There was a(nother) mention of the Navalny-made documentary Putin's Palace, and this time I Googled it and found the video inline (@ https://youtu.be/T_tFSWZXKN0?si=hvduwwqxBEHU7ktE). Watched a minute (don't want to stop reading just yet) and saw that (1) it's English dubbed and (2) it features Navalny up front. So I'm going to need to spend an hour and fifty-three minutes in that later today. But now (5:23 am), back to reading.

Of the War of the Roses, which he is reading while in solitary confinement, Navalny says "They leave Game of Thrones smoking nervously on the sidelines. In fact, I'm almost certain Game of Thrones is pretty much copied from them. Only dragons were added." (439)

Navalny is being placed in a more restrictive space in the prison,  and he says, "I wonder if these conditions will be closer to those of Hannibal Lector or those of Magneto from X-men..." (442)

ADDENDUM: read a little more--today page 455--but then the D8+9 kicked in, so I wasn't able to finish. Mañana, then.

Day 9 DDRD 2,592) December 4, 2024

Read to page 479, The End. And it's only 5:29 am...so I'll probably have to start in on something else right quick. But for now...this was quite a wonderful book. I really think everyone should read this...especially Trump (who is not once mentioned) and Putin (who is mentioned many times).

☮📤

DDR: My Struggle Book Three: Boyhood by Karl Ove Knausgård

427 pages. So 14 days should do it, I think.

Day 1 DDRD 2,577) November 20, 2024

Back to Min kamp...though not without a little bit of my own struggle.  There are so many other books that I want to read right now, and I'm still feeling very unsettled about this whole Karl Ove Knausgård wanting to fuck a 13 year old girl thing that I wasn't sure I wanted to read another word. Plus the whole He Can Be Such An ASSHOLE! Thing. But...here I am.

Read to page 40.

Interesting: this book was first published in Norwegian with the "sub-title" Tredje Bok, which you don't need to be multilingual to understand--but JiC, it's Third Book. So why Boyhood for us Yanks? I'm guessing for the same reason that they didn't title the movie George III (The Madness of King George): they feared Americans would think it was the last movie of a trilogy, the first two parts of which they had missed. We Americans have not impressed the world with out acuity.

As for today's reading...well, I was a bit put off by the shift to 3rd person for the first few pages. And even after that, everything just seemed to be moving in   s   l   o   w     m  o   t   i   o   n    .  I finally realized that I hadn't yet decompressed from Krasznahorkai...which also made me realize what a huge gap there was between Laszlo and Karl Ove.  There have been some good moments in the first two books of My Struggle, for sure...but this work just can't compare with Herscht 07769. Sorry, KOK. Just sayin'.

Another bit of unneeded ballast: Patriot: A Memoir by Alexei Navalny just came in to the library, and I'm really wanting to dive into that Right Now. But I'm not up for another 2DDR session. 

Hopefully this Book 3 will pull me in soon.

ADDENDUM: read a bit more...to page 70. 

KOK's father is a cruel man. Seeing how he treats Karl Ove makes me feel sorry not only for the child, but also for the man that child becomes. No wonder KOK can be an asshole. But at least he's a little better than his father. Which makes me think of my father. He had a cruel and uncaring father himself, and so perhaps no surprise that I often found my father to be harsh, and never felt that he had any respect for me. I often say, as if in jest, that my younger sister is the son he never had, because she was so good at things that I never even cared about. I am a better father than he was--athough when I look back at my life with my children, I see plenty of mistakes, for sure. My son, however, is a better father than I am, so hopefully the spiral continues to go towards the light.

Day 2 DDRD 2,578) November 21, 2024

Read to page 160. Yep, 90 pages. Had some downtime (4 whole hours!) between dropping son off at work and picking him back up...though some of that time was spent in grocery shopping and doing laundry. At any rate, a good day's worth of reading.

"The very thought of dad, the fact that he existed, caused fear to pump through my body." (69)

I've been thinking about my dad a lot while reading this book. My dad was a good guy and I think he did his best to be a good father. I can remember things which showed his love quite clearly. For instance, as a young boy, I was very interested in astronomy. My mom found out that there was an astronomy class at the local community college (where they had a planetarium!), and she called and asked if there was any way that I could attend the class. She was told that I could if I was accompanied by an adult. It would have been easy for my mom to go with me as she was intellectually curious, a great reader, and nrave about being in situations where she wasn't comfortable, but it wasn't her who took me. It was my dad. My dad, who had dropped out of school in the eighth grade, almist never picked up a book, and never felt secure about his intellect. And yet he did this for me, he sat in a room where he must have felt intimidated every second. Because it was important to me. At the same time, however, thoughts of his harshness come back to me. I remember at a very young age being in the basement with him and he had me sit up on top of a workbench while he cut my hair. I remember him yelling at me that I was being contrary-- Damned, contrary!--and being really frightened as he wielded scissors close to my ear, and I don't know if I moved or if he miscalculated, but he clipped my ear with the scissors and then got mad at me and blamed me. I felt frightened and ashamed, and I cried.

In other news...

Heh heh...Jonathan Hex. A few extra letters there. (t, a, and n if you're not familiar with this comic book.)

Day 3 DDRD 2,579) November 22, 2024

Read to page 215. Don't take this the wrong way or anything, but...young KOK sure does cry a lot. If I had this book in e-format I'd do a word search to confirm it, but since I don't, I'll estimate. I'd say that the word "cry" has appeared in this bok (as of the halfway mark) at least 100 times. I shit thee not. Maybe even two hundred times. And he's mentioned his buck teeth and bubble butt at least a dozen times each. It's a little distracting. 

I'd like to read some more, but I'm not sure u have time. Going to see Wayne "The Train" Hancock at Headliners in 90 minutes. Woo-hoo!

Day 4 DDRD 2,580) November 23, 2024

Read to page 248. Again, I'd like to read more, but it's 53 minutes until Tosca, so we'll see if i have the energy for more after that. ( Pretty tired because I didn't get home from the concert until after midnight and got my wake up call at 4:30 AM as usual.)

Read more: to page 278.

Day 5 DDRD 2,581) November 24, 2024

Read to page 343.

KOK listens to an album called Play by a group called Magazine. It goes like this:

https://youtu.be/TntWK2R6tx4?si=8ZdwTftVq5bLLKtO

Didn't do much for me, but since it was KOK's celebration of his father leaving to study abroad for most of the next year, it must have been chock full of meaning for KOK. 

Btw, he's still crying A LOT.

Day 6 DDRD 2,582) November 25, 2024

Read to page 427, The End. 

"The problem is not so much that the world limits your imagination as your imagination limits the world." (365)

I decided to give the Magazine album (👁⬆) another shot while heading into the last twenty pages of this book, and just as I was starting to think, "This isn't that bad," I heard this:

As the day stops dead

At the place where we're lost

I will drug you and fuck you

On the permafrost

I was sure I had heard wrong, but a minute or so later it repeated. But these guys are Brits, right?  Nobody can understand them. So I looked up the lyrics. And?

I will drug you and fuck you

Holy shit. That is way beyond not okay. Lost interest in that band, didn't I? Yes, I did.

This was an unpleasant volume. The constant crying, the violence of the father. The sequel abuse KOK and his friends committed against the girls in their class--pulling up their tops and grabbing their naked breasts...and one group of boys who held a girl down and penetrated her with a finger. KOK throwing rocks at cars on a highway, hitting one. KOK and his friend setting fires in the woods, one of which got out of control. I know all kids do stupid and shitty things, but this is way beyond that. These are felonies, for fuck's sake. I don't know if I even want to read the fourth volume.

I do know that it won't be my next DDR, though.

2024, meet 1973..

 

from The Tragedy of the Moon by Isaac Asimov, page 194.

DDR: Herscht 07769 by László Krasznahorkai

 

Took a few days to get to it (while I finished off Dostoyevsky's The Possessed), but now it's Yonki Time, man; 406 pages of László Krasznahorkai's Herscht 07769. I've been looking forward to this for about a month now.

So let's go.

Day 1 (DDRD 2,567) November 10, 2024

Read to page 20.

So there's a subtitle: Florian Herscht's Bach Novel. What is a Bach Novel? 

Here's the only thing I found:

Which is amusing, but not helpful. Perhaps Krasznahorkai will reveal his meaning of the term at some point. I wouldn't bet big money on that, though. These Hungarian mystics...you know.

Florian seems to be mentally retarded. Much in the mode of Of Mice and Men's Lennie he is also impressively strong, which I find to be an unfortunate use of a stereotype. Maybe LK can change my mind, but as the father of two autistic kids, I'm tired of the whole Special Needs People Have Super Powers shtick. Some of 'em are just people, y'know. 

Day 2 (DDRD 2,568) November 11, 2024

Read to page 80. Yep, 60 pages. And thats on a day where I had to take Joe to basketball practice, meet with someone from an assisted living house, then go to Joe's apartment to watch Penguin. 

But I really got sucked into it today. Actually didn't want to stop there, but since I already skipped My Struggle yes, I thought it should put in at least a little bit of time on that today. 

Well, maybe LK is going to clue us in on this Bach Novel business. On page 26, Florian is  informed by The Boss that "The Bachhaus" (a museum dedicated to J.S. Bach, see HERE) has been desecreated. The Boss and his Nazi friends take this as a crime against German heritage, and so convene at the Bachhaus to look into this.

Speaking of Nazis...it's pretty clear that Florian does not subscribe to these beliefs, but without family, he is left to be "guided" by The Boss, hence he is swept up with the group.

For The Boss, Bach represents the essence of Germany, of the pure blood that is being tainted by immigrants and Jews. Sound familiar? I just finished watching the first season of Slow Horses, and it also dealt with such people. Its tempting to think that they are just stupid, but that's just an easy dismissal, isn't it? And it gets us no further in countering their hatred and violence. It may even fuel it. It may be why Kamala Harris list to that fucking Nazi Trump.

There are some aspects of Florian which make him seem autistic: extreme aversion to changes in routine, lack of understanding with regard to everyday activities (like buying a train ticket, talking to women)...and there was a reference to his being a "genius" in some area or other. Maybe physics, as what he has to sayabout that (which is what he wants to say to Angela Merkel) is certainly beyond my comprehension.

Interesting thing: I'm really not even aware of the lack of end punctuation this time around. I guess I've been Krasznahorkai-ized.

Another interesting thing: while there are some, like The Boss, who are cruel to Florian  (though The Boss wouldn't see it that way, and I don't think Florian does, either), there are also quite a few people who look out for him and try to help him. I find some evidence of the truth of this in our world. 

So on the one hand, The Boss is a Nazi and he likes to smack Florian on the back of the head regularly. On the other hand, he got Florian his first apartment and furnished it. 😒 

I thought this was amusing: "... a few neighbors, especially the two who spent nearly the entirety of the second half of their lives peeking out the window to see if anything was going on out there, were decidedly glad this time...." (69)

On another note...this book looksbrand new, even though one person did check it put before me. The spine is unblemished, though. I wonder if person #1 ever even opened it. If so, they must have abandoned it venisoon after. (And check out that "Received" date! Thank you, LFPL.)

Oh, and The Boss tried to rape a 17 year old girl awhile back, but she kicked him in the 🥚 🥚  and got away. That girl grew up to be a neighbor who looks after Florian.

Day 3 (DDRD 2,569) November 12, 2024

Read to page 110. Going back for more, but I'm going to try to put down 30 pages in My Struggle 2 first. BTW, I tried reading with a little Bach-ground music (Cello Suite No. 1, performed by Yo-Yo Ma), but it was too distracting and I had to give it up. Nice cello, though.

Woke up, fell out of bed, had breakfast, then read. And here's something of a game changer: 

The Boss comes to the Children's Home where Florian has been housed since his parents died, and "...the way the Boss looked at him was different, the Boss looked at him the way a father looks at his son or an uncle looks at his nephew, no one else has that look in their eyes, Florian immediately sensed he was in good hands...." (84)

Day 4 (DDRD 2,570) November 13, 2024

Read to page 140.

"...every secret of life is in Johann Sebastian...." (117) So I guess I'd better get busy with my Bach.

Day 5 DDRD 2,571) November 14, 2024

Read to page 180.

 

Here's what The Boss has to say about homeless people: "I don't understand why they're not cleared away, the garbage truck comes around everyday, no?!" (171)

I think The Boss has a job waiting for him in Trump's Homeland Security department.

Day 6 DDRD 2,572) November 15, 2024

Read to page 228.

Florian is writing to Angela Merkel again. This time yelling her that the Security Council must start listening to Bach. Also that Bach should be played on TV, radio, airplanes, etc.

Day 7 DDRD 2,573) November 16, 2024

Read to page 258. I'm going to try to finish off My Struggle Book 2 today, then really bear down on this book. Standing in the way of that accomplishment: I stayed up past midnight watching thr Paul / Tyson "fight," and I'm REALly tired, (2) it's been a rough day, packing out both Jacqueline and Joe from overnight visits, and (3) Delta 8/9 is calling.

Day 8 DDRD 2,574) November 17, 2024

Read to page 295. Church, opera (Madama Butterfly), Chiefs vs. Bills. Not much reading time.

Day 9 DDRD 2,575) November 18, 2024

Read to page 320.

Day 10 DDRD 2,576) November 19, 2024

Read to page 376. So tomorrow will be it, I'm sorry to say, as this has been quite a thrilling read. 

Hmmm. Big left hand turn. Also some very confusing stuff. I'm pretty sure one character has died at least twice...in dramatically different ways. 

"...it was not the pandemic that was the danger, but…that people showed the worst side of themselves, and they were weak, immeasurably weak and immeasurably idiotic...." (377)

Well. That pretty much sums up 2020 to 2022.

Day 11 DDRD 2,577) November 20, 2024

Read to page

Nope. Jacqueline had choir practice, and I got to page 406, The End. It was quite a thrill ride, actually...and I'm thinking that despite the lack of end punctuation (there's only one period in the book, and that's on page 406), this might be the most accessible of Mr. Krasznahorkai's books. And I'm pretty sure that Floruan Herscht is the most well-developed character in the Krasznahorkai canon...and I've read 'em all. Also, since this book spins in part around the Covid pandemic, it felt more immediate than the other works...like it'd just been written (it was) rather than written 10 years ago and finally translinyo English. 

Foods I Will Never Eat

Anything that comes from the sea except fish and crabs.

Any fish that isn't in the shape of a rectangle and breaded.

Any crab that isn't in the form of a hamburger.

Any land meat that isn't from a cow, pig, chicken, or turkey. (And these must bear no resemblance to a living cow, pig, chicken, or turkey.)

Anything that is spicy hot.

Any insect.

Cock flavored soup.

Again, László Krasznahorkai

So here I am, trying to finish up my Complete Dostoyevsky Novels Project AND just a little way into my 6 Book Karl Ove Knausgård My Struggle Project, and look what arrives at the library:

So obviously something will have to give. It's due 11/23, and there's a good chance that I won't be able to renew it (it's brand new, after all)...and unlike previous Krasznahorkai books, which were slim enough to be short stories, this one is 496 pages of tiny print. But László Krasznahorkai is my favorite living writer (and top 5 all time), so it's mos def a priority...unlike the many books I check out, renew renew renew, then return on the final due date unopened. 

Hmmm. Need a plan. Or a clone.