Time, Forward!
Jun. 9th, 2009 04:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerMy latest amusement: Valentine Kataev’s Time, Forward!, a Stalinist socialist realist novel about the vast excitement of concrete pouring.
No, wait! Don’t change the channel! Concrete pouring is surprisingly epic. Also, the book actually reminds me a lot of Star Trek – the original “We’re going to promote diversity through pop culture!” Star Trek, not the new movie.*
Time, Forward! , like Star Trek, is a showcase of human diversity. I think it does a better job than the original Star Trek, actually. Instead of having one character for each token nationality, Time Forward has two, which meant that the Token Character did not have the honor of his/her (but mostly his) country resting on his shoulders.
Once you get through the token Ukrainians and Jews and Tatars (and, peculiarly, Americans**), there’s not much room left for ethnic Russians. In fact the hero of the whole show, in as much as such an ensemble piece has a hero, is Margullies the hardcore Jewish engineer who apparently subsists on dried mango candy. (He’s trying to beat the concrete pouring record. He doesn’t have time for silly things like “lunch.”)
So, for instance, if you have on one hand Sayenko the indescribably loathsome Ukrainian kulak’s son*** who refuses to help his fellow workers break the concrete pouring record, this isn’t an indictment of all Ukrainians. (It might be an indictment of kulak’s sons, though.) There’s another Ukrainian, Ishchenko the heroic leader of the concrete pouring brigade, to level things out; and as they don't have to carry the weight of their countries' reputations on their shoulders, the characters are all more human.
Although Time, Forward!, like Star Trek, does have a bit of a problem with the goodness of its characters. I’ve read that Roddenbury thought there should be no intra-Enterprise conflict, and socialist realist novels obviously have a stake in showing how amicable socialism is (once the kulak’s sons have skedaddled, at least), so everyone is surprisingly un-petty.
Although Time, Forward! does get in one really excellent villain: the aforementioned Sayenko, who cheats his fellow worker Zagirov out of all belongings at poker and then drags him around Magnitogorsk calling him “Tatar slave,” until Zagirov wises up, hits Sayenko on the head (to the grateful cheers of the reader), and runs back to help with the Fastest Concrete Pour Ever.
No one is the least bit annoyed with him for skipping out (well, being dragged out by Sayenko) of his shift earlier. This is what I mean by unrealistic goodness; you’d think someone would at least say something snarky.
It’s an interesting book. I don’t expect anyone will run out to read it, but if you ever have a yen to try out socialist realism it’s probably your best bet.
* A possible reason why American pop culture took the world by storm and Soviet pop culture, outside of the former Soviet Union, is mostly the preserve of wild-eyed Russian Studies majors. The Enterprise explores new galaxies; the heroes of Time, Forward! attempt to break the previous cement-pouring record.
**I realize this sounds a bit odd, but during the thirties the Soviet Union had a mad, unrequited love for the US of A. Of course America was an evil capitalist nation, but... – Sasha, just look at that incredible department store. You know what would make the USSR a socialist paradise? Macy’s. A Macy's even bigger than the one in New York. Don’t you think so, Comrade Stalin? Why yes, Comrade Stalin does.
***Kulaks were rich peasants. The class was entirely a Bolshevik invention; the peasants didn't believe in kulaks, and in fact took the kulak’s liquidation as a class as yet another sign that the Bolsheviks were the Antichrist.
People tend to be a bit snotty about the whole Antichrist thing, but in the peasants’ defense, the Bolsheviks really did have it in for peasants. They didn’t think they did, but they totally did. The whole collective farming thing? Totally an anti-peasant plot.
No, wait! Don’t change the channel! Concrete pouring is surprisingly epic. Also, the book actually reminds me a lot of Star Trek – the original “We’re going to promote diversity through pop culture!” Star Trek, not the new movie.*
Time, Forward! , like Star Trek, is a showcase of human diversity. I think it does a better job than the original Star Trek, actually. Instead of having one character for each token nationality, Time Forward has two, which meant that the Token Character did not have the honor of his/her (but mostly his) country resting on his shoulders.
Once you get through the token Ukrainians and Jews and Tatars (and, peculiarly, Americans**), there’s not much room left for ethnic Russians. In fact the hero of the whole show, in as much as such an ensemble piece has a hero, is Margullies the hardcore Jewish engineer who apparently subsists on dried mango candy. (He’s trying to beat the concrete pouring record. He doesn’t have time for silly things like “lunch.”)
So, for instance, if you have on one hand Sayenko the indescribably loathsome Ukrainian kulak’s son*** who refuses to help his fellow workers break the concrete pouring record, this isn’t an indictment of all Ukrainians. (It might be an indictment of kulak’s sons, though.) There’s another Ukrainian, Ishchenko the heroic leader of the concrete pouring brigade, to level things out; and as they don't have to carry the weight of their countries' reputations on their shoulders, the characters are all more human.
Although Time, Forward!, like Star Trek, does have a bit of a problem with the goodness of its characters. I’ve read that Roddenbury thought there should be no intra-Enterprise conflict, and socialist realist novels obviously have a stake in showing how amicable socialism is (once the kulak’s sons have skedaddled, at least), so everyone is surprisingly un-petty.
Although Time, Forward! does get in one really excellent villain: the aforementioned Sayenko, who cheats his fellow worker Zagirov out of all belongings at poker and then drags him around Magnitogorsk calling him “Tatar slave,” until Zagirov wises up, hits Sayenko on the head (to the grateful cheers of the reader), and runs back to help with the Fastest Concrete Pour Ever.
No one is the least bit annoyed with him for skipping out (well, being dragged out by Sayenko) of his shift earlier. This is what I mean by unrealistic goodness; you’d think someone would at least say something snarky.
It’s an interesting book. I don’t expect anyone will run out to read it, but if you ever have a yen to try out socialist realism it’s probably your best bet.
* A possible reason why American pop culture took the world by storm and Soviet pop culture, outside of the former Soviet Union, is mostly the preserve of wild-eyed Russian Studies majors. The Enterprise explores new galaxies; the heroes of Time, Forward! attempt to break the previous cement-pouring record.
**I realize this sounds a bit odd, but during the thirties the Soviet Union had a mad, unrequited love for the US of A. Of course America was an evil capitalist nation, but... – Sasha, just look at that incredible department store. You know what would make the USSR a socialist paradise? Macy’s. A Macy's even bigger than the one in New York. Don’t you think so, Comrade Stalin? Why yes, Comrade Stalin does.
***Kulaks were rich peasants. The class was entirely a Bolshevik invention; the peasants didn't believe in kulaks, and in fact took the kulak’s liquidation as a class as yet another sign that the Bolsheviks were the Antichrist.
People tend to be a bit snotty about the whole Antichrist thing, but in the peasants’ defense, the Bolsheviks really did have it in for peasants. They didn’t think they did, but they totally did. The whole collective farming thing? Totally an anti-peasant plot.
