Русское зазеркалье (двуязычная версия)

Herein is the source of our mistake: we, meaning you and me, have never actually agreed to regard the nocturnal part of human consciousness, being our fantasies, dreams, and premonitions, as something that has no meaning at all. The idea was simply superimposed onto us by the logic-centered rational education we have received at school, so we gradually grew into belief that this idea is true under any conditions. It is not. Were it true, such works as the Divine Comedy or Richard Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde would never be written.

How valid can be the information that we receive by mediation of the nocturnal part of our mind? To what extent does contemporary art still require this part? How is it possible to talk about artistic education when considering that education basically relies on the diurnal activity of our mind? Do art and education mutually exclude each other, and if they don’t, how can they possibly come together? I will be happy to receive some answers to these questions from you during the second part of our lesson.

Let us, secondly, give a thought to the guffaw the old man utters when he sees his younger self. What is he laughing at? Is it the futility of all human endeavors?

What youthful mother, a shape upon her lap

Honey of generation had betrayed,

And that must sleep, shriek, struggle to escape

As recollection or the drug decide,

Would think her Son, did she but see that shape

With sixty or more winters on its head,

A compensation for the pang of his birth,

Or the uncertainty of his setting forth?

—to quote from William Butler Yeats’s Among School Children: a poetically shaped question to which I have no answer to provide. You have probably noticed that the song I have been talking about for already half an hour poses more questions than it gives us answers. Good questions are not less valuable than good answers. I will admire those of you who will attempt to provide a meaningful answer to this poetically shaped question.

Why is author’s alter ego in dirty rags, thirdly? Doesn’t it actually mean that he dreads himself? Do not we, too, dread ourselves when seen from aside? Have you ever tried to record your own voice and to replay it to yourselves? Don’t you hate listening to your own voice? I am very close to say that I do. Imagine that we could invent a machine recording our own thoughts and emotions and that we would be able to replay them to ourselves. Would we bear it? Would we be able to simply recognise ourselves in this emotional mirror?

We most likely wouldn’t. The author does not recognise his other self who is only some years or maybe some two decades older than he is. I do not want to interpret it in Freudian terms, and I do not see it as a sign of psychopathology. For me, it simply means that we are afraid of our own selves, because we do not really dare to look at what we truly are. According to Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘Hell is other people.’ True, but not quite, because before it ever comes to others, Hell is us. We do not accept what we are. (Can you explain why?) How can we ever hope to coexist with others? We fail to learn ourselves. How can we ever hope to learn others? ‘Each of us bears his own Hell’—I guess it was Virgil who said that.

This was my exploration of ‘Foretelling My Destiny’ by Alexander Rosenbaum. I hope you have enjoyed it.[1]

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Наши занятия проходили в не очень большой аудитории, широкой и короткой, имея в виду, что маркерная белая доска за моей спиной была на длинной стене. По обе стороны от прохода стояло три ряда столов, за каждым из которых теоретически помещалось четыре студента, итого аудитория могла вместить двадцать четыре слушателя — «избыточная мощность» для группки, записавшейся на мой спецкурс. Патрик в этот раз никуда не выбежал, сидел и слушал с нервным вниманием, порой приоткрывая рот, так что я всё время собиралась предложить ему спросить, что он хочет, и один раз почти это сделала, — но нет, поймав мой взгляд, он отводил глаза, а ради человека, который на тебя не смотрит, прерывать лекцию вроде и совсем неуместно. Итак, Патрик никуда не убежал, но некоторая ротация всё же произошла.