Countries That Don't Exist: Selected Nonfiction continues Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's belated entry into the Anglophone canon of Russophone literature. If you are unfamiliar with the long-neglected writer, this is not the place to look for a comprehensive introduction, but it offers persuasive evidence of Krzhizhanovsky's erudition, wit, and style. What justifies bringing a writer out of unpublished or barely published obscurity? The response of knowledgeable readers. An unknown author cannot impact peers or heirs. Instead, chapters here show his responses to other writers: Edgar Allan Poe, Vladimir Solov΄ev, or George Bernard Shaw.
Obviously Polish, born in Kyiv (Kiev, says the cover), Krzhizhanovsky might well have wound up in Sandarmokh had he remained in the Ukrainian SSR rather than heading to Moscow. Soviet culture's centripetal tendency, though it limited his success, let him stay “under the radar.” He was not completely neglected in his lifetime: he did publish some writing, including some of the pieces here; he managed to get housing in a building for writers; he traveled on journalistic assignments. After he died in 1950 his writing was buried in archives, then rescued by scholars. Georgii Shengeli left an obituary note, Vadim Perelmutter discovered it, went in search of Krzhizhanovsky's work, and persisted until it was published in six volumes. Scholars and translators are now bringing him to Anglophone readers.
Editors Jacob Emery and Alexander Spektor provide an informative and elegantly written preface and a more substantial “Introduction: Restoring the Balance” (xv-xxxvi), with detailed comments on the author's prose nonfiction. Krzhizhanovsy clearly appeals to scholars with a developed sense of style and a fondness for the fantastic. Each translated chapter opens with a small introduction by that chapter's translator. The information comes in bite-sized bits just before the reader needs it, and it reflects the translators’ insights from intimate work with the texts.
The translators are Anthony Anemone, Caryl Emerson, Jacob Emery, Anne O. Fisher, Elizabeth F. Geballe, Reed Johnson, Tim Langen, Alisa Ballard Lin, Muireann Maguire, Benjamin Paloff, Karen Link Rosenflanz, Alexander Spektor, and Joanne Turnbull. Excellent translators are necessary to convey the writer's importance persuasively, and some of the essays convey Krzhizhanovsky's cleverness and linguistic play in marvelously creative ways. The texts come in chronological order, which does make it less clear when a change of tone or mastery reflects Krzhizhanovsky's own development rather than a switch of translator.
Individual chapters have a lot to offer. In “Argo and Ergo,” Joanna Turnbull cleverly replaces the riddles Krzhizhanovsky cites with rhyming English equivalents for the same objects (35). “A Philosopheme for the Theater,” translated by Alisa Ballard Lin, has a bold comment for all Slavists: “The Church Slavonic language served only idealism: its lexicon never, not in a single book, worked on behalf of other directions” (48–49). “The Poetics of Titles,” rendered with arresting wit and wordplay by Anne O. Fisher, contains interesting literary history alongside examples and analysis of Russian and translated titles. “Dramaturgy of the Chessboard,” translated by Reed Johnson, was written after World War II. Was Krzhizhanovsky certain that it would never be published, or was he willing to take risks? “If you take the role of the pawn in chess games of the eighteenth-century French master or the role of so-called heroes in the plays of Soviet dramaturges of the last decade (most especially of the last half-decade), you can't help but see their common features: the straight line, their interdependency, and the fact that the word ‘retreat’ has been stricken from their lexicon” (178). A chapter on George Bernard Shaw (translated by Caryl Emerson) positions the British author between paired cultural figures: artists, philosophers, playwrights, in a broad European context that barely touches on Russian or Soviet examples. Krzhizhanovsky emerges as a cosmopolitan reader and writer with a distinct authorial personality. The copious endnotes, 42 pages, are useful for a lesser-known author, only slightly repetitive, and almost entirely accurate. Krzhizhanovsky's own footnotes are in the chapter texts.
My review copy is dated February 10, 2022, two weeks before Russia's invasion of Ukraine ramped up the ongoing war and provoked some changes in publishing alignments. The Russian Library series of translations from Columbia UP has been outstanding in variety and quality, and Countries That Don't Exist is a worthy member. It will delight Krzhizhanovsky fans, making him available for teaching, for discussion with colleagues who do not read Russian, and for quality citation in one's own projects. This collection of non-fiction is a credit to everyone involved.
