"School of Finger Fluency" by Dina Rubina, summary Automatic translate

Dina Rubina’s collection of prose was published in 2008. This book is a collection of memories of her childhood in Tashkent, her studies at a music school for gifted children, and her tangled family ties. The texts are filled with vivid glimpses of everyday life in the last century. The writer describes cramped communal apartments, hot courtyards with irrigation ditches, closets reeking of mothballs, and the difficult post-war years. People in these texts often make mistakes, hurt each other with careless words, suffer from loneliness, and seek forgiveness. The author reveals human fragility through the prism of time.

Several stories from this collection have been successfully adapted for the screen. The television play "When Will It Snow?" was released in 1979, and a short film of the same name was released in 2011. The drama "Double Surname" was adapted into a film in 2006.

Stories about family and growing up

The book opens with the story "When Will It Snow?" Fifteen-year-old Nina is seriously ill. She sleeps on an old sofa with the inventory number 627 and awaits a complex kidney operation. The surgeon, Makar Illarionovich, will perform the operation. Nina is deeply distressed by the upcoming wedding of her father, who lost his wife in a plane crash. The girl strolls through the autumn city and falls in love with an older man, Boris. In the hospital ward, she learns a bitter truth from her brother, Maxim. Her deceased mother had long since fallen out of love with her father and was in love with another man. Letters are found in a notebook. This confession helps Nina forgive her father and accept life with all its imperfections. Nina writes a note to her father asking for forgiveness just before the operation.

Georgy Vozdvizhensky, the hero of the story "Double Surname," is raising his son Philip. Georgy knows a hidden truth. The boy’s real father is Viktor, his wife’s lover. Five years later, his wife leaves for Novosibirsk to join Viktor and takes their child with her. Philip retains his double surname, Kryukov-Vozdvizhensky. Years pass. Sixteen-year-old Philip, now an adult, returns for the summer and visits Georgy. The young man considers Georgy his father and criticizes the aging Viktor for his rudeness and reproaches. Georgy conceals the truth, jealously guarding his long-standing lie out of love for his son. Georgy receives a telegram about Viktor’s death, but continues to lie to Philip.

Stories about music and theater

The writer often addresses the topic of music education. In the story "Music Lessons," the heroine reluctantly teaches a girl named Karina to play the piano. The girl lives with her brother, sister Larisa, and her deranged grandfather. Karina’s father is imprisoned for stealing meat from a military base. The evil Aunt Zina tries to separate the orphans into different families and send the grandfather to an orphanage. The narrator intervenes and offers to take the children for herself. The aunt curses and drives the heroine away, accusing her of self-interest. Karina manages to defend her grandfather. The heroine forever carries a sense of guilt towards this family.

In the story "The House Behind the Green Gate," an eight-year-old girl attends music lessons with a private teacher. She secretly takes pretty tubes of lipstick from the teacher and trades them in the courtyard for yellow buttons. The teacher catches her red-handed. She writes a stern note to her mother demanding a refund of three rubles. The girl quits her lessons. For a long time, the heroine is afraid to stay in other people’s apartments, fearing bouts of kleptomania. A feeling of deep shame haunts her for many years.

The story "Still the Same Dream!…" describes rehearsals for the school drama club, led by Baba Liza. The students are staging a scene from Pushkin’s tragedy "Boris Godunov." Senka Plotkin, a failing student, is rehearsing the role of the monk Pimen and becomes passionately fascinated with historical truth. Senka steals his grandfather’s crutch for the stage. The narrator is assigned to play the role of the Pretender. At a crucial moment, she forgets the crutch in the teachers’ lounge. Senka flies into a rage, and only resourcefulness saves the performance. Alexander Sergeyevich from the theater studio invites Senka to study. Years later, Senka becomes a real theater director.

Sketches from life and creative everyday life

In the story "On Saturdays," sixteen-year-old Eva accompanies a jazz symphony orchestra. She lives with her aunt Sonya. She suffers from loneliness and hides her pain behind irony. She accidentally encounters her father, who has left her for another woman, at a trolleybus stop. Eva forgives her father in her heart, but maintains a deliberately distant demeanor. Eva finds unexpected solace in a quiet conversation over coffee with the bearded violinist Akundin.

Conservatory student Altukhov, from the story "This Wonderful Altukhov," previously studied in the sculpture department. He brilliantly parodies his acquaintances, invents tall tales, and lives in a rented room in the old town. Altukhov takes in little Yurka, saving the child from his careless mother, an actress in a film extras. Altukhov changes the boy’s surname and leaves for Leningrad to re-enter the institute. The narrator secretly loves Altukhov. The girl cries and sadly watches his blue coat from the window of the empty auditorium number thirty-six.

The heroine of the text "Concert on a Voucher from the Book Lovers’ Society" goes to give a literary reading. The institution turns out to be a high-security correctional labor colony. The warden advises her to read without pauses. The writer is terrified of the sullen juvenile delinquents in gray quilted jackets. She sits down at a broken piano and, instead of reading prose, begins loudly singing songs by Alexander Galich and Vladimir Vysotsky. The colonists reward her with a heartfelt ovation.

A high school student in the story "Astral Flight of the Soul in Physics Class" reads a book about family sex in class. Teacher Arkady Tursunbaevich gives her a stern reprimand. The student responds with a cheeky remark about her slender bust. Out of fear, the girl’s soul temporarily leaves her body and floats above the schoolyard. Later, the stern teacher shares his life’s troubles with the student — a sick wife with mastitis, crying twins, and lack of sleep. The girl recommends a folk remedy of honey and flour and is filled with warm sympathy for the teacher.

The text "Cleaning Day" contrasts the fates of two women. Nyura, a cleaning lady, mops the floors in the apartment of former actress Galina Nikolaevna for five rubles. Nyura worries about her daughter Valka, who has become pregnant by her boyfriend, Seryozhka. Her niece, Lina, agonizes over a call from her indifferent lover, a karate instructor. That evening, Lina puts on a black coat and goes to spend the night with her lover, ignoring the pleas of her distressed aunt. Nyura takes the commuter train home to Mytishchi, near Moscow.

In the story "Blackthorn," a boy lives with his nervous mother, Marina. The woman types texts at night to earn extra money. She lashes out at her son, yelling at him over his dirty jacket, but she truly loves him. Marina gives away her son’s best clothes to the soaking wet children of a milkmaid. On weekends, the boy sees his calm father. The child carefully hides his true feelings from his divorced parents. The boy doesn’t want to hurt his mother by enjoying walks in the park with his father.

The story "One Intellectual Sat Down on the Road" unfolds in the Maleevka Writers’ House of Creativity. The literary community is heatedly discussing a man riding a bicycle through the alleys, his coat open. Proofreader Anna encounters this strange man by chance. She ironically asks the pervert about books by the philosopher Bakhtin, the poet Gumilev, and the writer Charskaya. Panicked, the man flees behind a lilac bush. Anna recalls her former partner, Kosya, who worked as a matzo-maker in Tallinn.

Family chronicles and historical memory

The collection concludes with stories about roots and ancestral memory. In the text "Apples from Schlitzbuter’s Garden," the writer brings a manuscript to the editorial office of a Jewish magazine in Moscow. There, she meets an elderly literary worker named Grisha. Grisha treats his guest to sandwiches and golden apples. A striking coincidence emerges. Grisha lived in the Ukrainian town of Zolotonosha, next door to the heroine’s great-grandfather, David Zhukovsky. In his youth, Grisha was in love with Aunt Frida. The writer breaks the terrible news to the old man: Frida was hanged by the Germans during the occupation. Grisha bitterly mourns his lost youth.

The story "Gypsy" tells the story of the author’s great-great-grandmother. Her great-great-grandfather brought a genuine nomadic gypsy woman home from a fair in Zhovnino. For many years, her relatives were ashamed of this marriage. The gypsy woman bore children, but each spring she retreated to a camp. Before being executed during the German occupation, the ancient crone cursed the executioners with a terrifying howl. The next day, all the executioners perished in an accidental explosion at the commandant’s office. The narrator believes in the mystical power of gypsy blood. The great-great-grandmother’s menacing shadow invisibly punishes all those who have wronged the writer.

The final story, "The Murderer," reveals the secret of Aunt Berta Koganovskaya from Zolotonosha. In her youth, Berta became pregnant by her cousin. He advised her to see a doctor. The insulted girl ambushed her lover with a jar of sulfuric acid and splashed him in the face. His brother died of a heart attack on a cobblestone street. A jury acquitted the pregnant Berta thanks to the noble intercession of the murdered man’s brothers. Years later, the girl married engineer Misha Leshchinsky, survived the war in Chirchik, became the director of a cafeteria, and amassed substantial savings. She lived to be ninety in Tashkent. Berta retained her clear mind, her loyalty to the party, and her cold calculation to the very end.