Andrei Bely Prize - for innovation and loyalty to the traditions of samizdat

ST. PETERSBURG. Winners of the 2015 Andrei Bely Independent Literary Prize Announced

The Cerberus web of Soviet censorship smothered everything that contradicted the indestructible foundations of official ideology. The emergence of alternative art and samizdat was the only, albeit unsafe way out of the situation. Payback for dissent became psychiatric hospitals, prisons, camps. Keeping the books of Solzhenitsyn and other dissidents equated almost to high treason. But there was no other way to save literature that was objectionable to the authorities from destruction. In the samizdat version, not only individual works were published, but also literary almanacs. The magazine “Hours”, published from the late 70s to 1990, introduced readers to the forbidden works of Dragomoshchenko, Pomeranz, Becket, Castaneda and many others. In 1978, the editorial board of Chasov founded the non-governmental literary prize named after Andrei Bely. Its material content is scanty and ironic - 1 ruble, vodka and apple.

The best in the poetic section were Vasily Borodin and Sergey Zavyalov. Borodin’s “Elk Island” - a bizarre harmony of thoughts, omens, observations - has incorporated poetry written by the author over the past 10 years. “Soviet cantatas” by Zavyalov, inspired by Prokofiev’s music, are an attempt to comprehend the tragic experience of the country during the period of repressions and the gradual transformation of personality. The best prose work was recognized by “Living Pictures” by Polina Barskova, dedicated to the bitter subject of the blockade, the memories of the geniuses with whom life touched - Schwartz, Gorki, Picasso, Malich, the painful experience of the past, forgiveness. It is possible to survive without letting you destroy your world.

In the section “Humanitarian research” Ilya Kukulin won with a book about editing as a method of unofficial culture. Multilayer research is an attempt to analyze both cultural and social perturbations through the prism of film editing, about changes in its functions, about the influence exerted on alternative art. For his ascetic activity in publishing prose almanacs and poetry collections by representatives of the St. Petersburg underground, unofficial and uncensored literature: Aronzon, Rubinstein, Roald Mandelstam. In the honorary nomination "For Merit" was awarded to the French writer Antoine Volodin.

Elena Tanakova © Gallerix.ru