The Kindly Ones (Jonathan Littell)
- Highlight Loc. 6457-93 | Added on Tuesday, March 24, 2015, 06:07 PM
Its the same Russian autocracy, the same permanent insecurity, the same paranoia of the foreign, the same fundamental inability to govern correctly, the same substitution of terror for the common consensus, and thus for real power, the same unbridled corruption, in other forms, the same incompetence, the same drunkenness. Read the correspondence between Kurbsky and Ivan, read Karamzin, read Custine. The crucial given of your history has never been changed: humiliation, from father to son. Ever since the beginning, but especially since the Mongols, everything humiliates you, and all the politics of your ruling class consists not of correcting this humiliation and its causes, but of hiding it from the rest of the world. Peters city is nothing but another Potemkin village: its not a window opening onto Europe, but a theater set put up to mask from the West all the poverty and endless filth stretching out behind it. But one can humiliate only those who can be humiliated; and in turn, only the humiliated humiliate. The humiliated of 1917, from Stalin down to the muzhik, have done nothing since then but inflict their fear and their humiliation on others. For in this country of the humiliated, the czar, whatever his strength may be, is powerless, his will is lost in the muddy swamp of his administration, and he is soon reduced, like Peter, to ordering his minions to obey his orders; in front of him people bow, but behind his back, they steal from him or conspire against him; everyone flatters his superiors and oppresses his subordinates, everyone has a slave mentality, raby as you say, and this slave spirit rises to the top; and the greatest slave of all is the czar, who can do nothing against the cowardliness and humiliation of his people of slaves, and who thus, in his powerlessness, kills them, terrorizes them, and humiliates them even more. And every time theres a real rupture in your history, a real chance to get out of this infernal cycle to begin a new history, you blow it: faced with freedom, the freedom of 1917 you were talking about, everyone, people and leaders alike, recoils and goes to the old tried-and-true methods. The end of the NEP, the declaration of socialism in a single country, is nothing but that. And since hope wasnt completely extinguished, there had to be purges. The present Great Russianism is only the logical outcome of this process.
The Russian, the eternally humiliated man, can never escape from this humiliation except by identifying himself with the abstract glory of Russia. He may work fifteen hours a day in a freezing factory, eat nothing his entire life but black bread and cabbage, and serve a fat boss who calls himself a Marxist-Leninist but who rides around in a limousine with his high-class hookers and his French Champagnenone of that matters to him, so long as the Third Rome is at hand. And this Third Rome can call itself Christian or communist, its not important. As for the factory boss, he will constantly tremble for his position, he will flatter his superior and offer him sumptuous gifts and, if hes demoted, another one identical to him will be appointed in his place, just as greedy, ignorant, and humiliated, and full of scorn for his workers, because after all he serves a proletarian State. One day, no doubt, the communist façade will disappear, with or without violence. Then well discover that same Russia, intact. If you ever do win this war, youll emerge from it more National Socialist and more imperialistic than us, but your socialism, unlike ours, will be nothing but an empty name, and youll have nothing but nationalism left to cling to. In Germany, and in the capitalist countries, everyone says communism ruined Russia; but I believe its the opposite: its Russia that ruined communism. It could have been a fine idea, and who can say what would have happened if the Revolution had taken place in Germany rather than Russia? If it had been led by self-assured Germans, like your friends Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht? For my part, I think it would have been a disaster, since it would have exacerbated our specific conflicts, which National Socialism is trying to resolve. But who knows? What is certain is that having been attempted here, the communist experiment could be nothing but a failure. Its like a medical experiment conducted in a contaminated environment: the results can go straight in the trash.You are an excellent dialectician, and I congratulate you; you sound like a trained Communist. But I am tired and I am not going to argue with you. In any case, all this is nothing but words. Neither you nor I will see the future you describe.Who knows? Youre a high-ranking Commissar. Maybe well send you to a camp to interrogate you.Dont play with me, he replied harshly. Seats in your planes are much too limited for you to evacuate small fry. I know perfectly well Ill be shot, in a short while or tomorrow. It doesnt bother me. He went on in a cheerful voice: Do you know the French writer Stendhal? Then youll certainly have read this phrase Only a death sentence truly distinguishes a man. Its the only thing that cannot be bought. I couldnt help laughing; he too laughed, but more quietly.
I could go on with various tidbits like that, but suffice to say if you are mere physical worker there, you are like the lowest of the low. That is the extent of their disdain for labour, especially any tiring one.
