FFWD Weekly
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| Books by Lachlan Mackintosh A Werewolf Problem in Central Russia The New Yorker calls Victor Pelevin one of Europe's best young novelists. His latest collection of stories, A Werewolf Problem in Central Russia, is a wild and varied introduction into the strange world of modern Russia. The title story traces a young man's seemingly casual daytrip to the countryside outside Moscow, which first goes unusually wrong and then preternaturally right. When the werewolves do appear, they are decidedly human, debating municipal politics through a hybrid of growls and comprehension. The tale's resolution is marvelous, strange and satisfying. I don't know if any other story in the collection matches the vitality and spirit of the title tale. In "Sleep" we follow the student Nikita through his daily lectures until we discover, along with Nikita, that Moscow is a city of sleepers, all carrying their invisible pillows deftly in the crook of the neck. Nikita carries a pin inside his coat to prick himself when wanting to awaken for a moment, while an eerie, incredible tide pulls him toward sleeping his way through existence. "Vera Pavlovna's Ninth Dream" offers a sort of perestroika seen through the eyes of an elderly public lavatory attendant. And the other titles alone, "Tai Shou Chuan USSR (A Chinese Folk Tale)," "The Ontology of Childhood" and "Bulldozer Driver's Day" give a sense of the diversity of voices that Pelevin presents us with. "The Tarzan Swing" opens with my favourite sentence in the book: "The wide boulevard and the houses standing along both its sides were like the lower jaw of an old Bolshevik who, late in life, has arrived at democratic views." This story, like several in the collection, follows a questing central character through a matrix of thought and perception, dimly lit streets and one-way conversation. These stories are difficult at times, yet "The Tarzan Swing" is another where I found myself smiling over the final paragraph. |
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