Moscow: Malyavin V. V. & Co., 2012, 382 p.

I threw away my compass, trampled my watch in the dust, and went out to dance In the fog over the Yangtze...

BG, 2003

"The description of the manners and customs of foreign nations must, for the most part, be attributed to those matters which delight the mind in a pleasant and innocent way, and are of no small use to the people. We have a lot of indisputable evidence about this in the form of books about the travels of skilled people. And countries unknown in the old days were so often visited by curious Europeans and described in detail that we are as familiar with them as with our own homeland... "

Georg Johann Unfsrzagt, 1725

"The embassy of Their Imperial Majesty the Great Russia to the Chinese Emperor, which was sent in 1719 from St. Petersburg to the Chinese capital and patronal city of Peking"

The publication of another book by V. V. Malyavin is an event that is usually expected, even quite ordinary for his long-time fans. However, its appearance was a special, extraordinary event for Russian Oriental studies, the reading public, and for the author's own work. After all, perhaps for the first time in several decades, the pages of V. V. Malyavin's book do not feature great historical figures (Confucius, Chuang Tzu), not the wisdom of Chinese antiquity, and not the space of the entire Chinese civilization, but the Author himself, who opens his soul to us with captivating confidence, while measuring it with the difficult to see, vague and mysterious "the soul of Asia".

The book "Flowers in the Fog: Looking at Asia", published in 2012 with a circulation of 1000 copies, is not so much travel notes of a professional Orientalist, but essays on the life and culture of the peoples of Asia, written on the basis of impressions from the author's numerous trips to the countries of East Asia. The content of the book consists of three sections devoted to mainland China, the "Tibet Ocean", as well as" islands in the ocean " (Japan, Taiwan) and the countries of Southeast Asia. The appendix contains notes on the journey to the Holy Land, and opens the travelogy with an Introduction and Prologue "The Soul of Asia", in which the author outlines his perception of the" philosophy of travel "and"the impenetrable depths of Asia". In order not to return to purely formal points, I will immediately note an interesting design, good printing and, alas, ugly proofreading, which is completely unacceptable when publishing the works of such a respected author.

Not being able to list all the advantages of the book (in part, other reviewers have already done this), I want to share in my short review only some thoughts about the form and content of this special book, which seems to rediscover the personality of V. V. Malyavin, not so much as an Oriental scholar, but as a mature writer and philosopher traveling "around the world". in order to embrace the wisdom of Asia, solve the riddle of the Great Path of Life, and in fact "prepare yourself for eternity", for the "eternal fullness of being".

The language of the book is perhaps the very first proof that the reader is holding in his hands not dry travel notes, not idle "confessions of a tourist", but a highly artistic work that masterfully uses the richness and imagery of the Russian language. In a dialogue with himself and the silent, but not silent, primordial nature, V. V. Malyavin noticeably departs from his usual paradoxical style of presentation, which allows you to successfully push and step over the limits of verbal forms and meanings, but when used too often and persistently, it turns out to be no less paradoxical monotony, restriction and impoverishment-

page 190
using the author's style. Therefore, the addition of "branded" paradoxicality by other, no less powerful, but more natural stylistic means pleasantly enriched the language of the new book.

Perhaps the most successful, symbolic and confessedly lyrical are the numerous descriptions of nature, from harsh Tibet to bare loess plateaus, which convey the author's innermost thoughts and feelings. A vivid example of the poetic quality of Malyavinskaya's prose, which rises to direct lyrics in the finale, is a short description of Central Tibet, which will not leave even the most stingy reader indifferent:

"The central part of Tibet or Tibet proper... It is a slightly winding Brahmaputra valley stretching for fifteen hundred versts, bordered by high mountains. The earth and sky here seem to be open to each other and are mutually reflected in the clear waters of rivers and mountain lakes. The mountains stretched out along the valley like mighty dragons guarding the celestial world. Their sloping spurs are like the clawed feet of monsters, covered with the brown soil of dried soil. Their steep sides rise above their paws like yellow-ochre rocks. And above them float their stately white heads, lined with black lines. Over the mountain ranges, clouds float now in loose, now in neat rows, like a tribe of unknown "water people", pensive sky travelers. The landscape is extremely still, but full of hidden tension. Its drama comes from a relentless, unusually acute sense of the incommensurability of human vanity and the bottomless peace of heaven.

They are always eternal.
You are full of infidelities before eternity.

The deep intimacy of the author's spiritual connection with the age-old nature reaches a long dizzying level... the climax is also in the next very colorful and romantic passage:

"In the gorges of Mordo, turquoise-purple rocks hang over the traveler's head, centuries-old pines on steep slopes are overgrown with juicy green moss and giant mushrooms, the air is saturated with spicy aromas of mountain herbs, crystal streams spray and rush down from all sides, the sun's rays sparkle in the water dust of waterfalls, at the bottom of precipices, right under your feet, boil and the streams roar, and from this incessant orgasm of nature, the head is constantly spinning " (p. 268).

Not only the wild Mother Nature, but also the man-made, much more contradictory in form and essence, world of modern megacities, in particular the Japanese urban landscape, is also brilliantly outlined by the thin pen of a wandering author:

"The train with the cheeky name "Haruka" stood quietly on the platform... then he carried me out of the basement of the airport and onto the bridge that spanned the wide channel. And then, from behind the spans of the bridge, the "Zelo oblo monster" came rushing toward me with a feverish clatter of wheels: an unimaginable jumble of reinforced concrete and glass stretching along the shore. A materialized meon... Why does the triumph of reasonable convenience created by technology, which is so clear and pleasant in detail, give rise to something so incomprehensible and even repulsive on the scale of the whole? The train immediately crashed into the mosaic body of a monster" (p. 319). But who is it that inhabits all these monsters?

Over a rice field
The fog thickened,
There's a Catholic wandering around in it.
And the shaman wanders.
Roam the tops,
And the lower classes roam,
I hid them from each other
Fog over the Yangtze River...

I repeat that I have to leave many of the author's undoubtedly valuable observations, thoughts and insights for another review or for other reviewers... The analysis and commentary of details can be endless, but it seems important to me to convey the most general impression of "Flowers in the Fog". This impression comes down to the fact that over the years of traveling in Asia, V. V. Malyavin undoubtedly found an extremely harmonious understanding and unity with the vast Mother Earth and Sky of the Asian continent. Great distances have also been covered on the path of self-discovery. However, the author's carefully and lovingly unfolded panorama of diving into the "funnel of Asia" gradually gives rise to a feeling of a certain lurching and" sucking " incompleteness

page 191
narratives. As a result, if you look at it more broadly, it is noteworthy that of the three Great Principles of San Yuan (Heaven - Earth - Man), which are the basis of the original Chinese picture of the world, only two are presented in the book. There is no Man in it! More precisely, in the text, this Individual Person not only exists, but also seems to successfully represent the very missing link of the Three Beginnings and the entire narrative. He is strong, erudite, wise, handsome and charming. But he is alone, no one is standing next to him. He is alone - and this is the Author himself!

It is still logical to assume that in a book about Asia, the role of Man, as a third Principle commensurate with Heaven and Earth, should rightfully be given not to the author, but to the "Asiatic", Asians. But just such an Asian Person is not visible at all in the book, and his personality and personality, apparently, do not arouse the author's human interest or research enthusiasm. Even V. V. Malyavin's closest Japanese friend, geisha lover and Marxist Yehei Toheich is mentioned, though very vividly, but too briefly, only in passing (pp. 90-91). All the other Asian brethren found on the pages of the book-Chinese, Tibetans, Vietnamese, drivers, abbots of monasteries, guides, and fellow scientists-are simple, mostly faceless extras who only randomly appear from the crowd and are only formally present in the background of the author's narrative. Why only extras, and why only in the background?

Quoting the German philosopher Hermann von Kaiserling, who once likened the Chinese (Asians) to" headless " working ants, V. V. Malyavin very correctly notes that such a comparison, although very common at that time (1911-1912), is unfair neither to the Chinese nor to ants (p. 214). At the same time, surprisingly, in the eyes of V. V. Malyavin himself, who is really immersed (in contrast to the round-the-world tourist Kaiserling) in the living Asian reality, the Chinese in the XXI century are like a "pile of loose sand" or "dust of street crowds". If the pictures of boundless nature, Sky and Earth are shown in detail and close-up, with clear visibility, as if in a good Zeiss binoculars, then the author considers and sees the surrounding people in a completely different way. In the misty distance, from the heights of the Great Leshan Buddha (p. 71) or the viewport of the Taipei 101 skyscraper, these Asian people remind the author of the same "forming hieroglyphs" ants. Perhaps it is precisely this distance distorted by the internal "inverted binoculars" that ultimately determinesthe utter lack of true interpersonal communication disorientates the author, prompting him to make very dubious pessimistic confessions: "Alas, a conversation with a Chinese is rarely interesting for a Russian" (p. 69).Or: "Conversations with Chinese colleagues leave a painful feeling of emptiness of the whole procedure and the inability of the interlocutors to go beyond the given view" (p. 166).

But is this really the case?! Finally, the text also contains direct evidence of the author's general confusion and frustration at the feeling of emptiness and disrupted communication: "China, this new rising star of the world community, is burning on the world horizon like an illegal comet: its tail is fanning out across half the sky, and inside it is disembodied dust, a luminous void and the inability to find real contact" (p. 165). It seems that despite V. V. Malyavin's doubts, it is possible and necessary to find such a real contact.

And I walk and sing,
And all around is God;
I'm my own Sufi
And a yogi to himself.
In the heart of the seal
Eternal beauty,
And in the head
Fog over the Yangtze River...

"In one author, under all circumstances, you will not find what the other has devoted a great deal of work to," Georg Johann Unferzagt wrote in his account of his trip to Beijing. Of course, as a self-described writer and philosopher, the author of "Flowers in the Mist" is free to invoke the sacred right of arbitrary choice of the theme, form and content of his creations. But this subjective argument is too relative and weak for a" universal " traveling philosopher of the caliber of V. V. Malyavin. After all, a well-known professional orientalist who claims to have a deep understanding of China and Asia simply has no right to relegate to the category of an extra, write off and ignore a modern living person who legitimately embodies himself

page 192
one of the three eternal world principles. The sage who looks into the soul of Asia cannot see it without insight into the deep individuality, personality, and soul of the Asian himself.

In the meantime, three centuries after the Chinese journey of the young associate of Peter I, Georg Unferzagt, we can only state that the Asian countries and peoples described in such detail by curious Europeans are still hidden by a thinning, but by no means dispersed, fog that absorbs many colors. Therefore, I would like to believe that the future "artful travel books" by V. V. Malyavin will still reveal to us from under the veil of fog not only the colored Sky and Earth, but also the deepest living human dimension of Asia.

page 193

Permanent link to this publication: