Ingo Schulze

Ingo Shultse (rod. 1962) - pisatel iz byvshej GDR, prezident Akademii jazyka i literatury - chasto obraschaetsja v svoikh rabotakh k melankholii nemetskogo "postkommunisticheskogo sostojanija". Roman "Pravednye ubijtsy" stal polem dlja refleksii ob epokhalnykh peremenakh v strane cherez prizmu zhizni drezdenskogo bukinista Norberta Paulini. Kniga nachinaetsja kak legenda o znamenitom knizhnike - apolitichnom obrazovannom predstavitele srednego klassa, k kotoromu stekaetsja vsja intellektualnaja publika Vostochnoj Germanii. Idillija razrushaetsja padeniem Berlinskoj steny: postepenno Paulini terjaet pokupatelej, magazin i zhenu; ego bylaja otstranennost ot mira, nakhodjaschegosja za dverju knizhnogo magazina, transformiruetsja v radikalnye politicheskie vzgljady. Shultse masterski sochetaet elementy filosofskoj pritchi i trillera, allegorii i sotsialnoj satiry, fiksiruja metamorfozy emotsionalnykh perezhivanij sootechestvennikov. V svoem tekste-golovolomke avtor predlagaet porassuzhdat o tom, mozhet li chelovek, pobyvavshij v epitsentre tjazhelykh istoricheskikh sobytij, ostatsja vernym svoim printsipam. Perevod Sofja Negrobova

Each episode in this dazzling debut collection captures the spark in some tiny detail of everyday life in contemporary St Petersburg and fans it into a story that flares with comedy, surreal passion, heartbreaking indifference and mad Russian excess. There’s a Mafia shoot-out in a disco, as told by a gun-toting Walter Mitty simultaneously thrilled and horrified by the carnage he is creating. There are three devils who appear for an evening at the steam bath, their revelries ending in cannibalism – or is the watching manager just mad? These are sad, whimsical, macabre, bleakly funny stories, all told in a playful and voluptuous prose that is itself a homage to the great Russian masters whom Schulze is honouring – from Gogol to Pasternak, from Chekhov to Nabokov.