The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

Incomparably delightful with ever passing page. Do yourself a favor-- get the lift of reading a thoroughly clever account of graduate student adventures.

I have lived a long time and read a lot of books. Some were totally trashy and probably made me dumber, but they were totally engrossing. Other books were a much tougher slog, but they usually improved my knowledge of some subject and sometimes inspired a better overall understanding of my own (long) life. This book is unlike anything my eyes have ever seen. First and foremost, it is absolutely hilarious. Reading this book was as fun and addictive as watching the first season of Jersey Shore ("GTL: Grad School, Travel, Literature.") Except, each passing chapter gave my brain the sensation of a bounteous feast, instead of giving it brain-ulcers. That is, the book not only increased my knowledge of familiar and unfamiliar books from Russia and elsewhere, but it also made me think about such books, and my own life, in new ways. By combining personal insight and wisdom, literary theory, and a body of grueling journalistic service (visiting "Slap-in-the-Face," squatting or leaping over pits in Samarkand, depending on the type of pit) the author really provoked a lot of things for me to think about. Like, "to what extent is the goal of controlling your own life achievable, or even desirable?" Most people would like to control, at least partially, what happens to them, i.e. to minimize slaps in the face. But, do you also want to control what you like or love, and is this even possible? On the one hand, the heart is supposed to want what it wants. On the other hand Woody Allen has been viewed, to some extent, as a nasty pedophile. Probably what you love is controlled by your own outlook and personality, in the sense that you want yourself to want certain things (like a crush where you love to love someone) according to your interests and world-view. On the other hand, why do you want yourself to want certain things? This comes down to your life and experiences, which are partly under your own control or responsibility, but are partly determined by the actions of other humans in the world, grappling with the same apparatus. This is one example of the sort of train of thought that my brain did not expect to take upon reading about some grad students and Russians. The book is truly unique in genre and content--if you read it you will have your own variety of thoughts. It is certainly possible that you will not like the book as much! For instance, if you don't feel that what you love has much control over the rest of your life, or that it should, then maybe this book will make you really mad. Or, if you feel like it is inappropriate to make jokes or to learn about crazy ancient things, or to use literary theory, when there is poverty in like Haiti, or because 9/11 and some associated wars happened, then it will be hard for you to enjoy many of these essays. Finally, the author is evidently a lively young talented babe, so if you feel that people should only learn from the lives and thoughts of older men with distinguished personas and

This is a wonderful book, especially if you're interested in Russian literature and the whole graduate school experience. Elif Batuman is incredibly funny and smart and manages to be both glancingly anecdotal and profound. This is one of those great hybrid books that takes, as its jumping off point, the author's avoidance of the arduous process of writing a book (in this case a novel) and mostly describes what happens when the author is doing and thinking about other things, which in the end results in a different, and perhaps more interesting, book. I thought of Geoff Dyer's "Out of Sheer Rage," which describes his efforts (or lack of efforts) to write a book about D.H. Lawrence. Both books were immensely enjoyable.

Please be patient. I will get to the book in a moment, but first I want to explain why this very good book matters. My Polish grandmother was an austere, white-haired woman perpetually irked by her descent into the middle class. She believed that a lady rightfully avoided certain things such as work and cooking. She was, however, a great reader and had at one time aspired to be a poet. A sheaf of her poems written in a florid Slavic hand lies packed away in my basement. When I was thirteen, my mother pointed me in my grandmother's direction and instructed me to ask Grandma what to read. "You must begin", the old lady said firmly, "with Tolstoy. Resurrection and The Kreutzer Sonata." At the time I couldn't understand either and settled on "How Much Land Does a Man Need?" Since then I have had a recurring love affair with Russian lit. From Gogol and Pushkin I journeyed on through Dostoevsky and got as far as Master and Margarita. Nearly every step of the way some Russian emigre -the very people who insisted I read these books- wagged a cautionary finger at me: "You will never truly understand a word of this. The translation is terrible. And the Russian soul is... beyond you."" Now I have discovered The Possessed. This book with its comic-inspired cover lay in the Our Staff Recommends section of the bookstore, in a rack nine deep and quite undisturbed. So, hopeful that I would at last grasp the essence of the Russian soul or at least learn something, I bought it. Once I began to read, I couldn't put it down. Nor could I stop laughing. Elif Batuman has written a comic detective story in which the characters real and imaginary intermix and the revelation lies in the journey itself. Yet she knows so much more than Russian lit. She glides effortlessly across the artistic landscape from Babel to King Kong, from Tolstoy to Sammarkand. She is a keen tracer of lost personae. But there's more. Ms. Batuman has the delicate antennae needed to detect the nuances of academic silliness. She comes armed with a red-blooded aversion to the cult of pomp and obfuscation which dominates so much of modern scholarship. Better than that she comes armed with a facility for writing English which pleases the American soul. But she is also a teacher. In her deft way she touches on the central themes of Russian literature which has thrived despite the successive ogreships of the tsars, the communists, and now the Putinists. What are the central themes? According to her (and others) the Russian must lead at least two lives and perhaps three or more. At minimum there coexist the public persona, the private one, and the inner one that carries on a dialogue only with itself. But don't we all have these? Here's the difference: Many a Russian author reveals this multiple existence through his/her work and thereby risks the brutal perils of self-incrimination. Add to that a rich

Really, this series of essays lived up to the billing. First off, this book is downright funny, especially the series of essays "Summer in Samarkand," and the exaggerated retelling of the history of the Ice Palace. Ms. Satuman has a great feel for deadpan humor and comic understatement. Second, it's a "smart" book and full of theory: some elegant, some comicly half-baked, and some straight-up weird. The last essay on Girard's theory of mimetic desire is incredibly interesting stuff, even though I didn't believe a word of it. Third, it's personal, I felt like the book really revealed the personality of the author, and that I knew her well.

"The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them" is a book of many things; in part, it is a book about Russian Literature, travel to exotic places, but most of all about life. It is by turns extraordinarily funny, heart breakingly sad, and with profound insights. Lovers of Russian Literature will find new insight and fresh interpretations here. For those who are not so versed, this book serves as a gentle introduction to these works. The book consists of a series of essays, some of which have appeared before in the New Yorker, Harpers and n+1. While these essays span great breadth in literature and places, they are brilliantly joined together by an amazing introduction and wonderful conclusion. The writing is beautiful throughout, with highly quotable passages, and the author is a gifted storyteller---each story is a journey with its own surprises. My favorite passages were those which described people, including the author's loves. Like a sketch artist, in a few almost abstract lines a person is drawn or a situation captured. The book is a journey for the mind and the heart. This is a magnificent book, and an author you will want to get to know.