Whither Russia?
The Catkin and the Icicle : Aspects of Russia. By John Gooding. (Constable, 30s.)
THIS book is a joy. 'As historian, Russian- speaker, poet in prose, John Gooding has written such a superior brand of trAvelogue that it should really be 'called a memoir. From 1962 to 1963 he was a graduate student at Moscow Univer- sity. and for these ten months his appealing sense of the many-sidedness of things fastened on to key, facets of Russia: its religions, secular and otherwise, its writers and students, its past, and, above all, its past in its present and future. He understands, judges rarely.
Authors like Wright Miller, Ronald Hingley and Harvey Pitcher have impressed Os by their feel for the modern Russia, but John Gooding impresses us also with the wit and economy of a consistently' stimulating style. Many of his in- sights have a poetic quality which recall Journ6 into Russia, by Laurens van der Post.
He particularly excels in his descriptions of people, his evocations of nature being vivid and skilful, but less original. His frequent historical diversions also fascinate, flowing quite naturally in and out of the narrative and always illuminat, ing it. 'Those who had ascended the holy moun- tain to prostrate themselves before the mystery of Russia found suddenly that the object of their worship punched them on the nose.' So much for the English Slavophiles in 1917, but this passage is also an integral part of his probing reflections on Russia's past and future course.
While in Russia, 'I thought the failures of the Soviet Union, however gross, might be merely the inessential part; now I am less sure,' and he ponders de Tocqueville's theory 'that discontent rises as the mailed fist loosens its grasp; that reforms need not avert and can sometimes pre- cipitate a revolution.' He is equally uncertain about the condition of the Orthodox Church: 'when one is about to pronounce it dead, a sudden, inexplicable something bids caution.' He observes the fervour of the predominantly old women who crowd the churches, and also—what may be missed by the casual visitor--the con- cern of a number of young people for deeper and often religious values.
As for the mass of the students, he is struck by their purposefulness. Their frequent philis- tinism and lack of a feeling for the past save them from the deep pessimism of such as his young poet friend, who believes his poems will never be published. It may be, however, that since the author left Russia, the harvest calamity of 1963 and the 'de-Khrushchevisttion' of 1964-
65 have made the average student more sceptical and introspective.
But the author's desire to seek out the best in people, as also in his beloved Leningrad (`Tsarism's grandiose tombstones'), is one of his most appealing traits. His irony, often at his own expense, always operates gently: he is far too polite to refer to the often tendentious historical remarks of his guides as lies. He just quietly inserts in the text such questions as 'How in a rational universe could Pushkin die and D'Anthes live?'
PETER REDDAWAY
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