09 February 2009

My Literary Crushes

Russian-born author Lara Vapnyar began publishing her stories in English in 2002.

By Lara Vapnyar

Lara Vapnyar emigrated from Russia to New York in 1994 and began publishing short stories in English in 2002. She is the author of two collections of short stories, Broccoli and Other Tales of Food and Love (2008) and There Are Jews in My House (2004), and a novel, Memoirs of a Muse (2006).

As a teenager, I went through a series of literary obsessions with different writers. I would pick up a book from the shelf and fall in love. There could be a summer when I read nothing but Gogol and proclaimed him the greatest Russian writer, but by September I would switch to Dostoyevsky, only to abandon him for somebody else in a couple of months, or to return back to Gogol. I would be falling in love with writers, but not necessarily with the ones whose work I especially enjoyed. There were also writers whom I greatly admired but rarely enjoyed, like Tolstoy, for example. He can’t help but lecture at times. Often when I read his novels, I had an image of him hovering over as an annoying parent, and I wanted to say, “Oh, just leave me alone, let me enjoy the book.”

My longest, and the most serious, relationship has been with Chekhov. I can’t say whether I first fell in love with his stories or his portrait at the front of the book: Both were perfect. His stories were tender and light yet serious, so very serious. They were sad yet comical, but comical in a respectful way. There were no cheap laughs: Chekhov required the reader to find the humor. But the most important thing about Chekhov is his ability to quietly prod his reader to open his eyes and see things that had always been there, yet that had never been discovered. He makes his reader gasp with recognition.

I identified with every Chekhov character. I was Gurov, I was Anna Sergeevna, I was the circus dog Kashtanka. It was a perfect, untroubled romance until I read “Rothschild’s Fiddle.” Despite its name, the story isn’t about Rothschild but about Yakov, a Russian undertaker. Rothschild is a minor figure in the story, just a little Jew —  not a bad man but a ridiculous, pathetic man. Now here was a Chekhov character with whom I didn’t want to identify — but I couldn’t help but identify with him. He was a Jew, just as I was. I discovered many other Jews in Chekhov’s stories. They were never evil, but they were unfailingly small, incapable of grandeur. That was how Chekhov saw Jews.

After I immigrated to the United States and began to identify myself as a writer — two events that happened almost simultaneously — I became drawn to contemporary American writers, especially those who were like me of an immigrant descent. I admired the exquisite style and quiet depth of Jhumpa Lahiri, the fire and energy of Junot Díaz, the amazing experimenting of Alexander Hemon. I would turn to their work for inspiration when I was stuck with my writing, and I would turn for help to their characters when I was stuck in my personal life.

Yet, Chekhov remains the true literary love of my life. I keep his books on my nightstand, and I return to them again and again to remind myself that something so simple and unpretentious as Chekhov’s stories can open into the true greatness.