Pelevin's OMON RA

Reading Victor Pelevin’s  OMON  RA

                                                                                                Akella Charumati Ramdas

Victor Olegovich Pelevin (22 Nov 1962, Moscow), the most modern postmodernist and extremely popular writer, has a duel qualification – he completed Moscow Institute of Power Engineering and Gorky Institute of Literature. Probably that is why one observes assimilation of computer technology, a great attraction for internet, creation of a second reality etc. etc. in his works i.e. all that is so peculiar of postmodernist writers.

Some critics consider that Pelevin belongs to the ‘other’ prose; according to some others he is a ‘conceptualist’; while quite a few think that he is a ‘postmodernist’.

According to S.Kornev, “Judging by form of his works, Pelevin is a postmodernist, and post modernist – Classical, not only from the point of view of form, but the contents as well. It seems like that from first look…but look carefully…Pelevin, in fact, is – ideologically, contentwise not at all a postmodernist, but a very real Russian Classical writer – ideologue, like Tolstoy or Chernyshevskyi. Russian classical writer, ideologue, is a person who cleverly releases a fully readable literary product, so that you can’t put it down, and at the same time – be an ideologue, i.e. a sort of moralist, propagator – social or religious. A stubborn ideologue who hammers into the minds of his readers one and the same moral metaphysical theory.” 1

Victor Pelevin wrote his first ‘thing’- some poems – on computer, which did not click, and which was not published. He was working on translations of Carlos Castaneda and Arthur Makin in the middle of 1980s when he shifted to prose.

Interestingly, 1980s, the period of Gorbachev’s Perestroika, is very much the period when, accumulated for a number of preceding decades, ‘underground’ literature splashed in the form of ‘postmodern’. It appeared, like ‘modernism’ (formalism, decadence in the Russian context), as a reaction to the contemporary socio-political conditions in the country. Modernism, which preceded the October Revolution, appeared exactly one hundred years ago (in 1880) and it ruled the literary scene till 1930s; and postmodernism – after the collapse of Soviet Power. As if an interrupted process resumed back its further course! In fact postmodernism can be easily considered as extension of modernist ideologies.

Some famous Russian postmodernist writers are V. Erofeev, S. Davlatov, Tatyana Tolstaya., L. Petrushevskaya, E. Popov, V. Petsukh, M.Kuraev. One of the most ‘senior’ postmodern writers (b.1955) Vladimir Sorokin, who is not only a postmodernist but a ‘conceptualist’ as well, is very famous in the West.

Postmodernism was welcomed and equally disliked by Russian readers and critics. A. Solzhenytsin calls it a “Dangerous anticultural phenomenon” similar to ‘avangardism’ and ‘futurism’. “Philosophy of postmodernism has completely destroyed the modern world to its skeletal stage…up to the stage of graveyard, where there is nothing ‘living’, but everything or every idea stinks of decomposition”2.

While some critics say that “postmodernism is not death of culture, but a finished stage, which repeats itself during its aesthetic revolution”3. “It is achievement of freedom in literature.”4

Just “when all these debates about the very existence of postmodernism were getting more and more fierce and a doubt was being expressed about the longevity of postmodernism at one end of the continent, it suddenly underwent a strange mutation on the other end of it, infected with radioactive, chemical and ideological retreats. As if a monster had appeared, who, paradoxically combined in itself all the formal symptoms of postmodern literary production; fully exploited its destructive capacity, but which had nothing from its weak, skeptic philosophy.”5 And that is Victor Pelevin, “the most popular in Russia and the West writer of the new generation.”

Victor Pelevin’s first collection of stories (“The Blue Lantern”) came out in 1992, and the same year his Omon Ra appeared in Znamya (No.5). “The Blue lantern” was not much noticed by critics; all the same it got Russian Booker for that year, though Omon Ra was short listed for the same. Omon Ra got ‘Independent Foreign Fiction Prize’ the British Prize for translated literature. (Pelevin says, ‘it is not at all less than a booker’.).

Then started many more creations…many more prizes, lot of popularity and recognition…

But we are interested in his first short novel Omon Ra, which is in fact considered as the most suitable example of postmodernism.

Omon Ra is actually a phase, an episode from the life of a young boy who dreams of going to the Moon – and having apparently taken a trip all the way there – in which four of his flight-partners sacrifice their lives, and just when it was Omon Ra’s turn to die, he survives miraculously – and finds that he is back on the familiar network of Moscow Metro! It is a relief to find him safe and sound, but of course, the underground metro being an image of entrapment – we see that the hero hasn’t escaped at all; he is back in the dreary familiar world.

Omon Ra can be considered as the starting point for expressing spiritual, ideological thoughts which had been tormenting the author since his childhood. But, dedicated to the ‘Heroes of Cosmos’ Omon Ra is based on reality, it is authentic.

In an unpublished interview to Sally Laird, he says, “Today I found myself in some sort of Zoroastrian sanctuary in a park in Moscow, and there was no way to get out of this park, nobody knew where the exit was…

“We’re all trapped; the difference again is just that some people understand this and some don’t. I’ve had this feeling ever since I was 14 (Omon Ra’s age in the novel-ACR), the feeling that you don’t have any real control over your life, you can’t change it – you are ruled by outside influences. Of course you can make promises to yourself, promises to change. But it’s stupid work, just a way of monitoring what actually takes place outside your control.

“ Omon Ra is about the fate of a boy who decided in his soul to go up there, to go to the Moon. Then he found out that what he had undergone was not a ‘real’ journey, but – something like a transformation of the soul.

“Critics wrote that it was libellous description of soviet space technology, and of course, it is libellous. I never did a moment’s real research on it. Too much knowledge is very oppressive when you are writing. The best thing is to know just a little bit, and it wasn’t hard to find that much – the odd detail, to give the story a sort of ‘authenticity’.”6

In Omon Ra the reality of Brezhnev’s Russia is expressed through observation, through the thought process of the protagonist.

In the novel Soviet Cosmonautics is presented as a grandiose cheating, behind the “technical achievements” attained at the cost of the lives of self-sacrificing and dedicated to the Regime (or Idea) people.

It implies that it is based on the history of a strange, total mystification when soviet organs of power “put progressive people to a puzzle” in all directions, partially imitating the flight of a space rocket and its landing on the Moon.

The action unfolds in a traditional - known socialist realist- prose of 1960’s. The details about places, names etc can easily be recognised. There is parody, satire too, in using these names and locations.

In the very beginning, where the protagonist introduces himself (and the whole novel is narrated by him – he could easily be the prototype of the author!), he says, “OMON – the name is not popular and, may be, not the best, as it is. Thus named me father who worked all his life in military and wished that I too became a militiaman.

“Understand, Omka, - he would often tell me after a couple of drinks, if you go to militia – then with this name,… and if you register yourself in the Party…”7  (Omon Ra, p.9)

Obviously he wanted to suggest that by virtue of this name he would climb higher and higher very fast…

OMON is in fact abbreviation for Отдел Милиции Особого Назначения (Special Branch of Militia). During the golden years of Soviet dictatorship there were many abbreviations and names of famous events, personalities used as proper names.

OMON had a brother, OVIR (again an abbreviation for Отдел Визы и Регистрации – Visa and Registration Branch), who passed away while he was in fourth standard. Father wanted to make him a diplomat.

Their surname was Krivomazov (Ironical reminder of F.M. Dostoevsky’s Karamazov – here it is a little crooked, twisted – but they are apparently truth seekers! – may be not by direct method but in a crooked manner!).

The action takes place in the beginning of 1960s, when there was a craze to fly into the space. Every small detail in life expressed things related to space.

The protagonist, Omon, lived not far from the theatre “Cosmos”; there was a giant metallic rocket placed on a smoke pipe in the region where he lived; there was a wooden airplane in the children’s park near his house and it is from here that his personality starts developing in a particular direction. Once, while watching film about fighter planes on TV, he feels as if he is observing the world beneath from the cabin of pilots; he realises that the same can be done without being in a cabin etc. And he comes to the conclusion that “It means that it is possible to see from within yourself, like from an airplane, and it is doesn’t at all matter from where you are observing, but what you see in the process…”.(p.13-14)

Since then while walking on a snowy street in winter, he would often imagine that he is flying in an airplane over a field covered with snow; while taking a turn, he would tilt his head, and the world would obediently swing to the left or to the right.

Every now and then when Omon thinks about the events taking place in the space, Pelevin throws a hint that what Omon presumes as gigantic, realistic, is in fact just a virtual world. The action unfolds on these lines, of course, on a seemingly grand, horrifying and tragic backdrop.

Soon Omon, along with his friend Mityok, joins a flying school to realise his dream of flying to the Moon. But a couple of years before that he goes to a Pioneer’s Camp ‘Rocket’ during summer. He was around 14 at that time. Omon feels that this event would serve as a stepping stone to fulfill his dreams. Pelevin and Omon seem to be changing roles now and then, making the reader feel that it is perhaps an autobiographical novel. Pelevin (Omon) says, “Now I can see distinctly that my fate was already decided at that point of time, when I myself was undecided about my future plans. As if it was shown to me in a simplified way. May be it was the ‘echo’of future – in fact, the seed of this future, falling in the soil, at that very moment, which later, from a distance, seems to be flying in from the future in the form of an ‘echo’.(p.16)

In this camp the lunch that was served, was not at all tasty – soup with macaroni stars, chicken with rice and stewed fruit.

The same description of food is repeated four times in the novel: in the summer camp, in Flying School, in the spacecraft ‘Lunokhod’ and in the final scene where a woman is seen carrying packets of rice, macaroni stars, and frozen chicken in the metro train.

Pelevin depicts the monotonous mode of life and exposes the cheating to which the citizens were subjected to, the mask that was presented before the world. This happens gradually – from the summer camps to the flying school and culminates with the end of Omon’s flight to the Moon(!).

But at every stage the truth is depicted on a correspondingly appropriate scale.

So, in the summer camp, there were several card board spaceships hanging on threads by the ceiling. Each of them had the word ‘USSR’ painted on it. “A spaceship was hanging in front of our table, and from its foil was reflecting the orange, setting Sun, which suddenly looked similar to the headlamp of a metro train, illuminating in the dark void of a tunnel.”  (p.18)  

The relationship REALVIRTUAL; VIRTUAL REAL [The real Sun looks like a Projector (virtual Sun) in the summer school while the virtual Moon seems to be the real Moon in final flight to space] starts unfolding from this point.

According to Omon’s friend Mityok, even in the 20’s of last century, there were space ships – in 30’s, 40’s, 50’s and so on. Their shape changed gradually. And when Omon expresses his doubt about the statement, Mityok says that they existed in fiction – depiction of their flight was based on laws of motion. Omon says, “They never flew!”And Mityok pointed towards the hanging models of space ships and said, “These too do not fly.” (p. 18-19)

Omon understood what he wanted to say, “The only space ships where the star ships of future – communism - flew, was the imagination of soviet men, exactly like the dining hall surrounding us was that space, where those living here during the last training session launched star ships, so that they crossed the space-time continuum over the dining tables, when the creators of these card board fleet won’t be around. This thought created an inexpressible melancholy mood, which was always experienced by me while consuming dry fruit stew in the Pioneer’s Camp.

They were wondering why the pilot’s cabin in these hanging models is vacant. Mityok brings a rocket from the dining hall and takes out the little pilot sitting on a small cardboard chair. It was made of plasticine. But the strange thing that Mityok reported about the pilot and the rocket was that when the rocket was made, they started with the man. Created him with plasticine, put him on chair and pasted firmly with card board from all sides. And though there were different devices, switches, apparatus shown on the inner wall of the rocket, there was no door for the pilot to come out. Though from outside, there could be a seen the drawing of a handle, but inside, there was just a wall with different meters.

Mityok and Omon join Maresyev Flying Academy. It is in this Academy that the author is boldly showing the soviet reality, and not only showing but in a tragi-ironic way satirizing the whole system. A few examples are illustrated in this paper:

1. Name of the flying Academy is Maresyev Academy.

As is well known, Alexei Maresyev was the hero of Boris Polevoi’s novel “Story of a Real Man” (“Повесть о Настоящем Человеке”). During the World War II Maresyev is injured, his legs are amputated, but he again flies his fighter jet with his artificial legs. So, indirectly, Maresyev means – amputated legs!

During induction programme the instructor asks the boys, “You know, it is not a simple task – to fly into the Cosmos? And if the Motherland asks you to sacrifice your life? Then what, yeah?”

“It is implied,” I answered.

Next day, a course instructor, Lt. Colonel, said, “I want to tell you now, that here we prepare not only fliers, but in the first place – Real People, right? And when you get your Diploma and the military rank, be assured that by this time you would already be ‘Real Men with the Biggest Letter (Gorky’s expression – ACR) which is there only in the Soviet country.

“Children, remember the remarkable history of the legendary person praised by Boris Polevoi! He, having lost both his legs in the war, did not give up, but …”. And we, the staff of this flying Academy, and personally me, promise….: we shall make real people out of you in the shortest possible time!” (p.37-38)

And though the day ends with the boring description of supper: soup with macaroni stars, chicken with rice and stewed fruits, they felt terribly sleepy and having hardly reached their beds immediately fell asleep.

Next morning they woke up amidst wailing and pain. Suffering shrieks were heard from every bed. The lower parts of their faces were hidden behind tightly stretched cloth, they were tied to their beds with ropes and all of them observed that their feet were amputated! In the shortest possible time they were made Real Men – Maresyevs!

Even the senior students had faced the same fate, they were wearing strange looking shoes with a hollow front, they were walking with no confidence, holding the wall, or the back of cots! All Real Men! And there was an unhealthy paleness on their faces, which was telling of various days of suffering.

And they were immediately admitted into the first course of secret Space School of KGB’s first section.

Obviously, they were administered sedatives in their soup the previous night, so they could not feel the amputation of their feet. Effect of sedatives continued for another two days.

2. In Moscow’s Secret Space School, the trainees were clad in black uniform and introdeced to the teaching faculty. One of them was Col. Urchagin – sitting in a chair for the invalids. Does that remind us of something? Yes, Korchagin – Urchagin. Pavel Korchagin, hero of N.Ostrovsky’s “How the steel was tempered” (“Как закалялась Сталь”).   Like that Korchagin, this Urchagin too was blind. There was one more – Burchagin…both these …rchagins were from the Pavel Korchagin Military-Political School…they were very similar to each other, both were blind, both used the same chair , so that when one was present, the other remained away; lying – half lying in the tiny room on the fifth floor – in uniform with blanket drawn up to the waist to obscure the bedpan from prying eyes. Sparse furnishings of the room, a special cardboard pattern for writing with narrow slits for lines, the invariable glass of strong tea on the desk, white blinds on the windows and the potted plant – all that could move anybody to tears.

But during the first meeting with Urchagin Omon is told, “Sending a returnable spaceship with a cosmonaut to the Moon is not possible for us right now. But there is another possibility – sending there an automatic crew, which need not come back.”(p.47)

Omon expresses his doubt: “If the Lunakhod is automatic, why am I needed?”(p.49)

Urchagin, the political consultant, takes him out for a walk and explains: “…In history nothing happens as it is described in text books. The dialectic is that teachings of Marx, meant for a developed country, won in the very backward country. We, the communists, never had time to show the truth of our ideas – a lot of strength was taken away by war, very long was the battle with the past and with our internal enemies. We could not technically defeat the West. But the struggle of ideas – it is such a field, where you can’t stop even for a second. Paradox is, and, it is again the same, dialectic – that by cheating we help truth, because Marxism carries in itself the all conquering truth, and that, for which you are going to sacrifice your life, formally appears to be a fraud. But the more consciously…the more consciously you fulfill your victory more truthful it will look, more essence will acquire your short and beautiful life!

“Give up life? What victory? Foolishly inquired I.”

“The same, which already more than a hundred boys like you and your friend have accomplished.” (p.50-51)

Omon expresses his desire to leave the Academy and go back to the Pioneer’s camp but he was clearly warned, “Interesting…don’t want. Do you think that they would leave you now in peace? They would let you go? And even if they send you back, it will be like this, that you get up from your bed and walk on crutches?”

Will anybody need your services when you are without legs? These bitches won’t let you out live. Agreed – a?” (P.54-56)

3. Pelevin mocks at various other practices prevailing in the soviet state. We mention a few of them here:

The reader comes across Laika, the first dog that was sent into space. She was introduced to Omon as comrade Laika. She was in a light green Uniform with flaps showing that she had the rank of General-Major, two Lenin Medals were tucked on her chest…

So, anyone could become a Hero, not only a man, but even a dog!

4. There are quite a few interesting and tragic episodes in the novel. One such episode tells the readers how the children were named during those times. In addition to OMON and OVIR, about whom the readers are already informed that they are abbreviations, we come across another queer name Pkhadzer Vladilenovich Pidorenko. Pidorenko was the Director of flight. He was from a small Ukranian village Pidorenka. His father was a Chekist [Cheko -- Chrezvichainyi Komitet, the earlier nomenclature for KGB-ACR] and he named his son by combining the first letters of the phrase Partyiino – Khozyaistvennyi aktiv Dzerzhinskovo Raiona (Партийно-Хозяйственный актив Дзержинского Района – Pkhadzer—Пхадзер); in addition, in the names  Пхадзер  and Владилен the sum of letters is 15, which is the total number of Soviet Republics!

5. A very tragic fate mentioned is that of Ivan Trofimovich Popadya. He started his career in the Hunting Section as a huntsman, where the leaders of Government and Party would go for hunting, and his duty was to drive the animals – bears and wild boars – into the range of hunters, officers standing behind trees. Once it so happened that a strong boar drifted away and attacked one of the hunters with his fang. This was an official of the government, who died while being taken to the city, and a decision was taken to prohibit hunting the wild animals. But now and then there appeared certain opportunities when hunting became unavoidable, and hence Popadya was asked to wear the skin of a boar over a bullet proof jacket on his body, and it turned out to be his new profession. Soon he got used to the bullets of hunters.

But then the American politician Kissinger visited USSR in order to hold strategic talks with the authorities and “to sign the Treaty for Non Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons – it was of specific importance, as we never had them, and our enemies are not supposed to know this. “(p. 66). Therefore Kissinger was given the best treatment by the Government; every attempt was made to fulfill all his wishes. He wanted to go for hunting and the officials thought that it would be easy to hold talks with him during the hunting session. He expressed his desire to hunt for the bears – and was surprised and a little scared too to see two bears, specially prepared for him. They were Ivan and Marat Popadya – father and son. The guest fired at Marat with his bullet, and when Marat continued running around, the guest pounced upon him, fell him down and killed him with his knife. The father could not help the son; helplessly he watched the death of his son. It was the state matters that were more important. Needless to say that after killing the BEAR, Kissinger immediately signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty!

Omon’s training starts…and the day arrives when Omon ‘flies’ to the Moon. The rocket carrying ‘Lunakhod’ consisted of four stages. Each stage was monitored by his batch mates, the moment the first stage was ignited, the boy had to shoot himself from a pistol given to him for this purpose. When all four of them ‘sacrificed their lives’, it was Omon’s turn. He was supposed to land on Moon, come out of ‘Lunakhod’, reach a specific place over there and shoot himself. He is reminded of this when he starts walking on the surface of Moon, but his pistol gets jammed. In complete darkness he starts walking on Moon, the food products provided to him are getting over, they are laced with sedatives, so most of his ‘journey’ to Moon was carried on in sleep!

Omon keeps walking till he reaches a wall with various cables stuck to it, he turns around and stumbles against another wall…it was a tunnel; he keeps walking ahead till he sees some light, some rails and his ‘Lunakhod’ parked on these rails, he comes out and is stunned to notice that it was not Moon where he was walking but Moscow’s underground Metro route. He reaches, through some outlet, into a big hall, where he finds a press conference going on, and a practical session of landing of some spaceship on some moon is being shown to the world. The moon was there, the spaceship was there!! It was a total deceit!

Omon is followed; they try to catch him, and somehow he enters a Metro rail and finally gathers enough sense to think that he has to decide finally where to go.

Pelevin has succeeded in keeping the reader glued to the novel till the end. The mystery is revealed only towards the very end…and the reader is stunned like the hero.

One more significant aspect of Omon Ra is the emergence of Buddhist ideology which is present in a few subsequent works of Pelevin. In Omon Ra,  Pelevin is shown contemplating over two basic quests – “Who am I?”, and “ The World is nothing but just my impression”( Мир – только моё впечетление”).

Ever since his childhood, Omon was engrossed with this question, but he did not get any satisfactory answer from any one. He would ponder over such questions like, “How do I see? And who is it that sees? And what does it generally – to see? Is it some outside thing that I see or is it within myself? And what is it – within me, and beyond me?”He would often feel that he is standing on the very threshold of a puzzle, but, trying to make the last step towards it, he would soon lose that ‘I’, which was just now standing on the threshold. Questions about Soul, God, Life, Death bothered him in his childhood. It is here that he decides to choose a God for himself, and he chose “Ra”, the God ancient Egyptians believed in, and he chose a name for himself “Ra”. He would call himself Ra - Omon Ra. During his “flight to Moon”, after making him undergo ‘Reincarnation Test’, the officials gave him the same name for his flight.

Interestingly, if we consider “Ra” too as a name formed from abbreviation – it is Russian Army – Omon Ra becomes an unbelievable combination of materialism – spirituality; Army – God (Killer – Saviour; Destroyer – Creator!).

Perhaps that indicates towards the pursuit of soviet man in the Pre-Perestroika era.     

Notes

1.Корнев С , Столкновение Пустот: Может ли Постмодернизм быть русским и классическим? : Об одной авантюре Виктора Пелевина, Новое Литературное Обозрение. 1997. No. 28.

2. Quoted from Берёзина А.М. Русская Литература XX Века, 2002, LOGOS, SPB, p.312

3. Ibid, p.313

4. Ibid, p.314

5. Корнев С, Блюстители дихотомии: Тридцать сребреников за рецепт бестселлера : Кто и почему не любит у нас Пелевина //http:// sampo.karelia.ru/~madr/blust/html.

6. Sally Laird, Voices of Russian Literature: Interviews with Ten Contemporary Writers. community.livejournal.com/ru_pelevin/...

7. Пелевин Виктор, Жёлтая Стрела, М, Виргиус,2003.

Here and elsewhere the quotations from Russian are translated by me. Only page numbers are shown in brackets after the quotations hereafter.