MAGI proposal 2010 - to publish a series of contemporary Russian writers and poets living outside Russia.

In the beginning was the word. So begins the New Testament. This notion has become such an axiom that, ironically and seemingly, it has lost the power of persuasion. In the same way that irrefutable truths lose the power of surprise and turn into a cliché.

Yet a cliché can re-awaken us from the slumber of daily life that in our information age is overstuffed with unnecessary and thought-up complications.

And it is in this way that another Biblical cliché which states that nothing changes under the sun is sometimes a refreshing whip upon the lazy and conceited flesh of our contemporary civilization. For, after all, when we are long gone from the face of this earth, our descendants will remember and judge us by the heritage that we left behind, not our daily struggles. When we remember Ancient Greece, we think of Socrates and Plato, Euripides and Sophocles – not the logistics of selling olives in Sparta. This is an optimistic sign for us, human beings. Even if humanity seems drenched in cynicism and materialism during a particular epoch (as is very true of our own), with the passage of time only spiritual manifestations of its existence remain relevant.

MAGI – International Association Of Citizens of Art – has chosen as its main mission to promote and advance Russian cultural and spiritual heritage outside the borders of our homeland. Practically speaking, it is not a grueling task because Russia has always been and remains the land where the Word reaches insurmountable heights. The biggest pillar of Russian spiritual heritage is its literature and poetry which remains unmatched and unrivaled. It is literally through the power of the Word that Russia occupies an integral part of an International community. It is Pushkin and Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Turgenev, to name the very few, that come to mind of most people when they think of Russia.

Today, with international borders becoming increasingly lax, representatives of the Russian Word have become physically scattered throughout the world. Emigration and relocation has produced a series of writers and poets who employ their mother-tongue, i.e. Russian and it is on the very best of these writers and poets that MAGI proposes to concentrate its efforts and represent them in a worthy  way. When Thomas Mann declared that the German language is where he is, he was not exaggerating. Same goes for Nabokov and Brodsky who wrote outside the confines of their homeland but remain just as integral part of it as, for example, Lermontov and Mayakovsky who worked mostly in their native territory. Russia was as much a part of the former two as of the latter despite biographical circumstances.

MAGI proposes to publish a series of contemporary Russian writers and poets living outside Russia. Some of these writers and poets have been already published and read. Some of them have even been translated into other languages.  However, not enough emphasis has been placed on the fact that the scenery and the world that they offer is very different form that which can be seen in the writing of those who have never felt exile, whether voluntary or not. The criteria for choosing such authors would be the level of their mastery of the word. The form of their representation that MAGI proposes would be a series of gift editions comprised of two volumes for each chosen author, with an introduction for each author by an expert familiar with the author’s work, illustrated accordingly in the best traditions of book publishing. Such a feat of combining contemporary Russian émigré-writers into a single, unified gift series has not yet been undertaken either in Russia or outside of it. The works of the writers will be presented in its original language and a translation.

There are three major advantages to such a series:

1. As was mentioned above, MAGI would be the unprecedented initiator of a publishing series which will comprise contemporary Russian émigré authors under the same “brand”. As artists writing outside the borders of their homeland, these writers, as a rule, depict a peculiar world that is not characterized by the confines of a specific space and represent a more cosmopolitan cultural milieu.

2. As such, they would serve as Russia’s spiritual ambassadors thus ensuring and strengthening the prestige of their homeland and making its heritage a part of the International community.

3. And, finally, speaking from purely practical viewpoint the proposal to publish a gift series of Russian émigré authors is a very sound business proposition as well. With proper marketing and advertising, such an undertaking is bound to attract the targeted audience which will mostly be comprised of middle class majority that purchases books as gifts. It will also serve as an original souvenir for international tourists in Russia who are refined enough not to purchase another Matryoshka set or an ex-KGB officer’s hat as a memento from Russia.

And above all, this proposal will serve the cause of promoting the Word by publishing its masters in prose and poetry.

2009

Yana Djin/ Honored Member of MAGI

(The Artistic Committee of MAGI)