It’s funny that what everyone around me sees as my shameful stigma is in fact my hope. Let’s skip Turgenev’s silly somersaults, that puffing of imperial greatness. What remains is mine only—there are words in the language that I know better than the migrating houses of my sub-being, and those words have meanings, I know them, and this allows me to stand under any storm. My disagreement with Putinism has always been about words and the meaning of them. In 2014, they tried to shut me up when I called the Crimean operation an annexation. How could / dare you? That dreary questioning of the meaning of words brought back sanity to many, for a short while, but any passionate dialogue had been drying up. If you can’t remodel the language you can’t make a dressy shirt out of trims either.
Now the word “war” has boiled over. We don't want war, people cry, we just support our country. This is not a war. We want to kill children and women, we agree to blood and trophies, we will walk around in the clothes of the dead, we just don’t want war, don’t you dare say “war.” Don’t you dare speak words and name things.
I stay by the language, by my Russian language, and I shall not surrender it to anyone. “A raven” does not mean “a writing desk.” “Christianity” does not mean “cannibalism.” “Murder” does not mean “accident.” “Mercy” does not mean “callousness.” The words of my language have meanings. As long as I remember them, I can stand.
March 9, 2022 Translated by Shashi Martynova