Политические организации геев носят временный характер: пока не будут достигнуты равные права, гражданские права. После этого они утрачивают смысл. В России закон о наказании за гомосексуальные сношения мужчин был отменен не благодаря борьбе геев за свои права, отмена на геев снизошла сверху в ходе общей демократизации общества и в дипломатических целях (Россия хотела почувствовать себя равной в международных организациях). Вполне естественно, массовые организации геев в России не появились, а их небольшие зародыши рассосались. Нет целей, нет и смысла.
Гомосексуальные люди в России видят свои политические задачи в поддержке общей демократизации общества, в предотвращении возвращения коммунистов к власти. И в объяснительной работе, в просвещении публики относительно гражданских прав, в распространении терпимости к странным сторонам любого меньшинства. Почти все мы принадлежим к какому-нибудь меньшинству. Цыгане — это меньшинство. Писатели — это меньшинство. Ученые — меньшинство.
Но и воры — меньшинство. Уголовники — это очень мобильное и пластичное меньшинство. Они отражают, хотя и в искаженном виде, многие черты нашего общества. В них виднее некоторые контуры природы человека, обычно скрытые развитой культурой. Изучая их, мы начинаем лучше понимать себя.
То же самое относится и к гомосексуалам. Правда, это предмет для другой книги, тоже мною написанной. Что же до настоящей книги, это продукт своего времени. Но у меня подозрение, что от этого времени связи с современностью всё еще очень сильны.
— Лев Клейн
SUMMARIES[31]
L.S.Klejn
The adventures of a Russian scholar in prison and GULAG camp at the very end of the Brezhnev epoch are related in the first person.
The author of the book, a world-renowned archaeologist, who taught at Leningrad University, was arrested in the last wave of repression, which befell the Leningrad intelligentsia in the early ’80s, — when Soviet troops entered Afghanistan, the detente policy was wrecked and Sakharov was exiled to Gorki. At that time the blow fell upon professors who supported unorthodox positions; who were too often published in the West; or who were too popular among the student youth. In large part these professors were also of Jewish origin. The author was accused of homosexuality. The investigation and the court trial — resembling that of Oscar Wilde in its tension — are recreated in minute detail, and the facts are presented that relate to the participation of the KGB.
The first chapter (‘The fear’) is devoted to the domination of the KGB over the whole of Soviet society, its (the KGB) influence being felt in all spheres of Soviet life. The KGB kept everyone in awe but the author argues that ultimately fear most affected those in power: they were afraid of the people. The second chapter describes the arrest of the author and the severe conditions in the Soviet prison “The crosses” (Petersburg) — beyond the conditions permitted by international law. The third chapter (‘Short work with the help of the law’) relates the many transgressions of the law by the investigators and judges — evidenced with references to the protocols of the court trial. In the fourth chapter (‘The seventeenth expedition’) the transfer from the prison to the GULAG camp is described as the latest scientific expedition of the author. It was in this way that the author viewed his adventures in the camp. In the fifth chapter (‘Under the red sun’) he discusses the situation with an old and hardened criminal and describes some other cases, including the life story of an imprisoned old French Communist. Criticism of the domestic situation is never far away.
Yet, as distinct from other similar books, this book focus is not the description of oppression, but the contemplation of human nature. The book contains scholarly but vivid description and analysis of the closed criminal society. The author adduces a detailed comparison of this specific world with prehistoric society and advances a theory as to the cause of this similarity. The similarity is manifold: tattooing as a system of signs, rites of initiation, the developed system of taboo, three castes, clan conflicts, chieftains and their retinues, blood brotherhood, non-monetary exchange, etc.
The author considers criminal society to be closer to natural human society, in comparison to which our own society is artificial. The point is that human nature was formed in the Cro-Magnon period and biologically has not changed since. Homo sapiens sapiens, as this species is called with some exaggeration, has existed no less than 40 000 years (and in the Near East much longer). But for all our intellectual and social attainments we owe more to our culture than to our nature. This is seen in examples from India, in reports of feral children nurtured by wolves. When people are deprived of modern culture (or there is a shortage of it), and they are left to selforganisation (as happened in coercive Soviet labour camps), they form a savage society very close to a prehistoric one, to the society of Upper Palaeolithic.
The theme is important, the entire Soviet society experienced at least the influence of camp society with its slang, songs, rituals, customs, notions and morals: for in the space of 30 years more than 30 million people, i. e. a considerable part of the adult population of the country passed through the prisons and camps. This is why the book, whilst still in journal form (serialized over four years, 1988-91) aroused a veritable storm of comments in the most popular Leningrad ‘thick monthly’ Neva, achieving at that time a total sale of 700,000. As the KGB and the censors were then still very powerful, these sketches were published under the pseudonym Lev Samoylov (rather a transparent pseudonym: first name and patronym).