Open Democracy / ‘Belarus: love and paranoia’ by Natalia Leshchenko
Belarus: love and paranoia
A book on paranoia suddenly disappears. Two days after it had hit Minsk bookshops and Belarus’s internet retailers, it is suddenly “unavailable”. Neither inquiring readers nor embarrassed sales staff are given any explanation. It is as if the book never existed. But it did, and free electronic versions of the elusive novel are now spawning on the net.
Paranoia is a novel about love in time of dictatorship. The love between a man and a woman is described with freshness, subtlety, depth and joy. In the background is the dark, sinister world of authoritarian rule, with its frozen emotions, unspoken truths, and bizarre understanding of reality – so well entrenched in people’s heads that they are unsure which thoughts and fears are their own and which are implanted into their minds by overbearing power.
The book (which was published in Moscow) never mentions Belarus. The dictator is not the president but the secret-service minister, and his character is deliberately crafted to differ from the current Belarusian leader. The author opens the novel with the pointed statement: “all characters are fictional”. Yet Minsk’s landmarks are tangible in his social dystopia.
The Belarusian authorities’ nervousness is understandable on two counts. First, the political regime depicted in the novel is more melodramatic in its behaviour than the current reality (for example, the secret services kill dissenting young people rather than incarcerating them or expelling them from universities). Thus the novel runs against the message of “changing Belarus” the government is keen to present to Europe and the world beyond, to win their trust and investments. Second, the country portrayed has the atmosphere of a poignant, worried and lonely individual, far from the happy collectivist atmosphere the Belarusian authorities seek to project.
It is not the book but the ban that does the authorities a real disservice. This is a regime that became possible and sustained itself on the basis of the deft crafting of a populist national ideology. Here, the silent and unexplained prohibition of Paranoia erodes the image of trust that the government is painstakingly and at a great expense trying to disseminate.
The message of suppression is at glaring odds with the official governmental narrative. It suggests that the real things in Belarus happen in silence, unpredictably and without explanation. The government’s lack of communication in areas of international concern confirms and strengthens this adverse view.
The fear that lies behind this elusive decision by Belarusian officials is rooted in the borderless reality enabled by the internet and globalisation. True, they have banned books before. But Paranoia is the first novel that stands a chance of acquiring a large-scale international readership that they had confronted. Their awkward and clumsy treatment will, for a would-be populist regime, carry a greater cost even than its mishandling of the economy.
A double gift
Paranoia’s strongest point is the truthful, melancholy portrait of the ambiguous realities and confused attitudes of people forced to live under a watchful paternalistic state. Under communism, dissidents could pay lip-service to the political regime while secluding their own understanding of reality. Under dictatorship-induced paranoia, individual and social truths mix so well that people lose their judgment; their personal phobias are multiplied by the fears created by the secret services, so that they do not know where true reality begins and ends.
The novel articulates in a convincing and gripping way an argument rarely seen even in “political-regime” literature – that dictatorships are sustained not just by secret police and oppressive state apparatuses, but by people themselves. It demonstrates how real and perceived fears become mingled in ways that undermine individual action and judgment, and stifle liberty. It implies that regime-change begins not at the ballot-box but within a person’s own mind. This is a rare and insightful contribution that Belarusians, based on their own experience, can give to the world.
The country’s cultural products are the reflection and consequence of its social and political life. It is only logical that a Belarusian writer has published a book on life under dictatorship. The author is Viktar Martinovich, a soft-spoken, intelligent writer who now teaches in Vilnius: a man previously able to maintain the improbable position of a journalist employing a critical irony that offered no comfort but also no weapon to the authorities.
The Belarusian authorities, instead of banning the novel, missed a trick. They could have jumped on its bandwagon and celebrated the book. For the first time ever, the country has on offer a dynamic cultural product that has the chance to reach a worldwide audience. The censorship of Viktar Martinovich’s compelling prose will only fuel Paranoia’s international reputation. The authorities have transformed a piece of good literature into a political cause. Belarusians are now living with that double gift.
Роман или паранойя
В ноябре в Минске прошел Белорусский инвестиционно-экономический форум, призванный укрепить положительный имидж страны как надежного делового партнера. Следом за проведенным с помпой мероприятием Запад узнает об исчезновении с прилавков в Беларуси романа Виктора Мартиновича «Паранойя». Слова «укрепление отношений», «налаживание контактов», «либерализация», «улучшение климата», которыми изобиловал официальный пресс-релиз минского форума, неловко повисли в воздухе. Официальный Минск молчит и никак происходящее с книгой не комментирует.
Запад при этом терзается догадками: то ли весь старательно выстраиваемый имидж Беларуси как «неразведанной жемчужины Европы» и «динамично меняющейся к лучшему страны» – не более чем ложь, то ли белорусские власти просто не сильны в вопросах репутационного менеджмента и не могут внятно изложить свою позицию по проблеме. Так или иначе, ситуация однозначно негативно влияет на имидж страны, сводя не нет старания многих людей и значительные вложения времени и денег. К тому же каждая подобная ситуация только отчуждает западное общество еще больше.
При этом нет ничего ужасного в том, что у властей есть своя позиция, которая вполне может не совпадать с взглядами западной общественности или кого бы то ни было еще. Плохо то, что эта позиция не может внятно формулироваться, озвучиваться и защищаться цивилизованными методами.
То, что у белорусских властей серьезные проблемы с коммуникацией, не новость. Удивляет одно: как руководство страны намерено строить здоровое общество и налаживать интеграционные процессы с Европой и при этом ограничиваться отрепетированной и кондовой коммуникацией по праздникам?
Сам факт написания такой книги, ее скандальная популярность, неожиданный резкая реакция представителей официального Минска показывают, что проблема взаимоотношений власти и людей стоит сегодня острее, чем когда-либо. Все, кто прочитал роман, как один сразу же узнают в болезненном состоянии главного героя, метко отраженном названием книги, свои ощущения от современной Беларуси. И это несмотря на то, что многое в книге намеренно сильно гиперболизировано. Местами автор нарочито подчеркивает вымышленность сюжета.
Происходящее следует рассматривать как тревожный звонок, индикацию того, что тактика замалчивания, распространения страха и действий исподтишка неэффективна в деле построения общества здоровых и адекватных людей. Совершенно ясно, что характер коммуникации необходимо менять.
Что делают представители власти? Подчеркнуто молча изымают тираж, словно говоря: «Да, это Беларусь там описана! Что, вы сами не догадались? Как, вы не узнаете Минск?» При этом больше всего страдает репутация не автора, страны.
Создание благоприятного имиджа Беларуси среди западных аудиторий – одна из приоритетных задач правительства. Это должно привлечь в Беларусь инвесторов, туристов, должно создать спрос на белорусские товары за рубежом. «Дальновидный» ход с запретом книги и последующая «игра в молчанку» этому отнюдь не способствует.
В условиях глобальности процессов и относительно свободного обмена информацией такие промахи не остаются безнаказанными, не то что незамеченными. При этом белорусские власти не дают западным аудиториям выбора. Отсутствие обоснованной официальной позиции властей создает вакуум, который быстро заполняется домыслами и кривотолками. Ведь если чиновник не пользуется интернетом, это не значит, что им больше никто не пользуется.
И наивно полагать, что, изъяв книгу из обращения в одной стране, она дематериализуется для всех. Еще наивнее не видеть тот факт, что такой информационный повод – отличная возможность для противников правящего режима разыграть свою карту. Рейтинг цитируемости страны, конечно, вырастет на время, но именно такая известность губительна для ее репутации.
При всем богатстве выбора современных каналов коммуникации: от старых добрых СМИ до социальных сетей и блогосферы – чиновник стабильно предпочитает самый простой и надежный вариант – бездействие. Нам, наблюдающим происходящее с запада, официальный Минск поведением в вопросах PR напоминает буриданова осла. К слову, результат тот же.
При этом такая ситуация вызывает не смех – скорее, сожаление. В результате действий конкретных людей, мотивированных некими ложными ценностями, страдает вся страна. Это она недополучает инвестиции, это ее бизнесов сторонятся как сторонились, это на ее граждан продолжают смотреть со снисхождением. Потраченные на продвижение страны энергия, время и ресурсы летят в пропасть из-за одного нелепого шага.
Мы не устаем говорить, что страну представляют конкретные люди. Западное общество судит о Беларуси не по бравурным правительственным вебсайтам с рассказами про зубров, драники и перевыполнение плана, а по информации о людях, которые в силу тех или иных своих талантов становятся общественным явлением. При этом чем ярче личность, тем больше внимания она способна приковать к самой стране. Это нельзя отрицать, этим нужно пользоваться.
«Паранойя» имеет все шансы стать мировым бестселлером. Книга умна, интересна, эмоциональна и современна. У властей есть простой выбор. Они могут поддержать первый реальный белорусский культурный продукт и ассоциировать страну с его успехом у зарубежной аудитории. А могут продолжать хранить зловещее молчание и показать миру, что «Паранойя» и есть белорусская реальность.
Belarus: The Mistreatment of ‘Paranoia’
A book on paranoia disappeared in Minsk. Two days after it had hit bookshops and internet retailers, it was suddenly “ not available”, with no official explanation given either to the inquiring readers nor the embarrassed sales staff. It is as if the book has never happened. Except, of course, it has, and free electronic versions of the elusive novel are now spawning on the internet.
Paranoia is a novel about love at the times of dictatorship. The love between a man and a woman is described with freshness, subtlety, depth and joy. The background is the dark, sinister world of dictatorship, with their frozen emotions, unspoken truths, and the bizarre understanding of reality so well entrenched in people’s heads that they are unsure which of the thoughts and fears they have are their own and which are planted into their minds by the overbearing political regime.
Formally, the book never mentions Belarus. The dictator is not the president but the secret services minister, and his character is deliberately crafted to differ from the current Belarusian leader. The author opens the novel with a pointed statement that ‘all characters are fictional”. Yet, writing as he is in “reality plus anti-utopia” genre, he cannot help the setting, in which Belarusian capital Minsk is quickly recognisable.
It is easy to see why the Belarusian authorities got tetchy. First, the political regime described in the novel is more dramatic than the country’s current reality. (For example, tn the book, the secret services kill the dissenting youth rather than incarcerating or expelling their activists from universities as it happens in Belarus.) Hence, the novel runs against the message of “changing Belarus” the government is keen to present to Europe and the world outside, to win their trust and investments. Second, the book associates the country with a poignant, worried and lingering feel of a lonely individual, not the happy collectivist atmosphere the authorities are claiming for Belarusian society. Yet, it is not the book but the ban that does the Belarusian authorities disservice.
For a regime that arguably became possible due to a deft crafting of a befitting national ideology, the silent, unexplained prohibition of the “Paranoia” novel is
detrimental. It erodes trust, especially investor trust, that the government is painstakingly and at a great expense to the ailing economy trying to create abroad.
The information about disappearing books, dissenting youth being beaten up by squads of unidentifiable thugs, and of the imposition of discretionary demands on businesses creates a glaring gap with the official governmental pitch. It suggests that the real things in Belarus happen in silence, unpredictably and with no care for an explanation on the part of the authorities. The government’s lack of communication on points of international concern confirms and strengthens this adverse view of the country.
The dearth of common sense and understanding of the borderless reality enabled by the internet and globalisation betrays a sense of paranoia amongst the Belarusian officials themselves. Whilst they have banned books before, this is a first novel that stands of chance of acquiring international mass readership that they had confronted – and dealt with it awkwardly and clumsily. For the regime based on populist national ideology, mistakes in communication are dearer than mishandling of the economy.
Instead of banning the novel, the Belarusian authorities would be much more better off jumping on its bandwagon and celebrating Paranoia. For the first time ever, the country has on offer a cultural product that is timely, interesting and relevant for audiences worldwide.
Paranoia’s strongest point is the poignantly truthful portrayal of the mixed realities and the confused state of mind of people living under a watchful paternalistic state. Unlike under communism, where dissidents could pay a lip service to the political regime while keeping their own understanding of reality to themselves, in the dictatorship-induced paranoia, the individual and social truths mix so well that people lose their judgement, and the fear created by the secret services is multiplied by their own personal phobias so that one does not know where the actual reality begins and ends. The novel puts forward in a convincing and gripping way the argument rarely seen even in political regime literature – that dictatorships are sustained by people themselves, not only secret services and oppressive state apparatus. It demonstrates how real and perceived fears get mixed to stifle liberty and independent judgement, let alone undermine individual action. It implies that regime change begins not at the ballot box but within one’s own mind, a rare and insightful contribution Belarusians can give to the world based on their own experience.
The country’s cultural products are the reflection and consequence of its social and political life. It is only logical that a Belarusian writer has published a book on life under dictatorship. The author is a soft-spoken, quiet intelligent Victor Martinovich, who had previously stricken an improbable position of a journalist critical of the authorities and yet not an outright oppositionist due to his sense of irony; he would much rather be a successful writer than a dissident and does not target the government directly. The authorities’ knee-jerk reaction to ban it, in combination with Martinovich’s compelling prose, is likely to add Paranoia international acclaim and pose new uncomfortable questions for the Belarusian government to face and fend off. The authorities would be much better served if they addressed the novel themselves and communicated their view on it outright, or, even more so, celebrated it as Belarusian contribution to the world. It would leave it at the level of good literature instead of a political cause “Paranoia” has now become.
Natalia Leshchenko, Institute for State Ideologies (INSTID)