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Once Upon the River Love

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Russian-born novelist Andrei Makine's romantic and Proustian autobiographical first novel, Dreams of My Russian Summers, was quite appropriately written in French because its subject was largely the centuries-old love affair that Russians have had with French culture in all its forms. Set mostly in a grim, Stalinist Siberia, it charted a boy's intoxication with his grandmother's lustrous memories of turn-of-the-century Paris. That inheritance of lost treasures eventually caused him deep conflict, but Makine resolved it by becoming a writer.

And what a writer, even in translation. His prose in that book was a lavish, slow torrent, lush and haunting. Not surprisingly, Makine is the first novelist to have received France's prestigious Prix Medicis and Prix Goncourt for the same book.

His new novel, set in the 1960s, is equally as focused on dreams of glamor and glory contrasting with a dismal Siberian reality as crushingly onerous as the Soviet system that has planted prison camps there. And once again, it's aspects of French culture that come to symbolize everything fresh, exciting, and free that is missing in the narrator's life.

Reading this novel you enter a fascinating and quite alien world of snow, silence and history-as-nightmare, where blizzards cover towns with a weight that equals the burden of collectivization and the calamities of Russia's decades of devastation through Revolution, civil war, and war. In this setting, the brutal regularity of the winters is as heedlessly cruel as the inane Communist Party slogans and official optimism that ceaselessly forecast a glorious future proving the truth of Marxism- Leninism. But what about the barren here-and-now?

The handsome narrator Dimitri (nicknamed Don Juan) and his two eenaged friends struggle with all the familiar burdens of adolescence. Not surprisingly, Dimitri's first sexual encounter, with a prostitute whose life also affects his two friends, doesn't reveal the glories of love, but grotesque chagrin l'amour instead. It's Makine's rich prose that makes something original out of all the cliched inchoate longings for life, experience, certainty and identity. His prose--and the bitter, empty life in Dimitri's eastern Siberian town where people feel "condemned to this natural beauty, and to the suffering that it conceals."

Into that void shines an unexpected beam of light far grander than the Trans-Siberian Railway and its mysterious, magnetic passengers glimpsed through windows. Quixotically, the local cinema starts showing an adventure film starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and everyone for miles around starts lining up to see this movie not once, but dozens of times. In its chic, humor, and self-reflectiveness, the film offers unimaginable gifts to its Siberian audience. They see the unknown West there: excitement, sensuality, freedom, adventure, wit and sparkling fun. Belmondo's gorgeous smile on the movie poser undercuts years of fear and oppression under the Soviet system. And each of the trio of boys ironically finds deep lessons in the frivolous movie, identifying with different aspects of Belmondo's character: Lover, Warrior, and Poet.

Though the book is touchingly beautiful, it doesn't have quite the weight of Dreams of My Russian Summers, perhaps because there's no central figure who commands as much fascination as the grandmother there. You wonder if this book might not have made a better novella with some of the lushness trimmed away. At times the book's intoxication with language (which is its major strength), can even feel a bit exasperating. As H.G. Wells described Henry James's later style, you feel you're watching an elephant trying to pick up a pea.

But that's only an occasional problem. Most of the time you're happily, dreamily swept away, which is poetically appropriate. For the name of the Siberian river near Dimitri's town is Amur, also a Russian name for Cupid. And in French, the River Amur is spelled "Amour," which of course means love.

In a callous and cold Siberian village, whose inhabitants' lives revolve around timber, prisoners, and gold, there is no room for romance and beauty. Makine tells the story of three young boys who are full of indiscernible longings, until a Belmondo film arrives at a nearby town and gives voice to all their dreams. In one of novel's most poignant chapters, Makine describes how each of the three boys sees a different hero on the cinema screen- for the hardened Samurai, it is Belmondo's feats of bravery; for the crippled Utkin, it is his stoicism in the face of lifelong disappointment; and for the poet Dmitri, it is the alluring Western world of beauty and sensuality. Makine brings powerful emotion to both Dmitri's sexual desire and his longing to experience the West. Perhaps more than any other author, Makine manages to find intense lyric beauty in this carnal desire, devoting pages to blurry visions of female flesh. But most of all, this masterfully crafted novel leaves the reader with an emotional and philosophical understanding of how a single work of art can forever change the course of three human lives.

Samurai, Oetkin and the narrator, Juan, grow up in a sleepy town in Siberia. Their futures seem to be settled: one becomes a gold digger, lumberjack or prison guard, has sex with one of the local woman and slowly drinks oneself dead. But all three boys are idealists and dreamers in their own way, full of unfulfilled desires, who all somehow realize that there must be more to life. Only when they see the movie "The Red October" with Jean-Paul Belmondo, they realize that they can take their lives into their own hands.

Andrei Makine wrote a beautiful novel in which the reader can feel the snow and the Siberian cold and the hopelessness of life in a Siberian village, but also with exquisite descriptions of Siberian springs, romance, melancholy and unfulfilled desires. A great book.

I hope the girl who didn't understand the novel will try a little harder. It is so beautifully crafted. It holds in its pages the heartbreaking longing of youth for love and for their future which is mysteriously yet to unfold.

The narrator senses a life beyond his present circumstances through the Transsiberian train's windows. However he sees another future in the harshness of day to day existence there in Siberia. Makine puts a human face on that far unimaginable country. He also teaches us of the loss of war. It is a woven tapestry of character and time in which each piece contributes to the whole.

This is one of the best novels I have ever read. It does everything a perfect peace of literature should do, which is to transcend the reader to another time and place while feeling every emotion possible through the use of beautifully constructed sentences/words.

I was stunned by the beauty of the language in this book. Not only has Mr. Makine written a wonderful short novel, but Mr. Strachan has done a masterful job in translating it from French into English. The brilliance of a translation can easily be eclipsed by the overpowering beauty of the original, but in this case Stachan's work really shines. His translation is so wonderful that I can only wish I were capable of reading the Mr. Makine's original French; it must be truly extraordinary.

Mr. Makine's language is so rich and descriptive that I've decided to wait a bit before reading his "Dreams Of My Russian Summers." In a world of dull prose I'm not sure I've fully digested the banquet that Mr. Makine has presented in "River Love." I very heartily recommend this most beautiful literary novel.

... through images and imagination. For the western reader it will be difficult, if not impossible, to visualize the utter remoteness of a Siberian village lost in the vast plains of the taiga. Life is completely controlled by nature - winters last seven months or more. Before leaving the land and the people to recover in a short spring, winter hits with another vicious snowstorm. Only the houses' chimneys are seen protruding in the expanse of white. Digging out a path is like hollowing out a deep tunnel back to the surface. Makine's intricate portrayal of the land's extraordinary beauty, whether under snow or during the spring thaw, reveals his deep connection to nature and his Siberian past. It is a backdrop and, almost, a participant in this engaging story.

First of all, though, this is a growing-up story of three local boys: Dmitri, the narrator, and his friends Utkin and Samurai. For them "the beauty of the land was the least of the preoccupations in the land where we were born..." It was taken for granted. Still, the reader senses the equilibrium between the boys and their natural environment. A vivid account of their thrill at swimming in the icy cold current of the Olyei River and being confronted with unwelcome onlookers. Taking a steam sauna in a remote bath hut in the forest reflects their intimacy and happiness at being friends.

Daily life is also controlled by the political powers: the story is anchored in the early 1970s and Soviet rule dominates all aspects of it. Their village, having played an important role in the past and during the war, it is now only a shadow of itself: controlled by "gold, the gulag, and the taiga". The boys accept their reality while dreaming of a different world beyond their community on the shores of the Amour River and inhospitable Siberia. The Trans-Siberian train speeding by in the night symbolizes the wider world, the link between Occident and Orient.

For the three teenage friends, growing up also includes an increasing awareness of sexuality and curiosity for women and love. Eroticism and sensuality, let alone "love", had never been part of the local people's vocabulary, going back to the village's founding some 300 years ago by Cossacks. Carving out an existence has always been rough and challenging. Now, any sense of reality or knowledge of the outside world was filtered through Soviet-style propaganda: reaching or surpassing the monthly quotas; winning whatever battle was being fought. Women and men were, above all, socialist partners with a mission to fulfill the expectations of the system. For boys, eager to explore their blossoming feelings, this was not a good introduction.

Into this bleak and harsh reality "strolls" Jean-Paul Belmondo, charming, easy-going and successful ... and the boys and the villagers are changed forever: Belmondo appears on screen in the cinema "Red October". The impact could not have been more dramatic if he had come in person. The political slogan banners at the Politburo pale in comparison to his big poster in the main village square. His comedies, the first one in particular, stir the imagination of the boys. He represents a life in the "Occident" that is fantastic as it is alien. There, people have an easy time, life is rich, and the hero usually wins the girl. For the villagers, it is impossible to distinguish between fiction and reality. Through many repeat visits Dmitri and his friends slowly understand the story line. Each scene, every small item is analyzed and interpreted as authentic reflection of life in the West. The boys increasingly live an alternative reality - they visualize Paris, Venice and more. The West has met the East.

Makine's portrayal of the boys, their emotions and experiences of growing up is beautifully presented. There is Olga, Samurai's Francophile older friend, who introduces the boys to French literature and culture; there is Utkin's grandfather and Dmitri's aunt. They all come to life and round off the picture. Humour and irony balance the serious exploration of the challenges faced by young people living in remote places like Siberia and with ambitions to change their lives. They feel torn between Occident and Orient, between the unknown and the familiar worlds. Despite their different personalities and ambitions, they each have to choose their future direction.

Similarly to other Makine books, the story is embedded in a short narrative set decades later in New York. It sets a frame and also allows for reflection of the lives lived. Once Upon the River Love is very rich novel. It is specific in its captivating detail of land and people while at the same time raising pertinent general issues of fiction versus fact, imagination versus action and the role of these in forming young people's minds everywhere. I read the novel in the original French and was captivated by the exquisite style and richness of language. The emotional depth of the story reveals the Russian roots of the author. Read it slowly and savour its beauty. [Friederike Knabe].

Makine is a Russian-born author, who sought asylum in France at the age of 30. He is the first novelist to have received France's prestigious Prix Medices and Prix Goncouert for the same book. His perfect mastery of the French language is rooted on lessons received from his grandmother, and when presenting his writngs to the editors in France he had to pretend they were translations from Russian.

The coming of age for three boys in a remote village in Siberia is the main event around which this novel is structured. The trio, handsome Alyosha (the narrator), lamed Utkin, and strong minded Samurai, are all products of a secluded, narrow minded environment, where the only future perspectives are to work in the logging industry, the gold mines, or as a guard at a nearby gulag. In this world of no changes, in a land where romantic love had no place, of long winters, of boredom and lack of passions, the coming of a series of Belmondo movies will fuel their imagination and search for the unknown. The boys become seduced, fascinated by everything these films represent, the Western world and culture, freedom, love for the sake of love, and the beautiful sexy women. The effect is so strong that each one of the boys will eventually live out their own Belmondian fantasy. Uktkin as a writer, Samurai as a guerilla fighter, and the writer in the film industry.

Skilfully constructed and elegantly written, flamboyant style, sophisticated prose, sometimes overly elaborated. The reader will sometimes feel intoxicated with the language; Makine's descriptions of Siberian winters are at the same time exceedingly touching and repetitive. With a sexual overture, Andrei Makine carries his novel with a passionate prose, dreamy eroticism and powerful images.

This novel carries a universal theme in a provincial setting. In its deep psychological context, there is also the sociological aspect. The fascination "development" will play over "backwards" societies, the migration from the later to the first, and the emotional consequences upon those who dare face the change.

While I'm a big reader, I generally avoid translations because I'd rather read the prose exactly as the author wrote it. However, I was traveling and out of reading matter and happened upon this book at a shop and bought it. And I was glad. It's a lovely and lovingly written (or at least translated) tale that strongly evokes a sense of place--middle-of-nowhere Siberia--and time of life--adolescent on the cusp of adulthood. The book starts off a tad slow--it is in one sense about nothing but daily routines--but if you stick with it, you'll find yourself drawn into this beautiful story of love and growing up and Jean-Paul Belmondo(!).

Elements of the story involved some description of life in a rural village in Russia's far east during the dying days of the Soviet Union. The snow ,the long winter, the silent taiga provided an absorbing backdrop to the novel's thematic development. It is difficult to find a clear thread of narrative in the dreamlike sequences of the novel. It seemed to be about the adolescent protagonist's sexual coming of age, however his many reveries on the thrilling possibilities of the female body became increasingly tiresome.
The novel was also about the joys and excitement of Western Capitalism as revealed in an adventure film starring the French actor Belmondo, in direct contrast to the crushing dullness of life in the backblocks of Soviet Russia.
Our lad and his two friends saw the same film 17 times, walking 15 kilometres over the snow and through the forest to the the nearest small town to do so.
The film changed not only the boys' view of the world, but, it seems those of the many towns-people who also saw it. The film suggested the possibility for a better kind of life, in contrast to the drunkenness, cruelty and violence so much a part of the lives of the timber workers and their long suffering women. It seemed to change everyone's lives for the better.