Russian opposition: Kira Jarmysh’s novel “Dafuq” – culture

Ten days in the life of Anja Romanowa, 28 years old, girl from a middle-class family: In autumn they came as a novel from the middle of the Russian political opposition movement, from the group surrounding the regime critic Alexei Navalny. The author of “Dafuq”, Kira Jarmysch, has been his press officer since 2014. Navalny is sentenced to camp imprisonment, his anti-corruption foundation in Russia as “extremist” been banned. In August 2020, Jarmysch was sitting next to him on a flight from Tomsk to Moscow when he was with a Novichok poisoning collapsed. She herself had to spend seven months under house arrest, but she has now left the country and lives in a secret place in Europe.

Her character Anja was jailed for ten days after she was arrested at a banned demonstration against corruption in the country. The trial before the judge was short, in prison everything takes much longer. Anja comes into a cell where five young women are already sitting, and she is immediately drawn into the daily routine of detention, the daily routines, the surveillance, the toils of pastime. Anja, with her political offence, is more of an exception, the other prisoners in cell no. 3 are in prison for driving without a license or similar things. During Anja’s ten days, they are all released in turn.

From the genre of Russian prison literature, we mainly know the hard pieces, especially the Gulag books by Alexander Solzhenitsyn – of course, Anja also knows his “Ivan Denisovich”. Jarmysch’s book is not a grim, politically engaged story, it is very calm and almost cheerful, a discreet little picaresque novel. “Unbelievable Events in Women’s Cell No. 3” is the original title of the novel, which sounds ironic at first, but later it becomes very serious. The story goes into another dimension when fateful figures become visible behind the women in the cell, Anja speculates that they are there, spooky figures, fantastic and norn-like.

The women in Cell No. 3 come from all walks of life in Russian society, with all its problems and ambitions. One is married, the other has a child, Irka needs pills, Lyrica, and drinks, Maja does yoga and has mood swings as if she were pregnant. She reads Jo Nesbø (Anja reads Dostojewski) and is particularly coveted by the imprisoned boys in the other cells, who cling to the bars of the women’s cell when they go outside. Again and again the women’s conversations revolve around what you are willing to do with your body, plastic surgery and botox, but also prostitution: a beer for blowing a guy. Katja has luscious dreams about the day she gets out. “First we’re going to McDonald’s. A double cheeseburger, um… And farm potatoes… with cheese sauce! Damn, I could die, I’m crazy about McDonald’s stuff.”

The mood in the cell changes, sometimes it’s very sad, sometimes it’s very funny. There are moments of moodiness, but never mean, hard confrontation. A camaraderie prevails, you have common interests: making sure that you can talk on the phone for a few minutes a day, that you can shower as often as possible, that you get a bottle of hot water in your cell at breakfast, which you keep warm with blankets , so you can make tea all day long, and of course to stock up on cigarettes, from every nook and cranny. The guards and the fellow inmates assigned to kitchen duty are grumpy or dull, jolly or horny. And suddenly – what an apparition! – a public prosecutor is present during the daily visit and asks if there are any complaints, a woman who begins to glow in the dull cell, yellow blouse, tight black skirt, violet high-heeled sandals: “She exuded the heavenly scent of cleanliness and blossoms.”

I want to live well, says Anja, who is anything but revolutionary. When she arrives at a demonstration for the first time, she is overwhelmed by the sense of community. Like New Year’s Eve! Kira Jarmysch incorporates her own experiences into Anja’s curriculum vitae and conveys the mood of Russian youth, alternately telling stories in the tradition of Dostoevsky or Gogol (but there are also suggestions from Western literature – Tom Sawyer, for example, with the famous fence-stroking episode).

In her youth, Anja has a self-destructive desire to cut herself, she adores her father – he is an icon to her, but keeps his distance, eventually going to Italy – but when he visits her in detention there is an emotional catastrophe. She messes up her studies at the MGIMO diplomatic school in Moscow, where Kira Jarmysch also studied, and she is branded an example of youthful decadence. She is doing an internship at the State Department. A New Year’s Eve celebration there with the jaded young diplomats is staggeringly ridiculous, much like the parties at No. 10 Downing Street.

Open detailed view

Navalny encouraged Kira Jarmysch to write, he was her first reader, she sent him the book chapter by chapter, day by day. The novel was published by a Russian opposition publisher and was a great success. The responsible authorities are now checking whether the book contains propaganda for suicide, drugs and homosexuality.

The novel lacks that almost exotic atmosphere that is often associated with Russian literature, the proximity to western situations and systems is amazing, right down to the mentality in the USA under Trump. When Anja lodges a complaint with the public prosecutor, she is actually transported to the court in no time at all. Of course, the complaint is dismissed within minutes, which is faster than having to drive there and wait. While Anja is still waiting for the written document, the young policeman who is supposed to be guarding her goes to smoke a cigarette in front of the court, she follows him and he explains all his frustration to her. Possibly, he says, he will also side with Anja and her demonstrators. He voted for Putin, but nothing will change with him. “They lie and steal. We need a new order in the country… In Russia there was only one normal ruler. Under him there was order. And there was no theft.” Namely? “Stalin… he would get those rats out of the Kremlin and get on with it.”