Synopsis of “WE" or the "anti-absurdity”

by A. Slapovsky, 543 pages

The book “WE” (Moscow, EKSMO, 2005) differs from the book “THEY” as much as carnival differs from convoy, but it is set in the same artistic space organized by the same author, which proves once more his reputation as a “universal” writer. This is the first complete collection of stories printed in quality magazines of Russia and other countries. The first edition was called “A book for those who don’t like reading” (Moscow, Grant, 1999). The title is crucial - the language is simple edging on primitivism; the plot is dynamic and simple as well. This cannot be said about humor. Humor is of double structure – the first being at the surface, the second lying deeper and being more subtle. And, as is often the case, under these two types of humor lays sadness.

The book may be considered as the annals of the writer or a diary that reflects things happening to or around him. Phantasmagoric plots prompted the staff of the Vien University (Austria) to organize the seminar “Harms and Slapovsky”, inviting the latter. At the seminar A. Slapovsky urgently pointed that he is close to Harms only in some exterior features. Where Harms uses absurdity, he uses anti-absurdity. Thus, the word became the book’s second name.

Absurdity in art is common and sometimes trite. There’s no author who wouldn’t lean over multiple phantasmagorias. Slapovsky’s characters in their majority are absurdly normal. But this normality becomes pathological against the background of the crazy world, anti-absurdity becomes squared absurdity.

Short stories included in the book “War of the simpletons“ and “Not war, but peace” underline the book’s theme: Slapovsky first creates the world (a myth), then he dispels it, then again hosannas it, stating that it is all us but viewed from different points.

It is hard to retell the contents: each story has its own plot, its own style, comic or dramatic collision. Sometimes it’s a sketch of manners; sometimes a life experience, or something like group portraits (like in Joyce’s “Dubliners”).
In addition Slapovsky’s humor is not focused on a certain mentality of readers: every reader understands it in his own way, and everyone gets involved.

The book’s translation may be abridged.

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