Pussy Riot documentary

Sun Dec 29 02:07:03 UTC 2013

http://www.echo.msk.ru/blog/echomsk/1227596-echo/

=======================================

Could you, please, send the original, since I am curious which
Serebrennikov's words you translated as fucked, fuckoff, etc.

Also, out of curiosity - why didn't the organizers choose a different venue?
Why didn't they rent a privately-owned restaurant, concert hall, or movie
theater, instead of a state-sponsored theater? Surely, they could have even
built a marquee somewhere to hold this important event.

On Sun, 29 Dec 2013 00:16:00 +0000, Sarah Hurst wrote:
> 
> Here's my translation of a reply from the artistic director of the Gogol
> Theatre: 
> 
> Kirill Serebrennikov
> 5 hours ago near Moscow, Russia
> Even recently in all my interviews I asserted like a mantra: ³There¹s no
> censorship in the theatre, there¹s no censorship in the theatre, in the
> theatre there¹s no...² That¹s it, we¹re fucked, there¹s censorship in the
> theatre! Cynical, pointless and idiotic.
> Now any freedom, any desire to find sense, any desire to express oneself 
> it¹s all stuck in the impenetrable gloom and hassle which has arrived, filled
> all the space around us and controls us. We thought that somewhere  in the
> theatre, in the ³trendy² cafes, at home, or at the computer  there was still
> a little free air. It¹s like climbing on top of a wardrobe in a flood and
> looking for salvation under the ceiling, where there¹s still some air. That¹s
> it! We¹re fucked! There¹s no air! The ³overwhelming majority² got the air. It
>  this majority  orders a government for itself, and the government orders
> the music to amuse and delight this majority.
> They¹ve banned us from holding the premiere of the film ³Pussy Riot: A Punk
> Prayer² and a meeting with Nadia Tolokonnikova and Masha Alyokhina. Maxim
> Pozdorovkin had flown in specially from New York. All the work of Irina
> Prokhorova, who was supposed to host the conversation, has been cancelled.
> After a whole day of tense negotiations a banning document arrived from the
> department of culture at my request, which signifies one thing: censorship in
> action. That¹s it, it¹s over! Who could be so afraid of a peaceful
> conversation between a few hundred audience members at the Gogol Centre and
> some young women who have been amnestied? Who could be so afraid of the
> premiere of a film that has received a pile of prizes and that can¹t tell us
> anything new either about the government or about ourselves, as it was made
> rather a long time ago? I don¹t get it...
> The premiere and the conversation won¹t happen.
> At the Moscow Art Theatre they¹d only just finished the prosecutor¹s checks on
> my play The Pillowman, when a whole series of letters and appeals appeared
> from ³outraged and offended² citizens about Kostya Bogomolov¹s play. They
> demand Tabakov¹s resignation. They demand ³a lawsuit², ³a ban², ³a closure²...
> And it¹s clear that this isn¹t just an increase in seasonal schizophrenia 
> this is very real religious censorship. We¹re fucked! Welcome! We¹ve made it!
> Now the fanatics will tell us how to put on plays, what we can do and say on
> stage, and what we can¹t. Everyone knows what¹s happening at the Moscow Art
> Theatre, everyone reads the news. And where are all our professional
> societies? Why are you silent? Did you piss yourselves? Well done! Next time
> they¹ll come for you.
> And finally  an ethical Charter for the ³fuckoff² of cinematographers  who
> have concluded an accord by this fucking symphony. Censorship that they¹re
> trying to bring in not by the hands of bureaucrats, not by the clergy, but now
> by the hands of our colleagues themselves  the most adroit and nimble
> students of ³the Dragon². This is what¹s the most disgusting and odious. Yes,
> a weak person, but it¹s possible even for this weak person just to go around
> it, it¹s possible to try ³not to be, not to participate, not to do it², but
> it¹s possible to happily kick down a comrade, help him to fall, make sure he
> doesn¹t get up, and at the same time be happy at the ³elimination of a rival².
> You¹re living right, friends! It¹ll all work out for you.
> To sum up, it¹s a shame that we¹ve had to cancel the event. For me it¹s
> unbelievably repulsive and foul. I never thought that, to speak in the words
> of the classics, ³I¹d fall into such fucking crap². I call on all people for
> whom the concepts of honesty and freedom are alive, for whom the worth and
> right of an artist to create speak freely are important, to rally round and
> oppose the coming Gloom. In word, in action, in art, whatever you can do.
> And I hope that when this shameful bullshit ends, we, remembering all this,
> will laugh at ourselves, and will write the truth about this petty little
> period. If ³the overwhelming majority² doesn¹t cancel us, the truth and
> everything else before then. But experienced people tell me that because of
> our cowardice and laziness this ³bullshit² will never end.
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-- 
Galina S. Rylkova
Associate Professor of Russian
Languages, Literatures, and Cultures
256 Dauer Hall
University of Florida
Gainesville, FL 32611
USA
grylkova at ufl.edu
http://www.languages.ufl.edu/russian
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