Fly Swatter Portrait of an Exceptional Character

ONE Showing Off in Odessa They talk in Western Europe of our duplicity and wily cunning; they mistake the desire to show off and swagger a bit for the desire to deceive. --Alexander Herzen, Memoirs The Russia Alexander Gerschenkron was born into in 1904 was a vast and varied country of people who had been so frequently abused by tyrants that out of all the misery came a commonality of spirit shared even by Europeanized Russians like the Gerschenkrons. It was with enormous pride that all his life Alexander, known to his family by the nickname Shura (pronounced Shoo-rah, with the r rolled soft), referred to himself as "typically Russian." Typically Russian behavior was a matter of both style and attitude, a rough-hewn, zestfully counterintuitive approach to living that was evident in many aspects of comportment, from the wordless sounds only Russians made to express their appreciation for somethingsuch as a just-downed glass of vodkato the uniquely Russian shudder that came over people experiencing strong emotion. It was typically Russian to sleep in stuffy rooms with the windows closed, to enjoy breathing in the air on dusty roads, to insist there was no finer music than the murmur of the samovar, to have political arguments in which you were quietly modifying your position all the time while loudly refusing to concede anything, and typically Russian to look at the schoolboy warning you to rub snow on your nose because it was nearly blue with frostbite and inform him that you preferred it that way. After you had sent the schoolboy packing, it was also typically Russian to think you had spited your nose for the good of a not-yet-typical child. At its essence, to be typically Russian was to be "more so." Though Russians, for instance, were not always energeticwere, in fact, famed for their abilities as sleepersin his fleeting moments of vigor a typical Russian was more vigorous than anybody. In this way, Russians were "more so" about everything. As a Russian saw it, a Frenchman might be ardent when it came to Franceor a Frenchwomanbut he never truly lost his head about anything except a Frenchwoman. (Usually it was someone else's Frenchwoman.) Germans were even worse. They were so rigidly organized that they never lost their heads at all. Russians, however, believed in losing their heads and aspired to do so. Russians made outrageous claims, traveled to absurd lengths, pushed the limit, and exceeded expectations. Always they wanted to be more loyal, more devoted, more steadfast, more stoic, andwhen circumstances called for itmore long-suffering. That was a lot to live up to, and to meet the perpetual challenge typical Russians spent spectacular amounts of time lying around dreaming up magnificent feats for themselves to accomplish. In other words, it was a nation of show-offs. In Shura's view, this behavior was rooted in the populist intelligentsia's long-standing tradition of appropriating and preserving rural values. Russia was slow to industrialize, and into the early twentieth century many social mores still came from the provincesfrom the peasantry. Even townspeople like the Gerschenkrons were familiar with tales of peasant heroics: the heavy sacks of grain this mujik had hoisted; the broad fields of ripe wheat that one had cut to the ground by himself in a single day with his scythe. Many of these stories featured men who had allowed so much work to accumulate that everyone said this time, truly, it was just impossible: no man could finish such a job in such a limited time. Whereupon the peasant went out and completed the task in a remarkable lather of activity. Sometimes these frenzied finishes were pyrrhic victories. Among other things, they led to an epidemic of RussDawidoff, Nicholas is the author of 'Fly Swatter Portrait of an Exceptional Character' with ISBN 9780375700064 and ISBN 0375700064.