There are eerie parallels between the career of the author of this all too brief masterpiece and that of Nicolai Erdman, whose play The Mandate recently opened at the National Theatre. Novelist and playwright both achieved acclaim for pugnaciously satirical works produced in the mid-Twenties, a period of extravagant experiment in the Soviet Union. Then, within a short period, both were suffering the same denunciations — for formalism, objectivism, cosmopolitanism and so forth. Erdman spent three years in Siberia, Olesha fell precipitously from favour. Daunted, they devoted the rest of their lives largely to working on film scripts. Olesha died in 1960, Erdman some ten years later.
At first, even Pravda praised Envy for ‘exposing the envy of small despicable people’ against ‘the majestic reorganisation’ of life in the Soviet Union. But then, such was the even-handedness of the satire, readers soon began to realise that, although Olesha claimed himself to be a poputchik (reliable fellow traveller), he was as much out of sympathy with the world then struggling to be born as with the world so recently dead.
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in