Belarus as a Coral Island
During this presidential “election” I was reading William Golding’s Lord of the flies.
The book is essentially about “a bunch of children on deserted island revert to primitive ways.” English-speaking schoolchildren study it in high school and probably remember the main message of the book: the parody on Victorian “Coral island”, the inner corruption of the “civilized” man, the wild, cruel and violent nature of a human being, an innate part of all of us…
At this time, I couldn’t ignore certain Belarusan parallels:
Lukashenka, no doubt, is a lucipher-like hunter Jack Merridew.
Jack’s warriors (initially, a Christian boy choir) are Lukashenka’s servants, regular and simple Belarusian people who somehow became fierce guardians of Lukashenka’s system (riot policemen, KGB spooks, election committee members, etc.)
Milinkevich is Ralph — good, fair and democratic, but not strong enough to keep leadership.
But most importantly: cynism, lies, beating up, harrasing, arresting people became a norm in Lukashenka’s Belarus. And that’s what it makes it a “Coral island” in Europe.
April 4th, 2006 at 2:17 am
And how about Kazulin? ;)
April 4th, 2006 at 2:31 am
Who is Simon?
April 4th, 2006 at 6:39 am
Your very precise picture of the situation inspired me to publish a post in English this morning. By the way, have you seen Jack lately?
April 4th, 2006 at 6:38 pm
Interesting comparison, and frighteningly true. I never read books which is why I normally dont write any comments on your posts about books. Somewhere the story sounds familiar. Has this book been used to create a script for a movie perhaps?
April 5th, 2006 at 12:46 am
> endrus Says:
> And how about Kazulin? ;)
> Firefly Says:
> Who is Simon?
You guy’s answered each other’s questions. :))
People that understand who’s the Beast are Simon (i.e. active and passive opposition to the regime). So, Kazulin is definitely Simon. Especially considering the fact that he’ll probably pay for his treatment of the beast…
Kazulin can also be viewed as Piggy. ;)
April 5th, 2006 at 12:53 am
}T{Reme [Q_G]: Indeed, there’s a movie:
* http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0100054/
I wanted to watch it, but our DVD rental store doesn’t have it.
April 5th, 2006 at 6:54 pm
If you’d like to see that movie I can try and see if its sold here and send it to you?
February 2nd, 2008 at 10:36 pm
Thanks for sharing
February 7th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
I’d prefer reading in my native language, because my knowledge of your languange is no so well. But it was interesting! Look for some my links:
March 24th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
I’d prefer reading in my native language, because my knowledge of your languange is no so well.