Absurdistan

One of the books I bought on my trip to Washington and just got around to reading is Gary Shteyngart's Absurdistan, which I found one sale at a bookshop in Georgetown. It's the story of Misha Vainberg, an obese son of a criminally rich man, who is eager to return to the multi-culti United States to be with his South Bronx love. But thanks to his father's line of work, Misha can't get an American visa, and so concocts a roundabout scheme involving a trip to a CIS nation on the Caspian Sea for a fraudulent EU passport. But he manages to get caught up in the murky world of post-Soviet politics.

As I read it, I felt a bit of deja vu: like his acclaimed debut, The Russian Debutante's Handbook, Absurdistan is in large part almost two completely different novels thrown together. In each case, one is very good, the other, not so much. Handbook is about the Russian-American immigrant experience -- full of of very sharp insights into about assimilation, America, Russia. But then goes wildly off the rails when the story relocates to Prague, or however Shteyngart specifically dubs its transparent stand-in. Absurdistan goes the same way, an opening in Russia that is full of close observation, followed by a meandering plot in some imaginary place.

I also have some concerns about his madcap quirkiness. This seems to be a common affliction among hot younger writers these days. I remember I first heard the word "Absurdistan" at a strangely under-publicized reading he gave at Barnard College years ago, right after Handbook came out. It was a very nice night, only about a dozen people showed up, and I was generally impressed. But when he mentioned he thought his next project would be called "Absurdistan," I thought, "uh-oh." But Shteyngart is writing about Russia, and having lived her for awhile, I see how that is actually probably the best key in which to work. For example, twice Misha Vainberg's cellphone doesn't work, and he gets an automated message that says, "Respected mobile phone user: your attempt to make a connection has failed. There is nothing more to be done. Please hang up." Sounds a little to quirky and cute, but that's actually what cellphones here say when they can't get a signal.

But what really sealed the book for me is the realization about what Shteyngart is really doing here. When I realized that I was starting to sympathize with a gluttonous, track-suit wearing, son of a murderous oligarch, through a lot of whining and some of the least appetizing sex scenes in all of fiction, I realized he's playing a pretty big game. He's taking a close hard look at the Russian Soul. He's trying to describe in lucid prose what, famously and aggravatingly, "can only be seen with the eyes of the soul." There are two scenes in particular that I think are laser-like in defining something important about Russia: the description of the way Misha and Alyosha-Bob become friends on a snowy night in college, and the brief speech Misha's servant Timofey delivers at a key moment late in the book. Never let it be said there are no writers anymore willing to tackle Big Themes.