1. The leading western advocates of the convergence theory were Sorokin, Pitirim, Russia and theUnited States, (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1944)Google Scholar, Burnham, James, The Managerial Revolution (New York, John Day, 1941)Google Scholar, and Galbraith, John Kenneth, The New Industrial State (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1967 Google Scholar.See also Marcuse, Herbert, One Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Societies (Boston: Beacon, 1964 Google Scholar.

2. In a private conversation, Aksenov said that instead of convergence, his generation spoke of “socialism with a human face,” a phrase associated with the Dubcek reforms. Sakharov's optimistic views aboutconvergence also were formed under the influence of the reform movement in Czechoslovakia. In a typically Utopian statement about the future, Sakharov said in 1974: “The convergence of the socialist and capitalistsystems would be accompanied by demilitarization, the strengthening of international trust, and the defenseof human rights, laws, and freedom. Profound social progress and democratization would follow, and man'smoral, spiritual, and personal resources would be strengthened” (“Tomorrow: The View from Red Square, “Saturday Review: World, 24 August 1974, p. 13). For a general discussion of the Soviet debate over convergence, see Donald R. Kelley, “The Soviet Debate on the Convergence of the American and Soviet Systems, “Polity 6 (Winter 1973): 174–196. The official Soviet establishment considered convergence as unhistorical, contradicting the laws of dialectical materialism. See Igor’ Kon, “Sotsiologiia,” Filosofskaiaentsiklopediia, ed., F. V. Konstantinov, 5 vols. (Moscow: Sovetskaia entsiklopediia, 1970) 5: 92Google Scholar.

3. Aksenov's preoccupation with space is reflected in the titles of his works and the abundance ofcosmic metaphors in his fiction. See, for example, Zvezdnyi bilet, Na polputi k lune, Stal'naia ptitsa, andZolotaia nasha zhelezka.

4. The result of such narrative convergence is the indistinguishability in Ozhog of Moscow from Parisor of the Russian-French film star Marina Vlady from the Moscow vamp Marian Kulago. The same holds for Patrick Thunderjet, an American Slavist, and the Von Shteinbok progeny. “Moskvich” and the Soviet author Aksenov mesh with their California environment in Kruglye sutki non-stop, as if there were no differencebetween Soviet artists and their western counterparts. In Ostrov Krym, KGB agent Sergeev resembles hisCrimean counterpart Vostokov; the old emigre Andrei Luchnikov resembles the official Soviet specialist on Crimea, Marlen Kuzenkov; their sons are both hippie saxophone players.

5. See AleksandrZholkovskii, , “Iskusstvo prisposobleniia,” Grani, no. 138 (1985), pp. 78–98Google Scholar. Zholkovskii discusses Aksenov's art of convergence in the context of other Soviet fellow travellers whose writing mediates Soviet and non-Soviet cultural values.

6. According to Priscilla Meyer, the confused or damaged self in Aksenov's fiction is restored by the power of aesthetic vision; the power to act on one's ideals is attained by imaginative means (“Basketball, God, and the Ringo Kid: Philistinism and the Ideal in Aksenov's Short Stories,” Vasiliy Pavlovich Aksenov: A Writer in Quest of Himself, ed., Edward MoŽejko [Columbus, Ohio: Slavica, 1986] pp. 124–127). Perhapsthe short story “Pobeda” (1965) is Aksenov's best treatment of the superiority of art to life. See AleksandrZholkovskii, “Pobeda Luzhina ili Aksenov v 1966 godu,” A. K. Zholkovskii, Shcheglov, Iu. K., Miravtora i struktura teksta: stat'i o russkoi literature (Tenafly, N.J.: Hermitage, 1986), pp. 151–171 Google Scholar.

7. Thematically linked to Kruglye sutki non-stop, published in Novyi Mir in 1976, Ostrov Krym was Aksenov's “unofficial” literary response to his trip to Southern California in 1975, when he was writer-inresidenceat the University of California, Los Angeles. The novel has many references to Los Angeles andCalifornia: freeways, swimming pools in every backyard, beaches, extravagant houses built on sheer cliffs, the danger of earthquakes, policemen who resemble sheriffs from western films. (For a discussion ofKruglye sutki, see Barton Johnson, D., “Aksenov as Travel Writer: Round the Clock, Non-Stop,” VasiliyPavlovich Aksenov, ed., MoŽejko, , pp. 181–191.Google Scholar

8. The discourse of Ostrov Krym is both ironic and parodic; it is typically heterogenous with manylayers of association. One of the most prominent is the language of the old emigration. Some of the acronyms, organizations, names, and buzz words are historically and linguistically accurate, though in manyinstances they are applied only approximately. Thus, OSVAG, a White Army propaganda agency, becomesthe Crimean secret police; General Shkuro's Volch'ia sotnia becomes Count Ignat'ev-Ignat'ev's counterrevolutionarymonarchist secret society and therefore is reminiscent of Chernaia as well as Volch'ia sotnia (The actual General Ignat'ev was one of the few tsarist generals who joined the Communist side.) In a typicalcase of approximate usage, the terms mladorossy and Soiuz Molodoi Rossii are conflated into Soiuz Mladorossov.The very abundance of acronyms is typical of Soviet rather than Russian émigré discourse; many of them are used ironically, reflecting Aksenov's propensity for parodying Soviet terminology and cliches. From the perspective of the old émigrés, Aksenov's discourse is a mockery of their language and culture. Among other things, he deflates the hallowed images of Wrangel and Witte: Wrangel's image is comic (the name Ploshchad’ Barona is a Sovietism); Witte is a Bondian Goldfinger type who sells out to the Soviets.

9. The Island of Crimea, trans., Michael Henry Heim (New York; Random House, 1983), p. 64. Furtherreference to Aksenov's novel are in the text. It was written during the late 1970s; the Russian version, Ostrov Krym was published in 1981 (Ann Arbor, Mich.: Ardis, 1981).

10. Within the Whirlwind, trans., Ian Boland (New York; Harcourt Brace, 1981), pp. 185–186. Priscilla Meyer emphasizes the importance of Ginzburg's influence on Ozhog: the role of Margarita (Master and Margarita) “is played in The Burn invisibly by Aksenov's mother, Evgenija Ginzburg” ( Meyer, Priscilla, “Aksenov and Stalinism: Political, Moral, and Literary Power,” Slavic and East European Journal 30, no. 4[1986]: 523 and 515–517CrossRefGoogle Scholar).

11. Shragin, Boris, The Challenge of the Spirit (New York: Knopf, 1978, p. 69 Google Scholar. In a very recent statement, Aksenov speaks of history as a spiritual need, which “has withered away to practically nothing” incontemporary Soviet life (In Search of Melancholy Baby, trans., Michael Henry Heim and Antonina W.Bouis [New York: Random, 1987], p. 107).

12. The author deconstructs the Crimean dream in the manner of his fictional agent-provocateur and antiauthor Memozov, who blows up the narrative in Zolotaia nasha zhelezka and attempts to do the same inKruglye sutki non-stop.

13. Vremennyi evakuant is reminiscent of vremennoe pravitel'stvo, as is vremennaia duma, which is the name of Crimea's parliament. Andrei's father Arsenii Luchnikov is Aksenov's lyrical hero grown old: Heis a cosmopolitan professor of Russian history, millionaire horsebreeder, marshal of the nobility, and man ofliberal views. His thoroughly western life-style substantiates the author's contention that there was no perceptible difference between the enlightened elements in prerevolutionary Russia and their western counterparts

14. Emerging in Prague in the early 1920s, smenovekhovstvo was a movement of former supporters ofthe White cause to reestablish cultural contacts with the Soviet Union. The most famous essay in the collection Smena vekh was entitled “V Kanossu!,” urging émigrés to repent and even accept Soviet power: Smenavekh, ed., Iu. Kliuchnikov (Prague: 1921). From 1921 to 1922 Kliuchnikov also edited a weekly in Pariswith the same title. The most extreme cases of émigré nostalgia and guilt were the disastrous repatriations during the 1930s of Prince Sviatopolk-Mirsky, Aleksandr A. Kuprin, and Marina Tsvetaeva. The attempt to bridge the gap between the diaspora and the original homeland was revived again after World War II (Sovpatriotizm), as a result of which many old émigrés went back to Russia. The renewed effect of Sovpatriotizm is being felt again, with the repatriation of such people as Irina Odoevtsova, the widow of the oldemigre poet Georgii Ivanov.

15. Mustafa and Anton Luchnikov, Andrei's son, are separatists who are working toward the formation of a new Crimean nation. Although the Iaki youth movement rejects the unification of Great Russia and Muscovite imperialism, it too is a liberal convergence scheme based on the union of all local Crimean racesand ethnic groups, especially the Russian and Tatar nationalities. Turning to the Tatar East for cultural renewal, the Iakis recall the old émigré Eurasian movement of the 1920s. They are also Luchnikov's mostserious political opponents and provide Crimea with an alternative to the Common Fate League.

16. Hughes Supermarket is a Los Angeles chain.

17. “But even the unhappy prospect of miseries shared unequally suits human nature better than theUtopias of equality; Utopias, however brilliant their configurations, are horrifying,” Aksenov wrote in 1987(In Search of Melancholy Baby, p. 108).

18. Ellendea Proffer interprets Ozhog and Ostrov Krym as literary responses to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia (“The Prague Winter: Two Novels by Aksyonov,” The Third Wave: Russian Literature inEmigration, ed., Olga Matich with Michael Heim, [Ann Arbor, Mich.: Ardis, 1984], pp. 131–137).

19. More than anyone else Luchnikov resembles Leva Malakhitov of Randevu, written in 1968; he isAksenov's first diabolic parody of his lyrical hero. Like Luchnikov, Malakhitov is a quintessential superman destroyed by his multiplicity of talents, fame, and the Soviet system. Without even noticing it, he drifts fromthe ideology of convergence to collaboration. In the end, he is done in by his poetic muse and escapist artisticfantasies. As the author's lyrical hero gone astray, he stood as a warning to Aksenov.

20. Sergeev resembles Aksenov's antiauthor Memozov (see note 12), who embodies poshlost’ and the diabolic spirit of negation as expressed in his numerous attempts to deconstruct the plot.