Month: April 2024

Book: “White-Red-White. Flag. Nation. Identity”

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The publication in 2024 of a book about the white-red-white flag — or, as it is often called, the BChB (from the Belarusian bel-chyrvona-bely) — is rather symbolic. Once again, numerous myths and layers of dirt are being thrown at it, just as has happened periodically throughout its existence.

As an introduction, it’s worth noting that the white-red-white flag was the official flag of the Republic of Belarus from 1991 to 1995, as was the coat of arms “Pahonia,” rendered in the same colors (since, according to the approved designs, the red of the flag was meant to match the red of the coat of arms). Moreover, to this day these symbols are not formally banned in Belarus. However, in present-day Belarus one can receive a very real prison sentence for displaying them — and even for something as accidental as a white-and-red color combination, whether it’s socks or an LG TV box left on a balcony.

The book “Bel-Chyrvona-Bely” (published in Belarusian) is arguably the first full-fledged scholarly study of the origins of both the flag and the coat of arms, as well as of the color combination itself, released in the form of a substantial volume. I wouldn’t call it popular science — it is genuinely a thoroughly researched work by an entire collective of authors (who, unfortunately or perhaps fortunately for themselves, remain unnamed in the book). It is rich with illustrations, and all conclusions are supported by an extensive array of references, as one would expect from serious academic research.

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Songs: AP$ENT

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After leaving Belarus, I stopped listening to the radio, and as a result I drifted away from the musical atmosphere of my home country. So until the recent wave of bans targeting the singer AP$ENT, I hadn’t even heard of him. But once his music started being blocked practically everywhere — reportedly even at the state level in Russia, as if it were somehow corrupting minds — I decided to find out what kind of artist could cause that kind of reaction.

It turns out that in Russia he came under fire because of the song “Can I Go With You,” which he wrote last summer. There’s nothing overtly controversial in the lyrics — at least not if you don’t know the realities of the musician’s own life. The song unexpectedly went viral on TikTok, spawning countless videos with cats asking to come live at your place and other cute edits. Judging by those clips, many of their creators have no idea what the song is actually about. There are whole compilations of such TikTok videos — and it was precisely thanks to that viral spread that everyone suddenly heard about the track.

In reality, though, the musician hid in the lyrics the bitterness of leaving Belarus, where his wife began facing persecution over her posts. It’s actually spelled out in the song — though woven subtly between the lines. And the author doesn’t deny it; on YouTube he even accompanied the video with the words: “Those who know even a little about what’s happening in my life will understand.”

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“Ten Little Indians”: On the Changing Titles of an Agatha Christie Novel

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Content note: This post examines the publication history of Agatha Christie’s novel and the evolution of its title and associated rhyme. To document that history accurately, it includes direct quotations of period wording that contains racial slurs. Such language is unacceptable in modern usage; it appears here only as part of quoted historical material, for context and analysis.

Today I’d like to talk a little about Agatha Christie — more precisely, about one of her most famous works, the novel “Ten Little Niggers“. In Russian, both the novel and the 1987 Soviet film adaptation by Stanislav Govorukhin are still known under the title Desyat negrityat (“Ten Little Negroes”). In Russian usage, the word negrityonok historically functioned as a neutral racial descriptor rather than a slur, which partly explains why the title remained unchanged in that cultural context.

I first encountered this work in childhood — not through the book, but through Stanislav Govorukhin’s 1987 film adaptation, released in Russian as Desyat negrityat (and often referred to in English as Ten Little Indians). I saw it a year later, while vacationing at the seaside with my parents. The film was being shown at the resort cinema, and if I remember correctly, my younger brother and I even went without our parents.

I remember how that closed-circle mystery (Christie specialized in exactly that kind of structure), combined with an excellent cast and the oppressive atmosphere of the production, made an indelible impression on me. It didn’t exactly frighten me, but it was impossible to look away as, over the course of the story, nearly all the main characters disappear one by one. And yet — what could an eleven-year-old boy, which is what I was at the time, really understand of it? Back then I looked like this (not exactly a heartthrob, of course, but still reasonably presentable):

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