Monday 14 October 2024
“…. It had taken me seventeen years after her murder to figure out why Politkovskaya matters… when I brought her back to my classrooms in Spring 2023… and now eighteen years, standing in this Fall 2024 classroom, I now understand her significance completely… and precisely right now after staring at this slide I had made last year, I see it clearly… I realize now, more than ever why you must read her journalism; and it is this…” I petitioned my recent Thursday war class students.
I clicked on a keyboard button to bring up the next slide in my multi-media Politkovskaya presentation. The “and it is this” answer was a passage from Politkovskaya. I paused, not only to catch my breath, but to realize I was speaking from my heart, and to process what I had just been saying. Before that morning’s class, I didn’t at all plan on saying what I had just said, let alone be this candid.
In my momentary respite, I stared at the classroom screen. I was midway through my Politkovskaya slideshow, and I had aimed to finish the class on this slide, the now so-called “and it is this” slide. The slide contained a passage from Politkovskaya’s 2004 book, Putin’s Russia: Life in a Failing Democracy. I selected the passage from Putin’s Russia so that my students could understand that Politkovskaya wrote about this “and it is this” insight throughout her career. We were soon to begin studying her 2002 book, A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya, and I needed to leave my students with a powerfully convincing lesson before we all left for the long upcoming weekend.
Could my students already be anticipating what “and it is this” is? Were they sensitive to the answer Politkovskaya was offering them through this quotation on the slide? Did they already figure it out on their own after they had read Politkovskaya’s A Small Corner of Hell, ready for some other equally important question on something they didn’t necessarily understand? In other words, was I saying the obvious? Was I talking about a long accepted, undeniable point? If they already knew the answer, would they then be bored by a moot point?
Of course, I was teaching them for their own enlightenment; however, at that moment, I felt like a condemned but innocent man attempting to prove his worth. I was teaching myself as much as I was teaching them. I needed to see and feel for myself that Politkovskaya still mattered. My hero, Politkovskaya, was being tested by whom exactly, I wasn’t sure, but I had a suspicion: me. And by extension, I was being tested… by myself. I needed to be sure about my argumentative and teaching skills.
I didn’t yet speak. I gave the students time to read the slide. My pause lasted longer than planned for. My teaching notes for this “and it is this” slide were comprehensive and detailed; however, I decided to speak impromptu. But I still hesitated. The silence was deafening.
I realized that my unconscious was instructing my students from this moment onward. The outspoken, instinctive part of me was speaking to them. My fervid intellectual spirit of inquiry that possesses me whenever I talk of literature, music, ideas… this animated and motivated force that will not rest until it has its say was excited—not in some crazed, uncontrollable prophet-like screaming in the wilderness way—but in the similar manner in which Archimedes uttered suddenly, “Eureka! Eureka!” when he in private discovered the principle of volume and water displacement. When I said, “and it is this,” I later understood that that phrase was my own version of “Eureka! Eureka!” “And it is this” just came out of nowhere… or to be precise, my exclamation came out of my unconscious.
I made a breakthrough by uncovering another breakthrough. Politkovskaya’s words on the slide had hit me more deeply than ever before. I felt as though I were reading her words for the first time and felt as though I were having another “Holy shit!” moment; this time that experience was happening live, in front of my students.
Even in my most private self-reflections, I didn’t ever preface my insight of Politkovskaya’s importance precisely in that way: “and it is this.” Only by teaching Politkovskaya for the fourth semester in a row did I right away understand her importance at such a deep emotional level. I immediately understood how at that precise moment, during this Thursday’s morning class, now Politkovskaya would be a permanent lesson block in my future syllabi. I no longer second-guessed myself. I found the persuasive rhetoric to intrigue my students not only to continue reading her provocative and emotional A Small Corner of Hell but also to finish reading this despairing book. And more importantly, on a personal level, for me I uncovered the forceful explanation of Politkovskaya’s significance.
If there is a fragment of hope in Politkovskaya’s grim dispatches, then it might be this: a new generation of American undergraduates are being rescued from the abyss of cynicism. I know… a bold statement but I sensed something strangely encouraging happening among my classroom students. This was the class which asked, “Why should I care about the suffering of others, especially people I don’t know?”
Nonetheless, Politkovskaya’s book can cause its own pessimism due to its uncompromising portraits of war crimes and sadism. Many times, Politkovskaya’s vignettes of the inconsolable and heartbroken … anyone left alive after being run over by Putin’s war machine… are so harrowing and morbid that I needed to warn my students one week ago about Politkovskaya’s despairing writing style.
“The first time I read A Small Corner of Hell, I couldn’t read it in one sitting. When I had read a devastating passage, I needed to stop. I couldn’t go on. Reading Politkovskaya can be a demoralizing experience. And those unsettling moments happened frequently; and there are many. I needed months, yes, months, to finish reading the book. I know what I said sounds bad, but even though her book might be the most challenging one we’ll read during the semester, persevering through its emotional traumas are worth the discomfort.”
How could “discomfort” be “worth” the pain of reading Politkovskaya? Be patient, Reader, and wait for the “and it is this” part of my story.
However, those introductory remarks are in the past, and in that present Thursday morning reality, I was making my case on why and how they needed to persevere. I hoped that if they learned how to not to give up on reading Politkovskaya’s frightening book, they would then see that Politkovskaya’s despairing words might give way to that fragment of hope, one she had given her life for so that her readers and fellow Russians wouldn’t die a moral death. I hoped that what I was going to say next would inspire them to experience their own “Eureka! Eureka!” exclamatory moments.
“…. and it is this:” I repeated, pointing at the large screen in the classroom.
I had entitled the slide being shown on the classroom screen: “Anna Politkovskaya: Saving the Soul of Russia?” And the content on the slide was a passage from Politkovskaya’s Putin’s Russia. I quoted the following:
It is worth remembering an incident that began in a similar way in the twentieth century but had a different ending. When the Fascists [Nazis] entered Denmark, the Jews were ordered to sew yellow stars on their clothing so they could be easily recognized. The Danes promptly sewed on yellow stars, both to save the Jews and to save themselves from turning into Fascists. Their king joined with them.
In Moscow today, the situation is quite the opposite. When the authorities struck at the Chechens who are our neighbors, we did not sew on yellow stars in solidarity with them. (227-228)
“There’s the answer to the question of: “Why should I care about the suffering of others, especially people I don’t know?” I paused, not only for the effect but also not to stutter because the emotion of the passage was getting to me.
I also wanted a moment of silence after repeating the empathy question to allow the student who had asked me that exact question on the second day of class to remember their question, ponder the passage, and agree to receive this answer. I think the reason I was speaking unscripted was in large part due to this student’s second-day question. Yes, that question did affect me. And I needed to convince both the student and me that I had an answer, and the answer needed to be damned good.
“This is why we should give a shit! So that we don’t become like them, the Nazis who had tried to make the Danes like them… like hate-filled, genocidal murderers! So that we don’t become like them, Putin and his Kremlin cronies who had committed acts of war atrocities in Chechnya!” I said, my voice breaking while enunciating certain words.
“I’m not done, and Politkovskaya isn’t either. We’ll begin analyzing A Small Corner of Hell next week, but I need to mention this right now… before class ends in five minutes. I need to quote a part of “Prologue” from A Small Corner of Hell. “Prologue” is the other part of the answer to that question: ‘Why should I care about the suffering of others,’ but right now, I’ll only quote two lines from her book. I’ve memorized the lines because they are so good, so powerful. And those lines are:
So I want you to know the truth. Then you’ll be free of cynicism. And of the sticky swamp of racism that our society has been sliding into. (27)
Holy shit!” I said. This time, while pausing, I studied my students’ faces, hoping to see in their faces the “Eureka! Eureka!” moments beginning to happen. I spoke again quickly, recognizing I had two minutes left: “So you will be free from cynicism and the sticky swamp of racism! Be free from cynicism! Be free from the sticky swamp of racism! So you don’t become like them! So you don’t dehumanize like them. Remember on our first day of class? I told you that if we’ll remember only one thing from this class and it is that word: dehumanize. And this course is called ‘The (In)Humanity of War!’ And here’s the other part of the lesson: so you don’t dehumanize both the people whom the authoritarian war criminals have destroyed AND yourselves. Yourselves!” I said.
“Get out of your own stinking and sticky swamps of hate. Don’t allow yourselves to become stinking swamp dwellers!” I finished while running out of time.
I dismissed the class. My head was spinning. I immediately ran to the sitting area in the building foyer. The urgency of writing down what had just occurred in my classroom was overpowering.
While drafting this blog, I had another insight. I no longer worry whether my students will choose to write their upcoming Paper Two Assignment on Politkovskaya. I can’t always satisfy my students’ intellectual and cultural curiosities. If they don’t select Politkovskaya, perhaps they, too, like me, may require additional seventeen or eighteen years to decipher her relevance, and then at that point, they might also exclaim finally,” Eureka! Eureka!” or “and it is this” and their understanding of the world will become clearer.
Or perhaps I shouldn’t be anxious… I shouldn’t be cynical. Maybe, some of my students will choose A Small Corner of Hell to work on their writing assignments. Afterall, since Spring 2023, some of my students have written about Politkovskaya.
In fact, one bright and inquisitive student from my Spring 2023 taught me how the current generation of young people have embraced Politkovskaya. After an eye-opening office hour, he asked for permission to write about The Uncensored Library, an online site created in collaboration with the videogame makers of Minecraft and Reporters Without Borders, the non-governmental organization which helps to protect journalists reporting from danger zones. In the virtual reality game, users can explore a world where a massive library contains outlawed, censored, forbidden books and writers. The floor plan for this virtual library has several rooms. As of 12 October 2024, there are twelve rooms:
- Main Entrance
- Iran
- RSF (Reporters Without Borders) Freedom Index
- Russia
- Vietnam
- Saudi Arabia
- RSF
- Mexico
- Egypt
- Brazil
- Eritrea
- Belarus
My Spring 2023 student informed me that there is an entire virtual library bookshelf stocked with Anna Politkovskaya works in the Russia room. Of course, I allowed him to write on The Uncensored Library and Anna Politkovskaya!
“How has Putin not blocked this version of Minecraft?” I asked my student, dumbstruck.
“It’s a video game,” he explained so matter-of-factly. “No one can shut down a video game,” he rationalized.
I didn’t want to say anything in response to that explanation, knowing that eventually someone in Putin’s regime, or any of the other countries listed in The Uncensored Library will find a way to create a firewall around this website. After all, The Uncensored Library is a website, like any other website that tyrannical rulers have blocked in the past. For example, the Chinese government has blocked web access to The New York Times, and, Russia recently has barred numerous journalists from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and several other newspapers. There is no reason why The Uncensored Library can’t or won’t be a website that authoritarians might consider shutting down, blocking, hacking… you get the point. Until then….
My takeaway since last Thursday’s classes: not all our young generation has fallen into cynicism or the swamp of racism. If an online videogame can teach young people about freedom of the press and freedom of speech AND showcase Anna Politkovskaya’s journalism, then, “Eureka! Eureka!” I say again. Anna Politkovskaya still matters!