Chagin

Evgeny Vodolazkin is the author of novels “Lavr,” “The Aviator,” “Solovyov and Larionov,” “Brisbane,” and “The Justification of the Island,” as well as short-prose collections “Go Fearlessly” and “The Tool of Language.” He is a laureate of the “Big Book,” “Yasnaya Polyana,” and “Book of the Year” awards. His books have been translated into many languages.

Isidor Chagin can remember text of any complexity and store it in his memory for as long as needed. Phenomenal abilities become a heavy ordeal for the hero, because Chagin lacks a simple human joy—forgetting. Everything he touches becomes, quite literally, unforgettable for him.

Every great gift is a violation of harmony. Memory needs oblivion, the word needs silence, and fiction needs reality. In life they are intertwined just as tightly as tragedy and comedy in Evgeny Vodolazkin’s novels. The novel “Chagin” is no exception. Among its characters are Heinrich Schliemann and Daniel Defoe, secret agents, archivists, and emcees, as well as a special authorial style—just as always, one of the main protagonists of the writer.