Alexander Ikonnikov, whose books are not published in Russia, is successfully published in Europe in seven languages.
Russians in Germany
In Germany, Alexander Ikonnikov published two books - a collection of stories "Taiga Blues" (2001) and the novel "Lizka and Her Men" (2003) - in German. They were also republished in six more European countries - in different languages, except Russian. The circulation of these books is quite high - more than 300 thousand copies of the first, 200 thousand of the second. It turns out that it is easier for a Russian writer to publish in Europe than in Russia. Our publisher wants money from the author, while the Western one looks for authors himself, prints and pays the royalties. Books in Europe are now more valuable than ours.
Study and creativity
The biography of Alexander Ikonnikov begins in 1974 in Urzhum near Kirov on the Vyatka River. Sasha Ikonnikov began writing notes in German as early as the mid-90s, as an accompanying material for the photographs of the German photographer Anetta Frick, whom he accompanied as a translator on her journey across the Kirov region. The result of their creative tandem was the photo album "A Walk in Vyatka", published in Frankfurt (Ausflug auf der Vjatka, Frankfurt, publishing house Rosenfeld, 1998), which included nine short stories by the beginning writer.
In addition, Ikonnikov had other creative projects while studying at infaka. So, he was engaged in staging performances. The Theater of the Absurd under the direction of Ikonnikov staged The Bald Singer by Eugene Ionesco, The Face by Siegfried Lenz, the storyline of Ivan Homeless from The Master and Margarita. He wanted to continue studying cinematography, considered such options as the Munich School of Cinematography and VGIK, but deciding that the financial issue was beyond his power, he stayed on a pen and a piece of paper - this is "the simplest, cheapest".
After completing his studies at the university in 1998, Ikonnikov had to do military service, which attracted little to him - this was during the war in the Chechen Republic - so he chose the civilian option. At the interview, the officer told him: "You are lucky, in the village of Bystritsa they are looking for an English teacher." Ikonnikov objected that this does not correspond to his education, that he studied German, and he knows English poorly. To which he received the answer: "So what? What does it change?" So he spent two years teaching English in Bystritsa, watching snow fall on a provincial landscape where nothing is happening, and where the locals' only goal is to find how to pay for the next bottle of vodka.
Some time later, Ikonnikov, who was still teaching English at a rural school, received a call from the famous German historian and publicist Gerd Könen, who was delighted with his notes in "Walks in Vyatka" and advised him to continue writing - to write with the specific purpose of being published in a Berlin publishing house Alexander Fest, looking for new authors. Inspired by this confession, Ikonnikov set to work on the manuscript. He believes that the reason for Festus's decision to publish it was his funny story "Chronicle of the Seven Years War." The author's title of the collection "Reports from the Thawed Road" was replaced by Fest with a brighter and more commercially justified for Europe "Taiga Blues". This name evoked many associations among the Germans: it was logging in the Gulag, and Russian bears, and traditional vodka, as well as songs with an accordion. Social and everyday scenes of this kind are appreciated in the West: European inhabitants are very interested in "mysterious, gloomy and warlike Russia."
At the end of the rural period of his life, which gave him rich material for creativity, Ikonnikov moved to Kirov. There he works as a journalist, but soon leaves this activity to devote himself entirely to writing.
Another book by Ikonnikov, a couple of years after the first one was published in Germany, is the novel Lizka and Her Men. The plot of the book is the story of a girl whose first sexual experience makes the locals gossip about her, and therefore she leaves her town and moves to a big city, where she passes from one relationship to another. This is a tragicomic picture of the life of Russian provincials, their habits, opinions and desires. "A Western woman is consciously pursuing her own career, and ours is betting on a man," the author assures. "I was interested in the study of the Russian female character. It turned out to be a kaleidoscope of Russian life - from perestroika to the present." This novel enjoyed particular success in sentimental France: in the town of Lomme, Lizka was recognized as a 2005 book of the year.
Projects
The novel, which Ikonnikov writes for a German publishing house, is called "Porozin", after the name of the protagonist (from the word "separately"). "I'm trying to look inside a person. It's a question of courage. It is related to personal experience. Midlife crisis …"
His wife Lena is a programmer. Passions: Diderot, Schopenhauer, Freud, Bulgakov, Chekhov, Ilf and Petrov, Hesse, Max Goldt, Prokofiev, Liszt, films by S. Bondarchuk and Shukshin, travel to Europe, IT technologies.
Ikonnikov's formula for happiness: a quiet life, a house in the village, harmony with oneself, children. "Goethe said well: you don't have to travel around the world to understand that the sky is blue everywhere …"
During the week of the German language at the Faculty of Foreign Languages of VyatGUU, the German-speaking writer Alexander Ikonnikov read several stories to the student audience and advised, if possible, not to become a writer under any circumstances. Too much, in his opinion, a sedentary profession.
