On Antiterra Karl Marx is
known as Marx père, the popular author of 'historical' plays
(Ada, 2.5). Although Marx was very popular (particularly in
Russia), he did not write plays. This made me suggest that "Marx
père" actually hints at Shakespeare (whose name was
also spelled Shaxpere), the author of history plays.
According to Shakespeare,
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and
women merely players. (As You Like It, Act II, Scene
VII)
In the 20th century the globe was a theatre where
some spectacular 'historical' plays were staged not without a
success. Karl Marx wasn't their author, but his "younger brother" and
sons (Lenin and Co.) were among main performers and part-time
directors.
Incidentally, Anna Akhmatova's poem Londontsam
(To the Londoners) from the cycle V sorokovom godu ("In
the Fourtieth Year") begins:
Двадцать четвёртую драму Шекспира
Пишет время бесстрастной рукой.
The twenty-fourth drama of Shakespeare
Time’s writing with
its indifferent hand.
Akhmatova's "Tartar" penname reminds one of Katerina
Akhmakova, a character in Dostoevski's novel Podrostok (The
Adolescent, 1875). In my article "Grattez le Tartar..." I argue
that Kim Beauharnais, a kitchen boy and photographer at Ardis, is the son
of Arkadiy Dolgorukiy, the hero and narrator in Podrostok. I also
suggest that 'Alphonse Cinque' (as Van dubbed the Bourbonian-chinned concierge
at the Alphonse Four, 3.3) hints at Alfonsinka (as Arkadiy calls
Lambert's girlfriend Alphonsine), a character in Podrostok who
seems to be Kim Beauharnais's mother. Interestingly,
Cinque is a cycle of five poems (1945-46) by Akhmatova. In one of them
Ladog ("of Ladoga lakes") rhymes with radug ("of rainbows").
Raduga was the Durmanovs' favorite domain, near the burg of that name, beyond Estotiland proper, in the
Atlantic panel of the continent between elegant Kaluga, New Cheshire, U.S.A.,
and no less elegant Ladoga, Mayne, where they had their town house and where
their three children were born: a son, who died young and famous, and a pair of
difficult female twins. (1.1)
Alexey Sklyarenko