Authors

Giuseppina Larocca¹;  ¹ University of Macerata (Italy), Italy

Discussion

Takyr is a short story written in 1934 by Andrej Platonov during his experience in Turkmenistan. The text has been often read as part of what Katharine Holt defines as the “Turkmenistan cycle,” which refers to the stories written by the author during the 1930s, including the famous Dzhan. Set in the desolate backdrop of a landscape that combines the mystical and the real, where metaphors for water and sand dominate the narration, the story presents a child slave called Zarrin, who will become the mother of a young girl, Giumal’. 

This paper aims to examine the topic of motherhood and death as both a mirror of the life cycle and through analytical lenses which focus on Zarrin’s and Giumal’s status of slavery. The violent condition in which Zarrin lives, and to which Giumal’ also seems to be destined, is reversed by the young daughter’s attitude and experience. 

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate in what way Giumal’ won her freedom through suffering and violence in a search process in which Platonov emphasises the main character, who, at the end of the story is represented as a young graduate. 

I shall elucidate how in the narration the highest point of tension corresponds to Zarrin’s death, after which Giumal’ embarks on her quest for redemption. I shall argue that the strength of motherhood and the experience of death—associated with slavery and violence—exemplify the positive and negative ends found in all of the writer’s works and that the redemption of the oppressed is the only way of salvation for the Platonovian human character.