TIME IN THE CHINARI CIRCLE: LEONID LIPAVSKY

Abstract

This article explicates the concept of time in the works of Leonid Lipavsky, a member of the Leningrad literary and philosophical group OBERIU who wrote books entitled Explanation of Time, Treatise on Water, Study of Horror and a collection of private discussions that he brought together as Conversations. The article maintains that Lipavsky abandons a traditional view of time as an objective ontological characteristic of things and suggests considering it as a phenomenon related to the peculiarities of human sensation and of consciousness and language. According to Lipavsky, it is man who brings time into the world, which left to itself would be timeless. That possibility is contingent upon the structural uniformity between time and consciousness. The very source of human time appears to be the ability of consciousness to differentiate. The nature of time is revealed by the experience of extremity (the experience of horror) and is most explicitly manifested through language. In order to understand this process, the article analyzes special techniques developed by Lipavsky and the Chinari group to capture the contradictory experience of time. Lipavsky’s concept of the hieroglyph is central to the article’s finding that Lipavsky and the Chinari aimed at creating a synthetic methodology which would remain within the boundaries of a “critical” position (i.e. within a human-scale, phenomenological description of the world) while also pursuing a radical “empirical” inquiry into alien forms of reality. Lipavsky claimed that it is possible to make a catalogue of hieroglyphs which would contain a fund of “extra-human” experiences and then transform and expand the limits of the classical encyclopedic format inherited from the Enlightenment. The article argues that, despite its unique features, Lipavsky’s theory of time should be seen as falling within the philosophical tradition of phenomenalism. It is also evident that this theory resonates with the culture of the modern era and its critique of intellectualism and urge to synthesize science and art. © 2021, Gaidar Institute Press. All rights reserved.