What I really love about Goncharov tho, is that like. You only have access to about 3% of the world, like. Who is Natalia lighting candles for? What’s up with Ilya and that fisherman? Who was that third kid stealing oranges with them as children? You know, and it’s like. We, the audience, we’re not supposed to know these things, the narrative provides no answers bc life provides no answers, and everyone is simultaneously at the center of their own narrative, and a supporting role in somebody else’s. Like it’s so rare these days to see a work that really digs into this idea that not everything actually has to be spelled out, that there is no story that exists on its own without also being a meta-commentary on the stories that intersect with it, but that you don’t get to know what the commentary is because you’re not part of that story
