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[lazenby]

Potemkin's Carriage Passes Through (1965)

April 11, 1784

Last night we received orders from Sebastopol to remain here and await further instructions. It seems that we are to be kept here even after the carriage has passed through. It makes sense, we have traveled a great distance from our native villages, and even before we began building this village we had to prepare regular sleeping accommodations for ourselves. We began by building simple huts, for which we used part of the government material slated for the construction of the make-believe village. Then we built the housefronts of the village they had ordered onto our modest lodgings on either side of the road. My quarters, for instance, are situated directly behind a rather high wooden wall that creates the illusion of being a town hall when seen from the road. If one opens the front door of the town hall, one stands right outside my hut. I spend the days and nights lying here, listening to the reports of my foremen. Most of them are just painters. "Little Father Overseer," they say to me, "what shall we do now?" And I tell them.

Of course the roofers are really painters, and so are the glaziers who insert windows with deft brushes. The bricklayers are painters and so are the masons; the only people who work at their true trade here are the stagehands who put up the scaffolding and lent a hand with our lodgings. But since then no one's seen them do any work. I'm told that they are lying around drinking behind the wooden wall that looks like a tavern from the road. One of them supposedly had the idea of throwing a stone through one of the not-so-well-painted windows in the village the other day, and replacing it with real glass. If this practice spreads, I almost fear for the success of my mission.

April 12, 1784

The meaning of my last sentence in yesterday's annotations can best be illustrated by the fact that more and more fake windowfronts have, since then, been replaced by real ones. One of the glaziers, a certain Popov from Nicolaiev, a painter in reality, complained to me today. "Our honest work is being disfigured," he cried. "One hardly has time to lay down one's brush before people replace our paintings with real windows."

Sometimes I can't help feeling that we are in reality building two villages: a false one and a real one, without actually wanting to build the real one, as though it were frowing by itself out of the false one, as if by necessity.

April 13, 1784

A nightmare shocked me from my nap after lunch today. I dreamed that the carriage was finally passing through the village, but that the Empress was fast asleep and even the prince did not dare rouse her. I tell myself she might also happen to be in the arms of her lover, that very same Prince Potemkin, just as the carriage races through our street. Perhaps she'll look out for the flick of an eyelid. I'm aware that all of us are here for nothing but the possibility of this one blink. I have asked Pravdin to subject the gables particularly to another critical examination, in view of her possible glance.

Petrov just came to me, all out of breath, and told me confidentially that real smoke was rising from a chimney he had just finished painting. Since I have no time to check up on the matter myself, I sent him back and asked him to take a look at the various housefronts from the rear. Someone has extended the front towards the back and made a house of it, he called to me from the door of my hut. By all the saints! I wouldn't be surprised if church bells rang for mass tomorrow morning.

April 17, 1784

The dream I mentioned earlier seems to be undergoing curious transformations, especially when one compares it to the anxiety fantasies I had when I first learned of my mission. At the time I thought "What if Catherine expressed the wish to dismount? What if she were to be led behind the empty façades rather than into a cozy room?"

Lieutenant Chuchotatsky called on me yesterday, or the day before, just as I was lying down for a nap; he's being transferred from Odessa to one of the new garrisons on Crimea, "Where do you intend to build the make-believe village, Little Father?" he asked me. Although I know he's fond of joking, I'd almost jumped to my feet and rushed outside. For days now I've been plagued by a fantasy of the prince asking me the same question. The church bells did ring this morning and Petrov tells me that smoke is now rising from every chimney and that one can see one's reflection in countless windows behind which one can see real flowers standing in real vases. Supposedly the locksmiths, glaziers, roofers, bricklayers, et al., no longer have to paint stains on their overalls, and very close to my lodgings, wall to wall so to speak, I can hear men at work. I wouldn't be surprised if I discovered one of these days that my hut is a room in the town hall.

April 19, 1784

I can't get the thought out of my mind, especially since I hear sounds above my hut, as if people were running about. The temptation to get up and look into the matter is great. There is the danger of the prince's taking this village for a real village. And then he'll ask me where I built the fake one he ordered. He might even suspect me of having sold the material entrusted to me by the government. At any rate, I've hurriedly issued instructions to five the housefronts along the village road the outright dillettantish look of stage settings. While I write this, the glaziers and the roofers, the masons and the locksmiths are as busy as ants, painting over their handiwork.

April 21, 1784

I am particularly interested in the successful conclusion of this task since yesterday I was informed of my unanimous election to the position of town elder. My appointment is not far off, since the town hall is practically finished. Within the hour, a second door will be broken into my hut which, were I to get up, would lead me into the corridor of the town hall and into a suite of pleasant rooms that have supposedly been installed there for me.

I am forced to interrupt these notes. The approach of the imperial carriage has just been announced.

April 29, 1784

Breaking through the wall caused a most dreadful noise. I was obliged to get up and retreat to the opposite corner of the room. The sound still rings in my ears. I am told that it often takes weeks to get over that kind of experience. Absolute rest and especially sleep, the healer of all ills, are recommended.

The prefect came to make his report to me. The long-awaited carriage bearing the imperial arms has recently passed through. Work on the schoolhouse is progressing.