Максим Кантор - Рождественская история, или Записки из полумертвого дома

"Povest-parable" by Vladimir Kantor, "A Christmas Story", tells the tale of imposed sanctity. The plot is simple: philosopher Boris Kuzmin falls ill with a severe ulcer attack before Christmas and finds himself on the brink of Hell. The microcosm of the hospital ward is formed haphazardly, with helpless and defenseless patients submerged in the waters of the river Styx, facing the tyranny of the crude, unethical, and indifferent medical staff. The three-headed hydra of ward doctors sees themselves as fanatics of the idea of Russian sacrifice - they must kill innocent people for the greater good. The philosopher's nightly vigils, as if after his own death, and the executioner, named This, That, and The Other, who communicates with the condemned (parallels with V. Nabokov and Kafka, to name but a few). Against him stands only the wife-owl of the future martyr Boris, personifying enlightened Christianity and resembling Beatrice...