Page:Knight (1975) Past, Future and the Problem of Communication in the Work of V V Khlebnikov.djvu/45

37 THE PART PLAYED by the concept of 'byt' in Russian thought and literature is well known. Jakobson points out that the languages of Western Europe have no real equivalent for this word. He suggests that this may be because its basis in the idea of the immutability of social norms and conventions is something which West European society has been able to take for granted. In Russia, however, civilization is a much more recent and superficial phenomenon. Like St Petersburg—built by decree, with Italian architects and on a marsh—it has always seemed somewhat insecure in its foundations, foreign and temporary. "In Russia", Jakobson writes, "this sense of an unstable foundation has been present for a very long time, and not just as a historical generalization, but as a direct experience."

He quotes Chadaev:

"Everything is slipping away, everything is passing... In our own homes we are as it were in temporary billets. In our family life we seem foreigners. In our cities we look like nomads."

Because of this sense of slippage, a consciousness or its opposite—'byt'—has played in Russia a prominent part. The element of 'byt', as Jakobson describes it,

is the stabilizing force of an immutable present, covered