A candle burned

story about our future without books and love to chteniyu.Poprobuyte imagine what will happen when the hectic pace of life and progress will lead to the fact that books, literature no longer be needed and will only hearts dedicated non-modern people?

Mike Gelprin wrote the story "The candle was burning," which described a similar situation. Read it, please. And when the time - go to the bookshelves and choose yourself something interesting.

***

The call came when Andrei Petrovich lost all hope.
- Hello, I'm on your ad. You give literature lessons?
Andrei Petrovich stared at the screen videophone. A man in his late twenties. Strictly dressed - suit, tie. He is smiling, but his eyes were serious. Andrei Petrovich's heart sank, he posted an ad in a network only out of habit. In ten years, there were six calls. Three wrong number, two more appeared work in the old insurance agent, and one has beguiled literature with a ligature.

- D-give lessons - faltering with emotion, said Andrei Petrovich. - H at home. Are you interested in literature?
- Interests - nodded source. - My name is Max. Let me know what are the conditions.
"Zadar!" - Almost blurted Andrei Petrovich.
- Hourly pay - he forced himself to utter it. - By agreement. When would you like to start?
- I actually ... - interviewee hesitated.
- The first lesson for free - Andrei Petrovich added hastily. - If you do not like it, then ...
- Let's tomorrow, - flatly said Maxim. - At ten in the morning you want? By nine I take the children to school, and then free up two.
- Arrange - Andrei Petrovich was delighted. - Write down the address.
- I say, I remember.

On this night, Andrei Petrovich did not sleep, I went for a tiny room near his cell, not knowing where to put his hands trembling with emotion. For twelve years he lived on a miserable allowance. Since the day that he was fired.
- You are too narrow specialist - then said, averting his eyes, the director of the lyceum for children with humanitarian inclinations. - We value you as an experienced teacher, but that's your thing, alas. Tell me you do not want to be retrained? Tuition Lyceum could partially pay. Virtual ethics, the basics of the virtual law of robotics history - you might well teach it. Even the cinema is still quite popular. He, of course, not much time left, but at your age ... What do you think?

Andrei Petrovich refused, as many later regretted. New job can not be found, literature remained in a few schools, the latest libraries were closed, one after the other linguists who retrained in that much. A couple of years he pestered gymnasiums, schools and special schools. Then he stopped. Promayalsya six months retraining courses. When the wife left, and threw them.

Savings quickly ended, and Andrei Petrovich had to tighten the belt. Then sell the aircar, the old but reliable. Antique service, the remainder of the mother, for him - things. And then ... Andrei Petrovich was sick every time he thought of it - and then it was the turn of books. Ancient, thick, paper, is also from the mother. For collectors of curiosities gave a lot of money, so that Count Tolstoy fed for a month. Dostoevsky - two weeks. Bunin - half.

As a result, Andrei Petrovich left fifty books - the most favorite, read a dozen times, those with whom they could not leave. Remarque, Hemingway and Marquez, Bulgakov, Brodsky, Pasternak ... Books were on the shelf, occupying four shelves, Andrei Petrovich daily wiping the dust from the roots.

"If this guy Maxim - randomly thought Andrei Petrovich, nervously pacing from wall to wall - if ... then, you may be able to repurchase Balmont ago. Or Murakami. Or Amadou ».
Trivia, Andrei Petrovich suddenly realized. Whether Will buy off. He can pass, that's it, that's the only important thing. Pass! Refer a friend that knows what he has.

Maxim rang the doorbell at ten o'clock, on the dot.
- Come, - Andrei Petrovich began to fuss. - Sit down. That's ... Where would you like to start?
Maxim hesitated, carefully sat down on the edge of a chair.
- How do you see fit. You see, I know nothing. Full. I was not taught anything.
- Yes, of course - nodded Andrei Petrovich. - Like all the others. In general schools do not teach literature almost a hundred years. And now is not taught in special.
- Anywhere? - Max asked quietly.
- I'm afraid I have anywhere else. You see, at the end of the twentieth century, the crisis began. Read once was. At first the children and then the children grew up, and was once read to their children. Once more than his parents. There were other pleasures - mostly virtual. Games. All sorts of tests, quests ... - Andrei Petrovich waved. - And, of course, technology. Technical discipline began to force the humanities. Cybernetics, quantum mechanics and electrodynamics, high-energy physics. And literature, history, geography receded into the background. Especially literature. You watch, Maxim?
- Yes, please continue.

- In the twenty-first century no longer print books, paper changed electronics. But in the electronic version of books falling demand - rapidly several times in each new generation as compared to the previous one. As a consequence, it reduced the number of letters, and then they're gone completely - people stopped writing. Philologists lasted for a hundred years longer - by written twenty centuries earlier.
Andrei Petrovich paused, wiped his hand suddenly sweating forehead.

- I have a hard time talking about it, - he said at last. - I am aware that a natural process. Literature died because they did not uzhilas with progress. But kids, you know ... kids! Literature was what shaped the minds. Especially poetry. By determining the inner world of man, his spirituality. Children grow unspiritual, that's terrible, that's terrible, Maxim!
- I have come to this conclusion, Andrei Petrovich. And that's why you turned.
- Do you have children?
- Yes, - Maxim hesitated. - Two. Pavlik and Anya, same age. Andrei Petrovich, I only need the basics. I find literature on the network, will be read. I just need to know that. And that emphasis. You teach me?
- Yes, - said Andrei Petrovich firmly. - To learn.

He got up, crossed his arms, concentrating.
- Pasternak - he said solemnly. - Blizzards swept across the land, all the limits. Candle on the table, a candle burned ...

- You will come tomorrow, Max? - Trying to stop trembling voice, I asked Andrei Petrovich.
- Certainly. But that's ... You know, I worked as a manager at a wealthy couple. Veda economy, business, egged account. I have a low salary. But I - Maxim looked around the room - I can bring food. Some things might appliances. The account of payment. You want?
Andrei Petrovich inadvertently flushed. It would suit and for free.
- Of course, Maxim, - he said. - Thank you. I'm waiting for you tomorrow.

- Literature - is not only what is written, - said Andrei Petrovich, pacing around the room. - It is also as it is written. Language, Maxim, the same tool that was used by the great writers and poets. Listen.

Maxim listened intently. He seemed to be trying to remember, memorize it by heart teacher.
- Pushkin, - said Andrei Petrovich began to recite.
"Tauris," "Anchar", "Eugene Onegin».
Lermontov "Mtsyri».
Baratynsky, Yesenin, Mayakovsky, Blok, Balmont, Akhmatova, Gumilyov, Mandelstam, Vysotsky ...
Maxim listened.
- Are you tired? - I asked Andrei Petrovich.
- No, you. Continue, please.

Day was replaced by a new one. Andrei Petrovich cheered, awakened to life, which suddenly made sense. Poetry Prose changed, it took a lot more time, but Maxim appeared grateful disciple. He seizes on the fly. Andrei Petrovich did not stop to wonder how Maxim, at first muffled by the way, not perceiving, feeling not embedded in the language of harmony, with each passing day it learned and know better, deeper than the previous.

Balzac, Hugo, Maupassant, Dostoevsky, Turgenev, Bunin, Kuprin.
Bulgakov, Hemingway, Babel, Remarque, Marquez, Nabokov.
The eighteenth century, nineteenth, twentieth.
Classics, fiction, fantasy, detective.
Stevenson, Mark Twain, Conan Doyle, Shackley, Strugatsky, Weiner Zhaprizo.

One day, on Wednesday, Maxim did not come. Andrei Petrovich promayalsya all morning, waiting, persuading himself that he might be ill. He could not, whispering inner voice, stubborn and quarrelsome. Scrupulous pedantic Maxim could not. He did a half years not for one minute late. And then I did not even call. By evening, Andrei Petrovich did not stay in one place, and at night and did not sleep a wink. By ten in the morning he finally got exhausted, and when it became clear that Max does not come back, wandered to the videophone.
- The number is disconnected from the service, - told the mechanical voice.

The next few days passed like a bad dream. Even favorite books are not saved from acute depression and once again there was a feeling of worthlessness, which Andrei Petrovich year and a half remembered. Telephoned the hospital morgue, obsessive buzzing in the temple. What to ask? Or talking about? Were there certain Maxim, about thirty, I'm sorry, I do not know the name of?

Andrei Petrovich got out of the house when you are in the four walls became more unbearable.
- A Petrovich! - Nefedov greeted the old man, a neighbor below. - Long time no see. Why not go out, ashamed, or what? So you're kind of innocent.
- In what sense is ashamed of? - Andrei Petrovich was struck dumb.
- Well, what's this, your - Nefedov held edge of his hand across his throat. - Who went to you. I wondered what Petrovich old age with these people contacted.
- What are you about? - Andrei Petrovich went cold inside. - For what public?
- We know with what. I just see these darlings. Thirty years, I consider them worked.
- Who with them, then? - Begged Andrei Petrovich. - What are you talking about?
- Are you well, do not really know? - Startled Nefedov. - News Look, this is trumpeted everywhere.

Andrei Petrovich did not remember how to get to the elevator. Rose for the fourteenth, shaking hands fumbled in his pocket the key. On the fifth attempt opened, prosemenil to a computer connected to the network, flipped through the news feed. Heart suddenly gone from pain. With photos viewed Maxim, cursive lines under the image blurred before his eyes.

"Ulich hosts - with difficulty focusing vision, is read from the screen Andrei Petrovich - of stealing food, clothes and appliances. Home robot tutor, series DRG-439K. Defect control program. Said that independently came to the conclusion that children's lack of spirituality, which decided to fight. Illegally taught children subjects outside school. From the owners to conceal their activities. Withdrawn from circulation ... In fact disposed of ... ... The public is concerned about the manifestation manufactured by ready to bear ... specially created Committee decided to ... ».

Andrei Petrovich rose. Stiffly he walked to the kitchen. He opened the cupboard, on the bottom shelf was brought in by Maxim tuition open bottle of cognac. Andrei Petrovich pulled the plug, looked around in search of a glass. I not found and pulled from his throat. Coughed, dropping bottle, he stepped back to the wall. His knees buckled, Andrei Petrovich sat down heavily on the floor.

Down the drain, the idea came to the final. All down the drain. All this time, he taught the robot.

Soulless, defective piece of iron. I put into it all that is. All for the sake of which alone is worth living. Everything for which he lived.

Andrei Petrovich jumped at the heart of overcoming the pain and stood up. Dragged to the window, tightly wrapped transom. Now stove. Open burners and a half hour wait. And yet.

The doorbell caught him halfway to the plate. Andrei Petrovich, gritting his teeth, moved to open. On the threshold stood two children. A boy about ten years old. And the girl for a year or two younger.
- You are giving the lessons of literature? - Looking out from under the bangs falling over his eyes, the girl asked.
- What? - Andrei Petrovich was taken aback. - Who are you?
- I Pavlik - the boy took a step forward. - This is Anya, my sister. We from Max.
- From ... From ?!
- From Max - stubbornly boy. - He told me to give. Before he ... his ...

- Blizzards were blowing throughout the land unto all the coasts! - Suddenly shouted loudly girl.
Andrei Petrovich grabbed the heart, frantically swallowing, shoved, pushed him back into the chest.
- Are you kidding? - Quiet, barely audible voice he uttered.

- Candle on the table, a candle burned - the boy said firmly. - It was he who told me to tell, Max. You'll teach us?
Andrei Petrovich, clinging to a doorframe, stepped back.
- Oh, my God, - he said. - Come on. Come on, kids.

Mike Gelprin, New York (Seagull Magazine on 16/09/2011)

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