[In the following interview, which is based on talks between Leonov and Lysov that took place on April 26, 1983, and June 20, 1987, Leonov remarks on the difficulty of writing and the place of art in the twentieth century.]

Everyone entering Leonov's house leaves the world's mundanities and vanities on the doorstep. The personality of the owner, the feeling of concern he exudes, the time that seems to flow at a different pace in his study lined with books—ancient tomes, "books constantly in use" with worn gilded bindings, and the latest publications and periodicals—everything creates a "philosophical atmosphere", makes you aware of "the age-old concerns of the world waiting to be resolved" without, however, inducing a sense of guilt if you failed to address yourself to the task. Conversations with Leonid Leonov are always unique and unpredictable. Scattered over time, separated by the boundaries of understatement and questions that remained unasked, they complement one another, echo one another leaving an impression that the conversation has never stopped. There are so many questions I would like to have asked that I sometimes feel as if I were standing at the door of Leonov's flat, a nervous chill running down my spine.

The moral focus of Leonov's quests is "the large, genuine humanity", "all together", "united, perhaps, still only in its noble aspirations, but already standing on the threshold of unity." This noble, throbbing ideal informs everything Leonov says, whether he is talking about "the wisdom of ancient writers", tragic distortions in the course of science, nature or human history, the ethical consequences of the religious crisis, spiritual improvement or contemporary epistemological aspects of morality. The same high values are used as a yardstick of the "crevasses" which were formed in the 20th century as a result of the "volcanic displacement of concepts, forces and values", and which have "cut across continents, families and human hearts."

According to Leonov, a true artist "does not portray himself", "does not preach on his own behalf," "as a person inhabiting his time," he is committed to outlining the "thinkable ideal", strives to attain a new level of moral oneness with the great whole of the human race, and he rejects everything that is extraneous, "inessential", "not prompted by concern about tomorrow" and consequently distorting the natural "order of things."

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[Leonov]: The search in art is always the search for truth and universal harmony; it is a tireless quest of justice, of the challenges and goals of civilisation, a keen awareness of its tragic course…. The most powerful ideas, themes and aspects of themes are those the author holds nearest as a person. The underlying law is the same as the law which governs energy transfer without conductors: in order to reach the receiver, the energy charge should be great, and greater, the larger the distance to be covered. Such a high level of maturity of ideas can be observed in our major authors who have set a standard of excellence. The main thing by which you can judge an author is what guided him, what events of his life could have prompted this or that plot, how are his ideas rooted in his times, what did the artist find interesting and how he reacted? In my own case, there are some pointers in the legend about the "furious Calaphat" or say, Pchkhov's narrative about the escape of Adam and Eve who cry on the edge of the Garden of Eden while the Antipode invites them to go further and take a roundabout path. I have in one way or another experienced and thought about all this, but in my novels it does not spring from me, in this sense, my novels are not autobiographical.

[Lysov]: In your tribute to Tolstoy, speaking about an artist of the future (it might as well be the end of the century) you name among the many missions of the artist the task of recording "how our difficult era fits into the mainstream of humanity". Today, it is one of the main questions in our literature. Can I address this question to you paraphrasing it as follows, what is the distinguishing feature of continuity processes in the 20th century, and the complexity of continuity in art?

Great epoch like ours have strong winds blowing which turn the main ideas of mankind en face and "in profile". In order to arrive at the true substance and direction of these ideas, it is necessary to go to the root of things and find one's own place accordingly. Above all, one must adhere to the basic principles of humanity, the classical notions of Justice, Goodness and Beauty. These are the pillars of every world view, given the modifications brought by the specific nature of the times. You will remember my character Firsov who reflects about the "seven ideas" clad in historical garb. Morality understood in this way is the theatre of action for the whole history. I have a good deal to say about it in The Thief, in the discussions between Vikhrov and Seryozha in Russian Forest, in Skutarevsky: think about the conversation between two brothers. In the body of human values, only an indifferent person cannot locate his place: in order to be oneself, and find one's place in time, one must love, believe, have pity and compassion. To me, these concepts are much broader than passing fads or trends—they are not about "personal" loyalty to, say, Comrade Kalinin or Voroshilov. It is a different kind of loyalty. Without this higher sense of involvement neither human civilisation, nor the existence of the human race are possible … With prophetic insight into many features of the future, Dostoevsky dreaded most the upheavals and changes the future would inevitably bring to human morality. Dostoevsky's perception of the world took shape at a time when literature drew on solid, time-tested material, strong and reliable like old wood from which wonderful violins could be made. At that time there was no ambiguity about the notions of "eternity", "God", "motherland", "the people", "man in general". The Revolution did not merely change the former climate, but displaced and bared many concepts, they became contradictory. Writing today is a tricky business. The material is raw, you plane a board, and suddenly it twists. But tomorrow, this too may be obsolete.

It is an important, unwieldy epoch we are living in, I don't think an artist has ever been confronted with such difficulties … How to convey the cruel experience of the 20th century? In these conditions of polarised concepts and aberration of ideas, how does one determine the true value of things and pick one's bearings in depicting the world split asunder? Many meanings have been shifted, but the words have remained the same: I still have to call a desert a "desert", ecstasy "ecstasy" and people "people". So, I for one, cannot vouchsafe that I have managed to express the genuine content of my times.

Your Spiral, if I understand it correctly, opens with a diagnosis of the distortion of human ideas in the 20th century: "Sometimes dictionaries gave such widely diverging definitions of the same words, denoting everyday, and not only philosophical objects, as if the very chemistry of life was different on the opposite sides of the cleavage." Can this moral crisis lead to a global tragedy?

Yes, Spiral is short on optimism in the accepted sense. But optimism can be derived from tragic knowledge as well. One must look with unblinkered and honest eyes at the future and the tragic events that it may hold in store for us as a consequence of the many mistakes we make ourselves, but also of various survivals of our civilisation which are hard to get rid of.

But there must be a realistic way towards "reinstating" humanitarian values.

The ethical and the spatial worlds intersect in an invisible point to form a crucifix—a genuine human personality can only be formed if one passes through this crucifix. Nothing is dearer than the individual. Mikhail Gorbachev has expressed the idea that the interests of humanity are above the interests of class. This is a very important statement. Culture is what welds the human race into a single organism. Man, humanity … There are no other values, and many, if not all of them, were discovered in the past. It is through commitment to what is human that much of what has been lost can be retrieved. This is necessary in order to "be", and not just to "be seem to be", not to eke out a bleak existence in "the dark desert of the world". It is the catechism for daily life and for the processes going on deep under the surface. Everything proclaimed today coincides remarkably with the ideas preached by Pushkin's Prophet. Even if "the sinful tongue" has not yet been torn out of our heads, there is a pressing need for new departures, for the truth, something through which the whole mankind must pass. In our country, the quest for truth must redress many mistakes made either due to haste or to ignorance. We have left cruel and harsh times behind us: we were ploughing through uncharted deserts, without making detours—and the results were bound to affect our morality … The terrain of history is always rugged: there are mountains and valleys, ravines and precipices. I see contradictions coming to a head, and I pray to God that they should be resolved peacefully. Today, we see only the early signs of change: perestroika was preceded by a prolonged and grim period when terrible blunders and incredible overloads were explained away by promises of a bright future (which includes the present). As a result, we have run up a huge debt to our posterity.

To sum up, if one looks at all these processes, the complexity of the 20th century lies in the fact that the destinies of humankind have focussed in it. The October Revolution, in resolving many world problems, triggered a series of great historic events, both in the short and especially in the longer term. We passed through several historical stages and cleared many hurdles within several years. The problems being tackled in this century determine the road of the world for the future. Everything that happens to us, any choice we make is important not only for us, but for our descendants. We would do well to recall the work of the forester, not only as a profession, but as a moral symbol: one plants a tree for the sake of the future generations with no hope of seeing it bear fruit.

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The hand can barely commit to paper the fast-changing dimensions: the infinitely small particle "flying in lepton" with the speed of light, the Demiurge playing with a Leviathan in-between "acts of creation", the swirling primary substance, the ringing "waterfall" of history. I am in a hurry to learn something more about what seems most important, ever hoping to discover the magic "sesame". In the midst of these travails, I hear the muted voice of Leonid Leonov, thoughtful, groping for the right word: "I always stand before a mysterious curtain as it were. Behind it are strange, wonderful lives, and I am anxious to look at them. I feel like a child waiting to go to the circus—a treat and a mystery."