Vladimir Putin as Entertainer
November 12, 2015
In the twentieth century, we got accustomed to the clownish dictators who can sing or act or else amuse the crowds. In Russian, the term “yurodstvovat’” refers to clowning, practicing the art of amusement, yet it also allows the point of entry when dealing with being bound to balance between reality and non-reality, empirical evidence and non-entity, flesh-and-blood humanity and abstract ideas or principles. Small wonder that “yurodivye” were Russian medieval jesters whose work was to amuse the folks, and who were absolved from political responsibility for making any dangerous allusions to or even poking fun of real power structure. (Continue...)
