Review of Secret Life of Ivan Osokin by P.D. Ouspensky

 

WARNING! SPOILERS!

I had higher hopes for this book before I began it, to suddenly find that they’d been dashed away. My review is definitely biased since I am convinced by the Platonic tradition that the views here are absolute rubbish and nonsensical, but even if I find a premise illogical, if the story is entertaining or explores the option in an insightful way, I generally can suspend my disbelief. Sadly, that was not the case here. For those who do not know, I guess the author was somewhat of an occultist and spiritualist who believed in strange doctrines, like that of Nietzschean eternal recurrence (which is put on display here). It seems like me like the Stoic idea that the universe keeps on reforming itself and the exact same things happen over and over again for all eternity going from the beginning to the Great Conflagration and back again. It’s not exactly the same and I’m also not very familiar with Nietzsche so I can’t compare and contrast them.

            It looks like I’m getting ahead of myself. The basic plot is that a man, Ivan Osokin, who keeps making bad decisions (like all of us, so an Everyman) wishes he could go back and time and fix all his mistakes. Well, it just so happens that he knows a magician (I may be forgetting here, but I don’t recall how or why he knows a wizard) who can send him back in time although he tells him that he won’t be able to fix his mistakes. At first, I thought it would be similar to the butterfly effect or the final destination movies, the idea that even if you change some secondary details, it doesn’t matter the major events will stay the same. That is not the case as it makes very clear right off the bat. The magician informs Ivan that he will not be able to because he knew everything he needed to at the time and it was absolutely beyond his control (either that or it was in his control and he actually wanted things to turn out the way they did secretly). This is where things start to go downhill.

            Ivan is convinced that “we crawl about like blind kittens on top of a table, never knowing where the edge is. We do absurd things because we know nothing that lies ahead of us. If only we could know! (pg. 14). Ivan is, of course, right as Socrates and Plato and any rational person knows. The magician however asserts but does not explain why or how he gets the absurdly and obviously incorrect notion that we have full knowledge of all the future and present ramifications of our actions. And with that, he sends Ivan 12 years into the past and the reader is subjected to 100 pages of torment with the gleam of a jewel every so often to entice you along, but it is a bleak and dreary desert most of the way. The chief reason is because this idea is so horribly depressing which should also clue one into the fact that it is probably wrong. Again, I’m showing my Platonism by insisting that Beauty, Truth, and Goodness ultimately must coincide. Another painful error Ouspensky makes is that “there is no essential difference between the past and the future. (pg. 34)” Of course there is, as even a child can tell you, one is determined the other is not.

            What follows is a long, irritating, and depressing read as we follow Ivan and see him doing the EXACT same things he did before even though he saw them coming. “Everything is beginning to happen exactly as before, as though the wheel of some terrible machine were slowly turning, a wheel to which he is bound and which he can neither stop nor hold back. (pg. 42)” It would’ve been worth it, if we would’ve seen some clever way the author found to have him do the same things again, but alas that was not the case. “How could I have forgotten that?” (pg. 42) and “What the devil drives me to do all these stupid things?” (pg. 50) is all the justification given. Zero points for extreme laziness and lack of originality especially when it seems like this is supposed to be some type of apologetical work intended to convince us of the truth of his doctrine. The point could have been made with far less examples and far less of Ivan’s whining and carrying on, it really takes the wind out of your sails. You start to believe there is no redeeming quality to the book at all, it just drudges on for most of its length with depressing (and incorrect) philosophy multiplied through the lens of character we don’t even care about and in fact, somewhat hate.

            Another question not dealt with concerns the time travel, but I’ve seen enough and read enough time travel to know that it’s best not to ask too many questions, especially when there are far more egregious problems. He does somewhat expand on the reason why people do the same things over again (barely) when he likens it to why a rabbit freezes up in front of snake instead of running (pg. 58). The problem with that analogy is that most rabbits on most occasions don’t do that. Also, it is just another assertion, not an explanation and smacks of voluntarism. At some points Ouspensky types into a strangely mystical and to me, unintelligible, idea that “everything has already been and therefore nothing really exists, that everything is a dream and a mirage. They understand that there never has been anything, that they themselves do not exist, and that nothing exists (pg. 90).” This is different than the more reasonable (and Platonic) idea that this life is a shadow of another, greater, and fuller world. I don’t see the logic behind the first part of the statement; how is it that things already happening make it so nothing exists? What?

            After the long, boring, and depressing 2^nd act, we get the resolution where you would hope the slog had been worth it and you’d be wrong. The ending is representative of the book as a whole – there are some good seeds that could’ve, under the right circumstances, bore much fruit but that were utterly spoiled and ruined by a stupid philosophy. Ivan has screwed everything up exactly as before and wants to DO IT ALL AGAIN! You as the reader are hoping this damn thing doesn’t happen all over again to multiply your torments and luckily you are clear. The magician tells him that, of course, wouldn’t fix the problem. Apparently, he can keep going into the past a finite number of times, but then suddenly he will not cross paths with the magician in one of those and will have to keep going forward in time (pg. 111). The magician then reveals to Ivan, after he asks the right question, because apparently he is also a deterministic robot slave who cannot give any info unless asked the right question, that his love interest never had any intention of leaving him, it was an adolescent ruse meant to punish him. After this revelation, our inept magician (who seems like a stand-in for God) declares that he can only offer his help to people at a particular moment in time and only once in all the eternal recurrences of the universe. He never says why; just like the rest of the nonsense in the book you must just accept that’s the way things work.

            The magician also says that Ivan cannot change what has already happened but can change his future by professing absolute and unconditional obedience to him for 20 years and sacrificing what ever the magician deems necessary because sacrifice somehow “creates causes” (pg. 115). So many problems. I actually agree with the magician that “nothing can be acquired without sacrifice” but the magician’s explanation is super hokey and weird. Also, what was all that stuff about the future and past being the same and that, in fact, nothing exists, and everything is a farcical illusion? Also, why are things different now if there is a way to change things, we’ve been told this whole time we’re basically screwed—all we will ever amount to is slaves or puppets to the atoms and the void, destined to repeat an absurdly tragic and stupid play again and again for all eternity. Why does Ivan have to enslave himself to an untrustworthy mage; sounds like a trap. The magician’s final words to Ivan are bleak as hell “you must understand that very powerful forces will be opposed to you and you will be alone, always alone” (pg. 117) The last scene when Ivan is standing in a crowd and feels a wave of awe come over him, hinting that he sees beauty in all this nonsensical rubbish made my jaw drop. I’m genuinely surprised some people see this bleak and appalling vision compelling and worthy of anything more than scorn.

The book was not completely without merit, there are lots of interesting ideas, allusions, and references that crop up every now and then. For instance, I learned and laughed at something Pushkin wrote in his notes about a jester being asked whether he’d prefer to be hanged or quartered and he answered that he’d prefer milk soup. I might use that at parties. Also, like I said it had some nuggets of wisdom that glimmered about here and there dimly lighting the dark, arid desert of the manuscript. Here are some examples. Zenaida gives Osokin some actual good advice “When a man wants anything as strongly as you say you do, he acts” (pg. 4). We are shown how egotistical we can be, which is healthy, on pg. 13 “’I have never met a man yet,’ he says, “who was not convinced that he approached life rather differently from other people.” Ouspensky does show some insight into the human condition:

“There is something in us that keeps us where we find ourselves. I think this is the most awful thing of “(pg. 26) .

 “I never tell her what I ought to tell her, or what I think and feel. Why? It’s as though there were a mist around me, or as though I were tied and forced to act in this way and in no other” (pg. 103).

These passages eloquently express the notion that we are enslaved by passions against our will and this idea could’ve been explored in fruitful ways. The problem is that to do this goes 100% opposite his philosophy that we make these decisions in full knowledge and freedom. If we are in bondage to demons, evil thoughts, what have you, then we are in a tragic condition. The other thing is that he leans heavily on the tragic part but doesn’t see that this is a temporary condition from which we shall be liberated, so it is no wonder that the whole book is dismal.

            He also astutely notes the negative side of our adaptive superiority. We adapt so well that even if everyone on Earth died suddenly and all at once and you were the only one left alive this would astonish you at first, but then you would eventually get used to it. I find a poignant truth in that, but that’s the problem with this entire novella. Ouspensky focuses inordinately on the negative, but since he is human he tries to find some good in it, even though it isn’t logically possible so we are somehow supposed to believe the way things are as he presents them are good, we just need to accept his view to do it. It is better to “look the truth straight in the face” (pg. 85) and further to realize that there will be “charlatans who convince them [truth-seekers] that everything is very easy and simple. This is the greatest illusion of all” (pg. 113). It’s even true that “in order to change anything you must first change yourself. And this is much more difficult than you think. It requires constant effort for a long time and much knowledge” (pg. 113) The problem is that he is not offering the truth, though it is commendable that he thinks he does and valiantly strives after it. All in all, I would maybe recommend this for a one time read through if you have nothing better to do, but if you wanted more profound meditations on this subject I’d recommend going to classical sources like Plato and Plotinus, the Vedas, the Bible, Evagrius’ Praktikos, Shantideva’s Bodhicaryavatara or the Tipitaka. This is inane drivel compared to those ancient works.

 

Note: The kindle version is cheap but terribly formatted. You can still understand the story, but a physical copy may be better.