The Structure of Navalny's Memoir

I am not yet finished reading the memoir of Alexei Navalny, but I'm getting close. And I have looked ahead to see generally what is upcoming. So I know the structure of the book. That seems like a weird thing to say; usually readers know the structure of a book before reading—not always, with modern novels, for instance, but often even then you can figure it out pretty quickly. Navalny's memoir has an odd structure, half intentional memoir for publication, half prison diary. And there's no table of contents, or preface, or any sort of introduction. 

Should you want to know the structure of the book before reading? Maybe that knowledge will deprive you of the thrill of discovering its structure for yourself. I don't know. If you're planning on reading the book all the way through, maybe don't look at this post. On the other hand, maybe you're like me and you like to know what you're getting yourself into. Anyway, proceed at your own risk. 

By the way, going into the memoir, I was interested especially in two aspects of Navalny's life: his relationship to Christianity, and his bravery. Or, you might say, I was interested in why he returned to Russia after his 2020 poisoning—did it have anything to do with Christianity? Or what was the source of his courage? Or was it rather foolishness? I don't myself interpret his return to Russia as foolishness, but I have talked to people that I respect who do interpret it that way. Anyway, regarding his return and his faith, I have been taking notes, and I plan on posting some things about those topics. 

But here's the structure of the book, first in broad strokes, and then in more detail. The titles of the Parts (i.e., Part I, Near Death) are provided in the book. 

Part I, Near Death, chapters 1–2, pages 3–24

Part II, Formation, chapters 3–9, pages 25–174

Part III, The Work, chapters 10–18, pages 175–276

Part IV, Prison, pages 277–471

Epilogue, pages 473–79

It's Part IV that is the prison diary, with some social media posts thrown in (e.g., at Feb. 17, 2021; March 3, 2021). You could call it "Letters and Papers from Prison." This section covers a three-year period in four different calendar years, and the section is divided into entries dated according to those years. There are many more entries for the first year of Navalny's imprisonment, 2021, than for the subsequent years, and indeed there are more entries for the first half of 2021 than the second half. 

2021 contains entries totaling about 140 pages

2022, about 30 pages

2023, about 20 pages

2024, 4 pages

As for 2021, the first half of the year takes up about 120 pages, and the number of entries plummets in June. Every month of 2021 from June on has only a single entry, except for October, with two entries (one of substantial length), and December, with no entries. In contrast, February 2021 has an entry for every day until Feb 25, when he moves prisons. 

Now back to the memoir section, Parts I–III. Part I has two chapters recounting his 2020 poisoning, including his growing realization on an airplane that he felt not quite right, his recovery in Germany, and his decision to return to Russia. 

Below, I'll attempt to give titles or short descriptions of the chapters in Parts II–III. All of the chapters in the memoir are untitled. 

Part II, Formation

Chapter 3, memories of the USSR before Gorbachev

Chapter 4, memories of the period under Mikhail Gorbachev

Chapter 5, the end of the USSR

Chapter 6, getting into university

Chapter 7, the Yeltsin era

Chapter 8, Navalny's arrest upon his return to Russia (18 Jan 2021). This chapter is out of chronological sequence, but it is in my mind the most engrossing chapter of the book. 

Chapter 9, Yulia

Part III, The Work

Chapter 10, the beginnings of Navalny's political involvement in the early 2000s

Chapter 11, forming an organization called the Democrat Alternative

Chapter 12, Kirov and Yale

Chapter 13, the Anti-Corruption Foundation

Chapter 14, being prosecuted and running for mayor of Moscow

Chapter 15, Oleg Navalny in prison

Chapter 16, from blogging to YouTube, and eventually TikTok

Chapter 17, the presidential campaign in 2017

Chapter 18, bravery? Or: why do I do what I do?

Harpalus, An Unfaithful Servant

Alexander the Great had a courtier named Harpalus, whose story is told by various ancient authors. Here is the account in the first-century BC historian Diodorus Siculus (17.108.4–6; LCL edition, pp. 435–37)

Harpalus had been given the custody of the treasury in Babylon and of the revenues which accrued to it, but as soon as the king had carried his campaign into India, he assumed that Alexander would never come back, and gave himself up to comfortable living. Although he had been charged as satrap with the administration of a great country, he first occupied himself with the abuse of women and illegitimate amours with the natives and squandered much of the treasure under his control on incontinent pleasure. He fetched all the long way from the Red Sea a great quantity of fish and introduced an extravagant way of life, so that he came under general criticism. Later, moreover, he sent and brought from Athens the most dazzling courtesan of the day, whose name was Pythonicê. As long as she lived he gave her gifts worthy of a queen, and when she died, he gave her a magnificent funeral and erected over her grave a costly monument of the Attic type. 

After that, he brought out a second Attic courtesan named Glycera and kept her in exceeding luxury, providing her with a way of life which was fantastically expensive. At the same time, with an eye on the uncertainties of fortune, he established himself a place of refuge by benefactions to the Athenians. 

When Alexander did come back from India and put to death many of the satraps who had been charged with neglect of duty, Harpalus became alarmed at the punishment which might befall him. He packed up five thousand talents of silver, enrolled six thousand mercenaries, departed from Asia and sailed across to Attica. 

Diodorus continues the story just a bit longer, showing that Harpalus found himself unwelcome and, pretty soon,  murdered.

This story reminded me of the Parable of the Unfaithful Servant, told in Matthew 24:45–51.

But if that wicked slave says to himself, “My master is delayed,” and he begins to beat his fellow slaves, and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know. He will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. (Matthew 24:48–51; cf. Luke 12:35–48)

I have long found that last bit of Jesus’ parable to be sort of incredible. Would a master really punish a slave in that way? After reading some ancient histories of Alexander, I am less surprised by the master’s treatment of his slave. Alexander could deal harshly with any hint of insubordination, as you can tell from the passage above about Harpalus, who got scared because Alexander was executing insubordinate servants. I don’t recall a story in which Alexander cut anyone up in little pieces (as in Jesus’ parable), but there are some gruesome things in ancient histories, so while Jesus might be exaggerating for effect (hyperbole), he wasn’t exaggerating much.

My New Study of the Book of Daniel for Churches

A new book of mine—a study of Daniel designed for churches—was published a couple weeks ago by Heritage Christian University Press. This is the fourth book in a series; previous books of mine in this series have focused on the book of Exodus, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Gospel of Luke. How should I describe this series? These studies are beefy—usually fairly long chapters for books aimed at churches (sometimes 6000 words per chapter or more)—and are informed by scholarship but are trying to arrive at a devotional or theological meaning of the text relevant in the twenty-first century. 

This new book on Daniel is unique in the series because my son, Josiah, drew pictures for the book, appearing before each chapter. The cover art of the book is one of his original drawings, representing the mountain of Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Daniel 2.

My book has an introduction and twelve chapters, one for every chapter of Daniel. As I said, it's designed for churches, so I tried to write the chapters in such a way that the book would be useful for teaching or preaching in a church context. That goal determined some of what I chose to discuss, specifically that I do not have discussions of the major critical issues regarding the book of Daniel. I think I mention the historical obscurity of Darius the Mede, but I do not dwell on it, because that issue seems to me completely unimportant when trying to understand the story of the lions' den in Daniel 6—or, at least, when trying to understand how the story might help Christians. For the same reason, I never broach the issue of the date of Daniel. 

Here is a section of the preface that describes the approach of my study. 

Daniel is a difficult book, deceptively difficult. The first six chapters are so familiar to most Christians, even very young ones, that we might think that the book is filled with children’s stories. While the stories in the first half of the book present complexities of their own, it’s the second half of the book where the real difficulties lie. Some Christians spend all their time here, in the apocalyptic visions of Daniel 7–12, trying to relate these ancient prophecies to today’s headlines, attempting to discern how close to the end times we live. Other Christians avoid these visions like the plague. This book encourages a different approach. I do not think that God gave us the apocalyptic visions in order to map out a scheme of the end of history, but he most definitely intended for believers to read and value these chapters. While I acknowledge that the reading strategy I propose in this book is not void of its own share of complexity, I have tried not only to explain the nature of the visions and some of their details but also to show how they can help us cope with life as it is now. 

If you end up reading this book, you'll probably get tired of my saying that I don't know the best interpretation of a passage. I don't know what to do with the Seventy Weeks of Daniel 9. I don't know how to interpret all the details of Daniel 11, especially at the end (but I shy away from an Antichrist interpretation, the traditional Christian approach). Even in the absence of confidence on these matters, I think these chapters have relevance to believers today.