Illusion of “I”
The lie of individualism
The idea that you can become anything you want is a very American thing and it has a powerful grip on people’s imagination. I used to believe in it to an extent, too. And now I don’t. What changed?
I became a mother and have been witnessing and fostering my daughter’s growth for almost 4 years.
Some things have to be experienced and are impossible to grasp intellectually — motherhood is one of them. Having a child is like owning a time machine — it transports you back into your own childhood. All of a sudden memories I didn’t know I had flooded back and I was forced to reckon with them. Turned out the biggest memory I have from my childhood is being read to by my mother — constantly, widely. And so instead of inhabiting the droll world of 1990s Moscow I lived in the wonderful worlds of Roald Dahl, Astrid Lingred, Daniil Kharms, Mark Twain. It shaped my vocabulary and my relationship with language and books forever. And it all happened before I was six without any choice on my end.
Children have to share the destiny of their parents, Rachel Cusk once said. Yet this is not what the ideology of individualism teaches you. It obfuscates this fact, makes you believe it’s a minor detail and that what matters most is that you forge your own path…that if you wish and work hard enough at it, it’ll come true. And sometimes it does — there are exceptions that only prove the rule.
A radical break with your family destiny is possible, of course. But it has happened more often in revolutionary times. The early Soviet Union basically forced it on people. Old hierarchies were destroyed and a new Soviet man was forged, allowing a person born into the peasantry to become a renowned scientist, artist, historian — an unthinkable leap within one generation in normal times.
I get how this idea took root in American society. Since the revolutionary era people moved here, crossing a dangerous ocean, in the hope of building a new different life for themselves. They created new identities, forged their own paths, manifested their own destiny. Still, they didn’t go naked to this new continent but brought resources, education, and a way of seeing the world — all things that were shaped by circumstances of their childhood. Some came as indentured servants; others came with wealth and letters of recommendation. But I know this period of American history only very vaguely — mostly from watching Far and Away as a kid in Moscow. But it captures that ethos rather well I think.
But what about now? How could this idea remain intact in a society where generational wealth, middles class values, and nuclear family structure are so prevalent? Why would anyone believe themselves to be separate from the family unit into which they were born and in which they were raised? It’s a mystery to me now.
Still, not that long ago, this American naiveté and optimism was attractive to me. Maybe because I come from the old world but it felt liberating. I didn’t have to be defined or burdened by my past. I could become a new person. But now as a mother I can’t unsee how bogus this notion is.
In my daughter, who is not even 4, I already see my own vocabulary and my own way of being in the world. She is a separate person and yet most of the things she’s into now — books, animated films, world play, animals, even her disdain for cars — are influenced by me, her father, and her grandparents. She has her own preferences but they’re within the cultural world we create for. And it’s not just the things we do and buy for her — it’s not about the level of consumption. It’s also the things we don’t buy and don’t expose her to. We choose what goes into her head, sometimes on purpose but most of the time by osmosis. We involve her in the things we like. Our world is her world. For the last year I’ve been writing short poems in Russian in her name and now she identifies as a poet. But did she really choose this identity? On some level, yes. She likes to learn and recite “her” poetry and she likes pretending she’s writing out the words on pieces of paper like a poet. But her sense of what’s possible is determined by me and the rest of the family.
Parents have this ultimate power — they influence the most formative years of a child’s life. And it doesn’t mater if kids rebel and rethink things when they grow up. They’re still defined by the world of their parents. What we did as children is what feels “right" and “homey" to us when we become adults and come into our own.
Seems so obvious when I write these words down. Still I think it is a profound insight for this culture…and it’s a revelation for me. Back in the day I used to believe I’m just me and other people are just other people. If Yasha and I would be talking about some successful artist or writer, I’d get extremely annoyed when he would wonder about what their parents did for a living. It seemed vulgar and irrelevant to me. Who cares what their parents did? That didn’t define them. But I was wrong. Now I’m the one to look up someone’s family if I want to learn about them.
I know Proust was vehemently against this way of thinking and famously started writing “Contre Sainte Beuve” — an essay that eventually grew into In Search of lost Time — rejecting this biographical approach to art that literary critic Sainte Beauve promoted at the time. Well, Mr Proust, I beg to disagree. I think you were driven to deny the influence of biography on an artwork because of how closeted you were. You didn’t want people probing the fact that you were gay and hense homosexuality was on of the central themes in your novel.
The belief in the special meritocracy of the American Way is I think very entrenched. There are still some spaces where you can glimpse the truth, though. One of them was the marriage announcement section in the New York Times. I loved that section. It was just the raw facts about a new family unit being created. And it went something like this: a bridegroom Whyatt, 33, son of Richard and Genevieve Van Wick of Westchester, is to be married to Viveca, 32, daughter of Lawrence Leigh II and Isabelle York of Long Island. Bride’s father is a hedge fund manager at Bridgewater associates and her mother has a private psychoanalytic practice…etc, etc. You get the idea. It was all about clans, class, pedigree…and it was all out in the open. I write “was” because the Times killed the traditional format of these announcements a few years ago and changed it to a “mini vows” section. The paper said it was to “increase diversity" — basically they changed it so that it wouldn’t only feature upper class people and those aspiring to claw their way into that social stratum. I guess it’s smart that they got rid of the old format. “Let the plebeians be in the wedding section. Let them feel empowered. No need to have our generational wealth on display for every lurker and hater.”
The idea that America is a meritocracy full of individuals who started from ground zero and made themselves into something new with no help is a lie. And I think to claim otherwise is mean, disingenuous and insidious. To present people as pure individuals with their solo achievements separate from their family and ancestors makes others feel horrible and confused about their own individual lack of success. It puts it all on you. It hides structural cross-generational forces.
I don’t mean to say that people should never try to go beyond the world in which they were raised in. The idea of going after a dream is appealing and it takes bravery and it might lead somewhere. But structurally the odds are against you. It’s not just connections and money. It’s also psychological. You simply don’t know how to navigate inside the spaces you don’t grow up in. You’re going blind just by trial and error and luck and you have to learn along the way. But by the time you acquire this knowledge it might actually be too late for you to act on it. So the best that you can do is pass it on to your child. And the child can go at it. They can succeed where you didn't. That’s called the circle of life. And it explains why many famous writers and artists often have parents who were way less successful in these fields. Or even failed. Can you really call it failure, though? Their life and struggles facilitated their children’s success.
And your children are you. You are your children.
More and more I keep thinking about my dad. He was a minor, failed Russian poet or “unread” as he liked to say. Does that mean me or my daughter are destined for poetic success? Yes.
—Evgenia
It also makes one realize how hard it must be to break from repressive or abusive families. It takes real courage to throw out all you know to seek a better life. It took a lot of experience for me to understand how people could stay with abusive partners or hide their identities from parents that aren't understanding.
i accidentally unsubscribed, but i am back. you are a charming pair of writers. and as an immigrant (at 3 years old) with a father whose exception proved the rule, i appreciate your remarks.
compelling to learn that this Substack is a family affair.