(Harmondsworth: Granta, 1992).
‘ ENTIRE LIFE HAS CONSISTED ’: Tarkovsky, quoted in Robert Bird, Andrei Tarkovsky.
‘ SUBSEQUENT FILM ’: Tarkovsky, Time Within Time.
‘ I’M REDUCED TO ’: Tarkovsky, Sculpting in Time.
‘ A TEST ’: (‘that results in a man either withstanding or breaking. Whether a man survives or not depends on his sense of individual worth, his ability to distinguish what is important from what is transitory.’): Tarkovsky, quoted in Robert Bird, Andrei Tarkovsky.
‘ AN INFINITE, IF DANK ENCLOSURE ’: David Thomson, Have You Seen… ? (London: Allen Lane, 2008).
‘ THE BELIEVER WILL OPEN ’: Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity (New York: Pantheon, 1951).
‘ IS FAITH IN HOPE ’: Miguel de Unamuno, Tragic Sense of Life (New York: Dover, 1954).
‘ PEOPLE WILL DO ANYTHING ’: Carl Jung, Psychology and Alchemy (London: Roudedge & Kegan Paul, 1953).
‘ THE EYE WANTS TO SLEEP ’: James Tate, ‘Absences’, Selected Poems (Manchester: Carcanet, 1997).
‘ MY DISCOVERY ’: Ingmar Bergman, at nostalghia.com.
‘ EVERY TIME IT WAS ’: Safiullin, interview, bonus extra, on Stalker DVD.
‘ THE GREATER THE DEGREE ,’ ETC .: Nadezhda Mandelstam, Hope Against Hope: A Memoir, translated by Max Hayward (London: Harvill, 1999; first published 1971).
‘ THE POINT OF ROOMS ’: Don DeLillo, White Noise (London: Picador, 1985).
‘ EACH ONE OF US ’: John Berger and Nella Bielski, A Question of Geography (London: Faber & Faber, 1987).
‘ I COMPLETELY AGREE ’: Tarkovsky, from an interview with Aldo Tassone at nostalghia.com . Translated slightly differently in Andrei Tarkovsky Interviews, edited by John Gianvito; ‘ THE ZONE DOESN’T ’: interview with Laurence Cossé, ibid.
‘ EVERYTHING, AFTER PASSING THROUGH ’: Miguel de Unamuno, Tragic Sense of Life. (In the English edition—translated from the Spanish—the first use of ‘film’ is given as ‘cinematograph show’; hence the change!)
‘ THE EXCELLENT ACTING OF THE DOG ’: Kenzaburo Oë, A Quiet Life (London: Picador, 1998).
‘ PLANTS AND ANIMALS ’: Bélas Balázs, quoted in Robert Bird, Andrei Tarkovsky.
‘ POSING ’: Donatas Banionis, quoted in Bird, ibid..
‘ FANTASTIC DOG ’: Knyazhinsky, interview, bonus extra, on Stalker DVD.
‘ ONLY THAT WHICH ’: Tarkovsky, interview with Guerra at nostalghia.com .
‘ MAKE THE OBJECTS LOOK ’: Robert Bresson, Notes on the Cinematographer.
‘ FINAL MIRACLE ’: Tarkovsky, Sculpting in Time.
‘ TOO SELFISH ’: Philip Larkin, ‘Wild Oats’, Collected Poems (London: Faber & Faber, 1988).
‘ A RUSSIAN ANGEL ’: Olga Surhova, quoted in Rerberg and Tarkovsky: The Reverse Side of ‘Stalker’ (film).
‘ HERE YOU LIVE ’: Rashit Safiullin, interview, bonus extra, on Stalker DVD.
‘ THANKS TO TARKOVSKY’S ’: Vladimir Sharun, interview at nostalghia.com .
‘ ONE OF THE GLASSES ’; Kenzaburo Oë, ‘The Guide (Stalker)’, in A Quiet Life.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Mark Cousins, Tom Luddy and Chris Mitchell for reading an early version of the manuscript and making helpful suggestions and corrections. I am particularly grateful to Tom for furnishing me with information about Tarkovsky’s trip to Telluride.
A few passages from this book first appeared, in very different form, in the Guardian. I am grateful to Michael Hann for commissioning and publishing that piece.
Steam Books, Marcus Williams