I really hope that below the apparent surface of light and amusing form the reader will discern true depth of the content — it is for the sake of that depth that this book was written. For me, it was a serious preparation for a conversation with the younger generations about the fact that every person, no matter how old they are or what circumstances they find themselves in, must devote a part of their time, even the tiniest bit, to understanding life and building relationships with the outside world, by which I don’t mean society — rather, the whole universe. It is not true that one can only begin to be interested in philosophy and aesthetics only after one’s primary basic and social needs are satisfied. Moreover, life is not just about meeting needs. A person must be taught from an early age to not only cope with life and use it for their own purposes, but above all, to love life, and in order to be able to do so, they must first learn to see the beauty and diversity of the great wide world around them. My focus on the topic of colours isn’t accidental — to get stuck in the narrowness of a monochrome world, no matter how meaningful it may seem to us, is to deprive ourselves. Our true goal is to breach through to the wider world where all of life’s colours shine brightly. And the more diverse such a world is, the greater the odds of one achieving happiness in it.
The framework of the main plot of the book is the theme of the psychological aspects of colour perception. Many of us aren’t aware of a fact, which is very well known to artists, namely that each colour has its own unique character and charm and it interacts in a special way with other colours. Psychologists believe that it is these inherent traits of colours, rather than our own abstract views of what is and isn’t beautiful, that determine our own individual colour preferences. This statement won’t seem strange if one remembers that there is no colour in of itself — rather, it only exists in our sensations as a result of refraction of light, under the influence of an electromagnetic field of a light wave. Thus, our attraction to a particular colour scheme is in some way similar to a choice of a kindred spirit, with whom we are “on the same wavelength”; moreover, our colour preferences can change with age and may even depend on mood — after all, our own field is inconsistent. When one answers the question about their favourite colour, that person reveals a lot about themselves.
It is even more interesting that such a connection may be traced in relation to entire nations — sometimes, the national character is surprisingly accurate in its reflection of a particular colour. While writing what I know from my own and other people’s experience about the peculiarities of the inhabitants of real-world countries that served as prototypes for the fictional states of the Valley of Colours, I was sometimes surprised myself by just how smoothly the pieces of a large collection of scattered facts about a particular country came together in a well-fitting puzzle portrait of a particular colour’s interpretation in psychology. Even though the characters and the storyline of the book are, of course, a fantasy, at its foundation there are many facts taken from real life and for those who are unfamiliar with those facts, the ‘Borrowings’ section of the book may be of interest by itself.
I wish everyone passion for life,
Marina Varvarina
