The Culture of Samizdat

The Culture of Samizdat

Author: Josephine von Zitzewitz

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2020-11-12

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1350142646

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Winner of the 2022 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Titles Samizdat, the production and circulation of texts outside official channels, was an integral part of life in the final decades of the Soviet Union. But as Josephine von Zitzewitz explains, while much is known about the texts themselves, little is available on the complex communities and cultures that existed around them due to their necessarily secretive, and sometimes dissident, nature. By analysing the behaviours of different actors involved in Samizdat – readers, typists, librarians and the editors of periodicals in 1970s Leningrad, The Culture of Samizdat fills this lacuna in Soviet history scholarship. Crucially, as well as providing new insight into Samizdat texts, the book makes use of oral and written testimonies to examine the role of Samizdat activists and employs an interdisciplinary theoretical approach drawing on both the sociology of reading and book history. In doing so, von Zitzewitz uncovers the importance of 'middlemen' for Samizdat culture. Diligently researched and engagingly written, this book will be of great value to scholars of Soviet cultural history and Russian literary studies alike.


Book Synopsis The Culture of Samizdat by : Josephine von Zitzewitz

Download or read book The Culture of Samizdat written by Josephine von Zitzewitz and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-11-12 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2022 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Titles Samizdat, the production and circulation of texts outside official channels, was an integral part of life in the final decades of the Soviet Union. But as Josephine von Zitzewitz explains, while much is known about the texts themselves, little is available on the complex communities and cultures that existed around them due to their necessarily secretive, and sometimes dissident, nature. By analysing the behaviours of different actors involved in Samizdat – readers, typists, librarians and the editors of periodicals in 1970s Leningrad, The Culture of Samizdat fills this lacuna in Soviet history scholarship. Crucially, as well as providing new insight into Samizdat texts, the book makes use of oral and written testimonies to examine the role of Samizdat activists and employs an interdisciplinary theoretical approach drawing on both the sociology of reading and book history. In doing so, von Zitzewitz uncovers the importance of 'middlemen' for Samizdat culture. Diligently researched and engagingly written, this book will be of great value to scholars of Soviet cultural history and Russian literary studies alike.


Soviet Samizdat

Soviet Samizdat

Author: Ann Komaromi

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2022-05-15

Total Pages: 311

ISBN-13: 1501763601

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Soviet Samizdat traces the emergence and development of samizdat, one of the most significant and distinctive phenomena of the late Soviet era, as an uncensored system for making and sharing texts. Based on extensive research of the underground journals, bulletins, art folios and other periodicals produced in the Soviet Union from the mid-1950s to the mid-1980s, Ann Komaromi analyzes the role of samizdat in fostering new forms of imagined community among Soviet citizens. Dissidence has been dismissed as an elite phenomenon or as insignificant because it had little demonstrable impact on the Soviet regime. Komaromi challenges these views and demonstrates that the kind of imagination about self and community made possible by samizdat could be a powerful social force. She explains why participants in samizdat culture so often sought to divide "political" from "cultural" samizdat. Her study provides a controversial umbrella definition for all forms of samizdat in terms of truth-telling, arguing that the act is experienced as transformative by Soviet authors and readers. This argument will challenge scholars in the field to respond to contentions that go against the grain of both anthropological and postmodern accounts. Komaromi's combination of literary analysis, historical research, and sociological theory makes sense of the phenomenon of samizdat for readers today. Soviet Samizdat shows that samizdat was not simply a tool of opposition to a defunct regime. Instead, samizdat fostered informal communities of knowledge that foreshadowed a similar phenomenon of alternative perspectives challenging the authority of institutions around the world today.


Book Synopsis Soviet Samizdat by : Ann Komaromi

Download or read book Soviet Samizdat written by Ann Komaromi and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2022-05-15 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Soviet Samizdat traces the emergence and development of samizdat, one of the most significant and distinctive phenomena of the late Soviet era, as an uncensored system for making and sharing texts. Based on extensive research of the underground journals, bulletins, art folios and other periodicals produced in the Soviet Union from the mid-1950s to the mid-1980s, Ann Komaromi analyzes the role of samizdat in fostering new forms of imagined community among Soviet citizens. Dissidence has been dismissed as an elite phenomenon or as insignificant because it had little demonstrable impact on the Soviet regime. Komaromi challenges these views and demonstrates that the kind of imagination about self and community made possible by samizdat could be a powerful social force. She explains why participants in samizdat culture so often sought to divide "political" from "cultural" samizdat. Her study provides a controversial umbrella definition for all forms of samizdat in terms of truth-telling, arguing that the act is experienced as transformative by Soviet authors and readers. This argument will challenge scholars in the field to respond to contentions that go against the grain of both anthropological and postmodern accounts. Komaromi's combination of literary analysis, historical research, and sociological theory makes sense of the phenomenon of samizdat for readers today. Soviet Samizdat shows that samizdat was not simply a tool of opposition to a defunct regime. Instead, samizdat fostered informal communities of knowledge that foreshadowed a similar phenomenon of alternative perspectives challenging the authority of institutions around the world today.


Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond

Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond

Author: Friederike Kind-Kovács

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2013-03-01

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 0857455869

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In many ways what is identified today as “cultural globalization” in Eastern Europe has its roots in the Cold War phenomena of samizdat (“do-it-yourself” underground publishing) and tamizdat (publishing abroad). This volume offers a new understanding of how information flowed between East and West during the Cold War, as well as the much broader circulation of cultural products instigated and sustained by these practices. By expanding the definitions of samizdat and tamizdat from explicitly political print publications to include other forms and genres, this volume investigates the wider cultural sphere of alternative and semi-official texts, broadcast media, reproductions of visual art and music, and, in the post-1989 period, new media. The underground circulation of uncensored texts in the Cold War era serves as a useful foundation for comparison when looking at current examples of censorship, independent media, and the use of new media in countries like China, Iran, and the former Yugoslavia.


Book Synopsis Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond by : Friederike Kind-Kovács

Download or read book Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond written by Friederike Kind-Kovács and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2013-03-01 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In many ways what is identified today as “cultural globalization” in Eastern Europe has its roots in the Cold War phenomena of samizdat (“do-it-yourself” underground publishing) and tamizdat (publishing abroad). This volume offers a new understanding of how information flowed between East and West during the Cold War, as well as the much broader circulation of cultural products instigated and sustained by these practices. By expanding the definitions of samizdat and tamizdat from explicitly political print publications to include other forms and genres, this volume investigates the wider cultural sphere of alternative and semi-official texts, broadcast media, reproductions of visual art and music, and, in the post-1989 period, new media. The underground circulation of uncensored texts in the Cold War era serves as a useful foundation for comparison when looking at current examples of censorship, independent media, and the use of new media in countries like China, Iran, and the former Yugoslavia.


Dissident Legacies of Samizdat Social Media Activism

Dissident Legacies of Samizdat Social Media Activism

Author: Piotr Wciślik

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2021-07-22

Total Pages: 229

ISBN-13: 1000417972

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This book tells the story of the dissident imaginary of samizdat activists, the political culture they created, and the pivotal role that culture had in sustaining the resilience of the oppositional movement in Poland between 1976 and 1990. This unlicensed print culture has been seen as one of the most emblematic social worlds of dissent. Since the Cold War, the audacity of harnessing obsolete print technology known as samizdat to break the modern monopoly of information of the party-state has fascinated many, yet this book looks beyond the Cold War frame to reappraise its historical novelty and significance. What made that culture resilient and rewarding, this book argues, was the correspondence between certain set of ideas and media practices: namely, the form of samizdat social media, which both embodied and projected the prefigurative philosophy of political action, asserting that small forms of collective agency can have a transformative effect on public life here and now, and are uniquely capable of achieving a democratic new beginning. This prefigurative vision of the transition from communism had a fundamental impact on the broader oppositional movement. Yet, while both the rise of Solidarity and the breakthrough of 1989 seemed to do justice to that vision, both pivotal moments found samizdat social media activists making history that was not to their liking. Back in the day, their estrangement was overshadowed by the main axis of contention between the society and the state. Foregrounding the internal controversies they protagonized, this book adds nuance to our understanding of the broader legacy of dissent and its relevance for the networked protests of today.


Book Synopsis Dissident Legacies of Samizdat Social Media Activism by : Piotr Wciślik

Download or read book Dissident Legacies of Samizdat Social Media Activism written by Piotr Wciślik and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2021-07-22 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book tells the story of the dissident imaginary of samizdat activists, the political culture they created, and the pivotal role that culture had in sustaining the resilience of the oppositional movement in Poland between 1976 and 1990. This unlicensed print culture has been seen as one of the most emblematic social worlds of dissent. Since the Cold War, the audacity of harnessing obsolete print technology known as samizdat to break the modern monopoly of information of the party-state has fascinated many, yet this book looks beyond the Cold War frame to reappraise its historical novelty and significance. What made that culture resilient and rewarding, this book argues, was the correspondence between certain set of ideas and media practices: namely, the form of samizdat social media, which both embodied and projected the prefigurative philosophy of political action, asserting that small forms of collective agency can have a transformative effect on public life here and now, and are uniquely capable of achieving a democratic new beginning. This prefigurative vision of the transition from communism had a fundamental impact on the broader oppositional movement. Yet, while both the rise of Solidarity and the breakthrough of 1989 seemed to do justice to that vision, both pivotal moments found samizdat social media activists making history that was not to their liking. Back in the day, their estrangement was overshadowed by the main axis of contention between the society and the state. Foregrounding the internal controversies they protagonized, this book adds nuance to our understanding of the broader legacy of dissent and its relevance for the networked protests of today.


Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe

Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe

Author: H.Gordon Skilling

Publisher: Springer

Published: 1989-06-18

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 1349092843

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This study of the "independent life of society" (dissent) in Central and Eastern Europe examines the forms of independent activity at work today. Included are autonomous family life, religion and nationalism, the second economy, "samizdat" communications, the second culture and social deviance.


Book Synopsis Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe by : H.Gordon Skilling

Download or read book Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe written by H.Gordon Skilling and published by Springer. This book was released on 1989-06-18 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study of the "independent life of society" (dissent) in Central and Eastern Europe examines the forms of independent activity at work today. Included are autonomous family life, religion and nationalism, the second economy, "samizdat" communications, the second culture and social deviance.


Samizdat Past and Present

Samizdat Past and Present

Author: Tomáš Glanc

Publisher: Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press

Published: 2019-02-01

Total Pages: 245

ISBN-13: 8024640333

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This anthology of texts by Czech literary scientists presents the phenomenon of the samizdat and its historical transformation. The chapters primarily focus on the definition of the samizdat itself as well as the extensive controversy over the concept of unofficial literature. The scholars also pay attention to the origin, development and characteristics of the various samizdat editions; individual chapters are devoted to underground production and censorship. One chapter deals with the relationship between domestic samizdat production and exile literature. In the final chapters of the publication, samizdat is covered also in the international context, in particular in the Polish and Russian contexts. This book, Samizdat Past and Present, is a representative publication presenting the diverse forms of samizdat and has the potential to become a basic guide on the issue.


Book Synopsis Samizdat Past and Present by : Tomáš Glanc

Download or read book Samizdat Past and Present written by Tomáš Glanc and published by Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press. This book was released on 2019-02-01 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This anthology of texts by Czech literary scientists presents the phenomenon of the samizdat and its historical transformation. The chapters primarily focus on the definition of the samizdat itself as well as the extensive controversy over the concept of unofficial literature. The scholars also pay attention to the origin, development and characteristics of the various samizdat editions; individual chapters are devoted to underground production and censorship. One chapter deals with the relationship between domestic samizdat production and exile literature. In the final chapters of the publication, samizdat is covered also in the international context, in particular in the Polish and Russian contexts. This book, Samizdat Past and Present, is a representative publication presenting the diverse forms of samizdat and has the potential to become a basic guide on the issue.


Uncensored

Uncensored

Author: Ann Komaromi

Publisher: Northwestern University Press

Published: 2015-06-30

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0810131242

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2016 AATSEEL Prize for Best Book in Literary/Cultural Studies Vasilii Aksenov, Andrei Bitov, and Venedikt Erofeev were among the most acclaimed authors of samizdat, the literature that was self-published in the former Soviet Union in order to evade censorship and prosecution. In Uncensored, Ann Komaromi uses their work to argue for a far more sophisticated understanding of the phenomenon of samizdat, showing how the material circumstances of its creation and dissemination exercised a profound influence on the very idea of dissidence, reconfiguring the relationship between author and reader. Using archival research to fully illustrate samizdat’s social and historical context, Komaromi arrives at a more nuanced theoretical position that breaks down the opposition between the autonomous work of art and direct political engagement. The similarities between samizdat and digital culture have particular relevance for contemporary discourses of dissident subjectivity.


Book Synopsis Uncensored by : Ann Komaromi

Download or read book Uncensored written by Ann Komaromi and published by Northwestern University Press. This book was released on 2015-06-30 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2016 AATSEEL Prize for Best Book in Literary/Cultural Studies Vasilii Aksenov, Andrei Bitov, and Venedikt Erofeev were among the most acclaimed authors of samizdat, the literature that was self-published in the former Soviet Union in order to evade censorship and prosecution. In Uncensored, Ann Komaromi uses their work to argue for a far more sophisticated understanding of the phenomenon of samizdat, showing how the material circumstances of its creation and dissemination exercised a profound influence on the very idea of dissidence, reconfiguring the relationship between author and reader. Using archival research to fully illustrate samizdat’s social and historical context, Komaromi arrives at a more nuanced theoretical position that breaks down the opposition between the autonomous work of art and direct political engagement. The similarities between samizdat and digital culture have particular relevance for contemporary discourses of dissident subjectivity.


Writing Underground

Writing Underground

Author: Martin Machovec

Publisher: Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press

Published: 2019-12-01

Total Pages: 252

ISBN-13: 8024641259

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Výbor ze studií literárního historika a editora Martina Machovce, které vznikaly v posledních dvou dekádách (2000–2018), představuje celou řadu faset uvažování o fenoménu undergroundu. V jednotlivých studiích se zabývá zejména undergroundovou literaturou z okruhu I. M. Jirouse a rockové skupiny The Plastic People of the Universe, ale věnuje pozornost i širším souvislostem této literatury – jejím předchůdcům z 50. let (okruh Egona Bondyho a Ivo Vodseďálka), roli ve společenství Charty 77, vazbám na angloamerické prostředí nebo hudebním a scénickým realizacím a způsobu, jakým byly tyto texty v samizdatu šířeny. In this collection of writings produced between 2000 and 2018, the pioneering literary historian of the Czech underground, Martin Machovec, examines the multifarious nature of the underground phenomenon. After devoting considerable attention to the circle surrounding the band The Plastic People of the Universe and their manager, the poet Ivan M. Jirous, Machovec turns outward to examine the broader concept of the underground, comparing the Czech incarnation not only with the movements of its Central and Eastern European neighbors, but also with those in the world at large. In one essay, he reflects on the so-called Půlnoc Editions, which published illegal texts in the darkest days of the late forties and early fifties. In other essays, Machovec examines the relationship between illegal texts published at home (samizdat) and those smuggled out to be published abroad (tamizdat), as well as the range of literature that can be classified as samizdat, drawing attention to movements frequently overlooked by literary critics. In his final, previously unpublished essay, Machovec examines Jirous’s “Report on the Third Czech Musical Revival” not as a merely historical document, but as literature itself.


Book Synopsis Writing Underground by : Martin Machovec

Download or read book Writing Underground written by Martin Machovec and published by Charles University in Prague, Karolinum Press. This book was released on 2019-12-01 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Výbor ze studií literárního historika a editora Martina Machovce, které vznikaly v posledních dvou dekádách (2000–2018), představuje celou řadu faset uvažování o fenoménu undergroundu. V jednotlivých studiích se zabývá zejména undergroundovou literaturou z okruhu I. M. Jirouse a rockové skupiny The Plastic People of the Universe, ale věnuje pozornost i širším souvislostem této literatury – jejím předchůdcům z 50. let (okruh Egona Bondyho a Ivo Vodseďálka), roli ve společenství Charty 77, vazbám na angloamerické prostředí nebo hudebním a scénickým realizacím a způsobu, jakým byly tyto texty v samizdatu šířeny. In this collection of writings produced between 2000 and 2018, the pioneering literary historian of the Czech underground, Martin Machovec, examines the multifarious nature of the underground phenomenon. After devoting considerable attention to the circle surrounding the band The Plastic People of the Universe and their manager, the poet Ivan M. Jirous, Machovec turns outward to examine the broader concept of the underground, comparing the Czech incarnation not only with the movements of its Central and Eastern European neighbors, but also with those in the world at large. In one essay, he reflects on the so-called Půlnoc Editions, which published illegal texts in the darkest days of the late forties and early fifties. In other essays, Machovec examines the relationship between illegal texts published at home (samizdat) and those smuggled out to be published abroad (tamizdat), as well as the range of literature that can be classified as samizdat, drawing attention to movements frequently overlooked by literary critics. In his final, previously unpublished essay, Machovec examines Jirous’s “Report on the Third Czech Musical Revival” not as a merely historical document, but as literature itself.


Soviet Samizdat

Soviet Samizdat

Author: Ann Komaromi

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2022-05-15

Total Pages: 316

ISBN-13: 150176361X

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Soviet Samizdat traces the emergence and development of samizdat, one of the most significant and distinctive phenomena of the late Soviet era, as an uncensored system for making and sharing texts. Based on extensive research of the underground journals, bulletins, art folios and other periodicals produced in the Soviet Union from the mid-1950s to the mid-1980s, Ann Komaromi analyzes the role of samizdat in fostering new forms of imagined community among Soviet citizens. Dissidence has been dismissed as an elite phenomenon or as insignificant because it had little demonstrable impact on the Soviet regime. Komaromi challenges these views and demonstrates that the kind of imagination about self and community made possible by samizdat could be a powerful social force. She explains why participants in samizdat culture so often sought to divide "political" from "cultural" samizdat. Her study provides a controversial umbrella definition for all forms of samizdat in terms of truth-telling, arguing that the act is experienced as transformative by Soviet authors and readers. This argument will challenge scholars in the field to respond to contentions that go against the grain of both anthropological and postmodern accounts. Komaromi's combination of literary analysis, historical research, and sociological theory makes sense of the phenomenon of samizdat for readers today. Soviet Samizdat shows that samizdat was not simply a tool of opposition to a defunct regime. Instead, samizdat fostered informal communities of knowledge that foreshadowed a similar phenomenon of alternative perspectives challenging the authority of institutions around the world today.


Book Synopsis Soviet Samizdat by : Ann Komaromi

Download or read book Soviet Samizdat written by Ann Komaromi and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2022-05-15 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Soviet Samizdat traces the emergence and development of samizdat, one of the most significant and distinctive phenomena of the late Soviet era, as an uncensored system for making and sharing texts. Based on extensive research of the underground journals, bulletins, art folios and other periodicals produced in the Soviet Union from the mid-1950s to the mid-1980s, Ann Komaromi analyzes the role of samizdat in fostering new forms of imagined community among Soviet citizens. Dissidence has been dismissed as an elite phenomenon or as insignificant because it had little demonstrable impact on the Soviet regime. Komaromi challenges these views and demonstrates that the kind of imagination about self and community made possible by samizdat could be a powerful social force. She explains why participants in samizdat culture so often sought to divide "political" from "cultural" samizdat. Her study provides a controversial umbrella definition for all forms of samizdat in terms of truth-telling, arguing that the act is experienced as transformative by Soviet authors and readers. This argument will challenge scholars in the field to respond to contentions that go against the grain of both anthropological and postmodern accounts. Komaromi's combination of literary analysis, historical research, and sociological theory makes sense of the phenomenon of samizdat for readers today. Soviet Samizdat shows that samizdat was not simply a tool of opposition to a defunct regime. Instead, samizdat fostered informal communities of knowledge that foreshadowed a similar phenomenon of alternative perspectives challenging the authority of institutions around the world today.


The Big Green Tent

The Big Green Tent

Author: Ludmila Ulitskaya

Publisher: Macmillan + ORM

Published: 2015-11-10

Total Pages: 581

ISBN-13: 0374709718

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The Big Green Tent epitomizes what we think of when we imagine the classic Russian novel. With epic breadth and intimate detail, Ludmila Ulitskaya’s remarkable work tells the story of three school friends who meet in Moscow in the 1950s and go on to embody the heroism, folly, compromise, and hope of the Soviet dissident experience. These three boys—an orphaned poet; a gifted, fragile pianist; and a budding photographer with a talent for collecting secrets—struggle to reach adulthood in a society where their heroes have been censored and exiled. Rich with love stories, intrigue, and a cast of dissenters and spies, The Big Green Tent offers a panoramic survey of life after Stalin and a dramatic investigation into the prospects for individual integrity in a society defined by the KGB. Each of the central characters seeks to transcend an oppressive regime through art, a love of Russian literature, and activism. And each of them ends up face-to-face with a secret police that is highly skilled at fomenting paranoia, division, and self-betrayal. A man and his wife each become collaborators, without the other knowing; an artist is chased into the woods, where he remains in hiding for four years; a researcher is forced to deem a patient insane, damning him to torture in a psychiatric ward. Ludmila Ulitskaya’s novel belongs to the tradition of Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Pasternak: it is a work consumed with politics, love, and belief—and a revelation of life in dark times.


Book Synopsis The Big Green Tent by : Ludmila Ulitskaya

Download or read book The Big Green Tent written by Ludmila Ulitskaya and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2015-11-10 with total page 581 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Big Green Tent epitomizes what we think of when we imagine the classic Russian novel. With epic breadth and intimate detail, Ludmila Ulitskaya’s remarkable work tells the story of three school friends who meet in Moscow in the 1950s and go on to embody the heroism, folly, compromise, and hope of the Soviet dissident experience. These three boys—an orphaned poet; a gifted, fragile pianist; and a budding photographer with a talent for collecting secrets—struggle to reach adulthood in a society where their heroes have been censored and exiled. Rich with love stories, intrigue, and a cast of dissenters and spies, The Big Green Tent offers a panoramic survey of life after Stalin and a dramatic investigation into the prospects for individual integrity in a society defined by the KGB. Each of the central characters seeks to transcend an oppressive regime through art, a love of Russian literature, and activism. And each of them ends up face-to-face with a secret police that is highly skilled at fomenting paranoia, division, and self-betrayal. A man and his wife each become collaborators, without the other knowing; an artist is chased into the woods, where he remains in hiding for four years; a researcher is forced to deem a patient insane, damning him to torture in a psychiatric ward. Ludmila Ulitskaya’s novel belongs to the tradition of Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Pasternak: it is a work consumed with politics, love, and belief—and a revelation of life in dark times.