Political books from Russia
Recommended political books (14)
Travel the world without leaving your chair.
If you are into political here are some political books from Russia for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge.
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An Immigrant's Love Letter to the West by Konstantin Kisin EN
Description:
The book sets out to discuss themes including free speech and cancel culture through the perspective of a non-Western immigrant. It particularly addresses why the West has a negative view of itself, and why that is self-destructive.
One of the themes of the book is the history of slavery and the way it is taught in American schools. By talking about the life of his great grandfather as a serf in the Russian Empire, the Soviet gulags, Barbary corsairs and slavery in African kingdoms Kisin pushes back against the notion that slavery was unique to the West and makes a case that slavery in Afri... continue
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Dagboek Majdan by Andrej Jurʹevič Kurkov NL
Description:
Dagboekfragmenten van de Oekraïense schrijver (1961) waarin hij een inkijkje geeft in zijn dagelijks leven ten tijde van de grootschalige Euromajdan-protesten in Kyiv van november 2013 tot en met april 2014.
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De aardappels en de staat by Oleg Pavlov NL
Description:
Een grimmige, hilarische parabel in de traditie van Boelgakov, Dostojevski en Gogol. De boeken van Pavlov hebben de hedendaagse Russische literatuur duidelijk beïnvloed en benadrukken de verantwoordelijkheid van het individu, nog steeds een revolutionaire houding in Poetins Rusland. De Sovjet-heilstaat loopt op zijn laatste benen. In de onherbergzame steppe van Kazachstan moet een compagnie goelagbewakers zien te overleven op de rotte aardappels die het verre regimentshoofdkwartier hun heeft toebedeeld. De kapitein komt op een lumineus idee: als ze dat rantsoen nu in de grond stoppen, eten ze ... continue
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Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev EN
Description:
Considered one of the world's greatest novels, this controversial classic offers modern readers a vivid, timeless depiction of the clash between the older Russian aristocracy and the youthful radicalism that foreshadowed the revolution. Includes a new Introduction. Reissue.
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Never Remember : Searching for Stalin's Gulags in Putin's Russia by Masha Gessen EN
Description:
,"A book that belongs on the shelf alongside The Gulag Archipelago. -- Kirkus Reviews A haunting literary and visual journey deep into Russia's past -- and present. The Gulag was a monstrous network of labor camps that held and killed millions of prisoners from the 1930s to the 1950s. More than half a century after the end of Stalinist terror, the geography of the Gulag has been barely sketched and the number of its victims remains unknown. Has the Gulag been forgotten?Writer Masha Gessen and photographer Misha Friedman set out across Russia in search of the memory of the Gulag. They journey f... continue
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Read & Riot: A Pussy Riot Guide to Activism by Nadya Tolokonnikova EN
Description:
"as indispensable to confronting, say, your domineering mother-in-law or your local city council as it is to helping foment an ongoing and ever-escalating insurrection against, say, a sexist, racist, nepotistic power-mad oligarchy threatening to destroy democracy as we know it...My advice: Buy one" - VOGUE A guerrilla guide to radical protest and joyful political resistance from artist, activist and Pussy Riot founder Nadya Tolokonnikova. The face of modern protest is wearing a brightly colored ski mask. Nadya Tolokonnikova, founding member of the Russian activist group Pussy Riot, is a creati... continue
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Riot Days by Maria Alyokhina EN
Description:
In 2012 Maria Alyokhina and other members of Pussy Riot performed a provocative 'Punk Prayer', taking on the Orthodox church and its support for Vladimir Putin's authoritarian regime. They were charged with 'organized hooliganism'. That trial and Alyokhina's subsequent imprisonment became an international cause. For Alyokhina, her two-year sentence launched a struggle against the Russian prison system and an iron-willed refusal to be deprived of her humanity. This book gives voice to Alyokhina's insistence on the right to say no, whether to a prison guard or to the president.
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Seven Hanged by Leonid Andreyev EN
Description:
'It was like walking along the knife-edge of the highest possible mountain range, seeing life on one side and death on the other in the form of two deep, gorgeous and gleaming seascapes.' This astonishing novella from 1908, newly translated for Little Black Classics by War and Peace translator Anthony Briggs, probes the emotions and experiences of seven people condemned to death in Tsarist Russia. A powerful and subtle exploration of the morality of capital punishment, it was a bestseller at the time, and, in a strange quirk of history, influenced the conspirators in the cataclysmic assassinat... continue