I was in my late teens and early 20s when the Soviet Union fell, and I was too distracted by my life to pay more than fleeting attention to the fall of both the Iron Curtain and the USSR. For me, The Future Is History How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia by Masha Gessen is a great way to fill in the gaps. In a certain sense, it should not surprise us that Russia would become totalitarian in the decades following the collapse of the USSR. What other kind of society and political system had Russians ever known?
But at the same time, it is profoundly disheartening to read Gessen’s book. How can a people turn their society, culture, and political system around? It almost seems impossible. Gessen’s book hammers on the inevitable: will Russians always live and be a party to their doom?
No comments:
Post a Comment