Archives

Maya Ivanova reviews Anait Grigoryan’s “The Village on the Oredezh River” as a powerful portrayal of social breakdown in provincial Russia during the 1990s.

Maya Ivanova reviews “Echelon to Samarkand” Guzel Yakhina as a powerful novel that brings renewed attention to the Volga famine, a long-silenced catastrophe that devastated countless Tatar families.

Sonja Astrakhan reflects on Boris Grebenshchikov’s anti-authoritarianism, spiritual curiosity and enduring place in Russian culture.

Diego Benning Wang examines how, despite the absence of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia from the 2026 FIFA World Cup, clubs and players connected to the Caucasus give the region a modest but [...]

Georgie Archer reviews "Mr Nobody Against Putin", a film about the plight of a school turned upside down following the start of the war in Ukraine.

Maya Ivanova reviews “The Mountain and the Wall”, a novel that imagines what would happen if Russia sealed off its Muslim-majority Caucasian provinces with a wall.

Oliver Fisk examines how Kazakhstan aids Russia’s crackdown on activists and deserters fleeing the Kremlin.

Sasha Molotkova examines the heavy surveillance and enforcement of ideology at universities in Russia after the start of the full- scale war in Ukraine.

Georgie Archer reviews Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's memoir "The Oak and the Calf", which chronicles his literary career and fight against Soviet-era repression.

George Milne explores the exhibition "Artists Against the Kremlin" that allowed Russian dissidents to express their distinct position on the war in Ukraine and the pain of exile through art.