Man and His Surroundings

Man and His Surroundings is a collection of novellas that are unconnected by one plot, but which altogether constitute a piercing examination of Soviet and post-Soviet culture. The novellas are hilarious and poignant, satirical and philosophical, and they impart a better intuitive understanding of the Soviet cultural heritage and mindset.
Man and His Surroundings irreverently explores Soviet and post-Soviet identity, politics, and history. In what Iskander himself calls the book’s seminal novella, the narrator meets a man who believes himself to be Lenin, thawed out after decades of cryogenic storage. The narrator endures a phantasmagorical account of what “Lenin” thought and did during the October Revolution of 1917 and how another revolution is imminent. In another novella, the narrator tells of a nationally renowned fencer as the fencer sits at a neighboring table, discussing the impossibility of equality on earth, while his son pesters him for ice cream. The novellas enrapture the reader with their humor and impart a better intuitive understanding of the Soviet cultural heritage and mindset.

Contributor: Alexander Rojavin (Translated by)

Translator: Alexander Rojavin

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