Moscow 2042

Moscow 2042
Moscow 2042  
Author(s) Vladimir Voinovich
Original title Москва 2042
Country Soviet Union
Language Russian
Genre(s) Political, Dystopian, Satirical
Publisher Harcourt Brace Jovanovich; 1st ed English
Publication date 1986
Media type Print (Hardcover, Paperback)
Pages 424
ISBN 0-15-162444-5
OCLC Number 14932938
Dewey Decimal 891.73/44 19
LC Classification PG3489.4.I53 M6513 1987

Moscow 2042 (Russian: Москва 2042) is a 1986 novel (translated from Russian 1987) by Vladimir Voinovich.[1] In this book, the alter ego of the author travels to the future, where he sees how communism has been built up in Moscow: at first, it seems the government has actually been successful in doing so. But slowly it becomes clear that it is not really a utopia after all.

Voinovich wrote this book a few years before the downfall of the Soviet Union.

Contents

Plot summary

The Russian author Kartsev, living in Munich in 1982 (just like Voinovich himself), time travels to the Moscow of 2042. After the "Great August Revolution", the new leader referred to as "Genialissimus" has changed the Soviet Union... up to a certain point. After Vladimir Lenin's dream of the world revolution narrowed down to Joseph Stalin's theory of "Socialism in one country", Genialissimus has decided to start from building "Communism in one city", namely in Moscow.

The ideology has changed somewhat, into a hodgepodge of Marxism-Leninism and Russian Orthodoxy (Genialissimo himself is also Patriarch). The decay from which the Soviet Union suffered has worsened. The rest of the Soviet Union, where people barely survive, has been separated by a Berlin type of wall from the "paradise" of Moscow, where communism has been realised. Within the wall everyone gets everything "according to his needs". Only their needs are not decided by themselves, but by the wise Genialissimus. Most people have "ordinary needs", but a chosen few have "extraordinary needs". For the first-mentioned group, life is dismal even within the privileged "Moscow Republic". The situation finally gets so desperate that people throw themselves in the arms of the "liberator", a fellow dissident writer and (kind of) friend of Kartsev, the Slavophile Sim Karnavalov (apparently inspired by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn), who enters Moscow on a white horse and proclaims himself Tsar Serafim the First. Thus, communism is abandoned and society progressed back into feudal autocracy. This novel is considered[2] to be a masterpiece of dystopian satire.

See also

Book collection.jpg Novels portal

Nineteen Eighty-Four

References

External links


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать реферат

Look at other dictionaries:

  • «Мюр и Мерелиз» — «Мюр и Мерилиз», торгово промышленное товарищество, которому принадлежал один из крупнейших универсальных магазинов. Учреждено в Петербурге в 1843 шотландцем Мерелизом (Мерилиз) Арчибальзом. Преемник Мерелиза, брат его жены шотландец Эндрю Мюр… …   Москва (энциклопедия)

  • Vladimir Voinovich — Vladimir Nikolayevich Voinovich (alternatively spelled Voynovich, ru. Владимир Войнович, born September 26, 1932 in Dushanbe, Tajikstan) is a prominent Russian writer and a dissident. He is a member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in… …   Wikipedia

  • List of Russian language novelists — Russian Writers by Sergei Levitsky, 1856. This is a list of authors who have written works of fiction in the Russian language. The list encompasses novelists and writers of short fiction. For the plain text list, see Category:Russian novelists.… …   Wikipedia

  • Voynovich, Vladimir — ▪ Russian author in full  Vladimir Nikolayevich Voynovich  born Sept. 26, 1932, Stalinabad, Tadzhik S.S.R., U.S.S.R. [now Dushanbe, Tajikistan]       Soviet dissident writer known for his irreverent and perceptive satire.       After serving in… …   Universalium

  • List of dystopian literature — This is a list of novels commonly viewed as dystopian literature.The majority of the listed works are not controversial, in the sense that their dystopian character is generally acknowledged. However, some are not universally classified as… …   Wikipedia

  • Dermocracy — ( ru. Дерьмократия) derogatory term used in Russophone blogosphere and by Russian political media. The term is derived from a Russian word dermo ( ru. Дерьмо), meaning feces. It is used exclusively in a negative context, usually to describe… …   Wikipedia

  • автоматизированная система обработки таможенных данных — АСИКУДА Компьютеризированная система автоматической обработки таможенных деклараций, разработанная в ЮНКТАД совместно с Всемирной таможенной организацией. Версия АСИКУДА Уорлд была введена в 2004 г. и изначительно повысила эффективность системы… …   Справочник технического переводчика

  • Kernenergie nach Ländern — Dieser Artikel beschreibt die aktuelle Situation der zivilen Nutzung der Kernenergie in einzelnen Ländern. 30 Länder betreiben 432 Kernreaktoren mit einer gesamten Anschlussleistung von etwa 366 Gigawatt brutto (Stand: September 2011).[1] Stand… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • GURPS Reign of Steel — Infobox RPG title= GURPS Reign of Steel caption= GURPS Reign of Steel cover designer= David Pulver publisher= Steve Jackson Games date= 1997 genre= Cybernetic revolt, post apocalyptic science fiction system= GURPS footnotes= Reign of Steel is a… …   Wikipedia

  • Armed Forces of the Russian Federation — Banner of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation Founded …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”