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Loading... I Love Russia: Reporting from a Lost Countryby Елена Костюченко
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I almost didn't read this book because of the title, but I'm glad I did. Elena Kostyuchenko fearlessly and precisely documents what life in Russia has become under Putin. The hopelessness, the casual cruelties, the graft, and the utter desolation of backwash communities where people are living in conditions akin to medieval times. It brought to mind a real life Hunger Games, with Putin and his cronies living in the Capital and everyone else vassals in the districts. This book is not in any sense an apology for Russian behavior, but it does give context to the complete grip of Putin and his cronies. Reading this book brings home the fact that Russia must lose this war, not just for Ukrainians and the sake of the world, but also for Russians. It's always important to know one's enemy, and this book helps those who cherish a democratic world to do just that. no reviews | add a review
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"An unprecedented and intimate portrait of Russia, and a fearless cri de c ur for journalism in opposition to the global authoritarian turn To be a journalist is to tell the truth. I Love Russia is Elena Kostyuchenko's fearless and unrelenting attempt todocument Putin's Russia as experienced by those whom it systematically and brutally erases: village girls recruited into sex work, queer people in the outer provinces, patients and doctors at a Ukrainian maternity ward, and reporters like herself. The result is a singular portrait of a nation, and of a young woman who refuses to be silenced. In March 2022, as a reporter for Russia's last free press, Novaya Gazeta, Kostyuchenko crossed the border into Ukraine to cover the war. It was her mission to ensurethat Russians witnessed the horrors Putin was committing in their name. She filed her pieces knowing that should she return home, she would likely be prosecuted and sentenced to 15 years in prison. Yet, driven by the conviction that the greatest form of love and patriotism is criticism, she continues to write, undaunted and with eyes wide open. I Love Russia stitches together reportage from the past 15 years with personal essays, assembling a kaleidoscopic narrative that Kostyuchenko understands may be the last work from her country that she'll publish for a long time-perhaps ever. She writes because the threat of Putin's Russia extends beyond herself, beyond Crimea, and beyond Ukraine. We fail to understand it at our own peril"-- No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)947.0862History and Geography Europe Russia and eastern Europe [and formerly Finland] Russian & Slavic History by Period 1855- 1991-LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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This book is a collection of reportings by Elena Kostyuchenko, a young Russian journalist for Novaya Gazeta. The stories take place over many years all across Russia and other former Soviet countries. There are stories about everyday people in remote villages and their struggles with alcoholism and suicide in post-Soviet Russia. There are stories of ethnic cleansing, of mental institutions, of murdered journalists. There is a lot of war reporting, including the current war in Ukraine. It is horrific. If you are not sure if Russia and Putin are as bad as all that, read this book. ( )