About this episode

The episode explores how modern Russia controls narratives and the societal pushback against this control through literature.

Power doesn’t just seize territory. It seizes the story. I’m using a selection of 6 excellent new books to follow the narrative battlegrounds where modern Russia tries to control what people see as true, normal, and inevitable, and where society still finds ways to push back even when formal protest is risky, whether in framing Harry Potter, or surviving in the occupied Donbas. The books in question are: Alexis Lerner, Post-Soviet Graffiti. Free Speech in Authoritarian States (University of T...

People in this episode

Host: Mark Galeotti

Topics covered

• narrative control
• authoritarianism
• freedom of speech
• protest
• literature
• Russia

Keywords

• Russia
• narrative control
• authoritarianism
• freedom of speech
• literature
• protest

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Post-Soviet Graffiti. Free Speech in Authoritarian States

Places: Russia, Donbas

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