Black Earth City: When Russia Ran Wild (And So Did We)
Books / Paperback
Books › Biography & Autobiography › Personal Memoirs
ISBN: 0312420617 / Publisher: Picador, March 2003
A powerful documentary of the author's journey to the heart of the new Russia vividly captures the turmoil of this time by bringing to life the people she encountered, including Yakov, who spends half-a-million rubles on a taxi to see a girl in Minsk; Lola, who sleeps with her peers for a share of their dinner; and Viktor, who is haunted by violent memories of military sevice. Reprint.
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It is September 1991 and the dismantling of the Soviet Union is under way. In Voronezh, a provincial town famous for its loamy black earth, a sense of lightheartedness - part fear, part exhilaration - pervades. The people conquer uncertainty, hunger, and -20 degree temperatures by drinking huge quantities of black-market vodka and reveling in their new-found sexual freedom.Black Earth City is Charlotte Hobson's record of this tumultuous time. An irresistible guide, she brings us into the cramped, rundown Hostel no. 4, where international students and locals congregate. We meet Yakov, who blows half-a-million rubles on a taxi to see a girl in Minsk; Lola, who sleeps with her peers for a share of their dinner; Viktor, with his brutal memories of military service; and Mitya, Hobson's wild and optimistic lover whose gradual disillusion - and dissolution - mirrors his country's dramatic lurch from euphoria to despair.
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