Apocalyptic Realism: The Science Fiction of Arkady and Boris Strugatsky

by Yvonne Howell

The brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky have been Russia's most popular science fiction writers since their first publication appeared in 1959. The enormous and consistent popularity of their works over three decades of fluctuating political and literary conditions is all the more interesting when one considers that their primary readership has been the Russian scientific-technical intelligentsia - a sector of society whose values and attitudes were instrumental in transforming the Soviet Union. This lively and original study of the Strugatskys' development as writers and as spokesmen for a generation of Russian scientists is as timely as it is unique. It is also the first English language study of the Strugatskys' previously unpublished novels.

170 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1994

Reviews

[Beth Medvedev · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was written only 3 years after the end of the USSR, which seems so far in the past, but I think it benefits from that first post-Soviet decade.