Day of the Oprichnik
A Novel
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- €10.99
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- €10.99
Publisher Description
One of The Telegraph's Best Fiction Books of 2011
“Vladimir Sorokin is one of Russia's greatest writers, and this novel is one of his best . . . A joy to read—more entertaining, dynamic, engaging, and deeply hilarious than a dystopian novel has any right to be.” —Gary Shteyngart, author of Absurdistan and Super Sad True Love Story
A startling, relentless portrait of a troubled and troubling Russian empire, Vladimir Sorokin's Day of the Oprichnik is at once a richly imagined vision of the future and a razor-sharp diagnosis of a country in crisis.
Moscow, 2028. A scream, a moan, and a death rattle slowly pull Andrei Danilovich Komiaga out of his drunken stupor. But wait—that's just his ring tone. So begins another day in the life of an oprichnik, one of the czar's most trusted courtiers—and one of the country's most feared men.
In this new New Russia, where futuristic technology and the draconian codes of Ivan the Terrible are in perfect synergy, Komiaga will attend extravagant parties, partake in brutal executions, and consume an arsenal of drugs. He will rape and pillage, and he will be moved to tears by the sweetly sung songs of his homeland.
Vladimir Sorokin has imagined a near future both too disturbing to contemplate and too realistic to dismiss. But like all of his best work, Sorokin's new novel explodes with invention and dark humor.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Even with gang rape; drugs in the form of intravenous fish; and a homosexual, Viagra-induced orgy with organs "refurbished" by the Chinese, the latest from the bad boy of contemporary Russian literature feels hollow. Set in a Russia two decades in the future, this sardonic day-in-the-life follows "oprichnik" Andrei Danilovich as he fulfills his duties as a henchman for the restored Russian empire. In due time he'll lead an assault on the mansion of an aristocrat who has run afoul of His Majesty, do illicit drugs with his cohorts, head out to a huge transport artery from China to Europe to shake down some foreigners, and finally meet Her Highness for cocktails in the palace bathroom. Though Sorokin is capable as usual in filling his fictitious Russia with satirical touches and buckets of grotesque humor, neither Andrei nor his peers ever develop into anything more than Clockwork Orange knockoffs, and Sorokin's political critique reads stale.
