The Future Is History (National Book Award Winner): How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia

When I looked up “The Future Is History” on Amazon and saw the 1-star reviews left by obvious trolls, I just *knew* this book had to be dangerously good. So I bought it immediately. I had read several of Gessen's meticulous and eye-opening New Yorker pieces, but this book takes it to a whole new level.Gessen tells the story through seven dramatis personae, each “both ‘regular’, in that their experiences exemplified the experiences of millions of others, and extraordinary: intelligent, passionate, introspective, able to tell their stories vividly.” They give first-person accounts of the everyday ordeal of surviving true to oneself in Russia. Like Zhanna, daughter of popular opposition politician Boris Nemtsov and activist in her own right, whose life demonstrates some of the consequences of opposing the regime -- like exile, incarceration and murder. The story of Masha the journalist illustrates the perils of truthtelling. Pioneering psychotherapist Marina Arutyunyan tries to shepherd modern mental health to Russia through lacerating thickets of state-mandated ideology. Openly gay Lyosha tries to advocate for oppressed minorities without getting fired from his precarious university post.Through the lives of the protagonists, Gessen weaves the last century of Russian history. Stalin’s self-cannibalizing reign of terror is particularly chilling: “Stalin’s terror machine executed its executioners at regular intervals. In 1938 alone, forty-two thousand investigators who had taken part in the great industrial-scale purges were executed, as was the chief of the secret police, Nikolai Yezhov.” Stalin once invited an old friend from Georgia to Moscow for a reunion, and after lavishly wining and dining him, had him executed before dawn: “This could not be explained with any words or ideas available to man.”And that is the most astonishing aspect of this book: it is not fiction. The protagonists’ experiences are so logic-defying, so disheartening, and such violations of basic human decency as to exist in a separate universe that no novelist could concoct. And yet, this universe has an internal logic. Perhaps it's best explained through Hannah Arendt, whose three-volume “Origins of Totalitarianism” Gessen deftly scrunches down to a few essential paragraphs: “What distinguishes a totalitarian ideology is its utterly insular quality. It purports to explain the entire world and everything in it. There is no gap between totalitarian ideology and reality because totalitarian ideology contains all of reality within itself.”And yet, the book reads like a novel, which is why I don’t want to give away too much. Who is Homo sovieticus? For whom do Russians vote in the “Greatest Russian Ever” (aka “Name of Russia”) contest year after year? What’s going to happen to Boris Nemtsov after he defies Putin? Do our heroes avoid getting beat up and arrested at the demonstrations? Why is Putin so popular in Russia?One pervasive theme of the book is the hegemony of doublethink over the Russian psyche. Coined by Orwell in “1984”, doublethink is the necessity of maintaining two contradictory beliefs for survival, e.g. publicly supporting the government ideology while knowing that it oppresses your very existence.This is some crazy-making stuff that Russians seem to have been put through for over a century. And yet, there are still people who fight for truth, healing, and freedom. Over and over, they rise to attend banned protests very likely to land them in jail (or worse). Their stories of stupendous bravery and selflessness consistently inspire.And lest you as a Westerner think that you’re somehow safe because, oh, this is something happening elsewhere, please note that the recent rise of authoritarianism in countries like America takes its playbook straight out of Russia. Attacks on the press, construction of alternate realities, propagation of fake news, persecution of minorities, and the shameless grabbing of executive power: it’s all happening right now.And you know what else? We’ve seen it all before: Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Mao. So don’t read this book just because it’s a riveting account of life in what’s still an undiscovered continent for most Westerners. Don’t read it just because it’s a tour de force of journalistic craft and bravery. Read it because it also informs your life as an American, German, Frenchman, Hungarian, or anyone who values the freedom of human life and ideas. Read it so that you may be impelled to take action.-- Ali Binazir, M.D., M.Phil., author & public speaking trainerPS: Congratulations to Masha Gessen for winning the National Book Award. Thoroughly deserved.

The Future is History completed a series of readings on modern Russian history that began several years ago prior to the recent manifestations of Putin’s violence. I read lots of history and am fascinated with Russia. But like most westerners I’m content to think about Russia as a distant abstraction. Several years ago I read a book that was an oral history of the severe psychic trauma suffered by Russians during the disintegration of the USSR. While we celebrated the liberation of Eastern Europe and welcomed the new Russia into the community of nations, they were devastated when everything they had been taught, believed in, and held dear as truths crumbled and was exposed as a lie. Many Russians rebelled against this trauma and looked for explanations and a new direction. After the failure of Yeltsin’s attempt at liberalism Putin emerged as a new strongman. He scapegoated the US and the decadent west for their troubles and led Russia back to a repressive cult of personality reminiscent of Stalin.We were naive. We expected blue jeans and McDonald’s would create a new European country committed to global trade, the rule of law, and more freedoms for their citizens. The opposite happened in plain sight. The west continued to project their own perspective on viscous thugs and deluded themselves at every turn.This book’s uniqueness is it’s telling the tale through multiple street level characters therefore personalizing the story. I think this effectively humanizes the tragedy. The other reason this is interesting is it’s focus on Psychology. It’s easy to read a book on post perestroika Russia or the rise of Putin, there are lots of them. This book tells the story through the disciplines of psychology, sociology, and academics in general. How could this happen? Why did this happen? Why did the population support and welcome the repression? Those questions are not easily answered and not addressed by conventional histories.

Good, not great. The commentary on Russia since the Soviet collapse is excellent. However I felt very little for the various characters and was even bored at times while reading about them and their lives. Still this is worth reading as it gives terrific insight into the current state of affairs in Putin's Russia.

The best book of many I read to understand Russia

Time consuming as a read. But well placed perspectives

Extremely useful to understand Russia's failed transition to freedom and democracy. Putin appears for what he is, an undemocratic autocrat. The pre-conditions for an invasion of Ukraine are all described in this book: from the hate for Western democracies to the nostalgia for the Russian Empire.

This book has become one of my favorites. I read it twice an each time I learned something different. Is a must read book not only to understand Russia but the current political trends that the world is living.

El libro vale la pena y el servicio ha sido impecable.