A Present Past
Titan and Other Chronicles
by Sergei Lebedev
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Pub Date 1 Aug 2024 | Archive Date 1 Aug 2024
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Description
“Ghosts are not born by themselves. They are born of a silent conscience. They are as real as the ignored knowledge of crimes and the refusal to accept real responsibility. They are the distorted voice of the dead turned into mystical images. The voice of unwanted witnesses.”
A Present Past is a collection of short stories that brings to vivid life a post-Soviet world haunted by the secrets and crimes of its past. It features a judge overcome by the weight of his ruling, the stories within the old Soviet cemeteries, discovered objects that transport us to another time and the documents of the KGB. Seamlessly blending history with fiction, politics with individualism, reality with magic, the eleven tales explore the unacknowledged crimes of the Soviet Union and Russian State, and show how the devastating sins of the past pervade the present.
Advance Praise
A tour de force – exquisite and gripping, finely translated, fiction that pulls you into the beautiful and brutal service of imagining and understanding the human realities of modern Russia, a series of tales meticulously crafted and deeply imagined. - Philippe Sands, author of East West Street
One of Russia's most prominent contemporary writers, Lebedev, 41, has been hailed for a series of novels that hold a mirror up to Russia's blighted past. A former geologist, he chips away at the deep strata of his country's 20th century history, the seams of trauma concealed by a state-sanctioned campaign of oblivion. - The Financial Times
A luminous and magical writer, Sergei Lebedev excavates the Soviet past and gives voice to its restless ghosts. By exploring Russia’s dark history he sheds light on its terrible present. Lebedev’s stories are urgent and compelling at a time when a Kremlin leader is waging a myth-inspired war in Ukraine. - Luke Harding, author of Invasion: The Inside Story of Russia's Bloody War and Ukraine's Fight for Survival
Memories of the Soviet era emerge through relics, landmarks, and fantastical occurrences in this satisfying collection . . . Lebedev adds vibrant lyrical descriptions to the strange interplay of past and present . . . There's a real payoff to these rich and ambiguous stories. - Publishers Weekly
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781035904129 |
| PRICE | £9.99 (GBP) |
| PAGES | 288 |
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
AliceMaud M, Reviewer
This is an important topical collection of short stories by a Russian author currently living outside that country. My experience of collections and anthologies is that I always prefer some stories or essays to others in a book, and this collection was no exception. However, I’m very pleased I didn’t give up on it after the first story, which is the only one that did not appeal much to me, because there are some real gems here that will surely stand the test of time.
For this reader, the overarching theme of the collection is how the past hovers around like a ghost haunting the present. For example, some stories’ narrators ponder over events from their childhood, and communities discover that they have repressed their collective memory. Thus, this collection suggests that Russian’s repressive and cruel Soviet history is mirrored by today’s Russia, as though the ghost of that past is haunting us today.
The author trained as a geologist, and, unsurprisingly, I especially liked his accurate and affectionate portraits of Russian landscapes. The translator has managed to convey the typically Russian lyricism of these descriptions, although the occasional use of “American English” might well grate on those of us who are “British English” readers.
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