Robert Ginzburg - Quillette

Casualties of War

I have been a Russophile for as long as I can remember. Or, to put it more exactly, since I was eight years old, when I attended a school play performance of Gogol’s The Government Inspector. I loved Gogol’s sense of humour, the long names with their patronymics—

Robert Ginzburg

16 Apr 2022 · 13 min read

Monkey with a Grenade

“Not even a pig shits where it eats.” So said Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev when attacking Nobel Laureate Boris Pasternak for publishing his masterpiece Dr. Zhivago abroad while still living in Russia. Mao railed against the “running dogs” of capitalism. Stalinist propaganda posters vilified priests as sly geese, while Stalinist

Robert Ginzburg

20 Mar 2022 · 5 min read

An Englishman in Russia Bids His Daughter Farewell

I am an Englishman in Southern Russia. For nearly four years I’ve lived here, helping my Russian ex-partner bring up our (now) eight-year-old daughter. At 9 o’clock last night I saw both of them onto a sleeper-train to Moscow. From there they will fly to Italy and the

Robert Ginzburg

28 Feb 2022 · 6 min read