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A Russian Diary: A Journalist's Final Account of Life, Corruption, and Death in Putin's Russia | 
 enlarge | Author: Anna Politkovskaya
Creators: Scott Simon, Arch Tait
Publisher: Random House
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
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Rating:  7 reviews
Sales Rank: 84270
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 400
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 5.9 x 1.6
ISBN: 1400066824
Dewey Decimal Number: 947.086
EAN: 9781400066827
ASIN: 1400066824
Publication Date: May 22, 2007
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Condition: Brand new item. Over 3.5 million customers served. Order now. Selling online since 1995. Few left in stock - order soon. Code: R20080905220905H
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Product Description
Anna Politkovskaya, one of Russia’s most fearless journalists, was gunned down in a contract killing in Moscow in the fall of 2006. Just before her death, Politkovskaya completed this searing, intimate record of life in Russia from the parliamentary elections of December 2003 to the grim summer of 2005, when the nation was still reeling from the horrors of the Beslan school siege. In A Russian Diary, Politkovskaya dares to tell the truth about the devastation of Russia under Vladimir Putin–a truth all the more urgent since her tragic death.
Writing with unflinching clarity, Politkovskaya depicts a society strangled by cynicism and corruption. As the Russian elections draw near, Politkovskaya describes how Putin neutralizes or jails his opponents, muzzles the press, shamelessly lies to the public–and then secures a sham landslide that plunges the populace into mass depression. In Moscow, oligarchs blow thousands of rubles on nights of partying while Russian soldiers freeze to death. Terrorist attacks become almost commonplace events. Basic freedoms dwindle daily.
And then, in September 2004, armed terrorists take more than twelve hundred hostages in the Beslan school, and a different kind of madness descends.
In prose incandescent with outrage, Politkovskaya captures both the horror and the absurdity of life in Putin’s Russia: She fearlessly interviews a deranged Chechen warlord in his fortified lair. She records the numb grief of a mother who lost a child in the Beslan siege and yet clings to the delusion that her son will return home someday. The staggering ostentation of the new rich, the glimmer of hope that comes with the organization of the Party of Soldiers’ Mothers, the mounting police brutality, the fathomless public apathy–all are woven into Politkovskaya’s devastating portrait of Russia today.
“If anybody thinks they can take comfort from the ‘optimistic’ forecast, let them do so,” Politkovskaya writes. “It is certainly the easier way, but it is also a death sentence for our grandchildren.”
A Russian Diary is testament to Politkovskaya’s ferocious refusal to take the easier way–and the terrible price she paid for it. It is a brilliant, uncompromising expose of a deteriorating society by one of the world’s bravest writers.
Praise for Anna Politkovskaya
“Anna Politkovskaya defined the human conscience. Her relentless pursuit of the truth in the face of danger and darkness testifies to her distinguished place in journalism–and humanity. This book deserves to be widely read.”
–Christiane Amanpour, chief international correspondent, CNN
“Like all great investigative reporters, Anna Politkovskaya brought forward human truths that rewrote the official story. We will continue to read her, and learn from her, for years.”
–Salman Rushdie
“Suppression of freedom of speech, of expression, reaches its savage ultimate in the murder of a writer. Anna Politkovskaya refused to lie, in her work; her murder is a ghastly act, and an attack on world literature.”
–Nadine Gordimer
“Beyond mourning her, it would be more seemly to remember her by taking note of what she wrote.”
–James Meek
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| Customer Reviews: Read 2 more reviews...
"A Small Corner of Hell" September 26, 2007
Philip W. Henry (Rialto, CA)
13 out of 14 found this review helpful
A Russian Diary: A Journalists' Final Account of Life, Corruption and Death in Putin's Russia - By Anna Politkovskaya
It's fashionable these days to describe a book as "important.' While most aren't, Anna Politkovskaya's "A Russian Diary" is. As one of Russia's most influential journalists until her assassination, presumably by the KGB, Politovskaya chronicled dissident protests, suspicious fires and "accidents" and other examples of Putin's heavy-handed regime
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Some of her most impassioned writing came from Chechnya, which she characterized as "a small corner of hell." She wrote of the tragedy at Beslan, where dozens of school children were murdered. To this day, some of the victims have not been identified, because the tragedy was not a priority of the regime.
And she documents Putin's systematic retrenchment and repeal of many of the reforms enacted by his predecessors, Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Clearly, in the words of chess champion-turned-politician Kasparov, "Russia is a police state."
She writes: "What speed! The President has already signed the law abolishing the election of governors. It has been our fastest ever passage of a law, and all so that from January 1 Putin should not have to discuss matters with the governors or worry that they might be uncooperative. A Tsar should have serfs, not partners."
Like the KGB defector Alexander Litvenko, who was poisoned in London with radioactive polonium (again presumably by the KGB) , Politikovskaya paid a terrible price for her honesty.
She was murdered in Moscow on October 7, 2006-- Vladimir Putin's birthday.
The Naked Truth. July 18, 2007
Ian W. Robertson (Auckland, New Zealand)
8 out of 15 found this review helpful
As a person who has worked in Russia since 1988 till now I have seen many changes and many era's. I have also a Masters Degree in Russian History. The truth is always frightening, what Politskaya writes is the truth and she paid for it with his life, I have witnessed some of what she writes but as my Business is still in Russia it's better to stay quiet. A frightening expose in 2007!! May she live on in memory.
Sense of Sadness from Politkovskaya Murder December 2, 2007
David Sandino (Davis, CA USA)
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
For those who care about Russia, it is hard to put this book down. It is a compelling read. However, one cannot help read "A Russian Diary" without an overwhelming sense of sadness. We know how the story ends. The last entry in the diary was made in August 2006, and soon thereafter Anna Politkovskaya life ends, murdered by unknown assailants in Moscow.
The profound nature of this loss comes across on every page of this book, as Ms. Politkovskaya carefully and without flinching describes contemporary Russian society, warts and all, as perhaps no other journalist left living can. This book brings the reader a first-hand look into the tragedies of Dubrovka Theater and the school siege at Beslan. And also chronicles the seemingly endless war in Chechnya. She asks hard questions of the Russian government and its apparent failure to manage these matters.
As great of a loss as the death of Anna Politkovskaya is, her dairy is a reminder of perhaps the greatest tragedy and missed opportunity in the last quarter of a century. With the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia had the opportunity once and forever to move into the family of democratic states. This book documents that although there are elections, this has not really happened, not even close. What we have now is a tightly controlled state governed by an intelligence oligarchy with a fondness for the Soviet past, which has restricted rather than expanded civil liberties and workers' rights. These restrictions have been justified in the name of protecting national security and the promotion of state controlled capitalism. "A Russian Diary" documents how the Russian people are languishing with a government seemingly disinclined to tackle the serious social welfare problems that are besetting the country.
This book is commentary on the Russian government, but it also asks tough questions of Americans and Western Europeans. What could they have done differently to nudge Russia toward a democratic direction? Is it too late? Are we destined to regress into a more perverse version of the Cold War, with a Russian government mistrusting the West once again, but now empowered by oil and gas revenues?
I hope that is not the case both for Russia and the West. However, without Anna Politkoyskaya alive to point out the deficiencies in the Russian government and the shortcomings of the West, the unthinkable becomes possible.
A Sad and Depressing Story! February 22, 2008
Gilberto Villahermosa
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
Anna Politkovskaya's "Russian Diary" is a gold mine of information and provides unparalleled insights into Putin's Neo-Soviet Russia.
Many believe that Politkovskaya was murdered for her indepth investigative reporting into all aspects of Putin's regime. In this book she makes it clear that Russia is rapidly sliding into a dark and deep abyss.
Politkovskaya reveals the rampant corruption prevalent in the Russian government and its total disregard for the Russian population, human rights, and basic democratic principles.
"Russian Diary" is a first-hand account of the growing power of Russia's criminal community and its alliance with Vladimir Putin, the rampant greed and lawlessness of the new Russian business elite, the unbridled brutality of the Russian security services, and the gross incompetence of the Russian military.
Politkovskaya believed that Russia was headed for another major war in the Caucasus against the mountain peoples it has been terrorizing and murdering for the last decade.
This is a sad and depressing story that is all too familiar to those with firsthand knowledge of the Soviet Union and Russia.
 What courage! December 6, 2007
Mallow (Ipswich, MA USA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a riveting account of a life constantly in peril. The translation is equally outstanding, conveying both the "conversationalism" of a "diary" and the formality of the more essential elements.
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