The Future is History

Indispensable – Pankaj Mishra * Guardian *The Future is History is a beautifully-written, sensitively-argued and cleverly-structured journey through Russia’s failure to build democracy. The difficulty for any book about Russia is how to make the world’s biggest country human-sized, and she succeeds by building her story around the lives of a half-dozen people, whose fortunes wax and wane as the country opens up, then closes down once more. It is a story about hope and despair, trauma and treatment, ideals and betrayal, and above all about love and cynicism. If you want to truly understand why Vladimir Putin has been able to so dominate his country, this book will help you – Oliver BulloughMasha Gessen is a brave and eloquent critic of the Putin regime – Edward Lucas * The Times *Impassioned * Daily Telegraph *In The Future is History, Masha Gessen demonstrates how nostalgia has changed the fabric of Russian society. More than 25% of Russians believe that Stalin’s rule was good for the country. Gessen’s analysis reveals how imperial nostalgia goes hand in hand with an increase in nationalism, isolationism, sexism and homophobia… Memory is a responsibility. We ought to remember the past, not only in its polished glories but also its atrocities and injustices – Elif Shafak * Guardian *

Masha Gessen is a journalist and the author of several books including Blood Matters and The Man Without a Face, which was longlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize 2012. She has contributed to the New York Review of Books and the New Yorker. She has been described as Russia’s leading LGBT rights activist, and served as a member of the board of directors for the Moscow-based LGBT rights organization “Triangle” from 1993 to 1998. She lives in New York.