We are delighted to share our Book of the Month for April – Defiant Voices: Russian Short Stories from the 19th to the 21st Centuries, curated by Sergei Lebedev and published by Head of Zeus.

Defiant Voices brings together stories by 80 Russian-speaking authors, united by their defiance and resistance against empire, censorship and oppression. Here are stories of defiance smuggled through samizdat, hidden amid satire, recorded as witness, or brazenly speaking truth to power.

Defiant Voices speaks to the power of literature as resistance throughout Russian history; the power of “a lone man with a typewriter.”

Sergei Lebedev is one of the most perceptive contemporary Russian writers: a geologist-turned-author whose fiction explores the myths, memories and politics of the Soviet past. We interviewed Sergei about Defiant Voices: about the practices of defiance in the book and the reflection of history in these stories, about re-examining the authors weaponised by the Russian state, about the stories which resonated with him the most, and more.

Get 15% off Defiant Voices through the Pushkin House Bookshop till the end of April.