The Russian writer Vladimir Nabokov once said: In a Democracy, portraits of a nation's leader should never exceed the size of a postage stamp. That w…

- Vladimir Sorokin

The citizen lives in each of us. In the days of Brezhnev, Andropov, Gorbachev and Yeltsin, I was constantly trying to suppress the responsible citize…

- Vladimir Sorokin

I'm not a prophet or a teacher, I just ask questions. I don't think a writer should be a teacher, but should know how to pose the questions and expla…

- Vladimir Sorokin

The word "people" is unpleasant to me. The phrase "Soviet people" was drummed into us from childhood on. I love concrete people, enlightened people w…

- Vladimir Sorokin

Germans, Frenchmen and Englishmen can say of themselves: "I am the state." I cannot say that. In Russia only the people in the Kremlin can say that. …

- Vladimir Sorokin

The Khodorkovsky case is typical of the "oprichnina" - the system of oppression.

- Vladimir Sorokin

As a child I perceived violence as a sort of natural law. In the totalitarian Soviet Union, oppression held everything together. It was the sinister …

- Vladimir Sorokin

The West should be even more vocal in insisting that the Russians respect human rights.

- Vladimir Sorokin

In Russia there are special people who are permitted to do anything. They are the sacrificial priests of power. Anyone who is not a member of this gr…

- Vladimir Sorokin