Katastroika

Abstract

Katastroika: A Tale of Perestroika in Partgrad was completed by Zinoviev towards the end of 1989 and published in 1990. An excerpt had already appeared in issue 57 of the journal Kontinent (Zinoviev, 1988c). The work to some extent owes a debt to Saltykov-Shchedrin’s Istoriia odnogo goroda (History of A Town), although characteristically Zinoviev goes out of his way to deny that Katastroika is a satire (K:29). A satire, however, it nonetheless is, and once again Zinoviev offers an insight into the workings of Soviet society via a description of the absurd practices which are endemic to it. If the humour is occasionally strained, there are more than enough brilliantly funny passages to compensate for the infrequent lapses. Read in conjunction with Gorbachevizm, it provides a useful counterbalance to expert Western analyses.