Defiant Voices

An anthology of the very best Russian short stories, from the 19th century to today, selected by Sergei Lebedev, author of Untraceable.

An anthology of Russian short stories, from the 19th century to today, selected by Sergei Lebedev.

Compiled before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and completed in its shadow, this groundbreaking anthology brings together voices from across two centuries of Russian literature – voices of exile and resistance, of defiance and survival.

From the golden age of the nineteenth century to the contested present, here are stories that speak from within and against empire, censorship, and war. Compiled before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and completed in its shadow, this collection confronts the cultural complicity of the Russian language while celebrating its power to resist.

Edited by Sergei Lebedev – 'the best of Russia’s younger generation of writers' (The New York Review of Books) – the anthology is structured around five interrelated but distinct literary strands:

1. Classical Russian literature
2. Emigrant literature written in exile
3. Soviet censored literature
4. Uncensored Soviet literature
5. Post-Soviet literature

Here you will find tales smuggled through samizdat, penned in prison cells, whispered in exile, and shouted into the void. They are stories that survived the Tsar’s censors, Stalin’s purges, and Putin’s propaganda. The result is a battlefield of ideas, where incompatible truths collide and endure, and which serves to prove the great power of the word; the magical power that literature has always wielded – particularly in Russia.

Reviews for Sergei Lebedev:
'One of Russia's most interesting young novelists' Anne Applebaum
'Lebedev is arguably the best of Russia's younger generation of writers' New York Review of Books
'One of modern Russia's finest writers' Philippe Sands