Shaun Walker discusses his book, "The Long Hangover", on 1/16/17.
In this deeply reported book, Walker, Moscow correspondent for The Guardian, shows that the key to understanding Putin’s Russia lies in the country’s idealized image of its own past. A combination of selective memory and magical thinking, this image omits Soviet Russia’s shameful elements, such as Stalin’s purges and the gulag, while elevating the country’s triumph over fascism into a kind of origin myth. In interviews with people from throughout Russia, Crimea, and Ukraine, Walker finds that Russians are united by what they perceive as their glorious history, and long to re-establish Russia as the center of a powerful empire. He also shows how Putin has fomented and exploited this yearning, using it both to support and justify his aggressive actions against neighboring states.
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