The Making of an Autocrat

In 2017, in The Hague, the Russian novelist Mikhail Shishkin and I took to the stage to talk about rising authoritarianism. Projected on the giant screen behind us was a photograph of Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan shaking hands. I said to Shishkin: “Don’t you think we look like extras in their movie? As if we wouldn’t have existed if they didn’t.” Twenty-five years ago, when Russia was mentioned the first thing that came to our minds was Dostoevsky or Yuri Gagarin. Today it’s as if nobody lives in Russia but Putin. When I pointed this out the stage manager dutifully removed the partners-in-crime picture from the screen.