Moskva-Petushki [i.e. Moscow to the End of the Line] - 1981

Moscow: Self-published, 1981. [3], 67 leaves. 30x20,5 cm. Light green card binding. Original carbon copy typescript; first 52 leaves printed on translucent onion paper with thicker white paper interpolated for ease of reading. A few corrections in ink. Very good. Traces of moisture to card boards and parts of the text, not affecting legibility. Rare samizdat edition of a text known primarily through its illicit circulation during the 1970-1980s. Written in 1969 'Moscow-Petushki' was published abroad in 'tamizdat' form in Israel (1973) and Paris (1977), but could not be published legally in Moscow until 1989. Now acclaimed as one of the iconic texts of post-war Soviet literature, the novel describes 'a day in the life of the alcoholic Venichka Erofeev, setting out from Moscow to the small provincial town of Petushki to meet his sweetheart. Drinking more and more in the course of the journey, the hero finally falls into an alcoholic delirium, in which he has visions of terrible murders and he experiences his own metaphysical murder. The book is full of deep and biting social satire' (Cornwell 283). This copy is an unusually constructed samizdat: the text is printed on thin, translucent onion skin paper, which required interspersing additional white leaves for ease of reading. Not in the Sayag Collection. Not in Samizdat (Bremen: Temmen, 2000), which notes an undated 1978 edition of the text on 88 leaves. No samizdat copies of works by Erofeev traced through KVK, OCLC.