Brezhnev-Era Censorship of the Book Trade

Spisok knig, ne podlezhashchikh rasprostraneniiu v knigotorgovoi seti: bibliograficheskii ukazatel' [A list of books not suited for distribution through the book trade: a bibliographical index].

Moscow: "Kniga", 1981. Octavo (21.2 × 14.3 cm). Original printed wrappers; 118, [2] pp. Moisture stain to lower margin, barely visible throughout; some rust to staples; else very good.

Published by the All-Union state association of the book trade, "Soiuzkniga", this censorship list reflects aims of the cultural gatekeepers of the late Era of Stagnation, in the final years of Leonid Brezhnev's rule. While Khrushchev had relaxed censorship regulations in many ways, Brezhnev sought to reverse some of these freedoms. The present list focuses largely on non-fiction in the subject history, sociology, political science, international relations, with occasional works of literature and literary studies. It includes a number of pre-war works on Stalin and Lenin that would likely have been considered inappropriate under Khrushchev, but it also features works that are less clearly "dangerous", such as a 1940 work on Soviet champagne from Georgia. It also, perhaps surprisingly, indexes several anti-American and anti-imperialist works published following WWII. More importantly and expectedly, however, it does provide a complete list of publications by writers like Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, for instance, whose works were not considered fit for distribution.

The publication was issued for internal use and distributed according to a special list ("Dlia sluzhebnogo pol'zovaniia"). As of April 2023, KVK and OCLC only show one copy, in North America.

Book ID: 52883

Price: $350.00