By IPS Correspondents
MOSCOW, Sep 26 2002 (IPS)

Glasnost signalled the end of ideological control of the Soviet era, and thousands of books once banned were published at last. But recent criminal cases some writers have brought a new unease.

Earlier this month police searched the offices of the Ad Marginem publishing house over publication of a novel by Vladimir Sorokin ‘Goluboye Salo’ describing sex among Soviet leaders. The police seized five copies of the controversial novel.

The novel has provoked protests earlier. Last summer Vasily Yakimenko, leader of the pro-Putin youth movement Moving Together, printed excerpts from Sorokin’s works and set fire to these copies near the Bolshoi Theatre. Moving Together then filed a complaint that Sorokin was spreading pornography. The police promptly ordered an investigation.

Alexander Glushenkov acting for the author and publishing house filed a complaint that in printing Sorokin’s works the protest group had infringed copyright law. His case was dismissed by a Moscow district court.

Prominent writer Viktor Yerofeyev later sent an open letter to President Putin arguing that “persecution of writers is a scandal.” Yerofeyev argued that the works of such great writers as James Joyce and Vladimir Nabokov had once been banned on grounds of pornography. “Nobody but you can put an end to this outrage,” Yerofeyev wrote.

Putin, however, told the writers and their opponents to settle their differences “between themselves.” Moving Together has no official links with the Kremlin but the fact that members of this group like to wear T-shirts carrying Putin’s portrait has made some writers uneasy.

Prominent writer Edward Limonov has spent 14 months in jail. Limonov who heads the National Bolshevik Party NBP was arrested following the detention of two teenagers in February last year for trying to acquire illegal arms. Limonov and six party associates are accused with them of planning terrorism, attempting to set up armed units and stocking arms illegally. Limonov is also accused of asking for the state system in Russia to be toppled illegally. He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Limonov has called Putin’s regime a “strange mixture of Soviet fascism with favouritism towards beloved oligarchs.” He is campaigning for re-nationalising of property, and for boycotting Western goods. Limonov has a significant following among young artists and writers. NBP members are mainly in their teens and twenties.

Limonov has written seven books in jail, including the antigovernment Drugaya Rossiya (Different Russia). Earlier this year the NBP’s newspaper Limonka (the title means ‘hand-grenade’ and sounds similar to Limonov’s name) was barred from publishing excerpts from ‘Different Russia’.

Limonov’s supporters argue that the prosecution has no case against Limonov. They say he is the only Russian artist to be persecuted both by the KGB and, 30 years later, by the KGB’s main successor agency, the FSB.

Given the cases of Sorokin and Limonov, some Russian writers say the country is drifting again towards censorship. Communist censorship had failed to silence dissenting voices. Underground or “samizdat” literature spread around the world. Critics of the government say moves to silence writers now will not work.

The collapse of communism in 1991 brought hundreds of independent publishing firms into business. But the prosecution of some writers is testing the limits of the new freedom.

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