Its like reading the works of a Roman author, like Juvenal or Tacitus, decrying the follies and crimes of an Empire they so are extricable a part of. The criticism and cynicism in the dissident view of the Soviet Union, within the Soviet Union was also one of the great achievements of the Soviet Union.

An impressively evocative look at material life in the USSR, from gulags and the planned economy to Red Moscow perfume and the Soviet toilet — a “lost civilisation” of utopian fantasy and unbridled terror."— Financial Times Karl Schlögel provides us with a literary masterpiece of nostalgia, not only for lost civilization but also for his own life that was so intertwined in its decline. As a historian Schlögel was enmeshed in the world of the dissident history of the Soviet Union, and he was as much a part of that world he was a critique of. But I often forget that the richness of Russian culture doesn’t end when Khrushchev took over, and especially now that Soviet Russia is dead (in a way) and its archives are open (in a way), it’s the perfect opportunity for a skilled historian to offer some perspective on that era. That’s where Karl Schlogel’s Soviet Century: An Archeology of a Lost World comes in.Schlögel – assisted by his excellent translator, Rodney Livingstone – is an eloquent writer and a captivating travel guide around this Soviet “lost world”."—Stephen Lovell, Times Literary Supplement A work of deep scholarship and significant breadth about a relatively brief period of recent history when it seemed that there might be an alternative economic system to capitalism."—Joseph Brady, Society Karl Schlögel has created a rich and fascinating mosaic of Soviet culture focusing on the manifold sensory qualities and experiences of everyday life. His insatiable curiosity leads him to wide panoramas and meaningful closeups of a culture that lives on in histories, memories, and appropriations.”—Joes Segal, The Wende Museum

The Soviet Union is gone, but its ghostly traces remain, not least in the material vestiges left behind in its turbulent wake. What was it really like to live in the USSR? What did it look, feel, smell, and sound like? In The Soviet Century , Karl Schlögel, one of the world’s leading historians of the Soviet Union, presents a spellbinding epic that brings to life the everyday world of a unique lost civilization. I was excited to read this book because I love learning about life in the Soviet Union. I think it was a fascinating period of modern history that is often portrayed with caricatures and the premise of this book felt novel to me: approach the Soviet Union like a fallen civilization, and explore different facets of life within it to show what everyday life was like for normal citizens.The Soviet Union is gone, but its ghostly traces remain, not least in the material vestiges left behind in its turbulent wake. What was it really like to live in the USSR? What did it look, feel, smell, and sound like? In The Soviet Century, Karl Schlögel, one of the world’s leading historians of the Soviet Union, presents a spellbinding epic that brings to life the everyday world of a unique lost civilization. If the past is a foreign country, The Soviet Century is a unique travelogue from one of the world’s most innovative observers of urban space and material culture. Karl Schlögel’s scholarly Baedeker is the culmination of a lifetime of study, travel, and thought. It guides us across nothing less than a continental empire and a century of upheaval. But Schlögel’s greatest accomplishment is to connect stunningly eclectic new detail to the big picture, allowing us to see and feel a lost civilization anew.”—Michael David-Fox, Georgetown University His focus is not on the foreign relations or domestic crises of Soviet rule but on outward appearances: the look, the smell, the sounds of everyday life. Based on decades of research and an intimate knowledge of history and culture, ‘The Soviet Century’ is a fascinating chronicle of a not-so-distant era."—Joshua Rubenstein, Wall Street Journal