#russia

In front of me 327 pages of the manuscript [Master and Margarita] (about 22 chapters). The most important remains - editing, and it's going to be hard. I will have to pay close attention to details. Maybe even re-write some things... 'What's its future?' you ask? I don't know. Possibly, you will store the manuscript in one of the drawers, next to my 'killed' plays, and occasionally it will be in your thoughts. Then again, you don't know the future. My own judgement of the book is already made and I think it truly deserves being hidden away in the darkness of some chest. [Bulgakov from Moscow to his wife on June 15 1938] ↗

— Mikhail Bulgakov

#letter #master-and-margarita #russia #samizdat #writing

Lack of originality, everywhere, all over the world, from time immemorial, has always been considered the foremost quality and the recommendation of the active, efficient and practical man. ↗

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

#nihilism #russia #originality

She's like snow in Russian," said Anna. "Snow in the evening when the sun sets and it looks like Alpengluhen, you know? And if snow had a scent it would smell like that [the rose].... ↗

— Eva Ibbotson

#eva-ibbotson #roses #russia #snow

With Connery, he does act. He is in complete command. He completely trusts the person first, then the instrument. I've worked with his son also, on a picture in Russia. ↗

— F. Murray Abraham

#also #command #complete #completely #connery

Knowing what I knew about Russia, as much as I loved the music and was fascinated by the songs and the whole idea of it, I knew it would be a very lengthy and frustrating process. ↗

— Marc Almond

#fascinated #frustrating #i #idea #knew

In emerging democracies like Russia, in authoritarian states like Iran or even Yugoslavia, journalists play a vital role in civil society. In fact, they form the very basis of those new democracies and civil societies. ↗

— Christiane Amanpour

#basis #civil #civil society #democracies #emerging

The secret of politics? Make a good treaty with Russia. ↗

— Otto von Bismarck

#make #politics #russia #secret #treaty

I'm glad I'm not Brezhnev. Being the Russian leader in the Kremlin. You never know if someone's tape recording what you say. ↗

— Richard M. Nixon

#glad #i #know #kremlin #leader

Russia is Germany's most important neighbor in the East, and it will remain so. ↗

— Helmut Kohl

#germany #important #most #neighbor #remain

Suicidal violence is not the exclusive property of the Muslim world. Suicide bombings were a tactic of nationalist struggles in 19th-century Europe and Russia, the far east during the second world war and the Vietnam war, and in modern Sri Lanka. ↗

— James Buchan

#bombings #during #east #europe #exclusive