The Doomed City

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No Western science fiction writer, either American or European, has ever been as famous as the Strugatsky brothers were in the USSR. In the 1970s, whenever their latest book appeared, with an initial print run of only 500,000, only the truly fortunate were able to read it immediately. In 1979, Tarkovsky’s film Stalker, based on the Strugatskys’ Roadside Picnic, would finally win them recognition from the Soviet intelligentsia, and The Enchanters (1982), a screen adaptation of their story of magic Monday Starts on Saturday, would soon become an all-time audience favorite. But well before that, a long queue of relatives, friends, and work colleagues immediately formed for each one of those half-million books. Nobody found this daunting. We were used to having to stand in line and wait for the most valuable things. A month for a book, five years for a car, ten years for an apartment…

Of course, the difference was not merely in how many people knew the Strugatskys. The Strugatskys were known to the entire reading public of the Soviet Union, but there are also Western science fiction writers known to almost everyone.

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