Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's Roadside Picnic

7 notes on the mesmerizing Russian classic that invents its own ambient approach to the search for spirituality under tyrannical decay

1. Joyelle McSweeney recommended this novel to me after I asked her why there aren’t more science fiction books that use more Joycean language and effects. Her two slipstream/sci-fi novels, Flet and Nylund the Sarcographer, are two of my favorite examples of the untapped possibilities of that genre and how it can create actually new sensations of space, rather than tradition becoming a crutch. Highly highly recommend both McSweeney books, and glad to have read RP now as a compelling source of influence for them.

   

2. Even before diving into its contents, Roadside Picnic has a compelling energy in that it was conceived and composed in the 70s in Russia, as a work of samizdat, or literature that had to be printed and circulated in secret for fear of getting in trouble with the KGB. The afterword to this edition of the novel contains a brief history of their struggle to publication, including an eight year span where they went back and forth with various editors trying to get the work into print amidst lengthy censorship against depictions of vulgarity, violence, and immoral behavior. A list of examples shows that cuts were made to remove any mention of consuming alcohol, slang such as asshole and scum, or even the broad mention of doing violence. Arkady reflects on how they felt surprised even then at the extent to which the book was repressed even as a novel they felt wasn’t inflammatory at all. He also reflects that the eventual success of the novel was a victory, but a pyrrhic one, in that the censors who pushed against them are have all faded into history as unintelligent bureaucrats, while the novel lives on despite its mangling in earlier versions.