Leonid Parfenov

Premiere of the documentary film NABOKOV: GOOD RUSSIAN

and presentation of the new volume NAMEDNI 2021–2025

"NABOKOV: GOOD RUSSIAN"

The film tells the story of the great writer's life in exile: a son of aristocratic St. Petersburg, the last author of the Silver Age, an émigré moving from country to country, he became a titan of 20th-century world literature and a cult author in 21st-century Russia. The film's central theme is fidelity to one's calling and to a choice made once and forever: Nabokov was firmly convinced that he was a true Russian patriot-writer, and that the socialist regime in his homeland — and the Soviet literature it produced — was a bitter historical absurdity, bound sooner or later to vanish.

Filming took place in Cambridge, Berlin, Paris, Cornell University (New York State), and Montreux. In the dramatized scenes, Vladimir Nabokov and his wife Véra are portrayed by Maxim Sukhanov and Chulpan Khamatova. The soundtrack features tracks by Noize MC and Monetochka, set to Nabokov's own poetry.

"NAMEDNI 2021–2025"

The 13th volume of the project, and the first made entirely abroad, published by Mnogo Knig, Latvia.

The book fully preserves the signature album format — a mosaic of events, people, and phenomena — along with its original layout and design. Beyond the war-related themes, the volume captures the broader context of the five-year period: Ovechkin's record and Messi's World Cup win, NFT and ChatGPT, the "living in the moment" mood, Kadysheva's comeback, quadrobers and Labubu, "Boys' Word," "Squid Game" and "Barbenheimer," Markov's photographs, King Charles III, Shaman and Mizulina Jr., the Paris Olympics opening ceremony, Ozempic, Dolina's apartment scandal, Trump 2.0, internet restrictions in Russia, Yura Borisov and Vanya Dmitrienko, the "Naked Party," and "Mother Earth." Over 500 photographs and other illustrations.