So many people volunteered their time to remind me of what had happened during the 1980s and early 1990s, a time period many of us are trying to forget. They include Jonathan, J.Z., Ben, Brian, Leo, Maris, and Jessica.
Finally, my parents provided enough stories to fill several volumes and were kind and patient enough not only to answer all my nagging questions but to accompany me to Russia for a week of fish pie and remembrance. I would also like to thank all my “first responders,” people who took the time out to read early drafts of this book and offer advice: Doug Choi, Andrew Lewis Conn, Rebecca Godfrey, Lisa Hahn, Cathy Park Hong, Gabe Hudson, Binnie Kirshenbaum, Paul La Farge, Christine Suewon Lee, Kelly Malloy, Jynne Dilling Martin, Caitlin McKenna, Suketu Mehta, John Saffron, and John “Rosencranz” Wray.
Permissions Acknowledgments
Portions of this work appeared in the following publications in different form:
Chapter 1: Travel + Leisure, The New York Times, The New Yorker
Chapter 2: New York
Chapter 4: Travel + Leisure; Made in Russia: Unsung Icons of Soviet Design, edited by Michael Idov (Rizzoli); The Threepenny Review
Chapter 6: The New Yorker
Chapter 7: an essay first published privately and then in New York magazine’s My First New York (Ecco); The Threepenny Review
Chapter 8: The Threepenny Review, The New Yorker
Chapter 9: The Threepenny Review
Chapter 10: The Threepenny Review, Granta
Chapter 11: Gourmet, The New York Times Magazine, The Threepenny Review
Chapter 12: The New Yorker, The Threepenny Review
Chapter 13: The New Yorker
Chapter 14: The Threepenny Review
Chapter 15: The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker
Chapter 16: The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker
Chapter 17: The New York Times Magazine
Chapter 18: The New York Times Magazine
Chapter 21: GQ
Chapter 23: GQ, Granta, The New Yorker
Chapter 24: GQ, The New Yorker, Travel + Leisure
About the Author
GARY SHTEYNGART was born in Leningrad in 1972 and came to the United States seven years later. He is the author of the novels Super Sad True Love Story (2010), Absurdistan (2006), and The Russian Debutante’s Handbook (2002), and the memoir Little Failure. Super Sad True Love Story won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize and was selected as one of the best books of the year by more than forty news journals and magazines around the world. Absurdistan was chosen as one of the ten best books of the year by The New York Times Book Review and Time magazine. The Russian Debutante’s Handbook won the Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction and the National Jewish Book Award for Fiction. His fiction and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, Esquire, GQ, Travel + Leisure, The New York Times Magazine, and many other publications. His work has been translated into twenty-eight languages.
Gary Shteyngart is available for select readings and lectures. To inquire about a possible appearance, please contact the Random House Speakers Bureau at 212-572-2013 or rhspeakers@randomhouse.com.