Limonov
Emmanuel Carrere
POL, 2011
Hero or bastard, Limonov? Everyone will at least recognize that they have crossed their time in a unique way and lived several lives. Marginal poet, at the end of the communist era, he chose exile to the United States, where he experienced poverty and odd jobs. He escaped through writing and found success in Paris. But he did not cut ties with Russia, and he follows with passion the period of Perestroika, which inaugurates the dissolution of the USSR. Limonov then chose to engage with Serbian troops while the ex-Yugoslavia broke out, and finally joined Russia. There he founded the National-Bolshevik party, opposed to Putin, which earned him two years in prison …
Through this character, Carrère retraces a piece of Russian history, and paints a picture of an era which, after Soviet confinement, saw the rebirth of Russia, converted to capitalism. Lover of his country, nationalist and megalomaniac, Limonov embraced several causes, always with excess. What makes him an ambiguous hero, criticizable, but faithful at least to a certain “Russian soul”, and to a destiny which resembles that of his country.
At the Bpi, level 3, 840 19 CARR.E 4 LI
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