The Russia Project Research

Here are some books and videos on the history of Russia and its current politics. And yes, I've read and watched all of them.

Books

Documentaries and Videos
  • Dawisha, Karen. Putin's Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia? New York: Simon & Schuster, 2015. Print.                       
  • Garrels, Anne.  Putin Country: A Journey into the Real Russia . New York: Picador, 2017. Print.
  • Harding, Luke.  A Very Expensive Poison: The Assassination of Alexander Litvinenko and Putin's War with the West.  New York: Vintage , a Division of Penguin Random House LLC, 2017. Print.                             
  • Hoffman, David E. Billion Dollar Spy. Place of Publication Not Identified: Icon, 2017. Print.
  • Kasparov, G. K., and Mig Greengard. Winter Is Coming: Why Vladimir Putin and the Enemies of the Free World Must Be Stopped. London: Atlantic, 2016. Print.
  • Marshall, Tim. Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything about the World. New York: Scribner Book, 2016. Print.
  • Mikhail, Zygar. All the Kremlin's Men: Inside the Court of Vladimir Putin. New York, NY: PublicAffairs, 2016. Print.
  • Myers, Steven Lee. The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin. London: Simon & Schuster, 2016. Print.
  • Ostrovsky, Arkady. The Invention of Russia: The Journey from Gorbachev's Freedom to Putin's War. London: Atlantic, 2015. Print.
  • Pomerantsev, Peter. Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: Adventures in Modern Russia. London: Faber & Faber, 2016. Print.          
  • Satter, David. The Less You Know, The Better You Sleep: Russia's Road to Terror and Dictatorship Under Yeltsin and Putin. S.l.: YALE U PRESS, 2017. Print.
  • Soldatov, Andrei, and Irina Borogan. The Red Web: The Struggle between Russia's Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries. New York: PublicAffairs, 2015. Print.​
  • Volodarsky, Boris. The KGB's poison factory: from Lenin to Litvinenko. Minneapolis, MN: Zenith Press, 2010. Print.
Seventeen Moments of Spring is a 12 part series created in 1973 that is shown annually in Russia. It is a spy saga set during the final days of WWII. Exceptionally well made. Start watching and you'll be hooked!
Ever wonder what the contemporary art scene in Russia looks like? Here's a glimpse from the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow.
Ilya and Emilia Kabakov are Russian artists that left Russia to settle in the United States. Here is one of their latest projects. Heartwarming.

Refugee Stories Research

Here are some resources where one can find stories and background data on the ongoing war in Syria and the Syrian Refugee Crisis.

This American Life


 
  • Field of Vision Field of Vision in collaboration with The New Yorker made a six part documentary. Director Matthew Cassel follows Aboud Shalboub on his trek from war-torn Syria to the EU, where he hopes to gain refuge for his family. https://fieldofvision.org/the-journey

The New Yorker

​​Podcasts
The New Yorker Radio Hour Podcast entirely devoted to what’s happening in Syria Episode 54: Syria, The World’s Nightmare

Articles​
“The Assad Files” by Ben Taub
​ 
“Whom Can you Trust on the Syrian Border?” by Ben Taub

"Assad's War on Aleppo" by Steve Coll






Cover Artwork by Lorenzo Mattotti