A Russian Sci-Fi Classic with Jewish-Gentile Relations at Its Forefront

The Doomed City, composed in the 1970s by the Soviet science-fiction writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky was—unlike the brothers’ other works in the same genre—kept secret and unpublished until the late 1980s under Mikhail Gorbachev. Recently released in English translation, the novel tells the story of two protagonists in a mythical “experimental” city, the story of which is a compressed and twisted version of Soviet history. In his review, Marat Grinberg construes this deeply anti-totalitarian work as a commentary on Plato’s Republic, which the Strugatskys read in the manner of the 20th-century philosopher Leo Strauss. Thus it has an “Athens” component, embodied in the character of the idealist-turned-Nazi-collaborator Andrei, and a “Jerusalem” component, embodied in his Jewish counterpart, Izya:

It is through Izya, whom Andrei turned in to the Secret Police for torture in the novel’s second part, that Andrei acquires “understanding.” The brothers [Strugatsky], sons of a Jewish father and a Russian mother, were always fascinated with Jewishness, an interest manifested prominently in their works through characters, tropes, and allegorical constructs. Izya, “with his provocatively Jewish features,” embodies this preoccupation unabashedly, and he represents [the brothers’] philosophy of Jewishness. Transported to the City in 1968—after the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War, which played a crucial role in reawakening Soviet Jewish self-consciousness, and after the Soviet invasion of Prague, which shattered any illusions about the nature of the Moscow regime—Izya joins the “experiment” out of “curiosity.”

He acts as a Jewish Socrates, an eternal skeptic and trickster, never satisfied with any status quo yet fully comfortable with his Jewishness, even proud of it as the source of his wisdom. At the end of the novel, Izya, in whom the previously bigoted Andrei finally recognizes a true sage, develops a theory of the “Great Temple” of culture (also a corollary to Plato). The temple, “the heritage of the minority,” is being built by the select few—writers, artists, thinkers—whether the majority wants it or not; at best, history can provide conditions that do not irreversibly hinder the construction. . . .

Izya recognizes that the temple’s builders are not immune from the impurities of life, yet they are humanity’s only positive sustaining source. Their “minority” status emphasizes the temple’s Jewish underpinnings. Indeed, the novel’s conclusion hinges on the relationship between Jew and Gentile, or more specifically Jew and Russian.

Read more at Los Angeles Review of Books

More about: Arts & Culture, Jews in literature, Leo Strauss, Plato, Science fiction, Soviet Union

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023