Independence is...

“Independence is…” are selected essays by one of the most famous Belarusian authors, Uladzimir Orlov. This book is like a time machine: the reader will find himself in Minsk in the 1990s, Berlin after the fall of the Wall, Tunisia before the revolution, Stockholm, New York on the roof of the World Trade Center… With humor, precision, and poetic subtlety, Orlov reflects on time, space, and the search for Belarusian identity. The essays have been translated into more than 20 languages.

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The book of selected essays by Vladimir Orlov is a kind of time machine that will help the reader make dozens of journeys, invariably united by the search for Belarus and - by Orlov's unique juicy-rough humor. The destinations will be Minsk of the early 1990s and Berlin with the wall between two worlds that collapsed only yesterday, Georgia of the time of Zviad Gamsakhurdia and the Sahara of pre-revolutionary Tunisia, the roof of the still intact World Trade Center in New York and the Stockholm apartment of the 2011 Nobel laureate poet Tomas Tranströmer... Together with the writer, the reader will be able to feel the changes that have occurred in our country and the world over a quarter of a century. The essays included in the book have been translated into more than twenty languages.