Tue 5/17 @ 7PM
Vladimir Putin isn’t the most popular guy on earth right now, to say the least. Moscow-based journalist Masha Gessen has been watching him for quite a while and has quite a bit to share about how he came to power and how he has manipulated and controlled his country since his rise to power (under various titles) in the late 1990s. She authored 2012’s The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin, which talks about how he cemented his power and how that led to the corruption of the entire country and 2020’s Surviving Autocracy, an important warning for the U.S. steaming towards a corrupt autocracy of its own. (Stripping women of their personhood and control of their own bodies is an important step in that direction.)
Luckily, Gesse, who is trans & non-binary (still another reason why Putin would hate them), currently lives in New York. Still, they should watch their back!
Gessen will be the guest of the Hudson Library and Historical Society for a virtual streaming program on Zoom where they’ll talk about both books. The program is free but registration is required. Go here to register. Gessen’s books are available through Hudson’s Learned Own Book Shop.