Russia Is Back to Banning Books

Marcel Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time,” Virginia Woolf’s “Orlando,” and Stephen King’s “It.” These are just a few victims of book purges happening all over Russia.

Every authoritarian regime fears one weapon above all: a free mind. When a government starts banning books, it is not protecting its citizens. It is protecting itself. By deciding which books Russians may read, Putin is reviving a Soviet playbook that echoes the repression of Stalin’s era and the ideological controls of the Cold War.

The US needs to follow suit and adapt its Cold War playbook to the 21st century to take on a more active role in countering book censorship.

The Russian Ministry of Justice maintains a constantly updated Federal List of Extremist Materials. Alexei Navalny’s “Patriot” is just one example of the 5,504 materials on the list, ranging from books, songs, memes, and more.

The irony is striking. Vladimir Putin once praised Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the writer who exposed the brutality of Soviet repression and spent his life challenging censorship. In 2007, Putin, a former officer in the very KGB that once persecuted Solzhenitsyn, awarded him the State Prize for Lifetime Humanitarian Achievement. Yet today, Putin’s government is restricting books and silencing ideas it deems dangerous.

Putin has passed numerous laws to suppress the free exchange of ideas. Following the passage of a 2022 law cracking down on LGBTQ+ “propaganda,” publishing houses and bookstores have removed books with LGBTQ+ themes from their shelves and faced numerous book raids. The Russian Book Union later set up an expert panel that determines if books comply with Putin’s new legislation. Last year, authorities arrested 11 employees of Russia’s largest publishing house, Eksmo, for allegedly violating that law. In January, Eksmo shuttered its subsidiary that specialized in LGBTQ+ fiction. Using AI, Eksmo has internally assessed approximately 20,000 books to check for compliance with new censorship laws.

Putin has also expanded legal authorities designed to repress independent media and civil society organizations that the regime labels “foreign agents” or “extremist.” “Foreign agents” must include a disclaimer on anything they publish that demonstrates their status as such. Though there is no blanket ban on books by “foreign agents,” a new law, effective Sept. 1, 2025, bars “foreign agents” from creating “information products for minors.”

By censoring books, Putin is following a well-worn Soviet playbook: silencing ideas that challenge the state’s narrative.

Under Soviet rule, Glavlit, the official state censorship agency, restricted citizens’ access to information. In 1919, the Soviet government established Gosizdat as the first extensive state-run publishing house. In 1930, the creation of Ogiz, the Association of State Book and Magazine Publishers, later known as Glavizdat, fully consolidated publishing under government control. Glavlit monitored what could be published, while Glavizdat handled the physical printing and distribution of books.

Books in the USSR could not be published without a stamp of approval from Glavlit. In today’s Russia, books disliked by the regime cannot be sold without a “foreign agent” label – if they are allowed to be published at all. In the Soviet Union, independent bookstores could not exist, because state agencies controlled the industry. Putin’s government has similarly been shutting down independent bookstores.

The Russian State Library’s new restricted special repository, which contains approximately 18,000 “Russophobic” books taken from Russian-controlled regions of Ukraine, mirrors the restricted collections of Soviet libraries, called spetskhran. Just as Soviet writers were effectively barred from publication unless they were admitted to a state-sanctioned union, starting in September the Russian government will require writers to meet certain qualifications – a yardstick that could be used to discriminate against undesirables.

The Kremlin propaganda campaign also reaches into schools, where the government is reshaping textbooks to fit its narrative, just as the Soviet state did. New history textbooks rehabilitate Stalin’s image and blame the West for provoking the war with Ukraine.

As Putin borrows from the Soviet censorship playbook, independent Russian writers and publishers are borrowing from the Soviet resistance playbook. Tamizdat, a term meaning “published over there,” refers to banned Soviet works that people smuggled out of the USSR to be published in the West. Today, publishing houses such as Freedom Letters and Vidim Books, as well as organizations like StraightForward Foundation, help publish banned Russian books abroad.

Unlike during the Cold War, however, the US government isn’t doing much to help. In the past, the US Information Agency broadcast uncensored news into the Soviet bloc, published Russian-language materials, supported foreign publishers, and operated libraries abroad. The CIA helped smuggle banned books into the USSR. Today, these efforts are largely absent.

The US should dust off its Cold War playbook by supporting exiled Russian writers, funding the translation and digitization of banned Russian-language books, and helping Russians access independent literature.

Likewise, American publishing houses should move beyond statements of support. They should acquire and translate works by banned Russian authors, partner with dissident publishers such as Freedom Letters, and work with organizations like PEN America and Tamizdat Project to promote persecuted writers and expose expanding censorship.

History shows that dictators can ban books, but they cannot erase ideas. Putin’s war on books will be no exception. The Kremlin may control Russia’s bookshelves, but it cannot be allowed to control what Russians can know. When dictators fear books, the free world should make sure they are read.

Dr. Ivana Stradner serves as a research fellow with the Barish Center for Media Integrity at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where Camille Roussel is an intern.