A personal introduction by someone who has lived its language, culture, and contradictions
Russia has always fascinated people in the West. Part of it is the sheer size, part the history, and part the sense of mystery that seems to cling to it. I first encountered Russia through its language and literature, and later through living in Soviet Kiev in the early 1980s. Those experiences left a mark on me — a mixture of admiration, sadness, and unease — and they shaped how I see the country today.
This short piece is an attempt to explain the deeper forces behind Russia’s identity: where it came from, what shaped it, and why it behaves as it does.
1. Beginnings: Vikings, Slavs, and the Orthodox world
The early Russian state began in the 9th century when Scandinavian traders — the Varangians — travelled down the great rivers and established rule over the Slavic tribes. This early state, centred on Kyiv, became known as Rus’.
In the 10th century, Prince Vladimir adopted Orthodox Christianity from Byzantium. This decision shaped Russia’s identity for a thousand years:
- a strong central ruler
- a close link between church and state
- a culture of ritual, symbolism, and hierarchy
- a sense of being separate from the Latin West
The Cyrillic alphabet, created by the missionaries Cyril and Methodius, allowed Slavic languages to develop their own written culture.
2. The Mongol shadow: power, fear, and centralisation
In the 13th century, the Mongols conquered Rus’. Their rule lasted over two centuries and left deep marks:
- power must be centralised
- the ruler must be feared
- survival depends on obedience
- outsiders are a threat
- expansion is security
When your neighbours are steppe empires, “smallness” is not safety — it is extinction. This is the seed of the idea that Russia must be big to be safe.
When Moscow eventually rose to power, it inherited both the Orthodox tradition and the Mongol political style. The result was a state that was strong, centralised, and often harsh.
3. The Imperial mindset: the five pillars of Russian identity
From the 16th century onward, Russia expanded relentlessly — across Siberia, to the Pacific, into the Caucasus, and into Eastern Europe. Expansion became part of its identity.
A few core ideas took root:
- Size = destiny
- Suffering = virtue
- Military power = identity
- Expansion = normal
- Influence = proof of existence
By the 19th century, Russia was the largest country on Earth, a multi‑ethnic empire, and a European great power. Greatness became normality. This is why, even today, the idea of being “just another country” feels like humiliation to the elite.
4. Culture: the Russia that captured my imagination
Despite its political harshness, Russia produced some of the world’s greatest cultural achievements:
- Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov
- Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich
- Repin, Kandinsky
- Eisenstein, Tarkovsky
Russian culture is marked by emotional intensity, moral seriousness, and a fascination with suffering and redemption. Anyone who studies the language or literature feels this deeply — it leaves a mark.
5. The Russian Soul: Why Russia Always Eludes Complete Understanding
For someone who has studied the language, literature, and history — as I have — there is always something about Russia that resists full comprehension. Churchill famously called Russia “a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma,” and although the phrase is overused, it captures a real truth: Russia does not think about the world in the same way the West does.
This difference is not superficial. It is philosophical, psychological, and spiritual.
6. A Different Moral Universe: Suffering, Redemption, and the Russian Imagination
At the heart of Russian culture lies a distinctive conception of suffering. In the Western tradition — shaped by Greek rationalism, Roman law, and the Enlightenment — suffering is something to be avoided, minimised, or solved.
In the Russian tradition — shaped by Orthodoxy, harsh geography, and historical trauma — suffering is something to be endured, even embraced, because it is believed to reveal deeper truths.
In Russian thought:
- Suffering purifies
- Suffering ennobles
- Suffering reveals the soul
- Suffering is the path to redemption
This is why so much Russian literature is preoccupied with guilt, sacrifice, moral struggle, and spiritual rebirth through pain. Dostoevsky is the clearest example. His characters do not seek happiness; they seek meaning. And meaning, in the Russian imagination, is often found through suffering.
This worldview is not just literary. It permeates Russian psychology and politics.
7. The Orthodox Influence: Salvation Through Endurance
Orthodox Christianity differs from Western Christianity in important ways:
- It emphasises mystery over doctrine
- It values inner transformation over external action
- It sees redemption as a long, painful process
- It venerates holy fools — people who suffer for truth
This creates a cultural atmosphere where:
- hardship is normal
- endurance is admired
- sacrifice is expected
- comfort is morally suspicious
It is no accident that Russians often describe their country as “страна терпения” — a land of endurance.
8. Why This Makes Russia Hard to Change
These ideas are not political. They are not Soviet. They are not even modern.
They are civilisational.
They shape:
- how Russians see themselves
- how they interpret history
- how they endure hardship
- how they justify sacrifice
- how they relate to authority
- how they understand greatness
This is why Western attempts to “normalise” Russia — to turn it into a Denmark or an Austria — have always failed. You cannot graft Western expectations onto a civilisation whose moral universe is built on different foundations.
9. The Paradox: A People of Warmth, A Culture of Suffering
One of the great paradoxes of Russia is that its people are often warm, generous, humorous, and deeply humane — yet its culture venerates suffering, and its state often demands it.
This contradiction is part of what makes Russia so hard to grasp. It is also what makes it so tragic.
10. The Soviet period: modernisation without freedom
The Soviet Union inherited the imperial frame and added a new layer:
We are not just a great power — we are a world‑historical project.
The USSR achieved rapid industrialisation and victory in the Second World War, but at enormous human cost. It created:
- a powerful state
- a militarised society
- a culture of secrecy and fear
- a habit of saying one thing in public and another in private
When I lived in Soviet Kiev, I felt this atmosphere every day — the coded conversations, the quiet caution, the sense that the real life of the country existed behind closed doors.
Even after the USSR collapsed in 1991, many of these habits survived.
11. After 1991: a lost opportunity — and a trauma
After independence, Russia had a chance to become a modern, open, prosperous country. But the transition was chaotic:
- economic collapse
- corruption
- loss of global status
- nostalgia for order
1991 was not just a political collapse.
It was a collapse of identity.
For many Russians, it felt like:
- loss of empire
- loss of status
- loss of purpose
- loss of meaning
Putin understood this instinctively. He rebuilt the myth:
- “Russia is rising from its knees.”
- “The West is rotting.”
- “We are a great civilisation.”
12. My visit to St Petersburg
Years later, after my father died, I visited St Petersburg — a city I had long wanted to see. I expected beauty and culture, and I found them. But I also felt a deep unease, a sense of a place caught between eras. Despite the changes since the Soviet collapse, the atmosphere felt strangely familiar: cautious, sinister, slightly out of time.
I couldn’t wait to leave. That feeling told me more about modern Russia than any book could.
13. Why Russia cannot become “normal” like Austria or Denmark
For 500 years, Russia’s identity has been built on:
- size
- sacrifice
- military power
- exceptional destiny
- a sense of being surrounded
To become “normal,” Russia would have to give up:
- the imperial story
- the civilisational mission
- the idea of being a pole in world politics
- the belief that greatness is owed, not earned
This is why normality feels like loss.
14. Russia today: a country out of step with the modern world
Modern Russia is caught between past and future:
- It wants to be a great power, but lacks the economic and technological strength.
- It wants respect, but seeks it through fear rather than cooperation.
- It has extraordinary cultural heritage, but limited global influence.
- It has warm, resilient people, but a political system that restricts their potential.
The invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was meant to restore Russia’s status. Instead, it accelerated its isolation and decline. Meanwhile, the real global competition is between the United States and China. Russia is increasingly a junior partner, not a leader.
15. The tragedy of Russia
For anyone who has studied the language, lived in the culture, or absorbed its literature, the tragedy is clear:
Russia is a country of immense cultural richness and human warmth, but its political path has repeatedly led it into fear, isolation, and wasted potential.
It could have been a great nation in the 21st century — not because of its military, but because of its people, its science, and its culture. Instead, it has turned inward, clinging to old ideas of greatness that no longer fit the modern world.
16. Where might it be heading?
Whatever happens after Putin — power struggle, stagnation, fragmentation — Russia will emerge:
- smaller
- weaker
- poorer
- less influential
- with fewer friends
- and with a myth it can no longer afford
When a country’s identity depends on greatness, but its reality is shrinking, three things can happen:
- denial
- aggression
- collapse
Russia will remain important, but it is unlikely to shape the future in the way the U.S. and China will. Its greatest strength — its culture — remains, but its political trajectory limits what it can become.
17. Why Russia still matters
Despite everything, Russia remains a civilisation worth understanding. Its literature, music, and history offer profound insights into the human condition. And its people — generous, humorous, resilient — deserve better than the fate their leaders have chosen for them.
To understand Russia, one must see both sides:
- the beauty and the brutality
- the depth and the dysfunction
- the culture and the politics
- the potential and the tragedy
Only then does the country make sense.
How Russia’s Myth of Greatness Shapes Its Foreign Policy
A linked but separate section
1. Greatness as geography
Russia’s rulers have always believed that size = destiny.
The Mongol invasions taught them that small states die.
The endless steppe taught them that borders are never secure.
Expansion became a reflex, not a choice.
This is why “buffer zones” and “spheres of influence” still feel natural to the Kremlin. It is historical muscle memory.
2. Greatness as suffering
Russia’s identity is built on the idea that suffering is noble:
- “We endure what others cannot.”
- “Hardship proves our strength.”
This creates a foreign policy comfortable with:
- long wars
- high casualties
- economic pain
- isolation
Suffering is not seen as failure — it is seen as proof of greatness.
3. Greatness as mission
From the Tsars to the Soviets to Putin, Russia has always believed it has a civilisational mission:
- Tsarist Russia: “Third Rome”
- Soviet Russia: “Vanguard of world socialism”
- Putin’s Russia: “Defender of traditional civilisation”
Different costumes, same script.
Mission-driven states do not compromise easily.
4. Greatness as grievance
When reality contradicts the myth, grievance fills the gap:
- “We were betrayed.”
- “We were humiliated.”
- “The West took advantage of us.”
Grievance justifies aggression.
Grievance justifies isolation.
Grievance justifies the war.
5. Greatness as dependence on enemies
Russia needs the West as an adversary to sustain its myth.
Without an enemy, the myth collapses.
Without the myth, the regime loses legitimacy.
Thus the West must always be “rotting,” even when the numbers say otherwise.
6. Greatness as a trap
Russia could be:
- prosperous
- peaceful
- integrated
- modern
- respected
But that requires accepting normality — and normality means equality, not empire.
The elites cannot accept this.
So they cling to greatness even as the country shrinks.
7. Why Russia keeps clashing with neighbours and the West
Because the myth demands:
- influence
- control
- deference
- recognition
- fear
Foreign policy becomes a theatre of wounded pride.
8. Could Russia ever escape the myth?
Yes — but only under very specific conditions:
- a generational shift
- a post‑imperial reckoning
- a new national story
Identity cannot be destroyed; it must be replaced.
This is a transformation on the scale of a century, not a decade.
Coda: The Smirk
In the last seconds of the video, just before the drone struck, the Russian soldier lifted his head slightly and a faint smirk — barely more than a tremor at the corner of his mouth — appeared on his lips. It lasted no more than a heartbeat. But it said more than any words could.
It was not bravado.
It was not defiance.
It was not madness.
It was something older, quieter, and infinitely sadder.
It was the expression of a man who had lived his whole life inside a culture where suffering is expected, where fate is stronger than will, and where death is simply the final hardship in a long chain of hardships. A man who perhaps knew, from the moment he arrived in Ukraine, that he was already doomed.
There was no panic in his face.
No pleading.
No rage.
Only that small, ambiguous smirk — a gesture that seemed to say:
“Ну что ж… значит, так надо.”
“Well then… so it must be.”
In that instant, he was not a symbol of aggression or a cog in an invading army. He was simply a human being, alone at the end of his life, facing death with the strange, tragic fatalism that runs so deep in Russian history and literature.
It was the same fatalism Pushkin wrote about in The Fatalist.
The same fatalism Tolstoy saw at Borodino.
The same fatalism my Father witnessed in 1944 near his village when drunken Soviet soldiers charged across the snow into machine‑gun fire.
The same fatalism Grossman captured in Life and Fate, where individuals are swallowed by forces they cannot control, yet still retain a flicker of dignity in their final moments.
That smirk was not heroic.
It was not noble.
It was not admirable.
But it was human.
And in that brief, flickering expression, the entire tragedy of this war — and of Russia’s long, sorrowful history — seemed to gather itself into a single point, like a tear that never quite falls.
A life ending in a ditch, far from home.
A man shaped by a civilisation that has always asked too much of its people.
A death as pointless as the war that claimed it.
A smirk — and then nothing.
