Pussy Riot have certainly changed some people's assumptions about the role of political art and the relationship between the intelligentsia and the… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
There are several dozen political prisoners in Russia. When I cite that number people are often very surprised. They often think there are more. Well - there are hundreds of thousands of people who haven't had a fair trial, who are victims of the political system. But in the Amnesty International sense of the word, most of them are not… — Masha Gessen Copy Share
With Pussy Riot - this was a prank! It was a brilliant, artistically gifted prank. But they didn't expect to go to… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
You can't expect people who didn't exist as a community at all until about twenty years ago to have formed a political… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
I received the Media for Liberty Award from Swedish PEN, and the prize was awarded by the Swedish minister of culture, who… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
For example, if you are a blogger who wrote something about a local official and you're going to prison for that, you're… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
The reason Vladimir Putin released Pussy Riot, the Greenpeace activists who were kidnapped in international waters and kept in prison for two… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
There's this American pretense, which is the pretense of the journalist with the view from nowhere - which has somehow morphed into the journalist who was born this morning. So, he doesn't know that Donald Trump lied yesterday, and the day before. So, he concludes that he doesn't know whether Trump lied accidentally or on purpose. You can only pretend… — Masha Gessen Copy Share
Pussy Riot have certainly changed some people's assumptions about the role of political art and the relationship between the intelligentsia and the church. That's… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
Trump, like Putin, has a demonstrably thin skin and short temper when it comes to being criticized by journalists. — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
You risk everything if you so much as join a legal protest demonstration in Russia. It raises the stakes. — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
Donald Trump creates word salads. And that is awful to language, because we try to parse out what he's saying and try to find… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
It is the first time since 1993 that Russians have come out into the streets without an explicit permission from the government to do so. The main difference between the protests of 2011-2012 and these protests today is that they didn't have permits. These were - the people who were coming out into the streets were very young people, for… — Masha Gessen Copy Share
I think Donald Trump was brought to power by Americans. They voted for him. — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
In the 1990s, there was a lot of reform, and there was a lot of forward movement on a lot of fronts in Russia.… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
Poverty and scarcity are actually very good for totalitarian societies. They maintain that sense of mobilization that's essential for totalitarian societies. — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
I think that Putin's strategy has been throwing a lot of money, fairly haphazardly, at a lot of projects aimed at disrupting Western relations… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
Both Trump and Putin use language primarily to communicate not facts or opinions but power: it's not what the words mean that matters but… — Masha Gessen Copy Share Image
