The Clay Machine-Gun is a novel rich in hilarious paradox. Pelevin himself has described it as 'the first novel in world literature which takes place in an absolute void'. Controversially denied the Russian Booker Prize - the Jury President branded it as a kind of 'computer virus designed to destroy the cultural memory' - the book became a huge cult success in Russia.
The Clay Machine-Gun is a nightmarish fantasy about identity, crime and Russian history. The action cuts deliriously between present-day Moscow and 1919, the era of the Civil War, in which the narrator finds himself serving as a commissar in the division of the legendary commander Vasily Chapaev, and his formidable machine-gunner sidekick, Anna. Hailed as the greatest Russian novel of the post-Soviet era, The Clay Machine-Gun confirmed Victor Pelevin's status as one of the brightest stars in the Russian literary firmament.
- ISBN10 0571201261
- ISBN13 9780571201266
- Publish Date 21 August 2000
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 25 May 2021
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Faber & Faber
- Edition Main
- Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
- Pages 352
- Language English