‘You must remember, concerning Russia, that it is a country of snow and wolves, a vast and hard land. When I am there and I think of the Western cities, of London and Paris, it is with incredulity. Even in Moscow or St. Petersburg the idea of the West seems unreal to me. And in the country, of course, the unreality is so much more marked. That is reality, one feels, the steppe and the forests, the burnt summer and the frozen winter.’

‘And when you are here, does Russia seem as unreal?’

Tulenkov laughed. ‘No, never! But I can believe in this reality also, a reality that marches beside the other but never touches it.’