Yawning Heights is the first published novel by Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 philosopher Alexander Zinoviev. Zinoviev expressed skepticism and frustration toward writings that attempted to expose and reveal the evils of Soviet communism

Communism

Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

. Zinoviev chose, instead, to satirize and ridicule Soviet society in Yawning Heights, presented as the city / nation of Ibansk

Ibansk

Ibansk is a fictitious country invented by Soviet author Alexander Zinoviev in his 1976 novel titled The Yawning Heights. Every Ibanskian citizen is named Iban Ibanovich Ibanov, and therefore goes by a nickname. The most admirable character is Bawler. Truth Teller is obviously Alexander...

. The novel has been compared to the writings of Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...

, Lewis Carroll

Lewis Carroll

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson , better known by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll , was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, as well as the poems "The Hunting of the...

 and others.

Satire

As a logic

Logic

In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...

ian, Zinoviev was able to reduce many features of Soviet communism to what he calls "scientific laws". The book is also filled with numerous paradoxes and logical twists, à la Catch 22. The book begins with a logically-reflexive definition: a preface claims that the book details the result of an experiment. The preface identifies the purpose of the experiment as follows:

"to uncover those who disapprove of its implementation, and to take the appropriate measures".

One satire in a late chapter is that, after conquering the whole world in the Great Ibanskian Kissoff, the leaders of Ibansk discover another nation, Sub-Ibansk, whose inhabitants live underground beneath Ibansk and subsist of the sewage generated by Ibansk.

Explanation of title

The title of the book is a pun on a cliche of Soviet ideological propaganda, describing communism as the "Shining heights". The words "yawning" and "shining" in Russian are identical, except for the first letter: a Z in the case of "yawning", and an S in the case of "shining".

The "yawning" in the generally accepted translation of the Russian title does not refer to a "yawn" but rather to its meaning as in "yawning abyss". To capture the paradoxical nature of the Russian title, perhaps an apter translation would have been "abysmal heights" (the primary meaning of abysmal derives from abyss).

The "shining" in question refers to a similar type of Marxist

Marxism

Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...

 luminosity as in Shining path

Shining Path

Shining Path is a Maoist guerrilla terrorist organization in Peru. The group never refers to itself as "Shining Path", and as several other Peruvian groups, prefers to be called the "Communist Party of Peru" or "PCP-SL" in short...

 guerrillas still wreaking havoc in Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

.

Characters

Everyone in Yawning Heights is named Iban Ibanovich Ibanov, so each is instead referred to by a descriptive name, rather than their proper name. Some are recognizable.

Odd facts

In the book, one of the characters writes a satirical novel critical of his society. The character knows that the Brothers (KGB

KGB

The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...

) are searching his house to find his controversial book. This represents the level of metafiction

Metafiction

Metafiction, also known as Romantic irony in the context of Romantic works of literature, is a type of fiction that self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction, exposing the fictional illusion...

.