Queue

"Queue" — the first published book by Vladimir Sorokin — was released in 1985 in Paris by the publishing house "Syntax." In this book, as in the author's early short stories, the traits of the upcoming experiment on Russian prose are clearly visible, during which traditional genres, plots, and characters undergo radical transformation. In the novel, which consists entirely of direct speech, the queue is a metaphor for human life in general. Delicately, without annoying preachings — on the contrary, entertaining with the adventures of the characters — "Queue" teaches that to achieve a goal, almost always different efforts are needed than those we apply, and we never see the goal clearly. The endless conversation of people barely familiar with each other is not accidentally called a novel: each remark, like in a large prose narrative, adds a stroke to the portrait of the era and at the same time hangs in the air, belonging to everyone — and to no one.