Grand Centaur Station

Table Of Contents

Author’s Note
Introduction: The Muzhik

PART ONE
Red
Circle Against the Square:
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
Crime and Disorder (Repeat)
She Called Me a Romantic, the Bitch!
The Interpenetration of Light with Sorrow
Elektro-Shock Lady in La-La Land
To the Dacha with Two Monsters
Is This Yours?
Everyone’s Dandy in Goon City
The Two-Centimetre Question
Spiritual Danger
The Styx Is a River That Runs from the Heart
Flatheads at Twelve O’Clock High
Crocodile Shaslyk, Anyone?
The Square Is the Icon of Our Age

PART TWO
Black
Beyond the Urals:
The Choice Between Italian Shoes and the Exotic
Pahlavan Makhmud: Poet, Champion Wrestler, and Occasional Hat-Maker
Three Girls Named Star
At the Sign of the Blue Tongue
Who Was Natalie Wood?
Notes from the Underground
To the Summer Pastures
Lonely Penitent’s Guide to the World’s Worst Trips
Welcome to Kashgar City, Big Noses
The House of Stones and Earth
The Yellow King’s Kids
Nocturnal Brightness:
The Gods of Cloud, Rain, Wind, and Thunder

PART THREE
White
Life as a Horse:
Midnight Border Crossing
The Bare Texts of Its Boundaries
Karakorum
So What Is Your National Pride?
Twenty-One Taras, or, I Married a Mongolian Train-Trader
Baikal
About the Dress They Sold the Cow For

Epilogue: The Joke
Acknowledgements
Some Classic Works for Further Reading