A 1986 dystopian Russian novel basically predicted Vladimir Putin

In 1986, near the end of the Soviet Union, a Russian satirical novelist tried to imagine the future of his homeland. He envisioned a head of state who had risen through the ranks of the KGB, used a war to cement his power, elevated his former security colleagues into positions of influence, claimed to derive authority from the Russian Orthodox Church and ruled Russia for decades. In other words, he predicted Vladimir Putin. The writer was Vladimir Voinovich, and his novel was “Moscow 2042,” a dystopic satire about a man who takes a journey into the next century. The protagonist, a freelance writer named Vitaly Nikitich Kartsev, boards a Lufthansa space flight in 1982, consumes a dozen-plus in-flight vodkas, and lands in the year of the title. He finds little in the way of future tech to marvel at (“People with an interest in such things should read science fiction,” narrates Kartsev), and in Voinovich’s version of postmillennial Russia, the U.S.S.R. is still going strong.

But Voinovich hit upon the country’s ruler-for-life with remarkable foresight. In the novel, he’s known as the Genialissimo: “a great political figure, friend of all mankind, transformer of nature, and a multifaceted genius,” Kartsev tells a fellow citizen. A member of the writer’s welcome party in the year 2042 is even more gushing: “The Genialissimo is simultaneously the general secretary of our party, holds the military rank of generalissimo, and, moreover, stands apart from everyone.” As with Big Brother, details about his physical appearance are fleeting; Kartsev notices a portrait of the Genialissimo is “squinting in self-satisfaction.” But while there are no illustrations of him riding horseback while shirtless, his actions as written in 1986 bear uncanny similarities to those of the current Russian president. First, there’s the Genialissimo’s position among a ruling gerontocracy. One fellow passenger on Kartsev’s space flight is a left-wing terrorist from Munich who’s traveling to the future to collect proof of his ideology’s endurance. He remarks that “under communism, everyone will be young, handsome, healthy, and in love with one another.” Kartsev is therefore surprised to find that future Russia is ruled by the grandfatherly Genialissimo and his mob of decrepit bureaucrats.