“A short sketch about how the library works in a pre-trial detention center. One day my cellmate and I were returning to our cell after a walk, and on the floor at the entrance there was a book thrown through the door window in our absence...

“A short sketch about how the library works in a pre-trial detention center.
One day my cellmate and I were returning to our cell after a walk, and on the floor at the entrance there was a book thrown through the door window in our absence. We picked it up and looked at it - the fourth volume of Pasternak's collected works with stories, essays and notes. Inside there is a piece of paper - my application for the library, where I asked for the Strugatskys' book. But he didn’t ask for Pasternak. I thought about it and decided that the names of these authors, placed side by side, create alliteration - that’s why they were considered interchangeable. However, about two weeks later, instead of Stephen King, my cellmate was given a torn Jules Verne without the last pages, and no logic can be traced here.
And I eventually leafed through Pasternak, and not without interest, studied the autobiographical “People and Positions,” notes on his translation of Shakespeare, and the late essay (1959) “What is Man?” that very clearly reflects Pasternak’s view of history and culture. If the glamorous librarian had not brought me Pasternak instead of the Strugatskys, I would not have read any of this.
Your Vasya N., pre-trial detention center-1, St. Petersburg"