In his posthumously published memoirs, Alexei Navalny, the opposition leader, describes how his campaign for mayor of Moscow in 2013 launched his political career, which was directly inspired by American grassroots politics. Wire, David Simon's original HBO series about crime and power in Baltimore.
“I was banned from appearing on television or in newspapers, so I decided to communicate directly,” writes Navalny, who died in an Arctic prison in February. Ordered by dictatorial President Vladimir Putin, Navalny objected.
“There's a reason I wrote that our campaign is 'like a movie.' I'm a big fan of The Wire. In the first season, the story revolved around a hero who was running for mayor of Baltimore. I explained to our staff responsible for organizing meetings with the general public that I wanted the same situation: a stage, chairs for the elderly, groups of people around. This is completely normal in an American election campaign, but no one has ever done something like this in Russia before.
Navalny did not become mayor, but continued his opposition to Putin and attempted to run for president in 2018. Death At 47, his widow, Yulia Navalnaya, continued his work, including printing his book. The Patriot: There Was a Memory premiered on Tuesday.
The Wire ran for six seasons between 2002 and 2008 and is a candidate for best television series of all time. Since the third season, a story about the fictional mayor Tommy Garcetti, played by Irish actor Aidan Gillen, has been presented. Former Baltimore mayor, Maryland governor, and Democratic presidential hopeful Martin O'Malley, now United States Commissioner of Social Security, is widely seen as Simon's inspiration for Garcetti's character, although Simon has denied claims such as this.
Navalny has previously expressed his love for The Wire. In March 2022, after receiving an apparently long sentence on fraud charges, he tweeted: “Nine years. Well, the characters on my favorite TV show, The Wire, used to say, 'Do it for two days.' It's the day you enter and the day you leave.[.]I even had a T-shirt with this slogan, but the prison authorities confiscated it because they thought the print was terroristic.
In response, Simon tweeted photos of himself wearing a T-shirt with a quote on the front and “Fuck Putin” on the back.
The writer told Navalny: “Thank you for the credit… but the quote is now yours. You own it. And stay strong, brother. The whole world is watching.
Navalny responded: “So, technically, the characters in The Wire are now quoting me? Thank you very much David, this gift really means a lot. To donate another famous line from his series, we should all be strong, 'What the hell[uck] 'Did I do it?', one day to Putin, as he would say during his trial.
Technically, are The Wire characters quoting me now? Thank you very much David, this gift really means a lot. Another famous line from his series, “What Have I Done?”, is that we should all be strong enough to donate something to Putin one day, as he would say during his trial. https://t.co/AxngBSPjM8
– Alexey Navalny (@navalny) April 13, 2022
On the other hand, Navalny also expresses his affection for another legend of American popular culture: Hunter S. Thompson, the pioneer of the political magazine “Gonzo”, who died in 2005.
Last August, after being sentenced by a Moscow court to 19 years in prison on terrorism charges, Navalny issued a lengthy statement titled My Fear and Loathing: A Reference to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Wild Journey into the Heart of Sleep American, Thompson's 1971 novel.
“Hate,” Navalny wrote. “People ask me a lot about that and I started getting letters again: Do you hate the judge? Do you hate Putin more? I have said many times that the main thing to overcome in prison is hatred. There are many reasons for this and your helplessness is a strong catalyst for this process. So if you let it go, it will eat you and finish you off.
In his memoirs, Navalny says he considers his prison diary, now printed as part of a book, “conzo journalism.”
“Only, I'm inclined to suggest, I outdo Hunter S. Thompson, in his convertible, with his 'seventy-five little balls of mescaline…a salt shaker half full of cocaine,' and who knows (I can't remember exactly). But I love that book and that movie,” he added, referring to Terry Gilliam’s 1998 film version.
