Babuskhkas, Babka and Borscht
Lit from and about Eastern and Southeastern Europe
created by anotherbritinthewall
last updated January, 2026
Comments
Such a nice list! I am so happy that someone started one :). If you want, I do know more titles that can be added, just let me know if you have any other criteria for the books and where do you consider that Eastern Europe stops (like, do you include Hungary, Czechia, Poland or do you think that there are in Central Europe?).
Thank you 🥹 Yes, definitely, recommendations are welcome! I'm trying to keep it a bit more contemporary (obviously "The Nose" is a bit of an exception), and I've wanted to have it reference a whole bunch of countries and different authors but it's definitely a work in progress! I'm pretty open to different countries; at German universities (specifically when studying history) we decide between Eastern Europe (everythinf straight east from Germany, so including Poland and the Czech Republic) and South-Eastern Europe (including Albania, Romania, Hungary...), so I kind of used that as a guideline (it is arbitrary, though, so I'd just go by vibes as well 😂)
So, starting the '40-'50? or we can go to the interwar period and WWII? I will start with '40-'50 and I can add more if needed :)
- from Albania I would add Kadare, The general of the dead army and Spring Flowers, Spring Frost
- from Bulgaria I have The time shelter by Gheorghi Gospodinov (Booker winner) and The old man and the wolfs by Julia Kristeva
- from Greece: Kazantzakis - I can recommend El Greco and The Fratricides -from Czechia: Kundera (I have read Edward and God) and A Prayer for Katerina Horovitzova by Arnošt Lustig (best book about Holocaust outside of memoirs, according to me)
- from Serbia: My Family's Role in the World Revolution by Bora Ćosić and Garden, ashes by Danilo Kiš
- from Russia: a few authors are Arkady and Boris Strugatsky (SF), Nabokov (even if he mostly published in exile), Oksana Robski (i've read Casual, a chick-lit book) and Lyudmila Ulitskaya (specially as she needed to move in exile to Berlin after she spoke against the actual Russian regime, she need all the support that she can get)
- from Poland I can add Julia Fiedorczuk poetry
- from Montenegro: Miodrag Bulatović
- from Moldova: Kinderland by Liliana Corobca (one of the best books ever, again according to me)
- from Romania: Mircea Eliade (some of his works are published after 1940), Doina Rusti, Eugène Ionesco (theatre, the creator of the absurd theatre, I strongly recommend The Rhinos), Mircea Cărtărescu, Emil Cioran, Alina Nelega, Nina Cassian (poetry), Eugen O. Chirovici and Andrei Codrescu
