Russian publisher blacks out mention of Stalin and Hitler in book by Nobel laureate Günter Grass
Users of the Russian marketplace Ozon have complained about censorship in The Rat, a novel by German writer and Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Günter Grass. The independent Russian news outlet Verstka first reported on the complaints.
The original text includes the phrase “until a certain Hitler and a certain Stalin devoured all of Poland,” a reference to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the 1939 agreement that led to Poland’s division between Germany and the Soviet Union.
A video posted by one user shows the phrase “a certain Hitler and a certain Stalin” blacked out in the 2026 Russian edition, which includes a footnote reading, “This fragment of text has been removed in accordance with the requirements of the legislation of the Russian Federation.”
The censorship appears in both the print and digital editions. Meduza found no other examples of hidden text, and none are mentioned in the footnotes.
Buyers have complained in the comments that the publisher never warned them about the censorship. But the “Questions About the Product” section includes a January response from Alpina Publisher stating that “some fragments of the book were blacked out in agreement with the rights holders.”
Günter Grass was one of the most important German writers of the 20th century. He gained worldwide recognition with his debut novel, The Tin Drum, published in 1959. Along with Cat and Mouse (1961) and Dog Years (1963), the novel later formed part of the Danzig Trilogy. Grass won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999. He died in 2015.
His apocalyptic novel The Rat, built around a dialogue between the narrator and a rat, was published in 1986 and had never before appeared in Russian.
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