March 25, 2022
- By RFE/RL
J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books, has responded to comments made on March 25 by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who accused the West of trying to cancel Russia's rich musical and literary culture.
Rowling pushed back after Putin dragged her into a rant against efforts to “cancel’’ Russian culture as he spoke with leading cultural figures in a national television broadcast.
“Critiques of Western cancel culture are possibly not best made by those currently slaughtering civilians for the crime of resistance, or who jail and poison their critics,” the British author said on Twitter. She also posted an article about jailed anti-corruption campaigner Aleksei Navalny.
Putin complained of the cancellation of a number of Russian cultural events in recent weeks, saying Rowling was also canceled “because she...did not please the fans of so-called gender freedoms," a referenced to a controversy sparked by her opinions on transgender issues.
"Today they are trying to cancel a whole thousand-year culture, our people," he said. "I am talking about the gradual discrimination against everything linked to Russia."
Valery Gergiev, general director of St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theater, was among those who participated in the videoconference with Putin on March 25.
Gergiev was dismissed on March 1 as chief conductor of the philharmonic in Munich, Germany, and lost the chance to conduct at La Scala in Milan, Italy, after he failed to condemn Russia's invasion.
Spain’s Teatro Real opera house and London's Royal Opera House have canceled performances by Russia’s Bolshoi Ballet, and the philharmonic in Cardiff, Wales, dropped a concert of Pyotr Tchaikovsky's music from its program.
“The notorious cancel culture has become a cancellation of culture. Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, Rachmaninov are excluded from concert posters, and Russian writers and their books are also banned,’’ Putin said.
The last time such a campaign was carried out it was by the Nazis in Germany almost 90 years ago, he said, although no books by Russian writers have been banned.
Russia has also been barred from the Eurovision Song Contest and banned from participating in numerous sporting events.
Russia has denied attacking civilians in what it calls a "special military operation" launched against Ukraine on February 24, but Western powers say it has repeatedly hit civilian targets in what they call an unprovoked and unjustified invasion.
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