Navalny memoir, described as ‘final letter to the world,’ planned for October

A memoir by late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny will be released this fall, according to the publisher.

Alfred A. Knopf, the publisher of the upcoming memoir titled “Patriot,” said in a post on the social media platform X Thursday that it will be published Oct. 22, around eight months after Navalny’s death in February.

“Written with the passion, wit, candor, and bravery for which he was justly acclaimed, ‘Patriot’ is Navalny’s final letter to the world: a moving account of his last years spent in the most brutal prison on earth; a reminder of why the principles of individual freedom matter so deeply; and a rousing call to continue the work for which he sacrificed his life,” an announcement by Knopf reads, according to The Associated Press.

In a thread on X Thursday, Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said “[t]his is not how I imagined Alexey would write his biography at all.”

“I thought we’d be around 80 years old, and he’d be sitting at the computer by the open window, typing away,” Navalnaya continued. “And I would be grumbling about the grandchildren coming soon, telling him he’s busy with nonsense.”

Navalnaya said that following his poisoning in 2020, “everyone insisted, ‘Alexey, you should write a book.’”

“He just shrugged it off. What kind of biography can be written at 44? It’s barely halfway through life,” she continued. “He wasn’t rushing anyway – there was still so much ahead.”

However, she said that “things turned out differently” and that “[i]t turned out there wasn’t another half ahead.”“

“Nevertheless, Alexey did start writing the book then, and unexpectedly quickly got into it,” she continued. “He liked to recall events in his life in connection with the events in the country.”

Navalny, the most prominent leader of the Russia opposition against President Vladimir Putin, died in February at the age of 47 at a Russian penal colony. He had been imprisoned since 2021, when he returned to Russia after being treated for a poisoning he blamed on Putin.