AST Publishing House froze Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s fees – Kommersant

The AST publishing house froze payment of royalties to the writer Lyudmila Ulitskaya after information about her transfers to Ukraine. This was reported to Kommersant FM by the press service of the publishing house.

“In connection with the author’s statement about the transfer of royalties to Ukraine, the AST publishing house decided to suspend any payments under all contracts with Ulitskaya until the situation is clarified and possible official clarifications from the author regarding the recipients of royalties from books sold,” the publishing house explained.

January 31 pranksters Vovan and Lexus (Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexey Stolyarov) called Lyudmila Ulitskaya on behalf of the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Andrey Ermak. In a conversation, the writer admitted that she transfers royalties from the sale of books, including from Russia, to help Ukraine.

In November 2023, the public movement “Call of the People” appealed to the Investigative Committee and the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation with a request to check Ms. Ulitskaya, Vladimir Sorokin and Viktor Erofeev for financing the Ukrainian army. Writers refuted accusations.

On December 13, Vovan and Lexus called the writer Boris Akunin (recognized as a foreign agent, included in the list of terrorists and extremists). Mr. Akunin said that he understands the concept of “a good Russian is a dead Russian”, considers UAV attacks on Russian cities and the Crimean Bridge normal and advocates the division of Russia. TFR excited a criminal case against the writer on charges of publicly justifying terrorism and disseminating deliberately false information about the Russian army (Article 205.2, Article 207.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).

After the conversation, AST publishing house refused publish books by Boris Akunin, since the writer’s statements “require legal assessment.” The sale of books was suspended by Read-Gorod-Bukvoed and the Liters service. Also publishing house stopped release and sale of books by Dmitry Bykov (recognized as a foreign agent) due to his political statements. Mr. Bykov, in a conversation with Russian pranksters, said that he would like “to be useful in Ukraine.”

Alexandra Goroshilova