Irvine Welsh isn't pleased. The author who has three instances of "cunt", one of "fuck" and one of "fucking" on the first page of his novel Trainspotting has just learned about Russia's planned clampdown on "foul language". According to CNN, Vladimir Putin signed a law this week that will not only implement a ban on, and fines for, explicit language in plays and films, but will require books that contain swearing to be sold in sealed packages with explicit-language warnings.
According to The Moscow Times, "the law has been met with both criticism and shock, as swearing has been a vital component of Russian art, with some of the nation's best poets and playwrights using curse words prolifically, from classical Alexander Pushkin to contemporary post-modernist Vladimir Sorokin." Russian philosopher Vadim Rudnev told the paper that the attempts to regulate language made the government increasingly resemble a criminal gang. "They want to designate their territory this can be said and this cannot," he said. "In reality it is a common practice to swear among the intelligentsia."
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