About the book: 2002 / From the author: "Fairy tale for adults of pioneer age" - how to understand this? And the date of writing the story is strange: 1970, 2001. Moreover, separated by commas. But the story of the book is truly mystical! The fact is that thirty years ago I wrote a fairy tale - not so much for pioneers, but for adults (like, for example , Schwartz's fairy tales), in which children find themselves in an unknown country, where centuries-old negative experiences of mankind are collected - (a kind of model of hell). The heroes will have to overcome these dangerous traps in sixty years (on earth, sixty minutes pass, that is, an hour). If they don’t make it in time, they will remain “in the middle of nowhere” forever. That is, they will lose the “best” country in the world, loyal friends, home and a “Bright Future”, finding themselves in eternal captivity of Mother Leni, of Green Fear and Melancholy, of the Golden Fishing Rod and of Impenetrable Stupidity, in whose kingdom “fools they eat pies, but the smart ones eat leftovers.” In the story, everything ended well. Minute by minute, but the guys still managed to return home - with the firm intention to live differently, beware of the main danger: stopped, relaxed, became covered in moss - disappeared. In general, it turned out to be a kind of warning to the adults of the times of stagnation and the younger generation, in whose hands our country was supposed to be by the year 2000. At first, the magazine “Koster” was going to publish the story, even paid part of the fee, but then suddenly refused - “due to changes in editorial plans." Then she spent several years in Detgiz. The author was fed with promises, forced to redo it several times, hinted at a certain “fist at the top”, now unclenching, now clenching, but never turning into a pointing finger. In the end, we gave up. Then the television association Ekran, where I worked as a staff writer at the time, became eager to create a multi-part cartoon based on the story. Again, endless alterations, eliminating “obstructions” and “smoothing out corners”... In the end, the fairy tale, as similar to the original version as an empty cocoon to a butterfly, reached the screening room of last resort. There was such a phrase in the script almost at the very end: “Well, sixty years have passed, now we can’t get out of here.” It seems to be an absolutely innocent phrase, if not for the upcoming sixtieth anniversary of Soviet power. Fatal coincidence. In general, the vigilant authorities fainted, the film was taken off the air, literally studied under a microscope for several months for sedition, and then they finally showed it. Only once, just to pay the film crew at least some money. Considering that approximately the same fate befell my other literary “warnings and prophecies” at that time, out of frustration I decided to “change my profession.” Namely, buy a dacha in the Moscow region, earn a living by working on the land and write “on the table” until “better times.” When “the fairy tale becomes reality.” And she waited. Now you can publish everything - it would be worth it. The two-volume documentary-fiction novel “Dense Doors” and the story “The Last Experiment”, published only in a magazine version in 1973, were published... And finally, the turn of “fairy tales for adults of pioneer age” came. That is, just for those who were pioneers in the distant seventies. Those who, under the leadership of the “powers of that world,” also stalled, got stuck, took the bait, got caught, betrayed. Or he simply stopped and dozed off to wake up as an adult “in a completely different country.” So life itself “invented” a new ending at the end of the second millennium. And my fairy tale was included in the story almost unchanged - the original typewritten copy, yellowed with time. Go for a walk, author - censorship, bye bye! This is how the story turned out. Well, whether it is sad (there is no country) or joyful (no censorship) is for the reader to judge..