Michael Idov
Michael Idov (Michael Mark Zilberman) is a Latvian-American novelist, screenwriter and director..[1]. His works include films Leto (Cannes Main Competition, 2018[2]) and The Humorist, German television series Deutschland 89, and novels Ground Up and The Collaborators[3]
Biography
[edit]Family and early years
[edit]Michael Idov was born in Riga, Latvia, in 1976, to Jewish parents Mark Zilberman and Yelena Zilberman née Idov. His family immigrated into the U.S. as refugees in 1992, and were naturalized in 1998. After graduating from the University of Michigan with a BFA in Dramatic Writing and Film and Video Studies, Idov moved to New York City to start his writing career. His journalistic work, mostly for New York Magazine, garnered three National Magazine Awards and was featured in The Best American Magazine Writing collection[4]. His 2009 debut novel, Ground Up, became an unexpected bestseller in Russia in the author's own self-translation, and in 2012, Idov moved to Moscow to work as the editor in chief of GQ Russia. He quit the job and left Russia shortly after the annexation of Crimea in 2014; the experience formed the basis of his 2018 memoir, Dressed Up for a Riot.[5]
Private life
[edit]Idov lives in Berlin and Los Angeles with wife and frequent screenwriting collaborator Lily and daughter Vera.
Bilingualism
[edit]Idov writes in English and Russian, mostly keeping the two bodies of work separate and using the name "Mikhail Idov" (Михаил Идов) for his Russian-language output. In 2009, he became the first Anglophone writer since Vladimir Nabokov to republish a novel in a Russian self-translation[6]. Idov's unusual approach to transligualism and identity, which essentially involves maintaining two personas, has attracted some academic attention and analysis[7], with one researcher, Dr. Adrian Wanner, noting his "refus[al] to openly play the 'Russian card,' the 'Jewish card,' or the 'immigrant card'[8]." However, in 2022, responding to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Idov announced that he will not be writing in Russian as long as Vladimir Putin remains in power.[9]
Books
[edit]| Year | Title | Publisher | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | Ground Up | Farrar, Straus & Giroux | novel |
| 2009 | Кофемолка (The Coffee Grinder) | Corpus | Self-translation of Ground Up |
| 2011 | Made In Russia: Unsung Icons of Soviet Design | Rizzoli | essay collection, edited by |
| 2013 | Чёс (The Gig) | Corpus | Collection of original Russian short stories |
| 2018 | Dressed Up for a Riot | Farrar, Straus & Giroux | memoir |
| 2024 | The Collaborators | Scribner | novel |
| 2026 | The Cormorant Hunt | Scribner | novel, sequel to The Collaborators[10] |
Filmography
[edit]Film
[edit]| Year | English Title | Original Title | Writer | Director |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | Soulless 2 | Духлесс 2 | yes | no |
| 2018 | The Humorist | Юморист | yes | yes |
| 2018 | Leto | Лето | yes | no |
| 2021 | Jetlag | Джетлаг | yes | yes |
Television
[edit]| Year | English Title | Original Title | Creator/Showrunner |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | Londongrad | Лондонград | yes |
| 2017 | The Optimists | Оптимисты | yes |
| 2020 | Deutschland 89 | no |
References
[edit]- ^ "Michael Idov".
- ^ "Michael IDOV". Festival de Cannes. Retrieved 2025-07-23.
- ^ "THE COLLABORATORS | Kirkus Reviews".
- ^ The Best American Magazine Writing 2010. Columbia University Press. 2010-11-17. ISBN 978-0-231-15753-7.
- ^ "Dressed Up for a Riot". Macmillan Publishers. Retrieved 2025-07-28.
- ^ "The Act of Self-Translation | Jewish Book Council". www.jewishbookcouncil.org. 2009-12-14. Retrieved 2025-07-28.
- ^ Wanner, Adrian (2013). "Lolita and Kofemolka: Vladimir Nabokov's and Michael Idov's self-translations from English into Russian". Slavic and East European Journal. 57 (3): 450–464. doi:10.30851/57.3.006. ISSN 0037-6752.
- ^ Wanner, Adrian (2014). "Moving beyond the Russian-American Ghetto: The Fiction of Keith Gessen and Michael Idov". The Russian Review. 73 (2): 281–296. doi:10.1111/russ.10730. ISSN 1467-9434.
- ^ ""Language is Never the Enemy": Why I Will Not Write in Russian as Long as Putin is in Power". Vanity Fair. 28 February 2022.
- ^ Idov, Michael (2026-01-27). The Cormorant Hunt. Scribner. ISBN 978-1-6680-8228-7.