The devices outgrew us. We couldn’t control them. I know; I helped build them.— On the Beach (1959)
How, they ask, could I, being who I now am and understanding what I now understand, ever have said and done the things I am describing? — Tony Judt
They became more common after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine: stories about Armageddon. But even as they appeared in the New York Times or the Washington Post, on CNN or CBC Radio, reports of Russia’s nuclear arsenal seldom made the front pages or led off the nightly broadcasts. Instead, prospects of atomic annihilation have hovered at the fringes of our consciousness, always discussed below the fold. A Third World War may be lurking, but let’s try not to think about it.
On the first day of the invasion, February 24, 2022, the Russian military aimed its artillery at strategic targets rather than at civilians. That...
Joyce Wayne was previously the trade editor at Quill & Quire and the non-fiction editorial director at McClelland & Stewart. She is the author of the novel Last Night of the World. Her essay “All the Kremlin’s Men” was included in Best Canadian Essays 2021.
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