Linda Strange
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Military Service? Impossible!

Military Service? Impossible!

November 12, 2022 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

When I taught English in Russia in the late 1990’s, my main place of employment was the Tolyatti Pedagogical Institute,…

Blue Skies

Blue Skies

April 19, 2021 · by Linda Strange · in USA

I didn’t get back up into the hills again for several months. The repeated storms of January and February had…

The Dead Branch

The Dead Branch

January 1, 2021 · by Linda Strange · in USA

I took a walk up into the hills yesterday. It was a leaden sunless day, but the temperature had risen…

Fear and Trembling

Fear and Trembling

February 4, 2020 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized, USA

It’s that time of year again, Black History Month, the month when I once again try to explain to nine…

Don't Send Her Back

Don’t Send Her Back

July 22, 2019 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized, USA

The defining chant of Donald Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign is almost certainly going to be “send her back.”

The Wall I Knew

The Wall I Knew

January 30, 2019 · by Linda Strange · in Germany, USA

Want to watch a video of me reading this blog? Go to my You Tube Channel. On a cold Sunday…

My Cousin in California

My Cousin in California

December 2, 2018 · by Linda Strange · in Finland, USA

On November 9th, two weeks after my cousin in Pittsburgh, in her post-shooting gloom, bowed out of all social media,…

Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

October 9, 2018 · by Linda Strange · in USA

If you’d asked me before the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings how I felt about them, I’d probably have told you I…

Merit Pay, Anyone?

Merit Pay, Anyone?

March 3, 2018 · by Linda Strange · in USA

I wasn’t going to weigh in on this because, well, everyone else has, and what am I going to say…

Wallis, This One's for You

Wallis, This One’s for You

December 2, 2017 · by Linda Strange · in England, USA

Finally, some good news for a change. Amidst the debacle of “tax reform” and what appears to be rampant sexual…

Persistence

Persistence

February 24, 2017 · by Linda Strange · in Germany, Russia, USA

In our elementary school, we start teaching children about character traits in the third grade. We teach them to recognize…

To The Barricade

To The Barricade

January 22, 2017 · by Linda Strange · in USA

I never marched in a demonstration before yesterday. I don’t like crowds much, or noise, or commotion. I’m a stay-at-home-with-a-book…

2017: Brace For Impact

2017: Brace For Impact

January 1, 2017 · by Linda Strange · in England, Finland, France, Germany, USA

At the beginning of the Second World War in Europe, there was a period of time, eight months and one…

Election Week 2016

Election Week 2016

November 14, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in USA

Last week didn’t begin well. On Monday afternoon, we had to hospitalize our cat, Socrates. He’d been battling pancreatitis at…

Where You Can Put Your Putin

Where You Can Put Your Putin

September 18, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in Russia, USA

No one could love Russia more than I do. You have to love a country where the cabbie taking you home…

A Little History

A Little History

July 31, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in England, Germany, USA

They say if you don’t know your history, you’re doomed to repeat it and this certainly seems to be what’s…

A Cruel June

A Cruel June

June 17, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized

It goes on. Last Sunday morning we woke up to read about yet another mentally ill individual who went out…

De Ja Vu All Over Again

De Ja Vu All Over Again

March 9, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in Canada, USA

There it was again. That feeling. The feeling that I hadn’t felt in a long time, but that I still…

Madness

Madness

February 2, 2016 · by Linda Strange · in USA

And so it began yesterday upon the frozen fields of Iowa, that great democratic act of choosing. The Iowans have…

Lists

Lists

December 31, 2015 · by Linda Strange · in France, Germany, Syria, USA

As another year draws to its close and the next one edges near, there seems to be in both the…

O Canada

O Canada

November 2, 2015 · by Linda Strange · in Canada

A flash of light rent the October sky, lasted a few short moments, and then vanished as quickly as it…

The Bitter Pill

The Bitter Pill

April 8, 2014 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

When I was a university student of Russian History in the mid 1980’s, the Iron Curtain was still drawn tightly…

Sevastapol

Sevastapol

March 9, 2014 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

I’ve always found that when I want to understand something that’s happening in Russia, it helps to hit the books….

Native Son

Native Son

September 8, 2013 · by Linda Strange · in Syria, USA

It’s been a very bad week. First of all, Obama, he’s my guy, but he’s really made a mess of…

Hopscotch

Hopscotch

June 25, 2013 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized

You remember the 1980 movie “Hopscotch,” don’t you? Walter Matthau played a rogue CIA agent who was publishing a book…

Nineteen Eighty Four

Nineteen Eighty Four

June 16, 2013 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized

I know I should feel outraged, violated, sullied. When the whistle-blower Edward Snowden this last week let it be known…

Remember Gorbachev?

Remember Gorbachev?

March 11, 2013 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

I was reading an article about Gorbachev the other day. Gorbachev, remember him? I’m embarrassed to say that until I…

Eastward Ho!

Eastward Ho!

January 12, 2013 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized

Back when I was in high school in the late seventies and early eighties, back in the waning days of…

Russian Reformers Old and New

Russian Reformers Old and New

June 20, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

The demands of the Russian reformers seemed reasonable enough to me. They wanted the Russian government to stop being so…

Juneteenth

Juneteenth

June 6, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Germany, USA

Juneteenth is an African-American holiday officially celebrated in 41 states of the United States. It commemorates the final abolition of…

Don't Go to Gibraltar!

Don’t Go to Gibraltar!

May 23, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Uncategorized

“Whatever you do, don’t go to Gibraltar.” This was what our friends and neighbors down on the Costa del Sol…

Blame the Germans

Blame the Germans

May 7, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Germany

They’ve been muttering about them in Greece, and in Spain, in Portugal and in Italy. All the countries of Europe…

Putin Party Politics

Putin Party Politics

April 29, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Russia

Why did Putin win the Russian elections? He won due to election fraud. Well, yes, there was election fraud, buses…

Haavisto Loses, Finland Wins

Haavisto Loses, Finland Wins

March 11, 2012 · by Linda Strange · in Finland

Back in January, the Finns had an election, too. It was the first round of their presidential election. The Finns,…

Author

Portrait photo of Linda Strange

All countries are strange, none stranger than your own.

January 2023
I am delighted to announce that Glass Mountain Literary Magazine has published my short story Retention in their current issue. You can read the story here.
September 2022
Watch a video of me reading a live version of a blog about the Berlin Wall, The Wall I Knew.
July 2022
Watch a video of me reading a live version of my blog, The Last of the Best.
May 2022
I’m excited to announce three pieces of my writing have recently been published. What Ever Happened to Igor, an essay in Pangyrus, is about a study trip I took to Ukraine in 1985 with a group of Finns and Swedes. Igor was a young Ukrainian-Swedish man from Stockholm who was going to meet his father in Kyiv, a father he hadn’t seen in twenty years. Want to watch a video of me reading the essay? Click here. Will They Make it Home Again?, another essay in Pangyrus, explores the relationship between the images of World War Two childhood evacuations recorded in select works of European literature and the images of evacuation we now see on our television screens from Ukraine. Click here to watch the video.
Finally, The Longest Day, is a short story published in the 2022 Freshwater Literary Journal. It details the experience of a young non-English speaking Cape Verdean girl, Gee, on her first day in an American inner-city school. It is an account of Gee’s first encounter with her new ESL teacher and the safe space this teacher creates for Gee to express her true emotions. Watch a You Tube video of me speaking with Georbina DaRosa, the real-life inspiration for my story.

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