samizdat

[ sah-miz-daht; Russian suh-myiz-daht ]

noun

1. a clandestine publishing system within the Soviet Union, by which forbidden or unpublishable literature was reproduced and circulated privately.
2. a work or periodical circulated by this system.

samizdat

/ səmizˈdat /

noun

1. 1. a system of clandestine printing and distribution of banned or dissident literature
   2. ( as modifier )

      a samizdat publication

Word History and Origins

Origin of samizdat¹

1965–70; < Russian samizdát, equivalent to sam ( o )- self- + izdát ( el'stvo ) publishing agency; coined as a jocular allusion to the compound names of official Soviet publishing organs, e.g., Gosizdát for Gosudárstvennoe izdátel'stvo State Publishing House

Word History and Origins

Origin of samizdat¹

C20: from Russian, literally: self-published

Example Sentences

After years of being out of print, with copies and PDFs circulating among gay artists and activists like samizdat, it was republished in 2018.

From New York Times

But the text of his speech was quickly leaked by his supporters who posted it online in a modern-day version of samizdat, the way works of dissident writers were copied and shared in Soviet times.

From BBC

By contrast, the scenes of the teenage Adéla helping to produce samizdat in communist Czechoslovakia feel lived in and significant.

From Washington Post

One day in the mid-1970s, Kurkov’s older brother brought home an unbound, hand-typed samizdat copy of a new work by Solzhenitsyn, “The Gulag Archipelago,” which had recently begun to circulate among dissidents.

From New York Times

For 30 years of his professional life — during Soviet times — he was only able to publish abroad, infuriating the authorities, or through samizdat, the underground self-publishing network.

From New York Times