The Letter of Forty-Two () was an open letter signed by forty-two Russian literati, aimed at Russian society, the president and government, in reaction to the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis. It was published in the newspaper Izvestia on 5 October 1993 under the title "Writers demand decisive actions of the government."
The letter contains the following seven demands:
Newspaper Pravda reacted by publishing a letter by three Soviet dissidents â Andrey Sinyavsky, Vladimir Maximov and Pyotr Abovin-Yegides â calling for Boris Yeltsin's immediate resignation. It said among other things:
Nezavisimaya Gazetas 2nd editor-in-chief Victoria Shokhina, mentioning Vasily Aksyonov's statement ("It was right those bastards had been bombarded. Should I have been in Moscow, I'd have signed [the letter] too"), on 3 October 2004, wondered how "all of those 'democratic' writers who were preaching humanism and denouncing capital punishment" all of a sudden "came to applaud mass execution without trial". According to Shokhina, writer Anatoly Rybakov, when asked, 'would he have signed it', replied: "By no means. A writer can not endorse bloodshed". "But people like Rybakov are few and far between in our 'democratic' camp, and such people there are being disliked", Shokhina remarked.
A letter entitled "An appeal of the democratic public of Moscow to the President of Russia B. N. Yeltsin" ("ÃÂñÃÂðÃÂõýøõ ÃÂþñÃÂðýøàôõüþúÃÂðÃÂøÃÂõÃÂúþù þñÃÂõÃÂÃÂòõýýþÃÂÃÂø ÃÂþÃÂúòàú ÿÃÂõ÷øôõýÃÂààþÃÂÃÂøø ÃÂ.ÃÂ. ÃÂûÃÂÃÂøýÃÂ") was published on 8 October 1993, echoing key demands of the Letter of Forty-Two.