Saint Petersburg State University

Yeah, like a crime and punishment epilogue? Yeah.

But also, yeah, as you're talking, it kind of reminds me when I was in Russia studying at St. Petersburg State University.

And we had one professor, this older guy, not super old, but he mentioned that the women on the faculty there were doing a sort of protest slash art piece where they put up pieces of paper on the wall of comments, sexist comments that had been made to them.

And we're like, oh, that was cool.

yeah.

I went to Leningrad State University in St. Petersburg today.

Yeah, but

before that, you changed your name to Natasha.

The book sold very well.

On February 8th, 1899, St. Petersburg University students, mostly upper middle class children of the Russian intelligentsia, planned to celebrate Tatiana Day, the traditional anniversary of the university's founding.

According to the historian Richard Pipes, the university's rector banned those celebrations by decree.

Students booed the rector for 20 minutes straight and then started to riot.

The students pelted the police with snowballs, and the officers hit the students with whips.

Things spiraled out of control, and the students announced a strike.

St. Petersburg University socialist groups ignored the situation at first but quickly realized what an opportunity it was.

They could co-opt the riots for their own purposes, and so they did.

She was six around that time.

And, uh, you know, the husband and wife had been educated at, like, St. Petersburg University and studied English, so they were, like, had studied English literature, so they were basically, like, college professors-

Wow

... of English literature and culture, and the guy, Alexis, had studied abroad in Manchester, England, and while he was there, he had smuggled in all these, like, David Bowie records, Bob Dylan records, 'cause all, all of that was illegal in Russia.

This is where he learned to fight for survival, eventually earning a black belt in judo and practicing sambo, another form of martial arts.

He went on to study law at Leningrad State University, graduating in 1975.

In 1997, he earned a degree in economics from the St. Petersburg Mining University.

I throw that out there just to give you an idea of how highly educated he is.

Alexander Ulyanov had always been the quiet one, the brilliant one, the one who could lose himself for hours in a book about earthworms or chemical reactions.

Now home from St. Petersburg University, he moved through the house like a sleepwalker.

He'd sit at the piano but wouldn't play.

He'd pick up his old microscope but wouldn't look through it.

Inside, something was wrong with Sasha.

Alexander Ulyanov had always been the quiet one, the brilliant one, the one who could lose himself for hours in a book about earthworms or chemical reactions.

Now home from St. Petersburg University, he moved through the house like a sleepwalker.

He'd sit at the piano but wouldn't play.