The author himself characterizes the novel “Chapaev and Void” as: “This is the first work in world literature where the action takes place in absolute emptiness.”
In reality, it takes place in 1919 in Chapaev’s division, where the main hero—a decadent poet, Pyotr Void—serves as a commissar, and also, as always in Pelevin’s works, in virtual space, where the characters meet with Kawabata, Schwarzenegger, “Just Maria”…
According to critics, “Chapaev and Void” is the “first serious Zen Buddhist novel in Russian literature.”