
Leagues of Laughter
War, comedy and the Soviet legacy in Russia and Ukraine
A. Austin Garey (Author)
Leagues of Laughter traces how a Soviet-created youth game changed as students’ nation states collapsed, competed and went to war. The game, called KVN (Klub veselykh i nakhodchivykh, or Club of the Cheerful and Clever), spread to universities across the USSR in the 1960s. It is scored by a panel of judges, like figure skating, but is played in school and university leagues, much like football. KVN rocketed to mass popularity, oddly, due to Soviet censorship.
Young people could not protest in essays, speeches or fiction, but the referents of live jokes are hard to prove. KVN became a forum for Aesopian free speech. Soviet pedagogues promoted the game as a wholesome, intellectual youth activity, leading to a preponderance of ordinary schoolchildren gaining at least some experience writing jokes. Even after the fall of the USSR, millions of young people across the former Soviet bloc continued playing KVN in schools, universities and semi-pro leagues. Drawing on fieldwork in Russia and Ukraine between 2015 and 2019, Garey compares KVN traditions in two post-Soviet nation states at war. A series of interconnected, cross-border stories spanning 60 years illustrates how laughter and oppression entwined in the long cultural context of the war in Ukraine.
List of figures
List of tables
Note on transliteration and transcription
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Tradition and change
1 Origins
2 Traditions
3 Ruptures
4 Continuity
5 Censorship and circulation
6 Signs
Coda: Humour and hope
Glossary: KVN terms
Bibliography
Index
DOI: 10.14324/111.9781800088818
Publication date: 28 August 2025
PDF ISBN: 9781800088818
EPUB ISBN: 9781800088825
Read Online ISBN: 9781800088818
Hardback ISBN: 9781800088795
Paperback ISBN: 9781800088801
A. Austin Garey (Author) 
A. Austin Garey is Postdoctoral Research Scholar at the Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.
‘Smart, funny, and by turns painfully sad, Leagues of Laughter shows how comedy became civil society in a formerly socialist world. Garey writes with insight and compassion about those who, even today, joust on battlegrounds of ruse and truth.’
Bruce Grant, New York University
‘An invaluable contribution to anthropology, this thorough study of a widely popular Soviet-born game proves that deep cultural immersion helps achieve the seemingly impossible – to understand the humour of another culture, not only in times of peace, but also of war.’
Emil Draitser, Hunter College
‘Sophisticated and original, Leagues of Laughter explores transformations of comedy in Russia and Ukraine. It insightfully shows how people continue to laugh even during times of authoritarianism and war.’
Neringa Klumbyte, Miami University
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