26.4.05

Yo! It's Ё

Ulianovsk in Russia is the birthplace of two famous people: Lenin and Karamzin. When Lenin fell out of favour, tourists stopped going to the town because after reading "Poor Liza" no one is going to want to visit Karamzin's hometown. The residents of Ulianovsk must have known this because they considered putting up a monument to the Russian letter "ё," which Karamzin invented, although that's probably another reason to dislike the man. He's the reason Westerners pronounce Gorbachev incorrectly (that last letter is a "yo" and it gets the stress). Nothing came of the proposal except for the temporary monument in front of the the permanent monument to Karamzin.

Photo by ITAR-TASS

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