>'1935 Travelogue' is a very nice book. It was printed in 60s, probably, the only trustworthy book about America that was allowed to be printed in Soviet Union. Actually, Ilf & Petrov had to add couple chapters at the end 'condemning imperialiasm'; without them it was a good book, imo; not "12 Chairs" level, but close to "Golden Calf".

These guys were the Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett of their time & place, indeed. The amount of memorable, or rather legendary, quotes per megabyte of text in their books is quite high. How did that one about gasoline and ideas go? That's entrepreneurship.