The final chapter considers how Ilf and Petrov responded to the cultural crackdown, show trials, and purges that confronted them when they returned to the Soviet Union. In the travelogue’s penultimate chapter, “Anxious Life,” the anxiety that the writers attributed to capitalism provided an ambivalent and ironic framework for their explicit and implicit comparisons. Emphasizing the “anxiety” caused by the Stalinist purges, the chapter considers a range of possible readings of Ilf and Petrov’s claim that Soviet people were calmer and happier than Americans. The chapter concludes with an analysis of American and Soviet reviewers’ varied responses to the travelogue and asks: To what extent did Ilf and Petrov’s epic American road trip confirm their presuppositions? Did it allow them to glimpse the United States, the Soviet Union, and perhaps themselves anew?

The four chapters in Part V reconstruct Ilf and Petrov’s California adventures. By the time the writers arrived in San Francisco in early December, they were exhausted and homesick. However, because they had work to do, Ilf and Petrov remained in California for nearly a month. In the Golden State, the writers became active participants in American life as both Soviet cultural emissaries and minor Hollywood players. Part V examine how and to what degree their direct engagement with Americans transformed or reinforced everyone’s presuppositions.