Eduard Limonov (b. 1943) remains one of the most controversial figures in Russia today. From a minor samizdat poet of the early seventies to a best-selling author and a leader of the National-Bol&soft;&shachek;evik party in the nineties, the Limonov phenomenon has drawn varied interpretations (Matich, Titunik, Smirnov, Zholkovsky, Beraha, Ryan-Hayes). None of these interpretations, however, has explored Limonov's participation in the Moscow avant-garde group Konkret whose founders and members (Bax&chachek;anjan, Sapgir, and others) promoted the aesthetics of the Russian futurists and Oberiu. When examined in the context of Konkret's literary aspirations, Limonov's best works (Russkoe, Èto ja—Èdi&chachek;ka, and Dnevnik neuda&chachek;nika) exhibit systematic reliance on the group's distinguishing feature: epatage. By 1974, this principle acquires a metaliterary reality as can be seen in Limonov's conflation of biographical and fictional narratives in the New York and the Xar&soft;kov trilogies. Finally, Limonov's epatage of the last decade is most effectively expressed in cultivating and celebrating a plurality of public identities—an ultra-nationalist, a bisexual, a bohemian, a male chauvinist, and more.