[tuke]

I don't know why, but in my Soviet literature course in college (early 1980s) we read Cement. Maybe it was on syllabi back then because there was also an English translation. (Now that I look at Amazon, maybe there wasn't a translation back then.)

[ceasarby]

I was born and raised in Belarus and all these books: Evgeny Zamyatin, We Mikhail Bulgakov, Heart of a Dog Andrei Platonov, Foundation Pit Alexander Solzhenitsyn, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich Valentin Rasputin, Farewell to Matyora

were in high school program for Russian Literature in 10-11th grades.

Except for "Fyodor Gladkov, Cement". Never heard of it until today, had to look it up. Appears that this writer was in his prime in Stalin's times. Without reading his books can't say it's 100% crap, but the fact that he received 2 Stalin's Awards makes me think that the quality of literature there is not that good and he was more ideologically right for the communists than got recognition for writers talent.

You can check http://www.briefly.ru/school/ for list of mandatory Russian Literature for School Program. I'm sure, that for Foreign reader it will be more than enough to start with these books first, because they quality is tested by ages.