 Due to its effects on the way of life of the rural residents of the Angara valley, dam construction was criticized by a number of Soviet intellectuals, in particular by the Irkutsk writer Valentin Rasputin - both in his novel "Farewell to Matyora" (1976) and in his non-fiction book "Siberia, Siberia" (1991).The Angara is navigable by modern watercraft on several isolated sections