Irvine Welsh isn't pleased. The author – who has three instances of "cunt", one of "fuck" and one of "fucking" on the first page of his novel Trainspotting – has just learned about Russia's planned clampdown on "foul language". According to CNN, Vladimir Putin signed a law this week that will not only implement a ban on, and fines for, explicit language in plays and films, but will require books that contain swearing to be sold in sealed packages with explicit-language warnings.

According to The Moscow Times, "the law has been met with both criticism and shock, as swearing has been a vital component of Russian art, with some of the nation's best poets and playwrights using curse words prolifically, from classical Alexander Pushkin to contemporary post-modernist Vladimir Sorokin." Russian philosopher Vadim Rudnev told the paper that the attempts to regulate language made the government increasingly resemble a criminal gang. "They want to designate their territory – this can be said and this cannot," he said. "In reality it is a common practice to swear among the intelligentsia."

The moves are "just the thin end of a really nasty wedge", says Welsh, whose latest novel, The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins has one "bullshit", one "pussy" and one "fucking" on its opening page. "It seems to be an attempt to erase and/or marginalise certain cultures, ie the working class, the ghetto, and so on. Language is a living, organic thing. If you start to try to control that and prescribe what people say, the next thing is prescribing what people think."

Trainspotting, says Welsh, "wouldn't have worked without swearing – nor would James Kelman's Booker prize-winning How Late It Was, How Late, or John King's Football Factory."

It's worth remembering that Tolstoy himself wasn't averse to a bit of blue language. As Ivan Bunin's biography of the writer reveals, "even when, as a very old man, he would tell an anecdote in the presence of ladies, he could let loose words that were not normally said aloud."

As yet, a list of objectionable words has not been issued, with the legislation proposing that a panel of independent experts determine the "words and phrases not meeting the norms of modern Russian literary language". Writers' group English PEN has already condemned the move. Robert Sharp, its head of campaigns, says: "Swear words exist in every language and are part of everyday speech. Russian artists will no longer be able reflect genuine, everyday speech. Instead, they will have to sacrifice authenticity in order to please a committee of censors. This new law sends the signal that law-makers want to sanitise and silence the voice of ordinary Russians."

In recent years, Sharp adds, we have witnessed Russia's slow slide into authoritarianism, with impunity for the killers of Anna Politkovskaya, the prosecution of Pussy Riot, and the ban on discussing homosexuality. "These things have all squeezed the space for free speech in Russia. The government claims it is 'protecting and developing culture', but the effect will be to ensure that culture becomes staid, uniform and boring."

Tolstoy … also partial to a spot of blue language. Photograph: Harlingue/Roger-Viollet/Rex Features

Russia is not the only country in which authorities ban literature deemed offensive. In 2013, the children's series Captain Underpants took a starring role in Banned Books Week by beating Fifty Shades of Grey to the title of most challenged book in US libraries. Author Dav Pilkey anticipated the furore by prefacing the first of the 10-book series with a "Sturgeon General's Warning" that says: "Some material in this book may be considered offensive by people who don't wear underwear."

Welsh hopes that the Russian legislation will prove similarly counterproductive. "It sets the regime up for ridicule, particularly from younger people – and it should do, too," he said. "It just makes the regime seem very infantile."

Classic British works to outrage Putin …

Trainspotting, by Irvine Welsh

Choose us. Choose life. Choose mortgage payments; choose washing machines; choose cars; choose sitting oan a couch watching mind-numbing and spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fuckin junk food intae yir mooth. Choose rotting away, pishing and shiteing yersel in a home, a total fuckin embarrassment tae the selfish, fucked-up brats ye've produced. Choose life.

How Late It Was, How Late, by James Kelman

Ach it was hopeless. That was what ye felt. These bastards. What can ye do but. Except start again so he started again. That was what he did he started again … ye just plough on, ye plough on, ye just fucking plough on … ye just fucking push ahead, ye get fucking on with it.

This Be the Verse, by Philip Larkin

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.

They may not mean to, but they do.

They fill you with the faults they had

And add some extra, just for you.

The Miller's Tale, by Geoffrey Chaucer

This Absolon gan wype his mouth ful drie.

Derk was the nyght as pich, or as a cole

An at the wyndow out she putte her hole,

and Ansolon, hym fil no bet ne wers

But with his mouth he kiste hir naked ers

Ful savorly, er he were war of this.

Aback he stirte and thoghte it was amys,

For wel he wiste a womman hath no berd,

He felte a thyng al rough and long yherd,

And seyde, "Fy! Allas! what have I to do?"