Russian Modernism: The Transfiguration of the Everyday

by Stephen C. Hutchings

Overview

This book interprets the baffling complex of meanings attached by Russian culture to the concept of everyday life, or byt, and assesses its impact on Russian modernist narrative. Drawing on modern literary theory and theology, Stephen C. Hutchings argues that byt emerged from a dialogue between two aesthetic systems, one predominant in Western Catholic and Protestant cultures, the other reflected in Orthodox iconic traditions. He offers provocative, yet careful, readings of key narrative texts from the period.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521024495
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/09/2006
Series:	Cambridge Studies in Russian Literature
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	316
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.54(h) x 0.75(d)

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments; Introduction; Part I: 1. Narrative and the everyday: myth, image, sign, icon, life; 2. The development of byt in nineteenth-century Russian literature; Part II: 3. Enacting the present: Chekhov, art and the everyday; 4. Fedor Sologub's aesthetics of narrative excess; Part III: 5. The struggle with byt in Belyi's Kotik Letaev and The Christened Chinaman; 6. Breaking the circle of the self: Vasilii Rozanov's discourse of pure intimacy; 7. At the 'I' of the storm: the iconic self in Remizov's Whirlwind Russia; Conclusion; Notes; Bibliography; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"This first study devoted to the subject is welcome for its rich, informed theoretical discussion....A book for graduate students and researchers." Choice

"Russian Modernism will be useful to anyone with an interest in either Silver Age prose fiction or the interaction between Russian religious thought and Russian culture." Steven Cassedy, Slavic Review

"Stephen Hutching's densely written book rewards the diligent reader with a sophisticated, well-illustrated, and convincing analysis of the function of byt (routine life) in twentieth-century Russian literature. Hutching's work...provides fresh, insightful close readings of salient Silver Age texts...Even more important, however, Hutchings convincingly traces how the struggle in Russian literature between are and "real life" achieves its ultimate transposition through Silver Age literature....it merits careful attention by any serious scholar of twentieth-century Russian literature and cultural studies." The Russian Review, vol.59

From the Publisher