Epic and the Russian Novel from Gogol to Pasternak

Frederick T. Griffiths; Stanley J. Rabinowitz

book: Epic and the Russian Novel from Gogol to Pasternak

Open Access Published by Academic Studies Press 2011

Epic and the Russian Novel from Gogol to Pasternak

Frederick T. Griffiths and Stanley J. Rabinowitz
Funded by: National Endowment for the Humanities and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Humanities Open Book Program

In the series Studies in Russian and Slavic Literatures, Cultures, and History

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781618116826

Overview
Contents

About this book

Epic and the Russian Novel from Gogol to Pasternak examines the origin of the nineteen- century Russian novel and challenges the Lukács-Bakhtin theory of epic. By removing the Russian novel from its European context, the authors reveal that it developed as a means of reconnecting the narrative form with its origins in classical and Christian epic in a way that expressed the Russian desire to renew and restore ancient spirituality. Through this methodology, Griffiths and Rabinowitz dispute Bakhtin’s classification of epic as a monophonic and dead genre whose time has passed. Due to its grand themes and cultural centrality, the epic is the form most suited to newcomers or cultural outsiders seeking legitimacy through appropriation of the past. Through readings of Gogol’s Dead Souls—a uniquely problematic work, and one which Bakhtin argued was novelistic rather than epic—Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov, Pasternak’s Dr. Zhivago, and Tolstoy’s War and Peace, this book redefines “epic” and how we understand the sweep of Russian literature as a whole.

Author / Editor information

Stanley J. Rabinowitz (Ph.D. Harvard University) teaches Russian language and literature at Amherst College. He has taught at the University of California at Berkeley and has been the Max Hayward Fellow in Russian Literature at St. Antony's College, Oxford. His research interests include modern Russian prose and Russian classical dance during the first quarter of the twentieth century. Frederick Griffiths (Ph.D. Harvard University) is Class of 1880 Professor of Greek and Professor of Women's and Gender Studies, Amherst College. His primary focus has focused on relationship of literature and politics in Hellenistic Alexandria (Theocritus and Apollonius Rhodius), 19th and 20th century Russian (with S. J. Rabinowitz: Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Pasternak), and 20th century America (Willa Cather, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, Charles Johnson). He is the author of Theocritus at Court: articles on Apollonius Rhodius, Willa Cather, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison.

Reviews

Judith E. Kalb, University of South Carolina:
"Felicitous phrasing throughout (the Odyssey as “the grandfather of all Baedekers,” 155) renders this erudite volume a pleasure to read and ponder. Griffiths and Rabinowitz have created an exemplary and inspirational work of interdisciplinary scholarship. Any scholar of Slavic studies, classics, Russian intellectual history, or the classical heritage should gladly welcome this book."

John M. Kopper, Dartmouth College:
“Griffiths and Rabinowitz reveal the genre's liveliness, fluidity, and seemingly limitless ability to assert itself in modern letters. Newarly every sentence rewards, and will provoke serious readers to pause and think. The impressive erudition and critical imagination which Griffiths/Rabinowitz combine make one hope that this ancient/modern pair of critical bogatyri will sally forth again.”

Topics

Frontmatter Open Access Download PDF	1
CONTENTS Open Access Download PDF	5
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Open Access Download PDF	6
PREFACE Open Access Download PDF	9
1. Epic and Novel Open Access Download PDF	11
2. Gogol in Rome Open Access Download PDF	50
3. Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov Open Access Download PDF	117
4. Tolstoy and Homer Open Access Download PDF	144
5. Doctor Zhivago and the Tradition of National Epic Open Access Download PDF	176
6. Stalin and the Death of Epic: Mikhail Bakhtin, Nadezhda Mandelstam, Boris Pasternak Open Access Download PDF	195
Works Cited Open Access Download PDF	218
Index Open Access Download PDF	231

Language: English
Publisher: Academic Studies Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 240

eBook

Published: December 17, 2017
ISBN: 9781618116826