Russian, Soviet and post-Soviet literature from the 1900 to the present viewed in a socio-cultural and political context. The class is taught in English, on the basis of English translations; students with knowledge of Russian are encouraged to do at least some of the reading in the original.

The Russian Revolution of 1917 marked the beginning of a radical attempt to construct a new and unprecedented kind of society. It comes as no surprise that it took place in a culture with a long tradition of connecting literature to social change, and where the early-20th century avant-garde insisted on art’s ability to transform the world. This course uses the lens of utopia, understood as the desire to create an ideal society, to explore 20th century Russian literature. How did the drive to create a new social order react to the cultural legacies of the past? How were utopian visions of perfectibility informed by the Soviet embrace of technology and industry? What uncanny connections come up between the atheist utopias of Soviet communism and the eschatological traditions of Russian Orthodox Christianity? We will at once explore utopia’s underside, using “dystopia” to read works that critiqued the ideals and outcomes of the Soviet experiment. Science fiction, satire, and prison camp literature will feature prominently as works that cast doubt on the perfectibility of human society and that question the relationship of the revolution’s ideals and the reality of the society it created. Towards the end of the course we will consider texts written in the late Soviet and post-Soviet periods that reflect on the 20th century’s utopian experiments and its legacies.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills