Advanced studies in the several fields of Slavic literatures and linguistics. Content varies.

This seminar will explore Russian literature produced in exile. Starting in the 19th century with Alexander Herzen’s newspaper “Kolokol,” we will go up to the present day and examine texts arising from the migration of writers from Russia after its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Using Joseph’s Brodsky essay “A Condition We Call Exile” (1988) as our starting point of inspiration and scepticism, we will ask ourselves the questions: how does displacement condition various authorial positions and intentions? What ideological, aesthetic, and even linguistic challenges are caused by positioning oneself as an outsider, and what do these challenges help writers achieve? At a broader level, we will pose the questions: how did Soviet and émigré literature influence one another? What strategies should we employ in order to elucidate the global contexts in which the writing of Russophone literature took place? To what extent can Russian Modernism be considered a part of global Modernism? How should we understand the connection between “diasporic” writing and the literature of the “metropole” in today’s internet age? In what ways do “waves” of emigration remain a meaningful paradigm for the study of 20th-century literature when the boundary between émigré and Soviet literature is understood to be more porous? In addition to the inescapable duo of Nabokov and Brodsky, we will also consider the works of Shklovsky, Teffi, Gazdanov, Elagin, Khodasevich, Berberova, Limonov, Dovlatov, Losev, Glazova, and Ostashevsky.

Repeat Rules