Russian Literature Commons^™

Ideology In Literature And Literature As Ideology: Totalitarian And Reactionary Appropriation Of Resistant Texts, Huntley Hughes

Master’s Theses

This thesis seeks to explore the means by which nominally or potentially resistant texts are appropriated into violent or exploitative political structures for propaganda and profit. In the first chapter two pre-soviet Russian novels closely associated with the radical tradition are examined, through the lens of literary analysis, in order to uncover the ways in which ideologically egalitarian revolutionary movements can degenerate into authoritarian regimes. The second chapter is concerned with a Welsh text, How Green Was My Valley, which, despite being concerned with the conditions of the Welsh mining class, utilizes the narrative form of childhood recollection to insidiously …

Fatum Ad Benedictum: Moscow-Petushki, Homo Sovieticus, Postmodernism And The Fatidic Post-Soviet Irony Of Venedikt Vasilevich Erofeev, Paul N. Kleiman

Honors Papers

The following honors thesis is structured into two parts, four chapters apiece.

The first part is a philological study of the Soviet dissident and writer Venedikt Vasilevich Erofeev’s magnum opus, Moscow-Petushki (1969-70). This half of the thesis investigates Petushki in light of its thematic development of fate, or, more particularly, the fate of homo sovieticus—the ironic term devised by Soviet sociologist Aleksandr Zinovyev (1922-2006) to describe a typical conformist citizen of the Soviet Union. I will focus predominantly on Petushki’s connection to the end of the Khrushchev “Thaw” in the early-mid-1960s and the beginning of Brezhnev “Stagnation” in the late-1960s, …

How Do You Depict The Life Of A Soul?: Word And Text In And As Image In Soviet Nonconformist Art, Matthew Blong

MA Theses

Visual artworks by Soviet nonconformist artists, especially those associated with the Moscow Conceptualist and Sots-Art movements of the mid-1960s to mid-1980s, prominently feature experimentations with word and text—both in and as image—for a wide variety of reasons that have been studied by scholars of Soviet and Russian art.

In this paper, a formal and conceptual analysis of nearly thirty text-and-image artworks by nonconformist artists of the period traces the motivations and inspirations for this highly creative and generative practice. Beginning with the desire to resume where the historic Russian avant-garde had left off, these artworks challenge notions of language as …

Citizens United V The Federal Election Commission, Inverted Totalitarianism And Contemporary Fiction, Cory R. Chambers

PSU McNair Scholars Online Journal

In this paper I will explore the results of the 2010 Supreme Court Citizens United vs The Federal Election Commission as reflected in the contemporary literature. I will look at the role the corporation plays in American politics post Citizens United. My primary texts is the novel Super Sad True Love Story. My research question is: did the Citizens United decision open the door for ‘inverted totalitarianism’ to seep through the cracks of American society Using the allegorical novel Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart, I will show how Citizens United, the political theory of …

For Narrativity: How Creating Narratives Structures Experience And Self, Natallia Stelmak Schabner

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation responds to the challenge to narrativity posed by Galen Strawson in “Against Narrativity,” where he claims that not everyone is Narrative by nature and that there is no reason to be. I make my claim “For Narrativity” as a mental process of form finding and coherence seeking over time that is an inherent mental activity and essential for experience of one’s Self. I make my case through examinations of our experience of time, our use of language, how we plan, and our sense of Self. In the first chapter, I show that considering Narrativity as viewing life as …

Tuff Breeches, Arkadiy Ryabin

Theses and Dissertations

In consideration of language and it’s relationship to information and knowledge, the author explores personal set of events in relationship to that of the public, via forms of orality. 19th century American literature is posited as a hangover influencing contemporary events.

Are You My Venus In Fur? Masochism In German Literature And Film Through A Deleuzian Lens, Kristen Anderson, Adam Woodis, Faculty Advisor

John Wesley Powell Student Research Conference

No abstract provided.

The Invisible Protagonist: A Reassessment Of Brecht's The Good Person Of Szechwan, Diana Moody, Adam Woodis, Faculty Advisor

John Wesley Powell Student Research Conference

No abstract provided.

Zamyatin's Reception Of Wells's Fiction, Natalia Aksenova, Marina Khatyamova

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In their article "Zamyatin's Reception of Well's Fiction," Natalia Aksenova and Marina Albertovna Khatyamova examine several essays written by Yevgeny Zamyatin on Herbert Wells's texts and analyse Zamyatin's reception of Wells's work. Wells's ironic mindset, plot-driven writings, and attraction to parody drew Zamyatin's attention. Zamyatin felt a rapport with the central role of plot dynamics, unorthodox socialist politics, and dystopian tendencies in Wells's fiction. Discussions of the artistic qualities of Wells's writings allow Zamyatin to expound upon his own aesthetic program, known as "synthetism." In these discussions Zamyatin interprets Wells's work as a complex interpretation of technological modernity where the …

Tolstoy And Spirituality (Library Resources), Holy Cross Libraries

Library Resources for Campus Events

A bibliography of resources available through the Holy Cross Libraries which provide additional information related to “Tolstoy and Spirituality,” a conference held at the College of the Holy Cross April 21-22, 2017.

in this conference, an international slate of authors and scholars of Tolstoy's writings analyze his works of fiction and non-fiction to assess the viability and fruitfulness of his approach to Christianity.

Margarita As Supernatural Woman: Bulgakov's Subversion Of The Superfluous Man In The Master And Margarita, Jana Marie Domanico

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The paper explores the shifting definitions of the superfluous man through Russian history through the 19th century up until the Soviet era. The paper then examines Mikhail Bulgakov's subversion of the character trope in The Master and Margarita through his creation of Margarita, the supernatural woman. The author critiques Bulgakov's character Margarita through a feminist lens and then proceeds to examine work from Russian female writers who are historically undervalued. By comparing The Master and Margarita to the work of Teffi and Tatyana Tolstaya, the author hopes to reveal that in their use of Russian folklore and magical realism, the …

Adapting Skazki: How American Authors Reinvent Russian Fairy Tales, Sarah Krasner

Scripps Senior Theses

Adaptations of works have the potential to bring their subject matter to a new audience. This thesis explores the adaptation of Russian fairy tales into novels by authors Orson Scott Card and Joy Preble by looking at how they present Russian fairy tales, folkloric figures, and fairy tale structure to an American audience.

The Genetics Of Morality: Policing Science In Dudintsev’S White Robes, Yvonne Howell

Languages, Literatures, and Cultures Faculty Publications

The Men and women in White Robes (Belye odezhdv), Vladimir Dudinstev's fictional account of the banning of genetics in the Soviet Union, are acutely aware that in the 20th century, the study of the fruit fly is the study of man. The key to unraveling the mystery of human nature lies in the easily observed chromosomes of the forbidden fly (drosophila melanogaster). Under Stalin, the banned geneticists were branded “Morganists” after their hero Thomas Hunt Morgan, the Columbia University researcher who pioneered the technique of mapping locations on drosophila chromosomes to specific traits in the flies. To …

An Unusual State Of Matter (Russian Translation), Victor Fet

Biological Sciences Faculty Research

A selection of science poems by Roald Hoffmann (Cornell University). Translated into Russian by Victor Fet. Dedicated to the 80th birthday of this famous chemist.

The Eurasian Agenda: The International Relations Of Kyrgyzstan, Azamat Baiyzbekov

Master's Theses

The disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of the newly independent states in Central Asia are among the most important historical events of the 20^th century. As one of these newly independent and sovereign state, Kyrgyzstan found itself in the sphere of the geopolitical rivalry among the Great Powers, such as the U.S., Russia, and China. Even though a relatively small and militarily weak state, Kyrgyzstan came to play an important role in their Eurasian agenda. In this thesis, I examine in detail the international relations of Kyrgyzstan with all its neighboring states, but focus extensively on …

Around Sonja: On The First Russian Translation, Victor Fet

Biological Sciences Faculty Research

The first Russian translation of Wonderland was published anonymously in 1879 as Sonja v tsarstvie diva (Sonja in a Kingdom of Wonder, hereinafter referred to as Sonja).¹ Deep Victorian mysteries surround it. Its translator remains unknown—but a hint from Lewis Carroll himself leads one to Russian aristocrats, patrons of the arts, and famous writers. Its readership is undocumented, but the faces of children who most likely first read this book are still well known in Russia today, having been painted by the most famous nineteenth-century Russian artists. Further, as one looks carefully at the text itself, one …

A Mid-Range Episode Reading Of Odoevsky's The Cosmorama, Slobodan Sucur

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article "A Mid-range Episode Reading of Odoevsky's The Cosmorama" Slobodan Sucur argues that a focus on David S. Miall's theories of foregrounding and the mid-range episode may help to minimize ambiguities and contradictions that often emerge in readings of Gothic literature. The example focused on in the article is Vladimir Odoevsky's 1839 novella The Cosmorama. Sucur elaborates on the idea that the fantastic and sublime are naturally reader-receptive and anticipate some aspects of Miall's theory. In relation to this Sucur also discusses the possibility that mid-range episode reading may help bridge the gap between some tenets …

Readers In Pursuit Of Popular Justice: Unraveling Conflicting Frameworks In Lolita, Innesa Ranchpar

English (MA) Theses

This thesis examines the competing frameworks in Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita—the fictional Foreword written by John Ray, Jr., Ph.D. and the manuscript written by Humbert Humbert—in order to understand to what extent the construction manipulates the rhetorical appeal. While previous scholarship isolates the two narrators or focuses on their unreliability, my examination concentrates on the interplay of the frameworks and how their conflicting objectives can be problematic for readers. By drawing upon various theories by Michel Foucault from Power/Knowledge and Louis Althusser’s “On Ideology,” I look into how John Ray, Jr., Ph.D. and Humbert Humbert use authoritative voices to directly …

Risd Cabaret 1987-2000 Retrospective Program, Agnieszka Taborska, Bill Newkirk, Risd Archives

RISD Cabaret 1987-2000 Retrospective

No abstract provided.

Risd Cabaret 1987-2000 Retrospective Poster, Agnieszka Taborska, Bill Newkirk, Risd Archives

RISD Cabaret 1987-2000 Retrospective

No abstract provided.