Orsinian Tales is a collection of eleven short stories by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin , most of them set in the imaginary East European country of Orsinia.
71-593: The stories share few links except those derived from the use of a common geographical setting; the only link between characters appears in the stories Brothers and Sisters and A Week in the Country , both of which deal with members of the Fabbre family (whose history is continued in the later story Unlocking the Air ). Common to all the stories, however, are emotionally moving personal events—often, though not always, romantic—set against
142-632: A court theatre in 1672. Its director and playwright was Johann Gottfried Gregorii, a German-Russian pastor, who wrote, in particular, the 10-hour play The Action of Artaxerxes . The poetry and dramaturgy of Symeon of Polotsk and Demetrius of Rostov contributed to the development of the Russian version of the Baroque. In the 17th century, when bookmen from the Kiev Academy arrived in Moscow, they brought with them
213-530: A culture heavily influenced by the educational system of the Polish Jesuits . Mentioned Symeon of Polotsk created a new style which fused elements of ancient and contemporary Western European literature with traditional Russian rhetoric and the imperial ideology, which marked a key step in the Westernization of Russian literature. Syllabic poetry was also brought to Russia, and the work of Simeon of Polotsk
284-436: A flowering of literary talent: poet Vasily Zhukovsky and later his protégé Alexander Pushkin came to the fore. Mikhail Lermontov was one of the most important poets and novelists. Nikolai Gogol and Ivan Turgenev wrote masterful short stories and novels. Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy became internationally renowned. Other important figures were Ivan Goncharov , Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin and Nikolai Leskov . In
355-591: A growing respect for, or at least ambivalence toward, a female ruler in Catherine the Great. This concept heralded an era of regarding female characteristics in writing as an abstract concept linked with attributes of frivolity, vanity and pathos. Some writers, on the other hand, were more direct in their praise for Catherine II. Gavrila Romanovich Derzhavin , famous for his odes, often dedicated his poems to Empress Catherine II. In contrast to most of his contemporaries, Derzhavin
426-474: A leading international dramatist. Other important 19th-century developments included Sergey Aksakov 's semi-autobiographical writings; the father of Russian social realism poetry school, known for the sharp epic poem Who Can Be Happy and Free in Russia? Nikolay Nekrasov ; the fabulist Ivan Krylov ; the precursor to Naturalism Aleksey Pisemsky ; non-fiction writers such as the critic Vissarion Belinsky and
497-485: A liturgical language and became used as a literary language. The native Russian vernacular remained the use within oral literature as well as written for decrees, laws, messages, chronicles , military tales, and so on. By the Age of Enlightenment , literature had grown in importance, and from the early 1830s, Russian literature underwent an astounding "Golden Age" in poetry, prose and drama. The Romantic movement contributed to
568-460: A novel mix of narration, autobiography, and aesthetic as well as social commentary, and Yury Tynyanov (1893–1943), who used his knowledge of Russia's literary history to produce a set of historical novels mainly set in the Pushkin era (e.g., Lieutenant Kijé , Pushkin in three parts, 1935–43, and others). Following the establishment of Bolshevik rule, Vladimir Mayakovsky worked on interpreting
639-792: A pilgrimage is The Pilgrimage of the Abbot Daniel , which records the journey of Daniel the Traveller to the Holy Land . Complex epic works such as The Tale of the Destruction of Ryazan recall the havoc caused by the Mongol invasions. Other notable Russian literary works include Zadonschina , Physiologist , Synopsis and A Journey Beyond the Three Seas . Medieval Russian literature had an overwhelmingly religious character and used an adapted form of
710-456: A precedent for the remainder of the 18th century as Russian writers began to form clear ideas about the proper use and progression of the Russian language. Through their debates regarding versification of the Russian language and tone of Russian literature, the writers in the first half of the 18th century were able to lay foundation for the more poignant, topical work of the late 18th century. Satirist Antiokh Dmitrievich Kantemir , 1708–1744,
781-403: A review of Malafrena , Greg Costikyan commented that Russian literature Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia , its émigrés , and to Russian-language literature. Major contributors to Russian literature, as well as English for instance, are authors of different ethnic origins, including bilingual writers, such as Kyrgyz novelist Chinghiz Aitmatov . At
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#1732869527309852-465: A turning point in Old Russian literature as both the church and state lost control over the written word, which are reflected in the texts of writers such as Avraamy Palitsyn who developed a literary technique for representing complex characters. In the second half of the 17th century, the literature of Baroque took shape, primarily due to the initiative of tsar Alexis of Russia , who wanted to open
923-427: Is Russian philosophy , which reached its peak at this time (see works of Nikolai Berdyaev , Pavel Florensky , Semyon Frank , Nikolay Lossky , Vasily Rozanov , and others). Tramp squares with rebellious treading! Up heads! As proud peaks be seen! In the second flood we are spreading Every city on earth will be clean. Vladimir Mayakovsky , Our March (1917), translation The first years of
994-462: Is a pre-realistic novel in verse, Eugene Onegin (1833). Other poets important to the movement include Konstantin Batyushkov , Pyotr Vyazemsky , Yevgeny Baratynsky , Fyodor Tyutchev and Dmitry Venevitinov , along with the novelists Antony Pogorelsky , Alexander Bestuzhev and "Russian Hoffmann" Vladimir Odoyevsky . Tyutchev is best known for the following verse: Who would grasp Russia with
1065-458: Is fundamentally the Russian vernacular." Old Russian "bookish" literature traces its beginnings to the introduction of Old Church Slavonic in Kievan Rus' as a liturgical language in the late 10th century following Christianization . The East Slavs soon developed their own literature, and the oldest dated manuscript of Early Russian as well all-Slavic literature that has survived to this day
1136-423: Is known for his satirical chronicle The History of a Town (1870) and the family saga The Golovlyov Family (1880), which are considered his masterpieces. Nikolai Leskov is best remembered for his shorter fiction and for his (together with Pavel Melnikov ) unique skaz techniques, namely oral form of narrative stylization. Late in the century Anton Chekhov emerged as a master of the short story as well as
1207-441: Is mine, and that is also mine." And the princes began to pronounce of a paltry thing, 'this is great'; and themselves amongst them to forge feuds; and the heathens from all sides advanced with victories against the Russian land. — The Tale of Igor's Campaign , 2.1 ( c. 1185 ), translated by Leonard A. Magnus The main type of Old Russian historical literature were chronicles , most of them anonymous. The oldest one
1278-528: Is rare sample of the Rococo style, erotic light poetry in Russia. Alexander Nikolayevich Radishchev , for example, shocked the Russian public with his depictions of the socio-economic condition of the serfs . Empress Catherine II condemned this portrayal, forcing Radishchev into exile in Siberia . Others, however, picked topics less offensive to the autocrat . the historian and writer Nikolay Karamzin , 1766–1826,
1349-410: Is that it takes place in the imaginary Central European country of Orsinia , which is also the setting of her collection Orsinian Tales . In many ways, Malafrena reads like a 19th-century novel , with its many detailed characters, its political and romantic subplots, its lack of the supernatural, and its settings that range from the mansions of the aristocracy to slums and a prison. Malafrena
1420-727: Is the Primary Chronicle or Tale of Nestor the Chronicler (c. 1115). The oldest surviving manuscripts include the Laurentian Codex of 1377 and the Hypatian Codex dating to the 1420s. Anonymous works include The Tale of Igor's Campaign (a 12th century prose poem masterpiece) and Praying of Daniel the Immured . Hagiographies ( Russian : жития святых , romanized : zhitiya svyatykh , lit. 'lives of
1491-583: Is the Novgorod Codex or Novgorod Psalter written c. 1000, unearthed in 2000 at Veliky Novgorod , containing four wooden tablet pages filled with wax. Another earliest Russian book is the Ostromir Gospels written in 1056–1057, which belongs to the set of liturgical texts that were translated from other languages. The discord of the princes ruined them against the Pagans. For, brother spake to brother;—"This
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#17328695273091562-399: Is traditionally referred to as the "Golden Era" of Russian literature. The period of Romantic literature saw the flowering of poetic talent, in particular; the names of Vasily Zhukovsky and his protégé Alexander Pushkin came to the fore. Pushkin is credited with crystallizing the literary Russian language and introducing a new level of artistry to Russian literature. His best-known work
1633-528: Is written for an adult audience, rather than children and young adults, the target readership of most of Le Guin's works in the period of 1979–1994. The story takes place from 1825 to 1830, when Orsinia is ruled by the Austrian Empire . The hero is Itale Sorde , the son of the owner of an estate on a lake called Malafrena in a valley of the same name. Itale leaves the estate, against his father's will, to engage in nationalistic and revolutionary politics in
1704-687: The Cubo-Futurism with practice of zaum , the experimental visual and sound poetry ( David Burliuk , Velimir Khlebnikov , Aleksei Kruchenykh , Nikolai Aseyev , Vladimir Mayakovsky ); the Ego-Futurism based on a personality cult ( Igor Severyanin and Vasilisk Gnedov ); and the Acmeist poetry , a Russian modernist school, which emerged ca. 1911 and to symbols preferred direct expression through exact images ( Anna Akhmatova , Nikolay Gumilev , Georgiy Ivanov , Mikhail Kuzmin , Osip Mandelstam ). Though
1775-523: The Russian Academy of Sciences and his groundbreaking translations of French and classical works to the Russian language. A turning point in the course of Russian literature, his translation of Paul Tallemant's work Voyage to the Isle of Love , was the first to use the Russian vernacular as opposed the formal and outdated Church-Slavonic . This introduction set a precedent for secular works to be composed in
1846-515: The Russian Revolution of 1917, literature split into Soviet and white émigré parts. While the Soviet Union assured universal literacy and a highly developed book printing industry, it also established ideological censorship . In the 1930s Socialist realism became the predominant trend in Russia. Its leading figures were Nikolay Ostrovsky , Alexander Fadeyev and other writers, who laid
1917-477: The Russian nobility with an angle of critique. Fonvizin felt the nobility should be held to the standards they were under the reign of Peter the Great, during which the quality of devotion to the state was rewarded. His works criticized the current system for rewarding the nobility without holding them responsible for the duties they once performed. Using satire and comedy, Fonvizin supported a system of nobility in which
1988-600: The "Silver Age" are Anna Akhmatova , Marina Tsvetaeva , Osip Mandelstam , and Boris Pasternak . The Russian symbolism was the first Silver Age development in the 1890s. It arose enough separately from West European symbolism, emphasizing mysticism of Sophiology and defamiliarization . Its most significant figures included philosopher and poet Vladimir Solovyov (1853–1900), poets and writers Valery Bryusov (1873–1924), Fyodor Sologub (1863–1927), Vyacheslav Ivanov (1866–1949), Konstantin Balmont (1867–1942), and figures of
2059-576: The 19th century it was a dependency of the Austrian Empire ( Malafrena ). It was involved in the First World War ("Conversations at Night"), and was thereafter independent for a while. Its fate in World War ;II is not mentioned, but in 1946 or 1947 it became a satellite state in the East bloc . A revolt was attempted in 1956 ("The Road East"), but was crushed and followed by reprisals ("A Week in
2130-670: The 20th century). This country, "Orsinia", appears in Le Guin's earliest writings, and was invented by le Guin when she was a young adult learning her craft as a writer. The names Orsinia and Ursula are both derived from Latin ursus "bear" ( ursula = diminutive of ursa "female bear"; ursinus = "bear-like"). Le Guin once said that since Orsinia was her own country it should bear her name. The history of Orsinia follows, in general, that of other countries of Central Europe , particularly those formerly part of Austria-Hungary . Formerly an independent kingdom ("The Lady of Moge"), by
2201-631: The Church Slavonic language with many South Slavic elements. In the 16th century, reflecting the political centralization and unification of the country under the tsar , chronicles were updated and codified, the Russian Orthodox Church began issuing its decrees in the Stoglav , and a large compilation called the Great Menaion Reader collected both the more modern polemical texts and
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2272-420: The Country"), and Orsinia remained a repressive police state for several decades. In November 1989, following a series of non-violent protests, the government fell, to be replaced by a transitional régime promising free elections ("Unlocking the Air"). Le Guin did not publish any Orsinian stories dealing with its history since. The Orsinian stories borrow episodes from, and sometimes explicitly refer to,
2343-509: The Great , Lomonosov's works often focused on themes of the awe-inspiring, grandeur nature, and was therefore drawn to Peter because of the magnitude of his military, architectural and cultural feats. In contrast to Sumarokov's devotion to simplicity, Lomonosov favored a belief in a hierarchy of literary styles divided into high, middle and low. This style facilitated Lomonosov's grandiose, high minded writing and use of both vernacular and Church-Slavonic. The influence of Peter I and debates over
2414-578: The Northern Line" containing two tangentially linked episodes of uncertain date; and "Unlocking the Air" The last-named story extends Orsinian history to the time of the downfall of Communism in Orsinia – and the rest of Eastern Europe – in the winter of 1989. The stories are set in a fictional country somewhere in Central Europe, at different times in the period 1150–1989 (though only two take place before
2485-519: The Silver Age is famous mostly for its poetry, it produced some first-rate novelists and short-story writers, such as naturalist Aleksandr Kuprin , realists Nobel Prize winner Ivan Bunin and Vikenty Veresaev , pioneer of Russian expressionism Leonid Andreyev , symbolists Fedor Sologub , Aleksey Remizov , Dmitry Merezhkovsky , Andrei Bely , Alexander Belyaev , and Yevgeny Zamyatin , though most of them wrote poetry as well as prose. In 1915/16,
2556-568: The Soviet regime after the October Revolution of 1917, featured a proliferation of Russian avant-garde literary groups, and proletarian literature receive official support. The Imaginists were post-Revolution poetic movement, similar to English-language Imagists , that created poetry based on sequences of arresting and uncommon images. The major figures include Sergei Yesenin , Anatoly Marienhof , and Rurik Ivnev . Another important movement
2627-521: The backdrop of much larger political events such as wars and revolutions. Continually reasserted are the right of the individual—sometimes alone, but often in conjunction with others—to his or her own thoughts and emotions, not dictated by society, or convention, or the State. Additional stories in the cycle include the novel Malafrena (1979), set in the Orsinia of the 1820s; the Borges -like story "Two Delays on
2698-506: The backwardness Peter attempted to correct through his reforms. Kantemir honored this tradition of reform not only through his support for Peter, but by initiating a decade-long debate on the proper syllabic versification using the Russian language. Vasily Kirillovich Trediakovsky , a poet, playwright, essayist, translator and contemporary to Antiokh Kantemir, also found himself deeply entrenched in Enlightenment conventions in his work with
2769-581: The canal's rippled icy surface, The drug store, the street, and streetlight. Alexander Blok , Night, street and streetlight, drug store... (1912), translated by Alex Cigale The 1890s and the beginning of the 20th century ranks as the Silver Age of Russian poetry. Well-known poets of the period include: Alexander Blok , Sergei Yesenin , Valery Bryusov , Konstantin Balmont , Mikhail Kuzmin , Igor Severyanin , Sasha Chorny , Nikolay Gumilyov , Maximilian Voloshin , Innokenty Annensky , Zinaida Gippius . The poets most often associated with
2840-405: The capital. Mike Cadden notes that Malafrena has not received as much critical attention as many of le Guin's other works, primarily because the characters in the story do not connect well with one another. An imperceptible, omniscient author is used to tell the story, and le Guin herself acknowledges one of the strongest influences on her Orsinian works is Russian literature . In
2911-492: The elite were rewarded based upon personal merit rather than the hierarchal favoritism that was rampant during Catherine the Great's reign. I lay, and heard the voice of God: "Arise, oh prophet, watch and hearken, And with my Will thy soul engird, Through lands that dim and seas that darken, Burn thou men's hearts with this, my Word." Alexander Pushkin , The Prophet (1826), translated by Babette Deutsch and Avrahm Yarmolinsky The 19th century
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2982-529: The facts of the new reality. His works, such as "Ode to the Revolution" and "Left March" (both 1918), brought innovations to poetry. In "Left March", Mayakovsky calls for a struggle against the enemies of the Russian Revolution. The poem 150 000 000 (1921) discusses the leading role played by the masses in the revolution. In the poem Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1924), Mayakovsky looks at the life and work at
3053-524: The first Russian psychological novel . Aleksey K. Tolstoy and Afanasy Fet were also significant. As Romanticism came to command the stage, realistic began to flourish as well. The first great Russian novel was Dead Souls (1842) by Nikolai Gogol . The realistic natural school of fiction is said to have begun with the works of Ivan Goncharov , mainly remembered for his novel Oblomov (1859), as well as Ivan Turgenev . Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Leo Tolstoy soon became internationally renowned, to
3124-731: The foundations of this style. Ostrovsky's novel How the Steel Was Tempered has been among the most popular works of Russian Socrealist literature. Some writers, such as Mikhail Bulgakov , Andrei Platonov and Daniil Kharms were criticized and wrote with little or no hope of being published. Various émigré writers, such as poets Vladislav Khodasevich , Georgy Ivanov and Vyacheslav Ivanov ; novelists such as Ivan Shmelyov , Gaito Gazdanov , Vladimir Nabokov and Bunin, continued to write in exile. Some writers dared to oppose Soviet ideology, like Nobel Prize-winning novelist Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Varlam Shalamov , who wrote about life in
3195-409: The function and form of literature as it related to the Russian language in the first half of the 18th century set a stylistic precedent for the writers during the reign of Catherine the Great in the second half of the century. However, the themes and scopes of the works these writers produced were often more poignant, political and controversial. Ippolit Bogdanovich 's narrative poem Dushenka (1778)
3266-400: The gulag camps. The Khrushchev Thaw brought some fresh wind to literature and poetry became a mass cultural phenomenon. This "thaw" did not last long; in the 1970s, some of the most prominent authors were banned from publishing and prosecuted for their anti-Soviet sentiments. The post-Soviet end of the 20th century was a difficult period for Russian literature, with few distinct voices. Among
3337-579: The hagiographical and patristic legacy of Old Russia. The Book of Royal Degrees codified the cult of the tsar, the Domostroy laid down the rules for family life, and other texts such as the History of Kazan were used to justify the actions of the tsar. The Tale of Peter and Fevronia were among the original tales of this period, and Russian tsar Ivan IV wrote some of most original works of 16th-century Russian literature. The Time of Troubles marked
3408-486: The history of the Czech lands , as well as Hungary and other countries of Central Europe It is not however, a mere fictionalization of any real country, but rather one imagined with its own unique characteristics and history, distilled from le Guin's personal interpretation and reaction to historical events. Malafrena Malafrena is a 1979 novel by Ursula K. Le Guin . The only fantastic element of this novel
3479-577: The key figure of literary sentimentalism in Russia, for example, is known for his advocacy of Russian writers adopting traits in the poetry and prose like a heightened sense of emotion and physical vanity, considered to be feminine at the time as well as supporting the cause of female Russian writers. Karamzin's call for male writers to write with femininity was not in accordance with the Enlightenment ideals of reason and theory, considered masculine attributes. His works were thus not universally well received; however, they did reflect in some areas of society
3550-578: The leader of Russia's revolution and depicts them against a broad historical background. In the poem All Right! (1927), Mayakovsky writes about socialist society as the "springtime of humanity". Mayakovsky was instrumental in producing a new type of poetry in which politics played a major part. One of the most popular Soviet poets during the 1920s was Nikolai Tikhonov (1896–1979), a future important figure of Stalinist era, well-known for his Ballad About Nails , as follows: Could nails from such people be fashioned, you’d see That no tougher nails in
3621-505: The legacy of Peter I, writing in his manifesto Epistle on Poetry , "The great Peter hurls his thunder from the Baltic shores, the Russian sword glitters in all corners of the universe". Peter the Great's policies of westernization and displays of military prowess naturally attracted Sumarokov and his contemporaries. Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov , in particular, expressed his gratitude for and dedication to Peter's legacy in his unfinished Peter
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#17328695273093692-409: The mind? For her no yardstick was created: Her soul is of a special kind, By faith alone appreciated. An entire new generation of Romantic poets and novelists followed in Pushkin's steps. Mikhail Lermontov wrote the narrative poem Demon in 1829–39, which chronicled the love of a Byronic Demon for a mortal woman, as well as A Hero of Our Time (1841), which is often considered to be
3763-477: The most discussed authors of this period were novelists Victor Pelevin and Vladimir Sorokin , and the poet Dmitri Prigov . In the 21st century, a new generation of Russian authors appeared, differing greatly from the postmodernist Russian prose of the late 20th century, which led critics to speak about "new realism". Russian authors have significantly contributed to numerous literary genres. Russia has five Nobel Prize in literature laureates. As of 2011, Russia
3834-509: The new wave generation Alexander Blok (1880–1921) with Andrei Bely (1880–1934). New peasant poets was the conditional collective name of a group of peasant origin and country poetry trend ( Nikolai Klyuev , Pyotr Oreshin, Alexander Shiryaevets, Sergei Klychkov , Sergei Yesenin ). While the Silver Age is considered to be the development of the 19th-century Russian Golden Age literature tradition, some modernist and avant-garde poets tried to overturn it. Most prominent their movements:
3905-586: The point that scholars, such as F. R. Leavis , have frequently described them as among the greatest novelists of all time. Tolstoy's Christian anarchism can be seen in the following quote: Plants, birds, insects and children were equally joyful. Only men—grown-up men—continued cheating and tormenting themselves and each other. People saw nothing holy in this spring morning, in this beauty of God's world—a gift to all living creatures—inclining to peace, good-will and love, but worshiped their own inventions for imposing their will on each other. Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin
3976-488: The political reformer Alexander Herzen ; playwrights such as Aleksandr Griboyedov , Aleksandr Ostrovsky , Alexander Sukhovo-Kobylin and the satirist Kozma Prutkov (a collective pen name). Night, street and streetlight, drug store, The purposeless, half-dim, drab light. For all the use live on a quarter century — Nothing will change. There's no way out. You'll die — and start all over, live twice, Everything repeats itself, just as it was: Night,
4047-413: The reforms of Peter the Great , tying literary development to historical periodization. The term is generally used to refer to all forms of literary activity in what is often called Old Russia from the 11th to 17th centuries. Literary works from this period were often written in the Russian recension of Church Slavonic with varying amounts of the Russian or more broadly East Slavic vernacular. At
4118-464: The saints') formed a popular literary genre in Old Russian literature. The first notable hagiographer was Nestor the Chronicler, who wrote about the lives of Boris and Gleb , the first saints of Kievan Rus', and the abbot Theodosius . The Life of Alexander Nevsky is a well-known example, which combines political realism and hagiographical ideals, and concentrates on the key events of Alexander Nevsky 's political career. The earliest account of
4189-521: The same time, Russian-language literature does not include works by authors from the Russian Federation who write exclusively or primarily in the native languages of the indigenous non-Russian ethnic groups in Russia , thus the famous Dagestani poet Rasul Gamzatov is omitted. The roots of Russian literature can be traced to the Early Middle Ages when Old Church Slavonic was introduced as
4260-607: The same time, the native Old Russian vernacular was not only language of oral literature , such as epic poems ( bylina ) or folksongs, but it was also perfectly legitimate as written for practical purposes, such as decrees, laws (the Russkaya Pravda , the 11th–12th century, and other codes), letters (for example, the unique pre-paper birch bark manuscripts , the 11th–15th centuries, in Old Novgorod dialect ), ambassadorial messages, "in chronicles or military tales whose language
4331-454: The school of Russian Formalism , wary of the futurists and highly influential for the global theory of literary criticism and poetics , appeared; its programmatic article The Resurrection of the Word by the scholar and writer Viktor Shklovsky (1893–1984) was published in 1914, and the peak of activity occurred in the post-revolutionary '20s. An integral part of the literature of the Silver Age
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#17328695273094402-730: The second half of the century Anton Chekhov excelled in short stories and became a leading dramatist. The end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century is sometimes called the Silver Age of Russian poetry . The poets most often associated with the "Silver Age" are Konstantin Balmont , Valery Bryusov , Alexander Blok , Anna Akhmatova , Nikolay Gumilyov , Sergei Yesenin , Vladimir Mayakovsky , and Marina Tsvetaeva . This era produced novelists and short-story writers, such as Aleksandr Kuprin , Nobel Prize winner Ivan Bunin , Leonid Andreyev , Fyodor Sologub , Yevgeny Zamyatin , Alexander Belyaev , Andrei Bely and Maxim Gorky . After
4473-446: The short-story writers Isaak Babel (1894–1940) and Mikhail Zoshchenko (1894–1958). The OPOJAZ group of literary critics, a part of Russian formalism school, was founded in 1916 in close connection with Russian Futurism . Two of its members also produced influential literary works, namely Viktor Shklovsky , whose numerous books ( A Sentimental Journey and Zoo, or Letters Not About Love , both 1923) defy genre in that they present
4544-436: The styles of French classicism . Sumarokov's interest in the form of the 17th-century French literature mirrored his devotion to the westernizing spirit of Peter the Great's age. Although he often disagreed with Trediakovsky, Sumarokov also advocated the use of simple, natural language in order to diversify the audience and make more efficient use of the Russian language. Like his colleagues and counterparts, Sumarokov extolled
4615-459: The throne at the end of the 17th century, Peter the Great's influence on the Russian culture would extend far into the 18th century . Peter's reign during the beginning of the 18th century initiated a series of modernizing changes in Russian literature. The reforms he implemented encouraged Russian artists and scientists to make innovations in their crafts and fields with the intention of creating an economy and culture comparable. Peter's example set
4686-463: The vernacular, while sacred texts would remain in Church-Slavonic. However, his work was often incredibly theoretical and scholarly, focused on promoting the versification of the language with which he spoke. While Trediakovsky's approach to writing is often described as highly erudite, the young writer and scholarly rival to Trediakovsky, Alexander Petrovich Sumarokov , 1717–1777, was dedicated to
4757-480: Was continued by Sylvester Medvedev and Karion Istomin . The Life of the Archpriest Avvakum —an outstanding novelty autobiography written by the one of leaders of the 17th-century religious dissidents Old Believers Avvakum —is considered masterpiece of pre-Petrian literature, which blends high Old Church Slavonic with low Russian vernacular and profanity without following literary canons. After taking
4828-517: Was highly devoted to his state; he served in the military, before rising to various roles in Catherine II's government, including secretary to the Empress and Minister of Justice. Unlike those who took after the grand style of Mikhail Lomonosov and Alexander Sumarokov, Derzhavin was concerned with the minute details of his subjects. Denis Fonvizin , an author primarily of comedy, approached the subject of
4899-516: Was one of the earliest Russian writers not only to praise the ideals of Peter I's reforms but the ideals of the growing Enlightenment movement in Europe. Kantemir's works regularly expressed his admiration for Peter, most notably in his epic dedicated to the emperor entitled Petrida . More often, however, Kantemir indirectly praised Peter's influence through his satiric criticism of Russia's "superficiality and obscurantism", which he saw as manifestations of
4970-506: Was the Oberiu (1927–1930s), which included the most famous Russian absurdist Daniil Kharms (1905–1942), Konstantin Vaginov (1899–1934), Alexander Vvedensky (1904–1941) and Nikolay Zabolotsky (1903–1958). Other famous authors experimenting with language included the novelists Boris Pilnyak (1894–1938), Yuri Olesha (1899–1960), Andrei Platonov (1899–1951) and Artyom Vesyoly (1899–1938),
5041-532: Was the fourth largest book producer in the world in terms of published titles. A popular folk saying claims Russians are "the world's most reading nation". As the American scholar Gary Saul Morson notes, "No country has ever valued literature more than Russia." Scholars typically use the term Old Russian , in addition to the terms medieval Russian literature and early modern Russian literature , or pre-Petrian literature , to refer to Russian literature until
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