A History of Russian Literature

by Mirsky, Dmitry Svyatopolk

• ISBN13: 9780810116795
• ISBN10: 0810116790
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-08-01
• Publisher: Northwestern Univ Pr

Summary

Russian literature has always been inseparably linked to Russian history. D. S. Mirsky, in dealing with this fact, constantly keeps in mind the ever colorful and changing aspects of the one in discussing the other. With a keen and penetrating sense of values, fortified by a style sharp enough to carry every nuance of his meaning, he explores one of the most complex and fascinating literatures of the world. Sound in judgment, luminescent, and exquisitely written, Mirsky's work is essential reading for anyone interested in Russian literature. A History of Russian Literature: From Its Beginnings to 1900 contains all of the author's A History of Russian Literature and the first two chapters of his Contemporary Russian Literature. This single volume covers the beginning of Russian fiction, the Age of Classicism, the Age of Gogol, and the poets, journalists, novelists, and playwrights of the Age of Realism.

Author Biography

Prince Dmitry Svyatopolk Mirsky was born in Russia in 1890 and died in a Siberian prison camp in the late 1930s. During his lifetime, he was a soldier, a lecturer at King's College, London University, a member of the Union of Soviet Writers, a contributor to various Russian papers, and the author of several books of history and literary criticism. Besides the present volume, his best-known work is The Intelligentsia of Great Britain.

Table of Contents

The Literature of Old Russia	3	(28)
The Literary Language Literary Conditions
Translated Works the Kievan Period
The Chronicles
The Campaign of Igor and its Family
Between Kiev and Moscow the Muscovite Period
Muscovite Histories Beginnings of Fiction
The end of Old Muscovy: Avvakum
The Passing of Old Russia	31	(10)
The Southwestern Revival
The Transition in Moscow and Petersburg
The First Literary Verse the Drama
Fiction and Chapbooks
The Age of Classicism	41	(32)
Kantemir Trediakovsky Lomonosov
Narrative and Lyric Poetry After Lomonosov
Derzhavin the Drama
Eighteenth-Century Prose Karamzin
Contemporaries of Karamzin Krylov the Novel
The Golden Age of Poetry	73	(54)
Zhukovsky Other Poets of the Older Generation
Pushkin Minor Poets Baratynsky Yazykov
Metaphysical Poets the Theater Griboyedov
The Poets' Prose The Rise of the Novel
The Prose of Pushkin the Growth of Journalism
The Age of Gogol	127	(50)
The Decline of Poetry Koltsov Tyutchev
Lermontov the Poetry of Reflection
The Drama the Novelists of the Thirties
Gogol Lermontov's Prose The First Naturalists
The Petersburg Journalists
The Moscow ``Circles'' the Slavophils
Belinsky
The Age of Realism: The Novelists (I)	177	(38)
Origin and Character of the Russian Realistic
Novel Dostoyevsky's Early Work Aksakov
Goncharov Turgenev
The Sentimental Philanthropists Pisemsky
Novelists of Provincial Character
The Age of Realism: Journalists, Poets, and Playwrights	215	(41)
Criticism After Belinsky Grigoriev Herzen
The Radical Leaders Slavophils and Nationalists
The Eclectic Poets A. K. Tolstoy Fet
Realistic Poets Nekrasov
The Utter Decline of Poetry the Drama
Ostrovsky
Sukhovo-Kobylin, Pisemsky, and Minor Dramatists
The Costume Play
The Age of Realism: The Novelists (II)	256	(46)
Tolstoy (Before 1880)
Dostoyevsky (After 1849) Saltykov-Schedrin
The Decline of the Novel in the Sixties and
Seventies the ``Plebeian'' Novelists
The End of a Great Age	302	(45)
Tolstoy (After 1880) Leskov
Poetry: Sluchevsky
The Leaders of the Intelligentsia: Mikhaylovsky
The Conservatives Leontiev
The Eighties and Early Nineties	347	(36)
Garshin Minor Novelists Emigres Korolenko
The Literary Lawyers Poets Vladimir Soloviev
Chekhov
Index	383