Adventure Narratives in the Early Soviet Union
Riccardo Nicolosi editor Brigitte Obermayr editor
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Academic Studies Press
Published:31st Dec '24
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
In the early 1920s, Soviet writers and literary theorists were convinced that adventure fiction held the key to developing a new kind of narrative. The call for a "Russian Stevenson" (Lev Lunts) profoundly impacted the theory of prose and different notions of the literary hero. It also led theorists like Shklovsky to write dime novels and convinced writers of various backgrounds to explore Soviet topography in a new light, harnessing the synergies between imperialism and adventure. Despite the inherently anarchist nature of adventure and its bourgeois offspring, the magic of adventure found its way into socialist realism under different guises, demanding recognition and resisting neglect, especially in the case of socialist realist film.
This book offers a critical historical reconstruction of the early Soviet adventure craze and its lasting popularity in socialist realism. It also offers innovative theoretical propositions for a philological analysis of adventure fiction that arise from this unique historical context.
“How a society defines adventure and expresses it in works of culture can thus reveal much about the constraints of the mundane and aspirations of people to overcome them. Riccardo Nicolosi and Brigitte Obermayr’s edited collection of essays, Adventure Narratives in the Early Soviet Union, provides an array of interesting perspectives on the theme…The strength of the volume lies in the seven case studies of adventure literature. It does not rise above its status as a compendium of individual essays but nonetheless offers considerable new material on an often neglected topic of literary history.”
— Jeff Brooks, H-Net
“Riccardo Nicolosi and Brigitte Obermayr’s edited volume offers a kaleidoscopic view of a kaleidoscopic era in Soviet culture. No one who has looked closely at early Soviet writing and art would consider the editors’ focus on ‘adventure narratives’ to be excessively narrow. Indeed, adventure was the watchword for the first decade of Soviet rule—a rallying cry for the builders of a new culture. Regardless of how the Soviet adventure ended, it gave rise to some of the most innovative and entertaining texts and films of the first half of the 20th century, and the contributors to this volume explore these works with critical acumen and evident relish.”
— Boris Dralyuk, translator of Isaac Babel, Andrey Kurkov, and other authors
ISBN: 9798887196312
Dimensions: 233mm x 155mm x 15mm
Weight: 553g
210 pages