Lesson summary on the topic "review of the literature of the last decade." Review of Russian and modern literature Russian literature of recent years
1.Introduction
2.Search for a systematic analysis of the modern literary process.
3. Hypertextuality of modern Russian literature
4. The role of the writer’s creative individuality in the formation of the literary situation.
5. Conclusion.
- Today, in the depths of the modern literary process, such phenomena and movements as avant-garde and post-avant-garde, modern and postmodern, surrealism, impersionism, have been born or reanimated.
neosentimentalism, materialism, social art, conceptualism, etc.
- Literature voluntarily laid down
authority to act as a voice
public opinion and educator of human souls, and the places of positive heroes-beacons were taken by homeless people, alcoholics, murderers and representatives of ancient professions.
- If in 1986 the most books to read according to the Book Review survey: “Ulysses” by J. Joyce, “1984” by J. Orwell, “The Iron Woman” by N. Berberova, in 1995
There is already a different kind of literature on the bestseller lists: “The Killer Profession,” “The Wolfhound’s Companions,” “The Filthy Cop.” This orientation of the mass reader has become a pressing problem in both school and university teaching of literature.
Morning
Veniamin Erofeev
Have you ever seen the sunrise? Have you ever watched how slowly, as if with incredible weight, the sun rises? When the first rays begin to dispel the darkness, liquefying and destroying it. When the sky turns from black to blue... in a matter of hours. And when, nevertheless, the first rays of the sun, which have just peeked out over the horizon, cut through the sky, you don’t think about anything and don’t listen to anything. Just watching. Because you won't see this anywhere else. And when you come to your senses, you wonder - why did you come back? Why aren't you there? What have you forgotten here?...
The intensification of the creativity of women writers at the end of the century is an objective and significant fact. Just as the beginning of the twentieth century was marked by the revival of women's poetry, and modernism became a liberating element for the creativity of Russian women writers, who contributed to culture Silver Age freedom of feelings, individualism and subtle aestheticism, and so the end
The century passes largely under the sign of the aesthetic discoveries of women writers.
A special place in genre form-making occupies dystopia. The evolution of dystopia, considered only from the 1990s to the end of the twentieth century, shows how complex and ramified the picture of genre mobility is. Losing its formal cruel features, it is enriched by new qualities, the main one of which is a unique worldview.
The complex picture of aesthetic dispersion is complemented by the situation in the region Russian poetry of the end centuries. It is generally accepted that prose dominates the modern literary process. During last decade poetry has undergone an evolution from a state of almost complete booklessness to a situation where bookshelves and bookstore counters are sagging under the load of poetry collections published either at the author's expense or at sponsorship in circulations of 300-500 copies. Poetry carries the same burden of time, the same aspirations to enter new specific zones of creativity. Poetry, more painfully than prose, feels the loss of reader attention and its own role as an emotional stimulant of society.
It is already stated in the titles of novels and is further implemented in tests: “Live in Moscow: manuscript as a novel” by D. Pirogov,"The Death of Tsar Feodor: micronovel" M.Yu. Druzhnikova, “Erosiped and other vignettes” by A. Zholkovsky. E. Popov defined the genre of his novel “Chaos” as collage novel, the title of the novel by S. Gandlevsky is “NRZB”, by N. Kononov - “gentle theater: shock novel."
Theory:
In the 1950s, a number of decrees were issued in the USSR aimed at improving the quality of drama. The close interest of the ruling circles in modern drama was determined not only by general ideological considerations, but also by one additional reason. Seasonal repertoire Soviet theater should have consisted of thematic sections (Russian classics, foreign classics, a performance dedicated to an anniversary or holiday, etc.). At least half of the premieres had to be prepared according to modern drama. It was desirable that the main performances should be based not on light comedic plays, but on works with serious themes. Under these conditions, most of the country's theaters, concerned about the problem of the original repertoire, were looking for new plays.
General rise theatrical arts at the end of the 1950s it also brought with it the rise of drama. Works by new talented authors appeared, many of whom determined the main paths for the development of drama in the coming decades. Around this period, the personalities of three playwrights were formed, whose plays were staged extensively throughout Soviet period- V. Rozova, A. Volodin, A. Arbuzova.
Among the variety of genres and styles that have overwhelmed the theater since the late 50s of the 20th century right up to the present day, in modern drama we can note the clear predominance of the traditional for Russian theater socio-psychological plays. Despite the frankly everyday, even everyday background of the action itself, most of these works had a very deep, multi-layered philosophical and ethical subtext.
Here writers actively used such techniques as:
· creation of an “undercurrent”
· built-in plot,
· extensions stage space by introducing poetic or object symbols.
· For example, a small flower garden with daisies in A. Vampilov’s play “Last Summer in Chulimsk”, like the old one The Cherry Orchard from the famous drama of the same name by A. Chekhov, becomes for Vampilov’s heroes a kind of test for the ability to love, humanity, and love of life.
· Very effective, enhancing the psycho-emotional impact on the viewer, were such techniques as off-stage “voices”, sometimes constituting, in fact, a separate plan of action, or fantastic visions of heroes.
The late 1950s - early 1970s were marked by the bright personality of A. Vampilov. During his short life he wrote only a few plays: “ Farewell in June", « Eldest son", « Duck hunting» , « Provincial jokes", « Twenty minutes with an angel" And " The case of the master page», « Last summer in Chulimsk" and unfinished vaudeville " Incomparable Tips". Returning to Chekhov's aesthetics, Vampilov determined the direction of development of Russian drama in the next two decades.
Exercise: P Read one of the plays by the proposed authors (A. Volodin, V. Rozov, A. Vampilov) and prepare a short retelling.
Independent work No. 55-56.
Theory: textbook by V.A. Chalmaev, S.A. Zinin “Literature of the XX CENTURY. Part 2", pp. 326 – 352.
Exercise: Based on the theoretical material of the textbook, prepare answers to the following questions:
1. What events literary life recent years do you think are the most significant? Which books (publications) attracted your attention and why? What criteria do you use to determine the degree of significance of something? work of art V modern culture?
2. Based on materials from the site http:// magazines.russ.ru, prepare short messages about the leading “thick” literary magazines: “New World”, “Znamya”, “Zvezda”, “October”, “Neva”. Find information about the time the log was created, restore it a short history, characterize its place in the literary process of recent decades.
3. Explain how you understand the meaning of the concepts postmodernism, postrealism, neonaturalism, neosementalism. Describe the main features of each of these movements.
4. What sociocultural factors have a decisive influence on the development of modern cultural and public life?
5. Prepare a report on modern Russian literary awards (Booker Prize, Anti-Booker Prize, Apollo Grigoriev Prize, Andrei Bely Prize, Ivan Petrovich Belkin Prize). Pay attention to what literary merits are noted by each prize.
Independent work No. 57
V. Shakespeare “Hamlet”, O. Balzac “Gobsek”, G. Flaubert “Salammbô”, J.-W. Goethe. "Faust"
Impressionist poets (C. Baudelaire, A. Rimbaud, O. Renoir, P. Mallarmé, etc.).
Exercise: prepare a review (in writing) of a work you have read yourself foreign literature 19th century.
Approximate review plan:
1. Brief bibliographic information about the book.
2. The meaning of the title of the work.
3.Personal impressions of what you read.
4. Features of the plot and composition.
5. The writer’s skill in depicting the characters’ characters.
6. Language and style of behavior.
7. The main idea of the work.
8. Relevance of the problem.
Independent work No. 58.
E. Hemingway. “The Old Man and the Sea”, E.-M. Remarque. “Three Comrades”, G. Marquez. “One Hundred Years of Solitude”, P. Coelho. "Alchemist".
Assignment: prepare an electronic presentation on one of the suggested topics:
1. Based on the textbook material and additional literature, prepare a review of E. Hemingway’s work. What are the main themes of his works. Expand the content, main theme and idea of the story “The Old Man and the Sea.” Which works of the author would you recommend reading?
2. Get acquainted with the work of G. - G. Marquez. Expand the content, main themes and idea of the novel “One Hundred Years of Solitude.” What interested you in the writer’s work? What works would you recommend getting acquainted with?
3. Get acquainted with the work of P. Coelho. Reveal the content, main theme and idea of one of the works of this writer. What interested you in the work of this writer? What works would you recommend reading?
APPENDIX No. 1.
Poem Analysis Scheme
· Determine the topic (What?)
· Lyrical plot: how does the lyrical hero appear at the beginning, does his state change at the end?
· What kind of mood are you in? Does it change throughout the poem?
· The role of the landscape (if any)
· What figurative and expressive means does the poet use? (anaphora, metaphors, epithets, comparisons, litotes hyperboles);
· Verse genre (elegy, message, address, ode, landscape lyrics, madrigal, epigram, epitaph)
· Composition of the poem (can the verse be divided into semantic parts)
· Features of the syntactic structure (which sentences predominate in terms of the purpose of the utterance and intonation)
Sound structure of the language (predominance of sounds)
· Your attitude towards what you read.
Visual and expressive means
· Anaphora – repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of several lines of poetry
· Hyperbola– exaggeration
· Litotes– understatement
· Metaphor– hidden comparison of an object or phenomenon based on similarity of features.
· Personification- animation of inanimate objects.
· Oxymoron- a combination of words with opposite meanings ( hot snow, living corpse, sweet poison)
· Comparison- comparison of objects based on their similarity (there is a word How).
· Epithet– figurative definition of an object or phenomenon
Lyric genres:
ü Oh yeah- a solemn lyrical poem glorifying a heroic feat.
ü Landscape sketch- a picture of nature.
ü Elegy- a poem permeated with sadness, sad reflection about life, fate, one’s dream.
ü Message- addressing another person.
ü Satire- a work that makes fun of shortcomings.
ü Epigram- a satirical poem addressed to a specific person.
ü Madrigal – a short poem expressing admiration, a compliment.
ü Epitaph - a gravestone inscription in poetic form dedicated to the deceased.
APPENDIX No. 2.
Theory:
An episode is a part of the text that reveals semantic and compositional unity.
1. Determine the place of this episode in the development of the plot:
· At what point in the hero’s life do we meet him?
· What do we already know about him and the author’s attitude towards him?
2. Formulate the general impression of what you read, think about what caused it. In what ways does the author create it?
· What is interesting about the events, the actions of the hero, and the attitude of people towards him?
· Pay attention to the form of the narrative: on whose behalf is it being told? What is the advantage of this technique?
· Imagine whose eyes we see the picture?
· Think about how place and time are depicted (in other words, what is unique about the chronotope)?
· Pay attention to the peculiarities of word selection and grammatical organization of the text. How do they clarify their understanding of what is happening?
3. Draw a conclusion about main idea episode:
· What new things did you learn about the hero? What questions have arisen?
· Which one was presented? future fate hero?
4. Compare your understanding of the episode with its interpretation in criticism and other forms of art.
APPENDIX No. 3.
How to make a note?
Abstract– these are genres of working with another source. The purpose of this genre is to record and rework a particular scientific text.
The summary is verbatim extracts from the source text. At the same time, a synopsis is not a complete rewriting of someone else’s text. Usually, when writing a summary, the source text is first read, the main provisions are highlighted, examples are selected, the material is rearranged, and only then the text of the summary is drawn up. The summary can be complete when the work is carried out with the entire text of the source, or incomplete when one or more issues raised in the source are of interest.
The general sequence of actions when compiling a textual summary can be defined as follows:
1. Understand the goals and objectives of note-taking.
2. Get acquainted with the work as a whole: read the preface, introduction, table of contents and highlight informationally significant sections of the text.
4. Make a note, for this:
Consistently highlight theses in the text and write them down with subsequent argumentation;
Write a short summary - summarize the text of the summary, highlight the main content of the material studied, and evaluate it.
Notes can be planned, written on the basis of a drawn up plan for an article or book. Each question in the plan corresponds to a specific part of the outline.
APPENDIX No. 4.
Plan for analyzing a dramatic work:
2. Poster (list characters): In what main ways have they already been characterized? How does the arrangement of characters help one guess about the character (social, love, philosophical, psychological) of a dramatic work? We pay attention to the choice of names, the sequence of their presentation, and the author's remarks.
3. Design directions for the play: what “hints” do they contain for the director and actors? What features of the temporal and spatial organization of action explain the guess about the conflict of the play?
4. First appearance of the main characters. How are they revealed in the system of monologues, dialogues, aside remarks? Are we talking about the external or internal (psychological), conscious or unconscious conflict of the hero?
5. The main stages of the development of a dramatic conflict: its culmination and denouement of action. How are they related to the author's idea of the play?
6. You know some scenes of the work. Try to explain one of them.
List of literature
Main literature:
1. Lebedev Yu. V. Literature. Grade 10. Textbook for educational institutions. At 2 o'clock - M.: « Education »
2. Zinin S.A. Sakharov V. I Literature of the 19th century. Grade 10 Reading book for educational institutions. At 2 o'clock - M., LLC « TID « Russian word- RS »
3. Belokurova S.P., Sukhikh I.N. Literature. Grade 10 (basic level): practical work: secondary (complete) general education- M.: Publishing center "Academy" - 176 p.
4. Zinin S.A. Literature of the 20th century. 11th grade: Educational. for educational institutions. At 2 o'clock - M.: LLC "TID "Russian Word", 2007.-600 p.
Additional literature:
1.Kozhinov V. Prophet in his Fatherland. – M., 2002.
3.Musatov V.V. History of Russian literature of the first half of the twentieth century. – M., 2001.
4. Nabokov V. Lectures on Russian literature. – M., 2001.
5. Russian literature of the twentieth century. / Ed. A.G. Andreeva. – M., 2002.
6.Russian literature XIX V. (Parts 1, 2, 3). 10 grades / Ed. Ionina G.N. – M., 2001.
7. Smirnova L.N. Russian literature of the late nineteenth – early twentieth centuries. – M., 2001.
8. Sokolov A.G. History of Russian literature of the 19th–20th centuries. – M., 2000.
9.Timina S.I. Russian prose of the late twentieth century. – M., 2001.
What time period are we talking about when the term “modern Russian literature” is mentioned? Obviously, it dates back to 1991, receiving impetus for development after the collapse of the USSR. Doubts the presence of this cultural phenomenon does not currently occur. Many literary critics they agree that four generations of writers are behind its creation and development.
The sixties and modern literature
So, modern Russian literature did not arise out of nowhere immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Iron Curtain. This happened largely due to the legalization of the works of writers of the sixties, previously prohibited from publication.
The newly discovered names of Fazil Iskander became known to the general public (the story “Constellation of Kozlotur”, the epic novel “Sandro from Chegem”); Vladimir Voinovich (novel “The Adventures of Ivan Chonkin”, novels “Moscow 2042”, “Design”); Vasily Aksenov (novels “Island of Crimea”, “Burn”), Valentin Rasputin (stories “Fire”, “Live and Remember”, story “French Lessons”).
Writers of the 70s
Together with the works of the generation of disgraced freethinkers of the sixties, modern Russian literature began with books of authors of the generation of the 70s that were permitted for publication. It was enriched by the works of Andrei Bitov (the novel “Pushkin’s House”, the collection “Apothecary Island”, the novel “The Flying Monks”); Venedikt Erofeeva (prose poem “Moscow - Petushki”, play “Dissidents, or Fanny Kaplan”); Victoria Tokareva (collections of stories “When it became a little warmer”, “About what did not happen”); Vladimir Makanin (stories “A table covered with cloth and with a decanter in the middle”, “One and One”), Lyudmila Petrushevskaya (stories “Thunderstrike”, “Never”).
Writers initiated by perestroika
The third generation of writers - creators of literature - was awakened to creativity directly by perestroika.
Modern Russian literature has been enriched with new bright names of its creators: Viktor Pelevin (novels “Chapaev and Emptiness”, “Life of Insects”, “Numbers”, “Empire V”, “T”, “Snuff”), Lyudmila Ulitskaya (novels “Medea and her children”, “Kukotsky’s Case”, “Sincerely yours Shurik”, “Daniel Stein, translator”, “Green Tent”); Tatyana Tolstoy (novel “Kys”, collections of stories “Okkervil River”, “If you love - you don’t love”, “Night”, “Day”, “Circle”); Vladimir Sorokin (stories “The Day of the Oprichnik”, “Blizzard”, novels “Norma”, “Telluria”, “Blue Lard”); Olga Slavnikova (novels “Dragonfly Enlarged to the Size of a Dog”, “Alone in the Mirror”, “2017”, “Immortal”, “Waltz with a Beast”).
New generation of writers
And finally, modern Russian literature of the 21st century has been replenished with a generation of young writers, the beginning of whose creativity fell directly on the time of state sovereignty Russian Federation. Young but already recognized talents include Andrei Gerasimov (novels “Steppe Gods”, “Razgulyaevka”, “Cold”); Denis Gutsko (the Russian-speaking dilogy); Ilya Kochergina (story “The Chinese Assistant”, stories “Wolves”, “Altynai”, “Altai Stories”); Ilya Stogoff (novels “Machos Don’t Cry”, “Apocalypse Yesterday”, “Revolution Now!”, collections of stories “Ten Fingers”, “Dogs of God”); Roman Senchin (novels “Information”, “Yeltyshevs”, “Flood Zone”).
Literary awards stimulate creativity
It is no secret that modern Russian literature of the 21st century is developing so rapidly thanks to numerous sponsorship awards. Additional motivation encourages authors to further development their creativity. In 1991, the Russian Booker Prize was approved under the auspices of the British company British Petrolium.
In 2000, thanks to the sponsorship of the construction and investment company "Vistcom", another major award was established - "Natsbest". And finally, the most significant is the “Big Book”, established in 2005 by the Gazprom company. The total number of existing literary awards in the Russian Federation is approaching one hundred. Thanks to literary awards, the writing profession has become fashionable and prestigious; the Russian language and modern literature received a significant impetus to their development; the previously dominant method of realism in literature was supplemented by new directions.
Thanks to active writers (which is manifested in works of literature), it develops as a communicative system through further universalization, that is, through the borrowing of syntactic structures, individual words, speech patterns from vernacular, professional communication, and various dialects.
Styles of modern literature. Popular literature
Works of modern Russian literature are created by their authors in various styles, among which mass literature, postmodernism, blogger literature, dystopian novel, and literature for clerks stand out. Let's take a closer look at these areas.
Mass literature today continues the traditions of entertaining literature of the end of the last century: fantasy, science fiction, detective, melodrama, adventure novel. However, at the same time, there is an adjustment to the modern rhythm of life, to rapid scientific progress. Readers of mass literature make up the largest share of its market in Russia. Indeed, it attracts different age groups of the population, representatives of various levels of education. Among the works of popular literature, compared with the books of others literary styles, most of all bestsellers, that is, essays that have peak popularity.
The development of modern Russian literature today is largely determined by the creators of books with maximum circulations: Boris Akunin, Sergei Lukyanenko, Daria Dontsova, Polina Dashkova, Alexandra Marinina, Evgeniy Grishkovets, Tatyana Ustinova.
Postmodernism
Postmodernism as a direction in Russian literature arose in the 90s of the last century. Its first adherents were the writers of the 70s, and representatives of this trend contrasted realism with an ironic attitude towards communist ideology. They demonstrated in artistic form evidence of the crisis of totalitarian ideology. Their baton was continued by Vasily Aksenov “Island of Crimea” and Vladimir Voinovich “The Adventures of Soldier Chonkin”. Then they were joined by Vladimir Sorokin and Anatoly Korolev. However, Viktor Pelevin’s star shone brighter than all other representatives of this trend. Each book by this author (and they are published approximately once a year) gives a subtle artistic description of the development of society.
Russian literature at the present stage is developing ideologically thanks to postmodernism. His characteristic irony, the dominance of chaos over order inherent in changes in the social system, and the free combination of artistic styles determine the universality of the artistic palette of its representatives. In particular, Viktor Pelevin in 2009 was informally awarded the honor of being considered a leading intellectual in Russia. The originality of his style lies in the fact that the writer used his unique interpretation of Buddhism and personal liberation. His works are multipolar, they include many subtexts. Victor Pelevin is considered a classic of postmodernism. His books have been translated into all languages of the world, including Japanese and Chinese.
Novels - dystopias
Modern trends in Russian literature have also contributed to the development of the genre of the dystopian novel, which is relevant during periods of change in the social paradigm. Generic traits of this genre is the representation of the surrounding reality not directly, but already perceived by the consciousness of the protagonist.
Moreover, the main idea of such works is the conflict between the individual and a totalitarian society of the imperial type. According to its mission, such a novel is a book of warning. Among the works of this genre one can name the novels “2017” (author - O. Slavnikova), “Underground” by V. Makanin, “ZhD” by D. Bykov, “Moscow 2042” by V. Voinovich, “Empire V” by V. Pelevin.
Blogger literature
The problems of modern Russian literature are most fully covered in the genre of blogger works. This type of literature has both common features with traditional literature, and significant differences. Like traditional literature, this genre performs cultural, educational, ideological, and relaxation functions.
But, unlike it, it has a communicative function and a socialization function. It is blogger literature that fulfills the mission of communication between participants in the literary process in Russia. Blogger literature performs functions inherent in journalism.
It is more dynamic than traditional literature because it uses small genres (reviews, sketches, information notes, essays, short poems, short stories). It is characteristic that the blogger’s work, even after its publication, is not closed or complete. After all, any comment that follows is not a separate, but an organic part of the blog work. Among the most popular literary blogs on the Runet are the “Russian Book Community”, the “Discussing Books” community, the “What to Read?” community.
Conclusion
Modern Russian literature today is in the process of its creative development. Many of our contemporaries read the dynamic works of Boris Akunin, enjoy the subtle psychologism of Lyudmila Ulitskaya, follow the intricacies of fantasy plots by Vadim Panov, and try to feel the pulse of time in the works of Viktor Pelevin. Today we have the opportunity to assert that in our time, unique writers create unique literature.
Modern literature (at the applicant's choice)
Contemporary literature (60-80s)
2-3 works of the applicant’s choice from the following recommendation list:
F. Abramov. Wooden horses. Alka. Pelagia. Brothers and sisters.
V.P. Astafiev. King fish. Sad detective.
V.M. Shukshin. Villager. Characters. Conversations under a clear moon.
V.G. Rasputin. Deadline. Farewell to Matera. Live and remember.
Yu.V. Trifonov. House on the embankment. Old man. Exchange. Another life.
V.V. Bykov. Sotnikov. Obelisk. Wolf Pack.
The concept of “modern literature” covers a fairly large period and, most importantly, full of important social and political events, which certainly influenced the development of the literary process. Within this period there are quite clearly defined chronological “slices”, qualitatively different from one another and at the same time interdependent, developing common problems at one or another turn of the historical spiral.
Second half of the fifties - the beginning of the sixties was called the “thaw”, after the story of the same name by I. Ehrenburg. The image of the thaw as a symbol of the time was, as they say, on the minds of many; it is no coincidence that almost simultaneously with I. Ehrenburg’s story, even somewhat earlier, a poem by N. Zabolotsky with the same name was published in “New World”. This is due to the fact that in the country after the death of Stalin (1953) and especially after the 20th Congress of the CPSU (1956), the strict limits of political censorship in relation to works of art were somewhat weakened, and works appeared in the press that more truthfully reflect the cruel and contradictory past and present of the Fatherland. First of all, such problems as the depiction of the Great Patriotic War and the state and fate of the Russian village were largely subject to revision and reassessment. Temporal distance and beneficial changes in the life of society created the opportunity for analytical reflection on the paths of development and historical destinies of Russia in the 20th century. New military prose was born, associated with the names of K. Simonov, Yu. Bondarev, G. Baklanov, V. Bykov, V. Astafiev, V. Bogomolov. They were joined by the growing theme of Stalinist repressions. Often these themes intertwined together, forming an alloy that excites the minds of the public, activating the position of literature in society. These are “The Living and the Dead” by K. Simonov, “The Battle on the Way” by G. Nikolaeva, “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” by A. Solzhenitsyn, “Silence” and “Last Salvos” by Yu. Bondarev, “Business as Usual” by V. Belov, “ Potholes" and "Bad weather" by V. Tendryakov. The period of “conflict-free” was rejected without regret. Literature returned to the wonderful traditions of the classics, putting forward the “difficult questions” of life, enlarging and sharpening them in works of different styles and genres. All these works are, to one degree or another, marked by one common quality: the plot, as a rule, is based on the fact that government intervention in the fate of the heroes leads to dramatic and sometimes tragic consequences. If in the previous period, marked by “conflictlessness,” the unity of the government and the people, the party and society was affirmed, now the problem of confrontation between the government and the individual, pressure on the individual, and humiliation is emerging. Moreover, the heroes of the most diverse social groups recognize themselves as individuals, from military leaders and production directors (“The Living and the Dead,” “Battle on the Way”), to the illiterate peasant (B. Mozhaev, “From the Life of Fyodor Kuzkin”).
By the end of the 60s censorship tightens again, marking the beginning of “stagnation,” as this time was called fifteen years later, at a new turn of the historical spiral. The first to come under criticism were A. Solzhenitsyn, some countryside writers (V. Belov, B. Mozhaev), representatives of the so-called “youth” direction of prose (V. Aksenov, A. Gladilin, A. Kuznetsov), who were later forced to emigrate in order to to preserve creative freedom, and sometimes political freedom, as evidenced by the references of A. Solzhenitsyn, I. Brodsky, the persecution of A. Tvardovsky as the editor-in-chief of Novy Mir, who published the most critical works of those years. In the 1970s, there was an attempt, however weak, to rehabilitate the consequences of Stalin’s “cult of personality,” especially his role as Commander-in-Chief during the Great Patriotic War. Literature again, as in the 20s - 40s, splits into two streams - the official, “secretary” (that is, writers who held high positions in the Union of Soviet Writers), and the “samizdat”, which distributed works or were not published at all , or published abroad. “Samizdat” included B. Pasternak’s novel “Doctor Zhivago”, “The Gulag Archipelago” and “Cancer Ward” by A. Solzhenitsyn, poems by I. Brodsky, journalistic notes by V. Soloukhin “Reading Lenin”, “Moscow - Petushki” by V. Erofeev and a number of other works published in the late 80s and early 90s and continue to be published to this day...
And yet, living, sincere, talented literature continues to exist, even despite the tightening of censorship. In the 1970s, the so-called “village prose” became more active, coming to the fore in terms of the depth of its problems, the brightness of its conflicts, the expressiveness and precision of its language, in the absence of any special stylistic or plot “sophistications.” Village writers of the new generation (V. Rasputin, V. Shukshin, B. Mozhaev, S. Zalygin) move from social problems Russian village to philosophical, moral, ontological problems. The problem of recreating Russian is being solved national character at the turn of the era, the problem of the relationship between nature and civilization, the problem of good and evil, momentary and eternal. Despite the fact that these works did not directly address the acute political problems disturbing society, they nevertheless gave the impression of opposition; Discussions about “village” prose that took place on the pages of the “Literary Gazette” and the magazine “Literary Study” in the early 80s literally split criticism into “soilers” and “Westerners,” just like a hundred years ago.
Unfortunately, the last decade has not been marked by the appearance of works as significant as in previous years, but it will forever go down in the history of Russian literature with an unprecedented abundance of publications of works that, for censorship reasons, were not published earlier, starting from the 20s, when Russian prose essentially and split into two streams. The new period of Russian literature is taking place under the sign of uncensorship and the merging of Russian literature into a single stream, regardless of where the writer lives or lived, what his political leanings are and what his fate is. Hitherto unknown works by A. Platonov “The Pit”, “Juvenile Sea”, “Chevengur”, “Happy Moscow”, E. Zamyatin “We”, A. Akhmatova “Requiem” were published, works by V. Nabokov and M. Aldanov were published, returned emigrant writers of the last wave (70s - 80s) into Russian literature: S. Dovlatov, E. Limonov, V. Maksimov, V. Sinyavsky, I. Brodsky; there is an opportunity to appreciate first-hand the works of the Russian “underground”: “courtly mannerists”, Valery Popov, V. Erofeev, Vic. Erofeeva, V. Korkiya and others.
Summing up the results of this period of development of Russian literature, we can conclude that its most striking achievement was the work of the so-called “village writers”, who were able to raise deep moral, social, historical and philosophical problems based on the material of the life of the Russian peasantry in the 20th century.
The novels and stories of S. Zalygin, V. Belov, B. Mozhaev show how the process of de-peasantization began, which deeply affected not only the country’s economy, but also its spiritual and moral foundation. What all this led to is eloquently evidenced by the stories of F. Abramov and V. Rasputin, the stories of V. Shukshin and others.
F. Abramov (1920-1982) reveals the tragedy of the Russian peasantry, behind which stands the tragedy of the entire country, using the example of the northern Russian village of Pekashino, the prototype of which was F. Abramov’s native village Verkola. The tetralogy “Pryasliny”, which includes the novels “Two Winters and Three Summers”, “Brothers and Sisters”, “Crossroads”, “Home”, tells about the life of the inhabitants of Pekashin, who, together with the whole country, went through difficult pre-war, war and post-war years, until the seventies. The central characters of the tetralogy are Mikhail Pryaslin, who from the age of 14 remained not only the head of an orphaned family, but also the main man on the collective farm, and his sister Lisa. Despite their truly inhuman efforts to raise and put their younger brothers and sisters on their feet, life turned out to be unkind to them: the family is disunited, broken up: some end up behind bars, some disappear forever in the city, some die. Only Mikhail and Lisa remain in the village.
In the 4th part, Mikhail, a strong, stocky forty-year-old man, whom everyone previously respected and obeyed, turns out to be unclaimed due to numerous reforms that have destroyed the traditional way of life of the northern Russian village. He is a groom, Lisa is seriously ill, the daughters, with the exception of the youngest, glance at the city. What awaits the village? Will she be destroyed like her parents' house, or will she endure all the trials that befall her? F. Abramov hopes for the best. The ending of the tetralogy, for all its tragedy, inspires hope.
Very interesting are F. Abramov’s short stories “Wooden Horses”, “Pelageya”, “Alka”, in which, using the example of three women's destinies a far from encouraging evolution of the female national character can be traced in a difficult and critical time. The story “Wooden Horses” introduces us to Vasilisa Melentyevna, a woman with a fabulously epic name and the soul of a righteous woman. Her appearance brightens everything around, even her daughter-in-law Zhenya can’t wait for Melentyevna to come visit them. Melentyevna is a person who sees the meaning and joy of life in work, no matter what it is. And now, old and weak, she at least goes to the nearby forest to pick mushrooms, so that the day is not lived in vain. Her daughter Sonya, who in the difficult post-war period found herself working in logging and deceived by her loved one, commits suicide not so much from shame in front of people, but from shame and guilt in front of her mother, who did not have time and could not warn her and stop her.
This feeling is incomprehensible to Alka, a modern village girl who flutters through life like a moth, either clinging with all her might to city life, to the dubious lot of a waitress, or striving for the luxurious, in her opinion, life of a flight attendant. She deals with her seducer - a visiting officer - cruelly and decisively, seeking his dismissal from the army, which in those years actually meant civil death, and thus obtaining a passport (as is known, in the 50s and 60s peasants did not have passports, and to move to the city, you had to get a passport by hook or by crook). Through the image of Alka, F. Abramov focused the readers’ attention on the problem of the so-called “marginal” person, that is, a person who has just moved to the city from the village, who has lost his old spiritual and moral values and has not found new ones, replacing them with the external signs of urban life.
Problems of the “marginal” personality , the semi-urban, semi-rural man was also worried by V. Shukshin (1929-1974), who experienced in his own life the difficulties of growing a “natural” person, a native of an Altai village, into city life, into the environment of the creative intelligentsia.
But his work, in particular his short stories, is much broader than his description of the life of the Russian peasantry during a turning point. The problem that V. Shukshin came to literature of the 60s , in essence, has remained unchanged - this is the problem of personal fulfillment. His characters, who “invent” another life for themselves (Monya Kvasov “Stubborn”, Gleb Kapustin “Cut Off”, Bronka Pupkov “Pardon me, Madam”, Timofey Khudyakov “Ticket to the Second Session”), yearn for fulfillment at least in that fictional world . This problem is unusually acute in Shukshin precisely because behind the vivid narration, as if from the hero’s point of view, we feel the author’s anxious reflection on the impossibility real life when the soul is busy with the “wrong thing”. V. Shukshin passionately asserted the seriousness of this problem, the need for every person to stop and think about the meaning of his life, about his purpose on earth, about his place in society.
V. Shukshin called one of his last books “Characters”. But, in fact, all of his work is devoted to the depiction of bright, unusual, unique, original characters who do not fit into the prose of life, into its ordinary everyday life. Based on the title of one of his stories, these original and inimitable Shukshin characters began to be called “eccentrics.” those. people who carry something of their own, unique in their souls, which sets them apart from the mass of homogeneous character types. Even in his fundamentally ordinary character, Shukshin is interested in those moments of his life when something special, unique appears in him, highlighting the essence of his personality. This is Sergei Dukhavin in the story “Boots,” who buys insanely expensive, elegant boots in the city for his wife, the milkmaid Klava. He realizes the impracticality and senselessness of his action, but for some reason he cannot do otherwise, and the reader understands that this instinctively reveals a feeling hidden behind everyday life that has not cooled down over the years. life together love for my wife. And this psychologically precisely motivated act gives rise to a response from the wife, just as sparingly expressed, but just as deep and sincere. Unpretentious and strange story, told by V. Shukshin, creates a bright feeling of mutual understanding, harmony of “complex simple” people, who are sometimes forgotten behind the ordinary and petty. Klava awakens a feminine feeling of coquetry, youthful enthusiasm, lightness, despite the fact that the boots, of course, turned out to be small and went to the eldest daughter.
Respecting a person’s right to be himself, even if the exercise of this right makes a person strange and absurd, unlike others, V. Shukshin hates those who strive to unify personality, to bring everything under a common denominator, hiding behind ringing socially significant phrases, shows that often behind this empty and ringing phrase lies envy, pettiness, and selfishness (“My son-in-law stole a car of firewood,” “Shameless”). The story “Shameless” is about three old men: Glukhov, Olga Sergeevna and Otavikha. Socially active, energetic and decisive Olga Sergeevna in her youth preferred the modest and quiet Glukhov to the desperate commissar, but, ultimately left alone, returned to her native village, maintaining good and even relations with her aged and also lonely admirer. The character of Olga Sergeevna would never have been unraveled if old man Glukhov had not decided to start a family with lonely Otavikha, which aroused the anger and jealousy of Olga Sergeevna. She led the fight against the elderly, using the phraseology of social condemnation with all her might, speaking about the immorality and immorality of such a union, focusing on the impermissibility of intimate relationships at this age, although it is clear that it was primarily about mutual support for each other. And as a result, she aroused shame in the old people for the depravity (non-existent) of their thoughts about life together, fear that Olga Sergeevna would tell this story in the village and thereby completely disgrace them. But Olga Sergeevna is silent, completely satisfied that she managed to humiliate and trample people, perhaps she remains silent for the time being. Gleb Kapustin is also happy about someone else’s humiliation in the story “Cut.”
V. Shukshin’s favorite heroes are extraordinary thinkers who are in an eternal search for the meaning of life, often people with a subtle and vulnerable soul, who sometimes commit ridiculous but touching actions.
V. Shukshin is a master of a short story, which is based on a vivid sketch “from life” and a serious generalization contained in it based on this sketch. These stories form the basis of the collections “Village People”, “Conversations on a Clear Moon”, “Characters”. But V. Shukshin is a universal writer who created two novels: “The Lyubavins” and “I Came to Give You Freedom,” the film script “Kalina Krasnaya,” and the satirical plays “And in the Morning They Woke Up” and “Until the Third Rooster.” Both his directorial and acting work brought him fame.
V. Rasputin (b. 1938) - one of most interesting writers, belonging to the younger generation of so-called country writers. He became famous thanks to a series of stories from the life of a modern village near Angara: “Money for Maria”, “Deadline”, “Live and Remember”, “Farewell to Matera”, “Fire”. The stories are distinguished by their concrete sketches of the life and everyday life of a Siberian village, the brightness and originality of the characters of peasants of different generations, their philosophical nature, the combination of social, environmental and moral issues, psychologism, wonderful sense of language, poetic style...
Among the characters of V. Rasputin’s heroes, who brought him fame, first of all, it is necessary to highlight the gallery of images that critics defined as “Rasputin’s old women” - his peasant women who bore all the hardships and adversities on their shoulders and did not break, maintaining purity and decency, conscientiousness, how one of his favorite heroines, the old woman Daria from “Farewell to Matera,” defines the main quality of a person. These are truly righteous women on whom the earth rests. Anna Stepanovna from the story “The Last Term” considers the biggest sin in her life to be that during collectivization, when all the cows were herded into a common herd, after collective farm milking, she milked her cow Zorka in order to save her children from starvation. One day her daughter was caught doing this: “Her eyes burned me to my very soul,” Anna Stepanovna repents to her old friend before her death.
Daria Pinigina from the story “Farewell to Matera” is perhaps the most vivid and well-declarative image of the righteous old woman from the stories of V. Rasputin. The story itself is deep, polyphonic, problematic. Matera is a huge island on the Angara, a prototype of the Siberian paradise. It has everything that is necessary for a normal life: a cozy village with houses decorated with wonderful wooden carvings, due to which almost every house has a table nailed to it: “protected by the state,” a forest, arable land, a cemetery where ancestors are buried, meadows and mowing, pasture, river. There is the Royal Foliage, which, according to legend, attaches the island to the main land, therefore, being the key to the strength and indestructibility of existence. There is the owner of the island - a mythological creature, his amulet, his patron. And all this should perish forever, go under water as a result of the construction of another hydroelectric power station. Residents perceive the change in their fate differently: the young are even happy, the middle generation comes to terms with the inevitability of what is happening, some even burn their houses ahead of schedule in order to quickly receive compensation and drink it away. And only Daria rebels against a thoughtless and fleeting farewell to Matera, seeing her off to the inevitable oblivion leisurely, with dignity, dressing and mourning her hut, tidying up the graves of her parents in the cemetery, praying for those who, with their thoughtlessness, offended her and the island. A weak old woman, a dumb tree, and the mysterious owner of the island rebelled against the pragmatism and frivolity of modern people. They were unable to radically change the situation, but, standing in the way of the inevitable flooding of the village, they delayed the destruction at least for a moment and made their antagonists, including Daria’s son and grandson, and the readers think. That is why the ending of the story sounds so polysemantic and biblically sublime. What's next for Matera? What awaits humanity? The very posing of these questions conceals protest and anger.
In recent years, V. Rasputin has been engaged in journalism (a book of essays “Siberia! Siberia...”) and social and political activities.
IN 60 - 80s The so-called “military prose” also made itself known quite loudly and talentedly, shedding new light on everyday life and exploits, “days and nights” of the Great Patriotic War. “Trench truth”, i.e. the unvarnished truth of being “a man at war” becomes the basis for moral and philosophical reflection, for solving the existential problem of “choice”: the choice between life and death, honor and betrayal, a majestic goal and countless sacrifices in its name. These problems underlie the works of G. Baklanov, Yu. Bondarev, V. Bykov.
This problem of choice is solved especially dramatically in the stories of V. Bykov. In the story "Sotnikov" one of two captured partisans saves his life by becoming the executioner for the other. But such a price for his own life becomes prohibitively difficult for him, too; his life loses all meaning, turning into endless self-recrimination and ultimately leads him to the idea of suicide. The story “Obelisk” raises the question of heroism and sacrifice. Teacher Ales Moroz voluntarily surrenders to the Nazis in order to be close to his students taken hostage. Together with them he goes to his death, miraculously saving only one of his students. Who is he - a hero or a lone anarchist who disobeyed the order of the commander of the partisan detachment, who forbade him to do this act? What is more important - an active fight against the Nazis as part of a partisan detachment or moral support for children doomed to death? V. Bykov affirms the greatness of the human spirit, moral uncompromisingness in the face of death. The writer has earned the right to do this. own life and fate, having gone through all the long four years of war as a warrior.
In the late 80s - early 90s, literature, like society as a whole, was experiencing a deep crisis. The history of Russian literature in the 20th century was such that, along with aesthetic laws, its development was determined by circumstances of a socio-political and historical nature, which were not always beneficial. And now there are attempts to overcome this crisis through documentaryism, often striving for naturalism (“Children of the Arbat” by Rybakov, Shalamov), or by destroying the integrity of the world, peering closely into the gray everyday life of gray, inconspicuous people (L. Petrushevskaya, V. Pietsukh, T. Tolstaya) have not yet led to significant results. At this stage, catching any creative trends in the modern literary process in Russia is quite a difficult matter. Time will show everything and put it in its place.
Additional material
Nina Berberova once remarked: “Nabokov not only writes in a new way, he also teaches how to read in a new way. He creates his reader. In the article “On Good Readers and Good Writers,” Nabokov sets out his view of this problem.
“We should remember that a work of art is always the creation of a new world, and therefore, first of all, we must try to understand this world as fully as possible in all its burning newness, as having no connections with the worlds already known to us. And only after it has been studied in detail - only after that! - you can look for its connection with other artistic worlds and other areas of knowledge.
(...) The art of writing turns into an empty exercise if it is not, first of all, the art of seeing life through the prism of fiction. (...) The writer not only organizes the external side of life, but melts every atom of it.”
Nabokov believed that the reader should have imagination, a good memory, a sense of words and, most importantly, an artistic flair.
“There are three points of view from which a writer can be viewed: as a storyteller, a teacher and a magician. A great writer has all three qualities, but the magician predominates in him, and this is what makes him a great writer. The narrator simply entertains us, excites the mind and feelings, gives us the opportunity to make a long journey without spending too much time on it. A somewhat different, although not necessarily deeper, mind seeks in the artist a teacher - a propagandist, a moralist, a prophet (precisely this sequence). In addition, you can turn to a teacher not only for moral teachings, but also for knowledge and facts. (..) But first of all great artist
- is always a great magician, and this is precisely where the most exciting moment for the reader lies: in the feeling of the magic of great art created by a genius, in the desire to understand the originality of his style, imagery, the structure of his novels or poems.”
Section XIII. Literature of recent decades
Lesson 62 (123). Literature at the present stage Lesson objectives:
give an overview of works of recent years; show trends in modern literature; give the concept of postmodernism,
Methodical techniques:
teacher lecture; discussion of essays;conversation on the works read.
During the classes
I . characterized by the disappearance of former canonized themes (“the theme of the working class,” “the theme of the army,” etc.) and a sharp rise in the role of everyday relationships. Attention to everyday life, sometimes absurd, to experience human soul, forced to survive in a situation of disruption and shifts in society, gives rise to special plots. Many writers seem to want to get rid of their former pathos, rhetoric, and preaching, and fall into the aesthetics of “shocking and shock.”
The realistic branch of literature, having experienced a state of lack of demand, is approaching the understanding of the turning point in the sphere of moral values. “Literature about literature,” memoir prose, is coming to a prominent place.
“Perestroika” opened the door to a huge flow of “detained” and young writers professing different aesthetics: naturalistic, avant-garde, postmodernist, and realistic.
One of the ways to update realism is to try to free it from ideological predetermination. This trend led to a new round of naturalism: it combined the traditional belief in the cleansing power of the cruel truth about society and the rejection of any kind of pathos, ideology, preaching (prose by S. Kaledin “The Humble Cemetery”, “Building Battalion”; prose and dramaturgy by L. Petrushevskaya) . The year 1987 has special significance in the history of Russian literature. This is the beginning of a unique period, exceptional in its general cultural significance. This is the beginning of the process of returning Russian literature. The main motive of four years (1987) became the motive of rehabilitation of history and prohibited - “uncensored”, “seized”, “repressive” - literature. In 1988, speaking at the Copenhagen meeting of artists, literary critic Efim Etkind said: “Now there is a process underway that has unprecedented, phenomenal significance for literature: the process of return. A crowd of shadows of writers and works about which the general reader knew nothing poured onto the pages of Soviet magazines... Shadows are returning from everywhere.” The first years of the rehabilitation period - 1987-1988 - are the time of the return of spiritual exiles, those
With the republication of works by Mikhail Bulgakov (“Heart of a Dog,” “Crimson Island”), Andrei Platonov (“Chevengur,” “The Pit,” “Juvenile Sea”), Boris Pasternak (“Doctor Zhivago”), Anna Akhmatova (“Requiem”), Osip Mandelstam (“Voronezh Notebooks”), the creative heritage of these (famous even before 1987) writers was restored in full.
The next two years - 1989-1990 - are a time of active return of an entire literary system - the literature of Russian abroad.
Until 1989, sporadic republications by emigrant writers - Joseph Brodsky and Vladimir Nabokov in 1987 - were sensational. And in 1989-1990, “a crowd of shadows poured into Russia from France and America” (E. Etkind) - these are Vasily Aksenov, Georgy Vladimov, Vladimir Voinovich, Sergei Dovlatov, Naum Korzhavin, Viktor Nekrasov, Sasha Sokolov and, of course, Alexander Solzhenitsyn . The main problem for literature in the second half of the 1980s was the rehabilitation of history. In April 1988, a scientific conference with a very revealing title was held in Moscow - “Topical Issues historical science
and literature." The speakers talked about the problem of the truthfulness of the history of Soviet society and the role of literature in eliminating “blank historical spots.” In the emotional report of economist and historian Evgeniy Ambartsumov, the idea, supported by everyone, was voiced that “true history began to develop outside the ossified official historiography, in particular, by our writers F. Abramov and Yu. Trifonov, S. Zalygin and B. Mozhaev, V. Astafiev and F. Iskander, A. Rybakov and M. Shatrov, who began to write history for those who could not or did not want to do this.” In the same 1988, critics started talking about the emergence of a whole movement in literature, which they designated as “new historical prose.”, that is, the one that was not only published, but also written in the second half of the 1980s, confirms that during this period literature was primarily a civil matter. Only ironist poets and authors of “physiological stories” (“Guignol prose” (Sl.)) were able to loudly declare themselves at this time) Leonid Gabyshev (“Odlyan, or the Air of Freedom”) and Sergei Kaledin (“Stroibat”), in whose The works depicted the dark sides of modern life - the morals of juvenile delinquents or army hazing.
It should also be noted that the publication of stories by Lyudmila Petrushevskaya, Evgeny Popov, Tatyana Tolstoy, authors who today define the face of modern literature, went almost unnoticed in 1987. In that literary situation, as Andrei Sinyavsky rightly noted, these were “artistically redundant texts.”
So, 1987-1990 is the time when Mikhail Bulgakov’s prophecy (“Manuscripts don’t burn”) came true and the program so carefully outlined by academician Dmitry Sergeevich Likhachev was fulfilled: “And if we publish the unpublished works of Andrei Platonov “Chevengur” and “The Pit” , some of the works of Bulgakov, Akhmatova, Zoshchenko still remaining in the archives, then this, it seems to me, will also be useful for our culture” (from the article: The culture of truth is the anticulture of lies // Literary newspaper, 1987. No. 1). Over the course of four years, a colossal array was mastered by the general Russian reader - 2/3 of the previously unknown and inaccessible corpus of Russian literature; all citizens became readers. “The country has turned into an All-Union Reading Room, in which, following Doctor Zhivago, Life and Fate is discussed (Natalya Ivanova). These years are called the “reading feast” years;
There was an unprecedented and unique increase in the circulation of periodical literary publications (“thick” literary magazines). Record circulation of the magazine “New World” (1990) - 2,710,000 copies. (in 1999 - 15,000 copies, i.e. slightly more than 0.5%); all writers became citizens (in 1989, the overwhelming majority of people and deputies from creative unions were writers - V. Astafiev, V. Bykov, O. Gonchar, S. Zalygin, L. Leonov, V. Rasputin); civil (“severe”, not “elegant”) literature triumphs.
Its culmination is 1990 - the “year of Solzhenitsyn” and the year of one of the most sensational publications of the 1990s - the article “Wake of Soviet Literature”, in which its author, a representative of the “new literature”, Viktor Erofeev, declared the end of the “Solzhenization” of Russian literature and the beginning of the next period in modern Russian literature - postmodernist (1991-1994).
Postmodern storytelling is a book about literature, a book about books.
In the last third of the twentieth century, postmodernism became widespread in our country.
These are works by Andrei Bitov, Venedikt Erofeev, Sasha Sokolov, Tatyana Tolstoy, Joseph Brodsky and some other authors. The system of values is being revised, mythologies are being destroyed, the writers' views are often ironic and paradoxical.
Changes in political, economic, and social conditions in the country at the end of the twentieth century led to many changes in literary and near-literary processes. In particular, since the 1990s, the Booker Prize appeared in Russia. Its founder is the English Booker company, which is engaged in the production of food products and their wholesale.
The Russian Booker Literary Prize was established by the founder of the Booker Prize in the UK, Booker Pic, in 1992 as a tool to support authors writing in Russian and to revive publishing activity in Russia with the goal of making good contemporary Russian literature commercially successful in its homeland.
Russian bookers were Mark Kharitonov (1992, “Lines of Fate, or Milashevich’s Chest”), Vladimir Makanin (1993, “A table covered with cloth and with a decanter in the middle”), Bulat Okudzhava (1994, “The Abolished Theater”), Georgy Vladimov (1995 , “The General and His Army”), Andrei Sergeev (1996, “Album of the Day of Stamps”), Anatoly Azolsky (1997, “The Cage”), Alexander Morozov (1998, “Other People’s Letters”), Mikhail Butov (1999, “Freedom” ), Mikhail Shishkin (2000, “The Taking of Izmail”), Lyudmila Ulitskaya (2001, “The Case of Kukotsky”), Oleg Pavlov (2002, “Karaganda destinies, or the Tale last days"). It should be understood that the Booker Prize, like any other literary prize, is not intended to answer the question “Who is your first, second, third writer?” or “Which novel is the best?” Literary awards are a civilized way to arouse publishing and reader interest (“Bring together readers, writers, publishers. So that books are bought, so that literary work was respected and even brought in income. Writer, publishers. But on the whole, culture wins” (critic Sergei Reingold)).
Close attention to the Booker laureates already in 1992 made it possible to identify two aesthetic trends in the latest Russian literature - postmodernism (among the 1992 finalists are Mark Kharitonov and Vladimir Sorokin) and post-realism (postrealism is a trend in the latest Russian prose). Characteristic of realism is the traditional attention to the fate of a private person, tragically lonely and trying to self-determinate (Vladimir Makanin and Lyudmila Petrushevskaya).
Nevertheless, the Booker edition and those that followed it literary prizes(Anti-booker, “Triumph”, A.S. Pushkin Prize, Paris Prize for Russian Poet) did not completely remove the problem of confrontation between non-commercial literature (“pure art”) and the market. “The way out of the impasse” (that was the title of an article by critic and cultural critic Alexander Genis, dedicated to the literary situation of the early 1990s) for “non-market” literature was its appeal to traditionally mass genres (literary, even song) -
Fantasy (“fantasy”) - “The Life of Insects” (1993) by Victor Pelevin;
Fantastic novel - “Cassandra’s Brand” (1994) by Chingiz Aitmatov;
Mystical-political thriller - “The Guardian” (1993) by Anatoly Kurchatkin;
Erotic novel - “Eron” (1994) by Anatoly Korolev, “Road to Rome” by Nikolai Klimontovich, “Everyday Life of a Harem” (1994) by Valery Popov;
Eastern - “We can do anything” (1994) by Alexander Chernitsky;
An adventurous novel - “I am not me” (1992) by Alexei Slapovsky (and his “rock ballad” “Idol”, “thieves’ romance” “Hook”, “street romance” “Brothers”);
“new detective” by B. Akunin;
“ladies detective” by D. Dontsova, T. Polyakova and others.
A work that embodies almost all the features of modern Russian prose was “Ice” by Vladimir Sorokin. Shortlisted in 2002. The work caused a wide resonance due to the active opposition of the “Walking Together” movement, which accuses Sorokin of pornography. V. Sorokin withdrew his candidacy from the short list.
A consequence of the blurring of the boundaries between high and mass literature (along with the expansion of the genre repertoire) was the final collapse of cultural taboos (prohibitions), including: on the use of obscene (profanity) language - with the publication of Eduard Limonov’s novel “It’s me, Eddie!” (1990), works by Timur Kibirov and Viktor Erofeev; to discuss in literature the problems of drugs (Andrei Salomatov’s novel “Kandinsky Syndrome” (1994)) and sexual minorities (the two-volume collected works of Evgeny Kharitonov “Tears on Flowers” became a sensation in 1993).
From the writer’s program to create a “book for everyone” - both for the traditional consumer of “non-commercial” literature and for the general reading public - a “new fiction” emerges (its formula was proposed by the publisher of the anthology “End of the Century”: “A detective story, but written in good language” The trend towards “readability” and “interesting” can be considered a trend of the postmodern period.
The “fantasy” genre, turning out to be the most viable of all genre new formations, was the starting point for one of the most noticeable phenomena in modern Russian literature - this is the prose of fiction, or fiction-prose - fantasy literature, “modern fairy tales”, the authors of which do not reflect, but invent new absolutely implausible artistic realities.
Fiction is literature of the fifth dimension, as the unbridled author's imagination becomes, creating virtual art worlds- quasi-geographical and pseudo-historical.
Search
We can notify you about new articles,