LITR 025R. The Poet & Power

(Cross-listed as RUSS 025)
This course will explore Russian literature in its cultural and historical contexts. In Russia, a poet has always been a voice, a herald of freedom or non-conformism, if not an envoy of the regime. The poet is also a philosopher and a thinker. Students will read Russian literary texts from the early 18th century through the beginning of the 21st century. The circle will begin with Lomonosov, whose poetry glorified the Tsarinas. We will continue with censored works by Pushkin, Griboedov, Chaadaev, Gogol, Akhmatova, Chukovskaya, Solzhenitsyn and others who underwent political or social pressure from the Russian or Soviet state. We finish with postmodernist Pelevin, who was neither harassed nor arrested for his prose in a new phenomenon for Russia: during the last two decades literature has come to exist independently from power, in a parallel world.
Humanities.
1 credit.
Catalog chapter: Modern Languages and Literatures: Russian
Department website: https://www.swarthmore.edu/russian

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