About this item
Highlights
- Russian culture and Slavic Studies maintain that Gogol is an incontrovertible Russian writer.
- About the Author: Oleh S. Ilnytzkyj, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
- 204 Pages
- Literary Criticism,
Description
About the Book
This book resolves a long-debated question in Slavic Studies: Was Nikolai Gogol, the renowned 19th-century satirist, Russian or Ukrainian? Through a nuanced analysis of various arguments - historical and contemporary, from the plausible to the absBook Synopsis
Russian culture and Slavic Studies maintain that Gogol is an incontrovertible Russian writer. To call him a Ukrainian is to encounter deep skepticism. Oddly, the grounds of his "Russianness" are rarely made explicit and even less often examined critically. This book addresses these problems. It shows, for example, how scholars assume that language and theme make Gogol Russian. How others call him Russian by denying Ukrainians status as a separate nation, while still others avoid explanations altogether by representing him as a typical Russian in a national culture and literature. This book challenges such paradigms, situating Gogol within an "imperial culture," where Russian and Ukrainian elites shared intellectual pursuits but clashed over rival national projects. It reveals Gogol as a Ukrainian Russian-language Imperial Writer, a person who embraced an emergent Ukrainian movement while remaining a loyal imperial subject. This book will appeal to Russianists and Ukrainianists, anyone interested in questions of identity, cultural politics, and colonialism. It provides ample context and background, making it suitable for students. Readers who enjoy Taras Bulba will be drawn to the chapter that dispels the myth of its "Russianness."
About the Author
Oleh S. Ilnytzkyj, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.