The Freest Speech in Russia - by Stephanie Sandler

About the Book

"An essential introduction to contemporary Russian poetry that considers its development alongside post-Soviet Russia's evolving cultural and political landscape"--

Book Synopsis

The first English-language study of contemporary Russian poetry and its embrace of freedom--formally, thematically, and spiritually

Since 1989 and the fall of the Berlin Wall, Russian poetry has exuded a powerful awareness of freedom, both aesthetic and political. No longer confined to the cultural underground, poets reacted with immediacy to events in the world. In The Freest Speech in Russia, Stephanie Sandler offers the first English-language study of contemporary Russian poetry, showing how these poems both express and exemplify freedom.

This period was a time of great poetic flourishing for Russian poets, whether they remained in Russia or lived elsewhere. Sandler examines the work of dozens of poets--including Gennady Aygi, Joseph Brodsky, Grigory Dashevsky, Arkady Dragomoshchenko, Mikhail Eremin, Elena Fanailova, Anna Glazova, Elizaveta Mnatsakanova, Olga Sedakova, Elena Shvarts, and Maria Stepanova--analyzing their engagement with politics, performance, music, photography, and religious thought, and with poetic forms small and large. Each chapter investigates one of these topics, with extensive quotation from the poetry, including translations of all texts into English.

In an afterword, Sandler considers poets' responses to Russia's war on Ukraine and the clampdown on free expression. Many have left Russia, but their work persists, and they remain vocal opponents of domestic political oppression and international violence.

Review Quotes

"In this masterful study of contemporary Russian poetry, Stephanie Sandler presents a compelling case for understanding poetic freedom through the metaphor of air, both as a vital life substance and as a medium of transmission. . . . . Sandler turns the relative bleakness of the Russian poetic landscape -- uncertain and unfinalized--into a source of hope and resilience."---Matilda Hicklin, Modern Language Review

"Sandler offers subtle, highly perceptive and original analyses of works by poets who, while perhaps little-known outside the Russosphere, are key figures in contemporary versification. . . . In this fiercely erudite and wide-ranging study - the finest of its kind on the subject matter - she has demonstrated conclusively a flourishing of poetry, against considerable odds, over the past three decades in Russia."---Bryan Karetnyk, Times Literary Supplement

About the Author

Stephanie Sandler is the Ernest E. Monrad Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Harvard University. She is the author of Commemorating Pushkin: Russia's Myth of a National Poet and a coauthor of A History of Russian Literature.