Introduction to Twentieth-Century and Contemporary Russian Literature

What makes literature seem real? Deep? Mind-blowing? Funny? In the Soviet Union, people read literature as if their lives depended on it. Official sources of information were heavily censored, so the “voice of the people” was channeled instead through short stories, science fiction, satire, and other imaginative forms of truth-telling. This course focuses on Russian and Ukrainian authors from the Soviet and contemporary post-Soviet period. In translation, no prerequisites. Fulfills FSLT.