AREA_14 Russian History and Russian Literature

Faculty of Arts
Autumn 2014
Extent and Intensity
0/0. 3 credit(s). Type of Completion: k (colloquium).
Teacher(s)
prof. PhDr. Ivo Pospíšil, DrSc. (lecturer)
Mgr. Josef Šaur, Ph.D. (assistant)
Guaranteed by
prof. PhDr. Ivo Pospíšil, DrSc.
Department of Slavonic Studies – Faculty of Arts
Supplier department: Department of Slavonic Studies – Faculty of Arts
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is offered to students of any study field.
Course objectives
At the end of the course the student will able to understand the elementary evolutionary stages of Russian history and literature which often reflects it. At the same time, he/she will get a better grasp of the relation between the personalities of Russian history and Russian literature; the course will also provide him/her in a concise form the basic idea of the canon of Russian literature and of the historicity of Russian culture as such in connection with the European and world historical and literary development.
Syllabus
  • 1) Russian state and Russian Christianity in the period of the Kiev Rus‘; the canon of medieval literature of East Slavs: chronicles, hagiographies, sermons, battle tales, pilgrimage descriptions, translations, contacts with the Byzantine Empire 2) „Gathering of Russian Lands“: the formation of the Moscow power centre: literature as a state-formation factor 3) Russia under the Romanov Dynasty: political events, economy, clash of sacral and secular tendencies, picaresque tales 4) Russian and Europe in the 18th century: history and literature, pre-post effect as a manifestation of the developmental dynamism of Russian society and culture 5) The development of the Russian language, Russian as a culture- and state-formation factor 6) Russia as a European power: Russian classical literature of the early period: sentimentalism, preromanticism, Romanticism. History and literature: A. S. Pushkin‘s Work 7) Attempts at the reform and revolution: Alexander I and the Decembrists: literature in service of Russia‘s greatness 8) The Golden Age of Russian literature, Russian realism and the Russian novel (Nicolai Gogol, Ivan Turgenev, Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Anton Chekhov) 9) The Silver Age: Russia as a world empire, economic and industrial growth, expansion of cultural communication (literary magazines), modernism and its currents (decadence, symbolism, acmeism, futurism, imaginism) 10) Russia in three revolutions, First World War and Civil War: the change of literary paradigm, returns of the story, the Russian avant-garde 11) Relative plurality of politics and literature in the early Soviet Russia: literary groups and their programmes 12) The state and literature under Stalin‘s Dictatorship (1929-1953) 13) Politics and literature in the 1930s and the Great Patriotic War 14) The two periods of political thaw and literature (1945-1948, 1954-1970); the Soviet politics and literature in the period of glasnost, perestroika, and catastroika (1985-1991) 15) Russian postmodernism and the modifications of Russian politics and literature (1999-2014)
Literature
  • Бойко‚ М. Н.: Авторские миры в русской культуре первой половины XIX века. Санкт-Петербург: Дмитрий Буланин, 2005.
  • Pospíšil, I.:The Reverse Side of Emblems: A Russian Example. In: Codifications et Symboles des Cultures nationales. Actes. Brno 13-15 juin 2002, Masarykova univerzita, Brno 2003, s. 45-51.
  • Жукова‚ Ольга: Актуальность традиции: художественное творчество в истории русской культуры. Мoskva 2005.
  • Антология русской философии в трех томах. Санкт-Петербург: Сенсор, 2000.
  • The Cambridge History of Russia. Vols 1-3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  • Trigos, Ludmilla A.: The Decembrist Myth in Russian Culture New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
  • Авангард 1910-x - 1920-x годов: взаимодействие искусств. Москва: Государственный институт искусствознания, 1998.
  • Беленкин‚ Борис Исаевич: Авантюристы великой Смуты: Россия, XX век: революция, гражданская война 20-е годы. Москва: ОЛМА-ПРЕСС‚ 2001.
  • Pospíšil, I.: Paradoxes of Genre Evolution: the 19th-Century Russian Novel. Zagadnienia rodzajów literackich, tom XLII, zeszyt 1-2 (83-84), Łódź 1999, s. 25-47. PL ISSN 0084-4446
  • Pospíšil, I.: The Early Anglo-American Reflections in Russian Literature. Germanoslavica. Zeitschrift für germano-slawische Studien. 1996, Nr. 1, III (VIII), s. 67-75.
  • Иваницкий‚ Александр Ильич: Чудо в объятиях истории: пушкинские сюжеты 1830-х годов. Moskva: RGGU, 2008.
  • The Cambridge History of Russian Literature. Ed. by Charles A. Moser Revised edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
  • Areál Ruska ve světle historických výročí (1709, 1812, 1941, 1991): jazyk – literatura – dějiny kultury. Pospíšil, I. - Šaur, J. (eds.). 1. vyd. Brno: Masarykova univerzita. 267 pp. ISBN 978-80-210-5904-7. 2012. info
  • Evropské areály a metodologie (Rusko, střední Evropa, Balkán a Skandinávie). Pospíšil, Ivo - Šaur, Josef (ed.). 1st ed. Brno: Masarykova univerzita. 308 pp. ISBN 978-80-210-5434-9. 2011. info
  • POSPÍŠIL, Ivo. Pátrání po nové identitě : (rusistické a vztahové reflexe). Vyd. 1. Brno: SVN Regiony. 273 s. ISBN 808673515X. 2008. info
  • POSPÍŠIL, Ivo. Ruský román znovu navštívený (The Russian Novel Revisited). 1st ed. Brno: Nadace Universitas, Akademické nakladatelství CERM, Nakladatelství a vydavatelství NAUMA. 209 pp. Edice Scientia. ISBN 80-7204-423-0. 2005. info
  • PIPES, Richard. A concise history of the Russian revolution. 1st Vintage Books ed. New York: Vintage Books. xvii, 431. ISBN 0679422773. 1996. info
  • POSPÍŠIL, Ivo. The Crisis of Tradition in Russian Literature and the Postmodernist. In Postmodernism in Literature and Culture of Central and Easte. Katowice: Wydavnictwo Unyversytetu Slaskiego. p. 123-130. ISBN 83-85831-48-7. 1996. info
  • POSPÍŠIL, Ivo. Fenomén šílenství v ruské literatuře 19. a 20. století. In Fenomén šílenství v ruské literatuře 19. a 20. století. Brno: Masarykova univerzita Brno. ISBN 80-210-1083-5. 1995. info
Teaching methods
Lecture, presentation of extracts from seminar essays, group discussions, homework (e-learning), reading literary texts
Assessment methods
Seminar essay, three written tests; final written test consists of 20 questions for 20 points, minimum 10 points is needed to pass.
Language of instruction
English
Further comments (probably available only in Czech)
Study Materials
The course is taught only once.
The course is taught: in blocks.
Information on the extent and intensity of the course: 20 hodin.

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