Book contents
- The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature
- The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- On Transliteration, Names, and Dates
- Introduction
- History 1 Movements
- History 2 Mechanisms
- 2.1 The Monastery
- 2.2 The Court
- 2.3 The Salon and the Circle
- 2.4 The Thick Journal
- 2.5 The Publisher
- 2.6 Queerness
- 2.7 The Censor
- 2.8 The Voice
- 2.9 The Self-Publisher
- 2.10 The Market
- 2.11 The Internet
- 2.12 Empire
- Boxes 3 Places
- Boxes 4 Narrative Voices
- History 3 Forms
- History 4 Heroes
- Index
- References
2.10 - The Market
from History 2 - Mechanisms
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 31 December 2024
- The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature
- The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- On Transliteration, Names, and Dates
- Introduction
- History 1 Movements
- History 2 Mechanisms
- 2.1 The Monastery
- 2.2 The Court
- 2.3 The Salon and the Circle
- 2.4 The Thick Journal
- 2.5 The Publisher
- 2.6 Queerness
- 2.7 The Censor
- 2.8 The Voice
- 2.9 The Self-Publisher
- 2.10 The Market
- 2.11 The Internet
- 2.12 Empire
- Boxes 3 Places
- Boxes 4 Narrative Voices
- History 3 Forms
- History 4 Heroes
- Index
- References
Summary
A capitalist market has been part of modern Russian literature since at least the early nineteenth century. Even during the Soviet era, the market was never entirely abolished. But when socialism fell in 1991, capitalism rushed in. This chapter focuses on the economic, social, and aesthetic consequences of the market in post-Soviet Russian literature. The book market boomed just as thick journals and legacy critics lost cultural authority, and as readers, publishers, and writers were pulled towards bestselling imports, largely western pulp. Drawn by success and fascinated by new forms, many authors innovated genre conventions, authorial performance, and audience interaction, using misdirection, mystification, and online and social media, among other strategies. Others mobilised the terms of capitalism to mount a critique of the illusory values of the new market society.
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- The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature , pp. 388 - 406Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024