Friedberg_Nila-2021

I N T R O D U C T I O N Why the 1920s? The materials presented in this book were developed for an advanced-level content- basedRussian language course at PortlandStateUniversity entitled“Russian Literatureof the Twentieth Century: The 1920s.”Literature of this period is a major part of the Russian canon, but is notoriously difficult for learners of Russian to read in the original, due both to its stylistic complexity and the relative obscurity of its historical, political, and cultural references. And yet, this decade is crucial for understanding Russia – not only in the Soviet period, but also today. This was the period, after all, when Mikhail Zoshchenko, Isaak Babel, Mikhail Bulgakov, and Andrei Platonov meticulously documented the birth of the“NewSovietMan,”his“newspeak”and Soviet bureaucratese. Given the pronounced “Soviet nostalgia” in the political discourse of contemporary Russia, the “Soviet Person” still needs to be studied, and literature provides the best window into this Person’s world. The 1920s was the period when Alexandra Kollontai, a Marxist revolutionary and a diplomat, wrote essays and fiction on the “New Soviet Woman,” and her legacy in contemporary Russia remains relevant. This period saw the creation of numerous satirical works – but today’s learner needs guidance to understand the essence of this satire, whether pro-Soviet or critical of the Soviet experience. This was also the period when Babel experimented with creating a literary representation of dialects (e.g., Odessa Russian or Jewish Russian). These varieties of language have not disappeared. Bureaucrats still use some form of bureaucratese. Numerous contemporary TV shows imitate the dialects that Babel described. Moreover, Bulgakov’s Heart of a Dog gave rise, due largely to its film adaptation, to catch-phrases that still appear throughout contemporary Russian media, satirical contexts, and everyday conversation, in the speech of ordinary citizens and politicians alike. Thus, the Russian literature of the 1920s does not belong exclusively to the past, but has relevance and interpretive power for the present. Clearly, American students who wish to pursue a career in humanities, media analysis, analytical translation, journalism, or international relations must understand this period and the linguistic patterns it established. They need to learn to “read between the lines,” to see political nuances; to identify humor and propaganda; to pinpoint a political stance; to differentiate between educated, non-standard, or bureaucratic registers; to learn that language (including Russian) is not monolithic, but includes a variety of dialects and idiolects. All