RUSS245W

Tolstoy famously wrote, All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Beginning with his controversial novella, The Kreutzer Sonata, this course will examine love and family in Russian literature, a problem which becomes particularly complicated in the twentieth century. Topics will include androgyny in the writings of the symbolists, the regimentation of sex in Zamiatins anti-utopian novel We, mystical love in Bulgakovs Master and Margarita, questions of disease and sterility in Solzhenitsyns Cancer Ward, and generational conflict in the writings of Tsvetaeva and Petrushevskaia. The course does not require a background in Russian history of culture; only a curiosity and desire to explore new literary worlds. Taught in English.

Even Years

Spring Semester