Toxic Voices: The Villain from Early Soviet Literature to Socialist Realism (Studies in Russian Literature and Theory)

Satire and the fantastic, vital literary genres in the 1920s, are often thought to have fallen victim to the official adoption of socialist realism. Eric Laursen contends that these subversive genres did not just vanish or move underground. Instead, key strategies of each survive to sustain the villain of socialist realism. Laursen argues that the judgment of satire and the hesitation associated with the fantastic produce a narrative obsession with controlling the villain’s influence. In identifying a crucial connection between the questioning, subversive literature of the 1920s and the socialist realists, Laursen produces an insightful revision of Soviet literary history. Satire and the fantastic, vital literary genres in the 1920s, are often thought to have fallen victim to the official adoption of socialist realism. In this book, the author contends that these subversive genres did not just vanish or move underground. Instead, key strategies of each survive to sustain the villain of socialist realism. The author argues that the judgment of satire and the hesitation associated with the fantastic produce a narrative obsession with controlling the villain's influence. In identifying a crucial connection between the questioning, subversive literature of the 1920s and the socialist realists, the author produces an insightful revision of Soviet literary history Contents Acknowledgments Note on Transliteration Introduction: Scrounging in the Soviet Garbage Pit Chapter One: Writing a Precarious Balance Chapter Two: He Does Not Love Us When We Are Dirty Chapter Three: Things That Should Not Be Found Chapter Four: Lost in Translation Conclusion: Writers Forward! Notes Bibliography Index