Overview
Provides a comprehensive overview of the Russian intellectual tradition
Discusses a range of figures, including such philosophers as Alexander Herzen, Mikhail Bakunin, Vladimir Solovyov, Vladimir Lenin, Ivan Ilyin, Alexei Losev, and Merab Mamardhashvili; authors, such as Alexander Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Osip Mandelshtam, and Vladimir Nabokov; and literary critics and theorists, such as Vissarion Belinsky, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Yuri Lotman
Presents new material and critical discussion of the philosophical and cultural landscape of the Soviet period as well as preliminary reflections on the philosophical and intellectual development in post-Soviet Russia
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Table of contents (37 chapters)
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Front Matter
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Russian Philosophical Thought
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Front Matter
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Keywords
About this book
This volume is a comprehensive Handbook of Russian thought that provides an in-depth survey of major figures, currents, and developments in Russian intellectual history, spanning the period from the late eighteenth century to the late twentieth century. Written by a group of distinguished scholars as well as some younger ones from Russia, Europe, the United States, and Canada, this Handbook reconstructs a vibrant picture of the intellectual and cultural life in Russia and the Soviet Union during the most buoyant period in the country's history. Contrary to the widespread view of Russian modernity as a product of intellectual borrowing and imitation, the essays collected in this volume reveal the creative spirit of Russian thought, which produced a range of original philosophical and social ideas, as well as great literature, art, and criticism. While rejecting reductive interpretations, the Handbook employs a unifying approach to its subject matter, presenting Russian thought in the context of the country's changing historical landscape. This Handbook will open up a new intellectual world to many readers and provide a secure base for its further exploration.
Reviews
"A few years ago, while teaching a seminar titled, after Isaiah Berlin’s famous volume, 'Russian Thinkers,' I realized that my students and I would have benefited from a new, more comprehensive, survey of the history of Russian thought which would not only register events, names, and ideas, but also provide some kind of unifying idea and interpret 'Russian philosophies' in a lucid and stimulating way. This Handbook meets these requirements very well by offering a journey into the unusual, brilliant, and troubled world of Russian intellectual history. Written by an international team of distinguished philosophers, historians, and literary critics, it demonstrates the richness, integrity, power, and numerous paradoxes of Russian thought considered in historical, political, geo-political and literary contexts." (Ilya Vinitsky, Professor and Chair, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Princeton University, USA)
"This superb volume, by the very scale and diversity of its contributions, is the best testimony that Russian thought is an important part of the world's philosophical heritage. Questions of social ethics and political philosophy, of an individual’s relationship to the State, of adequate knowledge and virtuous behaviour, of wisdom and power, of religious and aesthetic values, of ideas and ideals as guidelines for human life—all of these are central to Russian philosophy and exemplify its continuing relevance for contemporary thought." (Mikhail Epstein, Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Cultural Theory and Russian Literature, Emory University, USA)
"Few scholarly subjects help us understand Russian culture as well as intellectual history, which studies how ideas influence one another and are situated in their own time. This excellent handbook brings together a wide range of leading scholars and reveals, as few recent books have, the fundamental ideas circulating through three centuries of Russian philosophy, literature, and art. The book is also a timely reminder, in our age of diverse electronic resources, that well curated scholarship is absolutely essential." (Justin Weir, Curt Hugo Reisinger Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures and Comparative Literature, Harvard University, USA)
The essays brought together in this impressive and unique volume cover a remarkable range of topics in Russian intellectual history, including major individual thinkers, writers, and critics, broader philosophical, literary, and cultural currents, as well as case studies in transcultural exchange. The volume will undoubtedly become an indispensable resource for those who have a serious interest in modern Russian thought, literature, and culture. (Ilya Kliger, Associate Professor of Russian Studies, New York University, USA)
Editors and Affiliations
About the editors
Marina F. Bykova is Professor of Philosophy at North Carolina State University, USA, and editor-in-chief of the journals Studies in East European Thought and Russian Studies in Philosophy.
Michael N. Forster is Alexander von Humboldt Professor, Chair in Theoretical Philosophy, and Co-director of the International Center for Philosophy, North Rhine Westphalia at Bonn University, Germany.
Lina Steiner is a Research Associate at the International Center for Philosophy, North Rhine Westphalia and a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy and Literature at Bonn University, Germany.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: The Palgrave Handbook of Russian Thought
Editors: Marina F. Bykova, Michael N. Forster, Lina Steiner
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62982-3
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
eBook Packages: Religion and Philosophy, Philosophy and Religion (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2021
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-030-62981-6Published: 23 May 2021
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-030-62984-7Published: 24 May 2022
eBook ISBN: 978-3-030-62982-3Published: 22 May 2021
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XXVII, 814
Topics: Non-Western Philosophy, Russian, Soviet, and East European History, Russian and Post-Soviet Politics, Russian