Description
Book SynopsisActs of Logos examines the 19th-century foundations of St. Petersburg’s famous literary heritage, with a focus on the unifying principle of material animation. Ever since Pushkin’s 1833 poem
The Bronze Horseman, the city has provided a literary space in which inanimate things (noses, playing cards, overcoats) spring to life. Scollins’s book addresses this issue of animacy by analyzing the powerful function of language in the city’s literature, from its mythic origins—in which the tsar Peter appears as a God-like creator, calling his city forth from nothing—to the earliest texts of its literary tradition, when poets took up the pen to commit their own acts of verbal creation. Her interpretations shed new light on the canonical works of Pushkin and Gogol, exposing the performative and subversive possibilities of the poetic word in the Petersburg tradition, and revealing an emerging literary culture capable of challenging the official narratives of the state.
Trade Review"This book is a very welcome addition to investigations of the Petersburg Text. [...] Scollins writes with admirable clarity. The chapters all offer their own lively and imaginative readings of classic texts." — Modern Language ReviewTable of Contents
- Prologue: In the Beginning Was Peter’s Word
- Introduction: St. Petersburg
- Myth, Text, Word
- 1. Cursing at the Whirlwind
- The Book of Job according to Pushkin
- 2. Gambling Away the Petri-mony
- Rival Models of Social Advancement in Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades”
- 3. Body Parts, Puff Pastries, and the Devil Himself
- Nevsky Prospect as the Hellmouth of Gogol’s Petersburg
- 4. Mertvye ushi
- The Annunciation Motif and Disorder of the Senses in “The Nose”
- 5. Kako sdelan Akakii
- Letter as Hero in “The Overcoat”
- Conclusion: Beyond the Schism
- Works Cited
