Description
Book SynopsisSoviet socialism was based on paradoxes that were revealed by the peculiar experience of its collapse. Focusing on the transformation of the 1950's at the level of discourse, ideology, language, and ritual, this book traces the emergence of multiple unanticipated meanings, communities, relations, and pursuits that this transformation enabled.
Trade ReviewWinner of the 2015 Prosvetitel (Enlightener) Book Prize Winner of the 2007 AAASS Wayne S. Vucinich Book Prize, American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies "If there is a prize for best title of the year, this book surely deserves it. Alexei Yurchak ... has written an interesting and provocative book about the way young Soviet Russians talked in the Brezhnev period and what they meant by what they said."--Sheila Fitzpatrick, London Review of Books "Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More is an important book... Everything Was Forever provides fresh paradigms that pack a hefty explanatory punch both with regard to its immediate subject matter and beyond. Its publication means that discussions of Soviet life, culture, and literature that rely on the old, rigid binarisms are going to seem instantly dated... [T]his study is a must-read."--Harriet Murav, Current Anthropology "Amidst these prolix transformations in Russian language and civilization, Yurchak's contribution has come in the form of a deep listening."--Bruce Grant, Slavic Review "The strength of Yurchak's study is in its methodological-analytical grasp of the seemingly contradictory nature of everyday existence... Yurchak provides an elegant methodological tool to explore the complex, intersecting and often paradoxical nature of social change."--Luahona Ganguly, International Journal of Communication
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments ix Chapter 1: Late Socialism An Eternal State 1 Chapter 2: Hegemony of Form Stalin's Uncanny Paradigm Shift 36 Chapter 3: Ideology Inside Out Ethics and Poetics 77 Chapter 4: Living "Vnye" Deterritorialized Milieus 126 Chapter 5: Imaginary West The Elsewhere of Late Socialism 158 Chapter 6: Tr ue Colors of Communism King Crimson, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd 207 Chapter 7: Dead Irony Necroaesthetics, "Stiob," and the Anekdot 238 Conclusion 282 Bibliography 299 Index 319
