Description
Book SynopsisThis work examines the phenomenon of demon possession in rural Russia. Drawing from a range of sources - religious, psychiatric, ethnographic and literary - Worobec looks at "klikushestuo" over a broad span of time but focuses mainly on the 19th and early-20th centuries.
Trade Review"Exceptionally well-researched and exhaustive."
-Association for Women in Slavic Studies
"Worobec is at her best as a storyteller.... Her scholarship is marked by a meticulous reading of sources and a sensitivity to and respect for the people she studies."—Russian Review
Table of ContentsTable of Contents
Confronting Klikushestvo: An Introduction
1. State and Church Perceptions
The Legal Case
Orthodoxy's Triumph over the Devil
Scientific Rationalism and the Miraculous
Conclusion
2. Peasant Views
Popular Orthodoxy
Witchcraft
3. Literary and Ethnographic Portrayals
Romantic Images
Images of Serfdome
An Ethnographic-Historical Account
Feodor Dostoevsky
Leo Tolstoy
The Dark Side of Peasant Beliefs
Conclusion
4. Psychiatric Diagnoses
The Search for Klikushi
Scientific Rationalism versus. Popular Practices
Hysteria versus. Somnambulism
Mass Psychology
Conclusion
5. Sorting through Multiple Realities
Appendix 1: Database of Klikushi/klikuny
Appendix 2: Database of Witchcraft Cases
Notes
Bibliography
Index
