Description
Book SynopsisAn athlete becomes a movie star; a waiter rises to manage a chain of nightclubs; a movie scenarist takes to writing restaurant reviews. Intrepid women hunt bears, drive in automobile races, and fly, first in balloons and then in airplanes. Sensational...
Trade ReviewFirst and foremost it is a recovery of little-known stories of Russian leisure activities, an effort to 'resurrect' what has largely 'vanished' from historical memory.... This recovery of the past is often quite celebratory (the author's pleasure in discovering and telling these tales of Russians 'at play' is apparent), yet this appreciation has interpretive weight. Louise McReynolds argues, against the well-known contempt for commercial entertainment by contemporary culturalist intellectuals, that Russia's growing commercial mass culture offered citizens facing a rapidly changing modern society much of value. Above all, it offered Russians opportunities to orient themselves as individuals and social beings, to fashion and adapt new identities, and to find refuge.
* Slavic Review *
In her well-researched and stimulating book, Louise McReynolds brings firmly to our attention the late tsarist leisure industry and show show it can deepen our understanding of Russian culture and society.... The book also has more than fifty well-chosen illustrations: street scenes, sports photos, photo-portraits (especially of actors), cartoons, and promotional pictures of resorts.
* SEER *
Table of ContentsThe origins of Russia's legitimate stage -- Commercializing the legitimate stage -- Sporting life as modern life -- The actress and the wrestler -- The Russian tourist at home and abroad -- "Steppin' out" in the Russian night at the fin-de-siaecle -- Inthe whirlwind of a waltz -- Tsarist Russia's dream factories.
