Russian Literature, 1988-1994: The End of an Era

Rolf Hellebust is a professor of Russian language and literature at the
University of Calgary.

Those who are familiar with Shneidman’s previous historical surveys of
Soviet writing in the 1970s and 1980s will know what to expect from this
volume. While there are many fervent supporters among Western literary
scholars of individual writers or trends in contemporary Russian
literature, few can boast such a comprehensive knowledge of what
Russians call the “literary process.” Few have had the patience to
keep up-to-date with both the unofficial side of Soviet literature and
the less-glamorous official artistic culture of the USSR’s last
stagnant decades. Fewer still have managed to cover all of the most
recent developments, in which writers of the older generation bemoan the
death of the literary process itself, while younger writers eagerly
contribute to its disintegration into a bewildering array of conflicting
tendencies.

The book begins with an overview of the political and social changes
that have redefined the role of art in post-Soviet Russia. In dealing
with events that are, as he writes, only beginning to unfold, Shneidman
avoids the stance of the objectivist historian. He makes his opinions
clear on the turbulent political forces that not only have affected the
lives of Russian writers, but continue to be a source of unease for
those outside of Russia. Of particular interest in his step-by-step
analysis of the dismantling of official Soviet literary institutions and
of the struggle among various factions over dwindling sources of
government funding.

Shneidman goes on to treat three major groupings of writers: the old
guard, the intermediate generation, and the “new writers of
perestroika.” Given the popularity in the Western scholarly community
of the phenomenon of Russian postmodernism, some readers might bristle
at Shneidman’s apparent bias against some of its representatives and
against the validity of the category in general. Nevertheless, his
observations are worth considering, and certainly reflect the attitudes
of many influential critics in Russia itself.