Alexandra Popoff, The Wives: The Women Behind Russia's Literary Giants

New book explores the role writer's wives played in the creation of Russian masterpieces

Leo and Sophia Tolstoy, 1906.

Yelena Akhtiorskaya reviews Alexandra Popoff's new book, The Wives: The Women Behind Russia's Literary Giants. A fascinating subject that is often overlooked: 'Alexandra Popoff’s book is a look at Russian writers’ wives—greatest hits edition—the women who brought us the men who brought us the classics. Included are Anna Dostoevsky and Sophia Tolstoy (the originals), Véra Nabokov, Nadezhda Mandelstam, Elena Bulgakov, and Natalya Solzhenitsyn, each of them paired with a handy epithet—Nursemaid of Talent (Mrs. Tolstoy) or Mysterious Margarita (guess who). The central argument of The Wives is twofold: that great writers have demanding habits, and that the women who tended to those habits deserve recognition.' [Read More]

Also at A Piece of Monologue:

• Vladimir Nabokov: Literary Psychologist
• Leo Tolstoy on Film
• Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky? The Experts Decide
• Diurnal vs. Nocturnal Writers: Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky
• Tolstoy: The Greatest Writer of all Time?
• Life of a Dostoyevsky Translator
• 'Accursed Questions': Translating Russian Literature

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago

Steve King on the first of a three-volume memoir

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Vol.1

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Vol.2

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Vol.3

Steve King on the first volume of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago: 'The first volume of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago was published in Paris on this day in 1973. The writing of the book was surrounded by a swirl of author secrecy and secret police snooping; when a typist was tortured into revealing the whereabouts of one copy of the manuscript and driven to suicide over guilt for doing so, Solzhenitsyn felt compelled to publish.' [Read More]

Also at A Piece of Monologue:

• Alexander Solzenitsyn's Short Stories
• Alexander Solzenitsyn's The New Generation

Alexander Solzenitsyn's The New Generation

Short story by Nobel laureate free to read online

The American Scholar has posted Alesksandr Solzhenitsyn's The New Generation online, translated into English by Kenneth Lantz (link via Susan Tomaselli) [Read More]

Also at A Piece of Monologue:

• Alexander Solzenitsyn's Short Stories

Alexander Solzenitsyn's Short Stories

9 stories to be published in English for the first time

Alexander Solzenhitsyn

A collection of stories by Russian writer Alexander Solzenitsyn, author of Cancer Ward and A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, are to be published in English for the first time. According to Dalya Alberge, the collection will be entitled Apricot Jam and Other Stories, and has been 'described by scholars as ranking alongside his best work' [Read More]

Disjecta: This week's links

(Image: Paul Buckley's design for the 25th Anniversary edition of Don DeLillo's White Noise)

A number of interesting articles and reviews in this week's selection. Jonathan Jones speculates on the degeneration of Philip Roth's artistic powers, Will Self meets The Road director John Hillcoat, and Joyce Carol Oates takes time out of her busy schedule to answer questions. There's also a link to Žižek's recent appearance on The Today Programme, a review of Celan's correspondence, and fifteen things you may or may not already know about coffee.

Literature:

Philip Roth: Jonathan Jones on The Humbling and Roth's late career
Don DeLillo: Celebrating the 25th anniversary of White Noise
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: Writer's son his father's rejects 'Old Testament' image
Paul Celan: Benjamin Ivry on Celan's Letters
J. M. Coetzee: The New Yorker briefly reviews Coetzee's Summertime
Philip K. Dick: Controversy grows over Google's Android/Nexus product line
Joyce Carol Oates: Questions and Answers

Philosophy & Critical Theory:

Slavoj Žižek: Žižek appears on BBC Radio 4's The Today Programme
Feminism: The Guardian reviews 'the feminist year ahead'

Music:

Jazz: Miles Davis' b-flat trumpet, on display in LA's Grammy Museum
Stewart Lee: Lee chooses his top musical influences
Samuel Beckett: Morton Feldman's Neither, words by Samuel Beckett

Film:

DVDs of 2009: Sight and Sound Magazine's top picks
Disney: Racial and gender stereotypes in Disney animations
Will Self: Self meets John Hillcoat, director of The Road

Television:

The Wire: A profile of the career of Michael K. Williams, The Wire's Omar Little
Mad Men: Life lessons from a Mad Men art assistant

Art:

The art of Henri Privat-Livemont

Etc.:

The Onion: Front pages 1988-2008
Cardiff Arcades Project
Coffee: Fifteen Things Worth Knowing About Coffee