A Culture of Discontinuity?: Russian Cultural Debates in Historical Perspective

Abstract

Russian culture has often been referred to as a culture of discontinuity and abrupt rifts, and the country's past was frequently revised and rewritten, so much so that it is hardly possible to speak of Russian culture as a homogeneous, unified whole. Every turn of Russian history was accompanied by a great cultural upheaval and facilitated fierce cultural debates. The destiny of Russia in the context of its geopolitical position and its cultural role on both domestic and international fronts have been fundamental to these debates. At the same time, such discussions always went deeper, and invariably acquired an existential dimension, probing into the human condition, into the cursed questions of existence.
This volume brings together diverse contributions from an international team of scholars, asking what has sustained Russian cultural development across the centuries and how Russian culture has evolved to this day. It treats the topic from a contemporary frame of reference, covering a broad range of Russian life, literature and arts, and sets the debates in historical perspective. In doing so, it links the particular with the general, exposing some unexpected connections and thus sheds some new light on Russian cultural trajectory.