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Russian Formalism: History - Doctrine
Hardcover.
311 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1980
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 5, 2016
Özet ama Rus Biçimcilerinden daha fazla yazmış.
June 13, 2022
A classic in its own right, Victor Erlich’s Russian Formalism offers one the earliest – and consequently somewhat dated – accounts of Russian Formalism, a movement in Russian/Soviet literary scholarship that many consider to be the start of modern literary theory. Erlich was a student of Roman Jakobson (one of the movement’s founders) and this bias certainly shows throughout. While he strikes a nice balance between covering the Moscow and Petersburg sub-groups, his overview at times feels partial to the former, particularly with respect to his insistent portrait of Shklovsky as a free-wheeling iconoclast. Sure, Shklovsky was extremely radical in his approach to literary analysis, but I couldn’t help but feel that Erlich sometimes presented his work as a bit juvenile in comparison to Jakobson’s academic rigor.
This isn’t to say that there’s not much to be admired here. Erlich does an excellent job sketching out the group’s origins and I especially enjoyed his overview of the intellectual tradition that anticipated its formation (Veselovsky, Pisarev, Russian Symbolism, etc). The second half of the book, appropriately titled “Doctrine,” deserves a note of praise as well. In this section, he covers the ideas central to the movement and breaks down many of the group’s thornier concepts, including literary evolution, verse structure, and defamiliarization. Although Erlich’s prose style tends to be pretty dry, I still found these sections to be very engaging and came to appreciate his painstaking attention to detail.
While Erlich’s Russian Formalism is probably no longer the most authoritative work on Russian Formalism, it’s nevertheless a very accessible introduction to the movement that remains a staple in Slavic Studies for a reason. If you’re interested in the history of literary theory or even just Russian modernity, this definitely isn’t a bad place to start. Just make sure to read the theorists a bit first!
[70/100]
This isn’t to say that there’s not much to be admired here. Erlich does an excellent job sketching out the group’s origins and I especially enjoyed his overview of the intellectual tradition that anticipated its formation (Veselovsky, Pisarev, Russian Symbolism, etc). The second half of the book, appropriately titled “Doctrine,” deserves a note of praise as well. In this section, he covers the ideas central to the movement and breaks down many of the group’s thornier concepts, including literary evolution, verse structure, and defamiliarization. Although Erlich’s prose style tends to be pretty dry, I still found these sections to be very engaging and came to appreciate his painstaking attention to detail.
While Erlich’s Russian Formalism is probably no longer the most authoritative work on Russian Formalism, it’s nevertheless a very accessible introduction to the movement that remains a staple in Slavic Studies for a reason. If you’re interested in the history of literary theory or even just Russian modernity, this definitely isn’t a bad place to start. Just make sure to read the theorists a bit first!
[70/100]
February 16, 2010
I give it 3 stars not because it's not good, but who really enjoys reading Russian Formalist literary theory? I will give it to them, though. Russian Formalism is a lot more comprehensive and flexible than American Formalism. Shklovsky makes Cleanth Brooks look positively curmudgeonly.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews