Open AccessThe Russian Theme in English Novels and its Reception in the Reviews of the Anglo-Russian Literary Society
Author(s) -
Irina Vladimirovna Arshinova
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
studia litterarum
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.1
H-Index - 3
eISSN - 2541-8564
pISSN - 2500-4247
DOI - 10.22455/2500-4247-2020-5-4-506-517
Subject(s) - theme (computing) , literature , russian literature , entertainment , duty , history , silence , tone (literature) , representation (politics) , publishing , russian culture , sociology , media studies , law , philosophy , art , aesthetics , political science , computer science , politics , operating system
From the very beginning of its existence, Anglo-Russian Literary Society hadD.M. Wallace’s following words as its motto. At the end of his his book Russia, hewrites: “Meanwhile, our [as the English] duty is clear. We ought to know Russia better.”Eager promoter of Russian culture and literature since 1893, the Society neverthelesswas ignoring popular English novels on Russian themes for quite a long time. In 1899,a “specially invited discussion” revealed the reason for this hostile silence: according tothe Society, “the representation of Russian life in English novels had been misleading.”However, 10 years after its foundation, the Society began publishing reviews on thesenovels in its Proceedings. Moreover, the tone of these reviews may be described asmoderately favorable. The analysis of the papers allows me to assume that this shiftmay be explained by the change of criteria applied to the novels (the criterion of“educativeness” was balanced by the criterion of entertainment): the popularizingfunction of these novels finally comes first.