Russia's Alternative Prose

Robert Porter

• Introduction - some theory and definition; parody; the "Metropol" affair; shock therapy - Aleshkovsky; Sorokin - female alternatives; Narbikova; Petrushevskaya; Tolstaya - Venedikt Erofeev - a short journey to eternity; Evgeny Popov - stories; "the soul of a patriot"; "the splendour of life"; Viktor Erofeev - stories; "Russian beauty" - Eduard Limonov, the debut, New York and the West; Soviet Kharkov; alternative prose, alternative politics.

'This book is both scholarly and entertaining - an all too rare combination in Russian studies in the 1990s. Robert Porter made me want to read or re-read nearly all the works he discusses. Surely this should be the main aim of every literary critic? But how rarely it is achieved!'Martin Dewhirst, Department of Slavonic Languages and Literatures, University of Glasgow'Porter is to be congratulated on a bold and, as used to be said in Soviet times, necessary enterprise. His book helps to make sense of a confusing period of literature, and deserves to be on every library shelf.'The Slavonic Review'... information is provided with most enjoyable ease. (It is, frankly, a damn good read.)'Irish Slavonic Studies'The strengths of this book lie in the author's presentation of the most significant new school of Russian prose fiction to appear after the onset of glasnost. Porter has made a close study, not only of the key novels and stories, but also of Russian and western analy