Maguire Muireann, Langen Timothy (eds.) Reading Backwards: An Advance Retrospective on Russian Literature

Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2021. — 304 p. — ISBN-10 1800641206; ISBN-13 978-1800641204.This edited volume employs the paradoxical notion of 'anticipatory plagiarism'-developed in the 1960s by the 'Oulipo' group of French writers and thinkers-as a mode for reading Russian literature. Reversing established critical approaches to the canon and literary influence, its contributors ask us to consider how reading against linear chronologies can elicit fascinating new patterns and perspectives. Reading Backwards: An Advance Retrospective on Russian Literature re-assesses three major nineteenth-century authors-Gogol, Dostoevsky and Tolstoy-either in terms of previous writers and artists who plagiarized them (such as Raphael, Homer, or Hall Caine), or of their own depredations against later writers (from J.M. Coetzee to Liudmila Petrushevskaia).Far from suggesting that past authors literally stole from their descendants, these engaging essays, contributed by both early-career and senior scholars of Russian and comparative literature, encourage us to identify the contingent and familiar within classic texts. By moving beyond rigid notions of cultural heritage and literary canons, they demonstrate that inspiration is cyclical, influence can flow in multiple directions, and no idea is ever truly original. This book will be of great value to literary scholars and students working in Russian Studies. The introductory discussion of the origins and context of 'plagiarism by anticipation', alongside varied applications of the concept, will also be of interest to those working in the wider fields of comparative literature, reception studies, and translation studies.Contributor BiographiesIntroduction: Countersense and Interpretation. Muireann Maguire and Timothy LangenGogolSomething for Nothing: Imagination and Collapse in O’Brien, Krzhizhanovsky, and Gogol. Timothy Langen
Seeing Backwards: Raphael’s Portrait of Nikolai Vasil’evich Gogol. Ilya VinitskyDostoevskyThe Voice of Ivan: Ethical Plagiarism in Dostoevsky and Coetzee. Michael Bowden
Foretelling the Past: Fyodor Dostoevsky Follows Guzel’ Yakhina into the Heart of Darkness. David Gillespie and Marina Korneeva
Notes from the Other Side of the Chronotope: Dostoevsky Anticipating Petrushevskaia. Inna TigountsovaTolstoyMaster and Manxman: Reciprocal Plagiarism in Tolstoy and Hall Caine. Muireann Maguire
The Posteriority of the Anterior: Levinas, Tolstoy, and Responsibility for the Other. Steven Shankman
From Sky to Sea: When Andrei Bolkonskii Voiced Achilles. Svetlana YefimenkoAfterword: But Seriously, Folks... (Pierre Bayard and the Russians). Eric Naiman