Irina Paperno

If you've read "The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People who Read Them" by Elif Batuman, then you might recognize the Berkeley professor who wrote this study as the one who encouraged her to go on a summer study program in Uzbekistan in order to teach Uzbek at UCB and explained to Elif that the reason the cost for the program was so high ($7000) was that $4000 was for the "body bag to send you home." That professor was Irina Paperno. I laughed out loud when I read this episode in the book because I could imagine exactly how Irina said this to her. Irina Paperno, before she went to teach at Berkeley, taught at UCLA where she was my thesis advisor and one of my favorite professors. She is a brilliant scholar and has a sharp wit. This book has languished on my shelf for close to 10 years. I finally read it through, and it brought back all the amazing research and discussions on semiotics and culture that Irina's lectures and seminars were filled with.
Irina looks at how suicides in the 19th century Russia was discussed in newpapers and literary journals as a social and political phenomenon. The medical, judicial and religious views on suicide in this society are explained and she presents actual suicide notes published in the papers and how they were analyzed by the often anonymous writers of these articles. She then looks at suicide in literature and especially at Dostoevsky's use of suicide in his novels, as well as in his publicistic work. It is an extremely interesting work, which finishes with the bizarre true story of a writer of feuilletons who wrote on suicide in the journals, and started corresponding with Dostoevsky after, having been caught embezzling money from the bank he worked at for reasons that seem to mimic situations straight out of Dostoevsky's novels, tried to commit suicide and ended up in Siberia.
This book is not light reading, but if you are interested in semiotics of Russian 19th century culture, I highly recommend it. Irina Paperno's breadth and depth of research is astounding. My only quibble is that there is no separate bibliography, though everything is in the endnotes.… (altro)

Nos romances de Dostoiévski, as idéias dos personagens sempre são influenciadas pelas idéias dos outros. Raskolnikov ouve estranhos discutindo no trem e adiciona o que escuta às suas próprias idéias, Stavróguin influencia Kirilov e é influenciado por ele. Foi esse o aspecto que achei mais interessante nesse livro: cartas de leitores que prenunciam seus personagens, ou que parecem tirados de seus livros, especialmente no que se refere a um tema que o obcecava: o suicídio. Todo o capítulo sobre Albert Kovner é excelente. NB: na pentalogia bibliográfica do Joseph Frank, ele é mencionado como Arkadi Kovner.… (altro)