Beyond the Flesh: Alexander Blok, Zinaida Gippius, and the Symbolist Sublimation of Sex (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780299229504)

Though the Russian Symbolist movement was dominated by a concern with transcending sex, many of the writers associated with the movement exhibited an intense preoccupation with matters of the flesh. Drawing on poetry, plays, short stories, essays, memoirs, and letters, as well as feminist and psychoanalytic theory, Beyond the Flesh documents the often unexpected form that this obsession with gender and the body took in the life and art of two of the most important Russian Symbolists. Jenifer Presto argues that the difficulties encountered in reading Alexander Blok and Zinaida Gippius within either a feminist or a traditional, binary gendered framework derive not only from the peculiarities of their creative personalities but also from the specific Russian cultural context. Although these two poets engaged in gendered practices that, at times, appeared to be highly idiosyncratic and even incited gossip among their contemporaries, they were not operating in a vacuum. Instead, they were responding to philosophical concepts that were central to Russian Symbolism and that would continue to shape modernism in Russia.

Author: Jenifer Presto
ISBN-10: 0299229505
ISBN-13: 9780299229504
Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
Language: English
Published: 11/07/2008
Pages: 352
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.25lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.10w x 1.00d

Review Citation(s):
Chronicle of Higher Education 01/23/2009 pg. 19
Choice 06/01/2009