Evgeniy A. Dobrenko

Dobrenko

PhD in Philology,

Professor at the University of Venice (Italy)

Education:

Graduated from the Faculty of Philology of Odessa State University (1984)

PhD thesis:

Analytical Trends in Modern Soviet Prose and the Work of Yuri Trifonov in the 1960s-80s: the Problem of Typology and Poetics (1987)

Research interests:

Soviet and post-Soviet literature and culture, Stalinism, socialist realism, Soviet national literatures, Russian and Soviet cinema, critical theory and history of Soviet culture.

Awards and distinctions:

Winner of the Efim Etkind Award for the best book about Russian culture
Winner of the AATSEEL Award for outstanding contribution to the development of science.

Teaching Activity:

Odessa State University, Russian State University for the Humanities, Duke University, Stanford University, Amherst College, University of California, University of Nottingham, University of Sheffield, University of Venice

Academic publications — over 250 publications.

Selected publications

Monographs

Stalinist Cinema and the Production of History: Museum of the Revolution. New Haven, Yale University Press; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2008. 270 p.
Political Economy of Socialist Realism. New Haven, Yale University Press, 2007. 408 p.
Aesthetics of Alienation: Reassessment of Early Soviet Cultural Theories. Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 2005. 152 p.
The Making of the State Writer: Social and Aesthetic Origins of Soviet Literary Culture. Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2001. 484 p.
The Making of the State Reader: Social and Aesthetic Contexts of the Reception of Soviet Literature. Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1997. 374 p.
The Metaphor of Power: Literature of the Stalin Era in Historical light. München: Sagner, 1993. 405 p. (Series “Slavistische Beitr”. Vol. 302)
Isaac Babel’s “Red Cavalry”. Moscow, Rossiiskii universitet Publ., 1993. 120 p. (with G. Belaia, I. Esaulov)

Books (author, editor-compiler)

State Laughter. Stalinism, Populism, and Origins of Soviet Culture. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2022.
Late Stalinism: The Aesthetics of Politics. New Haven, Yale University Press, 2020.
“It's Just Letters on Paper…" Vladimir Sorokin: After Literature. Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie Publ., 2018. In Russ.
Socialist Realism in Central and Eastern European Literatures under Stalin: Institutions, Dynamics, Discourses. London, Anthem Press, 2018.
Russian Literature Since 1991. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2015.
A History of Russian Literary Theory and Criticism: The Soviet Age and Beyond. Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011. 424 p.
The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-Century Russian Literature. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2011. 326 p.
Non-canonical Classic: Dmitry Alexandrovich Prigov (1940–2007). Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie Publ., 2010. 784 p.
Petrified Utopia: Happiness Soviet Style. London, New York, Anthem Press, 2009. 308 p.
Soviet Culture and Power: A History in Documents, 1917–1953. New Haven, London, Yale University Press, 2007. 576 p. (Series “Annals of Communism”)
The Landscape of Stalinism: Тhe Art and Ideology of Soviet Space. Seattle, University of Washington Press, 2003. 315 p.
Criticism of 1917–1932: Library of Russian Criticism, ed., with introduction and comm. by E.A. Dobrenko. Moscow, AST Publ., 2003. 463 p.
Soviet Wealth: Articles About Culture, Literature, and Cinema. Collection of Articles in Honor of the 60^th Anniversary of Günther. St. Petersburg, Akademicheskii proekt Publ., 2002. 448 p.
The Socialist Realist Canon. St. Petersburg, Akademicheskii proekt Publ., 2000. 1040 p.
Endquote: Sots-Art Literature and Soviet Grand Style. Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 2000. 241 p.
Socialist Realism without Shores. Durham, London, Duke University Press, 1997. 369 p.
Getting Rid of Mirages. Social Realism Today. Moscow, Sovetskii pisatel Publ., 1990. 413, [1] p.

Selected essays

“Hegemony of Brotherhood: The Birth of the Soviet Multinational Literature, 1922–1932.” Codex manuscriptus, issue 5. Moscow, IWL RAS Publ., 2024, pp. 15–128. https://doi.org/10.22455/CM.2949-0510-2024-5-15-128
“Socialist Realism.” The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature. Ed. by Simon Franklin, Rebecca Reich, Emma Widdis. Cambridge, CUP, 2024. pp. 147–163.
“Satire.” The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature. Ed. by Simon Franklin, Rebecca Reich, Emma Widdis. Cambridge, CUP, 2024. pp. 215–216.
“The Novel II.” The New Cambridge History of Russian Literature. Ed. by Simon Franklin, Rebecca Reich, Emma Widdis. Cambridge, CUP, 2024. pp. 607–623.
The Great Imitator: Russian History from “Potemkin Villages”to “Kuban Cossacks”. Ab Imperio, 2023, no. 4, pp. 65–72.
“Reading Stalinism: Stalinist Culture as a Research Field in the West.” The Reception of East Slavic Literatures in the West and the East, Firenze, Firenze UP, 2023. pp. 211–224.
“The Soviet Cold War Literary Imagination.” The Palgrave Handbook of Cold War Literature, London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. pp. 489–507. (Co-authored with Vladimir Dobrenko)
“The Readers’ Milieu 1917–1920s.” Reading Russia. A History of Reading in Modern Russia, vol. 3. Milan, Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures of Università degli Studi of Milan, 2020. pp. 15–42. (Co-authored with Abram Reitblat)
“When Comintern and Cominform Aesthetics Meet: Socialist Realism in Eastern Europe, 1956 and Beyond.” Comintern Aesthetics. Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 2020. pp. 420–448.

Scopus / Web of Science Publications

“Katerina Clark (1941–2024): Literary History as a Device.” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, vol. 25, no. 3, 2024. pp. 668–675.
“Soviet Multinational Literature as an Imperial Project and as a Challenge to the Empire.” Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, no. 4, 2024, pp. 245–254.
“The Cornerstone of Soviet Literature: RAPP and the Literary Process of the 1920–30s as a Research Field (Historiographical Introduction).” Slavic Literatures, vol. 146–148, 2024, pp. 1–43.
“Hegemony of Brotherhood: The Birth of Soviet Multinational Literature, 1922–1932.” Slavic Review, vol. 81, no. 4, 2022. pp. 869–890.
“Introduction.” Slavic Review, vol. 81, no. 4, 2022. pp. 865–868. (Co-authored with Klavdia Smola)
“From the History of Literary Institutions to the Institutional History of Literature.” Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, no. 3, 2022, pp. 229–231.
“Laughing Stalinism: The Fate of the Comic in a Tragic Age.” Slavic and East European Journal, vol. 65, no. 1, 2021, pp. 1–20.
“Judgement Day of Russian Literature. Post-Classical Novel: The Canon and Transgression.” Philological Class, vol. 25, 2020, no. 3, pp. 9–22.
“Building Stalinism: The Moscow Canal and the Creation of Soviet Space.” Slavic review, vol. 78, no. 3, 2019, pp. 862–863.
“Annushka Already Spilled the Butter.” Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, no. 158, 2019,pp. 357–370.
“The Art of Hatred: ‛Noble Fury’ and Violence in the Russian Culture of the World War II Period.” Russkaia Literatura, no. 3, 2019, pp. 217–228.
“The House of Government: A Saga of the Russian Revolution.” Novyi mir, no. 12, 2017, pp. 183–189.
“Crossing Borders: Modernity, Ideology, and Culture in Russia and the Soviet Union.” Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, no. 144, 2017, pp. 542–546.
“Prigov and the Gesamtkunstwerk.” Russian review, vol. 75, no. 2, 2016, pp. 209–219.