These essays will interest readers familiar with the work of Nobel Prize–winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and are a great starting point for those eager for an introduction to the great Russian’s work.
When people think of Russia today, they tend to gravitate toward images of Soviet domination or, more recently, Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine. The reality, however, is that, despite Russia’s political failures, its rich history of culture, religion, and philosophical reflection—even during the darkest days of the Gulag—have been a deposit of wisdom for American artists, religious thinkers, and political philosophers probing what it means to be human in America. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn stands out as the key figure in this conversation, as both a Russian literary giant and an exile from Russia living in America for two decades. This anthology reconsiders Solzhenitsyn’s work from a variety of perspectives—his faith, his politics, and the influences and context of his literature—to provide a prophetic vision for our current national confusion over universal ideals.
In Solzhenitsyn and American Culture: The Russian Soul in the West, David P. Deavel and Jessica Hooten Wilson have collected essays from the foremost scholars and thinkers of comparative studies who have been tracking what Americans have borrowed and learned from Solzhenitsyn and his fellow Russians. The book offers a consideration of what we have in common—the truth, goodness, and beauty America has drawn from Russian culture and from masters such as Solzhenitsyn—and will suggest to readers what we can still learn and what we must preserve. The last section expands the book’s theme and reach by examining the impact of other notable Russian authors, including Pushkin, Dostoevsky, and Gogol.
Contributors: David P. Deavel, Jessica Hooten Wilson, Nathan Nielson, Eugene Vodolazkin, David Walsh, Matthew Lee Miller, Ralph C. Wood, Gary Saul Morson, Edward E. Ericson, Jr., Micah Mattix, Joseph Pearce, James F. Pontuso, Daniel J. Mahoney, William Jason Wallace, Lee Trepanier, Peter Leithart, Dale Peterson, Julianna Leachman, Walter G. Moss, and Jacob Howland.
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Foreword by John Wilson Acknowledgments Introduction: Missing the Deep Roots and Rich Soul by David P. Deavel and Jessica Hooten Wilson
Part 1. Solzhenitsyn and Russian Culture 1. The Universal Russian Soul by Nathan Nielson 2. The New Middle Ages by Eugene Vodolazkin 3. The Age of Concentration by Eugene Vodolazkin 4. Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness in Solzhenitsyn by David P. Deavel
Part 2. Solzhenitsyn and Orthodoxy 5. Art and History in Solzhenitsyn’s The Red Wheel by David Walsh 6. The YMCA Press, Russian Orthodoxy, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn by Matthew Lee Miller 7. The Distinctively Orthodox Character of Solzhenitsyn’s Literary Imagination by Ralph C. Wood 8. How Fiction Defeats Lies: A Faithful Reading of Solzhenitsyn’s In the First Circle by Jessica Hooten Wilson
Part 3. Solzhenitsyn and the Writers 9. Solzhenitsyn’s Cathedrals by Gary Saul Morson 10. The Literature of Dissent in the Soviet Union by Edward E. Ericson Jr. 11. The Example of Prussian Nights by Micah Mattix 12. Kindred Spirits: Solzhenitsyn’s Western Literary Confréres by Joseph Pearce
Part 4. Solzhenitsyn and the Politicians 13. Inferno Dialogues: Why Americans Should Read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s In the First Circle by James F. Pontuso 14. Judging Communism and All Its Works: Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago Reconsidered by Daniel J. Mahoney 15. The Rage of Freedom: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s 1983 Templeton Prize Address by William Jason Wallace 16. What Americans Today Can Learn from the Russian Past: Lessons from Turgenev and Dostoevsky for American Hillbillies by Lee Trepanier
Part 5. Beyond Solzhenitsyn: Russian Writers and American Readers 17. City of Expiations: Ivan Karamazov and Orthodox Political Theology by Peter Leithart 18. Russia and the Mission of African American Literature by Dale E. Peterson 19. The Price of Restoration: Flannery O’Connor and the Nineteenth-Century Russian Realists by Julianna Leachman 20. Wisdom from Russia in the Thinking of Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton by Walter G. Moss 21. Totalitarian Physics and Moral Threshing by Jacob Howland
Contributors Index
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Jessica Hooten Wilson is the Seaver College Scholar of Liberal Arts at Pepperdine University. She is the author of a number of books, including The Scandal of Holiness.