The Guardian’s list of the 10 best writers in novels is so patently rubbish (two each entries for Martin Amis and Stephen King!?) that I feel compelled to respond with my own round-up of fictional writers in Russian literature. The usual rule applies: no more than one work per author. On the basis that he […]
Top ten fictional writers in Russian literature
https://sarahjyoung.com/site/2013/08/04/top-ten-fictional-writers-in-russian-literature/
Top ten food in Russian literature: part 2
I shall keep you in suspense no longer. 5. Shalamov, ‘Condensed Milk’. As in the case of Solzhenitsyn, hunger is ubiquitous in Shalamov’s stories, so food also plays a significant role. ‘Condensed Milk’ is unusual in depicting a moment of triumph and satiation: the narrator, offered a place on an escape, asks the ringleader Shestaskov […]
https://sarahjyoung.com/site/2011/06/19/top-ten-food-in-russian-literature-part-2/
Re-reading Crime and Punishment: characters
Re-reading Crime and Punishment hasn’t entirely resolved the perennial problem of Sonia, which I’ve mentioned previously, but I do finally seem to have found a way of accepting her as a character, which makes the novel’s denouement less contentious. Or maybe it’s just that I was focusing on the fine details rather than the big […]
https://sarahjyoung.com/site/2010/07/09/re-reading-crime-and-punishment-characters/