Ilya Varshavskii and the Jewish Language of Soviet Science Fiction

• In Event: "More Than Sci-Fi": The Models of Society in Late Soviet and Post-Soviet Speculative Fiction

Abstract

Ilya Varshavskii (1908-1974) was one of the most prolific and versatile science fiction writers of the Thaw era and beyond. Unlike the work of the Strugatsky brothers, who were his peers and friends, Varshavsky’s oeuvre has been largely neglected and is virtually unknown in the West. This talk, part of a larger project of investigating the place of Jewishness and Holocaust memory in Soviet and East and European sci fi, will reintroduce Varshavskii’s texts through this lens, paying special attention to how he weaves Jewish sensibility and at times explicit Jewish allusions into his stories via the themes of AI and time travel.

Author

• Marat Grinberg, Reed College