Tragedy Plunged into Reality: Konstantin Vaginov’s Goat Song and Biography

• In Event: In Dialogue with the Antique: Russian Reception of Classical Literature

Abstract

Konstantin Vaginov’s Goat Song has long attracted attention through its metatextual references, which see the various members of Vaginov’s circle recreated in the fictional Leningrad of the text. This paper will analyze the ways Vaginov combines tragedy and biography as a critique of Modernist adulation of Ancient Greek tragedy in the aftermath of the October Revolution.

Author

• Brian Kilgour, Bryn Mawr College