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The Idea of the Encyclopedia in Russian Thought and Literature

Fri, November 11, 2:00 to 3:45pm CST (2:00 to 3:45pm CST), The Palmer House Hilton, Floor: 7th Floor, Sandburg 7

Abstract

The idea of the encyclopedia has often been drawn upon by Russian thinkers, perhaps most famously in Vissarion Belinskii’s oft-quoted description of Evgenii Onegin as the “encyclopedia of Russian life”. Encyclopedias have served as metaphors for a number of Russian thinkers, including Mikhail Bakhtin and Aleksandr Bogdanov, and the figure of the encyclopedist and the concept of entsiklopedichnost’ have frequently been presented as ideals towards which one should strive. Encyclopedias have also made many appearances in Russian literature, and some prominent writers (including Valerii Briusov and Maksim Gor’kii) were involved in projects to create encyclopedias. This talk traces the history of the idea of the encyclopedia over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, examining the interconnection between encyclopedias as a philosophical metaphor and their appearances in literature. It does so with a view towards understanding the cultural significance of the encyclopedia as a genre in Russia and why the genre appealed to so many Russian and Soviet scholars, such as those behind the Bol’shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia.

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