lecturer in literature. Exciting lectures on literature

In the age of the Internet, knowledge is available to anyone - you just need to know the places where to find it. The editors of the Subculture Portal have selected ten lecturers who are able to tell about literature in a fascinating and informative way.

Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman is a classic that everyone who is interested in Russian literature and culture in general should read. Lectures can be found on bookshelves, but videos in which Lotman talks about the pre-revolutionary Russian world are much more impressive. We recommend watching the entire cycle.

Where to find: youtube

Many are familiar with Dmitry Bykov - he is a very media person, loves to talk about literature and does it very interestingly: he shares not so much facts as interpretations, refers to numerous sources and often expresses very original opinions.

3. Lectures by Andrey Astvatsaturov on Anglo-American literature of the 20th century

Astvatsaturov - the St. Petersburg king of American literature of the XX century. He teaches at the philological faculty of St. Petersburg State University and writes novels in his free time. We especially recommend to fans of Joyce, Salinger, Vonnegut and Proust - Astvatsaturov is really well versed in the issue. - We especially recommend his lectures to fans of Joyce, Salinger, Vonnegut and Proust, whose work Astvatsaturov understands really well. It will also be of interest to those who are concerned about the questions posed by modernists and the history of the 20th century in general.

Where to find: in contact with , youtube , the writer's own website

4. Lectures by Olga Panova on foreign literature of the 20th century.

If the previous two points are more interesting for a trained listener, then these lectures talk about literature from scratch, for beginners. Olga Panova builds the material in a very structured way and explains ideas and facts in sufficient detail. This does not detract from the lectures of fascination: Panova's rich erudition will allow even trained listeners to learn a lot of new things.

He teaches at the philological faculty of St. Petersburg State University. Another lecturer who can be recommended to those who are just starting to study literature as a science. Kaminskaya pays great attention to the historical context in which the writer worked. We especially recommend the lectures on Hermann Hesse and the Glass Bead Game.

6. Lectures by Boris Averin on Russian literature

A charismatic and highly educated lecturer, a real scientist, author of more than a hundred scientific papers. Boris Averin is not only a Nabokovologist, but also a specialist in sociology and the problem of memory. Through the prism of literature, he analyzes the important problems of society and the relationship of man with himself. Particularly interesting are the cycles of his lectures "Memory as a collection of personality", "Literature as self-knowledge", "Rational and irrational in literature and life".

7. Lectures by Konstantin Milchin on the latest Russian literature

Konstantin Milchin is worth listening to just because he is almost the only lecturer who talks about the literature of modern Russia and whose lectures can be found in the public domain. And since learning about the present, as a rule, is much more interesting than about the “traditions of antiquity,” it is definitely worth listening to. In addition, Milchin is a writer himself, so he speaks about techniques and techniques with great knowledge of the matter.

After getting acquainted with modern Russian literature, it's time to find out what is happening in the West. Alexandrov's course of lectures "Ecology of Literature" on the Culture TV channel is conveniently divided by country: French, English, Scandinavian writers. But we still recommend listening to it in its entirety.

9. Lectures by Pyotr Ryabov on the philosophy of anarchism and existentialism

Ryabov's lectures are distinguished by great enthusiasm for the subject: he talks about Sartre and Camus as if he knew them personally. In addition, his lectures are very relevant and suitable for those who like to tie abstract matters to today's agenda. Lectures on the philosophy of anarchism are invaluable if you want to get to know this movement and not read two kilos of books. And although anarchism is a personal philosophy, Ryabov knows how to maintain objectivity.

WRITERS, CENSORSHIP AND READERS IN RUSSIA

The lecture was given at the Celebration of the Arts at Cornell University on April 10, 1958.

In the minds of foreigners, "Russian literature" as a concept, as a separate phenomenon, is usually reduced to the recognition that Russia gave the world half a dozen great prose writers in the middle of the past and at the beginning of our century. Russian readers treat it somewhat differently, including here some other untranslatable poets, but still, we, first of all, have in mind the brilliant constellation of authors of the 19th century. In other words, Russian literature has existed for a relatively short time. In addition, it is limited in time, so foreigners tend to view it as something complete, finished once and for all. This is mainly due to the impersonality of the typically provincial literature of the last four decades that emerged under the Soviet regime.

I once calculated that the best of everything that has been created in Russian prose and poetry since the beginning of the last century is 23,000 pages of the usual type. It is obvious that neither French nor English literature can be so compressed. Both are stretched out in time and number several hundred great works. This brings me to the first conclusion. With the exception of one medieval masterpiece, Russian prose surprisingly fits in a round amphora of the last century, and for the current one there is only a jug for skimmed cream. One 19th century it was enough for a country almost without any literary tradition to create a literature that, in its artistic merit, in its world influence, in everything but volume, equaled that of English and French, although these countries began to produce their masterpieces much earlier. The astounding surge of aesthetic values ​​in such a young civilization would have been impossible if the entire spiritual growth of Russia in the 19th century. did not proceed with such incredible speed, reaching the level of old European culture. I am convinced that the literature of the last century has not yet entered the circle of Western ideas about Russian history. The question of the development of free pre-revolutionary thought was completely distorted by sophisticated communist propaganda in the 1920s and 1930s. our century. The Communists appropriated to themselves the honor of enlightening Russia. But it is fair to say that in the days of Pushkin and Gogol, most of the Russian people remained in the cold behind a curtain of slowly falling snow in front of the brightly lit windows of aristocratic culture. This tragic discrepancy arose from the fact that the most refined European culture was too hastily introduced into a country notorious for the disasters and sufferings of its countless stepchildren. However, this is a completely different topic.

Although, who knows, maybe not the other. Outlining the history of Russian literature, or rather, defining the forces that fought for the soul of the artist, I may feel for that deep pathos inherent in any genuine art, which arises from the gap between its eternal values ​​​​and the suffering of our confused world. This world can hardly be blamed for treating literature as a luxury or a trinket, since it cannot be used as a modern guide.

The artist has one consolation: in a free country he is not forced to compose guidebooks. Based on this rather limited view, Russia in the 19th century. was, oddly enough, a relatively free country: books could be banned, writers were sent into exile, scoundrels and idiots became censors, His Majesty in sideburns could himself become a censor and a ban, but still this amazing invention of the Soviet era - a method of coercion of a whole literary associations to write under the dictation of the state did not exist in old Russia, although numerous reactionary officials clearly dreamed of it. A staunch determinist might object that even in a democratic state, the journal resorts to financial pressure on its authors to force them to supply what the so-called reading public demands, and, consequently, the difference between it and the direct pressure of the police state, forcing the author to equip his novel with the corresponding political ideas, only to the extent of such pressure. But this is a lie, if only because in a free country there are many different periodicals and philosophical systems, and in a dictatorship there is only one government. The difference is qualitative. Let me, an American writer, think of writing an unconventional novel, for example, about a happy atheist, an independent citizen of the city of Boston, who married a beautiful black woman, also an atheist, who bore him a bunch of kids, little smart agnostics, who lived a happy, virtuous life up to 106 years and expired in a blissful sleep, I may well be told that in spite of your incomparable talent, Mr. will be able to sell it. This is the opinion of the publisher - everyone is entitled to their opinion. No one will send me to the wild expanses of Alaska if the story of my prosperous atheist is printed by some dubious experimental publishing house; on the other hand, American writers never receive government commissions to produce epics about the joys of free enterprise and morning prayer.

In Russia, before the Soviet regime, there were, of course, restrictions, but no one commanded the artists. The painters, writers and composers of the last century were quite sure that they lived in a country where despotism and slavery reigned, but they had a huge advantage that can only be fully appreciated today, an advantage over their grandchildren living in modern Russia: they were not forced to speak that there is no despotism and slavery. Two forces simultaneously fought for the soul of the artist, two critics judged his work, and the first was power. For a whole century, she was convinced that everything unusual, original in creativity sounds a sharp note and leads to a revolution. The vigilance of those in power was most clearly expressed by Nicholas I in the 30s and 40s. last century. The coldness of his nature permeated Russian life much more than the vulgarity of subsequent rulers, and his interest in literature would have been touching if he had come from a pure heart. With amazing perseverance, this man strove to become absolutely everything for Russian literature: his own and godfather, nanny and breadwinner, prison guard and literary critic. Whatever qualities he displayed in his royal profession, it must be admitted that in dealing with the Russian Muse he behaved like a hired killer or, at best, a jester. The censorship he established remained in force until the 1960s, weakened after the great reforms, tightened again at the end of the last century, was briefly abolished at the beginning of this century, and then miraculously and most terribly resurrected under the Soviets.

In the first half of the last century, government officials who like to stick their nose in everywhere, the highest ranks of the Third Division, who enrolled Byron in the ranks of the Italian revolutionaries, complacent censors of venerable age, journalists of a certain kind on the payroll of the government, a quiet, but politically sensitive and prudent church - in a word, this whole mixture of monarchism, religious fanaticism and bureaucratic servility pretty embarrassed the artist, but he could let in hairpins and ridicule the powers that be, while getting real pleasure from a lot of skillful, outright striking tricks, against which government stupidity was completely powerless. The Fool can be a dangerous type, but his vulnerability sometimes turns danger into a first-class sport. Whatever shortcomings the bureaucracy of pre-revolutionary Russia suffered, it must be admitted that it possessed one indisputable merit - the absence of intelligence. In a certain sense, the task of the censor was made more difficult by the fact that he had to decipher obscure political allusions, instead of simply attacking obvious obscenity. Under Nicholas I, the Russian poet was forced to be cautious, and Pushkin's attempts to imitate the daring French - Guys and Voltaire - were easily suppressed by censorship. But the prose was virtuous. In Russian literature, the Rabelaisian tradition of the Renaissance did not exist, as in other literatures, and the Russian novel as a whole to this day remains, perhaps, a model of chastity. Soviet literature is innocence itself. It is impossible to imagine a Russian writer who wrote, for example, Lady Chatterley's Lover.

So, the first force that opposed the artist was the government. Another force that constrained him was anti-government, public, utilitarian criticism, all these political, civic, radical thinkers. It should be noted that in terms of their education, intelligence, aspirations and human dignity, these people stood immeasurably higher than those crooks who were fed by the state, or the old stupid reactionaries who stomped around the shaken throne. The leftist critic was exclusively concerned with the well-being of the people, and he considered everything else: literature, science, philosophy only as a means to improve the social and economic situation of the disadvantaged and change the political structure of the country. An incorruptible hero, indifferent to the hardships of exile, but equally to everything refined in art - such was this type of people. The frantic Belinsky in the 40s, the inflexible Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov in the 50s and 60s, the respectable bore Mikhailovsky and dozens of other honest and stubborn people - all of them can be united under one sign: political radicalism, rooted in old French socialism and German materialism and foreshadowing the revolutionary socialism and sluggish communism of the last decades, which should not be confused with Russian liberalism in the true sense of the word, as well as with the enlightened democracies in Western Europe and America. Leafing through the old newspapers of the 60s and 70s, one is shocked to discover what extreme views these people expressed under the conditions of autocracy. But for all their virtues, left-wing critics turned out to be just as ignorant in art as the authorities. The government and the revolutionaries, the tsar and the radicals were equally philistines in art. Left-wing critics fought against the existing despotism and in doing so planted another one of their own. The claims, the maxims, the theories that they tried to impose had exactly the same relation to art as the traditional politics of power. From the writer they demanded social ideas, and not some kind of nonsense, but from their point of view, a book was good only if it could bring practical benefit to the people. Their fervor led to tragic consequences. Sincerely, boldly and boldly they defended freedom and equality, but they contradicted their own faith, wanting to subordinate art to modern politics. If, in the opinion of the tsars, writers were charged with the duty to serve the state, then, in the opinion of leftist criticism, they had to serve the masses. These two schools of thought were destined to meet and unite their efforts, so that finally in our time the new regime, which is a synthesis of the Hegelian triad, would unite the idea of ​​the masses with the idea of ​​the state.

Reading fiction is not only a pleasant pastime, but also an expansion of one's horizons. True, the true meaning of the work, some plot twists, often even the motive of the characters' actions, the characters themselves are not always clear. Here, additional literature or lectures from professionals in their field come to the rescue. We don't always have time to read extra, so watching and attending lectures is a great option. There are many sites on the Web that offer thousands of lectures in audio and video formats. You just need to find something really high quality.

Dmitry Bykov

Perhaps Dmitry Bykov is one of the most famous teachers of Russian literature today. He has a special eye for the history of fiction and a clear talent for teaching. His lectures are not only informative, but also interesting. At times very categorical in his statements, he nevertheless does not repel listeners.

Live, his lectures are not cheap, but there are recordings on YouTube. For example, his lectures on Russian literature of the 19th century:

Or a series of lectures on the 20th century:

You can also sign up for Dmitry Bykov's lectures on literature, which he gives in different cities of Russia. For example, on May 15 in Moscow, he will talk about Francis Scott Fitzgerald, the author of the world-famous novel The Great Gatsby.

"Bibigon": lectures on the school curriculum

A whole playlist of lectures on Russian literature, which was filmed by the Kultura TV channel for their children-viewers. In accessible language, boring lecturers talk about famous writers and their legendary works that have become classics.

Yuliana Kaminskaya

Yuliana Kaminskaya is an associate professor at the Department of the History of Foreign Literature at St. Petersburg State University, she is well versed in foreign literature and knows how to tell interesting stories about it. Together with lektorium.tv, she created a full course of lectures, where you can not only listen to the analysis of individual works, but also learn interesting facts from the history of foreign literature. Kafka, Hesse, Camus, Sartre and many other masters of the artistic word became the heroes of her lectures.

Golden Pages of European Literature

That is the name of another project lektorium.tv. The lecturer is Alexey Mashevsky, a Russian poet and literary critic. He talks about both Russian and foreign writers. Gogol, Defoe, Byron and other classics were the focus of his lectures.

"The Glass Bead Game" with Igor Volgin

The Glass Bead Game TV show on the Kultura channel is an interesting discussion format where literary scholars and writers discuss classical literature. Its permanent host, Igor Volgin, is a professor at the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov and a specialist in the work of Dostoevsky. He invites interesting characters, so the discussion is always exciting to follow.

Vladimir Nabokov

We could not miss in our review Vladimir Nabokov, a famous Russian writer who lectured on literature in the United States in the middle of the 20th century. Having made a huge contribution to literary criticism, he was remembered for his unique vision of Russian literature. Listening to the audiobook "Lectures on Russian Literature" is not at all boring - try it and get great pleasure.

First part

Second part

"Fight club"

Lectures on various subjects are often held at the Garage Museum Education Center in Moscow. For example, lectures on the works of Umberto Eco and Franz Kafka will also be held on April 15 and 22.

Of course, this is not the whole list of online events and lectures that you can listen to in order to expand your horizons in the field of literature. We wish you to find a lecturer who you really like, and then you will receive not only knowledge, but also great pleasure.

The author of the project "World of Bibigon" The presenters and experts are: 1. Arkhangelsky Alexander Nikolaevich Candidate of Philology, journalist, TV presenter, writer, cultural historian, author of more than 10 textbooks, including the textbook "Russian literature: a textbook for the 10th grade of a comprehensive school : At 2 o'clock"; 2. Bak Dmitry Petrovich Candidate of Philology, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University, Vice-Rector of the Russian State Humanitarian University; 3. Aleksey Nikolaevich Varlamov Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University, writer; 4. Volgin Igor Leonidovich Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Doctor of Philology, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University and the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky...

The author of the project "World of Bibigon" The presenters and experts are: 1. Arkhangelsky Alexander Nikolaevich Candidate of Philology, journalist, TV presenter, writer, cultural historian, author of more than 10 textbooks, including the textbook "Russian literature: a textbook for the 10th grade of a comprehensive school : At 2 o'clock"; 2. Bak Dmitry Petrovich Candidate of Philology, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University, Vice-Rector of the Russian State Humanitarian University; 3. Aleksey Nikolaevich Varlamov Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University, writer; 4. Volgin Igor Leonidovich Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Doctor of Philology, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University and the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky, member of the Union of Writers and the Union of Journalists of Russia; 5. Pasternak Elena Leonidovna Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University; 6. Smelyansky Anatoly Mironovich - laureate of the State Prize of the Russian Federation, Honored Art Worker of the Russian Federation, professor, doctor of art history, rector of the Moscow Art Theater School; 7. Kedrov Konstantin Alexandrovich poet, critic, candidate of philological sciences, doctor of philosophical sciences, twice nominated for the Nobel Prize, head of the poetic school of metacode and metametaphor, lecturer at the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky; 8. Velikodnaya Irina Leonidovna Head of the Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts of the Scientific Library of Moscow State University, Candidate of Philological Sciences, Professor of Moscow State University; 9. Murzak Irina Ivanovna Professor, Candidate of Philological Sciences, Vice-Rector for International Relations of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (now MSGU); 10. Andrey Leonidovich Yastrebov Doctor of Philology, Professor, Head of the Department of History, Philosophy, Literature, Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU); 11. Korovin Valentin Ivanovich Head of the Department of Russian Literature, Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU), author of a textbook on literature for senior classes; 12. Sobolev Lev Iosifovich Honored Teacher of the Russian Federation, teacher of the Russian language and literature at the Moscow Gymnasium No. 1567; 13. Lekmanov Oleg Andershanovich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities, Leading Researcher at the Institute of World Literature. A.M. Gorky; 14. Spiridonova Lidia Alekseevna - Doctor of Philology, Head. Department of the Institute of World Literature. A.M. Gorky; 15. Anninsky Lev Alexandrovich - literary critic, writer, critic, publicist, candidate of philosophical sciences; 16. Ivanova Natalia Borisovna - Doctor of Philology, writer, publicist, literary and art critic, literary historian; 17. Kling Oleg Alekseevich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Department of Theory of Literature, Faculty of Philology, Moscow State University; eighteen. Golubkov Mikhail Mikhailovich - Doctor of Philology, Associate Professor of the Department of the History of Russian Literature of the 20th Century. Faculty of Philology, Moscow State University; 19. Pavlovets Mikhail Georgievich - Candidate of Philological Sciences, Head of the Department of Russian and Foreign Literature and Methods of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU). 20. Agenosov Vladimir Veniaminovich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MPGU), Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences