Tolstoy

Tolstoy

Some fifty years ago Russian literature was practically unknown to Western Europe; by the majority of people its very existence seems to have been unsuspected; we find even so great an adventurer as Carlyle, himself guiding his countrymen to many new tracts of literary discovery, speaking of "the great silent Russians who are drilling a whole continent into obedience, but who have produced 'nothing articulate' as yet."[1] In less than thirty years from the time when Carlyle penned that sentence Russian literature had become recognised as one of the most powerful and vital in Europe; its influence, already enormous, increases every day; it is great in France, in Germany, in Scandinavia, even in conservative England; hardly since the Renaissance has Europe beheld such a phenomenona literary advance at once so rapid and so great. The truth is that we have seen in Russia a growth very similar to that which occurred in Western Europe at the time of the Renaissance. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries Europe as a whole experienced the vivifying influence of two great literaturesGreek and Latinand it had, at the same time, a mode of life {8} to depict and ideas of life to express which differed widely from those of the classical nations: the great models showed them the fascination of poetry and art, and stimulated them to production; the different conditions of life, the varying ideals, prevented their production from becoming a mere imitation, and made it new, significant, and vital. Something very similar has occurred hi modern Russia. Russia has had the stimulus of Western Europeespecially of England and Francebut, at the same time, the conditions of its life are so powerfully individual, so exceedingly unlike those of England and France, that its authors are hardly even tempted to produce work which is a mere imitation; as soon as they observe at all, the result of their observations is bound to be different. Their production is thus distinctive and individual, and, in its own turn, reacts upon the literatures which first inspired it. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 47353
Author: Winstanley, Lilian
Release Date: Nov 14, 2014
Format: eBook
Language: English