The image of Russia in Gary Shteyngart's novel 'Absurdistan'

O.B. Karasik

Kazan Federal University, Kazan, 420008 Russia

E-mail: karassik1@yandex.ru

Received November 20, 2017

Full text PDF

Abstract

“Absurdinstan” is the most famous novel written by Gary Shteyngart, a prominent contemporary American author of the Russian–Jeiwsh origin.

The aim of this work is to study the image of Russia as it appears in the perception of the contemporary American writer with complicated identity. This aim defined the following tasks:

1) to consider the means the author uses to create the image of Russia in his novel;

2) to reveal the influence of the author's complicated identity on the image of the country created by him.

During the research, the principles of the cultural and historical,  and biographic analysis, as well as comparative historical methods traditional for researches of works of fiction  have been used.

As a result of the research, the following conclusions have been drawn. Firstly, the border consciousness and immigrant mentality of the author, which comprises his Soviet childhood, emigration to the USA, and the commitment to modern American values, became the major factors influencing the creation of an absurd picture and image of Russia in this novel. Secondly, the stereotypes existing in mass consciousness, both Russian about their own country and American about Russia, influence the novel. These factors contributed to the creation of the satirical and absurd image of Russia.

The practical importance of the paper is that the conclusions drawn may be used when teaching the courses of History of the USA literature and Contemporary USA Literature, as well as while studying the phenomenon of American multiculturalism.

Keywords: multicultural American literature, Gary Shteyngart, identity, image of Russia, stereotype, absurd, satire

References

1. Butenina E.M. “Superfluous man” in a Chinese–American version. Vestnik Permskogo Universiteta, 2014, no. 2, pp. 141–147. (In Russian)
2. Ness P. Absurd person singular. The Guardian, 2007, June 9. Available at: https:// www.theguardian.com/books/2007/jun/09/featuresreviews.guardianreview4.
3. Karasik O.B. Evreiskaya literatura SShA na rubezhe XX – XXI vekov: v poiskakh identichnosti [Jewish Literature of the USA at the Turn of the 20th – 21st Centuries: Searching for Identity]. Kazan, RITs Shkola, 2015. 308 p. (In Russian)

For citation: Karasik O.B. The image of Russia in Gary Shteyngart's novel “Absurdistan”. Uchenye Zapiski Kazanskogo Universiteta. Seriya Gumanitarnye Nauki, 2018, vol. 160, no. 1, pp. 187–197. (In Russian)

The content is available under the license Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.