Description
One of the greatest literary minds of the twentieth century, Viktor Shklovsky writes the critical equivalent of what Ross Chambers calls "loiterature"-writing that roams, playfully digresses, moving freely between the literary work and the world. In Energy of Delusion, a masterpiece that Shklovsky worked on over thirty years, he turns his unique critical sensibility to Tolstoy's life and novels, applying the famous "formalist method" he invented in the 1920s to Tolstoy's massive body of work, and at the same time taking Tolstoy (as well as Boccaccio, Pushkin, Chekhov, Dostoevsky, and Turgenev) as a springboard to consider the devices of literature-how novels work and what they do. Available in English for the first time, Energy of Delusion provides contemporary readers with a new way of thinking about how great literature is written (and how great criticism might be) that is as timely today as ever.
About the Author
Viktor Shklovsky (1893-1984) was a leading figure in the Russian Formalist movement of the 1920s and had a profound effect on twentieth-century Russian literature. Several of his books have been translated into English, including "Zoo, or Letters Not about Love, Third Factory, Theory of Prose, A Sentimental Journey, Energy of Delusion", and "Literature and Cinematography", and "Bowstring". Viktor Shklovsky (1893-1984) was a leading figure in the Russian Formalist movement of the 1920s and had a profound effect on twentieth-century Russian literature. Several of his books have been translated into English, including "Zoo, or Letters Not about Love, Third Factory, Theory of Prose, A Sentimental Journey, Energy of Delusion", and "Literature and Cinematography", and "Bowstring".
Reviews
"...arguably the greatest critical work on Tolstoy's masterpiece" -Publishers Weekly "Shklovsky is a disciple worthy of Sterne. He has appropriated the device of infinitely delayed event, of the digression helplessly promising to return to the point, and of disguising his superbly controlled art with a breezy nonchalance. But it is not really Sterne that Shklovsky sounds like: it is an intellectual and witty Hemingway." -National Review "A rambling, digressive stylist, Shklovsky throws off brilliant apercus on every page . . . Like an architect's blueprint, [he] lays bare the joists and studs that hold up the house of fiction." -Washington Post "As an important cultural document by one of the 20th century's great literary minds, Energy of Delusion should readily find a haven in academic circles." -The Guardian
Book Information
ISBN 9781564784261
Author Viktor Shklovsky
Format Paperback
Page Count 428
Imprint Dalkey Archive Press
Publisher Dalkey Archive Press
Weight(grams) 630g
About the Author
Viktor Shklovsky (1893-1984) was a leading figure in the Russian Formalist movement of the 1920s and had a profound effect on twentieth-century Russian literature. Several of his books have been translated into English, including "Zoo, or Letters Not about Love, Third Factory, Theory of Prose, A Sentimental Journey, Energy of Delusion", and "Literature and Cinematography", and "Bowstring". Viktor Shklovsky (1893-1984) was a leading figure in the Russian Formalist movement of the 1920s and had a profound effect on twentieth-century Russian literature. Several of his books have been translated into English, including "Zoo, or Letters Not about Love, Third Factory, Theory of Prose, A Sentimental Journey, Energy of Delusion", and "Literature and Cinematography", and "Bowstring".
Reviews
"...arguably the greatest critical work on Tolstoy's masterpiece" -Publishers Weekly "Shklovsky is a disciple worthy of Sterne. He has appropriated the device of infinitely delayed event, of the digression helplessly promising to return to the point, and of disguising his superbly controlled art with a breezy nonchalance. But it is not really Sterne that Shklovsky sounds like: it is an intellectual and witty Hemingway." -National Review "A rambling, digressive stylist, Shklovsky throws off brilliant apercus on every page . . . Like an architect's blueprint, [he] lays bare the joists and studs that hold up the house of fiction." -Washington Post "As an important cultural document by one of the 20th century's great literary minds, Energy of Delusion should readily find a haven in academic circles." -The Guardian
Book Information
ISBN 9781564784261
Author Viktor Shklovsky
Format Paperback
Page Count 428
Imprint Dalkey Archive Press
Publisher Dalkey Archive Press
Weight(grams) 630g
