Literary Dimensions of National Identity: The Historical Novel of the Late Soviet Period (1960s--1980s).

The dissertation examines the changes that took place in the popular and ideologically "safest" genre of historical novel in the post-Stalin period in two Soviet literatures, Russian and Ukrainian. In this comparative study the author analyzes a set of novels by Russian and Ukrainian writers which center on Kievan Rus', medieval Muscovy, and the period of imperial expansion. These texts are analyzed within several interrelated theoretical frameworks. In particular, the author's approach is informed by Benedict Anderson's theory of the nation as an "imagined community", Clifford Geertz's concept of "local knowledge", and Rumina Sethi's postcolonial interpretation of the historical novel. This theoretical grounding allows conceptualizing the Soviet historical novel as an active element in a state-sponsored identity construction process where the official doctrines of the existing political system often played only minor roles. The theoretical tools of cultural anthropology highlight the possibilities that are offered by such an approach for the study of popular literary genres, particularly historical fiction. This methodology provides the basis for the main argument that historical novels in Russian and Ukrainian literatures culturally and ideologically were moving in different directions, thereby subverting one of the core principles of the Soviet identity model---the notion of a common transnational past. The dissertation helps in better understanding of how popular fictional texts about the past shaped national and cultural identities of the last Soviet generation.