Incidences
One often-forgotten aspect of twentieth-century literature is the extent to which Russian writers participated in the more extreme manifestations of the avant-garde. Futurists and constructivists abounded in pre-Stalinist Russia, and only gradually did such labels become terms warranting prison or professional oblivion. One of the last members of the Russian avant-garde was Kharms (1905-42), a Leningrader who combined a taste for the absurd with a mastery of the miniature. He wrote tiny "incidences," which are absurdist parables in which it seems that Kafka and a circus clown collaborate in commenting on daily life in Stalin's Soviet Union. Kharms' habit of ironic subversion attracted official notice early. He was first arrested in 1931, years before the great purges. Released in 1932 but rearrested in 1941, he starved to death in a Leningrad prison hospital during the siege. Most of the writings collected here were written in secret during the 1930s. They reflect the hunger, hopelessness, and constant fear of arrest of their time and are always delivered with a deadpan humor impossible to quite describe. They constitute a puzzlingly beautiful monument to a minor master.John Shreffler--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.