Wednesday 22 April, 1pm

Venue: LBF, Wellington Room

Russian literature is perhaps most famous for its epic, sprawling novels that leap from the microcosmic to the macrocosmic and back again. Running through the tapestry of tales of individual hope and despair is a commitment to ethical issues and an insatiable yearning for truth – moral, aesthetic, religious. In recent years, a new generation of Russian writers has come to the fore. They see themselves bridging the breach of time as torch bearers for contemporary Russians, and descendents of Russian literary greats.

New writing in Russia is colliding head-on with the vibrant and violent issues of today's world. Amidst religious revival, ethnic conflict and global recession, real life is batting aside the fantasy of the nineties and re-surfacing as the beating heart of Russian Literature. The modern Russian novel has a palpable social conscience, and addresses issues both unique to Russians and striking in their universality.  National and religious tensions, the status of the individual within the state, new consumerism versus old Soviet idealism, the lure of the market, the pressure of power and the fear of judgement day.  And coursing through all of these questions is one enduring and fundamental concern: the search for truth.

These are monumental issues, but the new generation of Russian writers confronts them with wit and bravery.  Please join us at this seminar to meet two writers at the forefront of this new movement, and to hear their views on the resurgence of the great Russian novel.