The Russian novel remains a subject of enduring interest for scholars, students, and general audiences. Major Russian novelists such as Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Nabokov continue to be popular and to carry intellectual prestige. But the tradition of the Russian novel extends well beyond these familiar authors and their works. This Oxford Handbook builds upon important earlier scholarship, but significantly updates our understanding of the Russian novel: showcasing newer interpretive paradigms, considering works outside the canon, and extending the story of the Russian novel through Soviet times and up to the varied literary landscape of the present. The "Russian novel" is a literary phenomenon quite distinct, both in form and spirit, from the British, French, or American traditions, and arising significantly later, during the second half of the 18th century. This lag can be attributed to several causes, including governmental oppression, as well as the relatively late development of robust literary institutions in Russia: professional editing, publishing, and criticism; a developed reading audience beyond the two capital cities of St. Petersburg and Moscow; circulation channels for books and "thick journals"; and a functional literary marketplace beyond the old court patronage model or the intimate literary and salon circles of Russian aristocrats. Under these conditions, it is astonishing that such an influential literary tradition could develop so quickly during the 19th century. This Handbook considers the Russian novel not only within Russia itself, but in the world, beginning with the first translations of novels from Russian to French and English in the late nineteenth century, and eventually to numerous other languages and cultural contexts. We treat Russophone novels by émigré writers, first in European capitals during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, then extending more recently to the U.S., Israel, and beyond. This Handbook also considers the political and cultural significance of Russophone novels within the independent states that had been territories of the former Soviet Union and used Russian as a compulsory lingua franca.
