{"product_id":"soft-matter-the-poetics-of-weakness-in-late-soviet-socialism-9780810148154","title":"Soft Matter: The Poetics of Weakness in Late Soviet Socialism","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eIdentifies and examines a poetics of weakness in Soviet underground literature\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Artists of the late Soviet era sought new, nonconformist ways of approaching literary fiction, arriving at weakness as a crucial principle of narrative and character formation. Julia Vaingurt argues that this counter-discourse of strategic weakness constituted both an aesthetic strategy and an ethical code, affording like-minded authors a feeling of recognition and commonality and uniting an international community of artists in resistance to the divisiveness of their worlds. \u003ci\u003eSoft Matter: The Poetics of Weakness in Late Soviet Socialism\u003c\/i\u003e explores the cultivation of weak subjectivity through modes such as gender subversion, queer holy foolishness, intoxication, madness, and writing disorders like graphomania and writer's block. Identifying the poetics of weakness as formative for Soviet underground literature of the 1960s and '70s, Vaingurt also traces the inheritance of a far older tradition within Russian culture of salutary weakness. As democratic deliberation continues to be under threat around the world, alternatives to the ubiquitous politics of force are an aesthetic, ethical, and ideological imperative. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Julia Vaingurt\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Northwestern University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 01\/15\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSeries:\u003c\/b\u003e Studies in Russian Literature and Theory\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 264\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780810148154","brand":"Northwestern University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43256040652937,"sku":"9780810148154","price":38.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0636\/9240\/6921\/files\/img_3e4694d2-947c-4764-9f00-a390cfcabde7.jpg?v=1736236150","url":"https:\/\/sonsanddaughtersbooks.com\/products\/soft-matter-the-poetics-of-weakness-in-late-soviet-socialism-9780810148154","provider":"Sons and Daughters Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}