Lives in Transit: A Collection of Recent Russian Women's Writing (Ardis Russian Literature Series)

One of the most remarkable changes taking place in Russia after the break-up of the Soviet empire is the radical transformation of Russian women's culture. Despite a historically male dominated culture, gender awareness has flourished in the 1990s, and is reflected in a new body of women's literature and a new concern for female experience. The prose and poetry included in this anthology examine essential issues in women's lives: women's sexuality, romantic love, motherhood, the economic and political life of women, their struggle to integrate domestic and professional roles, new family structures, physical health, abortion, rape, and so forth.

Twenty-five writers are represented here, ranging from young to old, new to established, avant garde to traditional. The newer writing has challenged earlier thematic and stylistic prohibitions and this entered into a stimulating dialogue with more traditional work, as Helena Goscilo points out in her informative introduction. Thus, when the heroines of "First Try" and "Bus Driver Astap" act against accepted moral codes, they suffer physical punishment, but the heroines in the stories by Sadur and Palei inhabit structures with completely new rules.

Russian culture has produced great women artists and writers, and there is a growing appreciation today for the body of literature created by its female writers. This anthology offers the reader fascinating insights into the contemporary world of Russian women and introduces some major new talents.

Helena Goscilo is Chairman of the Slavic Department at the University of Pittsburgh and one of the leading scholars in the field of Russian women's culture. Her works include Fruits of Her Plume Essays on Contemporary Russian Women's Culture; Balancing Acts; and Russian and Polish Women's Fiction. She is also co-editor of the anthologies Glasnost and The Wild Beach two collections of Russian prose from the 1980s.