The decade since the beginning of the perestrojka is a period of unprecedented change in Russian literature. From a medium entirely controlled by the party and, except for the forbidden and persecuted samizdat, exclusively published by state publishers, it developed into a completely free medium, not hampered by any censorship or interference by the authorities.
In this process of emancipation we can establish several phases:
1. 1985–1987. The first years of perestrojka. Books and
periodicals have published a lot of materials with new and
shocking
themes (the years of Stalin terror in
Rybakov's
2. 1988–1991. The great catching up maneuver.
Everything that had been forbidden in Soviet times (Nabokov, Brodskij,
Pasternak's
3. 1991–1995. A new and free literature establishes
itself. Its primary aim is not to tell the truth
any
more (this function is taken over by the mass media: the papers, radio
and television), but simply to be literature.
Hence the
strong inclination to postmodernism.
In my contribution to the congress I will give an outline of the great changes that have taken place in recent Russian literature and present tentative periodization of these 10 years. The guiding principle is the rapid transition of the literature function (literary magazines as a basic form) in Russia: from the very truth-telling (openly as well as between the lines) to being literature per se.