The Slavic Literature Pod

Show Notes:This week, Matt and Cameron say “sayonara” to Tipsy Tolstoy and “come on in” to The Slavic Literature Pod. RIP to having a valid reason to reference drunkenness on our resumes. Plus we address some questions you may have about the change. 08:53 - CarolynMarieReads' Youtube channel09:21 - Shae McMullin's InstagramThe music used in this episode was “Старое Кино / Staroye Kino,” by Перемотка / Peremotka. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: Instagram⁠ | Twitter⁠ | FacebookQuestions, comments, want to hear your voice on a bonus episode? Send us an email at slaviclitpod@gmail.com or call our voicemail at 209.800.3944Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Show Notes:Note: This is a re-run of The Captain’s Daughter by Aleksandr PushkinIt’s week 4 of Matt and Cameron’s June break. So this week, we’re looking back at one of our favorite books from this podcast, originally put out in October of 2021.Major themes: Is it really fatalist?, My boy Pugachev, Benedict Anderson will never leave us alone04:52 - It’s “Farmer’s Daughter” by Rodney Atkins, if anyone’s wondering. 35:09 - “Alexandr Pushkin’s The Captain’s Daughter: A Poetics of Violence” by Alexander Groce39:08 - Plotting History: The Russian Historical Novel in the Imperial Age by Dan Ungurianu 39: 54 - “Between Nation and Empire: Aleksandr Pushkin’s The Captain’s Daughter” by Irina Anisimova47:45 - Close, but no dice. It’s The History of Pugachev54: 52 - “Grinev the Trickster: Reading the Paradoxes of Pushkin’s The Captain’s Daughter” by Polina RikounThe music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:Note: This is a re-run of The Orchard by Kristina Gorcheva-NewberryIt’s week 2 of Matt and Cameron’s June break. So this week, we’re looking back at one of our favorite books from this podcast, originally put out in June of 2022.Major themes: The Time Between Dog and Wolf, Re-writing the past, Toasting to art  35:30 - To avoid spoilers, go to 36:4251:59 - The Orchard by Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry (click on the “Buy” button to see a list of places where you can purchase this book)The music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes: Note: This is a re-run of Zuleikha (parts 1 and 2) by Guzel Yakhina.It’s week 1 of Matt and Cameron’s June break. So this week, we’re looking back at one of our favorite books from this podcast, originally put out in April of 2021. Major themes: Forest spirits, Vestigial pagan folklore, and Dekulakization.03:51 - Here’s a link to the article that I heavily cited in this episode: Fear and Belief in the USSR’s “Great Terror”: Response to Arrest, 1935-1939.51:20 - Much of the information in this section is pulled from Lynne Viola’s paper “The Campaign to Eliminate the Kulak as a Class, Winter 1929-1930: A Reevaluation of the Legislation”.53:30 - “The Soviet War Against ‘Fifth Columnists’: The Case Against Chechnya, 1942-4” by Jeffrey Burds. See especially the section “Germany and Japan: Intelligence and Sabotage Networks, 1935-41.” 13:20 - Again pulled from Burds’s article, these are the characteristics of “bandit nations”:borderland elements, with close kinship or ethnic ties to foreign-based emigrationForeign use of those elements for espionage and other seditious acts within the USSRstrong religious traditionssustained by ‘heroic’ historical movement of insurrectionary elementsoperates on hostile terrain that facilitates concealmentThe music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes: Some quick updates before we head into our June break:HERE IS THE LISTENER SURVEY!The music used in this episode, and for the last time in a new release, was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Please go show them some love and buy their albums if you’re able. Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:This week, Matt and Cameron actually finish War and Peace by covering both epilogues. Did you want to find out what happened to the characters? Too bad! It’s time for more argumentation about history. Well, okay, there’s a little bit of character wrap-up. But most of it, predictably, is about farming. Just another day with Tolstoy. Major themes: Better History, Questionable Theories, Live Laugh Love Levin00:58 - I meant to say “75 serving” and “120 serving,” which is far less than 100 pounds. Good God, could you imagine, though? 10:18 - An apiologist, apparently. 23:18 - The Machete Order for Star WarsThe music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Buy this book with our affiliate links on ⁠Bookshop⁠ or ⁠Amazon⁠!Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:This week, Matt and Cameron finish War and Peace!! Well, minus the epilogue. Tune in to hear about the meeting of old acquaintances, the passing of old friends, and the quiet night at the end of a war. Book 4, Part 4. It’s the end of a true epic, in the most literary sense of the word. Be there or be square. Major themes: PTSD = Cool Dude, Super Friendship, Laws of HistoryThe music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Buy this book with our affiliate links on ⁠Bookshop⁠ or ⁠Amazon⁠!Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:This week, Matt and Cameron continue Napoleon’s invasion into Imperial Russia into its final phase: a slow, deadly retreat accompanied by irregular warfare in War & Peace’s Part 3 of Book 4. This is what Cameron studied for a potion of his degree and he is going to make that your problem in this episode. Follow along as we catch up with the youngest Rostov, Petya, as he finally deploys in the theater of war, and also find Pierre turning monastic during a death march. Nothing but good times, so grab your scavenged shoes found along a retreat route and tune in!Major themes: Guerilla Warfare, Spying = Being Mean, A Prosaic Prisoner03:07 - I’d apologize for my Yreka slander, but I’m actually not sorry. 04:20 - I was trying to think of inter-state (between state), intra-state (between a state and a non-state actor in the former’s borders), and extra-state (between a state and a non-state actor outside its borders) warfare.17:42 - Not to say this was a novel introduction of “rules of warfare.” Many places in many times had put similar thought into conducting warfare, but I mean to say this particular period has an outsized place in influencing modern thought. The music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Buy this book with our affiliate links on ⁠Bookshop⁠ or ⁠Amazon⁠!Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:This week, Matt and Cameron move away from particular characters and start talking about the long arc of history in Book 4, Part 2 of War and Peace. As the French army retreats from Moscow, it’s the perfect time to ask the question: hey, wait, was everyone wrong about calling Stalingrad the Soviet War and Peace? You’ll have to listen to find out. Plus we’ll learn about the function of pain in Tolstoy’s work, which will really lighten the mood. Grab your water for a long march back to Paris, then tune in! Major themes: The Function of Pain, Pierre’s Thiccness, Dialoguing with Stalingrad 26:45 - “Revisiting the Dialectic of Pain and Truth: War and Peace and The Death of Ivan Ilyich” by David RosenshieldThe music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Buy this book with our affiliate links on ⁠Bookshop⁠ or ⁠Amazon⁠!Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Shownotes:This week, Matt and Cameron start on Book 4, Part 1 (after diverging from our original plan to combine parts 1 and 2) and do a deep dive on how we can really analyze wisdom, on the horror of war collapsing into peace, and whether self-sacrifice can ever be a true ideal of Christianity. That’s right, it’s the big ideas section! Well - the whole book is the big ideals section, but this is a great survey of some of Tolstoy’s most interesting ideas. Grab your Youtube video of Slavoj Zizek and tune in! Major themes: Collapsing War and Peace Together, The Nature of Wisom, The Banality of Evil15:12 - I meant to say “Andrei,” not “Nikolai” here18:48 - “Cry” not “die”26:30 - Well, the prisoner per capita ratio is still high in China - just nowhere near as high as the U.S. 30:20 - I learned this in class sometime back, so I’m going to hedge this claim a bit. Here are some comparative numbers on draft dodging, but I’m unclear on how they got to these numbers (analyzing data from the U.S. gov vs. independent analyses) so I won’t say this is a definitive answer. If I can locate a study or similar research that uses a consistent methodology to analyze draft dodging these two periods, I’ll add it here. 51:57 - Some more information about Dostoevsky’s almost-execution53:24 - Surprisingly, I was right. The music used in this episode was “soviet march,” by Toasted Tomatoes. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. Buy this book with our affiliate links on ⁠Bookshop⁠ or ⁠Amazon⁠!Our links: Website | ⁠Discord⁠ Socials: ⁠Instagram⁠ | ⁠Twitter⁠ | ⁠FacebookAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands