Mikhail Elizarov Explained

Birth Name:Elizarov Mikhail Yuryevich
Birth Date:28 January 1973.[1]
Birth Place:Ivano-Frankivsk, USSR
Occupation:writer, singer-songwriter
Language:Russian
Notableworks:Fingernails, Pasternak, The Librarian, Cartoons, Earth
Genre:novel, short story, punk-bard-chanson
Movement:Russian postmodernism, magic realism
Awards:Russian Booker Prize 2008, National Bestseller 2020

Mikhail Yuryevich Elizarov (Russian: Елизаров Михаи́л Ю́рьевич; January 28, 1973) – is a modern Russian writer and singer-songwriter, laureate of the Russian Booker Prize in 2008 for the novel The Librarian.

Literary career

In 2001, the Russian publishing house Ad Marginem issued a collection of short novels Fingernails, which immediately captured the attention of the media and critics. The collection includes 24 short stories and a novel of the same title, the main characters of which are two pupils who possess paranormal abilities studying in a boarding school for demented children. The story was shortlisted for the Andrei Bely literary prize.[2] Russian literary critic Lev Danilkin of the Afisha magazine hailed the collection as the best debut of the year.

The next Elizarov's novel Pasternak (2003) prompted controversial polemic among Russian critics.[3] In this anti-liberal and anti-sectarian lampoon, the poet Boris Pasternak is depicted in the form of a demon who "poisons" the intelligentsia's minds with his works. Some critics categorized the book as "trash", "a sickening novel".[4] Literary critic Alla Latynina wrote in Novy Mir, that the novel has "an unpretentious, rather pop culture plot".[5] The Continent magazine, in a review of literary criticism, wrote that "when brown comes into fashion, its fans appear in literary circles", calling the author of NG-Ex libris Lev Pirogov, who spoke favourably of the novel,[6] "a Nazi-minded ideologist". Moreover, the magazine noted that the leitmotif of the criticism was "the crisis of liberal values, the entry into the arena of the enemies of freedom".[7]

On the other hand, the critic Vladimir Bondarenko in Zavtra newspaper praised highly the novel: "This is where the unbridled Russian revenge showed itself in full splendor, as a response to all the humiliations and insults of the Russian nation, the Russian character, the Russian faith and the Russian dream ... Through all a set of avant-garde literary techniques, through the philology of the text and dense erudition of the young writer, not inferior to either Umberto Eco, or Milorad Pavić, the unshakable centuries-old spiritual values of the Russian people are vehemently defended".[8] Lev Danilkin labeled the novel as an "Orthodox philosophical action movie".

In 2007, Elizarov's novel The Librarian was published, which in December 2008 won him the Russian Booker Prize.[9] The protagonist of the novel learns that some books of a forgotten Soviet writer possess mystical properties, and various groups of readers are waging a fierce battle to get them. As was noted by Anna Kuznetsova in the Znamya magazine, "Mikhail Elizarov's prose seems to be evolving like Vladimir Sorokin's: from scandalous shockingness to fiction rich in intellectual content".[10] [11] In 2015 the novel was translated to English by Andrew Bromfield and issued in Pushkin Press, London. Jeff VanderMeer highly praised the novel as "immensely entertaining" and compared it to works of Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Bulgakov, "while being very much its own thing"[12]

In 2011, the novel Cartoons became the finalist of the award National Bestseller.[13] In 2014, Elizarov won the NOS Prize in the nomination "Audience Choice Award" with the collection of short stories named We went out to smoke for 17 years. Mikhail Elizarov says, that "if we assume that the writer has two ink tanks on his desk with different kind of inks, then this book, unlike all my previous ones, is written entirely with the contents of the second ink tank. It has never happened to me before. A distinctive feature of this "second ink" is fiction. There is not a word of truth in this book". Nevertheless, the short stories in this collection are written in rather autobiographical, true-to-life style, uncharacteristic of all his previous books.

After almost six years of "silence", Mikhail Elizarov published a new book in October 2019. Titled Earth, the new novel is the first large-scale reflection on the "Russian Thanatos".[14] As the Russian writer and critic Andrey Astvatsaturov notes in his review, "Elizarov seems to have written his best novel so far. Inspirational and at the same time masterful, mature, measured and carefully thought out from the first to the last paragraph. Despite the huge array of text, this book is only the first part of the novel Earth, titled The Digger".[15] The plot unfolds itself around the protagonist who works in the funeral business in modern Russia and meets a mysterious young lady covered in tattoos.

Russian literary critic Viktor Toporov characterizes Elizarov as one of only two or three contemporary visionary writers of Russian literature (along with Vladimir Sharov and Sasha Sokolov)[16]

Musical career

In parallel to his literary activities, Mikhail Elizarov also performs songs of his own composition.[17] As of 2020, Elizarov's discography consists of eleven albums.[18]

Literary works

Awards

Translations

Discography

References

Bibliography

Reviews

Interviews

Notes

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Internet Speculative Fiction Database . Summary Bibliography: Михаил Елизаров .
  2. http://belyprize.ru/index.php?id=41/The Andrei Bely Prize 2001
  3. Alexandra Guzeva 112 Russian writers ranging from great, to absolutely freaking great// Russia Beyond, August 25, 2015.
  4. Web site: Shuhmin . Vladimir . Трэш, или Мусорный ветер перемен . Критическая масса (Critical Mass) . 2004 . 1.
  5. Alla Latynina Случай Елизарова Novy Mir, No. 4, 2019
  6. Pirogov Lev Архипелаг Pasternak // Nezavisimaya Gazeta, October 2, 2003
  7. Ermolin E and others Художественная литература и критика. IVQ2003 / The Continent, 2004, № 119
  8. Bondarenko V. Реакционный авангард // Zavtra, № 7 (83), July 10, 2003
  9. Web site: Russian Booker Prize 2008 . November 28, 2019 . June 18, 2013 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130618140410/http://www.russianbooker.org/archive/2008/ . dead .
  10. Anna Kuznetsova Mikhail Elizarov, The Librarian // Znamya, 2007, № 10
  11. Anna Aslanyan / Revolutions and resurrections: How has Russia's literature changed? // The Independent, April 8, 2011
  12. Jeff VanderMeer The Overlooked Books of 2015, The Slate book review, November 30, 2015
  13. http://ria.ru/culture/20110426/368467824.html Премия "Национальный бестселлер" назвала шесть финалистов 2011 года | РИА Новости
  14. https://ast.ru/book/zemlya-846925/ AST Mikhail Elizarov, Earth
  15. Astvatsaturov A. Review of the novel "Earth" of Mikhail Elizarov
  16. V. Toporov Is the new novel of M. Elizarov worth reading? / July 02, 2010
  17. http://zavtra.ru/content/view/shansone-iz-htoni/ Шансонье из хтони
  18. Web site: Mikhail Elizarov. Mikhail Elizarov. 2017-01-03.
  19. Web site: Russian Literary Awards . 10 March 2024 . Indiana University Bloomington Libraries . en-US.
  20. Web site: Russian Literary Awards . 10 March 2024 . Indiana University Bloomington Libraries . en-US.

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