Suicide as a Cultural Institution in Dostoevsky's Russia: Postmodernism, Objectivity, Multicultural Politics

by Irina Paperno

Book Overview

In the popular and scientific imagination, suicide has always been an enigmatic act that defies, and yet demands, explanation. Throughout the centuries, philosophers and writers, journalists and scientists have attempted to endow this act with meaning. In the nineteenth century, and especially in Russia, suicide became the focus for discussion of such issues as the immortality of the soul, free will and determinism, the physical and the spiritual, the individual and the social. Analyzing a variety of sources--medical reports, social treatises, legal codes, newspaper articles, fiction, private documents left by suicides--Irina Paperno describes the search for the meaning of suicide. Paperno focuses on Russia of the 1860s-1880s, when suicide was at the center of public attention.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0801484251
• ISBN13: 9780801484254
• Release Date: February 1998
• Publisher: Cornell University Press
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.1"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher