Spirit of the Totem : Religion and Myth in Soviet Fiction 1964–1988

Abstract

The book presents an original, interdisciplinary analysis of religious and mythological perspectives in fiction published in the Soviet Union between the mid-1960s and the mid-1980s. In doing so, it points to ways in which anthropological theory can be used as a framework for literary criticism. It also shows how, in the two decades before perestroika, religion and mythology served as alternative models for the intellectual and political reorientation of Soviet society. Selected works are explored with reference to a formative debate in anthropological studies on the nature and development of religion, based on Edward B. Tylor’s theory of ‘animism’ and Emile Durkheim’s theory of ‘totemism’. It is shown how the animist/totemist dichotomy highlighted by the controversy is reflected in Russian religious thought before 1917 and, particularly, in the literature of the Soviet era. Novels by Valentin Rasputin, Chabua Amiredzhibi, Daniil Granin, Chingiz Aitmatov, and Vladimir Tendriakov are discussed in the light of a range of mythological and religious systems. The study also shows how Durkheim’s theory of religion and group identity can be related to ideas put forward by the Russian nationalist writers Iurii Bondarev, Sergei Alekseev and Vasilii Belov, and suggests that examples of fiction by Petr Proskurin, Aitmatov, and Tendriakov indicate revived interest in the God-building theory of Gor’kii and Lunacharskii. In conclusion, the book argues that subtextual religious and mythological narratives in Soviet fiction between 1964 and 1988 provided a model for new literary discourse under perestroika and for subsequent political transformations. This book, originally published in paperback in 1995 under the ISBN 978-0-901286-61-1, was made Open Access in 2024 as part of the MHRA Revivals programme.