Boucquey Thierry (General Editor). Encyclopedia Of World Writers. 3 volumes
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Shattuck, Roger. Proust’s Way: A Field Guide to In
Search of Lost Time. New York: W. W. Norton,
2000.
Pushkin, Aleksandr (1799–1837) poet,
novelist, short-story writer
Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin was born in Mi-
hailovskoe, Russia, to aristocratic parents, Sergey
Pushkin and Nadezhda Osipovna. On his mother’s
side, Pushkin descended from an African slave,
given to Peter the Great as a state present from the
Ottoman Empire. He had close relationships with
his grandmother and his nurse, who brought
him up on Russian folktales, and with the serfs
on his family’s estate. He was given a classical
education from one of the best schools available
in Russia, the Lyceum Tsarskoye Selo. It was there
that he began to write poetry. He graduated with
honors in 1817.
After graduation, Pushkin began to pursue a life
of pleasure, freedom, and revolutionary thought in
St. Petersburg. He published poetry that was con-
sidered scandalous at the time and brought the at-
tention of the czar. In 1820, he published the long
narrative poetic romance Ruslan and Ludmilla,
which combined the traditional elements of a
Russian fairy tale with the exquisite control of po-
etic language. The poem was immediately recog-
nized as a masterpiece of Russian literature and
brought fame to Pushkin.
That same year, Pushkin published Ode to
Liberty, a poem that satirized famous figures of the
czar’s court and was viewed as politically and
socially radical by the censors. Pushkin was exiled
by the czar’s police and forced to relocate in Eka-
terinoslavl in southern Russia. This banishment
provided an opportunity for Pushkin to travel to
the exotic Caucasus and Crimea and gave him in-
spiration for his short stories,“The Prisoner of the
Caucus” (1822) and “The Fountain of Bakhchis-
arai” (1824). Both stories center on the beautiful
and inspiring mountainous landscape, and they
reveal a strong influence of the poetry of the noto-
rious Lord Byron. During his exile, Pushkin led a
riotous lifestyle, and he was then ordered to return
to his family’s estate in Mikhailovskoe.
Far away from the court and stimulating soci-
ety, in the solitude of Mikhailovskoe, Pushkin
began to work without distractions. There he con-
ceived his historical epic work, Boris Godunov
(completed 1825; published 1831). The poem,
broad in its scope, presents a tragic story of a
downfall of a Russian czar. The poem was popu-
larly received and was transformed into an opera
by Modest Mussorgsky. Pushkin gave a public
reading of the poem for which the government im-
mediately reprimanded him. After the death of
Alexander I in 1825, the new czar, Nicholas I, of-
fered to be the personal censor of Pushkin; all fu-
ture poems and stories were to be read directly by
him before publication. Pushkin found this
arrangement restrictive, however, and the czar or-
dered that he be put under constant government
surveillance for the rest of his life.
Critical Analysis
Aleksandr Pushkin is considered the greatest poet
of Russia. Often relying on historical founda-
tions, his work established and shaped the coun-
try’s poetic language. Influenced by the English
romantic poets, such as Wordsworth and Lord
Byron, however, Pushkin’s attitude was ironic in
the manner of Voltaire. His work was unprece-
dented in its scope, in imagery, and in its use of
common Russian language.
In the long narrative poems Poltava (1829) and
The Bronze Horseman (1837), Pushkin extols the
achievements of Peter the Great. In both poems,
the earthly figure of Russia’s emperor is trans-
formed through lyricism into a heroic deity who
builds the Russian Empire.
Eugene Onegin (1833) is considered to be the
definitive masterpiece of Russian literature. A
novel in verse, Eugene Onegin dramatically de-
scribes the ill-fated relationship between lovers.
The complex rhyme scheme and unprecedented,
delicate treatment of poetic meter still amaze read-
ers of Pushkin. Besides its poetic language, the
work also contains a biting commentary on the so-
358 Pushkin, Aleksandr
cial order of Russia during the 1820s. Some critics
consider Eugene Onegin among the greatest works
of all literature.
Although Pushkin is primarily known for his
verse, his short stories also attained critical recog-
nition. His stories and poems are based not only
on historical facts but also on the deep cultural tra-
ditions of the Russian people. In “The Golden
Cockerel” (1833), he introduces the traditional el-
ements of a fairy tale into his prose, finding inspi-
ration for his work in the bedtime stories that were
told to him in childhood. He transformed several
of these fairy tales into works of high poetic merit.
The Queen of Spades (1834) reveals deep psy-
chological torments of a gambler who decides to
risk his entire fortune in a game of cards. Eugene
Onegin and The Queen of Spades were adapted into
operas by Russian composer Tchaikovsky, while
“The Golden Cockerel” became the basis for an
opera by Rimsky-Korsakov. The adaptability of
Pushkin’s verse into music demonstrates the lyrical
quality of the poet’s work.
In 1837, Pushkin was wounded in a duel over
an alleged affair between his wife and a young
Frenchman; he died several days later, leaving a
legacy for generations of Russian writers and for
every major poetic movement. Pushkin clearly
showed the poetic capacity of the Russian lan-
guage, he also memorialized the rich cultural her-
itage of his motherland. Indeed, Pushkin is now
considered to be an incomparable part of Russian
language and culture.
A Work about Aleksandr Pushkin
Feinstein, Elaine. Pushkin. London: Weidenfield and
Nicolson, 1998.
Pushkin, Aleksandr 359
360
Qabbani
See KABBANI, NIZAR.
Quasimodo, Salvatore (1901–1968) poet
Salvatore Quasimodo, recipient of the 1959 Nobel
Prize for literature, was born in the small town of
Modica, Sicily. The son of a railroad worker, he
began to develop a love of writing in his early
childhood. His family, however, felt that it would
be much more practical for him to pursue an edu-
cation in a technical field; therefore, he moved to
Rome in his late teens to study engineering. Finan-
cial difficulties forced him to abandon his educa-
tion in 1923, but a series of odd jobs eventually led
to a secure government position as a civil engineer
in 1926. Stable in his employment, Quasimodo
was then able to return to his thoughts of becom-
ing a writer. His brother-in-law, the novelist Elio
Vitorini, introduced Quasimodo into literary cir-
cles where he soon befriended fellow writers Eu-
genio
MONTALE, and Guiseppe UNGARETTI.
Quasimodo published his first poetry in maga-
zines. His first volume of collected works, Water
and Land (1930), contained several poems that had
been written when he was as young as 18 as well as
numerous, more recent pieces. This collection falls
into what has been defined as the early phase of
Quasimodo’s career. Divided by World War II, his
works are distinctly marked as falling into two sep-
arate stylistic categories. Before the war, as in this
collection, his writing style was complex and
tended toward the metaphysical. Most of his po-
etry during this period was nostalgic, filled with
images of Sicily as a backdrop for feelings of lone-
liness and melancholy. At the same time, he also
concerned himself with themes of childhood
memory and a love for the beauty and culture of
Italy. He connects this culture to influences of var-
ious invaders, such as the Greeks and Romans, and
the profound and lasting effect they had on his
own literary heritage.
As Quasimodo’s early poetic style developed, he
began to come under the influence of the symbol-
ist movement (see
SYMBOLISM). Sunken Oboe (1932)
and Scent of Eucalyptus (1933) both contain poems
that exemplify the movement’s adherence to sug-
gestive imagery and mysticism. As a result, much
of his work during this period is considered diffi-
cult to analyze because of the complex and meta-
physical nature of his imagery content.
In 1938, becoming more involved in his writing,
Quasdimodo left his government post to become an
assistant to Cesare Zavattini, a well- known editor of
several popular literary periodicals. He continued to
work on his own poetry and to publish his works
Q
regularly in collections such as Greek Lyrics (1940),
a compilation of ancient Greek lyrical poetry. In this
work, he once again returned to the idea of past in-
fluences, making associations between modern style
and ancient language. Quasimodo also became en-
amored of the academic lifestyle at this point. He
devoted himself entirely to his writing, expanding
his focus to include essays on poetry and other
forms of literature as well as translations of classical
poetry and drama, including the works of Shake-
speare, Homer, Virgil, and Sophocles. In 1941, he
gained employment as a professor of Italian litera-
ture at the Guiseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan,
allowing him to continue to spread his own poetic
ideals to future generations.
The start of World War II marked a shift in
Quasimodo’s writing. He became a member of an
anti-Fascist group and spent a brief period of time
in prison. There, he began to develop a more hu-
manistic approach to his work, becoming more
concerned with social conditions, contemporary
issues, and the atrocities of war and human suffer-
ing. His best-known work, And Suddenly It’s
Evening (1942), marks the beginning of this
change in style.
Quasimodo briefly joined the Italian Commu-
nist Party at the end of the war, but he quickly re-
signed in protest of the party’s insistence that he
dedicate his talents to producing political poetry.
In response, he published Day after Day (1947), a
collection of poems in which he focuses on the
hardships faced by Italian citizens during World
War II and on his own disdain for his country and
the role that it played in the war. Vivid in descrip-
tion, this work is often considered one of the
strongest volumes of antiwar poetry to come out
of any country during this period. It reflects
strongly Quasimodo’s own concerns for the fate
of Italy, as well as his fear that the country will
lose its culture and beauty. This falls in direct par-
allel to his early works and their tendency to ex-
emplify those same values of cultural and natural
beauty.
In the later years of his life, Quasimodo contin-
ued to focus on issues pertaining to the tragedy of
human conditions and social injustices; however,
he also began to return to some of his earlier nos-
talgia, this time not for places but for people whose
lives impacted his own. Quasimodo had one child,
a daughter Orietta, born in 1935 to Amelia Spe-
cialetti, a woman to whom he was never married.
His first wife, Bice Donetti, had passed away in
1948. Although he remarried to the dancer Maria
Cumani, they permanently separated in 1960, leav-
ing him with three lost loves. His fond but often
bittersweet memories of these women, as well as
reminiscences over several friends who died before
him, form much of the driving force behind his
final volume of poetry, To Give and To Have (1966).
He continued to be active as a writer and a critic
until his death. While in Amalfi where he was judg-
ing a poetry competition, Quasimodo suffered a
cerebral hemorrhage. He was returned to Naples
for treatment, where he died, leaving behind a
legacy of poetry best known for its fight against the
social injustice and tragedy of war.
Other Works by Salvatore Quasimodo
Complete Poems. Translated by Jack Bevan. New York:
Schocken Books, 1984.
The Poet and the Politician, and Other Essays. Trans-
lated by Thomas G. Bergin and Sergio Pacifici.
Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press,
1964.
Queirós, José María de (Eça de
Queirós)
(1845–1900) novelist
Born in Portugal, Eça de Queirós was the illegiti-
mate son of a magistrate and was raised by his
grandparents. He was sent to boarding school at
the age of five. This parental neglect may explain
the satirical nature of his works.
After law school, he became a journalist and
then entered the consular service in 1872. He
resided mostly abroad, and his Letters from En-
gland (1870) provide us some amusing views on
life in Victorian England.
Considered Portugal’s greatest novelist, he was
influenced by ROMANTICISM and NATURALISM.He
Queirós, José María de 361
uses very expressive, realistic language and is
known for his character descriptions. His major
novels are critical portrayals of upper-class Por-
tuguese society. In O crime do padre Amaro (1876;
The Sin of Father Amaro) and his masterpiece Os
Maias (1888), Queiroz depicts the corruption he
saw among the clergy and in high society. He is
critical of the intellectual elite, which he believes
suffers from moral deficiency. His works seem to
say that Portugese society could not change unless
there was a major catastrophe.
Other Works by José María de Eça
de Queirós
The Illustrious House of Ramires. Translated by Anne
Stevens. New York: New Directions, 1994.
The Relic. Translated by Margaret Jull Costa. New
York: Hippocrene Books, 1995.
A Work about José María de Eça
de Queirós
Coleman, Alexander. Eça de Queirós and the European
Realism. New York: New York University Press,
1980.
Queiróz, Raquel de (1910– ) journalist,
novelist
Raquel de Queiróz was born November 17 in For-
taleza, a town in the state of Ceará in Brazil. Her
great-grandmother was the cousin of another fa-
mous Brazilian writer, José de ALENCAR, also from
the state of Ceará in northeastern Brazil. At age
seven, she moved with her family to Rio de Janeiro,
but they returned to Ceará just two years later, and
she would remain there until she graduated from
college in 1921.
Queiróz began to write early, and she had a long
career as a journalist. She also wrote novels, the
first of which, The Fifteen, was published in 1930.
The novel was very well received, and it gave
Queiróz a literary name in Brazil. She received the
Graça Aranha Foundation prize for the novel in
Rio de Janeiro in 1931. Just a few years later, she
formed friendships with Graciliano Ramos and
Jorge Lins do Rego, also from the northeast.
Through the exceptional writing of Queiróz and
others from this region, the northeastern novels of
Brazil were born. In the 1930s, Queiróz married
literary figure and poet José Auto da Cruz Oliveira.
They had a daughter and later separated. She con-
tinued to write in various genres throughout her
life, including journalistic chronicles, novels, short
stories, theater, and even children’s literature. One
of her best-known novels, The Three Marias
(1939), is often considered semiautobiographical
because it recounts the story of a young woman
through her developmental years, from the age of
12 until she turns 20.
Queiróz was also very politically active, and
she represented Brazil at the session of the General
Assembly of the United Nations in 1966, where
she worked especially on the Human Rights
Commission. On August 4, 1977, the Brazilian
Academy of Letters elected her as its first female
member, paving the way for future female authors
in Brazil.
Other Works by Raquel de Queiróz
Castro-Klaren, Sara, Sylvia Molloy, and Beatriz Sarlo,
eds. Selections in Women’s Writing in Latin Amer-
ica. Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1992.
A Work about Raquel de Queiróz
Ellison, Fred P. Brazil’s New Novel: Four Northeastern
Masters. Berkeley: University of California Press,
1954.
Queneau, Raymond (1903–1976) poet,
novelist
Raymond Queneau was born in Le Havre, France.
A man of many diverse intellectual interests, he
was a mathematician, scholar, humorist, linguist,
and poet. When he was 17, Queneau went to Paris,
where he briefly associated with André BRETON’s
surrealism. He composed the manifesto Permettez!
(1920) but soon broke with the group to write
about the link he saw between surrealism and EXIS-
TENTIALISM.
362 Queiróz, Raquel de
In his works, Queneau often uses colloquial
speech patterns and phonetic spelling of words.
Fascinated by languages, he felt that written French
needed to free itself from archaic rules and restric-
tions. His first novel, Le Chiendent (The Bark Tree,
1933), was noted for its use of slang and casual
language. Because of this, Queneau’s works are
difficult to translate, as the language itself is critical
to the interpretation.
Queneau is best known internationally for his
novel Zazie dans le métro (1959), the story of a
young girl who comes to visit Paris and stays with
her heterosexual uncle, who is employed as a
dancer in a gay bar. Her one desire is to ride the
metro, which she cannot do because the workers
are on strike. Instead, she embarks on a journey to-
ward adulthood. The novel was adapted to film in
1960, gaining both positive and negative critical at-
tention for its bold use of language and its break
from cultural norms.
After this first film endeavor, Queneau collabo-
rated on several other occasions with “New Wave”
film directors. His work in this genre marks his
most notable contribution to world literature. In
addition, one of his poems was made popular
when it was set to music by Juliette Greco. Que-
neau was elected to the Goncourt Academy in
1952. He died on October 26, having left his mark
in the destruction of traditional literary norms.
Another Work by Raymond Queneau
Stories and Remarks. Translated by Marc Lowental.
Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.
A Work about Raymond Queneau
Guicharnaud, Jacques. Raymond Queneau. Translated
by June Guicharnaud. New York: Columbia Uni-
versity Press, 1965.
Quental, Antero Tarquínio de
(1842–1891) poet
Antero Tarquínio de Quental was born in Ponta
Delgada, Portugal. He was from an aristocratic
family of intellectuals, writers, and religious lead-
ers. Nevertheless, all his life Quental was a rebel
and had decidedly liberal leanings.
He was the key figure in the Generation of
Coimbra, a group of students at the University of
Coimbra who attempted to revitalize postro-
mantic Portuguese literature. The Generation of
Coimbra had a great deal in common with Latin-
American MODERNISM, and Quental had many
affinities with Rubén DARÍO, modernism’s key fig-
ure.
Quental’s Modern Odes (1865) abandons ro-
mantic decadence and returns to a vocabulary of
classical images and symbols, presenting a height-
ened, purified view of reality with a pessimistic
tone.
Though not an innovator, Quental was a master
of the sonnet. He proved this in his Complete Son-
nets (1886), a collection of 109 sonnets that serve
as a spiritual autobiography.
Quental, though a minor figure, was an impor-
tant voice of modernism and social reform in
19th-century Portugal.
Quental, Antero Tarquínio de 363
364
R
Rao Srinivasa, Srirangam
See SRI SRI.
Rabéarivelo, Jean-Joseph (1903–1937)
poet
Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo was born in Tananarive,
Madagascar. His mother was a member of an aris-
tocratic Madagascar family that had been impov-
erished by the French takeover of the island.
Rabéarivelo was educated by his uncle in French
schools but left school at 13. He worked in various
occupations, including as a librarian, which gave
him the opportunity to read widely. He began to
write poetry, mostly in French but some in his na-
tive Malagasy, at first under pseudonyms. He also
began to write for journals, and when his article on
Madagascar poetry was accepted by the interna-
tional journal Anthropos in 1923, Rabéarivelo de-
cided to become a full-time writer. During the
same year, he became a proofreader for a printing
press, a job he kept until his death in 1937. He
married in 1926 and had five children; his grief
over the death of his youngest daughter in 1933,
expressed in a short story entitled “Un conte de la
nuit,” may have contributed to his death. After
struggling with addictions, Rabéarivelo committed
suicide by poisoning himself.
A sensation of despair and foreboding overhang
Rabéarivelo’s poetry, which was influenced by the
work of Charles
BAUDELAIRE and the French sym-
bolists (see
SYMBOLISM) as well as by traditional
Malagasy form. His melancholy resonates through
his poems, as in “Valiha,” which both celebrates
and grieves for a transformation of nature into art,
when bamboo shoots, rustling in the wind, are
turned into a musical instrument, the traditional
stringed valiha of Madagascar:
There they will sound
until an artist comes
who will break their godlike youth
and flay them in his village
and stretch out their skins
with shards of calabashes . . .
The isolation and sadness of the speakers of his
poems derive from Rabéarivelo’s personal life ex-
periences. His sorrow was further accentuated by
his perceived failure in life, giving his poems a
poignant bitter-sweetness. His despair is tinged
with a quiet resilience that was derived from his
love of freedom and nature, echoing the chants of
Madagascar’s highlands. Gerald Moore and Ulli
Beier remark, “In his poetry he has destroyed and
dismembered reality. And out of the fragments he
has built a new mythical world; it is a world of
death and frustration, but also transcended by a
sad beauty of its own.”
Another Work by Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo
Translations from the Night: Selected Poems of Jean-
Joseph Rabéarivelo. Edited by John Reed and
Clive Wake. London: Heinemann Educational,
1975.
Works about Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo
Adejunmobi, Moradewun. Jean-Joseph Rabéarivelo,
Literature, and Lingua Franca in Colonial Mada-
gascar. New York: Peter Lang, 1996.
Moore, Gerald and Ulli Beier, eds. Modern Poetry
from Africa. New York: Viking, 1963.
Rabinowitz, Sholem
See ALEICHEM, SHALOM.
Ravikovitch, Dahlia (1936– ) poet
Dahlia Ravikovitch was born in Ramat Gan, a sub-
urb of Tel Aviv (now in Israel), and spent her early
years on a kibbutz (a communal farm or settle-
ment in Israel) before attending high school in
Haifa. She later studied at the Hebrew University of
Jerusalem. Ravikovitch published her first collec-
tion of poems, The Love of an Orange, in 1959
when she was still in the army. She has worked as a
journalist, teacher, and television reviewer and
continues to write poetry.
Ravikovitch’s early poems are often romantic,
evoking distant places, love, and mythological fig-
ures. Her later work contains increased satire and
sarcasm but still maintains intellectual under-
standing and sensitivity.
After the Israeli war in Lebanon in 1982,
Ravikovitch became active in the Israeli peace
movement, and her poetry often tackles the diffi-
cult subject of war. She has said, “Everyone wants
peace but everyone thinks someone else should
bring it.” Yet, it remains difficult to categorize her
work—she takes on womanhood, human rights,
and war, alongside inner life and loneliness as
some of her themes.
Ravikovitch is considered one of Israel’s leading
poets. She has also written some prose and several
children’s books, has translated poetry by William
Butler Yeats, Edgar Allan Poe, and T. S. Eliot into
Hebrew, and is the recipient of the Shlonsky, Bren-
ner, Ussishkin, and Bialik Prizes.
Other Works by Dahlia Ravikovitch
A Dress of Fire. Translated by Chana Bloch. Camp
Hill, Pa.: Horizon House Publishers, 1978.
The Window: New and Selected Poems. In collabora-
tion with Ariel Bloch. New York: Sheep Meadow
Press, 1989.
Works about Dahlia Ravikovitch
Cooperman, Alan. “Making Peace Where Politicians
Fear to Tread.” U.S. News and World Report, June
30, 1997. Available online at http://traubman.
igc.org/makepeac.htm.
Lowin, Joseph. “Born to Dream: A Discussion into
English of Dahlia Ravikovitch’s ‘The Reason for
Falling.’” From the Literary Corner (17 April
2002) of The National Center for the Hebrew Lan-
guage. Available online at www.ivrit.org/liter-
ary/born_to_dream.htm.
realism
Realism in literature is a worldwide movement
that had its most profound effects in fiction and
drama in the late 1800s. Born out of the ideas of
the ROMANTIC novel but infused with concrete de-
tails and accurate descriptions of society, the char-
acters of realist fiction are drawn from the events
and contexts of modern life and face everyday ob-
stacles. Realism, as it has spread throughout the
world, has mutated into POETIC REALISM, NATURAL-
ISM, SOCIALIST REALISM, MAGIC REALISM, and (in
Italy) VERISMO. Realism has molded the expecta-
tions of readers worldwide, and in spite of the an-
tirealist trends in MODERNISM and POSTMODERNISM,
it remains a force every writer must reckon with
to this day.
realism 365
French Realism
Realism is most commonly traced to the French
novelist Honoré de BALZAC and his series of novels
and stories which, grouped together, form The
Human Comedy (1840). Balzac’s intention was to
portray, as accurately as possible, all aspects of
French life and culture, from the lowest prostitute
to the highest political leader. His attention to
detail in setting and characterization provided the
foundations for the movement, although the ac-
tual plots of his works, often absurd and almost
unbelievable, were far from the goals to which
realism ultimately aimed.
In 1857, Gustave FLAUBERT’s Madame Bovary
became the prototype for the realist novel. Like
Balzac’s work, Flaubert’s novel was the result of
systematic research; however, instead of fanciful
plots, he focused instead on the issue of female
adultery and the unhappy married life of a country
woman, Emma Bovary. Considered mild accord-
ing to modern standards, Flaubert’s love scenes
were so detailed that they resulted in the author
facing charges of obscenity. He was called the
anatomist of the heart.
Russian Realism
The shift from romantic idealism to realism in
Russian literature was primarily initiated by the
prose of Nikolay
GOGOL, which addressed aspects
of everyday life of the common people in Russia.
In many respects, realism in Russia coincided with
the development of a large class of government of-
ficials and merchants. The works of realism often
depict the lives and conflicts of the Russian mid-
dle class and deal with themes such as marriage,
money, and class relations. For the realists, litera-
ture needed to reflect the problems and issues per-
tinent to the economic, political, and social life of
the nation.
In the 1850s, during the early phase of the real-
ist movement, such writers as Aleksandr OSTROVSKY
and Ivan GONCHAROV began to shift artistic focus
toward the previously neglected merchant class,
while poets such as Nikolay Nekrasov (1821–78)
created long narrative poems that focused on the
social ills suffered by the poor. The early works of
realism often also depicted the moral degeneration
of the Russian aristocrats.
Most of the realist masterpieces produced in
Russia emerged during the movement’s late
phase, which is sometimes referred to as the
golden age of Russian literature. The highly
sophisticated prose of Ivan
TURGENEV,for in-
stance, focuses on the social dynamics of minor
aristocrats and middle-class families. Turgenev
also provided an unprecedented level of literary
attention to the Russian peasantry. Fyodor
DOSTOYEVSKY, however, concentrated on psycho-
logical realism. His novels carefully examine
the emotional motivations and desires of his
characters. Another giant of realism, Leo TOLSTOY,
combined astute social commentary with obser-
vations about spirituality and religion. Most crit-
ics view Anton CHEKHOV as the last seminal figure
of Russian realism. Like many other realists,
Chekhov focused on the problems and moral
dilemmas faced by middle-class families.
Chekhov believed that the middle class was the
backbone of Russian society and, therefore, cen-
tered his work on it.
Chinese Realism
In China, realism accompanied MODERNISM in lit-
erature into the 20th century. In a sense, many
modernist writers, such as
HU Shih, were realists
in their use of objectivity to reflect the modern
“condition.”
Several literary groups and organizations
formed during the May Fourth era, a period of
unprecedented intellectual openness, innovation,
and experimentation in China. Among them was
a group of scholars who comprised the Literary
Association. They also came to be known as the re-
alist school. Mao Dun (1896–1981; also known as
Mao Tun) was the leader of this group and its most
prominent practitioner. He took over the journal
Short Story Monthly and converted it to a journal
of vernacular literature (baihua literature). The use
of the vernacular was an important component of
realism in that it best captured the language of the
366 realism
Chinese people and contributed to an accurate
representation.
Mao Dun and the realist school openly advo-
cated “art for life’s sake,” which was a continuation
of the idea that literature could effect social
change. In contrast to the romantic tradition of
“art for art’s sake,” the objective representation
of reality had a sociopolitical purpose, and many
realist writers had agendas for reform. BA Jin, an
ardent anarchist and Communist, for example, was
known for his realistic portrayals of Chinese soci-
ety, as can be seen in Family (1931), his chronicle
of the falling gentry. Mao Dun’s 1933 work, Mid-
night, was another such work: Considered a major
political novel of the era, it was noted for its ob-
jectivity, optimism for change, and revolutionary
appeal.
Realism often manifested itself in short stories
and novels about daily life and included criticism
of government or society. BING Xin’s short stories,
such as “Loneliness” (1922), about young women
confronting issues in love and life, were extremely
popular, and because of her realistic portrayals,
they often provided psychological insight readers
could relate to.
The poetry school of realism also provided re-
alistic depictions of Chinese life, adding innovative
form and language. Realistic poetry focused on the
preservation of natural rhythms as found in ver-
nacular speech, as opposed to the poetic and for-
mal diction of formalists or the experimental
language of symbolist poetry. Realism’s poets in-
cluded Hu Shih, Li Jinfa (1900–76), and Dai Wang-
shu (1905–50), whose works were published in the
journal Poetry.
By the onset of the communist revolution, re-
alism had faded into the more direct objectives of
socialist realism. Works took on a distinct socialist
tenor, but components of realism, such as the close
representation of reality to provide social critique,
as well as writing in the vernacular, persisted.
These powerful elements of realism render it a
continuing popular force in Chinese literature
today, although it frequently appears in new,
slightly changed forms.
Works about Realism
Anderson, Marston. Limits of Realism. Berkeley: Uni-
versity of California Press, 1989.
Fanger, Donald, and Caryl Emerson. Dostoevsky and
Romantic Realism: A Study of Dostoevsky in Rela-
tion to Balzac, Dickens, and Gogol. Evanston, Ill.:
Northwestern University Press, 1998.
Lukacs, Georg. The Theory of the Novel. Translated
by Anna Bostock. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,
1974.
Mortimer, Armine Kotin. Writing Realism: Represen-
tations in French Fiction. Baltimore, Md.: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 2000.
Reid,J.H.Narration and Description in the French Re-
alist Novel: The Temporality of Lying and Forgetting.
New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993.
Reis, Ricardo
See PESSOA, FERNANDO.
Remarque, Erich Maria (pseudonym of
Erich Paul Kramer)
(1898–1970) novelist
Erich Maria Remarque was born in Osnabruck,
Germany, to Anna Marie and Peter Maria Kramer,
a bookbinder. Despite the modest income of the
family, Remarque was educated in the best private
school in town, but his studies at the University of
Munster were interrupted by the outbreak of
World War I and his subsequent draft into the
army at the age of 18. Remarque fought on the
Western front and was wounded several times.
After discharge from the military, Remarque
completed a pedagogy course offered by the gov-
ernment to veterans and soon began his writing
career as a journalist for a sports magazine, Sports-
bild, and then became its assistant editor.
Remarque’s first novel, All Quiet on the Western
Front (1929), is his most famous work. It realisti-
cally depicts the horrors faced by soldiers of both
sides during World War I. The novel begins in
1917, after Paul Baumer, the protagonist, loses half
of his friends in battle. Encouraged by their teacher
to enlist in the German army, Baumer and his
Remarque, Erich Maria 367