Phenomenology of Oil in Soviet and Post-Soviet Literature

Abstract

The essay explores the cultural meaning and social significance of oil in Soviet and post-Soviet Russian culture through the analysis of three literary case studies. The analysis shows that, from the anthropocentric optimism of the Soviet era to the awareness of our times about oil as an uncontrollable ‘object’, oil is a hybrid of nature and culture that holds a significant place in Russian literature. The first story is Boris Pilnyak’sGorod vetrov(City of Winds, 1928), the second is Isaac Babel’sNeft’(Petroleum, 1934), and the third is authored by Dmitry Bykov and was published in 2017 with the same title:Neft’(Oil).