306 Reviews Madness and the Mad in RussianCulture.Ed. byANGELA BRINTLINGER and ILYA VINITSKY.Toronto: University ofTorontoPress. 2007. 331 pp. $74; ?45. ISBN978-0-8020-9140-6. The articles collected herewere first prompted bya conference held five yearsago inColumbus, Ohio, on thetheme'Those CrazyRussians'.Fortunately, most of the speakers veeredslightly off-topic. Russian crazinessas a putatively nationalphe nomenon isnot theprimary concernhere. Madness in itselfismore of a draw, especiallyinitsrelation toliterature: witnessLevLoseff'sinsightful reconsideration ofBrodsky's asylum poem 'Gorbunov andGorchakov', or MikhailEpshtein's discus sion of how to contemplate one's mind without losing it(an art learnt fromPlato and Pushkin).Itis, however, the perception, treatment, and institutionalization of mad ness,or,asAngelaBrintlinger putsit,the'socialimplications of the mad in modern Russianculture'(p.7),whichmost commandstheattention of today's scholars. Doctors,rather than patients, emerge as the keyplayersin manyarticles. Despite the well-documented abusesof recent decades,Foucauldianaxes havebeen left in theshed; indeed,theRussianpsychiatrist isviewedherewith a fair degreeof sympathy, permitting thereadertopiece together theprofession's difficult history inRussia,fromitsstruggles toassertitsauthority in thenineteenth century to its equallycontested statustoday. Post-Soviet psychiatrists, as Julie V.Brownshowsin herafterword, havetheunenviable jobof trying torestore their battered reputation whiledealing with rising levels of mental illness, underfunding, heavycompetition from alternative practitioners, and the beliefs(shared byovera third of Muscovites, accordingtoa study of2005) that'mental disorders canbe causedbysorcery[. . orbycontact withextraterrestrials' (p.296). Particular attention is devoted to the period directly before and after 1917. Irina Sirotkina,forexample,comparesthemedical treatment of 'traumatic neurosis' among Russian soldiers in the FirstWorld War with the handling of shell-shock in the West, finding theformer tohavebeen considerably milderandmore 'relaxed' than the latter.After speculating on purely practical reasons to do with economics and facilities, Sirotkina goes on to suggest that itwas above all the political radi calization of psychiatrists at the timewhich led them to be 'more in sympathywith patients thanwith thosewho sent them towar' (p. 127). With theadvent ofSovietpower, psychiatry was elevatedtothepositionofpoli ticaland ideologicalauthority that would bringit intosuchdisreputefromthe 1960sonwards.In the1920Sand 1930s,however, psychiatrists were, itseems,still conscious of the extent of their ignorance of root causes and reluctant to advise aggressive, compulsory therapy. Such isthetentative drift ofDan Healey's analysis of the use of psychiatric expertise in cases of sex crime in Petrograd/Leningrad between 1917 and 1934. Healey suggests that psychiatrists of the timewere reluc tant to confirm the ideological reduction of sexual violence tomental pathology; nevertheless, this associationsoonbecameentrenched inSovietthinking. Theprospectofpsychiatry serving a utopianvisionof a pathology-free society clearlyappalledAntonChekhov. MargaritaOdesskaya's illuminating accountof MLR, 104.1, 2009 307 Chekhov'sscepticism about theprofession emphasizesinparticulartheauthor's 'instinctive correlation ofpsychiatric hospitals andprisons'(p.196), soclearly dis playedin 'Ward No. 6',andhissympathetic identification ofhappiness andcreativity withmadness in 'TheBlackMonk', a story whichposes thequestionofwhether 'ecstasy and inspiration' (p. 204) shouldeverbe treated at all.Odesskaya'sessay, which skilfully compares Chekhov'streatment ofmadnessandgenius with that of aRomantic precursor, VladimirOdoevsky,isfollowed byYvonneHowell'saccount of therecently publishedtheories of thegeneticist V. P.Efroimson (1908-1989). In the hopeof tapping mankind'sdormant reserves oftalent andcreativity, Efroimson elaborated a 'science of genius' that treats the latter 'not as a Romantic metaphor for madness,butas a socialandbiologicalfact'(p.210).Genius shouldbe studied, Efroimson believed,through an investigation ofbiochemical orhormonal disorders (including goutandmanic depression) which,thoughthemselves whollyharmful tocreativity, appeartohavethe'side-effect' ofstimulating mentalenergy (p.215). As thejuxtaposition of thesetwoarticlesillustrates, thiscollectionhas been intelligently edited,andBrintlinger's translations areofa highstandard. Madden ingacademic jargoniskept to aminimum,ifnot entirely exorcized: RobertD. Wessling,forexample,invites thereadertoponderthe'active scripts ofpositivist friendship' (p.82) and 'the psychiatric bodyencodedinthetext'(p.87) inhischap ter on 'Vsevolod Garshin,the RussianIntelligentsia, andFanHysteria'. Most of the contributions, however, arecommendably clear-headed, beginning with Ilya Vinit sky's discussion of mirthandmelancholy under Catherinethe Great,anopposition that encourages many interesting parallels with thefate of 'sanity andmadness' in subsequent Russianhistory. WOLFSON COLLEGE, OXFORD OLIVER READY Women inRussian Literature afterGlasnost: Female Alternatives. By CAROL ADLAM. London: Legenda. 2005. 148 pp. ?42.50. ISBN 978-1-900755-92-4. CarolAdlamprovidesa helpful overview ofpost-Soviet women'sprose, whichhas been a dominantforceinRussian literature since1991.FocusingonValeriiaNar bikova, Nina Sadur,andLiudmilaPetrushevskaia, sheshowsthe benefits andperils ofassigning these authors tothe nebuloustrend ofalternative prose(drugaia proza). The introductory chapter surveys thecontemporary politicaland socialcontext, opining thatalternative prose is less a trend than amoment of crisis for literarycri ticism, itself partofa cultureinflux(p.4). Thenextchapter...