The Word Made Self: Russian Writings on Language, 1860-1930

For the last two centuries, serious Russian thought about language has been nourished by sources alien to the current conventions of scholarly Anglophone discourse. In place of the snappy pragmatic essay or the empirical argument based on clinical evidence, we find Neoplatonism, the theology of the Eastern Orthodox Church, and German Romantic philosophy. Thomas Seifrid's patient, lucid treatment of this difficult and vital material will matter to anyone interested in literature, philosophy of language, speculative theology, sociology, and political rhetoric in Russia.

The Word Made Self is a fascinating study of the intersection of philosophy, linguistics and theology in the age of Russian Modernism. Thomas Seifrid provides a compelling introduction to and analysis of the works of Sergei Bulgakov, Pavel Florenskii, Aleksei Losev, Aleksandr Potebnia, and Gustav Shpet. He shows how the idea of language as a carrier of subjectivity was central to all these thinkers. He is particularly sensitive to the way they wove together philosophical strands from German Romanticism, the Orthodox tradition, and phenomenology. The arguments here will be of major interest to historians of the Soviet period, particularly those working with notions of Soviet subjectivity and contemporary concepts of ideology. The Word Made Self is also an invaluable resource for all scholars whose work deals with the Symbolist and Formalist movements.

The Word Made Self is the first comprehensive examination in English of the rich and multifarious body of discourses on language produced in Russia over a period of some seventy years, from the abolition of serfdom to the rise of Stalinism. Wide-ranging and sensitive to a variety of disciplines and writing practices from theology and philosophy to literary criticism, fiction, and psychology, Thomas Seifrid's book will become an important reference point in the field.