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On the eve of the Communist Revolution in 1917, Anastasiia
Verbitskaia may have been the most widely read author in Russia.
Her steamy, six-part saga, "The Keys to Happiness," far outsold
"War and Peace," capturing the public's imagination with its
mix of seduction and political and philosophical discussions.
A silent movie based on the novel was Russia's first feature
length film -- so lengthy that moviegoers had to buy two tickets
to see each part. Tickets sold out like hot cakes.
When the Communist regime took power, however, Verbitskaia's
works were condemned as counter-revolutionary. Her books were
banned and stripped off library shelves; a warehouse of her
books was burned. The queen of literary pop died in 1928,
dishonored, living in obscurity in Moscow.
This January, under the support of a Fulbright Research Grant,
USM Associate Professor of Russian Charlotte Rosenthal will
travel to Russia to piece together the unusual life of this
largely forgotten icon of popular literature. "More Russians
knew of her work than of Chekhov or Tolstoy; her influence
was enormous," says Rosenthal. "Yet she's been relatively
little studied and there are no recent books on her."
Rosenthal says she finds her subject particularly relevant
given the current state of literature in Russia. "When the
Soviet system fell apart there was a renewed interest in commercial
literature," she says. "Popular fiction has come back, a couple
of [Verbitskaia's] novels have been re-issued. But the most
popular fiction consists of murder mysteries, thrillers, and
crime novels. Homegrown romance has to compete with translations
of Danielle Steel and others."
Verbitskaia was the Venus in a wave of women writers in the
late 19th century. Because so few careers were open to women
in Russia, educated women churned out literature, helping
to create the country's first commercial book market. In earlier
research, Rosenthal co-authored the 1994 book, a "Dictionary
of Russian Women Writers," which profiled 448 of these authors.
Her interest in Verbitskaia was peaked, she says, by the changing,
episodic nature of the writer's life.
"She started as a highbrow writer and did not stand out,"
says Rosenthal. "Then she turned to popular fiction and turned
out a blockbuster novel that combines politics and philosophy
with sensational seduction scenes. It's sort of a large-scale
Playboy magazine in that sense -- a hybrid that alternates
between serious articles and sex. Then she had a third career
when she turned her novel, "Keys to Happiness," into a movie.
It was the most successful movie in Russia at that point.
She subsequently scripted other films and co-directed one."
Only one, fragile and incomplete copy of Verbitskaia's film
exists. With her Fulbright, Rosenthal will have access to
the film, as well as to Verbitskaia's letters, manuscripts,
fan mail, and belongings, which are housed in state archives
in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Rosenthal hopes to uncover details
about Verbitskaia's later years, as well as her family life.
Rosenthal hopes her own family life also will be enhanced
by her six-month stay in Moscow. She will travel there with
her 14-year-old daughter, Nadya, whom Rosenthal adopted from
Russia when she was seven. "I'm hoping she can tell me what
young people are talking about in Russia, what they're up
to, what music they like" she says. "I think it's really important
as a language instructor to visit my area regularly, to revive
my language, culture, watch TV. We'll be there during the
presidential election in March, so I'll have a lot of things
to tell my students when we get back."
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