Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics

1984
Author:

Mikhail Bakhtin
Caryl Emerson, editor
Translated by Caryl Emerson
Introduction by Wayne C. Booth

This important 20th-century theory of the novel focuses on “Dostoevskian discourse.”

“Bakhtin’s statement on the dialogical nature of artistic creation, and his differentiation of this from a history of monological commentary, is profoundly original and illuminating. This is a classic work on Dostoevsky and a statement of importance to critical theory.” Edward Wasiolek

This book is not only a major twentieth-century contribution to Dostoevsky’s studies, but also one of the most important theories of the novel produced in our century. As a modern reinterpretation of poetics, it bears comparison with Aristotle.

Caryl Emerson is A. Watson Armour III University Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Princeton University. Wayne C. Booth is professor emeritus at the University of Chicago.

“Bakhtin’s statement on the dialogical nature of artistic creation, and his differentiation of this from a history of monological commentary, is profoundly original and illuminating. This is a classic work on Dostoevsky and a statement of importance to critical theory.” Edward Wasiolek

“Concentrating on the particular features of ‘Dostoevskian discourse,’ how Dostoevsky structures a hero and a plot, and what it means to write dialogically, Bakhtin concludes with a major theoretical statement on dialogue as a category of language. One of the most important theories of the novel in this century.” The Bloomsbury Review