"... Holmgren gives a superb comparative analysis of the literary legacy of the two memoirists." —Times Literary Supplement
"Beth Holmgren’s book is a highly original and very productive critical appraisal of the work of Likiia Chukovskaia and Nadezhda Mandelstam." —The Russian Review
"This fine book, with its copious, informative notes and good bibliography, will interest students of 20th-century literature and theorists of autobiography, feminist criticism, and gender studies."Â —Choice
"... a fascinating book that provides a powerful testament to the strength and endurance of women in a particularly ghastly period of history." —Signs
"... impressive, eloquently written... an integrated comparative study of two very different female survivors of the Stalinist night." —Caryl Emerson
"... a bold scholarly act.... The writing is excellent throughout." —Barbara Heldt
Two extraordinary women writers are evoked as models of women’s heroic roles in preserving Russian culture in Stalin’s time. A fresh and eloquent approach to the literature of the Stalinist age.

Women's Works in Stalin's Time: On Lidiia Chukovskaia and Nadezhda Mandelstam

Literature & Fiction

Holmgren, Beth

History & Criticism

Indiana University Press

" ...impressive, eloquently written...[Holmgren] provide[s] an integrated comparative study of two very different female survivors of the Stalinist night." - Caryl Emerson, Princeton University. " ...a bold scholarly act...The writing is excellent throughout." - Barbara Heldt, University of British Columbia. Focusing on the works of Lidiia Chukovskaia and Nadezhda Mandelstam, Beth Holmgren reclaims the extraordinary roles that women writers played as conservators of culture and memory in Stalin's time. Holmgren argues that during the Stalin era, the domestic sphere offered a haven for dissident acts of resistance and cultural survival. She examines literary texts by such writers as Mikhail Bulgakov, Boris Pasternak, and especially Anna Akhmatova that variously scripted women's unofficial roles. She then traces how Chukovskaia and Mandelstam reclaimed and revised these scripts, evoking their own creative models. This fresh and original approach to the culture of the Stalin era illuminates Russian cultural and literary history with insights from feminist theory and recent writing on women's autobiography and on the theme of history and memory.

Indiana Univ. Pr

"Keys to Happiness", published in 6 volumes between 1908 and 1913, was one of the most sensationally popular and influential Russian novels of the early twentieth century. Against a panorama of Russian society on the eve of World War I, "Keys" recounts the stormy life of Manya Yeltsova, a Russian 'new woman' who pursues her dreams and passions to fame and notoriety as a dancer a la Isadora Duncan and a free spirit who captivates, among others, a Jewish socialist tycoon and a reactionary Russian nobleman. At the time of its publication, the novel crossed the boundaries of both gender and class to define a new type of literature in Russian society. Keying on the themes of art, love, politics, and personal freedom, it combines high culture with the era's fascination with self-gratification and the pleasures of the flesh. This sparkling abridged translation by Beth Holmgren and Helena Goscilo makes Anastasia Verbitskaia's startling bestseller available in English for the first time. The translation presents approximately a quarter of the novel, concentrating on decisive stages in Manya's personal development. Narrative summaries by the translators bridge omissions in the text. Their informative introduction places the novel within its cultural, political, and social context and makes clear for today's readers its literary and historical importance.

Keys to Happiness : A Novel

Goscilo, Helena

Verbitskaya, Anastasya

Verbitskaia, Anastasya

United States

In 1876, Poland's leading actress, Helena Modrzejewska, accompanied by family and friends, emigrated to southern California to establish a utopian commune that soon failed. Within a year Modrzejewska made her debut in the title role of Adrienne Lecouvreur at San Francisco's California Theatre. She changed her name to Modjeska and quickly became a leading star on the American stage, where she reigned for the next 30 years. During this time, she established herself as America's most esteemed Shakespearean actress, playing opposite such celebrated actors as Edwin Booth and Maurice Barrymore. Starring Madame Modjeska traces Modjeska's fabulous life and career from her illegitimate birth in Krakow, to her successive reinventions of herself as a star in both Poland and America, and finally to her enduring legacy.

Starring Madame Modjeska: On Tour in Poland and America

Dramas & Plays

Examines how capitalism affected the elitist culture of literature, publishing, book markets, and readership in turn-of-the-century Russia and its subject state, the Kingdom of Poland, highlighting the relationship between high culture and consumer culture. Looks at the problem of the merchant in Russian literature, Russian and Polish romances, the publishing business during the period, and the marketing of Russian literature. Includes b&w photos and illustrations. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Rewriting Capitalism: Literature and Market in Late Tsarist Russia and the Kingdom of Poland (SERIES IN RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN STUDIES)

Univ of Pittsburgh Pr

In this ground-breaking book, Beth Holmgren examines how—in turn-of-the-century Russia and its subject, the Kingdom of Poland—capitalism affected the elitist culture of literature, publishing, book markets, and readership. Rewriting Capitalism considers how both “serious” writers and producers of consumer culture coped with the drastic power shift from “serious” literature to market-driven literature.

Rewriting Capitalism: Literature and the Market in Late Tsarist Russia and the Kingdom of Poland (Russian and East European Studies)

University of Pittsburgh Press

Warsaw is My Country: The Story of Krystyna Bierzynska, 1928-1945 (Jews of Poland)

This book tells the story of Krystyna Bierzyńska, an acculturated Polish Jew, from her birth in Warsaw in 1928 up to the war’s end in May 1945, when she was reunited with her brother, Dolek, an officer in the Polish II Corps. Bierzyńska not only survived the Holocaust due in large part to the extraordinary efforts of her parents, blood relatives, and surrogate Christian family, but also served as a 16-year-old orderly in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. Hers is a Warsaw story, a biography that demonstrates how, in urban interwar Poland, the lives of liberal educated Catholics and acculturated, unconverted Jews significantly overlapped. Co-creating the culture and developing the economy and industries of independent Poland, acculturated Jews at last dared to believe that they qualified as Polish citizens and patriots. Bierzyńska’s story details her experience of two very different Warsaws: a cosmopolitan oasis of high culture, modern amenities, and tolerance, and an occupied capital intoxicated and united by conspiracy, where the residents joined together to overthrow a common enemy.

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

Academic Studies Press

This book tells the story of Krystyna Bierzyńska, an acculturated Polish Jew, from her birth in Warsaw in 1928 up to the war’s end in May 1945, when she was reunited with her brother, Dolek, an officer in the Polish II Corps. Bierzyńska not only survived the Holocaust due in large part to the extraordinary efforts of her parents, blood relatives, and surrogate Christian family, but also served as a 16-year-old orderly in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. Hers is a Warsaw story, a biography that demonstrates how, in urban interwar Poland, the lives of liberal educated Catholics and acculturated, unconverted Jews significantly overlapped. Co-creating the culture and developing the economy and industries of independent Poland, acculturated Jews at last dared to believe that they qualified as Polish citizens and patriots. Bierzyńska’s story details her experience of two very different Warsaws: a cosmopolitan oasis of high culture, modern amenities, and tolerance, and an occupied capital intoxicated and united by conspiracy, where the residents joined together to overthrow a common enemy.

Polish Cinema Today: A Bold New Era in Film

Structured according to key themes, Polish Cinema Today analyzes the remarkable innovations in Polish cinema emerging a decade after the 1989 dissolution of the Soviet bloc, once its film industry had evolved from a socialist state enterprise into a much more accessible system of film production, with growing expertise in distribution and marketing. By the early 2000s, an impressive, diverse cohort of filmmakers broke through the gridlock of a small set of esteemed, aging auteurs as well as the glut of imported Hollywood blockbusters, empowered by the digital revolution and domestic audience appetite for independent work. Polish directors today challenge sacrosanct bromides about national and gender identity, Poland's historical martyrdom, the status of the influential Catholic Church, and the benevolent family, while investigating the phenomena of migration and sexuality in their full complexity. Each thematic chapter places these recent films within a historical/cultural context nationally and transnationally, and designs its analyses of specific works to engage general audiences of film scholars, students, and cinephiles.

Humor & Entertainment

Movies

Lexington Books

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Books by Holmgren, Beth

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Holmgren, Beth. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Women's Works in Stalin's Time: On Lidiia Chukovskaia and Nadezhda Mandelstam

Women's Works in Stalin's Time: On Lidiia Chukovskaia and Nadezhda Mandelstam

Keys to Happiness : A Novel

Starring Madame Modjeska: On Tour in Poland and America

Rewriting Capitalism: Literature and Market in Late Tsarist Russia and the Kingdom of Poland (SERIES IN RUSSIAN AND EAST EUROPEAN STUDIES)

Rewriting Capitalism: Literature and the Market in Late Tsarist Russia and the Kingdom of Poland (Russian and East European Studies)

Warsaw is My Country: The Story of Krystyna Bierzynska, 1928-1945 (Jews of Poland)

Warsaw is My Country: The Story of Krystyna Bierzynska, 1928-1945 (Jews of Poland)

Polish Cinema Today: A Bold New Era in Film