Readings in Soviet History: The "New Man" in the Russian and Soviet Imagination

In this seminar we will examine that superman of modernity who inspired and terrified a century of Russian philosophers, artists, and revolutionaries: the New Man. We will explore the emergence and development of this ideal type between the 1840s and the 1940s. We will trace how radical socialists and religious conservatives constantly re-conceptualized him, and we will study Soviet attempts to transform its citizens into New Men and Women through Marxism-Leninism. Readings will include many of Russia's greatest philosophical and literary works of the period.