This book examines the reception of Darwin’s books and ideas in Russia as a cultural phenomenon, involving language, literature, science, philosophy, and humor. Diverse writers reveal the impact of the Darwinian moment on Russian minds and the public exchange of ideas, reflecting the optimism and anxiety of the late imperial era.

Reading Darwin in Imperial Russia: Literature and Ideas expands upon the cataloging efforts of earlier scholarship on Darwin’s reception in Russia to analyze the rich cultural context and vital historical background of writings inspired by the arrival of Darwin’s ideas in Russia. Starting with the first Russian translation of The Origin of Species in 1864, educated Russians eagerly read Darwin’s works and reacted in a variety of ways. From enthusiasm to skepticism to hostility, these reactions manifested in a variety of published works, starting with the translations themselves, as well as critical reviews, opinion journalism, literary fiction, and polemical prose. The reception of Darwin spanned reverent, didactic, ironic, and sarcastic modes of interpretation. This book examines some of the best-known authors of the second half of the nineteenth century (Dostoevsky, Chernyshevsky, Chekhov) and others less well-known or nearly forgotten (Danilevsky, Timiriazev, Markevich, Strakhov) to explore the multi-faceted impact of Darwin’s ideas on Russian educated society. While elements of Darwin’s Russian reception were comparable to other countries, each author reveals distinctly Russian concerns tied to the meaning and consequences of the challenge posed by Darwinism. The scholars in this volume demonstrate not only what the authors wrote, but why they took their unique perspectives.

Introduction

1. Brendan G. Mooney

What’s in a Word?: A History of the Words “Evolution” and “Natural Selection” in Russian and of Kliment Timiriazev’s Legacy as a Translator and Popularizer of Darwinism

2. James Goodwin

An Upheaval in Thinking Minds: Darwin’s Russian Reception as a Contextual Source in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment

3. Brendan G. Mooney

Nikolai Strakhovon Darwinism: Humans, Progress, and Organicism

4. Victoria Thorstensson

Anti-Darwinism as Anti-Nihilism: The Conservative Response to Darwinism in Mikhail Katkov’s Russian Messenger and The Moscow News and Boleslav Markevich’s Pedagogical Romance Marina from Alyrog (1873)

5. Stephen M. Woodburn

Nationality, Philosophy, and Science in Nikolai Danilevsky’s Critique of Darwinism

6. Charles Byrd

Darwinism “Dressed in Russian State Uniform”: Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin's “The Predators” and Other Works

7. Andrew M. Drozd

An Attack from the Left: Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s Critique of Darwin

8. Melissa L. Miller

Learned Neighbors and Hypnotic Seances: On Anton Chekhov’s Darwinist Parodies

Index

About the Contributors