Subject
SIGHTINGS: essays on VN peddled to Russian students at
www.litra.ru
www.litra.ru
From
Date
Body
Don't tell your undergraduates:
There happens to be a whole industry of pre-fab high school
"compositions" (essays, Russ. sochinenie) for Russian students that can
be downloaded for a fee from [www.litra.ru]. "Litra" is Soviet grade
school slang for lessons in "Literatura".
For 300 rubles ($ 10) one can also order a custom essay, written in 24
hours.
The industry boasts "a complete match between your essay and your age,
sex, school requirements", "a simple, understandable language without
complex figures of speech - teachers would never have a suspicion!"
The subjects include several dozen Russian authors and other odd stuff;
there are even essays in English, e.g. one titled "The Vocabulary of
Everyday Life" features English activities such as "We have dinner about
seven-thirty or eight o'clock, and then we sit and talk, listen to the
wireless or look at television, or Mrs. Priestley plays the piano." (!!)
A sample essay available on website on VN is attached (in Russian, and
anonymous of course) -- not a bad one, really (although with a
nationalistic, anti-emigre streak: "no Zoorlandia, imagined or real, can
replace Russia for a Russian.."), but in my opinion way beyond anything
an average Russian high school student would care to produce... I wonder
if it is lifted/collaged from some available Russian critical texts --
or written in earnest for scratch by some poor soul for $ 10?
Victor Fet
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm