There''s a Russian saying: ''The heart of another is like a dark forest.'' This book explores the forest as Russia''s heart - throughout history, and now in an ailing state. Russia has three times as many trees as we have stars in our galaxy. The Amazon might be considered the world''s lungs but Russia''s colder, less celebrated forests are just as vital; they provide nearly one-fifth of the world''s forest cover, and they have been the inspiration for cultural expression over the centuries. Russian forests are home to both mythical creatures - vexatious wood sprites and sinister mermaids - and animals whose pelts are coveted around the world. Russia''s greatest writers and artists have enshrined the forests in works like Anna Karenina and The Brothers Karamazov. Today, the forests are in peril. In Putin''s leadership alone, nearly 10% has been lost through logging, fire and climate change. This will have unavoidable consequences for the world''s climate. Drawing on literature, art, music, and original reportage, this book will explore the significance of the Russian forest from medieval times to the present, from pre-Christian forest spirits to the canonical figures of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Turgenev to modern tree-worshipping eco cults, examining the philosophical and environmental impact - and political power - of the vast Russian wilderness. It will encompass Indigenous traditions and folklore, Soviet visions of communist trees, daring moments of activism and intense political repression. Nature nourishes art even in the darkest of times. This book pays attention to all that we stand to lose in nature''s undoing.

Autorentext

Sophie Pinkham is a writer specialising in Soviet and post-Soviet culture, history and politics. She is Professor of Practice in the Comparative Literature Department at Cornell University. Her story for the Economist 1843, 'Lost in a Dark Wood', on migrants in the forest on the Belarusian-Polish border, was awarded a 2023 British Journalism Award. Her writing has appeared in The New York Review of Books, New York Times,*Guardian, New Yorker, Foreign Affairs, London Review of Books,*Foreign Policy, Archaeology, and The Paris Review, among other places. Her first book, Black Square: Adventures in Post-Soviet Ukraine, was published in 2016.

Klappentext

Russia has more trees than there are stars in our galaxy, and the forest lies at the heart of this vast nation's history and culture.

The Oak and the Larchtells the story of the northern Eurasian forests which have, over the centuries, been part of the territories of Chinggis Khan's Golden Horde, the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and now the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, and Mongolia. Ranging from the medieval era to the present, Pinkham draws on literature - from indigenous legends to canonical works by Tolstoy and Turgenev - as well as political history, art, music, and original reportage. As she traces the forest's role as a wellspring of national identity, a place of shelter, conflict and survival against the odds, Pinkham also shows the threats facing the forests - and what we stand to lose when nature is depleted.