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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them Paperback - 2010

by Elif Batuman

Batuman searches for the answers to the big questions in the details of lived experience, combining fresh readings of the great Russians with the sad and funny stories of the lives they continue to influence--including her own.


From the publisher

One of The Economist's 2011 Books of the Year From the author of Either/Or and The Idiot, Elif Batuman's The Possessed presents the true but unlikely stories of lives devoted--Absurdly! Melancholically! Beautifully!--to the Russian Classics. No one who read Batuman's first article (in the journal n+1) will ever forget it. "Babel in California" told the true story of various human destinies intersecting at Stanford University during a conference about the enigmatic writer Isaac Babel. Over the course of several pages, Batuman managed to misplace Babel's last living relatives at the San Francisco airport, uncover Babel's secret influence on the making of King Kong, and introduce her readers to a new voice that was unpredictable, comic, humane, ironic, charming, poignant, and completely, unpretentiously full of love for literature. Batuman's subsequent pieces--for The New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, and the London Review of Books-- have made her one of the most sought-after and admired writers of her generation, and its best traveling companion. In The Possessed we watch her investigate a possible murder at Tolstoy's ancestral estate. We go with her to Stanford, Switzerland, and St. Petersburg; retrace Pushkin's wanderings in the Caucasus; learn why Old Uzbek has one hundred different words for crying; and see an eighteenth-century ice palace reconstructed on the Neva. Love and the novel, the individual in history, the existential plight of the graduate student: all find their place in The Possessed. Literally and metaphorically following the footsteps of her favorite authors, Batuman searches for the answers to the big questions in the details of lived experience, combining fresh readings of the great Russians, from Pushkin to Platonov, with the sad and funny stories of the lives they continue to influence--including her own.

Details

  • Title The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
  • Author Elif Batuman
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition First Edition
  • Pages 304
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York
  • Date 2010-02
  • ISBN 9780374532185 / 0374532184
  • Weight 0.59 lbs (0.27 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.22 x 5.6 x 0.81 in (20.88 x 14.22 x 2.06 cm)
  • Library of Congress subjects Russian literature - Appreciation
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 2009025416
  • Dewey Decimal Code 891.709

Media reviews

Citations

  • Booklist, 02/15/2010, Page 21
  • Entertainment Weekly, 01/07/2011, Page 74
  • Library Journal, 11/15/2009, Page 64
  • Library Journal Prepub Alert, 10/15/2009, Page 57
  • New York Times Book Review, 03/28/2010, Page 20
  • NY Times Notable Bks of Year, 12/05/2010, Page 30
  • Publishers Weekly, 11/02/2009, Page 43
  • Publishers Weekly Best Books, 11/08/2010, Page 28

About the author

Elif Batuman has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2010. She is the author of the novels Either/Or, The Idiot, and the nonfiction book The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them. The recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award, and a Paris Review Terry Southern Prize for Humor, she also holds a PhD in comparative literature from Stanford University.
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
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ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

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ISBN 13
9780374532185
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0374532184
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
Stock Photo: Cover May Be Different

The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
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ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
Stock Photo: Cover May Be Different

The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
Condition
Used - Good
ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
Quantity Available
1
Seller
Reno, Nevada, United States
Seller rating:
This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.
Item Price
NZ$12.45
FREE shipping to USA

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Description:
Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Used - Good. Used book that is in clean, average condition without any missing pages.
Item Price
NZ$12.45
FREE shipping to USA
The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
Stock Photo: Cover May Be Different

The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
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Used - Good
ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
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Description:
Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Used - Good. Used book that is in clean, average condition without any missing pages.
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
Condition
Used - Good
ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
Quantity Available
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Mishawaka, Indiana, United States
Seller rating:
This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.
Item Price
NZ$12.75
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Description:
Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Used - Good. Former library book; may include library markings. Used book that is in clean, average condition without any missing pages.
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NZ$12.75
FREE shipping to USA
The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
Condition
Used - Very Good
ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
Quantity Available
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This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Elif Batuman

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ISBN 13
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
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The Possessed : Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them

by Batuman, Elif

  • Used
Condition
Used - Very Good
ISBN 13
9780374532185
ISBN 10
0374532184
Quantity Available
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