"The Possessed
Quirky, comical essays explore the relationship between Russian literature and life.
Possessed: Adventures With Russian Books And the People Who Read Them By Elif Batuman Farrar, Straus and Giroux 293 pp., $15
By Heller McAlpin / February 22, 2010
It’s not often that one laughs out loud while reading a book of literary criticism. In seven delightfully quirky essays that combine travelogue and memoir with criticism, Elif Batuman’s The Possessed takes us on an unconventional odyssey through the world of Russian literature in search of “direct relevance to lived experience, especially to love.”
Batuman, a first-generation Turkish-American, was educated at Harvard and Stanford, where she now teaches part time. What’s refreshing about her writing is her wonderful sense of the absurd and her willingness to venture into out-of-the-way corners – both geographically and intellectually – and to admit when she’s hit a dead end."
More:The Possessed / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com
