Writing the Russian literature series over at Vulpes means I end up going back to a lot of texts I last read as an enthusiastic undergraduate, when I had the time and energy (and the encouragement).  Technically I have all those things now, with the PhD starting this year, but four years in the “real world” doing filing and translating bad screenplays has made me tired and lazy.  I need a serious kick in the pants to opt for reading Pushkin (yes, even Pushkin) in my free time over, say, watching bad American formula sitcoms.  This is partly why I volunteered to write the Russian series in the first place, and it’s working… to such an extent that I need my own blog for all the overspill.

Well, this week it’s Lermontov and A Hero of our Time, and with my classic lack of organisation I’m starting on my reading today for a piece on Tuesday.  I like to call this an intensive writing experience.  I remember loving Lermontov as an undergraduate, to the extent that I carried a little volume of his poetry about in my bag for easy reference.  This makes me rather anxious, because I know what a pretentious, emo little prig I was back then, and I am quite certain that Lermontov outdid even me.  Will I still love him enough to overlook it all?  Updates here soon, possibly even today.

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