Professor Jane Taubman, an internationlly renowned authority on Russian Literature, notes: "Art for art's sake has always been suspect in Russia. Russian writers accept a burden of responsibility for their society and its moral health quite different from that customary in the West. Russian literature has always served the nation as a kind of public forum that the political culture and government censorship have otherwise made impossible."  This program will explore the rich history, literature, and culture of 19th and 20th Century Russia primarily through the medium of Russian novels. We will read representative novels of Nikolai Gogol, Ivan Turgenev, Lev Tolstoy, Fedor Dostoyevski, Mikhail Bulgakov, and Boris Pasternak.  The novels of these great Russian writers will be analyzed as works of art, social documents and moral statements. Special emphasis will be given to the role that Russian writers have played as social critics and as makers of Russia's social and cultural consciousness.