Bradley Gorski’s book, Cultural Capitalism.
Join us on January 20, 2026, at 12:30 pm PT for an online Sawchen lecture. Focusing on the theme of ‘networks’, CENES welcomes Dr. Bradley Gorski from Georgetown University.
Title: “Networking Cultural Markets: Capitalism and Literature in Post-Soviet Russia”
Abstract: Capitalist markets rushed into book publishing even before the Soviet Union fell when market-based reasoning of supply and demand and return on investment started influencing publishing decisions in the late 1980s. The market promised to liberate literature from Soviet ideological strictures and to bring Russian literature into modern world culture. But market reasoning had wide-ranging effects that went beyond publishing decisions to effect how literature was written and read. This talk examines the effects of capitalism on post-Soviet literature by paying close attention to the network effects that literary commerce set off across the broader culture. Through a careful reading of the publishing industry, literary criticism, and literary works themselves, the talk shows how capitalism changed literature and even laid the groundwork for a revived authoritarian culture.
Photo by Irina Denischenko
Biography: Bradley Gorski is assistant professor of Slavic Languages with a special focus on late- and post-Soviet literature and culture at Georgetown University. He has published academic work on post-Soviet bestsellers, late-Soviet hipsters, and medieval festivals and conservative aesthetics in today’s Russia. His writing and criticism on contemporary Russian literature and culture has appeared in World Literature Today, Public Books, the Times Literary Supplement, and other publications. He is the author of Cultural Capitalism: Literature and Success after Socialism and co-editor with Philip Tuxbury-Gleissner of Red Migrations: Transnational Mobility and Leftist Culture after 1917 . He is also a core researcher on “The Post-Soviet Public Sphere ,” a digital archive of the 1990s, supported by an NEH grant. You can read more about his work on his personal website.
How to attend:
This lecture is an online event, and takes place on January 20, 2026, at 12:30pm PT. Attendees must register here for the Zoom Webinar ahead of time. Please note that this is a recorded event.
Questions? Please email cenes.undergrad@ubc.ca
