{"product_id":"the-life-written-by-himself-9780231198097","title":"The Life Written by Himself","description":"\u003cp\u003eMoscow in the middle of the seventeenth century had a distinctly apocalyptic feel. An outbreak of the plague killed half the population. A solar eclipse and comet appeared in the sky, causing panic. And a religious reform movement intended to purify spiritual life and provide for the needy had become a violent political project that cleaved Russian society and the Orthodox Church in two. The autobiography of Archpriest Avvakum--a leader of the Old Believers, who opposed liturgical and ecclesiastical reforms--provides a vivid account of these cataclysmic events from a figure at their center. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWritten in the 1660s and '70s from a cell in an Arctic village where the archpriest had been imprisoned by the tsar, Avvakum's autobiography is a record of his life, ecclesiastical career, painful exile, religious persecution, and imprisonment. It is also a salvo in a contest about whether to follow the old Russian Orthodox liturgy or import Greek rites and practices. These concerns touched every stratum of Russian society--and for Avvakum, represented an urgent struggle between good and evil. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAvvakum's autobiography has been a cornerstone of Russian literature since it first circulated among religious dissidents. One of the first Russian-language autobiographies and works of any sort to make use of colloquial Russian, its language and style served as a model for writers such as Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Gorky. \u003ci\u003eThe Life Written by Himself\u003c\/i\u003e is not only an important historical document but also an emotionally charged and surprisingly conversational self-portrait of a crucial figure in a tumultuous time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eAvvakum Petrovich (1620\/1-1682) was born near Nizhny Novgorod to a priest and a nun. He became a leader in the Old Believers movement. He wrote the earliest version of his autobiography between 1669 and 1672 while imprisoned in Pustozersk, and was burned as a heretic in 1682. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eKenneth N. Brostrom (1939-2020) was associate professor of Russian at Wayne State University.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Columbia University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50912782549266,"sku":"9780231198097","price":14.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_cfeb13d2-a5a3-45e5-ab4c-4930ca9035ce.jpg?v=1738777890","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-life-written-by-himself-9780231198097","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}