Poetry. Literary Nonfiction. Translated from the Russian by Genya Turovskaya and Eugene Ostashevsky. Alexander Skidan is one of Russia's most important contemporary poets. With language that is at once literary, cinematic, philosophical, journalistic, his innovative writing calls into question the distinction between poetry and philosophy. In RED SHIFTING, Skidan blurs and shifts the boundaries between the two as literary genres and as modes of discourse. His work is both lyrical and disjointed, addressing unflinchingly the literary and historical condition of post-Soviet Russia, engaging in continuous discourse with what Walter Benjamin would call "the origins of the present crisis". He lives in St. Petersburg where he is also a literary and cultural critic, journalist, and translator, as well as one of the founding members of the collaborative art and politics publication What Is to Be Done. In 2006 he won the Andrey Bely prize for Nonfiction.

Author City: St. Petersburg RUS

Aleksandr Skidan is one of Russia's most important contemporary poets. With language that is at once literary, cinematic, philosophical, journalistic, his innovative writing calls into question the distinction between poetry and philosophy. Skidan blurs and shifts the boundaries between the two as literary genres and as modes of discourse. His poetry is both lyrical and disjointed, addressing unflinchingly the literary and historical condition of post-Soviet Russia.

Reviews and Other Links
Publishers Weekly
Blythe Boyer @ Bookslut
Benjamin Paloff @ Harp & Altar
Q & A with Joshua Cohen @ The Jewish Daily Forward
Margarita Shalina @ Three Percent
Alexander Skidan @ PennSound