Sex in public

Sex in Public examines the ideological poetics and the rhetoric of power in the Soviet Union during the 1920s, a period of anxiety over the historical legitimacy of Soviet ideology and Bolshevik power. Drawing on a wide range of sources - Party Congress transcripts, the classics of early Soviet literature, sex education pamphlets, the cinema, crime reports, and early Soviet ventures into popular science - the author seeks to explain the period's preoccupation with crime, disease, and, especially, sex. Using strategies of reading developed by literary scholars, he devotes special care to exploring the role of narrative in authoritative political texts. The book breaks new ground in its attention to the ideological importance of the female body during this important formative stage of Bolshevik rule.

First sentence: In the spring of 1925, Izvestiia reported on a murder trial that was arousing much interest in the northern Ukraine.

Year

1997

Language

English

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Editions

1

Pages

320

ISBN

9780691026251

Data source: Wikidata