Encyclopaedia of Youth: An Interview with Mikhail Epshtein

Abstract

This review of the book An Encyclopedia of Youth (Moscow, 2018) by the wellknown philologist and culturologist Mikhail Epstein and the writer Sergei Iur’enen examines the features of auto/biographical writing that the authors define as a dia-ography – autobiography as a dialogue. In telling of their youth, Epstein and Iur’enen have chosen a new form for the auto/biographical genre: the encyclopedia, which in this particular case makes it possible to preserve the individual voice of each author, and at the same time lends their dialogue an existential significance. The review is supplemented by an interview with one of the authors, Prof. Mikhail Epstein (Emory University, US).