Autobiography as Zoegraphy: Dmitrii A. Prigov’s Zhivite v Moskve

Abstract

This article discusses Dmitrii Prigov’s autobiographical novel Live in Moscow (Zhivite v Moskve, 2000). Following Giorgio Agamben’s distinction between bios as political life and zoe as biological life, it develops the term ‘zoegraphy’ as a poetological concept. Thus, the article aims to illuminate an aspect hitherto neglected in life-writing studies: autobiographical texts do not only refer to the life of a human subject, but also to non-human forms of life. After outlining a concept of zoegraphical writing, the article points out its narrative and anthropological implications in Prigov’s text.