Troublesome Words: A Cultural History of Russian by Simon Franklin

"Troublesome Words is an engaging, erudite and witty exploration of the origins of the Russian language. Simon Franklin sets out in an accessible way how Russian speakers have made sense of the world throughout Russia’s turbulent and often violent history. He maps out the religious, political, societal and cultural forces that have shaped today’s Russian language, the uses to which it is put by Russia’s political leaders, and how “non-normative” use of language is used to challenge authority. Highly recommended" – Laurie Bristow, President of Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge, and former UK ambassador to Russia

Language can be a battleground of ideas, and nowhere is this more vivid than in the Russian context. Across 350 years, Russian has been shaped by competing visions of what it should be, from early grammarians defining a literary standard to digital-era debates about slang, obscenity and online identity. Simon Franklin traces how tradition and disruption have continually reshaped the language, including sections on the discovery by the educated elite of the language of ‘the people’, the linguistic experiments of writers and revolutionaries, politics and the rhetoric of empire. Clear, concise and engaging, Troublesome Words is both a history and a cultural portrait, examining the global diversity of Russian today and revealing how language reflects power, imagination and the changing world.

Hardback