LiteratureXcange Festival in Aarhus (Denmark 2023)
Stepanova in 2006

Maria Mikhailovna Stepanova (Russian: Мари́я Миха́йловна Степа́нова; born June 9, 1972) is a Russian poet, novelist, and journalist. She is the current editor of Colta.ru, an online publication specializing in arts and culture. In 2005, she won the prestigious Andei Bely Prize for poetry. More recently, she also received the 2017–2018 Big Book Prize for her novel In Memory of Memory (Pamyati pamyati).

Biography

Born in Moscow on June 9, 1972, Stepanova studied at the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute, where she graduated in 1995. She published poetry in Russian-language literary magazines such as Zerkalo, Znamya, Kriticheskaya massa, and Novoe Literaturnoe Obozreniye, as well as in anthologies like Babylon, Urbi, and Ulov. Stepanova won many important Russian literary prizes, including the Pasternak Prize and the Andrei Bely Prize in 2005, and the Moscow Account Prize in 2006, 2009, and 2018.[1][2]

In 2007, Stepanova founded Openspace.ru, an online magazine dedicated to Russian-language arts and culture. Per Stepanova, The magazine "would provide the audience with modern, up-to-date, passionate view on what is going on in Russian culture and in the outer world."[3] She served as editor-in-chief of Openspace.ru until 2012, when she left the publication along with the majority of her editorial staff due to a withdrawal of funding from private investors. Stepanova disagreed with investor oversight amid the uncertain Russian political landscape; this drove her to found Colta.ru, the first Russian media outlet supported entirely by crowdfunding. Funded using crowdfunding platform Planeta.ru, Colta.ru guaranteed Stepanova more editorial freedom as editor-in-chief. Like Openspace.ru, the new magazine also covers Russian arts and culture.[4]

Stepanova's work has been translated into English, Hebrew, Spanish, Italian, German, Finnish, French and other languages. She was also appointed Siegfried-Unseld Guest Professor at Humboldt Universität in Berlin for the 2018–2019 school year.[5]

In 2023, she was elected as a Royal Society of Literature International Writer.[6]

Work

Stepanova's poetry has been highly influential in contemporary Russian literature. She is considered to have repopularized the traditional ballad as a poetic genre, employing and subverting conventional prosody and form.[7] She also frequently uses skaz, a Russian narrative technique featuring fragmentary idiomatic language and unclear narration. Translator Catherine Ciepielia writes: "For [Stepanova] the logic of form trumps all other logics, so much so that she will re-accent or truncate words to fit rigorously observed schemes."[8]

Stepanova herself conceives of poetry as form of resistance, a resistance that often manifests itself in political memory. Specifically, Stepanova coins the term "postmemory", to describe the middle-ground where politics and memory coincide.[9] Translator Sasha Dugdale emphasizes the importance of memory and myth in her work, both poetic and journalistic. This investigation of memory includes her recent highly-acclaimed novel In Memory of Memory, in addition to the Colta.ru 90s Festival, which attempts to dismantle political myths about the 1990s.[10]

Bibliography

Stepanova's writing has been translated into five English-language books, three of which will debut in 2021.

  • The Flower Dies under a Skin of Glass, translated by Sasha Dugdale (Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 2019).
  • In Memory of Memory, translated by Sasha Dugdale (London: Fitzcarraldo; New York: New Directions, 2021).
  • Relocations: Three contemporary Russian women poets, translated by Catherine Ciepiela and Anna Khasin (Brookline, MA: Zephyr Press, 2013).
  • The Voice Over, edited by Irina Shevelenko (New York: Columbia University Press, 2021).
  • War of the Beasts and the Animals, translated by Sasha Dugdale (Hexham, Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books, 2021).

Her poetry has also appeared in a number of English-language literary journals, including Aufgabe, Atlanta Review, Jacket, and Poetry International.[11]

References

  1. ↑ "Maria Stepanova – Joseph Brodsky". www.josephbrodsky.org. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  2. ↑ "Мария Степанова | Новая карта русской литературы". www.litkarta.ru. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  3. ↑ University, Stanford (2016-03-29). "Moscow journalist Maria Stepanova to speak about Russia's future". Stanford News. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  4. ↑ "Colta.ru | Всё о культуре и духе времени". www.colta.ru. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  5. ↑ "Berliner Künstlerprogramm". www.berliner-kuenstlerprogramm.de. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  6. ↑ "RSL International Writers | 2023 International Writers". Royal Society of Literature. Retrieved 3 December 2023.
  7. ↑ "Maria Stepanova – Russian Writers at Berkeley". russianwriters.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  8. ↑ Stepanova, Cynthia L. Haven interviews Maria (15 June 2017). "Mad Russia Hurt Me into Poetry: An Interview with Maria Stepanova". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  9. ↑ "Maria Stepanova (poet) – Russia – Poetry International". www.poetryinternational.org. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  10. ↑ "The war poetry of Maria Stepanova | Little Atoms". littleatoms.com. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
  11. ↑ "Resources – Your language my ear // Твой язык моё ухо". web.sas.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-11.
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