Crisis of Literature and Literary Studies and Ways of its Overcoming

Abstract

The paper reflects upon the contemporary crisis situation in literature as an institution and in Literary Studies as a discipline closely related to it. Special emphasis is made upon a dramatic decline in a taste for literature and Literary Studies. Referring to Russian and foreign scholars, the author states the reasons why literature no longer remains a central agency of acculturation and reality production. Along with it, she analyzes attempts to break the aforesaid stalemate.