One of the unique features of Russian literature is that, at the beginning of the 20th century, it was divided into two parts. One part remained in Soviet Russia and grew into the literature of the Soviet Union. The second part--no less significant--moved abroad, where it developed independently and received universal recognition thanks to the enormous talent of poets and writers of the Russian diaspora.
It is notable that, from the beginning of the 20th century to the present day, three Nobel Prizes in Literature have been awarded to authors of Russian literature who resided abroad (Ivan Bunin, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Joseph Brodsky), and two Nobel Prizes in Literature have been awarded to authors of Russian literature who resided in the Soviet Union (Mikhail Sholokhov, Boris Pasternak). True, there is one exception. Boris Pasternak, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1958, first published Doctor Zhivago in Italy, although he never emigrated from the Soviet Union. If Pasternak were included in the category of Russian writers abroad, then the ratio would be four-to-one in favor of the Russian diaspora writers, which confirms the incredibly high quality and undeniable talent of authors of Russian literature abroad.
Another feature of Russian literature is that it is usually divided into two ages—a Golden Age and a Silver Age. Russian Literature of the Golden Age, which is usually associated with A.S. Pushkin, is surprisingly pleasant to read. A person whose native language is Russian, as a rule, grows up on fairy tales and poems written by A.S. Pushkin. Pushkin’s language, like Mozart’s music, is perceived easily and freely; it flows from line to line and immerses the reader in the enormous richness and incredible beauty of the Russian language. Russian Literature of the Golden Age consists of countless stories, novellas, and novels written in the 19th century in a highly intellectual and complex language that was never intended for everyone. It was a means of communication between writers, poets, playwrights, and philosophers, among whom the Russian literary language was formed and developed.
Every Russian writer of that time was a philosopher. The best example is Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, whose novels are full of deep philosophical questions about life, death, religion, motivation, freedom, personal responsibility, and much more. In 19th century Russia, nothing was considered more prestigious and honorable than to be a poet or writer. That is why almost all the intellectuals of that time—philosophers, journalists, critics, and even doctors, such as A.P. Chekhov and M.A. Bulgakov—eventually became writers. In the 20th century, Russian writers and poets attained the status of gurus, enlightening and teaching their readers. One of the fundamental canons of this culture was the love of freedom, glorified by Russian poets, beginning with A.S. Pushkin.
Thus, Russian Literature of the Golden Age gradually became a national treasure of the country, and it espoused a powerful message about what is right and what is wrong and how difficult it is to be a decent person. It led its readers to become something better than they were; it educated, consoled, and calmed them. This unusually high moral aspect of the Golden Age of Russian Literature, with its concepts of kindness, compassion, mercy, and justice, was best formulated by L. N. Tolstoy when he expressed the philosophical opinion that mercy consists of spiritual support for one’s neighbor more than material help--spiritual support being defined as non-judgmental respect for the human dignity of a neighbor.
The Silver Age is a figurative name for a period in the history of Russian poetry dating back to the beginning of the 20th century. The name is meant to show that its poetry, like the Golden Age literature, is also highly treasured. The beginning of the 20th century in Russia was a period of social and cultural upheavals and ideological passions. The realistic depiction of life no longer satisfied Russian authors, and their dispute with the classics of the 19th century gave rise to many new literary movements. The Silver Age is perhaps one of the most tragic—but also the greatest—eras in the history of Russian literature. In less than a quarter century, Russia gave birth to a remarkable galaxy of poets, many of whom (Alexander Blok, Osip Mandelstam, Anna Akhmatova, Boris Pasternak, Marina Tsvetaeva) stood at the top of the world poetic culture of their time. The very self-perception of the era seemed imbued with poetry; even those authors whose main talent and achievements lay in the field of prose (Ivan Bunin, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Zinaida Gippius) made a significant contribution to the poetic landscape of the time. The Silver Age ended with the death of Alexander Blok and the execution of Nikolai Gumilev in 1921.
The Silver Age was remembered with nostalgia by emigrant poets from the Russian diaspora, led by Georgy Ivanov in Paris and Vladislav Khodasevich in Berlin. The Silver Age was an unusually creative period of Russian poetry that furthered the Golden Age’s tradition of originality. The Silver Age is believed to have begun with the appearance of Alexander Blok's Poems about a Beautiful Lady in 1901-02, but the term only became generally accepted in the 1960s. Anna Akhmatova and Boris Pasternak also began writing at this time and continued to produce literature for decades. During the Soviet period, the work of the Silver Age poets was ignored or banned, but during the so-called Thaw, widespread interest in it reappeared.
На Галерной чернела арка,
В Летнем тонко пела флюгарка
И серебряный месяц ярко
Над Серебряным веком стыл...
Anna Akhmatova
But the greatest blossoming of interest in the Silver Age of Russian literature occurred in the 1960s in the Soviet Union during the so-called Thaw of 1953 to 1964. In this short amazing time, all the arts flowered: literature in general, and poetry in particular, burgeoned. Boris Pasternak and Anna Akhmatova were still alive and, one might say, passed the baton to the younger generation of poets along with the spirit of the Silver Age. These young poets carried it to the broad masses of post-war youth, reading poems by Anna Akhmatova, Osip Mandelstam, and Marina Tsvetaeva throughout the country. These sprouts, having fallen on fertile soil, flourished magnificently among the people.
On the other hand, Joseph Brodsky was forced to leave the country. Had it not been for this, however, he might never have managed to become a great poet. He breathed life into the 20th century literature of the Russian diaspora. The writers of the Russian diaspora did not simply follow in the Soviet style, but surpassed it to some extent in terms of its influence on Russian-speaking society, taking the baton from the hands of the poets of the Silver Age.
This is when the moral aspect of Russian literature appears, dividing Soviet literature from Russian literature abroad. Soviet writers praised Socialist Realism, the construction of a new society based on equality and the brotherhood of all peoples, but on the other hand, prohibited the philosophical aspects of individualism. At the same time, they condemned Orthodox Christian religion and beliefs—a condemnation that was welcomed by the Soviet government which developed and expanded upon this condemnation for almost three-quarters of the 20th century.
Russian writers abroad, the first wave of the Russian diaspora, sang the human values they had left behind in pre-revolutionary Russia: kindness, compassion, and hope. They believed that kindness and mercy are the meaning of life—that kindness, mercy, joy, and concern for others are the basis of human happiness, self-happiness. A person who does good for others feels happy; kindness, as a moral quality of a person, manifests itself primarily in love, mercy, tolerance, help, and the desire to do good for other people without expecting external or internal reward.
The spiritual culture of the Russian people abroad was embodied by the representatives of the first wave of the Russian diaspora. The mentality of the Russian spirit existed in such subtle spheres of the human soul that it is not always amenable to unambiguous definition. The main ethical concept of representatives of the Russian diaspora at that time was the constant of goodness, central not only in the spiritual system of Christian values, but also in the material world, where the manifestation of goodness when relating to other people was especially important. Existence in three spheres at once—divine, human and spiritual—was characteristic of the Russian Orthodox Christian ethical concept in which goodness, kindness, generosity, happiness, and joy underlie the formation of the Russian culture abroad of that time.