I have always loved words and stories and believed in their power. Driven by this passion, I entered the Journalism Faculty at Moscow State University and later spent a year studying at West Virginia University in the United States. This five-year journey taught me not only about media and literary theory, but also about the tremendous value of a journalistic community: people who are committed to confronting grief and inequality by bringing hidden stories to light. I wrote articles for Russian media outlets in which I tried to draw attention to the experience of marginalised communities.
My close encounter with people’s struggles also deepened my love of literature and poetry, especially Russian fiction. While literature can articulate pain, it also continually reveals the enduring beauty of a world in which kindness still finds its place. When the Russian philologist Viktor Shklovsky was asked how one should approach and analyse art, he replied: “Don’t lose this childish attitude towards art. Advice? My advice — get surprised.” I try to follow this principle, allowing curiosity to guide my search for hidden meanings and new perspectives in literary texts.
In my research, I focus on literature as a means of capturing traumatic experience, both individual and collective, and ask whether the constant appeal to trauma in literature can become a strategy for overcoming it. Studying at Oxford had been a cherished dream, and getting here feels like receiving a Hogwarts letter. It is magical to be surrounded by people who share the same sparks.
For my Master’s, I intend to focus on contemporary Russian prose and explore how the experiences of different marginalised communities are represented within it. I hope to develop the concept of “communal trauma” in the Russian context, drawing on Richard Terdiman’s understanding of memory as an anxiety about lost communion and on the human desire to restore connection.
I find the spirit of Ertegun House exhilarating and inspiring. I cherish the idea of people from different humanities disciplines bringing together their skills, experiences, and ways of thinking, and sharing their curiosity and excitement with one another. Journalism taught me the value of such collective work: within an editorial team, people can devote themselves to different questions while contributing to a shared purpose. For me, the Ertegun community applies this romantic idea to the intellectual life of an academic community.
Ultimately, while addressing these more specific questions, I hope my Master’s project will contribute to the broader philosophical question that has guided my academic path: in a world increasingly marked by suffering, how can memory and pain resist devaluation and instead foster recognition, empathy, and social change?
