American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages

Divine Sophia: The Wisdom Writings of Vladimir Solovyov by Judith Deutsch Kornblatt
Review by: Alyssa DeBlasio
The Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 54, No. 1, Special Forum Issue: New Research on
the Learning and Teaching of Slavic Languages (SPRING 2010), pp. 192-193
Published by: American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages
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192 Slavic and East
European
Journal
sues of the
independence
of
Azerbaijan
and the
Karabagh
conflict as variables
affecting
the
ashiqs'
art. She
emphasizes
that the
tragedy experienced by
the latter is reflected in the oral
narrations.
Lastly,
the author looks at the
workings
of tradition and transformation over time
and concludes that the
ashiqs'
creations are
productive
and are
part
of a
living
tradition. The
ashiq appears
here as someone who
passes
the tradition
on,
but
always responds
to
changes
in
time and
space.
The book under review
accomplishes
an
important
task in that it examines a
complex phe
nomenon
using
an
interdisciplinary approach. Methodologies
and
approaches
drawn from the
fields of
history, anthropology,
cultural
studies, literary studies,
and
gender
studies
help
Old
field contextualize the music and
poetics
of
ashiqs
in
general
and women
ashiqs
in
particular.
This
study
will
surely
be a reference
point
and
inspiration
for future scholars who wish to fur
ther examine the issues of the social role of
ashiqs,
their ethnic
identity,
their
gender identity,
and,
last but not the
least,
such verbal and musical issues as
genre
and transmission. Unfortu
nately,
the book has some
weaknesses,
one of which is the absence of a clear research
design
that
might guide
the reader
through
the data and the
analysis.
Another is the
scanty index,
which is not sufficient to reflect the content of the text.
Lastly,
the translations are marred
by
a few inaccuracies.
Overall the book under consideration is
highly
recommended for those who are interested in
Turkic verbal and musical arts.
Huseyin Oylupinar, University of
Alberta
Judith Deutsch Kornblatt. Divine
Sophia:
The Wisdom
Writings of
Vladimir
Solovyov. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell
UP,
2009.
Bibliography.
Index, xviii + 297
pp.
$55.00
(cloth);
$21.95
(paper).
Although queries
as to Russia's first or most influential
philosopher
will
inevitably
illicit a
myr
iad of
responsesfrom
Skovoroda to
Berdyaev;
from Monomakh to
Bulgakovthe importance
of Vladimir
Solovyov
on the Russian
philosophical
timeline is
something
about which few schol
ars will
disagree. However, despite
his role as a
key figure
in Russian
thought,
if not as the
fig
urehead of Russian
philosophy, only
three books of his
twenty-volume
collected works have
been released to date.
Solovyov's
oeuvre is
equally paradoxical, including literary writings (from
theosophical poetry
to comic
drama) alongside
technical
philosophical
treatises. Judith Deutsch
Kornblatt's
study,
the most recent
publication
in a
modest, yet steady
flow of articles and books
on this elusive
thinker, captures
the
paradoxes
that
punctuate Solovyov's
life and work. It does
so in a
way
that is accessible and informative to
lay
readers and
specialists alike, bringing pri
mary
sources and relevant criticism
together
in a
well-structured, meticulously
researched work.
The book is broken
up
into two
parts,
the second of which
comprises
a selection of
Solovyov's sophiological
works in
translationmany
of which are available here in
English
for
the first time
(translated by Kornblatt,
Boris
Jakim,
and
Laury Magnus). According
to
Kornblatt,
these "wisdom
writings"
are the
philosopher's
"verbal 're-visions'" of his own
personal
visions
of
Sophia (5),
whom he saw as
representing
not
only wisdom,
but the eternal feminine and the
world soul. These
writings
include
philosophical dialogues, essays,
and lectures that contribute
to
Solovyov's understanding
of
Sophia,
most
notably
selections from the
longer
works Lectures
on Divine
Humanity (1877-1881)
and Russia and the Universal Church
(1889).
This
portion
of
the book also includes ten
poems
and the narrative
poema
"Three Encounters"
(1898),
in which
Solovyov
describes his
meetings
with the azure
apparition
of
Sophiathe
female
personifica
tion of
unity
who would
go
on to become his
lifelong
muse. The book concludes with a semi
autobiographical
short
story,
"At the Dawn of
Misty
Youth"
(1892),
and the comic
play
The
White
Lily (1893).
This content downloaded from 158.130.243.46 on Thu, 10 Jul 2014 18:55:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Reviews 193
Where
only excerpts
of
longer
works are
included,
Kornblatt
provides
summaries of the omit
ted
portions
of the
text, making
Divine
Sophia
ideal for use in a
survey
course. The translations
are all
carefully annotated, giving
details on
language use, imagery, and, perhaps
most interest
ing,
on
Solovyov's
own
markings
in his texts. Each selection is
supplemented
with a
reading
guide
that illuminates the historical and cultural context of the work while
offering insight
into
its
general
themes and intellectual relevance. While Kornblatt's nuanced annotations
provide
details that the
specialist
will
appreciate,
the
reading guides
are
general enough
for those who
might
be unfamiliar with the details of
Solovyov's philosophy, especially
those who
may
have
no
reading knowledge
of Russian.
The first
part
of the book is a
conceptual
introduction to
Solovyov's
life and to the idea of
Sophia.
In her
presentation
of the
philosopher's biography,
Kornblatt touches not
only
on
Solovyov's
influence on Silver
Age
writers and
philosophers,
but discusses less
commonly
ad
dressed
aspects
of his academic
development,
such as his
critique
of
positivism,
his
relationship
to neo-Platonism and German idealist
philosophy,
and his often
neglected
work in
literary
crit
icism. She also
places Solovyov
in
dialogue
with his Western
contemporaries,
such as Charles
Darwin,
William
James,
and Friedrich Nietzsche. Kornblatt
argues
that no
single
narrative can
do
justice
to a thinker as
multifaceted,
and often
contradictory,
as
Solovyov.
He is "what Rus
sians call an
originar (25),
she
continues,
and this
originality
is
apparent
not
only
in his un
orthodox
lifestyle,
but in the
paradoxical reality
of his
scholarship:
his
adoption
of
Slavophile
views but not an essentialized notion of Russian
nationalism;
his
active,
social
approach
to
phi
losophy
in contrast with the "morbid ennui"
offin
de sicle aesthetics
(95).
Transitioning
from
Solovyov's
life to his
approach
to
sophiology,
Kornblatt first traces the de
velopment
of
Sophia
from Greek culture
through
its
adaptation
in
twentieth-century literature,
spending
a considerable amount of time on
Sophia's representation
in biblical texts and
iconog
raphy.
She draws
explicit
and
implicit
links between the
paradoxes
in
Solovyov's
work and the
many
contradictions that surround the idea of
Sophiafor instance,
that
Sophia
takes on a fem
inine form in the
Proverbs,
but was never
personified
in the Torah. In
particular,
Kornblatt ex
amines the
following
contradictions in
Solovyov's
own
sophiological
attitude:
1) Sophia
is as
sociated with both the divine world and the natural
world; 2)
she exists as an idea of God but is
also the actualization of that
idea; 3) Sophia
is at the same time identified as the
body
of God
and the soul of the world. While Kornblatt does not
oversimplify
these
dichotomies,
she re
solves them
through
a discussion of
Solovyov's larger project
of an
all-encompassing organic
unity through Sophia.
Perhaps
one of the most
interesting parts
of Kornblatt's introduction is her brief discussion of
humor. While for Plato and Aristotle excessive
laughter
had the
power
to
put
one's
dignity
on
the
line, Solovyov
defines humans as "the
being
that
laughs" (91).
In the
reading guides
Korn
blatt draws attention to
Solovyov's
use of
humor,
such as his
mockery
of
Symbolism
in "Three
Encounters,"
his comic interludes in The White
Lily,
and his
authorship
of his own
self-depre
cating epitaph. Although
the comic element in
Solovyov initially appears
out of
place
in an oth
erwise solemn canon of
writing,
Kornblatt
argues
in her introduction that humor was
important
to
Solovyov precisely
because of its link to
Sophia.
He viewed
laughter
as
capable
of reconcil
ing opposites through unity,
and here we see a clear connection to
Sophia,
who was the one true
"bridge
between
opposites"
as well as "the
transfigurer
of them both"
(7). Thus,
as Kornblatt
points out, Solovyov
saw
Sophia
as "the force behind the ultimate
laugh," bringing unity
through
humor not
only
to the human
body,
but to the
body
of God as well
(91).
Alyssa DeBlasio,
University of Pittsburgh
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