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Paper short abstract:

This paper offers an ecocritical reading of works by two writers from Central Asia: Chingiz Aitmatov and Andrei Volos. Both authors use animals to examine the dynamics of power engendered by de-Sovietization in Central Asia. This article illustrate authors' willingness to think beyond the human.

Paper long abstract:

Contemporary Russian fiction represents Central Asia as a hybrid, multicultural region, characterized by a plurality of ethnicities and traditions. In this paper we analyze texts by two authors from that space: Chingiz Aitmatov (1928-2008), from Kyrgyzstan, and Andrei Volos (b. 1955), born and raised in Tajikistan in an ethnically Russian family. All of these writers are both Soviet and post-Soviet, all are connected to the diasporic community of Central Asia. Each text illustrates a unique multifaceted relationship with the region that blends heterogeneous cultural layers (Kyrgyz, Tadjik, Russian) and temporal-spatial dimensions (from Soviet to post-Soviet, from Central Asia to Russia and Europe). Our paper investigates the different ways and perspectives in which these texts address the issues arising from the denaturalized post-Soviet environment of Central Asia.

Kogda padajut gory (Aitmatov, 2007) and Palang (Volos, 2008), each explore a profound crisis of the Central Asian region. Following the lead of environmental or "ecocriticism", our reading brings to light a peculiar feature that these authors share, namely an emphasis on the profound interconnectedness of human and animals, of humans and their environment, and the entanglement of species and landscape, of organic and inorganic. We argue that each of these texts overturns the hierarchical and anthropocentric perspective that is more familiar to Western tradition, through the use of "other-than-human" or "more-than-human" characters. These Others - called into being by the specifics of Central Asian space and history - allow our two authors to criticize the abuse and exploitation of Others, perpetrated by a dominant authority. More generally, anthropomorphism, or the adoption of a point of view of an "other-than-human" character is a technique very close to ostranenie that enables these writers to address moral and philosophical questions linked to the overarching narrative of post-Soviet trauma. The response of these authors to the pressures of different discourses of dominance, including reckless modernization, the production of weapons, and the waging of war, creates a common thread running through their works.