Putin's war has prompted a deep analysis and reevaluation of the forces driving this deadly confrontation. At the Vanishing Point in History brings together renowned humanities scholars and prominent novelists to explore the roots and causes of the ongoing catastrophe in Eastern Europe.
This distinguished group of Russian émigrés, well-versed in Russian culture, history, and philosophy, aims to examine the past to understand the present. Experts in the inner workings of Russian society who have fled the country, they believe it is their responsibility to critically assess the current crisis, reflect on its origins, and outline the agenda for future research in the humanities. In response to this challenge, they present a collection of analytical essays that offer essential background and context for understanding the unfolding events in Europe.
Today's Russia is perhaps the most representative example of the grave threat that tyranny poses to global civilization. In its brutal attack on Ukraine, Putin's regime holds not only Russians but all of humanity hostage. The atrocities committed in the name of the "Russian world" make it urgent to thoroughly investigate Russia's current political pursuit in order to uncover its true origins and find a way forward.
At the Vanishing Point in History:
Critical Perspectives on the Russia-Ukraine War
Table of Contents
Notes on Contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
At the Edge of the Abyss: The Countdown Begins
Marina F. Bykova (North Carolina State University, USA)
Prologue
Doors of Hell: New Russian Apocalypticism
Mikhail Epstein (Emory University, USA)
Part I. Unlearned Lessons From Russia's Bloody History
The War on Progress and the Missed Opportunities of Russian Enlightenment
Marina F. Bykova (North Carolina State University, USA)
Between Nationalism and Universalism: The Imperial Imagination from Vladimir Solovyov to Alexandre Kojève
Boris Groys (European Graduate School, Switzerland)
The Defeated Judge the Victors, or Bolshevism in post-October Russian Thought
Alexander L. Dobrokhotov (King's College London, UK)
War in Ukraine and the Ethics of Pragmatism
Dmitri N. Shalin (University of Nevada, Las Vegas, USA)
Against the West: The Weimar Republic and Post-Soviet Russia in the Yeltsin Era as
Aggrieved Powers
Leonid Luks (Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt,Germany),
Part II. The War of Obsession
The "End of History" or the End of the Human Race? Rereading Fukuyama and HuntingtonDuring Russia's War Against Ukraine
Mikhail Sergeev (University of the Arts, Philadelphia,USA)
Point of Madness and the Search for History's Meaning
Mikhail Blumenkranz (Independent Scholar, Germany)
Nostalgia, Trickster, and the War
Mark Lipovetsky (Columbia University, USA)
The Return of the Grand Inquisitor
Maja Soboleva (University of Marburg, Germany)
The Viscosity of Russian Space: An Essay in Structural Analysis
Helen Petrovsky (Université Sorbonne Nouvelle, France)
Part III. Does Russia Have a Future?
Cyclical Progress. The Eternal Return of Modernity
Vladimir Marchenkov (Ohio University, USA)
Being Guilty, Feeling Guilty: Right and Morality in Russia in the Shadow of the Current War
Michail Maiatsky (University of Fribourg / University of Lausanne, Switzerland)
Russian Ouroboros
Mikhail P. Shishkin (Freelance Writer, Switzerland)
Defederating Russia
Alexander Etkind (Central European University, Vienna, Austria)
