Ken Hirschkop’s “new Bakhtin” for the English-speaking students

Abstract

A review of Hirschkop K. The Cambridge Introduction to Mikhail Bakhtin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. xvi, 250 p. (Cambridge Introductions to Literature). Speaking today about the importance of Mikhail Bakhtin's ideas for the humanities is restating the obvious. The book by the renowned Canadian literary and cultural studies scholar Professor K. Hirschkop, The Cambridge Introduction to Mikhail Bakhtin (2021), aims at a systematic description of M.M. Bakhtin's scholarly legacy for the English-speaking reader, primarily for students. In our view, in this edition, the author solves both the traditional tasks of a textbook-reference book, written in the genre of "Introduction," and the research tasks. The Russian thinker's theory and practice analysis is presented based on the texts of his Collected Works, which, according to Hirschkop, form an image of a "new" Bakhtin. The tried and tested scheme of the Cambridge Introduction enables the author to draw a concise sketch of the scholar's life, outline the main sources and contexts of his scholarly quest, analyze key ideas and works, and describe the process of Bakhtin’s reception in the English-speaking world.

Keywords

• K. Hirschkop
• M.M. Bakhtin
• J. Kristeva
• Bakhtin Studies
• biographical reconstruction
• reception of scholarly legacy