“I am a Phenomenon Quite Out of the Ordinary.” The notebooks, diaries and letters of Daniil Kharms

“I Am a Phenomenon Quite Out of the Ordinary” offers a fascinating look into the life and mind of poet and prose miniaturist Daniil Kharms (1905-1942). One of the legendary figures of the “Last Soviet Avant-Garde,” Kharms was the tutelary spirit of “Russia’s lost literature of the absurd.” His work, rescued from oblivion by a dedicated group of friends and scholars, has attained an almost cult status among present-day Russia’s literary elite. Anemone and Scotto offer a wide-ranging selection of materials from Kharms’s private notebooks, diaries, letters, and even documents from the KGB archives detailing Kharms’s tragic end in a psychiatric prison hospital. Most have never been translated before into English. Essential reading for anyone interested in Russian literature, Soviet culture, or a glimpse into the mind of a brilliant and quirky genius.