Pandemija, smert' i bezumie: Sestra četyrech Evgenija Vodolazkina

The article examines the first play written by Vodolazkin. Already world-renowned as a novelist, he was driven to the genre of comedy by the topicality of the subject matter of his work: the recent Covid pandemic. Even in his experiment as a playwright, however, he remains faithful to the main themes of his earlier novels, from Laurus to The Aviator and all the others. The pandemic constitutes the absurd backdrop against more general considerations on the human condition and for reflections on the meaning of life and death. Vodolazkin moves skillfully from postmodernism to modernism and back again, and then to a kind of neo-modernism made up of a rich postmodernist instrumentarium, late avant-garde perspectives, neorealist representations, towards religiosity and in favor of ethical engagement.