- kievan rus’ :city states scattered around a central city (kiev)
- flat land, hard to defend
- vladimir (king) – constantly fighting with citizens, different ideas on how to run
- need an ally — looked toward byzantine (istanbul)
- offered to marry byzantine emperor’s sister
- king of byz asked his sis to marry vladimir, was scared because vladimir seemed agressive
- vladimir had many wives, king of byz sis said yes even though she didn’t want to…
- byz asked vladimir to become christian
- vladimir had a pre-christian religion, (people also spoke same slavic language, not russian, did not exist yet)
- byz spoke greek, vladimir had two guys translate holy docs to, they had to come up with an alphabet *cyrillic alphabet
- translations were very powerful form a literary standpoint… king james bible came after shakespeare, also very literary.
- vladimir converted, new wife went back. he told his people to be christian
- he forced them to become christian (988 – 989)
- some people worshipped dieties and gods that were connected to their crops and land, connected with nature and the seasons
- people “said” they were christian for fear of death, but did not practice/believe
- dvoeverie: two faiths, side by side — coming together slowly at the same time
- russian people were used to telling them what to do and feel, but did not
- ended up in a culture that mixed both
- russian lit, full of struggle and evil
- how can there be a god if there are so many bad things
- connection between bad parts of human nature and connect it back to all that’s can be good
- does god exist?
- tortured
- prechristian gods, beauty of nature — power of river, winds, sun in eyes
Month: October 2025
finally starting to get back into the swing of things, a lot of things resolved in my mind. at least for now. starting this russian lit lecture series on the great courses website and will be keeping notes here, i want this blog to be more representative of my life so i can look back in the future. i realized i don’t remember a lot of things and would like to go back to piece things together, but maybe the best way is to document as you go. still planning to journal by hand but i think this is the best way to be able to go back and reference. so once again, for the 100th time, restarting this blogging journey.
started reading war & peace again yesterday. i just haven’t found a book that has quite moved me quite like it in the past few years (not that i haven’t read books that i wasn’t touched by) but there is an excitement in me when i read tolstoy that does not bubble up like others. the books i’ve read that have touched me generally make me feel sad, tolstoy makes me feel alive, wanting to explore more about humanity and life and people. so why not revisit, and unpack. really could probably spend my whole life studying just this one book. i read in the intro by pevear yesterday that it is very hard to simplify the telling of human truths (concept by tolstoy) and so war & peace is an attempt to do so in a very indirect way. i find this to be so true. it’s hard to tell a friend how you feel or are doing when they ask you “so what’s new?” — it can’t possibly encompass all of you. only you can know and maybe the person you live with and even that take a high level of awareness that many people don’t seem to have. and this writing stuff, is even harder. if you’re good you will be able to capture it. but i’d have to admit i’m at the moment notsogood, so let’s just try to capture as much as we can and parse it out later.