Formalists against Imperialism: The Death of Vazir-Mukhtar and Russian Orientalism

In January 1829, an angry mob in Tehran murdered Russian poet and diplomat Alexander Griboedov, author of the verse comedy Woe from Wit and architect of the Russian annexation of the north Caucasus from Persia after the Russo-Persian War. A century later, the Russian formalist writer Yury Tynianov wrote a historical novel about the event entitled The Death of Vazir-Mukhtar.

In this wide-ranging study, Anna Aydinyan posits that The Death of Vazir-Mukhtar conceptualizes Orientalism fifty year...