Quirky and original, Bulatova's book reinterprets Shklovsky's work of the 1920s by inscribing it in the larger field of Soviet discourses on biopolitics, registering both utopian visions of immortality and everyday physiological coercion. Shklovsky's prose, Bulatova compellingly argues, was part and parcel of this spirit of experimentation that sought -- and often failed -- to extend the realm of the possible.

Galin Tihanov, Queen Mary University of London, UK

Meticulously researched, eloquent, and original, Asiya Bulatova's study reveals the complexity of Viktor Shklovsky's thinking about corporeality – his acceptance of vulnerability, affirmation of individual needs, and insistence on creative defiance at a time when the Soviet ideology demanded discipline and obedience to the presumed laws of nature and socio-biological evolution. Grounded in close reading and thorough contextualization, this brilliant book is destined to become an inspiring resource for scholars of Formalism and the Early Soviet intellectual culture for years to come.

Ana Hedberg Olenina, author of Psychomotor Aesthetics: Movement and Affect in Modern Literature and Film

Bulatova takes a fresh look at Russia's most renowned formalist critic Viktor Shklovsky in light of early Soviet biopolitics, for which human bodies might be remolded and remade in the image of the Revolution. Her book makes a major contribution to new understanding of this extraordinary thinker and the culture he was working to create.

Tyrus Miller, Distinguished Professor of Art History and English, University of California, Irvine