Books by Michael Wachtel

Michael Wachtel, Viacheslav Ivanov: A Symbolist Life .  615 pp. of what Russian/Soviet cultural life was like in the early 20th century.  Focuses on broader strands, rather than just the most famous names.  Ivanov today is largely forgotten, but he was at the time arguably the most influential figure of that period.  “They were mostly a bunch of nuts” is one of my takeaways.