How It Was Done in Paris

Here, reintroduced into literary circulation, is an ignored yet rich and original page in Russian literary history--the "unnoticed generation" of Russian writers who took up residence in France after the Bolshevik coup of 1917. Leonid Livak analyzes the position of these writers in the context of French modernist literature, examining the ways in which French literary life influenced emigre artistic identities and oeuvre. The book challenges commonly accepted notions of emigre isolation from French literature and culture and is instrumental in reaching a fuller understanding of the cultural mechanisms involved in the effort by an expatriate community to carry on a creative existence.