Rating writers, and what our children actually read

MOSCOW. Named the main Russian writer.

The results of the February survey, which allowed to identify the best writer in Russia, can be considered quite predictable. The absolute headliner with 45% was the author of War and Peace and Anna Karenina. Lev Nikolaevich was ahead of Fedor Mikhailovich, who had scored half as much. The author of Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov and Idiot was chosen by 23% of the respondents as an idol. The bronze went to Anton Pavlovich, 3% ahead of the "sun of Russian poetry." Fifth place was honestly shared by Sholokhov and Gogol. The absence of any significant percentages among modern literary gurus is very revealing. More successful than others were Akunin and Dontsova with 3%.

High classics testify not only to the unconditional recognition of their talent. The number of those who cannot imagine themselves without a daily volume or reader in their hands, regularly visits the library, does not spare their hard-earned money on book novelties, and only decreases every year. According to statistics, about a third of Russians do not feel the need for reading. But everyone has a school curriculum in literature. And the first thing that can come up in the mind of a person dumbfounded by an intellectual questioning is a name from a mandatory list.

An informal interest in reading classics in the age of the Internet can be motivated only with the help of a non-standard approach to teaching, the search for new forms, and creative tasks. According to Irina Murzak, an assistant professor at Moscow Pedagogical University, current high school students and philologists are happy to read Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt, Dmitry Bykov, Ayn Rand, Bernhard Schlink. In their books they find answers to the most important and painful questions. The classics also have them. But to make them closer to Russian readers of different ages, only a revolution in education will help.

Elena Tanakova © Gallerix.ru