ABSTRACT
Grigorii Oster (1947–) is virtually unknown in the West, but in Russia his name has long been emblematic of contemporary culture. 1 He is the author of a brand of children's books called Vrednye sovety (Harmful advice), consumed by millions of children and adult readers. This brand is not, however, the only one Oster has in the hopper. Since 1975 when his first book, Kak khorosho darit’ podarki (It's so good to give presents) came out, he has written children's plays, screen plays for cartoons, short stories, poetry, and even a novel for preschool children, Skazka s podrobnostiami (A tale with many details, 1989). There is hardly a genre in children's literature to which he has not applied himself, and recently his artistic territory expanded even to the Internet, when he created the government-sponsored Russian president's website for children from eight to fourteen years of age, which was launched on January 19, 2004. Oster is so ubiquitous that it would not be an exaggeration to say that he has built his own state within the state of Russian children's culture. Critic Mariia Poriadina (2002) claimed that his works occupy as much as one third of the Russian “reading consciousness” (p. 34). 2 Currently, his only competitor on the Russian children's book market is Eduard Uspenskii (1937–) who, being ten years Oster's senior, established himself during a phase of high creative energy in children's literature in the 1960s. 3 Although some critics complain that Oster's books over-saturate the market (ibid.), the best examples of his work have become classics and occupy a prominent place in the vibrant tradition of playful literature for children. Oster's best works truly drive the reader to “a state of aesthetic shivering” (ibid., p. 35). This chapter introduces Oster as an author of children's literature to Western readers and explains his success, achievements, and innovations as a playful author. His creative method arguably makes him the most experimental of children's authors in contemporary Russian literature and places him within the postmodern literary tradition.
