Troublesome Words: A Cultural History of Russian (Language Worlds)

An accessible journey through the changing shape of the Russian language.

Across 350 years, the Russian language has been shaped by competing visions of what it should be, from early grammarians defining a literary standard to digital-era debates about slang, obscenity, and online identity. In this book, Simon Franklin traces how tradition and disruption have continually reshaped the language, including the linguistic experiments of writers and revolutionaries, the rhetoric of empire, and the global diversity of Russian today. Clear, concise, and engaging, Troublesome Words is both a history and a cultural portrait, revealing how language reflects power, imagination, and the changing world.

Simon Franklin is emeritus professor of Slavonic studies at the University of Cambridge. His books include The Russian Graphosphere, 1450–1850.