Exiled Russian Writer to Give Classes, Lectures at UMD in November

Maxim Osipov is the 2024-25 Maya Brin Resident.

By ARHU Staff

During a two-week residency at UMD beginning this week, acclaimed Russian writer and cardiologist Maxim Osipov will offer a rare perspective on the resilience of Russians in exile and Russian culture amid political turmoil. 

As the 2024-25 Maya Brin Resident in the School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures (SLLC), Osipov will lead public discussions, meet with students and engage with scholars on themes of war, exile and identity. Established over a decade ago, the residency program invites influential Russian cultural figures to campus for immersive experiences, including class visits, scholarly events and student dinners, in order to foster a deeper understanding of Russian culture.

“The events we have organized around Maxim’s residency will feature his multifaceted nature as a voice for Russians in exile and as a storyteller with his finger on the pulse of contemporary Russian society," said Assistant Professor of Russian Michael Lavery. “Osipov offers a unique perspective and honest portrayal of human beings in all their fallibility—their capacity for cruelty, vanity and cowardice, but also for compassion, selflessness and courage.”

Osipov will work closely with students from the Russian department and the Jiménez-Porter Writers’ House Living-Learning Program. He will give three public events: one in discussion with Jiménez-Porter Writers' House Director Ross Angelella on Nov. 6; one in conversation with Professor Mikhail Epstein, a Russian cultural theorist from Emory University, on Nov. 7; and he will participate in a day-long scholarly symposium titled “The Fifth Wave: Contemporary Russian Culture and Exile” on Nov. 8. Specialists in contemporary Russian culture from various universities will speak on Russia under Putinism, exploring Russophone identities in exile and the current exodus—known as the “fifth wave”—of Russians from their homeland.

Osipov said he is looking forward to meeting with students: “an opportunity I did not have in Russia.” 

Osipov made his writing debut in 2007 with a candid account of his experiences of contemporary Russian life as a doctor working in the provincial town of Tarusa. An award-winning prose writer, he has since published several collections of short stories including “Rock, Paper, Scissors” and “Kilometer 101,” essays and three plays. Osipov emigrated from Russia as part of the historical fifth wave of emigrants who fled Russia in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He is currently writer-in-residence at Leiden University in the Netherlands, where he serves as editor-in-chief for a magazine of unfiltered independent Russian writing aptly titled “Fifth Wave.” The publication serves as an outlet for exiled Russian writers united in their stance against violent totalitarianism and unable to freely publish in Russia because of censorship.

Over 10 Maya Brin residents have participated in the program since its inception in 2012. Mathematics Professor Emeritus Michael Brin named the program after his late mother, Maya Brin, who taught in UMD’s Russian program for nearly a decade. Brin brought his family to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1979. Both he and his mother found a home at UMD. He donated $600,000 in her honor to establish the Maya Brin Endowment in the Russian department of SLLC. The endowment also funds the Maya Brin Distinguished Lecturer faculty position, which is currently held by Zhanna Vernola.

Image of Osipov next to the artwork from his book covers.