None of the comparisons we can make with other comparably structured works would be valid in isolation, although many of these may have been contributory inluences (as, in some cases too, on Potocki’s The Manuscript Found in Saragossa). As such it is a formal curiosity, unique in Russian literature and perhaps even in European literature. It comprises a series of short stories of an assorted romantic nature (most of which had earlier been published separately), collected and embedded in a philosophical discussion on romantic aesthetics and the prospects of Russia as a force for the reinvigoration of the so-called «dying west» (18 sections in all, within nine «nights»). Odoevsky’s Russian Nights (Russkie nochi, 1844) may be best described as a «philosophical frame-tale» and it is sometimes termed a «philosophical novel».
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