This is an interview with Distinguished Professor Paul J. Contino on his book Dostoevsky’s Incarnational Realism: Finding Christ Among the Karamazovs and his audience with Pope Francis. It was conducted on June 22, 2023 by Peter Gregory Winsky. Paul’s book can be purchased here, and a Russian language edition of the book will soon be available here.
Links mentioned in the interview:
George Pattison “Reading Russian Philosophy in the Age of Putin: Dostoevsky and Putinism”
Fr. Antonio Spadaro’s “Bergoglio’s Map: Literature in the formation of Pope Francis”
Terrence W. Tilly’s The Karamazov Case: Dostoevsky’s Argument for His Vision
Chloë Kitzinger’s “Problems of Teaching Dostoevsky Now: A Brief Introduction” from The Bloggers Karamazov
The opening song in the interview is Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 4
The header image is the cover of Paul’s book.
The photographs were taken at the audience with Pope Francis and provided courtesy of Paul J. Contino.
Paul J. Contino is Distinguished Professor of Great Books at Pepperdine University. He received his Ph.D. in English Literature from Notre Dame, after which taught for twelve years at Christ College, the Honors College of Valparaiso University. He has served at Pepperdine since 2002, and has been twice granted their Howard A. White Award for Teaching Excellence. Along with his wife Professor Mary Mullins, he has co-edited the journal Christianity and Literature. In 2001 he co-edited and introduced Bakhtin and Religion: A Feeling for Faith (Northwestern UP). He has published a number of essays on Fyodor Dostoevsky, as well as essays on Zhuangzi, Dante Alighieri, and Jane Austen as well as a number of contemporary Catholic authors. His book Dostoevsky’s Incarnational Realism: Finding Christ among the Karamazovs (Cascade, Wipf and Stock, 2020) will soon be published in Russian translation (Trans. Irina Burova, Academic Studies Press 2022).