“Feel the Difference!” Children’s Book for Boys and Children’s Book for Girls in Boris Akunin’s project “Genres”

Abstract

Two texts published in the framework of Boris Akunin’s project “Genres” — Children’s Book for Boys and Children’s Book for Girls — are compared in this article. The analyses of these narratives are formulated through the gender approach. This evaluation results in the conclusion that both books reproduce traditional views on masculinity and, especially, on femininity. Children’s Book for Girls offers its addressees the universal essentialist model of femininity that reproduces the patriarchal gender stereotypes. The article by Irina Savkina.   Keywords: contemporary Russian literature, children’s literature, gender, gender stereotypes