Zinaida Hippius was a formative figure among members of the progressive Russian intelligentsia at the turn of the twentieth century. She distinguished herself as a poet, playwright, fiction writer, essayist, memoirist, and critic. Her activities in the Religious and Philosophical Society in St. Petersburg and the literary soirées that she organized--first in St. Petersburg and later in emigration in Paris--enhanced her fame in Russian literary circles. She brought up new ideas, took an active part in lively exchanges of opinion, and played a fundamental role in the religious renaissance of her country. For Hippius, the eternal properties of art were love of God, Christian ethics, spiritual elation, and religious transports. Art, she claimed, may promote beauty, refinement, morality, and religious thought. It reveals the Divine Spirit; in it, the Divine Word assumes a human image. The purpose of art, therefore, is to promote the moral and...