Identity is the overarching topic that connects most of the texts written by Iurii Serebrianskii, one of the leading representatives of so-called “Young” Russophone literature in Kazakhstan. This paper analyses how the topic is presented and what concepts of identity are integrated in four of the author’s most recognized works: Destination. Dorozhnaia pastoral’ (2010), Prazhaki (2014), Kazakhstanskie skazki (2017), and Altynshash (2018). I argue that Serebrianskii’s use of the Russian language, together with his explicit self-positioning in the Russophone world rather than the Russian world, is significant in the first two texts but loses importance through the later course of his work—both on a textual level and beyond. This development corresponds to a change in Serebrianskii’s reading audience. While he targeted a broader Russophone readership in his early work, he wrote his latter works for a primarily Kazakhstani readership, thereby shaping the emerging discourse of a polyphonic Kazakhstani identity.
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