Volume 15, 2017 year

The article envisages various interpretations of a poetic word and of the possibilities of the impact of a writer’s word on people appeared in some statements of A. S. Pushkin, V. A. Zhukovsky, G. R. Derzhavin, N. V. Gogol, K. S. Aksakov. It is revealing that these interpretations derived from the idea of the Divine Word that opens the Gospel of John, and at the same time drew on old traditions coming from the idea of a word in verbal folklore. The poetic word assumes importance only if it becomes uncommon and oriented at unexpected verbal associations: not until the word is said in an unconventional way, it becomes sublime poetry. It is this Evangelical (and fantastic) rule (“It would be good if the same word were said in another way”) allowed the poetic word to become a commonly used principle of literary evolution.

Keywords: Human word, a word and a deed, fairy tale, Divine word, G. R. Derzhavin, V. A. Zhukovsky, N. V. Gogol, K. S. Aksakov, sublime poetry

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A deep concentration and attentive listening to menacing historical omens manifested in nature, determine the ideas and feelings of the poets — contemporaries of the Patriotic War of 1812. Two large European volcanoes woken up in 1811—1812 — Vesuvius and Etna — were seen as a terrible presage, a natural harbinger of a historical catastrophe. Appealing to the image of an erupting volcano, poets saw the reason that entailed the sequence of world upheavals, the crush of spiritual values. The clergymen encouraged repentance and an appeal to God’s help. The rage of the erupting volcano was represented by poets as a certain moral lesson — the storming nature forces a person to turn regard on the sky and to think of readiness for death. As a result, the article came to the definition of a religious meaning of the motif of the erupting volcano in Russian poetry at the beginning of the 19th century.

Keywords: Russian poetry, an image, a motif, volcanic eruption, the flood, eschatology, French invasion of Russia

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The article puts a question of understanding of patriotism by Gogol and Belinsky. The problem is contemplated within the broad context of the interaction and opposition between Slavophilism and Westernism. The sources of a common mistaken opinion that Gogol’s owed his “Slavophilism” to Aksakov are studied. The article is based on an obscure history of the origin of one of Belinsky's polemical statements about Gogol as a writer who did not love Russia enough until 1839 and in fact was a “cosmopolitan poet”. In this regard, a particular attitude of Aksakov family toward religious and patriotic ideas of Gogol is taken into consideration. The recollections about Gogol by Sergey Timofeevich Aksakov-father — who shared Belinsky’s viewpoint in 1840 and inserted it later in his memoirs about Gogol, as well as the nature of the relationship of Gogol and Aksakov-father in the 1830s-1840s, are analyzed. Gogol’s views on the problem of difference between imaginary and true patriotism are introduced. The place of Gogol in the confrontation between the Slavophils and Westerners is determined.

Keywords: Gogol, Westerners, Slavophils, biography, ideology, creativity, interpretation, hermeneutics, concept, patriotism

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The article refers to the phenomenon of Western European, primarily French, and Russian socio-philosophical thought that got a traditional name of “Social Christianity” but in the Soviet times was entitled “Christian Socialism”. Dostoevsky’s “Russian socialism”, as the author himself denominates it in “A Writer’s Diary”, is for a long time and justly related to French “Social Christianity” and to its most famous representative F. R. de Lamennais (Hugues-Félicité Robert de Lamennais). At the same time “Russian Socialism” and all the entirety of Dostoevsky’s socio-philosophical views of 1860s — 1880s extremely remind Gogol’s ideas of his later period. Certain parallels between the two Russian classics are revealed in the article, and it is pointed out that while Dostoevsky’s views are usually treated with sympathy the same ideas in Gogol’s later works are often sharply criticized. The similarity between two writers, apart from certain influence of Gogol on Dostoevsky, is due to their orientation to the same currents in Western European socio-philosophical thought, and first of all to the “Social Christianity”. Both writers shared the key principle of this movement: aspiration to the transformation of social relations on true Christian basis, according to the Christian ideal of brotherhood between people regardless their class position. It was Gogol, along with Chaadaev, Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, who more than any other Russian writer or thinker was inspired by Lamennais’s “Paroles d’un Croyant” (1834) and other writings of the latter. Taking this into account a well-known correspondence between Belinsky and Gogol could be qualified as a dispute between an adherent of socio-political utopia and a disciple of “Social Christianity”.

Keywords: N. V. Gogol, F. M. Dostoevsky, Social Christianity, Christian Socialism, F. R. de Lamennais, utopian, Western European philosophy, brotherhood

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The article analyses the poetics of the “Epilogue” in “The Brothers Karamazov” as a generalizing conclusion of the novel. The situations of each of three scenes in the “Epilogue” match up the situations in the main chapter of the novel, opposite one to another, and are, in comparison to the latter, negation of the negation. At the end of the novel a Christian idea emerges, and the principles of Conciliarism and its Easter character come to the peak accomplishing, thus, their evolution. The events depicted in the “Epilogue” relate to the present time but they also have a way out in future, that is look up to a new, “key” novel conceived but not written by Dostoevsky. This combination of present and future in final stories attributes a dual nature to them: they finish the written novel and at the same time start a new, unaccomplished one, in other words they are both afterword and preface stories. The interrelation between the epigraph and the epilogue asserts the Christian worldview as conceptual and artistic foundations of “The Brothers Karamazov”.

Keywords: F. M. Dostoevsky, “The Brothers Karamazov”, epilogue, epigraph, storyline, hero, preface story, Christian idea

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In Tolstoy’s stories “What Men Live by” and “Where Love Is, There God Is Also” the choice of the anthroponymic naming formula is predetermined by the relation of characters to the Gospel. Anthroponyms determine the destiny of people, have a prospective function and give hope for the favorable safe final of the story. In the story “Where Love Is, There God Is Also” the narrator uses a proper name when his character is not right; a patronymic has a greater value than a proper name because the patronymic naming formula emphasizes the succession of generations as well as a religious and moral essence laid in the name. Tolstoy’s character absorbs the Word Divine and as a result of it he is transformed. The “neutral” impersonal naming formula is replaced by the anthroponymic naming formula with its Christian semantics obtained in baptizing. Semantics of anthroponyms not always “helps” Tolstoy’s characters. In the story “What Men Live by” the semantics of patronymic Trifonov is “empty”: Trifonov is a poor man who did not help Semyon in a difficult situation, which he himself created in part. In the story “How Much Land Does a Man Need?” greedy and cunning Pachom failed to realize the positive semantics of his personal name and died. Tolstoy’s nameless characters are usually separated from God; the exception is a woman with a child from “What Men Live by” and an old wanderer from “Where Love Is, There God Is Also”. Angel’s speech at the end of the story “What Men Live by” and the description of his ascension correlate with the Gospel text. The forms of inclusion of the Gospel text in Tolstoy’s stories are different. A number of stories are preceded by the evangelical epigraphs that create a parabolic composition. In some stories Tolstoy’s character reads and comprehends the evangelical verses; the Gospel text sounds in his speeches and “subdues” the narrative. All this leads to an increase in the meaning of Tolstoy’s “national stories”, written in the context of Christian literature.

Keywords: nameless characters, anthroponym, proper name, рatronymic, evangelical text, discourse strategies, Tolstoy

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Religious paintings are a specific form of reading the Gospel text. Based on I. E. Repin’s work “Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane” the author aims at revealing biblical texts as primary sources in the process of visualizing the Gospel events by the artist. The article does a research of the history of the picture, brings to light its compositional and coloristic features. While analyzing sacral reality depicted in the painting a theological dialogue between I. E. Repin and A. P. Chekhov is explored. The author notes the following results. Discussion about the presence of the moon on the night of Gethsemane events reveals the nature of the relationship of these people, their devoutness in life and work. Moreover, the author expresses a new hypothesis. Priest D. V. Rozhdestvensky, who consulted the writer on the question of the presence of the moon in the biblical events, could be a prototype of Ivan Wielkopolska in the story “Student” by A. P. Chekhov. It is concluded that by means of the moonlight I. E. Repin strived to convey a spiritual reality, to express a dramatic character of betrayal and Divine predetermination of Atonement.

Keywords: A. P. Chekhov, I. E. Repin, “Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane”, gospel text, devoutness, painting, sacred reality, prototype

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The article is dedicated to the analysis of the range of problems, tropes and literary types in E. N. Opochinin’s narration “Brothers” (1898). Evgeniy Nikolaevich Opochinin (1858‑1928) was a writer, archaeographer, collector, editor and employee of the newspaper “Government Printing Works”, an author of recollections and diary notes on F. M. Dostoevsky, A. N. Maikov, Ya. P. Polonsky and other his renowned contemporaries. He created various types of a Russian person in his writings, such as: an old believer, a hunter, an artist, a God’s fool etc. The story “Brothers” depicts an old believer who tries to break with his ambience. Opochinin’s narration reveals common tropes with Dostoevsky’s novel “The Brothers Karamozov”: rivalry between brothers, a revolt against relatives because of a woman, a spiritual crisis of the characters. After his protest the character of Opochinin’s story Mikhail Vyzhigin comes back to his community and becomes a hardcore old believer. Comparative — typological and structure methods make it possible to discover the peculiarity of the literary type conceived by Opochinin. The same as Dmitry Karamazov and Mikola the dyer in the “Crime and Punishment” Opochinin’s hero wants to wash away his guilt by suffers, he looks for spiritual light, but unlike Dostoevsky’s characters, he chooses an unblessed way, deprived of joy, he is driven by fear of God and not by love. Eschatological visions of the character become an instrument of revealing of the character’s inner world. Moreover, the writer uses a characterological and narrative antinome. Mikhail Vyzhigin wants to obtain the Truth turns to be deceived by his acquaintances.

Keywords: E. N. Opochinin, “Brothers”, F. M. Dostoevsky, plot, motif, antinome, literary type, Eschatological visions, “Theodore’s Walking Through Airy Ordeals”

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Based the short stories of N. V. Gogol (“Viy”), L. N. Tolstoy (“The Devil”), I. A. Bunin (“Mitya’s love”) the storyline of transformation of the diabolic within the idyllic is seen in its evolution. A mythological subject of the appearance of the cosmos out of the chaos is related to the destruction of the idyll. The Chthonian character that extends its power to Khoma and Irtenev manifests itself in unexpected conditions: idyllic, “peaceful landscapes” reveal the possibilities of a back awful metamorphose. While Khoma is seduced beyond his will, Irtenev is seen as an initiator in the story with Stepanida. In both situations relations of authorities as a regulator of social structure are kept current: an orphan seminarist gets seduced by a rich and noble young woman; in contrast, by inviting Stepanida, Eugene appeals to his position of a nobleman. Finally, both characters find themselves subjected to the demonic power that covers all the other relations of domination and submission. In the era of sentimentalism the idyllic canon was “acosmic”. Gogol and Tolstoy brought back its cosmism, and Bunin, coming after them, partly turned back to sentimentalistic acosmism by disclosing better the catastrophe of individual consciousness in a lyrical way.

Keywords: Gogol, Tolstoy, Bunin, Byron, “the idyllic”, infernality, chaos and cosmos

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