Volume 18, 2020 year

The article is focused on one of the key categories of historical and theoretical poetics — the category of genre. Until now, many issues related to genre and the genre analysis of a writing remain unsettled. The article considers the main problems of studying the category of genre, as well as different approaches: genetic, functional, systemic, typological ones. The emphasis is laid on the history of the study of the category “genre” by formal and sociological schools. A particular attention is paid to the contribution of P. N. Medvedev to the development of the genre as a category of poetics, as well as to the concepts of the genre by D. S. Likhachev, M. M. Bakhtin, G. N. Pospelov, V. V. Kozhinov, V. N. Zakharov, L. V. Chernets, N. L. Leiderman and others, some aspects of studying the category of genre in foreign literary criticism are considered. It is proved that, despite the idea of “atrophy”, the genre still remains significant both for the writer’s artistic thinking and for certain “expectations” of the reader from the text.

Keywords: genre, poetics, functional approach, genre system, genre features, formal school, sociological school, P. N. Medvedev, M. M. Bakhtin, foreign literary studies

Text (russian)

References

The subject of this paper is the transformation of the poetics of Cupid and Psyche plot in its national and historical modifications in European literature. The methodology of the analysis is based on mythological studies (A. N. Veselovsky, A. F. Losev) and genre studies (M. M. Bakhtin, S. S. Averintsev, E. M. Meletinsky, etc.). Allegorization of the images of Love and Soul appeared in the antiquity long before the novel by Apuleius “Asinus Aureus” or “Metamorphoses” (the 2^nd century AD). In a Greek epigram Eros is often associated with the element of fire that puts the soul — “Psycho” — to a variety of ordeals and tortures. In “Metamorphoses” by Apuleius the tale about Cupid and Psyche can be seen as an allegorical narration about the soul traveling around the world and looking for ways to Love and eternal life. Later, the parabolic core of the ancient story was enriched with new motifs from the arsenal of mythology, Neoplatonism and Christianity. The archetypical basis and platonic paradigm of the plot in “Metamorphoses” by Apuleius go together in a syncretic unity, that provides universality and polysemy of the different versions of tales about Cupid and Psyche in European literature. The neoplatonic version of the story, which interprets the reunion between Cupid and Psyche as the Union of God and Soul, is represented in literature by writings of Fulgentius, Boccaccio, Heine, Coleridge, Żuławski and others.

Keywords: mythopoetics, comparative literary studies, myth, neoplatonism, allegory, fairy tale, eternal images, Cupid, Psyche

Text (russian)

References

 The motif of “the escape from paradise” has recently become one more time the subject of historical poetics. This motif is opposed to “the expulsion from paradise” accepted in Western literature. In the perception of scholars the motif of “the escape from paradise” in 19th century literature took a paradoxical form of “loneliness” (Dmitriev, Pushkin, Ostrovsky and Batyushkov) and then was designated as a “moving” model of a Russian man’s life who escapes from Paradise — a “homeostatic” society (L. N. Gumilev). The transformation of the motif from a “stable” model to a “moving” one led to formation of a new Russian character — a “homeless wanderer” mentioned by F. M. Dostoevsky in his “Pushkin Speech”. The article puts forward a thesis that under the influence of wandering a part of Russian society feel inclined for Old Russian forms of world outlook that incites person’s searches for life paradise in his own soul. This trend appears in the pilgrimage and theological literature of the 19th century. The transformation of the ratio between the “stable” and the “moving” towards the Old Russian ideal of wandering brings man to the saving paths of evangelical commandments. The theme of “escape in the desert” is closely related to the theme of “Mental Paradise”. In this regard, the key plot of the popular collection “Mental Paradise” popular in the 17th century and released in Wallay Iversky Monastery in 1658–1659 is considered. Based on the manuscripts the article shows how the motives of “Paradise” and “escape in the desert” having preceded the trends and having been developed in the 19th century leading to the prosperity of pilgrimage literature, are presented in literature of pre-Peter Russia.

Keywords: motif, Mental Paradise, ideal of pilgrimage, escape in the desert, book culture of pre-Peter Russia, Dostoevsky’s “Pushkin Speech”

Text (russian)

References

The article is devoted to the memoir-autobiographical works of the great Russian satirist of the XVIII century D. I. Fonvizin. For the first time, it examines the autobiographical trilogy (“Message to My Servants Shumilov, Vanka and Petrushka”, “Letters from France”, “Sincere Confession in My Affairs and Thoughts”) as a single text. In the autobiographical works of the satirist, the Gospel text appears to be the most important connecting element determining the isomorphism of the author’s biography to the text. For the first time, D. Fonvizin’s “Autobiographical Trilogy” is investigated from the point of view of realizing the plot of the gospel parable about the prodigal son. The superimposition of the plot scheme of the parable (the departure of their father’s house — “Message to my servants…”, wanderings — “Letters from France”, the return of — “A Sincere Confession…”) reveals the transformation of the author’s spiritual and moral views: from godlessness through torment and spiritual search to repentance and gaining true Christian faith. The last work of Fonvizin is interpreted as an attempt to create the perfect autobiography. The system of epigraphs, as well as biblical quotes and allusions, are combined in an incomplete “Sincere Confession in My Deeds and Thoughts” into a single “supertext” of the author’s repentant prayer.

Keywords: Fonvizin, autobiography, Gospel text, life-creating strategies, prayer, penitence

Text (russian)

References

The article analyzes the peculiarities of biblical motifs and images in E. I. Kostrov’s works. In his odes the poet often refers to the Old Testament scenes and images through the prism of a Christian aspect. Kostrov considers ancient and the Old Testament subjects in the light of the Christian and Orthodox tradition. The poet attributes a Christian sound to the secular genre of the ode, saturating his works with the motifs of the Holy Scriptures. Kostrov often uses the concept of “meekness” emphasizing the sanctity of the Orthodox power, which gets commandments of mercy and humility from God leading to spiritual salvation. The motif of two paths — the unholy and righteous ones — becomes cross-cutting in Kostrov’s poetry. The path of Russia corresponds to the latter one. The motif of divine light descending into the world and eradicating the darkness is the motif of the people “chosen by God”. According to Kostrov, not the Jews but the Russians are such a people. Working with the texts of the Psalms, Kostrov introduces his own motifs, shows his individuality, reveals his own experiences and doubts, and disagrees with some ideas of his era. Christian ideals of meekness and non-violence are the main values in E. I. Kostrov’s poetry.

Keywords: Russian poetry of the 18th century, solemn ode, rewriting of the Psalm, axiology of literature, Old Testament plots and images

Text (russian)

References

The article reconstructs the creative history of the same name poems by A. S. Pushkin and M. Yu. Lermontov. M. Yu. Lermontov’s poem “Prophet” (1841) is considered as dialogical in relation to Pushkin’s “Prophet” (1826). By comparing draft and final versions of the poems, the semantic spectrum of the prophetic motif, common both o Pushkin and to Lermontov, is determined. The study of the creative work is used as an approch for understanding it. A special attention is paid to an eschatological motif openly stated in the draft of  “The Prophet” by Pushkin, going into subtext in the clean copy, but remaining paramount in the aspect of the work’s etiology and its rapprochement with Lermontov’s poem “The Prophet”. The features of Pushkin’s and Lermontov’s poetics are revealed. Pushkin emphasizes a single action associated with the idea of transforming a person into a prophet and developing in a single spatial point equal to the universe. Lermontov’s text is multi-event, that is bearing the prophetic word to people, the rejection by a vicious community, going to the desert, a harmonious stay in nature. It is noted that with a visible difference in the poetics of texts, the common stable and isomorphic to the prophetic motif remain the eschatological motif, the motif of transformation, the motif of carrying the word of God, the motif of paradisal being.

Keywords: A. S. Pushkin, M. Yu. Lermontov, poet-prophet, earthly world, creative history of the work, eschatological motifs

Text (russian)

References

The article focuses on the analysis of the poetic genesis of Lermontov’s poem “The Dream” (1841) that manifests itself in the author’s corrections in the rough copy and in the clean one. There was carried out a reconstruction of the poet’s creative process, of his work on the contexture and the creation of a completed artistic image. The article presents the transcription of the poem’s rough and clean copies including alterations and symbols of the manuscript. It has been proved that while the first versions in the main text identify three dreams, the final version keeps only two of them. In the course of his work on the text the poet chooses not to introduce the image of a dream into the first poem, but makes it clear that everything is happening in the dream only by means of the title. This technique increases the reality of the given image. In the analysis of the poem’s dynamic poetics a special emphasis is made on the registration of the landscape details changes due to which the poet conveys his perception of the natural world and his place in it as a body and soul creature. The narrator’s feelings of desolation and abandonment in the natural world get worse from the rough copy to the clean one, and at the same time grows his anxiety for the unanimity with his mistress who, as the hero himself, has a spiritual sight. The capacity of the characters for empathy and the experience of bodily death assert the poet’s faith in the immortality of the soul.

Keywords: M. Yu. Lermontov, “Notebook presented by V. F. Odoevsky”, clean copy, rough copy, diplomatic transcription, dynamic poetics, dream, death, love

Text (russian)

References

The article touches upon the analysis of the historical and literary circumstances of the appearance of one of the numerous author’s comments by Gogol on the comedian “The Government Inspector”, such as the article “The Prenotification for those who would like to play “The Government Inspector” as it should be”. A whole number of facts indicate that the origin of the “The Prenotification…” is related to the history of the creation by Gogol of the second edition of “The Government Inspector” in late December 1840 — February 1841. Together with the new edition, Gogol, unsatisfied with the staging of his comedy in St. Petersburg and Moscow theatres, first of all with the impersonation of Khlestakov, conceived a new presentation of “The Government Inspector”, believing that the revised edition would contribute to the theatrical updating of the play — performed “as it should be”. The text of the “The Prenotification…” precedes the creation of those fragments of “The Government Inspector” that Gogol sent for the new edition of the play in spring 1841 from Rome to Moscow for M. P. Pogodin and S. T. Aksakov and is a kind of a test experiment, a “rough draft” for “The excerpt from a letter written by the author shortly after the first presentation of “The Government Inspector” to one writer”, sent at that time to Aksakov, and simultaneously it is a preliminary description for subsequent explanations of the “silent scene” of “The Government Inspector” in the text of the very comedy. In addition, there is a connection between the “The Prenotification…” with drawings made by the artist A. A. Ivanov for the same final scene of “The Government Inspector”, which were created during the author’s reading of the comedy in Rome in February 1841. Thus, it is established that the “The Prenotification for those who would like to play “The Government Inspector” as it should be” properly was written not in the autumn 1846, as it is common to think, but five and a half years earlier, in early 1841. It is an opening article in the manuscript for the second edition of “The Government Inspector” in 1841, instead of which Gogol published here an accompanying article “The excerpt from a letter written by the author shortly after the first presentation of “The Government Inspector” to one writer”. The study allows us to conclude that Gogol’s interpretations are deeply organic to the original religious concept of comedy. The plot stem of the “The Government Inspector” is the “thunderstorm” of a distant government law, and of the even more inevitable Last Judgment. “The Prenotification…” addressed to the actors, and containing an appeal to take seriously and conscientiously the performance of the roles they were cast in, to pay special attention to the final scene, is an important component of Gogol’s strategy to bring back to his play the meanings lost due to inept staging. The presence of a number of motifs in the “The Prenotification…”, traditionally attributed only to the “late” Gogol, in the light of a new dating allows asserting the idea of the indissoluble unity and integrity of the artist’s creative path.

Keywords: Gogol, biography, creativity, textology, interpretation, hermeneutics, author’s intention, creative history, dramaturgy, stage performance, auto-commentary, foreword, composition, character, motive, integrity

Text (russian)

References

Based on the material of “Dead Souls”, the problem of the correlation of the “native” and the “universal” is considered. The author of the article highlights the special paraphrastic aspect of the interpretation of Russian classical literature, which includes both Western European aesthetic landmarks and the Orthodox cultural tradition, emphasizing their interweaving and mutual influence. In this aspect, the need to restore the full version of the name of Gogol’s poem is argued. The semantics of the cover of a separate edition of “Dead Souls” is analyzed. The author traces the paraphrastic context of the poem, referring to Dante’s “Divine Comedy”, which does not come down to motives, reminiscences, plot coincidences, but actualizes the unified Christian meaning of the Easter end of the earthly path, interpreted differently within the framework of Catholic and Orthodox cultural traditions. The semantics of the final Easter transformation of the “native” horizontal of Russia into the spiritual vertical of holy Russia in “Dead Souls” is revealed.

Keywords: the native, the universal, paraphrase, contexts of understanding, Gogol, Dante, Dead Souls, Divine Comedy

Text (russian)

References

The subject of scientific reflection is the contemplation and action as ways of the human attitude to the world, existence, substantiated and accomplished in the ontology of human life by I. S. Turgenev, thinker and artist. The presence of a “thought” and “will”, consciousness and action, knowledge and transformation is considered by the writer as a fundamental characteristic of the human way of existence, which becomes the semantic core of the philosophical and anthropological concept of the article-speech “Hamlet and Don Quixote” (1860), fundamental for the research on Turgenev's creative work at the level of historical poetics. The activity approach to the person, strengthened at the turn of the classical and non-classical stages of development of philosophical thought, — the time of formation of Turgenev’s world outlook, explains converging of the points of opposite “native types”, their transition from the ideal existence into the real one, their equally weighted opposition to the “evil and lies”. As a result, according to Turgenev's view the images of Hamlet and Don Quixote come together on the ground of “worship to the Truth” and the “idea of high merits” of the individual, in which the human “nature” and “quintessence” are objectified. Therefore, the analysis of the hamletian and don-quijotian types could be carried out by Turgenev just within the universal socio-cosmic lay of the interrelation of the opposites inherent in centripetal and centrifugal natural forces and their tendency to synthesis. The “tragic aspect of human life” engendered by the inaccessibility of such synthesis may be overcome by means of comprehension of the Truth, the “true meaning of nature”. Moreover, Turgenev’s ontological idea of the “Conciliation and absorbtion of everything existing in the other”, argued at the attitudinal and aesthetic levels, is the basis for the definition of the meaning of human life. This meaning is found in the balance between the content of all human life and the world, society, other people in the name of the “ideal”, establishment of the truth and justice. Hence, contemplation and action as forms of a morally responsible attitude to life in Turgenev’s artistic ontology are directly related to the problem of “high levels” and quality of human existence.

Keywords: Turgenev, philosophy of literature, ontology of human life, action, contemplation, the essence of man, truth, dignity, the Other, subjectology, characterology

Text (russian)

References

The article explores the role of logical connections in an epic text. It is these connections, according to the author of the article, that connect the individual components of the narrative (motifs, complexes of motifs) and make up in the reader’s perception for the missing elements. The reticence and failures to mention, common in fiction, appear in the narrative for various reasons. Sometimes due to the aesthetic principles of the writer who prefers ambiguity to a completed statement depriving readers of the opportunity to finish thinking over a vague idea. And sometimes, due to the author’s conviction that there is no need to explain the idea implied by what has been earlier said. But it also happens that the omissions in the narrative are engendered by the requirements for the presentation of a chosen topic, for example in crime fiction. But these reasons may go together as it occurs in Crime and Punishment. These ideas are illustrated by the analysis of one of the themes of the novel Crime and Punishment.

Keywords: Pushkin, Dostoevsky, criticism, logic of the text, motif, complexes of motifs, reception, understatement, crime, investigation, evidence, “tradesman in a dressing gown”

Text (russian)

References

The article deals with the poetics of completion in the novel “Demons” by F. M. Dostoevsky, and reveals the features of the “Conclusion” that reveals and generalizes the main idea of the work. The author analyzes the meaning of Stavrogin's letter to Daria Pavlovna Shatov, which sums up the hero's storyline, and clarifies the plot-composition function of the image of Marya Timofeevna. The novel symbolism of “lameness” excludes the possibility of considering the heroine as an “object of medicine” (L. I. Saraskin). The value of anachronism, which creates the originality of the novel's completion, is analyzed. The significance of semantic comparison of the story lines of Stepan Trofimovich and Nikolai Vsevolodovich is considered. The relationship between Stepan Trofimovich's Epiphany episode and the epigraph for expressing the idea of the novel is analyzed. When studying this problem, the preparatory materials of the work were involved. It is proved that in the novel “Demons” F. M. Dostoevsky showed the futility of criminal delusions and a difficult but necessary way to overcome them, and also expressed hope for the healing of Russia from these dangerous delusions.

Keywords: Dostoevsky, novel, “Demons”, plot, narrative, hero, conclusion, epilogue, conclusion

Text (russian)

References

The article focuses on the study of the role of the motifs in the development of the plot of Ivan A. Bunin’s novel “The Life of Arseniev”. Investigating the early stages of spiritual formation of the main character of the novel, the author of the article highlights the motifs of loneliness, the feeling of senseless of an imperfect existence, the aspiration to understand the meaning of all things, the highest sense of being, to find the source and sense of an existential despondency — longing for God. The aspiration to find unshakable and eternal values brings Arseniev about to take the unusual road, that is why the motifs of wanderings, encircling and pilgrimage have a significant role in the plot of the novel. The aimless wandering of Arseniev is a reflection of the fact that he has not yet found the highest sense of being, and is opposed to the motif of wandering as a conscious choice of the person, who establishes a certain truth by his own conscious way, that is why the meaning of the pilgrimage and such Christian images as a temple, church, cathedral, monastery, pilgrim, saints attests to the hero’s search for God and for the way to Him. Arseniev’s searches are conditioned by his strivings for an inmost soul that a human soul always imagines, that is by his longing for God, his desire to find the highest sense of being, a true path as the path to God. This conclusion is confirmed by the path of life of the main character which includes the interrelation of motifs of search of a sense and purpose of life, the right path, wanderings, encircling, pilgrimage and also the main iconic images (temple, monastery).

Keywords: Ivan Bunin, “The Life of Arseniev”, Existential and Christian Motifs, Christian Values, longing for God, sense of being, true path, pilgrimage

Text (russian)

References

The article studies the space-semiotic organization of one of the central symbolist novels of the Silver age, associated with the “estate topos” in Russian literature. Most of the action in the “Roman-Prince” by Z. N. Gippius takes place in the 1910s on the territory of country estates in different parts of Russia, as well as in the Western European castle near the Pyrenees, where Russian revolutionaries live. The duality of the Russian revolution manifested as late as in Decembrist movement (the “autocratic” dictatorship of P. I. Pestel and the Christian democratism of S. I. Muravyov-Apostol) echoed in Gippius’s novel in the form of the opposition between Roman Smentsev and Mikhail Rzhevsky, along with his supporters Florenty and Litta. Gippius’s discovery consists in the fact that she found in the field of “estate topos” a meaning that goes back to the activities of the Decembrists-noble revolutionaries of the first quarter of the 19th century, often large landowners. The “Estate topos” appears in the “Roman-Prince” as the topos of the Russian religious revolution in a number of local variations. The ideological and artistic circulation between its three loci unites the Western European castle, reminiscent of the educationist roots of the Russian “estate culture” with its ideal of a free personality, a noble estate of the Golden age, which brings Russia’s first apostles of religious revolution, and eclectic intelligent-landowner estate of the Silver age, the inhabitants of shich are under the evil power of the Antichrist of the revolution, genetically ascending to Stavrogin of the novel “Demons” by F. M. Dostoevsky. At the same time, they maintain the ability to break the fatal circle outlined by Smentsev thanks to the heterotopic connection with the other two estate projections presented in the novel. So, the scientific novelty of the article is that: here, in the material of the Gippius’s novel is identified and discussed an important modification of the “estate topos” in the literature of Russian symbolism — a landowner’s rural estate as a topos of the religious revolution, and for understanding of its structure a new category — “heterotopia of the estate” — is used.

Keywords: estate topos, estate locus, heterotopia of the estate, Silver age, symbolist novel, Z. N. Gippius, D. S. Merezhkovsky, religious revolution, religious community, new religious consciousness

Text (russian)

References

The study defines the tendency of modern poetry to gravitate towards enumeration and registers as an attempt to “restore” the cumulative figurative language, which has not a conditionally poetic, but mythologically real status. From the standpoint of historical poetics, such a language is interpreted as a series of outwardly heterogeneous, but semantically identical phenomena, rooted in the archaic consciousness. The specifics of the worldview in the lyrics of L. Aronzon and J. Brodsky, namely, a complex of motifs represented with the help of cumulative structures, is the subject of study. The study asserts that, having a stable “semantic halo” (extensive assimilation of reality as a set of equivalent elements), accumulation performs a wide range of tasks, forming bundles with different, if not opposite, motifs (“unity and magnificence” of the world — Aronzon; discreteness of being and its overcoming — Brodsky). A detailed analysis of both authors’ poems allows to identify both invariant (historically determined) and variative (individual creative) features of the cumulative figurative language.

Keywords: Aronzon, Brodsky, modern Russian poetry, cumulation, figurative syncretism, motif, image

Text (russian)

References

The article contributes to the study of implementation of the genre traditions of the Russian Medieval literature in the prose of the second half of the twentieth century, specifies categorical coordinates and challenges research approaches, artificially separating a single movement of Russian literature from the time of Ilarion and Avvakum to the present day. On the example of V. P. Astafiev’s book “Zatesi” which united the writer's small prose on the principle of cyclization of works based on the common stylistic and thematic features, the author comes to the conclusion about the artistic relevance of this technique, which originates in the medieval collections, in the aspiration of their compilers to work “outside of genre traditions” (D. S. Likhachev). But if in the Middle Ages this aspiration is more due to the subject-thematic tasks, in the New and Modern times the super-genre unity of the collection, of the book is a result of strengthening the compositional role of the author in their structural organization and the individualization of his image.

Keywords: literature of the Russian Middle Ages, V. Astafiev, genre, genre tradition, cycle, cyclization, super-genre unity, collection book

Text (russian)

References