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• The Hungarian reception of Dostoevsky until the 1920s in the context of European and Hungarian Modernism

  Ágnes Dukkon

  Views:

  283

  This paper deals with the questions Dostoevsky’s reception in Hungary in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The author investigates the growing interest in Dostoevsky in the context of the new trends of art and literature and gives a detailed survey of the most characteristic reactions (i.e. reviews, studies, introductions to books) about the new translations and editions of Dostoevsky’s works. Among the most relevant questions addressed arestereotypes about Russian culture and people, living in Hungary duringthe past centuries, the various interpretations of Crime and Punishment, and some comparative aspects in the analyses of this novel.

• Georgy Adamovich ‘The Beginning of the Story’, ‘From a Clogged Notebook’ - about the Turgenev’s Subtext

  11 p.

  Ludmila Sproge

  Views:

  302

  The discourse of ‘Ich-Erzählung’ creates visibility, or an autobiographical narrative,
  where the author narrates the more famous classical texts on the theme of ‘love as strong as
  death’. The narration of stories is based on the principle of the repeatability of individual
  thematic units built on similarities and contrasts. The text that is being created does not translate into an autonomous story about Maria Leopoldovna, but it exposes the technique of reminiscence poetics. Quotes and auto-quotes form or create a peculiar language of the major art,
  where the names of Turgenev and Tolstoy are markers of the story. Turgenev’s subtext is
  connected with the way meaning is constructed in the story, which is told about love that has
  never come true but is remembered all one’s my life.

• The Emigré Writers of the Empire : Other Coasts of Russian Literature and Culture: Ideas, Poetics, Contexts. Collective Monograph. Eds. Elżbieta Tyszkowska-Kasprzak, Ilona Motiejunaite and Alfija Smirnova in cooperation with Maria Gej. Scriptum, Wroclaw ‒ Krakow 2021, p. 494 ISBN 978-83-66812-37-6

  Lajos Pálfalvi

  Views:

  224

  This volume of studies on Russian émigré literature was published during the last year before the war in a form of scholarly cooperation between Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, and Czech scholars unthinkable today. The theme of joint research makes the work even more interesting, because Poles have a very different understanding of the mission of émigré writers than Russians. In the first chapter of the monograph, entitled The History of Emigration, we find interesting biographical portraits of prominent figures such as Alexander Herzen and Gleb Struve. In the next part we read mainly about ideological problems and ethnic stereotypes. The third chapter focuses on the problems of poetics, and the last on heterotypes. The aspects of the analyses also touch upon the poetics of space and imagology.

• Bugs, Burrow, Inquisitor: Dostoevskian Intertexts in Eyeless in Gaza

  Angelika Reichmann

  Views:

  263

  The present article is devoted to the discussion of intertextual connections between Aldous Huxley’s Eyeless in Gaza (1936) and three works by Dostoevsky: Notes from the Underground(1864), Crime and Punishment (1869) and The Brothers Karamazov (1880, Grand Inquisitor scene). As is well-known, the Dostoevskian novel of ideas was a major inspiring force for Aldous Huxley’s art: Huxley’s rewriting of the Grand Inquisitor episode in Brave New World (1932) is probably the best-known case in point. Nonetheless, insufficient critical attention has been devoted to the actual intertextual connections between the two novelists’ output. As I have demonstrated earlier, on closer inspectionPoint Counter Point (1928) turns out to be a rewriting of Devils (1872), which, however, alsoproves to be a low point in Huxley’s assessment of Dostoevsky – a companion piece to his incidental vicious critique included in his 1929 essay on Baudelaire, in which Huxley also targets spiritual quest. Let me argue that Eyeless in Gaza can be read as a sequel to that polemic, in which a change of Huxley’s attitude to Dostoevsky is clearly notable: the novel provides a much more subtle and even respectful critique of Dostoevsky by implying the universal relevance of the Dostoevskian underground to the understanding of the modern human condition and by re-embracing spiritual quest.

• From the Classic Novel to the Crime Novel: A Genre Paradigm Shift in Artistic Reception

  Olga Fedunina

  Views:

  181

  The article deals with the cases of classical works completion, in which their genre nature undergoes a change. The texts are transferred from the sphere of high literature to the low one, as the continuing of the plot with the criminal line becomes the main method. The material for the analysis is “The very same Tatiana” by A. and S. Litvinovs, as well as the novel “Death Comes to Pemberley” by P.D. James. I show that one of the most relevant genres in this change of genre paradigm is “by victim investigation”, which allows to retain some recognizable items of the classic primary source.

• Identity Problems from Historical, Cultural and Literary Aspects

  7 p.

  Andrea Posta

  Views:

  384

  This critique focuses on the latest part of the publication series by the Slavic Historical and Philological Association entitled “Individual and Collective Identities”, which is of great importance for the field of Russian Studies in Hungary as it provides a regular platform for academics with annual conferences. In the three main chapters of the book, identity is approached in different contexts from a historical, cultural, and literary point of view. For this reason, we can say that this collection stands out due to its interdisciplinary nature and complexity serving as a useful resource for those who deal with identity issues.

• Musical Ekphrasis in I.S.Turgenev's Novel Rudin

  Nóra Troitsky

  Views:

  375

  Turgenev-scholars often use the word "musicality" or "musical code" in the analysis of the writer's fictional prose, since Turgenev often refers to music in dialogues, in descriptions of the characteristics of the heroes. This article focuses on a musical piece, which occurs in the third chapter in Turgenev’s Rudin,F. Schubert’s famous “Erlkönig” Lied. This musical scene of the short novel evokes the mysterious atmosphere of Goethe’s ballad. Schubert’s “Erlkönig” thematizes some of the parallel motifs that appear in the novel such as travel, the motive of finding a path, and the problem of intransmissibility. My aim is to examine how these motifs are manifested in Turgenev’s novel. On the one hand, this research examines the purpose of the musical ekphrasis and how it might foreshadow his fate. This mimetic musical ekphrasis allows us to interpret the novel from different aspects. On the other hand, this intertextual element can be perceived as “mise en abyme” (L. Dällenbach), proceeding from the fact that the function of a diminutive mirror provides a key to a deeper understanding of the text.

• The Function of the „Author’s Mask” in “The Soul of a Patriot or Various Epistles to Ferfichkin” by Yevgeni Popov

  Annamária Vass

  Views:

  303

  Playing with the author’s figure is not a new device in Postmodernism. One may refer to “Either/Or” by Søren Kierkegaard or “The Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin” by Alexander Pushkin, or “The Fiery Angel” by Valery Bryusov. At the same time the foreword of “The soul of a patriot or Various epistles to Ferfichkin” proves that in Postmodernism this game is taken to the next level. The author who abandoned their fictional space and renounced theirauthorial role during Modernism returns and re-takes their formal place. However, he does not do it seriously but hiding behind the mask of the author – says Malmgren, introducing the term of the author’s maskinto literary discourse. In this analysis I state that Popov, using the author’s mask, turns the traditional interpretationof the author’s role inside out.  I conclude that, on the one hand, the author’s mask ridicules the concept by which the author’s biography is the key to his work. On the other hand, it makes fun of Vinogradov’s view, according to which there is always an abstract author hiding in the text who carries its real meaning. I come to the conclusion, that Popov uses this narrative technique to emphasise that it is impossible to look at a literary work as an arsenal of ultimate truths and statements. 

• Rácz, Ildikó Mária: A lét és a szerelem szentsége. Ivan Bunyin művészi világképe. L’Harmattan, Budapest 2020, 373 pp. ISBN 978-963-414-681-0

  Ágnes Dukkon

  Views:

  274

  This review presents a critical analysis of the monograph on Bunin by the Hungarian researcher Ildikó Mária Rácz. The author describes the main thematic blocs of the volume, for example, the influence of classic Russian literature on Bunin (Turgeniev, Tolstoi, Chekhov, and Tiutchev), the role of Eastern philosophy in the evolution of Bunin’s art, the connection between the modern psychological concepts (Freud, Jung) and the short stories as Mitya’s love or The grammar of love.

• From Gregory of Nyssa to Boris Akunin and Eugene Vodolazkin – and beyond : “the language, which I spake and fram’d”: Linguistic Presence: Collection of Academic Papers in Honour of Arpad Kovacs’s 80th Jubilee. Edited by A. Molnár and M. Hoványi. Budapest, ELTE Eötvös József Collegium, 2024, pp. 416. ISBN: 978-615-5897-67-2

  Márk Murányi

  Views:

  188

  This review discusses the Festschrift published in honour of Professor Árpád Kovács’s 80th birthday. Professor Kovács is an eminent Hungarian scholar whose research on Russian Literature (mainly on Dostoevsky’s oeuvre) and innovations in literary theory are well-known, respected and followed by the Slavic studies specialists throughout the world. The volume consists of 30 papers written by Professor Kovács’s friends, colleagues and admirers. In the high standard and innovative approach of each paper, the volume is undoubtedly worthy of Professor Kovács’s legacy and represents the unique approach to literary texts which he established during his career.

• The Chaos of Fragments, the Fragments of Chaos The Last Prosaic Work of M. Yu. Lermontov: Shtoss

  Andrea Posta

  Views:

  294

  The unfinished short story, Shtoss received little attention from critics, despite of the fact that it is actually the last prosaic text written by M. Yu. Lermontov. It has become somewhat forgotten because it was interpreted as nothing more than a literary joke the young poet played on his friends in St. Petersburg a few months before his tragic death. This article is a narratological analysis of the short story Shtoss based on the terminology used by Gerard Genette and Boris Uspensky. It also aims to interpret the possible function of fragmentation, absence and uncertainty in the short story.

• Issues of Translation from Russian to Hungarian and from Hungarian to Russian: Studia Litteraria 2020/1-2, LIX. évfolyam. Orosz irodalom fordításokban. Debrecen 2020, 146 p. HU ISSN 0562-2867

  Zsófia Varga

  Views:

  213

  This review is a content overview of the issue 1-2/2020 of Studia Litteraria, a Journal of Literary and Cultural Studies. This collection of scholarly articles is an excellent material for a varied and comprehensive look at current matters of translation and contemporary literature. The authors of the articles are practicing translators, therefore the general positions are explained through their own, specific works and practical experience. The purpose of this review is to briefly acquaint readers with the content of scholarly papers which have been categorized by topics for convenience.

• New Trends in the Use of Metaphors and Similes Including Names of Food in Modern Russian Prose

  Natalia Nikolina

  Zoya Petrova

  Views:

  300

  The article discusses metaphors and similes including culinary vocabulary, functioning in modern Russian prose. The purpose of the article is to identify new trends in the use of such figurative constructions in modern prose compared with the previous period in the development of Russian literature. The work outlines the main thematic groups of names of food and drinks used in prosaic texts, and notes changes in their composition and character. New elements in the semantic classes of «vehicles» of metaphors and similes are also revealed. A tendency towards the differentiation and concretization of images of comparison, which is characteristic of modern prose, is noted, and the means of its implementation (specific names and qualifying definitives) are described. The article considers new subjects of comparison and figurative parallels used in modern prose texts.

• Intimacy or exposure: Ukrainian artists and the camp wound in relations with Russia

  Kinga Anna Gajda

  Michał Kuryłowicz

  Views:

  364

  The aim of the paper is to provide an interdisciplinary analysis of cultural testimonies of the unique wound left by the camps in Ukrainian–Russian relations. Gulag literature, explored for decades in philology, is perceived mainly through the prism of the heritage of totalitarian systems and creative attitudes in the face of suffering, as extreme physical and mental experience. The aim of the paper is to analyze the works of Ukrainian artists of recent decades created as a result of imprisonment. Their literary and film creations make up the image of a wound inflicted in the name of achieving imperial goals while imprisoned in a camp. The juxtaposition of their diverse artistic reactions to the suffering of testimonies help to highlight the power with which the unsettled, forgotten, silenced, and now and unexpectedly updated wound of the camp past is reflected in today's attitudes of Ukrainians towards Russians.

• Ekphrasis - Chameleon of Literary studies “Theory and History of Ekphrasis: Results and Prospects of Study” Siedlce, 2018

  9 p.

  Nóra Troitsky

  Views:

  461

  This article aims to highlight the various methods in which ekphrasis can be analysed and new interpretations of the phenomenon in the monograph “The Theory and History of Ekphrasis: Results and Prospects of the Study” published for the 15th year anniversary of the previous work “Ekphrasis in Russian Literature” (2002). The articles touch upon the history of the study of ekphrasis, its typology, the dynamics of its functions as well as the poetics of description in the history of literature, theory and classification, including the theme of narratology, and works containing analysis from autobiographical points of view. The novelty of the monograph is that it also includes contemporary fiction which provides an excellent opportunity to redefine and reinterpret the phenomenon.

• Hero of Contemporary Russian Prose: Anna Skotnicka, Szczelina. Bohater współczesnej prozy rosyjskiej i jego światy, Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, Kraków 2020, 335 s. ISBN: 978-83-233-4771-2

  Elżbieta Tyszkowska-Kasprzak

  Views:

  220

  The text contains a review of the monograph by the Polish literary critic Anna Skotniсka A fissure: A hero of contemporary Russian prose and his worlds. The author considers incompleteness, absence, and insufficiency as a property of the existence of the character of the works of Russian writers of the late 20^th to early 21^st centuries. The sources of this problem, according to Skotnicka, can be seen in the state of disintegration of the social, psychological and mental image of the world in a changing reality, especially historical changes: the collapse of the Soviet Union, as well as political, cultural and social transformations. With these phenomena, the Polish literary critic also connects the concept of chaos, which is characteristic of the postmodern perception of the world as disunited, incomprehensible, alien in relation to people. Skotniсka considers these problems based on the works of Mikhail Kuraev, Svetlana Aleksievich, Roman Senchin, Lyudmila Petrushevskaya, Lyudmila Ulitskaya, Vladimir Makanin, and Mikhail Shishkin. The author refers to the current achievements of the humanities, especially philosophy. The work is innovative and stimulates reflection on the state of the modern human.

• Gender and Space in Literature and Cinema (Bogomil Rainov’s Roads to Nowhere and Metodi Andonov’s A White Room)

  Natalya Nyagolova

  Views:

  261

  The article discusses the structural link between the gender model and the fictional space in Bogomil Rainov’s short story Roads to Nowhere (1966) and its film adaptation—Metodi Andovov’s A White Room (1968). The transformations of the original text are traced via several semantic oppositions (masculine-feminine, rational-emotional, order-chaos) and the influence of two aesthetic paradigms—noir and the existentialist “new wave”. These transformations are interpreted in the socio-cultural context of the Bulgarian “thaw” with its quest for the marginal, regional, personal alternatives within the socialist system.

• The beginnings of the collective identity of Slovaks in the Central European context

  Peter Káša

  Views:

  223

  The study analyses the linguistic, literary and cultural contexts of the formation of Slovak national identity during the Enlightenment and the early national movement. The Slovak intellectual elite identified and defined Slovaks and the Slovak nation in terms of modern Austrian statehood, traditional Hungarian patriotism and cultural Slavism. The study shows that modern Slovak nationalism was already richly structured atits beginnings, adopting diverse ideological impulses and establishing relations with neighboring Slavic and non-Slavic cultures. 

• Language Registers’ Variety and its Implementation in the Commentary Novel The True History of “The Green Musicians”

  Dmitry Mazalevsky

  Views:

  383

  The paper examines the tools and techniques Yevgeny Popov uses in his commentary novel The True History of “The Green Musicians", combining various styles and types of speech, thereby assembling a diverse linguistic picture of the Soviet era. Popov destroys the myth created by Soviet ideology and propaganda about the people supporting the government, emphasizing that the people expressed their true attitude towards the Soviet regime through adages, ditties and other genres of folklore. Gathering a broad collection of poems and proverbs, slang and officialese, examples of censorship and self-censorship, the writer gives his assessment of the Soviet totalitarian regime. Implementing a complex system of 888 notes to his early unpublished text, Popov also protests against the totalitarianism of the linear text, thus expressing his position not only at the thematic level of the novel, but also at the level of the novel’s form.