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• Scientists in Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s Novels

  Tünde Szabó

  Views:

  105

  This study focuses on a characteristic type of hero in Ulitskaya’s works and analyses the image of the scientist heroes and their poetic functions in three of the author’s novels (The Kukotsky Enigma, The Big Green Tent and Jacob’s Ladder). These heroes represent a special kind of syncretic thinking. Firstly, in their conversations and debatesthe genre code of the Socratic dialogue is activated, as Mikhail Bakhtin described it in connection with the development of the polyphonic novel. Secondly, these heroes, who always appear in pairs, invoke the duo of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, as well as certain characteristics of “Quixotism”, which has a central role in the critique of the role that intellectuals have played in Russian culture. It is against the above background that the role of 20th-century intellectuals gains a new interpretation in Ulitskaya’s three novels.

• Comedy against a tearful background: The interference of catharsis in L.S. Petrushevskaya’s play Colombina’s Apartment

  Aleksandr Kubasov

  Views:

  18

  The paperraises the question of catharsis in modern dramaturgy as a complex and ambiguous aesthetic reaction of the reader. The concept of “interference of catharsis” is introduced, meaning the combination of two of its types, laughter and tears, due to which a synergistic effect occurs that enhances both reactions. The introduced definition is tested based on the analysis of Petrushevskaya’s one-act play Colombina’s Apartment, which is recognized as an example of a philosophical farce. It is noted that in modern drama, the place of pure tearful and laughter catharsis has been taken by their reduced derivatives. Irony replaces open laughter, and feelings of bitterness or regret replace tears. The analyzed play is recognized as an example of modern metadrama. Petrushevskayauses not only the traditional characters of the commedia dell'arte (Harlequin, Pierrot, and Columbine) ata new time and in a new setting, but also the poetics of puppet theater, as well as the realities of Soviet children's theater. Laughter, which operates throughout the entire play, is removed at the end by the bitterly ironic aesthetic reaction of the readers, which is caused by compassion for the funny characters. Superimposed on one another, they create what is called the interference of catharsis.

• Metaphors in Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s Short Story ”The Queen of Spades”

  8 p.

  Angelika Molnár

  Views:

  218

  In this paper it opens up how Lyudmila Ulitskaya in her short story “The Queen of Spades”develops the crisis situation whichher heroes getsinto. So, the problems of the crisis should beanalysed also from a broader perspective, however, we will confine ourselves to only one rather narrow aspect of the analysis of poetic utterance, namely the tropological one.The chosen (mechanical and animalistic) metaphors are connected with the figure of the main heroine and also her revolting daughter.

• Female archetypes of Bunin’s images

  Ildikó Mária Rácz

  Views:

  20

  The system of ideas, Sophiology and philosophy of love of Vladimir Solovyov had a significant influence on the religious philosophy and formation of aesthetic views of the Russian Silver Age. Although the Nobel Prize-winning Russian writer in exile, Ivan Bunin, consciously distanced himself from the ideological and poetic tendencies of Russian Symbolism, the philosophical roots of Bunin’s prose after 1910 can be traced in Russian religious philosophy and Eastern religious teachings (Buddhism and Taoism). Bunin’s philosophy of love is also imbued with the dualistic vision that is fundamental to his philosophy of being, and the dichotomy of ‘heavenly’ and ‘earthly’ love is reflected in the ‘angelic’ and ‘demonic’ opposites of his female figures. Yet the former is the embodiment of the unattainable ideal of the Eternal Feminine, the latter, the Femme Fatale, the bearer of the earthly promise of carnal pleasures, of sexuality. The author’s female heroines also include the avatar of the Wise Woman (the embodiment of some ancient, archaic wisdom) or the Emanation of Isis (as the embodiment of cosmic energy, standing above the earthly laws of life and death). And like the symbols of yin and yang in Chinese philosophy, in the depths of each of Bunin’s female figures lurks something of its opposite.

• Specificity of the Organization of Text Space in the Novel of E. Vodolazkin «Soloviev and Larionov»

  9 p.

  Natalia Fateeva

  Views:

  152

  The article analyzes the specificity of the organization of the text space in the novel, the relationship of its title and main characters is clarified. The main motives of the story that unite the heroes and motivate the interweaving of their destinies are highlighted: the railway, the sea, the horse and the rider, childhood, life and death. It is proved that the text of the novel is built as a search for an answer to the question about the secrets of the life of General Larionov.

• On the meaning of disjunction and conjunction in Lermontov’s The Demon

  Katalin Kroó

  Views:

  17

  The paper analyzes Lermontov’s verse narrative (poema) The Demon by focusing on some clear-cut binaries, representing and suggesting, as their primary meaning, dichotomic pairs related to the system of literary characters (the Angel or Tamara vs. the Demon), evaluative concepts (e.g. good vs. evil), and notions comprising ideological views (the celestial, the earthly world, or the netherworld). The interpretation takes a distance from these definitions, examining the poetic modes of neutralizing and removing the dichotomies in the text by weakening the semantic motivation for setting and interpreting the binaries; the emergence of mono-dualistic antinomy, and the creation of equivalences of motifs and constructs of reverse symmetry with the transformation of their reference. Resulting from these strategies for meaning generation in Lermontov’s text, a shift from an axiological conceptualization of the world to the literary model of the human existential experience of the soul can be traced.

• The Heritage of Tolstoy’s Artistic Detail in the Poetics of Chekhov (Defamiliarization and „Randomness”)

  Dominika Zoltán

  Views:

  126

  One type of the “random Chekhovian detail ”can be referred to as a special cognitive phenomenon arising during the perception of the background and foreground within the depicted perception of the hero. In this paper, I suggest that this technique works if we perceive Chekhov’s laconicity against the detailed descriptions of the inner world of Tolstoy’s characters in the process of their estrangement. In the first part using the example of “War and Peace” I examine the “random” details concerning various features of Tolstoy's defamiliarization and show their transformation in Chekhov’s poetics. The examples from Chekhov’s early short stories “Grisha” and “Polinka” demonstrate an intermediate level of this transformation. In the second part I turn to the story “The Lady with the Dog” and consider the transformation of Tolstoy's technique through parallels with the novels “War and Peace” and “Anna Karenina”. The situation of Gurov and Tolstoy’s characters (Natasha, Prince Andrei, Levin) is similar with regard to the fact that they retain true love in their hearts and get  into an everyday social situation, where they are exposed to the the automatism and lies of everyday life with special intensity.

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

  Nóra Troitsky

  Views:

  158

  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.

• Teffi as a Person and Woman Writer: A View from Overseas

  6 p.

  Natalia Prusakova

  Views:

  204

  This review describes the conceptual and content side of the book by an American specialist Edith Haber on the life and work of Teffi (1872-1952). This is the only monograph on Teffi in the world. In the review a subtle combination of historical method and literary criticism is noted. The biography of an outstanding person and a talented woman writer is reconstructed against a well-known historical background – three Russian revolutions, two world wars and the first wave of Russian emigration. Special attention is paid to the E. Haber`s analysis of evolution in Teffi`s writing. The characters and plots were changed, the author’s tone and part were altered. The book is praised for its uniqueness and the author – for her high professionalism.