Konstantin Leontiev’s “Ascetic Philosophy”: Thesaurus and Context

A holistic and close study of journalism, works of art and letters of K. N. Leontiev allows the author of the article to show the formation of the writer’s views, designated by him at the end of his life with the words “my ascetic philosophy”, the context they existed in and his vocabulary changes. The work discusses Leontiev’s creative, philosophical and personal interest to the issues of life of the spirit, the dynamics of his views, it is shown, how in the 1860s Leontiev comes from an aesthetic interest in the Church and its political defense in consular posts to a thirst for faith. The author pays special attention to the idea and concept of obedience, which are associated with Leontiev's idea of ​​“transcendental egoism”, focusing on personal salvation. Behind the idea of ​​obedience, Leontiev thinks about self-condemnation. The writer and thinker clearly explains the interdependence and interdependence of two principles, the “world” and the “monastery”; for Leontiev, monastery culture becomes a synonym for Orthodox culture. Leontiev tried to introduce ascetic principles of discipline and “sobriety” into his own artistic creation, and not only into content, but also into “performance”, applying in practice the rules that he formulated later in his famous article Analysis, Style and Trends.

Nature Images in Russian Odic Poetry of the 18th – Early 19th Centuries: Functional Role and Influence on the Further Literary Process

The article is devoted to the functional role of nature images in the formation of the imaginary structure of Russian odic poetry of the 18th – early 19th centuries. Examples are taken from the odic poetry of Mikhail Lomonosov, Vasily Trediakovsky, Alexander Sumarokov, Mikhail Kheraskov, Gavrila Derzhavin, Dmitry Khvostov. An attempt was undertaken to answer two questions: the place nature images occupied in odic poetry in the era of its pride and, secondly, the possibility to find in the poetry of classicism, despite the condescending attitude towards it that developed later in the history of Russian literature, something that constituted an organic part of the Russian classics of the 19th and 20th centuries. The functional role of nature images in the odic genre is shown, which, as it seemed, by definition is alien to natural themes, being organically connected with the pathos of civic consciousness and the appeal to the themes of heroism, great personalities, and historical events. However, as it turns out in a number of cases, the very objects of nature evoke the poet's admiration as an impressive work of the Creator, in others, nature is a background that in a certain way enhances the impression of the very historical events that constitute the subject of odic poetry. The conclusion is made about a certain continuity in the depiction of nature – from odic poetry to Russian lyric poetry and prose of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The Epigraph to ʽForest and Steppe’ by Ivan Turgenev: Conveying the ʽEmblematic’ Worldview in the Tradition of Translation

The article focuses on the reception of Russian classical literature translations in the English-speaking culture. The research was carried out on the material of three existing translations of ‘Forest and Steppe’ by both Russian and English translators published in 1895, 1955 and 1967. The main objective of the research is to determine the difficulties translators of Russian literature of the 19th century could face in the case of Turgenev's epigraph to ‘Forest and Steppe’. The tasks of the study were to define and describe the peculiarities of conveying the epigraph’s vocabulary, to outline the group of the most important keywords of the text, to recognize and describe discrepancies in their translation, to indicate why the chosen option is possible or impossible in the translation of Turgenev’s text. The study showed that Turgenev's worldview was formed under the influence of the culture of ‘rhetorical word’, and the epigraph to ‘Forest and Steppe’ proves it. The epigraph consists of a chain of symbolic images that add up to a single picture. The writer's worldview determined the style of the epigraph, the choice of vocabulary, and the composition of the text. For translators, the main difficulty at the lexical level lies in the fact that they often choose words that carry a greater emotional load than Turgenev’s vocabulary, and also introduce tropes, absent in the original, into translations. On the one hand, the translations create a realistic picture, in contrast to Turgenev’s symbolic landscape, on the other hand, the atmosphere of the text, reflecting the personality of the writer, is destroyed. The translations mirror profound changes that took place in the 19th–20th centuries in the European worldview.

Review of the Main Book Publications about Abkhazia by Russian Authors of the 19th Century

The article provides an analytical overview of the books by Russian authors of the 19th century, containing information about Abkhazia. Among the studied editions are well-known books that have widespread use in science, as well as rare ones, which have not been given due attention. The reviewed publications contain information about Abkhazia of a physical-geographical, military-topographic, military-statistical, historical-ethnographic, linguistic and archaeological nature. The article attempts to establish the differences in the authors’ cognitive interest in Abkhazia. The materials of the analyzed texts differ in terms of their volume, some of them represent a section or chapter of a book, and there are also generalizing publications entirely devoted to Abkhazia. Despite the discrepancies encountered between the editions in the description of the ethnic appearance of the Abkhaz people, they all contributed to the accumulation of knowledge about it, and played an important role in the formation of scientific Abkhaz studies. Biased assessments and condemnatory characteristics given by individual authors to historical circumstances have been critically analyzed.

I. A. Goncharov and Dante: Poetics Issues

The article is a continuation of our works devoted to I. A. Goncharov's novel trilogy (“Ordinary History”, “Oblomov”, “Cliff ”) and, at the same time, to the traditions of Dante's “Divine Comedy” in this trilogy. We are talking about the similarity of philosophical and theological attitudes (“the deification of man”), which found expression in the poetics of Dante's poem and Goncharov's novels, built into a single work. It is suggested that the early “super-task” of the writer to create a novel trilogy could have been formed under the influence of F. S. Schelling’s article “On Dante from a Philosophical Point of View”, which suggests that every major epoch can reproduce a three-part work in the spirit of the “Divine Comedy”. Especially important, in addition to the three-part structure, is the poetics of light in “Divine Comedy” and Goncharov’s novels — with a weakened attention (and almost complete absence in Goncharov’s works) of the color scheme. This feature of the poetics of the two writers seems to be connected with the deeply embedded theological meaning of their works and a single common source — the Holy Scripture.

Autobiographical Heritage and the Fate of the Personal Archive of the Russian Comic Writer Nikolai Alexandrovich Leykin

The article is devoted to a review of autobiographical works and the personal archive of the Russian humorous writer Nikolai Aleksandrovich Leykin. His figure traditionally attracted the attention of literary critics in connection with the work of A. P. Chekhov, whose early stories appeared in the journal Oskolki published by Leykin. At the same time, the humorist’s extensive and interesting autobiographical legacy has hardly been studied and fully published. The article provides an overview of the currently known handwritten and published autobiographical works of N. A. Leykin: memoirs, notes and diaries. A separate issue is the fate of the writer’s personal archive and the characteristics of his materials in the archives of Russia. In the cataclysms of the first half of the 20th century Leykin’s archive was dispersed and divided into three parts. By a lucky coincidence, many documents survived and entered the state archives, but some diaries and handwritten memoirs have not yet been found. The study of the extant volumes of the diaries allows us to speak about their uniqueness. In addition to being important for the scientific community, the diaries will be of interest to a wide range of readers, as they recreate the picture of the life of Russian society on the eve of cardinal changes.

Alexey Konstantinovich Tolstoy as a Discovery

In the review, V. A. Kotelnikov’s new book “Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy in Life and Literature” is regarded as a scientific discovery. The author lists various aspects of the great work that became the discovery of the personality of Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy (the circumstances of his life, relations with contemporaries, opinions on pressing issues, philosophical reflections, etc.), the discovery of A. K. Tolstoy’s works, keeping many mysteries, the discovery of some of his remarkable contemporaries, the discovery of the time of the earthly existence of the writer and poet who lived and worked in a difficult transitional historical era. The review notes that the book by V. A. Kotelnikov is remarkable for the discovery of the historical and cultural era of the middle of the 19th century in her biggest achievements, characteristic tendencies. The author emphasizes the breadth and encyclopedic knowledge of the author of the new research, which is a necessary condition for creating a book about a personality of the scale of A. K. Tolstoy. The style of the new edition is assessed, the main substantive aspects considered by the author are given, the importance of labor in modern literary criticism is shown. The book by V. A. Kotelnikov through dialogue, analogies and comparisons with the creative personality of the writer of the golden age of the classics also becomes a discovery of himself for the modern reader.

On “Real Truth” and “Higher Truth” in the Art Criticism of F. M. Dostoevsky

The article deals with the art reviews of F. M. Dostoevsky. Based on the analysis of the articles “Exhibition at the Academy of Arts for 1860–61” and “About the Exhibition” published in “A Writer’s Diary” for 1873, the aesthetic criteria for Dostoevsky’s assessment of genre, historical, portrait and landscape Russian painting are determined. The author of the article reveals the most important criteria outlined by Dostoevsky: the expression of the author’s ideal that distinguishes a painting from mirror reflection and photography; the artist’s independence from direction, excessive naturalness, theatricality and “excessive showiness”. Particular attention is paid to Dostoevsky’s analysis of paintings by V. N. Jacobi, V. G. Perov, V. E. Makovsky, N. G. Sсhilder, M. P. Klodt, I. E. Repin, A. I. Kuindzhi, N. N. Ge, whose work aroused genuine interest of the writer and prompted reflections on artistic truth in art. The characters of the paintings as presented by Dostoevsky come to life, acquire a “history of feelings”, a psychological appearance and a voice. The work distinguishes between such concepts used by Dostoevsky to analyze contemporary painting for the writer in the light of “realism in the highest sense”, such as “natural truth”, “real truth”, “stage truth”, “artistic truth”, “higher truth”.

The Issue of Criticizing the Text of the Short Story ʽWhere Love Is, There God Is Also’ by Leo Tolstoy (1885)

The article is devoted to the issue of criticizing the text of Leo Tolstoy's short story “Where Love Is, There God Is Alsoˮ (1885), its purpose is to substantiate the choice of the main source of the text for publication and to cleanse it of distortions. In the research literature, the issue of clarifying the history of formation of the given work as an artistic whole is open, details of the final stages of its creation have not been reconstructed, the editorship of this literary monument has not been concretized. The proposed work was performed in a certain sequence. First, all the discrepancies between the first lifetime editions of 1885–1886 were identified, and then a comparative analysis of them with handwritten materials was carried out. At the final stage, the classification of these discrepancies was correlated with the textual practice of the predecessors. As a result, the choice of the twelfth part of “The Works of Count L. N. Tolstoy” (1886) as the main text source for publication was theoretically justified, a list of recommended corrections based on manuscripts was compiled and argued. The tradition of criteria for scientific criticism of literary monuments has been supplemented with new principles. This is the transparency of editorial intrusions into someone else's text, the obligatory references to manuscripts or earlier publications in the list of corrections, a comprehensive disclosure of its composition (not a truncated format), the inadmissibility for a text critic to act as a co-author of the writer.

Ivan Goncharov and the Philosophy of Science of His Time (Issue of Science and Religion)

During the period of rapid development of science and technology among the main representatives of Russian classical literature, only Alexander Herzen and Ivan Goncharov experienced a deep and substantive interest in the philosophy of science. For the author of “The Precipice,” this interest was associated with the main issue around which the dominant problematics of his work is concentrated: this is the question of the compatibility of scientific thinking and traditional faith. This work examines mainly one aspect of the topic: the writer's interest in natural science and, above all, in astronomy. Darwinism, with its thesis on the origin of man from ape, and astronomical discoveries that activated thoughts about life on other planets, gave rise to doubts in the mass consciousness about the established religious picture of the world. Goncharov defined his attitude to these changes long before the outbreak of the crisis of religious consciousness in the 1860s. As a conservative and deeply religious person, he took scientific progress seriously, not opposing it to religion and considering it an instrument of God's Providence for humanity. The crisis of religious consciousness in Russian society of the 19th century is regarded as the main subject of Goncharov's artistic research, which binds “A Common Story,” “Oblomov” and “The Precipice” into a trilogy.