Тема Рождества в рассказе Н. П. Вагнера «Телепень»

Abstract

The aim of the research is to reveal the specifics of the artistic embodiment of the Christmas theme in N. P. Wagner’s story “Telepen” (at the level of the work chronotope, the system of images and the plot-compositional organization of the narrative). The theme of Christmas, as well as the problem of the genre Christmas canon transformation in N. P. Wagner’s fabulous creative work has not become a subject of a special comprehensive research yet. The scientific novelty is determined by the fact that for the first time one of the least known N. P. Wagner’s works with the Christmas theme - the story “Telepen”, which is included in the collection of philosophical tales and parables “Tales of the Purring Cat” (1872) and has the subtitle “A Christmas Story from Bygone Times”, is subjected to a holistic analysis in the chosen aspect. The article deals with the origins and tradition of the Christmas story formation in the Russian literature of the second half of the 19th century, the canon of the Christmas story as a source for N. P. Wagner’s work plot and its transformation there. As a result of the study, the expansion of the traditional framework of the “Christmas theme” by N. P. Wagner has been determined; a complicated genre structure of the text has been ascertained combining the traditions of the Christmas prose, everyday anecdotal tales and Gogol’s motives.