톨스토이의 서술방식:『세르기 신부』의 나선적 인식구조를 중심으로

Abstract

Tolstoy’s narrative technique is characterized by a detailed view of the protagonist’s inner world, one that experiences both heightened consciousness and frustration in the ideas formed by the external environment, thereby describing the process in which one establishes oneself as an autonomous human being in great detail. This is because Tolstoy, rather than focusing on the reality of truth, focused on the consciousness-raising process of characters who dismantle stereotypical ideas and orderly systems, and seek to take concrete truths and realize them in everyday life as the fundamental basis for their lives. This is also the case for his posthumous work, Father Sergius. Until now, this work has been analyzed as a criticism of the Russian Orthodox Church and the corrupt clergy, or as a moral description showing how physical desire corrupts one’s soul. However, such analysis undermines the literary value of this work. On the contrary, the significance of this work is in the detailed description of the consciousness-raising process of Sergius, who is transformed into a moral agent. In particular, this work, written 12 years after Tolstoy left the Russian Orthodox Church, reflects his distinctive religious conviction emphasizing the religious awareness of the here-and-now. Tolstoy, rather than revealing the truths of ideas, aimed at describing the consciousness-raising process of the people who seek to autonomously realize the truth through trial and error in everyday life, which echoes Tolstoy’s own religious awareness of the right here-and-now. This study analyzes the changes in the inner world of Sergius, who reforms into a moral agent, and examines how Tolstoy’s religious view is realized in his literature.