"Dostoevsky and the Gospel of John": translated from the French article by N.A. Struve (1983) with comments

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to introduce readers to the translation of the article by the French Russianist, publicist and translator N.A. Struve "Dostoevsky and the Gospel of John" (1983), which has not been published in Russian until now. It is through language, first of all, that the reader gets acquainted with the writer, therefore, works that consider stylistic features of biblical texts in their subsequent comparison with Dostoevsky's texts are of particular value to us. In addition to the translation itself, the authors' tasks included comparing N.A. Struve's research with similar works in Russian, as well as compiling a commentary on some quotations, concepts and terms used in N.A. Struve's article. Dostoevistics has accumulated a lot of works devoted to the influence of St. The writings on the life, creativity and spiritual path of F.M. Dostoevsky, however, there are not so many studies among them that raise the question of the influence of the text of Holy Scripture on the writer's idiosyncrasy. For us, the syntax of Dostoevsky is of particular interest, namely, the comparison of the compositional connections of words in his works and the text of the Gospel of John. The proposed translation and commentary allow us to supplement the ideas that have developed in Dostoevistics about the influence of the Gospel of John on the work of F.M. Dostoevsky, taking into account the results of recent research, including the methodology of studying and describing the author's idiostyle and compiling a dictionary of the writer's language.