Harlequinade Grotesque in the Works of Isak Dinesen (Based on the Novellas «The Poet» and «Carnival»)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of the harlequinade grotesque in the novellas by the Danish writer Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) «The Poet» and «Carnival». The study proves relevant due to the following factors: 1) the current revival in foreign literary criticism of interest in the aesthetics of commedia dell’arte, as well as the role it played in the art of the 20th century; 2) growing interest in Dinesen’s work in Russian literary criticism. This article is the first to highlight both the presence of the harlequinade grotesque in Dinesen’s work and its originality. The authors of the article show how Dinesen’s passion for Italian popular comedy and harlequinade, typical of Scandinavian literature of her era, grew into a special worldview and writing style that synthesized the tragic and the comic. The article aims at revealing the features of the harlequinade grotesque in Dinesen’s work. The leading method in the study is the method of intertextual analysis: the characters and plots of the short stories are analyzed for their similarity with classical images (Harlequin, Pantaloon, Columbine, etc.) and collisions of the harlequinade (the flight of lovers from oppressive old men). The article reveals the features of the representation of the harlequinade plot and the functions of the harlequinade grotesque that evolve from them. The results presented in the article allow us to say that the harlequinade grotesque in Dinesen’s work was realized at the character and plot level, being the mouthpiece of the writer’s worldview, transmitting her aesthetic principles and moral principles. Also, the presence of the harlequinade grotesque in Dinesen’s prose suggests the presence of a similar technique in the work of other Scandinavian writers and confirms the status of this type of grotesque as a pan-European one.