Namesakes in literature, or Chekhov's code in Sholokhov's novels

Abstract

An allusive proper name is one of the traditional artistic devices of the Russian classics. The author examines Sholokhov's prose to find nearly a dozen names with reference to various Chekhov short stories. In most cases, there is no similarity between the characters' destinies, but the sheer ubiquity of Chekhov-inspired names can be considered as an homage to the master. On the other hand, the allusive names that Sholokhov consistently borrows from The Cherry Orchard [Vishnyoviy sad] are indicative of plot parallels between Sholokhov's novels and Chekhov's play. Notably, Sholokhov uses allusive proper names as a means of generalisation and typification of characters, from the bulwark of traditional morality, the Cossack woman Natalia Stepanovna, the ‘Russian Lucretia,' to the evercheerful soldier Lopakhin, to the family of Mikhail and Dunyasha Koshevoy as a symbol of recovery of the nation divided by the civil war, to the Gaev family as a premonition of the fate awaiting peasant Russia. Such allusions allow for treatment of Sholokhov's novels as a trilogy about the tragedies of the Russian people in the first half of the 20th c.