Subject-material ontology in “Doctor Zhivago”, the “final book” by Boris Pasternak

Abstract

The article is addressed to the problem of typological characteristics of a number of novels distinguished by a long-term, large-scale conception and genre "proteism". Conventionally referred to as the "final books", these works represent an attempt to create a "universal text" of cultural memory. Such a text is intended to reveal the "totality of being", to answer the main questions of life. Through the prism of signs of the "final book", this article examines the novel "Doctor Zhivago" by Boris Pasternak. The main attention is focused on the study of the ontological aspect of the objective, material world of the work, in particular, household objects and interior components. In descriptive fragments, the frequency lexemes "thing" and "object" are highlighted, which act as a reduced description. Their "collective" semantics creates conditional, generalised images of material and ideal objects that realize the idea of contact between the existential (sacred) and the ordinary and the idea of restoring unity (integrity). The lexeme “thing” acts as an actualiser of meanings associated with the concept of a way of life, an order of things, harmonious to a greater or lesser extent. The lexeme “object” is most often marked by the state of “ontological uncomfortableness”, “alienation” of objects of the external world from a person, which arose as a result of the disintegration of “living” connections, the absence of “contact” and decline in general. The opposition “thing-object” implements in the narrative “ready-made / code” philosophical generalisations, which are differentiated depending on situations, and it expresses the assessment of reality given by the narrator, whose worldview in many cases is extremely close to the position of the protagonist.