Tracts or Vasily Shchukin’s Semiotic Journeys (Rec. Ad. Op.: Shchukin V. G. Gorod i mif: Issledovaniya v oblasti geopoetiki. –– M.: LENAND, 2021)

Abstract

The author of the book under review is the famous Slavic researcher Vasily Georgiyevich Shchukin (Krakow, Poland), whose works occupy a leading place in the development of the «estate» and «city» myths in human culture. The new monograph is a detailed and multifaceted development of the mythopoetic of the city. The view of the researcher is turned on the one hand, to the typical texts of Russian literature («The Storm» by Alexander Ostrovsky, «Oblomov» by Ivan Goncharov, «Crime and Punishment» by Fyodor Dostoevsky etc.), on the other hand, to empirical spaces refracted through the prism of artistic creations («Simonovo», «the Field of the Maiden», «Maryina Roshcha», «Lefortovo» etc.). A special place in the monograph is given to the study of the real loci of modern urban space (train stations, metro, Leninsky Gory, architectural buildings). The authors of the review note that in «Gorod i mif», the scientific interests of V. G. Shchukin go beyond the field of philology, linking with cultural studies, history, philosophy and art history. For the modern world and modern science, the «humanitarian» component of the reviewed work is extremely important. The study introduces the concept of «humanitarian geography», which is important for modern culture, it makes possible not only to perceive the world as a text («the world as a text»), but also to realize the dialogic nature of the space facing a person. Summarizing the huge and multifaceted material related to the semiotics of the city, V. G. Shchukin, according to the authors, creatively resurrects the «myth of the city».