Literary Life Research Articles

The image of the city in ancient Turkic monuments

The article deals with the city models in the philosophical tractates «Beneficial knowledge» by Yusuf Balasaguni and «Diwani Hikmet» by Ahmed Yasawi. The above mentioned philosophical tractates «Beneficial knowledge» by Yusuf Balasaguni and «Diwani Hikmet» by Ahmed Yasawi are nowadays the common heritage of the Turkic people as a treasure of the history of social, cultural and literary life of the middle ages. All-round systematic study of the ethnic group and statehood, language and graphic system, historical, cultural and ethnopolitical situation of the Kazakh and other Turkic people is an important task for our contemporaries. There are a lot of evidences that the Turkic people inhabiting the vast steppes at the junction of Europe and Asia have long been accustomed to urban life. This is evidenced by the description of the life of the city's inhabitants that can be found in medieval works: «Beneficial knowledge» by the philosopher, poet Y. Balasaguni and «Diwani Hikmet» by A. Yasawi. City Kuzorda (Balasaguni) and Kashgar are mentioned in the work of Y. Balasaguni «Beneficial knowledge» and the cities Medina, Mecca and Turkestan are mentioned in the work «Diwani Hikmet» by A. Yasawi. We have identified the following models of the city through hermeneutical analysis of the selected artistic works: 1. «City – space»; 2. «City – sacred place»; 3. «City – citizens»; 4. «City – disappointment»; 5. «City – historical figures».

FROM A COMMENTARY TO EUGENE ONEGIN BY A.S. PUSHKIN: DEDICATION, P.A. PLETNEV AND ‘PUSHKIN CIRCLE’

The study of literary relations is always hampered by the lack of direct evidence or their unreliability and the lack of a complete picture of literary life. Thus, it is necessary to reconstruct the historical, literary and biographical contexts by separating the facts that have stood the cross-check from the information that has not been verified. It is even more significant in cases when the specific involvement of writers in ‘invisible’ or at least implicit processes is discussed - it could determine not only some certain features of literary life, but also the images of literary history and ideology of literature. This is exactly how the history of literary relations between A.S. Pushkin and P.A. Pletnev seems to contain something purely non-trivial. Indeed, Pushkin rather unexpectedly dedicated the novel Eugene Onegin to a minor poet and a literary critic of little influence. The fact that it was Pletnev who acted as the trusted publisher of the novel in verse seems important, but not sufficient enough to explain Pushkin’s decision. Th is paper is devoted to other literary contexts of this case: it examines Pletnev as one of the prototypes of Lensky. Moreover, we analyze Pletnev’s review of the collection of poems by E.A. Baratynsky, which contained all the motives of Pushkin’s Dedication and was focused on the image of the history of Russian literature as it was presented in Eugene Onegin.

Review of The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams

A review of Philip Zaleski and Carol Zaleski, The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams (New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2015). 644 pages. $17.00. ISBN 9780374536251.

LING UISTIC MEANS OF ARTISTIC EXPRESSION IN TRANSCULTURAL PROSE OF FINLAND (PART 1)

The article discusses the features of transcultural writing on the material of the work by Ranja El-Ramly The Position of the Sun(2002). The work is written in Finnish, which, along with Arabic, is native to the writer, since El-Ramly comes from a bicultural family. The purpose of the study is to describe alliteration as a means of artistic expression. The methodological basis of the article is a transnational approach to cultural phenomena, which pays attention to movements and sociocultural existence beyond national, cultural, and linguistic boundaries in literary life. The main research method is the method of linguistic description of specific linguistic facts.The article reveals the content of the term ‘transcultural literature’ and its place in the literary space of Finland. The genre of the work The Position of the Suncan be defined as a lyrical novel, which is relatively new for Finnish literature. The work represents the flow of impressions that make up the content of the narrator’s image.The author of the article concludes that the special sound organization of words in a sentence, for example, the repetition of identical vowel sounds at the level of a phrase and even a sentence, is aimed at the emotional transmission of the mental world of the character

„This is how we love you in France! Now do what you want with our love!” or about the visits of some writers to Chișinău

The theme of the dialogue is the visits of foreign writers to Chișinău and the literary collaborations with them during the last two decades of the Soviet regime and in the first two after the emergence of the new state Republic of Moldova. The facts are reconstructed by the poet, prose writer, playwright, folklorist Iulian Filip, who was actively involved in them, starting in the 70s. Thus, the meetings in Chișinău with the Armenian poet Ghevorg Emin, the Japanese translator Sumiya Haruia, the Romanian writers Ioan Alexandru, Mircea Tomuş, the Italian journalist, editor and translator Amedeo Carrocci etc. are reconstructed. As a result of these meetings, collaborations were established and especially writers from Chișinău literature were translated. Living memory corrects the official records, irremediably converted to the themes required by Soviet culture, which the foreign writers who arrived in Chișinău had to honor. At the same time, Iulia Filip reconstructs some sequences from the literary life of the first years of the independence of the republic between the Prut and Dniester.

The literary life of colonial parasites

The literary life of colonial parasites

The Vital Mission of Creative Work in Contemporary Authors’ Ego-Narratives

This article examines literary interviews of Ural authors A. Salnikov and E. Simonova. The narrative analysis of the interview makes it possible to identify how the writer defines the writer’s mission, draw a conclusion about the strategies of public self-perception, its emotional dominants, and aspects of understanding the legitimacy of writing in the current literary process. The narrative about the author has a metatextual character, which is a result of the reconstruction of recurring (repetitive) motifs which are personally (emotionally) or supra-personally (culturally, regionally, nationally) conditioned. The “history of authorship” is enclosed in a narrative frame (the dialogue structure of the interview, non-free speaking). Speech genres of various types (“memory”, “anecdote”, etc.) freely circulate inside the interview. The writers’ narrative is interpreted as part of a “big story” about authorship told by its participants for a wide range of interested persons. The comparative analysis of the selected authors relates to the general moments of the creative fate of the writers (participants of the “Nizhny Tagil Renaissance” and, more broadly, the literary life of the Urals). The narrative frame of their interview depends on the fact of the “second debut” and puts Simonova and Salnikov in a situation of retrospective introspection. The event of entering the world of writers (the effectiveness of the event) is understood as a deviation from the natural course of things (Salnikov). Simonova’s self-perception speaks of a return to normality, to the natural existence of the creator in the world of words. The author makes a conclusion regarding the peculiarities of Salnikov’s and Simonova’s individual and creative self-mythologisation. For Salnikov, it is marginalisation: the writer mythologises the author’s path by crossing the border between the world of “non-writers” to the marginal world of poets. For Simonova, it is ironic casualisation: she deliberately denies poetic insights, giving importance to the ethical symmetry of talent and man through the development of self-depreciation traditional for Russian literature etiquette. The situation of the “second debut” (widely known among the reading public of different types), depending on different factors in each case but equally significant in the manifestation of writers in the public space, demonstrates the stability of the conditions accepted for themselves as authors throughout the creative path, is a way to establish the foundations of personal vitality.

The vicissitudes of life in the mirror of Nikolai Gumilyov`s literary reputation in the post-symbolist period

Nikolai Gumilyov is one of the key figures of acmeism and the literary life of Russia in the 20th century. The image of Nikolai Gumilyov, aspects of his work and influence on literature are of keen interest for modern philology. The article is devoted to a review of the elements of the biography that affect the literary reputation of the poet. The chronological framework of the study is the period from 1910 to 1914, from the period of the decline of symbolism to the outbreak of the First World War. The subject of the study is the reputation of the poet N. Gumilyov in the post-symbolist period. The analysis of the subject is carried out by means of system-typological, biographical and cultural-historical methods. The ups and downs of N. S. Gumilyov's fate influenced not only the creative process, serving as inspiration, but also the literary reputation of the poet, which determines the scientific novelty of the study. The result of the work carried out was the selection, through the analysis of selective places from the biography of N. S. Gumilyov, of such components of his reputation in the period of post-symbolism as “writer”, “traveler” and “lover”. The conclusions presented in the material can serve as a basis for considering both literary reputation in general and directly in the analysis of the image of the poet, as well as in determining the specifics of other periods of Nikolai Gumilyov's work and their influence on the literary reputation of the poet.

"Our Grand Inquisitor is a very good Man": to the Scientific Biography of Naum Abramovich Bortnik (1911-1977)

The article is devoted to the scientific biography of the Soviet medievalist, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor Nahum Abramovich Bortnik (1911-1977). The author pays special attention to the period of the Great Patriotic War. Letters addressed to N. A. Bortnik are introduced into scientific circulation. The letter of the writer Isaac Sadykov, who worked a lot in Sverdlovsk during the Great Patriotic War, sheds light on the literary life of the city. Special attention is paid to the discussions, sometimes acute, emotional, devoid of academic chic, which flared up between M. Ja. Sjuzjumov and N. A. Bortnik. The article publishes the minutes of the meeting of the Department of General History of the Ural State University. The author comes to the conclusion that it is necessary to reconstruct the scientific biographies of Soviet historians. This work is important for the preservation of the scientific heritage of our country. The publication of sources, in this case, is the only antidote against the tenets of "cathedral historiography" and empty references "separated by commas" in the notes for the next anniversary date. The article is a continuation of the study of the biographies of historians who were part of M. Ja. Sjuzjumov's "inner circle" and represents an independent scientific problem. The complete opposite of M. Ja. Sjuzjumov was undoubtedly N. A. Bortnik (1911-1977). They were separated by many things. Thus, M. Ja. Sjuzjumov belonged to the last generation of pre-revolutionary historians. Naum Abramovich Bortnik was a representative of the first generation of Soviet scientists. Professor Sjuzjumov has been developing the theory of dialectical continuity all his life; Professor Bortnik followed the "romantic school", highly appreciating the role of the masses of the people. M. Ja. Sjuzjumov saw echoes of political struggle in heretical movements; N. A. Bortnik insisted on the most important role of the leaders of the masses.

Moscow in the Works of the “Big Book” Winners: Location, Subject, Image

The paper considers the contribution of the works-laureates of the national literary prize “Big Book” to the formation of the “Moscow text” in the domestic literature of the 21st century. The relevance of the topic is determined by the most important role of the “Moscow text” in Russian culture in general and in the modern literary process in particular. The novelty of the research is in the specific consideration view of this cultural phenomenon: through the identification of characteristic features of the “Moscow text” in the works marked by the “Big Book”. The author presents review of the works of laureates, where Moscow is mentioned: popular science publications and works of art (mostly large, in several cases — medium epic form). The author shows that the place and role of Moscow in the text are always individual, correlated with the artistic tasks of each author and his personal perception of the city. The review starts with the collection of essays by the Moscovite scholar R.E.Rakhmatullin, dedicated, by definition of the author himself, to the metaphysics of Moscow. Then the author considers the novels by A.A. Kabakov, V.A. Zolotukha and L.A. Yuzefovich. Each of them has created an expressive image of the Russian capital in different periods of its existence. In a number of the works considered, Moscow primarily acts as life environment of the central character: lifelong (in L.E. Ulitskaya) or corresponding to a certain, more often initial period of biography (in M.S. Stepnova, M.P. Shishkin, etc.). In all these cases, the place of residence affects the fate of the character and, in turn, is characterized by the events of the plot. In a separate block, the article highlights the novelized biographies of Moscow writers, in which the capital is depicted as the centre of the literary life of the country. The paper shows both the role of each named writer in Moscow literary life and the reflection of Moscow life in his work. The author considers the ways of creating the image of the capital: from the description of urban landscapes to the reproduction of the “Moscow spirit” itself.

FROM A COMMENTARY TO EUGENE ONEGIN BY A.S. PUSHKIN: DEDICATION, P.A. PLETNEV AND ‘PUSHKIN CIRCLE’

The study of literary relations is always hampered by the lack of direct evidence or their unreliability and the lack of a complete picture of literary life. Th us, it is necessary to reconstruct the historical, literary and biographical contexts by separating the facts that have stood the cross-check from the information that has not been verified. It is even more significant in cases when the specific involvement of writers in ‘invisible’ or at least implicit processes is discussed — it could determine not only some certain features of literary life, but also the images of literary history and ideology of literature. Th is is exactly how the history of literary relations between A.S. Pushkin and P.A. Pletnev seems to contain something purely non-trivial. Indeed, Pushkin rather unexpectedly dedicated the novel Eugene Onegin to a minor poet and a literary critic of little influence. Th e fact that it was Pletnev who acted as the trusted publisher of the novel in verse seems important, but not sufficient enough to explain Pushkin’s decision. Th is paper is devoted to other literary contexts of this case: it examines Pletnev as one of the prototypes of Lensky. Moreover, we analyze Pletnev’s review of the collection of poems by E.A. Baratynsky, which contained all the motives of Pushkin’s Dedication and was focused on the image of the history of Russian literature as it was presented in Eugene Onegin.

REVIEW ON BOOK: POLYAKOVA L.V. E.I. ZAMYATIN’S PROSE: HISTORIOSOPHICAL QUESTS OF AN ARTIST. TAMBOV: PUBLISHING HOUSE “DERZHAVINSKY”, 2022. 748 p.

The monograph by L.V. Polyakova collects and systematizes the material concerning the creative biography of E. Zamyatin, his ideological priorities, poetics, the history of publications, relations with writers. The historiosophical concepts of the fi rst third of the century, facts and phenomena of literary life, disputes of critics, as well as modern literary thought are presented. A broad context is being built that allows us to perceive the philosophical depth and artistic power of Zamyatin’s prose in its integrity, multidimensionality, connections with the humanitarian insights of the twentieth century. Zamyatin’s creative individuality is revealed through the correlation of his views on the people, the revolution, world history with the views of N. Berdyaev, A. Blok, M. Gorky, S. Yesenin, I. Ilyin, T. Mann, N. Trubetskoy, S. Frank, O. Spengler and many others. Hermeneutical approach to the comprehension of works is effective, comparative analysis is actively used. L.V. Polyakova’s research is marked by a vivid polemic and reasoned judgments.

Andrew Maunder, Enid Blyton, A Literary Life

Andrew Maunder, Enid Blyton, A Literary Life

Identities of Transgender People in Ancient Tamil Literature

In human society, it is natural to see two genders, male and female. It is somewhat surprising that the work of transgender people, who can be called the third gender, is somewhat surprising. In the Mahabharatam, the story of the birth of a transsexual is extended. In nature's creation, we find these people incarnated as transsexuals in practical life. The records of transgenders can be found in abundance in Sangam literary grammar. Transgender people, who have been marginalized in society, are denied the right to participate in public. Transgenders living in small groups in the human community have been ridiculed as "identityless." This is the situation today. In the Sangam literary records, their identity has been recognized socially. It can be said that their contribution to the level of education is low. Transgenders, who are marginalized people, are more likely to be rejected at all levels. Since they lacked the right to education, there was no context in grammatical and literary fiction in which the pedis (hermaphrodites), the transgenders, could register their right to life. No one comes forward to help in public, fearing that if they raise their voice for them, they will be respected as untouchables in society. This denial is also a contemporary phenomenon. As a result, it is necessary to compile how third-gender identities are recorded in the literary field. Transgenders, also known as hermaphrodites, exist as records in literary life. The location of such people's lives is clearly visible in grammatical and literary fiction.

Exceptionalism and Difference in American (Literary) Studies

AbstractThis essay evaluates contemporary approaches to the study of American Exceptionalism through a review of two recent books: Ian Tyrrell’s American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea (2021) and Jordan Carson’s American Exceptionalism as Religion: Postmodern Discontent (2020). The essay argues that the two books provide compelling accounts of how discourses of American exceptionality have come to organize political, intellectual, and literary life in the US. However, it suggests that Tyrrell’s and Carson’s critiques of those discourses would benefit from a clearer heuristic distinction between the exceptionalist belief that the US is a singularly providential country and the empirically valid belief that it possesses a specific historical trajectory that differentiates it from other nation-states.After more than three decades of postexceptionalist scholarship that has trained us to look for circuits, symmetries, and solidarities across national lines, we would do well to return to . . . [asking] how particular US economic, political, and social differences have been created and maintained over time.

Psychological Domestic Violence against Woman as Reflected in Susan Glaspell’s Trifles

Susan Glaspell (1876-1948) was one of the pioneering American female playwrights who evolved into visibility at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the twentieth. She had celebrated in her personal and literary life the advent of the new woman striving to fulfill her dreams in a hostile and intensive world. Glaspell based her first dramatic play, Trifles, on an actual murder case she covered while working as a journalist.1 She may write her piece, Trifles, as an explanation for why a woman may murder her husband. In her attempt to explain, Glaspell created the character of Minnie Wright who is oppressed by her husband to the extreme. To fully free herself, Minnie escapes by way of strangling her husband to death. Thematically speaking, Glaspell’s Trifles handles women’s issues in a time where women like Minnie Wright were often forced to remain with “either father or husband just to have a roof over their heads. The life of a solitary woman without male protection was not an attractive option.”2
 In Trifles, the troubled marriage of the Wrights has culminated in Minnie Wright strangling her husband, John. The men vainly look for signs of violent rage, but the women, with growing empathy, are able to recognize the signs of quiet desperation under which many women of their time were forced to live. Glaspell contrasts male and female perspectives throughout the play, and engages the audiences’ sympathy firmly on the side of the women. Susan C. W. Abbotson indicates that “We are asked to witness Mrs. Wright’s life rather than Mr. Wright’s death, and we are shown that the true ‘crime’ has been the way she was being subjugated and ‘destroyed’ by her marriage.”3 Mr. Wright sees women as a submissive group whose concerns hold

THE UNDERSTANDING OF DEATH IN SABAHATTIN ALI'S POEMS

Sabah al-Din Ali is considered one of the most important writers of Turkish literature in the twentieth century. Although he wrote important works in many fields such as novels and stories; yet, he wrote some very important poems in Turkish literature. Sabah al-Din Ali was born on 25th of February, 1907 in the city of Egridra, in the province of Adirnah in western Turkey. His family was wealthy and he was a government employee. He died on the 2nd of April, 1948, at the age of 41 leaving many original works. He was a victim of a murder crime on the Turkish-Bulgarian border by a person named Ali Artkin, his body was found and identified at a later time. But the place of burial is unknown. Sabah al-Din Ali is the author of very important works of Turkish literature, such as "Madonna in a Fur Coat", "Sirca Koşek", "The Devil Within and Koyu Teshkli Yusuf", which are well known and adopted by the entire Turkish society. Sabah Al-Din Ali has a poetic identity and personality. All of his poems are very simple, understandable, amazing, shocking and comprehensive. He is considered an easy-to-understand poet and at the same time difficult to understand. His poems are so few that they can be collected in a book of 150 pages. Although he did not write volumes of poems, his poems reflect the simplicity of Turkish poetry. He used, very effectively, the syllabic meter, which is the national poetic unit of the Turks. In his introduction, his poems deal with issues such as pain, grief, death, and separation, and similarly, many poems have been written. As we know, death is a surrender of one’s soul, and as a result, the body is no more able to perform its functions. The body decomposes after death. The journey which starts with death differs according to beliefs. Whether there is life after death has been debated throughout human history, as a result there is no position to confirm or falsify this idea. Although the body decomposes, the artifacts left by the person remain alive and from this we can conclude that death has many dimensions. Throughout history scientists, poets and thinkers have expressed their opinions about this issue and contributed to the examination of death from many aspects. Poets, in particular have done this. In fact, due to the nature of poetry, spirituality comes at the forefront. Although death is material, its effects and depth are spiritual. Sabah al-Din Ali is one of the poets who touched upon this poetic aspect in many poems. This paper starts with this comprehensive abstract, then the poet's personal and literary life are handled. The concept of death will be treated with reference to the poet poems..

Rossica w Dziennikach Jarosława Iwaszkiewicza. Dwudziestowieczność. Wybrane aspekty

The article is devoted to the analysis of broadly understood twentieth-century russica appearing in Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz’s Journals. Individual russica were combined into thematic blocks that cover such spheres of cultural reality as literary life, literary studies, the times of the thaw, the condition of a writer in the Soviet Union, and Ilya Erenburg’s reception of specific Russian writers (Ilya Erenburg, Konstantin Paustowski, Andrei Vozniesienski, Boris Pasternak, Anna Akhmatova, Bella Akhmadulina). The basic phenomena are considered through the lens of cultural comparative studies, which assume that the research object is embedded in specific historical, political and aesthetic realities. The presence of the figure of the diarist clearly outlined in the Diaries allows us to look at the discussed problems not from an “isolating” encyclopaedic perspective, but from a personal perspective, enriched with an emotional layer. This approach is additionally supported by the selection of para-literary materials – i.e. diaries and ephemeral texts.

Детская литература и антропоканинная культура: собака Нэна Джеймса М. Барри при межкультурном переводе

The representation of dogs in children’s literature forms the subject of this article. It is framed within the concept of human-canine societies introduced by the French anthropologist Dominique Guillot who claimed that alongside any human society there exists a hybrid society formed by human beings and dogs in which dogs are regarded as its full members. Such societies exist in each country and they generate their own cultures that are developed gradually through ontogenetic ritualization but may change over time. The focus of the following research is the interconnection between children’s literature and such human-canine cultures. I claim that children’s literature is influenced by them and influences them at the same time. The key figure of the research, the Scottish writer James M. Barrie, not only gave dogs the status of full members of the society but endowed them with the status of his muses in his personal, public, and literary life. His own dog, a landseer Newfoundland called Luath, was his pet, friend, muse, and a prototype for Nana, a nanny dog from Barrie’s most famous play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up. I aim to study and analyze the transformations that occur to Nana when the play was staged, adapted, illustrated and published into a different human-canine culture. The source material of the study is a draft version of the play, the first published version of the play, illustrations for numerous British and American adaptations of the Peter Pan story, and the first Soviet edition of the play. The three parts of the article describe the history of the creation of Nana and the formation of her iconography in Great Britain; the history of the first American production and two further adaptations of the play, as well as the changes that Nana underwent in the American tradition; the history of the first translation of the play in the USSR and the work of the translator and artist in the construction of the Soviet Nana. I come to the conclusion that the image of Nana is formed in the period of time when the contemporary human-pet culture was introduced and incorporated into British mindset. I prove that Nana was Luath’s copy: his character and even his black marks were recreated in Nana’s costume. Moreover, Barrie’s popularity and his daily walks with Luath in Kensington Gardens turned the writer and his dog a landmark in London, so the British iconography of Nana developed rapidly and practically did not change over time. In the United States and the Soviet Union, the countries with their own unique human-dog cultures, Nana was transformed into a St. Bernard and a Cocker Spaniel respectively. Such transformations may be explained by different reasons. While in the United States this is a consequence of the blend of Luath with Barrie’s first dog, St. Bernard Porthos, which the writer himself confessed, in the USSR the reasons were rooted in politics and ideology which to a large extent influenced Soviet human-canine culture and hence the representation of dogs in children’s books.

Новая книга о творческом наследии Ф. М. Достоевского в восприятии его современников

This review examines a new in-depth study of the perception by contemporaries, both literary critics and readers, of a complex and multi-colored picture of the existence of the creative heritage of F. M. Dostoevsky. The author of the review notes the source base of the study under consideration, emphasizes the breadth of views of the authors of the book, their constant desire to understand the writer in his main ideas and the smallest observations. The assessment of literary criticism in the new edition becomes the reason and basis for identifying Dostoevsky’s place in public and literary life. Presenting the book, the author of the review describes its main sections, pays special attention to the names of forgotten writers and publicists, the movement and polarization of criticism.