Modern Russian Prose Research Articles

Мотивы «своего» и «чужого» в современной постколониальной отечественной прозе

The article examines the role of the opposition of “one’s own” and “someone else’s” in modern Russian prose – in V. Rasputin’s novel “Ivan’s Daughter, Ivan’s Mother” (2003), A. Volos’ novels “Khurramabad” (2000), V. Medvedev’s “Zahhok” (2017) and V. Galaktionova’s “On the Island of Buyan” (2003). The actualization of this opposition is due to the traumatic effect of the post-Soviet reality both in Russia and on the national outskirts of the former USSR. The article also clarifies the features of the post-colonial situation for the post-Soviet world and uses the metaphor of colonization proposed by Habermas. In particular, the destruction of the social environment familiar to the characters under the onslaught of the “alien” has become one of the most noticeable plot-forming factors of modern prose. The xeno- phobia of Rasputin and Galaktionova extends not so much to other nations, but to everything “alien”, including foreign discursive practices, new things, and the totality of the Lebenswelt surrounding the protagonists. The characters of Rasputin’s story overcome alienation and self-alienation, undergo a crisis of “their” common world and “their” personal one. The village of Buyan, which is similar to an island in Galaktionova’s novel, is portrayed as a unique archaic place where only «friends» who do not accept “strangers” live. It preserves the communal id- yll and traditional austerity of morals. Postcolonial novels about the civil war in Tajikistan are united by the motifs of loss of the motherland for the Russian natives of the country who are forced to leave for Russia which is foreign for them (“Khurramabad”) or to flee to an even more hostile location – a rural village (“Zahhok”). However, the Tajik characters are also divided into “friends” and “strangers”. The hybrid ethnic and cultural identity of the characters that lies between “their own” and “alien” (the Russian and Tajik worlds respectively) is inherent to several of the most important characters of both novels and it creates a dangerous conflict for them. The resolution of conflicts and collisions in both novels is the characters’ attempt to migrate to a new space which leads to an increase in alienation.

Взаимодействие компаратив­ных конструкций и их элементов в современной русской прозе

The article explores the interaction of comparative constructions in modern prose. The main objective of the study is to determine the types of interaction between metaphors and similes in the texts of modern Russian prose. The material of the study is the works of Buida, Vodolazkin, Ivanov, Ilichevsky, Matveeva, Pelevin, Rubina, Slavnikova, Sokolov, Sorokin, and Stepnova. The authors employed the methods of description, comparison and the struc­tural-semantic analysis and also took into account the semantic field organisation of lexical units. The article distinguishes between formal and semantic interaction of metaphors and similes. The most obvious manifestation of the formal interaction is the reversibility of tropes. Semantic interaction is based on the semantic coordination of elements of comparative con­structions based on predicate-actant relations or involves a combination of metaphors and similes in the text based on various relations between elements of the same semantic field. Along with the indicated types of interaction, the article describes cases of multiple images of one depicted object and representation of different objects in a unified figurative way. These cases are characterized as a special type of interaction of comparative tropes. The article high­lights the main source domains of interacting tropes. The most frequent semantic classes of metaphors and similes used in interaction contexts are anthropomorphic, zoomorphic and culinary images. In addition to them, mechanistic (including computer), scientific and theat­rical metaphors and similes have been identified. The article shows that the interaction of tropes can be intertextual in a literary text. It is concluded that modern Russian prose is characterized by the interaction of metaphors and similes of different types. This interaction is often associated with the presence of contrast, contextual synonymy, the ‘genus — species’ relation between images of comparative constructions in a text.

КЛЮЧЕВЫЕ ОБРАЗНЫЕ ПОЛЯ В ТЕКСТАХ СОВРЕМЕННОЙ РУССКОЙ ПРОЗЫ

The article examines the key figurative fields in the texts of modern Russian prose. The authors analyse the works of A. Varlamov, E. Vodolazkin, A. Ivanov, A. Matveeva, Z. Prilepin. The purpose of the research is to identify and describe the key figurative fields of different types in modern fiction. The key figurative field is defined as a set of lexical units of one semantic field, acting as images of comparative constructions (metaphors and similes), which is directly related to the development of the theme and plot of the work, its ideological and aesthetic content, to the characteristics of the main characters, and performs a text-forming function in the work of fiction. The analysis has identified three main types of such fields: 1. The field, whose composition is determined by the theme of the work; 2. The field, whose choice of units is motivated by the type of the protagonist and his point of view; 3. The field, determined by the ideological and aesthetic content of the work as a whole. The choice of units in the key figurative field is determined by the intentions of the author of a literary work. The nature of the field development in the text reflects the peculiarities of the writer's idiostyle. The article shows that the key figurative field is associated in a literary text with the deployment of its cross-cutting motives. The authors note that the dominance of the key figurative field is often set by the title of the work, which in this case is metaphorical or symbolic.

Retro-Utopia Temptation of Archangel Mikhail Groys By Vadim Mesyats

This article discusses the retro-utopian novel Temptation of Archangel Mikhail Groys by Vadim Mesyats. The novel explores an alternative scenario of overcoming the bleak present and entering the future by going back to a past represented by the medieval Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The novel is set in Belarus in 2013. Belarus is shown as the last stronghold of socialism, as the country that has managed to preserve both its recent and more distant past, as the ’paradise regained’, whose boundaries remain transparent for Russia and for the European Union. Belarus is a multi-confessional and (historically) multi-ethnic country, allowing it to uphold the ‘common cause’ of uniting brother nations and initiating their spiritual transformation. Apart from the obvious allusion to N. Fyodorov’s philosophy, the novel also contains multiple reminiscences to the works of V. Soloviev, Gorky’s The Confession, contemporary neo-paganism and discussions of contemporary historians about the Grand Duchy of Lithuania as the second centre for consolidating Russian lands.
 Keywords: neo-mythologism, neo-paganism, modern Russian prose, alternative history, Soviet nostalgia

ЭЛЕМЕНТЫ ВОСТОЧНОЙ ПОЭТИКИ КАК РЕГУЛЯТИВНЫЙ ИНСТРУМЕНТАРИЙ СОВРЕМЕННОГО ЛИТЕРАТУРНОГО ПРОЦЕССА

The article deals with the nature of the synthesis of modern Russian prose and elements of Eastern poetics. On the example of Victor Pelevin’s texts – Т (2009), Batman Apollo (2013), Secret views of Mount Fuji (2018) – the question of functioning in the author’s artistic discourse of the designated signs is objectified. In a special way in V.O. Pelevin’s prose the religious and philosophical aspect of Zen Buddhism as the adjacent direction of East culture is played. Elements of Eastern poetics organize the plot and thematic block of works in a special way. The variant principle of Viktor Pelevin’s writing organically complements the literary process, moving in a spiral of increment of world art practice. Moreover, reading is in a situation of multiple connotations of meanings, as well as a constructive relational assessment of being. Elements of oriental poetics in Pelevin discourse acquire shades of semantic tricks. The synergy of the author’s experiment is also becoming a reception model for the potential reader. An open dialogue, thus, produces the manipulation and synthesis of cultural signs with their own halo of readings. The analysis of the prose of Victor Pelevin confirms the idea that the compilation of different aesthetically world contemplation positions expanding the horizon of meaning, reduplicate the rhizome connotations. It is concluded that the implementation of Eastern poetics in the texts of postmodernism at the level of motives and images objectively concretizes the process of cultural synthesis of modern literature.

Metaphors of Everyday Speech in Modern Russian Prose

Metaphors of Everyday Speech in Modern Russian Prose

Автор и нарратор в истории русской литературы

The correlation between the author and narrator figures is considered not only theoretically, but in the diachronic aspect for the first time, as historically changed from Karamzin to Vodolazkin. The syncretism of these narrative instances in Karamzin’s prose was replaced by their radical segregation by Pushkin in playing forms of “image of the author” or the unreliable narrator (like Belkin), that leads to the emergence of an implicit authorial instance. The Great Russian classics (with the exception of “War and Peace”) refuse the “image of the author”, gives to the implicit authorship the status of a representation of the being truth. The crisis of classical authorship at the turn of the 19 th and 20 th centuries gives rise to various modifications in symbolism, in “ornamental” prose, in socialist realism, in postmodernism. The article also deals with the issue of creative reconstruction of the classical opposition in the works by Bulgakov, Pasternak, during The Thaw in 1960s and in modern Russian prose.

Концепт «терроризм» в современной русской прозе

Концепт «терроризм» в современной русской прозе

Functions of Phraseological Units in Detective Prose of B. Akunin

The author considers the problem of stylistic functions of linguistic units in modern Russian prose works through analyzing phraseological units in the detectives of B. Akunin. The article presents the most frequent types of phraseological units (idioms, set phrases, proverbs, sayings, popular expressions and other types of clichéd utterances) as representation of a personal literary style of this author. The research results point to their stylistic variety with high literary, colloquial, low colloquial, and slang units among them. The major types of phraseological unit conversion are distinguished as a prove of the writer's personal style, including, complete deformation of a component composition of a set phrase, reduction of the lexical length of phraseological units (implication), distribution of any component composition of the unit (explication), combining two or more phraseological units into a single set expression (contamination), replacement of a component in the composition of phraseological units with words of general literary layers (lexical variation), etc. The stylistic functions of all phraseological units under study are interpreted as retro-representation of the language of a certain time period, stylistic imitation of the communicative tone of oral speech, verbal characteristics of the characters who are referred to various social groups, and creation of humorous tone of the story. A comprehensive description of phraseological units used in modern fiction has revealed their artistic and stylistic potential.

ИДЕЙНО-ЭСТЕТИЧЕСКИЕ ПОИСКИ СОВРЕМЕННОЙ ПРОЗЫ КЫРГЫЗСТАНА НА РУССКОМ ЯЗЫКЕ

The article describes the literary process in Kyrgyzstan at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries through the lenses of the Russian discourse and traces the changes it undergoes. The authors argue that the Kyrgyz literature of the end of the XX - the beginning of the XXI century has undergone developmental stages mostly correlating with stadial development of the world literature. Ideological and aesthetical search of the modern Russian prose in Kyrgyzstan indicates co-existence of different artistic methods and literary trends in the Kyrgyz literature of the XXI century. The paper concludes that the modern Russian literature in Kyrgyzstan tends to evolve from realism to post-modernism.

We are back to history. But this time it’s hardcore. The 2017 Russian Booker shortlist

Devoted to contemporary Russian prose, the article considers the short-listed novels of the 2017 Russian Booker Prize and identifies their common characteristics, such as immersion into history, fascination with the aesthetics of violence, and dreaming in metaphors, etc. The critic notes that the latest shortlist of the Russian Booker turned out fairly versatile: in terms of the novels’ themes, style, and inner arrangement and structuring by the author. At the same time, they share something more than obsession with history: an enthusiasm for cruelty, violence, and, prominently, sadism. Perhaps not of the De Sade’s self-sufficient and self-centered variety, but while it may be naturally woven into the narrative fabric, it is just as creepy. The phenomenon may have roots in the violent outbursts of post-imperial and post-colonial wars, raging along Russia’s borders, both eastern and western, and bloodbaths tearing the country apart from the inside. Or was it called to life by the development logic of modern Russian prose, epitomized and recorded by the Booker selection? Linked together within a common context, these short but insightful reviews offer a convincing description of the trends typifying at least one particular year of modern Russian prose: 2017.

Demonology of geography

The article examines the ‘geographical dimension’ of modern Russian prose, in particular, through a mythological, and even demonological, prism. The mythological-dimensional complex is especially prominent in the Urals-themed works by O. Slavnikova (2017 (2006)) and A. Ivanov (his 2-volume series Parma’s Heart, or Cherdyn – The Mountain Princess [Serdtse Parmy, ili Cherdyn – knyaginya gor] (2003) and The Gold of the Uprising, or Down the River Gorge [Zoloto bunta, ili Vniz po reke tesnin] (2005)). Not only do the novels promote a region-specific metaphorical and mystic flavor of theUral Mountains, but they also feature very active and authentic demons, thus creating a unique provincial topos, whose spiritual quality stands out especially in comparison with its callous and apathetic metropolitan counterpart. Mainly based in the spiritual opposition between the Urals and the capital city, the conflict in the novels by Slavnikova and Ivanov is resolved in a historical dimension, because the hitherto culturally unexploredRussia offers unlimited riches for literary and mythological constructs and their integration into fiction.

Переводческая стратегия отчуждения знаков советского сверхтекста современной российской прозы (на примере произведений В. Пелевина и их переводов на английский язык)

Переводческая стратегия отчуждения знаков советского сверхтекста современной российской прозы (на примере произведений В. Пелевина и их переводов на английский язык)

Образ будущего в современной российской прозе

Образ будущего в современной российской прозе

Интертекстуальность как системообразующий принцип текстопостроения в современной российской прозе (кавказский сегмент)

Интертекстуальность как системообразующий принцип текстопостроения в современной российской прозе (кавказский сегмент)

Символика православного календаря в творчестве А. Варламова

The article considers the specifics of the Orthodox worldview reflection in the contemporary art. Attention is paid to the analysis of the ideological principle of the work through the representation of Christian chronometry. The novelty of the work is seen in the understanding of the symbols of the Orthodox calendar on the material of modern Russian prose, as until today there is a tradition of analysis of this problem only on the example of writers of the 19 th -20 th centuries. The novelty of the work also lies in the consideration of A. Varlamov’s creativity not from the perspective of continuation of the traditions of realistic prose or postmodern understanding of reality, but from the point of realization of the author’s religious worldview and attempts to translate the Orthodox worldview in his work. Special attention is paid to the analysis of spiritual and moral evolution of A. Varlamov’s characters in the context of symbols of Easter and Christmas holidays. The relevance of the study is determined by the appeal to the problems of the moral principle in modern fiction and the possibility of reading it from the position of the spiritual potential typical to all Russian classics. The author comes to the conclusion that modern Russian literature cannot be considered as completely secularized, it reflects the traditions laid down by Russian classics (A. S. Pushkin, F. M. Dostoevsky), and traditions associated with the idea of spiritual salvation of man.

Новая модель «значимого взрослого» во внутрисемейных отношениях (по материалам современной российской прозы для детей и подростков)

Новая модель «значимого взрослого» во внутрисемейных отношениях (по материалам современной российской прозы для детей и подростков)

Образ Чичикова в современной русской прозе

Образ Чичикова в современной русской прозе

(Neo)mythological Elements in the Modern Russian Prose (through the Example of “Surgeon” by Marina Stepnova)

(Neo)mythological Elements in the Modern Russian Prose (through the Example of “Surgeon” by Marina Stepnova)

Репрезентация мотивов гностицизма в современной отечественной прозе

Репрезентация мотивов гностицизма в современной отечественной прозе