Article

Name: The Reception of Pushkin’s Literary Tradition in Yuri Olesha’s Works

Authors: G. A. Zhilicheva

Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University

Abstract: This paper deals with the role Alexander Pushkin’s motifs play in Yuri Olesha’s works, including both his personal memoir No Day Without a Line and works of fiction which belong to various genres. The article describes four different receptive strategies that together form Olesha’s own ‘myth of Pushkin’. The strategy of canonization is characteristic of Olesha’s childhood memories. Pushkin is depicted as an embodiment of the eidos of art (e.g. Mention of ‘a book named Pushkin’, descriptions of a monument to Pushkin). The strategy of identification is typical for young Olesha’s poetry (e.g. poems Mozart and Salieri, The Stone Guest, Eugene Onegin’s Latest Odessa Trip) where Pushkin’s works form an invariant motif. The strategy of deconstruction is manifested in Olesha’s most well-known prose and drama. Pushkin’s principle of ‘harmonious’, balanced storytelling is disrupted. For example, in The Envy Nikolai Kavalerov becomes an envier similar to Salieri despite possessing an imagination of ‘Mozartian’ type. The refiguration of Pushkin’s motifs is made possible due to the emphasis on the ‘destructive’ characters and their ‘doubles’ in the plot (e.g. the envier, the ‘man in black’, the deadly statue, the ghost). The strategy of synthesis is evident as in later Olesha’s works Pushkin becomes a part of a larger authoreflective semantic structure. References to the motifs of ‘genius and villainy’, ‘deadly statue’, ‘the monument not made by human hands’ form a basis to Olesha’s own primal opposition between ‘the pauper’ and ‘the author’, between the loss of the artistic gift and the creator’s immortality. To late Olesha, Pushkin’s works manifest the category of artistic wholeness while his own creations are regarded as unfinished pieces, fragments. Olesha’s search for harmony becomes evident in his notes devoted to the analysis of the peculiar sounds and letters of Pushkin’s verses. The fragmentary nature of Olesha’s writing has its emblem in the figure of the legendary artist Apelles. Olesha uses a quote by Pliny the Elder, \Nulla dies sine linea’ – ‘Not a day without a line’. (In Russian language, the word строчка specifially means the line in the text, therefore a reference to the legend of Apelles is more subtle). The image of a ‘single line’ has an ambivalent value. Being a sign of an incompleteness of a work, it can also become as a symbol of a perfect creation, an ‘Apelles line’. The paper concludes with the statement that various forms of dialogue with Pushkin should be interpreted not only as a way of interaction with the literary tradition but also as a starting point of the writer’s own personal myth.

Keywords: Pushkin’s code, Olesha, No Day Without a Line, receptive strategy

Bibliography:

Chumakov Yu. N. Stikhotvornaya poetika Pushkina [Pushkin’s Lyrical Poetics]. St. Petersburg: Gosydarstvennyi pushkinskii teatral’nyi tsentr, 1999. 432 p.

Izer V. Vymysloobrazuyushchie akty [Fictionalizing Acts]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, 1997, no. 27, pp. 25–41.

Jakobson R. O. Statuya v poeticheskoy mifologii Pushkina [The Statue in Pushkin's Poetic Mythology]. Yakobson R.O. Raboty po poetike. Moscow: Progress, 1987, pp. 145–180.

Lacan J. Seminary. Kniga 11. Chetyre osnovnykh ponyatiya psikhoanaliza (1964) [The Seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book XI. The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis (1964)]. Moscow: Gnozis . Logos, 2004. 304 p.

Montaigne M. Opyty. Izbrannyye proizvedeniya v 3 tomakh [Essays. Selected Works in 3 volumes]. Moscow: Golos, 1992. 384 p.

Olesha Yu. Oblako. Stikhy [The Cloud. Poems]. Odessa, 1999. 90 p.

Olesha Yu. Piesy. Stat’i o teatre i dramaturgii [Plays. Writings on Theatre and Drama]. Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1968. 338 p.

Olesha Yu. Zavist’ [The Envy]. Moscow: Vagrius, 1999. 414 p.

Olesha Yu. Zavist’: Roman, Rasskazy. Stat’i [The Envy: A Novel. Short Stories. Articles]. Moscow: Eksmo, 2006. 608 p.

Panchenko I. “Skulpturnaya tema”: Yurii Olesha and Ivan Bunin [“The Theme of Sculpture”: Yuri Olesha and Ivan Bunin]. Novyi zhurnal, 2010, no. 261, available at: http://drupal.newreview.webfactional.com/content/ирина- панченко-«скульптурная-тема»-юрий-олеша-и-иван-бунин (May 10, 2017).

Perzeke A. B. “Mednyi vsadnik” A.S. Puskina: kontseptual’no-poeticheskaya invariativnost’ v russkoi literature XX veka (1917–1930-e gody) [“The Bronze Horseman” by Alexander Pushkin: The Invariance of Poetic Concepts in Russian Literature of 1917–1930s]: Doctor’s thesis. Veliky Novgorod, 2011.

Plinii Starshii. Estestvoznanie. Ob iskusstve [Natural History: On Arts]. Moscow: Ladomir, 1994. 941 p.

Pushkin A. S. Motsart i Sal’eri [Mozart and Salieri]. Pushkin A. S. Complete Works in 8 vol. Moscow: Pravda, 1954. Vol. 3, pp. 315–324.

Smirnov I. P. Roman i smena epokh: “Zavist’” Yuriya Oleshi [The Novel and The Shift of Ages: Yuri Olesha’s “The Envy”]. Zvezda, 2012, no. 8, pp. 11–19.

Ventslova T. Ten' i statuya. K sopostavitel'nomu analizu tvorchestva Fedora Sologuba i Innokentiya Annenskogo [More on the Comparative Analysis of the Works by Fyodor Sologub and Innokenty Annensky], Innokentiy Annenskiy i russkaya kul'tura XX veka. St. Petersburg: A.O. ARSIS, 1996, pp. 55–65.

Zhilicheva G. A. Figura nishchego v narrativakh Yu. Oleshi [The Character of the Pauper in Yuri Olesha’s Narratives]. Novyy filologicheskiy vestnik, 2010, no. 4 (15), pp. 121–129.

Zholkovskiy A. K. Popytki zavisti u Mandel'shtama i Bulgakova [Mandelshtam’s and Bulgakov’s Attemps at The Envy]. Zholkovsky A. K. Bluzhdayushchie sny i drugie raboty [The Wandering Dreams and Other Works]. Moscow: Nauka, Vostochnaya literatura, 1994, pp. 139–166.