Article

Name: The semantics of the image of a house in the novel of Lena Eltang «Other drums»

Authors: Elena А. Poleva

Tomsk State Pedagogical University, Tomsk, Russian Federation

In the section Study of literature

Abstract: The character-storyteller in the epistolary novel by Lena Eltang «Other drums» [Drugie barabany] is Kostas Kayris, an immigrant from Lithuania to Portugal. The circumstances of his private life (the absence of the father, cold relationship with his mother, homelessness experience, non-realised love for Aunt Zoe) and historical events (the collapse of the USSR and the hostile attitude of Lithuanians to everything Russian) cause the crisis of self-identity and existential sense of being lost in the reality. The basic plot event in the novel is the inheritance of the house in Portugal under the will of the favourite aunt and then its loss. In narration, the house is shown not only as an architectural construction, a place to live but also as an image of life in the consciousness of the character. To understand the semantics of the house image, it is significant to reveal the associative connections in the consciousness of the character. First of all, the house is related to a woman who is fascinating, but inaccessible to possession. Secondly, the house is a memory metaphor, a repository of the past into which Kostas plunges. The semantics of the image of the house is revealed in the system of spatial oppositions: house – pseudo-house, house – prison. The warmth of the house in Lisbon is opposed to the cold of habitation (pseudo-houses) in the homeland in Lithuania, and then in prison. One more significant spatial opposition: the static character and durability of the house against the fluidity of the river Tagus where it is located. The house in the novel embodies ideal life, dream and is linked to sensations of stability, security of existence. However, the narration about finding a house turns around the understanding of its loss. The author of the novel raises the question whether it is possible to hide in the House from life's difficulties, to drop out of historical time, social connections, plunging in the world of one’s consciousness? It appears to be impossible for some reasons: first, the reality embodied in the house accepts the person only temporarily and does not give an eternal residence permit; secondly, the heroimmigrant himself is of keeping the property, of becoming the full owner. At last, he is not free from the desire to understand himself, to understand the other people, and the search for answers inevitably leads to the road and that means from the house. The house loss is compensated by the return to writing in a situation of homelessness and restrictions of physical freedom. The world of letters becomes alternative to the house, opens «other possibilities». The house-language, which in the end is chosen by the hero-immigrant, unites the opposite values of the house (mastered, his life) and the road that implies the movement beyond the autistic and self-contained existence to the other (addressee), and the search for the basis for his identity and self-determination.

Keywords: Lena Eltang, emigration literature, epistolary novel, modern prose, modernism, the image of a house, homelessness, self-identification

Bibliography:

Bykovskaya T. V. Poetika doma: obrazy vnutrennego prostranstva cheloveka [Poetics of home: images of the inner space of a person]. Modern problems of science and education. 2013, no. 4. URL: 9 http://www.science-education.ru/110-9819 (accessed 14.09.2014).

Eltang L. Drugiye barabany [Other drums]. Мoscow, Eksmo, 2011, 640 p.

Ginzburg L. O psikhologicheskoy proze [On psychological prose]. Moscow, Intrada, 1999, 411 p.

Kovrizhnykh A. Yu. Poetika romanov Leny Eltang [The poetics of the novels of by Lena Eltang]. Language. Culture. Communication. 2015, no. 1. URL: http://journals.susu.ru/lcc/article/view/184/388 (accessed 19.03.2018).

Laukkonėn T. Lenos Eltang eilėraščio “Vasarotoja” semiotinė analizė. Literatūra. 2009, no. 51(2), pp. 107–113.

Logunova N. V. Russkaya epistolyarnaya proza XX – nachala XXI vekov: evolyutsiya zhanra i khudozhestvennogo diskursa [Russian epistolary prose of the 20th early 21st century: evolution of a genre and an art discourse]. Abstract of Dr. philol. sci. diss. Мoscow, 2011. URL: http://vak1.ed.gov.ru/common/img/uploaded/files/LogunovaNV.pdf (accessed 12.03.2015).

Lotman Ju. M. Vnutri myslyashchih mirov. Chelovek – tekst – semiosfera – istoriya [Inside the thinking worlds. Man – text – semiosphere – history]. Мosсow, LRC Publ. House, 1999, 464 p.

Mikhaylova G., Samoylenko A. Khudozhestvennaya kartina mira v romane Leny Eltang “Kamennyye klëny” [Artistic picture of the world in the novel “The stone maples” by Lena Eltang]. Literatūra. 2013, no. 55(2). URL: http://www.literatura.flf.vu.lt/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/55_2_91_106.pdf (accessed 10.02.2017).

Ratnikova E. Igra v metafory ponaroshku i vser’yez [Playing metaphors for fun and seriously]. Octyabr. 2012, no. 8. URL: http://magazines.russ.ru/october/2012/8/r13.html (accessed 19.03.2018).