Article

Name: Field notes of Russian officers about the War of 1812: the problem of authorship

Authors: Natalia V. Konstantinova

Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation

In the section Study of literature

Abstract:

The paper characterizes military travelogues about the War of 1812 and the foreign campaigns of the Russian army of 1813–1814 in the aspect of the authorship problem. The focus is on three texts that provide a better representation of various ways of describing military events by narrators. These are “Pohodnye zapiski artillerista (Field notes of an artilleryman), 1812–1816” by I. T. Radozhitsky, “Pisma russkogo ofitsera (Letters of a Russian officer)” by F. N. Glinka, and “Pokhodnye zapiski russkogo ofitsera, izdannye I. Lazhechnikovym (Field notes of a Russian officer published by I. I. Lazhechnikov)” by I. I. Lazhechnikov. The analysis evaluates the ratio of the “biographical author” and the subject of the narrative. A new type of narrator, the “Russian officer,” is specified versus the popular type of the “Russian sensitive traveler” characteristic of the “Karamzin canon.” The types of the subjects of the military travelogue narrative of the 10–20ies of the 19th century are identified and characterized. These are: “sentimental Russian officer,” a patriot, “an outside military observer,” and “a private man at war.” A detailed description of these types is provided. On the one hand, they are defined as variants of the type presented in the “Karamzin canon.” On the other hand, they are regarded as fundamental innovations of the authors of travelogues, demonstrating the specificity of the evolution of the genre in the 19th century.

Keywords: author, travelogue, Russian officer, narrative, type of narrator

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