MOSCOW AS A TEXT IN THE WORKS BY SERGEI N. DURYLIN: AUDIO AND VISUAL ASPECTS
DOI: 10.23951/2312-7899-2020-3-72-86
The article analyzes the problems of the poetic style of the “Moscow text” in the works of Sergei N. Durylin (1887–1954) based on the notes V Rodnom Uglu [Hometown. The Life of Old Moscow] (1928–1939) written in the Tomsk exile and the poem from the “Moscow cycle” “A. R. Artyom” (1926), which is being published for the first time. Aside from the traditional approach used by literary scholars, which proposes to consider urban space as a text, the article uses a multidisciplinary visual-anthropological approach, which considers a city as a visual-communicative text and a cultural-communicative environment. This is relevant due to both a new surge of interest in urban issues and due to the peculiarities of the poetic style of the writer’s works. It is the audiovisual code that makes it possible to most adequately consider the “urban space” in Durylin’s mentioned works as the most representative for considering this topic. Durylin’s poem “A. R. Artem” serves as the micro-model of the “Moscow text”. It contains the main audiovisual semiotic “signs” of “urban space” (the image of silence, on the background of which the “sounding world” of the Moscow house and its inhabitants are depicted: Alexander R. Artyom, Anton P. Chekhov, the cat). This emphasizes the importance of the anthropological aspect in the formation of the “Moscow text” model because characters, not cultural objects or loci, are bearers of the “Moscow spirit”. In the course of the analysis, an attempt was made to determine the place of the notes V Rodnom Uglu, which had not been previously analyzed by literary scholars, in the literary process of the era. Along with other Moscow texts, a novel about Moscow by Andrei Bely, poems by Marina I. Tsvetaeva, Happy Moscow by Andrei Platonov, “Moscow” works by Mikhail A. Bulgakov and Ivan S. Shmelyov, Durylin is trying to create his own invariant of the “Moscow myth”. Diverging from the construction of the traditional plot, Durylin creates and depicts the images of the capital (quiet, golden-domed, Great Russian) which acquired an almost mythological status for the writer, expressed Moscow’s unique and timeless face, which is almost always of national significance for the writer, and, one must think, showed the reader a certain perspective on reading the notes that make up the core of Durylin’s “Moscow text”. The writer identifies three important concepts that represent Moscow’s face: the soul of Moscow, the third Rome, dissolved in the historical post-revolutionary second Babylon, became the invisible Moscow-Kitezh, a city that should rise again. It is also important that Durylin presents his supertext about the city primarily as a “human way of being in existence” and, therefore, about space as a cultural dimension of being. Along with this, he presents the sacred archetype of sobornost as culture-forming. Trying to create an objective picture, the author pays attention to the testimonies of foreigners Herbert Wells, Émile Verhaeren, and others.
Keywords: “Moscow text”, audio-visual code, multidisciplinary, Durylin, sobornost, archetype
References:
Durylin, S. N. (1928). Pis’mo S.N. Durylina k B.N. Bugaevu (Andreyu Belomu) 1928 g. [S. N. Durylin’s letter to B. N. Bugaev (Andrey Bely), 1928].
Memorial Archive of S. Durylin’s Memorial House Museum. Durylin Fund. KP 525/70. 2 p.
Durylin, S. N. (2000). Moskva [Moscow]. In N. B. Volkova (Ed.), Vstrechi s proshlym [Meetings with the Past] (vol. 9, pp. 134–190). Moscow: Russkaya kniga.
Manuscript Department of the Russian State Library. Fund 331. A. P. Chekhov. No. 66. Unit 137. Durylin, S. N. (n.d.). A. R. Artyom.
REFERENCES
Avanesov, S. S. (2018). Urban Space as Anthropological Phenomenon. ΠΡΑΞΗΜΑ. Problemy vizual’noy semiotiki – ΠΡΑΞΗMΑ. Journal of Visual Semiotics, 2(16), 10–31. (In Russian). DOI: 10.23951/2312-7899-2018-2-10-31
Belyy, A. (1989a). Peterburg. Moskva v 2 t. [Petersburg. Moscow in 2 volumes] (vol. 1). Tula: Priokskoe kn. Izd-vo.
Belyy, A. (1989a). Peterburg. Moskva v 2 t. [Petersburg. Moscow in 2 volumes] (vol. 2). Tula: Priokskoe kn. Izd-vo.
Esaulov, I. A. (1995). Kategoriya sobornosti v russkoy literature [The category of sobornost in Russian literature]. Petrozavodsk: Petrozavodsk State University.
Kaznina, O. A. (2000). Moskva glazami anglichan (Mat-ly k issledovaniyu) [Moscow through the eyes of the British (Materials for research)]. In N. D. Bludilina, & S. A. Nebol’sin (Eds.), Moskva v russkoy i mirovoy literature [Moscow in Russian and world literature] (pp. 193–210). Moscow: Nasledie.
Korshunova, E. A. (2018). Moskva i “moskovskiy tekst” v romane I.S.Shmeleva “Leto Gospodne” i memuarakh S.N.Durylina “V rodnom uglu” [Moscow and the “Moscow text” in I. S. Shmelev’s novel “Summer of the Lord” and in S. N. Durylin’s memoirs “Hometown. The Life of Old Moscow”]. I. S. Shmelev i pisateli russkogo zarubezh’ya [I. S. Shmelev and writers of the Russian diaspora] (pp. 50–56). Proceedings of the International Conference. Simferopol: [s.n.].
Lyusyy, A. P. (2013). Moskovskiy tekst: Tekstologichkskaya kontseptsiya russkoy kul’tury [The Moscow text: The textological concept of Russian culture]. Moscow: Izdatel’skiy dom “Veche”; OOO “Russkiy impul’s”.
Malygina, N. M. (2005). Problema “moskovskogo teksta” v russkoy literature XX veka [The problem of the “Moscow text” in Russian literature of the 20th century]. Moskva i “moskovskiy tekst” v russkoy literature XX veka. IX Vinogradovskie chteniya [Moscow and the “Moscow text” in the Russian literature of the 20th century. IX Vinogradov Readings] (pp. 3–10). Proceedings of the International Conference. Moscow: Moscow State Pedagogical University.
Moteyunayte, I. V. (2009). Yurodskie slezy, kolokol’nyy zvon i russkaya istoriya (o sposobakh simvolizatsii v romane-khronike S.N.Durylina “Kolokola” na primere obraza yurodivogo [Fool for Christ’s tears, bell ringing, and Russian history (On the ways of symbolization in S. N. Durylin’s novel-chronicle “The Bells” on the example of the image of the fool for Christ]. In G. V. Mosalevoysbornik (Ed.), Teoriya traditsii: khristianstvo i russkaya slovesnost’ [Theory of tradition: Christianity and Russian literature] (pp. 337–357). Izhevsk: Udmurt State University.
Odesskiy, M. P. (1998). Moskva – grad svyatogo Petra. Stolichnyy mif v russkoy literature XIV – XVII vv. [Moscow: The city of St. Peter. The capital myth in the Russian literature of the 14th–17th centuries]. In G. S. Knabe (Ed.), Moskva i moskovskiy tekst russkoy kul’tury [Moscow and the Moscow text of Russian culture] (pp. 9–26). Moscow: RSUH.
Selemeneva, M. V. (2008). Gorodskaya proza kak ideyno-khudozhestvennyy fenomen russkoy literatury XX veka [Urban prose as an ideological and artistic phenomenon of the 20th-century Russian literature]. Moscow: Moskovskiy gumanitarnyy in-t im. E. R. Dashkovoy.
Skorospelova, E. B. (2003). Russkaya proza XX veka: ot A.Belogo (“Peterburg”) do B.Pasternaka (“Doktor Zhivago”) [The Russian prose of the 20th century: from A. Bely (“Petersburg”) to B. Pasternak (“Doctor Zhivago”)]. Moscow: TEIS.
Timenchik, R. D. (1987). K simvolike tramvaya v russkoy poezii [To the symbolism of the tram in Russian poetry]. Simvol v sisteme kul’tury. Tr. po znakovym sistemam, 21, 135–143.
( 319.61 kB ) 
( 313.37 kB )
Issue: 3, 2020
Series of issue: Issue 3
Rubric: ARTICLES
Pages: 72 — 86
Downloads: 837