Additional Information
Book Details
Abstract
The collection is comprised of twelve scholarly essays written by leading Chekhov specialists from around the world, each analysing an interpretation of Chekhov by one of three Russian thinkers of the Silver Age of Russian culture - Vasilii Rozanov, Dmitrii Merezhkovskii and Lev Shestov. It thus examines the hitherto under-researched relationship between the origins and the results of the cultural phase that came to be known as the Silver Age, and focuses specifically on the complex connections betweens Chekhov's legacy and the Russian culture of that period.
The collection is comprised of twelve scholarly essays written by leading Chekhov specialists from around the world. Each essay analyses an interpretation of Chekhov by one of three prominent Russian thinkers of the Silver Age of Russian culture - Vasilii Rozanov, Dmitrii Merezhkovskii and Lev Shestov. This volume is particularly valuable in that its main focus is placed on the perception of Chekhov's art by those who existed on the border between literary criticism and philosophy. This is complemented by a literary critique of their accounts, and therefore remains faithful to Chekhov's poetics.
The collection thus examines the hitherto under-researched relationship between the origins and the results of the cultural phase that we now refer to as the Silver Age, and focuses specifically on the complex connections between Chekhov's legacy and the Russian culture of that period. Through its stress on the philosophical perception of Chekhov, this book offers a thematically consistent and systematic revelation of new dimensions to Chekhov's creative heritage. The essays are supplemented by biographical accounts of Rozanov, Merezhkovskii and Shestov.
Olga Tabachnikova holds a PhD in Mathematics and a PhD in Russian Literature and Philosophy. She is now a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the Russian Department of the University of Bristol.
Table of Contents
| Section Title | Page | Action | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Half Title | i | ||
| Title | iii | ||
| Copyright | iv | ||
| CONTENTS | vii | ||
| ACKNOWLEDGMENTS | ix | ||
| INTRODUCTION | xi | ||
| Vasilii Rozanov (1856–1919) | xviii | ||
| Dmitrii Merezhkovskii (1865–1941) | xxi | ||
| Lev Shestov (1866–1938) | xxiii | ||
| Notes | xxvii | ||
| LIST OF NAMES | xxxi | ||
| LIST OF RUSSIAN CULTURAL CONCEPTS | xlix | ||
| Part One VASILII ROZANOV | 1 | ||
| ROZANOV ON CHEKHOV: ‘OVERCOMING LITERATURE’ AND EXTENDING HORIZONS | 3 | ||
| I | 3 | ||
| II | 6 | ||
| III | 8 | ||
| Notes | 10 | ||
| KIND AND QUIET: VASILII ROZANOV’S READING OF CHEKHOV | 13 | ||
| Notes | 27 | ||
| CONTEMPORANEITY, COMPETITION AND COMBAT. FACTS AND FICTIONS ABOUT EVERYBODY AND PASSIVENESS, ORIENTALISM AND ANAESTHESIA IN ROZANOV’S VIEW ON CHEKHOV | 37 | ||
| I. Contemporaneity and Competition. General Aspects of Chekhov’s Reception by Rozanov | 37 | ||
| II. Playwright Chekhov Speaks in The Cherry Orchard with the Voice of the Eternal Student Petr Trofimov (1904) and Represents a Poor Motionless and Passive Russia | 42 | ||
| III. The Poet and Thinker Chekhov, Used as an Argument in the Cultural Combat on the Concept of Party Literature | 44 | ||
| IV. The Praise of Chekhov’s Art as an Adequate Expression for Russia’s Love of Itself | 47 | ||
| V. The Place and Function of Russian Culture in the World: Chekhov’s Oeuvre as an Example of Compensation for the Ugliness of Russian Nature and the Russian People | 50 | ||
| VI. Chekhov’s Letters as Autobiography: ‘Should We Create History?’ | 52 | ||
| Notes | 55 | ||
| ‘TREE OF LIFE’ AND ‘DEAD WATERS’: WHY WAS ROZANOV AFRAID OF CHEKHOV? | 63 | ||
| Unanswered Letter | 63 | ||
| Chekhov: Pale Shadow of the Platonic Nihilist Gogol´ | 66 | ||
| Sphere of Observation: Between Brothel and Cemetery | 71 | ||
| Sphere of Observation: Camera Obscura | 75 | ||
| The Antichrist | 79 | ||
| Epilogue: ‘From Tinder to Tinder’ | 84 | ||
| Post Scriptum: Doctor Sambikin | 85 | ||
| Notes | 86 | ||
| Part Two DMITRII MEREZHKOVSKII | 91 | ||
| CHEKHOV AND MEREZHKOVSKII: TWO TYPES OF ARTISTIC-PHILOSOPHICAL CONSCIOUSNESS | 93 | ||
| I | 93 | ||
| II | 96 | ||
| III | 99 | ||
| IV | 102 | ||
| V | 103 | ||
| VI | 104 | ||
| VII | 106 | ||
| Notes | 109 | ||
| NEGATING HIS OWN NEGATION: MEREZHKOVSKII’S UNDERSTANDING OF CHEKHOV’S ROLE IN RUSSIAN CULTURE | 113 | ||
| Context: Merezhkovskii’s Preoccupations in 1905–1910 | 118 | ||
| Overall Evaluation of Chekhov’s Art | 124 | ||
| Notes | 126 | ||
| AN ILLUMINATING MISINTERPRETATION? ON MEREZHKOVSKII’S LITERARY CRITICISM OF CHEKHOV | 129 | ||
| I. The Literary Critic Mirrored by His Subject | 129 | ||
| II. From Poetic to Religiously-Motivated Criticism | 130 | ||
| III. Indirect Illumination of Chekhov’s Poetic Philosophy in ‘Chekhov and Gor´kii’ | 131 | ||
| The Cognition of God and Mathematical Evidence | 132 | ||
| The Fragility of the Positivistic Worldview | 134 | ||
| Existential Uncertainty in the Face of Death | 136 | ||
| Notes | 137 | ||
| CAN MEREZHKOVSKII SEE THE SPIRIT IN THE PROSE OF FLESH? | 141 | ||
| I. Merezhkovskii on Chekhov | 144 | ||
| II. Chekhov on Merezhkovskii | 151 | ||
| III. The Intelligentsia’s Satiety and Blindness | 157 | ||
| Notes | 163 | ||
| Part Three LEV SHESTOV | 167 | ||
| LEV SHESTOV ON CHEKHOV | 169 | ||
| Notes | 174 | ||
| BETWEEN TRAGEDY AND AESTHETICS: SHESTOV’S READING OF CHEKHOV – A GAZE DIRECTED WITHIN | 175 | ||
| I. ‘Shestovizing’ Chekhov: Facts, Conjecture and Existential Philosophy | 175 | ||
| II. Shestov, Freud and Positivist Philosophy: Proximity to the Enemy | 183 | ||
| III. The Difference Between Ideologies and ‘Lofty Rhetoric’ | 186 | ||
| IV. ‘Aestheticism’ Versus ‘Creation from Nothing’: Revolt, Cruelty, and Aesthetic Myopia | 189 | ||
| Notes | 194 | ||
| SHESTOV–CHEKHOV, CHEKHOV–SHESTOV | 199 | ||
| I | 201 | ||
| II | 203 | ||
| (1) | 206 | ||
| (2) | 210 | ||
| (3) | 214 | ||
| Notes | 216 | ||
| PHILOSOPHY’S ENEMIES: CHEKHOV AND SHESTOV | 219 | ||
| Shestov’s Existential Chekhov | 222 | ||
| Confronting ‘Absurd Walls’ | 227 | ||
| Notes | 240 | ||
| NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS | 247 |