Shaping of the genre canon of the dystopian novel in the novel by E. I. Zamyatin “We” against the background of the historical and literary quest of the era and the internal laws of the evolution of the novel form

Bystrenkov Dmitriy Leonidovich, Kazakov Aleksej Ashirovich

DOI: 10.23951/1609-624X-2024-3-123-130

Information About Author:

Bystrenkov D. L., post-graduate student, National Research Tomsk State University (pr. Lenina, 36, Tomsk, Russian Federation, 634050). E-mail: inkisback@mail.ru Kazakov A. A., Doctor of Philological Sciences, Associate Professor, Professor, National Research Tomsk State University (pr. Lenina, 36, Tomsk, Russian Federation, 634050), Tomsk State Pedagogical University (ul. Kiyevskaya, 60, Tomsk, Russian Federation, 634061). E-mail: Akaz75@mail.ru

In modern literary criticism, no one doubts the special role of the novel by E. I. Zamyatin “We” in the dystopian literary tradition. Among the illustrative studies on the topic, we mention S. S. Romanov, who determines why the appearance of the novel “We” “marked a new stage in the development of anti-utopianism, and its author was recognized as the first classic of the genre.”This article proposes to consider the named work not only in the aspect of its direct historical and literary factuality, but to study the hidden patterns of the literary process and the mechanisms of the evolution of genre forms that have developed at the junction of the novel form and the (anti) utopian model of reality. As follows from the results of the study, the key role in these processes of the novel by E.I. Zamyatin’s “We” is determined precisely by the fact that there is a connection and complete merging of the utopian and dystopian concepts with the novel form and the formation of the genre canon of the dystopian novel. At the same time, previous significant appeals to the utopian or dystopian (by F. M. Dostoevsky, H. Wells or in Russian religious philosophy at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries) do not create such a special genre subtype of the novel, and subsequent appeals to the problem by A. P. Platonov, O. Huxley, J. Orwell, R. Bradbury and others directly or indirectly rely on Zamyatin’s canon of form.

Keywords: utopia, dystopia, novel, genre canon

References:

1. Borisenko Yu. A. Ritorika vlasti i poetika lyubvi v romanakh-antiutopiyakh pervoy poloviny XX veka: Dzh. Oruell, O. Haksli, E. Zamjatin. Avtoref. dis. kand. filol. nauk [Rhetoric of power and poetics of love in dystopian novels of the first half of the twentieth century: J. Orwell, O. Huxley, E. Zamyatin. Abstract of thesis cand. philol. sci.]. Izhevsk, 2004. 10 p. (in Russian).

2. Koz’mina E. Yu. Poetika romana-antiutopii: na materiale russkoy literatury XX veka. Avtoref. dis. kand. filol. nauk [Poetics of the dystopian novel: based on the material of Russian literature of the twentieth century. Abstract of thesis cand. philol. sci.]. Moscow, 2005. 20 p. (in Russian).

3. Vorob’yova A. N. Russkaya antiutopiya XX – nachala XXI veka v kontekste mirovoy antiutopii. Avtoref. dis. dokt. filol. nauk [Russian dystopia of the 20th and early 21st centuries in the context of global dystopia. Abstract. diss. dr. philol. sci.]. Saratov, 2009. 49 p. (in Russian).

4. Romanov S. S. Antiutopicheskiye traditsii russkoy literatury i vklad E. I. Zamyatina v stanovleniye zhanra antiutopii. Avtoref. dis. kand. filol. nauk [Dystopian traditions of Russian literature and the contribution of E. I. Zamyatin to the formation of the dystopian genre. Abstract of thesis cand. philol. sci.]. Orel, 1998. 20 p. (in Russian).

5. Zamyatin E. I. Sobraniye sochineniy: v 5 tomakh [Collected works: in 5 volumes]. Мoscow, Russkaya kniga Publ., 2010. V. 1. 608 p. V. 2. 592 p. V. 3. 608 p. V. 4. 510 p. (in Russian).

6. Dostoevskiy F. M. Polnoye sobraniye sochineniy: v 30 tomakh [Complete works: 30 volumes]. Leningrad, Nauka Publ., 1976. V. 15. 624 p. (in Russian).

7. Huxley O. O divnyy novyy mir [Brave New World]. Saint Petersburg, Azbuka-klassika Publ., 2005. 256 p. (in Russian).

8. Huxley A. Vozvrashcheniye v divnyy novyy mir [Brave New World Revisited]. Moscow, Astrel’ Publ., 2012. 192 p. (in Russian).

9. Orwell G. “1984” i esse raznykh let. Roman i khudozhestvennaya publitsistika [“1984” and essays from different years. Novel and literary journalism]. Мoscow, Progress Publ., 1989. 384 p. (in Russian).

10. Wells H. Fantastika: Sobraniye sochineniy v odnom tome [Science Fiction: Collected Works in One Volume]. Moscow, AST Publ., 2010. 1214 p. (in Russian).

11. Miry Reya Bredberi. Tom 2 [The Worlds of Ray Bradbury. V. 2]. Voronezh, Polyaris Publ., 1997. 335 p. (in Russian).

12. Bakhtin M. M. Sobraniye sochineniy. Tom 4 (1): Fransua Rable v istorii realizma (1940 g.). Materialy k knige o Rable (1930–1950-e gg.) [Collected Works. Vol. 4 (1): François Rabelais in the history of realism (1940). Materials for the book about Rabelais (1930–1950s)]. Мoscow, Yazyki slavykanskih kul’tur Publ., 2008. 1120 p. (in Russian).

13. Lukach G. Teoriya romana (Opyt istoriko-filosofskogo issledovaniya form bol’shoy epiki) [Theory of the Novel (An Experience in Historical and Philosophical Study of the Forms of the Great Epic)]. Novoye literaturnoye obozreniye. 1994, no. 9, pp. 19–78 (in Russian).

14. Shishkin A. P. Russkiy bereg utopii (k voprosu ob evolyutsii russkoy literaturnoy utopii) [The Russian shore of utopia (to the question of the evolution of Russian literary utopia)]. Vestnik Moskovskogo universiteta. Seriya. 10. Zhurnalistika, 2016, no. 6, pp. 156–177 (in Russian).

15. Latynina Yu. L. Literaturnyye istoki antiutopicheskogo zhanra. Avtoref. dis. kand. filol. nauk [Literary origins of the dystopian genre. Abstract of thesis cand. philol. sci.]. Moscow. 1992. 20 p. (in Russian).

16. Bystrenkov D. L., Kazakov A. A. Russkaya antiutopicheskaya traditsiya (F. M. Dostoevskiy, E. I. Zamyatin) i O. Haksli: Problema retseptivnogo posrednichestva N. A. Berdyayeva [Bystrenkov D. L., Kazakov A. A. Russian dystopian tradition (F. M. Dostoevsky, E. I. Zamyatin) and O. Huxley: The problem of receptive mediation N. A. Berdyaev]. Vestnik Tomskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Filologiya – Tomsk State University Journal of Philology, 2022, no. 78, pp. 99–113 (in Russian).

17. Bakhtin M. M. Problemy poetiki Dostoyevskogo [Bakhtin M. M. Problems of Dostoevsky’s poetics]. In: Bakhtin M. M. Sobraniye sochineniy. Tom 6 [Collection of works. Vol. 6]. Мoscow, Yazyki slavyanskikh kul’tur Publ., 2008. P. 7–300 (in Russian).

18. Bystrenkov D. L., Kazakov A. A. Korrelyatsiya utopicheskogo i antiutopicheskogo i konstitutivnyye osnovy zhanrovoy formy [The correlation between a utopian and anti-utopian and constitutive basics of novel genre form]. Sibirskiy filologicheskiy zhurnal – Siberial Journal of Philology, 2023, no. 4, pp. 128–137 (in Russian).

( 460.9 kB ) ( 454.22 kB )

Issue: 3, 2024

Series of issue: Issue 3

Rubric: RUSSIAN LITERATURE, LITERATURE OF THE PEOPLES OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

Pages: 123 — 130

Downloads: 144