Literary criticism

The article studies one of the leading stylistic key notes of I. Ilf and E. Petrov’s oeuvre – playing with ‘other’ texts. In the course of analyzing the vaudeville A Strong Feeling a system of allusions to A. P. Chekhov’s play The Wedding is identified (the plot, genre, system of characters, etc.). The study of the ‘quote element’ in the play A Strong Feeling helps to draw the conclusion on the stylistic unity of the co-authors’ creative manner.

The article focuses on the group of Mandelstam’s poems dedicated to Andrey Bely and shows that this group constitutes an uncollected cycle associated with the archaic attributes of the requiem genre. The analysis of the cycle composition leads to the assumption that variability becomes one of the cyclization factors here.

The article examines historically determined approaches to the study of the oeuvre of the Chinese writer Lu Xun in the Soviet literary criticism in the 20–70s of the ХХth century, identifies the causes of interest in his heritage, analyzes the main achievements of the Russian Lu Xun studies, and provides a comparison with similar works by Chinese scientists.

The article represents an attempt of a literary, critical, and philosophical evaluation of the characteristic features of the short fiction written by Z. Gippius in emigration. Special attention is given to the theme of nostalgia and to the role of the ‘little man’ in the Bolshevist Russia.

For the first time the article addresses little-known works of the popular children’s writer of the early ХХ century Lidia Charskaya, that are intended for the audience of adults. It is indicated that the writer used the same methods in her compositions regardless of the readers’ age. Nevertheless, she turned out to be a mediocre author for mature readers.

The article considers features of the critical literary approach to the oeuvre of one of the most popular Russian authors of the second half of the XIXth century represented in a forgotten work by a prominent Russian philologist dedicated to the jubilee of the writer.

The article considers the image of Mashenka Turusina from the play by A. N. Ostrovsky Enough Stupidity in Every Wise Man. Analyzing textual behavior of the character, the author proves that the young foster daughter is not only ‘a home martyr’ but also a skillful manipulator who adjusts the environment to her own liking. This game makes her similar to the main character of the comedy – Glumov: he tries to make his way up by flattery and deception. Mashenka and Glumov, respecting each other, seem doubles surrounded by simple-minded ‘masters of life’ on whom their future depends.

The article considers the topic of visualizing theatre elements in the texts of the first Russian plays of the end of the XVIIth and the beginning of the XVIIIth century in its relation to the West-European and Russian book printing culture.

The article considers instances of heroics in Memoires by Mlle de Montpensier on the example of the Fronde events. Her ideas of heroic behavior are analyzed as well as the development of the heroic content of the protagonist image under the influence of historic, ethical, and literary factors.

The article is dedicated to the issues of the play poetics as philosophical, ontological, and aesthetic paradigm of the main movements of the modern literature. The main criteria of the play are analyzed in the theoretical research and literary works of the modernist and postmodernist writers.