“My confessions have no moral purpose” (“My Confession” by Nikolay Karamzin)

Abstract

The author of the article focuses on the genre originality of the work “My Confession” by Nikolay Karamzin (1802). Having included the definition of “confession” in the title, the writer emphasised the form of personal recognition; using the subtitle “A letter to an editor of a journal”, he emphasised the intentional public availability of the text. Nikolay Karamzin, mockingly imitating Jean-Jacques Rousseau, narrates in the first person as some immoral egocentric who positions itself as a “completely special person” who, neglecting morality, cynically highlighted uncontrolled self-will. The hero, as follows from his confession, would violate Christian commandments throughout his life, has never repented for anything; his confessional confessions have “no moral purpose”; they are only a device of cynical self-assertion of own amazingness. The only thing he managed to create, as follows from the “confession”, was to create an idol from himself, to become a kind of idol who constantly seeks excuses to amuse base pride, vanity, selfishness. In the image of a narcissistic egoist, Nikolay Karamzin, perhaps for the first time, has embodied confession in a literary text as unlimited shameless frankness.

Keywords

• nikolay karamzin
• “my confession”
• genre
• egocentric
• confession
• frankness
• cynicism