The Poetics of “The Temple of the Sun”: The Composition Issue

Abstract

In order to perceive the logic of alterations made by Bunin in the composition of his “travel poems” “The Temple of the Sun,” the author of the present paper offers an approach that presumes tracing the shifting borders between the composition blocks followed by the comparison of revealed new localizations and explanation of reasons why all these amendments have been implemented. The analysis relies on the wide range of accessible variants of Bunin’s travelogue. The starting point for the research was a well-known fact: initial 1915 and 1917 redactions contain eight chapters, whereas the 1936 redaction of the Publishing house “Petropolis” comprises eleven, even though the latter is smaller in volume. The primary source for this study is a chapter called “Delta,” which was separated from “older” sketches “The Sea of the Gods” and “Zodiacal Light.” This reorganization seems important for it led to the revision of the whole agenda of Bunin’s meeting with the Orient — the brand-new chapter accentuates a significant episode of the traveler’s parting with familiar realities of “half-European” Turkey and Greece and his penetration into the world that was never seen before. The main observation provided in the article is the definition of “Delta’s” mediating role in both perspectives — as a chapter intervening into a sequence of “older” parts, and the Nile delta itself — as an intermediatory spaсe between a maritime world (“The Sea of the Gods”) and a world of desert on whose verge Cairo is located (“The Light of Zodiac”).

Keywords

• i.a. bunin
• “the temple of the sun
• ” composition
• textology
• narratology