“A Gentle Creature” by Fyodor Dostoevsky and “The Barrier” by Pavel Vezhinov: Systematic and Comparative Reading

Abstract

The article attempts to identify systemic intertextual connections between novellas “The Barrier” by Pavel Vezhinov and “A Gentle Creature” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (as well as individual intertextual connections between “The Barrier” and “The Dream of a Ridiculous Man”) and show how their explication contributes to the comprehension of the artistic concept of each of the works. The methodological basis of the study is the interpretation of intertextuality as a product of reading (not as a phenomenon of “writing”), according to which Vezhinov and Dostoevsky – writers belonging to different national cultures and historical eras – in some sense become contemporaries. Accordingly, “A Gentle Creature”, written earlier, is enriched in meaning as a result of its comparison with “The Barrier”, as well as the latter by comparison with the story of Dostoevsky. The basis for comparing the stories is the similarity at the level of the storylines, the narrative type, the system of the characters. At the same time, the ways of transforming the storyline into a plot, such as: external composition, focalisation, organization of modal-temporal and spatial plans, are deeply different. The spatial organization of the works plays a particularly important role in this sense, since the storyline of both stories is based on one type of rite de passage – the transition from life “to another life”. This article is devoted to the question of whether this transition took place and whether, as a result, the spiritual transformation of the main characters took place.

Keywords

• fyodor dostoevsky
• pavel vezhinov
• “a gentle creature”
• “the barrier”
• external composition
• focalization
• artistic time
• spatial organization
• rite de passage
• transformation