Russian literary criticism of the 19th century. Foreword

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Keywords

RUSSIAN FORMALISM/ ENGLISH FORMALISM / LITERARY CRITICISM AND POLEMICS / LITERARY CRITICISM AND POLEMICS / RHETORIC OF DISPUTE AND COMPETITION IN LITERATURE / RHETORIC OF COMPETITION AND DISCUSSION IN LITERATURE / CLASS STRUGGLE/CLASS STRUGGLE/ BOLSHEVIK REVOLUTION/ BOLSHEVIK REVOLUTION

annotation scientific article on linguistics and literary criticism, author of scientific work - Yan Levchenko

The article traces the formation of aggressive rhetoric in the Soviet literary criticism of the 1920s on the example of discussions around the Leningrad branch of the formal school. These processes testify that the experience of war and revolution legitimizes any form of insult and destruction of the opponent, turns bullying into the mainstream and puts an end to the discussion about ideas, switching it to the area of intergroup competition and struggle for power, both symbolic and material. In turn, literary criticism also turns to personalities, appealing to ritual formulas, but using the methods of the new hegemon. In relation to the so-called formalists, these discursive maneuvers are manifested with particular clarity, since they are directed at the address of an ideological enemy sentenced to destruction. side of the triumphant class. Generosity proved beyond the power of the Bolsheviks after the victory of the revolution. Their tactics consisted of cultivating hatred, pushing various groups against each other under the slogan class struggle for the purpose of further clearing and/or absorption of any phenomena that diverge from the general line. The primary motivation for tightening the screws was the situation of the civil war. Then it was replaced by the demand for special vigilance in the period of the forced revenge of the bourgeoisie. The conceptualization of the NEP was not only economic, but also inevitably cultural in nature, and the proletariat was simply obliged to feel threatened by the surviving oppressors, whose consciousness remained the same as before the revolution. Finally, the long-awaited rejection of temporary cultural and economic measures legitimizes a new round of aggressive rhetoric, which intensifies the internal crisis of the "fellow travelers" of Soviet culture and makes it possible to put an end to them at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s.

From Dispute to Persecution: Rhetoric of Debates Surrounding the Formalist Circle in the 1920s

The present article traces the origins and forms of aggressive rhetoric in the Soviet literary criticism of the 1920s, using the example of the debates surrounding the Leningrad branch of the Russian Formalist School. The discussions around this research circle can be traced to the destructive experience of revolution and civil war, and the shift from conventional forms of debate to the abuse and annihilation of opponents, transforming the latter practices into the new mainstream. The discussion as such becomes a race for power, or a straight-up competition between political groups. In turn, literary criticism also starts reproducing the repressive methods of the victor. The so-called “formalists” represent the most prominent example of this process, as they were sentenced to annihilation as pure ideological enemies of the new hegemonic class both in a political and cultural sense.The contrast dualism that characterizes the opposition between 'us' and 'them' in Russian culture to the present day became visible during that time, as the triumphant class was fundamentally unwilling to compromise with the defeated. The Bolsheviks were not feeling magnanimous after the victory of the October revolution. Their strategy was to cultivate hatred, pitting different groups against each other under the banner of class struggle in order to further strip and/or remove any phenomena diverging from the established way forward. The primary motivation for the crackdown through terror was civil war. Subsequently, it was replaced by the requirement for special vigilance during the temporary resurgence of the bourgeoisie in the period of New Economic Policy (NEP). The conceptualization of the NEP was not only an economic and industrial, but also inevitably a cultural matter, and the proletariat simply had to feel threatened by the surviving oppressors whose consciousness remained the same as before the revolution. Ultimately, the announced and longawaited rejection of the NEP and its “restorative” culture legitimized a new round of aggressive rhetoric that reinforced the internal crisis of the Soviet “poputchiks” (primarily discriminated intelligentsia) and allowed to put an end to them on the cuspof the 1920s and 1930s.

The text of the scientific work on the topic "From controversy to bullying: the rhetoric of the Formalist controversy in the 1920s"

From controversy to bullying: the rhetoric of the Formalist controversy in the 1920s

Jan LEVCHENKO

Professor, School of Cultural Studies, Faculty of Humanities, National Research University Higher School of Economics (NRU HSE). Address: 105066, Moscow, st. Old Basmannaya, 21/4. Email: [email protected]

Key words: Russian formalism; literary criticism and controversy; rhetoric of dispute and competition in literature; class struggle; Bolshevik revolution.

The contrasting dualism in opposing one's own and the other's, which is still characteristic of Russian language behavior, is manifested here in a fundamentally unprepared

to compromise on the part of the triumphant class. Generosity proved beyond the strength of the Bolsheviks after the victory of the revolution. Their tactic consisted of cultivating hatred, pushing various groups against each other under the slogan of class struggle in order to further purge and/or absorb any phenomena that diverge from the general line. The primary motivation for tightening the screws was the situation of the civil war. Then it was replaced by the demand for special vigilance during the period of the forced revenge of the bourgeoisie. The conceptualization of the NEP was not only economic, but also inevitably cultural in nature, and the proletariat was simply obliged to feel threatened by the surviving oppressors, whose consciousness remained the same as before the revolution. Finally, the long-awaited rejection of temporary cultural and economic measures legitimizes a new round of aggressive rhetoric, which intensifies the internal crisis of the "fellow travelers" of Soviet culture and makes it possible to put an end to them at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s.

In memory of Alexander Yurievich Galushkin (1960-2014)

3 This article provides a number of examples illustrating the formation of a very specific discourse about art and literature, based on power rhetoric, taking deliberately aggressive forms and legitimizing violence. We are talking about Soviet literary criticism, which managed to purposefully reduce analysis to scolding, and judgment to condemnation. When in 1918 Vladimir Mayakovsky issued the "Order on the Army of Art"1, paving the divide between those who serve and those who evade, the first year of the revolution had not yet expired, and the First World War was only turning into a Civil War. There were enough grounds for the literal mobilization of representatives of any profession, including the humanitarian ones. However, the militarization of labor, in particular the creation of labor armies during the period of war communism, did not mean the militarization of critical discourse. In the departments of the People's Commissariat for Education, "specialists" from the former, who had received mercy for the time being, sat, while the generation of their future professional detractors had not yet matured, passing with the help of the same "specialists" primary training in proletarian organizations. It took the economic and cultural achievements of the NEP era for the intellectuals from among the victorious class, rushing into battle and not recognizing Stalin's Thermidor, to learn the effective tactics of their political leaders: the ideals of the revolution should be defended in the regime of a preventive attack.

Since the mid-1920s, the relevance of repressive rhetoric in the field of culture has been growing in proportion to its spread in the echelons of power. The revolution proclaimed culture the propaganda weapon of the state, and its utilitarian functions were emphasized even more than in tsarist Russia. Relations in the cultural field are turning into a direct reflection of the struggle, practically devoid of mediative filters, which marks the transition from the politics of discussions to the politics of orders. To the XIV Congress

12/07/1918. No. 1. S. 1.

VKP(b), famous for the loud defeat of the "Leningrad opposition", rudeness at the top has established itself as a communicative norm. Lenin's "shit" against the bourgeois intelligentsia, which supports the war on the German front (from a letter to Maxim Gorky on September 15, 19192), is not an accidental curse released in the heat of controversy, but the matrix of a certain language policy, tuned to the elimination of a hostile group. The cleansing of culture, bureaucratically implemented in 1932 through the liquidation of creative associations, began, among other things, with discussions about formalism. One such high-profile controversy took place in 1924 in the journal Print and Revolution and was provoked by Leon Trotsky's article "The Formal School of Poetry and Marxism" (1923), which declared a leading and therefore dangerous intellectual movement to be "an arrogant bastard"3 . Trotsky does not confine himself to criticizing formalism in art, condemning formalism both in law and in economic management, that is, denouncing the vice of formalistic narrowness in areas that are far from the study of literary devices.

It was Trotsky's article that served as a precedent for an expansive and expressive interpretation of formalism, a conscious going beyond the limits of its terminological meaning. Official Soviet criticism demagogically branded with this word everything that disagreed with the doctrine of socialist realism. As Gorky wrote in his well-known policy article of 1936, which provoked a whole series of devastating texts about various areas of art, “formalism is used out of fear of a simple, clear, and sometimes rude word”4. That is, on the one hand, there are rude but sincere supporters of the victorious class, who are building socialism and privatizing Pushkin and Flaubert for writing clearly and to the point, and on the other, all sorts of, in the words of the same Gorky, “Hemingways”, who they want to talk to people, but they don’t know how to speak like a human. It is curious that the situation does not change even in the nineteenth year of the victorious revolution. Two decades have passed, generations have practically changed, but the bourgeois intelligentsia has not gone away, it has not been possible to eradicate it by any merger of unions and prohibitions.

2. V. I. Lenin, Letter to A. M. Gorky, 15/IX, Completed. coll. op. M.: Politizdat, 1978. T. 51. S. 48.

3. Trotsky L. D. Formal school of poetry and Marxism // Trotsky L. D. Literature and revolution. M.: Politizdat, 1991. S. 130.

4. Gorky M. On formalism // Pravda. 04/09/1936. No. 99. URL: http://gorkiy.lit-info.ru/gorkiy/articles/article-86.htm.

solid measures. She, as the initiators of the "Great Terror" believed, was well disguised and continues to poison the life of the proletariat with formalist poison. How exactly - it doesn't even matter, since any formalism, up to formal logic, is bad by definition. It is logical that there is no longer any discussion, because the question "how" is, of course, a formalist question, and there is no need to answer it. The right question is not even “what”, but “who”: who orders whom, who closes whom, etc.

Within the framework of this article, I would like to draw attention to the fact that already from the beginning of the 1920s, aggressive-offensive rhetoric began to take hold on the issue of formalism, which subsequently supplanted, by right of the strong, any arguments based on scientific rationality and corresponding to the conventional manner of conducting a discussion. In the last decade, in studies of the Soviet past, the naive interpretation of the 1920s as an era of utopian idealism and pluralistic experiments is almost never found, which was abruptly replaced by a large concentration camp of the 1930s with its shouting and beatings behind the facade of voluntary-compulsory happiness. It was the 1920s that helped establish a new cultural discourse based on insulting and threatening opponents. This was explained by the fact that for the first time in history leadership was usurped for a long time by a social class, for which any signs of politeness marked a class enemy. In turn, for these enemies themselves, that is, the “former”, “disenfranchised”, temporarily hired by the new owners of “specialists”, good breeding and education also served as a criterion for dividing “us” and “them”. Actually, this is how the protective complex was formed, rethought by the intelligentsia in terms of the mission. These sociolinguistic markers drew a more visible line between the pre- and post-revolutionary era than the most spectacular ideas. Speaking even more definitely and, perhaps, somewhat tendentiously, the social adaptation of rudeness and the actual legalization of swearing as a substitute for discussion became a characteristic sign of the first post-revolutionary decade, but continue to sprout in modern public discourse.

It seems that the language of the cultural controversy of the 1920s served as a kind of laboratory from which came a stable standard of Russian language behavior, which is very pronounced today, for example, in television series, where characters either coo about something using diminutive suffixes, or ready to tear each other to pieces. Neutral communication models are a rarity, the transition from cutesy gentle

hysteria and threats is a norm that characterizes both mass TV production and social relations. The autonomy of discursive registers is associated with the contrastive dualism of one's own and the other's, which is rooted in the historical dualism of pre-Petrine culture and the Westernized imperial period5. The revolutionary reshaping of society sharpened the dualistic effect, but it did not weaken later, as economic and cultural life stabilized. It turned out to be an extremely convenient speculative form that legitimized the toughest scenarios of power and was invariably explained by the "aggravation of the class struggle." One can even assume with a certain risk that this was a kind of "end of history" in the Soviet way: if the class struggle does not weaken and enemies can always be recruited from the ranks of yesterday's supporters, then there is nowhere else to move, society freezes in the ever-reproducing "today", then is emptied and degraded. The discussion of any controversial issue at a meeting of the labor collective almost inevitably turned into a "witch hunt", whether it was the ominous courts of the 1930-1950s or the already decayed ritual studies of the era of stagnation. Regardless of the degree of their physical danger, they were based on the humiliation of the opponent. Soviet people adapted and developed immunity, nurtured indifference, which today is closely dependent on the level of aggression in social groups.

The participants of the formal school are here an example that clearly shows the transformation of the nature of the dispute with an opponent, objectionable, enemy - how aggression turns into a normative mode of discussion. The peculiarity of this example lies in the fact that, being necessarily pupils of pre-revolutionary culture, the formalists consciously opposed it and at the initial stage of post-revolutionary cultural construction were in solidarity with the new government, outwardly merging with other avant-garde figures who were also seduced by the realization of utopia. The deliberately careless, passionate language of their scientific and critical speeches was supposed to bring them closer to the agents of the new culture.

But these latter were not so easy to carry out. They well felt the bourgeois origin of Futurism, to which

5. See: Lotman Yu. M., Uspensky B. A. The role of dual models in the dynamics of Russian culture // Uspensky B. A. Izbr. works. M.: Gnosis, 1994. Vol. 1: Semiotics of history. Semiotics of culture. pp. 219-253.

adjoined the early OPOYAZ (Society for the Study of Poetic Language) with its touch of scandalousness. In 1927, Vyacheslav Polonsky, editor-in-chief of the journal Print and Revolution, wrote, exposing Novy LEF as a bourgeois project in the article Lef or Bluff:

Arising out of the decay of bourgeois art, Futurism had all its roots in bourgeois art.

He cannot be denied an understanding of the close connection between Futurism and the objects of his attacks. Without the "pharmacists," as the poetic cabaret "Stray Dog" disparagingly called visitors who paid for a full admission ticket, futurism would not have a chance. In February 1914, having barely appeared in Stray Dog, Viktor Shklovsky already participated on the side of the Futurists in a dispute in the hall of the Tenishevsky School, which he described as follows:

The audience decided to beat us. Mayakovsky passed through the crowd like a red-hot iron through the snow. I walked, resting directly on the head with my hands to the left and right, I was strong - I passed.

Early formalism began on the same level as the masters of prudent outrageousness, and at least for Shklovsky and his "marketing reputation" this genealogy remained significant. She was that part of the biography about which Eikhenbaum wrote: "Shklovsky turned into the hero of a novel, and a problematic novel at that." At the same time, it is obvious that the petty-bourgeois and any other simple public was capable of throwing themselves into a fight both before and after any revolutions. The difference was that, in hardened times, fighting became the potential horizon of any discussion. Even having a bad idea of each other, the opponents were always ready to give a decisive battle9. Unless Viktor Shklovsky, Yuri Tynyanov and Boris Eikhenbaum, as representatives of theoretical formalism, allowed themselves to talk about their

6. Polonsky V.P. Lef or bluff // Polonsky V.P. On literary topics. M.: Krug, 1927. S. 19.

7. Shklovsky V. About Mayakovsky. M .: Soviet writer, 1940. S. 72.

8. Eikhenbaum B. M. "My timepiece" ... Artistic prose and selected articles of the 20-30s. St. Petersburg: Inapress, 2001, p. 135.

9. On the mutual "ignorance" and approximateness of ideas about the theoretical views of the opposite side, see: Hansen-Love OA Russian formalism. Methodological reconstruction of development based on the principles of estrangement. M.: Languages of Russian culture, 2001. S. 448-449.

their opponents in a reduced form only in private correspondence, while they answered them publicly, systematically increasing the onslaught.

I will give examples. In January 1920, "Petrogradskaya Pravda" published an editorial note "Closer to Life", where it accused the researchers of poetics, in particular Shklovsky, of escapism and inconsistency with the great era. It is necessary to write about worker-peasant art, but he publishes articles about the bourgeois "Don Quixote" and delves into the Stern, that is, "teasing" the reader and "naughty", as the "gentlemen" did in the old days. “Write not for amateur aesthetes, but for the masses!” - called the party publicist Vadim Bystryansky ™. Shklovsky answered his opponent on the "home field" - on the pages of the newspaper "Life of Art". He stated that he was not a "literary raider and conjurer" and could only give

The leaders of the masses are those formulas that will help to understand the newly emerging, because the new grows according to the laws of the old. It pains me to read the reproaches of Pravda and it is insulting to be called “gentlemen”, I am not “master”, I have been “comrade Shklovsky” for the fifth year already.

The controversy is notable for its frankness and openness, a declarative desire to take advantage of the revolutionary freedom of expression. But characteristic reservations are already appearing: “Comrade from Pravda, I am not making excuses. I am asserting my right to pride.” Shklovsky puts a pun on the requirement to respect his point of view. Earlier in the same note, he states directly: “I demand respect.” ^ It is significant that the comparison of Shklovsky with a criminal, used by Bystryansky, was liked by the pre-revolutionary critic Arkady Gornfeld, who remained after the revolution in the same, albeit opportunistically updated, positions. Summarizing in an article of 1922 the opposition of formalism to other trends in modern criticism, Gornfeld irritably noted " noisy journalism" and "circle jargon", calling Shklovsky "a talented raider". Of course, I meant

10. V. B. [Bystryansky V. A.] On the topics of the day: Closer to life! // Petrogradskaya Pravda. 01/27/1920. No. 18.

11. Shklovsky V. B. In his defense // Shklovsky V. B. Hamburg account. M .: Soviet writer, 1990. S. 90.

12. Ibid.

13. Gornfeld A. Formalists and their opponents // Literary Thought. 1922. No. 3. S. 5.

the superficial nature of his works, however, the criminal connotations could not but create additional contexts against the background of the trial against the right SRs that began so timely, from which Shklovsky fled to Europe, avoiding the inevitable retribution for his eloquent military past.

Representatives of aesthetic criticism of pre-revolutionary origin, against which Shklovsky and later Eikhenbaum invariably opposed, responded correctly to the Formalists, but could not hide their dissatisfaction with the unusual, too eccentric style of presentation of the material. In this regard, the unanimous rejection of Shklovsky by émigré critics (Roman Gul, Mikhail Osorgin), who cultivated pre-revolutionary intellectual trends for obvious ideological reasons, is indicative. Shklovsky came under fire from the leading pens of emigration during his brief but fruitful stay in Berlin, when two of his novels charged with literary theory came out of print at once: the travelogue “Sentimental Journey” and the epistolary “ZOO. Letters are not about love. In the restrained style of émigré criticism, Shklovsky was also responded to by some adherents of traditional critical writing who remained in Russia. Even in the official organ of Soviet literature - the journal "Print and Revolution" edited by Vyacheslav Polonsky - at first articles appeared, as if created by venerable and moderate conservatives of the Russian diaspora. Thus, Konstantin Loks, secretary of the Main Science at the Narkompros, who clearly shares the views of Lunacharsky as an "educated Bolshevik", in 1922 wrote in a review of Shklovsky's article "Rozanov":

Science is science, and a mixture of feuilleton and science is an unnecessary matter.<...>

It is high time to put aside this swagger of bad taste.

In the same year, 1922, under the art department of the Main Political Education Department, the thin magazine Vestnik Iskusstva was published for a short time. Its editor was theater critic Mikhail Zagorsky, an employee of the Theatrical Department (TEO) of the People's Commissariat of Education, where the Vestnik Theater magazine was published under his supervision:

14. Loks K. G. Viktor Shklovsky. Rozanov. From the book. "The plot as a phenomenon of style." OPOYAZ Publishing House, 1921, Petrograd // Print and Revolution. 1922. Prince. 1. S. 286.

Of course, they are dissolute, unreliable and frivolous guys - these frolicking writers from the Book Corner, all these Khovins, Shklovskys, Eikhenbaums and other "jolly art historians" from the OPOYAZ community. We are not on our way with them. But they are smart people and very, very insightful. Their group is almost the only literary group in Petrograd with a keen sense of modernity, although they have a poor understanding of it.<...>

This is the most interesting group of literary beasts that escaped the flood.

Using the biblical metaphor popular in the early post-revolutionary years, Zagorsky reveals his refinement, although he willingly appropriates Bolshevik phraseology (“We are not on the same path with them”). The contemptuous use of the plural in the enumeration of specific names, derogatory epithets on the verge of familiarity are, on the contrary, concessions to the new discourse that the author volunteered to accept, like his idol Vsevolod Meyerhold. Theoretically, Zagorsky is right on the path with the formalists, but for the large-scale left-wing art that is ideologically close to him, the chamber review journal Knizhny Ugol is not radical enough, and even petty-bourgeois.

In the 1920s, even the most insignificant conceptual differences began to be perceived as an occasion for passionate statements. Since 1923, the Petrograd newspaper Life of Art has been published as a magazine and has shown less and less tolerance towards both the remnants of pre-revolutionary criticism and futuristic zaum, with which formalism was identified by inertia. In 1924, the magazine provided a platform for the ideologist of Soviet literary constructivism, Kornely Zelinsky. Standing up for strengthening the semantic component of a literary work, Zelinsky, at the same time, repelled the idea of a text as a construction, which partly brought him closer to the platform of formalism. Nevertheless, in the article “How Viktor Shklovsky is Made”, the title of which parodies the approaches of the OPOYAZ program texts, Zelinsky is limited to presenting personal accounts to the head of a competing company:

15. Zagorsky M. Book. Among books and magazines. "Relight". Book. 1. Book Corner. Issue. 8. "Northern days". Book. II // Bulletin of Arts. 1922. No. 2. S. 18.

From his brilliant skull, which looks like the head of an Egyptian commander, unexpected thoughts are pouring out, like moisture from a watering can onto the flowerbeds of Russian literature.

Unable to hide his annoyance at the influence of only three years older, but much more experienced colleague, Zelinsky continues:

At the beginning there is a word. No, in the beginning there was Shklovsky, and then formalism. This round, shiny head, like a cock cocked over books, acts like a master key among literary buildings.

The head that haunts Zelinsky looms not only over literature. At this time, Shklovsky had already returned from abroad and worked in Moscow at the 3rd factory of Goskino, whose title would become the title of one of his most famous books of the 1920s. It has not yet come out, but Soviet thick magazines are already deliberately and without unnecessary equivocations cracking down on the remnants of formalism. “A vivid manifestation of that time is the ‘collapse of genres’,” is how Labori Kalmanson, under the pseudonym G. Lelevich, writes about the beginning of the decade. Now, in his words, the “bourgeois theoreticians” Shklovsky and Tynyanov “watch with horror” how strong literature reappears like Yuri Libedinsky and Lydia Seifullina.About Shklovsky's "Sentimental Journey", republished in Moscow in 1924, Yesenin's admirer, critic Fyodor Zhits, spoke in the same magazine: "The author is guided by headless automatism, mischief, nihilism" / 8. However, in response to the soon-to-be-published article “Why We Love Yesenin,” Vladimir Yermilov, the leading critic of the proletarian magazine “On a Literary Post,” published a pamphlet called “Why We Don’t Love Fedorov Zhitsey.” Critics at all times take up arms against each other, but here the stormy atmosphere is getting thicker, because it is provoked by constant projections into extra-literary struggle.Here is a student of the Institute of Red Professors Viktor Kin writes about Shklovsky in the "Young Guard":

16. Zelinsky K. How Viktor Shklovsky is made // Life of Art. 1924. No. 14. P.13.

17. Lelevich G. Hippocratic face // Krasnaya nov. 1925. No. 1. S. 298.

18. Zhits F. Viktor Shklovsky. "Sentimental Journey" L .: Publishing house "Atenei", 1924 // Krasnaya nov. 1925. Book. 2. S. 284.

We do not risk offending Shklovsky by saying that his book is unprincipled, that it contains an alien, harmful ideology.<...>This muzzle is familiar to us. In the tails, she whispered about the murder of Lenin by Trotsky. I looked from behind the table of the Soviet institution. She rode on buffers and on roofs with bags of seeders and cans of vegetable oil. Muzzle, one might say, all-Russian. The same, terribly familiar muzzle looks from every page of "Sentimen-

tal travel".

Keane comments on a quote from Shklovsky's book: "It's good to live and feel the way of life with your muzzle"20. Commenting, he relishes and enhances the role of this expressive word, filling the anaphora with more and more pejorative, and then sinister meaning. The "horror", which Lelevich attributed to the formalists, seizes their opponents - now they simply have to defend themselves.

After the dispute about the formal method in the block of the magazine "Press and Revolution", which exemplarily provided Eikhenbaum's initial article "Around the Question of the Formalists"^ with five negative responses, it was possible to open fire to kill. In a diary entry dated October 17, 1924, Eikhenbaum characterizes the controversy over his article: “The answers are really boorish. Barking, cursing, anger, shouting. After the release of Shklovsky's The Third Factory, there was no longer any need to even implicitly refer to precedents. The aforementioned Fyodor Zhits writes that once Vasily Rozanov opened a new page in literature - he opened it in a formal sense. Judging by the critic's elegant rhetorical turn, he does not at all go into "an assessment of his lascivious political views and the odor of Karamazovism that comes from almost all of his works"^3. Shklovsky, as Zhits admits, following many other critics, comes entirely from Rozanov, perhaps in a minor way:

19. Kin V. V. Shklovsky. "Sentimental Journey" Memories. 1924. 192 pages. Circulation 5000 // Young Guard. 1925. Book. 2-3. pp. 266-267.

20. Shklovsky V. B. “Nothing has ended yet ...” M .: Propaganda, 2002. S. 192.

21. Eikhenbaum BM Around the issue of formalists // Press and Revolution. 1924. No. 5. S. 1-12.

22. Op. Quoted from: Curtis J. Boris Eichenbaum: His Family, Country, and Russian Literature. St. Petersburg: Academic project, 2004. P. 138.

23. Zhits F. Viktor Shklovsky. "Third Factory" Ed. "A circle". 140 pp. 1926 // Krasnaya nov. 1926. No. 11. S. 246.

[He] is like a man less than his teacher.<...>What is lacking is the masculinity of the sight, the will to conquer the reader. Shklovsky's handwriting glides over paper without pressure or thought, his observations sway on the thin stalks of feuilleton and casual conversation. But if these features irritated and outraged when Shklovsky wrote about the revolution, events of great tragic scope, they played a positive role in The Third Factory24.

One of the most effective critical methods is used - the appeal against the accused of his own weapons. After all, some five years ago Jacobson wrote in a programmatic article for the formalist movement that the former literary science was reduced to the level of an optional causerie25. Only now accusations of chatter lead not to methodological, but to political conclusions. As Arkady Glagolev writes in a review of The Third Factory,

This is the life story of a typical Russian petty-bourgeois intellectual, not devoid of a clear philistine flavor, a writer who still feels like a semi-foreign element in Soviet reality26.

It is difficult to argue with the correct class assessment of the Komsomol critic, but the characteristic word "darling" is an unmistakable marker of sanctioned persecution. The executive editor of the magazine "Soviet Cinema" Osip Beskin, ex officio, allows himself not only cautious instructions, but also openly ominous irony:

And where, if not in Krug, was the next masterpiece of Shklovsky, this ubiquitous figaro of our time, giving the world the reactionary theories of literature, reviving the aesthetic traditions of the good old times, ennobling Soviet filmmaking, scattering the sparkles of his paradoxical feuilleton on the envy and corruption of the less nimble their brethren?27

24. Ibid. pp. 246-247.

25. Yakobson R. O. About artistic realism // Yakobson R. O. Works on poetics. M.: Progress, 1987. S. 386.

26. Glagolev A. V. Shklovsky. "Third Factory" Ed. "A circle". M., 1926. Pp. 139. C. 1 rub. // Young guard. 1927. Book. 1. S. 205.

27. Beskin O. Handicraft workshop of literary reaction // At the literary post. 1927. No. 7. S. 18.

Corruption is an important motif, noticed by proletarian criticism, which takes a seemingly paradoxical, increasingly conservative position. In the same 1927, Vyacheslav Polonsky called Shklovsky a "Marxist-eater" and a "pornographer"^8. The first is for the fact that he impudently defends production art from the Marxists in the Novy LEF magazine, which causes their legitimate laughter. The second - for the script of the film "The Third Meshchanskaya, or Love in Three", which was banned from showing in parts of the Red Army. Beskin, whom Polonsky dislikes, as well as all Rapovites, also draws attention to "such intimacy", "the game of negligence"29. In 1927, Soviet culture, just at the forefront of gender issues (from the books of Alexandra Kollontai to educational films about prostitution and venereal diseases), is a stronghold of chastity, and films like The Prostitute (1926, Oleg Frelikh) or The Third Meshchanskaya (1927, Abram Room) are late in getting into the trend. Tynyanov, who submitted an article on literary evolution to the same journal, speaks very harshly about Beskin's article and his professional hypocrisy in a letter to Shklovsky:

Now, they say, a petty demon howled you there. Meanwhile, my article was accepted there. I haven't read the demon yet, but I have no doubt that I'm rotten.

One could point to Tynyanov's no less cool and even more furious phraseology, if it were not for the space of private correspondence. The willingness to publish in a proletarian journal indicates that in the minds of the Formalists there still exists, by inertia, freedom of the press. About it, the same Polonsky spoke at the same time quite definitely:

In the atmosphere of a literary war, where the strongest wins, our literary disputes about fellow travelers and about which squad of writers the future belongs to will be resolved.

28. Polonsky V.P. Bluff continues // Polonsky V.P. On literary topics. pp. 37-39.

29. Beskin O. Decree. op. pp. 18-19.

30. Op. Quoted from: Toddes E. A., Chudakov A. P., Chudakova M. O. Comments // Tynyanov Yu. N. Poetics. History of literature. Movie. M.: Nauka, 1977. S. 519.

31. Polonsky V. P. To the question of our literary differences. Article one. Critical notes on the book of G. Lelevich "At the literary post" // Polonsky V.P. On literary topics. S. 110.

Speaking about the winners, Polonsky was wrong only that the future of literature belongs to the proletariat. The future, as is known, already in the second half of the 1920s belonged to the opportunist nomenklatura. But there was no doubt about the very fact of waging war and its transition to a decisive phase in parallel with the announcement of the course of the first five-year plan. In 1929, Isaac Nusinov tightly strings aggressive metaphors against the sentenced formalist:

Viktor Shklovsky took it into his head to hide under the redoubt - in the military terminology of 1812, Boris Eikhenbaum, or,

in a modern way, into the trench of the literary environment, but flopped into a formalist-eclectic puddle33.

On Shklovsky's article "A Monument to a Scientific Error" (1930), in which the author floridly and evasively renounces formalism, Mark Gelfand will issue a review with the characteristic title "The Declaration of Tsar Midas, or What Happened to Viktor Shklovsky." In the course of rhetorical means, reflecting the utmost vigilance and attitude to expose and destroy the class enemy. The defamation of the Formalists will subside a little in 1931, only to flare up with renewed vigor in the middle of the next decade, when the concept itself will turn into a stigma, realizing the principle of nomina sunt odiosa as fully as possible.

The tightening of rhetorical screws as a prelude to repression dominated the reaction to formalism, but it was not its only form. The "old-fashioned" critics of formalism were mostly forced to join the prevailing discursive manner and subsequently languidly included their voice in the choir, vilifying the renegades on behalf of the collective (Pavel Sakulin, Viktor Zhirmunsky, etc.)34. The voice of other carriers of alternative views (first of all, we are talking about Mikhail Bakhtin and the circle of the State Academy of Artistic Sciences - the State Academy of Artistic Sciences) fell silent with the disappearance of the occasion in the early 1930s, if not

32. Conscious distortion of the term "literary life".

33. Nusinov I. Belated discoveries, or How V. Shklovsky got tired of eating with his bare hands, and he got a homemade Marxist spoon // Literature and Marxism. 1929. No. 5. S. 12.

34. For more details about this mimicry mechanism, see the representative reconstruction of the defeat of the science of literature in post-war Leningrad: Druzhinin P. A. Ideology and Philology. Leningrad. 1940s. Moscow: New Literary Review, 2012, pp. 453-487.

Pavel Medvedev's book Formalism and Formalists (1934), restrained in tone, but devastating in accordance with the rules of the game. The silence of Boris Engelhardt was highly eloquent both in regard to his colleagues and in the mainstream of the science of literature. In parallel with the growing persecution, he managed to offer an example of a scientific-critical analysis of the methodological foundations of the formal school.

In the well-known work The Formal Method in the History of Literature (1927), Engelhardt tried to place his object in the broad context of aesthetic theories and came to the conclusion that there is not a method, but a completely autonomous discipline that can be conditionally designated as formal poetics. She considers all works of world literature in no other way than from the point of view of abstruse language, constructing the object of her research in such a way that any thematic, ideological, historical components are excluded from the field of analysis. Engelhardt, as a supporter of the aesthetics of Johann Georg Hamann, the linguistic phenomenology of Alexander Potebnya, and the historical poetics of Alexander Veselovsky, does not even so much criticize the Formalists, with many of whom he is connected by work on similar topics at the same institute, as he shows that they do not revolutionize the methods of literary history. Moreover, neither this applied area of the aesthetics of the word, nor even the general aesthetics of the Formalists, was simply noticed. Engelhardt stubbornly distances himself from disputes about formalism, which is why the formalist expressive charm disappears by itself and a rather simple, if not primitive, theoretical scheme remains. The height of the critical intensity for the author is the word "notorious" in relation to "abstruse language", as well as its designation as "a declarative scarecrow with which the Futurists tried to strike the imagination of the layman"^. Below, Engelhardt uses the word “dragon” as a synonym for “scarecrow” - he must scare away from the school “all fellow travelers dangerous with their eclecticism”^6. In other words, Engelhardt models, if not parodies, the position of the Formalists themselves, referring to Eikhenbaum's latest policy article at the time

35. Engelgardt B. M. Formal method in the history of literature // Engelhardt B. M. Izbr. works. St. Petersburg: St. Petersburg University Press, 1995. P. 76.

36. Ibid. S. 78.

(“We are surrounded by eclectics and epigones,”37 it says almost paranoidly about yesterday's friends and even some students).

Against the backdrop of open attacks by the critics of Krasnaya Nov and Press and Revolution, Engelhardt’s closed controversy turned out to be a kind of archaic innovation of discourse, an evolution through retreat, which had to be remembered only in the post-Soviet years, but already in the aspect of the history of science . In the 1930s, such scientists fell silent on principle, and without the pathos characteristic of conscious pariahs like Olga Freidenberg. Engelhardt became the translator of Jonathan Swift, Walter Scott and Charles Dickens; he died in besieged Leningrad. However, neither he, nor even the Formalists with their relatively happy fate (if one considers that they almost completely escaped the Gulag) cannot be considered defeated - even in a war with a predetermined end. Fair play was understood as a temporary, intermediate state. The logic of a hegemon who is forced to use the resources of a defeated opponent does not assume that the latter has a chance to survive and survive. The enemy is either broken or killed. The rules of the game regarding the enemy as a temporary ally can change at any time. The route of this change is from discussion to defamation, from conventional witticism to outright rudeness.

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FROM DISPUTE TO PERSECUTION: RHETORIC OF DEBATES SURROUNDING THE FORMALIST CIRCLE IN THE 1920S

Jan Levchenko. Professor, School of Cultural Studies, Faculty of Humanities, [email protected]

National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE). Address: 21/4 Staraya Basmannaya str., 105066 Moscow, Russia.

Keywords: Russian formalism; literary criticism and polemics; rhetoric of competition and discussion in literature; class struggle; Bolshevik revolution.

The contrast dualism that characterizes the opposition between "us" and "them" in Russian culture to the present day became visible during that time, as the triumphant class was fundamentally unwilling to compromise with the defeated. The Bolsheviks were not feeling magnanimous after the victory of the October revolution. Their strategy was to cultivate hatred, pitting different groups against each other under the banner of class struggle in order to further strip and/or remove any phenomena diverging from the established way forward. The primary motivation for the crackdown through terror was civil war. Subsequently, it was replaced by the requirement for special vigilance during the temporary resurgence of the bourgeoisie in the period of New Economic Policy (NEP). The conceptualization of the NEP was not only an economic and industrial, but also inevitably a cultural matter, and the proletariat simply had to feel threatened by the surviving oppressors whose consciousness remained the same as before the revolution. Ultimately, the announced and long-awaited rejection of the NEP and its "restorative" culture legitimized a new round of aggressive rhetoric that reinforced the internal crisis of the Soviet "poputchiks" (primarily discriminated intelligentsia) and allowed to put an end to them on the cusp of the 1920s and 1930s.

DOI: 10.22394/0869-5377-2017-5-25-41

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Literary criticism occupied an important place in Russian literary and social life.

How do criticism and fiction relate? It would seem that there is no doubt that literature is primary, and criticism is secondary, in other words, that critical thought follows in its development the movement of literature and cannot contain more than what is given by literature. In principle, this is true, but since the time of the Decembrists, it has become a tradition for Russian criticism to address problems not only purely literary, but also social, philosophical, and moral. In addition, cases are known when the best critics were able to give such forecasts of literary development, which were subsequently fully justified.

Public life in the 60s. was very tense. Literary criticism was just one of the main areas of ideological struggle, which was reflected in a sharp polemic between representatives of various trends. Defenders of the revolutionary democratic ideology and supporters of "pure art" defended diametrically opposed theories, looked at the goals and objectives of literary creativity in different ways.

Not all prominent writers of the XIX century. recognized the justice of the sharp literary controversy, when some defended the benevolence of only Gogol's traditions, while others accepted only Pushkin's "pure poetry". However, Turgenev wrote to Druzhinin about the need for both Pushkin and Gogol in Russian literature: “Pushkin’s literature receded into the background - let it come forward again, but not in order to replace Gogol’s. We still urgently need Gogol's influence both in life and in literature. A similar position was held by Nekrasov, who, during the period of the most acute controversy, urged the younger generation to learn from Pushkin: "... learn from the example of a great poet to love art, truth and homeland, and if God has given you talent, follow in Pushkin's footsteps" . But at the same time, in a letter to Turgenev, Nekrasov argued that Gogol is “a noble and most humane person in the Russian world; one must wish that the young writers of Russia follow in his footsteps. Material from the site

In the middle of the XIX century. representatives of two main trends, two aesthetic theories sharply argued. Who was right, who was wrong? To a certain extent, both sides were right.

We can say that the ideal is an organic combination, the harmony of aesthetic, moral, sociological, historical criteria. Unfortunately, this has not always worked out. There was no unity among critics: various schools and directions appeared, each of which had not only its own achievements and successes, but also shortcomings, not least caused by excessive polemical extremes.

I will start a little afar, from the very beginning of the 19th century, because all this may be necessary for the feeling of the era - and because it was a single process.

The role of Russian journals in this period is great and varied. Journals are sources of education, conductors of philosophical, aesthetic, political and economic information. All fiction, not to mention critical literature, passed through magazines.
New Russian journalism arose at the very beginning of the 19th century, or even in the last decade of the 18th century. Karamzin's Moscow Journal, published in 1791-1792, hardly anyone can remember, but his Vestnik Evropy (1802-1803) is already closer to us, educated people over sixty can remember how their parents read it , for example). These are the first Russian magazines created according to the Western European model - magazines with permanent sections, including critics, a variety of material, a more or less unified ideological and artistic direction, fascination and accessibility of presentation, and, finally, a certain periodicity.
In the first half of the century, such magazines as the Moscow Telegraph (1825-1834), Telescope and the appendix - the newspaper Molva (1831-1836), Sovremennik (published since 1836) and Domestic Notes ( from 1846). The last two journals will play an exceptional role in the social and political life of the second half of the 19th century.
Although I will talk mainly about magazines, it is impossible not to mention the famous odious newspaper of the 19th century - this is the "Northern Bee" (1825-1864), founded by the equally famous and odious Bulgarin. Attention, until 1825 it was a stronghold of liberal ideas, the Decembrist poets were published in it, after that it was a loyal organ, for which it was subjected to a number of polemical attacks and ridicule from almost all other magazines. Since 1860, he again changes course towards a democratic one, articles about Nekrasov and Saltykov-Shchedrin begin to be published in it. Nevertheless, all the time of its existence it is considered the secret body of the III branch.
The Literaturnaya Gazeta did not exist for long, in the publication of which Pushkin took part - in 1830-1831 this newspaper was considered an opposition publication, following the traditions of Decembrist journalism. It publishes both Russian (Gogol) and foreign (Hugo) writers.
The newspaper under the same name appears in 1840-1849, has a subtitle: "Bulletin of sciences, arts, literature, news, theaters and fashion" and a general progressive orientation.
"Moscow Telegraph" - a magazine published in 1825-1834. It did not have a bright literary orientation, but it published articles on philosophy, the history of literature, history, public and private economy, natural sciences, including translated ones.
"Telescope" - also did not shine with bright fiction, but served as a platform for controversy on a variety of issues - linguistic, historical and even natural science. Belinsky's first articles appear in Molva.
It was in the "Telescope" that the beginnings of those phenomena that would later be called Slavophilism and Westernism appeared.
The Western and Slavophile trend of thought emerged in the 1930s and 1940s in a debate about the path of Russia's development. The names are very conditional, and in no case can one of these directions be considered oppositional, and the other - loyal. Both were in opposition to the official course. Westerners were supporters of the Europeanization of Russia, the development of its economy, culture, politics and public institutions along the path of Western European states. Among them were liberals, supporters of gradual reforms, and radicals (democrats) - supporters of the revolution. Actually, the controversy between Otechestvennye Zapiski and Sovremennik was connected with this (see below). T.N. Granovsky, M.N. Katkov, I.S. Turgenev, P.Ya. Chaadaev, B.N. Chicherin and others. The extreme left wing of the Westerners - A.I. Herzen, V.G. Belinsky, N.P. Ogarev, partly M.A. Bakunin.
The Slavophils, on the contrary, defended the idea of the originality of the social system of Russia and Russian culture, and saw the origins of this originality in the special character of Orthodoxy. They attributed rationalism and disunity to the West, while in Russia they saw patriarchy, spiritual integrity. The Slavophiles called for a rejection of the path that Russia had followed since the reforms of Peter I - in particular, by the way, they objected to the separation of the educated classes from the lower ones and saw salvation in people's life, way of life and customs. (Remember in "Fathers and Sons" the dispute between Bazarov and Pavel Petrovich? “(Bazarov): And then I’ll be ready to agree with you,” he added, getting up, “when you present me at least one decision in our modern life, in family or public, which would not cause complete and merciless denial.
“I will present you millions of such resolutions,” exclaimed Pavel Petrovich, “millions!” Yes, at least the community, for example.
A cold smile twisted Bazarov's lips.
- Well, about the community, - he said, - talk better with your brother. He now seems to have experienced in practice what a community, mutual responsibility, sobriety and the like are.
- The family, finally, the family, as it exists among our peasants! cried Pavel Petrovich.
- And this question, I believe, is better for you not to analyze in detail. Have you heard of daughters-in-law, tea? The position of Pavel Petrovich does not correspond to the Slavophile as a whole, he is rather close to Westernizers-liberals, but this exchange of remarks perfectly illustrates the way of polemic between Slavophiles and Westerners-democrats).
The Slavophiles include the critic I.V. Kireevsky, poet, philosopher and critic A.S. Khomyakov, S.T. Aksakov, the author of the book “Childhood of Bagrov-grandson”, and his sons K.S. Aksakov and I.S. Aksakov, also literary critics.
The Slavophiles did not have a permanent journal for reasons of censorship. They published a number of collections of articles; in the 1950s, when censorship softened somewhat, the magazines Molva, Parus, and Moskvityanin appeared.
In 1861-1863, the Vremya magazine was published by F.M. and M.M. Dostoevsky. It develops the ideas of pochvenism, which is, in essence, a modification of Slavophilism - the original path of Russia is recognized in pochvenism, but historical progress is not denied, which, however, is given a different meaning than that of the Westerners.
In general, at the time being described, moderate Westernism rather than Slavophilism is favored in political and public life. Western journals are actively arguing with each other, but the Slavophiles, as we see, do not have their own journal.
Among the Westerners there are both believers (Granovsky) and atheists (Bakunin), for example, both liberals and democrats. Slavophiles are mostly Orthodox, often defiantly.
After the reforms of 1861, the moderate Westernizers partly drew closer to the Slavophiles.

Otechestvennye Zapiski has been published in St. Petersburg since 1818. Until 1839, the magazine was mostly filled with articles on historical and geographical topics. Its true heyday begins in 1839, when the publisher transformed it into a monthly "scholarly-literary journal" of a large volume (up to 40 printed sheets). Each issue contained the sections "Modern Chronicle of Russia", "Science", "Literature", "Art", "House Economics, Agriculture and Industry in General", "Criticism", "Modern Bibliographic Chronicle", "Mixture". It is attended by writers and critics of various generations and trends, as well as Westerners and Slavophiles. The critical department is headed by the famous critic, who influenced the entire literary process of the second half of the 19th century and the entire school of Russian literary criticism, V.G. Belinsky. Gradually, the magazine becomes a distinctly Westernizing organ. In 1847, Belinsky, and with him Herzen, for a number of reasons, including everyday ones, moved to the journal Sovremennik, and Otechestvennye Zapiski became a publication of a liberal-Western orientation, while Sovremennik acquires a distinctly democratic - revolutionary flavor.
The Sovremennik magazine was founded in 1836, and Pushkin was involved in its founding. In particular, "The Captain's Daughter" was printed there. Until 1843, the magazine was published 4 times a year. In 1846 the magazine fell into disrepair and was sold to Nekrasov and Panaev.
Since then, the program of the journal has been determined by the articles of its ideological inspirer Belinsky. It publishes works by leading authors - Goncharov, Herzen, Turgenev, Druzhinin's story "Polinka Saks" is printed in it, and translations of novels by Dickens, Thackeray and George Sand are also printed in it. Since 1858, the magazine began to conduct a sharp debate with the liberal direction, finally becoming openly revolutionary. At this time, Turgenev leaves him (and soon after he writes the novel "Fathers and Sons" - the polemic with the democrats in the novel is present in the most distinct way).
In June 1862, the magazine was suspended for 8 months; it began to appear again at the beginning of 1863.
In London, in 1855-1868, the almanac of Westerners Herzen and Ogarev "Polar Star" was published. This is the first uncensored Russian democratic journal. It frankly calls for revolution, publishes the freedom-loving poems of Pushkin, Lermontov, Ryleev, and publishes various revealing materials. Despite this, the magazine was not banned in Russia and, according to rumors, Alexander II opened the meetings of the Cabinet of Ministers with the words “Have everyone read the latest issue of the Polar Star? Attitude towards Herzen changed after the Polish uprising of 1863 :), when he sided with Poland and condemned the Russian Empire.
So, the dry residue. Currently, the newspaper "Northern Bee", the magazines "Domestic Notes", "Sovremennik" (St. Petersburg), "Molva", "Parus" and "Moskvityanin" (Moscow) are published (but they can hardly reach our city, as they come out in a very small circulation), "Polar Star" (London)

History of Russian literature of the 19th century. Part 2. 1840-1860 Prokofieva Natalia Nikolaevna

Literary and public struggle at the turn of the 50-60s

1858 is the year of a sharp demarcation between the revolutionary democracy and the liberal nobles, who were once together. The Sovremennik magazine comes to the fore. The ideological gap between its employees was due to the arrival here in 1855 as a leading critic N. G. Chernyshevsky, and then N. A. Dobrolyubov, who headed the bibliographic department of the journal.

V. Botkin, P. Annenkov, D. Grigorovich, I. Turgenev, who are more prone to reformist ways of transforming Russian society, will find themselves in the opposite camp to Nekrasov, Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov. Many writers of a liberal-Western orientation will collaborate in M. N. Katkov's journal Russky Vestnik.

So, at the turn of the 1850s and 1860s, the process of delimitation of social and literary positions was completed and new social and literary trends emerged. Everyone understands that the central question is the question of serfdom. Reforms are becoming inevitable, but everyone is interested in their nature: will the peasants be released with an allotment, "with land", with an allotment for a ransom, or "without land."

The radical point of view is defended by the magazine "Contemporary". After the split in 1856, the magazine strengthens its position N. G. Chernyshevsky. In 1858, the department of criticism in the magazine was entrusted N. A. Dobrolyubov. In addition to Nekrasov, Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, the editorial staff of Sovremennik included M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, G. Z. Eliseev, M. A. Antonovich, and others. literary and political using fiction for the purposes of political struggle and propaganda. The position of Sovremennik is entirely shared by the supplement to the magazine Whistle (1859-1863), which brought together Sovremennik employees and satirical writers. Later, a satirical magazine Iskra (1859–1873), which was close to them, appeared under the editorship of the satirical poet V. S. Kurochkina and artist N. A. Stepanova, where Dobrolyubov, Eliseev, Weinberg collaborated. Sovremennik was actively supported by G.E. Blagosvetlov, headed by G.E. D. I. Pisarev, V. A. Zaitsev, N. V. Shelgunov, D. D. Minaev.

Magazines became resolute and implacable opponents of Sovremennik "Library for reading" whose leading critic was A. V. Druzhinin, “Domestic Notes”, whose department of criticism, and then the general editorial board, were in the hands of S. S. Dudyshkina, Russian Bulletin headed by M. N. Katkov.

A special position was occupied by the "Moskvityanin" and the Slavophiles. Journal of the Slavophiles "Russian conversation" in which the main role was played A. I. Koshelev, T. I. Filippov and I. S. Aksakov, published an article by K. S. Aksakov “Review of Modern Literature”, which proclaimed anti-Western ideas. But in another article, Our Literature, published after the author's death in the newspaper The Day, Aksakov sympathized with Saltykov-Shchedrin's satire in Gubernskie Ocherki. In addition to these printed organs, Slavophile ideas also developed in the newspaper Parus, published by I. S. Aksakov. In 1850–1855 "Moskvityanin" came "young edition" (A. Ostrovsky, then A. Grigoriev). T. I. Filippov and B. N. Almazov became its active collaborators, who somewhat toned down the anti-Western tone of their speeches. Later, in the 1860s, the traditions of the Slavophiles were largely adopted by the journals of the brothers F.M. and M. M. Dostoyevsky "Time"(1861–1863) and "Epoch"(1864–1865).

The main literary struggle unfolded around the specifics of the so-called "reflection" of reality and the social functions of art. It was conducted by Chernyshevsky, Dobrolyubov, to a lesser extent Nekrasov, Saltykov-Shchedrin and their like-minded people under the banner of asserting the principles of critical realism, as if the writers and critics with whom the polemic was conducted (I. Turgenev, A. Ostrovsky, L. Tolstoy, P. Annenkov , A. Druzhinin and others) insisted on some other direction in literature and opposed realism. Behind the words about realism, something else was hidden: the desire to make literature an appendage of social struggle, to reduce its independent significance, to reduce its inherent value and self-sufficiency, to communicate to it purely utilitarian goals. For this purpose, even the term “pure art” was invented, which was mercilessly stigmatized by writers who sang of the beauty of nature, love, universal values and supposedly indifferent to social ulcers and vices. For the critics of the radical trend, who stood up for realism in literature, even the requirement of critical realism was insufficient in the new social conditions. They brought to the fore the genres of political satire. Dobrolyubov's programmatic article "Literary trifles of the past year" (1859) rejected the principles of the previous satire. Dobrolyubov was dissatisfied with the fact that Russian satire criticized individual shortcomings, while it was supposed to expose the entire public-state system in Russia. This thesis served as a signal to ridicule all modern "accusatory" literature as superficial and harmless. It is quite clear that the author had in mind not so much purely literary goals as political goals.

At the same time, radical "left" criticism ridicules the once so-called "advanced" people who have become "superfluous" and useless. Even Herzen objected to such ideas, who took such laughter to himself and could not refuse the progressiveness of the historical types of Onegin and Pechorin.

Russian writers and critics (L. Tolstoy, I. Turgenev, N. Leskov, A. Pisemsky, A. Fet, F. Dostoevsky, P. Annenkov, A. Druzhinin and others) could not, of course, pass by the humiliation of fiction , past the direct declaration of tasks unusual for it, past the preaching of reckless utilitarianism, and reacted sharply negatively to these ideas of radical criticism with major "anti-nihilistic" novels, articles, reviews and statements in letters.

Radical critics found support for their utilitarian public views on art in theoretical treatises, literary articles and works of art. Chernyshevsky. The idea of the essence of art was set forth by Chernyshevsky in his dissertation "The Aesthetic Relations of Art to Reality"

From Chernyshevsky's point of view, it is not the "idea" of beauty and not beauty in art in general that is the criterion and model of beauty, but life itself and beauty in nature, in life. Chernyshevsky is not embarrassed by the fact that examples of truly beautiful are very rare in life. Art itself is a more or less adequate imitation of reality, but always lower than the reality it imitates. Chernyshevsky puts forward the concept of the ideal of life, "as it should be." The ideal of art corresponds to the ideal of life. However, according to Chernyshevsky, the idea of the ideal of life among the common people and other strata of society is different. The beautiful in art is the same as the common people's idea of a good life. And the idea of the people is reduced to the satisfaction of partly animal, partly completely ascetic and even miserable desires: eat well, live in a good hut, sleep enough and work. Of course, a person must be fed, have a roof over his head, the actual right to work and rest. However, for Russian writers, who met Chernyshevsky's revelations with indignation, thoughts about a person did not focus on his material needs. They dreamed of a high spiritual content of the individual. Meanwhile, in Chernyshevsky, all spiritual needs were excluded from the concept of beauty, or they were not given priority attention.

Proceeding from the “material” idea of beauty, Chernyshevsky believed that art was called upon to contribute to the transformation of reality in the interests of the people and the implementation of their concepts of beauty into reality. The writer was ordered not only to reproduce what a person is interested in (especially a simple person, a person from the people, a peasant, a commoner) in reality, not only to explain reality, but also to pass judgment on it. Hence it is clear that art is a form of human moral activity, that art is identified with morality. The value of art depends on how much it acts as a means of educating and shaping a person, transforming an unattractive reality into a “good life”, in which a person is fed, groomed, warmed, etc. A person’s spirituality can be raised not to the heights of universal ideals, contemptuously called “abstract ”, “speculative”, “theoretical”, but to a completely understandable level that does not cross the boundaries of material claims necessary to maintain life.

Literature from this point of view is nothing but a servant of a certain direction of ideas (best of all, the ideas of Chernyshevsky himself). The idea of "our time", Chernyshevsky wrote, is "humanity and concern for human life."

In the 1850s, Chernyshevsky aggressively expounded his aesthetic views not only in theoretical works, but also in literary criticism. A generalization of his thoughts was the book "Essays on the Gogol period of Russian literature." In it, he considers Gogol as the founder of the literature of critical realism. However, for all the significance of Gogol, this writer, according to Chernyshevsky, was not fully aware of the ideas he expressed, their connection, their causes and consequences. Chernyshevsky demanded from contemporary writers that the conscious element be strengthened in their work.

To the greatest extent, this task was successful for him in the novel "What to do?" - a work that is rather weak in ideological and artistic terms, but naively and fully embodies the author's dreams of a "good life" and the idea of \u200b\u200bthe beautiful.

The novel is dominated by a rationalistic, logical beginning, only slightly embellished with an "entertaining" plot, made up of banal situations and plot moves of second-rate romantic literature. The purpose of the novel is journalistic and propaganda tasks. The novel was supposed to prove the need for a revolution, as a result of which socialist transformations would be carried out. The author, who demanded from writers a truthful representation and almost a copy of reality, did not follow these principles himself in the novel and admitted that he had taken his work out of his head from beginning to end. There was no workshop of Vera Pavlovna, no semblance of heroes, not even a relationship between them. From this arises the impression that the invented ideal, illusory and utopian through and through, is contrived and forced.

The crown of the story is the so-called "dreams" of Vera Pavlovna, which are symbolic paintings depicting either the liberation of all girls from the basement, or the complete emancipation of women and the socialist renewal of mankind. The second dream affirms the great power of science, especially the natural scientific research of the Germans, and the value of labor (“life has labor as its main element”). Only having understood this simple idea, Vera Pavlovna takes up the organization of a new type of labor partnership.

Vera Pavlovna, Kirsanov and Lopukhov appear in the novel as "new people" (and ordinary ones at that). All of them share the theory of "reasonable egoism", which consists in the fact that the personal benefit of a person lies, supposedly, in the universal interest, which is reduced to the interest of the working people and is identified with it. In love situations, such reasonable selfishness is manifested in the rejection of domestic oppression and forced marriage. A love triangle is tied up in the novel: Vera Pavlovna is connected with Lopukhov, but he, having learned that she loves Kirsanov, “leaves the stage” and at the same time experiences genuine pleasure in himself (“What a high pleasure it is to feel acting like a noble person ...” ). This is the proposed way to resolve dramatic family conflicts, leading to the creation of a morally healthy family.

Next to new, but ordinary people, there are also new people, but already “special”. Rakhmetov is referred to them. Probably, Chernyshevsky had in mind first of all himself. Rakhmetov is a professional revolutionary who rejected everything personal for himself and is only occupied with the public (he "was engaged in other people's affairs or nobody's affairs in particular", "he had no personal affairs ..."). Like a knight without fear or reproach, Rakhmetov delivers "fiery speeches" and, of course, the author adds with irony, "not about love." In order to get to know the people, this revolutionary wanders around Russia and fanatically, renouncing family and love, professes rigor in relation to women and prepares himself for illegal revolutionary activity.

It must be said that Chernyshevsky's sermon in the "artistic" form of the novel did not go unnoticed and made a great impression on the Raznochinsk youth, who longed for social change. The sincerity of sympathy for the people on the part of the author of What Is to Be Done? there is no doubt, just as there is no doubt the sincere faith of the radical youth in the ideals that Chernyshevsky revealed to them. But this sincerity does not atone for either the weakness of thought or the weakness of Chernyshevsky's artistic talent. Its influence is due to a large extent to the ignorance and lack of enlightenment of young people, their isolation from culture or its superficial assimilation. Under these conditions, the simple solutions proposed by Chernyshevsky and his like-minded people captivated young minds, not experienced in science, philosophy, or culture, who were prone to ill-conceived theories and decisive actions.

Chernyshevsky knew this kind of youth well, since he himself, like Dobrolyubov, came from it. Having discarded all the traditional values that were instilled in him within the walls of his prosperous and revered priest's house, he retained, however, the atmosphere of his parents' monastery - puritanical, ascetic and fanatical. As is often the case, puritanism is a combination of purity and wickedness. Everyone who happened to meet with Chernyshevsky and his supporters could not understand why they had so much hatred and poisonous malice. Herzen called them "biliary", and Turgenev once said to Chernyshevsky: "You are a snake, but Dobrolyubov is a spectacled snake."

Chernyshevsky was a type of person characteristic of the late 1850s-1860s. He was a plebeian who had the opportunity to touch science and culture. But in order to master the sciences and culture, it was necessary first of all to form one's feelings and one's mind, that is, to master real wealth - all the property of Russian culture and Russian science. However, as a plebeian, Chernyshevsky despised the culture of the nobility and the aesthetic and artistic values that it acquired, because they were not utilitarian. The most valuable thing for him in all Russian literature - Belinsky and Gogol - with their help, you can undermine the existing order and begin social transformations. Consequently, literature is needed as a material for propaganda and is nothing but journalism in a more or less entertaining form. Much more important and more useful than any art is Western science, which is necessary for the future technical progress of socialist society in the interests of the peasantry, which is the repository of socialist ideals. Consequently, "scientific rationalism" was put at the basis of fiction and its criticism.

To this it must be added that the criticism of Chernyshevsky and his followers can rightly be called "journalistic", since its main goal is to extract social and propaganda benefits from the work being evaluated, the artistic value of which depends not on aesthetic merits, but on the social problems raised in the work, on the spirit in which their solution is planned, and on the social situation. One and the same work, for example, the plays of A. N. Ostrovsky, could be evaluated differently by Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, but not because the critics differed in the principles for evaluating the aesthetic qualities of the work, but because they applied the same criteria in different public situations. What seemed essential and useful to Dobrolyubov, looked to Chernyshevsky no longer essential and useless. In accordance with this, the same features of the work seemed either aesthetically significant and valuable, or aesthetically colorless and of little artistic value.

The general tendency in the evaluation of artistic phenomena was to simplify the content of works to the utmost, reducing it to social needs that are relevant at a given historical moment, regardless of whether the writer had such needs in mind or not. This aroused the fair indignation of the writers. In particular, Turgenev, in Chernyshevsky's analysis of such a psychologically subtle story as Asya, did not recognize not only his idea, but also its embodiment. At the same time, Chernyshevsky did not clarify the author's intention and execution, but wrote an article that deliberately distorted the content and meaning of the story.

In fairness, it must be said that Chernyshevsky was by nature not deprived of either an aesthetic sense or an artistic taste. In those articles where he digressed from his favorite ideas of social reconstruction, he expressed profound ideas and concrete aesthetic judgments. First of all, articles about the works of Leo Tolstoy should be included here. Chernyshevsky was the first to speak about the features of Tolstoy's talent - observation, subtlety of psychological analysis, simplicity, poetry in pictures of nature, knowledge of the human heart, depiction of the "mental process" itself, its forms and laws, "dialectics of the soul", self-deepening, "tireless observation of oneself ”, extraordinary moral exactingness, “purity of moral feeling”, “youthful immediacy and freshness”, mutual transition of feelings into thoughts and thoughts into feelings, interest in the subtlest and most complex forms of a person’s inner life.

Separate statements of Chernyshevsky about Nekrasov's poetry, in which there is no "social tendency", are also remarkable.

Unfortunately, the social ideas in many of Chernyshevsky's articles prevented him from objectively evaluating works of art. To the same extent as Chernyshevsky, he was captivated by such ideas and N. A. Dobrolyubov. For five years, Dobrolyubov collaborated with Sovremennik, and for three years he was its chief critic. Like Chernyshevsky, he was a puritan and a fanatic, distinguished by an extraordinary capacity for work. His popularity among young people was no less than Chernyshevsky's. The central idea on which Dobrolyubov's criticism was based was the idea of organic development, inevitably leading to socialism. Man, from the point of view of Dobrolyubov, is a product of life circumstances. This truth, known for a long time, is developed by him in the following way. If a person depends on circumstances, then he is not born with ready-made human concepts, but acquires them. Therefore, it is important what concepts he acquires and "in the name" of what concepts he will then "wage the struggle of life." From this it followed that the artist's worldview is directly manifested in the work, and the work of art is an expression of the worldview, which appears in the form of a figuratively designed life truth. The degree of artistry (with all reservations) depends on the writer's convictions and their firmness. From all this it follows that literature has the official role of a propagandist of the "natural concepts and aspirations" of man. Under the "natural concepts and aspirations" of man, socialist convictions are understood. The main requirement that an artist needs to make is not to distort reality, which meant portraying it exclusively in a critical light as not corresponding to popular ideals.

In this regard, Dobrolyubov develops the concept of nationality and comes to the conclusion: “... in order to be a folk poet ..., one must be imbued with the national spirit, live its life, become on a par with it, discard all the prejudices of estates, book teaching, etc., feel all those simple feeling that the people have. “This,” the critic adds, “Pushkin lacked.” Pushkin mastered the "form of the Russian nationality", but not the content, since Pushkin was alien to socialist ideals.

Dobrolyubov calls his criticism "real". Her main focus is life realism. However, the concept of realism in Dobrolyubov does not include an objective depiction of life, but its reproduction in relation to the interests of the people, as the critic himself sees them. Developing the concept of "real criticism", Dobrolyubov proceeds, it would seem, from the correct provisions: for "real criticism" "it is not so much important what the author wanted to say, but what was said, or at least unintentionally, simply as a result of a truthful reproduction of the facts of life ". However, as G. V. Plekhanov has already shown, Dobrolyubov could not hold on to these positions. Ultimately, his criticism began to tell the writer what to write, how to write, and in what spirit to write. With all the rejection of normativity and didacticism, publicism prevailed and prevented the stated position from being consistently carried out in aesthetic judgments.

The most consistent opponents of Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov in the 1850s were V. P. Botkin and A. V. Druzhinin. The principles of their evaluation of literary phenomena can be called the principles "aesthetic criticism".

V.P. Botkin borrowed a lot from Belinsky, believing that literature is “the most powerful conductor of the ideas of education, enlightenment, noble feelings and concepts into society.” With these ideas, Botkin ended up in the Sovremennik magazine, led by Nekrasov and Chernyshevsky. However, he soon began to disagree with the staff of the magazine.

“Before any demands of modernity,” wrote Botkin, clearly contradicting Chernyshevsky, “there is a personal self, there is this heart, this person.” At the basis of any true human feeling and any deep thought "lies the infinite", and poetic words "can only hint about it." People can be poets in their souls, silently, as Tyutchev said (“A thought uttered is a lie”), but few are able to express their feelings and their thoughts in art. Therefore, one must have artistic talent. An artist is one who is endowed with the gift of expressing in words a sense of beauty, "one of the greatest revelations for the human spirit." With this thesis, another divergence with Chernyshevsky begins: the main thing in art is feeling, not thought, since a work of art opens up to the feelings of a person and affects a person primarily with its sensual side. “For those who are looking for only thoughts and images in poetry,” Botkin wrote, “Mr. Ogarev’s poems do not represent anything remarkable; their naive charm is understandable only to the heart. The criterion of artistry is the special quality of the poem, clearly felt by the feeling, the absence of the appearance of writing, artificiality. Art is the higher, the less noticeable it is. The poem must “pour out of the heart” or, as L. Tolstoy said, “be born”, arise naturally. In true art there should be no teaching. Fet's poems can serve as an example of truly artistic creations. Aesthetic criticism did not deny art a social function, but believed that art would better fulfill this function when it was art. The action of art is produced on a person through spiritual pleasure. Such an approach to art allowed Botkin to give impressive critical examples of the analysis of literary phenomena.

The founder of "aesthetic criticism" is rightfully considered A. V. Druzhinin, who also acted as a writer. Druzhinin does not renounce the social role of literature, from the connections of literature with reality, and supports the realistic trend.

After Druzhinin left the editorial board of Sovremnik in 1856, he became editor and leading critic of the Library for Reading magazine. Here he publishes many wonderful articles.

Druzhinin believes that without a strict aesthetic theory there can be no criticism. The foundations of such a theory are as follows: Russia is an integral organism, and literature is part of the national organic "body", which is part of the world whole. The existence of humanity and man is determined by the "ontological spirituality" that literature conveys and imparts. It follows that the existence of a people depends on the specifics of the innate "poetic element". Fiction provides the inner character of the people, its spirit. Poetry springs from love, from the joy of life, and literature is the result of love for the subject. This does not mean that a writer cannot touch the bad sides of life. On the contrary, their critical portrayal signifies the restoration of the love of life. Druzhinin's formula of the poetry of life does not come down to realism, and naturalness is too narrow a concept for true realism. Poetry can be in everything - in the high and eternal, but also in everyday life. The artist must be artistic - unintentional, sincere, sensitive, have a childish outlook on life and avoid instructive didactics. In this sense, creativity should be free. For example, even Nekrasov's work, despite its tendentiousness and didacticism, Druzhinin considered free, since this tendentiousness and didacticism stem from a sincere love for the subject.

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At the turn of the century, little was said in the world about the HEIR TO THE THRONE, the GRAND Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich, the future Emperor Nicholas II. There were occasional bad rumors. They said that he was ill, weak-willed and even intellect, gossiped about his connection with the ballerina Kshesinskaya and that the connection

The era of the “sixties”, which did not quite correspond, as it will happen in the 20th century, to calendar chronological milestones, was marked by a rapid growth in social and literary activity, which was reflected primarily in the existence of Russian journalism. Numerous new publications appeared during these years, including Russkiy Vestnik and Russkaya Beseda (1856), Russkoe Slovo (1859), Vremya (1861) and Epoch (1864). The popular Sovremennik and Library for Reading are changing their face. New social and aesthetic programs are formulated on the pages of periodicals; novice critics quickly become famous (N. G. Chernyshevsky, N. A. Dobrolyubov, D. I. Pisarev, N. N. Strakhov and many others), as well as writers who have returned to active work (F. M. Dostoevsky, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin); uncompromising and principled discussions arise about new outstanding phenomena in Russian literature - the works of Turgenev, L. Tolstoy, Ostrovsky, Nekrasov, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Fet. Literary changes are largely due to significant socio-political events (the death of Nicholas I and the succession of the throne to Alexander II, the defeat of Russia in the Crimean War, liberal reforms and the abolition of serfdom, the Polish uprising). The long-restrained philosophical-political, civic aspiration of public consciousness, in the absence of legal political institutions, reveals itself on the pages of "thick" literary and art magazines; it is literary criticism that becomes an open universal platform on which the main socially relevant discussions unfold.

The distinct uniqueness of the criticism of the 1860s lies in the fact that the analysis and evaluation of a work of art - its original, "natural" function - is supplemented, and often replaced by topical reasoning of a journalistic, philosophical and historical nature. Literary criticism finally and distinctly merges with journalism. Therefore, the study of literary criticism of the 1860s is impossible without taking into account its socio-political guidelines.

In the 1860s, differentiation took place within the democratic socio-literary movement that had been taking shape over the previous two decades against the background of the radical views of the young publicists of Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo, which were no longer associated only with the struggle against serfdom and autocracy, but also against the very idea of social inequality. Adherents of former liberal views seem almost conservative. The irreversibility of the ideological delimitation was clearly manifested in the fate of Nekrasov's Sovremennik. Extreme in their latent anti-government orientation "statements of that circle of writers, behind whom in Soviet historiography for many decades the ideologically oriented collective designation of "revolutionary democrats" was fixed - N. G. Chernyshevsky and N. A. Dobrolyubov, their followers and successors: M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, M.A. Antonovich, Yu.G. Zhukovsky - forced even such propagandists of Belinsky as I.S. Turgenev, V.P. "Sovremennik" did not reach that peremptory literary-critical statements, which the publicists of "Russian Word" became famous for.

The original public programs - Slavophilism and pochvenism - were imbued with general guidelines for progressive social liberation development; at first, the Russky Vestnik magazine also built its activities on the ideas of liberalism, the de facto leader of which was another former associate of Belinsky, M. N. Katkov. However, the publication, which became famous thanks to the publication of the most significant works of the late 1850s and 1860s (Provincial Essays, Fathers and Sons, The Enchanted Wanderer, Crime and Punishment, War and Peace were printed here), turned out to be the most ardent opponent of radicalism, all kinds of reconciliation with it, and in the 1860s it was the first to defend the monarchical state foundations and primordial moral foundations. Obviously, public ideological and political indifference in the literary criticism of this period is a rare, almost exceptional phenomenon (articles by A.V. Druzhinin, K.N. Leontiev). The widespread public view of literature and literary criticism as a reflection and expression of current social problems leads to an unprecedented growth in the popularity of criticism, and this gives rise to fierce theoretical disputes about the essence of literature and art in general, about the tasks and methods of critical activity. The sixties are the time of the primary comprehension of the aesthetic heritage of V.G. Belinsky. Critics of that time did not encroach on the main principles of his literary declarations: on the idea of the connection of art with reality, and the reality of the "local", devoid of mystical, transcendental openness, on the position of the need for its typological knowledge, referring to the general, natural manifestations of life. However, magazine polemicists from opposite extreme positions condemn either Belinsky's aesthetic idealism (Pisarev) or his passion for social topicality (Druzhinin). The radicalism of the publicists of "Sovremennik" and "Russian Word" was also manifested in their literary views: the concept of "real" criticism, developed by Dobrolyubov, taking into account the experience of Chernyshevsky and supported (with all the variability of individual literary critical approaches) by their followers, believed "reality", presented (“reflected”) in the work, the main object of critical consideration. The position, which was called "didactic", "practical", "utilitarian", "theoretical", was rejected by all other literary forces, one way or another affirming the priority of artistry in assessing literary phenomena. However, "pure" aesthetic, immanent criticism, which, as A. A. Grigoriev argued, is engaged in a mechanical enumeration of artistic techniques, did not exist in the 1860s. At the same time, internal analysis, which pays attention to the individual artistic merits of the work, is present both in the articles of Grigoriev himself, and in the works of Druzhinin, Botkin, Dostoevsky, Katkov, and even Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov. Therefore, we call “aesthetic” criticism a trend that sought to comprehend the author's intention, the moral and psychological pathos of the work, its formal and meaningful unity. Other literary groups of this period: both Slavophilism, and pochvenism, and the "organic" criticism created by Grigoriev - to a greater extent professed the principles of criticism "about", accompanying the interpretation of a work of art with fundamental judgments on topical social problems. "Aesthetic" criticism did not have, like other currents, its ideological center, finding itself on the pages of "Library for Reading", "Contemporary" and "Russian Messenger" (until the end of the 1850s), as well as in "Domestic Notes", which, unlike the previous and subsequent eras, did not play a significant role in the literary process of this time.

The most active and popular literary trend of the 1860s, which set the tone for the entire social and literary life of the era, was the "real" criticism of the radical democratic orientation.

Its main publications were the magazines Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo. In 1854, Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky (1826-1889) made his debut in Sovremennik, who, after his very first performances, attracted attention with his directness and boldness of judgment.

In the articles and reviews of 1854, Chernyshevsky appears as a truly faithful follower of Belinsky’s ideas as a theorist of the “natural school”: following the author of the famous “letter to Gogol”, the critic of Sovremennik demands from writers a truthful and meaningful depiction of the realities of the surrounding reality, revealing modern social conflicts and demonstrating the hardships of the life of the oppressed classes.

Thus, in a review of A. N. Ostrovsky’s comedy “Poverty is no vice,” Chernyshevsky seeks to show the unnaturalness of a happy ending and condemns the playwright for his desire to forcibly soften the critical pathos of his works, to find the bright, positive aspects of merchant life. The creed of Chernyshevsky - a journalist and writer - is revealed by his polemical work "On Sincerity in Criticism" (1854). The main task of critical activity, the author of the article recognizes the spread among the "mass of the public" of understanding the social and aesthetic significance of a work, its ideological and substantive merits - in other words, Chernyshevsky brings to the fore the educational, educational possibilities of criticism. In pursuing the goals of literary and moral mentoring, the critic should strive for "clarity, certainty and directness" of judgments, for the rejection of ambiguity and ambiguity of assessments.

Chernyshevsky's master's thesis "The Aesthetic Relationship of Art to Reality" (1855) became the programmatic aesthetic document of the entire radical democratic movement. Its main task was to argue with the "dominant aesthetic system" - with the principles of Hegelian aesthetics. The key thesis of the dissertation - "beautiful is life" - allowed its author to express his conviction in the objective existence of beauty. Art does not generate beauty, but more or less successfully reproduces it from the surrounding life - therefore, it is certainly secondary in relation to reality. Its meaning is “to give an opportunity, although to some extent, to get acquainted with the beautiful in reality to those people who did not have the opportunity to enjoy it in reality; serve as a reminder, excite and revive the memory of the beautiful in reality in those people who know it from experience and love to remember it. The task of art, according to Chernyshevsky, in addition to "reproducing" reality, is its explanation and the verdict that the artist makes of the surrounding life. Thus, developing the aesthetic views of Belinsky, Chernyshevsky for the first time theoretically substantiates the socially productive function of art. In a series of articles about Pushkin, dedicated to the first posthumous collection of the poet's works, Chernyshevsky seeks to reconstruct his social position, attitude to political events, and power on the basis of the materials from the Pushkin archive for the first time.

Assessing the progressiveness of Pushkin, Chernyshevsky reveals his inner opposition to the authorities and at the same time reproaches him for passivity, for philosophical detachment, explaining this, however, by the oppressive conditions of life of the Nikolaev time. "Essays on the Gogol Period of Russian Literature" (1855-1856) can be regarded as the first major development of the history of Russian criticism in the 1830s-1840s. Positively evaluating the work of Nadezhdin and N. Polevoy, Chernyshevsky focuses on the activities of Belinsky, who, in the opinion of the author of the cycle, outlined the true routes for the progressive development of Russian art literature. Following Belinsky, Chernyshevsky recognizes the critical image of Russian life as the key to literary and social progress in Russia, taking Gogol's work as a standard for such an attitude to reality. Chernyshevsky places the author of The Inspector General and Dead Souls unquestionably higher than Pushkin, and the main criterion for comparison is the idea of the social effectiveness of the writers' work. The journalist believed that a sober and critical understanding of reality at the present stage is not enough, it is necessary to take concrete actions aimed at improving the conditions of public life. These views found expression in the famous article "Russian man on rendez-vous" (1858), which is also remarkable from the point of view of Chernyshevsky's critical methodology. Turgenev's short story "Asya" became the occasion for large-scale journalistic generalizations of the critic, which did not aim to reveal the author's intention. In the image of the protagonist of the story, Chernyshevsky saw a representative of the widespread type of “best people”, who, like Rudin or Agarin (the hero of Nekrasov’s poem “Sasha”), have high moral virtues, but are not capable of decisive actions. As a result, these heroes look "cheesier than a notorious villain." However, the deep accusatory pathos of the article is directed not against individuals, but against the reality that gives rise to such people. It is the surrounding social life that is actually the protagonist of most of Chernyshevsky's literary critical articles.

In the late 1850s and early 1860s (until his arrest in 1862), Chernyshevsky paid less and less attention to literary criticism, concentrating entirely on issues of a political, economic), socio-philosophical nature.

Chernyshevsky's closest associate, Dobrolyubov, develops his propaganda initiatives, sometimes offering even sharper and uncompromising assessments of literary and social phenomena. Dobrolyubov sharpens and concretizes the requirements for the ideological content of modern literature; the main criterion for the social significance of the work becomes for him the reflection of the interests of the oppressed classes. Unlike Chernyshevsky, Dobrolyubov admits that the author of works of art may not be a supporter of purposeful accusation, but by correctly and in detail presenting the facts of the surrounding reality, he thereby already serves the cause of literary and social progress. “If a work came out from the pen of a writer who did not belong to the democratic camp, then for Dobrolyubov it was probably even preferable to have such a lack of direct authorial assessment<...>In this case, the reader and the critic will not have to “unravel” the complex contradictions between objective images, facts and some subjective conclusions that distort facts, which an “ideological” but not democratic author would certainly have found. In other words, what matters to the publicist of Sovremennik is not what the author said, but what "affected" them. Dobrolyubov does not exclude the idea of the unconscious nature of artistic creativity. From this point of view, a special role belongs to criticism, which, by subjecting the picture of life depicted by the artist to analytical comprehension, just formulates the necessary conclusions. Dobrolyubov, like Chernyshevsky, substantiates the possibility of literary-critical reflections “about” a work, which are directed not so much to comprehending its internal formal-content originality, but to actual social problems, the potential of which can be found in it.

Dobrolyubov used the works of A.N. Ostrovsky (articles "Dark Kingdom", 1859 and "Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom", I860), Goncharov ("What is Oblomovism?", 1859), Turgenev ("When will the real day come?", 1860), F.M. . Dostoevsky ("The Downtrodden People", 1861). However, despite such a variety of objects of literary criticism, due to the desire for broad generalizations, these articles can be considered as a single metatext, the pathos of which boils down to proving the inferiority of Russian socio-political foundations. One of the most fundamental questions for all "real" criticism was the search for new heroes in modern literature. Dobrolyubov, who did not live to see the appearance of Bazarov, only in Katerina Kabanova saw the signs of a person protesting against the laws of "the crown of the head and the kingdom."

The sharpness and categorical nature of some of Dobrolyubov's judgments provoked a conflict in the Sovremennik circle and throughout the democratic movement. After the article “When will the real day come?”, which, according to Turgenev, distorted the ideological background of the novel “On the Eve” and thereby violated the ethical norms of criticism, the magazine was left by its longtime collaborators - Turgenev, Botkin, L. Tolstoy. However, a real polemical storm within the most radical movement erupted in the mid-1860s between the journals Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo. In 1860, Grigory Evlampievich Blagosvetlov (1824-1880) became the editor of the Russian Word, founded a year earlier, replacing Ya.P. Polonsky and A.A. Grigoriev, who did not bring popularity to the publication. The similarity with the thinkers of Sovremennik in the interpretation of basic values - the need for social equality and political change - did not prevent the head of the new journal from being skeptical about the productivity of those areas of public propaganda that Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov declared. The young publicists invited by him and working under his direct influence, D. I. Pisarev and V. A. Zaitsev, demonstrated the independence of the ideological foundations and tactical tasks of the monthly.

Dmitry Ivanovich Pisarev (1840-1868) quickly became the leading contributor to the Russian Word. Pisarev the writer found himself in the image of a fearlessly mocking skeptic, questioning any, even the most authoritative and popular teachings, shocking the reader with deliberate straightforwardness and unexpected paradoxical judgments. The impeccability of the extremely pragmatic, rationalistic logic brought Pisarev unprecedented popularity among young readers and provided evidence for his mercilessly mocking statements about the worthless (and, therefore, harmful) activities of the publicists of the Russian Messenger (Moscow Thinkers, 1862), Slavophilism (Russian Don Quixote", 1862) and, in fact, the whole of Russian philosophy, which is built on speculative, illusory foundations ("Scholastics of the 19th century", 1861). Pisarev considers moderation in views to be an illusion, thus substantiating the legitimacy of extreme, radical views. Paying tribute to the liberation aspirations of Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov, Pisarev is not in the least embarrassed by his disagreement with them on certain fundamental issues. The publicist of Russkoye Slovo is skeptical about the possibility of the conscious activity of the oppressed classes, especially the peasantry, considering the educated youth to be the main active force in Russian society. Pisarev sharply disagrees with Dobrolyubov in his assessment of certain literary phenomena. According to Pisarev, Dobrolyubov, who considered Katerina Kabanova "a ray of light in a dark kingdom", succumbed to the explicit idealization of the heroine.

Pisarev subordinates his aesthetic and literary reasoning to extremely utilitarian ideas about human activity. The only purpose of fiction is declared to be the promotion of certain ideas, based on the tendentious reproduction of social conflicts and on the image of "new heroes". It is not surprising that Pisarev's favorite works of the 1860s were "Fathers and Sons" by I.S. Turgenev ("Bazarov", 1862; "Realists", 1864) and "What is to be done?" N.G. Chernyshevsky ("The Thinking Proletariat", 1865), realizing Pisarev's innermost ideas about conscious rational work aimed at creating personal and social good.

Next to Pisarev's articles were published the works of Varfolomey Alexandrovich Zaitsev (1842-1882), who, with all his journalistic talent, reduced the radical ideas of his journal colleague to an absurd simplification. Zaitsev is a desperate "destroyer of aesthetics", who categorically rejected art as a whole and consistently opposed modern natural science ideas to poetry. Art, according to the harsh statement of the critic, "deserves a complete and merciless denial." These and similar statements by Zaitsev and Pisarev caused constant polemical attacks, not only from the original opponents, opponents of radicalism, but also from the closest like-minded people - the journalists of Sovremennik. The controversy, the source of which was differences in understanding the nuances of propaganda tactics, quickly turned into a magazine squabble, reaching personal insults, to mutual accusations of complicity with conservative and pro-government forces. And despite the fact that in the end this hopeless dispute was terminated, the public reputation of the journals suffered markedly - the controversy demonstrated a clear shortage of new productive ideas and marked the crisis of the radical movement. The activity of magazines, in which literary issues were increasingly relegated to the periphery, was banned by the government after the assassination attempt on Alexander II in 1866.

Despite such loud internal disagreements, the adherents of radical views had common opponents: representatives of "aesthetic" criticism, ideologists of Slavophilism and pochvennichestvo, and supporters of the conservative "protection" from Russky Vestnik and Moskovskie Vedomosti. The main opponents on many literary issues for the journalists of "Sovremennik" and "Russian Word" were representatives of the so-called "aesthetic" criticism. Former associates of Belinsky, who formed the backbone of Sovremennik until the mid-1850s: I.S. Turgenev, P.V. Annenkov, V.P. Botkin, A.V. Druzhinin - without enthusiasm perceived the proclamation of new aesthetic principles by the young publicists of the magazine. Turgenev, for example, in letters to Kraevsky, Nekrasov, and others, called Chernyshevsky's dissertation "vile carrion" and "a vile book." Critics, who, unlike their young colleagues, were not inclined to talk about literature in an abstract theoretical way, had to defend their view of art. At the same time, focusing on the "classical" aesthetics of Belinsky (on his judgments of the early 1840s), they thought within the framework of aesthetic views common to the entire era: they compared literature with non-aesthetic "real" life, searched for a typological reflection of "reality as it is" in the work there is". However, the opponents of "utilitarian", or, as they put it, "didactic" criticism freed literature from the need to serve the topical needs of the time, from the indispensable depiction of class conflicts, and left its independent, sovereign meaning behind belles-lettres.

In contrast to the publicists of Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo, who, while expressing their convictions, often started from Russian literature of previous years, the defenders of the aesthetic approach mastered it as a positive basis for declaring their own predilections. Pushkin appears as their eminent like-minded person in the articles of A. V. Druzhinin (“A. S. Pushkin and the last edition of his works”, 1855) and M. N. Katkov (“Pushkin”, 1856). The work of L. Tolstoy, Turgenev, Ostrovsky and even Nekrasov and Saltykov-Shchedrin demonstrates the unshakable relevance of timeless moral and psychological issues of human existence.

Pavel Vasilievich Annenkov (1813-1887) was one of the first to stand up for the aesthetic ideals of this literary-critical movement, publishing in 1855 on the pages of Sovremennik the article “On Thought in Works of Fine Literature” and in 1856, already in the Russian Bulletin”, the work “On the Importance of Artistic Works for Society”. Annenkov seeks to prove that in a literary work everything should be subordinated to a single goal - the expression of "artistic thought" associated with the development of "the psychological aspects of a person or many persons." Literary narration "draws life and strength from the observation of spiritual shades, subtle characteristic differences, the play of countless excitements of a human moral being in contact with other people." Any "deliberate", abstract thought, philosophical or "pedagogical", distorts the essence of real creativity, the most "expensive" qualities of which are "freshness in understanding phenomena, innocence in looking at objects, courage in handling them." On the other hand, the inner, “artistic” thought, which can also have a “random” character and which is based on attention to the spiritual motives of human behavior, to its moral experiences, is precisely the key to the individual expressiveness and artistic persuasiveness of a literary work. The qualities of “nationality” must also have an equally subordinate character in literary creation. A critic who looks for these features in a work, ignoring its artistic merits, makes a mistake, because he extracts a part from the whole: only a true artist is able to be truly popular, penetrating into the depths of national morality. Defending the ethical and psychological aspect of fiction as the main criterion for evaluating both the work itself and its heroes, Annenkov does not agree with the categorical sentences passed by "real" criticism on the heroes of Turgenev's works of the 1850s. In the article “On the literary type of a weak person” (1858), which polemically responds to the work of N.G. Chernyshevsky "Russian man on rendez-vous", the critic seeks to expand the perception of the social phenomenon that is embodied in the image of the protagonist of the story "Asya": people who think, who know how to doubt themselves and those around them, play an important role in the life of society. "<...>we still continue to think that among people who enlist and themselves enroll in the category of suspicious, as if deprived of the ability to long and strongly desire, only a real, living thought is still saved that meets the needs of modern education. The type of a “weak” person “excites all requests, raises debate, touches on subjects from different angles, swarms in research to confirm some generally beneficent thought, tries to arrange life with science, and finally represents in free creativity the verification of the present and the striving for the poetic ideal of existence.”

In the second half of the 1850s in Russia for the first time appeared its own periodical of Slavophilism - the journal "Russian conversation", which published articles by I.V. Kireevsky, A.S. Khomyakov, K.S. Aksakov. Literary issues, however, are not the subject of the main interest of either the leaders of the journal (A. I. Koshelev, I. S. Aksakov, T. I. Filippova), or its authors, who turned mainly to philosophical, historical and social problems. Of the literary-critical works of the publication, only the article by K. Aksakov "Review of Modern Literature" (1857) caused a great resonance. Strictly approaching the phenomena of artistic literature of the 1850s and through the prism of the “Russian outlook”, evaluating the originality of writers and the depth of understanding of folk spirituality, Aksakov considers only Tyutchev in poetry and Ostrovsky in prose to be truly significant authors without hesitation. In the work of Fet and A. Maikov, the critic sees the poverty of thought and content, in the work of Turgenev and L. Tolstoy, despite the presence of "truly beautiful" works, - unnecessary details, from which "the general line that connects them into one whole is lost"1, in the stories of Grigorovich and Pisemsky - a superficial description of folk life, in Shchedrin's "Provincial Essays" - some caricature of images. At the same time, the final destruction of the "natural school" allows Aksakov to look with optimism into the future of Russian literature.

Despite the limited nature of the Slavophile movement in the 1850s and 1860s, it was precisely at this time that the intensive spread of the Slavophile ideology to other currents of social thought began. Figures and magazines of a purely Western orientation allow themselves unexpectedly sympathetic reviews of the works of K. Aksakov, Kireevsky, Khomyakov: Druzhinin, in an article on criticism of the Gogol period, reproaches Belinsky for unfair harshness towards the authors of Moskvityanin, a great work is published on the pages of Fatherland Notes K.N. Bestuzheva-Ryumin "Slavophile doctrine and its fate in Russian literature", characterizing the activities of Moscow writers of the 1840-1850s with respect and sympathy. Many of the judgments and ideas of the Slavophiles were accepted and assimilated by the new currents of the 1860s - in particular, "soil" criticism. In the first half of the decade, the ideology of “pochvennichestvo” was developed by F.M. Dostoevsky, who, together with his brother M.M. Dostoevsky, in 1861 gathered a small circle of relative like-minded people and organized the Vremya magazine. The position of the new movement was already determined in the announcement of a subscription to the publication, published on the pages of newspapers and magazines in 1860: the main goal of social activity, the author of the "Announcement", Dostoevsky, considers "the fusion of education and its representatives with the beginning of the people", more precisely, the promotion this process, which takes place naturally in society. Sharing the key beliefs of the Slavophiles, the ideological inspirer of Vremya wrote about the spiritual identity of the Russian nation, about its opposition to European civilization. However, unlike the Slavophiles, Dostoevsky interprets the reforms of Peter I, for all their inorganic nature for the people's consciousness, as a natural and necessary phenomenon that instilled on Russian soil the principles of literacy and education, which in the end will lead Russian society to peaceful harmony.

In the "Introduction" to "Series of Articles on Russian Literature", which opened the critical and journalistic department of "Vremya", Dostoevsky, in fact, continues to develop the ideas of the "moderate" Slavophil I. Kireevsky, discussing the all-European and even universal human potential of Russian spirituality, based on the exceptional ability to sympathize with the "alien", on a special mental mobility that allows you to perceive and master the national landmarks of other peoples. The process of class reconciliation, which, according to Dostoevsky, is currently taking place, will contribute to the realization of this potential; the task of journalism and journalism should be to promote this process: to bring an educated society closer to the understanding of the Russian people, to the “soil”, as well as to promote the development of literacy among the lower classes.

Dostoevsky assigns a huge role in the unity of Russian society to domestic literature, which in its best examples demonstrates a deep understanding of national spirituality. The problem of the goals and meaning of literary disputes is raised by Dostoevsky in the programmatic aesthetic article “G. -bov and the question of art "(1861). The two main journalistic and literary parties - supporters of the theory of "art for art's sake" and, on the other hand, representatives of "utilitarian" criticism - according to Dostoevsky, are conducting an artificial discussion, distorting and exaggerating the opponent's point of view and having in mind not the search for truth, but only mutual pain. In such an exchange of views, the fundamental question of the essence and functions of art is not only not resolved, but, in fact, is not even raised. Dostoevsky develops his own vision of the problem by modeling a polemical dialogue with Dobrolyubov. Without questioning the thesis about the social purpose of art, about "usefulness", the author of "Vremya" resolutely opposes the point of view that a work of art should be subject to topical social needs and that the main criterion for evaluating its "usefulness" is the presence in it of a certain trend, its compliance with the "known" aspirations of society. According to Dostoevsky, this approach distorts ideas about the significance of art, because it ignores the main effect of a work of art - its aesthetic impact. Dostoevsky is convinced that works that fairly illuminate the pressing issues of our time, but are artistically imperfect, will never achieve the result that the "utilitarians" are counting on - especially since a momentary understanding of "usefulness" can turn into a mistake when viewed remotely.

True art is based on free creativity, then any requirement for an artist in the end also leads to a violation of the principle of "usefulness" - and in this aspect Dostoevsky sees the internal inferiority of Dobrolyubov's position. Nikolai Nikolaevich Strakhov (1828-1896), in the future an authoritative publicist of "neo-Slavophilism", and in these years - an aspiring journalist and critic, took upon himself the defense of the philosophical and aesthetic predilections of "Vremya", expressed in Dostoevsky's articles. However, in his works there is a desire, avoiding extremes, to promote the convergence of dissimilar literary and social programs. In Strakhov's article on Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" (1862), which came out after two sensational reviews of "Sovremennik" and "Russian Word", which struck with the opposite of assessments of the novel, one can clearly see the critic's intention to discover a grain of truth in the judgments of his predecessors, or, in any case, explain their point of view. Pisarev’s sincere position, devoid of tactical bias (Turgenev’s loud break with Sovremennik certainly influenced the pathos of Antonovich’s article), seemed to Strakhov more reliable, moreover, the Russkoye Slovo article became for the critic another indirect confirmation that “Bazarovism”, “ nihilism" are indeed present in real social life. The critic considered Turgenev's merit an understanding of the aspirations of the younger generation, the latest manifestations of social consciousness, which were reflected in the novel even more consistently than in Pisarev's article. And in this article in Vremya, art is recognized as a more perfect means of understanding the deep problems of social life than the most "progressive" journalistic experiments.

One of the main critics of the journal was A. A. Grigoriev, who, after several years of journal wanderings, found a more or less suitable platform for expressing his favorite aesthetic judgments. After leaving the Moskvityanin in 1855, Grigoriev occasionally published in Russkiy Vestnik, Library for Reading, Russian Conversation, Svetoche, Otechestvennye Zapiski, headed the critical department of the Russian Word before Blagosvetlov came, but I never found constant support and sympathy anywhere. However, it was at this time that his original concept of "organic" criticism took shape.

In the article “A Critical Look at the Foundations, Meaning and Techniques of Modern Art Criticism” (1857), Grigoriev, dividing works of art into “organic”, that is, “born” with the help of the author’s talent by life itself, and into “made”, arising thanks to conscious writer's efforts, reproducing a ready-made artistic model, he outlined the corresponding tasks of literary criticism, which should discover the ascending connections of “made” works with their source, and evaluate “organic” ones based on the life and artistic susceptibility of the critic. At the same time, Grigoriev, as in the early 1850s, is looking for ways to combine ideas about the historicity of literature and its ideality. First of all, Grigoriev denies the fruitfulness of “pure” aesthetic criticism, which, in his opinion, comes down to “material” recording of artistic means and techniques: a deep and comprehensive judgment about a work is always a judgment “about”, considering it in the context of the phenomena of reality. .

However, he also does not accept the method of modern historicism, which connects literature with the momentary interests of the era: such a method is based on a false opinion about the relativity of truth and takes as its basis the truth of the last time, knowing or not wanting to know that it will soon turn out to be false. The critic opposes such a “historical view” with a “historical feeling”, which is able to see a given era through the prism of eternal moral values. In other words, Grigoriev rejects the rationalistic view of art - "theoretical" criticism, which biasedly seeks those aspects in a work of art that correspond to the a priori speculations of theorists, that is, violating the main principle of "organism" - naturalness. "Head thought" will never be able to understand reality deeper and more accurately than "heart thought".

Grigoriev confirms the firmness of his literary convictions in other program-theoretical works: in the article “A Few Words on the Laws and Terms of Organic Criticism” (1859) and in the later cycle “Paradoxes of Organic Criticism” (1864). In the article "Art and Morality" (1861), the former critic of "Moskvityanin" once again touches upon the problem of a timeless and historical view of ethical categories. Sharing the eternal moral commandments and norms of moral etiquette, Grigoriev comes to an innovative judgment for his era that art has the right to violate modern moral dogmas: “art as an organically conscious response to organic life, as a creative force and as an activity of creative force - nothing conventional, including and morality, does not obey and cannot obey, nothing conditional, therefore morality, should not be judged and measured.<...>Not art should learn from morality, but morality<...>at art."

One of the criteria for high morality and "organism" of literature for Grigoriev was its compliance with the spirit of the people. Popular and comprehensive talent of A.S. Pushkin, who created both the rebel Aleko and the peaceful, truly Russian Belkin, allowed Grigoriev to exclaim the famous: “Pushkin is our everything” (“A look at Russian literature since the death of Pushkin”, 1859). The critic discovers an equally deep and comprehensive understanding of people's life in Ostrovsky's work (“After Ostrovsky's Thunderstorm”, 1860). Grigoriev categorically rejected Dobrolyubov's opinion about the incriminating nature of the playwright's work. An understanding of the problems of nationality and the tasks of Russian literature, similar to F. M. Dostoevsky, led Grigoriev to collaborate in the journal Vremya, in which the critic developed the theme of the mutual influence of nationality and literature (“People and Literature”, 1861; “Poems by A. S. Khomyakov "; "Poems by N. Nekrasov", both - 1862), as well as the problem of the relationship between the individual and society ("Taras Shevchenko", 1861; "On the new edition of the old thing:" Woe from Wit "", 1863, etc.)

In 1863, in Strakhov's article "The Fatal Question", censorship saw seditious statements on a painful Polish topic, and "Vremya", which since 1861 had significantly strengthened its authority and popularity, was subjected to an unexpected ban. The publication of the Epoch magazine, undertaken a year later, which retained both the staff and the position of Vremya, did not bring the desired success. And in 1865, after the death of M. M. Dostoevsky, the "Epoch" ceased to exist.

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