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Boris V. Kovalev
St. Petersburg State University
Andrey P. Zhukov
St. Petersburg State University
An alienated person in the novels “Do not Feed or Touch the Pelicans” by Andrey Astvatsaturov and “A Brief Life” by Juan Carlos Onetti Borges
Boris V. Kovalev, Andrey P. Zhukov. An alienated person in the novels “Do not Feed or Touch the Pelicans” by Andrey Astvatsaturov and “A Brief Life” by Juan Carlos Onetti Borges. Vestnik of Kostroma State University, 2021, vol. 27, № 3, pp. 183–193 (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.34216/1998-0817-2021-27-3-183-193
DOI: https://doi.org/10.34216/1998-0817-2021-27-3-183-193
УДК: 821.161.1.09''21''; 821(899).09''20''
Publish date: 2021-08-18
Annotation: The article compares the methods of describing the “alienated person”, landscape and interpersonal relationships in the novel “Do not Feed or Touch the Pelicans” by the contemporary Russian writer Andrey Astvatsaturov and in the novel “A Brief Lifeˮ by the Uruguayan prose writer Juan Carlos Onetti Borges. The aim of the work is to identify the points of contact between the texts of the Uruguayan and the Russian authors within the framework of the hermeneutic approach. The research reveals a number of similarities in the authors' poetics at the narratological, compositional, philosophical and socio-psychological levels. Particular attention is paid to the analysis and commenting of dialogues in Andrey Astvatsaturov and J.C. Onetti. The communication of the characters in the texts is unproductive, the characters are alienated from each other and from the “soilˮ, and the spiritual in them is in irreconcilable conflict with the bodily. Montevideo and Santa Maria with J.C. Onetti as loci are Latin American analogues of St. Petersburg with Andrey Astvatsaturov. The “carnivalˮ finals of the novels are compared. The conclusion is made about the typological similarity of Andrey Astvatsaturov and J.C. Onetti as authors who hold pessimistic views of the real world and model fictional worlds in an attempt to overcome the oppressive longing of reality. The authors borrow techniques and strategies for text arrangement from authors such as William Cuthbert Faulkner, Jerome David Salinger, and Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre while working on his novels. The question is raised about the further observation of the evolution of the poetics of Andrey Astvatsaturov and the subsequent comparison of his new texts with the novels of J.C. Onetti.
Keywords: Andrey Astvatsaturov, Juan Carlos Onetti Borges, contemporary Russian prose, Uruguayan literature, Latin American novel
Literature list: Astvatsaturov A.A. I ne tol'ko Selindzher [Not just Salinger]. Moscow, AST Publ., 2015, 312 p. Astvatsaturov A.A. Ne kormite i ne trogaite pelikanov [Do not feed or touch pelicans]. Moscow, AST Publ., 2019, 350 p. Astvatsaturov A.A. Osen' v karmanakh [Autumn in pockets]. Moscow, AST Publ., 2015, 287 p. Astvatsaturov A.A. Otkrytaia kniga [The open book]. URL: https://tvkultura.ru/video/show/brand_id/63635/episode_id/2215601/video_id/2240843/ (access date: 15.10.2020). Zhenett Zh. Figury [Fugures]: in 2 vols. Moscow, Izd.-vo im. Sabashnikovykh Publ., 1998, vol. 1, 2, 944 p. Mezhikovskaia T.I. Literatura Urugvaia [The literature of Uruguay]. Istoriia literatur Latinskoi Ameriki [The history of Latin American literature]. Vol. 4: Ocherki tvorchestva latinoamerikanskikh pisatelei XX v. [Essays on the creativity of Latin American writers of the twentieth century]. Moscow, IMLI RAN Publ., 2005, pp. 452–511. Onetti Kh.K. Korotkaia zhizn'. Verf': povesti i rasskazy [A short life. Novels and short stories]. Moscow, Raduga Publ., 1983, 408 p. Onetti Kh.K. Takaia pechal'naia [So sad like she is]. URL: http://rulibs.com/ru_zar/prose_contemporary/onetti/1/j12.html (access date: 15.10.2020). Sadulaev G. Osen' Evropy [The autumn of Europe]. URL: https://finbahn.com/german-sadulaev-estonskii-pisatel'-v-3/ (access date: 03.10.2020). Sartr Zh.-P. Bytie i nichto: Opyt fenomenol. ontologii [Being and nothingness]. M., TERRA-Kn. klub, Respublika Publ., 2002, 638 p. Terterian I. Korotkaia zhizn': Predislovie [A short life: The introduction]. Moscow, Raduga Publ., 1983, 408 p. Uspenskii B.A. Poetika Kompozitsii. Struktura khudozhestvennogo teksta i tipologiia kompozitsionnoi formy [Poetics of Composition. The structure of the literary text and the typology of the compositional form]. Moscow, Iskusstvo Publ., 1970, 224 p. Chachanidze G.D. Problema telesnosti v filosofii Zh.-P. Sartra [The problem of corporeality in the philosophy of Sartre]. Summa filosofii [The sum of philosophy. Issue 6]. Ekaterinburg, Publ. Ural. un-ta, 2006, vol. 6, pp. 190–195.
Author's info: Boris V. Kovalev, St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia, bvkovalev@yandex.ru, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1904-1844
Co-author's info: Andrey P. Zhukov, Candidate of Philological Sciences, St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia, andreszh@yandex.ru, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5012-5421