Журнал «Филоlogos»

NEW PATH" AND "LITTLE DEMON" (ABOUT THE PROBLEM OF AESTHETIC CONSCIOUSNESS OF RUSSIAN MODERNISM)

Author: Sarychev Ya.V.

The article proposes a nontypical solution for the literary criticism of the problem of the aesthetic characteristic of the "new religious consciousness" phenomenon, brought about by the creative efforts of D.S. Merezhkovsky and his associates. The transformation of private intellectual doctrine to the extent of the whole trend of Russian modernist thought and literature, which was most fully imprinted and "conscious" of itself in the format of the "New Path" magazine (1903-1904), suggests the existence of rational principles of the organization of modernist consciousness among the leaders of the "neo-Christian" party. The analysis of the artistic and aesthetic component of the "New Path" and the specifics of editorial preferences, confirming this message, also makes it possible to see lines of a purposeful break with traditional aesthetics, including the symbolist one. The fact of the rejection by the organizers of the journal, for reasons not completely understood, of the novel "Little Demon" by F. Sologub becomes only a particular, albeit a significant, manifestation of the general trend. No less indicative is the orientation towards low-grade (according to the general impression) fiction, the target orientation of which is well demonstrated by D.V. Filosofov's "Earwig" story. This is far from outstanding and in the genre respect an accidental work for Filosofov, clearly and polemically making a start from the plot of the "Little Demon", solves an important task for D.S. Merezhkovsky - Z. Hippius's circle, the task of overcoming the "aesthetic-decadent" heritage by the force of “new” consciousness. The combination of the data and analytical perspectives presented in the article leads to the idea that the literary policy of the "New Path" with its pronounced "anti-aesthetic" line was stimulated by the desire for the most radical liberation from everything old as a necessary prerequisite to the new. If the "consciousness" and the corresponding literature really pretend to be new, then they must be qualitatively different from previous models, just as Christian culture differed from pagan culture. "Neo-Christian" literature is driven by a similar universal-modernist task, asserting its own religious and epistemological principle for metaphysics and artistic creativity, as opposed to the symbolist inclination to "decadence and aestheticism", considering this way the only true one.