Журнал «Филоlogos»

THE IMAGE OF THE BATHHOUSE AS A SPACE OF THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE HERO

Author: Alexandrov I.A.

The article examines the artistic functionality of the bath image on the basis of Russian literature works of different eras. During the issue examination many cultures' traditional idea of the bath as a special space contributing to the internal transformation of a person is maintained. At the same time attention is focused on the ability of many heroes to undergo a strong steam, and this is an important aspect of their subjectivity. The attention is paid to the variety of situations of transition from one state to another in which a literary character reveals the implicit features of his personality during the ablution. In the time of Old Russian literature the archetypal nature of the image is revealed in "The Tale of Bygone Years" and "The Tale of the Blessed Peter and Fevronia of Murom". In Pushkin's works the bath is a litmus of the heroes' infernality. Thus the romanticization of Tatyana Larina's image in "Eugene Onegin" lies through the dream motif associated with the pagan ritual of divination in the bath. Therefore this image becomes the starting point of the plot’s culmination which gives it an important compositional role. In the novel “The Captain's Daughter" the bath is represented as the space of the carnival leading to the realization of Pugachev's mythologemes. Taking a steam bath Pugachev undergoes a game initiation disguising secret bodily signs as distinctive "royal" attributes. It is proved that in "The Notes from the Dead House", the autobiographical story of F.M. Dostoevsky, the scene of the hero's visit to the prison bath plays an important role in revealing Isai Boomstein's character. Plunging into the "hell" of the steam room, into the inhuman heat a prisoner of Jewish origin carries out an act of "national" initiation and becomes "one of our own" among the convicts. The article also analyzes "The Alyosha Beskonvoiny" story by V.M. Shukshin in which the image of the bath is shown as a space giving the opportunity to the protagonist to come to inner spiritual and psychological growth in a playful way. Alyosha manages to feel that divorced from reality world that gives him strength. The conclusion is made about the importance of bodily experience leading the hero to a different spiritual hypostasis.