Журнал «Филоlogos»

ABOUT THE PLOTNESS AND THE LITERATURNESS OF CHEKHOV’S "THE STEPPE"

Author: Korablev A.A.

The article presents a historical, literary and theoretical introduction to the cryptological reading of A.P. Chekhov's story "The Steppe". The author's epistolary testimonies about the work on this work are analyzed as likely indications of a specific subtext plotness. The author's appeal to the work of N.V. Gogol is interpreted as the most explicit, but not the only literary allusion, indicating the skillful systemic and conceptual intertextuality of the story, along with those aspects that correlate with the psychotypes of the main characters. The immanent Chekhov's plotness is contrasted with the classical event plot, as well as the prevailing idea of the "plotlessness" of Chekhov's prose. It is argued that Chekhov not only wrote, but also thought by the plot; he saw in the plot the formal and meaningful beginning of text generation. The central characters of the story are understood as complex types differentiated from each other on different grounds (age, temperament, occupation) and correlated with different cultural and historical concepts (Platonic, Aristotelian, Dante′s), as well as key projections activating aspects of the artistic structure defined by them (physical movement across the steppe; metaphorical generalization of human life; psychological formation of personality; symbolic manifestation of being in the dynamics of its comprehension). The main character of the story is autobiographical and archetypal, it combines the author's personal life experience and professional author's ideas about human nature. The description of the "britchka", with which the story begins and which evokes associations with the Gogol′s "britchka" from the poem "Dead Souls", is read as key to recognizing the hidden meanings of the "Steppe". Firstly, it is an orientation towards Gogol's poem as a model, path and method; secondly, it is an expression of creative competition in relation to the master; thirdly, it is a connection to the codes of systemic and conceptual author's cryptography. Chekhov's "The Steppe" is considered as a continuation of the classical tradition and a manifestation of new art, as a transformation of personal impressions and personal views into an integral panorama of national and world history, in particular, the history of literature.

Key words:
A.P. Chekhov; N.V. Gogol; "The Steppe"; plotness; subtext; literary cryptography