The Dialog with Nihilism in Russian Polemical Novels of the 1860s-1870s By Victoria ...

510 Pages·2013·4.42 MB·English

The Dialog with Nihilism in Russian Polemical Novels of the 1860s-1870s

By

Victoria Thorstensson

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of

the requirements for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

(Slavic Languages and Literatures)

at the

UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON

2013

Date of final oral examination: 1/17/2013

The dissertation is approved by the following members of the Final Oral Committee:
Alexander Dolinin, Professor, Slavic Languages and Literatures
David M. Bethea, Vilas Research Professor, Slavic Languages and Literatures
Judith Kornblatt, Professor, Slavic Languages and Literatures
Andrew Reynolds, Associate Professor, Slavic Languages and Literatures
David McDonald, Professor, History
© Copyright by Victoria Thorstensson 2013
All Rights Reserved
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The Dialog with Nihilism in Russian Polemical Novels of the 1860s-1870s
Victoria Thorstensson

Under the Supervision of Professor Alexander Dolinin
At the University of Wisconsin-Madison

This dissertation examines the development of the polemical Russian novel concerning
the “hero of the time” during the 1860s-1870s when the problem of nihilism was literature’s
main concern. Most novels written during this era participated in the debate on nihilism and
discussed the vitality and potential of the new “hero of the time,” the nihilist (or “new man”).
This study examines the genesis of the literary images of the nihilist “heroes of the time;” it also
explicates the connections between these works and illustrates common influences upon writers.
This thesis reveals the extent to which the conversation about nihilism in Russian culture was
many-voiced and contradictory; debate carried on not only on the pages of novels, articles in the
“thick” journals, and newspapers, but also in everyday life and behavior, in fashion and linguistic
usage, in personal interactions and in political trials. The debate over nihilism was more complex
than previously assumed in literary scholarship, and this dissertation provides a detailed
reconstruction of the process by which polemical novels of the time came into being. Novels
analyzed in this dissertation include – apart from the works by Turgenev, Chernyshevsky and
Dostoevsky – writing frequently overlooked by such novelists as Leskov, Pisemsky and
Goncharov, as well as a broad range of fiction by minor writers, such as Avseenko, Kliushnikov,
Kushchevsky, Sleptsov, Orlovsky, Markevich and others. The authors discussed in this study
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cover a wide spectrum of literary craftsmanship and ideological agendas. Through a close
reading of these works, the dissertation aims to provide an archeology of nihilist themes and
writings and to reveal their sources and origins in other publications. The study of minor novels
by secondary authors highlights the “median literary norms of the epoch” (Lotman) and helps
reconstruct the bigger picture of the development of the polemical novel, at the same time
serving as a necessary prelude for more sophisticated readings of the politics and poetics of the
great works by Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Leskov, Goncharov and other writers who engaged with
nihilism.
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Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I would like to thank my advisor, Alexander Dolinin, for sparking
my interest in Herzen and in Leskov in my first years of graduate school and for giving me
encouragement and support all these years. His inspirational teaching made me want to become a
professor and his wisdom and demand for excellence made me into the scholar that I am now.
Thank you to the members of my committee for their corrections and comments. Their expert
recommendations and careful editing improved my manuscript significantly and all errors that
remain are entirely my own. I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to David Bethea for his
kindness and unwavering support and for letting me share, in classrooms and beyond, his passion
for Russian literature and for humanity. David Stepanovich, you are my constant reminder of
what is at stake in our profession and if I stick around, it will be because of you. I am also
grateful to Judith Kornblatt for her support, for her thorough reading of this dissertation, for her
insightful and perceptive comments, and for trying to keep me on schedule. I want to thank
Andrew Reynolds for being my true friend, for being always ready to save me in moments of
crisis, and for catching those widgeons and articles that everyone else missed. I am grateful for
David McDonald for his input and for his flexibility. I also thank Lori Hubbard for always
having all the answers.
I express gratitude to my other mentors, colleagues and friends, from whose advice and
input I benefited enormously at all stages of this project. I thank Ilya Vinitsky for being a genius,
for reading my work and for sharing with me some seeds of his wisdom. I want to acknowledge
Tatjana Lorkovic who opened for me the treasures of the Yale library, the best and the most
beautiful sanctuary of knowledge in the world. I am also grateful to my colleagues at the
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University of Pennsylvania and Yale University: Kevin Platt, Julia Verkholantsev, Irina Dolgova
and Julia Titus for helping me to find a balance between my research and teaching. I want to
thank my friends at the University of Wisconsin: Amanda Murphy, for being the best and the
sweetest; Kat Scollins, Vika Ivleva, Matt Walker, and Emily Shaw – for their friendship and for
always being there for me. Thank you to Vika Kononova and to Olga and Jeff Campbell for
putting up with me in the last weeks before the defense. Colleen Lucey’s last minute edits put a
finishing touch on this work.
Finally, I want to thank my family for believing in me all these years. Edi and Roland,
thank you for being my safety net. Моя дорогая мамочка, без тебя я бы не справилась. All
that I achieved here I owe to my wonderful husband, my first reader and editor, Martin
Thorstensson, and to my beloved sons, Danil and Stiva. Their love and devotion sustained me. It
is to them that I dedicate this dissertation. It was a long journey but it is with satisfaction that I
now take off my blue spectacles and get out my ribbons and crinolines.
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Table of Contents

Abstract i-ii
Acknowledgements iii-iv
Table of Contents v-vii
Introduction 1-52

1. The Russian Polemical Realist Novel The 1-22
Problem of the Antinihilist Novel: An
Overview 22-42
a. Definitions
b. Periodization 22-27
c. Nineteenth-Century Perspectives 27-29
d. The Soviet Approach to the Study 29-33
of the Antinihilist Novel 33-38
e. Western Studies: Charles Moser’s
Antinihilism in the Russian Novel 38-40
of the 1860s
f. Contemporary Russian Studies of
the Antinihilist Novel 40-42
2. Methods, Goals and Structure
42-52
Chapter 1
The Birth of the Hero: Bazarov at the Court of the Contemporary / the 53-128
Contemporaries

1. Turgenev’s Novel as the Reflection of the 54-58
“Body and Pressure of Time”
2. The 1860s: Major Signposts 58-62
3. The Search for a New Hero and the Coming 63-68
of the Raznochinets
4. The Raznochinets and the Natural School 68-70
5. The Superfluous Raznochinets and the 70-75
“Pushkinian” Tradition
6. The Literary Types of Pomialovsky’s 75-84
Characters: Bourgeois Happiness and
Molotov
7. The Question of Leadership: Turgenev or the 84-86
Contemporary?
8. The Power Struggle inside the Contemporary 86-93
9. The Battle for Belinsky’s Legacy 93-98
10. “The Whistling” 98-102
11. The Campaign Against Fathers and Sons and 102-111
the Final Split between two Generations
12. The Accusations against Turgenev 111-115
13. The Connotations of the Word “Nihilist” in 115-118
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the Context of the Name Calling in the 1860s
14. The Types of Sitnikov and Kukshina 118-128

Chapter 2
The Polemic about the “Hero of the Time” and the Positive Hero in the 129-216
1860-1870s: The Nihilists and the New Men after Bazarov

1. The Nihilist Epoch: An Historical 129-132
Perspective
2. The “Nihilist” or “New Man”? 132-135
3. Ivan Kushchevsky and his Novel Nikolai 135-139
Negorev, or The Successful Russian
4. Mathewson’s Concept of the “Positive Hero” 139-143
5. Bazarov and Rakhmetov 143-148
6. Bazarov and the “New Men”: 148-166
Chernyshevsky and the Problem of the
Typical
7. The Nihilist Fad: When Appearances Are 166-180
Not Deceitful
8. The Rigorist and Don Quixote: “The Man of 180-198
Action” as the “Hero of the Time”
9. The Nature of Action for “the Man of 198-210
Action”
10. Imitations of Bazarov and Chernyshevsky’s 210-216
“New Men” in Democratic Literature

Chapter 3 218-358
Pisemsky, Leskov, Kliushnikov and the “Antinihilist Campaign” of
1863-1864

1. The Years 1863-1864 as the Turning Point 219-222
and the Beginning of the “Antinihilist
Campaign”
2. The Problem of Characters in Pisemsky’s 222-236
The Troubled Sea: Baklanov as “an Ordinary
Mortal from Our So-Called Educated
Society”
3. Pisemsky’s “Salt of the Earth”: Proskriptsky 236-253
and the Images of the Younger Generation.
4. The Genre of The Troubled Sea 253-261
5. A Path to “Our Famous Exiles in London”: 261-279
Exploring the Image of Herzen in The
Troubled Sea and in Other Novels of the
1860s-1870s.
6. “The Second Sally” in the “Antinihilist 279-288
Campaign”: Leskov’s No Way Out as “Not
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Literature”
7. Leskov’s “Deed”: Vasily Sleptsov and “The 288-301
Znamenskaya Commune” in No Way Out
8. Leskov’s No Way Out and the Classification 301-312
of Nihilists
9. Nikolai Strakhov and His Critique of 312-317
Nihilism
10. Kliushnikov’s Mirage and the Creation of 317-331
the Conservative Positive Hero
11. Kliushnikov’s Mirage and the Polish 331-358
Conspiracy

Chapter 4 359-448
The Demonic Nihilist

1. The Demon as the Paterfamilias of Russian 359-367
Nihilists: Andrei Osipovich (Novodvorsky)
and His Episode from the Life of Neither a
Peahen, Nor a Crow
2. Russian Demons: Ishutin’s “Hell” and 367-386
Karakozov
3. Russian Demons: Sergei Nechaev 386-400
4. The Discourse on Infection, Sheep, Swine 400-409
and Wolves and the Appearance of the First
Demonic Nihilist Characters in Literature
5. The Immediate Literary Context of Leskov’s 409-417
At Daggers Drawn and Dostoevsky’s
Demons
6. The Demonic Nihilists of Leskov’s At 417-448
Daggers Drawn and Dostoevsky’s Demons

Conclusion 449-460

Appendix 1 461-466

Appendix 2 466-472

Bibliography 473-501
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Introduction

Найдете вы теперь на улицах столицы хотя бы одного
человека в пледе? Едва ли вам это удастся, а в те
времена человек в пледе был злобой дня, и с чего бы не
начиналась речь, все же, в конце концов, она сводилась
к тому таинственному процессу, который совершается
под этим пледом.
Евгений Соловьев, Очерки из истории русской
литературы, 1907.1

(1) The Russian Polemical Realist Novel (2) The Problem of the Antinihilist Novel: An Overview
(a) Definitions (b) Periodization (c) Nineteenth-Century Perspectives (d) The Soviet Approach to
the Study of the Antinihilist Novel (e) Western Studies: Charles Moser’s Antinihilism in the
Russian Novel of the 1860s (d) Contemporary Russian Studies of the Antinihilist Novel (3)
Methods, Goals and Structure

1. The Russian Polemical Realist Novel
This study opens at the point in the development of the Russian realist novel at the beginning of
the 1860s when, continuing the tradition of the socially-conscious Russian classical novel about
the superfluous “hero of the time” and enriched with the experience of the Natural School of the
1840s-1850s, it acquired a potent new form in the works of Ivan Turgenev. The study continues
through the age of Russia’s great reforms until the mid-1870s, during which the development of
the Russian realist novel reached its apogee and Russian novelists started to “turn out one after
another those masterpieces of prose fiction that still rank among mankind’s greatest artistic
achievements.”2 Perhaps the most characteristic aspect of the classical Russian novel is its
concern with the artistic reflection and discussion of the most important social issues of the time.

1 “Have you seen on the streets of our capital these days a single person wearing a plaid? I doubt you will manage to
do it now but in those days a person in a plaid was the topic of the day. No matter what a conversation started with,
by the end, it would always come down to that mysterious process that was happening under that plaid.” Evgenii
Solov'ev, Ocherki iz istorii russkoi literatury (Saint Petersburg: 1907), p. 429.

2 I quote Hugh McLean’s entry on “Realism” in Victor Terras, ed., Handbook of Russian Literature (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1985), p. 366.