№ 4, 2022 year

The articles included in the fourth issue of "The Unknown Dostoevsky" for 2022 are dedicated to the 70th anniversary of Boris Nikolaevich Tikhomirov, a member of the editorial board, the leading author of the journal, a remarkable researcher of Russian literature. These articles were written by his colleagues and students from different cities of Russia and the world and are related to his scientific interests and activities.Dostoevsky, Tikhomirov, russian literature, anniversary, archive, textual studies, research, the science of Dostoevsky

Using epistolary and memoir evidence, as well as relying on the data of the “Postal Road Worker of the Russian Empire” of 1852, the article reconstructs the route used to bring Dostoevsky and two of his fellow Petrashevites, Sergei Durov and Ivan Yastrzhembsky from St. Petersburg to Tobolsk in December 1849 — January 1850. Along the way, they spent eleven days in a local transit prison and the all-Siberian Order on exiles determined the place where they would serve their penal servitude sentence. In the course of the presentation, the author of the article critically analyzes the unreliable version of Dostoevsky and his companions’ route to Siberia, which was presented on the map in the publication "Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky in portraits, illustrations, documents" (1972). A detailed route that was used to bring Dostoevsky and Durov from Tobolsk to the Omsk prison (and Yastrzhembsky on January 21 to the Catherine Distillery) on January 20, 1850 is also described. In the final part of the article, the route that Dostoevsky took in late February — early March 1854 is examined. He traveled from Omsk to Semipalatinsk, where, upon completion of penal servitude, he had to serve as an ordinary soldier in the Siberian Line No. 7 battalion.Dostoevsky, Yastrzhembsky, Petrashevites, penal servitude, exile, route, Siberian postal tract, transit prison, Order of exiles, Postal Road Worker, Yaroslavl, Kazan, Ural, Tobolsk, Omsk, Semipalatinsk

The article reveals how the writer’s personal drama was reflected in his novel “The Brothers Karamazov.” The unexpected death of their three-year-old son on May 16, 1878 was a tragic shock for the Dostoevskys. The causes of his death have not yet been clarified: there is no critical analysis of documentary sources, no diagnosis has been made, the described symptoms (fever, diarrhea, vomiting) may be related to several childhood diseases, family legends about the disease are unreliable. Dostoevsky’s pilgrimage to the Optina Hermitage had a personal reason along with his creative interest in the plot of the new novel. The writer sought to say goodbye to the earthly life of baby Alexey on the fortieth day of his death at Optina, but he was late. During the trip, Dostoevsky had an important conversation with Vladimir Solovyov, in which the writer revealed the idea of his future novel: the Church “as a positive social ideal.” After Dostoevsky’s pilgrimage to the Optina Hermitage, his novel took final shape. The thanatological motifs in the work include scenes in the monastery, Ivan Karamazov’s “collection” of facts, the death of elder Zosima, the illness and death of his brother Markel, Ilyusha Snegirev, and other heroes. These motifs play a key role in forming the poetic idea of the novel. The thanatological theme of the novel has Easter significance. Dostoevsky wrote a novel in which he not merely describe an event, he articulated the meaning of being: in the person of Alexey Fyodorovich Karamazov, he resurrected his son in the name and prototype of the deceased Alexei Fyodorovich Dostoevsky. With every proclamation and glorification of the hero, Dostoevsky proclaimed the immortality of his son.Dostoevsky, Alexey Fyodorovich Dostoevsky, biography, illness, death, Optina Hermitage, novel, thanatological plot, Easter idea, resurrection, literature

The article examines the influence of the phenomenon of post-truth on the creation of artistic images of Russian writers in the novel and screen arts. The essence, tools and role of post-truth in the construction of political and cultural life were described by Plato in the “The State.” Having spread in modern times, post-truth seeks to replace the truth of history, to infiltrate real destinies and biographies, to act in their place, to operate with imaginary things instead of authenticity, to use the “bad is more interesting than good” principle. The experience of the first Russian silent film biography of A. S. Pushkin (1910) and all the subsequent eighteen biographical films about the poet’s fate showed the flaws of artistic adaptations dedicated to real heroes: historical unreliability, untruth of character, deliberate distortion of biography, the introduction of false, politically biased versions for the sake of greater showiness and scandalousness. The central plot of the article is devoted to artistic texts related to the image of F. M. Dostoevsky. Boris Akunin’s novel “The Turkish Gambit” (1998) touches on the events of the Russian-Turkish War of 1877–1878, describing them from openly Ottomanophile positions, painting the characters fighting for Russian interests in dark colors. The novel author focuses on author of the “Writer’s Diary;” depicted namelessly, but with a full set of biographical signs, he is vindictively and scandalously defamed. Dostoevsky is present in J. M. Coetzee’s novel “The Master of Petersburg” (1994, translated from English 1999), also in the “shame and fall” perspective. The image of the real Dostoevsky is deliberately distorted, rather than elevated, in the created neo-myth — the debunking of the Russian writer was apparently the true goal of the novelist.F. M. Dostoevsky, post-truth, A. S. Pushkin, Plato, Plato’s treatise The State, B. Akunin, The Turkish Gambit, J. M. Coetzee, The Master of Petersburg, artistic interpretation

The article is devoted to the analysis of the calligraphic inscription “Nevedomov” in the drafts for Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel “Demons” and contains new facts of this work’s creative history related to the artistic reception of the work of Alexey Pisemsky and, in particular, the novel “People of the Forties” (1869). In addition to textual issues, the paper examines Dostoevsky’s attitude to the works of Pisemsky, the literary images created by both authors in the context of the theme of the Forties, key aspects of the study of this topic in literary criticism. A comparative analysis of the motif and figurative structure of the novels “Demons” and “People of the Forties” is proposed, allowing to identify the specifics of the artistic narrative in both works and the peculiarities of the creative perception of the problems in Pisemsky’s novel during the period of Dostoevsky’s work on “Demons.”Dostoevsky, Pisemsky, textual criticism, calligraphy, creative history, literary interrelations, Demons, People of the Forties

The article examines the history of the relationship of the Dostoevskys with the family of one of the last Decembrists — Matvey Muravyov-Apostol, and notes the vital role of the ward of the Decembrist Avgusta Sazanovich in their communications. The correspondence acquaintance of F. M. Dostoevsky with M. I. Muravyov-Apostol took place during the Siberian penal servitude through Baron A. I. Wrangel, and personal acquaintance — in Tver in 1859. Communication subsequently resumed in the 1870s and continued until the last years of the Decembrist’s life and the writer’s death. The main documentary sources were letters from A. P. Sazanovich to F. M. and A. G. Dostoevskys, published in the Appendix to the article. Nineteen of these letters were introduced into scientific circulation for the first time, and the remaining four were published unabridged. The letters of Sazanovich reveal unknown episodes of the biography of both MuravyovApostol and the Dostoevskys, as well as other persons from their circle (Decembrists, Petrashevites, etc.), clarify the fate of the unique documents of the Decembrists and the history of the A. G. Dostoevskaya collection. These documents demonstrate that the Muravyov-Apostol family and the Dostoevskys have developed a warm relationship based on mutual respect, trust and support. In the letters A. P. Sazanovich appears as a strong and outstanding woman who shared all the difficulties of life with Muravyov-Apostol, and similar in spiritual power and beliefs to Dostoevsky and his wife and assistant, a selfless giver, and a subtle admirer of the writer’s work.Fedor Dostoevsky, Anna Dostoevskaya, Matvey Muravyov-Apostol, Avgusta Sazanovich, Avgusta Sozonovich, M. S. Volkonsky, Yalutorovsk, Platon Ivanovich Popov, Decembrist, petrashevets, sister of mercy, Red Cross, letter, correspondence, archive

The article presents some results of the work on the translation of the complete edition of A. G. Dostoevskaya’s memoirs into Spanish, which will be published in Madrid in 2023. This work was carried out in 2022 based on a Russian-language edition published in 2015 by the Boslen publishing house and edited by I. S. Andrianova and B. N. Tikhomirov. The Soviet editions of this text are not complete. The memoirs of the writer’s wife were translated into Spanish only once: the publication was published in 1978 in Buenos Aires and republished in 2021 in Madrid. However, it is replete with abbreviations and is a secondary translation: its source is not the original publication in Russian, but its translation into Italian. These circumstances undoubtedly distort the text of A. G. Dostoevskaya’s memoirs for Spanish-speaking readers. The editors of the 2015 Russian edition conducted a thorough textual examination of the white autograph of the memoirs of the writer’s wife. However, in the process of its translation, it was possible to clarify and comment on certain features of the text, to identify memory errors (“Ehrenbreitstein” instead of the correct “Ebersteinburg,” etc.) and possible typos of the memoirs’ author. The first complete translation of Dostoevsky’s wife’s memoirs into Spanish was born in close cooperation between the translator and the editors/compilers of the 2015 Russian-language edition.F. M. Dostoevsky, A. G. Dostoevskaya, memoirs, translation, Spanish, textology, autograph, manuscript, editor

The article develops the hypothesis set forth by Boris Egorov, a famous researcher of the work of Dostoevsky and Ap. Grigoriev, which claims that “some of the remarks and character traits of Mitya Karamazov are reminiscent of Grigoriev’s,” and also considers the assumption made by Vladimir Tunimanov about “closeness, partially turning into congeniality” of the “artistic natures of the two principal writers of the soil.” The presence in the work of Dostoevsky of other echoes or “shadows” of Grigoriev’s personality, both serious and caricature, is also discussed. Particular attention is paid to the nature of the problematization and even refutation of “pochvennichestvo” in Dostoevsky’s late works. Thus, in “The Brothers Karamazov,” “pochvennichestvo” is more likely to be refuted, both in the image of Dmitry Karamazov and in the whole structure of the novel. The socio-political illusions regarding if not the Russian people, then at least the Russian peasantry, have already been ultimately exposed, not by Dostoevsky, but by his closest “secret student” and at the same time, as is typical for such cases, by the debunker Chekhov (and subsequently by Bunin). Dostoevsky maintained a closeness to Grigoriev until the end of his life in his commitment to the ideal of “living life,” which resounds both in the fiery declarations of the “ridiculous man,” and in the wise precepts of the elder Zosima, as well as loyalty to the “people’s truth” discovered by Grigoriev in the works of Pushkin.Dostoevsky, Apollon Grigoriev, The Brothers Karamazov, Dmitry Karamazov, prototype, pochvennichetsvo

Not much has been said about Dostoevsky and hesychasm, and mainly with the greatest evidence and persuasiveness in the case when direct references to the figures of hesychasm appeared directly in the text of Dostoevsky's novel (“The Brothers Karamazov”). However, hesychasm can be considered as an optimal explanatory structure already for the novel “Crime and Punishment”. In this novel hesychasm is most obviously present, not from the point of view of superficial references or an external plot developing in the “apparent flow of life” (as Dostoevsky designated what happens on the surface of being), but from the point of view of the deepest plot, in which what happens in the novel is connected with “ends and beginnings” (so Dostoevsky called the origins and the results of events that are beyond the obvious, beyond time). The original title of the novel, “The Drunkards”, which later became “Crime and Punishment”, as well as the characteristics of the characters found in “Crime and Punishment” (to be “drunk without wine”, to be mistaken for a drunk in a sober state, to hide behind the illusion of intoxication their pre- and post-criminal state), strictly associate drunkenness with sin and a crime. The direct opposition to this state is sobriety, which the participants of the Hesychast tradition strive to achieve, and the collection of texts of this tradition, “Philokalia”, is called in the translation by Paisii Velichkovsky: “Words and Beginnings of Sacred Sobriety”. The separation of heart and mind, which characterizes the two main criminal characters of the novel, is the main characteristic of the pre-natural state of a person according to hesychasm. Hesychasm also makes it possible to explain why the heroine, who occupies the highest position in the spiritual structure of the novel, is characterized by the words “She will see God”.Dostoevsky, hesychasm, The Philokalia, Crime and Punishment, The Drunken, biblical quotes, author’s theory of art

The article presents a detailed commentary on the famous statement of Rodion Raskolnikov, which actualizes the ambivalent semantics of the images of the “trembling creature” and the prophet. As the results of the narrative and textual analysis of “Crime and Punishment” show, this feature of word usage makes it possible to differentiate between the positions of the author and the hero. The article also proves that in the canonical text by Dostoevsky Raskolnikov’s thought is framed as a “foreign word,” graphically and punctuationally marked, as indicated by quotation marks, italics, an initial colon and an exclamation mark at the end. In the quoted text, Raskolnikov’s exclamation and the direct speech of the prophet in the interpretation of the hero of the novel alternate twice. The article shows how the author exposes his position to crushing “plot criticism,” debunking Raskolnikov’s religious and moral mistakes, including the opposition of Christ to Mohammed, which the author eliminates in the epilogue of the novel by mentioning Abraham, “the father of all believers.” His figure is a key one in the system of historical and spiritual kinship of the three world religions. In the context of anthropology and genealogy of the Sacred History, Raskolnikov’s last vision symbolizes his return to the “bosom of Abraham.” The hero, like a prudent robber in one of the variants of the iconographic plot, seems to be next to the “forefather.” As a result of the conducted historical, cultural and textual analysis, the author concludes that Dostoevsky, following Pushkin, reproduced the effect of the hero’s co-existence with the main figures of Sacred History in his novel.Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, Sacred History, Abraham, Christ, Mahomet, Raskolnikov

The article attempts to unravel what the special “charm” of Svidrigailov, the hero of the F. M. Dostoevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment,” suggested in the article by B. N. Tikhomirov, is for the modern reader. As he develops the “characterology and psychology of a new type” with inspiration (B. N. Tikhomirov), the writer reveals the “prototype” of the modernist and postmodernist hero in the image of Svidrigailov. The techniques include the creation of “novel within a novel” within the work in the form of a “Svidrigailov text.” The article shows that Svidrigailov’s “charm” is revealed as the charisma of a hero who stepped from the 19th into the 20th century. Dostoevsky not only influenced the literature of postmodernism, but also created a prototype of a postmodern novel, in which the narrative is structured as that of the hero, rather than the author, and where the laws of cryptopoetics, fragmentary composition, shifting narrative plans — from real reproduction of events to illusory-dreamlike, and even delusional associations of the hero prevail. The article concludes that Dostoevsky’s hero is close to the contemporary hero of modernism and postmodernism with his attitude to the game and mythologization, his irony, cynicism, lack of faith, theatricalization of life collisions, integration of the levels of being and non-being.F. M. Dostoevsky, Svidrigailov, modernism, postmodernism, novel within a novel, play, irony, theatricalization, mythologization, deconstruction

The article examines the place and role of K. E. Golubov’s spiritual quest in the context of F. M. Dostoevsky’s work of the late 1860’s. Dostoevsky pondered what may lead young Russian nihilists back to the soil, to Russian folk life, and who may become their spiritual mentors. Dostoevsky was interested in K. E. Golubov’s personality and world outlook and in the very fact of his conversion to Edinoverie as a natural progression of the modern man towards the truth. The writer was close to the former Old Believer, who was averse to the modern European development path. K. E. Golubov’s position on Darwinism as a cultural phenomenon was primarily close to that of the staunch anti-Darwinist N. N. Strakhov. The Old Believer firmly believed that man has a spiritual nature, unlike animals. Golubov’s stance on man could not fail to attract Dostoevsky’s attention. Besides, the views of the former Old Believer and the writer are similar in regard to the consequences of the dissemination of natural scientific ideas in modern society, whose spiritual foundations have been shaken: both defend the divinely inspired spiritual nature of man. Dostoevsky, in a letter to A. N. Maykov dated December 11 (23), 1868, depicted K. E. Golubov as the link to the idea of ‘new Russian people’. In “The Idiot”, by creating a scene of Myshkin’s speech at Yepanchin’s party and by including a remark of the Old Believer merchant in his speech, the writer was implicitly referring to P. Prussky and K. E. Golubov, introducing the theme of “their” God and the exceptionally sharp contrast between the East and the West.Dostoevsky, K. E. Golubov, Old Believers, Edinoverie, West and Russia, Russian Man, Darwinism, The Idiot, Atheism

Dostoevsky’s life in Staraya Russa is marked by a number of events, names, facts, documentary evidence. Some of them deserve special attention, because they allow to reveal unknown pages in the life of the writer and his family. These include the formulary list of the police officer E. M. Gotsky-Danilovich (1830–1895), who secretly monitored F. M. Dostoevsky during his stay in Staraya Russa in 1872–1875. The case materials related to retired lieutenant Fyodor Dostoevsky were partially lost. However, some documents have been preserved, confirming the participation of Gotsky-Danilovich in the organization of surveillance of the writer. The article provides a description of the service record of the police officer for the first time. This document allows to make a number of interesting observations, supplement existing information about the Staraya Russa milieu of the Dostoevsky family, and identify topics for further research on the causes of the loss of the Gotsky-Danilovich notebook, the search for it and its possible content.F. M. Dostoevsky, E. M. Gotsky-Danilovich, environment, Staraya Russa, supervision, police officer, archival document, formulary list

The speech of the lawyer and publicist A. D. Gradovsky against F. M. Dostoevsky’s “Pushkin Speech,” as well as the latter’s response in the “Diary of a Writer” in 1880, occupy a prominent place in the golden fund of Russian thought. For the first time, a study of the background of this episode has been undertaken. In 1869–1878, Gradovsky was an ally of Dostoevsky, but in 1879 he already became his opponent. The main reason for this divergence is their different approaches to the problem of the relationship between the people and the intelligentsia, their role in the country’s history, in its present and future. Gradovsky’s position was reduced to the value of the intelligentsia as educators, with its progressive efforts being supported by the state, while the people were viewed as “passive material.” Dostoevsky, on the contrary, insisted on the active, effective nature of popular ideals, hence his call to hear and understand his people — the key goal set in the January 1881 “Diary of a Writer,” which became the last remark of the Russian thinker in this dispute. An article by A. D. Gradovsky “The Answer to G. Dostoevsky,” written between August 12 and 20, 1880, but not published, is published for the first time in the appendix.F. M. Dostoevsky, Pushkin’s Speech, A. D. Gradovsky, polemics, Slavophilism, Westernism, the people, Russia, Europe

The peer-reviewed collective monograph is a series of articles, each of which, filling a certain lacuna of the least studied first half of F. M. Dostoevsky's life, is an example of a real investigation of confusing, unclear or completely distorted facts about the writer and his genealogy based on a strict systematization of the already known and newly discovered documentary sources. The main body of articles and the appendix were prepared by the project manager B. N. Tikhomirov, three sections — with the participation of E. D. Maskevich, and one — in co-authorship with N. A. Tikhomirova. The study includes various aspects that in one way or another influenced the formation of the personality and worldview of the classic, and his artistic system. The reader will learn numerous new details not only about Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, but also about his milieu (father, brothers, especially Mikhail, with whom he was closest; fellow students, teachers and colleagues in the Main Engineering School and the Drawing Room of the Engineering Department), as well as about the collisions of this period, the vicissitudes of the time of Dostoevsky's entry into the literary circle, months of imprisonment in the Peter and Paul Fortress, and the details of sending convicted Petrashevites to Siberia. Through the prism of the writer's scientific biography, little-known facts of Russia’s history and culture are revealed to the general public, i. e., the peculiarities of the education system (using the example of the educational process at the Main Engineering School) and the provision of material assistance from the imperial treasury to the families of political prisoners, including Mikhail Dostoevsky. The literary block of the study included a scrupulous analysis of the reading circle of the young Dostoevsky, which in a certain sense determined the features of his artistic poetics: the book “One Hundred and Four Sacred Stories of the Old and New Testaments” by I. Gibner, as well as Gothic novels by A. Radcliffe, and numerous “pseudo-Radcliffians.” Many archival documents reflected in the monograph are published and introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. The logical conclusion of the data added by the authors to the scientific biography of Dostoevsky of the preSiberian period was the first complete publication of the memoirs written by Baron A. E. Rizenkampf, a friend of the writer's youth, with a commentary by B. N. Tikhomirov, which supplements and corrects certain points in the previous editions of the memoirs. The importance of the reviewed monograph cannot be overestimated. It seems necessary to continue the monumental work of the authors to fill in the gaps in the scientific biography of F. M. Dostoevsky.Dostoevsky, biography, archival materials, printed sources, documentary evidence, memoirs

The review examines the content of B. N. Tikhomirov’s research, methodology, sources, design, as well as the shortcomings of the publication. It includes a general description of the author of the book as a Dostoevsky scholar and delineates the range of his interests in this sphere. The literary and local history aspect of his scientific activity that dates back to the local historical method of N. P. Antsiferov is revealed. The book under review belongs to the branch of literary local lore that studies the addresses where Dostoevsky himself lived, rather than the St. Petersburg of his characters. Below is a detailed analysis of the book. The actualization of the biographical approach determines the achievement of the goal set by the author — “to recreate the external aspects of the great artist’s life.” This goal also shapes the structure of the book, which comprises two unequal parts about Dostoevsky’s St. Petersburg life in the house on Kuznechny Lane in 1846 and in 1878–1881. Special attention is paid to the nature of B. N. Tikhomirov’s work with sources of information about Dostoevsky’s life in these periods: memoirs, diaries, epistolary, newspaper chronicle, artifacts, notebooks. The author concludes that the author managed to create an authentic and multifaceted image of the writer, even in the absence of references to his creative work.B. N. Tikhomirov, F. M. Dostoevsky, St. Petersburg, Dostoevsky on Kuznechny Lane. Dates. Events. People, biography of the writer, literary local lore, museum, source

In B. N. Tikhomirov’s book “Dostoevsky. Literary walks along Nevsky Prospekt. From the Winter Palace to Znamenskaya Square” shows St. Petersburg in the time of F. M. Dostoevsky. In particular, it contains a description of the architectural landscape of Nevsky Prospekt, discusses Dostoevsky’s relationship with contemporary writers, critics and editors of magazines, offers historical, cultural and everyday commentary on fragments from “A Writer’s Diary,” the novels “Crime and Punishment,” “The Idiot,” “A Raw Youth,” stories “The Double,” “Notes from the Underground,” “The Crocodile,” describes the prototypes of the heroes of these works, and shows their routes. The essays and artistic miniatures included in the book recreate living images of the great writer and his contemporaries, raise acute moral and socio-political problems. The book becomes a journey for the reader in different senses — geographical, historical, artistic, and mental.F. M. Dostoevsky, St. Petersburg, Nevsky Prospekt, literary local history