Андрей Белый: автобиографизм и биографические практики

Sometimes these devices are similar to some postmodernist ones. The similarity between the two trends was widely studied by scholars such as Michail Berg, who stated that the differences between modernism and postmodernism are not related to their poetic, but rather to the conditions in which their literary practices function. Michail Epštein instead believes that modernism and postmodernism are two different articulations of the same cultural paradigm, while Mark Lipoveckij assumes the existence of a kind of «postmodernization of modernism», which he interprets under a wider perspective, including within that category trends such as decadent, symbolist, and avant-garde movements up until the literary experiments made soon after the First Congress of Soviet Writers in 1934.[683]

Within the Russian context the comparison between modernism and postmodernism has been applied in relation to individual authors and movements,[684] although Belyj’s works are still not considered enough under this perspective. Masha Levina-Parker has analysed this topic in relation to Belyj’s autobiographical works, for which she proposed the definitions of «serijnaja avtobiografija» and «serijnoe samosočinenie»[685] (the first of them is borrowed from Leigh Gilmore). This theoretical concept successfully describes the philosophical foundation of Belyj’s typical «variation on the theme» and his repeated autobiographical experiments, which are played on recurrent themes which Levina-Parker using Lotman’s words defines as «autobiographical invariants».

The erosion of the boundaries between genres that characterizes the «postmodernization of modernism» is at the base of the progressive overlapping of auto-biography and literary work. The fusion of reality and fantasy in new literary forms is based on literary practices which are rooted in literary tradition. The French scholar Vincent Colonna showed convincingly how ancient narrative strategies can be considered under the perspective of autofiction[686] as it was theorized after the mid-1970s. This allows us to imagine that the rise of autofiction in Russia can also be dated back to the modernist era. Some typical aspects of autofiction seem to be useful for a critical interpretation of Belyj’s autobiographical works.[687] In particular, some elements and fundamental strategies which Colonna identifies in various ancient literary works seem to be suitable for Belyj, as he recovers canonical literary devices and elaborates them in a new way. The results of this are not too different from postmodernist autofiction. In the present paper I will rely on the recent monograph by Emmanuel Samé[688] in order to show how zoomorphism and the representation of animals may be considered one of those elements.

Samé believes the relation between autobiography and autofiction resembles that between a father and son. He considers the author of autofiction as an «additional character in the story» usually presented masked as «the figure of the oppressed, of the “perverted” son».[689] He grounds his analysis on the fundamental concept of psychoanalytic therapy, which assumes the interaction between therapist and patient necessary. The relation between author and character in Samé’s view is constructed on the same type of relationship between the two parties, one of which has a stronger authority over the other. Samé first analyzes this «oppressor—oppressed» relationship. Through the analysis of a textual corpus, he studies the imitation, belonging and idolatry relationship that can be established between the two. Samé then reverses it and examines the escape from this relationship by the «oppressed». This happens through a destructive and anti-Oedipal outward projection which can be realized in various forms, such as disease, terrorism, anarchism, duel, or irony. Among these attitudes, which can all be considered in order to analyse the theme of the father in Belyj’s works, Samé devotes a chapter to the representation of the «cynical» animal.[690]