Article

Name: The image of Athos in the late works of V. Rasputin: tradition and innovation

Authors: N. V. Kovtun

Krasnoyarsk State Pedagogical University, Krasnoyarsk, Russian Federation

In the section Study of literature

Abstract: The paper is devoted to a problem of belief, service to the Fatherland, which is important for Rasputin’s creativity. The text “On Mount Athos” is devoted to this problem. The work deals with the literary tradition of a pilgrimage to the Sacred Mountain (with experience of K. Leontyev and B. Zaytsev taken into account). The novelty of the Rasputin’s work is revealed: the openness of the text, a dialogism, the interpretation of the Russian Athos as a Book, the originality of the author’s image. The main themes and images of the essay “On Mount Athos” are considered: the image of Virgin, the themes of prayer, austerity, temple, temptation, wandering, hearth, Fatherland, eternity and death. The text includes the important author’s ideas expressed in his stories. The Athos appears as the close-up program of images, plots of national history and culture, staying between two poles, where the life of Russia proceeds in constant fluctuation. The destructive periods (the Tatar yoke, the Distemper, the Revolution of 1917, the globalization) are replaced by the short periods of piety and prosperity, their pledge – Athos – “an unshakable step to God.” The concept of Athos allows specifying the ideological content and artistic originality of modern traditionalism in general.

Keywords: Rasputin, late prose, essay “On Mount Athos,” penance, pilgrimage

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