Article

Name: “The skull cup of prince Svyatoslav”: an “implicit” plot in V. Sosnora’s “Old Russian” cycle

Authors: Tatiana I. Kovaleva, Igor E. Loshchilov

Institute of Philology of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation

Abstract:

“The skull сup” is a persistent, recurring motif in Russian poetry. V. Sosnora’s “Old Russian” cycle demonstrates an unusual manifestation of this motif. This cycle was first published in the collection “January shower” (1962) and in its final version as a standalone book, “The riders” (1969). An analysis of the poem “Behind the Izyum hill” from the cycle reveals a “hidden” plot of “The Russian primary chronicle” about the cup made from Prince Svyatoslav’s skull. This plot enters the work through the memory of poem “The Pecheneg cup.” The reader encounters it in “January shower” as the compositional center of the cycle or in the version of “The riders” as a kind of phantom, ghostly epigraph to the whole cycle.

Keywords: V. Sosnora’s poem “Behind the Izyum hill,” V. Khlebnikov’s poem “The Pecheneg cup,” “The Russian primary chronicle,” the cup made from the skull of prince Svyatoslav

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