The word poshlost’ denotes the concepts of banality, vulgarity or phlistinism, and has been an intellectual and cultural obsession since the second half of the nineteenth century, lasting well into the twentieth century. Russian author Vladimir Nabokov attempted to familiarize English-speaking readers with the notion of poshlost’ in his book Nikolai Gogol (1944); it is hard to find any English-language exposition of the term that does not cite Nabokov’s vigorous elaboration of it. Moreover, it is arguably a convention in scholarship to acknowledge the relationship between poshlost’ and Nabokov’s uncompromising moral and aesthetic values. Poshlost’ has often been discussed as a theme in Nabokov’s fiction, and its bearing on Nabokov’s role as a cultural critic has often been assessed, but there are few studies that examine how the concept influences the overall composition and interpretation of his fiction. This thesis examines how poshlost’ functions as a literary device in Nabokov’s final Russian-language novel Dar (1938), which tells the story of an émigré Russian writer living in Berlin in the 1920s. I look at poshlost’ from the perspective of the theories of aesthetic innovation advanced by semiotician and cultural theorist Iurii Lotman, and within this framework I link poshlost’ with the formation and re-formation of the protagonist’s, as well as the author’s, consciousness. I consider it a relational construct rather than simply an immanent feature of the text, as it would be considered in Russian Formalist approaches. Among the topics I focus on are individuation, self-modelling and autocommunication as facets of the process of personal and creative maturation. I argue that poshlost’ serves as a means of modelling Nabokov’s aesthetics as a textual feature and is a multisignifying and a multifaceted device whose overall artistic effect depends on the conditions under which it is employed.

The word poshlost’ denotes the concepts of banality, vulgarity or phlistinism, and has been an intellectual and cultural obsession since the second half of the nineteenth century, lasting well into the twentieth century. Russian author Vladimir Nabokov attempted to familiarize English-speaking readers with the notion of poshlost’ in his book Nikolai Gogol (1944); it is hard to find any English-language exposition of the term that does not cite Nabokov’s vigorous elaboration of it. Moreover, it is arguably a convention in scholarship to acknowledge the relationship between poshlost’ and Nabokov’s uncompromising moral and aesthetic values. Poshlost’ has often been discussed as a theme in Nabokov’s fiction, and its bearing on Nabokov’s role as a cultural critic has often been assessed, but there are few studies that examine how the concept influences the overall composition and interpretation of his fiction. This thesis examines how poshlost’ functions as a literary device in Nabokov’s final Russian-language novel Dar (1938), which tells the story of an émigré Russian writer living in Berlin in the 1920s. I look at poshlost’ from the perspective of the theories of aesthetic innovation advanced by semiotician and cultural theorist Iurii Lotman, and within this framework I link poshlost’ with the formation and re-formation of the protagonist’s, as well as the author’s, consciousness. I consider it a relational construct rather than simply an immanent feature of the text, as it would be considered in Russian Formalist approaches. Among the topics I focus on are individuation, self-modelling and autocommunication as facets of the process of personal and creative maturation. I argue that poshlost’ serves as a means of modelling Nabokov’s aesthetics as a textual feature and is a multisignifying and a multifaceted device whose overall artistic effect depends on the conditions under which it is employed.

O presente trabalho tem como objetivo traduzir para português brasileiro e fazer uma análise semiótica da novela Parque cultural (1983), do escritor russo Serguei Dovlátov. Além disso, pretendemos apresentar aos leitores e pesquisadores brasileiros os traços fundamentais da obra deste, que é um dos principais prosadores russos da segunda metade do séc. XX e um dos maiores representantes da Terceira Onda de emigração russa. Uma das especificidades do método artístico de Dovlátov consiste em uma forte vinculação de sua obra com fatos da cultura, literatura e história da Rússia e da União Soviética. Essa característica permite-nos analisar seus textos como textos de cultura, segundo a concepção semiótica de Iú. Lótman. Na novela Parque cultural, espelham-se tais fenômenos da cultura soviética, como o mito soviético do poeta Aleksándr Púchkin, considerado símbolo da cultura, a existência na União Soviética de duas culturas paralelas (a oficial e a não oficial), o fenômeno da massiva emigração dos anos 1970, entre outros. A tradução da novela Parque cultural (título em russo, Zapoviédnik) para o português do Brasil, com notas e comentários, constitui parte integrante deste trabalho. Praticamente toda a obra de Dovlátov é humorística, e a transmissão dos elementos de humor e marcas culturais, presentes no texto, foi um dos desafios dessa tradução. / This work is aimed at translating the novel Pushkin Hills by Sergei Dovlatov into Brazilian Portuguese (the title in Russian is Zapoviednik, and the title in Portuguese is Parque Cultural, 1983) and analyze this text from a semiotic point of view. We furthermore intend to present the basic features of Dovlatovs work, who is considered to be one of the leading Russian prose writers of the second half of the XX century and one of the greatest representatives of the Third Wave of Russian Emigration, to readers and Brazilian researchers. One of the features of Dovlatovs artistic methods lies in the close connection of his work with the culture, literature and history of Russia and the Soviet Union. This feature allows us to analyze his texts as cultural texts, according to Yuri Lotmans semiotic concept. The themes of the novel Pushkin Hills reflect such phenomena of Soviet culture as, among others, the \"Soviet\" myth of the poet Aleksandr Pushkin, who is considered to be a symbol of culture, the existence in the Soviet Union of two parallel cultures (official and unofficial), the massive emigration of the 1970s. The translation of the novel into Brazilian Portuguese, with notes and comments, is an integral part of this work. Almost all of Dovlatov\'s work is humorous, and conveying elements of humor and cultural references in the text was one of the challenges of this translation.

Este trabalho propõe um estudo da poética e da vida literária de Marina Tsvetáieva com base em uma seleção de suas obras em prosa consideradas representativas de seu pensamento artístico, bem como de seus principais procedimentos compositivos. Para tanto, foi empreendida uma análise de forma e conteúdo dessas obras, integrada ao contexto histórico e literário em que foram produzidas, à luz dos recursos teóricos e interpretativos oferecidos por Tzvetan Todorov, Véronique Lossky, Joseph Brodsky e Walter Benjamin, entre outros. / This work proposes a study of Marina Tsvetaevas poetry and literary life based in a selection of her prose works considered representatives of her artistic thought as well as her main compositional principles. Therefore, it was done an analytic study of these works integrating them into historic and literary context that they were produced, in light of the theoretical and interpretative resources of Tzvetan Todorov, Véronique Lossky, Joseph Brodsky and Walter Benjamin, among others.

Este trabalho propõe um estudo da poética e da vida literária de Marina Tsvetáieva com base em uma seleção de suas obras em prosa consideradas representativas de seu pensamento artístico, bem como de seus principais procedimentos compositivos. Para tanto, foi empreendida uma análise de forma e conteúdo dessas obras, integrada ao contexto histórico e literário em que foram produzidas, à luz dos recursos teóricos e interpretativos oferecidos por Tzvetan Todorov, Véronique Lossky, Joseph Brodsky e Walter Benjamin, entre outros. / This work proposes a study of Marina Tsvetaevas poetry and literary life based in a selection of her prose works considered representatives of her artistic thought as well as her main compositional principles. Therefore, it was done an analytic study of these works integrating them into historic and literary context that they were produced, in light of the theoretical and interpretative resources of Tzvetan Todorov, Véronique Lossky, Joseph Brodsky and Walter Benjamin, among others.

O presente trabalho tem como objetivo traduzir para português brasileiro e fazer uma análise semiótica da novela Parque cultural (1983), do escritor russo Serguei Dovlátov. Além disso, pretendemos apresentar aos leitores e pesquisadores brasileiros os traços fundamentais da obra deste, que é um dos principais prosadores russos da segunda metade do séc. XX e um dos maiores representantes da Terceira Onda de emigração russa. Uma das especificidades do método artístico de Dovlátov consiste em uma forte vinculação de sua obra com fatos da cultura, literatura e história da Rússia e da União Soviética. Essa característica permite-nos analisar seus textos como textos de cultura, segundo a concepção semiótica de Iú. Lótman. Na novela Parque cultural, espelham-se tais fenômenos da cultura soviética, como o mito soviético do poeta Aleksándr Púchkin, considerado símbolo da cultura, a existência na União Soviética de duas culturas paralelas (a oficial e a não oficial), o fenômeno da massiva emigração dos anos 1970, entre outros. A tradução da novela Parque cultural (título em russo, Zapoviédnik) para o português do Brasil, com notas e comentários, constitui parte integrante deste trabalho. Praticamente toda a obra de Dovlátov é humorística, e a transmissão dos elementos de humor e marcas culturais, presentes no texto, foi um dos desafios dessa tradução. / This work is aimed at translating the novel Pushkin Hills by Sergei Dovlatov into Brazilian Portuguese (the title in Russian is Zapoviednik, and the title in Portuguese is Parque Cultural, 1983) and analyze this text from a semiotic point of view. We furthermore intend to present the basic features of Dovlatovs work, who is considered to be one of the leading Russian prose writers of the second half of the XX century and one of the greatest representatives of the Third Wave of Russian Emigration, to readers and Brazilian researchers. One of the features of Dovlatovs artistic methods lies in the close connection of his work with the culture, literature and history of Russia and the Soviet Union. This feature allows us to analyze his texts as cultural texts, according to Yuri Lotmans semiotic concept. The themes of the novel Pushkin Hills reflect such phenomena of Soviet culture as, among others, the \"Soviet\" myth of the poet Aleksandr Pushkin, who is considered to be a symbol of culture, the existence in the Soviet Union of two parallel cultures (official and unofficial), the massive emigration of the 1970s. The translation of the novel into Brazilian Portuguese, with notes and comments, is an integral part of this work. Almost all of Dovlatov\'s work is humorous, and conveying elements of humor and cultural references in the text was one of the challenges of this translation.