The thesis focuses on the textual representations of everyday experiences in short stories by Evgenii Grishkovets in the collections Planka (Plank, 2006) and Sledy na mne (Traces on Me, 2007). It reviews the literary environment of the first decade of the twenty-first century, and new realism is defined as a new literary trend, incorporating the elements of previously prominent realist and postmodernist traditions, and determined as partially a reaction to these. Grishkovets’ short stories are analyzed through the prism of Henri Lefebvre's theory of “everydayness,” including the latter’s concepts of alienations (the feeling of being foreign or estranged to oneself and some or all elements of one’s existence), moments (instances of true insight into a situation or experience) and presence (an individual’s experience of the authentic in an everyday situation). Through the analysis of the texts, an effort is made to determine the instances when Grishkovets’ characters reach the state of Lefebvre's total man, a person whose perception is not clouded by the alienations, and the concept of Russia’s ‘new hero’ in literature is discussed in correlation with Lefebvre's total man. / February 2016

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The great movement in Russian literature known as realism has been aptly described by one of its later adherents, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, as "imaginative literature", which "depicts life as it really is", and that "its aim is truth-unconditional and honest". There truly could be no better standard than this for enlightened literature. For although life is never static, and modes in literature of various regimes have come and gone and will continue to do so, nevertheless, truth sought sincerely by all serious thinkers throughout the ages remains eternal. Unfortunately hierarchies, oligarchies and dictatorships of various kinds have been forced upon human beings since the beginning of known history. With these regimes have come the masterminds who endeavored to mold into their particular cast the minds subjected to them. In some instances they have succeeded, but there have always been those refugees of independent thought who, because they refused to bow down to the decrees of a tyrant, have either hid in catacombes or fled to other lands. Such people are the illuminators of the ages— God's shining stars. Theirs was the spirit of 19th Century Russian realism. Its portrayal of truth is one of the most glorious in all literature. / Arts, Faculty of / Central Eastern Northern European Studies, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this paper is to observe and discuss the description of peasantry in Russian prose literature from the second half of 1840's to 1917. In the introduction is given an outline of the peasant theme before the forties. For that purpose all material is sub-divided into chapters; each chapter discusses an individual writer, except the fourth chapter which considers the raznochintzy writers. The initial chapter discusses the first works of Grigorovich which are concerned with peasant life in the forties. Chapter Two deals with Turgenev's stories from A Sportsman's Sketches which show the spiritual and poetical side of the peasantry. The Third chapter discusses the works of Pisemsky of the fifties; here the realistic description of peasantry reaches its height. Chapter Four is a detailed analysis of the works of the raznochintzy writers of the sixties and seventies: Sleptzov, Levitov, Reshetnikov and mainly Gleb Uspensky. They are compared with their predecessors as well as compared among themselves. Chapter Five discusses the main works of Korolenko who acquaints the reader with the way of life of the Yakuts, Tartars, the Siberian and Russian peasants, and nomads. The Sixth chapter deals with the main works of Chekhov concerned with the peasantry. His works retain in themselves the sober truth of both the portrayal of the raznochintzy writers of the sixties and the artistic beauty of Turgenev. The Seventh chapter considers the works of Bunin where they are compared with those of Chekhov. With Bunin's works ends the period of critical realism before 1917. This is followed by a short conclusion, where some works of Tolstoy are discussed. / Arts, Faculty of / Central Eastern Northern European Studies, Department of / Graduate

This thesis presents a comparative study between the short stories of Turgenev and those of the French Naturalists - Daudet and Zola. The study of the French language brought me to the realization that certain works of Daudet, for instance, could be compared to the ones of Turgenev, with whom I was familiar from my school years in Russia. Their style is very much the same. But to tie their stories to the work of Zola was a somewhat more difficult task. And yet, I will show the parallels between the short stories of Turgenev and Zola as well, especially because in the eyes of many, Zola is known as the greatest representative of the Naturalist novel. The research has confirmed the possibility of existing parallels between the stories of the three writers. I will try to show that the role of Turgenev's sketches is somewhat of a link between the Russian and French school of Naturalism. I will examine the similarities in form and style of the sketches of Turgenev, Daudet, and Zola. Their sketches' general characteristic, such as the technique of hiding the intent of the sketch, often makes the work more difficult to understand. At the same time there seems to be at least one major difference. It is the role of nature. The way the three authors approach this subject in their stories may reflect their cultural differences. Turgenev addresses nature as a story character that is equal to the other characters. To him, nature is the most powerful and purest form of this life. I think that Daudet comes close to Turgenev in these descriptions. He also reveals certain romantic ways in his stories. But Daudet does not have Turgenev's lyricism, which was introduced to Turgenev by life in the agrarian countryside of Russia. Daudet sees the beauty of nature, but he, as well as Zola, uses these descriptions for background scenes only. They add to the color of their sketches, making them more real and dimensional. In order to explain the existing difference in the writers' attitudes towards nature, I have included a brief overview of the historical situation, which existed in the countries in the middle of nineteenth century Realism. The non-parallel development of France and Russia is perhaps one of the reasons for the difference between the two literary schools of these countries. Also, I will show the existing confusion in the classification of the genre of the sketch. I mention that the major difference between a short story and a sketch lies in the fact that the former describes events, while the latter describes conditions. A sketch is like a photograph that catches the moment on film, while a short story is a narration of some particular action. I try to follow the guidelines suggested by Russian formalists, and use the established opinion that Daudet in France, just as Turgenev in Russia, is believed to have given the genre of sketch a “particular direction." After having set all these guidelines which I think ought to be introduced before the actual comparison of the stories, I will show the examples of possible comparison of the works of the writers. And my conclusion is that Turgenev's sketches are not isolated. In his shocking portrayal of the reality of serfdom he is close to Zola. But, in his artistic form he differs from Zola and comes close to the more romantic writings of Daudet. The unity of place, action, and the detailed descriptions are present in the work of all three writers. The concentration on mood and atmosphere prevails in the stories of Turgenev and Daudet as opposed to the more realistic and brutal themes of Zola. But if Turgenev's work shares the romanticism of the nature descriptions with that of Daudet, in the convincing portrait of situations Turgenev is as powerful as Zola.

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A dissertação é composta por duas partes que dialogam entre si. Na primeira, propõe-se uma tradução poética comentada do poema Pro Eto /Πpo Эmo (Sobre Isto) (1923), de Vladímir Maiakóvski, diretamente do russo para o português brasileiro, inédita no Brasil. A segunda parte dedica-se à apresentação e análise dos elementos fundamentais do poema, seja no tocante às imagens e tema, seja nos aspectos formais de sua composição. O poema, escrito entre dezembro de 1922 e fevereiro de 1923, possui 1.813 versos e foi publicado pela primeira vez na edição de estreia da revista LEF, criada e dirigida por Maiakóvski. A despeito da animosidade da crítica, muitos o consideraram a obra mais bem trabalhada do poeta, inclusive ele mesmo. O poema defende um novo amor condizente com a revolução e a nova sociedade, critica o individualismo da família tradicional e o filistinismo pequeno burguês. A revolução reflete-se nas imagens e formas empregadas na composição que tornam Sobre Isto a súmula da poética de Maiakóvski. À luz das teorias formalistas de Ossip Brik, Nikolai Khardjiev, Vladímir Trenin, Roman Jakobson, Kristina Pomorska, e da própria concepção poética de Maiakóvski, o estudo pretende mostrar como som e sentido fundem-se para revolucionar a abordagem do amor na literatura e como a oficina poética de Maiakóvski se encontra plenamente realizada nesta obra. / The monograph is composed by two interconnected parts. The first one proposes a poetic annotated translation of the poem About This (1923), by Vladimir Mayakovsky, from Russian into Brazilian Portuguese, unpublished in Brazil yet. The aim of the second part is to present and analyze the fundamental elements of the poem, be it in terms of imagery and subject, be it concerning the formal compositional aspects. The poem was writen between December 1922 and February 1923. It has 1,813 verses and was published for the first time in the premiere edition of the journal LEF, created and directed by Mayakovsky. Despite of the animosity of the critics, many considered it to be the most well developed work of the poet, including himself. The poem defends a new love befitting the revolution and the new society, it criticizes the individualism of the traditional family and the petty bourgeois philistinism. The revolution is reflected in the imagery and compositional formal aspects employed, which makes About This a summary of Mayakovsky\'s poetics. In the light of the formalist theories of Ossip Brik, Nikolai Khardjiev, Vladimir Trenin, Roman Jakobson, Kristina Pomorska, and Mayakovsky\'s own poetic conception, the present study aims at demonstrating how sound and sense merge to revolutionize the approach of love in literature and how Mayakovsky\'s poetical workshop is completely accomplished in this oeuvre.

This dissertation investigates nineteenth-century narrative representations of the Cossacks—multi-ethnic warrior communities from the historical borderlands of empire, known for military strength, pillage, and revelry—as contested historical figures in modern identity politics. Rather than projecting today’s political borders into the past and proceeding from the claim that the Cossacks are either Russian or Ukrainian, this comparative project analyzes the nineteenth-century narratives that transform pre-national Cossack history into national patrimony. Following the Romantic era debates about national identity in the Russian empire, during which the Cossacks become part of both Ukrainian and Russian national self-definition, this dissertation focuses on the role of historical narrative in these burgeoning political projects. Drawing on Alexander Pushkin’s Poltava (1828), Nikolai Gogol’s Taras Bulba (1835, 1842), and Taras Shevchenko’s Haidamaky (1842), this dissertation traces the relationship between Cossack history, the poet-historian, and possible national futures in Ukrainian and Russian Romantic literature. In the age of empire, these literary representations shaped the emerging Ukrainian and Russian nations, conceptualized national belonging in terms of the domestic family unit, and reimagined the genealogical relationship between Ukrainian and Russian history. Uniting the national “we” in its readership, these Romantic texts prioritize the poet-historian’s creative, generative power and their ability to discover, legitimate, and project the nation into the future. This framework shifts the focus away from the political nation-state to emphasize the unifying power of shared narrative history and the figurative, future-oriented, and narrative genesis of national imaginaries.