Journal archive

Abstract: This article aims to deautomatize the perception of A. P. Chekhov’s story “The Man in a Case”, correlating the plot of the story (and the entire small trilogy) with Chekhov’s contexts that are close in meaning. Contextual, narrative and intertextual analysis allow the author to assess the quality of Chekhov’s irony, directed towards characters-narrators. The first part of the article considers Chekhov’s works related to the hunting plot. Starting from the genre of the hunting story, which Chekhov discredits (which fits into the anti-hunting trend of literature since the 1880s), the author of the article traces the ambiguity of the semantic field of hunting in the writer’s works (hunting as a theater, quarrel, binge or senselessly ruined life). Hunting is actualized as a typical plot scheme that triggers off the movement of a plot that deceives the reader’s expectations. In particular, such deception is a deliberate narrative strategy of the depicted author in relation to the depicted reader in “Drama During a Hunt”. In the second part of the article, the author looks at the stories that make up a small trilogy, which is also united by the hunting situation. Analyzing the story “The Man in a Case”, the author of the article shifts attention from Belikov to Burkin and, actualizing the method of the “evidence paradigm”, hyperbolizes those contradictions that a gullible reader (who is like Burkin’s listener Chimsha-Gimalayskiy) may not notice in the story. Literary critics also demonstrate similar credulity, which confirms what has been written about “The Man in a Case” for many decades. However, there are exceptions: these are the scholars who expose Burkin as an unreliable narrator and thereby “whitewash” Belikov. The article actualizes the “zoological” subtext of Chekhov’s little trilogy, satirically highlighting all the characters- narrators involved in it, united by a sense of envy against the objects of their narrative hunting as well as literary subtexts, one of which is represented by Pushkin’s Belkin cycle. It is the structure of the “Stories of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin” that problematizes the character’s story as a source of reliable information about the event in which the narrator follows a typical literary plot or is an interested person.

About the author(s) :

Elena A. Ivanshina
Voronezh State Pedagogical University (Voronezh, Russia)
ORCID ID https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7599-5231

Publication Timeline:

Date of receipt: 21.06.2022; date of publication: 29.12.2022

References:

Afanasyev, E. S. (1997). Tvorchestvo A. P. Chekhova: Ironicheskii modus [Creativity of A. P. Chekhov: Ironic Mode]. Dis. …
d-ra filol. nauk. Yaroslavl. 301 p.
Afanasyev, E. S. (2010). Fenomen khudozhestvennosti: ot Pushkina do Chekhova [The Phenomenon of Artistry: From Pushkin
to Chekhov]. Moscow, MGU. 296 p.

Bogdanova, O. V. (2016). Intertekstual’nye allyuzii v rasskaze A. P. Chekhova «Chelovek v futlyare» [Intertextual Allusions
in A. P. Chekhov’s Short Story “The Man in a Case”]. In Nauchnyi vestnik Vostochnoevropeiskogo natsional’nogo universiteta
imeni Lesi Ukrainki. No. 8 (333), pp. 4–9.
Bogdanova, O. V. (2017). K voprosu o sisteme obrazov rasskaza A. P. Chekhova «Chelovek v futlyare» [On the Question
of the System of Images of A. P. Chekhov’s Short Story “The Man in a Case”]. In Uspekhi sovremennoi nauki. Vol. 3.
No. 3, pp. 14–17.
Bogdanova, O. V. (2019). Novyi «futlyarnyi chelovek» rasskaza A. P. Chekhova «Kryzhovnik» [The New “Case Man”
of A. P. Chekhov’s Short Story “Gooseberry”]. In Chekhovsie chteniya v Yalte. Issue 23: Izuchenie chekhovskogo naslediya
na rubezhe vekov: vzglyad iz XXI stoletiya: sbornik nauchnyh trudov. Simferopol, IT «ARIAL», pp. 198–215.
Chekhov, A. P. (1974–1982). Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i pisem: v 30 t. Sochineniya: v 18 t. [Complete Works and Letters,
in 30 vols. Essays, in 18 vols]. Moscow, Nauka.
Epshteyn, M. (2015). Ironiya ideala: paradoksy russkoi literatury [The Irony of the Ideal: Paradoxes of Russian Literature].
Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie. 384 p.
Faustov, A. A. (2000). Avtorskoe povedenie Pushkina. Ocherki [The Author’s Behavior of Pushkin. Essays]. Voronezh,
VGU. 322 р.
Freydenberg, O. M. (1997). Poetika syuzheta i zhanra [Poetics of Plot and Genre]. Moscow, Labirint. 448 p.
Ginzburg, K. (2004). Mify – emblemy – primety: Morfologiya i istoriya [Myths – Emblems – Omens: Morphology and
History]. Moscow, Novoe izdatel’stvo. 348 p.
Gromov, M. P. (1989). Kniga o Chekhove [Book about Chekhov]. Moscow, Sovremennik. 384 p.
Ibatullina, G. M. (2015). Chelovek v parallel’nykh mirakh: refleksiya v poetike chekhovskoi prozy [A Man in Parallel Worlds:
Reflection in the Poetics of Chekhov’s Prose]. Moscow, Berlin, Direkt-Media. 253 p.
Ivanshina, E. A. (2013). Na peresechenii granits: vrach v russkoi literature [At the Border Crossing: A Doctor in Russian
Literature]. In Faustov, A. A. (Ed.). Kharakterologicheskie strategii v russkoi literature. Voronezh, OOO IPTs «Nauchnaya
kniga», pp. 105–155.
Ivanshina, E. A. (2021). Koleso fabuly i dvizhenie syuzheta: kak rabotaet motivnyi kompleks u Chekhova [The Wheel
of the Plot and the Movement of the Plot: How Chekhov’s Motivic Complex Works]. In Vestnik Udmurtskogo universiteta.
Seriya Istoriya i filologiya. Vol. 31. No. 3, pp. 543–550.
Kamenskaya, Yu. V. (2001). Ironiya kak komponent idiostilya A. P. Chekhova [Irony as a Component of Chekhov’s Idiostyle].
Dis. … kand. filol. nauk. Saratov. 173 p.
Khohlova, N. A. (2015). Ob osobennostyakh kontsepta okhoty v rasskazakh A. P. Chekhova pervoi poloviny
1880-kh gg. [About the Peculiarities of the Concept of Hunting in the Stories of A. P. Chekhov in the First Half of the
1880s]. In Vestnik Tomskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. No. 400. pp. 11–19.
Odesskaya, M. M. (1993). Russkii okhotnichii rasskaz vtoroi poloviny XIX veka (tipologiya, traditsii) [Russian Hunting Story
of the Second Half of the 19th Century (Typology, Traditions)]. Avtoref. dis. ... kand. filol. nauk. Moscow. 24 p.
Parkacheva, V. L. (2005). Proza A. P. Chekhova 1888–1904 godov: Problema paradoksal’nogo avtorskogo myshleniya
[A. P. Chekhov’s Prose of 1888–1904: The Problem of Paradoxical Author’s Thinking]. Avtoref. dis. … kand. filol. nauk.
Moscow. 26 p.
Polotskaya, E. A. (2000). O poetike Chekhova [About Chekhov’s Poetics]. Moscow, Nasledie. 238 p.
Shatsev, V. N. (2010). Malen’kaya trilogiya A. P. Chekhova: literaturnaya traditsiya XIX veka i problema rasskazchika [Chekhov’s
Little Trilogy: The Literary Tradition of the 19th Century and the Problem of the Narrator]. Dis. ... kand. filol. nauk.
Saint Petersburg. 212 p.
Shmid, V. (2013). Proza Pushkina v poeticheskom prochtenii: «Povesti Belkina» i «Pikovaya dama» [Pushkin’s Prose in Poetic
Reading: “Belkin’s Stories” and “The Queen of Spades”]. Saint Petersburg, Izdatel’stvo SPbGU. 356 p.
Stenina, V. F. (2013). Okhota v chekhovskom tekste: ritual i povedencheskie strategii [Hunting in the Chekhov Text:
Ritual and Behavioral Strategies]. In Mir nauki, kul’tury, obrazovaniya. No. 3 (40), pp. 288–290.
Stepanov, A. D. (2005). Problemy kommunikatsii u Chekhova [Chekhov’s Communication Problems]. Moscow, Yazyki
slavyanskoi kul’tury. 400 p.
Tyupa, V. I. (2009). Analiz khudozhestvennogo teksta [Analysis of a Literary Text]. Moscow, Izdatel’skii tsentr «Akademiya
». 336 p.