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Abstract: The paper focuses primarily on the image of the main character of B. Akunin’s Akunin’s series of detective novels often referred to as Fandorin cycle, portrayed in the last underresearched novels All the World’s a Stage, The Black City and Not Saying Goodbye. A review of the studies of literary criticism and academic research on Akunin’s work has revealed that the basic principles of his poetics include intertextuality and the use of gamebased strategies. They enable the author to create a unique combination of historical detective novel and postmodern ironical novel. The novels of the cycle as a total make up a biographical plot reflecting the development of the personality and a search for the way of life of the protagonist. In the last novels, researchers have discovered a growing tendency for visualization and cinematic effects, which stimulate a transfer from solving isolated historic mysteries to depicting major historic events. In the course of the study, the author analyzed the plots and systems of characters in the last novels of the cycle; considered both the direct characteristics of the protagonist in the author’s speech and the indirect characterization through his own inner monologues and other characters’ appraisals; and described the principal differences of the “new” Fandorin as compared to the familiar classical image of a detective described by researchers of the first books of the cycle. It has been found that the age-related and psychological evolution of the protagonist, closely associated with the disintegration of the Russian empire, becomes the mainstream plot of the Fandorin project. The analysis shows that the classical image of a detective created in the earlier books is transformed in the plot of the novels under study. The last novels bring to the fore romantic and adventure motifs, perfectly suitable for cinema. The main character loses his grip, luck and intuition, becoming ridiculous and starting to get outplayed. As a result, Fandorin turns into an ordinary man, unable to change the course of history, though quite capable of loving and being a husband and a father. The research makes it possible to assess the results of realization of Boris Akunin’s literary project and to discover the general tendencies of development of contemporary fiction.

About the author(s) :

Aleksandr M. Lobin 

Ulyanovsk State Pedagogical University named after I. N. Ulyanov (Ulyanovsk, Russia)

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6885-0963

Publication Timeline:

Date of receipt: 21.06.2021; date of publication: 30.03.2022

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