"Рецептивная эстетика" Дмитрия Чижевского

The book concerns the renowned Slavicist and philosopher Dmytro Chyzhevsky (1894-1977), whose academic oeuvre, though yet to be fully published, continues to provoke considerable debate. The monograph focuses on Chyzhevsky’s ideas related to the reception of literary texts and their interpretation. It also examines his participation in the Constance School of Reception Theory in 1963-1977, including his publications in the essay series Poetics and Hermeneutics. The book consists of a Foreword, Introduction, three chapters, Conclusion, Bibliography, and two Appendixes. Appendix 1 contains materials related to Chyzhevsky’s bibliography, Appendix 2 comprises reviews on Chyzhevsky’s books by different authors. The Foreword provides a general outline of the book against the background of contemporary literary studies, discusses key sources, and presents a list of archives and abbreviations. The Introduction posits the main achievements and challenges of Chyzhevsky Studies, discusses recent publications of Chyzhevsky’s works, analysing their role within contemporary Humanities. The author proposes to define the analysis and interpretation of Chyzhevsky’s texts as an “archaeology of literary studies” of the twentieth century. He also explains the literal and metaphoric meaning of “reception aesthetics” used in the title: in its literal meaning, reception aesthetics relates to Chyzhevsky’s actual cooperation with the representatives of the Constance School, while the other meaning refers to “receptive” and “aesthetic” ideas of Chyzhevsky regarding literature and literary criticism.The Introduction also focuses on Chyzhevsky’s methodology and highlights the links his literary publications have to the philosophy of the first half of the twentieth century. Chyzhevsky’s academic biography began with the study of mathematics and astronomy, later he turned to Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology, and in the 1920-1930s he was an active member of the Prague Linguistic Circle. Correspondingly, such areas and approaches (mathematics, phenomenology, structuralism) have always been present in his academic research and publications, albeit in different proportions. Chyzhevsky sought precision in historical facts, details, dates; in his publications, he paid particular attention to the role of text analysis, while his “phenomenological vaccine“ guided his constant interest in European mysticism, especially the study of German mysticism and its influence on the spiritual development of the Slavs and Slavic literature. Chyzhevsky’s structuralism and formalism are very special: as a rule, the semantic construction of the literary text relates in his publications to the wider context of world literature, as separate motifs and plots are analysed, taking into account their functioning in literature from Antiquity to the twentieth century. Yet his work frequently overlooks the function of certain elements, typical for structuralist interpretations of texts. Analysing a motif, image, or eternal plot in Russian literature, Chyzhevsky always mobilizes numerous examples and citations from other literary texts and other national literatures, demonstrating his fine skills of intertextual analysis. Thus, Chyzhevsky understands the meaning of the literary text as a study of intertextual relations, rather than as a phenomenological analysis (Martin Heidegger or Emil Staiger).Chapter I, Dmitrij Chyzhevsky and European Culture of the Twentieth Century, is a short presentation of Chyzhevsky’s academic biography (1.1) and two mainstream ideas of his oeuvre: the unity of philosophical and literary approaches to literary text interpretation (1.2) and the concept of cultural and historical epochs (1.3). The subchapter 1.1, Science as Devotion: the Fate of a Mystic and Germanophile, presents Chyzhevsky’s academic endeavours in the context of his contradictory and complex character. The author indicates that in addition to three philosophical discourses (Hegelianism, phenomenology, and hermeneutics), Chyzhevsky’s biography and academic works may be interpreted in the context of dispositional analysis (Michel Foucault), using the concept of “knowledge / power” to describe and interpret Chyzhevsky’s texts. This approach is justified by the fact that, throughout his life, he lived in opposition to different state authorities (powers) – Soviet, German, and American. This subchapter also contains memoirs by Hans-George Gadamer, Asya Humetsky, Eugen Malanyuk, Hans-Jürgen zum Winkel, Dietrich Gerhardt, which testify to his contradictory character, on the one hand, and the scope of his knowledge, on the other.Subchapter 1.2, Philosophic Literary Criticism and Philosophy of Dmitrij Chyzhevsky, deals with the issues of philosophical literary criticism, which is reflected in his study of philosophical themes in literary texts, on the one hand, and in his recourse to the literary text as support evidence for the philosophical concepts of the world and man, on the other. This subchapter analyses the possible connections between philosophy and literary criticism as an academic discipline and literature as a kind of art. It also interprets Chyzhevsky’s references to Martin Heidegger and Romano Guardini as well as his personal ideas about the connection between his literary research and philosophy. The chapter examines Chyzhevsky’s publications in which his relation to the ideas of Hegel, Ernst Cassirer, Max Scheller, Karl Löwith, and Roman Jakobson becomes obvious. The chapter presents Chyzhevsky’s texts on Rozanov and, in particular, his article focused on Platonic references in Fyodor Sologub’s poem The Art of Creation (Творчество, 1893). The author concludes this chapter by comparing Chyzhevsky’s and Bakhtin’s strategies of literary criticism and their typological similarity. Subchapter 1.3. presents Chyzhevsky’s concept of cultural and historical epochs, which reflects the mechanisms by which literary styles developed in European art. Chyzhevsky’s theory is based on the alternation of cultural styles, a movement that occurs between two poles, which embody Plato’s (the sensory perception of the world) and Aristotle’s ideas (the logical and rational perception of the world). Building on such premises, Chyzhevsky proposed a “wave“ theory of European art history. This subchapter analyses the aforementioned theory alongside the congruent ideas of Oswald Spengler, Arnold Toynbee, Edward Porębowicz, and Julian Krzyżanowski. The subchapter discusses Chyzhevsky’s central ideas regarding the patterns of emergence, development, and decay of cultural and historical epochs, which illustrate the periods of literary history via such styles as Realism, Biedermeier, and Modernism (Futurism). Chapter II, The Problem of the Reader in Dmitrij Chyzhevsky’s Academic Heritage, deals with the theoretical questions of literary text reception, which the scholar addressed in his works. Subchapter 2.1, The Question of the Reader in the Literary Studies of the First Half of the Twentieth Century, presents a wide range of ideas associated with the problem of reception and reading. It also discusses readers of various authors, and authors as “ingenious readers” (Fyodor Dostoyevsky). In this chapter, the author addresses the problem of the reader in Chyzhevsky’s works, contextualizing the problem as it was viewed throughout the first half of the twentieth century by Oleksandr Biletsky, Nikolay Rubakin, Alfred Bem, Nikolay Zhinkin, Valentin Asmus. Primary attention is paid to the lesser-known reviews Chyzhevsky published in the 1920-1930s of works by Ukrainian, German, and Russian writers on bibliographies, library studies, and reading. In these particular book reviews, Chyzhevsky touches on a wide range of problems, such as the essence of library studies and bibliophilia, book graphic design, the role of books in education and upbringing, the necessity of academic references and their essence in texts on political topics. These issues linked Chyzhevsky’s interwar concerns with post-war reception aesthetics.Subchapter 2.2, The Reader’s Psychology and Reading in Dmytro Chyzhevsky’s Works, focuses on those publications in which the scholar addresses the problem of the reader’s psychology and reading directly. In particular, these are the articles from 1928: On the Reader’s Psychology and Reading and The Book as an Object of Philosophical Study, as well as publications on certain books and their role in the history of European culture. Chyzhevsky discusses the outlined problems in the context of semiotics, phenomenology, and philosophy of symbolic forms (Edmund Husserl, Ernst Cassirer). The aforementioned articles are viewed in relation to the scholar’s membership in the Ukrainian Society of Book Lovers: together with other texts of his, they were published in the Society’s journal “Knyholiub” (The Book Lover) and testify to Chyzhevsky’s philosophical approach to the problem of creation/writing and reception/reading of the book. Chyzhevsky understood the book as a symbol of the “ideal being”, which reflects “the spirit of the language” and “the spirit of the people”. By the end of the chapter the author compares and contrasts Chyzhevsky’s ideas about the reader’s psychology and reading with those of Alfred Bem and Umberto Eco.Subchapter 2.3. presents Chyzhevsky as a reader and interpreter of Hryhorii Skovoroda and Nikolai Gogol. These writers occupied a very special place in Chyzhevsky’s writings: the scholar published two monographs on Skovoroda (in Ukrainian in 1934 and in German in 1974), while in the end he never completed the book on Gogol which Chyzhevsky had been working on throughout much of his life The chapter introduces substantial and little-known data concerning early reviews by Chyzhevsky, in which Skovoroda is mentioned as a philosopher and writer. In this context, the author traces the evolution of Chyzhevsky’s ideas about Skovoroda’s systematic teachings, the essence of his typological and genetic relations with Christian theologists, and German mystics. Further on, the chapter proposes an analysis of Chyzhevsky’s publications (both well-known and little-known) on Gogol and his prose, which are contrasted and compared with the ideas of Vladimir Nabokov, Yuri Shevelov, Yuri Barabash, Yuri Mann. Separate attention is given to Chyzhevsky’s articles on Gogol’s connections to Poland and reviews of the publications of Russian émigré scholars (Mikhail Gorlin, Vsevolod Setschkareff, Aleksey Remizov) on Gogol. Chapter III, Dmytro Chyzhevsky’s Poetics and Hermeneutics, draws on the publications reflecting the scholar’s hermeneutic ideas and on his presentations at the Constance School of Reception Theory (expressed primarily in the collection of essays Poetics and Hermeneutics).. Subchapter 3.1 introduces the record of Chyzhevsky’s participation in meetings and discussions, at the same time underlining the complexity of how representatives of reception aesthetics were seen in the context of literary studies (Hans-Georg Gadamer’s hermeneutics, Hans Blumenberg’s metaphorology, Reinhart Kozellek’s history of notions, Aleida and Jan Assman’s theory of cultural memory) and political discourse (the so-called “case of Jauss”). This chapter also discusses terminological issues connected with such notions as “aesthetics of reception”, “phenomenological literary criticism”, “communication theory”. Further on, the chapter presents Chyzhevsky’s articles in “Poetics and Hermeneutics”; it also brings to light materials from minuted meetings: his contributions to discussion of the reception of myths in European culture, on the problems of mimesis, questions of Russian Modernist aesthetics. In addition, the chapter deals with Chyzhevsky’s articles on Russian formalism and Slavic Baroque in the context of discussions and publications of the time.Subchapter 3.2 focuses on Chyzhevsky’s hermeneutic strategies, related to his experience in phenomenology (Edmund Husserl), his participation in the Prague Linguistic Circle, and his personal relations with Hans-Georg Gadamer. Chyzhevsky’s hermeneutic strategies and their interpretative potential are presented and discussed on the basis of his works concerning an outstanding figure of the European Baroque, John Amos Comenius. In 1934 Chyzhevsky discovered in the Halle orphanage Comenius’s principal work De rerum humanarum emendatione consultatio catholica, and since then this Czech theologian, writer, and educator became Chyzhevsky’s life-time research subject. Chyzhevsky analysed Comenius’s creative writing in the context of three notions: the author – the text – the reader (he studied the author’s biography, interpreted his texts, described the history of their (texts’) reception, and defined Comenius’ readers). Little-known publications on Comenius (reviews in particular) as well as statements about him in Chyzhevsky’s correspondence allow the author to reconstruct the history and evolution of Chyzhevsky’s reception of the Czech writer and to interpret the notions through which he described Comenius’s texts (Baroque universalism, Renaissance religious crisis, rational/mathematic mysticism, emblematics). For Chyzhevsky, comparison of Comenius’s ideology with the ideas of René Descartes, Nicholas of Cusa, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was important as well as contrasting his own ideas with those of leading Comeniologists of the time, such as: Dietrich Mahnke, Jan Patočka, and Josef Hendrich. In addition, the chapter analyses Comenius’s concepts of the garden and the labyrinth (The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart) in their correlation with Baroque ideology and its reception in Slavic literatures.Subchapter 3.3 interprets the cycle of Chyzhevsky’s publications known under the general title Fruits of Reading (Lesefrüchte). The scholar began publishing these short “notes” in “Zeitschrift für Slavische Philologie”, which he continued in “Die Welt der Slaven”. Thematically, these pieces embrace different fields of knowledge: literature, literary criticism, astronomy, philosophy, psychology, bibliography, mathematics. According to content, they may be divided into: 1) comments directed towards his own or other authors’ publications; 2) critical reflections regarding different academic articles; 3) reading accounts of books and articles from different fields of science. This subchapter analyses in detail 1) Chyzhevsky’s critical reaction to the Soviet edition of Theophan Prokopovych’s work in 1961, in which he addresses a wide range of problems from Horace’s Ars Poetica and The Acts of the Apostles to the Polish fraszka and Adam Mickiewicz’s Pan Tadeusz; 2) Chyzhevsky’s publications on acrostic poems from the anthology of Ukrainian spiritual lyrics Bohohlasnyk (1790); 3) short articles on Gogol’s writings and his connection to European existentialism (Martin Heidegger); 4) notes on the intertextual analysis of the motif of Atlantis in Slavic literatures; 5) Chyzhevsky’s linguistic texts.In the Conclusion, the author stresses the complexity of Chyzhevsky Studies, which is rooted in the scholar’s methodological strategies (which often conflate hermeneutics, structuralism, and phenomenology); also, to add to this complexity, his language differs considerably from the language of contemporary Humanities. In Chyzhevsky’s work, ideas of reception aesthetics appear in different forms; they also relate to different fields of study (from the psychology of literary text reception to the phenomenological interpretation of the literary text) and represent different discourses (literary criticism, philosophy, psychology, and sociology).