The Apocalyptic Symbolism of Andrej Belyj

Fülszöveg

This first full-length study in EngMsh of the Russian writer, Andrej Belyj (1880-1934), seeks to elucidate the major schema informing the works of this leading figure of Russian symbolism.
For the first time, the essentially apocalyptic nature of Belyj's mentality and writings is revealed within the context of the author's period when figures such as Solov'ev, Merezkovskij and Blok were predicting the catastrophic end of the world and the final struggle between Christ and Antichrist. Yet this sense of the end was, in Belyj's case, largely intuited from his own psychic experience of the loss of original innocence and primordial oneness with the cosmos upon entering the world of time and space at birth. Consequently, all of Belyj's literary figures are exemplars of microcosmic man who mirror on the personal level the universal tension between cosmos and chaos. Within this context his literary creations unmistakably reveal the mythic contours of Dionysus, Christ, Antichrist, the... Tovább

Fülszöveg

This first full-length study in EngMsh of the Russian writer, Andrej Belyj (1880-1934), seeks to elucidate the major schema informing the works of this leading figure of Russian symbolism.
For the first time, the essentially apocalyptic nature of Belyj's mentality and writings is revealed within the context of the author's period when figures such as Solov'ev, Merezkovskij and Blok were predicting the catastrophic end of the world and the final struggle between Christ and Antichrist. Yet this sense of the end was, in Belyj's case, largely intuited from his own psychic experience of the loss of original innocence and primordial oneness with the cosmos upon entering the world of time and space at birth. Consequently, all of Belyj's literary figures are exemplars of microcosmic man who mirror on the personal level the universal tension between cosmos and chaos. Within this context his literary creations unmistakably reveal the mythic contours of Dionysus, Christ, Antichrist, the Harlot, the Woman Clothed in the Sun, etc.
Beginning with an essentially romantic and naive vision of the Divine Feminine, Belyj proceeds finally to a vision of the Christ of the Second Coming as the godhead of a new apocalyptic symbolism. Within this conceptual framework Belyj himself increasingly identifies the catastrophic content of his own life with that of Christ in an age when the Antichrist is ascendent.
In the same manner, his theory of symbolism becomes patently apocalyptic inasmuch as he is unable to foresee the attainment of symbolism-which is synonymous with the rediscovery of the microcosmic man in harmony with the cosmos-within his own time. Thus, a system of "sym-bolization" must provide a prolegomena to a future system of genuine "symbolism" to be realized only with the symbolic Second Coming of Christ.
The author, Samuel Cioran, is a graduate of the University of Toronto. His previous teaching positions have included Scarborough College (University of Toronto), Middlebury College and the University of Alberta. At present he is the Chairman of the Department of Russian at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. His publications have appeared in journals both in Canada and the U.S.A. Vissza