In the footsteps of the "Hound of the Baskervilles". Doyle's Novel as a historical source of the Modern Era
About choosing the object of study
On the one hand, Doyle's novel is considered trivial, tabloid literature that fully meets the criteria of this genre.
On the other hand, there are phenomena that are not characteristic of this kind of paraliterature, which for a long time did not even deserve the attention of literary criticism:
The first is that for more than a century the novel has been literature for young people. In different countries, cultures, in different historical epochs, of course, there is entertainment in it, as in all children's literature, but it means there is also a didactic and educational effect.
The second is that, unlike tabloid literature, the novel is not just not a one-day novel, it has been read for more than a hundred years, and is often called a classic of English literature or at least a classic detective story, usually literature that rarely goes beyond one fashion season, one or two generations.
"The Hound of the Baskervilles", written at the end of the 19th century, is certainly still a famous work, and because the 20th century did not give a reason to forget it: the spread of cinema, horror films, TV shows.
There may be a secret, of course, in the complexity of the variety of literary techniques used from other genres of high literature, or folklore, in which a fairy tale has also lived for centuries.
But what is not the seriousness of this kind of literature? The novel is full of stereotypes, cliches. It did not conflict with conventional morality, like Flaubert's novel, for example. He was not indignant, he did not castigate, he did not ridicule, like Dickens' novels, due to which they were given a leading role in Soviet literary criticism as a "merciless critic of capitalist exploitation." Maybe a little bit about criminology, which is gaining momentum, maybe even inspiring, like Verne's novels to inspire future scientists and engineers. There may be a bit of satire on the views of old rural England, as the traditional genre of the English novel has been since Swift's time, but how much Dartmoor really is in the early 20th century. it was exactly what it appears in the novel: at that time, Dartmoor on the coast had already turned into a place of popular recreation – seaside resorts, maybe a frightening, stereotypical, but entertaining story published in a magazine for railway passengers was supposed to entertain, collect cash for the publisher, the author and draw attention to the rural area of resorts- in this sense, there was an innovation –PR – and it played its role so much that modern Dartmoor serves as a place that attracts tourists to the Baskerville Hall hotels, etc.
The novel is quite stereotypical, its very designation among the novels and short stories about Holmes with the participation of the detective and his friend Watson tells the reader that this is another detective story, an intriguing plot, an intellectual, but not intricate, mystery, with several false moves, which in the end, of course, the genius of Holmes will unravel. Although we said that this might have had a strong advertising move, but in reality Holmes is not the main character of the novel, moreover, eight years later, and in this novel Doyle was not going to resurrect him, although one of the themes of the novel is the return to life-at least through the transmigration of souls-Stapleton, like his Father Roger Baskerville is surprisingly reminiscent of Hugo, who brought an ancient curse on the Baskervilles. And maybe it was the success of the novel that Doyle expected, he characterizes it as "scary, already creepy" -and, nevertheless, forced Doyle to continue writing novels and short stories about Holmes. Doyle felt like a writer again, occupying the minds and hearts of an increasingly educated part of late Victorian society. Moreover, the novel became famous far beyond the borders of England and Europe. Of course, as Doyle said more than once, the financial side was not the main thing, but like any creative person, of course, the writer was not without ambition. Although, there was no fundamental novelty, nonconformity, merciless satire in the novel. Moreover, we know that with all his image as a writer, a publicist, Doyle supported the empire: what about the depiction of the historical past, what about modern discussions about the Anglo-Boer War, than in contrast to Dickens among the nonconformist part of society, and in the revolutionary intelligentsia, from which later in Soviet literary criticism he was labeled almost an "apologist for British imperialism", along with Kipling, with his famous "burden a white man," unlike the Americans: Mark Twain, especially Beecher Stowe. Modern feminist assessments will not even find anything in the author's view of the position of a woman: his heroines –Miss Stapleton, Laura Lyons - do not fight, they are passive, they only give an excuse to show the men around them either not gentlemen, or real gentlemen - in Watson's assessment of Sir Henry. The gentleman at that time had already become an important article of English export and was protected, among other things, by such writers as Doyle, as protective duties-only English literature could consider: who should be called a real gentleman, how he should dress, behave with others, in society with his equals, with those who are higher in the social hierarchy or lower-if we are talking about Sir Henry, then about the impoverished nobility in the sense of the privileges of the stratum, its social position, but in the sense of nobility of character, the English nobility has long lost touch with the class structure, and Holmes, even Watson, moreover, Sir Henry, even Mortimer and Sir Charles, all of them certainly demonstrate the best features of a noble–natured English gentleman: it was this, and not only the superstitious fear with which Sir Charles surrounded himself, namely the inability to refuse a woman his request for help, that led to the tragedy that Holmes had to untangle in order to prevent new ones. And the way Laura Lyons was doubtful, and the way Watson defends the honor of Sir Charles shows the significance of this purely English phenomenon in the English novel. Therefore, of course, from the history of morality, the novel is not just conformist, it admires, unlike the type of Russian intellectual-which the Russian Empire gave birth to-admires not only with impunity, but even with encouragement in the form of national pride-the very concept of a gentleman.
As a child in the 80s of the last century, I first watched on TV the Soviet version, Maslennikov's film adaptation of Doyle's novel The Hound of the Baskervilles. Then in the USSR, despite the criticism of the "decaying West" and Hollywood film genres, they also made imitative films, we had our own blockbuster disaster film "The Crew", there were our own action films about the author of sambo starring Andrei Rostotsky, even the eastern "White Desert Suns", Mikhalkov's own western "His among Strangers, a stranger among his own", there was his own "bond" -"Seventeen Moments of Spring", and his horror films: "Viy", "The Strange Story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and ... "The Hound of the Baskervilles". I'm not going to compare Hollywood movies and ours right now. But there was a good literary basis for Maslennikov's film -Doyle's novel. Later there were other films. Also in childhood. There was an "American Werewolf in London." Then there were revelations by director Maslennikov how "The Dog ..." was filmed and how many "inaccuracies" in Doyle's books and that the actor-performer of the main role Livanov in England was recognized as the best performer of Holmes (the English Order of the actor was awarded). Much later it turned out that there is still no serious biography of Doyle, even in English. And that Doyle's "inaccuracies" are rather a consequence of the inaccuracy or peculiarities of artistic translations in general, be it Dickens or any other author (it's like in an adapted movie we get used to the voice of a dubbing understudy). Modern young generations are often not familiar with either the Soviet film adaptation, or foreign ones, or with Doyle in general. The popularity of reading is falling catastrophically, and with it, despite the spread of gadgets, elementary literacy even in writing in their native language. But the borders are open, and it would be possible to go to Devonshire. I didn't go. But if I had, there would certainly have been another book. Although, it's not about the very possibility of such a trip. I remember how surprised and disappointed vlogger's entry about Gottorp Castle in Germany was, that a meeting between Chancellor Schroeder and President Putin took place there, Vlogger still knew, but why exactly there, that the future Russian Emperor Peter the Third (Prince of Holstein) and his future wife met and got acquainted for the first time in this castle, the Russian Empress Catherine the Second, did not know, was especially disappointed by the phrase: "probably some German nobleman lived here."
It is not enough just to come and take off, knowledge is needed, which determines the richness of a person's inner world. Just as it is not the literary basis alone that determines in advance the success or failure of the film adaptation. Just as it is impossible to follow a literary source when transcribing material (any film adaptation, according to Yutkevich, can neither be a verbatim presentation nor a distortion of a literary work) in cinematography: cinematography as a separate let synthetic art is not able to convey the language of a literary work, an adequate image of the word according to Zolotussky (although when reading we are dealing with imagination). But it is the director's imagination, fantasy, feeling, inspiration, according to Yutkevich, that creates a new work in essence, where the director or screenwriter and director, actors, cameraman and artist act as co-authors of the writer. But despite all the differences from the original or diligent copying, my first acquaintance with Doyle's work was still an acquaintance with the Soviet film adaptation with Livanov, Vitaly Solomin, Steblov, Nikita Mikhalkov, Rina Zelenaya (whose character is not in the novel), Irina Kupchenko, Alla Demidova and others. Maybe for some of the translators of the future, acquaintance with the literary analysis of a foreign work, with the peculiarities of literary translation, or for directors, film critics, with the problem of screening works, will also begin with this maybe not outstanding, but not useless book, which I wrote not for the sake of an academic title or money, but living, out of a feeling of interest and with passion, love, which I would like to convey to the reader.
Detective as a genre, Collins convinces us of this, is not necessarily an investigation of a crime as such, but always a riddle, a puzzle. If a person who loves to read is briefly initiated into the mystery of the novel "The Woman in White", then I think he will take it, although not without fear, but he will not be able not to take up reading 700 pages of the novel. Which, due to the constant reminder of riddles to the reader, is easy to read.
In addition to trying to "understand" what is so attractive and special about Doyle's novel, how the basis of the work changes when translated into another language, especially when the film adaptation of "translation" into another language of art, I am interested in another topic, perhaps the most important in my research:
Can a literary work, even such as Doyle's novel, be considered as a historical source?
Although, the topics often overlap.
For example, "My Pushkin" by Marina Tsvetaeva. As a historical source, it certainly shows: the attitude of children, students of that particular social environment and in that era to Pushkin's work, to his memory, which works were recommended and impressed children.
In particular, an excerpt about the currently little-known poem "Ghoul" is of interest in connection with the study of "Dogs...", where it is clearly shown through the eyes of a child that as soon as he realizes that he is talking about a dog, the poem ceases to be truly scary, no matter what kind of dog it is. Why doesn't this happen to the story after all?..
In 2009, for the first time, a critical and methodological essay by the historian of Russian culture, archivist, source scholar and bibliographer Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya was published "For the scientific study of history! On the methods and techniques of historical research." The annotation to the book says that the author "sets out the tasks and conditions of research, examines the types of historical sources with a refutation of a number of provisions of theoretical source studies of the Soviet years." Ira Fyodorovna names fiction among the genera (types) of sources (and not only prose, but also poetry and drama). However, she calls it an addition to all those considered: among the written ones are legislative acts, periodicals, diaries, letters, memoirs, office work of state institutions and personal archives. I.F.Petrovskaya stipulates that fiction can be considered as an additional source: "of course, I mean works describing the author's lifetime it is directly familiar to him, and not the previous, not the past" (here, of course, a curious condition for a historian, but quite understandable). Entering into a polemic with the author of an article in the journal "History of the USSR" in 1976 (N.I.Mironets "Fiction as a historical source (To the history of the issue)" -which in itself indicates that the question was posed in Soviet source studies at least as a problem: can literature be a source), I.F.Petrovskaya he argues that "not only "highly artistic"" works are valuable, on the contrary: "writers with less imagination (or, perhaps complementing the idea of Ira Fedorovna, genres of popular literature as literature for a wide, not demanding public, if, of course, they describe modern conditions) they were more "copied" from the surrounding life." The author believes that just in the works of writers who have not become classics, many historical realities are imprinted, and their inventions are in line with the then popular ideas.
In confirmation of the role of the genre, I.F.Petrovskaya points out a quote from the "Brief outline of methodology ..." by V.N. Peretz: "usually a huge number of literary works of "average quality", imitative and compilation - much more in line with the tastes of contemporaries and therefore much better characterizes the growth of literary tastes of society." According to Ira Fedorovna, the works of the 19th century are of the greatest importance as a historical source. In my opinion, and I will try to show this in my work, this is due to the development of a modern type of society: industrial production, consumer culture, the spread of education and the democratization of power, the activation of society, the involvement of more and more broad strata in active political and public life. The modern Russian cultural historian Kobrin speaks directly about the birth of modern society in the 19th century, and in England (which was the first to undergo the "industrial revolution", it was called the "workshop of the world"), and speaking about this, characterizes his ideas, comparing modernity with how the heroes of the stories lived, dressed, behaved in society and Conan Doyle's novels-Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, as if they really were real historical figures. But it is no coincidence that the Holmes Museum on Baker Street in the English capital is the first and almost the only museum of a literary hero in history. Moreover, Doyle is the "creator" of an entire street, for who in the whole world would know Baker Street today if Doyle had not once settled Holmes there. They believe in Holmes as the real one. What literary techniques were intended to enhance the verisimilitude:
The described era is modern, the geography, for all the fictitious nature of the street, is real
As well as the nature of the narrative: the novel consists of memoirs, letters, diaries, newspaper articles, mentions of real events, persons, etc.
But the fact that the reader believes in Doyle's stories as in history, Bene's note: history since the time of Herodotus claims to differ from literature in that it fundamentally describes reliable events, in a story that really happened, in fact, there is a feature of his work and I also talk about this in my work. And therefore, too, the choice of it as an object of narrative study is not accidental.
If we try to present a modern opinion on the problem itself: can a work of art serve as a historical source (although, for ancient history, somehow without thinking, the entire meager arsenal of sources is used to reconstruct the picture of the past, that is, even epigraphy, numismatics, mining by archaeologists, according to which the spiritual life is reconstructed, including when-that is, the existing society, people, if we do not mean literature, then such a type of artistic creativity as painting has also long had an auxiliary, but the significance of a historical source, as well as history helps in the study of paintings, it is not only about the very principle of historicism and the history of painting in general), then we can quote from the textbook "Source Studies of modern History: theory, methodology, practice", published in the "Higher School" in 2004: "to what extent do these works contribute to a more a deep understanding and explanation of past life, whether they can act as sources in the scientific knowledge of history are the questions that historical science faces today."
At the same time, again, it was somehow ignored that historical science itself once came out of the kind of literature (as Herodotus, who was also called the "father of history" by Cicero, wrote in the first surviving treatise "History": "my duty is to convey everything that is told, but of course, I am not obliged to believe everyone. And I will follow this rule in all my historical work," that is, separating it from fantasy, fiction, from literature... however, considering it possible to invent dialogues of my characters, "and not only them" - as the author of the book "Strategies for understanding the Past: Theory, History, Historiography" Yu. Zaretsky also notes) It is enough to name Karamzin in relation to Russian history. And to a large extent it has not lost this opportunity even today, which is vividly demonstrated, for example, by the work of Edward Radzinsky in a new role not as a playwright, but as a historian.
V.V.Fortunatov's 2016 textbook "History" says nothing about a literary work as a historical source, even if only as an additional one. But it is prepared for bachelors and specialists of non-historical specialties.
Vladimir Bogdanov's book (intended for schoolchildren and students, 2014, in a scientific edition) "From Herodotus to the Internet: Essays on entertaining source studies" highlights fiction as historical sources. He even mentions that for Soviet historical science in this matter "two paths have been outlined": the study of the influence of literature on the historical process (as an example, the collection of M.V.Nechkina's work "Functions of the artistic Image in the historical process", 1982) and the study of the reflection of the historical process in literary works (for example, Lotman's work).
In her essay, I.F.Petrovskaya also argues that the question actually remains only for a certain kind of works: satirical or obviously false (it is not clear why satire is singled out, because if we talk about satire, it is also known as social, in exposing public orders, you can see the order of public life, institutions, views people), and the work of individual authors (without specifying which ones and for what such disfavor). It also resembles in some way the history of the issue: moreover, the articles of such a leading figure of Russian historical science as V.O. Klyuchevsky "Eugene Onegin and his ancestors" (1887) and "Fonvizin's Nedorosl" (1896), "in which he used these works as a historical source." There are also modern authors who turn to literature for historical research, for example, the authors of the book "The History of Russia of the 19th-early 20th centuries: New Sources of Understanding" edited by S.R.Sekirsky (published in 2001), and V.V.Zverev "The Power of the Earth" and "The Power of Money" in the works of Gleb Uspensky" (in the collection "Historian and Artist", 2004).
In general, as modern Russian authors (Repina L.P., Zvereva V.V., Paramonova M.Yu.) noted in the "History of Historical Knowledge" (Moscow: Bustard, 2006): "the object of historical knowledge is a person whose nature and behavior are diverse in themselves and can be viewed from different angles and interrelations" (quote from V.V.Fortunatov's textbook "History").
As the author of the methodological essay, I.F.Petrovskaya suggests several directions in which the historian fruitfully turns to the fiction of the time under study:
-general acquaintance with the era, images of people of that past, "lifestyle" in the broadest sense (concepts, habits, customs, household life, range of interests, level of education, etc.);
- the history of social thought, ideology (how can we not recall the significance of Radishchev's or Chernyshevsky's books in Soviet historical science, for which "Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow", in complete unity with Pushkin's opinion, was less a work of fiction than a life story, especially Chernyshevsky's novel "What to Do?", which directly relied on for a picture of the mores of the advanced youth of his time, and not just an artistic novel);
- the author, as an exponent of certain views (in this sense, I.F.Petrovskaya considers it possible to include historical romanistics in the list of sources);
-ideas, views, commitment to which the characters share;
-the history of human psychology, in particular, moral norms;
- the place of religion in people's lives;
-the history of artistic life;
- the history of the revolutionary movement in terms of its stimuli, motivations, and psychology of the participants;
-a researcher of political history will find reviews of political figures and events-a reflection of the opinions that existed in society (this is where the possibilities of this type of poetry as an epigram come in).
Vladimir Pavlovich Bogdanov, in the above-mentioned "Essays on Entertaining Source Studies", calls another important feature of literary works for a historian: they can serve as an important (sometimes the only) source for the biography of their author. Recalling such a well-known and long-standing (several centuries old) problem: as a "Shakespearean question" -the problem of authorship of Shakespeare's works. I would also mention a similar but more ancient "Homeric question".
For me to choose the subject of my research, I would consider Doyle's novel to be appropriate for trying to answer the question: is it possible to "extract" information from a work of fiction worthy of attention for the study of history on all these subjects, with the possible exception of the place of religion or the history of the revolutionary movement. It is clear that a work of fiction (with rare exceptions, like the mentioned book by Radishchev or the novel by Chernyshevsky) has its own tasks, and thus provides the historian with the opportunity to find answers to questions not directly, but using the methods of textual criticism, hermeneutics, in principle, not at all alien to Soviet historical science, when Marxism offered to look for examples in everything classism, the class nature of social interactions, struggle (historians S.B.Kirkh and O.V.Metel in their work "Soviet Historiography of Antiquity in the context of world historical thought", 2020. the publications say bluntly: "Marxism, as we tried to show in the introductory essay, is the search for hidden, non-obvious explanations -that's why Soviet authors in general, and Deacons in particular, never attached too much importance to the quite obvious fact of the exchange of technologies and ideas in the ancient world, and treated concepts with even greater skepticism borrowing forms of social and political life"), perhaps because they are understandable and widespread in modern Russian science (for example, the popularity of the source scholar I.N.Danilevsky, who defended in 2004. doctoral dissertation on the topic "Hermeneutic foundations of the study of chronicle texts", who taught university lecture courses "Hermeneutics and Textual studies", headed the academic center "History of Private Life and everyday life"), widespread and not only in the scientific community, especially in the light of opinions about the "closeness of archives", the experience of exposing "white spots" or "black holes" in the Soviet history of the period of "perestroika", when every weekly paid attention to it, on the same basis (the search for "hidden" knowledge in the text, the need to work on "fishing" it out of the text), both semi-scientific and quasi-scientific authors of popular history flourish -it may not be entirely successful, but they are combined with the global phenomenon of "folk history". In foreign historiography, these methods – hermeneutic analysis of the text, have become common in the practice of studying history, even in secondary schools, see this in comparison with the Russian tradition of teaching in Zaretsky's book Strategies for Understanding the Past.
As for the very methodology of such research as scientific in Russian historiography, the same I.F.Petrovskaya, who devoted several pages in the essay in fact to justify the very possibility of such, even if not as basic, but additional, outlining the range of possible questions with which the historian could address them, argues that artistic works need in historical criticism, "like all other historical sources." As an example, the images of landlords in Gogol's poem are not all landlords, and the merchants from Ostrovsky's plays are not all Russian merchants. And in poetic texts, especially song lyrics, it is not always possible to perceive literally all expressions:
"in general, it is worth remembering that phenomena have been hyperbolized in fiction," Ira Fedorovna advises the researcher. And indeed, hyperbole is a well-known artistic technique, which means that for a researcher of works of art as a historian, the historian needs to know the features of the subject of research (to be partly a philologist), peculiar only to him (which will allow him to develop a methodology for such research), because this is primarily a literary work (as once, however, the "History of the Russian State"the author of "Poor Lisa", "Marfa Posadnitsa", "Herodotus" of Russian history, or even more often called "Columbus", N.M.Karamzin).
To what extent does a writer writing on historical topics, for example, V.S. Pikul, become a historian, this, with all the interest of the question, is not part of my task, since I chose a work of fiction, but modern in time to the author and the first readers, and I.F.Petrovskaya, assuming the possibilities of literature as a source for the historian, historical novels "and other writings about the past" categorically denied such a right: "in no case can it be perceived as a source for the study of the time depicted in them" (but as the historian of the Third Reich K.Zalessky brilliantly showed on the example of Semenov's novel and Lioznova's film in the book "Seventeen Moments of Spring: A Crooked Mirror of the Third Reich" such writings can be a source for the study of modernity, when the authors under the guise of history in fact, they paint a picture of the world of special services known to them and modern to them). Although it is possible to argue with another statement by I.F.Petrovskaya that "in those cases when a novelist thinks that he is "writing history", he conveys only his own idea of it" (and wouldn't different historians always come out from the pen of different pictures of the past, even if they wrote about the same thing But returning to the topic of historical literature, Ira Fyodorovna quotes Feuchtwanger (the author of the novel "False Nero" for example): "I never thought of writing history." This can be said by the author of the story "The Hound of the Baskervilles", who really did not write the story. Nevertheless, let's see, in my opinion, any literary work cannot fail to bear the stamp of its time, which is manifested not in the architecture of buildings (not only in them), but in the lives of people, society, which is the subject of history. But we must not forget that we are still dealing with a literary work (even as a historical source), which means that it is by definition (although debatable, for the historical and cultural tradition of literary criticism, which dominated in its sociological, Marxist part in Soviet literary criticism: this is especially evident when considering in comparison with foreign theories and methods of literary research: the textbook by Turysheva) a part of the world of literature, national, world, the world of artistic images, plots, creativity in general. And here the work of a historian may help to understand and discover something new from the point of view of literary history (if you adhere to this view of literary creativity, but it is historicism in literature that continues to dominate in Russian literary criticism, in other words, the ideas of literature as a linear process in time dominate - see Yampolsky's book "Spatial History. Three texts about history", in this regard, it is all the more interesting for a historian to turn to the study of a literary work: does it really reflect such a view of literary creativity - does it have a perspective, in other words, or does it have one).
In conclusion of the introductory part of the work, I will only focus a little on a simple enumeration of the authors and works important in connection with the topic that fell out when designating research methods: of course, the research that glorified Lotman, there is no doubt that when working on the comments on "Eugene Onegin", the scientist showed himself as a philologist and historian in equal measure, and he showed the real possibilities of Pushkin's novel as an "encyclopedia of Russian life" of the early 19th century. This is the work of (again, philologist) Yuri Fedosyuk "What is unclear among the classics or, Encyclopedia of Russian everyday life of the 19th century." (in general, it is clear that the priority topic in the historical study of literary works will certainly be the history of everyday life, everyday life, which took a dominant place in Russian historiography after the collapse of the USSR, following the discrediting of political history, or excessive economism of history in the USSR, the spread of the influence of the French school of "Annals", in the 20th century. rehabilitated history in Europe, after the "battles for history", as the work of the founding father of this trend was called in historiography, but in Russian historiography, of course, pre-revolutionary "life writers" could be called "pioneers": Zabelin, Gilyarovsky, whose bestseller is being republished in the 21st century, the more forgotten Pylyaev, the author the book "Old Petersburg" published before the revolution). Olga Eliseeva "The daily life of Russian literary heroes of the 18th-the first third of the 19th century."-in general, it is in the history of everyday life and in the literary analysis of classical works that history and literary criticism reveal the unity of tasks: the literary critic also seeks to understand the authenticity of the depicted. Striving for an objective picture of the past is a task that for himself (unlike the writer) it was the historian who set himself (starting with the "father of history"), and acutely, especially in critical times (like the recent "perestroika"), society has always set, presented to the historian-scientist. Here is just a cursory list of books, the authors of which certainly used, including (in full accordance with the complementarity postulated by Petrovskaya in her essay) literary works as a historical source: Jan Mortimer "Medieval England", de Beaulieu "Medieval France", Michel Pastoureau "Everyday life of France and England during the time of the Knights of the Round Table", Catherine Coaty "Unkind Old England", Lucy Worsley "The English House: An Intimate History". But of course, as an additional source, we will find literature in history books as diverse in topics (and research techniques) as: "Man in the Culture of the Ancient Near East" by Weinberg, "The Sixties: the World of the Soviet Man" by Peter Weil and Alexander Genis, or the works of Soviet philologist Bakhtin and historian Gurevich, especially impossible not to mention the work of Academician Likhachev. In general, if we talk about folklore, epic, Aron Yakovlevich Gurevich (the author of the whole so-called an anthropological method in the study of historical sources based on the rejection of anonymity, a comprehensive study of the social environment from which the author of a particular written source came out, a method that has entered the arsenal of historians abroad -see the work of A. Buller "Introduction to the theory of History") published a monograph on the Norwegian saga (where, after all, the author anonymous, since it's about folklore) as a historical source, but if we recall Homer, then one day a St. Petersburg archaeologist, considering Homer's poems to be a historical source, made the discovery of Troy (or, as it is believed, another, but also the city of Ilium called in the poem-see, for example, Klein's article "Homeric History"), Schliemann of course, and if about the Bible, then interpretations of biblical texts are several hundred or even thousands of years old (in terms of books of the Old Testament), more than one hundred years of history and the whole scientific discipline of biblical studies, where the Sacred the text, and in particular the author's texts of the Gospels, are studied precisely as historical sources (to quote the words of the outstanding Soviet and Russian archaeologist Lev Samuilovich Klein from an article in 2009. "Popular about the Bible", which is a review of the book by journalist Nikonov: "The Bible is presented in Nikonov's book only as a collection of Jewish folklore, as a collection of worthless tales. Meanwhile, the Bible is also the most important (and colossal) historical source on the Ancient East. A lot of events, names, names of countries and peoples have reached us through the Bible, and many biblical information is confirmed by archaeological excavations. By the way, the book by the German Bible apologist Keller "And yet the Bible is Right" is based on this. In the middle of the 20th century. He substituted confirmation of geographical names and real historical events for the justification of miracles and divine stories. They were, and in this sense the Bible is right. And the myths set out in the Bible remain myths"), although of course, such works as Homer's poems, Norwegian sagas, Russian chronicles, Sacred Books can hardly be called ordinary literary works. But hermeneutics as an interpretation of the text, textual studies began hundreds of years ago with the study of Sacred texts. If we keep in mind such a tradition, then Petrovskaya is absolutely right, correcting a modern educational publication that the question of whether literary works are historical sources has not been controversial for a long time. Moreover, the representative of pre-revolutionary Russian historical science and in the USSR, R.Yu.Wipper, including on the basis of the analysis of the "Epistles of the Apostle Paul", "Sayings of Jesus", "Memoirs of the Apostles", defended the point of view that both Jesus Christ and the Apostle Paul are "a person composed", and "sacred" books" 2nd century-"the first method of document substitution, which was then used more than once in the practice of the Christian Church" (quote from the course of lectures "History of the Middle Ages", delivered by Whipper at Moscow University and recommended in the 2000 edition for college and university students).
With the advent of new technologies in art, the advent of cinema, and films are also the subject of historical research. I will list again only some works published recently (and reflecting, albeit short, but also my own history of cinema): "Propaganda of war in the cinema of the Third Reich" by Polyakova, ""Battle after Victory": the image of the enemy in Soviet feature films of the Cold War period" by Kolesnikov, "The Death of Crowned Russia: A Screen about the death of the Romanov Dynasty" by Tyurin, "The Uprising of Phantasms: the Stalinist Era in post-Soviet Cinema" by Yakobidze-Gitman, "Museum of the Revolution: Soviet cinema and the Stalinist historical narrative" by E. Dobrenko, "The screen image of the time of the Thaw: the 60-80s" by Zaitseva et al. As it is not difficult to notice, when choosing topics, the authors were often guided by "topical" plots of Russian history. It's not that I would intentionally avoid choosing a work as the subject of research that helps to reveal the plots of history that remain "relevant": revolutions, world War, but choosing such a work allows you to do an experiment that is "pure" (from journalism first of all) from the point of view of scientific tasks. Although the predominant interest here is in the work itself, for obvious reason (the story has long been part of adventure literature, along with the works of Defoe, Swift, Stevenson, Dickens, etc., recommended for young people), known since childhood. But also because, as part of a less studied complex of classical literature of the 19th century, it is also very informative precisely as a historical source, and because it has been little studied and because the literature of the 19th century. But it happens that the epoch itself can dictate the choice of works, genre, or an entire art form, so the specifics of the time, epoch: the meaning of theater (along with poetry, approximately, by the way, history and historians will also acquire significance in the "perestroika"), which as an art form is closely related to literature, reflects the study P.Bogdanova "Directors of the sixties". This is important for my work because Doyle's novel was also part of a new genre in the spreading literacy of the first order: the emergence of the phenomenon of (historical) mass culture itself. After all, he was published in a magazine distributed primarily among passengers of the British railway.
Research methods
So, let's try to present literary works with historical sources. Methodologically, this would mean an attempt to reconstruct the past based on them. It is logically correct to assume that since I am dealing with literary works, interpretative, hermeneutic methods of studying texts are necessary for my task. And here I will use philological hermeneutics, which is just as logically widespread (only for the objective interpretation of a work, as opposed to the task set for myself) in literary studies, where the process of understanding the text of a work is considered as movement along the so-called hermeneutic circle. On the one hand, the text is considered in relation to the epoch, the literary genre. On the other hand, the text is the spiritual life of the author, and his spiritual life itself is part of the historical epoch. The presentation of the text from these two positions, the transition from the general to the particular and back again, is a movement in the hermeneutical circle. The key point for me, for the task of my research, is the historical epoch, the connection of the text with it. Apart from the tasks of historical research, of course, this does not in any way interfere with a better, deeper understanding of the literary work. These are actually the tasks and examples that were carried out: Yuri Lotman in relation to Pushkin's Eugene Onegin, Dmitry Sergeevich Likhachev to the Russian epic and chronicles (although their research served the tasks of cultural history, the theoretical basis for which, as I mentioned, are concepts philosophically dating back to Plato, but questioning the ideas of the "history of literature" is not my task, I am trying to show the possibilities of literature for the history of social, cultural, but above all history). To identify the meaning (cognitive for a historian) from the text of a literary work, the interpretative method of Emilio Betti is also suitable for me: according to Betti's theory of interpretation (in 1955, the book "General Theory of Interpretation" by the Italian jurist, historian and philosopher Emilio Betti was published), interpretation is a process in which three sides are involved: the subjectivity of the author, subjectivity an interpreter and a representative form that performs the function of an intermediary through which their message is carried out. The central concept of Betty's theory is the "representative form" of the object of interpretation – a concept that encompasses all possible meaningful expressions of human subjectivity (written text, work of art, speech, deed, symbol, gesture). In our case, it is a literary work. The main function of the representative form is the translation of the meaning contained in it (we are interested in the meaning that characterizes the views, habits, practices of social interaction, institutions of the society of which the author, his characters, and his first readers were members, that is, the historical epoch, otherwise history). The fact that I will not limit myself to a deep understanding of the plot, structure of the work, composition, style, language does not mean that the method will be used as alien to this kind of interpretation-interpretation occupies a central place in the methodology of the humanities in general, including history, wherever the procedure for identifying the meaning and significance of the studied object is the main strategy for the researcher.
Betty identifies four basic principles, or "canons," of interpretation. Their main task is to ensure the objectivity of interpretation:
-the canon of autonomy of the interpreted object implies that the interpreter must get away from his own subjectivity, which can distort the correctness of interpretation, in other words, the meaning should not be "introduced", but "taken out";
-the canon of integrity, or semantic connectedness, requires the interpreter to correlate the part and the whole in order to clarify the meaning of the interpreted object;
-the canon of relevance of understanding requires the interpreter to be able to transfer someone else's thought into the relevance of his own historical life;
-the canon of hermeneutical semantic correspondence, or adequacy of understanding, implies the openness of the interpreter to the spirit that created the work.
Betty identifies other types of interpretation: "reproductive" (its purpose is to convey the meaning inherent in the work to the addressee (viewers, listeners). These include dramatic, musical interpretation, text translation), "normative" ("normative" interpretation has a regulatory function. Understanding is not an end in itself, it is "intended to regulate actions based on rules that are derived from norms and dogmas, from moral assessments and the requirements of psychological circumstances"; Betty includes legal, religious, ethical and pedagogical interpretations here). For obvious reasons (research objectives), I am interested in: "recognizing". The purpose of "recognizing interpretation" is to understand the meaning contained in a representative source (text, work of art, act). This type of interpretation includes historical and philological representations. The French philosopher Ricoeur noted that interpretation reveals a multiplicity of meanings. Interpretation has to deal with signs or symbols, the structure of the meaning of which can be polysyllabic, when one meaning – direct, primary, literal – moreover means another meaning – indirect, secondary, allegorical – which can be understood only through the first. Riker calls this circle of expressions with a double meaning a hermeneutic field. As a result, the text may have several meanings layered on top of each other. According to Riker's definition, "interpretation is the work of thinking, which consists in deciphering the meaning behind the obvious meaning, in identifying the levels of meaning contained in the literal meaning." But following Riker's thought, I also consider the multiplicity of interpretations not a disadvantage, but a virtue of understanding. However, I also agree that with the very variability of interpretation, there is a problem of objectivity, the most adequate of interpretations. But in this case, as criteria of adequacy, I can use just historical documents on the era in question, and literary materials concerning this kind of genre of literature and the author. When working with the text, these criteria will simply constitute the initial interpretative base, which, nevertheless, I do not seek to bring into the text, on the contrary, I only check the material extracted from the text with these data familiar to me a priori, as well as the entire body of knowledge for any author, researcher. As criteria of adequacy, I will rely on regional studies materials, for example, the multi-volume Soviet popular scientific geographical and ethnographic publication "Countries and Peoples" edited by Doctor of Historical Sciences, academician Julian Vladimirovich Bromley (grandson of the famous theatrical figure Konstantin Sergeevich Stanislavsky). The publication is Soviet, but in 40 years it is unlikely that the physical and geographical conditions have changed so much. But as for the changed socio-cultural historical conditions, I will use the work of the famous Polish sociologist, philosopher, theorist and historian of ethics Maria Ossovskaya "Knight and the Bourgeois" (1987 edition), which became famous far beyond Poland, in terms of the history of morality. In particular, the chapter on gentlemen. As for English, namely Victorian life, everyday life by the works of modern English historians and philologists: "The English House: an Intimate History" by Lucy Worsley and "Bad Old England" by Catherine Coaty. So to speak, these are my criteria for adequacy in the study.
Concluding the review of the scientific and methodological basis of the research, I consider it necessary to give a critique of the interpretative (and hermeneutic) method, because it concerns the interpretation of art. After all, I chose not a memoir as the object of my research, but a work of fiction.
Thus, the American writer Susan Sontag in her essay "Against Interpretation" gives a critical assessment of the role of interpretation in art. Sontag draws attention to the fact that the initial theory of art claimed that art is a mimesis, an imitation of reality. According to Sontag, the emergence of interpretation was due to the need to reconcile ancient texts with "modern" requirements. Nowadays, interpretation has become a universal way of understanding, and is applied to things of any dignity. Sontag sharply criticizes the style of modern interpretation, in particular its open aggressiveness and obvious contempt for the visible.
S. Sontag ("Against interpretation"): "The old manner of interpretation was insistent but respectful; another one was built over the literal meaning. The new style is excavation; digging, destroying, digging "behind" the text to find the subtext, which is the true one."
According to Sontag, interpretation does not prevail everywhere. In addition, there is an "escape from interpretation" in modern painting, which is especially evident in abstractionism and pop art.
S. Sontag (ibid.): "Abstract painting is an attempt to banish content in the ordinary sense of the word; where there is no content, there is nothing to interpret. Pop art goes the opposite way to the same result, using content that is so obvious, so “as it is”, it also becomes uninterpreted."
According to Sontag, to interpret means to impoverish, to dry up the world in order to establish a ghostly world of "meanings". Sontag offers a technique against interpretation. To do this, it is necessary to create clean and whole things that would capture with their pressure and directness of treatment. According to Sontag, the highest and most liberating value in contemporary art is transparency, which will allow you to experience the light of the thing itself, the thing as it is. Sontag concludes his essay with the phrase: "Instead of hermeneutics, we need the eroticism of art."
S. Sontag (ibid.): "Our task is not to find as much content as possible in an artistic thing, especially not to squeeze out of it what is not there. Our task is to put the content in place so that we can see the thing at all."
What can you say to that? Unless only what could be more tempting (playing along with the calls of Sontag) than an attempt to see the original intention of the author, or even not the intention, but to read this or that literary work of the past as it was read by the first readers-to whom it was directly addressed. Although, of course, as in the case of reconstruction of the past, the non-linear nature of memories in principle is not a realistic idea (and this is a limitation for the researcher), because reconstruction is not identical to the construction, it is not the past itself, and to some extent as a memory it is a game. But in this limitation of speculative retrospect, wealth is again, just like in the proverb that what is important is seen better from a distance. The historian often comes across this: certain phenomena in history can gain more importance from less over time, and it turns out that contemporaries attached unjustifiably great importance to some, but for an objective researcher both those and others are important. This is what should distinguish my "commenting" from the tasks of a cultural historian. I will not be interested only in the history of everyday life (Yu. Lotman, D.S.Likhachev) for a deeper understanding of culture, works. I am interested in how informative and thus valuable a literary work will be for a deeper understanding of the historical epoch in which it was written. So, the field of activity is a new history, the object is the British Colonial Empire, at the zenith of its development, the 19th century, the so-called "Victorian era", the subject is English society: institutions, people: gentlemen, farmers, rural doctor, postmaster, baronets, etc. Source: a literary work and all the persons are characters of an adventure story (it would seem that there is a genre restriction, you can not use, for example, a fantasy novel, however, and in a fantastic work there may be and even may be a clearer worldview and in particular social representations and even the very structure of the society in which this work was written, and this it has long been known, and allows the use of epic works, myths about gods and heroes to restore the picture of medieval or even ancient society by medievalists and historians of antiquity).
To help the researcher, as Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya and erudition notes: the historian simply has to read a lot (for example, in Holmes' remark alone that he understands painting, he just has different tastes with Watson, and the mention of an exhibition of certain Belgians ... for a person familiar at least briefly with the history of painting, it is clear that it cannot be, because the story was written at the very beginning of the 20th century., about such Belgians as Magritte, or Delvaux, pioneers of surrealism, but most likely it is not by chance about such artists as Van de Velde and Van Risselberg-pointillists, the theorists of avant-garde art, and thus in one phrase, one mention to a researcher with erudition, it is clear that they are talking about an endless, but began in the 19th century. dispute between supporters of classical, academic and avant-garde art and the mention of the Belgians is not accidental).
As for the rest of the methods… Vladimir Pavlovich Bogdanov in "Essays on entertaining Source Studies" notes, for example: "With all the variety of methods and techniques for studying information from sources, they all come down to the main principle-comparison. It is the comparison that makes it possible to supplement the information of one source with the information of another, refute the data of one document and confirm the correctness of another." "Thus," writes V.P. Bogdanov, "a comparison of sources can provide new information." That is, the methods of comparative historical, comparative studies. And curiously, V.P. Bogdanov illustrates these methods of comparison by example, comparing A.S. Pushkin's Eugene Onegin with other literary monuments of the "Pushkin era". Thus revealing hidden information for us, but expressed for contemporaries in the fact that Pushkin in the novel clearly appeals to "at least seven works," the author notes. "The appeal to them was understandable to contemporaries (and this speaks about the reading circle of that era), gave an ironic meaning to the brilliant lines of the poet," concludes V.P.Bogdanov. "Thus, we have before us not just a literary work, but also a kind of creative position of Pushkin in relation to romanticism and to the literary life of the country at that time. And this is an important argument in literary studies and in general in the history of Russian culture of the early 19th century." I also tried to select the "reading circle" - works of approximately the same genre, the same cultural and historical soil, time (here the history of literature and my own erudition, necessary for any research, helps me). The result is a small list (14 works for scrupulous comparative analysis, of course in Russian translations, but about that – about the language, that is, literally the language, we are talking ahead, but this of course imposes certain restrictions): Mary Shelley "Frankenstein", Prosper Merimet "Locis", Gaston Leroux "The Phantom of the Opera", Oscar Wilde "The Canterville Ghost", Washington Irving "Sleepy Hollow", the stories of Joseph Sheridan le Fanu, "The Entail" Hoffman, Stevenson "The Strange Story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", Collins "The Woman in White", Edgar Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher", "Murder in the Rue Morgue", Stoker's "Dracula", Austin's "Northanger Abbey", Cronin's "Castle Brody", and much less well-known (and some apocryphal, and I, too, through comparative analysis and interpretations, allow me to draw a conclusion about the authorship of both the novel and the short stories) Doyle's own stories are not from the Sherlock Holmes cycle, not detective stories, but the genre of "horror literature".
In the list, as you can see, there are samples of "horror novels", an era close to the time of the first publication of the novel, and works considered in the history of literature itself that begin the triumphant march across continents and epochs of the detective genre (Collins and Poe). I will try to present my arguments "for" and "against" in my work: where did this popular genre "come from", what is the secret of its popularity, and whether these works actually relate to the novel in question. Should these first works in the popular genre be considered classical works (and, strictly speaking, are they so much different, for example, from Chekhov's "Black Monk", or the stories of Daniil Andreev, especially Sologub's novel "The Little Demon" -the most incidentally republished novel before the revolution in Russia, or Gogol's novels, which we do not we consider them examples of "popular reading", and you can't call Hoffmann that, even though they were and are popular authors, as you can see, I have already gone beyond strictly English or European literature, Russian Russian classics are much more familiar to me, just as a Russian reader, but they are more a source for the second part of the work, where I will try to make comparisons of sources not just of one "reading circle", but rather historically distant from each other and just try to highlight in this what would indicate despite the changes in the history of society, this is all the more curious because we are talking about the example of the Russian classics about society, as everyone and everyone is well aware a priori moving towards the three revolutions of the early 20th century, which became factors, they significantly changed the picture of the world around the world, in the entire world history, no matter how they then rethink the meaning of the most radical of these - the October 1917, socialist, Bolshevik coup, even if we do not share the concept of a totalitarian state, we still cannot but recognize its influence on subsequent literature, at least in the Soviet Russia, but the changes in society that led to three revolutions... even if we believe that the revolution of 1917. were part of the European revolutions as a result of the First World War, then the First Russian Revolution cannot be part of them, and had to have internal political reasons, so the changes in society that led to three revolutions... the question again goes beyond literary studies, even if literary works are considered the source), and why over time The genre of detective or "horror novel" has become a part of popular culture. As you can see, the selected works for comparison eventually raise questions that go beyond only literary criticism, namely those related to the history of culture and history as such, society, moreover, to the origin of modern society, such as modernity, where there is also mass culture in which these genres flourish in literature, and in movies and on television (and actually: why?).
Among another method that I'm going to use in my work, and V.P.Bogdanov also talks about it in his "Essays ..."-the so-called statistical, the historian calls the information received structural. However, when dealing with a literary work (but as a historical source) I considered it possible to use modern methods of text research, common in foreign philology, more related to the study of its structure and the actual analysis of the text of the work, but for example, from an attempt to "color" the chapters of the story in the colors that occur in the text (of course, the original, that is, in English), you can get an interesting picture, which, looking ahead, can say (in literary studies) in confirmation of the genre of the story, but also (which is no less important for my research) to give information about the worldview of the contemporaries of the characters in the story, something that is well known, but only as fans of this subculture, steam punk, in what colors the cities of the "Victorian era" were painted, the industrial centers of England, what their inhabitants wore (in terms of color) what was actually (in terms of color) the world surrounding the English gentleman (and not speculatively, based on the ideas of the "civilization of coal and steam", but on the basis of this analysis: highlighting the mentioned colors in the text, chosen of course by the author, but a contemporary for his contemporary characters), and how the English province, the rural hinterland, where, in fact, the lion's share of the action in the story takes place, differed against this background, and why the English village is depicted in the paintings so diametrically opposed to our usual idea (of the "civilization of coal and steam") and the idea of a fan of steam punk style landscape painters of that time (and in the emerging printing industry of postcards). Here is such a "Fauvist", seemingly completely far from social history, intra-textual analysis of "meaningless", "formal" methods alien to the Soviet traditions of literary criticism.
As for the methods of literary criticism... of course, if I chose a literary work as a source, then they are also necessary in the study. In particular, those of them who consider works not to be purely "the individual beginning of the author", but on the contrary reflecting the features of the epoch, the signs of the time, not a "thing in itself", that is, in art, but on the contrary reflecting ideas about the linear, historical nature of the development of literature and art together with society. In the final part of the introductory scientific and methodological chapter of the work, I will allocate a place precisely in order to focus in more detail on research in order to reconstruct the historical past, but methods borrowed for these purposes, if the source is literature, from literary studies.
In the psychoanalytic concept of literary studies by Freud and Jung, the entire novel can be presented as the story of a boy-the main character living in a manor with his father and mother, and suffering from nightmares, except for Sir Henry, all the characters in the novel can be quite part of his fantasy:
The archetype of the Mother in the novel is Baskerville Hall (its negative representation of the Dartmoor swamp)
In the scheme of the Oedipus complex, the uncle is none other than the father, an obstacle to the possession of the estate
Stapleton is the alter ego archetype of the Shadow of Sir Henry himself (as well as the Anima archetype forming a pair with Sir Henry-Miss Stapleton and Laura Lyons in a negative display, if not the connotation of good and evil, and very clear, then these pairs, like what Holmes saw in the portrait gallery, are not distinguishable at all)
Holmes (in a complex Holmes-Watson construction, his viz-a-vi) is the archetype of the Spirit (his negative expression is the Hound of the Baskervilles, both are on the trail, one is a detective, the other is a bloodhound)
And Dr. Mortimer either did not exist at all, as in the story of going to the doctor for something shameful: one of my friends is in pain there, after a holiday romance, what do you advise him ... or, if Holmes is the personification of at least a supernatural force fighting evil, his messenger, the whole function of Mortimer in the novel-intermediary, his figure seems to be replaceable, the terrified Sir Henry himself could have made the same request to Holmes, it is curious that Watson sees only two sights in the Grimpen village: the office of a postal employee (again mediation, the Messenger) and Mortimer's house.
The boy feels fear and dislike for his father, the owner of the estate, which is overlaid by love for his mother, in nightmares he sees the expression of his secret desires-he is tormented by a vision of a dog that kills his father, and he becomes the owner of the estate, Dr. Mortier is a psychoanalyst, can resolve this in the spirit of the Conan Doyle novel, more precisely the concept psychoanalytic literary studies
In accordance with Jungian hermeneutics, or rather the theory of individuation, which according to Jung forms the deep plot of all narrative literature, the novel looks like this:
The test of life in society-the hero-an American farmer comes to London, having turned into an English landowner under the law of inheritance
Positive development occurs due to a collision with a legend-sobering up –"I got a pretty inheritance"-through irrational fear
The test of self-awareness-meeting with one's own Shadow–Stapleton is the whole novel –negative development does not occur through interference in the Holmes case
The test of meeting with Anima-love. A positive development also occurs due to the discovery of Miss Stapleton's complicity in the crime, with her ambiguous role as a sister-wife-accomplice-opponent of her husband's criminal plan
Obeying the archetype, a person remains at the mercy of illusions, accepts them as reality-and individuation is interrupted
Realizing the archetype as a part of one's own psyche, which determines one or another of its qualities, reactions, fantasies, actions, overcomes the power of the archetype
The Test of knowledge-meeting with the archetype of the Spirit-Holmes
The description of the Self in the literature on Jung is rare, Turysheva gives an example: Bazarov (in episodes of passing away), Sorel (in episodes of imprisonment and trial), Tatyana Larina (refusal to Onegin)-and so similar to the passage of initiation overcoming fear of the legend and the test of love and revealed knowledge by Sir Henry-a novel perhaps it loses in the completeness of the disclosure of the plot, in the drawing of images, but not in the plot itself and in the selection of images
There could be a part described on behalf of Miss Stapleton-her story: what connected her with a man like her husband, why she began to resist his crimes, the love story through her eyes to Sir Henry, and so on-in the finale, a wedding is possible, if Sir Henry forgave her, he had reasons for this: a letter, Watson's warning by mistake, she almost herself She died on that fateful night when the dog attacked Sir Henry
In general, it is curious that the novel is obviously written through Watson's eyes, it is difficult to distract from the figure of Holmes, the superhero in it, and Watson really, as his representative, the conductor of light, makes Holmes feel in the novel, although he acts only at the beginning and end, but the main character is Sir Henry and this is reflected in the title and in the beginning –where Mortimer tells everything precisely in connection with the arrival of Sir Henry, and in the love line-what does it have to do with Watson or Holmes, so it's curious, that all the other characters look archetypal-but so in life-we cannot know the complexity of the inner world of other people who we meet and for us they are only archetypes, just as we are for the rest –and in the novel this is just visible-more precisely by how far it falls short of a serious novel form- where stereoscopic, not even chronological, but spatial action would be presented – where we would not have to think about: what happened before Sir Charles's death, and what happened before Stapleton's arrival in England, but how this story was seen from Meripith House, or through the eyes of the Barrymores, and what happened to them before Sir Charles came to England, and what happened to Sir Charles in South Africa, what kind of elections in which he was a candidate, but his death cut short his participation in them, and so on.
Moreover, in mythocritical Jungian hermeneutics, the story of Miss Stapleton –if it had ended with a wedding –would have been its own story of beauty and the beast, its own story of Cinderella –despite the fact that she was obviously in the archetype of Anima –a substitute for Sir Henry's mother-obviously an American
And this would not even interfere with the historical truth: if Doyle himself says that it's great that against the background of the nouveau riche, a representative of an ancient family decided to revive his ancestral nest, against the background of stories from the Canterville ghost or Ishigura, where English estates go to the Nouveau riche from the New World, Miss Stapleton and Sir Henry still and immigrants from America, but not nouveau riche, but as if the rightful owners of the estate were
In Jungian English mythocritical hermeneutics (with all the criticism) –Bodkin-one can guess the distinction between the archetypes of heaven and hell-gloomy landscapes or, if not blooming gardens, then comfortable Victorian London with all its attributes: railways, hotels, shoes, cabs, telegraphs, archetypes of God, the devil (even called more than once in the the novel is opposed to both civilization and rationalism in general, and Holmes – by the way, at the same time, an emotionless robot, in particular, the episodes associated with evil are the most emotionally colored) and the hero-hesitating in choosing good and evil or entering into confrontation with forces of a higher order
According to Graves, the novel also has a monomyph –defining all European literature-the confrontation of the Sun and the Moon-masculine, rational and feminine, irrational, but at the same time poetic –if Bodkin identified archetypes in literature, according to Graves, literature has its history in archetypes: medieval lunar poetry, in the 17th-18th centuries. the solar myth, the expression of which is the cult of rationalism in the art of classicism and Enlightenment, the cult of the Moon returns in romanticism -not even in sensuality or gloom, but in an intimate theme
According to Northrop Fry: the novel, of course, like all adventure literature, is the "myth of spring", but we see echoes of the "myth of winter" in it-in the demonic creature and in the title
He almost doesn't get to the "myth of summer"-the wedding of the heroes.
Even in the interpretation of the origin of literary imagery according to Fry: there is a comic pervomif-images of friendship, love, anthroporphism of the gods, we said instead of pastoral –Victorian not in the sense of gloom just, but on the contrary the development of the world of things –London, the workshop of the world, harmony even – and Holmes is also working to maintain it-fighting injustice-"the lights of Edison and Swann" is also from Sir Henry's side-and there is a tragic first myth-a world of swamps, inexplicable fears, if there were only this side in the novel-then it would be a horror novel like Dracula, the image of a monster, but the line is detective it does not just connect these components of the novel-like day and night-"be afraid to go out into the swamps at night"-but also debunks modern crime, restoring justice and harmony –in this sense, fabulousness, and a Hollywood novel, it is no coincidence that Hollywood has filmed many times and in an attempt to contrast it (with all the criticism of ideologists) in Soviet cinema, along with Gogol's own film adaptations, the Weiner brothers detectives, the spy detectives of Julian Semenov, disaster films like "The Crew", although this is only part of the causal relationship, the other in the historical parallel of Victorian England after the industrial revolution, the beginning of consumer society and the late USSR, with a common and moral background of faith in the progress of science, a revival of interest in the past, but the struggle against religious prejudice (as can be seen from Doyle's biography-but unlike his hero, Doyle did not escape the fascination with another irrationality-spiritualism, and in this sense, as if he remained, unlike his literary hero, in captivity of rather gloomy illusions-in the novel, Holmes, though without touching himself legends, exposes the irrationality of the monster).
Fear in children's and romantic prose
Curiously, when inheriting a dog, Sir Henry remembers that he heard something about this legend in his childhood-this is how Doyle bridges the bridge from folklore, a scary fairy tale to childhood fears, or primitive thinking: when the world was and seemed frightening-isn't that why fairy tales are usually scary
Neo-Romanticism is one of the many definitions used by writers and critics of the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. to describe the transitivity of culture from the "old" to the "new"-"modern", "modern"
This definition, once quite weighty, but half-forgotten in the 20th century, should be considered in relation to others.The symbols of the cultural shift are naturalism, impressionism, and symbolism. Despite the spread in a number of countries and giving it the status of a historical and literary concept in the 20s under the influence of the German "philosophy of life", neo-Romanticism did not become a commonly used term, because it rather denoted not specific stylistic features, but their general property, a certain "zeitgeist", as a result of which it was gradually absorbed other concepts similar in content.
For the first time, neo-Romanticism was discussed at the turn of the 1880s-1890s in the Berlin artistic environment. This buzzword, adopted from French critics, but used unlike them, not in a negative, but in an affirmative sense, indicated the need to overcome the well-known provincialism of German literature in the last third of the 19th century. The demand implied the renewal of the great national tradition, a protest against wingless naturalism – life writing, not a denial of naturalism, but its expansion, elevation to a "new ideal" - a mystical sense of things, poetic dionysism as the hunger of life
Nietzsche formulated such an understanding of neo-romanticism in the 1880s, first of all, which corresponds to his dream of a rapprochement in the "superman" -Holmes - the sage and the beast
Ideologically, this implied a search for personal, as it were earthly, religiosity, symbolically -a movement from the blurring of the world in impressionism and symbolist allegory to a new objectivity, to the simplification of language and its expression.
Viennese writer Friedrich Fels: "every naturalist is a romantic at heart, even if he does not accept the definition of romanticism."
The playwright Hofmannsthal used it to combine "analysis of life and escape from life" in Viennese Art Nouveau.
Realizing the instability of the definition, not wanting to see romanticism in the mysticism of Maeterlinck, they stopped putting a generalizing meaning into the definition -it began to be used to characterize the theatrical repertoire.
K. Vollmeller, R. Beer-Hoffmann: "The Death of George", "Count Charolais", R. Huch "Fra Celeste" neo-Romanticism meant a popular idea of the attributes of romance-legends - in the novel, an independent work attributed to Robertson -heroic personalities from the past, elements of folklore, extravaganza, colorful fiction.
Critics then called individual works by Ibsen, Strindberg, Hamsun – it seems, Verharn, d Annunzio, T. Mann, Rilke, Przybyszewski, Wyspiansky.
And in the 1920s: even the heyday was "Fighting the Demon" by Zweig.
Some of the provisions turned out to be applicable to English literature.
But in England itself, if this term was used, it was not in the Nietzschean sense (although what is Mowgli-if not in its pure form a combination of a sage and a beast) neo-romanticism here meant a modification of the tradition of the "adventurous novel" by Collins, Haggard, Stevenson, Doyle.
The exoticism of the themes, the proximity to the mass reader.
In Russia, Merezhkovsky was the first to talk about neo-Romanticism-"Neo-Romanticism in Drama" 1894-negatively belated violators of classical traditions, enemies of scientific poetry, obsolete traditions of the theater, new idealists rebelling against positivism and naturalism.
Bely: "Arabesques" 1911: "the symbolism of modern art emphasizes that realism, romanticism and classicism are a threefold manifestation of a single principle of art.
Blok "The Collapse of humanism", "On Romanticism" 1919:
"a human being is a humane animal, a social animal, a moral animal (–a dog) is being transformed into an artist" (everyone plays some other people's roles -both Holmes, Watson, and Sir Henry - everything, and Freckland).
In the USSR in the 30–80s, infrequent references to neo-Romanticism were either ideologized (within the framework of harsh interpretations of decadence and modernism), or are intended to denote something separate from decadence, but not aligned with realism.
And later, neo-Romanticism came to be considered a British phenomenon.
The idea of courageous heroism , eager for change, was identified.
The style of "healthy youth": travel, shipwrecks was contrasted with psychologism, aesthetics of Wilde and verbose descriptive.
It remains to add that Western literary critics do not use the term after the Second World War.
We have described in such detail the history of a seemingly familiar term in order to show how contradictory and inconsistent its use in Russian science is. although by tradition they call English neo-Romantic writers.
The theoretical approach did not work out.
Nevertheless, the rejection of this concept seems insufficiently motivated and, I think, it may still be useful.
But it is noteworthy that Doyle is not considered at all, but only Kipling and Conrad: "Foreign literature K.19-n20": a textbook for students.universities.edited by V.M.Tolmachev.-M., 2003.
But before I finish with historical, textual and literary methods, I want to note one more necessary quality of a researcher-historian – the so-called sociological imagination and historical imagination (which can be found in the work of a historian or not, but I believe that for fruitful work they are necessary and if not given by nature, their you should try to develop yourself). In general, there are many questions of the quality of a researcher: what a historian should be (true, there is no little and this is evident from the article by the prominent Soviet and Russian archaeologist Lev Samuilovich Klein, who generously shares in them, with bitterness for science, career experience in Soviet science and the state of modern Russian, post-reform), attention is paid, first of all about such qualities such as honesty, not bribery and not venality, the integrity of a scientist, but also the lack of conceit, honesty, which does not allow plagiarism of work. In principle, these qualities are generally civil, so to speak, but Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya rightly believes that they are all the more important for a researcher in the field of humanities. On the same issue of truth and lies, V.P. Bogdanov (belonging to a much younger generation of scientists than L.S.Klein, I.F.Petrovskaya) finishes "Essays...". I completely agree with them (although there is no semblance of a "Hippocratic oath" in the humanities and it seems to be believed that the harm caused by a quasi-historian is much less than a pseudo-doctor, but it's how you look at it: history too often, according to the experience of the 20th century, of course falsified, became material for dangerous ideologies, including those condemned for the first time in the Nuremberg International Tribunal - the very concept of the Third Reich is taken from the history of Germany). Therefore, these are the qualities that should be understandable without explanation.
I would like to elaborate on the creative qualities, which may also turn out to be universal, but the truth is with the specifics that distinguish a historian from any other scientist. We will talk about historical imagination and sociological imagination (as I understand them myself). And this is about this side of the researcher's work (perhaps because, due to the experience of Soviet state-based ideologized historical science, the issues of a scientist's honesty are still more relevant) in the works of I.F.Petrovskaya, V.P.Bogdanov (even more so because they are popular science and intended even for schoolchildren, and not only students, such as, "Essays...") is mentioned too sparingly. Ira Fedorovna argues fairly, shares her experience of a systematic approach, the development of associative memory. But as for my question, he remarks casually: "You need to know a lot to develop a historical imagination." Only noting the importance of the fiction of the past (obviously the classics) for this.
V.P. Bogdanov says in this regard, also only mentioning the "sensitivity of the historian", quoting from Michelet, which he chose as an epigraph to the book: "... When I first entered these cellars filled with manuscripts, this wonderful necropolis of monuments of national history, I was ready to exclaim with joy ... "Here I will stay forever However, in the palpable silence of these galleries, I quickly learned to detect movement and whispers that did not belong to death. These papers and parchments, so long abandoned by everyone, wanted nothing more, nothing less, than to see the light again: after all, these are not just papers, but the lives of people, provinces and countries... they all lived and talked, surrounding the author with a hundred-language army. Breathing in their dust, I saw them get up. They rose from the tombs, one raised his hand, the other his head, as if in Michelangelo's "Last Judgment" or in the dance of death."
Of course, if I chose a literary work as a source, then the characters are fictional characters who have never lived. But... after all, just as the images of the gods and heroes of ancient myths or the saints of Christianity are depicted on the great canvases of the great masters of the Renaissance from nature, from some real-life prototypes, some names have even been preserved by history, so any literary heroes in reality are also copied from someone, often not even from one person, embodied the features of several faces at once . So to some extent they were real too. Another question is that from the pen of Doyle, these characters themselves seemed so real that to this day there is a Sherlock Holmes Museum in London on Baker Street, and Gogol had to almost justify himself for such characteristic types of landowners in the poem, as Sologub in the preface to numerous editions of the novel, justify himself, that he did not write the characters of the novel from himself, and at the same time that they are not the fruit of his allegedly perverted fantasy (or only its fruit), but on the contrary, the author provoked readers, they are written off from the surrounding nature, that is, from you readers.
But it is the imagination of the writer, it is believed, as Andreas Buller argues in his Introduction to the Theory of History, that the line between literature and history lies precisely in the fact that the historian is obliged to provide evidence and assure everyone that everything that he describes "actually happened." But I have just given examples when a writer took upon himself, under the burden of indignation, the obligation to justify himself by saying that he wrote as in kind.
Nevertheless, let's try to imagine what is historical, what is sociological (without mixing one with the other, as the sciences themselves are not similar) imagination.
Historical imagination is, of course, not just the ability to see cause-and-effect relationships, this is common to all representatives of Homo sapiens sapiens and not even one of them, but the ability to imagine the past, of course, the historian is helped in this by the baggage of his empirical knowledge, but before the past is reconstructed in the work, it must arise, to paraphrase Marx or Wilczek The famous example with the architect and the bee is that the bee does not need to imagine it before building, it builds by instinct, by reflex. A historian can also work on a hunch, intuitively, but this does not arise in reality, by itself, but is a consequence of an increasing deepening in knowledge (the limit, of course, in which it is impossible to achieve). But this feeling is developed in the historian, although initially it was common to all people-curiosity, although here I can step away from the task too much: to talk about the difference between creative imagination and historical, there is no difference, more precisely historical, as well as scientific in general, is only a special example of creative. Historical imagination is similar to intuition, architectural design on paper, before embodiment, owes its origin to the development of curiosity and the ability to see cause-and-effect relationships that have everything. Curiosity ... in his work in "Essays..." V.P. Bogdanov even quotes such a quote from Mark Blok: "Even if we assume that history is not suitable for anything, we should still say in its defense that it is fascinating" (it is a pity that this cannot be said about many modern and Soviet works historians who sin with scientific academicism, economism and dryness of presentation, what kind of historical imagination is there and, therefore, besides the lack of truth, doubts about honesty, as evidenced by Kobrin's famous essay "On the honesty of a historian", It serves as a popular appeal during the collapse of the USSR to the then revived classics of historical pre-revolutionary science: Kostomarov, Platonov, Presnyakov, Klyuchevsky, Karamzin, Solovyov, Kornilov, Granovsky, Whipper, Turaev, etc.).
What is the sociological imagination? The sociological view of the world differs from the usual ideas. As Peter Berger wrote, the sociological approach is the ability to notice the general in the particular. Sociological thinking arises when we begin to understand how general categories affect our private lives, "to see the unusual in the banal." This approach is called sociological imagination (the concept was introduced by Charles Wright Mills) — the ability to abstract from one's experience of everyday life.
This is the end of the review of the theoretical and methodological part of the historical part, I think, in more detail for the issues of "historical imagination", the "anthropological approach" to history, ideas about the dialogic nature of the process of cognition of history in the dialogue between the historian and the source, I refer the reader to the mentioned work of Buller "Introduction to the theory of History". I will only note that the principle of dialogicity was developed for historical science by the Soviet and Russian historian-medievalist A.Ya.Gurevich (recognized in the world) on the basis of the proposed principle by the Soviet literary critic M.Bakhtin. And I.F.Petrovskaya in her work, speaking of a historian, stipulates that by a historian she means any researcher (literary critic, art critic, even an economist) when he refers to the past.
And, in conclusion of the introductory part of the work, I would like to return a little to the theories and methods of literary criticism, if the historical source is a work of fiction. It is curious, by the way, that Andreas Buller in "Introduction to the Theory of History" remarks: "it is not for nothing that the famous German historian Karl Schlegel, author of the interesting book "Terror and the Dream. Moscow 1937"advised his reader that in order to better understand the Moscow realities of the Stalin era, one should turn to reading Mikhail Bulgakov's fantasy novel The Master and Margarita." "Without a doubt," A. Buller writes further, "the novel "The Master and Margarita" is a fantasy, but a fantasy that allows the reader to plunge into the real atmosphere of Moscow in the 1930s. Bulgakov's allegories and fantastic parallels hide the very real situation of that time. No "serious" historical study could have described the life of Moscow of that era better, more clearly and more vividly than Mikhail Bulgakov does." So, in search of the "real atmosphere" of only other epochs, I turn to literary works (in no way believing that this will be enough for any historian, it is still an additional historical source, although for a much more ancient time, Homer's poems serve as the basis for the historical reconstruction of entire civilizations and epochs with everything doubt about the authorship and authenticity of the image). As for the emotional side of the advantage of an artistic text (and the text can also be an image, such as Picasso's response in his abstract manner to the tragedy of Guernica in the Spanish Civil War, as the director of a children's art school, an artist, once remarked to me, it was hardly possible in the artistic language of realism), no one disputes.
So, what are the theories and methods of literary criticism that could be useful in my work.
World literary studies developed in the 20th century. there are many theories and methods, one way or another, for a comprehensive and in-depth study of the text, the interaction of literature and readers through it, but I will certainly be satisfied with a more conservative direction, which still considered literature as an integral part of society as well as man in general in the era before the discovery of the dark side of personality in Freud's psychoanalysis, for example, that is, cultural-the historical school, sociological in general, as well as Marxist, biographical (and the analysis of the author's existence, in the part in which he is socially determined), but also the structuralism of myth, He considers literature to be a symbolic, semiotic system similar to language itself. And, the first one here will be the French philosopher Hippolyte Taine. Being a Frenchman, he nevertheless wrote to The History of English Literature: "a work of literature is not just a play of the imagination, the self-willed whim of an ardent soul, but a snapshot of the surrounding mores and evidence of a certain state of mind." For Ten, the works are documents in which, as O.N. Turysheva writes ("Theory and Methodology of foreign literary Criticism"): "the psychology of an entire nation found expression at a certain historical moment in its development."
Examples of modernist analysis are shown in an attempt at a Freudian-Jungian interpretation earlier.
And in conclusion: a few words (since this is still a question of auxiliary, service, means, not methods, and I am not a linguist, not a translator, although the question is auxiliary, but not secondary) on the issue of the original text, the problem of the technique of classical and modern translation (revealed in a brilliant work with irony characteristic of the author Chukovsky and the generalizing work of the "school of literary translation" of the Soviet literary critic, translator Kashkin – the book by Nora Gal, Natalia Volzhina, the author of the classic Soviet translation of the story, belongs to the circle of "Kashkinites"). Working with foreign literature, as with any "non-speaking" source (although any historical source also belongs to an era with the tasks of "understanding"), is of course a special difficulty, but not so categorical, especially considering that the historian has to deal with striking differences in view of changes over time of sources and on native language. But if the language of classical literature of the 19th century, the "Pushkin era", nevertheless, with the reservation that it is literary, it is still modern Russian, then for the first part of the work we are talking about English and work on translated (however, the original, of course, too) editions of the same text.
And here is the closest version of the Russian name to the original: "The dog hunting the Baskervilles."
The name contains elements of meanings: wild hunt, dog-pursuer, chase.
If Doyle shows that there is no dog of the Baskervilles, there is a dog of Stapleton, then in Jungian hermeneutics there is no dog of Stapleton, and Stapleton himself, who is only the archetype of the Shadow of the main character himself. Curiously, the film language is close to the postmodern film adaptation with Cumberbatch in the role of Holmes, which, according to film critics, "retained the spirit of the original."
The novel seems to be modern, unlike medieval ballads, ancient epics, it is certainly modern, even historical 100 and a little years is not such a long time, but is there no deception of translation here either-any foreign work is always read in a modern translation.
And yet, how would a novel be able to understand, for example, a resident of the forests of Brazil-a representative of the Piraja tribe-where there are no ideas about the supernatural, no ideas about property and many, many more ideas that are perceived "automatically" for us.
Nevertheless, if we replace them with representations of another culture, of course it will be a different work, but nothing will change fundamentally: you can make a cultural translation without fundamentally losing meaning, because the categories of good and evil, friendship, betrayal are universal for a person, although then and now any person even in He read Christian, English or Russian culture, and therefore interpreted the novel in his own way - as shown by the hermeneutics of Heidegger, Gadamer and the phenomenology of Husserl.
Imaginary reality or historical reality?
If we apply the philosophical creativity of the deconstructivists (Derrida) at least in the sense of looking at the periphery, away from the main plot, from the main characters, then this may prove fruitful for the purpose and purpose of my research.
In the first three chapters, the scene is an apartment on Baker Street and among the characters there are only the main participants: Holmes, Watson, Mortimer and in the third chapter Sir Henry joins. But at the end of the fourth chapter, when Holmes notices the surveillance of his guests and goes outside with Watson, a whole series of "minor" characters appear. Let's take a closer look...
Holmes and Watson make their first visit to the district office of the courier office. Where Holmes, as a bosom friend, talks with a certain Wilson, the manager, inquires from him about the courier boy, Cartwright. Hires him to go around more than 20 hotels around Charing Cross (they are unlikely to be large, and besides, Holmes gives an assignment, stipulating that from 23 to 20 they will immediately say that the garbage was taken out or burned, but in the evening Cartwright really telegraphed about the completed assignment). Then Holmes and Watson enter one of the galleries, where, as the reader understands from the beginning of the fifth chapter, they examined and argued about modern painting ("the Belgians"). And they go into the Northumberland Hotel. Before meeting for lunch with new acquaintances and clients, Holmes, for the sake of business, is interested in the porter's guest book and asks about those who interested him: as it turned out, the owner of one of the coal mines, staying with his family, and a disabled woman, the wife of the former mayor of one of the cities with a girl, a maid, also a regular visitor to the hotel. During lunch or after it, Holmes resorts to a novelty from the hotel-to the telegraph and sends a telegram directly to the post office in Grimpen (where, as the reader later learns, the postmaster is not just the head of the post office, in fact, without staff, his boy son also serves as his postman, he delivered the telegram Barrymore to Baskerville Hall, without taking any receipt personally from the butler in receiving it, but also the grocer, because the whole village is a wilderness, but note in the 1880s having both a post office and a telegraph office, and a stop on the railroad, a few miles away, and also a doctor and a hotel). And in the evening, Holmes interviews the cabman who hurried to explain himself: John Clayton (by the way, without "mister", despite seven years of work as a driver, in fact, a young man who is not yet thirty).
What conclusions can be drawn here, using just the theory of deconstructionists. Indeed, are these characters really that "secondary"? For a moment, let's imagine that among the hotel guests, cab passengers, there are dozens exactly like our "main characters"... And indeed, the story does not reveal a semantic center, unless, of course, one gives free rein to the imagination: what brought a respectable lady to London, and even an invalid?.. What is a seemingly successful businessman doing in the English capital at this time, a man still young (somehow they usually forget that Holmes and Watson are not even middle-aged people-Watson, despite his retirement, but he was injured, they are still young gentlemen and all the film adaptations sin by presenting in their image middle-aged actors, especially the elderly, are just closer to the original, though only this, postmodern series on the theme of Holmes with Cumberbatch, with Downey Jr. and then probably the actor is already too old for the role, the actors of the Soviet TV series are twice as old as their characters, and therefore their bachelor life in a rented apartment on Baker Street or Holmes's part-time job in a university laboratory should not surprise them, as well as Mortimer's remark about the "second largest expert", Holmes is still only on the way to earning a reputation, even by age), but with his family, the owner of a coal mine. It is unnecessary to explain what coal is for Victorian England: This is the blood and food of the whole new branch of the economy - industry. And England is the "workshop of the world." Therefore, at the age of 30, the owner of the mine, this in itself should be an exciting story. She is like that even for a boy-who is called smart. He has really come a long way for his 14 years: a courier in the capital office! Thousands of his peers in the same London "work" as "larks" -pick up junk in any weather at low tide along the banks of the Thames and hand it over to junk dealers, catching a cold and stepping on nails and glass with bare feet. It is necessary to indicate where we got the information from: here we begin to verify the reliability of the information from the story not just by the popular presentation in Coaty's book, but in that part of it where it was used by the modern English life writer Henry Mayhew for the middle of the 19th century (although almost seventy illustrations from illustrated ones are a special "treasure" for the historian in Coaty's book reference books, novels and the press of that time, especially since realism and genre scenes in the painting of Victorian England were not yet widespread). But it is not difficult to notice that all these characters represent, so to speak, that part of Victorian society that supplies goods and services, and this whole part of the story is not accidentally just riddled with money: Holmes only manages to get sovereigns and shillings, unbuckling the courier, the cabman. Most of these conversations revolve around money. We can immediately say that in general, the courier office is for us, an indicator of the imperfection of logistics. The abundance of servants in the market had exactly the same function-labor was just becoming mechanized, industry was still gaining momentum. It's not just about class privileges, or fashion, dresses, for example, were such that for a lady the toilet took much longer, and it would be difficult to do without the help of servants. The same applies to plumbing, cooking, even in the capital of the "workshop of the world". But everything we see in this part of the story (with an abundance of characters) is a service industry. And, here is the most interesting thing, which allows a deviation from the semantic center of a literary work by deconstructionism, interesting for a historian trying to extract information of a historical nature-I, when comparing the method of comparative studies and a systematic approach, and internal historical criticism of this information, a fairly large arsenal of similar methods on one example-the book of Kouti, regarding child labor in the Victorian era, or public transport: in the 1830s in England (and this is only the beginning of Victoria's reign, and the story was published after the death of the queen, whose reign in the history of England was one of the longest-almost 70 years, to be more precise 64 years: these are 16 presidential terms in the United States) legislative regulation of women's and child labor began in 1840. (and it's only been three more years from the "Victorian era" and the queen is young) it was forbidden to use people under the age of 21 as chimney sweeps, although small fines have not yet put an end to this practice (children were scary to say suitable for such work-cleaning chimneys from the inside), but after the increase in fines in 1864. this practice is increasingly becoming the property of history (and Dickens's literature-world-famous for writing the horrors of childhood in that industrial era), but in the 1860s, half of the children in London from 5 to 15 years old go to school, and since 1880 primary education for children under 10 years old becomes compulsory (they were called for knowledge and a bowl of soup). Cabs or light convertibles replaced stagecoaches and omnibuses from Paris in the 1820s as a novelty, as a fashion, but in the story we are talking about just a common form of urban transport. Moreover, the cabmen "stuck to their jobs" and I understand why Clayton decided to personally testify to himself over Holmes. What do we see? Obviously not an "imaginary reality": let there be no historical events, dates, or persons by whom one could judge the distance from the real history of that time, but in terms of everyday life everything seems to be reliable, except for one thing... the story was written in 1901, the time of action is placed in 1889. That is, if everything depicted in it is not an "imaginary story", but a "story" even for the first readers. Although Doyle did not write the story, he placed his characters and pushed the plot into a recent, but history. That is, in terms of everyday life, we just see the "historical reality" (of course, it is still marked by the author's idea, which is why all these "talking" details for the historian, after all, for the plot of the story it is the details and in relation to the author's idea-to the plot, to the center of the story, the characters are secondary, but they become the background of the main action and form the historically reliable background necessary for the transmission of authenticity from the point of view of some part of the story).
Starting the actual research, first we will try to "understand" the described methods, which Turysheva encourages the researcher to use without giving priority to any one of them, without dwelling on the "purity" of the method, we will try to "understand" the time and place of the novel and its main characters.
Who are the Mortimers
The novel begins with the appearance of the first character out of the cycle of short stories and novels about Holmes: Dr. Mortimer.
Mortimer is actually not a rare surname in England. For example, there is a modern historian Ian Mortimer, and his book translated into Russian "Medieval England", in which, by the way, he writes about the 14th century royal treasurer Sir Roger Mortimer. That is, this surname is not rare and historical, so the impression of the really not pretty, strange, sloppy Dr. Mortimer, who appeared with superstitions and an old manuscript, is also the impression of a man himself, who fell from somewhere in the past, a man with a history, a legend, although still young, recently married (only 5 years ago). And, he really is with the legend of the Baskervilles dog.
Here the Russian reader should keep in mind that:
Modern sources say: the last wolf in England was killed in North Lancashire in the 14th century. Ralph Higden, a resident of Chester, wrote in 1340. that there are "few wolves left in England." The latest guide to trapping wolves dates back to 1289, but back then wolves were still found in the highlands of Scotland. In Germany, where the last wolves were killed much later, but also before Modern Times, it is believed that with their disappearance, numerous local legends about werewolves are transformed into legends about a demonic dog, and in the legends of the Rhineland these are huge dogs with glowing eyes. Not infrequently, by the way, these ghostly images, which merged before the era of mass trials of witches and werewolves, with others: vampires, are described as criminals who made a pact with the devil and, moreover, the curse extends to family members, for example, in the most famous execution on charges of werewolf in the 16th century. in Germany, Peter Stump, cruelly Executed, it is believed, including in the era of the Counter-Reformation in this politically motivated process, in a Protestant area, were not only the peasant Peter Stump himself, but also his concubine and his unmarried daughter. In folk lore, Rhenish versions of the werewolf sometimes appear as the returning dead avengers. Tsenker wrote down a legend in which a suicide appears in the form of a huge wolf. The possible connection between the avenger and the werewolf, if it really existed, has disappeared in recent centuries, perhaps under the influence of belief in witches, since the werewolf has partly become the male counterpart of the witch. Sober-minded robbers used these superstitions to rob travelers in the forest dressed in wolf skins. It is curious that as traditional measures against Stuppes, as werewolves were called in Germany after the infamous, much-hyped process of the 16th century, although it only marked the beginning of hundreds more similar ones before the 18th century: the hunted must stick a knife into the paw of a werewolf squatting, or in the place where he was the werewolf belt, thus putting an end to the persecution. Or, if there was a specific suspicion about the monster attacking him, he only needed to give his name. As you can see, the Rhenish legends about werewolves, known throughout Germany and Europe since the 16th century., from the trial of Peter Stump, and possibly known to Doyle or his co-author, could be reflected in the plot of the novel. But let's go back to England. In the 20th century, in a new, studied era, the demonic dog is the hero of Agatha Christie's mystical story "The Hound of Death", that is, a dog, a hound, and not quite real, and not at all an instrument of crime, a story, not a novel, by another famous classic of the English detective story. Let's go back to England.
Wild boars were found in the hunting parks of the aristocrats.
But the only truly dangerous living being, writes Ian Mortimer, was a man already in the 14th century in England.
So, the Mortimers are a very famous surname in English history, it is also the so-called Anglo-Norman nobility. Actually, the relatives of the kings, the pretenders to the crown, moreover, just as the rights as heirs through the Mortimers became the reason for the inter-dynastic war, known in history as the War of the Roses.
Richard, Duke of York, the largest feudal lord of England, regent, rival of King Henry the Sixth, father of kings from the York dynasty: Edward the Fourth and Richard the Third, through his granddaughter Queen Elizabeth of York, wife of King Henry the Seventh Tudor, ancestor of all subsequent English kings, but he is also the son of Anne Mortimer, heir to the titles and rights of his childless uncle, brother of Edmund Mortimer's mother. And is a maternal descendant of King Edward III's third son Lionel Antwerp (while King Henry the Sixth's fourth son, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster). The son of Edward the Third, Lionel, had a daughter, Philippa Plantagenet, who married Edmund Mortimer. Chaucer, the author of The Canterbury Tales and the "father of English poetry", was a page to Philippa's mother and Lionel's wife Elizabeth. Their son Roger Mortimer had a daughter, Anne Mortimer, who was the mother of Richard, Duke of York. The surname Mortimer is repeatedly found among the heroes of Shakespeare's historical chronicles.
So that's who the Mortimers are... a tangle of names: kings, the War of the Roses (by the way, between representatives of the same dynasty, as in the family of the Baskervilles baronets), and literary names-stars of the first magnitude: Chaucer and Shakespeare. Can the name be considered random then?..
Yes, and what is Devon? Next to the coast of the English Channel, from where the coast of Normandy is visible in good weather (the surname has a Norman origin: de Mortemer and, by the way, to the Old French morte mer, which meant "dead water", that is, "swamp"). From where, several times, pretenders and invaders landed on the lands of England.
Among the numerous works by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle dedicated to Sherlock Holmes, The Hound of the Baskervilles stands out. This story is written in the genre of a mystical thriller
- initially, it was not at all a story in the cycle of stories about Holmes, and it is not a story, although not the first larger-scale work about a detective, but there is no detective among the main character there -Watson is investigating
-originally a novel about an evil esquire, Sir Richard Cable, who sold his soul to the devil
-from Devonshire
Apparently, "The Hound of the Baskervilles" was originally conceived as a joint creation of Conan Doyle and Robinson. "Here in Norfolk, Fletcher Robinson is with me, and together we are going to make a small book called The Hound of the Baskervilles - one that will make the reader's hair stand on end!" wrote Arthur Conan Doyle in a letter to his mother.
A curious detail is that Doyle borrowed the surname for the persecuted noble family from Harry Baskerville, who was... Robinson's coachman. In March and April 1901, Harry drove his master and his guest, the writer, around the Dartmoor neighborhood.
In March 1901, Doyle wrote a letter to the publisher of the Strand magazine, Greenhow Smith, and offered him a new work, emphasizing that he was creating it in collaboration with a friend, Fletcher Robinson, and "his name must certainly be next to mine on the cover. Both the style, the gusto, and the whole writing are completely mine... but Robinson gave me the main idea, introduced me to the local flavor, and I think his name should be mentioned..."
But when, six months later, the publication of The Hound of the Baskervilles began in The Strand, Robinson was not among the authors at all, although his name was mentioned in a footnote on the title page. Here's how it looked: "The appearance of this story was made possible thanks to my friend, Mr. Fletcher Robinson, who helped me come up with the plot and suggested the realities. A.K.D."
It is possible that the prototypes of the Baskervilles are the Cavendishes, Dukes of Devonshire (although their residence is Chatsworth House in central England, in Derbyshire). But what can indicate a similarity, except that it is Devonshire in the ducal title: firstly, the coat of arms: deer heads (in the novel boars), secondly, the family was constantly in opposition, supported the Whigs; thirdly, in the possession of the dukes there is an ancient Hardwick Hall carefully preserved as a relic the beginning of the 17th century, by the way, the Hall is a country residence, a cottage, without fortifications and not like a castle or a palace; Fourth, in the history of England in the 18th century, the family was known for the scandalous cohabitation of the 5th Duke of Devonshire, William, with two women under one roof (it is clear that the big one): moreover, after being widowed, he married the second of the women, and thus they were both legally his wives, but for 20 years the second was only his wife's friend and mistress, and of course cohabitation was known for illegitimate births; Fifthly, their story was so famous that in our time a book was already written and a film "The Duchess" was shot with Keira Knightley as the Duchess of Devonshire (the first of the duke's wives, by the way, she played an outstanding role in the political life of the country, as it is believed replacing the lack of harmony in marriage with social activities), the very fact The fact that the story of the family of the Dukes of Devonshire gained literary and cinematic fame only adds to the speculation that this may be the second story that inspired writers and directors to create; sixth, of course, the novel was written much earlier than the fact that one of the dukes was already Governor-General of Canada in the 20th century, but the residence of the Governor-General in Ottawa, Rideau Hall, already existed at that time as a residence and for visits by English (i.e. Canadian) monarchs to the country Of course, this is a completely indirect assumption, but the Duke's daughter, the future famous wife of Prime Minister Macmillan, Dorothy Cavendish, lived in her father's family in Ottawa, in Rideau Hall, growing up in Chatsworth House from childhood. But as a child, she received lessons in German, French, horse riding and golf. Sir Henry also knew how to ride, but he learned this as the son of a farmer. He hardly knew how to play golf, even spoke English with an American accent, that is, he was a "redneck" in our concept.
And here the differences begin, or rather it is essentially only one thing: the Cavendishes are one of the oldest aristocratic families in England and one of the richest, and therefore they could be in opposition to the kings, they cannot be compared with the Baskervilles, who set out to seek happiness and at the same time capital in the colonies, married Creoles, or became farmers, in comparison with the literary Baskerville Hall, perhaps even the old "little" Hardwick Hall does not go. But deer heads as the coat of arms of the Cavendishes and the title of the Dukes of Devonshire still allow us to make such assumptions (especially since it is known that in childhood Doyle was fond of genealogy and heraldry).
Devonshire in English Literature and History
In English literature, the gloomy wastelands and swamps of Dartmoor have repeatedly served as a source of inspiration for various writers and poets (for novels by Eden Philpotts, short stories by Blackmore, poems by N. Carrington, in addition, the Deep Purple band recorded their famous album in Devon in 1970, Devon is mentioned by Agatha Christie in "Ten Little Negroes", the heroes of the series live in Devon books about Potter, and in addition, Devonian is one of the oldest geological periods in the history of the Earth, sometimes called the "era of fish"). But what the work of Walter Scott did for Scotland, for Yorkshire the Bronte sisters, for Exmoor Blackmore, for Dartmoor Conan Doyle (and besides the novel, two more of his stories about the great detective Holmes take place in Devonshire). At the same time, unlike those listed, Doyle was Irish, but grew up in Edinburgh, Scotland and for the first time we can say he visited Devonshire with Roberts just before writing the novel.
As for the story. In the Middle Ages, Dartmoor was a royal hunting ground. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 against James the Second Stuart began with the landing of the Prince of Orange in Devonshire.
There is, besides the Cavendishes, another historical prototype (possible as the basis of the storyline): with the landing in the neighboring county of Dorset, the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion began-the first attempt to overthrow the Catholic king James II. When King Charles II dies and his younger brother James inherits him, the illegitimate son of King Charles II, Duke James of Monmouth, who lived in exile (and grew up in exile, but made a brilliant military career during his father's reign), declares his rights to the throne, popular and supported by many in England. But he is defeated, he was captured and executed. Although, all the same, it did not help King James to retain the throne.
And as for the love story, it is certainly not new at its core: love, which is burdened by mutual hostility, hatred, revenge, crimes: these are "Lorna Doon", "Wuthering Heights", and "Tess of the Derbervilles", in Russian literature and "The Noble Nest", and "Dubrovsky", and in general, of course, "Romeo and Juliet": all this with different reminiscences is one of the archetypes (like the Cinderella story), "eternal plots". But there are parallels directly from the books that are close in time, place, and spirit (Victorian literature) to the novel from the books: in "Lorna Doon" (a classic novel, but first published in Russian only in 1993 and therefore little known in Russia), the main villain is Carver Doon in the finale... drowning in a quagmire (the action really takes place in Exmoor).
In Thomas Hardy's much more famous novel in Russia, Tess's deceived husband, after learning after marriage that she had already been deceived, seduced, and even gave birth and lost a child, cannot immediately forgive her (she was afraid of losing her lover), and in order to sort out herself and her feelings leaves (place the action is an English province) to Brazil, to South America, from where he then returns in the final part of the novel to the death of Tess. These novels were probably well known to Doyle. Hardy's novel, as it often happens, has long been recognized as a classic, shocked the prim Victorian society, that is, contemporary readers. The background of the plot there is also a noble origin of an impoverished family, and in the very name in the surname there is also a parallel: the Derbervilles and the Baskervilles. In the novel, the origin of the family is associated with William (also like the Prince of Orange) the Conqueror of the 11th century. Devonshire is one of the counties on the English Channel, the landing place of the rebels and conquerors, so it is quite possible that on the contrary the Baskervilles were not originally farmers, but were among the Norman nobility or knights who found themselves in England during the conquest. However, we are speculating about all this: the historical setting around the fictional characters and the plot of the novel, what Doyle could only have imagined, or even not think at all. But for a reader from a foreign language environment, knowledge of the near-term details, unless of course the reader is a Medieval historian or a Germanic philologist, may not be superfluous at all. And, of course, while Doyle's descendants hide the writer's archive, talk about prototypes (including, if not for part of the writer's published legacy and the Holmes prototype) the plots of his works and much more can only be conjectured. Anyway: the scandal of the 18th century. with the Dukes of Devonshire and one of the significant events in English history (the Glorious Revolution of 1688): the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth is something that both the author and the first readers of the novel could not help but keep in mind.
Where is the West Indies? We continue the historical geography
Human life, even large in its average values, is too short in comparison with human history. On the one hand, to a modern reader, and even not so modern, but in the 60s and 70s and 80s of the 20th century. Doyle's novels seemed somehow archaic, historical, in the sense that they personified the English classics, the Victorian era, the 19th century. But in reality, if you think about it: Maslennikov is shooting the Soviet version of the novel, and only a little more has passed since the first publication... 70 years old. Yes, a lot of big historical events were compressed at that time, as a rule, big historical events are worth a lot of human sacrifices, but the 20th century. and in this sense, he distinguished himself: The First World War, in only one battle near Verdun (which, however, can hardly be called a simple battle, rather a massacre, as it was dubbed almost immediately), 400 thousand French soldiers died alone, revolutions in Europe and Russia, the collapse of European monarchies-empires, the civil war in Russia, fascism in Europe, Stalinist repressions in the USSR against the background of unprecedented industrialization in terms of pace and scale, World War II, the American nuclear bombing of Japan, the collapse of the colonial empires of France and England, the first flight of a Soviet man into space, That's what these 70 years have absorbed, but it's 70 years... It hasn't been more than that. In 1875. Doyle is still a boy, taking his final exams at the Jesuit school in Stonyhurst (Lancashire). I was born in 1975, "just" 100 years later. By the standards of history, this is not so much. My generation witnessed the independence of just those states that were still the English West Indies, where Doyle in the novel 1901-02. places Roger Baskerville, Beryl Garcia and Stapleton: my generation witnessed how the British colonial administration and presence were replaced by the American Reagan administration, in fear of the appearance of a second Castro in their "backyard" of America, in the Caribbean, the American White House sent dollars there to support certain politicians, intervened in the politics of these young states, or directly carried out military intervention and my generation in the USSR, organized went out on the street or at school spoke with the slogans "Grenada we are with you", "Hands off Nicaragua" or Honduras. But if we talk about the English West Indies in the 70s and 80s of the 20th century, then only in this historical period became independent: Grenada in 1974, Dominica in 1978, Saint Lucia and Saint Vincent in 1979, Antigua in 1981, Saint Kitts in 1983. Our generation has witnessed how even the American invasion of Grenada, a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations, did not shake the position of the British cabinet, did not force Thatcher to condemn these actions of Reagan, support the UN resolution on violation of international law and the demand for the withdrawal of American troops, although there is no trace that, as a precursor to the invasion, Reagan declared that Grenada A Soviet-Cuban military vehicle was deployed, but it was not found. Then the same thing will happen again during the premiership of Tony Blair and the presidency of Bush Jr. with the intervention in Iraq (despite the impossibility of sympathizing with the dictator). But these were visible evidences, visible to our generation, that England had finally lost its position in the world to America and turned into its "junior partner". But when Doyle was 42 years old, and he had been married for 15 years and was known as the author of short stories and the first novel about Holmes, the Anglo-Boer War (then called the "last colonial war", although it would still be in the second half of the 20th century. the war in Algeria) had just begun. England was still an empire and continued to expand its territories. From the point of view of the human age, history is slow, no matter what radical changes in public life take place, they happen slowly. Maybe also because the most popular for decades, novel in Germany Remark "On the Western front without change" stridently anti-war novel, could not, did not, for all its popularity, is not spared neither Germany nor Russia nor Britain nor Europe nor the world from Nazism and another more terrible (the contemporaries of the First world war, the great war, it seemed unthinkable) The Second World War. Perhaps that is why the Great Reforms of Alexander the Second did not save the Russian Empire from several revolutions, and the revolutions themselves, for all their radicalism, did not lead to the real liberation of the people. Maybe that's why the attempt to democratize the Soviet system, liberate people, and "perestroika" led to the collapse of the USSR, impoverishment, and loss of faith in reforms and democracy. More than once, in order for bold projects to be realized, it was required that several generations be brought up for this. Pushkin and the Decembrists were possible only as a consequence of the reforms of Catherine II and the Patriotic War of 1812. Radishchev, in the reign of Catherine the Second, with the same ideas, was a loner who was sentenced to exile in Siberia. And half a century later, the same ideas were the state policy of the Great Reforms of Alexander the Second. People, due to the fact that the century is short, are always in a hurry, but history always seems to be unhurried, although if these individual historical figures or whole movements do not urge it, then none of this happens at all.
Devonshire is also one of the modern districts of the English Bermuda Islands (the same West Indies).
Who is Watson? We place the character in a historical and geographical context and turn the literary hero into a quasi-historical hero
The question of what the heroes of the story lived for is a meaningless question, the story and all its characters, if silent about it, are the author's idea. That is why the "biographies" of Holmes take place, of course, if they are consistent (which is actually difficult: Doyle wrote a whole series of short stories and novellas over several years, and there were also apocrypha, forgeries, imitators and continuators), only information from literature is compiled, without any speculation. However... isn't that what I do when, for example, I talk about Watson?.. I think not, because I am only trying to reveal (with the help of historical sources) some of the information given by Doyle, yes, it is not obvious at all that the writer himself assumes in his character.
In order to understand what Dr. Watson is, or rather who he really could be (because we do not know Doyle's own awareness of the hero whom he made a participant in the colonial war in Afghanistan, a military doctor who was wounded), I will quote a few quotes from Brandon's book:
"the first Afghan War (1838-42) was the first step in the "big game", which lasted more than a century. The stakes turned out to be high-control of India's northwestern border and, as Lord Curzon said, "power over the world" depended on its reliability and security."
Russia was the main opponent in this brutal rivalry, and Tsar Nicholas I, the "gendarme of Europe," seemed to want to stay in Central Asia forever. He conducted diplomatic intrigues with the Pashtuns and Persians, carried out pressure from the Caucasus to the Persian Gulf (I will add that, as is known, the Russian envoy and one of the early classic writers of the 19th century Griboyedov was killed in Iran).
India could only be invaded from the north, and the British began to fear that the tsar would turn out to be another Alexander the Great. The approach of the Cossacks seemed even more threatening, since the loyalty of the Sepoys remained doubtful. Moreover, on the map, the Himalayas hardly looked like the most powerful natural rampart of the Earth.
Therefore, the government began to push through a plan to replace the Emir of Kabul, Dost Mohammed, with a puppet ruler, Shah Suju. The landing party achieved this goal in 1839. But the British, not to mention the subsequent invaders, ignored the Duke of Wellington's warning that when "military difficulties end in Afghanistan, real difficulties begin."
It soon became obvious that Shah Suja could only survive in a circle of British bayonets. Thus, the occupying army became a common enemy of the Afghan tribes, who, in the absence of a foreign enemy, spent energy fighting each other.
The people were, as one Scottish officer later declared, a "tiger race."
Now the Afghans were stalking their prey through a maze of narrow, dirty streets flanked by adobe houses with flat roofs. That was Kabul. Every man of its 60,000 inhabitants had "a sword and shield, a dagger, a pistol or a musket."
The most famous victim was the British envoy, Sir William McNaughton. He was killed during negotiations with the vengeful son of Dost Muhammad Akbar Khan. The latter's face was distorted with "diabolical rage" during the crime.
Parts of McNaughton's severed body were carried through the streets, and the torso was hung on a meat carcass hook in the grand bazaar.
However, the British garrison, whose officers were having fun, playing cricket, running after Afghan women and jumping horses over the wall of the military camp instead of strengthening their positions and searching for supplies, did not strike back. Under the command of General William Elphinstone, a sick incompetent man who last saw gunfire in battle, at Waterloo, the most horrific retreat in British military history took place.
On January 6, 1842, a column of 4,500 soldiers and 12,000 sutlers began a 90-mile march through the mountains. Their target was Jalalabad, which was held by General Sale. The deep snow hindered progress, as well as a huge amount of property. One regiment needed two camels to transport a supply of cigars from Kabul, and British junior officers, who had up to 40 servants per person, would rather leave their swords and pistols than go without "travel bags, perfumes, Windsor soap and cologne."
It was a moving prey, and the Afghans rushed at it like wolves at a flock of sheep. They slaughtered stragglers, stole pack animals, and looted carts. At dusk on the first day, Elphinstone's van had traveled only 6 miles, and his rearguard was still leaving the camp that the Afghans had burned down.
In the bitter cold that night, some sepoys camped outdoors and burned their hats and equipment in bonfires. Others woke up severely frostbitten, and some of their legs looked like burnt logs. One Englishwoman saw how "men took off their boots and whole feet with them."
Elphinstone's column barely reached the 5-mile Kurd-Kabul pass, narrow and dangerous. An icy stream was rushing from above, which had to be crossed 28 times. People are terribly cold and hungry. Caught "in the jaws of this terrible gorge," they turned out to be easy targets for the shooters who settled on the rocks.
The gorge turned out to be filled with corpses. Elphinstone tried to pay off, and Akbar Khan actually took several British hostages -wounded officers, women and children. But the local chiefs said they did not want gold, "nothing but blood could satisfy them."
The Afghans barricaded the next major pass and killed the remaining British. One man, assistant surgeon William Breedon, made it to safety. It happened on January 13th. He was wounded several times, and an Afghan knife cut off a piece of the bone of his skull. As Bredon stated, everything would have been worse if "I didn't have a piece of Blackwoods Magazine in my cap." When his dying pony brought his blood-stained burden to the walls of Jalalabad, the garrison shuddered.
Bredon is depicted in the famous painting by Lady Elizabeth Butler, who painted this scene (so Doyle, who is interested in both history and politics, could not have been unaware of this).
The Afghans have inflicted, to quote Blackwoods Magazine itself, "an almost irreparable damage to the British nation, an almost indelible stain on the British character."
Of course, this is the first Afghan war, Watson clearly could not participate in it in the cycle of stories about Holmes, the British took into account the experience of that war, the following expeditionary forces turned out to be the avengers, and Watson could be among them, but do not forget that he was a military doctor, not just an army officer. But let's remember that the assistant surgeon turned out to be the only survivor in the entire Kabul garrison of General Elphinstone. But this is about the kind of person Holmes warns in the novel about "the danger in Dartmoor, expresses the hope to see him alive and unharmed, and asks not to part with weapons day or night."
On the marshes and wastelands of the Dartmoor hills in southwestern England, where villages are two or three traditional-style houses on one street, except for scattered small farms and a couple of cottages, the British Empire is found: an heir from Canada who fell in love with the first beauty of Costa Rica, and a dispute for a million pounds left a baronet uncle, who made it in South Africa to revive the family estate.
At the same time, for readers of the novel - the English middle class, the swamps and wastelands of Dartmoor, like the West Indies, seem equally exotic, sufficient to get on the pages of adventure popular literature, among the works of Cooper, Mayne Reed, Jack London, Jules Verne, Haggard and others, that is, along with Africa, Alaska or India.
For most Englishmen of that time, the West Indies (Central America) was still an indeterminate place on the map (the English Empire was so big and colorful), somewhere near India. That is, at the beginning of the 20th century. they were still in the same delusion as the discoverers of America-the companions and followers of Columbus himself.
In 1865, in Jamaica (the English West Indies - in the novel Stapleton's homeland), there was an uprising in Morant Bay. Former slaves (by the way, Brandon mentions that the slaveholders of the huge colonial empire could receive compensation for the abolition of slavery only in London...) Hungry for land and freedom, the poor and the unemployed killed two dozen whites. According to the Times, blacks became disillusioned with the civilizing results of liberation and returned to barbarism: "like the ancient Gauls slaughtering consuls, the black crowd shot at the courthouse, enjoying the blood... For several days they embodied the drunken dream of the domination of Blacks and the enslavement of whites. This was Africa, which had been sleeping before, but now broke through in their natures. They wanted to destroy those who freed them."
Governor Edward Eyre (namesake of the governess from Bronte's novel), who remembered the Sepoy uprising, declared martial law, hanged and flogged many hundreds of blacks, burned over a thousand houses. He also accused the Baptist preacher G.W. Gordon and got him executed on the principle: "although he may not be guilty, it will still benefit him."
Disputes over Eyre's actions have escalated in England. There were defenders (but two dozen whites died during the uprising), for example, Carlisle called the governor "a brave, gentle, generous and bright man whom I would make dictator of Jamaica for the next 25 years" (that is, until 1890, Doyle was 30 years old and he was already a famous author of stories about Holmes). Brandon writes: "anticipating the language of fascism, Carlisle believed that in such a role, Eyre would be able to discipline a "lazy black " gentleman" with a bottle of rum in his hand, shirtless, stupid and self-satisfied, around whom the richest region on Earth returns to the jungle."
However, Eyre was recalled, although the opponents did not achieve prosecution and sentencing (although the uprising probably characterized the governor's rule). John Stuart Mill, who sought the prosecution, received many insulting letters-from "rude jokes, words and drawings to death threats." Moreover, for this purpose it was not necessary to cut out words and glue them with gum (that is, the basis of chewing gum) from the Times, it was possible not to write letters at all, but simply to send a newspaper. Brandon characteristically calls the cause of the conflict and the state of English public opinion a "swamp of racial prejudice."
There is very important evidence about where and how the Holocaust matured in the large-format (pretentious) quoted book by Pierce Brandon "The Decline and Destruction of the British Empire", especially in the part where the arguments of politicians, philosophers, anthropologists from pamphlets published in the second half of the 19th century on the problem, then known as "the burden of the white about the racism of whites towards blacks, and about the current known as social Darwinism. The passages cited by English authors of the 1860s are very reminiscent of Nazi propaganda of the 1920s and, alas, the practice of the 30s and 40s.
For example, Winwod Reed in the book "Wild Africa" of 1864, encouraging readers to look coolly and calmly at the gracious destruction of local residents, thus paints an idyllic white future of a black colony:
"When cockneys from Timbuktu will have outdoor restaurants in the oases of the Sahara, when hotels and road signs will appear at the headwaters of the Nile, when it will become fashionable to go yachting on the lakes of the Great Plateau, when noble gentlemen building houses in Central Africa will have their own parks with elephants and pools with hippos, young ladies Sitting on folding stools under palm trees, they will read "The Last Negro" with tears in their eyes, and the Niger will become as romantic as the Rhine." Of course, not everyone held such views, they believed, based on Christian commandments, that the mission of England could be civilized to the same extent as it was civilizing.
But it is not a discovery that in addition to the humanistic position there was also a whole philosophy of racism. It's not new.
A modern view of the British Empire
Several factors in world history contributed to the creation of a huge colonial British Empire: firstly, the creation of a large naval fleet by England and its dominance in world waters, and secondly, oddly enough, the war of independence of the United States, in which England was defeated, but it compensated for losses in North America precisely due to the fact that She tried to liberalize her colonial rule: slavery in the English colonies was abolished earlier than in the United States itself, and by strengthening its desire to acquire colonies, thirdly, the Great French Revolution, and then Napoleon's desire to dominate Europe and the defeat of France in the so-called Fourthly, the fact that the main competitors: France, Germany, the United States were busy with their own internal problems: in France, the revolution, in Germany only the creation of a single state in Europe, in the United States, the abolition of slavery and the civil war, and so on, there were other factors, for example, scientific and technological progress, the position of the "workshop of the world", the industrial revolution, which improved the quality of the armament of the army and navy -at the same time the British began to create the first samples for wholesale murder in the war, weapons of mass destruction, for example, a machine gun, and the telegraph appeared, an underwater cable -which increased the maneuverability of the metropolitan government and the army due to the speed of information transmission (the same methods as the creation of first-class roads throughout the empire by the Romans or the monopolization of mail by the Mongol-Tatars).
But if in 1792 there were 23 colonies in the British Empire, then in 1816 there were already 43. If in 1750 12.5 million people lived in the empire, then in just 70 years 200 million people already lived.
Curiously, when in 1876 the Queen was proclaimed Empress of India, Prime Minister Disraeli pointedly reminded that the ancestors of the Indian rajahs occupied their thrones when England was still a Roman province.
At the same time, a doctor from West Africa, J.A.B.Horton, tried to remind English and other racists, refuting the false theories of anthropologists, among other things, this was far from an innocent occupation under the rule of the church, with which many people met Darwin's theory of anthropogenesis, more precisely, only a hypothesis, although it was not at all far away at least among the followers of racism, which then resulted in social Darwinism, where Christianity was already trying to remind about humanism, so, Horton also recalled the ancient Britons of the Roman Empire and recalled how Cicero advised his friend Atticus not to buy slaves in Britain, because these poorly dressed barbarians are "the ugliest and most stupid creatures who cannot learn music and other achievements."
As for the popular idea of the "white man's burden", it can be noticed when we read about the sparsely populated, backward and remote Dartmoor (Sir Henry gets discouraged at the sight of the estate and promises to run electricity) that by 1914 British investors owned 113 railways in 29 countries, including the Canadian railway, about which the famous phrase was said: "the railway in search of the state."
So that's what the British Empire was?.. If we talk about the population of the colonies, in particular in 1917. 400 thousand workers from Hindustan were hired on the basis of bonded contracts in Trinidad and British Guiana to work on sugar plantations in the West Indies. Even today, the islands of the former British West Indies have a high population density, more than half are descendants of slaves and immigrants from Africa.
Colonies and the metropolis... It is also a matter of free trade. Which was mentioned by Doyle at the beginning of the novel. "Stay away from the swamps" and from the "promises of protectionism", which leads to higher prices of goods. At the same time, as is well known, the works of political economists, in particular Marx, appear on capital, on trade, on speculative, financial capital. Slavery has not been abolished everywhere in the world. According to the modern philosopher of science Kanke, Marx invents, rather than discovers, an abstract work, insisting on the materialistic nature of the laws of social development discovered by him, sharply criticizing idealist philosophers, but his delusion leads to the political doctrine of Marxist socialism, which will be expensive in the 20th century.
But let's return to the English monarchy, which, by the way, in a hypocritical effort to cover up colonial rule and conquest with arguments about freedom, about justice, about the burden of a white man carrying enlightenment, technology and civilization, already then provided shelter to various kinds of political immigrants, in London Herzen opens a Russian free printing house, directly in 1902 - the year the novel was published, On the eve of the Russian-Japanese War, England concludes an agreement with Japan, and Marx is known to have found political asylum in England.
The colonial empire has never been united, as someone put it, there has always been no more unity in it than unity in the equator. But one of the "staples" was precisely the cult of the enlightened monarchy and the monarch, the cult of the queen, which even then made the royal family a symbol for subjects divided by faith, race, nationality and territories. And the cult was not born by chance. Huge efforts were made to create this fetish. In particular, and therefore the geographical map is still full of the name Victoria.
But what was the empire?..
An example about the subjects of the indigenous inhabitants of the colonies: they attacked the "Royal Niger Company" in Akassa in 1895. -this is exactly Africa, where Doyle sent Sir Charles to earn millions of dollars, the subject of the motive for the crimes in the novel, then they wrote to the Prince of Wales that they were now "really very, very sorry-especially, because some of her employees were killed and eaten." And they surrendered themselves "to the mercy of the good old queen."
At that time, the Times, which Doyle glorifies in the novel, talking about fonts, saying in the words of Holmes that the newspaper rarely falls outside the highly educated, wrote that the new weapon, the Gatling machine gun, which turned out to be the same as McCormick's reaping machine in relation to the sickle, turned out to be better if the British general was lucky and managed to "catch a large crowd of savages in an open area." This newspaper really liked it when Ashanti was forced to "listen to Gatling music for a bit." But still, the Times considered wholesale murder less desirable than "forcing a group of savages to run away regularly."
Then in 1884 the Maxim machine gun was patented. Cecil Rhodes, telling how the Matabele warriors "left a thick layer of corpses on the ground," remarked: "no losses with the Maxim.
In the 1860s, new breech-loading rifles appeared. A big step forward in comparison with the Brown Bess silicon rifles, although such a gun was larger than bows and arrows-the usual weapons of the indigenous people. All these new weapons and technologies gave the necessary advantage to the British troops in the "small wars" of Queen Victoria, which were fought in the 19th century. so often that the expression Pax Britannica was called "a grotesque monster of hypocrisy," and the queen herself was not only a Big White Mother, but also Mrs. Old Criminal.
New weapons turned colonial battles into hunting. The soldiers actually called the local population "game." Robert Baden-Powell thought that chasing the "laughing black devils" of Matabele was "the best sport in the world." The persecution (so you can actually translate literally the novel about the Baskervilles dog, in which the English nouveau riche baronets turn out to be the object of the "hunt") of the locals in Africa turned out to be all the more exciting because the "game" also had small arms, at least discarded barrels or cheap guns called "Birmingham gas pipes". Baden-Powell himself was also wounded in the thigh by a stone bullet coated with lead fired from a Matabele musket. It 's left over from her ... bruise.
The empire builders, who had such superiority in armament, tended to achieve their goals without seeking friendship and favor at all. Actually, this was the key to future destruction, despite all the propaganda of the "white man's burden".
Another touch to the portrait of the monarchy and empire: the queen had a passion for Indian precious stones, as well as the honorary prisoner taken to London by Maharaja Duleep Singh, the queen had three purses filled with Indian stones, Duleep Singh could not forgive her the famous Koh-i-nor diamond, the highest sign the one he wore on his sleeve. It was he who gave her the nickname "Mrs. Old Criminal", but clearly not because of the methods of English conquest and colonial policy. At the same time, in London, the queen made Singh a pet, commissioned his portrait to Winterhalter and urged him to wear warm woolen underwear in England. The modern symbol of the English monarchy in the Commonwealth countries, although it has other reasons, begins there, in the cult of Queen Victoria, the one-of-a-kind Empress of India.
Ordinary subjects in the metropolis and in the 20th century. much after Doyle, they continued to confuse India and the West Indies, believing that they were "somehow connected." It is for this reason that the English colonies in America and Africa, Asia have become part of the exotic of English adventure literature. The era of colonialism, but it is surprising how ignorant such outstanding journalists, writers like Poe, Doyle are in depicting the exotic in their long-classic works: the orangutan as an inventive ferocious monkey, enraged at the sight of blood ... the sweetest animal, phlegmatic, feeding on vegetation, Doyle with a never-existing snake that crawls along a cord and hears whistling, etc.
As for the "burden of the white man", there are of course examples of a civilized civilizing role, but it was in the West Indies and in the 1930s that the vast majority of subjects remained illiterate. However, Pierce Brandon defends the point of view that the history of any empire (the ancestors of the British also learned this during the time of ancient Rome, although a thousand years have passed and who already remembers it)– a history of human suffering.
What are colonies? And what was the West Indies at the time of Doyle and the publication of the novel?
In 1902, Doyle continues and finishes the publication of the novel, which began in 1901, so in 1902 a republic was proclaimed in Cuba (although it is not an English, but an American colony), the US flag was lowered and the American army was evacuated. An English protectorate is being established over Swaziland. In 1901, a federation appeared in Australia, it became a dominion. And in May 1902, the peace was just signed, which put an end to the world-famous Anglo-Boer War that took place in South Africa. That is, the novel was published by Doyle during the Anglo-Boer War. The British colonial Empire is a real-time mode, moreover, nothing foreshadows its decline: more than 10 years before the First World War, almost 40 years before the Second World War in general.
And now let's take a closer look through Doyle's novel at the British Empire, as an advanced "bureaucratic state" for its time. And let's try to "understand" again: what is more in the novel: the "imaginary reality" (according to Lacan) of the author, or the "historical reality" familiar to the historian today, but no less strange in name (for clarification, the reader can be sent, for example, to Aleida Assman)
And now let's take a closer look through Doyle's novel at the British Empire, as an advanced "bureaucratic state" for its time. And let's try to "understand" again: what is more in the novel: the "imaginary reality" (according to Lacan) of the author, or the "historical reality" familiar to the historian today, but no less strange in name (for clarification, the reader can be sent, for example, to Aleida Assman)
It is known from the history of the post office that:
1820- the envelope was invented by the Brewer paper merchant in Brighton, England.
1832-the invention of the electric telegraph, later combined with the postal business.
1840 -the first issue of the same postage stamp in England.
1874-the formation of the Universal Postal Union, one of the first international associations to guarantee postal communications.
In parallel, the development of railways and shipping is underway, which also increased the speed of shipments and the number of correspondents.
A radical revolution in this way took place in the 19th century, and at the beginning of the 20th century, the advent of aviation significantly increased the speed of mailing. The postal service became nationwide and began to serve the entire population. By combining railway and steamship lines, it became possible to establish correct postal communications between the most remote countries.
The key concept here is that postal communication has become nationwide. That is, the post office has become a part and attribute of a proper bureaucratic state (in Weber's classical concept). Along with the judicial system, the national conscription army, state systems: education, health, police, with officials (i.e. civil servants) of the customs and tax service (placed in England, along with other departments and the government under the control of parliament, that is, public control), the transport service- the railway also appeared for the first time in 19th century. in England, it is the oldest in the world, and although it was represented by private companies, already in the 1840s in England it was a nationwide network, during the First World War, although it was not nationalized, it was managed by the government (from 1948 to 1993, the British railways were nationalized, but now the time after privatization, the activities of railway companies are controlled by the state regulator) and these are the attributes of a bureaucratic state that ensure the proper work of all parties, aspects of the life of society and the economy and this order of things replaced feudal monarchies, merchant trading republics of the Mediterranean or provinces of the Netherlands, when the private law of the lords prevailed, based on violence, restrained only by religious morality.
In the book "Economy and Society", Weber identified many types of public administration. Weber was the first to explore officialdom as a social institution. Bureaucratization as the most effective and rational way of organizing public administration is for Weber a key characteristic of a rational and legal type of government and one of the most important components of the modernization process of Western society.
The scientist identified some necessary conditions for the formation of a bureaucratic apparatus:
an increase in the administered territory and the number of controlled persons;
increasing the complexity of administrative tasks;
the emergence of a monetary economy in which there is an active circulation of funds.
The development of communication routes and means of communication has made public administration more efficient, while at the same time generating demands for the democratization of society.
According to Weber, the ideal type of bureaucracy presupposes a clear hierarchy of positions, strictly defined competencies, and written rules of conduct, while the new norms should be neutral. Officials in the model of Doyle's contemporary scientist should receive qualified training and be promoted solely on the basis of professional maturity, the level of which should be determined not by individual subjects, but by groups of experts:
"The decisive argument determining the superiority of a bureaucratic organization is its purely technical superiority over any other form of organization."
Recognizing bureaucracy as the most effective and even indispensable form of organization of modern public administration, Weber saw it as a threat to the personal freedom of citizens. An increasingly rational approach to the organization of life in society drove people into an "iron cage" of bureaucratic control. To deter officials, society needs strong politicians and entrepreneurs.
What interests me in this is that the post office, the railway, the telegraph and the police, thus as part of this rational bureaucratic system, do not arise and develop "on their own".
In the novel, the reader will find exactly these and others, but only some of the attributes of the bureaucratic state described by Doyle's contemporary Weber: in the note in the second chapter, which Mortimer quotes in full, the political party and parliament, the institution of elections are immediately mentioned. In the finale of the novel, Holmes enlists the help of the professional police, Scotland Yard, to complete the case. And when Watson goes to Grimpen the next day, after arriving at Baskerville Hall, to check whether the telegram has been delivered to Barrymore in his own hands, he runs into the postmaster. But the reader finds all these institutions of the bureaucratic state not just fragments, but also developing: the postmaster is still far from what Holmes called the head of the post office, and indeed from a professional civil servant, he is also a grocer, his son is a boy, so this is rather another addition to the family business-trade in products and goods. The same can be said about the police-in the novel, the reader follows the investigation of a private detective, only in the finale the figure of a Scotland Yard inspector appears, the police still cause ridicule in the cycle of stories and novels, and private investigation does not even represent her worthy of competition, although it resorts to her help, as well as the police cooperate with private investigators. Returning to parliament, elections and parties, it is characteristic that the figure of the county's candidate for election to the House of Commons is called the old baronet. Whether or not his young heir settles in the manor depends on the fate of the entire village district by Mortimer, which prompts him to seek advice from Holmes, and his practice as a doctor obviously depends on this.
The parish priest and the school are not mentioned at all. More precisely, a distant relative of the Baskervilles serves as a parish priest in the neighboring district. The former teachers are a naturalist and his wife, the criminal Stapleton. But at that time, this company: a landowner, a priest, a teacher, a doctor, a postmaster and a representative of the police or the court-really made up the entire educated part of the local district. From the point of view of categories in Weber's sociology of power, this is a mixture of different types: charismatic, traditional and developing rational-bureaucratic.
In the history of Russia, in the traditions of pre-revolutionary historiography, legal, describing the history of the state, the most important stages in the formation of the bureaucratic type of political power were: the reforms of Peter the Great, Catherine the Second, Alexander the First, Nicholas the First and Alexander the Second. This is also reflected in Russian classical literature, especially in the so-called Petersburg novels by Gogol ("The Overcoat") and his poem "Dead Souls". In general, the motif of Russian literature is the depiction of the decline of the nobility, the ruin of the "noble nests", the motif of the "Cherry Orchard". Along with the figures of "superfluous people"-the raznochinets, who are educated but cannot be in demand in Russian society, suffer "from the mind." These are all also reflections of a turning point, constant reform over the course of two centuries, the transition from one type of political power, management, to another, which, as is known in Russia, ended with three revolutions and a civil war in the early 20th century.
Here it would be possible to compare the phenomena of this transition reflected in the literature using a comparative method. One can only note that evolution in England was still earlier: before the 18th century, England already knew at least two revolutions, and one of them is mentioned by the author of the legend in the novel. On the other hand, bureaucratic institutions were closely linked to a developed financial system and a spirit of mercantilism, and government protectionism was also mentioned in the Times editorial.
One example from the history of English mail: all correspondence in the British West Indies (where the Stapletons come from in the novel), despite the fact that the island colonies in this part of the Atlantic Ocean are located much closer to each other than to the metropolis, but all correspondence from one neighboring island to another went through London with all costs. This was done (one can only guess why) and because of politics: England was afraid of the unification of these colonies, even in an administrative sense (and after the experience of the United States), but also certainly in the sense of mercantilism-it is clear that such mail messages cost more, and mail, as you know, is a government agency, part of the bureaucratic type of political power. It is clear that such a "long hook" in the mail involved other "players" of beneficiaries: shipping companies.
In Russia, it is just possible to notice the weakness of logistics, even if we are talking about the continental empire, even if we are talking about public service. In Kuprin's story, a Tatar peasant from the first pages is justified for omissions in the service by the fact that he does not know the Russian language, although Kazan seemed to be incorporated into all-Russian politics, the state back in the 16th century, and is the most important transport, trade and cultural hub between central Russia and the Urals and Siberia. The Tatar soldier in Kuprin's story was also simply illiterate. What kind of postal message could we be talking about, even if there was a logistical opportunity (in fact, if there was such an opportunity, then there would be no question: there would be literate and Russian-speaking soldiers and officers from the national outskirts). Even in this aspect (found in literature), it seems that the difference between the two empires can be noticed. Let's not forget that the novel (as well as the whole cycle) Doyle's articles were published in the "magazine for mass reading", sold among passengers of the British railway. That is, she was an example of mass literature, mass culture. In Russia, however, it was still in its infancy: on the one hand, there was already a great classic written by authors from educated privileged strata and for the reader of their circle, and on the other - fairground literature, distributed by peddlers, popular, fed by folklore. Doyle and his cycle strictly speaking do not belong to either the first or the second. But even taking into account the popularity of this particular cycle and imitators in Russia, it is difficult to name analogues among Russian literature itself. Kuprin spoke very unflatteringly about Doyle, the writer, the author of Holmes. The point, as it seems, when comparing national literatures, is far from only the difficulties of translation. By the way, despite the position of the "workshop of the world", the World Exhibitions in England, the colonial empire - the largest in the world in terms of population, territory, and geographical latitudes ("the sun never sets"), English was still rare -Tolstoy read (and wrote) much more often in English.French, German, Latin, ancient Greek, rather than English, although Tolstoy read English authors in the original and was also unusual in this, along with a peasant shirt, original religious views that led him to excommunication, etc. By the way, this is rarely taken into account by historians and researchers when they talk about the fate of Shakespeare's works on a global scale. The world fame of the English playwright (already known to Tolstoy and Chekhov) was also a new phenomenon: we can say that modern and older English literature was spreading in Europe, the USA and Russia at the same time. France and Germany were still the centers of culture in the 19th century. England, despite the fact that it was the first to develop industry, was a "workshop", London is also the financial capital of the world, and the foremost in the field of science: Newton in the 18th century, political economists, Darwin in the 19th century. (biology itself is also a new field) and technology. But not in the field of philosophy or literature. Even the United States, which has become independent, has not yet lost its provinciality, but gaining momentum as future leaders, one should not forget, again, until quite recently they were colonies of England. And England could not boast of traditions at that time to the same extent as they used to in the 20th century: Austria-Hungary, Russia, especially the Ottoman Empire (in the early 20th century) looked much more "traditional", even archaic against its background. she was still there).
Therefore, it can be roughly said that the clash in the First World War was a clash, and on both sides (military alliances) of empires of the traditional type of political power (according to Weber) and rational-bureaucratic (which, according to Weber, is inseparable from developed trade and finance). Therefore, we can say that in the novel ("for mass reading"), the reader sees in the English countryside (which, nevertheless, the characters get to in a few hours directly by rail from London) a bizarre figure of a postmaster without postal employees, at the same time also a grocer (but do not forget that in this "wilderness"there is already a post office and a telegraph!). And this at a time when post offices (and maybe much more respectable ones) have long been available in remote corners of the empire: in the West Indies, in South Africa or in India (although the Queen's subjects and Doyle's readers still confused parts of the world, believing that the West Indies is located just "west of India"). And it seems obvious that such a situation a few miles from the English capital has a direct relationship to the colonial conquests: this motif definitely sounds in the novel along with the ruin of an ancient noble family that forgot about the estate and turned out to be scattered throughout the colonies (the old baronet was returning from South Africa with a million capital; the young one from Canada being a farmer; Stapleton, having married the first beauty of Costa Rica from the West Indies, where he was born and the motive for his crimes is the thirst for money, the capital of the old baronet). If we recall that private companies have always been ahead of colonization: the East Indies or the West Indies, for example, then the bourgeois character of the colonial empire and its nascent bureaucratic apparatus (of which the post office in Grimpen is part of a fictional English village, but not a fictional post office) will be obvious. Especially against the background of postmaster's offices and Yamsky stations of Russian literature: where the difficulties of logistics are more clearly visible than the thirst for enrichment. It is difficult to imagine that the owners of Yamsky stations would also enrich themselves for their services. The fact of the matter is that rather it looks (unlike the English post office) like a state duty caused by necessity. The consumer of mail services in Grimpen was clearly not the Baskervilles, who appeared only two years ago, although who knows: maybe they are, and then Mortimer's worries are more obvious if Baskerville Hall continues to be empty again. Curiously, in Coombe Tracey, Laura Lyons, thanks to the same baronet, got the opportunity to earn money as a typist.
About Laura Lyons, a typist seeking a divorce, living separately from her husband and father, compare Somerset Maugham in "The Moon and the Penny" about Mrs. Strickland, also the artist's wife, living separately from her husband, the difference is that Mrs. Strickland refused to give a divorce, and had two children in marriage: "Soon I I found out that a peculiar version of this story had spread among Mrs. Strickland's friends. Strickland allegedly fell in love with a French dancer, whom he first saw on the stage of the Empire Theater, and followed her to Paris. I never found out where such a rumor originated, but it aroused sympathy for Mrs. Strickland and strengthened her position in society. And it was not useless for the profession she intended to acquire. Colonel McAndrew was not exaggerating when he said that she was penniless, she needed to start earning a living, and the sooner the better. She decided to benefit from her extensive acquaintances with writers and took up the study of shorthand and typewriting. Her education suggested that she would be an excellent typist, and her family drama made these attempts to become independent very likable. Her friends promised to provide her with work and recommend her to their acquaintances.
The MacAndrews, childless and well-to-do people, took over the care of the children, so Mrs. Strickland had to support only herself. She moved out of her apartment and sold the furniture. Having settled in Westminster, in two small rooms, Mrs. Strickland began life anew. She was so diligent that there was no doubt about the success of her enterprise."
The story, by the way, continued: "Before leaving, I went to see Mrs. Strickland. I hadn't seen her for quite a while and noticed that she had changed", "She had succeeded in her endeavor and now kept an office in Chancery Lane; Mrs. Strickland herself hardly typed, but only checked the work of four girls who worked for her", "She earned money hard. However, she could not get rid of the idea that earning a living was not a completely decent occupation, and therefore, no, no, and reminded the interlocutor that she was a lady by birth."
Mortimer quoted a local newspaper to Holmes, telling more modern events. Even if she was in the custody of the municipal authorities, all together this does not make Grimpen, Coombe-Tracy such a "wilderness", but this is in comparison with Russian literature: for an English reader, even a contemporary of Doyle, this is exactly the wilderness, and such that the writer easily places a hard labor prison there (by the way, in the difference from the village and the famous quagmire is really historical, existing to this day). But as Kouti quotes in his popular book: such institutions (as well as mental hospitals) were built precisely in the deserted, as they say in Russia, in "bear corners" (once again, in Russian history and literature, these places would not look like this at all: they even have a young, metropolitan education and Practice doctor! traveling in a high-speed dog-cart carriage suitable for such places, against the background of Bulgakov's "Doctor's Notes" written in a realistic manner, that Veresaev is just a "showcase of civilization": a hotel, a doctor, a store, a post office with a telegraph, a newspaper, and Sir Henry's idea to conduct electricity, Frankland, threatening the court with the queen, his daughter, who earns money as a typist -however, again, how much of Doyle's "imaginary reality" is in this, and how much of the "historical reality"?.. the very fact that Doyle describes the "wilderness", endowing it with fictional geographical places: Grimpen, Coombe-Tracy, makes it doubtful that this was really a cast from his own "historical reality", but also present in the novel, otherwise it would be difficult for its modern reader to believe, first of all, in Holmes as a real historical a face, not a fictional literary hero). But this is really not so important: it is much more important that this is exactly how the "English wilderness" should have looked according to Doyle, and contemporaries did not find it so unconvincing. And from the point of view of a historian or sociologist, the novel still looks amenable to analysis today as the "historical reality" of the modern era, I considered the political aspect, in Weber's terminology, the bureaucratic state, another important part of the public sphere is next: the economy, especially since the motive of the crime in the novel is not the recently empty family estate, but capital, put together by an old baronet in a South African colony.
Economy
Sir Charles's Gold
In 1886, a gold mine was discovered in the Witwatersrand in the Boer Transvaal (before the Anglo-Boer War), and so rich that it eclipsed even the diamond mines of Kimberley (the action in the novel during the Anglo-Boer War takes place in 1889). And changed the very position of the Boer Republic. She went from being in need to being an El Dorado. Johannesburg appeared in a bare place, but in one where gold dust, as Brandon writes, "poured even from anthills." Gold mining turned this village from tents and barracks into "the largest gambling hell on earth", bloated with salons and brothels (in one of the brothels of Bombay in India, by the way, they hung a huge portrait of the queen, who was distinguished by chastity, among other things, although in the concept of Victorian morality, in politics, where it was not the queen alone who set the tone, it gave hypocrisy). Within 10 years, just at the time of the novel's publication, Johannesburg, the center of the gold rush, turned into the largest city in South Africa, although the railway appeared only in 1892. and before that, every nail, board and brick had to be delivered in wagons pulled by oxen.
By the end of the century, over a quarter of the world's gold was mined in the mines of Johannesburg.
It is in the novel that it is (and not at all a long-abandoned estate in sparsely populated Dartmoor) the subject of the motive for the crimes. In the original Doyle (which is not noticeable from the translations, the quality of modern translations is such that, for example, it is certainly difficult for an uninitiated reader to recognize the writer "Lawrence Durrell", the elder brother of the also famous naturalist writer Gerald, whose surname has been spelled and called Darrell in Russian for decades), the motive of hunting, prey runs through the entire book in which the Baskervilles are, and the game is their wealth.
By the way, about the motives, but different. Literary reminiscences, just a few of them:
The Curse of the Family-compare "the Cursed Kings" –and later a series of novels by Druon
The motif of the revived legend is "Golem". The
secretary of Dr. Martin Hesselius, a psychiatrist and one of the first in the history of literature "occult detectives" in Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's short stories "The Watsons" tells about extraordinary incidents in which the obvious or hidden influence of supernatural forces
is visible – this is the name of one of Austen's novels
A family legend is present in Du Maurier's novel The Spirit of Love
As is obvious, Doyle's novel is clearly "inscribed" in the history of literature. By the way, it is full of frank, though usually elusive in translations, allusions to the English classics, which are now well known to the foreign reader.
But let's return to the topic of the actual story.
Not all that glitters is gold
The fact that the world of people of previous centuries, even decades (before the development of the modern paint and varnish industry, the appearance of plastic, paints in textiles, synthetics) was less bright indicates a change in the printing business: a few decades ago, books were illustrated with very low-quality photographs (and the photograph itself, as they say, did not stand still-with the advent of gadgets and instagram, it is now obvious to everyone), and a few centuries ago, book bindings were all from the same printing house, wherever and in whatever language they were published in dark-colored covers (compare with paper modern editions). And old films shot on film, if not adapted for viewing in high quality on a computer, have also lost a lot, and even a hundred years ago, even less movies were silent at all. Like television receivers (the word itself smacks of anachronism), they have made an amazing evolution from small screens (but on a huge bedside table), to enlarge (black and white, by the way) the image in which the lens was used, to collapsible (the newest) and liquid crystal television panels hung on the wall like a roll. Do I need to say the words from the advertisement and about the saturation of the color scheme? At that time, culture and civilization were largely natural (the complaint of many detractors of modern artificial materials), but it was much inferior to nature even in colorfulness. And no lithograph in a magazine or book could convey even a small fraction of the impressions of a traveler from tropical islands. In this regard, it is curious that poor visibility is often artistically associated with: faded photography, failing memory and fog, which can by itself generate illusions of vision: ghosts, revived, and of course, ancient legends. But, talking about economics in the novel, you should start by counting money, not a decent occupation, but everything will do for science, in the pockets of his characters.
The Economics of Literary Heroes
By the way, at what expense did the heroes live?
The Stapletons rented a cottage, kept servants (the Spaniard Antonio was an accomplice of the owner, they took him with them from America to Yorkshire, from Yorkshire to Devonshire). Jack Stapleton buys a dog, makes coffee, goes to London, where he hires a cab for the whole day, stops at a hotel where his wife cuts words from the Times with scissors and so on, his wife also flaunts in outfits on the marshes.
Yes, Holmes mentions in the final chapter that Stapleton seems to have been involved in more than one crime at once, he talks about robberies in which the perpetrator was not found, practically claims that Stapleton in a mask shot a servant boy in cold blood with one of them.
Dr. Mortimer lives by his practice (although it cannot be too large for him in this wilderness, where the population is poor) and nevertheless is constantly busy, including, as Vsevolod Ovchinnikov noted about the British, a hobby more appreciated and significant among them than a profession. About the profession of a doctor: there are two doctors in the novel: Mortimer, Watson, and Doyle-the author himself is also a doctor, as well as Russian classics-contemporaries Chekhov, Bulgakov, Veresaev, the speech is still ahead.
Dr. Watson is a retired military doctor, moreover, after being wounded.
Dr. Doyle writes books. At that time, even in Russia, with all the narrowness of the reading audience, literary magazines and at all costs, even with censorship, did not give a bad income.
Laura Lyons is helped by the whole neighborhood: Sir Charles, Dr. Mortimer and Stapleton.
Sir Charles is, of course, a landowner, but also the owner of a huge capital. Tin is the most important element, it was used to produce bronze, in the textile business for dyeing wool, and with the development of the industry in the 20th century. and in electrical engineering. And large-scale mining is carried out in South America, where Stapleton is from.
A small digression. The tin soldier in its modern form appeared around 1730 in Germany.
The heyday of the flat tin miniature is associated with the personality of Johann Hilpert, a native of Coburg (Saxony). In 1760, he founded a separate production and in a short time developed a standard tin figurine, turning it from an uncomplicated toy into an artistic work. High demand required the craftsmen to find economical ways to produce soldiers.
In 1819, the Berlin engraver Gustav Zelke opened a factory and made flat figures of soldiers of all branches of the Prussian army for the king. At the beginning of the 19th century, "tin figure factories" began to appear not only in Nuremberg, F;rth and Augsburg, but also in Berlin, Potsdam, Leipzig, Freiburg, Meissen, Dresden and other German cities.
In 1839, Ernst Heinriksen, an artist and engraver from Silesia, opened his own production in Nuremberg and introduced a "standard" 30 mm size for walking and 40 mm for equestrian figures. His products became extremely popular and subsequently gained international recognition under the name "Nuremberg miniature".
France is becoming the birthplace of three-dimensional figures, which allows them to contribute, since by making figures of this size, small details of clothing can be accurately reproduced. The "Golden Age" of the historical tin miniature was the second half of the XIX century. In 1893, the British manufacturer William Britaine Jr. revolutionized the manufacture of soldiers by introducing the hollow casting method (slip casting), as a result of which soldiers became lighter and cheaper.
The game of soldiers was popularized by the famous science fiction writer G. D. Wells in 1913 in the book "Little Wars". Being a pacifist, he hoped that, having "played enough soldiers," future children would not be so willing to participate in real wars.
It was only after 1950 that plastic soldiers appeared on sale in the developed countries of the world.
Andersen's first literary fairy tale "The Persistent Tin Soldier" tells the story of a soldier whose casting did not have enough tin, but he did not lose his durability, appeared in 1838 and became popular throughout Europe.
From 1730 to 1950, for at least a period of time, popular toys for children could be made from tin, having raw materials, hiring artisans, engravers, artists, opening a factory (the first in England) in Cornwall, inventing something improved, for example, casting whole crews of ships, England "mistress of the seas", or exotic colonial troops: sepoys and so on. And all this with stocks of raw materials. I remind you that despite the abandoned mine depicted, only 4 mines in Cornwall produced a quarter of all the tin that was mined in England back in the 20th century. only 40 years ago, and the Grimpen quagmire, the stench of which dispersed the miners, was the product of Doyle's literary fantasy.
However, Holmes was also amazed at Stapleton's ingenuity, and the story of the embodiment of the legend and the invention (or only use) of a luminous substance to make the ghost of a dog believable, which Stapleton's strength and grasping mind went to crimes.
By the way, a curious comparison that usually escapes: Sir Henry. What is unusual for a Russian reader? Nothing. But in the USA, not only titles were abolished, but also a rule was introduced: Joe Biden, Bill Clinton. That is, not John, not William. Can you imagine: Vinnie Churchill? And now, compare: Sir Charles, not Sir Charlie... And Sir Henry, but... Not Sir Henry. That is, there is something derogatory, comical about this, that a farmer from Canada is almost a "Yankee" (although still not a Yankee, because he is still an American from the USA) and suddenly... by chance, he is made an English baronet - although an inferior (not a lord), but still a title. And hence: except for him-"I'm not used to this address yet," sir. And besides his costume, his manners (condescendingly, they still find a gentleman in him, and a real one), and this... Sir Henry.
But I have already written that the object of greed for Stapleton is not the title, not the estate and the manor. And capital, and having nothing to do with this and tin deposits: Doyle writes that Baskerville made capital, although the quoted newspaper makes a difference between the nouveau riche, that is, literally "new rich" and "old nobility", to which Baskerville is counted, but he made neither more nor less... A million pounds in South Africa, on speculation. By the way, how much is a million pounds then?.. And let's remember: the Barrymores received five hundred pounds and... They ask to be relieved of their duties as servants, they are going to open their institution with these funds. And Sir Henry, again condescendingly, though regretfully, allows them to name him in a way that would indicate a connection with the Baskervilles. Mortimer generally admits to Holmes right away that he received a thousand in his will. And that's when Holmes asked about the value of the entire inheritance... So if you could do business for five hundred or a little more pounds, then a thousand is not enough, and a million is even better.
In the Lost (Doyle's book The Lost World) Haggard places the untold treasures of the biblical King Solomon in a country in South Africa ("King Solomon's Mines" is also a novel from the 1880s - the time of action in the novel).
Sir Henry. It is mentioned that he grew up in a cottage on the shores of the English Channel. Judging by the biography of Haggard, who was born into a landowner's family in a cottage, and not in the manor (where his grandfather lived), on the estate, the cottage is also part of the estate. Moreover, the finale talks about the poor health of Sir Henry (and after the shock, he and Mortimer go on a trip around the world), so judging again by the biography of Haggard, who was a sickly child in childhood and therefore grew up in the village, Sir Henry could also live in the coastal part of Devonshire, where there are resort towns on the oceanic coast with mineral springs, because since childhood he did not have enviable health. And he was not a farmer since childhood, did not grow up in a farmer's family (most likely his stepfather, when his mother, widowed, went to Canada, where she married), and thus, nevertheless, in childhood he could learn horse riding, read books from the library of his father, uncle or grandfather, who were usually in the landlords families, learn to hunt with a gun, be brought up under the supervision of a governess, and so on.
In general, some of the biographies of the Baskervilles could also be copied from the history of some noble family, for example, even the Haggards, natives of Norfolk, where Doyle met Robinson. Haggard was a fellow writer (author of adventure literature) Doyle. So, the writer's father is the last in the family who led the life of a rural landowner, was distinguished by a steep temper and a despotic character (like Hugo Baskerville and some of his descendants). The biography of the writer himself is called typical for the youngest son of a rural petty nobleman (gentry).
One of the ancestors of the admirals of the fleet is mentioned in the portrait gallery, through service in the navy, any of the Baskervilles could settle in the colonies, the same father of Stapleton. The novel, which deals with the capital accumulated in the colonies, could only have appeared in the colonial period of the history of England.
So, the object of Stapleton's lust is capital. By the way, one more digression: Holmes considered him a Baskerville, and he was from the Baskerville family. But could he prove his origin?.. Most likely (we are always talking about the logic of the writer Doyle within the framework of the social and artistic-literary realities of that time) no. And that was what prevented him from opening up to Sir Charles. Moreover, this does not necessarily mean that Stapleton is the illegitimate son of Roger Baskerville. He could have been born in an ordinary marriage, but under English law it was not recognized as such. Let's not forget that the 19th century-marriages are made in heaven... that is, they are registered by churches, and there are sometimes insurmountable differences between them. In particular, it is also such that in our understanding a legitimate ordinary family, but Stapleton could have a surname, but could not have legal rights simply by virtue of the fact, as Lord in Collins' novel, that there was a religious obstacle between the parents to marriage. And this poses a new dilemma for the attentive reader: in fact, the author himself outlined it in the final chapter: and then how could Stapleton justify his claims in case of success (and he clearly counted only on success, like any criminal) of his enterprise? Moreover, as Sir Henry also confirmed, capital, estate and title are inseparable. A little more digression: Sir Charles himself considered his cousin's heir. I met with him. He even offered him a share of the capital during his lifetime. For some reason, he didn't even know about Henry Baskerville, nor about Roger Baskerville's son. And for some reason Mortimer was persistently looking for another heir and found it and brought it, and asked Holmes for advice. Moreover, upon entering into the inheritance, he immediately had to dispose of the will, if he did not marry and he did not have an heir, then the heir still remains a great-uncle, a man also not young and childless. That is, in that case: the fate of Baskerville Hall would be decided by the queen. She could transfer it along with the title to another person, for merit, to anyone, or she could take it away altogether, attach it to the royal possessions, especially since previously, as we already know, there were royal hunting grounds in Dartmoor, and now, by the way, a national park.
But how could Stapleton make his claims? Only fraudulently, and that's what Doyle is talking about, but something is too vague in the words of Holmes himself. Although, he just made Holmes well versed in English law, especially criminal law. But apparently his hero understood this better than the author himself. Although the fact that he is still the author betrays the fact that nothing is revealed in the novel in what kind of fraudulent way was Stapleton going to take over the capital, but without taking over the title? He really doesn't seem to need him, especially since he's not a lord, he wouldn't get the right to sit in the House of Lords, but Sir Charles, by the way, was going into politics and was a candidate for the Liberal Party in the elections to the House of Commons. Both the real (well, within the framework of the novel) Sir Baskervilles-both uncle and nephew wanted to revive the estate. But Stapleton was going to steal capital through crimes, through fraud, he apparently didn't care about the estate (especially since, as we already know, the capital was not related to its origin). But the capital, precisely in the baronets' desire to revive the estate, was legally connected with both the title and the estate. Doyle talks about the ways Stapleton could have chosen for his fraud: to pass off an accomplice as an heir in order to share capital and estate with him, but does not say exactly how it was necessary to cheat English laws for this. How was this possible? To make an outsider a baronet at all. After all, this is the same title that opened up opportunities, as can be seen from Sir Charles, to participate in public administration. Of course, the lord in Collins' novel turns out to be just such a fake lord (despite the fact that he is still not an outsider, but on the contrary the son of a real lord, but illegitimate), but there was a false entry in the parish register about the marriage of his parents. What kind of record and from where was Stapleton going to present for an accomplice and why? It's not clear. Of course, it's probably not by chance that Doyle talks about the "intricacy" of English law, when Frankland's litigiousness is ridiculed, but still, when the question concerns such a thing as a motive for murder, not even one, attempted murder, still clarity should be greater, and so of course this reduces the quality, dignity of the plot of any detective story. As well as fantastic ideas about a real dog: a giant half-breed, at the same time with the qualities of a bloodhound, able to follow a trail in the fog, harnessed to a person, this is also discussed ahead. Let's get back to personal finance. Bourgeois civilization, money loves the bill.
What are Frankland's sources of income? What does he use to finance his litigation, which also has no personal benefit?
And what does Mr. Holmes live on, with all the modesty of a bachelor life? He and Watson rent an apartment with lunch in London. He buys reagents. But he doesn't always take money from clients when investigating cases. His brother works in the Foreign Office. But he's a mister, not a baronet. From what income he generously pours money to the cabman, or the Cartwright boy, who are busy: one drives a cab, the other works in the post office. And he also hires a boy going to Devonshire.
Barrymore and those servants, but they are paid by the landowner.
Sir Henry is a rural exwire
Another significant and still elusive side of this novel is the grotesque depiction of a rural estate just a few hours away, already with the advent of the railway, from the capital at the very beginning of the 20th century. It seems that not only the family ghost itself, but also the manor house itself, the district itself, have already come from somewhere in the distant past, they clearly look like some kind of anachronism, and Doyle, with the irony peculiar to the English in general, usually lost in translations, makes fun of her.
Let's read the text of the novel: what does Sir Henry see when approaching the manor? Stunted, crooked trees. Excuse me, but where is the garden? Famous English gardens, the gardener. Then... at the very entrance there is a dilapidated gatekeeper's house, and an unfinished new house. At the same time, there is no gatekeeper. Maybe a liveried footman will meet the landowner at the entrance to the manor? No, and then we find out in the course of the novel that there are only 4 servants in the entire manor: the butler, his wife, the scullery maid and, Perkins, the acting groom. Excuse me, but who cleans the grate?.. Carries firewood? After all, they are warming themselves by the fireplace with Watson, having arrived. After all, this is a huge old mansion, several floors high, with two towers that are visible long before the house itself is visible, two wings of black granite ... and only 4 servants? What does a million-dollar inheritance feel like? Sir Charles became rich in the South African colonies. For sure, it's not just the "lack of observation" usual for Doyle, but not observation in an effort to show the squalor and irrelevance of all this in the new 20th century. And in the end, who is in the role of a rural lord in the swamps? An American farmer, in fact, who does not get used to his new position in any way. Maybe there could have been more comedy if it hadn't been for the main thing in the plot: in fact, Sir Henry inherited just the family monster and... Nothing more. Even the Barrymores, as soon as he appears, talk about their intention to leave the estate, and this is after they lived together with the Baskervilles under the same roof for several centuries, as befits an old family connected with the baronets. The regalia of the representatives of the baronet family is listed when Holmes drew attention to the portraits: There are also portraits of Kneller and Reynolds, court portrait painters from the Georgian era, barely visible in the gloom of obviously poor lighting. There is not just a curse on everything, deer heads hang on the walls, the nobility traditionally hunted, but for a long time there has been no gardener, no kennels, no guard dogs, no hunting dogs, a seal hangs... desolation, and the landlords themselves turned into an object of hunting, into prey, let us recall the literal translation of the title of the novel. It has been half a century since postal communication was established in England: tens of millions of correspondence are sent annually, the telegraph works with America-wires are laid, like the modern Internet, along the ocean floor. But Mortimer, who came from Dartmoor, from the village of Grimpen, when Holmes says that it is necessary to check whether Barrymore really stayed at Baskerville Hall, asks: how to do it? And Holmes explains to him about the telegrams. But even then, checking, Watson discovers that the head of the post office is a part-time grocer who does not even have postmen-his son, James, delivers letters. This is not just a Gothic novel, I'm sorry, it's also the same thing that we found everywhere in Russian literature at the same time and much earlier: Turgenev, Chekhov-description of the ruin of the "noble nests". And of course, this is a novel, and a plot with a legend, and a detective story, but it is also a novel whose characters are experiencing a turning point, they are at the junction of different eras, the Victorian era has just ended-recently the longest reign in the history of England, it could not but accommodate big changes: more than one generation has changed, but it coincided with rapid industrial development, where England was a pioneer, the "workshop of the world." And already in the 20th century, and just a few kilometers away, an American farmer inherited a former manor house, a mansion dating back to the Tudor and Stuart eras, by the way, Hugo in the detailed portrait in a doublet of black velvet with a white lace collar, with a plumed hat and long curls, and the signature says that this is a portrait of 1647-the year at the beginning of the revolution in England, Hugo is a typical representative of the king's supporters, i.e. the losing side, and after the defeat of the royalists and the execution of the king, in the history of England, for example, had its own Dubrovsky, a royalist turned robber, Robin Hood, who robbed members of parliament on rural roads who voted for the execution of the king, and if he was wrong, then left with apologies-James Hind. And so it could have been –we do not know Hugo Baskerville, had he not been led to the edge of the abyss by his passion for women.
But the "golden age" of the nobility is far in the past.
Back in 1900 – and this is the time of writing the novel, in England, almost half of the women were looking for work as maids, but not only from the nobility, and the servants of the nobility still wore liveries, despite the fact that this is an anachronism.-
The Duke of Portland kept a staff of... 320 servants at his Welbeck Abbey house in the same year 1900.
Four liveried footmen for the family, two footmen to serve the servants, a footman for the classroom, a valet, a waiter, an assistant butler, a senior servant, two pages, a porter, two bellhops, six servants, etc., etc.
Compare the contrast with the novel, with what Lord Henry Baskerville saw, against which Barrymore with a full black beard, who in the novel is tall, taller than the lord, looks more representative, more respectable. And this is in England: where great attention to style is always emphasized, and in Victorian England, where class differences are strong (I remember Barrymore's condescending smile when Sir Henry admitted that he decided to dress "in English", another feature of the irony of the image of "Sir Henry", which can only be understood by knowing the history, well familiar to contemporaries-the first readers of the novel).
And it cannot be said that there was mutual understanding between the lord and the servants – the few who remained, to put it bluntly, the reader's entire novel is being put on the wrong track, forcing, along with Watson, Sir Henry to suspect... The Barrymores, for whom, according to the will of the former baronet, it turned out to be possible to have their own personal life, their own life for the first time in the history of the Barrymore family, separate from Baskerville Hall.
This is a novel, for all its originality, like the play "The Cherry Orchard", and like Waugh's novel "Return to Brideshead": after all, among other things, at the center of his narrative is an ancient rural manor. Well, the fact that there is also a family ghost, what an English castle without it. And in its own way, it is also exposed, maybe there is no vivid social drama like in Chekhov's play on the theme of people at a crucial time, or aesthetic nostalgic admiration for an era that has sunk far into the past, as in Waugh's novel, but this is a novel in its own way praising and denying Victorian morality, romanticism, in principle, if in the novel if there is a moral, then it is generally accepted for English novels of the old Victorian era (the novel itself already belongs to the new one, that is, to some extent, progress is so rapid that the time of action in the novel is the 1880s. , a novel written in the 1900s is already to some extent a historical novel): a novel about a man who does not know how to control himself, a novel about a man - as Dickens wrote -"with an unkind character", a novel again, in its own way, passionate about progress, how not to remember Sir Henry's keen desire to conduct electricity at the first impression, and this then meant building his own generator, and this is a novel about people who find themselves on the edge of time, feel out of place. Sir Charles, whose efforts to reconstruct the estate did not even lead to the completion of the new gatekeeper's house, which still does not exist, the gatehouse should not be presented as something shabby, for example, the hunting lodge at the Cavendish manor in Derbyshire -the Clockwork House architecturally resembles the donjon of a medieval castle, that is, the tower several floors high, he is a rural landowner who has seen the world, made God knows how and on what a huge fortune in the colonies, and lived in Baskerville Hall for only two years, having managed to make the neighborhood fall in love with him, but what seemed to him to be society: doctor Mortimer, both the Stapleton siblings-either tenants or landlords on the marshes, which is also a contrast for the lord's company, along with illiterate farmers who hardly saw anything outside of Dartmoor, maybe never even been to London, believed in the family ghost.
However, the British found and still find charm in this, as in the swamps, there was even such a trend of English painting - muralism, from the English name of wastelands, swamps. Muralists are
19th century artists, romantic landscape painters who depicted the English province: Samuel Palmer, Constable.
By the way, it is not necessary to perceive a farmer as something very socially low, not at all. In the article by A.J.In "Reflections of an old farmer", published in the magazine "England" in 1963 No. 2, pp.92-99, an old saying is quoted: "you can become a farmer only in the third generation." But the more noticeable is the difference with the position of a baronet, that is, the lowest level, but even titled nobility.
And, as for the impoverishment of the estate, even the English farmer's house is decorated with an English hedge-and for protection from the winds, but not only for utilitarian purposes.
Street calls it a "lovely hedge": "at the roots there is all kinds of grass, in the hedge there is edible sorrel, all kinds of flowers-violets of all colors and aromas, children learn the world of plants, get burned by nettles, then insects, then the first hunting experiments with a ferret, finally with a spaniel, pheasants live in the hedge,-sneak up on game from the downwind side, during picnics-blackberries, nuts were collected from the hedge, required care-pruning, strengthening, cutting pea stakes, and in a romantic time-the guy who never kissed a girl in the shade of a hedge missed something the best, what is there in England."
Traditional farmhouses, as well as manor houses, even in English literature have their own names-the same as we see "Wuthering Heights" in the novel of the same name by Emilia Bronte. In "Wuthering Heights" we are also talking about a family secret.
On the other side of the English Channel in France, Normandy, with a similar relief, natural and climatic features, is also the center of the textile industry and crafts (famous lace and lace makers), mining industry (only coal and iron ore), vegetable growing, forage production and dairy farming, and even pig farming, unlike England. The descriptions of a traditional peasant house are curious: stone walls, an earthen floor, a pointed roof, maybe covered with turf, a wardrobe bed (with wood and stone carvings), cattle in a hut, only separated by a partition, one room. The description of the dwelling resembles another work by another English author – Tolkien, of course, and the dwellings of Hobbits. However, in the novel itself we will not find descriptions of villages and farms, peasant houses. But we will take a closer look at the social roles of both the main and "secondary" characters of the novel, into the English society depicted in the novel.
Society
Mortimer, Watson and Doyle: Medical writers and naturalists
In addition to Doctors Mortimer, Watson (Doyle), as well as Dr. Jekyll (Stevenson), or Van Helsing (Stoker), or Moreau (Wells), or Mabuse (Norbert), one can name a character from one of the first films in general, and horror films in particular (it is no less curious that these characters literature became the first and movie heroes, although not all were scary, for example, Dr. Krupov Herzen): Dr. Caligari. And later: the characters of Soviet fiction-Dr. Salvator, or Dowell (is it not an allusion to the name of the author of English detective stories). But Doyle himself was a doctor (as well as Chekhov, Bulgakov, Veresaev, and many other authors).
Arthur Conan Doyle has a short story "The Leather Funnel", it also has signs that the author shares the theories of physiognomists, which he puts into the mouth of Dr. Mortimer in the novel, attributing to him a passion for anthropology. And in general, it is clear that most likely the fascination with folklore was not the result of the same interest that romantics had earlier, as collectors of fairy tales by the brothers Grimm, but the interest generated by the sensational discoveries of archaeologists, cuneiform decoders, the discovery of the modern East, what was called "oriental antiquities", exotics (in full accordance with the adventure novel of that time). But the method that is demonstrated in the story is much more interesting: it is not deductive at all, but it has a sample of deduction, although it is presented in a peculiar way as a hypnotic experience (but it is justified quite scientifically). In general, the story shows that the so-called deductive method is nothing more than an ordinary scientific procedure: there is a subject of study, there is an object, goals and objectives are set, a method is sought and an experiment is set (in a detective story, too, investigative). That's how magic and the inherent scientism of the century are bizarrely combined. However, in the novel, just the magical is exposed with the help of skepticism and just intelligence, observation, not even science (Holmes does not even resort to chemistry experiments, knowledge of anything from the field of natural sciences, however, the investigator in the novel is not Holmes, which distinguishes him from the entire cycle of stories and novels about Holmes, but the doctor Watson).
But the profession of a doctor, for all its rarity in comparison with later times, was popular and fashionable at that time. There are three doctors in the novel: Mortimer and Watson. The third one? The author is Doyle. He's a doctor too.
Here is a typical biography that Watson could have had not only before he met Holmes, but before his service in Afghanistan:
British photographer Samuel Kay Balbirnie was a young man of 23 at the time of the opening of the photo studio. Although he studied medicine, he decided to test himself in the field of photography (if a doctor was a fashionable profession, at least to study medicine, then photographers mastered a new kind of art, were pioneers, where there were among the early photographs and genres strange in our opinion: illustrations for works of literature or religious, historical subjects, he was fond of staged photography Carroll, photographs of giants and dwarfs from the circus of freaks, spiritualistic photographs-they seemed to demonstrate the truly limitless possibilities of new art, and having appeared in the USA, it is most widespread in the UK, having been convicted in the USA and France, the so-called headless portraits-these genre photographs were bought by members of the royal family and the queen herself, posthumous photographs-photographs of a deceased person as alive with relatives, sometimes some of these genres took on a commercial character, where researchers argue whether, for example, headless portraits with the aim of horrifying, or a manifestation of a kind of black humor, like spiritualistic photographs, also characterize the era, in general, it is difficult to see the circumstances of the appearance of the same photographic art behind modern development, Roland Barthes, a French philosopher, believes that photography itself arose in response to attempts to overcome the threshold of time, human life, other authors argue that at first photography itself as art was considered as an intrusion into the sphere of the spiritual in man, even books were published, for example, "Personal experiences of William G. Mumler in photographing spirits", and they were used as a source by Doyle in his "History of Spiritualism", Doyle, who was known to be fond of spiritualism, to what extent Doyle is generally on the side of skepticism about the ancient legend in the novel is still a question, again, the fascination with the ideas of transmigration of souls-Oriental ideas was possible among Europeans precisely in the colonial era, Doyle could not know about genetics-there was no such science yet, he put into Stapleton-Hugo Baskerville exactly the idea of the resettlement of souls, which was most likely known in England in connection with colonialism in British India, Doyle himself was photographed with a ghost and defended, and it was during the publication of the novel in the press that the authenticity of such photographs was considered, that supposedly new art showed the superpowers of people, Nietzsche's philosophy of superman and the Napoleon complex are recalled -Stapleton also suffered from it to some extent, but Holmes also seemed like a kind of superman, hence the appearance in literature, especially Russian, of a small man, condescension to whose weaknesses, even ironic sympathy, looks different all creativity is permeated-also, by the way, did not know the large novel forms, Chekhov, and then how many such small people will be victims of social experiments in the 20th century.); He received funds for his own workshop from his father. He purchased Robert Pratchett's photography studio for sale at 33 Western Road in Brighton, which had previously done portraits in the then popular genre of business card (French carte-de-visite). Balbirni's studio, which specialized exclusively in special effects, was not a commercial success. Two years later, it closed, and the photographer himself became... an army doctor.
The high-profile case of anatomical killers was a little earlier, in the pre-Victorian era.
Regarding physiognomy, which was fashionable at the same time, there are even such tests now, they serve for entertainment, for example, in the online version of Maxim magazine: distinguish a serial killer from a children's poet (photographs of Gianni Rodari, Boris Zahoder and Heinrich Sapgir are used, but also serial killers: a teacher and director of a tour club, a doctor). This in itself characterizes: how Lombroso's theory "works". Sometimes it works, otherwise there would not be such tests today, and by the way, we seem to forget that Yankovsky in the role of Stapleton is too charming, because actually Jack Stapleton is a killer. And if there is charm, then it is the charm of a cunning, insidious, malefactor, criminal, sophisticated (remember his hobby: an amateur entomologist hunting butterflies-then this will be used more than once in literature and cinema, for example, and "Perfumer" and "Collector") killer.
This is also the time when Mendeleev made his discoveries, including the periodic table of elements. The only thing worth it is Count Fosca's monologue from Collins' novel in praise of chemists. In Russia at the same time, Turgenev was writing a novel with the main character Bazarov. Borodin is a composer, but also a chemist.
Theodore Dreiser talks about chemistry as the basis of morality and immorality in his novel "American Tragedy". Among the main characters are manufacturers, manufacturers of collars (i.e., actually shirts, because these are the collars that were dressed up under a tailcoat, for example) and shirts, where chemical operations are also among the production operations. Wilkie Collins makes the main character of the artist (he himself comes from a family of artists: his father, grandfather and brothers were them), the artist works with paints. And, of course, Holmes is in the cycle of Doyle's short stories and novels-he works part-time in the laboratory, conducts chemical experiments at home. Chemistry at that time was something like modern programming. This is not at all the same as making a character passionate or involved in chemistry today. And Stapleton uses, moreover, a phosphoric mixture unfamiliar to Holmes to give an even more terrible appearance to the dog, imitating a ghost dog.
Regarding Lombroso's theory, it is curious that in Austen's novel Catherine Morland suspects General Tilney of a crime, too, guided by the external manifestations of the crime on the criminal's face, however, they are not at all in the features of appearance as such, Dr. Mortimer also discusses the features of appearance, Catherine even finds grounds for her suspicions of the similarity of the general's appearance with the famous literary The villain of Radcliffe's novel, but it's about the guilt on his face. And not at all the difference in the size of the forehead or supraorbital protrusions and the like, which already distinguishes the time of Lombroso, Bertillon (mentioned again by Mortimer) and Doyle.
The deductive method... Deduction is generally a fundamental method in science. But it is far from the only one, for example, among logical operations there is an inductive method, induction, where the conclusion is based not on fact, proof, but on assumptions, probability. And if the deductive method is absolutized, as in the case of Holmes (and yet he is not a scientist, but a detective and evidence of guilt or innocence is at stake), then the creative one is cut off. Holmes is not inclined just to fantasize, to admit. That is probably why he sometimes cannot answer certain questions from Watson (who, whether due to limitations, behaves like a child with an adult: he asks ridiculous or just uncomfortable questions, uncomfortable just like children, because he does not know that this is not important and insoluble) as in the case of the question: how was Stapleton going to prove his rights to the Baskervilles' capital?.. Although this was the motive for the crimes.
As for the Baskervilles-the use of the surname, there is a curious detail: in the late Soviet period, the works of naturalists were published, translated, and popularized in numerous editions in the USSR: Grzhimek, the Gooddoll spouses, for example (in both cases, by the way, the role of the scientific editor of publications, Doctor of biological Sciences Bannikov, was significant), there will be a dozen books, several editions, Bannikov (why I mention) in the preface to one of them spoke about their enormous educational significance, it is difficult to compare even with what- or another, this is to the question of the prevalence of such literature in the late USSR (although of course, as always, she had fans, readers, and remained indifferent), so in one of the books Baskerville is the name of one of the hyena dogs, and of course, the nickname was given by the authors-the Gooddoll spouses, Europeans. Both (in the USSR it was not necessary to specify what the nickname Baskerville means along with a Witch, a Black Fairy, a Demon, an Imp) are notable for the spread in the culture of both the West and the Soviet, decades later, the names of English baronets, literary heroes of Doyle's novel. This is a multi-million audience for several generations. But there was also (after Doyle) Baskerville, a character in the novel by Umberto Eco, filmed in the same way as Doyle's novel. The rest is often mentioned mainly in pop culture: in rock band recordings, in the titles of detective books, in films, it is directly related to Doyle's characters. But from all this - not only the novel itself, but also the fact of naming an African wild hyena dog by the nickname when observing a pack of naturalists. I repeat, this is not a scientific publication with a small special audience, it is a popular science book with an educational task distributed in the USSR (and not only in the USSR). There have already been documentary films on the same topic (such anthropomorphic sagas about certain wild animals, the development of the work of another contemporary of Doyle-Seton-Thompson), this nickname could also occur there. Baskerville is the name of a hyena dog from a popular science book with the characteristic title "Innocent Killers". Here one might notice that actually the Baskervilles in Doyle's novel are victims, but.. Stapleton, like Hugo Baskerville, whose soul moved into Stapleton, is also a Baskerville.
Is Dr. Watson so simple: of course, he is simple and even simple-minded, and not too smart, just like a child, whom it is sinful to deceive and make fun of. Another thing is that as the story spread, and in general the cycle, dozens of film adaptations, and the illustrators of the books tried, but the main thing was that historically the ideas of what is considered simplicity and what is not changed, the literary image turned into a stamp. But in fact, all the stories and novels of the Holmes cycle are written on his behalf, and the text more than once compliments his literary manner... but most importantly, it turns out that about his simplicity and not too much... let's say insight, and we can only judge by... we judge his own writings, without even thinking about how this character is not ambitious and sincere, and even Holmes, with all the banter over a friend, or rather, a companion (they rent an apartment together, and not being colleagues, relatives, acquaintances from childhood, get along well with each other, namely friends, but with different interests, tastes and even leisure) is not mistaken when talking about his personal qualities: not the ability to betray and leave a comrade in a difficult situation, his personal courage (after all, he is a retired military doctor, and even from Afghanistan, in general, one episode - very well known to British subjects a hundred years ago - says what a military doctor is, after being wounded, who returned from Afghanistan - only a military doctor survived from the entire corps, as I said earlier). At that time, it was still a lack of ambition, ambition and, most importantly, not the ability to joke (but Watson is not touchy either) - admitting this is also part of what drops honor (and Watson does not have such an important quality for an Englishman as having a hobby), but he has the most important thing -what Stapleton lacked, which is not even inherent in Holmes, is a sense of tact and the ability to hold himself, self-control, and for the British it is so it was important what turned into their national character for others, interpreted not infrequently as prudery, arrogance, although this is just another thing -etiquette is not about "how to blow your nose properly", it is part of culture, and the phenomenon of a gentleman arose on this, which is not at all synonymous with, for example, a snob or a dandy, although a gentleman also keeps his suit clean and tidy, so this is so important that, in fact, the novel, as I also noticed earlier, may also be about this: about a sense of tact, about restraint, about self-control, the center of this the motive in the story is a verbal battle between Holmes and Stapleton, when Holmes and Watson witnessed the death of Seldon, the dialogue is described by Dr. Watson: neither Holmes nor Stapleton betrayed themselves, and Watson left admiration for this in the novel. This is the part of the novel that, with any translation, will differ in perception by non-English readers, for example, Chekhov's story about an English governess who did not even flinch when her master undressed and climbed into the water to untangle the fishing line-he is about the same and not about the same: he is just about the Russian perception this English "manner". Therefore, a remark from the mouth of Watson (actor Vitaly Solomin) in the Soviet film adaptation to Mortimer about his certain tactlessness when he called Holmes a "second expert" (in the manner of Steblov's "scientific absent-mindedness") may take place, although in the original these are Holmes's words, Watson not only "wrote them down", but also commented- scolding a friend for interrupting Mortimer and answering him rather sharply. All this hardly makes Watson such a simple character, on the contrary, he is certainly a positive character, and only such a hero could become a companion to the ideal hero of the novel-Sir Henry (besides, with all the youth of all the characters, just even still young, and even if he is threatened by unknown danger-Watson simply turned into a mother hen, burdened by his importunity, bordering on tactlessness, but he had to think first of all about safety, and not because it was some expensive client or an errand from Holmes, he also managed to sincerely attach himself to Sir Henry, therefore, in communicating with Stapleton there was precisely recognition, and not just caution, because talking and communicating and then with the naturalist, Watson did not even realize that he was the criminal from whom the real threat to the baronet emanated). Over a hundred years of publishing the novel and a series of stories about Holmes, readers have become so used to the fact that their author was Doyle that they no longer perceive Watson as a narrator, but just one of the characters, judging from him, in my opinion, is often not quite true, that is, authentic to the original English work.
Baronets
In the film adaptation of Maslennikov, Nikita Mikhalkov appears as a kind of mix of stereotypes about Canadians and Yankees: on the one hand, he is emphatically cheeky, but also democratic, gets to know Mrs. Hudson first (who is not in the novel at all), interrupts gentlemen, speaks too loudly, is dressed in a huge fur coat, on the other hand, holds in his hands, entering, the saddle (probably this detail especially confused the English viewer, who left an impression of the Soviet film adaptation). The text gives a clear definition: "he is a farmer in Canada, a wonderful person in every way." Of course, in itself, that the descendant and heir of the Baskerville baronets, the owner of Baskerville Hall, is a farmer in the North American (at that time, not even former, considering when Canada received self-government) colonies, this is a kind of irony. But Sir Henry (not used to the title in the novel) - by no means a Yankee and his stubbornness is more reminiscent of the English character, and a rabid temperament, if it manifests itself, also suggests that he is a descendant of Hugo. Therefore, Mikhalkov's character is with a saddle and in a fur coat, cheeky, such a fairground Yankee, of course, an inflection.
But on the other hand, just such a character, and not at all a caring farmer from Canada, is a logical consequence of the entire history of the genus. The film adaptations of the stories about Holmes Maslennikov in general "corrected" Doyle in many ways (starting from the fact that Holmes agrees with Watson that snakes do not hear, and therefore go to the master's knock in the film "Motley Ribbon", although Doyle's usual accusations of the scale of flaws and inaccuracies are greatly exaggerated, often this a consequence of the inaccuracy of the translators, not the author, and the same applies to phosphorus, instead of just a "luminous mixture" in the "Hound of the Baskervilles"). But the Yankee Sir Henry is more logical. The Yankee historically designated first the rebellious inhabitants of the North American colonies (the future USA), then during the Civil War the inhabitants of the northern states as opposed to the southern ones (among which the largest state, originally colonized by the Spaniards, Texas, was later annexed by the Spaniards), and eventually just the inhabitants of the USA-a state independent of the English crown, which achieved this independence in wars. Initially, the Yankees were those who rebelled against the power of the king.
And now, let's look at the history of the genus in the novel.
In the text of the legend, the author of this manuscript of the mid-18th century, one of the Baskervilles, saying that this story (for him a century ago) began during the Great Uprising (that is, the English Revolution of the 17th century), "strongly recommends" descendants to read the work of Lord Clarendon about the revolution. We are talking about the first Earl of Clarendon, Edward Hyde, advisor to Charles the First and Charles the Second, the largest English historian of the 17th century. But Sir Hugo - "the curse of the Baskervilles" calls him "impious, godless." As you know, the socio-political conflict that led to the English Revolution of the 1640s and the Glorious Revolution of the 1680s had an outwardly religious character: opponents of royal power were supporters of the new Protestant religion, Presbyterians, who thus opposed both Catholics and Protestants of the Royal Church-Anglicans. Of course, they considered each other "godless". And today Presbyterians in the USA and Canada make up the majority of Protestants, they for religious reasons made up a significant part of the emigrants to the colonies, where they also rebelled against the royal authority. Then, as for the history of the family. When Holmes became interested in the portrait gallery, Sir William Baskerville, chairman of the commission in the House of Commons under Pitt, is mentioned among the representatives of the Baskervilles depicted. This means, of course, not necessarily the ancestor of a famous actor (by the way, an American, the son of a very devout manager in a trucking company), although who knows. This means the prime minister of the 18th century, or rather one of the two (to each other: father and son), and both, too, like Baskerville, William (a name obviously popular among supporters of the Glorious Revolution, when William, Prince of Orange, the stadtholder of Holland, was invited to the throne of England): William Pitt Sr. and William Pitt- Junior. Nevertheless, there is a difference: Pitt Sr., rather by birth belonged to the Nouveau riche than to the aristocracy, his premiership was marked by colonial expansion, he himself made a fabulous fortune as a leader in the East India Company, and led the Whig Party (which appeared during the Glorious Revolution as the party of opponents of the Stuart Restoration) and his son, who was prime minister for 20 years during the Napoleonic Wars, from which England emerged victorious, as is known, increasing his influence in Europe and the world, and who first became prime minister at the age of 24, still remaining the youngest prime minister in the history of England, but he led the Tory Party (which was traditionally a representative of the interests of landowners, hereditary nobility and during the Glorious Revolution of the Stuart Party). Two details will help to explain exactly which Pete is being discussed in the text: the obviously reverse chronology is observed (it is unlikely that the portraits were hung randomly and Holmes's gaze moves apparently from closer in time to older ones, reaching Hugo Baskerville), and before Sir William, Rear Admiral Baskerville, who served under the command of Rodney in the West Indies and, the second detail: a detail of the costume, it was "talking" for that time (you can recall from history the Phrygian cap, and "sans-culottes", and "roundheads", etc.)"Sir William is wearing a blue frock coat. Since we are talking about painting, and not just history, it is not superfluous to recall the famous English portrait "Blue Boy" by Gainsborough (in the text, Holmes, as it turns out to the surprise of Watson and Sir Henry, who understands painting, in another story they whiled away time at the exhibition of the Belgians, although it must of course be noted that this knowledge differs the author is Doyle, it would be strange if the characters knew what the author does not know, although the history of the work sometimes shows just that, Neller and Reynolds are mentioned in the text). The portrait was at one time a cry, a slap in the face to all those who saw it. On the one hand, the portrait shows a boy in a blue satin suit-the clothes of aristocrats. But on the other hand, the model was Jonathan Battell, the son of an ironmonger (the father was the customer and owner of the painting). Both the artist and the customer dressed a non-aristocrat in an aristocratic costume intentionally. So, the blue suit was not unambiguously a sign of belonging to the aristocracy, and what is more important for us is political views. By the way, the fate of the painting "Blue Boy" is also curious: Battell went bankrupt, the painting went up for auction, was sold under the hammer. After changing several owners, it turned out to be owned by the Duke of Westminster. And after the First World War, it was sold for a fabulous price of almost a million dollars to the American "railway king" Huntington. Moreover, before being sent overseas, she was exhibited at the National Gallery, and the director of the gallery even accompanied her with a farewell inscription on behalf of all the British. She is still in America.
But back to the Baskervilles Portrait Gallery. That rear admiral under Rodney's command in the West Indies, served in the 1760s. At that time, George Bridges Rodney captured most of the French colonies in Central America for the English crown (for which, by the way, he received the rank of vice admiral and the title of baronet). Obviously, Baskerville received the title of rear admiral much later, since Rodney also had it, this is an honorary title-no more. But another thing is more interesting: during the American War of Independence, it was Rodney who led the British Royal Navy. And despite the defeat of the king, Rodney received the title of baron. And soon after the War of Independence, the premiership of William Pitt Jr. begins.
If you believe the chronological order, then the portrait of Sir William Baskerville, a member of parliament, but not just a deputy, but in fact a minister, head of the commission under Pitt, refers to the premiership of Pitt the elder, a Whig. Which also refers to the name of Baskerville: William and the Whig leader Prince William of Orange. And the rear admiral's blue suit is not at all a sign of adherence to aristocratic traditions (as in the portrait of the "Blue Boy"), as well as the careers of Baskerville and Rodney during the War of Independence could have diverged. But it is obvious that the Baskervilles were all the time opponents of strong royal power, they were Presbyterians during the revolution, supporters of parliament and Cromwell, were supporters of Pitt the elder and the Whigs.
And then the reference in the text of the manuscript to the "godlessness" of Sir Hugo is read in a different way, and the fact that when studying the portrait gallery, Holmes and Sir Henry call him a Cavalier, that is, the accepted naming of supporters of King Charles the First during the English Revolution, which is confirmed by the telling details of his costume: black velvet and lace.
In continuation of this trend, Sir Henry could easily turn out to be a Yankee (as in the film adaptation of Maslennikov), although in the text of the novel he is a Canadian decent farmer, then still in the colony, suddenly becoming a baronet in the ancestral homeland of England, the metropolis. By that time, the families of the Baskerville brothers were scattered all over the world and their connections were cut off so much that no one knew that Roger Baskerville in South America had a son, Jack Stapleton, like two drops of water similar to the curse of the Baskerville family, only these are not just inherited qualities, but literally the overpowered soul of an ancestor. The reference to South America is also not accidental-the descendant of a supporter of the king, unlike Sir Henry, who legally inherited the estate, inherited a frenzied temperament, criminal tendencies and, Hugo's external features, obviously related to slavery in South American (Spanish, French, and not necessarily English) colonies. Where mestizos of hounds and guard dogs were used to capture runaway slaves and suppress uprisings.
And the cowboy image of the Yankee in the film is, of course, close to the livestock industry of Devon. What is the difference between a shepherd and a cowboy? Cowboys were the same shepherds, but they drove huge herds of beef cattle to natural pastures. In Devon, a breed of cool cattle was bred, known, like other English, all over the world.
Why the old baronet believed so much in the family legend, told his close friends about it, maybe he believed even before, as Doyle writes, he gave Stapleton the idea himself: perhaps this can be explained by psychoanalysis (although there was no psychoanalysis at the time of writing the story, but soon it appeared), and it may relate to an old trauma, which was thus actualized through family tradition, and actualized along with his decision to return to the estate (from South Africa) and restore "former glory". Freud drew attention to Wilhelm Jensen's novel Gradiva, in the novel the hero is an archaeologist, in the relief of Pompeii time he "sees" familiar features-the features of a familiar girl (the article "Natural History" by cultural historian Mikhail Yampolsky, professor at New York University is much deeper than this thought, it is about those features in the present, and in the in the literal sense of the present, in modern culture, which do not allow us to forget the past, do not turn it into something separable from the present: this is how the features of Hellenic culture appear in a Gothic cathedral). But it is possible that the old baronet "wished" for the legend to come to life. Although, apparently, she represented something as inseparable from the estate, from the idea of restoring "former glory", as well as the capital and title that Sir Henry inherited, together again... with the family curse of the Baskervilles. By the way, in the original this is conveyed with black humor, which is not present either in the classical translation by Volzhina or in the modern translation by Brilova: in the first translation this passage sounds like this (we are talking about the final part of the note in the Devonshire newspaper, quoted by Mortimer): "As they say, Sir Charles's closest relative is Mr. Henry Baskerville (if he is alive), the son of the deceased's middle brother. According to the latest information available to us, this young man is in America. Measures have now been taken to find him and inform him about the large inheritance he received." And here is a modern translation: "It is assumed that the next of kin is Mr. Henry Baskerville, if he is alive, the son of Sir Charles's younger brother. According to the latest information, the young man was in America. They are looking for him now to inform about the inheritance." And here is what is really written in the original: "It is understood that the next of kin is Mr. Henry Baskerville, if he is still alive, the son of Sir Charles Baskerville's younger brother. The young man when last heard of was in America, and enquiries are being instituted with a view to informing him of his good fortune". That is, literally about a young man: "if he is still alive" and "to make him happy." Do you understand?.. And this is not my interpretation, here are more facts about how the novel in translations has lost the "salt" of the Doyle original (I'm not saying that Brilova's translation does not show knowledge of the school curriculum: the degree of comparison, of course, as it is and then in the text of her translation-Henry is the son of the middle, not the youngest -"youngest"-brother). Here is another excerpt: the novel begins even with Holmes's irony over Watson's simplicity, he generally likes to bully his naive companion, and here he is, when Watson returned from the club, and it has already been found out how this did not escape Holmes again, the detective unfolds in front of Watson a stunning picture of the scene: vast expanses of desert swamps for dozens miles, the small houses of the village of Grimpen, the huge ("great") Princetown penal colony... that is, it is obvious that he is intimidating him, because Watson, in general, despite his combat past as an adult, is a big child, and he responds in the original like this: "It must be a wild place." That is, literally: "There must be a wild place" (and then he -Holmes will recommend, without asking Watson himself, his companion as a companion to the baronet, who is just going to these wild places, and Holmes, out of caution, does not recommend him to go there alone, and then at the train station, escorting Watson, inquires from him-did he take a weapon, and when he answered in the affirmative, he recommends not to part with it day or night, and generally expresses confidence that he will be very surprised if he returns alive... this is all an open irony, because Holmes, by his own admission, does not yet know to the same Watson whether a crime has been committed at all, and Watson is a former military doctor who returned from Afghanistan, Holmes is amused by this whole situation: some kind of madman who left his career in London, a medic, by the way, he is not what he is Doctor, this is again out of irony, Holmes calls him doctor... some farmer from Canada in the role of a baronet, and Holmes is also amused by this "Sir Henry", that is, in American diminutive, but Sir... and Watson joined them... some kind of ghost dogs, "fairy tales" about the abduction of girls.... this is all visible from the original, but not at all visible from Russian translations, and this is Doyle's style, this is generally an English novel, how can it be without English humor and without haunted castles too, and mutual exchange of barbs with the United States, compare "Yankees at the court of King Arthur", banter-from overseas over the prudery of the Sirs, and in Britain over the simplicity, the rudeness of the Yankees). This is how the Russian translators end this passage: "Yes, the places are wild" (Volzhina), "It must be a dreary place" (Brilova). It can be seen that it is gray, dull, far from the original text. If it still seems to the reader that I am exaggerating, one more passage: when talking about the Baskerville brothers, and specifically about the younger (as it turns out, Stapleton's father), Volzhina's translation sounds like this: "Are there no other applicants for the inheritance? - no. The only other relative we have been able to find out anything about is Roger Baskerville, the younger brother of the unfortunate Sir Charles. There were three brothers. The middle one, who died at a young age, is the father of this Henry. The youngest, Roger, was considered a black sheep in the family. He inherited the Baskerville despotism and looked exactly like the family portrait of that Hugo Baskerville. Roger did not get along in England and was forced to flee to Central America" (Volzhina). "- As I understand it, there are no other applicants for the inheritance?- no. The only one whose fate we have been able to trace is Roger Baskerville, the youngest of three brothers. Sir Charles was the eldest. Henry is the son of the middle offspring, who died young. The youngest, Roger, was known in the family as the black sheep. He inherited the family's despotic disposition and, as I was told, looked like a living copy of old Hugo's portrait. He did not get along with justice in England and fled to Central America" (Brilova). And here's what Doyle actually said in the original: "There is no other claimant, I presume? -None. The only other kinsman whom we have been able to trace was Roger Baskerville, the youngest of the three brothers of whom poor Sir Charles was the eldest. The second brother, who died young, is the father of this lad Henry. The third, Roger, was the black sheep of the family. He came of the old masterful Baskerrville strain and was the very image, they tell me, of the family picture of old Hugo. He made England too hot to hold him, fled to Central America". It is not even so important here, as after the just-mentioned amount of inheritance, Mortimer says "poor Sir Charles", especially not so important that Roger Baskerville "inherited the domineering breed of Baskervilles", as that "he found England too hot to stay in it, and fled to Central America". Maybe I'm exaggerating, but from the Russian translations, it's not clear what an unsurpassed stylist Stevenson is, or any traces of Doyle's brilliant irony... But back to Sir Charles. The way he believed in the legend himself, how he discovered his fear in front of Stapleton, it is also clear that, according to Benjamin, "there is no such document of culture that at the same time would not be a document of barbarism. And since he himself is not free from barbarism, so is the process of passing on tradition..."
Just as one can find associations with the "collective guilt" of the post-war generations of Germans, according to Jaspers. Mental wounds that do not lead to changes in personality are called traumas. Perhaps this is just an assumption that the old baronet learned from emigration, from life in the colonies... something else besides a million dollars of capital. It is also hard to believe that neither the baronet, nor even Mortimer (an anthropologist!) they did not notice the external resemblance of Stapleton to the portrait from the family gallery (Mortimer, moreover, unlike the baronet, did not differ in tact, remember, in the dating scene he called Holmes "the second expert"). It is possible that it was not the baronet who revealed the old legend to Stapleton, but Stapleton himself, by his similarity in this wilderness, in the absence of kinship, opened the old wound of the landowner. Maybe not even a personal one, but a kind of shame in association with "collective guilt".
But the most interesting thing is not all of this: and what I personally have no explanation for. Doyle talks about the Baskerville brothers four times in the story, makes Sir Henry remember his father, his childhood years in a cottage on the coast (also, by the way, the Baskervilles' possession is a common practice, manor and cottages anywhere on the landowner's land, they are baronets, not lords, but landowners). Doyle even reports on four more members of the genus, naming them... but the middle brother, Sir Henry's father, remained unnamed! If the conversation about the brothers had been in the text once, it would have been all right, but four times the characters of the novel talk about it, even just the children of the author of the manuscript are mentioned, two sons, to whom he turns and asks them not to tell anything to his sister, his daughter Elizabeth. And Sir Henry's father's name is never mentioned. Moreover, Sir Charles knew nothing about the nephews, the name of the old baronet's brother was well known to Mortimer and Barrymore (obviously, because the personal pronoun is used in the plural, although it is strange that such an important person, such a rich man had no other attorney in his affairs, except as a doctor and friend, and even a butler). It was only thanks to the knowledge of the middle brother's name (hidden from readers, this is one of the most important "omissions", since it is obvious that the author insists on it) that they were able to find the heir and destroy the plans of the criminal (Stapleton, although there is an extravagant version that the novel is "not read like that", and Mortimer is the criminal, but according to according to the text of the novel, Mortimer had already lived in Devonshire for three years before the baronet returned to the manor, but Stapleton appeared only shortly after the arrival of Sir Charles Baskerville).
Sir Charles is also not as simple as he seems. Although, of course, maybe I'm speculating here. But... In the novel, only two characters become real victims: Seldon and Sir Charles. Is it by chance?..
This is how Seldon (translated by Brilova) is characterized: "...There is little chance that you will receive a reward, but that your throat will be cut is very much.... This is not some ordinary criminal. He will stop at nothing. "And who is he?" "Selden, sir, the Nottinghill murderer.... The crime was one of the most brutal and the cruelty of the murderer had no explanation.... the court questioned Selden's sanity."
Isn't it strange that in such a company of victims there turned out to be an old baronet, who is described allegedly in a local newspaper article about rumors about the circumstances of his death, as follows: "thanks to his benevolence and rare generosity, he won the sympathy of all who were familiar with him...In our time of the nouveau riche, one could only rejoice at how the scion of an ancient family that knew the best of times managed to make a fortune in foreign lands in order to revive the former glory of the family at home..."Is there a contradiction here? The censure of the nouveau riche and, in fact, an indication that Sir Charles himself ("acquired considerable wealth from speculation in South African securities") was one of them and "lived in Baskerville Hall for a relatively short time." While Sir Henry got off with only fright, and his characterization is just the following: "all the reviews that have come down to us said one thing: the young man is impeccable in all respects."
And here is what Dr. Jekyll from Stevenson's novel writes in his autobiography: "in the old days, people used the services of hired killers to create their crimes with their hands, without endangering themselves or their good reputation. I was the first person who resorted to this method in search of pleasure. I was the first person whom society saw clothed in the robes of venerable virtue and who could throw off this temporary outfit in the blink of an eye."
And was Sir Charles quite normal?
Here is how the Russian writer of the same time Leonid Andreev describes his character, the crazy Petrov, in the story "Ghosts": "it is very possible that he (the doctor) is also bribed by his mother and is waiting for a favorable moment when he can deal with him. Last Sunday, Petrov himself saw that his mother, an old woman, was standing around the corner, staring intently at his window, and when he screamed, she hurriedly disappeared, and Dr. Shevyrev assured that no one was there. Whereas he himself, with his own eyes, saw her, right around the corner - in a lamb cap, pushed to one side, and with staring terrible eyes.
He was talking, and there was hopeless horror in his strangled voice, in his wild, disheveled beard.... Petrov felt the worst of all. From the constant gloom creeping in through the windows, it seemed to him that the end was already coming, and every minute he expected something terrible. The premonition of impending disaster was so palpable that for hours he sat motionless... all his horror was concentrated in his mother... she walked through the woods in her lambskin cap, pushed to one side, she hid under the table, under the beds, in all the dark corners. And at night she stood at his door and quietly pulled the handle.
On Sunday morning, his mother came and cried for an hour in Dr. Shevyrev's mezzanine. Petrov did not see her, but at midnight, when everyone had been asleep for a long time, he had a seizure."
Let's compare it with the description of Sir Charles, given by the way by the doctor (!) Mortimer: "he had a reserved disposition, but his illness brought us closer... In recent months, I have become increasingly convinced that Sir Charles's nervous system is in critical condition. He took the legend that I read to you to heart; he was so imbued with it that, although he regularly walked in the park, he would not have gone out on the wasteland at night for anything in the world... He was sincerely convinced that an evil fate was weighing on the Baskervilles, and, I must say, the information about his ancestors did not reassure him at all. Everywhere he seemed to see some kind of menacing shadow, and more than once he asked me if I had seen an incomprehensible creature when I visited the sick at night and if I had heard barking. He asked about barking especially often, and his voice trembled at the same time.
I remember clearly how, about three weeks before the tragedy, I drove up to Baskerville Hall in the evening. Sir Charles was just standing in the doorway. I got off the gig, approached him and found that he was not looking at me, but into the distance and his face expressed boundless horror. Turning quickly, I caught a glimpse of a large animal, like a black calf, flashing past the far end of the driveway. Sir Charles was seriously worried, and I had to go back there and see what it was. The calf, however, had already disappeared from sight, and this incident threw my patient off balance. I stayed with him all evening, and it was then, to explain my excitement, that he introduced me to the story I had read to you and instructed me to keep the manuscript."
At that time, the doctor was inclined to consider it a consequence of nerves, and probably his lifestyle. The heir found a connection with the atmosphere of the estate: "it is not surprising that in such a place uncle was haunted by forebodings. Anyone would be scared here."
But wasn't there something here that Pushkin called "and the boys are bloody in the eyes"? In the same Soviet film adaptation, but based on Stevenson's novel, the director conjectured and added a scene where Dr. Jekyll is a military doctor, in the colonial troops he is indifferently forced only to pass by tortured natives, in particular a local woman, his friend even gives a comment on this in a racist sense. There is no such episode in Stevenson's novel, in Doyle's novel the past of the oldest baronet is not revealed in any way.
But here's the curious thing: you can read about it in M.In the chapter on the "interference of bourgeois and noble personal patterns in the 19th century" (the baronet was also a nouveau riche, in addition to the title and estate, capital was actually the motive for the crime), the moral researcher quotes from the arguments of Enlightenment philosophers: Helvetius, Mandeville and Volney: "the idea of man in Helvetius's essay On the Mind downright romantic. Helvetius preaches the cult of great passions and fights mediocrity with all his might. He prefers a man of great delusions and great passions to exemplary mediocrity. More freely, on the contrary, advising to take care of their own interests, he considers the best way to serve them to curb passions (and even in Sir Henry, for all his "perfection", they found the "hot temper" of the Baskervilles- my comment) and cold rational calculation. For Helvetius, the pursuit of fame is the noblest of the motives of human activity. He regrets that in countries where trade flourishes, the pursuit of fame is being replaced by the pursuit of wealth. Otherwise, he looks at it more freely, calling for enjoying "blissful prosperity" in peace and security. Volney sharply condemned those who preferred momentary pleasure to future benefits. Helvetius, on the contrary, composes a real philippic against prudence, and his arguments reveal an acquaintance with Mandeville. A prudent person is, by definition, Helvetius, a person who knows how to imagine future evil so vividly that he refuses pleasure in the present, so as not to incur trouble in the future."
Of course, the history of colonial wars and colonial administration, as depicted in P. Brandon's great work, counts examples of moral decline and criminal revelry, on which capital was made, by the thousands. In general, the idea that "crime is at the heart of any wealth" (Honore de Balzac) has always been (and before Balzac) widespread. Has it always been true? Another question. It is equally important that even from such a method of acquisition, the way out was not necessarily in the multiplication of evil. He could have been the other way around, in generous charity. As on the contrary, it was not a crime at all, but the very nature of a rich but generous man, contributed to his generosity in charity. The practice, for example, of gifting churches with hereditary riches, or even during their lifetime with gifts, is so wide that it does not even require clarification. But the sacrifices of the church at that time were not only for the restoration or construction of a temple, but also for just that wide-ranging and charitable activity of the church: before the revolution in Russia there was still no social support from the state, but almshouses, night shelters, free canteens existed at churches and monasteries. The state imposed on the church the duty of primary public education.
In Soviet times, an example of the criminal connection between wealth and crime in the personality of the Belgian King Leopold II was popular (for me, again, the point is important here that we are talking about colonial policy in the 19th century). Leopold II was an ardent supporter of the ideas of colonialism and founded the formally independent Free State of the Congo in Africa, becoming in the period from 1876 to 1908 by his personal owner. To increase the productivity of ivory and, above all, rubber, the indigenous population was subjected to severe torture and exploitation. The atrocities in the Congo Free State during the reign of Leopold II had, according to historians, "apocalyptic proportions." Leopold's activities were condemned in Europe; the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph I (for whose son Rudolf Leopold married his daughter Stephanie) called the Belgian king a "crowned broker", Lenin characterized him in approximately the same terms ("businessman, financier, conman"). Mark Twain and... Arthur Conan Doyle performed satire on the king. But in the USSR, they preferred to keep silent about such a broad condemnation, mainly Lenin's phrase was quoted. And the example itself was presented as a textbook.
In general, this is an example of what A. Megill calls the "prejudice of universality" and "hermeneutical naivety": "historians often confuse "general laws" with other types of generalizations, they sometimes longed for the full force of the idea that the field of research is scientific only if it reveals general laws. By "generalization" historians usually mean a broad statement, which nevertheless is still tied to a special historical context. In the language of historians, the following hypothetical statement is considered as a generalization (we do not touch on the question of whether the statement is correct here): "As a result of the growth of cities and the development of trade, feudalism gave way in Europe in the late Middle Ages and early Modern times to the nascent capitalism." The "problem of generalization," as historians understand it, is usually the problem of how to get from fragmentary and confusing data to such broad statements.... in philosophy and social sciences, it is widely believed that knowledge of the general or universal (as opposed to the singular or separate) is really scientific; all other knowledge there is knowledge of a lower order. The prejudice of universality comes from the specifics of ancient Greek thinking, from the philosophy of Plato and from the philosophy of Aristotle (M.B.Yampolsky holds the same opinion regarding the history of culture as a historical discipline-my comment)... in our time, the desire for universalization is still alive, although in modern thinking it originates not from Aristotle, but from ideas Hume and Kant.... An epistemologically attentive reader demands that such (explanatory, generalizing) statements can be supported by evidence and arguments... A historian should be able to argue, not just make statements...any causal statement involves counterfactual reasoning... Perhaps we would agree that the statement that the cession of the road by feudalism to capitalism "occurred as a result" of the growth of cities and trade is actually explanatory, if we were convinced of this by considering the arguments "for" and "against"... By hermeneutical naivety, I mean the mistake of organizing a historical message as if it were a "view from nowhere" instead of-as it really is-a view from some private interpretive perspective. Modernist academic culture-especially when it proclaimed the prestige of science -tended to suppress the interpretive dimension. Both Marx and Freud were notorious for their penchant for such repression, but their position is far from unique."
In Marxist criticism, as O.N. Turysheva describes (and as it can be seen from the subject of study of M.Ossovsky): "the ideology of the class forms the consciousness of a person, imposing on him the map of the world in which the class is interested. A person is considered as a carrier of false consciousness, limited by his social affiliation. The bearer of false consciousness, determined by the class, is also the author (of a literary work in this particular case, my comment)." "On the basis of this understanding of creativity, the methodology of Marxist criticism develops (in Soviet times it was almost the only possible one - my comment). It is formed by the decoding of the class content unconsciously reflected in the work... Thus, if in theoretical terms Martian criticism is sociological (it deduces the meaning of the work from the factor of the author's social affiliation), then in methodological terms it is a variant of hermeneutics (since it aims to decipher the implicit meaning expressed in the work outside the will of the author)."
Therefore, if I were to analyze the characters (as typical, that is, related to the "historical reality" in the work) in Marxist criticism (or in Soviet times-being influenced by "totalitarian ideology and the state", which in itself is also one of the concepts of explanatory theory), then I would consider the added episode to Stevenson's novel in the Soviet film adaptation, it is also logically correct in a generalized sense: all colonialists behave exactly like this, any wealth is associated with crime. Although, if there had been a possibility of counterfactual arguments at that time, there would also have been many of them (but some of them, as well as the prevalence of condemnation of Leopold II in his actions in the Belgian Congo, were hidden): Sir George Beaumont bequeathed his collection of paintings to the English state, if the gallery is opened-it was the beginning of the famous collection of the National Gallery in London, as well as a number of other donations, as in Russia the most famous art gallery is called Tretyakov Gallery by the name of the patron, its founder, the appearance of a psychiatric service in the city is also connected with the surname of the Moscow merchants Alekseevs-the Moscow city psychiatric hospital bears the name of one of the representatives of the genus, the mayor N.A.Alekseev, another representative of the same surname is much better known under a pseudonym -the founder of an entire school of art, a theater reformer and the founder of the Moscow Art Theater- K.S. Stanislavsky (Alekseev), of all the Tomsk rich men, E.N.Kukhterin is called the most famous (founder of the family and firm "E.N.Kukhterin and Sons"), the largest match factory in Siberia, founded by them, worked throughout the Soviet 20th century (of course, nationalized), but the entire 20th century remained a "mystery for with seven seals" that Innokenty Yevgrafovich Kukhterin was so respected by the workers that when the factory was nationalized, the workers elected the former owner as its first director. And here is how another Tomsk merchant, the enlightener of Siberia, Pyotr Ivanovich Makushin, explained his credo (the first bookstores, libraries, folk schools, a newspaper and a people's university are connected with his activities in Tomsk, and sometimes in Siberia): "who spent his childhood in a squalid environment, the years of youth in a "barrack" bursa, who began my public service in the semi-wild Altai, having experienced hardships there even in clothes and shoes, all my subsequent life I did not allow myself either luxurious surroundings or the usual entertainment for rich people: going out, cards, in the evening, formal dinners, traveling, etc., although he had sufficient funds for that. At the risk of being suspected of the abnormality of my brains, I decide to say that I did it not out of avarice, which explained my behavior even to my close relatives, but out of a deep consciousness that these funds are not mine, but the public domain. I considered myself only the treasurer of the people's money under the strict control of my conscience." In the history of the merchant city, there was even an entire surname - the Yerenevs, who went bankrupt due to "excessive" charity.
So it's not so simple with the thesis that any wealth is associated with crime. Although, the connection may also be different. The novel just illustrates how the old baronet's capital became the motive for Stapleton's crimes. And maybe it was generous charity that contributed to this. After all, as Mortimer explained, the exact amount of capital was not known even to the oldest baronet. All that has been said does not contradict the fact that in the 19th century. and just in this "psychology of treasurers" is an illustration of the intertwining of bourgeois and noble (with the idea of service) morality (and the baronet was also both a nobleman and a nouveau riche). Just as this does not negate another thing: if we consider that "Holmsiana" was associated not only with the works of Poe, but also with Collins, then the plot of "The Woman in White" also has a motive of madness and a madhouse. And in the 19th century, many works on the topic of mental illness and psychology were published, and the medical service for mentally ill people (from the world of classical literature of the 19th century) was developing both in Russia and in Europe (the famous Bedlam). psychiatry also draws phenomena-for example, the "Adele syndrome" called by the name of the daughter, and not the heroine of the novel, Hugo), one can say that the development of psychiatry is crowned by the figure of Freud (which occupies as significant a place in the influence on the humanities as Marx on social sciences, in the 20th century. even Freud Marxism will arise). Maybe such frequent mention, attention to mentally unbalanced people, to people with shattered nerves, to the abnormal (which Selden is called right in the novel) is due to the fact that this is also a "historical reality". But maybe, after all, with a larger circle of authors and books considered, all this will sink among a narrow group of writers interested in this subject, it is precisely related to their perception, and of course, one should not necessarily look for a causal explanation for this by the methodology of Marxist criticism, but the fact that in Doyle's perception there was obviously just such an attitude to the nouveau riche, to the nobility, as if he personally wrote that article in the Devonshire newspaper (although he did exactly that-this is his "imaginary reality", if we find the specified number, then, unlike Holmes's experiment with the Times editorial, we will not find this article there, it is only available in the novel -it is self-evident) and an explanation for this should be sought... in the biography of the writer. As well as a possible prototype of the character of the old baronet: for example, Carr tells about the circumstances of the appearance of Arthur Doyle's second surname: Conan -young Arthur Doyle was declared the heir of a childless elderly relative with the condition of attaching the surname and thus the characterization of this character is more useful from the point of view of analysis in general to the so-called first literary school - "biographical" (founded by Sainte-Beuve in the first half of the 19th century. based on the statement directly opposite to Aristotelian "Poetics", that a work is an "objectified otherness of the author's "I"", in which the author's personality "affects the whole". It is important to me that the idea of analyzing author's psychology, which is already following in the development of these ideas, compares the individuality of one author with other authors, with other individuals, where it is easy to conclude that there are different interpretations that reflect "historical reality", and somewhere even a connection with social origin is possible. I'm even curious why Sir Charles? In England, this name is associated, among other things, with the executed king, so there is a breed of spaniel dogs, the varieties of which differ by the names themselves, appealing to the time of the revolution: cavalier-King Charles and King Charles (cavaliers were called supporters of the king), the story mentions both the revolution (the Great Uprising) and the spaniel (Mortimer's dog), and the old baronet bears the name of the king executed during the revolution (although this may be an allusion, or it may be a subjective, not too reasoned interpretation, and nothing like this existed either in the author's plan or in the text, although it is possible in the interpretation of Freud or Jung as an individual unconscious or part of an intertextually expressed collective unconscious).
Titles and addresses:
The Baskervilles: baronets, but not barons, and not lords, and not an ancient aristocratic family as is usually understood, the title of baronet could either be obtained from the king for personal services to the king, or bought –but it did not give the right to a peerage-membership in the House of Lords.
But the address is not just Sir Charles or Sir Henry, but Sir Charles and Sir Henry, this is not a polite form of address to a man without a title, but it is an address to men with a title.
Without a title: Sir or mister.
Watson, Mortimer, Holmes-just sir or mister.
Dr. Watson and Dr. Mortimer:
A doctor is also a practicing doctor.
But this is also the title of a scientist.
Since 1917, there have been no hereditary titles in Russia, and it is not customary to use all the others in the same way as in England: Dr. Watson, Dr. Mortimer, even if we are talking not about a scientist, but about a practicing doctor.
The manor is not even Tudor at all. Sir Henry exclaims upon acquaintance: "To think that my ancestors lived here for five centuries!" The action takes place in the 1880s. That is, the estate is thus no later than the 14th century. And the Tudors are the 15th century. This is not even the time of the War of the Roses, this is the time of the beginning of the Hundred Years' War, the time of the founding of the Order of the Garter. The time when Scotland was independent on the island of Britain, and English troops captured the French king on the continent in Europe. This is the time of the Kings Edward the First, Second and Third. The time of the Crusades. Probably no estate in England could boast of such antiquity already in the 19th century. Despite the fact that this is an antiquity not only of the manor, but also of the Baskervilles themselves (in which, too, by analogy with the de Erbervilles, the Anglo-Norman origin is guessed).
The novel is definitely still a part (at least in part) that then fashionable tradition of family chronicles: Budenbrocks, Forsytes, Baskervilles...Doyle's novel has a genealogical theme: the history of the family. In any family, there is a curse of the family. And so, in accordance with both the religious idea and the idea of progress, the forces of the genus are aimed at getting rid of the curse.
These are the same ideas as in Bunin's story "The Village" where the unhappy fate of the descendants of the first serfs in Durnovka, then the new owners of Durnovka from the same serfs, leads to the impoverishment of the family and the fact that the old brothers sell the estate and leave for the city.
But in Doyle's novel, the story of a family of baronets, albeit the lowest in the hierarchy of the aristocracy, but a noble family, which is related to Bunin's novel "The Life of Arsenyev". In general, these ideas are very common for classical literature: family chronicles, family histories. The same Thomas Mann's "Budenbrocki" and his other novels.
It's as if the Lords of the Baskervilles are the ones who don't really exist in history. The famous typographer, publisher in particular Milton John Baskerville from Worcestershire, who lived in the 18th century. And an American chemist, professor at the University of North Carolina and City College-College of the City University of New York, who created an advanced chemical laboratory, which to this day is called Baskerville Hall, a contemporary of Doyle.
In the novel, the Baskervilles, who live in a Tudor manor (16th century), for several generations of ancestors, as Sir Henry says, nevertheless do not belong to the titled nobility, they are not barons, as can be understood, namely baronets, a specifically English part of the privileged class, something between simple nobility and titled, unlike the titled, even the lowest baronial title in the hierarchy, baronets have never sat in the House of Lords. In general, this title could either be obtained for merit, which happened in the 20th century, for example, with Thatcher's husband, or it could be bought, as Bazhov says in his tale about a Russian merchant, they say that he even bought the title of baronet in England, and there were periods in the history of England when this title it can be said that it was massively provided, including to the nobility of Ireland and Scotland, and as we know, Doyle's own family had Irish roots, despite the fact that he himself was born and raised in Edinburgh, Scotland. The baronets wore a bar for everyday wear and a special insignia around their necks.
In the novel, the Baskervilles have a coat of arms - boar's heads.
Hunters, going to hunt wild boars, usually could spend the night earlier, for example, in a cowshed, in order to soak up the smell of livestock, kill the smell of humans, and wild boars are not afraid of domestic cattle. So here's Stapleton... pretending to be a naturalist, Stapleton of Merripit House, a neighbor of Sir Charles and then Sir Henry, in fact also disguised himself by living in a cottage on the marshes, like old Frankland for example. Mortimer's house stood in the village of Grimpen. Stapleton, the Baskervilles hunter, kept the dog out of sight (although there were obviously few people there to look at) and at home in the swamps. Pretending to be a gentleman, the one for whom Sir Henry was worried when he recognized his "sister", and that an escaped convict was walking around, he was such a hunter, sleeping in a cowshed.
The novel critically plays up the Catholic values of "family and land": the true cause of the conflict is the wealth accumulated by speculation in South Africa, the last of the Baskervilles, firstly, turns out to be not the last at all, and the family has not been cleansed at all in five generations, Stapleton is the same as his ancestor, even outwardly, secondly, Sir Henry is a Canadian, a farmer, an American accent cannot hide his origin, as well as a child's delight about the "ancestral nest" is replaced by fear and despondency before the family ghost. It is difficult to separate fear, veiled morality and irony over all this. The irony of Holmes or the irony of the author over a character he does not know so well. Or maybe Carr is wrong, and Doyle was not at all such a categorical breaker of family principles with Catholicism. But what can be said for sure is that the traditions of "family and land"-Catholic traditions are present in the novel. An example of misunderstanding due to the lack of details in the translation or comments: it is already difficult for people of non-religious tradition to imagine what exactly caused such outrage in Collins' novel from Mrs. Fernley's daughter that a village boy imagined Mrs. Fernley's ghost, and a person of religious tradition understands everything more than clearly: ghosts are restless souls, souls who sinned in life. Therefore, the ghost of someone is also an indication of his sinful life, accusations of misconduct or even crimes.
All the more understandable is the delicacy and scrupulousness of Mortimer's treatment of the detective, which he excuses only by concern for the safety of the young baronet.
Sir Charles is somewhat reminiscent of the famous English artist Leighton.
By the age of 48, unmarried Lord Leighton, a member of the Royal Academy of Art, was, according to historians, "a model of morality in high society." He was unfailingly generous to his models and aspiring artists. In the correspondence, Leighton mentioned the relief he felt alone (only 4 servants were a consequence not of stinginess or only of the abandonment of the estate, especially not of the lack of money, but of the secluded lifestyle of Sir Charles). Modern art historians believe that it is impossible to establish the degree of intimacy that has developed between Leighton and his constant Muse, the theater actress Dorothy Dean. Leighton's sisters destroyed letters that could have served to clarify the truth... There is also a story in the novel about a half-destroyed letter to Sir Charles by Mrs. Laura Lyons.
Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman in the comments to Pushkin's novel tells in detail about the personal name of the literary hero of course in Russian literature of the beginning of the 19th century. that the name itself, and even put in the title tells the reader about the genre of the work, and even about the plot, in Pushkin's time it turns out the characters were quite cardboard, say, Scoundrels could not be something other than a scoundrel, etc., just like in the mask theater. And here an interesting question arises: Doyle puts a real surname in the title, but Lotman writes that in Pushkin's time and for some time after that it was simply impossible, hence these strange surnames - more like stage names, even in English, but much earlier, Byron does not seek to talk about the surname of the main one at all the hero, Doyle puts a real English surname in the name, and then again in Holmsian: according to some versions, these are landowners, but not Devonshire, and it is with a similar story, according to another it is a local Devonshire man, well known to both Robinson and Doyle, but he is not a landowner, and his supposedly gravestone is still being shown to tourists today. But this is a real, not invented surname, put in the title of the story about the family curse. Boldly? Usually? Did it have a basis in the source of the legend? Invented? For what? To make it more convincing? According to Lotman, calling his hero exactly like that, Pushkin said that it would not be a completely decent gentleman, this was the color of the name Eugene, but it would not be so convincing to consider that this real person if the hero had, say, the surname Rudin, as later in the novel and its title by Turgenev.
The entail and literary reminiscences are contemporary to Doyle, which speaks for the "historical reality" in the novel, although paradoxically it will be about a literary work again.
"Apparently, the young man inherited all the bad qualities of his ancestors: from the very first minutes of his stay in R...sitten, he showed himself proud, arrogant, unrestrained, selfish."
- the unexpected heir (Sir Henry)
"Take your time, Mr. Baron. You dare not start governing before the spiritual one is opened... besides the judges, the baron and F., there was another young man of very noble appearance in the courtroom.
It was midnight, the moon was shining brightly in the next room; the door to it was wide open. Here it seemed to the lawyer that someone was slowly and heavily climbing the stairs, jingling and rattling keys. F. became alert, got up, went into the hall and clearly heard that someone was approaching the hall doors from the corridor. Soon the doors opened, and a deathly pale man in a nightgown slowly entered the hall... in one hand he held a candlestick with a burning candle, in the other a large bunch of keys. The lawyer immediately recognized the butler... F. I followed him cautiously with a candle. They went down the stairs; the butler unlocked the main door of the castle; F. deftly slipped in after him..."
- and the idea itself: the grandfather, the progenitor of the family, engaged in astrology, witchcraft, conceived in his pride to elevate his family: establish a entail, calculated the marriage of his heir by the stars, and in the end: his descendants quarreled, sacrificed his will, committed crimes, the family soon stopped and the castle was transferred to the treasury –in "To the dog..." pride stings Hugo with the refusal of the farmer's daughter, pride speaks in him when he behaves in such a way that everything is allowed to him, and he then calls upon the forces of evil to help him-for which both he and his descendants pay the price, in their pride, they look like him-romanticism about the power of Fate, its vicissitudes-Serafina turns out to be also from the von R. family, - it turns out he is also a Baskerville.
Wolfgang's alliance with Julia seemed to the old man to be an encroachment on the decisions of that higher power that helped him in his earthly endeavors
- he ended up buried in his tower.
The dark force that hung over the castle touched her
Serafina is the sister of a young man (Stapleton), became the wife of a young man of noble appearance (Sir Henry)
I will give you some excerpts using the comparative method, and you will compare them yourself:
"... and I know very well that some dark family secret, enclosed in these walls, like a terrible ghost, survives the owners from here and allows them to stay here only for a short time..."
"The cart drove into the courtyard; we got out of it, and then only I saw the extraordinary figure of an old servant, dressed in an old-fashioned jaeger livery, intricately embroidered with a lot of all sorts of snooks."
"We passed through long vaulted corridors; ... columns, capitals and colorful arches seemed to hang in the air; our gigantic shadows walked next to them, and the strange images on the walls on which they glided seemed to shudder and tremble, and their whisper mingled with the echoing echo of our footsteps: "Do not wake us, Don't wake us up! We are a reckless magical people sleeping here in ancient stones." Finally, when we had passed through a long row of cold, gloomy rooms, Franz opened the door to the hall, where a brightly burning fireplace greeted us with a cheerful crackle."
"And so I was left alone in the high, spacious knight's hall... the full moon shone through the wide arched windows, illuminating with magical light all the dark corners of this ancient building, where neither the dim light of my candle nor the fire of the fireplace reached. The walls and ceilings of the hall-as can still be found in old castles today-were covered with outlandish antique decorations, some with heavy panels, others with fantastic paintings and brightly colored gilded carvings. In large paintings, which most often represented a wild junkyard of bloody bear and wolf hunting, animal and human heads carved out of wood were placed against painted bodies, so that, especially in the wavering, flickering light of the moon and fire, everything came to life terrifyingly truthfully. From the portraits placed between these paintings, knights in hunting outfits appeared at full height, probably the ancestors of the current owners who loved hunting. Everything: painting and carving-was a dark color of a bygone time."
"Having calmed myself down, I pick up the book from the floor and throw myself back into the chairs, but suddenly someone quietly and slowly, with measured steps, walks through the hall, and sighs, and moans, and in this sigh, in this moan lies the deepest human suffering, inconsolable sorrow. Yeah! It must be some sick animal trapped in the lower floor. ... so I calmed myself, but suddenly someone began to scratch at a new wall, and louder than before, heavy sighs were heard, as if ejaculated in the terrifying anguish of the dying hour. "Yes, it's a poor trapped beast..." ...nasty scratching..."
"Intricately dressed in ancient fashion... the old baronesses, with their strange, towering hairstyles... seemed to me not funny at all, but completely ghostly... it seemed ... the old women were at peace with the sinister ghost roaming the castle, and perhaps they themselves were capable of doing something creepy or terrible."
"And I will not spare my belly to conjure an evil ghost that survives descendants from the ancestral castle of their ancestors."
"Did this strange hatred come from love, or should I say, from falling in love with a creature that seemed to me the most charming, the most wonderful thing that ever walked the earth? And that creature was the Baroness herself."
"And this alone was so amazingly strange that the imagination involuntarily combined this picture with an ominous obsession, and the baroness appeared to be an angel of light.
" "Then she was barely nineteen years old"
"I behaved indescribably absurdly"
"I saw and heard only her, but I knew firmly and immutably that it would be absurd and madness to venture into some kind of love affair, although at the same time I understood that it was impossible for me, like a boy in love, to contemplate and worship from afar."
"Such romantic, even chivalrous love, as she presented to me on a sleepless night, so excited me that I had the childishness to start in the most pathetic way to wander before myself and at the end mercilessly sigh: "Serafina, oh, Serafina!"
- don't get so close to the Baroness.. leave it to the young coxcombs who are always happy to hang around
"The wind poured light flakes of snow into my face…When it began to get dark, I could barely see a few steps away from me...there was a rustle in the thicket, and I saw less than two hundred paces from me... the beast, flashing its eyes, jumped at me, and I would inevitably die...the baron hurried to me: -For God's sake! Are you covered in blood? Are you covered in blood? Are you injured?"
- reading this, you better understand "The Dog..."
- a literary device: against the background of inexplicable horror, anxiety, small, insignificant fears to explain the play of light and shadow, etc.
"If I add that I was twenty years old and drank several glasses of strong punch, then they will believe that I was more restless in the knight's hall than ever.
" He ordered a few repairs to the ruined building and shut himself in with a sullen butler and a few servants. He was rarely seen in the village."
"Its surroundings are harsh and deserted, only in some places lonely blades of grass grow on bottomless quicksand, and instead of the park that usually adorns the castle, a skinny pine forest adjoins the bare walls of the manor house from the shore side, whose eternally gloomy headdress saddens the colorful outfit of spring and where instead of the joyful rejoicing of the birds awakened to a new joy only the terrifying cawing of crows, the shrill cries of seagulls, harbingers of the storm."
"They were afraid of the terrifying desolation of these places"
- romantics discovered the moods in nature, as if, returning to spiritualize it, it was not surprising that a monster could suddenly appear from everywhere
There is no wisdom of the beast in the novel, which would emphasize its danger, as for example, in the Seton-Thompson novels, or in the novel "Vesyegonskaya She-Wolf" (for all the difference in historical and cultural, by the way, both works are connected with the theme of the forest attendants, a change in attitude towards predators, the development primarily in the West of the green movement as a political one, that in relation to wolves, the human attitude, as the author defends, is unjustified, but has changed almost diametrically opposite (see Pavlov's work).
On the one hand, the beast and the swamps are the characters of the novel, on the other, because they are exposed-the monster is not a beast, and the scene of the disaster is not a swamp, the monster is a naturalist of the Nabokov type, or Himmler type, or Beriev type, the former owner of a private school for boys, but still not a teacher hunting with a net on insects, in the swamps of Dartmoor, enthusiastically and scientifically, who discovered a new species, like Nabokov, but he is a criminal, and by Holmes's own admission the most dangerous, and he could kill Sir Henry in London, as Holmes also noted, if the devil chose Dartmoor for himself as the scene of action, what prevents him from making London an arena, he has not yet met the devil with such a narrow jurisdiction, the place of action is Stapleton's soul.
But the subject of the dog is actually little revealed in the novel, except for a couple of howls that Watson and Sir Henry hear and attacks on Seldon, although they could be part of a false trail. But we must not forget that the novel was eventually published (although it is not known whether it was intended, unlike the short stories about Holmes, whose size was set by the magazine) in a magazine, and already stretched for several months.
Curiously, at the very beginning of the novel, the writer gives the old baronet to the dog to be torn to pieces, in order to replace him with a young, charming, simple-minded, sympathetic word, allows him to fall in love with Stapleton's sister, and evoke reciprocal feelings, to ride through the marshes, which are dangerous.. so that we can empathize with the hero. To imagine an old one in the place of a young baronet... of course, all these things would not be possible with him, which means there would be a completely different romance.
The "Little Lord" book shows that you can get a rich inheritance and ... nothing terrible happens. Of course, we can say that the heir is a child and the book is written for children's reading.
Maria Ossowska is a prominent Polish philosopher and sociologist, an expert in the theory and history of ethics, since her article "Science of Science" in 1935, co–authored with her husband, St.Ossovsky, as recognized in world literature, began the study of science.
The knight and the bourgeois: Studies on the history of morality.-M., 1987.
Chapter 7.Gentleman
"Good name, good name, good name! I have lost my good name, an immortal part of myself. Shakespeare. Othello.
Initially, the gentleman is the younger sons, disinherited by virtue of the custom of single inheritance. Not wanting to be mistaken for yeomen–free landowners of non-noble origin, whom they considered inferior to themselves, they called themselves gentlemen.
1531. Thomas Eliot's essay "The Mentor". Part One draws a sample of a person applying for a high position, of course, that this is a man of noble birth, a gentleman. pp.128-129
The attitude towards education is condescending, considering it the lot of the lower classes.p.130
Barons are members of Parliament, peers, its upper house for life, by birthright, part of the titled nobility
Renaissance writer Henry Peacham (p. 132): is it possible to lose nobility due to vices if it can be obtained through virtue? May. Can poverty be combined with nobility? Maybe.
Then Peacham considers the activities worthy of a gentleman: lawyers and doctors, with the exception of surgeons, midwives and charlatans, he considers it possible to classify them as gentlemen. In England and in the 19th century, surgeons and dentists were not accepted in society -they worked with their hands.
Merchants are not allowed in the circle of gentlemen
Everyone who earns a living: artists, actors, violinists, magicians
The art is high. Even a tarantula bite can be cured with music. Poetry can turn rudeness into politeness. Hate turns into love. Cowardice into bravery. But it's not for a gentleman to do this.
A gentleman should take care of his reputation
Know horse riding, swimming, running, hunting especially
Doubts whether people who live in seclusion can be considered gentlemen
.133
The main features that persisted until the Second World War:
The most important change was the democratization of this model
Down to just a polite form of address
The lecturer who said "Ladies and gentlemen" did not mean the class position of the audience
. p.134
The taboo of manual labor in the 20th century.
Trading is undesirable, but it becomes necessary because of the law on single inheritance
The younger brothers settle in the city and either directly or by marrying a rich one, entering the merchant environment
Writer Johnson: "thanks to the single inheritance, there was only one fool in the family" (the eldest son was usually not forced to study: his career was already secured)
Unmarried women performed the duties of governesses, taking revenge for their uncomplicated lives on children entrusted to their care
. pp.134-135
Democratization is far from eliminating class differences
p.135
Thackeray: a lord at the university is given a degree in 2 years, which is usually achieved in 7 years, he does not need to take an exam, students of different positions do not dine together, they differ in clothes, even in uniform-the poor do not have tassels on their hats
Yes, it's all on taxpayers' money, but poverty in Puritanism is the fault
of p.135
Solidarity within his class-an Eton or Harrow pupil, having come to power, distributes positions to his comrades
p.136
Marriages in a narrow circle of the elite-thanks to which it consisted entirely of relatives
p.136
Special importance to good manners
p.137
Contempt for intellectual pursuits
Thackeray: speaking of a certain baronet, he was indignant at the very thought that a man who could hardly read, a rude man who could only have "animal feelings", was sitting among the highest dignitaries of England (it was about membership in the House of Lords)
p.137
Rawdon Crowley "was known in the city as the first and most famous scamp and dandy. Boxing, rat-baiting, ball-playing and four-legged riding were then in vogue among our English aristocracy, and he was enthusiastically engaged in all these noble arts" Thackeray.Vanity Fair
p.137
Swift. Gulliver: since childhood, they have been brought up in idleness and luxury
and, as soon as age allows them, they burn their strength in the company of dissolute women, from whom they become infected with bad diseases; having thus squandered almost all their fortune, they marry low-born women for money, who differ neither in beauty nor in health, whom they hate and despise; weak, sickly body, thinness and an earthy complexion are sure signs of noble blood; a healthy and strong build is even considered dishonorable for a noble man, because at the sight of such a big man, everyone immediately concludes that his real father was a groom or a coachman
A mixture of moping, stupidity, ignorance, tyranny, sensuality and arrogance
And so, without the consent of this brilliant class, no law can be issued, repealed or changed; these same people categorically decide all our property relations
.137
Disregard for intelligence was combined with character education: calmness, self-confidence -an independent person
p.138
He's in control of himself
He is truthful, but he will not tell the truth unnecessarily
He trusts others and disposes to trust himself
Since he can take an important position, the law does not punish him humiliatingly
In court, he is released from the oath
Persevering in overcoming difficulties
Avoids affectation
He is distinguished by his laconicism and distrust of overly emotional assessments
of "Not bad"-his highest praise
Tact, fulfillment of obligations, willingness to help
Rivalry is the opposite of humility
The ideal is not a virtue, but an honor
Everything that brings honor is recognized as a virtue
To despise danger is not even a manifestation of courage, it is a sign of good upbringing. A bulldog that is not inferior to a huge dog –that's a gentleman
p.139
"reflecting on the heart of a gentleman, I see him as a man who stands on his own, free from immoderate passions"
p.139
Avoiding professionalism has become a national trait-what a person does only because he likes
it p.140
Excessive intelligence does not suit a gentleman, because it smacks of professionalism
.140
-Holmes does not understand the obvious things, he just does not care and does not need
Keeps his composure in all situations-ruined a good thing
Not afraid to take risks
And sometimes he doesn't do anything for days, lying on the couch
But he is persistent in the matter that has occupied him
The danger to England of the cult of incompetence
p.140
The significance of the ritual element before the end of the Second World War
p.141
Having a title, you can be different from everyone
else.153
Compare:
Genealogy in the 19th century is just nonsense, especially in America, where it is only important that a person managed to capture and hold -the hero of Faulkner's novel
p.151
The specific art of enjoying life. Feasts with copious libations were interspersed with hunting and gambling
This was possible only thanks to the huge staff of servants
Teng estimated that a family of three needed seven servants and three horses
A horse (riding) was an indispensable attribute of the nobility. She distinguished the ruling from the governed, allowed them to look down from above. It was not easy for a gentleman to come to terms with plebeian means of transportation. If he had to travel by rail, he demanded a special train
, p.143
Chapter 10. The interference of bourgeois and noble personal patterns in the 19th century.
E.Ozheshko, although he praises the heroine of his novel for choosing a husband not from her circle, did not decide not to make her a noblewoman. With considerable difficulty, nobility is separated from noble origin
p. 437
Defoe ridiculed the nobility, but he himself sought to rise higher, dressed and behaved in a noble manner
. p.447
The bourgeois and the noble in England 19th century.
Fielding in the novel "The Story of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews" (1742):
Ignorance (the tutor does not dare to correct barich), about his aplomb and arbitrariness, the delay in the salary of the servants, does not know how to distinguish Latin from Welsh
p.447
-a novel during discussions that never stop, however: who is considered a gentleman
Generosity or the culture of personal behavior
p.449
New bourgeois ideals
"The one who earned his estate by his own labor deserves much more than the one who lost it because of his neglect"
p.448
"Sir Roger gives money to people, and I create conditions for my people so that they do not depend on my favors"
p. 448
"Perhaps the best use of the "Book of Peers"the idea is to look through the entire list from beginning to end, to make sure how many times nobility of origin has been sold and bought, how poor scions of the nobility sell themselves to the daughters of rich snobs from the City, and rich snobs from the City buy noble maidens"
p.450
The habit of cold locks, heavy armor, uncomfortable saddles. Even central heating is debatable: great ingenuity in terms of the amenities of the urban strata-the love of amenities excludes heroism-there is heroism in the story
He becomes a real lord
It is difficult not to notice the motive of initiation in this whole story
Membership in the club, its coat of arms depicted on the carriage door, on the buttons of the coachman's livery, as well as on its notepaper
There is a new nobility: Galsworthy's "Forsyte Saga"
Does not know as such, but how the bourgeoisie adopts noble traits, while maintaining its own
They chase the refined, elegant, there is no place for selfless actions, exciting risks, sobriety, practicality, -Sir Henry's shoes are extravagance –a la Don Quixote of course–but we talked about anachronism
And he diligently transfers everything to money
And all for some reason-the first two books of the saga are devoted to the Victorian era-the ascent of the family-the origin of which was not noble and ancient -Baskervilles –Tudor mansion
Old Jolyon's father was a bricklayer, rose to be a construction contractor
Old Jolyon didn't have time to get an education
His son already had the classical schools of the privileged Eton and Cambridge behind him.
And he is accepted into a club that his rich father was not accepted
into. 451
Thackeray:
Old man Pump sweeps the shop, runs errands, becomes a trusted clerk and companion
Pump is the second head of the company, rakes in more and more money and marries his son to the count's daughter
Pump the third does not leave the bank, but the main business of his life is to become the father of Pump the fourth, who is already an aristocrat in the full sense of the word and occupies a place in the House of Lords as Baron Pump, and his offspring already by right of inheritance dominates our nation of snobs
p.450
Sir Henry: pedantry
Our clients were not late for a second (Mortimer was previously described as absent–minded -he forgot his cane-so clearly this is not his trait)
Short, stocky, sturdy
His swarthy, weathered skin indicated that this man was by no means a homebody or a white-handed person, and at the same time, his calm, confident posture gave him away as a true gentleman (that is, he still had to be seen)
He is represented by Mortimer
"Yes, he is," said the Baronet. "and the most curious thing, Mr. Holmes, is that if my friend had not invited me to visit you, I would have come to you of my own accord. They say you can guess different puzzles – he came, as a baronet should, to take time, to spend it with interest
The story of the shoes
About the dog: this story was loved to tell in our family
…
Shall I call you a cab
- Baron, the millionaire does not have a carriage in London and travels either in a cab, public transport, or on foot
Travels first class
At the station, attention was paid to him-and a carriage was waiting for him, pulled by a pair of short, stocky horses, the coachman, an awkward fellow with angular features, took off his hat, greeting -not a word about the livery, buttons with a coat of arms, a coat of arms on the carriage door, it's not even a carriage at all
And a description of Baskerville Hall…
The Forsytes are threatened by love and beauty: one of them is ostracized by the family because he runs away with a pretty governess and decides to become an artist, the other because he falls in love with an architect who understands what love and beauty are
The Baskervilles are threatened by the heavy burden of an ancient family
The position of landowner may have been necessary for Sir Charles simply to get into the House of Commons. He was a baronet, which did not allow him to be a member of the House of Lords. But he could have been elected to the House of Commons from his position as the owner of Baskerville Hall. The small number of inhabitants only made the task easier. The electoral system in England before the 20th century. from a modern point of view, it was far from democratic: out of tens of millions of the population, only a hundred thousand had voting rights, and in particular residents of ancient villages with the center usually of a landowner's estate (usually the landowner did not even need to bribe voters in order to be elected from local farmers who rented land from him). Electoral reforms (including Pitt Jr.) in the 19th century allowed to expand voting rights and make the system more democratic.
How unique are the events from the legend, the theft of the bride or the dishonor of a girl by a lord or baronet, is ironic for the beginning of the 19th century. of course, not only the novel Austin reports, but it is not at all ironic, although there are disputes about the documentary, but the following fact is given (I took it from the book by historian Ian Mortimer):
the story of the rape of nuns by a gang of young men, soldiers led by Sir John Arundel, the younger brother of the Earl of Arundel in 1379, later they rob the monastery, kidnap and rape the bride from a village wedding, eventually taking the nuns and the bride with them on a ship en route to Brittany, where they drown overboard during a storm. Mortimer borrows this story from Historia Anglicana, Riley and, calling it exceptional, "it cannot be said that it describes typical crimes of its time." But, then the historian immediately notes that the chronicler Thomas Walsingham, who recorded it, did not doubt its authenticity, and people in the Middle Ages really believed that young men, gathered and drunk, really behave exactly like this: incredibly selfish, aggressive, especially if armed, drunk, bored and gathered in the gang.
"In our wild swampy region, in this huge deserted house, we can afford not to think about the conventions that make life so difficult for the inhabitants of cities." Collins
These are sparsely populated territories, the wilderness, and therefore the population away from the centers is the preservation of traditions, history in reality, in its primitiveness, in the novel there are sites of primitive people, and the same exoticism as distant countries. In the wedding ceremony, by the way, in the English village, of course, there was a party with friends, but also a trip, even if not far away, within your means. And in the legend, it is essentially described through the kidnapping of course and with the subsequent escape of the bride, but there may also be a wedding of Hugo Baskerville with a farmer's daughter. One might notice in words from the film adaptation: - What kind of lunch can there be in the swamps?!
Translation difficulties regarding the English moore: wastelands or swamps. In Russia, by the way, swamps are either the remnants of a glacier, which swamps the soil, or lowlands, where accumulated water swamps the soil. In England, Cornwall, and Devon, these are not lowlands, not a glacier, they are on a plateau, the soil is rich in peat (which is why it is unstable) and the marine climate is humid. But there is no quagmire, and even Grimpen, of course not.
The social conflict during the English Revolution took a religious form: the Presbyterians rebelled against the king, in the name of God, that is, they tended to consider the king himself godless, much less Hugo Baskerville. But Hugo is a cavalier, and therefore a "renegade of the family." Most members of the family demonstrated the behavior of the Nouveau riche since the 17th century, rather than the hereditary landowning nobility. That 's why ... the estate turned out to be abandoned. And the English Revolution, like any intra-civil conflict, was a deeply traumatic division in this family.
But there were also quite non-political circumstances that influenced the neglect of the estate and this contradicts our generalization about the condemned "noble nests", characteristic of the modern era in general. In fact, probably usually the reader misses the important point that the crime is not built at all around the estate, which is not rich, abandoned a long time ago, Sir Charles (curiously, his name is also like the Stuart kings: Charles the First executed, and Charles the Second, who reigned during the Restoration, which was interrupted however by a new Glorious the revolution) set out to revive it (but did not manage to do anything except half build a new gatehouse, which should not be perceived as something ordinary - this is nothing more than practically the donjon of a medieval castle, here again how to convey it in translation, the Russian "gatehouse" sets up the idea of an insignificant structure in scale and the very activity of Sir Charles immediately looks like insignificant, while on the contrary it was grandiose in scale and tasks). In general, the novel has a theme close to Doyle's hobbies of transmigration of souls, so he writes (through Watson's mouth, of course) about the impression that a man with an American accent, who has never been to Devon, is riding in a railway carriage in an ordinary tweed jacket, but his skull (here the anthropologist Mortimer intervenes) and his face, his his eyes say that he is flesh of the flesh of this people, a place where several generations of ancestors lived as masters, thus the theme of both the return of the prodigal son and the theme of rebirth: here is the carriage from Baskerville Hall itself (also Sir Charles only managed to hire a few servants, to get a carriage, including hiring Barrymors, who have served the Baskervilles for centuries, and in the Soviet film adaptation Barrymore does not recognize the new owner, confuses him with Watson, there is no such thing in the text, or this desire for solitude, which again contradicts the image of the ideal gentleman) rides through a valley, along a river in which young shoots grow oaks and fir trees, in England, forest restoration programs (which were cut down centuries ago, as well as large animals disappeared, and Doyle makes wild boars the coat of arms of the Baskervilles, and the ghost dog, with its predatory behavior, looks like a wolf that has long disappeared in England) appear back in Doyle's time, these are restored young forests. And at every turn of the plot in the novel, we come across a story: and a story right down to the dwellings of primitive man.This is a very historically rich book, a work of fiction.
So, an important point escapes the reader: Stapleton's criminal intentions do not revolve at all near the ancient family estate (poor and long neglected), Doyle only makes it a place of action, but one that can itself have an impact on the characters. And the motive for the crime is the capital acquired by Sir Charles in the colonies. Money. The inheritance is about a million pounds, the amount now, then and even more then is simply fantastic. Sir Charles, being a baronet, intending to settle in England, in the wilderness, in the family estate, reviving it and running for parliament, is in fact the same nouveau riche who are criticized by the local newspaper, genuinely and presumably not disinterestedly mourning his "tragic sudden death."
What is the place of action described? The southwestern tip of the island of Great Britain. Then there is only a small group of islands in the ocean: Scilly. In the south, the English Channel (in English, the English Channel or just the Channel). To the north is Bristol Bay. In its eastern part is the city of Bristol. Once the second seaport in England after London, such proximity is not accidental in order for the descendants of the Baskerville baronets to disperse to the colonies. Moreover, the Avon River is not so far away, and the city of Stratford, where Shakespeare was born. And the largest western port in England will move from Bristol to Liverpool, to the north, where American music will come from, and from where the Beatles' fascination will spread around the world. But let's return to the scene of the novel.
To the south is the Canal, to the north is Bristol Bay. This is the Cornwall Peninsula. The whole of England is characterized by a maritime climate. For the whole of England, the nearest coast, which is in the west, which is in the east, is several hundred kilometers away. But in Cornwall, the proximity of the ocean is felt even more. In fact, the rains never stop here. That's also why the soil is swampy. But this is not lowland. In the center of Cornwall, where Devon is located, there is a hill, the Dartmouth plateau (600 m above sea level). In modern England, everything above 200 m is a protected area (in Devon, the Dartmoor National Park). Forests have been cut down, animals have been exterminated. There are a thousand cities. The population is tens of millions. The density is high. The industry is highly developed. Hence the importance of such territories. Hundreds of kilometers from the capital, from the ocean, it is really a sparsely populated land, a wilderness. Moreover, on the plateau there are pointed peaks, like fantastic teeth (here it is a huge dog's mouth). The marine climate, rains even in spring. In England, an island between 60 and 50 degrees north latitude, the seasons are different than in Russia: in the Soviet film, Mortimer sees dog tracks in the snow. It never snows in Devon. The action in the novel takes place in late autumn: October-November. But the murder of Sir Charles took place in May. Spring is usually the driest time of the year in England. But not in Devon. There is no snow in winter, but it is cloudy all the time, it rains. The growing season of plants is year-round. Therefore, in the Soviet film adaptation: - Orchids (typically a marsh plant) They haven't bloomed yet. In the text, in fact: Sir Henry arrived too late to really admire the beauty of these places. And Miss Stapleton asks Watson to pick her an orchid flower. But both are equivalent: the flowering time is limited not by the climate, not by the seasons, but by the weather. Stormy winds are blowing from the ocean. If there are no winds, thick fogs are common. Vegetation is sparse. In fact, there are very few trees. It's raining. There are sandy beaches and resort towns on the coast. But in the center the soils are not suitable for agriculture. Although flowers are grown on Scilly: "Dutch" tulips. On the Devon plateau, the agricultural map of England shows places suitable for cattle breeding on natural pastures, and sparsely populated. The text mentions a mine: a mine, and the huts of the miners. But English iron ore is generally of low quality (33% iron), it has never competed with imported, it is said about tin, I have already written about tin earlier. Pastures for sheep farming and cattle breeding are the main sources of wealth in these places. And the cultivation of vegetable crops (but due to the abundance of moisture, not fruits, grapes, etc.)- that's why Cornwall is called the "garden" of England. Some of the few advantages turned out to be available only with the opening of the railway.
The echoes of the usual conflict between the landowner and the peasants in the legend, again, cannot be imagined in the same way as in Russia: serfdom was never widespread in England, and disappeared back in the tenth century. In general, most of English history is the history of the so-called middle classes, for whom he also writes a novel from the history of the baronets - albeit of the lower, but titled nobility and Doyle. The peasantry as such no longer existed in England in Doyle's time. Agriculture is about farms. And with employees. With the lease of land from landowners. Moreover, one farming family has about 100 hectares. That is, a hundred dessiatines or a thousand acres. There is no large game (there are wild ponies, a few deer, but there are no large predators, there are few forests, hence, by the way, in English literature such attention is paid to seemingly small animals: badgers, ferrets, wild goats, rabbits), therefore they hunt otters (there are many rivers), and a breed of dogs is bred for hunting otters - Otterhound. A lot of rivers and swamps-a lot of waterfowl and Dr. Mortimer therefore gets a "curly-haired spaniel", in the text exactly like that, it is clear that the imagination or inattention of the directors forces the use of spaniels, but completely different breeds, in the film adaptation of Maslennikov in the dialogue of Holmes and Watson, even the emphasis is on this: "- So it is cocker?!" In Russia, it is called the "English Cocker spaniel". Rapid economic activity: mining of ore, peat and flooding of production sites, waterlogging of land, or vice versa, draining swamps for pastures, and less waterfowl for hunting - this is the source of possible conflicts, except for land lease, between the landowner and farmers.
And, of course, the main subject of misunderstanding of translators, which I have already noticed: moor. Previously, this main feature of Cornwall was translated into Russian by the ponderous phrase "peat bogs". In modern translations, it is no better: "moorlands". This is all justified, of course, by the fact that there really are no analogues of such a landscape in Russia (artists traditionally go to the seashore, one of them even wandered to Dartmoor, where Laura Frankland married him). Unless the Russian northwest is similar: the Murmansk region.
Just like the Russian spring with the melting of snow, the opening of rivers from ice, it is always a flood, a riot of water, from the murmur of streams to the flooding of forests. And England has the driest time of the year. So the Russian swamps are lowlands, continuous fields of unstable soil, if the swamp is on horseback, then the liquid trunks of the dying forest. In England, moor is, firstly, not lowlands, but on the contrary, in Devon they are located on the Dartmouth plateau, where there is a dependence on altitude above sea level: wastelands on which heather grows, which turns red in summer and colors the entire wasteland, higher hills are interspersed with peatlands that are swampy (peat and it gives instability to the soil), and also rock outcrops - granite peaks (fantastic teeth, and dangerous rocky shores on the west coast). Cornwall is 50 degrees north latitude - and there has never been a glacier here, and this is also the difference from the Russian boundless marshes (remnants of a glacier), and therefore numerous preserved, of course, due to the weak population of places for thousands of years, the dwellings of primitive man.
Doyle writes a story, to summarize, seemingly familiar in Russia: a ruined "noble nest", except with English specifics about a family ghost indicating unclean origin, almost a biblical story of the prodigal son-but the Baskervilles and Stapleton return to Dartmoor from the colonies, and Sir Charles from South Africa, Sir Henry from Canada, the Stapletons from South America. And Doyle is writing a novel... against the background of the Anglo-Boer War, called the "last colonial" (but there will also be Algeria in the 20th century.)a huge colonial empire, where the metropolis is almost an indistinguishable spot on the map, but this is the Homeland-abandoned, abandoned... So is Baskerville Hall. The leitmotif here may be this: the British have conquered the whole world for themselves, but... we lost ourselves in it. The rural wilderness, full of wild superstitions, is the Homeland, the land of the ancestors. And what it can also be... for prodigal sons.
What could be the reasons that Sir Hugo was like that? Or that the brothers quarreled so that their paths in life parted long ago. Here's what I found in Ian Mortimer's book: it's about the means and methods of parenting in families by parents of children in medieval England: "the phrasebook says that "if you have children, whip them with a rod and teach them good manners all the time they are small." Then, the historian recalls that at that time, even a seven-year-old could be hanged for theft, and that the cruelty of upbringing was justified by this: cruel discipline is part of strict moral education. Some men insist that a good father beats children at every opportunity, instilling in them the fear of breaking the law, and condescending fathers violate this parental duty. By the way, corporal punishment in English schools was abolished only in the 20th century. In Doyle's time, they were a tradition and still the norm. It can be assumed that Sir Hugo did not have a father as a child. And the time of action is the end of the 16th century, the English Revolution suggests a historical reason as possible. The same goes for the Baskerville brothers in the 19th century. It is obvious that they grew up without paternal care. And that's why they didn't really know each other (Sir Henry had never been to Baskerville Hall as a child, because his father lived in a cottage on the coast and never visited the estate), and therefore Stapleton stepped on a slippery slope (obviously, Stapleton's father died early, as well however, Sir Henry, in his mother's second marriage, he ended up in Canada).
In Cronin's novel, truly terrible without horror and ghosts, in the new traditions of realism, but where there is also a family, a clan, a claim to a manor house, especially for an Englishman "my house is my fortress", there is a whole dramatic scene: where a father expels an unmarried pregnant daughter from the house, and giving birth a daughter, and in a storm, strong for a hundred years, and there this girl almost dies, and because of the wind breaking trees, and almost drowns in a river, then in a swamp, and eventually gives birth to a child in a stable. The finale, although the child did not survive, of course refers to the Christian theme. But the whole scene forces us to take a different look at the legend told in Doyle's novel: there is also a girl there, and she died in the swamp, on the way to her father's house, from where Hugo was abducted, who died due to the fault of a hellhound that arose in the swamp, which became the curse of the Baskervilles. What if this legend allegorically conveys the real story: Hugo fathered a child from a farmer's daughter, whom his father refused because of this dishonor, and the illegitimate child became a pretender and a disgrace to the Baskervilles. Curiously, Brody's pride, which forced him to expel his own daughter, was fueled by his fantasies that he was a relative of the local ducal family.
Illegitimate, by the way, in the 19th century it was also a child in the actual marriage of the parents, but for one reason or another unconsecrated by the church and therefore invalid, this is not at all the same as in the 20th century. marriage, not even registered in the registry office, especially a modern "civil marriage". Although formally all this is concubination -"cohabitation", known even in Ancient Rome, and illegitimate children are known to be children born outside of any form of cohabitation: from a mistress or lover, between non-married and non-cohabiting people. Illegitimate and illegitimate are not the same thing at all. Both are united only in the fact that, as a rule, if they were not given the share of recognition more often by their father, mother, or by one of their relatives more often than their father, mother, then the position of these children was not enviable, since they did not inherit their legitimate parents (although before genetics, the fact of legality in the biological sense of the birth of such and such a person from such and such was so doubtful that, for example, in the tradition of the French court, in order to exclude the phenomena of turmoil, strife, wars dangerous for the whole country, the nobility witnessed not only the wedding of monarchs, but also the act of love and the birth of heirs). From this point of view, illegitimate people are all born when a church marriage had no legal force, and in modern Russia such a concept cannot be just because the church crowns only couples registered at the registry office. And the assignment of the title of baronet in Collins' novel was not a consequence of his father's absent-mindedness, but difficulties still obviously with the church consecration of marriage, for example, with different faiths of the spouses.
Like thousands of small farmers, peasants from Germany, Iceland, Ireland, and England emigrated from Europe to the USA and Canada for centuries in search of a better life, so did the Baskervilles. The best dole and need. The reason is the disorder in the family, the consequence is the disintegration and impoverishment of the whole family. So somewhere this adventure novel is about this, about the same as the story of the Golovlev family, told by Saltykov-Shchedrin, as well as Tolstoy's parable of the brothers. At the beginning of the novel, the mysterious death of a descendant of the Baskervilles, who returned with a million to his ancestral homeland in order to revive the estate, at the end of the novel, the discovery: that this is a nephew hiding himself under a false name, a criminal who is responsible for the death of his uncle and wove a network to kill his cousin, and all not even because of the estate, but the capital accumulated by his uncle somewhere in the colonies, where he himself comes from. This is a sad story of emigrants trying to return and revive everything, including I... old feuds.
The Baskervilles could have originally been farmers, back in the 17th century. during the English Revolution, after the suppression of the uprising in Ireland, the Cromwell government distributed even small and medium-sized farmers of land in the conquered country. Of course, it's not the same, but Doyle makes the manor house a Tudor building. Henry Tudor became king after the end of the dynastic War of the Roses, during which the English nobility exterminated each other. Both the rival dynasties of York and Lancaster themselves lost contenders and, as a result, the crown went to a subsidiary branch of the Tudors. Why shouldn't Baskerville, being a farmer, but who took part in the war, receive an estate as a reward, maybe even with a tin mine operating at that time. By the way, in the 70s of the last century, when England resumed the extraction of tin ore, a quarter of it was mined at only 4 mines in Cornwall, as I noted earlier. But in Tudor times, the main wealth of these places was natural pastures for sheep and cows: in the mountains, peat bogs and moorlands were used as natural meadows.
And, after the Baskervilles, if they had not quarreled with each other over the estate, or politics, or religious issues, if the port city of Bristol had not been close, from where the colonies seemed so close with their seemingly quick and easy opportunities for enrichment, the estate, the lands belonging to them, could have been a solid source of income and fortress, wealth families. First, tin ore. Secondly, peat: since there are peat bogs on the territory of the Baskervilles' possessions, then there is his untold wealth-and peat is the main type of fuel at that and much later time. Thirdly, sheep farming and even weaving factories. Fourthly, dairy farming is in the foothills, Dartmouth ponies still live in the wild, a breed of cows was bred in Devon, these lands were not suitable for agriculture, but there were opportunities for animal husbandry, which means in the future: butter and cheese. Fifthly and sixth, vegetable growing (nearby in Wales is an agricultural area of Great Britain, potatoes are grown on the London market) and floriculture ("orchids have not bloomed yet", and the Island of Scilly with "Dutch" tulips near Cornwall). Seventh, forests were usually planted on the slopes of the plateau at an altitude above 200 m in England in order to obtain wood. And eighth, today there is a national park in these places, so there were opportunities for tourism (and the Tudor manor is also an attraction in itself, for this you can start a rumor about a family legend). And ninth, even hunting is possible, if there is a forest, then why not turn it into hunting grounds. Tenth: peat bogs or moorlands could also be drained for agricultural purposes, and forage crops could be grown (nearby livestock farms). Eleventh, in Scotland, where there are plateaus and hills with granite outcrops among the mountains, granite is mined.
So, a Tudor manor house, a forest (a yew alley grows), that is, wood, hunting grounds, game in the end. And everything above the forest boundary: mountain sheep farms, dairy farms of the foothills, moorlands and peat bogs for pastures, ferns grow higher. And there are minerals everywhere: granite, tin and peat. Decades later, in the 20th century, peat remained the main fuel in rural areas of the British Isles. If there are peat bogs all around. London, by the way, was very close when the railway appeared. And nearby there is a picturesque coast and resort towns. By the way, the railway in England is the very first in the world, but in the 20th century. it is inferior to road transport and communications (more widespread and more accessible), even part of the former railway tracks (tens of thousands of km) is being removed, and in the 70s, just a few decades ago, 20% was only electrified.
But, the Baskervilles, as we can judge from the portrait gallery, served the crown, although they were in opposition to the kings, and scattered to the colonies, turning (and then not all, maybe even only Sir Charles) into nouveau riche, no matter how the local newspaper criticized them, lamenting and separating Baskerville, but Stapleton's main object of desire was not an old manor house with an unfinished "gatehouse", land with rare small farms, sparsely populated, an abandoned old tin mine where he keeps a dog, or peat bogs with butterflies and moths, or orchids, among other things, the subject of genuine interest to him and his wife, the manor house with only 4 servants and only its own crew, and not even a title, but a fantastic capital for that time, especially about a million pounds sterling. Another thing is the legitimate heir- Sir Henry, who was a farmer in Canada. Although it is not noticeable in the text that he was strongly inspired by his work, but he was busy with a love affair and mysterious threats, a curse of the kind, which in a strange way... It did not follow the Baskervilles overseas to Africa or America, although as I have already noticed, it is not clear what made Sir Charles return to England. The Baskervilles are the main characters of the novel, despite the fact that the novel begins when Sir Charles is not there, the main ones, not by chance the name, like most family sagas coming out at that time, but not the only ones, there are actually many "secondary", but clearly not random, characters in the novel. This is discussed in the second part of the chapter about the characters of the work and the possible historical background behind their appearance. But let the novel differ from the stories and novels in the Holmes cycle in that Holmes is not the main character in it, but it is difficult to perceive the novel outside of his figure, which is also central in its own way. Therefore, first, the continuation of the description of the main characters. Next in line is the great detective, whose occupation gave the name to one of the most numerous works published in the 20th century. the whole genre of detective literature.
Crime, Detectives and police
Any detective cannot be separated from crimes, this is what makes him a detective, and what confused Watson himself when he met Holmes. To better understand the atmosphere of the novel, it is necessary to tell that the Victorian era in England is also the time of the heyday of art, science, and industry, but it is also the time and in connection with this (of course, by occupation, and not the heyday associated with this) unheard-of crimes: the sanctimonious morality of the Victorian time led to the appearance of baby-farming, when she is unable to feed, find a job, a single mother condemned by society and the state, and even gave birth out of wedlock according to newspaper ads (this is the heyday of the media, newspaper business, the Times, which Holmes spoke so enthusiastically about, and we remember that the Times wrote about the colonies) sold the baby, allegedly paying nannies who undertook to find "foster parents", and on this basis infanticides appeared, the most famous among them is Amelia Dyer, executed in London in 1896, the press wrote a lot about her black case, the same when with which she bought up victims by deceiving mothers, and Doyle couldn't help but know about it. This is the time of the so-called anatomical murders, when the heyday of medicine could not be limited to legally permitted autopsies only of executed criminals, and at the University of Edinburgh, the same one where Doyle then studied and it turns out he also could not help but know this story, the surgeon Knox worked, who, in addition to the fame of a racist, became even more famous for his connections with "anatomical killers" Burke and Hare (from the name of the first in English, strangulation by chest compression is called the verb burking)- they killed their victims in order to sell them to unscrupulous doctors, who used the bodies to study and teach students. This is a time when the fame of an anthropologist for posterity does not always look decent due to the spread of the philosophy of racism, social Darwinism, but in general, anthropologists could "dig in graves" for the same purpose as anatomical killers to sell bodies for unscrupulous doctors. In this regard, the figure of Dr. Mortimer, modestly refusing to be called a doctor, and the story in which the lawyer Frankland accuses Mortimer of illegal exhumation looks different. Moreover, Doyle not only knew about this side of the profession (he is a doctor himself), but also directly left information that he knows about it (as well as his contemporaries, of course, the first readers of the novel), in one of the first stories about Holmes "Motley Ribbon": "when a doctor commits a crime, He is more dangerous than all other criminals. He has strong nerves and great knowledge. Palmer and Pritchard were the best specialists in their field. This man is very cunning, but I hope, Watson, that we will be able to outwit him. We have a lot of terrible things to go through tonight, and therefore, please, let's calmly light our pipes for now and spend these few hours talking about something more fun." Of course, the modern era knows that even today there are still maniacs-doctors and nurses, but the mentioned Palmer and Pritchard were murderous doctors at a time when the profession itself was rare (Pritchard even, like Mortimer, wrote articles for medical journals). In this regard, again, the figure of Dr. Mortimer does not look at all as charming and funny as in the Soviet film adaptation performed by the actor Steblov- Mortimer, at least called "strange" in the novel. At least Dr. Watson was a military doctor, but we were just talking about him, what is a military doctor in the colonies. And how the local population treated him, especially the rebels. The surgeon's assistant was the only one who was wounded, scalped in fact, but survived, in the retreat of the British garrison from Kabul to Jalalabad during the First Afghan War. It was a time when art itself was ambiguously criminal, as evidenced by the cycle of paintings of the so-called Murder in Camden Town by the artist Sickert. All the paintings depict a naked woman and a woefully dressed man with his arms crossed. The paintings are given ambiguous, even playful names: "Summer afternoon, or What should we do to pay the rent?"And that's how it would all look if it weren't for the facts that made it possible to suspect that Sickert killed his models, and in general was either a friend or Jack the Ripper himself. But in the early 20th century. Sickert was considered a respected artist. His familiarity with the details of the crimes (how not to recall Watson's suspicions about Holmes himself in the circumstances of the acquaintance) was explained by the permission of the police to attend the investigative actions "for creative purposes." While later it was suspected that for the artist himself it was necessary to explain the presence of his fingerprints at the crime scene. Needless to say, the most famous crime mystery of that time remains the mystery of the murder of prostitutes in Victorian London by a murderer who was never found - the so-called Jack the Ripper, the Queen's son himself was named among the later suspects. And finally, what is Selden-a brutal killer whose sister is the housekeeper at Baskerville Hall, the swamps around and the mysterious hunt for the baronets of the supposedly family monster. But this is now, later it began to be perceived by readers as a fantastic entourage, no, at that time the very need for at least a fictional Holmes, to uncover the secrets of crimes that were commonplace, the "banality of evil", because the queen herself was called by her honorary prisoner from India "The Great Old Criminal", the appearance of such a literary detective it was a necessity.
Mr. Sherlock Holmes
The English address mister means that a person does not have any title, the word mister is accurately translated into Russian, but the English mister also sounds, after all, we are talking about an Englishman. There is something surprisingly different here, the title of the chapter has obviously remained since the first magazine publication of the novel, otherwise it somewhat contradicts the meaning: the novel appeared 8 years later, after Doyle wrote the last novel about Holmes, several chapters in the novel have nominal names, and in the first chapter the reader gets acquainted, of course, not with Holmes, but with James Mortimer, about whom Watson and Holmes have been trying to find out something from the first lines of the novel before a personal meeting.
Compositionally, in general, the first chapter of the novel is similar to the original, but the forewarning to the reader in the plays: through Mortimer's story, through his dialogues with Watson and Holmes, we immediately get acquainted with the main characters, and through Holmes's study of the map, we also get to know the location of the novel.
The time of action in the novel 1889 is the inscription on Mortimer's cane in 1884, and then Holmes says: 5 years have passed, more precisely-September 1889, because Mortimer takes out a newspaper from June of the same year, with the results of the investigation into the mysterious death of Sir Charles, the murder occurred on June 4 – Mortimer himself says this.
In the 1948 translation, the cane is not quite aptly called a stick, the English phrase is elegantly bypassed by the use of the phrase "strong evidence".
The ring with the engraving on the cane is about an inch –Thumbelina-then the edge of the Mortimer manuscript is two inches–2.5 cm inch.
In fact, Holmes demonstrates the exact opposite of what he calls "very sound reasoning" - it is much more likely that Mortimer would have erased the cane in the city, where paving was everywhere then, than in the village. Holmes boasts that his method allows him to unravel even the most difficult cases without leaving the room, but we will study the scene in more detail in the novel, especially since in the end, in this novel, Holmes still goes personally to the scene, and even incognito.
The cane was obviously suitable as a gift for walking in that area: hilly marshes.
Attention is drawn to the title of Mortimer's articles "Abnormal phenomena of atavism", "Are we progressing?" - in the novel, too, at first we are talking about superstition, about an ancient legend that suddenly comes to life.
Dissonant with the entire description and dialogues of Holmes, his "indifference" is the pathetic anticipation of Mortimer's appearance: "here it is a fateful moment, Watson! You hear footsteps on the stairs, these steps break into your life, but whether they bring with them good or evil is unknown. What did a man of science, Dr. James Mortimer, need from the detective Sherlock Holmes… Come in."
Reasoning about the Holmes skull is a tribute to Lambroso's theory, then considered the last word of science, that a criminal can be recognized by appearance, in particular by the structure of the skull-it is curious that the description of Holmes' skull corresponded to the type of criminal in the Lambroso handbook.
There is a discrepancy with the pedigree of the author of the manuscript: he calls himself a direct descendant of Hugo, his name is Hugo, but this is clearly not his portrait then, because the manuscript is dated twice-first by Holmes (and he thereby certifies its authenticity-that it was not forged, planted by Stapleton, and therefore the legend of the dog is real, but actually this is the whole idea of Stapleton, even Sir Henry, who has never been to Baskerville Hall, which is called the castle in the manuscript, has heard something about it), then how it is signed: 1740s, portrait of Hugo -the same-1640s, if you make simple calculations, then the author of the manuscript could not be too distant a descendant of Hugo, although he names his father and then his grandfather-not saying that one of them was Hugo, although Hugo could be the grandfather of the author of the manuscript: the author wrote it being obviously not young, to his sons, say he was born in 1680, in 1740s he is 60, his father was born in 1640, and in turn his grandfather in 1600, although it may well be that Hugo is a great-grandfather.
A few more words about Hugo's offspring: it can be said for sure that the Baskervilles, who were under the curse, were not descendants of the kidnapped farmer's daughter, but if Hugo had descendants, and he also died in the swamps then, then he was already married, had children, and if he decided to kidnap a girl to marry her to himself By force, then he was a widower, and God only knows what his wife's fate was.
The distance from Baskerville Hall to the girl's house is three miles-a mile-1.6 km, so 3 miles is almost 5 km-not close, the farmer's land lay close to the estate, not so close, it is obvious that this is the tenant of another landowner-according to feudal law, Hugo of course trespassed.
They saw the shepherd after driving a mile or two-while chasing through the swamps- in the same novel, Frankland will argue with Watson about Cartwright-they say whether this is the shepherd's son-what shepherds are in the swamps-it is obvious that this figure is just as supernatural, this is an angel warning Hugo's friends-a shepherd herding his flock- this is also the image of the Savior.
The friends are then called squires –drunken squires.
A pack that has long been famous for the purity of the breed and ferocity.
The newspaper in the novel is clearly opposed to the manuscript.
Sir Charles is named in it as the candidate of the Liberal Party.
He is called childless, a widower, a man with oddities – in general, he is called hospitable, previously sober-minded.
Sir Henry is named the son of the middle (unnamed) brother, so Stapleton is the son of the youngest (there were three brothers in total).
The incident occurred three weeks before the tragic event-wild ponies still live in Dartmoor, previously about questions about barking dogs-and then –"quite a lot of shepherds."
Footprints-footsteps
Yew alley-gravel path-about eight feet –turf on the sides-six feet on each side-and thus twenty feet wide-by the way, in the original both measures of length and footprints –foot, footprints,-foot 30 cm, - the path is 2 m40 cm, the turf strips are almost 2 m, and together 6 m –the width of the alley is decent-two gates to the marshes, one entrance is an alley to the house, the other to the gazebo, where there is a second gate-Sir Charles did not reach it 50 steps, he ran exactly in the direction of the house, confused immediately but, frightened, where he could least seek salvation -as Holmes notes, this, in addition to the strange boot prints, indicates panic terror -then, by the way, the story of the shoes-in the novel, the title is a hound –that is, a tracking dog, Holmes is also a tracker detective, traces of a huge dog were seen thirty paces from the body The old landowner, near the first gate, in the middle of the alley-it can be assumed that the entire alley is about 100 steps-approximately -the length of the step of course depends on many factors: gender, height, weight, figure, clothes, etc.-
The length of a person's step directly depends on their height, gender and clothing. Men have a longer step than women (with equal height). For short people, it is shorter than for tall ones (it is clear that because of the length of the legs). And also for the same person, the step may differ due to the clothes he is wearing, so if a woman wears a narrow skirt, then her step will be shorter than she would walk in sweatpants or wide trousers. The average walking step length can vary from 70 cm to 85 cm. And when running, the step length can increase to one meter or more.
But on average from 70 to 85 cm - so the length of the alley can be 70-85 meters-is quite decent, with a width of 6 meters -although it is not indicated on the most detailed map, despite the fact that it is very old – yews grow slowly.
The height of the gate is small.
The shoes, by the way, gave Holmes the idea at once that the dog was real and that this murder, disguised not even as an accident, but as a superstition –the curse of the Baskervilles.
Roger was a black sheep-he allegedly died in Central America in 1876 -Stapleton was either his son, maybe out of wedlock, and therefore could not act openly, hunting for the Baskervilles inheritance, or even Roger himself-what age Stapleton is unknown.
Mortimer did not ask for an investigation, he almost believed in the legend himself, but turned to Holmes as an unsurpassed practitioner, being not a practical person –he forgot his cane after waiting for an hour without leaving a business card, obviously a man not so brave to walk around the swamps –doctors can be called at night, and although the dog it's family, so to speak, but who knows: Mortimer's neighbor, a blacksmith and a farmer saw it, and according to Holmes' joke, which caused Mortimer's censure, it's unlikely that the devil has a narrow jurisdiction, but he turned to Holmes for advice, because he turned out to be the owner of the manuscript once, and there were two witnesses to the strange prints, and all the Baskervilles who lived in the manor ended tragically -three, and he was interested in making the estate inhabited-four, but not risking the heir-five.
Baskerville Hall –ivy still twists from the 17th century, surrounded by forest.
The marshes are on the right, the yew alley parallel to them is on the right.
The small group of buildings –the village of Grimpen-in which Mortimer lives, his wife is probably from the locals, never appears in the novel, but because of her, Dr. Mortimer left the London clinic and career.
For five miles-that is, for 8 km –housing is very rare.
14 miles from the farms is the Princetown Convict Prison (which still exists)-that is, 22 kilometers away –and between and around are bleak, lifeless swamps –wild places -according to Watson.
The scene–precisely the scene-is both the beginning of the action in the play and a hint at the staging of the legend can be -"furnished as well as possible"-according to Holmes.
Stapleton, in order to simulate an accidental murder, under the influence of a legend, does not plan the murder himself, but for this he gets a dog that he keeps in the swamp-the most ferocious, but he sort of entrusts his will to kill to a dog, which really embodies his desire to kill the Baskervilles. The dog from the legend embodies fate, fate, doom, but in fact the dog is not the Baskervilles, but Stapleton is only the personification of his personal desire and will-according to Ivanov Vyach. Ivanov Vyach.Dostoevsky and the Tragedy Novel//Ivanov Vyach.The faces and disguises of Russia. Aesthetics and literary theory.-M., 1995.: "If a person remains outside of God, then his will, unknown to himself, is the Rock that owns him, he could destroy himself," for Ivanov, the "I" that has fallen into evil has the nature of the multiple will of the demonic legion.
Stapleton is the center of the novel, the mover, there is no plot without his black will, but does Holmes destroy his plans? He does not act actively, even in the finale he is embedded in the development of Stapleton's plan, having previously solved it through observing the women surrounded by Stapleton, a planned rational crime, with all the imitation of an irrational crime, is violated by feelings: the love of Miss Stapleton and Sir Henry, and jealousy, a sense of betrayal on the part of Stapleton, Laura Lyons, who loves him.
Does Stapleton himself believe in the legend? A paradoxical question: one can answer believes in a legend, that is, just like Holmes, who solves crimes because he himself is close to criminals in terms of type of thinking and, according to Lambroso's theory, not only in terms of type of thinking.
In the novel, almost all hunters are pursuers and hunted: Stapleton for the Baskervilles, Miss Stapleton for Sir Henry, Sir Henry for Miss Stapleton, Sir Henry and Watson for Barrymore, the police for Seldon, Holmes for Stapleton, Laura Lyons for Stapleton. The hounds are the dogs of the goddess of Night.
The Angel of Music in The Phantom of the Opera, compare it to Nietzsche's The Spirit of Music. Nietzsche is known for being a misanthrope and misogynist, a bachelor, in addition to being a great philosopher, at least by influence, not always favorable, and a maxim about the whip and the woman. Stapleton was helped in his case, or rather, the ladies should have helped.
Laura Lyons, Miss Stapleton-both married women in the novel write letters to bachelors.
Mr. Frankland is also not as simple as it seems: a gentleman who has become stupefied in old age, who has descended to the point that he throws his daughter out of the house, and is leading a law suit for no reason.
What is the reason for his daughter Laura's divorce? Divorces were difficult, but why does she need funds to get a divorce? Why did her father kick her out of the house?
What kind of man is her husband, the artist Lyons? Artists usually came to Devonshire to paint sketches from nature, but to the seashore, to the south.
The image of a detective is inseparable from the image of a criminal, his vis-a-vis: Holmes and Stapleton, and unlike Holmes' shunning sorority, his vis-a-vis acts with the help of the ladies around him.
Romanticism opened the intimate world of a simple "little" man, who replaced the epic heroes and ... was horrified.//Skonechnaya O. Russian paranoid novel: F.Sologub,A.Bely,V.Nabokov.-M.,2015. pp.64-70
A real "bear corner" is when from the window of any house you can see not the neighboring house, not the city or even the village, but the swamps.
The ordinary fear of a metropolitan resident, a city dweller in front of a "poor and dark" province-although after the story of Jack the Ripper it would seem difficult to scare a reader – a resident of London with a monster, even if a hundred kilometers from his house, the story was probably forgotten or was a cliche of literature-a castle, a ghost, a forest thicket, swamps, a monster.
But there are other topics: the origin of evil-transcendentally or rationally it can be explained, evil in general – materially or not, what is our world-Schopenhauer, who is the progenitor of evil-is it how Christian-in this case, Victorian morality-teaches the theme of returning to life-a Christian motive-but Nietzscheanism-doom to repeat the suffering-Stapleton seeks to take advantage of the legend-the family ghost-but repeats the fate of Hugo –although his father already resembled Hugo in everything.
Gothic, horror does not contradict romanticism at all, on the contrary: the dark mystery in "Jane Eyre", outright horror in such melodramas as "Wuthering Heights", "Rebecca", "The Headless Horseman", "The Scarlet Letter", "Sleepy Hollow", so these are usually the authors of romantic, sentimental prose In itself, this does not mean entertaining literature, for entertainment: "Notre Dame de Paris" by Hugo, "Gobseck" by Balzac, "Hamlet" by Shakespeare (the author of "Romeo and Juliet"), less well-known in Russia "Loki" with, of course, the well-known Merime. But in "The Dog ..." the horror is just being debunked, and there is no melodrama-the love story of neither Stapleton nor Sir Henry ends in nothing for either Lyons or Stapleton's sister-wife, although in the Holmes cycle you can find this: the story of Watson's marriage (how romantically outstanding is another question) or, about the king of Bohemia (the only character who solved Holmes turned out to be a woman-Irene Adler), of course there are colonies in the cycle: "Motley Ribbon", and treasures – "Treasures of Agra", moreover, the cycle began with a completely romantic story-not "Vanina Vanini", or "Red and Black" by Stendhal, but "A Study in crimson tones" is about nothing but revenge for stolen love: "do you remember Lucy Ferrier"- "The Dog ..." is a more sober work in this sense, where horror not only turns out to be profane (but also without disappointment for the reader), but also does not become romantic – in this sense of course, Russian literature also has examples of the gloomy Dostoevsky, and the "Ghoul" by A.K. Tolstoy, of course, and Gogol's prose, which is much more advanced in the sense of horror than the German romantics, and Gogol also relied on folklore, Ukrainian, horror is in "The Queen of Spades", and in "The Bronze Horseman", and in Pushkin's "Stone Guest", but Aksakov's "Scarlet Flower" is, of course, a fairy tale, but isn't romanticism in Germany beginning with the collection of folklore: the brothers Grimm (and nationalism-as Steblin wrote about, saying that romantics discovered the inner world of man, contradictions in it, feelings, fears, wasn't it horrified that any person is contradictory, there is a struggle between Good and Evil in him) , and it is no coincidence that all this literature, in most cases, is quite close to the theory of Steblin, just to a person in childhood, in adolescence, and this also shows it as part of romantic prose, so one could say, that Doyle and "The Dog..." is romantic prose, of course, and yet it differs, but not in its entertaining, shabby presentation, but in its irony, which hides a critical view and not of a young writer-to what extent time is to blame here-the end of Victorian England, and to what extent the writer's personality matures (also in reinforcement of Steblin's theory of social and individual development), or both combined.
But in any case, fear is a feeling, a strong feeling, love experiences also know it well, and therefore it would be strange if romanticism did not try to explore it (by artistic means): horror is an integral part of romantic literature, in "Dog ..." fear has just such a character-not criminal, but mystically colored, although in other novels about Holmes there are these intertwinings, which makes, for all the classics of Doyle's detectives, not detectives, which are full of epigon literature, which sought to develop just a mind game, which, as you know, overshadows the senses, as on the contrary, we can say that with regard to the prose that preceded the appearance of Holmes-yes, he is a calculating machine, a robot, a computer, as they would say today, but Watson is scared and surprised for him, because he has the features of a complementary partner, as if they were a couple-this is not a joke, Holmes scholars hypotheses have also been put forward that Watson is not a man, but a woman (it is not clear how he or she could have married then, etc.), and the reader, no matter how much he admired the detective's analytical abilities, is most often unable to unravel it, and he identifies himself precisely with Watson-the narrator, through his eyes and words, we readers know about Holmes and admire him, for all his Watson's completely devoid of the ability to think, and therefore, by the way, laugh, it is known that a sense of humor is inseparable from the development of intelligence, just as there is no real feeling of love without fear. But Doyle grew up when he wrote this prose, and therefore is cynical: he makes Stapleton's sister-wife agree to this ambiguity, yes, she loves her husband (and is afraid), and then falls in love with Sir Henry (and begins to be afraid of another, and loses fear of her husband, but along with love for him she begins to hate him), he invents a rural lady of dubious reputation, makes her Stapleton's mistress, connects them, - an interesting life in this wilderness: a maniac criminal, cunningly trying to resurrect an ancient curse of his own kind, and a passionate woman, a victim deceived by her husband and then her lover (and who said that it doesn't happen, and Doyle is a "banal storyteller", and all this literature is "entertaining no more than a crossword puzzle") Doyle's cynicism obviously leads him to the idea of profaning the legendary monster, because in the legend it is real, that is, no one has debunked it, and Holmes, as we know, arises in the course of the development of the novel, the drama of which was given, according to Doyle, by his co-author, a younger one, although his profession would seem all the more cynical (he is a journalist, and even a military man, and even at a time when England is waging war in the colonies, just where the author or authors return Sir Charles and Stapleton to Baskerville Hall, not to mention the origin of wealth, and the established type a criminal, one and the other, as well as about what reason made all three Baskerville brothers leave Devonshire one day, and fate scattered them all over the world -of course, and there seemed to be no limits for the British Empire then).
Sentimentalism opened the little man to realism –it took over the inner world-feelings from romanticism and made instead of the previous novel-where the characters were Manichean-the arena of the struggle between good and evil, the very soul of the most ordinary person-of course not in the class sense-after all, these are works for an educated society, where the most ordinary people take the place of third-rate characters- they are either nameless, or very little attention has been paid to them, they cannot yet be genuine heroes, moreover, Holmes still bears the features of a romantic hero-an unattainable superman, in many ways, a folklore hero-that is, literally an epic hero who cannot be imitated and empathized with too-but he is not the main character-his function is no more than the "god from the machine" in an ancient play.
Romanticism, sentimentalism is not yet realism, but also symbolism, - they no longer make a topic of the struggle of a man, maybe even a saint with the devil's power, after the secularization of consciousness after the French Revolution, the progress of science, but they are still unable to see evil much more terrible than superstition, as in the novels of Dickens, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Cronin, they are not yet able to make fun of the weaknesses and fears of the layman, as in the short stories by Chekhov, Averchenko, and the novels of Kestner, but there was not yet the First World War, the 20th century, having stopped paying attention to the central characters of religion, they are unable to part with the remnants of an older paganism, partly this is naturalism, and of course, Romanticism again with its pantheistic deification or spiritualization of the forces of nature, having become disillusioned with Christianity, these authors certainly cannot forget the theme of eternal life, the return to life, symptomatically depicted outside the central theme of Christianity in the form of tragic werewolf, the eternal but pathetic life of a vampire, but in Doyle's novel this serves as the main theme-an attempt at rationalistic explanations.
A person who has already become not an object of the struggle of dark and light forces, but who himself has become a contradictory figure, although the problem of the origin of evil – whether it comes from a person or from the outside remains, but is just solved aside that it depends on the person, but in general a person – before the genocide, the world wars of the 20th century, still not the devil himself, he can be blinded by madness like Seldon and only in this state capable of brutal murder, or greed like Stapleton, acting surreptitiously, weaving a complex scheme of crime, and remaining pathologically criminal in origin-as in the theory of Lambroso-criminal you can tell by appearance-which is what Holmes practically does-by recognizing in the portrait resemblance to Hugo Baskerville in Stapleton, just one step further to the heroes of Cronin-where evil lurks in the terrible but ordinary nature of an ordinary man in the street, who is not possessed by either madness or the devil, the history of the Holocaust has shown in reality that neither the origin nor any special vices explain the monstrous crimes committed by ordinary people -for ideological reasons, even without motives of personal hatred or self-interest, all previous literature could not know such a Person -it believed in Man, castigated him for his ability to turn others into slaves but she could not imagine the industrial destruction of children, the elderly, and women with the help of a bureaucratic, technically debugged system, Dickens used elements of Gothic, but to depict much more terrible, although there are ordinary things-social injustice, however, Dickens could not know how banal evil in a person can be-in the sense that Arendt characterized it, but as demonstrated by Nazi criminals, the same Eichmann at the trial in Israel: here we can say such an evolution in the depiction of evil in a person-from a "Monk" Lewis, through the novels of Shelley, Stoker to the novel of Doyle, to the novels of Dickens, Cronin and the terrible reality of the 20th century, which made us doubt not only that science certainly benefits man, what a contrast with the novels of Verne are the novels of Wells, Stevenson, - but also to doubt the very concept of humanism is from the word man.
The story of Laura Lyons may very well resemble the story of another Laura, Laura Lady Glyde from Collins' novel.
Here we are helped by the technique described by the actress who played Laura Lyons in Maslennikov's film, Alla Demidova. She said that when she played the role of Chekhov, she tried to understand the image of her heroine, interpreting any detail, so from the mention that in Paris she lived on the upper floors, and knowing that at that time bohemians loved to live in apartments with attics: artists, actors, she thought out the details of the image. Of course, Laura Lyons is hardly an equally complex image, but the method itself is very interesting for literary analysis, besides it involves the study of history.
Mrs. Stapleton apparently wrote an anonymous letter to Sir Henry (this is what Holmes says in the final chapter), what were the reasons to hide her name? Of course, there are many of them. And first of all, safety from the threat from the criminal husband. But the modern reader may not catch another one of the many: it was also not decent to write to a woman, especially a married woman to a man, especially a bachelor and a stranger. And as we know, England is a country where manners and etiquette were highly appreciated. In the 19th century. correspondence was considered inappropriate even between engaged but not yet married young people. Although, of course, they wrote.
The novel also reflected the mood in the dynamically changing world of the late 19th century. Nostalgia for old England with its haunted castles, to history intensified.
And therefore about conventions that are collapsing, but nostalgically attractive.
With the change of the historical and cultural context, a work of literature may be of interest as a source for a historian, of course, but it can become a classic from mass literature, just for example because after decades of a rapidly changing world, now we find some charm for the good old days -"good old England" as they say.
The English education system has always been based on the ability to control oneself, and the manners and etiquette of the nobility should also serve this. Of course, the nobility should have succeeded in the art of self-control, this was not condescendingly required of people of the lower class: now the reader will pay attention again to the verbal duel between Holmes and Stapleton immediately after the discovery of Seldon's body, described with admiration by both Watson. The novel of the 20th century is devoted to the same thing - manners, etiquette, and eventually self-control, "the ability to control oneself". moreover, it was written by an Englishman of foreign origin and called "the most English" - "At the end of the day" by Ishiguro. We find the same thing in Doyle's novel. Austen's novel is about the same thing-drinking a young, inexperienced girl from the provincial wilderness, appearing for the first time in society, not knowing the rules of good manners, manners, conventions of social behavior. To imagine an English novel without this is probably as ridiculous as an English novel without English humor (subtle or ironic, mocking, including over oneself with wordplay, sitcom, masks-in the novel everyone hides, including Holmes and even Watson: "that's right, caution above all" -their own a person who constantly gets into trouble: even Sir Henry falls in love with... a married woman whom her husband passes off to everyone as... my sister, being... they are completely different from each other, although there is little comedy in this, there is just more danger).
In search of a Victorian artist who would depict realistically the everyday life surrounding him, I came across an author whom I almost believed, but he painted genre paintings as if from the lives of people of the 18th century. And then I thought: we may not see anything unusual, but in painting, in the literature of previous centuries, it was customary to push back what was told in the past, it was customary to depict paintings on biblical, ancient subjects, and in Doyle's time, writers were no longer afraid to tell contemporaries about modernity, and Doyle also mystified the story Doyle's entire literary device was based on telling a story in such a way that it would be believed.
All romantic literature is closely linked to an interest in history. Moreover, starting with Cervantes' novel Don Quixote, we see a profanation of the medieval worldview, including superstitions, and in a couple of the main characters it is not difficult to recognize the prototypes of the same knight and his rustic squire. Holmes is called a gentleman in the novel, and perhaps Holmes, or rather Doyle, is more than anyone else obliged to spread this social type outside of England.
And if the world owes Russia the concept of the intelligentsia as not every educated or intellectual person, but a person for whom the common good is higher than the personal, and who is unselfish - this is in the age of the development of capitalism, then England has developed its own attractive social type, this is a gentleman.
And Holmes is one of the prime examples. But is he really a gentleman? Holmes, as can be seen from the first novel about him, works as a consultant. His method of deduction allows him not to leave his room at all to unravel the most difficult, baffling detectives investigating the area, in addition, he obviously moonlights in the chemical laboratory of the hospital. But for the novel, he only pretends to stay in London, in fact sacrificing comfort by settling in Cum Tracy and even spending time in a cave. As for the characterization given by him to Stapleton, in the very acquaintance with readers, Holmes complains that criminals have become all artless, his method of deduction is often not needed, even any dilettante can investigate (this is the background on which Stapleton appears). At the same time, he is harsh (Stapleton bluntly says that they are simple people in the swamps).
By the way, his gallantry cannot be verified -he practically does not communicate with women.
The letter was written at the hotel and sent to Sir Henry at the hotel.
The Northumberland Hotel. Notting Hill was a quiet residential area where a significant proportion of the London middle class lived.
Northumberland is a county in the east of England, but also in the east of Canada, where Sir Henry came from.
In the first chapter, Holmes and Watson talk about Mortimer (and the dog). Soon Mortimer materializes (along with a dog - a "curly-haired spaniel"). Mortimer tells Holmes and Watson the legend, the circumstances of Sir Charles's death (and about the Baskervilles' dog) And about Sir Henry. Soon Sir Henry materializes. Sir Henry brings a letter from a stranger. Soon a stranger in a cab materializes. Then Watson, Sir Henry and Mortimer (with the dog, and Doyle mentions that Watson is playing on the road with the doctor's spaniel) go to Baskerville Hall. Barrymore materializes. The text of the novel is still being deduced: Holmes and Mortimer. And without mentioning, stories and conversations, as if out of the blue (Watson even confuses Mortimer at first) Stapleton falls on Watson, then immediately his wife. Are the naturalist and his wife as unpredictable as nature itself?.. But they also suddenly fell down (let's recall the English norms of hospitality-it is customary to arrange in advance to come to visit, Russian readers, reading a novel, pay little attention to these violations of etiquette: to call out to a person, impose their society on him, invite him to visit-this is perhaps normal for a rural wilderness, but it is not polite). And they also talk-and warningly, about the dog. These techniques - the sequence of representation of the characters (maybe not conscious) also increases anxiety and tension in the novel.
Returning to the figure of Laura Lyons. The motive of Diana the Huntress, even the Infernal Diana, is also possible in this, which means the motive of jealousy. After all, in the finale, Holmes and Watson are forced to give Laura Lyons the key to the denouement under the pressure of evidence that her lover, who promises to marry her, is deceiving her that he is already married.
Roman's connections with Catholicism, which had an important role in Doyle's family and in the very choice of his studies, are evidenced by the choice of an assistant (unwittingly) to Stapleton: Laura Lyons. Lion is known in English as lion, lioness... A dog of Doyle's size is compared to a "young lioness". But also by the Pope (whom in the first chapters, as Holmes informs Mortimer, the doctor, like a confessor, wanted to please) he was at that time (and during the time in which Doyle's actions take place) and at the time of the publication of the novel Leo the Thirteenth. In particular, he was known for the largest number of encyclicals, which themselves have the appearance of a medieval document (written in Latin), that is... manuscripts. And among the encyclicals of Leo the Thirteenth, in particular, the encyclical in which the Pope condemned the new science and the new philosophy, setting them the task of confirming with reason the data given by the revelation of the truth. Leo XIII managed to achieve the position of leader of a significant part of Western European conservative elements, which he skillfully used in the interests of the church, achieving the repeal of most of the decrees against Catholicism.
As for Lyons' personal name, Laura. Then this is the generally accepted translation into Russian of the name Laura, which is common in the English-speaking world. And the most famous Laura in the centuries was, is and will be Petrarch's beloved. In England, the name Laura has been popular since the 19th century, when it was probably borrowed from Italian as a real personal name. The peak of the name's popularity occurred in the last decades of the 20th century: in 1984, in England and Wales, the name was recorded in 2nd place in the top ten most popular female names. Petrarch... Leo the Thirteenth recited by heart. But that's not all.
The poet played her name in combination with the theme of gold (for example, Laura — l'aurea, that is, "golden", how not to remember that Doyle writes precisely about the fruits of Sir Charles's gold in relation to the half-built new "gatehouse"), and even the running of time (it. l'ora — "hour", from the novel: "I have to repeat my question, because you made an appointment with Sir Charles on that very day and hour...")
Among other things, the name bore parallelism with the Greek Daphnis (according to legend, turned into a plant, into a tree), the symbolism of vegetation in general (laurel and not only laurel, symbolically a laurel wreath crowned the head of the winner). The place of action is hardly affected from the point of view of civilization: frequent mentions of the remains of primitive man's dwellings are not accidental. We can say that the imaginary love is not for Laura, but for the fact that she was supposed to serve as the key not to Holmes at all, but to him-Stapleton to his uncle's gold, which completely captured him, that side of the symbolic name of Laura-vegetable, natural in the end completely absorbed Stapleton and ... absorbed.
Compare how Petrarch's innovation is described: what is new in Petrarch compared to the courtly poetry of the late Middle Ages is a complete fusion of poetic and vital position, the transformation of love from a conventional poetic device into the principle of life and feeling itself (V. P. Shestakov. Eros and Culture: Philosophy of Love and European Art).
But that's not all.
And although the question of the reality of the historical Laura herself has been debated for centuries (some of Petrarch's friends expressed doubt about her existence, she was never mentioned in Petrarch's letters). But it is assumed that Laura de Nouveau (the French version of her name is Laure) was the count's wife... Hugo II de Sade (French: Hugues II de Sade), ancestor of the Marquis de Sade. Hugo. And what is the name of the source of all the troubles of the Baskervilles in the novel?.. Sir Hugo.
The biographer of the famous Marquis de Sade writes about this: "The question of whether Laura de Sade was really Laura Petrarch was not without debate, although the Sade family never doubted this. The Marquis's uncle, the Abbe de Sade, a friend and correspondent of Voltaire, devoted himself to studying the life of his predecessor and her admirer. The result of his literary enthusiasm was The Memoirs from the Life of Francesco Petrarch, published in 1764-1767. The Marquis de Sade, whose consolation in his long imprisonment was the appearance of Laura in a dream, felt a similar affection for her. So Doyle must have known about the attempt to identify Laura, Petrarch's beloved, with the alleged wife of the ancestor of the Marquis de Sade, who, among other things, was so noted in the literary field that his novels have been banned in different countries for centuries. By the way, about the time of action in the novel.
Why 1889?
Was the choice of 1889 the time of action in the novel accidental? This is the year of the 100th anniversary of the Great French Revolution, which historically caused the first serious damage to the positions of the Catholic Church, not from the point of view of religious disputes like the Reformation, but the Enlightenment. Although whether Doyle Spirit was entirely on his side is also another question. But in his disputes with Catholic relatives (Doyle, like Wilde, was an English writer, of Irish descent), who was fond of history (and at the end of the 19th century. The French Revolution is already history) I probably turned to its pages more than once.
Contemporary novels and literary reminiscences
In 1889, Stevenson's novel The Lord of Ballantrae, another novel about Cain's sin, was also published.
The narrative is presented as the memoirs of Ephraim Mackellar, a servant at the Darrisdeer estate in Scotland (with the inclusion of two fragments written by Colonel Francis Burke). The action begins in 1745, the year of the second Jacobite Uprising. When Handsome Prince Charlie raises a rebellion, by the decision of his father, two Darrisdir brothers, James and Henry, must split up: one of them must join the rebels, and the other — the royalists. Thus, whichever side wins, the estate will remain in the possession of the family. The younger of the brothers wants to join the rebels, but the older one is against it, and they draw lots. The elder wins and goes to the Jacobites, while the younger remains to support King George II.
The rebels lost, the elder Darrisdir is considered dead. Henry becomes heir, but does not accept the title of Lord of Ballantrae. At his father's insistence, Henry marries his brother's fiancee to improve the family fortune. Several years pass. Henry is disliked by the townspeople, as they consider him a traitor to the uprising. His father and wife treat him with complete indifference, because they grieve for the deceased James, the family's favorite. Soon, James, who was presumed dead, returns and begins blackmailing Henry, threatening to destroy his family and deprive him of his title. Hardships change Henry, turning him into a sullen and withdrawn man, obsessed with one thought — to destroy his brother, who poisoned his life.
Curiously, in 1889, in which Doyle places the action of the novel, Jerome's book "Three in a Boat, not counting the Dog" was also published. Compositionally, in the novel, three main characters usually change in dialogues: Holmes, Watson and the invisible Mortimer (and a dog "bigger than a terrier", in Jerome's novel a terrier dog), then Holmes, Watson and Mortimer (and a spaniel), for some period a quartet and pairs are formed: Sir Henry and Mortimer (and Mortimer's spaniel) and Holmes with Watson, then Watson, Sir Henry and Mortimer (with the dog, which is actually... it is always present in the book or in the use of the lexicon, which is also not perceptible in translations: "dogged", "iron dogs", "futmarks" and so on), Watson, Sir Henry and Barrymore (and the dog of the Baskervilles), then the quintet and pairs and triangles are formed again: Watson and the Stapletons (and the dog), Watson and Laura Lines (and Stapleton in discussion or Sir Charles), Watson and Frankland and then his daughter, then the "stranger in the swamps", Watson, Sir Henry and the attempt to catch Selden (and again the Baskervilles' dog), Sir Henry and Stapleton (and the Baskervilles' dog), in the finale again Holmes, Watson and Lestrade (Sir Henry and the hound of the Baskervilles). All that's missing is... boats, but the scene is far from the Thames, and so there is plenty of water in the swamp, too, and it's not a problem to drown: the pony is drowning, Stapleton is drowning. The doom of these places is obvious to everyone without the legend and tricks of Stapleton. It was not for nothing that the miners left him. And Mortimer, who changed London to Dartmoor, is called at least "strange." And the reason for this decision occupies Holmes and Watson already in the first chapter: and to the answer on the occasion of the wedding, besides the well-known opponent of marriage, Holmes replies at all: "oh, how bad it is." To Mortimer's amazement, he countered Holmes' brusqueness with raptures about the "cast from Holmes' skull."
The dog is constantly mentioned in the pages of the novel. But Jerome's most famous novel and "one of the most famous English novels", published exactly in the year in which Doyle puts the action, and when the demand for a trip along the Thames doubled, he is Doyle in the novel... He doesn't say a word. The absence of this historical marker (even if the year had not been specified, it would be possible to accurately indicate at what time the action is described), as mentions and ... tragedies in Mayerling makes just the time of action in Doyle's novel conditionally literary, and not... historical.
In 1889, Mark Twain's novel was also published:
a typical Yankee from Connecticut at the end of the XIX century gets hit on the head with a crowbar during a fight and loses consciousness. When he wakes up, he discovers that he has fallen into the era of the British King Arthur (VI century), the hero of many chivalric novels.
The enterprising Yankee immediately finds a place at the king's court as a wizard, pushing old Merlin aside. Using his knowledge of science, technology and history, he begins to transform British society on the model of modern America. The Yankee manages to achieve great success before his "witchcraft" activities cause active opposition from the church and chivalry, and they declare war on him.
Idea
The story, conducted as a humorous anecdote, conveys the leitmotif of the idea of the inevitable collapse of utopian ideas of the industrial era. The main character, who at first does not accept the Middle Ages, is nostalgic for the spiritual purity of people who are unspoiled by greed.
Does it remind you of anything? Doyle sends his Yankee Sir Henry to the English province, frozen in the past like jelly.
In a broader sense, Doyle's novel is certainly intertextually placed in the context of both modern English and English literature in general, first of all. Shakespeare's plays are certainly at the heart of English literature -therefore, in the novel we can find traces of "Hamlet", "Macbeth", for example, and whether the legend of Mortimer is not a prophecy for Stapleton.
The reasons for the death of Sir Charles can be judged from another, but also a novel of classic English literature, from the novel by Jane Austen:
"Catherine soon realized quite clearly that they were all caused by deliberate self-deception, that every trifle turned into a significant circumstance in her morbidly alert state, and that this was due to a certain line of thought, because of which, even before arriving at the abbey, she eagerly anticipated all sorts of ominous discoveries."
The episode with the surveillance of Barrymore is also surprisingly intertwined with the following remark in Austen's novel Northanger Abbey:
"Catherine, before going to bed, twice made her way from her room to the corresponding gallery window. Outside the window, however, it was completely dark. The time had not yet come, apparently-the sounds coming from below indicated that the servants had not yet gone to bed. Watching before midnight was obviously pointless. But when the clock strikes twelve and everything in the house is quiet, if she can overcome her fear of the dark, she will go out into the gallery and look out the window again. The clock struck twelve, but Catherine had been sound asleep for half an hour by that time."
Austen's novel talks about "romantic anxieties", "romantic visions", as befits the literature of romanticism and neo-Romanticism.
In general, it is strange that no one except Holmes has solved (including Mrs. Lyons) in Stapleton's "sister" his wife. But here's what we'll find in Austen's novel (in parentheses with my comments): "Mr. Tilney was deep in conversation with a young and attractive socialite leaning on his arm, in which Catherine immediately (Catherine! immediately!) she recognized his sister (the situation is exactly the opposite) and thus thoughtlessly neglected the excellent opportunity to imagine him already married and, therefore, lost to her forever (divorces were not supposed to be then). Following a simple and natural train of thought, she could not imagine that Mr. Tilney could be a married man. He did not talk like that, did not behave like the family men she had seen before. And although he mentioned his sister in the conversation, he did not say a word about his wife. All this was enough to mistake his present companion for Miss Tilney. Therefore, instead of turning deathly pale and fainting on Mrs. Allen's chest, Catherine continued to control herself (again, the English "self-control") and remained sitting in place, albeit with a slightly pink face (there are elements of English irony here)."
If Catherine Morland could immediately recognize Mr. Tilney as a bachelor, and not a family man, which then did not allow Mrs. Lyons, or Sir Charles, or Dr. Mortimer, even Dr. Watson (although his powers of observation are as brilliant as those of his vis-a-vis, so he probably does not count) not to see that Stapleton is a family man. Is it really such a drowsiness and inexperience, even in comparison with... a 17-year-old provincial young lady?
But Mrs. Stapleton is a model of the heroine. In Austen's novel, we read: "to be humiliated in the eyes of society, to bear the stigma of shame, protecting the purity of the heart and the innocence of actions blackened by the machinations of the true culprit of evil, is one of the indispensable features of the heroine's biography. And the firmness with which the heroine endures all the trials does honor to her character. Catherine was firm too. She suffered, but not a word of complaint escaped her lips." Who said at all, after all, that after Sir Henry's return from a trip around the world, the resumption of his affair with Mrs. Stapleton would be so impossible? In the end, she suffered, with the honor of a heroine, obviously according to Austen's quote, and to her detriment, she tried more than once to warn Sir Henry of the danger.
The stars of the first magnitude of English literature are certainly Shakespeare and Dickens. But the rich literary literature on Shakespeare shows that new approaches to analysis are constantly being found, new discoveries are happening, it would seem, where everything should have been known for a long time. Of course, the literary tradition itself is changing under the influence of changes in worldview, but in the analysis of Shakespeare, researchers of the 20th century analyzed the conventions of the theater of the 16th century, Shakespeare's style. They studied the way of life, history and art of Shakespeare's time in inseparable connection with his work.
Shakespeare is usually associated with tragedies, with the theme of love and jealousy. And least of all with the same topics is usually Doyle.
Usually in adventure literature, the love line is designed to strengthen the main plot line according to the principle of interference in physics. But in this case, something else: Stapleton, in whose crimes his wife has already refused to help him, although she does not betray him, believing that they are bound by love or marriage ties, she is even ready to endure insults, humiliations and beatings, allows her to captivate Sir Henry and thus involuntarily forces her to play the role of an accomplice, luring the baronet online to a criminal (and an entomologist), she abhors this role, and only love (for her husband, and not at all for the baronet) keeps her from betraying him, but she allows Sir Henry to get carried away with himself, and begins to respond with sincere sympathy for this man too, the author allows us to look at a traditional love story (maybe not so skilful, because this is not a drama, but a horror novel, and even fiction, albeit of a high artistic level, even against the background of epigon literature, and what can compare with Shakespeare), but in the original text the English reader even meets reminiscences with Shakespeare, quotes which escape the Russian reader in translations from Shakespeare, which Watson uses in reports about this (who also turns from Holmes' assistant into a friend to Sir Henry), the sympathies of Miss Stapleton and the doctor make the figure of the baronet also cute for the reader, especially with the knowledge that he is basically a young simple farmer, devoid of aristocratic manners and prudery, with an uncle's million-dollar inheritance, became the object of attention of some mysterious criminal, this is the difference from the love line in general in an adventure novel: It's not just the love of two heroes, it's the love of a criminal's accomplice and... his victim. And of course, according to the laws of the genre, when their paths diverge, the author is sad, as the end of any love affair is sad, but a marriage between an accomplice of a criminal and a victim would not be possible. And it is no coincidence that Holmes even understands this, that apart from a real meeting when he failed a client, and this is a shadow on his entire investigation, he admits this, with a family monster, the realization that the woman whom Sir Henry fell in love with, deceived and betrayed him, remaining a loving wife to the criminal was also a strong shock for the young baronet and poisoned the seemingly happy ending.
Serious literature probably also differs from not quite serious literature in that the author of a serious work sets the task of a researcher, and not a serious one - entertainment. Although, of course, the traditions of American education show that it is possible to enlighten through entertainment, Americans somehow avoid direct didactics. Considering this approach to be boring. And if the work generally touches on some themes, notes inherent in all, then it rightly receives the character of a study of a universal phenomenon. For example, the connection between literature and folklore.
One of the mistakes of literary criticism in the past is ignoring the laws of a work of art and treating its characters as real people. Another mistake is the erroneous division of literature into one in which action prevails, and into one in which the main thing is the inner world, the characters of the characters, ignoring the fact that, in fact, actions are a manifestation of character.
The traditions of scientific literary studies, as well as modern forms of literature, do not have much time by historical standards. And you can see how the accumulation and development of approaches to the analysis of literature took place. From Coleridge, who proceeded from the fact that there is an inseparable connection between the writer and his creation, there is a tradition of a biographical approach. In the 20th century. Stoll has already defended the idea that dramatic realism and the realism of life should not be equated. These ideas are developed in the book "Art and Artificiality in Shakespeare's work". It would seem a simple idea: the heroes of works of art obey other laws: the laws of drama. But for a long time it was different. In 1928. Wilson Knight defended the idea that it is necessary to analyze a literary work based on the work itself, on its aesthetic perception. Consider different works by the same author (he also analyzed Shakespeare's work) as a series of works closely related to each other.
At the same time (in 1928, Rylands), the idea appeared to analyze the words and images of literary works. Bernard Harris, associate professor of English literature at York University, called this approach the most radical in the sense of discovering new ideas in literary criticism of classical and long-known, studied works. She applied the method of writing out images that occur, and found out that "Romeo and Juliet" conveys young love as the domination of light: sun, moon, stars, fire, lightning, radiance. What is opposed to darkness, night, clouds, fog, smoke.
"Hamlet" conveys a different atmosphere: images of ill health dominate: diseases, physical disabilities.
Modern criticism, according to Harris, shows just the complexity of works of literature, how different approaches are intertwined in the analysis, which means there will be no end to the flow of criticism, which contributes, in my opinion, to the depth of understanding of language, literature, and not only: theater.
But it is no less important for me that in the 1960s discoveries turned out to be possible within the framework of a rather traditional approach -biographical, historical. In the 1963 season. The Royal Shakespeare Theatre has staged a new play: a trilogy called The War of the Roses, consisting of three parts of Henry the Sixth, combined into two plays-Henry the Sixth and Edward the Fourth and the play Richard the Third. The trilogy ran in the theater for three nights in a row, and sometimes all three plays ran on the same day. They were prepared: processed by John Barton, associate professor of English literature at the University of Cambridge, the directors of the plays were: Peter Hall, director of the theater, and his assistants Frank Evans (his article on the playwright's views on history was published in the magazine) and the same John Barton.
These previously little-known plays showed Shakespeare as a historian, his political philosophy, his attitude to the problem of power, which can certainly be interpreted in my opinion as a desire for conformism, as propaganda of the ideas of absolutism, or as a sincere position of the historian, the desire to avoid the destruction of power and a new civil strife. But we must not forget that Shakespeare used political myths for his dramaturgy (the image of Richard the Third, which had been established since Tudor times, was recently definitively refuted), and on the other hand, the time in which the great playwright created was in fact no less dangerous: Queen Elizabeth sent hundreds of her opponents to the block, which is usually in the shadow of England's successes on the international stage during her reign (the defeat of the Great Armada and, of course, Shakespeare's plays themselves). //England, 1964g. No. 2 (10). F.Evans. English history through the eyes of Shakespeare. pp.30-39. B.Harris. Modern English literature about Shakespeare. pp.40-47.
One of the early plots of the English classics, in which the catalyst for the whole action is a ghost, and not at all imaginary, but real, is the shadow of Hamlet's father in Shakespeare's tragedy. Moreover, in the first production, this role was played by Shakespeare himself.
And the sample of writing the English letter S, which Holmes points to, is given in particular in the title page of the first edition (early 17th century) of Shakespeare's most famous play, The Tragic Story of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.
Doyle and Dickens
Victor Shklovsky. Favourites. In 2 vols. vol.1. Tales of prose.-M., 1983.:
Dickens found the "terrible", what was also called "Gothic", in the usual.
p.187
"A novel of secrets". The novel is organized by mystery, secrets into a single whole.
p.187
Dickens treated not only ghosts, but also Gothic mysteries with contempt, as he saw worse things.
p.189
Ghosts in novels were an outdated fashion, which was worn out, treating it ironically.
p.188
In one of the insert novels of the Pickwick Club Notes, a clerk, who is haunted by a ghost living in an old filing cabinet, persuades the ghost to change his residence, warning that there are bedbugs in the closet.
p.188
The power of showing minor characters, which Chesterton joyfully emphasizes in Dickens' analysis, is associated with weakness and conventionality of intrigue.
p. 190
Critical realism The story includes many pages of authors' dissatisfaction with that very convention.
p.191
Fadeev: "Dickens's characters do not develop depending on circumstances, they exist throughout the novel as he "took them out of the bag." His extensive, fascinating plot is therefore necessary for him to give a kaleidoscope of faces and characters without their development" (A.Fadeev. For thirty years. –M., 1957)
pp.191-192
We can say that the novel of secrets, which we are also very fond of, goes back to Dickens with many of its flaws and commonplaces.
The true successor of the technique of the novel of secrets is Dostoevsky
P.193
Doyle and Scott
David Daiches. Sir Walter Scott and his World. – M., 1987. The famous British philologist, professor, author of the 2-volume "History of Engl.literature in the coverage of criticism", monographs on Burns, Stevenson, etc.
- was born like Doyle in Edinburgh
As Doyle might have said, "I was not born in splendor, but I was not born in insignificance."
p.15
-and the time and place correspond to the desire in the past to find the foundations for self-affirmation
Half of his soul was completely under the spell of the heroic and violent past, but the other half, belonging more to the enlightened Edinburgh of the heyday than to the wild Borderland, believed in reason, moderation, the development of trade, all kinds of benefits and-what's a sin to conceal-in material interest. When these sides of his nature come into serious conflict, then Scott rises to the heights of artistic foresight in his novels.
p.27
The story of the writer's formation is the story of a boy bewitched by places and legends associated with cruel and heroic deeds.
To combine witchcraft and reality.
Childhood experiences fed the romantic side of his nature.
The gift of the storyteller.
Ancient feudal grandeur and current tastes.
The usual folklore collectors for Europe of that time, both earlier and later, were the Brothers Grimm.
He accepted one thing with his mind and another with his heart. As a thinker, he supported the Enlightenment, but his imagination flared up, and his enthusiasm flared up from ancient poetry, ballads and other legacies of the "barbaric" past.
At the heart of the foundations of all Scott's novels lies the same question that pushed him onto the path of a novelist-how to combine tradition and progress, is there anything valuable in the old knightly way.
- Scott is a famous "dog lover", his four-legged friends were painted by the famous artist Landseer: "At this very moment that I am writing to you, Mr. Landseer, who has managed to write in the house of every dog except my person, is busy with his own business."
Welcoming the technical innovations aimed at what Bacon called "the relief of the human lot," Scott fell into the same contradiction that most English writers were to experience.
p.64
"I set out to collect a variety of observations regarding common superstitions and traditions, which, if left unassembled, will certainly and finally be forgotten".
p.69
"I'm like a tiger ..I clung with a death grip to any collection of old ballads and stories that chance throws at me."
Continuity-a straight line connecting the past and the present, a sense of community with bygone generations-that was what dominated Scott's feelings. But he still understood that in many important ways, changes are not only necessary, but also desirable.
p.71
"Songs of the Scottish Border"
His generation had not yet shown scrupulousness in preserving texts as they existed, a scrupulousness peculiar to modern philologists, and Scott believed that he had every right "smooth out the stanza" or even replace the original verses with "more sonorous and heroic ones".
p. 73
Scott's mansion with its outlandish collection of relics-weapons, armor, coats of arms along with... cutting-edge gas lighting.
He belonged to the kind of authors who were able to penetrate the relationship between momentary human existence and the course of history.
p.92
The novel "Guy Mannering" approaching the template: predictions, appropriation of property, the appearance of a lost heir, who eventually gets a beauty and inheritance.
P.97
Connections between individual characters and the forces of history
Scott was granted the title of baronet, which he called "the little title" in French.
Pp.105-106
The ideology of chivalry or its idealization
"Superstitions are very colorful, and sometimes I make them work well for me, but I do not allow them to harm my interests or convenience."
p.119
As for religion, fanaticism disgusted him.
p. 119
He believed that religious zeal could still bring some benefit to the lower classes, "the good warns against rude and vile vices," but in the upper classes it "is capable of repairing one evil, breaking up families, inciting children against parents and instructing everyone in a new way, as I think, to fall into the arms of the devil, glorifying Gentlemen."
From the introductory article by V.Skorodenko "The World of a great artist":
"The biographical method is fraught with the temptation to reduce everything to the facts and circumstances of the hero's personal life. The latter, of course, can explain a lot, but not everything, and here there is a danger of losing sight of the fact that the writer's personal life does not develop in a vacuum, but in conditions of a very specific time and historical and social situation.
" p.6
Doyle and Collins
In two novels: "The Woman in White" by Collins (earlier) and "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by Doyle, there are even more definite parallels (although both baronets and wastelands, and an anonymous letter and the surname Cartwright and, it is no coincidence that Collins and Doyle are called the founders of the detective genre):
"I didn't answer. My gaze froze on the last sentence of the letter: "There will always be a place in my heart for your mother's daughter, because your mother was my first, my best and only friend." These words and the assumption I made about the sanity of the letter writer suggested an idea that I was afraid to even think about, let alone express it out loud. I began to fear for my sanity. It was too much like an obsession to attribute everything strange and unexpected to the same hidden source, the same sinister influence. This time, I decided, in defense of my own courage and my common sense, not to succumb to temptation and not to make any assumptions that are not supported by facts...
..."I have a very definite opinion," I replied.- The boy's story, of that I am quite sure, is based on a true fact. I confess I would really like to see the monument over Mrs. Fairlie's grave and examine the footprints around it...
...- Because it confirms my suspicion, which arose when you gave me an anonymous letter to read.
"I presume, Mr. Cartwright, that you have had reason to conceal your suspicion from me until now?"
- I was afraid to believe in him myself. I thought it was completely ridiculous, I thought it was again the result of my overactive imagination. Now everything has changed. Not only the boy's answers, but also a phrase accidentally dropped by the teacher confirmed my guess. Perhaps further events will prove that I was wrong, Miss Holcomb, but at this very moment I have no doubt that the imaginary ghost in the cemetery and the woman who wrote the anonymous letter are one and the same person.
Miss Holcomb stopped, turned pale, and looked at me intently.:
"Who is it?"
"Mr. Dempster, without knowing it, gave us a clue. When he spoke about the figure the boy had seen in the cemetery, he mentioned the "woman in white."
"Isn't that Anna Catherick?"
- Yes, Anna Catherick.
Miss Holcomb leaned heavily on my arm."
Let's compare it with excerpts from The Hound of the Baskervilles (not forgetting that in both cases we are talking about ghosts):
"... So this is all that was reported about the death of Sir Charles?
-Yes.
-Then introduce me to the facts that did not get into print...
..."I've never had to talk to anyone about this before," Dr. Mortimer began, clearly worried. - I kept a lot of things silent at the investigation for the simple reason that it is inconvenient for a man of science to support rumors born of superstition... Guided by these considerations, I preferred to keep something quiet, because excessive frankness would not have done any good anyway. But I can talk straight to you...
..Barrymore gave erroneous testimony at the inquest. According to him, there were no footprints on the ground near the body. He just didn't notice them, but I did. At a short distance from Sir Charles, there were perfectly fresh and clear...
- Footprints?
- Footprints.
- Male or female?
Dr. Mortimer looked at us strangely and answered almost in a whisper:
- Mr. Holmes, these were the paw prints of a huge dog!
I confess at these words a chill ran through my skin."
The parallels in Doyle's modern novel to European, primarily English romantic literature are so great that sometimes it seems that Doyle deliberately wove the thread of the narrative in this way, like those words from the Times editorial, cut out with nail scissors and pasted so that a letter, anonymous, addressed to Sir Henry turned out.
"For the cause of Laura, for the cause of Truth," says the main character of the novel, art teacher Walter Cartwright, bluntly in one of the final chapters.
By the very name, Collins' novel and Doyle's novel (10 times smaller in volume, but hardly having a larger number of characters and storylines traditionally for a Russian novel) are similar: "The Woman in White" is about a ghost woman, and "The Hound of the Baskervilles" is about a ghost dog.
The name, in terms of idiomatic expressions, of course, says: white in English is used in the sense of honesty, friendship: "He is completely white and you can trust him as yourself." Of course, it also matters here.
In Collins' novel, in fact, we are talking about the Truth, which unites honest people, and a couple of criminals with accomplices resort to lying, hiding the Truth, and a company of honest people is obliged to find out the Truth and make it public in order to save the heroine.
In Doyle's novel, we are talking about a Fine, about Punishment for an attempt on someone else's property: someone else's bride may be a farmer's daughter, and not a wedding, but dishonor, in film adaptations, often a wife killed in jealousy, and Sir Charles's capital, probably acquired not in the most honest way, the dog is usually also the keeper of property and honor, and human life, in this sense, a Hellhound rushes at Hugo's heels, and a detective with assistants runs headlong at Stapleton's heels in the finale.
By the way, the roots of the plot or part of the plot of Doyle's novel are so deep that they will lead us to the "Three Piglets", which originally arose on the same folklore soil of Dartmoor, where the monstrous wolf also causes concern, but the plot or parts of the plot of the novel will lead us to a wider expanse of European and not only European in the sense of Western- European literature.
Vladimir Semyonovich Korotkevich is a Belarusian Soviet writer[1], poet, playwright, screenwriter and publicist, classic of Belarusian literature. He is one of the most prominent figures in the Belarusian literature of the 20th century. He became the first Belarusian writer who turned to the genre of historical detective.
In the historical detective story "The Wild Hunt of King Stach" (1958), the writer depicted the events of the 1880s (that is, literally the same time of action as in the analyzed novel) in one of the remote corners (as in the novel, but not in England) of Belarus (also known for swamps). In this story, the author tried to show the society of that time, with its national, cultural and historical features, with its patriotic ideas. The author condemns the betrayal of the motherland, national and social evil.
The plot of the story echoes the detective story "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by A. K. Doyle: the events are also based on a family legend, a curse that should destroy the genus, and in the denouement the mysticism turns out to be a criminal plan. However, unlike the English detective story, in "Wild Hunt" an important place is occupied by national and social motives that influence the development of the plot. Belarus seems to be oppressed and lost, but at the same time a nationally distinctive region with a rich history, culture and traditions. The text of the story contains references to national dances, clothes, dishes, drinks, customs, and a unique, now lost breed of horses.
The author uses such techniques as mistaken identity, a "fake" suspect, solving a half-burned letter (literally as in Doyle's novel), identifying unknowns by a peculiar vocabulary, reading footprints. In addition, the author constantly maintains tension, exposing the hero to danger: he is repeatedly pursued by the "wild hunt", attempts are made on him, he is called to a duel, frightened by ghosts, the police are interested in him.
That is, the work of the Belarusian writer, created on Belarusian soil, has a lot of literal coincidence with Doyle's novel. But it does not seem to be about copying. Korotkevich's work was also loved by cinematographers and theater directors.
"The Wild Hunt of King Stakh" is a feature film based on the novel of the same name by the Belarusian writer Vladimir Korotkevich.
The film is called the first Soviet mystical thriller.
The play based on the story was staged several times by various Belarusian directors on the stages of different theaters.
The film of the same name was shot in 1979. Korotkevich did not particularly like the film adaptation of his work, since the film practically lacked one of the key themes of the story — sadness about the difficult fate of the Belarusian people.
The story was translated into Russian by Valentina Shchedrina in 1980, in the wake of the popularity of the film of the same name. There is also an English translation by Nikolai Khalezin.
Curiously, in Doyle's novel itself, Holmes tells Watson: "criminologists will say that something similar has already happened, and, of course, they will remember the murder in Grodno, Ukraine, in 1866, and Anderson from North Carolina, but our current case has some very peculiar features."
Analyzing Russian literature close to the author by origin, one can recall: "The Ghoul", "The Queen of Spades" by Pushkin-who can also be "reduced" to entertaining literature, "Dubrovsky" is a story about a robber in the spirit of Robin Hood.
Gogol.
"The Ghoul" by A.K.Tolstoy.
The "little devil" of Sollogub.
And the "devil" of the classics of Tolstoy, Chekhov, the gloomy grotesque almost Dickensian, but certainly Gogol's social satire of Saltykov, the drama of Korolenko, Grigorovich, the stories of Andreev.
Kuprin is a mystical word used for a romantic love story in "Olesya".
The Soviet tradition is interesting: until now, it seems to us ideologized, propagandistic, full of cliches, platitudes, excessive pathos, falsehood, yes, there were such authors and such works, but there were different, but most importantly, Belyaev's stories, after industrialization, industrial revolution and the discovery of the space age, the nuclear era, with a new faith in progress and science, and the Soviet man, unlike the Western man in the 20th century. there are more people of the New Age than of the Modern, and if in Gaidar's "Chuk and Gek" the "Yuletide story" is visible to researchers today, then for example Rybakov's "Bronze Bird" are elements of a Gothic novel, the same-English, ancient:
the atmosphere of mystery, terrible, the sculpture of a bird, an ancient manor, the "countess", swamps, also the exposure of these village superstitions, behind which real murders, as in the case of an escaped convict, a boatman here, treasures-of course, we can say that the author deliberately borrows these elements and this is also the ideology-the demonization of landlords, there is a historiographical error in the book – Elizabeth is attributed to the brutal massacre of the old count and his son, although in reality there was no death penalty under Elizabeth, but we can say otherwise: does this novel continue, intended of course for young people (but Stevenson's "Treasure Island" is not for young people), the traditions of both the Russian Gothic novel and the classic English, but this is professional literature (and it undoubtedly developed under the influence of European, when after a century of Westernization the St. Petersburg Empire and nobility arose, in many ways culturally opposed to the people), and folklore traditions of course, in Russia it is much further for this, we can say our own –even from the story of Fyodor Kuritsyn 15b.
And, if Rybakov's story has these elements as coming, despite socialist realism, the partisanship of literature, from the Gothic novel, then Soviet literature has shown examples in these conditions of the development of classical literature, even in forms so unlike critical realism and the great novel form, as if this thesis confirms the appearance of Soviet science fiction and Soviet detectives, on the contrary, we can even talk about an adventure story, a detective story, in continuation of stories about old manors, ghosts, treasures, family jewels and family curses, only with elements of socialist realism and party literature in the form of the fact that children are certainly pioneers, dark forces personify exploiters, and the estate is selected for a children's labor commune.
Another thing is that these types of literature in those conditions of the totalitarian influence of socialist realism could not develop (to Hollywood proportions for sure, but the Soviet man of the first half of the 20th century had nothing to be afraid of in literature, life itself scared him, as it is written about Dickens, much more-experiments of the revolution, civil, then the Great Patriotic War, repression).
At the same time, it is curious that the Russian cultural tradition, even unlike the Belarusian one, did not know castle architecture. Literary critics have long found much deeper differences between Western and Russian literature.
In the 1940s, Vladimir Nabokov used the "History of Russian Literature" by Svyatopolk-Mirsky, written in English, when he gave his lectures at Cornell. Russian Russian is considered by him to be "the best history of Russian literature in any language, including Russian."
Svyatopolk-Mirsky wrote about Lunets:
"he was the most extreme and uncompromising of the literary "Westerners", who opposed the developed Western technique to the deeply rooted undramatic and plotless Russian tradition. His tragedies "Outlaws" (1921) and "Bertrand de Born" (1922) are pure tragedies of action, with a quick and logical plot development, without unnecessary psychology. Despite the fact that there is a lot of thought in them, these are not problematic plays, but tragedies of situations."
So, "The Dog ..." is a vivid detective story in a series of short stories and novels about Holmes, popular mass literature, entertainment genre.
And now I propose a list of literary works:
H. G. Wells. "Dr. Moreau's Island"
Shakespeare. "Hamlet"
by Meyrink. "Golem"
Sollogub F. "The Little Devil"
A.P.Chekhov "The Black Monk", "The Cherry Orchard"
Pushkin A.S. "The Bronze Horseman", "The Stone Guest", "The Queen of Spades", "The Ghoul"
Gogol N.V. "Dead Souls", "Viy", "The Night before Christmas"
E.Bronte "Wuthering Heights"
Dostoevsky "Notes from the Dead House"
Dickens "Great Expectations", "The Mystery of Edwin Drood"
Mayne Reed "The Headless Horseman"
Wilde "Portrait of Dorian Gray", "Canterville Ghost"
Prosper Merime "Locis"
Gaston Leroux "The Phantom of the Opera"
Stoker "Dracula"
Irving "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"
Hoffman "Elixirs of Satan", "Entail"
Belyaev "Island of Lost Ships", "Amphibian Man", "Professor Dowell's Head"
Lermontov "The Hero of our time", "The Demon"
Stefan Zweig
Korotkevich "The Wild Hunt of King Stach"
Du Maurier "Rebecca", "Birds"
Konrad "The Heart of Darkness"
Kipling "Mowgli", "Tales of Old England"
Goethe "Faust"
Updike "The Witches of Eastwick"
Mark Twain "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn"
Murdoch "The Black Prince"
Stevenson "The Strange Story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "Treasure Island"
Hugo's "Notre Dame Cathedral"
Cronin "Castle Brody"
Austin "Northanger Abbey"
Galsworthy "The Saga of the Forsytes"
Cervantes "Don Quixote"
Odoevsky
Bestuzhev-Marlinsky
A.K.Tolstoy
Is it possible to find common ground not only with Doyle's novel, but in general in these works so different in terms of the skill of the authors, the time of creation, popularity and, even fame, national culture? At first glance, only what is about a person: two arms, two legs, two eyes, two ears. In fact, even the use of such definitions as "Victorian novel", "Gothic novel" will already allow us to classify them. But they all have something much more in common: if we continue from the definitions already given, then we can come up with new "black romanticism", "expressive novel", "psychohistory", but whatever they come up with, they all use folklore, if we assume that literature in general is the author's folklore recorded in novel form, then they use to a greater extent, they are connected with the secularization of consciousness, as if all the devils were poured out of the bag at once, the development of science, the rationalization of consciousness, the detective, the deductive method, the industrial era, its beginning, soot and soot, whether we are talking about American or English folklore, or Belarusian, Lithuanian, whether we are talking about the "Victorian" or "Dickensian" era in England, or the Stalinist USSR during industrialization, Belyaev's novels, but in fact it is also: irony over the ideals of the past, Don Quixote, or Roman Austin, Wilde's story, Doyle's novel, Leroux's novel -it does not matter what is the object of irony: a chivalric or Gothic novel, childhood fears - there is a cave in "Tom Sawyer", hiking at night to the cemetery, Indian Joe, -this is the appearance, including in the USSR of a mass reader, and with it a mass references.
It is also important to note here that we know not only the novels themselves, but also the no less well-known film adaptations, they are known to us from cinema-the most developed and almost the most democratic art form available to everyone, more than a picture book, but we must keep in mind that the earliest of the listed appeared for the first time in the 19th century. there were these novels for film adaptations, and for these novels, except perhaps folklore, there was nothing, and yet-most of the authors-besides being writers, there were also journalists, so we owe them the emergence of the genre of "sensational novel" -a detective story, which we do not necessarily have to associate with really mass literature, with a mind game, which most of the detectives will turn into only in the 20th century.
I have given a number of works to show, such as Shakespeare's Hamlet, that by no means all literature in which a ghost acts belongs simply to an entertaining, that is, as if not serious, frivolous kind of literature.
But was Doyle's novel the bearer of some kind of innovative idea? Did he have any avant-garde significance in the development of literature? Of course not. And the author did not set such tasks. On the contrary, this is the reason for popularity: the author was guided, one might say, by the taste of his already known readership, used (talented) elements of mass consciousness, stereotypes (that's why there are so many intersections, or still parallels with other modern similar examples of emerging mass literature, but it was born on the foundation of masterpieces, folklore, and the pen of a talented, gifted storyteller author). Moreover, one should not think that since this is mass literature, it is not worthy of scientific attention, on the contrary, and in particular the artistic and innovative techniques that Doyle developed for the genre of detective-adventure novel, short story, for example, they were actively used in such a seemingly distant sphere from Doyle as Soviet propaganda during the Cold War in the cinema: in Soviet detective-adventure films of the Cold War. But, of course, Doyle's novel has the most genealogically in common with English or English-speaking and more or less contemporary literature.
Ambrose Bierce is an American novelist and journalist whose bold, biting, uncompromising articles earned him fame as a brilliant publicist and the nickname Bitter Bierce; a Civil War veteran who gained a unique existential experience at the front that defined the themes and plots of many of his novels; the direct literary heir of Edgar Poe (whom he called "the greatest known American") and the predecessor of Howard Lovecraft, who had a keen interest in the psychology of horror and metaphysical riddles – and passed away no less mysteriously than many of his characters, missing at the end of 1913 in revolutionary Mexico.
The novel "The Green Face", written immediately after "Golem", also preserves an ancient legend at its core.
Mary Ann Evans, who wrote under the pseudonym "George Eliot", went down in the history of English literature as one of the outstanding masters of the late Victorian novel.
The novel "Middlemarch" is the main work of the writer, a true masterpiece, which reflects all the main ideas, characters and plot moves of English literature of the late 19th century. The place of its action is a provincial town in middle England with all its secrets and mysteries hiding behind the beautiful facades of well—maintained houses. Having "visited" Middlemarch, the reader will find here enough entertainment for the heart and mind: unsuccessful and happy marriages, inheritance scams, deceitful secular conventions, intriguers of all stripes and kind-hearted pastors, true love and windy infidelities… It is not for nothing that the novel "Middlemarch" is present in many lists of the best books of all time — eventful, it combines the classic elegance of style with the fascination of plot twists and turns.
"The Spirit of Love" (1931) is the first novel by the English writer Daphne Du Maurier (1907-1989); its plot unfolds against the backdrop of spectacular landscapes of Cornwall, which became Du Maurier's second homeland, as well as the setting for her other famous novels: "Jamaica Inn", "Rebecca", "The Royal General", "My cousin Rachel."..
"The Spirit of Love" is a generational family saga about four Cornish Coombe family owning a ship yard. The history of this family, full of sorrows and joys, mutual love and hatred, covers a hundred years, from the thirties of the XIX century to the thirties of the XX century. Subsequently, Du Maurier admitted that she believes in the spiritual connection of generations, and this is exactly what her first novel is about – a strange connection.
This is also the world of amazing creatures who, having stepped two centuries ago from the field of legends and legends into the world of fiction, very soon became permanent characters in fiction and theater, and then cinema and computer games, became the most popular heroes of modern and postmodern cultural mythology and the subject of research interest of representatives of various scientific disciplines from psychoanalysis to social anthropology.
Is Doyle really creating a new reality? A different reality? Why do his plots and characters seem so easy to be real? What is his literature then? Creating a new reality? A reflection of reality-if so, why are there so many film adaptations in different eras, and popularity? Comprehension of reality by accessible means, what makes, for example, the children's prose of Gaidar, Rybakov, even Makarenko special from the usually ideologized Soviet one-so much so that in Chuk and Gek they find the plot of a "Yuletide story", i.e. as "Yuletide" as it is Soviet?
"My house is my fortress" - this English proverb is well known. And few people manage to learn the secrets of the English house, to see "tears invisible to the world".
The novel by A. Cronin tells about the disintegration of a family
This is an excellent example of the development of the tradition of the "Gothic" and "sensational" novel: detective intrigue is combined with an unusual love drama unfolding against the background of lyrical landscapes of Cornwall and picturesque paintings of Italy in the forties of the XIX century. With each turn of the plot, the reader is more and more lost in guessing who is in front of him — the victim of unfair suspicions or a calculating intriguer; but whichever version he leans towards, the finale will be unexpected.
"The works of Henry James included in the book, classics of American and world literature, introduce the reader to the world of psychological and mystical mysteries, superstitious expectations, mysterious, terrible, sometimes inexplicable events. The novel "The Turn of the Screw" (1898), which gave the collection its name, became a kind of "calling card" of James and was awarded numerous film adaptations. The traditional Gothic "ghost story" turns under James's pen into a paradoxically ambiguous narrative about the mysteries of existence and the dark corners of consciousness, about a world in which any truth can be challenged and each event can be followed by another "turn of the screw" of fate governing human life."
Northanger Abbey is Jane Austen's most ironic and mischievous book. Catherine loves to read "Gothic novels", and her whole life, as it seems to her, is full of dark secrets and riddles. And therefore, an ancient mansion turns into a sinister nest of crime in her eyes, a charming young aristocrat into a demonic, mysterious villain. It is only through love that Catherine finds a new perspective on reality, she discovers previously unknown sides of life.
Le Fanu is an outstanding writer of the Victorian era, in which he was often called the "Irish Wilkie Collins" and "Irish Edgar Poe", the author of many Gothic short stories, novellas and novels that survived temporary oblivion at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries, and then regained popularity – already among new generations of readers. On the pages of the collection "In a Dim Glass" (1872), which became the last lifetime published book by Le Fanu, there are stories about otherworldly retribution for a long–standing sin – and a story about an obsessive obsession that drives a respectable man in the street crazy, a romantic plot about ardent love and a mysterious room - and the legend of a vampire seducer, for a quarter centuries ahead of Bram Stoker's Dracula. The secretary of Dr. Martin Hesselius, a psychiatrist and one of the first "occult detectives" in the history of literature, tells about these extraordinary incidents, in which the obvious or hidden influence of supernatural forces is visible.
But from literature, let's turn back to history. Although, at first, there is still a small digression, developed in the study later, about the use of color.
In our language, we often use colors to denote something: red from anger, for example, lies like that on a blue (i.e. clear) eye, and so on. It's the same in English. Moreover, some colors - black, red - are used in the same meaning. But there are nuances: for example, the yellow color of cowardice (Americanism). And brown, even in the meaning of tanned, is betrayal and deception. Now let's remember: Stapleton married the first beauty of Costa Rica, she is unusually dark for an Englishwoman (especially to be Stapleton's sister), and she also betrays her husband, deceives Sir Henry.
Moustache. In the British army, officers were allowed to shave their moustaches only in 1916. (the novel was published in 1901). And for many years after, they had a stable associative relationship with a stupid, non-reasoning person. The very last name is Watson: from what ("what?") complements the image of this simple-minded, stupid, not even understanding humor person, with a facial expression that can be translated into Russian jargon: "what?"
Stapleton's last name is also telling. She seems to be pointing to the other side of his nature.: a paperclip, like that neatness, pedantry, scrupulousness in entomology classes. Breaking into his house in the finale, Holmes and the company found an entire office, the walls of which were decorated with a rich collection of butterflies. By the way, Central America - which Doyle made Stapleton's homeland- is famous for huge insects, like any tropics, including butterflies the size of a bird. Compare the gigantism of a dog.
Then, Stapleton is from the West Indies. Sir Henry is from Canada. Sir Charles made a fortune in South Africa. But again, this sounds like it only to the Russian reader and maybe modern English. But in Doyle's time, it was all the British Empire. And it still exists: Canada, although autonomous, but it has a governor-general, Australia, although independent, but the Queen of Australia is the Queen of England, and finally, the Falkland Islands (the war for which with Argentina during Thatcher's premiership was almost the last colonial war), and the Rock, Gibraltar, about islands (and England is also an island) Roosevelt also said that the British were ready to annex any island. But by Gibraltar, England controls the strait from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean Sea. But these are all remnants of the largest colonial empire in the history, in the 1960s, during the decade of its collapse, the number of subjects (the same as the queen today) in colonies in America, Asia and Africa decreased from 700 million to 5 million people. This is what is called the collapse of the empire. And since then, England has joined the EEC, turned into a junior partner of the United States. In Doyle's time, England was an Island and a huge empire, although it was separated from continental Europe by a narrow strait called the Channel in England (which people swam across setting records, and now trains run through a tunnel laid under water), it sharply separated itself from the continent, and then with whom would it unite there? The continent is dominated by the empires of the Habsburgs, Hohenzollerns and Romanovs, the Turkish sultan. In England, parliament, parties, elections, the power of the king is limited. In Russia, as Peredonov from Sologub's novel admits that as a student he dreamed of a constitution, but only one without a parliament, which baffles even the police chief. And Doyle is a patriot, an imperialist. He justifies the British publicly and openly in the Anglo-Boer War, where there is actually a war between some colonialists against others. And this is South Africa, that is, the one where Sir Charles made a million pounds. And this is all England. Roger Baskerville did not go to any colonies there, he went to the English West Indies. Sir Henry is a farmer, but a farmer not somewhere, but in English Canada. This is a country where Kipling is also an imperialist, writing The Jungle Book. Moreover, slavery was abolished in 1833. And the planters and sugar growers began to go bankrupt, unable to withstand competition in free trade, when they had to hire workers, even the same slaves, but pay them. The ruin was so long, the industries based on the slave trade were so profitable and numerous: tobacco, sugar, coffee, cotton, coconuts, bananas and other "colonial goods", as they were called in Russia, the British instilled the taste of tea with sugar all over the world, so the ruin was such that it lasted until 1917. and then. And Roger Baskerville could have had a plantation, there was even a sugar factory. In place of these industries there in the West Indies, in Latin America, criminalized drug trafficking industries and illegal production and trade of alcohol were already appearing. That's what I could use... the image of Stapleton will appear.
By the way, as I have already noticed, the authors made a very big mistake, if compared with the original, in the film adaptation of Maslennikov with the image of Mortimer. Steblov is a charming, sweet, touching character, comedic, especially in his absent-mindedness, simplicity, with a cocker Snoopy actor. In fact, in the original text it is almost the most... a repulsive image. It may even be designed to contrast at the same time with the suspicious for the reader, whom the author puts "on the wrong track" Barrymore and the "cute" Stapleton against their background. Even Mortimer's last name itself is a root word, too, like "dead." And his description: tall, thin, stooped, with a hooked nose, with a raspy voice, with tobacco-stained fingers, with fingers long as an insect, in a sloppy suit. A repulsive appearance, isn't it? Nothing to do with the on-screen image of a simple, absent-minded guy, which Evgeny Steblov always played on the screen (the film "Literature Lesson" at the dawn of his film career). In the text, Mortimer is called at least "strange."
Although, everyone who lives on the marshes of Dartmoor resembles a well-known English reader from Carroll's fairy tales... the company. Mortimer, by the way, digging in graves, who wants to get at least a cast of Holmes' skull when they meet! That was Sir Charles's doctor, a scientist, ready...Share the wildest superstitions! Stapleton, the killer with the butterfly net, and where? In the swamps, where they laid paths with pegs through the Grimpen bog, which even the miners abandoned long ago! Old Frankland (by the way, also with a talking surname: sincere, outspoken, that is, "I say what I think"), out of his mind, kicked out his own daughter, and litigating with the whole neighborhood. And that's what Mortimer says.: even the most educated people!
Where is not unimportant for the British sense of tact, humor, self-control, prudery in this sense, not only arrogance and contempt, but politeness, which for an Englishman is akin to "sobriety and mental health". So no one from this company knows how to control emotions. Stapleton is a criminal, at first, just the most respectable of all, and then he makes a scene for Sir Henry in the marshes out of jealousy of his wife. I would like to say that they are all half-witted, including, alas, Sir Charles, who in his old age believed in the family ghost before Stapleton took advantage of it. And of course, the Barrymores are still servants, whose relative is simply the king of this company: really crazy and committed a brutal murder, but because of insanity and not executed, Seldon.
Who do they resemble in this?
Of course, the Five o'clock company, familiar to all lovers of English literature at all times: The Mad Hatter, the March Hare and the Dormouse from Alice in Wonderland (the book of the 1860s):
"Tell me, who lives around here? "What is it?" she asked.
- In this direction, - the Cat waved his right paw in the air, - there lives a certain Hat. A Uniform Hat! And in this direction," and he waved his left paw in the air (remember, Laf-or still Left-to the left, Lefter Hall of Frankland-the Simple-Minded in a possible Russian translation, and there are also Dead Men, Skrepkin, but also Lvov, Pochemuchkin-Watson, by the way Baskerville - can also be translated as basque-to bask at the hearth, and will - in the future, as a wish for a strong family hearth, a fortress of the family, but in reality the opposite is happening), -a Crazy Hare lives. I went crazy in March. Visit anyone you want. Both are abnormal (translated by Boris Zakhoder)." Although, as it is known further: " - We are all abnormal." And the chapter: in which they drink tea at five o'clock like crazy.
It's ironic. Self-irony. Those who are capable of self-irony are, of course, healthy.
By the way, about the fact that the marshes of Dartmoor are not located in the lowlands, but on the contrary on high ground. From the biography of Doyle by John Dixon Carr, a letter from Doyle sent to his mother on April 2, 1901 from Princetown is quoted:
"Here I am in the highest city in England. Robinson and I are exploring the Marshes for our Sherlock Holmes book. I think it's going to be great; really, I've already written almost half of it. Holmes is in the best shape, and the idea that I owe to Robinson is very interesting."
By the way, Doyle corresponded with Stoker when he worked as Ibsen's secretary.
And how about this: "They say Sir Isaac Newton confessed that he feels like a child collecting shells on the shore of the great and unknown ocean of truth." This is from the novel by Mayor Shelley "Frankenstein" (1818). In the text, Mortimer literally quotes, modestly preferring not to compare himself with scientists.
An example of irony in Stoker's novel: "The doctor will confirm that I once tried to kill him in order to strengthen my vitality at the expense of his blood, based on the Holy Scripture, which says: "For blood is life." Although the sale of a certain patented product has trivialized this well-known truth."
Unlike Doyle's novel, in Stoker's novel the supernatural-the enemy really turns out to be a diabolical creature, this is not just confirmed, but justified on behalf of... an investigative scientist, professor of medicine "and not only", Van Helsing.
A vampire can turn into a wolf himself. The dark mystery that connects the characters gives eroticism to the relationship, which is also noticed by the modern creators of The Vampire Diary, the Twilight saga, etc.
The true crime is not just the deprivation of life, but the destruction of the victims' souls-which Professor Van Helsing repeatedly stipulates-in full accordance with Christian ideas –compare how different the motives of crimes in novels are-in one we are talking about money, even a huge amount of money, the estate of Lee, but not a word is said about the destruction of the soul and in another, it clearly shows not the safest world for life in general–the ordinariness of parting with life-with all the progress -but the danger of the death of the eternal soul -although there may be a difference just with all that one work was separated from another by only 20 years, -and it reflected progress, increased security and convenience of living along with the consistent secularization of the worldview – this was still before the 20th century. with its world wars, dangerous discoveries of science, social experiments, unprecedented interference in the private lives of citizens and genocide - if Dickens considered exploitation and danger of life in the absence of real progress to be terrible things Looking contemptuously at the fears generated by prejudices and superstitions, then what are these things, because we are not talking about exploitation.
"The waiting became so intense that the seconds dragged on like in a nightmare"
- the trap scene.
- the scene of the beginning of the hunt for the count refers to his first appearance in England – almost legendary for the heroes – they only know about him from newspapers about a strange ship. The Russian names of the ships "Dimitri" and "Tsarina Ekaterina" are interesting in both cases.
- it is curious that the count, before becoming a vampire, fought with the Turks, also defending a seemingly holy cause, - the heroes say this, but not in the sense of protecting faith, on the contrary, believing that it was then that he resorted to the help of the devil, - at one time he crossed the Turkish border
- the novel can also be interpreted as anti-Semitic: What is he doing? He finds the most suitable place in the world for himself and begins to prepare. He tries his hand at his abilities, learns new languages, social environment, politics, laws, finance, science, customs of another country. All this only whetted his appetite.
"Thus, we are only fulfilling the will of the Almighty, who wished that the world and the people for whom His Son suffered would not be given up to the monsters, who by their very existence offend this great sacrifice" - and then just the passage about the crusaders.
-or further: "Oh, if he were from God and not from the devil, what a powerful source of good he would become for us. And now we are called to free the world from it. We must act quietly and secretly; for in our enlightened age, they do not even believe in what they see with their eyes... - they talk about themselves: - ready to destroy even their souls for the sake of... the good of mankind, in the name of the glory of God.
I had no time to finish the sentence when I saw a red mark on my forehead in the mirror and realized that I had not got rid of the filth." – It is curious that the filth is incest.
- what they themselves say is hunting: "-We take hard drives. Quincy, as always, gives good advice, especially since it's about hunting." –or: "Let's search the house, find out everything we need, and only then will we begin what our friend Arthur calls "chasing the fox" in hunting jargon
- however, what does this mean -the techniques of demonizing enemies are universal, trivial, the same, but undoubtedly there is something in common here that both myths-novel and historical are in line with the Christian, but in fact Judeo-Christian, that is, Manichean, and at the same time within the framework of the concept of totalitarianism and totalitarian tradition
- there is another point here, they often compare themselves to crazy people, - two of them are psychiatrists, and there is mention of "infection", "influence", -meaning their involvement in this still seemingly fantastic world, -and here is an excerpt: -"friend John, you and I need to discuss something in confidence. ...Madame Mina is changing before our eyes... given Miss Lucy's sad experience, we must get ahead of events this time… I can see the characteristic features of a vampire appearing on her face."
-the text can be read in the postmodern tradition and as dangerous fantasies of a group of people who convinced themselves of the existence of vampires, sought out and found their signs in familiar faces, who thus became victims of their fantasies -especially since the author does not speak anywhere about his point of view on the narrative, but the whole novel according to literary tradition The 19th century, like the analyzed novel by Doyle, is presented as excerpts from diaries and letters.
"A few minutes later, Morris, looking around some corner, suddenly recoiled. We all immediately looked in his direction-the nervous tension was clearly increasing -and saw a lot of phosphorescent dots flickering like tiny stars: it was a stream of rats.
" From Lawrence Rees about the Jewish pogrom in Antwerp in the spring of 1941: "it is important to note that the organizers of this attack had just watched the propaganda film The Eternal Jew...the picture is clearly anti - Semitic . She is notorious for comparing Jews to rats."
p. 204
"On the 12th in the morning we left London from Charing Cross station, arrived in Paris" -this is a fairly frequent mention, as well as the Times, due to the magnitude of these concepts -the largest newspaper and an important transport hub -there is hardly any semantic meaning in this.
It is unlikely that the monster will decide to appear in human form, this will cause a lot of suspicion, which he does not need at all, so he will most likely remain in the box-the dog was such a box for Stapleton.
The Earl is a criminal and a criminal type of Stapleton, also belonging to the family of baronets. Nordau and Lombroso would have defined it that way - Holmes did not just recognize Stapleton's portrait resemblance to Hugo, he could not help but "find out" if Doyle thus adhered to the popular, but later proved to be unsound theory in criminology that a criminal is a criminal by virtue of biological origin, and even has characteristic features in his appearance. Stapleton is Roger's son, who was considered a "black sheep" in the family-Holmes could not help but recognize the similarities, because according to Lombroso's theory, both Roger and Stapleton could not help but look like the same criminal in their family –Hugo Baskerville himself, it's not just about the portrait that betrayed Baskerville in Stapleton, but also The fact that the resemblance to Hugo confirmed for Holmes that Stapleton was a criminal-Lombroso's theory was already not shared by everyone, the Provisional Government also closed prisons because it believed that crimes were a social creation, not a biological one , This is reflected in the story "The Green Van" - that under communism there would be no prisons, no criminals - about the early years of the Soviet militia.
Later in Stoker's novel, for a short time, but the figure of the Jewish merchant Guildenstein, who unwittingly rendered a service to Dracula, will appear. But who exactly is depicted in the novel as the vampire's assistants are the Gypsies who shared the fate of European Jews in the Nazi totalitarian empire in the 20th century.
The killing technique in the legend – the beast torments the throat of the victim –Hugo, is also in Stoker's novel-with the same technique Dracula dealt with a random assistant, followed by the heroes – was he then in the form of a giant dog, in which he appeared in England, killing the entire crew of the captured ship.
The figure of Dracula appears as a criminal, but unlike Stapleton, without losing the supernatural. Moreover, the supernatural helps the heroes not to track down in order to catch and bring to justice, but to deal with the criminal: a magic circle, magical objects, including from Christianity – prayer, crucifixes, a wafer, but along with garlic, a branch of rosehip and even something just from progress, the power of hypnosis is also used, and Dracula himself is credited with superstitions that limit his freedom of action even on the way to escape from his pursuers.
Anti-Semitic or not, the novel is certainly permeated with the theme of the immortality of the soul, the theme of the sacrifice of Christ, and generally Christian motives, although at the end of the novel in Dracula's castle the characters smell sulfur-the presence of the devil, and yet beliefs in vampires are not part of canonical Christianity.
"Lord..." he began, but Arthur interrupted him: "No, no, for God's sake, don't! At least not now. I'm sorry, sir, I don't want to offend you, but I can't bear to hear that title..."
"Do you know that Mrs. Westenra left you her entire fortune?
" Oh my God! I had no idea!
"Now everything belongs to you, and you have the right to dispose of everything at your discretion..."
"Oh, if you only knew what I owe you! These notes are like a ray of sunshine. They explain everything. I am stunned, blinded-so much light! Although there are clouds gathering further away. But you can't see it. Oh, how grateful I am to you, what a clever girl you are! Madam, if Abraham Van Helsing can ever be of any use to you or your family members, I hope you will let me know. I will consider it a pleasure to help you as a friend... There are people dark and light, you radiate light..."
"Thank you, thank you endlessly! You've taken a load off my soul. If you don't mind, I'll give you one notebook to read. It's quite big, I typed it out on a typewriter. This is a copy of the diary that Jonathan kept abroad, it describes everything that happened to him. I won't risk telling you anything about him now. Read it for yourself and judge..."
"-Then I am at your service with all my soul and body. I have some papers, but if you are traveling by train at 10.30, you will not have time to read them here, please take them with you and read them on the train."
"I bought him the local morning and yesterday's London newspapers. While we were talking through the window of the carriage, he casually flipped through them. Suddenly something caught his attention in the Westminster Gazette-I recognized it by its color..."
"Yesterday the professor went to Exeter and spent the night there, and today at half past five he burst into my room and thrust yesterday's Westminster Gazette into my hands.
- What do you say about this? "What is it?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.
I looked at the newspaper, but I didn't understand what he meant. Then Van Helsing pointed out to me an article about children who were lured into the woods. It didn't mean anything to me until I got to the place where the tiny wounds on their necks were described. The
heroes of Doyle's novel also did not immediately understand what an anonymous letter and an article about customs policy in the Times had to do with it.
Of course, this is not about plagiarism, of course, and not about direct borrowing, and not about simultaneous visits by the same "ideas" -Doyle obviously read and unwittingly transferred something from Stoker's novel into the novel, as well as short stories by Hoffman, Irving, Roman Leroux-his previous novel, but also Doyle's novel not exactly a novel from the series of novels and short stories about Holmes, in which he is not the main character, and not a classic detective story, and not a classic "horror novel", but still these comparisons indicate that between Doyle's novel and these works are not of the detective genre, but in general, the same direction – neo–romantic -has a lot in common.
Stoker's novel also mentions Exeter, the main city of the English county of Devonshire. What does this mean? Probably nothing more than that the train schedules have not changed
"... In the silver glow of the moon, I saw a snow-white figure reclining on our favorite bench. A new cloud instantly covered everything with darkness, I thought I saw a black shadow bending over a white figure. Whether it was an animal or a man, I did not understand... I probably ran fast, although I had the feeling that my legs were filled with pig, and my joints did not bend. Closer to the top, I could already make out a bench and a white figure, although it was dark. I was not mistaken: a tall black shadow bent over a white reclining figure. I screamed in fright: "Lucy!Lucy!" The shadow raised its head, I saw a pale face and red sparkling eyes. Lucy did not answer, and I rushed to the cemetery gate, flew into them-for a minute the church blocked my friend from me. When I jumped out from behind the church, the cloud passed, the moon shone brightly on Lucy, with her head thrown back on the back of the pew. There was no one near her…
From Dr. Seward's diary: A strange and sudden change took place in Renfield last night. From about eight o'clock on, he began to worry and sniff like a dog following a trail.
But the strangest thing: as soon as the schooner touched the shore, a huge dog jumped out on deck, ran to the bow, jumped down on the sand and, rushing to the steep cliff on which the cemetery is located, disappeared into the darkness.
Everyone is talking about a strange incident... great interest was aroused by a dog that jumped onto land as soon as the ship crashed into the shore. Many members of the Animal Welfare Society, popular in Whitby, are ready to shelter her. But, unfortunately, the dog cannot be found anywhere -it has disappeared through the ground. Perhaps she was so scared that she fled to the swamps and is now hiding there. Some people really don't like it –it's fraught with trouble, because, apparently, this is a real predator: early this morning they found a large dog dead, an unclean mastiff belonging to a coal merchant who lives near Tate Hill Pier. The dog was lying on the road opposite the owner's yard. Obviously, he had a fight with some fierce beast-his throat was torn open, his belly was ripped open-it looks like sharp claws.
There was no sign of the huge dog; given public opinion at the moment, the city would probably take her under its care.
... and the death of poor Mr. Swales, who was found next to our bench this morning with a broken neck. Obviously, as the doctor said, he fell off the bench from fright-he had an expression of such unspeakable horror on his face that, according to the people who found him, they had goosebumps.
Even today, long but inspired arguments and someone-a professor of medicine- are able to convince the reader of the reality of vampires. What can we say about the reader of more than a century ago
While bandaging Arthur, I saw how weak he was, took him by the arm and wanted to take him away. But then Van Helsing, without turning around-it seems that this man's eyes are on the back of his head…
All this seemed ridiculous to me, and I told him: "Of course, Professor, I know that you are not doing anything in vain, but now your actions have puzzled me. A skeptic would assume that you are engaged in exorcism. – It's quite possible!- he replied... "
"So you are afraid that my previous experience and beliefs prevent me from understanding some unusual phenomena?
- Yes, it's not for nothing that you are my favorite student. You should be taught. By wishing to understand, you have already taken the first step towards understanding. So you think the wounds on the neck of the children are of the same origin as Miss Lucy's?
- I think so.
"But you're wrong.He even stood up while saying that.- Oh, if only it were so! But alas! It's getting worse, much, much worse.
- For God's sake, Professor, what do you want to say?!I exclaimed.
With an expression of despair, Van Helsing sank into an armchair, covered his face with his hands and said:
"These wounds were inflicted by Miss Lucy!
"You're a smart man, friend John, and you're sensible, but you're a prisoner of prejudice."
"My logic is simple, this time it is no longer the logic of a madman jumping from hummock to hummock in a swamp in the fog.
" "A small moth flew past us, and Stapleton with amazing speed and dexterity rushed after it in pursuit. I was horrified to see that the moth rushed straight to the quagmire, but my new acquaintance, as if nothing had happened, jumped from hummock to hummock and waved his green net."
Or, Le Fanu. "Green Tea" - and the first versions were earlier - is a novel in the final version in the collection of 1872.- Doyle certainly read –as a doctor, as a writer, and as a spiritualist.
The text is written on behalf of an unnamed doctor who became a companion and secretary, assistant to Dr. Martin Hesselius, a German, much more experienced and older, who practiced in England. According to the author, his cases from practice are not only of medical interest. Moreover, his method –it is curious how the doctor presents the case histories -allows modern authors of annotations to call him an "occult detective."
A philosophical physician – he is called-devotes more time to a comprehensive study of data from practical activities than an ordinary doctor-surpasses in terms of thoroughness and detail of analysis: such a medic acquires the habit of careful observation-Bell and Holmes are here, but Doyle himself is a doctor–and in general Chekhov, Bulgakov, and Cronin are doctors in literature.
Mortimer, by the way, goes to Devon as a rural priest-Watson reads the parishes that fall under his medical care, the figure of a doctor-what's in That Sawyer-she's in the 19th century. it is associated as something opposed to a priest, as a messenger of science – remember Mortimer's reasoning - Mortimer brings a superintelligence to Devon-almost a Holmes computing machine, in order not just to heal, but to fight prejudices in which he also believes...
Chapter 2 Le Fanu, – and we remember the Dog again as a letter composed on 9/10 from a newspaper editorial:
The doctor asks Lady Mary – just as Holmes and Watson are trying to restore the portrait of Mortimer from an artifact left behind -his cane -of course this is in itself a scientific method of reconstruction:
"Yes, you are a wizard, Dr. Hesselius!"
Doyle calls a wizard in modern terms – "a genius."
And yet there remains something like a magician-a reaction to Holmes' proof that the letter was compiled from a newspaper.
The description of the room in the third chapter-reminiscent of the description of Baskerville Hall-"looked gloomy," "the impression was almost painful," and even: "however, my mood at that time was probably influenced by some side actors. I was gripped by a kind of special premonition."
Next, instead of the manuscript, there is a folio in Latin, which is also about the supernatural.
And even something explaining to us about the legend of the hellhound-"I read the pages and came to the place where it says that an evil spirit appears to the eyes of any creature not related to it, according to the law of correspondence, in the form of a ferocious and terrible beast"-how not to remember a huge black dog, in which Dracula turned around in the novel by Stoker and another doctor , Van Helsing .
Doyle's novel debunked a huge layer of literature, including contemporary literature – "about the devil" - and maybe that's what was different in its novelty. Although, Doyle himself was a spiritualist. Almost like Mortimer, who brings the supermind to the Swamps to finish off the ghost he believes in.
"They are able to awe a man who leads a secluded life" - the story of Sir Charles is also guessed
"I may be a doctor and my nerves are hardened, but sometimes it happens that the expression on my face-this mirror of the soul-throws me off balance. Mr. Jennings's gaze haunted me; it so shocked my imagination that I had to abandon my previous plans for the evening and go to the opera to unwind."
"A short gloomy alley of elms–I got off the omnibus too early: there were still two or three hundred steps to the house. A brick wall stretches along the footpath, behind the wall is a hedge of yew or other dark evergreen plant"-it resembles the yew alley in Baskerville Hall, isn't it.
"I am powerless to give you an idea of the horror that I experienced then... for several moments I could not take my eyes off the beast's eyes."
"I found a monkey-seized with horror and disgust -as if a real animal-one of the passengers absentmindedly forgot -but –wanting to explore how the animal is set up but not daring to use my hand for this, I gently poked it with an umbrella –the monkey did not move, but the umbrella passed through it–in the dark it is not visible worse than during the day- she is surrounded by a halo resembling a glow," Stapleton's dog also shone like a ghost, but it turned out to be a "luminous mixture."
"You are giving the soul the place it deserves. If this is not a vision, but a reality... - We will discuss this in due course, and in great detail. I'll tell you what I think about it."
"Just as, following the gentle touch of the lips, our food experiences the destructive power of the teeth… so the infernal machine grabs the tip of the finest nerve, it gradually absorbs the unfortunate mortal completely," Stapleton fell victim to his own crime, but drowned in the quagmire.
"I repeat again with absolute certainty: I would certainly have ensured that the inner eye, which Mr. Jennings unwittingly opened in himself, first clouded and then closed. In the case of delirium tremens, a similar pathological sensitivity is observed. His case, without a doubt, should be classified as difficult. The true cause of his death was nothing more than hereditary suicidomania" - here, too, the fantastic is profaned, it turns out to be quite real and also a hereditary "flaw".
The novel "An old acquaintance":
"Mr. Barton, the younger brother of a certain baronet–I'll call him Sir James Barton-was not distinguished by his love of luxury. He occupied an apartment, was immersed in himself, kept one horse and one servant.
Captain Barton made it a habit, after spending an evening in the company of the old lady and her beautiful pupil, to walk home alone.
The shortest route of such night walks ran along one rather long unfinished street-a deserted road-the moon was pouring misty light
Steps
When Mr. Barton was thinking about it the next morning–rather critically-the servant put a letter on the table in an altered handwriting
: "Mr. Barton, former captain of the Dolphin, is warned of danger. He would be wise to avoid *** Street. If he does not stop walking there, then there will be trouble-let him remember this once and for all, because he should be afraid of the Observer."
What is the purpose of the author-to provide a service, and at the same time he declared himself to be someone who "should be feared." All together–the letter, its author, and the true goals of the latter-represented an unsolvable puzzle, moreover, in the most unpleasant way reminiscent of the events of last night."
There was still some doubt about the ghostly steps, but the letters were not an illusion.
The announcement – there's a telegram
"-A demon is following me
- Then tell me, dear sir, what kind of support do you expect from me
"There are some circumstances... I know that the creature that is chasing me is not a human being."
"General Montague: I will catch this ghost in no time, and even you will understand everything.
The General had no doubt that the being who appeared to his future son-in-law was in no way a figment of the imagination, but on the contrary, consisted of flesh and blood and was animated by the determination to pursue the unfortunate gentleman, intending to burn him out of the world."
Finally get rid of the horror-if about the legend, then Doyle, turning it into the basis of a novel that became popular, freed Dartmoor from horror, making the Baskerville dog something like a scarecrow, which has a gloomy but romantic charm and attracts tourists. Although, in the literature itself, these motifs are clearly folklore, in professional literature they are very, very common.
"Whether these events are connected or not, but whatever the explanation for the mysterious persecution, there is no doubt about one thing: what kind of forces are involved here, no one can find out until Doomsday."
Manuscript, manuscript-"The Name of the Rose" by Umberto Eco (where the main character is also William of Baskerville)
The Butler-the novel "At the End of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro
An unexpected and very young heir is "Little Lord Fauntleroy", an unexpected heir is Dostoevsky's "Idiot"
A castle that inspires fear, except for Hoffmann's, except for the house of Usher, except for the mistakenly fearsome Northanger Abbey, of course -Walpole's "Castle of Otranto", Dracula's castle in Stoker's "Dracula"
A castle that inspires horror, but not at all supernatural inhabitants -"Brody's Castle"
A castle that neither inspired nor inspired fear, but quite the contrary made one nostalgic-"Return to Brideshead" Into
a Family curse, except for the house of Usher, Hoffmann's "Entail", Wilde's "Canterville Ghost", again, if not supernatural, then these are Thomas Mann's "Buddenbrokes" and "Saga about the Forsytes" Galsworthy, the decline of the aristocratic family - and Chekhov's "Cherry Orchard", the stolen inheritance – and Mamin-Sibiryak's "Privalovsky Millions"
Unaccountable fear-"Rebecca" Du Maurier
The connection of generations-Du Maurier's "Spirit of Love"
The dog is a monster, but as the personification of justice, Seton-Thompson's "Winnipeg Wolf"
A dog is corny, but a human friend is in the English version of "Lassie", "Hachiko"
There is also a detective, a crime and a criminal-Dupin, Nat Pinkerton, Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Commissioner Maigret, etc.
Genre: you can't call it a "horror novel", we don't call romance novels, heroic, adventure novels, in a literary sense, not in a user sense, but we say romanticism, sentimentalism, and find common ground with other types of art, speaking generally about the era, and here it is possible that horror novels are Expressionism, detective stories in Western literary studies were originally called "sensational novels". In expressionism, you can see the whole range of contacts with other genres, as in painting: almost realism, more romanticism, impressionism, and abstractionism, like Lovecraft's.
The definition of a "Victorian novel" is also not entirely accurate, because there is not much difference between Hoffmann (Germany), Leroux (France), Irving (USA) and Stevenson, Wells, Doyle. First of all, one should not see regional boundaries here, but on the contrary, uniting in a separate time epoch in the cultural history of Europe and America.
"Brody's Castle" is an example of what a novel can be written about an old English mansion in the genre of realism, and no less scary, without mysticism.
While "Northanger Abbey" shows that there can be Gothic, irony, but without the expressionism of sensation novels or horror novels.
Washington Irving has a story "The Ghost Groom", to which the writer himself prefaced a comment, as if this was a very common story in the world of literature, they say, only the place of action differs from his story.
The story has the same motive for kidnapping someone else's bride. For the sake of which the groom goes to the hoax. In the story, he is first called a Wild Hunter, Irving comments that legends about him are common in Germany. Satan himself is called a wild hunter.
This also refers to the novel "The Wild Hunt of King Stach" by Korotkevich. Obviously, the hellhound of the Baskervilles from this Wild Hunt is the tool of a Wild Hunter, but there is no such stable myth in Russian, and therefore a similar Curse does not fit in any way with the specifics of Wild Hunting.
There is also a literal borrowing: compare the text of the legend and this excerpt from the story: "Her room (we are talking about the bride) was empty, the bed was not rumpled, the window was open, -the bird flew away!" Although the semantic difference is the opposite: in the text of the legend from the novel, we are talking about the escape of a girl kidnapped against her will, who is in danger of dishonor, and in the text of the story about the voluntary flight of the bride for the purpose of the wedding, in the finale, the groom himself and the baron's daughter, his married wife, appear in front of the bride's father with the revelation of the legend of the ghost groom.
"The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"
- reading again, we better understand "The Dog..."
"There is no doubt, however, that this place continues to be under some kind of spell that has fascinated the minds of its inhabitants, who live for this reason in a world of continuous daydreams. They adore all kinds of beliefs, are subject to ecstatic states and visions; unusual ghosts often hover before them, they hear some kind of music and voices. The whole area is replete with local legends, "unclean" places, dark superstitions; fiery meteors and shooting stars blaze over the hollow more often than anywhere else; there is, as it seems, a Nightmare with all its vile offspring.
The main spirit among those who visit this enchanted corner-he is also, apparently, the commander-in-chief of the entire host of air forces-a certain Headless Horseman. It is said that this is the shadow of a Hessian cavalryman, whose head was torn off by a cannonball in some nameless battle of the Revolutionary war and who from time to time, as if on the wings of the wind, sweeps through the darkness of the night in front of the locals. He is seen, however, not only in the valley, but sometimes on the surrounding roads, especially near the nearby church. Indeed, one of the most trustworthy historians of this region-he has carefully collected and collated the confusing stories about the ghost rider-claims that the body of the cavalryman is buried inside the church fence, and his spirit prowls the battlefield at night in search of a severed head..."
-a dog may be looking for a master, but in the original the hound, the ghostly hound that chases the loot
of "Lokis" is a bear wedding (the reverse of the also common plot of "beauty and the beast"), a novel by Merime of the 1860s, filmed in Poland, France, and Belarus.
In the story of Merime (early 19th century), there is supposedly ancient evidence of the vision of the Swedish King Charles the Eleventh, it is especially noteworthy how the recording ended: "And if what I have stated here is not the true truth, I renounce the hope of a better life beyond the grave, which I may have earned by some good deeds, especially by zealous work for the benefit of my people and the protection of the faith of my ancestors." There is a special difference in the fact that in the story "The Vision of Charles the Eleventh" the entry is authored by the king, and in the novel by Doyle baronet there is no voice of the landowner and executor, the desire to warn or edify subjects (or descendants). Of course, the story was known to Doyle (as a man equally interested in spiritualism and literature).
The motive of Wild hunting. "Sleepy Hollow"-"the headless horseman", "the ghost rider", of course, Reed's novel of the same name.
Kafka is also a fear, but of a different kind –not Stoker's fear, not Cronin's fear. An absurdist fear.
I mentioned Hoffmann's "Entail" in connection with the topic of inheritance of the estate. Mirimsky about Hoffman: Mirimsky I.V. Articles on classics.-M., 1966, Soviet literary critic, expert in Western European literature, his concept of Defoe's work became a textbook in Soviet literary criticism:
"The main conflict for all Romanticism-the discord between dream and reality, poetry and truth-acquires a hopeless, tragic character from Hoffman.
"86
"Good people" - satisfied with their existence, they obediently fulfill their meaningless role and in their complacency and spiritual poverty they do not see the fatal secrets hiding behind the scenes. They are happy, but this happiness is false, because it was bought at a high price of self-denial, voluntary renunciation of everything truly human, and above all of freedom and beauty
"true musicians" are romantic dreamers, people not of this world. They look at life with horror and disgust, striving to escape from it into the ideal world created by their imagination. They are happy in their own way, but their happiness is imaginary, because the romantic kingdom they have invented is a phantom," that is, literally a ghost
p.87-88
"They are condemned to oscillate between two worlds-the illusory and the real. The fatal duality is reflected in their soul, bringing into it a bifurcation of consciousness."
p.88
"However, unlike the stupid "good man", the romantic supposedly has a "sixth sense" that reveals to him not only the terrible mystery of life, but also the joyful symphony of nature, its poetry, "the sacred harmony of all beings, which is its deepest secret." Art is called to express this poetic spirit of nature"
p.88
- there is a mystery, is there a poetry of nature in the novel in this way?
"Satirical essay: "The purpose of art in general is to provide a person with pleasant entertainment and turn him away from more serious "activities, so that he can then be a good gear wheel in the state mill and start spinning and spinning again."pp.93-94
- Doyle, by emphasizing in life that he never bet money, greed-giving up a career as a Catholic doctor, which was at odds with his beliefs, with how he hated his most commercially successful enterprise, Holmes, shows that Doyle did not share this, sharing the opinion that the writer is a good storyteller
"In Hoffmann saw the fairy tale as the main type of romantic literature. If Novalis's fairy tale turned into a continuous allegory, then in Hoffmann's fairy tales the foundation on which the fantastic grows is the real reality"
pp.97-98
"The combination of the real and the fantastic is the fundamental principle of Hoffmann's poetics, prompted by a sober understanding that Burgher reverie is the flip side of petty–bourgeois life"
p.98
"Hoffmann tries to comprehend his creative manner in the essay "Jacques Kahlo" pointing to the grotesque engravings of this 17th century French painter. as an example, "
p.98
"Images taken from everyday life, passing through the artist's consciousness, through his inner romantic world, turn into a real-fantastic"
p.98
"He takes the hero out of life, trying to portray him with such individual features so that at first glance you can recognize him as an official, a student, yourself (- today we read this as pictures of the life of historical England), on the other hand, only a romantic poet "is able to merge the wonderful phenomena of the spiritual world with life, intertwine the fantastic with the phenomena of everyday life and to cast a strange magic cap on such serious people as advisers, archivists and students, forcing them like evil spirits, fooling around in broad daylight through the noisy streets of a familiar city to the laughter of respectable neighbors"
p.99
"But life in dreams is only a temporary stay in fantasy, and a return to real life is inevitable-the motive for solving, exposing, breaking the veil of mystery"
P.99
"Everything fatally returns to its original basis" – the mirror image of the legend and the finale of the novel Doyle
P.99
"a tale from modern times" -this is how Hoffmann defined his works
P.99
-the action begins in real London, where it already acquires fantastic features, is transferred to a more convenient place for fiction-the swamps of Dartmoor, but nevertheless this is not a "far away kingdom", but a real Dartmoor-this is how the fantastic and the real are combined according to Hoffman
-speaking of colonies and, in this regard, exoticism in the works of English literature, but Hoffmann also had myth–making in the early 19th century in the Oriental spirit - his literary tales "Little Muck", "Caliph Stork", etc., although Germany did not have colonies, and Germany itself as a single state at that time There was no
"Shifting the high romantic plan to a low, everyday one –shoes against the background of a legend, and a shoe in the final in a quagmire -Hoffman thereby destroys it, but does not take it off –laughing at the heroes and readers, the author laughs at himself, -freedom turns out to be the freedom of poetic consciousness, and happiness is the happiness of an illusory escape into the world romance and adventure"
p. 103
"All of Hoffmann's romantic heroes are two-minded, suffering from "chronic dualism", spiritual duality.-but not by complex dramatic inconsistency, -in each of them live two souls constantly at war with each other: earthly and heavenly, prosaic and poetic.
" p.104
"Gives the hero an independent artistic existence of a double"-Stapleton –Holmes, Stapleton-Sir Henry
P.104
"Two streams of Hoffmann's fiction-"The Nutcracker", with others.sides – fiction of "nightmares and horrors"
p.104
"Borrowed from folk-tale literature"
p.104
"Hoffmann's appeal to dark fiction, which repeatedly plunged him into the sphere of the irrational –spiritualism- was not just a tribute to one of the fashionable and unhealthy addictions of Romanticism, just as this "fashion" itself did not arise only from the concession of writers to the public's interest in mysterious and scary stories
There is a pattern to everything," the author comments
on page 105
- Soviet literary criticism, standing on sociological Marxist grounds in literary criticism, was inclined to explain this or was forced to explain it as "a reflection of the confused psychology of the petty bourgeoisie," allegedly frightened and disappointed by the events of the bourgeois revolutions.
In my opinion, historical and cultural trends certainly take place -it is impossible to deny, paying tribute to psychoanalysis or any other hermeneutics, phenomenology, constructivism or any other poetics, and they really have a basis, as we could see from our own experience, living in an era of change, in the instability of everyday life, and in that pressure of scientism the secularization of consciousness experienced by people who lived in the 19th century. although in Doyle's work it is difficult to call it a protest, but his other hero, Professor Challenger, discovers "lost worlds", which even today it is difficult to call otherwise,- scary than scientific (as in Verne's novels), fantastic
Fatalistic attitude
- but there is no call for humility, there is no feeling of hopelessness - compare with the author's beliefs in the field of religiosity, his detective solves the riddle and discovers that at least there is no fate in this monster
Expression
Hoffmann's novel "The Elixir of Satan" represents the kind of novel that developed in England in the late 18th century and is known as the "Gothic"
p.107
-gloomy romance: monasteries, castles, ghosts
Heine: "they say a student in G;ttingen went crazy from this novel"
p. 108
- literature generally had a great influence on readers back then: this can be seen in the reaction to Goethe's Werther -the "epidemic" of suicides among young people, that's about the influence of Hoffmann, in the 20th century. the radio dramas of Wells' War of the Worlds, but in modern times cinema also has no less influence, although literature still has censorship lists in a number of countries.
And yet it is difficult to imagine such an influence today, and all because at that time the religious, mythological consciousness was still more total.
"But if Hoffmann in the novel The Elixir of Satan, where a terrible epic takes place against the background of real life in Germany in the 18th century, uses this material with all the skill of a satirist to show the spiritual squalor and inhumanity of the nobles, the lies and hypocrisy of the Catholic Church," then in Doyle's novel it is as if there is no
such thing.109
"He he tries to neutralize the impression of the mystical either by dissonant ironic accompaniment ("Have you never heard a drink scream?"), or by the psychological state of the hero, or by natural circumstances"
pp.109-110
"In the Entail, Hoffman introduces us to an old, neglected noble castle, into the world of ghosts, lunatics, delusions that appear in the darkness of the night under the wild howl of the wind and the roar of the sea. But this is only a traditional romantic veil, behind which a truly terrible fratricidal war is unfolding between representatives of one noble family"-as in the novel
p.113
Hoffmann's Mademoiselle de Scuderie (1818) is the earliest example of the crime genre in world literature. Hoffman was the first to address the criminal topic"
p.114
"The connection of this work with folk art is obvious. It is found not only in the writer's use of narrative techniques, but also in the main thing, taken from folklore, the spirit of cheerfulness and cheerful faith in the triumph of goodness and truth, which permeate Hoffmann's fairy tale ("Baby Tsakhes")"
p.124
"Referring to the past, Hoffman does not call for its revival. He talks about the past with elegiac sadness" - in Doyle's novel there are Neolithic monuments, there is irony over Mortimer, who is passionate about excavations, Doyle speaks more with irony than with elegy, except for the choice of a legend in the plot, the novel does not betray Doyle's faith in spiritualism, except in the transmigration of souls, more even exposes faith Into the Supernatural
p. 129
Wilde's "Canterville Ghost"
In fact, the plot is the opposite: it is not the ghost that terrorizes the owners of the castle, who, however, are not its hereditary owners, and are not related to the ghost by any family ties, but the new owners survive, if I may say so, this ghost, forcing him to suffer, to experience humiliation. But in essence, these are not the Otis, and not their newfangled means, not even their Reformed church and advanced views, but the entire modern civilization at that time: secularized, absorbed in the successes of science, technology, technology and progress, these spirits of the Middle Ages were expelled, the interest in which the daughters, Otis was surprised and displeased. If we talk about the novel, then its decadence is visible in it: yes, there is irony, romance, aestheticism, but there is quite a lot of the cult of Gothic.
To understand the plot of Doyle's novel, Lord Canterville's remark is interesting: if I had the cruelty to take them (jewelry, a gift from a ghost) from her (Virginia), the old scarecrow would leave his grave and begin to poison my existence.
The genre of the novel varies from chapter to chapter: there is satire, sentimentalism, Gothic, and symbolism.
Is Doyle's novel a comic work?
Yes. Judge for yourself. In order for a work to be tragic in an aesthetic categorical sense, it must reflect an insoluble life conflict, as a result of which there is a reassessment of the values of the characters. In the comic, the means of revealing life's contradictions is ridicule. At the heart of the comic is a discrepancy with the norm, which can manifest itself at the linguistic level and the levels of the plot and characters. At the linguistic level, these are reservations, imitations of speech defects. Sir Henry is a Canadian farmer, he only performs the role of an English squire. And when he is nervous, for example, when he scolds the hotel staff, a shoe from the second pair was stolen from him, he "speaks with an American accent." At the level of the plot, this comic unrecognition of the hero is both Holmes hiding in a cave in a swamp, and Stapleton himself with a net, and Barrymore, arousing suspicion with his majestic figure and strange behavior. At the character level, there is a contradiction between what is desired and what is real, the self-positioning of the hero and his real position -in addition to Sir Henry and Dr. Mortimer, who came to the gentlemen of the capital for advice about a local legend, who believed in it, this is Watson himself - who seriously undertook to scribble reports in the role of an investigator. This is, of course, a tragicomic novel. It has no heroic, tragic or comic pathos, but tragicomic.
It is scary, melodramatic, lyrical (which is not so clear from Russian translations), and comic, and again irony is a hidden mockery. And over others, and over himself: even Stapleton makes excuses for what he and his sister can do in such a wilderness where his sister is... He walks through the swamp in his outfits.
It seems to be in it ... there is only no historicism (of course, in the literary sense)-the author does not aim to display the peculiarity of the epoch, to analyze historical events. In fact, there is no living image of the era, the characteristic features of the reality in which the characters live, or rather no more than in any work and not necessarily literary. Even the heroes-are they typical? Do they embody certain features of the time, social phenomenon, system or environment? Are the characters the result of generalizations, typification? Probably not. Even some ability to understand them, we can only find contextually, adding artistic images with information from the historical literature itself. Outside of this, we don't see all these Mortimer hobbies or the fact that Holmes shares Lombroso's theories at all. And the sphere of interest in the novel by the author himself? What did he want to express in it? Is it not the best conclusion to search for a historical source in a novel?
The novel is devoid of psychology, there are no hidden subtexts in it, I find them in connection with history and literature. It is intended to entertain. But there must be some kind of research vein, even if we are talking about an artistic way of knowing: I think this is the nature of fear, and of course, criminology, and even history, religion (but not as a hidden subtext, but more unconsciously by the author as a refraction of personal experiences).
As for the typification of images, this also contradicts the well-established ideas that Holmes is another "eternal image" in the series of Hamlet, Don Quixote. But then what does he represent? A willingness to sacrifice yourself? He takes risks, even undertakes adventures, but this does not seem to be the main thing, he is clearly a superman, but not of such a plan. The search for the meaning of life? No, they're definitely not his thing. The desire to find the truth? Perhaps even the ability to find the truth. Even a superpower that makes him not just not a typical detective, but a unique, out-of-ratings expert (in the novel, at the very beginning, Mortimer makes the mistake of calling him a "second magnitude"). Actually, the plot involves pushing his superpowers against an almost unsolvable mystery. Although he is not the main character in the novel.
But here's what's characteristic if you try to find symbols in a novel -an independent artistic image, a sign with a multi-valued emotional and allegorical meaning. I find in him a dog from legend or Stapleton's dog as a real symbol, and according to typology it has a support not somewhere, but in a cultural tradition. The variability of such symbols is generally limited by tradition. Indeed... Holmes calls the legend a fairy tale, the whole narrative is built as a profanation of the legend, and this does not seem to fit very well with what we know about the author's views on the nature of the supernatural, of course, and Russian translations do not convey the author's irony over the rationality of the main character, who is not loved, although commercially and not only commercially the most successful hero Doyle, and the fact that his character is not close to Doyle, we learn this from the context-from biographical information, from the history of stories and novels about Holmes.
But the dog is not from the legend, just let the huge black dog, as a threat - that is, as a kind of symbol in the novel, is understood by its heroes: and by the same Holmes. That is, a novel in which tradition is immediately discarded as a wild superstition... in its main quality-the symbolism is completely preserved, and even vice versa, it is supported by the rational -the only difference is that the dog is not a product of supernatural forces, but an instrument of crime, chosen by its perpetrator-a real person, Stapleton. And, by the way, it is precisely as an unquestionable symbolic tradition by English readers, where this tradition is widespread, that the novel reads differently, we agree, than just a detective investigation.
Moreover, this shows the main idea of the work, which has no contradictions with what we know about the author: he seems to want to say not that legends are superstitions that should not be believed, but something completely different: all these superstitions are not so simple, they can be followed hiding someone, even without the participation of supernatural forces, or almost without their participation (Stapleton is almost the reincarnation of old Hugo), is an evil intent. That is, this is not exactly profanation and ridicule, it is not naive faith that is being ridiculed - on the contrary, it is tragic: the old baronet died, and the young one was barely saved by the legs and well-aimed shots of Holmes in the company of Watson and Lestrade, but just rationalism, some not skillful actions of Watson, other people's roles that are forced to play everything these strange characters, alien to these swamps. All of them, including Mortimer, are not local.
Even the landscape in the novel is somehow more elegiac than heroic. Needless to say, Doyle not only profanes the novel itself, but also in a new capacity, but extends these superstitions and legends themselves.
Compositionally, the novel is complex: a manuscript, memoirs, diary, letters, newspapers, although at first glance everything seems to be simple on the contrary. But this is possible because of the similarity with narratives-linear sequence, cause-and-effect relationship, let me remind you part of a successful narrative strategy in literature. Compositionally, it also has a concentric type of composition with mirror symmetry: this is how the characters and the plot of the legend repeat themselves in the plot of the novel (and the culmination, of course, is the "recognition" of Holmes, who discarded the manuscript as a fairy tale, Stapleton from the portrait of old Hugo).
A novel in the strict sense is a modern drama, only written as a novel. That's why there are so many dialogues in it, that's why it is the most adaptable (it remains to be wondered why it was not staged as the same "Motley Tape"), that's why compositionally it only seems simple, it is strict and consistent, as any drama should be: exposition, and direct, the beginning, the climax, and the denouement, and a successful one, and an epilogue. Dramatic and cinematic (although published and written in the era before cinema, but the heyday of the theater, and cinema was then fed by theatrical art and literature, including drama).
And as a drama, it is a tragicomedy, and therefore Maslennikov was able to film it as a buffoonery comedy. This is also suggested by the author: the grotesque in the very size of the dog... more precisely, the trace: it's just huge. And, all the characters wear "masks". Although, of course, the novel has generic similarities with both a ballad (and "translating" into Russian-with epics, for example, "Dobrynya and the Serpent", which turns into "Ilya Muromets and the Robber Nightingale"), and with a fairy tale (in the role of Cinderella - Sir Henry, and in the role of a fairy- the givers... Mortimer, of course, but to get an inheritance you have to pass the test).
But as for the stylistic affiliation, this is not romanticism (unless with the prefix neo): romanticism arises in response to the crisis of rationalism, the Enlightenment, which led or led into the Jacobin terror and the Napoleonic dictatorship with the Napoleonic wars, it is stamped -yes, elegiac, disappointments, the magical arises in it as a response to dissatisfaction with reality, there is a romantic "twofold world"-real and ideal, or idealized, there is a rebellion against the surrounding reality, it is unlikely that Professor Challenger's "Lost World" can be considered such, there is attention to psychologism, to the inner world of the characters, there is impressionism, lyricism (here more expressionism), the romantic hero-he is, of course, ideal (Sir Henry), but he is a rebel, a loner, with a tragic fate, and here more d'Artagnan, surrounded by heroes who are always ready to help him, Of course, there is also a common appeal to folklore. But there are also elements of sentimentalism-letters, a road, a diary, and we see everything through Watson's eyes-this is his inner world of fears, experiences, discoveries, he is the most emotional, but closed enough for real sentimentalism. There are also elements of classicism-the cult of reason (even if with self-irony, it is also in the solution of the coffee pot), there is a mixture of some genre low with high-baronets, that is, knights, but some kind of household story with kidnapping, with not noble intentions, some kind of story with attempts on inheritance, and even indirectly related to the very antiquity of the genus, it is still capital made up of financial speculation in the colonies, but there is a clear division of heroes into positive and negative, although the Barrymores, they can not be so determined: They are harboring a fugitive dangerous criminal, or Miss Stapleton is either an accomplice, or a victim (and in the new story the main criminal at all), it cannot be said that all the characters are outstanding personalities, this is only Holmes, who is even so cramped in such a company that one can say he allows Watson to act on his own in the swamps (and in the new novel-the sequel, which is a separate conversation, does not appear at all, although Gate seeks to surpass him, or justifies his "mistake" by not participating in the investigation, he only used what he could see in the swamp, and the information that Watson supplied him), there is also no basic conflict as a conflict between feeling and reason (although what is a dog?), or as a conflict between will and duty (or it could be in a melodramatic line with Miss Stapleton who fell in love or just did not fall in love with Sir Henry), but the baronet himself intends to understand his new role as a squire as it is the superiority of duty over will. But this is definitely not realism, not naturalism. Moreover, it is eclecticism, precisely as the first, earlier in the series of a variety of styles and without a stylistic narrative at all in the 20th century. And most importantly, it is a fantastic work. That is, literally, the art of imagination. A special type of imagery with a focus on fiction, violation of logical connections, laws of reality (this is why the conflict of the super-rationally arranged Holmes with fiction, in which he does not look brilliant at all-the investigation is not explicit, which then allows imitators to invade it, build alternative versions and publicists, with the main criminal-Mortimer, for example, he cannot remember the investigation in the final chapter, and during the action of the story he generally hides in a cave, where he sets up a museum on the contrary-the museum of civilization, and all this is ironically played out in the new story-all his achievement is in fact in convicting Stapleton of falsifying the fact that Miss Stapleton is not miss, but Mrs., and adultery-it is characteristic that this is noticed by the eyes of the author-a woman whose qualities of the authors of the detective story in comparison with men have long been undeniable after Agatha Christie). In modern terminology, this is not even science fiction, but fantasy-the world of irrational fantasy, mystical beginnings. What kind of historical evidence is there then. Although, of course, the dog is an allegory-as it was widely used by classicists, Krylov's fables. But this ambiguous allegory is also what replaces the concept of fear, perhaps remorse, and greed, which when Stapleton cannot stop, and greed itself, a criminal thirst for money, forces him to follow the baronet to Devonshire, and it destroys him. "The Wolf and the Lamb"-Sir Henry is certainly the very gentleness and defenselessness, if not for friends... despite all his occasionally manifested temperament and the stubbornness of the Baskervilles, and Dr. Mortimer is indeed ignorant, but his anthropology, ethnography and folklore fascinates more than medical practice. Bertillon, by the way, experimenting with identifying a criminal by his characteristic appearance, is just a colleague (Holmes also pays tribute to this by recognizing Stapleton in the portrait of the 17th century., By the way, today we do not consider the theory of reincarnation scientific, and then Holmes goes even further than Lombroso and in full accordance with the tastes of Doyle himself-he may even have tried to connect his unloved a character, but very popular and for this there are socio-historical reasons, with his own views, he liked the experiment, but it was not continued in the cycle and subsequent stories and novellas were more a continuation of the original ones, performed according to his confession according to a template, where everything is tied to a riddle-a logical task, with a deceptive course of investigation for the reader, in the story this is just the main narrative-Watson's investigation, but if in all other works Holmes convincingly makes extraordinary heuristic solutions to the problem, then in the story it is not so, and this is visible in the new story that this is not a parody, namely, a sequel, and a new hero instead of Holmes).
How much did Doyle himself believe in the legend? The question may seem naive. But in reality, let's not forget that Doyle was a spiritualist, and in the novel he never once allowed irony either over a ghost or over faith in them, as Irving or Wilde did.
The Hound of the Baskervilles was a very modern book. It is today that we read the baronet's ideas to hold lanterns in a thousand candles as a reference to history, at that time it was still a novelty. Even the title of the book refers to the boom in dog breeding: at the end of the 19th century, a huge number of modern breeds appeared, but then they were new, "designer": Doberman, bull terrier, bullmastiff, Great Dane, boxer, Leonberger, etc. And all these are the fruits of mestization, note: bull terrier, bullmastiff. Stapleton also buys a half-breed gound (at that time, in fact, any hunting dog from a wolfhound, that is, a wolfhound to a foxhound, bloodhound, etc.) and a mastiff (also at that time, usually, if we do not talk about clean lines, any huge guard dog).Of course, he obviously does not buy for the purpose of breeding the breed. Although just then "designer" dogs were sold for a lot of money: the first modern-type bulldogs were sold for thousands of pounds. In general, if it weren't for the fabulous money, none of the breeders would have started breeding new breeds. But that time was a real boom in dog breeding, which, except in a reduced form, was repeated not so long ago with the opening of the country in Russia, after the collapse of the USSR (also the time of the emergence of nouveau riche, oligarchs, and in general the "initial accumulation of capital"). Cynological organizations-clubs-appear, exhibitions are held, breeding books appear, etc. And all this is written by the press, which is also in its heyday (Mark Twain works as a journalist in the USA, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov writes satire to newspapers in Russia) (the person who gave Doyle the idea of the book is also a journalist). The first steps are taken by the professional police (and as can be seen from Doyle's stories, they are not the most brilliant), the question is being discussed what is a dog's sense of smell, what does it depend on, whether it follows some natural human smell, or some remarkable smells: from shoes, cologne, etc., can the court, The verdict is based on such "testimony" of a dumb and relatively unconscious being. Doyle certainly contributes to the development of criminology with his stories, it is no coincidence that they are still recommended for reading by students of criminology, and this work, where Stapleton baits a half-breed, a dog he bought for a man, puts him on the trail of not a criminal at all, but a victim, the book presents a picture of an unheard-of crime-hunting a man, however is it really unheard of when in countries where the slave trade and slavery flourish, in South Africa and America (where Stapleton himself comes from, but where Sir Charles also got his capital, and Sir Henry from the USA or Canada-but in the USA only a few decades ago, slavery for the black population was abolished during the Civil War) a man with dogs hunted down runaway slaves, but in the book one descendant of landowners hunts another. And all this is intended as reading for traveling by rail (even one trip) in a tabloid magazine (specially well illustrated, simply written, because education is not yet so widespread). Of course, the modern reader has not seen any of this for a long time, he reads the book differently, even catching the atmosphere of the era with a superficial flair, like a theatrical scenery, by the way, the action in Leroux's novel "The Phantom of the Opera" was directly transferred to the stage, before the advent of cinema opera as a new synthetic art form was extremely popular and fashionable. For the time being, we will leave the preliminary conclusions about the discrepancy between the novel and historicism, and continue the analysis precisely in the phenomenon, historical of course, of fashion. Undoubtedly, the novel is fashionable, which is shown by the novel's almost intertextual involvement in contemporary literature, but also like many fashion phenomena, whether it has not lost its popularity, or periodically experiencing it again. So, fashion.
Fashion
Fashion is in clothes, in everyday life, in ideas, in everything; fashion is changeable, changeable, like the weather, one of the distinctive and therefore charming features of any time. But if magazines, photography, to a lesser extent, but also painting and literature help to fix fashion in the field of clothing, then there is less evidence for ideas, especially if they are not political or have not caused a revolution in science. For example, if it weren't for a couple of strokes, barely perceptible details in Soviet films, who would so easily even from contemporaries of that time remember how popular they were in the 80s: auto-trainings, yoga, this is besides aerobics, Burda magazines, and this is even before the era of astrological horoscopes, but on the contrary with the fashion for psychics, however and it's not about them, and not about production gymnastics, but about what is most fully recorded against the background of others in comedies: "The most charming and attractive", "We are cheerful, joyful, happy" and "In love on my own." For that era, there was evidence of this in the cinema. And if we are talking about the times before the development of modern technology?.. Wasn't there evidence of the same thing: such a universal social, but not related to politics or the development of ideas in religion or science, even with the development of technology and technology, even with some disasters, but such a fashion, how the styles of dresses, hats, jackets, shirts, ties, trousers change, or cufflinks, wristwatches, and straps go in and out of fashion, so this is the same kind of fashion, but in the field of hobbies, was there not evidence of the same kind of hobbies in mysticism, superstition, folklore, especially national, one's own, village, and spiritualism, hypnosis, was not the novel "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by Doyle such a testimony to such a fashion, especially since, as I have already shown, it is almost intertextual to many other examples of contemporary literature with the same themes. Like some kind of fashionable musical motif, replicated here and there in another sphere of musical art. But usually fashion is associated with us, if not with clothes, then with objects more than with ideas.
Newspaper
Not just the Times, but the Ve Times - the largest, most famous and oldest English newspaper, published since the 18th century, since 1785. It is still being published.
In the 19th century. in the 1810s, it began to be printed on a steam press and delivered by rail.
The first newspaper that sent a correspondent to the war, and it was the Crimean War. This military commander was William Howard Russell.
In the 1890s-1900s-the time of writing the novel, I was going through ... a financial crisis.
She supported Britain's participation in the First World War. In 1920, the infamous so-called Protocols of the Elders of Zion were placed on the editorial page in the editor's column: on May 8, 1920, The Times, of which Steed remained the editor-in-chief, published the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in the editorial column as an authentic document (later most serious researchers recognized them as an anti-Semitic hoax and plagiarism); in the same The editor's column called Jews "the most dangerous in the world." In an article entitled "The Jewish Danger, an alarming pamphlet: We need to figure it out" (eng. The Jewish Peril, a Disturbing Pamphlet: Call for Inquiry) Steed wrote about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion:
"Protocols" — what is it? Are they genuine? If so, what kind of evil gathering could concoct such plans and be so happy to present them? Or is it a fake? If so, where did such an inexplicable prediction come from in it—a prediction that has already partially come true, and everything is going to make it come true completely?"
But the following year, Philip Graves, then The Times correspondent in Constantinople (now Istanbul), exposed the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as a forgery, and The Times refuted its editor's statement last year.
In the 1930s, Soviet intelligence officer Kim Philby worked as a correspondent for the same newspaper in Spain during the Civil War.
In the 1940s, she drew criticism from Churchill for supporting the Communists. Deputy editor–in-chief is the famous pro-Soviet historian Carr, author of the multi-volume "History of Soviet Russia".
Since 1982, she began to use computers, and only then the photo set and computer layout replaced the linotypes that the newspaper used... since Doyle's time.
But the well-known font of the Times New Roman and the modern font of the We Times newspaper are not at all the typeface that Holmes is talking about. This font appeared in the 1930s: it was first used by the Times newspaper on October 3, 1932. Microsoft uses Times New Roman as the main font.
Dogs
Not objects at all, but nevertheless subject to fashion. The very love of the British for animals made such a novel possible - "The Hound of the Baskervilles", in the center of the narrative, after all, let it be an evil, phantom, but a dog.
Parallels with other works of English classics: even in the names. Sir Henry... Baskerville, but also Tinley. Laura... Lyons, but also Fairlie. Although, the first Laura is Mrs., and the second is Miss. The British generally made the names speaking: miss is an unmarried woman, the daughter of her father, Mrs. is a married woman, the wife of her husband, Mr. is just a gentleman, Sir Henry is a nobleman, a landowner, but not necessarily a lord, the doctor is a man of academic rank, as a rule a doctor, Dr. Mortimer despite the publications is only a doctor.
Translations rarely take into account specific historical features: for example, what is the intrigue (and irony) of the novel "Northanger Abbey": there is the Fullerton estate, which is owned by the childless (and untitled) Mr. Allen. There is the village of Fullerton, which has a parish priest (like the father of the writer herself) with ten children, among whom is a daughter, Catherine Morland. The Allens take her with them to Bath, to a resort, where, through accidental circumstances, she comes to the attention of General Tinley, who wants to marry his younger (and therefore does not inherit his estate - Northanger Abbey, which was really before the Reformation and the distribution of church property to the nobles, the abbey) son, who decided to give the profession of a priest for a rich bride Miss Morland is rumored to be just like that. Love really arises between young people. And as a result, the angry general still relents, and his youngest son, the future priest, marries the daughter of a priest, who are satisfied with love more than rich possessions, a modest, cozy cottage on the shore is enough for them. But the Russian reader must figure it out for himself: who are the Allens, why do they take Miss Morland with them to Bath, to guess with the general and not notice the irony: if the general has decided to make the youngest son a priest, he chooses the daughter of a priest as his wife, and not a rich bride.
In the center of the action of the novel "The Woman in White" are the baronets, and the wastelands again. From the same novel, the usual distribution of the rural district is visible: there is the Limmeridge House estate, and there is the village of Limmeridge, and there are farms with their own names, for example, "Todd's Corner". If there is a Meripit House in the novel, it can be assumed that there was or is a Meripit village. Although, of course, following the tradition of Austen's realistic prose, the books, although recognizable geography, usually have fictional local names.
From Collins' novel, the delicacy of the advice Mortimer came to Holmes for is obvious: he is forced to let him into the circumstances of his personal life, the family secrets of another, even a family alien to himself. Pets are part of such a personal life.
Already at that time, the fashion for "cats" was born in England.
The images of children on Barton's canvases were mawkish and sentimental. These cute and well-mannered children from rich families are shown in rich interiors. They didn't seem to be affected by poverty, uncertainty about the future, or hard work, like thousands of other English children during the Industrial Revolution. Even the British noted this. The artist replied to criticism that he devoted his own work to the depiction of animals and children.
Charles Barber's clients were wealthy English families. In the early 1890s, Queen Victoria drew attention to his work. The artist's art granted him the right to depict the children and grandchildren of the royal family along with their animals.
The dogs were painted by Wardle and Landseer.
Arthur John Elsley was also known for sentimental paintings of children in a style similar to his contemporary.
Morgan's paintings were hugely popular during his lifetime and were widely replicated. Frederick Morgan is a portrait painter of domestic and rural scenes, also painted idyllic childhood paintings, where pets, and dogs, including some of the significant figures in the paintings.
But John Atkinson Grimshaw is known for his urban landscapes that convey fog and twilight. But in the novel, the writer is looking for a background that caused Watson and Holmes to remark away from the really gloomy, moreover, as it is known, drowning in smog London, just in such a, but not idyllically depicted rural wilderness. However, Grimshaw is also known for such paintings.
Baskerville Hall in the novel performs the same function as the "mysterious mansions" in the landscapes of Grimshaw, here is an example of a description of one such painting:
"And of course Grimshaw, this article cannot be without his landscapes!
Mystery, mystery, mystical play of light always haunts the landscapes of Grimshaw. Here, as in the case of William Deguve, it is difficult to choose one painting. However, I decided to use the landscape "At the gates of the park" as a basis, which seemed to me especially mystical and even sinister.
The moonlit night after the rain is a frequent subject for Grimshaw's paintings. A muddy road, wet autumn grass, trees with fallen leaves on gloomy bushes – it looks like a late October night landscape. There is a mysterious mansion ahead, towards which the lady is heading. The moon is the only source of light in her path.
There is not much point in interpreting this and other Grimshaw paintings. There could be anything here. We can agree that George Gordon Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley are in this house"// Internet channel House Among Laurels. Yandex Zen
In general, as the Russian proverb says: "in a quiet pool –devils are found."
By the way, English literature came out according to one of the opinions from English landscape painting, it is enough to recall even the names of novels, for example, "Wuthering Heights", despite the fact that this is also the name of the estate.
But, back to the dog, that is, literally the dog.
In ancient Egypt, the dog was a symbol of justice. In this case, it is possible to use this symbolism of an ancient myth: Stapleton, having no legal rights to the Baskervilles' inheritance, fails with the idea of reconstructing the family ghost, which in turn appears as the fulfillment of justice over Hugo Baskerville.
In ancient India, dogs were attributed power over evil spirits.
In medieval Europe, black dogs were associated with witch hunts.
It is hardly worth arguing that the novel was intended specifically to debunk superstitions: the legend is used in it only as part of the plot. And much later than the novel, there is information that people in England continue to meet a giant ghost dog. The case in the novel is described as a special case, as one of the crimes investigated by Holmes.
The witch seduced the dogman and turns herself into a dog in Gogol's story "Viy".
This is the motive of the Magic Hunter and the Wild Hunt, as I have already noticed. But also in Dante's "Immortal Comedy" there is a chapter about the hellhound Cerberus.
It can be noted that just as stories about the transmigration of souls are usually circulated only in the countries of the Buddhist-Hindu cultural area, so stories, literary or film stories similar to the "Dog of the Baskervilles", despite Doyle's involvement in the plot of colonies from all over the world (West Indies, Canada, Africa) have a continuation, reminiscences, only in the area of European, Christian culture (including in Russia, where the book was very popular before the revolution, as well as the Maslennikov series in the late USSR-it is always a matter of culture, which was ignored for a long time by economists who believed that any demand depends on supply, not taking into account that, for example, selling pork in Israel or in Arab countries would be not just stupid, but also dangerous, in economics in the 20th century. awareness of the factor of culture and certain public institutions, their development, along with with the factors of democracy, developed property relations, legal consciousness, social institutions, although the fact that culture is an economically significant factor was discovered and used by the churches).
But in reality, everything may be even older than the Abrahamic religions. In this whole story, as I have already noticed, it is not difficult to notice parallels with initiation.
Initiation (Latin initiatio "initiation; performance of the sacrament") or initiation is a rite that marks the transition of an individual to a new stage of development within a social group or mystical society. Among the rites of passage, initiation rites, or initiations, occupy a special place. The history of religion distinguishes three categories of initiation — three types of transition. The first includes collective rituals marking the transition from childhood or adolescence to adulthood (performed at the age of six or twelve), as well as rituals taking place individually or in narrow groups. The second category of rituals includes all kinds of rites of entry into a secret society or brotherhood. The third category of initiation confirms the mystical vocation, which at the level of primitive religions represents the vocation of a shaman or leader. A distinctive feature of the third category of initiation is a stronger religious experience, compared to that which falls to the lot of other members of the community.
The essence and purpose of initiation are always and everywhere the same, only the ways of adapting it to the place and time differ. Adaptation is never the product of anyone's imagination; but, like the adaptation of traditional forms in general, it always comes from a "non-human" source; for outside of it there may be no tradition, no initiation, but only some of the "parodies" so often found in the modern world, which neither from which they do not originate and lead to nothing.
The roots of the rite can be traced back to ancient times, among almost all peoples. Initiation is usually accompanied by a festive ceremony, often with various, often painful, trials (for example, tattooing, bodily injury, ant bites, surgical interventions, etc.). Various remedies were often used to cause drowsiness or a significant decrease in pain sensitivity, thereby creating conditions for overcoming painful trials. Myths and legends of the ancient, prenatal period of history testify to the variety of rituals.
One of the stages of initiation introduced the teenager into the world of spiritual values and at the same time into the laws of human society. During this period, he learned the myths and sacred traditions of the tribe, the names of the gods and the history of their deeds, as well as the rules of behavior, the organization of adults. During this test, the teenagers had to prove their willpower and spirit, which was supposed to mean their presence in the world and responsibility. In many tribes during this period, multiple prohibitions were imposed: deprivation of food, dumbness, living in the dark. All this was not only an exercise in asceticism, but also meant giving up ambitions and all desires. In the face of difficulties and pain, the boy received a message that he could no longer return home the same. Initiation usually included a triple revelation: the sacred, death, and sexuality. All three types of experience are absent from the child, so the initiate learns about them during the ritual and then includes them in the structure of his life. Physical trials, often painful, pursued the goal of submission, which was followed by a symbolic return to the original, not yet formalized state, which caused a symbolic experience of death and a new birth.
And, here is another curious remark about how different peoples have similar or the same motives can have different interpretations: "Thanks to the old Oriental fairy tale "The Magic Lamp of Aladdin", we all know a genie who lives in a bottle or lamp and fulfills any desires. And in the Disney version, he is generally a very cute, funny and kind wizard. I remember when I was a child, I dreamed of finding such a lamp. And the "Soviet gin" old man Hottabych is a very charming dandelion grandfather. But this is not the case with the Turks. They're scared to death of gins. Why? Yes, because jin is a terrible demon! The embodiment of all horrors."
Every culture has its own fears, so the very use of a certain superstition in literature should imply that it is familiar. But in the novel, the ghost dog actually turns out to be a real dog, unusual, but just a dog and not the Baskervilles, but Stapleton.
Stapleton's Dog
Doyle meant the half-breed Old English Mastiff and the Irish Wolfhound (Irish Wolfhound) or the Scottish Deerhound (Doyle had Irish roots, Arthur grew up in Scotland), these greyhounds are also gounds (but not hounds-a fundamental mistake of Russian translators and interpreters-Doyle certainly was not an attentive author, but neither modern English mastiffs nor English bloodhounds they do not have a black color, unlike greyhounds) and differ (like mastiffs) in gigantic sizes -Doyle was primarily interested in the gigantic size of the dog: The plot begins with the discovery of the tracks of a giant dog. The effect of the imaginary mixing of giant dogs should only have been amplified. But the instinct inherent in hounds, greyhounds, sighted hunters, was not then common and proven in criminology, on the contrary, research and experiments in this direction were just beginning.
In addition, compare: "Ze Gound of ze Deep" - it would be more correct to "Plunge into the abyss" - it's about the sea, about something big and dangerous.
And, at the same time: "The Gound of Notre Dame"-we also have a similar connotation, we also use the slang "greyhounds".
"Ze Gound of Spring"-spring is also different, our streams murmur, and their winds howl (hence the hound dogs, because hounds -during hunting they chase the beast with a voice so that hunters know where they are chasing).
But why isn't the Hound after the Baskervilles definitely not a Hound? Because firstly, gounds in England are not necessarily hounds, wolfhounds, greyhounds are also gounds. But they do not hunt by instinct, and this is a debatable issue then. And secondly, in England, large predators and game in general have long disappeared, and English hounds, if they are small, they are not even Russian hounds-we can still hunt wolves and wild boars with them. But usually they do not hunt with a hound alone, but in packs. Therefore, well, like a Hound after the Baskervilles...
Although, shoes are certainly the qualities of a hound. But was Doyle a hunter?.. Let's put the question more broadly: in the novel, there is still more, despite all the absurdity of the generally accepted concept of "historical reality" (that is, all the same, as if there were no reality) or even the "imaginary reality" inherent in artistic works (also an absurd term) of the author, inherent in truth not only in artistic works and in accordance with the discoveries of literary criticism 20b. the "imaginary reality" of not only the author, but the author and the reader?..
The history of culture in the novel
I visited the apartment of the 19th century. Guess what these household items are for!
October 16th
In Kaliningrad, I was lucky enough to get into an apartment-museum of the 19th century. This apartment, located on the ground floor, used to be occupied by representatives of the middle class.
All furniture, finishes, floors, etc. remain authentic and in the same form as it was used 100 years ago.
There are a lot of objects in the apartment to look at and study. For example, batteries weighing 200 kg, which for obvious reasons are not attached to the wall, but they stand on their own legs. By the way, despite its "antiquity", the batteries already had a handle for temperature control.
The life of cats in Zelenogradsk resembles a Japanese cartoon
I also liked the first Mercedes typewriter (the brand has nothing to do with cars).
There is a lot to describe, in fact. There are a lot of details and everything is interesting!
I want to show you a few "favorites" of the 19th century, which were very popular at the time. And you try to guess what these items are needed for and how they were used in everyday life. Well, there are other interesting questions that you can try to answer.
So,
1) This is the 1000th bill. Do you think that's a lot of money at that time? What do you think you can buy for that amount?
Now let's move to the kitchen, where basically only the cook was, so there is no table here. The meal was always held in the living room.
Pay attention to the washbasin, which resembles steps in shape: that is, two sinks, and one below the other.
2) Why do you think there are two sinks in the kitchen at that time?
The question of the dishes. At that time of the 19th century, cups of this type were popular.
3) What do you think is the purpose for which such a bridge is made in the cup?
Another very interesting, and most importantly convenient element of the kitchen, reminiscent of abacus.
4) What do you think it is and what is it for?
Labels are a list of products.
Next, one of the main items is a very small sewing machine. I think you immediately understood what it was intended for?
5) Did you understand why you need a small and very light sewing machine?
In fact, the apartment is full of items that are no longer used today or very rarely, but at that time, in the 19th century, these things were in great demand.
One example of things from that time that are still popular these days.
6) This is such a metal beetle. Do you understand what you need it for?
So,
A banknote with a face value of 1000, how great is its value?
This is one of the first monetary units, so 1000 is a fortune. For example, a car could be bought for 700. That is, you understand that you can live on this money for a long time. Usually such money was kept in banks. Then, of course, inflation devalued money every day, it got to the point that they started to heat the furnace, so there was no benefit from them.
2. Two sinks were installed in the kitchen at that time. One served to soak dirty dishes in soda and salt for exactly 24 hours, that is, for one day. The second sink, which is lower, was used for household needs - to wash fruits, vegetables, etc. This was how they used to save water, which was very expensive. By the way, water meters were already installed at that time. The stepped design of the sinks is just a matter of beauty and nothing more.
3. In the 19th century, men wore mustaches, so they had the whole mustache and beard care kit, for example, a comb, scissors, a mustache net during sleep, so as not to spoil their shape. But dishes with a special "fence" for moustaches have become especially popular. So, men could not worry that a drop of tea or broth would fall on a white shirt.
4. When the cook prepares food and suddenly something ends, she always has at hand such a notebook resembling an abacus. By the end of the day, the cook already knew what she needed to buy.
5. We used to travel too, so everything had to be practical, light and miniature, like, for example, a sewing machine. The assistant could immediately fix the hem of her mistress's dress on the way, etc.
6. Such items (here, for example, in the form of a beetle) began to be especially popular for removing boots. At that time, heavy boots became fashionable, which are difficult to take off yourself, needed the help of another person, so this invention became very popular. Such an object can be found today, but in other forms. // Vladimir Kiri. Yandex Zen
We won't learn any of this from the novel. But what does this mean? It is paradoxical that in the novel "imaginary reality" is faked as "historical reality", and although much was already changing quickly then, but in the 1900s, everything that was known about the 1880s was still a lot, and certainly about everyday objects.
"The advent of electric lighting-cleaner, but also more expensive - has opened up an opportunity for citizens to choose. In some houses, gas pipes have been replaced with electrical wiring. However, the cost of one incandescent lamp was equal to the average weekly earnings, not to mention installing your own generator. The pioneer in the development of electric lighting was the gun magnate William Armstrong, who equipped it in his home in Northumberland (Cragside)- and what was the name of the hotel in London – a small hydroelectric power plant. Overseas, in New York, the millionaires from Fifth Avenue competed with him in terms of innovations: in the 1880s, small generators also appeared in their houses." -p.268.//
Worsley L. English House. An intimate story.-M.,2016. –this shows the wealth of the Baskervilles, the desire to impress Doyle's readers, and the importance of the Baskerville estate for the neighborhood.
By the way, in the 17th century revolutions took place twice in England and such a direction of painting as ceremonial portraits of royal families, the nobility did not develop after the revolutions for well-known reasons in England. This all the more developed art for the bourgeoisie, where landscapes occupied such a significant place that they are mentioned in every work of classical literature. Therefore, when talking about portraits of members of a non-noble, non-aristocratic, but titled noble family, Doyle emphasized, on the one hand, the usual attribute of a noble estate, and on the other hand, he showed exactly the feudality, the antiquity of the family and its possessions. Just in contrast to the life of the reader of the novel: purely bourgeois.
The romanticization in literature of one or another geographical and local history feature (Yorkshire, Exmoor or Dartmoor) was certainly influenced by the development of landscape painting.
But in the novel, by the way, landscape geography is written out rather sparingly (and this despite the fact that Doyle personally gained impressions after visiting Dartmoor, and the fact that they still believed in the novel). The features of Dartmoor (and the Soviet translation) are better understood from a small modern article (based on personal observation) in the journal "Science and Life" (No. 3, 2014) by philologist Elena Veshnyakovskaya.
What is not in the novel?
Characteristic "chest houses" in villages: built of local stone
Stone fences that serve as a fence and boundary, separating some fields, pastures from others, and stone crosses are found near them-they also indicate the place in the fence beyond which the path continues, because the fence is not large, and the crosses serve as landmarks in a treeless and deserted area
A feature for any tourist, traveler: the combination of marshes and fogs allows you to walk ankle-deep in water and shoulder-deep in clouds
The moors are actually neither wastelands nor swamps. And the torahs are also not just granite rocks (they are flat like the surface of a table). It cannot be said that the landscape is too familiar to everyone in England (except partly from the novel and other examples of literature). Hollow (according to folklore) flat hills (in which Hobbits can also live)
Stone Bridges-the hallmark of Dartmoor-clapper bridges
Sheep and ponies (wild Dartmoor ones too), as well as red cows of the local breed, imported to Russia at one time and also well-known.
A huge number of sites, dwellings of Neolithic man and circles of stones, as suggested by the traces of Druids, as the old religion is called here - the ancient faith of the Celts
The habitats of the heath are the most extensive in the Neotropics and tropical Africa, but also occur in Northern Europe and Western Europe, Northern Australia, North America, Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. Most of the moorlands in the world are very diverse ecosystems. In the vast moorlands of the tropics, biodiversity can be extremely high. The heath is also related to the tundra (where the subsurface is permafrost or permafrost soil), appearing as the tundra recedes and inhabiting the area between the permafrost and the natural zone of the tree. The boundary between tundra and heath is constantly shifting with climate change.
Heath, or heath is a biotope, generally typical of mountainous terrain, although I repeat, we are accustomed to perceive swamps as lowlands.
It is most widespread in the temperate climates of the Northern and Southern hemispheres, such as in Great Britain, Ireland and New Zealand, as well as in the high-altitude areas of the tropics, as in the Andean paramos, philologist Veshnyakovskaya compares with the African lowland steppes-savannas. As a rule, wastelands are not biologically diverse and are usually associated with heather.
Peat is also used as a wall insulation in construction, and as a litter for livestock in animal husbandry.
Is it possible to drown in a peat bog without inventing the Grimpen bog? The answers vary, but it's easy. Ireland is one of the richest countries in terms of peat reserves. Billions of tons. The peat layer in peat bogs can reach 6 m. It is 3 times larger than the tallest human height.
The fauna of the moorlands in Europe is represented by such birds as the white partridge, field harrier, gyrfalcon, golden plover, great curlew, field lark, meadow horse, meadow chekan, white-throated thrush and mountain tap.
In the second half of the 20th century, the excessive use of moorlands for grazing, commercial forest plantations and the invasion of alien plants such as the Common Eagle led to the degradation and disappearance of 20% of the entire wasteland space
The modern attitude to nature differs from the past, and it is not easy for us (a hundred years have passed since the discovery of the charm of the Russian landscape by Shishkin and Levitan) to understand that even at the beginning of the 18th century, the very idea that the genre of pure landscape could be a suitable subject for art was a little more than a hundred years old. At that time, of course, religious subjects, historical ones, portraits of royal families and nobility were dominant. Curiously, in the novel itself, painting is mentioned in the first chapters, when Holmes suggests that Watson spend time watching a painting by Belgian artists in a gallery before lunch at the hotel with Sir Henry and Mortimer. And of course in the study of the portrait gallery in Baskerville Hall.
Gottfried Kneller. Godfrey Kneller (German: Gottfried Kniller, English: Godfrey Kneller, Godfrey Kneller; 1648-1723) was a German painter, the most popular portrait painter of Great Britain at the turn of the XVII and XVIII centuries. He was knighted by King William III. George I granted him the dignity of a baronet.
The Hermitage also has other examples of works by this artist.
Not he himself, but his works are well known to schoolchildren in modern Russia:
portrait of Peter in 1698, portrait of Isaac Newton in 1689 by Kneller are published in dozens of editions of history and physics textbooks.
Portrait of Henry Risley, Earl of Southampton in the 1981 Soviet film Portrait from the original.
Curiously, the other, usually called the ancestor of the detective genre, Collins' novel is not a detective, it does not have a deductive method, and Cartwright is not a detective. But still, what he does in addition to drawing lessons, and he is an artist, is explicitly called "investigation" in the novel, and who should not do it, as an artist, an observant person - the non-observation of others, not artists, is also mentioned in the novel.
The theme of drawing lessons is often heard in Collins' novel "The Woman in White", where the main character is an artist, disputes about how to depict the landscape sound in Austen's novel "Northanger Abbey", similar conversations between the characters are led by the author (Gaskell) in the novel "North and South", in Doyle's novel too There is an artist, this is Laura Lyons' husband. The novel mentions an exhibition of Belgian artists and one of the key roles was played by family portraits in the gallery at Baskerville Hall.
And how old is the farmer's daughter?.. It is no coincidence that the novel mentions a painting by Reynolds, Reynolds' most famous work is a portrait of a child whose life was tragically cut short, and the image of a girl Penelope Boothby was also an image of innocence. In the traditions of romanticism, she was also a symbol of childhood (or rather, just the concept of childhood, as distinct from adulthood, which was formed in Modern times), openness to the world, nature - in the novel, the girl seeks salvation where Sir Charles finds death, who mistakenly fled from home, and not to home.
Penelope was the daughter of a baronet, she spent her short life at the family estate of Boothby Ashbourne Hall in Derbyshire. At the age of 3, she was a model for the painting "The Bonnet" by Joshua Reynolds. Penelope died of an illness at the age of 5. Due to the death of her only young daughter, her parents' marriage is believed to have collapsed. Her father went broke. And in the 1810s, a descendant of the manufacturer Arkwright lived in Ashbourne Hall (there is a character with the surname Cartwright in the book). Penelope in Reynolds' painting may have become part of that image of innocence and purity, which in the age of advertising made a similar image of a girl possible on a soap package. Symbolically literal purity.
So how old was the farmer's daughter? The events in the legend are dated to the 18th century, but the legend describes the times of the English Revolution of the 17th century., in relation to the biography of Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry the Seventh Tudor, it is mentioned that her first marriage, concluded when the bride was only a year old, is not valid also because it was concluded before the age of 12, and although it is the 15th century. We are talking about the fact that the age of the farmer's daughter could be very young in modern terms.
Drawing is not an uncommon hobby.
Hobbies: almost every character in the novel who lived in seclusion on Dartmoor had his own hobby: Frankland had a telescope and probably, in addition to litigating (studying English laws), was an amateur astronomer (although most likely he spied on the residents), his daughter married an artist who came to Dartmoor to write sketches, a doctor Mortimer was interested in anthropology, the remains of primitive human settlements allow for excavations, and even Stapleton was interested in botany, even more entomology, even more precisely lepidopterology-lepidoptera, that is, butterflies. By the way, it is quite a rewarding occupation for a scientist: Until now, lepidopterists discover up to a thousand new species of butterflies every year.
The Russian Entomological Society, which included botanists, was founded in the 1850s. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, representatives of the nobility, aristocrats, even Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich Romanov (in addition to their passion for history) were engaged in this. As Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov is also known (by the way, he has been an Anglomaniac since childhood). Among the famous lepidopterists: the son of the merchant Yershov, Chetverikov is the son of a manufacturer, a relative of Stanislavsky; travelers Przhevalsky, Potanin, son of the landowner Alferaki, son of a lieutenant general of the Russian Imperial army, nobleman, emigrant of the first wave, American diplomat Avinov. Of course, the 19th century was a time to continue studying the geography of the Earth, its flora and fauna. But it is curious that Nabokov's interest in this field of science arose in childhood under the influence of books by Maria Sibylla Merian, which he found in the attic of the Vyra estate. Merian was a 17th-century German artist. In 1699-1701, she made a trip to Suriname, during which she observed and described the local flora and fauna. During her two years in Suriname, she collected a rich collection of insects, caterpillars, and butterflies, which for a long time was the most complete entomological survey of South America. As you know, Stapleton was born in South America. Scrupulousness is a necessary quality in a passion for entomology. And this is another, in addition to prudery, quality of Stapleton, which led him to thoughtfulness, and therefore to the insidiousness of criminal plans and actions. But this quality was hardly characteristic of the rabid nature of his ancestor.
In his occupation of lepidopterology, Stapleton was a real Briton and, moreover, an aristocrat. Even the Soviet columnist Vsevolod Ovchinnikov wrote in a book about England about the attitude of the British to hobbies (obviously adopted by wide strata from the idle and educated class, the nobility): the British highly appreciate the activities of people in which they indulge not for the sake of money or duty. Holmes and Watson were amateurs themselves, in fact, it seems that we owe the stories about the detective to this: Holmes was engaged in investigations without taking remuneration, and Watson, a retired military doctor, after being wounded, was engaged in their literary presentation, which was known to both Mortimer and Stapleton at Dartmoor. Actually, of course, Dr. Doyle was fond of writing short stories, novels, journalism. By the way, at the same time in the 19th century in England, dog breeding was developing, including from the queen's hobby.
Whether the British are right or not, science and literature have both come out of the hobby.
Doyle's novel also has a genealogical theme: the history of the family, which was also fashionable at that time, judging by the number of biographical novels and family chronicles. There can be a curse of the family in any family. And so, in accordance with both the religious idea and the idea of progress, the forces of the genus are aimed at getting rid of the curse.
These are the same ideas as in Bunin's story "The Village": where the unhappy fate of the descendants of the first serfs in Durnovka, then the new owners of Durnovka from the same serfs, leads to the impoverishment of the family and the fact that the old brothers sell the estate and leave for the city.
But in Doyle's novel, the story of a family of baronets, albeit the lowest in the hierarchy of the aristocracy, but a noble family, which is related to Bunin's other novel, The Life of Arsenyev. In general, for classical literature, as I have already noticed, these ideas are very common: family chronicles, family histories. The same Thomas Mann's "Budenbrocki", Galsworthy's "The Saga of Forsytes", etc.
In another novel by Austen, "Arguments of Reason," the landowner discusses why he would not prefer a career in the Navy, and in Doyle's novel admirals are mentioned among the ancestors of the Baskervilles, so just because a career in the Navy (the largest then English) gave the opportunity to advance people with the darkest origins.
From the same novel by Austen, the circumstances of the Baskervilles' family feud are also clear: when one brother knows nothing about the other. The entail is not just the inheritance of the title and estate by the elder brother, namely, the non-divisibility of the title and estate, and the responsibility of the elder brother. If there were younger sons of the father in the family (everything was different with the daughters: they were married with a dowry, but shifting responsibilities to the members of the husband's family, but what concerned the younger sons concerned their widows and children, that is, nephews and nieces, and this can be seen from Collins' novel "A Woman in white", where the sisters Miss Holcomb and Miss Fairlie, sisters only on the female side, live in their house, but where the stepfather's brother and father are the owner: uncle, Mr. Fairlie), his eldest son was obliged, at the expense of just managing the estate, to give them a career: buy an officer's patent, give money for legal education, buy a church parish, or keep it for life. Obviously, the Baskervilles had forgotten about it.
"Of course, during the farewell conversation in her mother's bedroom, an important practical advice should have come from her wise lips-a warning could not escape from her heart regarding unfeeling lords and baronets who flatter their souls by seducing young ladies and taking them to their remote estates. Who wouldn't have thought of that? However, Mrs. Morland had so little idea of the lords and baronets that she had no idea of their general depravity and did not suspect the damage they could do to her daughter by their nefarious machinations. Her concerns were limited to the following points: - Please, Catherine, wrap your neck better when you leave the ball. And I would like you to write down your expenses-I will give you a special notebook for this."
Or from the same novel: "They had no worries on the way, except for Mrs. Allen's fear that she had left a pair of wooden shoes at a roadside inn-a fear, fortunately, that was not confirmed."
If one did not know that Austen's novel Northanger Abbey (translated by Immanuel Marshak) was published more than half a century earlier than Doyle's novel, then the reader might consider Austen's novel in these passages ironic in relation to Doyle's novel. But there is something else here. Indeed, Austen's novel is an irony, a parody, as Genieva noted, of "horror novels" back in the 18th century, in particular by Anna Radcliffe. And the style of literature to which Doyle's novel is usually attributed is called neo-Romanticism, that is, as if historically, Doyle's novel really tried to revive some traditions ridiculed by Austen. This is also noticeable in the above quotes. And the definition by literary critics of Doyle among the writers of neo-romanticism is, of course, quite justified.
In Anna Radcliffe's The Udolphian Mysteries, the father of the main character is engaged in botany. He lost two boys, focusing all his attention on his only daughter.
A young priest Thomas Fowle, the lover of 24-year-old writer Jane Austen, died of yellow fever in the West Indies, hoping to earn money for a wedding, after which she never married.
The Watsons is the title of Jane Austen's unfinished novel.
Doyle, in the so-called mystical stories (though sometimes attributed by publishers to Doyle), addressed the topic of the mysterious portrait at least twice: this is the name of one of the stories, but the text in the novel seems to have even been copied from another (which indicates, perhaps, confirmation of Doyle's authorship of both this part of the novel, written in collaboration with Robinson, and the story).
Conan Doyle also has another story (authorship is not questioned in it) "A strange incident in Oxford": in it again we can see similarities in the plot, literary techniques, constructions, even phraseologically (despite the fact that the translators for all three are different: N. Volzhina, N. Vysotskaya and V.Polyakov) and with that story, in which Doyle's authorship is considered doubtful, and with the novel about the dog of the Baskervilles (this proves that, after all, with the exception of the idea of the plot, help in getting acquainted with local material and possibly writing a legend, the rest of the novel is written entirely by Doyle).
Before pointing out the phraseological similarities, I note that in these and in a number of his other works, Doyle addresses one topic: immortality, because they are haunted, aliens from the other world, and they are attributed (as in folklore, superstitions) extraordinary strength, abilities. But Doyle seeks to push his heroes together-from the modern century, which accounts for the heyday of science (the discoveries of Mendel, Mendeleev, Darwin, a number of discoveries in physics, including radioactivity, discoveries in medicine, Doyle was a doctor himself) and technology (the invention of photography, telegraph, phonograph, railways, automobiles, steamships, steam locomotives, airships, airplanes, movies), people of a sober mind, critical thinking in order to be called supernatural, and "discovers" that almost every such event hides not just someone's skillful manipulation, and designed to hide crimes (this is also an interesting connection with Luddites, fears of progress: and where science and technology will lead us). Specifically, in this story, the supernatural, by the way, is not exposed at all (the evil character really masters some secret of reviving the mummy, although after the actions of the main character-by the way, also an amateur, and also a future doctor, he hurriedly leaves and the background remains unexplained), although it remains a crime, but as in A whistleblower novel cannot go to court because the evidence is not convincing and, moreover, it will cause ridicule.
And now I propose to compare the phrases from the story and the novel (where there is both an alley and a monster chasing on its heels, which its criminal discoverer calls a "demon of revenge", and Stapleton tries to make one of the purchased dog, moreover, this discoverer himself first gives out an animated mummy, more precisely for the noise in his room from her- for allegedly buying a pedigree dog, and a gate, but also her own original flavor: The oldest college in Oxford, a corner tower, a spiral staircase worn by numerous generations - as a watercourse of young English life, but still preserved, along with modern pursuits, for example, boxing and rowing, and the very fascination with ancient oriental languages -Egyptology, as paleontology also began in the 19th century):
- But, please, listen to me, leave these rooms.
"Get out of here," she said. - Leave for London immediately!
- without saying what I should be afraid of. - Bellingham. - But that's childish. Why should I be afraid of him or anyone else?
"But what do you think is the danger?" - Do you know the legend about the dog? - I don't believe this nonsense!
- I was pushed. I was standing on the shore, and something caught me from behind like a feather and threw me down. I didn't hear or see anything. But I know what it was. "Me too," Smith whispered. Lee looked at him in surprise, "So you found out?" Do you remember my advice? - Yes, and I think I'll follow it. "I don't know what the hell you're talking about," Gasti said.
- Yes, sir, but maybe the letter was sent by a man who is convinced that the whole story is completely supernatural. - What's the story? Sir Henry asked sharply. "You gentlemen seem to know a lot more about my business than I do!"
He walked quickly to the Farlingforth Gate, beyond which a long gravel alley began. Gripping the iron latch of the gate, Smith looked back at the road he had come. Something was approaching fast along it. It moved in the shadow of the bushes, silently, stealthily, a dark crouching figure, barely distinguishable against the dark background. She was approaching with amazing speed. In the darkness, Smith could only make out a skinny neck and two eyes that would haunt him in nightmares for the rest of his days.
Quick footsteps were heard in the silence of the swamps. Crouching behind the boulders, we stared intently at the murky silver wall that was approaching us. The footsteps got closer and closer, and then out of the fog, as if opening a curtain in front of him, the one we were waiting for stepped out. Then he walked quickly along the path, passed us and began to climb up the gentle slope that began just behind the boulders. As he walked, he kept glancing over his shoulder, apparently wary of something. "Hush!" whispered Holmes, and snapped the trigger. - Look! Here she is! In the midst of the fog creeping towards us, a measured, fractional trampling was heard. Yes! It was a dog, huge, pitch black. But none of us mortals have ever seen such a dog. Flames shot out of its open mouth, sparks flew from its eyes, flickering fire shimmered over its muzzle and neck. In no one's inflamed brain could there have been a vision more terrible, more disgusting, than this infernal creature that jumped out of the fog at us.
The heavy gate slammed shut behind him, but he heard it immediately swing open in front of his pursuer. Distraught, Smith raced through the darkness, hearing a thumping sound behind him, and, looking back, saw that this terrible vision was catching up with him in huge leaps (The monster was rushing along the path in huge leaps, sniffing at the tracks of our friend. We came to our senses only after it rushed past), flashing eyes, stretching out a bony hand. Thank God the door was wide open. Smith saw a narrow strip of light from the lamp burning in the front. But the trampling was already very close, and Smith heard a hoarse bubbling in his ear. He flew into the door with a scream, slammed it, locked it behind him and, fainting, fell into a chair. "Jesus, Smith, what happened?" Peterson asked, appearing in the doorway of the office. - Give me a sip of cognac!
The dog howled one last time, snapping its teeth furiously. Sir Henry was lying unconscious where she had overtaken him. Lestrade pushed the neck of a flask of cognac between his teeth. - Oh my God! The baronet whispered. - What was that? Where is it?
Smith was reputed to be a good runner, but he had never run like he did that night.
God, how Holmes ran that night! I've always been considered a good runner, but he beat me to it.
"My dear fellow, you're exaggerating too much," Peterson said. - Your nerves are shaken from excessive activities. Judge for yourself: How can such a monster walk the streets of Oxford, even at night, and remain unnoticed? - He was seen. The residents of the city are scared, there are rumors about an escaped monkey (a reference to Poe's story). Everyone is talking about it all the time.
- I found out that some of the local residents, even before the tragic death of Sir Charles, saw a strange creature in the swamps, exactly matching the descriptions of the Baskerville demon and unlike any other animal known to science.
"Your accusations against Bellingham are serious, of course, but if you go to the police, they'll just laugh at you. - I know. That's why I want to do it myself.
- But there is a crime, isn't there? - Nothing like that! These are all guesses and assumptions. We will be laughed at in court if we go there with such a fantastic story.
Doyle is credited with the authorship (although there is doubt about this, but I will try to prove the possibility of authorship on the contrary) of the story "The Secret of Swalecliff Castle". From the text of this story, flaws are visible in the description of the surroundings of Baskerville Hall: for example, it is strange, but it seems that there is nothing in the vicinity of the estate, except for a couple of cottages, a post office, and a doctor. In the same story, which also takes place in the countryside of Dartmoor, and where the main character is also the son of a landowner, and where there is also a manor house, and cottages, and villages, so there is, besides the postal employee, and a church, and a church watchman, there is a blacksmith shop (in fact, there are horses all around carriages, cabs) and a blacksmith, there are peasants (what kind of farm is the Baskervilles, because they are landowners), there is a peddler, there is a milkman. In general, some poor description is given in the novel. If all this is not essential, as if it is implied by the reader (especially modern ones), then why is it in the story, or why then resort to methods of including diary entries, letters - to give more reality to the plot, but not to mention the familiar environment of the rural district at that time.
Now, why is the story most likely written by Doyle-the plot, techniques and structurally it is very similar to Doyle's novel:
there is also Dartmoor, also a swamp, also paths, also a gate, also a prison, also the son of a landowner (there is a baronet), there is also a line where a nephew left without inheritance is mentioned, who went on a crime (robbed uncle and uncle also dies in the story), also the theme of a ghost (the dog in the novel depicts a ghost from family legend, and ghost dogs are mentioned in the story along with others), and also the ghost turns out to be hiding a crime, but it is also not completely clear to the reader: whether there really is a ghost, or not, there is also participation in the plot of the picture, also a love line (which is still successfully resolved).
There are even almost literal coincidences (although the plot is absolutely original in detail):
- Good God, what is it? (the same fear of seeing the supernatural)
- No, I didn't meet Mick...
- Like him... Did he look like that? (compare with the phrases about the traces discovered by Dr. Mortimer)
"So you don't know about anything?" (that's what the novel says about the dog)
And as in the novel, the investigation is led by an amateur (and also with medical knowledge), and as in the novel, the reader is told the crime and the biography of the criminal (who also escaped justice for this crime, but was punished differently and who is not alive -he committed suicide in prison) at the end of the case.
There are actually too many similarities not to suspect that there is Doyle's authorship here (or skillful borrowing, but it is known how Doyle himself revealed the secrets of writing detective stories, and in fact, the Holmes cycle was stories, he wrote according to a certain template).
As for the writer's imaginary reality
Doyle is the "creator" of the whole street, for who in the whole world would know Baker Street today if Doyle had not once settled Holmes there
They believe in Holmes as the real one. What literary techniques were designed to enhance the verisimilitude:
The Epoch is modern
Geography is real
As well as the nature of the narrative: memoirs, letters, diary, newspaper articles, mentions of real events, persons, etc.
But, in contrast to Doyle, his older contemporary, the French writer Flaubert, on the contrary, is known for the thoroughness of working on the texts of his works, no matter what they talk about, even about the production of faience.
An imaginary reality?
The work constantly changes its temporal modality: either thanks to the legend, the reader finds himself in the 17th century, or thanks to the imagination (the author is the narrator) Watson in primitive times, then thanks to Holmes's insight through the portrait gallery at Baskerville Hall in the 18th century. And at the same time, it is surprisingly strictly chronological internally: the events lend themselves to chronologically accurate dating (from the date on the cane and Holmes's remarks in the first chapter, the introduction to the text of the alleged text of the newspaper, then letters and Watson's diary). But it cannot be said that the different temporal modality was ordered-linear, as the modern reader sees it. Historicism was a new phenomenon then. Note that there is still a main narrator ("director") in the novel- Mortimer, who (in accordance with the ideas of structuralism breaks the modality of time in a novel: he reads a manuscript, then a note, spreading both skepticism and faith in a monster), that is, he also acts in meaning... the historian, only hurrying home, allows him to tell Barrymore about the estate. And the work itself is surprisingly reminiscent... museum: the cane in the first chapter is still an ordinary accessory of its time, but after all, the characters use it to draw a portrait of Mortimer and it is time-bound (hence the contradictions-"elderly and respectable" in Watson's imagination is inferior to "young and devoid of any ambition" man according to Holmes), the manuscript of the 18th century. in the second, The Tudor manor in the following chapters: "Just think," says Sir Henry, "that my ancestors lived within these walls for centuries." From chapter to chapter, the reader moves from one museum exhibit to another without noticing.
In general, it is curious that there is a Holmes Museum on Baker Street, that there is a hotel with elements of a historical and literary museum in Devonshire-claiming that Baskerville Hall was written off from it-more precisely, from what now serves as a hotel museum (after all, all these are parts of an "imaginary reality" the author and the reader-in accordance with the concepts of phenomenology). Why is there no Arsene Lupin Museum? Or Hercule Poirot? And why is there no museum of any other romantic hero of the novel, not necessarily a detective, 19th century? Of course, this is "guilty" of the literary device of Doyle, the narrator, who always sought to give his stories "plausibility"-creating and mixing "imaginary reality" with "historical reality"-which is why there are so many dates, geographical (including fictional) names in the novel-like the village of Grimpen and the Grimpen bog (in the real swamps of Dartmoor, they say it is quite problematic to drown and there is definitely no quagmire). It turns out that the novel itself carries the makings of a potential museum. Why the Holmes Museum (and not Poirot)? Is it because Holmes has an "exact" address: 221b Baker Street, London? Is it because the whole "Holmsian" begins with an apartment rented by Holmes and Watson (whom Doyle also makes a "historical" person: he was a military doctor in Afghanistan, but few literary heroes have their own "history" ...), the actions of the first chapters of the novel also take place in that apartment. Is it because the details of the interior, everyday life, and costume are inscribed with such care in the "Holmsiana"? However, there are many details from the museums of real life in the 19th century. Doyle's reader will be new, this is by no means an "encyclopedia of 19th century English life"! Although it is clear that many things are not voiced by the author for the reason that they should have been well known to the reader anyway. And Doyle did not write "history", although this is the point - he wrote "history", that is, the plot is all flesh of the flesh of historicism, in accordance with the ideas of phenomenology, nevertheless, he is completely the fruit of the author's consciousness (but the author is a historical person, 19th century., his consciousness is classified in literary studies and stories like romanticism and historicism, Yampolsky writes that historicism and romanticism are even associated as synonyms). The plot and composition, and the characters, and literary techniques are all within the framework of historical consciousness and romanticism. And in full accordance with the exposition of what historicism and romanticism of the 19th century are. in Yampolsky's article about the symbol and Hegel: in the novel, too, there are the same timeless phenomena-a monster turned into a symbol by romanticism (a dog from a legend, and romantic, though colored in criminal tones, Stapleton is engaged in such a reconstruction) - on the one hand, a product of his epoch-the Middle Ages, on the other hand -as a symbol becoming timeless and therefore, for Holmes, it looks like an anachronism, a fairy tale, but the old baronet believed in it on his head, and Mortimer also believed, seeking advice from the detective-embodied Reason, and this is the second phenomenon of timelessness in the novel, which makes history orderly, linear, with the laws in historicism "discovered" in the 19th century (Marx). Phenomena are really closely related to each other (not a monster that becomes a symbol and a mind that creates a narrative and explanatory story), but romanticism and historicism, which is remembered by the first historiographer of Russian history, the romantic writer Karamzin, and the collectors of fairy tales (the very ones to whose interest Mortimer attributed the manuscript and Holmes read) romantics brothers Grimm is in Germany. It is curious how the motive of the "creation of history" is conveyed in the novel: in fact, none of the main characters is a "local resident": Holmes and Watson are directly involved in the case, and who? Mortimer, who only got married five years ago and went into practice at Dartmoor. The old baronet returned from South Africa only two years ago. Stapleton "returned" after him (from northern England, and before that from Central America altogether). Similarly, the new owner, Sir Henry, who had never seen Baskerville Hall before, "returned". Unless the Barrymores were hired from among the locals. And of course, the samples of local residents are Frankland and his daughter and, not named, but serving as an argument in confirmation of everything Mortimer tells, the farmers: they saw something similar to a dog. But they are the locals who only witness what the "aliens" tell and what they direct on local soil, and personifying it-Devonshire is now known all over the world, including from Doyle's novel (although even folklore as a symbol, the story of the dog is taken from a completely different part of England, where Doyle was recovering his health or allIs this the local legend that Robinson introduced Doyle to?.. Or Robinson is a journalist and introduced him to a local legend where Doyle was recovering and where they met, while making friends, Robinson took Doyle to visit his Devonshire-allusions to the plot, isn't it? But this is also a part of phenomenological criticism -the work is the fruit of the author's consciousness). Moreover, I have already said that in Doyle's "imaginary reality" Dartmoor is a "hole", a "bear corner", a space where superstition, prejudices of the past can ideally roam, any monsters can settle without any symbolism and romanticism with historicism. But is it true? And although there may be an element of "historical reality" in the novel, it is true, English: where the "wilderness" is located just a few hours away from the capital, where the railway runs nearby (in the 19th century!), where there is: a hotel, a post office (and a telegraph!), its own doctor with "dog cart", and Baskerville Hall is not a landmark (it is constantly being talked about its abandonment and the need for "revival"), or it is still the center of the district (electrification plans!). But once again-the locals seem to be devoid of prejudice-Frankland, if a collector, is not a fairy tale, but legal precedents, he is also, of course, a historian in his own way, when he claims that private or communal ownership is established by law there and there (depending on this, the village then exalts it, then indignantly curses and burns an effigy-few signs of life are "really" from the local area, because the legend of the dog only seems to be part of its history, it was introduced by "aliens"-it is unlikely that this manuscript was published in a local newspaper, which refutes only "rumors"). But is this really such a "hole"? Not only from a geographical point of view, but also from a historical point of view: studies of microhistorists of the 20th century showed that the ideas that the peasants of the Middle Ages were such "provincials" were too stretched: a lot of historical and geographical information was brought to the villages by knights, feudal lords returning from distant military campaigns, from the war, from the same crusades in the Middle Ages, but local peasants also served them as squires, infantrymen... Let's recall the story "The Return of Martin Herr", not invented by Natalie Zemon Davis. But in Doyle's "imaginary reality," all these farmers living near the telegraph, a few hours from London, never seem to have left the confines of their village, they are generally nameless because they are static figures, like trees in the local landscape. They are just a background that should give the features of a "stopped time", a "swamp" for any civilized person, as Watson is amazed that the Stapletons chose such a life for themselves... as Mortimer complains about the narrowness of the circle of local educated people, although he suffers from Frankland's education (and Stapleton turns out to be the main criminal from a friend). But the farmers, the postmaster, they are only called upon to better highlight the advantages of civilization: the cave that Holmes chose as a temporary parking lot (he even spent the night at Coombe Tracy) in Doyle's text turns into its opposite -into a kind of museum of civilization (and this is ironically accompanied by Holmes' comments-they say how much he needs, clean A collar in the swamps?!- as in the historical joke of the "silver age" about a Russian poet who dressed up in peasant clothes, glorified simplicity and at the same time lived in huge and the best rooms of the capital's St. Petersburg hotels, and when receiving guests, he said, looking around at all this luxury of interiors: do we need much ...)! And after all, the reader, for his part (in line with phenomenological concepts as well as another part of the work-the reader's consciousness), again believes in this. That the legend is a local superstition of dark provincials (how does Laura Lyons manage to earn money in it, working as a typist ...). And yet, what kind of historian is without a mistake? It is obvious that in the mind (historical and romantic at the same time-which is in itself a historical, transitory, stylistic sign of the modern era even for its time) of the author, this is exactly how the English province and its inhabitants should have looked (but the times when they were afraid of steam locomotives and smashed machines have long passed-just think, a hundred years ago even for Doyle's time). However, I am again too picky about the text, as if forgetting that, as I stated earlier in the text, "historical reality" is mixed with "imaginary reality" (for our time, "imaginary history", which nevertheless researchers, cultural historians are ready to take for a "cast from nature", forgetting the main postulate of phenomenology -any work of art, even if it aims to reflect the epoch, is passed through the imagination, perception, consciousness of the author-individual, the subjective in this concept is ideally suited for an attempt to reconstruct, except just the views on the history and culture of a particular writer, in any case, if one believes something in the work to be the source, then why not assume something else for the historical truth-the same story with the dog from the legend, it is necessary to argue selectivity to the approach, but it seems that the researchers consider it too self-evident-like an unmarked cup with a shelf for a mustache, from which Dr. Watson was supposed to drink tea: meanwhile, in such a department, without argumentation, it is simply a reflection of our modern views. We are people of the 21st century. we cannot seriously believe in such prejudices, which means that the author himself also seemed to relate to this, although he lived in the 19th century, which we believe he reproduces in his works, in my opinion this position is not convincing: it is not clear methodologically just what one thing is rejected and the other is accepted as a fact: it does not seem strange to reject the history of the Nazis based on the story of Semenov, especially the film adaptation of Lioznova, but at the same time it is not discussed that the life and morality of the Victorian era are reproduced in Doyle's story, and in the film adaptation of Maslennikov, based on the desire to accurately follow both the literary and historical sources and reproduce the details of everyday life, the viewer sees exactly the reconstruction, it seems that Maslennikov, paying attention to his interview, not consciously, and even criticizing Doyle for "unreliability", and without taking into account what the scientists themselves knew and thought at that time, reconstructs the very Doyle's "imaginary reality", only giving features of verisimilitude, and continuing Doyle's work-to pass off the story as a story, only Doyle consciously did this, entertaining readers, and himself, gave him special pleasure, judging by Carr's biography, it was when they took his fiction for truthfulness, and argued about the details, forgetting, as in the story about Captain Kopeikin, that what difference could it make if the snake could return to the whistle or crawl along the bell cord, if the whole story... a figment of the author's imagination, and if, in an effort to give features of verisimilitude, and contrary to Maslennikov's criticism, it is fortunate that there is a Holmes museum, and the director himself argues with Doyle a hundred years later, was mistaken, or followed the scientific data of his time, even the indicated episode in the "Motley Ribbon" is considered by Doyle with the same irony or It is a sincere misconception that Carr writes that you will not understand: when Doyle is joking, and when he is serious: as an argument that snakes can crawl vertically, Doyle also cited this, saying that boa did it in a theatrical production of the story... but boa is a boa constrictor, he is not a venomous snake, which again breaks the logic of the plot, but Doyle himself told this decades after the publication of one of the early stories "Holmsiana", continuing to involve readers and already viewers of the production in his "imaginary" world). From the point of view of my subject of study, it is more interesting that the plot, composition, and semantic content (which can be extracted from the story as an author's idea) are inscribed in the historical consciousness of the "historical" 19th century, in historicism and romanticism of the modern era!
Therefore, Doyle strives to use dates and geographical references of the place of action in the text, therefore the novel contains different time modalities, therefore it potentially carries the features of a historical and cultural museum, the idea of which also develops in the "historical" 19th century, and this is probably what modern cultural historians "peck" at, as originally I did without critically believing that the novel "reflects" the way of life, the morality of its time, as if it were really an "encyclopedia of 19th century English life" -it is historical in its very composition, in its very plot, and Doyle is a historian, but not at all in the same sense, what Tolstoy did when he was working on the novel "War and Peace", and even Pushkin, working on "Eugene Onegin": I repeat, there are several mentions of news events in the novel, but in relation to the specified chronology of action, not a word is said, for example, about the construction of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, or the mysterious suicide of the heir the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as well as in the novel there is a coffee pot, but there is no cup with a shelf for a mustache, if Dr. Watson is a gentleman from the capital and he was accepted at the club, then he simply had to drink from such a cup, is the author obliged to mention this?.. of course not, but in this case, how can a novel serve as an "encyclopedia of the era"?.. it necessarily has a reflection of the epoch, but it is bizarrely mixed up, namely in the novel by Doyle, known for his literary technique of "misleading the reader", with the "imaginary reality" created by him, where it is not worth mentioning the well-known events of the specified chronology... and the "historical reality" is passed through the author's imagination, where the historical consciousness of the 19th century. In itself, it is a reflection of the inherent modernity of historicism and romanticism (synonyms) with its interest in history, the ability, as Yampolsky points out, to turn the past into history with rationalism, and history into a museum, and the monster of the Gothic Middle Ages, the fruit of the religious worldview of his time into a "timeless" symbol of a new style in the 19th century-Romanticism. But is this also true, are stylistic differences so important, and to what extent literature is generally able to go beyond the narrow range of subjects given back in mythology, a fairy tale, to what extent it can be a story at all, and not just change the entourage, external clothes once and for all to the mythems given in terms of French structuralism?
Myths
Let's turn to the method of the French structuralists. To begin with, let's try to identify the so-called mythemes, using the analysis algorithm proposed and illustrated by the example of the myth of Oedipus (a popular theme and psychoanalysis of Freud at the same time), Levi-Strauss. "Mythemes are phrases in which one can state," writes O.N.Turysheva, "the essence of a particular episode" (then they are built by the researcher into paradigmatic connections, on the basis of which the interpreter makes a semantic analysis).
I will immediately present the general meaning of the myths. Acquaintance-Holmes and Watson get acquainted with Mortimer, Mortimer introduces them to Sir Henry, and in absentia with all the inhabitants of the district, Sir Henry and Watson get acquainted with the Barrymores, Watson and Sir Henry get acquainted with the Stapletons, Watson gets acquainted with Frankland and Laura Lyons. The second paradigmatic connection: non-recognition: at the level of interpretations, Maslennikov correctly stated this general meaning here, which in the film adaptation: Sir Henry hesitates before recognizing Holmes as a detective, Barrymore mistakes Watson for Sir Henry, and so on. The general meaning of "not recognizing" in the novel: its quintessences are how Miss Stapleton made a mistake, demanding that Watson leave Dartmoor immediately, and as soon as Holmes recognized Baskerville in Stapleton from a family portrait, and first established that Miss Stapleton was the wife of a naturalist, presenting a photograph of the Vandeleur couple to Laura Lyons. The third general meaning is connected with the second and first: referring to the vocabulary of naturalists-mimicry, in other words, when a person impersonates another, or if it is not consciously forced to play a role previously unfamiliar to him (we will meet further with the general meaning of the novel as a staged performance): Mortimer makes a reservation that he is just a Mr., not a doctor, the novel actually begins with Watson trying himself as an investigator, using the deductive method of a friend, Sir Henry - still a Canadian farmer, but now he is, in his words, an esquire, Stapleton hides his family ties with the Baskervilles, passes off his wife as his sister, and pretends to be just a naturalist who wandered into these swamps to replenish his collection of butterflies, Miss Stapleton is thus forced to play the role of her husband's sister and flirt with Sir Henry, or sincerely sympathizing with him, getting carried away, being a married middle-class woman of Victorian England, the fate of such a role can be judged by the unenviable position of Laura Lyons, simply because divorces are still not possible, in addition, Miss Stapleton does not really succeed in her role also because she is the first beauty of Costa Rica, her appearance is in discord with both her husband-brother and the locals, Stapleton forces even a dog to play her role, which actually exists, but exists only as an imitation of a family ghost, which however It does not reduce her threat to the Baskervilles, even the Barrymores hide their family ties with the Nottinghill killer, and Holmes, who in fact is the "man on the hill". The fourth general meaning: riddles. Holmes suggests first, as an exercise, to break your head over a cane. Mortimer then puzzles the detective with the real case. Holmes soon sets up surveillance on Sir Henry, with whom they try to solve the mystery of the anonymous letter. Watson and Holmes then conduct parallel investigations (and Holmes does this covertly, presenting Watson with another mystery that he is trying to solve with a revolver): they are trying to find out first who L.L. is, and then the role of Laura Lyons in this whole story, to unravel the true face, which, however, also turns out to be "with a double bottom" ("he is also Baskerville")-Stapleton. The whole novel is a chain of riddles that Holmes and Watson are trying to solve and solve (albeit not to the end: how the criminal was going to claim his rights to capital and estate, who was his accomplice in his own house, why he acted in such a criminal way, what other crimes his hand lies on, and so on). The fifth general meaning: the myths of lost family ties, or hidden ones: an unexpected inheritance for a Canadian farmer, the Barrymores secretly helping their brother-in-law, Stapleton passing off his wife as his sister, and himself hiding his relationship with the Baskervilles, Frankland disinheriting his daughter, Laura Lyons, trying to divorce her husband. One way or another, in all the intricacies, and threatening the heroes of the novel, there are family ties that were destroyed back in the days that scattered the brothers across the empire. This is the general meaning of civil strife-it is not for nothing that the legend talks about the revolution, it is proposed to study Lord Clarendon's work on the Great Uprising. The sixth chain of myths: murders or death threats. The novel begins with the strange death of an old baronet. Then the surveillance of Sir Henry and an anonymous letter, which can be interpreted as a warning, or as a threat. The butler's wife, the sister of the Nottinghill murderer, hiding and helping him. And yet he himself becomes a victim of Stapleton's criminal schemes. The general meaning of the novel (as well as not recognizing it as a hidden kinship) is permeated throughout the text of the novel: from the terrible pictures of the death of ponies in a bog to butterflies and moths impaled on pins caught in a net by Stapleton (Holmes confirms that he really is an enthusiastic naturalist-lepidoptyrologist). The seventh chain of myths is connected by a common meaning, which can also be called a scientific term - the epistolary genre. In the novel, everyone either tells, or writes or reads something: it begins with readings and attempts to decipher the inscription on the cane. Then its owner, Mortimer, appears and immediately takes out a manuscript, an article in a local newspaper, and his own impressions. Then they all puzzle over an anonymous and cunningly compiled letter from the Times editorial (which is obvious only to Holmes) to Sir Henry. Watson then quotes his own letters to Baker Street, sent from Baskerville Hall. Moreover, he pays a visit to the postmaster on the very first day, because the baronet is busy reading business papers. Even Laura Lyons earns money at Coombe Tracey by typing on a typewriter. Dr. Mortimer definitely likes to read scientific texts and not only on medicine, he also writes articles in medical journals himself- which the reader learns immediately from the first chapter even before Holmes and Watson met Mortimer personally in an apartment on Baker Street. Even the Barrymores offer a clue, curious about the rest of the letter to the old baronet from a certain L.L. And the whole essence of the dialogues, first Watson, then Holmes, regarding the role of Laura Lyons in the crime, are based on that letter: who and why forced her to turn to Sir Charles with it. But in reality, the general meaning here is much deeper, although from this moment I begin a semantic analysis of these paradigmatic connections themselves. In the general sense of reading, writing, notes, letters, diaries - the nature of creativity, the connection of imagination with reality: Stapleton first got acquainted with the text of the same manuscript before he decided to ignite the imagination of the old baronet, and bought a dog, which he forced to imitate a ghost. And the dog is the central link of the whole plot, no wonder the novel is called that. Thus, the novel hides the question of the nature of imagination and its connection with reality. This is the central issue of all literary creativity (and not just him), which is probably why all the characters in the novel are constantly busy writing, composing, telling, reporting, reporting (remember the telegrams from the post office in Grimpen and from Cartwright). And the map according to which Holmes "visited Devonshire spiritualistically" earlier than physically and sent Watson there as a guest at Baskerville Hall. As for the hidden family ties, which conceal either the crimes of the past or the germ of the future (which is for the Barrymores, which is in the story of the Baskervilles), then this is more broadly a question of the nature of history, which is also present in the novel (the subject of my research is traces of the Victorian era), but in the novel it, the whole story-sites or places of worship of primitive people, mines of the Roman era, in the appearance of Sir Charles and Sir Henry, the anthropologist Mortimer sees the intertwining of the Celts with the Anglo-Saxons, his very surname is "speaking" precisely in the sense of history for the English reader, then a manuscript from the time of the revolution of the 17th century, then a gallery of portraits and a brief, but excursion into the history of England in the 18th century. But again, the meaning is even deeper: the novel considers an ancient legend as a fairy tale, in it rationalism prevails over prejudice, thus positivism is asserted-no past will prevent- literally speaking in the words of Sir Henry, to rush into the future: which the young baronet is going to illuminate, including electric lanterns. It was written before the 20th century with its world wars, totalitarian dictatorships right in Europe, and the Nazis and fascists in Italy directly appealed to tradition, to history, to the past, the very idea of the "Third Reich", or the revival of Mussollini's "Roman Empire", experiments paid for by multimillion victims, the novel was written before the Holocaust, before Arendt's discovery of the "banality of evil", and although in it the naturalist turns out to be "the most sinister criminal" according to Holmes himself, a worthy opponent of Holmes, he is still imbued with faith in a future in which progress and reason will prevail. Literally in a few years, Spengler will respond to the First World War with the "Decline of Europe", in which irrationalism will reign pessimistically, triumphant over the rationalism of the past, over the positivism of history. And there is an even deeper meaning in all this... if we talk about the nature of creativity, then the question goes back to the time of Plato: his idealistic ideas that there is a "world of ideas" that only feeds the physical world (and in fact this goes even further to the beliefs of the ancient Greeks that man is guided by the gods, and his thoughts and actions-that is, to those myths with whom the tragedies of Sophocles argued), to the question of predestination and the free will of man, which occupied the minds of Christian philosophers of the European Middle Ages, and the secularized consciousness of the Enlightenment (and as a new form of the nature of artificial intelligence, the hypothesis that we live in virtual reality is an urgent question in modern times): These are precisely the questions Holmes asks when arguing with Mortimer in the first chapters of the story: footprints... whether from a real dog that has become an instrument of a real person's criminal intent, or a really revived legend, or even what Holmes and Mortimer agree on, nothing prevents supernatural forces from using objects made of flesh for their own purposes (on the one hand, for the past, this is certainly a reference by association to the times of the witch hunt, and the signs of a contract with the devil are clearly seen in the legend of old Hugo, and on the other hand to the idea of artificial intelligence and robotics of the new century). But if we turn to the ideas of Mikhail Yampolsky, the meaning of the interpretations will turn out to be even deeper: on the one hand, it is necessary to mention another descriptive part - another general meaning and another mytheme: they relate to a descriptive story: the Barrymores have been in the service of the baronets for four centuries, but now they hide their connections (of course related) from the owner, because in modern times John Barrymore married Eliza Seldon...
What is the subtext of the legend? Did the baronet kidnap the daughter of a neighbor farmer? To abuse? Or is it part of the custom in the wedding ceremony? As Jane Austen wrote back in the early 19th century in her novel ironically about the dangers for a young girl: "baronets kidnap girls." In modern times, Stapleton, who hides his relationship with the baronets, turns out to be a criminal, but who is he? Is he really the legitimate son of Roger Baskerville? And who did he marry himself? The first beauty of Costa Rica? A mulatto, a Creole, a West Indian?.. Ahead is 20b. with the ideas of social equality and nationalism, racism, but this is practice, theory in the form of ideas of social Darwinism, Chamberlain and Gobineau, Lambroso (Mortimer's fascination with anthropology is not at all as harmless an occupation as the medical profession at that time -it is enough to recall his "hobby" in carefully determining the size of certain structures of skulls, and the practice of the Nazis, or the murder scandal in the Victorian era for the sale of bodies then to medical universities), Nietzsche (and Kipling writes about Mowgli, continuing the tradition of the enlighteners about the ideal of the natural life of a savage, but a book riddled with racism-where a man, even though Mowgli reigns over the world of animals in the jungle, under which the features of enslaved peoples are guessed, and Dostoevsky's hero, after talking about Napoleon, about a superman, goes and kills an old interest-bearing woman, but there are also new people of Chernyshevsky, ready for a social revolution, who began it with themselves... in this series of modern literature, a novel of an entertaining nature, but in which one can find traces of many ideas of the era, does not seem so naive at all... after all, in the end, all the problems lie in the oblivion of the "soil", in the unsolved mystery of the "cursed past", which is based "on the mixing of noble blood.".. to put it bluntly: if you don't want to have a murderer from Nottinghill in your next of kin-at that time a suburb of London, known as one of the first mass developments of cheap housing for the middle class, if you are of course a lord, or at least a lord's butler in the fourth generation... do not marry Eliza Seldon, of course, if you yourself are of dubious origin and do not know what to do with it, it will "not save" you, "it will not comfort" even if you marry the first beauty of Costa Rica, and it will not comfort a million earned on speculation somewhere in South Africa, it is also an unworthy occupation for a hereditary aristocrat, and even one who has not parted with the prejudices of the past). And now from Yampolsky's book Cosmography and the Labyrinth, a quote from David Hume: "It is generally recognized that there is considerable uniformity in the actions of people of all nations and eras and that human nature always remains the same in all its principles and actions. The same motives always give rise to the same actions, the same phenomena arise from the same causes. Ambition, avarice, selfishness, vanity, friendship, generosity, patriotism-all these affects, mixed to varying degrees and distributed among people, have been and still remain the source of all actions and enterprises that have ever been observed among mankind since the beginning of the world. Would you like to get acquainted with the feelings, inclinations and lifestyle of the Greeks and Romans? Study the character of the French and English thoroughly, and you will not make big mistakes by transferring to the former most of the observations you made on the latter. Humanity is so much the same in all epochs and in all countries that history does not give us anything new and unusual in this regard." This is David Hume, 18th century. Yampolsky, following Shpet, notes about this view that it did not yet know historicism, which appears in the 19th century. Thus, the novel demonstrates historicism, that is, it does not just contain traces of "historical reality", which may include prevailing or widespread ideas that have appeared, but is itself built by a plot, characters, itself part of a certain big idea- historicism and positivism. Now let's return to Yampolsky, he quotes again, now Max Weber, and in particular his theory of the "disenchantment" of the modern world and "its instrumental rationalization": does it remind you of anything again? Holmes is the epitome of rationality in this particular story and is busy "disenchanting" an old legend that suddenly comes to life in the swamps of yes, Dartmoor, but at the end of the 19th century - the "enlightened century"! And Yampolsky calls it the "historical century" precisely in the sense of affirming historicism. And history is understood as a set of extraordinary, diverse human social behavior. But nevertheless, without magic: "the historical trace is understood as the trace of a miracle, an incredible act (note that history, although it uses a comparative historical method, general scientific methods of comparison, it always has unique events of the past as its subject, they make up history, unlike sociology and political science -my comment)." Moreover, the plot is entertaining, intended for mass reading, reflects, of course, in its own way, colossal philosophical problems: history as long as there is no identity of the subjective and objective, this is from Yampolsky, who talks about the "grand style", quoting Marcuse's arguments about Hegel: "until culture reaches full adequacy between subject and object, that is, as long as it is historical, it inevitably carries elements of anachronism" (but in the novel this is exactly what the "revived legend" looks like). And this, of course, has to do with historicism, with history as a series of unusual events, with helplessness (although in the 19th century. they thought just the other way-transferring the principles of exact sciences to history and in line with positivism) the derivation of universal laws and, to the question of predestination and free will: once, and the wheel of fortune (rock and in the ideas long before Christian theology-the ancient Greeks) turns like this, turning into evil will for Sir Charles (and for Stapleton who thinks he set it in motion for himself), turns so that the Canadian farmer turns into the heir of an aristocratic family, two, and the wheel of fortune turns so that Mortimer involves Holmes in the story, seeking only advice, but he finds a detective, three, and Stapleton, thinking to take advantage of women: a wife and a mistress, becomes bait for Holmes himself, and is exposed as a criminal, and the love between Sir Henry and Stapleton's wife... as Holmes observes, "it defies all plans and calculations."
That is, in a chain of incredible cases (as part of the plot line, with the suspicion of the Barrymores, which ended with the death of Seldon, and the unintended punishment of the escaped criminal at least in this way), we see the story as it is understood by the "historical" 19th century. It seems to us that this is a "plausible story", especially since it "disenchants" the legend: there is no ghost dog, although there is a dog, but it was bought from Ross and Mangle, in London, hunted down to track people and smeared with a "luminous mixture". The "magic" is really something else: in the way Stapleton's plans collapse, his criminal designs turn against him. The same is shown in Collins' novel The Woman in White, where the characters (and criminals) even talk about the "perfect crime." And it seems to us, as readers, that here it really is, reflected, noticed by the writer's sharp and penetrating gaze, "reality". But let's remember what I tried to call "imaginary reality" in the novel earlier, and what exists both as "historical reality" and "imaginary reality", but passed through the author's worldview, which largely shares the general worldview of the "historical century", and as in the novel from the paradigmatic connection revealed by the Levi-Strauss method Mythically, one can see philosophical questions about the nature of creativity: in a novel, everyone either writes, or tells, or composes, or prints, or reports... and most importantly, of course, first Mortimer appears in the reader's imagination, then he appears himself, then Mortimer reads the manuscript, and Holmes dismisses him, showing, by the way, as I said, the historical method both in the sense of external criticism (dating of the document), and in the sense of internal criticism, as from a "fairy tale", then Mortimer reads "something more modern", namely an article from a local newspaper, then shares his impressions, showing us the narrator again, and in the end, the reader faces the problem of the novel: is it true or fiction, a legend that has come to life, or what lies behind it: is there a crime in this at all, and so on. But at first we see only the imaginary, and then the real, and appearing as negatives used to appear in photographs: a legend-a note-an eyewitness's story (!) and: surveillance, an anonymous letter, then the remains of another (L.L.), the strange behavior of the butler, the death of Seldon, howling in the swamp, and finally, The finale is the appearance of a real dog and its murder with the help of a Scotland Yard inspector, and Watson, catching Stapleton with bait-slipping and endangering Sir Henry... from whom they hid both the nature of the dog, and who the real criminal was, and themselves, sitting like hunters in ambush...
That is, leaving him just staying in a dangerous imagination! Which turned out for him to be compressed to a "quantum compression" of the entire plot: first, he came face to face with a suddenly "revived legend" with all the surprise, and then became an eyewitness to her murder as a material object, having learned about Stapleton, his cousin, hiding behind this crime, in whose wife, and not in whose sister, he was he was in love, and from whose guests he had just left-it became a shock for him, from which he was treated for a long time, but as if he had passed initiation and gone on a trip around the world, as if this adventure alone was not enough. That is, the novel has this problem: the ratio of the imaginary and the real, in other words, art and reality (and in the plot of the novel, Sir Charles became a victim of a crime by virtue of his own imagination: he mistook a real dog for a family ghost, but showing his own obviously guilty conscience). And the novel seems plausible to us. But art is always created by the author, the artist. Let's quote Yampolsky again, and Adorno, because the problem is relevant to the topic of my work in that it embodies in its own way a particular question from this general relationship, and allows researchers to talk about the modern era: "this contradiction is fundamental to the entire history of the 19th century, which is drowning in anachronisms and cannot find the desired style unity (in Yampolsky's reasoning, this has to do with the problem of "great style" and the stylistic diversity of the modern era - my comment). "The very concept of style, as an all-pervading representation of the epoch, bears the stamp of something irretrievably lost. We can talk about the stylistic unity of the Greek Classical era or Gothic, but the closer we get to modernity, the more difficult it is to detect this unity."
"This contradiction is expressed in the idea of the ability of art to ensure immortality, that is, to take what is depicted beyond the historical. The essayist of the early 20th century. (the time of the modern writing and the first publication of the novel is my comment) Robert de la Sizeranne saw an irreconcilable contradiction between the idea of sculpture and the monuments of people in modern clothes that were becoming widespread (today it is part of the problem of film adaptations and historical films, when modern actors play historical people, and that of great personalities, that of ordinary people, the success of the Soviet film adaptation, but for the Soviet viewer, can also be explained by the strategy of authenticity of the authors of the film, but also the coincidence of the period of "stagnation" with the last years of the Victorian era in some aspects of public life, which deserves separate consideration if it really took place, and was not the reverse perspective of a cultural scientist, such as Kobrin: the creators of the film adaptation, thinking that they were reconstructing the Victorian era reflected modern Soviet realities, and later, it seemed to cultural scientists that there should have been and is almost an identity between them, which made it possible, among other things, to so skillfully film and reconstruct - my comment). The absurdity of such monuments, in his opinion, was an involuntary attempt to immortalize a passing fashion."
"Sizerann explained the absurdity of modern monuments by the contradiction between a historically determined toilet and the idea of sculpture focused on embodying eternal beauty and harmony."
"Theodor Adorno wrote about the conflict experienced by art, which is constantly faced with the inability to harmonize details (this is obviously due to the very appearance of entire individual characters and plot moves in the work- my comment) and absorb them into a kind of totality. A work of art is created by an artist who gives it visibility as a form. But the work also claims to be objective in its form (in historical science, any scientific research claims to be objective in its content-my comment), which supposedly has a universality in which the world is reflected.
Adorno wrote: "A deceptive feeling is awakened that all this is not a deception, that the diffuse features inherent in the work, alien to the personal principle of the Ego and the pre-established totality introduced into them were in harmony with each other a priori, whereas harmony itself is staged and directed from the outside."
So, here, finishing the plot related to the use of the method of identifying myths, I come to the part of them in which paradigmatic connections lead to a common meaning-the novel as a production. No matter how plausible or improbable a work of art looks, it is always created by the author, the artist. Look: in the case of mimicry, with unrecognition, it seems that before the performance the characters were given roles: a Canadian farmer should play the role of a newly minted squire, Barrymore -obviously, only two years playing the role of a butler-the role of a butler in the fourth generation of ancestors, his wife- the wife of such an "old" servant, hiding her own origin and that her brother is a criminal, an escaped convict, a pariah of society, forced to hide in the swamps next to the family ghost of the Baskervilles, whose victim he will become by mistake, having nothing to do with the Baskervilles, except that he was dressed in a suit of Sir Henry, Laura Lyons She must in various ways, leading her to a reprehensible relationship (she is still formally married) with Stapleton, and then to the role of an unwitting accomplice in crimes, play the role of a respectable woman, a victim of her husband and father, Frankland is a besotted old-age litigant, to play the role of an equally blindly punishing Law, Watson-a detective, Holmes-a tramp in the swamps, or a primitive man who cannot leave the benefits of civilization and comfort and live a truly primitive state in a cave, everyone has their own masks, their own roles, even Sir Charles, was still a nouveau riche who remembered the title and the estate are only in their old age, everyone plays roles, acting out a play. It's time to ask the question: who is the director in this case? It is clear that following the logic of art, in the work it is the wheel of fortune, or rock. But in the analysis of the work, by the way, it is also clear that the author. But in reality, the director is also among the heroes... Holmes?.. No, Holmes is even grateful (just like an actor after a successful performance) that he was given such a riddle, such an interesting case. He even lavishes compliments on Stapleton, which is why this naturalist, whose victim was only the old baronet and largely due to his own upset nerves, is not a calm conscience and prejudices and an escaped convict, and then by negligence, and his actions do not pull at a crime actually presented in a jury trial, that's why Holmes needed to restrain Watson and use Sir Henry's already ready victim as bait. Maybe it was Stapleton then?.. And then, dying in the swamp, he could shout like Nero: "what an artist is dying!" But no. In fact, the director is Mortimer. It is he who introduces Holmes and readers to the manuscript, to the legend, then to the note, to the story of the strange death of the old baronet, with mysterious traces, which only he witnessed. He then introduces Sir Henry to Holmes and Watson. And then Stapleton is shown, according to his confession, Watson from the window. Mortimer is the real director of the entire drama (but of course, not a mysterious criminal, as in alternative versions of the plot, if only for the simple reason that a few years before the appearance of the baronet he lived in Dartmoor, and did not come after Sir Charles, as Stapleton let slip, and if there is one obvious criminal, to why look for some hidden one). It is Mortimer who thanks Holmes for the riddle, for his dedication to the case. Mortimer differs from all the characters in the novel in that he always seems to act from behind the scenes: and generally leads a kind of private life hidden from readers-it is no coincidence that nothing is known about his wife, except that she simply exists. And here is another discovery... usually the author is associated with Watson, saying that Doyle endowed this particular character with his own features. It could very well be. But... there are two doctors in the novel, if you pay attention to Doyle's profession. Mortimer is passionate about anthropology (Doyle was interested in genealogy since childhood, and Mortimer- a "talking" surname in England, was fond of heraldry, history in general), believes in spirits (Doyle also, and the more surprising is the plot if he really was "exposing" this as superstition and prejudice, Doyle, on the contrary, defended the existence of ghosts captured in photographs, and openly in print, and even before after writing the novel, and after), sad circumstances are known from the biography of the writer, which forced him (including from financial interests) to re-write the story with Holmes as the hero, he had a sick wife (Mortimer's wife does not appear in the novel, and it is only mentioned, moreover, for the sake of his wife, obviously, Mortimer left the medical profession in the capital, Doyle, although not at all for the sake of his wife once, but left medical practice for the sake of literary and journalistic activities, which brought him both more income and satisfaction in life, modern then only developing journalism by the way then she knew many names of outstanding writers whom we perceive only as writers, for example, Mark Twain), he loved animals (like Mortimer and Snoopy-a curly-haired spaniel, a lost breed, similar to modern American and Irish water spaniels, unlike the cocker, the dog is not small, but medium-sized, and quite comparable to the characteristic given by Holmes, judging by the teeth prints on the cane, and just unlike the cocker, capable of carrying such a heavy cane for the owner, necessary in the rural wilderness and swampy, and hilly terrain, a characteristic that attentive readers usually have so many funny questions about: from a cocker to a mastiff, it's like from a monkey to an elephant, no, in the original curly-haired, not at all small in size, a spaniel, a hunting dog, a retriever, maybe similar to a modern curly-haired one, but not a spaniel, but a retriever, Snoopy in the story is the only real dog that appears to the reader immediately from the first chapter). And finally, the most important argument that Mortimer (except Watson) has as a prototype of Doyle himself is that Doyle was an unsurpassed storyteller, and Mortimer, as is obvious from the analysis by deconstruction methods, is also primarily a storyteller. But nevertheless, there are two doctors and two narrators in the novel... and they shared the writer's traits equally. Two and a detective: Watson is conducting his own investigation for the first and only time. Two heroes... in addition to Holmes, Sir Henry, and this also distinguishes the novel from the entire cycle of "Holmsians" (made, as Doyle openly admitted, according to a certain template, in the novel it is valid for the plot line involving Holmes, but the genre novel is not at all a classic detective story, but an intertwining with modern "horror novels", with which there is, as I showed intertextual borrowings, and Doyle has biographical connections with some authors, in addition to the fact that Doyle was both a reader and wrote "horror stories" himself, just much less well-known today than his detective stories and adventure-historical works: a series of works with Professor Challenger, reminiscent of Verne's novels at all, and a cycle with Brigadier Gerard from the time of the Napoleonic Wars). Sir Henry, as I also found out by deconstruction, also makes a novel a banal work with a romantic hero. And two antiheroes... Stapleton, and Barrymore (who, as in the classic detective story, is a false trail for the reader's attempt to guess: who is the criminal, suspicions fall on him immediately from the black beard of the pursuer of Sir Henry and Mortimer in London), of course, if you do not separate his weapon from Stapleton-a real dog imitating the curse of the Baskervilles from the legend, whereby Stapleton himself turns into the likeness of old Hugo, whom he even looks like, as well as his the father who "escaped" from England to Central America-in such a bizarre way (actually by the writer's imagination, where are the traces of the Catholic idea of redemption, the renewal of the human race, the general Christian idea, although Doyle had a difficult relationship with religion: his family were not Irish at all, but descendants of English colonists in Ireland who retained Catholicism, while the Reformation and religious wars took place in the metropolis, and Doyle himself, who broke openly with Catholicism, turned into a "lousy father" for his relatives) "a legend comes to life" in the "enlightened age". Doyle himself is (and this is reflected in the novel) a combination of advanced ideas that today we might not consider so advanced, of course, with his attitude to tradition, prejudice, religion, politics and history, science, philosophy and creativity. The novel is in a much greater sense the fruit of this whole complex of ideas, subjective views, than a reflection of "historical reality". The work is the personal beginning of the author, who is, of course, a genuine director, only his will gives the work (to one degree or another of the author's own art) integrity, meaningfulness and harmony of ideas that may not have a place in reality or look as ridiculous as the later reconstructions of the past, or the attempts themselves to capture it the transitory significance in the form of eternal art (in the analysis of the "great style" and the historicization of art in the 19th century. Yampolsky's example was the painting "The Death of General Wolf" in 1777. Benjamin West, curiously, was dissuaded from the idea of exactly how to depict the hero by Reynolds, mentioned in the novel, a picture where, almost for the first time, the hero was presented to the public not in a conventional manner-clothes, according to the "great style" of ancient times, but in real historical clothes-in the uniform of his time, in the task of depicting "historical truth", which was audacious and new for its time, but specifically for that picture, this experience was recognized as not having destroyed the "great style", except for the costume, everything else was canonical, namely, as Hume wrote, it did not know "history", the hero even in uniform looked like an ancient hero, as a hero should look, Doyle's novel did not seem to have any daring task at all, the fruit of the author's idea, it was written for the entertainment of readers, nevertheless it was the fruit of the "historical" 19th century at the same time.
By the plot itself, Doyle painted "history", even bearing the features of aristocratic snobbery, nationalism and racism, Doyle, a publicist, was at the same time known to be the author of an apologetic justification for the colonial Anglo-Boer war in South Africa, where he places the subject of the crime - the million-dollar capital of Sir Charles, which he took to England-in the novel this is just an author's explanation, it does not carry just any maxim, except that in the note quoted by Mortimer, the old baronet was praised and contrasted with the nouveau riche just those, that he thought to use capital to restore the former glory of his ancestors, the fate of the entire village district also depended on it, the fact that the same ideas were shared by the young baronet, the ideal hero in the author's plan, shows that they were also evaluated by the writer himself, who did not care about the nature of the origin of this capital, although it was England of the 19th century. it was the birthplace of socialism, and sheltered many political emigrants from Europe, Russia, who shared the ideas of socialism, in particular Marx, Engels, and Herzen, but in comparison with these ideas, Doyle appears to be a conservative, if not a reactionary author, of course, unless socialism itself is considered a reaction to bourgeois changes, but this is another topic The main thing here is that the novel is by no means an "artifact", not a neutral source, but a subjective view, with completely different tasks, in its entirety the fruit of the author's idea, the interweaving of "imaginary reality" and "historical reality" as part of the author's subjective views and ideas widespread at that time, but it is much more important that he, as a whole work, is a reflection of the "historical" 19th century. with his ideas of historicism and positivism: people are not at all the same, neither as representatives of different strata, nor as representatives of different peoples, countries and epochs, but at the same time they remain people, although this will already be a discussion about the evolution of historicism, and the difficulties of a researcher with the "anthropological method", for example, Aron Yakovlevich Gurevich, in fairness it should be noted that the authors of the structuralist method in literary criticism, the same Levi-Strauss, on the contrary, considered its application possible, believing the work on the contrary not to be the fruit of the author's subjective creativity, and Levi-Strauss considered the work to be rigidly and objectively determined by logic, the structure of language, and in general devoid of any meaning, which allowed him to look at his analysis as objective, just not to associate mythemes with some chronological sequence, but to distinguish them as certain structures of the narrative text present in it according to the very logic of using language, so for my analysis I only used part of the method-reducing the entire narrative to a single phrase, which is the meaning of the episode, then their location depends on the general meaning of the paradigmatic connection in these mythological phrases, applying part of this method, I found these phrases and connections useful for researching this novel for studying the history of the modern era, I did not use this method to study the text of the novel as part of the study of literature, works in the ideas of in the theory of structural linguistics, the text and the method of its study from structuralism are here only a source and a method for understanding in the tasks of historical reconstruction, to do this without believing the work on the contrary to be the fruit of the author's subjective, and therefore unique, "historical" plan and only because it reflected the "historical" time of its epoch, apparently, just without sharing the concept of historicism, or not considering it, is fundamentally impossible, roughly speaking: if you do not "believe" in "history", then how can one find traces of the "historical". But the point is also not unimportant: what kind of "history" we are dealing with, traces of which "history" we can find, in which "history" we will "believe": because on closer examination we will see that we ourselves live in an "imaginary reality", we are always dealing with an "imaginary history": for example, we cannot know what William Shakespeare looked like (as there is a "Shakespearean question" about the authorship of famous tragedies and comedies, sonnets, as there is a "Homeric question"), but there is a canon: how exactly Shakespeare, the author of tragedies and comedies, should be depicted, and there are portraits, monuments, busts, in accordance with tradition, with the canon according to which he is always "recognizable" or, recently, a work was published in which a military historian questioned the term and invention in the way of warfare, which seemed to everyone to have long been known as "blitzkrieg", it turned out that in German military documents this term is not mentioned at all, that as for the tactics of military operations, we were talking, as before, about maneuver warfare, and the term turned out to be widespread after the war from the press. That is, when talking about "history" we always meet with conventions, with something generally accepted, but sometimes not even historical at all, that is, the historicity of which caused and causes controversy: the historicity of Jesus Christ, or Joan of Arc in France (her cult appears precisely on the eve of the First World War). Moreover, the whole "history" in its chronological, stadial sequence is itself a mixture of the "chronology of Scaliger" and Hegel's historicism. Of course, I will seek out and find traces of just such a generally accepted "history", because any alternative ones are vulnerable to the fact that they are not generally accepted by either the scientific community or the public consciousness (although, of course, at present the scientific community is also reviewing such previously fundamental foundations of the "old model" of "universal history" as its Eurocentrism or sexism, as the model itself developed towards science in the 19th century, overcoming the limitations of the "history of states and sovereigns", wars and diplomacy), but understanding the whole conventionality of this is not that reconstruction, and the very subject of this reconstruction. But it seems that the "historicity" of the analyzed novel is not even where it was supposed to be: not in the "reflection" of "historical reality", but in the field of worldview, reflected in the composition of the work, and this can be seen by modern methods of literary criticism.
Content analysis of the text of the novel (according to the modern translation by L.Brilova):
Units of analysis, categories: heroes of the novel, mentioning personal names without pronouns
Units of analysis, subcategories: chapters of the novel
Units of account, frequency of mention, absolute, in the chapter: number of times
Units of account, frequency of mention, absolute, in the novel: number of times
The disadvantage of the method: it does not take into account expression, accentuation, the text is written on behalf of Watson, and Watson's name sounds only from the lips of the other characters in addressing him; historical figures are only mentioned once, as well as some very minor fictional characters, of which there are quite a few in the novel, along with about 30 mentioned; Sir Charles – the deceased by the beginning of the action is repeatedly mentioned in the novel, practically in all chapters; the absolute record holder in terms of the frequency of mentions, despite the fact that Holmes is allegedly in London for several chapters, and Watson is leading the investigation, is Sherlock Holmes -224 times; the Barrymore spouses are not rarely mentioned in the novel, the Stapletons are also mentioned in the final chapters, the Mortimers spouses only once, in my analysis I did not count these mentions
Results:
Chapter 1
Sherlock Holmes 23
Mortimer 14
Watson 10
Chapter 2
Charles Baskerville 27
Hugo Baskerville 12
Mortimer 10
Sherlock Holmes 9
Barrymore 6
Watson 1
Sir Henry 1
Murphy 2
Frankland 1
Stapleton 2
Hugo Baskerville, author of Legend 1
Roger, the son of the last 1
John, the son of the last 1
Elizabeth, daughter of the last 1
Chapter 3
Sherlock Holmes 14
Sir Charles 13
Mortimer 12
Sir Henry 7
Watson 6
Roger Baskerville 2
Stapleton 1
Bradley 1
Chapter 4
Holmes 32
Sir Henry 17
Watson 15
Mortimer 15
Wilson 2
Cartwright 2
Chapter 5
Sherlock Holmes 29
Sir Henry 15
Watson 8
Mortimer 8
Barrymore 7
Theophilus Johnson 3
Mrs. Oldmore 2
Sir Charles 3
James Desmond 3
Roger Baskerville 1
Cartwright 1
John Clayton 3
Chapter 6
Sir Henry 17
Mortimer 9
Sherlock Holmes 7
Watson 3
Sir Charles 5
Barrymore 3
James Desmond 1
Frankland 1
Stapleton 1
Perkins 1
Selden 2
Swan and Edison 1
Chapter 7
Sir Henry 15
Stapleton 14
Miss Stapleton 14
Watson 9
Barrymore 9
Holmes 7
Mortimer 6
Mrs. Barrymore 2
Sir Charles 6
Chapter 8
Barrymore 12
Sir Henry 11
Holmes 2
Watson 0
Stapleton 4
Miss Stapleton 1
Perkins 1
Mortimer 3
Frankland 4
Chapter 9
Barrymore 17
Sir Henry 15
Watson 10
Stapleton 7
Selden 7
Holmes 6
Sir Charles 1
Mrs. Barrymore 2
Miss Stapleton 4
Chapter 10
Barrymore 15
Sir Henry 10
Mortimer 8
Selden 8
Sir Charles 7
Holmes 6
Watson 4
Stapleton 4
Frankland 5
Lions 1
L.L. 8
Chapter 11
Sir Charles 17
Frankland 14
L.L. 9
Holmes 1
Watson 6
Sir Henry 3
Mortimer 1
Perkins 2
Queen 2
Stapleton 3
Barrymore 2
Middleton 1
Morland 2
Chapter 12
Holmes 32
Watson 16
Sir Henry 16
Stapleton 16
Bradley 1
Cartwright 2
L.L. 4
Sir Charles 3
Selden 5
Barrymore 1
Chapter 13
Holmes 23
Watson 12
Sir Henry 11
Stapleton 10
Miss Stapleton 6
Sir Charles 4
Barrymore 2
Mrs. Barrymore 1
Selden 2
Neller 1
Reynolds 1
Rodney 1
Rear Admiral Baskerville 1
Pitt 1
Sir William 1
Hugo 1
Cartwright 2
Lestrade 5
L.L. 9
Anderson 1
Chapter 14
Holmes 30
Sir Henry 15
Stapleton 10
Watson 4
Lestrade 6
Frankland 1
Perkins 1
Myers 1
Mrs. Stapleton 6
Mortimer 2
Sir Charles 1
Chapter 15
Stapleton 32
Sir Henry 15
Sir Charles 12
Holmes 3
Upwood 2
Montpensier 1
Karer 2
Mortimer 7
Mrs. Stapleton 11
Anthony 3
Roger Baskerville 1
Fraser 1
Ross and Mangles 1
L.L. 4
Cartwright 2
Watson 2
The De Reschke brothers 1
Marcini 1
Analysis:
The novel justifies its name-the Baskervilles are generally mentioned, counting Stapleton, who is also a Baskerville, if we count Hugo, only 8 Baskervilles-393 times, the couple Holmes and Watson are really the main characters-330 times, the queen is mentioned without a name -2 times, once the premier Pitt even without specifying which of the two premieres we are talking about: Pitt Sr. or Pitt Jr., Admiral Rodney once, along with the Bradley trademark, which was honored twice and the opera singers-the De Reschke brothers, along with the restaurateur Marcini-these are the least common names in the novel, but they are historical persons: the queen, only deceased by the time of publication of the first edition of the novel, dedicated to Robinson, who reigned for almost 70 years, whose cult existed throughout the empire, in the novel without a name in context as the hypothetical case of Frankland v. the queen, is mentioned as many times as the brand of tobacco-only twice, Holmes surpasses the mentions of his protagonist Stapleton more than twice, the butler Barrymore, when counted in mentions together with his wife, is comparable in the text with the main negative character Stapleton-this was a literary device given in the template by Doyle himself, in order to really deceive the reader and detectives, to put them on the "wrong track", Watson harbors suspicions against Barrymore in the first half of the novel; two baronets combined are mentioned fifty times more often than the central character Holmes, but Holmes paired with Watson surpasses twice the frequency of mentions of both baronets combined, but is inferior by a hundred mentions, if you count all those mentioned in the novel among the Baskervilles, but Holmes, Sir Charles, Sir Henry and Barrymore are the most frequently mentioned in separate chapters, and Stapleton in the final one; in the novel, there are female characters among the main characters: Mrs. Stapleton, Mrs. Lyons and Mrs. Barrymore-but they meet only from the middle of the narrative, and are mentioned much less often than many male characters, especially since all three are married women, that is, according to English tradition, they are referred to as Misssis and with the surnames of the male spouses, also the heroes of the novel, except for Lyons, but who is curiously made a hero by some film adaptations with the same desire to confuse the viewer and put him on the "wrong track", making him suspect; two of the women, Mrs. Stapleton and Mrs. Lyons, behave independently of their husband, and the author clearly sympathizes with both of them and makes his male characters and readers empathize with them: Mrs. Stapleton is mentioned less than 50 times, which is half the size of her husband, Mrs. Lyons, who is condemned by her father, and who is "afraid to compromise a lonely old man the gentleman" by Sir Charles is mentioned in the text of the novel, more precisely, of course, the translation of the novel -34 times, Mrs. Barrymore, regardless of her husband-5 times, against 74 mentions of Barrymore, in general, these main female characters of the novel are mentioned-almost 90 times, there are slightly less mentions of one Watson, or one Stapleton, that is, this detective novel, the English classic is a rather brutal work, of the 10 main characters there are only three women, but the novel takes place during the reign of the queen:
Sherlock Holmes – 224
Sir Henry – 168 times
Watson -106
Stapleton -104
Sir Charles – 99
Mortimer-95
Barrymore -74
The analysis of the novel from the point of view of the text strategy popular in commercially oriented modern mass literature:
According to me, the idea of text perception as the interaction of the requirements of the text to the reader and the reader to the text (the horizons of expectation of the text and the reader) posed the problem of historical variability of perception//"The History of Literature as a challenge to literary theory" (1967). The task of criticism is set in this way as a reconstruction of the history of the impact of the text on different generations. Without setting such a task, one can still notice: the very popularity of the novel in different generations shows its proximity to serious literature rather than to mass entertainment, commercial, serious, classical in this analysis differs from mass by the presence of a timeless reader in the textual strategy. But here we could try to point out what is in the novel that makes it popular for a number of generations, and according to the theory of modern literary criticism brings it closer to the classics -in our opinion, on the one hand, this is changing reader expectations-England of the early 20th century. it presents to each subsequent generation an exoticism greater than for the original reader, but this alone is certainly not enough, on the other hand, just the unchanged reader's expectations- and they are in the continuing relevance of the novel- in the sense of recognizing ideas about betrayal, about greed, about property and wealth, about paying for wealth, for obsessing over it -but no less important are probably those elements of the work itself, the plot, the characters that bring it closer to folklore, this made this English novel understandable and popular for the English reader, but almost immediately after its appearance all over the world, and perhaps through those elements that made it so through the widespread development of a modern society
The psychoanalytic concept
In the psychoanalytic concept of literary studies by Freud and Jung, the entire novel can be presented as the story of a boy-the main character living in a manor with his father and mother, and suffering from nightmares, except for Sir Henry, all the characters in the novel can be quite part of his fantasy:
The archetype of the Mother in the novel is Baskerville Hall (its negative representation of the Dartmoor swamp)
In the scheme of the Oedipus complex, the uncle is none other than the father, an obstacle to the possession of the estate
Stapleton is the alter ego archetype of the Shadow of Sir Henry himself (as well as the Anima archetype forming a pair with Sir Henry-Miss Stapleton and Laura Lyons in a negative display, if not the connotation of good and evil, and very clear, then these pairs, like what Holmes saw in the portrait gallery, are not distinguishable at all)
Holmes (in a complex Holmes-Watson construction, his viz-a-vi) is the archetype of the Spirit (his negative expression is the Hound of the Baskervilles, both are on the trail, one is a detective, the other is a bloodhound)
And Dr. Mortimer either did not exist at all, as in the story of going to the doctor for something shameful: one of my friends is in pain there, after a holiday romance, what do you advise him ... or, if Holmes is the personification of at least a supernatural force fighting evil, his messenger, the whole function of Mortimer in the novel-intermediary, his figure seems to be replaceable, the terrified Sir Henry himself could have made the same request to Holmes, it is curious that Watson sees only two sights in the Grimpen village: the office of a postal employee (again mediation, the Messenger) and Mortimer's house
The boy feels fear and dislike for his father, the owner of the estate, which is overlaid by love for his mother, in nightmares he sees the expression of his secret desires-he is tormented by a vision of a dog that kills his father, and he becomes the owner of the estate, Dr. Mortier is a psychoanalyst, can resolve this in the spirit of the Conan Doyle novel, more precisely the concept psychoanalytic literary studies
In accordance with Jungian hermeneutics, or rather the theory of individuation, which according to Jung forms the deep plot of all narrative literature, the novel looks like this:
The test of life in society-the hero-an American farmer comes to London, having turned into an English landowner under the law of inheritance
Positive development occurs due to a collision with a legend-sobering up –I got a pretty inheritance-through irrational fear
The test of self-awareness-meeting with one's own Shadow–Stapleton is the whole novel –negative development does not occur through interference in the Holmes case
The test of meeting with Anima-love. A positive development also occurs due to the discovery of Miss Stapleton's complicity in the crime, with her ambiguous role as a sister-wife-accomplice-opponent of her husband's criminal plan
Obeying the archetype, a person remains at the mercy of illusions, accepts them as reality-and individuation is interrupted
Realizing the archetype as a part of one's own psyche, which determines one or another of its qualities, reactions, fantasies, actions, overcomes the power of the archetype
The Test of knowledge-meeting with the archetype of the Spirit-Holmes
The description of the Self in the literature on Jung is rare, Turysheva is an example: Bazarov (in episodes of passing away), Sorel (in episodes of imprisonment and trial), Tatyana Larina (refusal to Onegin)-and so similar to the passage of initiation overcoming fear of the legend and the test of love and revealed knowledge by Sir Henry-the novel is possible loses in the completeness of the disclosure of the plot, in the drawing of images, but not in the plot itself and in the selection of images
There could be a part described on behalf of Miss Stapleton-her story: what connected her with a man like her husband, why she began to resist his crimes, the love story through her eyes to Sir Henry, and so on-in the finale, a wedding is possible, if Sir Henry forgave her, he had reasons for this: a letter, a warning from Watson by mistake, she almost herself She died on that fateful night when the dog attacked Sir Henry
In general, it is curious that the novel is obviously written through Watson's eyes, it is difficult to distract from the figure of Holmes, the superhero in it, and Watson really, as his representative, the conductor of light, makes Holmes feel in the novel, although he acts only at the beginning and end, but the main character is Sir Henry and this is reflected in the title and in the beginning –where Mortimer tells everything precisely in connection with the arrival of Sir Henry, and in the love line-what does it have to do with Watson or Holmes, so it's curious, that all the other characters look archetypal-but so in life-we cannot know the complexity of the inner world of other people we meet and for us they are only archetypes, just like we are for the rest –and in the novel this is just visible-more precisely by how far it falls short of a serious novel form- where stereoscopic, not even chronological, but spatial action would be presented – where we would not have to think about: what happened before Sir Charles's death, and what happened before Stapleton's arrival in England, but how this story was seen from Meripith House, or through the eyes of the Barrymores, and what happened to them before Sir Charles came to England, and what happened to Sir Charles in South Africa, what kind of elections in which he was a candidate, but his death cut short his participation in them, and so on
Moreover, in mythocritical Jungian hermeneutics, the story of Miss Stapleton –if it had ended with a wedding –would have been its own story of beauty and the beast, its own story of Cinderella –despite the fact that she was obviously in the archetype of Anima –a substitute for Sir Henry's mother-obviously an American
And this would not even interfere with the historical truth: if Doyle himself says that it's great that against the background of the nouveau riche, a representative of an ancient family decided to revive his ancestral nest, against the background of stories from the Canterville ghost or Ishigura, where English estates go to the Nouveau riche from the New World, Miss Stapleton and Sir Henry still and immigrants from America, but not nouveau riche, but as if the rightful owners of the estate were
In Jungian English mythocritical hermeneutics (with all the criticism) –Bodkin-one can guess the distinction between the archetypes of heaven and hell-gloomy landscapes or, if not blooming gardens, then comfortable Victorian London with all its attributes: railways, hotels, shoes, cabs, telegraphs, archetypes of God, the devil (even called more than once in the the novel is opposed to both civilization and rationalism in general, and Holmes – by the way, at the same time, an emotionless robot, in particular, the episodes associated with evil are the most emotionally colored) and the hero-hesitating in choosing good and evil or entering into confrontation with forces of a higher order
According to Graves, the novel also has a monomyph –defining all European literature-the confrontation of the Sun and the Moon-masculine, rational and feminine, irrational, but at the same time poetic –if Bodkin identified archetypes in literature, according to Graves, literature has its history in archetypes: medieval lunar poetry, in the 17th-18th centuries. the solar myth, the expression of which is the cult of rationalism in the art of classicism and Enlightenment, the cult of the Moon returns in romanticism -not even in sensuality or gloom, but in an intimate theme
According to Northrop Fry: the novel, of course, like all adventure literature, is the "myth of spring", but we see echoes of the "myth of winter" in it-in the demonic creature and in the title
He almost doesn't get to the "myth of summer"-the wedding of the heroes
Even in the interpretation of the origin of literary imagery according to Fry: there is a comic pervomif-images of friendship, love, anthroporphism of the gods, we said instead of pastoral –Victorian not in the sense of gloom just, but on the contrary the development of the world of things –London, the workshop of the world, harmony even – and Holmes is also working to maintain it-fighting injustice-the lights of Edison and Swann, too, from Sir Henry's side-and there is a tragic first myth-a world of swamps, inexplicable fears, if there were only this side in the novel-then it would be a "horror novel" like Stoker's Dracula, the image of a monster, but the detective line does not just connect these components of the novel -like day and night-"be afraid to go out into the swamps at night"-but also debunks prejudice, revealing modern crime, restoring justice and harmony –in this sense, fabulousness, and a Hollywood novel, it is no coincidence that Hollywood has been filmed many times and in an attempt to contrast it (with all the criticism of ideologists) in Soviet cinema, along with Gogol's own film adaptations, the Weiner brothers detectives, the spy detectives of Julian Semenov, disaster films like "The Crew", although this is only part of the causal relationship, the other is visible by some cultural scientists, for example, Kobrin, the historical parallels of Victorian England after the industrial revolution, the beginning of consumer society and the late USSR, with a common and sanctimonious morality, against the background of faith in the progress of science, the revival of interest in the past, but the struggle against religious prejudice (as can be seen from Doyle's biography-but unlike his hero, Doyle did not escape the fascination with another irrationality-spiritualism, and in this sense, as if he remained, unlike his literary hero, in captivity of rather gloomy illusions-in the novel, Holmes However, without touching the legend itself, it exposes the irrationality of the monster).
Fear in children's and romantic prose
Curiously, when inheriting a dog, Sir Henry remembers that he heard something about this legend in his childhood-this is how Doyle bridges the bridge from folklore, a scary fairy tale to childhood fears, or primitive thinking: when the world was and seemed frightening-isn't that why fairy tales are usually scary
Kafka is also a fear, but of a different kind -not Stoker's fear, not Cronin's fear, an absurdist fear. Fear is not rarely profaned by laughter.
In this regard, comparisons with Wilde's contemporary novel works are curious:
"The Canterville Ghost"
In fact, the plot is the opposite: it is not the ghost that terrorizes the owners of the castle, who, however, are not its hereditary owners, and are not related to the ghost by any family ties, but the new owners survive, if I may say so, this ghost, forcing him to suffer, to experience humiliation. But in essence, these are not the Otis, and not their newfangled means, not even their Reformed church and advanced views, but the entire modern civilization at that time: secularized, absorbed in the successes of science, technology, technology and progress, these spirits of the Middle Ages were expelled, the interest in which the daughters, Otis was surprised and displeased. If we talk about the novel, then its decadence is visible in it: yes, there is irony, romance, aestheticism, but there is quite a lot of the cult of Gothic.
To understand the plot of Doyle's novel, Lord Canterville's remark is interesting: "if I had the cruelty to take them (jewelry, a gift from a ghost) from her (Virginia), the old scarecrow would leave his grave and begin to poison my existence."
The genre of the novel varies from chapter to chapter: there is satire, sentimentalism, Gothic, and symbolism.
Canterville Castle was seven miles from the nearest Ascot railway station, so Mr. Otis telegraphed for a carriage to be sent for them... an elderly woman in a neat black silk dress, a snow-white apron and a cap was waiting for them on the porch. It was Mrs. Umney, the housekeeper... following her, they passed through a beautiful old Tudor hall and went into the library, a long room paneled in black oak, with a low ceiling and a huge window with colored glass…
Pinkerton stain remover and cleaner "Champion"... a bottle of lubricating oil "Rising Sun Tammany" - the industrial boom, the beginning of consumer society, advertising is parodied, traditionally in England Americans are portrayed as more free from dogmas, traditions and superstitions ... that this is not so, can be seen from the same "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" by Irving
Wilde also has a literal mention of Doyle's novel:
"The ghost glared at her and immediately took the necessary measures to turn into a big black dog-this masterful trick once earned him well-deserved fame and, according to the family doctor, caused the chronic dementia of Lord Canterville's uncle, the honorable Sir Thomas Horton. But then footsteps were heard, and the ghost failed to carry out his insidious plan. He limited himself to the fact that he began to phosphoresce weakly."
By the way, this novel also contains a hint of the origin of this literature (after all, in the case of literature, we are dealing with a special form of comprehension of being-artistic, figurative-this is the main category of the work-artistic images, besides, let's not forget about the origin of writers-socio-culturally, they were from a privileged class which, as the feudal order was eroding, lost all influence, and who but the writers had to protest with the means available to them against this, however, in the case of Wilde, who – by the method of biographical psychologism-had a strained relationship with a representative of the House of Lords, we have a reaction just to that part of the literature, which in his opinion was carried away and seriously frightened the reader with old legends):
"The vulgarity of the twins and the crude materialism of Mrs. Otis were outrageous –vulgarity and crude materialism in philosophy, science, politics, journalism, morality, art and, literature itself."
"The Crime of Lord Arthur Savile" (-"comedy detective")
- Wilde is a very witty ironic author (perhaps without equal in this) parodies the detective genre of the "sensational novel", which only appears in literature, along with developing journalism and developed later not infrequently by journalists, one of the co-authors of Doyle's novel, journalist Robinson, and Doyle was engaged in journalism and journalism
"The Dog ..." also irony, but irony to the Gothic novel, and as in the tradition of Cervantes, and the characters are typical: Holmes-Don Quixote, Watson - Sancho Panso, a chivalrous novel
The psychoanalytic concept leads us to the questions: What are the causes of creativity? Why does someone like comedies, and someone likes melodramas, horror films or thrillers?
In general, psychoanalysis considers art as a kind of symbol that can be interpreted like a dream. This symbol is associated with infantile sexual experiences.
Horror Movies
Those who prefer this particular category of films, according to psychoanalysts, react in this way to unconscious trauma at the prenatal level. After all, having no way out, these injuries lead to total anxiety, unmotivated panic states.
Melodramas
In an emotional form, they express the complex of orphanhood, that is, deep feelings associated with the trauma of birth, as well as with weaning as a "betrayal" of the mother.
Thrillers
They relieve the tension of repressed aggressive sexual impulses, as well as homosexual anxiety (the derivative of which, as is known, is paranoid anxiety).
Comedies
They give a surrogate outlet to antisocial impulses. The effect is achieved through the identification of the viewer with an antisocial personality – a criminal, a loser. The problems of the oedipal period are played out here.
Historical films
They perform the function of forced infantilization of people. These films demonstrate situations when something interferes with the love aspirations of one person for another. As a result, this prohibition is "fixed" as a norm of sociality. There is only a "debt" to the Motherland, the people, etc., with which personal interests and love relationships cannot be compared.
Cinema (a "Dog..." Doyle's most filmed work is my comment)
Watching movies allows each of us to be on the plane of the screen. The temptation to merge with the masses through the forced introduction of one's own psychic reality into the world is so strong that modern man actually represents a kind of sediment of identifications with numerous film and advertising characters. In order to fully cover the entire range of unconscious requests (someone, for example, likes mostly historical "action movies" with a pretentious protagonist like Tsar Leonid or Hercules - and this obviously speaks to the internal "requests" of this person – NS), each culture must provide a certain set of cult films (1960-1970- the years in the USSR: "Girls", "Gentlemen of fortune", "Ivan Vasilyevich changes his profession", "Well, wait!", "Caucasian captive", etc.).
Let's make a reservation right away – even omniscient psychoanalysis has boundaries: it makes clear the deep motives that make people create, but it does not explain the phenomenon of creativity at all. The mystery of artistic genius is inaccessible to psychoanalysis, like any other branch of science and philosophy.
Of course, only a person who is naturally endowed with any talents can sublimate his energy into creativity. But for those who are not very lucky with this (but both of the above problems take place), one thing remains – to become neurotic. It is not for nothing that neurotic symptoms are called the "creativity" of a neurotic. It's a pity that only a psychotherapist can appreciate this talent.
But let's return to our creators. The basis of artistic motivation is the artist's desire to replace the unsatisfactory world of the surrounding reality with the world of psychic reality – his own (with its anecdotal phrase "I see it that way"). All this, by the way, is available to each of us in dreams, the creators of which we are every night.
The impact of an artistic work (be it theater, cinema, art exhibition, etc.) on people is associated with the artist's unique ability to evoke empathy. And the more talented the creator is, the greater the response in the hearts he will cause. At the same time, both sides receive a sense of relief, and at the same time, pleasure – both the public and the artist. The first is because he unconsciously identifies himself with the images of paintings, movie characters, etc., and the second is because he "let off steam" of his unconscious infantile sexual experiences. That is, works of art solve the problem of discharging sexual impulses (often unacceptable to the person himself) in a way that is allowed – both for himself and for society.
Cinema as an art form is synthetic, and as a universal social phenomenon, with all the diversity of national cinematographies, cinema, perhaps just with the spread of societies such as modern and postmodern, is a much more universal phenomenon than literature, than national literatures. It is interesting to compare Doyle's novel with works of Russian literature, all the more familiar to the author of the study
In Turgenev's novel "The Noble Nest" there is a description of the return to the manor of the landowner. Of course, if in Doyle's novel the heir goes to the estate, who has never even been there, a young baronet, and the novel is English, and the beginning of the 20th century, and in Turgenev's novel the owner returns, and the novel is Russian, and the novel of the middle of the 19th century, but it is curious to compare.
Interestingly, the Russian novel speaks more than once about the feeling of homeland, but for some reason there is not a word in English, and this despite the fact that the baronet does not just go to the ancestral home, he generally returns from the USA or Canada to his native country, where he was born and grew up.
Then, curiously, on the contrary, the Russian novel talks about the feeling of the landowner about returning to a long-abandoned house, and this is while the aunt died only two years ago, and old servants and even their little grandchildren actually live in the house. Obviously, servants with families don't count. But in the English novel, nowhere does it say that the manor was empty, and this is at a time when only 4 people actually live in a huge house: the Barrymore couple, the dishwasher and Perkins the coachman.
Then, an interesting remark: the owner, Lavretsky, looking at the house made of pine logs, believes that it will stand for another half a century, while in Baskerville Hall even the upholstery of the dining room is made of oak, and the house itself has essentially remained unchanged for five centuries, later only side extensions appear. In Vasilevka, only park trees are described as ancient.
And finally, another curious comparison: the baronet more than once discusses how he will change everything here: he will conduct electricity, his uncle was possessed by the same ideas, who decided to revive the estate, but the hero of Turgenev's novel, on the contrary, sees everything as it remains unchanged, he does not think to change anything, on the contrary He strives to be treated with this immutability, even boredom, and learn to do things slowly.
Otherwise, such different books, authors, descriptions, on the contrary, are surprisingly similar: the road, landscapes, impressions from a long journey, from returning to the estate, meeting servants, memories, and even portraits, they play a key role in the English novel, and Holmes (and in fact Doyle) discovers knowledge, even in general terms, English painting (and history, heraldry) Of modern times, on the walls-with the late development of painting of the European style and genre in Russia, its rarity, Turgenev does not say anything at all about the authors of portraits, although portraits also occupy a place in the plot of the novel, and the author tells the story of the genus to readers, introducing them to the characters.
Such a detail is also curious: in England, as is known, there is a monument to Cromwell, a portrait of the curse of the Baskervilles also quietly hangs in the gallery, but in Russia, as is known, after the Decembrist uprising, the heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812, those involved in it were punished by the fact that their portraits were removed.
Kuprin is known for his disparaging criticism of the detective hobby, the mystical is used for a romantic love story in the story "Olesya"
The story "The Orlakh peasant Woman" is an attempt at a rationalistic interpretation of the mysterious phenomena that occupied Odoevsky.
Dogs in Russian works of art:
Uspensky Yu.A kitten named Woof
Charushin. Tomka
Mikhalkov. Puppy
Sasha is Black. Mickey's Fox Diary
Yesenin. Kachalov's dog
Troepolsky, Bely Bim, Black Ear
Bulgakov M.The heart of a dog
Chekhov. Kashtanka
Chekhov. Chameleon
Chekhov. The lady with the dog
Turgenev. Mumu
Turgenev. Hunter's Notes
Kuprin. Stories
Tolstoy. The lion and the dog
Sollogub V. The dog
Garin N.G. Childhood Themes
Nosov N.Vitya Maleev at school and at home
Nosov N.Bobik visiting Barbosa
Prishvin
The Shepherd Roy
We are with
Kazakov Y. Arcturus the hound dog
The Border Dog is Scarlet
Cash
Vladimov G.Faithful Ruslan
Andreev L.Kusaka
Aleshkovsky. Shoo and Two Portfels. Shoo and I'm in Crimea
Koval Yu.Underdressed
Metter I.Mukhtar
Veltists. Adventures of Electronics
Waiting for the goat
Yakovlev Yu.A person should have a dog
Mittens
Artemon
The Blue Puppy
Ryabinin B.Friends who are always with me
Ryabinin B.Niger
Nemenova L.Pup from the constellation of Hounds of Dogs
Aitmatov Ch.Piebald dog running by the edge of the sea
Wild dog dingo or, the story of the first love
of the Strugatsky Brothers. The Beetle in the anthill (Saymak, Kafka, Christie)
Przymanowski Ya.Four tankmen and a dog
Shmelev I. My Mars
Akopov E.Friend
Obviously, even by the names, it is emphasized that a dog is a friend of a person.
The love of the British for pets is visible even in the fact that in Austen's novel of the early 19th century. we meet Sir Henry (this is, in my opinion, Henry's familiar address, which is also found in the French play of the 19th century. "A glass of water" emphasizes either the youth of the face or his junior position, in the play Sir Henry is the son of a viscount, in the novel Austen we are talking about a young man, and in Doyle's novel, as I have already noticed, in addition to the youth of Sir Henry, his somewhat satirical type: a Canadian farmer and suddenly an English baronet with his own estate and even the family ghost) Tinley, playing with a Newfoundland puppy and two terriers, is mentioned in a mid-19th century novel by Collins as Miss Fernley's left-handed dog, and in Doyle's novel of the early 20th century there is a spaniel by Dr. Mortimer. Let's compare: in "Dubrovsky" there are Troekurov's kennels, which it would not be bad to exchange for some of the nobles, in "Dead Souls" Nozdryov sells, whether he sells muzzled puppies, then yes in the early 20th century. Kuprin's "White Poodle" and Chekhov's "Kashtanka", but even in Anton Pavlovich's story, Stolyar calls the dog a "misunderstanding", and in English classical literature we see dogs in an "ordinary" but simply modern form-companions, however, in the works of the 19th century: Sir Henry does not hunt with his Newfoundland, Miss Fernley walks with his dog in a cape from the wind and pampers his left-handed dog, Dr. Mortimer went to the swamps for a spaniel, Watson plays with him on the train, even though it is a hunting breed.
In chapter 13 of the novel, Inspector Lestrade is compared by Watson to a bulldog (I would compare Watson to a fox terrier: Holmes's definition is "a man of action", while Holmes himself is with a police bloodhound, and Baskerville of course with a mastiff, but only purebred dogs), Cartwright Holmes compares with a dog in the sense of devotion. The "dog" theme, as I have already noticed, is not rarely heard in the novel
Let's try to move on to using such formalistic methods that analyze sounds and colors in the text and start with just the same dog barking:
The barking of a dog is heard in the novel from the first chapter-at first it is the bark of the curly-haired spaniel Mortimer. Then he turns into the polyphony of a pack of hounds of the 17th century. in the legend, then he terrifies Stapleton Watson with the howl of a dog, who tries to pass it off to the simple-minded Watson for a cry of drink. He stops talking only in the finale-at the most dramatic moment-the dog attacks Sir Henry–and pursues-which serves as a hallmark of origin- not like a hound, or even a Cuban Great Dane, but as soon as the bullmastiff or the traditional giant Irish and Scottish breeds appeared (Doyle is from the English Irish, grew up in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland) greyhounds, - silently.
In general, the novel does not differ in cacophony or polyphony, on the contrary, it provides residents of London, noisy by the standards of the early 20th century, to relax in the rural wilderness of Dartmoor, unless of course there were terrible riddles and warnings not to go to the swamps at night.
The clop of the hooves of cabs and carriages of wealthy citizens. The creak of the springs of the Baskervilles carriage. The noise of trains is perhaps all that serves as the soundtrack of the novel. For the original reader, a resident of modern England to Holmes and Doyle, there is nothing exotic, special effects, of course, except for the main thing -the mysterious female crying, the terrible howling of an incomprehensible creature. But even this has something of the well-known, not infrequently terrible "fairy tale", that is, folklore. And where would traditions not be preserved, if not in the rural wilderness. But let's ask questions: is Holmes really an archetypally folkloric character, and if so, how did the reader of the new modern era take him for a real person, opened a museum for him, called a great detective, how does all this agree: folklore and modernity, traces of which as "historical reality" I am trying to find in the text of the novel and As I showed earlier, if I find it at all not in the entourage of things, or the reproduction of reality in the novel, more in the patterns of behavior of the characters, this is still to come, and in the worldview, as has already been noted, but even compositionally, what is also discussed ahead, in a word, is not at all what looks from the outside and the directors are trying to carefully reproduce in the film adaptations: in terms of reflecting "historical reality" in its everyday life, but even in what has long been called "history" primarily political, the novel reproduces more familiar to literature, but and not only for her, as we are also talking about ahead, an "imaginary reality". Is Holmes a folklore character and also therefore successfully inscribed in the history of literature, or a type of new hero also of the new modern era?..
A folklore hero or a modernist hero?
If Holmes is a typical folklore character, which explains his popularity, and is really not a psychologically difficult character, then the question is: why was he mistaken for a real person, and even a great one (the great detective)?
What is folklore (and whether it exists): it is difficult to imagine that a certain group of authors worked on a particular song (composing it is not a collective work), a story-authorship was simply absent as such (they did not sign, hence the situation with the mystery of Shakespeare -the writing craft was not in the hands of a long time he was respected, he was hidden as a bad disease, confused as Turgenev's mother with the service of a clerk, the concept itself was historical and appeared with romantics, who generally idealized and poetized the concept of the People, besides there was still a class society, and folk art was revered by the privileged class-from where professional art came, everything that was created by the taxable estates, but this does not mean that it is the fruit of collective creativity as such and the disappearance of folklore is associated not just with the development of professional art, but with the spread of literacy, education, necessary just for professional art and the destruction of class society, replacing it with a class, bourgeois one in the sense of political equality of all before the law and the elimination of class privileges), folklore refers to very different arts in their origin-historical, in the sense that authorship has long been impossible to establish (in this sense, the Homeric epic is also folklore, only tradition and recognition of art force poems to be attributed to Homer), traditional art is the same as historical (of course, you can draw a distinction, but if we talk about professional author's art, continuing the traditional, and this is not about folklore), amateur, - but this is more precisely, it is not professional art (but then it is not necessarily historical and folk), and popular (hence the desire to call it "folk"-it is difficult to imagine that songs grow like mushrooms: the song is composed by the author, it spreads because it is successful, popular among the people who can change it, to complement, to alter, and not necessarily in an effort to decorate, but simply because this is always the mechanism of news dissemination-a "deaf phone", and now we already have a common plot, motive, and call it "folk art", for a song about Stenka Razin, which is cited as an example of folklore creativity, after all, the authorship is known)
If we assume that the main difference between a fairy tale and everything else is that the fairy tale does not try to hide that it is invented and not real, then the novel is not just not a fairy tale, but the exact opposite of it, because Doyle considered the work of a narrator for writing, who is believed that he did not compose, but told a particular story But in the sense of the fabulous , there is really a lot in the novel
As for the "archetypal" -of course, human psychology cannot differ in a wide range, anyway, always and everywhere we learn concepts such as love, friendship, betrayal, hatred, courage, cowardice, etc., but is it worth talking about "archetypal", in the sense of the prevalence of motives, that they are historical, maybe there may even be talk of a folk community in the distant past for those peoples who are connected by a single plot in folklore or at least interaction in the distant past, in the end, about the popularity of the original "text" - so the same legend wanders , but in the novel, as for the legend, it is very different from everything known, but it is not even presented in the form in which Doyle heard it.
Folklore
V.I.Fomin. The truth of the fairy tale. Cinema and folklore traditions. Historical and theoretical monograph.-M., 2012:
"Emerging in the bosom of folk art culture, professional arts, eventually separating from folklore and gaining independence, in their subsequent development abruptly and obviously move away from their original folklore origins. Folk culture and professional arts live side by side, but each move in its own special way. In the course of this development, professional arts pick up and adopt the experience accumulated by folk culture, use the arsenal of one or another of its artistic means.
Professional arts, in any case, the advanced part, in the course of its historical development, is completely exposed to the process of increasing democratization. Moreover, thanks to the means of modern mass communication, unprecedented opportunities are opening up for familiarization with those values of classical or modern professional culture that until recently were the property of a narrow circle.
Folklore and other branches of folk art represent a special type of culture, fundamentally different in all its key features from the system of individual artistic creation. It is these profound differences that make folklore an art that professional art, for all its perfection, cannot replace."
"In our national science, folklore is commonly understood as the collective creativity of the broad masses of the people, reflecting the views, aspirations, worldview and worldview of the national collective, its artistic tastes."
"In folk art, an individual dissolves his subjective perception in general. On the contrary, in professional art, an individual, alienating from the common, seeks expression of his own sense of the world and only through it finds the common" (Nekrasova M. Folk art as part of culture)
On the relationship with the concept of entertainment: Engels: "a folk book is designed to entertain a peasant..."
What are the distinctive features of folklore: "Avoids everyday plausibility, straightforward copying of reality. In a folk tale and song, in an epic tale, reality is boldly transformed by means of fiction, grotesque, idealization."
"Professional art is art "from the outside." It brings with it a lot of things that "its own" folklore culture did not and could not give."
"In some cases, plots, images, motifs, genre constructions or some other elements of folklore culture can still more or less retain their original contours. In others, getting into the unique individual author's world, they are actively transformed, transformed that their very folklore origin can be guessed by some other perceptible signs."
Vasily Shukshin: "I grew up in a peasant family, where the ideas of what art is and what it exists for were special.And these ideas are such that they lead more to a song, a fairy tale, an oral story and even a folding lie, but of a very creative nature, I note"
Paustovsky: "We live in a world of fairy tales coming true." The dream of flying carpets has been realized. In the setting of fairy tales coming true, it is difficult, first of all, for the fairy-tale magicians themselves.
"There is practically no place for faith in the miraculous."
Aitmatov: "There is no limit to human imagination and there cannot be. Now we are faced with the fact that the exploration of outer space and outer space exhausts our imagination."
"The light of knowledge is now brightly flooding the darkest corners of existence."
"But the fairy tale lives in modern culture not only as a genre. The plots, images of a fairy tale, individual techniques of its poetics and the very foundations of fairy-tale thinking in the function of subordinate, serving elements are very often included in other genre communities. Moreover, this sphere is no longer fairy tales, but fabulousness seems incomparably broader and, by the way, more interesting and meaningful."
What is the secret of such resilience of the genre
The phenomenon of fairy-tale fiction. The vivid poetic fiction
"Setting on fiction" defines almost all the specifics
The "separation" from reality, stated in the beginning, then powerfully and rapidly increases, forming a fabulous space and time.
And at the final point of the plot, with the help of a "self-revealing" ending formula, it is recalled that the story told must be treated as fiction, no matter how much it captivates.
It is wrong to treat a fairy tale as some kind of naively childish, light-hearted entertainment genre based on a mindlessly intoxicating, low-content fantasy game."
Belov: "folk philosophy with all its national characteristics is better expressed in a fairy tale than anywhere else."
"Perhaps all aspects of people's life have found in it not only a reflection, but also an assessment. The adventures of princes in other lands, the adventures of a brave soldier are followed by human destinies, fabulous conflicts convey complex everyday and social relations" (Vedernikova N.Russian folk Tale.- M., 1975)
Isn't that too loud?
No. Moreover, fantastic fiction and the truth of life do not end up in a fairy tale in the position of antagonistic principles. They are directed towards each other -"magical fiction helps to more fully express the reality of folk ideals and rejection of existing conditions."
"With all her device, she organically answered the deep human need for active play with the world around her-she unleashed the imagination."
"In our time, when realistic lifelike tends to occupy a dominant position in culture, when the art of jewelry-accurate psychological analysis, the skill in creating a reliable, palpably accurate picture of life has reached such high perfection, the old folk tale-both as a genre and as a tradition, as a type of thinking based on conditional assumptions (-computer games, virtual reality) , on the game of reality, on free transformations of nature, - have not decreased in price at all."
"The folk tale does not know the characters, avoids psychological detail. An unusually subtle and rich psychological range is already appearing in Andersen's fairy tale. His characters suffer and rejoice, love and overcome doubts to the same extent as the heroes of any other literary genre"
"If the typological range of heroes of a folk tale is quite strictly limited, then in the literary one it not only expands, but fundamentally opens. Her hero can be any social type, character, any phenomenon or even an object."
"In folklore, a fairy tale keeps its distance from other genres. Having entered the literature, she freely comes into contact."
"Its form, if necessary, can be expanded to a novel"
(science fiction, detective story, romance novel, fantasy, although all literature can be classified as fiction).
A happy ending is required. Admits the negative
"The good purpose of the hero turns out to be unattainable, where there is no indispensable victory over evil."
The need for a miracle
"Even if a fairy-tale hero acts in a work, there are elements of magical fiction, we will not necessarily have a fairy tale at all."
It is more correct to talk about the fabulousness of such a work.
A cursory discussion of the boundaries of a fairy tale shows how far a fairy tale can go in literature from the original folklore ones.
-The motive of testing the hero
-inner drama –by convention –black, white
-brings the novel closer to the fairy tale, folklore, its conventions, the intricacies of the plot, Doyle himself understood this perfectly well -wide popularity is connected with this.
About fear
"Fear for a child is a useful thing in many ways, it is a great instinct. Fear makes him explore life, explore the world. At the same time, household fear and artistic fear are not the same thing at all: if a child is scared in the dark, he can become a stutterer, but I have not yet come across the fact that children begin to stutter from a scary fairy tale. Fairy tales, like instinct, have their own powerful mechanism of action. He develops in the child the muscles of fantasy, Her Highness of fantasy, which is needed by both the future artist, the future mathematician, and the future lover" (Roland Bykov. A great movie for the little ones)
Walter Scherf considers the scary tale to be "an exercise, a lesson in boldly entering the world."
We even know in advance that the hero will receive a royal daughter and half the kingdom in the final. But the hero gets them in the fight.
Doyle perfectly understood the possibilities of the genre and used it, Doyle should not be criticized in this sense for the lack of psychologism, because his novel has been popular for a long time, which means it stands the main test- time and the reader.
Are the logic of the intended character and the logic of the fairy tale narrative too far apart? But nevertheless, there are examples of another, the drama of Schwartz.
He transformed the most famous, worn-out plots beyond recognition precisely by turning "masks" into complex and vivid characters.
Hollywood, called the "dream factory," also fed on folklore, its plots, and technology.
The experience of creating a bright, dynamic, exciting spectacle, the ability to work on any material in an interesting and fascinating way for the reader-but even initially, what he admitted and why he insisted on co-authorship was a legend - that is, folklore is the grain of the whole novel.
"The beginning of literature is folklore recorded in writing" -Propp is the most famous Russian researcher of folklore fairy tales.
"Holmsiana" had not yet developed at the time of writing the novel. Yes, Holmes was already a popular figure, it's pointless to deny that, and perhaps this forced Doyle to make him a character in the novel, after which he became simply a "cult".
Holmes has long been a typical character, just like Don Quixote (quixotism) or Hamlet: in everyday speech we can hear the expression: - Well, you're just like some kind of Sherlock Holmes. In the meaning of an observant person.
Holmes puzzles were printed in the Strand itself.
Holmes may have become not only a typical character, but also a cult figure not so long ago, after the release of the series, far from the original with Cumberbatch in the title role, new generations around the world turned again to Doyle's books about the great detective.
The great detective himself has long been the hero of the works of not only Doyle, but many different masters of the authors of the detective genre, where Holmes is not always a Victorian hero, because Doyle himself criticized the film adaptations of his works for giving his character the attributes of a later time.
The fact that the novel is the most famous work about Holmes: Whose merit is that? Holmes, the main character in a series of novels and short stories, or Devonshire folklore?
On the one hand, Doyle used the plot and techniques of folklore, on the other hand, he created not just a new work of professional literature, but a whole genre of "sensational novel" or detective story. Let us turn again to Doyle's contemporary literature. In the magazine "Artist" at the same time in 1894, another doctor and publicist (essays on Sakhalin, not praising the colonial war and imperialism, but criticizing the most brutal tsarist penal servitude and exile) Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, in another country publishes the story "The Black Monk" (not an entertaining, but a serious genre).
There are only three characters in this story:
Andrey Vasilyich Kovrin — Master of Philosophy. This is the first time when Chekhov's character becomes a philosopher.
Egor Semenovich Pesotsky is a well—known gardener, former guardian and tutor of Kovrin. A man of business, cultivating a beautiful garden, the author of polemical pamphlets on gardening.
Tanya Pesotskaya is the daughter of Yegor Semyonych, a childhood friend, and later Kovrin's wife.
And finally, the fourth character in the story is the black monk mirage, a ghost seen by Kovrin.
All the other people appearing in the Black Monk: the Pesotskys' guests, the workers in their garden, Kovrin's second wife are just extras without words, devoid of any external signs.
Plot
Andrey Vasilyevich Kovrin is a learned man, a philosopher and a lover of psychology, going to the village to improve his mental health. He spends the summer at the estate of his former guardian Pesotsky and his daughter Tanya. In the village, he continues to lead his usual "nervous" lifestyle — he reads and talks a lot, sleeps little, smokes and drinks wine. His thoughts are occupied by the ancient legend of the mirage in the form of a black monk, known to him from nowhere. Kovrin tells this legend to Tanya and after that, walking in the garden, he clearly sees a black monk emerging from a vortex.
In a state of euphoria from what he saw, he proposes to Tanya. Then the preparations for the wedding are underway, Egor Pesotsky is especially happy, he sees in Kovrin the heir to his horticultural farm. Soon Kovrin is visited again by a black monk. Kovrin tries to comprehend his nature, believing that the monk exists only in his imagination and fearing that he is mentally ill. The monk talks with Kovrin and convinces him that Kovrin is a genius, that he is different from the others. Kovrin is flattered, everyone notices that he has become cheerful and cheerful. Sometimes he gets blood in his throat, but he doesn't pay attention to it. One day Tanya finds Kovrin talking to an empty chair. She convinces her husband that he is mentally ill, Kovrin begins to be treated. Life seems bland to him, he misses talking to the black monk. Pesotsky's mundanity is already annoying him. He breaks up with Tanya, reproaching her and her father for forcing him to be treated. Later, he lives with another woman, whom he humbly obeys in everything and obediently treats. At the resort, where he came to treat his health, he receives a letter from Tanya. She curses him, blaming him for her father's death and for her broken life. Kovrin is suddenly seized with anxiety, he remembers how cruel he was to them, a black monk appears to him. Kovrin dies of an attack, but with a blissful smile.
History of creation
The story was written by Chekhov in Melikhov in the summer and autumn of 1893. In July, Chekhov informed his patron and publisher A. S. Suvorin: "I also wrote a 2-sheet novella, The Black Monk. If you had come, I would have let you read it." In August, Suvorin offered Chekhov to print a story in the newspaper Novoye Vremya, but he refused, "because he decided not to give stories with "to be continued" to the newspapers." F. A. Kumanin, editor of the Artist magazine, asked Chekhov very much: "If you have something ready for another magazine give it to us." On December 18, 1893, Chekhov wrote to his publisher: "In the January book of The Artist, you will find an image of a young man suffering from megalomania; this story is called The Black Monk."
Perception
The story "The Black Monk" has a reputation among literary critics for being mysterious.The main mystery, the main question about the "Black Monk", the debate about which continues to this day, was formulated back in 1900 by Chekhov's contemporary Nikolai Mikhailovsky: "what does the story itself mean? What is its meaning?" the critic asks, who is the black monk: a kind genius "calming tired people with dreams and daydreams about the role of "God's chosen ones", benefactors of humanity," or on the contrary, an evil one, "insidiously flattering people into the world of illness, misfortune and grief for the surrounding loved ones and, finally, death"? Mikhailovsky himself answered his questions "I do not know." Vladimir Kataev conditionally divided those who wrote about this story into "kovrinists", who see Chekhov's clash of high ideals with, in Mikhailovsky's words, "fatal shallowness, greyness, scarcity of reality" and "Pesotskists", who see Kovrin's false thinking, and consider Pesotsky's horticulturist-agronomist to be a true "modest genius". The latter in Soviet times repeatedly compared Pesotsky with Michurin.
Lifetime criticism
Leo Tolstoy liked the story "The Black Monk". Talking with G. A. Rusanov in 1894, Tolstoy said: "The Black Monk is a charm." Dividing Chekhov's best works into two grades, L. N. Tolstoy attributed the story "The Black Monk" to the first.
Critic S. A. Andreevsky, reviewing Chekhov's collection of Novellas and Short Stories, noted: "The Black Monk gives us a deep and faithful study of mental illness <...>. The figures of the fanatical landowner-gardener and his faint-hearted, pretty daughter <...> are depicted extremely vividly. The fatal quarrel between the mentally healthy and the mentally ill leads to a terrible tragedy, in its senselessness," and the critic A.M. Skabichevsky saw in the story "a very interesting depiction of the process of insanity." In his opinion, "the reader does not take any idea, any conclusion from all this."
G. Kacherets believed that the author of the story "looks at people who are striving for the ideal, overflowing with thirst for it and suffering for it, as if they were sick of the soul," therefore, "hobbies, sincerity, pure passions appear to him as symptoms of a close mental disorder."
Assessments of foreign philologists
One of the authors of the modern collection "Reading Chekhov", Paul Debrecheny, saw in the story "The Black Monk" a kind of preliminary attempt by the writer to combine symbolism and mysticism. In his opinion, in this work it is also felt that Chekhov was familiar with French symbolism, Nietzsche and Solovyov.
But it is not difficult to notice the parallels of the plot with the analyzed novel of an entertaining nature, that is, the very choice of the plot does not say that the writer is the author of "tabloid literature", Doyle's novel could be "more complex literature", although its popularity is probably due to the borrowing of folklore and the plot and reception, and folklore, with all the task of entertainment, has long been the object of serious study, especially in the age of cinema, advertising and mass culture. At the same time, the novel entertainment is a continuation of the European satire novel of the old chivalric novel and the new Gothic novel. The image of Holmes in this way is not so simple at all: it is both a new hero, a typical character of European literature, and a folklore character, while being perceived as "real" for all its grotesqueness of a "walking calculating machine", clicking the most intricate crimes, sometimes even without leaving the room, smoking a pipe, entertaining himself and Watson with dinner in the restaurant and so on, that is, on the one hand, an obviously invented image, a kind of hero, but of an intellectual nature, on the other hand, an ordinary person with his quirks and weaknesses, even bad habits.
Moreover, the folklore techniques themselves, they are all-pervasive plot elements, can be used in any genre. Earlier I noticed that in Rybakov's story there are these elements as coming, despite socialist realism, the partisanship of literature, from the Gothic novel, Soviet literature has shown examples in these conditions of the development of classical even in such a way not similar to critical realism, as if this thesis confirms the appearance of Soviet science fiction and Soviet detectives, here on the contrary, we can talk about an adventure story, a detective story, as well as stories about old manors, ghosts, treasures, family jewels and family curses, only with elements of socialist realism and party literature in the form of the fact that children are certainly pioneers, dark forces personify exploiters, and the estate is selected for a children's labor commune.
And, let's look at the list of works again, among which there is clearly a place for the analyzed one:
H. G. Wells. "Dr. Moreau's Island"
Shakespeare. "Hamlet"
by Meyrink. "Golem"
Sollogub F. "The Little Devil"
A.P.Chekhov "The Black Monk", "The Cherry Orchard"
Pushkin A.S. "The Bronze Horseman", "The Stone Guest", "The Queen of Spades", "The Ghoul"
Gogol N.V. "Dead Souls", "Viy", "The Night before Christmas"
E.Bronte "Wuthering Heights"
Dostoevsky "Notes from the Dead House"
Dickens "Great Expectations", "The Mystery of Edwin Drood"
Mayne Reed "The Headless Horseman"
Wilde "Portrait of Dorian Gray", "The Canterville Ghost"
Prosper Merime "Locis"
Gaston Leroux "The Phantom of the Opera"
Stoker "Dracula"
Irving "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"
Hoffman "Elixirs of Satan", "Entail"
Belyaev "Island of Lost Ships", "Amphibian Man", "Professor Dowell's Head"
Lermontov "The Hero of our time", "The Demon"
Stefan Zweig
Korotkevich "The Wild Hunt of King Stach"
Du Maurier "Rebecca", "Birds"
Konrad "The Heart of Darkness"
Kipling "Mowgli", "Tales of Old England"
Goethe "Faust"
Updike "The Witches of Eastwick"
Mark Twain "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn"
Murdoch "The Black Prince"
Stevenson "The Strange Story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "Treasure Island"
Hugo's "Notre Dame Cathedral"
Cronin "Castle Brody"
Austin "Northanger Abbey"
Galsworthy"The Saga of the Forsytes"
Cervantes "Don Quixote"
I have given a number of works to show, such as Shakespeare's Hamlet, that by no means all literature in which the ghost acts refers simply to entertaining reading, that is, as if not serious, a frivolous kind of literature.
Neo-Romanticism is one of the many definitions used by writers and critics of the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. to describe the transitivity of culture from the "old" to the "new"-"modern", "modern".
"This definition, once quite weighty, but half-forgotten in the 20th century, should be considered in relation to others.The symbols of the cultural shift are naturalism, impressionism, and symbolism.
Despite the spread in a number of countries and giving it the status of a historical and literary concept in the 20s under the influence of the German "philosophy of life", neo-Romanticism did not become a commonly used term, because it rather denoted not specific stylistic features, but their general property, a certain "zeitgeist", as a result of which it was gradually absorbed other concepts similar in content.
For the first time, neo-Romanticism was discussed at the turn of the 1880s-1890s in the Berlin artistic environment. This buzzword, adopted from French critics, but used unlike them, not in a negative, but in an affirmative sense, indicated the need to overcome the well-known provincialism of German literature in the last third of the 19th century. The demand implied the renewal of the great national tradition, a protest against wingless naturalism – life writing, not a denial of naturalism, but its expansion, elevation to a "new ideal" - a mystical sense of things, poetic dionysism as a hunger for life."
Nietzsche formulates such an understanding of neo-romanticism in the 1880s, first of all, which corresponds to his dream of rapprochement in the "superman" - and Holmes clearly surpasses the "ordinary man" with his rational abilities, the "sage and the beast".
"Ideologically, this meant a search for personal, as it were earthly, religiosity, symbolically -a movement from the blurring of the world in impressionism and symbolist allegory to a new objectivity, to the simplification of language and its expression." Textbook on foreign literature. pp.284-285
Viennese writer Friedrich Fels: "every naturalist is a romantic at heart, even if he does not accept the definition of romanticism."
The playwright Hofmannsthal used it to combine "analysis of life and escape from life" in Viennese Art Nouveau.
Realizing the instability of the definition, not wanting to see romanticism in the mysticism of Maeterlinck, they stopped putting a generalizing meaning into the definition-it began to be used to characterize the theatrical repertoire.
K. Vollmeller, R. Beer-Hoffmann: "The Death of George", "Count Charolais", R. Huch "Fra Celeste" neo-Romanticism meant a popular idea of the attributes of romance-legends- in the novel, an essentially independent work attributed to Robertson -heroic personalities from the past, elements of folklore, extravaganza, colorful fiction.
European critics then called individual works by Ibsen, Strindberg, Hamsun – it seems, Verharn, d Annunzio, T. Mann, Rilke, Przybyszewski, Wyspiansky.
And in the 1920s: even the heyday was "Fighting the Demon" by Zweig.
"Some of the provisions turned out to be applicable to English literature.
But in England itself, if this term was used, it was not in the Nietzschean sense (although what is Mowgli-if not in its pure form a combination of "the sage and the beast"- my comment) neo-romanticism here meant a modification of the tradition of the "adventurous novel" by Collins, Haggard, Stevenson, Doyle.
The exoticism of the themes, the proximity to the mass reader."
"In Russia, Merezhkovsky was the first to talk about neo-Romanticism-"Neo-Romanticism in Drama" 1894-negatively belated violators of classical traditions, enemies of scientific poetry, obsolete traditions of the theater, new idealists rebelling against positivism and naturalism.
Bely: "Arabesques" 1911: "the symbolism of modern art emphasizes that realism, romanticism and classicism are a threefold manifestation of a single principle of art." pp.286-87
"Block "The Collapse of humanism", "On Romanticism" 1919:
"man is a humane animal, a social animal, a moral animal is being transformed into an artist."
"In the USSR in the 30-80s, infrequent references to neo-Romanticism were either ideologized (within the framework of a strict interpretation of decadence and modernism), or designed to mean something separate from decadence, but not aligned with realism."
Folklore themes in the novel by Huch, the novel "Memories of Ludolf Ursley Jr.", Hauptman, Hesse (early works).
In 1958, in The History of English Literature, the novel was not compared, it was considered as a separate continuation of an exclusively English adventurous novel.
And later, neo-Romanticism began to be considered a British phenomenon.
The idea of courageous heroism , eager for change, was identified.
The style of "healthy youth": travel, shipwrecks was contrasted with psychologism, aesthetics of Wilde and verbose descriptive.
It remains to add that Western literary critics do not use the term after the Second World War.
"We quoted the history of the term in such detail to show how contradictory and inconsistent its use in Russian science is. The theoretical approach did not work out.
Nevertheless, the rejection of this concept seems insufficiently motivated and, I think, it may still be useful"// p.288. Foreign literature.K.19-h20:a textbook for students.universities.edited by V.M.Tolmachev.-M., 2003
Doyle's novel is primarily an English-language work of English literature and, above all, literature of the 19th century, i.e. late Victorian. Near:
Ambrose Bierce is an American novelist and journalist whose bold, biting, uncompromising articles earned him fame as a brilliant publicist and the nickname Bitter Bierce; a Civil War veteran who gained a unique existential experience at the front that defined the themes and plots of many of his novels; the direct literary heir of Edgar Poe (whom he called "the greatest known American") and the predecessor of Howard Lovecraft, who had a keen interest in the psychology of horror and metaphysical riddles – and passed away no less mysteriously than many of his characters, missing at the end of 1913 in revolutionary Mexico.
The novel "The Green Face", written immediately after "Golem", also preserves an ancient legend at its core.
Mary Ann Evans, who wrote under the pseudonym "George Eliot", went down in the history of English literature as one of the outstanding masters of the late Victorian novel.
The novel "Middlemarch" is the main work of the writer, a true masterpiece, which reflects all the main ideas, characters and plot moves of English literature of the late 19th century. The place of its action is a provincial town in middle England with all its secrets and mysteries hiding behind the beautiful facades of well—maintained houses.
"The Spirit of Love" (1931) is the first novel by the English writer Daphne Du Maurier (1907-1989); its plot unfolds against the backdrop of spectacular landscapes of Cornwall, which became Du Maurier's second homeland, as well as the setting for her other famous novels: "Jamaica Inn", "Rebecca", "The Royal General", "My Cousin Rachel"...
"The Spirit of Love" is a generational family saga about four Cornish Coombe family owning a ship yard. Subsequently, Du Maurier admitted that she believes in the spiritual connection of generations, and this is exactly what her first novel is about – about the strange connection of generations.
The novel by A. Cronin tells about the disintegration of a family. This is an excellent example of the development of the tradition of the "Gothic" and "sensational" novel: detective intrigue is combined with an unusual love drama unfolding against the background of lyrical landscapes of Cornwall and picturesque paintings of Italy in the forties of the XIX century. With each turn of the plot, the reader is more and more lost in guessing who is in front of him — the victim of unfair suspicions or a calculating intriguer; but whichever version he leans towards, the finale will be unexpected.
The works of Henry James, a classic of American and world literature, introduce the reader to the world of psychological and mystical mysteries, superstitious expectations, mysterious, terrible, sometimes inexplicable events. The novel "The Turn of the Screw" (1898), which gave the collection its name, became a kind of "calling card" of James and was awarded numerous film adaptations. The traditional Gothic "ghost story" turns under James's pen into a paradoxically ambiguous narrative about the mysteries of existence and the dark corners of consciousness, about a world in which any truth can be challenged and each event can be followed by another "turn of the screw" of fate governing human life.
Northanger Abbey is Jane Austen's most ironic and mischievous book. Catherine loves to read "Gothic novels", and her whole life, as it seems to her, is full of dark secrets and riddles. And therefore, an ancient mansion turns into a sinister nest of crime in her eyes, a charming young aristocrat into a demonic, mysterious villain. It is only through love that Catherine finds a new perspective on reality, she discovers previously unknown sides of life.
Le Fanu is an outstanding writer of the Victorian era, in which he was often called the "Irish Wilkie Collins" and "Irish Edgar Poe", the author of many Gothic short stories, novellas and novels that survived temporary oblivion at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries, and then regained popularity – already among new generations of readers.
"Green Tea" is a novel in the final version in the collection of 1872.- Doyle certainly read –as a doctor, as a writer, and as a spiritualist.
The text is written on behalf of an unnamed doctor who became a companion and secretary, assistant to Dr. Martin Hesselius, a German, much more experienced and older, who practiced in England.
According to the author, his cases from practice are not only of medical interest.
Moreover, his method –it is curious how the doctor presents the case histories -allows modern authors of annotations to call him an "occult detective."
A philosophical physician – he is called-devotes more time to a comprehensive study of data from practical activities than an ordinary doctor-surpasses in terms of thoroughness and detail of analysis: such a medic acquires the habit of careful observation-Bell and Holmes are here, but Doyle himself is a doctor–and in general Chekhov, Bulgakov, and Cronin are doctors in literature.
Mortimer, by the way, goes to Devon as a rural priest-Watson reads the parishes that fall under his medical care, the figure of a doctor-what's in That Sawyer-she's in the 19th century. it is associated as something opposed to a priest, as a messenger of science – remember Mortimer's reasoning- Mortimer brings a superintelligence to Devon-almost a Holmes computing machine, not just to heal, but to fight prejudice.
Chapter 2 – and we remember "The Dog..." again, as a letter composed on 9/10 from a newspaper editorial.
The doctor asks Lady Mary – just like Holmes and Watson are trying to restore the portrait of Mortimer from an artifact left behind-his cane
-of course this is in itself a scientific method of reconstruction:
"Yes, you are a wizard, Dr. Hesselius!"
by Doyle, "the wizard", as I have already noticed, is called a genius in modern terms.
And yet there remains something like a magician-a reaction to Holmes' proof that the letter was compiled from a newspaper.
The description of the room in the third chapter-reminiscent of the description of Baskerville Hall-looked gloomy, the impression was almost painful, and even: however, my mood at that time was probably influenced by some side actors. I was gripped by a kind of special premonition
Next, instead of the manuscript, there is a folio in Latin, which is also about the supernatural.
And even something explaining to us about the legend of the hellhound-I read the pages and came to the place where it says that the evil spirit appears to the eyes of any creature not related to him, according to the law of correspondence, in the form of a ferocious and terrible beast-how not to remember the huge black dog that he turned into Dracula in the novel by Stoker and another doctor, Van Helsing.
"I may be a doctor and my nerves are hardened, but sometimes it happens that the expression on my face-this mirror of the soul-throws me off balance. Mr. Jennings's gaze haunted me; it so shocked my imagination that I had to abandon my previous plans for the evening and go to the opera to unwind.
A short gloomy alley of elms–I got off the omnibus too early: there were still two or three hundred steps to the house. A brick wall stretches along the footpath, behind the wall is a hedge of yew or other dark evergreen plant-it resembles the yew alley in Baskerville Hall
The sun had already set-they were also driving to the Hall at the end of the day
I am powerless to give you an idea of the horror that I experienced then... for several moments I could not take my eyes off the beast's eyes
I found a monkey-seized with horror and disgust-as if a real animal-one of the passengers absentmindedly forgot -but –wanting to explore how the animal is set up but not daring to use my hand for this, I gently poked it with an umbrella –the monkey did not move, but the umbrella passed through it–in the dark it is visible no worse than in the daytime, she is surrounded by a halo resembling a glow
You are giving the soul the place it deserves. If this is not a vision, but a reality... - We will discuss this in due course, and in great detail. I'll tell you what I think about it.
Just as, following the gentle touch of the lips, our food experiences the destructive power of the teeth… so the infernal machine grabs the tip of the finest nerve, it gradually absorbs the unfortunate mortal completely
I repeat again with absolute certainty: I would certainly have ensured that the inner eye, which Mr. Jennings unwittingly opened in himself, first clouded and then closed. In the case of delirium tremens, a similar pathological sensitivity is observed. His case, without a doubt, should be classified as difficult. The true cause of his death was nothing more than hereditary suicidomania."
"An old acquaintance"
Mr. Barton, the younger brother of a certain baronet–I'll call him Sir James Barton-was not distinguished by his love of luxury. He occupied an apartment, was immersed in himself, kept one horse and one servant .
Captain Barton made it a habit, after spending an evening in the company of the old lady and her beautiful pupil, to walk home alone.
The shortest route of such night walks ran along one rather long unfinished street-a deserted road-the moon was pouring misty light...
Steps
When Mr. Barton was thinking about it the next morning–rather critically-the servant put a letter on the table in an altered handwriting
: "Mr. Barton, former captain of the Dolphin, is warned of danger. He would be wise to avoid *** Street. If he does not stop walking there, then there will be trouble-let him remember this once and for all, because he should be afraid of the Observer."
What is the purpose of the author-to provide a service, and at the same time he declared himself to be someone who "should be feared". All together – the letter, its author, and the true goals of the latter-presented an unsolvable puzzle, moreover, in the most unpleasant way reminiscent of the events of the previous night.
There was still some doubt about the ghostly steps, but the letters were not an illusion
The announcement is a telegram there
"I'm being chased by a demon."
- Then tell me, dear sir, what kind of support do you expect from me
- There are some circumstances... I know that the creature that is following me is not a human being.
Incipient mental illness
General Montague: I will catch this ghost in no time, and even you will understand everything.
The General had no doubt that the being who appeared to his future son-in-law was in no way a figment of the imagination, but on the contrary, consisted of flesh and blood and was animated by a determination to pursue the unfortunate gentleman, intending to burn him out of the world.
A change of scene
Finally get rid of the horror-if about the legend, then Doyle, turning it into the basis of a story that became popular, saved Dartmoor from horror, making the Baskerville dog something like a scarecrow, which has a gloomy but romantic charm and attracts tourists, not fairy tale collectors or cryptozoologists
Are these events related or not. but whatever the explanation for the mysterious persecution, there is no doubt about one thing: what kind of forces are involved here, no one can find out until Doomsday."
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Irving
Irving's "Sleepy Hollow" resembles Gogol-maybe not even by chance, because Gogol and Irving knew Hoffman equally -and therefore this similarity is in the irony with which folk life and its superstitions are described.
But it is said about Brom Bones that he "sits in the saddle like a Tatar", his band is compared to ... the Don Cossacks:
"Sometimes his band, rushing past the farmhouses at midnight, made itself felt by shouting and whooping, reminiscent of the screams and whoops of the Don Cossacks."
And how the yard and farm of old Balt van Tassel are described in Gogol's way through the eyes of Ichabod Crane and the festive table at the village festival:
"His voracious imagination pictured every piglet running around the yard with nothing but a pudding in its belly and an apple in its grinning mouth; he placed pigeons comfortably at the bottom of a wonderful pie, covering them with a browned crispy crust on top; as for geese, they swam in their own fat, while ducks, resembling loving, just combined by marriage, the newlyweds, gently clinging to each other, lay on a platter, abundantly doused with onion juice (-but maybe this is a translation by Ananii Bobovich?)
The various charms of a real Dutch festive table (-how can you not remember Dutch painting), and besides -in the village, and besides -in the abundant autumn season. My God, what, what wasn't there! how many dishes with cakes of all kinds, indescribable varieties, known only to experienced Dutch housewives! There were famous walnut cakes, "oli koek" melting in the mouth, crumbly, delicate donuts crunching on the teeth; there were cupcakes made of sweet and puff pastry cupcakes, ginger cupcakes, honey cupcakes-the whole cupcake breed in general. there were also apple pies, peach pies, pumpkin pies, sliced ham and smoked beef; moreover, wonderful delicacies made of plum jam, peaches, pears and quinces, not to mention stewed fish and fried chicken, bowls with milk and cream..."
Nevertheless, it is more interesting for us to see the image of the rural district itself, in order to compare it with the description of Dartmoor, its villages of Coom Tracy, Grimpen, the cottages of the Frecklands and Stapletons:
"I mention this quiet and serene corner with all praise; in these little forgotten Dutch valleys scattered throughout the vast state of New York, neither the population, nor the manners, nor the customs undergo any changes. The great stream of migration and progress, which is constantly changing the face of other areas of our troubled country, passes completely unnoticed here... and although many years have passed since I wandered among the drowsy shadows of Sleepy Hollow, I still wonder if the same trees and the same families grow in its God-preserved bosom?"
And here is the characteristic of the old Balt van Tassel:
"It could serve as an exemplary portrait of a prosperous, self-satisfied, complacent farmer. His views and thoughts, however, did not fly too often beyond the fence of his estate, but within its boundaries everything was cozy, well-maintained and sound."
The figure of Ichabot himself somehow resembles Mortimer:
"He was a bizarre combination of cunning and simplicity. His passion for the supernatural and to digest all these indigestible things were truly amazing, and both of these properties strengthened in him as he stayed in this enchanted area" (-however, this is Mortimer, who remained a bachelor, it is difficult to imagine him crafty, a collector and a peddler of gossip).
The irony of the chivalric novels is the same:
"I think that in accordance with the rules of a truly romantic story, it would be quite appropriate to give some idea of the general appearance and decoration of both my hero and his steed.
The horse on which Ichabot rode was an old broken working nag..."
Mention of Don Quixote:
"Brom, not devoid of a kind of chivalry, was not averse to bringing the matter to an open clash and resolving the dispute about the lady of the heart in accordance with the custom of the most straightforward and non-wise thinkers-I mean the knights errant of bygone times.
Van Tassel watched the movements of a small wooden warrior armed with a pair of skewers–one in each hand-and bravely fighting the wind on the turret that crowned the grain barn."
Reading even in excerpts, quotations from this literature, we better understand the "Dog ...".
"There is no doubt, however, that this place continues to be under some kind of spell that has fascinated the minds of its inhabitants, who live for this reason in a world of continuous daydreams. They adore all kinds of beliefs, are subject to ecstatic states and visions; unusual ghosts often hover before them, they hear some kind of music and voices. The whole area is replete with local legends, "unclean" places, dark superstitions; fiery meteors and shooting stars blaze over the hollow more often than anywhere else; there is, as it seems, a Nightmare with all its vile offspring.
The main spirit among those who visit this enchanted corner-he is also, apparently, the commander-in-chief of the entire host of air forces-a certain Headless Horseman. It is said that this is the shadow of a Hessian cavalryman, whose head was torn off by a cannonball in some nameless battle of the Revolutionary war and who from time to time, as if on the wings of the wind, sweeps through the darkness of the night in front of the locals. He is seen, however, not only in the valley, but sometimes on the surrounding roads, especially near the nearby church. Indeed, one of the most trustworthy historians of this region-he carefully collected and collated the confusing stories about the ghost rider-claims that the body of the cavalryman is buried inside the church fence, and his spirit prowls the battlefield at night in search of a severed head..."
"Lokis "– a bear wedding (the reverse of the plot "beauty and the Monster"), a novel by Merime of the 1860s, filmed in Poland, France, and Belarus.
The motif of the "wild hunt".
In Sleepy Hollow, there is a headless horseman, a ghost rider, as in the novel of the same name by Mayne Reed.
From the novel Merime:
"I am taking you to the forest, where the animal kingdom is now in full bloom, to the motherhouse, the great womb, the great crucible of life. According to our folk legends, no one has yet explored its depths, no one could penetrate into the core of these forests and swamps, except, of course, the gentlemen poets and sorcerers, who have no barriers. There's a republic of beasts or a constitutional monarchy-I can't say which. Lions, bears, moose, bison – all these animals live peacefully together. The mammoth preserved there enjoys special respect. It seems that he is the chairman of the Sejm (-the obscurity of these depths is emphasized, Doyle's motives about the "Lost World" are curious again, in the USSR "Sannikov Land" -when geographical discoveries seemed to have reached the limits of reality, my comment). They have the strictest police supervision, and if anyone gets offended, they are tried and exiled. The guilty animal then falls out of the fire and into the flames. It is forced to flee to human areas. And not many people can stand it.
- An interesting tale…
We began to go deeper into the thicket. Soon the narrow path we were following disappeared. Every minute we had to go around huge trees, the low branches of which blocked our path. Some of them, withered from old age, fell to the ground, forming like a rampart with barbed barriers, which it was not possible to cross. In places we came across deep swamps covered with water lilies and duckweed. Further on, there were lawns where the grass sparkled like an emerald. But woe to anyone who would set foot on them: their rich and deceptive vegetation usually covers the swamps, ready to swallow both horse and rider forever. Because of the difficult road, we had to interrupt the conversation. I tried my best to keep up with the count and wondered with what unerring accuracy, without a compass, he kept the right direction, which should have been followed to get to kapas.
Finally we saw a hill in the middle of a vast clearing. It was quite high, surrounded by a moat, which could still be clearly distinguished, despite the bushes and landslides. Apparently, excavations have already been carried out here. At the top, I noticed the remains of a stone structure; some of the stones were burned..."
In the story of Merime (early 19th century), there is supposedly ancient evidence of the vision of the Swedish King Charles the Eleventh, it is especially noteworthy how the recording ended: "And if what I have stated here is not the true truth, I renounce the hope of a better life beyond the grave, which I may have earned by some good deeds, especially by zealous work for the benefit of my people and the protection of the faith of my ancestors." There is no particular difference in the fact that in the story "The Vision of Charles the Eleventh" the entry is authored by the king, and in the novel by Doyle Baronet, there is no voice of the landowner and executor, the desire to warn or edify subjects (or descendants). Of course, the story was known to Doyle (as a man equally interested in spiritualism and literature).
The main conflict for all romanticism-the discord between dream and reality, poetry and truth - acquires a hopeless, tragic character in Hoffmann
. 86
"good people" - satisfied with their existence, they obediently fulfill their meaningless role and in their complacency and spiritual poverty they do not see the fatal secrets hiding behind the scenes. They are happy, but this happiness is false, because it was bought at a high price of self-denial, voluntary renunciation of everything truly human, and above all of freedom and beauty
"true musicians" are romantic dreamers, people not of this world. They look at life with horror and disgust, striving to escape from it into the ideal world created by their imagination. They are happy in their own way, but their happiness is imaginary, because their fictional romantic kingdom is a phantom
p.87-88
They are condemned to oscillate between two worlds-the illusory and the real. The fatal duality is reflected in their soul, bringing into it a bifurcation of consciousness
p.88
However, unlike the stupid "good man", the romantic supposedly has a "sixth sense" that reveals to him not only the terrible mystery of life, but also the joyful symphony of nature, its poetry, "the sacred harmony of all beings, which is its deepest secret." Art is called to express this poetic spirit of nature
p.88
In the fairy tale, Hoffman saw the main type of romantic literature. If Novalis's fairy tale turned into a continuous allegory, then in Hoffmann's fairy tales the basis on which the fantastic grows is real reality.
pp.97-98
G. tries to comprehend his creative manner in the essay "Jacques Kahlo" pointing to the grotesque engravings of this French painter of the 17th century. as an example
, p.98
, Images taken from everyday life, passing through the artist's consciousness, through his inner romantic world, turn into a real-fantastic
p.98
He takes the hero from life, trying to portray him with such individual features so that at first glance one can recognize in him an official, a student, himself, on the other hand, only a romantic poet "is able to merge the wonderful phenomena of the spiritual world with life, intertwine the fantastic with the phenomena of everyday life and throw a strange magic cap on such serious people, as advisers, archivists and students, forcing them, like evil spirits, to romp in broad daylight through the noisy streets of a familiar city to the laughter of respectable neighbors."
p.99
But living in dreams is only a temporary stay in fantasy, and a return to real life is inevitable-the motive for solving, exposing, breaking the veil of mystery
P.99
Everything fatally returns to its original basis. p.99 – as well as the mirroring of the legend and the finale of the novel
"a tale from the new times" -this is how G. defined his works
P.99
Shifting the high romantic plan to a low, everyday one –shoes against the background of a legend, and a shoe in the final in a quagmire -"G. thereby destroys it, but does not remove it –laughing at the heroes and readers, the author laughs at himself, -freedom turns out to be the freedom of poetic consciousness, and happiness is the happiness of an illusory escape into the world romance and adventure"
p. 103
All the romantic heroes of G. are double-minded, suffering from "chronic dualism", spiritual duality.- but not by complex dramatic inconsistency, -in each of them there live two souls constantly at war with each other: earthly and heavenly, prosaic and poetic.
p.104
Two streams of fiction by G.-"The Nutcracker", with others.Sides –fiction of "nightmares and horrors"
p.104
Borrowed from folk fairy-tale literature
P.104
G.'s appeal to gloomy fiction, which repeatedly plunged him into the sphere of the irrational – spiritualism - was not just a tribute to one of the fashionable and unhealthy addictions of Romanticism, just as this "fashion" itself did not arise only from the concession of writers to the public's interest in mysterious and scary stories
.105
Expression
The novel by G. "The Elixir of Satan" represents the kind of novel that developed in England in the middle of the 18th century and is known as the "Gothic"
p.107
-gloomy romance: monasteries, castles, ghosts
Heine: "they say a student in G;ttingen went crazy from this novel"
p. 108
But if G. in the novel "The Elixir of Satan", where a terrible epic takes place against the background of real life in Germany, K.18v. uses this material with all the skill of a satirist to show the spiritual squalor and inhumanity of the nobility, the lies and hypocrisy of the Catholic Church, then in Doyle's novel there is no
p.109
He tries to neutralize the impression of the mystical either by dissonant ironic accompaniment ("have you ever heard a drink scream?"), or by the psychological state of the hero, or by natural circumstances
Pp.109-110
In "The Entail" Hoffman introduces us to an old, neglected noble castle, into the world of ghosts, sleepwalkers, delusions that appear in the darkness of the night under the wild howl of the wind and the roar of the sea. But this is only a traditional romantic veil, behind which a truly terrible fratricidal war is unfolding between representatives of one noble family-as in the novel
p.113
"Mademoiselle de Scudery" (1818) is the earliest example of the crime genre in world literature. G. was the first to address the criminal topic
P.114
The connection of this work with folk art is obvious. It is found not only in the writer's use of narrative techniques, but also the main thing, taken from folklore, the spirit of cheerfulness and cheerful faith in the triumph of goodness and truth, which permeate the fairy tale of G. ("Baby Tsakhes")
p. 124
Referring to the past, G., by no means calls for its revival. He speaks of the past with elegiac sadness
p. 129
That is, literally, the analysis of Hoffmann's work approaches the analyzed work, and everywhere the words about a folklore fairy tale sound like a refrain. But "a tale of new times". Although, according to the researcher, Hoffman was the first to turn to the detective genre, the primacy is still disputed by Poe, Collins, but Doyle and Christie are undoubtedly called the founders of the new genre.
Edgar Allan Poe
"The fall of the House of Usher"
"Perhaps, I thought, it is only necessary to look at the same features of the surrounding landscape from a different angle, at the details of the same picture, and the depressing impression will soften or even disappear completely"
"This is the curse of their family, he said, the hereditary disease of all Ushers"
"Murders on the Rue Morgue"
"- Auguste Dupin is a special gift of thinking, analytical."
"I was living in Paris at that time with very special interests and, feeling that the company of such a person was an invaluable find for me, I was not slow to admit it to him. Soon we decided to live together for the duration of my stay in Paris; and since my circumstances were a little better than Dupin's, with his consent I rented and furnished, in the spirit of romantic melancholy so dear to both of us, a house of quaint architecture badly damaged by time in a secluded corner of the Faubourg Saint-Germain."
- the case of the "stereotomy"- like a cane and a coffee pot
"One evening we were walking along an unusually long dirty street in the vicinity of the Palais Royal. Everyone seemed to be thinking about their own things, and for a quarter of an hour none of us said a word. When suddenly Dupin, as if casually, said:
- Where does he go, such a starving man! It would be better if he tried his luck at the Variety Theater.
"That's right," I replied mechanically.
I was so lost in thought that it took me a moment to realize how well Dupin's words coincided with my thoughts. But I immediately came to my senses, and my surprise knew no bounds.
"Dupin," I said seriously, "this is beyond me. To tell you the truth, I'm amazed, I just can't believe my ears. How did you guess what I was thinking about..." I stopped here to make sure he knew exactly who I was thinking about.
"...about Chantilly," he finished. – Why did you hesitate? You told yourself that with his puny build, he had nothing to meddle with tragedies.
Yes, that was the subject of my thoughts....
-Explain to me, for God's sake, your method..."
- he calls it inductive: inference from a fact to its cause (-actually, this is a scientific method of causation)
When Doyle is accused of almost plagiarism, it is as if they forget that he did not necessarily invent the deductive method, this is how he already called his method of reasoning in establishing the identity of the patient, the diagnosis of Doyle's teacher, the prototype of Holmes, Bell
Kuprin's review of Doyle's short stories about Holmes is generally surprising: how such a writer with literary taste and talent did not see the difference between Poe's short stories and even Doyle's short stories, Poe's style does not go beyond the journalistic, even within the journalistic it is dry, too superficial, and even unlike Doyle it is simply teeming with absurdities, not just inaccuracies and the only thing that distinguishes it from the reports is that it is just a place of events, the characters are essentially occupied by a verbose description of feelings, mostly disturbing, frightening, depressive, and in this it is noticeable that the poet is more, than a journalist in his novels, the entertainment in them is so inventively artificial that it is difficult to take for real, while Doyle's novels just make you believe what is happening, and finally, there is no Baker Street in the United States, where there would be an Auguste Dupin Museum.
Although Poe's influence on Doyle is huge: from the novel about the orangutan, there is a thread to the Hollywood blockbusters about King Kong in the 20th century.
But in Doyle's assessment, and not according to Kuprin, he turned out to be less prescient than his admirers, because, according to Doyle, he received most of the letters from Russia. However, Poe himself, like Doyle later, was surprised that readers were amazed at unraveling the essence of what the writer himself had made up his mind when inventing the novel.
""Dupin," I exclaimed, completely discouraged, "this is more than a strange hair-it does not belong to a person!"-"footprints? male or female? - These were the tracks of a giant dog!"
"The Mystery of Marie Roger" (Supplement to "Murders in the Rue Morgue")
- in them, the victims are a widow who rents out rooms and an unmarried daughter
. "Few, even the most reasonable person, has not sometimes happened to almost believe in the supernatural with vague excitement, faced with a coincidence so striking that the mind refuses to recognize it as just a game of chance."
Detective as a genre, Collins convinces us of this, not necessarily the investigation of a crime as such, but always a riddle, a puzzle, which are also beloved by folklore.
If a person who loves to read is briefly initiated into the mystery of the novel "The Woman in White", then I think he will take it, although not without fear, but he will not be able not to take up reading 700 pages of the novel. Which, due to the constant reminder of riddles to the reader, is easy to read.
The whole plot (as any detective can) it is built by Doyle (as has been pointed out more than once) in accordance with the principle of plotting the stories of Poe, although it is usually said about the story "Murder on Morgue Street", but no less important in the "Lost Letter": the unobvious evidence-Stapleton the killer is always in sight of his victims, the dog is not a ghost, but a real one of course it is real. You can even specify the details of the story: tobacco smoke, guessing the manuscript in the plot of the story and the description of the letter in the story, ridiculing the prefect of the Paris police, talking about the amount promised for the letter (and the amount of inheritance in the story), even an episode not included, but mentioned in the biography with the attempted murder of Sir Henry immediately upon arrival in London, an entry left in a new email.
Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment and Dreiser's American Tragedy are examples of novels centered on a criminal and a crime, but these are not detective stories. The focus of the detectives is not the criminal, not the crime, not the nature of the crimes, but the figure of the detective, the methods of investigation.
But is this particular novel a detective, it is no coincidence that it stands apart in the Holmes cycle and in Doyle's entire work
The novel is not a classic detective
story "The Entail" by Hoffman
"The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" by Irving
"The Phantom of the Opera"Leroux
"The Canterville Ghost" by Wilde
"Northanger Abbey" by Austin
But the novel is not the classic horror novel
"Dracula" by Stoker
Not a social drama, even in the style of Dickens's novels
"The Cherry Orchard",
Where we are not talking about the whole stratum-the impoverishment of the nobility, for example, but the families
of the "Buddenbrokes"
"The Saga of the Forsytes"
Melodramatism in the novel certainly does not reach the level of, for example, "Northanger Abbey"
. Paradoxically, there are many similarities with the "Bronze Bird", more than with "Dracula", "The Canterville Ghost" or "Northanger Abbey", but "The Bronze Bird" is a work for young people, part of Soviet ideologized (socialist realism, partisanship) literature
It is possible to give such a definition:
This is an adventure, detective novel with techniques borrowed from the Gothic novel, the plot is based on English folklore (which is more typical for horror novels, but not at all typical for a classic detective story)
And yet this is not a horror novel, where there is a mystery, and it remains a mystery (although part of the legend does not even receive any development-the legendary dog remains a legendary dog, for Holmes the fairy tale remains a fairy tale-folklore)
In the detective there is a mystery, which, unlike the mystery, gets a solution.
And of course, in the novel, the detective part occupies the main place, completely in the scheme that Shklovsky found for Doyle's short stories about Holmes (nevertheless, with the peculiarity that usually the part that is only associated with Watson's false assumptions is generally the basis in the novel, and in the plot the mystery is more inherent in the Gothic novel).
It can be assumed that Doyle introduced a fashionable novel of "black fiction" into his "Holmsian" novel, and what we know is that Holmes appeared in the novel unexpectedly, in the course of working on his idea in collaboration with Robinson, and that it is based on English folklore, and that the novel has romantic characters and a romantic the story in its original sense, so to speak, is a love story (and in this sense, as in exposing the mystical story in the novel, the book is rather from a series of literature called post–Victorian, Edwardian, neo–Romantic) that Holmes in the novel is by no means the main character, all this allows us to assert that this is not an ordinary novel from the cycle about the great detective. Rather, it is a novel by Doyle from a series of Victorian "horror novels", in which he introduced Holmes as one of the characters. We do not know anything about such studies, but we can only assume that Doyle's authorship in the novel is precisely in the detective line with the detective, and all the rest is joint work, while by Doyle's own admission, the legend in the novel and the legend as the source of the novel belong to Robinson in general, while the literary processing here could belong to Doyle, although Robinson himself was a writer, a creative person, artistically gifted, and his other novels are known to be co-authored, as well as Doyle.
The translation (traditional) and Maslennikov's film adaptation made the characters of the novel respectable. But this book also belongs chronologically to the 19th century, it is flavored with the horrors and irony inherent in classical literature of the 19th century and its characters are much more similar to the characters of Gogol, Dickens, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Balzac, Hugo, Dostoevsky and Stevenson. Grotesque, caricature, human features reaching Rabelaisian or Dante vices, but in a domestic setting, even if an ancient manor and mystery, but quite ordinary for that era. The characters of the screen version play as if it were Turgenev-a realistic, even journalistic, melodramatic social novel, Tolstoy, Goncharov, Chekhov. It seems to me that in this regard, the heroes of the Bronte sisters - that the gypsy from "Wuthering Heights", that the landowner disfigured by fire from "Jay Air" are underestimated. People and writers of that time were looking for signs of vices, the stamp of character on the face, in the entire appearance of a person. Hence racism and Lambroso's theory. And literature has not yet been able to convey the movements of the soul by other techniques than landscape sketches, costume features, and everyday sketches.
Speaking generally about the era, it is also possible here that horror novels are expressionism, detective stories in Western literary studies were originally called sensational novels. In expressionism, you can see the whole range of contacts with other genres, as in painting: almost realism, more romanticism, impressionism, and abstractionism, like Lovecraft's.
The definition of a Victorian novel is also not entirely accurate, because there is not much difference between Hoffmann (Germany), Leroux (France), Irving (USA) and Stevenson, Wells, Doyle. First of all, one should not see regional boundaries here, but on the contrary, uniting in a separate epoch in the cultural history of Europe and America.
The Stapleton couple is certainly another of the many variations on the theme of Beauty and the Beast. But what is curious is Stapleton, catching butterflies and moths, wandering through the swamps with a net, interested in botany, this is such a symbiosis of the Gray Wolf and Little Red Riding Hood at the same time, especially since he is not a Gray Wolf himself, reincarnating into her grandmother, but buying and keeping in the center of the Grimpen quagmire a genuine Gray Wolf-the dog of the Baskervilles, more precisely, a dog, with which he imitates a dog from an ancient legend. In the role of an unhappy, but fabulously rich, not waiting for a granddaughter with pies, grandmother Sir Charles, and in the role of a genuine Beanie, who is warned of the danger of settling in the family estate-Sir Henry. It unites a fairy tale, variants of which are found in all major European nations, and the novel is the motive of initiation. Sir Henry, in order to truly become a baronet, inherit the manor, title and capital, must pass the test, which he heard something about as a child. There are other parallels: Prince charming Sir Henry, an innocent child-he is young, differs only in favorable reviews, is fearless-a noble knight, of course, cannot help but fall in love with a Beautiful Woman whom the Monster deceived into his nets, and he must of course release her, and then marry (true, the sister turns into a wife, which somewhat confuses the cards). And in the role of assistants to the Cap or the Knight – against the Monster, or the Wolf, his faithful hounds, detectives, bloodhounds, detectives-Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson (although the owner himself must act as bait). There is even a Cinderella motif: a farmer from Canada, pure of soul, suddenly turns into an English baronet, a millionaire. There are even shoes of their own: shoes that someone steals in the very first chapters… But that's not all: the main character must go on a journey (first from Canada to London, then from London to Devonshire) full of dangers and adventures, deal with monsters, ghosts and criminals in the swamp of Dartmoor and find his love. There is also the enmity of the families of two loving ones: the motive of Romeo and Juliet is Stapleton's sister, who turned out to be a criminal, turns out to be his wife, but even being an accomplice, she knows everything and seeks to warn the main character, whom she also falls in love with, here she is Ariadne, who holds a ball in her hands, and passes the thread from him to her Theseus, descending into the Maze-swamps of Dartmoor, where the monster lives: a real symbiotic monster-Stapleton and his huge dog, masquerading as a family ghost. And, of course, masks: all the main characters wear masks because they are either hiding or pretending not to be who they really are. And, as in a real ancient tragedy, the god from the car-appearing instead of a strange stranger in the swamps, Holmes, to tear off all masks, help the hero accomplish the feat, and punish the true villain. And at the same time, unwittingly read a moral about the need to preserve family ties. Or not to fall into the extreme of greed, seduction by gold. Or do not forget your small homeland. Do not chase happiness in foreign lands. Or the motive of the prodigal son. Or the purification of the family from an ancient curse, in which modern means help it: the telegraph, the railway, and so on, and most importantly – the deductive method. As you can see, even a schematically small novel, clearly intended for popular reading, reproduces many well-known subjects from folklore to literary traditions since antiquity. Along the way, of course, English irony is added to it (and of course, the pair of Holmes and Watson is a variation of Don Quixote and Sancho Panso, which in turn are a parody of the heroes of medieval chivalric novels), wordplay (hunting and dog lexicons, quotes from classics), sitcom, heroes often get to the wrong place, they are confused, so Sir Henry and Watson decided that Barrymore is the main villain and conspirator, however, this is not always a comedy, Stapleton and the dog are also mistaken when Selden becomes their victim, and if this is an English novel, then you must constantly exercise the ability to curb your temper, their feelings, even to hide them-and in the novel a duel takes place just in circumstances when Holmes is convinced that Stapleton is the criminal, and Stapleton reveals that it was not Sir Henry who was killed, but an escaped convict, and both strive not to give themselves away, besides manners, etiquette, which is important to observe even if you live No one sees you in the swamp either: Miss Stapleton is sporting an outfit as if she were in London at some party. All this explains why this is an English novel, why it has become popular, why the popularity of this English novel has gone far beyond England and its time. In any culture that has at least some relation to European, Christian, this story is always recognizable. And there is nothing better than meeting a pleasant acquaintance (for many of the fairy tales, folklore and myths, this is familiar literally from childhood) where it would seem he did not think (an English detective of the early 20th century or for contemporaries and compatriots-another story in a tabloid magazine about detective Holmes, made in general according to the patterns of stories about Holmes by Doyle, which he himself then discovered in his article, but this story, where Holmes is not the main one the hero, and he was not in the original plan, still differs from everyone else in popularity and fame) to see him. Or, which is also not difficult to notice: Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, we know in the literary treatment of the romantics of the 18th and early 19th centuries, that is, we are dealing with the literature of romanticism and neo-romanticism, which has long become literature for reading by young people in our time, in the most romantic time, or with the advent of cinema and TV– for real, the plots of films for family viewing (which, by the way, probably require no more translation than an illustrated children's book). This is the literature of romanticism, even if it is the tradition of "horror novels". In this regard, the detective phenomenon itself looks different, paradoxically responding to the conditions of modern times -the displacement of religious thinking, the role of religion and the church in public life, scientization, and generally less cruelty of society, this is a reminiscence of the same medieval chivalric novel, where knights defend justice not with sword and cross, but with intelligence and new They are not warriors, but police officers or private detectives, and the enemies are not other armies, but criminals. But the heroes still defend justice, and serve for the benefit of society. Their work certainly not only in literature involves the same risk that attracts the reader's attention to notes like Watson about Holmes. And, ultimately, if you look even more broadly, this is still the same function, socially useful, of this kind of literature, if even more so it has a high artistry, which enhances the impact on the reader and corresponds to the author's skill, as well as the epic, the fairy tale, as history, and law, and the state, to convince, to spread the sociality of a person, what distinguishes him from the rest of the diversity of life, useful sociality: good conquers evil. This is so, even if we study only the language of the novel, because language is a symbolic record of speech, and speech is nothing more than a means of communication. If it is a work of foreign literature, then hence the whole meaning of the art of translation. And if the translator constantly works to improve his culture, knows the history and history of literature, then he will be able to better guess eternal plots, archetypes in the process of working on a new work, which will increase the artistry of his translations, because he will inevitably process, enriching or bringing closer to understanding for an audience brought up in their own culture, not only without moving away, but also approaching greater authenticity with original ideas and text.
Elements of a pact with the devil-a widespread cultural motif
In the legend, Hugo is a robber, blasphemes when he finds out that the captive has escaped-he calls the devil-the motive of an oral contract, the consequence of which could be the appearance of a monster, and the curse of the genus
The condition of the deal could be the desire to gain wealth (or youth-as in Stevenson's novel, i.e. folklore plots with the development of romantic literature acquire the features of literary works in accordance with the subjective interpretation of the author, the level of development of society, etc.)-and Stapleton could be a participant in such a deal
The consequence could also be recklessness-Stapleton's obsession is not just calculation, but an obsession in resurrecting a legend-this is mentioned several times in connection with his genius, the novel says
The stories of such a deal could have a comic effect-the devil or his messenger could be deceived, for example in Gogol's story
Then, as part of this cultural motive-such a transaction can leave a mark, a trace by which you can find out about it-Holmes, as is known and only he, recognizes the features of Stapleton in Hugo's portrait, which for him, and subsequently for others, serves as indisputable proof that Stapleton is Baskerville himself
Stevenson's novel has parallels with Hoffmann's "Elixir of Satan", and with Stevenson Wilde's novel "Portrait of Dorian Gray" (and in Wyald's novel there is Sir Henry among the main characters)-where the motive is simply not wealth, or power, or secret knowledge, or love, but youth and, with the novel then popular "The Sorrow of Satan" by Corelli, translated and published in Russian, where the main character is allegedly inherited a huge amount of money-no comments
There are many variants and literary ones, including the legend of Dr. Faust-there are two doctors in the novel: Watson and Mortimer
Then, in Lewis's novel "The Monk", part of the plot revolves around the incestuous relationship of a brother with a sister -a monk who first entered into a relationship with Satan, who entered the monastery under the guise of a monk who actually turned out to be a woman, then helps the monk rape and kill a girl who turns out to be his sister-Stapleton passes off his wife as a sister and exposure his belief in this becomes part of the final conviction that he is a criminal –evidence of Lyons (the talking name is lioness, in the novel about the dog it is said that it is the size of a young lioness)
Hoffmann's novella "The Entail" of 1817: the castle of certain barons, which has fallen into disrepair, in order to save it from destruction, its owner declares a entail, i.e. the transfer of it by inheritance only to the eldest in the family-this may be the reason that the Baskervilles brothers dispersed all over the world, although in this case there should have been another elder before Sir Charles -but after the tragic death of the baron, his sons quarreled over the castle, which eventually goes to the grandson, he shuns the castle, and the investigation conducted at his request makes it possible to convict his butler's grandfather of the death, Barrymore, and this discovery became possible because of the butler's somnambulism, Barrymore is also suspected in the novel because he inexplicably walks around the manor at night
Then there turns out to be another owner of the castle-an unexpected son from a secret marriage-as they say without comment
Doyle's family had Irish roots, so the Irish writer Sheridan le Fanu in the novel "Carmilla" the main bearer of evil is an irresistible, femme fatale, as if this is not in Doyle's novel, however, there is a hint: as a false trail, the same as the story with the Barrymores, Miss (called sister in the novel) Stapleton is a woman from the colonies, a brunette, of unprecedented beauty, whom Sir Henry immediately falls in love with, she is the author of a note in London, drawn up with nail scissors, she is frightened and tells Watson, mistaking him for a baronet, to leave Dartmoor
The Irish Legend of the Headless Horseman-and Washington's short story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and Mayne Reed's novel "The Headless Horseman".
Curiously, in the real Sleepy Hollow there is the village of Tarrytown with the Lyndhurst estate (with two towers) of Jay Gould, the American millionaire railroad king, about whom the press wrote a lot: in particular, about Gould's scam in 1869, when he intended to raise grain prices by buying gold, and therefore the prices for its transportation that is, railway tariffs (roman mentions at the very beginning a warning in the Times about tariffs, although of course in 1869. Doyle was not there yet, but interestingly, Doyle was interested in the topic of the Napoleonic Wars, and the press called this Gould scam Gould's "Napoleonic plan"), and he was a baron, and now his name is associated with the most unscrupulous businessman in history, who more than once found himself on the verge of bankruptcy, but left an inheritance of tens of millions dollars.
By the way, again about the amount of inheritance, as is known today by inflation, the concept of a millionaire may not mean anything yet: 700 thousand pounds in the 1890s of the Baskervilles - how much is that? In the 1840s, by decision of the Queen and Parliament, awarding the inventor of the postage stamp with 20 thousand pounds was presented as a high reward.
"Castle in the Carpathians" by Jules Verne himself.
"Dracula" by Stoker-which consists of letters (in the novel there are chapters of Watson's letters) and entries from the diary of the main character (in the novel there is a chapter -entries from the diary), and at the beginning of the story a deal with British real estate (in the novel the inheritance of Baskerville Hall).
Gogol's "Portrait" is a story where money represents evil (in the novel, in principle, about this-Stapleton is obsessed with wealth, money in general, as Holmes then becomes known, and Sir Henry, having inherited, finds himself involved in this story with the family curse of the Baskervilles- by the way, so far it turns out he led the life of an American farmer, his the curse did not apply).
Is Stoker's novel a fairy tale, even if it is dark and creepy? Is Kiplin's book about Mowgli a fairy tale? In a strict sense, it is paradoxical to what I wrote earlier, but in the form that is known in the folklore of different peoples, and the fairy tale as a folklore form is very schematic, of course not. This is a fairy tale, but a "tale of a new time."
The culturologist Kobrin finds in the novel a reflection of the epoch and culture of modernity. The question of whether Soviet Art Nouveau was debatable, this is what is ahead, but Kobrin finds the relationship of the novel with Maslennikov's film adaptation much greater than just a novel and a film adaptation. It is curious about everything else from Soviet literature, really adventurous, borrowing plots and techniques of the neo-Romantics of the 19th century, for example, a Soviet novel, one title is "The Heir from Calcutta". By the way, Doyle's novel could be called "The Heir from Canada" without prejudice to the meaning. And yet, as I have already shown, the novel reflects little of the "historical reality" of modernity, and the Soviet film adaptation therefore has so much in common culturally with the industrial society of the USSR that it is a Soviet film adaptation. And, nevertheless, the novel's connections with modernity are much deeper, which is still to be discussed in more detail: in the very composition of the novel - narrative, the method of the investigative historian demonstrated by Holmes, historical narratives and science also only developed in the 19th century, along with European novels, and even in samples of the culture of behavior of Holmes and the characters of the novel. But this speech is even more detailed ahead. This is so to say about the future, the new, but for now about the past, historical, folklore and literary traditions. It is difficult to get rid of the parallels with the Soviet adventure and literature, which is also developing against the background of industrialization, the spread of literacy in society.
So far, the novel is an example of romantic prose. Where a contradictory personality appears in romanticism, a hero with strong feelings next to him - Hamlet, Onegin, Pechorin, there are robbers, and not necessarily even noble ones, as in Dubrovsky, in the Hero of our time just the opposite, and of course, there is a mystery.
But, let's agree that Soviet adventure literature was not mainstream, and since the 19th century, English and not only English literature has been influenced by such a magnitude as Dickens.
Wilson Agnus. The World of Charles Dickens. –M., 1975.
- English philologist and writer
The eternal disputes where some give precedence to Dickens, the humorist, others (now so numerous) to the master of horrors
p.28
The only one of all Victorian writers stepped over a century
p.31
Maternal grandfather, Charles Barrow, the cashier, forged his reports for 9 years. Embezzled 6,000 pounds. This scandalous discovery occurred 2 years before the birth of Charles, the grandson. Fearing prosecution, he fled abroad
p.35
In Victorian England (and, accordingly, in literature) people who were threatened with prosecution for any criminal prosecution or bankruptcy, and even those who committed crimes against morality fled abroad
p.36
-why Roger Baskerville ended up abroad
Children's books: "Mother Bunch", a popular collection ... most of the stories belonged to the scary
ones p.40
His first novels grew out of reporter's notes and went through a picaresque novel and a novel of the high road
Dickens the Storyteller
P.42
- we imagine these genres as if they were abruptly changing, in fact, the techniques of both could be intertwined for a long time
The work of most real novelists is rooted in the world of fairy tales
At the same time, D. took care that everything that happened in his books was believable, as evidenced by many of his letters to his friend John Forster, with whom he discussed the plots in detail. He tried to convince the reader
with his story.43
-D. is a realist, does Doyle deviate from this or not at all?
In D.'s novels, murder plays a large, almost ritualistic role
. p.45
-drama sometimes slipping into melodrama
- on Charing Cross-business street - there was a Warren wax factory, a small enterprise that left a mark only in world literature by the fact that little Dickens worked in it
The increased interest in the criminal world is associated with the precarious position of his family-through appraisers, loan sharks and junk dealers
P.99
- the journalist's characteristic indifference to people's social problems
- how does the Victorian differ from the Dickensian
-D. published novels in weekly magazines
And it is clear that they are of a magazine nature
-homeless people under Waterloo Bridge, unhappy childhood, prisons with those sentenced to execution
At that time, the artistic world was much closer to journalism and much further from the university public, from the scientific world, from serious philosophical thought... that's why D. did not come into contact with many of those who, according to our current ideas, formed the center of thought
.138
-Devonshire is a rural idyll
The indifferent human crowd simply does not notice the world of criminals until the cry is heard: murder
p.141
Throughout his life, D. argued that crime is the fruit of the appalling poverty and ignorance of Victorian society
P.141
But he did not try to evoke compassion for criminals.
P.141
A pop novel: The general public has a need to sympathize with the oppressed, but there is no time to understand what oppression leads to. Readers want to feel sorry for Oliver Twist, so he cannot be a real being, because the real Oliver would turn into a depraved and calloused Feigin, disgusting to us
p. 143
And yet, when the time comes to poison the gang, the reader wants to participate in the persecution; deep down, he does not mind joining the exploits of the gang
. p.143
The fashionable "Newgate novel" is a genre of the 30-40s about criminals (Bulwer-Leeton). D. tried to avoid romantically embellishing criminals
P.144
-Doyle's relationship to Stapleton? Does he like something? It is pointless to speculate whether he condemns
the ideals of antiquity, the savage or the noble robber, Robin Hood
-the intimacy of the work is usually associated with stability , family solitude-seclusion in the life of the author himself in order to create
The highest achievement of Victorian ethics is an exaggerated sense of conscience, but it is precisely this scrupulousness and concern for the little things and everyday life that easily turn conscientiousness into a parody of oneself. Mr Pecksniff lives happily in a world where scrupulousness passes for truth, and reading a capital plowshare for genuine morality.
-it looks like late neo-Stalinism
p.183
-Tractarianism
-the fascination with antiquity also brings us closer to the late USSR, the appearance of collecting icons, coins, monument protection societies, and a passion for folk art
The railway is a symbol in the novel. For a native of the past, the railway for him is the personification of destruction, he should also be afraid, like the inhabitants of the houses, that they turned out to be an obstacle on the way of the new line
p.215
- if they were tested with laughter and pity, then they would be living characters
Masterpieces of all time "David Copperfield", "War and Peace", "In search of lost time"
p.220
He did not distrust reason-he only condemned its monstrous or absurd use. The essay "A night scene in London" - horrors should be preserved for the sake of order in the political economy: "I do not wish for a moment to discredit the reasonable that exists in this most necessary of sciences, but at the same time I resolutely and with disgust reject the insane conclusions that are sometimes drawn from this science. And I turn my words to those who cherish the spirit of the New Testament, to those who take such assessments to heart."
p.228
- journalistically sensitive responsiveness to the malice of the day
"Meanwhile, every day, new manifestations of English servility, English sycophancy and other features of our disgusting snobbery"
- is there in the novel
p.247
The late Victorian era-ordinary vulgarity puts on a smart look, and money loses its value and is feverishly
squandered p.285
The ironic style of D.
- a dog as a symbol of inheritance, a symbol of money
- life was more intimate, personal, we distinguish this personal tone in the novel, where the images are compressed to a circle of people -and what if there were broad social canvases
Restraining his optimism and humanism, confusing faith, evil was inextricably linked with violence
p.293
"A notorious repeat offender can always be locked up for three months. When he gets out of prison, he'll be just as notorious a repeat offender. So, we need to put him back in jail. "God have mercy," the Society for the Protection of Offended Hooligans will cry, "it's like sentencing him to life imprisonment." That's what I stand for....when I see how he shames women walking out of church on Sunday evening, I think it's not enough to skin him for it..."
pp.293-294
D. is convinced that it is necessary to help the police, and private detectives who are professionals and will bring the matter to an end: "otherwise we will face the fate of the Far West and the butcher's knife"
p.294
1865-the brutal suppression of the uprising in Jamaica. Some were outraged by this. D., Carlyle, Ruskin – came out in his defense. - some assessments sound almost racist today
P.295
"The other day there was a rally of donkeys who condemned the governor of Jamaica for suppressing the uprising! So, we worry about New Zealanders and Hottentots, as if they are the same as the clean-shirted residents of Camberwell, and they can be tamed with pen and ink."
p.295
The Queen did not show curiosity about D.'s novels-unlike Doyle
's short stories, p.297
-was Sir Charles killed, and if so, by whom? – does the description of the novel come down to this
- murder (or mystery) plays a subordinate role in the novel, then what is the main idea? And is she in the novel?
- the social aspect, the historical one? But England is reduced to the size of a rural district, the population is represented by several persons
- there is no ancient aristocratic family there
A private investigator is one of those people whose professional skills, dexterity and perseverance in the fight against criminals were admired by D.
S.299
It is impossible to call a modern hero, he remains in many ways a figure of the Gothic novel (Jasper from "Edwin Drood", Monks from "Oliver Twist")
p.301
However, the general orientation leaves no doubt: kindness (love) and nobility courageously resist evil, furious efforts doomed to defeat
.301
D. reproached Byron (among other things) for surrounding the murderers with a romantic halo. The killer is not the one who is head and shoulders above the rest, ... he is a cowardly bully, a vain creature.
p.301
The essay "Visiting Newgate Prison" about death row: "Nothing, he'll run away. The night is dark, cold, the gates are not locked, a moment later he is already outside and rushing away like the wind (Seldon tried to escape). A wide open field stretches around... finally he slows down. Well, of course, he got away from the chase (The chase is the name), now you can stretch out here on the shore and sleep until dawn. A deep, dreamless sleep comes. But then he wakes up, he's cold. The grey morning light, seeping into the cell, illuminates the figure of the warden. Before he wakes up, the prisoner jumps up from his restless bed and remains in doubt for a minute. Just a minute! The cramped cell and everything in it is too familiar and real-there can be no mistake. He's a criminal again, condemned to death, desperate for everything. And in two more hours he will be dead.
" p.302
-a stalking and persecuted killer, and is Doyle romanticizing romanticizing?
- the novel could be historical, didactic
In D.'s letters there are lines about the young murderer Thomas Hawker: "before us is an arrogant, windy, dissolute youth (Seldon for his sister), pretending to be a sophisticated rake and libertine: too overdressed, too self-confident, swaggering with his appearance, the owner of an extraordinary hairstyle, cane, snuffbox and a good voice-but unfortunately, only a son a simple shoemaker. ..He starts looking for a way to become famous... the stage? No. It's not going to work. And the murder? It always attracts the attention of newspapers! True, then the gallows follows, but without it, the murder would not have been of any use. There would be no glory without her. Well, we're all going to die sooner or later.… In cheap theaters and tavern stories, they are (murderers!) They always die with honor... come on, Tom, glorify your name! ..You will be able to do it (like the arguments in Dostoevsky's novel) and conquer the whole of London.
" p.303
But if evil is a banal, vulgar and vile thing, then where does this interest in the identity of the criminal come from? p.303
What kind of writer was not a victim of this limitation (about the characters of the characters)? Except Tolstoy and Stendhal in the first three quarters of the "Monastery of Parma". As for the rest, all these witty and seemingly unexpected plot twists (and the dog) are solely a matter of writing technique
p.303
And yet, about Doyle, as well as about D., we can say that a hundred years later he remains an original, in many ways an unsurpassed writer
Victor Shklovsky. Favourites. In 2 volumes. vol.1. Stories about prose.-M., 1983.
Dickens found the "terrible", what was also called "Gothic", in the usual
p. 187
"a novel of mysteries"
P.187
the novel is organized by mystery, secrets into a single whole
Dickens treated not only ghosts, but also Gothic mysteries with contempt, as he saw worse things
. p.189
Ghosts in novels were an outdated fashion, which was worn out, treating it ironically
p.188
In one of the insert novels of the Pickwick Club Notes, a clerk, who is haunted by a ghost living in an old filing cabinet, persuades the ghost to change his residence, warning that there are bedbugs in the closet
p.188
The power of showing minor characters, which Chesterton joyfully emphasizes in Dickens's analysis, is associated with the weakness and conventionality of intrigues
.190
Critical realism the story includes many pages of dissatisfaction with the very convention of the authors
P.191
Fadeev: "Dickens's characters do not develop depending on circumstances, they exist throughout the novel as he "took them out of the bag." His extensive, fascinating plot is therefore necessary for him to give a kaleidoscope of faces and characters without their development" (A.Fadeev. For thirty years. –M., 1957)
pp.191-192
We can say that the novel of secrets, which we are also very fond of, goes back to Dickens with many of its flaws and commonplaces
The true successor of the technique of the novel of secrets is Dostoevsky
P.193
- precisely in the sense of social analysis, the true purpose of the Dickens mystery novel
Dickens' last novel (unfinished) is classified as a Gothic novel and a detective story, i.e. Dickens can be said to have stopped where Poe, Collins and Doyle begin. Is it worth distinguishing between such "serious" prose and "entertaining" prose, bearing in mind these authors?
I have already written about another Scott figure close to Doyle earlier.
Half of his soul was completely under the spell of the heroic and violent past, but the other half, belonging more to the enlightened Edinburgh of the heyday than to the wild Borderland, believed in reason, moderation, the development of trade, all kinds of benefits and-what's a sin to conceal-in material interest. When these sides of his nature come into serious conflict, it is then that Scott rises in his novels to the heights of artistic foresight
. p.27
The story of the writer's formation is the story of a boy bewitched by places and legends associated with cruel and heroic deeds
To combine witchcraft and reality
Childhood experiences fed the romantic side of his nature
The gift of storytelling is also characteristic of Doyle
Ancient feudal grandeur and current tastes
The usual folklore collectors for Europe of that time, both earlier and later, were the Brothers Grimm
He accepted one thing with his mind and another with his heart. As a thinker, he supported the Enlightenment, but his imagination flared up, and his enthusiasm flared up from ancient poetry, ballads and other legacies of the "barbaric" past
At the heart of the foundations of all S.'s novels lies the same question that pushed him onto the path of a novelist-how to combine tradition and progress, is there anything valuable in the old knightly way
- and this is typical for preserving the tradition of constitutional England
The novel "Guy Mannering" with an approximation to the template: predictions, appropriation of property, the appearance of a lost heir, who eventually gets a beauty and inheritance
P.97
From the introductory article by V.Skorodenko "The world of a great artist":
The biographical method is fraught with the temptation to reduce everything to the facts and circumstances of the hero's personal life. The latter, of course, can explain a lot, but not everything, and here there is a danger of losing sight of the fact that the writer's personal life does not develop in a vacuum, but in conditions of a very specific time and history.and social.situation
p.6
Romanticism-the disadvantaged position of Scotland is a specificity with a general interest in the past, which is also in Soviet adventure literature, whether it is about the distant and dark past, or the heroic, or rather the heroized past of the revolution and the civil war.
Of course, attention is attracted by Byron, Scott, Burns, Dickens, depending on the scale of the lit.values
However (and Doyle) "was such an outstanding, versatile nature that to reduce his appearance to a common denominator would be to distort and impoverish the idea of him."
p.13
One of the mistakes of literary criticism in the past is ignoring the laws of a work of art and treating its characters as real people, even if they believe in Holmes so much that his museum exists. Another mistake is the erroneous division of literature into one in which action prevails, and into one in which the main thing is the inner world, the characters of the characters, ignoring the fact that, in fact, actions are a manifestation of character.
The traditions of scientific literary studies, as well as modern forms of literature, do not have much time by historical standards. And you can see how the accumulation and development of approaches to the analysis of literature took place. From Coleridge, who proceeded from the fact that there is an inseparable connection between the writer and his creation, there is a tradition of a biographical approach. In the 20th century. Stoll has already defended the idea that dramatic realism and the realism of life should not be equated. These ideas are developed in the book "Art and Artificiality in Shakespeare's work". It would seem a simple idea: the heroes of works of art obey other laws: the laws of drama. But for a long time it was different. In 1928. Wilson Knight defended the idea that it is necessary to analyze a literary work based on the work itself, on its aesthetic perception. Consider different works by the same author (he also analyzed Shakespeare's work) as a series of works closely related to each other.
At the same time (in 1928, Rylands), the idea appeared to analyze the words and images of literary works. Bernard Harris, associate professor of English literature at York University, called this approach the most radical in the sense of discovering new ideas in literary criticism of classical and long-known, studied works. She applied the method of writing out images that occur, and found out that "Romeo and Juliet" conveys young love as the domination of light: sun, moon, stars, fire, lightning, radiance. What is opposed to darkness, night, clouds, fog, smoke.
"Hamlet" conveys a different atmosphere: images of ill health dominate: diseases, physical disabilities.
Modern criticism, according to Harris, shows just the complexity of literary works, how different approaches are intertwined in the analysis, which means there will be no end to the flow of criticism, which contributes to the depth of understanding of language, literature, and not only: theater, cinema, history.
But it is no less important for me that in the 1960s discoveries turned out to be possible within the framework of a rather traditional approach -biographical, historical. In the 1963 season. The Royal Shakespeare Theatre has staged a new play: a trilogy called The War of the Roses, consisting of three parts of Henry the Sixth, combined into two plays-Henry the Sixth and Edward the Fourth and the play Richard the Third. The trilogy ran in the theater for three nights in a row, and sometimes all three plays ran on the same day. They were prepared: processed by John Barton, associate professor of English literature at the University of Cambridge, the directors of the plays were: Peter Hall, director of the theater, and his assistants Frank Evans (his article on the playwright's views on history was published in the magazine) and the same John Barton.
These previously little-known plays showed Shakespeare as a historian, his political philosophy, his attitude to the problem of power, which can certainly be interpreted in my opinion as a desire for conformism, as propaganda of the ideas of absolutism, or as a sincere position of the historian, the desire to avoid the destruction of power and a new civil strife. But we must not forget that Shakespeare used political myths for his dramaturgy (the image of Richard the Third, which had been established since Tudor times, was recently definitively refuted), and on the other hand, the time in which the great playwright created was in fact no less dangerous: Queen Elizabeth sent hundreds of her opponents to the block, which is usually in the shadow of England's successes on the international stage during her reign (the defeat of the Great Armada and, of course, Shakespeare's plays themselves). //England, 1964g. No. 2 (10). F.Evans. English history through the eyes of Shakespeare. pp.30-39. B.Harris. Modern English literature about Shakespeare. pp.40-47.
Moreover, the work is read in a new way by modern formal methods of literary criticism, especially in the original.
"The Woman in White"
An example of mandatory cultural knowledge for correct translation. Collins' novel "The Woman in White" in Russian is perceived by us in much the same way as in the original, although there is some difference: in England, white represents honesty, in Russia purity. Regarding honesty, for example, we say: crystal honest, clean as glass, that is, for us-transparency, colorlessness. But in China, the same literally translated novel will be perceived completely differently, because in China white is traditionally the mourning color. In the traditions of Europeans, again, that of the British, that of the Russians-black. But in the English novel, the personification of lies. The novel contrasts Anna Catherick, the black color of her mother's clothes, and the man in black.
In two novels: "The Woman in White" by Collins (earlier) and "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by Doyle, there are more definite parallels (although there are baronets, and wastelands, and an anonymous letter):
"I didn't answer. My gaze froze on the last sentence of the letter: "There will always be a place in my heart for your mother's daughter, because your mother was my first, my best and only friend." These words and the assumption I made about the sanity of the letter writer suggested an idea that I was afraid to even think about, let alone express it out loud. I began to fear for my sanity. It was too much like an obsession to attribute everything strange and unexpected to the same hidden source, the same sinister influence. This time, I decided, in defense of my own courage and my common sense, not to succumb to temptation and not to make any assumptions that are not supported by facts...
..."I have a very definite opinion," I replied.- The boy's story, of that I am quite sure, is based on a true fact. I confess I would really like to see the monument over Mrs. Fairlie's grave and examine the footprints around it...
...- Because it confirms my suspicion, which arose when you gave me an anonymous letter to read.
"I presume, Mr. Cartwright, that you have had reason to conceal your suspicion from me until now?"
- I was afraid to believe in him myself. I thought it was completely ridiculous, I thought it was again the result of my overactive imagination. Now everything has changed. Not only the boy's answers, but also a phrase accidentally dropped by the teacher confirmed my guess. Perhaps further events will prove that I was wrong, Miss Holcomb, but at this very moment I have no doubt that the imaginary ghost in the cemetery and the woman who wrote the anonymous letter are one and the same person.
Miss Holcomb stopped, turned pale, and looked at me intently.:
"Who is it?"
"Mr. Dempster, without knowing it, gave us a clue. When he spoke about the figure the boy had seen in the cemetery, he mentioned the "woman in white."
"Isn't that Anna Catherick?"
- Yes, Anna Catherick.
Miss Holcomb leaned heavily on my arm."
Let's compare it with excerpts from The Hound of the Baskervilles (not forgetting that in both cases we are talking about supposedly ghosts):
"... So this is all that was reported about the death of Sir Charles?
-Yes.
-Then acquaint me with those facts that did not get into print...
..."I've never had to talk to anyone about this before," Dr. Mortimer began, clearly worried. - I kept a lot of things silent at the investigation for the simple reason that it is inconvenient for a man of science to support rumors born of superstition... Guided by these considerations, I preferred to keep something quiet, because excessive frankness would not have done any good anyway. But I can talk straight to you...
..Barrymore gave erroneous testimony at the inquest. According to him, there were no footprints on the ground near the body. He just didn't notice them, but I did. At a short distance from Sir Charles, there were perfectly fresh and clear...
- Footprints?
- Footprints.
- Male or female?
Dr. Mortimer looked at us strangely and answered almost in a whisper:
- Mr. Holmes, these were the paw prints of a huge dog!
I confess at these words a chill ran through my skin."
The parallels in Doyle's modern novel of European romantic literature are so great that sometimes it seems that Doyle deliberately wove the thread of the narrative in this way, like those words from the Times editorial, cut out with nail scissors and pasted so that a letter, anonymous, addressed to Sir Henry turned out.
Although in Collins' novel there is no recognition of the criminal by the portrait of an ancestor, but the main character is an investigator, actually an artist.
"For the cause of Laura, for the cause of Truth," says the main character of the novel, art teacher Walter Cartwright, bluntly in one of the final chapters.
By the very name, Collins' novel and Doyle's novel (10 times smaller in volume, but hardly having a larger number of characters and storylines traditionally for a Russian novel) are similar: "The Woman in White" is about the ghost woman of the first chapters, and "The Hound of the Baskervilles" is about a ghost.
The name, in terms of idiomatic expressions, of course, says: white in English is used in the meaning of honesty, friendship: He is completely white and you can trust him as yourself. Of course, it also matters here.
In Collins' novel, in fact, we are talking about the Truth, which unites honest people, a couple of criminals with accomplices resort to lying, hiding the Truth, and a company of honest people is obliged to find out the Truth and make it public in order to save the heroine.
In Doyle's novel, we are talking about a Fine, about Punishment for an attempt on someone else's: someone else's bride, perhaps, a farmer's daughter, not a wedding, but dishonor, in film adaptations often a wife killed in jealousy, and Sir Charles's capital, a dog is usually also a caretaker of property and honor, human life, that's the meaning of A Hellhound is racing at Hugo's heels, and a detective and his assistants are running headlong at Stapleton's heels in the finale.
"Dracula"
Even today, long but inspired arguments and someone-a professor of medicine- are able to convince the reader of the reality of vampires. What can we say about the reader of more than a century ago
While bandaging Arthur, I saw how weak he was, took him by the arm and wanted to take him away. But then Van Helsing, without turning around-it seems that this man's eyes are on the back of his head…
All this seemed ridiculous to me, and I told him: "Of course, Professor, I know that you are not doing anything in vain, but now your actions have puzzled me. A skeptic would assume that you are engaged in exorcism. – It's quite possible!- He replied…
The story of the escaped wolf from the zoo
Translated by Tatiana Krasavchenko
- So you are afraid that my previous experience and beliefs prevent me from understanding some unusual phenomena?
- Yes, it's not for nothing that you are my favorite student. You should be taught. By wishing to understand, you have already taken the first step towards understanding. So you think the wounds on the neck of the children are of the same origin as Miss Lucy's?
- I think so.
"But you're wrong.He even stood up while saying that.- Oh, if only it were so! But alas! It's getting worse, much, much worse.
- For God's sake, Professor, what do you want to say?!I exclaimed.
With an expression of despair, Van Helsing sank into an armchair, covered his face with his hands and said:
"These wounds were inflicted by Miss Lucy!
"You're a smart man, friend John, and you're sensible, but you're a prisoner of prejudice."
- My logic is simple, this time it is no longer the logic of a madman jumping from hummock to hummock in a swamp in the fog.
A small moth flew past us, and Stapleton gave chase with amazing speed and agility. I was horrified to see that the moth rushed straight to the quagmire, but my new acquaintance, as if nothing had happened, jumped from tussock to tussock and waved his green net.
The waiting became so intense that the seconds dragged on like in a nightmare
-a trap scene
It is called a beast – that is, a beast
"So you're on a ship?" – Oh, yes!
- the scene of the beginning of the hunt for the count refers to his first appearance in England – almost legendary for the heroes – they only know about him from newspapers about a strange ship
In both cases, the Russian names of the ships "Dimitri" and "Tsarina Ekaterina" are interesting
. Such ships are not reported in the schedule that is printed in the Times
- a mention of the newspaper, but this is not surprising-the largest, most authoritative
From the description of the count: with a large hooked nose
The heroes look like underground workers or conspirators – revolutionaries, carbonarians, Freemasons, and terrorists - a common theme in the 19th century. – they don't involve the police, they compare themselves to the crusaders – and, like the crusaders, we go on a journey to save others. Like them, we will go east
- it is curious that the count, before becoming a vampire, fought with the Turks, also defending a seemingly holy cause, - the heroes say this, but not in the sense of protecting faith, on the contrary, believing that it was then that he resorted to the help of the devil, - at one time he crossed the Turkish border
- the novel can also be interpreted as anti-Semitic: What is he doing? He finds the most suitable place in the world for himself and begins to prepare. He tries his hand at his abilities, learns new languages, social environment, politics, laws, finance, science, customs of another country. All this only whetted his appetite.
Thus, we are only fulfilling the will of the Almighty, who wished that the world and the people for whom His Son suffered would not be given up to the monsters, who by their very existence offend this great sacrifice -and then just the passage about the crusaders
- or further: oh, if he were from God and not from the devil, what a powerful source of good he would become for us. And now we are called to free the world from it. We must act quietly and secretly; for in our enlightened age, they do not even believe in what they see with their eyes... - they talk about themselves: - ready to destroy even their souls for the sake of ... the good of mankind, in the name of the glory of God
I had no time to finish the sentence when I saw a red mark on my forehead in the mirror and realized that I had not got rid of the square. – it is curious that the filth lies in incest
- and at the same time, it is the hunt by not indifferent people who did not dare to resort to police force that resembles the hunt for Nazis
- that it's a hunt they say themselves: - We also take hard drives. Quincy, as always, gives good advice, especially since we are talking about hunting. –or: let's search the house, find out everything we need and only then begin what our friend Arthur calls "chasing the fox" in hunting jargon
-however, what does this mean -the techniques of demonizing enemies are universal, trivial, the same, but undoubtedly there is something in common here that both myths-novel and historical are in in line with the Christian, but in fact Judeo-Christian, Manichean, totalitarian tradition
- there is another point here, they often compare themselves to madmen, -two of them are psychiatrists, and there is mention of infection, influence, -meaning their involvement in this still seemingly fantastic world, -and here is an excerpt: -friend John, you and I need to discuss something confidentially. ...Madame Mina is changing before our eyes... given Miss Lucy's sad experience, we must get ahead of events this time… I can see the vampire's characteristics showing on her face.
-the text can be read in the postmodern tradition and as dangerous fantasies of a group of people who convinced themselves of the existence of vampires, sought out and found their signs in familiar faces, who thus became victims of their fantasies-especially since the author does not say his point of view on the narrative anywhere, but the whole novel according to the literary tradition of the 19th century. presented as excerpts from diaries and letters.
A few minutes later, Morris, examining a corner, suddenly recoiled. We all immediately looked in his direction-the nervous tension was clearly increasing-and saw a lot of phosphorescent dots flickering like tiny stars: it was a flood of rats
From Lawrence Rees on the Jewish pogrom in Antwerp in the spring of 1941: it is important to note that the organizers of this attack have just watched the propaganda film "The Eternal Jew"...the picture is clearly anti - Semitic . She is notorious for comparing Jews to rats
p. 204
On the morning of the 12th, we left London from Charing Cross station, arrived in Paris-this is quite a frequent mention, as well as the Times, due to the magnitude of these concepts-the largest newspaper and an important transport hub-there is hardly any semantic meaning in this
It is unlikely that the monster will decide to appear in human form, this will cause a lot of suspicion, which he does not need at all, so he will most likely remain in the box-the dog was such a box for Stapleton
- The Count is a criminal and a criminal type. Nordau and Lombroso would have defined him that way -Holmes not only recognized Stapleton's portrait resemblance to Hugo, he could not help but find out if Doyle thus adhered to the popular, but later proved to be not wealthy, theory in criminology that a criminal is a criminal by virtue of biological origin, and even has characteristic features in his appearance Stapleton is Roger's son, who was considered a black sheep in the family-Holmes could not help but recognize the similarities, because according to Lombroso's theory, both Roger and Stapleton could not help but look like the same criminal in their family – Hugo Baskerville himself, it's not just the portrait that betrayed Baskerville in Stapleton, but also the fact that the resemblance to Hugo confirmed for Holmes that Stapleton was a criminal-Lombroso's theory was already not shared by everyone, for example, the Provisional Government closed prisons also because, believing that crimes are a social creation, not a biological one, this It was also reflected in the story "The Green Van" - that there would be no prisons under communism, there would be no criminals - about the early years of the Soviet militia
Later in the novel, the figure of the Jewish merchant Guildenstein, who unwittingly rendered a service to Dracula, will appear for a short time. However, probably as in the case of some other classic novels, in the modern era of political correctness, these figures look symbolic. But who exactly is depicted in the novel as the vampire's assistants are the Gypsies who shared the fate of European Jews in the Nazi totalitarian empire in the 20th century.
The killing technique in the legend – the beast torments the throat of the victim –Hugo, is also in Stoker's novel-with the same technique Dracula dealt with a random assistant, followed by the heroes – was he then in the form of a giant dog, in which he appeared in England, killing the entire crew of the captured ship
The figure of Dracula appears as a criminal, but unlike Stapleton, without losing the supernatural. Moreover, the supernatural helps the heroes not to track down in order to catch and bring to justice, but to deal with the criminal: a magic circle, magical objects, including from Christianity – prayer, crucifixes, a wafer, but along with garlic, a branch of rosehip and even, the power of hypnosis is also used, and Dracula himself is attributed superstitions that restrict freedom his actions even on the way to escape from his pursuers
Anti-Semitic or not, the novel is certainly permeated with the theme of the immortality of the soul, the theme of the sacrifice of Christ, and generally Christian motives, although at the end of the novel in Dracula's castle the characters smell sulfur-the presence of the devil, still beliefs in vampires are not part of Christianity
- Lord... - he began, but Arthur interrupted him: - No, no, for God's sake, don't! At least not now. I'm sorry, sir, I don't want to offend you, but I can't hear that title.…
"Do you know that Mrs. Westenra left you her entire fortune?
" I had no idea!
- Now everything belongs to you, and you have the right to dispose of everything at your discretion…
...because the romantic phase of my life is over…
"Oh, if you only knew what I owe you! These notes are like a ray of sunshine. They explain everything. I am stunned, blinded-so much light! Although there are clouds gathering further away. But you can't see it. Oh, how grateful I am to you, what a clever girl you are! Madam, if Abraham Van Helsing can ever be of any use to you or your family members, I hope you will let me know. I will consider it a pleasure to help you as a friend ... There are people dark and light, you radiate light…
You trust people, and low people are distrustful-aphorisms, wisdom
- Thank you, thank you endlessly! You've taken a load off my soul. If you don't mind, I'll give you one notebook to read. It's quite big, I typed it out on a typewriter. This is a copy of the diary that Jonathan kept abroad, it describes everything that happened to him. I won't risk telling you anything about him now. Read it for yourself and judge…
- Then I am at your service with all my soul and body. I have some papers, but if you are traveling by train at 10.30, you will not have time to read them here, please take them with you and read them on the train
I bought him the local morning and yesterday's London newspapers. While the mmas were talking through the window of the carriage, he casually flipped through them. Suddenly something caught his attention in the Westminster Gazette-I recognized it by its color…
Yesterday the professor went to Exeter and spent the night there, and today at half past five he burst into my room and shoved yesterday's Westminster Newspaper into my hands.
- What do you say about this? "What is it?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.
I looked at the newspaper, but I didn't understand what he meant. Then Van Helsing pointed out to me an article about children who were lured into the woods. It didn't mean anything to me until I got to the place where the tiny wounds on their necks were described. That's what it's all about!
-comparison –what we do at work is similar
Of course, this is not about plagiarism, of course, and not about direct borrowing, but also not about simultaneous visits with the same ideas-Doyle obviously read and transferred something from Stoker's novel into the novel, as well as short stories by Hoffman, Irving, Roman Leroux-his previous novel, but Doyle's novel is not quite a novel from a series of novels and short stories about Holmes, in which he is not the main character, although not a classic horror novel, but still these comparisons indicate that between Doyle's novel and these works of non-detective genre, but in general the same direction –romantic –have more in common, than the works of the same direction in literature
Exeter is the main city of the English county of Devonshire
What does this mean? Something more than that the train schedules have not changed
...In the silver glow of the moon, I saw a snow-white figure reclining on our favorite bench. A new cloud instantly covered everything with darkness, I thought I saw a black shadow bending over a white figure. Whether it was an animal or a man, I did not understand... I probably ran fast, although I had the feeling that my legs were filled with pig, and my joints did not bend. Closer to the top, I could already make out a bench and a white figure, although it was dark. I was not mistaken: a tall black shadow bent over a white reclining figure. I screamed in fright: "Lucy!Lucy!" The shadow raised its head, I saw a pale face and red sparkling eyes. Lucy did not answer, and I rushed to the cemetery gate, flew into them-for a minute the church blocked my friend from me. When I jumped out from behind the church, the cloud passed, the moon shone brightly on Lucy, with her head thrown back on the back of the pew. There was no one near her…
From Dr. Seward's diary: A strange and sudden change took place in Renfield last night. From about eight o'clock on, he began to worry and sniff like a dog following a trail.
But the strangest thing: as soon as the schooner touched the shore, a huge dog jumped out on deck, ran to the bow, jumped down on the sand and, rushing to the steep cliff on which the cemetery is located, disappeared into the darkness.
Everyone is talking about a strange incident... great interest was aroused by a dog that jumped onto land as soon as the ship crashed into the shore. Many members of the Animal Welfare Society, popular in Whitby, are ready to shelter her. But, unfortunately, the dog cannot be found anywhere -it has disappeared through the ground. Perhaps she was so scared that she fled to the swamps and is now hiding there. Some people really don't like it –it's fraught with trouble, because, apparently, this is a real predator: early this morning they found a large dog dead, an unclean mastiff belonging to a coal merchant who lives near Tate Hill Pier. The dog was lying on the road in front of the owner's yard. Obviously, he had a fight with some fierce beast-his throat was torn open, his belly was ripped open-it looks like sharp claws.
There was no sign of the huge dog; given public opinion at the moment, the city would probably take her under its care.
... and the death of poor Mr. Swales, who was found next to our bench this morning with a broken neck. Obviously, as the doctor said, he fell off the bench from fright-he had an expression of such unspeakable horror on his face that, according to the people who found him, they had goosebumps.
If vampires are images inspired by anti–Semitic propaganda, although here the mutual influence may be reversed, then Dracula the ruler in the guise of a vampire is also just a textbook image in a long row from the Dragon ("draconian laws"), Caligula, Genghis Khan to Ceausescu, Pol Pot, Bokassa, etc. Indeed, it is no coincidence that in the image of a vampire there is no ordinary person who does not belong to the ruling stratum.
An example of irony in Stoker's novel: "The doctor will confirm that I once tried to kill him in order to strengthen my vitality at the expense of his blood, based on the Holy Scripture, which says: "For blood is life." Although the sale of a certain patented product has trivialized this well-known truth."
Unlike Doyle's novel, in Stoker's novel, the supernatural-the enemy really turns out to be a diabolical creature, is not just confirmed, but justified on behalf of an investigative scientist-a professor of medicine and not only Van Helsing.
A vampire can turn into a wolf himself
The dark secret that connects the characters gives eroticism to the relationship
The true crime is not just the deprivation of life, but the destruction of the victims' souls-which Professor Van Helsing repeatedly stipulates-in full accordance with Christian ideas –compare how different the motives of crimes in novels are-in one we are talking about money, even a huge amount of money, the estate of Lee, but not a word is said about the destruction of the soul and in another, it clearly shows not the safest world for life in general–the ordinariness of parting with life-with all the progress -but the danger of the death of the eternal soul -although there may be a difference just with all that one work was separated from another by only 20 years, -and it reflected progress, increased security and convenience of living along with the consistent secularization of the worldview – it was still before the 20th century. with its world wars, dangerous discoveries of science, social revolutions and experiments
of the "Phantom of the Opera"
Who, having learned about the legend dear to the old D, used it so cruelly that the girl became in his hands only a defenseless instrument that can be made to sound at his discretion?
"The Phantom of the Opera" is more logical, structured in the plot, one cannot even say that it is strained-how this letter was sent and thrown on the sidewalk, believing that someone would pick it up and take it to the written address, but this was also a reality in the first decades of the 20th century. Stevenson's language is lighter, more elegant, you constantly stumble in Doyle's texts, Wilde's works cannot compete in originality, wit, which requires even greater observation, aestheticism, but "The Dog..." losing maybe on all these points stands at least next to these novels and novels, short stories by these authors, Doyle's contemporaries.
"The Phantom of the Opera", like other works, helps to understand that, in principle, all these are plots on the theme of Beauty and the Beast, even probably the plot of a fairy tale about a Princess imprisoned in a castle tower, guarded by a terrible monster, who is waiting to be freed by a knight in love with her, to whom she also reciprocates and will help to defeat the monster, as it is also noticeable in the ancient myth of the Labyrinth, the Minotaur, Theseus and the thread of Ariadne… In the Dog as Ariadne, the princess is Miss Stapleton, Mr. Stapleton and the dog are in the role of the monster, and Sir Henry is in the role of the knight, who is helped by the selfless Holmes, like some ancient god who is not indifferent to the person he likes, although in reality there is certainly a genius rebelling against injustice, out of love for solving crimes -something by the way similar to Freckland, of course, only how can a scarecrow resemble a human being
Steblin criticized, but it is obvious that through popular plots framed by many modern details, a medieval or even even more ancient fairy tale looks through, slightly fermented in a different way to attract the attention of an adult reader, and not noticeably captivate him, like a fairy tale, a heroic myth, in childhood.
"The Phantom of the Opera"
Opera in the 19th century was a popular genre, the same as pop music, pop music, not even musicals today
The film "The 20th century" begins with the news announced by the boys selling newspapers: Verdi died
"The Dog ..." ends with Watson's invitation by Holmes to the opera…
- Then, Kristina, it seems to me that you are being played.
And I saw, Mr. Investigator- that's how I see you now-I saw a terrible skull that looked at me with eye sockets burning with hellfire
"The Dog...", "The Phantom of the Opera" and "Jekyll": they can be called fantastic "black novels", and the roles of the detective in all three are as follows: in "The Dog ..." a brilliant detective, but his investigation remains in the background, he is not the main character, in "The Phantom of the Opera" there is a policeman a detective, but he is in the second, third plane, and even does not come to a solution, the investigation, so to speak, is led by a journalist who appears as the historian of this case, in "Jekyll" the criminal himself reveals all the details in the notes that his friend Atherson reads, there are in fact no detectives at all.
But there is undoubtedly a common thing here: all three novels are based on letters, memoirs, notes, diaries, -on epistolary material and newspapers -constant mentions of press reports.
All three novels have a style of presentation characteristic of the press, which is why they are called "sensational" novels. And the authors, besides being writers, were journalists.
The comparison of "The Phantom of the Opera" and "The Dog ..." in the composition: both there and there the beginning unfolds with letters-in "The Phantom of the Opera", including the Ghost himself, to new directors, in "The Dog ..." firstly, Mortimer shares his opinion, history and newspaper news (a figure similar to "a walking newspaper", characteristic of rural provincial life, it is characteristic that Stapleton also refers to Mortimer, explaining how he recognized Watson), secondly, from a mysterious letter from a stranger in London, compiled from a newspaper editorial
Even the general thing in the unfolding of the plot: -These were the tracks of a giant dog; -It seemed to me that Satan himself was in front of me
Although, at first glance, these are completely different works, but in reality, "The Phantom of the Opera" has much more in common with "The Dog ..." than any other, including the works we are considering. But this is not a detective story, and that's why you should not consider "The Dog ..." a "classic detective" (Watson is leading the investigation, and Holmes only appears like a god from a car to the finale, explaining to Watson and readers the course of his investigation in the style of a chronicle).
Of course, we are far from imagining that the work of Doyle, Hoffman and Korotkevich represents a kind of genealogical series. But however, the connections between them are obvious
There are intertextual "borrowings" in the novel, along with a literary device designed to increase the realism of what is described: newspaper articles, letters, diaries, several mentions of news events, but in relation to the specified chronology of action, not a word is said, for example, about the construction of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, or the mysterious suicide of the heir of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, just like in the story there is a coffee pot, but there is no cup with a shelf for a mustache, if Dr. Watson is a gentleman from the capital and he was accepted at the club, then he simply had to drink from such a cup, is the author obliged to mention this?.. of course not, but in this case, how can a novel serve as an "encyclopedia of the era"?.. as I have already noticed, no, there is necessarily a reflection of the epoch in it, but it is bizarrely mixed up, namely in the novel by Doyle, known for his literary technique of "misleading the reader", with the "imaginary reality" created by him in the novel, where it is not worth mentioning the well-known events of the specified chronology... and the "historical reality" is passed through the author's imagination, where the historical consciousness of the 19th century. In itself, it is a reflection of the inherent modernity of historicism and romanticism with its interest in history, the ability, as Yampolsky points out, to turn the past into history with rationalism, and history into a museum, and the monster of the Gothic Middle Ages, the fruit of the religious worldview of his time into a "timeless" symbol of a new style in the 19th century -Romanticism).
But the novel also has its own, and the widely advertised method is well-known and strongly associated with Holmes deductive. This should be discussed separately, since the deductive method... deduction in general is a fundamental method in science and here the connection is just with folklore and other works of romantic literature modern to Doyle, not with all, methods are discussed in Le Fanu's short stories and even in Stoker's novel, but still the connection with romanticism here is made as if not so obvious, in Doyle's novel before rationalism the detective and Sir Henry's desire to illuminate the old manor with the "inventions of Edison and Swann" mysticism and medieval magic, prejudice is clearly not as dominant as in the same classic "horror novel" "Dracula", and the positivism of romantics and non-romantics was again shared by Soviet adventure literature, especially when Soviet spaceships began to "surf the expanses of space."
The deductive method
The deductive method... Deduction is generally a fundamental method in science. But it is far from the only one, for example, among logical operations there is an inductive method, induction, where the conclusion is based not on fact, proof, but on assumptions, probability. And if the deductive method is absolutized, as in the case of Holmes (and yet he is not a scientist, but a detective and evidence of guilt or innocence is at stake), then the creative one is cut off. Holmes is not inclined just to fantasize, to admit. That is probably why he sometimes cannot answer certain questions from Watson (who, whether due to limitations, behaves like a child with an adult: he asks ridiculous or just uncomfortable questions, uncomfortable just like children, because he does not know that this is not important and insoluble) as in the case of the question: how was Stapleton going to prove his rights to the capital of the Baskervilles?.. Although this was the motive for the crimes.
In accordance with the teachings of Roland Barthes about the connotative (hidden) meaning of the sign, which imposes a certain train of thought on the recipient (reader) (while the author may use this without realizing it, because he himself, as part of culture, is also not quite an independent person, individuality-and you can immediately see that Doyle is perhaps distinguished by art possession of these sign meanings, not even consciously) I see these connotations in the story: the constant use in the original (practically not transferable by translations) of that, what I called the "dog vocabulary" ("dog cart" is the name of the crew that Mortimer uses, "doggid" is the pursuit), as well as the seemingly usual literary techniques of whipping up an atmosphere of anxiety through the details of the surrounding environment: the gloom that Sir Henry felt on the first evening of his stay at Baskerville Hall and Watson, the fog, even here are not just landscape descriptions as part of the mood transfer in the novel, namely the linguistic means in the same description, signs-formally, you can trace what colors and sounds are found in the narrative. These are stereotypes (deconstructionists really understood absolutely all signs of the language to be stereotyped).
If we turn to Lacan's ideas, then again I see in the idea of the author's lack of independence hidden quotations, borrowings (again not necessarily conscious), for this I analyzed more than a dozen contemporary literary texts of the novel (about many it can be argued that Doyle was familiar with them before writing the novel) and it can be argued, "borrowings"sometimes they are just literal.
One can also find epistems of Michel Foucault in the work, they are all the more interesting if I use the work as a source of historical reconstruction: both in Holmes's "recognition" of the criminal and in Morimer's fascination with anthropology, the system of views of that time is visible (it, alas, led to racism in Europe decades later), but then the theory Lombroso was considered part of the new word of science.
If we try to follow Holmes to use the method, in accordance with Barth's proposed methodology, to identify the "text" in the work-that is, the whole complex of meanings that the author unconsciously captured by textual analysis, then we can come to an interesting conclusion.
Following Bart, hidden codes and borrowings are quite easily discovered, to which Doyle, as an author, was also subject to stereotypes. Simply put, those cultural codes are revealed, which, using the example of a romantic work, Bart defined: action (a narrative about the tragic fate of a romantic hero), semiotic (a standard, a set of stereotypes: how a romantic hero should behave and what to say), hermeneutical (the code of the riddle, which the hero must of course solve), cultural (stereotypically romantic ideas inherent in the era: what should be the beloved woman of the hero, for example), symbolic (the unconscious of the hero).
And, indeed, as the deconstructivists described, I find: that the work opens with a "text"-I just can't judge that the author consciously created it -full of cultural meanings of the era, precisely in accordance with my subject of research (historical). And this is precisely not an explicit "text"-because the novel is "incorrectly" interpreted by all known film adaptations.
At first glance, I repeat a banal thing-this is in the full sense of the word a work of neo-Romanticism literature, a novel of adventures of a romantic hero. But on the other hand, for some reason it's not obvious. The main character of the novel is usually called Holmes, although an exception is still made for this work, saying that the main narrator and investigator is his vis-a-vis Watson. But both are mistaken, because in the "text" the main character turns out to be, of course, Sir Henry.
Look for yourself: the very first mention of him in a quote from a local newspaper is imbued with irony, but also empathy, about his youth and the nature of his inheritance-on the one hand, fabulous, on the other hand with "history". But Mortimer gives an even more explicit description-and then in the "text" I find nothing that would cast even a shadow on Mortimer's characterization of this "highly flawlessly recommended young man." But this and only this should be the "real" romantic hero. And of course, he is faced with a dangerous, almost insoluble mystery-a family legend (here the dog is like that protective spirit that guards the treasure-these tests, of course, refer us to another theory and other methods-the motive of initiations). Little attention is paid to the age of the novel's characters, film adaptations using mature actors create completely different "codes". In fact, all the heroes and antiheroes of the novel are very, very young. They are no more than 30 years old. And Sir Henry is so especially said that he is "very young" (that's why he is also just Henry, even though he is sir, in this reference not only to his American upbringing, free from any prejudices and traditions, the hidden irony of the British, but also just a sign of his young age, and again, is there a mention the fact that he essentially grew up without parents, especially lost his father early and had never been to Baskerville Hall, which is perceived as the ancestral home, and thus he was forced to wander overseas-doesn't this make him even more romantically heroic). Then, of course, he meets love-and, as befits a romantic hero, falls in love immediately, does not hide his feelings, loves sincerely, courts gallantly and... He falls in love blindly. And to solve all the riddles, successfully overcome all the trials and obstacles, a real romantic hero needs... that's right, loyal and just as honest, noble friends, as Watson and Holmes are in the "text". And the friendly nature of Watson's relationship with Sir Henry also emphasizes this: Watson is a simple-minded Watson, of course, trying to help Holmes and conduct an investigation, but he tells Stapleton that he is only a guest at Baskerville Hall. And for some reason I believe it.
In general, if you take heroes and antiheroes as the very gallery of ancestors, then they all very much resemble ... the "Three Musketeers" of Dumas the elder. Well, unless Holmes is very similar to the noble Robin Hood, who always comes to the rescue against any injustice, but Holmes is not a robber (although Doyle said in the cycle that between a detective and a criminal, the only difference is on whose side he is: good or evil). But if according to the stereotypes of the French novel of the first half of the 19th century: in this "text", Holmes is the analogue of Athos, the wiser, "older", Holmes is the analogue of the simpleton, sybarite Porthos-certainly Watson, melancholic, that's just not enough charm, Aramis is Mortimer, and Sir Henry himself is certainly the new d'Artagnan. It's the same adventure novel... four friends.
If you look at the antiheroes: the cardinal is the very criminal encroachment on someone else's title, estate and capital-the very evil that made Stapleton a criminal, forced him to turn family tradition and a dog accidentally bought for these purposes, which should play its role-ghosts, into an instrument of crime. Among the soldiers of this evil spirit (protecting treasures nevertheless, as if testing: is there a worthy heir) is my lady, although not so bloodthirsty and did not have time to turn her weapon against the young baronet (but already unwittingly played her role against the old and also noble gentleman)"the mysterious Laura Lyons, too, and Mrs. Stapleton is Constance. Heroes and antiheroes are easy to read from each other, though there is a difference. But this is what makes the stereotype not so obvious, but certainly no less interesting. Evil will eventually be punished, and good will prevail. Sir Henry will be saved, his feelings will be upset, but he himself is brave, at such a young age, an idealist who believes in his duty ("title, estate and dollars must be inseparable, otherwise how can you restore the former glory of the family"), to the ancestral home ("just think, so many generations the ancestors lived here", and reproaches to the Barrymores-hereditary servants, although we should not forget that this is what an American farmer, a young man, says -Doyle's irony -when they want to take a settlement to go about their business and in the end the baronet allows them to use the name, by association with their former service), will prove worthy of inheritance.
Everything, as you can see, literally follows ordinary stereotypes, codes of a romantic novel for young people, which for decades have been the novels of Dumas, Jules Verne, and... Doyle. But thanks to the deconstructionists, it is clear that this is not just the literature of romanticism, this is the function of the cultural language of the epoch, the history of which interests me. And this Manichaean certainty of the characters, the belief, literally and in full accordance with the ideas of Lombroso, that the criminal can be identified in person, because he looks like old Hugo like two drops of water, it makes this novel not such a complex work, the heroes and antiheroes are so clearly divorced, so undeveloped - there is no development of these traits in them, evolution (and the concept and word were fashionable then). However, Doyle uses mimicry techniques: the evil in the person of Stapleton is also faked as a "decent" person, a harmless naturalist, like he passes off a dog as a ghost, that is, he only seems kind and harmless. Barrymore, who is less capable of disguises (also a young man, like his wife), has been supporting the deceptive course of the investigation for a long time, he is suspicious to the reader. And his wife turns out to be Selden's sister. In Dumas's novel, no one pretends to be anyone (although the comedy of masks is also traditional), everyone knows everything about each other, they only exchange barbs at court. But the analysis of this topic will lead us directly to the origins of European literature - to the ancient Greek art of theater, at least to the European medieval fairground, to the Globe theater, of course, Shakespeare, but in any case - to the codes, to the repressive force of the dual nature of the sign, which the deconstructionists spoke about. The "text" is so full of cultural codes that it loses its integrity, some stereotypes refer to others. Does the language itself impose this? Or Doyle's upbringing, and his worldview, literary tastes, stereotypes of the era? After all, the repressive functions of language and the ideas inherent in the epoch are not the same thing. Psycholinguist (and well-known critic of linguistic determinism) Steven Pinker writes ("The Substance of Thinking: Language as a window into human nature"): "the vulnerable point of linguistic determinism (in the form of the Sepir-Whorf hypothesis) is that the various directions in which language can be associated with thinking are often confused by it, and banal observations are given out as fundamental discoveries." Indeed, the period of romanticism stands out in the history of literature, romanticism is characterized by a romantic hero and, like any cultural and historical phenomenon and not only in literature, the characteristic features and techniques by which, strictly speaking, he was singled out. By the way, we see these same romantic heroes, for example, in the Soviet children's detective stories by Anatoly Rybakov. These techniques have generally spread in literature for young people. Apparently, it implies a better assimilation of a stereotype, a template in the image of the inner world of the characters, by placing them in an exotic setting and dynamism of action (what is called adventure literature is characteristic of a western). "The Bronze Bird" directly contains the same plot structure (the code of the riddle is the most obvious, and this can already be seen from the title). That is, this kind of literature adapts perfectly even in such a complex socio-cultural phenomenon as socialist realism, as children's literature in the USSR. What does the language have to do with it? Is this then the reason for her features? By the way, because of the stereotypical stories about Holmes, his "cardboard" as a character, sometimes called a "walking computing machine", Doyle tried to "kill" the hero, despite the fabulous income from "Holmsiana" (and the novel broke Doyle's silence on the subject of Holmes, he yielded to public opinion, even the wish queens). It was understanding this stiltedness of his characters in "Holmsian" that Doyle aspired to a different kind of creativity, because sentimental prose with its deepening into the inner world of a person, into the shades of his nature, in the depiction of character development has long been known. But mass culture was coming to the fore, for which the stereotypical heroes of the adventure genre turned out to be the most suitable. And again, what does linguistic determinism have to do with it? Does the language really dictate such specificity? As a verb indicating actions in a sentence. So, three explanatory theories can be proposed: the first, indeed, is a historical and cultural theory, and I tested it by referring to the history of morality as presented by Ossovskaya, to the phenomenon of the gentleman - that is, to a social, and not to a literary phenomenon, and then socio-cultural phenomena were reflected, genres and styles of literature were determined. However, one can immediately say: almost half of the sources of Ossovskaya are literature itself. The second theory is the theory of structuralism-about archetypes, the romantic hero in it is not divorced from social reality, historical reality, but he is something again inherent in the history of literature itself: transitional from the mythological hero to the superman Nietzsche, through and culturtrager Kipling, for example, the noble robber Hood from English folklore, and in general it's not so much diversity and linear development, how many persistently transmitted archetypes. But first, let's analyze the third explanatory theory -linguistic determinism. Criticizing, Pinker highlights her following theses: language has an impact on thinking, because we get a significant part of our knowledge through reading and oral communication (it is unlikely that people would have known the facts that Caesar conquered Gaul if they had not learned it from other people through language); a sentence can build a conceptual structure ("frame") of the event, affecting how people structure the event in addition to the message about who did what and in relation to whom; The vocabulary of any language reflects the kinds of phenomena that native speakers encounter in real life and therefore think about.; since language functions by evoking meanings in the brain, and since meanings are correlated with concepts that arose in another way (for example, through visual perception), then if we use the word language in the most general sense, it indicates only meanings (and not the real words, phrases and constructions that make up the language), we can say that language affects thinking-then language is thinking-by definition (Pinker, however, is just an opponent of theories of linguistic determinism); when people think of an entity, among its many attributes that they can think of is its name (the nominative meaning of the sign according to Barth's theory); in any computing system, there must be means to store intermediate calculation results (working memory in psychology with its two vivid forms-mental images and phonological loop-mnemonics); each language encourages speakers, when they construct or interpret sentences, to pay attention to certain aspects of reality (this is how in English speakers have to think about the category of time-the so-called "thinking for speech"); words and grammatical structures have a profound effect on how speakers think, even when they do not actually speak or listen; the medium of thinking is real words and sentences in the language of which the speaker is a native speaker; if representatives of two cultures speak different languages that differ in those concepts, which can express them, their beliefs are not comparable. In principle, Wittgenstein's philosophy has already pointed out the importance of language for the very process of thinking and cognition. In principle, Pinker himself does not doubt the obvious influence of speech on the thinking process, he just does not believe that language is thinking, for example. In principle, all this creates difficulties for foreign language learners (and for the translator): different words for familiar phenomena (in their native language), a different word order in a sentence-different grammar rules, and an emigrant who has mastered a foreign culture begins to really think in a foreign language, after all, the language is closely related it is connected with thinking and this is also a banal fact. Russian Russian literature, for example, which was pointed out that in English the depth of thought is expressed in active actions, as a result, for the Russian reader, all English literature first of all seems to be a literature of action, devoid of that the depth of thought familiar from Russian literature. The way perceptions differ was obvious when, after the events of 1991. the traditional presentation of TV news in the Western English-language format was changing: many people of mature age then complained about the lack of understanding of the presenters -too fast speech, dynamic, causing anxiety by this alone. The contrast was between the program "Time" on Channel One and "Today" on NTV, even though the language itself had not changed and it was not the novelty of the lack of censorship. Moreover, this was part of the differences in society and culture - the dynamism inherent in the English-speaking world, for example, the emphasis on doing, again, and not on reflection. That is, language definitely has an impact on culture. And the difference between English and Russian literature as "active action" and "spiritually oriented" literature, is there not a difference in perception due to differences in language (although this may be the reverse process of culture's influence on language)? Then does the language make the romantic hero and the literature of romanticism so stereotypical? Our perception based on language difference? How much does the dynamism of action in a neo-romantic (adventure) and, above all, an English-language novel written in English differ from any other (which we do not call romantic) work of English literature as well? How does the translation change the "atmosphere" of the work? Russians Russian language changes when they write romantic works in Russian? I am only referring to these questions as examples of at least the influence of language on thinking. Linguistic determinism helped to identify in the novel a romantic hero common in popular culture today, but also associated with a long-standing folklore tradition. Doyle's novel, his cycle of short stories and novels about Holmes, stood simultaneously at the origins of mass culture in the 20th century. and itself arose as part of this not so much linguistic as socio-cultural phenomenon. It is still common today, and it is all the more curious to look at the novel as a history of this phenomenon. It seems that the whole mass culture is primarily based on stereotypes, maybe folklore.
Style (art)
Material from Wikipedia
Style (other-Greek ;;;;;;, Latin stylus — a rod, a writing stick) is one of the main categories of art studies. The unique integrity of all elements of the content and form of an artistic work, including it in a historical series of similar works characterized by the unity of the place and time of creation. In a different formulation: a special quality of the form of a work of art, achieved by the integrity of the creative method, methods of shaping, techniques of composition, individual manner and technique peculiar to artists of a certain historical period.
Style // Vlasov V. G. A new encyclopedic dictionary of fine art. In 10 volumes — St. Petersburg: ABC Classics. — Vol. IX, 2008. — p. 460
Melodrama (French: m;lodrame; from others- Greek: ;;;;; "song, poem, lyrical work" + ;;;;; "action") is a genre of fiction, theatrical art and cinematography, whose works reveal the spiritual and sensual world of heroes in especially vivid emotional circumstances based on contrasts: good and evil, love and hate and the like. As a rule, the plots of melodramas are concentrated around family themes (love, marriage, marriage, acquaintance, the vicissitudes of family life) and rarely go to other planes, although many melodramas have the features of historical dramas and unfold in one or another schematically presented historical context. There may be tragic scenes in the plot, in most cases ending with a happy ending. In melodrama, the emotional thickening of the text, the sharpness of the intrigue suppress the subtle development of characters who are usually stereotypical and behave predictably. Cinematic and theatrical melodramas are traditionally accompanied by musical numbers that emphasize the emotionality of the story.
Melodramas usually focus on dialogue, which is often bombastic or overly sentimental, rather than action. The characters are often simply drawn and may seem stereotypical. Melodramas tend to unfold in the private sphere of the home and focus on issues of morality and family, love and marriage, often with challenges from the outside, such as a "temptress", a scoundrel or an aristocratic villain. Melodrama on stage, in movies, or on television is usually accompanied by dramatic and thought-provoking music that offers cues to the audience of the drama presented.
In a scientific and historical musical context, melodramas are Victorian dramas.
Drama (Greek: ;;;;; "deed, action") is a literary (dramatic), scenic and cinematic genre. It became particularly widespread in the literature of the XVIII;XXI centuries, gradually replacing another genre of drama — tragedy, contrasting it mainly with a household plot and a style closer to everyday reality. With the advent of cinema, he also moved into this kind of art, becoming one of its most widespread genres.
"Unlike lyrics and like an epic, drama reproduces primarily the outside world — the relationships between people, their actions, and conflicts that arise. Unlike the epic, it has not a narrative, but a dialogical form. The aesthetic subject of the drama is the emotional and volitional reactions of a person manifested in verbal and physical actions. Dramatic works are characterized by acute conflict situations, imperiously prompting the character to verbal and physical action. Dramas specifically depict, as a rule, the private life of a person and his social conflicts. At the same time, the emphasis is often placed on universal contradictions embodied in the behavior and actions of specific characters.
As a literary genre, drama has stable subgenres:
Melodrama
Psychological drama
Petty-bourgeois drama (in the XVIII century)
The drama of the absurd
Symbolist Drama
An existential drama
The concept of "drama as a genre" (different from the concept of "drama as a kind of literature") is known in Russian literary studies. Thus, B. V. Tomashevsky writes:
"In the XVIII century. the number of "dramatic" genres is increasing. Along with strict theatrical genres, lower, "fairground" ones are put forward: Italian buffoonery comedy, vaudeville, parody, etc. These genres are the sources of modern farce, grotesque, operetta, miniature. Comedy splits apart, isolating from itself a "drama", i.e. a play with a modern household theme, but without the specific "comic" position ("petty-bourgeois tragedy" or "tear comedy"). <...> Drama decisively displaces other genres in the XIX century, in harmony with the evolution of the psychological and everyday novel."
"Symbolist drama is a drama based on the philosophical teachings of the German romantic idealists (neo—Romanticism), the attraction to mysticism, to individualistic self-absorption, the transition to the realm of illusory distractions.
The departure of playwrights from naturalism and impressionism to symbolism at the end of the XIX century, the beginning of the XX century was observed among writers who joined the naturalistic concept of drama at the beginning of their activity. Thus, G. Hauptman leaves the position of the social drama of the first period of his work and, starting with "Gannele" (1892), retreats into the world of illusory visions of "The Sunken Bell" (1896) and "Pippa Dances" (1906). A profound change is gradually outlined in the work of G. Ibsen, passing in the late 1880s and early 1890s. from a critical analysis of society to the creation of symbolic images of the last period of creativity ("The Wild Duck", 1884; "The Builder Solness", 1892; "When we, the Dead, Rise Again", 1899) and thereby paving the way for symbolist playwrights in Germany.
Withdrawal from reality, self-absorption and a craving for mysticism give rise to the disintegration of the drama into a number of lyrically saturated paintings; preference is given to a one-act play, a brief, musical-lyrical scene that frees itself from outlining external events and plunges into a "conflict-free human conscience" (Maeterlinck).
The technique of symbolist drama is most clearly developed in Maeterlinck's plays, for example, "The Blind" (1890), "Inside There" (1894), "Sister Beatrice" (1900), etc., where listening to "silence", "music of the soul" and "unconscious" is framed in a coherent system. Maeterlinck was also the main theorist of symbolist drama, aptly characterizing its features such as "progressive paralysis of external action", "secondary dialogue", revealing the mystical meaning hidden behind the spoken words, and the unreality of images that bring symbolist drama closer to the puppet theater (see Maeterlinck's writings, The Buried Temple, 1902, The Treasure of the Humble, 1897, Double Garden, 1904 and others).
Typical for symbolist drama is the retrospective use of plots that are readily borrowed from distant, aesthetically perceived epochs (for example, Renaissance and Venice of the XVIII century by Hofmannsthal) or drawn in the feudal Middle Ages (by Maeterlinck) from mystical legends and tales and framed in the form of a fairy tale extravaganza ("The Sunken Bell" by G. Hauptman).
The themes and images of withering, dying, sleep and death, favored in symbolist dramas, reveal the pessimism inherent in a social group that has lost faith in the solidity of existence and is doomed to inaction."
"Neo—Romanticism is a trend in art (primarily in literature) at the turn of the XIX—XX centuries, which arose as a reaction to the realistic and naturalistic trends of the second half of the XIX century. In the general sense of the word, it can be defined as the revival of literary sentiments of the first half of the XIX century in Europe (romanticism). It can be understood as an early phase or one of the currents of modernism.
The world of neo-romantic literature is full of surprises, adventures and dangers, but the most ordinary people act in it. The heroism of deeds is the desire to live life vividly, without losing respect for oneself ("Treasure Island" by R. L. Stevenson, "Captain Rip-Off" by L. Boussenard).
Neo-Romanticism turned out to be a very fruitful literary trend. In the 20th century, neo-romantic works continued to be created ("The Odyssey of Captain Blood" by R. Sabatini and "The Heir from Calcutta" by R. Stillmark).
The formation of neo-Romanticism was significantly influenced by the philosophy of Nietzsche and Schopenhauer, therefore, in the center of a neo-romantic work there is often a personality of special power, in which the authors emphasized one bright character trait (for example, Danko and Larra from the story of A.M. Gorky "The Old Woman Izergil", Captain Nemo from the novels of Jules Verne, Martin Eden from the novel of the same name by Jack London).
Among the prominent representatives of neo—Romanticism are such writers as Joseph Conrad, Ethel Lilian Voynich, Jack London, Henry Rider Haggard, Mayne Reed, Raphael Sabatini, Jules Verne, Arthur Conan Doyle, Henrik Ibsen, Selma Lagerlef, Knut Hamsun, Rudyard Kipling, Eino Leino, Edmond Rostand, Robert Stevenson, Hermann Hesse, Salome Neris; in Russia — early Maxim Gorky, Alexander Kuprin, Nikolai Gumilev, Alexander Green, Vladimir Nabokov."
Neo-Romantics also include some significant musicians of the 20th century.
"Genre (from the French genre, Latin. generis — "genus, species, tribe, generation") — "a community of artistic works that develops in the process of the historical development of art, based on their self-determination in terms of objective meaning as a result of the interaction of epistemological (cognitive) and axiological (evaluative) functions of artistic activity." Such a preliminary definition does not exhaust all aspects of the genre differentiation of works of art. The difficulty lies in the fact that the concept of "genre" is, as it were, outside any morphological system and, at the same time, refers to any of its components and system-forming connections." Genre // New encyclopedic Dictionary of Fine Arts. In 10 tons . (Russian). — St. Petersburg: ABC Classics, 2005. — Vol. III. — p. 623.
What is the stylistic affiliation of the novel?
This is clearly not a novel in the styles of realism and naturalism inherent in social drama. And this is another circumstance that does not allow its content to be considered a "historical source" in the literal sense. Another is the very feature of literature that distinguishes it from folklore -individual creativity, in which, quoting Fomin: "the personal author's view of each artist and his unique creative method are visible." The epic is characterized by the lack of personalization of heroes, as well as the fairy tale by the lack of psychology, the detail of characters, the epic is characterized by poetic language, the parable is allegorical, the fairy tale is figurative, symbolism. So what is the style of the novel? Called neo-Romanticism in philology. Literature in the 19th century (and the literary fairy tale) appeared precisely from the Romantics (even from "fairy tale collectors" like the Brothers Grimm), from the Jena romantics. And they are the same... the fathers of historicism- which, like literature, is always a subjective view (unlike the previous tradition based on the canon- which is why many works are not attributed, they are anonymous). Because of this, as Yu writes.Habermas in an article on modern architecture, in the first decades of the 19th century, the lack of a single style was especially acutely felt, until the recognition of the pluralism of styles came. But in history, the search began for some kind of "objective reality" with which to check, the categories of exact sciences are borrowed, where Newton's method of mechanics is mistakenly assumed to be identical to the scientific method in general. We are looking for "laws of social development", "patterns", "universal concepts". The artistic way of thinking, on the contrary, recognized quite early the possibility of a variety of vision. And yet there was no "big style", but there were several coexisting. What is neo-romanticism? The same eclecticism that is found in the 19th century: the combination of the realistic with explicit fantasy or symbolic.
A quote from M.B.Yampolsky: "a symbol is understood as a form of thought in which the distinction between a particular, special and universal, phenomenon and idea is removed. Goethe (who, as Spengler wrote, was always underestimated as a philosopher-my comment) wrote: "Symbolism turns a phenomenon into an idea, an idea into an image, and moreover in such a way that the idea always remains in the image infinitely effective and unattainable." And again: "In 1846. The architect (Viollet-le-Duc) wrote a small but important work "Gothic Style in the 19th century", which discussed the issue of the admissibility of the construction of Gothic-style buildings in the 19th century, which excited the Academy. Viollet-le-Duc admits that such buildings will be an anachronism, an "oddity", so they cannot, like Notre Dame, claim the status of a historical monument. They, the architect wrote, "will present a shocking contrast with everything that will be built, with everything that will happen around, and, by virtue of this contradiction alone, rising to the power of the monument, they will offend reason and taste..."
This "insult to reason," however, only works to the extent that Gothic is understood as a historically defined style. Viollet-le-Duc suggests looking at it from a different point of view. Gothic is not only the style of the Middle Ages, but also the most adequate expression of the spirit of religion. Having risen to the spirit, to the idea, Gothic loses historicism and becomes trans-historical.
But the most important thing here is the ability of reason and idea to transform a heterogeneous assemblage, the monster of historicism into its opposite. Historically, the deterministic turns into a symbol."
So, the ghost dog from the legend of the 17th century. -medieval superstition, at first it seems and shocks, looks like a monster, not contagious for the 19th century, contradicting everything that is happening around, but as an idea, for Stapleton it is an instrument of crime, the embodiment of his greed, for Doyle it is a symbol of the disintegration of the family, the same greed, that that it is impossible to escape from the past (literally as Sir Charles tried), it must be comprehended. Which, as E.Dobrenko showed on the example of Stalin's "historical" cinema (and Soviet historical science, Soviet literature) does not guarantee that this understanding will not create a new mythology (to folklore images-folk heroes of folk museums, and Stalin in the cult, you can add Robin Hood from the ballad, and modern "pop culture stars: who, on the one hand, are real persons, on the other hand, the product of a strange feature of collective consciousness -known for thousands of years according to the commandment: "do not create an idol for yourself...").
Perhaps this makes it difficult for us to perceive Holmes now: he has long become a character in popular culture in general, having gone beyond the Doyle cycle. Thanks to the first illustrators, and then to the screen images of world cinema, he even became an outwardly recognizable, almost replicated brand. Therefore, it is necessary to clarify which characters we are talking about: in the novel and its perception by the first readers in the Strand - passengers of the English railway or about a character of modern mass culture. And the novel seems to be the same mix of styles as architecture in the 19th century. Who made the evolution from romanticism with elements of folklore and realism to symbolism (which does not prevent Holmes from turning into a symbol of pop culture in a helmet and with a pipe and did not prevent his transformation into a kind of model of rational behavior and "communicative rationality", by the way, including the eccentricity attributed to people of science, continued the image of Einstein, in this mixing of a gentleman with his eccentric behavior, again, there is a certain eclecticism). In general, this is also a mystery: how can we perceive this eccentric as almost a standard gentleman (the KVN team from Odessa in the late 20th century, which produced the program "Gentleman Show" on Russian TV, dressed in the style of Holmes, armed with a pipe)- this is all the more so because manners and self-control, which are so important in England, are also mentioned in the text of the novel. But how can this eccentricity, and indeed the obvious "abnormality" (which, as Skonechnaya notes, was generally the subject of interest to writers at that time, many of whom were doctors themselves) of the heroes of the novel, again, literally be considered historical? As for the mixture of realism and fantasy, the same thing is in another Doyle cycle about Professor Challenger in The Lost World, in which an English professor meets living dinosaur lizards on a lost island in the ocean. Doyle's ideas spread in the 20th century: from "The Dog ..." to "An American Werewolf in London", "The Wolf Man", from "The Lost World" to "Jurassic Park", but Doyle's works themselves signified the beginning of the phenomenon of mass culture (where, contrary to E. Dobrenko's claims, clearly mythical characters coexist with really historical or plausible-in the same video games, and this is in addition to the mechanism shown by E. Dobrenko himself for turning myth into history (on the contrary, for turning history into myth).
Doyle's original text is imbued with irony characteristic of both his works and English literature in general. Doyle created at the end of the 19th century. the hero, who will be dubbed a "computing machine", is a super-rationalist, while it would seem that for the author himself Holmes is not at all a favorite character, Doyle was personally involved even, along with others involved in this fashion (for example, the last royal family in Russia with Papyrus, Badmaev or Rasputin at court) in the irrational, in spiritualism, into the occult (the royal family as Orthodox was alien to this, but psychics, and Badmaev or Papyrus were definitely not Orthodox). In print, Doyle seriously defended the possibilities of the new photography technique to capture intangible objects, the same ghosts. And in the original text, Doyle is ironic about Holmes, about his rationalism. In the Soviet translation, it is not uncommon for statements to seek to obscure the fact that Holmes is also a drug addict. But in reality, this is more typical for modern translations, but in Soviet they called things by their proper names. But what is hidden in both of them is just the irony of Holmes, the narrator Watson (and the narrative is written on his behalf) just constantly hits as if it were in the language of film texts-gaki, it is clear to the reader that Holmes is not quite a gentleman, to put it mildly (even in risky matters he for example, "I've never run like this before..." what does this mean, about the fearlessness of a hero or the endurance of a gentleman?). But in Soviet and Russian translations, Holmes is "an exemplary gentleman", "hero", "rationalist". The text becomes the same irony, but over Watson's stupidity-only he writes it... Watson himself. And self-irony is not a stupid person's trait at all. The Don Quixote-Sancho Panso pair breaks up in this translation. But it is she who serves as the prototype of Holmes-Watson, as in general the characteristics of the Cervantes novel for European literature (and not only literature in popular culture). Sancho Panso is funny, but he is not the author of the text in the novel, and Don Quixote is funnier, at least more ridiculous. It's the same with Doyle's lyrics about Holmes. And not just about Holmes. In general, his heroes are Holmes, Watson, Professor Challenger, Brigadier Gerard (an unknown hero of the past Napoleonic wars, but who performed quite a few feats)- they are such "weirdos". Holmes is no exception. It's all the more funny that they believed in him as a real story, a real hero. And it was just then that the translators and directors began to hone this very feature of him-to make him more and more "realistic". And in the reader's perception, he is already completely different than... in the original. Moreover, he turned not at all into a literary hero, even an "eternal hero" like Don Quixote, but into a cultural hero-that is, the hero of Doyle's text, and a movie hero and the "central exhibit" of his own museum... it is not distinguishable. And because the myth is that in the Russian translation it is hidden from readers that Holmes is a drug addict, it was hidden in the film adaptation of Maslennikov, but not in the Soviet translation. But both there and there, Holmes still appears to readers as a rationalist without the author's irony over the character.
But in the author's irony (the author is a spiritualist) over Holmes' rationalism, and over his supposedly deductive method, which only according to him, his bravado helps him solve crimes, and before which the police are powerless, without leaving the apartment... in fact, Doyle constantly sends Holmes to investigate, in the novel he even goes, hiding from everyone, to Dartmoor, to the swamp itself, to a cave, unlike Watson, who was visiting the manor. In this irony, there is certainly an echo of that philosophical dispute between rationalists on the continent (in particular in Germany-Kant, for example) and empiricists in Britain (Bacon with his "Experiments", Newton with his method of experiment, which was generally identified with scientific). Holmes is a logician, a propagandist of deduction, but in fact forced... analyze observations all the time. That is, from a rationalist in the scientific sense... to turn into an empiricist. But Doyle, the author, is in no hurry to align himself with either of them. He is generally a man of science, medicine, on the one hand, and art and literature on the other. Although this opposition is far-fetched, but before the pragmatic turn in philosophy in the mid-20th century. after Kant, it was a common misconception. And Doyle, as a person with a developed artistic imagination, gave himself entirely to the fantasy world, in his works, he wrote not only historical stories, not only detective stories, but also mystical stories (and here they were practically unknown in the USSR, as well as strange for the propagandist of the rational method, as he began to be considered in the science-oriented Soviet culture, his journalistic speeches in defense of "haunted photographs", biographies mentioning this were first translated and published in the USSR only during the period of perestroika). But the division of the two directions in European philosophy into rationalists and empiricists, as the same Kanke writes, has not sunk into oblivion until now. Moreover, the entire scientific history, as it was and remains in Russia as a successor to the German one (and that was based on Kant's philosophy, on German idealistic philosophy in general, on Marxism, which, as the same Kanke showed, also remained in the position of idealism, contrary to declarative statements), it so organically absorbed the position of rationalism that This made it possible, among other things, to engage in "anti-scientific mythology", "propaganda doctrinaire", or "empty aestheticism". That is why there is a gap between the "exact sciences", which continued the position of empiricists from Newton, Bacon, and the humanities. Of course, this is not a specifically Russian phenomenon, but in Russia, during the Soviet period, it was naturally (if you came to self-restraint, to scholasticism and dogmatism) developed from... rationalism. After all, rationalism has nothing to do with realism, it is closer to abstractions-to logic and mathematics, it is generally about the procedure of cognition, and if you do not engage in reflection, then you can become like "priests", as Ranke, the father of scientific history (philologist by education). Empiricists therefore believed that rationalists were unjustifiably introducing their abstractions into science as fundamental. But the lack of reflection on the methods and boundaries of cognition - reliance on observation and experiment, is just as harmful as focusing only on thinking, ignoring sensory mechanisms, is just as ridiculous as attempts to replace the everyday with scientific (this resulted in the cultural character of the "absent-minded professor"), as well as disregard for ethics (for example, after the contribution of scientists to the creation of weapons of mass destruction). The way out of this, of course, is not in the oblivion of science, which is impossible in principle, not in regression into superstition and religion, or the transformation of history into quackery with moralizing (always tipped into the past from modernity) or the "foresight", indistinguishable for the reader, on the contrary (no matter how much one talks about the causes of the First World War-and the author, and the reader is "well aware" that she is a fact of history, but for the same reasons... another question), and as Kanke shows "in the recognition of concepts based on thinking and the sensual", the conceptual basis of the scientific, the return of ethics to scientific disciplines, which became possible after a pragmatic turn in the philosophy of science. But for the culture of the USSR, this is a different situation: a linguistic turn, a pragmatic turn, the return of science to aesthetics and ethics, to history, reflection on the topics of scientific knowledge, historical knowledge, the situation of postmodernism in culture, all this seemed not to exist in Soviet philosophy, science and culture.
Yandex Zen
Alexander Sedov
Their view of our Holmes is 17
December 12, 2020
The research is apparently authored by an American student (undergraduate or even, perhaps, graduate student). Eran SPIVAK approached the matter in an extraordinary way and tried to look at the film "The Dog of the Baskervilles" (1981) directed by Igor Maslennikov through the eyes of socialist realism (to the best of his ideas). The review is small and, in fact, is a fragment of a larger work.
The circumstances of the existence of this text seem mysterious to me. Or rather, his current absence from the network. I fished out Eran Spivak's review from the Internet a few years ago, and, as expected, copied the link to the work. Nowadays, this link does not lead anywhere. The site has moved to a new address, and the original text cannot be found through search engines. Usually, the traces of the authors of the reviews of our "Holmes" are easy to find - you can find their profiles and publications on other sites. But not in the case of Eran Spivak. Perhaps the reason is that the Russian Studies program at the University of California recommends its graduates to specific US institutions - for example, the NSA (National Security Agency) and the Ministry of Defense
Social Realism and the Hound of the Baskervilles
Comparing and contrasting the image of Jack Stapleton in two film adaptations
The author of the review: Eran SPIVAK, a student at the University of California (the text was written as part of the Russian Studies Program in December 2010) - the original link to the English text
/ translation - A.S./
The core of the plot, if we are talking about a detective, should be a villain or a criminal who is able to keep a significant part of the story in suspense, successfully countering the detective, shading and complementing him – only in this way the reader will believe more in a confusing and complex mystery, and the detective will turn into a figure necessary for solving the crime. The presence of a cunning and determined villain is what makes the detective strain all his strength to solve the problem; if it all came down to some tramps or hooligans, then there simply would not be enough material for a fascinating and exciting detective story. Many writers have had a hand in formulating a set of principles and rules for the detective genre. One of the most notable works of this kind – "Twenty Rules for writing detective stories" was published by the famous writer Willard Huntington Wright under the pseudonym S. S. Van Dyne. Among other things, Wright notes that a good murder story should focus on a crime that is committed by one character out of rational motives and to achieve some undisclosed motive or purpose.
The villain must be cunning and clever, but by no means a professional in such crimes, and as a character he must play such a key role in the development of the plot so that the reader, delving into the plot, empathizes more and more with the rest of the characters. In similar rules formulated by Grobius Shortling and Ronald Knox, it is added that the criminal must appear at the beginning of the story, and it is unacceptable for the author to put a villain who just happened to be at his fingertips as the main suspect. "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by Arthur Conan Doyle is an excellent example of strict adherence to the canons of the detective genre, all the basic requirements are met here, which are well interconnected. Over the long years of the cinema's existence, this story has been repeatedly transferred to the screen. Against the background of all film adaptations, the 1981 Soviet film most closely follows the original source, thus better preserving the original character of the story. This is one of the last Soviet films created before the period of Glasnost and perestroika, which dramatically changed the nature of the Soviet media and cinema; The Soviet "Hound of the Baskervilles" is a perfect example of a combination of detective fiction and socialist realism in the depiction of a villain on the screen.
It should be noted that in numerous attempts to develop a definition of the detective genre, stories about Sherlock Holmes are always referred to as a key point. It is logical to assume that the stories where Holmes appears should be examples of style. The Hound of the Baskervilles is no exception. This story is masterfully written – and it is easy to read, and is perceived rather not as a detective story, but as an eyewitness's diary. There are not many places where the narrative is conducted in the third person, in most cases the characters themselves tell their stories, so the narrator does not need to constantly push the plot forward. The criminal side of the story centers around the death of the head of the wealthy Baskerville family. The unusual circumstances of his death prompt Sherlock Holmes to immediately take up the case, which must be resolved as soon as possible due to the arrival of the new heir of the Baskervilles at the family estate. As Holmes and Watson conduct their investigation, we get to know a variety of characters. The butler, the escaped convict and other characters all come under suspicion, as the plot throws up new clues from time to time. In the end, the plot leads us to meet Jack Stapleton, the main villain, whose sharp insight combined with determination and willingness to resort to any means makes him the most formidable enemy for Holmes and Watson. Despite the fact that at the end, Stapleton still suffers defeat, Holmes treats him with extreme seriousness, so in this regard, Stapleton is a successful villain.
The film adaptations of this story vary greatly in their scope, pictorial solution and correspondence to the original plot. The British version of 1959 takes a rather original approach to the story, turning it into a psychological horror tale mixed with jealousy and revenge. Perhaps, from the point of view of a horror film, everything turned out well (as you know, opinions vary depending on the tastes of the audience). However, due to the fact that the general intonation and the nature of the plot have been changed, certain aspects related to purely detective intrigue have disappeared from the film. The characters have become more flat and one-dimensional, their roles have become isolated, separated from each other. It feels like Holmes and Watson are investigating less and less themselves, and more and more of them are plotting themselves, throwing evidence for the convenience of the characters. As a result, the nuances that are so necessary for a real villain and an ideal enemy capable of resisting Sherlock Holmes have disappeared from the image of Jack Stapleton. There were weaknesses in Stapleton's character – jealousy, arrogance and some kind of irrationality. He is all pale and awkward, in short, by his nature he approaches the type of offended marginal personalities. The audience has nothing to respect or fear him for, rather they will pity Stapleton or feel disgusted with him. It is clear that he is a villain, but not a worthy enemy, and against the background of the brave Holmes and Watson, he looks more like a scourge. Contrary to detective rules, this Jack Stapleton behaves absurdly, he has fits of rage (which eventually leads the villain to defeat), which, it should be noted, turn out to be very useful, as they help to unravel the woven network prepared for the main characters.
Unlike the British version, in the 1981 Soviet film adaptation, everything about the original source is left intact. The film runs for about three hours, so we can look at the characters themselves in much more detail. Jack Stapleton is played by Nikita Mikhalkov (so in the text, – A. S. note), a Russian actor and director who is widely recognized for playing psychologically diverse and complex roles rich in nuances. And it is possible that this role was played so successfully due to the fact that the Soviet film adaptation involves subtle references to socialist realism. Jack Stapleton is shown to be cunning and astute. He is young, attractive, and full of healthy energy, which makes him "related" to Holmes and Watson. It seems that he is even a little younger than Holmes, and in his energy, rather, closer to Watson. On a subconscious level, it symbolizes the subtle penetration of Western values into the Soviet system. While Holmes and Watson are completely absorbed in revealing the true background of a terrible crime, and the rightful heir to the family fortune settles into a new place, Jack Stapleton is introduced onto the scene as a hero ready to go to his goal without choosing means (which completely coincides with the image of capitalism portrayed in the Soviet media as greedy ruthless and insatiable in his aspirations).
From the point of view of the Russian layman, Stapleton, as a character endowed with cunning and intelligence, is an image of capitalism quite convincing and quite seductive. On the other hand, Sir Charles is presented in the film as an ideal communist member of society: he prefers to act only within the framework of the law, and at the same time would like to make sure that the small community that has formed around his estate, including the castle staff, hired detectives, new neighbors who moved out of the city, still there was (thus emphasizing the socialist idea of the responsibility of one member of society to another).
The classical German and pre-revolutionary Russian view of history as the history of the state, institutions of law, government and modern as the history of the development of public institutions. Since the second half of the 20th century, the study of mentality (not quite adequately translated into Russian as "worldview"). The class approach (not Soviet Marxism). Economism determined by geography, climate (Soviet Marxism) and mentality (non-Soviet). The anthropological approach (Soviet non-Marxism). The history of science, technology, culture, fashion, morality, and everyday life are popular research areas today.
Any even very useful method for studying history is usually useful as long as they do not begin to replace all other methods of historical analysis, especially to contrast them with all others.
And, at the heart of the formal logical procedures: identification of: causes and details (i.e. analysis), the use of comparison and analogies (i.e. synthesis). And traditional historical criticism is a set of techniques that a historian uses in order to distinguish truth from falsehood in historical evidence.
Usually, historical criticism is divided into external and internal. Under external criticism, if the authenticity of the source is established, it is very often necessary to solve questions about the time and place of its origin, about its author, whether it is the original source or borrowings from some other source, etc.
From this external criticism, it is necessary to distinguish internal criticism, which consists in deciding in what relation the news contained in the sources are to the actual facts, that is, whether these news can be considered completely reliable, or only probable, or whether the very possibility of the reported facts should be rejected. The main issues are solved here by examining the internal dignity of the sources, depending on the nature of the sources themselves, on the individuality of the author, on the influences of place and time. At the same time, it is very often necessary to verify the reliability of some sources by others, and many sources about the same fact may, to a greater or lesser extent, either coincide with each other or contradict each other.
"Modern history is
close to the definitions of critical theory -
a number of approaches, trends and (theoretical) discourses, closely examining and criticizing society and culture, based on knowledge from the social and humanitarian sciences, as well as on the growing inter-/transdisciplinarity
he Marx "developed the concept of a special type of theoretical knowledge, the key characteristics of which were [...] interdisciplinarity and practical-political "engagement
In the broadest sense, it does not denote any specific "theory or holistic research program, but refers to a variety of (theoretical) discourses" that differ "in their origin, content, orientation, etc." Among such discourses, Marxism, the Frankfurt school, psychoanalysis, poststructuralism, feminism, postcolonialism, multiculturalism are usually called, studies of racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, colonialism, etc. Each critical project (the project of critical theory) asserts and considers itself "as the most effective means of exposing ideological mechanisms.
The discursive diversity of "critical theories" is associated with so-called cultural studies, the leitmotif of which is "consideration of cultural phenomena in the aspect of their organizing relations of domination and subordination related to gender, class, racial, etc. differences," and cultural forms, phenomena and processes are not considered as secondary formations, "dependent on institutional forms or on political or economic organization", but as "dynamic forces"
Another understanding of critical theory goes back to theoretically saturated literary criticism, where literature and the text as a whole are considered not so much in terms of the conceptual perspective of the author's intentions, "but in terms of the ideological, rhetorical, aesthetic structure of the text and the culture in which it was produced."
The modern dictionary of V.A.Kanke characterizes the scholastic method in this way: "the scholastic method usually contained the stages of etymological, semantic, conceptual and speculative analysis. At the stage of etymological analysis, the origin of words and their meanings were discussed. Semantic analysis, especially when it came to sacred texts, was aimed at moralizing. The conceptual analysis involved clarifying the course of thought of the authors of the works. At the speculative stage, the consequences of what was learned were clarified, and knowledge was systematized... During the Soviet years, the development of philosophy and social sciences was artificially restrained. Minor criticism of F. was allowed.Engels, but not to K. Marx and especially V.I. Lenin." Modern science owes much to scholasticism for the development of formal logic.
But it is precisely this as a method that is to blame in that situation, as Yu wrote.In the text of his speech at the All-Russian Founding Conference of the Association of Participants in Russian-American Exchange Programs "Professionalism, Education, Morality and the Future of Russia" (Moscow, May 31-June 1, 1997): "It is usually considered that two factors are decisive for establishing strong relations of cooperation between our humanities scientists and foreign colleagues: material the basis and proficiency in the language of their partners... But I would still like to mention here one more factor, the importance of which should not be underestimated: the historically established differences in the traditions of scientific discourse in our country and in the United States...
Hardly anyone today will seriously challenge the fact that the integration of Russian humanities and humanities education into the general global stream, despite the fall of the Iron Curtain, still continues to experience serious difficulties. They are largely due to the well-known meager state funding for education and science, the plight of our libraries, the lack of qualified specialists in advanced fields of humanitarian knowledge, and its low public prestige. This state of affairs is also aggravated by the historical and political circumstance that for decades the USSR was artificially isolated from the Western world. As a result of this isolation, a situation has arisen where not only certain areas of humanitarian thought, but also, in a certain sense, the new language of science itself, which developed in the West in the second half of the 20th century, has to be mastered in Russia only now. As an example, we can cite the deconstructionist methodology of analysis and the conceptual apparatus associated with it, which are currently extremely common in human sciences in the United States, but still remain little known to Russian teachers and students."
The epistemological innovations of the last decades of the 20th century, which dramatically changed the very face of humanitarian knowledge, are usually associated with the so-called "linguistic turn" and are more often referred to as "postmodernism". The rapid expansion of these innovations from literary studies and philosophical linguistics into other humanities is quite obvious today. The attention of scientists is increasingly focused on a special study of the processes of intellectual creativity, on specific linguistic forms, writing and speech, on verbal and non-verbal texts, their perception by the reader, and finally, on the researcher's self-reflection. All of this fully applies to modern Western historical science, whose appearance has changed significantly over the past thirty years.
For now, we can only state that the understanding of the influence of postmodern methodology on the "craft of the historian" (no matter with a plus or minus sign) has only just begun and that for most researchers it still continues to remain far from their daily pursuits an obscure exotic. In this regard, it is difficult not to agree with the opinion of Yu.N.Afanasyev, who noticed back in the mid-1990s that the changes that took place in world historiography at the end of the 20th century are still perceived with great difficulty.
And yet, surprisingly, another alternative has been realized. As it turns out, Yu himself.In those years, Zaretsky probably did not differ much from the general environment, speaking about the "extreme prevalence" of American deconstructivism, which had such in the 70s, and by the 90s was significantly displaced by the "new historicism". These are really theories and methods from literary studies, and they are directly related to the topic of my work, so we will talk about them in more detail yet. In the meantime, I would like to end the purely historical topic with the amazing fact that the alternative that has really begun to be realized is both the fantastic and the desired one that Yu spoke about.Zaretsky, indeed, some positive aspects of the old Soviet higher school, focused not so much on narrow specialization as on erudition in general, turned out to be more clearly visible.
Art historian Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya in her "critical and methodological essay" "for the success of research" advises a "systematic approach to it": "There are different definitions of the concept of "system". I rely on the original meaning of this Greek word-a whole consisting of parts, a compound. But I am not referring to the systematic approach that is identified with structuralism. Considering a subject, a phenomenon as a set of interrelated elements is one side of this approach. When studying the historical process, another is more important. The main thing is the perception of each studied object as part of the whole-of that time and the environment to which it belonged, as an element (subsystem) of a higher system in relation to it, which, in turn, is a link of another."
I understand this in such a way that historical information from a literary work must be considered precisely as part of information about that era, which is evidenced by both the literary work and the literary work itself must be understood as part of the kind of literature to which it belongs, as part of the national literature in the language of which it is written, in a word, there is something more behind the historical and literary in the relationship -with history in general, with historical sources specific to a given era, and with the history of literature, with other works of the same genre, the same era, not necessarily written in the same language. This is certainly a valuable, necessary approach to research, without which it would not represent anything -I would not be able to extract information from it if I did not know the history of the issue from other sources and other literature. I suppose a literary work is still not the main type of historical source when there are others. But on the other hand, in history itself, in the history of literature, there are precedents when exactly one or two literary works remain from the entire historical epoch. What would have happened if there had been nothing left of Victorian England but Doyle's story?.. Maybe a real disaster. But there are precedents... for example, the poems of Homer and the most ancient period of history, forgive me for the tautology of Ancient Greece.
"With a systematic approach," says Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya, "the researcher realizes his work as a link in the knowledge system. Considering the studied object as an element of a higher system gives the work the status of a study of a part of that higher integrity, moreover, it requires a more or less clear idea of its structure. All this provides not a "tunnel vision", but a wide overview, prevents errors that are inevitable when examining the subject in isolation,"-here I propose to use other well-known information as an indicator of the correctness of reasoning and conclusions, and a systematic approach can be compared with a wide-angle photographic lens. "In order to master a systematic approach," Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya continues, "we need systematic thinking. Consistency in one way or another has always been characteristic of people's thinking and activity, otherwise it would be impossible to develop human society (one of the naive forms is folk signs, an attempt to introduce a "system" into natural and other phenomena)... If consistency is not inherent in the genes, it can be developed. You need to train yourself to perceive every fact as an element of a whole... If you allow yourself a paradox, you can say: in order to be capable of research, you need to preserve some childishness of thinking. I mean the well-known children's questions: "Why?", "Why?", "And before?", "And then?". The answers to these questions will put the encountered fact, the phenomenon in the appropriate system, and present it in the existing connections." And, of course, about erudition: "the education of systematic thinking is at the same time the education of the associative, logical memory necessary for the researcher." And: "for a historian, there is no superfluous knowledge (you need to read a lot), their abundance protects against one-sidedness in assessment… But it is important ... only a systematic approach gives genuine erudition-not as knowledge of individual facts (I will add on my own -so that the entire educational process could be replaced, as suggested in the children's detective story by A. Rybakov, his hero, by reading reference books, encyclopedias), but also as an understanding of the connections between them." And, most importantly: "a systematic approach dictates the appropriate methodology of work at all stages, from the beginning to the completion of the study. The research topic is always the system, too. It has a basic, central question and auxiliary ones, the solution of which is necessary to answer the central one. The object of research, considered as a system, suggests a system of required knowledge ... Only a systematic approach allows you to master the entire set of useful literature and necessary sources." My work, in no case, while following a systematic approach, will still not constitute an equivalent replacement for the encyclopedia of Victorian England, precisely due to the fact that I am obliged to consciously limit myself only to the information that is available in a literary work, and for the sake of the information itself, and to test the ability of literary works to be a historical source the epochs much closer to the present, when there are definitely a lot of special sources, so that literature and art were neglected for a long time, but it can also be a source ... And within the framework of a systematic approach, it is the encyclopedism of information, but in connection with the novel, it will allow the work itself to possibly become part (with a systematic approach) of the complex of necessary literature. My task in this way is to test the question of the ability of the source, methods (and the researcher, of course), to expand information about the era under study, precisely by what is reflected in the literature that gave rise to it.
"It is the systematic approach that brings success and pleasure. The pleasure of successfully and relatively easily overcoming difficulties is also aesthetic. Correctness and expediency have aesthetic value, as well as the very truthful reflection of historical reality," concludes Ira Fedorovna Petrovskaya. So Doyle's literary device, mentioned as a literary device, serves in historical research, where it is also widely used, for essentially the same tasks-harmony. "At the same time, thanks to the sources identified as a result of this approach, a lot of unknown and previously incorrectly illuminated things have always been discovered," I.F.Petrovskaya sums up in the whole chapter of her essay, which is called the "Systematic Approach".
Kirill Kobrin. Sherlock Holmes and the Birth of Modernity
Kobrin K.R. Sherlock Holmes and the birth of modernity: Money, girls, dandies of the Victorian era. - St. Petersburg: Ivan Limbach Publishing House, 2017. - 184 p.
"Sherlock Holmes and the Birth of Modernity" by Kirill Kobrin is a view of the world created by Conan Doyle as a projection of the Victorian era. The stories of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson turn out to be a kind of encyclopedia of life during the times of heroic capitalism and the triumph of British colonialism. The author analyzes the adventures of the famous detective in the context of various types of social consciousness and behavior. Colonial wars, political intrigues, the formation of a market economy, banks, scams, crime, technological progress and social injustice, the status of women, theaters, entertainment, household culture, public transport and the press – the whole world of the nascent modern era, all aspects of life in multinational London, the capital of a huge empire, the first metropolis in modern history are reflected in events that Conan Doyle makes the Baker Street apartment the center of."
In Soviet literary criticism, detective stories in general, and even Doyle's classic ones, were difficult to find among the topics for research. It was considered low, and not a classic at all, fiction. But from the point of view of "pure science": any cultural phenomenon can and should be the subject of study, especially a work that has not lost its popularity over a hundred years, is most often filmed, and stood at the beginning of the phenomenon of mass culture. One of the first in Russian, not literary, but historical, was the study of Kobrin. At the time of the first publication, the topic itself was considered eccentric. But his monograph paved the way for the analysis of Doyle and "Holmsiana" in particular, by others, including me.
The novel was published at a time when a little more than 10 years had passed after the tragedy in Mayerling, and a country in which there was a free press, and about a hero who liked to show his insight: why would he, in relation to the time of action, not hint at "the strange circumstances of the death of the young heir of the old monarch of one of the the oldest dynasties of Europe" (which, by the way, is very similar to the plot of the novel as a whole), especially if in the same novel he "provides services to the Pope", and his relative "serves in the Foreign Office".
Perhaps, if, after all, at the beginning of the 20th century. the tragedy in Mayerling was still unknown to the general reader, then the absence of a hint of it in the story of 1902 cannot serve as a strong proof that there is no connection with the real "historical reality" in it. But theoretically, any literary text does not set such a task, and is always more a product of the creative imagination of the author than historical evidence, this is all the more understandable if we take into account the problem of subjectivity in historical monographs themselves (that is, scientific historical research).
It is known from other sources that photography at the turn of the century was marked by the fashion for staged photos with ghosts, the story is part of this kind of interest. But the reader will not learn anything about this from the novel itself. Victorian photography seriously discussed the possibility of transferring images of a non-material world and now there is a lot of such "horror" on the Internet. But it is interesting that all this is about film photography, and now, with the many times increased possibilities of digital, we do not notice this.
The mores of the 19th century. in the USA, as with the conviction of spouses, the wife was usually not executed, and as the first serial killer, already convicted as a widow, went to execution in a wedding dress, hoping maybe someone would marry her, a reflection of former realities -mostly single men or married women with official husbands went to the colony administration, military. That's why Stapleton married a Creole.
Doyle describes the family tradition, the family portrait gallery, the ancestral manor, the relationship between servants and masters over generations... but Doyle is not an aristocrat, he simply stylizes the plot for the life of the English lower, but aristocracy, which was both numerous and had long been the object of all sorts of gossip (Austin: "Baronets kidnap girls"). But stylization is stylization. How can it be the source of the life of the English provincial lower in the hierarchy of the nobility of the nobility at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Holmes would seem to rationally hit the nail on the head, arguing ironically about the power of the "devil", its spatial limitations, but in the Russian classics there is a story "An Enchanted Place" in which this power is much spatially smaller than even the parish of a priest (Gogol from "Evening on a Farm near Dikanka"), and this was fed by folklore, his superstitions. So Mortimer is more knowledgeable in terms of, if not communication with the "dark forces", then in the knowledge of folklore or folk superstitions. But Holmes's remark is not identical to the opinion of the author (the creator and Mortimer), he describes the dialogue of his characters (and even through his other hero, Watson, he is the narrator in the novel), in which he is not obliged to take anyone's position.
In a novel, a work of literature with its own laws, artistic fantasy plays a major role. However, the novel is part of modern culture in a broad sense.
"The era of modernity, modernity, sometimes modern (from the English modernity — modernity; modern — modern) is a concept meaning a society changed as a result of the establishment of capitalism, industrialization, urbanization, secularization, the development of state institutions and civil society. Such a society is contrasted with traditional society and postmodern society.
The following signs of a modernized society can be distinguished:
In a modernized society, people begin to act rationally in all areas of life, while in a traditional society, people act as their fathers and grandfathers did.
In a modernized society, both physical and social mobility of the population is quite high. In a traditional society, its members usually live the same way as their fathers and grandfathers. In a modernized society, a person often lives in a different place from where he was born, has a different profession than his father, and belongs to a different social group.
In a modernized society, a person must have the ability to adapt to a changing environment. It sets a new rhythm of life. So, peasants usually work hard only when performing seasonal agricultural work, they themselves determine the time of work and rest. But when a peasant moves to the city and becomes an employee, he has to work hard every day at the same pace. Politicians and entrepreneurs are forced to react quickly to changes in the external environment. A person is forced to adapt to a new environment, if he has lost a source of livelihood in the old place, he needs to establish contacts with people unfamiliar to him, get used to new spiritual values characteristic of the society into which he has joined.
In a modernized society, there are mechanisms that ensure the resumption of economic growth after any crisis. In a traditional society, economic growth either does not exist at all, or occurs so slowly that over the course of many generations, people's income levels and lifestyles remain virtually unchanged.
The modernized society differs from the traditional one by a sufficiently high level of civic culture of the masses, which creates prerequisites for democracy. In traditional societies, authoritarian rule is typical. Although democratic societies existed both in antiquity (Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome) and in the Middle Ages (urban communes), but only a smaller part of the population usually participated in political life in them, they were unstable, constantly being attacked by populist tyrants supported by the masses."
In historical chronology, the novel is part of late Victorian literature.
"The Victorian Era (1837-1901) was the period of the reign of Victoria, Queen of the British Empire, Ireland and India.
The Victorian era appears heterogeneous, as it is characterized by rapid changes in many areas of society: technological, demographic shifts, changes in political and social perception. Such active and constant changes in the sphere of economic and spiritual life were caused by the absence of large-scale wars (which allowed Great Britain to develop intensively), fear of disaster from the outside, and throughout the period interest in religious issues remained, there was a rapid development of scientific thought and self-discipline of the human personality.
In the field of economics, the industrial revolution and the development of capitalism continued during this period. In foreign policy, Britain's colonial expansion continued in Asia (the "Big Game") and Africa (the "fight for Africa").
The social image of the era is characterized by a strict moral code (gentlemanliness), which consolidated conservative values and class differences, romanticism and mysticism. The demographic situation has undergone major changes: the number of inhabitants of England and Wales has grown from 16.8 million in 1851 to 30.5 million by 1901; the population of Scotland has also grown from 2.8 million in 1851 to 4.4 million by 1901, and in Ireland the population has significantly decreased from 8.2 million in 1841 to less than 4.5 million by 1901, due to emigration and the Great Famine of 1845-1849[4]. During the period 1837-1901, about 15 million people emigrated from Great Britain (mainly to the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa).
Although the Victorians did not manage to cope with the problem of poverty, the social and economic achievements of the era were significant. Mass production led to the emergence of new types of products, and the standard of living gradually increased. The development of production opened up new professional opportunities — for example, the growing demand for typists allowed a significant number of literate women to get a job for the first time in their lives. A new type of transport — trains — transported employees from the city home to the suburbs every day, and workers every weekend on excursions to the coast, which over time became an invariable attribute of the English way of life.
Despite the huge changes, the Victorian era did not shake the confidence and optimism of the nation. The British believed that they could and should maintain the status of a leading world power, and only the beginning of the First World War made them doubt this.
Victorian Morality
The society was dominated by values professed by the middle class and supported by both the Anglican Church and the opinion of the bourgeois elite. The values and energy of the middle class formed the basis of all the achievements of the Victorian era.
Sobriety, punctuality, diligence, economy and economy were valued even before Victoria's reign, but it was in her era that these qualities became the dominant norm. The example was set by the queen herself: her life, completely subordinated to duty and family, was strikingly different from the lives of her two predecessors. Most of the aristocracy followed her example, abandoning the flashy lifestyle of the previous generation. So did the skilled part of the working class.
Middle—class people believed that prosperity was a reward for virtue and, therefore, losers did not deserve a better fate. The extreme puritanism of family life gave rise to feelings of guilt and hypocrisy."
If we distinguish between the "culture of shame" and the "culture of guilt", then the old baronet remained in the "culture of shame", he never articulated the cause of his fears as "guilt". Curiously, according to legend, and a reference to the Bible, the curse ended long ago-by the beginning of the 19th century. As well as the fact that the transfer of individual guilt to generations of descendants contradicts the ideas of civil law, within which, for example, Holmes was completely involved in the search for the criminal (but due to insufficient evidence, "reincarnation" clearly not from the code again turned out to be "one of the most important" for him). Hugo fully corresponds to the "culture of shame", when he chased after the girl he had stolen, called on the forces of evil to help himself, he was guided by ideas of dishonor, as they say, the fugitive escaped from him. He did not understand this as a crime, as his own "guilt", which required Holmes to investigate his descendant, if not to separate these two crimes, as the curse does. The curse unites the family, and paradoxically makes Sir Henry's hereditary rights more legitimate.
If you understand this story as unrelated at all... to a commemorative story, that is, using the past for the purposes of the present, turning the past into a ritual, Mortimer presents a manuscript allegedly given to him by an old baronet, talks about fears as the doctor of an old baronet, tells about the traces he has only seen, seeks advice from Holmes-that is, in full accordance with the commemorative idea of the past legitimizes Sir Henry has inherited Baskerville Hall, and Holmes, out of habit, searches for and finds the criminal (although without convincing evidence for a jury trial). This reading of the novel is more than convincing, but the intrigue completely disappears from it, the principle of explanation is violated, which brings satisfaction to the reader. But I didn't change anything in his plot.
Prominent writers of the Victorian era are Charles Dickens, William Makepeace Thackeray, Anthony Trollope, the Bronte sisters, Conan Doyle, Rudyard Kipling and Oscar Wilde; poets — Alfred Tennyson, Robert Browning and Matthew Arnold, pre—Raphaelite artists.
British children's literature is forming and reaching its heyday with a characteristic departure from direct didacticism towards nonsense and "harmful advice": Lewis Carroll, Edward Lear, William Rands. Another trend in painting of this era, which reflected the development of the English literary fairy tale of this time, is Victorian fairy tale painting (representatives: Richard Dudd, John Anster Fitzgerald, Mark Lancelot Simons).
In the field of architecture, the Victorian era was marked by the widespread trend of historicism, especially Neo-Gothic. In English-speaking countries, the term "Victorian architecture" is used to refer to this period.
The Victorian era in the periodization of history is usually limited to the New time from the Latest.
The New Age, or New History, is a period in the history of mankind, located between the Middle Ages and Modern times. The concept of "New History" appeared in Italy during the Renaissance, as an element of the three-pronged division of history into ancient, middle and new proposed by humanists. The criterion for determining the "new age", its "novelty" in comparison with the previous era, was, from the point of view of humanists, the flourishing of secular science and culture during the Renaissance, that is, not a socio-economic, but a spiritual and cultural factor. However, this period is contradictory in its content: the High Renaissance, Reformation and humanism coexisted with a surge of irrationalism, the development of demonology, a phenomenon that has received the name "witch hunt" in literature.
The concept of "New Time" was perceived by historians and established in scientific usage, but its meaning remains largely conditional — not all peoples entered this period at the same time. One thing is certain: in this period of time, there is the emergence of a new civilization, a new system of relations, a Eurocentric world, a "European miracle" and the expansion of European civilization to other parts of the world.
As a rule, in Soviet historiography, within the framework of the formation theory, its beginning was associated with the English Revolution of the middle of the XVII century, which began in 1640. Other events that are accepted as the starting point of the New Age include events related to the Reformation (1517), the discovery of the New World by the Spaniards in 1492 and the fall of Constantinople (1453).
Consideration of events related to the New Age ends with the First World War (1914-1918)[3].
Within the Modern era, two sub-stages are usually distinguished, their boundary is the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the beginning of the work of the Congress of Vienna.
The "Long XIX century" is a historical period that lasted, according to the British Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm, who singled it out, from 1789 to 1914 (Ilya Ehrenburg called the same time frame of the XIX century as a historical, not calendar, period in his works and memoirs). Its main feature was the dominance of empires in the world. The beginning of this period is the Great French Revolution, and the end is the First World War, as a result of which the German, Russian, Austro—Hungarian and Ottoman Empires were liquidated. Eric Hobsbawm writes about this period in the books "The Age of Revolutions: Europe 1789-1848", "The Age of Capital: Europe 1848-1875" and "The Age of Empires: Europe 1875-1914".
Hobsbawm also popularized the concept of the "Short twentieth Century" (1914-1991).
Eric John Ernest Hobsbawm (eng. Eric John Ernest Hobsbawm; June 9, 1917, Alexandria — October 1, 2012, London) was a British Marxist historian, best known for his works on the "long XIX Century" ("The Age of Revolutions: Europe 1789-1848", "The Age of Capital: Europe 1848-1875" and "The Age of Empires: Europe 1875-1914") and "the short XX century" ("The Era of extremes. The Short twentieth Century 1914-1991"), a theorist and critic of nationalism.
Periodization of history is a special kind of systematization, which consists in the conditional division of the historical process into certain chronological periods. These periods have certain distinctive features, which are determined depending on the chosen basis (criterion) of periodization. A variety of reasons can be chosen for periodization: from a change in the type of thinking (O. Comte, K. Jaspers) to a change in communication methods (M. McLuhan) and environmental transformations (J. Goodsblom). Many scientists use economic and production criteria to create periodization: These are both socio-economic relations and means of production (Marxist theory of formations) and the main sphere of production (theory of industrial and post-industrial society; periodization according to the principles of production by L. E. Grinin).
The West of the Modern era: the mechanism of imprinting experience and modernity in literature (historicism) and its cultural-forming functions in the modernization of society (detraditionalization, rational communication).
"Modernity" - a new awareness of time ("The Dog of the Baskervilles" by Doyle; "historical novel" of the "historical century", rational communication, mass culture)
The main contradiction of the epoch is ideals and imperatives-money and power (Gogol's "Dead Souls", Sologub's "Petty Demon", consumer society)
The new identity of the individual: national states instead of class empires (Zweig's "Impatience of the Heart", Hasek's "Brave Soldier Schweik", Kuprin's "Duel", Chekhov's "Duel", Remarque's "On the Western Front without Change", The State of the Common good)
Detraditionalization as an Attack on Morality (Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, Balzac's Eugene Grande, Stendhal's Red and Black-Romanticism as a Condition for Marital Fidelity, Flaubert's Madame Bovary, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Dreiser's American Tragedy, The Return in Brideshead" Vo, "Maurice" Forster, "Sanin" Artsybashev, emancipation and minority rights).
The most well-known approaches to the study of history proper, arising in the "historical age", in the Victorian era:
The formation approach
In Soviet historical science, the most widespread scheme of five formations (the so-called "five-year plan"), which was developed by Soviet scientists based on the works of Marx and Engels, in particular the work "The Origin of the Family, private Property and the State" by Friedrich Engels. The essence of the concept was that any human society goes through five successive stages in its development — primitive communal, slave-owning, feudal, capitalist and communist formations. This scheme was included as an indisputable dogma in all educational and reference Marxist publications, and Soviet historians made considerable efforts to find a consistent change of formations in the history of any society.
The so-called "creative Marxists" perceived the five-membered scheme as the main erroneous construct of Marxist theory and it was against it that their main critical statements were directed. To a very high degree, the development of creative Marxism in the USSR should be associated with the discussion about the Asian mode of production — the sixth formation, the existence of which was postulated by Marx, but rejected by Soviet scientists.
Based on the new ideas voiced during the discussion, new formation schemes were formed, different from the scheme of the five formations. In some concepts, there are six formations — between primitiveness and slavery, researchers have an "Asian (politic) method of production" (Semenov, Koranashvili, Kapustin, Nureyev, etc.). In other formations, there are four — instead of slavery and feudalism, a "large feudal formation" (Kobishchanov) or a single pre—capitalist formation - a "class-class society" (Ilyushechkin). In addition to single-line formation schemes, multilinear ones have appeared, fixing the differences in the development of Western civilization and non-Western societies. The multilinear approach to world history was most consistently defended by L. S. Vasiliev.
As of 2011, Yu. I. Semenov remains one of the most consistent proponents of the formation theory. He created a global formational (relay-formation) concept of world history, according to which no society is obliged to go through all formations, as Soviet historical science insisted. The latter societies do not go through the stage at which the first ones were, they do not repeat their movement. When they enter the highway of human history, they immediately begin to move from the place where the once advanced societies stopped earlier.
The civilizational approach
Unlike stadium theories, including Marxist, the civilizational approach considers the historical process in a different plane, not in a diachronic "vertical", but in a spatial "horizontal" dimension. Proponents of this approach believe that the allocation of equivalent civilizations avoids the question of progress in history, and therefore avoids the gradation of developed, developing and undeveloped peoples.
It is believed that the main ideas of the cyclical understanding of history were formulated in the works of Giambattista Vico. However, this approach was most clearly outlined for the first time in Heinrich Ruckert's book "Textbook of World History in an organic presentation" (1857). However, the most detailed civilizational theory was formulated in A. Toynbee's 12-volume essay "Comprehension of History". Toynbee identified about 30 civilizations with unique inimitable features. The reasons for the emergence of civilizations were the "challenges" of the external environment. Each of the civilizations went through the stages of emergence, growth, fracture and disintegration in its development. The internal structure of civilizations was based on a functional division into a "creative minority", the masses, and the "proletariat".
The weaknesses of the civilizational approach have long been revealed. Firstly, it was not possible to identify objective criteria by which civilizations are distinguished. For this reason, their number differs greatly from one author to another, and various speculations are possible (up to the reduction of any people to a special civilization). Secondly, the identification of civilizations with living organisms is incorrect. The time of existence of civilizations varies, periods of rise and decline can happen repeatedly. Thirdly, the causes of the genesis and decline of different civilizations are different.
The civilizational theory was popular in world science half a century ago, now it is in a state of crisis. Foreign scientists prefer to turn to the study of local communities, the problems of historical anthropology, and the history of everyday life. The theory of civilizations has been most actively developed in recent decades (as an alternative to Eurocentrism) in developing and post-socialist countries. During this period, the number of identified civilizations has increased dramatically — up to the point of giving a civilizational status to almost any ethnic group. Wallerstein characterized the civilizational approach as an "ideology of the weak", as a form of protest of ethnic nationalism against the developed countries of the "core" of the modern world system.
Modernization theories
Modernization theory is a theory designed to explain the process of modernization in societies. The theory considers the internal factors of development of any particular country, based on the premise that "traditional" countries can be attracted to development in the same way as more developed ones. Modernization theory attempts to identify the social variables that contribute to social progress and development of society, and attempts to explain the process of social evolution. Although none of the scientists denies the process of modernization of society itself (the transition from a traditional to an industrial society), the theory itself has been heavily criticized by both Marxists, representatives of the idea of the free market, and proponents of the theory of dependence for the reason that it represents a simplified view of the historical process.
The approach in which history is considered in the process of improvement, improvement or updating is called the "modernization approach". In terms of historical significance, the modernization approach considers history as a process of transition from a traditional society to a modern society, from an agrarian society to an industrial one. The main goal of the modernization approach is to study modernization.
Dominated in American sociology in the middle of the twentieth century, largely due to figures such as Talcott Parsons and Samuel Huntington, in the 1960s it was sharply criticized due to inconsistencies in the theory's provisions with the observed social processes in modernizing societies, and as a result was rejected as a sociological paradigm; Huntington's final defeat took place in 1972-1973, through the efforts of Immanuel Wallerstein and Charles Tilly. Later attempts to revive the theory were associated with the concepts of the "end of history" and the clash of civilizations, which were more ideological in nature.
Neo-evolutionism
The concept of neo-evolutionism arose in the mid-50s of the XX century thanks to the work of American ethnologist Leslie White and American anthropologist Julian Steward. At the heart of neo-evolutionism, the basic postulates of traditional evolutionism have been preserved, but instead of the idea of a one-line development of culture, neo-evolutionists have proposed several concepts of evolution, such as the theory of general and particular development, the law of cultural dominance, etc. Neo-evolutionists relied in their works not on philosophy or history, but on specific sciences directly dealing with social change. These are disciplines such as paleontology, archaeology, ethnology and historiography.
Neo-evolutionists viewed the history of society as a set of closed systems developing in different directions. This development was the result of human adaptation to various environmental environments. There are three types of evolutionary concepts: one-line, universal, and multilinear. The concept of one—line evolution requires the presence of universal stages of the consistent development of socio—cultural systems, such as, for example, "savagery - barbarism — civilization". It is not currently used. The idea of universal evolution is to detect global changes that take the form of development. The theory of multilinear evolution admits the existence of many approximately identical paths of socio-cultural development and the establishment of universal laws of evolution is not its goal.
The world is a system analysis
World-systems analysis explores the social evolution of systems of societies, but not of individual societies, unlike previous sociological approaches, in which theories of social evolution considered the development primarily of individual societies, not their systems. In this, the world-system approach is similar to the civilizational one, but goes a little further, exploring not only the evolution of social systems covering one civilization, but also such systems that cover more than one civilization or even all civilizations of the world. This approach was developed in the 1970s by A. G. Frank, I. Wallerstein, S. Amin, J. Arrigi and T. dos Santos. As the most important precursor of the world-system approach, which laid its foundations, F. is usually considered. Braudel. Therefore, it is no coincidence that the main world center for world-systems analysis (in Binghamton, at the University of the State of New York) is named after Fernand Braudel.
The society of Modern Times is an industrial society
An industrial society or industrial society is a society formed in the process and as a result of industrialization, the development of machine production, the emergence of adequate forms of labor organization, the application of scientific and technological progress. It is characterized by continuous production, mechanization and automation of labor, the development of the market of goods and services, the humanization of economic relations, the increasing role of management, and the formation of civil society. The term was coined by the French philosopher and sociologist Henri de Saint-Simon.
An industrial society is a society based on industry with flexible dynamic structures, characterized by: division of labor and growth of its productivity, high level of competition, accelerated development of entrepreneurial resources and human capital, development of civil society and management systems at all levels, widespread development of mass communication media, high level of urbanization and an increase in the quality of life.
Industrial society arises as a result of the industrial revolution. There is a redistribution of the labor force: employment in agriculture falls from 70-80% to 10-15%, due to which the share of employment in industry, trade and other non-agricultural areas of employment increases, which leads to an increase in the share of the urban population (80-85%).
Entrepreneurial activity becomes the dominant factor of production. For the first time, Joseph Schumpeter introduced an entrepreneurial resource as a leading factor in development.
As a result of the scientific and technological revolution, industrial society is being transformed into a post-industrial society.
Features of an industrial society under capitalism
The growth and development of special and general education, science, culture, quality of life, infrastructure.
The transition to machine production.
Population movement to cities is urbanization.
Uneven economic growth and development — stable growth alternates with recessions and crises.
Acceleration of social and historical progress.
Exploitation of natural resources, often to the detriment of the environment.
The basis of the economy is competitive markets and private property. The right of ownership of the means of production is considered as natural and inalienable.
The labor mobility of the population is high, and the possibilities of social movement are practically unlimited.
Entrepreneurship, narrow specialization (which affects the principles of education), individualism, ability and willingness to innovate are recognized as the most important values in an industrial society.
According to some scientists, the main criterion that an industrial society has been formed in a given country is that no more than 50% of the population works in agriculture. This criterion makes it possible to fairly accurately identify countries that are at the pre-industrial stage.
Industrial society is characterized by a sharp increase in industrial and agricultural production; accelerated development of science and technology, means of communication, the invention of newspapers, radio and television; expansion of educational and educational activities; population growth and an increase in life expectancy; the formation of a monopoly, the fusion of industrial capital with banking, a significant increase in the level and quality of life in comparison with previous eras; increased mobility of the population; division of labor not only within individual countries, but also on an international scale; centralized state; smoothing the vertical differentiation of the population (dividing it into castes, estates, classes) and strengthening horizontal differentiation (dividing society into nations, "worlds", regions).
Talcott Parsons (English: Talcott Parsons; December 13, 1902, Colorado Springs - May 8, 1979, Munich) was a representative of American sociological theory, head of the school of structural functionalism, one of the founders of modern theoretical sociology.
Samuel Phillips Huntington (Eng. Samuel Phillips Huntington; April 18, 1927, New York, USA — December 24, 2008, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, USA) was an American sociologist and political scientist, the author of the concept of the ethnocultural division of civilizations, published by him in the article "Clash of Civilizations?" (The Clash of Civilizations?) published in 1993 in the magazine "Foreign Affairs", and then in 1996 in the book "Clash of Civilizations".
Structural functionalism
Structural functionalism is a methodological approach in sociology and sociocultural anthropology, consisting in the interpretation of society as a social system with its own structure and mechanisms of interaction of structural elements, each of which performs its own function. The founder of structural functionalism is considered to be the famous American sociologist Talcott Parsons, who in his research relied on the classical concepts of Herbert Spencer and Emile Durkheim, as well as the British social anthropologist of Polish origin Bronislaw Malinowski. The basic idea of structural functionalism is the idea of "social order", that is, the immanent desire of any system to maintain its own balance, coordinate its various elements, and achieve agreement between them. Robert Merton, a student of Parsons, made a great contribution to the development of this approach and its adaptation to practice. In particular, Merton paid great attention to the problem of dysfunction.
The first sociologists stood at the origins of structural functionalism: Auguste Comte, Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim. They sought to create a science of society that, like physics or biology, could discover and justify the laws of social development.
The Victorian era gave rise to many theories and methods, and it is there that many modern scientific directions and entire branches of scientific knowledge originate.
Auguste Comte
The creator of sociology, Auguste Comte, proclaimed the main task of sociology to search for objective laws of social development that do not depend on a particular person.
Comte relied on the methods of analysis of natural sciences. By analogy with the sections of physics, Comte divided sociology into "social statics" and "social dynamics". The first was focused on studying how the parts (structures) of society function and interact with each other in relation to society as a whole. First of all, he considered how the main institutions of society (family, state, religion) function, ensuring social integration. In cooperation based on the division of labor, he saw a factor in the establishment of "universal consent". These ideas of Comte will later be developed by scientists representing structural functionalism in sociology and studying mainly the institutions and organizations of society.
Social dynamics was devoted to understanding the problems of social development and the policy of change. The scientist sought to create, in his own words, an "abstract history" without names and without relation to specific peoples.
Herbert Spencer
The English philosopher and sociologist Herbert Spencer also considered society at the level of institutions and functions. Sociology, according to Spencer, is the science of studying the structural and functional changes that take place in society.
Spencer proposed a very original evolutionary theory of society, which explained social changes, the nature of society by the law of the average level of development of its members. Evolution, according to Spencer, involves progressive change, developing in three directions: from separation to integration, from homogeneity to differentiation and from uncertainty to certainty, orderliness. Evolution leads to simultaneous changes in structure and functions.
Emile Durkheim
French sociologist Emile Durkheim has substantiated a new view of society, its structures and people — social realism. Its essence lies in the fact that society, although it arises as a result of the interaction of individuals, acquires an independent reality, which, firstly, is autonomous in relation to other types of reality, secondly, develops according to its own laws; thirdly, there is a primacy of structures and functions of society in relation to the individual and the functions of his consciousness and behavior, that is, individual reality is considered secondary.
The subject of Durkheim's sociology is a social fact. A social fact is external to the individual and has a coercive effect on him. Social facts can be material (society itself, its social structures) and immaterial (morality, values and norms, collective consciousness, beliefs).
The main provisions
1) Society is considered as a system;
2) The processes of the system are considered from the point of view of the interconnectedness of its parts;
3) Like an organism, the system is considered limited (that is, processes operate in it aimed at preserving the integrity of its boundaries).
Disadvantages of the theory
Parsons underestimated the role of conflicts, he ruled them out;
Parsons has no development, no evolution. Later, he tried to correct this flaw, but there was not enough time for a thorough study of the issue.;
Parsons limited the functions of social subsystems to four, which, in his opinion, were sufficient for the survival of the system as a whole; a fair question arises about the need for the existence of other functions inherent in society and in one way or another affecting its vital activity.
Critics of functionalism in American sociology — Charles Wright Mills and Alvin Gouldner — noted the overcomplication of Parsons' language and the scholasticism of the theory. They also showed that it is practically impossible to describe significant social transformations within the framework of the Parsonian version of functionalism, since in it the possibility of conflict of interests of various social groups is minimized.
The development of macrosociology in the 19th and 20th centuries led to the emergence of a whole bunch of original theories. Representatives of these schools and trends are having a discussion among themselves about the essence of society. None of these schools and trends could win this discussion, since each of them is right in its own way and a theory of their synthesis is needed. There are 11 main schools and directions in macrosociology. The most influential are three of them: symbolic interactionism, structural functionalism and conflictology. Positivism is a leading trend in the sociology of the 19th century — early 20th century. The founders of this trend were Henri de Saint-Simon and Auguste Comte, followed by Herbert Spencer and Emile Durkheim. The main aspiration of positivism is the rejection of speculative reasoning about society, positive sociology should be evidence—based as natural science. The characteristic features of positivism were naturalism, organicism and evolutionism. Naturalism (sociology) means the point of view that social phenomena obey the laws inherent in nature — the laws of physics, mechanics, biology, geography.
Mechanics
The main idea of mechanicism is that society is like an aggregate of elements, each of which can be studied independently of each other. Humans can be studied independently of each other as gas molecules.
Authors who have worked in this field: Henry Charles Carey, Adolphe Quetelet.
Quetelet even tried to explain social life by the laws of physics and established a statistical relationship between the types of crimes, gender, origin, age, and place of residence of the offender. From this, Quetelet concluded that a certain number and certain types of crimes accompany society with the necessity of the law of nature. To describe a society, it is necessary to discover the characteristics of the "average person".
Geographical school in Sociology
The main idea: geographical factors affect society, for example, climate affects the temperament of residents, the size of the territory affects the form of government and the size of the population, it is necessary to make a periodization of Russian history according to the periods of colonization of the territory. Small countries prefer to introduce a republic, medium—sized countries — a monarchy, and large countries - tyranny, according to the principle "the larger the country, the more rigid the regime".
Authors: Charles Louis de Montesquieu, Henry Thomas Bokle, Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky, Friedrich Ratzel, Lev Ilyich Mechnikov.
Organicism
The main idea is that society and the body are similar to each other.
Authors: Thomas Hobbes, Herbert Spencer, Pavel Fedorovich Lilienfeld-Toal, A. E. F. Scheffle, R. Worms.
Thomas Hobbes, in his work Leviathan, expressed the idea that the state is an artificial person in which the supreme power is the soul, officials of the executive and legislative branches are joints, reward and punishment are nerves, the welfare and wealth of citizens is strength, the security of the people is the occupation of Leviathan, advisers to the king — this is memory, justice and laws are reason and will, civil peace is health, turmoil is disease, civil war is death. Herbert Spencer pointed out that growth is characteristic of both society and the body. Lilienfeld pointed out that trade resembles blood circulation. Scheffle pointed out that economic life resembles metabolism. Worms compared a workshop to a small gland, a factory to a liver, a commodity to the secretion of a gland, railways to vessels, government to the brain. Conclusion: the comparison of society and the body itself is correct, but metaphors alone do not help much in scientific research.
Social Darwinism
The main idea: the mechanism of social evolution is no different from the mechanism of biological evolution, therefore, the strongest survives in society. Thus, the factors of evolution in both society and the biosphere are heredity, variability, natural selection and the struggle for existence.
Authors: Thomas Malthus, Herbert Spencer, Joseph Arthur de Gobineau, Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Ludwig Voltman, Georges Vache de Lapouge, Francis Galton, Ludwig Gumplovich.
Conclusion: The results of the Nazi experiments on the implementation of the theory of social Darwinism horrified the whole world.
Psychological direction in sociology
The main idea: the laws of society can be reduced to the laws of psychology. The life of society is a game of innate instincts, especially sexual and aggressive instincts. The life of society can be reduced to imitation, to the psychology of the crowd or to national psychology. The progress of society can be explained by a conscious desire for progress.
Authors: William McDougall, Sigmund Freud, Gabriel Tarde, Gustave Lebon, Moritz Lazarus, Heyman Steinthal, Lester Frank Ward, Franklin Henry Giddings.
Mistake: psychological reasons did not explain the mechanism of social evolution in any way, since instincts, crowd psychology, the mechanism of imitation, the "people's soul" were the same today and ten thousand years ago, but society has changed a lot during this time, these psychological factors cannot be the reason for the progressive development of society. Emile Durkheim proved that psychological reasons cannot even be the cause of suicide.
Behaviorism and the theory of exchange
The main idea of behaviorism is that human behavior can be reduced to responses to environmental stimuli based on the principle of conditioned reflex. Any act of a person can be explained by material reward or the desire to avoid corporal punishment.
The founders of behaviorism: John Brodes Watson, Burres Frederick Skinner.
The main idea of the exchange theory is that in the process of social interaction, people exchange goods, services, information, thanks, etc. Before entering into social interaction, people weigh future rewards and costs. If the expected costs are greater than the reward, then people refuse to interact. The exchange takes place on the principle of "You to me, I to you." In the process of communication, a person has to expend efforts to find a common topic of conversation in order to make our communication sustainable. Human behavior is determined by how his actions were rewarded in the past, for example, a person went fishing today because his fishing was successful yesterday.
The author of the theory of exchange: George Caspar Homans.
The mistake is that human consciousness is more complicated than the consciousness of the rats Skinner experimented on. A human, unlike a rat, has not only conditioned reflexes, but also abstract thinking, oral speech and the ability to implement activities.
Interactionism
The main idea: using sign language, you can exchange information and exercise psychological control. With the help of acting out scenes, you can humiliate or show your high opinion of a person. At work and in politics, a person is forced to create his own image. The "stigma" prevents communication. Embarrassment is a sign of a mistake in the game and an expression of a request to try again.
Authors: George Herbert Mead, Herbert Bloomer, Irving Hoffman, Harold Garfinkel.
Information exchange and control through gestures is an ancient, primitive way of exchanging information and psychological control, which is inherited by humans from animal ancestors. In addition, man has invented other, more modern ways of exchanging information through words and ways of social control through the threat of sanctions and the introduction of stereotypes.
Axiology
The main idea: a person looks at the world through the prism of his assessments (this thing is good, and this one is bad) and acts in accordance with these assessments. He strives to achieve the good and avoid the bad. Value systems in different eras differ from each other. The value system is imposed on a person by his environment in the process of socialization, in the process of assimilation of norms. Cultural values are fundamental norms and requirements (imperatives) in society about dignity, beauty, piety, and so on. Axiology is the science of cultural values.
Max Weber founded the "understanding sociology". He wrote that a person is doomed to choose between duty and beliefs.
Structural functionalism
The main idea: every organization, every custom, idea or belief has its own function in society.
Authors: Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim, Bronislaw Kaspar Malinowski, Alfred Radcliffe-Brown, Robert King Merton, Peter Shtompka, Talcott Parsons.
Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown were anthropologists and proved this position by the example of customs they discovered in primitive societies of Melanesia and the Andaman Islands. Social phenomena that have no function, such as conflicts, are dysfunctions and should disappear. According to Durkheim, a person's refusal to fulfill his family and religious functions leads to loneliness and, eventually, to suicide. Thus, society takes revenge on a person for refusing to perform functions. The function of the crime is that the punishment for this crime allows people to confirm the rules prohibiting the crime. There was no division of labor between people in society in a primitive society where people were similar to each other. In modern society, public opinion hovers over people, which dictates that people do certain things. Errors of structural functionalism: underestimation of the role of conflicts in society, the use of excessively abstract concepts, the lack of classification of the stages of development of society.
Theory of social conflict
The main idea: social conflicts are inevitable, but they need to be settled. Kozer believed that conflicts give way to major innovations, prevent the "ossification" of society, and are the reason for the development of society. According to Kozer, the functions of conflicts are that they contribute to defusing tension and are "diversion channels" through which they get to know each other better. Dahrendorff believed that conflict is the result of resistance to the relationship of domination and subordination, that conflicts are a generator of change, that suppression of conflict leads to its aggravation, and settlement leads to controlled evolution. A subordinate at work can calm his vanity by becoming a leader and controller outside of work hours — in a sports team, in a church community, in a party organization, etc. It is impossible to influence the causes of conflicts, but it is possible to reduce the intensity of conflicts. The state, the court, the press — these institutions settle conflicts. Geiger believes that in the 20th century, the methods, tools and techniques of class struggle were officially recognized and legislated by society, thanks to which they were brought under control. The class struggle today proceeds according to certain rules and, therefore, has lost its edge. Capital and labor make mutual compromises, negotiate dispute resolution, and in this way determine working conditions — the level of wages and the length of the working day. The West is no longer threatened by the socialist revolution, so Marx was wrong in his predictions. There are three methods of conflict resolution — the method of avoidance, conquest or subjugation.
The authors of the school of conflict: Lewis Kozer, Georg Simmel, Ralph Dahrendorff, Theodor Geigerpruen.
Conclusion: the conflict can be settled only when the loser recognizes the fact that he has become an object of control by the winner or has ceded his sphere of influence to the winner. Until the moment of this recognition, the goal of settling the conflict is an impossible task. The only thing that can be settled is the price of being willing to obey.
Technological determinism
The main idea: technology develops independently of human will according to the law of endless improvement of technical parameters. Within this area, there is a discussion between technocrats and technophobes. The former are optimists and believe that the development of technology will solve all problems, for example, filters, settling tanks, etc. are needed to solve environmental problems. The latter believe that humanity will die from technology, for example from a bad environment or as a result of a war with robots, so you need to break technical devices, for example, Luddites in England broke mechanical looms, you need to escape to a desert island or to the taiga. Time will tell who is right in this discussion.
Authors: Samuel Butler, Thorstein Bunde Veblen, Marshall McLuhan.
Veblen made a prediction about a revolution of managers, during which power would shift from entrepreneurs to technocrats, but this forecast turned out to be a utopia. Marshall McLuhan divided the story into three periods depending on the change of means of communication.
Integrative theory
Many sociologists have tried to create a theory of synthesis of these schools and trends in sociology in order to combine in one theory all the best that has been accumulated in other schools. Talcott Parsons tried to do this by combining axiology and structural functionalism. Homans tried to do this based on the theory of exchange. An integrative theory has not yet been created.
Immanuel Maurice Wallerstein (eng. Immanuel Maurice Wallerstein; September 28, 1930, New York, USA - August 31, 2019) was an American sociologist, political scientist and neo-Marxist philosopher, one of the founders of the world-system theory, one of the leading representatives of modern left-wing social thought.
Charles Tilly (English: Charles Tilly; May 20, 1929 — April 29, 2008) was an American sociologist, political scientist and historian, one of the leading representatives of historical sociology. He is the author of books on the relationship between politics and society, in particular, on social movements. He dealt with the problem of the origin, emergence and formation of national states in a broad historical perspective — from the early Middle Ages to the era of Modern Times and modern capitalism.
The world is a system analysis
World-system analysis, or world-system theory, explores the social evolution of systems of societies, not individual societies, unlike previous sociological approaches, in which theories of social evolution considered, first of all, the development of individual societies, not their systems. In this, the world-system approach is similar to the civilizational one, but goes a little further, exploring not only the evolution of social systems covering one civilization, but also such systems that cover more than one civilization or even all civilizations of the world. This approach was developed in the 1970s by A. G. Frank, S. Amin, J. Arrigi and T. dos Santos. The most famous version was developed by I. Wallerstein.
In Russia, the school of world-system analysis is represented by B. Y. Kagarlitsky, A. I. Fursov and A. V. Korotaev.
Historical Sociology
Historical sociology or the sociology of history is a branch of sociology that focuses on how societies evolve in history. She examines how social structures, which are usually perceived as natural, are formed as a result of complex and lengthy social processes. The main issues that modern historical sociology explores include: the emergence of capitalism, revolutions and social movements, the causes of the emergence, existence and decline of empires, the nature of states and the processes of state creation, social inequality and gender.
Origin and development
According to Richard Lachman, sociology was created from the very beginning as a historical discipline, the subject of which was social transformation, but gradually sociologists began to focus more and more on modern society, analyze certain aspects of the static cross-section of society and try to explain individual behavior. Accordingly, modern historical sociology is "a way within sociology itself to remain faithful to the fundamental project of the discipline of the "founding fathers" (Marx, Weber, Durkheim)."
In the 1920s and 1950s, the historical orientation in sociology almost disappeared. Some researchers, whose work can be attributed to this direction (like Karl Polanyi and his fundamental study "The Great Transformation"), stood aside from the general development of sociology during this period. Even the work of Norbert Elias "On the Process of Civilization" (1939), which was later recognized as a classic, remained almost unnoticed during the years of its birth. Since the mid-1960s, the revival and rapid development of this field in the United States began, which Randall Collins later called the beginning of the "golden age of macrohistoric sociology." One of the first important works during this period was Barrington Moore's book "The Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy" (1966), which opened a series of works that became classics. Thanks to the work of Moore, Collins, as well as Reinhard Bendix, Seymour Lipset, Charles Tilly, Teda Skochpol, Michael Mann and others, historical sociology has become an influential field in sociology. The "calling card" of historical sociology in this period was the widespread use of the comparative method. The works of representatives of this "second wave" in historical sociology were largely a reaction to the shortcomings of the theory of modernization, which oversimplified the development of human societies, they tried to introduce a more scientific approach and focused on changes in the social structure. The emergence of the school of world-system analysis led by Immanuel Wallerstein and Giovanni Arrigi belongs to the same "wave" in the development of historical sociology.
In the 1990s, the "third wave" appeared in historical sociology. Its representatives (Richard Lachman, Ronald Aminzadeh, Elizabeth Clemens, Brian Dill, etc.) criticized their predecessors for the insufficient historicity of their works and focus in their research on the dynamics, variability, subjectivity of historical actors and the long-term unpredictable consequences of their actions. In addition, they paid much more attention to culture than the representatives of the two previous "waves", and emphasized its importance. This "wave" was largely a reaction to the successes of gender studies, postcolonial and other theories, and was reinforced by the collapse of the regimes of "real socialism". One of the main proponents of the "cultural turn" in historical sociology in the 1990s was William Sewell, but already in 2000 he stated that excessive concentration on culture and agency leads to forgetting the basic objective conditions of capitalism, just when it expanded its sphere of influence and power in the world, and called for a return to research on social structures.
In modern American universities, historical sociology occupies a peculiar place — a small number of researchers are engaged in it, but work with it accounts for a disproportionately large proportion of prizes for the best scientific book or article awarded by the American Sociological Association.
Anthropological, dialogical methods of A.Y.Gurevich
Aron Yakovlevich Gurevich, as he writes in his book "Introduction to the theory of History" (textbook) The modern German historian Andreas Buller: "suggests that the historian in his work apply the anthropological method, i.e. abandon the study of anonymous historical processes and turn to the study of a particular person and specific forms of his life. . The essence of the anthropological approach is to explore in the past not abstract anonymous processes, but a specific historical personality in its socio-cultural context, with all the features of its mentality." Can this method help in the study of a literary work? After all, we are dealing with fictional characters. Moreover, A.Ya.Gurevich's approach assumes "the maximum possible points of observation, different angles, in order to restore all aspects of human life accessible to the historian, to understand their actions, the events of their life in its complexity." At first glance, this method hardly suits me at all. But... it's not even that a literary work is created in its cultural and historical environment by a specific author, and his characters also have prototypes in historical reality, and are even known to literary critics, but that it is the literary hero who is a typical, characteristic personality, if you like, as a "hero of our time": Pechorin, Onegin Bazarov, Oblomov, because generalizing terms are known from the history of literature -"bazarovism", "Oblomovism", precisely in this - typification, in the success of the writer, his observation, the ability to generalize, isolate characteristic features, present them vividly, figuratively, "return to society", to the one from which he took his characters, and that's why literature is a "mirror", a reflection of his era, that's why the literary hero is definitely no less suitable for the anthropological method than the personalities who really acted in history, the inhabitants. But we, the readers, do not perceive these heroes as people who really lived in the past otherwise, they are just as real for us to open museums, erect monuments, argue with them, try to understand.
In this sense, literature has always differed favorably from history, with its economism, not distinguishing between people -"masses", "estates", "classes". The anthropological method allows us to imagine specific people behind these faceless concepts. The same thing was actually done by writers, but without claiming historical truth, they did not think to write history. Gurevich also presents his method as follows: a modern historian cannot immediately understand the causes of mass outrages in the Middle Ages in the event of the death of the Pope, especially if the historical source does not directly report this, and does not report it precisely because contemporaries of the event do not need to explain these reasons, they are well known, and that is the task of a historian to try to understand the motives of people of the past. And for this, the historian should not be content with an external description, glide on the surface, he should be an active researcher and enter into a dialogue with the past. How is it to enter into a dialogue with the past?.. And here another method is dialogical, the connection of which with the theory of literary critic Bakhtin is pointed out by both Buller and Gurevich himself, because Bakhtin believed that the difference between the humanities and natural sciences is that the subject of study of the humanities is the subject: "but the subject as such cannot be perceived and studied as a thing, because, as a subject, he while remaining a subject, he cannot become voiceless, therefore his cognition can only be dialogical."
Gurevich speaks of "contact with a man of a distant epoch, with his psyche, with his mental outlook, with his interests and passions." In reality, of course, this dialogue is conducted between texts -it is about the relationship of text to text. "Each historian, participating in the dialogue, creates his own interpretation of the past, when he "takes a particular text, analyzes it, dissects it into certain fragments, groups them in a new way, selects from them those elements that seem especially important to him." Thus, the historian creates his own source from a variety of sources." Yes, "in a certain sense, he, the historian, creates a source," says Gurevich." "Therefore, history for Gurevich," Buller continues, "is a discipline that constructs historical sources based on the available "raw material" that has come down from the past. "However, what Gurevich calls 'raw material,'" Buller notes, -"it is such only for the historian, but not for the author of the source, who, perhaps, did not suspect that his texts would serve someone as "raw material"." That is, in full accordance with my task: I can choose and construct a source from any text, including a literary work of the past.
And if I apply the methods of historical research in a reasoned, scientific way, then the information received will be the same reconstruction of the past as from any other historical source: a legislative act, memoir notes, chronicler's notes, and so on. The historian constantly deals with texts (therefore, in the opinion of I.F.Petrovskaya, he should read a lot): sources, later interpretations that preceded him, he creates his own interpretation, creates a new text, and so on. Therefore, Buller writes, the story cannot but have a dialogical character. Therefore, Bogdanov also noticed that, in fact, penetration into the past begins with the usual process for literature-reading the text of the source, when we have mastered its language, and just read, before us, as when reading a novel, a poem arises only if it is a historical source reconstruction, or elements of this reconstruction generated and dependent on development our historical (and not artistic, as when reading literature, but the difference is not so fundamental, especially if, according to a systematic approach, we check the product of our imagination with other data, from our point of view, the main historical sources are more reliable, in fact, the historian also works on any other historical written source, from this begins the very criticism of the source-checking its authenticity) of the imagination.
So far, I have been paying "too much" attention, and this is understandable to the central characters of the novel. Let's try, after getting acquainted with the theories of the study of society, applying the philosophy of deconstructionism, to look at the minor characters of the novel in order to represent the depicted or ... the society displayed in it.
If we apply the philosophical creativity of the deconstructivists (Derrida) in the sense of looking at the periphery, away from the main plot, from the main characters, this may prove fruitful for the purpose and purpose of my research.
In the first three chapters, the scene is an apartment on Baker Street and among the characters there are only the main participants: Holmes, Watson, Mortimer and in the third chapter Sir Henry joins. But at the end of the fourth chapter, when Holmes notices the surveillance of his guests and goes outside with Watson, a whole series of "minor" characters appear. Let's take a closer look...
Holmes and Watson make their first visit to the district office of the courier office. Where Holmes, as a bosom friend, talks with a certain Wilson, the manager, inquires from him about the courier boy, Cartwright. Hires him to go around more than 20 hotels around Charing Cross (they are unlikely to be large, and besides, Holmes gives an assignment, stipulating that from 23 to 20 they will immediately say that the garbage was taken out or burned, but in the evening Cartwright really telegraphed about the completed assignment). Then Holmes and Watson enter one of the galleries, where, as the reader understands from the beginning of the fifth chapter, they examined and argued about modern painting (the Belgians). And they go into the Northumberland Hotel. Before meeting for lunch with new acquaintances and clients, Holmes, for the sake of business, asks the receptionist about the guest record book and asks about those who interested him: as it turned out, the owner of one of the coal mines, staying with his family, and a disabled woman, the wife of the former mayor of one of the cities with a girl, a maid, also a regular visitor to the hotel. During lunch or after it, Holmes resorts from the hotel to a novelty-to the telegraph and sends a telegram directly to the post office in Grimpen (where, as the reader later learns, the postmaster is also the head of the post office, in fact without a staff, his boy son also serves him as a postman and a grocery merchant, he is he delivered a telegram to Barrymore at Baskerville Hall, without taking any receipt personally from the butler for receiving it, the village is a wilderness, but note in the 1880s having both a post office and a telegraph office, and a stop on the railroad, a few miles away, as well as a doctor and a hotel). And in the evening, Holmes interviews the cabman who hurried to explain himself: John Clayton (by the way, without "mister", despite seven years of work as a driver, in fact, a young man who is not yet thirty).
What conclusions can be drawn here, using just the theory of deconstructionists. Indeed, are these characters really that "secondary"? For a moment, let's imagine that among the hotel guests, cab passengers, there are dozens exactly like our "main characters"... And indeed, the novel does not reveal a semantic center, unless, of course, one gives free rein to the imagination: what brought a respectable lady to London, and even an invalid?.. What is a seemingly successful businessman doing in the English capital at this time, a man still young (somehow they usually forget that Holmes and Watson are not even middle-aged people-Watson, despite his retirement, but he was injured, they are still young gentlemen and all the film adaptations sin by presenting in their image middle-aged actors, especially the elderly, are just closer to the original young, though only this, postmodern series on the theme of Holmes with Cumberbatch, with Downey Jr. and then probably the actor is already too old for the role, the actors of the Soviet series are twice as old as their characters, but in the original, young people and therefore should not be surprised by their bachelor lifestyle in a rented apartment on Baker Street or Holmes's part-time job in a university laboratory, as well as Mortimer's remark about the "second largest expert", Holmes is still even on the way to earning a reputation), but already with the family, the owner of a coal mine. It is unnecessary to explain what coal is for Victorian England: this is the "blood and food" of the whole new sphere of the economy - industry. England is the "workshop of the world". Therefore, at the age of 30, the owner of the mine, this in itself should be... a fascinating story. She is like that even for a boy-who is called smart. He's really come a long way for his own... 14 years old: courier in the capital office! Thousands of his peers in the same London "work" as "larks" -they pick up junk at low tide along the Thames bank in any weather and hand it over to junk dealers, catching a cold and stepping on nails and glass with bare feet. It is necessary to indicate where we got the information from: here we begin to check the "authenticity", that is, the correspondence to the "historical reality" of information from the novel is not just a popular account of the history of 19th century England. Coaty, and in that part of it where she used the modern English life writer Henry Mayhew for the middle of the 19th century (although a special "treasure trove" for the historian in the book of Coaty herself are almost seventy illustrations-from illustrated reference books, novels and the press of that time, especially as realism, genre scenes in Victorian painting England has not yet been distributed). But it is not difficult to notice that all these characters represent, so to speak, that part of Victorian society that supplies goods and services, and this whole part of the novel is not accidentally just riddled with money: Holmes only manages to get sovereigns and shillings, unbuckling the courier, the cabman. Most of these dialogues revolve around money, as well as Holmes's recognizable possible motive for a possible crime - inheritance, namely, a million pounds of capital. We can immediately say that in general, the courier office is an indicator of the imperfection of logistics. The abundance of servants in the market had exactly the same function-labor was just becoming mechanized, industry was still gaining momentum. It's not just about class privileges, or fashion, dresses, for example, were such that for a lady the toilet took much longer, and it would be difficult to do without the help of servants. The same applies to plumbing, cooking, even in the capital of the "workshop of the world". But everything we see in this part of the novel (with an abundance of "minor" characters) is a service industry. And, here the most interesting thing is that it allows us to detect a deviation from the semantic center of a literary work by deconstruction, interesting for a historian trying to find historical information in a novel in a work of fiction, from Coaty's book from the researcher's sources we learn about child labor in the Victorian era, or the emerging public transport: in 1830-the 1980s in England (and this is only the beginning of Victoria's reign, and the story was published after the death of the queen, whose reign in the history of England was one of the longest-almost 70 years, to be more precise 64 years: these are 16 presidential terms in the United States) legislative regulation of women's and child labor began in 1840. (and it's only been three more years from the "Victorian era" and the queen is young) it was forbidden to use people under the age of 21 as chimney sweeps, although small fines have not yet put an end to this practice (children were scary to say suitable for such work-cleaning chimneys from the inside), but after the increase in fines in 1864. this practice is increasingly becoming the property of history (and Dickens's literature-world-famous for writing the horrors of childhood in that industrial era), but in the 1860s half of the children in London from 5 to 15 years old go to school, and since 1880 primary education for children under 10 years old becomes compulsory (they were called for knowledge and a bowl of soup). Cabs or light convertibles replaced stagecoaches and omnibuses from Paris in the 1820s as a novelty, as a fashion, but in the novel we are talking about a common, ordinary form of urban transport. Moreover, the cabmen "stuck to their jobs" and I understand why Clayton decided to personally testify to himself over Holmes. What do we see? Obviously not an "imaginary reality": let there be no historical events, dates, or persons by whom one could judge the distance from the real history of that time, but in terms of everyday life everything seems to be reliable, except for one thing... the novel was written in 1901, the time of action is placed in 1889. That is, if everything depicted in it is not an "imaginary reality", but a "historical reality", but precisely "historical" even for the first readers. Although Doyle did not write the story, he placed his characters, pushed the plot into a recent, but still history. That is, in terms of everyday life, we just see "historical reality" (of course, it is still marked by the author's idea, which is why all these "talking" details for the historian, after all, for the plot of the novel it is the details and in relation to the author's idea-to the plot, to the center of the novel, the characters are secondary, but it is they who become the background of the main action and form the historically reliable background necessary for the transmission of authenticity from the point of view of some part of the story).
As you can see, quantitative analysis, a formal approach can provide information for study. Another question is the prevalence or limitation of only this side in research. Here we can probably say a few words again about fundamental things.
The physical world is quite constant for even several generations, and if there are changes, they demonstrate cyclicity (seasons, daily routine). Therefore, quantitative methods based on repeatability are so applicable in the analysis of physical reality, and patterns can be deduced. And of course, mathematics is the tool. The same can be said about biology.
But as for culture, social relations... Culture has a fundamentally different language -the language of signs, symbols, on the one hand, mathematics is also a symbolic language, but the symbols in it are unambiguous. And cultural signs are ambiguous. One of the reasons for the ambiguity in history, that is, that the cultural world, unlike the physical world, demonstrates variability and is not necessarily cyclical or linear. That is why "exact sciences" are called "exact", but to deduce universals, patterns in the sphere of culture, society is problematic and, in principle, probably impossible and unnecessary, because this is different. But that's also why the methods of Lamarckian biology are not suitable. It will be necessary to look for the "hidden meaning", "subtext", "decrypt" the text, which in general for the world of culture and history, society, in principle (especially if by "text" today we mean all kinds of information) is the main medium of information, the source, and for any even the most primitive text, it is necessary to know the language to read it elementary. I understand historical and literary criticism as deepening this ability to "read".
At the same time, history differs from literature, in my opinion, unchanged over the centuries: if literature is fundamentally "not obliged to be reliable and reasoned", it is the fruit of the "author's idea", then history, on the contrary, with all other identities, is obliged to argue on the contrary and be, like all other fields of knowledge, a science based on evidence, verifiable (but how?), a well-founded source base. And the methods of historical and literary criticism are different, despite the fact that they deal with texts (there are other sources in history -museum collections practically do not contain written sources, but the artifacts collected in them are the same "signs" of culture that are "deciphered" and again enclosed in monographs-that is, texts) just based on different ways of knowing. At the same time, history has its own object of study- past cultures and ways of social interaction as fundamentally different from modern ones, this is the need for professional knowledge of history today (not the transfer of tradition, as it was in the pre-scientific time, when both history and literature have not yet stood out from one sphere of knowledge, namely the dissimilarity, diversity of cultures if we talk about real, modern ones, then they are engaged in such a historical discipline as ethnography).
I will try to illustrate the methods that I consider necessary in my work.
The second edition (1980s) of the art critic Irina Aleksandrovna Kuznetsova "The National Gallery in London". We are talking about the work that the author in the book calls an "entertaining scene": about the painting of the middle of the 15th century, the so-called Angelico school, "The Abduction of Elena" (from the famous collection of Italians of the National Gallery in London). I will give the passage in full (especially since, judging by the size of the painting and its place in a large collection as a whole, the author pays little attention to it): "The Abduction of Elena, attributed at one time to Benozzo Gozzoli and originating from the same Lombardo-Baldi collection as a number of other important acquisitions by Eastlake (artist, art critic, first director of the gallery-my note), gives us a surprisingly funny and at the same time charming in its light grace interpretation of the classic theme. There is no hint of antiquity in the painting. All the characters are dressed in the most exquisite fashion of the mid-15th century, and the temple depicted on the right is much more reminiscent of Brunelleschi's creations than Greek architecture. Slender, blond Paris runs out of there, carrying on his shoulders Elena the Beautiful, who looks little excited by this event and, taking a flirtatious pose, looks around. The group of young dandies standing on the left seems to have been placed here for the sole purpose of showing off their luxurious outfits. A ship on the river and a toy landscape in the background complete this entertaining scene, full of movement and curious details, in which the spirit of secular novelists of that time comes to life." Meanwhile, it seems only the limited space and time, and other goals of the work prevented the art critic from showing more "curiosity" to the "details" that the work of the medieval painter is full of. I'll take a little peek... In fact, the passage in the book is nothing more than a description of the painting, when the eye glides only on the outside of the depicted, even for an art critic. Although, there is an interpretation in this description (for some reason it is cheerful, playful, light), and a manifestation of the same "systematic approach", it would seem, when the author really guesses that the clothes and the temple "do not carry a hint of antiquity", and even attributes the plot to a similar novella of that time (maybe Boccaccio or something similar). And I looked a little longer... The first thing that attracted attention was the small volume of the composition, in principle a small volume of figures, but the feeling immediately-with such a "saving" of size: there is nothing random in the picture, not a single random detail, not a single random figure. Next, I noticed a strangeness: if the center depicts a couple that the art critic described as Paris and Elena, then... for some reason, inside the building, I see a young man grabbing one woman from a group of women by the elbow, she even seems to show surprise, fright, then I notice that a figure from the same building is facing the central couple, shouting and threatening something after, and most importantly... the headdress of the woman, whom the man grabbed by the elbow, and Elena from the pair in the center of the composition are the same... And I include my "systematic approach", my erudition and knowledge of the historian: this is in the 20th century. you can find the same hats, garments... and in the 15th century. there was no industrial production yet, and it is unequivocal that the same headdress demonstrates only one thing: the artist depicted inside the building... Paris and Elena, just another episode of the whole scene.... kidnappings, then I draw attention to the fact that in the group of "dandies", which the art critic generally considered to be placed for the sole purpose of demonstrating fashion (?! - there was no fashion at all in the 15th century, of course we call this word simply the accepted style of clothing, fashion in its modern meaning also did not exist and could not be), but in the center stands a young man with already surprisingly similar curls... Yes, this is undoubtedly Paris: the same as in the pair in the center of the composition... and then more: I notice the same couple already hugging rather... on the way to the ship, on the stern of which there is a rower pushing the ship away from the shore, but the back of the ship looks like the towers of a fortress, and in the bay, which the artist depicted (in general, there are several plans in a small picture, there are even mountains, you can easily see castles and fortresses on them, from this the picture gives the impression of saturation details, which are actually not so many) the same ship that has already spread its sails, and then it is depicted twice more, retreating into the sea... In the foreground is a boy frolicking, maybe that's why the composition seemed so frivolous to the art critic, it's obvious that it is... Cupid, that is, Eros, hinting at the true reasons for the "abduction", because we know from the Homeric plot that there was no "abduction", that is, of course there was, and it then caused the Trojan War (the fortress and towers at the stern of the ship ...), but at the heart is love. Then, with vegetation very sparingly depicted (although what kind of composition is this in general? a genre scene, or "cosmic landscape", peculiar to that time, because there was no landscape as a genre for several centuries ...) attracts attention to a pyramidal tree, strictly standing out in the center of the composition: myrtle or laurel?.. A symbol of glory. So, what is in front of us?.. Yes, it must be the same technique that is typical today for "hagiographic icons" (I remind you that in the art of both the West and the East of Europe in the Middle Ages, iconography prevailed, and, strictly speaking, paintings like this... the beginning of the development of secular painting): in front of us on a small canvas... the whole plot, confirming the attribution of the painting as the plot of the abduction of Elena by Paris: from collusion (a group of "dandies"), snatching (by the elbow) inside the building, to fleeing on the way to the ship (the artist depicted the couple at least twice more), and then on the ship (which is depicted in one small painting first standing by the shore, without sails, then with sails raised and retreating into the bay, into the sea: four times!) - here is a brief retelling of the plot of Homer's poem, but a retelling by visual means, we can say: cinema! Half a millennium before the invention of cinema in general. That's what these scenes are like inside a painting with the same characters. We still have medieval art in front of us. This means that the speaker is unambiguous... symbols, signs, and without semantics, hermeneutics, we cannot read this "text". Of course, this is a kidnapping: but not a random boy frolicking in the foreground-this is Cupid, Eros, that is, an allegorical image of love, and in the center behind him is a laurel tree-an allegory of glory (the Trojan War is ahead! and the fortress, the towers on the ship without symbols openly hint at this). Then, inside the building, the female figures actually gathered in front of the figure on a high pedestal-Mercury?.. Although, the author rightly notes that clothes, architecture (and ships) do not depict antiquity... But this does not mean that there is "not a hint" of an ancient plot in the picture. Then there was still no study of history, art history, there was no archaeology, it was not yet known for certain, and this knowledge was not available: what people looked like in Homer's time....actually, this is not the case today, we present the heroes of Homer according to later images, reconstructions (and the poems themselves depicted events, if they were in reality, half a millennium after), and how was there no hint of antiquity when the plot itself is antique. And as for the costume, the architecture... either this is due to the "modernization" of antiquity, which was customary in the Middle Ages, and all scenes from the Bible are depicted in this way, without distinction between the Old Testament or New Testament parts of the Holy Scriptures, or this is completely an initial realistic painting, where the ancient plot is also depicted... only the background, it is possible that the figures are not random at all-and the whole picture... a wedding gift to some noble family (it is curious how I notice here the similarity of the "systematic approach", "anthropological" and other scientific ones with the deductive method itself from Doyle's novel, but this is not accidental either... we will also talk about this ahead). And if we continue the series of allegories, then the entire Homeric plot, as indicated by the authoritative Dictionary of Antiquity, translated from German, according to one of the beliefs, is only an allegorical image... the changing of the seasons: Elena the Beautiful is spring or summer, an allegorical symbol of fertility (she is kidnapped more than once in the myth both before and after Paris, by the way). So much for a "small picture", "an easy, entertaining scene"...
That's what a systematic approach is, guaranteeing genuine erudition. You can neither modernize nor make your interpretation more modern. Associative examples are possible. So we have a movie in front of us, if this is a wedding gift, and the figures are not random, but realistic features, then if you want a video from the celebrations for memory... but in the language and means of medieval or more precisely Renaissance art.
Noble Italian families in the 15th century could afford it. Just like the ship in the bay.
What helped me to "unravel" the plot of the picture? The idea of a sign, a symbol in art, especially medieval, hermeneutics in the study of literature, knowledge of history, knowledge of the history of art. The same "cosmic landscape", really overloaded with figures, symbols, is a hackneyed technique of medieval painting, at the turn from the Middle Ages to Modern Times. This is a "Landscape with a scene of the legend of St.Christopher" by Jan Mandein (16th century) from the collection of Dutch paintings in the Hermitage. And, in general, "landscapes with a scene ..." from the same collection by Bles, Patinir, not from the Hermitage and the famous Bosch (Bosch's works are not in the Hermitage), and his followers (who are in the Hermitage). I am familiar with these paintings and from the description in the essay-guide by N.N.Nikulin.
This is also encyclopedic information: if the plot was attributed to Gozzoli, then in his paintings "the gospel plot finds embodiment in a secular creation, where refined decorativeness is combined with naturalness in the depiction of the Magi, in whose ranks Gozzoli places portraits of his contemporaries and representatives of the Medici family"!..
That's right: it's likely that we just don't know yet, but already when investigating further, we can assume what kind of historical figures could have been depicted in the scene of the abduction of Helen by Paris by an artist of the 15th century. clearly Florentine school...
And, all this is a systematic approach, associative memory, which I.F.Petrovskaya (art critic) writes about, and of course, the "anthropological method" of the medievalist A.Ya.Gurevich.
But in principle, the methodology of the entire study can already be understood on this example, on this literally illustration. I will name another example of this method, it has long been used in a completely different field: in theatrical art, moreover, in the work of a director, an actor in the preparation of a play, for a role. However, not by everyone and not everywhere. Personally, I may have first become acquainted with this as a method from a TV interview with Alla Demidova, when talking about working on the role of one of Chekhov's heroines, she told how she "caught on" to the phrase left in the description of the scene by Chekhov himself that his heroine had recently arrived from Paris, where she rented a room on the upper floors... And from the history of art, Alla Demidova knew that on the upper floors in the French capital, at that time, so-called bohemians loved to live: artists, artists... According to her, this detail added to her knowledge of her character, and how she should be played. This detail is a systematic approach, not just erudition, but as I.F.Petrovskaya notes, when everything is in its place: both the time and the place of action are not confused in the head, and everything is found quite easily (is Holmes's reasoning familiar in the novel?).
But the method described by Alla Demidova was not so unknown in Soviet theatrical art. For example...
Another Soviet theater and film actor Oleg Borisov (further quotes from Olga Egoshina's reviews): "in his interview, Borisov said that even from the role of Gani Ivolgin he began to collect books about Dostoevsky: "I began to read everything related to Dostoevsky in one way or another. There is a whole library. I felt a real philological excitement... But "bookish" discoveries alone are not enough. Day after day, I walked the Dostoevsky way. In slush, rain, blizzard-along St. Petersburg streets, alleys, courtyards, so that the route would enter my step to automatism..." (I wonder if you have encountered Dodin, who also walked Dostoevsky's routes?) "
Yes, this is the so-called "method of work of Dodin" - Lev Dodin, the famous Russian theater director. "Exhausting, unlike anyone else, requiring every time not to follow a once-laid route, but to circle through all the possibilities of the text, checking all the turns and branches," writes Olga Egoshina.
It is amazing, but even literally speaking: Oleg Borisov that "book discoveries alone are not enough", and the theater critic "about all the possibilities of the text", but he even literally calls what is known in historical science as the "anthropological approach" and the "dialogical method" of Gurevich.
Habermas: "One of the main problems raised in the Theory of Communicative Action is the problem of language. This is explained by the dialogical form of communication itself, which requires special attention to language, outside of which the specifics of communicative action cannot be adequately studied. The sociologist perceives communication itself, in the process of which the meanings and meanings of linguistic expressions are revealed, as an interaction mediated by language.
Another significant problem of the study is the problem of discourse, since it is based on it that the analysis of the social conditionality of speech utterances is based. Discourse, as well as interaction, seems to Jurgen Habermas to be a form of communicative action aimed at achieving linguistic consensus, agreement between the subjects of communication, that is, at establishing a balance between interests and a symmetrical distribution of chances in the actions of the subjects of communication."
So, I'm getting ahead of the main conclusions of the work: what exactly is the modern era in the novel? And to the central concepts of the conclusion: discourse, and as I have previously noticed the dialogic nature of the novel, which is characteristic of drama in general, and the novelty of the communication techniques demonstrated, which allow Holmes to become a great detective and unravel complex, mysterious crimes. But first, a few more words about "imaginary reality" and the symbol as an element of "text", language.
The philosophical concept of virtual reality
"Philosophy abstracts the idea of virtual reality from its technical embodiment. Virtual reality can be interpreted as a set of objects modeled by real processes, the content and form of which do not coincide with these processes. The existence of simulated objects is comparable to reality, but is considered separately from it — virtual objects exist, but not as substances of the real world. At the same time, these objects are relevant, not potential. The "virtuality" (imaginary, false appearance) of reality is established in relation to the "basic" reality that determines it. Virtual realities can be nested into each other. At the end of the modeling processes going on in the "main" reality, virtual reality disappears."
Properties
"Regardless of the implementation of virtual reality, the following properties can be distinguished in it (according to N. A. Nosov):
generation (virtual reality is produced by another reality external to it),
relevance (exists actually, at the moment of observation, "here and now"),
autonomy (has its own laws of being, time and spaces);
interactivity (can interact with other realities, however, having independence).
According to the philosophical concept of S. S. Khoruzhego, computer virtual reality can be characterized as a multimodus existence, that is, a being that allows for a variety of options and scenarios for the development of events."
The imaginary (according to Lacan)
"The imaginary (French Imaginaire) is a term of Jacques Lacan's psychoanalytic theory. The order of the Imaginary, along with the Symbolic and the Real, is one of the elements highlighted by Lacan in his attempt to distinguish between the elementary registers that make up the dimensions of human existence. These three terms were developed by Lacan gradually during the evolution of his thought, and the Imaginary arose first, long before the 1953 Rome Report, in which the concept of the Symbolic came to the fore.
In accordance with these three concepts, Lacanian creativity is usually divided into three periods: Imaginary (1936-1952), Symbolic (1953-1962) and Real (1963-1981). During the first of these, Lacan considered imago as a specific subject of study of psychology, and identification as a fundamental mental process. The imaginary acted as a dimension of images, conscious or unconscious, perceived or imagined. Lacan paid the most attention to the Imaginary during the two decades following the release of his "Mirror Stage" in 1936.
The basis of the order of the Imaginary lies in the formation of the Ego at the stage of the "mirror" stage. By expressing the Self in this way, the category of the Imaginary provided the theoretical foundation for the polemic that Lacan subsequently waged with ego psychology. Since the Self is formed in the process of identifying the "mirror" image-copy, identification becomes an essential part of the Imaginary. The relation by which the Ego is constituted in identification becomes a place of alienation, which is another feature of the Imaginary. And this attitude is fundamentally narcissistic. Thus, Lacan writes about "the different phases of imaginary, narcissistic, mirror identification — all these three adjectives are synonymous here" —that make up the history of the Ego.
If "The Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real are an unholy trinity, whose members can easily be called Deception, Absence, and Impossibility," then the Imaginary is the realm of superficial phenomena that are inherently deceptive, is deception."
Imaginary and Symbolic
"With the increasing role of the Symbolic in Lacan's works after 1953, the Imaginary begins to be viewed in a slightly different light, namely as structured by the order of the Symbolic.
Moreover, it became obvious to Lacan that the Imaginary includes a linguistic dimension: since the signifier is the basis of the Symbolic, the signified and the process of signification belong to the Imaginary. Thus, language has both Symbolic and Imaginary aspects."
The imaginary of the late Lacan
"Just as the dominance of the Imaginary in early Lacan was replaced by the dominance of the Symbolic after his Roman report, so the Symbolic, in turn, gave way to the Real by the end of the 1960s. Since then, Lacan has been giving less and less importance to the Oedipus complex, which he considers as a mythological, and therefore an imaginary version of an unconscious organization."
The Imaginary and French culture
"As Lacanian teaching spread, the term Imaginary penetrated into a broader philosophical culture. Thus, Gilles Deleuze defines the imaginary as "a game of reflection, reproduction, inverted identification and projection, each time in the form of doubling."
Discourse analysis — in a general sense — is a number of approaches in the social sciences, the purpose of which is a critical study of discourse, and the main tasks are the analysis of the balance of forces in society, in the implementation of which a normative approach is formulated, from the position of which it is possible to critically analyze these relations in connection with social changes. Discourse-analytical approaches can include: the theory of discourse by E. Laclo and S. Mouff, critical discourse analysis, discursive psychology, etc.
In specific senses, it is used:
in linguistics, to denote the analysis of the relationship between sentences and utterances at the micro level;
to indicate the analysis of the ways in which mental schemas are used in people's understanding of the text.
"Discourse analysis is not just one of the methods of investigating a certain problem through a specific way of analyzing discourse, but an integral complex that includes: 1) philosophical (ontological and epistemological) premises concerning the role of language in the social structures of the world; 2) theoretical models and 3) methodology of how to choose an approach to the study of the problem; 4) specific methods of analysis."
The key premises of discourse analysis and other socio-constructionist approaches
"As Vivien Barr and Kenneth Gergen have shown, various socio-constructionist trends, including discourse analysis, share a number of basic assumptions:
A critical approach to knowledge about the world. Our knowledge of the world and ourselves is not a reflection of reality, but is the result of its categorization, or, in other words, the product of discourses.
The historical and cultural conditionality of the ways of understanding and representing the world and ourselves. Knowledge is conditional (antifundamentalism). The social world is designed and built socially, that is, it is not a given, and people do not have a set of characteristics or features given by nature (anti-essentialism).
The relationship between knowledge and social processes. The ways in which people understand the world arise and are supported by social processes, social interactions. Knowledge is constructed by these processes and interactions.
The relationship between knowledge and social behavior. "Differences in social attitudes lead to differences in social actions. As a result, the social structure of knowledge and truth have social consequences."
Discourse
"Discourse, or discourse (from late Latin. discursus — reasoning, argument; originally — running, fuss, maneuver, circulation) is a multi—valued term meaning, in a general sense, speech, the processes of linguistic activity and the systems of concepts that presuppose them."
Classical understanding of discourse
"The division of truths into direct (intuitive) and indirect (accepted on the basis of consistent and logical evidence) has already been carried out by Plato and Aristotle. Plato distinguishes between a universal, integral, non—partial and non-individual unified mind - and a discursive mind (reason), in its movement embracing and correlating individual meanings.
Thomas Aquinas contrasts discursive and intuitive knowledge, considering discursive thinking as the movement of the intellect from one object to another.
The development of science in the XVII—XVIII centuries led to the construction of various interpretations of intuitive and discursive cognition. For Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz, the universality and necessity of scientific knowledge is guaranteed by intellectual intuition, which underlies the proof and provides discursive thinking and contemplation with consistent proof. Hobbes, defining the specifics of human understanding, connects it with understanding the sequence (or study) of representations one after another, which is called (unlike speech expressed in words) speech in the mind. He connects the discursivity of thinking with the ability of language words to be signs of general concepts. Locke believed that fundamental truths are grasped intuitively, while others are grasped through other ideas, through demonstration or sequential reasoning, and the more steps in this sequence, the clearer the conclusion turns out to be. The clarity of complex ideas depends on the number and location of simple ideas, and there are three ways to form complex ideas (objects, relationships, and general concepts).
In the German philosophy of the Enlightenment, there were two lines in the interpretation of discursive thinking, one of which (x. Wolf, M. Mendelson) exaggerated the role of discursive thinking, while another (F. G. Jacobi, I. G. Haman) contrasted intuition, feeling, and faith with mediated knowledge.
In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant contrasts the discursive clarity of concepts with the intuitive clarity achieved through contemplation, calling discursive thinking rational cognition through concepts. He interprets the concept as a discursive representation of what is common to many objects. Hegel contrasts discursive thinking, which he identifies with formal and rational, with speculative thinking, which comprehends the unity of the immediate and the mediated, the variety of abstract definitions in a concrete understanding of life. The interpretation of discursive cognition as the antithesis of intuitive knowledge persisted into the 20th century."
Postmodern understanding of discourse
"A new understanding of discourse appeared in the 20th century in the French philosophy of postmodernism and poststructuralism; it is characterized by a special spiritual attitude and ideological orientations, as they are expressed in a text that has coherence and integrity and is immersed in socio-cultural, socio-psychological and other contexts.
The interpretation of the new vision of discourse in the philosophy of the 20th century is expressed in the fact that it is understood as a linguistic and speech structure developed in a monologue, for example, speech or text.
At the same time, discourse is often understood as a sequence of communicative acts performed in a language. Such a sequence can be a dialogue, a conversation, written texts containing mutual references and devoted to a common topic, and so on.
It is believed that discourse is associated with the activity of a language corresponding to a special linguistic sphere, and has a special vocabulary. In addition, the production of discourse is carried out according to certain rules (syntax) and with certain semantics, which implies its restrictive nature. Discourse is thereby created in a certain semantic field and is designed to convey certain meanings, being aimed at communicative actions with their characteristic grammar. The decisive criterion of discourse turns out to be a special linguistic environment in which linguistic constructions are created. According to this understanding, discourse is a "language within a language", that is, a certain vocabulary, semantics, pragmatics and syntax that manifest themselves as ideology in actualized communicative acts, speech and texts.
In this regard, discourse in the 1960s and 1970s was understood as a connected sequence of sentences or speech acts. In this sense, it can be interpreted as a text close to the concept.
By the end of the 1980s, discourse began to be understood as a complex communicative phenomenon, a complex system of knowledge hierarchy, including, in addition to the text, extralinguistic factors (knowledge about the world, opinions, attitudes, goals of the addressee, etc.) as ideological attitudes, consideration of which is necessary for understanding the text. This is related to the tradition coming from M. Foucault, which requires the inclusion of power relations and other ideological forms in the context of considering discourse, under the influence of which discourse acquires socially relevant significance. In this sense, discourses today have important social consequences for individual countries and peoples, local and corporate social groups.
This tradition has now developed into socially constructionist approaches to discourse analysis. As noted by its representatives, M. V. Jorgensen and L. J. Phillips, discourse is often understood to mean "the general idea that language is structured in accordance with patterns that determine the statements of people in various spheres of social life. Well—known examples are "medical discourse", "political discourse", and scientific discourse."
The discursive field
"The discursive field is a mixture of intellectual and social fields, where social interaction turns into a certain type of practice."
Processes that provide discursive fields
Reproduction of the general categorical apparatus is the language of communication.
Maintaining the boundaries of the discursive field — where boundaries are areas of limited understanding or complete misunderstanding.
The presence of a common theoretical framework, which is a single intellectual stream.
The forceful nature of the discursive field.
The tendency towards institutionalization.
A discursive community is formed on the basis of the discursive field.
The hierarchy of the discursive field
The founders are the founders (each field has its own).
Leaders-interpreters — followers-heirs who develop and adapt an idea to a specific period of time and place.
Activists are energetic figures of the discursive field.
Adherents — follow the rules, reason in categories, often just consumers.
Fellow travelers are "random passers—by."
At the same time, it is assumed that the maximum interest in the topics discussed is in the center of the fields of discourse, and the closer to the borders, the more interest and intensity of communication weaken."
In the article "Architecture of Modernity and Postmodernity", Y.Habermas repeatedly points out the main contradiction (true, speaking about the urban environment, architecture and planning, but I think this is only a special case, and the contradiction is peculiar to much broader phenomena) of modernity: the need to arrange life (perhaps in accordance with ideals) and ways to This is money and power (the article says nothing about ideals, or almost nothing, but it is clear that ideals compete with money and power). I tried to use this for my research and noticed: what is possible due to the specifics of the language, and perhaps culture as a whole, English-language literature (and cinema) do not seem psychological enough to the Russian-speaking reader, there are too many actions in them, and therefore probably what is understandable to the English-speaking reader (or viewer) to the Russian-speaking remains unclear or finds too simple explanations (but maybe that what I will describe next is speculation and it does not follow directly from the text). Many in Russia have noticed (this is from comments on the Internet): the "intricacy" of Stapleton's motive: uncle is generous, old, ill, has no heir, and Stapleton himself is from the Baskervilles, is friends with Sir Charles-why not open up, not use his uncle's generosity during his lifetime, and then inherit the capital? Or even if we talk about the method of murder... why such "difficulties", although readers and viewers usually explain this so that Stapleton could not be suspected. But if we now recall the contradiction of modernity... obviously, Stapleton could not adequately withstand competition with money, because if he had it, there would be no motive (he eventually could not withstand competition with the authorities, at that time the police were taking the first steps, there was a lot of private investigation, and Holmes is the power, this is the law, besides in the finale, he directly resorts to the help of the police, but there he was most likely prevented by an unexpected heir-Sir Henry, about whom the old baronet did not know himself, Mortimer found him, his practice depended on whether Baskerville Hall was inhabited or not, moreover, in one of the film adaptations there is an attempt to murder Sir Henry Stapleton in London, and this is not an assumption, it is for this that he tracked down the young baronet, and only after making sure that he and Mortimer had already turned to the detective, he preferred to return to Devonshire). And about the situation when money and power lose competition, Y. Habermas writes in the same article (in relation to architecture): "nostalgia for dedifferentiated life forms often gives the described trends (building planning and the participation of clients in it-my comment) a touch of anti-modernism. And then they are combined with the cult of soil science and with respect for the banal. This ideology of simplicity renounces the reasonable potential and the intransigence of cultural modernism.".. Stapleton's motive was not only to embezzle the old baronet's capital, he was taking revenge like a man who couldn't do it... as an envious person. He was avenging his father, who had fled from his family, from England, and for himself. He was taking revenge and therefore used the old baronet's fear. As a man who could not win in competition with money and power, he "renounces reasonable potential" and turns to the "cult of soil science with respect for the banal", with "nostalgia for dedifferentiated life forms"-reconstructs an ancient legend in which evil is punished by a hellhound. And the fact that in English-language literature the character of the characters, their evolution are expressed through actions, and in Russian-speaking (and French, German) through psychologism, creates a picture that the Russian-speaking reader does not understand the motives of Stapleton and his relationship with the old baronet. The reader is left to guess: what kind of conversations could be going on at Meripith House after the Stapletons returned from Baskerville Hall: the nephew hated his uncle... surely, he considered him a vulgar old man, because while he was making money on financial speculation in the colony, he did not think about Baskerville Hall, and then suddenly he turned out to be such an esquire and generous to charity-the fact that his uncle could change so much -Stapleton did not want to notice this, because he was possessed by the idea of revenge and crime, coupled with greed, he wanted to seize capital by any means (he probably intended to kill Sir Henry when he met him in London-the letter could have been written by his wife when he shared with her the heir's visit to the detective, I decided to retire to Devonshire and test my ghost dog on my nephew). What allowed me to imagine or interpret the plot and motive of the crime in such a way, and without psychologism? The indicated contradiction of modernity and how it could have an outlet in nostalgia, anti-modernism, rejection of reason, pochvennichestvo, banality (this is easily found in the political and social radical or conservative reaction to many social phenomena of modernity, the development of its rationality, a more radical separation from tradition, or pluralism of stylistic diversity, eclecticism, with a discrepancy between the functionality of the content and the classicism of the form, if we talk about architecture-for example, the entrance to the subway as a reconstruction of a villa in the Palladian style). These speculations are all the more justified because the contradiction is internal, it is inherent in modernity as well as stylistic diversity (the inability to create a single "big style", as M.B.Yampolsky wrote about it). So, it does not need to be seen at all, if you are writing a novel in the modern era, you will still have the theme of ideals, the need to arrange life and the competition of this with the imperative of the market and bureaucracy: the imperative of money and power. Speaking about the types of government, about the bureaucratic state, M. Weber speaks about the same thing when he talks about the threat to citizens from a rationalized bureaucratic state apparatus that subordinates everything to rules and discipline.
"Husserl's philosophy is focused on epistemological problems. The basis of knowledge for Husserl is evidence (direct contemplation); Husserl calls the criterion of evidence in knowledge the "principle of all principles". In other words, epistemological research should be unsubstantiated, that is, it should be based only on what is obviously seen, rejecting all preliminary theories.
A privileged place in the composition of consciousness is given to sensory contemplations (perceptions, representations, etc.) as the fundamental element underlying all other experiences of consciousness (value, volitional, etc.). At the same time, perception is the "fundamental", "primordial" experience; other sensory contemplations are its modifications.
Evidence is inherent not only in the contemplation of really existing things in sensory experience, but also in the contemplation of essences (ideation). Thus, the existence and possibility of direct contemplation (ideation) of ideal objects — essences, meanings - are postulated.
Philosophy is interpreted as phenomenology, a strict science related to the "all—encompassing unity of existence", which should become the foundation of all scientific knowledge. Phenomenology is a descriptive science that (based on the principle of evidence and phenomenological reductions) explores and brings into the system the a priori in consciousness, thereby defining the basic concepts of the sciences.
The instrument of phenomenology is phenomenological reduction. Phenomenological-psychological and eidetic reductions make it possible to "turn off" the real world, given in a natural setting, and move on to focusing on the experiences of consciousness themselves; then transcendental reduction makes the transition from the consciousness of the empirical subject to pure consciousness (that is, purified from all, including mental, reality of experiences).
Phenomenological reflection reveals that the fundamental property of consciousness is intentionality, that is, the property of its acts to be "consciousness of", consciousness of something - namely, an intentional object (which can be not only a real thing or a mental act in the real space-time world, but also an ideal — essence, meaning). Thus, there is a fundamental distinction between the real and intentional content of consciousness (in the setting of transcendental reduction — noesis and noema). Noesis is the act of focusing on an object, giving meaning to an object; noema is this very meaning, indicating a being that is transcendent in relation to the act (an object, real or ideal). To speak of being (of the transcendent) apart from its manifestation in consciousness (noeme) is absurd."
The idiographic approach
"Idiography, an idiographic approach or method (from the Greek. ;;;;; — peculiar + ;;;;; — I write) — 1) mainly in the neo—Kantianism of the Baden school is a method of historical cultural sciences aimed at describing the individual characteristics of historical facts formed by science on the basis of "attribution to value" (Wertbeziehung). The latter is understood as a way of distinguishing "essential" reality from individual events and phenomena, which helps to distinguish cultural phenomena from natural ones; 2) in psychology (as a particular manifestation of the above) — the search for individual characteristics of a person or any other object (for example, civilization, a specific evolving society), by the presence of which he differs from other people.
The opposite is a nomothetic approach aimed at identifying patterns of functioning and evolution of various kinds of systems (natural, social, semiotic, etc.)."
"For the first time this term was proposed by the German idealist philosopher V. Windelband. By idiographic thinking, he meant a course of reasoning in which individual facts are described and attention is paid to particular features rather than general laws. Further, the concept is developed in detail by G. Rickert."
"The idiographic approach differs from the nomothetic one on three grounds — in understanding the object of measurement, in the direction of measurement and in the nature of the measurement methods used. Personality, according to the idiographic approach, is a system, the study of personality is carried out through the recognition of its individual characteristics, for this purpose projective techniques and idiographic techniques are used. German philosopher and psychologist V. Dilthey, in his work "Thoughts on Descriptive and Dissecting Psychology" (1894), proposed dividing psychology into two sciences — explanatory psychology and descriptive psychology. The second science, in his opinion, should deal with the description of the mental life of an individual, and the comprehension of this life is possible with the help of empathy. Thus, he proposed the creation of an independent idiographic psychology aimed at studying specific facts.
The German idealist philosopher and psychologist V. Stern, in his article "On the psychology of individual differences" (1910), considered the idiographic approach as a specific way to study individuality. V. Stern proposed to diagnose an individual according to many psychological parameters and on the basis of the data obtained to compile his individual psychogram.
The idiographic approach was developed in detail by the American psychologist G. Allport in highlighting personal dispositions. His proposed method consisted in in-depth study and analysis of a single case over a long period of time. According to Allport, the main method within the framework of the idiographic approach is the biographical method."
Contextuality
"Context (from Latin contextus — "connection", "connection") is a term widely used in a number of humanities (linguistics, semiotics, sociology, philosophy, anthropology), directly or indirectly studying language and communication. Initially, the term referred to a written text, but later it became more widely understood and included both oral speech and the situation in which a specific communication takes place. Different researchers approach the classification of types of context in different ways, but traditionally the verbal context itself (or linguistic) and the situational context (or extralinguistic, non-verbal) differ.
There are two main meanings of the term:
A verbal context is a complete passage of written or oral speech (text), the general meaning of which allows you to clarify the meaning of individual words or sentences included in it. The presence of a verbal context always directly affects the understanding of any messages, and hence the citation error often found in society, called "taking out of context" (repeating some truncated part of the original text to the detriment of its integrity, which can seriously distort its original meaning).
A situational context is a communication situation that includes the situation, time and place, as well as any facts of reality that help to interpret the meaning of a statement more accurately. In this regard, various texts or speeches often mention various kinds of social, cultural, political or historical context of what is written or said. Sometimes the linguistic terms "background knowledge" or "presupposition" are used to describe the situational context.
The term consists of the Latin com- (con-) — "together" and textere — "weave, weave"; contextus — "connection, connection, plexus, coupling". It was borrowed at the end of the XVIII century from the French language.
Application examples
Contextuality (context conditioning) is a condition for the meaningful use of a particular linguistic unit in speech (written or oral), taking into account its linguistic environment and the situation of speech communication.
Contextual (from the French contextue) — context-driven. For example: "Contextual connections of the word".
To speak based on context means to adhere to the established level of abstraction in conversation and use the concepts of the semantic field set in it. Consequently, the loss of context in a conversation can lead to misunderstandings between the interlocutors (due to accidental agreement with an incorrect interpretation of the thoughts of one of the participants in the conversation).
Examples of the use of the term: "... in the context of aesthetic representations of the XIX century, Turner's work was innovative ...", "Any event occurring in the life of the subject is interpreted based on the context of the situation reflected in the memory of the subject.".
According to paragraph 4.1. of the new ISO 9001 standard (version 2015), it is required that the organization understands, monitors and analyzes the context in which it operates. The context, in the standard, refers to external and internal factors, as well as the risks associated with them, which are significant from the point of view of the goals and strategic direction of the organization, and which affect the ability of the organization's quality management system to achieve the expected results. (In the official translation of GOST R ISO 9001-2015, the English-language term "Context" is translated as "Organization Environment".)
In linguistics (first of all, when analyzing languages with SVO structure and writing from left to right), left and right contexts are distinguished: the left context includes statements to the left of a given word, and the right context includes statements to the right of it."
Content analysis
"Content analysis (from English contents - content, content) or content analysis is a standard research method in the field of social sciences, the subject of analysis of which is the content of text arrays and products of communicative correspondence.
In the Russian research tradition, content analysis is defined as a quantitative analysis of texts and text arrays for the purpose of subsequent meaningful interpretation of the revealed numerical patterns. Content analysis is used in the study of sources that are invariant in structure or essence of content, but outwardly exist as unsystematic, randomly organized text material. The philosophical meaning of content analysis as a research method consists in ascending from the variety of textual material to an abstract model of text content (conceptual and categorical apparatus, ambiguities, collisions, paradoxes). In this sense, content analysis is one of the nomothetic research procedures used in the field of application of idiographic methods.
There are two main types of content analysis: quantitative and qualitative.
The content analysis technique has found wide application in the information age, but the history of the method is not limited to the era of automatic text processing. Thus, the first examples of the use of content analysis date back to the XVIII century, when in Sweden the frequency of appearance of certain topics in the text of a book served as a criterion for its hereticism. However, it is possible to seriously talk about the use of content analysis as a full-fledged technique only since the 30s of the XX century in the USA. The term content analysis was first used in the late 19th century. XX centuries. American journalists B. Matthew, A. Tenney, D. Speed, D. Whipkins. The origins of the content analysis methodology were also founded by the French journalist J. The Kaiser.
Content analysis was used mainly in sociological research, including the study of advertising and propaganda materials.
In the field of political research, the use of content analysis techniques was initiated by G. Lassuel, who began analyzing propaganda materials from the period of World War II. In the 1960s, during the so-called "methodological explosion", research using content analysis techniques became especially active. This contributed to the development of the methodology and diversified its options. It was during this period that the active use of computer technology in research began.
The range of disciplines in which content analysis is used is quite wide. In addition to sociology and political science, this technique finds application in anthropology, personnel management, psychology, literary studies, history, and the history of philosophy. Ole Holsti cites the following distribution of research in the field of content analysis by sciences: sociology, anthropology — 27.7%, communication theory — 25.9%, political science — 21.5%. It should also be noted the use of content analysis in the field of historical research and public relations.
With the help of content analysis, it is possible to analyze such various types of texts as media reports, statements by political figures, party programs, legal acts, advertising and propaganda materials, historical sources, literary works.
A necessary condition for the application of the content analysis methodology is the availability of a material information carrier. In all cases where such a medium exists or can be recreated, the use of content analysis techniques is acceptable.
The first stage
Determining the totality of the studied sources or messages using a set of specified criteria that each message must meet:
a given type of source (press, television, radio, advertising or propaganda materials)
one type of message (articles, notes, posters);
the specified parties involved in the communication process (sender, recipient);
comparable message size (minimum volume or length);
frequency of messages;
the way messages are distributed;
the place of distribution of messages;
the time when the messages appeared.
If necessary, other criteria can be used, but the above are most common.
The second stage
Formation of a sample set of messages. In some cases, it is possible to study the entire set of sources determined at the first stage, since the cases (reports) to be analyzed are often limited in number and well accessible. However, sometimes content analysis must rely on a limited sample taken from a larger array of information.
The third stage
Identification of units of analysis. They can be words or topics. The correct choice of analysis units is an important component of the whole work. The simplest element of a message is a word. A topic is another unit that represents a separate statement about a subject. There are fairly clear requirements for choosing a possible unit of analysis:
it must be large enough to express the meaning;
it should be small enough not to express many values.;
it should be easy to identify;
the number of units should be so large that it is possible to make a selection from them.
If a topic is chosen as the unit of analysis, then it is also highlighted in accordance with certain rules:
the topic cannot go beyond the paragraph.
a new topic arises if there is a change:
perceiving,
acting,
goals,
categories.
There are also special methods of content analysis adapted to the needs of historical and historical-philosophical research.
The fourth stage
Allocation of units of account that may coincide with semantic units or be of a specific nature. In the first case, the analysis procedure is reduced to calculating the frequency of mentioning the selected semantic unit, in the second, the researcher, based on the analyzed material and research goals, himself puts forward units of account, which may be:
the physical extent of texts;
the area of the text filled with semantic units;
the number of lines (paragraphs, characters, columns of text);
the duration of the broadcast on radio or TV;
film footage for audio and video recordings,
the number of drawings with a certain content, plot, etc.
In some cases, researchers use other elements of the account. The strict definition of its operators is of fundamental importance at this stage of content analysis.
The fifth stage
The calculation procedure itself. It is generally similar to the standard classification techniques for selected groupings. It is used to compile special tables, use computer programs, special formulas, and statistical calculations.
The sixth stage
Interpretation of the results obtained in accordance with the goals and objectives of a specific study. Usually, at this stage, such characteristics of the text material are identified and evaluated, which allow us to draw conclusions about what the author wanted to emphasize or hide. It is possible to identify the percentage of prevalence of subjective meanings of an object or phenomenon in society."
Quantitative content analysis
"Quantitative content analysis (also referred to as content analysis) is based on the study of words, topics and messages, focusing the researcher's attention on the content of the message. Thus, when going to analyze the selected elements, you need to be able to anticipate their meaning and determine each possible result of observation in accordance with the expectations of the researcher.
In fact, this means that as a first step in conducting content analysis of this type, the researcher must create a kind of dictionary in which each observation will be defined and assigned to the appropriate class.
The problem is that the researcher must anticipate not only the mentions that may occur, but also the elements of their contextual use, and for this a detailed system of rules for evaluating each use case must be developed. This task is usually solved by piloting the set of messages to be analyzed (that is, by identifying on the basis of a small sample of messages those types of key mentions that are most likely to occur in a subsequent, more complete analysis) in combination with arbitrage assessments of contexts and ways of using terms. It is preferable to deal with the observations of not one, but several researchers.
A more difficult task is the need to assign specific ratings to key mentions — when we have to decide whether this mention is given in a positive or negative sense, "for" or "against" the object of interest, etc., and also when we need to rank a number of mentions according to the strength of their ratings (i.e. in according to which of them is the most positive, which is next to it in positivity, etc.). At the same time, the researcher needs indicators that are quite subtle, which could measure not only the moods of political actors, but also the strength of these moods. This task is especially difficult in historical, historical-philosophical and psychological research, since it involves a high level of humanitarian training of specialists using the methodology of content analysis. There are many methods to make this decision easier. In some cases, they rely on the judgments of a group of arbitrators (experts) about the meaning or strength (intensity) of a certain term. As an example of such techniques, the Q-sorting method and scaling by the method of paired comparison can be cited. At the turn of the XX-XXI centuries, specialists in the application of mathematical methods in historical research paid much attention to the development of special computer expert systems (within the framework of the ideology of Artificial Intelligence)."
High-quality content analysis
"In addition to words, themes and other elements denoting the content side of messages, there are other units that allow for qualitative or, as it is also called, structural content analysis. In this case, the researcher is not so much interested in what is being said as how it is being said.
For example, the task may be to find out how much time or print space is devoted to a subject of interest in a particular source, or how many words or newspaper columns were devoted to each of the candidates during a certain election campaign.
On the other hand, other, perhaps more subtle issues related to the form of the message may be taken into account: whether a particular newspaper message is accompanied by a photograph or an illustration, what are the dimensions of the headline of this newspaper message, whether it is printed on the front page or placed among numerous advertising messages. When answering such questions, the researcher's attention is focused not on the subtleties of the content, but on the way the message is presented. The main issue here is the fact of the presence or absence of material on the topic, the degree of its isolation, its size, and not the nuances of its content. As a result of such an analysis, much more reliable measurements are often obtained than in the case of content-oriented research (since formal indicators are less ambiguous), but, as a result, much less significant.
Measurements in the parameters examined during qualitative content analysis superficially affect the very content of each message, in contrast to the detailed and careful examination required for quantitative analysis. As a result, high-quality content analysis is usually easier to develop and conduct, and therefore cheaper and more reliable than meaningful content analysis. And although his results may be less satisfying, because they provide more of an outline than a complete picture of the message, but when answering a specific research question, they can often turn out to be quite adequate."
Intent analysis
"Intent analysis (English intention - intention, goal) or intent analysis is a theoretical and experimental approach that allows, by studying the speaker's public speech, to reveal the hidden meaning of his speeches, intentions and goals that influence discourse, inaccessible when using other types of analysis.
The intent analysis is aimed at the intentional characteristics of speech, which are directly related to the course of communication. The method gives the researcher the opportunity to describe both typical and other intentions, including unconscious ones, which are perceived by the participants of communication and are the psychological reality of communication. Intent analysis involves the study of natural speech materials that are directly taken from the surrounding life. For example, by the method of a hidden tape recorder, when speech that sounds during a conversation is recorded on tape or other media, and then shorthand is recorded according to a special system: pauses, overlapping replicas and other features of oral speech are taken into account.
The method is quite young and was developed by the Laboratory of Speech Psychology and Psycholinguistics of the Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences and is used to clarify the inner meaning of political propaganda texts.
The method is based on the idea that adults who have undergone socialization, when entering into communication, usually do not so much ingenuously express what they think, as they build their speech accordingly and strive to achieve goals that are sometimes difficult, sometimes hidden by the speaker and hide behind ostentatious intentions (intentions) to exert the desired effect. The intentional orientations of the speaker are formed into a rather complex structure and are aimed at influencing listeners. Moreover, intentions have various types of manifestations, which does not prevent them from being arranged according to the laws of language so that listeners can perceive their general orientation, as well as feel different emotional moods in statements — approval, censure, threat, etc. Studying intentional forms provides an opportunity to find the key to understanding the ways of verbal influences and motives. Therefore, especially in cases of important oral or written speeches, a good knowledge of the rules of intentional construction of verbal statements will greatly help the author of the text and discourse. The method of intent analysis is psychosemantic in nature, and therefore designed for a subjective assessment by perceived statements. The methodological organization of the work consists in a step-by-step assessment by experts (one or more) of the author's statements taken from a certain selected text. The evaluation criteria throughout the study are unchanged: what caused this or that statement, what is its target orientation, why is it necessary for the speaker at all? At the same time, it should be understood that the methodology is not devoid of subjectivity, therefore it needs careful study. This is the best way to conduct research by a group consisting of three or four expert people. This will allow, in case of any discrepancies, to carry out coordinated corrections of their judgments, as well as to obtain additional facts about the "zones of indistinguishability" or "difficult to distinguish" intentions. An operational dictionary of intentions, which is compiled on the basis of clear cases, can be a good help. In some cases, it is useful to reformulate the analyzed statements with the obligatory preservation of the meaning of the original.
In the course of research by the Laboratory of Speech Psychology and Psycholinguistics of the Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, it was found that in conditions of direct communication, the intentional state of the interlocutors largely serves as an indicator of the speech partner and current communication. Moreover, along with the intentions that arise in the course of interaction (to answer, clarify, confirm), the movement of the conversation is influenced by more general aspirations, which, in connection with the practical activities of communicants, develop outside the dialogue. The intentional orientations of the subjects are one of the most important psychological foundations on which the discourse is then built. In many ways, they determine how and what exactly is said, how interaction with the whole audience or only a single interlocutor takes place.
N. D. Pavlova, analyzing the dialogues of A. V. Karaulov's television program "The Moment of Truth" and comparing discourses, revealed the peculiarity of the dialogical intentions of the interlocutors of the presenter, as well as their influence on the development of the conversation."
Nomothetic method
"Nomotetics, a nomotetic approach or method (from the Greek. v;;;; - law + root ;; — to believe, to establish) - 1) in Kant's teaching, the method of "legislative" activity of the mind in establishing the laws and rules of cognition; 2) in neo—Kantianism of the Baden school is a method of natural sciences aimed at identifying common patterns that generalize the general trends of science. The concept was introduced by Wilhelm Windelband, described in detail by Heinrich Rickert, who, following Kant, saw the subject of natural science in nature as the being of things, since it is determined by general laws. The nomothetic method is contrasted with the idiographic one, aimed at revealing its uniqueness in the studied object (the latter, according to Rickert, should be used by sciences investigating single, special phenomena, such as, for example, history).
In the 20th century, a number of literary theories appeared, applying a nomothetic approach, realizing the principle of philology as an exact science. Such theories include structuralism (see the article by Y. M. Lotman "Literary Criticism should be a science"), Opoyazov and neo-Opoyazov formalism (for example, Boris Yarkho), as well as the nomotetic tradition of modern American philology."
Theory of communicative action
"The theory of communicative action is the theory of the German philosopher and sociologist Jurgen Habermas, aimed at an integrative understanding of social reality. According to this theory, the communicative model aims to revise and update the classical concept of rationality, as well as to determine the extent of a critical assessment of the social structure. The essay, according to the author's idea, was supposed to be the basis of a broad-scale social theory. The work of the same name was published in 1981, but Habermas continued to develop the theory in subsequent works.
This work by Jurgen Habermas consists of two volumes.
The first volume
The first volume of the work is called "Rationality of action and social rationalization". In it, the sociologist, who set out to resist the attack on reason and science, mainly touches on the topics of the possible "embodiment" of the "main philosophical theme" — reason and anti—reason - in the activities of people, their connections, interactions and objective life forms.
In this part of his work, Habermas, adhering to the phenomenological tradition, formulates the concept of the "life world" (Lebenswelt) — a world of action common to all people and mastered in their interaction. Habermas analyzes the formation of images and pictures of the world from a mythological approach to it, in particular, exploring its alternatives (openness—isolation; one-sidedness—versatility; egocentrism—the world-centrism of knowledge, etc.). The researcher carries out this analysis based on the works of Levi-Bruhl, Cassirer and Levi-Strauss.
In general, this volume is divided into four parts:
Introduction ("Approaches to the problem of rationality");
"Weber's Theory of rationality";
"Social action, target activity and communication";
"From Lukacs to Adorno: Rationalization as reification."
A number of sociological and philosophical concepts (Popper's "third world" concepts, sociological theories of interaction, decision-making, the so-called "sociology of communication", "analytical theory of action" (Danto), etc.) are considered here mainly from the point of view of communication. Thus, studying actions from the point of view of the attitude of the acting person-"actor" (Aktor) to the world, the author implies three types of actions: teleological (strategic), norm-regulating and dramatic. Habermas sees the differences between these types in the peculiarities of man's attitude to the world and in the establishment of differences between the action itself and this world.
The second volume
The title of the second volume of the work is "Criticism of the functional mind". It is also divided into four parts, which are entitled as follows:
"Paradigm shift in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Durkheim: from targeted activity to communicative action";
"The system and the life world";
"Talcott Parsons: the problem of the construction of social theory";
"From Parsons through Weber to Marx."
This volume of the work presents a critical analysis of the theory of symbolic behavior by J. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, opposed to the views of E. Durkheim. Habermas notes the advantage of the latter, which explores not only the phenomena of collective consciousness and individual action, but also raises issues of development and differentiation of the "social", which is clearly seen in the concept of division of labor and forms of solidarity by E. Durkheim.
Using the material of the phenomenological philosophy and sociology of Husserl, Landgrebe, Schutz, etc., Habermas reveals the structures of the "life world" through communication, demonstrating the historical formation of the opposition of systems and the "life world".
The main areas of research
Habermas carries out his research in the following main directions:
the proposal of a new critical theory of society, different from the theories of M. Horkheimer and T. Adorno;
development of the concept of communicative rationality by means of hermeneutics, various theories of language;
development of the theory of social action (in particular, communicative);
analysis of the most significant trends and crises of the modern world through the concepts of the life world and the system.
Problems
One of the main problems raised in the "Theory of Communicative Action" is the problem of language. This is explained by the dialogical form of communication itself, which requires special attention to language, outside of which the specifics of communicative action cannot be adequately studied. The sociologist perceives communication itself, in the process of which the meanings and meanings of linguistic expressions are revealed, as an interaction mediated by language.
Another significant problem of the study is the problem of discourse, since it is based on it that the analysis of the social conditionality of speech utterances is based. Discourse, as well as interaction, seems to Jurgen Habermas to be a form of communicative action aimed at achieving linguistic consensus, agreement between the subjects of communication, that is, at establishing a balance between interests and a symmetrical distribution of chances in the actions of the subjects of communication."
Problem solving theories
Information approach
"From the point of view of the information approach, a task is a difference between two states; a task is considered solved when the signs of the existing and required state are identical. Thus, the process of solving a problem takes place when an organism or an artificial intelligence system makes the transition from a given state to a desired target state.
Representatives of the information approach proceeded from the fact that a person, just like a computer, operates with symbols (signs), therefore, computing machines can be "used as devices to simulate the process of human thinking." The problem—solving models they created were often computer programs at the same time (the most famous example is the "Universal Problem Solver"). Newell and Simon, created in 1957).
Lindsay and Norman describe the problem solving as follows.
All currently available information related to the task is called the awareness state. Solving a problem is a sequential transition from one state of awareness to another, and then to the next, and so on, until the required final state of awareness, i.e., a solution, is reached. Such transitions are carried out with the help of operators — means that reduce the gap between the present state of awareness and the state that will follow it. Finding operators is the main difficulty in solving the problem.
There are two possible solution strategies: forward and reverse search. 1. In direct search, "a person first tests some method of approach to the task, and then looks to see if he has made progress as a result of its application." 2. In the reverse search, "a person considers the desired solution, asking the question: what preliminary step is necessary in order to come to it? After determining this step, the step immediately preceding it is determined, and so on, at best, up to the starting point specified in the formulation of the initial problem." The reverse search is carried out using a means-result analysis (comparison of means and goals): at each step, this intermediate goal is compared with the available state of awareness and a means operator is found that reduces the gap.
There are two types of operators: 1) algorithms (a set of rules that guarantee the result) and 2) heuristic techniques (for complex problems where algorithms are not found)."
Facilitator
"Facilitator (English: facilitator, from Latin. facilitis "easy, convenient") is a person who ensures successful group communication. The word "facilitator" is a direct borrowing of the English facilitator, a derivative of the English verb "to facilitate" (with the approximate meaning of "simplify").
By ensuring compliance with the rules of the meeting, its procedures and regulations, the facilitator allows its participants to focus on the goals and content of the meeting. Thus, the facilitator solves a twofold task, contributing to a comfortable atmosphere and fruitful discussion. In the context of the etymology of the term, it can be said that a facilitator is someone who makes the communication process convenient and easy for all its participants. From a group point of view, a facilitator is someone who helps the group understand a common goal and supports positive group dynamics to achieve this goal during the discussion, without defending one of the positions or sides.
The International Association of Facilitators (IAF), which has been in existence since 1989, currently includes more than 1,200 members from 63 countries."
Now let's think again: what is the attraction for readers of the image of Holmes?
Fashion in the early 20th century. , the fashion among which is the fashion for spiritualism (and therefore Papyrus, and then Rasputin, and therefore religious philosophy, and Merezhkovsky, something similar then repeated at the collapse of the USSR: psychics, astrologers, gathering an audience of millions and "riddles of history" in the media, which were experiencing a boom at that time, was born "the yellow" Soviet, Russian press), and the fashion for detective stories (Holmes was not the first and not the last, and not the only literary hero of this kind: for example, Nat Pinkerton, his closest competitor, and we should not talk about the reason for Holmes's popularity, and about the reason for his success among competitors), but fashion is an attribute of a new era-modernity, it is she who sets the discontinuity in the history of the new era (perhaps she has to do with the fact that, as M.B.Yampolsky tells historicism does not allow creating a single "big style");
Detective is a kind of the first intellectual game: "Who wants to become a millionaire?", "Field of Miracles", "Own game", "What? Where? When?"-at the same time, the crossword puzzle was born, and the stories and novels of the Holmes cycle were published in the magazine and this is part of the phenomenon of mass media no less than literature, which means again the modern era-with mass reading, flows of information, propaganda, various kinds of texts, a "linguistic" turn in the humanities sciences;
If Sir Henry is just another romantic hero, then Holmes is one of the "new people" that both socialists and philosophers dreamed of, and for the sake of this "new humanity" they did not hesitate to sacrifice real people in the present: Holmes as a "computing machine" (which did not exist then) is also a "superman" Nietzsche;
Holmes has the features of a folklore character, one of those heroes who are outside the tradition, they are rational, which means by definition they easily step over the boundaries of cultures (folklore is diverse with archetypality), and this is a man of the modern era and future globalization (here it is worth looking for Holmes, who is well-versed in skills... communicative rationality, unlike even his friends-Watson, who... in the novel, he quarrels with literally everyone: with the postmaster, Frankland, Laura Lyons; and Sir Henry, who shouts at the head waiter in the hotel, gets into an altercation with Stapleton, with the same Watson; Both Watson and Sir Henry have been annoyed for a long time, they suspect the Barrymores; Holmes conducts dialogues the most and ideally, demanding arguments from others, constantly argues his arguments, seeks to establish the rules of dialogues at once-that in the case of acquaintance with Mortimer, that in the case of acquaintance with Sir Henry, that in a visit to Laura Lyons, that about the cane at the very beginning of the novel with Watson: "-you You know my method, so apply it.", - and these rules are always based on rationality, and not in a meaningful sense, but in the sense of the rules for conducting a conversation or, if you want, an interrogation, then after Holmes and detectives in general, isn't this element that allows you to be able to communicate will create popularity for spy thrillers: find out everything, subdue everyone, and all this thanks to the skills to keep silent in time, or vice versa, insert the right word-text, word, information that is transmitted through writing and signs-that's what began to be appreciated, to attract the attention of the general public from the very beginning, the same applies to the spread of literacy and education, to professional development of workers, officials, to the involvement of citizens in democratic or totalitarian societies, but in active public life, and democracies and totalitarian regimes are massive in terms of social activity, characterized by social mobility, and not by hierarchy or class isolation of the system; the information society preceded the postmodern, the power belongs to the one who controls the flow of information, and thereby influences the consciousness of millions with the help of modern media, Popper about the "open society");
Holmes is outside the tradition, but he is also in the pantheon of literary heroes, which is much broader than the time under consideration-Don Quixote, Gargantua and Pantagruel, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, it is possible that these literary heroes are related to the heroes of myth, and thus Holmes is also just a new mythical hero (theory of literary criticism about archetypes: Propp about the "fairy tale");
and, of course, Doyle's literary technique: to create a story in this way, with such a plot, and such characters in which... the reader believes in real ones, or at least "based on real events", which is exactly what, again, in the conditions of media development (and Doyle, Mark Twain, who by the way himself wrote a parody of Holmes, London - worked as journalists at that time) is more quickly replicated by various magazines, newspapers that use the reader's interest also with the common goals of the new era-to entertain and earn money;
something should be left for the element of chance, although this is relevant to the study, for example, of the community of journalists, or writers of that time (it is no coincidence that the first Gothic novels -Polidori, Shelley came from the same "literary circle", at a later time it has already gone beyond such a narrow circle, even and because the writers worked as journalists in the era of the development of mass media, democracy, and the involvement of the "masses" in political life, when mass armies based on universal conscription appeared, world wars -the era of modernity is fundamentally different from that, what Gurevich analyzed as "the culture of the silent majority", Holmes, by the way, as the hero of programs for young people, did not compulsively also spread knowledge of geography and history through participation in such stories, geography in the novel is much broader than even the British Empire, for example, modern Belarus is mentioned, although curiously almost as an allusion to the well-known novel by Merime, which also has a manuscript, folklore, - folklore, by the way, as a material for literature and cinema, often turns out to be fertile ground precisely from the point of view of popularity, there are swamps, an ancient manor, landowners, a local scientific society, the supernatural and the figure of a researcher, although this is not yet a detective, but instead of imitating a ghost, a "real" werewolf).
In 1862, an international chess tournament was organized in London to coincide with the World's Fair. The Vienna Chess Society received an invitation to delegate its representative to the tournament, which was Steinitz. Steinitz played modestly and took the sixth (last prize) place, scoring 8 points out of 13, while two points were the result of the non-appearance of the opponents who left the tournament. London has developed a chess infrastructure, several popular chess clubs were opened and newspapers were published. At first, he earned his living by betting with random partners at Simpson's Divan restaurant and chess clubs.
During 1884 and 1885, negotiations were underway for a match between Steinitz and Zuckertort. The agreement on the terms of the match was signed at the end of 1885[. It separately stipulated that the match was being played for the title of world champion. According to the terms of the match, the winner was the first to win ten games. The games were held in three American cities: New York, St. Louis and New Orleans. Steinitz won the first game on January 11, 1886.
When Steinitz visited Havana in 1888, he received an offer from local patrons to host a match in Cuba, choosing a worthy contender at his discretion. Steinitz named the Russian master Mikhail Chigorin, his ideological opponent, who had a positive score against Steinitz in tournament meetings. The 20-game match took place in the winter of the following year. Steinitz won with a score of 11;:6;.
The 1896 match in Moscow. Preparing for this match, the former champion came to Rostov-on-Don at the beginning of the new year to hold a match with Emmanuel Schiffers. Steinitz won, but without a clear advantage: +6 -4 =1. In the summer, he took only sixth place in the Nuremberg tournament, which Lasker won. The rematch turned into a confident victory for Lasker: 10 wins with only 2 losses. After the match, when Steinitz was still staying in a Moscow hotel, he was found to have symptoms of a mental disorder (later the chess player himself claimed that his first symptoms appeared back in 1876, after the match with Blackburn, and were repeated with special fatigue). For about a month, he was placed in a psychiatric clinic in Moscow, where he was visited by the famous psychiatrist Korsakov. In March, the former champion was discharged from the hospital, and he went to Vienna. In the same year, he returned to the States on the Pennsylvania steamer.
And only the tenth-eleventh place in London (1899), where Lasker triumphantly won. The London tournament was the last competition.
These first intellectual battles for the title of king of world chess begin simultaneously with the fashion for detective stories. The first world chess champions were contemporaries of Holmes.
Prototypes
Alan Pinkerton is an American detective and intelligence officer of Scottish descent. He is best known as the founder of the Pinkerton National Detective Agency.
Eugene Francois Vidocq is a French criminal who became one of the first modern private detectives and the "father" of criminal investigation in its modern form.
It is curious that these detectives should be distinguished from the heroes of police novels, who do not pretend to be genius.
Even earlier, in the 1820s and 40s, the so-called Newgate novels appeared. They depicted melodramatically embellished biographies of famous criminals at that time, taken from Newgate calendars, hence the name. The novels caused great controversy and drew criticism, in particular from the writer William Makepeace Thackeray, who ridiculed them in several of his novels and openly criticized the authors.
And there were the so-called "terrible pennies". "Terrible Pennies" was a cheap popular serial literature produced in the 19th century in the United Kingdom. This derogatory term usually refers to a story published weekly, each of which costs one penny. The subject matter of these stories was usually sensational, and they focused on the exploits of detectives, criminals, or supernatural beings. First published in the 1830s, The Terrible Pennies featured characters such as Sweeney Todd, Dick Turpin, and the Vampire Varney.The Guardian described them as "Britain's first example of mass culture for young people."
Although the term "terrible penny" was originally used to refer to a certain type of literature circulating in middle Victorian Britain, it came to encompass many publications that featured cheap sensational literature. They were printed on cheap paper and were intended for young people from the working class. More than a million periodicals were sold per week, but the popularity of penny publications was called into question in the 1890s due to the emergence of competing literature, especially the halfpenny periodicals published by Alfred Harmsworth.
Sweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as a villain in the Victorian horror series The String of Pearls (1846-1847). The original tale became the basis of a Victorian melodrama and a London urban legend. A barber from Fleet Street, Todd kills customers with a razor and sends their bodies to Mrs. Lovett, an accomplice who bakes their meat into meat pies. The story has been retold many times, in various media outlets. The musical, based on Christopher Bond's 1973 play of the same name, significantly deepened Todd's characterSweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as a villain in the Victorian horror series The String of Pearls (1846-1847). The original talee the basis of a Victorian melodrama and a London urban legend. A barber from Fleet Street, Todd kills customers with a razor and sends their bodies to Mrs. Lovett, an accomplice who bakes their meat into meat pies. The story has been retold many times, in various media outlets. The musical, based on Christopher Bond's 1973 play of the same name, significantly deepened Todd's character. It portrays him as an ex-convict, Benjamin Barker, who becomes obsessed with murdering Turpin, the judge who wrongfully convicted him and destroyed his family.
Claims that Sweeney Todd was a historical figure, which is disputed by scientists, although possible legendary prototypes of the criminal exist.
Richard Turpin (baptised September 21, 1705 - April 7, 1739)Richard Turpin (baptised September 21, 1705 - April 7, 1739) was an English highwayman whose exploits were romanticized after his execution in York for stealing a horse. Turpin may have followed his father's trade as a butcher early in his life, but by the early 1730s he had joined a gang of deer thieves and later became a poacher, robber, horse thief and murderer. He is also known for a fictional 200-mile (320 km) overnight trip froHe is also known for a fictional 200-mile (320 km) overnight trip from London to York on his horse Black Bess, a story made famous by Victorian writer William Harrison Ainsworth almost 100 years after Turpin's death.
Turpin became the subject of legend after his execution, romanticized as dashing and heroic in English ballads and popular theater of the 18th and 19th centuries, as well as in cinema and television of the 20th century.
Varney the Vampire; or "Feast of Blood" is a serialized GVarney the Vampire; or "Feast of Blood" is a serialized Gothic horror of the Victorian era, attributed to James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett Finger. It first appeared in 1845-1847. In the form of a series of weekly cheap pamphlets, which were then called pennies for pennies. The author was paid in typesetting, so when the story was published as a book in 1847, it was of epic size: the original edition had 876 pages with two columns and 232 chapters. In total, this is about 667,000 words.
This is a story about the vampire Sir Francis Varney, which presents many of the images present in vampire fiction, known to the modern public.
Horror literature (English horror literature, horror fiction; often just "horror" or even "horror", sometimes borrowed from the English "horror") is a genre of fiction aimed at causing the reader a sense of fear. Akin to the genres of fantasy and mysticism at the same time, although all of them represent separate developments in mysticism and horror, nevertheless, they are oHorror literature (Englorror literature, horror fiction; often just "horror" or even "horror", sometimes borrowed from the English "horror") is a genre of fiction aimed at causing the reader a sense of fear. Akin to the genres of fantasy and mysticism at the same time, although all of them represent separate developments in mysticism and horror, nevertheless, they are often classified into one subgroup of fiction due to numerous similarities, but there are differences in them, and horrors are not always fiction. Representatives of the genre have both absolutely inexplicable plot descriptions and fiction based on real events ("psychological thrillers", for example, do not allow a single fantastic element at all).
Most often, horror has a limited set of themed characters, borrowed, as a rule, from the grassroots mythology of different peoples: vampires, zombies, werewolves, ghosts, demons, etc. Often, but not always, horror literature tells about the supernatural in the truest sense of the word.
An adventure novel (also an adventurous novel, from the French aventure) is a genre of novel that was formed in the middle of the XIX century on the wave of romanticism and neo—romanticidventure novel (also an adventurous novel, from the French aventure) is a genre of novel that was formed in the middle of the XIX century on the wave of romanticism and neo—cism with their characteristic desire to escape from petty-bourgeois everyday life into the world of exoticism and heroism. In a broader sense, we can talk about the existence of a special adventurous genre, or adventure literature, which is distinguished by a sharp division of characters into heroes and villains, "the rapidity of the development of action, the variability and acuteness of plot situations, exaggerated experiences, motives for abduction and persecution, secrets and riddles." The task of adventure literature is not so much to teach, analyze or describe reality as to entertain the reader.
Pinkertonian is a detective-adventure literature of the first decades of the 20th century, negatively evaluated by critics, but extremely popular among readers. Named after the main character, detective Nat Pinkerton. Main features: "antipsychologism and effectiveness, plot tension and sensationally criminal themes."
It originated in the United States at the beginning of the 20th century and quickly spread to European countries, including Russia. The predecessors were the French novel-feuilleton (fr:Roman-feuilleton), the English "Newgate novel" (eIt originated in the United States at the beginning of the 20th cd quickly spread to European countries, including Russia. The predecessors were the French nouilleton (fr:Roman-feuilleton), the English "Newgate novel" (en:Newgate novel) and the American "penny novel" (en:Dime novel). The name of the phenomenon was given by the main character of the most famous cycle — "the king of detectives" Nat Pinkerton, whose prototype was the American detective Alan Pinkerton. In addition to Pinkerton, the heroes of such books were Nick Carter, Sherlock Holmes (who had nothing in common with Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes) and many others, less notable. Books about the adventures of Ivan Dmitrievich Putilin were also published in Russia, signed with the pseudonym Roman Dobry, under which the writer R. L. Antropov was hiding. Books about Pinkerton and other detectives were especially popular among teenagers. Critics treated the "Pinkertonism" sharply negatively, a large article by Korney Chukovsky "Nat Pinkerton and modern literature" is known, where the consumer of such books is compared to a Hottentot savage.
In In 1923, Nikolai Bukharin published an article in the newspaper Pravda, in which he called on Soviet writers to create a "red Pinkerton" — adventure literature to promote revolutionary ideas. As a response to this call, several novels were written, including "Mess-Mend, or the Yankees in Petrograd" by Marietta Shaginyan (1923), "Trust D. E. The History of the Death of Europe" (1923) by Ilya Ehrenburg, "Mustard Gas" by Vsevolod Ivanov and Viktor Shklovsky (1925), etc. Also, in a detective vein, the hoax novel "The Master and Margar, in a detective vein, the hoax novel "The Master and Margarita" (1929-1940) by the famous Mikhail Bulgakov was created, here the Soviet poet Ivan Bezdomny, an example of a pre-war Komsomol member of the 1930s, was brought out in the role of Pinkerton.
A novel-feuilleton is a genre variety of a major literary form: a work of fiction published in a periodical print edition for a certain period of time in several issues. Doyle's novel was first published in the Strand magazine, intended as entertainment for railroad passengers.
The novel receives the "feuilleton" supplement thanThe noeceives the "feuilleton" supplement thanks to the French publishers Julien Louis Geoffroy and Louis-Francois Bertin, who in 1800 introduced the "feuilleton" (or basement) column in their Parisian newspaper "Journal des D;bats", in which information that did not fall into other headings was published. For the first time, the novel-feuilleton began to be published in France in the second half of the 1930s, in the daily newspapers of Emile Girardin Century and the Press, as well as in the aforementioned Journal des D;bats and the daily political newspaper Le Constitutionnel.
Thus, L, Louis Veron, a journalist and publicist, in 1835 gave up the lucrative position of director of the Grand Opera, becoming the main owner of the newspaper Le Constitutionnel. Veron was able to make the newspaper popular by offering the reader a novel with a sequel. Andre Mauroy wrote in The Three Dumas: "an annual subscription cost only forty francs, so there was no shortage of subscribers and ads, but subscribers had to be not only won, but also retained. This could best be achieved by publishing an "exciting" novel-a feuilleton — that is, a novel printed in basements from room to room. The formula "To be continued", which was invented in 1829 by Dr. Veron for the Revue de Paris, has become a powerful driving force of journalism."
At the end of the XIX — beginning of the XX century, the Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary spoke about Emile Gaborio on its pages as follows:
"... Gaborio's talent manifested itself mainly in his novels, which were originally published in newspaper articles and aimed at influencing the reader's imagination as much as possible. These are the so-called "criminal novels", where the action is grouped around some mysterious crime and the main role is played by a detective who, like deus ex machina, at the most critical moments. The very titles of Gaborio's novels characterize his manner of acting on the rough instincts of the average reader, on the love of strong feelings. These titles always portend horrors, crimes, and bloodshed."
It is believed that Conan Doyle created detective stories and novels, being strongly impressed by Gaborio's work, it is noted that his Sherlock Holmes is a type of detective in which the traits of the characters of the French author manifest themselves.
Contemporaries of Arthur Conan Doyle tended to downplay the literary significance of Sherlock Holmes, seeing in him a kind of hybrid of Monsieur Lecoq, Dupin Edgar Poe and Cuff Wilkie Collins. Doyle himself, in the first work of the Holmes cycle, the story "A Study in Crimson Tones" (1887), through the mouth of his character stated that Holmes surpasses his famous colleagues in everything:
"To hear you say it, it's very simple," I smiled. — You remind me of Dupin in Edgar Allan Poe. I thought such people only existed in novels.
Sherlock Holmes got up and began to light his pipe.
"You certainly think that by comparing me to Dupin you are complimenting me,— he remarked. — And in my opinion, your Dupin is a very stupid guy. This technique is to confuse your interlocutor with some phrase "for the occasion" after a fifteen—minute silence, really, a very cheap ostentatious trick. He certainly had some analytical skills, but he was by no means the phenomenon that Poe seemed to think he was.
— Have you read Gaborio? - I asked. "Do you think Lecoq is a real detective?"
Sherlock Holmes chuckled ironically.
"Lecoq is a pathetic brat,— he said angrily. — All he has is energy. This book just makes me sick. Just think what a problem it is to identify a criminal who has already been imprisoned! I would have done it in twenty-four hours. And Lecoq has been digging for almost six months. You can use this book to teach detectives how not to work."
"Nevertheless, the images of Lecoq and Holmes have many common features. According to Doyle's American biographer Daniel Stashauer, "despite the fact that Doyle considered Poe to be an unsurpassed master, the "Study in Crimson Tones" was influenced by the detectives of another, almost forgotten author today. French writer Emile Gaborio, whose action-packed novels were very popular at the time, impressed Conan Doyle with the "careful linking of the plot." The detective created by Gaborio, Monsieur Lecoq, possessed many traits and skills that are now firmly associated in our minds with Sherlock Holmes. Lecoq was not only a master of disguises, but also applied scientific methods — for example, he used plaster casts to get footprints of a criminal. Lecoq's contempt for the head of the security service, Gevrol, anticipates the style of relations between Sherlock Holmes and Inspector Lestrade from Scotland Yard, and the good-natured but narrow-minded father Absinthe, Lecoq's comrade, admiring his skills, may have become the prototype of Dr. Watson."
Detective and detective are not Dupin's profession. He just reads various newspapers, draws conclusions and gets down to business, sometimes consulting with the police. The main weapon of the hero is his mind and intellect, with which Dupin reveals difficult riddles that the police consider unsolvable. In the story "Murder on the Rue Morgue", Dupin investigates a crime that the police considered the most difficult, but with the help of intelligence and facts, Dupin learns that the killer of two women is an orangutan, which is later confirmed. In the story "The Stolen Letter," Dupin manages to find out where the stolen letter is also with the help of logical thinking."
Dupin's method
"Poe described Dupin's method of using logical reasoning, using the example of a card player: "The amount of information received is not so much the reliability of conclusions as the accuracy of observation." There is a scene in the story in which Dupin manages to find out what the narrator was thinking at that moment, based on the constructed associative series. Subsequently, this method will be used by him in the investigation of the crime.
This method emphasizes the importance of reading and writing the word. Directly from a newspaper article by Cuvier (probably meant the French zoologist Georges Cuvier) Dupin receives information about orangutans. Thus, the reader himself is involved in the investigation, independently searching for clues in the process of reading. Po also pays special attention to the power of the spoken word. When Dupin asks the sailor about the murders, he himself plays out the scene of his own partial death: "The sailor's face turned purple, it seemed he was struggling with suffocation. Instinctively, he jumped up and grabbed his baton, but immediately collapsed into a chair, trembling all over, deathly pale."
The story "Murder on the Rue Morgue" is considered the first work in world literature in the detective genre, therefore Auguste Dupin is the first literary detective, followed by many other famous literary detectives: Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Father Brown, Commissioner Maigret, etc. Moreover, some of them, for example, Holmes and Poirot, were created using some techniques from Poe's stories."
By the way, how justified are Holmes's comparisons with a computing machine, which at that time had not yet been invented, but that's not even the point, anticipating the story that Holmes is a model of a new communicative reality, whether it is correct to compare him with a mechanism, I will consider the theory of heuristics of science, which is engaged in building models of the process of searching for an original solution to a problem.
Heuristic models
"Human thinking can be conditionally divided into conscious-logical and intuitive-practical. In the real implementation of the creative process, both types of thinking interact in dialectical unity, the result of such interaction is a model of a problematic situation. It is preceded by preliminary, often long and intense reflections, searches, and trials."
"Heuristics as a science is engaged in the construction of heuristic models of the process of searching for an original solution to a problem. The main task of heuristics is to build models for the implementation of the process of searching for a new solution to the problem for a given subject (or society as a whole).
There are various types of such models, among them some variants can be cited as an example:
the blind search model, which relies on trial and error;
a maze model in which the problem being solved is considered as a maze, and the process of finding a solution is considered as wandering through a maze;
a structural and semantic model that proceeds from the fact that the basis of heuristic activity for solving a problem is the principle of building a system of models that reflects the semantic relations between the objects included in the task."
Features of heuristic activity
"Heuristic methods and modeling are inherent only to man and distinguish him from artificial intelligent (thinking) systems." Thus, the identification of Holmes as embodied rationality with a computing machine is effective, but not correct.
"Currently, the sphere of human activity includes:
setting a task;
the choice of methods for its solutions and the construction (development) of models and algorithms, hypotheses and assumptions;
understanding the results and making decisions.
It is worth noting that an important feature of human activity is the presence of an element of chance in it: inexplicable actions and crazy decisions often underlie original and unexpected ideas."
But the incorrectness of Holmes' comparisons with a computer does not prevent us from using computer science methods.
Big Data
"Data science (Eng. data science; sometimes datalogy — datalogy) is a branch of computer science that studies the problems of analyzing, processing and presenting data in digital form. It combines data processing methods in conditions of large volumes and high levels of parallelism, statistical methods, data mining methods and artificial intelligence applications for working with data, as well as database design and development methods.
It is considered as an academic discipline, and since the early 2010s, largely due to the popularization of the concept of "big data", and as a practical cross-sectoral field of activity."
"What are the Simpsons hiding? Analyzing the series using Data Science tools
When it comes to Big Data, something serious immediately comes to mind. For example, cool engineers calculating algorithms for content recommendations for Netflix or Spotify, or maybe scientists who estimate the probability of an Earth collision with another deadly asteroid.
All this, of course, exists, but no one forbids using big data for something fun. For example, they can be used to analyze in detail the cult animated series "The Simpsons".
Today we are using the full power of Data Science and find out who is the most talkative character of the show, why Ned Flanders is not the kindest character and how the popularity of The Simpsons has changed over the years among viewers.
Who's in charge in Springfield
To begin with, let's look at the replicas of 15 main and minor characters. As expected, the representatives of the Simpson family turned out to be the most talkative, and therefore the most important characters. There is only one interesting exception: Homer's father is Grandpa Simpson. Although he is a member of the family, he speaks even less than some of the minor characters. This should not be surprising: Old Abe likes to sleep more than talk.
But it's even more interesting to look at the dynamics of the characters' communication. To do this, we have made a special grid. The lighter the square at the intersection, the more often the characters interact with each other. For example, you may notice that Homer communicates more often with his wife than with his children. And in general, almost all communication takes place within the Simpson family, and the characters communicate with other residents of Springfield much less often.
Who is the main good-natured and grumpy "Simpsons"
It will take months or even years to review all 32 seasons and evaluate each spoken phrase. Therefore, we went to the trick and used VADER Sentiment Analysis, a special tool to find out the emotional coloring of the characters' phrases.
We expected to see Ned Flanders in the top, but ruthless algorithms decided otherwise. The most "kind and positive" characters turned out to be Bart's cynical and constantly smoking teacher Edna Krabapple-Flanders and Marge's sister Patty Bouvier.
Perhaps the fact is that the algorithm is designed to analyze posts and comments on social networks. In the case of evaluating positive phrases, he could not understand the irony and cynicism of the characters and give the wrong result.
But VADER Sentiment Analysis did a better job with the "grumblers": at the very bottom of the list are the school bully Nelson and the eternally evil gardener Willie.
The location of the action matters
Everything is clear with the characters, but what about the locations? We analyzed the main places where the characters go, and the number of phrases they utter there.
Let's make a reservation right away that we removed the Simpsons house from the study, otherwise it would have taken up all the free space.
As expected, 3 main locations won:
the school (the main habitat of Bart and Lisa);
Nuclear power plant (Homer's place of work);
bar "U Mo" (a place of rest for the older generation after work).
Fast forward from Springfield to the real world
It's time for the general statistics of the animated series.
Most often, a regular series of shows gathers 8 million viewers in front of the screens. But still there are episodes that attract over 30 million fans!
The average popularity of the animated series releases is clear from this graph, but I would like to know how it has changed over the years (infographic).
https://zen.yandex.ru/media/id/5e1b45532fda8600b18...
"If you combine two different groups of data into one, the interpretation of this data can change to the opposite" - the Monty Hall paradox.
So, the novel by methods of datalogy, we explore communicative means, dialogues, which, as I noted earlier, the novel is oversaturated in such a way that it resembles a work of drama and therefore is not by chance the most adaptable work of Doyle.
Chapter 1
Mr. Sherlock Holmes utters 74 phrases: 56 are addressed to Watson, 18 to Mortimer.
Dr. Watson 21 phrases. Everyone is facing Holmes.
Dr. Mortimer 26 phrases: 24 addressed to Holmes, 2 to Watson.
Holmes and Mortimer each interacted with two characters, Watson with only one. The phrases addressed by Holmes are almost 4 times the number of phrases addressed by Watson or Mortimer.
Out of 74 phrases by Holmes: 15 interrogative (of which 9 are addressed to Watson, and 6 to Mortimer), 5 exclamation points (all addressed to Watson).
Of Watson's 21 phrases: 6 interrogative and none exclamation points (all addressed to Holmes).
Of Mortimer's 26 phrases: 2 interrogative and one exclamation point (all addressed to Holmes).
Bottom line: Holmes is talkative, interested, expressive, reasoning, sociable. Watson is taciturn, occasionally curious, not intrusive, restrained and tactful. Mortimer is primarily a storyteller, otherwise close to Holmes. Watson does not interfere in Holmes' conversation with the visitor, at first he expressed a desire to leave him alone. Holmes is careless in dealing with Watson, interrupts Mortimer. Mortimer is absent-mindedly tactless, apologetically but brusquely (examining the skull, calling Holmes the second-largest expert). The main character is Holmes.
Chapter 2
Holmes utters 19 phrases: with the exception of 2, all are addressed to Mortimer.
Watson is generally silent in chapter 2 (Mortimer addresses him in two phrases in the first chapter, and Holmes also addresses him in this one without requiring an answer).
Mortimer utters 25 phrases -all addressed to Holmes, and this is with the exception of: reading a manuscript, a note in a newspaper and a lengthy story.
Of Holmes' 19 phrases: 5 are interrogative. Of Mortimer's 25 phrases: 2 are interrogative.
Bottom line: Mortimer likes lengthy quotes and generally telling stories, Holmes is curious. Both show a penchant for accuracy, like to talk and argue. In the center of chapter 2 is the narrator Mortimer, who ends the story spectacularly, intrigued.
Chapter 3
Holmes-136 phrases. Of these, 60 are addressed to Mortimer, 76 to Watson. Of these: more than half-37 are inquisitively interrogative to Mortimer, 16 are interrogative to Watson (as part of the reasoning, as a request). With five exclamation points, Holmes turns to Mortimer, and once to Watson. Holmes utters a total of 136 phrases: 53 interrogative and 6 exclamation points.
Mortimer utters 72 phrases-all addressed to Holmes, many are a monosyllabic answer: yes and no. Of these, five are interrogative.
Watson-20 phrases, and they are mostly monosyllabic, not infrequently interrogative, as in the first chapters. Of the 20 phrases in this chapter (all addressed to Holmes), 11 are interrogative, one is exclamation.
Bottom line: Watson serves Holmes as an assistant (and like a personalized second self) for reasoning (Holmes could just as easily ask, thinking about his reflection, but Watson is a doctor! he is able to listen to the interlocutor and even bring him to the answers with naive questions, not such a reflection, on the contrary, a necessary element in reasoning, that is, in the deductive method declared by himself), an assistant in general (Watson himself answers Holmes's question: already leave - if you do not need help and in general Watson's figure does not contain the investigated phenomenon was very common at that time-a companion, but how much is it a social phenomenon, and not a literary device? In the novel "A Room with a view of the Arno" or in a pair of Jeeves and Wooster, in the first case the companions are not at all close, and in the second the role of companion is performed by a servant, indirectly we can say this and from literary sources says that such a social phenomenon really was, and Holmes' acquaintance with Watson could have a reason to to rent an apartment, but it continued as a companionship, which later took on the features of ambiguity, because such a phenomenon remained in history). Mortimer is the center of attention, but Holmes appeals to him most of all. According to the results of the first three chapters (more than 400 phrases), Holmes utters more than 200 phrases, Watson-41 (and is silent in the 2nd chapter, where the narrator -legend, note, memoir story, Mortimer reigns, and more than 120 phrases in dialogue with Holmes, including monosyllabic answers).
Chapter 4
A new character appears-Sir Henry. The scene is the same. Holmes and Watson's apartment on Baker Street. But only at the beginning of the chapter, then for the first time it is transferred to the streets of London and to the district courier office.
Holmes utters 141 phrases. Watson is 11. Mortimer is 18. Wilson is the manager of the district courier office-3. Cartwright, the boy, the courier-5. Sir Henry, a young baronet, a farmer from Canada-62 phrases.
Holmes interacts the most in the chapter: it is he who addresses Wilson and Cartwright ("minor characters"), communicates with Watson, Mortimer, and the baronet, that is, with all the characters. Watson interacts only with Holmes (he is silent even when entering the courier office with him). Mortimer and Holmes and the Baronet. The Baronet is also in this way with Holmes and Mortimer. But Holmes is at the center of the action.
The chapter begins with Mortimer's introduction of the baronet, and with the baronet's phrase. And this is seen as a socio-historical moment-although the baronet is just entering his new role, a new social position (you see, I am now an exwire, he says, explaining the purchases), but he takes an authoritative position in dialogues: they do not dare to interrupt him, while he can interrupt, and initiate dialogues. At the same time, Holmes again shows the expressiveness of his speech. But a small number of Watson's phrases can again be easily quoted at all -although they are not monosyllabic, they are short phrases expressing admiration for Holmes' reasoning or interrogative, showing a misunderstanding of the same Holmes (which for the reader and for Holmes seems to serve as proof of the "narrow-mindedness" of the companion and at the same time, nevertheless, because admiration the fool is not worth much, but "exalts" the detective).
If we try to continue the formal analysis, quantitative content analysis, for example, we will try to analyze all references to the sights of the English capital: for the 19th century. the new Bank building in the City, palaces and parks of Westminster... but all this is not in the novel at all. Of course, the main place of action is not London, but Dartmoor, Devonshire (and Grimpen and Grimpen Bog, Coombe Tracy, Lefter Hall and others, as well as Baskerville Hall, which did not exist in reality). Of course, some of the sights are not mentioned in the text precisely because they seemed "self-evident" to contemporaries: it was easy for them to imagine what seems impossible to us, today. Of course, Doyle didn't write a guidebook, he didn't write an essay, he didn't write a story. And here I come to the first conclusion: one cannot ignore the fact that the whole plot and all the characters are fictional. That is, this plot and these characters never existed, unlike even historical plots and figures. However, there is no argument that such a plot and such heroes could not exist: today it may seem improbable to us that Stapleton, who sought to appear as an heir to crimes, lived side by side with the old baronet and did not show up, went in such an intricate, roundabout way (but he could have motives for this) It seems implausible to us that the millionaire baronet led too modest a lifestyle for a millionaire, and that he spent too sparingly to restore the estate (unfinished gatehouse). But that's how it happens. This is not an argument. And, in the end, the subject of study is not the plot itself, not the characters themselves, but the story. Yes, the story is in the artwork.
The cultural and historical school in literary studies understood back in the 19th century that even an artistic text reflects reality and is saturated with historical realities. The modern American "new historicism" expressed the same idea with the formula "the text is historical." Having developed the idea that "history is textual", because our ideas about it are built one way or another on the basis of texts. The idea of the historicity of the text allows us to explore its dependence on the historical and cultural context: the theories and practices of the era, the biography of the author, his worldview, the events of his life, his psychology. Moreover, in the intertextual approach, new historicists, in order to understand a literary work, involve the whole range of texts, including those that are considered historical sources: legislative acts, texts of a political, religious and other plan. This is bearing fruit-it allows you to interpret familiar classical works in a new way. Shakespeare's Hamlet is analyzed by Stephen Greenblatt along with texts including the Protestant Church condemning the belief in ghosts. O.Eliseeva writes that the "Auditor" now correlates with the inspections of the Third Department and this turns out to be a new "inconvenient" moment in the modern reading of the text. However, in literary studies, such a method is aimed at understanding literature, not reconstructing history. But in order to methodologically and theoretically strictly follow the goal, I recognized the need to take into account the statements of modern genetic criticism, the "new hermeneutics", that an artistic text is the result of an author's intention, and as such is integral, complete. And that, any other attempt at interpretation outside the author's intention has nothing to do with the text, and the interpreter essentially acts as a co-author or author of such an attempt at interpretation, in which, in fact, he is limited only by his capabilities, it all depends on which and how many other texts came into his field of vision. Even in intertextuality, I would think to limit myself to fiction and those literary works with which Doyle himself and his first readers could be familiar.
So Doyle didn't write the story. But Doyle was a historically real person, he wrote in the context of the history in which he lived, and therefore there are opportunities in his text for... historical reconstruction. In literary studies, there is an experience of such research in order to better understand literature. My goal is different-the reconstruction of history. I am not writing a study of the work itself as part of literature, nor am I writing a scientific commentary on a literary text. Such an experience is also available in history, especially for the currently popular "cultural" history, the history of everyday life, which is understood as the history of everyday life and morals. O.Eliseeva recognizes the complexity of such a study in view of the danger of assuming for history all that is described in the Russian classics of the 18th-19th centuries, since it is the fruit of the author's idea. I would also add that the fruit of the author's idea is primarily. And he agreed that many researchers and readers lack understanding of this.
Doyle did not write history, in the words of the modern American historical theorist Alan Megill, he, like historians, did not "dig in the dust of archives." Moreover, Leo Tolstoy, by his own admission, while working on the novel "War and Peace", wrote precisely "the history of the people". And indeed, as Seidenshnur convincingly showed in a study of the Soviet period, he worked with just a large set of documents, moreover, argued with historians, and generally speaking defended a point of view much more similar to the point of view of modern historians than historians of the 19th century, who considered history as the history of sovereigns, and the sources for which They were served only by acts of State power and diplomacy. But Doyle didn't write the story. This distinguishes him, like any other writer, from a historian, although the boundaries are still shaky. The historian also works creatively, moreover, this is a misconception, as A. Buller shows in his work, that the historian turns to sources without having a certain concept, no, on the contrary, the historian already turns (and selects) sources with a certain ready-made speculative concept, which he only looks for confirmation in the sources. And that is why, based on the same sources, we readers and colleagues always come across, as it were, different "stories". However, for a historian, on the one hand, this is recognition as an inevitable evil- a subjective factor, and on the other hand, a professional strives to minimize its influence in every possible way. But here is a writer, anyone (and not Leo Tolstoy) on the contrary, he is free in his work, everything that comes out from under his pen as literature is the product of his author's idea, even if he tried to be as authentic as possible in his presentation, plausible. Here is a curious point: the specifics of Doyle are not just a writer, but also a storyteller, and even if you believe Doyle's fictionalized biography (and there is simply no other one, despite Doyle's popularity) by J.D. Carr, "The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle" was preceded by just the narrator, the stories told by Doyle were always believed at first as in real, and with one of the first experiments in literature, the same incident happened: his story "The Messages of Hebekuk Jephson", according to Carr, is "the most fantastic": "it received an echo beyond the limits of ordinary literary criticism." "In faraway Gibraltar, a certain Mr. Solly Flood read the message and lost his peace and sleep. Through the central news agency, the text of the telegram was distributed throughout England: "Mr. Solly Flood, Her Majesty's Advocate General in Gibraltar, declares Hebekuk Jephson's message to be a fake from the first to the last word." It should also be noted here that journalism was taking its first steps then and the newspaper word was believed. And at the same time, historical writings were still only distinguished from professional literature (let's recall Karamzin, Pushkin or Momsen in Europe). Carr writes: "Dr. Conan Doyle did not just enjoy all this newspaper hype -he heard the voice of his vocation behind it. He was able to compose tall tales, which many took at face value. This is exactly what Edgar Allan Poe did in the New York Sun, and every reader firmly believed that Harrison Ainsworth and seven companions crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a controlled balloon. Poe deliberately tricked readers, mocking them angrily. The doctor from Southsea (that is, Doyle) tried only to entertain them. Apparently, a writer of tall tales can smash a realist to smithereens on his own field and with his own weapon, if only-if only!- he will manage to grasp the right realities."
It would seem that this has long been known in literature, in history. There is a well-known literary technique-the conscious use of dating techniques, the introduction of elements of the "outside world" into the text -newspaper clippings, mentions of real names, events, pseudo-writings and pseudo-diaries (all this is in the story) to give the character of reality, that is, unlike the historian, who is forced to say once that he will write at all not tall tales, but only "how it really was", Doyle or the writer must constantly argue, prove the authenticity of what has been stated, as if casually using this technique, unwittingly (or consciously) gives the narrative the features of a real story. Once again, this is a well-known literary technique. The truth is that rarely anyone seems to have looked a little further. Let's turn to the text of the novel.
On the very first page in any of its editions, the first thing that the reader encounters is the reflections of Holmes and Watson on the cane, and in particular in the very first paragraph Doyle reports the date in its engraving: 1884. That is, it puts the reader at once at a certain time-for the first readers, a recent story (the story was published in 1901-02). Then Watson takes the "Medical Handbook" from the shelf and we, the readers, together with the characters, read an article from there-brief biographical information about Dr. Mortimer.
In the second chapter, Mortimer himself appears with a manuscript that is commonly called a "legend" in literary studies, although judging by its text: "written by Hugo Baskerville for his sons Roger and John, with instructions to keep this a secret from their sister Elizabeth" not only Sir Charles, who became a victim of Stapleton, but also the author The manuscript believed that what was described in it was not a legend at all. However, Holmes showed an example of historical criticism - in terms of external criticism, when he dated it! And I was practically not mistaken (naming 1730, such an exact date, and even on the edge of my pocket, was of course bravado). We are also informed of the exact date of the manuscript: 1742 - another reference to time. And the essence of internal historical criticism (checking information for authenticity): "interesting for collectors of fairy tales." But it wasn't a "legend." This is precisely the manuscript, that is, the historical source, the family tradition of the baronets. By the way, Austen's novel (early 19th century) "Northanger Abbey" shows us: why, in fact, are we talking about baronets? This is the lowest title of the English nobility, it does not give the right, for example, to sit in the House of Lords, and there were, unlike higher titles, quite a lot, that is... it is easier to mislead readers. Although, of course, this is a misconception from the Pushkin family: "the darkness of low truths is dearer to me than the uplifting deception." Then Mortimer reads a "more modern" document: Doyle again reports the exact time and place-"Devon Country Chronicle of June fourteenth of this year." It's a local newspaper. Mortimer reads out a short list of facts about the recent death of Sir Charles Baskerville, a possible candidate for the Liberal Party in the next election.
In the fourth chapter, Holmes already asks Watson to show him yesterday's issue of the Times, which is already the most famous English newspaper, and reads out an excerpt from an editorial about the government's protectionist policy. In the fifth chapter, Holmes and Watson go to dine with Sir Henry Baskerville and Mortimer in the restaurant of the Northumberland Hotel. This hotel still exists today. Where else is the receptionist interested in the guest record book? Then they use the telegraph. The cabman is questioned, and Doyle gives the reader the full details of the cabman, including his address, and which company owns the cab: "John Clayton, Three Turpey Street, Borough. A cab from the Shiplease Yard company, at Waterloo Station." Then Trafalgar Square, the Waterloo Canal, and the Northumberland Hotel appear in the cabman's story -that is, the information is repeated twice, but from the mouth of another character. And all these are real geographical, historical and cultural places today. In London.
Then, in the novel there are two chapters (out of 15) -representing letters from Watson to Holmes, they are also dated, and one chapter is excerpts from Watson's diary. The narrator-Watson resorts to them, in search of more accurate information, without relying on memory. This is all a well-known technique in cinema today (there was no cinema at that time): the most terrible horror films are just those that are devoid of special effects and deliberately forged as documentaries. And this is not a matter of taste at all, otherwise it would not be a separate genre (which is also not the only genre-Hitchcock's films are devoid of any artificiality, except just the fact that ordinary things turn into inexplicable and therefore disturbing phenomena, for example, "Birds"), would not have so much imitations. For example, "The Blair Witch" -what is so terrible about children's play and laughter that the characters hear outside the tents in the forest. It would seem nothing. If you do not add three clarifications: events happen to people who got lost in the forest, the time of action is night, and they actually went to the forest, hearing stories about a witch who preys on people, on children. And the whole movie specifically imitates an amateur video. But if this cinematic technique is well known today, then the literary technique is why we are afraid of the paw prints of a giant dog... it was almost invented or widely disseminated by Doyle, who has the talent of both a writer and a narrator of stories, not necessarily scary, which were believed to be real. In general, the phenomenon of the memorial museum to a literary character-Sherlock Holmes, is almost the only example in the history of literature. But I have already noticed that it is usually not seen beyond this famous literary device.
Let's turn once again to the text, to the same quotes. What can you notice? The "medical reference book" really certainly exists. But is there an article in it specifically about the same Mortimer?.. Let's leave aside the "legend". The local newspaper in Devonshire really could or could be, but if we believe in the article in it that Mortimer is reading, we will have to believe in the reality (at least historical) of Sir Charles Baskerville... and therefore into the whole plot, with all the characters. Farther... The hotel still exists today. There is no way to check the entry of the guest book, or there is, but even if it mentions exactly the same persons that Holmes inquired about at the desk, does this prove the reality of Holmes... And finally, the most important thing: in the first novel of the entire cycle, Doyle gives an address that is still world famous today: 221b Baker Street, London. And it has long been known that such an address on Baker Street never existed, then it was specially established as the Holmes Memorial museum-apartment. I believe that this is not just a literary device. One or two such pieces of information can be called examples of a literary device. But we are talking about something much more weighty: I call it an "imaginary reality". There is a reference book, but no article. There is a newspaper, but no article. There is a newspaper, there is an article, but they do not prove anything, they do not explain. There is a hotel, there is a guest book, but again this cannot serve as an argument. Etc. Throughout the text of the novel: what gives the date of the letters allegedly written by Watson to Holmes. Doyle is an author, he creates an "imaginary reality", and he creates it as part of the author's plan, consciously.
What does this give me in studying the text and reconstructing history? Millions of readers and researchers have fallen under the spell of this "imaginary reality": philologists, historians of different generations around the world (and in my opinion, both I and the domestic historian and cultural critic Kobrin). The Holmes Museum at 221b Baker Street owes its very existence to this charm and talent of Doyle the storyteller.
As you know, Doyle immediately introduces the chronology of the story from the very first paragraph, in the very first chapter: 1884 is indicated on the cane, in a conversation with Watson, Holmes notices that five years have passed since then. Therefore, the time of action is 1889 (you can even give a more accurate chronology of all the actions of the story, in full accordance with the author's idea of an imaginary reality). But what happened in the real, historical year 1889?
For example, the Eiffel Tower is being installed in Paris. There is no hint of this in the novel. Of course, Doyle is not a chronicler. But the event is exceptional in its impact. And first of all, the negative one. A lot has been written about him in the press. However, no one could have imagined that the Eiffel Tower would soon become a symbol of Paris.
In 1889. On January 30, the bodies of Crown Prince Rudolf and his beloved Baroness von Evening were found in Mayerling Castle. And again, the entire world press has been writing about it all year. There is not a hint in the novel. Of course, Doyle is not a chronicler. However, the final chapter says that after the Baskervilles case, Holmes was busy, for example, that: "he managed to protect the unfortunate Madame Montpensier, who was accused of murdering her stepdaughter, Mademoiselle Carer-a young lady who, as you know (this is the most interesting thing here-"as you know"-my note), six months later she turned up in New York alive and married in addition." Of course, to suggest that Doyle would involve Holmes in unraveling a real high-profile political case, such as the mysterious suicide of the Crown Prince and his beloved, would be folly. But that's the whole point. It's funny how Doyle's "exposure" usually happens: the director of the Soviet film adaptation, a series he worked on for several years, responds in the sense that when the director's team decided to smear the dog with phosphorus, it turned out that Doyle "lied everything" in his stories, it's not even that the "luminous" was not correctly translated a mixture", or an incident that really took place, and which Igor Maslennikov also recalls, he even had to "correct" the original: that snakes do not hear, and in the film Livanov as Holmes, Solomin as Watson responded to this remark, He replies that the criminal noticed something like that, so he additionally invited the snake back by tapping. However, the real incident was connected with the inability of snakes to crawl on vertical surfaces, to which the real Doyle objected, arguing that in a theatrical production based on the story "Motley Ribbon" boa crawled perfectly, as if forgetting that boa... a representative of boas, that is, non-stinging, non-venomous snakes, they hunt in a completely different way. The whole logic of such disputes still remains... in the direction of the logic of "imaginary reality". What difference does it really make: it was like that or otherwise, if all this... Imaginatively.
And, if it were madness to imagine Doyle interfering with Holmes in the real high-profile crimes of the century (although Doyle himself used his talent in unraveling real crimes, and other authors, and the cycle of short stories and stories about Holmes generated just a stream of different quality and kind of literature, they could also interfere with the detective in real historical high-profile cases) For example, why explain to the reader that Sir Charles amassed millions of dollars in financial speculation in South Africa at the very time when the "gold rush" began there: in 1886. (that is, three years before the time of the action in the novel) gold deposits are discovered in the Transvaal. And a small working village grows very quickly into a large city - Johannesburg. What's it? The carelessness of the writer, which Doyle was often reproached for and will be reproached for? Or maybe it's just that Doyle was not a chronicler, and even deliberately trying to give authenticity to his works (and he still did it better than others, as evidenced by the Holmes Museum, and the renamed address on Baker Street, and historians dedicating scientific monographs, finding evidence in the "Holmsian" of the past, although this is not obvious even in terms of "cultural" history: after all, no one, even the most talented writer, can be a source on the history of costume, everyday life and mores of his time!) I couldn't keep up with absolutely everyone, even if there were widely known facts of his time, he generally created his "imaginary reality", which he consciously distanced from the historical environment around him (for us) just as much as they differed... real house numbers on Baker Street, real articles in real newspapers that he quoted, and so on. Having completely different goals and objectives (even than Leo Tolstoy) when he created, he, as Carr wrote, "entertained readers."
In this case, can his novel serve even as an auxiliary historical source? If we interpret the information reported in it, without taking into account the phenomenon of "imaginary reality", of course not. But... strictly speaking, the novel, precisely because of the "imaginary story" ("reality" for Doyle's contemporaries, for posterity - "history"), only has the features of an "ordinary" literary work, which simply by virtue of its origin should have features indicative of the past (and this is indeed the case, but if we just We take it into account... "an imaginary story"). In reality, of course, it is primarily a work of art, the fruit of the author's idea (even when it comes to history, politics, geography, whatever it is, it is also a subjective factor for the historian in his work), which only has indefinite (especially in the form of conscious writing of an "imaginary reality" with imitation of "certainty", but it's not like that) features of time. Collingwood, a theorist of history, in his work "The Idea of History" denied the existence of "imaginary worlds", argued that there is only one historical world, and he is right, there are no "imaginary worlds" in history. But it is precisely Doyle's work that is an example of the conscious production of an "imaginary reality" by the imagination of a brilliant writer, in which even his contemporaries believed (what can we expect from descendants). And it allows you to make sure of this... the usual historical criticism in the approach to his works as to ... ordinary historical sources. If they claimed to... to tell a story, historians would have to reject them as "tall tales", but they never pretended to convey the world around them realistically, reliably (Doyle was also the author of such a geographical and historical hoax as "The Lost World"), so... actually, there can be as much "Victorian" in his works about Holmes as there is... paleontological in the "Lost World". For some reason, this is exactly what usually escapes even modern professional researchers. Although, when approaching literature as historical sources, this must be recognized as a common misconception. So, O.Eliseeva, rightly noting about the "author's imagination", and representing "complexity" in the task of telling on the basis of literature about the daily life of the past, still speaking about mores (in comparison with examples of everyday life), also rightly noting: "the air of the epoch, the logic of behavior is much more difficult to convey" and: "in that is why the heroes of other historical novels and films, dressed according to the requirements of distant centuries, act as if they are our contemporaries," nevertheless considers it possible: "to catch the past by the tail and show which side it reflected in the works of art." This is probably true for authors and works who declared the tasks of their creativity to scourge mores, even fantastic works (because it is more clearly visible from what they came, from what reality, these fantasies). But there cannot be a single methodology or a single approach for the entire literature complex, just as the methodology for studying archaeological, written sources, and the entire historical complex differs. But trying to convey the "air of the epoch" in general seems an impossible task, because it is not conveyed by contemporaries themselves in memoir literature, which is all (if it is not diary entries, letters) a product of later reflection, as Yurchak rightly notes, when the author, seemingly, lived at the time he aspires to to testify, he himself rethinks it in contradiction with his "air". As noted in the journalism of the Soviet artist (one of the participants in the "historical" exhibition criticized by Khrushchev), memory is not linear in principle, fragmentary, and the past is presented in memory as a subject for "play", it is known as reconstruction. As you can see, an attempt to analyze literature as a source provides an opportunity to analyze the very process of cognition of the past. This alone has theoretical value. The method of reflection on the procedure of cognition, which is popular in modern humanities, is also necessary for any research. Continuing the thought of O.Eliseeva, the "air of the epoch" does not consist only of everyday life and mores, it consists in a complex in which all aspects of what is presented in the form of a schematic narrative: politics, economics, society, culture of a particular time. That is why no contemporary "recognizes" time from historical educational literature: due to the fragmentary nature of information, selection in accordance with other criteria, other tasks. But the closest to such a possibility, of course, are works of art and in general the entire arsenal of art tools, for example, closer to an attempt to convey the "air of the era" known as the "thaw" and the films of Khutsiev, Romm, and the novels of Aksenov than the decisions of the authorities. But for the 19th century, there is still no such wide arsenal of art tools, especially synthetic ones like cinema. And even an attempt at generalizations based on the material of all literary texts can only pretend to such a representation, taking into account not only what I called "imaginary reality", in fact, to a lesser extent this "author's imagination" (Petrovskaya even believes that the less developed it is, the more valuable the source, because the less capable the author it copies reality more subtly-a controversial issue), if we do not take into account the narrowness and limitations of the literary environment itself in a society where there is still no mass literature, literacy of the first order, divided into estates. To all that has been said, it should be added that after the works of Benjamin, Tynyanov, Shklovsky, Yampolsky (and not only them, but a huge complex of theories and methods of literary criticism focused on the text as a phenomenon independent of cultural and historical context at least), there is doubt that the history of literature is a historical discipline, that literature not "out of time". Then where can the qualities necessary for a historical source come from in literature, this is a possible statement of the problem, even if literature and history are not of different nature, but are described in different models. Historically, it was history that stood out from literature into professional knowledge through the approval of models from the complex of "exact sciences" in it: it was equally influenced by Newton's physics, understood as a general scientific principle (hence attempts to search for "patterns", "laws") and evolutionism, which made a revolution in biology in the 19th century. This is all the more obvious contradiction with the approach to literature as a source of history, as in the very understanding of the possibilities of literary criticism, history, the phenomenon of literature, and the reconstruction of the past since the 19th century. (and more for foreign than domestic knowledge, "thanks" to dogmatically assimilated Marxism, which largely preserved the "spirit of science" of the 19th century and in the 20th century), several revolutions took place: in particular, the "sociological" one in history (and which also expressed the convergence of methods of historical science with physico-mathematical, oriented not even just on cognition of the object, not the subject, but on cognition by methods that evaluate quantitative parameters rather than qualitative ones: measurability and repeatability of phenomena).
When setting the task of reconstructing traces of the past from works of art, it is necessary to: "the author's imagination", or "imaginary realities", and an understanding of the limitations of the process itself and the means of cognition, it is necessary to at least provisionally stipulate, keep in mind. With this in mind, as well as the non-applicability of the methods of exact sciences to the humanities... let's continue the analysis of the novel by formal methods.
There are peculiar circles in the novel, the movement along them is a chase. The first circle: in the text of the manuscript, the plot of the legend. Old Hyuga is chasing the farmer's daughter, his drinking buddies and the Baskervilles' dog are hurrying after him. A second, wider circle (these circles are not identical or even equal): Stapleton (the dog of the Baskervilles, i.e. Stapleton's dog) chases the old, then the young baronets, and gives chase to him (with the help of Mortimer, Laura Lyons, then Miss Stapleton) Holmes with Watson, the inspector (a group of friends of the young baronet). Actually, the obvious narrative on the contrary regarding the plot of the legend allows us to imagine it as circles, and even the fact that the connecting link that makes these circles parts of a spiral similar to an hourglass (with different sizes of circles) is... The hound of the Baskervilles. She is the pole of the spiral, mathematically speaking. And the centers of the circles are the storytellers: for the first, Hugo is the narrator of the legend, and for the second, Watson.
Is it possible to understand something else from this geometry, following the goals of humanitarian research...
In the novel "Valley of Fear" there are many allusions to "Dog..."
Scientific cognition, for example, in mathematics or physics distinguishes objects of the surrounding reality into static and dynamic (at least the idea of subsequent analysis was born from this). You can try to analyze the text, bearing in mind, for example, descriptions of actions and reflections, this affects the reader's perception of the plots. It can be noted that the place of action in the first three chapters (the story, by the way, was supposed to be published in two chapters a month and the time of action - from the end of summer to spring coincided with publications in the magazine) is chamber-it takes place in the apartment of Holmes and Watson, but it is actually interspersed with descriptions of the actions of the characters, it It doesn't happen in thought. And in general, there is a contradiction in this story: did Holmes not presumptuously declare that his method allowed him to unravel cases without leaving the room at all? In this story, he does not just leave the apartment, does not just go to Dartmoor from London, he hides there for most of the story. But so far in the first chapters there are arguments, but about what? About how much Mortimer must have to walk. Then even the reader is shown a chase scene - in the text in the text-a manuscript with a legend. The real journey begins, of course, in the chapter about the trip to Dartmoor. And there is a place for lyrical digressions that Watson likes so much, but he can rarely afford them in the text, both because he describes the business of a companion, and because, judging by the remark in the story "The Sign of Four", he wants to please Holmes with his literary experiments, to please him (although he does not really I like that Holmes is so vain sometimes). But there are quite a few places in the cycle for traveling of a different kind: Holmes is constantly on stimulants, this is strong tobacco (as in this story), and coffee (and there is a mention too), and even drugs. In this story, Holmes is obviously under the influence, thank God only of coffee and tobacco, wandering around Dartmoor "in the spirit" (a kind of existential journey, but of course the "stream of consciousness" itself, lengthy arguments, lyrics in the cycle are very few and these are the laws of the genre, which, however, Doyle created, and such are the traditions of English literature and the peculiarities of the language, or rather the mentality reflected in it). Even in the chamber part of the novel, during the interrogation of Mortimer by Holmes, verbs fall out like peas from a bag:
they saw
nothing
, they did not see
, they wandered
, they did not approach
It was
not there
If there is
understood, there is
no
way to get
there, answer, there
were
It was closed
(the verbless form is a feature of the Russian language)
, I did
not look
for it, I did not find
it.
And all this in a questioning tone. This is expression in its purest form, and I have already tried to define the genre definition of the novel as a work of expressionism, as well as the popular "horror novels" contemporary to it. There are more than 20 verbs, and for the most part they are not difficult to notice if you write them out-they relate to statements in opposition. And as we know: the mystery lies precisely in the fact that there was-there was no crime, there was-there was no dog, etc. Stapleton's wife or sister, Laura Lyons was-was not at the gate, Sir Charles burned-did not burn the letter, wrote-did not write to Mrs. Lyons, Barrymore followed Baskerville in London, was plotting-was he plotting, was the telegram delivered-not delivered, and so on and the like. Most of the story changes the place of action away from the English capital-if you can talk about the connection of the detective with urban romance, then the place of action in the story is still an English village, wilderness, province. Although... the characters are just strangers to her, city dwellers (as seen in the pastiche, Holmes is called a refined gentleman-tea with sugar has long been in fashion in England itself, but she spends huge efforts to get the whole world hooked on it, although globalization is still very far away), who invaded her with their interests and even such extravagant habits as wandering through the marshes in outfits, as if it were a street in London. But there are horses in the swamps too... more precisely, ponies, although they drown in the quagmire from time to time. And the locals (that is, of course, strangers, but the heroes of the story) always appear in the landscape unexpectedly (this is also noted in the pastiche), just as if they suddenly turned around the corner on a paved street (although instead of houses there are dolmens, granite ledges, but you can wander along them even at night as on a pavement-they are horizontal, and in the light of the moon, as in night city lighting).
There are also completely static objects in the novel. Although the text does not tolerate anything static: Sir Charles is constantly mentioned on the pages of the story as if he did not die, or was resurrected, and old Hugo literally moves into Stapleton under the guise of which he commits crimes. But these are portraits, of course. In general, the connections between the image and the real person in the story are perceived by us differently from the contemporaries of the first publication, photography was still a fashionable, new topic at that time. Portraits could only be afforded by still very wealthy people (as well as photography was not cheap at all). And in the text, for example, Holmes follows Stapleton from the marshes, in Coombe Tracey, because he establishes Stapleton's connection with Laura Lyons (a married woman, although living separately from her husband, although she works as a typist, and Stapleton is a learned man, a naturalist, despite being a fraud, his hobby scientific studies in a very specific and also very fashionable field at that time - let's recall Nabokov, for example, lepidopterology, Holmes only confirms with his investigation, even such a "distant" person from the world of science as Mr. Mortimer is published in magazines). But Holmes first follows his alter ego with a minus sign, then runs into him in the night in the swamp, but can see him (and show Laura as proof that she is being deceived) in a photo paired with his wife, and then his exact copy-rubs the 17th century old Hugo. And the subject of the investigation is not just a dog, but also a ghost or an imitation of a ghost (it is curious that in the pastiche Gate is interested in a photograph of a dog, and newspapers tend to publish the first pictures of an event, a phenomenon precisely as evidence of reality).
The investigation in the novel is presented mainly as Watson's investigation of what the Barrymores are hiding, that is, a false trail. And on this false trail, Barrymore, when everything ends well for the couple (although for a while, Seldon dies instead of America, falling off the dolmen, trying to escape from the dog... there is a lot of running in the text of the story: Sir Charles runs, Seldon runs, Sir Henry runs, Miss Stapleton runs, Stapleton himself runs, and when he finds his wife-sister with the baronet, and when he tries to hide in the marshes, Holmes, Watson and Lestrade run, catching up with the dog from which the baronet is trying to escape, there is even the reasoning, of course, was not made on the run, and then, Watson, that Holmes "has never run so fast before", this is a very dynamic novel, with all the fundamental difference between European literature and Russian, which cannot be said about its film adaptation in the Soviet version of Maslennikov, where they really like it... interiors where this passion is visible in an attempt to convey... the atmosphere, the way of life of Victorian England, for which everything is suitable that more or less resembles Europe in general in the USSR: old Petersburg, Estonia), but Barrymore admits about the letter... and this became the thread by which both Watson and Holmes meet in the cave, their investigations turn out to be parallel. However, for Holmes, Laura Lyons was scheduled to be an interviewer for a different reason: she communicates too closely with Stapleton, and he hides that he is married. Watson's story also about the fact that in a strange way Laura's letter coincides with the time of the assassination attempt on the old baronet only strengthens suspicions about her and the Stapletons. Watson is not so far from discovering the criminal, he is much less agile and not as observant as Holmes, likes to shy away from lyrics, romance, which Holmes reproaches him with in The Sign of Four, but still. Moreover, he is not even sure that L.L. is Laura Lyons, but he conducts the interrogation as if he is convinced of this, and she confesses. Let her lock herself in the main room for now. But who said that this first meeting would not be a prologue to the second, third. It was Watson who found out that the telegram to Barrymore had not been delivered directly into his hands. And, after all, Watson runs as well as Holmes. In general, they complement each other perfectly: they can even be represented as mathematics, exact sciences and humanities, as science in general and, for example, art. That is, as different, but equally necessary ways of cognizing reality: scientific and artistic (something that centuries earlier had not been separated in religious worldview and worldview). They even sometimes exchange roles to the best of their abilities: when Watson takes up the lancet, and Holmes picks up the violin (and by the way, he knows how to play perfectly when Watson asks him to).
In the end, it is precisely thanks to this combination, this combination of Holmes' analytical mind and Watson's penchant for romanticizing, that the narrative turns out. And in the novel, compliments are given to Watson himself (Sir Henry and Stapleton, in the pastiche his story, for all its artistry, serves as a guide for the Gate, that is, it is clear that the map, even the most detailed one, on which Holmes wandered in the spirit, would have been as much use, otherwise Holmes would not have sent Watson on a journey and I would not have gone, only incognito, following).
And again, it must be remembered that literature and history (and geography) were not too separated, and the methods of investigation were then in their infancy. It all read both as artistic, but also as a revelation (and Doyle was written asking for investigations, and one day he couldn't even refuse, he took up the case). In my opinion, modernity in the novel is represented precisely by this: historicism, positivism, but it would seem that many works of modern literature are permeated with this, but in Doyle's novel the writing procedures themselves are presented in Watson's notes, in the description of the work of the great detective... the narrative. It is no coincidence that Mark Blok compared the work of a historian... with detective work.
Mark Block compares the work of a historian to that of a detective. Not by accident.
The novel is written in the language of a journalist and a journalist. In the "huge" footprints of the "huge" dog, in fact, the beginning of the journalistic style is a language that is specifically focused on shocking, exciting, impressing and paying attention (and this is how it differs from the language designed to make you think, or sharing ready-made conclusions: dry and strict).
Holmes is nevertheless, in the novel and in the cycle of short stories and novels, the author of several monographs (about this in the novel "The Sign of Four"), which already mentions "footprints": "here is my monograph on the study of footprints, with notes on taking fingerprints using plaster ...", among the monographs about more than a hundred varieties of cigar ash and how a person's profession affects the shape of his hand (and this is not palmistry, because in general: "I do not do fortune telling. It's a disgusting habit, it ruins logical abilities").
At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, at the time when the novel was being created, one of the most famous manuals on the theory of developing historical science was the book by French historians Charles Langlois and Charles Seignobos "Introduction to the Study of History" - "summarizing the ideas of positivist theory about the work of a historian," as Zaretsky writes. So here are the source documents, in their book... "these are the traces left by the thoughts and actions of people who once lived."
But Doyle himself, as I have already noticed, shared a belief in the mystical, he was a spiritualist, which was generally fashionable at that time, as I have also already noticed, and above all a journalist, including propagandizing faith in spiritualism.
Was Doyle "naive" and "selfless" in promoting spiritualism? The spiritualistic seances of the early twentieth century - what were they like?
"As in our days, most often the mediums were ordinary crooks trying to hit the jackpot for those who want to believe in miracles. Of course, even hundreds of revelations of such charlatans then, as now, did not at all reduce the flow of sufferers laying out their hard-earned money to another medium. However, in order to create an entourage of the presence of spirits, occult magicians still had to work hard, so that the way they earn money can be compared with the way magicians earn their living. With the caveat, however, that "miracles" were presented as miracles, and not a banal "sleight of hand". Photographs of those years testify to how the spiritualistic sessions took place. Often on them we can see how the so-called ectoplasm comes out of the body of the medium. So, in the following two rather disgusting pictures, taken presumably in 1910, the fortune teller Marta Bero, also known as Eva Quarry, is depicted.
Madame Bero specialized in excretion from the openings of her body (nose, mouth, ears) Ectoplasm. When Madame went into a trance, mysterious faces appeared on the substance. Of course, the session, like other similar events, took place in darkness, so those present did not see that the ectoplasm was an ordinary thin material – chiffon, gas or muslin. Another medium named Mina Crandon turned out to be even more inventive and used sheep lungs to reproduce ectoplasm. Chewed paper, soap and egg white were also used.
Martha Bero, however, did not lag behind. After a series of performances with ectoplasm, she learned to play with light effects (what's not a reason for the interest of the masses in physics?). Fortunately, a few years later, Madame Bero was finally exposed.
A popular trick among psychics was the famous "flying tables". Most often, these tables could only be seen on photographs advertising the abilities of a particular medium and inviting a gullible audience to a session. They were made, for example, like this. The camera with the photographic plate was set to a long shutter speed, and the "mystery" took place under red light, which did not illuminate the emulsion. At the right moment, the "spirit" turned the table over from behind the white curtain, the medium pressed a button, the flash flash went off, and voila! – the picture of the "flying" table is ready. Needless to say, all the others who were present in the picture and made surprised eyes were figureheads. However, sometimes the tables did not fly – at sessions with an outside audience, they could just move and bounce. In this they were helped by the nimble legs of the medium himself, actively working under the table. As you can see, the spiritualistic seances of those years were both the most unpretentious and rather witty "miracles", which, in a good scenario, could claim to be quite honest and very interesting magic numbers in the circus arena.
Later, in the 1930s, when scientific achievements, and with them their popularization, marched across the planet at a rapid pace, the physical tricks of mediums with bouncing tables and ectoplasm had to sink into oblivion. I could only rely on mental tricks. "Broadcasting" on behalf of the spirit has gained popularity. A once-famous medium named Moirick Morris broadcast on behalf of the spirit of Power. At the moment of the "broadcast", the lady's body stiffened, the voice turned from female to male, and the improvised stream of predictions could last up to 45 minutes without stopping.
With the advent of television (and in our country also with the collapse of the USSR), psychics mastered it, only slightly changing the nature of their exhortations. Now they charged the viewers with water, and the youngest of them were "relieved" of enuresis."
In spiritualism, communication is at the center, or in the language of skeptics, quasi-communication. The novel, as I have already noticed earlier, is so dialogical that it resembles more a work of drama and therefore it is no coincidence that it is the most adaptable work of Doyle in the 20th century.
"Communication (as communication and communication) — from Latin. "communicatio" — communication, transmission and from "communicare" — to make common, to talk, to connect, to communicate, to transmit — a term accepted in research that designates operating systems that daily ensure the unity and continuity of human activity (see in this regard the theory of communication, the science of communications, communication science, communication studies, which represents It is a translation of the English term communication studies), as well as a meta-discourse (R. Craig).
The process of communication (including as a form of interaction) is understood as one of the foundations of human life and society. At the same time, researchers are talking about both communication processes and its results.
According to I. P. Yakovlev and other numerous researchers, communication as a science should be understood as a set of studies on the role of communication in society, bearing in mind its development, the content and structure of communication processes, the use of their means, etc.
For example, according to S. V. Borisnev, communication should be understood as a socially conditioned process of transmitting and perceiving information in conditions of interpersonal and mass communication through various channels using different means of communication.
M. S. Andrianov limits the understanding of communication to studies of semantic aspects of social interaction.
According to Niklas Luhmann, communication should be understood as "a certain historically specific ongoing, context-dependent event" as a set of actions characteristic only of social systems, during which there is a redistribution of knowledge and ignorance, and not a connection or transfer of information, or the transfer of "semantic" contents from one mental system possessing them to another.
According to Baxter, Sillars and Vangelisti, communication is the means by which people construct and maintain their relationships."
The history of communication as a science
"Communication studies stand out as an independent field of social sciences in connection with the development of technical means of infocommunication, especially radio in the 1920s, as well as later with the development of technology in general, including the advent of television and computers, and in addition - with the development of large corporations and the processes of globalization. The development of communication theory is associated with the formation of cybernetics, computer science, semiotics, with the complication of mathematics and engineering sciences.
The first Department of communication was opened in the 1940s in the USA.
As A. V. Nazarchuk notes, the understanding of communication issues went in at least three directions:
— Anglo-American, aimed at linguistic analysis and "clarification of language experience" (L. Wittgenstein);
— French, not limited to language communication, but including various social communication problems of modern society, such as understanding ideology and the authorities, criticism of capitalism, and the understanding of discourse;
— "philosophy of dialogue" (M. Buber, E. Levinas, M. Bakhtin, F. Rosenzweig, F. Ebner, O. Rosenstock-H;si, M. Bibler, etc.).
A research school with its own characteristics and traditions has developed in Germany. German communication studies grew out of the study of newspaper business in the early 20th century (the so—called Zeitungskunde), which after 1945 was renamed Publizistikwissenschaft (everything related to the study of various means of communication: books, films, newspapers, radio, etc.), and later into Publikations- und Kommunikationswissenschaft. Until the 1950s, research was devoted to the study of the history of the subject, after which the sociological theoretical and empirical approach prevailed. In parallel, in the 1970s, a new scientific direction appeared in Germany - Medienwissenschaft (lit. "the science of the means of communication"), which also studies political communication. Kommunikationswissenschaft and Medienwissenschaft were often used interchangeably. Currently, a single designation has been adopted for Kommunikations- und Medienwissenschaft, which implies an understanding of communication as a subject of research in relation to various research areas (for this, see the website of the German Society for the Study of Communication Media and Communications).
F. I. Sharkov uses the neologism "communicology" as a means of reducing communication research to his proposed understanding of communication, since for him communicology is "a system of formed knowledge and activities for obtaining new knowledge about communication, synthesizing into a single knowledge (science): 1) communication theory; 2) theories of various communications developed by various authors (for example, theories of mass communication, theories of intercultural communication, many theories of sociolinguistic communication, theory of egalitarian communication, etc.); 3) sciences and scientific fields studying various communications (sociology of communication, psychology of communication, etc.); 4) theory and practice of communicative activity in various spheres of society through various means and with various subjects."
A set of communication studies in relation to other sciences
"The theory of communication is developing within the framework of other sciences.
Thus:
ethnography studies the everyday and cultural features of communication as communication in ethnic areas;
psychology and psycholinguistics examines the factors contributing to the transmission and perception of information, the process of interpersonal and mass communication, as well as various aspects of communicating subjects — communicants;
linguistics deals with the problems of verbal communication — the normative and non—normative use of words and phrases in speech - oral and written, dialogic and monological, and other types of it;
paralinguistics considers ways of non—verbal communication - gestures, facial expressions, and other non-verbal means of communication;
sociolinguistics examines the social nature of language and the peculiarities of its functioning in various communities, the mechanisms of interaction of social and linguistic factors that determine contacts between representatives of different groups;
The sociology of communication studies social communication, and in particular the functional features of communication between representatives of various social groups in the process of their interaction and as a result of influencing their attitude to the social values of a given society and society as a whole."
Theories and models of communication
Communication theories
"Grachev believes that the theories of communication developed by foreign scientists can be divided into two categories: macro-level and micro-level. If microlevel theories focus on the relationship between communicators and recipients, as well as on the impact of communication on the individual, then macrolevel theories try to explain communication processes at the systemic level."
Microlevel theories
"Microlevel theories include, for example, the following theories: "magic bullet theory" by G. Lasswell, "theory of minimal effects" ("limited effects theories"), "theory of utility and satisfaction of needs" ("theory of uses and gratifications"), originally developed by E.Katz, various concepts according to which the mass media sets researchers their agenda ("agenda-setting" theories)".
Macro-level theories
"This area is represented by a significantly smaller number of publications, in particular, the works of G. Almond and J. Coleman, K. Deutsch, D. Easton, D. Knoke, and J. Kuklinski, R. Hackfeldt and J. Sprague, R.J. Schwarzenberg, T. Yamagishi, M. Gillmore, K. Cook, N.Lumana, and others. "
Communication models
" In the history of the development of communication theory, S. V. Borisnev identifies the following models:
The linear (classical) model of communication by G. Lasswell (1948) includes 5 main elements of the communicative process: who? (transmits a message) — a communicator; what? (transmitted) — message; how? (transmission is underway) — channel; to whom? (the message is sent) to the audience; with what effect? (the effectiveness of the message) is the result.
T. Newcomb's socio-psychological (interactionist) model of communication T. Newcomb's socio-psychological model of communication, which sets the dynamics of changes that communication will strive for. This model tries to take into account both the relationships that develop between the communicators and their relationship to the object of conversation, and postulates that the general trend in communication is the desire for symmetry. If the relationships of the communicants coincide with each other, they will strive to match their relationship to the object in question. If the relationship to each other does not match, the relationship to the object of speech will also not match. The coincidence of relations to the subject of conversation, if the relations to each other do not match, will be perceived as abnormal.
The noise model of communication by K. Shannon — W. Weaver supplemented the linear model with an essential element — interference (noise), which makes communication difficult. The authors identified technical and semantic noises — the first are associated with interference in the transmitter and channel, and the second with distortion of transmitted values when perceiving content. At the same time, communication was conceptualized by the authors as a linear, unidirectional process.
The factorial communication model of G. Malecki is one of the many variants of the development of the Shannon-Weaver communication model, which included, in addition to the basic elements, about two dozen more factors that make up the context of the communication process and actively influence its subjects.
In the circular (closed), balanced model of communication V. Shramma and K. Osgood (1954) proposed to consider the sender and recipient of information as equal partners, and also emphasized feedback, which balanced the direct communication: encoding — message — decoding — interpretation — encoding — message — decoding — interpretation.
A. Pyatigorsky's textual model of communication comprehends a person's communication with himself and others, which he carries out through a (written) text. According to this model, communication is always carried out in a certain communicative situation of communication with other persons.
According to D. P. Havre, there are 2 main approaches to understanding communication theory:
the process-information approach, within the framework of which such theoretical models of communication as the X model were developed. Lasswell, the mathematical model of communication by K. Shannon and W. Weaver, the socio-psychological model of communication by T. Newcomb, the model by J. Gerbner, the integral (generalized) model of communication by B. Westley and M. McLean, the transactional model of communication by the representative of the Texas school of communication A. Teng;
The semiotic approach, focusing on signs and sign systems, is represented by the following developments: the structural and linguistic direction and the concept of the F. sign. de Saussure, the logical and philosophical direction and the model of signs of Ch. Peirce, the logical model of G. Frege's signs, as well as the work of Ch. Morris, Ogden and Richards.
I. P. Yakovlev also suggests talking about:
systemic cybernetic methodology, within the framework of which an important contribution was made to the science of communications, in particular by such sociologists as T. Parsons, N. Luhmann, such cyberneticists as N. Wiener (in particular, the understanding of direct and feedback communication), H. von Foerster (distinction between first and second order cybernetics);
cognitive theories of communication (ch. Osgood);
the influence of structuralism on the understanding of communication (K. Levi-Strauss);
a critical approach to communication (Marxism, the Frankfurt School, the direction of research on communication as a cultural problem (R. Hoggart, R. Williams, S. Hull), in which, through the consideration and analysis of discourses, actions and texts as bearing certain ideologies that support and strengthen the power of some social classes and groups over others, the role of power and violence in communication processes."
"The scheme (model) of communication, understood as a speech event and close to the model of Claude Shannon, was proposed by R. Jacobson, however, unlike Shannon, he assigned a key role in communication not to information, but to language: a message is sent from the addressee to the addressee, created and interpreted using a code common to all participants in communication. The code is a language, considered as a system that brings into line a sensually given object, sign, some implied meaning. Each person is a member of various communication communities, and therefore a carrier of various codes. Communication, as the transmission of messages, always occurs in the context of other messages (belonging to the same act of communication or linking the remembered past with the anticipated future, thereby asking the fundamental question about the relationship of this message to the universe of discourse), affecting the encoding and interpretation of messages by communication participants.
Yu. M. Lotman challenged R. Jacobson's model of communication, pointing out that two people cannot have exactly the same codes, and language should be considered as a code along with its history. With full similarity / correspondence / equivalence of what is said and how it is perceived, according to Y. M. Lotman, the need for communication disappears altogether, since there is nothing to talk about, but only the transmission of commands remains. The code, like L. Wittgenstein's language game, individualizes communication, and the latter, thus, appears as a translation from the language of my "I" into the language of your "you". Yu. M. Lotman considers the text as a substratum of communication in which many codes and many communicants meet. The latter acts both as a memory of communication and at the same time as its boundaries. Yu. M. Lotman distinguishes between "ordinary" communication, which takes place in the "I —he" system, and autocommunication, which takes place in the "I —I" system; within the framework of autocommunication, the message acquires a new meaning, as conditions, time and context change messages, that is, the message is being transcoded. Sending a message to oneself causes a restructuring of the structures of one's own personality (for example, one cannot read a diary the same way it was written). Autocommunication is associated with any act of authorship, since each text carries a message to itself. The concept of autocommunication is expanded by M. Y. Lotman to the concept of thinking, with the necessary accompanying process of internal speech.
In line with the consideration of social issues, in the reading of structuralism, the possibility of communication is based on a system of signs, that is, in a certain language, which, according to K. Levi-Strauss, can be considered any system of social relations of any kind, that is, a variety of operations that provide the possibility of communication between individuals or groups. The vision of language in every kind of social relationship leads to the consideration of any social interaction as a form of communication. According to K. According to Levi Strauss, each communication system and all of them together have the task of constructing a particular sociality (social reality); this process is carried out by values that hold societies together, through symbols, the ability to convey and observe the meaning embedded in social rituals.
Communication is considered in line with R. Barth's semiology, through the concept of myth, understood as a communicative system in which it is not the object of the message itself that is important, but the form of the message, that is, how this object is communicated for the purpose of a certain communication. Myths, like metaphors, serve to expand the functions of regular communication, allowing you to build up communicative worlds of other orders over a semiotic system of the first order, thereby creating a wealth of communication, an abundance of meanings."
Communicative actions (acts) and their typology
The theory of communicative acts by T. M. Newcomb
"The theory of communicative acts by T. M. Newcomb (from lat.communicatio — to communicate) is a socio—psychological cognitive theory that explains the emergence of liking and dislike. In general, the concepts of structural balance and communicative acts only allow us to fix some discrepancy (dissonance) in people's perception of each other (or other persons), but do not allow us to predict the future direction of changes in their views with sufficient certainty."
Marshall McLuhan's Theory of Means of Communication
"According to Marshall McLuhan, a means of communication should be understood as a message. For example, the content of a movie is a novel, the content of a novel is speech, etc. The means of communication are an external extension of a person's consciousness and his organs as a whole. In the book "Understanding the means of communication (Understanding Media)" in this capacity, he examines clothes, homes, etc., showing how these "extensions of a person outside" are reflected in language and regulate communication. Thus, clothing and housing as means of communication streamline the life of human communities; The city as such is a means of communication that extends the collective consciousness and body outward, regulating relations with the environment (a dwelling without walls as a more extensive human habitat). As external extensions of man, acting as means of communication, M. McLuhan considers, in essence, all artifacts.
According to M. McLuhan, all means of communication are "translators" of some types of experience and energy into others. For example, money as a means of communication translates the skills and experience of one worker into the skills and experience of another. M. McLuhan also studied how communication tools create and reproduce social relationships."
Varieties of communication
"In communications, by means of its implementation, it is customary to distinguish the following main types of communication:
verbal communication
non-verbal communication, or communication carried out in paralinguistic discourse:
communication using signs
communication using gestures
communication using symbols
communication using other paralinguistic means (for example, facial expressions, poses, etc.)
According to the subjects of communication and the type of relationship between them, it is customary to distinguish the following types of communication:
interpersonal communication is a type of personality—oriented communication associated with the exchange of messages and their interpretation by two or more individuals who have joined into certain relationships with each other; a type of communication in a situation of interpersonal interactions and/or relationships;
Intergroup communication is a type of interaction between people determined by their belonging to various social groups and categories of the population, independent of their interpersonal relationships and individual preferences;
public communication is a type of institutional (status—oriented) communication with the public (a significant number of listeners); the message in such communication affects public interests and acquires a public character;
mass communication is a process of systematic dissemination of information, which is institutional in nature, as well as the transmission of specially prepared messages using various technical means to numerically large, anonymous, dispersed audiences; it is a regulator of dynamic processes of public consciousness, an integrator of mass sentiments, as well as a powerful means of influencing individuals and groups."
Theory of communicative action by Jurgen Habermas
"One of the main concepts of the theory of communicative action by the German philosopher Jurgen Habermas is the concept of discourse. The decisive idea of Habermas is that the rules of speech action can become the topic of conversation, discussion, in a word, discourse. Discourse is a dialogue that is conducted with the help of arguments. They allow us to identify the generally significant and normative in statements. If the normativity of statements is found, then the normativity of actions is set in this way. Discourse provides communicative competence. Outside of discourse, the latter is absent. According to Habermas, discourse is a dialogue, the participants of which have reached a certain level of maturity, in the sense of mental ability to think, i.e. they have overcome their infantilism in a rational linguistic sense. Habermas uses the concept of M;ndigkeit. Translated from German, this is the word coming of age.
By discourse, Habermas understands a means of a dialogically reasoned test of a claim to significance. The purpose of which is to achieve a generally valid agreement. Discourse is a communicative technique that has a number of rules:
1) participation in the discourse is open to every subject who is capable of speech if he has equal rights with other participants in the discourse;
2) any coercive action in order to achieve agreement or consensus is prohibited;
3) the participants of the discourse should come to an agreement only on the basis of motivation to achieve a general and reasoned agreement or consensus. Habermas introduces the concept of true and false discourse. False discourse is a phenomenon of false agreement or consensus. It is understood as a natural consequence of coercion, which is embedded in the very structure of communication. It arises as a result of violation of one or more rules of discourse. Communicative practices have no compulsion if they offer the subjects of discourse the same distribution of chances for choosing and performing speech acts. In communication, only a specific "nonviolent coercion" of the most appropriate argument should take place. Then a truly true discourse is realized.
The main problem in interpreting truth as an agreement achieved as a result of argumentation is implied in the fact that a thorough evaluation criterion is necessary to distinguish genuine and imaginary agreement. Habermas proposes to solve this problem (as well as to find a criterion for fixing various types of discourse and types of speech acts that correspond to them) the introduction of an ideal speech situation. The ideal speech situation has the following features:
1) it does not allow violence as external, as violence that follows from the very structure of the communicative process, thus, the prototype for it is a communicative action;
2) the only kind of coercion that is allowed in an ideal speech situation is the "nonviolent" violence of the best argument, which stimulates the search for convincing means of substantiating existing judgments.
Thus, the truth is associated not so much with the characterization of arguments from the point of view of argumentation, but with the pragmatics of the modality of their ability to convince. It is important for Habermas to focus on the connections between the idea of truth and the idea of freedom. The idea of freedom assumes that consent is sufficiently rational or has the necessary justification only if it is achieved in the process of "convincing" argumentation.
The logic of discourse is of particular importance in the process of finding the most effective arguments. The logic of discourse provides for the possibility of stricter conditions for the selection of arguments in the argumentation process. Thus, the legality of the conclusion or the choice of the necessary justification may be questioned. In other words, since every argument is made within the framework of a specific language system, if it is possible to prove its possible inefficiency, then it must pass the test of critical verification and, if necessary, must be changed.
Further, the structures of an ideal speech situation determine the symmetry of the conditions for those persons who take part in the argumentation process. This option is possible, on the one hand, as a result of the recognition by the participants of each other's discourse as fully sane and responsible subjects of action for their judgments, their willingness to criticize, self-criticism and substantiate their judgments. On the other hand, the same probability distribution in the selection and implementation of speech acts, which ensures the possibility of the very principle of exchanging roles in the argumentation process, as well as the same rights and obligations. The same distribution of possibilities for making explanations and judgments. Substantiation or refutation of their claim to the significance of what grounds are laid for the fact that no judgments have an unlimited validity period and therefore will not avoid criticism and thematization. The similarity of roles, and, consequently, the ability to allow and prohibit, etc., does not relate to the specific argumentation process itself, but to the conditions of its organization. The discourse includes conceptually formulated ideas of freedom and justice by means of universal pragmatics, in other words, the requirements of an ideal form of life. Also, an ideal speech situation eliminates the interruption of the communication process. The subjective reason for this is that a communicative action is not considered completed until all participants agree that they can make mutual claims to each other. Discourse is important when there is a fundamental possibility of reaching a rational informed agreement on the subject, which implies that the argumentation process takes place in an open manner and can last for quite a long time. Consent, which is achieved under the condition of an ideal speech situation, is considered genuine consent. The concept of an ideal speech situation makes sense to explain the very possibility of speech. The prototype for mutual understanding in the case of spoken language is that in any speech act it is necessary to assume the presence of an ideal speech situation. The German philosopher believes that there is some kind of initial agreement that is directly related to the structure of speech itself. Speech is impossible without structure. The meaning of a speech situation is that there are at least two participants — the one who speaks and the one who listens. The verbal behavior of the participants in the communication process presupposes the desired mutual understanding.
In addition, Habermas believes that in theoretical, practical and explicative discourses, participants in the argumentation process should proceed from the fact that the conditions of an ideal situation of speech are realized quite clearly. Since the outcome of each discourse depends on the focus on genuine agreement, then in any discourse, contrary to empirical motives, one should proceed from the assumption that there is an ideal discourse, a certain sample of an ideal speech situation. This assumption is available in the case of argumentation and allows us to consider the ideal situation of speech as one of the conditions for the possibility of realizing discourse and the cognitive process as such. An ideal speech situation, on the one hand, is not a fact, but, on the other hand, it cannot be a pure speculative construction; the mutual assumption of this ideal speech situation is necessarily present in every case of the communicative process.
Argumentation is a prerequisite for genuine discourse, since from the point of view of the communicative process it can be convincing for any audience. The procedure of the argumentation process may end with a rationally justified agreement. Thus, when implementing these conditions, the argumentation process can be considered as a general search for truth, which is aimed at achieving an intersubjective consensus. This strategy may have as its definition a mechanism for producing a "better argument" and may be considered a continuation of the orientation towards the process of mutual understanding.
The process of mutual understanding consists, according to Habermas, in a speech act and a yes/no position taken by the opponent in relation to this act. The object of discourse, that is, the consensus about something in the world, or its position, which can be challenged, depends on the establishment of a relationship between at least two participants in the discourse, the speaker and the listener.
To establish such a mutual understanding, the universals constituting the dialogue are of particular importance. Without referring to these universals, it is impossible to define the invariant components of an ideal speech situation. In particular, these expressions themselves, or the interpersonal relationships that can be generated between the speaker and the listener, as well as the subjects in question. However, one universal or formal pragmatics cannot identify all the necessary conditions for mutual understanding. Therefore, the material processes that determine them also turn out to be essential for these processes. According to Habermas, these include the concepts of the objective world and the life world.
Thus, discourse, ideally, is a model, a model for developing communicative competence. Specific discourses can be more or less successful, disputes, resentments, disagreements (discourses) are not excluded. Habermas introduces the concept of true and false discourse. False discourse is a phenomenon of false agreement or consensus. It is understood as a natural consequence of coercion, which is embedded in the very structure of communication. It arises as a result of violation of one or more rules of discourse. For Habermas, the very fact of the relevance of the discourse is of the utmost importance. The more complex the discourse, the more effective it is. Discourse destroys the false self-evidence of judgments. In addition, it requires their comparison, correction and achievement of previously non-existent consistency. Due to their ability to come to agreement with each other, people achieve consensus; as for the individual, he comes to agreement with himself."
The novel was written in the era of modernity, in the era of the power of the ideas of positivism and historicism.
In historicism, the past is comprehended and described, turning into a causal narrative narrative, similar to the literary text that also developed in the 19th century in novels (only instead of a plot in historical narratives, a concept).
The plot of the analyzed novel can also be interpreted as a procedure for personalizing and historicizing a semi-mythical character. The ghost dog from the manuscript turns into a crime weapon in the hands of a modern criminal, into Stapleton's dog, and the myth into a modern "sensational novel".
What is the past in the novel? What is the source? If we interpret the plot as a procedure of historical cognition (A.Buller).
According to Gurevich, "traces of the past" are found in monuments of the past, which only in the procedure of historical knowledge (practically according to Kant) turn into historical sources. In this sense, the historian-researcher himself creates a source, which in the study is the novel itself.
The Soviet political and aesthetic project is considered to have reworked the theories of modernity, declaratively declared itself the successor of Marxism, but it was the opposite of 19th century historicism, with its declaration, as Ranke stated: "to describe the past as it really was." Maybe it retained elements of 19th century historicism, or they served other purposes. But it was fundamentally unhistorical. In what M.Yampolsky describes as unhistorical, radically at odds with the historicism of the 19th century, and E.Dobrenko, meaning the same thing (Stalin's historical films and novels, narratives) as a historicization of modernity, there is no contradiction: it was not supposed anywhere... reconstructing the past with a purpose... his knowledge.
A pronounced focus on the effect of authenticity according to A.Yakobidze-Gitman (the researcher studied post-Soviet films about Stalinism) is achieved due to the scrupulously detailed texture and/or "authority" of personal memories. But, as the researcher notes, the creation of this effect is especially concerned with directors who did not catch the Stalin era, who make a cult out of old battered photographs, old things, old everyday life. They imitate by cinematic means the involuntariness of subjective memories, all this contributing to the creation of a "mythology of authenticity." This is easily explained by the fact that a cinematographer who aspires to authenticity, but is unfamiliar with the material "first-hand", needs some special "decoys" in order to believe in authenticity himself first of all.
That is why, looking ahead, I will note that in the analyzed pastiche novel, the "continuation novel", the postmodern novel, there is even much more "historical evidence" of the era.
Those who own the material do not care so much about the texture and
pay more attention to the dramatic side.
Genre with its causal relationships,
necessary for a strong dramatic intrigue, they always arrange the depicted reality...
- this is both a mechanism of historicization and a successful
narrative strategy
For a communicative task, there are elements of a "game" with the reader in the form of a false trail, hints, deception of expectations.
But the accumulation of senseless, devoid of causality (historicism) murders in a pastiche novel is not just eclecticism, it is the same eclecticism that makes A.Yakobidze-Gitman
Recall F.'s thesis.Jamison: In postmodern culture, along with the disintegration of the classical subject, both great styles and stylistic integrity disappear. The gate alter ego of Watson in the pastiche novel constantly wonders: who and why needed this or that assassination attempt..
of course, this is part of the plot's intrigue, but it may also be just the understanding of the text that.. more of an author's idea
mosaic, collage, decay... the meta-narrative, the splitting of integral consciousness, the parallel coexistence of realities -even if not so clearly in the text for the entertainment of the general reader, but what is the passage with a discussion about the heroes of Devonshire in a London cafe
worth talking about the numerous examples of imitation styles and
various forms of pastiche needless to say" -the novel itself is pastiche (as Doyle's novel is evidence of modernity) evidence postmodernism
instead of resurrecting old photos, making them a fetish
of everyday life, yes, this is also there, but not as an orientation towards the reconstruction of private life - an orientation towards the media heritage, that is, the public side - this is Doyle's novel itself, and "Watson's novel" in the text of the pastiche
and, by the way: if modern styles have become the object of pastiche in postmodernity, is it possible to identify with modernity Soviet culture?
"Spin-off (spin-off in English — "by—product", "offshoot") is a work of fiction (book, film, computer or board game, comic book), which is an offshoot in relation to another, already existing work and uses its popularity, recognition or commercial success due to the use of any elements — characters, events or themes — that played a secondary role in the predecessor work. In other words, the spin-off pays special attention to something that was not central to the original work. When releasing spin-offs, it is assumed that they will be perceived by an audience already familiar with the characters and situational aspects better than completely new works.
As a rule, the main difference between a spin-off and a simple continuation or prehistory of a work of art is the participation of characters who were secondary or even episodic in the original work as the main actors. It is important to note the difference between a spin-off and a remake — a new interpretation of the work only with different accents, new techniques or new conditions for the development of the same plot. "
Spin-offs in relation to the original work
"Spin-off events can occur at different times in the chronology of the original work:
A side work can be a sequel to the original plot, in the case when the events of the spin-off take place later. For example, "Daredevil" and "Elektra", "Friends" and "Joey", "Rocky Balboa" and "Creed: Legacy of Rocky".
A spin-off can be a prequel if it tells about events that take place before the events of the original work. As an example, "X-Men" and "X-Men: The Beginning. Wolverine", "Shrek Forever" and "Puss in Boots", "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" and "Fantastic Beasts and Where they Live".
A spin-off can be a midquel if the events in the works take place in parallel. For example, "Hamlet" and "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead", "The Amazing Wanderings of Hercules" and "Xena the Warrior Queen", "Arrow" and "Flash".
A spin-off can be an interquel if its events take place between two original works. For example, "Rogue One. Star Wars: Stories"."
In literature
The original work of the spin-off
"On the Western front without change" and the "Return" of the Remark.
"Continuation is a concept and established terminology denoting the development of the idea of a work of art. The events unfold in the same fictional universe and are chronologically linked to each other. Continuation is a common technique in the entertainment industry, as it allows you to exploit a commercially proven concept. The creation of a chain of sequels is also related to the franchise. Sequels can be a combination of different directions and genres. For example, a sequel to a movie can be a computer game and vice versa. The continuation of the work should not be confused with the remake.
Continuation in literature and art has a long tradition. The novel "Twenty Years Later" (1845) by Alexandre Dumas is a continuation of the novel "The Three Musketeers". One of the first sequel films in the history of cinema is considered to be the picture "The Incredible Journey" by Georges M;li;s, shot in 1904, as a continuation of the commercially successful "Journey to the Moon" (1902).
The boundary between the types of continuations may be conditional. So, for example, the difference between the series and the sequel is quite conditional. Film critic Caroline Jess-Cook described the difference this way: the series denies change, the sequel is the very essence of progress and rebirth. Jess-Cook attributed the James Bond franchise to a multi-part film, since there is no serious change in the main character inside. A typical example of a sequel: the films of the Star Wars saga. In the course of the development of the saga's plot, there is a profound change and rebirth of the protagonist from positive to negative, as well as a number of main characters themselves. All this does not negate the fact that the sequence of sequels can go into the series.
The division between the types of sequels (sequel, prequel, and so on) is usually based on the chronology within the universe. However, when applied to a specific implementation, the definition may be vague. For example, it is difficult to say what the film "The Godfather 2" is in relation to the previous picture — a sequel or a prequel.
The continuation paradigm is close to the paratext concept proposed by Gerard Genette. In theory, the paratext is characterized as a kind of media environment of the main text of a work of art. For example, it can be comments, criticism, illustrations. The continuation can also be considered as a generalization of the idea of a paratext, the cultural essence of which expands the original author's idea."
The sequel
"A sequel (English sequel "continuation") is a continuation of a work of art, chronologically following the events of the original work. Example: the book "Alice through the Looking Glass" is a sequel to "Alice in Wonderland".
The Prequel
"A prequel is a work chronologically describing events preceding an earlier original work. Example: a new trilogy of films from the Star Wars saga ("The Hidden Menace", "Attack of the Clones" and "Revenge of the Sith") — prequels to the classic film trilogy of this saga ("New Hope", "Empire Strikes Back", "Return of the Jedi"), the games Might & Magic Heroes VI and Might & Magic Heroes VII are prequels to the game Heroes of Might and Magic V."
Midquel
"Midquel (English midquel, contamination of the prefix mid - from middle "middle" and sequel) is a work that develops the plot of previous works on the same topic. The peculiarity of the midquel is that the events depicted in it chronologically relate to a period within the original plot. Examples: the actions of the novel "The Chronicle of Captain Blood" and the collection of stories "The Luck of Captain Blood" by Rafael Sabatini take place within the framework of the plot of the novel "The Odyssey of Captain Blood"; the cartoon "Bambi 2" fills the plot gap inside "Bambi"."
Interquel
"Interquel (English interquel, contamination of the prefix inter- "between" and sequel) is a work of fiction, the plot events of which take place between the events of previously created works. Thus, the interquel is both a sequel for one work and a prequel for another. The action of the "Prince of Persia" games: The Forgotten Sands" and "Battles of Prince of Persia" take place in between the plots of the Prince of Persia games: The Sands of Time" and "Prince of Persia: Warrior Within", as well as the interquel game Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark, which takes place between Transformers: War for Cybertron and Transformers: Fall of Cybertron, as well as Heroes of Might and Magic VII, which takes place between Heroes of Might and Magic VI and Heroes of Might and Magic V, and the movie "Rogue One. Star Wars: Stories", taking place between the third and fourth episodes of the Star Wars saga."
Rickwell
(English requel, contamination of the prefix re- from reboot "reboot" and sequel) is a partial restart that chronologically follows the events of previous works. An example is "Terminator: Genesis"."
Crossover
"Crossover is a work of fiction that mixes elements and/or characters from several independent fictional universes (not to be confused with a crossover spin—off, a side work where the characters of the main work can participate). For example, in the movie "Freddy vs. Jason" there are maniacs from the horror film series "A Nightmare on Elm Street" and "Friday the 13th", and in the movie "Alien vs. Predator" aliens from the action horror fiction film series "Alien" and "Predator" collide, also these two aliens collided with the Batman universe in the short film "Batman: Dead End".
In the comics industry, crossovers are called both a comic book where characters from different fictional universes meet (for example, Marvel Comics and DC Comics), and a plot in which characters from the same universe act, but from different comic book series (for example, Civil War for Marvel or Infinite Crisis for DC).
In the gaming industry, video games for the Sega platform "RoboCop vs Terminator" or "Spider-Man and the X-Men: Arcade's Revenge" can serve as an example of a crossover.
In literature, a crossover is a work written in two or more genres (for example, a fantastic detective story, a fantastic love novel, a political-love thriller."
Remake
"Remake (from the English remake — "remaking") is the release of new versions of existing works of art with modification or addition of their own characteristics. It is most often used in music and on television (as a reworking of a film, song, any musical composition or dramatic work). The remake does not quote or parody the source, but fills it with new and relevant content, however, "with an eye" to the sample. It can repeat the plot moves of the original, the types of characters, but at the same time depict them in new historical, socio-political conditions."
A.M. Volkov's novella "The Wizard of Oz" is a remake of L.F. Baum's novella "The Amazing Wizard of Oz".
Pastiche
"Pastiche (French pastiche: from Italian. pasticcio — pasticcio, stylized opera-medley, lit. "mixture, pate") is a secondary work of art (literary, musical, theatrical, etc.), which is an imitation of the style of the works of one or more authors. Unlike parody, pastiche does not so much ridicule as honor the original. Metaphorically, pastiche and pasticcio describe works that are either composed by several authors or include stylistic elements of the works of other artists. Stylization is an example of eclecticism in art.
The allusion is not a fake. A literary allusion may refer to another work, but does not repeat it. Moreover, allusion requires the audience to share the cultural knowledge of the author. Allusion and stylization are mechanisms of intertextuality."
In art
Literature
"In literature, pastiche is most often meant to denote a literary technique in which a light-hearted ironic imitation of someone else's style is usually used; although joking, it is usually respectful. It usually implies a lack of originality or consistency, an imitative mess, but with the advent of postmodernism, stylization has become positively constructed as deliberate, witty homage or playful imitation.
For example, many Sherlock Holmes stories originally written by Arthur Conan Doyle were written as pastiches. As an example, Ellery Queen and Nero Wolfe are characters in mystical parodies and pastiches.
A similar example of stylization is the posthumous sequels of Robert E. Howard's short stories, written by other writers without his permission. This includes stories by Conan L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter. David Lodge's novel The British Museum is Falling (1965) is a mixture of works by Joyce, Kafka and Virginia Woolf. In 1991, Alexandra Ripley wrote the novel Scarlett, a pastiche of Gone with the Wind, in an unsuccessful attempt to recognize it as a canonical sequel.
In 2017, John Banville published Mrs. Osmond, a sequel to the Portrait of Lady Henry James, painted in a style similar to that of James.[9] In 2018, Ben Schott published the book "Jeeves and the King of Clubs", dedicated to the character Jeeves P. G. Wodehouse, with the permission of the Wodehouse Estate."
"Restart or Reboot (English Reboot), is a new version of a work of art (film, computer game, comic book, etc.), which uses the same characters and ideas, but ignores the events of previous works from the series, creating a new storyline.
The term "reboot" is used by analogy with the corresponding computer term (which refers to the process in which the computer completely cleans the contents of RAM and starts its work again), referring to the fact that the work "restarting" the series does not take into account previous works on this topic and begins a new canon.
The main differences between reboots and remakes are a complete change in the plot (while remakes retain the main plot moves of the original) and the beginning of a new series of works (and the remake is a new version of a single work).
The main purpose of the relaunch is to "revitalize" the series to attract new fans and increase revenue. Thus, the reboot can be seen as an attempt to save a series that is morally outdated. In addition, restarting the series is a fairly safe project from the point of view of profit, since a work with famous characters already has fans, which is why it is a less risky move than a completely original work."
The novel has a pastiche: the main character is a lawyer (in the history of modern history, the setting is not to "judge", but to "understand" the past), the text uses the text "Watson's tale" (and this is after the "linguistic turn" in the humanities, which marked the boundaries of modernity and postmodernity), the plot as one of the possible versions- not the husband is a criminal, but his... wife and, Watson was not mistaken with Holmes, but just were... they were misled and did not succeed enough in the investigation. There can be many reconstructions of the historical past, and instead of "how it really was": "it was different, depending on which point of observation to look at." Reconstruction is always reconstruction, not construction (there can be no identity, absolute certainty). A dog... They are trying to imitate the legend again.
Hughes is not Watson also because the novel was not written on behalf of Gate's assistant
"I arrived in Devonshire at the end of October, a warm southern autumn greeted me with already faded greenery and damp winds. On the way to Grimpen, I saw a lot of hills overgrown with heather, mosses, horsetails and ferns, swamps, forests and famous ancient dolmens. To be honest, I expected to see a darker picture. Autumn Devonshire struck me with picturesque landscapes. At first sight, I fell in love with this pastoral serenity and red cows in green meadows.
I abandoned my plan to stay at the Grimpen Hotel as soon as I learned that Merripit House was empty and for rent. I'm lucky, you can't think of a better headquarters. What luck it is to immediately fall into the very heart of the tragedy, to settle in a criminal nest.
About half an hour in a cart and we're there. I was standing in front of a nondescript house that seemed offended and abandoned. The dull gray walls were decorated with green ivy, cheerfully climbing over potholes and cracks. The stunted stunted orchard did not enliven the landscape, but rather emphasized the squalor of the area.
There were two of us, me and my valet, Hughes, an efficient, unflappable fellow, a retired sergeant in the Royal Infantry. Jingling the keys, he unlocked the doors and, with the creak of unoiled hinges, I entered the abode of evil and sadness. Inside, everything turned out to be not so bad, there were remnants of comfort and family warmth in the rooms. A carved sideboard, an elegant bureau, a lamp with an intricate shade, engravings on the walls, embroidered pillows on the sofa and in the armchairs. It was felt that a woman's hand had been applied to the interior design. A habitable and abandoned nest.
The view from the window was magnificent – endless swamps, gray boulders, puddles and hummocks among the hills to the horizon. I took the trouble to ask my sullen companion's opinion:
– How do you like it here, Hughes?
– The house is like a house. If it weren't for the swamps...
– Well, I don't know, old man. I am satisfied. Light a fire, make stronger coffee. We'll stock up on candles and wait.
I said the last sentence almost in a whisper, under my breath, but Hughes heard it.
– You'll see. Although, maybe it would have been better not to wait for anything.
– Are you expecting trouble?
"It's possible, Hughes. Anything.
I went up to the second floor and from the three bedrooms I chose the one that overlooked the marshes. Blue striped wallpaper, light furniture, a stove in white tiles – it's quite cozy. My revolver moved from the inside pocket of my jacket to the drawer of the bedside table. I sat down on the windowsill and admired the swamp landscape – frozen and deserted. Thickets of reeds, bright green patches of duckweed, a hill rising near the horizon, and silence hovering over this mysterious beauty. That's where it all happened. And quite recently. In this house, on these marshes… I'm in the lair of the beast. Who would have thought, in the midst of such peace ... Evil has not left these places, it lurks, hides and waits… A little more and I'll start writing poetry.
Downstairs, on the ground floor, there was a crash. Hughes dropped something. I moved away from the window, took out of my bag a volume in a red cover with gold lettering, new, but already thoroughly read, and placed it on the chest of drawers.
I paid my first visit to Dr. Mortimer. His house was not difficult to find, it stood out with a presentable appearance against the background of the unsightly buildings of Grimpen. A quiet sleepy town… More precisely, the village. More precisely, it is half a city, half a village. Most of the houses are located along the central street, from which narrow crooked streets run away.
Climbing the massive stairs, I rang the doorbell and felt my heart skip a beat, as if responding to the overflow of a bell. That's it, I'm coming into the game, not a step back, the case has begun.
Dr. Mortimer turned out to be a very young man, thin, tall and stooped. His gray, close-set eyes looked at me through the glasses with obvious sympathy.
–Thomas Gate,– he repeated my name, stretching the vowels with a smile and shaking my hand. "So you're the one who's staying at Merripit House?" An extravagant act. How do you like it there?
– It's quite cozy inside and quite gloomy outside, in general, I like it.
– Are you a thrill seeker?
– I don't know, I haven't figured it out yet.
– Well, I'm glad to meet you. Our places are quiet, I would even say deaf. Our society is small, every educated person counts.
"Well, actually, that's the kind of welcome I was hoping for, Doctor. I'm a simple, easy-going person and I don't like to cause trouble for people.
–Well, we'll see," Mortimer chuckled. – We will understand later how sincere you were with me at the moment.
It seemed to me that a doctor's home should smell like medicine, like a hospital exam room, but Mortimer's living room smelled of lavender. I found myself in a large bright room with fresh blue wallpaper on the walls and sunny landscapes in elegant frames. The shelves are decorated with embroidered napkins and porcelain figurines. There is a vase with white chrysanthemums on the bedside table by the window.
The doctor sat me down at the table, and his wife, a sickly pale but pretty woman with kind eyes and a childish smile, served tea. Steam floated over the thin porcelain walls of the cup, a silver spoon clattered, a drop of milk fell from the gilded spout of the milkman. After taking a sip, Mortimer looked at me with such curiosity that I realized it was time to tell him about myself, the doctor wanted to dissect me.
– This is my first time in Devonshire.
I got stuck on this phrase, but while I was looking for words, the hospitable host took the initiative by asking:
– On business?
– No, I'm just traveling. I'm a lawyer, I have a small private practice in London. Perhaps I would never have made it to your land.… But Mr. Watson's story…
There was no need to continue, the doctor smiled knowingly and nodded:
– That's what I thought. As soon as I found out that a certain visiting young man had settled in Merripit House, I thought so: "This is no other than at the suggestion of Dr. Watson." He presented our surroundings in an unusually picturesque way in his work. Especially the swamps. I hope you are not disappointed?
– No, not at all. But no less than the natural beauties, I was interested in the story of the dog.
– Yes, Dr. Watson made our place famous. This story has made a lot of noise.
It seemed to me that the doctor was not eager to return to the recent tragic events in his memories, but he kindly answered my questions. In a few words he told about Sir Henry's journey. Baskerville recovered from his troubles and treated his shattered nerves, although ... the doctor began to notice a shadow of gloomy thoughtfulness on the baronet's face. And, by the way, Sir Henry got married. On the trip, he met a charming girl and...
"All's well that ends well," Mortimer concluded with seemingly insincere joy, it seems that he did not consider the ending of the story so happy.
– And the ghost of a dog no longer bothers the offspring of a noble family? - I asked.
The doctor gave me a surprised look, but suddenly broke into a smile and laughed, shaking his finger.
– Uh, Mr. Gate. But Holmes shot a dog, and we don't have another one, and we didn't have one."
"Intending to replenish the supply of smokes, I went into a shop near the post office. The dim evening light pouring through the large lattice windows and a lamp with a round shade adequately illuminated the counter and shelves of the shop. The strong smell of spices hit my nose.
There were only a couple of customers in the shop. A hunched back loomed in the corner – an old man was examining tea packets. A girl in a dark gray jacket and a green beret was paying for her purchases- two small parcels. I saw her light profile with a slightly upturned nose and a plump lower lip, a delicate blush and a scattering of pale freckles lay on her cheek, a reddish shine walked in her brown hair. After putting the purchases in her bag, she turned around, walking away from the counter, and I caught the look of her golden-brown eyes. I stared at her, frozen in place. We didn't look at each other for more than five seconds, but it seemed much longer. It seems that the young lady did not like the way I was staring at her, she lowered her eyes, and since I stood in her way as if rooted to the spot, she was forced to bypass me like a billboard. I stepped up to the counter and heard the doorbell ring behind me –the girl came out. Looking at the shelves, I couldn't find the cigarette boxes–the stranger's face was still in front of my eyes."
– Yes, it's a gloomy place, – I shared my impression. – A great scene for a bloody drama. If there was nothing, it would be worth coming up with.
Baskerville looked at me with an ironic smile.
– If it hadn't been? Do you believe these stories about a dog?
"I am a materialist, Sir Henry, but the air of Devonshire has a corrupting effect on me.
"Well, shall I tell you, Mr. Gate?" the Baronet chuckled. – Hang on, we're all a little crazy here.
After laughing, we got off our horses and walked across the lawn. This is where everything happened more than two hundred years ago... or are these just fairy tales? But even if there are fairy tales, for some reason this valley is called the place of action. So there was something here. Here are the stone pillars, the ones mentioned in the manuscript, in the XVII century they still stood at attention. The only surviving witnesses, they know the whole truth… A strange anxiety came over me, I felt defenseless. But what was threatening us here? It seemed to me that someone was watching me. I looked around carefully and, noticing nothing suspicious, seemed to calm down. There is probably a sacred wormhole in this place that excites the imagination.
"It would be interesting to come here at night," I said. – On a clear night with a full moon.
- Yes? And you really are a thrill–seeker..." the baronet replied. – Well, you know the way now, you can come whenever you want.
And then I saw something that I didn't expect, but deep down, I admit, I wanted to see. In the first few seconds, I decided that I was just having a fantasy. I squatted down – there was a large animal paw print on a patch of bare ground next to a puddle… Why, it was a dog trail, a huge dog trail."
"The door creaked. Did it seem so? No, someone is walking downstairs. Cautious but confident steps, light and barely audible. Is Hughes back? No, that's not how he moves his legs, I recognize his quiet but heavy tread even when I'm awake. This is someone else and with secret intentions.
I went down the stairs, stepping softly, pausing and listening at every step. Here is the lighted opening of the first floor, I can already see the living room... a shadow lies on the floor, someone is standing in the middle of the room. Quiet, not a sound… Just the ticking of the mantel clock. The shadow moved, moved, slowly, noiselessly. I took a few more steps and looked into the living room. A dark figure stood in front of the sofa..."
"The servant began to babble something indistinctly, Baskerville and I looked at each other and, no longer listening to the old man, hurried to the house. Leaving the horses in the yard, we ran through the wide–open doors... I must admit that by this point I had already deduced that Frankland had suffered a heart attack or stroke, but the picture that presented itself to our eyes left no doubt - the old man was killed. He was lying face down on the floor by the fireplace with his head smashed in a pool of blood. I bent down and touched the pale cold hand–Frankland was dead, the corpse was already frozen. We stood silently looking at the dead man for perhaps a minute – the servant managed to return to the house and join us.
– Did you work for him? Baskerville asked.
- Yes. My name is Andrus, at your service, gentlemen," he did not speak very clearly and slightly lisped.
– Who else is in the house?
– No one. The cook comes in the afternoon, every other day.
The old man took a stale handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his sweaty face.
– How did this happen?
– I don't know. I just found him like this. What a blessing, gentlemen, that I met you. I just didn't know what to do."
"A soft, long-drawn howl came to my ears, as if it flew off the pages of a book. What's it? From where? I looked out the window, and the swamp was spread out in front of me, glistening in the moonlight. The silence that hung over him seemed unshakable. Was I imagining things? I was about to sit down in the chair again, when the mournful, drawling moan resounded again in the silence, louder and longer with anguish. Here it is! Is the dog back?!
I grabbed a revolver, flew down the stairs to the first floor and rushed out of the house. The cold night dampness washed over me. The rolling plain stretched out in the gloom, diluted by moonlight. I looked around – quiet calm and not a single living soul. Just me with my heart pounding in my chest and a revolver in my hand. Who am I trying to look out for in the ominous darkness? A dog, a ghost, a resurrected Stapleton? And then the howl came again, slid along the bolt and turned into a dull growl. I rushed to run at the sound, the grass crunched under my feet, I searched the hummocks and thickets of reeds. "Night time, when the forces of evil reign supreme..." No, evil has not left these swamps, it is here, somewhere nearby…
And I saw her… I saw the black silhouette of a dog on top of a low hill. A large animal with strong long legs. Does she smell me? Is she looking at me? After pausing for a moment, without taking my eyes off the unfolding picture, I rushed to run to the hill."
"Barrymore brought the port, and Mrs. Baskerville and I continued the conversation, she smiled with gentle slyness:
– Poor Mr. Gate, you are tired of riddles, but it seems that you came here for them?
– I was fascinated by the story of the dog, but I was not looking for adventures on my head.
– I understand you. My advice to you is to leave Merripit House and move to Grimpen, where you will feel safer.
– I'll feel even more comfortable in London.
- Yes? Do you want to leave? Genuine regret flashed in the lady's eyes.
– I don't want to and I won't leave. And I won't move to Grimpen. You're right, I got what I was looking for and, by and large, I like it all.
"And you don't think it's dangerous here?"
– I haven't noticed any danger for myself yet. Aren't you worried about the return of the hound of the Baskervilles?
- what? How can she come back? Holmes shot her.
– Have you heard howling in the swamps?
– I'm not.
"And you didn't see any tracks?" So Sir Henry and I came across a very interesting trail in the valley. Didn't he tell you?
Mrs. Baskerville shrugged her shoulders:
– A dog's trail, it's just a dog's trail.
"It was a very large dog trail, my lady. And not far from Merripit House, in the swamp, I saw a dog, a huge black dog.
– With a glowing muzzle?
– No, it's like.
"I don't even know what to say to that," the lady chuckled, shaking her head.
"What if Stapleton came back and went back to his old ways?" - I asked.
The smile left Mrs. Baskerville's lips.
"Did you really just say that, Mr. Gate?"
"In the semi-darkness, I did not notice the ravine lurking on the way and almost fell into it, miraculously staying on the edge. At the moment when I was looking around, a rocket took off into the sky, illuminating the edge of the clearing. The flash lit up the bottom of the hollow and went out, but I managed to notice… I didn't understand what it was. What was lying there… It shouldn't have been there. I bent down to the ravine, peering into the darkness, trying to make out what a random flash had pulled out of the darkness. I thought of going to the clearing to get a torch, but I was afraid that I would not be able to return to my place, I would lose it, I did not want to bother. I decided that I could handle it and began to descend into the ravine, it was shallow with a gentle slope. There was indeed something lying at the bottom, I stumbled upon it and, crouching down, began to fumble with my hands. Raw grass, stone, cloth… It seems to be silk... something cold, smooth, wet… The skin is... human. There was a man lying at the bottom of the ravine. I felt the man's face... neck, hair… It's a woman. She lay motionless, pliant as a doll."
"A mystical tale… A legend recorded in 1742 about the tragedy that occurred during the era of the Great Rebellion of 1649-1653. And the real Stapleton case is 1898. Approximately 240 years have passed between the death of Hugo Baskerville and the murder of Charles Baskerville. What connects these stories? We are trying to draw parallels.
The dog is the murder weapon. In whose hands? Actually, it's kind of in the hands of the devil.… The dog in the manuscript is considered to be among the forces of evil. But Hugo is punished for his sins, his murder is rather the punishment of God... a hellish tool, but the punishment of God. But then what is the farmer's daughter being punished for? Stop. And who said that the girl was killed by a dog? Come on, what's in the manuscript? "The moon shone brightly on the lawn, in the middle of which lay an unhappy girl who had died of fear and loss of strength." Yes, the dog didn't touch her. The dog bit Hugo. Therefore, the devil has nothing to do with it, the black dog is God's punishment. And in our story, the animal is the instrument of crime.
Now let's look at the other characters. Hugo is Stapleton, both dissolute guys, both villains, both Baskervilles, both came to a bad end. Stapleton picked up the weapon that killed his ancestor two hundred years ago, but, ultimately, this weapon turned against the villain himself.
So, then the girl, the farmer's daughter. Who is it? Beryl? Or maybe Laura? According to Watson, both are victims of Stapleton. He used both of them. But for some reason, Beryl evokes sympathy from the author, but Laura does not. Laura Watson even seems to disapprove. Although it was Beryl who was complicit in Stapleton's scams before coming to Devonshire. These affairs with the squandered money and the school... her role could be, of course, passive, but still. At least she was covering for him. Laura's past is less criminal. She just falls in love with the wrong men. But Watson clearly doesn't like her. Why? Laura answered his questions sharply. And by what right did the doctor get into her life? He is not a policeman, not an investigator, not a judge. Mrs. Lyons had every reason to tell him to go to hell. It seems that Watson considered her an accomplice to the crime. Maybe he's right about something? Maybe I'm just not noticing something? Something that he saw?"
"The wind drove the grains of sand over the stones, picked through the stalks of herbs, the sky turned gray, the horizon shone with gold. I thought about the transience of time, about the perishable and eternal… As in a friend, the strangled cry of Baskerville… Not a scream, but a loud excited whisper:
– My God! Gate, look!
I turned around, and the baronet was pointing at the hill from which we had descended. A man in a grey raincoat with a hood on his head was moving along its slope. Taking his time, he deftly descended to the bottom, as if he were swimming, looking at his feet and not noticing us.
– Hey! My dear, wait! Sir Henry shouted.
The stranger did not even glance in our direction, he did not slow down or quicken his pace, as if he did not notice anything around him. This gray shadow came down the hill and disappeared behind the rocks. I thought that the man in the raincoat had walked past our camp and looked at the place where the doctor had been sitting a quarter of an hour ago. He wasn't on the stone.
– Mortimer! I cried out in alarm and looked at Baskerville.
The Baronet understood me, and we started running towards the hill. At the bottom, I looked around, trying to find the stranger, but he seemed to have disappeared. We set off up the hill in a hurry. When we reached our parking spot, we found the doctor lying on his back on the ground. Our friend was lying with his arms outstretched, his hat had fallen off his head, and his glasses were askew on his nose. I threw myself on my knees and lifted the poor guy's head:
– Mortimer! – I called and did not receive an answer."
From correspondence with the author of the pastiche novel, from which, but above all, of course, from the novel, one can see a scrupulous knowledge not only of the text of the "primary source", but also of history:
"Why do you call Laura Lyons Mrs. Frankland?
According to the British laws of that time, a divorced woman regained her maiden name, but at the same time she was called Mrs.. So after the divorce, Laura, Mrs. Lyons, became Mrs. Frankland."
"– I arrived two days ago. Dr. Mortimer is my only acquaintance so far," I began the conversation.
"Well, yes, you have settled in Merripit House," the old man slyly flashed his eyes. – You are interested in the story of the Baskervilles dog, a fan of Mr. Watson's talent. Yes?
– That's right.
"But you're a lawyer, aren't you?"
– That's right.
Frankland, squinting with a foxy smile, leaned towards me and said in a conspiratorial tone, softly and insinuatingly: – You can tell Dr. Mortimer about your literary research. You can't fool me.
– What do you want to say?
– I mean, a man like you could find more interesting things to do here. A visiting lawyer, settles in Merripit House and makes acquaintances with witnesses of a high-profile crime… Wow. Stapleton is considered the murderer of Baskerville, but his guilt has not been proven at all.
– Is that so? Do you doubt his guilt?
– I have no doubt. I am stating a fact – it has not been proven. I'm not a fan of detective fiction or fiction in general. But of course I've read Dr. Watson's story about the hound of the Baskervilles. And I found no evidence of Stapleton's guilt. What's there? He hid his past, passed off his wife as his sister, looked like a portrait of Hugo Baskerville… Does this prove that Stapleton is the killer? This may mean something to Dr. Watson, but you're a lawyer, Mr. Gate. Tell me, how would you react to such evidence in court?
– They wouldn't have much weight in court.
– That's exactly it. The prosecution has nothing at all to do in court with such evidence, and all other evidence is indirect… And even less so. If a letter smells like jasmine, it does not mean that it was written by a woman.
"So you don't think Stapleton was the killer?"
– I didn't say that. I said that his guilt has not been proven. You've heard a lot about me… Well, yes, you've read Watson's book. You know, I've eaten more than one dog at trials. Unlike you, I am not a professional lawyer, but I understand something about these cases. If Stapleton had lived, Mr. Holmes would not have had a chance to send this guy to the gallows. At least, with the evidence that Dr. Watson presented in his work. A skilled lawyer would have easily ruined this case in court.
"What do you think, Mr. Frankland?" Did Stapleton really die in the Grimpen bog?
"That's an excellent question, Mr. Gate. I don't understand at all, why would we all consider Stapleton dead? The guy was listed as dead solely on the grounds that after the very night when the dog was killed, no one saw him alive.
"But no one saw his corpse either?"
– Exactly, – the lawyer smiled rapaciously. "Look, Mr. Gate, let's join forces and do our own investigation. Let's rub the nose of the refined gentleman from Baker Street.
– I suspect, Mr. Frankland, that you have already been digging in this direction. And it seems to me that you have already managed to dig up something.
– Everything can be.
"But if not Stapleton, then who?"
The old man took a short pause, put on a sedate appearance and spoke:
– You see, Mr. Gate, if you think about it carefully… Only properly, without any indulgences. Then you will discover the truth that no one has… Please note: no one in this case has a decent alibi. Except maybe Dr. Watson. And if we take into account the fact that our assessment of this case was largely influenced by the story of the aforementioned doctor… We have every right to suspect him, too.
"What are you talking about, Mr. Frankland?
"Don't pretend, dear sir, that I have surprised you very much. I see through people. Especially lawyers.
– You deftly evade the question. So do you have a suspect?
– And you think about my offer. If you're going to investigate, then you're going to investigate. Why shake the air in vain? I noticed that you are very interested in this case.
I liked old Frankland – not chicken brains at all, and even flavored with experience and seasoned with pepper and bile. Maybe I'll run into his bad temper, but God help him, I'm not a gift myself. Such gentlemen are simply adored by my Aunt Daphne."
"Early twentieth century England. Dr. Watson's book The Hound of the Baskervilles has just been published. A young London lawyer, Thomas Gate, a fan of Sherlock Holmes stories, arrives in Grimpen at the scene of the detective story. He settles in Merripit House and gets acquainted with the participants of the tragic events – Dr. Mortimer, Henry Baskerville, Barrymore the butler, Frankland the lawyer, Laura Lyons, etc.
Gate has doubts that Stapleton was the culprit of the crimes. A chain of mysterious accidents and deaths confirms his guesses. Holmes made a mistake. Evil has not left these places. Once again, the ominous howl of a dog can be heard over the Grimpen marshes. "I can't help but notice a strange thing. You find corpses all the time, Mr. Gate. It is you. With your arrival, Grimpen seems to have been attacked."
"A soft, long-drawn howl came to my ears, as if it flew off the pages of a book. What's it? From where? I looked out the window, and the swamp was spread out in front of me, glistening in the moonlight. The silence that hung over him seemed unshakable. Was I imagining things? I was about to sit down in the chair again, when the mournful, drawling moan resounded again in the silence, louder and longer with anguish. Here it is! Is the dog back?!
I grabbed a revolver, flew down the stairs to the first floor and rushed out of the house. The cold night dampness washed over me. The rolling plain stretched out in the gloom, diluted by moonlight. I looked around – quiet calm and not a single living soul. Just me with my heart pounding in my chest and a revolver in my hand. Who am I trying to look out for in the ominous darkness? A dog, a ghost, a resurrected Stapleton? And then the howl came again, slid along the bolt and turned into a dull growl. I rushed to run at the sound, the grass crunched under my feet, I searched the hummocks and thickets of reeds. "Night time, when the forces of evil reign supreme..." No, evil has not left these swamps, it is here, somewhere nearby..."
"London met me with the usual bustle. I hailed a cab and ordered it to take me to West Brompton. From there, changing the carriage, I went to Fulham Road. Soon I was standing in front of a door topped with a sign reading Ross & Mangles. The image of the dog's head suggested that I had hit exactly where I was aiming.
A young man of solid build was sitting at the desk in a small, cozy and clean hall. He smiled affably, flashed a bald spot on his prematurely bald head and offered his services.
– This is a dog kennel, isn't it? I clarified first.
–That's right, sir. Do you want to buy a dog?
– Maybe. Do you have any fighting breeds?
– We can offer you a choice of dogs of various breeds, including fighting ones. For what purposes do you need a dog?
– I'm looking for a big strong dog.
– Will a mastiff or Alan do?
– Is there a bandog?
– Of course, you need a strong and large watchdog. We can pick up an excellent half-breed.
It's time to get down to business, but first I decided to lubricate the wheels:
– Frankly, everyone I turned to for advice recommended your nursery to me. It looks like you don't have any worthy competitors.
– Sir, of course, you will find a lot of dog breeders in London and its surroundings, but you will not be offered anywhere as wide a choice as Ross & Mangles.
– Is it true that Stapleton bought the famous Baskervilles dog from you?
The young man closed his eyes and smiled knowingly, his smug face read: "I knew it, of course you've heard about us, yes, we're famous."
"Mr. Watson has given you a great advertisement," I said.
– I won't hide it, yes, it was our dog. Do you want the same one?
– Exactly.
– I hope you will not use the animal for offensive purposes.
– God forbid. Ah, Mr.... – I decided to get acquainted with the interlocutor.
–Abramson,– he said quickly.
–Hope," I lied back and continued to ask. – Mr. Abramson, do you often buy such dogs from you?
– Often. Watchdogs are in great demand among rural residents. You understand that.
– Do you still have a photo of that dog?
– Alas, if I only knew that the dog would become so famous.
– Was the beast really that scary?
– That's right – the beast. I will not say that the dog was distinguished by an impeccable exterior, not at all. But it was the largest, strongest and fiercest specimen.
"Did you sell that dog to Stapleton personally?"
"No, it wasn't me who handled that dog, it was poor Malcom.
– Why the poor guy?
– He's dead. He fell into the Thames, must have been drunk. They searched for him for two days until they fished his body out of the river.
– Well, look how it happens in life.
– Yes, sir, it's a sad story.
"And when did this happen?"
– Sometime in early summer.
– And recently, say, during this month, has no one ordered a similar dog from you?
"No, sir,– Abramson snapped, and a spark of suspicion flashed in his eyes.
The limit of my interlocutor's frankness was exhausted, and I ran out of questions.
I left the nursery in a bad mood. Another thread broke. Although... a negative result is also a result. Doesn't Melcombe's suspicious death confirm my suspicions? Well, yes – confirmation of guesses, not proof. This testimony of the seller could form part of the chain of evidence, and his death proves nothing.
The next item in the program of my London voyage was Baker Street. When I went to Devonshire, I did not think that the matter would take such a serious turn. Frankland's suggestion, "Let's rub the nose of this refined gentleman from Baker Street," at one point seemed tempting to me. But now the mess is serious, and I decided to seek advice from the famous detective. I easily found house No. 221b and a black door with a pair of lanterns in frosted shades. I will not hide it, I was slightly excited, spurred on by curiosity and deep respect. No, I did not belong to the ranks of Holmes's fans, but I paid tribute to his talent and merits. The door was unlocked by an elderly lady with regular features and friendly attentive eyes.
– Good afternoon, ma'am. May I see Mr. Holmes?"
L. Pace (Lyudmila Dmitrieva). "The Death of the Hound of the Baskervilles" is published on the website: "Ghost Worlds"
"In the story, Beryl is represented by a terrified victim. But what gives Stapleton power over her? Beryl Garcia, a beautiful woman from Costa Rica, a woman with a strong character, "a woman with Spanish blood in her veins." How does Watson write about her? "Her delicate, proud features were so regular that her face might have seemed lifeless if not for the expressive mouth and the quick glance of her beautiful dark eyes." It might seem lifeless… People who have excellent self-control have such faces. Good. What did this short, thin blond man with a lean face and a narrow long chin do to her? If Beryl didn't like his criminal tendencies, then how did he keep her? Stapleton's special intelligence and charm are not noticeable in the books, and he is also not a wealthy man. Beryl didn't like his criminal plans, why didn't she leave him? Were you afraid? Was she just afraid of him? There was a monster hiding under the guise of a flimsy scientist. I'd like to see him. By the way, Laura liked him too. A plain guy with a lean face, and what a success women have."
"At breakfast, I noticed that Hughes was silent and thoughtful. I clung to him with questions, he dodged, but eventually gave up.
"You can think what you like about me, sir, but I'll tell you. I was so scared today that I almost read Our Father.
"My God, you're talking about yourself, my brave Hughes.
– And I think, Mr. Gate, that if you were in my place today, you would have fired the entire clip from your revolver.
I didn't argue, I like to shoot.
– So that's what I'll tell you. In the morning I went to the farm to get milk and butter for breakfast. The Backer farm is about two miles from us, you know. It was already getting light, and the fog was spreading in the valley. I was walking along the path past the marshes. And suddenly out of this very fog..."
From correspondence with the author:
Lyudmila, thank you for your attention and comment. I really wanted to get into the Conan Doyle wave, but not slide into imitation. It's good if it worked out.
A great detective! Yes, this is a classic English detective story. I did not expect that "The Hound of the Baskervilles" could have such a sequel. It seems to me that the book fits seamlessly into the framework set by Conan Doyle: the atmosphere, the characters, the development of the plot. And at the same time, this is not an imitation, the novel has its own style. I really liked the main character. ) I hope this isn't Gate's last case. I want him to stay in Grimpen. )
It's good that the hero's conclusions are supported by quotes from The Hound of the Baskervilles – it's convenient to read and analyze along with the characters.
There are sometimes typos in the text, but there are not many of them, they do not interfere.
Thank you. It was very interesting.
Yana Chernenkaya:
The book interested me. I bought it and read it. In principle, it's not bad. But there are a lot of mistakes and typos, and from time to time very strange scenes come out like a drinking party of three gentlemen who barely know each other, one of whom is a baronet, another is a doctor, and the third is a lawyer. It looks too much... in Russian, or something.
I was very offended by the phrases: "the doctor unbuckled earlier" than someone appeared there (as I understand it, he got drunk to the point of complete insensibility - I'm sorry, the bright image of Dr. Mortimer does not fit with this in any way); "how did I immediately misunderstand" (the author's spelling). And the story of Mrs. Lyons dipping cookies in a glass of wine in front of an outsider gentleman... well, to put it mildly, in my head it somehow doesn't really fit with the prim English. In Italy, this would probably be understandable under certain circumstances, but in England...
However, in general, the interpretation is funny. If you do not pay attention to the above disadvantages, then it is quite an interesting detective story. I read it with some pleasure. Thanks!
22.01.2019
The text of the novel is pastiche by L.Moreover, "The Death of the Hound of the Baskervilles" is very interesting, precisely in connection with Doyle's text (in connection with which this new one appeared in general, but just as the text of Doyle's novel could not have appeared in any other era, as only in the modern era, so the text of L.Moreover, it could not have appeared not in the postmodern era -it is also "postmodern" in this sense). This is not just an epigon, another, and another version of events from a new angle (although, like any postmodern text, it is fundamentally imitative, ironic, although irony is not usually transmitted by Russian translations, too dry and strict is already inherent in Doyle's characters, parody, game, and therefore also serves the same tasks... in its purest form, as Doyle's text is "the reader's entertainment").
This is an independent text in many ways, original, with a new main character-in whom you immediately believe, he is convincing, he does not look like Holmes. Another thing is the plot, the next version, but it is also based on the original reading of Doyle's text itself, and the version is presented in game form, although there are also scary episodes, as in Doyle's text, there are even more of them. But the most important thing, if we compare: the author expands the limits of exactly the "imaginary" that Doyle created with his text (in literature it is not new at all-entire worlds-universes are known, and sometimes you catch yourself thinking that different authors and plots belong to the same space-time, indeed, for example, Zweig's novel "Impatience hearts" ends where Remarque's novel "On the Western Front without Change" begins), but the author expands, it adds new details to the biographies of already familiar characters (and through the new protagonist, the reader gets acquainted with acquaintances in absentia), and they are indeed recognizable, and there are a lot of new characters complementing the place and plot of the action from Doyle's text, and now, attention: "historical reality", "testimonies" and "reflections" epochs in the new modern Russian-language text... much more than in Doyle's text: and red Devonian cows (I already mentioned this, but which are not in Doyle's text at all!) and much, much more (moreover, if Doyle, as a man, is stingy in describing costumes at all, even if we are talking about women's outfits, then the author of a modern novel, a woman, on the contrary, provides details of "historical" costumes and outfits now), and there are innovations in communication practices, in how it is built... Russian Russian characters communicate: the whole text plays on the theme of universal suspicion and the impossibility without trust (and the "pipe of peace", the indicator is the familiar drinking of alcohol in modern Russian morality, but this is far from a specifically Russian trait and the range of famous drinks of English origin in the novel is wide, much wider known by the Russian tradition) to build... the dialogue itself, that is, if in the original novel rationality and the need for argumentation serve as the rules of dialogue, then in the new modern foreign-cultural novel the absurdity of total suspicion and the need, but also supported by arguments, of trust (a very interesting specifically new moment). At the same time, of course, the very understanding of the past in the new novel belongs to postmodernism, and this is evident from the allusion constantly found in the text, the roll call with the original text, references to different traditions, stories, cultures, hidden and explicit quoting of other texts (which was true already in Doyle's text, and is also ignored by Russian translations) However, postmodernism exists in different assumptions, in different interpretations of the same thing - both the novel itself and just what is new in communication practices (one can suspect both this and that, and the other- equally, until the third is proven, or it remains just to trust, guided by common sense, or just trust on sympathy, or on trust itself, but the reverse side of reliability and trust... fiction and deception).
That is, a new, modern or "postmodern" novel, no worse, if not better than the Soviet film adaptation of the Russian-language novel, allows you to better understand the original text, including in connection with the tasks of my research. It is not difficult to notice that in the pastiche novel, the main character of which is not a detective, but a lawyer, but also leading his own investigation, is reproduced, "played out"... historical writing.
What forms of historiography were known before historicism? If we do not count the works of ancient authors, then: epic, myth, folklore and chronicles. If we highlight those in which there are heroes and compare them with the historiography of the 19th century, then we can see that history without personalization has so far proved impossible only for great historical figures (although the path to the anthropological approach turned out to be tortuous: from the second half of the 19th century and in the first half of the 20th century. history turned out to be strongly influenced by economic theory and methods of exact sciences, on the contrary, it becomes anonymous, but after discussions about the role of personality in history-which incidentally relates to the romantic hero of literature, and criticism of this approach, as well as the catastrophes of the 20th century., the ongoing criticism of reason and the study of the very process of cognition, the idea of that it is about people and it becomes relevant to the concept of humanities again). That is also why it is necessary to consider an appeal to ancient authors: Plutarch, Suetonius, who wrote history in the era long before historicism, in the form of biographies. Moreover, this form of historiography makes it entertaining and more similar to literature, of course, literature of the 19th century. The hermeneutic approach to texts, to the historical itself, is the idea that it is not given to us in the surface layers of messages, and just like in archaeology, texts should be deciphered, an element of agent investigation is also inseparable from the historical narrative, conspiracies have always seemed to be part of the historical description, and this is another factor that makes historiography firstly, self-sufficient (they turned to her to understand or find the "true" motives and causes of certain events -and even in the meaning of "historical truth", as if it had always been hidden -hence the factuality and causality of historiography, too), and secondly, again entertaining and personalized (when history was the field of action of good and evil forces, there was no need to talk about the role of personality, and even evil, but real people can get involved in conspiracies). Here, again, the connection with the novel is already visible. It also has these elements: the personalization of the characters and, of course, the agent's vision, the motive of the conspiracy, not even one: the Barrymore conspiracy also exists, the only thing is that it has nothing to do with the surveillance of Baskerville, and does not harm them at all. And the need for personalized characters even makes the dead Sir Charles very often mentioned throughout the novel, and in such a way that the reader sees him alive. He is full of emotions, emotions, he is not a static figure at all, he feels fear, anxiety, he is full of nobility, responds to the request of Laura Lyons, knows how to be friends, confide secrets. In order to arouse sympathy among readers, apparently for this purpose the author deliberately goes against the historical truth-speaking not at all about gold as a source of capital, often associated with crimes in the colony, or in any case characterizes greed, the desire for enrichment, but about financial speculation, as about what can be considered luck: as if he had won in the lottery. And although this is not entirely true, but in the note the old baronet separates himself from the nouveau riche. And although I myself claim that his figure is not at all so cloudless, at least in the past, but he evokes sympathy: an old, sick, well-intentioned philanthropist. Therefore, when, for example, I talk about "Holmsian" as similar to myths, and heroes as similar to mythical heroes, then we must keep in mind... Usually, of course, it is only about Holmes. But it is as if all the others simply did not exist, or they would serve only as a background. But it's not even that, as E. Dobrenko studies in detail on the example of Stalin's historical cinema, myth and history cannot be combined in works of art at all, Holmes, as I have already noticed, looks exactly like a real historical figure, and not at all a mythical hero, besides which should be typical, such a hero does not They'll be writing letters to Baker Street. Therefore, the novel in which the story is told does not in any way resemble either an epic, a myth, a fairy tale, or the ballad of Robin Hood. This is an example... historicization of the past, rational understanding of it, even if we are talking about such a past, which is the fruit of the author's artistic imagination. And for the 19th century, which in itself is "historical" precisely in the sense of the emergence of historicism and the development of historiography, history as a science, such a novel is not unique, but relative to many other works of literature of an earlier time, it is an example... historicization of the plot. And any of the main characters is... a historian: whether it's Mortimer, an archaeologist and paleoanthropologist, whether it's Frankland, an archivist who... He is looking for judicial precedents in the huge legislative and judicial assembly in England (as is known, there is no constitution, codes, etc. in modern England), whether it is Holmes, who studies the past of the inhabitants of the district and finds out that Stapleton impersonates another, as well as his wife for his sister, whether it is Watson, who is vividly and poetically interested in the past... what about the sites of primitive man on Dartmoor, what about Baskerville Hall, a Tudor manor house in which he serves as a tour guide... Barrymore, educating the young baronet on his genealogy. Even if this is given in the novel by the background, by references, but it sets off the natures of the characters. So this is a historical description in every sense, but... which can in no way serve as a source for the history of England in the second half of the 19th century. And it is no coincidence that any such "historical" information is usually taken from an "external" narrative, only related to the novel: from the same mention that Watson served as a military doctor in Afghanistan and that this may speak about the hero... the Lev Dodin method. Which I use. The novel cannot be a source, and here are two more arguments: the novel is deliberately built in a strict chronological sequence and any events described in it can, if desired, be accurately dated: there are dated letters from Watson, dated newspaper issues are mentioned, there are direct indications-links to the time of action, but in real historical time - there were high-profile events such as the installation of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the mysterious suicide of the Crown Prince in Austria-Hungary. There is not even a hint about anything about this in the novel. Although, there are two mentions of the Pope, but about this... It's as if Holmes and Watson didn't read the newspapers at all... but they were just reading them, and Holmes asks Watson where they have yesterday's issue of the Times. Of course, it can be noted that if the text of the manuscript is surprisingly similar to the main idea of Christianity about original sin, taken from the Bible, its first book of Genesis, then the whole plot is based on the mysterious death of an old baronet, allusively, too, and there is a reference to the mysterious death of the young Crown Prince in historical reality. And this was just much more obvious to the first readers of the novel. But it is not at all obvious to us. Precisely because it is at the heart of the novel, but it is not even mentioned in it. One can say that the entire Christian ideology in the novel is represented by mentioning figures from the hierarchy of the church: the parish priest (including a distant relative of the Baskervilles) and the Pope himself. Nevertheless, the novel is a source, just not in the sense that it is usually believed (Kobrin). It is historical by the very fact that it is written... like history, in the 19th century. But the reader of the novel will be surprised to find in any museum of the 19th century that he knows nothing about everyday life, that is, the "past" itself is not in the novel. Just as he was not in Stalin's historical films, but was in the film adaptations of Russian classics (Dobrenko). Even the researcher can be said to continue to fall for Doyle's literary technique-to believe in the reality of what is described, and to believe that Doyle reflected his era - its everyday life and moral norms. Not quite like that. On the contrary, in the novel, any historical evidence is passed through the author's imagination, and much in general is the fruit of his fiction, fantasy, which is only deliberately given plausibility. It is for this, as E. Dobrenko notes, that the agent's vision was used in Stalin's historical cinema and this gave them entertainment and verisimilitude (unlike an epic or myth, a fairy tale is a folklore plot, again a direct allusion to the plot of the novel: Holmes does not believe in fairy tales in the manuscript, but seeing surveillance, he believes very much in the agent's influence- he even tries to grab an ephemeral opponent by the beard, but it turns out to be fake). The lack of direct historical evidence in the novel, of course, may be a consequence of the author's self-censorship: after all, the mention in the novel, and even a detective novel, and even the reader of which is the royal family, of any events of current politics is not the place to mention it, Doyle allowed himself to make direct statements about it, but in journalistic works (like his infamous book apologizing for the British colonialists in their struggle against other true Boer colonialists). But at the same time, Doyle does not consider it questionable to mention, even unrelated to the plot, the Pope, and even threatens the English crown itself with lawsuits through Frankland. But in any case, there is just no complex of such information in the novel, so that if you imagine that only this novel remains from the entire Victorian century (and, by the way, there are precedents for restoring entire historical epochs according to this kind of preserved evidence in history, I have already talked about this, but we can remind you again: Homeric poems and the ancient past of Greece) -the historian would have learned little from it. But it clearly reveals a complex associated with historicism, for example, the discourse of modernity, and in this sense it can be a source, but again... such a source that does not lose its relevance all the time as long as there is a dominant historicism, as long as the era of modernity lasts... that is why the researcher "finds", as if in the novel, the beginning of those norms that we call modern for ourselves. In the novel there is the imaginary instead of history, but in the novel there is historicism and the discourse of modernity. That is why it looks like a "modern history"... historicism, by the way, always not only rationalizes the past, it inevitably personalizes it, and gives it the features of an entertaining conspiracy, but also modernizes it, and in such a way that it is always a modern narrative, from history in it, just like in the Stalinist historical cinema, only wigs and costumes (and even those according to we will not be able to study Doyle's novel as a fashion phenomenon, except without evaluating one witness or participant in the phenomenon -the author himself). That's exactly why... when 20b. after catastrophes, he becomes convinced that he cannot cognize the past when he returns to the past the right to its autonomy from the present (the crisis of historicism and positivism in 20th century historiography), when the postmodern era begins... then there are film adaptations in which only the names from the original are: Holmes and Watson (and the most popular one with Cumberbatch as Holmes). Therefore, it seems to me that in many ways, what E. Dobrenko described as inherent in Stalin's cultural policy, as a Stalinist political and aesthetic concept, it is certainly built on the patterns of modernity and much is simply immanently inherent in modernity, because it lies at its foundation (like romanticism, and the other side of entertainment -melodrama, love as a culturally significant phenomenon also opposes the religious traditional idea of marriage and is as much a part of modernity as the emancipation of women). And yet, of course, the "Stalinist project" and the "modern project" are generally different. But the very fact that Doyle's novel was "allowed" in the Stalinist USSR says that it was not alien to Soviet ideology, the film adaptations that with Volkov in the role of Holmes, that I. Maslennikov were part of the film adaptations of classics that began back in the 1920s of the 20th century in the USSR. It is all the more surprising that Doyle was not a representative of "advanced views", but on the contrary liberal and even largely conservative (like Kipling, for example). Not only did he not ridicule the political system, like Mark Twain, he apologized for it in its most inappropriate activity: in the Anglo-Boer War. And even more so, there was no "class struggle" in Holmsian. And popularity alone since pre-revolutionary times cannot explain the spread of "Holmsiana" in the USSR, many popular things then (for example, the works of Charskaya or the authors of the same Anglo-American literature for young people) were completely expelled. I think "Holmsiana" just fit into the canon of the Stalinist political and aesthetic project, which was an example of the discourse of modernity: and the entertainment of the agent's vision: Stapleton is an absolutely Stalinist cultural antihero-a hidden enemy, a conspirator (so, as we see again, his literary figure is not so harmless, along with the anthropologist Mortimer, who argues about the shape of the skulls, the Celtic race, and so on, and Holmes, who finally "identified" the criminal in Stapleton by similarity to the portrait of old Hugo, God knows whether it was written for the 17th century. from nature, especially since there was more of the idea of transmigration of souls, intertwined with the newfangled ideas of Lambroso ...). The novel reveals a connection with history, but it is not a source of the historical, it is an example in itself... historical description (which perhaps confuses researchers, coupled with Doyle's literary technique of giving everything written verisimilitude), the transgressions of the imaginary (even if it is imitated by reality) in the novel before historical reality in comparison with how much of the connection with history in the "historical" Stalinist cinema are simply ridiculous, but there are fundamental differences between both the similarities that allowed Doyle's Soviet film adaptations to be inscribed in the Soviet canon of film adaptations of classics in general (which proves once again that Doyle is a classic of English literature even there, when translators do not detect, for example, hidden quotations from Shakespeare). In this fundamentally general , and is found ...the connection of the historiography of the modern era with the literature of the same period in general. But the subject of this work is not the history of England itself, nor the history of European or Russian literature, nor history in literature, but thus how modernity turns into ... history in literature, and how this function participates in the culture of a modernized society.
Culture participates in the creation of identity (national, state, political, religious). The novel is a historical source not so much by content as by morphology. His value to the story, to paraphrase Ferro's remark about the film, is not only in what he tells, but also in the culture-building approach he claims. Namely, rational communication. At the same time, the fundamental rejection of tradition only expands the possibilities of such communication.
E.Dobrenko, unlike I.Petrovskaya, on the contrary, speaking about historical Soviet films, novels, argues and proves that they reflect history, with the only difference just (and I.Petrovskaya's disregard is understandable precisely because there is no "historical reality" of the time described in them) that they reflect the epoch his appearance: "Alexander Nevsky tells us much more about 1938 than about the 13th century."
It is interesting how E.Dobrenko interprets the function of history in Soviet society: "the strategy of mass societies is to replace social memory with history. Memory is trauma; History is therapy. In the artificial memory created through the historical narrative, social trauma is removed through the historicization of experience. The price for this therapeutic procedure is the alienation of the past. It is here that History meets Literature directly.: As R. Barth noted in The Zero Degree of Writing, "the teleology common to the Novel and to narrative History is the alienation of facts." History turns out to be a protective dam against Memory, which must be frozen and verbalized in the images of History. If Memory is a selection procedure, then History is a procedure for conceptualizing and alienating the experience (memory). History is not a collection or even a selection of events. This is not a set of interpretations of these events, but rather a system of techniques and optics that produce the "events" themselves from the past and give them the status of events. In other words, History can be thought of as an alienated past, as a transformed social experience (Memory is personal; History is social). As such, it does not articulate the traumatics of real experience, but serves to derealize the past and memory." This is the process we see in the text of the novel. Five different stories can be distinguished in the text, although it itself is a story, a narrative unfolding in a clear chronological sequence, a story about a certain event that needs to be comprehended, rationalized, and thus memory alienation occurs, and the entire text morphologically is the sixth story, except for those presented inside the text (the author of the sixth is of course the author-Doyle as well as all five).
The first is still traditional-a manuscript with a legend: it represents a banal plot-for the 17th century.-evil and injustice are immediately punished by a hellish supernatural dog-actually this is not a story, but the past that is proposed to be comprehended (Holmes, however, hastily discards it as a "fairy tale", for collectors of antiquity, that is, for romantics, there was a connection with them both for history and for literature of the 19th century, and for historicism as such, and for modernity in general). All the subsequent ones are really stories: the note acts like Holmes, calls the past rumors. Then there is the third story, hesitating, it is intriguing, it presents a mystery, the story of an eyewitness Mortimer. The fourth story is erroneous, this is the Watson investigation, in which the past (both recent and associated with it 17th century-the curse of the Baskervilles) is interpreted as the machinations of the Barrymores, and the fifth story is the real one, the Holmes investigation, which ended with the exposure of the criminal Stapleton.
E.Dobrenko calls a Museum an adequate materialization of history and explains what a Museum is: that it is not a collection, but a composition, the past in it is mediated and almost unrelated to memory: "if history is a conceptualized past, then the museum is a materialized history." Is Baskerville Hall a museum? I don't think so. Because the novel presents the process of turning the past into history. That's when it ended, then yes: the manuscript may not be hidden, but appear there somewhere behind glass, as an exhibit. As something that is on display, replacing the true story (the past). E.Dobrenko: "keeping the form, the museum destroys the content." By the way, this shows the importance of Stalinism as a modernizing phenomenon, and in the way it positioned itself - as the heir and guardian of the purity of Marxism... the ideology of the 19th century, its connection with modernity is obvious. So, in the novel, the past, turning into history, is destroyed, and we see it literally: at first it is profaned, the ghost turns out to be a real, albeit scary, but a dog smeared with a luminous mixture, and she is shot by an inspector of Scotland Yard. The traumatic past is repressed, alienated, and it doesn't even need to be forgotten. It no longer poses any threat. And it seems that this eluded the author, who in life acted as a champion of spiritualism, and in the text of the novel destroyed as if only a real dog... but if this ghost really existed... then Stapleton would have no need to reconstruct it, to imitate it, there would be nothing to imitate. Having exposed, in reality, and is exposed... legend. So... the past. This kills continuity and tradition. Of course, it is important for the novel that it is an example from romantic horror literature with which intertextuality is revealed, but obviously its appearance was possible again not only as a reflection of fashion, but also the explanation of the boom in museums in the situation of social dynamics in Stalinist industrialization, which E.Dobrenko gives: "it generated "the interpretation of the past through artificial history, which partially obscured social relations and the struggle of the past (in the Marxist interpretation, this struggle is the loss of status by the nobility in the face of the strengthening of the social role of the bourgeoisie, the motif of the "cherry orchard", repeated many times in Russian classical literature, by writers of the nobility, "singers of ruined noble nests", but culturally it may also be a reflection of changes in morality, which M. notices.Ossovskaya, and in the historical and biographical interpretation is connected with the ideology of the author, which has more to do with the ideas of chivalry, which are amusingly transferred from the nouveau riche or illegitimate offspring of an aristocratic family to a Canadian farmer, although here he is assisted by a detective, with a doctor companion, another medic-the "three Musketeers" and, a police inspector); the belief that the past can be understood through pastiche and stereotype, turning it into a simple narrative and spectacle; the belief that history will turn into a legacy, safe and sterile, inaccessible to perversion and temptation; finally, a complete loss of faith in a historical subject seeking his own redemption and the universal redemption of all mankind."
Stapleton reconstructs a ghost, but on the contrary, it means to deprive it of authenticity, profane it, and finally kill it. The exhibit no longer produces anything but pure "knowledge".
Unlike Literature, History cannot be written, it can only be rewritten (there are four versions of the Story in the text: a note, an eyewitness account, the Watson investigation, the Holmes investigation, based on the same facts).
Like any Historical one, Doyle's interest in the topic was allusive, that is, he spoke about the problem of modernity and addressed only a certain point in the past in order to solve the problem of modernity on his material. That is, historicism does not describe the past, but dissects it, uses it in the interests of the present, therefore, dealing with its periodization, because it is clear that history as the past is continuous.
Modern History and Literature meet in the novel.
The fact that it is possible to analyze the text of a novel in the same way that E.Dobrenko analyzes Soviet historical novels and films shows that both there and there is a single mechanism for "processing history", which "perfectly corresponded to the nature of historicizing art": "Hegel (according to Yu.Habermas Hegel was the first to formulate the classical concept of modernity-my comment), comparing historical description with art, saw the purpose of the former in reflecting the disharmony of the world, and the latter in harmonizing reality." And then, speaking about the Soviet historical narrative in the texts of historians and writers, E. Dobrenko seems to be talking about the novel under study: "the boundaries between these two types of historical vision are blurred. Historical description is increasingly subordinated to the goals of aestheticizing history, whereas socialist realist art in its "total realism" definitely returns to the principles of primitive mimesis. Both of these strategies of reading history, which are opposite in many respects, obey the "Lenin's theory of reflection." Both in "historical science" and in art, there is a return-on a new level-to "prehistory"-a myth that always adapts the individual to the natural and social whole." But if this can be found in the novel, then this is the possibility of historicism as a whole.
In Soviet discourse, history and the past merge, the concept of the "historical past" is introduced: "Nowhere, probably, has socialist realism merged with romantic aesthetics so clearly as in the field of historicizing art."
E.Dobrenko writes how the rejection of classism under Stalin deprived the story of a plot, but the universal motivation turned out to be a conspiracy: "on the idea of which Stalin's "Short Course" was built. Thus, a literal coincidence can be found here: "the conspiracy did not just become a plot master key, but actually created a plot around which the whole action revolved." So what does this mean? Did the principles of Stalin's historical concept and aesthetic doctrine coincide with the principles of Doyle's work, or English neo-Romanticism, or simply turned out to be identical to the principles of historicism of the classical "historical century"?.. To refute Kobrin's thesis that the novel reflects the history of modernity, which has parallels in the Soviet period and therefore the novel is so close to the Soviet reader, and Maslennikov's film adaptation of the original, it can not only be shown that the novel does not contain much of the "historical reality" and is actually the "imaginary reality" of the author, who lived and worked in the era of modernity, and therefore the novel is a work of modernity, but in order to refute or prove Kobrin's thesis, although not interpreted as literally as the famous cultural critic, let's put the question more radically, despite the fact that Dobrenko, who studies Soviet cinema, denies the existence of such a connection, but: is Soviet art a part, a successor to the art of the "historical century", Art Nouveau?..
The contradiction is expressed in the very idea of the ability of art to take what is depicted beyond the historical. The essayist of the early 20th century. (the time of modern writing and the first publication of the story-my comment) Robert de la Ciseranne saw an irreconcilable contradiction between the idea of sculpture and the widespread monuments of people in modern clothes. The absurdity of such monuments, in his opinion, was "an involuntary attempt to immortalize a passing fashion."
"Sizerann explained the absurdity of modern monuments by the contradiction between a historically determined toilet and the idea of sculpture focused on embodying eternal beauty and harmony."//Yampolsky.
"Theodor Adorno wrote about the conflict experienced by art, which is constantly faced with the inability to harmonize details and absorb them into a kind of totality. A work of art is created by an artist who gives it visibility as a form. But the work also claims to be objective in its form, which supposedly has a universality in which the world is reflected. Adorno wrote:
A deceptive feeling is awakened that all this is not a deception, that the diffuse features inherent in the work, alien to the personal principle of the Ego and the pre-established totality introduced into them were in harmony with each other a priori, whereas harmony itself is staged and directed from the outside."
No matter how plausible or improbable a work of art looks, it is always created by the artist. Look: it seems that before the performance, the characters of the novel were given roles: a Canadian farmer should play the role of a newly minted squire, Barrymore -obviously, only two years playing the role of a butler-the role of a butler in the fourth generation of ancestors, his wife- the wife of such an "old" servant, hiding that her brother is a criminal, an escaped convict, a pariah of society, forced to hide in the swamps next to the family ghost of the Baskervilles, whose victim he will become by mistake, having nothing to do with the Baskervilles, except that he was dressed in a suit of Sir Henry, Laura Lyons must in various ways leading her to a reprehensible relationship (she is still formally married) with Stapleton, and then to the role of an unwitting accomplice to crimes, to play the role of a respectable woman, a victim of her husband and father, Frankland is a besotted old-age litigant, to play the role of an equally blindly punishing Law, Watson-a detective, Holmes-a tramp in the swamps, or a primitive man who cannot leave the benefits of civilization and comfort and live in a truly primitive state, in a cave, everyone has their own masks, their own roles, even Sir Charles, was still a nouveau riche, who remembered about the title and the estate, only in their old age, everyone plays roles, acting out a staged performance. It's time to ask the question: who is the director in this case? It is clear that following the logic of art, in the work it is the wheel of fortune, or rock. But in the analysis of the work, by the way, it is also clear that the author. But in reality, the director is also among the heroes... Holmes?.. No, Holmes is even grateful (just like an actor after a successful film) that he was given such a mystery, such an interesting case. He even lavishes compliments on Stapleton, which is why this naturalist, whose victim was only an old baronet and an escaped convict, and then by negligence, he really did not act like a murderer, in general his actions do not pull at a crime actually presented in a jury trial, that's why Holmes needed to restrain Watson and use the victim is like bait. Maybe it was Stapleton then?.. And then, dying in the swamp, he could shout like Nero: "what an artist is dying!" But no. In fact, the director is Mortimer. It is he who introduces Holmes and readers to the manuscript, to the legend, then to the note, to the story of the strange death of the old baronet, with mysterious traces, which were witnessed only by him. He then introduces Sir Henry to Holmes and Watson. And then Stapleton shows Watson from the window. Mortimer is the real director of the entire drama (but of course, not the mysterious one), as in alternative versions of the plot, if only for the simple reason that a few years before the appearance of the baronet he lived in Dartmoor, and did not come after Sir Charles, as Stapleton let slip, if there is one obvious criminal, what to look for some hidden other). It is Mortimer who thanks Holmes for the riddle, for his dedication to the case. Mortimer differs from all the characters in the story in that he always seems to act from behind the scenes: and generally leads a kind of private life hidden from readers-it is no coincidence that nothing is known about his wife, except that she simply exists. And here is another discovery... usually the author is associated with Watson, saying that Doyle endowed this particular character with his own features. It could very well be. But... there are two doctors in the story, if you pay attention to Doyle's profession. Mortimer is passionate about anthropology (Doyle was interested in genealogy since childhood, and Mortimer- a "talking" surname in England, heraldry, history in general), believes in spirits (Doyle also, and the more surprising is the plot "exposing" this as superstition and prejudice, Doyle defended the existence of ghosts captured in photographs, openly in print, and even before writing the story, as well as after), from the biography of the writer is known for the sad circumstances that forced him (including from financial interests) to re-write the story with Holmes as the hero, he had a sick wife (Mortimer's wife does not appear in the story, but only mentioned, moreover, for the sake of his wife, obviously, Mortimer left his medical practice in the capital, Doyle, although not at all for the sake of his wife once, but left his medical practice for the sake of literary and journalistic activities, which brought him both more income and satisfaction in life, journalism by the way then knew many names of outstanding writers, whom we perceive only as classic writers, for example Mark Twain), he loved animals (like Mortimer, Snoopy in the novel is the only real dog that appears to the reader immediately from the first chapter). And finally, the most important argument that Mortimer (except Watson) has as a prototype of Doyle himself is that Doyle was an unsurpassed storyteller, and Mortimer, as is clear from the analysis by deconstruction methods, is also primarily a storyteller. But there are two doctors in the novel... and they shared the writer's traits equally. Two and a detective: Watson is conducting his own investigation for the first and only time. Two heroes... in addition to Holmes, Sir Henry, and this also distinguishes the story from the entire cycle of novels and short stories. Sir Henry, as I also found out by deconstruction, also makes a novel a banal work with a romantic hero. And two antiheroes... Stapleton, and Barrymore (who, as in a classic detective story, is a false trail for the reader), of course, if you do not separate from Stapleton his weapon-a real dog imitating the curse of the Baskervilles from the legend, whereby Stapleton himself turns into the likeness of old Hugo, whom he even looks like, like his father who "escaped" from England to Central America in such a bizarre way (actually by the writer's imagination, where there are traces of the Catholic idea of redemption, the renewal of the human race, the general Christian idea, although Doyle had a difficult relationship with religion: his family were not Irish at all, but descendants of English colonists in Ireland who retained Catholicism, while the Reformation and religious wars took place in the metropolis, and Doyle himself, who broke openly with Catholicism, turned into a "lousy father" for his relatives) "a legend comes to life" in the "enlightened age". Doyle himself is (and this is reflected in the novel) a combination of advanced ideas that today we would not consider advanced, of course, with his attitude to tradition, prejudice, religion, politics and history, science, philosophy and creativity. The novel is in a much greater sense the fruit of this whole complex of ideas, subjective views, than a reflection of "historical reality" or "objectivity of form". The work is the personal beginning of the author, who is, of course, a genuine director, only his will gives the work (to one degree or another of the author's skill) integrity, meaningfulness and harmony of ideas that may not have a place in reality or look as ridiculous as the later reconstructions of the past, or the very attempts to capture its transitory the meaning in the form of eternal art (in the analysis of the "great style" and the historicization of art in the 19th century. Yampolsky's example was the painting "The Death of General Wolf" in 1777. Benjamin West, curiously, was dissuaded from the idea of exactly how to portray the hero by Reynolds, mentioned in the novel, a picture where, almost for the first time, the hero was presented to the public not in a conventional manner-clothes, according to the "big style" of ancient times, but in real historical clothes-in the uniform of his time, in the task images of "historical truth", which was audacious and new for its time, but specifically for that painting, this experience was recognized as not having destroyed the "great style", except for the costume, everything else was canonical, namely, as Hume wrote, it did not know "history", the hero even in uniform looked like an ancient hero, as a hero should look, Doyle's novel did not have any daring task at all, the fruit of the author's idea, published for the entertainment of readers, nevertheless was the fruit of the "historical" 19th century at the same time. and he painted the "story" with the plot itself, even bearing the features of aristocratic snobbery, nationalism and racism, Doyle, a publicist, was at the same time known to be the author of an apologetic justification for the colonial Anglo-Boer war in South Africa, where he places the motive of the crime - the million-dollar capital of Sir Charles, which he took to England-in the novel it is just an author's explanation, it does not carry just any maxim, except that in the note quoted by Mortimer, the old baronet was praised and contrasted with the nouveau riche just those, that he thought to use capital to restore the former glory of his ancestors, the fate of the entire village district depended on it, the fact that the same ideas were shared by the young baronet, the ideal hero in the author's plan, shows that they were also evaluated by the writer himself, who did not care about the nature of the origin of this capital, although it was England of the 19th century. it was the birthplace of socialism, and sheltered many political emigrants from Europe and Russia who shared the ideas of socialism, in particular Marx and Engels, and Herzen, but in comparison with these ideas, Doyle appears to be a conservative, if not a reactionary author, but this is another topic, the main thing here is that the novel is not in any way in no case is it an "artifact", not a neutral source, but a subjective view, with completely different tasks, in its entirety the fruit of the author's idea, the interweaving of "imaginary reality" and "historical reality" as part of the author's subjective views and ideas widespread at that time, but it is much more important that he, as a whole work, is a reflection of the "historical" 19th century. It is precisely as a whole work, it is a reflection of the "historical" 19th century. with his idea of historicism: people are not at all the same, neither as representatives of different strata, peoples, countries and epochs, but at the same time they remain people, although this will already be a discussion about the evolution of historicism, and the difficulties of the researcher with the "anthropological method", for example, Aron Yakovlevich Gurevich, in fairness it should be noted that the authors of the structuralist the method in literary criticism, the same Levi-Strauss, on the contrary, considered its application possible, believing the work on the contrary not to be the fruit of the author's subjective creativity, but determined rigidly and objectively by logic, Levi-Strauss considered the structure of language and the work in general devoid of any meaning, which allowed him to look at his analysis as objective, just not to associate mythems with some chronological sequence, but to distinguish them as certain structures of the narrative text present in it according to the very logic of using language, so that for my analysis, I only used part of the method-reducing the entire narrative to a single phrase, which is the meaning of the episode, then their location depends on the general meaning of the paradigmatic connection in these mythological phrases, applying part of this method, I found these phrases and connections useful for researching this story for the study of the history of the modern era, I did not use this method to study the text of the story as part of the study of literature, works in the ideas of in the theory of structural linguistics, the text and the method of its study from structuralism are here only a source and a method for understanding in the tasks of historical reconstruction, to do this without believing the work on the contrary to be the fruit of the author's subjective, and therefore unique, "historical" plan and only because it reflected the "historical" time of its epoch, apparently, just without sharing the concept of historicism, or not considering it, is fundamentally impossible, roughly speaking: if you do not "believe" in "history", then how can one find traces of the "historical"). But the point is also not unimportant: what kind of "history" we are dealing with, traces of which "history" we can find, in which "history" we will "believe": because on closer examination we will see that we ourselves live in an "imaginary reality", we are always dealing with an "imaginary historyfor example, we cannot know what William Shakespeare looked like (as there is a "Shakespearean question" about the authorship of famous tragedies and comedies, sonnets, as there is a "Homeric question"), but there is a canon: how exactly Shakespeare, the author of tragedies and comedies, should be depicted, and there are portraits, monuments, busts, in accordance with tradition, with the canon. That is, when talking about "history" we always meet with conventions, with something generally accepted, but sometimes not even historical at all, that is, the historicity of which was and is in doubt: the figure of Joan of Arc in France (her cult appears precisely on the eve of the First World War). Moreover, the whole "history" in its chronological, stadial sequence is itself a mixture of the "chronology of Scaliger" and Hegel's historicism. And finally, the conventionality of reconstruction, and the very subject of this reconstruction. In this case, what can be studied at all? Text. Composition. A text that is always organized in accordance with its own laws. This is all the more important because modern historical texts and modern forms of literature appeared simultaneously in the 19th century.
Any text is organized according to its own laws. For example, a book by the Soviet writer, documentary filmmaker, and war participant V. Chichkov about sports for children, published in the 1970s. One phrase: "Soviet athletes at all competitions confirm their high sporting spirit," and written in chapter 11, that is, not in the introduction or afterword. Both the reader and the author knew in advance what the book was about in principle. As the laws of the detective genre, in which both the author and the reader know in advance that there is a crime, there is a criminal, there is a detective with whom nothing will happen during the narration, because he must finish the investigation, the crime will be solved, the criminal will be found and punished. So it is here, although this is not a novel, but a documentary story for children. A journalistic essay. Reportage. If you try to define the genre boundaries of individual chapters. But in principle, the main thing for both the author and the reader is pre-determined: "Soviet athletes ..." And this is not propaganda, not a cliche, at least not only that. In many ways, these are the laws of storytelling. They may be less obvious if we are talking about a monographic study, but they are there. And if the researcher does not follow strictly scientific research methods, they are the ones who "lead" the narrative.
M.B.Yampolsky, quoting Schopenhauer, Nietzsche argues that in the second half of the 19th century there was a "transition from the stylistics of culture to the stylistics of subjectivity," from "objectivity to the paradigm of totalizing subjectivity of the observer." Stefan Gheorghe understood historicism as an inadequate form of expression of modernity, representing the latter exclusively through the past. And if we turn to the heroes of the novel, then again it is easy to notice this: the narrative begins with a cane, with the study of a memorable record of a gift-that is, a landmark past for Mortimer, what makes farmer Henry Baskerville Esquire if not the past merits of his ancestors and inheritance? What makes Stapleton a criminal, if not his past, even the recent one, which forced him to change his name once again in England. Why his wife looks so dissonant on the marshes of Dartmoor-her very appearance speaks of her origin, that is, her Latin American past. What ruined Sir Charles, if not his past and the frightening story from the manuscript, with which Mortimer introduces Holmes and Watson. What are the Barrymores hiding? That Selden was connected by his past to their own. Each of the characters has a past, through which their present position is determined. One can notice: how else? But in Gheorghe's remark, the word "exclusively" is important to me. Is there anything stopping the naturalist Stapleton from being just a naturalist? No, it hinders: his crimes. He's not just the naturalist he wants to look like. What does Laura Lyons strive for, how not to get rid of her past? The Barrymores can't leave Baskerville Hall yet. Mortimer is forced to seek advice because he is afraid that the Baskervilles' past will damage the new owner of the estate. Although, the past is connected with the fact that it is dead: the heroes of the legend lived in the 17th century, the dog is not just a dog, but a ghost, Selden killed a murderer, Stapleton is also a murderer, Sir Charles, who took the legend too close to his heart, lost his life. M.B.Yampolsky calls this a "disease of historicism": collecting "dead traces of the past". The historical collections of museums really began once as collecting. In the novel, they also collect: Mortimer paleoanthropological and ethnographic collections, Stapleton butterflies (isn't this where the story of maniac collectors of the 20th century in popular culture begins), Frankland judicial victories. There is also historicism in the novel in the sense of a large, universal history-Mortimer studies the remains of primitive man, Watson poetically describes how his historical imagination visited him-when he abandoned thoughts that it was the 19th century, walking among the remnants of the material culture of primitive people, and the rest of the series of great history: mentioning the events of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Jacques Le Reader contrasts tradition with historicism.: "It can be argued that the triumph of historicism actually manifests a crisis of traditions, a lack of historical continuity... the most ancient social strata -the aristocracy and the peasantry, for whom traditions are still alive - do not need historicism to assert their sense of history. On the contrary, the bourgeois strata, taking the aristocratic lifestyle as a model, cultivate the "neo-Baroque" or "Italian Renaissance" style to build their own palace."
It is curious that M.B.Yampolsky analyzes historicism precisely in connection with the disintegration of a single large style based on tradition, on the search for a new unified style, and the appearance of a variety of styles, a change in the very concept of style, the appearance of even style there, in a private interior where it never existed (Biedermeier), eclecticism (when antique columns they began to decorate the facades of banks and parliament buildings). That is, the death of Sir Charles, who from the nouveau riche tried to take the aristocratic style of his ancestors as a model, but could not reconstruct it, because he himself was already a nouveau riche, it can be read symbolically-as a desperate and fruitless search for the lost unity of style. The new owner, according to Barrymore, will establish new orders, and the electrification of Baskerville Hall is what Walter Benjamin understood by historicism in his essay "Eduard Fuchs: collector and historian" - a materialized image of culture, and the answer to this was the mass culture of the 20th century, which often began to spread around the world from overseas, from the USA, where Sir Henry also comes from. History becomes an object of construction. M.B.Yampolsky writes: "I think what Benjamin is really describing here is a radical stage of rebellion against historicism, when a styleless structure from which all historical stylistic elements have been removed becomes a way of explosively transforming fragments from the old into the new." According to M.B.Yampolsky, this is the end of style and the transformation of the past into an element of actual experience (as the whole plot of the novel seems to the modern reader-where rationalism and the new method of Holmes sheds like an electric new light, Sir Henry literally came from overseas, to the events of the legend of the 17th century., which thus remains only an element of actual experience during which the young baronet is freed from the influence of the past).
At the time of Doyle's work on the novel, the story was not at all what the reader knows today. At least academic. First, she was still heavily influenced by metaphysics, despite all the talk about being scientific. Secondly, scientific history was considered not just a story written by professionals, but it was only a political, military, and diplomatic history. And it was a national story, and not even a nation, the people were the subject of attention, it was a national-state one. That is, beyond the interest of academic history there were ordinary people (in the center -prominent political statesmen, generals), even cultural history was understood as the history of intellectuals, but not folklore (despite the romanticism of the early 19th century. and even borrowing the terminology of romantics, for example, "folk spirit"). At the same time, the history of professionals did not consider it a contradiction to consider the artistic, creative method scientific. It was at this time, the time of writing the novel, that individual scientists and works appeared in which politics was inferior to culture (Lamprecht in Germany, Turner in the USA, although economic determinism, Marxism, were more common), prominent figures were at the center of the description along with ordinary people (Michelet and Jaures in France), there was a special interest in regional history-but all this mostly remained outside academic history and readers of the works of professional historians were not among the readers (in Europe, professionalization itself was part of the strategy of the Prussian state to dominate the German states in Europe -it straddled the idea of national unity, and then on the continent and in the world in general-part of what was soon called German imperialism). In England, history until the end of the 19th century. It was still sometimes understood as legal (so Frankland, who is looking for judicial precedents and ancient laws and acts in his litigious lawsuits, is a historian).
How is the past understood? How is history written? First of all, it is written "retroactively", retrospectively (in the finale of the novel there is the last chapter as if it is retrospective - but it is only in relation to the plot of the novel), Watson, starting the narrative in the novel, has already experienced it. Is every retrospective view a story? No. One could describe it as a memory. Conceptuality, what is noted in Yurchak's work as a look at the respondents' own past - representatives of the last Soviet generation, skipped 30 years later through both events-the collapse of the USSR, and through their historical conceptualizations-the theory of totalitarianism, this conceptuality makes memories not memories at all, but history. The murder of Stapleton's dog makes possible exactly the way the whole narrative is presented in the novel. That is, it has already been experienced, comprehended, rationalized, and conceptualized. It's a retrospective look, it's a story.
At the same time, Watson is one of the witnesses and participants in the events, who also used letters and a diary when describing them (but the whole novel is not letters and a diary). In fact, the novel is a sample of the same work by Lord Clarendon on the Great Rebellion mentioned by the author of the manuscript. There are several different texts in the novel: two excerpts from newspapers, two letters and a fragment of a third, and an excerpt from a diary. The rest is presented in the form of dialogues (that is why the story looks like a dramatic work, but there is an explanation for this - the narrator himself took part in the described, and if he was not a participant in the dialogues, then he was a witness to them). Lord Clarendon was also not just a chronicler, he was a participant in events, and wrote history, being actually a political emigrant on the continent. His mention in the text of the legend is not such an accident at all. It's more like an umbilical cord-it points to the genesis of the narrative. Maybe even Doyle wrote the novel under the impression of reading a historical work (although this is a contextual assumption, Clarendon's work was published and known for a long time in educated circles, but at the turn of the century then, in the early 20th century. it was popular to turn to some of the subjects of the Middle Ages at the highest state level: in France, the state cult of Joan of Arc appears, and in England, as a sign of final reconciliation with the past-that is, its alienation-a monument to Cromwell is erected, despotic features attributed to him, the pathos of revenge, although this is all far from the idealism and puritanical rigor of a real historical person but you can also guess in the features of the characters of the novel, moreover, the attitude on the religious and political issue is exactly what has often served as a division of the genus, it forced both a split within families and crimes and flight, but the belief in ghosts may indicate that the old baronet was a Catholic -Protestantism condemned such superstitions most strongly among Christian movements, in Catholicism it could all get along, along with the cult of saints, with folklore, it is not contradictory at all one can recall the famous chimeras of Notre Dame in Paris, and judging by the biography of Doyle, written by Carr in collaboration with his son: the writer himself experienced a split in the family on religious grounds -Doyle broke with the family tradition of Catholicism, and it was not at all about his education as a doctor, the conflict occurred precisely with the rejection of widespread medical practice among Catholics, from which-out of need and pessimism, but without at all assuming popularity, Doyle the writer appeared).
Causality is a causal relationship (what is the basis of an explanatory story) in plot as a successful narrative strategy.
The emergence of modern modes of transport went hand in hand with the spread of education, newspapers, and literature. This is all the foundation from which the modern information society can be said with certainty. Literature, history, newspaper publications, legislative acts are all those types of texts whose communicative impact is extremely wide. First, any text itself is intended for communication, that is, communication. Alphabetic or hieroglyphic writing, symbolic, symbolic here plays the role of what should facilitate communication. Secondly, the importance of a literary work that has the potential of wide dissemination for communicative impact is enormous, in fact they are second only to cinema in the 20th century. And here are just the techniques both intra-literary and originating from the plot (and the novel is dialogical) they play the role of a letter, a symbol in terms of improving communication skills. And the fact that the novel has had a steady interest for more than a hundred years, and is Doyle's most adaptable work, allows us to find some of these techniques or mechanisms in it. I will be more interested in those that are inseparable from modernity and modernization (both because the task is historical and because the subject of study is modern).
What are the mechanisms for understanding and capturing experience and modernity in a novel?
Rationalization (detraditionalization, secularization and deduction)
Agent thinking (metaphors of verticality)
Historicization of modernity (legitimation)
Communicative rationality (dialogue, argumentation, consensus)
The mechanisms turn into the functions of modernization itself -historicism (detraditionalization, secularization, but also agent thinking), communication based on communicative rationality.
An example of historicization is the translation of a memory into a story. It is used in the novel. Moreover, due to the fact that Doyle, hating his most popular character, decided to get rid of him, but after a while he returned, though not reviving him yet. Hence the shape of the memories. Although the novel, like everything in the cycle, is written on behalf of Watson.
The novel is distinguished by its dialogic nature. But everything that happens - the reader sees as if through Watson's eyes, and hears with his ears, he is the narrator.
Reliability is an imitation of reliability. Watson, playing the role of a kind of chronicler detective, pretends to be objective, and this meant to be reliable. But in fact, of course, this is the fruit of the author's imagination. Because Doyle didn't write stories, but he wrote a novel based on memories.
Very often they approach historical issues with a modern attitude. Restoration as a cultural phenomenon appeared in the first third of the twentieth century. Before that, the old buildings were junk. Which has been standing since I don't know when and symbolizes backwardness and degradation. Pyramids are a mountain of stones, old churches are unfashionable junk. The concept of "antiques" appeared along with history, religious consciousness used to prevail, and what began to be of museum value or antique was either still applicable in the household (great-grandmother's wedding dress, there is no demolition), or junk from the time of the "king of Peas."No one took care of the old buildings.
That is, museums, the historical genre in art, restoration, antique collections -all this is also historicism and appears together with modernity, in which the past becomes alienated and acquires some significance and value. But what was the impetus for the emergence of a fundamentally new worldview in the 19th century?
What was the impetus for the emergence of a new worldview in the 19th century?
The War of Independence of the United States (in which the Russian Empire, by the way, acted as allies to the rebellious colonies), the Great French Revolution, the revolutions of 1848 in Europe, and in the first half of the 19th century. in general, about a dozen revolutions: the revolution in France of 1830, the revolution in Belgium, uprisings, revolutions and national liberation wars in European provinces The Ottoman Empire and Latin America, global so-called Napoleonic wars, affecting the whole of Europe and Russia, which were conducted more than 10 years in the early 19th century. to unify Germany, Italy, the expansion of suffrage in England, the abolition of serfdom in Russia and slavery in the United States (although in the English colonies it was cancelled too early), discoveries in science: the theory of evolution, the discovery of the mechanisms of heredity Mendel, inventions in the art: photography, steam engine, Telegraph, telephone; most of these discoveries and inventions occurred in the second half of the century, but the industrial revolution began, the aristocracy and the church in Europe were rapidly losing their position and privileges. Against such a background, which increased in frequency and prevalence of revolutions, regional conflicts (ancient class empires were disintegrating), and reforms that changed the balance of power in states, mass armies appeared on the basis of universal conscription, education spread, the emancipation of women, the first photo (experiments) This is 1818, romanticism in literature in 1820, and changes in worldview are taking place.
The first international crisis that threatened to escalate into a world war was the Moroccan one in 1911. The novel was published 10 years before him, and three years later the First World War became a fact. Which again required a rethink of history. Some considered it to be the First World War, the result of a chain of tragic accidents, others considered it to be the natural tragic finale of even centuries-old development.
Doyle should not forget that besides being a writer and journalist, he was a doctor. Skonechnaya notices and confirms with quotes and facts that the time was alarming, marked by an interest in psychopathology, and this interest was precisely among writers. A little later than the publication of Doyle's novel, but a few years before the start of the war, Strindberg's novel "Hell" was published, then his "Legends". From the novel "Hell": "So many terrible, incomprehensible things happened that even the most unbelievers hesitated. Insomnia increases, nervous seizures become more frequent, visions are in the order of things, true miracles are happening. Everyone is waiting for something." Spengler began work on "The Decline of Europe" before the First World War.
From "Legends": "The strange time we live in: it turned the whole world upside down. Mysterious forces have reigned."
The spread of photography turned out to be associated with the so-called posthumous photographs, with discussions about imprinting ghosts, about the possibility of a new technique to record the existence of the supernatural. The time of the fashion for spiritualism. Doyle also participated in discussions about photographs and spiritualism.
It was at this time that the Frenchman Papus first appeared at the court in St. Petersburg, then Badmaev, and finally Rasputin.
Skonechnaya writes: "Fear, expectation of horror and readiness for it, a sense of total threat, suspicion (even before the First World War, the public throughout Europe was shocked by the Dreyfus affair in France- my comment) of a mystical, occult and political nature (then the infamous Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the surge of anti-Semitic pogroms appeared in the Russian Empire-my comment) they make up the flavor of the time. The experience of persecution characteristic of the era is perceived as something genuine, as a sign of deep observation and dedication." And further: "the pathological turns out to be extremely close to art, makes up its material, inspires its creators." By the way, what are the scientific artifacts that Sir Charles took out of South Africa, how exactly did the Baronet and Dr. Mortimer establish the distinction between Bushmen and Hottentots in the evenings? I suspect that in about the same way that his curiosity about Holmes' skull stemmed from, and the artifacts were only inferior in number to the one depicted in the famous painting by Vereshchagin, who was considered more an artist reporter than just an artist. And Russia's successes in the Balkans and Central Asia attracted attention in European capitals. And England sought to conquer Afghanistan, from the war in which Watson was wounded and arrived in London.
The "color of Time" refers specifically to the time of the novel's writing and its first publication, rather than to the time (1889) in which Doyle places the plot. And this also suggests that it can serve as a source of history in the novel. And secondly: E.Dobrenko, analyzing the Soviet political and aesthetic project, believes that: "the conspiracy and the conspiracy vision of the world gave these fantasies a plot and a special kind of entertainment and plausibility," as well as: "the total historicity of modernity." And as for the plausibility: "the latter is especially important, since agent thinking needs credibility, finding in a staged "reality" (I call it "imaginary" or even "imitated" - my comment) confirmation of its version of history, in which everything is shrouded in mystery and takes place "behind the scenes" of the visible. The task of the narrative is to "uncover the secret springs" of visible "events" that only camouflage the "true" events and therefore filled with "historical meaning."
I want to remind you of the entry in the diary of Nicholas II immediately after the abdication: "betrayal, cowardice and deception are all around" and that under arrest the family read "The Hound of the Baskervilles" among other literature.
And the fact that Stalin's worldview (as well as other leaders of the first half of the 20th century) was shaped by the events of the First World War, which preceded the revolutions of 1917-18 and the civil war in Russia, uprisings in Germany and Austria-Hungary, the war with Poland, Ukraine, Transcaucasia, Finland and the Baltic States (we are talking about the events after the revolutions of 1917. and Russia's withdrawal from the war, and then the end of the First World War, not to be confused with the events of the outbreak of the Second World War). So... The twenty-first years of the early 20th century played a major role for the entire 20th century in general. Stalin, whose worldview was significantly shaped by the First World War (despite the fact that he was 35 years old) ruled alone in the USSR until the early 1950s, that is, until the middle of the century. His political and aesthetic project was based on Soviet dogmatic Marxism, but Marxism is the ideology of the mid-19th century, flesh of the flesh of the "historical" century preceding it.
And in this regard, a quote from the modern American historian, epistemologist A. Megill: "when we specifically turn to the context of the "human sciences", we find that a striking feature of secularized, modernist academic culture was its adherence to metaphors of verticality -the surface reality was opposed to the deep, hidden reality. The use of such a metaphor, which is perhaps most evident in Freudianism and Marxism, was actually inherent in the entire social science of the 20th century. A common trope of modernist research is that things observed more or less directly are not "real" reality at all. According to this position, the task of research is to move to what is hidden - to the "basic" determinants, to the "fundamental" features of the situation." And further: "Metaphors of verticality tend to give privileges to an explanatory project" and (quoted by Parages): "any explanation admits the action of some underlying mechanism."
To put it another way: "agent thinking", "suspicion", "persecution mania", "conspiracy", "metaphors of verticality" - all this is not just a part of the Soviet political and aesthetic project, individually, or only "modernist academic culture", or "the color of time", it is apparently immanent It is inherent in historicism, as well as the "total historicization of modernity". And in this sense: Doyle's novel is only part of the general and flow of contemporary literature "fear, anxiety, a sense of horror", and not only fiction, and not only English (Nietzsche, or Spengler "The Decline of Europe" and "Change of Milestones" in Russia, and "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", etc., and the novel "The Little Devil" is the most popular work of the early 20th century. in Russia: more than a dozen editions), he himself is morphologically an example of a modernist understanding of history, and therefore, together with the ongoing modernism, he remained "modern" for decades for more and more new generations of readers, having already become a classic, and with the advent of cinema he became Doyle's most adaptable work and one of the most adaptable works of literature, and in this meaning -"the color of time", and the morphology of historicism-they are the source of an era in which conspiracy, persecution is one of the most common elements of history, politics, public behavior, and artistic culture.
What the historian had to find as hidden was shaped in ideologies, in the USSR it was Marxism, and through ideology they were already calling for everyone to look at all phenomena in different aspects of public life. In the West, after the Second World War, the same thing dictated the beginning of a "linguistic turn" in the humanities -the social and the method of cognition itself were declared deterministic by language. Skonechnaya also notes that "the same twigs" (creepy, because it is not clear what they mean) of Strindberg's "Hell": "we meet in the philosophical landscape of Deleuze and Guattari."
The mechanism of historicization (the history of the "historical" century itself, the modern era): restrospection, alienation (objectification and typology), I as Another (biography is the same story in Gorky's autobiographical trilogy: not Gorky, but Alexey Peshkov), factuality and causality, detraditionalization (secularization), narrativization (the mechanism of imprinting) melodramatism (typification) and agent-like thinking (metaphors of verticality related to causality) add to the entertainment.
In opposition: myth, epic, folklore legend, historical chronicle.
Myth (or mythological thinking) is comprehended, and turns not into something objective, but being subjective (and only subjective, author's, unlike folklore, tradition, and hence the feeling of contradiction with the installation of historical truth and the desire to search for objectivity, borrowing from the exact sciences of methods and the worldview itself-the identification of the method of Newton's mechanics with the scientific in general and the search for laws in history, which in Marxism even leads to the opposition of ideology and facts), only meaningful in a complex of ideas- into an ideology in which, precisely at the expense of a melodrama, a romantic hero, a conspiracy, which is common with a literary (artistic means of cognition), mythologization is obtained (it is characteristic that the Stapleton case does not receive any resolution in court, and the evidence remains insufficient, and the past-the final chapter-remains fundamentally unknowable, but all this is also visible from understanding the mechanism of cognition, from modern postmodernism, and then it carried a charge of positivism).
In historicism, after romanticism (literary processing of fairy tales), the scientifically oriented way of cognition and the artistic (in which mechanisms are nevertheless visible, and genres develop from them) are separated (but they have a common origin in historicism or modern culture, which mistakenly gives the impression that history is written according to patterns, for example, socialist realism, the fact that literature can serve as a source of an epoch, since its features are reflected in it, is unlikely, any work of literature is therefore a work of literature, which is completely the fruit of the author's thought, and just as no subjective view, say, of the fashion phenomenon can be considered a reflection of the entire fashion of the era, so the imaginary past in literature is not the source of the really former, any novel, and this is most simply noticeable in historical novels-the fruit of the author's imagination, in it the epoch was only reflected refracted through the worldview of a very specific author, who did not he tried to suppress subjectivity, unlike even the historian). History defends its view of the past, arguing and asserting authenticity (while using creative imagination-historical, fantasy, which allows you to build concepts-instead of plot and plots). From the artistic method of defending the freedom of creative imagination, subjectivism, genres developed (first literature, then cinema as a synthesis of arts through opera - "historical plots" are not accidental, but in the 20th century. it takes place on the material of world wars and revolutions, the historicization of modernity, the historical differs from the modern only in costume and interiors-what was called the modernization of the past in history, historical politics also emerged from this -both as a phenomenon and as a sphere of knowledge studying it, and it is clear that when the interlocutor expresses his position in relation to one or the other If there is another relevant topic from the past, then he primarily talks about his own modern political and ideological views, historicism has always turned to history from the present and in the very choice of themes and figures was determined by the present, this is not a feature of the Soviet ideological project, but historicism, and in the Soviet project it only pointed to its conservative for social and scientific ideas of the 20th century. connection –through the dogmatization of Marxism-with historicism of the 19th century.): melodramas, horrors (which combined romanticism and medieval folklore based on myth, religion, superstition - it seemed to have received a new cultural space for the continuation of existence), detective and spy novels (in which the method of cognition most clearly turns into the plot itself).
And only the criticism of reason inherent in modernity, immanently a priori, after the catastrophes of the 20th century. and the regression of irrationality, which led to a concentration on the method of scientific knowledge, made postmodernism possible, when the history of modernity was, as it were, caught up in claims to universality, to science, the connection of ideology with myth, narrative with literature, the fundamental unknowability of the past, the opposite of conceptual history and memories, memory, the same finding of the space of a historical museum was seen in the present, like a bank, a store, an apartment building in the same historical building, the museum has a greater relationship to symbolism, modern art (performance), than to the space of history.
If we compare the legend and the plot of the novel in the interpretation of the Freudian genesis of social relations according to Freud, then we can probably see that the purpose of the plot is to restore the social norm. But something completely different is happening. Please note: in the text of the manuscript there is not only no doubt about what was told, there is about the same difference that Doyle makes between Mortimer's message, and how Holmes understood it, and the real reason Mortimer turned to Holmes: Mortimer also does not doubt the supernatural, or at least is overwhelmed with skepticism in solving the problem, he is only looking for advice from Holmes, he even looks for confirmation of his opinion rather: that the Baskervilles are threatened by something, but only when they live in Baskerville Hall, or rather not even that, but the literal call of the legend: when they break the ban-and go out into the swamps, especially at nightfall, and this is something-the forces of evil, threaten the Baskervilles only there-on Dartmoor. Mortimer actually wants confirmation of his opinion, so that Holmes agrees that it is better for the young baronet not to go to Baskerville Hall at all. However, there is something else that shakes Mortimer, it is the dependence of the neighborhood on whether Baskerville Hall is inhabited or not, and in this there is his-Mortimer's personal interest, as well as gratitude to the old baronet for the inheritance and friendship, he believes that his personal interest should give way to the duty and safety of the young baronet. That's what the problem consists of, unlike the mystery presented in the novel. The legend and Mortimer, following the legend in which he was forced to believe by the circumstances of the old baronet's death, demands compliance with the ban in view of some violated social norm that cannot be restored, it only now requires compliance with the ban (now it is clear that this is an allusion to the Christian idea of original sin). Holmes first accepts Mortimer's rules and asks a provocative question, which Mortimer considers blasphemous and frivolous: the question of the limits of these forces, the same as the power of the parish priest. That is, Holmes profanes, of course, Mortimer's problem (and he does not know whether there was a crime at all and whether Mortimer is normal with his advice and manuscripts, however, he immediately takes on faith the mention of dog tracks-he does not show any reasons not to trust Mortimer completely), Holmes profanes, but uses concepts from religious discourse and, only the fact that he has established the surveillance of Sir Henry and Mortimer convinces him that something is wrong here, and this something certainly has nothing to do with the supernatural. And only the publication of this in front of Mortimer inclines him to think that his opinion was wrong in one part: that the Baskervilles were threatened by something on Dartmoor, but unmistakable in another - the most significant-that something was really threatening them. And then - the whole plot, the investigation. But... no violated social norm is restored, the ban is not just not respected, it is ignored, moreover, the problem is solved only through an equally provocative violation of the ban -Sir Henry, surprisingly, is literally inclined to return at night through the swamp. That is, what is indicated at the beginning of the novel as the past, obliging it to remember and know, to observe (as a tradition), and which, by the way, is an allusion to the central idea in Christianity, receives a completely different resolution according to the plot of the novel, but a resolution in which the reader believes more than in the manuscript, but here the absence of this restored social norm or a clear violation of the ban still leaves some feeling of disappointment, guilt. And this very feeling-after all, the ban was dictated by guilt, paradoxically, too, still means the restoration of a social norm, but different and in a different way. That is, it should be assumed that instead of the idea of the fall, there should also be some kind of inclusive global project behind it, maybe not so widespread at that time. It's like a set of concepts - through discourse, I find in the text of the novel and this is a project of modernity (perhaps in this way its connection with Christianity and the Middle Ages is revealed, with the reproduction of tradition-by the way, always imitative-mimetic-and also conditioned by the text-the Bible, and these mimetic imitations can be found in the hierarchy of society and the distribution of social responsibilities, and in the texts of chronicles, chronicles, which, as the source scholar Danilevsky constantly tells, are looking for analogies and tend to describe battles, biographies of kings, saints as descriptions of Old Testament battles taken from the Bible, as biographies of significant figures and therefore described in the Bible).
Secularization –maybe that's why Doyle's personal attention is so great (besides the fact that it is fashionable, but fashion can be just due to the real process of secularization and the same thing happened with quasi-religion during the collapse of the USSR -a surge of interest in parapsychology, astrology) to spiritualism. Thus, it can be assumed (through the application of ideas from the imaginary Lacan, imitated by Girard, that the novel is related to a personal problem that occupied the author-even a neurotic (as well as the origin of creativity) break with the Catholic tradition of the family, especially fanatical, how fanatically the British who lived in Ireland adhered to the faith, and with the social situation of that time similar to how ideology was discredited in the USSR during the collapse, and this is also one of the reasons for the popularity of the novel at that time - the general phenomena of secularization (part of modernity).
But let's return to the characters of the novel, to their biographies - parts of history, to see again how much the text reflects historical reality. The sinister figure of Stapleton is highlighted in the novel by the image of his beautiful wife, she is clearly in Stevenson's words about the wife of another charismatic literary villain, the pirate Lanky John Silver, "clearly not of a white race," and Treasure Island, by the way, is located there - in the Spanish Sea, in the West Indies, from where Stapleton and his wife came and brought. The first readers probably did not need to explain what it means to mention the West Indies in the novel.
One question is: what do English laws say about the transfer of title to a Canadian farmer, Sir Henry, another question is: where did the same farmer get the money to inherit a million pounds worth of capital? Inheritance tax has not been abolished anywhere, it seems. So even without the ghost, the ghostly dog, Henry really inherited something else, that is, he would not have gotten it yet. By the way, why do only Sir Henry and Sir Charles, that is, the baronets, have the address sir in the novel?
" What is the difference between "sir" and "mister". How to contact whom? Let's figure it out
I recently watched Nolan's excellent film "The Argument". There I noticed a dialogue when the main character came to a meeting with an Englishman in a fashionable restaurant and communicates with the head waiter
– Can I help you, sir?
"I'm having lunch with Mr. Crosby."
"I suppose you mean Sir Michael Crosby?"
The head waiter pronounced the word "sir" with emphasis, making it clear that his interlocutor had made a mistake, while adding the name of Mr. Crosby – Michael. What made the Englishman so upset?
Let's start with "mister". The modern word "mister" has come a long way to its modern look. It appeared in the process of reducing the word "master" used in an unstressed position before a person's name. It happened around the middle of the XVI century AD. The word "master" comes from the Old French maistre, which came from the Old English (that's the irony – the word defector) m;gester. As you can guess, m;gester comes from the Latin magister.
Why did the word make such a tricky path from Latin to English, then to French, and then back to English?
The film about Holmes' old age is called "Mr. Holmes", not "Sir Holmes". After reading this post, you will be able to explain why.
From my English history course, I remember that the Latin period lasted in England until the Saxon conquest in the 5th century AD. Accordingly, Latin was replaced by the language of the new conquerors. In 1066, England was conquered by William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, who was from (as one might guess) Normandy and spoke French at that time. Accordingly, the language of the court (i.e., the written language, commoners could not write) changed to French. It was only by the 15th century that the British came to power again and have been in possession of Albion ever since.
As for the Latin word "magister", it comes from the adjective "magis" – "greater", from "magnus" – "big". If we dig very deep into history, then we will get to the proto-Indo-European root "meg-" – "big". It is still present in the "mega-" and "mega-" consoles.
As for the use of the word "mister" in modern English, it has already lost its original meaning of "master" when it was used to name a teacher or just a master (a person who understands something deeper than others or knows how to do something better than others).
Now it is equivalent to the Russian polite address "mister", and children also address adult unfamiliar men – "Hey, mister" or teachers at school. Accordingly, women are addressed in this case as "miss" (if not married) or as "mrs.", which is an abbreviation of the word mistress (mister in the feminine gender), which appeared when English nouns widely used the grammatical category of gender.
Sir – comes from the English word "sire", later shortened to "sir". Remarkably, there are still two words in English "sire" and "sir", which translate into Russian, respectively, "sir" and "sir". The first is used in relation to the monarch, and the second to other titled persons.
As in the case of the word "mister", we have a long way to go, including the Old French stage "sieur" and come back to Latin, where the word sounded like "senior" and translated as "senior".
Historically, this word was a titular address and was applied to members of knightly orders with the rank of knight, or to people with personal knighthood (that is, knighted by the monarch, but who did not join any of the orders).
What is noteworthy is that the woman in the knighthood was called dame (lady), and the knight's wife was a lady. When using the title address, it is allowed to pronounce only the first name – Sir Michael, or the first and last name, as in the example from the film at the beginning – Sir Michael Crosby. Thus, we understand that in the film the head waiter insisted that Michael Crosby was not some kind of horseradish from the hill, but a titled person.
Addressing by the surname with the addition of "sir" is wrong. You can't say "Sir Crosby." You can say it more precisely, but it will be a bad idea.
As for the modern language, the address "sir" is usually applied in the police and the army to senior officers, as well as at work for subordination and in educational
institutions. Also, such an address can be used in business correspondence when the name of the interlocutor is not known – "Dear Sir!"
For women, they use the same "ma'am" (ma'am), which is an abbreviation of "madam", which, as you can already guess, comes from the fusion of the words "my" and "lady" (dame). //Yandex Zen
Sir Charles, as I have already noticed, is also not as simple as he seems. Although, of course, maybe I'm speculating here. But... In the novel, only two characters become real victims: Seldon and Sir Charles. Is it by chance?..
This is how Seldon (translated by Brilova) is characterized: "...There is little chance that you will receive a reward, but that your throat will be cut is very much.... This is not some ordinary criminal. He will stop at nothing. "And who is he?" "Selden, sir, the Nottinghill murderer.... The crime was one of the most brutal and the cruelty of the murderer had no explanation.... the court questioned Selden's sanity."
Isn't it strange that in such a company of victims there turned out to be an old baronet, who is described allegedly in a local newspaper article about rumors about the circumstances of his death, as follows: "thanks to his benevolence and rare generosity, he won the sympathy of all who were familiar with him...In our time of the nouveau riche, one could only rejoice at how the scion of an ancient family that knew the best of times managed to make a fortune in foreign lands in order to revive the former glory of the family at home..."Isn't there a contradiction here? The censure of the nouveau riche and, in fact, an indication that Sir Charles himself ("acquired considerable wealth from speculation in South African securities") was one of them and "lived in Baskerville Hall for a relatively short time." While Sir Henry got off with only fright, and his characterization is just the following: "all the reviews that have come down to us said one thing: the young man is impeccable in all respects."
And here is what Dr. Jekyll from Stevenson's novel writes in his autobiography: "in the old days, people used the services of hired killers to create their crimes with their hands, without endangering themselves or their good reputation. I was the first person who resorted to this method in search of pleasure. I was the first person whom society saw clothed in the robes of venerable virtue and who could throw off this temporary outfit in the blink of an eye."
And was Sir Charles quite normal?
Here is how the Russian writer of the same time Leonid Andreev describes his character, the crazy Petrov, in the story "Ghosts": "it is very possible that he (the doctor) is also bribed by his mother and is waiting for a favorable moment when he can deal with him. Last Sunday, Petrov himself saw that his mother, an old woman, was standing around the corner, staring intently at his window, and when he screamed, she hurriedly disappeared, and Dr. Shevyrev assured that no one was there. Whereas he himself, with his own eyes, saw her, right around the corner - in a lamb cap, pushed to one side, and with staring terrible eyes.
He was talking, and there was hopeless horror in his strangled voice, in his wild, disheveled beard.... Petrov felt the worst of all. From the constant gloom creeping in through the windows, it seemed to him that the end was already coming, and every minute he expected something terrible. The premonition of impending disaster was so palpable that for hours he sat motionless... all his horror was concentrated in his mother... she walked through the woods in her lambskin cap, pushed to one side, she hid under the table, under the beds, in all the dark corners. And at night she stood at his door and quietly pulled the handle.
On Sunday morning, his mother came and cried for an hour in Dr. Shevyrev's mezzanine. Petrov did not see her, but at midnight, when everyone had been asleep for a long time, he had a seizure."
Let's compare it with the description of Sir Charles, given by the way by the doctor (!) Mortimer: "he had a reserved disposition, but his illness brought us closer... In recent months, I have become increasingly convinced that Sir Charles's nervous system is in critical condition. He took the legend I read to you to heart; he was so imbued with it that, although he regularly walked in the park, he would not have gone out on the wasteland at night for anything in the world... He was sincerely convinced that an evil fate was weighing on the Baskervilles, and, I must say, the information about his ancestors did not reassure him at all. Everywhere he seemed to see some kind of menacing shadow, and more than once he asked me if I had seen an incomprehensible creature when I visited the sick at night and if I had heard barking. He asked about barking especially often, and his voice trembled at the same time.
I remember clearly how, about three weeks before the tragedy, I drove up to Baskerville Hall in the evening. Sir Charles was just standing in the doorway. I got off the gig, approached him and found that he was not looking at me, but into the distance and his face expressed boundless horror. Turning quickly, I caught a glimpse of a large animal, like a black calf, flashing past the far end of the driveway. Sir Charles was seriously worried, and I had to go back there and see what it was. The calf, however, had already disappeared from sight, and this incident threw my patient off balance. I stayed with him all evening, and it was then, to explain my excitement, that he introduced me to the story I had read to you and instructed me to keep the manuscript."
At that time, the doctor was inclined to consider it a consequence of nerves, and probably his lifestyle. The heir found a connection with the atmosphere of the estate: "it is not surprising that in such a place uncle was haunted by forebodings. Anyone would be scared here."
But wasn't there something here that Pushkin called "and the boys are bloody in the eyes"? In the same Soviet film adaptation, but based on Stevenson's novel, the director conjectured and added a scene where Dr. Jekyll is a military doctor, in the colonial troops he is indifferently forced only to pass by tortured natives, in particular a local woman, his friend even gives a comment on this in a racist sense. There is no such episode in Stevenson's novel, in Doyle's novel the past of the oldest baronet is not revealed in any way. But it also did not need to be disclosed to the first readers, as well as the mention of the West Indies, which at that time was certainly not associated with the Cuban revolution of the 20th century. It turns out that the novel reflects historical reality, but again not in the literal sense in which it appears on the surface.
But here's what's interesting: you can read about it in M.In the chapter on the "interference of bourgeois and noble personal patterns in the 19th century" (the baronet was also a nouveau riche, in addition to the title and estate, capital was actually the motive for the crime), the moral researcher quotes from the arguments of Enlightenment philosophers: Helvetius, Mandeville and Volney: "the idea of man in Helvetius's essay On the Mind downright romantic. Helvetius preaches the cult of great passions and fights mediocrity with all his might. He prefers a man of great delusions and great passions to exemplary mediocrity. More freely, on the contrary, advising to take care of their own interests, he considers the best way to serve them to curb passions (and even in Sir Henry, for all his "perfection", they found the "hot temper" of the Baskervilles- my comment) and cold rational calculation. For Helvetius, the pursuit of fame is the noblest of the motives of human activity. He regrets that in countries where trade flourishes, the pursuit of fame is being replaced by the pursuit of wealth. Otherwise, he looks at it more freely, calling for enjoying "blissful prosperity" in peace and security. Volney sharply condemned those who preferred momentary pleasure to future benefits. Helvetius, on the contrary, composes a real philippic against prudence, and his arguments reveal an acquaintance with Mandeville. A prudent person is, by definition, Helvetius, a person who knows how to imagine future evil so vividly that he refuses pleasure in the present, so as not to incur trouble in the future."
Of course, the history of colonial wars and colonial administration, as depicted in P. Brandon's great work, counts examples of moral decline and criminal revelry, on which capital was made, by the thousands. In general, the idea that "crime is at the heart of any wealth" (Honore de Balzac) has always been (and before Balzac) widespread. Has it always been true? Another question. It is equally important that even from such a method of acquisition, the way out was not necessarily in the multiplication of evil. He could have been the other way around, in generous charity. As exactly the opposite, it was not a crime at all, but the very nature of a rich but generous man, contributed to his generosity and charity. The practice, for example, of gifting churches with inherited wealth, or during life it is so wide that it does not even require clarification. But the sacrifices of the church at that time were not only for the restoration or construction of a temple, but also for just that wide-ranging and charitable activity of the church: before the revolution in Russia there was still no social support from the state, but almshouses, night shelters, free canteens existed at churches and monasteries. The state imposed on the church the duty of primary public education.
In Soviet times, an example of the criminal connection between wealth and crime in the personality of the Belgian King Leopold II was popular (for me, again, the point is important here that we are talking about colonial policy in the 19th century). Leopold II was an ardent supporter of the ideas of colonialism and founded the formally independent Free State of the Congo in Africa, becoming in the period from 1876 to 1908 by his personal owner. To increase the productivity of ivory and, above all, rubber, the indigenous population was subjected to severe torture and exploitation. The atrocities in the Congo Free State during the reign of Leopold II had, according to historians, "apocalyptic proportions." Leopold's activities were condemned in Europe; the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph I (for whose son Rudolf Leopold married his daughter Stephanie) called the Belgian king a "crowned broker", Lenin characterized him in approximately the same terms ("businessman, financier, conman"). Mark Twain and Arthur Conan Doyle performed satire on the king. But in the USSR, they preferred to keep silent about such a broad condemnation, Lenin's phrase was mostly replicated. And the example itself was presented as a textbook.
In general, this is an example of what A. Megill calls the "prejudice of universality" and "hermeneutical naivety": "historians often confuse "general laws" with other types of generalizations, they sometimes longed for the full force of the idea that the field of research is scientific only if it reveals general laws. By "generalization" historians usually mean a broad statement, which nevertheless is still tied to a special historical context. In the language of historians, the following hypothetical statement is considered as a generalization (we do not touch on the question of whether the statement is correct here): "As a result of the growth of cities and the development of trade, feudalism gave way in Europe in the late Middle Ages and early Modern times to the nascent capitalism." The "problem of generalization," as historians understand it, is usually the problem of how to get from fragmentary and confusing data to such broad statements.... in philosophy and social sciences, it is widely believed that knowledge of the general or universal (as opposed to the singular or separate) is really scientific; all other knowledge there is knowledge of a lower order. The prejudice of universality comes from the specifics of ancient Greek thinking, from the philosophy of Plato and from the philosophy of Aristotle (M.B.Yampolsky holds the same opinion regarding the history of culture as a historical discipline-my comment)... in our time, the desire for universalization is still alive, although in modern thinking it originates not from Aristotle, but from ideas Hume and Kant.... An epistemologically attentive reader demands that such (explanatory, generalizing) statements can be supported by evidence and arguments... A historian should be able to argue, not just make statements...any causal statement involves counterfactual reasoning... Perhaps we would agree that the statement that the cession of the road by feudalism to capitalism "occurred as a result" of the growth of cities and trade is actually explanatory, if we were convinced of this by considering the arguments "for" and "against"... By hermeneutical naivety, I mean the mistake of organizing a historical message as if it were a "view from nowhere" instead of-as it really is-a view from some private interpretive perspective. Modernist academic culture-especially when it proclaimed the prestige of science -tended to suppress the interpretive dimension. Both Marx and Freud were notorious for their penchant for such repression, but their position is far from unique."
In Marxist criticism, as O.N. Turysheva describes (and as it can be seen from the subject of study of M.Ossovsky): "the ideology of the class forms the consciousness of a person, imposing on him the map of the world in which the class is interested. A person is considered as a carrier of false consciousness, limited by his social affiliation. The bearer of false consciousness, determined by the class, is also the author (of a literary work in this particular case, my comment)." "On the basis of this understanding of creativity, the methodology of Marxist criticism also develops (in Soviet times it was almost the only possible one - my comment). It is formed by the decoding of the class content unconsciously reflected in the work... Thus, if in theoretical terms Martian criticism is sociological (it deduces the meaning of the work from the factor of the author's social affiliation), then in methodological terms it is a variant of hermeneutics (since it aims to decipher the implicit meaning expressed in the work outside the will of the author)."
Therefore, if I were to analyze the characters (as typical, that is, related to the "historical reality" in the work) in Marxist criticism (or in Soviet times-being influenced by "totalitarian ideology and the state", which in itself is also one of the concepts of explanatory theory), then I would consider the added episode to Stevenson's novel in the Soviet film adaptation, it is also logically correct in a generalized sense: all colonialists behave exactly like this, any wealth is associated with crime. Although, if there had been a possibility of counterfactual arguments at that time, many of them would also have been discovered (but some of them, as well as the prevalence of condemnation of Leopold II in his actions in the Belgian Congo, were hidden): Sir George Beaumont bequeathed his collection of paintings to the English state, if a gallery is opened-it was the beginning of the famous collection of the National Gallery in London, as well as a number of other donations, as in Russia the most famous art gallery is called Tretyakov Gallery by the name of the patron, its founder, the appearance of a psychiatric service in the city is also connected with the surname of the Moscow merchants Alekseevs-the Moscow city psychiatric hospital bears the name of one of the representatives of the genus, the mayor N.A.Alekseev, another representative of the same surname is much better known under a pseudonym -the founder of an entire school of art, a theater reformer and the founder of the Moscow Art Theater- K.S. Stanislavsky (Alekseev), of all the Tomsk rich men, E.N.Kukhterin is called the most famous (founder of the family and firm "E.N.Kukhterin and Sons"), the largest match factory in Siberia, founded by them, worked throughout the Soviet 20th century (of course, nationalized), but the entire 20th century remained a "mystery for with seven seals" that Innokenty Yevgrafovich Kukhterin was so respected by the workers that when the factory was nationalized, the workers elected the former owner as its first director. And here is how another Tomsk merchant, the enlightener of Siberia, Pyotr Ivanovich Makushin, explained his credo (the first bookstores, libraries, folk schools, a newspaper and a people's university are connected with his activities in Tomsk, and sometimes in Siberia): "who spent his childhood in a squalid environment, the years of youth in a "barrack" bursa, who began my public service in the semi-wild Altai, having experienced hardships there even in clothes and shoes, all my subsequent life I did not allow myself either luxurious surroundings or the usual entertainment for rich people: going out, cards, in the evening, formal dinners, traveling, etc., although he had sufficient funds for that. At the risk of being suspected of the abnormality of my brains, I decide to say that I did it not out of avarice, which explained my behavior even to my close relatives, but out of a deep consciousness that these funds are not mine, but the public domain. I considered myself only the treasurer of the people's money under the strict control of my conscience." In the history of the merchant city, there was even an entire surname - the Yerenevs, who went bankrupt due to "excessive" charity.
So it's not so simple with the thesis that any wealth is associated with crime. Although, the connection may also be different. The novel just illustrates how the old baronet's capital became the motive for Stapleton's crimes. And maybe it was the generous charity, rehabilitating Sir Charles, that contributed to this. After all, as Mortimer explained, the exact amount of capital was not known even to the oldest baronet. All that has been said does not contradict the fact that in the 19th century. and just in this "psychology of treasurers" is an illustration of the intertwining of bourgeois and noble (with the idea of service) morality (and the baronet was also both a nobleman and a nouveau riche). Just as this does not negate another thing: if we consider that "Holmsiana" was associated not only with the works of Poe, but also with Collins, then the plot of "The Woman in White" also has a motive of madness and a madhouse. And in the 19th century, many works on the topic of mental illness and psychology were published, and the medical service for mentally ill people (from the world of classical literature of the 19th century) was developing both in Russia and in Europe (the famous Bedlam). psychiatry also draws on phenomena-for example, the "Adele syndrome" called by the name of the daughter, and not the heroine of the novel, Hugo), one can say that the development of psychiatry is crowned by the figure of Freud (which occupies as significant a place in influencing the humanities as Marx, in the 20th century. even Freud Marxism will arise). Perhaps such frequent mention, attention to mentally unstable people, to people with shattered nerves, to the abnormal (which Selden is called right in the story) is due to the fact that this is also a "historical reality". But maybe, after all, with a larger circle of authors and books considered, all this will sink among a narrow group of writers, among whom there are quite a few doctors, is it by chance that those interested in this subject are connected with their perception, and of course, one should not necessarily look for a causal explanation for this by the methodology of Marxist criticism, but the fact that that in Doyle's perception it was obvious exactly this attitude towards the nouveau riche, to the nobility, as if he had personally written that article in the Devonshire newspaper (although he did exactly that-this is his "imaginary reality", if we find the specified number, that's in contrast to Holmes' experiment with the Times editorial... we will not find this article there, it is available only in the novel -it is self-evident) and an explanation for this should be sought in the biography of the writer. As well as a possible prototype of the character of the old baronet: for example, Carr tells about the circumstances of the appearance of Arthur Doyle's second surname: Conan -young Arthur Doyle was declared the heir of a childless elderly relative with the condition of attaching the surname and thus the characterization of this character is more useful from the point of view of analysis in general to the so-called first literary school - "biographical" (founded by Sainte-Beuve in the first half of the 19th century. based on the statement directly opposite to Aristotelian "Poetics", that a work is an "objectified otherness of the author's self", in which the author's personality "affects the whole". It is important to me that the idea of analyzing author's psychology, which is already following in the development of these ideas, compares the individuality of one author with other authors, with other individuals, where it is easy to conclude that there are different interpretations that reflect "historical reality", and somewhere even a connection with social origin is possible. I'm even curious why Sir Charles? In England, this name is associated, among other things, with the executed king, so there is a breed of spaniel dogs, the varieties of which differ by the names themselves, appealing to the time of the revolution: cavalier-King Charles and King Charles (cavaliers were called supporters of the king), in the novel, the dog even in the name, the revolution (the Great Uprising) is mentioned both the spaniel (Mortimer's dog) and the old baronet bear the name of the king executed during the revolution (although this may be an allusion, or it may be a subjective, not too reasoned interpretation, and nothing like this existed in the author's plan, neither in the text, although it is possible in the interpretation of Freud or Jung as an individual unconscious or part of an intertextually expressed collective unconscious).
But, let's continue, about the characters, I also noticed earlier that in the film adaptations of the characters of the novel, more mature actors play.
"Cinema is an art form where visual transmission of information prevails. Simply put, as I see it, I understand it. Even if they try to convey something else to you with words, you believe your eyes first of all. Therefore, the approval of age-old actors for the roles of young people often completely breaks the script. To the point that viewers completely incorrectly read even the plots of films, not to mention the moral messages embedded there.
For example, the long-suffering Ostrovsky. When we discussed the "Cruel Romance", in the comments, many were extremely amazed that the author Karandyshev was a young man! He is very young, because in the remarks to the play, Paratov, who is "just over 30", is not named young. Therefore, Karandyshev is about 22-23 years old. And he is played by a 46-year-old actor. Plus, everyone watched "Office Romance", and remembered that there his hero is a little older than the heroine Freundlich (who plays mother in J.R.). Everyone sees a man in his forties on the screen, and they perceive his hero that way. But, you must agree: it's one thing when an inexperienced young man commits stupidity. And it's quite another thing when an elderly uncle, who has not managed to achieve anything in twenty years of service, tries to fix things by marrying a young beauty. Instead of the mistakes of youth, it is an attempt to jump into the last carriage. All the meanings are gone.
Balzaminov's "Marriage" was even less fortunate. Soviet criticism exalted him to the skies! Although the performer of the main role himself considered his work a failure and called it "the marriage of the embalmed." I watched this movie in my childhood, then in my youth. And I couldn't understand what was interesting about the story of an elderly fool? An old man, clearly a clinical idiot, for some reason calls a woman younger than himself a mother. He makes faces, rides like a goat, talks nonsense. Why did he want to woo a young girl? And why is this headache for the beautiful merchant Belotelova? There was no tolerance for the alternatively gifted in me, and there is no beauty in him either… It was only much later that I found out that Mishenka Balzaminov was... 20 years old! Georgy Vitsin was 47 years old at that moment! Forty-seven! Mishenka is good enough for his younger sons!
Would you say that this role is grotesque, any exaggerations are acceptable here? Compare Balzaminov with the hero of another grotesque film "For Two Hares"! Also, a young man who does not shine with intelligence chases brides, dreams of boHatstvo and kicks his legs. But he's YOUNG! That's why it looks funny, not... strange.
The movie "Girls", beloved by many, also gave me a surprise at the time. What I see: a broken-down woman of 23-25 years old and a matured man with an obviously difficult biography, who spent a lot of time in the sawmills for the benefit of the national economy. She clearly knows how to turn men off, but she hardly believed him, and he got entangled in the usual lies and clumsily got out for a long time. And now, many years later, it turns out that this is practically a story about first love! Girls of 17 years old and a 23-year-old guy! Bang! Bang! For all N. Rumyantseva's diminutiveness, for all her pigtails, her look is certainly not girlish. And even an old woman will not be able to suspect a young man in Ilya-Rybnikov.
Another pearl of Soviet cinema, "War and Peace". How Pierre-Bondarchuk was praised! For the depth of the image, for penetrating into Tolstoy's ideas, for acting skills… But Tolstoy's Pierre was 20 years old at the beginning of the novel (1805) and, accordingly, 27 years old during the war of 1812. In the film, it's not even so much the discrepancy in appearance that hurts the eye, it can be forgiven. It turns out that it is the depth of the image that is superfluous. Bondarchuk invests in it his own, already established, conceptualizations of a mature person. Pierre in the novel is just doing all the rake dancing possible for a growing man. He has not yet matured to what Bondarchuk knows! To whom it is impossible to "disentangle" his experience.
Even the most brilliant actor cannot reliably play a character fifteen or twenty years younger than himself. Even with plastic makeup, even with computer rendering. Why – I wrote in detail here. The memories of youth fade, other experiences accumulate, meanings change, temperament goes away. The young should be played by the young."//Yandex. Zen
Note that in this generational difference, the difference between the "imaginary reality" of the author of the filmed work and the "imaginary reality" of the directors of the film adaptations. Speaking of a literary work as a historical source, we should also talk about a film adaptation as a kind of translation from the language of literature into the language of another art form, and if we are talking about a work of another culture, then we should also talk about this. Thus, we are not talking about one text, but about several, the differences between which are obvious even when trying to follow the original. And there is subjectivity in everything: the subjectivity of the author, the subjectivity of the translator, and the translations differ, which is also obvious, the subjectivity of the director, as well as the subjectivity of the interpreter. It is actually easier to get to historical reality through this, if we talk not about the literal reading of traces of historical reality, but about the mechanism itself, also peculiar, which was used by the author of the original text, which so successfully turned out to be adapted for cinema, although the novel, like other classic works, was written before its invention, but both the novel and the cinema are the offspring of the new century, modernity. In this way, I find traces of history in the novel not where usual, not in the literal reproduction of everyday life, interior, costume, but in language, not in language as such, but in the very form and plot of the work, that is, in the story I opposed earlier... the author's "imaginary reality". Let us turn to the philosophical concept of Girard, whose first work was "The Lie of Romanticism and the Truth of the Novel."
The philosophical concept of Rene Girard
The central theme of Rene Girard's works is "the process of institutionalization of ritual sacrifice, which, according to the author, serves to ensure the stability of the social system and represents one of the foundations of culture and the etiology of the origin of religion."
"The beginning of the creation of the mimetic concept of the origin of religion was laid in his first book, The Lies of Romanticism and the Truth of the Novel (Mensonge romantique et v;rit; romanesque, 1961), in which, through a comparative analysis of the works of Cervantes, Flaubert, Stendhal, Proust and Dostoevsky, Girard reveals the basic anthropological position stating that a person in desires is mimetically equal in response to the desires of another, in particular, in the novels of these writers, we can see that the more the orientation towards a transcendent goal recedes into the background, the more attractive the desire of a neighbor becomes. Thus, our desires are copies of the desires of "exemplary" carriers or "mediators", whose objects of desire become our objects of desire. But the bearer of desire becomes our rival if we desire exactly the same thing as he himself. Phenomena such as jealousy or envy originate from this mimetic situation."
"In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Rene Girard's research interests shifted from the field of literary studies towards socio-historical anthropology and history. Rene Girard became the author of an original anthropological concept in which he developed his concept of "mimetic desire", applying it to religion and social life. His anthropological concept is reflected in the books "Violence and the Sacred" (La violence et le sacr;, 1972), "The Scapegoat" (Le Bouc ;missaire, 1982) and "I see Satan falling like Lightning" (Je vois Satan tomber comme l';clair, 1999). Girard says that if we turn to the primitive forms of religion, we can notice in them the same rite of sacrifice. This ritual represents the sacralization of collective aggression towards an individual. A person or animal is declared a "scapegoat." Rene Girard also explores Greek tragedy, in which he finds a weakened version of sacrifice. Rene Girard develops the Freudian concept of the genesis of social relations from the repetition and reproduction of the primary act of aggression of the mass against the individual father and the further experience of a sense of collective guilt and responsibility as a mechanism for reproducing social norms." The work is the fruit of the author's creation, an "imaginary reality", but the author is a very real historical person, his worldview is reflected primarily in his work consciously and unconsciously, worldview, artistic tastes, and history, not as it was, but as the author imagines it to be... the reader. Yes, a work based on one of the modern foreign philological concepts is not just a fruit of the author's idea, it is born in union with the reader and, it is clear that the modern reader, differing from the first readers of the novel himself, reads the novel in a different way, especially belonging to another culture, reading it in translations, not being familiar and with those real geographical landmarks. Here, again, we can make a digression to illustrate how the Russian reader cannot understand the specifics of the English marshes on the hills, "moorlands".
"A whole cavalcade of horsemen chased a girl running away along a swamp path. "they all jumped on horses, thirteen in number, and joined the chase." – hmm, the road should be quite spacious, thirteen horses - they require a decent place. And how could they even arrange a chase through the night swamp? It is clear that Sir Hugo and his drinking companions were completely drunk, but their horses were sober and not suicidal enough to ride through the quagmire.
"After riding a mile or two, they met a shepherd with a flock and asked him if he had seen the chase." – A shepherd with a flock? In the night swamp? What should a herd do in a swamp, there's nothing for cattle to eat there! Moreover, where is there to spend the night with the flock?
The denouement of ancient events occurred "at the descent into a deep ravine." The witnesses "directed the horses into the depths of the ravine. And there they saw a wide lawn, and on it two large stone pillars." – Something doesn't fit in with the usual appearance of flat and wet marshes, don't you think? Gullies and other terrain irregularities usually occur in solid soil, and then there are these rocks…
Next, we turn to the events of the new time. At the cane on which Holmes demonstrates the wonders of deduction, "the thick iron tip has completely worn off – apparently, Dr. Mortimer walked with it for many miles." In swampy areas, the soil is usually soft, so why was the thick iron knocked down as if on stones?
And this is what Sir Henry's meeting with the ancestral homeland looks like.
..And I just can't wait for the peat bogs to finally appear. – That's how it is! In that case, your wish has been fulfilled – you can admire them," said Dr. Mortimer, pointing out the window. In the distance, beyond the green squares of pastures and the wavy edge of the forest, like a fantastic vision that appeared in a dream, a dull gray hill with a jagged peak appeared
Wait, what hills? He wanted to see the swamp! A wet lowland!
The road from the station to the "marshes" also goes uphill, and over rocks.
In front of us rose a steep hill covered with heather, the first harbinger of the proximity of peat bogs… The carriage ascended the hill, and in front of us stretched vast expanses of peat bogs with dolmens and stone pillars visible in some places on them… And then we saw a valley like a deep bowl with stunted oaks and pines, twisted and bent by the wind that has been raging here for centuries. Two tall, narrow towers rose above the trees. Our driver pointed at them with his whip. –Baskerville Hall,– he said.
Judging by the description, the estate is located below the surrounding landscape, in a depression. How does it not flood?
Well, yes, there was also an escaped convict, and Holmes lived in some rock caves… In general, whatever you want, but the described rocky highlands, blown by the winds, does not look like a swamp in any way.
Moor is a type of landscape for which there is no adequate translation. Just transliteration – mura – won't tell us anything. In fact, this is something close to the famous English "moorlands". A natural area at the point where a flat granite continental plate comes to the surface. This is practically a plateau, with minimal vegetation, hard and rocky.
From Wikipedia: Dartmoor is the largest piece of open space in the southern part of England with an area of 954 km2 covered with wide moorlands and stands on a granite base.
What about the Grimpen quagmire in which Stapleton drowned? In places of depressions, indeed, small swamps and swamps sometimes form, as in the tundra on permafrost. Only winters in England are mild, the moisture that falls with the rains is held not by ice, but by the underlying granite. In other places, everything is quite solid and stony, you can ride horses, and there is something to knock down a cane. And there is no grazing for a flock of sheep."
Yandex.Vasilisa's Zen Reflections
What then allows a work written at a different time and belonging to a different culture to remain popular on a global scale? I have already analyzed some possible reasons earlier, these are the archetypal character, the dialogic character of the novel, and the connections of the plot with folklore, but also something new, including the author's techniques, including those that are included today in the strategy of reader interest:
"Let the hero suffer: how to make the reader empathize
Source: nuvolanevicata / istockphoto.com
Anna Efremova September 16, 2019
The work of mirror neurons in the brain allows us to sympathize not only with people around us, but also with the heroes of books, films or TV reports. How do I describe a character in a way that increases his chances of reader empathy? Literary critic Susan Keen from Hamilton College in New York has been studying the phenomenon of narrative empathy for many years and in her book "Empathy and the Novel" names the conditions under which the author is more likely to reach the hearts of readers.
Literature is a safe zone where the healthy skepticism inherent in the reader remains in limbo, beyond the threshold of the text. Being fiction, an artistic narrative disarms the reader, weakens his distrust and thereby clears the way for narrative empathy. But some narrative strategies enhance the already free flow of empathy.
If there is a character, there is empathy
A name, basic life circumstances, and feelings, even if not explicitly expressed, are already capable of striking a spark of empathy: simply notifying the listener of the existence of another human being activates a network of mirror neurons in itself.
For this reason, even a stereotypical character from second-rate literature will get his share of narrative empathy: the description does not have to be realistic, and a rather hacky one will do. Literary critic and cognitive scientist Patrick Colm Hogan remarks about this:
"While literary critics and professionals appreciate novels for breaking conventions and shifting norms, readers' reactions to familiar situations and formulaic plot moves activate sincere empathy—for predictable twists and stencil characters."
However, vivid and unusual images act differently: by slowing down the pace of reading, they allow the reader to feel the hero better, literary critic David Miall and psychologist Don Quicken note.
Despite the fact that the reader's similarity to the literary hero (especially the similarity of life goals) contributes to identification, he does not necessarily have to share our views on life or be something like us; he may be of a different age, gender/gender or religious beliefs. It can even be an animal — the main thing is for the reader to be told about his name, what he looks like, what character traits he has, how he behaves, what role he plays in the development of the plot and how he talks.
Tell us about the hero. But not all of them
The more points of contact with one's own destiny a reader sees in a literary text, the faster empathy shoots out. But sometimes an understatement is needed: a 2004 study suggests that empathy acts as a gap-filling mechanism, that is, the reader himself substitutes guesses that resonate with his own psychological state in place of the missing information.
Let the hero act
Instead of describing the character of the hero, let him act and explain the motives of his actions — this way you are more likely to engage the reader emotionally and encourage him to project personal experiences onto the character.
Let the hero suffer
Empathy for fictional characters manifests itself easier and faster when they experience negative emotions. Susan Keen notes that, although her students often describe unity with the hero in moments of joy and pleasure, empathic compassion touches much deeper.
"Such bitter and painful experiences as grief or annoyance are more in need of the healing power of empathy," Adam Smith explained in The Theory of Moral Feelings. On the other hand, the character's misfortunes touch us because we often transfer them to ourselves.: A text that awakens the reader's hidden fears will drag him headlong into a sea of empathy. By the same analogy, it is easier for us to empathize with heroes who — like us — make mistakes.
Follow the rhythm
Empathy usually increases in the middle of storylines, when the problem or mystery facing the characters has not yet been solved, and subsides (and sometimes disappears) in moments of hesitation and hesitation. Knowing this, the author can control the pace and structure of the narrative in order to increase the level of reader empathy, for example, use a multi—level narrative, give the ending strength or leave it weak.
Keep in mind that the complexity and discontinuity of the text can serve as an obstacle to empathy: the ability to trace a cause-and-effect relationship simplifies identification with characters and, consequently, empathy.
The shape matters
The level of engagement and empathy depends on the length of the work, its correspondence to the genre, the portrayal of the scene, the number of volumes in the book series and the pace of the narrative.
As for the author's style, some researchers believe that the aesthetic merits of the work increase the chances of an emotional response and narrative empathy. Others suggest that excessive admiration for the author's style distracts the reader, prevents him from immersing himself in a fictional reality and, accordingly, empathizing with its inhabitants.
Become a hero yourself
According to Keen's analysis, the most infallible tool for influencing the reader was and remains a first-person narrative. The position from which the author has the opportunity to depict the inner world and emotional state of the hero is the most advantageous, because this approach conveys the "authentic" thoughts of the hero, directly connecting him with the reader. Despite the fact that narration from the outside causes a weak empathic reaction, a third person, or "omniscient narrator", also causes trust and empathy. This perspective allows the author to move from one character to another, reliably reproducing their mental monologues through improperly direct speech and creating the most complete picture of what is happening - a technique that Flaubert masterfully used when creating the world of Madame Bovary.
Are these rules going to work for sure?
Not obligatory. Empathy can be unpredictable, manifests itself from case to case and does not always coincide with narrative attitudes. Sympathy may arise not for a carefully drawn protagonist, but for a schematically sketched character. Keen calls the phenomenon of inconsistency of the author's idea of reader empathy "empathic inaccuracy."
In addition, narrative empathy can be randomly enhanced by the correspondence of a text to a specific historical, cultural or social situation: the context of a work of art affects the quality, strength and shades of empathy.
Keen notes that no novel is able to elicit an empathic reaction from all readers without exception. Features such as age, experience, biases, knowledge about the period being described, and even the quality of attention affect how we recognize other people's emotional states; inherited genetic characteristics also affect this skill. As Michael Steig noted, "certain personal qualities and experience allow some readers to sort out the emotional puzzle of a literary work more original and deeper than others."
Communication practices play an important role today, including in the formation of civil society. How much the absence of a "constructive dialogue" harms international and domestic politics can be seen from A. Miller's article in the collection "Historical Politics of the 21st century." There is also a curious reference to a foreign researcher who identified the role in the formation of civil society, the ability to achieve a national consensus of large traditional federal, especially with different political vectors printed publications. It is all the more curious to note that in the novel at the very beginning (new types of information sources still then) are mentioned: newspapers. Interestingly, it seems that one of the arguments by which Holmes confirmed his point of view in the controversy with Mortimer was the demonstration of his competence: how quickly and accurately he found the way in which the anonymous letter was written, for this Holmes resorted even to comparison with Mortimer's own methods (differences in the structure of the skulls of representatives of different peoples of Africa), but it was no less important that Holmes demonstrated the different weight of sources: while he and Watson read the Times"Mortimer came to Holmes with the manuscript of the 17th century. ("unless it's a fake, of course"), and the local Devon newspaper, which is all the more untrustworthy because Mortimer did not even tell the editorial board what he told only Holmes as an eyewitness. Interestingly, both the Times and even The Strand, in which the novel was first published (and in which it was written by Doyle), are still being published.
From the point of view of psychology, text is the main unit of communication, a phenomenon of real life activity, built with the help of elements of the language system (see the works of Alexey Alekseevich Leontiev, Valery Pavlovich Belyanin). The text, as a phenomenon of linguistic and extralinguistic reality, is a complex phenomenon that performs different functions and is considered in different aspects: as a means of communication, a reflection of the mental life of an individual, a product of a certain historical epoch, a form of cultural existence, etc.
Romantics, contrary to classicism, idealized the Middle Ages. Historicism has turned to the future. Neo-Romanticism represents the existence of a rationally meaningful, conceptualized history of medieval culture. Which then (as potentially spectacular and having high abilities of narrative empathy) continued to exist in cinema and computer games.
Are the characters of the novel really just functions, not personalities, non-subjective characters (even the Stapletons are indistinguishable from the deceptive beauty of the swamps, Holmes is a "computing machine" at all)? On the one hand, there is no psychologism (accepted in the literature of Russian, French, German), the characters have no personal life. But on the other hand, they do not write letters, they do not create museums (so this is a biographical cycle of novels and short stories, another thing is that biography refers to memories, to personal experience as well as history to memory and the past, it is conceptual, selective as well as the compositions of exhibits in museums differ from any collection).
Is the "imaginary reality" in the novel even a space of myth, epic-timeless? On the one hand, Holmes looks like a mythical hero, in the "imaginary reality" there are no clear links to a real historical time (the installation of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf) and there are timeless metaphors-conspiracy, the curse of the Baskervilles, melodrama, but on the other hand-there is a clear chronology and horology, why in the epic or The myth would need quotes from newspapers, letters, diaries. This is history, that is, a meaningful past. And there are several historians in the novel, you can even divide them by specialization: Holmes, Frankland are source historians, and closely related interests: Holmes is a forensic historian, Frankland is a legal historian, Mortimer is an archaeologist, antiquarian, anthropologist, Watson is a historiographer, taking into account hidden quotes from English classics-a literary historian, Barrymore is a tour guide, art historian, genealogist, museologist, Stapleton is a reconstructionist. And Baskerville Hall is a museum, unless there is another exhibit until the end of the novel-a manuscript behind glass, for example.
When I say that the novel is history in itself, of course, we are talking about history in the sense of historicism, about the history that was made by science in the 19th century, a history that tried to learn about the past using the methods of exact sciences, conceptual history, not descriptive, but explanatory history, not necessarily related to archival research, source studies, when the facts are adjusted to a concept that may even be initially set, and even when referring to documents, sources, the researcher is only looking for confirmation. And in this sense, the novel is a literal reflection of the worldviews of modernity.
In the postmodern pastiche novel, Hughes no longer plays such a role for Gate as Watson does for Holmes, he is still more a servant, a performer of errands, and not related to the investigation (Watson and Holmes for a stratified society were still people of the same level, Watson was not the valet of a detective). And the role of Watson for Holmes is performed for Gate by certain characters familiar from the "Watson novel", and this is not at all the degree of trust that exists between two companions, and Gate "has to" reduce the distance by drinking beer together in a pub, which so outrages the modern Russian-speaking reader, despite the fact that he himself The novel is a pastiche of a Russian-language novel.
It is usually customary to concentrate on the figure of Holmes in the cycle, and on his so-called deductive method (which obviously should not be identified with deduction in the philosophy of science). But in reality, I find a characteristic feature in the cycle-dialogicity. And what follows from this at least? Dialogue - always assumes the presence of at least two participants, this is the lowest level (but also the most active and widespread-this even shows the success of TV shows in the talk show format, television researchers even call talk shows the most television genre, unlike other types of TV programs, in comparison with other media). Holmes is in fact inseparable from his regular in the vis-a-vis cycle, Dr. Watson. Again, it is usually customary to present Dr. Watson as a narrator, a companion of Holmes, who provides him with assistance from time to time, and significantly-saving his life, sanity, and helping in the sense of running errands. But if you look closely, the reader can see that in reality Holmes and Watson are an example of so-called collective intelligence. It is in the novel (where Watson is actually the central figure) in the very first chapter that Holmes pays a compliment, more precisely, as Watson interprets it, to the doctor, ironically pointing out his errors in reasoning, but Watson for the detective is not just an errand performer, he is a necessary component in his method: he needs such a partner, such a visa- A-vi. This is a problem-solving technique that, for example, for large groups manifests itself as a brainstorming technique.
Collective intelligence or collective intelligence is a term that appeared in the mid-1980s in sociology when studying the process of collective decision-making (and this is exactly what we see in the cycle, otherwise why would Holmes even need: Watson, Mortimer, Lestrade, Sir Henry, why would he even have dialogues, Monsieur Bertillon, mentioned by Mortimer That's exactly what he did -more precisely, he invented universal technical means of solving forensic problems, he did not seek to develop the theory and practice of the investigation itself, including through interaction with participants, witnesses, suspects). Researchers from NJIT have defined collective intelligence as the ability of a group to find solutions to problems more effective than the best individual solution in this group (even if Holmes thinks that Watson is no more useful than a polished coffee pot). In this respect, collective intelligence surpasses the intelligence of any individual in the group ("one head is good, but two are still better" as the Russian proverb notes, Holmes introduces a third-Mortimer, and a fourth-Sir Henry, uses information through Watson, obtained or reported by old Frankland, like many old people those who have fallen into suspicion and the need to monitor the neighborhood-in pastiche, it is not by chance that he becomes a full-fledged investigator). This concept is used in sociobiology, political science and in the context of applications designed for group review and crowdsourcing. The concept of collective intelligence can affect consensus (in general, the key concept for modernity - the search for which the entire political culture of democracy was aimed at, and Holmes also put the other side of the socio-political process by his very work - the assertion of the rule of law, but in terms of communication, Holmes himself sets the rules of dialogues), social capital, and such concepts such as electoral systems, social media (and the novel itself is related to the emerging mass culture) and other methods of accounting for public intellectual activity.
But collective intelligence as a property of a collective arises only as a result of interaction (and this is communicative rationality), and consists in the ability to constantly learn, using feedback, to produce information necessary at a given moment for decision-making. That is, the novel, or rather the characters presented in it, the dialogues, the methods by which they cope with the tasks takes us into the sphere that I wrote about earlier, known since the late 20th century. as a heuristic.
"Heuristics (from other Greek ;;;;;;; — "I find", "I open") — a branch of knowledge, a scientific field that studies the specifics of creative activity. In cognitive science and behavioral economics, a heuristic is often referred to as a separate thinking technique that can lead to errors (for example, the "accessibility heuristic")."
"Heuristics is understood as a set of techniques and methods that facilitate and simplify the solution of cognitive, constructive, practical tasks. Heuristics is related to psychology, physiology of higher nervous activity, and cybernetics. As a science, heuristics develops at the intersection of philosophy, psychology, artificial intelligence theory, structural linguistics, information theory, mathematics and physics."
And it is no coincidence, knowing that the narrative is related to historicism, to the scientization of forms of understanding the past, to history -the New Philosophical Encyclopedia defines heuristics as a methodology of scientific research.
In accordance with heuristics, information theory, and the cognitive approach, we will find examples in the novel:
"Conventional wisdom (English Conventional wisdom, CW; Russian habitual thinking) is an established term in Western culture used to describe ideas or explanations that are generally accepted as true by the public or experts in any field." Holmes, despite the derogatory remark of the absent-minded Mortimer, still acts as an expert for his companions and for Mortimer himself, to whom he came for advice.
"Problem solving is the process of performing actions or mental operations aimed at achieving a goal set within the framework of a problem situation — a task; it is an integral part of thinking. From the point of view of the cognitive approach, the problem-solving process is the most complex of all the functions of intelligence and is defined as a higher-order cognitive process that requires coordination and management of more elementary or fundamental skills.
The problem statement is the exact formulation of the problem conditions with a description of the input and output information."This is generally related to computer science. And it is no coincidence that Holmes, even though I previously showed that this is not correct, was called a "computing machine".
Although, this is far from the case.
"Lateral thinking (from the English lateral thinking — lateral, transverse, directed to the side) is the ability to think outside the box, unconventionally, using the maximum number of approaches to solving a problem, which are quite often ignored by human logical thinking. The term describing the principle of an entire scientific concept was proposed in 1967 by Edward de Bono, and in 1970 his book "Lateral Thinking: Creativity Step by Step" (1970) was published. Edward de Bono is by far one of the world's most respected experts in the field of creativity.
Our mind prefers the usual and predictable solutions to problems. In most cases, we think "vertically" (logically), that is, choosing the most promising approach to solving the issue, which implies successive steps, each of which must be justified. Lateral thinking helps to solve difficult problems using unusual methods, or using elements that are ignored by ordinary logical thinking."
And Holmes constantly criticizes, one might say, the logic of the layman: Mortimer only repeated someone's stupidity, Sir Charles could not walk on his toes, he ran. And lateral thinking has to do with creativity. And it would be surprising not to find examples of this in the text, because its author is a writer, a creative person. Although there was more than one example in the history of English literature when a writer with his imagination was at the same time ... a scout-Defoe, Maugham.
And in the novel, the proposed methods for solving the problem are also, what is not :
"Open source intelligence (English: Open source intelligence, OSINT) is an intelligence discipline that includes the search, selection and collection of intelligence information from publicly available sources, as well as its analysis." In the novel, newspapers: The Times, the Devon Chronicle.
Holmes and Watson are also:
"Transactive memory is the combined memory of two or more people." Moreover, by his own admission, which so stunned Watson when they met, Holmes does not like to fill his mind with everything in a row. In the final chapter of the novel, Watson also struggles to get additional information from his companion for his notes. He had already forgotten her. And there are also catalogs, and they also complement each other: the Holmes file and the Watson medical reference book. Libraries have been known since the time of Alexandria, since the time of Museon, but as part of a mass society, an information society for Doyle's contemporaries, they are still at the time of their formation.
As for the specific techniques,:
"The Five Whys is a technique used to study the causal relationships underlying a particular problem. The main task of the technique is to find the root cause of a defect or problem by repeating one question — "Why?". Each subsequent question is added to the answers to the previous question. The number of "5" is selected empirically and is considered sufficient to find solutions to typical problems." Isn't this the way Holmes formulates the task and outlines ways to solve the problem in the Baskervilles case?
And finally, speaking about Watson's role as a technical side in this symbiotic intelligence:
"The duckling method (English: Rubber duck debugging) is a psychological method of solving a problem, delegating it to a mental assistant. The method is described in the book "The Programmer-pragmatist".
The essence of the method lies in the fact that the test taker puts a toy duckling on the desktop (or imagines it mentally, in fact, a duck is conditional, the object can be any), and when he has a question that is difficult to answer, he asks it to the toy, like a living person, as if it really can reply. It is believed that the correct formulation of the question contains at least half of the answer, and it also gives an impetus to thoughts, directing them in the right direction, translating the "stream of consciousness", in fact, "porridge in the head", into the form of formal terms."
Language, both as a sign (letters) writing system and as a sign (sounds) speech system, is a means of communication, only a means of communication. But in the post-Soviet space, grammar is studied and taught, especially in the broadest link-school, something close to mathematics, with the rules of speech and writing. That is, rarely as a means of communication.
Inspired by the very idea of Kobrin's work, I decided to present the novel as a historical source of Victorian England. But after applying textual and contextual analyses, I found myself disappointed: it cannot be any historical source. Moreover, Kobrin and scientists like him make a methodological mistake: because nothing historical can be modern at the same time, because in his work Kobrin studied history from the book also as the beginning of what still lasts. But the historical can be described as historical only because it has ended. But when studying the text, no, no, yes, I came across the feeling that there are concepts inside the text that are conceptually familiar to me-discourse.
Applying discourse analysis, I discovered that if the novel cannot serve as a historical source, then it itself is an example of historicization of the past, although it is a literary text. But I found the discourse of modernity in it. And then I realized: why Kobrin could be so mistaken-he understood history within the framework of historicism, and I within the framework of postmodernism. Then I tried to find examples of the historical within the framework of historicism, and indeed, you can find examples of the same textual and contextual analysis, systemic thinking-and the rationalization of power according to Weber (police, mail and telegraph), and the beginning of consumer society (grocery, shoes from Canada then in the quagmire), and mass society (newspapers), both moral changes and the motive of the "cherry orchard" are the impoverishment of the aristocratic family. But it is still not possible to find examples of history in the understanding of postmodernism - as first of all, not political or state history, but the history of things, everyday life (in this sense, Tolstoy wrote even more history in the 19th century than his contemporaries historians), and even the well-known facts of great history in the text of the novel, of course, and they are not found (the Eiffel Tower, the suicide of the Crown Prince, if it is 1889). Nevertheless, in the novel it is possible to find a discourse of communicative rationality -even using the data science method, to understand its cinematography-it is dialogical, dynamic, which is what cinema requires. You can even find the discourse of modern information theory-heuristics, how it formulates the problem and ways to solve it (and of course the original ones, he is also an entertaining read). And finally, what is the deductive method? What does it have to do with deduction in mathematics, in logic, in philosophy? Is it so scientific? And here again, the difference in ideas about modern and postmodern science (and the positivism of modern culture-and for this reason alone, the novel can in no way be modern, when science really became the basis of production in developed countries, but also a source of social and political problems, Doyle was interested only in criminology, just after the catastrophes of the 20th century. the positivism of the novel does not seem so naive-the fascination with Mortimer's craniology, for example, or the theories of Bertillon, Lambroso Holmes, although Doyle is just not inclined to share faith in the triumph of reason-the whole novel is a collision of the supra-rationalism of Holmes - the most popular, but not loved by the author himself, who desperately proved his views in print with faith in spiritualism, with the supernatural and I would not say that it was successful-just the irony disappears from the translations, but Holmes is not so convincing in the investigation-and this allows you to write parodies and sequels, and the dog itself is actually immediately accepted as a symbol, Paradoxically, the rational explanation thus only serves as a new justification for the old legend, and in general, all these evil spirits after secularization will quietly move into the sphere of mass entertainment culture). But the critique of reason, which began with its very triumph, has already marked its boundaries with a "linguistic turn" and presented it so convincingly for the first time: that history is also texts (in general, we always deal with language and concepts in descriptions, and not phenomena in themselves-because of this, even linguists with experience can fall into the error of believing that language is similar to phenomena that physicists discover or biologists describe, and it cannot but be similar-the toolkit is the same-the language itself, this is not a similarity, but an indication of a common origin).
And analyzing (discourse analysis) historicism, I came to another discovery: by the very attitude towards rational understanding, detraditionalization, historicism allowed to erase the boundaries of cultures and facilitated the dissemination of information, such its characteristics as temporality, causality (and the desire not only to describe, but also to explain), understanding the universalism of history (long before globalization in in a world with religious and class boundaries, even with historical boundaries in the sense of the stadiality of the development of society), all this still serves literature - its novel form as successful narrative strategies. And then it dawned on me: the narrative in history and the classic novel in literature are sometimes even written by the same personalities, they have the same forms, methodologically the differences relate only to the attitude to authenticity (but Ranke is a philologist by education, and historical imagination is justified as a method of filling the vacuum in an effort to give the story a narrative character between the facts reported by the sources). And here again Kobrin's mistake is clear. Because in the intensively communicating world of the 19th and 20th centuries, adaptation in the form of translation and film adaptation was designed to erase the boundaries of historical and cultural - which was already a novel for Soviet citizens. The film adaptation! That's what allowed Kobrin to talk about the heroes of the novel as both historical and modern-he thought about the novel through the popular film adaptation of Maslennikov, but it's just an adaptation with the modernization of the text, and even based on the classic Soviet translation by Volzhina. And Maslennikov was motivated by modernism in the sense of recognizing the universality of the historical, even with all his interest in the interior and the desire to convey the atmosphere of the era. The method of the stage director Dodin, actor Borisov, which the actress Demidova recognized -it therefore testifies to the synthesis of history and art, that history itself was art, and imagining as a reliable historical reconstruction according to the diaries of the same Dostoevsky staging of his own work - the actors and the director were still in the representations of the least of the same A writer, at most - the world of the novel as a narrative and narrative as a novel (without realizing it, without reflecting on it, and from here it is interesting now to hear "claims" to Doyle's text about "authenticity", in general it is symptomatic that such a method is suitable precisely for staging, for film adaptation, and not at all for reconstruction of the past!). In postmodernism, history, the work of a historian, and scientific knowledge are presented differently. There is no history as one, as universal, as generating patterns and laws. And we have to clarify what historical source, what kind of history the researcher seeks to present this or that text (which, in fact, is always a semantic system that is designed to carry information, and the better and more fully it carries information, the more communicative the text has, but it is always text, always language, and no other possibility for history, and if we talk about language, then there is no evidence or reflection for science at all). The paradox also lies in the fact that if you get to the elements of the structure (and go from theories to text, or get carried away trying to analyze it with mathematical data science analyses-color, transmission of dialogues, actions and reflections-where are the laws of the genre that Doyle wrote, and the peculiarities of the language, in which the peculiarities of mentality) and philosophical phenomenology-in the pursuit of the utmost accuracy of science and methodology, the requirement of "pure" knowledge, not mediated by concepts and theories, again turns into the development of new concepts (limitation of cognitive capabilities-Kant, which is actually from Plato, and his ideology from the mythology of the Greeks, recorded in tragedies, that is, classical, but ancient literature).
In the postmodern period, the historian's focus on the text led to questions of the nature of knowledge of the past, to reflection and ideas of the impossibility of reliable reconstruction, the lack of universality and misconceptions about the introduction of methods of exact sciences into the sciences of the spirit, more precisely Newton's mechanics, understood as science itself and the scientific method itself. Discourses-structures, levels of sensory perceptions, intentions-intentions in phenomenology, which I tried to analyze quantitatively (color, and found connections, except for intertexuality, allusions to "horror novels", although the detective is a "sensational novel" in the era of the formation of mass print and literature) return to the topic of the division of literature as a way of artistic cognition the world, with a single nature of creativity (and there are psychoanalytic possibilities for explaining motives, but not abilities!), a reflection of the crisis (which, on the contrary, should be understood as an expansion of the search for ideas) in humanitarian knowledge. The attempt to present a literary text as a historical source led to the discovery (convincing or not, I cannot say) of a single nature...both, and the idea of the boundaries of knowledge of the past and scientific knowledge in principle. Attempts to use different methods, both traditional and modern, have yielded results, but in general reflect the situation "after the method" for the humanities, there may be a pernicious search for the ability to "explain" rather than "understand" (in my work, how history and literature were written in the "historical age", and how today, the culturologist reflects on these topics).
From the work of the modern epistemologist Allan Megill:
"Some hypercritical researchers insist that any knowledge must be reliable. Following the philosophers, they divide reliable knowledge into two categories: on the one hand, direct knowledge derived from personal experience; on the other hand, logical knowledge derived through deductive procedures. But none of these forms, nevertheless, can be applied to historical knowledge. No one can get absolutely accurate (in these senses) knowledge about whether Napoleon Bonaparte actually existed (moreover, in the 19th and early 20th centuries. books were popular that proved just that Napoleon never existed, that this was a symbolic image, about how the chronicle evidence of a particular historical figure or event is told today by the source scholar Danilevsky, about how the "Fomenkovites" build their analogies - my comment). Napoleon no longer exists, he is no longer accessible to our direct experience; at the same time, there is no such logical procedure that could reliably establish the existence of Napoleon. As a result, there are people who deny historians the ability to really know anything about the past.
We (the authors of the chapter in the book "Historical Epistematology" are three American historians: Megill, Sheppard, Honenberger) agree with them that our ideas about the historical past cannot be put into the traditional philosophical concept of authenticity. Accordingly, we argue that reliability in this sense should be forever rejected as a criterion of historical knowledge. Instead, since we are talking specifically about historical knowledge, we prefer to talk about degrees of certainty. The degree of reliability inherent in a certain set of ideas about the past corresponds to the degree to which the acceptance of these ideas can provide an explanation of the totality of historical sources (with some reservations, which will be discussed below). Although history cannot achieve either "direct experiential" or "deductive" certainty, the correctness of historical explanations can be established based on how well they respond to the totality of historical evidence compared to alternative explanations.
Where there is a high degree of reliability, i.e., where this explanation is much better than alternative explanations in terms of matching the totality of historical ones, the historian has every right to assert that such and such an event took place. "Caesar crossed the Rubicon" is a statement so much better than a statement denying this fact ("Caesar did not cross the Rubicon") that it can be freely called true, although it can never be "established" experimentally or logically."
Next, the authors talk about logical methods: abduction, deduction and induction. From which, by the way, we can conclude: Holmes positions himself as an author, or at least a practitioner, who considers the deductive method to be the basis of his work as an investigator. And it even allows him to solve riddles (crimes) in a matter of minutes, or without leaving the room, while they have baffled Scotland Yard inspectors. But in this novel, Holmes did not just leave the room for the purpose of investigation, did not just leave London, and went to Dartmoor, where he spent at least two weeks, but also hid it from Watson, Mortimer and Sir Henry (why? not the way he explained it, maybe just because he was powerless in front of the riddle? At least for the time of the preliminary conclusion, although he mentioned to Watson that he already had an assumption who the perpetrator was still there at the train station, but in reality, Holmes clearly demonstrates in the novel not deduction, or even abduction in the form that he had a hypothesis and he only went to back it up with facts, to check, and induction-he followed the investigation in an experienced, empirical way, and he followed the dog in the swamp, just like Selden, that's why he made Sir Henry believe in its reality, and warned of the danger not imaginary, it was there that he tracked down Stapleton and his relationship with the married Laura Lyons, and then gathered information that Miss Stapleton was not Jack's sister, but Jack's wife, in order to get information from Laura Lyons, demonstrating how Stapleton deceived her, but then something strange happens). Something logically wrong is happening: Holmes does not seriously consider the manuscript, and he was prompted to take up the case - an anonymous letter to Sir Henry and surveillance of him in London, the death of an old baronet, strange in the opinion of his personal doctor, and not a "fairy tale". The "fairy tale" tells about the Baskervilles dog, who punishes three or four generations of the family for the misconduct of old Hugo, an indomitable temper and a blasphemer (in what he shouted there is an indication of a contract with the devil). But Holmes doesn't even consider all this. Therefore, in reality, there is no story in the novel itself. None at all. The dog did not exist or existed in the past, the dog exists (the shoes were stolen-and this also forced Holmes to take up the case), but it is not irrational, of course, of nature. Although it is still not clear for a long time: whether there was a crime, what motive, and there is always not enough evidence (and here again a "fairy tale" is mixed in, which "will make them laugh in court," and this is seen as the cunning of the criminal). There is no history, but I prove that this is the essential feature of historicism-we remember that the Soviet project was attributed as an exception-travesty, not interest in reconstructing the past, it is always present, and differs from the present only in costume and wigs, so it seems to me that this is the essence of historicism, that is, history as the science of the modern era (even where it declared the tasks of reconstruction, the installations themselves were such that it turned out to be a travesty of the present and nothing more, with regard to the Rank, it was just about the ideology that was brought under the unification of Germany on the basis of Prussian militarism). But back to the dog... then Holmes clearly makes a logical mistake (and one can immediately assume that this is the lack of rigor of Doyle-he still writes a novel for entertainment, and there are other tasks-genre restrictions, he does not write a treatise on logic, and in this case I am interested in the novel as a striking example that reveals the mechanism of writing a narrative and a novel in the era of classical literature and the emergence of scientific history): having discarded the "fairy tale" for a long time, he suddenly becomes convinced that old Hugo actually seems to be a real historical figure-he sees his portrait (and an authentic one, as evidenced by the dating-there is nothing simpler to give credibility than to indicate the time and place-Doyle uses this technique widely, so much so that the entire novel can be represented by dates and places of action, now it is considered part of a successful narrative strategy for the reader-whatever the fiction, apparently quasi-real events or narratives based on real events are particularly popular, and Doyle, as a storyteller, was known for, that his stories were always believed as if they really happened-an almost literal reproduction of the requirement from historians from the mouth of Ranke, by the way a philologist by profession, and by the way who allowed historical imagination among the methods -why reproach postmodernism that it seeks to see a kind of literature in the historical narrative, little to declare authenticity it must be argued, while in historicism the reliance on sources was very soon replaced by reliance on explanatory theories-however, as part of the proof of authenticity, as Megill writes about causality, if there is a convincing causality, then it can also serve as part of the proof that this or that event really happened, although it depends on what is considered the cause-causality is not at all a synonym or even an immanently inherent part of rationality, the whole point is only in the paradigm-the orientation of vision). However, this does not say anything else: why shouldn't old Hugo exist. But the logical mistake begins in the fact that Holmes sees in the portrait exactly the same old Hugo-the curse of the Baskervilles, that is, not the same face as described in the manuscript, not just the same face, but exactly as it is described in the manuscript... although did something else make him suddenly believe in a "fairy tale"? And then he completely ends the fallacy of logical reasoning: having discovered a resemblance -literally a portrait with Stapleton (and the fact that it really is, and Stapleton is really Baskerville, and this is a possible motive, but this only strengthens suspicion), but for Holmes this is the most important evidence: and why? Because it turns out "this is how you can believe in the transmigration of souls" (the argument is just so-so, especially since it is taken from the Hindu tradition, where even today there are still "sensations" about the reincarnation of infants, although they do not go beyond the boundaries of Hindu culture, just as they usually see a trait within Christian culture), that is, having discarded the "fairy tale" as a "fairy tale", and having engaged in a rational investigation (empirically accumulating facts is an inductive method, but not at all deductive), he suddenly receives in such a strange way the most important proof for his reasoning, "remembering" about the "fairy tale" in connection with the portrait of Baskerville in the 17th century. and discovering a portrait resemblance to Stapleton. But then it's even more interesting (and I'm not even talking about the fact that according to the logic of the plot - a special logic, Holmes of course turns out to be right). Megill, Sheppard, and Honenberger suggest that historians use three criteria of the philosopher Taggard as criteria for confirming the degree of reliability: coincidence, simplicity, and similarity. Let's try to apply them to the obviously irrational Baskervilles dog (but Holmes, according to the portrait, should have found it, and not Stapleton's dog at all. Why? Still not clear? Yes, because he took part of the "fairy tale" as the most important proof, moreover, she received it in this way...rational confirmation).
So, the criterion of coincidence: the more facts are explained, the better. But it is precisely the frequency of coincidences that makes the author of the manuscript take up the pen and warn posterity. Is not it so?..
Simplicity: the fewer "auxiliary" hypotheses a particular explanation requires, the better. And who can say that the investigation is a whole novel long, and even where the whole chain of conclusions is not visible, it is not even so transparent in the special final chapter, because Holmes is not used to clogging the brain with all the circumstances of a completed case. For the author of the manuscript, it was obviously just such a superstitious explanation, from the religious discourse, which was generally dominant at that time (and this, by the way, is the third criterion: similarity-we will find a lot of such irrational explanations for the past epochs-the Middle Ages, but in a causal connection- causal, that's why old Hugo fell victim to the hellhound, because he is a blasphemer and a thief, causality is not at all part of the rational, it's just how the reason for this or that phenomenon looked in the Middle Ages). And here is the most important discovery: we cannot claim that the thesis that our rational habit (which, yes, Kobrin is right in this, still prevails, but it is older than Holmes, Doyle, though Holmes is exactly such a super-rational "eternal hero" in the literature of a new genre- the "sensational novel" that we we just call it a detective, and Doyle developed the canon with his novels and stories about the detective of this genre, which is an intellectual game), but we cannot say that this is not our rational habit, broadcast through universal literacy in newspapers, books, the noise of trains, airplanes, the hum of factories and factories, electric lighting dispersed wild superstitions that they were quite a part of reality, in fact, it's just better for us today to understand that our ancestors (the text of the manuscript was of course written by the same author as the whole novel, although there are doubts about this-the author is a journalist, a friend of Doyle Robinson, but it's written quite traditionally - by analogy with the texts of past centuries, even for the authors of the novel published in 1901-02, first in a magazine, then in a separate edition), this is how they explained the surrounding reality for themselves, just like our other ancestors, those who are closer, and we ourselves tend to explain Newton's mechanics, Einstein's theories, Darwin, and so on, but for them, exactly what we now call superstition, religion, for them, this was just as real an explanation (and of course, no coherent, universal, with the laws of the development of history before the 19th century. no matter how there was, after the "linguistic turn" in the humanities, a "pragmatic turn" in philosophy in the 20th century, when the alienation of the present from the past occurred once again-and it was called modernity, and our era is postmodern, then of course now we tend to understand that the key word now is not an explanation, and understanding, we tend to understand that we modernize and modernize the past, or did not understand it, did not strive to understand, believing in ourselves, believing universal history and laws possible, that Man is always and everywhere the same, the playful and imitative side of the new culture manifested itself even then, however, without realizing itself as such, when such adaptations of the text as the Maslennikov series were obtained, somewhere as far from the original as the Soviet era itself-but Maslennikov caught the irony in the text, Doyle was ironic just about Holmes' rationality, and in in the cycle, the author himself is associated with the figure of Watson, but not with the main character, although there are also common features with him, Doyle is at least a controversial figure, but Maslennikov brilliantly captured this irony, which is not so obvious in translations and created a comedy-buff, on the contrary, ironically at the irrationality of Mortimer, at all, but it turned out to be far from the original in that it is dynamic, there is very little reasoning, lyrics in it at all, this is a property of English literature, and the English language, and cinema as art, and detective as a genre, but Maslennikov to postmodernism, to fascination with the history of everyday life I got carried away with the idea of transferring the interiors of Victorian England, everyday life, by the way, there is very little of all this, negligibly little in the text itself, so much so that any visit to a modern museum will give a hundred times more information than reading it, and even viewing illustrations of the same canonical Pagett, and the text does not contain the famous Holmes helmet, a modern researcher, by the way, if desired, finds a lot of things in the text that cannot be in it, for example, Kobrin, finding it both historical and modern, is apparently not inclined to pay attention to it-that the text is fundamentally not reflects and does not imitate the era, is indifferent to it, of course, he roughly places the action in modernity, in 1889, reports this binding to the time and place of action, although there is no Grimpen, like Coombe-Tracy, moreover, Baskerville Hall did not exist and does not exist, but even then history is the history of diplomacy, the state and sovereigns, laws, wars, that is, political, with political economy, partly economic, statistical history, but not the history of everyday life, culture, these are just postmodern ideas-they appear only after the Second World War in historiography, and it is curious that Tolstoy, with his epic novel, convinced that he was writing history, and judging by the arguments, and his painstaking search for sources, working on them, he was closer to understanding history in its modern meaning, than his contemporaries-historians, and Doyle did not write any history at all, he only entertained the reader, this is generally fundamentally the territory of imagination, not reflection, fiction, as well as his other famous cycle "The Lost World", although he was the author of a cycle about the Napoleonic wars with Brigadier Gerard, and I will leave this as an indication of a possible weakness in my statement, just as for the new pastiche novel, Doyle could not even drop a hint of Miss Stapleton's crime if she was a representative of the indigenous population of Central America, for about the same reason, there is no distinction between the culture of another people, epoch, another culture, Man is one, and according to Hegel, the future as a movement in history towards freedom, as progress is known as well as the past, there is no need to be specifically interested in it, except only as an illustration of such a philosophy, and there are historical peoples, and there are not historical ones, and also what interest can there be in them, although if Baril Garcia is a descendant of the Spaniards, then of course you can see in this a hint of some attempt at historical revenge for the defeat of the Great Armada in front of the fleet of the new superpower of England, to which the Spanish colonies in America then moved).
The non-obviousness of the heuristic value of historical descriptions is that they are literary, that is, they can be fascinating, like literature, most of them cannot be verified (history is impossible to verify at all, it is history, but I am talking about sources), and otherwise, unlike even seers, "prophecies" in history are events of the past (no matter how much you talk about why the First World War happened, it happened anyway), and unlike real prophecies facing the future, even weather forecasts, they always seem to "come true".
For Sir Charles, the legend turned out to be a "self-fulfilling prophecy" (the same can be said about Holmes's investigation-after all, he always finds a criminal and as a hostage of the detective genre, it cannot be otherwise: the reader also seems to know about it in advance).
Allan Megill in his work "Historical Epistemology" discusses the explanatory side of historical writing, and mentions that otherwise (in one of the strategies) the explanation of the past will be no more reliable than forecasts for the future. I believe that, with one degree or another of reliability, the historical description is just that. Indeed, let's take for example such a historical event, which sharply raised questions about the validity of views on history in the sense of movement towards freedom and progress: the First World War.
Let's start with the reason for the war. In Musil's novel, in which the theme is played out: they are preparing to celebrate the anniversary of the German Kaiser in 1918, the reader understands that there are no monarchies in 1918. not at all, but the story begins with a car accident in Vienna. Maybe this is my opinion, but isn't there an allusion here to the occasion of the First World War: and if indeed, the unfortunate Archduke and his wife would not have died at the hands of terrorists in the same Sarajevo. Would there have been a war then? There was a crisis in 1911, but... after all, the war did not happen then. Or... and if the Archduke had safely passed the second attempt at all (after all, he passed the first attempt on the same day in the same Sarajevo). Would there have been a war then?
If we begin to list different reasons, to assert their effectiveness in combination, then this will partly be an admission of the fact that none of them looks convincing. This means that there is no convincing explanation for such a colossal historical, recent, well-documented (even the newsreel remains) event.
It is not difficult to notice that the historical narrative of modernity is vulnerable exactly where alternative studies usually likes to fantasize: the role of chance and the role of personality in history. Tartakovsky, back in the years of perestroika or shortly after, wrote about such an example: what if a malarial mosquito had bitten Alexander the Great not when it bit, but before the conquests? The story would obviously be different. Or: what if Napoleon had not suffered from pain at the Battle of Borodino?..
Don't the commonly called causes and effects in the historical narrative really look like forecasts for the future?
Let's try to look at the text of the novel with all this now. Wasn't it the Holmes investigation that made Stapleton's crime less than perfect? And not the accidental arrival of Sir Henry? Was it Mortimer's accidental interference in the case? Just to get Holmes involved in it. Or, if Holmes had been sitting in the Baker Street apartment out of habit, would he have been able to investigate the case? Trace Stapleton's connection to Laura Lyons. Or, and if Dr. Watson, seizing a thread, thanks to the curiosity of Mrs. Barrymore, the remains of the letter untouched by ashes, the suspicions of the baronet and the doctor of the couple in malice against the owner (too many accidents for the success of the deductive method), as usual, would not have allowed himself to be confused, would Holmes have investigated him?
Doesn't it seem strange that only Mortimer saw the dog's tracks? Whether there is a dog at all, it doesn't matter which one or whose. And anyway, can a ghost leave footprints? Was it too early for Mortimer to believe in the legend? That is, neither the police, nor the Barrymores (who noticed the remains of the letter in the fireplace), nor Perkins (who probably had to keep an eye on the alley, by the way, his name refers to William Perkins, a famous English Protestant theologian of the 16th century, known in particular for the fact that Perkins claimed that by his unchangeable establishment, God from eternity chose some people to save and predestined others to damnation, thus adhering to Supralapsarian views). Or is it surprising that Mortimer and Sir Charles, with their discussion of the features of Hottentot and Bushman skulls, did not notice that Stapleton... so much like the portrait of old Hugo. Or: does the Baskervilles dog exist, it chases Selden, yes, in Sir Henry's fur coat, but ... He's not a Baskerville at all.
And yet: you can ask the reader these questions as much as you want, there is no need to retell the novel. He just might have his own laws! But these are the laws of literary storytelling! The laws of the detective genre!
That's it! But why does historical writing also not lend itself as a text to its own special or the same laws, built according to a narrative strategy. And this is not my guess at all, for example, E.Dobrenko believes that the historical narratives of the Soviet political and aesthetic project are also subject to the laws of literature, "A short course in the history of the CPSU (b)" is designated by him as having all the signs of a spy novel, that is, a kind of detective story. And the comparison of a historian with a detective, made by the heroic French historian Marc Block, looks different. I just assume that this is not a property of the Soviet political and aesthetic concept alone, but such is generally the property of historicism (contrary to its declarations), that is, the history of the modern era. And how it can be seen today is a view from the postmodern culture, and I'm not saying that it's more reliable.
In short, it can be noted that historiography is capable of producing history itself as reality, so that another historiography again "reflects" it in its own way, and thereby contributing to its new production again (isn't this the impression "history repeats itself first as a tragedy, then as a farce", that's in the pastiche text the only thing that "gives it away" as not independent is a kind of theatricality, artificiality, literary, not intellectual play, but this is also characteristic of postmodernism as a whole, for culture with museums, performance).
Retelling an episode from Stalin's "autobiography" about how Stalin, in exile back in 1915, took Leninist positions and even then stigmatized Kamenev's cowardly and treacherous behavior in the village of Monastyrsky, E.Dobrenko remarks: "in the context of Stalin's biography, the ratio of Stalin/Kamenev in 1915. (the values are simply incomparable) turns out to be not only real, but also with a clear advantage towards the former. This optical effect is achieved by the old literary technique of "auto-preaching" - Stalin's biography is written from the end: having just been born, he is already a leader.
This optics also determines Stalin's well-known ability to foresee (this foresight backwards) the future. This divine quality is constantly emphasized in the biography. The story acquires validity. It can be said that it justifies itself. This ideological perpetuum mobile was one of the main inventions of Stalin's historical narratives."
But again, E.Dobrenko, whose work is limited to the Soviet political and aesthetic project, does not notice that this is a feature of the history of modernity. And then, by the way, he quotes White: "White calls the "calculation" of the material to be presented and justified "a poetic act indistinguishable from a linguistic one."
Here is what A. Megill writes about White's book: "Since the publication of the book Metahistory in 1973, Hayden White's name has been at the center of many discussions among philosophers of history. I will not enter into a debate here about some of White's specific statements that relate to the convergence of history with fiction. Rather, I am interested in the very fact of such a discussion, since the wide (albeit polemical) response that White's work has received among those interested in theoretical problems of historiography is in itself indicative. This indicates an impressive recognition of the power of narrative (and related literary forms)... We need to better understand the nature and meaning of this irresistible force."
And then Allan Megill discusses just this in the chapter "Does the narrative have its own cognitive value?" -he tends to see that historians write narratives, writers have invented the most common and successful literary form in the fact that, of course, the narrative has cognitive value, because the narrative as a chronologically organized message by its very procedure (writing, telling) seeks to make sense of the world, makes its image accessible (while not the fact, that the world is just like that). And apparently so... the very way of thinking. Hence the prevalence of gossip: it arranges one thing with another and therefore looks plausible. One can say, reading the arguments of A.Megill, who reveals the aesthetic, cultural power of the narrative, and its ability to evoke intellectual satisfaction, which I just understand that the reader for whom the story of how the First World War became possible, it really seems possible precisely according to those arguments, explanations that are presented in the form of a narrative, a narrative, aesthetically and culturally strong story, therefore it can be said that after historians themselves thought about the nature of knowledge, after the "linguistic turn", they began to talk about the crisis of narrative, folk history of non-professionals, which, as a global phenomenon, is the answer to these demands of readers-to return the narrative, one can say, for all the absurdity and lack of professionalism (and complete lack of reflection), the authors of folk history texts show us history... in its earliest times of development, as a pure narrative, despite the fact that gossip (here, again, we must make an adjustment to mass culture, to the mass media, which in the pre-digital era was fed by gossip, which was served as sensationalism by the "yellow press", and in the digital era gossip without intermediaries can spread with with no less effect of communicative power, and as illusorily "familiar" to millions, of course, gossip feeds on the materials of the "personal life" of the "stars": each of its consumers thinks that they know A and C, who can really be connected by one or another that is distributed on the network, but the very bringing together of A and C, and the story itself, which, as A. Megill notes, people generally tell, is the same procedure that bases historical narrative in its purest form-as well as what bases literary narrative forms or most of them, which are not avant-garde texts with "the stream of consciousness", the heuristic significance of the historical narrative here is only in the very peculiarity of history, if on the contrary the distance between the past and the present, and the method, commitment to scientific methods of reconstruction, are emphasized.
E. Dobrenko analyzes in approximately the same way, without seeking to go beyond the scope of his subject: considering many things specific, inherent only in the Soviet, even Stalinist political and aesthetic project.
Speaking about the heuristic value and significance of the narrative, Megill himself draws attention to the ability (whether by virtue of the literary form or narrative) to return history to a purely moral and pragmatic approach: "claims to give lessons in morality and piety turned out to be fraud, since certain historical actions in the past were assessed as "exemplary" based on already the prevailing ethical views. Therefore, such a story was nothing more than an exercise in sophistry, reflecting modern prejudices dressed in the clothes of antiquity." And as for why such a story still prevails, Megill himself answers the reader, listing the circle of interested parties: "in Ranke's time, only a few, only the highest elite, had the right to set tasks. Today, the stage is filled with a mass: rulers and people, producers and consumers of history, a motley and loudly chattering crowd. Among them are local legislators who talk about the need for "proper" teaching of history in schools and universities in their impeccable states; federal legislators, shocked by the historical ignorance of college students and the general public (is this not proof of the lack of direct connection between the proposed view of the past and the present, both as "forgotten" lessons and as well learned? No one would raise such a big voice of indignation when it came to literature, realizing that after all, "as many authors as there are opinions," precisely because history is more complicated than any narrative or theory, it is "unique" or only as a tragedy or farce. In general, all this is very recognizable and therefore the expectations of Soviet historical science were certainly ridiculous when discrediting Marxism for a new fundamental principle-my comment); generous patrons determined to establish a department of the history of this and the history of that (that's just worse with this in Russia, with the social responsibility of business, more precisely with business itself, and this role the state defends itself: to close something-to open it-my comment); Americans who are proud of their ethnic heritage or religion and want to be sure that their glorious past is properly represented and glorified; veterans who demand that their wars be not only correctly interpreted, but also firmly preserved in memory; all those who were deprived of their loved ones or otherwise touched by the major catastrophes of our time, in In particular, the shocking events of September 11, 2001. On the other side of these individuals and groups, whose active interest in history is obvious, are those whose interests are more vague and consumer-oriented. I am referring here to those who "appreciate" history the way you can appreciate a beautiful wallpaper pattern or a neatly manicured lawn; those who visit the White House, inspect the fields of past battles and other similar historical sites; linger on a journey to examine memorial plaques; - in general, all those who I like old things. Their interest in history sometimes goes so far as to be expressed with the phrase: "I've always loved history."
The narrative itself (and therefore it reveals such unity with both literature and gossip as a form) is fascinating, in modern times it is the most common and most successful strategy for literature. And in the 21st century, few people are interested in the fact that the romantic hero of 19th century literature becomes a literary reality at the same time as the doctrine of socialism, but like both, they themselves are indicators that this could not be in historical reality then in the 19th century. What makes the hero and the novel convincing is precisely the new form of understanding and presentation of the past and the successful narrative strategy used so far.
A.Megill, speaking about the cognitive ability of the narrative as a literary form, refers to the philosopher of history Louis Mink, who just shared the content of the narrative and its form, which gives meaning. But Megill further argues to Mink that: "how can we learn from any single narrative that the 'conceptual assumptions' that we distinguish in the text were actually supported by people in an empirical reality that exists outside the text?"
A good question, as Holmes would have noted, is the literary hero who created the museum, who, like his author Doyle, a writer distinguished by the originality of the narrator, can be distinguished from a historical distance, especially from a postmodern distance.
And, in conclusion, about the detective of the so-called Golden Age:
The Golden Age Detective
"Most detective works of the Golden Age are distinguished by a large number of similar features - among them a light, unpretentious narrative, a frivolous attitude to crime (most often it was murder) and the so-called game of the author and the reader, the essence of which was that the author gives his reader all the evidence and information, giving a chance to solve crimes before the detective. Many cliches were established ("a corpse in the library", "murder in a locked room" and so on), the main questions of the novels were "who?" and, sometimes, and very often, "how?". The authors of that era had a predilection for introducing classic English mansions and a limited circle of suspects (often representatives of the upper strata of society) into their novels. "
10 Commandments of the detective novel
" In 1929, Ronald Knox compiled the so-called "10 Commandments of the detective novel":
The culprit must be someone mentioned at the beginning of the novel, but it should not be a person whose train of thought the reader was allowed to follow.
A detective story, as a rational literary genre, cannot have a supernatural or otherworldly background.
It is unacceptable to use more than one secret passage.
In a detective novel, there cannot be poisons and ingenious devices unknown to science that require a long explanation.
The Chinese should not appear in the work.
Neither baseless, but true intuition, nor a lucky chance can help a detective in investigating a crime.
The criminal cannot be a detective.
A detective cannot hide anything from the reader in order to maintain the spirit of fair play.
The detective's silly friend, Watson or Hastings in one form or another, should not hide any of the considerations that come to his mind; in his mental abilities he should be slightly inferior – but only very slightly - to the average reader.
Indistinguishable twin brothers and doppelgangers in general cannot appear in a novel unless the reader is properly prepared for it."
20 rules for writing detective
stories" In response to Knox's "Commandments", the American Willard Ride, better known by the pseudonym S. S. Van Dyne, compiled "20 rules for writing detective stories" (1929):
It is necessary to provide the reader with equal opportunities with the detective to unravel the mysteries, for which it is clear and accurate to report all incriminating traces.
In relation to the reader, only such tricks and deception are permissible that a criminal can use against a detective.
Love is forbidden. The story should be a game of tag, not between lovers, but between a detective and a criminal.
Neither a detective nor any other person professionally involved in the investigation can be a criminal.
Logical conclusions should lead to exposure. Accidental or unfounded confessions are unacceptable.
A detective cannot be missing a detective who methodically searches for incriminating evidence, as a result of which he comes to the solution of the mystery.
A mandatory crime in a detective story is murder.
In solving a given mystery, it is necessary to exclude all supernatural forces and circumstances.
Only one detective can act in a story — the reader cannot compete with three or four members of the relay team at once.
The perpetrator must be one of the most or least significant actors, well known to the reader.
An unacceptably cheap solution in which one of the servants is the culprit.
Although the perpetrator may have an accomplice, basically the story should tell about the capture of one person.
Secret or criminal communities have no place in the detective story.
The method of committing a murder and the method of investigation must be reasonable and scientifically justified.
For a quick-witted reader, the solution should be obvious.
There is no place in the detective story for literature, descriptions of painstakingly developed characters, and the coloring of the situation by means of fiction.
In no case can a criminal be a professional villain.
It is forbidden to explain the mystery by accident or suicide.
The motive of the crime is always of a private nature, it cannot be an espionage action, seasoned with any international intrigues, motives of secret services.
The author of detective stories should avoid all sorts of formulaic solutions and ideas."
The main literature (on the theoretical and methodological part):
1. Yu.Habermas. Modern is an unfinished project. //Yu.Habermas. Political works. - M.: Praxis, 2005.
2. Concepts of modernity.A retrospective of two traditions.//Y.Habermas.Political works.-M.:Praxis, 2005.
3.M.B.Yampolsky.Style and history.Buffon and Hegel. //M.B.Yampolsky.Spatial history.Three texts about history.-St. Petersburg.:Book workshops; Workshop "Session", 2013.- Cosmography and the labyrinth.
4. M.B.Yampolsky.Symbol. Hegel, Viollet-le-Duc, romanticism.//M.B.Yampolsky.Spatial history.Three texts about history.-St. Petersburg.:Book workshops; Workshop "Session", 2013.-Cosmography and the labyrinth.
5.M.B.Yampolsky.Style and historicism.Biedermeier.Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and others.//M.B.Yampolsky.Spatial history.Three texts about history.-St. Petersburg.:Book workshops; Workshop "Session", 2013.-Cosmography and the labyrinth.
6. O.N.Turysheva.Theory and methodology of foreign literary studies: studies.the manual.-M.:FLINT:Science, 2013
7.A.Buller.Introduction to the theory of history: studies.the manual.-M.:FLINT:Science, 2013.
8.A.Megill.Historical epistemology.-M.:"Canon +" ROOI "Rehabilitation", 2009
9.V.Bogdanov.From Herodotus to the Internet: essays on entertaining source studies.-M.: "The Whole world", 2014.
10.I.F.Petrovskaya. For the scientific study of history! On methods and techniques of historical research: A critical and methodological essay.-St. Petersburg: Publishing house "Petropolis", 2009
11.T.I.Zaitseva.Historiography.Foreign historiography.20th century.:Educational and methodical manual.Tomsk: Publishing house of TSPU, 2005.
12.E.E.Seidenshnur."War and Peace" by L.N. Tolstoy.The creation of a great book.-Moscow:Kniga, 1966.
13. O.Egoshina.Space actors. Oleg Borisov, Innokenty Smoktunovsky.//O.Egoshina.The first plots.The Russian scene at the turn of the Millennium.-Moscow:UFO, 2010.- Portraits.
14. L.E.Grinin.Periodization of history:theoretical and mathematical analysis.//History and mathematics.Problems of periodization of historical macro processes.-M.:KomKniga, 2006.
15. Features of the relationship between literature and reality. //Analysis of a literary work:studies.- the method.the manual/author-comp.S.M.Zayats.-M.:FLINT, 2018.- Fiction and life.
16. Analysis of a fragment (episode) of a prose work. //Analysis of a literary work:studies.- the method.the manual/author-comp.S.M.Zayats.-M.:FLINT, 2018.-The experience of analyzing a literary work.
17. V.S.Shutov. Theoretical models of totalitarianism.//Totalitarianism and totalitarian consciousness:collection of articles and conference materials.- Tomsk:Tomsk regional anti-Fascist Committee, 1996.
18.Yu.P.Zaretsky.Strategies for understanding the past.Theory, history, historiography.-M.:UFO, 2011.
19.R.G.Pihoja."Ideological discipline" in science.The defeat of the "new direction".//R.G.Pihoy.Moscow.Kremlin.Power.Forty years after the war, 1945-1985.-Moscow:Rus-Olympus, Astrel:AST, 2007.- From stability to stagnation (1969-early 1980s).
20.L.S.Klein.The torments of science: a scientist and power, a scientist and money, a scientist and morality.-Moscow:UFO, 2017.
21.S.B.Krikh.The ways of the historian.//S.B.Krikh, O.V.Metel.Soviet historiography of antiquity in the context of world historical thought.-M.:LENAND, 2020.
22.G.Iggers,E.Yang. Global history of modern historiography.-M.:"Canon +" ROOI "Rehabilitation", 2012.
23.In.A.Kanke.Philosophy of science: a concise encyclopedic dictionary.-M.:Omega-L, 2009
24.A.J.Toynbee.My view on history.//A.J.Toynbee.Civilization is facing the court of history. The World and the West.-M.:AST: Astrel; Vladimir: VKT, 2011. -Civilization before the court of history.
25.Yu.M.Lotman.Life and culture.//Yu.M.Lotman.Conversations about Russian culture: The life and traditions of the Russian nobility (18th-early 19th centuries).-St. Petersburg.:Azbuka,Azbuka-Atticus, 2015.
26.Yu.M.Lotman.A.S. Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin". Comment.-St. Petersburg.:Azbuka,Azbuka-Atticus,2016.
27. F.Fukuyama.Is Latin America's lag behind the United States due to the inferiority of its institutions?// F.Fukuyama.Lagging behind.-M.:Astrel, 2012.
28.P.Brandon.The decline and destruction of the British Empire 1781-1997.-M.:Astrel, 2011.
29.P.Weil, A.Genis.60th.The world of the Soviet man.-M.:AST:CORPUS,2014.
30.M.G.Kachurin. Literature of the second half of the 19th century. Russian Russian literature and the Russian Revolution. //M.G.Kachurin, D.K.Motolskaya.Russian literature: uch. for 9th grade.ms.shk.-M.:Enlightenment, 1982.
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32.P.Bogdanov.Directors of the Sixties.-M.:UFO, 2010.
33.L.A.Zaitseva.A screen image of the time of the thaw (60-80's).-M.; St. Petersburg.:Nestor-History, 2017
34.V.I.Fomin. The truth of the fairy tale. Cinema and folklore traditions.-M.: "Canon +" ROOI "Rehabilitation", 2012.
35.E.Dobrenko. The Museum of the Revolution: Soviet Cinema and the Stalinist historical narrative. Moscow:UFO, 2008.
36. A.Yakobidze-Gitman.The rise of phantasms. The Stalin era in post-Soviet cinema.-M.:UFO, 2015.
37.Yu.P.Tyurin.The death of crowned Russia: a screen about the death of the Romanov dynasty.-M.: "Canon +" ROOI "Rehabilitation", 2012.
38. A.G.Kolesnikova. "Battle after victory": The image of the enemy in Soviet feature films of the Cold War period.-Moscow:RSUH, 2017.
39.G.V.Dyatleva.The art of the Third Reich.-Rostov n/A: Phoenix, 2013
40. A.A.Polyakova. Propaganda of war in the cinema of the Third Reich.-M.:LLC "CPI "Mask"", 2013
41.A.Yurchak.It was forever, until it was over. The last Soviet generation.-Moscow:UFO, 2019.
42.I.P.Weinberg. A man in the culture of the ancient Near East.-M.: The main editorial office of Oriental literature, Nauka Publishing House, 1986.
43.L.Vinnichuk. People, customs and customs of Ancient Greece and Rome.-M.:Higher School, 1988.
44.Yu.A.Fedosyuk. What is unclear among the classics, or the Encyclopedia of Russian life of the 19th century.-M.:FLINT: Nauka, 2012.
45.O.I.Eliseev.The daily life of Russian literary heroes.18-the first third of the 19th century.-M.:Molodaya Gvardiya,2014.
46.M.Ossovskaya.Methodological notes on the identification of the social conditionality of ideology//M.Ossovskaya Street.The Knight and the bourgeois: Studies in the history of morality. -M.: Progress, 1987.
47.S.Pinker.The substance of thinking: Language as a window into human nature.-M.:URSS: LIBROCOM Book House, 2016.
48.Ya.Mortimer.Medieval England: a time Traveler's Guide.-Moscow:Eksmo, 2015.
49.M.Pasturo.The daily life of France and England during the time of the Knights of the Round Table.-M.:Molodaya Gvardiya, 2009.
50.M.-A.Polo de Beaulieu. Medieval France.-Moscow:Veche,2014.
51.L.Worsley.English house. An intimate story.-M.:Sinbad,2016.
52.A.Assman.Oblivion of history-obsession with history.-Moscow:UFO, 2019.
53.B.Hellman.Fairy tale and the past: The History of Russian children's literature.-M.:UFO, 2016.
54. T.Voronina.Literary representation and the formation of historical representations.//T.Voronina. To remember in our way: socialist realist historicism and the siege of Leningrad.-Moscow:UFO, 2018.-Literature in history, history in literature.
55. T.Voronina.The history of the USSR in a Soviet way.//T.Voronina.To remember in our way: socialist realist historicism and the siege of Leningrad.-M.:UFO, 2018.
56. O.Skonechnaya.Russian paranoid novel: Fedor Sologub, Andrey Bely, Vladimir Nabokov.-M.:UFO, 2015.
57.E.A.Polotskaya."The Cherry Orchard": Life in time.-M.:Nauka, 2004.
58.J.Chisholm.World history in dates.-M.: "Rosman", 1994.
Theoretical and methodological (4):
1. A.Megill. Historical epistematology.-M.:"Canon +" ROOI "Rehabilitation", 2009.
2. O.N.Turysheva. Theory and methodology of foreign literary studies: studies.the manual.-M.:FLINT:Nauka, 2013.
3. Y.Habermas. Modern is an unfinished project. Architecture is modern and postmodern. Concepts of modernity. // Yu.Habermas. Political works. -M.:Praxis, 2005.
4. M.B.Yampolsky. Cosmography and the labyrinth. //M.B.Yampolsky.Spatial history.Three texts about history.-St. Petersburg.:Book workshops; Workshop "Session", 2013.
Comparative historical (4):
1. P. Brandon. The decline and destruction of the British Empire. 1781-1997.-Moscow:AST:Astrel, 2011.
2.E.Kouti. Unkind old England.-St. Petersburg: BHV-Petersburg, 2016.
3.L.M.Shevchenko, I.N.Grozdova, E.F.Rogov. Great Britain. //Foreign Europe. Western Europe. Countries and peoples. Scientific-populus. Geogr.-ethnogr.ed. in 20 volumes.-M.:Mysl, 1979.
4.M.Ossovskaya. The Knight and the bourgeois: Studies in the history of morality. -M.: Progress, 1987.
Intertextual (8):
1.V.Irving. Sleepy Hollow. //V.Irving. Sleepy Hollow: short stories.-St. Petersburg, Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2019.
2.B.Stoker. Dracula.-St. Petersburg, Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2019.
3.E.A.Po. The fall of the House of Usher.//E.A. Po. The Fall of the House of Usher: a novel, short stories. - St. Petersburg: Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2018.
4.P.Merime. Locis.//P.Merime. Carmen and other short stories.-St. Petersburg: Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2016.
5.E.T.A. Hoffman. The entail.//E.T.A.Hoffman. Night sketches: short stories.- St. Petersburg: Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2017.
6.G.Leroux.The Phantom of the Opera.-St. Petersburg.:ABC, ABC-Atticus, 2017.
7.W.Collins. The woman in white.-St. Petersburg.:ABC, ABC-Atticus, 2018.
8. R.L. Stevenson. The strange story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.//R.L.Stevenson.The Strange Story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: novels and short stories.-St. Petersburg.:Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2016.
Text (4):
1.A.K.Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles (A.C.Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles). In English, Moscow:ICARUS Publishing House, 2015.
2. English with Sherlock Holmes. The Hound of the Baskervilles=Conan Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles.-Moscow:VKN Publishing House, 2019.-(Ilya Frank's method of educational reading).
3. A.K.Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles. Translated by N.Volzhina.// A.K.Doyle. The whole Sherlock Holmes: novellas, short stories.-St. Petersburg: CJSC "Trade and Publishing House "Amphora", 2014.
4.A.K.Doyle. The Hound of the Baskervilles. Translated by L.Brilova.//A.K.Doyle.The Sign of Four; The Hound of the Baskervilles: novels.- St. Petersburg.:ABC, ABC-Atticus, 2019.
Historical and biographical (2):
1. J.D. Carr. The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.// J.D.Carr, H.Pearson. Arthur Conan Doyle.-M.: Book, 1989.
2.H.Pearson. Conan Doyle. His life and work (chapters from the novel). // J.D.Carr, H.Pearson.Arthur Conan Doyle, Moscow: Kniga, 1989.
In the footsteps of the Hound of the Baskervilles
© Copyright: Иван Саунин2, 2024
Свидетельство о публикации №224092200028
Свидетельство о публикации №224092200028
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