The value method in literary studies (on the interpretation of N.A. Nekrasov's work in the axiological aspect)

Vei Sin'i PhD in Philology Postgraduate student, Department of the History of Russian Literature of the XIX Century, Faculty of Philology, Lomonosov Moscow State University. 518100, Kitai, spetsial'nyi raion, g. Shen'chzhen', ul. Tsin'syue, Raion Nan'shan', Tszin'lun, kv. C— 503, sinjivei@yandex.ru Other publications by this author

1.

The problems of literary axiology, the correlation of literary creativity, literary text and ethical values, which is at the center of our research, is one of the most ancient, the questions related to it were raised at the very first origins of philosophical thought. The two greatest minds of Ancient Greece and humanity as a whole saw this relationship differently. As we all remember well, Plato in the "State" considered it necessary to expel poets from a properly organized polis (state), since poetry and ethics are fundamentally opposed: "So will we not establish," says Socrates, "that all poets, starting with Homer, reproduce only the ghosts of virtue and everything else that serves the subject of their creativity, but the truth does not concern? It's like in the example we just gave: a painter will draw a shoemaker who will seem like a real shoemaker, and yet this painter knows nothing about shoemaking; and the viewers of his paintings, too, they judge only by the colors and outlines"^[1]. Poets only lie about the gods, bring confusion and temptation into the minds of citizens. Aristotle, as is also well known, treated art differently in his "Poetics". From his point of view, tragedy, showing passions and vices, simultaneously serves their "purification" (catharsis): "... Tragedy is the reproduction of an action serious and complete, having a certain volume, decorated with speech, its various types separately in different parts, — the reproduction of an action, not a story, performing through compassion and fear the purification of such feelings"^[2]. Thus, obviously, art can be preserved in an ideal state.

Actually, Plato and Aristotle have already, one might say, set the parameters of all discussions on the stated problem. These discussions were conducted throughout the history of the ancient world, in the early and late Middle Ages (when the fathers of the church discussed within the framework of theology, for example, the benefits and generally the permissibility for a Christian of reading Homer or Virgil, who sang of pagan gods), in the Renaissance and Enlightenment (it is easy to recall the preface by J.J. Rousseau to "Julia, or New Eloise", in which the author dissuades potential readers from reading his own novel, since such a pastime is obviously immoral)^[3]. One way or another, the main content of various treatises devoted to this topic fluctuated between the recognition that literature is capable of teaching good, educating its fans in a truly moral spirit, and the denial of any axiological value behind fiction.

In modern Russian literary studies, such discussions do not lose their relevance. One of the most active areas has been called "religious literary studies", whose representatives, such as I. A. Yesaulov^[4] M.M. Dunaev^[5], defend the point of view that all genuine literature has and even should have a Christian character, carry Christian moral principles. Accordingly, the presence of such is found in poets and writers who have never called themselves Christians, who have not declared their faith (for example, in A.A. Fet). Obviously, such researchers proceed from the ideas of some innate or inevitably "with mother's milk" already in childhood assimilated Christian worldview of the future writer, who fatally and inevitably transfers it into his works. This approach affected, in particular, non-racial studies. Its main representative is V.I. Melnik, who in numerous works sought to "reveal" in Nekrasov's poems and poems both religious Christian symbolism, and the Christian value picture of the world and human being in it, Christian axiology^[6]. Taking into account considerations about the correlation of the religious and general romantic mood of his worldview, inherited, in V.I. Melnik's opinion, from the poet's mother. There is no doubt that the high civic pathos of Nekrasov's poetry, which was completed under the influence of the poet's revolutionary-democratic environment, was formed on the basis of a "saint" already prepared in childhood, a religious-romantic worldview and perception of life as serving the weak and disadvantaged – in which Nekrasov's mother played the main role^[7] At the same time, analyzing the poem "Childhood" by N.A. Nekrasov, D.N. Rozhnov comes to the conclusion that in this work the poet, using Christian motives and images, lays in them an individual author's meaning, which is not identical to the Orthodox understanding, as a result of which the spiritual meaning of traditional Christian images and concepts is distorted in the minds of readers ^[8] .

Such a trend, however, precisely in the case of Nekrasov's poetry reveals its theoretical and "practical" weakness. Its biased nature is quite obvious: Christian religious values are recognized as the only possible ones, and any other ideas about ethics and morality are rejected as "false". Values are imposed on poets "without fail", while ignoring, somehow bypassing the facts of indifference or even contempt of a writer for the church and religion (including Nekrasov). The analysis of texts itself turns into a persistent search for symbolism in texts: often the researcher clings to a word or statement that is insignificant in the general context (in which the author habitually used some word that could have Christian connotations, for example, "cross" or "sin") and ignores everything that is in the same text contradicts such interpretations. Science is thus being replaced by ideological propaganda.

There is no doubt that in modern literary criticism there are also more balanced approaches to literary axiology, suggesting the possibility of the existence and coexistence of different and equal ethical value systems and the opportunity for the artist to express them in his work. These include the works of V.E. Khalizev, which found completion in his last book^[9]. There are also a number of other works in which literary axiology develops with restraint and thoughtfully. Thus, the view that is more characteristic of modern literary studies suggests that the value principle is not an organic, significant part of artistic works and, accordingly, its study is not worthy or, in any case, the primary task of literary studies and literary history (such include, for example, the works of Gasparov, Zholkovsky, etc., structuralism and poststructuralism) it has a fairly strong "opposition" in the modern scientific field.

For our work, however, a detailed review of new discussions on the topics of literary axiology will be superfluous. They are conducted on too abstract a field. It is much more useful to consider theoretical philosophical concepts created in the era of Nekrasov himself (or in the preceding one). Such concepts are closer to Nekrasov himself and at the same time give theoretical grounds for understanding his axiology. Turning to such concepts, we thereby simultaneously get the theoretical foundations for our work and have the opportunity not to forget the historical approach, to trace the genealogy of the Nekrasov value system and its connections with his poetics.

2.

The Russian social and aesthetic thought of the first half of the XIX century was characterized by the search for theoretical foundations for understanding the place of art in society and human life. In this search, she turned to German classical philosophy, which began after Winkelmann, who actually created this section of philosophy and seriously developed these issues. From the very beginning, therefore, there was an acute question about what connects aesthetics with ethics. The original source of wisdom was the philosophy of Kant, significant, for example, for Karamzin and Zhukovsky. However, it quickly proved unsuitable for the tasks set by Russian thought.

The fact is that Kant, who devoted the third "criticism" to aesthetic activity and aesthetic perception - "Criticism of the faculty of judgment", strictly separated the judgments of taste and artistic activity from both pure reason and "practical philosophy", from ethics. Defined through the concepts of "expediency without purpose", "disinterestedness" and subjective judgments, but claiming universal validity, aesthetics turned out, on the one hand, as if an intermediate member between scientific knowledge of the world and behavior based on the famous categorical imperative. On the other hand, aesthetic pleasure was connected with ethics only indirectly – through some analogy: perhaps a person disposed to the contemplation of beauty is also disposed to moral behavior, it is potentially possible in such a way that a developed aesthetic sense leads to a better development of a person's civic consciousness: "So, I say: the beautiful is a symbol morally good; and only for this reason (because such an attitude is natural for everyone, and each person expects it as a fulfillment of duty from another) it pleases and claims the consent of the other; at the same time, the soul is aware of a certain ennobling and elevation above the simple receptivity of pleasure from sensory impressions and judges the dignity of others by a similar maxim of its ability to judge"^[10]. John R. Silbe believes that "the concept of the highest good (goodness of perfection) has the meaning of the core in Kant's ethics"^[11]. In contrast, Lara Denis emphasizes the "duty of self-improvement" (Perfect duties to oneself) Priority in Kant's ethics^[12].

Such constructions remained important for Russian aesthetic thought for a long time. Echoes of such a concept can be found in the critical and theoretical constructions of critics of "pure art", for example, Druzhinin. However, it is obvious that they will not help much in understanding Nekrasov's poetry. It cannot be said that such an understanding of the connection between aesthetics and ethics was completely alien to him. He was able to perceive, for example, Fet's poetry in this way. Nevertheless, for him as a practitioner, such a concept is inapplicable.

Another thinker who became extremely important to the Russians was Friedrich Schelling. His fascination with philosophy was very significant and, perhaps, indirectly influenced the work of Nekrasov during his early collection "Dreams and Sounds". As is well known, for Schelling, art not only meant a lot, but stood at the top of all possible ways of knowing the world, combining the sensual and rational principles. Art represented, from Schelling's point of view, the only possible synthesis: "Art is the highest for a philosopher precisely because it opens to his gaze the holy of holies, where, as it were, what is divided in nature and in history, what is in life and in activity, as well as in the eternal and primordial unity, burns in eternal and primordial unity. thinking, forever must avoid each other^[13]." The initial area of the artist is the area of the sensual, in which he sees through and makes the area of the ideal visible, leaving both as merged and at the same time infinitely distant from each other: "Every beautiful picture appears as if due to the fact that the invisible barrier separating the real world and the ideal world is removed; it serves us as an enlightenment, in which images and regions of the fantasy world clearly arise, only dimly shining through the veil of the real world"^[14]. This ideal world appears in a work of art not as a consequence of conscious intention, but as if by itself, unconsciously, thanks to the mysterious property of genius, which, precisely because it renounces claims to thought, reaches the infinite depth of wisdom: "The identity of conscious and unconscious activities is reflected in a work of art. However, their opposite is infinite, and it is removed without any participation of freedom. The main feature of the work of art, therefore, is the unconscious infinity (synthesis of nature and freedom). The artist, as it were, instinctively brings into his work, in addition to what is expressed by him with obvious intention, a certain infinity, which no finite mind is able to fully reveal"^[15].

However, at the same time, Schellingian aesthetics significantly more radically than Kant's broke with the world of the moral universe and partially refused any role in the knowledge of the surrounding world in the same sense and meaning in which science cognizes it. This made her an exponent of what can be called a romantic worldview, in which an intuitive attitude to the world, irrationalism, came to the fore. Art, to which Schelling's concepts are applicable, actually refused any teaching role and ultimately led to immoralism, to the poetization of evil. There was no doubt about individualism and the refusal of any participation in the social side of human existence. All this made Schellingianism unsatisfactory for Russian social and aesthetic thought, which was looking for some other meaning of art in general (and literature in particular).

Accordingly, the next thinker who had a significant and, one might say, decisive influence on Russian thought was Hegel. It is to his philosophy that the most progressive and liberal-minded Russian publicists come, who had a huge influence, including on the mature poetry of Nekrasov. And it is Hegel who gives us theoretical tools that are truly suitable and adequate for analyzing the axiology of Nekrasov's work. Hegel attaches less importance to art than Schelling. It does not stand with him at the highest stage of the development of the human spirit. Philosophy and religion occupy this place. It is not awarded such an honor precisely because it is awarded in Schelling – because it cannot overcome the sensual principle in itself, thereby yielding to pure thought, freed from the accidental in itself and in its object, which it comprehends: the Hegelian idea of beauty as a form of "concrete contemplation and representation of the absolute spirit in itself as an ideal - a concrete form generated by the subjective spirit, in which natural spontaneity is only a sign of an idea; so enlightened for its expression by the creatively embodying spirit that this form does not indicate anything other than an idea"^[16].

In return, however, art gets the role that Schelling denied her. It becomes one of the tools of cognition of reality. At the same time, it is important to understand that Hegel understands reality not just as an existing being, not just as an incoherent set of empirically obtained "data", impressions and conclusions. The reality of an object does not mean its mere presence before the eyes, for example, but its coincidence with its concept: "Reality is the immediate unity of essence and existence, or internal and external. The discovery of the real is the real itself, so that it also remains essential in this discovery, and only in so far as it is present in the immediate external existence.Existence is the immediate unity of being and reflection; it is therefore a phenomenon that arises from the base and sinks into the base. The real is the positivity of this unity, the relation that has become identical with itself"^[17]. An object, a specific instance of any kind, may not coincide with a reasonably comprehensible concept of its own, for example, it may be defective or be at the moment when we contemplate it, only at the stage of its formation (we can see a bud that has yet to become a flower and thereby get closer to its "the concept"). It can be understood accordingly in such a way that art, according to Hegel, turns out to be further from the "concept", but closer to the concrete "definition" in which the object is now located. If philosophy approaches the abstract essence of things and is complacent about their current existence (seeing their concept in them), then art is closer to their current existence, since, as already mentioned, it has not got rid of the sensual. This means that if a wise man is supposed to remain calm, looking at the imperfection of the present world, then the artist can express another dialectical moment – indignation, denial, experience of imperfection and, even outwardly, but unfairness.

It was precisely this theoretical basis that answered the search for Russian thinkers. It was on this basis that the critic and publicist V.G. Belinsky, the most important for Nekrasov, formed his aesthetic principles, which organically incorporated the value principle. In the articles of the early 1840s, Belinsky gradually puts forward the concept of art as the poetry of reality (primarily in the famous "Pushkin cycle"). This concept reconciles, combines the requirement of "reflection" of reality and its evaluation. Ultimately, it combines realism in relation to reality and a strict system of moral and ethical values. It is thanks to Hegelian constructions in the concept of reality that Belinsky immediately combines the idea of "reflection", a truthful representation of everything that "exists" in it, and the idea of evaluation. A realist artist has the right and even the duty not only to describe truthfully, but also to "judge" what he describes from the point of view of the correspondence of the described objects to their "concepts". Reality, therefore, is at the same time an idea of what the state of things is and what it should be.

Compared to the romantic criticism of reality, it is impossible not to see a very serious shift here. If the romantic poet and thinker judges reality and ultimately "curses" it from the point of view of the "ideal", "higher values" that exist in his soul, are opposed to this world, then the "poet of reality" judges reality from the point of view of values and ideals that are the foundation of this reality itself, but in they have not yet been implemented. Accordingly, unlike a romantic poet, who may well remain passive, feel contempt for the world (recall the most important concept of romantic irony), it is quite possible for a realist poet to have an active attitude to the imperfection of the world, even if activity can be expressed in emotions (for example, anger at injustice being committed in front of his eyes). The poet has the right to this by his "nature", he has such a right to an imperfect, not fully enlightened look, a look that cannot tear itself away from the feelings that suffering causes, unable to overcome the feeling of pity that this suffering causes. He is not able and – once again – should not be able to see not the object itself, but its concept. He sees both the object and the concept and cannot connect them in his thinking (that is, according to Hegel, he sees the bud with his eyes, mentally knows about the flower, but instead of calmly admitting that the bud is so pathetic and touching simply because it has not reached flowering, has not developed to its concept, but it will inevitably reach him, he feels sorry for this touching lump). Hence the indignation that only a philosopher can overcome in himself. Hence the opportunity to directly proclaim, affirm the highest values that the poet knows about and longs for: "It is good for those who, not content with real reality, carried in their soul the ideal of a better existence, lived and breathed one thought — to help, to the extent of the means given to them by nature, the realization of the ideal on earth, — early in the morning he went out to general work with a sword, and with a word, and with a spade, and with a broom, depending on what he could do, and who came to his brothers not only for feasts of joy, but also for crying and lamenting ..."^[18].

Thanks to Belinsky and his enormous influence on Russian intellectual life, such ideas became extremely significant, one might even say dominant in Russian criticism and aesthetics, largely determined its development. In particular, we see their development (and, undoubtedly, simplification) in another critic and art theorist, also extremely significant for Nekrasov – N.G. Chernyshevsky. In his, one might say, sensational treatise, dissertation "Aesthetic relations of art to reality", he directly proclaims not only the primacy of reality over art, but also the need for art not only to reflect reality, but also to criticize it, to pass judgment on it: "Art only reminds us with its reproductions of what is interesting for he tries to introduce us to some extent to those interesting aspects of life that we have not had the opportunity to experience or observe in reality"^[19]. The purpose of art, thus, appears as if subordinate to the tasks of life itself: "Reproduction of life is a general, characteristic feature of art, which constitutes its essence; often works of art have another meaning — an explanation of life; they often have the meaning of a verdict on the phenomena of life"^[20]. In the work of Chernyshevsky, we can say that some logical steps leading to this conclusion are omitted. This is done precisely because such a right to criticize reality seems to Chernyshevsky to have been "proven" for a long time.

Chernyshevsky adds Feuerbach's ideas and his philosophical anthropologism to the Hegelian concepts in their origins. It is argued that it is man who is the highest embodiment of everything that is valuable in the world. This is also expressed in any religion in which the ideal of man is embodied in the image of God: "The highest, true essence of Christianity, purified from theological elements and contradictions, flows precisely from the heart, from the inner need for good, for suffering and death for the sake of people, from the divine urge to do good, wishing to make everyone happy, not excluding even the most rejected and despicable, from the moral duty of charity in the highest sense, when it became by inner necessity, that is, by the heart, from the human essence, which is revealed as the heart and through the heart"^[21]. Thus, the circle closes. Any person, including an artist, poet, writer, a priori become bearers of higher values and their embodiment and are entitled, speaking about their problems, to speak on behalf of higher values.

All that has been said now allows us to outline a general idea of the place in Nekrasov's poetry of values, ideals and appeals to the reader to actively intervene in the surrounding reality. From the romantic Schellingian idea of the opposition of higher values to the "world", their impracticability in this reality and hence the predominance of the idea of escapism, withdrawal from the world and ultimately the desired death, Nekrasov moves to the "poetry of reality". This poetry assumes, firstly, that the poet has his own experience of "contact" with the world, with the phenomena of reality, while with those of its "definitions" that are as far as possible from its "concept" (that is, simply speaking, acquaintance with the world of the oppressed, humiliated, deprived of the opportunity to realize in his own life the true purpose of human existence). Secondly, the ability to keenly empathize with life as it is is necessary. In this case, the poet's own experience of experiencing humiliation and poverty (being in this "skin") becomes an important help. Thirdly, it is necessary to have a higher idea of what is the ideal of human existence, and what conditions are necessary for its implementation in reality. The poet (as taught by Chernyshevsky and Feuerbach) does not necessarily have to take these ideas from "books", that is, be familiar with some philosophical concepts. His knowledge can be intuitive, he just needs to turn to himself, to his feeling (including, by the way, religious – according to Feuerbach, as we have seen, a person in this case is dealing, so to speak, with himself). It is important to be "honest" and follow the ideas of reason. If these "ingredients" are present, the depicted reality will be worthy of the highest representation of it. It becomes a synthesis of its description and moral requirements for it. These same ingredients determine the poet's right to make demands on the reader – to actively work on the transformation of reality, to strive to realize the ideal of human existence in his own life.

Of course, this also determines the order of our analysis of Nekrasov's works. Moving from the first to the second, and then to the third component of his realism, the researcher should strive to establish the relationship in which they are in specific works in creativity as a whole, which methods of ethical preaching the poet prefers (direct or from the opposite, for example), to what extent he is able to break away from reality and soar into the realm of ideal requirements, etc. This, however, already applies to the practical part of our study.