CC BY
39
References:
1. Abdullaev F. Khorezm dialects. - Tashkent, 1961. - 346 p. (In Uzbek).
2. Beketov B. The Kazakh language in Karakalpakstan. - Alma-Ata, 1990. - 128 p. (In Kazak).
3. Dictionary of dialectology. - Alma-Ata, 2007. - 800 p. (In Kazak).
4. Junisov N. Regional peculiarities of the national language. - Alma-Ata, 1981. - 136 p. (In Kazak).
5. Nurmagambetov A. The Kazakh language in Turkmenistan. - 1974. - 230 p. (In Kazak).
Maslov Gleb Nikolaevich, The University of Bologna, Doctoral student, Department of Interpreting and Translation E-mail: [email protected]
Anthropology of Russian Symbolism
Abstract: The article analyzes philosophico-anthropological views of the Russian symbolists. The anthropological ideals of Alexander Blok, Andrei Bely and Vyacheslav Ivanov are revealed. Keywords: Russian symbolism, philosophical anthropology.
Polemicizing with the supporters of the pragmatic role of artistic creation, Vyacheslav Ivanov, one of the theorists of the Russian symbolism, wrote that «man is the only subject of any art, although, not the benefit of the man, but his mystery» [1, vol. 2, 615].
Russian symbolism manifested itself not only as an artistic movement, but also as a worldview school. In our opinion, its anthropological grounds were not sufficiently researched in the complex worldview structure of symbolism (except for the attempts of anthroposophical interpretation of the heritage of Andrei Bely). Despite the following of same artistic movement, Alexander Blok, Andrei Bely and Vyacheslav Ivanov held significantly different views on both the reasons of decrease of the humanistic component in the culture of early XX century and proposed ways of coping with anthropological crisis.
Since the heritage of symbolism is going to be considered from philosophical anthropological point, let us make a few preliminary remarks about philosophical anthropology. Briefly, its subject lies in the philosophical consideration of a man. Such tautological definition confuses any researcher: isn't the entire scale of humanitarian knowledge (history, philology, psychology etc.) about the man? Furthermore, aren't chemistry and physics about the world
the man perceives it, i. e. isn't it a part of his nature? How to define anthropology? One can agree that anthropology is a biological science about the evolution of the Homo species and its racial variations, or a science about the lifestyle of so-called uncivilized tribes, or, simply, the collection of human types (the practice of literature). By contrast, philosophical anthropology begins with the solution of two tasks: firstly, at least approximate indication of the place of the man in ontology, clarifying the interrelations in the triad World-Man-God, and, secondly, determination of an ideal type of the man. Both, ontology and ideal-typical portrait of the man change from culture to culture.
Thus, the Renaissance era put in the forefront the idea of the man-co-creator, who improves, completes the world created by God with his own activity. The man separated from God by a large gap in the Middle Ages became closer to the Absolute during the Renaissance era; he rose in his own eyes and became the subject of pride for himself. The man is a godlike agent of cultural transformation — this was the main idea of the humanism. The interest in the «book of nature» as a source of knowledge of God promoted the development of natural sciences, but, by the beginning of XIX century, the scientific paradigm drove the idea of God out of its core to the
periphery forsaken by all and the man had to look for the grounds of own value in himself. Industrialization gave birth to a mass man, a specialist in whom the Renaissance ideal of universal knowledge split up. By the beginning of XX century, the concept of the man was in crisis, because it was exposed to the attacks of both theocentric and anthropocentric variants of ontology. Russian symbolism tried to harmonize these approaches in its teaching about the man.
Revelation of a significant feature of the man, such universal and indestructible quality that makes him stand out among other creatures and elements of the world is an important task of anthropology. Either the capacity for a goal-oriented action or the use of a letter to fix and render information seeks this role in philosophy [2]. It appears interesting to clarify what aspect of human nature was considered essential by the symbolists.
Regarding the ideal type of the man, for the vast majority of movements of the European culture raised on Christianity, the search for anthropological ideal was not difficult — Jesus was one, the earthly embodiment of Christ. Same dominance is in the Russian new religious consciousness and symbolism. At the same time, there is quite a notable exception: Alexander Blok. Yes, he was born in an Orthodox family; yes, he had a marriage in a church and frequently addressed the image of Christ in his art. Nevertheless, Blok professes his conscious distancing from Christianity: «I have non- (anti?) Christian consciousness» [3, 153]. And, even more definitely: «I do not believe in God and can't believe, because to believe in God, does it mean to have weary, lyrical, poor thoughts about Him» [3, 124]. And more: «... I will not go to Christ to cure myself; I don't know Him and have never known» [4, vol. 8, 105]. Blok is against the obedience of artistic imagination to religious schemes: «... Thinking highly of the lyrical manner of the soul that shall defeat lyrical immorality <.> I don't fancy it when one attempts to solve everything with means outside lyrics, even if by "a hail promised by religions"» [3, 344].
Blok confesses that his main support is the belief in himself: «... I believe in myself very much, <...> I feel some healthy integrity inside myself and a capacity and ability to be a free, independent and
honest man» [3, 324]. Thus, Blok denies the strategy of conformity unto Christ and looks for support in his own self. This choice is the choice of the path of individualism. Like humanist, the poet aspires to maximally unlock his gift, his virtue (virtu), manifesting himself, his fundamental essence as a lirist. Lyrist is a personal anthropological ideal of Blok. The only hope and support of the lyrist is himself, anthropological completness of his essence. This requires a clarification. Despite his non-Christian and non-theist credo, Blok had mystical sense of the world; although, this «other reality» was realized by him as non-personalized force, «Unknown Dreadful» [3, 325], terrifying and punishing, which he is protected from by the lyrical gift, «sleepy blanket»: «As for mystery, I know it is real and dreadful, and that it will punish me» [3, 253]. Lyrical poet is a traveler in a special reality, the door to which opens through taking the inward turn to self, in «microcosm»: «Macrocosm for our <lyric poet> is foreign» [4, vol. 5, 134] to such extent that, eventually, capable of «only internal absolute life», the poet perishes as an instrument, «which rusts and loses richness of sound in the conditions of the surrounding external life» [4, vol. 7, 405].
The task of achieving own ideal cannot be solved by someone else as any task of self-realization. Passionate pursue of own purpose to be a lyrical poet tells about a powerful impact of the Renaissance idea of the humanism on Blok, which, relying on the individualism, collapses under the weight of human mass in the era of revolutions. These phenomena are considered in detail in the article «Collapse of humanism» (1919) written by Blok. It might appear that in this work Blok acknowledges the defeat of the personal anthropological ideal — individualism. In fact, the stage of world history is captured by the crowds and loners-specialists confront it. Blok makes a paradox statement that «civilization of the mass is not only impossible, but also isn't required» [4, vol. 6, 99], depriving the specialists of their faith in their social calling. The ground of such decisive judgement for Blok lies in his support of the idea of contrasting civilization and culture. The latter is understood as spontaneous and natural force uniting various aspects of human life with a single bursting; and civilization is understood as
rationalization and abandonment «by the spirit of music» [4, vol. 6, 103-105]. By the criterion of closeness to culture, one can develop an anthropologic stratification according to Blok's concept: spontaneous public masses, keepers of the spirit of music, are closer to culture than civilized bourgeois. Only rare representatives of «catacomb» culture understand art as «the voice of powers and spontaneous force» [4, vol. 6, 109]. The very sensitivity to power, absolute will, which is defined by Blok as music, sets the vector of anthropologic development. Having overcome many previous life forms — animal and social, the man, according to Blok, becomes an artist [4, vol. 6, 114].
But how did this prophecy change Blok's view on his own self, his individualistic credo? In our opinion, it did not; it only manifested his idea about himself as an artist, anthropological norm of the future.
According to Blok, a poet is a translator of true reality, musical in nature: «What is a poet? A man who writes verses? Of course, not. Poet is <...> the carrier of the rhythm» [4, vol. 7, 105]. In Blok's thoughts, harmony obtained by the poet performs the selection picking «something more interesting than average human from the pile of human slam» [4, vol. 6, 165], to give birth to a new human type. Thus, in Blok's anthropology, the selection of human creatures takes place not according to the criteria of biological, economic or social adaptability, but according to the degree of artistic ability of being in harmony with invisible subbase of all phenomena, uncontrollable spontaneous force — music: «At bottomless depth of the spirit, where a man ceases to be a man, at depth, unreachable for the state and society, created by civilization, the sound waves roll» [4, vol. 6, 143]. Thus, the artist in the depth of his or her being is anarchic, asocial and dehumanized (overhumanized). But, the main thing — music, identical to reality, opens for him due to afferent immersion in Self.
But, music was never an instrument of loss of individuality and trans-personal experiences for Blok as it is typical for the anthropology of Vyacheslav Ivanov. Unlike Blok, metaphysical nature of the man of a thinker Vyacheslav Ivanov is within Christian doctrine interpreted by him through the projection
on the most exotic phenomena of culture — from ancient Dionysianism to Nietzscheanism and psychology ofJung. However, the richness of interpretations does not distract Ivanov from the general vector of consideration of the man through the prism of dogmatic history of the lapse from virtue, penance and salvation. The main sign of improper state of the man is the feeling of being an orphan, separation from God (disbelief), nature (combination of impenetrable objects) and other people. The ideal state of the man is impossible without acceptance of everything to «put the world in the heart» [1, vol. 1, 829] (let's pay attention to the fact that the home of the world is in the heart, not the mind). According to Ivanov, in the classic ontological triad God-World-Man, the latter enters the conflict with all elements including his own self. Ivanov writes that «there is no mysterious life in the man without defiance of God» [1, vol. 3, 80]. In history, the defiance of God was expressed in the fearless competition with God in the period of humanism that was subject to the attack by the theory of Overman [1, vol. 1, 836]. Ivanov considers both, secular humanism and the concept of Overman as deadended because they isolate from God [1, vol. 3, 108]. Proclamation of the man as supreme and final value by humanism, according to Ivanov, blocked the development of culture: «For humanism, the disclamation of own self would be the surmounting of the man» [1, vol. 3, 438]. Nietzsche delivered humanism of suicide killing the Renaissance doctrine of Overman theories. But, according to Ivanov, this theory is isolating; it only sets movement towards Overman but not towards God. Religious humanism within the frames of Christianity is the right solution for Iva-nov. Non-acceptance of the second element of ontological triad — world (nature) provokes immersion in Self coinciding with the testament of Novalis to search for God in the depth of own heart, where personal meets super-personal.
As for the third element of ontological triad — the man, Ivanov claims that disunion of people will be solved in the finale of meta-history, when the mankind becomes one Man, one Adam [1, vol. 4, 485], who, in turn, will become «the body of Christ» [1, vol. 3, 465]. This concept is based on cabalistic idea
ofAdam Kadmon and ancient idea of Panathropism: «... Name to the earth and world is Pananthropos» [1, vol. 3, 118].
It should be noted that throughout his life Iva-nov concentrated on the desire to overcome isolation in the individual human body. His binding of Dionysianism with Christianity (in fact, in both religions God is a victim whose flesh and blood is savored by adepts) had hope for a stronger unity of the individuals in transpersonal religious communities, to the extent of transpersonal states of consciousness typical for the bacchants. Available reconstructions of Dionysian orgies allow assuming that the feeling of loss of fleshly border between individuals was achieved through dances and dithyrambic chants due to hyperventilation of brain. At the peak of activity, the participants experienced merging in choir that performed as a unified subject.
The anthropology of Ivanov was a variant of the theory of unity, total project, where in the finale of historic process the Panantropos was identified with the nature and the Body of Christ, i. e. the ontologi-cal triad turnedi nto monad and, thus, anthropological ideal — deification of the man was achieved.
Another variant of anthropology, where the man was placed in the focus of any theoritisation is found in Andrei Bely's works. Two ideologemes defining anthropology of Bely are rooted in the concept of the Divine Humanity by Vladimir Solovyov : firstly, final harmonization of dissociated personalities; secondly, theurgic role of the mankind. These are central topics for the «Argonauts» group, which the poet was the soul of. Young thinkers attempted to ground the possibility of preservation of individuality in the final unity of the mankind proposed by the theurgic project. The use of Nietzschean individualism and with the universalism ofVladimir Solovyov was justified with the support of the results of the works by N.V. Bugaev, the father of Andrei Bely, the dean of physics and mathematics department of the Moscow University [5].
Interest in the variability of human personality drafted in the «Emblem studies of the sense» was further developed in the works written after becoming acquainted with anthroposophy and its founder Rudolf Steiner. The problem of polyphonism of
personality dominates during this period: «Neither "Self " is expressed in personality, but in the gradation of personalities, each of which has its own role» [6, 420], «... individual is always the collective» [6, 421]. Apparently, the anthroposophy of Steiner had fundamental influence on Bely or, if we may, came into resonance with own ideas of the poet. Theoretical interest in the full transformation of the man's essence sounding in tune with symbolist program defined the openness ofA. Bely to practical anthro-posophic exercises able to influence the intimate parts of soul and spiritual organization. Bely tries to destroy the border between the man and those opposing him, humanize extra-human.
In the solution of the problem of subject-object dichotomy, Bely follows the steps of earlyJ.G. Fichte who overcame both «thing in itself» and psychophysical duality of the world with the help of imma-nentization of the external world («not — self») in «Self» based on the fact that the world is proclaimed as the result of the activity of imagination. Farther perspective of merging of individual «Self» with the Absolute is achieved through the growth of self-consciousness, which, in turn, is possible as a result of productive activity of imagination. Any experience is excess except for the experience of thought [7, 118-135].
Eventually, world view is the result of construction of a building from the elements of the world, which are «mirrors the builder — self-conscious "Self "» [8, 21]. That is, the reality is generated by the consciousness. It's a vicious circle. In the world of Bely the man who wants to be is sentenced to imagination. It is imagination that «dissolves» thickened reality for forming the new World from this moving material of thought: «... Our consciousness can penetrate our unconsciousness ... we will finally find those forms of consciousness, while they are closed and called a dead world, which are death and which we carry inside as a skeleton... We will overwhelm the entire realty and, according to the words of Apocalypse, the very death will be pushed into fire» [9, 91]. Cognition through identification with the cognizable, intuitive penetration is the method of occultism: «Man is a worm who transmits all worlds. Man follows the path to
become the world and, having become the world, stand above the world» [10, 141-142]. The image about «the travel of the consciousness» in the kingdoms of nature described by Bely coincides with phenomenological description of trans-personal LSD-therapy conducted by Stanislav Grof [11]. Thus, in the anthropologic concept of Bely, we find one more total project guided by monistic will to the activity of only self-conscious Self aimed at devouring the entire reality. Let us summarize it. One can note that anthropological prospects are seen by Ivanov and Bely in monistic equality of elements of the ontological triad God-Man-World; herewith, according to Bely, consciousness is the agent of such transformation, whereas, Ivanov puts emphasis on
fleshly and heart openness. Solving the problem of harmonization of an individual and the collective, Bely and Ivanov rely on opposite intentions. If, in the concept of Pananthropos, Ivanov is oriented to the «dissolution» of self in others, the Self-conscious Theurge of Bely is a subject, who aimed at perceiving the other as a variant of only Self. But Blok remains an individualist showing an example of a man convinced that his loneliness, non-coincidence with others, non-affiliation with the group allow fulfilling the purpose of an artist. We reckon that out of three proposed images of the man — Pananthropos by Ivanov, Self-conscious Theurge by Bely and Blok's Artist, only Blok's project can be really fulfilled within the frames of a human life.
References:
1. 2.
3.
4.
5.
Ivanov V. I. Sobranie sochinenij T.1-4. - BryusseF : Foyer Oriental Chrétien, 1971-1987. Petrov M. K. Yazyk. Znak. Kul'tura. - M.: Nauka, 1991.
Andrej Belyj i Aleksandr Blok. Perepiska, 1903-1919 . - M.: Progress-Pleyada, 2001. Blok A. A. Sobranie sochinenij: V 8 t. - M.-L.: Goslitizdat, 1960-1963.
Chistyakova E.I. Simvol kak chislo v teorii simvolizma: (Po povodu filosofskix razmyshlenij Andreya Belogo)//Filosofskaya i sociologicheskaya. mysl '. - Kiev, 1989. - N 6. - S. 96 Belyj A. Simvolizm kak miroponimanie - Moskva : Respublika, 1994.
Maslov G. N. Strategii myshleniya i dejstviya v russkoj filosofii nachala XX veka. - M. : Dialog-MGU, 1997.
Belyj A. Osnovy moego mirovozzreniya.// Literaturnoe obozrenie, 1995, № 4-5. S. 13-37. Belyy A. Kul'tura mysli.//Filosofskaya i sotsiologicheskaya mysl', 1989, № 6. S. 92-95.
10. Belyj A. Ritm i dejstvitel'nost'//Kul'tura kak esteticheskaya problema. - M., 1985.
11. Grof S. Oblasti bessoznatel'nogo: opyt issledovaniya LSD-terapii. Global'nye problemy i obshhechel-ovecheskie cennosti. - M.: Progress, 1990. S. 437-454.
6.
7.
8. 9.
