Transformation of the Published Texts by Bunin in 1920–1930: From the First Publication to the Collection of Works

Information about the author:

Dmitry D. Nikolaev, DSc in Philology, Leading Research Fellow, A.M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Povarskaya 25 a, 121069 Moscow, Russia.

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8449-4682

E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

Abstract:

The article explains the main trends of Bunin’s work in emigration on already published texts. The first publications of works in periodicals, publications in Bunin’s books and in the collected works are compared. New versions of pre-revolutionary works, and the principles of transformation of texts written already in exile are analyzed. It is shown that Bunin continued to work carefully on the texts of already published works, even those that critics assessed as “perfect”. At the same time, Bunin did not just create an increasingly “perfect” work from the point of view of style. Both before the revolution and in exile Bunin takes into account the audience that a particular publication is aimed at — its age, national, social, and ideological features, making the text more “modern” in terms of a specific time of perception.