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Abstract:

The article considers the short stories of the 1890–1900s as the beginning of shaping his style by Bunin. The work defines the principle of Bunin’s style which is the principle of “related antithesis”. Based on the worldview of the author, this principle implies the mutual attraction of poles which are sharply outlined and enlarged in their opposition. The short stories of the 1890s witness only the early tendency to relate oppositions: they do not have high expressiveness and possess only surface mechanisms of approach (various repeats), which results in an accidental adjacency of different objects and phenomena. The short stories of the 1900s make the style principle of Bunin more definite and persistent. The author changes his striving to show the integrity and qualitative diversity of the world for a creative focus on the dialectical unity of sharply outlined oppositions, putting emphasis on their immediate convergence. The ways and devices of the “related antithesis” principle are becoming more various and can be found on different levels of structure: the artistic time continuum and place, the syntax of short stories and the author’s discourse, of course. Now by the increased number of oxymorons the author aims for a sharp convergence of opposite poles in one point. The work concludes that the early prose of Ivan Bunin shows how the “related antithesis” principle is becoming the basic style device providing the aesthetic integrity of his artistic mode.