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Acknowledgements:

The research was carried out at the A.M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences with the financial support of the Russian Science Foundation (project No. 22-18-00347 “Ivan Bunin’s Early Work: Poetry, Prose, Criticism, Journalism, Translations (1883–1902)”).

Abstract:

This research explores the question of representation of Tolstoyan movement in the works of Ivan Bunin. The author of the article assumes that there is a contextual proximity between Tolstoyan and narodniks movements, a historical continuity, reflected in collective practices, religious foundations of “going out to the people”, and certain thematic connections. The last point is particularly noticeable in the study of early Bunin, who, as the analysis of biographical material shows, was influenced by both narodniks and Tolstoyans. A comparative analysis of the writer’s stories (“Tan’ka” (1892), “To the Edge of the World” (1894), “In the Country” (1895), “New Year” (1901), etc.) with the works of S. Karonin (“Stories about the Parashkin People” cycle (1879–1880), “From Below Upwards: The Story of a Worker” cycle (1883–1886)), essays by A.I. Ertel, and his novel “The Gardenins” (1889), along with texts by G.I. Uspensky (“The Power of the Land” (1882), “It Did Not Happen” (1882)), leads the researcher to a hypothesis about the transitional nature of early Bunin’s prose. In this prose, narodniks issues are transformed from a social program into the personal perception of the characters, and Tolstoyan elements are reduced to the characters’ inclination toward “simplification”, which is also highly individual. Such a “comprehensive” approach allows us to consider early Bunin as an independent figure, separated from both narodniks and Tolstoyan movements by an individualistic interpretation of “popular” issues, while interpreting them within the broader discourse of the late 19^th century.