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Abstract:

The article analyzes early versions (drafts and first edition) of Leonid Andreyev’s play “To the Stars” (1906). In these texts of 1905, stylistic elements are found that are characteristic of the poetics of expressionism, which will manifest itself in full force in the later plays “The Life of Man” (1907) and “King-Hunger” (1908). The early version of “To the Stars” is marked by the depersonalization of peasant characters and the reduction of their monologues to speech clichés and folklore formulas. The common source of both the earliest and already mature manifestations of expressionist poetics in Andreyev’s drama is his story “The Red Laugh”. The similarity of the individual stylistic principles in all these works is emphasized by a prominent motive that is transmitted from one version to another — the hatred of commoners for the bookish wisdom of masters. However, in the early version of “To the Stars” the author felt a dissonance between the style of the fragments reflecting the street, “common folk layer” of the play, and its main core, potentially representing the daring thoughts of the intelligentsia, a lofty dispute, symbolically limited by a stuffy office space. This forced the author to revise the early edition, completely clearing it of innovations.

Keywords: Leonid Andreyev, Dramaturgy, Expressionism, Textology, “The Red Laugh”, “To the Stars”, “The Life of Man”, “King-Hunger”.