About the author:
Olga A. Blinova, PhD in Philology, Associate Member of the Research Units CREE EA4513, INALCO, Grands Moulins 65, 75214 Paris Cedex 13, France; GEO UR1340, University of Strasbourg, René Descartes 22, BP 80010, 67084 Strasbourg Cedex, France.
ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9829-7935
E-mail:
Abstract:
Borrowed from Aristotle, the dichotomy of male and female principles is widely exploited by representatives of the Silver Age to talk about the universe, being and artistic creation. Based on the analysis of the incarnations of the two fundamental principles in Zinaida Gippius’s poetry, the article shows how, hidden behind the apparent conformism, her system of poetic images undermines the androcentric foundations of the philosophical-artistic thought of her time. It is shown that instability of gendered boundaries are achieved through the poet’s use of two processes: the first consists in the association of the distinctive qualities and attributes of one principle with the bearers characteristic of the opposite principle; the second brings together, in a single phenomenon or in one being, the specific qualities of the two principles. Special attention in the study is paid to the use of grammatical genders and, especially to the neutral gender to which Gippius gives, in her poetic world, the cosmogonic role of chaos. In conclusion, it is pointed out that the association of chaos with the neutral leads to the attenuation of the initial dichotomy and to the rehabilitation of the feminine principle.