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Abstract:

This article attempts to resolve the issue of V.P. Burenin’s negative attitude towards early Russian Symbolism. It is concluded that his struggle against this new artistic phenomenon rested on a contradiction between two cultural languages addressed to different kinds of readers. Burenin spoke to readers of “Novoe vremya”, including representatives of diverse Russian social strata of the late 19th century. He was guided by general understandability and accessibility, which the works of early Symbolists did not possess. As literature broke up into layers, Burenin solved the problem of translating ideas from elite literature into the unsophisticated reader’s language. His articles dissected and decomposed the language of the new literary movement, reduced the complex to the simple and the elevated to the banal, and also employed analogies to place obscure images on familiar ground. Burenin’s reviews of Z.N. Gippius’s short stories and D.S. Merezhkovsky’s fiction novel “Resurrection of the Gods” indicate that the new kind of prose was not to his liking. But the success of Merezhkovsky’s novel in Europe led Burenin to recognize the author’s merit, although he hinted at the borrowed elements in the novel. When considered from a journalistic perspective, the lack of a definitive stance, contradictions, ad hominem attacks and unfounded claims were not a drawback of Burenin’s publications, rather their advantage since they attracted readers and boosted the newspaper’s circulation. His articles served to shape the reputations of writers in popular belief, adding fame to their names and memorability to the titles of their works.

Keywords: V.P. Burenin, “Novoe vremya”, early Russian Symbolism, newspaper polemics, feuilleton, critical essay, writer’s reputation.