Title of the article:

FEATURES OF ANIMALISTIC IMAGES` FUNCTIONING IN THE ART OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE MODERN PAGAN MOVEMENT

Author(s):

Sofya V. Pepelyaeva

Roman V. Shizhenskiy

Information about the author/authors

Sofya V. Pepelyaeva — PhD in Philology, Associate Professor, Nizhny Novgorod State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Il'inskaya St. 65, 603950 Nizhny Novgorod, Russia; Samara State Transport University, Komsomol'skaia Pl. 3, 603011 Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. E-mail: sofia87@mail.ru

Roman V. Shizhenskiy — PhD in History, Associate Professor, Nizhny Novgorod State Pedagogical University, Ulyanova St. 1, 603005 Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. E-mail: heit@inbox.ru

Section

Theory and history of culture

Year

2020

Volume

Vol. 55

Pages

pp. 80–92

Received

August 20, 2018

Date of publication

March 28, 2020

DOI:

10.37816/2073-9567-2020-55-80-92

Index UDK

008+398.2+299.18

Index BBK

71+82.3(2Рос=Рус)6+86.39

Abstract

Present paper is to study the functioning of animalistic images in literary texts by representatives of the modern pagan movement. A relatively recent character of this worldview phenomenon prompt its adherents to generate a new artistic and cultural space, filling it with both traditional images and newly created ones, original not only in terms of neo-paganism, but also for the entire Russian culture. The authors note that the constant structural change of the new language text field leads to the creation of works of different categories: texts revealing the theory of this doctrine, texts-prophecies, as well as — what is of our main interest — literary texts. This paper analyzes traditional Russian folklore animalistic images presented in the abovementioned works of art — images of a crow, a bear, a hare, a wolf. The authors point out that the neopagan epic is characterized by the synthesis of traditional features of folklore texts and “Newspeak”, which turns all created texts into a special mythopoetic space to contain “’new paganism’ writers`” own ideas about the traditional narrative structure and poetics of folklore texts. Furthermore, the study attempts to determine the genre orientation of the works of art considered and highlights the features characteristic of the traditional Russian fairy tale, namely: the conventionality of the depicted world, the trickster behavior of the “weak” hero, the method of creating a comic element in the text.

Keywords

Russian neopaganism, narrative, byvalshina, magician, animalism, “newspeak”, image, trickster behavior.

References

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