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Tat'iana Tolstaia's “Dome of Many-Coloured Glass“: The World Refracted through Multiple Perspectives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Helena Goscilo
Helena Goscilo*
Affiliation:
Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Pittsburgh
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Extract

Speaking recently about the impact of Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of glasnost’ on Russian culture, the exiled Russian scientist Zhores Medvedev expressed skepticism about the artistic benefits of the reforms, comparing them unfavorably to those ushered in by Khrushchev's liberalization: “Whereas Khrushchev's thaw brought many new names and new talents into literature, no new talents have emerged in the past two years.“' Medvedev's statement suggests that he has not been reading Soviet literary journals assiduously. Otherwise he would have noticed the emergence of at least one remarkably talented newcomer on the literary scene—Tat'iana Tolstaia, the most gifted young woman writing fiction in Russia today and arguably the most noteworthy prosaist of the young generation at large.

Type
Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 47 , Issue 2 , Summer 1988 , pp. 280 - 290
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1988

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References

1. “The Emigres Speak Out,” The Nation, 13 June 1987, p. 814.

2. Na zolotom kryl'tse sideli has been reviewed in English, superficially and with breezy obtuseness, by Laird, Sally, “Refusing to Grow Wise,” Times Literary Supplement, 26 June 1987, p. 696 Google Scholar. Tolstaia'sfiction consists of the following: “Na zolotom kryl'tse sideli,” Avrora, no. 8 (1983): 94–101; “Svidanie sptitsei,” Oktiabr', no. 12 (1983): 52–57; “Sonia,” Avrora, no. 10 (1984): 76–83; “Chistyi list,” Neva, no. 12 (1984): 116–126; “RekaOkkervil',” Avrora, no. 3 (1985): 137–146; “Milaia Shura” and “Okhotanamamonta,” Oktiabr', no. 12 (1985): 113–117, 117–121; “Peters,” Novyi mir, no. 1, (1986): 123–131; “Spi spokoino, synok,” Avrora no. 4, (1986): 94–101; “Ogon’ i pyl'” and “Samaia liubimaia,” Avrora, no. 10 (1986): 82–91, 92–110; “Poet i muza,” “Fakir,” and “Serafim,” Novyi mir, no. 12 (1986): 113–119, 119–130, 130–133; “Krug” [collective title for three stories: “Liubish'—ne liubish',” “Noch', “and “Krug “], Oktiabr', no. 4 (1987): 89–95, 95–99, 99–104. “Sonia” was reprinted in Rasskaz: 1984 (Moscow: Sovremennik, 1984): 373–380. Thirteen of the stories have been reprinted in Na zolotom kryl'tsesideli, which omitted “Samaia liubimaia,” “Poet i muza,” “Serafim,” and “Noch'.” Translations of “Svidanie s ptitsei,” “Sonia,” and “Peters” by Mary Zirin are included in Heritage and Heresy: Recent Fiction by Russian Women, ed. Helena Goscilo (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988 Google Scholar. The translation of “Sonia,” by Nancy Condee, first appeared in Nancy Condee's Newsletter to the Institute of Current World Affairs, no. 17, accompanied by a brief but informative sketch of Tolstaia'a life and oeuvre. Thus far the sole article in Russian devoted to Tolstaia is by Elena Nevzgliadova, “Eta prekrasnaia zhizn': orasskazakh Tat'iany Tolstoi,” Avrova, no. 10 (1986): 111–120. All passages cited from Tolstaia's works refer to the original journal publications and are identified by page numbers in parentheses within the body of the text.

3. Tolstaia should not be confused with Tat'iana Vladimirovna Tolstaia, who writes fictional biographies of established Russian writers (e.g., Detstvo Lermontova: povest’ [Moscow, 1957]), or Tat'ianaL'vovna Sukhotina Tolstaia (b. 1864). The Tolstaia of this article belongs to a four-generation dynasty of writers, for her great grandmother (A. N. Tolstoi's mother) was Aleksandra Leont'evna Turgeneva (b. 1854), whose prose fiction included a novel entitled Neugomonnoe serdtse. (I am indebted to Mary Zirin for thisinformation.)

4. For her dream of being a nurse see the interview with S. Taroshchina entitled “Ten’ na zakate, “Literaturnaia gazeta, no. 30 (23 July 1986): 7. “Na zolotom kryl'tse sideli” appeared in Avrora, the journal that also enabled Liudmila Petrushevskaia to make her official literary debut in 1972 with the two stories “Rasskazchitsa” and “Istoriia Klarissy.“

5. Tat'iana Tolstaia, “A Little Man Is a Normal Man,” Moscow News, no. 8 (1987): 10.

6. “Seraphim,” for instance, is a shocking revelation that brilliantly captures the dynamics and consequences of misanthropy.

7. In the Literaturnaia gazeta interview in 1986 Tolstaia noted, “poka zhizn’ ne zavershena, ee nel'ziani podytozhit', ni otsenit'. Menia interesuet i zhizn'—tselikom, i chelovek—tselikom, i to, chto chelovek, nikomu ne nuzhnyi pri zhizni, posle svoei smerti stanovitsia vse nuzhnei i nuzhnei, i pamiat’ o nem rastet, kak ten’ na zakate” (p. 7).

8. Compare the interview with Milan Kundera in Elgrably, Jordan, “Conversations with Kundera,“ Salmagundi, no. 73 (Winter 1987): 6 Google Scholar.

9. Moscow News, p. 10.

10. Ibid.

11. The aptness of such Bakhtinian concepts as heteroglossia, refraction, orchestration, for a reading of Tolstaia makes one query Bakhtin's implicit conviction that these characteristics belong exclusively orprimarily to the novelistic genre.

12. Soviet critics have linked Tolstaia's name with those of both Gogol’ and Bulgakov. ( “Ten’ nazakate,” p. 7).

13. About her first story, Tolstaia has said (in ibid., p. 7):

14. The name Filin carries fruitfully contradictory connotations, as often happens in Tolstaia's fiction.In this case it suggests both eagle and owl.

15. On Zamiatin's use of the device, seeD. S. Mirsky, Contemporary Russian Literature, 1881–1925 (New York: Knopf, 1926), pp. 297–298. Mirsky observes that Zamiatin's method of giving unity to his stories is to construct “a large family of metaphors (or similes) dominated by one mother metaphor “ (p. 298). See also Alex M. Shane, The Life and Works of Evgenij Zamjatin (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968), pp. 153–154.

16. I examine Tolstaia's treatment of gender in a forthcoming article tentatively entitled “Monsters Maternal, Marriageable, and Male: Tolstaia's Use of Gender Stereotypes. “

17. Zmei Gorynych, the serpent of the mountains, is the most frequently encountered hostile force pitted against the hero of Russian magical tales. Endowed with three, six, nine, twelve, or more heads, the serpent devours people and carries off beautiful maidens. Thus the transformation from Seraph to Zmei Gorynych brings into eloquent play the broad range of qualities associated with both figures in religion, folklore, and cultural tradition at large.

18. On this, see Unger, Merrill F., Unger's Bible Dictionary (Chicago: Moody, 1957–1973), pp. 52–53, 996Google Scholar; and Haag, Herbert, ed., Bibel-Lexicon (Zurich: Einsiedeln, 1951), pp. 1, 506–1, 507Google Scholar.

19. “Anketa ‘LR': Mezhdu proshlym i budushchim,” Literaturnaia Rossiia, no. 1 (2 January 1987