Cover not available
Article published In:
Language and Dialogue
Vol. 10:2 (2020) ► pp.241–270

Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway

A farewell to The Zone

| Sechenov University (Russia)
| RUDN University (Russia)

This paper focuses on three chapters about captain Yegorov and Katya Lugina in Sergei Dovlatov’s novel entitled Зона (The Zone: A Prison Camp Guard’s Story). The intertext shown and discussed in the paper suggests that the three chapters may be viewed as a ‘modified version’ of Ernest Hemingway’s WWI novel A Farewell to Arms. We then use the intertext as the basis for the discussion of Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway and the value of Hemingway’s personality and works for Dovlatov. We analyze two aspects of Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway: (1) Dovlatov’s emotional response to Hemingway’s novel and (2) Dovlatov’s contemplation of esthetics of art. In the end, we discuss the notion of tradition in connection with Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway.

Keywords: Dovlatov, Hemingway, intertext, dialogue, reader, emotional response, horizon of expectations, memory, background knowledge, author, esthetics of art
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Aims and scope
    • 2.1Intertextuality and intertext
    • 2.2Dialogue
      • 2.2.1Emotional response and emotionally charged information
      • 2.2.2Esthetics of art
  • 3.Intertext in Dovlatov’s The Zone
  • 4.Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway and the readers
    • 4.1Dovlatov’s reception of A Farewell to Arms
      • 4.1.1Emotional response
      • 4.1.2Esthetics and ethics of art
    • 4.2Dovlatov vs. Hemingway: Conceptualization and esthetic activity
    • 4.3Esthetic activity behind Dovlatov’s writing
  • 5.Dovlatov and tradition
  • 6.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 4 September 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ld.00068.zay
References
Bakhtin, Mikhail
(1924) 1990 “Author and Hero in Aesthetic Activity.” In Art and Answerability: Early Philosophical Essays by M. M. Bakhtin, ed. by Michael Holquist and Vadim Liapunov, translated by Vadim Liapunov, 4–256. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
(1976) 1979 “Проблема текста в лингвистике, философии и других гуманитарных науках [The problem of Text in Linguistics, Philosophy, and Other Humanities].” In Эстетика словесного творчества [Aesthetics of Verbal Art], 281–307. Moscow: Iskusstvo.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland
(1968) 1977 “The Death of the Author.” In Image. Music. Text, translated by Stephen Heath, 142–148. New York: Hill and Wang.Google Scholar
(1973) 1981 “Theory of the Text.” In Untying the Text. A Poststructuralist Reader, edited by Robert Young, translated by Ian McLeod, 31–47. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
(1971) 1977 “From Work to Text.” In Image. Music. Text, translated by Stephen Heath, 155–164. New York: Hill and Wang.Google Scholar
Boseman, Julie
2012 “To Use and Use Not.” New York Times, July 4 2012 [URL]
Brodsky, Joseph
(1991) 1992 “О Сереже Довлатове [About Sergei Dovlatov].” Zvezda 21:4–6.Google Scholar
Cohen, Hermann
1912 Ästhetik des reinen Gefühls [Esthetics of Pure Feeling], 21 vols. Berlin: Cassirer.Google Scholar
Dovlatov, Sergei
(1976) 2014 Невидимая книга [The Invisible Book]. In Собрание сочинений Сергея Довлатова [The Collected Works of Sergei Dovlatov], compiled by Andrei Aryev, 6–112, vol. 31. St. Petersburg: Azbuka.Google Scholar
(1980) 2004 Соло на ундервуде [Solo on an Underwood]. Соло на IBM [Solo on an IBM]. St. Petersburg: Azbuka-klassika.Google Scholar
(1982) 2011 The Zone: A Prison Camp Guard’s Story. Translated by Anne Frydman. Richmond: Oneworld Classics.Google Scholar
(1987) 2003 Филиал [Affiliate]. St. Petersburg: Azbuka-klassika.Google Scholar
1998 “Армейские письма к отцу [Army Letters to the Father].” Zvezda 51: 108–41.Google Scholar
2003 Жизнь коротка [Life Is Short]. St. Petersburg: Azbuka-klassika.Google Scholar
Genette, Gérard
(1982) 1992 Palimpsestes: La littérature au second degré. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.Google Scholar
Genis, Alexander
2004 Довлатов и окрестности [Dovlatov and his Environs]. Moscow: Vagrius.Google Scholar
Guyau, Jean-Marie
1889 L’Art au point de vue sociologique. Paris: Alcan.Google Scholar
Hemingway, Ernest
(1929) 1976 A Farewell to Arms. Moscow: Progress Publishers.Google Scholar
Herman, Judith L.
1992 Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence. From Domestic Violence to Political Terror. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
von Humboldt, Wilhelm
1836 Über die Verschiedenheit des menschlichen Sprachbaues und ihren Einfluss auf die geistige Entiwickelung des Menschengeschlechts. Berlin: F. Dünmbr.Google Scholar
Iser, Wolfgang
1979 Der implizite Leser: Kommunikationsformen des Romans von Bunyan bis Beckett. Munich: Fink.Google Scholar
Jauss, Hans R.
1979 “Literaturgeschichte als Provokation der Literaturwissenschaft.” In Rezeptionsästhetik, ed. by Rainer Warning, 126–162. Munich: Fink.Google Scholar
1982a “Zum Problem des dialogischen Verstehens.” In Dialogizität, ed. by Renate Lachmann, 11–24. Munich: Fink.Google Scholar
1982b Toward an Aesthetic of Reception. Translated by Timothy Bahti. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Juvan, Marko
2008 “Towards a History of Intertextuality in Literary and Culture Studies.” CLC Web: Comparative Literature and Culture, Vol.10, Issue 3. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
van der Kolk, Bessel
2014 The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, Brain and Body in the Transformation of Trauma. New York: Penguin Books.Google Scholar
Kristeva, Julia
1967 “Bakhtine, le mot, le dialogue et le roman.” Critique (239):438–465.Google Scholar
Kuritsin, Vyacheslav
2001 Русский литературный постмодернизм [Russian Literary Postmodernism]. Moscow: OGI.Google Scholar
Levin, Harry
1951 “Observations on the Style of Ernest Hemingway.” Kenyon Review 131: 581–606.Google Scholar
Mannheim, Karl
1940 Man and Society in an Age of Reconstruction: Studies in Modern Social Structure. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co.Google Scholar
Marková, Ivana
2003 Dialogicality and Social Representations. The Dynamics of Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mika, Bogumiła
2013 “ ‘Looking out for the Horizon.’ The Music of Gustav Mahler in the Light of the Theory of the Aesthetic of Reception by Hans Robert Jauss.” Interdisciplinary Studies in Musicology 131, 189–202. Poznan: PTTPT and Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM.Google Scholar
Müller-Wood, Anja
2014 “The Role of Emotions in Literary Communication: Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man .” In Literature as Dialogue: Invitations Offered and Negotiated, ed. by Roger D. Sell, 137–160. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Piegay-Gros, Nathalie
(2002) 2008 Введение в теорию интертекстуальности [An Introduction to Intertextuality]. Translated and edited by Georgiy K. Kosikov. Moscow: LKI.Google Scholar
Popper, Karl R.
1964 “Naturgesetze und theoretische Systeme.” In Theorie und Realität, ed. by Hans Albert, 87–102. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.Google Scholar
Riffaterre, Michael
1980 “La trace de l’intertexte.” La Pensée: Revue du rationalisme moderne 2151: 4–18.Google Scholar
Seliverstova, Olga
2002 “Когнитивная семантика на фоне общего развития лингвистической науки [Cognitive Semantics in the Framework of the Overall Development of Linguistics].” Voprosy Jazykoznanija 61: 12–26.Google Scholar
Sell, Roger D.
2014 “Introduction.” In Literature as Dialogue: Invitations Offered and Negotiated, ed. by Roger D. Sell, 1–20. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Tyutchev, Fyodor
(1833) 1957 “Silentium!” In Полное собрание стихотворений [The Complete Collection of Poems], 3211. Leningrad: Sovetskiy Pisatel.Google Scholar
Villard, Henry S. and James Nagel
1989 Hemingway in Love and War: The Lost Diary of Agnes von Kurowsky. Boston: Northeastern University Press.Google Scholar
Vysevkov, Pavel
2008 “Функции писем в структуре повести С. Довлатова «Зона» [Functions of the Letters in the structure of Dovlatov’s The Zone ].” Kritika i semiotika 91: 112–125.Google Scholar