Mythopoetics of V. Y. Zazubrin’s novel “Mountains”: Eros and Thanatos

About the author:

Tatiana A. Bogumil, Cand. Sci. (Philol.), Associate Professor of the Department of Literature, Altai State Pedagogical University, Barnaul, Russia tbogumil@mail.ru; https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5166-9132

Abstract:

This article examines the erotic and thanatic imagery and motifs in V. Ya. Zazubrin’s novel “Mountains” within the context of the Yermak’s plot, which revolves around the universal theme of conquering the land-woman. The Yermak’s plot, foundational to Siberian Russian cultural texts, is associated with the traditional motif of “capture of a city = enthronement = wedding / violence / fornication”, along with the motif of “death of a man by a woman / water”. Through a mythopoetic analysis of selected works about Siberia, it becomes evident that the analogy of woman-country is further clarified by the analogy of woman-earth/water. In V. Ya. Zazubrin’s novel, which explores the civil war and collectivization in Altai, the metaphorization of gender poetics is observed through aquatic, animal, and plant semantic codes. The novel embeds the “gender issue” within the main plot, determining not only the individual fate of a “private” man, but also the specifics of national history. This study sheds light on how river imagery in Siberia, such as the Ob and Biya rivers, is depicted using obscene language, which can be interpreted as a relic of symbolic copulation with Mother Earth. Keywords: geopoetics, Siberian text, image of Altai, Yermak’s plot, F. M. Dostoevsky, V. Ya. Zazubrin

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