“TO BE OR NOT TO BE?”: DISCUSSIONS ABOUT SOUL IN SOVIET LITERATURE AND CRITICISM OF THE 1920–1930S

Abstract

The article is devoted to the problem of transformation of the key Russian concept “Soul” in the socialist realism literature and critique of post-revolutionary decades. It is found that for the supporters of new political system this concept is mainly related to religious ideas about divine in human being. Symptomatic for 1920s attempts to discredit this concept, to exclude it from the active vocabulary as ideologically alien anachronism are described. Complex “poputchik’s” (L. Leonov’s, M. Shaginyan’s), “internal emigrant’s” (A. Platonov’s) reflection on Bolshevik spiritual experiment is shown. Soviet River by L. Leonov, Gidrocentral by M. Shaginyan, The Street Organ by A. Platonov do indicate that Soul continues to be one of the main ontological categories for these writers. It is stated that by the mid-1930s the word Soul has not disappeared from literary language, although more often than not it has been used only in structure of idioms. The texts by F. Gladkov, I. Le, V. Ketlinskaya, B. Yasensky, G. Dalny, P. Nilin, A. Zorich, A. Carcev prove that traditional views on Soul have just not been eradicated by new ideology but have been distorted and adapted to it. The difference between categories “collectivism” and “sobornost” is demonstrated.