Instructions for Immortals

Abstract

The poetics and themes of Orthodox literature are analyzed, categorized and contextualized through the works of its most popular authors, Father Aleksandr Torik and Iuliia Voznesenskaia.

Notes

English translation © 2015 Taylor & Francis, from the Russian text © Voprosy literatury. Svetlana Boiko, “Dlia bessmertnykh: instruktsii; Pravoslavnaia kniga segodnia,” Voprosy literatury, 2014, no. 5, pp. 61–88.Translated by Liv Bliss. Translation reprinted from Russian Studies in Literature, vol. 51, no. 4. doi: 10.1080/10611975.2015.1089132

^1. Iu. Tynianov, Poetika. Istoriia literatury. Kino (Moscow: Nauka, 1977), pp. 257–58.

^2. Cf. “The issue of the concrete choice of path… can only be resolved by analyzing the correlation of the literary series with other historical series” (Iu. Tynianov and R. Iakobson, “Problemy izucheniia literatury i iazyka,” in Tynianov, Poetika, p. 283).

^3. D.S. Likhachev, Poetika drevnerusskoi literatury, 3rd ed. (Moscow: Nauka, 1979), p. 55.

^4. Ibid., p. 57.

^5. Ibid., p. 63.

^6. Ibid., pp. 57–58.

^7. Cf. “The literary genres of Ancient Rus differ most substantially from modern genres…. They emerge not only as varieties of literary creativity but also as specific manifestations of ancient Russian lifestyles, of usages, of everyday life in the broadest sense of the word” (ibid., p. 62).

^8. S.S. Averintsev, Poetika rannevizantiiskoi literatury (Moscow: Coda, 1997), p. 166 [http://omiliya.org/article/mir-kak-shkola-ssaverintsev.html; all URLs accessed June 2015—Trans.].

^9. This genre was widespread both in the nineteenth century and earlier. See the letters of the Elders of Optina, of the hierarch Ignatii (Brianchaninov), of the hierarch Feofan Zatvornik [the Recluse].

^10. For example, Archpriest Serafim Slobodskoi's The Law of God [Zakon Bozhii], a manual that is fifty years old already, Sergei Vorob'ev's The Bible and History [Bibliia i istoriia], and many others.

^11. Archimandrite Tikhon (Shevkunov), “Nesviatye sviatye” i drugie rasskazy, 3rd ed. (Moscow: Izdanie Sretenskogo monastyria, 2011), p. 7.

^12. For an overview of reactions, including in the newspapers, and a pertinent commentary, see Marina Borisova, “O kreativnom klasse i nekreativnom narode: Kniga arkhmandrita Tikhona (Shevkunova) ‘Nesviatye sviatye’ kak zerkalo nesostoiavsheisia revoliutsii,” Ekspert, 2014, nos. 1–2, pp. 52–54.

^13. Averintsev, Poetika rannevizantiiskoi literatury, p. 157.

^14. Archpriest Aleksandr Torik, “Nepridumannye istorii sviashchennika Aleksandra Torika,” interviewer Andrei Sigutin: Ezhednevnoe internet-SMI “Pravoslavie i mir,” November 25, 2011 [www.pravmir.ru/nepridumannye-istorii-svyashhennika-aleksandra-torika].

^15. Torik, “Nepridumannye istorii.”

^16. Ibid.

^17. Archpriest Aleksandr Torik, “Ia ne znaiu adres Flaviana,” Foma, October 3, 2011.

^18. See Mariia: Zhurnal rossiiskogo nezavisimogo zhenskogo religioznogo kluba “Mariia” (Frankfurt on Main), 1981, no. 1; 1982, no. 2.

^19. Iu. Voznesenskaia, “Asti Spumante: “Russkie dela” grafini Apraksinoi (Moscow: Lepta Kniga, 2011), p. 122 [http://e-libra.ru/read/250237-asti-spumante.-pervoe-delo-grafini-apraksinoj.html].

^20. Compare “I want to say that I now assess my entire life before the monastery as a life lived in the minus column, including my dissidence and everything I wrote before the monastery” (Voznesenskaia, “Fenomen Iulii Voznesenskoi. Interv'iu s pisatel'nitsei,” interviewer Liudmila Il'iunina: Nasha vera: Informatsionno-obrazovatel'nyi molodezhnyi pravoslavnyi portal, October 22, 2003 [site not available as of June 2015—Trans.]).

^21. Ibid.

^22. Ibid.

^23. The quotation continues, “But here is a very important detail: no one's prayers will help he or she who does not pray! And you are busy with everything imaginable except your personal salvation.”

^24. Father Daniil Sysoev, Instruktsiia dlia bessmertnykh, ili Chto delat', esli vy vse-taki umerli (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo khrama proroka Daniila na Kantemirovskoi, 2009), p. 97. Going forward, this publication will be cited in the text parenthetically, each time with the page number.

^25. Cf. “Remember that by now you should be on good terms with your Guardian Angel. I do hope you are. Do not forget to thank him and wish him well on his feast-day. And when is the Guardian Angel's feast-day? The twenty-first of November” (ibid., p. 87).