Stylization and Parody on Dostoevskian Themes

Stylization and Parody on Dostoevskian Themes Harry Walsh University of Houston The Russian Formalist critic Yury Tynianov, searching for a concept less problematical than "literary influence," hit upon the not-muchless elusive term "stylization" (stilizatsiia) to designate one writer's conscious emulation of stylistic or compositional features prominently displayed in the work of another writer. But Tynianov places a major constraint on the application of stylization by drawing a fairly clear contrast with parody. He understands the distinction in this way: Stylization is close to parody. Both live a double life: behind the apparent structure ofa work, its first level, lies a second level, that of the work which it stylizes or parodies. But in parody it is obligatory to have a disjunction of both levels, an inversion of them; the parody of a tragedy will be a comedy (it matters little whether this is done through an exaggeration of comic elements), and a parody of a comedy could be a tragedy. In stylization there is no such disjunction. There is, on the contrary, a correspondence of the two levels—the stylizing level and the stylized level showing through it—one to another. Nevertheless, it is but a single step from stylization to parody; stylization that is comically motivated or emphasized becomes parody. (102) Obviously it need not always be clear to the reader when or even whether there is a "disjunction of both levels." Tynianov is forced to concede this point, inasmuch as his analysis involves at any one time stylistic and thematic features of Gogol's writing found in the works of Dostoevsky, whose attitude toward his predecessor at any time is never easy to characterize. Tynianov does believe that the distinction is noticeable, or at least can be noticed; he observes that stylization "crosses over into parody easily and noticeably." For the purposes ofthis inquiry let us stand Dostoevsky on his head. Rather than as an imitator, he will be seen as the inspiration for emulation by others (which leads us to the frightening prospect of secondary stylization, a subject that, mercifully, will not be pursued here). The appearance of Dostoevskian motifs in two recent novels will be examined. The novels are Peasant Men and Women (Muzhiki i baby) ' by the Russian author Boris Mozhaev, and TAe Philosopher's Pupil 217 218Rocky Mountain Review by British writer Iris Murdoch. Through a comparison of the Dostoevskian material found in these works with that of the original models, we may be able to arrive at a simpler and more universally applicable rule for distinguishing stylization and parody than that of Tynianov's somewhat vague "disjunction of levels." Peasant Men and Women is set in rural southern Russia in 1929 and depicts the forced collectivization ofseveral agrarian villages along with the dispossession and banishment into exile of peasant families deemed to be prosperous (the so-called kulaks, or "fists"). Mozhaev's novel is strikingly at odds with the traditional shibboleths of Soviet "socialist realism," and the second part of the novel lay unpublished for several years. For a cautious Soviet editor of the early 1980s (the late 1980s being something quite different), not the least troubling of the novel's features are the prominently displayed echoes of motifs found in Dostoevsky's novel Devils (Besy), which for many years was not printed as a separate volume in the Soviet Union, owing to comparisons that could be made between Dostoevsky's nihilist "devils" and certain attitudes ofCommunist Party functionaries in the USSR.2 In his comparative study of Gogol and Dostoevsky, Tynianov searches through the vast body of Dostoevsky's published and unpublished writings trying to pinpoint just what aspect(s) of Gogol's creativity caused his successor to return again and again to him for inspiration. Tynianov concludes that Dostoevsky found Gogol's characters to be convincing bearers ofprofound truths about the human psyche, truths not always apparent to thejournalist or social scientist. But if we isolate the Dostoevskian parts of Peasant Men and Women we will find that, in contrast to the broad nature of Dostoevsky's fascination with Gogol, Mozhaev's evocation of Dostoevsky is much more narrowly focused. Out of the vast interplay of emotions—both between...