Evolution of V.B. Sven’s Creative Work: From Essays and Stories to the Big Epic Form

The article for the fi rst time attempts to introduce into the Russian cultural circulation the creative heritage of V.B. Sven, whose 120th anniversary of birth was celebrated in 2017. This writer of the second wave of Russian emigration is now almost unknown in homeland. His works, however, deserve to be noticed by Russian readers and researchers. Firstly, V.B. Sven’s works, due to their high artistic level, are an integral part of Russian culture. Secondly, the writer refl ected in his literature a number of interesting historical and cultural phenomena, characteristic of the era he wrote about. A literary analysis of V.B. Sven’s works is given in correlation with his unusual biography. Many facts from the writer’s life are refl ected only in sources diffi cult to access; they are presented to a wide audience in this work for the fi rst time. The article considers the specifi cs of V.B. Sven’s creative style in the evolutionary development. The article develops a periodization of the literary array created by the writer and justifi es the conditionality of its division into periods. It shows the infl uence of M.M. Prishvin on the work of V.B. Sven, determines the place of the writer in the emigrant literature, analyzes the reviews of his works written by his contemporary critics-emigrants. Much attention is paid to the artistic innovation of V.B. Sven, his experiments in the fi eld of artistic form, inherent in later works. The article highlights the mystical element in the worldview and, accordingly, in works of the writer, and the specifi c cultural phenomenon closely associated with it — Miklashevsky’s “system”, which became the content and structural center of one of his works. The article distinguishes between the diffi culty of seeing any V.B. Sven’s lifetime printed publications, on the one hand, and the availability of texts of his works in digitized form, on the other. There is emphasized the importance, in a situation like this, of information about the existence of the works, about their merits and accessibility. The references to the article include a list of sites where the main works of the author can be found.

V.B. Sven, Russian emigration, social conflict, revolution, evolution, culture, literature, creative heritage, genre, psychologism

1. Sven V.B. Prishvin’s, Grani [Facets], 1953, no. 17, pp. 77—87 (in Russ.).

2. Agenosov V.V. Sven (Kublitsky) Viktor Borisovich, Vosstavshie iz nebytiya: antologiya pisatelei Di-Pi i vtoroi emigratsii [Risen from the Oblivion: An Anthology of the Writers of Displaced Persons and of the Second Emigration]. Moscow, AIRO-XXI Publ., 2014, pp. 548—561 (in Russ.).

3. Sven V.B. Tsena zhizni: rasskazy [The Price of Life: Stories]. Munich, Author’s Publ., 1960, 151 p.

4. Sven V.B. The Channel of Five Seas: (Journalist’s Notes), Grani [Facets], 1952, no. 15, pp. 46—57 (in Russ.).

5. Sven V.B. Seliger: (Essays of Ordinary Days), Grani [Facets], 1954, no. 21, pp. 60—78 (in Russ.).

6. Sven V.B. Hunting Stories: The Habit. Grandpa Tit, Grani [Facets], 1953, no. 17, pp. 84—88 (in Russ.).

7. Bolshukhin Yu.Ya. Those Who Found the Word (An Accompanying Essay), Literaturnoe zarubezh’e: sbornik-antologiya [Literary Emigration: Collection-Anthology]. Munich, Tsentral’noe Ob’’edinenie Politicheskikh Emigrantov iz SSSR Publ., 1958, pp. 339—354 (in Russ.).

8. Aleksandrov V. (ed.) Pestrye rasskazy: sbornik emigrantskoi prozy [The Motley Tales: Collected Emigrant Prose]. New York, Imeni Chekhova Publ., 1953, 411 p.

9. Sven V.B. Kalambay, Grani [Facets], 1953, no. 19, pp. 34—35 (in Russ.).

10. Sven V.B. Tim, Novyi zhurnal [New Journal], 1964, no. 76, pp. 107—112 (in Russ.).

11. Sven V.B. A Wolf, Novyi zhurnal [New Journal], 1964, no. 76, pp. 103—106 (in Russ.).

12. Sven V.B. Ruvim, syn Davidov: rasskazy [Ruvim, Son of David: Stories], Mednyi Vsadnik Publ., 1947, 125 p.

13. Sven V.B. Bunt na korable [Mutiny on the Ship]. Munich, Tovarishchestvo Zarubezhnykh Pisatelei Publ., 1961, 140 p.

14. Sven V.B. Uzhe pora: rasskazy [It’s Time: Stories]. Munich, Tovarishchestvo Zarubezhnykh Pisatelei Publ., 1966, 221 p.

15. Terapiano Yu.K. To the Memory of Viktor Sven, Russkaya mysl’ [Russian Thought]. Paris, 1972, February 3 (no. 2880), pp. 8—9 (in Russ.).

16. Nosov N.N. The Foreign Publications in Russian of the Works of Yu.K. Terapiano (To the 125th Birth Anniversary), Bibliotekovedenie [Library and Information Science (Russia)], 2017, vol. 66, no. 5, pp. 543—552 (in Russ.). DOI: 10.25281/0869-608X-2017-66-5-543-552.

17. Sven V.B. Semyon Osipovich, Vozrozhdenie [Renaissance], 1967, no. 189, pp. 30—50; no. 190, pp. 7—29; no. 191, pp. 7—27; no. 192, pp. 7—27 (in Russ.).

18. Sven V.B. Mol’ [A Moth]. Munich, Tovarishchestvo Zarubezhnykh Pisatelei Publ., 1969, 318 p.

19. Sven V.B. Chei drug i chei vrag Mikhail Zoshchenko? [Whose Friend and Whose Enemy Is Mikhail Zoshchenko?]. Munich, Tsentral’noe Ob’’edinenie Politicheskikh Emigrantov iz SSSR Publ., 1958, 64 p.

20. Sven Viktor, “Vtoraya literatura”: elektronnyi arkhiv zarubezh’ya imeni Andreya Sinyavskogo: sait [“The Second Literature”: Andrei Sinyavsky Electronic Archive of Emigration: website]. Available at: http://www.vtoraya-literatura.com/razdel_274_str_1.html (accessed 02.04.2018) (in Russ.).

21. Viktor Borisovich Sven, KnigoGid: website. Available at: https://knigogid.ru/authors/124995-viktor-borisovich-sven (accessed 02.04.2018) (in Russ.).

22. Sven Viktor Borisovich, Libros: website. Available at: http://www.libros.am/author/38281/sven-viktor-borisovich (accessed 02.04.2018) (in Russ.).

23. Sven V. A Moth. Mutiny on the Ship, Ridli: website. Available at: http://readli.net/avtor/Sven-Viktor/ (accessed 02.04.2018) (in Russ.).

24. Sven Viktor: The Author’s Biography and Books, RuLit: website. Available at: http://www.rulit.me/authors/sven-viktor (accessed 02.04.2018) (in Russ.).