Gaydin B. N., Lukov Vl. A. Investigations into Shakespeare Made in the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities for the Conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012”

Статья выполнена в рамках проекта РГНФ «Информационно-исследовательская база данных “Современники Шекспира: электронное научное издание”» (грант № 11-04-12064 в).

UDC / УДК 004 ; 009

Гайдин Б. Н., Луков Вл. А. Исследования по Шекспиру Центра теории и истории культуры Института фундаментальных и прикладных исследований Московского гуманитарного университета для Международной конференции «Шекспировские чтения 2012»

Abstract ◊ The article presents the results of the work of the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities on two issues of Shakespearian studies in the form of summaries in English, which were prepared especially for the International Conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012” (Moscow, the Shakespeare Committee of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 9–13 July 2012).

Keywords: Shakespeare, Shakespeare’s contemporaries, Hamlet, Ivan the Terrible.

Аннотация ◊ В статье представлены результаты работы Центра теории и истории культуры Института фундаментальных и прикладных исследований Московского гуманитарного университета по двум темам шекспироведения в форме рефератов на английском языке, подготовленные специально для международной конференции «Шекспировские чтения 2012» (Москва, Шекспировская комиссия РАН, 9–13 июля 2012 г.).

Ключевые слова: Шекспир, современники Шекспира, Гамлет, Иван Грозный.

In the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities (IFAS at MosUH) three reports were prepared for the International Conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012” (Moscow, the Shakespeare Committee of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 9–13 July 2012). The first one has already been published in our electronic academic journal[1]. Hereafter the works of B. N. Gaydin and Vl. A. Lukov are presented.

In his report “The Image of Hamlet in Contemporary Russian Culture: Hamletism and Hamletization” Boris N. Gaydin makes an attempt to analyze the main tendencies in the interpretation of Hamlet in contemporary Russian culture. Drawing some parallels to the prominent interpretations of the 19^th and 20^th centuries, which have entered the Russian culture for ever, he considers a number of interpretations of Shakespeare’s iconic character (eternal image) in various adaptations, theatrical productions, cinematic versions, and TV shows in the 1990s–2000s and makes a conclusion about the crisis of the Russian Hamletism nowadays. For instance, a four-part film “Hamlet. 21^st Century” directed by Y.V. Kara did not draw a wide public response. In the author’s opinion, two reasons of that can be mentioned as follows:

1) If Hamlet is a significant constant, which is in the center of the viewers’ cultural thesaurus, then such people probably cannot find a degree of profundity of the protagonist that could be significantly interesting for them. This interpretation of the image of Hamlet of the first decade of the third millennium is comparatively pale and poor in the comparison with the classical versions.

2) People who have the character of Hamlet at the periphery of their thesauri or who come to know this iconic hero in this interpretation for the first time ever, they do not find anything that could set this film apart from the thousands other motion pictures with races, explosions and other stunts. The verbal content is not interesting for them and they do not pay much attention to it.

Even the gorgeous Crimean sights could not help the director and the cast to add a larger degree of Hamletism into the film. Yu.V. Kara’s version of “Hamlet” can be ranged among numerous kitschy adaptations of classical literary works addressed to gross audience. It is difficult to rank a great part of this production among the masterpieces of the world cinema. However, these films fulfill an important function: they retain the eternal images (iconic characters) in the cultural thesauri (at least, at their peripheries) of representatives of different generations, social classes, nations, etc.

The paper underlines the necessity to study the phenomenon of Hamletization, which is to be found much more often than Hamletism. The latter is currently at the periphery of the cultural thesaurus in Russia.

In his report “Ivan the Terrible and Shakespeare in Their Cultural Context” Vladimir A. Lukov states the following:

Tsar Ivan the Terrible (1530–1584) was a senior contemporary of Shakespeare. The Russian Tsar attracted England’s attention twice: in 1567 (when he was wooing Queen Elizabeth), when Shakespeare was only three; and in 1583 (when Russian ambassadors came to arrange the Tsar’s marriage to Mary Hastings), when the Bard was nineteen. By 1587–1588, when Shakespeare moved to London, all talks of the Russians had ceased, and the execution of Mary Stuart and the following defeat of the Spanish Armada were the picks of the day. This explains why Russia is so seldom mentioned in Shakespeare’s texts. In “Love’s Labour’s Lost”, there are references to Russian masquerade costumes worn by the King and his courtiers (this was probably evoking laughter in the English audience). Shakespeare speaks about cold and snow, endless Russian spaces, savage bears (“Henry IV” and “Macbeth”), long nights (“Measure for Measure”), one of the heroines of “Winter’s Tale” Hermione is the daughter of a Russian Emperor. This is not much, yet it is as much as the average European perhaps knew about Russia.

A comparison of Shakespeare and Ivan the Terrible as authors might also be of some interest. When we compare the epistles of Tsar Ivan with Shakespeare’s and other European authors’ texts, they sound extremely archaic, whatever innovations you find in this shining example of the 16^th-c. Russian letters. Alternatively, we could admit that Russian literature had pitifully lost the race against the rest of Europe (the Mongol Yoke could be a valid excuse), or say that the literary process in Russia had taken a unique and inexplicable route. The first encounters of Russian culture with Shakespeare would occur much later, and this would develop in Shakespearianism practiced by A.S. Pushkin, in the acceptance of a Shakespearean outlook in the works of F. Dostoyevsky and L. Tolstoy; nowadays, we can also speak about a case of neo-Shakespearianism.

All three reports presented at the conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012” are developing the conception of Shakespeare-sphere[2] — which has been proposed by the Theory and History of Culture Center of the IFAS at MosUH and outlined on the portal — and representing its distinct fragments. The reports were published in the collection of abstracts of the reports presented at the conference[3].

[2] Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A. Genii na veka: Shekspir v evropeiskoi kul'ture: Nauch. monogr. M. : GITR, 2012. S. 324–336; Zakharov N. V., Lukov Val. A., Lukov Vl. A. Shekspirosfera // Elektronnoe periodicheskoe nauchnoe izdanie «Vestnik Mezhdunarodnoi akademii nauk. Russkaia sektsiia» (Elektronnyi resurs). 2012. №2. S. 70–75. URL: http://www.heraldrsias.ru/online/2012/2/238/ (retrieved on: 20.12.2012); Lukov Val. A., Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A., Gaidin B. N. Shekspirosfera (Shekspir, ego sovremenniki, ego epokha v kul'ture povsednevnosti) [Electronic resource] // Informatsionno-gumanitarnyi portal «Znanie. Ponimanie. Umenie». 2012. № 3 (mai — iiun'). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/3/Lukov~Zakharov~Lukov~Gaydin~Shake­speare-sphere/ (retrieved on: 20.12.2012).

[3] Gaydin B. N. The Image of Hamlet in Contemporary Russian Culture: Hamletism and Hamletization // Shekspirovskie chteniia 2012: Shekspir v natsional'nykh kul'turakh : sb. annotatsii dokladov. Izd. 2-e, ispr., elektronnoe. M. : Izd-vo Mosk. gumanit. un-ta, 2012. S. 7; Lukov Vl. A. Ivan the Terrible and Shakespeare in Their Cultural Context // Shekspirovskie chteniia 2012: Shekspir v natsional'nykh kul'turakh : sb. annotatsii dokladov. Izd. 2-e, ispr., elektronnoe. M. : Izd-vo Mosk. gumanit. un-ta, 2012. S. 34.

REFERENCES (TRANSLITERATION)

Gaydin B. N. The Image of Hamlet in Contemporary Russian Culture: Hamletism and Hamletization // Shekspirovskie chteniia 2012: Shekspir v natsional'nykh kul'turakh : sb. annotatsii dokladov. Izd. 2-e, ispr., elektronnoe. M. : Izd-vo Mosk. gumanit. un-ta, 2012. S. 7.

Lukov Val. A., Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A., Gaidin B. N. Shekspirosfera (Shekspir, ego sovremenniki, ego epokha v kul'ture povsednevnosti) [Elektronnyi resurs] // Informatsionno-gumanitarnyi portal «Znanie. Ponimanie. Umenie». 2012. № 3 (mai — iiun'). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/3/Lukov~Zakharov~Lukov~Gaydin~Shake­speare-sphere/ (retrieved on: 20.12.2012).

Lukov Vl. A. Ivan the Terrible and Shakespeare in Their Cultural Context // Shekspirovskie chteniia 2012: Shekspir v natsional'nykh kul'turakh : sb. annotatsii dokladov. Izd. 2-e, ispr., elektronnoe. M. : Izd-vo Mosk. gumanit. un-ta, 2012. S. 34.

Zakharov N. V., Lukov Val. A., Lukov Vl. A. Shekspirosfera // Elektronnoe periodicheskoe nauchnoe izdanie «Vestnik Mezhdunarodnoi akademii nauk. Russkaia sektsiia» (Elektronnyi resurs). 2012. №2. C. 70–75. URL: http://www.heraldrsias.ru/online/2012/2/238/ (retrieved on: 20.12.2012).

Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A. Genii na veka: Shekspir v evropeiskoi kul'ture : Nauch. monogr. M. : GITR, 2012.

Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A., Makarov V. S., Gaydin B. N. Digital Shakespeare in Russia [Elektronnyi resurs] // Informatsionno-gumanitarnyi portal «Znanie. Ponimanie. Umenie». 2012. № 5 (sentiabr' — oktiabr'). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/5/Zakharov-et-al_Digital-Shakespeare/ (retrieved on: 20.12.2012).

СПИСОК ЛИТЕРАТУРЫ

Захаров Н. В., Луков Вал. А., Луков Вл. А. Шекспиросфера // Электронное периодическое научное издание «Вестник Международной академии наук. Русская секция» (Электронный ресурс). 2012. №2. C. 70–75. URL: http://www.heraldrsias.ru/online/2012/2/238/ (дата обращения: 20.12.2012).

Захаров Н. В., Луков Вл. А. Гений на века: Шекспир в европейской культуре : Науч. моногр. М. : ГИТР, 2012.

Луков Вал. А., Захаров Н. В., Луков Вл. А., Гайдин Б. Н. Шекспиросфера (Шекспир, его современники, его эпоха в культуре повседневности) [Электронный ресурс] // Информационный гуманитарный портал «Знание. Понимание. Умение». 2012. № 3 (май — июнь). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/3/Lukov~Zakharov~Lukov~Gaydin~Shake­speare-sphere/ (дата обращения: 20.12.2012).

Gaydin B. N. The Image of Hamlet in Contemporary Russian Culture: Hamletism and Hamletization // Шекспировские чтения 2012: Шекспир в национальных культурах : сб. аннотаций докладов. Изд. 2-е, испр., электронное. М. : Изд-во Моск. гуманит. ун-та, 2012. С. 7.

Lukov Vl. A. Ivan the Terrible and Shakespeare in Their Cultural Context // Шекспировские чтения 2012: Шекспир в национальных культурах : сб. аннотаций докладов. Изд. 2-е, испр., электронное. М. : Изд-во Моск. гуманит. ун-та, 2012. С. 34.

Zakharov N. V., Lukov Vl. A., Makarov V. S., Gaydin B. N. Digital Shakespeare in Russia [Электронный ресурс] // Информационный гуманитарный портал «Знание. Понимание. Умение». 2012. № 5 (сентябрь — октябрь). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/5/Zakharov-et-al_Digital-Shakespeare/ (дата обращения: 20.12.2012).

Гайдин Борис Николаевич — кандидат философских наук, заместитель директора Центра теории и истории культуры Института фундаментальных и прикладных исследований Московского гуманитарного университета. Тел.: +7 (499) 374-59-30.

Gaydin Boris Nikolaevich, Candidate of Science (philosophy), the deputy director of the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities. Tel.: +7 (499) 374-59-30.

E-mail: russhake@gmail.com

Луков Владимир Андреевич — доктор филологических наук, профессор, директор Центра теории и истории культуры Института фундаментальных и прикладных исследований Московского гуманитарного университета, заслуженный деятель науки Российской Федерации, академик Международной академии наук (IAS, Инсбрук), Международной академии наук педагогического образования, член Шекспировской комиссии РАН, лауреат Бунинской премии. Тел.: +7 (499) 374-75-95.

Lukov Vladimir Andreevich, Doctor of Science (philology), professor, the director of the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities, honored scientist of the Russian Federation, full member of the International Academy of Science (Innsbruck) and the International Teacher’s Training Academy of Science, the Bunin Prize laureate. Tel.: +7 (499) 374-75-95.

E-mail: lookoff@mail.ru

Citation: Gaydin B. N., Lukov Vl. A. Investigations into Shakespeare Made in the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities for the Conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012” [Elektronic resource] // Informatsionnyi gumanitarnyi portal «Znanie. Ponimanie. Umenie». 2012. № 6 (noiabr' — dekabr'). URL: http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/6/Gaydin_Lukov_Investigations-into-Shakespeare/ [archived in WebCite] (retrieved on: dd.mm.yyyy).

Библиограф. описание: Gaydin B. N., Lukov Vl. A. Investigations into Shakespeare Made in the Theory and History of Culture Center of the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Studies at Moscow University for the Humanities for the Conference “Shakespeare Readings 2012” [Электронный ресурс] // Информационный гуманитарный портал «Знание. Понимание. Умение». 2012. № 6 (ноябрь — декабрь). URL:   http://www.zpu-journal.ru/e-zpu/2012/6/Gaydin_Lukov_Investigations-into-Shakespeare/ [архивировано в WebCite] (дата обращения: дд.мм.гггг).