The Novels of Nikolai Pomyalovsky “Bourgeois Happiness” and “Molotov” and the Formation of the Raznochintsy’s Class Consciousness: A Political and Textual Analysis

Abstract

This article off ers an analysis of “Bourgeois Happiness” and “Molotov,” two novels by Nikolai Pomyalovsky that present an artistic conceptualization of the formation of the consciousnes of the raznochintsy class. The heroes of Pomyalovsky’s novels, Yegor Molotov and Mikhail Cherevanin, personify two strategies for the behavior of representatives of the new class. Molotov integrates into the existing structure of society and comes to creatie a bourgeois “idyll.” Cherevanin refuses to integrate, becomes a pessimist and chooses a path of self-destruction. The search for a mission by both heroes ends in failure. Molotov and Cherevanin do not have faith in their own strength and lack a clear understanding of what to do. But the artistic conceptualization of such searches undertaken by Pomyalovsky had a greater socio-political signifi cance. Pomyalovsky began the work to be completed by Nikolai Chernyshevsky, another well-known writer of the raznochintsy class. And the achievment of Chernyshevsky was that he united the disparate parts of the unformed raznochintsy consciousness in a comprehensive doctrine that he presented in the novel “What Is to Be Done?”

References

1. Anderson, K. M., Artamonova, Iu. D., Boitsova, O. Iu. et al. “Politicheskaia tekstologiia kak nauka i uchebnaia distsiplina: materialy kruglogo stola,” Vestnik Moskovskogo universiteta. Seriia 12. Politicheskie nauki, No. 4, 2014, pp. 110–136. 
2. Annenkov, P. V. “Sovremennaia belletristika,” Sankt-Peterburgskie vedomosti, No. 5, 1863, pp. 37–47. 
3. Bibikov, P. A. “Po povodu odnoi sovremennoi povesti,” Vremia, Vol. 7, No. 1, Sep. II, 1862, pp. 31–57. 
4. Blagoveshchenskii, N. A. “Nikolai Gerasimovich Pomialovskii: (biografi cheskii ocherk),” Pomialovskii, N. G. Polnoe sobranie sochinenii, Vol. 1. 2nd ed. St. Petersburg: Izdatel’stvo S.V. Zvonareva, 1868, pp. I–XLVII. 
5. Boborykin, P. D. Za polveka. Vospominaniia: In 2 vol. Vol. 1. Moscow: Khudozhestvennaia literatura, 1965. 
6. Brodskii, N. L., and Sidorov, N. P. Kommentarii k romanu N. G. Chernyshevskogo “Chto delat’?” Moscow: Kooperativnoe izdatel’stvo «Mir», 1933. 
7. Chernyshevskii, N. G. “Russkii chelovek na rendez-vous,” Chernyshevskii, N. G. Polnoe sobranie sochinenii: In 15 vols., Vol. 5: Stat’i, 1858–1859 gg. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo khudozhestvennoi literatury, 1950, pp. 156–174. 
8. Iampol’skii, I. G. N.G. Pomialovskii. Lichnost’ i tvorchestvo. Moscow; Leningrad: Sovetskii pisatel’, 1967. Kern, A. P. “Rasskaz o sobytiiakh v Peterburge,” Minuvshie gody, No. 10, 1908, pp. 49–69. 
9. Kropotkin, P. A. Lektsii po istorii russkoi literatury. Moscow: Common place, 2016. 
10. Manchester, L. Popovichi v miru: dukhovenstvo, intelligentsiia i stanovlenie sovremennogo samosoznaniia v Rossii, transl. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, 2015.
11. Offord, D., Rjéoutski, V., and Argent, G. The French Language in Russia: A Social, Cultural, Political, and Literary History. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2018. 
12. Paperno, I. Semiotika povedeniia: Nikolai Chernyshevskii — chelovek epokhi realizma. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, 1996. 
13. Pisarev, D. I. “Roman kiseinoi devushki,” Pisarev, D. I. Sochineniia: In 4 vols., Vol. 3: Stat’i, 1864–1865. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo khudozhestvennoi literatury, 1956, pp. 185–218. 
14. Pomialovskii, N. G. Meshchanskoe schast’e. Molotov. Ocherki bursy, ed. N. I. Iakushkin. Moscow: Sovremennik, 1987. 
15. Pypin, A. N. “Sochineniia Pomialovskogo,” Sovremennik, № 11–12, 1864, pp. 61–101. 
16. Sorokina, Iu. S. “Primechaniia,” Pisarev, D. I. Sochineniia: In 4 vols., Vol. 3: Stat’i, 1864–1865. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo khudozhestvennoi literatury, 1956, pp. 528–532. 
17. Tolstoi, L. N. “Iunost’,” Tolstoi, L. N. Polnoe sobranie sochinenii: In 90 vols., Vol. 2. Otrochestvo. Iunost’. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo khudozhestvennoi literatury, 1935, pp. 79–241.