THE TRADITIONS OF ANTIQUE KALOCAGATIA IN THE POETRY OF A. POLEZHAEV

Introduction. Through Byzantium, Ancient Russia turned out to be the direct heir of Ancient Greece. The study of the interaction of these cultures is the study of the history of the preservation of spiritual values that were significant in antiquity and perceived and rethought by Russian culture: beauty, harmony, kalokagatiya, eidos and many others. The focus of our attention is the phenomenon of kalokagatiya. The aim of the article is to analyse the traditions of ancient kalokagatiya in the poetry of A. Polezhaev. Material and methods. The material of the study was A. Polezhaev’s poems with anthological poetics, which made it possible not only to trace the general evolution of anthological poetics in Russian lyrics, but also to note the features of its use in the poet’s work. The following research methods were used: biographical, genetic, comparative typological. The biographical method is significant in that it helps to reveal the prerequisites for Polezhaev’s interest in the heritage of antiquity. With the help of the genetic method, it is possible to identify the sources, genesis and evolution of the leading concepts of the anthological tradition, including with a central focus on the ideal of ancient kalokagatia that interests us in the Russian poetic tradition of the 19th century. The comparative-typological method gives the analysis the opportunity to find and present in the system similarities and differences in the poet’s interpretation of the topic of interest to us. Results and discussion. Ancient culture and its values, perceived by Russian culture through the means of Byzantium, have long been entrenched and reflected in Russian literature. For the anthological tradition of Russian lyric poetry and for poets who were close to anthological poetics, the concept of beauty in the callocagation sense becomes important. We consider callocagation as one of the manifestations of the ancient phenomenon of ‘plastic beauty’, which is the quintessence of the combination of internal and external beauty. Later, in the European culture of the modern era, new concepts are assigned to this phenomenon – a phenomenon that arises at the junction of different arts, that is, ekphrasis. An important variation of pictorial ekphrasis is the phenomenon of an imaginary portrait, closely related to the anthological tradition, created by the poet in the poem ‘Kartina’. An analysis of the lyrics of A. Polezhaev, in a number of poems tending to antological poetics, shows the poet’s interpretation of the phenomenon of callocagation. Beauty is interpreted by him not as a manifestation of universal harmony, on the contrary, harmonious beauty only confirms the unattainability of happiness for the lying-down hero. Polezhaev creates an inaccessible and beautiful ideal to which the hero aspires, but he causes only confusion, torment and crisis in the hero’s soul. Conclusion. In our work, we explored the features of perception, reflection and transformation / reincarnation of ancient ideals in the works of Polezhaev with anthological poetics. The phenomenon of plastic beauty is closely linked in its history with the idea of callocagation – the harmony of external and internal content. Polezhaev’s lyrics are distinguished by the peculiarities of the hero’s perception of beauty in the callocagation sense, refracted through the features of the godless romanticism and the poet’s worldview.

Polezhaev, kalokagatiya, antiquity, anthological tradition, Russian romanticism