From the Latin short story to the Russian spiritual verse: From the history of one folk plot

Abstract

The article considers the history of the poetic versions of the plot of “The Enchanted Monk” in the Russian poetic tradition. These versions were not previously subjected to a special study. In the article, the poetic versions of the plot are arranged in chronological order among the entire corpus of literary and folk texts, a brief historical commentary is provided to each text, the verse of each text is analyzed, and a picture of the history of the plot in its poetic form is presented. The methodology of the research includes the elements of the “Russian method” (quantitative assessment of verse parameters, rhythmical analysis, etc.). In certain cases, a semantic interpretation of the meter is used. The metre and rhythm of the poetic versions are considered in the historical and cultural context, against the background of the poetic tradition. The main points in the poetic history of the text are as follows: literary syllabic verse (17th century); transitional poetic and prosaic forms (18th century); the first trochaic literary imitations of a folk verse (18th century); classical iambic tetrameter (19th century); free iamb in a literary translation with a predominance of five-footed lines (20th century); four-footed amphibrach in the folk tradition (20thcentury). An attempt is made to identify the literary source of the origin of the four-footed amphibrach in folk verse: such a source was probably the Russian ballad verse at the beginning of the 19th century.