Altai text of Vitalii Bianki

Abstract

Selected works of V. V. Bianki are considered in the context of the theory of local supertexts (the Tartu-Moscow school). The Altai text acts as a subsystem of the Siberian text, coinciding with it in a number of parameters, but being isolated by geographic reference to the region. The proposed analysis makes it possible to single out the invariant motive of the “Altai” works of the writer — the existential choice of a person at the acute moment of the “fight” with a representative of natural forces, embodying the “spirit” of Altai. Human characters are hierarchically organized according to the degree of increased involvement in natural life: urban — local — scientist-naturalist. At the opposite pole there are variants of a kind of genius loci of the region: sable, bear, mountain goat, element. Bianki’s palette is not limited to the genres indicated by the author: novella and short stories. Starting with a reliable image of the “hunt-trade” (“Askyr,” “The last shot”), the author continues with stories with a bias towards anecdote (“Fatal beast,” “Somersault”) and the parable (“Boon”), and ends with the text, actualizing the canon of a fairy tale (“She”). The designated corpus of texts has not only thematic coherence, but also increased orderliness. Structural and semiotic connectivity is manifested in the tendency to the formation of binary microcycles, the presence of a single plot invariant and a mythological core. All these are arguments in favor of the existence of the Altai text in the writer’s work.