“But quiet was our bivouac open…”: A few words about the sources of Lermontov’s inspiration

Abstract

Establishing the sources of “Borodino” is a task with many unknowns, hardly feasible even for modern philology. Nevertheless, we do know about several components of the masterpiece: the 1829 school sketch “Le champ de Borodino” and the “Field of Borodino” composed a year or two later to some extent allow us to determine between which alternatives Lermontov was choosing. For example, the French prose text paints the night before the battle in both camps, while the author of the juvenile poem focuses on the Russian. Historicity obviously conflicts here with lyrism. Overcoming the conflict, that is, acting as a historian of the battle while remaining in the costume of its hero, works better if one represents action assumed in a given plot situation. Besides memoirs, among which the notes of F. N. Glinka and N. N. Lubenkov reveal obvious overlaps with Lermontov’s texts, the poet turns to literary models. Among the latter is the Iliad in Gnedich’s translation, which came out in 1829 and was lively discussed by literary scholars and scholars, in particular by Lermontov’s teacher A. F. Merzlyakov. Complementing the parallel with Il. 11, 523, we add to the list of sources the contrasting description of the Trojan and Achaean camps, seen through the eyes of Agamemnon (10, 11–16), especially since the author of “Le champ de Borodino” describes the behaviour of the French in almost the same terms as Homer describes the Trojans.