Abstract
This study is an attempt to reconstruct and sum up philosophical interpretations of Stavrogin, the main hero of the classic Dostoevsky’s novel “The Devils”, given by the outstanding Russian religious thinkers in the twentieth century. The author emphasizes that, however different can be their philosophical premises, the discussed interpretations of Dostoevsky’s hero are compatible and complementary. Confronting and, above all, synthesizing different points of view, he tries to grasp the basic historiosophical, anthropological and religious ideas of Russian renaissance.
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Notes
In another place Hessen wrote: ‘Not only rationally but with the whole of his existence he [i.e. Stavrogin] does not believe in God, from whom he fell breaking the bond of love which links all creatures with themselves and with God. In realising that he himself had fallen from God he already overcomes the border of his own disbelief, though this he manages only in a rational way which prompts him all the more to crave faith and with this to all the more strongly experience the fact that he himself is unable to love and consequently is unable to believe’ (p. 694).
A different viewpoint is taken by R. Przybylski, who suggests that Berdyaev and Ivanov did not undertake a historiosophical reinterpretation of the character of Stavrogin (Przybylski 1996, pp. 40–41).
On this subject compare also Przybylski (1996, pp. 40–43).
In a noteable essay of 1972 Ryszard Przybylski defended Christian anthropology and at the same time refused to acknowledge the tragedy of the hero of The Devils (Janion 1996 pp. 47–48; Przybylski 1996, passim, particularly p. 9, 18, 40). He comprehended Christian anthropology here rather as an idealistic than a dialogical one. ‘No world outlook is able to provide him [i.e. an atheist] with an ideal personal model, for the idea which is not faith floats through his soul leaving behind it the bitter taste of emptiness. Only faith is able to keep an idea in man and make him into a person. Disbelief rots the Ego’ (Przybylski 1996, p. 40). It is worth here drawing attention to this detail, although it was not this which determined the ‘detragedy’ of Stavrogin in Przybylski’s perspective. On the other hand the possibility of a Christian and dialogical interpretation of the character of Stavrogin was signalled by Jan Krasicki though not developing this theme. It was, however, this researcher—and possibly to a greater degree than Przybylski—who remained insensitive to the tragedy of the hero of The Devils (Krasicki 2002a, pp. 55–56; 2002b, pp. 75–76).
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Trans. Guy Russell Torr; reviewed and edited by E.M. Swiderski.
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Mazurek, S. The individual and nothingness (Stavrogin: a Russian interpretation). Stud East Eur Thought 62, 41–54 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11212-010-9102-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11212-010-9102-2