CONTRADICTIONS IN IVAN BUNIN’S ATTITUDE TO CREATIVE WORK (AS EXPRESSED IN THE AUTHOR’S LATE LYRICS)

Abstract

The paper deals with Ivan Bunin’s poems written in 1916 – 1952, which remain still the least examined part of his oeuvre. In this period the author’s attitude to creative work might be called ambivalent: at the same time he was certain of the anti-entropic matter of art, but disappointed in its resources. The poet purposed to deny all kinds of conventionalities, to speak about things that are “truly yours and genuine, and justly claim to be expressed, to leave a trace…” Both his prose and lyrics were affected by this claiming to escape the conventionalities of art, to liberate the artistic form, to draw literature closer to the real. The genre of the most liberating potential appeared to be the fragment. The poet’s lyrical self-expression assigned to such fragmental construction is even more distinct in prose, where the fragment is more stable in genre respect. It was important for Bunin to represent incompleteness and infinity of life. Word and reality tend to get substantially closer, but the verse form, inevitably bound to literature and cultural associations, resist the approach. That is why the conventionalities of verse could not be overcome even with the maximal simplification of style and rhythm.