Aesthetics and Metaphysics of Celestial Bodies in V. A. Zhukovsky’s Pavlovsky Poems

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This work was carried out with financial support from Russian Science Foundation, project no. 23-78-01016 “Cosmic Images in Russian Poetry of the Late 18th – First Third of the 19th Century: Ontology and Poetics” (https://rscf.ru/project/23-78-01016/).
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Potashova, K. A. “Aesthetics and Metaphysics of Celestial Bodies in V. A. Zhukovsky’s Pavlovsky Poems.” Dva veka russkoi klassiki, vol. 7, no. 2, 2025, pp. 62–79. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.22455/2686-7494-2025-7-2-62-79
Abstract:
The purpose of the article was to identify the features of V. A. Zhukovsky’s poetic cosmology, presented in all its diversity in the cycle of Pavlovsky Poems (1819). The article reconstructs the romantic understanding of the structure of the universe established in Zhukovsky’s poetry and its new poetic comprehension. It examines the poetics, aesthetics, and ontology of the image of the moon as a poetic constant of Zhukovsky’s meditative lyrics. In comparison with the judgments of the holy fathers, the article reveals the symbolic fullness of the images of heavenly bodies in Zhukovsky’s Pavlovsky Poems, associated with the glorification of the divine presence, the visible embodiment of paradise, and the expression of memory. The article argues that the metaphorical meaning of the moon in Zhukovsky’s artistic system is associated with the disclosure of the longing for the human soul and its transformation when encountering eternity. The scientific novelty of this study is determined by the identification of the semantic fullness of the image of the moon and stars in the Pavlovsky Poems of the poet’s poems aimed at understanding Zhukovsky’s worldview.
Keywords: V. A. Zhukovsky, cosmological imagery, lunar landscape, worldview, ontology, visualization mechanisms.
Author: Ksenia A. Potashova
Information about the author:
Ksenia A. Potashova, PhD in Philology, Associate Professor, State University of Education, Friedrich Engels St., 21 a, 105005 Moscow, Russia.

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0164-0371

E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Received: December 10, 2024
Approved after reviewing: March 28, 2025
Published: June 25, 2025
Issue: 2025 Volume 7 No. 2
Department: Russian Literature of the 18th–19th Centuries
Pages: 62–79
DOI: Visit Website
EDN:
https://elibrary.ru/CSOBRR
UDK: 821.161.1.09"18"
Publication Type: Research Article

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