The Story “Little Hero”: A Short Form in the “Estate Text” by F. M. Dostoevsky

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Bogdanova, O. A. “The Story ʽThe Little Hero’ as a Small Form in the ʽEstate Text’ by F. M. Dostoevsky.” Dva veka russkoi klassiki, vol. 7, no. 2, 2025, pp. 220–239. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.22455/2686-7494-2025-7-2-220-239
Abstract:
Unlike other works by F. M. Dostoevsky of the 1840s, “The Little Hero” presents not only the Moscow estate experience (Darovoe and Fili) but also the St. Petersburg one (the landscape parks of Tsarskoye Selo, Peterhof, Pavlovsk...). The dacha experience, comprehended in the “St. Petersburg Chronicle” and “White Nights,” is brought in, and multiplied by acquaintance with Moscow merchant relatives. Thus, the estate-dacha topos in “The Little Hero” is not an autobiographical copy but an artistic generalization with an internal opposition of the estate and dacha segments with different value paradigms. For the first time, the article ontologizes the “estate topos” in Dostoyevsky’s works, which became a distinctive feature of his “estate text” in comparison with contemporary writers. Since the 1860s it has been realized in Christian-pagan coordinates. However, in the story of 1849, written in a prison cell of the Peter and Paul Fortress, the first achieved effect of ontologization is due to the romantic mood of the author and the choice of a small form — the genre of a literary fairy tale with its “eternal” meanings.
Keywords: F. M. Dostoevsky, “The Little Hero,” short story, literary estate, literary dacha, ontologization, small forms, literary fairy tale, romanticism, landscape park.
Author: Olga A. Bogdanova
Information about the author:
Olga A. Bogdanova, DSc in Philology, Leading Research Fellow, A. M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Povarskaya St., 25A, bld. 1, 121069 Moscow, Russia.

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7004-498X

E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Received: February 01, 2025
Approved after reviewing: April 04, 2025
Published: June 25, 2025
Issue: 2025 Volume 7 No. 2
Department: Russian Literature of the 18th–19th Centuries
Pages: 220-239
DOI: Visit Website
EDN:
https://elibrary.ru/DJGUJR
UDK: 821.161.1.09"19"
Publication Type: Research Article

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