Powieści Aleksandra Weltmana po stu latach

Abstract

The article presents a tentative analysis and evaluation of the literary production of the Russian writer Alexander Weltman (1800-1870), the author of numerous poems, poetic tales, dramas, novels, and short stories. This writer, who has now fallen almost in to entire oblivion, was among the most fertile and most widely read representatives of nineteenth-century Russian fiction. The author of the article records the present state of research on this writer’s work, cites the principal facts and events of his life, describes his personality and general outlook, and analyses his literary production. Her attention has been centered on his novels, the most important portion of Weltman’s literary heritage. There are three periods to be distinguished in Weltman’s work. During the first the writer was under the influence of Romanticism; the second period was of transitory character: Weltman was oscillating beetwen the romantic and the realistic visions of reality; in the third period his works were written in the realistic convention. The author has tried to bring to light the most outstanding of the writer’s achievements for each successive period. Thus, Weltman the romantic writer created a new literary genre, consisting of a combination of certain elements of the historical novel with elements of a fairytale; in his mature years he was sometimes able to achieve a synthesis of the best attainments of Romanticism and Realism; finally, in the last period he strove to create a novel of a new type, founded on the experience of both picaresque novels and prose of social and psychological character, depicting the morals and manners of his time. The analysis of this writer’s work permits to conclude that Weltman deserves a place in the history of Russian literature.