Prison Uniforms in A. P. Chekhov’s “Fictional Wardrobe”: Sakhalin Island

Authors

  • Elena Sozina

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2016.4.191

Abstract

The author regards A. P. Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island through the lens of contemporary post-colonial criticism. She focuses on the colonisation of the island, which Chekhov analysed from a variety of angles (the economic development of Sakhalin and its colonisation by means of prisoner labour). Chekhov unites a number of points of view in the text, but it is also important that Chekhov himself quite often employs the language of a supporter of the imperial idea, although his account testifies to the failure of colonisation and the inability to modernise the Russian legal system. According to Chekhov, this resulted from the problems inherent in the reforms and the fact that serfdom had not been entirely wiped out. Chekhov stops using the indirect narration he had previously employed and directly expresses his opinion on the things he witnesses, quite often omitting his own evaluations. The author emphasises the continuity between the literary tradition of the 1860s and 1870s (G. Uspensky, N. Pomyalovsky, F. Reshetnikov, etc.) and Chekhov’s works. Sakhalin Island is part of a super textual entity, since it should be read alongside Chekhov’s letters on the continuation of his journey around Southeast Asia, which give a wider perspective of the colonisation of the island. Chekhov changed his manner of narration a number of times and reconsidered his approach: the text reflects those changes. Apparently, this was connected with Chekhov’s ambiguous impression of his journey to Sakhalin, with what he saw on the island, and how he perceived what was going on there and his own role. It is impossible to describe or interpret the colonisation of the island of Sakhalin in an unambiguous way, and it was one of the writer’s tasks to learn about its results.

References

Chekhov, A. P. (1974–1983). Polnoe sobranie sochineny i pisem : v 30 t. Pis′ma : v 12 t. [Complete Works and Letters: 30 Vols.]. Moscow, Nauka.
Dal, V. I. (n. d.) Tolkovyy slovar′ zhivogo velikorusskogo yazyka : v 4 t. [Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian Language: 4 Vols.]. URL: http://www.classes.ru/all-russian/russian-dictionary-Dal-term-13379.htm (mode of access: 10.02.2016)
Foucault, M., Naumov, V. (Transl.) & Borisova, I. (Ed.). (2015). Nadzirat′ i nakazyvat′ : Rozhdenie tyur′my [Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison]. 416 p. Moscow, Ad Marginem Press.
Entsiklopedichesky slovar′ F. A. Brokgauza i I. A. Efrona : v 86 t. [The Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary: 86 Vols.]. URL: http://www.vehi.net/brokgauz/ (mode of access: 10.02.2016).
Etkind, A., Uffelmann D. & Kukulin, D. (2012). Vnutrennyaya kolonizatsiya Rossii: mezhdu praktikoy i voobrazheniem [There within: Practices of Internal Colonisation in Russia’s Cultural History]. In Etkind, A., Uffelmann, D. & Kukulin, I. (Eds.).Tam vnutri : Praktiki vnutrenney kolonizatsii v kul′turnoy istorii Rossii : sb. st. (pp. 6–50). Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie.
Etkind, A. (2014). Vnutrennyaya kolonizatsiya : Impersky opyt Rossii [Internal Colonisation. Russia’s Imperial Experience]. 2nd ed. 448 p. Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie.
Gabdullina, V. I. (2014). Struktura narrativa v knige A. P. Chekhova “Ostrov Sakhalin”: arkhetipichesky i kul′turnyy podtekst [The Structure of Narrative in A. P. Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island: Archetypical and Cultural Subtext]. In Narrativnye traditsii slavyanskikh literatur: ot Srednevekov′ya k novomu vremeni. K yubileyu chlen-korrespondenta RAN E. K. Romodanovskoy : materialy Vseros. nauch. konf. (pp. 201–205). Novosibirsk, Omega Print.
Gogol′, N. V. (1994). Sobranie sochineny : v 9 t. [A Collection of Works: 9 Vols.]. Vol. 7. 624 p. Moscow, Russkaya kniga.
Kataev, V. B. (1974). Avtor v “Ostrove Sakhalin” i v rasskaze “Gusev” [The Author in Sakhalin Island and in Short Story Gusev]. In V tvorcheskoy laboratorii Chekhova (pp. 232–252). Moscow, Nauka.
Kataev, V. B. (2001). Realizm i naturalizm [Realism and Naturalism]. In Russkaya literature rubezha vekov (1890-e – nachalo 1920-kh godov) : v 2 kn. (Book 1, pp. 191–258). Moscow, IMLI RAN, Nasledie.
Corrado, Sh. M. (2011). Sakhalinskaya katorga i mezhdunarodnaya tyuremnaya reforma [Sakhalin Hard Labour and the International Penal Reform]. In A. P. Chekhov i Sakhalin: vzglyad iz XXI stoletiya : materialy mezhdunar. nauch.-prakt. konf. 21–22 sent. 2010 g. /Pravitel′stvo Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; ministerstvo kul′tury Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; Sakhalinsky gos. un-t. (pp. 33–40). Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Kolorit.
Levkovskaya, A. Yu. (2010). Ayny v knige A. P. Chekhova “Ostrov Sakhalin” i ikh sovremennoe polozhenie [The Ainu People in A. P. Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island]. In Kostanova, I. A. (Comp.). XIII Chekhovskie chteniya : Anton Pavlovich Chekhov i kniga “Ostrov Sakhalin” v dvizhenii epokh: vek XIX – vek XXI (pp. 34–38). / Upravlenie kul′tury administratsii goroda Yuzhno-Sakhalinska. Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, SakhGU.
Nekrasov, N. A. & Podol′skaya, I. I. (Comp.). (1987). Stikhotvoreniya : 1856 [Poems: 1856]. 526 p. Moscow, Nauka.
Pospišil, I. (2015). Ostrov Sakhalin A. P. Chekhova kak lebedinaya pesnya russkogo klassicheskogo romana i puti k novomu romanu [A. P. Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island as the Swan Song of the Russian Classical Novel on the Way to the New Novel]. In Ivo Pospišil. Na forpostakh teorii i istorii klassicheskoy russkoy literatury / Colloquia Literaria Sedlcensia. XX (pp. 177–182). Siedlce, Instytut Neofilologii I Badan Inyerdyscyplinarnych Universytetu Przyrodniczo-Humanistycznego w Siedlcach.
Said, E. (2006). Orientalizm : Zapadnye kontseptsii Vostoka [Orientalism]. 638 p. Saint Petersburg, Russky mir.
Savinkov, S. V. (2013). Zachem Chekhov ezdil na Sakhalin [Why Chekhov Travelled to Sakhalin]. In Pecherskaya, T. I. (Ed.). Literatura puteshestvy: kul′turno-istoricheskie i diskursivnye aspekty : sb. nauch. rabot (pp. 373–385). Novosibirsk, Gaudeamus.
Shcheglov, V. V. (2011). Impersky motiv rossiyskoy kolonizatsii Dal′nego Vostoka [The Imperial Motive for the Russian Colonisation of the Far East]. In A. P. Chekhov i Sakhalin: vzglyad iz XXI stoletiya : materialy mezhdunar. nauch.-prakt. konf. 21–22 sent. 2010 g. / Pravitel′stvo Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; ministerstvo kul′tury Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; Sakhalinsky gos. un-t. (pp. 88–90). Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Kolorit.
Sozina, E. K. (2015). Etnograficheskaya belletristika v russkoy literature rubezha XIX–XX v. [Ethnographic Fiction in the Russian Literature of the Turn of the 20th Century]. In Romodanovskaya, V. A., Silant′ev, I. V. & Titova, L. V. (Eds.). Krugi vremen : V pamyat′ Eleny Konstantinovny Romodanovskoy (pp. 625–636). Moscow, Indrik.
Sukhikh, I. N. (1985). “Ostrov Sakhalin” v tvorchestve A. Chekhova [Sakhalin Island in A. Chekhov’s Creative Work]. In Russkaya literature, 3, pp. 72–84.
Sukhikh, I. N. (2007). Problemy poetiki Chekhova [Issues of Chekhov’s Poetics]. 2nd ed. 497 p. Saint Petersburg, Filologichesky fakul′tet SPbGU.
Troitskaya, N. A. (2011). Sakhalinskaya katorga kak neudachnyy ekonomichesky eksperiment [Sakhalin Hard Labour as a Failed Economic Experiment]. In A. P. Chekhov i Sakhalin: vzglyad iz XXI stoletiya : materialy mezhdunar. nauch.-prakt. konf. 21–22 sent. 2010 g. / Pravitel′stvo Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; ministerstvo kul′tury Sakhalinskoy oblasti ; Sakhalinsky gos. un-t. (pp. 29–32). Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Kolorit.
Ushakov, D. N. (n.d.). Bol′shoy tolkovyy slovar′ sovremennogo russkogo yazyka [Great Explanatory Dictionary of the Contemporary Russian Language]. URL: http://www.classes.ru/all-russian/russian-dictionary-Ushakov-term-23943.htm (mode of access: 10.02.2016).
Vizgin, V. P. (1995). Mishel′ Fuko – teoretik tsivilizovannogo znaniya [Michel Foucault –Theoretician of Civilized Knowledge]. In Voprosy filosofii, 4, pp. 116–126.
Vysokov, M. S. (2010). Kommentary k knige A. P. Chekhova “Ostrov Sakhalin” [A Commentary for A. P. Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island]. 848 p. Vladivostok – Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Rubezh.
Yadrintsev, N. M. (1882). Sibir′ kak koloniya : K yubileyu trekhsotletiya [Siberia as a Colony: For Its 300th Anniversary]. 471 p. Saint Petersburg, Tip. M. M. Stasyulevicha.

Published

2016-12-28

How to Cite

Sozina, E. (2016). Prison Uniforms in A. P. Chekhov’s “Fictional Wardrobe”: Sakhalin Island. Quaestio Rossica, 4(4), 64–83. https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2016.4.191

Issue

Section

Vox redactoris