Religiously based morality in the theatre of Alexander Ostrovsky
Item
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Title
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Religiously based morality in the theatre of Alexander Ostrovsky
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Identifier
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d_2009_2013:0b0dd2d6cd05:10210
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identifier
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10476
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Creator
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Muratova, Olga,
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Contributor
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Daniel C. Gerould
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Date
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2009
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Theater | Slavic literature | Religion | Christian morality | Ostrovsky | Russian Orthodoxy | society of guilt | society of shame
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Abstract
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The dissertation offers a new way of interpreting Alexander Ostrovsky's dramas. The Ostrovsky scholarship is systematic, thorough, and well documented, but it may overlook a particular aspect of the playwright's work, that of Christian, and more specifically Russian Orthodox, morality. The dissertation correlates facts of Ostrovsky's biography (some of which were not publicized during the Soviet era), textual content of his dramas, and biblical conceptual language in them with the historical and cultural context of nineteenth-century Russia, revealing religiously based didacticism in the playwright's oeuvre. A coherent explanation of the factors (historical, ethnological, theological, epistemological, and, at least partially, ontological) that shaped Ostrovsky's life views and consequently his writing is offered as a key element of the argument presented. The writer's four metanarratives (guilt vs. shame; sin; money; theatre), which are being singled out as dominant in his dramas, are looked at from the standpoint of his understanding and interpretation of Christian doctrines. Previous research traditionally labeled a number of Ostrovsky's plays atypical for his writing style, thus creating an exclusive approach to the interpretation of the body of his work. However, if Ostrovsky is regarded as a didactic author who embodied within his plays certain attitudes about morality, which were the outgrowths of religion-influenced ethical positions of his time, exclusions become unnecessary and every drama conforms to a unifying pattern. By shedding more light on Ostrovsky's work and grounding it in Russian Orthodoxy, the dissertation demonstrates that while the playwright should be considered a realist in form, the content of his plays renders them moral fables, rooted in the Bible and the teachings of the Russian national church.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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2009_2013.csv
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Comparative Literature
