Moscow, Oct. 18-20, 2012
The 8th “Belye Chteniya” (White Readings) conference was held in Moscow at the Institute for Philology and History at the Russian State University for the Humanities (RSUH) from October 18 to 20, 2013. Four sessions of this conference were devoted to narratology. The first took up General Issues of Narratology, during which the following papers were delivered:
- Matthias Freise (University of Göttingen, Germany): “If Narration were Collection”
- Konstantin A. Barsht (Institute of Russian Literature, Saint Petersburg): “Voice and Point of View in Narrative”
- Ljubov D. Bugaeva (Saint Petersburg): “Cognitive Narratology: Pro et Contra”
- Yuri L. Troitsky (RSUH): “Historiographical Text from G. Genette’s Viewpoint”
- Kseniya A. Vorotyntseva (Institute of Philology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Novosibirsk): “The Problem of Daily Routine in Fictional Narrative”
After these papers, an in-depth discussion was opened on the ways in which narratology has developed, and in particular on the role of cognitive narratology in this process.
During the second session, On the Boundaries of Narratology, questions relating to classical narrative of particular interest for narratology were discussed. The first three papers dealt with the correlation between performativity and narrativity in lyrical poetry:
- Valerij I. Tjupa (RSUH): “Performatives as Subject Matter of Narratology”
- Lyudmila V. Tataru (Saratov State University): “Narrative and the Cognitive Nature of Lyrical Poetry (English poetry of the 17th and 18th centuries)”
- Arcadij A. Chevtaev (State Polar Academy, Saint Petersburg): “Plot and Fabula Structure of Lyrical Narrative”
The next session included two papers devoted to the effectiveness and limits of applying narratological concepts and terminology to the study of cinema and the other visual arts:
- Victor A. Milovidov (Tver State University): “Narration in Intermedial Artistic Systems”
- Nikolai V. Poselyagin (Moscow State University): “Feature Film as an Object and Non-Object of Narratological Studies”
The third session took up the problem of Narrative Structures. The following papers were presented and discussed extensively:
- Vladislav Sh. Krivonos (Volga State Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Samara): “Gaps in the Narrative Structure of A Hero of Our Time”
- Galina A. Zhilicheva (Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University): “Peculiarities of Focalization in B. Pasternak’s Novel Doctor Zhivago”
- Maria D. Andrianova (Saint Petersburg): “Narrative Peculiarities of ‘Doubles’ in Andrei Bitov’s Prose”
- Do Hai Phong (Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam): “The Narrative Structure of Postmodern Discourse in L. Ulitskaya’s Sonechka”
- Inna G. Drach (RSUH): “The Difference between Cinematic and Montage Novels in the Light of the Nature of Literary Montage”
The fourth and final session included papers whose focus was on the problem of Narrative Instances:
- Veronika B. Zuseva-Özkan (RSUH): “Metanovel and Novel with Authorial Intrusions after Cervantes (a Narratological Aspect)”
- Elena Yu. Kozmina (Ural Federal University, Ekaterinburg): “A Hero’s Manuscript as a Narratological Problem”
- Olga A. Grimova (Kuban State University): “Narrative Strategy in Yu. Buida’s Novel Dark Blue Blood”
- Andrei D. Stepanov (Saint Petersburg State University): “Chekhov’s Narrative and Generative Poetics”
- Olga V. Fedunina (RSUH): “The Hero’s Conceptual Horizon in Criminal Narrative: a Genre Aspect”
- Irina S. Belyaeva (Tver State Technical University): “The Author and Hero in V. Nabokov’s Novel The Gift”
On the whole, the two last sessions showed that classical narratology still holds considerable potential for further scientific research.
The proceedings of the narratology section at the White Readings conference will soon be published in the Russian-language international electronic journal Narratorium at http://narratorium.rggu.ru The articles will be accompanied by ab-stracts in English.