Strokina S. South in the prose by A. I. Kuprin: mythopoetical organization of artistic space

The dissertation elicits the features of forming the mythological spatial picture of the world in the prose works by Aleksandr Kuprin. The dissertation researches the individual artistic "myth of South" in Kuprin's prose works. The thesis elicits the opposition of core values in Kuprin's artistic "myth of South" ("true/false") that causes ambivalent presentation of the area of the South ("blessed South" and "profane South"). It traces back the motives of the "South" works by Kuprin that realize this ambivalence (motives of temptation and irrevocability of the past) as well as prevailing plot of this works (test for sincerity of heroes' feelings). It also analyses main spatial mythological images of Kuprin's "South myth" ("south town", "country house", "steamboat", "sea", "white acacia") as well as mythopoetical features of anthropologic type of "southerner" in Kuprin's prose works. So, Kuprin's mythopoetical methods mentioned above are interpreted as a display of neorealism with its synthesis of realistic and modernist principles of Kuprin's artistic world.