The article analyzes a wreath of sonnets “Sergius of Radonezh”, written by the outstanding master of Russian stephanistics, Petrozavodsk poet Yuri Linnik, in 2003. The material for the creation of this magnificent work was drawn from the chronicles and legends about the life and death of one of the most respected saints in Russia and the founder of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery – Sergius of Radonezh, who blessed Dmitry Donskoy for the Battle of Kulikovo. Linnik's predecessors included the famous hagiographer, Epiphanius the Wise, author of “The Life of our Venerable and God-bearing Father, Abbot Sergius the Wonderworker...”, other writers such as historians (V.O. Klyuchevsky), theologians (P.A. Florensky), philosophers (G.P. Fedotov), literary critics (D.S. Likhachev), icon painters (Andrey Rublev), and sonnet poets (Sergey Solovyov, Oleg Ivanov). Dante Alighieri's “Divine Comedy” also influenced Linnik in his work. The idea of the Trinity, brought into the spiritual life of compatriots by the abbot of the Trinity Monastery, embodied the dream of a united Russia, which prompted “to know God not only as One in many ways, but also to embrace with all one's being the deepest trinitarian dialectics”. Sergius Radonezh's Life, presented in an unusual format of a wreath of sonnets, forms an appropriate and harmonious artistic structure for the poet's ideas, expressing the Russian people's eternal aspirations for non-unified unity.
Key words: Sergius of Radonezh, Epiphanius the Wise, Andrey Rublev, Dante Alighieri, Yuri Linnik, Trinity, wreath of sonnets
DOI: 10.22250/20728662_2024_2_188
About the author
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Oleg I. Fedotov – D.Sci. (Philology), Full Professor, Professor at the Department of Russian Classical Literature of the Institute of Philology of the Moscow State Pedagogical University; build. 1, 1 Malaya Pirogovskaya st., Moscow, 119435, Russia; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. |