The epistolary novel and the letter in the novel (GuyMannering, or The Astrologer by W. Scott and A Novel in Letters by A.S. Pushkin)

On the basis of a comparative typological analysis of the novels Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer by Sir Walter Scott and A Novel in Letters by A.S. Pushkin the article discusses questions about the nature of the sentimental epistolary novel (Richardson) development by English and Russian writers and the role of Sir Walter Scott in Pushkin's realistic novel in prose. W. Scott being the successor of the traditions in the development of Richardson sentimental novel in letters by its creative reinterpretation proved an immediate precursor of Pushkin in the creation of A Novel in Letters. W. Scott and Pushkin are similar in the development of the conflict based on the heroes' social inequality, in the development of the motives of the province and the capital, in the typology of female images, in the nature of psychological analysis. Orientation of the writers on the sentimental tradition is due to the moral, philosophical and aesthetic views, in particular, the Enlightenment concept of the person which predetermined the actualization of the problem of the personality, attention to the inner life of the person. Using the letter - the cycle of letters in Scott's Guy Manner-ing and Pushkin's epistolary novel genre - is dictated by the need to dramatize the epic narrative. In Guy Mannering the events of which occur in England and Scotland in the second half of the 18th century W. Scott introduces the narrative structure of 20 letters forming five epistolary lines. Unlike Richardson, who burdened the letters in his novel with purely epic descriptions of what was happening, Sir Walter Scott uses letters primarily to emphasize the dramatic nature of the situations. The sharpest story events are not told by the narrator who functions as an observer, but by the anxious heroes in their letters. Through their perception the reader sees the spiritual life of the Scottish nobility and the inhabitants of the frontier in the second half of the 18th century, their living, habits. The author himself indicates the value of the letter genre in the novel as a method of psychological analysis in his address to the reader before one of the messages of Julia, the heroine. W. Scott's and Pushkin's connection with the sentimental tradition is found in the creation of ideal images, especially female ones, expressing the authors' ideas of moral perfection and poetization of the rustic rural life as a sample of life simplicity and naturalness as opposed to the artificial, aristocratic and vain existence in the capital. The poetics of the novel by Sir Walter Scott, one of the first to understand the tragic contradictions of the person in European literature, has a strict psychological pattern and lacks inclination to affectation. Scott's experience proved to be a solid foundation in the development of psychological analysis for Pushkin. Pushkin's choice of the epistolary form is due to his desire to express the tense spiritual state of the heroes with almost eventless and simple outer plot. Pushkin builds his novel basing on the cycle of letters that has a dramatic content. However, this focus on the drama of passion could cause the incompleteness of A Novel in Letters. Pushkin's understanding of history based on observations of Russian life and embodying the concept of progress could not confine to the processes occurring inside the noble world. The epic conclusion required a different level of consciousness representing the point of view of the democratic majority. The next step was the creation of The BelkinTales. Mastering W. Scott's experience proved an important step towards the creation of Pushkin's prose novel.

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