Dialogue of cultures in Tomsk theatrical chronotope at the turn of the 20th century

Theatrical chronotope in Tomsk was formed earlier than in other Siberian cities. Its formation demonstrated a high level of cultural development of the region. Theatrical chronotope should be understood as a space-time continuum that refers to all the “attributes”, contributing to formation of theatrical business and theater in general: theater stages and buildings, companies, actors, repertoire, critics and periodicals, in which performances and audience growth were constantly described. Although first theatrical performances in other Siberian cities are believed to be held at the end of the 18th century, all the chronotope components in Tomsk appeared only by the end of the 19th - early 20th centuries: stone theatre building, repertory company, weekly periodicals (Sibirskaya Gazeta, Sibirskiy Vestnik) with their own reviewers. We can distinguish three types of Siberian theater critics in 1880-1916: рopulist, liberal and revolutionary-democratic. They existed almost simultaneously and formed a multi-level dialogue within theatrical chronotope. The cultural elite of society were represented by the so called “oblastniki”, who are usually thought to be Siberian orthodox apologists, ignoring all the European and international impact. In fact, the situation was different. For example, political exile Felix Volkhovsky believed that theatrical critic should teach the reader and the viewer, educate their public spirit and moral qualities. Vsevolod Dolgorukov represented the second type of the Siberian critic. Hereditary Prince, he was exiled in Siberia for permanent housing after a criminal trial. “Dialogue of cultures” was fully organized on the pages of the newspaper Sibirskiy Vestnik where he worked. Dolgorukov reviewed foreign plays and analyzed local Tomsk performances in the framework of Saint Petersburg and European tradition. The revolutionary-democratic type of critic was presented by Georgiy Vyatkin who was considered to be “native” Siberian, not only because he was born in Siberia, but also because he got education in Tomsk. Following Dolgorukov, Vyatkin paid great attention to the foreign theatrical repertoire without separating it from the national one. It is thanks to the theatrical chronicle written by local critics and reflected in periodicals we can restore Tomsk Drama Theatre repertoire: which included both Russian classic works and European theatrical plays of different trends. Dialogue of cultures was organized in Tomsk theatrical chronotope not only in the repertoire, but also at the level of guest actors. Reviews of Tomsk critics included translated articles of foreign writers and journalists, which expanded the vision of Siberian spectators of trends in the European theater and as a result connected Siberia with Russian Centre and Europe.

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