G. Pushkaryov's In the ranges of the Altai as a prototype of the Oirot encyclopedia (Some aspects of the artistic-ideological imagination of Soviet national peripheral areas)

The article covers the book In the ranges of the Altai (1930) by Gleb Pushkaryov, one of the founders of The Siberian Writers' Union and one of the ideologists of Siberian Early Soviet literature which is the model of artistic-ideological imagination of Soviet national periphery (Oirot autonomous oblast - Oirotia). Created as a travelogue (three schoolboys travel throug h the Altai Mountains following the routes of V.V. Sapozhnikov and G.N. Potanin) and addressed to the teenage children, the book is considered to be an experience of a systemic summary of the knowledge of nature and ethnography of the newborn autonomy, a prototype of the Oirot encyclopedia. The literary context of this fictitious travelogue is interpreted as a re-discovery of the Altai Mountains which sets the new name, Oirotia, for the territory. Pushkaryov's viewpoint is interpreted as an opposition to such a "rediscovery" which consists in following the regional position in the creation of the images of Siberian non-residents and non-residential territories; this idea is emphasized by the geographical term "Altai" used in the title. The book is interpreted as an attempt of the opposition to the rhetoric of the cultural retardation created by the Soviet national policy. The author of the article comes to a conclusion that the addressee choice allows Pushkaryov to avoid critical social problems, so he does not portray the authochtons ("the natives", "the Kalmyks") as the victims of the Tsarism colonial policy in the past and the Great Russian chauvinism at present, but speaks about them as of "the children of nature". At the beginning of his creative development, G. Pushkaryov wrote a series of micro-stories about the Altai peoples, "The infants of the Mountains" (1922). Children's view on the world of the exotic nature of the Altai Mountains and the exotic "Kalmyks", an Altai people, balances these worlds naturally; adults' view (the teacher, the guides) separates these worlds assimilating the first one economically and almost leveling the second one ethnically. In the ranges of the Altai, the characters-travelers discover several worlds existing in parallel: the civilized world of the present, the exotic world of the natives, the fairy-tale world of natural resources along with fabulous bandits and Old Believers. The passage between the worlds is realized via the mountain passes - natural world boundaries. The natural-science component of the text bases on the geographical, botanical, zoological, entomological, and ethnographical scientific data collected mainly by the scientists of Tomsk State University in the late 19th - early 20th centuries. The latest information on the region is presented by statistics (deer-raising, beekeeping, hunting, wood floating etc.). Pushkaryov's book is a manual typical for the outset of the Soviet study of local lore; it demonstrates the specifics of the national periphery description in the form of a fascinating journey around an exotic area.

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