"Italian playwrights are exceptional…" Article 1. Notes on Italian drama in A. Maikov's traveller's diary of 1842−1843

Apollon Maikov's traveller's diary of 1842-1843, whichbecame the reflection of what he "had seen and read during his first journey to Paris and Rome in1842", is an important document that characterizes the formation of the poet's outlook and creativetenets. One of the fragments in the Roman part of the diary is devoted to the evaluation of Italiandrama and translation of extracts from G.B. Niccolini's tragedy Antonio Foscarini.Contemplations over Italian drama are an important indication of Maikov's interpretation of therequirements to art posed by the contemporary life. Maikov began his journey round Europe with aclear task in mind: his works were to become modern in their content and touch upon the mostpressing problems of the century. It is quite revealing that within the broad range of Italian literatureMaikov chose to address the works of Italian playwrights of the 18th and 19th centuries, who wereclose to the ideological leaders of the liberation movement and strove to meet the real challenges ofpolitical life. Their experience is of great significance to Maikov in view of the pre-set creative task toexplore the contemporary realities, select the factual material and develop a corresponding artisticperspective to it. When looking at the works of Italian tragedians as a man of today, Maikov identifiestheir principal drawbacks. In his opinion, these tragedies are lifeless and too simplistic, as theircharacters display an overtly facile psychological reaction to particular life situations. Therefore, theauthors suggest a rhetorically one-sided interpretation, whereby the heroes invariably stick torealization of their main story line.Maikov's interest in G.B. Niccolini's tragedy Antonio Foscarini is due to its specific content thatdistinguished the tragedy from most of the Italian theatre tragedies of that time. Its plot is not based onone of the stories of Italian conspiracies, but is of a deeply intimate nature, a story thrown into thewhirlpool of political events by some adverse chance, which made it possible for the author to exposethe conflict between the tyrannical authority encroaching on people's lives and the free personalityasserting his rights and defying the terror of death brought by the zealotry of inquisition.Contemplations on Italian drama allow looking into Maikov's creative laboratory. At the sametime, they reveal and specify the most important things in the system of the young poet's aestheticviews, his understanding of the vital tasks that the contemporary art is called upon to solve,demonstrate the subtlety and depth of Maikov's perception of the key cultural trends of the time.

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