The vision of Peter Artemiev from his letter to his father and its role in the text structure

The paper examines the eschatological vision of Peter Artemiyev, the author who lived in the second half of the seventeenth century, presented in the part of his letter to his father from Moscow to Suzdal. The analysis was made of the letter duplicate preserved in the only copy in the draft manuscript of the late seventeenth century from the Synodic collection of SHM, no. 393. This letter is of a high scientific value as a source of biographical information about the writer and his literary masterpieces, combining the traditions of Old Russian booklore and cultural innovations of the second half of seventeenth century. In the letter structure, a special place takes the story of his own visionary experience (hell vision) that is related to the early period of life. The study deals with the content and system of characters of the vision, defines its structural specificity, establishes the connection between the vision and letter context, and determines its function in the compositional structure of the work. By its content, the vision described by Peter Artemiev is close to the type of visionary genre where the otherworld themes were developed. The text of the vision reflects the complex of author’s representations that were formed by the booklore influence, especially the texts with eschatological content. Among the topoi of the visionary genre used by the author, a special role plays the image of «paper scroll» where the sacred knowledge about some part of the otherworld is imprinted. This image can be definitely correlated with the Old Covenant storyline concerning the calling of prophet Ezekiel (Ez 2: 1-10; 3: 1-11). The connection of vision with Bible theme might have defined the character and conceptual orientation of its interpretation by the author himself. In total, the eschatological motifs and characters used by Peter Artemiev, according to his interpretation, have highlighted in the letter context such aspects of vision as pointing at chosenness and reminder of retribution for the sinner. The text analysis shows that the vision of Peter Artemiev, the content of which is closely connected with the letter context, had a significant influence on the author’s image and manner of self-expression. It made the confessional basis of the essay stronger and expanded its semantic range. In the narration, one can trace the individual features of the author, the elements of psychological selfanalysis. Since Peter Artemiev vision is included in the letter structure, it helped him to disclose his writer's talent, demonstrate the individuality and authors self-consciousness.

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