“The Consolations of the Forest” by S. Tesson - a new page in the French “Siberian text”

The paper addresses “The Consolations of the Forest” by S. Tesson, where the author creates a new myth of Siberia. The documentary image of Siberia in the novel is full of sophisticated mythopoetic symbolism. Siberian locus is semanticized both as a chthonian land and a land of purity. Purity, the main semantic characteristic of the Siberian chronotope, is associated with silence, emptiness, simplicity, naturalness, and cold. Motifs of simplicity and naturalness connect the concept of purity with the idea of the beautiful. Tesson reveals the meanings that make Siberia a part of cultural space. The purity complex is closely connected with the existential notion of freedom. The novel is organized by the idea of the narrator’s initiation, setting him free. The Siberian forest is shown to be an ideal liminal land, leading to the realm of freedom. The liminal character of the Siberian chronotope is manifested in the infernal semantics and the characteristics common to an island and a desert. The plot can be interpreted as a rite of passage in which the narrator, melting into Baikal nature, acquires freedom and peace. Liminality, a basic myth for the Siberian text, is explored in a new way, more akin to the model of the Siberian text that prevails in classic Russian novels, where Siberia is represented as a place of temporary death leading to resurrection. Tesson mythologizes the geographic space heeding not to the stereotypes existing in the French culture but to his own beliefs. The Siberian locus incarnates Tesson’s values and represents the sum total of a dream of a contemporary person exhausted with the consumerist society and aspiring personal freedom.

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