To the study of the structure of hagiographic fragments containing visions (Kiyevo-Pecherskiy Patericon and the Life of Alexander Svirsky)

Old Russian stories about visions in the context of writings have a movable structure that cannot be presented in the form of an absolutely stable scheme. However, abstracting from the content and analyzing the construction of a particular event in the narrative allows revealing a general construction scheme of the fragments “with visions”, suggesting a common structural scheme of the structure of any fragment “with visions” in Old Russian literature. To confirm this idea, the paper considers the structure of hagiographic fragments from “The Tale of Isakiy of the Caves” (Kiyevo-Pecherskiy Patericon) written in the 13th century and “The Life of Alexander Svirsky” of the 16th century including stories about the visions of monks contrasting in content. In “Patericon Tale,” the title character is faced with the demons in the guise of angels and a demon who has taken on the likeness of Christ. On the contrary, Alexander Svirsky is graced with a vision of angels and the Trinity. Not only are the common structural elements analyzed, but also the differing ones. It is shown that regardless of the content of the stories about visions, the fragments are constructed according to the general scheme. The elements of this scheme together are the mechanism driving the movement of events in the narrative, with vision being one of the necessary functional components. Different elements are interconnected with the behavior of the main characters of the works and their semantic organization.

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