Ivan Bunin’s story “Idol”: politics, ethnography, and poetics in light of the text’s history

Based on an analysis of two manuscript autographs and all printed versions of the story “Idol,” this paper examines the evolution of the work’s central ethnographic theme and reconstructs the subtexts embedded by the author. The study focuses on the juxtaposition of man and animal characteristic of the collection “Bozh’ye drevo” (“The God’s Tree”), noting that the underlying meaning of this structure is often obscured in the final editions. By referring to the original manuscripts, the analysis uncovers “double” and “triple” parallelisms that Bunin later eliminated to refine his prose. This research projects the story’s ethnographic discourse onto classical works of early Russian ethnography (zemleopisaniya). A conclusion is made that Bunin assimilated various phobias typical of early ethnographic observers, adopting standard features of their poetics: describing the protagonist through exotic attire and dietary habits. These features serve as zoomorphisms, reflecting the inseparable connection between human and animal nature. This perspective allows for a full appreciation of parallelism as a primary device in the poetics of “Idol.” Additionally, the paper explores potential intertextual sources for the plot (fabula). It is argued that the arrival of the couple at the Moscow Zoological Garden skating rink likely traces back to a famous episode in Leo Tolstoy’s novel “Anna Karenina.”

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