The "Chinese text" and the emigrant myth in the poetry of the Russian Far Eastern emigration of the 1920s-1950s

The article deals with the transformation of the forming "Chinese text" into an "emigrant myth" in the poetry of the Russian Far East emigration in the works of V.F. Perelyshin (Salatko-Petrishche), Vs.N. Ivanov, A.P., Parkou, A. A. Achair (Gruzov) and other poets. The "Chinese text" is understood as a mirror of the consciousness of poets who were alienated from Russia, and comprehended the traditional culture of China like the world of the second homeland. In contrast to the "national myth," a new type of identity -an "emigrant myth" is being formed. As a way of constructing the artistic picture of the world, it is formed in the poetry of emigration through oppositions, such as Russia - China, West - East, I - the Other, past - present, memory - oblivion, etc. The article explores the proximity of the function of the mythologeme and the motive in the formation of a kind of an integral unity. In the "Chinese text", Russian poets embody two semantic dominants, which are based on the thought of the daily life of the poor Chinese "little man" and, at the same time, of the eternal sources of the ancient spiritual culture. They are contradictory and deeply interrelated, fitting into the symbolic paradigm of the mythologemes of "cosmos" and "chaos". On their basis, the motives of alienation and psychological trauma in exile, motives of acceptance and non-acceptance of the "alien" culture were formed. And, respectively, the main theme of the "Chinese text" - comprehension and finding paradise, the image of which became an expression of existential insight, -was correlated with the myth of "return". It is shown that the motives and themes of "revival" in the emigrant mentality develop in the spirit of Eurasianism. It is concluded that since the 1930s the idea of China as a foreign space was receding into the background. As the embodiment of the salvation myth and the new paradise, the image of China integrated into the paradigm of the "Chinese text". Mythologemes of the "death of the old me" and the "rebirth of the new me" were filled with the Chinese national tradition. On the basis of the analysis, it is proved that in poetry Russian emigrants recreate the syncretic image of ancient China. It is an echo of the "emigrant myth" as a new reality in which the soul lives. The aspect of immersion in the Other's culture is considered, which reflects the process of formation of a new type of identity. It is determined that the motive of comprehending the religious culture of China, in which Russian poets see the possibility of revival and the attainment of harmony, plays a big role in the development of the "Chinese text". In the poetry of the Russian Far East, the "Chinese text" is not only a supertextual unity, thematically related to the cultural notion of China, but also the spiritual reality of consciousness, embodying the history of cognition and discovering oneself in the "Other" culture. It exists as a new version of identity, contributing to the formation of an "emigrant myth".

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