Provincial newspapers and the story about exposers in the Russian fiction of the 1860s
The article is devoted to the research of Gubernskiye Vedomosti (the Regional News) and the story about provincial exposers in the Russian literature of the 19th century. These plot schemes are formed in the 1860s and are closely connected with exposure tendencies in literature. Peculiarities of such plot schemes are investigated in the material of the articles of different magazines (Otechestvennye Zapiski (Patriotic Notes), Sovremennik (The Contemporary), Iskra (The Spark)). The reputation of the provincial newspapers depended on the culture stereotype. Many journalists of the provincial newspapers were clerks and office-holders. This fact affected the reader's and writer's impression. Events of everyday life were deformed by the internal reviews in the famous magazines (see our article "Transformation of 'internal reviews' genre in the provincial text of Russian literature of the 19th century"). In the newspapers and satirical weekly newspapers it was described in different rubrics (for example, "Write us" or "From the province"). The rubrics of Iskra presented many anecdote situations. In all the contexts analysed the plot scheme is connected with the dilettantism and unprofessional character of provincial fiction. For example, this motif is developed in "The Devil in Kholopsk": "you will gossip and accept bribes as all enlighteners. You will play cards every night and will write about progress in the Regional news every morning". The stereotype is connected with the semantics of other plots about provincial exposers. It formed in fiction under the influence of M. Saltykov-Shchedrin's "Provincial Sketches". The satiric semantics of these plot schemes has two sides. On the one hand, many episodes of the provincial life are ridiculed here. On the other hand, journalists and authors of these reviews are ridiculed, too. Further big novel forms are investigated ("The Devil in Kholopsk" by Fedorov, "The Exposers" by Stopanovsky and "The Boiling Sea" by Pisemsky). The plot scheme of "The Devil in Kholopsk" is based on "The Lame Devil" by Lesage. The story of the novel presents a provincial trip of a clerk and the devil in the town of Kholopsk. Many speeches of characters are connected with exposure tendencies: "What can create it? The emptiness of the rural provincial life and lack of education". In the final of the novel provincial journalists and exposers become equal. The plot scheme of "The Exposers" presents an evolution of this motif. The event here is the appearance of "The Brothers Robbers". It is an exposure story which includes Chichikov, Chichikhin, Kostylkov and all other residents of the provincial Gryazeslavl. In Stopanovsky's novel the liberal exposers are compared with the conservative majority. "The Exposers" presents a behaviour code: this theme covers the relations of the author and the reader. The initial plot scheme transformed, because the meaning of the story is a complex of false identification. Similar realization is used in "The Boiling Sea" and connected with Basardin's character. Exposure here is one of many episodes of the novel story, and, therefore, one of many episodes of social life. Thus, the story about provincial exposers and regional journalists are similar on the semantic level. Moreover, it can have influence of exposure tendencies in the Russian literature and fiction of the 1860s.