An early edition of Andrey Bolotov’s memoirs (from the archives and manuscripts section of the State Historical Museum)
- DOI
- 10.5922/2225-5346-2020-2-10
- Pages
- 114-122
Abstract
The history of the creation of Andrei T. Bolotov’s memoirs has been little studied. In particular, the stages of his work on this text are not entirely clear. This article is an attempt to shed light on one aspect of this problem. Bolotov’s personal fund (No. 349) in the Archives and manuscripts section of the State Historical Museum contain a manuscript of Bolotov’s memoirs entitled “Part 2”. It differs significantly in its essential characteristics (paper, design, size, composition, title, division into sections, etc.) from most manuscripts of Bolotov’s memoirs. The study presents a textual analysis of this manuscript and compares it with the text of memoirs published by Mikhail Semevsky, — the most complete printed edition of The Life and Adventures of Andrei Bolotov. The stages of Bolotov’s work on the manuscript are considered; a comparative analysis of lexical units, stylistic preferences, and the content of the manuscript is carried out. The results obtained suggest that the undated manuscript is the earliest version of the memoirs, supposedly written in the late 1770s.
Reference
Bolotov, A. T., 1870—1873. Zhizn' i priklyucheniya Andreya Bolotova, opisannye samim im dlya svoikh potomkov [The life and adventures of Andrei Bolotov, described by him for his descendants]. Vol. 1—4. St. Petersburg (in Russ.).
Bolotov, A. T., n. d. Priklyucheniya Andreya Bolotova s 1752 po 1758 god, opisannye samim im [Adventures of Andrei Bolotov from 1752 to 1758, described by him]. OPI GIM F. 349. № 2 (in Russ.).
Veselova, A. Yu. and Milyutin, M. P., (in press) The history of the creation of the memoirs of A. T. Bolotov. Russkaya literatura [Russian Literature], 3 (in Russ.).