Oldal 270 [270]
OCR
GYÖRGY ZOLTÁN Józsa The Pythagoreans ought to be considered a further development in Bryusov’s project to write the play entitled The Fall of Atlantis, which remained unfinished. The main conflict, which lies in the protagonist’s dilemma over the correct reading of the text, foreshadows an early Russian version of the contemporary branch of science known as Rezeptionsdsthetik. The hero’s death is looked upon as the loss of the interpreter, and here Bryusov touches upon the question of the recipient as co-author. It is well-known that Russian Symbolists viewed the process of reception as a creative act on the part of the reader. The exclusivity of initiation is proclaimed by Prognost and Gorgij, adherents of the esoteric status of knowledge and brethren of Sinaret, the tragic hero. For them, the ritual is supposed to be an indispensable prerequisite to obtaining the right to interpret a text. The narrative elements of the dramatic etude thematize a problem of hermeneutics ina way that makes this problem perceivable for common readers. Nonetheless, it becomes complicated, given the problem of proclaiming culture as memory, and a reference is made to the Platonic idea of the optimal creative literary process, which is governed by the perfect functioning of memory. This very idea, which provokes controversial associations with Vj. Ivanov’s orthodox theory of the poet as “an organ of the people’s memory,” comes to the fore due to the specific activity of the protagonist: he is trying to decrypt a text written by the dwellers of Atlantis. The code for deciphering it, thus, has vanished. Consequently, the presence of this hermeneutic principle momentarily elevates the play into a symbolic space. Utterances on the lips of the dramatic characters are thus to be distinguished on the level of their esoteric and anagogic meanings. In spite of archetypal schemes exploited in the dramatic situation, the potential connotative meanings are perceived by means of surveying the religious philosophical context of the play. It is no accident that the problem of this or that reading of a text or oral utterance is pre-coded by the “profession” of the hero, who considers himself capable of finding the code to the heritage of Atlantis. The dramatic hero is cast simultaneously in the role of the mirror image of the recipient, i.e. reader or viewer, who, in the same fashion, is involved in a situation of decoding, which is realized in the process of perceiving the play. The hero’s death with which the dramatic etude comes to a conclusion, however, comes as a turning point, which is associated with contemporary echoes of the dying of the spirit of the Silver Age of Russian Culture. The motif of death thus acquires the meaning of the death of the learned, erudite, intelligent reader. Finding the adequate code is turned into a task and privilege which belongs to the leaders of the Pythagorean brotherhood, that is, those in possession of power within its hierarchy. Here, we have the idea that power will predetermine the landmarks of values which can serve as a basis for the process of interpretation. + 268 + Daréczi-Sepsi-Vassänyi_Initiation_155x240.indb 268 6 2020.06.15. 11:04:23
