Harrison, EA; (2013) The development of the image of Catholicism in Russian literary tradition: 1820-1949. Doctoral thesis (PhD), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This thesis examines the development of the image of Catholicism in Russian literary tradition between the end of the Napoleonic War and the end of the Second World War. It analyses Catholicism as represented in texts from several different genres – poetry, drama, essays, letters, travel writing and novels. The texts are taken from the work of Chaadaev, Pushkin, the Slavophiles, Gogol´, Tiutchev, the Russian Jesuits, Dostoevskii, Solov´ev, Rozanov, Merezhkovskii, Ellis and Dmitrieva, and Viacheslav Ivanov. The thesis argues that although aspects of the negative image of Catholicism in Russian literary culture remained fairly constant through this period of Russian history, the literary development of this image differed substantially from its development in polemics and essays. The literary sphere allowed Catholicism to be seen in a more open way. The treatment of Catholicism in poetry, novels and travel writing suggested that it be seen as a faith, just like Russian Orthodoxy. Writers depicting Catholicism in a positive light were striving for a universalism that they saw as the essence of being Russian. The thesis therefore reveals that while for some writers, ‘Russian’ and ‘Catholic’ were antithetical concepts, others had a receptive attitude to Catholicism, sometimes culminating in the act of conversion could be seen as a step towards the Universal and unity with the rest of humankind that all Russians should strive towards.

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