Napoleonic Theme in M. Lermontov's Oeuvre: the History of Academic and School Interpretations

Student: Pliushcheva Anna

Educational Programme: Philology (Bachelor)

Year of Graduation: 2018

The study is devoted to the Napoleonic cycle of Lermontov, which traditionally includes six poems ("Napoleon", "Napoleon (Meditation)", "Napoleon’s Epitaph", "Saint Helena", "Aerial Ship" and "Last Housewarming"), and to the history of academic and school interpretations of these texts in the pre-revolutionary period. Moreover, another important part of this paper is an overview of the evolution of the Napoleonic theme in Lermontov's work - from the elegy "Napoleon" to "Last Housewarming". As shown in the study, the early critical and academic interpretations of the Napoleonic theme gradually diverge from the interpretations of school textbooks. If critics and researchers stressed the romanticization of the image of Napoleon in Lermontov's poems, the school canon, based on his "patriotic" poems ("Borodino", "Two Giants"), excluded those texts in which the admiration of the French emperor's personality was noticeable.

Student Theses at HSE must be completed in accordance with the University Rules and regulations specified by each educational programme.

Summaries of all theses must be published and made freely available on the HSE website.

The full text of a thesis can be published in open access on the HSE website only if the authoring student (copyright holder) agrees, or, if the thesis was written by a team of students, if all the co-authors (copyright holders) agree. After a thesis is published on the HSE website, it obtains the status of an online publication.

Student theses are objects of copyright and their use is subject to limitations in accordance with the Russian Federation’s law on intellectual property.

In the event that a thesis is quoted or otherwise used, reference to the author’s name and the source of quotation is required.

Search all student theses