10.13125/2039-6597/4029
The heritage left by the literary experiments of the Silver Age and of the avant-garde was almost forgotten until the 1960s, when dissent towards the socialist realism’s guidelines became stronger and the cultural underground started to take shape. In this context, some authors re-discovered the achievements of the 1920s’ literature and mixed them with the feelings and perceptions of the Soviet man. One of them was V. Gubin, whose povest’ Illarion i Karlik is a clear sample of this attempt of recreating the connection, previously abruptly broken, between the underground culture of the 1960s and the Silver Age.The aim of this paper is to focus on Illarion i Karlik, underlining the connection between his artistic sensibility and the explorations of Andrei Bely, who started to pursuit the complete metricalization of the prosaic text. This rhetorical device indeed constitutes the basis of the novel and offers a sample of how aesthetics became the main way of resistance against the regime.
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Noemi Albanese
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Vladimir Gubin
Reviving Andrei Bely’s heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin’s Illarion i Karlik
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Noemi Albanese
2020/05/30
10.13125/2039-6597/4029
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Vladimir Gubin
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Reviving Andrei Bely’s heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin’s Illarion i Karlik
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        Reviving Andrei Bely’s heritage:
        Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin’s
                  Illarion i Karlik

                                 Noemi Albanese



Abstract
      The heritage left by the literary experiments of the Silver Age and of the
avant-garde was almost forgotten until the 1960s, when dissent towards the
socialist realism’s guidelines became stronger and the cultural underground
started to take shape. In this context, some authors re-discovered the
achievements of the 1920s’ literature and mixed them with the feelings and
perceptions of the Soviet man. One of them was V. Gubin, whose povest’ Illarion
i Karlik is a clear sample of this attempt of recreating the connection, previously
abruptly broken, between the underground culture of the 1960s and the Silver
Age.
      The aim of this paper is to focus on Illarion i Karlik, underlining the
connection between his artistic sensibility and the explorations of Andrei Bely,
who started to pursuit the complete metricalization of the prosaic text. This
rhetorical device indeed constitutes the basis of the novel and offers a sample
of how aesthetics became the main way of resistance against the regime.

Keywords
     Metricalization; Silver Age; Underground; Andrei Bely; Vladimir Gubin



Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)
ISSN 2039-6597
DOI: 10.13125/2039-6597/4029
                                           Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)




   Reviving Andrei Bely’s heritage:
  Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin’s
             Illarion i Karlik
                           Noemi Albanese


      The presence, in prosaic texts, of fragments with a clear metric
character has been a constant in Russian literature since the 18th century,
but it was only during the Silver age and thanks to the linguistic and
artistic reform implemented by Andrei Bely that this phenomenon
assumed a precise role in identifying authorial poetics oriented on the
purely aesthetic perception of the literary work and process. For this
reason, Bely’s studies became an essential point of reference for anyone
who has subsequently attempted to follow similar paths.
      The idea that there is no boundary between poetry and truly artistic
prose (which is deeply different from journalism and popular fiction),
arise in Bely’s writings around 1909, when he began to add an
increasingly higher metric coefficient to his prose (starting with
Serebriany golub1, 1909), and has given its most complete theoretical
definition in the article O khudozhestvennoy proze2, published in the
«Gorn» magazine in 1919. In the very first lines he highlights the
sameness of prose and poetry, stating also an equivalence between the
prose that he considers as the «best one» and the metricalized structure
of prose:




     1
       Transl.: The Silver Dove. – Here and in all the following occurrences,
translations from Russian into English are mine (N.A.).
     2 Transl.: On Artistic Prose.




                                                                                 1
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



         […] не даром мы делим речь на художественную и прозаи-
      ческую; между поэзией и прозой художественной нет границы;
      признаки поэтической и прозаической речи одни: тут и там
      цветы образов; тут и там те же встречают нас фигуры и тропы;
      размеренность характеризует хорошую прозу; и эта
      размеренность приближается у лучших прозаиков к
      определенному размеру, называемому метром; размеренность
      внутренняя («ритм» или «лад») характеризует хорошую прозу3
      (Bely 1919: 49).

      Bely also finds in the prose of great authors such as Gogol, Pushkin
or Tolstoy the presence of a well-defined sequence of accents4.
Therefore, he discarded the traditional idea that the difference between
prose and poetry lies in the presence or absence of metre. To
demonstrate that the metre is present and can be traceable in every
literary work, Bely refers to the classical metres and at the same time
expands the boundaries of traditional measures. He identifies 24
measures (19 more than the ones traditionally used in Russian poetry,
i.e. iamb, trochee, dactyl, amphibrach and anapaest), various
combinations of which would define the framework of each text. This
approach has been criticized and is certainly exaggerated and can be
considered valid only theoretically, as an expression of Bely's overall
aesthetic conception; but it is not applicable to the everyday literary


      3
         Transl.: It is not by chance that we divide the discourse into literary and
prosaic; there is no boundary between poetry and artistic prose; the character-
istics of poetic and prosaic discourse are the same: images flourish in both; in
both we meet figures and tropes; rhythm characterizes good prose; and in the
best writers, this rhythmicity approaches a precise measure called metre; the
internal rhythmicity ("rhythm" or "tone") characterizes good prose.
       4 It is worth noting that Bely, talking about the difference between prose

and poetry as it is traditionally understood, does not link it to the double seg-
mentation and, therefore, to the formal organization of the text that seems to
be, nowadays, the only valid criterion to distinguish prose from poetry. In-
stead, Bely was convinced that the difference is structural and to be found in
the metric sequence.


2
                                              Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



practice, and, in any case, productive. Bely himself was well aware of
this, and, in his own literary practice, he preferred using traditional
metres. In his work we can identify the first phase, where certain
fragments in binary metres (trochee or iamb) are accompanied by a
precise graphic setting of the text, organized according to principles
reminiscent of visual poetry (we refer in particular to the cycle Simfonii5,
1902-1908), and the second, more mature phase, its climax being
represented by Maski6 (1932), where the metrical pattern is intended to
be present in the whole piece of work, and this is accomplished through
the use of ternary patterns, more productive than the binary ones (see
Orlitsky 1999).
      Sploshnaya metrizatsiya, the complete metricalization, which
requires accurate examination and longer periods of perception of texts
that should preferably be read aloud, can be considered a great
innovation of A. Bely’s and the yardstick for all the authors aspiring to
the poetics focused on the aesthetic perception of the word and aiming
to bring the prose, in its refinement, to the level of poetry:

       Белый же и его последователи метризуют весь текст; при
     этом метр, даже не захватывая все слоговые группы, выступает
     именно как знак эстетической природы прозаического текста,
     приравнивая его к высокой (стихотворной, силлабо-
     тонической по преимуществу) поэзии7 (Orlitsky 2002: 38).

    Therefore, Bely tries to make the metricalization process
universally applicable. On the one hand, this attempt makes the
metricalization clearly recognizable and a sign of “high” art; on the other
hand, making the process pervasive and applying it to every type of text,


     5
        Transl.: Symphonies.
     6
        Transl.: Masks.
      7 Transl.: Bely and his successors apply metricalization to the entire text;

and the metre, although not covering all the syllabic groups, acts precisely as
a sign of the aesthetic nature of the prosaic text, making it equal to the higher
poetry (in verse, predominantly accentual-syllabic).


                                                                                    3
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



Bely weakens its strength and often obtains results that have been
considered by different critics as too artificial. This is the main objection
that Bely’s opponents made to this literary device. Note, for instance,
Mikhail Girshman’s comment (Girshman 1982: 309), according to which
the real problem with this kind of texts lies in the fact that readers – even
if not educated or specially trained – are led to perceive the metre as
something separated from the text itself and not as an integral part of
the work.
      According to this line of thinking, the real sign of art is precisely
the imperceptibility of the rhythm in prose, which allows to retain the
multiformity of speech, not flattening it on a metrical pattern that can
become redundant and uniform: «[р]итмизация прозы хороша,
покуда она незаметна, покуда проза не похожа на стихи. Будучи
явной, намеренной, ритмизация убивает прозу так же, как, скажем,
внутренняя рифма»8 (idem: 319). Furthermore, it should always be kept
in mind that any attempt to mechanically apply the methods of poetic
text analysis to prose (in addition to Bely, we can recall theories of
Peshkovsky and Shengeli; see Peshkovsky 1928, Shengeli 1921 and, for
a general overview, Orlitsky 2008) can be considered an acceptable
starting point but they cannot but fail as they do not take into account
processes and ways of organization inherent to prose.
      Thanks to Bely, metre in prose, traditionally clausal (klauzal'nyj),
«однозначно задающий разбиение текста на условные строки,
аналогами которых выступают его фрагменты»9 (Orlitsky 2002: 51),
becomes mostly catenary (tsepnoy), «подобного разбиения не
предполагающий и не имеющий точного аналога в стиховой
культуре»10 (ibidem), so it is realized as an uninterrupted flow.


      8
        Transl.: Rhythmization of prose is fine as long as it is imperceptible, as
long as it does not make prose resemble verse. When it is made evident, inten-
tional, rhythmization kills prose just as, for instance, internal rhymes do.
      9 Transl.: Which univocally establishes the division of text into conven-

tional [verse] lines, the text’s fragments being considered the lines’ analogues.
      10 Transl.: Which does not imply such a division and does not have a pre-

cise analogue in verse culture.


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                                              Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



     Leaving aside criticisms and discussions that arose around Bely’s
ideas, it is unquestionable that they made a very strong impact on the
contemporary artistic world and influenced the aesthetics of all
succeeding Russian authors, both those who deliberately detached
themselves from them, avoiding any metrical pattern (even accidental11)
or making an ironic and caricatural use of the process, and those who
made metre a crucial element of their own artistic conception.
     Because of his purely aesthetic approach, not applicable to the
practical revolutionary needs, the work and research of Bely and the
entire Silver Age were condemned to oblivion by the Soviet system and
by the normative canons of socialist realism. The latter, aiming at a clear
definition and delimitation of every aspect of art and life, did not
approve of the mixture of verse and prose, which within socialist realism
returned to being two separate and monolithic poles. This same division
can be also found in the first period12 of the Russian literature in
emigration, but for a different reason: emigrant writers wanted to place
themselves in the wake of the great 19th century Russian novel tradition
(see Orlitsky 2008: 304).
     Later on, it is thanks to Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977), an
extraordinary figure beyond any classification, group or school,
representative of the second generation of writers-émigrés, that the link
with the poetics of formal elaboration and contamination between prose
and poetry of the beginning of the 20th century, broken by the Soviet
government, is reestablished again. His example was actively followed


     11
         It is interesting to note that the attempt to avoid any metric inserts at
any cost often results in great artificiality, since in every Russian text, includ-
ing journalistic ones, due to the nature of the language itself, one can find the
standard metric coefficient of about 15% (see Orlitsky 1991 and 2002). Going
up over 20% indicates the deliberate authorial will to move in the direction of
prose metricalization, while falling below 10% indicates the opposite desire.
      12 We are referring to the first (during the Revolution of 1917 and the fol-

lowing civil war mainly) and to the second (during and after World War II)
waves of Russian emigration; for an overview of the different waves, see
Magarotto 2007 and Raev 1994.


                                                                                    5
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



by the “unofficial” literature (in particular in Leningrad, while in
Moscow writers mostly referred to the avant-garde experiments)
starting from the late 1950s–early 1960s13. In this period searches in the
field of metricalization of the entire piece of prose or its fragments start
again, and the boundaries between the two poles appear once more
permeable, becoming the basis of the aesthetics of the so-called Bronze
Age of Russian literature. The mixture of prose and poetry and,
specifically, the metrical pattern, defines an artistic alternative to the
aesthetics proposed by the regime, therefore not subordinated to the
criteria – dear to the official propaganda – of an art at the service of the
construction of the new Soviet era, but based on stylistic refinement and
formal perfection. In this sense, the tendency towards metricalization of
prose can be considered as an integral and characteristic aspect of those
works that are anti-Soviet from the merely aesthetic point of view. In the
practice of various authors, this attempt is carried out in different ways,
as it adapts to each author’s specific poetics.
      Vladimir Andreyevich Gubin (Leningrad, 1934 – Saint Petersburg,
2003) can be considered as a true follower of Andrei Bely's theories and
practice. In his Illarion i Karlik14, a povest’ continuously elaborated,
refined and rewritten in the period of over twenty years, Gubin pursues
the complete metricalization, making the metrical pattern the focus of
the text’s artistic nature and value.
      The name of Vladimir Gubin is well-known to those who have been
an active part of the Leningrad underground, but, unfortunately, even


      13
         «Литературная практика 1960–1980-х гг. демонстрирует обострен-
ный интерес к поискам на стыке стиха и прозы, берущим свое начало в
массовых экспериментах 1910–1930-х гг. и глубже – в отдельных опытах
поэтов и прозаиков XIX в.» (Orlitsky 1991: 4). Transl.: The literary practice of
the ’60–’80s shows an exacerbated interest for searches at the borderline be-
tween verse and prose, which started in mass experimentations of the ’10–’30s
and, earlier, in certain experiments by some 19th century poets and prose-writ-
ers.
      14 For an introduction to V. Gubin, his poetic and to Illarion i Karlik, see

Caramitti 2015.


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                                             Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



today it remains almost totally unfamiliar to anyone outside that circle.
He lived all his life in Leningrad (then St. Petersburg) and was part of
LitO (literaturnoye obyedinenie, literary circle) lead by David Yakovlevich
Dar, a master and an unquestioned maître à penser for the young
generation. It is thanks to his relationship and continuous cultural
exchanges with Dar that Gubin developed his own poetics, focused on
a constant labor limae and on a refined elaboration of the phonic and
rhythmic material.
     Another crucial meeting for Gubin was the one with Boris Vakhtin,
Vladimir Maramzin and Igor Efimov. They immediately found some
common aesthetic point of view among them, and founded, in 1964, the
Gorozhane15 literary group, that has been considered the most important
unofficial association of prose writers in ’60s Leningrad (see Ariev 2015:
648). Together they compiled (and tried to publish, but without success)
two prose collections, in 1964 and 1966, clearly stating the intention to
recreate a link with the literary tradition of ’20s. Although they were not
openly against the current status quo as defined by the socialist realism,
their works were not accepted by any publishing house, and received a
few negative and often specious reviews (in particular, the one signed
by Vera Ketlinskaya; see Dolinin et alii 2003).
     After the failure to publish the two collections of prose, Gubin
decided to stop his efforts to see his works published and choses to
pursue the path of a lifetime self-isolation, in which he rethinks all his
work, refining, chiselling and condensing it16. Illarion i Karlik is clearly
the major result of this “poetic work” (see idem: 647), based not on the




     15
         Transl.: The city dwellers. For an overview of this literary group, see
Iocca 2018.
      16 Realizing the impossibility to publish his work was for Gubin a painful

moment, which reflections could be found in Illarion i Karlik, in particular in
the characters of Grafaill (in his name, Rafail, Raphael, and grafoman, grapho-
maniac are merged), a dissident poet, and of Karlik himself, described as a
pisar’, a scribe. For a complete analysis of this theme, see Caramitti 2015.


                                                                                   7
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



idea of fame and success but on the one of «достоинства и
самодостаточности, верности и веры»17 (Juriev 2014: 137).
     It is exactly on the basis of this idea that writing became for Gubin
across the years a way to re-read the morally and aesthetically
unacceptable Soviet era, capable to allow him to go beyond any political
compromise. Unable or unwilling to resist in a different way, he chose
the faith in Literature and in the Russian language as an alternative to
the given reality, identifying the mission of every writer, and therefore
his mission, in being a «сотовари[щ] по выживанию»18 (Gubin 2003:
455), despite all the difficulties and pains of everyday life.
     In the novel Illarion i Karlik, started in 1976 and accomplished in
1996, Gubin carries to extremes that particular conception of language
already born in the environment of Gorozhane, embodied in the
"традиция вывернутого, сдвинутого, орнаментального слова,
загоняющего смысл в невозможность никому и ничему служить,
кроме себя самого"19 (idem: 139). According to this principle, the
motivation and reason of art is far from the work’s plot: it only lives in
and on the poetic Word.
     It is possible to distinguish 4 main published versions of the novel:
   1. Illarion i Karlik, subtitle: Skazano na Rusi v 4-kh chastiakh doveritelno
       Mikhailu Efrosu20, published in Paris (and is, therefore, a case of
       tamizdat21), in 1984 in «Echo» (n. 13), magazine of Russian

      17
          Transl.: Dignity and self-sufficiency, loyalty and faith.
      18
          Transl.: Survival companion.
       19 Transl.: Tradition of the twisted, moved, ornamental word, which

drives the sense into the impossibility of serving anything or anyone else, but
itself.
       20 Transl.: Said in Rus’ in 4 parts confidentially to Mikhail Efros.

       21 As anticipated, after understanding the impossibility to be officially

published in the Soviet Union, Gubin retired. He continued writing just for
himself and shared his works only with his closest friends, in particular the
former Gorozhane. Their continuous support and interest for Gubin’s narrative
is the reason why he finally decided to publish the first version of his main
work (which did not circulated even in samizdat) in tamizdat, on the journal
directed by V. Maramzin, a former Gorozhane member, emigrated in 1975.


8
                                            Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



      emigration published by V. Maramzin. The 4 parts are titled:
      Karlik, Potseluy-menya-za-nozhku22, Illarion, I na smekh, i na smert23;
   2. Bashnia (Glava iz romana «Illarion i Karlik»)24, published in the
      Petersburg magazine «Sumerki», 12, 1991, pp. 40-70;
   3. Illarion (Glava iz romana «Illarion i Karlik»), published in the literary
      almanac       «Kamera       khraneniya»       (Saint    Petersburg      –
      Frankfurt/Mein, V, 1996, pp. 43-69);
   4. Illarion i Karlik, subtitle: Povest’ o tom, chto…25 published by the
      «Kamera khraneniya» publishing house in Petersburg in 1997 and
      reprinted in 2003 in the second volume (dedicated to the 1970s) of
      the three-volume anthology Kollektsiya: Peterburgskaya proza
      (leningradskiy period) published by «Ivan Limbakh». This version
      is considered the canonical one, faithful to the author's last wishes,
      and is divided into four parts, with titles slightly differing from
      the 1984 edition: Bashnia, Pomezana, Illarion, I na smech, i na smert.

      The difference between the four texts is impressive and allows to
clearly understand the evolution of Gubin's poetics and style; in this
article, we will refer only to the last edition (published in 1997 but,
according to the author’s note, dating back to 1976–1980), the most
complete from stylistic point of view.
      As the Word itself is the centre of the povest’, the plot of Illarion i
Karlik is very sparse: Karlik is the guardian of a phantom tower in which
the heads, detached from the bodies but still thinking, of the 'great' of
the nation are kept. He has a sister, Pomezana, who has the habit of
flying around the world naked. In one of her flights she ends up in the
clutches of the henchmen of the bloody monarch Illarion, few pages
before described in his merciless destruction of the idyllic village of
Shnurki. Illarion falls in love with Pomezana and therefore tries to
convince her to marry him, but without any success. Karlik tries to free

     22
        Transl.: Kiss-my-foot.
     23
        Transl.: Both for fun and for death.
     24 Transl.: The tower (a chapter from the novel «Illarion and Karlik»).

     25 Transl.: Short novel about what…




                                                                                  9
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



his sister but ends up in prison, from where he manages to escape only
thanks to the help of Procent, Illarion's derided and humiliated brother
and inventor, who proposes to use a device of his own invention, able
to transfer souls from one body to another. In the general confusion the
device is no longer used, and it is not clear what happens to Karlik, who
suddenly reappears in a courtroom, accused of the murder of the
monarch. At the same time, in the characteristic confusion of temporal
planes and alternated flash-backs and flash-forwards, Illarion's lustful
feelings towards Pomezana are transformed into mere hunger that leads
him, frustrated by the failed attempts to conquer her, to tear the girl to
pieces; shortly afterwards he will die devoured by the flames that almost
magically burst out of the fireplace.
      These few elements of the plot are essentially condensed only in the
fourth part of the povest’, I na smech, i na smert; in the first one, Bashnia,
the discourse is focused on Karlik and is full of digressions on different
themes, like the role of the artist, poetics, happiness, and love. The
second part, Pomezana, is made up only of ellipsis26 and the third one,
Illarion, is also rich in digressions and focuses on the destruction of
Shnurki. The whole action takes place in an unrecognizable time and
space, halfway between past and future, but it is possible to read in some
small details, such as bloody and insane deeds of Illarion, or the
description of how authorities treat artists, a clear echo of the Soviet
present of the author, which allows us to interpret the text as an aesthetic
claim of the role of writers in a society that has lost every poetry and
freedom to create.
      For this reason, the role of the metricalization is crucial, even if its
presence is not clear in the first reading, at first sight. The task of the
ideal reader, cooperative and deeply involved in the literary process, is
to recognize the priyom, finding the key to understanding and proper


       To give to the reader a better idea, this is all the content of the second part:
      26

«………………………………………………………………………………………..
.……………………………………………………………………………и т.д. и т.
п. Это не для печати.» (Gubin 2003: 489) / Transl.: […] etc. etc. This is not to
be printed.


10
                                          Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



reading of a work that otherwise remains, even for the Russian readers
– as confirmed, among others, by the critic Yu. Orlitsky and by the poet
D. Davydov during private conversations held in winter 2014 –
unintelligible. It is therefore possible to apply to Gubin the same analogy
that Bely, in his introduction to Maski, used for his own art, not
immediately understood by his contemporaries, comparing it to
Impressionism: «Импрессионисты были непонятны до момента,
пока кто-то не подсказал: вот как их нужно смотреть; с этого
момента – вдруг: непонятные стали понятны»27 (Bely 1989: 762).
Therefore, one needs to find the right way of reading, which consists, in
the case of Illarion i Karlik, in recognizing the centrality of the musical
and rhythmic element, realized in accordance with specific metrical
patterns. It is exactly Bely’s novel Maski (1932), the third volume of the
trilogy Moskva, that can be considered, from the metrical point of view,
the noble antecedent of the operation carried out by Gubin in Illarion i
Karlik. For this reason, the author’s introduction, placed at the beginning
of the novel, is fundamental; here Bely provides a sort of business card,
«художественный паспорт»28 (ibidem) of himself and of his work. After
a brief summary of the plot of the two previous volumes and an
anticipation of what is contained in the third, the author, aware of the
fact that many readers and critics considered his style unusual and not
very comprehensible, identifies the problem in the centrality reserved to
sound and intonation, underlined as well by the particular segmentation
of the phrase:

       Кто не считается со звуком моих фраз и с интонационной
     расстановкой, а летит с молниеносной быстротой по строке,
     тому весь живой рассказ автора (из уха в ухо) – досадная
     помеха, преткновение, которое создает непонятность:
     непонятность – не оттого, что непонятен автор, а оттого, что


     27
        Transl.: The Impressionists were misunderstood until someone sug-
gested: that's how you need to look at them. From that moment, they suddenly
became understandable.
     28 Transl.: An artistic passport.




                                                                               11
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



      очки, т. е. специальный прибор для ношения на носу, не
      ведающий о назначении читатель […], начинает нюхать, а не
      носить на носу29 (idem: 763).

      Bely concludes by saying that Maski is actually not a prosaic text,
but a poem in verse, «написанная прозой для экономии бумаги»30
(ibidem) where, thanks to punctuation, the main pauses and intonational
accents are highlighted. Metricalization is a fundamental aspect of such
an artistic framing, and Maski is the work with the highest metric
coefficient in Bely's entire production; here metres – mainly ternary – are
alternated in a fluid way, and non-metric fragments are almost
completely absent.
      In order to give a sample of how Maski is organized on the metric
level, and of the use that Bely makes of punctuation, it is interesting to
recall the incipit of the novel. It is quite a long fragment as it extends
until the moment when the end of the phrase, indicated by a full stop,
coincides with the end of the metrical chain:

        Козиев Третий с заборами ломится из Гартагалова к Хаппих-
      Иппахена особняку (куплен Элеонорой Леоновной Тителевой);
      остановимся: вот дрянцеватая старь!
        И Солярник-Старчак с Неперепревым думали, что
      покупалось пространство двора, а не дом: для постройки.
        Репейник, да куст, да лысастое место – большой буерачащий
      двор, обнесенный заборами от Гартагалова, Козиева,
      Фелефокова и Синюкишенского переулков, которые вместе с
      Жебривым и Дриковым – головоломка сплошных загогулин,

      29
         Transl.: To those who do not take into account the sound of my phrases
and the intonational arrangement, but flies along the lines with flash-like
speed, the whole author’s tale (from the ear to the ear) is but annoying hin-
drance, and obstacle that creates obscurity: not because the author is unintel-
ligible, but because the reader, ignorant of the function of glasses, that special
device that should be worn on one’s nose, begins to sniff them instead of put-
ting them on his nose.
      30 Transl.: Written in prose only to save paper.




12
                                              Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



     куда скребачи-скопидомы, семьистые люди, за скарбами сели,
     где улицы нет никакой, и в тупик выпирает перинами толстое
     собство.
       Задергаешь здесь, – чортов с двадцать; и пот оботрешь
     двадцать раз, как теленок, Макарами загнанный в Козиеву,
     сказать можно, спираль.
       От нее – тупички, точно лапочки сороконожки. Заборчики,
     крыши; подпрыгивает протуварчик; скорячась, пройдешь –
     кое-как; [Дак96M]31 коли прямо пойдешь, – разлетятся
     берцовые кости; и будет разбитие носа о дом Неперепрева:
     красный фундамент на улицу вышел.
       Другие дома не доперли; лишь крыши кривые
     крыжовниковых красно-ржавых цветов, в глубине тупиков
     повалятся, трухлеют под небом; а дом Неперепрева прет за
     заборик; из сизо-серизовой выприны «сам» с пятипалой рукой
     [Ан38]32 и с блюдечком чайным, из окон своих рассуждает.
       Напротив заборчик, глухой, осклабляяся ржавыми зубьями;
     сурики, листья сметает; подумаешь – сад.
       Здесь когда-то стояла и кадка-дождейка; и куст подрезной
     был; латук, лакфиоль разводили; цвела центифолия; ныне же
     тополь рябою листвою шумит да склоняется липа прощепом –
     сучьистое, мшистое и заструпелое дерево; коли кору
     оторвешь, – запах прели; скамеечка: «Хаппих-Иппахен,
     Ипат» – на ней вырезано33 [Амф49ГД]34 (Bely 1989: 367-368).




     31
         96 dactyl chains with a masculine caesura. Here and in all the following
occurrences, the indication of the metrical pattern in bold is mine (N.A.) and it
is always located at the end of each metrical series. The indication of the meter
(дак for dactyl, амф for amphibrach and ан for anapaest) is followed by the
number of feets and, when relevant, by the indication of the caesura (М for
masculine and ГД for hyper-dactylic).
      32 38 anapaest chains.

      33 This fragment (as the following one from Illarion i Karlik) is not trans-

lated as the focus is not on the content but on the metrical pattern.
      34 49 amphibrach chains with a hyper-dactylic caesura.




                                                                                   13
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



     The metricalization of the prosaic text implemented by Bely is
pervasive, it covers the text almost in its totality, creating very long
chains. In order to make this experiment possible, the author made a lot
of choices at the lexical and spelling levels of words (for example, using
the termination of the feminine singular instrumental -oyu instead of -
oy, or the verbal ending form -sya instead of the regular -s', resulting in
an extra syllable), and in some cases they are perceived by the reader as
extremely artificial and redundant.
     Building on the example of Maski, Gubin follows the path of the
complete metricalization of the text, but manages to make the rhythm
not too evident, avoiding in this way the criticisms that have been made
against Bely, who has been accused (as already mentioned) of rhythmic
monotony and of excessive predominance of the metrical aspect over all
the others. To achieve this result, the author of Illarion i Karlik focused
on a different perception of the unity of the text, linking it not to the
logical-syntactic aspects of the plot (that is quite weakened), but to the
centrality of the poetic word and of its density, that is able to create wide
and pervasive textual links. The length of the metrical chains is on
average around 10 to 20 units, so they are far shorter than the extensive
chains created by Bely. Even when he uses the same metre in subsequent
chains, Gubin chooses to interrupt the rhythm, to segment it, even
against any logical, syntactic or intonational pause, making the rhythm
unpredictable and giving the text a major variability, as can be clearly
seen in the incipit of the povest':

        Блохи — вот ураган! [Ан2]35 Эта сыпучая мгла без единого
      пятнышка света спешила навстречу тебе — как опилки железа
      навстречу магниту. Стихия, чирикая, чиркала [Дак16]36 по
      корпусу носа, [Амф2]37 настропаляла глаза прослезиться,
      царапала незащищенную плоть, ела теплую шею, не кашу.



      35
         2 anapaest chains.
      36
         16 dactyl chains.
      37 2 amphibrach chains.




14
                                               Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)



     Вторжение длилось ускоренно, длилось оно [Дак16М]38 всего
     ничего [Амф2]39 (Gubin 2003: 453).

      The entire text is metrically organized and structured, as it has been
proved by the analysis of the entire povest’ as per the principles of the
metrical scan of poetic texts, applicable also to prose as demonstrated by
the researches by Yu. Orlitsky and S. Kormilov (in particular, see
Orlitsky 1991, 2002 and Kormilov 1995, 2012). This investigation,
conducted for the first time by the author of this contribution 40, showed
the coexistence of very long and short fragments where all the canonical
patterns mostly used in Russian poetry (the two binary, iamb and
trochee, and the three ternary, dactyl, amphibrach and anapaest)
interchanges and are carefully balanced, creating a final effect of high
harmonization. The longest metricalized fragment is composed of 73
amphibrach chains (Gubin 2003: 481), but this is an unicum; in the rest
of the povest’, Gubin prefers higher variability and alternance, which
contributes to create the impression of a very refined prose, close to
poetry in his rhythm.
      The final result is an extraordinary and compact text which can be
understood and deciphered properly by a participating and patient
reader thanks to the metrical element. Even in the first version,
published in 1984, there is a tendency towards the metricalization of the
text in prose, but here it is absolutely less pervasive, thus revealing a
tension towards the poetic element, more specifically rhythmic, which
is not necessarily translated into the use of the metre.
      Continuing working on Illarion i Karlik for twenty years, Gubin
chooses to make the metre the centre of his art and the unifying element
of the text itself, also demonstrating a maturity of elaboration and an


     38
         16 dactyl chains with a masculine caesura.
     39
         2 amphibrach chains.
      40 The results of the integral scan of Illarion i Karlik by V. Gubin have been

realized and reported for the first time in N. Albanese, Procedimenti poetici in
prosa: dinamiche sperimentali nella letteratura underground degli anni ’60 e ’70, PhD
thesis, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, 2017.


                                                                                    15
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik



inclination for the labor limae much deeper than a young man at his first
literary experiences could have done. To give an idea of the real weight
of the metre in Gubin's povest’, it seems interesting to report the
statistical data elaborated from the integral analysis of the text: out of
the total 53,659 syllables, a good 96% were metricalized. This number
has been obtained including in the calculation the metric fragments with
a number of feet lower than the generally accepted one41 (therefore, with
less than 3 feet for the ternary metres and 4 for the binary ones). This
percentage goes down to 92% if the short fragments are not considered.
Inside the metricalized fragments, the proportion among the different
metres shows a clear predominance of ternary metres on the binary
ones, as shown in table 1:

                                       Percentage calcu-           Percentage calcu-
                                       lated on properly           lated on properly
                                       metrical chains +            metrical chains
                                          short chains                    only

        Dactyl                                 55,5 %                      57,1 %

        Amphibrach                             31,1 %                      30,8 %

        Anapaest                               12,2 %                      11,4 %

        Tot. ternary patterns                  98,8%                       99,3 %

        Iamb                                   0,8 %                       0,4 %

        Trochee                                0,4 %                       0,3 %

        Tot. binary patterns                   1,2 %                       0,7 %

      Table 1. Distribution of the metrical patterns in the metricalized
      fragments of V. Gubin’s Illarion i Karlik

       The practice to include in the calculation shorter fragments is common
      41

and scientifically accepted if they are inserted in a general metric context, or if
they are preceded or followed by standard length metric chains (see Orlitsky
2002: 49).



16
                                         Between, vol. X, n. 19 (Maggio/May 2020)




     These are certainly impressive numbers, that have never been
reached after Bely by any author who has not used metricalization for
parodistic purposes; there is significant predominance of ternary
patterns, in particular of dactyl, but thanks to the careful work carried
out by the author, the final effect is of great harmony and refinement,
that identifies Illarion i Karlik as a perfect sample of aesthetical non-
conformity to the Soviet standard.




                                                                              17
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik




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                                The Author
Noemi Albanese

      Adjunct professor, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”. Her main
research interests are: 20th century Russian Literature, theory of skaz,
forms between prose and poetry in underground soviet literature.

       Email: noemi.albanese@uniroma2.it



                                The Article
Date sent: 29/02/2020
Date accepted: 20/04/2020
Date published: 30/05/2020


                                                                                  19
Noemi Albanese, Reviving Andrei Bely's heritage: Metricalization in Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik




                             How to cite this article
Albanese, Noemi, “Reviving Andrei Bely’s heritage: Metricalization in
Vladimir Gubin's Illarion i Karlik”, Le culture del dissenso in Europa nella
seconda metà del Novecento, Eds. C. Pieralli - T. Spignoli, Between, X.19
(2020), www.betweenjournal.it/




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