Reviews 349 

the masses as the subject of revolution, whereas to the latter they are merely an 
object to be manipulated by the educated revolutionary leadership (p. 251). Similarly, 
Stadtke gives a political meaning to the "canonization" of Pushkin, on the one hand, 
and the reckless attacks on the poet made by some revolutionary democrats, on the 
other (p. 227). 

Belinskii is naturally the focus of Stadtke's book. Predictably, Stadtke sides 
with Soviet scholars—and Plekhanov, to some extent—in seeing Belinskii's later 
period as his "mature" one and recognizing the movement toward his positions in 
the mid-1840s as "progress." Nevertheless, the author sees the inconsistencies in 
Belinskii's theoretical positions, and his critical attitude is not limited to the early 
Belinskii. He points out that Belinskii's aesthetic system did not allow for conflicts 
which were not based in objective reality (pp. 199-201) ; consequently, Belinskii 
could not appreciate Dostoevsky's The Double and the works of some other major 
authors (Balzac, George Sand) which showed "romantic" tendencies. Stadtke's 
description of Belinskii's criticism as "aesthetics in motion" (eine sich bewegende 
Asthetik), in which aesthetic categories are subordinated to historical and literary 
change, is remarkably apt (p. 201). 

Altogether, Stadtke's book combines the better qualities of East European 
scholarship with the strengths of Western scholarship. Among other things, Stadtke 
shows great competence in the comparative aspect of his subject by demonstrating 
full control not only of the German sources of Russian aesthetics, but of French 
sources as well. 

VICTOR TERRAS 

Brown University 

C H E K H O V ' S A R T O F W R I T I N G : A C O L L E C T I O N O F C R I T I C A L E S S A Y S . 
Edited by Paul Debrecseny and Thomas Eekman. Foreword by Ronald Hingley. 
Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers, 1977. iv, 199 pp. $8.95, paper. 

This anthology of articles on Chekhov is the result of a Chekhov symposium or-
ganized at the University of North Carolina in the spring of 1975. Although the 
collection contains articles by Thomas Winner and Karl Kramer, both of whom 
have published books on Chekhov, the emphasis is on work by a generation of scholars 
who are just now beginning to say their word on Chekhov, so far in the form of 
journal articles. The anthology thus serves as a useful introduction to a new genera-
tion's thinking about Chekhov. 

The volume will not in any way greatly revise the understanding of Chekhov 
currently held in academic criticism. It does show a methodological bias, as the 
editors note, for the methods of Formalism and Structuralism. Most of the authors 
show themselves to be well-trained readers of text, and one can glean a number of 
interesting insights about specific stories. 

Ordinarily, the most useful gesture a reviewer can make in reviewing an an-
thology is to list the contributors and indicate the nature of their efforts, so that 
the reader can select from the menu what pleases his taste. In this case, the editors 
of the volume have written an excellent review of its contents in their introduction. 
I would simply suggest that anyone interested in Chekhov should pick up a copy 
of the volume and read these three pages to find what he wants. 

Several of the most interesting essays are those considering the question of 
Chekhov's relationship to Impressionism in painting. The notion that Chekhov is an 
"Impressionist" has been much bandied about, most notably, perhaps, in an article 
by Dmitri Cizevsky, "Chekhov in the Development of Russian Literature" (re-
published in Chekhov: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Robert L. Jackson). 
"Aspects of Impressionism in Chekhov's Prose" follows Cizevsky's outline to some 



350 Slavic Review 

extent and illustrates a number of his points by reference to Chekhov's stories. 
The articles by Thomas Winner and Savely Senderovich try to give more rigor-
ous definition to the analogy. Winner points to the highly syncretic nature of 
Chekhov's art, which provokes analogies not only with painting but with music and 
incorporates elements from myth and folk art. Winner links this syncretic tendency 
in choice of form and material to the characteristic structure of Chekhov's works 
with their seeming lack of action and reliance upon repetitions to achieve significant 
form. Savely Senderovich takes a hard look at the analogy to Impressionist painting 
and tries to put it on a sounder methodological footing. His observation that many 
of the qualities that define Impressionism in painting are peculiar to the act of paint-
ing as such serves to clear the air. He proposes a "morphological" approach to the 
analogy, by which aspects of Chekhov's writings can be compared to Impressionist 
painting on the grounds of similarity in deep function, rather than because of super-
ficial resemblances such as use of color. Many of his comparisons are illuminating. 
I fear, however, that when he analogizes Chekhov's "overthrow of spiritual per-
spective" to the Impressionists' overthrow of geometrical perspective on the canvas, 
he stretches the method to its breaking point. 

PATRICIA CARDEN 

Cornell University 

E V G E N I J Z A M J A T I N : H A R E T I K E R IM N A M E N D E S M E N S C H E N . By 
Gabriele Leech-Anspach. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1976. x, 119 pp. DM 
58, paper. 

This short survey (119 pages) covers a vast amount of ground. Divided into three 
tightly organized and concise sections, the text opens with a twenty-four-page bio-
graphical introduction, which emphasizes the politics of Zamiatin's literary career. 
Continuing with a section on theoretical writings (14 pages), the author summarizes 
Zamiatin's philosophical, stylistic, and aesthetic views. The work culminates in the 
major section, "Stories, Novels, and Plays" (70 pages), in which virtually all of 
Zamiatin's fiction and drama are analyzed, or at least characterized. That Gabriele 
Leech-Anspach treats eighty-four different works in only eighty-five pages suggests 
the intensity of this tour de force. Eleven pages of bibliography and indexes conclude 
the survey. A reference handbook on Zamiatin's life and work could hardly be more 
compact or complete. 

A solid, reliable work which follows established scholarship and criticism, this 
survey serves the general German reader who may be familiar with We, but not with 
Zamiatin's other works. (Only a small portion of his writings has been translated 
into German, much of it by Ms. Leech-Anspach herself.) Although written for the 
generalist, the work yields few generalized insights. A survey can collect and sum-
marize material, but without a controlling idea it cannot discriminate among accumu-
lated data or distinguish crucial events and works from less important ones. The 
subtitle suggests such a generalization. Unfortunately, neither the image of Zamiatin 
as a heretic nor the suggestion that his heresy was humanitarian emerges clearly. 

The biographical section pays more attention to the context and effects of Zamia-
tin's actions than to their origins or intent. The brief description of Zamiatin's theo-
retical writings relates them to ideas of Belyi, Blok, Remizov, Ivanov-Razumnik, 
Fedin, Gorky, Sholokhov, Leskov, L. Tolstoy, as well as to H. G. Wells, Anatole 
France, Nietzsche, Bergson, Sartre, Bernard Shaw, and Upton Sinclair. But again, 
context overwhelms content. Zamiatin certainly viewed the true artist as a heretic, but 
the reader is not shown how this concept applied to Zamiatin himself. 

The analysis and summary of Zamiatin's prose and dramatic works proceed 
thematically and structurally, rather than chronologically, under the headings "Dark