Article

Name: Theoretical Discourse as an Object of Metaparody in Russian Post- Modern Prose

Authors: G. A. Zhilicheva

Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University (Novosibirsk, Russian Federation); Russian State University for the Humanities (Moscow, Russian Federation)

Abstract:

This article deals with the roles that metaparody plays in modern prose. Methodologically, it follows Yuri Shatin’ semiotic approach to parody. In his works, parody is regarded as a special function of aesthetic language that comically reimagines a work’s pretexts while also expanding its referential semiotic structure by pointing out its intertextual sources.

Contemporary fiction expands the semantic field of the plot by having narrators or characters reflect on philological terms and concepts. Furthermore, in postmodern fiction, representation of popular theoretical interpretations often achieves the effect of metaparody, the parody of scholar metalanguage.

This paper studies metaparody in A. Bitov and A. Zholkovsky’s “philological prose”. It also deals with parodic reception of well-known theories (such as V. Propp’s fairy-tale functions; Structuralist approach to language; PostStructuralist concepts of discourse and narrative) in post-modern novels by M. Uspensky, A. Lyovkin, and V. Pelevin.

Investigating references to theoretical discourse in various story episodes and structure units makes it possible to define the principles of “intrigue of interpretation” found in contemporary novels. This intrigue, featuring readers as characters (including professional readers such as scholars, librarians, critics, or publishers), becomes especially valuable in post-modern situation of “lacking reality.” Texts of this variety showcase the methods of interpreting and describing them as parts of the plot, while the “superior” theorizing instance becomes interwoven into the event-line. As such, both theoretical models and basic narrative conventions appear in parodical light, including even the crucial postmodern conflict between literary solipsism and the “open structure.”

Keywords: metaparody, post-modern, novel, narrative, Bitov, Zholkovsky, Uspensky, Lyovkin, Pelevin

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