Опыт освоения языка Осипа Мандельштама: «Как светотени мученик Рембрандт…» [Understanding Mandel’shtam’s Language: “Kak svetoteni muchenik Rembrandt…”]

Abstract

The article offers a close reading of one of Osip Mandel’stam’s Voronezh texts, the poem “Kak svetoteni muchenik Rembrandt…”, which has been examined more than once and from very different positions (see the synopsis of the main interpretations in the initial part of the article). The main impetus for the article comes from my wish to understand the language of this text as its structure, lexis, and sounds have not been sufficiently studied. What I also examine from a linguistic point of view, are such essential features of Mandel’stam’s poetics as his techniques for condensing the semantics of a text by combining several meanings at different levels (words, phrases, etc). A revision of the previous understanding of syntax in both stanzas of the poem unexpectedly opens up the opportunity to take a fresh look at the distribution of the roles of the poet and Rembrandt, which in turn lead to the rethinking of the poem’s imagery and its general idea. In my understanding, the focal point of the poem shifts from Rembrandt and his paintings to the I of the poet and his tragic relations with his time and contemporaries.

KEYWORDS: 20^th-Century Russian Literature, Osip Mandel’shtam (1891—1938), “Kak svetoteni muchenik Rembrandt…”, Close Reading, Linguistics and Poetics.