The Conception and Imagination of China in Russian Silver Age Literature: History, Genealogy and Meanings.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This dissertation traces the development of the representation and conceptualization of China in Russian artistic, philosophical and academic literatures in the Silver Age (from the 1880s to the 1920s), with a focus on their relationship with the intellectual quest for Russia's self-identity. It argues that discourses from different cultural domains participated together in the construction of the "myth" of China that resulted from the Russian intellectuals' and writers' reflection on Russia's identity and European modernity. China figured in their intellectual work as the product of theorization and imagination that facilitated the remapping of Russia's identity. The myth of China served first and foremost as a response to the various trends of socio-political modernity such as nation-state building and imperialist expansion. It indicates, on the one hand, a reevaluation of the established Europeanized mentality in Russian social and cultural life, and, on the other hand, a revaluation of the Asian influence on Russian culture and a reinvention of Asian heritage in the history of Russia. For the intellectuals, writers and poets of the Silver Age, it was both of historical responsibility and of realistic necessity to engage with China, which presented new opportunities and difficulties for Russia regarding its self-positioning in the modern world.