“The Human Organizing Element” in the Prose of M.A. Kuzmin (“Phyllida’s Shadow”)

The concept of ‘the organising element of human being’ is interpreted by Kuzmin as the content that gives meaning to human existence, transcending the limitations of the practical order, functional and material forms of human life in society. The plot of the story ‘The Shadow of Phyllida’ and the logic of the characters’ decisions and actions are connected with the search for such a meaningful organising element. The theme of suffering and suicide due to unhappy love is traditional, but Kuzmin develops the plot in such a way that the love drama goes beyond actions dictated solely by passion and despair. This allows the characters to come closer to understanding the inner essence of their passion – to recognise it as something greater than individual sensual desire. Thus, each of Phyllida’s three unusual decisions and Pankratius’ attraction to the deceased turn out to be steps towards understanding the mystery of love, in which conventional ideas about the boundaries of life and death are overcome. The material of the myth about Phyllida is refracted not in myth-motivated actions, but in the personal decisions of the heroes, conditioned by centuries-old traditions of poetic creativity accumulated by Alexandrian culture. Decisive for Kuzmin is the connection of the plot with art as the otherness of myth, in particular in the form of poetic traditions that organise the text of “The Elegies of Phyllida”. In these texts Phyllis expresses her personal experiences, creates herself and cognizes herself in the myth of Phyllida. The poetic tradition testifies to the deep involvement of the individual in the spiritual world of Alexandria, as the centre of Hellenistic culture at various stages of its development: its roots go back to the origins of the secret wisdom of the West and the East, to Gnostic teachings and monotheism. It is this involvement in the world of art as a creative energy, that synthesises the vital and spiritual values of the past and future, that “organises” the consciousness of the heroes.