Aesthetics of the fantastic in the book "The prose of the poet" by N. Aseev

The colossal historical revision of the 1920s catalyzes the aspiration of art to extend the boundaries of empirical reflection of the real world. Social, political, scientific, technical, and psychological changes of the Revolutionary era require adequate forms of aesthetic embodiment. As a consequence, literary process of the period actualizes artistic potential of the fantastic. Short stories written by Nikolaj Aseev, a representative of the futuristic movement and a member of the "Left Front of the Arts", demonstrate an expressive implementation of variable techniques of science fiction. In contrast to the positivist principle of "literature of fact", "The Prose of the Poet", which includes the author's short stories and essays of the Post-Revolutionary years, is full of fiction elements - from futuristic rational models to comic grotesque exaggeration. The complex of direct and indirect references to works of Western and Russian writers organizes a wide fantastic context. Inclusion of fantastic elements becomes one of the leading integration determinants within the synthetic structure of the book. Producing phantasmagoric worlds of the future and imaginary images of the past, the author explores a new type of relationship between a man and the surrounding reality through the prism of the fantastic conventions.