Conceptual and historical understanding of the relationship between «slovesnost’» and «literature»

The article describes historical conditions of formation and development of two central philological concepts "literature" and "slovesnost’". The fi rst part of the article examines their genesis, formations and complex longterm interactions. The second part is devoted to the presentation and generalization of their further scientifi c understanding. The question of preference of one of these concepts in the works of diff erent authors is raised and considered in the present research, and there is also an attempt to identify, on the basis of the reconstruction, the reasons for the historical substitution of one concept by another. The concept of "slovesnost’" arises on the Russian soil, while "literature" is borrowed from German. At the end of the XVIII XIX centuries "literature" gradually began to replace "slovesnost’" until it fi nally became dominant in the domestic philological discourse, which is primarily due to the narrowing of the scope of the concept: it started to be associated mainly with a fi ction. In the Soviet times it practically went out of circulation. The second life of "slovesnost’" began in the 1990s, but usually it was only a "technical" term in its nature. Post Soviet studies tend to loosen the tension formed by the semantic weight of both concepts: the authors seek either to turn them into synonyms, or to arrange them according to the genus species hierarchy. However, this does not solve the problem since each concept claims to be the main one. In fact, it turns out that the selection of a most suitable word can speak about the value position of the researcher, which is revealed by the axiological approach to Russian classical literature and culture. In this case it appears to be fundamental that the concept of “slovesnost’” is rooted in the Christian tradition and is based on its idea of the nature of the word.