The crisis of the bibliographic department: did Dostoevsky write reviews for “Grazhdanin” (“The citizen”)

The first part of the novel “Alexey Slobodin. Family History” was published in the 10th, 11th and 12th issues of “Vestnik Evropy” for 1872, under the pseudonym P. Al’minsky (A. I. Pal’m). A critical review of Pal’m’s work was posted anonymously in “Grazhdanin” (“Citizen”) (1873, no. 1). In his notebook, F. M. Dostoevsky entrusted the writing of the review to V. P. Meshchersky. In 1935, E. N. Konshina linked the writer’s note with a review of Pal’m's novel. V. V. Vinogradov was the first to declare Dostoevsky’s authorship. The researchers tried to resolve the issue unambiguously: it was either Dostoevsky or Meshchersky. However, Dostoevsky’s editorial work involved various forms of interaction. Review of “Alexey Slobodin. Family History” is based on the concept of artistic types, which was developed by Dostoevsky. He tasked Meshchersky with writing the review and provided him with a review plan. There are several fragments in the critical review that make it possible to recognize Dostoevsky as a co-author. Thus, an appeal to the of Savely Tuberozov type precedes the review of the novel by N. S. Leskov (Stebnitsky) “Soboryane” published in the fourth issue. There is a similarity in the description of this image. In his analysis of Leskov’s work Dostoevsky reveals the concept of type in more detail than Meshchersky. The controversy with A. N. Pypin, presented in the article on the novel “Palma,” also belongs to Dostoevsky. The style is noticeably incosistent, which indicates that the text resulted from the simultaneous work of two authors: Meshchersky and Dostoevsky. The article presents additional arguments in favor of the fact that Dostoevsky was one of the authors of the review of Lesko’s novel “Soboryane.” The mathematical methods used in this study confirm this hypothesis.