Narrative intrigues in E.G. Vodolazkin’s novel “Chagin”

The article is devoted to narrative structure of the E.G. Vodolazkin’s novel “Chagin” and explores the ways of artistic reflection of modern biography. Presenting it to the reader, the author turns to a number of narrative intrigues, each of which is endowed with special functions. Enigmatic and liminal intrigues direct the reader’s attention to the search for the meaning of the hero’s personal presence in being, to the study of the problem of identity. The development of these intrigues is intensified by the system of equivalences, thanks to which Chagin’s life is correlated with the life paths of the people around him. Reconstructing this correlation, the reader realizes that the ontological essence of a person is manifested not so much in the empirical life-construction determined by pragmatics, but in that fictional plot in which a person would like to be realized. Thus in Vodolazkin’s novel there is a revision of immanences that traditionally determine human biography: a shift in emphasis from an external-event act to a mental act, a rethinking of the plot of the life path in accordance with the realized awareness of the eidetic essence of the “I”. The field of tension between the actual and ontological biography is the main catalyzer for the intrigue of interpretation, which is also significant for the receptive pattern of “Chagin”. As a result of the analysis, the author of the article comes to the conclusion about the overcoming of the biographical by the archetypal that is taking place in the novel, as well as about the hybridization of the narrative strategies of biography and myth, which determine the narrative specifics of “Chagin”.