The image of “steppe” in the Russian and Hungarian literatures (selected pages)

This paper examines the representations of the steppe image in the Russian and Hungarian literatures on the examples of works by A.P. Chekhov and Hungarian poets and writers, especially Miklos Meszöly. The correlation of the poetic worlds is analyzed via two scientific approaches: firstly, mythopoetic, and, secondly, tropological. It is not very difficult to compare the works of authors who seem so distant in time and semantic orientation. They are brought together as a general linguistic worldview of the Russian and Hungarian peoples (“steppe” / “puszta”), and a specific poetic purpose of the writers. The image of the steppe belongs to those objects of artistic and philosophical reflection, which allow to detect, on the one hand, the genetic connection of literary traditions, on the other - their typological similarity. The analysis first summarizes the development of the image of the steppe in the Russian folklore, Cossack songs and Chekhov’s works using the example of “The Steppe”, “The Pecheneg” and “At Home”, followed by a brief overview of the Hungarian literary tradition on the steppe wildlife, in particular, in poems of Sandor Petofi. Meszöly read Chekhov intensively, and most likely he was familiar with the novellas and short stories mentioned above. The poetics of the short novel “High School” clearly grows out of this heritage, but the importance of the special linguistic world of its author should not be diminished, that is why the stories are loaded with unusual metaphors, comparisons and personifications, renewing the literary canon.