Turko-mongol motifs and symbols in M. Veller's «Altai» prose

The image of Altai in Russian literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is multifaceted and contradictory. The popular contemporary Russian writer and publicist M. Weller (b.1948) has contributed to the formation of Altai's image in Russian literature. The author analyzes Weller's stories that were written on the basis of impressions from his stay in Altai in 1976, “The Horse for One Pass” (1983) and “We Will Not Go to Lake Ishtugol” (1988). These concern the customs and everyday life of cattle rangers leading a flock of sheep from Mongolia to Biisk. Weller depicts the culminating episode of “We Will Not Go to Lake Ishtugol,” the duel between Siverin and the red-haired Mongol horse, in epic, mythological terms, as a duel between the Man and Tulpar, the mythical horse of the Turks. The dressage of a horse in the story “The Horse for One Pass” is seen as an embodiment of the ancient Turkic motif of “kut-guch,” the exchange of vitality between a person and a horse as a symbol of spiritual improvement. The article thus contributes to a better understanding of the “Altai” topos in Russian literature.