Vol 26, No 2 (2021)

A study of the currently existing translations of Anton Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island (From Travel Notes) (Luba and Michael Terpak - 1967, Brian Reeve - 1993) shows that the reason for some errors in translated texts is not always due to the negligence of translators, which is so clearly noticeable in the first translation, but rather in the incomprehensibi- lity for foreigners of some realia in the original text. Reference to two available Сommentaries on Sakhalin Island, by M.L. Semanova (1985) and M.S. Vysokov (2010), as well as to the works of other Chekhov scholars, did not give the sought-after explanations of certain vague excerpts from the book. Those obscure excerpts are also poorly understood by the Russian readership. In particular, we are talking about Chekhov’s mention of the use of a naval rope in the surgical department (Chapter VII) and the perception of the status of a class feldscher/paramedic (Chapter XII). The author of the article offers her own commentary on difficult-to-understand passages and thus fills the gap that has arisen. Conclusions are drawn about the need to continue to provide Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island with commentaries and notes. Such commentary should serve two purposes. Its linguistic and cultural character should help to clarify the realias not only for representatives of a foreign linguistic culture - in order to prevent gross errors in translations, but also for the present-day Russian reader, separated from the time when A.P. Chekhov’s book was written by almost one hundred and thirty years.

The article deals with the modern interpretation of four post-war poems by A.T. Tvardovsky: House by the Road, Beyond Distance, Tyorkin in the Other World, By Right of Memory , which were insufficiently studied in the previous research works. The main idea is focused on the artistic embodiment of historical thinking in these works. The main feature of these works is a contradictory combination of utopian consciousness and the dystopian mood of the lyric hero, who is pondering over personal and historical memory. The author concludes that Tvardovsky’s post-war poems capture the paradoxes of the historical thinking of a personality who, on the one hand, gets out of the influence of the dominant ideology, and on the other hand, demonstrates an apologetic attitude towards the key concepts and mythologems of totalitarian discourse. The hero of Tvardovsky’s later poems appears as a front-line soldier, an artist, a publicist, an analyst of modern times, a prescient; he wanders the roads of the past and present, at the crossroads of personal and historical memory, gets even to death, goes on believing in the mission of the political leaders, the a priori truth of the Country and the People inspired by dystopian impulses and sees mysteries of history through his destiny.

The article deals with the problems of creativity and myth making in the Moscow texts by A. Dolmatov. The research is aimed at studying the author’s ideas about his lyrical hero and the formation of the narrator’s self-portrait. A. Dolmatov’s texts are dedicated to Moscow and the urban way of life, since it is the “Moscow theme” that is the sense-making component in the writer’s work. The article presents a brief history of rap poetry formation in Russia in the XXI century. The main features of problematics and poetics of A. Dolmatov’s texts are analyzed. The task is to trace the evolution of the author’s ideas on poetics and the meaning of rap as a genre of literature. The relationship of Dolmatov’s lyrical hero with the city of roads, Moscow, defines the development of the author’s work in alternative poetry of the 21 century.

The article is devoted to the image of Africa in the travelogues by poets Claude McKay (A Long Way From Home, 1937) and Langston Hughes (The Big Sea, 1940), the significant figures of Harlem Renaissance; and also compares this image with Africa in the poems of both writers. The image of Africa as “the land of ancestors” and “the foremother of the Negro people” was popular among the artists and philosophers of the Harlem Renaissance, but at the same time, it was often idealized. That is why meeting a real Africa becomes, to some extent, a moment of truth for an African-American artist, the reason to take a new look at himself and his values. Biographies of Hughes and McKay reveal why equally motivated, at first glance, writers united by a common dream of a “black people’s home”, when faced with the real Africa, react to it in exactly the opposite way. The article shows that young cosmopolitan poet Langston Hughes did not find respond to his poetic ideals in real Africa and after that forever divided Africa into real and poetic, while Claude McKay, who kept up the reunification of the Negro people and had traveled around the whole Europe, only in Africa for the first time in his life “went native”. At the same time, Hughes is significantly influenced by his mixed origins and McKay - by his colonial background. The article contains materials of correspondence, fragments of the travelogues never been translated into Russian before.

Russia was proud of Russkoye Bogatstvo (Russian Wealth) magazine for a long while. It was among the most reputable and influential periodicals in the country. Not only had many Russians known of the magazine, but they were also its dedicated readers. On the one hand, the interest in Russkoye Bogatstvo could have been justified by the excellent selection of its authors among the best Russian writers and scientists. On the other hand, its publishers were Russia’s most famous critics, publicists, and outstanding literary figures recognized in the cultural and scientific circles. The magazine publications stood out due to their excellent style and availability for people of various social levels: both educated readers and those without profound knowledge of literature, science, and arts. The readers’ pool included older and experienced people and very young students. Later, the name of the magazine became a symbol of the great intellectual wealth of Russia.

Functional language styles serve social, political, economic, cultural, and other areas of human life, they are also widely used in our studies and life. The Chinese language’s journalistic style has its unique linguistic features that give us a basis for a better understanding of Chinese media texts. The research is carried out due to the necessity to identify the specifics and distinguishing features of the stylistic system of the Chinese language, in particular, the journalistic style, which is a kind of literary written Chinese language and is widely used in almost all mass media. The results introduce new data into the process of learning the functional styles of the Chinese language, and will also contribute to a better understanding of the structure, culture of the language, and content of Chinese media texts in terms of their lexical content.

The problem of social aggression of young people that are immersed in digital communication has become the subject of this study. The authors did not confine to the state of the depressing condition of the ethical sphere in digital communication. They wanted to find out the underlying causes of the social antagonism and the conflict. One of the most important reasons for social destruction is the lack of clear space-time coordinates for a virtual subject. It leads to the use of the passive personality by the technologies themselves. A man turns into material for algorithms, and his psychophysics becomes a continuation of impersonal technology. This situation characterizes the formation of a new era of Web 4.0, which the authors call “counter communication”. Interactivity is a thing of the past. Technologies of “new sincerity” come to its place. Outrageousness, detabooing, use of eroticism are forms of communicative use of a virtual subject who, in the modern communicative space, is in a state of unrelenting tension, which only changes its mode in connection with all new reasons for exaltation. The study of the psyche of young people completely immersed in the virtual world has become a confirmation that virtual ethics is moving further and further from the “traditional” ethical principles. Their social skills, as well as social protection, were the lowest among the various groups of young people. Communication for them ultimately turns into a persistent search for entertainment, into a striving for a hedonistically comfortable environment, into denial of socially significant topics and problems.

The material presents the analysis of the draft law of Ukraine On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine Regarding Ensuring National Information Security and the Right of Access to Reliable Information . This law can for the first time in the history of the country criminalize journalists for disseminating false information and set up new forms of control over information in the future. This is not the first attempt by the country’s leadership to bring all actors into a legal and civilized channel (the draft law On the Media No. 2693, which is also under consideration by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, stands for the systematic policy of reforming the media sector of Ukraine). The research is aimed at defining the place of the draft law in the reformed system of legal regulation of the Ukrainian media, from the position of the academic community neutral to the process. For this purpose, a detailed content analysis was conducted, which showed that, in the long run, the ambiguous wording of the adopted document at the stage of its enforcement, leaves the regulatory authorities free to interpret it depending on the interests of the parties, rather than on the language of the law. Considering the risks associated with the entry into force of this draft, one should also take into account the ambiguous reaction of the local and international media community. The article may be considered as a contribution to the development of criteria for a comprehensive scientific analysis of the legislation regulating the activity of media structures.

The review article presents various views on the periodization of Russian literature in the 1920s and 1930s and provides arguments in favor of new, refined approaches to the boundaries of the period. Particularly noteworthy are the works of those authors who point to the need for an expanded understanding of the “twenties”. The concept of the “Big Twenties” is of particular value in connection with the centenary of the magazine Krasnaya Nov , which made a significant contribution to the literary process of that time.

The review gives the analysis of a new biographical study on Andrey Platonov and the Moscow literary environment. The monograph by N.M. Malygina restores the phenomena of literary Moscow in 1920-1940-s, it also gives an idea of the place the writer took and the role he played among professionals. As well it illustrates the relationship and influence of authors and critics on each other. For the first time the artistic world and the writer’s strategy of Andrei Platonov are compared with the world and the strategy of B.L. Pasternak.

Internet communications in Albania are developing according to a special scenario. It is explained by the country’s long international isolation and, accordingly, the late arrival of digitalization in this European state. The author notes the high level of currently provided Internet services: Albania is ahead of the leading countries in some indicators. However, this breakthrough is taking place against the background of the generally low level of education of the Albanians and low incomes of the population, so the supply does not match the demand, it overtakes it. A separate problem is the large amount of false information that goes from social networks to online media. The immediate urgent task that the Albanian media community will have to solve is increasing media literacy and regulating the Internet (either through user’s self-control or with the help of the state).