Correspondence of I.V. Kireevsky with A.S. Pushkin and P.A. Vyazemsky in the light of the development of the genre of friendly writing in the 1830s
Authors:   Saint Petersburg State University of Industrial Technologies and Design, Kuzmina Marina D. 
Published: March 2022

The epistolary genre, especially in the invariant of friendly writing, flourished in the first third of the 19th century, when it played an important role in the development of literature, becoming, according to the famous definition of Yu.N. Tynyanov, a “literary fact”. The letter acted as a creative “laboratory”, allowing writers to experiment freely, then apply the results of experiments in prose and poetry. At the same time, it itself was comprehended as a text of literary value. Hence the great attention of writers to him, in particular A. Pushkin and his correspondent friends. Their correspondence has been widely studied, and on its basis a scientific understanding of the epistolary culture of the first third of the 19th century has been compiled. At the same time, attention has ignored a significant part of the epistolary heritage of their contemporaries — in particular, I.V. Kireevsky. Meanwhile, he was also gifted with literary talent, organically included in the cultural context of the era, was in friendly correspondence with a large number of people, including A.I. Koshelev, A.V. Venevitinov, E.A. Baratynsky, N.M. Yazykov, V.F. Odoevsky, S.A. Sobolevsky, Р.А. Vyazemsky, A.S. Pushkin himself, etc. We are interested in his epistolary communication with the latter two. Both of them were not among his closest friends. He did not communicate with them for long — only in the early 1830s — in connection with the publication of his magazine “European” and on other business issues. So, the reason for the letter has always been business. However, writing “on business” does not necessarily mean writing a business letter. It seems important to raise the question of how the aforementioned correspondence correlates with the friendly correspondence of that time, the tone of which was primarily determined by Pushkin’s epistolary works. The poet-genius wrote only two letters to Kireevsky — the same as Kireevsky to him. All four texts are very literary, abound in tropes, combine benevolence and light humor, reveal that special freedom of communication that only friendly writing enjoyed. Their authors, both literary men, speak to each other in the same language, perfectly understood by both. But if Kireevsky is restrained at times, scrupulously observes epistolary etiquette, if at times he excessively piles up paths, if, finally, he departs from the epistolary tradition, for example, replacing writing with a literary-critical article — and creates, in essence, not friendly, but semi-friendly-semi-daily, or friendly-business letters, then Pushkin remains within the framework of the traditions of friendly epistolography, at the same time he boldly pushes them apart, offering his correspondent a very “correct” and at the same time free-bold version of a friendly letter. Kireevsky is trying to learn from him. He uses Pushkin's experience, in particular, in his correspondence with Vyazemsky, in which he feels obviously more relaxed than in an epistolary dialogue with a poet of the first magnitude. Unfortunately, Vyazemsky’s letters to Kireevsky are unknown. And there are five of Kireevsky’s messages to him. Unlike letters to Pushkin, they are friendly. The author in them quite boldly experiments with the genre possibilities of friendly writing, however, without going beyond the traditions of epistolography of the 1830s. So, he resorts to parodying features of business correspondence and parodying them mixing with features of friendly correspondence, is engaged in “word creation”. These are the traditions of “buffoonery”–“galimate” Arzmamas writing. Although cautiously, Kireevsky combines them with the dosed-in traditions of confidential-confessional epistolography, which were relevant at the end of the 18th — beginning of the 19th centuries, and unclaimed by Pushkin and his correspondent friends in the 1830s.