Андрей Белый: автобиографизм и биографические практики - [89]

Even the dog is related to Korobkin, as was Letaev. In order to represent the dog, Belyj uses a large series of diminutives, nicknames collective forms of the words «sobaka» and «pes», a device he utilized also with other animals. The collective forms here define the dog Tomočka, yellow and brown as the environments in which Korobkin lives, who looks just like his master (ME 14, 28, 31, 39, 40, 42, 43, 54).[700] In this view, the play on words that, with typical devices used by Belyj, show how the dog enters the alienated and more intimate world of Korobkin’s are made through mathematics and are very persuasive: the plural of the noun «pes» («psy») sneaks in a formula composed of Greek letters («“psi”, “ksi”, “fi”», ME 55), brackets, modules and other signs. Even after Tomočka’s death, who is crushed by a carriage, Korobkin evokes him (ME 106, 209, 210, 246). Korobkin’s words keep a comparison with a dog up until the last page of the novel (ME 102, 256). The meaning of the comparison with the dog is explained by Belyj even more clearly with the verb «tomničat’», which the National Corpus of the Russian Language (www.ruscorpora.ru) records only in Belyj’s novel, but of which V. Dal’s «Slovar’ živogo velikorusskogo jazyka» gives the following definition: «prikidyvat’sja tomnym, nežnym, slabym; milovidničat’».[701] Korobkin’s weak character, a quality which in «The Baptized Chinaman» Kotik Letaev noted in his father regardless his feral aspect and which aroused in him tenderness, is here manifested in a direct way, without allusions.

Korobkin’s canine docility is opposed to the diabolism of Mandro, who in «The Moscow Eccentric» is associated with a tiger (ME 19) and a crow (ME 78, 212) because of his agility, but also with a mythological animal with mane and horns (ME 75). His feral nature, up until that moment hidden under the guise of an elegant dandy, can be seen beneath the robe of leopard skin that he wears (ME 134): Mandro is hairy like an animal (ME 134). His animality matures gradually in the novel and eventually explodes at the end of this novel, when he becomes a gorilla (ME 250–251), once again a symbol of anguish and fear, as will be seen later in relation to «Moscow in Jeopardy».

Analysed under the perspective of the comparison with the animals, the autobiographical element related to the father as it was represented in «The Baptized Chinaman» is extended in «The Moscow Eccentric» to two characters. They both embody qualities that in the first novel Belyj attributed to the father and that correspond to autobiographical truth. In «The Moscow Eccentric» Belyj’s narrative re-elaboration breaks them up and distributes them in two characters, thus creating a typological classification of two characters, i.e. the compliant victim and the diabolical oppressor.

In «Moscow in Jeopardy» Belyj’s strategy is amplified even more evidently, as at least fifty different animal species are nominated, many of which already recur in «The Moscow Eccentric», e.g. the tiger, crow, birds, lion, cat, mouse, snake and the frog, while others appear here for the first time, such as butterflies, gazelle, swallow, wolves, fish, goat and the tarantula. Compared with the previous novels, here the world of nature takes over the feral city, the «mandraščina» (MJ 178).

Belyj makes long lists of plant and animal varieties, the latter used very frequently and repeated several times. As in his earlier novels, they are an element of comparison and therefore bear the function of characterizing a character or event. Even more frequently and in a new way if compared to his previous works, the author uses pejoratives, pet names, diminutives of all kinds and sometimes collective nouns, with which he describes animals within groups, flocks, and in packs or possessive adjectives. Related to animals are: skin or fur that covers men and environments (e.g. the sable fur coat of Mandro, MJ 15); ram skin hats (MJ 15); Malaysian tiger skin and the brindle fabrics that adorn Mandro’s house (MJ 24, 146, 166; 94); the frog skin (MJ 176); snake skin (MJ 194); the peacock’s tail feathers on the walls of Mandro’s house (MJ 137, 166); the mounted bird of prey (MJ 158); the deerskin gloves (MJ 165); the lion’s paws on the legs of the armchair (MJ 165). All these elements transform the world of human beings in a feral and distressing world («zverinaja žizn’», MJ 215).

While in some parts of «The Moscow Eccentric» in the use of the representation of animals and zoomorphism the grotesque element was very evident (see the passage where Korobkin puts the cat on his head instead of his hat, ME 252), in the second novel less space is left for the grotesque. Already in the last page of «The Moscow Eccentric» grotesque becomes tragedy: «He wore not a cat but a crown of thorns» («On nadel na sebja ne kota, a – ternovyj venec», ME 256). This predominates in «Moscow in Jeopardy», creating a deep sense of anguish.

Some animals recurring in the two previous novels in relation to some characters, also appear in «Moscow in Jeopardy» but in a more generalized way, causing a kind of invasion of the city «pod udarom», even thanks to the frequency with which they are nominated. Flies and spiders move around it devilishly, almost recreating Kotik’s hallucinated mythological images which he could see in «The Baptized Chinaman». Mandro embodies the «myth of the spider spiders» («mif pauka paukov», MJ 177) and, like Bulgakov’s Voland, transforms the city’s inhabitants into monstrous men, new beasts carried with unprecedented anguish.