UTOPIAN MOTIFS IN THE NOVEL “ZULEIKHA” BY GUZEL YAKHINA

Abstract

Contemporary Russian writer Guzel Yakhina, in her novelistic opus, examines lesser-known aspects within the traditional thematic framework of the Russian Revolution and Civil War, such as the dispossession of the Tatars, the life of the Volga Germans, or the famine in the Volga region. In her debut novel ZULEIKHA, the author thematizes the metamorphosis of the main character and her path to gradual emancipation and self-knowledge through a series of trials and changes she experiences during the civil war. This paper reveals the presence of numerous basic motifs of literary utopia and examines their function in shaping the ideological structure of this novel. Several differences from the usual utopian model are observed because the author replaces the typical isolated utopia with a penal camp, focusing more on the main character's personal growth and self-improvement rather than on social issues and creating a new social order. Since one of the significant aspects of the main character's personal growth is her liberation from gender stereotypes, the work also touches on gender issues, drawing several parallels between this novel and works of feminist utopia. The parallel with Zakhar Prilepin's contemporaneous novel, THE MONASTERY, featuring similar themes and creation dynamics, is also noteworthy. Both works advocate the view that love is a force capable of turning universal hell into individual, personal paradise. In the author's words, it is a novel about “overcoming mythological consciousness, whether male or female” (Yakhina 2016). With this novel, the author Guzel Yakhina enters into a polemical relationship with both utopian and camp themes, stepping out of the socio-political sphere into the sphere of anthropological and religious antinomies.