Open Access‘STEPPENWOLF’. TOWARDS THE BIOGRAPHY OF BORIS VILDЕ
Author(s) -
Boris Solomonovich Kaganovich
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
voprosy literatury
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.1
H-Index - 1
ISSN - 0042-8795
DOI - 10.31425/0042-8795-2018-4-363-385
Subject(s) - wife , hero , biography , philology , nazism , sister , émigré , art history , literature , history , art , classics , philosophy , sociology , law , anthropology , gender studies , feminism , theology , archaeology , german , politics , political science
Numerous works have been written about the young Russian еmigrе writer Boris Vildе (1908–1942), a late hero of the French Resistance, who was executed by Nazi occupants. Descriptions of his personality are often contradictory, and each account is very precious. The article introduces and examines new, hitherto unpublished material about Vildе: it includes the letters of his wife’s mother Myrra Lot-Borodina, a famous French scholar of religions and philologist of Russian origins, to her sister, the Leningrad-based historian Inna Lyubimenko, from the Petersburg archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The letters provide a number of unique and valuable facts and observations about Vildе and his personality. Another discovery for the studies of Vildе, the correspondence between the famous French author Andrе Gide and his friend, the translator Dorothy Bussy, is quoted to enrich our knowledge about Vildе. It follows that A. Gide took Vildе under his wing and actively supported his relocation from Germany to France. As a result, far from resembling his stereotypical and slick image, Vildе is revealed as an extraordinary and heroic person.