OPPOSITION OF «ONE’S OWN – ALIEN» IN IMAGOLOGICAL CONTEXT (ON MATERIAL OF «JAPANESE» PAGES OF«FRIGATE “PALLAS”» BY I.A. GONCHAROV)

Abstract

This article discusses the issue associated with the specifics of “one's own” and “alien” image functioning in the travel book by I.A. Goncharov "Frigate Pallas". Japan was defined as an object of relations, which the writer visited during the world expedition of 1853–1855. The authors of the article believe that not only I.A. Goncharov's thoughts and feelings as a Russian person were embodied in the "Japanese" pages of the work (his lifetime criticism wrote about his “Russian impressions” from visiting a distant country), but also the knowledge gathered from the sources published at the time of the trip, which also had a direct, lively look of a keen outside observer endowed with the gift of writing. Japan in the middle of the XIXth century was a closed state. This explained its technical backwardness, which was fixed by I.A. Goncharov, the supporter of the adoption of progressive industrial innovations coming from Western Europe. The writer was struck by the “savagery”, “uncultured” Japanese nature, and the “strangeness” of the Japanese appearance, and this contributed to their somewhat ironic portrayal in travel notes. In addition, this fixation reflected a certain “overlook” of the writer, who believed that belonging to Christian culture provides the basis for a negative assessment of those civilizations that are supposedly at the “pagan” stage of their development, according to the spirit of colonial ideas (Shintoism is a traditional Japanese faith, in which, as in Chinese Taoism, the concept of God as an absolute person was absent). Japan is “the kingdom of the Dream” for I.A. Goncharov, as well as Russia, by the way (hence, there is the place for “Oblomovschina” in Japanese life). At the same time, the writer notes that the Western countries did not do the necessary, due to which their image would have positive features in Japanese perception: the closed nature of island Japan was caused by the desire to preserve national identity, not to lose ethnic identity under the pressure of aggressive alien influences. Thus, Japan by I.A. Goncharov is not only the reflection of exotic eastern realities, but also a special “reality” in which one recognizes “one's own”, “alien”, and “distant” and “close” in a complex inner interweaving.