The Steppe, by Chekhov, and Misplaced Ideas from Somewhere Else

• Grant number: 19/13370-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: September 01, 2019
• End date: August 31, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Literature - Modern Foreign Literatures
• Principal Investigator: Mário Ramos Francisco Júnior
• Grantee: Lucas do Nascimento Delfino
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This project aims to present as the object of its analysis Anton Chekhov's novella The steppe (!B5?L, translit.: "Stiep"), written and published in 1888, in Russia. The study of this work is motivated, firstly, by the high level of its aesthetic production, noticed from its first reading, and by Roberto Schwarz's observations in his essay "Misplaced ideas: essays on brazilian culture", from 1977, which acts as a guide for the discovery of the issues presented on Chekhov's work. Since the 18th Russia is considered a peripheral and, therefore, backward nation, this project is interested in examining how the coexistence between the bourgeois ideas and the remains of the servile institution manifests itself under the literary form and provides means of understanding the complexity of Russia's historical process during the second half of the 19th century.