Historia alternatywna a rosyjskie pragnienia imperialne : "Ukus angela" Pawła Krusanowa

Abstract

The present article consists of two parts. The first part is an analysis of the “imperial syndrome” – a factor shaping contemporary Russian fiction. Russian writers are divided into apologists of the empire and its opponents. Increased interest in the imperial topic in Russia falls on 1998. Works forming the core of the first wave of “imperial fantasy” appeared in the late 1990s (Variant “I” by V. Mihajlov, Тëмная гора by È. Gevorkân, Vybrakova by О. Divov, Sel’va ne lûbit čužih by L. Veršinin and Žavoronok by А. Stolârov). These artists soon found imitators and followers. In the second wave of «imperial fantasy», one can include works of Vyacheslav Rybakov, Dmitry Jankowski and Holm van Zajczyk. Imperial topics are supported by the world-systems theory developed by an American historian and sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein. Owing to this, Russia regains the status of superpower, as in Paul Krusanow’s novel Ukus angela, analyzed in the second part of this article. The author shows Russia regain significance basing its policy on the concepts of Eurasians and pro-Kremlin ideologues in type of A. Dugin and A. Siekacki, and on the Gnostic theory under the sign of G. Gurdjieff.