Literary criticism

In this article we are considering the poetics of the spatial image – the provincial town – in the plays by Gorky and Chekhov. The context of the XIX century classical drama enables to determine the new content of the province image, to reveal common features of the «new drama» poetics and author`s individual peculiarities as well, and to confront the world outlook positions of its two creators – Chekhov and Gorky reflected in the failing – to – coincide appraisals of the perspectives in the development of the Russian provincial life in the early XX century.

Jonathan Coe’s satirical novel «What a Carve-Up!» is analyzed through the prism of traditional Gothic elements; their contribution to the ideological, philosophical and compositional structure of the novel is revealed.

The article analyses what Russian authors were on Albert Maltz’s reading list. In this regard special attention is paid to the correlation between Maltz’s aesthetic evaluations and political views, and the official line of the USA communist party guidelines in the field of art. Comprehensive examination of Maltz’s contacts with Soviet dissidents sheds the light on the dynamics of his attitude to social realism which was founded by M. Gorky.

The article studies judicial discourse, namely, the peculiarities of speech interaction between the judge and the defendant during the judicial interrogation. The author distinguishes three types of tactics in the speech of Russian and English judges in accordance with the functions performed by them. In the work, the national-cultural specificity of the speech of Russian judges is noted, due to a number of social factors and features of the national mentality.