2 Note on Transliteration I am using the Library of Congress system without diacritics, with the following exceptions: - In the main text I have chosen to spell names ending in “skii” as “sky” (as in Zhukovsky) - I will use the common spelling of the names of noted Russian authors, such as Tolstoy 3 Introduction This dissertation focuses on three Russian poets—Aleksandr Pushkin, Mikhail Lermontov, and Vasily Zhukovsky, and on the handling of rusalka figures in their work. I claim that all three poets used the rusalka characters in their works as a means of expressing their innermost fantasies, desires, hopes, and fears about females and that there is a direct correlation between the poets’ personal lives and their experiences with women and the rusalka characters in their works. Aleksandr Pushkin used the rusalka figure in two of his poems¾the short whimsical poem “Rusalka” written in 1819, and the longer more serious poetic drama “Rusalka” that he started in 1829 and never finished. The ways in which Pushkin uses the rusalka characters in these works represent his growth and development in terms of experiencing and understanding women’s complex internal worlds and women’s role in his personal and professional life. I claim that the 1819 poem “Rusalka” represents the ideas that Pushkin had early on in his life associated with a power struggle between men and women and his fears related to women, whom he viewed as simplistic, unpredictable, and irrational, with the potential of assuming control over men through their beauty and sexuality and potentially using that control to lead men to their downfall. In the 1829 poetic drama “Rusalka” one can see Pushkin’s much richer and fuller understanding of the women’s complex internal worlds, of the power and independence of women, of the suffering and pain that come with being rejected and abandoned, of the grief and guilt that can arise over lost love, and the unknown direction in which love takes people, keeping in mind that it brings bliss, but also challenges. 4 Mikhail Lermontov’s character demonstrated a unique combination between a threatening and wild “demonic” side marked by skepticism, pessimism, and cynicism, and a beautiful and gentle soul that showed Lermontov’s soft human side. In three of his works, “Rusalka” (1836), “Morskaia Tsarevna” (1841), and “Demon” (1830-1839), Lermontov used human and non-human figures to express his distinctive vision on the possibilities of lasting love between individuals. I claim that the portrayal of the union between human and non-human characters in these works is an expression of Lermontov’s two-sided nature, which turned the poet’s life into a never-ending struggle between the beauty of his human soul and the cynicism, skepticism, and pessimism of his demonic side. Even though Vasily Zhukovsky—a “sentimental dreamer and proponent of virtue”1, had a life very different from that of Lermontov, he used the rusalka character Undina in his work Undina for purposes similar to Lermontov’s. Zhukovsky not only translated Friedrich Heinrich Karl de la Motte, Baron Fouqué’s prose work Undine into Russian, but also transformed it into an original beautiful work of Russian poetry. I believe that in the character of Undina¾a unique hybrid between a human soul and the inhuman essence of a water spirit who takes the unusual role of a protagonist instead of the traditional role of an antagonist, Zhukovsky combined his ideas and dreams of an ideal female figure with his need and hope for one. All three poets depicted, addressed, or described multiple real and fictional female figures in their other works. The fact that the works in which they use the rusalka characters are not describing or addressing specific people, unlike their ordinary love lyrics, gave the 1 Ilya Vinitsky, “Introduction,” in Vasily Zhukovsky’s Romanticism and the Emotional History of Russia (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2015), 6. 5 poets the opportunity to imagine and speculate on different scenarios about their own internal quest for understanding and finding an ideal partner and love. The rusalka figure, as opposed to other fictional female figures that the poets used in their works, seems to have been a specific device for the expression of the poet’s innermost feelings, fantasies, fears, and desires in the early part of the nineteenth-century Russia. This can be explained by the powerful role and the strong presence of Russian folklore in Russians’ lives. In the following two sections, I will discuss the distinctive role of the rusalka figure in the Russian cultural imagination, as well as cultural attitudes toward women that were prevalent during the formative years of Pushkin’s, Lermontov’s, and Zhukovsky’s lives. Then, in the subsequent three chapters I will discuss each of the poet’s work on the rusalka figure in turn. **** In Ivan the Fool: Russian Folk Beliefs, A Cultural History Andrei Sinyavsky states that the ancient tradition of folklore is rooted deeply into Russian people’s psychology and they all, with or without realizing it, share a strong connection to the old folk beliefs. Sinyavsky claims that “it is the more primordial and ancient, the more primeval and organic gods, who have accompanied the Russian people throughout their history. That means they can characterize both the Russian way of life and folk culture better than those heavenly rulers who lost their original form.”2 According to D. K. Zelenin the rusalka is one of the oldest, most well-known and wide-spread characters in Russian folklore. Zelenin claims that these 2 Andrei Sinyavsky, Ivan the Fool: Russian Folk Beliefs, A Cultural History ( Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 2000), 108. 6 water spirits exist in the myths of all Slavs, Western and Eastern.3 He also points out that “the bulk of available materials and recorded memorates and fabulates for the nature spirits dates from the end of the nineteenth century, when belief in those personages was already in a state of decline. In the 1850’s the situation had been quite different: a contributor to an ethnographic study published by the Imperial Geographic Society noted that many of the peasants of Iaroslavl’ Province claimed to have encountered rusalki personally.4 And it wasn’t just the peasants from the Iaroslavl’ Province who claimed to have encountered rusalki. Peasants from all over Russia believed that their own lives or the lives of people they knew have been affected by rusalki in some way. The rusalka figure was very important and influential in the lives of the Russian peasants as shown by the fact that she is one of most developed and complex folklore characters and has a large number of beliefs, rituals, and traditions that the peasants devoted to her as described by Zelenin in Ocherki Russkoi Mifologii: Umershie Neestestvennoiu Smert’iu i Rusalki (Articles on Russian Mythology: Unquiet Dead and Rusalki) and by Propp in Russkie Agrarnye Prazdniki: Opyt Istoriko-Ėtnograficheskogo Issledovaniia (Russian Agrarian Holidays: An Attempt for Historico-Ethnographic Research). According to the accounts from Zelenin, Propp, and Sinyavsky, the rusalka character has always been gender-defined as a woman, and in the Russians’ minds the parallel between a rusalka and a woman is instinctive, natural, and unquestionable. As Zelenin points out, looking at the rusalki’s characteristics and behavior one can clearly see that there are striking similarities between the rusalki and village women in terms of appearance, behavior, way of life, and social structure and that even 3 D. K. Zelenin, "Rusalki," in Izbranye Trudy. Ocherki Russkoi Mifologii: Umershie Neestestvennoiu Smert’iu i Rusalki (Moscow: Indrik, 1995), 122. 4 Ibid., 65. 7 after they die, as unclean/ unquiet dead, the rusalki keep imitating their normal life preserving their appearance, everyday routines, and habits.5 The Russian rusalka has some similarities with the Greek siren that served as the base for the creation of the Western mermaid, but there are also some distinct differences between the rusalka and the siren. The Greek siren came to Russia through literary texts and was not widely known all over Russia. It was well known in certain parts of Russia, which is obvious from a few existing accounts of the appearance of the “rusalka- faraon”6¾beautiful women with fish tails who seduce men with magical songs. The upper body of the rusalka-faraon is human and the lower part is a fish tail. The Russians believed that they were Egyptian women who drowned in the sea while pursuing the Jews. Their singing is magical and beautiful. Sometimes when they sing even the sea becomes calm and a person can get hypnotized and listen forever. However, there are just a few accounts of rusalka-faraons. The main mermaid- like figure in Russian folklore is the rusalka.7 In Ocherki Russkoi Mifologii: Umershie Neestestvennoiu Smert’iu i Rusalki Zelenin describes the rusalka character in great detail. He states that in the Russian mind the image of the rusalka is very unclear, foggy, confusing, and fluid. Part of the reason why this is, is because the image of the rusalki is a very complex image that combines characteristics from a number of major folklore characters such as the water spirit, the forest spirit, personified illnesses, the midday spirit, the ancient Greek siren, etc. Many sources show that people see rusalki as unclean/ unquiet dead. They are mostly women who died from unnatural death under unnatural circumstances. Many believed that in general, women and 5 Ibid., 149. 6 rusalka-pharaoh 7 D. K. Zelenin, op. cit., 149. 8 young girls who took their own life and/or weren’t given a proper burial become rusalki.