Between literature and philosophy

Russian formalism and the Neo-kantians

Patrick R. Flack

Université de Fribourg

pp. 87-96

in: Erik Martin, Schamma Schahadat, Irina Wutsdorff (eds), Eine andere Moderne?, Wiener Slawistischer Almanach 76, 2015.

Abstract

Russian Formalism constitutes all at once a very obvious and a very con­fusing topic for a discussion of the interrelations of literature and phi­losophy in a Russian context. The Russian formalists’ obvious relevance here stems of course from their well-known attempt to frame literature as a specific, autonomous and clearly-defined object of inquiry, an attempt which entailed a strong rejection of the conflation of philosophical and literary discourses that can be seen as typical of 19th century Russian culture. By providing a decidedly negative answer to the question of lit­erature’s philosophical or reflexive functions, Russian Formalism even appears to have heralded the irruption in Russia of a new, “Western” viewpoint that considers literature and philosophy as two separate and clearly distinct types of discourse. Confusingly, however, Russian for­malism also seems to have failed both in successfully establishing the autonomy of literature and in clarifying the latter’s new relation to phi­losophy. On the one hand, the formalists’ early definitions of literature as an exclusively aesthetic or poetic phenomenon were soon challenged and had to be very thoroughly adapted and expanded in order to take into account the ideological, social, historical and moral components they had initially sought to expunge. On the other hand, the formalists’ explicit refusal to discuss the epistemological and philosophical implications of their own theorizing in systematic terms prevented them from articulating a clear explanation of their implicit view of philosophy as a reflexive, methodological tool. As a result, instead of providing a new categorisation of literary and phi­losophical discourses, Russian Formalism seems to have led both catego­ries to implode and dissolve.