Наследие Л. Н. Толстого в парадигмах современной гуманитарной науки

92 A theme of death (the fear of death) is present nearly in all main works of Tol- stoy (including «Azbuka», stories for children, books of aphorisms). Let us recollect the famous pages of "War and Peace" describing the death of the little princess Bolk- onskaya, the demise of Petya Rostov, the death of the old prince Bolkonskiy and the death of wounds of his son Andrey, not mentioning the mass death of soldiers on the battlefields. Let us remember «The three deaths» and «The death of Ivan Ilyich», where this is the main theme. Let us recall «Khadzhi Murat», «The Kreutzer So- nata»... And how many Tolstoy's heroes commit suicide! This is a well-known hero- ine of the novel «Anna Korenina», Nekhlyudov from the story «A Billiard-Marker's Notes», Fedor Protasov from the play «The Living Corpse», Evgeniy from the novel «The Devil». Life and death are the most important concepts of Tolstoy's philosophy and his art world. Death according to Tolstoy is directly connected to how righteous the person’s life has been. Tolstoy believed in the triumph of spiritual life over death [20, p. 466–468]. «The angels of fear, sorrow and death stood by my side since the day I was born», – confesses Munch in his diary [7] (one more noticeable characteristic: both Leo Tolstoy and Edvard Munch kept diaries throughout their lives). E. Munch con- stantly depicts the dying people on his canvases: «The Sick Child» (1886), «Death in the Sick Chamber» (1895), «The Death Bed» (1895), «Death in the Sick Room» (1896), «The Dead Mother and the Child» (1897–1899). One more important theme for the ideology of both artists is nature and the city. Nature is blessed, it gives strength to the creative work, the city environment is ag- gressive, it is a place of anxiety. This is the way L. Tolstoy and E. Munch feel, they are convinced of it.Here is the famous beginning of Tolstoy's novel «Resurrection»: «Though hundreds of thousands had done their very best to disfigure the small piece of land on which they were crowded together, by paving the ground with stones, scraping away every vestige of vegetation, cutting down the trees, turning away birds and beasts, and filling the air with the smoke of naphtha and coal, still spring was spring, even in the town. The sun shone warm, the air was balmy; everywhere, where it did not get scraped away, the grass revived and sprang up between the paving- stones as well as on the narrow strips of lawn on the boulevards. The birches, the poplars, and the wild cherry unfolded their gummy and fragrant leaves, the limes were expanding their opening buds; crows, sparrows, and pigeons, filled with the joy of spring, were getting their nests ready; the flies were buzzing along the walls, warmed by the sunshine. All were glad, the plants, the birds, the insects, and the chil- dren. But men, grown-up men and women, did not leave off cheating and tormenting themselves and each other. It was not this spring morning men thought sacred and worthy of consideration not the beauty of God's world, given for a joy to all creatures, this beauty which inclines the heart to peace, to harmony, and to love, but only their own devices for enslaving one another» 1 . And here is Munch's picture «Evening on Karl Johan Street» (1892): the crowd of inhabitants with truly beastly facial expres- sions walk along the city street towards the observer, and towards the crowd (with it's back to the observer) the lone figure of a man is moving, he doesn't belong here, he is 1 Quoted by: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1938/1938-h/1938-h.htm#link2HCH0001.