On the afternoon of March 21st, Prof. Вадим Владимирович Полонский, Corresponding Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Department of Literature and Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Gorky Institute of World Literature, visited the School of Foreign Studies (SFS) of Nankai University and gave an academic report titled “Dostoyevsky’ Reception in the West”. Teachers and students from the SFS and the School of Literature of Nankai University and Tianjin Normal University attended the lecture. The lecture was hosted by Prof. Wang Lidan of the Department of Russian.
In the lecture, Professor Полонский first presented the early translations of Dostoevsky’s works in the West, which played an important role in the acceptance of his writings. He then analyzed Dostoevsky's key influence on the literature and culture of Western countries from the late 19th century to the early 21st century and highlighted the concepts of “irrationality”, “subconsciousness”, and “unconsciousness”, which are central to the artistic expression in the Western study of Dostoevsky’s works. Professor Полонский further explored how Western writers and critics have integrated the artistic world depicted by Dostoevsky into the Western cultural framework since the early 20th century, and how various scholars, such as Sigmund Freud, the German writers Hermann Hesse and Thomas Mann, and the British novelist David Herbert Lawrence, have commented on Dostoevsky’s works. Finally, he also presented an overview of the 200th anniversary conference of Dostoevsky’s birth held at UNESCO headquarters in 2021.
During the two-hour academic feast, Professor Полонский freely switched between languages, which not only helped teachers and students better understand how Dostoevsky’s works relate to Western culture, but also expanded their research methods and perspectives and deepened their understanding of comparative literary studies. In the interactive session, teachers and students had in-depth exchanges with Prof. Полонский around the details of Dostoevsky’s interaction with Eastern and Western cultures, the influence of Dostoevsky’s creation on Sigmund Freud’s psychological theories, and the characterization in his creation. Finally, the lecture ended successfully in a strong academic atmosphere.
