THE RUSSIAN LITERARY AVANT-GARDE AND THE CINEMA (1920S AND 1930S): THE FILM-WORK OF ISAAK BABEL' AND JURIJ TYNJANOV (FILM, SOVIET)

The broad purpose of this dissertation is to discuss the film writings of two eminent Russian prozaiki, Isaak Babel' and Jurij Tynjanov, Chapter I, the Introduction, provides a background to the main discussion with a brief survey of some prominent writers and their involvement with the cinema circa 1896-1930. The emphasis there is on those writers who are well-known but whose reputations rest on their literary output, not on their film-work. Among those discussed are Gor'kij, Andreev, Blok, Belyj, Majakovskij, Mandel'stam and Olesa; the film-work of Mejerxol'd, the theater director, is also considered.;A very large portion (one half) of the dissertation is given over to (1) very comprehensive notes to the chapters, (2) extensive bibliographies of the film writings of the authors discussed, and (3) a compilation of six appendices. The aim there is to situate the discussion of Babel' and Tynjanov into a general context of Soviet literature and cinema of the 1920s and 1930s. The appendices include a list of Russian language film periodicals and five Tynjanov texts, the most important being the intertitles to the film, SVD, and an annotated Russian text (previously unpublished) of "LIEUTENANT KIZHE".;The filmscripts of Babel' is the subject of Chapter II, while Chapter III concerns the filmscripts and critical film articles of Tynjanov. Both writers wrote several filmscripts; some of these were produced as films. In several cases, the text of the script and/or the film itself is unobtainable or lost. The discussion thus centers on those filmscripts which are available and on those films which are extant. Of the several scripts attributed to Babel', the most significant are "WANDERING STARS" (1926), "BENJA KRIK" (1926), "THE CHINESE MILL (A MOBILIZATION DRILL)" (1927-28) and the revision of (')Ejzenstejn's destroyed masterwork, "BEZHIN MEADOW" (1936-37). Tynjanov's most significant scripts are "THE OVERCOAT" (1926), "SVD" (1927), "THE MONKEY AND THE BELL" (1930-32) and "LIEUTENANT KIZHE" (1927, 1934). Each of these scripts/films is treated differently: Whenever appropriate, they are placed within the context of the writers' literary oeuvres, but as the goal is not to discuss film as literature, the stress is on the cinematographic strategies evidenced in the scripts, as well as on thematics and textual history.