Author’s name:
Alexander F. Tsirulev – Linguistics University of Nizhny Novgorod, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia
Abstract:
The article examines the evolution of the genre of literary autobiography. Its analysis is grounded in the personalist principle, according to which the genre of autobiography emerged as a result of both broader sociohistorical developments and the evolution of the artistic consciousness characteristic of a given historical period. An analysis of autobiographically oriented works by ancient and medieval authors leads to the conclusion that the writings of Seneca and Marcus Aurelius, as well as those of early medieval authors such as St. Augustine, Otloh of St. Emmeram, Guibert of Nogent, and others, cannot be regarded as literary autobiographies in the strict sense of the term. This is because the personal element in these works is only beginning to emerge and has not yet developed into the organizing principle of the narrative. Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations contains important elements of autobiographical discourse; however, its personal dimension is substantially subordinated to the public orientation of the author’s self-representation. In Augustine’s Confessions, the author’s personality remains muted and is not developed in an artistic sense, since Augustine conceives of himself not as an autonomous agent of will but as part of Divine Providence. Augustine’s successors, including Otloh of St. Emmeram and Guibert of Nogent, follow their teacher in matters of literary form and inherit from him the tendency to subordinate personal history to broader theosophical reflection. Their autobiographical writings remain firmly within the conventions of religious discourse. At the same time, despite their departure from psychological self-exploration, the works of Augustine, Otloh of St. Emmeram, Rather of Verona, Guibert of Nogent, and others prepare the way for the flourishing of humanist autobiography, since religious reflection and the recognition of the divine and meaningful within oneself lead not to the devaluation of the human person but to the revelation of authentic human nature. Through the knowledge and recognition of God within one-self, the individual comes closer to an awareness of the self. Thus, early medieval autobiography constitutes a kind of threshold to literary autobiography as an independent genre, serving as a link between the autobiographical writings of antiquity and those of the Renaissance
| Section | CROSS-CULTURAL ASPECTS OF LITERARY DISCOURSE |
| DOI: | 10.47388/2072-3490/lunn2026-74-2-216-230 |
| Downloads | 4 |
| Key words | autobiography, Aurelius, Augustine, genre, personality, discourse, psychologism, introspection |