A JOURNEY THROUGH DANTE’S WORLdS: METAMORPHOSIS OF POETIC SPACE IN THE PROSE OF OSIP MANDELSTAM

Abstract

The article analyzes the poetics of Mandelstam and its linkage to the figure of Dante. It is shown that Mandelstam’s understanding of the impact of poetic text on the reader’s mind in his later theoretical works “Conversation about Dante” and “Journey to Armenia” is set by the structure of the world of “The Divine Comedy”. The author explores the way the initial (“infernal”) stage of   perception,   when   the   word   that   penetrates   the   consciousness   is doomed   to   perish in   the   reader’s   intertextual   reaction   to   a   later   resurface with new meanings. This phase coincides with the beginning of Dante’s journey — the entry into the landscape that is difficult to describe or analyze, and a downward movement that the Pilgrim, led by Virgil, makes.