Rainer Maria and Heinrich Abeles. About an ‘academic publication’

Abstract

The article examines a book about the literary legacy of the Russian writer S. N. Schill (1863-1928), known by her pen-name Sergey Orlovsky. Unfairly obscure these days, she wrote books for children and young adults, prose, memoirs, poems, dramas, studies about Russian literary history, and engaged herself as translator and educator, who spared no effort in bringing education to the masses. Sofia Schill is mostly remembered today by her correspondence with R. M. Rilke, whom she knew personally, while her own legacy and biography remained unknown until very recently. The book published by RGGU press sought to rectify the injustice.

Sadly, the job was only half successful. Having pointed out a few errors and inaccuracies overlooked by the publishers and the author of the introduction (I. Ovchinkina), K. Azadovsky dwells on the general and very pertinent issues concerned with publication of, and commenting on, archival material: he discusses the role of the scholar preparing a publication (a ‘publicator’) in the contemporary context of humanities, and his/her responsibility to their ‘predecessors’; the problem of quotations; the level of the commentary and professionalism; and the moral aspect of the work of a philologist or a publisher.