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The Russian taxi driver as an existential hero. Literary-cinematographic manifestations
https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2026-2-85-97
Abstract
The article starts with a typical figure for the Russian émigré life in Paris between the two wars — a taxi driver, a hero in G. Gazdanov’s novel Night Roads [Nochnie dorogi]. The protagonist reveals an unusual perceptiveness and existential experience. The study of the driving profession goes on to include A. Borshchagovsky’s short story Three Poplars in Shabolovka [Tri topolya na Shabolovke], as well as its film adaptation by T. Lioznova. This leads the authors to the conclusion about the taxi driver as a representation of the existential hero in 20th-century Russian prose.
About the Authors
A. A. Pronin
L. N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Aleksandr A. Pronin, Doctor of Philology
2 Satpaev St., Astana, 010008
A. K. Ishanova
L. N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Asima K. Ishanova, Doctor of Philology
2 Satpaev St., Astana, 010008
A. V. Svyatoslavsky
Moscow Pedagogical State University
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
Aleksey V. Svyatoslavsky, Doctor of Culturology
1 Malaya Pirogovskaya St., Moscow, 119435
References
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10. Zherdeva, V. (1999). Existential motifs in the works of the ‘unnoticed genera tion’ of Russian émigré writers (B. Poplavsky, G. Gazdanov). Thesis abstract. Candidate of Philology. Moscow State Pedagogical University. (In Russ.)
Review
For citations:
Pronin A.A., Ishanova A.K., Svyatoslavsky A.V. The Russian taxi driver as an existential hero. Literary-cinematographic manifestations. Voprosy literatury. 2026;(2):85-97. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2026-2-85-97
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