Christian Motives in the Short Story “God Alone Sees the Truth” by S. V. Engelhardt

Abstract

The article presents an analysis of Christian motives in the short story by S. V. Engelhardt “God Alone Sees the Truth,” which is a direct rethinking of the short story by L. N. Tolstoy “God Sees the Truth, but Will Not Tell Soon.” The article proves that Engelhardt creatively mastered Tolstoy’s ideas at the level of plot, narrative form, motives and chronotope. Important is the context of Engelhardt’s early prose of the 1850–1860s, which preceded the consolidation of Christian motives in her later work of the 1870–1880s. In the story under consideration the author of the article highlights and analyzes the motives of miracle, sin, repentance, forgiveness, prayer, wandering, spiritual guidance. A detailed study of the realizations of various motives and their semantic echoes makes it possible to identify significant oppositions and trace the spiritual evolution of characters.