How an expression gets its shape and comforts a person. To one motive in the letters of A. Platonov

Abstract

The Russian writer of the Soviet period Andrei Platonov (1899–1951) is well known to have had a very original style in his novels and short stories. It is an important goal to find out in what sense his style is original and how he created it. In this connection, it is worthwhile to pay some attention to his personal letters because some of them (especially ones written to his wife, Maria), show the same strangeness as found in his literary works. This paper concentrates on one expression he used when he wrote to Maria in 1945 about their beloved son Platon (Tosha) who had died from tuberculosis one and half years before: “kiss him through the earth.” Comparison of Platonov’s expressions in his letters concerning the same topic (how to take care of the dead son and his grave) shows that he created this expression not straight away, but after repeating and varying some ordinary ones. It therefore seems that it took some time for him to come up with the fore-mentioned expression after which he ceased writing about the death of his son. The author finds the same tendency also in a short story “Empty Soul (Pustodushie)” written by Platonov in the same period. The thesis about the important role of repetition and variation of more ordinary expressions in order to reach more original and strange ones in Platonov’s style could be tested with his other works.