Censorship and Self-Punishment: An Examination of the System of Literary Text Production in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K00497
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 02040:European literature-related
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo (2023); Kanazawa University (2019-2022)
• Principal Investigator: Hiramatsu Junna 東京大学, 大学院人文社会系研究科(文学部), 准教授 (60600814)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: ロシア文学 / ソ連文学 / 検閲 / ドストエフスキー / 社会主義リアリズム

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This study examines censorship in Russian and Soviet literature from the perspective of constitutive censorship, which encourages rather than prohibits text production. It discusses the case of Dostoevsky's works as examples of how the partial relaxation of censorship during the Great Reforms in the second half of the 19th century paradoxically strengthened the self-censorship of writers, incorporating the censoring function into the content of their works and stimulating the formation of the self-punishing subject. In Soviet official literature, writers internalized the master plot involving external violence in the form of self-destruction of the protagonist's body, and these representations of physical violence attracted further external censorship, thus creating a cycle of internal and external censorship. This study also discusses how the above-mentioned relationship between censorship and representations of violence is linked with the colonialism of Russia and the Soviet Union.

Free Research Field

ロシア文学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

一般に、西欧リベラル民主主義社会には検閲は存在せず、それに対して権威主義社会では厳しい政治検閲があると理解されているが、そうではなく、あらゆる社会において、私たちは外的・内的検閲の相互作用を介して発話やテクスト生産を行なっている、という本研究の認識は、社会的意義をもつと考える。また本研究が論じたロシア・ソ連に特有の自己懲罰的な構成的検閲は、現在のロシア＝ウクライナ戦争下のロシアの検閲状況の理解にも有効だと思われる。現状を単なる政治権力による国民弾圧とみなさず、国民による公式言説（自己犠牲的暴力の促進）の内面化として理解し、より深いレベルで検閲を理解することが可能になるからである。