The article considers transformation of the classic foundation in
Th. Mann’s “Death in Venice” inside S. D. Dovlatov’s short story cycle
about passed summer. The author shows how a well-known plot is trans-
formed, evolved, turns into a type of modern joke, which is regarded by
the postmodern writer as the main “adequate” genre of the modern lit-
erature. A diminishing effect of the pathetic classic narration results from
the shift of formal narrative dominants. Mann uses the genre of novella,
a story like a parable, whereas Dovlatov rejects integrity of narration
by forming the cycle which consists of three short “sketch” episodes.
The modern author writes as if fragmenting the intact, granulating and
simplifying the form. Mann’s intertextems allowed the Russian writer to
consider the problems raised in the novella (tragic loneliness of an artist)
from a different postmodern angle.
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