Thematic Composition of the Collection "The Return of Chorb" by V. V. Nabokov

Nabokov's small Russian-language prose has always been of particular interest to researchers. Nevertheless, the earliest short stories of the 1920s, included in the writer's first collection "The Return of Chorb" (1929), remain barely studied. This work seeks to prove that the stories in the collection have a single thematic composition and are subject to a single logic. Methodologically, the work is based primarily on the ideas of Ya. E. Golosovker. He introduces the term "curve of meaning", which denotes the movement and metamorphosis of an image "until its meaning is completely exhausted". To achieve this "exhaustion", the opposition is first introduced, fixing the framework of the analysis. It defines the extreme points of the curve of meaning and "stimulates the movement of the image" along this curve. Thus, in the work, one of the extreme points of the curve of meaning is taken as a breakthrough into the "perfected" world, as opposed to earthly vulgarity. This opposition is presented in each story, is realized at different levels and connects the collection with a single mainline plot: the struggle of "good" (creatively transforming principle) and "evil" (the beginning of vulgarity). The composition is arranged according to the principle of diversity: the collection has a single thematic core, to which all the stories gravitate. Thanks to it, a single thematic narrative develops, which does not develop linearly from the first to the last story: different thematic elements are highlighted, then weakened, then disappear altogether. This work analyzes all the stories in the collection from this point of view and shows how, thanks to each of them, the mainline plot unfolds.