WIELKIE TEMATY KULTURY W LITERATURACH SŁOWIAŃSKICH Slavica Wratislaviensia CLXXVII • Wrocław 2023 • AUWr No 4135 https://doi.org/10.19195/0137-1150.177.3 Data przesłania artykułu: 20.12.2021 Data akceptacji artykułu: 5.06.2022 JOSEF DOHNAL Uniwersytet Masaryka w Brnie, Czechy (Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic) Uniwersytet Świętych Cyryla i Metodego w Trnawie, Słowacja (University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava, Slovak Republic) Эпидемия как тест смысла жизни в повести Викентия Викентьевича Вересаева Без дороги * The Epidemic as a Test of the Meaning of Life in Vikentiy Vikentiyevich Veresaev’s Without a Road Abstract The article discusses the thematic core of V.V. Veresaev’s novel Without a Road (Без дороги, 1894). A detailed analysis of the prose lead the author to believe that the depiction of the epidemic in the protagonist‘s diary has become a catalyst for Veresayev’s own views. The way in which the character perceives the epidemic and the aid for the sick focuses on the rudeness, passivity, mis- trust displayed by “the people” towards “the intelligentsia.” The “people’s” aggressive resistance to the protagonist leads him to a mental crisis and, ultimately, death. The depiction of the course of the epidemic revealed the inadequacy of Narodnik notions of the unilateral responsibility of the intelligentsia for the ignorance and misery of “people.” The protagonist of this prose can thus be considered a specific subtype of the so-called superfluous man; although he himself is active, he is doomed to failure not only through his own fault (accepting an unviable ideological premise), but to a far greater extent through the fault of those who are unwilling to accept his help and who have punished him for his altruistic activity. Keywords: V.V. Veresaev, Without a Road (Без дороги), Narodniks, images of the “super- fluous man” * Příspěvek vznikl v rámci grantu specifického výzkumu Masarykovy univerzity MUNI/ A/1331/2020 (ID=57944) Mezislovanské kulturní a literární vazby. Slavica Wratislaviensia 177, 2023 © for this edition by CNS