№ 4, 2018 year

Based on a new textological interpretation of a record in Dostoevsky’s plan list at the turn of 1859–1860 (“Anania and impressions” instead of a more common in the academic publication “Apathy and impressions”) as well as on the analysis of his correspondence of the end of 1859 with Pleshcheev in the article is put forward a thesis about the intention of Dostoevsky to write a literary and critical essay dedicated to this literary work making an emphasis on its main character — peasant Anany Yakovlev. The supposed content of that unrealized intention is subject to analysis in this article.Dostoevsky, Pisemsky, “A Bitter Fate”, an unrealized intention, textual criticism, historic and literary commentary, literary and critical essay

The article is dedicated to the analysis of graphical peculiarities of Dostoevsky’s handwritten texts based on the materials of his notebooks and workbooks. A special emphasis is placed on the study of the peculiarities of hand writing and graphological analysis of the materials of the notebook dated back to 1854–1860 and of that one of 1860–1862. A preliminary version of the mark alphabet has been compiled that will be enriched while studying further the manuscripts. Each mark is provided with a necessary textual commentary both in regard to a particular letter and to the whole of observations resulted from the contextual analysis of author’s writings. The materials of this article represent the first attempt to elaborate the “ABC Book of Dostoevsky”, with eventual practical application of the received results in future. A detailed characteristic of the writer’s hand writing makes it possible to read the texts more precisely and to carry on a substantiated work with the so called «complicated reading», that is the scribbles in Dostoevsky’s manuscripts. A chronological coherent acquisition of information about the hand writing and the correlation of marks with their contextual analysis will allow create a resupplied Information database for textual critics and researchers of the writer’s works. The materials of the database could be useful in research and publishing activity.F. М. Dostoevsky, hand written heritage, notebooks, textual study, paleography, graphics, Illustrated Information database, graphological examination, publishing activity, digital Dostoevsky

The article envisages the problems of the chronological attribution of F. M. Dostoevsky’s “first” notebook kept in the Manuscripts Department of the Russian State Library (Fund 93.I.2.6). All the dating information related both to the notebook in whole and to its particular records, is specified. Analysis of the manuscript, comparison of biographic and literary data and calculations administrated by Dostoevsky from January of 1860 till October of 1862 allow explaining and clarifying the dates given for the first time in the notebook published in volume 83 of “The Literary Heritage”, and withdrawing from the dating (1861–1862) offered by V. S. Nechaeva in “The Description of the Manuscripts of F. M. Dostoevsky”. The dates of particular records, that permit to define the extreme dates of filling in the notebook, are specified in the article. A lot of questions touched upon in the article are of a polemical character and need further researches.F. M. Dostoevsky, manuscripts, notebooks and workbooks, textual study, attribution, chronology

The article is among the historiographic works researching into the topic of the ambience of F. M. Dostoevsky. The research focuses on the figure of an actor, writer, and professional newsman, author of “The Citizen” and correspondent of Dostoevsky. The image of S. F. Kalugin undergoes transformations in the article: an unlucky literary day worker bowed down with poverty, a swindler using unworthy ways of making money, a successful actor, writer and newsman having overcome misfortunes and pulled himself up by his own bootstraps. Due to the graphological and authorship examination of the letter of Kalugin’s “son”, held on the basis of the achievements of domestic forensic science, it is highly likely to allow reattributing this letter to S. F. Kalugin himself; the appeal to the archives in Moscow and St. Petersburg made it possible to significantly enrich a biographic portrait of the character, and to add bare facts to the hypothesis and eventual conclusions.F. M. Dostoevsky, S. F. Kalugin, N. S. Kalugin, «The Citizen», «Western Russia Herald», «The Official Gazette», Alexandrinsky theatre, Literature Fund, correspondence, attribution, graphological examination, charity

The article focuses on the question of the lost letters of F. M. Dostoevsky to V. F. Putsykovich, among others a number of letters of Putsykovich to the editor of the Journal “Russkoe Obozrenie” [“The Russian Review”] A. A. Aleksandrov in 1896-1897 get published (in short) and introduced into scientific discourse, that testify the preparation of four Dostoevsky’s letters for publication by V. F. Putsykovich at request of the editors office. As far as the given letters were not placed in the journal, the article makes an attempt to identify them by a range of indications kept in Putsykovich’ letters to the editor of “Russkoe Obozrenie” and to seek among them for the lost Dostoevsky’s letters. Based on the analysis of correspondence it gets asserted that Dostoevsky’s letters (three original versions and one copy) sent by V. F. Putsykovich to the editors office of “Russkoe Obozrenie” were not given back to their owner but kept in a personal archive of the journal’s editor A. A. Aleksandrov. Today they are kept in the Dostoevsky Fund of Russian State Archive of Literature and Art.V. F. Putsykovich, A. A. Aleksandrov, S. F. Sharapov, “Russkoe Obozrenie”, “A Moscow Collection” of 1887, the lost letters of F. M. Dostoevsky, Russian State Archive of Literature and Art

The “Kumanin case”, due to which a split-up between F. M. Dostoevsky and his relatives occurred, had a drastic impact on the writer’s destiny. His participation in the trial for the heritage of Moscow aunt A. F. Kumanina was taken painfully by A. G. Dostoevskaya that tried to help in solving this controversial issue. Anna Dostoevskaya took upon herself a part of problems of her husband related to negotiations, journeys, drafting of papers and documents. She carried on correspondence; arranged meetings con co-inheritors and bailsmen of Dostoevsky. She provided this information in her memoirs, notebooks and letters. Analysis of the factual material allows us to conclude that A. G. Dostoevskaya involved into the “Kumanin case” as the writer’s wife played a significant and decent role in it.F. M. Dostoevsky, A. G. Dostoevskaya, the Kumanins, relatives, testament, heritage, litigation, land, letters, memoirs

The article introduces into scientific discourse an unknown source of biographical data about the family of A. M. Dostoevsky, younger brother of the writer. It is a commemorative edition of a family menology in Church Slavonic dated back to 1849 and kept in the Literary-Memorial Museum of F. M. Dostoevsky in St. Petersburg. On its margins in front of the corresponding dates Andrei Mikhailovich placed records about family events, such as birthdays, baptismal ceremonies, weddings and deaths of his children, the writer’s nephews and nieces. The author of the article considers the mentioned records as a primary source, even in regard to notorious memories of A. M. Dostoevsky. On the fly page of the calendar of months together with a provenance there is a record, made by an unidentified hand which testifies the fact of obtainment of the book by Andrei Mikhailovich from doctor F. P. Gaaz. The article makes an attempt to reconstruct the circumstance under which the writer’s brother could meet a legendary “holy doctor”.Andrei Dostoevsky, menology, marginalia, biographical source, birth, baptismal ceremony, wedding, death, memories

From the autumn of 1866 taking of shorthand notes and further transcribing of those notes became an important stage in Dostoevsky's creative process. Thanks to his wife and assistant, professional stenographer A. G. Dostoevskaya, the writer got acquainted with the enlighteners who were at the forefront of the development of shorthand in Russia and Germany — P. M. Olkhin and Yu.-W. Zeibig. The role of P. M. Olkhin in life and work of the Dostoevskys was significant: for 20 years he had been engaged in the application of various shorthand systems to the Russian language and had developed his own system on the basis of the German cursive writing of Gabelsberger, that one underlain the works of Dostoevsky and his assistant. It was P. M. Olkhin who introduced the writer and his stenographer to one of the leading German stenographers and a member of the Royal Shorthand Institute in Dresden, Yu.-W. Zeibig. A. Dostoevskaya recorded in her diary two short meetings of the writer with the Dresden stenographer Zeibig. She also met him more than once, including at a meeting of the German stenographers' circle, where she was invited on purpose. There is no documentary evidence of communication between Dostoevsky and Olkhin. In the memoirs of the writer's wife there are only their opinions about one another as “sullen” people; it is mentioned that the boy who carried the icon during the wedding ceremony of Dostoevsky was the son of Olkhin named Konstantin. The article presents data from church books, clarifying information about the birth of P. M. Olkhin and his son; the documentary evidence of the communication between A. G. Dostoevskaya and the Dresden stenographer Yu.-W. Zeibig is studied.P. M. Olkhin, F. M. Dostoevsky, A. G. Dostoevskaya, Yu.-W. Zeibig, shorthand, creative process, Dresden Institute of Stenography

The article gives a brief overview of the literary works of the representatives of the Dostoevsky family-brother, wife, children and grandchildren of the writer. A special attention is paid to the analysis of Anna Dostoevskaya’s fiction, written after the death of Dostoevsky. The manuscript texts attributed to her are kept in the archives of Russian State Archive of Literature and Art and Manuscript Department of the Institute of Russian Literature and are not widely known. Dostoevsky's wife wrote two humoristic stories (the end of one of them has not come to our days) and two dramas — a farcical play “Recommendation” and a monologue scene “The Confession of Marmeladov”, prepared for a theatrical performance. Their author appears as a good storyteller who loves entertaining plots, having a subtle sense of humor and a satirical gift. A literary experience of A. G. Dostoevskaya is interesting as texts of the pupil of the great writer whose artistic skill developed as a result of a long-term spiritual ties and joint creative work with Dostoevsky. The article has a supplement of Anna Dostoevskaya’s literary works published for the first time.F. M. Dostoevsky, A. G. Dostoevskaya, literary heritage, dinasty, family, farcical play, manuscript, Marmeladov’s confession