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Call for Papers Theme: Grand Inquisitors Subtitle: Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky and the Western Philosophical Tradition Type: Interdisciplinary Conference Institution: Russian Cultural Centre Location: London (United Kingdom) Date: 21.–22.9.2020 Deadline: 8.5.2020 __________________________________________________ The philosophical genius of both Fyodor Dostoevsky and Andrei Tarkovsky was immediately apparent. Of Dostoevsky’s first novel, Poor Folk (1846), renowned literary critic Vissarion Belinsky proclaimed to the young novelist: “To you, an artist, the truth has been revealed and proclaimed; it has come to you as a gift. So cherish your gift, remain faithful to it, and be a great writer”. Similarly, of Tarkovsky’s debut film, Ivan’s Childhood (1962), Ingmar Bergman wrote: “My discovery of Tarkovsky's first film was like a miracle. Suddenly, I found myself standing at the door of a room the keys of which had, until then, never been given to me. It was a room I had always wanted to enter and where he was moving freely and fully at ease”. Despite turbulent careers compounded by often deleterious relationships with the Russian state, both Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky are considered grandmasters of their respective arts. This conference considers the strong philosophical consonance between Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky, their engagement and confrontation with the modern Western philosophical tradition, and the nature of the religious existentialism that grounds their most significant works. Tarkovsky’s philosophical indebtedness to Dostoevsky is summarily epitomised in a diary entry dated to April 30th, 1970: “Dostoevsky could become the whole point of what I want to do in cinema”. Dostoevsky’s own artistic purpose was fundamentally defined by a spiritual epiphany he experienced during his imprisonment in Siberia. The transformation of Dostoevsky’s literature upon his return to European Russia occurred in part due to his new-found spiritualism and in part owing to his new philosophical bearings. On February 22nd, 1854, while imprisoned in Siberia, Dostoevsky wrote to his brother requesting books by Vico and Ranke, as well as “the Koran, Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, and…without fail…Hegel, especially Hegel’s History of Philosophy. My whole future is bound up with that”. Hegelianism had permeated the Russian intelligentsia since the 1840s. The spread of German Idealism, borne itself through Cartesian subjectivity and Kantian transcendental logic, contaminated Russian high society with ideals of atheism and nihilism. It was such ideals that Dostoevsky’s major novels, upon his return to writing, aimed at overthrowing. Dostoevsky developed, across his literature and political writings, a religious existentialism that would have a profound influence on major subsequent philosophers, such as Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus. Through his characters, Dostoevsky subverts the modern dictates of science and reason in order to comport his readers toward an understanding of human authenticity, that is, toward self-mastery and self-control, itself grounded in the religious experience. Faith and spirituality were predominant themes in Dostoevsky’s major novels of the 1860s and 70s and in Tarkovsky’s films from 1966 to 1986. Echoes of Dostoevskyan religious existentialism reverberate throughout Tarkovsky’s oeuvre, while the fundamental aspects of the human condition explored in such works as The Idiot, Demons, Crime and Punishment, and The Brothers Karamazov resonate with Tarkovsky’s own character studies in Stalker, Andrei Rublev, Solaris, and The Sacrifice. Like Dostoevsky, Tarkovsky stood against the tides of rationalism and idealism, proclaiming that “knowledge distracts us from our main purpose in life. The more we know, the less we know. Getting deeper, our horizon becomes narrower. Art enriches man's own spiritual capabilities, and he can then rise above himself, to use what we call 'free will’”. Like Dostoevsky, Tarkovsky sought to emancipate the human condition from its material and epistemological bonds and turn it towards a mode of spiritual authenticity. This conference aims at exploring not only the resonance of the philosophies of Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky but also considers the broader philosophical tradition within which both artists stand. That is to say, how are we to understand the literature of Dostoevsky and the cinema of Tarkovsky within the broader canon of the history of philosophy? If, for instance, Dostoevsky himself effected through his writings manifest shifts in contemporary philosophical thought, particularly in the realm of existentialism, to what extent is Tarkovsky engaging with such developments in his own time? This leads to an inevitable comparison of Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky’s treatment of the ‘West’ and its impact of its principles on the Russian state. For Dostoevsky, this meant the encroachment of Western ideals upon the Russian spirit, while for Tarkovsky this signifies the political conflict of the Cold War characterised by the competing ideologies of capitalism and communism. Ultimately, this conference aims at developing a comprehensive understanding of the essential relation of Dostoevsky and Tarkovsky beyond the structures of their respective artistic genres in order to elucidate the degree of philosophical consonance between two of the most important and influential Russian artists in world history. Scholars of all disciplines and at any stage in their academic careers are invited to submit abstracts that engage with the fundamental theme of the conference and provoke fruitful and edifying interdisciplinary discussion. Some possible topics for discussion include, but are not by any means limited to: - In what ways does Dostoevsky through his literary and political writings engage with Western philosophy? How does his literature confront and resist the incursion of metaphysical thought upon the Russian spirit and to what degree does it influence later philosophers, particularly Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre? - To what extent is Dostoevsky’s philosophy informed by his Slavophilism? - How does the aesthetic experience of Tarkovsky’s ‘poetic cinema’ espouse or oppose the philosophical aesthetics of the likes of Plato, Plotinus, Kant, Schopenhauer, Dewey, and Beardsley? - In what ways does Dostoevsky influence the films of Tarkovsky, thematically or philosophically? To what extent is there a common understanding of ‘Russianness’ between both artists? - What is the nature of the religious existentialism that grounds Dostoevsky’s later novels, particularly The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov, and how do such themes resonate with the subject of faith that predominates many of Tarkovsky’s films, especially Andrei Rublev, Stalker, and The Sacrifice? Scholars of all disciplines and at any stage in their academic careers are invited to submit abstracts of up to 300 words by May 8th to: aaron.tur...@rhul.ac.uk Notifications will be sent out within two weeks. Papers are expected to last up to 30 minutes with 10 minutes for discussion to follow. Keynote Speakers: Stephen Mulhall (University of Oxford) George Pattison (University of Glasgow) Nariman Skakov (Stanford University) Venue: Russian Cultural Centre, Kensington, London Contact: Aaron Turner Royal Holloway, University of London Email: aaron.tur...@rhul.ac.uk __________________________________________________ InterPhil List Administration: https://interphil.polylog.org InterPhil List Archive: https://www.mail-archive.com/interphil@list.polylog.org/ __________________________________________________
