THEATRICALITY AS A CHARACTERISTIC PROPERTY OF DOSTOEVSKY’S PROSE

Dostoevsky is a writer who stands out for his special individual style. The article discusses one of the features of Dostoevsky’s style — the theatricality of his prose. Theatricality manifests itself in the plot and its individual episodes: new characters are often introduced with lengthy descriptions of appearance and behavior, and only then enter into conversation. Dostoevsky’s descriptions of the characters are structurally similar to the author’s remarks in the text of the play addressed to the actors. Often the replicas of the characters are commented on — as if it were an actor whom the author recommends to speak louder or quieter, standing up or jumping up, etc. Theater researchers note that things on the stage turn into signs, the meaning of which is associated with the unfolding action. In Dostoevsky’s works, things acquire a symbolic function, linking separate parts of the narrative, in a sense predetermining certain actions of the characters. In other words, some things turn out to be almost the heroes of the story. Such, for example, is the “pestle” in the novel “The Brothers Karamazov”. A clear division between the description of the participants in an almost stage action and their replicas in conversation allows the reader to focus on the speech of the characters, which is the real center of the narrative in Dostoevsky’s works.