Strach wyglądający spod świątecznej choinki. Niepokój egzystencjalny i codzienne lęki radzieckiego człowieka w antydramacie Aleksandra Wwiedienskiego Choinka u Iwanowów

Abstract

Among the emotions and processes that regulate human behavior, fear is undoubtedly the most crucial for human existence. The theme of fear and existential uncertainty resonates particularly strongly in the works of fin de siècle authors, including the Russian absurdist writer Alexander Vvedensky, especially in his play The Christmas Tree at the Ivanovs’, created in the poetics of the theater of the absurd. Its characters are puppet figures trapped in an absurd world full of fear, anxiety, and terror. Contrary to the title, Vvedensky’s play, which is a perfect example of modernist playfulness with the viewer and reader, tells a story about dying, which in the Russian artist’s work also takes the form of a grotesque execution. This world is therefore “frightening” primarily because of the inevitability of death. Vvedensky’s drama expresses the existential fear and despair resulting from the human awareness that life is meaningless because sooner or later, it must end in annihilation. In the play The Christmas Tree at the Ivanovs’, fear transforms from an individual experience into a universal phenomenon revealing the absurd of existence, the violation of time and space, and the loss of sanity in the Soviet reality of the post‑revolutionary period.