To Study Russian Literature in English: The Reception of Maurice Baring and Dmitry Merezhkovsky in Modern Japan

Abstract

This paper examines the perception and influence of the English books on Russian Literature in modern Japan, especially Tolstoi as Man and Artist: with an Essay on Dostoïevski by a famous Russian novelist, poet, religious thinker and literary critic, Dmitry Sergeyevich Merezhkovsky (1865–1941), which was published in 1902, and Landmarks in Russian Literature by an English writer and scholar of the Russian literature and Russian affairs in general, Maurice Baring (1874–1945), which was appeared in 1910. Their books were widely read among the Japanese intellectuals in the early 20th century. As the previous studies have indicated, Russian literature became a worldwide craze in those days, and Japan was also one of the countries where it gained popularity. There are some studies of the Japanese translations of Russian literature in modern Japan, which revealed that the greater part of them were translated not from Russian originals, but from the translations in the Western languages.
On the other hand, it is not well known that the characteristics of Russian literature were received in Japan at that period by books written in the Western languages other than Russian, such as English, and research to elucidate this reality has not progressed sufficiently. We analyze the English books and the English translations of the studies of Russian Literature by Baring and Merezhkovsky in the collection of Natsume Soseki (1867–1916), one of the most famous writers of modern Japan and an avid reader of these books, in Tohoku University Library in Sendai, Japan. We discuss their texts, and line drawing and comment writing by Natsume in these books which were published in the early 20th century. This paper shows that it is essential to understand the reception of Russian literature in Japan not only from the bilateral perspective between Japan and Russia, but also from a broader international perspective, such as the trilateral relationship between Japan, Britain, and Russia.