CONTACT US: Contact info
|
Citation |
Vinitsky I. Avtobiografija 2021; (10): 137-173. |
|
Vernacular Title |
Смерть барона. Герменевтика самоубийства в европейской культуре конца XVIII века (из истории русско-шведских связей) |
|
Copyright |
(Copyright © 2021, Dipartimento di Studi Linguistici e Letterari, Università di Padova) |
|
DOI |
unavailable |
PMID |
unavailable |
|
Abstract |
In October 1800, a young, rich, popular and successful Swedish aristocrat and military hero in the Russian service committed suicide, seemingly for no reason. His name was Major Magnus-Wilhelm Sprengtporten (1772-1800), and he was the son of the famous Swedish traitor, Finnish patriot and Russian agent Goran Magnus Sprengtporten (1740-1819; the future military governor of Finland). The real cause of his death in Moscow triggered an intense epistolary debate that has remained unnoticed by Russian and Western scholars of suicide. The participants of this debate included Russian, Swedish, Finnish, Polish, and French writers, politicians, military men, conspirators, adventu- rists, courtiers, and historians, ranging from the Russian writer Karamzin to Napoleon, then First Consul of France, and Russian Emperor Paul I. The major question posed by this project is not why the son of the infamous Swedish politician decided to commit suicide, but rather how this suicide reveals a number of dramatic ideological, political, emotional, and literary conflicts and shifts in Russia, Sweden, and Europe as a whole on the eve of the Napoleonic Wars. Language: ru |