AND THE CREATION OF THE “FIRST THEORY OF PLOT STRUCTURING”
The essay “Viktor Shklovsky, Roman Jakobson and the Creation of the ‘First Theory of Plot
Structuring’” unravels the context of the Viktor Shklovsky’s paper “Speeches of Don Quixote”
presented in the Moscow Linguistic Circle (MLC).
Until now, the minutes of this February 15, 1920 meeting of the MLC were not known
in their entirety. A recent discovery of a complete copy of these minutes in the Roman Jakobson’s
Collections at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) allows to establish the circumstances
of the creation of Shklovsky’s theory of artistic plot. The minutes also suggest that Jacobson took part in streamlining this “first theory of plot structuring,” as he described his friend’s
works and papers of those years (1918‒1921).
Plot theory became the first dominant topic in Shklovsky’s biography as a scholar. He worked
on his theory of plot consistently since the summer of 1918. Considering the plot as a constructive
factor in works of art, Shklovsky unfolded the general provisions of his article-manifesto “Art
as a Device” (1916). He presented the first results of his research in the essay “The Connection
of Plotting Techniques with General Techniques of Style,” that he published in “Poetics” (1919),
the first anthology of Russian Formalism. This publication turned out to become a decisive step
in establishing the OPOIAZ (Society for the Study of the Theory of Poetic Language) in the Fall
of 1919.
Minutes of the OPOIAZ meetings did not survive. The chronology of the Society’s work
can be gleaned from the relevant publications in the “Life of Art” newspaper, as well as testimonies
of its participants, in particular, the Korney Chukovsky’s diaries and later reminiscences
of Jakobson.
It is no coincidence that Shklovsky chose “Speeches of Don Quixote” as the topic of his
presentation in the MLC. On the eve of his arrival in Moscow, he had to defend his critical positions
from the attacks of the proletarian critics. On February 10, he published in the “Life of Art”
a response to the anonymous feuilleton “Closer to Life” that appeared in the “Petrogradskaya
Pravda.” He structured his essay as a mini-manifesto that explained the principles of the
OPOIAZ’ scholarly work.
The minutes of the MLC meeting February 15, 1920 demonstrate that discussion of the
Shklovsky’s report centered on the issues of terminology. Rozaliya Shor drew attention
to the “decomposition of the form”; Osip Brik contrasted “deployment of plot” in detective fiction
against “piling up” in “realist” novels; Jakobson spoke of two types of “motivation,” a concept he
borrowed from the OPOIAZ’ terminological arsenal. That discussion was quite legitimate, since,
according to the Jakobson’s radical opinion, Shklovsky’s paper, just like his other “writings”
on plot as the artistic device, in fact represented the “first theory of plot structuring”.
These remarks suggest that Jakobson’s observations could have forced Shklovsky soon to turn
to modern prose, both as a critic and as an author.
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AND THE CREATION OF THE “FIRST THEORY OF PLOT STRUCTURING” // Сюжетология и сюжетография. 2018. № 2. Pp. 5–24. DOI: 10.25205/2410-7883-2018-2-5-24.