The dystopian tradition in A. Rubanov’s dilogy “Chlorophilia” and “Living Earth”

This article is dedicated to the interpretation of the novelistic dilogy by Andrey Rubanov, one of the leading contemporary Russian prose writers. The aim of the study is to identify the specific features of the dystopian tradition’s refraction in A. Rubanov’s novels “Chlorophilia” and “Living Earth”, which form a unified thematic, genre, and contextual whole. The scientific originality of the study lies in the fact that, for the first time, a comparative analysis of the author’s novels reveals the peculiarities of their dystopian discourse. The study establishes, firstly, that while retaining key genre components of dystopia, as represented in the novels of G. Orwell, Ye. Zamyatin, and A. Huxley (topographical confinement, depiction of a technocracy-based totalitarian society against which the hero rebels), in A. Rubanov’s dilogy, the successful functioning of the dystopian world and its tragic impact on humanity is caused by the development of a consumer society, which has a detrimental effect on individuals. Secondly, the contemporary writer, following the creators of “classical” dystopian discourse, makes the idea of dehumanization the central ideological and thematic line in the dilogy and, using floral imagery, demonstrates the transformation of person into homo florus with complete depersonalization and loss of self-identification.