The Dog-Fabulist: Glimpses of the Posthuman in A Dog’s Heart (1925) by Mikhail Bulgakov

Authors

  • Luigi Gussago Monash University, Melbourne

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.37536/ECOZONA.2019.10.2.2890

Keywords:

Russian, literature, animal studies, Bulgakov, posthuman

Abstract

      Mikhail Bulgakov’s science-fiction novella A Dog’s Heart (??????? ??????, 1925) is a brilliantly wry account of an experiment to graft human organs onto the body of a stray mutt, with unexpected consequences. The dog turns into a despicable, unruly hominid that wreaks havoc in Professor Preobrazhensky’s already endangered bourgeois existence. Critics have seen the story mostly as a prophecy predicting the downfall of the homo sovieticus: the uncontaminated, witty voice of the dog-narrator does not spare either the aristocratic opportunists of the new regime, or the violent, unruly proletarians. However, from an animal studies perspective, Bulgakov’s story, along with examples from Mikhail Zoschchenko’s and William Golding’s anti-utopian fiction, may also be investigated as an exhortation to discover new narratives of “intra-action” (Barad) among all sorts of living agencies, and as an enactment of what Joseph Meeker calls the “play ethic,” where more-than-human and human beings participate on equal terms in the game of survival and co-evolution. Through a comparative analysis of the three main characters, Sharik, Sharikov and Preobrazhensky, this article shows how Bulgakov’s story is not only a fable about human fallibility and political conflicts, but also opens a window onto a posthuman alternative.

 

 

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Author Biography

Luigi Gussago, Monash University, Melbourne

Luigi Gussago finished earned his PhD in Italian and Comparative literature in 2014 with a dissertation entitled "Tricksters of Today. Contemporary Picaresque Fiction in English and Italian (1991-2009): A Comparative Approach". He currently works as an Assistant Lecturer in Italian Studies at Monash University.

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Published

2019-09-30