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Abstract:

The article considers the importance of the antinomy of «masculine and feminine» in Nikolay Gumilev’s public speeches and print papers devoted to the substantiation of the artistic program of Acmeism and preceding the publication of two manifestos of the new literary school in the Apollo magazine in 1913. It is shown that Gumilev consciously linked Acmeistic poetics and the Adamistic worldview with the masculine principle, contrasting them with Symbolism, which highlighted the feminine element. It is noted that despite the great theoretical and polemical potential of this antinomy, which demonstrated real differences in the stylistic manners and aesthetic principles of the two phenomena of the literary process, the leader of Acmeism eventually refused to further develop this concept and did not include it in the texts of articles programmatic for Acmeism. It is suggested that the probable reason for this decision was the desire to emphasize the synthetic nature of the new poetic school, as well as to avoid undesirable associations with the theoretical constructions of Vyacheslav Ivanov, who also turned to the categories of male and female to understand the essence of Symbolist art and the ways of its further development.