Date of Award

Spring 2026

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Department

Comparative Literature

First Advisor

Judith Kalb

Abstract

While nominally appearing disparate in their construction, the theoretical systems pioneered by Russian Symbolist poet Viacheslav Ivanov and Swiss psychologist Carl Gustav Jung operate under parallel hermeneutics of inference concerning the symbolic comprehension of reality. This dichotomy is drawn between an immediate (conscious) stratum of sensible reality of Apollonian, concrete, individual, and intelligible forms, and a transcendent (unconscious) stratum of Dionysian, associative, collective, and nominally unintelligible forms. In the present investigation, we aim to identify the proximity between Jungian analytical psychology and Ivanov’s “Realistic Symbolism” in order to provide the groundwork for future application of Jungian methodologies as an interpretive lens for Symbolist artwork. The path taken begins with an analysis of the “origin myths” underlying Ivanov’s Symbolism and the precursor to analytical psychology, Freudian psychoanalysis, to determine the kernel which unites the two disciplines. In order to establish the value of analytical psychology over Freudian psychoanalysis in the interpretation of Ivanov’s work, we proceed to investigate the divergence between Freud and Jung with respect to the core motif of the archaic psyche as an object of psychoanalytic inquiry, demonstrating that the individual, empirical approach of Freud presents as diametrically opposed to the collective, transcendental approach of Jung, the latter aligning with the orientation of Realistic Symbolism. Having traced the commonalities between Realistic Symbolism and analytical psychology from the kernel of the psychoanalytic origin myth to the specifics of Jung’s noumenal approach and position on the archetypes of the collective unconscious, the final task of the present study is to determine the degree to which concepts of Jungian analytical psychology may serve as an analytical tool for Ivanov’s artistic works. Here, Ivanov’s poems “Альпийский рог” and “Порог сознания” are used as exemplary materials to identify the interior and exterior orientations of Symbolist enlightenment and the degree to which these orientations align with concepts in analytical psychology.

Rights

© 2026, Jack Wilson Dedmondt

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