WHITE NIGHTS

SPACE REPRESENTATIONS IN DOSTOIÉVSKI´S RUSSIAN LITERATURE AND VISCONTI´S ITALIAN FILM

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the novel White Nights, written in 1848, by the russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) and the 1957 Italian film adaptation of the same name, by the director and screenwriter Luchino Visconti (1906-1976). The novel White Nights tells the story of the protagonist Dreamer, described only in psychological characteristics, and of Nastienka, a young woman disillusioned by the limitations and frustrations in her life path due to the sultry conditions conditioned to women in the late 19th century. This article also presents two main points: analysis of the space presented in the literary work through the city of Saint Petersburg in Russia and discussing issues related to interculturality in adaptation. The theoretical framework was based on studies by Paul Ricoeur (2004). Regarding adaptation theory, studies by Linda Hutcheon (2013), Robert Stam (2006) and Sergei Eisenstein (1990) were used. Finally, the critical and sociological perspective was based on studies by Walter Benjamin (1985) on cinema, specifically in the essay The work of art in the age of technical reproducibility (1935/1936). This study has an investigative and bibliographical nature, with the aim of analyzing characteristics of interart dialogue in literature and film.