“The Nameless City” by V. F. Odoevsky: “The Fiction of a Mental Experiment” and the Narrative Structure of the Text

Aim. To identify the narrative techniques applied in V. F. Odoevsky’s novella “The Nameless City” which make it possible to conduct an experiment with ideas in the artistic space. Methodology . The range of philosophical and scientific ideas reflected in the novel is established, its narrative features are considered in connection with the aesthetic and ideological whole of the novel “Russian Nights.” Cultural-historical and system-structural methods were used. Results . It was revealed that the main tool of the ideological experiment is a complex composition, each of the levels of which problematizes and reinterprets the previous one. This allows the writer to expand his criticism of Bentham’s concept to a discussion of empirical cognition problems, as well as crisis phenomena of science and society. Research implications consist in the complex consideration of narrative techniques that organize the “artistic and journalistic” narration of V. F. Odoevsky as a special integrity.