The poetry of science and the science of poetry (about the scientific and poetic heritage of M. V. Panov)

Abstract

The article examines the scientific and poetic creativity of the outstanding Russian philologist Mikhail Viktorovich Panov. The author analyses Panov’s ideas formulated in the course of lectures on the language of Russian poetry, emphasizing that, for Panov, the development of the Russian poetic language relies on the movement of poetic forms embodied at the level of phonetics, verbal and figurative series of literary works. The dynamics of poetic form is determined by poets’ desire to search for new and unexpected forms of poetic language; however, this search frequently follows the path of repeating familiar poetic formulas or their conscious displacement (shift). Panov-the researcher finds a scheme or matrix for describing a wide variety of poetic trends and styles, offering a scientific classification of poetic techniques. However, having a poetic talent, Panov was able to discover poetry in science, which he adored. The author of the article analyses several of Panov’s poems about life and war (of which he was a participant), about science and scientists. Linguistics and scientific ideas formulated by linguists became heroes of Panov’s poetry. Therefore, Panov’s work intertwined the approach of both a scientist and a poet: he finds science in poetry and poetry in science.