Gurevich, P. S. Tragic Fortunes of Personality

Abstract: Addressing to the literature of the 19th – 20th centuries, a famous researcher Grigory Konson uses significant art material in order to reveal the phenomenon of human destructiveness. Images of the main characters of different literary works show that some people have neither conscience nor compassion. Such people generally have a rather powerful destructive nature. In this regard, the author of the present review analyzes the phenomenon of catastropism in personal consciousness. The author also raises a question about a very fine line between the norm and pathology. The author of the review appeals to the works of a famous essay writer of the early last century Max Nordau who was nearly the first one in the humanities to talk about the degradation of the humanity that influenced the minds and feelings of people. The author of the review uses the historical method allowing to trace back the sources and development of fatal anti-humanistic tendencies in modern culture along with Grigory Konson. The author of the review also uses the phenomenological method in order to provide a full description of the phenomenon of degradation based on the analysis of Grigory Konson’s book. The novelty of the research is defined by the fact that Grigory Konson’s thesis was the first one in Russian literature to provide a full and versatile research of the phenomenon of the murdering intellect. In this regard the analysis of the dual conscience syndrome is of particular interest. The author of the review also underlines the special role of the moral opposition to the public psychopathic temptation.

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