Kotelnikov Vladimir Alekseevich - Professor, Institute of Russian Literature (Pushkinskij Dom) of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint-Petersburg, Russia.

The article, among other meaning-forming factors of the narrative text, highlights the specific locus of the railway, which plays a significant role in Russian literature of the ۱۹th and then ۲۰th centuries. It is shown that in the space of the railway car the worldview and behavior of people change. This is due to the nature of the microsociium that develops in such a space. It can occur a variety of, unpredictable meetings, there is an attraction or repulsion of the met, communication can expose the most intimate depths of personality or mask them. All this is done in conditions of heightened mental tension, under the influence of such factors, which rarely occur in systemic communicative acts. Such phenomena is demonstrated by the examples of Leo Tolstoy's novel "Kreutzer Sonata", his novel "Resurrection", Dostoevsky's travel notes and his novel "The Idiot", works by Ivan Bunin ("The Life of Arseniev", "Penguins" etc.), Vladimir Nabokov ("Other Shores", "Glory" and etc.)The article, among other meaning-forming factors of the narrative text, highlights the specific locus of the railway, which plays a significant role in Russian literature of the ۱۹th and then ۲۰th centuries. It is shown that in the space of the railway car the worldview and behavior of people change. This is due to the nature of the microsociium that develops in such a space. It can occur a variety of, unpredictable meetings, there is an attraction or repulsion of the met, communication can expose the most intimate depths of personality or mask them. All this is done in conditions of heightened mental tension, under the influence of such factors, which rarely occur in systemic communicative acts. Such phenomena is demonstrated by the examples of Leo Tolstoy's novel "Kreutzer Sonata", his novel "Resurrection", Dostoevsky's travel notes and his novel "The Idiot", works by Ivan Bunin ("The Life of Arseniev", "Penguins" etc.), Vladimir Nabokov ("Other Shores", "Glory" and etc.)

Russian Literature, Railway, Locus of Train, Leo Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Bunin, Nabokov.