Georges Florovsky (1893–1979) was a prominent Russian émigré historian, philosopher, Orthodox theologian, and ecumenist. He was also the first Orthodox theologian to teach at Harvard Divinity School (1957–1964). In the 1920s, Florovsky wrote and defended his dissertation on the leading nineteenth-century Russian public intellectual, Alexander Herzen (1812–1870). Until now, the full text of Florovsky's work had been considered lost. I recently found five documents containing a substantial portion of the dissertation in the Georges Florovsky Papers archive of the St Vladimir's Seminary Library (GFP SVS). This newly discovered material amounts to about one-half of the dissertation and contains some important clues for reconstructing the remaining half of the work. My article discusses: 1) the plan of the dissertation and the history of its composition; 2) Florovsky's defense of the dissertation in Prague in 1923, as summarized in Alexander Izgoev's report, preserved in the Georges Florovsky Papers at the Princeton University Library (GFP PUL); 3) Florovsky's preparation of the dissertation for publication; 4) the description of the newly discovered archival material; and 5) the reconstruction of the dissertation, as preserved in the redactions of 1928–1930. The dissertation is the only monographic study that Florovsky ever finished, his other book-length studies being surveys rather than monographs. The dissertation is also important for understanding the methodological presuppositions of Florovsky's magnum opus, The Ways of Russian Theology (1937).
The Plan of the Dissertation and the History of Its Composition
Three main periods are commonly distinguished in Florovsky's nomadic scholarly career: Russian (1893–1920), European (1920–1948), and American (1948–1979).Footnote 1 When he was a graduate student at the University of Odessa (1916–1919), Florovsky began gathering material for his writings on Russian intellectual history. He passed all of the qualifying examinations, but his dissertation research was interrupted by his family's evacuation from Bolshevik Russia to Europe during the Civil War. In his letter to a prominent Czech Slavist Irzhi Polivka, dated July 6, 1921, Florovsky noted:
As I was leaving Russia in the beginning of 1920, unfortunately, it became necessary to abandon all of my manuscripts, unfinished works, and so on. Among these was a study, which I would very much like to restore and complete. I became convinced long ago that it was necessary to reconsider the accepted understanding of the development of Russian intellectual history. In the course of analyzing the relevant material, I sketched out a plan of the book dedicated to this theme.Footnote 2
According to Florovsky's original plan, the book was to consist of a methodo-logical introduction to the philosophy of history and ten chapters dedicated to the following authors and themes:
1) Ivan Kireevsky; 2) Aleksei Khomiakov; 3) Iury Samarin; 4) Vissarion Belinsky; 5) Alexander Herzen; 6) Nikolai Gogol; 7) Ivan Aksakov; 8) Sociological patriotism (a) populism (first of all N. Mikhaikovsky), (b) late Slavophilism (Danilevsky, Leontiev, and others); 9) Vladimir Solovyov; 10) The crisis of the social ideal in Russia (Struve, Bulgakov, Berdyaev, Gershenzon, [“The Landmarks” symposium], Novgorodtsev, and others).Footnote 3
The seminal ideas of the book were sketched out in the lecture, “The Eternal and Temporal in the Teaching of the Russian Slavophiles,” delivered in Sofia in February 1921 and later published as a journal article.Footnote 4 In the originally planned book, only one chapter was dedicated to Herzen. Florovsky realized that it would be impossible to complete such an ambitious project in Sofia due to the dearth of the relevant scholarly literature. Still he was confident that the chapter on Herzen could be finished in the Bulgarian capital. It is possible that already in the summer of 1921 he completed the preliminary bibliographic research and had the relevant material at his disposal.
In his reply to the young Russian scholar, Irzhi Polivka warned that Czech publishers were unlikely to undertake the publication of such a comprehensive study and recommended publishing various parts of the work separately. Having considered Polivka's advice, in his letter of August 10, 1921, Florovsky announced a change of his plans: “Presently I have nearly finished a section of the book dedicated to Herzen. It may be possible to publish this section as a separate monograph entitled ‘Herzen's philosophy of history.’ According to my preliminary estimate, this would be a small book of seven-eight typographical sheets.”Footnote 5 The size of a single typographical sheet in the pre-revolutionary Russia was about thirty thousand characters (with spaces). This would bring the total number of characters in Florovsky's preliminary estimate to about 210–240 thousand, resulting in a book of about 150–200 pages. Florovsky's vague reference to a nearly finished section on Herzen could imply that he had finished the first chapter and had probably sketched out the second chapter of the future dissertation. Apparently, Florovsky made the decision to limit the scope of his research to the monograph on Herzen between 6 July and August 10, 1921.
In his next letter to Polivka, dated 3 October 1921, Florovsky wrote:
Dear Professor, With my friend prince N. S. Trubetskoy, who is travelling to Prague, I am sending a typescript of the part of my historical study of Russian philosophical thought, which is being prepared for publication as a separate book entitled “A. I. Herzen's Philosophy of History.”In the event of a publication, a special introduction will need to be added.Footnote 6
What part of the future dissertation had been completed by October 1921? It is clear that the introduction had not been written. On these grounds, this preliminary version of the work could be labeled “T(DOct1921)—Intro,” where “D” refers to the “dissertation,” “T” stands for the “typescript of,” “Oct 1921” refers to the date of the dissertation's redaction, and “minus Intro” accounts for the fact that the dissertation still lacked an introduction. In his letter of November 30, 1921, Florovsky mentioned his plan to add a “conclusion, discussing the influence that Herzen's views had on the later philosophical and socio-historical Russian thought.”Footnote 7 This implies that in November Florovsky had a version of the dissertation that could be designated “DNov1921 —Conclusion.” It is difficult to say definitively whether the third, final chapter of the dissertation, which was eventually published as “The Dead Ends of Romanticism,” had been finished by then. Attracted by a new teaching opportunity, Florovsky moved from Sofia to Prague in December 1921. In his biographical interview given in 1969, Florovsky corroborated the fact that most, if not the entire dissertation had been finished prior to his move to Prague.Footnote 8 He first announced that his “dissertation was completely ready for publication” on July 11, 1922, in a review of Gustav Shpet's study, “Herzen's Philosophical Worldview.”Footnote 9 Such an announcement gives reasons to believe that both the introduction and the conclusion of the dissertation by then had been finished too. This version could be designated DJul1922. Based on this evidence, we may conclude that the dissertation took Florovsky from approximately four months (July–October 1921) to about a year (July 1921–July 1922) to complete. While Florovsky wrote relatively quickly, it should be noted that he began his forays into Russian intellectual history while he was still a gymnasium student in Odessa (around 1911).
Florovsky's Defense of the Dissertation in Prague
In the 1920s, the Czech government offered considerable financial help to refugees from Bolshevik Russia, being particularly generous towards university professors and students.Footnote 10 Having received a stipend from the Czech government, Florovsky moved to Prague in order to teach at the recently founded Russian Law Faculty of Charles University as well as in the Russian Institute.
It was a common expectation that a dissertation would be published before its defense took place. In order to meet this expectation, beginning in 1922, Florovsky made more systematic efforts at publishing his dissertation. Initially, he negotiated with the Russian-German émigré publishing house, Slowo, located in Berlin. In his letter to Florovsky, dated February 21, 1922, the director of the press, Iosif V. Gessen, wrote: “Dear Georges Vasilievich, I am honored to notify you that the Slowo publishing house has accepted your book, ‘On Herzen's Philosophy of History,’ for publication. Your royalty will be 10% of the selling price. I am sending the manuscript for your review, as advised by P. P. Suvchinsky.”Footnote 11 The manuscript was returned to the author with a view of revising it for publication. In his letter of November 13, 1922, Gessen reminded Florovsky about their agreement and asked him to send an edited copy of the book to the Press.Footnote 12 Florovsky mentioned his editorial work on the dissertation in his letter to N. S. Trubetskoy of December 14, 1922: “During the last weeks I have not written letters to anyone, since I was preoccupied with the rather nasty business of preparing the final version of my Herzen dissertation for publication. After a serious discussion and with the approval of P.[avel] I[vanovi]ch [Novgorodtsev], I decided to take up the Slowo staff on their offer to publish the book. No other publication vistas have opened up over the past year.”Footnote 13
By mid-January 1923, Florovsky finished this pre-publication redaction—RJan1923(DJul1922)) = DJan1923—and sent it to Slowo. Gessen replied: “I have recently received your manuscript. However, due to the sudden change of the demand, we will not be able to undertake the publication of your book in the immediate future.”Footnote 14 When Florovsky inquired about the publication prospects again in March 1923, the staff responded that “instead of improving, the conditions of the publication industry had become worse.”Footnote 15 Slowo had to reduce the number of new titles drastically due to inflation.Footnote 16
Having failed to publish the dissertation, Florovsky made twenty copies on a hectograph (a forerunner of the modern copy machine). As will be explained later, the typescript presented for the defense—T(RJun1923 (DJan 1923)) = T(DJun1923)—differed from the redaction of January 1923, (DJan1923).Footnote 17 Most, perhaps all, traces of the previous redactions would have become invisible in the new typescript version of the dissertation, T(DJun1923).
The defense was initially scheduled for the fall of 1922, but took place in the summer of the following year, on June 3, 1923. A copy of Alexander Izgoev's brief report of the public disputation that took place in conjunction with the defense is preserved in the Florovsky Papers at Princeton.Footnote 18 Because of its importance for the newly found text of the dissertation, this previously unpublished document is here translated from its Russian original and cited in full:
G. V. Florovsky's Dissertation Defense (A Letter from Prague), 1923
Russian intelligentsia in Prague took a keen interest in G. V. Florov.[sky’s] disputation, which took place on June the 3rd. The large auditorium of the “geological society” was full. Several Czech scholars and public intellectuals were present. A sensation was caused by P. N. Miliukov's arrival by airplane from Paris to Prague, where he was going to deliver a lecture.
The disputation was carried out with the solemnity characteristic of the former Russian university life. Having opened the proceedings on behalf of the Academic Group, D. D. Grimm nominated prof. A. A. Kizevetter, in his capacity as the dean and chair of the department of history and philosophy, to organize the disputation in conjunction with G. V. Florovsky's application for the degree of Master of Philosophy, in accordance with the academic laws and customs.
According to the disputant's Curriculum Vitae, announced by the department secretary, G. V. F., a son of a protopresbyter, was born in 1893, studied at the gymnasium and the university of Odessa, where he was retained in preparation for a teaching position. He conducted his research under the supervision of professors [B. V.] Varneke and N. N. Lange. Two of his student works received awards. In 1919, he passed his master's qualifying examinations and was hired by the department of philosophy and psychology of Novorossiisky University as a Privat Dozent. But instead of teaching, in 1920 he found himself in Bulgaria, where he continued his research. Having been invited to come to Prague in 1922, he submitted his dissertation “Herzen's Philosophy of History” in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master's degree.
The dissertation has not been published. It was presented in several typescript copies (229 pages in folio) and could be studied only by the members of the Academic Group. For this reason, with the exception of the official opponents no one could speak during the disputation. Apart from the typescript of this book, G. V. Florovsky published several reviews and articles in journals and in the Eurasian symposia.
In a long introductory speech, G. V. F. observed that the main factor of Russian history was the conversion of Russians to Christianity through Byzantium, or the East.[ern] Roman Empire. This is why Russian philosophical thought addressed the problem of mutual relations between Russia and Europe with a special force. The difference between the two is not racial or geographic, for Russia is also European. But in contrast to the Catholic and Protestant West it represents the Orthodox East, or, to be more precise, Russia is the great East-West. Herzen's philosophy, along with that of the Slavophiles, is one of the first attempts to answer the question of the relationship between Russia and Europe. Herzen did not give an answer. He reached a dead-end. The main accomplishment of nineteenth-century Russian philosophy does not consist in producing a system of thought, but in exposing the dead-ends, to which certain directions of thought lead. Reaching a dead-end indicates a need for a change of an intellectual framework. Having come to a dead-end, Herzen could not get out of it, for he did not have the resources for such a change. But Dostoevsky, who was similar to Herzen in his critique of European life, undertook the required change of consciousness following the same path of Romantic irrationalism. In his metaphysical poetry, Dostoevsky sketched out a sought-for synthesis of “systematic” and “creative” moments of existence. He found this synthesis in the idea of heterogeneity of the divine and human worlds, which interacted freely, not deterministically, as well as in the three-fold foundation of the world: personal God, nature, and human being.
Concluding his speech, G. V. F. read nineteen theses,Footnote 19 which followed from his dissertation.
Having noted the book's literary gifts, the first opponent, prof. N. O. Lossky, pointed out its main weaknesses. The author presents Herzen's thought without relating it to the development of the European and Russian thought. Instead of the real Herzen, he presents an imaginary figure. F.[lorovsky] does not realize that Herzen's psychological type possesses a pathos of freedom, irrationalism, and individualism, typical of Romanticism. However, Herzen's views justify neither freedom, nor irrationalism, nor individualism. Herzen's views could be an object of a psychological, rather than a historical-philosophical study. Having chosen the wrong object of study, G. V. F. had produced neither a philosophical work, nor a psychological biography of Herzen, which were both possible and needed. Contrary to G. V. F.'s opinion, Herzen's worldview is not well integrated: up to the age of 35 Herzen did philosophy, but abroad he subsequently abandoned this pursuit and fell into “anti-Romantic naturalism.”
After agreeing with the observations of prof. N. O. Lossky, the second opponent, prof. P. B. Struve noted in his speech that in his study G. V. F. took neither the historical facts, nor the documents into consideration. His Herzen was not real, but stylized after a European, or a Romantic. Ignoring the obvious, the defendant underestimated the influence upon Herzen of the followers of Saint-Simon and of the French socialists. Florovsky also did not take into account that Herzen became a journalistic disaster in the [18]60s.
Despite these considerable mistakes and blind spots of the dissertation, P. B. Struve believes that the author is a talented man, who has a systematician's mind and who is capable of contributing valuable works to Russian philosophy. “Harness yourself to a systematic pole,”—concluded P. B. Struve,—“but choose a field of study that is wide enough. In this regard I was somewhat taken aback by your introductory speech: do not limit your field of work artificially.” It seems that the opponent had in mind limiting philosophy by the confessional boundaries.
The last opponent, prof. V. V. Zenkovsky, rebuked the defendant that he had not systematized Herzen's views, neglecting his epistemology and ethics. Zenkovsky noted that Florovsky mistakenly counted the [18]30s as the beginning of Russian philosophy, ignoring the Russian Masons and [philosopher Grigory] Skovoroda and that he had wrongly and tastelessly assigned to Herzen a place between Gogol and Dostoevsky.
G. V. F. made an extensive response to his opponents. As a result the disputation lasted long. At the end of the exchange, prof. A. A. Kizevetter read the definition allowing G. V. F. to defend his thesis with the noted criticism of his work, declared the defense of the dissertation to be “quite satisfactory” and the author worthy of the title of Master of Philosophy.
The public greeted this announcement with applause.
Having washed in such a hot bania, the new Russian Master of Philosophy in Prague began his thorny path. . . A. S. Izgoev.
Izgoev's report produces an impression that Florovsky's dissertation was subjected to the most devastating criticism. One should take into account, however, that such a heated disputation at the defense was not unusual in the pre-revolutionary Russian academe. For example, as N. O. Lossky recalled, the defense of his own doctoral dissertation took five hours and was extremely taxing psychologically.Footnote 20
One should also consider the fact that in everyday life Florovsky's opponents—N. O. Lossky, P. B. Struve, and V. V. Zenkovsky—were not only his senior colleagues, but also his good acquaintances. Not long before his defense, Florovsky wrote a passionate public letter to Struve, defending his standing in the Eurasian movement and declaring himself Struve's student to the chagrin of his fellow-Eurasians.Footnote 21 The Lossky family relocated to Prague from St Petersburg in November 1922. It is likely that their acquaintance with Florovsky happened shortly thereafter. Since their apartments in Prague were located in the houses on the same square, it was convenient to pay regular visits to each other. As for Zenkovsky, Florovsky and he had made a brief acquaintance already in Odessa, where Zenkovsky evacuated from Kiev during the Civil War. Their paths continued to cross—with Zenkovsky in Paris and with N. O. Lossky in New York—several times after 1923.
Unfortunately, Izgoev reported nothing regarding the content of Florovsky's responses to his opponents. Forty-five years later, while in retirement at Princeton, Florovsky told his biographers the following:
[Andrew Blane asks:] Who was present at your defense, were there not some famous people or so, I seem to have read it somewhere, Miliukov perhaps?
[Florovsky responds:] Well, Miliukov was in the public. My official opponents were Professor Lossky, Peter Struve, and Father Zenkovsky. And they were very bad. They did not know the subject, and they had really no time to learn it. Well actually Struve said we were not criticizing your work, but we were criticizing you, because you were looking in the wrong direction. The wrong direction was religious metaphysics. And Miliukov was sitting in the front row—he said “Vy opasnyi chelovek. [You are a dangerous man.] You definitely have impetus, but not of the right kind.”Footnote 22
Some details of this interview, especially Struve's general point, seem to dovetail with Izgoev's report. For example, according to Izgoev, in his speech Struve dwelt more on the general standpoint and the future direction of Florovsky's work, than on his particular interpretation of Herzen. However, Florovsky's caustic remarks that his opponents “were very bad” and “did not know their subject” are not borne out by Izgoev's comments. One may agree with Zenkovsky that Florovsky presented Herzen's views non-systematically and with N. O. Lossky that Florovsky did not produce a psychological biography.
Florovsky's Later Work on the Dissertation and the Publication of Separate Chapters
Izgoev's ironic comment regarding Florovsky's future “thorny path” was not far from the truth, at least as far as the publication of the dissertation was concerned. Izgoev mentions that the typescript consisted of 229 pages, which allows designating the version of the dissertation submitted for the defense more precisely as T229 (DJun1923). As I show below, the page count of T229 (DJun1923) is a major clue to dating the typescript of the dissertation, DSVS, recently found in the archive of St Vladimir's Seminary Library (GFP SVS).
Several months after the defense, Florovsky continued to edit the dissertation. In his letter to N. S. Trubetskoy of February 10, 1924, Florovsky wrote:
I am presently a slave of my Herzen [dissertation], which is now ready to be published on the pages of The Academic Notes of the Academic Collegium. For me this book is completely out of date. If this were not a dissertation, which would have to be published in order to justify my degree, I would have avoided its publication and would not have subjected myself to the risk of being scolded for the things that I would not have written now. You can only imagine how frustrated and nervous I was, while losing time on reworking a book that had become useless to me!Footnote 23
Florovsky's words make it clear that in early 1924 he was revising the dissertation quite substantially. It is possible that some parts of the dissertation had been thoroughly rewritten at this time. The February 1924 redaction of the dissertation may be designated RFeb1924(DJun1923) = DFeb1924. It could have included both the section of the T229 typescript and the changes introduced by hand, or retyped. Florovsky was moving on to other research projects and now considered his dissertation somewhat dated. This partly explains why he did not follow through on the publication of the dissertation in The Academic Notes of the Academic Collegium. It is also clear that he had not abandoned his plan to publish the dissertation eventually and continued to make inquiries at other publishing houses. His Master's degree was confirmed on October 6, 1923 and the associated diploma was issued by the Board of the Russian Academic Organizations Abroad on April 30, 1925.Footnote 24 In the pre-revolutionary Russia, a Master's degree in philosophy entitled its holder to full-time university-level teaching and research, roughly corresponding to the present-day Ph. D. degree in the United States. Florovsky was later also awarded several honorary doctorates, the first one being from the University of St Andrew's in Scotland.
In his letter to Swiss theologian Fritz Lieb of October 16, 1928, Florovsky wrote:
My dissertation on Herzen has not been published and exists in 20 hectograph copies. The only copy in my possession is completely unreadable, because I used it to prepare a book, which I hoped to publish. The first chapter about Herzen's youth will be published in The Contemporary Notes journal sometime soon. I will send you an off-print.Footnote 25
Hence, in the fall of 1928, Florovsky possessed only one of the twenty original copies of T229 (DJun1923). This unique copy was so heavily edited that it became, in his own words, “unreadable.” This new redaction, made in conjunction with preparing the first chapter for publication, may be designated: R1928(DFeb1924) = D1928.
Despite the resistance from the editors, the first chapter of the dissertation was published in The Contemporary Notes as “The Quest of the Young Herzen” in 1929.Footnote 26 In the same year, F. Lieb agreed to publish a German translation of the final chapter of the dissertation in his journal Orient und Occident. In his letter of October 4, 1929, Florovsky informed Lieb:
I think that the promised article will be ready by the end of December. But I do not know how to call it. Perhaps, “The Contradictions of Romanticism (Herzen, Leontiev, Dostoevsky).” In Russian I would call it ‘The Dead Ends of Romanticism’. . . The main idea of the article is that in his philosophy of history Herzen was a typical Romantic, similar to Leontiev. Dostoevsky went through the Romantic phase and had completely overcome it.Footnote 27
In the next letter of November 1, 1929, Florovsky wrote: “I am planning to send my article to you in the beginning of December.”Footnote 28 Lieb published Florovsky's article under the title “Die Sackgassen der Romantic” in 1930.Footnote 29 In 2007, Vladimir Iantsen published a previously unknown document, containing the bulk of the Russian original of this article, which he found in F. Lieb's archive. The original was entitled “The Dead Ends of Romanticism (The Last Chapter of the book Herzen's Spiritual Way).” Florovsky later confirmed the fact that this article was a reworked chapter of his dissertation, Herzen's Philosophy of History, in his biographical interview. In response to Andrew Blane's question regarding the fate of his dissertation, Florovsky said: “The first chapter was published in Sovremennye Zapiski [The Contemporary Notes] and the last chapter was published in German. It [the last chapter] compared Herzen, Dostoevsky and Konstantin Leontiev.”Footnote 30
To conclude, Florovsky was able to publish the revised first chapter and the German translation of the last chapter during his lifetime. Iantsen's valuable publication made the bulk of the Russian original of the last chapter available for scholarly study. The last mentioned redaction of 1929 may be designated as RDec1929(R1928(RFeb1924(RJun1923(DJan1923)))) = DDec1929.
The Description of the Newly Discovered Archival Material
The Georges Florovsky Papers at the St Vladimir's Seminary Library (GFP SVS) in Yonkers, New York, contain a total of five documents relevant for the reconstruction of the dissertation “Herzen's Philosophy of History.” All documents are in GFP SVS, Box 2. In order to distinguish them clearly, I will designate them DSVS, MsDec1930, AppendixSVS, IntroUntitled, and IntroTitled. The rationale for these designations is discussed in this and the next section of the paper.
The largest document, DSVS, consists of 81 numbered pages inserted in an untitled manila folder of legal size (8.5 by 14 in). Several pages have smaller inserts, containing editorial corrections, additions, and bibliographic notes, either attached with paper clips or glued on. The editorial corrections are entered in black ink and with red and blue pencils. The title page, the table of contents, the author's name, and the date are missing. The document starts with the numbered page 87. The numbers of the extant pages are as follows: 87–62, 214, 218, and 237–39. Pages 87–112 and 238 are written by hand using black ink pen. The location of the manuscript, the content, and the handwriting confirm Florovsky's authorship beyond any reasonable doubt. The handwriting corresponds most closely to that of Florovsky's papers written in the 1920s–1930s. In the following decades his handwriting changed noticeably. The main text of pages 113–62, 214, 218, 237, and 239 is written on the typewriter, using older spelling. This fact also decreases the probability that the typed portion of the text was produced in the post-war period, when Florovsky used the Russian typewriters without the pre-revolutionary letter “iat’,” necessitating newer spelling.
The handwritten part, especially pp. 87–112, contains fewer corrections than the typed part. One may suppose that the handwritten part was based on the typed part, which had become “unreadable” as a result of numerous corrections. On most pages the pagination is changed at least once, on some pages twice, three, and even four times. The text of the first surviving page (p. 87) begins with the chapter title: “The Debates of the 40s.” The title is preceded by the chapter number “III,” which is crossed out and changed to “II.”
This chapter partly coincides with Florovsky's essay, “Herzen in the [18]40s,” the author's copy of which is the second document pertaining to the dissertation, preserved in GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments by Florovsky” in a separate standard letter-size untitled manila folder. The manuscript of “Herzen in the 40s” bears the author's signature as well as the place and date of completion: “Paris, 1930. XII.” On these grounds, I designated the manuscript MsDec1930. On the first page, in the upper right corner, there is a resolution signed by Peter Struve, indicating the acceptance of the essay for publication on January 29, 1937. The pages are numbered 1–49 and 79–88. Pages 50–78 are missing. It is not clear why at some point after January 1937 the paper had to be returned to Florovsky unpublished. The document was published by V. V. Bychkov in 1995.Footnote 31
What is the relationship between MsDec1930 and pages 87–162 of DSVS, which contain the second chapter, entitled “The Debates of the 40s”? The early sections of these two documents differ more substantially than the concluding sections. The comparison of one sentence from the penultimate pages of both MsDec1930 and DSVS yields some preliminary conclusions (the underlined words signal textual variations and the italicized words signal the same words moved to a different place in the sentence):
In DSVS the word “vdrug” (“suddenly”) is circled with a pencil and accompanied by a sign indicating its move to the place before the word “vykristallizovat’sia,” that is, exactly to the place where it occurs in MsDec1930. Another remarkable feature of MsDec1930 is that it contains no marks of the subsequent editorial changes apart from Struve's resolution, whereas corrections and changes abound in DSVS, especially its typed-up part. This leads to the conclusion that MsDec1930 is a later, edited, but incomplete, version of DSVS, pp. 87–162. We may suppose that having finished editing and having published chapter one in Russian and chapter three in German, Florovsky turned to editing and publishing the remaining chapter two, the final pre-publication redaction of which was completed in December 1930, which is also terminus ad quem of the undated version of chapter two in DSVS.
The pagination of the typed-up pages of DSVS contains another important clue for dating this document. DSVS ends on p. 239. The number of page 237 of DSVS was changed three times. The originally typed number, 227, was crossed out and changed to 222, which was in turn crossed out and changed to 220, and finally to 237. If page 237 in the final redaction corresponded to page 227 in the underlying typescript, then page 239 in the final redaction (the last page of the main text) corresponded to page 229 in the underlying typescript. According to Izgoev's report, the total number of pages in the typescript presented for the defense was 229. This makes it extremely probable that the typed text, which was subsequently edited to the point of becoming “unreadable” was none other than that of T229(DJun1923). Hence, DSVS is a result of at least three attested redactions, RDec1929(R1928(RFeb1924 (T229(DJun1923)))), and was finished no later than December 1930. The corrections introduced with the three different writing instruments: black ink, blue and red pencils are consistent with the three identified redactions.
The additional evidence for this conclusion is furnished by a fragment of the dissertation from the personal archive of Peter Struve, recently published by Modest Kolerov (Frag. DStruve). Based on the handwriting and content, Kolerov identified his important find as the author's text of the conclusion to Florovsky's dissertation. The document is a typescript which contains numerous editorial marks made in ink. The sheets are numbered from 162 to 167.
Frag. DStruve matches the text of DSVS in several places. When compared against each other, the text of DSVS contains several additional minor stylistic changes in comparison to the text of Frag. DStruve. For example, on p. 250, Frag. DStruve includes a sentence that is subsequently crossed out: “No ne eto nas interesuet.” [“But this does not interest us.”] This awkward side-remark is absent from p. 218 of DSVS, which otherwise closely follows the text on p. 250 of Frag. DStruve. It would appear that the typed-up portion of DSVS was produced using the text of Frag. DStruve. This would make the typescript of Frag. DStruve older than T(DJun1923), which would also account for the fact that the version of the dissertation in Struve's possession was only 167 pages total, which was 62 pages shorter than the version of the dissertation presented for the defense (T229). This shorter 167-page version, which most likely lacked chapter three, could be one of the two earlier redactions, T(DJul1922) or T(DJan1923), but not DNov1921, which, according to Florovsky, still lacked a conclusion. It should be emphasized that my conclusions regarding the date of the typed core of Frag. DStruve are preliminary.
To sum up my findings thus far:
The newly found author's copy of the dissertation (DSVS) is based on the typescript, which was presented for Florovsky's defense on June 3, 1923 (T229 (DJun1923). Florovsky made twenty copies of this document on the hectograph.
DSVS contains the complete text of the second chapter, entitled “The Debates of the 40s.” The essay “Herzen in the 40s” was based on this chapter. Florovsky completed the final redaction of pp. 87–162 before “Herzen in the 40s,” that is, before December 1930.
DSVS also contains four extant pages of the “Conclusion” to the dissertation (pp. 218, 237–39).
The typescript of Frag. DStruve was written earlier than the pages of the “Conclusion” surviving in DSVS. It is possible to reconstruct the missing pages of the “Conclusion” in DSVS from Frag. DStruve.
The handwritten Appendix of the dissertation, named in the Russian original “Prilozheniia,” composed after 1923, is preserved in a separate untitled letter-size manila folder in GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments (by Florovsky).” The extant pages are numbered 240–65 and 269. Pages 266–68 are missing.
Two large gaps in DSVS—pages 1–86 and 163–213—amounting to about a half of the dissertation, require further explanation.
Chapter-by-Chapter Reconstruction of the Text of the Dissertation
Florovsky tended to preserve his unpublished writings and correspondence with extreme care. What could then account for the two considerable gaps in DSVS? One may suppose that the missing parts were at some point sent to the publishers. In this case, the first gap, pp. 1–86, could correspond to the first chapter of the dissertation, published in The Contemporary Notes, in two 30-page installments. It is possible that at some point Florovsky counted each of these two installments as a separate chapter, which would account for the fact that chapter “The Debates of the 40s” (DSVS, pp. 87–162) is numbered “III,” which was later changed to “II.”
However, DSVS lacks 86 first pages, not 60. One could explain this discrepancy by observing that the copious footnotes of DSVS were removed from the version of the first chapter published in The Contemporary Notes. It could also be argued that the typed-up text took less space than that of the manuscript.
It is more plausible that the gap of the first 86 pages stands for the first chapter plus the “Introduction,” which Florovsky mentioned in his letter to I. Polivka of October 3, 1921. GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments (by Florovsky)” also contains in a separate untitled letter-size manila folder two documents, which represent two redactions of the dissertation's introduction. The first redaction bears a title, “Vvedenie: Russkaia filosofiia kak zadacha” (“Introduction: Russian Philosophy as a Task”), and consists of ten pages. The second redaction is untitled and consists of five and a half pages of typed text and six handwritten pages of the text that is unfinished. There is a small lacuna between the typed and the handwritten parts. Both redactions—Introtitled and Intrountitled—are important for understanding the methodology of Florovsky's dissertation. These documents have never been published or discussed. The aggregate volume of the Introduction and the first chapter approximately corresponds to the beginning 86 pages missing from the newly found copy of DSVS.
The second major gap, consisting of pp. 163–213 missing in DSVS, most likely corresponds to chapter three, which Florovsky subsequently reworked as “The Dead Ends of Romanticism,” published in German by F. Lieb and recently in Russian by V. Iantsen. In addition, the remaining pages of the “Conclusion” could be restored on the basis of Frag. DStruve, published by M. Kolerov.
Finally, the title page of the dissertation is preserved in GFP PUL as a separate stray sheet. The page bears the author's name, “Georges V. Florovsky,” and the title in the center: “Herzen's Philosophy of History (From the Past of Russian Thought).” The epigraph from Bonaventure's Itinerarium is added in Latin by hand in the lower right corner of the page.
Based on the documents that I recently found—the title page, two redactions of the “Introduction,” DSVS, and AppendixSVS—as well as the previous important findings of Kolerov, Iantsen, and Bychkov, the following reconstruction of the nearly complete text of the dissertation could be made:
Title Page. “Herzen's Philosophy of History.” Preserved as a stray sheet in GFP PUL, C0586, Box 62, folder 12. Unpublished.
Introduction. The text is preserved in two redactions, Introtitled (“Russian Philosophy as a Task) and Intrountitled in GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments (by Florovsky),” untitled letter-size manila folder. Unpublished.
Chapter One. “Herzen's Young Years.” Florovsky published this chapter in two issues of The Contemporary Notes in 1929.
Chapter Two. The text is preserved in two considerably different versions.
The earlier version bears the title “The Debates of the 40s.” The source of the text is DSVS, pp. 87–162. The text is based on the typescript of the dissertation submitted for the defense on 3 June 1923. The typescript is heavily edited by hand. The text is preserved in GFP SVS, Box 2, in a separate untitled legal-size manila folder. Unpublished.
The later version bears the title “Herzen in the 40s.” Pp. 1–49 and 78–88 are preserved in GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments (by Florovsky) in a separate untitled letter-size manila folder. This version was finished by Florovsky in December 1930, approved by P. Struve for publication in 1937, but was not published during Florovsky's lifetime. This document was published by V. Bychkov in 1995.
Chapter Three. “The Dead Ends of Romanticism.” The text survives in the Russian original and in German translation.
A large part of the Russian original is preserved in the archive of F. Lieb. The final edition of the text was finished in December 1929. The text was published by V. Iantsen in 2007.
The German translation was made from the complete Russian original. The text was translated by B. Unruh and published by F. Lieb in Orient und Occident in 1930.
Conclusion. The text is preserved in two incomplete redactions. The early redaction consisting of six pages is preserved in the archive of P. Struve. It was published by M. Kolerov in 1997.
Four pages of the later redaction, based on T229 (DJun1923), are preserved in GFP SVS, as pages 218, 237–39 of DSVS. Unpublished.
Appendix. The text is preserved in GFP SVS, Box 2, Sub-box “Unpublished Papers and Fragments (by Florovsky)” in a separate untitled letter-size manila folder. The extant pages are numbered 240–65 and 269. Pages 266–68 are missing. Unpublished.
The proposed scheme allows for the reconstruction of more than 95 percent of “Herzen's Philosophy of History.” The typescript underlying the redactions of DSVS has been shown to be none other than that presented by Florovsky at his defense on 3 June 1923. While the dates of the two versions of the “Introduction” are yet to be determined, the final redactions of the other parts of the dissertation were undertaken at different times between 1928 and 1930. More specifically, DSVS is a result of RDec1929(R1928(RFeb 1924 (T229 (DJun1923)))), and DJun1923, in turn, is a result of RJan1923(RJul1922(RNov1921(DOct1921))), which means that the text of DOct1921 went through at least six attested redactions. While it is difficult to judge how comprehensive each of the redactions was, it could be said with confidence that each redaction concerned changes that were made to at least one chapter of the dissertation.
When published, the reconstructed text of the dissertation will make a sub- stantial contribution to Florovsky scholarship, since the dissertation was his only monographic work. In addition, the reconstructed text will shed light on the philosophical and historical presuppositions of Florovsky's magnum opus, The Ways of Russian Theology.
