Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2015, Slavic and East European Languages and Literatures

Abstract The current study analyzes signs and signifiers that constitute the structural composition of Pushkin's historical works Boris Godunov and The Captain's Daughter and compare them with their Soviet and post-Soviet screen adaptations. I argue that the popularity of these literary works with filmmakers is based on their inexhaustible topicality for Russian society of the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, and therefore reassessment of their film adaptations guides us towards developing a better understanding of the sociopolitical complexities in modern Russia. The analysis employs methods of semiotics of film, which is a relatively young science, but has already become one of the most promising fields in the theory of cinema. The research is based on the scholarship of such eminent theorists and semioticians as Metz, Bluestone, Barthes, Lotman, Bakhtin, and others. By performing semiotic analysis of Russian intermedial transpositions and Pushkin's source texts, the study demonstrates the parallels between the historical periods and contemporary Russia.

Committee: Brian Joseph (Advisor); Alexander Burry (Advisor) Subjects: Film Studies; Foreign Language; History; Literature; Russian History; Slavic Literature; Slavic Studies