Book | Chapter

After the defense of his thesis, Solov"ëv sought the professorship at Moscow University now vacant owing to Jurkevich's death. We look here at his efforts in this regard, his effectiveness as a university-level lecturer and his abrupt departure for London to research a planned doctoral dissertation on Gnosticism. We examine the reaction to his magister's thesis, particularly that of Kavelin, and his own reply to the criticism, which provided some much needed clarification. We also look at the openly mystical turn in his thought as evidenced by an only recently published set of manuscripts from this time that he had once hoped would serve as the basis of a doctoral dissertation. Nonetheless, these manuscripts contain an odd assortment of reflections, some apparently written in response to his earlier critics and which demand rational scrutiny. Finally, we will look at Solov"ëv's hurried and odd sojourn to Egypt on suspect grounds and his account of his adventures there both as related at the time to others and later in life in poetry.

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-01348-0_2

Full citation: