Publications of German artist M. Retzsch in the Stroganovs' collection in Research Library of Tomsk State University
The paper describes the study of the book collection of Grigory Stroganov (1793-1857), stored in the Research Library of Tomsk State University (RL TSU). The focus is on the unique editions of plates to the works of the German classical authors by the 19th century German artist Moritz Retzsch (1779-1857). RL TSU stores M. Retzsch's five editions in German to the works of Schiller and Goethe, conventionally called "plates in essays": fragments of Schiller's ''Lied von der Glocke'', 1922; eight fragments of Schiller's ''Fridolin, oder der Gang nach dem Eisenhammer'', 1824; fragments of Schiller's ''Kampf mit den Drachen'', 1825; fragments of Schiller's ''Pegasus im Joche'', 1833; fragments of Goethe's ''Faust'', 1928. It is proved that "plates in essays" by M. Retzsch are a unique publishing project. There Retzsch is the artist, the author of the plates to the texts by Goethe and Schiller, their commentator, interpreter and researcher, and, finally, the publisher and editor. M. Retzsch discovers a new type of publication, which is based on illustrations. The versatility of Moritz Retzsch in these publications in modern terms may be called the phenomenon of multiculturalism. The paper presents the typology of publications, analyses the nature of the relation of the prose and the prints, the specific connection of illustrations with the original texts, the evolution of Retzsch's creative strategies, raises the problem of cyclization of his editions of Schiller's poetry, the possibility of their semantic interpretation as a whole. Both common features of editions and uniqueness of each project are analysed. Among Retzsch's creative strategies are 1) the expansion of the semantic space of the original texts (especially in the illustrations to "Faust" by Goethe, to Schiller's "Lied von der Glocke", "Fridolin", "Pegasus im Joche"); 2) the free interpretation of the original in the translation from one art language to the other can chart new spheres in cross-cultural communication, including publication of Retzsch's works in the context of modern topical problems of cultural dialogue in historical-literary and theoretical aspects 3) Retzsch's works have not yet been widely read and being phenomena of a special kind leave open the question of genre specifics of this project.