Vol. 17 (2024): Contemporary Issues of Literary Criticism Literatures of Small Countries and Challenges of the Modern Global World
International Literary Standard and Modern Georgian Poetry

Elemine – The Free Creator: Inspired by Jemal Karchkhadze's Novella "Elemines"

Bela Durglishvili
Akaki Tsereteli State University

Published 2024-12-20

Keywords

  • Elemines,
  • Knowing yourself

Abstract

The novella underscores an eternal feature of great literature: it must simultaneously belong to a prominent national literary tradition and express a universal, progressive perspective on humanity. This is vividly illustrated in the 20th-century writer Jemal Karchkhadze's novella "Elemines," in which he thinks in fables.
The author crafts literary and fantastical theories, interwoven with intertextual and paradigmatic models presented through the plot and characters of the Gospel. Using the codes and peculiarities of proverbial language, he explores humanity's fundamental questions: Who are we? What is the purpose of the world? What is the humankind itself?
However, in "Elemines," he prophetically anticipates the phases of world development and sets the action during the pinnacle of technological progress, the era of artificial intelligence. Against this backdrop, the main character, the free preacher Elemine, emerges as an electromagnetic individual. Elemine arises uniquely from a negatively charged individual, characterized as a free creator with a distinct perception of dimensions, the universe, and beauty.