Abstract
The paper discusses the passage from Mandelstam’s essay “A Word about Georgian Art” according to which, at the heart of the Georgian Mythology, created by Lermontov, is Tamar. Tamar of Mandelstam’s discourse is the protagonist of Lermontov’s ballade “Tamar”. As the recent research of folkloristic and traveller’s notes has shown, Lermontov’s Tamar is a generalized character which has no connection with national shrine of Georgians, the Queen Tamar. What is more interesting, there is no saying why Lermontov gave the name Tamar to such a depraved and treacherous character as Lermontov’s protagonist is.
The fact is that, it influenced negatively and at least ambiguously on development of Russian literature in 20s of 20 c. which is proved by Mandelstam’s under mentioned essay (published in 1922) and Mayakovsky’s poem “Demon and Tamar” (published in 1924). Tamar’s image in both pieces is either parody or false.