The Epistolary Self-Presentation of M.V. Lomonosov: The Construction of the Scientist's Identity in 18th Century Russian Culture

The article is devoted to the analysis of the epistolary heritage of M.V. Lomonosov. A sufficiently extensive corpus of letters, thoroughly studied by philologists and historians, has hardly been examined as a form of self-description. The study clarifies what roles M.V. Lomonosov sought to establish for himself in his correspondence, what topics he included and excluded from his epistolary communication, and how he distributed tones and rhetorical gestures among different groups of his addressees – patrons, colleagues at the Academy of Sciences, and subordinates. Special attention is given to the formulaic expressions in the texts (addresses, self-naming) and their dependence on the status of the addressee. It is emphasized that Lomonosov not only impeccably mastered the norms of epistolary etiquette but also used them as a tool for social positioning, strengthening personal authority, and achieving desired goals. An interdisciplinary approach, combining methods of historical-biographical analysis and sociocultural interpretation of the text, allows for the reconstruction of the system of epistolary behavior of the sender. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the fact that Lomonosov's epistolary legacy is interpreted for the first time as a coherent strategy of self-presentation of a professional scholar. The fact that in his correspondence, Lomonosov positioned himself primarily as a scientist, relegating other roles and statuses (poet, administrator) to the periphery, allows for an examination of his texts in the context of the emergence of this profession in 18th-century Russia. The correspondence presents a space where the Enlightenment ideal of the autonomy of the individual, based on reason and individual achievements, is vividly revealed, while simultaneously exposing the deep contradictions faced by a scholar existing under conditions of patronage dependence and institutional uncertainty. Thus, Lomonosov's "epistolary portrait" illustrates how models and the rhetoric of self-presentation were shaped in Russian culture during the Modern era.

letters, epistolary self-presentation, Mikhail Lomonosov, scholar, epistolary etiquette, epistolary culture, Enlightenment, Russian culture, Academy of Sciences, identity