Кто отменит русского писателя: споры о цензуре, институт критики и отзывы Д. Писарева о прозе Н. Лескова

This article proposes a new approach to the relationship between literary criticism and censorship in the Russian Empire. Instead of the widespread view of criticism as the defender of the autonomy of art from the interference of repressive censorship, it proposes an understanding of literature as a space for political struggle, and of criticism as an active participant in this struggle. At the same time, literature is not reduced to a “reflection” of class or party conflicts taking place outside its limits, but is understood as a community of writers united by certain principles and norms. This argument is proven by the analysis of Dmitry Pisarev's scandalous review of the novel No Way Out by Nikolai Leskov. Considering these reviews in the context of the journalistic polemics of Pisarev and his contemporaries about the place of censorship in literary life, the article shows that for the critic himself, the main object of the polemic was not Leskov, but the censorship, from which the democratic journalism was trying to wrestle the control of literary industry.