The coincidence of the symbol with reality is an ancient question, which in Vyacheslav Ivanov’s symbolism is re-proposed as absolutely current, at the beginning of the 20th century and even more so today, in the third millennium. Ivanov’s reflection on “form” begins with the mystical search for the “inner form” that characterized the history of the Symbolist movement, and in general of the whole “silver century” of Russian culture. The common sentiment led to changing the cultural and social forms, and at the same time to the rediscovery of the sources and the authentic nature of the Russian soul and its poetic and literary expressions, but also theological and ecclesial ones. The union of soul and body, of being and essence, in the movement of reality is the encounter of the divine and the human, which gives meaning to the existence of the universe: it is the movement of the “Stars Nocchieri [Pilot Stars]”, title of the first collection of poems by Ivanov. Faith is not a denial of power, as Nietzsche argued, but it is the act in which the whole power of being manifests itself in the form of living beings. In the post-modern era, the Nietzschean objection is taken up in an even more radical and nihilistic form, for which there is no unity between form and matter, since the essence of both one and the other is excluded: the divine origin of every being is not denied, the being of every reality is denied. It is therefore more necessary than ever to rediscover the meaning of the existence of things, not to save the divine, but not to completely lose the human. Keywords: symbol, reality, form, material, energy, Silver
The Third Dimension: A Comparative History of Mountains in the Modern Era
