RE-READING EUGENE ONEGIN: TATYANA’S INNER WORLD AS THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND MORAL CENTER OF THE NOVEL

Authors

  • Nure Jannat Department of English, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh
  • Md. Nasir Uddin Department of English, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.46827/ejlll.v10i2.705

Keywords:

Tatyana Larina, Eugene Onegin, inner world, psychological realism, gender roles, national identity

Abstract

This article reconsiders Alexander Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin by arguing that Tatyana Larina, rather than Eugene Onegin, constitutes the novel’s primary psychological and moral center. This study challenges the traditional focus on Onegin as the paradigmatic “superfluous man” and shows that the text’s most significant emotional and interpretive focus is organized through Tatyana’s inward development. This research uses a qualitative interpretive method and close textual study for the analysis of key stages (her literary imagination, emotional awakening, dream experience, engagement with Onegin’s library, and final moral decision) in Tatyana’s character formation. Narrative theory, gender theory, and ethical criticism are used for the analysis. The transformation of her subjectivity from romantic projection to reflective moral awareness is the particular concern of this research. This study also offers an account of the ethical complexity of her final refusal of Onegin. The article argues that this refusal is not just a passive submission to social norms, rather it is an active and self-conscious moral stance that is shaped by the tension between desire, responsibility, and social constraint. This study, thus, redefines Tatyana not simply as a central character, but as the principal site through which Pushkin explores inwardness, gendered subjectivity, and moral selfhood, which helps reveal the deeper structural coherence of the novel.

Author Biographies

  • Nure Jannat, Department of English, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh

    Nure Jannat is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh. Her research interests span literature, language studies, and critical theory, with a particular focus on 19th- and 20th-century Russian literature, English language teaching (ELT), feminist literary criticism, and cultural analysis. Her scholarly work examines narrative form, ideology, and representations of identity across diverse literary and pedagogical contexts. She has published widely in international journals and has presented her research at multiple global conferences.

  • Md. Nasir Uddin, Department of English, Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh

    Nasir Uddin is an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh. His research lies at the intersection of English literature, language studies, and cultural studies, with particular emphasis on comparative literature, Romantic poetry, Shakespearean drama, Russian literature, classical antiquity and American fiction.

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Published

2026-05-09

Issue

Vol. 10 No. 2 (2026)

Section

Articles