Образ Туниса в автодокументальной и художественной литературе русских эмигрантов «первой волны»

The article reviews the cultural and axiological image of the North African country of Tunisia in the autodocumentary and literary fiction of the “first wave” Russian emigrants. On the basis of memoirs by Vladimir Berg, Nikolai Knorring, Irina Knorring, and Roman Gul’s essays on the Civil War dedicated to their stay in Tunis, the author describes the main motives of the immigrants’ perception of Africa and highlights their dichotomous characteristics (dream – reality, desolation – home, restraint – freedom). This image includes both Old Testament allusions to exile/exodus and schematic representations of the outlying continent; it actualizes the theme of Russia as the lost home. For some authors, Tunisia became a “Russian corner”, where their service to a future Russia took place, a place of awareness of the loss of their homeland. For others, it became a constraining bondage, an “unfreedom”, a place of alienation leading to the loss of meaning of life.