Boris Akunin’s Postmodern Čajka

The article explores Boris Akunin's The Seagull (2000) as a postmodern detective story. Akunin exploits and simultaneously makes light of the basic concepts of postmodernism: parodic and intertextual stance, the erasure of the line between high and mass literature, a mixing up of genres, a non-linear plot, emphasized theatricality, and metafictionalilty. It also discusses Akunin as a representative of intellectual mainstream fiction, and intertextuality is both a discursive tool of the postmodern scepticism toward cultural heritage, and a defense mechanism of culture.