Abstract
In Problems of Dostoevsky Creative Art (1929) Bachtin presents polyphonic novel in terms of dialogical unfinalizability. In his manuscript (1938) eventually published as Rabelais and His World (1965) Bachtin argues that carnival laughter overcomes all oppressive social norms and presents his unfinalizability as pure loophole: in this way he regards modern novel as a space for dialog and conflict. Averincev, Groys and Ryklin affirm that in fact with his carnival theory Bachtin justified Stalinist violence, where neither dialog nor conflict were possible.

Keywords: laughter, novel, violence, totalitarianism