The most ancient of these genera artistic creativity is an epic. Early forms of the epic arose even in the conditions of the primitive communal system and are associated with human labor, with the conquest of nature, with tribal clashes (for example, the tales of the North American Indians about Hiowata). In its development, the epic experienced great changes, prosperity and decline; its plots, heroes, genres and style changed; strata of various historical eras were deposited in it.
The main feature of the epic is that it reproduces reality external to the author, usually without the intervention of the author, whose identity is largely hidden from readers. Only in autobiographical genres and in the literature of the 20th century is this rule violated.
The narration in the epic is conducted on behalf of a real or fictitious narrator, witness, participant in events and, less often, the hero of events. The epic uses a variety of methods of presentation (narration, description, dialogue, monologue, author's digressions), the author's speech and the speech of the characters, in contrast to drama, where one method of presentation (dialogue) and one form of speech (the speech of the characters) are used. The epic presents great opportunities for a multifaceted depiction of reality and depiction of a person in the development of his character, circumstances, motivation of events and behavior of characters. The narration in the epic is usually conducted in the past tense, as about past events, and only in new literature does the epic include both the present tense and a combination of past, present and future tenses. The language of the epic is largely figurative and plastic, in contrast to the lyrics, where emotionally expressive speech dominates.
The specific types of epic are epic, epic, fairy tale, novel, story, poem, short story, essay, fable, anecdote.
Epic is the largest and most monumental form epic literature. The ancient heroic epic and the modern epic differ significantly from each other.
Ancient epics are rooted in folklore, mythology, and the legendary memory of prehistoric times. The most important feature of ancient epics is that in them everything wonderful and incredible becomes an object of immediate faith and the only possible form of exploration of the world. The ancient epic inevitably dies out along with the end of the “childhood of human society.” It is artistically necessary only as long as mythological consciousness lives and determines human perception of the world.
The basis of the epic of modern times is either a realistic (as, for example, in “War and Peace”, in “The Brothers Karamazov”, “Quiet Flows the Flow”) or a romantic awareness of the world (as, for example, in Proust’s epic “In Search of Lost Time” ). The main feature of modern epic is that it embodies the destinies of peoples, the historical process itself.
When classifying species forms in the epic great importance differences in the volume of works play a role.
There is a small form (story), a medium form (story) and a large epic form - the novel. Unlike a story and a novel, a story is not characterized by a developed system of characters; it does not have a complex evolution of characters and their detailed individualization.
A story with a dynamic plot, unexpected, sharp plot twists and denouement is usually called a short story.
A descriptive-narrative story is called an essay. The plot in the essay plays a smaller role than the dialogue, author's digressions, and description of the situation. A characteristic feature of the essay is documentary. Often essays are combined into cycles.
The leading epic type is the novel. The word “novel” itself initially meant, in medieval Europe, narrative works in Romance languages.
In the history of the European novel we can distinguish several stages of its development.
Ancient novel (“Ethiopian” by Heliodorus and others). Such a novel was built according to a certain pattern: the unexpected separation of lovers, their misadventures and a happy union at the end of the work.
A chivalric romance - it also combined love and adventure elements. The knight was portrayed as an ideal lover, ready to endure any challenge for the sake of his lady.
By the 18th century, the picaresque novel took shape. Its theme is the ascent of an enterprising person from the lower classes up the social ladder. The picaresque novel widely reflects the elements of life and is interesting in its concrete recreation of ordinary everyday situations.
The true heyday of the novel occurred in the 19th century. In Russian literature, the novel received its own specific coloring. Russian word artists in their expressions depict the discord between the individual’s aspirations for the ideal and the impossibility of achieving it. A so-called gallery of “extra” people appears.
In the 20th century, a decadent novel appeared - depicting a conflict between the individual and the environment, often this conflict is insoluble. An example of such a novel is Kafka's The Castle.
So, we found out that the types of epic are novel, story, short story, essay, etc. But types are not yet the final forms of literary works. While always retaining the general generic characteristics and structural features of the type, each literary work also contains unique features dictated by the characteristics of the material and the characteristics of the writer’s talent, that is, it has a unique “genre” form.
Epic (epos) translated from Greek language- word. It is a narrative form of literature. Plato believed that an era combines lyrical elements (the author's statements) and dramatic elements (imitation). According to Aristotle, the author of the epic tells the story “about events as something extraneous, as Homer does, or from himself, without replacing himself with another and displaying all the depicted persons in action.” According to Goethe and Schiller, the author talks about an event, transferring it to the past, and in drama he portrays it as what is happening now. According to Hegel, epic reproduces objectivity in an objectivizing form. V. Kozhinov classifies epic, like drama, as a fine art.
In epic works, life is depicted as something external to the author and characters. It seems that the author stands on the side and talks about what he knows and saw. By the way the writer describes events and characters, we can conclude how he relates to what he portrays.
Events in the era are depicted as those that have already taken place, therefore they are told in the past tense. Present and future tenses are used to provide dynamism and vividness to the narrative. Epic works are written primarily in prose. All of them are narrative in nature.
The forms of narration in epic works are different. The most common form is the third person narrative. Sometimes the narrator can be a character in the work (Maksim Maksimovich in the story “Bela” from “A Hero of Our Time” by M. Lermontov). In their worldview, narrator-characters can be close to the writer. The first-person narrative gives the work authenticity and introduces a lyrical element into it. There are works in which the characters themselves talk about what they saw and experienced. This is evidenced by the ancient novels - "Metamorphoses" ("The Golden Ass") by Apulsya and "Satyricon" by Petronius, and Lepky's memoirs "The Tale of My Life".
In addition to the story, epic works contain descriptions of the objective world, nature, and everyday life. Sometimes the author's reflections are “connected” to the story. The story about events can be accompanied by statements of characters, their monologues, and dialogues. The author can characterize some moments from the character’s life, report on what happened at different times and in different places.
In epic works, characters are revealed in actions, deeds, gestures, facial expressions, and speech.
Epic has three types of artistic form: poetic, prose and syncretic.
Types, genres of epic
The origin of the epic dates back to primitive times. In folk poetry, there are such types of epic as fairy tale, epic, folk duma, legend, translation.
A fairy tale is an epic work that tells about fantastic events and the adventures of heroes. There are fairy tales, heroic, social, fantastic, satirical, humorous, tales about animals and the like.
In addition to folk tales, there are literary fairy tales. Famous fairy tales by I. Franko, A. Pushkin, brothers J. and V. Grimm, Andersen and others.
The epic is an epic recitative song that was performed by folk singers and musicians in princely times. The characters of the epics are folk heroes - the hero Ilya Muromets, Dobrynya Nikitich. Epics arose in the 11th-12th centuries. V Kievan Rus, subsequently spread to the northern regions of Russia. The features of epic heroes were preserved in Ukrainian fairy tales, such as “The Tale of Kotigoroshko” and “The Tale of Kozhemyak”.
Legend (lat. Legenda - what should be read). This is a folklore or literary work in which the story is on a fantastic theme. Legends have different meanings. Legends include the “lives” of the first Christians, “holy” ascetics and princes, common in the Middle Ages. they were read in churches and monasteries on holidays in honor of saints. Subsequently, apocryphal legends with atheistic motives appeared. These legends were banned by the church. There are known legends about historical events and national heroes, about the leader of the liberation war Khmelnitsky, Fastovsky colonel Semyon Paliy. In the legends about Alexei Dovbush,
Maxim Zaliznyak, Ustim Karmalyuk, Lukyan Kobylitsa reveals the struggle of peasants against feudal oppression.
Peace (mime) (Greek Mythos - word, translation). Myths appeared at a time when people had a naive, direct understanding of the world around them. M. Moklitsa calls myth an alternative reality. According to her, myth is “the objectification of the initial perception, which over time becomes synonymous with fiction, an inadequate vision of something that actually does not exist in life. Myth concentrates the polyaspectality of the human worldview. It is equally deceptive and true: it denotes our infinite the process of searching for true knowledge. Myth is the antithesis to the scientific worldview - adequate, justified, communicated as true." Myths differed from fairy tales because fairy tales were considered fantasy, and from legends because legends contained real historical events and heroes. The myth was perceived as something probable. Modern literary scholars consider myth to be a generalized, holistic perception of reality, characterized by a synthesis of the real and the ideal and appears at the subconscious level. Myth is understood as a stable archetype model, which is framed in certain plots and images.
Ancient Greek, ancient Roman, and German-Scandinavian mythology left a noticeable mark in literature. Plots from ancient mythology were used by Dante ("The Divine Comedy"), G. Boccaccio ("Fiesolan Myths"), P. Corneille ("Medea", "Oedipus"). J. Racine ("Andromache", "Iphigenia in Aulis").
Folk jokes (anecdotes) are satirical or humorous stories that ridicule certain human vices.
A parable is an allegorical story about human life of a moralizing nature. The parable genre appeared in folklore; it comes from apologia (fairy tales about animals). From the apology the story also developed. Yu. Klimyuk, comparing parable and fable, notes that the close genre form of parable and fable is due to the commonality of their origin: from myth to fairy tale, from fairy tale to apology, from which the fable and parable themselves developed. “Instructiveness, allegorical, philosophical, external similarity of construction,” writes Yu. Klimyuk, “these are the features that connect a parable with a fable. At the same time, a parable has a number of differences: if a fable depicts a person’s character, exposes its features, then in a parable it Little attention is paid to the characters' characters; they are often non-specific, one might even say abstract, completely dependent on a predetermined thought...
And one more significant difference: a fable is a comic work, a parable is, in principle, a serious work (although there may be humorous and satirical parables) ... "
“A parable,” continues Yu. Klimyuk, “is often called a parabola. A parabola is a group of allegorical, moralizing and educational genres (parable, fable, short tale, anecdote, story, etc.), in which, through the collected example and its interpretation certain thoughts were affirmed...
According to the content and ideological orientation, the parable is divided into religious and secular, philosophical and moral, as well as folklore. A parable can have various modifications: a short instructive expression (proverb, saying, maxim), a plot parable (prose and poetic), a parable with and without explanation, a parable with and without allegory, a parable - a parabola, a parable - a detailed comparison ".1 In Ukrainian literature, the parable was used as the basis of a plot or as a separate genre by I. Franko, D. Pavlychko, Lina Kostenko, B. Oliynyk.
Yu. Klimyuk argues that not every parabola is a parable, but every parable can be considered a parabola. It is difficult to distinguish a parable from a parabola. Some literary scholars identify them.
In the “literary dictionary-reference book” we read: (Greek parabole - comparison, juxtaposition, similarity) - “an instructive allegory, a genre variety close to a parable, in which, in a compressed story about a certain event, several other levels of content are hidden. Inside the structure of the parabola there is a different image , which gravitates toward a symbol rather than an allegory (sometimes a parabola is called a “symbolic parable”), but it does not suppress objectivity, situationality, and remains isomorphic in relation.” A. Potebnya considered a parable to be a type of fable.
Epic (Greek Eroroiia from epos - word and roieo - - to create) is a narrative type that was popular before the advent of the novel. The epic originates in mythology and folklore. In ancient Greece, an epic was a cycle of folk tales, legends and songs about significant historical events, legendary and historical heroes. On the basis of folk epics, author's ones were formed - Homer's "Iliad" and "Odyssey", Vsrgil's "Aeneid". "The Knight in the Tiger's Skin" by Sh. Rustaveli, "The Tale of Igor's Host", "Jerusalem Liberated" by T. Tasso, "The Lusiads" by L. di Camoes.
The famous Russian literary critic Bakhtin wrote that the epic has three design features:
1) the subject of the epic is the national epic past, the “absolute past”, in the words of Goethe and Schiller;
2) the source of the epic is the national spoken word, and not personal experience;
3) the epic world is removed from modernity, that is, from the time of its singer (the author and his listeners), by absolute distance... “The world of epic,” M. Bakhtin specifies, “the national heroic past, the world of the beginnings and peaks of the national history, the world of parents and founders, the world of the “first” and “best”. was a poem about the present (turning only for posterity into a poem about the past). Epic, as a certain genre known to us, was originally a poem about the past..., and the author’s attitude (that is, the attitude of the speaker of the epic word) is the attitude of a person, speaks of what is unattainable for it. the past, the reverent attitude of the offspring. The epic word in its style, tone, character of imagery is fundamentally incompatible with the word of a contemporary about a contemporary, addressed to his contemporaries (“Onegin, my good friend, was born on the banks of the Neva, where, perhaps, you were born, or shone, my reader... ")". The epic comprehensively describes the socio-political life, customs, culture, life of the people, and family relations. her style is solemn, her presentation unhurried. A special place in epic poems is occupied by the speeches of heroes, monologues, and dialogues.
In the 18th century the epic was replaced by the novel. The big ones began to be called epics epic works- novels, novel cycles. Such Ukrainian epic novels as “Human Blood is Not Water,” “Big Relatives” by M. Stelmakh, “Volyn” by U. Samchuk, epic poems “Cursed Years,” “Ashes of Empires” by Yuri Klen are known.
A novel (French Roman, German Roman, English Novel) is a large epic work in which a person’s personal life is depicted in connection with the public life. There are many heroes in the novel and their characters and multifaceted connections between themselves and society are described in detail.
At first, the term “novel” was used to describe poetic works written in the Romance language (Italian, French, Portuguese...). The word "novel" appeared in the Middle Ages. As V. Dombrovsky notes, a novel was called “a story about fantastic, wonderful knightly adventures, composed in a non-poetic, common language, which, to distinguish it from Latin, the language of the church and spiritual literature (linqua latina), was called Romanesque (linqua romana). Those stories from" appear first in France, where they create continuations of ancient knightly poems (chanson de gesture - songs about true stories, that is, the Old French epic, in which the famous "Song of Roland" comes first), and then... cycles of medieval traditions and legends about Arthur, the Holy Grail and the Knights of the Round Table.
In the 13th century. two "Romances of the Rose" by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meen appear in Old French. The term "novel" was first used by the English literary critic George Patenham in a study
"The Art of English Poetry" (1589). French literary critic of the 17th century. Pierre-Daniel Huet defined a novel as follows: “These are fictional love stories, skillfully laid out in prose for the satisfaction and edification of readers.” 1.
The novel is a multifaceted epic work in which reality is revealed in many ways. The novel has several plot lines, many characters who are depicted in public relations and in everyday life.
The novel has a complex composition; it uses stories, descriptions, author's digressions, monologues, dialogues, etc.
As a great epic form, the novel has evolved over many centuries. It appeared in Ancient Greece during the late Hellenistic era. The ancient novel was entertaining. He depicted obstacles on the path to love for lovers. In the II-VI centuries. n. e. the novels “Aethiopica” by Heliodorus, “Daphnis and Chloe” by Long, “The Golden Ass” by Apuleius, and “Satyricon” by Petronius appeared.
In the Middle Ages, romances of chivalry became popular. There are known cycles of novels about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. These novels told about the legendary adventures of heroic knights, in particular the extraordinary adventures of Alexander the Great. During this era, popular novels about the love of Tristan and Isolde appeared, novels that promoted the Christian religion, and the famous novel about Barlaam and Jehoshaphat.
During the Renaissance, writers use realistic principles of depiction, as evidenced by the novels “Gargantua and Pantagruel” by Rabelais and “Don Quixote” by Cervantes. Cervantes's novel is a parody of a chivalric romance. In the 18th century The adventure novel (Gilles Blas by Lesage) and the novel of education (Wilhelm Meister by Goethe), the psychological novel (Pamela by Richardson) are gaining popularity. In the 19th century, the historical novel appears (Ivanhoe by Walter Scott). Development of the novel in the 19th century . is associated with the names of Stsdal, Balzac, Dickens, Thackeray, Flaubert, Zola, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Panas Mirny.
The Ukrainian novel originated in the 19th century. The first novels were “Mister Khalyavsky” by G. Kvitka-Osnovyanenko, “Tchaikovsky” by E. Grebenki. Significant contributions to the development of the romantic form in Ukrainian literature were made by Marko Vovchok ("Living Soul"), P. Kulish ("Black Rada"), I. Nechuy-Levitsky ("Clouds"), Panas Mirny and Ivan Bilyk ("Do the Oxen Roar , when is the manger full? "), V. Vinnichenko ("Solar Machine"). Talented novelists of the 20th century. is Andrey Golovko ("Weed"), Y. Yanovsky ("Riders"), V. Vo-Mogilny ("City"), S. Sklyarenko ("Svyatoslav", "Vladimir"). Modern Ukrainian novels are represented by such genres as philosophical (“New Commandment” by V. Vinnychenko), erotic (“Fornication” by E. Gutsalo), historical (“Roksolana” by P. Po Grebelny), detective (“Deposits of Gold” by V. Vinnychenko) socio-psychological (“Whirlpool” by G. Tyutyunnik, “Cathedral” by O. Gonchar), adventure (“Tigrocat” by Ivan Bagryany), gothic (“Marko the Damned” by A. Storozhenko), satirical (“Aristocrat from Vapnyarka” by A. Aist) , autobiographical (“Thought about you” by M. Stelmakh), fantastic (“The Chalice of L Mrita” by A. Berdnik), biographical (“The Adventure of Gogol” by G. Kolesnik), memoir (“The Third Company” by V. Sosyura), adventurous (“ Imitation" by E. Kononenko). Ukrainian writers use various forms of history - a confessional novel ("I am Bogdan" by P. Po Grebelny), whimsical ("The Borrowed Man" by E. Gutsalo, "The Flock of Swan" by Vasily Zemlyak), a chronicle novel. ("Chronicle of the City of Yaropol" by Yu. Shcherbak), a novel in short stories ("Tronka" by O. Gonchar), a raman ballad ("Wild Honey" by Leonid Pervomaisky).
In literary practice there are such genres as an essay novel, a memoir novel, a feuilleton novel, a pamphlet novel, an epistolary novel, a report novel, a montage novel, a parable novel, a parody novel, and an essay novel.
Bakhtin classifies the novel according to the principle of constructing the image of the main character: a novel of wandering, a novel of testing, a biographical novel, a novel of education. “Not a single historical type,” according to the scientist, “stands up to the principle in its pure form, but is characterized by the advantage of one or another principle of the hero’s design. Since all elements are mutually significant, a certain principle of the hero’s design is associated with a certain type of plot, a concept of the world according to a certain composition of the novel." In a travelogue, the hero has no essential characteristics. His movement in space, adventures make it possible to show the spatial and socio-static diversity of the world (country, nationality, culture). This type of hero and construction of the novel is characteristic of ancient naturalism, in particular, for the works of Petronius, Apuleius and Tormes, “Gilles Blas” by Alain Rene Lesage.
M. Bakhtin notes that the wandering novel is characterized by a “spatial and static concept of the diversity of the world,” life is depicted as an alternation of contrasts: successes - failures, victories - defeats, happiness - misfortune. Time has no historical definition, there is no development of the hero from youth to maturity and adventurous time in the novel, including moments, hours, days, temporal characteristics dominate: the next day, after a battle, a duel. Due to the lack of historical time, there are no such socio-cultural phenomena as a city, a country, a social group, a nationality. The image of a person in a wandering novel is static.
The novel of trials is constructed as a series of situations, tests of loyalty, nobility, courage, and valor. For the heroes of this novel, the world is an arena of struggle. An example of such a novel is the work of the Greek writer of the era of antiquity Heliodorus "Ethiopica". A type of trial novel is the medieval knightly novel “The Romance of Tristan and Isolde.”
At the heart of the novel are trials - exceptional polyps and situations that cannot exist in an ordinary, typical human biography, adventures are strung together. In a chivalric romance, a fairy-tale time appears, which is not associated with historical events and conditions. The world, minor characters Tests are a decoration, a background for the heroes of the novel. In the XVIII-XIX centuries. the novel of testing, according to M. Bakhtin, “has lost its purity, but the type of constructing a novel on the idea of testing a hero continues to exist, of course, becoming more complicated by what was created by the biographical novel and the novel of education.” The novels of Stendhal, Balzac, Dostoevsky, according to the observations of M. Bakhtin, are novels of testing.
The biographical novel has existed since the 18th century. Its plot is based on the main points life path: birth, childhood, years of study, marriage, structure of life, death. In a biographical novel, biographical time and events are localized. The development of a hero is the result of changes in his life. Biographical novels can be historical-biographical or autobiographical in nature. Historical and biographical novels include “Petersburg Autumn” by A. Ilchenko and “The Mistake of Honore de Balzac” by Nathan Rybak.
Autobiographical novels differ from historical-biographical novels primarily in that they represent a kind of family history, of which the author is a participant. These are “The Knight of Our Time” by M. Karamzin, “Childhood”, “Adolescence”, “Youth” by L. Tolstoy, “Our Secrets”, “Eighteen Years” by Yu. Smolich.
The basis of the novel of education is the pedagogical idea. The formation of a hero occurs in connection with real historical time. The best novels of education include "Gargaitua and Pantagruel" by F. Rabelais, "The History of Tom Jones, Foundling" by G. Fielding, "The Life and Reflections of Tristan Shandy" by Stern, "Taras of the Way" by Oksana Ivanenko, "The City" by V. Pidmogilny.
Since the boundaries between a novel and a story are vague, the same works are classified as both novels and stories ("Borislav Laughs" by I. Franko, "Maria" by U. Samchuk, "The Senior Boyar" by T. Osmachka).
Literary historians count up to hundreds of novel genres.
In the 20th century, a “new novel” or “anti-novel” appeared in the West. Its creators Nathalie Sarraute, A. Rob-Grillet, M. Butor stated that the traditional novel has exhausted itself. They believe that a new novel should be plotless and heroless.
Literary scholars turned to theories of the novel in the 19th century. Schelling noted that a novelist can depict all of reality, various manifestations human nature, tragic and comic. According to Schelling, the characters in a novel are symbols that embody human characters.
Hegel made a significant contribution to the theory of the novel. He believed that the novel arose during a day of social crisis, the novel is the end of the development of society. At the heart of the novel is the conflict between the poetry of the heart and the prose of the relationship between the personal and the public. In the conflict of the novel, the characters are contrasted with their surroundings.
V. Kozhinov expressed the opinion that “the beginning of the novel generally subjugates all genres.” V. Dneprov believes that the novel synthesizes all types of literature, it is the leading form of the art of words (Features of the 20th century novel. - M.; Leningrad, 1965) .
Sometimes writers combine their novels into dilogy ("Mother", "Artem Garmash" by Andrei Golovko), trilogy ("Alps", "Blue Danube", "Golden Prague" by O. Gonchar), tetralogy ("Childhood of Theme", "Gymnasium Students" "Students," Engineers "M. Garin-Mikhailovsky). There are known cycles of novels ("The Human Comedy" by O. Balzac, "Extraordinary Journeys" by Jules Verne).
The story (from poviduvata) is an epic work of medium form. It occupies an intermediate place between a novel and a short story. The story is based on one or more conflicts, few events, one or several episodes, slow development of events, and a relatively simple composition. V. Kozhinov believes that the story “does not have a tense and complete plot unit”; it lacks “unity of end-to-end action *”.
The works of M. Berkovsky, V. Kozhinov and other literary scholars note that the story is closer to the epic of the ancient world than to the epic of modern times. its subject is the calm flow of life, which can be talked about. There are no gostrodramatic situations in the story that attract a novelist. M. Gulyaev notes in this regard that epicness and slowness are not a sign of all stories. Some of the stories are dramatic, intensely conflicting, that is, close to a novel. These, in particular, are “Nevsky Prospekt” and “Notes of a Madman” by Gogol.
There is an opinion that the story is lyrical, close to music. But other epic works are also marked by lyricism. The stories include the works "Nikolai Dzherya", "Kaidashev's Family" by I. Nechuy-Levitsky, "Evil People" by Panas Mirny, "The Earth is Humming" by O. Gonchar, "Poem about the Sea" by A. Dovzhenko. Comparing the novel and the story, Yu. Kuznetsov notes: “The novel tends to master action, and the story - to record being... its ending is mainly open, follows from the logic of the events depicted, and not from oppositions, as in a short story, descriptions are carried out according to the principle stringing."
In ancient times, stories were considered works that told about something. In the literature of Kievan Rus, stories were called chronicles ("The Tale of Bygone Years") or the lives of saints ("The Tale of Akira the Wise"). The story as a type of epic acquired its characteristics in the 19th century. The first stories in Ukrainian literature were "Marusya", "Poor Oksana » G. Kvitki-Osnovyanenko. The development of the story is associated with the work of Mark Vovchka ("The Institute"), T. Shevchenko ("Artist", "Musician"), I. Nechuy-Levitsky ("Nikolai Dzherya"), I. Franko ("Zakhar Berkut"), M. Kotsyubinsky (“Fata morgana”).
This type of epic is used by Gonchar, V. Shevchuk, E. Gutsalo, V. Yavorivsky, I. Chendei.
Genres of the story: historical, social and everyday life, historical and biographical, fantastic, detective.
A story is an epic work of small form. It is usually based on one event, one problem. A story within a story has a beginning and an end. The story requires the writer to be able to paint a bright picture in a small area, to create a situation in which the hero reveals himself clearly and in relief. The characters in the story are formed, there is no broad motivation for actions and events, the descriptions are compressed, there are few of them.
The story gains popularity during the Renaissance. Then J. Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales" appears. This type of epic flourished in the 19th century. Famous Ukrainian masters of short stories were M. Kotsyubinsky, V. Stefanik, Marko Cheremshina, S. Vasilchenko, O. Kobylyanskaya, I. Franko, Nikolai Khvylevoy, Grigory Kosynka.
There are stories of social and everyday life, socio-political, socio-psychological, satirical, humorous, tragic, comic.
The boundaries between a story and a story are not always clear, so the works “I dug a potion early on Sunday” by O. Kobylyanskaya and “Debut” by M. Kotsyubinsky are classified by some as stories, and by others as short stories.
Novella (Italian Novella - news) is a small type of epic. It appeared in Ancient Greece, had an oral form, entertaining or didactic character. it was used as inserted episodes by Herodotus (the story about Arion, the ring of Polycrates), Petrova (the story about Matryona of Ephesus). In the Hellenistic era, the short story had an erotic character. As a type of epic, the short story took shape during the Renaissance in Italy (“Decameron” by Boccaccio, “Heptameron” by Margaret of Navarre). Greatest development reached in the 19th century. In Ukrainian literature, such genres of short stories as psychological (V. Stefanik), socio-psychological, lyrical-psychological (M. Kotsyubinsky), lyrical (B. Lepky), philosophical, historical (V. Petrov), political (Yu. linden), dramatic (Grigory Kosynka).
Whose difference is a novella from a short story? There are fewer characters in the novella than in the short story; the characters are formed; the novelist does not comment on the thoughts and feelings of the characters. Every detail is polished in the novella; for microanalysis, it uses one moment from life and reveals significant psychological experiences on it. The short story has a single-line, tense, dynamic plot, unexpected turns of action, a sudden ending, an asymmetrical composition, and, as a rule, a dramatic collision. IN foreign literature Basically, they do not distinguish between a story and a novella.
Essay (French Essai - attempt, sketch) is a genre that is at the intersection of fiction and journalism. It raises a partial question. The essay is characterized by great subjectivity. Essays include various works: philosophical, historical, critical, biographical, journalistic, moral and ethical and even poetic.
A classic example of an essay is the book “Essays” by the French humanist philosopher Michel Montaigne. This book contains opinions, observations, impressions from what I read and experienced. Problems of education, upbringing, fame, dignity, wealth, death are violated. Montaigne wrote that the book was created by him, and he was created by a book that is part of his life. He freely expresses his thoughts on subjects that go beyond his understanding and horizons in order to give an idea of his beliefs. The author does not go directly to the subject, but seems to walk around it. Therefore, the essay is always "about". In almost every phrase of "Experiments" there is a pronoun "I" ("I believe", "I agree", "for me").
Revealing the specifics of the essay, M. Epstein in the article “Laws of the Free Genre” (Questions of Literature - 1987. - No. 7) emphasizes that an essayist does not have to be a good storyteller, a deep philosopher, or a sincere interlocutor. He may be inferior to the power of thought of a philosopher, the brilliance of imagination to a novelist and artist, and the sincerity and frankness to the authors of confessions and diaries. The main thing for an essayist is cultural comprehensiveness. Montaigne was the first to talk about what he felt as a person. The essayist tries himself in everything. The best definition of a genre is universality, several about everything. An essayist, according to M. Epstein, is “a master of works on a free topic”, “a professional of the amateurish genre”. M. Bakhtin believed that in the 20th century. All genres of literature are being sensitized. Yesseization also affected the literary works of A. Losev, S. Averintsev, G. Gachev, O. Gonchar, Yu. Smolich, D. Pavlychko, I. Drach. Short stories and essays, novel-essays, and novel-essays appeared ("Kulish's Novels" by Petrov, "At Twilight" by R. Gorak).
An essay is a type of journalism on the verge of the art of words and journalism. As an independent type of epic, it has existed since the 18th century. The essay appeared in England and was popular in the works of writers of educational realism (Addison, Voltaire, Diderot). The essay occupied a significant place in the literature of the 40s of the 19th century. Physiological essays appeared in Russian literature, in which writers showed the life of ordinary workers.
The essays were a significant success among readers Ukrainian writers, in particular I. Nechuy-Levitsky (“On the Dnieper”), Panas Mirny (“Journey from Poltava to Gadyach”), M. Kotsyubinsky (“How we went to Krinitsa”). These essays are original travel notes, the origins of which are in Homer's "Odyssey", Lukian's " True story". A famous author of travel notes was V. Grigorovich-Barsky (1701-1747 pp.). His works combine the characteristics of different genres: stories, essays, walks, legends, lives. The synthesis of autobiographical, traveler and essay is the work of Natalena Koroleva "Without roots", "Roads and paths of life", collections of essays by Evdokia Gumennaya "Many skies", " Eternal Lights Alberta", memories of V. Samchuk "On a white horse", "On a black horse", P. Tychyna's "Travels with the K. Stetsenko Chapel".
What is specific about the essay? Some researchers see it in documentation (factography), others - in journalistic wit. But these signs are not present in every essay; there are essays with fictional characters and plots (G. Uspensky - “The Power of the Earth”). The essays violate social, economic, political, moral and ethical problems at a certain stage of the development of society. The essays depict portraits political figures, scientists, writers, ordinary workers. The authors of the essays are interested in social life in all its manifestations. Hence, the excitement of the narrative, the journalistic passion in the assessments of what is depicted, the openness in the affirmation of ideas. criticize everything that slows down progress. The author’s beginning in the essay is stronger, brighter than in the novel; the essay can be laconic and can take hundreds of pages (Karamzin’s “Letters of a Russian Traveler”). .
In literary criticism there is no single genre classification of essays. There are documentary and non-documentary essays. And also - wandering, portrait, everyday, socio-political, historical, problematic, zoological, foreign, essays about nature. A type of essay is biographical sketches about the life and work of outstanding people. This type of essay appeared in antiquity ("Comparative Lives" of Plutarch, "Biography of Agricola" by Tacitus).
A feuilleton (French Feuilleton from feuille - letter, sheet) is a work of an artistic and journalistic nature on a current topic, revealed in a satirical or humorous form. A feuilleton is an intermediate link between an essay, a short story and a short story.
In France, a feuilleton was a newspaper supplement containing a political pamphlet. Subsequently, the feuilleton became an organic part of a newspaper sheet (“basement”), separated by a thick line. Later, they began to call an article written in the “basement” a feuilleton. The first feuilletonist was Abbot Geoffroy, who published a theatrical review in the newspaper "Journal de Debas". The figurative and expressive means of feuilleton are irony, hyperbole, grotesque, pun, comic situation, satirical detail.
There are documentary and non-documentary (problematic) feuilletons. Famous literary; feuilletons (Yu. Ivakin - collection "Hyperboles"). The founder of the Ukrainian feuilleton is V. Samoilenko. The development of this type of epic is associated with the work of K. Kotka, Ostap Vishnya, S. Oleynik, A. Aist, E. Dudar. Ostap Cherry his feuilletons called smiles. Varieties of feuilletons are radio feuilletons, telefeuilletons. Pamphlet (English Pamphlet from the Greek Pan - everything, phlego - I smoke) - a journalistic work on a topical topic L. Ershov characterizes the pamphlet as follows: “It’s like a feuilleton, but not on an insignificant level. ", but on a key topic. It is based on a large social object, this largely explains the specifics of the pamphlet, the features of its construction and style... the pamphlet is closer in structure to a journalistic article. It is based on objects of enormous weight, which often do not need to be translated V social aspect. They are already connected with it: the socio-political structure of the state, moral and ethical principles..., individual major state and political figures, etc. That is why the development of the topic in the pamphlet often occurs in the manner of an article, and not through emotional-figurative associations."
A pamphlet can use the forms of an interview, report, or letter. In the pamphlet, the author does not hide his position, the style of the pamphlet is passionate, the language is expressive, it is characterized by aphorism, irony, and sarcasm.
The pamphlet appeared in the era of antiquity. The philippics of Demosthenes and Lucian’s pamphlet “Praise of the Fly” have reached our time. In the 16th century In Germany, Ulrich von Hutten's pamphlets "Letters of Dark People" appeared at the end of the 17th - beginning of the 17th century. XVIII century - Swift's pamphlets "A Modest Proposal", "Letters from a Clothmaker". The masters of the pamphlet were Diderot ("Jacques the Fatalist"), Courier ("Pamphlet on Pamphlets"), Mark Twain ("To My Missionary Critics").
In Ukrainian literature, the founder of the pamphlet was Ivan Vyshensky. His pamphlets take the form of dialogue. The history of the Ukrainian pamphlet knows the names of such writers as I. Franko (“Doctor Besservisser”), Lesya Ukrainka (“Shameless Patriotism”), Les Martovich (“The Invented Manuscript”), Nikolai Volnovoy (“Apologists for Clericalism”). This genre was used by Yu Melnychuk, R. Bratun, F. Makivchuk, R. Fedorov, D. Tsmokalenko.
Parody (Greek Parodia - reworking in a funny way from para - against, ode - song) is a genre of folklore and satirical literature, the object of which is the composition, vocabulary, insults, style, direction, work of the writer. Parody is a form of literary struggle. She uses irony, sarcasm, and jokes. "Parody - according to Yu. Ivakin, - false mirror, into which the writer looks, laughing bitterly and crying joyfully. Let us remind you that a crooked mirror distorts. However, parody is the only case when distortion does not distort, but clarifies the truth. The parody is paradoxical: it resembles its object more than it resembles itself. It is not difficult to give examples of the opposite phenomenon, when the object of parody is more similar to the parody than it is to it... To be funnier, a parody has to pretend to be serious. A truly funny parody is not funny... “Parody is a type of criticism, polemic. It becomes relevant in literary discussions. Elements of parody are in the novels “Don Quixote” by Cervantes, “The Golden Calf” by I. Ilf and E. Petrov, and the poem “Orleans” maiden" by Voltaire. It originated in ancient Greek literature. The poem "Batrachomyomachy" ("War of Mice and Frogs") is a parody of the heroic epic. Aristophanes' comedy "Clouds" is a parody of Socrates and the Sophists, "Frogs" is a parody of Euripides' tragedy.
Parody appeared in Ukrainian literature in the 16th century. Parodies of sacred scripture and church and religious literature are known. Kotlyarevsky's Aeneid is imbued with elements of parody. Ostap Vishnya, V. Chechvyansky, Yu. Vukhnal, S. Voskrekasenko, S. Oleynik, B. Chaly, A. Zholdak, Yu. Kruglyak, V. Lagoda, Yu. Ivakin successfully worked in the parody genre. Neo-avant-garde artists, in particular the group Bu-Ba-Boo, turn to parody.
Humoresque is a short essay, poetic, prose or dramatic, about a funny person or incident. Humoresques can take a poetic or prose form. S. Rudansky called his humoresques humoresques. Ostap Vishnya, A. Klyuka, S. Voskrekasenko, D. Belous, S. Oleinik, E. Dudar performed in the humoresque genre. Folklore is often used in literary humoresques. Famous humorous songs are “Sell, dear, gray bulls”, “Oh, what kind of noise was that made”, “If I were a Poltava centurion”.
In humoresque, laughter takes the form of benevolent criticism in a folk, witty, ironic, oxymoronic form.
The tale (English, French Fable, Latin Fabula) is a popular epic work of world literature. The tale has a plot, allegorical images, teachings, and originates in folklore. Many fables are based on folk tales about animals.
The development of the fable is associated with the name of Aesop (VI century BC). Up to 400 texts are attributed to him. appeared before the new era Indian fables, which were included in the collection "Panchatantra" (Pentateuch). The fables of Phaedrus, Lafontaine, Sumarokov, and Krylov gained worldwide fame. The first Ukrainian fabulist was G. Skovoroda. The works of P. Gulak-Artemovsky, E. Grebenka, L. Glebov, S. Rudansky are associated with the fable.
Basically bikes have two parts. The first reveals an event, fact, phenomenon, person, the second reveals the moral, which can be at the beginning or end of the fable. Most fables are in poetic form, written in free verse.
A number of researchers classify the fable as a lyrical-epic work, M. Gulyaev ("Theory of Literature", M., 1977) - as a lyrical one. A. Tkachenko considers it among epic and among lyrical-epic works.
In creative practice there are such small epic works as sketch, sketch, watercolor, arabesque, miniature, sketch, icon, thorn, crumbs. Watercolor, sketch, icon, sketch, etude are named by association with painting. The term “arabesque” was introduced by A. Schlegel to designate small texts with elements of fantasy, “ironic pathos,” and the grotesque. Gogol called a series of stories and articles arabesques, A. Bely called a collection of literary critical articles ("Arabesques", 1911), Nikolai Khvylovy's short story "Arabesques".
Generic specificity of works.
One of the most important problems of modern school literary education is the problem of studying a work of art, taking into account the uniqueness of its type and genre.
Despite the relativity of the boundaries separating one poetic genre from another, with all the complex system of mutual transitions, each work of art always represents one or another poetic genre - epic, literature or drama.
“Taking into account the generic specifics of works of art when studying them at school will help schoolchildren understand literature as an art form and create the necessary attitude towards the perception of epic, lyricism, and drama. Each of these types of art differs in the manner of reflecting reality, and in the way of expressing the author’s creation, and in the nature of the impact on the reader. Therefore, while there is a unity of methodological principles in their study, the methods of working on epic, lyric and drama are different.” The qualitative certainty of poetic genera, the specificity of the content of each of them, the very principle of the artistic translation of life material accessible to epic, lyric poetry and drama, is first of all discovered by the artist of words. “The very idea already, as it were, carries within itself in embryo the artistic possibilities of epic, lyricism or drama. Therefore, it is natural that comprehension of the laws of the poetic kind is necessary for the reader, especially the literature teacher, who seeks to penetrate into art world works"
Epic (Greek) epos- word, narrative, story) is a literary genre distinguished along with lyrics and drama. An epic, like a drama, reproduces an action unfolding in space and time, the course of events in the lives of the characters. A specific feature of the epic is the organizing role of the narrator: the speaker reports events and their details as something that happened and is remembered, simultaneously resorting to descriptions of the setting of the action and the appearance of the characters, and sometimes to discrepancies.
The most precise definition of the epic was given by V.G. Belinsky: “epic poetry is primarily objective external poetry, both in relation to itself and to the poet and his reader. Epic poetry expresses the contemplation of the world and life as existing in themselves and being in perfect balance with themselves and the poet or reader contemplating them.”
I.A. Gulyaev also speaks of the objectivity of the epic narrative: “In an epic work, external circumstances determine the behavior of the characters, their present and future.”
The narrative layer of the epic work interacts with the dialogues and monologues of the characters. The epic narrative either becomes self-pressing, temporarily suspending the statements of the heroes, or is imbued with their spirit in inappropriately direct speech; Sometimes it frames the characters’ remarks, sometimes, on the contrary, it is reduced to a minimum or temporarily disappears. But overall it dominates the work, holding together everything depicted in it. Therefore, the features of the epic are largely determined by the properties of the narrative.
The epic narration is conducted on behalf of the named narrator, a kind of mediator between the person depicted and the listeners, a witness and interpreter of what happened. Information about his fate, his relationships with the characters, and the circumstances of the “story” are usually missing. At the same time, the narrator can “condense” into a specific person, becoming a storyteller.
The epic is as free as possible in the exploration of space and time. The writer either creates scenic episodes, that is, pictures that record one place and one moment in the life of the characters, or - in descriptive, overview, "panoramic" episodes - he talks about long periods of time or what happened in different places. The epic uses the arsenal of literary and visual means in full, which gives the images the illusion of plastic volume and visual and auditory authenticity. The epic does not insist on the conventionality of what is being recreated. Here it is conditionally not so much what is depicted, but rather the “depicting” one, that is, the narrator, who is often characterized by absolute knowledge of what happened in its smallest details.
The epic form is based on various types of plot structures. In some cases, the dynamics of events are revealed openly and in detail, in others, the depiction of the course of events seems to drown in descriptions, psychological characteristics, and reasoning. The volume of text of an epic work, which can be either prosaic or poetic, is practically unlimited - from miniature stories to lengthy epics and novels. An epic can concentrate in itself such a number of characters and events that are not available to other types of literature and types of art. At the same time, the narrative form is able to recreate complex, contradictory, multifaceted characters that are in the making. Associated with the word “epic” is the idea of showing life in its integrity, revealing the essence of an entire era and the scale of the creative act. The scope of epic genres is not limited to any types of experiences and attitudes. The nature of the epic is the universally wide use of the cognitive and ideological capabilities of literature and art in general.
So, the main features of epic works are the reproduction of phenomena of reality external to the author in the objective course of events, narration and plot. When studying epic as a type of literature, it is necessary to familiarize students with these features. This is especially important when distinguishing between types and genres of literature.
b) the uniqueness of the epic genres.
Difficulties that arise when analyzing epic works arise when determining the genre of the work. A serious mistake will be made by the one who begins to consider a story or story, making demands on them that only a novel can meet.
One of the teacher’s methodological tasks is to introduce students to the genre uniqueness of epic works and teach them to apply this knowledge when analyzing works. It is important to consider age characteristics students and stages of literary education at school. In grades V - VI, the study of genres of literary works (fairy tale, legend, myth, chronicle, epic, fable, story, story, ballad, poem) serves to clarify the author's poetry. Work in grades VII - VIII is aimed at systematizing ideas about the types and genres of literature; the range of study includes such genres as: novel, biography, hagiography, parable, sermon, confession, short story. Literary theory in high school helps to trace historical changes in poetics literary families and genres.
Epic genres are divided into large (epic, novel), medium (life, story) and small (fairy tale, fable, parable, short story, short story, sketch, essay). Some forms of prose also belong to the lyrical-epic genres.
The methodology for analyzing an epic work is largely based on the uniqueness of the type and genre. And the volume of the work plays an important role in choosing the path of analysis. This is due to time constraints and the intensity of the school curriculum. Here's how to solve it in this case the problem of analyzing the works of M.A. Rybnikov: “Methodological techniques are dictated by the nature of the work... A ballad can be analyzed using a plan, but it is unlikely that a lyrical work should be planned. The short story is read and understood in its entirety. From the novel we select individual, leading chapters and read one of them in class, another at home, carefully analyze the third and retell it close to the text, analyze the fourth, fifth, sixth at a faster pace and retell it briefly, excerpts from the seventh and eighth chapters are given in in the form of an artistic story to individual students, the epilogue is told to the class by the teacher himself. The riddle is guessed and repeated by heart, the proverb is explained and accompanied by everyday examples, the fable is analyzed with the expectation of understanding the morality expressed in it.”
Short epic works, as a rule, are read and analyzed holistically in class. But a fairy tale and a fable are one thing, an epic, a ballad, a short story is another. Analysis of a fairy tale is mainly prepared by expressive reading, practical assimilation of its text (oral and written retellings, observations of language). “The fable carefully examines its direct meaning, the way the fabulist depicts the characters, be they animals, plants, or people. The fable is read so that it evokes a smile or laughter, so that its “cheerful slyness” (Pushkin) and its irony reach young listeners. Let schoolchildren enjoy Krylov’s ability to indicate in two or three lines the character of a character, his manner of expressing thoughts.” One can draw on the testimony of contemporaries that Krylov read his fables with deliberate sly simplicity, designed primarily for the listener to perceive the living pictures themselves “ heroes" of the fable, had a good laugh at them or sympathized with them. Only after this do they move on to the figurative, allegorical meaning of the fable, and think about its morality. The fable is retold, read in person, staged. Younger schoolchildren can illustrate fables. Cases from life are discussed to which the moral of the fable could be applied. Schoolchildren learn the fable by heart or memorize apt fable expressions. This type of work is related to the development of students’ speech.
When analyzing epics, commentary reading is appropriate, since they are complex in content and language. In the process of slowly reading the epic about Ilya Muromets and the Nightingale the Robber, students, with the help of the teacher, draw up a plan for it and consolidate their skills simple plan, learn about the complex plan. The teacher explains what the children themselves cannot yet “discover” and draws pictures that have cognitive significance. At the same time, observations are being made of the language of the epic: repetitions, constant epithets, hyperboles, etc. At the same time, the necessary lexical and phraseological explanations are given. As a result of assimilation of the text, a conversation is held that helps to understand the general meaning of the epic: who is depicted in Ilya Muromets, what feats he performs, what qualities of a national hero he reveals.
On the verge of two types of literature there is a poem, the study of which presents considerable difficulties for schoolchildren. What a poem has in common with a story and a story is the presence of a plot in it. It is most appropriate to clarify the plot basis of the poem and begin a conversation about it. Due to the author's digressions and the hero's confession, the plot is weakened. Therefore, from a general view of the plot of the poem, the dictionary moves on to observations of its composition. Her plan is discovered and recorded. But we must not forget about expressive reading.
Studying larger works will require more time, but it is precisely when studying such works that one should most of all avoid excessive stretching and detailing of the analysis. In Gogol’s ten-chapter story “Taras Bulba,” three chapters are especially difficult, in which Taras’s meeting with his sons and detour to the Sich is told, about the Sich, its orders and morals, about the Cossacks in the battle of Dubno, about Taras as a commander, about the heroism of Ostap and the death of Andriy. Students should be able to recite these chapters; the most important passages from them are read in class. The remaining chapters are retold very briefly, in a few sentences (what is depicted in them, what significance they have for understanding the content of the work).
The main features of the epic as a type of literary literature are events, actions as the subject of the image (eventfulness) and narration as a typical, but not the only form of verbal expression in the epic, because in large epic works there are descriptions, reasoning, and lyrical digressions (which connects epic with lyrics), and dialogues (which connects epic with drama). Epic works are created in both prose and poetic form.
Folk and book literature have their own types of epic works.
Types of folk epic literature are: fairy tale, myth, legend (legend), epic, historical song, spiritual verse, proverb, riddle.
The consciousness of primitive people was syncretic; the rudiments of science, art, religion, morality and other types of social consciousness, which later acquired relative independence, still existed inseparably in it. Literary art is also an integral part of work, everyday life and religious rituals and celebrations. Traces of primitive syncretism are carried by myths - ancient tales that reflect people's fantastic ideas about the world around them and themselves.
A fairy tale is one of the oldest types of folk literature, an epic, predominantly prosaic work of a magical, adventurous or everyday nature with a focus on fiction, which does not deprive the fairy tale of its connection with reality1. Based on theme and structure, fairy tales are divided into fairy tales, everyday tales, and tales about animals. Some animal tales arose in pre-class society and were associated with totemism. Some of the fairy tales about animals were originally associated with myths and had magical meaning (representatives of the mythological school in folklore studied them as “shards of an ancient myth”), everyday tales about a peasant, a gentleman, an intelligent soldier, they were often distinguished by their sharp satirical orientation. By the nature of their attitude towards the depicted, they could be humorous and satirical. Writers turn to fairy tales as a type of verbal creativity: they use fairy-tale images and process them literary. This was done by P. Bazhov, A. Tolstoy, A. Platonov and others. Many writers (P. Ershov, A. Pushkin, M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, V. Kaverin, V. Kataev, etc.), preserving the techniques of folk tales, created literary fairy tales (fairy tales by A. Remizoia, “Fairy tales are not quite for children” by L. Andreev).
Myth (Greek tuNuz - legend, tradition) is a story about gods, spirits, heroes, reflecting people’s pre-scientific ideas about the world. The ancient Greek myths have reached us most fully (of course, in later retellings and alterations). We know little about ancient Russian myths, but certain images were also reflected in fairy tales and epics. In “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” there is a mention of a diva who “cries to the top of the tree.” ()Reflecting the naive-fantastic and at the same time poetic ideas of people of a distant era, myths are the source material for the development of many genres of literature. Thus, the myth of Prometheus, who gave people fire against the will of Zeus, received literary treatment in the works of Aeschylus (“Chained Prometheus”), I.V. Goethe (“Prometheus”), Shelley (“Prometheus Unbound”), Vyach. Ivanov (“Prometheus”), M. Karim (“Don’t Throw Fire, Prometheus!”), J. Marcinkevičius (“The Poem of Prometheus”) and many others. Works related to the interpretation of myths have the following features: increased suggestiveness; installation on secondary perception, mediated by the first reality - myth, parable; orientation towards a variety of symbols; interest in moral issues. Writers and poets, creatively reworking well-known motifs and plots, always comprehend modern problems.
Legends are close to myths - semi-fantastic tales about events that actually happened and people who really lived. In Ancient Greece, for example, legends about the war with the inhabitants of Troy (XII century BC) were widespread. These myths were formalized by wandering singers into heroic songs.
Legend (from Latin 1edeps1ag lit. - something that should be read) or legend - 1) in folklore - an oral folk story that has become a tradition, based on a miracle, a fantastic image. Legends differ in subject matter: historical, religious, demonological, everyday, etc. The text of a folklore legend is unstable; 2) in literature, one of the most significant genres of writing throughout the European Middle Ages, initially - the life of a saint; over time, instructive stories about Christ and his apostles, Adam, Eve, Noah, etc. began to be called this.
Epics, or antiquity - heroic songs of an epic nature, poetic tales about historical events Ancient Rus', about its heroes, folk heroes who embodied the people's ideals of courage and love for their native land (Ilya Muromets, Alyosha Popovich, Dobrynya Nikitich). In the epics, the man of labor is also glorified - the hero-plowman Mikula Selyaninovich, the giant Svyatogor, the merchant-guslar Sadko, etc. The world of epics is a real Russian land, but its depiction is accompanied by fantastic pictures and images associated with
ties with ancient myths. The epic verse is inextricably linked with the tune and melody. The epics were sung in a chant, to the accompaniment of the gusli.
Based on the combination of ancient myths, legends and heroic songs, the first great epic poems, or epics, arose. Their classic examples are Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. These are epic works depicting events in which the fate of a nation and people are decided. They are characterized by a wide, universal coverage of reality.
A historical song, unlike an epic, is dedicated to specific historical figures (Ivan the Terrible, Suvorov, Pugachev) or real historical events(Battle of Kulikovo). These songs began to take shape later than epics, in the 18th century. They have an epic beginning. The song, like the epic, is written in tonic verse, but the epic verse, as a rule, has three main stresses in a line; a song verse, depending on the length of the lines, may have two, three or four main stresses.
Spiritual poetry is a collective concept adopted to designate folk prose works of various genres, united by a common Christian religious content. In terms of their material (plot), they go back to book sources (the Bible, lives of saints, church hymns, as well as legends and apocrypha)1. Spiritual poems were sung by wandering singers - pilgrims, who were called “walking kalikas” (the name comes from the name of the shoes of medieval guards - lat. caligae, calicae). Spiritual poems about Alexei, the man of God, about Joseph the Beautiful, about Yegoriy the Brave, and others were widely circulated. F.I. Buslaev noted that spiritual poems “appeared to the taste... of the Russian people and entered the common treasury... of religious, Christian poetry.”
Images and motifs of spiritual poems are found in Russian literature: in the legend “About Two Great Sinners” (“Who Lives Well in Rus'” by N.A. Nekrasov), in the story “The Sealed Angel” by N. Leskov, in the poem “Pogorelytsina” by 11. Klyuev, in poems by M. Kuzmin.
All types of epic book literature are usually divided by volume into large (novel), medium (story, poem), small (short story, short story, ballad, essay) and the smallest (fable, anecdote). This division is conditional, since the volume of works of any type and genre does not have strict restrictions.
The most complex of the modern epic genres is the novel (French roman or conte roman - a story in the Romance language) - this is a multifaceted, multi-problem epic work depicting the private life of a person in broad connections with society. It is sometimes called the "epic of private life". Already in Antiquity, the prerequisites for novelistic thinking were formed, the essence of which was the assessment and artistic reproduction of reality from the point of view of an individual.
The action in a novel is always full of external or internal conflicts, or both. Events in the novel are not necessarily described in chronological order; sometimes writers use the technique of plot-compositional inversion. When analyzing an epic work, you should pay attention to the categories of space and time.
The novel genre has come a long way in development. In the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, chivalric novels - about the extraordinary adventures and love affairs of feudal knights - became widespread. Later, the picaresque novel was widespread in European literature, which was usually structured as a story by a rogue hero about the vicissitudes of his life. At the beginning of the 17th century. Spanish writer M. Cervantes created famous novel « Cunning Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha,” parodying the images, plots and style of chivalric novels. A significant contribution to the development of the novel genre was made by the French writer Antoine Prevost (“The History of the Chevalier de Grieux and Manon Lescaut”, 1731). According to Guide Maupassant, Prévost created "a charming form of the modern novel." The novel received its further development in the works of such writers of the 18th century as D. Defoe (“Robinson Crusoe”), G. Fielding (“The History of Tom Jones, Foundling”), J.-J. Rousseau (“Julia, or the New Heloise”) and others. The art of the novel reached its highest flowering in the work of realist writers of the 19th and 20th centuries. - Stendhal (“The Parma Monastery”, “Red and Black”), Honore de Balzac (“The Human Comedy”), Charles Dickens, who created several dozen novels. In Russian literature, the first examples of the novel were created by A. Pushkin and M. Lermontov. Internationally recognized masters of the realistic novel are I. Turgenev, L. Tolstoy, F. Dostoevsky. Their traditions were continued by A. France, R. Rolland, K. Hamsun, J. Golsuorsi, W. Faulkner, E. Hemingway, R. Tagore, R. Akutagawa.
P.A. Nedzvetsky, in the article “Phases of the Russian realistic novel,” examined the evolution of the Russian classical novel of the 19th century. and identified “novel phases unfolded in time”, which are not just chronological periods, they show “the main lines of the Russian novel (from
A. Pushkin to L. Tolstoy).” Let's consider the main provisions of this article.
Like other stable genres, the Russian classic novel of the 19th century. developed both under the influence of changing reality and according to its own internal logic. Its evolution can be represented in the form of novel phases unfolding in time, and not simply chronological periods. They are clearly visible in the main line of the Russian novel, represented by the works of Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol, Herzen, Goncharov, Turgenev, L. Tolstoy, Dostoevsky. “We, Russians,” testified L. Tolstoy; - We generally don’t know how to write novels in the sense in which this type of writing is understood... in Europe.<...>Russian artistic thought does not fit into this frame and is looking for a new one for himself. Hegel’s definition of the genre can be extended to the Russian novel with fundamental differences, since he defined the novel as “an epic of private life,” and Belinsky called Pushkin’s novel “Eugene Onegin” “a historical poem in the full sense of the word.” But the Russian novel cannot be reduced to an epic of pressing social “issues” (as was the case with J. Sand, V. Hugo, E. Zola) not because it is alien to them, but because it has always been associated with the most important ethical problems of humanity . In Western European literature, such a form was widespread as the novel of success (Y. Lotman’s term) or, more broadly, the novel of the individual’s confrontation with society, the world for the sake of independence from them (Balzac, Stendhal, Maupassant, Dickens, Thackeray). L. Tolstoy was ironic about the hero of such novels. In Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment there is only a superficial resemblance to such a novel. S. Zweig noted: “For Dickens, the goal of all aspirations will be a pretty cottage in the lap of nature, with a cheerful crowd of children; for Balzac, a castle, with a peerage title and millions... Which of Dostoevsky’s heroes strives for this? - Nobody. Balzac’s hero wants to enslave the world, Dostoevsky’s hero wants to overcome it.”
What did the Russian novel become? Back in 1835, Belinsky saw in the novel the form most convenient “for the poetic representation of a person considered in relation to public life" Instead of person, we can put personality, and we will get an almost exhaustive definition of the genre in “its national identity.” After all, the Russian “epic of the new world” is unthinkable without personality as “an individual being, separate from the people, curious... in itself,” but not closed in on itself, because from the very beginning it was inspired by the search for unity - unity. The hero of the Russian novel has always longed to find harmony with people and with the world. He is attracted by a world order that meets the goals and values of the individual as much as the rights and demands of the whole.
The unifying pathos of the Russian novel expanded the very genre-forming problem “personality - society (world)”. He owes him “the uncommon expression on his face...”. The fundamental national features inherent in the Russian novel are epic (epic) breadth; historicism along with mythology; deepest drama; the desire to “search through all issues”: social, moral, aesthetic, religious. The “Encyclopedia of Russian Life” was the majority of Russian novels: “Eugene Onegin” by Pushkin, “Dead Souls” by Gogol, “The Precipice” and “Oblomov” by Goncharov, “Nov” by Turgenev. Pathos expanded the very genre-forming problem (“personality - society (world). The relationship (conflict) of the individual with the world was actually transformed in confrontation - for the sake of the desired harmony between them (being and everyday life, general and private, spiritual and material, national and class, heroic and ordinary). In general, this collision, common to the Russian novel, changes from time to time. This process is very dynamic. The main phases of the emergence and development of the Russian novel owe their appearance to it: 1)
syncretic form of the 30s (Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol); 2)
novel in the strict sense of the concept (Herzen, Goncharov, Turgenev); 3)
universal synthetic phase of the 60s - 70s (Dostoevsky, L. Tolstoy).
The sources of syncretism in the novels of Pushkin, Lermontov, and Gogol are different. There was no Russian realistic novel before the novels of these authors. It grows from the subject of the image - ordinary, prosaic reality and adequate to it " modern man».
Let's consider the origins of this genre in the works of Russian classics. Gogol’s universal character in “Dead Souls” is Russia (“All Rus'”). The poem gives a national view of the characters and events depicted, there is a desire to draw heroes in a direct - mythological - understanding (in this light, it should be noted that Gogol’s orientation towards examples of medieval and ancient epic - the works of Dante, Homer, as well as the “small type of epic" - the poem ).
Lermontov’s “essay” is not at all limited to the “history of the human soul,” but also contains an image of modernity. Belinsky remarked: “Lermontov is a great poet: he objectified modern society.” Let us feel in the text the heroic-heroic spirit of the era of 1812, as Lermontov perceived it: “Yes, there were people in our time...” The author emphasized not only the painful split in society of the 30s, but also Pechorin’s desire to take over the burden of responsibility for one’s own destiny (“...I had a high assignment... But I did not guess this assignment...”) and the fate of my entire generation. The genre complexity of “A Hero of Our Time” is not limited to the combination of epic and lyricism. It also contains a dramatic confrontation between the hero and fate, which goes back to high tragedy. In Lermontov's time, this tragedy was deformed: the novel contains elements of tragicomedy, farce, masquerade acting (games), seasoned with the author's bitter irony. In ancient tragedy, fate is majestic and formidable. The hero of Lermontov's novel, Grushnitsky, has “fate - a turkey”, “nature is a fool”. Lermontov's dramatism is “fatal,” although he, reduced to a game, subjugates everything to himself.
The least syncretic form of Pushkin's novel is Eugene Onegin. This is a novel because the objects of its depiction are ordinary people, albeit with a developed personality. According to Belinsky, Pushkin in Onegin “took... life as it is... with all the coldness, with all its prose and vulgarity.” The task of poeticizing this life turned out to be difficult. Its creation presupposed a new aesthetic philosophy of reality. If classicists and romantics divided the world into ordinary (private) and “important” (or sublime), “low” and “high” spheres, then Pushkin contrasted this in “Eugene Onegin” with a single life, ordinary at its core, but very diverse. The poetry of a particular person, event, scene is not due to “chanting”, but to inexhaustibility. The concept of the “ordinary” allowed Pushkin, within the framework of private destinies, to grasp and typify the general trends of Russian society “into one of most interesting moments its development" (Belinsky). Pushkin discovered an “ordinary” character, inexhaustible in its possibilities. The prosaic language of the 20s was not suitable for this (the prose was monophonic or pathetically lofty, like Radishchev’s, or gracefully elegant, like Karamzin’s, or colloquially naturalistic, like A. Izmailov, V. Narezh- nogo). All that remained was poetic speech. A “novel in verse” appeared - a syncretic genre. The “age of heroes” gave way to the “modern prosaic state” (Hegel).
The concepts of “new age” and “modern man” were heard in Pushkin, in Baratynsky (“The Last Poet”), in Tyutchev (“Our Century”), in Lermontov (“Masquerade”, “Duma”). The Russian novelist began to observe the man of “the present century with his selfish feelings, seasoned with pride and weakness, high spiritual impulses and insignificant actions.” He began to show the contradictions of man and a man entangled in the “mud of little things,” as Lermontov and Gogol did. The poetry of “being” is identified with “common life,” and prose with the real state and life of a person “of our time.” Instead of the interpenetration of poetry and prose, there is a predominance of the first over the second. Thus, in Onegin, people’s patriarchal morality (duty) is higher and richer than the demands of individual passion; in “A Hero of Our Time”, in the light of true heroism, the deeds of even such a person as Pechorin appear petty and insignificant; V " Dead souls“The idea of national “reconciliation” stands in stark contrast to class-caste isolation and disunity. The drama of this novel form is also of a special nature.
In the first examples of the Russian realistic novel, an attempt was made to solve the most important problems of modern man as a being, first of all, a social one: national and universal. And therefore, already in the initial phase, the novel became the focus of Russian ethics, sociology and philosophy (hence such a craving for it in both Dostoevsky and L. Tolstoy), which were born from a typologically similar turning point in Russian and world history.
The Russian novel of the late 40s and 50s, in terms of structural content, is a direct opponent of the novel of syncretic form.
The novelists of the 40s and 50s (Goncharov, Herzen, Pisemsky) creatively developed the important achievement of their predecessors - the “mechanism” of the polyphonic narrative word, which is adequate to the content of reality. And there was a natural transition from the form “in verse” to an objective narrative in prose unconstrained by lyricism, which is natural for a genre that reflects reality in its completeness and “perfect truth” (Belinsky). They also learned the lessons of Lermontov’s psychological analysis, and writers such as Goncharov also adopted Gogol’s art of typological generalizations. They abandoned the epic, heroic or tragic-mythological structure and pathos. They were characterized by “anti-mythological thinking” (Yu. Lotman). In their field of vision it was no longer “all of Rus'”: “Gogol’s ideal was too high; to fully embody it was... an impossible task for art” (Pisemsky). The focus of the writers of this era is on the class-unlimited individual and his dramatic relationship with society. A strict form of this genre is being formed238.
The anti-mythologism and anti-syncretism of the novel of the 40s and 50s was natural, because it had an ideological premise. Their creators did not perceive the prosaicization of life as a “spiritual eclipse” (Belinsky) or illness, but recognized this phenomenon as a historical immutability and inevitability. “Everything is so ordinary...”, “everything fits some prosaic level,” notes Goncharov in the novel “Frigate “Pallada”” (1858), characterizing the “picture of the world” that opened up to him on his trip around the world. The general thing is the search for a life “norm” (Goncharov), in which a person does not sacrifice his own interests. In the “general - personal” problem, novelists are more interested in the “personal”.
The relationship between spiritually-eternal (absolute, limitless) and materially-finite (relative, temporary) principles and aspirations of man is explored. The formation of personality in the novels of Goncharov and Turgenev was accompanied by a feeling of social loneliness, uselessness and spiritual nihilism that resulted in extremes (Bazarov, Mark Volokhov) or spiritual maximalism (Rudin, Lisa Kalitina, Vera, Raisky). This hopelessness of personal fate is mythologized in the novel.
The Russian novel, unlike the Western European one, tries to “remove” this antinomy in the social,
family or practical life of his hero. The ideal of personality is assessed from the standpoint of real-practical life. And society is tested by the presence of higher values in it. This happened because the “social and family” Russian way of life (Goncharov) stood as an insurmountable barrier for a person who wanted to find “a balance of practical aspects with the subtle needs of the spirit”; the hero’s personality was tested by his understanding of duty to the country, society; society was tested by its attitude towards personality, to eternal values. There was a so-called double test.
Speaking about the second phase of development of the Russian novel, R.A. Niedzwiecki concludes: “It is not the novel, therefore, that grows out of myth, but the latter is created or adapted to the aesthetic tasks of the novel.”
The author of the article considers the third phase of the development of the Russian novel (Dostoevsky, Tolstoy in the 60s and 70s) as universally synthetic.
Tolstoy and Dostoevsky do not accept the selective hierarchical perception of the world, which in the novels of Turgenev and Goncharov determined the centripetal nature of its structure, as well as the content-aesthetic inequality of psychological and everyday-writing components. Any part of “War and Peace” (family or “historical”, everyday or psychological) is equivalent in content: the human essence is revealed to the same extent in everyday as in spiritual or social manifestations (the hunt in Otradnoye or the scenes at the bedside of the dying Bezukhov reveal the concept in this way the same as the picture of the Battle of Borodino). Goncharov was amazed that in Tolstoy’s novel “even in minor characters” the characteristic features of Russian folk life are embodied.”
In Turgenev and Goncharov, the role of the bearer of national and universal values belongs to a spiritually developed personality. The “simple” person is “secondary” in their works. This view was rejected by Dostoevsky and Tolstoy. For Dostoevsky, not only Raskolnikov and Porfiry Petrovich, but also Sonya and the dumb Lizaveta took part in the ideological duel. Dostoevsky obviously has an ideological and artistic
natural equality of a “primitive” person with representatives of the “Russian cultural system”.
The novel of the 60s and 70s opened up a new way of artistic generalization. According to Goncharov, it is impossible to typify “chaos, decay,” but Dostoevsky poses and solves precisely this problem and wants to think about modernity. The novel of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy breaks the tight boundaries of a love conflict. According to N. Strakhov, Tolstoy’s novel is not about love, but about family... In Goncharov, “the feeling of love is either the motive, the content, the goal of almost every aspiration, every activity, every ambition, self-love...”. In the Russian novel of this period, love “enters some kind of higher synthesis in the spiritual spectrum of the heroes... merges, and is often overlapped by completely different aspirations.”
The authors of novels of the 40s and 50s are distrustful of social and political conflicts (the only exception is Turgenev's Nov). In Tolstoy, the scene of Bogucharov’s rebellion (“War and Peace”), Konstantin Levin’s search for connections with the peasantry (“Anna Karenina”) are no less significant than the spiritual quest of A. Bolkonsky or the story of Anna Karenina. Dostoevsky directly used material from Russian political trials in “The Possessed” and “The Teenager.” In his novels, the interpenetration of the existential with the everyday, the spiritual and psychological with the social is obvious. One of the main problems is “personality - society,” but the problem is complicated by the fact that it was a time of “shakyness” (Dostoevsky) of many norms. Not only the “previous order” is questioned and denied, but morality, morality and ethics as such. Tolstoy sought to unite his heroes within the framework of “society - family”, Dostoevsky - within the framework of “society - brotherhood”. Towards the people's truth, being purified and resurrected in it, the intellectual heroes of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky go - through delusions, doubts, retreats, and sometimes crimes. In the novel of the 60s and 70s, the orientation of the heroes of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky towards “popular thought” is necessarily present.
The universalization of the Russian novel is also manifested through its synthesis of drama (tragedy) and epic (epic canvas).
The novel of the 60s and 70s gravitated towards myth, but not in the heroic-heroic origins, but in the biblical-Evan Gelic ones. Here is “the organic interpenetration of sociality and psychologism, mythology and philosophy” (Gogol). In the works of Turgenev and Goncharov, the myth was romanticized. The evangelical mythology of the works of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy is based on the understanding that the Christian idea for them seems to be the guarantor of morality and ethics. This allowed the novel of the 60s and 70s to comprehensively consider all the issues of our time.
In Russian prose of the 80s and 90s, the rigor of the novel form was replaced by flexibility and mobility of small forms more adequate to this task (Garshin, Korolenko, Gorky, Chekhov, L. Andreev, etc.). L. Tolstoy predicted this: “The form of the novel is not only not eternal, but it passes.”
In the best examples of literature late XIX- beginning of the 20th century The Russian classic novel continued its new life. And this period can be designated as the fourth phase.
The entire 20th century critics, discussing the problem of the genre, spoke of the “death of the novel.” But it is enough to recall the novels of A. Platonov, M. Bulgakov, M. Sholokhov, L. Leonov, V. Kaverin, A. Bitov and some novels of postmodernists, as well as the novels of R. Rolland, J. Joyce, F. Kafka, G. Hesse , as the idea appears that this statement is premature239.
The lengthy presentation of Nedzvetsky’s article is due to the fact that the author, in our opinion, created a conceptual picture of the history of the development of the Russian novel.
Most realistic novels written in the 19th and 20th centuries should be classified as socio-psychological. In such works, the novelist sets himself the task of showing social types, their psychology and the life circumstances that shape these characters (“Oblomov” by I. Goncharov, “The Lord Golovlevs” by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin).
A novel with a broad depiction of folk life in critical historical epochs received the definition of an epic novel (Greek eroroia - a collection of legends): “War and Peace” by L. Tolstoy, “Walking through Torment” by A.
Tolstoy, “The Life of Klim Samgin” by M. Gorky, “Quiet Don” by M. Sholokhov. The epic comprehends the crossroads of history and the life of a “private person.”
The novel, created during the Soviet period of history, entered into world literature in various genre varieties: 1) historical and biographical (“Kyukhlya” by Yu. Tynyanov); 2) historical (“Peter the Great” by A. Tolstoy, “Tais of Athens” by I.A. Efremov, “Impatience” by Y. Trifonov, “Tsushima” by A. Novikov-Priboy); 3) national-historical (“DataTutashkhia” by Ch. Amirejibi); 4) heroic-romantic (“Destruction” and “Young Guard” by A. Fadeev, “Waves of the Black Sea” by V. Kataev, “Partisans” by G. Adamovich); 5) philosophical (“The Master and Margarita” by M. Bulgakov, “Russian Forest” by L. Leonov, “Doctor Zhivago” by B. Pasternak); 6) socio-psychological (“Cities and Years” by K. Fedin); 7) dystopian novel (“We” by E. Zamyatin, “Chevengur” by A. Platonov); 8) satirical (“The Twelve Chairs” and “The Golden Calf” by I. Ilf and E. Petrov, “Envy” by Y. Olesha, “The Extraordinary Adventures of Julio Jurenito and His Disciples” by I. Ehrenburg); 9) science fiction (“The Razor Blade” by I.A. Efremov, “Aelita” by A. Tolstoy, “Amphibian Man” by A. Belyaev); 10) novel-parable (“The Scaffold” by Ch. Aitmatov); 11) production (“Cement” by F. Gladkov, “Sot” by L. Leonov, “People from the Outback” by A. Malyshkin, “Battle on the Way” by G. Nikolaeva); 12) adventure (“Two Captains” by V. Kaverin, “Erendorf Island” by V.
Kataeva); 13) a novel of education (“How the Steel Was Tempered” by N. Ostrovsky), etc.
In the variety of genre definitions of the novel, two groups can be distinguished: 1) thematic (historical, autobiographical, detective, adventure, satirical, fantastic, philosophical, erotic, sea, etc.) and 2) structural (novel in verse, novel-pamphlet, novel- parable, saga novel, feuilleton novel, box novel [a set of episodes], river novel [a series of novels with common characters or plot], epistolary novel, etc.).
For literature of the 20th century. a phenomenon called “artistic synthesis” became characteristic. It manifested itself most clearly in the novel form, which T. Mann called an intellectual novel. This is by no means a different genre or a new stylistic formation. This is a different worldview and a different method, corresponding to “... the time, the era of historical upheavals,<...>who raised before us the question of man, forcing us to imagine everything human as something unified.<...>The human is whole,” asserted T. Mann240.
Among the exemplary intellectual novels are V. Nabokov’s novel “The Defense of Luzhin”, the novels “Joseph and His Brothers” and “Doctor Faustus” by T. Mann, “Steppenwolf” and “The Glass Bead Game” by G. Hesse, “The Hopscotch Game” "X. Cortazar, "Pushkin House" by A. Bitov and others.
“A true masterpiece of modern conceptual synthesis” was called by L.G. Andreev’s novel “The Death of Virgil”, arguing that the world in it “... is alternative: life and death, art and life, politics and art, culture and the “everyday” - everything is in a state of discussion, a dispute, all the more heartbreaking because it is concentrated in the soul of the great poet, tormented by doubts and disappointments, and finds resolution in the final synthesis, in the merging of Being and Non-Being, Earth and Cosmos, the given Self and the Universal Spirit - in the triumphant absolute Unity.”241
Synthetic novel forms are a frequent occurrence in latest literature. Let us take as an example the novel-commentary “ True story Green musicians" Evg. Popova (1999). The text of this novel occupies 24 pages, and the commentary to it is 73. The novel part contains all the elements of the traditional narrative structure, and the commentary expands the space of the novel, projecting additional information onto it, a direct journalistic assessment of what is depicted. It contains many true facts of Soviet and post-Soviet history. Thus, Evg. Popov, “using the technique of commentary that has become established in postmodern literature<...>in fact, creates a version of artistic synthesis, successfully combining “old” and “new” experience, the “thesis” of a traditional narrative and the “antithesis” of a commentary novel”242.
Another genre form of epic is the story. In school and university textbooks it is defined as an epic work, a cross between a novel and a short story - it is more than a story, but less romance in terms of volume and number of actors. However, such an interpretation of the story deprives it of the right to exist as an independent genre and makes it difficult to define. Following him, A. Pushkin’s story “ Captain's daughter» more novel by M.Yu. Lermontov’s “Hero of Our Time,” and M. Gorky’s largest work, “The Life of Klim Samgin,” should be considered not a novel, but a story.
The boundary between a story and a novel should be sought not in their volume, but in the features of the composition. Unlike a novel, which tends toward an action-packed composition, the story presents the material chronically. Based on this, a story can be defined as a type of epic work of medium or large form, constructed in the form of a narrative about events in their natural sequence.
The origins of the story as a genre go back to the distant past. IN ancient Russian literature the term “story” had a very broad meaning. The “story” was understood as any narrative about any events (“The Tale of Bygone Years”, “The Tale of Batu’s Invasion of Ryazan”, “The Tale of Misfortune”). Gradually, the meaning of the term narrowed to the concept that we cited above. A typical “pure” form of the story is works of a biographical nature, artistic chronicles, for example, S. Aksakov’s dilogy “The Childhood Years of Bagrov the Grandson”, “Family Chronicle” and “Poshekhon Antiquity” by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, M. Gorky’s trilogy “Childhood” , “In People”, “My Universities”, etc. They contain one type of narration in the form of a chronicle, where the image of the narrator determines the artistic unity. There is no single plot with a cause-and-effect relationship in the story; there are individual episodes that became a point highest voltage, and since there is no single end-to-end action, they are connected to each other according to the principle of chronicle, i.e. with the active “participation” of the author. We find a striking example of a story with this kind of narration in “Notes from the House of the Dead” by F. Dostoevsky, “The Enchanted Wanderer” by N. Leskov, “The Steppe” by A. Chekhov, “The Village” by I. Bunin.
The story is a short epic prose form. This is a short epic with a limited number of characters (most often the story is about one or two characters). The story usually narrows down the time and place of action. So, in the story of A.P. Chekhov's "Chameleon" the action takes place for a short time in the market square, but it fully reveals the character of the police supervisor Ochumelov, who changes his opinion about the fate of the little dog depending on whether it belongs to the general or not. The plot of a story is usually some event that gives the writer the opportunity to stage important question and reveal the character of your hero.
The story is characterized by one problem and one event. For example, in I. Turgenev’s story “Mumu” the main event is the story of Gerasim’s acquisition and loss of a dog. This event served as the reason for a sharp clash between the serf and the lady. Among the stories, a distinction is made between works of the sketch (descriptive-narrative) and short story (conflict-narrative) types.
A story with a sharply developing plot and an unexpected ending is called a norella (Italian novella - lit. news). According to Goethe's definition, a short story is “a plausible story about an unheard of and entertaining event.” A novella, unlike a short story, does not contain a deep psychological development of the image; the hero is not revealed in socio-political, but in moral essence. A classic example of a short story is Boccaccio's Decameron. Recognized masters of the genre - E.T.A. Hoffmann, P. Merimee, A. Pushkin, O. Henry, Guy de Maupassant, J. London, S. Zweig, A. Chekhov, K. Paustovsky. In the era of realism, the short story was replaced by the short story.
Among other epic genres in modern literature, the essay has been fruitfully developing - a type of small form that differs from the story in the absence of a single and acute conflict. Conventionally, essays can be divided into fiction and artistic-documentary. The first depicts fictitious persons and events (“Morals of Rasteryaeva Street” by G. Uspensky, “Essays on the Bursa” by N. Pomyalovsky), the second - genuine persons and facts of life with the exact designation of places, dates, names (memoir essays by M. Gorky “Lion Tolstoy”, “Korolenko”, “A.P. Chekhov”, etc.). An artistic essay differs from an essay as a type of journalistic literature in the imagery of its presentation. There are such types of essays as travel essays (“Letters of a Russian Traveler” by N.M. Karamzin).
A fable is a short story in verse or prose that has an allegorical meaning, with a directly formulated moral conclusion. This is usually a short poetic work of a moralizing and satirical nature. The story in it is told, as a rule, in an allegorical form; there is comedy in the fable. Most often, its characters are animals: fox, donkey, wolf, lamb, etc., but people can also act (“Peasants and the River”, “Demyanova’s Ear”, “The Picky Bride”). The composition of the fable is based on the technique of antithesis. An almost obligatory component of a fable composition is dialogue (it was not for nothing that V.G. Belinsky called fables “little comedies”). The founder of the fable genre, the ancient Greek fabulist Aesop (VI century BC), wrote fables in prose. Russian fables are written primarily in free verse. “In Russia, the main stages in the development of the fable were the amusing fable of A.P. Sumarokova, mentor I.I. Khemnitsera, graceful I.I. Dmitrieva, slyly sophisticated IA Krylova, colorful and everyday A.E. Izmailov"1, in the 20th century. the fables were written by D. Bedny and S. Mikhalkov.
The organizing principle of an epic work is a narrative about the destinies, actions, thoughts of the characters, and the events of their lives (the plot of the work). It is characterized by a temporal distance: Aristotle noted that the poet talks “about an event as something separate from himself,” the narration is conducted from the outside and has the form of the past tense.
Works of the epic kind know no limitations in the volume of text. Chekhov's short stories and epic paintings by L. Tolstoy ("War and Peace"), J. Galsworthy ("The Forsyte Saga"), A. Tolstoy ("Walking in Torment"), M. Sholokhov ("Quiet Don") "absorb “includes a huge number of events, human characters, which contributes to the depiction of life and man in all their diversity.
In epic works, the presence of a narrator is very important, whose speech characterizes not only the object of the statement, but also the speaker himself, who often acts as a witness and interpreter of events and characters. The vision of the world, the way of thinking of the one who narrates, is always imprinted in the work. That is why in the works of B.M. Eikhenbaum, V.V. Vinogradova, M.M. Bakhtin and others proved the legitimacy of introducing the term “image of the narrator” into literary criticism. So, G.A. Gukovsky developed this position in his book about N.V. Gogol: “Every image in art forms an idea not only of what is depicted, but also<...>about the depicter, the bearer of presentation<...>The narrator is not only a more or less specific image,<...>but also a certain figurative idea, principle and appearance of the speaker, or, in other words, certainly a certain point of view on what is being presented, ideological and simply geographical, since it is impossible to describe from anywhere and there cannot be a description without a descriptor”1.
There are several ways of storytelling: 1.
The “absolutization” of the distance between the characters and the narrator was characteristic of the heroic epic: Homer’s maximum objectivity. According to Schelling, the epic “needs a narrator who, by the equanimity of his story, constantly distracts us from too much involvement in the characters and directs the attention of the listeners to the net result”1. In ancient prose, the distance between the narrator and the characters disappears (“The Golden Ass” by Apuleius). 2.
In the literature of the 18th - 20th centuries. Another type of narration appears - subjective. The writer looks at the world through the eyes of his hero. Thus, Pushkin assessed Pugachev’s personality from Grinev’s point of view; in “War and Peace” the Battle of Borodino is presented in the perception of Pierre Bezukhov; Stendhal, as it were, transforms into young Fabrizio, describing the battle of Waterloo (“The Parma Monastery”).
Flaubert argued: “You need to be transported into the character.” This is how he worked: in works on the psychology of art, an astonishing fact is cited: while working on the episode of the dying of Emma Bovary, Flaubert lost consciousness, and during an examination, traces of potassium cyanide were found in his blood, which poisoned the heroine of his novel.
The coincidence of points of view of the narrator and the hero in novel prose of the 19th - 20th centuries. speaks of an increased interest in the inner world of man and the desire to understand life through the prism of different value orientations; it gave artistic speech internal dialogue. 3.
The most common form of epic storytelling is third-person retelling. A personified narrator, who speaks from the actual “first” person, is a narrator who can simultaneously be a character in the work (for example, Maxim Maksimych in the story “Bela” from Lermontov’s novel; Ivan Vasilyevich in L. Tolstoy’s story “After the Ball”).
IN autobiographical works Garin-Mikhailovsky, L. Tolstoy, M. Gorky, I. Shmelev, with the facts of life and worldview, many of the narrators-characters are close (but not identical) to the writers themselves. In this regard, we can talk about the autopsychologism of these works. Sometimes the life positions of the hero-storyteller diverge from the author’s (“My Life” by A. Chekhov)243.
One of the founders of Russian literary criticism was V.G. Belinsky. And although serious steps were taken in antiquity in developing the concept of literary gender (Aristotle), it was Belinsky who owned the scientifically based theory of three literary genera, which you can get acquainted with in detail by reading Belinsky’s article “The Division of Poetry into Genera and Types.”
There are three types of fiction: epic(from Greek Epos, narrative), lyrical(a lyre was a musical instrument, accompanied by chanting poems) and dramatic(from Greek Drama, action).
When presenting this or that subject to the reader (meaning the subject of conversation), the author chooses different approaches to it:
First approach: in detail tell about the object, about the events associated with it, about the circumstances of the existence of this object, etc.; in this case, the author’s position will be more or less detached, the author will act as a kind of chronicler, narrator, or choose one of the characters as the narrator; the main thing in such a work will be the story, the narration about the subject, the leading type of speech will be precisely narration; this kind of literature is called epic;
The second approach: you can tell not so much about the events, but about the impressed, which they produced on the author, about those feelings which they called; image inner world, experiences, impressions and will relate to the lyrical genre of literature; exactly experience becomes the main event of the lyrics;
Third approach: you can depict item in action, show him on stage; introduce to the reader and viewer of it surrounded by other phenomena; this kind of literature is dramatic; In a drama, the author's voice will be heard least often - in stage directions, that is, the author's explanations of the actions and remarks of the characters.
Look at the table and try to remember its contents:
Types of fiction
| EPOS | DRAMA | LYRICS |
| (Greek - narrative) story about events, the fate of the heroes, their actions and adventures, a depiction of the external side of what is happening (even feelings are shown from their external manifestation). The author can directly express his attitude to what is happening. |
(Greek - action) image events and relationships between characters on the stage(a special way of writing text). The direct expression of the author's point of view in the text is contained in the stage directions. |
(from the name of the musical instrument) experience events; depiction of feelings, inner world, emotional state; the feeling becomes the main event. |
Each type of literature in turn includes a number of genres.
GENRE is a historically established group of works united by common features of content and form. Such groups include novels, stories, poems, elegies, short stories, feuilletons, comedies, etc. In literary criticism the concept is often introduced literary type, it's more broad concept than genre. In this case, the novel will be considered a type of fiction, and genres will be various types of novels, for example, adventure, detective, psychological, parable novel, dystopian novel, etc.
Examples of genus-species relationships in the literature:
- Genus: dramatic; view: comedy; genre: sitcom.
- Genus: epic; view: story; genre: fantastic story etc.
Genres being categories historical, appear, develop and eventually “leave” from the “active stock” of artists depending on historical era: ancient lyricists did not know the sonnet; in our time, an archaic genre has become one that was born in ancient times and popular in XVII-XVIII centuries Oh yeah; Romanticism of the 19th century gave rise to detective literature, etc.
Consider the following table, which presents the types and genres related to the various types of word art:
Genera, types and genres of artistic literature
| EPOS | DRAMA | LYRICS | |||
| People's | Author's | Folk | Author's | Folk | Author's |
| Myth Poem (epic): Heroic Strogovoinskaya Fabulous- legendary Historical... Fairy tale Bylina Thought Legend Tradition Ballad Parable Minor genres: proverbs sayings puzzles nursery rhymes... |
EpicNovel:
Historical Fantastic. Adventurous Psychological R.-parable Utopian Social... Minor genres: Tale Story Novella Fable Parable Ballad Lit. fairy tale... |
A game Ritual Folk drama Raek Nativity scene... |
Tragedy Comedy: provisions, characters, masks... Drama: philosophical social historical social-philosophical Vaudeville Farce Tragifarce... |
Song | Oh yeah Hymn Elegy Sonnet Message Madrigal Romance Rondo Epigram... |
Modern literary criticism also highlights fourth, a related genre of literature that combines the features of the epic and lyrical genres: lyric-epic, which refers to poem. And indeed, by telling the reader a story, the poem manifests itself as an epic; Revealing to the reader the depth of feelings, the inner world of the person telling this story, the poem manifests itself as lyricism.
In the table you came across the expression “small genres”. Epic and lyrical works are divided into large and small genres, largely in volume. Large ones include an epic, a novel, a poem, and small ones include a story, story, fable, song, sonnet, etc.
Read V. Belinsky’s statement about the genre of the story:
If a story, according to Belinsky, is “a leaf from the book of life,” then, using his metaphor, one can figuratively define a novel from a genre point of view as “a chapter from the book of life,” and a story as “a line from the book of life.”
Minor epic genres to which the story relates is "intense" in terms of content, prose: due to the small volume, the writer does not have the opportunity to “spread his thoughts along the tree”, get carried away with detailed descriptions, enumerations, reproduce a large number of events in detail, and the reader often needs to say a lot.
The story is characterized by the following features:
- small volume;
- The plot is most often based on one event, the rest are only plotted by the author;
- a small number of characters: usually one or two central characters;
- the author is interested in a specific topic;
- one main issue is being resolved, the remaining issues are “derived” from the main one.
So,
STORY is a small prose work with one or two main characters, dedicated to depicting a single event. Somewhat more voluminous story, but the difference between a story and a story is not always possible to catch: some people call A. Chekhov’s work “Duel” a short story, and some - a big story. The following is important: as the critic E. Anichkov wrote at the beginning of the twentieth century, " it is the person’s personality that is at the center of the stories, not a whole group of people."
The heyday of Russian short prose begins in the 20s of the 19th century, which gave excellent examples of short epic prose, including the absolute masterpieces of Pushkin ("Belkin's Tales", "The Queen of Spades") and Gogol ("Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka", St. Petersburg stories ), romantic short stories by A. Pogorelsky, A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky, V. Odoevsky and others. In the second half of the 19th century, short epic works by F. Dostoevsky ("The Dream of a Funny Man", "Notes from the Underground"), N. Leskov ("Lefty", "The Stupid Artist", "Lady Macbeth" were created Mtsensk district"), I. Turgenev ("Hamlet of Shchigrovsky District", "King of the Steppes Lear", "Ghosts", "Notes of a Hunter"), L. Tolstoy ("Prisoner of the Caucasus", "Hadji Murat", "Cossacks", Sevastopol stories) , A. Chekhov as the greatest master of the short story, works by V. Garshin, D. Grigorovich, G. Uspensky and many others.
The twentieth century also did not remain in debt - and stories by I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, M. Zoshchenko, Teffi, A. Averchenko, M. Bulgakov appear... Even such recognized lyricists as A. Blok, N. Gumilyov, M. Tsvetaeva “they stooped to despicable prose,” in the words of Pushkin. It can be argued that at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries the small epic genre took over leading position in Russian literature.
And for this reason alone, one should not think that the story raises some minor problems and touches on shallow topics. Form story concise, and the plot is sometimes uncomplicated and concerns, at first glance, simple, as L. Tolstoy said, “natural” relationships: the complex chain of events in the story simply has nowhere to unfold. But this is precisely the task of the writer, to enclose a serious and often inexhaustible subject of conversation in a small space of text.
If the plot of the miniature I. Bunin "Muravsky Way", consisting of only 64 words, captures only a few moments of the conversation between the traveler and the coachman in the middle of the endless steppe, then the plot of the story A. Chekhov "Ionych" would be enough for a whole novel: the artistic time of the story covers almost a decade and a half. But it doesn’t matter to the author what happened to the hero at each stage of this time: it is enough for him to “snatch” from the hero’s life chain several “links” - episodes, similar to each other, like drops of water, and the whole life of Doctor Startsev becomes extremely clear to the author, and to the reader. “As you live one day of your life, you will live your whole life,” Chekhov seems to be saying. At the same time, the writer, reproducing the situation in the house of the most “cultured” family in the provincial town of S., can focus all his attention on the knocking of knives from the kitchen and the smell of fried onions ( artistic details! ), but to talk about several years of a person’s life as if they never happened at all, or as if it were a “passing”, uninteresting time: “Four years have passed”, “Several more years have passed”, as if it is not worth wasting time and paper for the image of such a trifle...
The depiction of a person’s daily life, devoid of external storms and shocks, but in a routine that forces a person to forever wait for happiness that never comes, became the cross-cutting theme of A. Chekhov’s stories, which determined the further development of Russian short prose.
Historical upheavals, of course, dictate other themes and subjects to the artist. M. Sholokhov in the cycle of Don stories he talks about terrible and wonderful human destinies during the time of revolutionary upheaval. But the point here is not so much in the revolution itself, but in the eternal problem of man’s struggle with himself, in the eternal tragedy of the collapse of the old familiar world, which humanity has experienced many times. And therefore Sholokhov turns to plots that have long been rooted in world literature, depicting private human life as if in the context of world legendary history. Yes, in the story "Mole" Sholokhov uses a plot as ancient as the world about a duel between father and son, not recognized by each other, which we encounter in Russian epics, in the epics of ancient Persia and medieval Germany... But if ancient epic explains the tragedy of the father who killed his son in battle by the laws of fate, which is not subject to man, then Sholokhov speaks about the problem of a person’s choice of his life path, a choice that determines all further events and in the end makes one a beast in human form, and the other an equal to the greatest heroes of the past.
When studying topic 5, you should read those works of fiction that can be considered within the framework of this topic, namely:
- A. Pushkin. The stories "Dubrovsky", "Blizzard"
- N. Gogol. The stories "The Night Before Christmas", "Taras Bulba", "The Overcoat", "Nevsky Prospekt".
- I.S. Turgenev. The story "The Noble Nest"; "Notes of a Hunter" (2-3 stories of your choice); story "Asya"
- N.S. Leskov. Stories "Lefty", "Stupid Artist"
- L.N. Tolstoy. Stories "After the Ball", "The Death of Ivan Ilyich"
- M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Fairy tales "The Wise Minnow", "The Hero", "The Bear in the Voivodeship"
- A.P. Chekhov. Stories “Jumping”, “Ionych”, “Gooseberry”, “About Love”, “Lady with a Dog”, “Ward Number Six”, “In the Ravine”; other stories of your choice
- I.A.Bunin. Stories and stories “Mr. from San Francisco”, “Sukhodol”, “Easy Breath”, “Antonov Apples”, “Dark Alleys” by A.I. Kuprin. The story "Olesya", the story "Garnet Bracelet"
- M. Gorky. Stories “Old Woman Izergil”, “Makar Chudra”, “Chelkash”; collection "Untimely Thoughts"
- A.N. Tolstoy. The story "Viper"
- M. Sholokhov. Stories "Mole", "Alien Blood", "The Fate of Man";
- M. Zoshchenko. Stories "Aristocrat", "Monkey Language", "Love" and others of your choice
- A.I. Solzhenitsyn. The story "Matrenin's yard"
- V. Shukshin. Stories “I Believe!”, “Boots”, “Space” nervous system and a lot of fat", "Pardon me, madam!", "Stalled"
Before completing task 6, consult a dictionary and establish the exact meaning of the concept you will be working with.
Recommended literature for work 4:
- Grechnev V.Ya. Russian story of the end XIX - early XX century. - L., 1979.
- Zhuk A.A. Russian prose second half of the 19th century century. - M.: Education, 1981.
- Literary encyclopedic dictionary. - M., 1987.
- Literary criticism: Reference materials. - M., 1988.
- Russian story XIX century: History and problems of the genre. - L., 1973.