The novel gives a broad picture of the socio-political life of Russia at the end of the 19th century. The Russian intelligentsia is one of the main historical problems of our country. Problems in the sense that this social layer I could never find myself, decide on my own ideals. Intellectuals, liberals, terrorists - after reading the novel you will have no questions left about why in the Russian Empire these concepts were synonymous for many.
2. “Uncle Vanya”, Anton Chekhov
After watching the theatrical production of Uncle Vanya, Gorky wrote to Chekhov: “Uncle Vanya and The Seagull are a new kind of dramatic art […]. Other dramas do not distract a person from reality to philosophical generalizations - yours do this.” What can we say, Chekhov’s plays are truly the most powerful in Russian literature.
“Uncle Vanya” is in no way inferior to “The Cherry Orchard” or “Three Sisters”. But for some reason the Ministry of Education excluded the play from the list of required reading books, which affected its current popularity. If you decide to read it, keep in mind that this work is heavy and the narrative in it is told in a serious tone unusual for Chekhov.
3. “Red Laughter”, Leonid Andreev
If “Red Laughter” is mentioned in literature lessons, it is only briefly. The main attention is paid to another story of the author - “Judas Iscariot”. But “Red Laughter” is such a stylistically precise work that you get goosebumps not from the described horrors of war, but from the sonorous, rich syllable.
Nobody wrote about the war like that. No one else ever wrote like that. If you want to clearly and clearly find out what the word “style” means in literature, read Andreev.
4. “The Head of Professor Dowell”, Alexander Belyaev
Belyaev's work is entertaining in nature. That is why, probably, his works were not included in school textbooks. However, the ability to entertain while maintaining a great art style is also worth a lot. Even though Belyaev is now rated as a classic of fiction, we don’t always have to read to think about the problems of the world, right? “The Head of Professor Dowell” is a fascinating experiment in science fiction literature for its time.
5. Collected Works, Daniil Kharms
Kharms - a prankster and a daredevil Soviet literature. His absurdist prose is devoid of an obvious moralizing message, which is why schoolchildren receive certificates without learning anything about the most original Soviet writer. Select central work Kharms is quite difficult, so we recommend reading the first thing that comes to hand. Here, for example, is the whole story “New Anatomy”:
One little girl grew two blue ribbons on her nose. The case is especially rare, because on one tape it was written “Mars”, and on the other “Jupiter”.
This novel needs no introduction. Ostap Bender’s phrases have long been disassembled into quotes and have become popular. Even if for some reason you did not have a chance to read the legendary novel about the great schemer, you have probably seen one of its many film adaptations. However, this is the case when none of the film incarnations compares with the literary original. After all, these are like Shanghai leopards compared to Mexican jerboas. Infinitely better.
7. “The Living and the Dead”, Konstantin Simonov
The trilogy by Konstantin Simonov is dedicated to the Great Patriotic War. It is based on personal experience author, and perhaps that is why it turned out to be so inspired and sincere. This is a chronicle of the events of 1941–1945, presented through the prism of the views of war participants. The work is fundamental, large-scale, with many deeply written images, strong dialogues and storylines. "War and Peace" of the 20th century.
It’s strange why Soviet classic science fiction writers are still not included in the school curriculum. Almost every one of their books is philosophical and covers a wide range of topics. “Roadside Picnic” is perhaps the authors’ most famous work. The Stalker book series originates here. “The Zone,” even before becoming a popular place for the works of literary epigones, was introduced by the Strugatskys as the deepest metaphor. A metaphor that summarizes all human activity and gives it the universal meaning of the pursuit of happiness.
9. “The Razor’s Edge”, Ivan Efremov
“The Razor's Edge” is a novel in which Efremov expressed his entire worldview. That is why it is so multifaceted and affects great amount different topics: science, philosophy, mysticism, love, yoga. The writer spent such difficult work on the synthesis of materialistic, metaphysical and mystical teachings, that his book can be considered not only as piece of art, but also as a kind of philosophical treatise. It is not surprising that after writing the novel, Efremov acquired the status of a spiritual guru.
10. Novels, Vladimir Nabokov
We can understand why there is no Lolita in the school curriculum. But why so little time is given to other works of the author like “The Defense of Luzhin” or “Invitation to Execution” is a mystery. Nabokov discovered a completely new dimension of the Russian language - one that was unknown to either Pushkin or Tolstoy. His words sound, smell, feel on the skin and tongue. This is a synesthetic feast of sounds and colors, where topics that are not the most traditional for Russian literature are raised, such as the relationship between the author and his creation, and the illusory nature of the world.
11. “Generation “P””, Victor Pelevin
“Generation P” is the bible of the nineties. What is the new Russia, what are the values of the emerging world, where are their sources and what is the meaning of the media - Pelevin, of course, digs much deeper than the level of an entertaining story about the adventures of the talented PR specialist Vavilen Tatarsky. The eternal problem “Who can live well in Rus'?” transforms into “What is Rus'? What is good? And what, after all, does it mean to live?
Ideologically, Pelevin’s work is somewhat outdated: there are already different realities in the yard. However, his approach to explaining phenomena, combining postmodern ideas and the metaphysics of Indian and Iranian philosophy, is completely unique. The method of analysis of social phenomena discovered by Pelevin gives his creation a timeless meaning.
12. “Boris Pasternak”, Dmitry Bykov
The works of this writer cannot be found in the school curriculum for one simple reason: they have not yet managed to get there. Dmitry Bykov is one of the most prominent representatives of modern literature. This is a writer classical school with a good sense of language and a desire for extensive character development.
“Boris Pasternak” is a biographical work, but thanks to Bykov’s literary talent, it is read as a work of art and gives a textured understanding of Pasternak’s life path.
And what books are left outside? school curriculum, do you remember?
Victor DRAGUNSKY
Glory to Ivan Kozlovsky
I have only A's on my report card. Only in penmanship is a B. Because of the blots. I really don't know what to do! Blots always jump off my pen. I only dip the very tip of the pen into ink, but the blots still jump off. Just some miracles! Once I wrote a whole page, pure and simple, a real five-star page that was a pleasure to look at. In the morning I showed it to Raisa Ivanovna, and there was a blot right in the middle! Where did she come from? She wasn't there yesterday! Maybe it was leaked from some other page? Don't know...
And so I only have A's. Only a C in singing. This is how it happened. We had a singing lesson. At first we all sang in chorus “There was a birch tree in the field.” It turned out very beautifully, but Boris Sergeevich kept wincing and shouting:
Pull out your vowels, friends, pull out your vowels!..
Then we began to draw out the vowels, but Boris Sergeevich clapped his hands and said:
A real cat concert! Let's deal with each one individually.
This means with each individual separately.
And Boris Sergeevich called Mishka.
Mishka went up to the piano and whispered something to Boris Sergeevich.
Then Boris Sergeevich began to play, and Mishka quietly sang:
Like on thin ice
A little white snow fell...
Well, Mishka squeaked funny! This is how our kitten Murzik squeaks. Is that really how they sing? Almost nothing can be heard. I just couldn't stand it and started laughing.
Then Boris Sergeevich gave Mishka a high five and looked at me.
He said:
Come on, laugher, come out!
I quickly ran to the piano.
Well, what will you perform? Boris Sergeevich asked politely.
I said:
Song civil war“Lead us, Budyonny, boldly into battle.”
Boris Sergeevich shook his head and began to play, but I immediately stopped him:
Please play louder! I said.
Boris Sergeevich said:
You won't be heard.
But I said:
Will. And how!
Boris Sergeevich began to play, and I took in more air and started drinking:
High in the clear sky
The scarlet banner flutters...
I really like this song.
I can see the blue, blue sky, it’s hot, the horses are clattering their hooves, they have beautiful purple eyes, and a scarlet banner is flying in the sky.
At this point I even closed my eyes with delight and shouted as loud as I could:
We are racing there on horseback,
Where is the enemy visible?
And in a delightful battle...
I sang well, probably even heard on the other street:
A swift avalanche! We are rushing forward!.. Hurray!..
Reds always win! Retreat, enemies! Give it!!!
I pressed my fists on my stomach, it came out even louder, and I almost burst:
We crashed into Crimea!
Then I stopped because I was all sweaty and my knees were shaking.
And although Boris Sergeevich was playing, he was somehow leaning towards the piano, and his shoulders were also shaking...
I said:
So how?
Monstrous! Boris Sergeevich praised.
It's a good song, isn't it? I asked.
“Good,” said Boris Sergeevich and covered his eyes with a handkerchief.
It’s just a pity that you played very quietly, Boris Sergeevich, I said, you could have been even louder.
Okay, I’ll take it into account, said Boris Sergeevich. Didn’t you notice that I played one thing, and you sang a little differently!
No, I said, I didn't notice that! Yes, it doesn’t matter. I just needed to play louder.
Well, said Boris Sergeevich, since you didn’t notice anything, we’ll give you a C for now. For diligence.
How about a three? I was even taken aback. How can this be? Three is very little! Mishka sang quietly and then got an A... I said:
Boris Sergeevich, when I rest a little, I’ll be able to get even louder, don’t think so. I didn't have a good breakfast today. Otherwise I can sing so hard that everyone’s ears will be covered. I know one more song. When I sing it at home, all the neighbors come running and ask what happened.
Which one is this? asked Boris Sergeevich.
Compassionate, I said and started:
I loved you...
Love still, perhaps...
But Boris Sergeevich hastily said:
Okay, okay, we'll discuss all this next time.
And then the bell rang.
Mom met me in the locker room. When we were about to leave, Boris Sergeevich approached us.
Well, he said, smiling, perhaps your boy will be Lobachevsky, maybe Mendeleev. He may become Surikov or Koltsov, I would not be surprised if he becomes known to the country, as Comrade Nikolai Mamai or some boxer is known, but I can assure you absolutely firmly of one thing: he will not achieve the fame of Ivan Kozlovsky. Never!
Mom blushed terribly and said:
Well, we'll see about that later!
And when we walked home, I kept thinking:
“Does Kozlovsky really sing louder than me?”
"HE IS ALIVE AND GLOWING..."
One evening I sat in the yard, near the sand, and waited for my mother. She probably stayed late at the institute, or in the store, or perhaps stood on the bus stop. Don't know. Only all the parents in our yard had already arrived, and all the kids went home with them and were probably already drinking tea with bagels and cheese, but my mother was still not there...
And now the lights began to light up in the windows, and the radio started playing music, and dark clouds moved in the sky - they looked like bearded old men...
And I wanted to eat, but my mother was still not there, and I thought that if I knew that my mother was hungry and was waiting for me somewhere at the end of the world, I would immediately run to her, and would not be late and not made her sit on the sand and get bored.
And at that time Mishka came out into the yard. He said:
- Great!
And I said:
- Great!
Mishka sat down with me and picked up the dump truck.
- Wow! - said Mishka. - Where did you get it? Does he pick up sand himself? Not yourself? Does he leave on his own? Yes? What about the pen? What is it for? Can it be rotated? Yes? A? Wow! Will you give it to me at home?
I said:
- No I will not give. Present. Dad gave it to me before he left.
The bear pouted and moved away from me. It became even darker outside.
I looked at the gate so as not to miss when my mother came. But she still didn’t go. Apparently, I met Aunt Rosa, and they stand and talk and don’t even think about me. I lay down on the sand.
Here Mishka says:
- Can you give me a dump truck?
- Get off it, Mishka.
Then Mishka says:
- I can give you one Guatemala and two Barbados for it!
I speak:
- Compared Barbados to a dump truck...
And Mishka:
- Well, do you want me to give you a swimming ring?
I speak:
- It's broken.
And Mishka:
- You will seal it!
I even got angry:
- Where to swim? In the bathroom? On Tuesdays?
And Mishka pouted again. And then he says:
- Well, it was not! Know my kindness! On the!
And he handed me a box of matches. I took it in my hands.
“You open it,” said Mishka, “then you will see!”
I opened the box and at first I didn’t see anything, and then I saw a small light green light, as if somewhere far, far away from me a tiny star was burning, and at the same time I myself was holding it in my hands.
“What is this, Mishka,” I said in a whisper, “what is this?”
“This is a firefly,” said Mishka. - What, good? He's alive, don't think about it.
“Bear,” I said, “take my dump truck, would you like it?” Take it forever, forever! Give me this star, I’ll take it home...
And Mishka grabbed my dump truck and ran home. And I stayed with my firefly, looked at it, looked and couldn’t get enough of it: how green it was, as if in a fairy tale, and how close it was, in the palm of my hand, but shining as if from afar... And I couldn’t breathe evenly , and I heard my heart beating, and there was a slight tingling in my nose, as if I wanted to cry.
And I sat like that for a long time, a very long time. And there was no one around. And I forgot about everyone in this world.
But then my mother came, and I was very happy, and we went home. And when they started drinking tea with bagels and feta cheese, my mother asked:
- Well, how's your dump truck?
And I said:
- I, mom, exchanged it.
Mom said:
- Interesting! And for what?
I answered:
- To the firefly! Here he is, living in a box. Turn out the light!
And mom turned off the light, and the room became dark, and the two of us began to look at the pale green star.
Then mom turned on the light.
“Yes,” she said, “it’s magic!” But still, how did you decide to give such a valuable thing as a dump truck for this worm?
“I’ve been waiting for you for so long,” I said, “and I was so bored, but this firefly, it turned out to be better than any dump truck in the world.”
Mom looked at me intently and asked:
- And why, why exactly is it better?
I said:
- How come you don’t understand?! After all, he is alive! And it glows!..
GREEN LEOPARDS
The teacher wrote the topic of the essay on the board: “Your comrade.”
“Do I have a REAL comrade? thought Andryusha. With whom you can climb mountains, go on reconnaissance missions, and dive to the bottom of the World Ocean. And in general, at least go to the ends of the world!..”
Andryusha thought and thought, then thought and thought again and decided: he has such a friend! And then he wrote in his notebook in capital letters:
MY COMRADE GRANDMOTHER
Her name is Klavdia Stepanovna, or simply Grandma Klava. She was born a long time ago, and when she grew up, she became a railway worker. Grandma Klava took part in various physical education parades. That's why she's so brave and clever
Andryusha read the essay and sighed: he didn’t like it. Is it possible to write so boringly about a grandmother?
“No way,” he thought.
And he began to dream. About real mountains that I have never been to. I wish I could climb to the very top!..
Where eternal glaciers do not melt.
Where is the snow avalanche
falls off a cliff.
Where it's cold even in July
And eagles soar in the sky
The mountain paths there are dangerous.
There is a rockfall in the gorge.
Here the snow leopards appear -
in the snow from head to toe.
They go out onto the road
They have an excellent appetite!
And each of the leopards by the leg
tries to grab you.
A horde of leopards approached.
Belt slips out of fear
But here to the top
Grandma Klava climbed up
as agile as a deer.
The backpack is on her back,
and there are 28 cutlets in it,
piece of African cheese
and even a Chinese bracelet.
And grandma fed the leopards
maybe two minutes
and with a hardworking hand
I stroked them on the head.
Snow leopards have had their fill
and politely say this:
“Thank you, Grandma Klava,
for a delicious and satisfying lunch!..”
And then we brushed our teeth and
went to the den to take a nap.
“That’s it, grandma! - thought Andryusha. “With such a comrade, not only in the mountains, but also in reconnaissance, you’re not the least bit afraid.”
And then it occurred to him:
Night. Street. Flashlight. Pharmacy
No, it's better like this:
Night. Lake. Moon. Dubrava. And in the middle there is a ravine. In short, a typical military situation
Intelligence is nothing to sneeze at!
Do you see the ravine turning black?
The enemy is hiding there -
enemy of the Soviet people.
How will he jump out of the ditch?
when he pulls out his gun,
as he asks Grandma Klava:
“How old are you, grandma?”
But Grandma Klava will not flinch -
That's the kind of person she is!
(no, it's better like this:
She's such a person!)
That's why it won't even flinch
removing the duffel bag.
And in that duffel bag, according to the regulations
Allowed: 20 cutlets,
bottle of ghee
and even a tram ticket.
Our enemy will feed
he will sigh not our way:
“Thank you, Grandma Klava!
This is a very nutritious story
treat"
And he will immediately throw his pistol far into the sea.
Andryusha was now dreaming well: he clearly imagined how the gun was slowly sinking to the very bottom of the World Ocean. Wow, how deep!..
Washing half the world with water,
The world ocean is seething.
It's very damp at the bottom
happens at night.
There is water on both the left and the right
so I can't breathe
But dear grandmother Klava
knows how to dive bravely!
And in the deep valley
The sperm whale lies with a mustache.
He thinks a bitter thought
and quietly gnaws on a bone:
“And who is that there with fins?
moves like a sawfish?
Excuse me, yes, it’s yourself
Yes, this is Grandma Kla"
The sperm whale is overjoyed
breath stifled in the goiter -
he can't say the words
but only mumbles: BU-BU-BU
And the grandmother from scuba gear
took out 12 cutlets,
cherry jam jar
and even a bouquet of daisies.
And the sperm whale mumbles: “Save-BU BU-BU-BU-shka, save-BU BU-BU-Shka” and only blows multi-colored bubbles out of happiness.
And those bubbles rise to the surface where the edge of the water is. Or the edge of the air in general, the real edge of the world. And Anryusha rises with them. There is no land, no water, no air in sight. Continuous airless space. It's called space. And the Earth, somewhere far away, flickers with a dim light. And it melts, it melts
Our planet has melted,
and with it our country.
There is no white light visible here,
but Grandma Klava is visible!
She is near the starry outskirts,
flies among interplanetary worlds,
like Yuri Gagarin,
or maybe like German Titov.
In a spacesuit with Grandma Klava
8 cutlets hidden,
pot of chicken broth
and even the Dawn alarm clock.
Astronomers of the Universe are watching
for a tasty and filling lunch
into your big telescopes
and send a grateful greeting:
THANK YOU PTA
GRANDMOTHER KLAUDIA STEPANOVNA PTA
YOUR MATERNAL CARE
IN THE NAME OF THE WORLD PUBLIC
TSK
National glory thunders -
a thundering sound spreads:
“Long live Grandma Klava,
and also grandma’s grandson!”
And even the constellations in the sky
Libra, Scorpio and Sagittarius -
greeting grandmother and grandson
I'll end with this:
END
And on time! Because the bell just rang.
“Oh, it’s a pity,” Andryusha sighed, the lesson is so short.”
He remembered that he had another grandmother. Her name is Elena Gerasimovna, or simply Grandma Lena. She was also born a long time ago. And also
“Okay,” Andryusha decided. I’ll definitely write about it another time.”
And he signed the essay: Andryusha IVANOV, grandson of grandmother Klava (and grandmother Lena too)
Tatiana PETROSYAN
A NOTE
The note looked most harmless.
According to all gentleman's laws, it should have revealed an inky face and a friendly explanation: “Sidorov is a goat.”
So Sidorov, without suspecting anything bad, instantly unfolded the message and was dumbfounded.
Inside, in large, beautiful handwriting, it was written: “Sidorov, I love you!”
Sidorov felt mockery in the roundness of the handwriting. Who wrote this to him? Squinting, he looked around the class. The author of the note was bound to reveal himself. But this time, for some reason, Sidorov’s main enemies did not grin maliciously. (That’s how they usually grinned. But this time they didn’t.)
But Sidorov immediately noticed that Vorobyova was looking at him without blinking. It doesn’t just look like that, but with meaning! There was no doubt: she wrote the note. But then it turns out that Vorobyova loves him?!
And then Sidorov’s thought reached a dead end and fluttered helplessly, like a fly in a glass. WHAT DOES LOVES MEAN??? What consequences will this entail and what should Sidorov do now?..
“Let’s reason logically,” Sidorov reasoned logically. For example, what do I love? Pears! “Love means I always want to eat”
At that moment, Vorobyova turned to him again and licked her bloodthirsty lips. Sidorov went numb. What caught his eye were her long untrimmed claws, and yes, real claws! For some reason I remembered how in the buffet Vorobyova greedily gnawed at a bony chicken leg
“You need to pull yourself together, Sidorov pulled himself together. (My hands turned out to be dirty. But Sidorov ignored the little things.) I love not only pears, but also my parents. However, there is no question of eating them. Mom bakes sweet pies. Dad often carries me around his neck. And I love them for that"
Here Vorobyova turned around again, and Sidorov thought with sadness that he would now have to bake sweet pies for her all day long and carry her to school around his neck in order to justify such a sudden and crazy love. He took a closer look and discovered that Vorobyova was not thin and would probably not be easy to wear.
“All is not lost, Sidorov did not give up. I also love our dog Bobik. Especially when I train him or take him out for walks"
Then Sidorov felt stuffy at the thought that Vorobyova could force him to jump for every pie, and then take him for a walk, holding him tightly by the leash and not allowing him to deviate either to the right or to the left.
“I love the cat Murka, especially when you blow right into her ear, Sidorov thought in despair, no, it’s not that I like to catch flies and put them in a glass, but I also love toys that you can break and see what’s inside.”
The last thought made Sidorov feel unwell. There was only one salvation. He hastily tore a piece of paper out of the notebook, pursed his lips resolutely and in a firm handwriting wrote the menacing words: “Vorobyova, I love you.”
Let her be scared.
O. KOSHKIN
TIRED OF FIGHTING!
At exactly 13:13 the secret intelligence officer was declassified. He ran through the streets to escape pursuit. Two men in civilian clothes were chasing him, shooting as they went. The scout had already managed to swallow three ciphers and was now hastily chewing on the fourth. “Oh, I wish I had some soda now!” he thought. How tired he is of fighting!
Top-top-top!.. the boots of the pursuers were knocking closer and closer.
And suddenly, oh, happiness! the scout saw a hole in the fence. Without hesitation, he jumped into it and ended up in the zoo.
Boy, come back!” the usherette angrily waved her hands.
No matter how it is! Former intelligence officer Mukhin ran along the path, climbed over one grate, through another and found himself in an elephant enclosure.
I'll hide here with you, okay? he shouted, panting.
“Hide, I don’t mind,” the elephant answered. He stood with his ears moving and listened to the radio about events in Africa. After all, homeland!
Are you at war? he asked when last news ran out.
Yeah, I ate all the encryption! Mukhin boasted, slapping his stomach.
Child's play, the elephant sighed and sadly stomped on the spot. My great-grandfather fought, yes!
Whoa? Mukhin was surprised. Your great-grandfather was a tank, or what?
A stupid boy! the elephant was offended. My great-grandfather was Hannibal's war elephant.
Who? Mukhin didn’t understand again.
The elephant perked up. He loved to tell the story of his great-grandfather.
Sit down and listen! he said and drank water from an iron barrel. In 246 BC, a son, Hannibal, was born to the Carthaginian commander Hamilcar Barca. His father fought endlessly with the Romans and therefore entrusted the education of his son to a war elephant. This was my dear great-grandfather!
The elephant wiped away his tears with his trunk. The animals in the neighboring enclosures became quiet and also listened.
Oh, it was an elephant mountain! When he fanned himself with his ears on hot days, such a wind rose that the trees cracked. So, great-grandfather loved Hannibal as his own son. Without closing his eyes, he made sure that the child was not kidnapped by Roman spies. Noticing the spy, he grabbed him with his trunk and threw him across the sea back to Rome.
“Hey, the spies are flying! looking at the sky, the inhabitants of Carthage said. It must be war!
And exactly, to the First Punic War! Hamilcar Barca had already fought the Romans in Spain.
Meanwhile, the boy grew up under the care of a war elephant. Oh, how they loved each other! Hannibal recognized the elephant by its steps and fed it with choice raisins. By the way, do you have any raisins? The elephant asked Mukhin.
Nope! he shook his head.
It's a pity. So, when Hannibal became a commander, he decided to start the Second Punic War. "Maybe we should not? my great-grandfather dissuaded him. Maybe we’d better go for a swim?” But Hannibal didn’t want to listen to anything. Then the elephant trumpeted, calling the army, and the Carthaginians set off on a campaign.
Hannibal led his army across the Alps, intending to hit the Romans in the rear. Yes, it was a difficult transition! Mountain eagles carried away soldiers, and hail the size of melons fell from the sky. But the road was blocked by an abyss. Then the great-grandfather stood over her, and the army crossed over him as if across a bridge.
The appearance of Hannibal took the Romans by surprise. Before they had time to deploy the formation, the elephant was already running towards them, sweeping away everything in its path. The infantry moved behind him, the ace of the flanks was cavalry. Victory! The army rejoiced. They picked up the War Elephant and began to rock it.
“Brothers, let’s go swimming!” The elephant suggested again.
But the soldiers did not listen to him: “What else, I want to fight!”
The Romans were not going to make peace either. Consul Gaius Flaminius gathered an army and marched against the Carthaginians. Then Hannibal resorted to a new trick. He mounted the army on an elephant and led it through the swamps, bypassing the enemy. Great-grandfather was up to his neck in water. Soldiers hung from the sides like bunches of grapes. On the way, many got their feet wet, and the commander lost an eye.
And again Hannibal won! Then the Romans gathered for a council and decided to decide, the elephant’s voice trembled, he raised the barrel and, in order to calm down, poured all the water on himself, to kill his great-grandfather! That same night, a spy dressed as Hannibal crept into the Carthaginian camp. He had poisoned raisins in his pocket. Approaching the elephant, he stood on the leeward side and said in the voice of Hannibal: “Eat, father elephant!” Great-grandfather swallowed just one raisin and fell dead
The animals in the neighboring enclosures were crying. Crocodile tears flowed from the crocodile's eyes.
What about Hannibal? asked Mukhin.
For three days and three nights he mourned his elephant. Since then, his luck has changed. His army was defeated. Carthage was destroyed, and he himself died in exile in 183 BC.
The elephant finished the story.
“I thought only horses fought,” Mukhin sighed.
We all fought here! We are all fighting!.. the animals shouted vying with each other: camels, giraffes, and even a hippopotamus that surfaced like Submarine.
And the crocodile is the loudest:
Grab the belly, twirl the tail and carry it! Like a battering ram. And bite the enemy. You'll break all your teeth!..
And they let mice under the armor, the elephant interjected accusingly. This is to tickle knights!
And us, us! The frogs were straining themselves in the terrarium. They will tie you to the front line all night, sit and croak at the scouts!..
Mukhin grabbed his head straight: what is it like, all the animals were forced to fight?..
Here he is! suddenly a voice came from behind. Gotcha! Hands up!
Mukhin turned around. His friends Volkov and Zaitsev stood at the bars, aiming their guns.
Come on, I'm tired of you! Mukhin waved him off. Let's go swimming!
That's right, the crocodile approved. Come to my pool, there’s enough room for everyone! And the water is warm
Mukhin began to unbutton his coat.
“I’ll bring you raisins tomorrow,” he said to the elephant. Good raisins, not poisoned. I'll ask my mom.
And he climbed into the water.
Tatiana PETROSYAN
MOM, BE A MOM!
Yurik did not have a father. And one day he told his mother:
If only my dad had been there, he would have made me a hockey stick.
Mom didn't answer. But the next day the “Young Carpenter” set appeared on her bedside table. Mom was sawing, planing, gluing something, and one day she handed Yuri a wonderful polished hockey stick.
“It’s a good stick,” Yurik sighed. Only my dad would go to football with me. The next day, my mother brought two tickets to the match in Luzhniki.
Well, I’ll go with you, Yurik sighed. You don't even know how to whistle. A week later, at all matches, my mother furiously whistled with two fingers and demanded that the referee be given up. That's when the difficulties with soap began. But Yurik sighed:
If only there was a dad, he would lift me up with his left hand and teach me tricks
The next day, mom bought a barbell and a punching bag. She achieved excellent athletic results. In the mornings she would lift the barbell and Yurika with one left hand, then hit a punching bag, then run to work, and in the evening the semi-finals of the World Cup awaited her. And when there was no football or hockey, my mother would bend over the radio circuit with a soldering iron in her hands until late at night.
Summer came, and Yurik went to the village to visit his grandmother. But mom stayed. At parting, Yurik sighed:
If only there was a dad, he would speak in a deep voice, wear a vest and smoke a pipe
When Yurik returned from his grandmother’s, his mother met him at the station. Only Yurik didn’t even recognize her at first. Mom’s biceps bulged under her vest, and the back of her head was cropped short. With a calloused hand, my mother took the pipe out of her mouth and said in a gentle bass voice:
Well, hello son!
But Yurik just sighed:
Dad would have a beard
At night Yurik woke up. IN mom's bedroom the light was on. He got up, walked to the door and saw his mother with a shaving brush in her hand. Her face was tired. She soaped her cheeks. Then she took the razor and saw Yurik in the mirror.
“I’ll try, son,” my mother said quietly. They say if you shave every day, your beard will grow.
But Yurik rushed to her and roared, burying himself in his mother’s hard press.
No, no, he sobbed. No need. Become a mother again. You won't grow your dad's beard anyway!.. You'll grow your mom's beard!
Since that night, my mother dropped the barbell. And a month later I came home with some skinny guy. He didn't smoke a pipe. And he didn't have a beard. And his ears were protruding.
He unbuttoned his coat, under which, instead of a vest, he discovered a cat. He unwound the muffler; it was a small boa constrictor. He took off his hat and a white mouse was scurrying around there. He handed Yuri the cake box. There was a chicken sitting in it.
Dad! Yurik beamed. And he dragged dad into the room to show him the barbell.
Alexander DUDOLADOV
BAM AND DONE!
Let everything remain the same, and I will have spanish name Pedro.
Bah!..
Everything remains the same. And I am a Spaniard with black eyebrows. A smile is like a photo flash.
Hello Pedro!
Smile.
Salute, Pedro!
Smile in response. I don't understand the language. A guest from a friendly country. I go, gawking at the achievements.
Eh, it’s good to be a foreign guest of Moscow! Much better than Nitkin Em. Just how to do it. You can't do it without a magic wand.
Let me be the magic wand myself! So wooden and thin. And magical!
Bang!
I'm a magic wand! I bring benefits to people. As soon as I wave, all sorts of benefits arise.
What if you become useful?
Bang!
And here I am benefit! Everyone is happy to see me. Everyone is smiling. Old people and youth. No! Bang!
I am the smile of youth!
I'm laughing! Ha ha ha ha!
Nitkin! Where are you? Why are you laughing in class? Nitkin, get up! What is the topic of the essay?
The topic of the essay, Olga Vasilievna, the essay “What do I want to become when I grow up?”
Well, what do you want to become when you grow up?
I want to become I want to become
Snegirev, don’t give Nitkin any advice!
I want to become a scientist.
That's good. Sit down and write: to scientists.
Nitkin sat down and began to write in his notebook: “I want to become a scientist cat so that I can walk around the chain.”
And Olga Vasilievna went to the table and also began to write. Report for the district: “In the third “B” a test was carried out on the topic “What do I want to become.” Based on the results of the essay, I report the following data: one doctors, eight singers, five cooperators, scientists "
Mmm-uh!
Nitkin! Get up now! And take off this stupid chain!
Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann. The Nutcracker and the Mouse King
On December 24, the children of Medical Advisor Stahlbaum were not allowed to enter the passage room all day, and they were not allowed into the living room adjacent to it at all. In the bedroom, Fritz and Marie sat huddled together in a corner. It was already completely dark, and they were very scared, because no lamps had been brought into the room, as was supposed to be the case on Christmas Eve. Fritz, in a mysterious whisper, told his sister (she had just turned seven years old) that since the very morning there had been something rustling, making noise and quietly knocking in the locked rooms. And recently a small dark man with a large box under his arm slipped through the hallway; but Fritz probably knows that this is their godfather, Drosselmeyer. Then Marie clapped her hands for joy and exclaimed:
- Oh, did the godfather make us something this time?
The senior court adviser, Drosselmeyer, was not distinguished by his beauty: he was a small, dry man with a wrinkled face, with a large black patch instead of his right eye and completely bald, which is why he wore a beautiful white wig. Every time the godfather had something entertaining in his pocket for the children: either a little man rolling his eyes and shuffling his feet, or a box from which a bird jumps out, or some other little thing. And for Christmas he always made a beautiful, intricate toy, which he worked hard on. Therefore, his parents carefully removed his gift.
- Oh, my godfather made something for us this time! - Marie exclaimed.
Fritz decided that this year it would certainly be a fortress, and in it pretty little soldiers would march and throw out articles, and then other soldiers would appear and go on an attack, but those soldiers in the fortress would bravely fire cannons at them, and they would rise noise and rumble.
“No, no,” Marie interrupted Fritz, “my godfather told me about the beautiful garden.” There big lake, miraculously beautiful swans with golden ribbons on their necks swim along it and sing beautiful songs. Then a girl will come out of the garden, go to the lake, lure the swans and feed them sweet marzipan...
“Swans don’t eat marzipan,” Fritz interrupted her, not very politely, “and the godfather can’t make a whole garden. And what good are his toys to us?” They are immediately taken away from us. No, I like my father’s and mother’s gifts much better: they stay with us, we manage them ourselves.
And so the children began to guess what their parents would give them. Marie said that Mamzel Trudchen (her big doll) has completely deteriorated: she has become so clumsy, she keeps falling on the floor, so now she has nasty marks all over her face. And then, mom smiled when Marie admired Greta’s umbrella so much. And Fritz insisted that he just lacked a bay horse in his court stables, and not enough cavalry in his troops. Dad knows this well.
So, the children knew very well that their parents had bought them all sorts of wonderful gifts and were now placing them on the table; but at the same time, they had no doubt that the kind baby Christ shone everything with his gentle and gentle eyes and that Christmas gifts, as if touched by his gracious hand, bring more joy than all others.
TREE Zoshchenko
The children were looking forward to fun party. And even through the crack of the door we could see how my mother was decorating the Christmas tree.
Sister Lela was seven years old at that time. She was a lively girl.
She once said:
Minka, mom has gone to the kitchen. Let's go to the room where the tree is and see what's going on there.
The children entered the room. And they see: a very beautiful tree. And there are gifts under the tree. And on the tree there are multi-colored beads, flags, lanterns, golden nuts, lozenges and Crimean apples.
Lelya says:
Let's not look at the gifts. Instead, let's eat one lozenge at a time.
And so she approaches the tree and instantly eats one lozenge hanging on a thread.
Lelya, if you ate a lozenge, then I’ll also eat something now.
And Minka comes up to the tree and bites off a small piece of apple.
Lelya says:
Minka, if you took a bite of the apple, then I’ll now eat another lozenge and, in addition, I’ll take this candy for myself.
And Lelya was such a tall, lanky girl. And she could reach high. She stood on her tiptoes and began to eat the second lozenge with her big mouth.
And Minka was surprisingly short. And he could hardly get anything except one apple that hung low.
If you, Lelishcha, ate the second lozenge, then I will bite off this apple again.
And Minka again took this apple with his hands and again bit it off a little.
Lelya says:
If you took a second bite of the apple, then I will no longer stand on ceremony and will now eat the third lozenge and, in addition, I will take a cracker and a nut as a souvenir.
Minka almost roared. Because she could reach everything, but he couldn’t.
And I, Lelishcha, how will I put a chair by the tree and how will I get myself something besides an apple.
And so he began to pull a chair towards the tree with his thin hands. But the chair fell on Minka. he wanted to lift the chair. But he fell again. And straight for gifts.
Minka, it seems you broke the doll. This is true. You took the porcelain hand from the doll.
Then mother’s steps were heard, and the children ran into another room.
Soon the guests arrived. Many children with their parents.
And then mom lit all the candles on the tree, opened the door and said:
Everyone come in.
And all the children entered the room where the Christmas tree stood.
Now let each child come to me, and I will give each one a toy and a treat.
The children began to approach their mother. And she gave everyone a toy. Then she took an apple, lozenge and candy from the tree and gave it to the child.
And all the children were very happy. Then mom picked up the apple that Minka had bitten off.
Lelya and Minka, come here. Which of you two took a bite of this apple?
This is Minka's work.
Lelka taught me this.
I’ll put Lelya in the corner with her nose, and I wanted to give you a wind-up little train. But now I will give this winding little train to the boy to whom I wanted to give the bitten apple.
And she took the train and gave it to one four-year-old boy. And he immediately began to play with him.
Minkaa got angry with this boy and hit him on the hand with a toy. And he roared so desperately that his own mother took him in her arms and said:
From now on, I will not come to visit you with my boy.
You can leave, and then the train will remain for me.
And that mother was surprised by these words and said:
Your boy will probably be a robber.
And then mom took Minka in her arms and said to that mom:
Don't you dare talk about my boy like that. Better leave with your scrofulous child and never come to us again.
I will do so. It's common for you to sit in nettles.
And then another, third mother, said:
And I will leave too. My girl didn't deserve to
· she was given a doll with a broken arm.
And Lelya shouted:
You can also leave with your scrofulous child. And then the doll with the broken arm will be left to me.
And then Minka, sitting in his mother’s arms, shouted:
In general, you can all leave, and then all the toys will remain for us.
And then all the guests began to leave. Then dad entered the room.
This kind of upbringing is ruining my children. I don't want them to fight, quarrel and kick out guests. It will be difficult for them to live in the world, and they will die alone.
And dad went to the tree and put out all the candles:
Go to bed immediately. And tomorrow I will give all the toys to the guests.
And thirty-five years have passed since then, and this tree is still not forgotten.
Bazhov Malachite box
From Stepan, you see, there are only three little kids left.
Two boys. They are timid, but this one, as they say, is neither like mother nor father. Even when Stepanova was a little girl, people marveled at this girl. Not just the girls and women, but also the men said to Stepan:
- It’s no different that this one, Stepan, fell out of your hands and into someone it just arose! She herself is black and small, and her eyes are green. It’s like she doesn’t look like our girls at all.
Stepan used to joke:
- It’s no surprise that she’s black. My father hid in the ground from an early age. And that the eyes are green is also not surprising. You never know, I stuffed master Turchaninov with malachite. This is the reminder I still have.
So I called this girl Memo. - Come on, my reminder! - And when she happened to buy something, she would always bring something blue or green.
So that little girl grew up in people’s minds. Exactly and in fact, the horsetail fell out of the festive belt - it can be seen far away. And although she was not very fond of strangers, everyone was Tanyushka and Tanyushka. The most envious grandmothers admired it. Well, what a beauty! Everyone's nice. One mother sighed:
- Beauty is beauty, but not ours. Exactly who replaced the girl for me.
According to Stepan, this girl was killing herself. She was all clean, her face lost weight, only her eyes remained. Mother came up with the idea of giving Tanya that malachite box - let him have some fun. Even if she’s small, she’s still a girl—from a young age, it’s flattering for them to make fun of themselves. Tanya started taking these things apart. And it’s a miracle - the one she tries on, she also fits it. Mother didn’t even know why, but this one knows everything. And he also says:
- Mommy, what a good gift my dad gave! The warmth from it, as if you were sitting on a warm bed, and someone was stroking you softly.
Nastasya sewed the patches herself; she remembers how her fingers would become numb, her ears would hurt, and her neck could not get warm. So he thinks: “It’s not without reason. Oh, it’s not without reason!” - Yes, hurry up and put the box back in the chest. Only Tanya from then on, no, no, will ask:
- Mommy, let me play with my dad’s gift!
When Nastasya gets strict, well, a mother’s heart, she will regret it, take out the box, and only punish:
- Don't break anything!
Then, when Tanya grew up, she began to take out the box herself. The mother and the older boys will go to mowing or somewhere else, Tanya will stay behind to do housework. First, of course, he will manage that the mother punished him. Well, wash the cups and spoons, shake off the tablecloth, wave a broom in the hut, give food to the chickens, look at the stove. He’ll get everything done as quickly as possible, and for the sake of the box. By that time, only one of the upper chests remained, and even that one had become light. Tanya slides it onto a stool, takes out the box and sorts through the stones, admires it, and tries it on for herself.
War and Peace
In Mozhaisk there were troops standing and marching everywhere. Cossacks, foot and horse soldiers, wagons, boxes, guns were visible from all sides. Pierre was in a hurry to move forward as quickly as possible, and the further he drove away from Moscow and the deeper he plunged into this sea of troops, the more he was overcome by anxiety and a new joyful feeling that he had not yet experienced. It was a feeling similar to the one he experienced in the Slobodsky Palace during the Tsar’s arrival - a feeling of the need to do something and sacrifice something. He now experienced a pleasant feeling of awareness that everything that constitutes people's happiness, the comforts of life, wealth, even life itself, is nonsense, which is pleasant to discard in comparison with something With which, Pierre could not give himself an account, and even her I tried to understand for myself for whom and why he found it especially charming to sacrifice everything. He was not interested in what he wanted to sacrifice for, but the sacrifice itself constituted a new joyful feeling for him.
On the morning of the 25th, Pierre left Mozhaisk. On the way down the huge steep mountain leading out of the city past the cathedral, Pierre got out of the carriage and started walking. Behind him came a regiment of cavalry with singers in front. A train of carts with those wounded in yesterday's case was coming towards us. The carts, on which three or four wounded soldiers lay and sat, were jumping on a steep incline. The wounded, tied with rags, pale, with pursed lips and frowning brows, holding onto the beds, jumped and pushed in the carts. Everyone looked at Pierre’s white hat and green tailcoat with almost naive childish curiosity.
One cart with the wounded stopped at the edge of the road near Pierre. One wounded old soldier looked back at him.
- Well, fellow countryman, they’ll put us here, or what? Ali to Moscow?
Pierre was so lost in thought that he did not hear the question. He looked first at the cavalry regiment that had now met the train of wounded, then at the cart where he was standing and on which two wounded were sitting. One was probably wounded in the cheek. His whole head was tied with rags, and one cheek was swollen as big as a child's head. His mouth and nose were on one side. This soldier looked at the cathedral and crossed himself. Another, a young boy, a recruit, fair-haired and white, as if completely without blood in his thin face, looked at Pierre with a kind smile. The cavalrymen walked over the cart itself.
- Oh, the hedgehog’s head is gone, Yes, they are tenacious on the other side - they performed a soldier’s dance song. As if echoing them, but in a different kind of fun, the metallic sounds of ringing were interrupted in the heights. But under the slope, near the cart with the wounded, it was damp, cloudy and sad.
The soldier with a swollen cheek looked angrily at the cavalrymen.
“Today I’ve seen not only soldiers, but also peasants!” The peasants are being driven away too,” said the soldier standing behind the cart with a sad smile, addressing Pierre. - Nowadays they don’t understand. They want to attack all the people, one word - Moscow. They want to do one end. “Despite the vagueness of the soldier’s words, Pierre understood everything he wanted to say and nodded his head approvingly.
“Cavalrymen go to battle and meet the wounded, and do not think for a minute about what awaits them, but walk past and wink at the wounded. And out of all these, twenty thousand are doomed to death!” – thought Pierre, heading further.
Having driven into a small village street, Pierre saw militia men with crosses on their hats and in white shirts, who were working on something on a huge mound. Seeing these men, Pierre remembered the wounded soldiers in Mozhaisk, and he understood what the soldier wanted to express when he said that the whole people wanted to attack.
How dad studied at school
HOW DADDY WENT TO SCHOOL
When dad was little, he was sick a lot. He did not miss a single childhood illness. He suffered from measles, mumps, and whooping cough. After each illness he had complications. And when they passed, little dad quickly fell ill with a new disease.
When he had to go to school, little daddy also lay sick. When he recovered and went to class for the first time, all the children had been studying for a long time. They had all already become acquainted, and the teacher knew them all too. But no one knew little dad. And everyone looked at him. It was very unpleasant. Moreover, some even stuck out their tongues.
And one boy tripped him up. And little daddy fell. But he didn't cry. He stood up and pushed that boy. He also fell. Then he stood up and pushed little daddy. And little daddy fell again. He didn't cry again. And he pushed the boy again. They would probably push each other like that all day. But then the bell rang. Everyone went to class and sat down in their seats. And little daddy didn’t have his own place. And they sat him next to the girl. The whole class started laughing. And even this girl laughed.
Here little dad really wanted to cry. But suddenly he felt funny, and he laughed himself. Then the teacher laughed too.
She said:
Well done! And I was already afraid that you would cry.
“I was afraid myself,” Dad said.
And everyone laughed again.
Remember, children, the teacher said. When you feel like crying, be sure to try laughing. This is my advice to you for life! Now let's study.
Little dad found out that day that he reads better than anyone in the class. But then he found out that he wrote worse than anyone. When it turned out that he was the best speaker in class, the teacher shook her finger at him.
She was a very good teacher. She was both strict and cheerful. It was very interesting to study with her. And little dad remembered her advice for the rest of his life. After all, it was his first day of school. And then there were many of these days. And there were so many funny and sad, good and bad stories at little dad’s school!
HOW THE POPE TOOK REVENGE OF THE GERMAN LANGUAGE
Alexander Borisovich Raskin (19141971)
When dad was little and in school, he had different grades. In Russian it is “good”. According to arithmetic, “satisfactory.” In terms of penmanship, “unsatisfactory.” In terms of drawing, it’s “bad” with two minuses. And the art teacher promised dad a third minus.
But then one day a new teacher entered the class. She was very pretty. Young, beautiful, cheerful, in some very elegant dress.
My name is Elena Sergeevna, what’s your name? she said and smiled.
And everyone shouted:
Zhenya! Zina! Lisa! Misha! Kolya!
Elena Sergeevna covered her ears, and everyone fell silent. Then she said:
I will teach you German. Do you agree?
Yes! Yes! the whole class shouted.
And so little dad began to learn German. At first he really liked that the chair in German is der stul, the table is der tysh, the book is das buch, the boy is der knabe, the girl is das metchen.
It was like some kind of game, and the whole class was interested in finding out. But when declensions and conjugations began, some knaben and methen got bored. It turned out that I needed to study German seriously. It turned out that this is not a game, but a subject like arithmetic and the Russian language. I had to learn three things at once: write in German, read in German and speak in German. Elena Sergeevna tried very hard to make her lessons interesting. She brought books with funny stories to class, taught the children to sing German songs and joked in German during the lesson. And for those who studied properly, it was really interesting. And those students who did not study and did not prepare lessons did not understand anything. And, of course, they were bored. They looked into the house less and less often and were more and more silent as shit when Elena Sergeevna questioned them. And sometimes, just before the German lesson, a wild cry was heard: “Ich habe spatziren!” Which translated into Russian meant: “I have a walk!” And translated into school language meant: “I have to skip!”
Hearing this cry, many students echoed: “Shpaciren! Shpaciren! And poor Elena Sergeevna, coming to class, noticed that all the boys were studying the verb “shpatziren”, and only girls were sitting at their desks. And this, understandably, made her very upset. Little dad also was mainly engaged in shpatziren. He even wrote poems that began like this:
There are no more pleasant words for a child’s ear than familiar words: “We’re running from the German!”
He did not want to offend Elena Sergeevna by this. It was just a lot of fun to run away from class, hide from the principal and teachers, and hide in the school attic from Elena Sergeevna. It was much more interesting than sitting in class without learning a lesson, and when Elena Sergeevna asked: “Haben sie den Federmesser?” (“Do you have a penknife?”) answer after a long thought: “Ikh niht”... (which sounded very stupid in Russian: “I don’t...”). When little daddy answered like that, the whole class laughed at him. Then the whole school laughed. And little dad really didn’t like it when they laughed at him. He liked to laugh at others much more. If he were smarter, he would start studying German, and people would stop laughing at him. But little daddy was very offended. He was offended by the teacher. He was offended by the German language. And he took revenge on the German language. Little dad never took it seriously. Then he didn't study properly French at another school. Then he hardly studied English at the institute. And now dad doesn’t know a single foreign language. Who did he take revenge on? Now dad understands that he offended himself. He cannot read many of his favorite books in the language in which they are written. He really wants to go on a tourist trip abroad, but he is ashamed to go there without knowing how to speak any language. Sometimes dad is introduced to different people from other countries. They speak Russian poorly. But they all learn Russian, and they all ask dad:
Sprechen si deutsch? Parle vous France? Do you speak English?
And dad just throws up his hands and shakes his head. What can he answer them? Only: “Their niht.” And he is very ashamed.
HOW DADDY TOLD THE TRUTH
When dad was little, he was very bad at lying. Other children were somehow better at it. But they told little dad right away: “You’re lying!” And they always guessed right.
Little dad was very surprised. He asked: “How do you know?”
And everyone answered him: “It’s written on your nose.”
After hearing this several times, little daddy decided to check his nose. He went to the mirror and said:
I am the strongest, the smartest, the most beautiful! I am a dog! I'm a crocodile! I'm a locomotive!..
Having said all this, little dad looked at his nose in the mirror for a long time and patiently. There was still nothing written on the nose.
Then he decided that he needed to lie even harder. Continuing to look in the mirror, he said quite loudly:
I can swim! I draw very well! I have beautiful handwriting!
But even this blatant lie achieved nothing. No matter how little dad looked in the mirror, nothing was written on his nose. Then he went to his parents and said:
I lied a lot and looked at myself in the mirror, but there was nothing on my nose. Why do you say that it says that I’m lying?
Little daddy's parents laughed a lot at their stupid child. They said:
No one can see what is written on his nose. And the mirror never shows this. It's like biting your own elbow. Haven't you tried it?
No, said little daddy. But I'll try...
And he tried to bite his elbow. He tried very hard, but nothing worked. And then he decided not to look at his nose in the mirror anymore, not to bite his elbow and not to lie.
Little dad decided to tell everyone only the truth starting Monday. He decided that from that day on, only the pure truth would be written on his nose.
And then this Monday came. As soon as little dad washed his face and sat down to drink tea, he was immediately asked:
Have you washed your ears?
And he immediately told the truth:
No.
Because all boys don't like to wash their ears. There are too many of them, these ears. First I wash one ear, and then the other. And they are still dirty in the evening.
But adults don't understand this. And they shouted:
A shame! Slob! Wash it immediately!
Please... little daddy said quietly.
He went out and returned very quickly.
Did you wash your ears? asked him.
Soaped, he answered.
And then they asked him a completely unnecessary question:
Both or one?
One...
And then he was sent to wash his second ear. Then he was asked:
Did you drink fish oil?
And little daddy answered the truth:
Drank.
A teaspoon or a tablespoon?
Until that day, little dad always answered: “Dining room,” although he drank tea. Anyone who has ever tried fish oil should understand it. And this was the only lie that was not written on the nose. Everyone here believed little daddy. Moreover, he always poured fish oil into a tablespoon first, and then poured it into a teaspoon, and poured the rest back.
Tea room... said little dad. After all, he decided to tell only the truth. And for this he received another teaspoon of fish oil.
They say that there are children who love fish oil. Have you ever seen such children? I've never met them.
Little daddy went to school. And he had a hard time there too. The teacher asked:
Who didn't do their homework today?
Everyone was silent. And only little daddy told the truth:
I did not do.
Why? asked the teacher. Of course, one could say that there was a headache, that there was a fire, and then an earthquake began, and then... In general, one could lie about something, although this usually does not help much.
But little daddy decided not to lie. And he told the honest truth:
I read Jules Verne...
And then the whole class laughed.
Very good, the teacher said, I’ll have to talk to your parents about this writer.
Everyone laughed again, but little daddy felt sad.
And in the evening one aunt came to visit. She asked little daddy:
Do you like chocolate?
I love you very much, said honest little dad.
Do you love me? asked the aunt in a sweet voice.
No, said little daddy, I don’t like it.
Why?
First of all, you have a black wart on your cheek. And then you scream a lot, and all the time it seems to me that you are swearing.
What's too long to tell? Little daddy didn't get any chocolate.
And the little dad’s parents told him this:
Lying, of course, is bad. But you shouldn’t tell only the truth all the time, on every occasion, by the way or inopportunely. After all, it’s not my aunt’s fault that she has a wart. And if she doesn’t know how to speak quietly, then it’s too late for her to learn. And if she came to visit and also brought chocolate, there would be no need to offend her.
And little daddy is completely confused, because sometimes it is very difficult to understand whether it is possible to tell the truth or whether it is better not to.
But still he decided to tell the truth.
And from then on, little dad tried his whole life to never lie to anyone. He always tried to tell only the truth. And often for this he received bitter instead of sweet. And they still tell him that when he lies, it’s written all over his nose. Well then! It's written like that! There's nothing you can do about it!
V. Golyavkin. My good dad
3. On the balcony
I go to the balcony. I see a girl with a bow. She lives in that front door. She can whistle. She will look up and see me. This is what I need. “Hello,” I’ll say, “tra-la-la, three-li-li!” She will say: "Fool!" - or something different. And it will go further. As if nothing had happened. As if I wasn't teasing her. Me too! What a bow to me! It's like I'm waiting for her! I'm waiting for dad. He will bring me gifts. He will tell me about the war. And about different old times. Dad knows so many stories! No one can tell it better. I would listen and listen!
Dad knows about everything in the world. But sometimes he doesn't want to tell. He is then sad and keeps saying: “No, I wrote the wrong music, the wrong music, but it’s you!” - He’s telling me this. “You won’t let me down, I hope?” I don't want to offend dad. He dreams of me becoming a composer. I'm silent. What is music to me? He understands. “It’s sad,” he says. “You can’t even imagine how sad it is!” Why is it sad when I'm not sad at all? After all, dad doesn’t wish me harm. Then why is that? "Who will you be?" - says he. “Commander,” I say. "War again?" - My dad is unhappy. And he fought. He rode a horse and fired a machine gun.
My dad is very kind. My brother and I once told our dad: “Buy us ice cream. But more of it. So that we can eat.” “Here’s a basin for you,” said dad, “run for some ice cream.” Mom said: “They’ll catch a cold!” “It’s summer now,” dad answered, “why would they catch a cold?” - “But the throat, the throat!” - Mom said. Dad said: “Everyone has a sore throat. But everyone eats ice cream.” - “But not in such quantities!” - Mom said. “Let them eat as much as they want. What does quantity have to do with it! They won’t eat more than they can!” That's what dad said. And we took the basin and went for ice cream. And they brought a whole basin. We placed the basin on the table. The sun was shining from the windows. The ice cream began to melt. Dad said: “That’s what summer means!” - He told us to take the spoons and sit down at the table. We all sat down at the table - me, dad, mom, Boba. Boba and I were delighted! Ice cream runs down your face and shirts. We have such a kind dad! He bought so much ice cream! That now we won’t soon want
Dad planted twenty trees on our street. Now they have grown up. A huge tree in front of the balcony. If I reach down, I'll get the branch.
I'm waiting for dad. He will appear now. It's hard for me to look through the branches. They are closing the street. But I bend down and see the whole street.
"Notes of an Outstanding Loser" Arthur Givargizov
TEACHERS CANNOT STAND IT
Everyone knows that teachers can’t stand each other; they only pretend that they love each other, because everyone considers their subject to be the most important. And the Russian language teacher considers her subject to be the most important. That’s why she assigned an essay on the topic “The most, most important subject.” It was enough to write just one sentence: “The most important subject is the Russian language,” even with mistakes, and get an A; and everyone did so, except Seryozha; because Seryozha did not understand what kind of objects we were talking about, he thought that the object was something solid, and wrote about a lighter.
“The most important item,” the teacher read Seryozha’s essay out loud, is a lighter. You can’t light a cigarette without a lighter.” Just think, she stopped, you won’t light a cigarette. I asked a passerby for a light, and that was it.
What if in the desert? Seryozha calmly objected.
In the desert, you can light a cigarette from the sand, the teacher calmly answered. There is hot sand in the desert.
Okay, Seryozha agreed calmly, but in the tundra, at minus 50??
In the tundra, yes, the Russian language teacher agreed.
Then why two? asked Seryozha.
“Because we are not in the tundra,” the Russian language teacher sighed calmly. And not in the tundra, she suddenly shouted, the most important subject is the great and mighty Russian language!!!
RESULTS All-Russian competition"Living Classic"
19th century
1. Gogol N.V. "Taras Bulba" (2), " Enchanted place"", "The Inspector General", "The Night Before Christmas" (3), "Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka".
2. Chekhov A.P. “Thick and Thin” (3), “Chameleon”, “Burbot”, “Joy”, “Summer Residents”.
3. Tolstoy L.N. “War and Peace” (excerpts “Petya Rostov”, “Before the Battle”, “The Death of Petya”, monologue by Natasha Rostova (5)), “The Lion and the Dog”
4. Turgenev I.S. Prose poem “Pigeons”, “Sparrow” (2), “Shchi”, “Russian language”.
5. Pushkin A.S. “Peasant Young Lady” (3).
Aksakov S.T. "Early summer".
Glinka F.N. "Partizan Davydov".
Dostoevsky F.M. "Netochka Nezvanova."
Korolenko V. “The Blind Musician.”
Ostrovsky N.A. "Storm".
20th century
1. Green A. "Scarlet Sails" (7)
2. Paustovsky K.G. “Basket with fir cones” (3), “Old cook”, “Tenants of the old house”.
3. Platonov A.P. "Unknown flower" (2), "Flower on the ground"
4. M. Gorky (1), “Tales of Italy”
5. Kuprin A.I. (2)
Alekseevich S. “The Last Witnesses”
Aitmatov Ch.T. "The block"
Bunin I.A. "Lapti"
Zakrutkin V. “Mother of Man”
Rasputin V.G. "French lessons".
Tolstoy A. N. “Nikita’s Childhood”
Sholokhov M.A. "Nakhalenok."
Shmelev I.S. “Summer of the Lord,” excerpt from the chapter “Breaking the Fast”
Troepolsky G.N. "White Bim black ear"
Fadeev A. “Young Guard” excerpt “Mom”
Original work (search engines by title do not provide links)
"The Tale of Aimio, the North Wind and the Fairy of the Taka River - Tika"
Children's literature
Alexandrova T. “Traffic Light”
Gaidar A.P. "Distant Countries", "Hot Stone".
Georgiev S. “Sasha + Tanya”
Zheleznikov V.K. "Scarecrow"
Nosov N. “Fedina’s task”
Pivovarova I. “Nature Protection Day”
Black Sasha “Diary of Mickey the Pug”
Foreign literature
1. Antoine de Saint-Exupery “ A little prince" (4).
2. Hugo V. “Les Miserables.”
3. Lindgren A. “Pippi, Longstocking.”
4. Sand J. “What the flowers talk about.”
5. S.-Thompson “Lobo”.
6. Twain M. “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer”
7. Wilde O. “Boy Star”.
8. Capek Karel “A Dog’s Life.”
For example, Lev Kassil became famous for his book “Conduit and Schwambrania”, Nikolai Nosov for his novels about Dunno, Vitaly Bianchi for his “Forest Newspaper”, Yuri Sotnik for his story “How I Was Independent”
But Radiy Pogodin does not have such a book. Even his story “Dubravka”, the story “Turn on the Northern Lights”, the story “Chizhi”
After “Scarlet,” Yuri Koval began to write one after another his wonderful stories and novellas: “The Adventures of Vasya Kurolesov,” “The Little Napoleon III,” “Five Kidnapped Monks,” “Wormwood Tales.” The novel "Suer-Vier".
Well, Lizaveta Grigorievna, I saw young Berestov; I've seen enough; We were together all day.
Like this? Tell me, tell me in order.
If you please, let's go, I, Anisya Egorovna, Nenila, Dunka
Okay, I know. Well then?
Let me tell you everything in order. We arrived just before lunch. The room was full of people. There were the Kolbinskys, the Zakharyevskys, the clerk with her daughters, the Khlupinskys
Well! and Berestov?
Wait, sir. So we sat down at the table, the clerk was in first place, I was next to her and my daughters were sulking, but I don’t care about them
Oh Nastya, how boring you are with your eternal details!
How impatient you are! Well, we left the table and we sat for three hours, and the dinner was glorious; blancmange cake blue, red and striped So we left the table and went into the garden to play burners, and the young master appeared here.
Well? Is it true that he is so good-looking?
Surprisingly good, handsome, one might say. Slender, tall, blush all over his cheek
Right? And I thought that his face was pale. What? What did he look like to you? Sad, thoughtful?
What do you? I've never seen such a madman in my entire life. He decided to run with us into the burners.
Run into the burners with you! Impossible!
Very possible! What else did you come up with! He'll catch you and kiss you!
It's your choice, Nastya, you're lying.
It's your choice, I'm not lying. I got rid of him by force. He spent the whole day with us like this.
Why, they say, he’s in love and doesn’t look at anyone?
I don’t know, sir, but he looked at me too much, and at Tanya, the clerk’s daughter, too; and even Pasha Kolbinskaya, it’s a shame to say, he didn’t offend anyone, he’s such a spoiler!
It is amazing! What do you hear about him in the house?
The master, they say, is wonderful: so kind, so cheerful. One thing is not good: he likes to chase girls too much. Yes, for me, this is not a problem: it will settle down over time.
How I would like to see him! Lisa said with a sigh.
What's so clever about that? Tugilovo is not far from us, only three miles: go for a walk in that direction, or ride a horse; you will surely meet him. Every day, early in the morning, he goes hunting with a gun.
No, not good. He might think I'm chasing him. Besides, our fathers are in a quarrel, so I still won’t be able to meet him. Ah, Nastya! Do you know what? I'll dress up as a peasant girl!
And indeed; put on a thick shirt, a sundress, and go boldly to Tugilovo; I guarantee you that Berestov will not miss you.
And I can speak the local language perfectly well. Oh, Nastya, dear Nastya! What a wonderful idea!
Victor Golyavkin
THAT'S WHAT'S INTERESTING!
When Goga started going to first grade, he knew only two letters: O for a circle, and T for a hammer. That's all. I didn't know any other letters. And I couldn't read. Grandma tried to teach him, but he immediately came up with a trick: “Now, now, grandma, I’ll wash the dishes for you.” And he immediately ran to the kitchen to wash the dishes. And the old grandmother forgot about studying and even bought him gifts for helping him with the housework. And Gogin’s parents were on a long business trip and relied on their grandmother. And of course, they didn’t know that their son still hadn’t learned to read. But Goga often washed the floor and dishes, went to buy bread, and his grandmother praised him in every possible way in letters to his parents. And I read it aloud to him. And Goga, sitting comfortably on the sofa, listened with his eyes closed. “Why should I learn to read,” he reasoned, if my grandmother reads aloud to me.” He didn't even try. And in class he dodged as best he could. The teacher tells him: “Read it here.” He pretended to read, and he himself told from memory what his grandmother read to him. The teacher stopped him. To the laughter of the class, he said: “If you want, I’d better close the window so it doesn’t blow.” Or: “I’m so dizzy that I’m probably going to fall... He pretended so skillfully that one day his teacher sent him to the doctor.” The doctor asked: - How are you? “It’s bad,” said Goga. - What hurts? - All. - Well, go to class then. - Why? - Because nothing hurts you. - How do you know? - How do you know that? - the doctor laughed. And he slightly pushed Goga towards the exit. Goga never pretended to be sick again, but continued to prevaricate. And the efforts of my classmates came to nothing. First, Masha, an excellent student, was assigned to him.
“Let’s study seriously,” Masha told him. - When? - asked Goga. - Yeah right now. “I’ll come now,” Goga said. And he left and did not return. Then Grisha, an excellent student, was assigned to him. They stayed in the classroom. But as soon as Grisha opened the primer, Goga reached under the desk. - Where are you going? - asked Grisha. “Come here,” Goga called. - For what? - And here no one will bother us. - Yah you! - Grisha, of course, was offended and left immediately. No one else was assigned to him.
As time went. He was dodging. Gogin's parents arrived and found that their son could not read a single line. The father grabbed his head, and the mother grabbed the book she had brought for her child. “Now every evening,” she said, “I will read this wonderful book aloud to my son.” Grandma said: “Yes, yes, I also read interesting books aloud to Gogochka every evening.” But the father said: “You really shouldn’t have done that.” Our Gogochka has become so lazy that he cannot read a single line. I ask everyone to leave for the meeting. And dad, along with grandmother and mom, left for a meeting. And Goga was at first worried about the meeting, and then calmed down when his mother began to read to him from a new book. And he even shook his legs with pleasure and almost spat on the carpet. But he didn't know what kind of meeting it was! What was decided there! So, mom read him a page and a half after the meeting. And he, swinging his legs, naively imagined that this would continue to happen. But when mom stopped at the most interesting place, he became worried again. And when she handed him the book, he became even more worried. “Then read for yourself,” his mother told him. He immediately suggested: “Let me wash the dishes for you, mommy.” And he ran to wash the dishes. But even after that, my mother refused to read. He ran to his father. His father sternly told him never to make such requests to him again. He thrust the book to his grandmother, but she yawned and dropped it from her hands. He picked up the book from the floor and gave it to his grandmother again. But she dropped it from her hands again. No, she had never fallen asleep so quickly in her chair before! “Is she really asleep,” thought Goga, “or was she instructed at the meeting to pretend?” Goga tugged at her, shook her, but the grandmother did not even think about waking up. And he really wanted to know what happens next in this book! In despair, he sat down on the floor and began to look at the pictures. But from the pictures it was difficult to understand what was happening there next. He brought the book to class. But his classmates refused to read to him. Not only that: Masha immediately left, and Grisha defiantly reached under the desk. Goga pestered the high school student, but he flicked him on the nose and laughed. What to do next? After all, he will never know what is written next in the book until he reads it.
All that remained was to study. Read for yourself. That's what a home meeting is all about! This is what the public means! He soon read the entire book and many other books, but out of habit he never forgot to go buy bread, wash the floor or wash the dishes. That's what's interesting!
Victor Golyavkin
TWO GIFTS
On his birthday, dad gave Alyosha a pen with a gold feather. The golden words were engraved on the handle: “On Alyosha’s birthday from dad.” The next day Alyosha went to school with his new pen. He was very proud: after all, not everyone in the class has a pen with a gold nib and gold letters! And then the teacher forgot her pen at home and asked the kids to borrow it. And Alyosha was the first to hand her his treasure. And at the same time I thought: “Maria Nikolaevna will definitely notice what a wonderful pen he has, read the inscription and say something like: “Oh, what beautiful handwriting it’s written!” or: “What a beauty!” Then Alyosha will say: “And you look on a golden pen, Maria Nikolaevna, the real gold one!" But the teacher did not look at the pen and did not say anything like that. She asked Alyosha for the lesson, but he did not learn it. And then Maria Nikolaevna wrote a deuce in the journal with a golden pen and returned the pen. Alyosha, looking at his golden feather in confusion, said: “How does it happen?.. This is how it happens!..” “What are you talking about, Alyosha?” the teacher didn’t understand. “About the golden feather...” said Alyosha. Can you give twos with a golden pen?
“So today you don’t have golden knowledge,” said the teacher. - It turns out that dad gave me a pen so that they could give me two grades with it? - said Alyosha. - That's the number! What kind of gift is this?! The teacher smiled and said: “Dad gave you a pen, but today’s gift you made for yourself.”
FASTER, FASTER! (V. Golyavkin)
Heading 5 Heading 615
by choosing a work of art for memorizing a fragment of the work ("Living Classics" competition)
It is necessary to choose those works in which there is dialogue, there is expression, in which the heroes - boys and girls - are most often the same age as modern teenagers, because their life and fate are close, understandable and interesting to modern schoolchildren.
The works offered are mainly short stories and novellas. They carry a great emotional and educational charge to the young reader. The authors of these works are recognized classics of literature for children and youth of the 20th century.
Belov V.I. Mishuk (a fairy tale for Anyuta) / Tuesok: a book for children and their parents on the literature of the Vologda region. – P. 301 – 312.
Ushinsky K.D. Hunter of fairy tales / Tuesok: a book for children and their parents on the literature of the Vologda region. – P. 123 -126.
Mikhalkov S. Tales about animals: Moscow, 2009.-(White gloves, Simulating hare, Pelican education, Magic word, Exam and others)
Mikhalkov S. Why mice don’t hurt cats: fables and fairy tales. – Moscow, 2003.
Black S. Soldiers' Tales.
Charskaya L. Sibirochka. – Moscow, 2009. – (for example, Chapter XIII – Letter...)
Astafiev. V. Strizhonok Skrip. /Tuesok: a book for children and their parents on the literature of the Vologda region. – P. 66 – 74.
Carroll L. Alice in Wonderland. - Any edition.
Bulychev K. Pashka the troglodyte: a fantastic story. – Moscow, 1998. – (Alice and her friends in the labyrinths of history).
In the Land of Legends: Legends past centuries retold for children. – Moscow, 2004. – P.- 206-222. (The Pied Piper of Hamelin)
Twain M. Taming the Bicycle. /Extracurricular reading (for 6th grade). – Moscow, 2007. – P. 28 – 38.
Voskoboynikov V. Life of wonderful children. – St. Petersburg, 1999. –
(Short stories within a character narrative):
Alexander the Great. –P.7 – 20
Avicenna – pp. 21 – 32. Newton. – P.33 – 42.
Suvorov. – P. 67 – 78.
Chaplin. – P. 103 – 116.
Edison. – P. 117 – 130.
Einstein. – P. 145 – 154.
Bill Gates. – P. 165 – 173. and others
Works about the Great Patriotic War of 1941 - 1945. for middle school age:
In the “Library of Courage” series collections:
"Russian character"
Sobolev Leonid. Duel. – pp. 21 - 26
Polevoy Boris. The last day of Matvey Kuzmin. – P. 27 – 39.
Cassil Lev. Portrait by fire. – P. 40 – 48.
Tolstoy Alexey. Russian character. (From “Stories by Ivan Sudarev”) - pp. 49 – 61. (if not included in the school curriculum)
Lev Kassil. Hold on, captain!: stories about the Great Patriotic War:
Cassil Lev. Hold on, captain!: stories about the Great Patriotic War. – Yaroslavl, 2003. – P. 51 – 62. - (Library of Courage)
Cassil Lev. A story about an absent person. - Ibid. – P. 5 – 12.
Cassil Lev. Everything will come back. - Right there. – P. 21 – 30.
Cassil Lev. Marks of Rimma Lebedeva. - Right there. – P. 45 – 50.
"Little Soldier":
Polevoy Boris. Guard private. – P. 5 – 24.
Panteleev Leonid. Nayalika. – P. 25 – 42.
Platonov Andrey. Little soldier. – P. 43 – 50.
Lavrenev Boris. Scout Vikhrov. – P. 51 – 62.
Sergey Alekseev
Alekseev S. Battle of Stalingrad 1942 – 1943. – any edition.
Alekseev S. From Moscow to Berlin: stories about the Great Patriotic War. – Moscow, 2007. – any publication.
Alekseev A. One hundred stories from Russian history. – Moscow, 2005. – any publication.
Anatoly Mityaev .
Mityaev A. Letter from the front: stories about the Great Patriotic War. – any edition:
Guard teddy bear.
Earrings for a donkey.
Ivan and the Krauts. And other stories.
The sixth is incomplete.
Night blindness.
Warm "tongue".
Triangular letter.
A bag of oatmeal.
Valentin Kataev
Kataev V. Son of the regiment. – Moscow: Onyx, 2008. – P. 68 -70, 71 -73 and others.
Ilyina E. The fourth height. – Moscow: AST: Astrel, 2008. – any publication.
A selection of texts for the reading competition “Living Classics”
A. Fadeev “Young Guard” (novel)
Monologue of Oleg Koshevoy.
"... Mom, mom! I remember your hands from the moment I began to recognize myself in the world. Over the summer they were always covered with a tan, it didn’t go away even in the winter - it was so gentle, even, just a little darker on the veins. Or maybe they were rougher, your hands - after all, they had so much work to do in life - but they always seemed so tender to me, and I loved kissing them right on the dark veins. Yes, from that very moment. the moment I began to become aware of myself, and until the last minute, when you, exhausted, quietly laid your head on my chest for the last time, seeing me off on the difficult path of life, I always remember your hands at work. I remember how they scurried about in the soap bar. foam, washing my sheets, when these sheets were still so small that they looked like diapers, and I remember how you, in a sheepskin coat, in winter, carried buckets on a yoke, placing a small hand in a mitten on the yoke in front of the yoke, you yourself were so small and fluffy, like mitten. I see your fingers with slightly thickened joints on the ABC book, and I repeat after you: “ba-a - ba, ba-ba.” I see how with your strong hand you bring the sickle under the belly, broken by the grain of the other hand, right on the sickle, I see the elusive sparkle of the sickle and then this instant smooth, such a feminine movement of the hands and the sickle, throwing back the ears in the bunch so as not to break the compressed stems. I remember your hands, unbending, red, turning blue from the cold water in the hole where you rinsed clothes when we lived alone - it seemed completely alone in the world - and I remember how imperceptibly your hands could remove a splinter from your son’s finger and how they instantly threaded a needle when you sewed and sang - sang only for yourself and for me. Because there is nothing in the world that your hands cannot do, that they cannot do, that they would abhor! I saw how they kneaded clay with cow dung to coat the hut, and I saw your hand peeking out of the silk, with a ring on your finger, when you raised a glass of red Moldavian wine. And with what submissive tenderness your full and white hand above the elbow wrapped itself around your stepfather’s neck when he, playing with you, picked you up in his arms - the stepfather whom you taught to love me and whom I honored as my own, for one thing alone, that you loved him. But most of all, I remembered forever how gently they stroked, your hands, slightly rough and so warm and cool, how they stroked my hair, and neck, and chest, when I lay half-conscious in bed. And whenever I opened my eyes, you were always next to me, and the night light was burning in the room, and you looked at me with your sunken eyes, as if from the darkness, yourself all quiet and bright, as if in vestments. I kiss your clean, holy hands! You sent your sons off to war - if not you, then another, just like you - you will never wait for others, and if this cup passed you by, it did not pass another, just like you. But if even in the days of war people have a piece of bread and there are clothes on their bodies, and if there are stacks of stacks in the field, and trains are running along the rails, and cherries are blooming in the garden, and a flame is raging in the blast furnace, and someone’s invisible force raises a warrior from the ground or from the bed when he was sick or wounded - all this was done by the hands of my mother - mine, and his, and his. Look around, too, young man, my friend, look around, like me, and tell me who you offended in life more than your mother - wasn’t it from me, wasn’t it from you, wasn’t it from him, wasn’t it from our failures, mistakes and Is it not because of our grief that our mothers turn gray? But the time will come when all this will turn into a painful reproach to the heart at the mother’s grave. Mom mom!. .Forgive me, because you are alone, only you in the world can forgive, put your hands on your head, like in childhood, and forgive... "
Vasily Grossman “Life and Fate” (novel)
Last letter to a Jewish mother
“Vityenka... This letter is not easy to break off, it is my last conversation with you, and, having forwarded the letter, I am finally leaving you, you will never know about my last hours. This is our very last separation. What will I tell you, saying goodbye, before eternal separation? These days, as throughout my life, you have been my joy. At night I remembered you, your children's clothes, your first books, I remembered your first letter, the first day of school. I remembered everything, everything from the first days of your life to the last news from you, the telegram received on June 30. I closed my eyes, and it seemed to me that you shielded me from the impending horror, my friend. And when I remembered what was happening around me, I was glad that you were not near me - let the terrible fate blow you away. Vitya, I have always been lonely. On sleepless nights I cried with sadness. After all, no one knew this. My consolation was the thought that I would tell you about my life. I’ll tell you why your dad and I separated, why I lived alone for such many years. And I often thought how surprised Vitya would be to learn that his mother made mistakes, was crazy, was jealous, that she was jealous, was like all young people. But my destiny is to end my life alone, without sharing with you. Sometimes it seemed to me that I should not live away from you, I loved you too much. I thought that love gave me the right to be with you in my old age. Sometimes it seemed to me that I shouldn’t live with you, I loved you too much. Well, enfin... Be always happy with those you love, who surround you, who have become closer to your mother. I'm sorry. From the street you can hear women crying, police officers cursing, and I look at these pages, and it seems to me that I am protected from a terrible world full of suffering. How can I finish my letter? Where can I get strength, son? Are there human words that can express my love for you? I kiss you, your eyes, your forehead, your hair. Remember that on days of happiness and on days of sorrow, mother’s love is always with you; no one can kill it. Vitenka... Here is the last line of my mother’s last letter to you. Live, live, live forever... Mom.
Yuri Krasavin
“Russian Snows” (story)
It was a strange snowfall: in the sky, where the sun was, there was a blurry spot shining. Is it really a clear sky up there? Where does the snow come from then? White darkness all around. Both the road and the lying tree disappeared behind a veil of snow, barely ten steps away from them. The country road, going away from the highway, from the village of Ergushovo, was barely visible under the snow, which covered it in a thick layer, and what was on the right and left, and the roadside bushes showed outlandish figures, some of them had a frightening appearance. Now Katya walked, not lagging behind: she was afraid of getting lost. - Why are you like a dog on a leash? - he said to her over his shoulder. - Walk next to me. She answered him: “The dog always runs ahead of the owner.” “You’re being rude,” he remarked and quickened his pace, walking so quickly that she was already whining pitifully: “Well, Dementy, don’t be angry... This way I’ll fall behind and get lost.” And you are responsible for me before God and people. Listen, Dementy! “Ivan Tsarevich,” he corrected and slowed down. At times it seemed to him that a human figure, covered in snow, or even two, loomed ahead. Every now and then vague voices came, but it was impossible to understand who was speaking or what they were saying. The presence of these travelers ahead was a little reassuring: it meant he was guessing the road correctly. However, voices were heard from somewhere on the side, and even from above - the snow, perhaps, was breaking someone’s conversation into pieces and carried it to different sides? “There are fellow travelers somewhere nearby,” Katya said warily. “These are demons,” Vanya explained. - They are always at this time... they are at their peak now. - Why now? - Look, what a hush! And here you and I... Don’t feed them bread, just let them lead people so that they get lost, make fun of us and even destroy us. - Oh, come on! Why are you scared? - Demons are rushing, demons are hovering, the moon is invisible... - We don’t even have a moon. In complete silence, snowflakes fell and fell, each the size of a dandelion head. The snow was so weightless that it rose even from the air movement produced by the walking feet of the two travelers - it rose like fluff and, swirling, spread to the sides. The weightlessness of the snow gave the deceptive impression that everything had lost its weight - both the ground under your feet and yourself. What remained behind was not footprints, but a furrow, like behind a plow, but it, too, quickly closed. Strange snow, very strange. The wind, if it arose, was not even wind, but a light breeze, which from time to time created a commotion around, causing the surrounding world to shrink so much that it even became cramped. The impression is as if they were enclosed in a huge egg, in its empty shell, filled with scattered light from the outside - this light fell and rose in clumps, flakes, circled this way and that...
Lydia Charskaya
“Notes of a Little Schoolgirl” (story)
In the corner there was a round stove, which was constantly burning at this time; The stove door was now wide open, and one could see how a small red book was burning brightly in the fire, gradually curling into tubes with its blackened and charred sheets. My God! Japanese Little Red Book! I recognized her immediately. - Julie! Julie! - I whispered in horror. - What have you done, Julie! But there was no trace of Julie. - Julie! Julie! - I desperately called my cousin. - Where are you? Ah, Julie! - What's happened? What's happened? Why are you shouting like a street urchin! - suddenly appearing on the threshold, the Japanese woman said sternly. - Is it possible to shout like that! What were you doing here in class alone? Answer this very minute! Why are you here? But I stood dumbfounded, not knowing what to answer her. My cheeks were flushed, my eyes stubbornly looked at the floor. Suddenly, the loud cry of the Japanese woman made me immediately raise my head and come to my senses... She stood by the stove, probably attracted by the open door, and, stretching out her hands to its opening, moaned loudly: “My little red book, my poor book!” A gift from my late sister Sophie! Oh, what grief! What a terrible grief! And, kneeling down in front of the door, she began to sob, clutching her head with both hands. I felt infinitely sorry for the poor Japanese woman. I myself was ready to cry with her. With quiet, careful steps I approached her and, lightly touching her hand with mine, whispered: “If you only knew how sorry I am, mademoiselle, that... that... I repent so much... I wanted to finish the sentence and say how I repent that I didn’t run after Julie and didn’t stop her, but I didn’t have time to say this, because at that very moment the Japanese woman, like a wounded animal, jumped up from the floor and, grabbing me by the shoulders, began to shake me with all her might. Yeah, you repent! Now you repent, yeah! What have you done? Burn my book! My innocent book, the only memory of my dear Sophie! She probably would have hit me if at that moment the girls had not ran into the classroom and surrounded us from all sides, asking what was the matter. The Japanese woman roughly grabbed me by the hand, pulled me into the middle of the class and, menacingly shaking her finger over my head, shouted at the top of her voice: “She stole from me the little red book that my late sister gave me and from which I did German dictations for you.” She must be punished! She's a thief! My God! What is this? On top of the black apron, between the collar and the waist, a large white piece of paper dangles from my chest, secured with a pin. And on the sheet is written in clear, large handwriting: / “She’s a thief!” Stay away from her!" It was beyond the power of the little orphan who had already suffered a lot to bear! To say right away that it was not I, but Julie, who was to blame for the death of the little red book! Julie alone! Yes, yes, now, no matter what it became! And my gaze found the hunchback in the crowd of other girls. And what kind of eyes she had at that moment!.. What sadness and horror looked out of them! No! You can calm down, Julie! - I said mentally. - I won't give you away. After all, you have a mother who will be sad and hurt for your action, but my mother is in heaven and sees perfectly well that I am not to blame for anything. Here on earth, no one will take my action as close to their heart as they will take yours! No, no, I won’t give you up, not for anything, not for anything!”
Veniamin Kaverin
"Two Captains" (novel)
“On my chest, in my side pocket, there was a letter from Captain Tatarinov. “Listen, Katya,” I said decisively, “I want to tell you a story. In general, like this: imagine that you live on the bank of a river and one fine day on this A mail bag appears on the shore. Of course, it does not fall from the sky, but it is washed away by the water. And this bag falls into the hands of one woman who loves to read. And among her neighbors there is a boy, about eight years old, who loves to listen. And then one day she reads him this letter: “Dear Maria Vasilyevna...” Katya shuddered and looked at me in amazement - “... I hasten to inform you that Ivan Lvovich is alive and well,” I continued quickly, “Four months ago I, according to his instructions...” And without taking a breath, I read the navigator’s letter by heart. I didn’t stop, although Katya took me by the sleeve several times with some horror and surprise. “Have you seen this letter?” she asked and turned pale. “Is he writing about his father?” she asked again, as if there could be any doubt about it. - Yes. But that is not all! And I told her about how Aunt Dasha once came across another letter, which spoke about the life of a ship covered in ice and slowly moving north. “My friend, my dear, my dear Mashenka...” I began by heart and stopped. Goosebumps ran down my spine, my throat tightened, and I suddenly saw in front of me, as in a dream, the gloomy, aged face of Marya Vasilyevna, with gloomy, sullen eyes. She was like Katya when he wrote her this letter, and Katya was a little girl who was still waiting for a “letter from daddy.” Finally got it! “In a word, here it is,” I said and took out letters in compressed paper from my side pocket. - Sit down and read, and I’ll go. I'll be back when you read it. Of course, I didn't go anywhere. I stood under the tower of Elder Martyn and looked at Katya the entire time she was reading. I felt very sorry for her, and my chest always felt warm when I thought about her, and cold when I thought how scary it was for her to read these letters. I saw how, with an unconscious movement, she straightened her hair, which was preventing her from reading, and how she stood up from the bench as if to make out a difficult word. I didn’t know before whether it was grief or joy to receive such a letter. But now, looking at her, I realized that this was a terrible grief! I realized that she never lost hope! Thirteen years ago, her father went missing in the polar ice, where there is nothing easier than to die of hunger and cold. But for her he died only now!
Yuri Bondarev “Youth of Commanders” (novel)
They walked slowly down the street. Snow flew in the light of lonely street lamps and fell from the roofs; There were fresh snowdrifts near the dark entrances. The whole block was white and white, and there was not a single passer-by around, as in the dead of a winter night. And it was already morning. It was five o'clock in the morning of the new year. But it seemed to both of them that yesterday evening had not yet ended with its lights, thick snow on collars, traffic and bustle at tram stops. It’s just that last year’s snowstorm was churning through the deserted streets of the sleeping city, knocking on fences and shutters. It began in the old year and did not end in the new one. And they walked and walked past smoking snowdrifts, past swept-out entrances. Time has lost its meaning. It stopped yesterday. And suddenly a tram appeared in the depths of the street. This carriage, empty, lonely, crawled quietly, making its way through the snowy darkness. The tram reminded me of the time. It moved. - Wait, where did we come? Oh yes, Oktyabrskaya! Look, we have reached Oktyabrskaya. Enough. I'm about to fall into the snow from fatigue. Valya stopped decisively, lowered her chin into the fur of her collar, and looked thoughtfully at the lights of the tram, dim in the snowstorm. Her breath froze the fur near her lips, the tips of her eyelashes turned frosty, and Alexey saw that they were frozen solid. He said: “It seems like it’s morning...” “And the tram is so dull and tired, like you and me,” Valya said and laughed. - After a holiday, you always feel sorry for something. For some reason you have a sad face. He answered, looking at the lights approaching from the snowstorm: “I haven’t ridden a tram for four years.” I wish I could remember how it's done. Honestly. In fact, during his two weeks at the artillery school in the rear city, Alexey became little accustomed to peaceful life; he was amazed at the silence, he was overwhelmed by it. He was touched by the distant bells of the tram, the light in the windows, the snowy silence of winter evenings, the wipers at the gates (just like before the war), the barking of dogs - everything, everything that had long been half-forgotten. When he walked along the street alone, he involuntarily thought: “There, on the corner, there is a good anti-tank position, you can see the intersection, in that house with a turret there may be a machine-gun point, the street is being shot through.” All this was familiar and still lived firmly in him. Valya gathered her coat around her legs and said: “Of course, we won’t pay for the tickets.” Let's go as rabbits. Moreover, the conductor sees New Year's dreams! Alone on this empty tram, they sat opposite each other. Valya sighed, rubbed the squeaky frost of the window with her glove, and breathed. She rubbed the “peephole”: dim spots of flashlights rarely floated through it. Then she shook the glove on her knees and, straightening up, raised her close eyes and asked seriously: “Did you remember anything just now?” - What did I remember? - Alexey said, meeting her gaze point-blank. One reconnaissance. AND New Year near Zhitomir, or rather, near the Makarov farm. We, two artillerymen, were then taken on a search... The tram rolled through the streets, the wheels squealed freezing; Valya leaned over to the worn “eye,” which was already filled with a thick, cold blue: either it was getting light, or the snow had stopped, and the moon was shining over the city.
Boris Vasiliev “And the dawns here are quiet” (story)
Rita knew that her wound was fatal and that she would have to die long and difficult. So far there was almost no pain, only the burning sensation in my stomach was getting stronger and I was thirsty. But it was impossible to drink, and Rita simply soaked a rag in the puddle and applied it to her lips. Vaskov hid her under a spruce tree, covered her with branches and left. At that time they were still shooting, but soon everything suddenly became quiet, and Rita began to cry. She cried silently, without sighs, tears just flowed down her face, she realized that Zhenya was no more. And then the tears disappeared. They retreated before the huge thing that now stood in front of her, what she needed to deal with, what she had to prepare for. A cold black abyss opened up at her feet, and Rita looked courageously and sternly into it. Soon Vaskov returned. He scattered the branches, silently sat down next to him, clasping his wounded hand and swaying.
— Zhenya died?
He nodded. Then he said:
- We don’t have any bags. No bags, no rifles. Either they took it with them or hid it somewhere.
— Zhenya died right away?
“Right away,” he said, and she felt that he was telling a lie. - They are gone. Behind
explosives, apparently... - He caught her dull, understanding look, and suddenly shouted: - They didn’t defeat us, you understand? I'm still alive, I still need to be knocked down!..
He fell silent, gritting his teeth. He swayed, cradling his wounded hand.
“It hurts here,” he pointed at his chest. “It’s itching here, Rita.” It itches so much!.. I put you down, I put all five of you there, but for what? For a dozen Krauts?
- Well, why do that... It’s still clear, it’s war.
- It’s still war, of course. And then, when will there be peace? It will be clear why you should die
did you have to? Why didn’t I let these Krauts go further, why did I make such a decision? What to answer when they ask why you guys couldn’t protect our mothers from bullets? Why did you marry them with death, but you yourself are intact? Did they take care of the Kirovskaya Road and the White Sea Canal? Yes, there must be security there too, there are a lot more people there than five girls and a foreman with a revolver...
“No need,” she said quietly. “The homeland doesn’t start with the canals.” Not from there at all. And we protected her. Her first, and then the channel.
“Yes...” Vaskov sighed heavily and paused. “You just lie down for a while, I’ll take a look around.” Otherwise they’ll stumble and that’ll be the end of us. “He took out a revolver and for some reason carefully wiped it with his sleeve. - Take it. True, there are two cartridges left, but still calmer with him. - Wait a minute. “Rita looked somewhere past his face, into the sky blocked by branches. - Do you remember how I came across the Germans at the crossing? I then ran to my mother in the city. I have a three-year-old son there. Name is Alik, Albert. My mother is very sick and will not live long, and my father is missing.
- Don't worry, Rita. I understood everything.
- Thank you. “She smiled with colorless lips. - My last request
will you do it?
“No,” he said.
- It’s pointless, I’ll die anyway. I'm just getting tired of it.
“I’ll do some reconnaissance and come back.” We'll get to ours by nightfall.
“Kiss me,” she suddenly said.
He leaned over awkwardly and awkwardly pressed his lips to his forehead.
“Prickly...” she sighed barely audibly, closing her eyes. - Go. Cover me with branches and go. Tears slowly crawled down her gray, sunken cheeks. Fedot Evgrafych quietly stood up, carefully covered Rita with his spruce paws and quickly walked towards the river. Towards the Germans...
Yuri Yakovlev “Heart of the Earth” (story)
Children never remember their mother as young and beautiful, because the understanding of beauty comes later, when mother’s beauty has time to fade. I remember my mother gray-haired and tired, but they say she was beautiful. Large, thoughtful eyes in which the light of the heart appeared. Smooth dark eyebrows, long eyelashes. Smoky hair fell over his high forehead. I still hear her quiet voice, leisurely steps, feel the gentle touch of her hands, the rough warmth of the dress on her shoulder. It has nothing to do with age, it is eternal. Children never tell their mother about their love for her. They don’t even know the name of the feeling that binds them more and more to their mother. In their understanding, this is not a feeling at all, but something natural and obligatory, like breathing, quenching thirst. But a child’s love for his mother has its golden days. I experienced them at an early age, when I first realized that the most necessary person in the world was my mother. My memory has not retained almost any details of those distant days, but I know about this feeling of mine, because it still glimmers in me and has not dissipated throughout the world. And I take care of it, because without love for my mother there is a cold emptiness in my heart. I never called my mother mother, mother. I had another word for her - mommy. Even when I became big, I could not change this word. My mustache has grown and my bass has appeared. I was embarrassed by this word and pronounced it barely audibly in public. The last time I uttered it was on a rain-wet platform, near a red soldier’s train, in a crush, to the sounds of the alarming whistles of a steam locomotive, to the loud command “to the carriages!” I didn’t know that I was saying goodbye to my mother forever. I whispered “mommy” in her ear and, so that no one would see my manly tears, I wiped them on her hair... But when the train started moving, I couldn’t stand it, I forgot that I was a man, a soldier, I forgot that there were people around, a lot of people, and Through the roar of the wheels, through the wind hitting my eyes, I shouted: “Mommy!” And then there were letters. And the letters from home had one extraordinary property, which everyone discovered for themselves and did not admit their discovery to anyone. In the most difficult moments, when it seemed that everything was over or would end in the next moment and there was no longer a single clue for life, we found an untouchable supply of life in letters from home. When a letter arrived from my mother, there was no paper, no envelope with a field mail number, no lines. There was only my mother’s voice, which I heard even in the roar of the guns, and the smoke of the dugout touched my cheek, like the smoke of a home. On New Year's Eve, my mother spoke in detail in a letter about the Christmas tree. It turns out that Christmas tree candles were accidentally found in the closet, short, multi-colored, similar to sharpened colored pencils. They were lit, and with spruce branches The incomparable aroma of stearin and pine needles spread throughout the room. The room was dark, and only the cheerful will-o'-the-wisps faded and flared up, and the gilded walnuts flickered dimly. Then it turned out that all this was a legend that my dying mother composed for me in an ice house, where all the glass was broken by the blast wave, and the stoves were dead and people were dying of hunger, cold and shrapnel. And she wrote, from the icy besieged city, sending me the last drops of her warmth, the last blood. And I believed the legend. He held on to it - to his emergency supply, to his reserve life. Was too young to read between the lines. I read the lines themselves, not noticing that the letters were crooked, because they were written by a hand devoid of strength, for which the pen was heavy, like an ax. Mother wrote these letters while her heart was beating...
Zheleznikov “Dogs Don’t Make Mistakes” (story)
Yura Khlopotov had the largest and most interesting collection of stamps in the class. Because of this collection, Valerka Snegirev went to visit his classmate. When Yura began to pull out huge and for some reason dusty albums from the massive desk, a drawn-out and plaintive howl was heard right above the boys’ heads...-
Do not pay attention! - Yurka waved his hand, moving his albums with concentration. - The neighbor's dog!-
Why is she howling?-
How do I know. She howls every day. Until five o'clock.
It stops at five. My dad says: if you don’t know how to look after, don’t get dogs... Looking at his watch and waving his hand to Yura, Valerka hastily wrapped his scarf in the hallway and put on his coat. Running out into the street, I took a breath and found windows on the façade of Yurka’s house. The three windows on the ninth floor above the Khlopotovs’ apartment were uncomfortably dark. Valerka, leaning his shoulder against the cold concrete of the lamppost, decided to wait as long as necessary. And then the outermost window lit up dimly: they turned on the light, apparently in the hallway... The door opened immediately, but Valerka didn’t even have time to see who was standing on the threshold, because a small brown ball suddenly jumped out from somewhere and, squealing joyfully, rushed under Valerka legs. Valerka felt the wet touch of a dog’s warm tongue on his face: a very tiny dog, but he jumped so high! (He stretched out his arms, picked up the dog, and she buried herself in his neck, breathing quickly and devotedly.-
Miracles! - a thick voice rang out, immediately filling the entire space of the staircase. The voice belonged to a frail, short man.-
You to me? It’s a strange thing, you know... Yanka is not particularly kind to strangers. And how about you! Come in.-
Just a moment, on business. The man immediately became serious.-
On business? I'm listening. -
Your dog... Yana... Howls all day long. The man became sad.-
So... It interferes, that is. Did your parents send you?-
I just wanted to know why she howls. She's feeling bad, right?-
You're right, she feels bad. Yanka is used to going for walks during the day, and I’m at work. My wife will come and everything will be all right. But you can’t explain it to a dog!-
I come home from school at two o'clock... I could walk with her after school! The owner of the apartment looked strangely at the uninvited guest, then suddenly walked up to the dusty shelf, extended his hand and took out the key.-
Here you go. It's time to be surprised by Valerka.-
Do you really trust any stranger with the key to your apartment?-
Oh, excuse me, please,” the man extended his hand. - Let's get acquainted! Molchanov Valery Alekseevich, engineer.-
Snegirev Valery, student of the 6th “B,” the boy answered with dignity.-
Very nice! Is everything all right now? The dog Yana did not want to go down to the floor, and then she ran after Valerka all the way to the door.-
Dogs don’t make mistakes, they don’t make mistakes... - engineer Molchanov muttered under his breath.
Nikolay Garin-Mikhailovsky “Tyoma and the Bug” (story)
Nanny, where is Zhuchka? - asks Tyoma. “Some Herod threw a bug into an old well,” the nanny answers. - All day, they say, she screamed, heartfelt... The boy listens with horror to the nanny’s words, and thoughts swarm in his head. He has a lot of plans flashing through his mind on how to save the Bug, he moves from one incredible project to another and, unnoticed by himself, falls asleep. He wakes up from some kind of shock in the middle of an interrupted dream, in which he kept pulling out the Bug, but she broke down and fell again to the bottom of the well. Deciding to immediately go save his pet, Tyoma tiptoes to the glass door and quietly, so as not to make noise, goes out onto the terrace. It's dawn outside. Running up to the hole of the well, he calls in a low voice: “Bug, Bug!” The bug, recognizing the owner's voice, squeals joyfully and pitifully. - I'll free you now! - he shouts, as if the dog understands him. A lantern and two poles with a crossbar at the bottom on which a loop lay began to slowly descend into the well. But this well-thought-out plan unexpectedly burst: as soon as the device reached the bottom, the dog tried to grab onto it, but, losing its balance, fell into the mud. The thought that he worsened the situation, that Bug could still have been saved and now he himself is to blame for the fact that she will die, makes Tyoma decide to fulfill the second part of the dream - to go down into the well himself. He ties a rope to one of the posts supporting the crossbar and climbs into the well. He realizes only one thing: not a second of time can be lost. For a moment, fear creeps into his soul that he might suffocate, but he remembers that the Bug has been sitting there for a whole day. This calms him down and he goes further down. The bug, having sat down again in its original place, has calmed down and with a cheerful squeak expresses sympathy for the crazy enterprise. This calmness and firm confidence of the bugs are transferred to the boy, and he safely reaches the bottom. Without wasting time, Tyoma ties the reins around the dog, then quickly climbs up. But going up is harder than going down! We need air, we need strength, and Tyoma already doesn’t have enough of both. Fear covers him, but he encourages himself in a voice trembling with horror: “Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid!” It's a shame to be afraid! Cowards are only afraid! Those who do bad things are afraid, but I don’t do bad things, I pull out the Bug, my mom and dad will praise me for this. Tyoma smiles and again calmly waits for the surge of strength. Thus, unnoticed, his head finally protrudes above the top frame of the well. Making a last effort, he gets out himself and pulls out the Bug. But now that the job is done, his strength quickly leaves him, and he faints.
Vladimir Zheleznikov “Three branches of mimosa” (story)
In the morning, in a crystal vase on the table, Vitya saw huge bouquet mimosas. The flowers were as yellow and fresh as the first warm day! “Dad gave this to me,” said Mom. - After all, today is the Eighth of March. Indeed, today is the Eighth of March, and he completely forgot about it. He immediately ran to his room, grabbed his briefcase, pulled out a card in which it was written: “Dear mom, I congratulate you on the Eighth of March and I promise to always obey you,” and solemnly handed it to his mother. And when he was already leaving for school, his mother suddenly suggested: “Take a few branches of mimosa and give it to Lena Popova.” Lena Popova was his desk neighbor. - For what? - he asked gloomily. - And then, today is the Eighth of March, and I’m sure that all your boys will give the girls something. He took three sprigs of mimosa and went to school. On the way, it seemed to him that everyone was looking at him. But at the school itself he was lucky: he met Lena Popova. He ran up to her and handed her a mimosa. - This is for you. - To me? Oh, how beautiful! Thank you very much, Vitya! She seemed ready to thank him for another hour, but he turned and ran away. And at the first break it turned out that none of the boys in their class gave anything to the girls. No one. Only in front of Lena Popova lay tender branches of mimosa. -Where did you get the flowers? - asked the teacher. “Vitya gave this to me,” Lena said calmly. Everyone immediately began to whisper, looking at Vitya, and Vitya lowered his head low. And at recess, when Vitya, as if nothing had happened, approached the guys, although he already felt bad, Valerka began to grimace, looking at him. - And here the groom has come! Hello, young groom! The guys laughed. And then high school students passed by, and everyone looked at him and asked whose fiancé he was. Having barely sat through the end of the lessons, as soon as the bell rang, he rushed home as fast as he could, so that there, at home, he could vent his frustration and resentment. When his mother opened the door for him, he shouted: “It’s you, it’s your fault, it’s all because of you!” Vitya ran into the room, grabbed mimosa branches and threw them on the floor. - I hate these flowers, I hate them! He began to trample the mimosa branches with his feet, and the yellow delicate flowers burst and died under the rough soles of his boots. And Lena Popova carried home three tender branches of mimosa in a wet cloth so that they would not wilt. She carried them in front of her, and it seemed to her that the sun was reflected in them, that they were so beautiful, so special...
Vladimir Zheleznikov “Scarecrow” (story)
Meanwhile, Dimka realized that everyone had forgotten about him, slid along the wall behind the guys to the door, grabbed its handle, carefully pressed it to open it without a creak and run away... Oh, how he wanted to disappear right now, before Lenka left, and then, when she leaves, when he won’t see her judging eyes, he’ll come up with something, he’ll definitely come up with something... last moment he looked around, collided with Lenka’s gaze and froze.He stood alone against the wall, eyes downcast. - Look at him! - said the Iron Button to Lenka. Her voice trembled with indignation. - He can’t even lift his eyes! - Yes, it’s an unenviable picture,” said Vasiliev. - It's peeled off a little.Lenka slowly approached Dimka.The Iron Button walked next to Lenka and told her: - I understand it’s difficult for you... You believed him... but now you’ve seen him true face! Lenka came close to Dimka - as soon as she extended her hand, she would have touched his shoulder. - Punch him in the face! - Shaggy shouted.Dimka sharply turned his back to Lenka. - I spoke, I spoke! -Iron Button was delighted. Her voice sounded victorious. -The hour of reckoning will not pass anyone!.. Justice has triumphed! Long live justice! She jumped up on her desk: - Guys! Somov - the most cruel boycott! And everyone shouted: - Boycott! Boycott Somov! Iron Button raised her hand: - Who's for the boycott? And all the guys raised their hands behind her - a whole forest of hands hovered above their heads. And many were so thirsty for justice that they raised two hands at once. “That’s all,” thought Lenka, “and Dimka has met his end.” And the guys stretched their arms, pulled, and surrounded Dimka, and tore him away from the wall, and he was about to disappear for Lenka in the ring of an impenetrable forest of hands, their own horror and her triumph and victory.Everyone was for a boycott! Only Lenka did not raise her hand.- And you? - Iron Button was surprised. “But I don’t,” Lenka said simply and smiled guiltily, as before. -Have you forgiven him? - asked the shocked Vasiliev. - What a fool,” said Shmakova. - He betrayed you!Lenka stood at the board, pressing her cropped head to its black, cold surface. The wind of the past whipped her face: “Chu-che-lo-o-o, traitor!.. Burn at the stake!” - But why, why are you against?! -Iron Button wanted to understand what prevented this Bessoltseva from declaring a boycott on Dimka. -You are the one who is against it. You can never be understood... Explain! “I was at the stake,” Lenka answered. - And they chased me down the street. And I will never chase anyone... And I will never poison anyone. At least kill me!
Ilya Turchin
Extreme case
So Ivan reached Berlin, carrying freedom on his mighty shoulders. In his hands he had an inseparable friend - a machine gun. In my bosom is a piece of my mother’s bread. So I saved the scraps all the way to Berlin. On May 9, 1945, defeated Nazi Germany surrendered. The guns fell silent. The tanks stopped. The air raid alarms began to sound. It became quiet on the ground. And people heard the wind rustling, grass growing, birds singing. At that hour, Ivan found himself in one of the Berlin squares, where a house set on fire by the Nazis was still burning down.The square was empty.And suddenly a little girl came out of the basement of the burning house. She had thin legs and a face darkened from grief and hunger. Stepping unsteadily on the sun-drenched asphalt, helplessly outstretching her arms as if blind, the girl went to meet Ivan. And she seemed so small and helpless to Ivan in the huge empty, as if extinct, square that he stopped, and his heart was squeezed by pity.Ivan took out a precious edge from his bosom, squatted down and handed the girl the bread. Never before has the edge been so warm. So fresh. I have never smelled so much of rye flour, fresh milk, and kind mother’s hands.The girl smiled, and her thin fingers grabbed the edge.Ivan carefully lifted the girl from the scorched ground.And at that moment, a scary, overgrown Fritz - the Red Fox - peeked out from around the corner. What did he care that the war was over! Only one thought was spinning in his clouded fascist head: “Find and kill Ivan!”And here he is, Ivan, in the square, here is his broad back.Fritz - The red fox took out a filthy pistol with a crooked muzzle from under his jacket and fired treacherously from around the corner.The bullet hit Ivan in the heart.Ivan trembled. Staggered. But he didn’t fall - he was afraid to drop the girl. I just felt my legs filling with heavy metal. The boots, cloak, and face became bronze. Bronze - a girl in his arms. Bronze - a formidable machine gun behind his powerful shoulders.A tear rolled down from the girl’s bronze cheek, hit the ground and turned into a sparkling sword. Bronze Ivan took hold of its handle.Fritz the Red Fox screamed in horror and fear. The burnt wall trembled from the scream, collapsed and buried him under it...And at that very moment the edge that remained with the mother also became bronze. The mother realized that trouble had befallen her son. She rushed out into the street and ran where her heart led.People ask her:
What's your hurry?
To my son. My son is in trouble!
And they brought her up in cars and on trains, on ships and on planes. The mother quickly reached Berlin. She went out to the square. She saw her bronze son and her legs gave way. The mother fell to her knees and froze in her eternal sorrow.Bronze Ivan with a bronze girl in his arms still stands in the city of Berlin - visible to the whole world. And if you look closely, you will notice between the girl and Ivan’s wide chest a bronze edge of her mother’s bread.And if our homeland is attacked by enemies, Ivan will come to life, carefully put the girl on the ground, raise his formidable machine gun and - woe to the enemies!
Elena Ponomarenko
LENOCHKA
Spring was filled with warmth and the hubbub of rooks. It seemed that the war would end today. I've been at the front for four years now. Almost none of the battalion's medical instructors survived. My childhood somehow immediately turned into adulthood. In between battles, I often remembered school, the waltz... And the next morning the war. The whole class decided to go to the front. But the girls were left at the hospital to undergo a month-long course for medical instructors. When I arrived at the division, I already saw the wounded. They said that these guys didn’t even have weapons: they got them in battle. I experienced the first feeling of helplessness and fear in August '41... - Guys, is anyone alive? - I asked, making my way through the trenches, carefully peering into every meter of the ground. - Guys, who needs help? I turned over the dead bodies, they all looked at me, but no one asked for help, because they no longer heard. The artillery attack destroyed everyone... - Well, this can’t happen, at least someone should survive?! Petya, Igor, Ivan, Alyoshka! - I crawled to the machine gun and saw Ivan. - Vanechka! Ivan! - she screamed at the top of her lungs, but her body had already cooled down, only her blue eyes looked motionless at the sky. Going down into the second trench, I heard a groan. - Is there anyone alive? People, at least someone respond! - I screamed again. The groan was repeated, indistinct, muffled. She ran past the dead bodies, looking for him, who was still alive. - Darling! I'm here! I'm here! And again she began to turn over everyone who got in her way. - No! No! No! I will definitely find you! Just wait for me! Do not die! - and jumped into another trench. A rocket flew up, illuminating him. The groan was repeated somewhere very close. “I’ll never forgive myself for not finding you,” I shouted and commanded myself: “Come on.” Come on, listen up! You will find him, you can! A little more - and the end of the trench. God, how scary! Faster Faster! “Lord, if you exist, help me find him!” - and I knelt down. I, a Komsomol member, asked the Lord for help... Was it a miracle, but the groan was repeated. Yes, he is at the very end of the trench! - Hold on! - I screamed with all my strength and literally burst into the dugout, covered with a raincoat. - Dear, alive! - his hands worked quickly, realizing that he was no longer a survivor: he had a severe wound in the stomach. He held his insides with his hands.“You’ll have to deliver the package,” he whispered quietly, dying. I covered his eyes. A very young lieutenant lay in front of me. - How can this be?! What package? Where? You didn't say where? You didn't say where! - Looking around, I suddenly saw a package sticking out of my boot. “Urgent,” read the inscription, underlined in red pencil. - Field mail of the division headquarters." Sitting with him, a young lieutenant, I said goodbye, and tears rolled down one after another. Having taken his documents, I walked along the trench, staggering, feeling nauseous as I closed my eyes to the dead soldiers along the way. I delivered the package to headquarters. And the information there really turned out to be very important. Only I never wore the medal that was awarded to me, my first combat award, because it belonged to that lieutenant, Ivan Ivanovich Ostankov....After the end of the war, I gave this medal to the lieutenant’s mother and told how he died.In the meantime, the fighting was going on... The fourth year of the war. During this time, I completely turned gray: my red hair became completely white. Spring was approaching with warmth and rook hubbub...
Boris Ganago
"Letter to God"
E this happened at the end of the 19th century. Petersburg. Christmas Eve. A cold, piercing wind blows from the bay. Fine prickly snow is falling. Horses' hooves clatter on the cobblestone streets, shop doors slam - the last purchases are made before the holiday. Everyone is in a hurry to get home quickly.
T only a little boy walking slowly along the snowy street. ABOUT Every now and then he takes his cold, reddened hands out of the pockets of his old coat and tries to warm them with his breath. Then he stuffs them deeper into his pockets again and moves on. Here he stops at the bakery window and looks at the pretzels and bagels displayed behind the glass. D The store door swung open, letting out another customer, and the aroma of freshly baked bread wafted out of it. The boy swallowed his saliva convulsively, stomped on the spot and wandered on.
N Dusk is falling imperceptibly. There are fewer and fewer passers-by. The boy pauses near a building with lights burning in the windows, and, rising on tiptoe, tries to look inside. After a moment's hesitation, he opens the door.
WITH The old clerk was late at work today. He's in no hurry. He has been living alone for a long time and on holidays he feels his loneliness especially acutely. The clerk sat and thought with bitterness that he had no one to celebrate Christmas with, no one to give gifts to. At this time the door opened. The old man looked up and saw the boy.
- Uncle, uncle, I need to write a letter! - the boy said quickly.
- Do you have money? - the clerk asked sternly.
M The boy, fiddling with his hat in his hands, took a step back. And then the lonely clerk remembered that today was Christmas Eve and that he really wanted to give someone a gift. He took out a blank sheet of paper, dipped his pen in ink and wrote: “Petersburg. 6th January. Mr...."
- What is the gentleman's last name?
“This is not sir,” muttered the boy, not yet fully believing his luck.
- Oh, is this a lady? - the clerk asked smiling.
- No no! - the boy said quickly.
- So who do you want to write a letter to? - the old man was surprised.
- To Jesus.
- How dare you make fun of an elderly man? - the clerk was indignant and wanted to show the boy the door. But then I saw tears in the child’s eyes and remembered that today was Christmas Eve. He felt ashamed of his anger, and in a warmer voice he asked:
-What do you want to write to Jesus?
- My mother always taught me to ask God for help when it’s difficult. She said that God’s name is Jesus Christ,” the boy came closer to the clerk and continued. - And yesterday she fell asleep, and I just can’t wake her up. There’s not even bread at home, I’m so hungry,” he wiped the tears that had come to his eyes with his palm.
- How did you wake her up? - asked the old man, rising from his table.
- I kissed her.
- Is she breathing?
- What are you saying, uncle, do people breathe in their sleep?
“Jesus Christ has already received your letter,” said the old man, hugging the boy by the shoulders. -He told me to take care of you, and took your mother with him.
WITH the old clerk thought: “My mother, when you left for another world, you told me to be kind person and a devout Christian. I forgot your order, but now you won’t be ashamed of me.”
B. Ekimov. “Speak, mother, speak...”
In the mornings the mobile phone now rang. The black box came to life:
the light came on in it, cheerful music sang and the daughter’s voice announced, as if she were nearby:
- Mom, hello! Are you okay? Well done! Questions or suggestions? Amazing! Then I kiss you. Be, be!
The box was rotten and silent. Old Katerina marveled at her and could not get used to it. This seems like a small thing - a matchbox. No wires. He lays there and lies there, and suddenly his daughter’s voice begins to play and light up:
- Mom, hello! Are you okay? Have you thought about going? Look... Any questions? Kiss. Be, be!
But the city where my daughter lives is one and a half hundred miles away. And not always easy, especially in bad weather.
But this year the autumn has been long and warm. Near the farm, on the surrounding mounds, the grass turned red, and the poplar and willow fields near the Don stood green, and in the courtyards pears and cherries grew green like summer, although by time it was high time for them to burn out with a red and crimson quiet fire.
The bird's flight took a long time. The goose slowly went south, calling somewhere in the foggy, stormy sky a quiet ong-ong... ong-ong...
But what can we say about the bird, if Grandma Katerina, a withered, hunchbacked old woman, but still an agile old woman, could not get ready to leave.
“I throw it with my mind, I won’t throw it…” she complained to her neighbor. - Should I go or not?.. Or maybe it will stay warm? They are talking on the radio: the weather has completely broken down. Now the fast has begun, but the magpies have not come to the yard. It's warm and warm. Back and forth... Christmas and Epiphany. And then it’s time to think about seedlings. There’s no point in going there and getting tights.
The neighbor just sighed: it was still so far away from spring, from seedlings.
But old Katerina, rather convincing herself, took one more argument out of her bosom - mobile phone.
- Mobile! — she proudly repeated the words of the city grandson. - One word - mobile. He pressed the button, and immediately - Maria. Pressed another - Kolya. Who do you want to feel sorry for? Why shouldn't we live? - she asked. - Why leave? Throw away the house, the farm...
This was not the first conversation. I talked with the children, with the neighbor, but more often with myself.
Last years she was leaving to spend the winter with her daughter in the city. Age is one thing: it’s difficult to light the stove every day and carry water from the well. Through mud and ice. You will fall and hurt yourself. And who will lift it?
The farmstead, which until recently was populous, with the death of the collective farm, dispersed, moved away, died out. Only old people and drunks remained. And they don’t carry bread, not to mention the rest. It's hard for an old person to spend the winter. So she left to join her people.
But it’s not easy to part with a farm, with a nest. What to do with small animals: Tuzik, cat and chickens? Shove it around people?.. And my heart aches about the house. The drunkards will climb in and the last saucepans will be stuck.
And it’s not too much fun to settle into new corners in old age. Even though they are our own children, the walls are foreign and life is completely different. Guest and look around.
So I was thinking: should I go, should I not go?.. And then they brought a phone for help - a mobile phone. They explained for a long time about the buttons: which ones to press and which ones not to touch. Usually my daughter called from the city in the morning.
Cheerful music will begin to sing, and the light will flash in the box. At first, it seemed to old Katerina that her daughter’s face would appear there, as if on a small television. Only a voice was announced, distant and not for long:
- Mom, hello! Are you okay? Well done. Any questions? That's good. Kiss. Be, be.
Before you know it, the light has already gone out, the box has fallen silent.
In the first days, old Katerina only marveled at such a miracle. Previously, on the farm there was a telephone in the collective farm office. Everything is familiar there: wires, a big black tube, you can talk for a long time. But that phone floated away with the collective farm. Now there is “mobile”. And then thank God.
- Mother! Do you hear me?! Alive and healthy? Well done. Kiss.
Before you even have time to open your mouth, the box has already gone out.
“What kind of passion is this?” the old woman grumbled. - Not a telephone, waxwing. He crowed: be it... So be it. And here…
And here, that is, in the life of the farmstead, the old man’s life, there was a lot of things that I wanted to talk about.
- Mom, can you hear me?
- I hear, I hear... Is that you, daughter? And the voice doesn’t seem to be yours, it’s somehow hoarse. Are you sick? Look, dress warmly. Otherwise, you are urban - fashionable, tie a down scarf. And don't let them look. Health is more valuable. Because I just had a dream, such a bad one. Why? It seems like there is some cattle in our yard. Alive. Right on the doorstep. She has a horse's tail, horns on her head, and a goat's muzzle. What kind of passion is this? And why would that be?
“Mom,” came a stern voice from the phone. - Talk to the point, and not about goat faces. We explained to you: the tariff.
“Forgive me for Christ’s sake,” the old woman came to her senses. They really warned her when the phone was delivered that it was expensive and she needed to talk briefly about the most important thing.
But what is the most important thing in life? Especially among old people... And in fact, I saw such passion at night: a horse’s tail and a scary goat’s face.
So think about it, what is this for? Probably not good.
Another day passed again, followed by another. The old woman’s life went on as usual: get up, tidy up, release the chickens; feed and water your small living creatures and even have something to peck at yourself. And then he’ll go and hook things up. It’s not for nothing that they say: even though the house is small, you are not told to sit.
A spacious farmstead that once fed a large family: a vegetable garden, a potato garden, and levada. Sheds, cubbyholes, chicken coop. Summer kitchen-mazanka, cellar with exit. Pletnevaya town, fence. Earth that needs to be dug little by little while it’s warm. And cut firewood, cutting it wide with a hand saw. Coal has become expensive these days and you can’t buy it.
Little by little the day dragged on, cloudy and warm. Ong-ong... ong-ong... - was heard sometimes. This goose went south, flock after flock. They flew away to return in the spring. But on the ground, on the farm, it was cemetery-like quiet. Having left, people did not return here either in the spring or in the summer. And therefore, the rare houses and farmsteads seemed to crawl apart like crustaceans, shunning each other.
Another day has passed. And in the morning it was slightly frosty. Trees, bushes and dry grass stood in a light layer of frost - white fluffy frost. Old Katerina, going out into the courtyard, looked around at this beauty, rejoicing, but she should have looked down at her feet. She walked and walked, stumbled, fell, hitting a rhizome painfully.
The day started off awkwardly and just didn't go well.
As always in the morning, the mobile phone lit up and began to sing.
- Hello, my daughter, hello. Just one title: alive. “I’m so upset now,” she complained. “It was either the leg playing along, or maybe the slime.” Where, where...” she got annoyed. - In the courtyard. I went to open the gate at night. And there, near the gate, there is a black pear. Do you love her. She's sweet. I’ll make you compote from it. Otherwise I would have liquidated it long ago. Near this pear tree...
“Mom,” a distant voice came through the phone, “be more specific about what happened, and not about a sweet pear.”
- And that’s what I’m telling you. There, the root crawled out of the ground like a snake. But I walked and didn’t look. Yes, there’s also a stupid-faced cat poking around under your feet. This root... Letos Volodya asked how many times: take it away for Christ’s sake. He's on the move. Chernomyaska...
- Mom, please be more specific. About myself, not about the black meat. Don't forget that this is a mobile phone, a tariff. What hurts? Didn't you break anything?
“It seems like it didn’t break,” the old woman understood everything. — I’m adding a cabbage leaf.
That was the end of the conversation with my daughter. I had to explain the rest to myself: “What hurts, what doesn’t hurt... Everything hurts, every bone. Such a life is behind..."
And, driving away bitter thoughts, the old woman went about her usual activities in the yard and in the house. But I tried to huddle more under the roof so as not to fall. And then she sat down near the spinning wheel. A fluffy tow, a woolen thread, the measured rotation of the wheel of an ancient self-spinner. And thoughts, like a thread, stretch and stretch. And outside the window it’s an autumn day, like twilight. And it seems chilly. It would be necessary to heat it, but the firewood is tight. Suddenly we really have to spend the winter.
At the right time, I turned on the radio, waiting for words about the weather. But after a short silence, the soft, gentle voice of a young woman came from the loudspeaker:
- Do your bones hurt?..
These heartfelt words were so fitting and appropriate that the answer came naturally:
- They hurt, my daughter...
“Are your arms and legs aching?” a kind voice asked, as if guessing and knowing fate.
- There’s no way to save me... We were young, we didn’t smell it. In milkmaids and pig farms. And no shoes. And then they got into rubber boots, in winter and summer. So they force me...
“Your back hurts...” cooed softly, as if bewitching female voice.
- My daughter will get sick... For centuries she carried chuvals and wahli with straw on her hump. How not to get sick... Such is life...
Life really was not easy: war, orphanhood, hard collective farm work.
The gentle voice from the loudspeaker spoke and spoke, and then fell silent.
The old woman even cried, scolding herself: “Stupid sheep... Why are you crying?..” But she cried. And the tears seemed to make it easier.
And then, quite unexpectedly, at an inopportune lunch hour, the music started playing and my mobile phone woke up. The old woman was frightened:
- Daughter, daughter... What happened? Who's not sick? And I was alarmed: you’re not calling on time. Don't hold a grudge against me, daughter. I know that the phone is expensive, it's a lot of money. But I really almost died. Tama, about this stick... - She came to her senses: - Lord, I’m talking about this stick again, forgive me, my daughter...
From afar, many kilometers away, my daughter’s voice was heard:
- Talk, mom, talk...
- So I’m humming. It's kind of a mess now. And then there’s this cat... Yes, this root is creeping under my feet, from a pear tree. For us old people, everything is in the way now. I would completely eliminate this pear tree, but you love it. Steam it and dry it, as usual... Again, I’m doing the wrong thing... Forgive me, my daughter. Can you hear me?..
In a distant city, her daughter heard her and even saw, closing her eyes, her old mother: small, bent, in a white scarf. I saw it, but suddenly felt how unsteady and unreliable it all was: telephone communication, vision.
“Tell me, mom...” she asked and was afraid of only one thing: suddenly this voice and this life would end, perhaps forever. - Talk, mom, talk...
Vladimir Tendryakov.
Bread for dogs
One evening my father and I were sitting on the porch at home.
At my father's Lately there was some kind of dark face, red eyelids, in some way he reminded me of the station master, walking along the station square in a red hat.
Suddenly, below, under the porch, a dog seemed to grow out of the ground. She had deserted, dull, unwashed yellow eyes and abnormally disheveled fur on the sides and back in gray clumps. She gazed at us for a minute or two with her empty gaze and disappeared as instantly as she had appeared.
- Why is her fur growing like that? - I asked.
The father paused and reluctantly explained:
- Falls out... From hunger. Its owner himself is probably going bald from hunger.
And it was as if I was doused with bath steam. I seem to have found the most, most unfortunate creature in the village. There are no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, but someone will take pity, even if secretly, ashamed, to themselves, No, no, no, and there will be a fool like me, who will slip them some bread. And the dog... Even the father now felt sorry not for the dog, but for its unknown owner - “he’s going bald from hunger.” The dog will die, and not even Abram will be found to clean it up.
The next day I sat on the porch in the morning with my pockets filled with pieces of bread. I sat and waited patiently to see if the same one would appear...
She appeared, just like yesterday, suddenly, silently, staring at me with empty, unwashed eyes. I moved to take out the bread, and she shied away... But out of the corner of her eye she managed to see the bread taken out, froze, and stared from afar at my hands - empty, without expression.
- Go... Yes, go. Don't be afraid.
She looked and did not move, ready to disappear at any second. She did not believe either the gentle voice, or the ingratiating smiles, or the bread in her hand. No matter how much I begged, she didn’t come, but she didn’t disappear either.
After struggling for half an hour, I finally gave up the bread. Without taking her empty, uninvolved eyes off me, she approached the piece sideways, sideways. A jump - and... not a piece, not a dog.
The next morning - a new meeting, with the same deserted glances, with the same unbending distrust of the kindness in the voice, of the kindly extended bread. The piece was only grabbed when it was thrown to the ground. I couldn’t give her the second piece anymore.
The same thing happened on the third morning and on the fourth... We didn’t miss a single day without meeting, but we didn’t become closer to each other. I was never able to train her to take bread from my hands. I have never seen any expression in her yellow, empty, shallow eyes - not even a dog's fear, not to mention a dog's tenderness and friendly disposition.
Looks like I've encountered a victim of time here too. I knew that some exiles ate dogs, baited them, killed them, butchered them. Probably my friend also fell into their hands. They couldn’t kill her, but they killed her trust in people forever. And it seemed like she didn’t particularly trust me. Raised by a hungry street, could she imagine such a fool who was ready to give food just like that, without demanding anything in return... not even gratitude.
Yes, even gratitude. This is a kind of payment, and for me it was quite enough that I feed someone, support someone’s life, which means that I myself have the right to eat and live.
I did not feed the dog, which was peeling from hunger, with pieces of bread, but my conscience.
I won’t say that my conscience really liked this suspicious food. My conscience continued to be inflamed, but not so much, not life-threatening.
That month, the station manager, who, as part of his duty, had to wear a red hat along the station square, shot himself. He didn’t think of finding an unfortunate little dog for himself to feed every day, tearing the bread off himself.
Vitaly Zakrutkin. Mother of man
On this September night, the sky trembled, trembled frequently, glowed crimson, reflecting the fires blazing below, and neither the moon nor the stars were visible on it. Near and distant cannon salvos thundered over the dully humming earth. Everything around was flooded with an uncertain, dim copper-red light, an ominous rumbling could be heard from everywhere, and indistinct, frightening noises crawled from all sides...
Huddled to the ground, Maria lay in a deep furrow. Above her, barely visible in the vague twilight, a thick thicket of corn rustled and swayed with dried panicles. Biting her lips in fear, covering her ears with her hands, Maria stretched out in the hollow of the furrow. She wanted to squeeze into the hardened, grass-overgrown plowed land, cover herself with earth, so as not to see or hear what was happening now on the farm.
She lay down on her stomach and buried her face in the dry grass. But lying there for a long time was painful and uncomfortable for her - the pregnancy was making itself felt. Inhaling the bitter smell of grass, she turned on her side, lay there for a while, then lay down on her back. Above, leaving a trail of fire, buzzing and whistling, rockets flashed past, and tracer bullets pierced the sky with green and red arrows. From below, from the farm, a sickening, suffocating smell of smoke and burning lingered.
Lord,” Maria whispered, sobbing, “send me death, Lord... I have no more strength... I can’t... send me death, I ask you, God...
She rose, knelt, and listened. “Whatever happens,” she thought in despair, “it’s better to die there, with everyone.” After waiting a little, looking around like a hunted she-wolf, and seeing nothing in the scarlet, moving darkness, Maria crawled to the edge of the corn field. From here, from the top of a sloping, almost inconspicuous hill, the farmstead was clearly visible. It was a kilometer and a half away, no more, and what Maria saw penetrated her with mortal cold.
All thirty houses of the farm were on fire. Slanting tongues of flame, swayed by the wind, broke through black clouds of smoke, raising thick scatterings of fiery sparks to the disturbed sky. Along the only farm street, illuminated by the glow of the fire, German soldiers walked leisurely with long flaming torches in their hands. They stretched torches to the thatched and reed roofs of houses, barns, chicken coops, not missing anything on their way, not even the most strewn coil or dog kennel, and after them new strands of fire flared up, and reddish sparks flew and flew towards the sky.
Two strong explosions shook the air. They followed one after another on the western side of the farm, and Maria realized that the Germans had blown up the new brick cowshed that the collective farm had built just before the war.
All the surviving farmers - there were about a hundred of them, along with women and children - the Germans drove them out of their houses and gathered them in an open place, behind the farm, where there was a collective farm current in the summer. A kerosene lantern was swinging on a current, suspended on a high pole. Its weak, flickering light seemed like a barely noticeable point. Maria knew this place well. A year ago, shortly after the start of the war, she and the women from her brigade were stirring grain on the threshing floor. Many cried, remembering their husbands, brothers, and children who had gone to the front. But the war seemed distant to them, and they did not know then that its bloody wave would reach their inconspicuous, small farm, lost in the hilly steppe. And on this terrible September night, their native farm was burning down before their eyes, and they themselves, surrounded by machine gunners, stood on the current, like a flock of dumb sheep on the rear, and did not know what awaited them...
Maria's heart was pounding, her hands were shaking. She jumped up and wanted to rush there, towards the current, but fear stopped her. Backing away, she crouched to the ground again, sank her teeth into her hands to muffle the heart-rending scream bursting from her chest. So Maria lay for a long time, sobbing like a child, suffocating from the acrid smoke creeping up the hill.
The farm was burning down. The gun salvos began to subside. In the darkened sky the steady rumble of heavy bombers flying somewhere was heard. From the side of the current, Maria heard a woman's hysterical crying and short, angry cries of the Germans. Accompanied by submachine gun soldiers, a discordant crowd of farmers slowly moved along the country road. The road ran along a corn field very close, about forty meters away.
Maria held her breath and pressed her chest to the ground. “Where are they driving them?” a feverish thought beat in her fevered brain. “Are they really going to shoot? There are small children, innocent women...” Opening her eyes wide, she looked at the road. A crowd of farmers wandered past her. Three women were carrying babies in their arms. Maria recognized them. These were two of her neighbors, young soldiers whose husbands had gone to the front just before the Germans arrived, and the third was an evacuated teacher, she gave birth to a daughter here on the farm. The older children hobbled along the road, holding on to the hems of their mothers' skirts, and Maria recognized both mothers and children... Uncle Korney walked awkwardly on his homemade crutches; his leg had been taken away during that German war. Supporting each other, two decrepit old widowers walked, grandfather Kuzma and grandfather Nikita. Every summer they guarded the collective farm's melon plant and more than once treated Maria to juicy, cool watermelons. The farmers walked quietly, and as soon as one of the women began to cry loudly, sobbingly, a German in a helmet immediately approached her and knocked her down with blows from a machine gun. The crowd stopped. Grabbing the fallen woman by the collar, the German lifted her, quickly and angrily muttered something, pointing his hand forward...
Peering into the strange luminous twilight, Maria recognized almost all the farmers. They walked with baskets, with buckets, with bags on their shoulders, they walked, obeying the short shouts of the machine gunners. None of them said a word, only the crying of children was heard in the crowd. And only at the top of the hill, when for some reason the column was delayed, a heartbreaking cry was heard:
Bastards! Pala-a-chi! Fascist freaks! I don't want your Germany! I won't be your farmhand, you bastards!
Maria recognized the voice. Fifteen-year-old Sanya Zimenkova, a Komsomol member, the daughter of a farm tractor driver who had gone to the front, was screaming. Before the war, Sanya was in seventh grade and lived in a boarding school in a distant regional center, but the school had not been open for a year, Sanya came to her mother and stayed on the farm.
Sanechka, what are you doing? Shut up, daughter! - the mother began to wail. Please shut up! They will kill you, my child!
I will not remain silent! - Sanya shouted even louder. - Let them kill, damned bandits!
Maria heard a short burst of machine gun fire. The women began to voice hoarsely. The Germans croaked in barking voices. The crowd of farmers began to move away and disappeared behind the top of the hill.
A sticky, cold fear fell on Maria. “It was Sanya who was killed,” a terrible guess struck her like lightning. She waited a little and listened. Human voices were not heard anywhere, only machine guns were tapping dully somewhere in the distance. Behind the copse, in the eastern hamlet, flares flared up here and there. They hung in the air, illuminating the mutilated earth with a dead yellowish light, and after two or three minutes, flowing out in fiery drops, they went out. In the east, three kilometers from the farmstead, was the front line of the German defense. Maria was there with other farmers: the Germans were forcing residents to dig trenches and communication passages. They wound in a sinuous line along the eastern slope of the hill. For many months, fearing the darkness, the Germans illuminated their defense line with rockets at night in order to notice the chains of attacking Soviet soldiers in time. And the Soviet machine gunners - Maria saw this more than once - used tracer bullets to shoot enemy missiles, cut them apart, and they, fading away, fell to the ground. So it was now: machine guns crackled from the direction of the Soviet trenches, and the green lines of bullets rushed towards one rocket, to a second, to a third and extinguished them...
“Maybe Sanya is alive?” Maria thought. Maybe she was just wounded and, poor thing, she’s lying on the road, bleeding? Coming out of the thicket of corn, Maria looked around. There is no one around. An empty grassy lane stretched along the hill. The farm was almost burnt down, only here and there flames still flared up, and sparks flickered over the ashes. Pressing herself against the boundary at the edge of the corn field, Maria crawled to the place from where she thought she heard Sanya’s scream and shots. It was painful and difficult to crawl. On the boundary, tough tumbleweed bushes, blown by the winds, gathered together, they pricked her knees and elbows, and Maria was barefoot, wearing only an old chintz dress. So, undressed, last morning, at dawn, she ran away from the farm and now cursed herself for not taking a coat, a scarf, and putting on stockings and shoes.
She crawled slowly, half-dead with fear. She often stopped, listened to the dull, guttural sounds of distant shooting, and crawled again. It seemed to her that everything around was humming: both the sky and the earth, and that somewhere in the most inaccessible depths of the earth this heavy, mortal hum also did not stop.
She found Sanya where she thought. The girl lay prostrate in the ditch, her thin arms outstretched and her bare left leg uncomfortably bent under her. Barely discerning her body in the unsteady darkness, Maria pressed herself close to her, felt the sticky wetness on her warm shoulder with her cheek, and put her ear to her small, sharp chest. The girl’s heart beat unevenly: it froze, then pounded in fitful tremors. "Alive!" - thought Maria.
Looking around, she stood up, took Sanya in her arms and ran to the saving corn. The short path seemed endless to her. She stumbled, breathed hoarsely, afraid that she would drop Sanya, fall and never rise again. No longer seeing anything, not understanding that the dry stalks of corn were rustling like a tin around her, Maria sank to her knees and lost consciousness...
She woke up from Sanya’s heart-breaking moan. The girl lay under her, choking from the blood filling her mouth. Blood covered Maria's face. She jumped up, rubbed her eyes with the hem of her dress, lay down next to Sanya, and pressed her whole body against her.
Sanya, my baby,” Maria whispered, choking on tears, “open your eyes, my poor child, my little orphan... Open your little eyes, say at least one word...
With trembling hands, Maria tore off a piece of her dress, raised Sanya’s head, and began wiping the girl’s mouth and face with a piece of washed chintz. She touched her carefully, kissed her forehead, salty with blood, her warm cheeks, the thin fingers of her submissive, lifeless hands.
Sanya’s chest was wheezing, squelching, bubbling. Stroking the girl’s childish, angular-columnar legs with her palm, Maria felt with horror how Sanya’s narrow feet were getting colder under her hand.
“Come on, baby,” she began to beg Sanya. - Take a break, my dear... Don’t die, Sanechka... Don’t leave me alone... It’s me with you, Aunt Maria. Do you hear, baby? You and I are the only two left, only two...
The corn rustled monotonously above them. The cannon fire died down. The sky darkened, only somewhere far away, behind the forest, the reddish reflections of the flame still shuddered. That early morning hour came when thousands of people killing each other - both those who, like a gray tornado, rushed to the east, and those who with their breasts held back the movement of the tornado, were exhausted, tired of mutilating the earth with mines and shells and, stupefied by the roar, smoke and soot, they stopped their terrible work to catch their breath in the trenches, rest a little and begin the difficult, bloody harvest again...
Sanya died at dawn. No matter how hard Maria tried to warm the mortally wounded girl with her body, no matter how she pressed her hot chest against her, no matter how she hugged her, nothing helped. Sanya’s hands and feet grew cold, the hoarse bubbling in her throat ceased, and she began to freeze all over.
Maria closed Sanya’s slightly open eyelids, folded her scratched, stiff hands with traces of blood and purple ink on her fingers on her chest, and silently sat down next to the dead girl. Now, in these moments, Mary’s heavy, inconsolable grief - the death of her husband and little son, hanged by the Germans two days ago on the old farm apple tree - seemed to float away, shrouded in fog, wilted in the face of this new death, and Maria, pierced by a sharp sudden thought, realized that her grief was only a drop invisible to the world in that terrible, wide river of human grief, a black river, illuminated by fires, which, flooding, destroying the banks, spread wider and wider and rushed there faster and faster , to the east, moving away from Mary what she lived in this world for all her short twenty-nine years...
Sergey Kutsko
WOLVES
That's how it works country life, that if you don’t go out into the forest before noon, and don’t take a walk through familiar mushroom and berry places, then by evening there’s no point in running, everything will be hidden.
One girl thought so too. The sun has just risen to the tops of the fir trees, and already there is a full basket in my hands, I have wandered far, but what mushrooms! She looked around with gratitude and was just about to leave when the distant bushes suddenly trembled and an animal came out into the clearing, its eyes tenaciously following the girl’s figure.
- Oh, dog! - she said.
Cows were grazing somewhere nearby, and meeting a shepherd dog in the forest was not a big surprise to them. But the meeting with several more pairs of animal eyes put me in a daze...
“Wolves,” a thought flashed, “the road is not far, run...” Yes, the strength disappeared, the basket involuntarily fell out of his hands, his legs became weak and disobedient.
- Mother! - this sudden cry stopped the flock, which had already reached the middle of the clearing. - People, help! - flashed three times over the forest.
As the shepherds later said: “We heard screams, we thought the children were playing around...” This is five kilometers from the village, in the forest!
The wolves slowly approached, the she-wolf walked ahead. This happens with these animals - the she-wolf becomes the head of the pack. Only her eyes were not as fierce as they were studying. They seemed to ask: “Well, man? What will you do now, when there are no weapons in your hands, and your relatives are not nearby?
The girl fell to her knees, covered her eyes with her hands and began to cry. Suddenly the thought of prayer came to her, as if something stirred in her soul, as if the words of her grandmother, remembered from childhood, were resurrected: “Ask the Mother of God! ”
The girl did not remember the words of the prayer. Making the sign of the cross, she asked the Mother of God, as if she were her mother, in the last hope of intercession and salvation.
When she opened her eyes, the wolves, passing the bushes, went into the forest. A she-wolf walked slowly ahead, head down.
Ch. Aitmatov
Chordon, pressed against the railing of the platform, looked over the sea of heads at the red carriages of the endlessly long train.
Sultan, Sultan, my son, I am here! Can you hear me?! - he shouted, raising his arms over the fence.
But where was there to shout! A railway worker standing next to the fence asked him:
Do you have a mine?
Yes,” Chordon answered.
Do you know where the marshalling yard is?
I know, in that direction.
Then that's it, dad, sit on the mine and ride there. You'll have time, about five kilometers, no more. The train will stop there for a minute, and there you will say goodbye to your son, just ride faster, don’t stand there!
Chordon rushed around the square until he found his horse, and only remembered how he jerked the knot of the chumbur, how he put his foot into the stirrup, how he burned the sides of the horse with damask and how, ducking, he rushed down the street along the railway. Along the deserted, echoing street, frightening the rare passers-by, he rushed like a ferocious nomad.
“Just to be in time, just to be in time, there’s so much to tell my son!” - he thought and, without opening his clenched teeth, uttered a prayer and incantations of the galloping horseman: “Help me, spirits of the ancestors! Help me, patron of the Kambar-ata mines, don’t let my horse stumble! Give him the wings of a falcon, give him a heart of iron, give him the legs of a deer!”
Having passed the street, Chordon jumped out onto the path under the iron road embankment and slowed down his horse again. It was not far from the marshalling yard when the noise of the train began to overtake him from behind. The heavy, hot roar of two steam locomotives paired in a train, like a mountain collapse, fell on his bent broad shoulders.
The echelon overtook the galloping Chordon. The horse is already tired. But he expected to make it in time, if only the train would stop; it wasn’t that far to the marshalling yard. And fear, anxiety that the train might suddenly not stop, made him remember God: “Great God, if you are on earth, stop this train! Please, stop, stop the train!”
The train was already at the marshalling yard when Chordon caught up with the tail cars. And the son ran along the train - towards his father. Seeing him, Chordon jumped off his horse. They silently threw themselves into each other's arms and froze, forgetting about everything in the world.
Father, forgive me, I’m leaving as a volunteer,” said the Sultan.
I know, son.
I offended my sisters, father. Let them forget the insult if they can.
They have forgiven you. Don’t be offended by them, don’t forget them, write to them, you hear. And don't forget your mother.
Okay, father.
A lonely bell rang at the station; it was time to leave. For the last time, the father looked into his son’s face and saw in him for a moment his own features, himself, still young, still at the dawn of his youth: he pressed him tightly to his chest. And at that moment, with all his being, he wanted to convey his father’s love to his son. Kissing him, Chordon kept saying the same thing:
Be a man, my son! Wherever you are, be human! Always remain human!
The carriages shook.
Chordonov, let's go! - the commander shouted to him.
And when Sultan was dragged into the carriage as they walked, Chordon lowered his hands, then turned around and, falling to the sweaty, hot mane of the captain, began to sob. He cried, hugging the horse's neck, and shuddered so much that under the weight of his grief the horse's hooves moved from place to place.
The railway workers passed by in silence. They knew why people cried in those days. And only the station boys, suddenly subdued, stood and looked at this big, old, crying man with curiosity and childish compassion.
The sun rose above the mountains two poplars high when Chordon, having passed the Small Gorge, drove out into the wide expanse of a hilly valley, going under the snowiest mountains. Chordon took my breath away. His son lived on this land...
(excerpt from the story “A Date with My Son”)
Excerpt from the story
Chapter II
My mommy
I had a mother, affectionate, kind, sweet. My mother and I lived in a small house on the banks of the Volga. The house was so clean and bright, and from the windows of our apartment we could see the wide, beautiful Volga, and huge two-story steamships, and barges, and a pier on the shore, and crowds of people walking certain hours to this pier to meet incoming ships... And mommy and I went there, only rarely, very rarely: mommy gave lessons in our city, and she was not allowed to walk with me as often as I would like. Mommy said:
Wait, Lenusha, I’ll save up some money and take you along the Volga from our Rybinsk all the way to Astrakhan! Then we'll have a blast.
I was happy and waiting for spring.
By spring, mommy had saved up some money, and we decided to carry out our idea on the first warm days.
- As soon as the Volga is cleared of ice, you and I will go for a ride! - Mommy said, affectionately stroking my head.
But when the ice broke, she caught a cold and began to cough. The ice passed, the Volga cleared, but mommy coughed and coughed endlessly. She suddenly became thin and transparent, like wax, and she kept sitting by the window, looking at the Volga and repeating:
“The cough will go away, I’ll get better a little, and you and I will ride to Astrakhan, Lenusha!”
But the cough and cold did not go away; The summer was damp and cold this year, and every day mommy became thinner, paler and more transparent.
Autumn has come. September has arrived. Long lines of cranes stretched over the Volga, flying to warm countries. Mommy no longer sat by the window in the living room, but lay on the bed and shivered all the time from the cold, while she herself was hot as fire.
Once she called me over and said:
- Listen, Lenusha. Your mother will soon leave you forever... But don’t worry, dear. I will always look at you from heaven and rejoice at you good deeds my girl, uh...
I didn’t let her finish and cried bitterly. And mommy started crying too, and her eyes became sad, sad, just like those of the angel I saw on the big icon in our church.
Having calmed down a little, mommy spoke again:
- I feel that the Lord will soon take me to Himself, and may His holy will be done! Be a good girl without a mother, pray to God and remember me... You will go to live with your uncle, my brother, who lives in St. Petersburg... I wrote to him about you and asked him to shelter an orphan...
Something painfully painful when hearing the word “orphan” squeezed my throat...
I began to sob, cry and huddle by my mother’s bed. Maryushka (the cook who lived with us for nine years, from the very year I was born, and who loved mommy and me madly) came and took me to her place, saying that “mama needs peace.”
I fell asleep in tears that night on Maryushka’s bed, and in the morning... Oh, what happened in the morning!..
I woke up very early, I think around six o’clock, and wanted to run straight to mommy.
At that moment Maryushka came in and said:
- Pray to God, Lenochka: God took your mother to him. Your mom died.
- Mommy died! - I repeated like an echo.
And suddenly I felt so cold, cold! Then there was a noise in my head, and the whole room, and Maryushka, and the ceiling, and the table, and the chairs - everything turned over and began to spin before my eyes, and I no longer remember what happened to me after this. I think I fell on the floor unconscious...
I woke up when my mother was already lying in a large white box, in a white dress, with a white wreath on her head. An old, gray-haired priest read prayers, the singers sang, and Maryushka prayed at the threshold of the bedroom. Some old women came and also prayed, then looked at me with regret, shook their heads and mumbled something with their toothless mouths...
- Orphan! Orphan! - Also shaking her head and looking at me pitifully, Maryushka said and cried. The old women also cried...
On the third day, Maryushka took me to the white box in which Mommy was lying, and told me to kiss Mommy’s hand. Then the priest blessed mommy, the singers sang something very sad; some men came up, closed the white box and carried it out of our house...
I cried loudly. But then old women I already knew arrived, saying that they were going to bury my mother and that there was no need to cry, but to pray.
The white box was brought to the church, we held mass, and then some people came up again, picked up the box and carried it to the cemetery. A deep black hole had already been dug there, into which mother’s coffin was lowered. Then they covered the hole with earth, placed a white cross over it, and Maryushka led me home.
On the way, she told me that in the evening she would take me to the station, put me on a train and send me to St. Petersburg to see my uncle.
“I don’t want to go to my uncle,” I said gloomily, “I don’t know any uncle and I’m afraid to go to him!”
But Maryushka said that it was a shame to tell the big girl like that, that mommy heard it and that my words hurt her.
Then I became quiet and began to remember my uncle’s face.
I never saw my St. Petersburg uncle, but there was a portrait of him in my mother’s album. He was depicted on it in a gold embroidered uniform, with many orders and with a star on his chest. He looked very important, and I was involuntarily afraid of him.
After dinner, which I barely touched, Maryushka packed all my dresses and underwear into an old suitcase, gave me tea and took me to the station.
Lydia Charskaya
NOTES OF A LITTLE GYMNASIUM STUDENT
Excerpt from the story
Chapter XXI
To the sound of the wind and the whistle of a snowstorm
The wind whistled, screeched, groaned and hummed in different ways. Either in a plaintive thin voice, or in a rough bass rumble, he sang his battle song. The lanterns flickered barely noticeably through the huge white flakes of snow that fell abundantly on the sidewalks, on the street, on carriages, horses and passers-by. And I kept walking and walking, forward and forward...
Nyurochka told me:
“You first have to go through a long, big street, where there are such tall houses and luxurious shops, then turn right, then left, then right again and left again, and then everything is straight, straight to the very end - to our house. You will recognize it right away. It’s near the cemetery, there’s also a white church... so beautiful.”
I did so. I walked straight, as it seemed to me, along a long and wide street, but I didn’t see any tall houses or luxury shops. Everything was obscured from my eyes by a white, shroud-like, living, loose wall of silently falling huge flakes of snow. I turned right, then left, then right again, doing everything with precision, as Nyurochka told me - and I kept walking, walking, walking endlessly.
The wind mercilessly ruffled the flaps of my burnusik, piercing me through and through with cold. Snow flakes hit my face. Now I was no longer walking as fast as before. My legs felt like they were filled with lead from fatigue, my whole body was shaking from the cold, my hands were numb, and I could barely move my fingers. Having turned right and left almost for the fifth time, I now went along the straight path. The quiet, barely noticeable flickering lights of lanterns came across me less and less often... The noise from the riding of horse-drawn horses and carriages in the streets died down significantly, and the path along which I walked seemed dull and deserted to me.
Finally the snow began to thin out; huge flakes did not fall so often now. The distance cleared up a little, but instead there was such a thick twilight all around me that I could barely make out the road.
Now neither the noise of driving, nor voices, nor the coachman's exclamations could be heard around me.
What silence! What dead silence!..
But what is it?
My eyes, already accustomed to the semi-darkness, now discern the surroundings. Lord, where am I?
No houses, no streets, no carriages, no pedestrians. In front of me is an endless, huge expanse of snow... Some forgotten buildings along the edges of the road... Some fences, and in front of me is something black, huge. It must be a park or a forest - I don’t know.
I turned back... Lights were flashing behind me... lights... lights... There were so many of them! Without end... without counting!
- Lord, this is a city! The city, of course! - I exclaim. - And I went to the outskirts...
Nyurochka said that they live on the outskirts. Yes of course! What darkens in the distance is the cemetery! There is a church there, and, just a short distance away, their house! Everything, everything turned out just as she said. But I was scared! What a stupid thing!
And with joyful inspiration I again walked forward vigorously.
But it was not there!
My legs could hardly obey me now. I could barely move them from fatigue. The incredible cold made me tremble from head to toe, my teeth chattered, there was a noise in my head, and something hit my temples with all its might. To all this was added some strange drowsiness. I wanted to sleep so badly, I wanted to sleep so badly!
“Well, well, a little more - and you will be with your friends, you will see Nikifor Matveevich, Nyura, their mother, Seryozha!” - I mentally encouraged myself as best I could...
But this didn’t help either.
My legs could barely move, and now I had difficulty pulling them, first one, then the other, out of the deep snow. But they move more and more slowly, more and more quietly... And the noise in my head becomes more and more audible, and something hits my temples stronger and stronger...
Finally, I can’t stand it and fall onto a snowdrift that has formed on the edge of the road.
Oh, how good! How sweet it is to relax like this! Now I don’t feel tired or pain... Some kind of pleasant warmth spreads throughout my whole body... Oh, how good! She would just sit here and never leave! And if it weren’t for the desire to find out what happened to Nikifor Matveyevich, and to visit him, healthy or sick, I would certainly fall asleep here for an hour or two... I fell asleep soundly! Moreover, the cemetery is not far away... You can see it there. A mile or two, no more...
The snow stopped falling, the blizzard subsided a little, and the month emerged from behind the clouds.
Oh, it would be better if the moon didn’t shine and at least I wouldn’t know the sad reality!
No cemetery, no church, no houses - there is nothing ahead!.. Only the forest turns black like a huge black spot there in the distance, and the white dead field spreads around me like an endless veil...
Horror overwhelmed me.
Now I just realized that I was lost.
Lev Tolstoy
Swans
The swans flew in a herd from the cold side to the warm lands. They flew across the sea. They flew day and night, and another day and another night, without resting, they flew over the water. There was a full month in the sky, and the swans saw blue water far below them. All the swans were exhausted, flapping their wings; but they did not stop and flew on. Old, strong swans flew in front, and those who were younger and weaker flew behind. One young swan flew behind everyone. His strength weakened. He flapped his wings and could not fly any further. Then he, spreading his wings, went down. He descended closer and closer to the water; and his comrades further and further became whiter in the monthly light. The swan descended onto the water and folded its wings. The sea rose beneath him and rocked him. A flock of swans was barely visible as a white line in the bright sky. And in the silence you could barely hear the sound of their wings ringing. When they were completely out of sight, the swan bent its neck back and closed its eyes. He did not move, and only the sea, rising and falling in a wide strip, lifted and lowered him. Before dawn, a light breeze began to sway the sea. And the water splashed into the white chest of the swan. The swan opened his eyes. The dawn reddened in the east, and the moon and stars became paler. The swan sighed, stretched out its neck and flapped its wings, rose up and flew, clinging to the water with its wings. He rose higher and higher and flew alone over the dark, rippling waves.
Paulo Coelho
Parable "The Secret of Happiness"
One merchant sent his son to learn the Secret of Happiness from the wisest of all people. The young man walked forty days through the desert and
Finally, he came to a beautiful castle that stood on the top of the mountain. There lived the sage whom he was looking for. However, instead of the expected meeting with a wise man, our hero found himself in a hall where everything was seething: merchants were coming in and out, people were talking in the corner, a small orchestra was playing sweet melodies and there was a table laden with the most exquisite dishes of the area. The sage talked with different people, and the young man had to wait about two hours for his turn.
The sage listened carefully to the young man's explanations about the purpose of his visit, but said in response that he did not have time to reveal to him the Secret of Happiness. And he invited him to take a walk around the palace and come again in two hours.
“However, I want to ask for one favor,” the sage added, handing the young man a small spoon into which he dropped two drops of oil. — Keep this spoon in your hand the entire time you walk so that the oil does not spill out.
The young man began to go up and down the palace stairs, not taking his eyes off the spoon. Two hours later he returned to the sage.
“Well,” he asked, “have you seen the Persian carpets that are in my dining room?” Have you seen the park that the head gardener took ten years to create? Have you noticed the beautiful parchments in my library?
The young man, embarrassed, had to admit that he did not see anything. His only concern was not to spill the drops of oil that the sage entrusted to him.
“Well, come back and get acquainted with the wonders of my Universe,” the sage told him. “You can’t trust a person if you don’t know the house in which he lives.”
Reassured, the young man took the spoon and again went for a walk around the palace; this time, paying attention to all the works of art hanging on the walls and ceilings of the palace. He saw gardens surrounded by mountains, the most delicate flowers, the sophistication with which each piece of art was placed exactly where it was needed.
Returning to the sage, he described in detail everything he saw.
- Where are the two drops of oil that I entrusted to you? - asked the Sage.
And the young man, looking at the spoon, discovered that all the oil had poured out.
- This is the only advice I can give you: The secret of Happiness is to look at all the wonders of the world, while never forgetting about two drops of oil in your spoon.
Leonardo da Vinci
Parable "NEVOD"
And once again the seine brought a rich catch. The fishermen's baskets were filled to the brim with chubs, carp, tench, pike, eels and a variety of other food items. Whole fish families
with their children and household members, were taken to market stalls and prepared to end their existence, writhing in agony on hot frying pans and in boiling cauldrons.
The remaining fish in the river, confused and overcome with fear, not even daring to swim, buried themselves deeper in the mud. How to live further? You can't handle the net alone. He is abandoned every day in the most unexpected places. He mercilessly destroys the fish, and eventually the entire river will be devastated.
- We must think about the fate of our children. No one but us will take care of them and deliver them from this terrible obsession,” reasoned the minnows who had gathered for a council under a large snag.
“But what can we do?” the tench asked timidly, listening to the speeches of the daredevils.
- Destroy the seine! - the minnows responded in unison. On the same day, the all-knowing nimble eels spread the news along the river
about making a bold decision. All fish, young and old, were invited to gather tomorrow at dawn in a deep, quiet pool, protected by spreading willows.
Thousands of fish of all colors and ages swam to the appointed place to declare war on the net.
- Listen carefully, everyone! - said the carp, which more than once managed to gnaw through the nets and escape from captivity. “The net is as wide as our river.” To keep it upright under water, lead weights are attached to its lower nodes. I order all the fish to split into two schools. The first should lift the sinkers from the bottom to the surface, and the second flock will firmly hold the upper nodes of the net. The pikes are tasked with chewing through the ropes with which the net is attached to both banks.
With bated breath, the fish listened to every word of the leader.
- I order the eels to immediately go on reconnaissance! - continued the carp. - They must establish where the net is thrown.
The eels went on a mission, and schools of fish huddled near the shore in agonizing anticipation. Meanwhile, the minnows tried to encourage the most timid and advised not to panic, even if someone fell into the net: after all, the fishermen would still not be able to pull him ashore.
Finally the eels returned and reported that the net had already been abandoned about a mile down the river.
And so, in a huge armada, schools of fish swam to the goal, led by the wise carp.
“Swim carefully!” the leader warned. “Keep your eyes open so that the current does not drag you into the net.” Use your fins as hard as you can and brake on time!
A seine appeared ahead, gray and ominous. Seized by a fit of anger, the fish boldly rushed to attack.
Soon the seine was lifted from the bottom, the ropes holding it were cut by sharp pike teeth, and the knots were torn. But the angry fish did not calm down and continued to attack the hated enemy. Grasping the crippled, leaky net with their teeth and working hard with their fins and tails, they dragged it in different directions and tore it into small pieces. The water in the river seemed to be boiling.
The fishermen spent a long time scratching their heads about the mysterious disappearance of the net, and the fish still proudly tell this story to their children.
Leonardo da Vinci
Parable "PELICAN"
As soon as the pelican went in search of food, the viper sitting in ambush immediately crawled, stealthily, to its nest. The fluffy chicks slept peacefully, not knowing anything. The snake crawled close to them. Her eyes sparkled with an ominous gleam - and the reprisal began.
Having received a fatal bite each, the serenely sleeping chicks never woke up.
Satisfied with what she had done, the villainess crawled into hiding to enjoy the bird’s grief to the fullest.
Soon the pelican returned from hunting. At the sight of the brutal massacre committed against the chicks, he burst into loud sobs, and all the inhabitants of the forest fell silent, shocked by the unheard-of cruelty.
“Without you, I have no life now!” lamented the unhappy father, looking at the dead children. “Let me die with you!”
And he began to tear his chest with his beak, right to the heart. Hot blood gushed out in streams from the open wound, sprinkling the lifeless chicks.
Losing last strength, the dying pelican cast a farewell glance at the nest with the dead chicks and suddenly shuddered in surprise.
Oh miracle! His shed blood and parental love brought dear chicks back to life, snatching them from the clutches of death. And then, happy, he gave up the ghost.
Lucky
Sergey Silin
Antoshka was running down the street, with his hands in his jacket pockets, tripped and, falling, managed to think: “I’ll break my nose!” But he didn’t have time to take his hands out of his pockets.
And suddenly, right in front of him, out of nowhere, a small, strong man the size of a cat appeared.
The man stretched out his arms and took Antoshka on them, softening the blow.
Antoshka rolled onto his side, got up on one knee and looked at the peasant in surprise:
- Who are you?
- Lucky.
-Who-who?
- Lucky. I will make sure that you are lucky.
- Does every person have a lucky person? - Antoshka asked.
“No, there aren’t that many of us,” the man answered. “We just go from one to the other.” From today I will be with you.
- I'm starting to get lucky! - Antoshka was happy.
- Exactly! - Lucky nodded.
- When will you leave me for someone else?
- When necessary. I remember I served one merchant for several years. And I helped one pedestrian for only two seconds.
- Yeah! - Antoshka thought. - So I need
anything to wish?
- No no! - The man raised his hands in protest. - I am not a wish-fulfiller! I just give a little help to the smart and hardworking. I just stay nearby and make sure the person is lucky. Where did my invisibility cap go?
He groped around with his hands, felt for the invisibility cap, put it on and disappeared.
- Are you here? - Antoshka asked, just in case.
“Here, here,” responded Lucky. - Don't mind
me attention. Antoshka put his hands in his pockets and ran home. And he was lucky: he made it to the beginning of the cartoon minute by minute!
An hour later my mother returned from work.
- And I received a prize! - she said with a smile. -
I'll go shopping!
And she went into the kitchen to get some bags.
- Mom got Lucky too? - Antoshka asked his assistant in a whisper.
- No. She's lucky because we're close.
- Mom, I'm with you! - Antoshka shouted.
Two hours later they returned home with a whole mountain of purchases.
- Just a streak of luck! - Mom was surprised, her eyes sparkling. - All my life I dreamed of such a blouse!
- And I’m talking about such a cake! - Antoshka responded cheerfully from the bathroom.
The next day at school he received three A's, two B's, found two rubles and made peace with Vasya Poteryashkin.
And when he returned home whistling, he discovered that he had lost the keys to the apartment.
- Lucky, where are you? - he called.
A tiny, scruffy woman peeked out from under the stairs. Her hair was disheveled, her nose, her dirty sleeve was torn, her shoes were asking for porridge.
- There was no need to whistle! - she smiled and added: “I’m unlucky!” What, you're upset, right?..
Don't worry, don't worry! The time will come, they will call me away from you!
“I see,” Antoshka said sadly. - A streak of bad luck begins...
- That's for sure! - Bad luck nodded joyfully and, stepping into the wall, disappeared.
In the evening, Antoshka received a scolding from his dad for losing his key, accidentally broke his mother’s favorite cup, forgot what he was assigned in Russian, and couldn’t finish reading a book of fairy tales because he left it at school.
And just in front of the window the phone rang:
- Antoshka, is that you? It's me, Lucky!
- Hello, traitor! - Antoshka muttered. - And who are you helping now?
But Lucky wasn’t the least bit offended by the “traitor.”
- To an old lady. Can you imagine, she had bad luck all her life! So my boss sent me to her.
Soon I will help her win a million rubles in the lottery, and I will return to you!
- Is it true? - Antoshka was happy.
“True, true,” answered Lucky and hung up.
That night Antoshka had a dream. It’s as if she and Lucky are dragging four string bags of Antoshka’s favorite tangerines from the store, and from the window of the house opposite, a lonely old woman smiles at them, lucky for the first time in her life.
Charskaya Lidiya Alekseevna
Lucina's life
Princess Miguel
“Far, far away, at the very end of the world, there was a large, beautiful blue lake, similar in color to a huge sapphire. In the middle of this lake, on a green emerald island, among myrtle and wisteria, intertwined with green ivy and flexible vines, stood a high rock. On it stood a marble the palace behind which was defeated wonderful garden fragrant aroma. It was a very special garden, which can only be found in fairy tales.
The owner of the island and the lands adjacent to it was the powerful king Ovar. And the king had a daughter, the beautiful Miguel, a princess, growing up in the palace...
A fairy tale floats and unfolds like a motley ribbon. A series of beautiful, fantastic pictures swirl before my spiritual gaze. Aunt Musya’s usually ringing voice is now reduced to a whisper. Mysterious and cozy in the green ivy gazebo. The lacy shadow of the trees and bushes surrounding her cast moving spots on the pretty face of the young storyteller. This fairy tale is my favorite. Since the day my dear nanny Fenya, who knew how to tell me so well about the girl Thumbelina, left us, I have listened with pleasure to the only fairy tale about Princess Miguel. I love my princess dearly, despite all her cruelty. Is it her fault, this green-eyed, soft pink and golden-haired princess, that when she was born, the fairies, instead of a heart, put a piece of diamond in her small childish breast? And that the direct consequence of this was the complete absence of pity in the princess’s soul. But how beautiful she was! Beautiful even in those moments when, with the movement of her tiny white hand, she sent people to a cruel death. Those people who accidentally ended up in the princess’s mysterious garden.
In that garden, among the roses and lilies, there were small children. Motionless pretty elves chained with silver chains to golden pegs, they guarded that garden, and at the same time they plaintively rang their bell-like voices.
Let us go free! Let go, beautiful princess Miguel! Let us go! - Their complaints sounded like music. And this music had a pleasant effect on the princess, and she often laughed at the pleas of her little captives.
But their plaintive voices touched the hearts of people passing by the garden. And they looked into the princess’s mysterious garden. Ah, it was no joy that they appeared here! With each such appearance of an uninvited guest, the guards ran out, grabbed the visitor and, on the orders of the princess, threw him into the lake from a cliff
And Princess Miguel laughed only in response to the desperate cries and groans of the drowning...
Even now I still cannot understand how my pretty, cheerful aunt came up with a fairy tale so terrible in essence, so gloomy and heavy! The heroine of this fairy tale, Princess Miguel, was, of course, an invention of the sweet, slightly flighty, but very kind Aunt Musya. Oh, it doesn’t matter, let everyone think that this fairy tale is a fiction, princess Miguel herself is a fiction, but she, my wondrous princess, is firmly entrenched in my impressionable heart... Whether she ever existed or not, what do I really care about? there was a time when I loved her, my beautiful cruel Miguel! I saw her in a dream more than once, I saw her golden hair the color of a ripe ear, her green, like a forest pool, deep eyes.
That year I turned six years old. I was already dismantling warehouses and, with the help of Aunt Musya, I wrote clumsy, lopsided letters instead of sticks. And I already understood beauty. The fabulous beauty of nature: sun, forest, flowers. And my eyes lit up with delight when I saw a beautiful picture or an elegant illustration on a magazine page.
Aunt Musya, dad and grandma have been trying since I was early age develop my aesthetic taste, drawing my attention to what for other children passed without a trace.
Look, Lyusenka, what a beautiful sunset! You see how wonderfully the crimson sun sinks in the pond! Look, look, now the water has turned completely scarlet. And the surrounding trees seem to be on fire.
I look and seethe with delight. Indeed, scarlet water, scarlet trees and scarlet sun. What a beauty!
Yu. Yakovlev Girls from Vasilyevsky Island
I'm Valya Zaitseva with Vasilyevsky Island.
There is a hamster living under my bed. He will stuff his cheeks full, in reserve, sit on his hind legs and look with black buttons... Yesterday I beat one boy. I gave him a good bream. We, Vasileostrovsk girls, know how to stand up for ourselves when necessary...
It’s always windy here on Vasilyevsky. The rain is falling. Wet snow is falling. Floods happen. And our island floats like a ship: on the left is the Neva, on the right is the Nevka, in front is the open sea.
I have a friend - Tanya Savicheva. We are neighbors. She is from the Second Line, building 13. Four windows on the first floor. There is a bakery nearby, and a kerosene shop in the basement... Now there is no shop, but in Tanino, when I was not yet alive, there was always a smell of kerosene on the ground floor. They told me.
Tanya Savicheva was the same age as I am now. She could have grown up long ago and become a teacher, but she would forever remain a girl... When my grandmother sent Tanya to get kerosene, I was not there. And she went to the Rumyantsevsky Garden with another friend. But I know everything about her. They told me.
She was a songbird. She always sang. She wanted to recite poetry, but she stumbled over her words: she would stumble, and everyone would think that she had forgotten the right word. My friend sang because when you sing, you don't stutter. She couldn’t stutter, she was going to become a teacher, like Linda Augustovna.
She always played teacher. He will put a large grandmother's scarf on his shoulders, clasp his hands and walk from corner to corner. “Children, today we will do repetition with you...” And then he stumbles on a word, blushes and turns to the wall, although there is no one in the room.
They say there are doctors who treat stuttering. I would find one like that. We, Vasileostrovsk girls, will find anyone you want! But now the doctor is no longer needed. She stayed there... my friend Tanya Savicheva. She was taken from besieged Leningrad to the mainland, and the road, called the Road of Life, could not give Tanya life.
The girl died of hunger... Does it matter whether you die from hunger or from a bullet? Maybe hunger hurts even more...
I decided to find the Road of Life. I went to Rzhevka, where this road begins. I walked two and a half kilometers - there the guys were building a monument to the children who died during the siege. I also wanted to build.
Some adults asked me:
- Who are you?
— I’m Valya Zaitseva from Vasilyevsky Island. I also want to build.
I was told:
- It is forbidden! Come with your area.
I didn't leave. I looked around and saw a baby, a tadpole. I grabbed it:
— Did he also come with his region?
- He came with his brother.
You can do it with your brother. With the region it is possible. But what about being alone?
I told them:
- You see, I don’t just want to build. I want to build for my friend... Tanya Savicheva.
They rolled their eyes. They didn't believe it. They asked again:
— Is Tanya Savicheva your friend?
-What's special here? We are the same age. Both are from Vasilyevsky Island.
- But she’s not there...
How stupid people are, and adults too! What does “no” mean if we are friends? I told them to understand:
- We have everything in common. Both the street and the school. We have a hamster. He'll stuff his cheeks...
I noticed that they didn't believe me. And so that they would believe, she blurted out:
“We even have the same handwriting!”
- Handwriting? - They were even more surprised.
- And what? Handwriting!
Suddenly they became cheerful because of the handwriting:
- This is very good! This is a real find. Come with us.
- I'm not going anywhere. I want to build...
- You will build! You will write for the monument in Tanya’s handwriting.
“I can,” I agreed. - Only I don’t have a pencil. Will you give it?
- You will write on concrete. You don't write on concrete with a pencil.
I've never written on concrete. I wrote on the walls, on the asphalt, but they brought me to the concrete plant and gave Tanya a diary - notebook with the alphabet: a, b, c... I have the same book. For forty kopecks.
I picked up Tanya’s diary and opened the page. It was written there:
I felt cold. I wanted to give them the book and leave.
But I am Vasileostrovskaya. And if a friend’s older sister died, I should stay with her and not run away.
- Give me your concrete. I will write.
The crane lowered a huge frame of thick gray dough to my feet. I took a stick, squatted down and began to write. The concrete was cold. It was difficult to write. And they told me:
- Do not rush.
I made mistakes, smoothed the concrete with my palm and wrote again.
I didn't do well.
- Do not rush. Write calmly.
While I was writing about Zhenya, my grandmother died.
If you just want to eat, it’s not hunger - eat an hour later.
I tried fasting from morning to evening. I endured it. Hunger - when day after day your head, hands, heart - everything you have goes hungry. First he starves, then he dies.
Leka had his own corner, fenced off with cabinets, where he drew.
He earned money by drawing and studied. He was quiet and short-sighted, wore glasses, and kept creaking his pen. They told me.
Where did he die? Probably in the kitchen, where the potbelly stove smoked like a small weak locomotive, where they slept and ate bread once a day. A small piece is like a cure for death. Leka didn't have enough medicine...
“Write,” they told me quietly.
In the new frame, the concrete was liquid, it crawled onto the letters. And the word “died” disappeared. I didn't want to write it again. But they told me:
- Write, Valya Zaitseva, write.
And I wrote again - “died.”
I am very tired of writing the word “died”. I knew that with each page of Tanya Savicheva’s diary it was getting worse. She stopped singing a long time ago and did not notice that she stuttered. She no longer played teacher. But she didn’t give up - she lived. They told me... Spring has come. The trees have turned green. We have a lot of trees on Vasilyevsky. Tanya dried out, froze, became thin and light. Her hands were shaking and her eyes hurt from the sun. The Nazis killed half of Tanya Savicheva, and maybe more than half. But her mother was with her, and Tanya held on.
- Why don’t you write? - they told me quietly. - Write, Valya Zaitseva, otherwise the concrete will harden.
For a long time I did not dare to open a page with the letter “M”. On this page Tanya’s hand wrote: “Mom May 13 at 7.30 o’clock.
morning 1942." Tanya did not write the word “died”. She didn't have the strength to write the word.
I gripped the wand tightly and touched the concrete. I didn’t look in my diary, but wrote it by heart. It's good that we have the same handwriting.
I wrote with all my might. The concrete became thick, almost frozen. He no longer crawled onto the letters.
-Can you still write?
“I’ll finish writing,” I answered and turned away so that my eyes could not see. After all, Tanya Savicheva is my... girlfriend.
Tanya and I are the same age, we, Vasileostrovsky girls, know how to stand up for ourselves when necessary. If she hadn’t been from Vasileostrovsk, from Leningrad, she wouldn’t have lasted so long. But she lived, which means she didn’t give up!
I opened page “C”. There were two words: “The Savichevs died.”
I opened the page “U” - “Everyone died.” The last page of Tanya Savicheva’s diary began with the letter “O” - “There is only Tanya left.”
And I imagined that it was me, Valya Zaitseva, who was left alone: without mom, without dad, without my sister Lyulka. Hungry. Under fire.
In an empty apartment on the Second Line. I wanted to cross out this last page, but the concrete hardened and the stick broke.
And suddenly I asked Tanya Savicheva to myself: “Why alone?
And I? You have a friend - Valya Zaitseva, your neighbor from Vasilyevsky Island. You and I will go to the Rumyantsevsky Garden, run around, and when you get tired, I’ll bring my grandmother’s scarf from home and we’ll play teacher Linda Augustovna. There is a hamster living under my bed. I'll give it to you for your birthday. Do you hear, Tanya Savicheva?”
Someone put his hand on my shoulder and said:
- Let's go, Valya Zaitseva. You did everything you needed to do. Thank you.
I didn’t understand why they were saying “thank you” to me. I said:
- I’ll come tomorrow... without my area. Can?
“Come without a district,” they told me. - Come.
My friend Tanya Savicheva did not shoot at the Nazis and was not a scout for the partisans. She simply lived in her hometown during the most difficult time. But perhaps the reason the Nazis did not enter Leningrad was because Tanya Savicheva lived there and there were many other girls and boys who remained forever in their time. And today’s guys are friends with them, just as I am friends with Tanya.
But they are only friends with the living.
Vladimir Zheleznyakov “Scarecrow”
A circle of their faces flashed in front of me, and I rushed around in it, like a squirrel in a wheel.
I should stop and leave.
The boys attacked me.
“For her legs! - Valka yelled. - For your legs!..”
They knocked me down and grabbed me by the legs and arms. I kicked and kicked as hard as I could, but they grabbed me and dragged me into the garden.
Iron Button and Shmakova dragged out a scarecrow mounted on a long stick. Dimka came out after them and stood to the side. The stuffed animal was in my dress, with my eyes, with my mouth from ear to ear. The legs were made of stockings stuffed with straw; instead of hair, there was tow and some feathers sticking out. On my neck, that is, the scarecrow, dangled a plaque with the words: “SCACHERY IS A TRAITOR.”
Lenka fell silent and somehow completely faded away.
Nikolai Nikolaevich realized that the limit of her story and the limit of her strength had come.
“And they were having fun around the stuffed animal,” said Lenka. - They jumped and laughed:
“Wow, our beauty-ah!”
“I waited!”
“I came up with an idea! I came up with an idea! - Shmakova jumped for joy. “Let Dimka light the fire!”
After these words from Shmakova, I completely stopped being afraid. I thought: if Dimka sets it on fire, then maybe I’ll just die.
And at this time Valka - he was the first to succeed everywhere - stuck the scarecrow into the ground and sprinkled brushwood around it.
“I don’t have matches,” Dimka said quietly.
“But I have it!” - Shaggy put matches in Dimka’s hand and pushed him towards the scarecrow.
Dimka stood near the scarecrow, his head bowed low.
I froze - I was waiting for the last time! Well, I thought he would look back and say: “Guys, Lenka is not to blame for anything... It’s all me!”
“Set it on fire!” - ordered the Iron Button.
I couldn’t stand it and screamed:
“Dimka! No need, Dimka-ah-ah!..”
And he was still standing near the scarecrow - I could see his back, he was hunched over and seemed somehow small. Maybe because the scarecrow was on a long stick. Only he was small and weak.
“Well, Somov! - said the Iron Button. “Finally, go to the end!”
Dimka fell to his knees and lowered his head so low that only his shoulders stuck out, and his head was not visible at all. It turned out to be some kind of headless arsonist. He struck a match and a flame of fire grew over his shoulders. Then he jumped up and hurriedly ran to the side.
They dragged me close to the fire. Without looking away, I looked at the flames of the fire. Grandfather! I felt then how this fire engulfed me, how it burned, baked and bited, although only waves of its heat reached me.
I screamed, I screamed so much that they let me out of surprise.
When they released me, I rushed to the fire and began to kick it around with my feet, grabbing the burning branches with my hands - I didn’t want the scarecrow to burn. For some reason I really didn’t want this!
Dimka was the first to come to his senses.
“Are you crazy? “He grabbed my hand and tried to pull me away from the fire. - This is a joke! Don’t you understand jokes?”
I became strong and easily defeated him. She pushed him so hard that he flew upside down - only his heels sparkled towards the sky. And she pulled the scarecrow out of the fire and began waving it over her head, stepping on everyone. The scarecrow had already caught fire, sparks were flying from it in different directions, and they all shied away in fear from these sparks.
They ran away.
And I got so dizzy, driving them away, that I couldn’t stop until I fell. There was a stuffed animal lying next to me. It was scorched, fluttering in the wind and that made it look like it was alive.
At first I lay with my eyes closed. Then she felt that she smelled something burning and opened her eyes - the scarecrow’s dress was smoking. I slammed my hand down on the smoldering hem and leaned back onto the grass.
There was a crunch of branches, retreating footsteps, and then there was silence.
"Anne of Green Gables" by Lucy Maud Montgomery
It was already quite light when Anya woke up and sat up in bed, looking confusedly out the window through which a stream of joyful sunlight and behind which something white and fluffy was swaying against the background of the bright blue sky.
At first, she couldn't remember where she was. At first she felt a delightful thrill, as if something very pleasant had happened, then a terrible memory appeared. It was Green Gables, but they didn’t want to leave her here because she was not a boy!
But it was morning, and outside the window stood a cherry tree, all in bloom. Anya jumped out of bed and in one leap found herself at the window. Then she pushed the window frame - the frame gave way with a creak, as if it had not been opened for a long time, which, however, was in fact - and sank to her knees, peering into the June morning. Her eyes sparkled with delight. Ah, isn't this wonderful? Isn't this a lovely place? If only she could stay here! She will imagine herself staying. There is room for imagination here.
A huge cherry tree grew so close to the window that its branches touched the house. It was so densely strewn with flowers that not a single leaf was visible. On both sides of the house there were large gardens, on one side an apple tree, on the other a cherry tree, all in bloom. The grass under the trees seemed yellow from the blooming dandelions. A little further away in the garden one could see lilac bushes, all in clusters of bright purple flowers, and the morning breeze carried their dizzyingly sweet aroma to Anya’s window.
Further beyond the garden, green meadows covered with lush clover descended to a valley where a stream ran and many white birch trees grew, the slender trunks of which rose above the undergrowth, suggesting a wonderful holiday among ferns, mosses and forest grasses. Beyond the valley a hill could be seen, green and fluffy with spruce and fir trees. Among them there was a small gap, and through it one could see the gray mezzanine of the house that Anya had seen the day before from the other side of the Lake of Sparkling Waters.
To the left were large barns and other outbuildings, and beyond them green fields sloped down to the sparkling blue sea.
Anya’s eyes, receptive to beauty, slowly moved from one picture to another, greedily absorbing everything that was in front of her. The poor thing has seen so many ugly places in her life. But what was revealed to her now exceeded her wildest dreams.
She knelt, forgetting about everything in the world except the beauty that surrounded her, until she shuddered, feeling someone's hand on her shoulder. The little dreamer did not hear Marilla enter.
“It’s time to get dressed,” said Marilla shortly.
Marilla simply did not know how to talk to this child, and this ignorance, which was unpleasant to her, made her harsh and decisive against her will.
Anya stood up with a deep sigh.
- Ah. isn't it wonderful? - she asked, pointing her hand at beautiful world outside the window.
“Yes, it’s a big tree,” said Marilla, “and it blooms profusely, but the cherries themselves are no good—small and wormy.”
- Oh, I'm not just talking about the tree; of course, it is beautiful... yes, it is dazzlingly beautiful... it blooms as if it were extremely important for itself... But I meant everything: the garden, and the trees, and the stream, and the forests - the whole big beautiful world. Don't you feel like you love the whole world on a morning like this? Even here I can hear the stream laughing in the distance. Have you ever noticed what joyful creatures these streams are? They always laugh. Even in winter I can hear their laughter from under the ice. I'm so glad there's a stream here near Green Gables. Maybe you think it doesn't matter to me since you don't want to leave me here? But that's not true. I will always be pleased to remember that there is a stream near Green Gables, even if I never see it again. If there had not been a stream here, I would always have been haunted by the unpleasant feeling that it should have been here. This morning I am not in the depths of grief. I am never in the depths of grief in the morning. Isn't it wonderful that there is morning? But I'm very sad. I just imagined that you still need me and that I will stay here forever, forever. It was a great comfort to imagine this. But the most unpleasant thing about imagining things is that there comes a moment when you have to stop imagining, and this is very painful.
“Better get dressed, go downstairs, and don’t think about your imaginary things,” said Marilla, as soon as she managed to get a word in edgewise. - Breakfast is waiting. Wash your face and comb your hair. Leave the window open and turn the bed around to air it out. And hurry up, please.
Anya obviously could act quickly when required, because within ten minutes she came downstairs, neatly dressed, with her hair combed and braided, her face washed; At the same time, her soul was filled with the pleasant consciousness that she had fulfilled all of Marilla’s demands. However, in fairness, it should be noted that she still forgot to open the bed for airing.
“I’m very hungry today,” she announced, slipping into the chair indicated to her by Marilla. “The world no longer seems as dark a desert as it did last night.” I'm so glad it's a sunny morning. However, I love rainy mornings too. Every morning is interesting, right? There is no telling what awaits us on this day, and there is so much left to the imagination. But I’m glad that it’s not raining today, because it’s easier not to be discouraged and to endure the vicissitudes of fate on a sunny day. I feel like I have a lot to endure today. It's very easy to read about other people's misfortunes and imagine that we too could heroically overcome them, but it's not so easy when we actually have to face them, right?
“For God's sake, hold your tongue,” said Marilla. “A little girl shouldn’t talk so much.”
After this remark, Anya fell completely silent, so obediently that her continued silence began to irritate Marilla somewhat, as if it were something not entirely natural. Matthew was also silent - but at least that was natural - so breakfast passed in complete silence.
As he neared the end, Anya became more and more distracted. She ate mechanically, and her large eyes were constantly, unseeingly looking at the sky outside the window. This irritated Marilla even more. She had an unpleasant feeling that while the body of this strange child was at the table, his spirit was soaring on the wings of fantasy in some transcendental land. Who would want to have such a child in the house?
And yet, what was most incomprehensible, Matthew wanted to leave her! Marilla felt that he wanted it this morning as much as he did last night, and that he intended to continue to want it. It was his usual way to get some whim into his head and cling to it with amazing silent tenacity - ten times more powerful and effective thanks to silence than if he talked about his desire from morning to evening.
When breakfast was over, Anya came out of her reverie and offered to wash the dishes.
— Do you know how to wash dishes properly? asked Marilla incredulously.
- Pretty good. True, I am better at babysitting children. I have a lot of experience in this matter. It's a pity that you don't have children here for me to take care of.
“But I wouldn’t want there to be more children here than in this moment. You alone are enough trouble. I can't imagine what to do with you. Matthew is so funny.
“He seemed very nice to me,” said Anya reproachfully. “He’s very friendly and didn’t mind at all, no matter how much I said it—he seemed to like it.” I felt a kindred spirit in him as soon as I saw him.
“You're both eccentrics, if that's what you mean when you talk about kindred spirits,” Marilla snorted. - Okay, you can wash the dishes. Use hot water and dry thoroughly. I already have a lot of work to do this morning, because I have to go to White Sands this afternoon to see Mrs. Spencer. You will come with me, and there we will decide what to do with you. When you're done with the dishes, go upstairs and make the bed.
Anya washed the dishes quite quickly and thoroughly, which did not go unnoticed by Marilla. Then she made the bed, though with less success, because she had never learned the art of fighting feather beds. But still the bed was made, and Marilla, in order to get rid of the girl for a while, said that she would allow her to go into the garden and play there until dinner.
Anya rushed to the door, with a lively face and shining eyes. But right at the threshold she suddenly stopped, turned sharply back and sat down near the table, the expression of delight disappearing from her face, as if it had been blown away by the wind.
- Well, what else happened? asked Marilla.
“I don’t dare go out,” said Anya in the tone of a martyr renouncing all earthly joys. “If I can’t stay here, I shouldn’t fall in love with Green Gables.” And if I go out and get acquainted with all these trees, flowers, and garden, and stream, I cannot help but fall in love with them. My soul is already heavy, and I don’t want it to become even heavier. I really want to go out - everything seems to be calling me: “Anya, Anya, come out to us! Anya, Anya, we want to play with you!” - but it's better not to do this. You shouldn't fall in love with something you'll be torn away from forever, right? And it’s so hard to resist and not fall in love, isn’t it? That's why I was so happy when I thought I'd stay here. I thought there was so much to love here and nothing would get in my way. But this brief dream passed. Now I have come to terms with my fate, so it’s better for me not to go out. Otherwise, I'm afraid I won't be able to reconcile with him again. What is the name of this flower in a pot on the windowsill, please tell me?
- This is a geranium.
- Oh, I don't mean that name. I mean the name you gave her. You didn't give her a name? Then can I do it? Can I call her... oh, let me think... Darling will do... can I call her Darling while I'm here? Oh, let me call her that!
- For God's sake, I don't care. But what's the point in naming geraniums?
- Oh, I like things to have names, even if it's just geraniums. This makes them more like people. How do you know you're not hurting geranium's feelings when you just call it "geranium" and nothing more? After all, you wouldn’t like it if you were always called just a woman. Yes, I will call her Darling. I gave a name to this cherry tree under my bedroom window this morning. I called her Snow Queen because she's so white. Of course, it won’t always be in bloom, but you can always imagine it, right?
“I’ve never seen or heard anything like this in my life,” Marilla muttered, fleeing to the basement for potatoes. “She's really interesting, as Matthew says.” I can already feel myself wondering what else she will say. She casts a spell on me too. And she’s already unleashed them on Matthew. That look he gave me as he left again expressed everything he had said and hinted at yesterday. It would be better if he were like other men and talked about everything openly. Then it would be possible to answer and convince him. But what can you do with a man who only watches?
When Marilla returned from her pilgrimage to the basement, she found Anne again falling into a reverie. The girl sat with her chin resting on her hands and her gaze fixed on the sky. So Marilla left her until dinner appeared on the table.
“Can I take the mare and the gig after lunch, Matthew?” asked Marilla.
Matthew nodded and looked sadly at Anya. Marilla caught this glance and said dryly:
“I’m going to go to White Sands and resolve this issue.” I'll take Anya with me so Mrs. Spencer can send her back to Nova Scotia right away. I'll leave some tea for you on the stove and come home in time for milking.
Again Matthew said nothing. Marilla felt that she was wasting her words. Nothing is more annoying than a man who doesn't answer...except a woman who doesn't answer.
In due course, Matthew harnessed the bay horse, and Marilla and Anya got into the convertible. Matthew opened the courtyard gate for them and, as they slowly drove past, he said loudly, apparently not addressing anyone:
“There was this guy here this morning, Jerry Buot from Creek, and I told him I'd hire him for the summer.
Marilla did not answer, but whipped the unfortunate bay with such force that the fat mare, unaccustomed to such treatment, broke into a gallop indignantly. When the convertible was already rolling along high road, Marilla turned around and saw that the obnoxious Matthew was standing, leaning against the gate, sadly looking after them.
Sergey Kutsko
WOLVES
The way village life is structured is that if you don’t go out into the forest before noon and take a walk through familiar mushroom and berry places, then by evening there’s nothing to run for, everything will be hidden.
One girl thought so too. The sun has just risen to the tops of the fir trees, and already there is a full basket in my hands, I have wandered far, but what mushrooms! She looked around with gratitude and was just about to leave when the distant bushes suddenly trembled and an animal came out into the clearing, its eyes tenaciously following the girl’s figure.
- Oh, dog! - she said.
Cows were grazing somewhere nearby, and meeting a shepherd dog in the forest was not a big surprise to them. But the meeting with several more pairs of animal eyes put me in a daze...
“Wolves,” a thought flashed, “the road is not far, run...” Yes, the strength disappeared, the basket involuntarily fell out of his hands, his legs became weak and disobedient.
- Mother! - this sudden cry stopped the flock, which had already reached the middle of the clearing. - People, help! - flashed three times over the forest.
As the shepherds later said: “We heard screams, we thought the children were playing around...” This is five kilometers from the village, in the forest!
The wolves slowly approached, the she-wolf walked ahead. This happens with these animals - the she-wolf becomes the head of the pack. Only her eyes were not as fierce as they were studying. They seemed to ask: “Well, man? What will you do now, when there are no weapons in your hands, and your relatives are not nearby?
The girl fell to her knees, covered her eyes with her hands and began to cry. Suddenly the thought of prayer came to her, as if something stirred in her soul, as if the words of her grandmother, remembered from childhood, were resurrected: “Ask the Mother of God! ”
The girl did not remember the words of the prayer. Making the sign of the cross, she asked the Mother of God, as if she were her mother, in the last hope of intercession and salvation.
When she opened her eyes, the wolves, passing the bushes, went into the forest. A she-wolf walked slowly ahead, head down.
Boris Ganago
LETTER TO GOD
This happened at the end of the 19th century.
Petersburg. Christmas Eve. A cold, piercing wind blows from the bay. Fine prickly snow is falling. Horses' hooves clatter on the cobblestone streets, shop doors slam - the last purchases are made before the holiday. Everyone is in a hurry to get home quickly.
Only a little boy slowly wanders along a snowy street. Every now and then he takes his cold, red hands out of the pockets of his old coat and tries to warm them with his breath. Then he stuffs them deeper into his pockets again and moves on. Here he stops at the bakery window and looks at the pretzels and bagels displayed behind the glass.
The store door swung open, letting out another customer, and the aroma of freshly baked bread wafted out. The boy swallowed his saliva convulsively, stomped on the spot and wandered on.
Dusk is falling imperceptibly. There are fewer and fewer passers-by. The boy pauses near a building with lights burning in the windows, and, rising on tiptoe, tries to look inside. After a moment's hesitation, he opens the door.
The old clerk was late at work today. He's in no hurry. He has been living alone for a long time and on holidays he feels his loneliness especially acutely. The clerk sat and thought with bitterness that he had no one to celebrate Christmas with, no one to give gifts to. At this time the door opened. The old man looked up and saw the boy.
- Uncle, uncle, I need to write a letter! - the boy said quickly.
- Do you have money? - the clerk asked sternly.
The boy, fiddling with his hat in his hands, took a step back. And then the lonely clerk remembered that today was Christmas Eve and that he really wanted to give someone a gift. He took out a blank sheet of paper, dipped his pen in ink and wrote: “Petersburg. 6th January. Mr...”
- What is the gentleman's last name?
“This is not sir,” muttered the boy, not yet fully believing his luck.
- Oh, is this a lady? — the clerk asked, smiling.
No no! - the boy said quickly.
So who do you want to write a letter to? - the old man was surprised,
- To Jesus.
“How dare you make fun of an elderly man?” — the clerk was indignant and wanted to show the boy to the door. But then I saw tears in the child’s eyes and remembered that today was Christmas Eve. He felt ashamed of his anger, and in a warmer voice he asked:
-What do you want to write to Jesus?
— My mother always taught me to ask God for help when it’s difficult. She said God's name is Jesus Christ. “The boy came closer to the clerk and continued: “And yesterday she fell asleep, and I can’t wake her up.” There’s not even bread at home, I’m so hungry,” he wiped the tears that had come to his eyes with his palm.
- How did you wake her up? - asked the old man, rising from his table.
- I kissed her.
- Is she breathing?
- What are you talking about, uncle, do people breathe in their sleep?
“Jesus Christ has already received your letter,” said the old man, hugging the boy by the shoulders. “He told me to take care of you, and took your mother to Himself.”
The old clerk thought: “My mother, when you left for another world, you told me to be a good person and a pious Christian. I forgot your order, but now you won’t be ashamed of me.”
Boris Ganago
THE SPOKEN WORD
On the outskirts big city there was an old house with a garden. They were guarded by a reliable guard - the smart dog Uranus. He never barked at anyone in vain, kept a vigilant eye on strangers, and rejoiced at his owners.
But this house was demolished. Its inhabitants were offered a comfortable apartment, and then the question arose - what to do with the shepherd? As a watchman, Uranus was no longer needed by them, becoming only a burden. There were fierce debates about the dog's fate for several days. Through the open window from the house to the guard kennel, the plaintive sobs of the grandson and the menacing shouts of the grandfather often reached.
What did Uranus understand from the words he heard? Who knows...
Only his daughter-in-law and grandson, who were bringing him food, noticed that the dog’s bowl remained untouched for more than a day. Uranus did not eat in the following days, no matter how much he was persuaded. He no longer wagged his tail when people approached him, and even looked away, as if no longer wanting to look at the people who had betrayed him.
The daughter-in-law, expecting an heir or heiress, suggested:
- Isn’t Uranus sick? The owner said in anger:
“It would be better if the dog died on its own.” There would be no need to shoot then.
The daughter-in-law shuddered.
Uranus looked at the speaker with a look that the owner could not forget for a long time.
The grandson persuaded the neighbor's veterinarian to look at his pet. But the veterinarian did not find any disease, he only said thoughtfully:
- Maybe he was sad about something... Uranus soon died, until his death he barely moved his tail only to his daughter-in-law and grandson, who visited him.
And at night the owner often remembered the look of Uranus, who had faithfully served him for so many years. The old man already regretted the cruel words that killed the dog.
But is it possible to return what was said?
And who knows how the voiced evil hurt the grandson, attached to his four-legged friend?
And who knows how it, scattering around the world like a radio wave, will affect the souls of unborn children, future generations?
Words live, words never die...
An old book told the story: one girl’s father died. The girl missed him. He was always kind to her. She missed this warmth.
One day her dad dreamed of her and said: now be kind to people. Every kind word serves Eternity.
Boris Ganago
MASHENKA
Yule story
Once, many years ago, a girl Masha was mistaken for an Angel. It happened like this.
One poor family had three children. Their dad died, their mom worked where she could, and then got sick. There wasn’t a crumb left in the house, but I was so hungry. What to do?
Mom went out into the street and began to beg, but people passed by without noticing her. Christmas night was approaching, and the woman’s words: “I’m not asking for myself, but for my children... For Christ’s sake! “were drowning in the pre-holiday bustle.
In desperation, she entered the church and began to ask Christ Himself for help. Who else was left to ask?
It was here, at the icon of the Savior, that Masha saw a woman kneeling. Her face was flooded with tears. The girl had never seen such suffering before.
Masha had an amazing heart. When people were happy nearby, and she wanted to jump with happiness. But if someone was in pain, she could not pass by and asked:
What happened to you? Why are you crying? And someone else's pain penetrated her heart. And now she leaned towards the woman:
Are you in grief?
And when she shared her misfortune with her, Masha, who had never felt hungry in her life, imagined three lonely children who had not seen food for a long time. Without thinking, she handed the woman five rubles. It was all her money.
At that time, this was a significant amount, and the woman’s face lit up.
Where is your home? - Masha asked goodbye. She was surprised to learn that a poor family lived in the next basement. The girl did not understand how she could live in a basement, but she knew exactly what she needed to do on this Christmas evening.
The happy mother, as if on wings, flew home. She bought food at a nearby store, and the children greeted her joyfully.
Soon the stove was blazing and the samovar was boiling. The children warmed up, satiated and became quiet. The table laden with food was an unexpected holiday for them, almost a miracle.
But then Nadya, the smallest one, asked:
Mom, is it true that at Christmas time God sends an Angel to children, and he brings them many, many gifts?
Mom knew very well that they had no one to expect gifts from. Glory to God for what He has already given them: everyone is fed and warm. But kids are kids. They so wanted to have a Christmas tree, the same as all the other children. What could she, poor thing, tell them? Destroy a child's faith?
The children looked at her warily, waiting for an answer. And my mother confirmed:
This is true. But the Angel comes only to those who believe in God with all their hearts and pray to Him with all their hearts.
“But I believe in God with all my heart and pray to Him with all my heart,” Nadya did not back down. - Let him send us His Angel.
Mom didn't know what to say. There was silence in the room, only the logs crackled in the stove. And suddenly there was a knock. The children shuddered, and the mother crossed herself and opened the door with a trembling hand.
On the threshold stood a little fair-haired girl Masha, and behind her was a bearded man with a Christmas tree in his hands.
Merry Christmas! - Mashenka joyfully congratulated the owners. The children froze.
While the bearded man was setting up the Christmas tree, Nanny Machine entered the room with a large basket, from which gifts immediately began to appear. The kids couldn't believe their eyes. But neither they nor the mother suspected that the girl had given them her Christmas tree and her gifts.
And when the unexpected guests left, Nadya asked:
Was this girl an Angel?
Boris Ganago
BACK TO LIFE
Based on the story “Seryozha” by A. Dobrovolsky
Usually the brothers' beds were next to each other. But when Seryozha fell ill with pneumonia, Sasha was moved to another room and was forbidden to disturb the baby. They just asked me to pray for my brother, who was getting worse and worse.
One evening Sasha looked into the patient’s room. Seryozha lay with his eyes open, seeing nothing, and barely breathing. Frightened, the boy rushed to the office, from which the voices of his parents could be heard. The door was ajar, and Sasha heard his mother, crying, say that Seryozha was dying. Dad answered with pain in his voice:
- Why cry now? There's no way to save him...
In horror, Sasha rushed to his sister’s room. There was no one there, and he fell to his knees in front of the icon, sobbing. Mother of God hanging on the wall. Through the sobs the words broke through:
- Lord, Lord, make sure that Seryozha doesn’t die!
Sasha's face was flooded with tears. Everything around blurred as if in a fog. The boy saw in front of him only the face of the Mother of God. The sense of time disappeared.
- Lord, you can do anything, save Seryozha!
It was already completely dark. Exhausted, Sasha stood up with the corpse and lit the table lamp. The Gospel lay before her. The boy turned over a few pages, and suddenly his gaze fell on the line: “Go, and as you believed, so be it for you...”
As if he had heard an order, he went to Seryozha. My mother sat silently at the bedside of her beloved brother. She gave a sign: “Don’t make noise, Seryozha fell asleep.”
Words were not spoken, but this sign was like a ray of hope. He fell asleep - that means he’s alive, that means he will live!
Three days later, Seryozha could already sit in bed, and the children were allowed to visit him. They brought their brother’s favorite toys, a fortress and houses that he had cut out and glued before his illness - everything that could please the baby. The little sister with the big doll stood next to Seryozha, and Sasha, jubilantly, took a photograph of them.
These were moments of real happiness.
Boris Ganago
YOUR CHICKEN
A chick fell out of the nest - very small, helpless, even its wings had not yet grown. He can’t do anything, he just squeaks and opens his beak - asking for food.
The guys took him and brought him into the house. They built him a nest from grass and twigs. Vova fed the baby, and Ira gave him water and took him out into the sun.
Soon the chick grew stronger, and feathers began to grow instead of fluff. The guys found an old birdcage in the attic and, to be safe, they put their pet in it - the cat began to look at him very expressively. All day long he was on duty at the door, waiting for the right moment. And no matter how much his children chased him, he did not take his eyes off the chick.
Summer flew by unnoticed. The chick grew up in front of the children and began to fly around the cage. And soon he felt cramped in it. When the cage was taken outside, he hit the bars and asked to be released. So the guys decided to release their pet. Of course, they were sorry to part with him, but they could not deprive the freedom of someone who was created for flight.
One sunny morning the children said goodbye to their pet, took the cage out into the yard and opened it. The chick jumped onto the grass and looked back at his friends.
At that moment the cat appeared. Hiding in the bushes, he prepared to jump, rushed, but... The chick flew high, high...
The holy elder John of Kronstadt compared our soul to a bird. The enemy is hunting for every soul and wants to catch it. After all, at first the human soul, just like a fledgling chick, is helpless and does not know how to fly. How can we preserve it, how can we grow it so that it does not break on sharp stones or fall into the net of a fisherman?
The Lord created a saving fence behind which our soul grows and strengthens - the house of God, the Holy Church. In it the soul learns to fly high, high, to the very sky. And she will know such a bright joy there that no earthly nets are afraid of her.
Boris Ganago
MIRROR
Dot, dot, comma,
Minus, the face is crooked.
Stick, stick, cucumber -
So the little man came out.
With this poem Nadya finished the drawing. Then, fearing that she would not be understood, she signed under it: “It’s me.” She carefully examined her creation and decided that it was missing something.
The young artist went to the mirror and began to look at herself: what else needs to be completed so that anyone can understand who is depicted in the portrait?
Nadya loved to dress up and twirl in front of a large mirror, and tried different hairstyles. This time the girl tried on her mother’s hat with a veil.
She wanted to look mysterious and romantic, like the long-legged girls showing fashion on TV. Nadya imagined herself as an adult, cast a languid glance in the mirror and tried to walk with the gait of a fashion model. It didn't turn out very nicely, and when she stopped abruptly, the hat slid down onto her nose.
It’s good that no one saw her at that moment. If only we could laugh! In general, she didn’t like being a fashion model at all.
The girl took off her hat, and then her gaze fell on her grandmother’s hat. Unable to resist, she tried it on. And she froze, making an amazing discovery: she looked exactly like her grandmother. She just didn't have any wrinkles yet. Bye.
Now Nadya knew what she would become in many years. True, this future seemed very distant to her...
It became clear to Nadya why her grandmother loves her so much, why she watches her pranks with tender sadness and secretly sighs.
There were footsteps. Nadya hastily put her hat back in place and ran to the door. On the threshold she met... herself, only not so frisky. But the eyes were exactly the same: childishly surprised and joyful.
Nadya hugged her future self and quietly asked:
Grandma, is it true that you were me as a child?
The grandmother was silent, then smiled mysteriously and took out an old album from the shelf. After flipping through a few pages, she showed a photograph of a little girl who looked very much like Nadya.
That's what I was like.
Oh, really, you look like me! - the granddaughter exclaimed in delight.
Or maybe you are like me? - Grandmother asked, squinting slyly.
It doesn't matter who looks like whom. The main thing is that they are similar,” the little girl insisted.
Isn't it important? And look who I looked like...
And the grandmother began to leaf through the album. There were all sorts of faces there. And what faces! And each was beautiful in its own way. The peace, dignity and warmth that radiated from them attracted the eye. Nadya noticed that they were all small children and gray old men, young ladies and smart military men - were somewhat similar to each other... And to her.
Tell me about them,” the girl asked.
The grandmother hugged her little blood to herself, and a story flowed about their family, coming from ancient centuries.
The time for cartoons had already come, but the girl didn’t want to watch them. She was discovering something amazing that had been there for a long time, but lived inside her.
Do you know the history of your grandfathers, great-grandfathers, the history of your family? Maybe this story is your mirror?
Boris Ganago
PARROT
Petya was wandering around the house. I'm tired of all the games. Then my mother gave instructions to go to the store and also suggested:
Our neighbor, Maria Nikolaevna, broke her leg. There is no one to buy her bread. He can barely move around the room. Come on, I'll call and find out if she needs to buy anything.
Aunt Masha was happy about the call. And when the boy brought her a whole bag of groceries, she didn’t know how to thank him. For some reason, she showed Petya the empty cage in which the parrot had recently lived. It was her friend. Aunt Masha looked after him, shared her thoughts, and he took off and flew away. Now she has no one to say a word to, no one to care about. What kind of life is this if there is no one to take care of?
Petya looked at the empty cage, at the crutches, imagined Aunt Mania hobbling around the empty apartment, and an unexpected thought came to his mind. The fact is that he had long been saving the money that he was given for toys. I still couldn't find anything suitable. And now this strange thought is to buy a parrot for Aunt Masha.
Having said goodbye, Petya ran out into the street. He wanted to go to a pet store, where he had once seen various parrots. But now he looked at them through the eyes of Aunt Masha. Which one of them could she become friends with? Maybe this one will suit her, maybe this one?
Petya decided to ask his neighbor about the fugitive. The next day he told his mother:
Call Aunt Masha... Maybe she needs something?
Mom even froze, then hugged her son to her and whispered:
So you become a man... Petya was offended:
Wasn’t I a human before?
There was, of course there was,” my mother smiled. - Only now your soul has also awakened... Thank God!
What is the soul? — the boy became wary.
This is the ability to love.
The mother looked searchingly at her son:
Maybe you can call yourself?
Petya was embarrassed. Mom answered the phone: Maria Nikolaevna, excuse me, Petya has a question for you. I'll give him the phone now.
There was nowhere to go, and Petya muttered embarrassedly:
Aunt Masha, maybe I should buy you something?
Petya didn’t understand what happened at the other end of the line, only the neighbor answered in some way. in an unusual voice. She thanked him and asked him to bring milk if he went to the store. She doesn't need anything else. She thanked me again.
When Petya called her apartment, he heard the hasty clatter of crutches. Aunt Masha didn’t want to make him wait extra seconds.
While the neighbor was looking for money, the boy, as if by chance, began to ask her about the missing parrot. Aunt Masha willingly told us about the color and behavior...
There were several parrots of this color in the pet store. Petya took a long time to choose. When he brought his gift to Aunt Masha, then... I don’t undertake to describe what happened next.