A striking epigraph to the entire work of Nikolai Semenovich Leskov is his own words: “Literature should seek the highest, not the lowest, and the goals of the Gospel for it should always be more valuable than the goals of the Charter on Prevention. We are given a clear instruction: “A voice cries, Make straight the paths by which salvation comes.” Salvation is common to all “in love, in forgiveness of insults, in mercy to everyone - to one’s own and to the Samaritan,” and the goal and joy is that with a general softening of hearts, “swords will be reforged into plowshares, and the peace of God will be established in hearts.” all people".
Writers and thinkers of the Russian diaspora of the first wave of emigration (I. Ilyin, B. Zaitsev, P. Struve) rightly called Leskov “ greatest Christian among Russian writers". “I.A. Ilyin, who called Leskov a “profound artist and philosopher,” believed that Russian literature - “in an expanded sense” - “can be called ... moral theology.” And this is moral theology, in other words Christian teaching about morality is the spiritual core of Nikolai Semenovich’s works. It is the basis of his creativity. Modern researcher of the Orthodox foundations of Russian literature M.M. Dunaev expresses a similar point of view: “One can directly state that in its highest manifestations, Russian literature no longer became just the art of words, but theology in images.” “The coming revival of Russia was never questioned by Leskov, who managed in his works not only to show the national characters of the “righteous heroes”, to create his own artistic “iconostasis” of the saints of the Russian land, but also to recreate the very spirit of the nation.”
Understand Leskovsky art world outside the religious context, religious and moral thoughts, aspirations and achievements of the artist, it is impossible in the same way as to comprehend the true originality Russian literature. The spiritual charm of the majority goodies Leskov is that they are strongly connected with the Orthodox worldview, which was then at the same time predominantly Russian. History testifies that the Russian people not only accepted Orthodoxy, but it was through it that they gained and established their national identity. Without this truth, it is impossible to understand either Leskov’s heroes, or their selfless love for people and Russia, or the pathos of his work.
The writer created his works about the “righteous” in the post-reform era, when people were partly “lost” in the new social circumstances that had developed. How F.M. Dostoevsky and L.N. Tolstoy, Leskov is trying to defend universal human values, which are gradually beginning to collapse.
His works reveal to us many characters, innumerable shades of movements of the Russian soul. He, like no one else, realized that the deep essence of this soul, its root, was the Christian faith. And no matter how our holy Rus' was trampled, no matter how the formidable enemies of God took up arms against it, they could not break it, break this Christian faith. For Leskov himself, this faith instilled love for man, even the most fallen one. All his works are inspired by this love. With love and faith, he penetrated the hearts of the people and reflected it in his creations. All of Leskov’s work is imbued with the spirit of Christian love and compassion for man as the image of God, albeit sometimes very clouded. This faith, love and compassion determined the character of his writings. He saw what others do not see, but which is life itself. After all inner life, internal work, the state of the soul - that area in which God Himself deigns to reveal Himself, to choose as an abode.
The author affirmed, propagated, justified, defended life according to the word of Christ, defended from the storms of time, from various false and contrary to the human spirit teachings. The Orthodox faith, the Christian faith is revealed in his works in all its strength, truth, truth and beauty. How closely she intertwined with the Russian soul, how closely she entered her life. The author reveals it in his heroes, the author shows it in their destinies, and lives their souls with it.
Christianity in Rus', in turn, was closely intertwined with ancient pagan culture, which even today influences the formation of people’s mentality. Without taking into account the factor of Orthodox-pagan syncretism, it is impossible to understand either Orthodoxy, which is different from the Byzantine prototype, or achievements in various fields national culture with its characteristic features of explicit and implicit dual faith, and, finally, the origins of those internal spiritual traits and qualities that distinguish the Russian person. Where, for example, does he get the “breadth of soul” known throughout the world?
ON THE. Berdyaev wrote that there is a correspondence between the immensity of the Russian land and the Russian soul: “In the soul of the Russian people there is the same immensity, boundlessness, aspiration to infinity, as in the Russian plain.” This unwritten law of “correspondence between earth and soul” operates with amazing constancy at all times of Russian history and carries within itself the light of the search for Truth, Goodness and Beauty. All this received the most complete and perfect embodiment in the amazing language created by the Russian people, inimitable folklore, and most importantly in art - great Russian literature, music, painting, architecture.
Russian spirituality has shaped Russian culture over the centuries, which, in turn, shapes current spirituality. A huge layer of Russian culture and spirituality is connected with Orthodoxy. Creativity of Slavophiles I.V. Kireevsky (1806-1856) and A.S. Khomyakov (1804-1860) was an attempt to develop a system of Christian worldview. They came to the idea that Russian education should be based on the perception of “integral knowledge,” combining reason and faith, and true philosophy should be the philosophy of “believing reason.” Significant influence The spiritual world of Russians was influenced by the ideas of Buddhism and esoteric philosophy. There is also the influence of Muslim culture.
What are character traits specifically Russian spirituality? Ideas about spirituality as the highest expediency were manifested in the reflections of Russian thinkers about the fate and destiny of Russia, and in the belief in the special mission of Russia: “Moscow is the third Rome”, “the worldwide responsiveness of the Russian person”, spiritual, mental and everyday originality.
One can agree with P.E. Astafiev, who wrote: “If there is not and cannot be a Russian national philosophy, then there is not and cannot be a Russian national self-consciousness, for philosophy, in contrast to the knowledge of objects, is precisely the self-consciousness of the whole spirit.”
“The religious and moral thoughts of the “most original Russian writer” - especially in the final period of his creative biography - are not just a testament, but a message, a testament to modern consciousness. About this gift of messenger from Leskov, which allows him to convey in the images of art the highest truth, wrote Daniil Andreev soulfully. In relation to Leskov, he also pointed out the bitter biblical truth that “there is no prophet in his own country”: “Talented messengers, like Leskov or Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy, remained isolated units; they, so to speak, rowed against the tide, without meeting among their contemporaries either proper understanding or fair assessment.”
Modern philologist V.I. Kuleshov writes: “A return to religion, to spiritual and moral principles is perhaps one of the most striking features of the modern worldview. This is especially relevant for the entire spiritual situation in Russia today, which is on the path to self-restoration. The elimination of many ideological restrictions stimulated scientific research in the field of studying ethical, philosophical and religious foundations historical and literary process. Now that our literary criticism is freeing itself from atheistic cliches and the pressure of all kinds of ideological dogmas, the task of reading Russian classics in line with the cross-cutting problem of the interaction of literature and Christianity is not only of undoubted interest, but is becoming urgently relevant. Awareness of the “Christian (namely Orthodox) subtext of Russian literature as a special subject of study” becomes one of most important tasks literary studies".
Spiritual culture is a set of spiritual values, as well as the process of their creation, distribution and consumption. Spiritual values are designed to satisfy the spiritual needs of a person, i.e. everything that contributes to its development spiritual world(the world of his consciousness). And if material values, with rare exceptions, are fleeting - houses, machines, mechanisms, clothing, vehicles, etc., etc., then spiritual values can be eternal as long as humanity exists. Let's say, the philosophical judgments of the ancient Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle are almost two and a half thousand years old, but they are still the same reality as at the time of their expression - just take their works from the library or get information via the Internet.
Speaking about spiritual culture, we should note its diversity. Spiritual values include philosophy, science, religion, morality, and art. Philosophy is essentially the basis of spiritual culture. It contributes to the formation in each person of a certain view of the world and of his place in this world, what is usually called a worldview. It gives a person the opportunity to think about the meaning of his life, thereby allowing him to carry out a kind of general orientation in the reality around us.
Other spheres of spiritual culture are moral, aesthetic and artistic. The very concept of “morality” comes from the word “character”, which means the mental and volitional qualities of a person. The main purpose moral culture to be a regulator of human relations.
In Leskov, even the description of nature carries a moral and philosophical charge. Moreover, all this is written magnificently artistic language. That is why Russian literature was the pinnacle of our spirituality, that is why the works of Russian classical writers not only had a huge influence on the development of Russian culture, but also left a deep mark on spiritual development humanity.
Realizing the place and significance of N.S. Leskov in the literary process, we always note that he is an amazingly original writer. The external dissimilarity of his predecessors and contemporaries sometimes made him see in him a completely new phenomenon, which had no parallel in Russian literature. Leskov is brightly original, and at the same time you can learn a lot from him.He is an amazing experimenter who gave birth to a whole wave of artistic searches in Russian literature; He is a cheerful, mischievous experimenter, and at the same time extremely serious and deep, setting himself great educational goals.
Leskov’s creativity, one might say, knows no social boundaries. He brings out in his works people of various classes and circles: and landowners - from the rich to the semi-poor, and officials of all stripes - from the minister to the quarterly, and the clergy - monastic and parish - from the metropolitan to the sexton, and military men of various ranks and types of weapons, and peasants, and people from the peasantry - soldiers, artisans and every working person. Leskov willingly shows different representatives of the nationalities of Russia at that time: Ukrainians, Yakuts, Jews, Gypsies, Poles... Leskov’s versatility of knowledge of the life of each class, estate, and nationality is amazing. Leskov’s exceptional life experience, his vigilance, memory, and linguistic flair were needed to describe the life of the people so closely, with such knowledge of everyday life, economic structure, family relationships, folk art, folk language.
With all the breadth of coverage of Russian life, there is a sphere in Leskov’s work to which his most significant and famous works belong: this is the sphere of life of the people.
Who are the heroes of Leskov’s most beloved works by our readers?
Heroes" Sealed angel" - mason workers, "Left-handed" - blacksmith, Tula gunsmith, " Toupee artist"- serf hairdresser and theatrical make-up artist
To place a hero from the people at the center of the narrative, it is necessary First of all, master his language, be able to reproduce the speech of different layers of the people, different professions, destinies, ages. The task of recreating the living language of the people in a literary work required special art, when Leskov used the form of skaz.
The tale in Russian literature comes from Gogol, but was especially skillfully developed by Leskov and glorified him as an artist. The essence of this manner is that the narration is not conducted on behalf of a neutral, objective author; the narrative is narrated by a narrator, usually a participant in the events being reported. Speech work of art imitates the live speech of an oral story. Moreover, in a fairy tale, the narrator is usually a person from a different social circle and cultural layer to which the writer and the intended reader of the work belong. Leskov’s story is told by either a merchant, or a monk, or an artisan, or a retired mayor, or a former soldier. . Each narrator speaks in a way that is characteristic of his education and upbringing, his age and profession, his concept of himself, his desire and ability to impress his listeners.
This manner gives Leskov’s story a special liveliness. The language of his works, unusually rich and varied, deepens the social and individual characteristics of his characters, and becomes for the writer a means of subtle assessment of people and events. Gorky wrote about Leskov's tale:"...The people of his stories often talk about themselves, but their speech is so amazingly alive, so truthful and convincing that they stand before you as mysteriously tangible, physically clear, as people from the books of L. Tolstoy and others, otherwise to say, Leskov achieves the same result, but with a different technique of mastery."
To illustrate Leskov’s storytelling style, let’s take some tirade from "Lefty" This is how the narrator describes, based on Lefty's impressions, the living and working conditions of English workers : “Every worker they have is constantly well-fed, is not dressed in rags, but each one is wearing a capable tunic vest, shod in thick boots with iron knobs, so as not to get his feet on anything; he works not with a boilie, but with training and has for himself concepts. In front of everyone, in plain view, hangs a multiplication dot, and under his hand is an erasable board: all the master does is look at the dot and compare it with the concept, and then he writes one thing on the board, erases another, and neatly puts together what is written on the numbers. , that’s what actually happens.”
The narrator did not see any English workers. He dresses them according to his imagination, combining a jacket with a vest. He knows that they work there “according to science”; in this regard, he himself has only heard about the “multiplication dot”, which means that a master who works not “by eye”, but with the help of “digits”, must check his products with it. The narrator, of course, does not have enough familiar words; he distorts or uses unfamiliar words incorrectly. “Shiblets” become “schiglets” - probably by association with panache. The multiplication table turns into a “chicken” - obviously because the students “chuck” it. Wanting to designate some kind of extension on the boots, the narrator calls it a knob, transferring to it the name of the extension on a stick.
Popular storytellers often reinterpret strange-sounding foreign words into Russian., which, with such alteration, receive new or additional meanings; Leskov especially willingly imitates this so-called “folk etymology” ". Thus, in “Lefty” the barometer turns into a “storm meter”, the “microscope” into a “small scope”, the “pudding” into a “studying” " etc. Leskov, who passionately loved puns, wordplay, witticisms, and jokes, filled “Levsha” with linguistic oddities. But their set does not give the impression of excess, because the immense brightness of the verbal patterns is in the spirit of folk buffoonery. And sometimes a verbal game not only amuses, but behind it there is a satirical denunciation.
The narrator in a tale usually addresses some interlocutor or group of interlocutors, the narrative begins and progresses in response to their questions and comments. At the core "Toupee artist" - the story of an old nanny to her pupil, a nine-year-old boy. This nanny is a former actress of the Oryol serf theater of Count Kamensky. This is the same theater that is described in Herzen’s story “The Thieving Magpie” under the name of the theater of Prince Skalinsky. But the heroine of Herzen’s story is not only a highly talented, but, due to exceptional life circumstances, also an educated actress. Leskov’s Lyuba is an uneducated serf girl, with natural talent capable of singing, dancing, and performing roles in plays “by sight” (that is, by hearsay, following other actresses). She is not able to tell and reveal everything that the author wants to tell the reader, and she cannot know everything (for example, the master’s conversations with his brother). Therefore, not the entire story is told from the perspective of the nanny; part of the events are presented by the author with the inclusion of excerpts and small quotes from nanny's story.
In the very popular work Leskova - "Lefty" we encounter a tale of a different kind. There is no author, no listeners, no narrator. More precisely, the author’s voice is heard for the first time after the completion of the tale: in the final chapter, the writer characterizes the story told as a “fabulous legend,” an “epic” of the masters, “a myth personified by folk fantasy.”
(*10) The narrator in “Lefty” exists only as a voice that does not belong to a specific, named person. This is, as it were, the voice of the people - the creator of the “gunsmith legend”.
"Lefty"- not an everyday tale, where the narrator narrates events he has experienced or personally known to him; here he retells a legend created by the people, as folk storytellers perform epics or historical songs. As in the folk epic, in “Lefty” a number of historical figures act: two kings - Alexander I and Nicholas I, ministers Chernyshev, Nesselrode (Kiselvrode), Kleinmichel, ataman of the Don Cossack army Platov, commandant of the Peter and Paul Fortress Skobelev and others.
Contemporaries did not appreciate either “Lefty” or Leskov’s talent in general.They believed that Leskov was excessive in everything: he applied bright colors too thickly, put his characters in too unusual positions, forced them to speak in an exaggeratedly characteristic language, and strung too many episodes onto one thread. and so on.
Most associated with the creativity of the people "Lefty". At the very basis of its plot lies a comic saying in which the people expressed admiration for the art of Tula masters: "The Tula people shoed a flea". Used by Leskov and popularly used legends about the skill of Tula gunsmiths. Also in early XIX century, an anecdote was published about how an important Russian gentleman showed an expensive English pistol to a craftsman at the Tula Arms Factory, and he, taking the pistol, “unscrewed the trigger and showed his name under the screw.” In “Lefty,” Platov arranges the same demonstration to prove to Tsar Alexander that “we have our own at home just as well.” In the English “armoury cabinet of curiosities”, (*12) taking the especially praised “pistol” in his hands, Platov unscrews the lock and shows the tsar the inscription: “Ivan Moskvin in the city of Tula.”
As we see, love for the people, the desire to discover and show the best sides of the Russian folk character they did not make Leskov a panegyrist, did not prevent him from seeing the features of slavery and ignorance that his history imposed on the people. Leskov does not hide these traits in the hero of his myth about the brilliant master. The legendary Lefty and his two comrades managed to forge and attach horseshoes with nails to the legs of a steel flea made in England. On each horseshoe “the artist’s name is displayed: which Russian master made that horseshoe.” These inscriptions can only be seen through a “microscope that magnifies five million times.” But the artisans did not have any microscopes, but only “shot eyes.”
This is, of course, a fabulous exaggeration, but it has a real basis. Tula craftsmen have always been especially famous and are still famous for their miniature products, which can only be seen with the help of a strong magnifying glass.
Admiring the genius of Lefty, Leskov, however, is far from idealizing the people as they were, according to historical conditions, at that time. Lefty is ignorant, and this cannot but affect his creativity. The art of the English craftsmen was manifested not so much in the fact that they cast the flea from steel, but in the fact that the flea danced, wound up with a special key. Savvy, she stopped dancing. And the English masters, cordially welcoming Lefty, sent to England with a savvy flea , indicate that he is hampered by a lack of knowledge: "...Then you could have realized that in every machine there is a calculation of force, otherwise you are very skilled in your hands, but you did not realize that such a small machine, like in the nymphosoria, is designed for the most accurate accuracy and does not have shoeings can’t. Now the nymphosoria doesn’t jump and dance through this.” Leskov gave this point. great importance. In an article devoted to the tale of Lefty, Leskov contrasts Lefty’s genius with his ignorance, and his (ardent patriotism) with the lack of concern for the people and homeland in the ruling clique. Leskov writes: “The reviewer of “New Time” notes that in Lefty I had the idea to bring out not one person, and that where it says “Lefty”, you should read “Russian people”.
Lefty loves his Russia with a simple-hearted and ingenuous love. He cannot be tempted by an easy life in a foreign land. He is eager to go home because he is faced with a task that Russia needs to complete; thus she became the goal of his life. In England, Lefty learned that the muzzles of guns should be lubricated, and not cleaned with crushed bricks, as was customary in the Russian army then, - which is why “bullets dangle in them” and guns, “God bless war, (...) are not suitable for shooting ". With this he hurries to his homeland. He arrives sick, the authorities did not bother to provide him with a document, the police completely robbed him, after which they began to take him to hospitals, but they did not admit him anywhere without a “tugament”, they threw the patient onto the floor, and finally, “the back of his head split on the paratha” . Dying, Lefty thought only about how to bring his discovery to the king, and still managed to inform the doctor about it. He reported to the Minister of War, but in response he received only a rude shout: “Know (...) your emetic and laxative, and don’t interfere with your own business: in Russia there are generals for that.”
In the story" Stupid artist" the writer depicts a rich count with an “insignificant face” that exposes an insignificant soul. This is an evil tyrant and tormentor: people he dislikes are torn to pieces by hunting dogs, executioners torment them with incredible tortures. Thus, Leskov contrasts truly courageous people from the people with “gentlemen”, maddened by immense power over people and imagining themselves courageous, because they are always ready to torment and to destroy people at their own whim or caprice - of course, with the hands of others. There were enough such “foreign hands” at the service of the masters: both serfs and civilians, servants and people appointed by the authorities to assist in every possible way the “powers of this world.” The image of one of the master's servants is vividly depicted in "The Stupid Artist." This is pop. Arkady, undaunted by the torture that threatens him, perhaps fatal, tries to save his beloved girl from the abuse (*19) of her by a depraved master. The priest promises to marry them and hide them at his place for the night, after which both hope to get into the “Turkish Khrushchuk”. But the priest, having previously robbed Arkady, betrays the fugitives to the count's people sent to search for the escaped ones, for which he receives a well-deserved spit in the face.
"Lefty"
ORIGINALITY OF NARRATION. LANGUAGE FEATURES. While discussing the genre uniqueness of the story, we said nothing about such a definition of the genre as “skaz”. And this is no coincidence. The tale as a genre of oral prose implies an attitude towards oral speech, narration from the perspective of an event participant. In this sense, “Lefty” is not a traditional tale. At the same time, skaz can also be called such a way of storytelling, which involves “separation” of the narrative from the participant in the events himself. In “Lefty” exactly this process occurs, especially since the word “fable” is used in the story, suggesting the fantastic nature of the narrative. The narrator, being neither a witness nor a participant in the events, actively different forms expresses his attitude to what is happening. At the same time, in the tale itself one can detect the originality of the position of both the narrator and the author.
Throughout the story the style of narration changes. If at the beginning of the first chapter the narrator outwardly unsophisticatedly sets out the circumstances of the emperor’s arrival in England, then successively talks about the events taking place, using colloquialisms, outdated and distorted forms of words, different types of neologisms etc., then already in the sixth chapter (in the story about the Tula masters) the narrative becomes different. It does not completely lose its colloquial character, however becomes more neutral, distorted forms of words and neologisms are practically not used . Shift narrative style the author wants to show the seriousness of the situation described. It doesn't happen by chance even high vocabulary, when the narrator characterizes “the skilled people on whom the hope of the nation now rested.” The same kind of narrative can be found in the last, 20th chapter, which obviously, to summarize, contains the author's point of view, so its style differs from that of most of the chapters.
The narrator’s calm and apparently dispassionate speech often includes expressively colored words(for example, Alexander Pavlovich decided to “travel” around Europe), which becomes one of the forms of expressing the author’s position, deeply hidden in the text.
The narrative itself skillfully emphasizes intonation features of characters' speech(cf., for example, the statements of Alexander I and Platov).
According to I.V. Stolyarova, Leskov “directs readers’ interest to the events themselves”, which is facilitated by the special logical structure of the text: most of the chapters have an ending, and some have a kind of beginning, which makes it possible to clearly separate one event from another. This principle creates the effect of a fantastic manner. It can also be noted that in a number of chapters, it is at the end that the narrator expresses the author’s position: “And the courtiers who are standing on the steps all turn away from him, thinking: “Platov got caught and now they’ll drive him out of the palace,” that’s why they couldn’t stand him for bravery” (end of chapter 12).
It is impossible not to note the use of various techniques that characterize the features of not only oral speech, but also folk poetry in general: tautologies(“they shod on horseshoes”, etc.), peculiar forms of verbs with prefix(“I admired”, “send”, “clap”, etc.), words with diminutive suffixes(“palm”, “little belly”, etc.). It is interesting to pay attention to the entered text of the saying(“morning is wiser than night”, “snow on your head”). Sometimes Leskov can modify them.
ABOUT the mixing of different manners of narration is evidenced by the nature of neologisms. They can go into more detail describe an object and its function(two-seater carriage), scene(busters - combining the words busts and chandeliers, the writer gives a more complete description of the room in one word), action(whistles - whistle and messengers accompanying Platov), designate foreign curiosities(marble coats - camel coats, etc.), the state of the characters (waiting - waiting and agitation, an annoying couch on which long years lay Platov, characterizing not only the hero’s inaction, but also his wounded pride). The appearance of neologisms in Leskov is in many cases due to literary play.
“Thus, Leskov’s tale as a type of narration was not only transformed and enriched, but also served to create a new genre variety: the tale. A fairy tale is distinguished by its great depth of coverage of reality, approaching in this sense the novel form. It was Leskov’s fairy tale that contributed to the emergence of a new type of truth-seeker, who can be put on a par with the heroes of Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky” (Mushchenko E.G., Skobelev V.P., Kroychik L.E. S. 115). The artistic originality of “Lefty” is determined by the task of searching for special forms of expressing the author’s position to assert power national character.
Leskov Nikolai Semenovich (1831-1895)
An artist of words who, according to the fair statement of M. Gorky, “is fully worthy to stand next to such creators of Russian literature as L. Tolstoy, Gogol, Turgenev, Goncharov.”
Extremely diverse in its subject matter, Leskov’s work had a special focus that corresponded to the essential interests of his era and, to a certain extent, anticipated the search for Russian literature at the beginning of the 20th century. The writer’s original talent was turned to understanding the depths of Russian national life, which he comprehended in all its diversity social composition, at various levels of its development. To Leskov’s searching gaze, Russian life was revealed both in its root basis, and in its growing fragmentation, in its centuries-old immobility and the drama of brewing historical changes.
This breadth of coverage of Russian reality, characteristic of the writer, determined the special quality of artistic generalization inherent in his work. According to the apt remark of M. Gorky, no matter who Nikolai Semenovich Leskov wrote about - about a peasant, a landowner, a nihilist, he always thought “about the Russian man, about the man of this country... and in every story of Leskov you feel that his main thought “I’m not thinking about the fate of the person, but about the fate of Russia.”
In an effort to capture “that elusive thing that is called the soul of the people,” Nikolai Semenovich Leskov most willingly writes about the simple people of provincial Russia, “overlooked” by literature. Showing a preferential interest in “grassroots” life, he acts as a son of his time - the turning point of the 60s. In this time of crisis, on the eve and during the years of the peasant reform, a gap between the mentality of the advanced part of Russian educated society and the self-awareness of the people, who still represented great mystery for liberating thought.
The rapid growth of public self-awareness imparts new relevance to the formulation of national-historical problems in art. They receive, perhaps, the most comprehensive development in Leskov’s work.
Leskov spent his childhood and early youth in the Oryol region. He retained a deep attachment to this region throughout his life. For a number of reasons, Leskov was unable to receive a systematic education. He began his bureaucratic service early and conducted it first in the criminal chamber of the Oryol court, and then, after moving to Kyiv, in the recruit presence.
In 1857, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov joined the commercial company of his distant relative, the Englishman A. Ya. Schcott. New economic activity, frequent and long-distance travel around Russia further broadened his horizons and introduced him to new aspects of folk life. At the beginning of the 60s, he entered literature as an already established person who knew Russian life well, had his own idea of its general state and the ways of its development.
Leskov Nikolai Semenovich himself valued his life experience and often subsequently contrasted it with bookish, abstract knowledge. “I knew the life of the common people down to the smallest detail... You just need to know the people as you know your own life, not by studying it, but by living through it.”
Captured by the “purifying” spirit of the era of the 60s, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov makes an attempt to actively intervene in the disorderly course of Russian life. He sends his correspondence to the Kyiv and then to the capital newspapers. Written with a great civic temperament, his notes and articles cause a public outcry. This is how many years begin literary work Leskova, which always seemed to the writer one of the most effective forms of public service.
Unlike the ideologists of Sovremennik, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov perceived the idea of a revolutionary reorganization of Russian life not in its distant historical perspective, which was revealed from the heights of advanced theoretical thought, but in its relation, first of all, to contemporary reality, in which the vestiges were still very strong. spiritual serfdom."
The writer was convinced that due to the centuries-old backwardness of Russian life, the undeveloped forms of social initiative, and the dominance of mercantile-selfish interests in the psyche of people, the revolution in Russia, even if it happened, would not bring good changes, but would result in a spontaneous destructive rebellion.
From these positions, Leskov the publicist entered into open polemics in 1862 with representatives of revolutionary democratic thought, whom he called “theorists.” Despite the warnings made to him in the leading press, Leskov, with all his characteristic “excessiveness” in denunciations, continues this polemic in the novels “Nowhere” (1864) and “On the Knives” (1870-1871), which played a fatal role in his future writing.
In the first of these novels, the author expresses a skeptical view of the fate of the liberation movement in Russia. Sympathetically depicting young people suffering from the “crowdedness” and “stuffiness” of Russian life, dreaming of a new, humanistic system life relationships(Liza Bakhireva, Rainer, Lipstick), Leskov at the same time says that these extremely few “pure nihilists” have no one to rely on in their social searches. Each of them faces imminent death.
Grotesque-pamphlet image of circles of opposition-minded youth, transparent prototypicality of the series negative characters- all this caused a flurry of the harshest critical reviews. The author of “Nowhere” gained a reputation as a reactionary writer for many years.
In the light of historical distance, it is obvious today that the concept of Russian nihilism in “Nowhere” is significantly different from that contained in the openly reactionary “anti-nihilistic” novels of V. P. Klyushnikov, V. V. Krestovsky, B. M. Markevich and others. Unlike these writers, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov did not at all try to present the contemporary liberation movement as devoid of historical roots (in particular, entirely inspired by the Polish conspirators).
In his depiction, “nihilism” is a product of Russian life itself, which with difficulty emerged from the state of “dead immobility” and “muteness.” Therefore, among the champions of new ideas in “Nowhere” are people with sensitive hearts, unmercenary people, romantic idealists, who opened up the gallery of Leskov’s “righteous people.”
Finding himself in a break with advanced journalism, Leskov is forced to publish his new works in Katkov’s “Russian Bulletin”. In this magazine, which led the campaign against the “nihilists,” he published the novel “On Knives,” an extremely tendentious work in which, according to Dostoevsky, “the nihilists are distorted to the point of idleness.” Polemical fervor is palpable to one degree or another in a number of other works by Leskov, published in the late 60s and early 70s: in the story “ Mysterious person"(1870), the satirical chronicle "Laughter and Grief" (1871), the historical chronicle "Soborians" (1872).
However, Leskov's rapprochement with the protective, conservative camp could not be long-term. The writer, whose worldview had deep and strong democratic predilections, was disgusted in Katkov’s journal by the spirit of aristocratic caste that permeated him, the idealization of the nobility, Anglomania, and disdain for the Russian folk life.
During the publication of Leskov’s historical chronicle “A Seedy Family” (1875), which tells about the process of spiritual and moral impoverishment of an eminent noble family, in the Russian Messenger, the writer interrupts the printing of the chronicle and leaves the Katkov magazine. “We disagreed (on the view of the nobility), and I did not finish writing the novel,” he will say later, emphasizing the principled nature of his action.
Somewhat earlier than “A Seedy Family,” in the same chronicle genre, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov created such works as “Old Years in the Village of Plodomasovo” (1869) and “Soboryans.” This is an important stage in the writer’s artistic quest. Starting from the outdated, in his opinion, canonical example of a novel with a love affair, he develops an original genre of a chronicle novel, which is based on socio-ethical conflicts.
The writer believed that the chronicle genre allows one to depict a person’s life as it goes - “as a tape”, a “developing charter”, makes it possible not to worry about the roundness of the plot and not to concentrate the narrative around the main center. Leskov's most significant work in the new genre is “Soborians”.
Observing the progress of Russian post-reform life, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov is becoming more and more disappointed in the possibility of its renewal. Under the influence of depressing impressions of reality, which “excites and angers” him, the writer experiences an acute ideological crisis.
Fearing editorial arbitrariness, not wanting to associate himself with any “directional” publications, the writer persistently seeks opportunities for non-literary earnings. In 1874, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov entered the service of the Ministry of Public Education, but it also ended in discord. In 1883 he was expelled “without forgiveness.”
Increasingly alienated from official Russia with its political retrograde, “vulgar backward step,” Nikolai Semenovich Leskov perceives his dismissal as a manifestation of this general process. In his work, satirical tendencies have been noticeably growing since the mid-70s. “But I would like to write something funny,” he noted in a late letter to L.N. Tolstoy (July 23, 1893), “to represent modern vulgarity and complacency.”
Leskov Nikolai Semenovich sharply takes up arms against the “suffocation” of contemporary Russian life (“Unmercenary Engineers”, 1887), against the church, which, in his opinion, has lost the living spirit of faith (“Little things of the bishop’s life”, 1878), against various kinds of apologists of Russian backwardness (“Zagon”, 1893). With bilious causticity, he creates satirical images of zealous guards and confident in the complete impunity of their actions, employees of the gendarmerie investigation, who have reached the pinnacle of art in insinuations directed against people they dislike (“Administrative Grace”, 1893); “Hare Remise”, 1894), which, due to their exceptional social relevance, could only be published after 1917.
Throughout the 80s, Leskov’s critical attitude towards the institution of the state and towards everyone who officially represents its interests intensified. The ideas expressed in the chronicle “A Seedy Family” about the fundamental incompatibility of the highest ethical principles and those norms and laws of behavior that are prescribed to a person in the statutory order are developed in a number of Leskov’s later works.
One of the most striking of them is the famous story “The Man on the Clock” (1887). Having heard at his post near the Winter Palace the desperate cries of a man dying in the Neva ice-hole, private Postnikov, exhausted in his soul, eventually leaves his post and hurries to help the drowning man.
However, from the point of view of public order, his noble deed is not a feat of philanthropy (“kindness”), but a serious official crime, which inevitably entails severe punishment. The story is permeated with the author's bitter irony. In the actions of superiors, something common is revealed, determined by their external status and alienating them from the world of natural human connections.
Unlike the sentry, each of them, being a link in a single state mechanism, has largely drowned out everything human in himself and subordinated his behavior to what his official position, career interests, and the logic of the momentary conjuncture require of him.
Overcoming the danger of fruitless skepticism, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov continues his persistent search for positive types, pairing with them his faith in the future of Russia. He writes a series of stories about “righteous people” who embody through their lives popular ideas about morality. True to their ideals, these people, even in the most unfavorable circumstances, are able to maintain independence of character and do good.
The writer’s position is active: he strives to strengthen his readers in “constant fidelity to good ideas”, to encourage them to courageously resist the corrupting influence of the environment. “Characters are moving, characters are maturing” - this encouraging note sounds even in one of the darkest in tone of Leskov’s late stories “Winter Day” (1894), which exposes the spirit of “nasty”, shameless cynicism, penetrating all spheres of society.
In the last years of his life, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov finds himself much closer to the social camp with which he was so sharply at odds at the beginning of his writing career. Annoyed by the lack of “guiding criticism,” he respectfully recalls the high asceticism of Belinsky and Dobrolyubov. More than once he sympathetically quotes Saltykov-Shchedrin in letters and works of art.
In 1895, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov dies of heart disease. He himself considered the reason for it to be the unrest that he had to experience during the publication of the first collected works, when the volume in which “Trifles of Bishop’s Life” was published was seized. “I think and believe that “I will not die at all,” wrote Nikolai Semenovich Leskov shortly before his death. “Nikolai Semenovich Leskov is the writer of the future,” said L. Tolstoy.
Despite all the obviousness of Leskov’s sharp ideological divergence from the revolutionary democrats, in the socio-literary self-determination of the writer in the early 60s there was a kind of paradox that deserves the most close attention. Criticizing the “impatient theorists” from the standpoint of “spontaneous” democracy, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov turns to a multifaceted and in-depth study of people’s life, the need for which was most consistently insisted on by revolutionary democratic criticism.
Leskov’s first essays and stories (“The Life of a Woman,” 1863; “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk,” 1865; “Warrior,” 1866) directly follow the tradition of Russian literature of the 40s, primarily Turgenev’s “Notes of a Hunter” and Grigorovich’s story “ Anton Goremyka,” which Leskov Nikolai Semenovich loved and sometimes polemically opposed more late works populist fiction. Like Turgenev, he shows a special interest in bright, talented people, marked by the stamp of artistry. At the same time, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov significantly expands the range of his observations.
His gaze stops not only on those who embody the best impulses towards beauty and light, but also on those who, for one reason or another, are powerless to throw off the shackles of “spiritual serfdom.” Leskov the artist is increasingly attracted to complex, contradictory characters, fraught with a lot of mysterious and unexpected things. Expanding the sphere of reality that is subject to artistic research, he boldly introduces into his narrative the realities of rough, common people’s life, depicting it as it is, in all its glaring ugliness.
Leskov’s works, dedicated to talented Russian people (“Sealed Angel”, “Lefty”, “Stupid Artist”), are distinguished by their humanistic orientation. From them it is clear that the concept of “artistry” in Leskov is associated not only with a person’s natural talent, but with the awakening of his soul, with strength of character. A true artist, in the writer’s view, is a person who has overcome the “beast” within himself, the primitive egoism of his “I”.
One of important features The poetics of Leskov the satirist is the mobility of artistic accents when depicting persons and events, undermining the usual hierarchy of main and secondary and sometimes radically transforming general meaning depicted. Thanks to compromising details that encourage the reader to look at things differently than the simple-minded narrator does, Leskov’s word often becomes “insidious,” crafty, and two-voiced. These lively shifts in the tone of the narrative are especially significant in the writer’s later stories, in particular in those that deal with prominent Russian rulers.
Behind the imposing appearance of these church fathers, the important slowness of movements, the imperturbable evenness of voice (“quietly”!), one suddenly reveals an indifference to good and evil that is unacceptable for a spiritual shepherd, a dullness of the ethical instinct, and speculation on lofty gospel sayings (“Unmercenary Engineers”, “Man on hours"). Nikolai Semenovich Leskov himself appreciated this “quiet causticism” inherent in many of his works, which was not always captured by contemporary criticism.
The “insidious” manner of Leskov the satirist concealed great opportunities for exposing Russian reality. However, negation in his satire usually does not take categorical and absolute forms. It is no coincidence that the writer himself spoke of its “kindness,” and once repeated the paradoxical definition that he gave it at the time when the satirical chronicle “Laughter and Grief” was published - “good satire,” wrote Gorky.
Obviously, this special tone of Leskov’s satire is connected with the nature of his general worldview, which is akin to the people’s feeling. The writer perceives the contemporary world of Russian life not so much in the socio-historical contradictions tearing it apart, but in its integrity. He never ceases to hear in it echoes of tribal unity, dating back to the era of “solid” epic and fairy-tale times.
The writer’s belief in the surmountability of the growing alienation and fragmentation of life is also associated with his favorite form of narration, which involves a lively appeal to another person. It is in the art of storytelling to the greatest extent the folk basis of the creative gift of the writer was revealed, who, like Nekrasov, managed to reveal, as it were, from the inside the diverse characters of the Russian people. In the skillful weaving of the “nervous lace of colloquial speech,” Leskov, according to Gorky, has no equal.
Nikolai Semenovich Leskov himself attached great importance to the writer’s “voice production.” “A person lives by words, and you need to know at what moments in your life psychological life“Which one of us has what words to say,” he said. Nikolai Semenovich Leskov purposefully achieved vivid expressiveness in the speech of his heroes; by his own admission, it was given to him at the cost of “tremendous labor.”
He collected the colorful language of his books “for many years from words, proverbs and individual expressions, captured on the fly, in the crowd on barges, in recruiting presences and monasteries,” he also borrowed it from the ancient books, chronicles, and writings of schismatics that he lovingly collected, assimilated it from communicating with different people.
In love with the living folk word, Leskov Nikolai Semenovich artistically plays with it in his works and at the same time willingly composes new words, rethinking foreign ones in the spirit and style of “folk etymology”. The saturation of his writings with neologisms and unusual colloquialisms is so great that at times it caused criticism from his contemporaries, who found it redundant and “excessive.”
The work of Leskov, who in his own way managed to deeply understand the contradictions of contemporary Russian life, penetrate into the peculiarities of the national character, and vividly capture the features of the spiritual beauty of the people, opened up new perspectives for Russian literature. It acquired new relevance during the period of the revolutionary shift in Russian life, which entailed the active participation in historical achievements of the broadest masses of the people.
At this time, M. Gorky, K. Fedin, Vs. Ivanov and other writers standing at the origins of Soviet literature turn with great interest to the study of Leskov’s work and recognize their continued connection with him.
Leskov is, of course, a writer of the first rank. Its importance is gradually growing in our literature: its influence on literature is increasing, and readers’ interest in it is growing. However, it is difficult to call him a classic of Russian literature. He is an amazing experimenter, who gave birth to a whole wave of similar experimenters in Russian literature - a mischievous experimenter, sometimes irritated, sometimes cheerful, and at the same time extremely serious, who set himself great educational goals, in the name of which he conducted his experiments.
The first thing I want to draw attention to is Leskov’s searches in the field of literary genres. He is constantly searching, trying his hand at new and new genres, some of which he takes from “business” writing, from magazine, newspaper or scientific prose literature.
Many of Leskov’s works have under their names genre definitions, which Leskov gives them, as if warning the reader about the unusualness of their form for “ great literature": "autobiographical note", "author's confession", "open letter", " biographical sketch"("Alexey Petrovich Ermolov"), "fantastic story" ("White Eagle"), "public note" ("Great Wars"), "small feuilleton", "notes about family nicknames" ("Heraldic Fog"), " family chronicle" ("A Seedy Family"), "observations, experiences and adventures" ("Hare Remiz"), "pictures from life" ("Improvisers" and "Little things in bishop's life"), "from folk legends new build» (“Leon the butler’s son (The Table Predator)”), “Nota bene to memories” (“Populists and dissenters in the service”), “legendary case” (“Unbaptized priest”), “bibliographic note” (“Unprinted manuscripts of plays by deceased writers "), "post scriptum" ("About the Quakers"), "literary explanation" ("About the Russian left-hander"), "short trilogy in a daze» (“Selected grain”), “reference” (“Where are the plots of Count L.N. Tolstoy’s play “The First Distiller” taken from), “excerpts from youthful memories” (“Pechersk Antiques”), “scientific note” (“About Russian icon painting"), "historical correction" ("Inconsistency about Gogol and Kostomarov"), "landscape and genre" ("Winter Day", "Midnight Offices"), "rhapsody" ("Udol"), "the story of an official of special assignments" ( “Caustic”), “bucolic story on a historical canvas” (“Partners”), “spiritual incident” (“The Spirit of Madame Zhanlis”), etc., etc.
Leskov seems to avoid the usual genres for literature. Even if he writes a novel, then as a genre definition he puts in the subtitle “a novel in three books” (“Nowhere”), thereby making it clear to the reader that this is not exactly a novel, but a novel that is somehow unusual. If he writes a story, then in this case he strives to somehow distinguish it from an ordinary story - for example: “a story at the grave” (“The Stupid Artist”).
Leskov seems to want to pretend that his works do not belong to serious literature and that they are written casually, written in small forms, and belong to the lowest kind of literature. This is not only the result of a special “bashfulness of form” that is very characteristic of Russian literature, but a desire for the reader not to see something complete in his works, not to “believe” him as an author and to figure out the moral meaning of his work himself. At the same time, Leskov destroys the genre form of his works, as soon as they acquire some kind of genre tradition, they can be perceived as works of “ordinary” and high literature, “Here the story should have ended,” but... Leskov continues him, takes him into side, passes it on to another narrator, etc.
Strange and non-literary genre definitions play in Leskov’s works special role, they act as a kind of warning to the reader not to take them as an expression of the author’s attitude towards what is being described. This gives readers freedom: the author leaves them alone with the work: “believe it if you want, or not.” He relieves himself of a certain share of responsibility: by making the form of his works seem alien, he seeks to shift responsibility for them to the narrator, to the document he cites. He seems to be hiding from his reader.
This reinforces that curious feature of Leskov’s works that they intrigue the reader with an interpretation of the moral meaning of what is happening in them (which I wrote about in the previous article).
If we compare the collection of Leskov’s works with some kind of unique shop in which Leskov lays out goods, providing them with labels, then first of all there is a comparison of this shop with the willow toy trade or with the fair trade, in which folk, simple elements, “cheap toys” ( tales, legends, bucolic pictures, feuilletons, certificates, etc.) occupy a dominant position.
But this comparison, for all its relative correctness in its essence, requires one more clarification.
Leskov's toy shop (and he himself made sure that his works were filled with cheerful confusion and intrigue *(( In a letter to V.M. Lavrov dated November 24, 1887, Leskov wrote about his story “Robbery”: “ In terms of genre it is everyday, in terms of plot it is a fun confusion», « overall a fun read and true household picture city of thieves». ))) could be compared to a store that is now usually called “Do it yourself!” Reader myself must make a toy from the materials offered to him or find an answer to the questions that Leskov poses to him.
If I had to look for a subtitle for the collection of his works, in the spirit of Leskov’s genre definitions, I would give it the following genre definition: “Literary problem book in 30 volumes” (or 25, no less). His collected works are a huge problem book, a problem book in which the most complex life situations are given for their moral assessment, and direct answers are not suggested, and sometimes even different solutions are allowed, but on the whole it is still a problem book that teaches the reader active goodness, active understanding people and independently finding solutions to moral issues in life. At the same time, as in any problem book, the construction of problems should not be repeated often, because this would make their solution easier.
Leskov has a literary form he invented - “landscape and genre” (by “genre” Leskov means genre paintings). This literary form(by the way, it is distinguished by its very modernity - many of the achievements of literature of the 20th century are anticipated here.) Leskov creates for complete authorial self-elimination. The author does not even hide here behind the backs of his narrators or correspondents, from whose words he supposedly conveys events, as in his other works - he is completely absent, offering the reader a kind of shorthand recording of conversations taking place in the living room ("Winter Day") or hotel (“Midnight Owls”). Based on these conversations, the reader himself must judge the character and moral character of those talking and about those events and life situations that are gradually revealed to the reader during these conversations.
The moral impact on the reader of these works is especially strong because nothing is explicitly imposed on the reader: the reader seems to guess everything himself. Essentially, he actually solves the moral problem proposed to him himself.
Leskov's story "Lefty", which is usually perceived as clearly patriotic, as glorifying the work and skill of the Tula workers, is far from simple in its tendency. He is patriotic, but not only... For some reason, Leskov removed the author's preface, which states that the author cannot be identified with the narrator. And the question remains unanswered: why did all the skill of the Tula blacksmiths only lead to the result that the flea stopped “dancing dances” and “doing variations”? The answer, obviously, is that all the art of the Tula blacksmiths is put at the service of the whims of the masters. This is not a glorification of labor, but a depiction of the tragic situation of Russian craftsmen.
Let us pay attention to another extremely characteristic technique literary prose Leskov - his passion for special words-distortions in the spirit of folk etymology and for the creation of mysterious terms for various phenomena. This technique is known mainly from Leskov’s most popular story “Lefty” and has been repeatedly studied as a phenomenon of linguistic style.
But this technique cannot in any way be reduced only to style - to buffoonery, the desire to make the reader laugh. This is also a technique of literary intrigue, an essential element of the plot structure of his works. “Little words” and “terms”, artificially created in the language of Leskov’s works in a variety of ways (here not only folk etymology, but also the use of local expressions, sometimes nicknames, etc.), also pose riddles for the reader that intrigue the reader at intermediate stages of development plot. Leskov informs the reader of his terms and mysterious definitions, strange nicknames, etc. before he gives the reader the material to understand their meaning, and it is by this that he gives additional interest to the main intrigue.
Here, for example, is the story “The Dead Estate,” which has the subtitle (genre definition) “from memories.” First of all, we note that the very title of the work introduces an element of intrigue and amusement - what class, and even the “dead” one, will be discussed? Then the very first term that Leskov introduces into these memoirs is the “wild fantasies” of old Russian governors, the antics of officials. Only later is it explained what kind of antics these are. The riddle is resolved unexpectedly for the reader. The reader expects to read about some monstrous behavior of the old governors (after all, they say “wild fantasies”), but it turns out that we are simply talking about eccentricities. Leskov undertakes to contrast the old bad “wartime” with modern prosperity, but it turns out that in the old days everything was simpler and even more harmless. The “wildness” of ancient fantasies is not at all scary. The past, contrasted with the new, very often serves Leskov to criticize his modernity.
Leskov uses the “term” “combat time,” but then it turns out that the whole war boils down to the fact that the Oryol governor Trubetskoy was a great hunter of “making noise” (the term again), and, as it turns out, he loved to “make noise” not out of malice, but as a kind of artist, actor. Leskov writes: “ They always said about bosses who especially wanted to be praised: “A hunter of making noise.” If he gets attached to something and makes a noise and curses in the worst possible way, but it won't cause any trouble. It all ended with one noise!“Then the term “insolent” is used (again in quotation marks) and it is added: “About him (that is, about the same governor.- D.L.),That’s what they said in Orel that he “likes to be daring”" The terms “strain” and “upstart” are given in the same way. And then it turns out that the governors’ smart driving served as a sign of “firm power” and, according to Leskov, “decorated” the old Russian cities when the bosses went “to the upstart.” Leskov also speaks about the reckless driving of ancient governors in his other works, but characteristically - again intriguing the reader, but in different terms. In “Odnodum”, for example, Leskov writes: “Then (in the old days.- D.L.)the governors traveled “terribly”, but greeted them “in awe”" The explanation of both terms is made in “Odnodum” surprisingly, and Leskov casually uses various other terms that serve as auxiliary intriguing devices that prepare the reader for the appearance of the “arrogant figure” “himself” in the narrative.
When creating a “term”, Leskov usually refers to “local usage”, to “local rumor”, giving his terms a folk flavor. About the same Oryol governor Trubetskoy, whom I already mentioned, Leskov cites many local expressions. " Add to that, writes Leskov, that the person we are talking about, according to the correct local definition, was “unintelligible"(term again - D.L.),rude and autocratic - and then it will become clear to you that he could inspire both horror and a desire to avoid any meeting with him. But the common people loved to watch with pleasure when “he sat down.” Men who visited Orel and had happiness
(emphasis added by me.- D.L.),to see the prince riding, they used to say for a long time:
- A-and-and, how he sits down! It's like the whole city is rattling!»
Leskov further says about Trubetskoy: “ It was "Governor" from all sides "(term again - D.L.);the kind of governor who has now been transferred due to “unfavorable circumstances”».
The last term that is associated with this Oryol governor is the term “spread out”. The term is given first to amaze the reader with its surprise, and then its explanation is given: “ This was his favorite(Governor.-D. L.)the arrangement of his figure when he had to walk, and not drive. He took his hands “on his sides” or “firth”, causing the hood and the skirts of his military cloak to splay out and take up so much width that three people could walk in his place: everyone could see that the governor was coming».
I do not touch here on many other terms associated in the same work with another governor: Kyiv Ivan Ivanovich Fundukley: “sweating”, “beautiful Spaniard”, “deacon descending from the mountain”, etc. The following is important: these kinds of terms have already been found in Russian literature (in Dostoevsky, Saltykov-Shchedrin), but in Leskov they are introduced into the very intrigue of the narrative and serve to increase interest. This is an additional element of intrigue. When in Leskov’s work the Kiev governor Fundukley (“Dead Estate”) is called a “beautiful Spaniard,” it is natural that the reader expects an explanation for this nickname. Other expressions of Leskov also require explanations, and he is never in a hurry with these explanations, hoping at the same time that the reader does not have time to forget these mysterious words and expressions.
I. V. Stolyarova in her work “Principles of Leskov’s “insidious satire” (the word in the tale of Lefty)” draws attention to this remarkable feature of Leskov’s “insidious word.” She writes: " As a kind of signal of attention addressed to the reader, the writer uses a neologism or simply unusual word, mysterious in its real meaning and therefore arousing the reader's interest. Talking, for example, about the trip of the Tsar's ambassador, Leskov notes meaningfully: “Platov rode very hastily and with ceremony...” The last word, obviously, is stressed and is pronounced by the narrator with a special meaning, “with a stretch” (to use Leskov’s expression from his story “The Enchanted Wanderer”). Everything that follows in this long period is a description of this ceremony, which, as the reader has a right to expect, contains something interesting, unusual, and worthy of attention.» *{{ Stolyarova I. V. Principles of Leskov’s “insidious satire” (a word in the tale about Lefty). // Creativity of N. S. Leskov: Collection. Kursk, 1977. pp. 64-66.}}.
Along with strange and mysterious words and expressions (terms, as I call them), nicknames that “work” in the same way are introduced into the intrigue of the works. These are also riddles that are posed at the beginning of the work and only then explained. This is how even the largest works begin, for example “The Soborians”. In the first chapter of “Soboryan” Leskov gives four nicknames for Achilla Desnitsyn. And although the fourth nickname, “Wounded,” is explained in the same first chapter, in total all four nicknames are revealed gradually as you read “The Council.” The explanation of the first nickname only maintains the reader’s interest in the meaning of the other three.
The unusual language of Leskov’s narrator, individual expressions defined by Leskov as local, little words, nicknames, at the same time in the works again serve to conceal the identity of the author, his personal attitude to what is being described. He speaks “in other people’s words” - therefore, he does not give any assessment to what he is talking about. Leskov the author seems to be hiding behind other people's words and buzzwords - just as he hides behind his narrators, behind a fictitious document or behind some pseudonym.
Leskov is like a “Russian Dickens”. Not because he is similar to Dickens in general, in the manner of his writing, but because both Dickens and Leskov are “family writers”, writers who were read in the family, discussed by the whole family, writers who are of great importance for moral formation of a person, are brought up in youth, and then accompany him throughout his life, along with the best memories of childhood. But Dickens is a typically English family writer, and Leskov is Russian. Even very Russian. So Russian that he, of course, will never be able to enter the English family the way Dickens entered the Russian one. And this despite Leskov’s ever-increasing popularity abroad and primarily in English-speaking countries.
There is one thing that brings Leskov and Dickens very much together: they are eccentric, righteous people. Isn’t Leskov’s righteous man Mr. Dick in “David Copperfield” whose favorite pastime was flying kites and who found the correct and kind answer to all questions? And why not the Dickensian eccentric Immortal Golovan, who did good in secret, without even noticing that he was doing good?
But a good hero is precisely what is needed for family reading. A deliberately “ideal” hero does not always have a chance of becoming a favorite hero. A favorite hero should be to a certain extent a secret of the reader and writer, for if a truly good person does good, he always does it in secret, in secret.
The eccentric not only keeps the secret of his kindness, but he is also a literary mystery, intriguing to the reader. Bringing out eccentrics in works, at least in Leskov, is also one of the techniques of literary intrigue. An eccentric always carries a mystery. Leskov’s intrigue, therefore, subordinates the moral assessment, the language of the work and the “characterography” of the work. Without Leskov, Russian literature would have lost a significant share of its national flavor and national problematics.
Leskov’s creativity has its main sources not even in literature, but in the oral conversational tradition, going back to what I would call “talking Russia.” It came out of conversations, disputes in various companies and families and returned again to these conversations and disputes, returned to the entire huge family and “talking Russia”, giving rise to new conversations, disputes, discussions, awakening the moral sense of people and teaching them to independently solve moral problems.
For Leskov, the whole world of official and unofficial Russia is, as it were, “his own.” In general, he treated all modern literature and Russian social life as a kind of conversation. All of Russia was native to him, a native land where everyone knows each other, remembers and honors the dead, knows how to talk about them, knows their family secrets. This is what he says about Tolstoy, Pushkin, Zhukovsky and even Katkov. He even calls the deceased chief of gendarmes “the unforgettable Leonty Vasilyevich Dubelt” (see “Administrative Grace”). Ermolov for him is, first of all, Alexey Petrovich, and Miloradovich is Mikhail Andreevich. And he never forgets to mention them family life, about their relationship with one or another character in the story, about acquaintances... And this is by no means vain boasting about “a short acquaintance with big people.” This consciousness - sincere and deep - of one’s kinship with all of Russia, with all its people - both good and bad, with its centuries-old culture. And this is also his position as a writer.
A writer's style can be seen as part of his behavior. I write “maybe” because the style is sometimes perceived by the writer as ready-made. Then this is not his behavior. The writer only reproduces it. Sometimes the style follows the etiquette accepted in literature. Etiquette, of course, is also behavior, or rather, a certain accepted stamp of behavior, and then the writer’s style is devoid of individual traits. However, when the writer's individuality is clearly expressed, the writer's style is his behavior, behavior in literature.
Leskov's style is part of his behavior in literature. The style of his works includes not only the style of language, but the attitude towards genres, the choice of the “image of the author”, the choice of themes and plots, methods of building intrigue, attempts to enter into a special “mischievous” relationship with the reader, the creation of an “image of the reader” - distrustful and at the same time simple-minded, and on the other hand, sophisticated in literature and thinking in public issues, reader-friend and reader-enemy, reader-polemicist and reader “false” (for example, a work is addressed to one single person, but is published for everyone).
Above, we tried to show Leskov as if hiding, hiding, playing blind man's buff with the reader, writing under pseudonyms, as if on random occasions in secondary sections of magazines, as if refusing authoritative and impressive genres, a writer who is proud and seemingly offended...
I think the answer suggests itself.
Leskov’s unsuccessful article on the fire that started in St. Petersburg on May 28, 1862 undermined his “literary position... for almost two decades” *(( Leskov A. N. The life of Nikolai Leskov according to his personal, family and non-family records and memories. Tula, 1981. P. 141.)). It was perceived as inciting public opinion against students and forced Leskov to go abroad for a long time, and then avoid literary circles, or, in any case, treat these circles with caution. He was insulted and insulted himself. New wave Public outrage against Leskov was caused by his novel “Nowhere”. The genre of the novel not only failed Leskov, but forced D.I. Pisarev to declare: “Is there at least one honest writer in Russia who will be so careless and indifferent to his reputation that he will agree to work in a magazine that adorns itself with stories and novels by Mr. Stebnitsky" *(( Pisarev D.I. Works: In 4 volumes. T. 3. M., 1956. P. 263.}}.
All of Leskov’s activities as a writer, his searches are subordinated to the task of “hiding”, leaving the environment he hates, hiding, speaking as if from someone else’s voice. And he could love eccentrics - because he, to a certain extent, identified them with himself. That’s why he made his eccentrics and righteous people mostly lonely and incomprehensible... “Rejection from literature” affected the entire character of Leskov’s work. But is it possible to admit that it shaped all its features? No! It was all together here: “rejection” created the character of creativity, and the character of creativity and style in in a broad sense this word led to “rejection from literature” - from the literature of the front row, of course, only. But this is precisely what allowed Leskov to become an innovator in literature, for the emergence of something new in literature often comes precisely from below - from secondary and semi-business genres, from the prose of letters, from stories and conversations, from approaching everyday life.
Poetics N.S. Leskova (Story style. Specifics of style and combination of stories. The story "Lefty")
N.S. Leskov played a significant role in Russian literature, in particular, in the development of special stylistic forms. Studying the works of N.S. Leskov, it should be noted that he turned to a special style of storytelling - skaz. A tale, being a structural-typological formation, has a certain set of characteristics and signs. In addition, within a particular genre, in the works different writers the tale is modified due to the use of new stylistic devices, and typological stylistic properties, without changing, are replenished with new content.
Leskov is, of course, a writer of the first rank. Its importance is gradually growing in our literature: its influence on literature is increasing, and readers’ interest in it is growing. However, it is difficult to call him a classic of Russian literature. He is an amazing experimenter, who gave birth to a whole wave of similar experimenters in Russian literature - a mischievous experimenter, sometimes irritated, sometimes cheerful, and at the same time extremely serious, who set himself great educational goals, in the name of which he conducted his experiments.
The first thing you should pay attention to is Leskov’s searches in the field of literary genres. He is constantly searching, trying his hand at new and new genres, some of which he takes from “business” writing, from magazine, newspaper or scientific prose literature.
Many of Leskov’s works have genre definitions under their titles, which Leskov gives them, as if warning the reader about the unusualness of their form for “great literature”: “autobiographical note”, “author’s confession”, “open letter”, “biographical sketch” ("Alexey Petrovich Ermolov"), "fantastic story" ("White Eagle"), "social note" ("Great Wars"), "small feuilleton", "notes about family nicknames" ("Heraldic Fog"), "family chronicle" ("A seedy family"), "observations, experiments and adventures" ("Hare's harness"), "pictures from nature" ("Improvisers" and "Trifles of Bishop's Life"), "from folk legends new build" ("Leon the butler's son (The Table Predator)", "Nota bene to memories" ("Populists and dissenters in the service"), "legendary case" ("Unbaptized priest"), "bibliographic note" ("Unprinted manuscripts of plays by deceased writers" ), "post scriptum" ("About the Quakers"), "literary explanation" ("About the Russian left-hander"), "short trilogy in a daze" (“Selected grain”), “reference” (“Where did the plots of Count L.N. Tolstoy’s play “The First Distiller” come from”), “excerpts from youthful memories” (“Pechersk Antiques”), “scientific note” (“On Russian icon painting "), "historical correction" ("Inconsistency about Gogol and Kostomarov"), "landscape and genre" ("Winter Day", "Midnight Offices"), "rhapsody" ("Yudol"), "story of an official of special assignments" (" Sargent"), "bucolic story on a historical canvas" ("Partners"), "spiritual incident" ("The Spirit of Madame Zhanlis"), etc., etc.
Leskov seems to avoid the usual genres for literature. Even if he writes a novel, then as a genre definition he puts in the subtitle “a novel in three books" ("Nowhere"), making it clear to the reader that this is not quite a novel, but a novel in some way unusual. If he writes a story, then in this case he strives to somehow distinguish it from an ordinary story - for example: "story at the grave" ("The Stupid Artist").
Leskov seems to want to pretend that his works do not belong to serious literature and that they are written casually, written in small forms, and belong to the lowest kind of literature. This is not only the result of a special “bashfulness of form” that is very characteristic of Russian literature, but a desire for the reader not to see something complete in his works, not to “believe” him as an author and to figure out the moral meaning of his work himself. At the same time, Leskov destroys the genre form of his works, as soon as they acquire some kind of genre traditionality, they can be perceived as works of “ordinary” and high literature, “Here the story should have ended,” but... Leskov continues him, takes him into side, passes it on to another narrator, etc.
Strange and non-literary genre definitions play a special role in Leskov’s works; they act as a kind of warning to the reader not to take them as an expression of the author’s attitude to what is being described. This gives readers freedom: the author leaves them alone with the work: “believe it if you want, or not.” He relieves himself of a certain share of responsibility: by making the form of his works seem alien, he seeks to shift responsibility for them to the narrator, to the document he cites. He seems to be hiding from his reader Kaletsky P. Leskov // Literary encyclopedia: In 11 volumes [M.], 1929-1939. T. 6. M.: OGIZ RSFSR, state. dictionary-encycl. publishing house "Soviet Encyclical.", 1932. Stb. 312--319. .
It should be noted that the tale of N.S. Leskova differs from the tales of other writers in many ways. In his tale great attention pays attention to details. The narrator's speech is slow, he strives to explain everything carefully, since the listener can be different. In the unhurried and well-reasoned nature of the tale monologue, the narrator’s self-esteem appears, and therefore he gains the right to tell the story, and the audience trusts him.
Leskov has a literary form he invented - “landscape and genre” (by “genre” Leskov means genre paintings). Leskov creates this literary form (by the way, it is very modern - many of the achievements of literature of the 20th century are anticipated here). The author does not even hide here behind the backs of his narrators or correspondents, from whose words he supposedly conveys events, as in his other works - he is completely absent, offering the reader a kind of shorthand recording of conversations taking place in the living room ("Winter Day") or hotel ("Midnight Owls"). Based on these conversations, the reader himself must judge the character and moral character of those talking and about those events and life situations that are gradually revealed to the reader during these conversations.
Leskov's story "Lefty", which is usually perceived as clearly patriotic, as glorifying the work and skill of the Tula workers, is far from simple in its tendency. He is patriotic, but not only... For some reason, Leskov removed the author's preface, which states that the author cannot be identified with the narrator. And the question remains unanswered: why did all the skill of the Tula blacksmiths only lead to the result that the flea stopped “dancing dances” and “doing variations”? The answer, obviously, is that all the art of the Tula blacksmiths is put at the service of the whims of the masters. This is not a glorification of labor, but a depiction of the tragic situation of Russian craftsmen.
Let us pay attention to another extremely characteristic technique of Leskov’s artistic prose - his predilection for special words-distortions in the spirit of folk etymology and for the creation of mysterious terms for various phenomena. This technique is known mainly from Leskov’s most popular story “Lefty” and has been repeatedly studied as a phenomenon of linguistic style.
Since the 70s, the “interest” of the presented material begins to dominate in the work of N.S. Leskova. The focus on reporting “interesting” facts leads the writer to documentaryism and a kind of exoticism of the material. Hence the portrait nature of the heroes of his works, in which contemporaries, not without reason, saw pamphlets. The author turns to historical memoirs and archives for his stories, using ancient folk legends, tales, “prologues”, lives, carefully collecting folklore material, current jokes, puns and sayings.
Starting from the traditions of noble literature in terms of theme and composition, Leskov also started from it in terms of language. Leskov contrasts the erased language that dominates literature with careful work on the word. Skaz and stylization are the main methods of Leskov’s stylistics. “In almost all of his stories, the narration is told through a narrator, the peculiarities of whose dialect the writer strives to convey. He considers one of his main merits to be “voice production,” which consists “in the ability to master the voice and language of his hero and not stray from altos to basses. I tried to develop this skill in myself and it seems that I achieved the fact that my priests speak in a spiritual way, men - in a peasant's way, upstarts and buffoons - with tricks, etc. On my own behalf, I speak in the language of ancient fairy tales and church folk in a purely literary speech"One of the writer's favorite language techniques was speech distortion and "folk etymology" unclear words"Kaletsky P. Op. op. pp. 318-319..
In the works of N.S. Leskov often uses lexico-syntactic elements: archaic vocabulary, phraseological units, speech cliches, vernacular elements and dialectisms, proverbs and sayings, everyday jokes, repetitions and folklore elements. It is also necessary to say about occasional formations (occasionalisms), built according to the type of “folk etymology”.
Leskov is like a “Russian Dickens”. Not because he is similar to Dickens in general, in the manner of his writing, but because both Dickens and Leskov are “family writers,” writers who were read in the family, discussed by the whole family, writers who are of great importance for moral formation of a person, are brought up in youth, and then accompany him throughout his life, along with the best memories of childhood. But Dickens is a typically English family writer, and Leskov is Russian. Even very Russian. So Russian that he, of course, will never be able to enter the English family the way Dickens entered the Russian one. And this despite Leskov’s ever-increasing popularity abroad and primarily in English-speaking countries.
Leskov’s creativity has its main sources not even in literature, but in the oral conversational tradition, going back to what is called “talking Russia.” It came out of conversations, disputes in various companies and families and returned again to these conversations and disputes, returned to the entire huge family and “talking Russia”, giving rise to new conversations, disputes, discussions, awakening the moral sense of people and teaching them to decide for themselves moral problems.
Leskov's style is part of his behavior in literature. The style of his works includes not only the style of language, but the attitude to genres, the choice of the “image of the author,” the choice of themes and plots, methods of building intrigue, attempts to enter into a special “mischievous” relationship with the reader, the creation of an “image of the reader” - distrustful and at the same time simple-minded, and on the other hand, sophisticated in literature and thinking on social issues, a reader-friend and a reader-enemy, a polemicist reader and a “false” reader (for example, a work is addressed to one single person, but is published for everyone).
A tale is one of the most important problems of modern linguistics and is considered from a linguistic point of view as a prose work in which the method of narration reveals the real speech and linguistic forms of its existence. The study of skaz began in the 20s of the last century in connection with the beginning of the process of revaluation of artistic values. The interlingual aspect of the study seems relevant from the point of view of solving pressing problems of finding ways to translate certain lexical and syntactic means of literary prose.
In the work of the great Russian writer of the 19th century N.S. Leskov's "Lefty" most clearly reveals the image of a fairy-tale-epic narrator. Literary tale as a special Russian phenomenon national language and culture represents a scientific problem in the interlingual aspect, since it carries the features of stylistic and speech non-equivalence.
Tale by N.S. Leskova in "Lefty" is built on stylistic speech contrast. Two authors can be distinguished as subjects of speech: the literary narrator (author) and the narrator himself, who reflects the true meaning of things.
The issue of skaz remains debatable and remains acute today. There is still no definition of skaz that can fully reflect the contradictory essence of this artistic phenomenon. It entered literature at the beginning of the 19th century as an artistically isolated work of oral folk art Gelgardt R.R. Bazhov's style of tales. Perm: 1958. P. 156 (482 pp.). According to G.V. Sepik, “a literary tale is a speech type, and stylization under this speech type in literary and artistic practice places the tale in the plane of ideas about the type and form of narration, about genre varieties epic literature" Sepik G.V. Peculiarities of tale construction literary text: Based on the short stories and stories of N. S. Leskov. Author's abstract. dis. ...cand. Philol. Sciences / Moscow. state ped. Institute named after V.I. Lenin. Specialist council D 113.08.09. - M., 1990. - (17 s). C12.
V.V. Vinogradov believes that “a tale is a unique combined stylistic form of fiction, the understanding of which is carried out against the background of similar constructive monologue formations that exist in the social practice of speech interactions...” Vinogradov. Problems of Russian stylistics. - M., 1981 P. 34 (320 p.). In the monograph by E.G. Muschenko, V.P. Skobeleva, L.E. Kroychik provides the following definition: “a tale is a two-voice narrative that correlates the author and the narrator...” Muschenko E. G., Skobelev V. P., Kroychik L. E. Poetics of the tale. Voronezh, 1979: 34.
B.M. Eikhenbaum, V.G. Goffman, M.M. Bakhtin set the tale to “oral speech” Eikhenbaum.B.M. Leskov et al. populism, in collection: Blokha, L., 1927 Bakhtin M.M. Aesthetics of poetic creativity, etc. Different approaches to skaz as a speech type and as a form of storytelling are reflected in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia.
In Western works, a tale is understood as a “story within a story” McLean H. Nikolai Leskov. The Man and His Art. Harvard, 2002: 299-300. The same idea is supported by I.R. Titunik, highlighting two types of texts in the tale. The first consists of statements addressed directly by the author to the reader, the second consists of statements addressed by persons other than the author, persons other than the reader Sperrle I.C. The Organic Worldview of Nikolai Leskov. Evanston, 2002. Some works explore the linguistic side of the tale Safran G. Ethnography, Judaism, and the Art of Nikolai Leskov // Russian Review, 2000, 59 (2), p. 235-251, but it should be noted that in the latter work an attempt is made to characterize the functions of linguistic units of various levels in the text of the narrative, and the question of the connection of stylistic elements with the entire verbal and artistic system of the work is not considered at all.
Studying theoretical sources by revealing the essence of the concept “skazovaya manner” (“skaz”) makes it possible to come to the conclusion that in research the term “skaz” in a broad sense is considered as a speech type, and in a narrow sense - as a prose work in which the method of narration reveals its basic speech and language forms.
In this dissertation, a tale is considered from a linguistic point of view as a prose work in which the method of narration reveals the real speech and linguistic forms of its existence.
Because of my genre specificity A literary fairy tale work is based on contrast, which is reflected in the speech composition, and the basis of the contrast is the distinction between the author and the narrator, since in a tale there are always two speech parts: the part of the narrator and the part of the author. The categories “image of the author” and “image of the narrator” are considered by many scientists: V.V. Vinogradov 1980, M.M. Bakhtin 1979, V.B. Kataev 1966, A.V. Klochkov 2006, N.A. Kozhevnikova 1977, B.O. Corman 1971, E.G. Muschenko 1980, G.V. Sepik 1990, B.V. Tomashevsky 2002 and others.
The term “category of the author’s image” appeared in the early 20s of the 20th century. V.B. Kataev distinguishes two types of authors: the author, as real personality, who created the work and the author, as a structure in which the elements of objective reality are correlated with the human attitude towards them and thereby organized “aesthetically” and which is broader than the categories of author’s subjectivism, such as the author’s intention, author's position, author's voice, introduction of the author to the number characters etc. - are included in it as components Kataev V.B. Problems of interpretation of the work of A.P. Chekhov. Author's abstract. dis. for the job application scientist step. Dr. Philol. Sci. M. 1984 P. 40. A.V. Klochkov identifies three types of author-narrators in a prose work:
3) “personalized author-narrator”, designated (by some name) narrator Klochkov Linguistic and stylistic features of literary tale in the interlingual aspect: abstract. dis. pump scientist step. Ph.D. Philol. Sciences 2006 (24 p.). P. 16.
As subjects of speech in the tale of N.S. Leskov can be distinguished as a “literary storyteller” (“author”), as well as “the storyteller himself.” But there is often a mixture of the voices of the author and the narrator.
When considering the “image of the author (storyteller),” we must not forget about the “image of the listener (reader).” According to E.A. Popova “listeners are as necessary a component of a tale as the narrator” Popova E.A. Narrative universals. Lipetsk, 2006 (144 pp.) P. 131. The focus of the skaz narration on the listener is associated with the folklore essence of skaz as an oral art, which involves direct communication with the audience. In addition, the tale involves addressing not just listeners, but a sympathetic audience.
The narrator’s connection with the listeners can be carried out in different ways. E.G. Muschenko, considering the features of skaz, points out such an interesting aspect as the “loudness ceiling.” A tale is not only an oral story, “it is always a quiet conversation, and you can catch it indirectly. It seems that such indirect signs of the quietness of a tale narrative are both conversational intonation and its rhythm” Muschenko E. G., Skobelev V. P., Kroychik L. E. Decree. op. P. 31.
The dialogical relationship of the narrator with the listeners develops using a variety of means and techniques: rhetorical questions, the use of constructions with intensifying particles and interjections, the use of forms of familiarity to express their attitude, the use of constructions with intensifying particles and interjections, etc.
The study focuses on the speech behavior of the narrator. His speech differs from the author’s stylistically (with the help of various style-forming elements). In a tale monologue, during the narration process, the narrator often addresses his listeners, expressing own attitude to what is reported. The presence of the interlocutor can be indicated by addresses, as well as second-person pronouns.
Another feature of the skaz construction can be considered its focus on oral speech. The different settings of the tale depend on the ideas about the tale. If the tale is considered as a “speech type”, then there is an orientation towards oral non-literary elements of speech, and if as a “form of narration”, then there is an orientation towards an oral monologue of a narrative type as one of the genres of epic prose, i.e. installation on someone else's word.
Studying the tale, scientists highlight it different kinds and types. So, N.A. Kozhevnikova speaks of the existence of two types of tales: “unidirectional,” in which the assessments of the author and narrator lie on the same plane or are closely in contact, and “bidirectional,” in which the assessments of the author and narrator lie in different planes and do not coincide Kozhevnikova N.A. Types of narration in Russian literature XIX-XX centuries M, 1994. (333 pp.) P. 99.
S.G. Bocharov believes that a skaz can change in terms of speech if the distance between the direct speech of the author and the skaz changes. On this basis, types of tales are differentiated: “a simple one-directional tale by Neverov”, “an exquisite tale by Babel”, “a comic tale by Zoshchenko” Bocharov S. G. Roman by L. Tolstoy “War and Peace” M. 1971. P. 18.
E.V. Klyuev distinguishes three types of skaz: “free”, “subordinate” and “subordinate”. By “free” skaz he means a skaz in which the author and narrator have equal rights in the sense that neither of them is subordinate to the other. The “subordinating” tale is identified by the researcher on the basis of the dominant role of the writer, inviting the addressee to perceive the ideological and figurative content of the tale text in a certain aspect. And, finally, “subordinate tale” is a tale in which the author demonstratively provides the narrator with complete freedom of expression" Klyuev. Literary tale as a problem of stylistics of artistic and journalistic speech. Abstract of thesis for a degree in Philology. M. 1981 P. 15..
In the works of N.S. Leskov mainly contains skaz works with “free” and “subordinating” skaz. These types of tales differ from each other in their compositional introduction to the more complex structure of the whole, as well as in the principles of distinguishing between the author and the narrator. The “free” tale is more complex in compositional design; it is built on the principle of intra-compositional contrast. Works with a “subordinating” skaz are structurally constructed in such a way that it is impossible to distinguish the author’s narration, which means that they lack intra-compositional contrast. Based on these structural features, stories in the writer’s work are combined.
conclusions
Literary translation is the translation of a work or texts of fiction in general. It should be noted that in this case the texts of fiction are contrasted with all other speech works on the basis of the fact that for a work of art one of the communicative functions is dominant - this is artistic-aesthetic or poetic.
When translating from one language to another, vocabulary is distributed depending on the transfer of meaning into equivalent, partially equivalent and non-equivalent. Due to the peculiarities of the lexical composition, various methods and techniques of translation transformations are used in translation. In the theory of translation, realities cause particular difficulty - such words and expressions that denote such objects. In this row there are also stable expressions containing such words.
Features of N.S.’s poetics Leksov's idea is to develop a stylistic genre - the tale form. In the works of N.S. Leskov mainly contains skaz works with “free” and “subordinating” skaz. These types of tales differ from each other in their compositional introduction to the more complex structure of the whole, as well as in the principles of distinguishing between the author and the narrator.