The name of Nikolai Semenovich Leskov, a wonderful Russian writer,
One of the problems that needs careful consideration due to little study and extreme complexity is Leskov’s genre-logy in its evolutionary and innovative modifications. The problem of genre traditions, the need to take them into account in his own work, was perceived by Leskov extremely acutely in connection with the inevitable use of given and not very natural ready-made forms. At the beginning creative path adjoining the then widespread genre of so-called accusatory essays - with the difference that the hand of the future fiction writer was already felt in them, the writer then turned it “into a feuilleton, and sometimes into a story” (23, p. XI).
In a well-known article about Leskov P.P. Gromov and B.M. Eikhenbaum, who cited after the author of the unpublished book “Leskov and His Time” A.I. Izmailov touches upon one of the most important aspects of the unique artist’s aesthetics in passing, noting that “Leskov’s things often baffle the reader when an attempt to comprehend their genre nature(hereinafter it is emphasized by me - N.A.). Leskov often blurs the line between a newspaper journalistic article, essay, memoir and traditional forms of high prose - a story, a story."
Reflecting on the specifics of each of the prose narrative genres, Leskov points out the difficulties of distinguishing them: “A writer who would truly understand the difference between a novel and a story, essay or story would also understand that in their three last forms he can only be a draftsman, with a well-known stock of taste, skills and knowledge; and, conceiving the fabric of the novel, he must also be a thinker...” If you pay attention to the subtitles of Leskov’s works, then both the author’s constant desire for genre certainty and the unusualness of the proposed definitions like “landscape and genre”, “story on grave”, “stories by the way”.
The problem of the specificity of Leskov's story lies in its similarities and differences with
genre canon is complicated for researchers by the fact that in critical
literature of Leskov's time did not have sufficiently accurate typological
Chinese criteria for the genre of a story in its differences from a short story or short story
lead. In 1844-45, in the prospectus of the Educational Book of Literature for Russian
of youth" Gogol gives a definition of a story, which includes the story
as its particular variety (“masterfully and vividly told picture
case"), in contrast to the tradition of the short story ("an extraordinary incident",
"witty twist"), Gogol shifts the emphasis to "cases that can
go with every person and are “wonderful” in psychological and moral
descriptively (63, p. 190)
In his St. Petersburg cycle, Gogol introduced a modification into literature short psychological story, which was continued by F.M. Dostoevsky, L.N. Tolstoy, and later in many stories (“Red Flower” by V.M. Garshin, “Ward No. 6” by A.P. Chekhov and many others).
By weakening the plot beginning and slowing down the action, the power of cognitive analytical thought increases here. The place of an extraordinary incident in a Russian story is often taken by an ordinary incident, an ordinary story, understood in its internal significance (63, p. 191).
Since the late 40s of the 19th century, the story has been understood as special genre both in relation to the short story and in comparison with the “physiological sketch”. The development of prose associated with the names of D.V. Grigorovich, V.I. Dalia, A.F. Pisemsky, A.I. Herzen, I.A. Goncharova, F.M. Dostoevsky, led to the identification and crystallization of new narrative forms.
Belinsky argued in 1848: “And that’s why now the very limits of the novel and story have expanded, except for the “story” that has long existed in literature, as a lower and lighter type of story,“So-called physiologies, characteristic sketches of various aspects of social life have recently received the right of citizenship in literature.”
Unlike an essay, where direct description, research, problem-journalistic or lyrical montage of reality predominates, the story retains the composition of a closed narrative, structured around a specific episode, event, human destiny or character (63, p. 192).
The development of the Russian story form is associated with “Notes of a Hunter” by I.S. Turgeneva, combining the experience of a psychological story and a physiological essay. The narrator is almost always a witness, listener, and interlocutor of the characters; less often - a participant in events. Artistic principle becomes “accidentality”, unintentionality of the choice of phenomena and facts, freedom of transitions from one episode to another.
The emotional coloring of each episode is created using minimal artistic means. Experience of psychological prose familiar with
b “details of feeling”, is widely used in detailing the narrator’s impressions.
Freedom and flexibility of sketch form, naturalness, poetry of the story with an internal sharpness of social content - qualities of the Russian short story genre, coming from “Notes of a Hunter”. According to G. Vyaly, “Turgenev contrasts the dramatic reality of the traditional short story with the lyrical activity of the author’s narrative, based on accurate descriptions of the situation, characters and landscape. Turgenev brought the story closer to the border of the lyric-essay genre. This trend continued in folk stories L. Tolstoy, G.I. Uspensky, A.I. Ertelya, V.G. Korolenko
According to B.M. Eikhenbaum, the short story is not only built on the basis of some contradiction, discrepancy, error, contrast, but by its very essence the short story, like an anecdote, accumulates all its weight towards the end, which is why the short story, according to the formula of B.M. Eikhenbaum, - “a climb up the mountain, the goal of which is to look from a high point”
B.V. Tomashevsky in his book “Theory of Literature. Poetics,” speaking about prose narrative, divides it into two categories: small form, identifying it with the novella, and large form - novel (137, p. 243). The scientist already points out all the “bottlenecks” in the theory of genres, noting that “the sign of size - the main one in the classification of narrative works - is not nearly as unimportant as it might seem at first glance. The volume of the work determines how the author will use the plot material, how he will construct his plot, and how he will introduce his themes into it.”
Academician D.S. speaks about the “cunning” of Leskov’s letter. Likhachev in the famous article “False” ethical assessment by the Constitutional Court. Leskov": "Works of N.S. Leskov demonstrates to us (usually these are stories, novellas, but not his novels) a very interesting phenomenon of masking the moral assessment of what is being told. This is achieved by a rather complex superstructure over the narrator of a false author, above whom the author, already completely hidden from the reader, rises, so that it seems to the reader that he comes to a real assessment of what is happening completely independently” (72, p. 177).
With all certainty in his monograph “Leskov - an artist” V.Yu. Troitsky pointed out the extraordinary aesthetic function of the image of the narrator in Leskov’s prose, including in the short story genre (141, pp. 148-162).
O.V. Evdokimova, a subtle and accurate researcher of Leskov’s creativity, speaking about the embodiment in the images of Leskov’s storytellers “ different forms awareness of some phenomenon,” expresses an extremely valuable idea about the presence in Leskov’s stories of a structure typical for this writer, clearly schematized in the same a short story, which D.S. talks about. Likhachev. In Shameless, “the personality of each of the heroes is depicted by Leskov in a colorful way, but without going beyond the limits of the form of consciousness that the hero represents. There are bright personalities in the story, but they are conditioned by the sphere of feelings and thoughts about shame” (46, pp. 106-107). And further: “Any work by Leskov contains this mechanism and can be called “a natural fact in a mystical light.” It is natural that the writer’s stories, tales, and “memoirs” often look like everyday stories or pictures from life, and Leskov was and is known as a master of everyday storytelling.”
The problem of the genreology of Leskov's story is recognized by researchers in its severity and relevance. In particular, T.V. directly speaks about this. Sepik: “Leskov’s work is characterized by an innovative, experimental attitude to genre practice. Innovation of this kind in itself represents a philological problem, since the boundaries between the story and the short story are blurred here (we perceive conflict at all levels as an indicator of the quality of the short story, and not an ordinary story, especially complicated by the tale form), between the story and memoirs (some stories are divided into chapters, which is more consistent with the story), story and essay; between novel and chronicle (for example, the wealth of characters and types involved). In addition, the so-called “new heats” practiced by Leskov have not been studied. Literary narrative norm as a standard defining subjective will over the objective sphere work of art, is transformed into a new genre form with ambiguous characteristics, blurred genre boundaries"
Language
Literary critics who wrote about Leskov’s work invariably - and often unkindly - noted the unusual language and bizarre verbal play of the author. “Mr. Leskov is... one of the most pretentious representatives of our modern literature. Not a single page can go by without some equivocations, allegories, words made up or dug up from God knows where, and all sorts of curiosities,” this is what A said about Leskov. .M. Skabichevsky, known in the 1880s - 1890s. literary critic democratic direction (kunststük, or kunstük - a trick, a clever thing, a trick). A writer at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries said this somewhat differently. A.V. Amphitheaters: “Of course, Leskov was a natural stylist. Already in his first works he reveals rare reserves of verbal wealth. But wandering around Russia, close acquaintance with local dialects, studying Russian antiquity, Old Believers, primordial Russian crafts, etc. added a lot, over time, into these reserves Leskov took into the depths of his speech everything that was preserved among the people from his ancient language, smoothed out the found remains with talented criticism and put them to work with great success. The special richness of the language is distinguished by... “The Imprinted Angel” and “ The Enchanted Wanderer." But the sense of proportion, which is generally not inherent in Leskov’s talent, betrayed him in this case too. Sometimes the abundance of overheard, recorded, and sometimes invented, newly formed verbal material served Leskov not to benefit, but to harm, dragging his talent down a slippery path. the path of external comic effects, funny words and figures of speech." Leskov was also accused of "the desire for the bright, convex, bizarre, sharp - sometimes to the point of excessiveness" by his younger contemporary, literary critic M.O. Menshikov. Menshikov responded about the writer's language as follows: "Irregular, motley, the antique (rare, imitating an ancient language. - Ed.) manner makes Leskov’s books a museum of all kinds of dialects; you hear in them the language of village priests, officials, book-readers, the language of liturgical, fairy-tale, chronicle, litigation (the language of judicial records - Ed.), salon, all the elements, all the elements of the ocean of Russian speech meet here. This language, until you get used to it, seems artificial and motley... Its style is incorrect, but rich and even suffers from the vices of wealth: satiety and what is called embarras de richesse (overwhelming abundance - French - Ed.). It does not have the strict simplicity of the style of Lermontov and Pushkin, in whom our language took on truly classical, eternal forms, it does not have the elegant and refined simplicity of Goncharov and Turgenev’s writing (that is, style, syllable - Ed.), there is no sincere everyday simplicity of Tolstoy’s language , – Leskov’s language is rarely simple; in most cases it is complex, but in its own way beautiful and magnificent.”
The writer himself said this about the language of his own works (these words of Leskov were recorded by his friend A.I. Faresov): “The writer’s voice production lies in the ability to master the voice and language of his hero... I tried to develop this skill in myself and achieved, It seems that my priests speak in a spiritual way, nihilists - in a nihilistic way, men - in a peasant way, upstarts from them and buffoons with tricks, etc. On my own behalf I speak in the language of ancient fairy tales and in purely church-folk language. literary speech. That’s why you recognize me in every article now, even if I didn’t sign it. It makes me happy. They say I'm fun to read. This is because we all: both my heroes and myself, have our own voice. It is placed in each of us correctly, or at least diligently. When I write, I’m afraid of getting lost: that’s why my philistines speak in a philistine way, and my lisping and burry aristocrats speak in their own way. This is the expression of talent in a writer. And its development is not only a matter of talent, but also of enormous work. A person lives by words, and we need to know at what moments in our psychological life which of us will have which words. It is quite difficult to study the speeches of every representative of numerous social and personal positions. This popular, vulgar and pretentious language, in which many pages of my works are written, was not composed by me, but was overheard from a peasant, from a semi-intellectual, from eloquent speakers, from holy fools and holy fools.”
1. Innovation M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in the field of satire.
2. Roman M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin “The History of a City” as a satire on bureaucratic Russia. Modernity of the novel. Disputes about the author's position.
3. The artistic originality of the novel by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin “The History of a City” (irony, grotesque, image of an archivist, etc.).
The work of Saltykov-Shchedrin, a democrat for whom the autocratic serfdom that reigned in Russia was absolutely unacceptable, had a satirical orientation. The writer was outraged Russian society“slaves and masters”, the outrage of the landowners, the obedience of the people, and in all his works he exposed the “ulcers” of society, cruelly ridiculed its vices and imperfections.
So, starting to write “The History of a City,” Saltykov-Shchedrin set himself the goal of exposing the ugliness, the impossibility of the existence of autocracy with its social vices, laws, morals, and ridiculing all its realities.
Thus, “The History of a City” is a satirical work, the dominant artistic medium in the depiction of the history of the city of Foolov, its inhabitants and mayors there is grotesque, a method of combining the fantastic and the real, creating absurd situations and comic incongruities. In fact, all the events taking place in the city are grotesque. Its inhabitants, the Foolovites, “descended from ancient tribe blockheads”, who did not know how to live in self-government and decided to find themselves a ruler, are unusually “boss-loving”. “Experiencing an unaccountable fear,” unable to live independently, they “feel like orphans” without city governors and consider the “saving severity” of the outrages of Organchik, who had a mechanism in his head and knew only two words - “I will not tolerate” and “I will ruin.” Quite “common” in Foolov are such mayors as Pimple with a stuffed head or the Frenchman Du-Mario, “on closer examination, he turned out to be a girl.” However, the absurdity reaches its culmination with the appearance of Gloomy-Burcheev, “a scoundrel who planned to embrace the entire universe.” In an effort to realize his “systematic nonsense,” Gloomy-Burcheev is trying to equalize everything in nature, to organize society so that everyone in Foolov lives according to the plan he himself invented, so that the entire structure of the city is created anew according to his design, which leads to the destruction of Foolov by his own residents who unquestioningly carry out the orders of the “scoundrel”, and further - to the death of Ugryum-Burcheev and all Foolovites, consequently, the disappearance of the order established by him, as an unnatural phenomenon, unacceptable by nature itself.
Thus, by using the grotesque, Saltykov-Shchedrin creates a logical, on the one hand, and on the other hand, a comically absurd picture, but for all its absurdity and fantasticness, “The History of a City” is a realistic work that touches on many topical problems. The images of the city of Foolov and its mayors are allegorical; they symbolize autocratic-serf Russia, the power that reigns in it, Russian society. Therefore, the grotesque used by Saltykov-Shchedrin in the narrative is also a way to expose the ugly realities of contemporary life that are disgusting for the writer, as well as a means of revealing the author’s position, Saltykov-Shchedrin’s attitude to what is happening in Russia.
Describing the fantastic-comic life of the Foolovites, their constant fear, all-forgiving love for their bosses, Saltykov-Shchedrin expresses his contempt for the people, apathetic and submissive-slavish, as the writer believes, by nature. The only time in the work the Foolovites were free - under the mayor with a stuffed head. By creating this grotesque situation, Saltykov-Shchedrin shows that under the existing socio-political system, the people cannot be free. The absurdity of the behavior of the “strong” (symbolizing the real power) of this world in the work embodies the lawlessness and arbitrariness perpetrated in Russia by high-ranking officials. The grotesque image of Gloomy-Burcheev, his “systematic nonsense” (a kind of dystopia), which the mayor decided to bring to life at all costs, and the fantastic end of his reign - the implementation of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s idea of inhumanity, the unnaturalness of absolute power, bordering on tyranny, about the impossibility of its existence. The writer embodies the idea that autocratic-serf Russia with its ugly way of life will sooner or later come to an end.
Thus, exposing vices and revealing absurdity and absurdity real life The grotesque conveys a special “evil irony”, “bitter laughter”, characteristic of Saltykov-Shchedrin, “laughter through contempt and indignation”. The writer sometimes seems absolutely ruthless towards his characters, overly critical and demanding of the world around him. But, as Lermontov said, “the medicine for a disease can be bitter.” Cruel exposure of the vices of society, according to Saltykov-Shchedrin, is the only effective means in the fight against the “disease” of Russia. Ridiculing imperfections makes them obvious and understandable to everyone. It would be wrong to say that Saltykov-Shchedrin did not love Russia; he despised the shortcomings and vices of its life and devoted all his creative activity to the fight against them. Explaining “The History of a City,” Saltykov-Shchedrin argued that this is a book about modernity. He saw his place in modernity and never believed that the texts he created would concern his distant descendants. However, a sufficient number of reasons are revealed due to which his book remains the subject and reason for explaining the events of contemporary reality to the reader.
One of these reasons, undoubtedly, is the technique of literary parody, which the author actively uses. This is especially noticeable in his “Address to the Reader,” which was written on behalf of the last archivist-chronicler, as well as in the “Inventory of City Governors.”
The object of parody here is the texts ancient Russian literature, and in particular “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”, “The Tale of Bygone Years” and “The Tale of the Destruction of the Russian Land”. All three texts were canonical for contemporary literary criticism, and it was necessary to show special aesthetic courage and artistic tact in order to avoid their vulgar distortion. Parody - special literary genre, and Shchedrin shows himself to be a true artist in it. What he does, he does subtly, smartly, gracefully and funny.
“I don’t want, like Kostomarov, gray wolf scour the earth, neither, like Solovyov, spread like a crazy eagle into the clouds, nor, like Pypin, spread my thoughts throughout the tree, but I want to tickle my dear Foolovites, showing the world their glorious deeds and the reverend one, the root from which this famous tree came and its branches covered the whole earth with theirs.” This is how Foolov's chronicle begins. The writer organizes the majestic text “Words...” in a completely different way, changing the rhythmic and semantic pattern. Saltykov-Shchedrin, using contemporary bureaucracy (which, undoubtedly, was affected by the fact that he was correcting the position of ruler of the provincial chancellery in the city of Vyatka), introduces into the text the names of historians Kostomarov and Solovyov, without forgetting his friend, the literary critic Pypin. Thus, the parodied text gives the entire Foolov chronicle a certain authentic pseudo-historical sound, an almost feuilleton interpretation of history.
And in order to finally “tickle” the reader, just below Shchedrin creates a dense and complex passage based on “The Tale of Bygone Years”. Let us remember the Shchedrin bunglers who “smack their heads on everything,” the gush-eaters, the slotters, the rukosuevs, the kurales, and compare them with the glades, “living on their own,” with the Radimichi, Dulebs, Drevlyans, “living like bestials,” animal customs, and Krivichi.
The historical seriousness and drama of the decision to call the princes: “Our land is great and abundant, but there is no order in it. Come reign and rule over us” - becomes historical frivolity for Shchedrin. For the world of the Foolovites is an inverted, looking-glass world. And their history is through the looking glass, and its through the looking glass laws operate according to the method of “by contradiction”. The princes do not go to rule the Foolovites. And the one who finally agrees puts his own Foolovian “thief-innovator” over them.
And the “supernaturally decorated” city of Foolov is built on a swamp in a landscape sad to the point of tears. “Oh, bright and beautifully decorated, Russian land!” - the romantic author of “The Tale of the Destruction of the Russian Land” exclaims sublimely.
The history of the city of Foolov is a counter-history. It is a mixed, grotesque and parodic opposition to real life, indirectly, through chronicles, ridiculing history itself. And here the author’s sense of proportion never fails.
After all, it's a parody literary device, allows, by distorting and turning reality upside down, to see its funny and humorous sides. But Shchedrin never forgets that the subject of his parodies is serious. It is not surprising that in our time “The History of a City” itself is becoming an object of parody, both literary and cinematic. In cinema, Vladimir Ovcharov directed the long and rather dull film “It”. IN modern literature V. Pietsukh carries out a style experiment called “The History of a City in modern times”, trying to manifest the ideas of city government in Soviet times. However, these attempts to translate Shchedrin into another language ended in nothing and were happily forgotten, which indicates that the unique semantic and stylistic fabric of “History...” can be parodied by a satirical talent, if not greater, then equal to the talent of Saltykov-Shchedrin. Saltykov resorts only to this kind of caricature, which exaggerates the truth as if through a magnifying glass, but never completely distorts its essence.
I.S. Turgenev.
The indispensable and first means of satire in “The Story of a City” is hyperbolic exaggeration. Satire is a type of art where hyperbolism of expression is a legitimate technique. However, what is required of the satirist is that the fantasy of exaggeration does not stem from a desire to amuse, but serves as a means for a more visual reflection of reality and its shortcomings.
The genius of Saltykov-Shchedrin as a satirist is expressed in the fact that his fantasy seemed to free reality from all the obstacles that hampered its free manifestation. For this writer, the fantastic in form is based on the undoubtedly real, which the best way reveals what is characteristic, typical in the existing order of things. Shchedrin wrote: “I don’t care about history, I see only the present.”
With the help of the grotesque (depicting something in a fantastic, ugly-comic form, based on sharp contrasts and exaggerations), the writer manages to create a historical satire in “The History of a City.” In this work, Saltykov-Shchedrin bitterly ridicules political system, lack of rights of the people, arrogance and tyranny of the rulers.
The historical point of view made it possible for the writer to explain the origin of autocracy and its development. “The History of a City” has it all: there is evolution, there is the history of Russia. The appearance of the gloomy figure of Gloomy-Burcheev, completing the gallery of mayors in the novel, was prepared by the entire previous presentation. It is carried out according to the principle of gradation (from less bad to worse). From one hero to another, the hyperbolic nature in the depiction of the mayors becomes more and more intense, and the grotesque becomes more and more apparent. Gloomy-Burcheev takes the character of the autocratic tyrant to the final limits, just as the image of the mayor itself is taken to the limit. This is explained by the fact that, according to Saltykov-Shchedrin, the autocracy has reached its historical end.
Revealing the roots of the hated regime, the satirist pursued it at all stages of development and in all its varieties. The gallery of mayors reveals the variety of forms of autocratic tyranny and tyranny, which are also depicted using the grotesque.
For example, Organchik is a mayor with “ mysterious story", which is revealed in the course of the story. This hero “is visited by the watchmaker and organ maker Baibakov. ... they said that one day, at three o’clock in the morning, they saw Baibakov, all pale and frightened, come out of the mayor’s apartment and carefully carry something wrapped in a napkin. And what is most remarkable is that on this memorable night none of the townsfolk were awakened by the cry: “I will not tolerate it!” - but the mayor himself, apparently, stopped for a while the critical analysis of the arrears registers and fell into sleep.” And then we learn that one day the mayor’s clerk, “entering his office in the morning with a report, saw the following sight: the mayor’s body, dressed in a uniform, was sitting at a desk, and in front of him, on a pile of arrears registers, lay, in the form of a dandy press -papier, a completely empty mayor’s head..."
No less fantastic is the description of another mayor, Pimple: “He smells! - he [the leader] said to his confidant, “it smells!” It’s like being in a sausage shop!” This story reaches its culmination when one day, in a fight with the leader, the mayor “already went into a rage and did not remember himself. His eyes sparkled, his belly ached sweetly... Finally, with unheard-of frenzy, the leader rushed at his victim, cut off a piece of the head with a knife and immediately swallowed it..."
The grotesque and fantasy in the description of the mayors begins already in the “Inventory to the mayors” at the very beginning of the novel. In addition, not only the rulers themselves are grotesque, but also the Foolovian people over whom these rulers are placed. If the mayors exaggerate their tyranny, stupidity and covetousness, then the people exaggerate their indecisiveness, stupidity, and lack of will. Both are good. All of them are “worthy” heroes of the book of the great satirist.
The fantasy and hyperbolic nature of “The History of a City” is explained by Saltykov-Shchedrin himself. This justifies the satirist’s chosen methods of grotesque depiction of the images of his work. The writer noted: “... the history of the city of Foolov, first of all, represents a world of miracles, which can be rejected only when the existence of miracles in general is rejected. But this is not enough. There are miracles in which, upon careful examination, one can notice a very clear real basis.”
Genre of the novel by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin “Lords of the Golovlevs”. Disputes about genre in literary criticism.
Traditionally, “The Golovlevs” is positioned as a novel. Based on the definition of this term, fixed in the Great Soviet encyclopedia, then this is a type of epic as a type of literature, one of the largest epic genres in volume, which has meaningful differences from another similar genre? national historical (heroic) epic. As opposed to the epic with its interest in the formation of society? to events and positive characters of national-historical significance, the novel shows interest in the formation of the social character of an individual in his own life and in its external and internal collisions with the environment. Here you can add the definition of Bakhtin M.M., Bakhtin M.M. Questions of literature and aesthetics. M., 1975 for a more complete understanding of the specifics of this genre: “A novel, a detailed narrative, which, as a rule, creates the impression of a story about real people and events that are not actually such. No matter how long it may be, a novel always offers the reader an action unfolding in an integral artistic space, and not just one episode or bright moment.
Let us consider in more detail which of these definitions is applicable to determine the genre of such a work as “The Golovlevs.”
In the center of the story is one single family - the Golovlevs, its three generations are shown in their gradual degeneration and extinction. Consequently, this is a chronicle novel telling about the events taking place on the Golovlev family estate. But that's only one side of this work, since it has much in common with the fairly developed in Russian classical prose genre of memoir-family chronicle. However, the connection between “The Golovlevs” and the traditional family novel is purely external. It is impossible to explain all the features of the genre nature of Saltykov’s novel with “family” content. The “family” feature was reflected in him mainly only in the designation of the thematic framework, the boundaries of a certain circle of life phenomena.
The view on family and family issues may be different. Saltykov viewed the family primarily as a social category, as an organic cell of a social organism. In 1876, he wrote to E.I. Utin: “I turned to the family, to property, to the state and made it clear that none of this was available anymore. That, therefore, the principles in the name of which freedom is constrained are no longer principles even for those who use them. I wrote “The Golovlevs” on the principle of nepotism." M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in the memoirs of contemporaries, 2nd ed., vol. 1 - 2, M., 1975. P. 113.. From the context it is clear that in understanding the principle of nepotism the Saltykovs put in special content. It is not for nothing that Saltykov’s family stands on a par with the state and property, these cornerstones of the noble-bourgeois system. The satirist devoted many pages to exposing the decay of a system based on exploitation and slavery; in this sense, “The Golovlevs”, in their ideological motives, are closely intertwined with other works of Saltykov, and primarily with “Well-Intentioned Speeches” and “Poshekhon Antiquity”.
Here Saltykov opposes the established traditions of the novel (both on Russian and Western European soil) with its love-family plot. By highlighting the task of creating a social novel, he finds a traditional family romance too narrow. He points out the need for a decisive change in the social basis of the novel and persistently puts the problem of the environment in the first place. “After all, a man died because his sweetheart kissed her sweetheart,” wrote Saltykov, “and no one thought it wild that this death was called the resolution of the drama. Why? - and precisely because this resolution was preceded by the very process of kissing, that is, drama... With all the more reason it is permissible to think that other, no less complex definitions of a person can also provide content for a very detailed drama. If they are still used insufficiently and uncertainly, it is only because the arena in which their struggle takes place is too poorly illuminated. But it exists, it exists, and even very insistently knocks on the doors of literature. In this case, I can refer to the greatest of Russian artists, Gogol, who foresaw long ago that the novel would have to go beyond the framework of nepotism.”
It may seem strange that Saltykov, who so sharply opposed the tradition of the “family novel” and put forward the task of illuminating the social environment, “the arena in which the struggle takes place,” built his novel on the basis of “nepotism.” However, this impression is purely external; The principle of nepotism was chosen by the author only for a certain convenience. It provided ample opportunities to use the richest material of direct life observations.
When they talk about the principle of nepotism, they usually mean a traditional novel in which all life conflicts, dramatic situations, clashes of passions and characters are depicted exclusively through the private life of the family and family relationships. At the same time, even within the framework of traditional, customary family romance, the presented family romance is not something homogeneous and motionless. This conventional concept often serves as a means of designating only external features of the plot.
The main determining factor genre sign the novel "The Golovlevs" is social factor. The author focuses on social problems.
But it would be strange, when talking about social and public problems, to ignore the psychological side of this work. After all, “The Golovlevs” reveal not only the theme of the extinction of the landowner class, but also the theme of the extinction human soul, the theme of morality, spirituality, conscience in the end. The tragedies of broken human destinies curl like a black mourning ribbon through the pages of the novel, evoking both horror and sympathy in the reader.
The head of the Golovlev family is the hereditary landowner Arina Petrovna, a tragic figure, despite the fact that in the collection of weak and worthless people of the Golovlev family, she appears as a strong, powerful person, a real mistress of the estate. For a long time, this woman single-handedly and uncontrollably managed the vast Golovlevsky estate and, thanks to her personal energy, managed to increase her fortune tenfold. The passion for accumulation dominated in Arina Petrovna over maternal feelings. The children “did not touch a single string of her inner being, who was completely given over to the countless details of life-building.”
Who created such monsters? - Arina Petrovna asked herself in her declining years, seeing how her sons were devouring each other and how the “family stronghold” created by her hands was collapsing. The results of her own life appeared before her - a life that was subordinated to heartless acquisitiveness and formed “monsters.” The most disgusting of them is Porfiry, nicknamed Judas in the family since childhood.
The traits of heartless acquisitiveness characteristic of Arina Petrovna and the entire Golovlev family developed in Judushka to their utmost expression. If a feeling of pity for her sons and orphaned granddaughters still visited Arina Petrovna’s callous soul from time to time, then Judushka was “incapable not only of affection, but also of simple pity.” His moral numbness was so great that without the slightest shudder he doomed each of his three sons - Vladimir, Peter and the illegitimate baby Volodka - to death in turn.
The world of the Golovlev estate, when Arina Petrovna rules in it, is a world of individual arbitrariness, a world of “authority” emanating from one person, authority that does not obey any law, contained only in one principle - the principle of autocracy. The Golovlevskaya estate prefigures, as they said in the 19th century, the whole of autocratic Russia, numb in the “stupor of power” (with these words Saltykov defined the very essence of the reign of Arina Petrovna, “a woman of power and, moreover, highly gifted with creativity”). Only from her, from Arina Petrovna, do certain active currents emanate, only she in this Golovlevsky world has the privilege of action. Other members of the Golovlev world are completely deprived of this privilege. At one pole, in the person of autocrat Arina Petrovna, power, activity, and “creativity” are concentrated. On the other - resignation, passivity, apathy. And it is clear why, despite the “numbness” that dominates Golovlev’s world, only in Arina Petrovna there is still something alive.
Only she is capable of “life-building,” whatever it may be, only she lives - in her household, in her acquisitive pathos. Of course, this is a very relative life, limited to very narrow boundaries, and most importantly, it deprives all other members of Golovlev’s world of the right to life, dooming them ultimately to a “coffin”, to dying. After all, Arina Petrovna’s life activity finds satisfaction in itself, her “creativity” does not have any goal outside itself, any moral content. And the question that Arina Petrovna often asks: for whom am I working, for whom am I saving? - the question is, in essence, illegal: after all, she was saving not even for herself, much less for her children, but due to some unconscious, almost animal instinct of accumulation. Everything was subordinated, everything was sacrificed to this instinct.
But this instinct, of course, is not biological, but social. Arina Petrovna's hoarding - in its social and therefore psychological nature - is very different from the stinginess of Balzac's Gobsek or Pushkin's Stingy Knight.
In the novel, thus, Saltykov set himself a difficult task: to artistically reveal the internal mechanism of family destruction. From chapter to chapter, the tragic exit from the family and from the life of the main representatives of the Golovlev family is traced. But everything characteristic of the process of destruction of the landowner’s family is most consistently summarized in the image of Porfiry Goloplev. It is no coincidence that Saltykov considered it necessary at the very beginning of the second chapter to note the following: “The family stronghold, erected by the tireless hands of Arina Petrovna, collapsed, but it collapsed so imperceptibly that she, without understanding how it happened, “became an accomplice and even an obvious driver of this.” destruction, the real soul of which was, of course, Porfishka the bloodsucker.”
Consequently, this is a psychological and tragic novel.
But, in addition, the novel “Gentlemen Golovlevs” is also a satirical novel. The prophetic, as Gorky put it, laughter of Saltykov's satire in the novel penetrated the consciousness of entire generations of Russian people. And in this unique process of public education lies another advantage of this work. In addition, it revealed to reading Russia the image of Judas, which entered the gallery of common world satirical types.
Thus, we can conclude that Saltykov-Shchedrin’s novel” in its genre originality is a unique synthetic fusion of a novel - a family chronicle, a socio-psychological, tragic and satirical novel.
The universal human meaning of the image of Judas Golovlev. Disputes about its creation and essence.
One of the most striking images of the satirist was Judushka Golovlev, the hero of the novel “Lord Golovlevs.” The Golovlev family, the Golovlev estate, where the events of the novel unfold - this is collective image, generalized character traits life, morals, psychology of landowners, their entire way of life on the eve of the abolition of serfdom.
Porfiry Vladimirovich Golovlev is one of the members of a large family, one of the “monsters” as his mother, Arina Petrovna, called her sons. “Porfiry Vladimirovich was known in the family under three names: Judas, blood drinker and frank boy,” - this exhaustive description is given by the author already in the first chapter of the novel. The episodes that describe Judushka's childhood show us how the character of this hypocritical man was formed: Porfisha, in the hope of encouragement, became an affectionate son, ingratiated himself with his mother, gossiped, fawned, in a word, became “all obedient and devoted.” “But Arina Petrovna, even then, was somewhat suspicious of these filial ingratiations,” subconsciously guessing an insidious intent in them. But still, unable to resist the deceitful charm, she was looking for “the best piece on the platter” for Porfisha. Pretense, as one of the ways to achieve what you want, became a fundamental character trait of Judas. If in childhood, ostentatious “filial devotion” helped him get the “best pieces,” then later he received the “best part” for this when dividing the estate. Judas first became the sovereign owner of the Golovlev estate, then of his brother Pavel’s estate. Having taken possession of all his mother's wealth, he doomed this previously formidable and powerful woman to a lonely death in an abandoned house.
The traits of heartless acquisitiveness inherited from Arina Petrovna are presented in Porfiry highest degree of its development. If his mother, despite all the callousness of her soul, was sometimes still illuminated by a feeling of pity for her sons and orphan granddaughters, then her son Porfiry was “incapable not only of affection, but also of simple pity.” Without any remorse, he doomed all his sons - Vladimir, Peter and baby Volodka - to death.
The behavior and appearance of Judas can mislead anyone: “His face was bright, tender, breathing humility and joy.” His eyes “exuded a charming poison,” and his voice, “like a snake, crawled into the soul and paralyzed the will of a person.” The hypocritical essence of the Blood Drinker, compared by the writer to a spider, is not immediately recognized. All his loved ones - mother, brothers, nieces, sons, everyone, Those who came into contact with him felt the danger emanating from this man, hidden behind his good-natured “idle talk.”
With his meanness and vile actions, Judas cannot cause anything but disgust. With his speeches, this bloodsucker, in the words of one peasant, can “rot a person.” Each of his words “has ten meanings.”
An indispensable attribute of Jewish idle talk is various kinds of aphorisms, proverbs, religious sayings: “we all walk under God,” “what God has arranged in his wisdom, you and I don’t have to redo it,” “every person has his own limit from God,” and so on. Further. Porfiry Vladimirovich calls on these phrases for help whenever he wants to do something nasty that violates moral standards. Thus, the sons who asked Judas for help always received a ready-made maxim instead - “God punishes disobedient children”, “you messed up yourself - get out of it yourself”, which were accepted as “a stone given to a hungry man.” As a result, Vladimir committed suicide, Petenka, who was put on trial for embezzlement of government money, died on the way to exile. The atrocities committed by Judushka “slowly, little by little” looked like the most ordinary things. And he always came out of the water unscathed.
This insignificant person in all respects dominates those around him, destroys them, relying on serfdom morality, on the law, on religion, sincerely considering himself a champion of the truth.
Revealing the image of Judas - a “blood drinker” protected by the dogmas of religion and the laws of power, Shchedrin denounced the social, political and moral principles serf society. Having shown in the last chapter of the novel the “awakening of the wild conscience” of Judas, Shchedrin warns his contemporaries that sometimes this can happen too late.
Using the example of Judushka, a predator with the capitalist grasp, who, having lost the free peasant strength, in new conditions, is sophisticated in other methods of extorting money from completely ruined peasants, the satirist says that there is a “grimy”, he is already here, he is already coming with a false measure, and this is an objective reality.
Family drama“The Golovlev Lords” unfolds in a religious context: plot situation Last Judgment covers all heroes and is transferred to readers; gospel parable about prodigal son appears as a story about forgiveness and salvation, which will never come true in the world where the Golovlevs live; The religious rhetoric of Judas is a way of self-exposure of the hero, who has completely separated sacred words from vile deeds.
In search of the “hidden” plot of the novel, researchers turn to those biblical and mythological images with which “The Golovlev Lords” are saturated.
It should be emphasized right away: Shchedrin was not an orthodox writer - neither in politics, nor especially in religious sense. It is difficult to say how much of the gospel images of “Christ’s Night”, “The Christmas Tale” and the same “Lord Golovlevs” were reality for him, and how much were successful metaphors or simply “ eternal images" One way or another, the events of the Gospel for Shchedrin invariably remained a model, a model that is repeated from century to century with new characters. The writer directly said this in a feuilleton dedicated to N. Ge’s painting “ last supper“(cycle “Our Social Life”, 1863): “The external setting of the drama has ended, but its instructive meaning for us has not ended. With the help of the artist’s clear contemplation, we are convinced that the mystery, which actually contains the grain of the drama, has its own continuity, that it not only has not ended, but always stands before us, as if it happened yesterday.”
It is significant that we are talking specifically about the Last Supper, or more precisely, about the moment when Judas finally decided to betray. Thus, it is the confrontation between Christ and Judas that turns out to be eternal.
How is it going in “The Golovlev Lords”?
Ta psychological characteristics traitor, which Shchedrin gives in the cited feuilleton, has nothing to do with the character of the main character of the novel.
The Last Supper is not mentioned at all in the novel; For the heroes, only the way of the cross of Christ - from the laying of the crown of thorns - matters. Everything else (the preaching of Christ and His resurrection) is only implied. The Gospel events are shown from two points of view: Judas and his “slaves”. The fact that serfs are persistently called slaves is, of course, no coincidence. For them, Easter is a guarantee of future liberation: “The slaves felt in their hearts their Master and Redeemer, they believed that He would rise, truly rise. And Anninka also waited and believed. Behind the deep night of torture, vile mockery and nodding - for all these poor in spirit, a kingdom of rays and freedom was visible.” The contrast between the Lord-Christ and the “Gentlemen Golovlevs” is probably intentional (remember that the very title of the novel appeared at the last stage of the work - that is, precisely when the quoted words were written). Accordingly, the “slaves” are not only the serfs of the Golovlevs, but also the “slaves of God.”
In the mind of Judas there is no image of resurrection: “Forgave everyone!” - He spoke aloud to himself: - not only those who then gave Him otset with bile to drink, but also those who later, now, and henceforth, forever and ever, will bring otset mixed with bile to His lips... . Terrible! oh, this is terrible! Porfiry is horrified by what was previously only the subject of idle talk - and comforting idle talk: “And the only refuge, in my opinion, for you, my dear, in this case, is to remember as often as possible what Christ himself suffered.”
The plot of “The Golovlev Lords” is the implementation of the model given in the Bible; but the trial of Christ turns out to be, in the end, a metaphor: “he [Judas] understood for the first time that this legend was about some unheard-of untruth that had carried out a bloody judgment on the Truth...”.
One way or another, it is the biblical code, explicated on the last pages of the novel, that gives us the opportunity to read the global plot of the novel. It is no coincidence that Shchedrin says that in the soul of Judas no “vital comparisons” arose between the “legend” that he heard in Good Friday, and his own history. The hero cannot make such comparisons, but the reader must make them. However, let us also pay attention to the fact that Porfiry Vladimirych, who was called not only “Judas”, but also “Judas,” calls himself Judas once - just before his death, when he mentally repents to Evprakseyushka: “And to her he, Judas, inflicted severe injury, and he managed to take away the light of life from her, taking away her son and throwing her into some nameless pit.” This is no longer just “comparison”, but identification.
The parallel between Judas and Judas is sometimes drawn by Shchedrin with amazing accuracy, but sometimes it goes into subtext. For example, in recent months Porfiry’s life was tormented by “unbearable attacks of suffocation, which, regardless of moral torment, in themselves are able to fill life with continuous agony” - an obvious reference to the type of death that the Gospel Judas chose for himself. But for Porfiry, his illness does not bring the expected death. This motif perhaps goes back to the apocryphal tradition, according to which Judas, having hanged himself, did not die, but fell from the tree and died later in agony. Shchedrin could not resist a meaningful inversion: Judas, in the prime of her life, “looks - as if he’s throwing a noose.”
Judas never commits treason in the literal sense of the word, but on his conscience is the murder (“death”) of his brothers, sons and mother. Each of these crimes (committed, however, within the framework of the law and public morality) and all of them together are equated to betrayal. For example: as a fratricide, Judas undoubtedly acquires the features of Cain, and when Porfiry kisses dead brother, this kiss, of course, is called the “last kiss of Judas.”
At the moment when Judas sends his second son to Siberia, and in fact to death, Arina Petrovna curses him. Mom’s curse always seemed very possible to Judas and in his mind it was framed like this: “thunder, the candles went out, the curtain was torn, darkness covered the earth, and above, among the clouds, the angry face of Jehovah can be seen, illuminated by lightning.” This clearly refers not only to the mother’s curse, but also to God’s curse. All the details of the episode were taken by Shchedrin from the Gospels, where they are connected with the death of Christ. The betrayal of Judas was accomplished, Christ was crucified (again), but Judas himself did not even notice this - or did not want to notice.
The tragedy of the novel “The Golovlevs” makes it similar to “Anna Karenina”, named by L.D. Opulskaya is a tragedy novel, because the time depicted by the writers in these works was truly filled with dramatic events.
This drama is especially noticeable in the ending of the novel “The Golovlevs,” about which there are several different opinions.
Researcher Makashin wrote: “The greatness of Saltykov the moralist, with his almost religious faith in the power of moral shock from awakened consciousness, was nowhere expressed with greater artistic power than at the end of his novel.”
And, indeed, for Shchedrin the ending of Judushka’s life story is “sterile.” Artistic Features This part of the work is manifested in a clear difference in the intonation of the author’s narration in the scene of the awakening of Judas’s conscience and the final lines of the novel, where we are talking about him. The intonation changes from sympathetic, passive to insensitive, informational: the coming morning is illuminated only by the “numb corpse of Golovlev’s master.”
The change in style after the scene of the awakening of conscience is due to the author’s return to reality, to the everyday reality surrounding him. It is here that the writer focuses on the problem of the survival of man and society. Shchedrin puts humanity before a radical antithesis, a decisive choice - the only alternative “either-or”: either humanity, having driven out conscience, will wallow in vile self-destruction, covered in the mire of trifles, or will nurture that growing little child in which conscience also grows. Shchedrin does not indicate any other paths for humanity.
Prozorov believes that the ending of “The Golovlev Lords” may indeed “seem sudden and even almost unlikely.” For the world at night, nothing happened except the physical act of death of the Golovlevsky master.
Literary critic V.M. Malkin, on the contrary, believes that “the end of Judas is natural. He, who has revered church rituals all his life, dies without repentance...” And death without repentance gives us the opportunity to consider it a deliberate death, i.e. suicide.
Active author's position Shchedrin can be seen in his personal attitude to the current events: the writer, with pain and bitterness, realizes the loss of spirituality and humanism in family relationships and such a state of the world when, in place of the disappeared “conscience,” a “emptiness” appears, corresponding to a “familyless” human existence.
Traditional and innovative in the novel by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin “Lords of the Golovlevs”.
Genre features: Each chapter is like a separate sketch of the life of the Golovlev family in one or another period of time. The journalistic style enhances the satire, giving it even greater persuasiveness and authenticity. “The Golovlevs” as a realistic work: The work presents typical characters in typical circumstances. The image of Judas is written out, on the one hand, very clearly and endowed with individual features, on the other hand, it is typical for Russia. half of the 19th century century. In addition to social satire, in the image of Judas one can also notice a certain philosophical generalization - Judas is not only a certain type characteristic of a certain time, but also a universal type (albeit sharply negative) - “Judas” are found anywhere and at all times. However, Saltykov-Shchedrin’s goal is not at all reduced to showing a certain type or character.
His goal is much broader. The theme of his narration is the story of the decomposition and death of the Golovlev family, Judas is only the most bright image from a whole series.
Thus, the center of the narrative is not a specific type or image, but a social phenomenon. The pathos of the work and the satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin: The satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin has a pronounced social character. The disintegration of the Golovlev family (drunkenness, adultery, idle thinking and idle talk, inability to do any creative work) is given in a historical perspective - the life of several generations is described. Trying to understand and display in my works the features Russian life, Saltykov-Shchedrin takes on one of the most characteristic layers of Russian life - the life of provincial landowners-nobles. The accusatory pathos of the work extends to the entire class - it is no coincidence that in the finale everything seems to “return to normal” - a distant relative of Judushka comes to the estate, who has been following what is happening in Golov-lev for a very long time.
Thus, Judas’s repentance and his visit to his mother’s grave lead nowhere. Neither moral nor any other purification occurs. This episode contains irony: no repentance can atone for the atrocities that Judas committed in life. Traditions and innovation: Saltykov-Shchedrin in “The Golovlev Gentlemen” continues the traditions of Russian satire, founded by Gogol. There is no positive hero in his work (like Gogol in his “The Government Inspector” and “Dead Souls”), realistically depicting the surrounding reality, Saltykov-Shchedrin exposes the vices of the social system and Russian social development, and carries out a social typification of phenomena. His style, unlike Gogol’s, is devoid of a touch of fantasy; it is deliberately “reified” (the sketchy, journalistic nature of the narrative) in order to give an even more unattractive character to the vices depicted in the work.
Thematic diversity of fairy tales by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Their proximity to folk tales and differences from her.
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin can rightfully be called one of greatest satirists Russia. Saltykov-Shchedrin’s satirical talent was most clearly and expressively manifested in the fairy tales “For children of a fair age,” as he himself called them.
There probably isn't one dark side Russian reality of that time, which would not have been touched upon in any direct or indirect way in his magnificent fairy tales and other writings.
The ideological and thematic diversity of these tales is, of course, very great, just as, in fact, the number of problems in Russia is great. However, some themes can be called basic - they are, as it were, cross-cutting for the entire work of Saltykov-Shchedrin. First of all, this is a political issue. In fairy tales in which it is touched upon, the author either ridicules the stupidity and inertia of the ruling classes, or sneers at the liberals of his time. These are such tales as “The Wise Minnow”, “The Selfless Hare”, “The Idealist Crucian” and many others.
In the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow,” for example, one can discern a satire on moderate liberalism. The main character was so frightened by the danger of getting hit in the ear that he spent his entire life without leaning out of the hole. Only before his death does it dawn on the gudgeon that if everyone lived like this, then “the entire gudgeon race would have died out long ago.” Saltykov-Shchedrin here ridicules philistine morality, the philistine principle “my hut is on the edge.”
Satire of liberalism can also be found in such fairy tales as “The Liberal”, “The Sane Hare” and others. The author devotes the fairy tales “The Bear in the Voivodeship” and “The Eagle Patron” to denouncing the upper strata of society. If in the first of them Saltykov-Shchedrin ridicules the administrative principles of Russia, as well as the idea of necessary historical bloodshed, then in the second he uses pseudo-enlightenment and examines the problem of the relationship between despotic power and enlightenment.
The second, no less important topic for the writer includes fairy tales in which the author shows the life of the masses in Russia. Latest topic Most of the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are devoted, and there is no doubt that these are almost all of his most successful and most famous tales. This is “The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals”, and “ Wild landowner", and many others. All these tales have one thing in common - a caustic satire on different types of gentlemen who, regardless of whether they are landowners, officials or merchants, are equally helpless, stupid and arrogant.
Thus, in “The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals” Saltykov-Shchedrin writes: “The generals served in some kind of registry... therefore, they did not understand anything. They didn’t even know any words.” It is quite natural that, suddenly finding themselves on the island, these generals, who all their lives believed that buns grew on trees, almost died of hunger. These generals, who according to the established order in Russia at that time were considered gentlemen, far from the peasant demonstrate their complete inability to live, stupidity and even readiness for complete brutality. At the same time, the simple man is shown by the author to be a real fine fellow, he will cook a handful of soup and get meat. In this tale, the man appears as the true basis of the existence of the state and nation. But Saltykov-Shchedrin does not spare the man. He sees that the habit of obeying is ineradicable in him; he simply cannot imagine life without a master.
Saltykov-Shchedrin touches on many other topics in his fairy tales, for example, he ridicules the proprietary morality and capitalist ideals of his contemporary society, exposes the psychology of philistinism, etc. But no matter what topic the writer takes, his fairy tale invariably turns out to be topical and poignant. This is where great talent comes into play.
“Fairy Tales” by Saltykov-Shchedrin is a unique phenomenon of Russian literature. They represent a fusion of folklore and modern reality to the author and were designed to expose the social vices of the 19th century.
Why did the writer use the fairy tale genre in his work? I think he was trying to get his thoughts across common people, call him to active action (it is known that Shchedrin was a supporter of revolutionary changes). And a fairy tale, its language and images could best make the artist’s thoughts accessible to the people.
The writer shows how helpless and pitiful, on the one hand, and despotic and cruel, on the other, is the ruling class. Thus, in the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner” main character he disdainfully despises his serfs and equates them to soulless objects, but without them his life turns into hell. Having lost his peasants, the landowner instantly degrades, taking on the appearance of a wild animal, lazy and unable to take care of himself.
In contrast to this hero, the people in the fairy tale are shown as a living creative force on which all life rests.
Often, following the folklore tradition, animals become the heroes of Shchedrin's fairy tales. Using allegory, Aesopian language, the writer criticizes the political or social forces of Russia. Thus, in the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow”, his irony and sarcasm are awarded to cowardly liberal politicians who are afraid of the government and are incapable, despite good intentions, of decisive action.
When creating his “Fairy Tales for Adults,” Saltykov-Shchedrin uses hyperbole, grotesque, fantasy, and irony. In a form that is accessible and understandable to all segments of the population, he criticizes Russian reality and calls for changes that, in his opinion, should come “from below,” from the people’s environment.
The work of Saltykov and Shchedrin is replete with folk poetic literature. His tales are the result of many years of life observations of the author. The writer conveyed them to the reader in an accessible and vivid manner. artistic form. He took words and images for them from folk tales and legends, in proverbs and sayings, in the picturesque talk of the crowd, in all the poetic elements of the living folk language. Like Nekrasov, Shchedrin wrote his fairy tales for ordinary people, for the widest reading circles. Therefore, it was no coincidence that the subtitle was chosen: “Fairy tales for children of a fair age.” These works were distinguished by true nationality. Using folklore samples, the author created on their basis and in their spirit, creatively revealed and developed their meaning, took them from the people in order to return them later ideologically and artistically enriched. He masterfully used vernacular. Memories have been preserved that Saltykov-Shchedrin “loved purely Russian peasant speech, which he knew perfectly.” He often said about himself: “I am a man.” This is basically the language of his works.
Emphasizing the connection between the fairy tale and reality, Saltykov-Shchedrin combined elements of folklore speech with modern concepts. The author used not only the usual opening (“Once upon a time there were…”), traditional expressions (“neither to say in a fairy tale, not to describe with a pen, “he began to live and get along”), folk expressions (“he thinks in a thought,” “mind chamber”), colloquialism (“spreading”, “destroy”), but also introduced journalistic vocabulary, clerical jargon, foreign words, and turned to Aesopian speech. He enriched folklore stories new content. In his fairy tales, the writer created images of the animal kingdom: the greedy Wolf, the cunning Fox, the cowardly Hare, the stupid and evil Bear. The reader knew these images well from Krylov’s fables. But Saltykov-Shchedrin introduced topical political themes into the world of folk art and, with the help of familiar characters, revealed complex problems of our time.
Nikolai Leskov is one of the peculiar representatives of Russian classical literature. Its narrative features are largely related to the writing style used by the writer.
One of the key features inherent in Leskov is his lively manner of presentation, a language close to colloquial. The author's texts are very different from correct literary speech, but this feature does not turn them into overly simple and primitive.
Leskov deliberately inserted into his works speech errors and misuse of words. However, it should be noted that in such cases it is not the direct speech of the author that sounds in this way, but the speech patterns put into the mouths of the characters.
With the help of such techniques, Leskov managed to show Russian reality and representatives of different social strata in a broad and multifaceted way. The writer uses many different dialects and manners of conversation typical of village priests or officials. Their originality helps him enliven the narrative, making the characters brighter and more prominent.
It is characteristic that the writer did not reproduce the actual folk speech. The manner he uses is only stylization, but it looks very natural and believable.
The narrative styles used by Leskov are also different. This is also an appeal to folklore motives and to the language of the chronicle, court and other various aspects of social life.
The widespread use of national color was dictated for various reasons. First of all, Leskov’s goal was to depict the Russian character; it is not without reason that in a number of works he contrasts it with foreigners, especially Germans.
In addition, Leskov is a satirist. Bizarre expressions of different characters helped him more vividly draw the images of heroes, in which he depicted the personification of the qualities of the people. The coloring of the narrative language allowed the writer not to resort to excessive dramatization in his works.
Leskov's works can be defined as tales. Epic elements are woven into the story, which looks like a narrative about a story that happened in real life, which gives Leskov’s works a unique flavor. The manner of presentation has the appearance of a story from one good friend to another, where the truth is not so easy to separate from fiction. However, clearly implausible details do not spoil the overall impression.
Option 2
Leskov is an outstanding writer, who began his career in the twentieth century.
Leskov has a completely different language and style of writing each work and therefore it is very difficult to confuse him with anyone else. He can also be called an experimenter, who on the one hand is kind and cheerful, but on the other hand he is serious, who sets big goals for himself and does everything to fulfill them.
If you consider his creativity, it seems that he has no boundaries. He can bring out heroes not only from different circles, but also from different classes. In addition, representatives meet here different nationalities. These could be Ukrainians, Yakuts, Jews, Gypsies and Poles. And he knows perfectly well how each person lived. And for this he had life experience, as well as memory, instinct and a keen eye.
Before you put one of the people as the main character, you must first study his manners, and also learn how to express his speech and thoughts as he does. Immerse yourself at least a little in his life and field of activity.
The story about the main character is not narrated by the author or a neutral character, but by a special narrator who is in the thick of all the events. The story can be told not only by a landowner or merchant, but also by a monk, artisan or retired soldier. With the help of this, each work is saturated with living creatures. The language becomes rich and diverse. Using this facet, you can not only judge, but also evaluate each of the characters, as well as the event that occurs in the work.
Since Leskov has never seen workers before, he dresses them as he sees fit. He doesn’t know many of the words they use in their work. That is why many of them are distorted and pronounced completely differently.
Many contemporaries considered Leskov not such a great writer. And that’s all, because each of his heroes did not have a very good and easy situation in life. One problem is superimposed on another and then it is very difficult or almost impossible to deal with them.
In one of his works, he talked about Tula craftsmen, who are actually professionals in their field and can make beautiful and miniature things from any material.
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Solzhenitsyn wrote a large number of various works that became not only popular, but also famous. But he wrote the work “In the First Circle” in 1958.
It's impossible to imagine life modern man easily. For most of us, it begins in childhood. Help with housework, cleaning the house, looking after younger brothers and sisters.
Leskov's innovative experiments in combining realistic writing with the conventions of traditional folk poetic techniques, the courage to resurrect the style and genres of old Russian books in the interests of updating the narrative palette, masterly stylistic experiments with phraseology, drawn either from road vernacular, or from persistent professional lexicons, from the Nestor Chronicle and topical newspaper periodicals, from the language of theology and exact sciences - all this often baffled criticism, which was lost in the definitions of Leskov’s art. This is what makes N.S. stand out. Leskov compared to all the writers of the 19th century.
His skill was compared with icon painting and ancient architecture, the writer was called an “isographer,” and this was generally true. Leskov's gallery of original folk types Gorky called it “the iconostasis of the righteous and saints” of Russia. However, along with archaic stylization, Leskov impeccably mastered a lively “voice performance”: the countless confessions of his peasants, masons, soldiers, hermits, buffoons, merchants, serf actors, single-lords - as well as representatives of other classes - sound like the richest symphony of Russian national speech of the 19th century.
The most diverse characters in their social status in Leskov’s works were given the opportunity to express themselves in their own words and thus act as if independently of their creator. Leskov was able to realize this creative principle thanks to his outstanding philological abilities. His “priests speak spiritually, nihilists speak nihilistically, peasants speak peasantly, upstarts from among them and buffoons with tricks.”
Juicy, colorful language Leskov's characters corresponded to the bright colorful world of his work, in which a fascination with life reigns, despite all its imperfections and tragic contradictions. Life as perceived by Leskov is unusually interesting. The most ordinary phenomena, falling into art world of his works are transformed into a fascinating story, a poignant anecdote or a “funny old fairy tale, under which, through some kind of warm slumber, the heart smiles freshly and tenderly.” Matching this semi-fairy tale, “a world full of mysterious charm,” Leskov’s favorite heroes are eccentrics and “righteous people,” people with an integral nature and a generous soul. We will not find such a number in any of the Russian writers. goodies. Sharp criticism of Russian reality and an active civic position encouraged the writer to search for the positive principles of Russian life. And Leskov placed his main hopes for the moral revival of Russian society, without which he could not imagine social and economic progress, on the best people of all classes, be it the priest Savely Tuberozov from “Soboryan”, a policeman (“Odnodum”), officers (“Unmercenary Engineers” ", "Cadet Monastery"), peasant ("Non-Lethal Golovan"), soldier ("Man on the Clock"), artisan ("Lefty"), landowner ("A Seedy Family").
Leskov’s genre, thoroughly imbued with philology, is the “tale” (“Lefty”, “Leon the Butler’s Son”, “The Captured Angel”), where speech mosaic, vocabulary and voice are the main organizing principle. This genre is partly popular, partly antique. “Folk etymology” reigns here in its most “excessive” forms. Another characteristic of Leskov's philology is that his characters are always marked by their profession, their social and national sign. They are representatives of one or another jargon, dialect... It is also characteristic that these dialects are used by him in most cases in a comic sense, which enhances the playful function of the language. This applies to the learned language, and to the language of the clergy (cf. the deacon Achilles in “Councils” or the deacon in “Journeys with a Nihilist”), and to national languages. Ukrainian language in “The Hare Remise” it is used precisely as a comic element, and in other things the broken Russian language appears every now and then - in the mouths of either a German, or a Pole, or a Greek. Even such a “social” novel as “Nowhere” is filled with all kinds of linguistic anecdotes and parodies - a trait typical of a storyteller, a variety artist. But besides the realm of comic tale, L also has the opposite realm - the realm of sublime declamation. Many of his works are written, as he himself said, in “musical recitative” - metrical prose, approaching verse. There are such pieces in “The Bypassed”, in “The Islanders”, in “The Spendthrift” - in places of greatest tension. In his early works, L uniquely combines stylistic traditions and techniques he took from Polish and Ukrainian. and Russian writers. But in later works this connection
By conviction, Leskov was a democrat and educator - an enemy of serfdom and its vestiges, a defender of education and popular interests. He considered the main progress to be moral progress. “We need not good orders, but good people,” he wrote. The writer recognized himself as a writer of a new type; his school was not the book, but life itself.
At first creative activity Leskov wrote under the pseudonym M. Stebnitsky. The pseudonymous signature “Stebnitsky” first appeared on March 25, 1862, under the first fictional work, “The Extinguished Case” (later “Drought”). It lasted until August 14, 1869. From time to time the signatures “M.S.”, “S” slipped through, and, finally, in 1872. "L.S.", "P. Leskov-Stebnitsky" and "M. Leskov-Stebnitsky." Among other conventional signatures and pseudonyms used by Leskov, the following are known: “Freishitz”, “V. Peresvetov”, “Nikolai Ponukalov”, “Nikolai Gorokhov”, “Someone”, “Dm. M-ev”, “N.”, “Member of Society”, “Psalmist”, “Priest. P. Kastorsky", "Divyanka", "M.P.", "B. Protozanov", "Nikolai - ov", "N.L.", "N.L. - in”, “Lover of Antiquities”, “Traveler”, “Watch Lover”, “N.L.”, “L.”. Leskov’s actual biography as a writer begins in 1863, when he published his first stories (“The Life of a Woman,” “Musk Ox”) and began publishing the “anti-nihilistic” novel “Nowhere” (1863-1864). The novel opens with scenes of leisurely provincial life, outraged by the arrival of “new people” and fashionable ideas, then the action moves to the capital.
The satirically depicted life of a commune organized by “nihilists” is contrasted with modest work for the good of people and Christian family values, which should save Russia from the disastrous path of social upheaval, where young demagogues are taking it. Then Leskov’s second “anti-nihilistic” novel “On Knives” (1870-1871) appeared, telling about a new phase of the revolutionary movement, when the former “nihilists” degenerate into ordinary swindlers. In the 1860s, he intensively searched for his own special path. Based on the outline of popular prints about the love of a clerk and his master's wife, the story “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District” (1865) was written about disastrous passions hidden under the cover of provincial silence. In the story “Old Years in the Village of Plodomasovo” (1869), which depicts serfdom in the 18th century, he approaches the genre of chronicle.
In the story “Warrior” (1866), fairy tale forms of storytelling appear for the first time. Elements of the tale that later made him so famous are also found in the story “Kotin Doilets and Platonida” (1867).
Characteristic feature Leskov’s creativity is that he actively uses the skaz form of storytelling in his works. The story in Russian literature comes from Gogol, but was especially skillfully developed by Leskov and made him famous as an artist. The essence of this manner is that the narration is not conducted on behalf of a neutral, objective author. The narration is conducted by a narrator, usually a participant in the reported events. The speech of a work of art imitates the living speech of an oral story.
He also tried his hand at dramaturgy: in 1867 on stage Alexandrinsky Theater they are staging his drama from the life of a merchant, “The Spendthrift.” The search for positive heroes, the righteous, on whom the Russian land rests (they are also in “anti-nihilistic” novels), a long-standing interest in marginal religious movements - schismatics and sectarians, in folklore, ancient Russian literature and icon painting, in everything “variegated” folk life accumulated in the stories “The Sealed Angel” and “The Enchanted Wanderer” (both 1873), in which Leskov’s style of storytelling fully revealed its capabilities. In “The Sealed Angel,” which tells about the miracle that led the schismatic community to unity with Orthodoxy, there are echoes of ancient Russian “walkings” and legends about miraculous icons.
The image of the hero of “The Enchanted Wanderer” Ivan Flyagin, who went through unimaginable trials, recalls epic Ilya Muromets and symbolizes the physical and moral fortitude of the Russian people amid the suffering that befalls them.
In the second half of the 1870-1880s, Leskov created a cycle of stories about Russian righteous people, without whom “the city would not stand.” In the preface to the first of these stories, “Odnodum” (1879), the writer explained their appearance this way: “it’s terrible and unbearable” to see one “rubbish” in the Russian soul, which has become the main subject of new literature, and “I went to look for the righteous, but where No matter what I asked, everyone answered me in the same way that they had never seen righteous people, because all people were sinners, but both of them knew some good people. I started writing it down.”
Such " good people"turn out to be the director of the cadet corps ("Cadet Monastery", 1880), and a semi-literate tradesman, "who is not afraid of death" ("Not Lethal Golovan", 1880), and an engineer ("Unmercenary Engineers", 1887), and a simple soldier (“Man on the Clock”, 1887), and even a “nihilist” who dreams of feeding all the hungry (“Sheramur”, 1879), etc. This cycle also included the famous “Lefty” (1883) and the previously written “Enchanted wanderer". In essence, the same Leskov righteous people were the characters in the stories “At the End of the World” (1875-1876) and “The Unbaptized Priest” (1877).
Responding in advance to critics’ accusations that his characters were somewhat idealized, Leskov argued that his stories about the “righteous” were mostly in the nature of memories (in particular, what his grandmother told him about Golovan, etc.), and tried to give the story a background of historical authenticity , introducing descriptions of real people into the plot.
In the 1880s, Leskov also created a series of works about the righteous of early Christianity: the action of these works takes place in Egypt and the countries of the Middle East. The plots of these stories were, as a rule, borrowed by him from the “prologue” - a collection of the lives of saints and edifying stories compiled in Byzantium in the 10th-11th centuries. Leskov was proud of his Egyptian sketches of Pamphalon and Azu.
The story "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk". Controversy with “The Thunderstorm” by N. Ostrovsky. A series of works about the “righteous”, a reflection in it of Leskov’s ethical and aesthetic ideal. By conviction, Leskov was a democrat-educator - an enemy of serfdom and its vestiges, a defender of education and popular interests. He considered the main progress to be moral progress. “We need not good orders, but good people,” he wrote. The writer recognized himself as a writer of a new type; his school was not the book, but life itself.
Leskov began publishing relatively late, in the twenty-ninth year of his life, having published several notes in the newspaper “St. Petersburg Vedomosti” (1859-1860), several articles in the Kyiv publications “Modern Medicine”, which was published by A.P. Walter (article “About working class", several notes about doctors) and "Economic Index". Leskov’s articles, which exposed the corruption of police doctors, led to a conflict with his colleagues: as a result of the provocation they organized, Leskov, who conducted the internal investigation, was accused of bribery and was forced to leave the service.
At the beginning of his literary career, N. S. Leskov collaborated with many St. Petersburg newspapers and magazines, most of all publishing in “Otechestvennye zapiski” (where he was patronized by his familiar Oryol publicist S. S. Gromeko), in “Russian speech” and “Northern Bee” . “Otechestvennye zapiski” published “Essays on the Distilling Industry,” which Leskov himself called his first work, considered his first major publication. Leskov’s actual biography of a writer begins in 1863, when he published his first stories (The Life of a Woman, Musk Ox) and began publishing the “anti-nihilistic” novel “Nowhere” (1863–1864). The novel opens with scenes of leisurely provincial life, outraged by the arrival of “new people” and fashionable ideas, then the action moves to the capital. The satirically depicted life of a commune organized by “nihilists” is contrasted with modest work for the good of people and Christian family values, which should save Russia from the disastrous path of social upheaval, where young demagogues are taking it. Then Leskov’s second “anti-nihilistic” novel “On Knives” (1870–1871) appeared, telling about a new phase of the revolutionary movement, when the former “nihilists” are degenerated into ordinary swindlers.
In the 1860s, he intensively searched for his own special path. Based on the outline of popular prints about the love of a clerk and his master's wife, the story “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District” (1865) was written about disastrous passions hidden under the cover of provincial silence. In the story “Old Years in the Village of Plodomasovo” (1869), which depicts serfdom in the 18th century, he approaches the genre of chronicle. In the story “Warrior” (1866), fairy tale forms of storytelling appear for the first time. Elements of the tale that later made him so famous are also found in the story “Kotin Doilets and Platonida” (1867). A characteristic feature of Leskov’s work is that he actively uses the skaz form of storytelling in his works. The story in Russian literature comes from Gogol, but was especially skillfully developed by Leskov and made him famous as an artist. The essence of this manner is that the narration is not conducted on behalf of a neutral, objective author. The narration is conducted, usually by a participant in the reported events. The speech of a work of art imitates the living speech of an oral story. He also tried his hand at drama: in 1867, his drama from the merchant life The Spendthrift was staged on the stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater.
The search for positive heroes, righteous people on whom the Russian land rests (they are also in “anti-nihilistic” novels), a long-standing interest in marginal religious movements - schismatics and sectarians, in folklore, ancient Russian literature and icon painting, in all the “variegated colors” of folk life have accumulated in the stories “The Captured Angel” and “The Enchanted Wanderer” (both 1873), in which Leskov’s style of storytelling fully revealed its capabilities. In the Sealed Angel, which tells about the miracle that led the schismatic community to unity with Orthodoxy, there are echoes of ancient Russian “walkings” and legends about miraculous icons. The image of the hero Enchanted Wanderer Ivan Flyagin, who went through unimaginable trials, resembles the epic Ilya of Murom and symbolizes the physical and moral fortitude of the Russian people amid the suffering that befalls them. In the second half of the 1870s and 1880s, Leskov created a series of stories about Russian righteous people, without whom “the city would not stand.” In the preface to the first of these stories, Odnodum (1879), the writer explained their appearance this way: “it’s terrible and unbearable” to see one “rubbish” in the Russian soul, which has become the main subject of new literature, and “I went to look for the righteous, but wherever I turned, Everyone answered me in the same way that they had never seen righteous people, because all people were sinners, but both of them knew some good people. I started writing it down.”
Such “good people” turn out to be the director of the cadet corps (Cadet Monastery, 1880), and a semi-literate tradesman, “who is not afraid of death” (Not Lethal Golovan, 1880), and an engineer (Unmercenary Engineers, 1887), and a simple soldier (Man on the clock, 1887), and even a “nihilist” who dreams of feeding all the hungry (Sheramur, 1879), etc. This cycle also included the famous “Lefty” (1883) and the previously written “Enchanted” Wanderer. In essence, the same Leskov righteous people were the characters in the stories “At the End of the World” (1875–1876) and “The Unbaptized Priest” (1877). Responding in advance to critics’ accusations that his characters were somewhat idealized, Leskov argued that his stories about the “righteous” were mostly in the nature of memories (in particular, what his grandmother told him about Golovan, etc.), and tried to give the story a background of historical authenticity , introducing descriptions of real people into the plot.
In the 1880s, Leskov also created a series of works about the righteous of early Christianity: the action of these works takes place in Egypt and the countries of the Middle East. The plots of these stories were, as a rule, borrowed by him from the “prologue” - a collection of the lives of saints and edifying stories compiled in Byzantium in the 10th-11th centuries. Leskov was proud of his Egyptian sketches of Pamphalon and Azu.
At the same time, the satirical and accusatory line in the writer’s work also intensified (“The Stupid Artist”, “The Beast”, “The Scarecrow”): along with officials and officers, clergy began to appear more and more often among his negative heroes. In his later years, creating stories based on an anecdote, a “curious incident” preserved and embellished by oral tradition, Leskov combines them into cycles. This is how “stories by the way” arise, depicting situations that are funny, but no less significant in their national character (Voice of Nature, 1883; Alexandrite, 1885; Ancient Psychopaths, 1885; Interesting men, 1885; Deceased class, 1888; Corral, 1893; Lady and fefela, 1894; etc.), and " yuletide stories" - clever tales about imaginary and real miracles that happen at Christmas (Christ visiting a peasant, 1881; Ghost in the Engineering Castle, 1882; Journey with a Nihilist, 1882; The Beast, 1883; Old Genius, 1884; Scarecrow, 1885; etc. .). The cycle of essays Pechersk Antiques and the story “The Stupid Artist” (both 1883), which tells about the sad fate of a talented hairdresser from the serfs in the 18th century, are “anecdotal” in their essence and stylized as historical and memoir works.
Leskov's latest works (novel-pamphlet Devil's Dolls, 1890; stories Midnight Workers, 1891; Yudol, 1892; stories Hour of God's Will, 1890; Improvisers, 1892; Product of Nature, 1893; etc.) are marked by sharp criticism of the entire political system of the Russian Empire, especially its police component. For this reason, some of them were published after the 1917 coup.
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