Manilov is the hero of N.V. Gogol's poem, a landowner. He is the first of the landowners whom Chichikov visits. The author plays on the character’s surname (from the verb “to lure”, “to lure”).
Manilov is characterized by the author as a fruitless dreamer, a man without his own opinion, unable to bring any matter to completion. The character of the hero is difficult to grasp. The author himself describes it using a proverb: “people are so-so, neither this nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan nor in the village of Selifan”. Manilov’s appearance further emphasizes his dullness and typical nature: “In appearance he was a distinguished man; His facial features were not devoid of pleasantness, but this pleasantness seemed to have too much sugar in it; in his techniques and turns there was something ingratiating favor and acquaintance. He smiled enticingly, was blond, with blue eyes. In the first minute of conversation with him you can’t help but say: “What a pleasant and a kind person“The next minute you won’t say anything, and the third you’ll say: “The devil knows what it is!” and you’ll move away; if you don’t move away, you’ll feel mortal boredom.”
Manilov's mismanagement is shown even when describing his estate. Chichikov sees lifeless and pitiful views. His house is blown by all the winds, dilapidation and desolation are everywhere. The gazebo, which is pompously called the “Temple of Solitary Reflection,” also attracts attention.
Manilov's household is run by a drinking clerk, the housekeeper steals, the servants sleep and idle: “You can’t say that he was involved in farming, he never even went to the fields, farming somehow went on by itself.” Manilov constantly comes up with various “projects” that are not only useless, but also hardly feasible: “...looking from the porch at the yard and the pond, he talked about how nice it would be if he could suddenly lead from the house underground passage or build a stone bridge across the pond, on which there would be shops on both sides, and so that merchants could sit in them and sell various small goods needed by the peasants.”
Manilov is a supporter of everything Western and emphasizes his high education. He even named his children strange names- Themistoclus and Alcides. He is happily married, but his relationship with his wife looks feigned and parodicly sentimental.
Manilov is not looking for benefits in the deal with Chichikov. He gives the souls of the peasants for free and takes over the deed of sale.
Behind Manilov's external pleasantness lies insignificance, dullness and emptiness.
Poem by N.V. Gogol " Dead Souls"was published in 1842. The title of the poem can be understood in two ways. Firstly, main character, Chichikov, buys dead peasants (dead souls) from landowners. Secondly, the landowners amaze with the callousness of their souls; each hero is endowed with negative qualities. If we compare dead peasants and living landowners, it turns out that it is the landowners who have “dead souls.” Since the image of a road runs throughout the entire narrative, the main character is traveling. One gets the impression that Chichikov is simply visiting old friends. Through the eyes of Chichikov we see landowners, their villages, houses and families, which plays an important role in revealing the images. Together with the main character, the reader goes through the path from Manilov to Plyushkin. Each landowner is painted in detail and thoroughly. Consider the image of Manilov.
The surname Manilov is a telling one, you can guess that it is formed from the verb to lure (to attract to oneself). In this man, Gogol exposes laziness, fruitless daydreaming, sentimentality, and inability to move forward. As they say about him in the poem, “a man is neither this nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan, nor in the village of Selifan.” Manilov is polite and courteous, the first impression of him is even pleasant, but when you look into the details and get to know the landowner better, your opinion about him changes. It gets boring with him.
Manilov has a large estate, but does not take care of his village at all, does not know how many peasants he has. He doesn't care about life and fate common people, “the economy somehow went on by itself.” Manilov’s mismanagement is revealed to us on the way to the estate: everything is lifeless, pitiful, petty. Manilov is impractical and stupid - he takes over the bill of sale and does not understand the benefits sales of the dead shower. He allows the peasants to drink instead of work, his steward does not know his business and, like the landowner, does not know how and does not want to manage the farm.
Manilov constantly has his head in the clouds, not wanting to notice what is happening around him: “how good it would be if suddenly an underground passage was built from the house or a stone bridge was built across the pond.” It is clear that dreams remain just dreams, some are replaced by others, and this will always be the case. Manilov lives in a world of fantasies and “projects”, real world alien and incomprehensible to him, “all these projects ended only in words.” This person quickly gets boring, since he does not have his own opinion, and can only smile cloyingly and say banal phrases. Manilov considers himself well-mannered, educated, noble. However, in his office for two years there has been a book with a bookmark on page 14, covered with dust, which suggests that new information Manilov is not interested, he only creates the appearance of an educated person. Manilov’s delicacy and warmth are expressed in absurd forms: “cabbage soup, but from the heart,” “May day, name day of the heart”; officials, according to Manilov, are entirely “most respectable” and “most amiable” people. The speech characterizes this character as a person who always flatters; it is not clear whether he really thinks so or simply creates an appearance in order to flatter others, so that right time There were helpful people nearby.
Manilov tries to keep up with fashion. He tries to adhere to the European way of life. The wife studies French at a boarding school, plays the piano, and the children have strange and difficult to pronounce names - Themistoclus and Alcides. They receive home education, which is typical for wealthy people of that time. But the things surrounding Manilov testify to his inability, isolation from life, and indifference to reality: the house is open to all winds, the pond is completely overgrown with duckweed, the gazebo in the garden is called “Temple of Solitary Reflection.” The stamp of dullness, scarcity, uncertainty lies on everything that surrounds Manilov. The setting clearly characterizes the hero himself. Gogol emphasizes the emptiness and insignificance of Manilov. There is nothing negative in it, but there is nothing positive either. Therefore, this hero cannot count on transformation and rebirth: there is nothing to be reborn in him. Manilov's world is a world of false idyll, the path to death. It is not for nothing that Chichikov’s path to the lost Manilovka is depicted as a path to nowhere. There are no living desires in him, that force of life that moves a person and forces him to perform some actions. In this sense, Manilov is a “dead soul.” The image of Manilov personifies a universal human phenomenon - “Manilovism,” that is, the tendency to create chimeras and pseudo-philosophizing.
Lesson summary based on N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls.”
(9th grade)
Subject: “Everyone has his own, but Manilov had nothing”
Target: analyze the image of the landowner Manilov.
Tasks:
identify techniques for describing the character of the landowner, the internal logic of creating the image;
teach the ability to determine the principles of typification of social phenomena;
involve students in research work.
Lesson structure:
1 . Organizational stage.
2. Checking homework.
3. Announcement of the topicand lesson objectives.
4. Work in notebooks.
5. Summing up the lesson.
6. Homework.
During the classes
1. Organizational stage.
1. Preparing students for work in the classroom.
2. Mutual greeting between teacher and students.
3. Visual control of readiness for the lesson.
2. Checking homework.
3. Announcement of the topic and lesson objectives.
One of the features of N.V. Gogol’s talent is that “passion to know everything,” that “desire to know a person,” which makes him look for people of all classes and notice something interesting in everyone.”
So, the purpose of today's lesson is to analyze the image of the landowner Manilov.
In the poem “Dead Souls” N.V. Gogol wrote: “It is much easier to portray characters big size: there, just throw paints from your entire hand onto the canvas... and the portrait is ready; but all these gentlemen, of whom there are many in the world, who look very similar to each other, and yet, when you look closely, you will see many of the most elusive features - these gentlemen are terribly difficult for portraits.”
Guys, please tell me when the first meeting with Manilov takes place?(The meeting with Manilov occurs already in the first chapter) .
What impression can you form about Manilov before meeting him?
4. Work in notebooks.
Now we will create a table in which we will record quotes from the text and your observations. We will fill it out during the discussion.
Criterion
Manilov
Appearance
Character
Features of behavior and speech
Relationships with others
Description of the estate
The result of the transaction
- Manilov's appearance.
In the description of Manilov’s portrait there is a succinct phrase: “...revealing in his face an expression that is not only sweet, but even cloying...”
IN portrait characteristics Manilov, the author emphasizes that he is a prominent person, but only “at first glance”; his facial features are not devoid of pleasantness, “but this pleasantness is somehow cloying, “sugar”; “ingratiating” manners, “tempting” smile, “blond hair, blue eyes.” The first impression is that Manilov is a kind, pleasant person, then some kind of uncertainty is felt, it is even suggested by the author: “neither this nor that...”.
- Manilov's character.
With his first phrase, Gogol emphasizes Manilov’s lack of anything specific: “Everyone has his own enthusiasm<...>... in a word, everyone has their own, but Manilov had nothing.” The character of this man seems to merge with the tone of the gray, boring, lifeless landscape.
- Features of behavior and speech.
In the expression on Manilov’s face during conversation, in speech, in the choice of words, in the manners and intonations of his voice, the author notes the same exaggerated sensitivity, sentimentality, and most importantly, mental limitation, vacuity, and helplessness of thought. Manilov is trying to conduct a lofty conversation, to understand facts of life. He talks a lot, uses nothing meaningful words, cannot complete sentences, instead there are gestures that replace the statement. All this speaks of the lack of content of Manilov’s thoughts, of his stupidity.
- Relationships with others.
The owner and his wife communicated with each other in a cloyingly sentimental manner: “Open your mouth, darling, I’ll put this piece in for you.” Manilov expresses himself extremely elegantly and in a bookish way: “It really was such a pleasure, May Day, the name day of the heart...”. Every person in Manilov is kind, courteous, sweet, pleasant, intelligent, educated, well-read and worthy, but not because this is how it really is, but because Manilov does not understand anything about people. The names of Manilov's children - Alcides and Themistoclus - clearly smack of the pagan ancient past, ancient times before the birth of Christ.
The comic scene at the door in the living room characterizes Manilov as overly amiable and intrusive. Again, the hero feels “saccharine sweetness.”
- Description of the estate.
The description of the village and the estate characterizes the landowner as lazy and mismanagement: the house stood “open to all the winds,” and the pond in the estate was covered with greenery. The author ironically notes that this “is not unusual in the English gardens of Russian landowners.” The birch trees here are “small-leaved, sparse,” “gray log huts” are scattered around the manor’s house and “nowhere between them is a growing tree or any greenery...”. The gazebo with a flat green dome and blue columns was called the “Temple of Solitary Reflection.” Life in the house and on the entire estate seemed to have stopped: the bookmark still remained on page 14, two armchairs were not ready and were covered with matting.
- The result of the transaction.
He is confused and helpless before Chichikov's proposal to sell dead souls. Gogol conveys this well by describing the hero’s facial expressions and gestures. It is surprising that, without knowing the person (Chichikov), Manilov immediately trusts him and tries in every possible way to serve him, to prove his “heartfelt attraction”... After this, he does not think about his action, but indulges in joyful reflections that he has given the guest a little pleasure. Again we see Manilov’s spinelessness and stupidity, which manifests itself not only in deeds, but also in his thoughts.So, the ability to persuade gave Chichikov his first results and he achieved his goal, without spending any savings.
5. Summing up the lesson.
What is the main thing in Manilov? What detail in the description of the hero is dominant?(The theme of sugar and sweetness, the author, with his comparisons, ensures that the reader develops a feeling close to physical disgust.)
- What is hidden behind Manilov’s smiling face? How does the author himself characterize the hero?(A pleasant Manilov smile for everyone is a sign of deep indifference to everything around them; such people are not capable of experiencing anger, sorrow, joy.)
- With the help of what details does Gogol give a comic coloring to the images of his characters?(An integral part of Gogol’s portrait drawing are poses, clothing, movements, gestures, facial expressions. With their help, the writer enhances the comic coloring of the images and reveals the true essence of the hero.)
What is distinguishing feature Manilov?(His main psychological trait is the desire to please everyone and always.)
What do the names of Manilov’s children emphasize?
What conclusions does the author lead readers to?( Manilov is a calm observer of everything that happens; bribe takers, thieves, embezzlers - all the most respected people for him. Manilov is an indefinite person; he has no living human desires. This is a dead soul, a person “so-so, neither this nor that.”)
Conclusion. Instead of real feeling, Manilov has a “pleasant smile”, cloying courtesy and sensitive phrases; instead of thought - some kind of incoherent, stupid reflections, instead of activity - either empty dreams, or such results of “labor” as “slides of ash knocked out of a pipe, arranged, not without effort, in very beautiful rows.
6. Homework
One of the characters in the poem “Dead Souls” by Nikolai Gogol is the landowner Manilov, a blond and blue-eyed retired officer. The image of Manilov is very interesting - he leads an idle and comfortable life, indulging in dreams from morning to evening. Manilov’s dreams are fruitless and absurd: to dig an underground passage or build such a high superstructure over the house so that you can see Moscow.
Speaking about Manilov’s characterization, it should be noted that during the idle dreams of the landowner, the master’s house is blown by all the winds, the pond is covered with greenery, and the serfs become lazy and completely out of hand. But all sorts of everyday problems They care little about the landowner Manilov; all management of the farm is entrusted to the clerk.
The clerk is also not particularly bothered, as evidenced by his plump face with eyes swollen from satiety. At 9 o'clock in the morning the clerk, having left his soft feather beds, just begins to drink tea. Life on an estate of 200 peasant huts, somehow flows by itself.
The image of Manilov in the poem "Dead Souls"
Manilov is mostly silent, constantly smoking a pipe and reveling in his fantasies. His young wife, whose feelings for whom have not faded over 8 years of married life, is raising two sons with original names- Themistoclus and Alcides.
At the first meeting, Manilov makes a very favorable impression on everyone, since thanks to his good-natured disposition, he sees only the good in all people, and turns a blind eye to the shortcomings inherent in every person.
What is "Manilovism"? The image of Manilov gave birth to this concept, which means a complacent and dreamy attitude towards life, but it also combines idleness.
Manilov tends to become so immersed in his dreams that life around him seems to freeze. The same book has been lying on his desk for two years, on page 14.
The owner of the estate is characterized by selflessness - when Chichikov’s visit to Manilov took place with the purpose shopping dead souls (dead, but considered alive according to the revision tales of peasants), Manilov suppresses the guest’s attempts to pay money for them. Although at first he is very surprised by this proposal, his pipe even falls out of his mouth and he is temporarily speechless.
Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov, in turn, is surprised that Manilov and the clerk cannot immediately answer the question of how many peasants have died since the previous census. There is only one answer: “A lot.”
The image of Manilov is noteworthy in that he gave rise to such a concept as “Manilovism,” which means a complacent and dreamy attitude towards life, combined with idleness and inactivity.
Work:
Dead Souls
Gogol emphasizes the emptiness and insignificance of the hero, covered by the sugary pleasantness of his appearance and the details of the furnishings of his estate. M.'s house is open to all winds, the sparse tops of birch trees are visible everywhere, the pond is completely overgrown with duckweed. But the gazebo in M.’s garden is pompously named “Temple of Solitary Reflection.” M.’s office is covered with “blue paint, sort of grey,” which indicates the lifelessness of the hero, from whom you won’t get a single living word. Having caught on to any topic, M.’s thoughts float into the distance, into abstract thoughts. To think about real life, and even more so, this hero is not capable of making any decisions. Everything in M.'s life: action, time, meaning - has been replaced by refined verbal formulas. As soon as Chichikov expressed his strange request for the sale of dead souls in beautiful words, and M. immediately calmed down and agreed. Although before this proposal seemed wild to him. M.’s world is a world of false idyll, the path to death. It is not for nothing that even Chichikov’s path to the lost Manilovka is depicted as a path to nowhere. There is nothing negative in M., but there is nothing positive either. He is an empty place, nothing. Therefore, this hero cannot count on transformation and rebirth: there is nothing to be reborn in him. And therefore M., along with Korobochka, occupies one of the lowest places in the “hierarchy” of the heroes of the poem.
This man is a little reminiscent of Chichikov himself. “God alone could say what kind of character M. has. There is a family of people known by the name: neither this, nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan, nor in the village of Selifan. His facial features were not devoid of pleasantness, but in this pleasantness, it seemed , too much sugar."
M. considers himself well-mannered, educated, noble. But let's look into his office. We see heaps of ashes, a dusty book, which has been open for the second year on page 14. there is always something missing in the house, only some of the furniture is upholstered in silk fabric, and two armchairs are upholstered in matting. M.’s weakness is also emphasized by the fact that the landowner’s housekeeping is handled by a drunkard clerk.
M. is a dreamer, and his dreams are completely divorced from reality. He dreams of “how good it would be if suddenly an underground passage was built from the house or a stone bridge was built across the pond.” G. emphasizes the inactivity and social uselessness of the landowner, but does not deprive him human qualities. M. is a family man, loves his wife and children, sincerely rejoices at the arrival of a guest, tries in every possible way to please him and do something pleasant.
MANILOV is a character in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls” (first volume 1842 under the title “The Adventures of Chichikov, or Dead Souls”; second volume 1842-1845). Meaningful name M. (from the verb “to lure”, “to lure”) is played ironically by Gogol, parodying laziness, fruitless daydreaming, projectism, and sentimentality. Possible literary sources images of M. - characters from the works of N.M. Karamzin, for example Erast from the story “ Poor Lisa». Historical prototype, according to Likhachev, there could be Tsar Nicholas I, who reveals kinship with type M. The image of M. dynamically unfolds from the proverb: a person is neither this nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan, nor in the village of Selifan. Things surrounding M. testify to his inability, isolation from life, and indifference to reality: the manor’s house stands on the south, “open to all winds”; M. spends time in a gazebo with the inscription “Temple of Solitary Reflection,” where various fantastic projects occur to him, for example, to build an underground passage from the house or to build a stone bridge across a pond; in M.’s office for two years in a row there has been a book with a bookmark on page 14; There are ashes scattered in caps, a tobacco box, piles of ash knocked out of a pipe are neatly placed on the table and windows, which constitutes M. M.’s leisure time, immersed in tempting thoughts, never goes out into the fields, and meanwhile the men get drunk, near the gray huts of the village of M. not a single tree - “only one log”; the economy goes on somehow by itself; the housekeeper steals, M.'s servants sleep and hang out. M.'s portrait is built on the principle of quantitative injection positive quality(enthusiasm, sympathy, hospitality) to extreme excess, turning into the opposite, negative quality: “his facial features were not devoid of pleasantness, but this pleasantness seemed to have too much sugar in it”; in M.’s face “the expression is not only sweet, but even cloying, similar to that mixture that the clever secular doctor sweetened mercilessly...”; “In the first minute of a conversation with him, you can’t help but say: “What a pleasant and kind person!” The next time you won’t say anything, and the third time you’ll say: “The devil knows what it is!” - and you will move further away...” The love of M. and his wife is parodic and sentimental. After eight years of marriage, they still bring sweets and tidbits to each other with the words: “Open your mouth, darling, I’ll put this piece for you.” They love surprises: they prepare a “beaded toothpick case” or a knitted wallet as a gift. M.'s refined delicacy and warmth are expressed in absurd forms of irrepressible delight: “cabbage soup, but from the heart,” “May day, name day of the heart”; officials, according to M., are entirely the most respectable and most amiable people. M.'s image personifies a universal human phenomenon - “Manilovism,” that is, the tendency to create chimeras and pseudo-philosophizing. M. dreams of a neighbor with whom he could talk “about courtesy, about good treatment, follow some kind of science that would stir his soul in this way, would give, so to speak, this guy ...”, philosophize “under the shadow of an elm tree” ( Gogol's parody of the abstraction of German idealism). Generalization, abstraction, indifference to details are the properties of M.’s worldview. In his sterile idealism, M. is the antipode of the materialist, practical and Russophile Sobakevich. M. is a Westerner, gravitates towards the enlightened European image life. M.'s wife studied French at a boarding school, plays the piano, and M.'s children, Themistoclus and Alcides, are educated at home; their names, in addition, contain the heroic claims of M. (Alcides is the middle name of Hercules; Themistocles is the leader of the Athenian democracy), however, the alogism of the name Themistoclus (the Greek name - the ending “yus” is Latin) ridicules the beginnings of the formation of the semi-European Russian nobility. The effect of Gogol’s alogism (ugliness that violates the decent norm of the subject series) emphasizes the decadence of “Manilovism”: at dinner at M.’s, a dandy candlestick with three ancient graces and next to “a copper invalid, lame... covered in fat” is placed on the table; in the living room there is “wonderful furniture upholstered in dandy silk fabric” - and two armchairs upholstered in matting. M's estate is the first circle of Dante's hell, where Chichikov descends, the first stage of the “deadness” of the soul (M. still retains sympathy for people), which, according to Gogol, consists in the absence of any “enthusiasm.” The figure of M. is immersed in a dim atmosphere, designed in twilight-ash and gray tones, creating “a feeling of the strange ephemerality of what is depicted” (V. Markovich). Comparing M. with a “too smart minister” indicates the illusory ephemerality and projectism of the highest state power, whose typical features are vulgar sweetness and hypocrisy (S. Mashinsky). In the dramatization of the poem carried out by the Moscow Art Theater (1932), the role of M. was played by M.N. Kedrov.
Manilov is a character in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls.” The name Manilov (from the verb “to lure”, “to lure”) is played ironically by Gogol. It parodies laziness, fruitless daydreaming, projectism, and sentimentality.
(The historical prototype, according to D. Likhachev, could be Tsar Nicholas I, who reveals kinship with the Manilov type.)
Manilov is a sentimental landowner, the first “seller” of dead souls.
The image of Manilov dynamically unfolds from the proverb: a person is neither this nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan, nor in the village of Selifan.
1) The character of the hero is not defined, it is not perceptible.
“God alone could say what kind of character Manilov has. There is a race of people known by the name: neither this nor that, neither in the city of Bogdan, nor in the village of Selifan.”
Manilov’s weakness is also emphasized by the fact that the landowner’s housekeeping is handled by a drunkard clerk.
Generality, abstraction, indifference to details are the properties of Manilov’s worldview.
In his sterile idealism, Manilov is the antithesis of the materialist, practitioner and Russophile Sobakevich
Manilov is a dreamer, and his dreams are completely divorced from reality. “How nice it would be if suddenly an underground passage was built from the house or a stone bridge was built across the pond.”
The landowner was only engaged in project planning: he dreamed, but these projects did not come true.
At first he seems like a nice person, but then you become deathly boring with him, because he has no opinion of his own and can only smile and say banal, sugary phrases.
In Manilov there are no living desires, that force of life that moves a person, forces him to perform some actions. In this sense, Manilov is a dead soul, “not this, not that.”
He is so typical, gray, uncharacteristic that he does not even have certain inclinations towards anything, he does not have a name or patronymic.
2) appearance - In Manilov’s face “the expression is not only sweet, but even cloying, similar to that potion that a clever secular doctor sweetened mercilessly...”;
Negative quality: “his facial features were not without pleasantness, but this pleasantness seemed to have too much sugar in it”;
Manilov himself is an outwardly pleasant person, but that’s if you don’t communicate with him: there’s nothing to talk to him about, he’s a boring conversationalist.
3) education - Manilov considers himself well-mannered, educated, noble.
But in Manilov’s office for two years in a row there has been a book with a bookmark on page 14.
He displays a “beautiful soul” in everything, lively manners and an amiable chirp in conversation.
Having caught on to any topic, Manilov’s thoughts float into the distance, into abstract thoughts.
Manilov’s refined delicacy and warmth is expressed in absurd forms of irrepressible delight: “cabbage soup, but from the bottom of my heart,” “May day, name day of the heart”; officials, according to Manilov, are entirely the most respectable and most amiable people.
Manilov most often uses words in his speech: “dear”, “permit me”, and indefinite pronouns and adverbs: some, this, some, this...
These words add a tinge of uncertainty to everything that Manilov says, creating a feeling of semantic futility of speech: Manilov dreams of a neighbor with whom he could talk “about courtesy, about good treatment, follow some kind of science,” “as it would be in the real world.” It would be really good if we could live together like this, under the same roof, or philosophize under the shadow of some elm tree.”
This hero is not capable of thinking about real life, much less making any decisions. Everything in Manilov's life: action, time, meaning - has been replaced by refined verbal formulas.
Manilov is a Westerner and gravitates towards the enlightened European way of life. Manilov's wife studied French at a boarding school, plays the piano, and Manilov's children, Themistoclus and Alcides, are educated at home;
Comparing Manilov with a “too smart minister” indicates the illusory ephemerality and projectism of the highest state power, the typical features of which are vulgar sweetness and hypocrisy.
The claims to sophistication, education, and refinement of taste further emphasize the inner simplicity of the inhabitants of the estate. In essence, this is decoration covering up poverty.
4) qualities: positive - enthusiasm, sympathy (Manilov still retains sympathy for people), hospitality.
Human Manilov is a family man, loves his wife and children, sincerely rejoices at the arrival of a guest, tries in every possible way to please him and do something pleasant.
And he has a sweet relationship with his wife. Lyubov Manilov and his wives are parodic and sentimental
Manilov was mismanagement, the business “somehow went by itself.” Manilov’s mismanagement is revealed to us on the way to the estate: everything is lifeless, pitiful, petty.
Manilov is impractical - he takes over the bill of sale and does not understand the benefits of selling dead souls. He allows the peasants to drink instead of work, his steward does not know his business and, like the landowner, does not know how and does not want to manage the farm.
Manilov is a boring interlocutor, from him “you won’t get any lively or even arrogant words”, that after talking with him, “you will feel mortal boredom.”
Manilov is a landowner who is completely indifferent to the fate of the peasants.
Gogol emphasizes the inactivity and social uselessness of the landowner: the economy somehow goes on by itself; the housekeeper steals, M.'s servants sleep and hang out...
5) Things surrounding Manilov testify to his inability, isolation from life, and indifference to reality:
Manilov’s house is open to all the winds, thin tops of birches are visible everywhere, the pond is completely overgrown with duckweed, but the gazebo in Manilov’s garden is pompously named “Temple of Solitary Reflection.”
The master's house stands on the south; near the drab huts of the village of Manilov there is not a single tree - “only one log”;
The stamp of dullness, scarcity, and uncertainty of color lies on everything that surrounds Manilov: gray day, gray huts.
In the owners’ house, everything is also untidy and dull: the wife’s silk hood is pale in color, the walls of the office are painted “with some kind of blue paint, like gray”..., creating “a feeling of the strange ephemerality of what is depicted”
The situation always clearly characterizes the hero. In Gogol, this technique is brought to a satirical point: his heroes are immersed in the world of things, their appearance is exhausted by things.
Estate M is the first circle of Dante’s hell, where Chichikov descends, the first stage of the “deadness” of the soul (sympathy for people still remains), which, according to Gogol, consists in the absence of any “enthusiasm.”
Manilov's estate is the front façade of landowner Russia.
6) Manilov’s leisure time is:
Manilov spends time in a gazebo with the inscription “Temple of Solitary Reflection,” where various fantastic projects come to his mind (for example, to build an underground passage from the house or to build a stone bridge across a pond); in Manilov’s office for two years in a row there has been a book with a bookmark on page 14; There are ashes scattered in caps, a tobacco box, piles of ash knocked out of a pipe are neatly placed on the table and windows, immersed in tempting thoughts, he never goes out into the fields, and meanwhile the men get drunk...
Conclusion.
Gogol emphasizes the emptiness and insignificance of the hero, covered by the sugary pleasantness of his appearance and the details of the furnishings of his estate.
There is nothing negative in Manilov, but there is nothing positive either.
He is an empty place, nothing.
Therefore, this hero cannot count on transformation and rebirth: there is nothing to be reborn in him.
Manilov's world is a world of false idyll, the path to death.
It is not for nothing that even Chichikov’s path to the lost Manilovka is depicted as a path to nowhere.
And therefore Manilov, along with Korobochka, occupies one of the lowest places in the “hierarchy” of the heroes of the poem.
The image of Manilov personifies a universal human phenomenon - “Manilovism,” that is, the tendency to create chimeras and pseudo-philosophizing.