The daughter of the common people, who also inherited the people's scope of passions, a girl from a poor family becomes a captive of a merchant's house, where there is neither the sound of the living, nor the voice of a person, but there is only a short stitch from the samovar to the bedchamber. The transformation of the bourgeois woman, languishing from boredom and excess energy, takes place when the district heartthrob pays attention to her.
Love scatters a starry sky over Katerina Lvovna, which she had never seen before from her mezzanine: Look, Seryozha, what a paradise, what a paradise! The heroine exclaims childishly and innocently into the golden night, looking through the thick branches covering her. blossoming apple tree to clean blue sky, which had a full fine month.
But it is no coincidence that in pictures of love, harmony is disrupted by suddenly invading discord. Katerina Lvovna’s feelings cannot be free from the instincts of the possessive world and not fall under the influence of its laws. Love yearning for freedom turns into a predatory and destructive beginning.
Katerina Lvovna was now ready for Sergei through fire, water, prison and the cross. He made her fall in love with him to the point that there was no measure of devotion to him. She was distraught with her happiness; her blood was boiling, and she could no longer listen to anything...
And at the same time, Katerina Lvovna’s blind passion is immeasurably greater, more significant than self-interest, which gives shape to her fatal actions and class interests. No, her inner world not shocked by the court's decision, not excited by the birth of a child: for her there was neither light nor darkness, neither bad nor good, nor boredom, nor joy. My whole life was completely consumed by passion. When a party of prisoners sets out on the road and the heroine sees Sergei again, happiness blossoms with him in her convict life. What is the social height from which she fell into the convict world for her, if she loves and her beloved is nearby!
The class world gets at Katerina Lvovna on the washed-out transit routes. For a long time he prepared an executioner for her in the guise of a lover who had once beckoned her to happy fairytale Arabia. Admitting that he never loved Katerina Lvovna, Sergei is trying to take away the only thing that made up Izmailova’s life, the past of her love. And then the completely lifeless woman, in the last heroic surge of human dignity, takes revenge on her scoffers and, dying, petrifies everyone around her. Katerina Lvovna was trembling. Her wandering gaze concentrated and became wild. Hands once or twice stretched out into space unknown where and fell again. Another minute and she suddenly swayed all over, without taking her eyes off the dark wave, bent down, grabbed Sonetka by the legs and in one fell swoop threw her over the side of the ferry. Everyone was petrified with amazement.
Leskov portrayed a strong and passionate nature, awakened by the illusion of happiness, but pursuing her goal through crimes. The writer proved that this path had no way out, but only a dead end awaited the heroine, and there could be no other way.
This wonderful work served as the basis for D. D. Shostakovich’s opera Katerina Izmailova, written in 1962. Which once again proves the extraordinary nature of the work of N. S. Leskov, who managed to find and convey typical features the character of Katerina Lvovna, which revealed itself so tragically and led the heroine to inevitable death.
Each writer in his work creates a world (which is usually called artistic), different not only from other artistic worlds, but also from the real world. Moreover, it has long been noted that in different works of the same writer, the worlds can also be different, varying depending on the characters of the characters depicted, on the complexity of the social or spiritual situation depicted by the author.
The above applies primarily to the work of such original and original writers as N.S.
The plots, characters, and themes of his works are so diverse that it is sometimes quite difficult to form an idea of any artistic unity.
However, they have a lot in common, in particular: motives, tonality, character traits of the characters and main characters. Therefore, after reading several works by Leskov and opening the next one, you involuntarily tune in to a certain mood, imagine the situation, environment, atmosphere, immersed in which you discover a world that is amazing and beautiful in its originality.
Leskov’s world may seem strange and gloomy to an unprepared reader, because it is inhabited mainly by truth-seeking heroes, surrounded by ignorant fools, for whom the only goal is prosperity and peace of mind. However, thanks to the power of Leskov’s unique talent, life-affirming motives predominate in the depiction of heroes. Hence the feeling inner beauty and harmony art world Leskov's heroes are surprisingly pure and noble, their speech is simple and at the same time beautiful, as they convey thoughts containing eternal truths about the power of good, the need for mercy and self-sacrifice. The inhabitants of Leskov's vast world are so real that the reader is convinced that they were copied from life. We have no doubt that the author actually met them during his many trips around Russia. But no matter how ordinary and simple these people are, they are all righteous, as Leskov himself defines them. People who rise above the line of simple morality are therefore holy to the Lord. The reader clearly understands the author’s goal to draw attention to the Russian people, their character and soul. Leskov manages to fully reveal the character of a Russian person with all his pros and cons.
What is especially striking when reading Leskov’s works is his heroes’ faith in God and boundless love for their homeland. These feelings are so sincere and strong that a person overwhelmed by them can overcome all the obstacles that stand in his way. In general, a Russian person is always ready to sacrifice everything and even his life in order to achieve his high and beautiful goal. Someone sacrifices themselves for the sake of faith, someone for the sake of the Fatherland, and Katerina Izmailova, the heroine of Lady Macbeth Mtsensk district, sacrificed everything in order to save her love, and when all ways and means were tried, and a way out of the situation was not found, she threw herself into the river. This is similar to the ending of Ostrovsky's play, where Katerina Kabanova dies because of her love, and in this Leskov is similar.
But no matter how beautiful and pure of soul a Russian person is, he also has negative qualities, one of which is a tendency to drink. And Leskov denounces this vice in many of his works, the heroes of which understand that drinking is stupid and absurd, but they cannot help themselves. This is probably also a purely Russian feature of the behavior of letting go of one’s soul by drowning one’s grief in wine.
Growing up in the lap of nature, among beautiful landscapes, space and light, Leskov’s simple hero from the people strives for something sublime, for beauty and love. For each specific hero, this desire manifests itself in its own way: for Ivan Flyagin it is a love for horses, and for Mark Alexandrov it is an enthusiastic attitude towards art, towards an icon.
Leskov’s world is the world of Russian people, carefully created and preserved by them for themselves. All works were written by Leskov with such an understanding of even the most incomprehensible depths of the human psyche, with such love for the righteous and Russia, that the reader involuntarily becomes imbued with Leskov’s style of writing, begins to really think about the questions that once worried the writer and have not lost their relevance and in our time.
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Homework on the topic of: Lady Macbeth Mtsensk history tragic love and crimes of Katerina Izmailova.
Passionate nature or sick soul
in Leskov’s essay “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District”.
Literature lesson in 10th grade.
Teacher Shulepova Irina Anatolyevna
Didactic purpose : to contribute to the formation of UUD in the process of understanding and comprehending the idea of Leskov’s essay by means of activating students’ independent cognitive activity.
Lesson type : a lesson in learning new material and primary consolidation.
Planned results (content goals):
Subject :
Know the concept of “essay”;
Compare heroes different works;
Evaluate the actions of the heroes;
Analyze the text of a work of fiction.
Metasubject:
Cognitive :
Find the necessary information in the text;
Analyze, compare, contrast, generalize, draw conclusions.
Communication :
Collaborate productively and communicate with peers when solving various educational problems;
Formulate and express your own opinions on lesson problem,
Use adequately speech means for solving various communication problems.
Regulatory :
Choose actions in accordance with the assigned tasks;
Correct your own answers.
Personal:
Develop meaning-making;
Form artistic taste;
Develop the ability for independent learning activities;
To educate a creative reader, a sensitive listener;
Educate citizens moral qualities personality.
Teaching methods : reproductive, partially search.
Forms of organization of students’ cognitive activity : frontal, individual, group.
During the classes.
There is righteous happiness, and there is sinful happiness.
The righteous will not cross anyone,
and sinners will overcome everything .
Leskov "Non-Lethal Golovan".
Fear the man whose God is in heaven .
B.Shaw.
Lesson organization.
1.Opening speech by the teacher.
The essay “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District” was first published in the magazine “Epoch” in 1865 under the title “Lady Macbeth of Our District”. The story shows the inextricable connection between capital and love crime. This is one of the artistic peaks of Leskov’s work. The main content of N. S. Leskov’s essay “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk” is the theme of love, the theme of a tragic female fate.
2.Genre originality .
Define an essay.
Feature article - one of the varieties of the small form of epic literature - the story, which differs from its other form, the short story, in the absence of a single, acute and quickly resolved conflict and in the greater development of the descriptive image.
An essay is an artistic and journalistic genre that combines logical-rational and emotional-imaginative ways of reflecting reality to address certain aspects of the concept of a person or social life.
Essay literaturetouches not on the problems of the formation of the character of an individual in its conflicts with the established social environment, as is inherent in the short story (and novel), but on the problems of the civil and moral state of the “environment” (usually embodied in individual individuals) - “moral descriptive” problems; it has great cognitive diversity.Essay literatureusually combines features fiction and journalism.
3. Semantics of the name, its understanding.
The first part of the title refers us to Shakespeare's tragedy "Macbeth"
A pre-prepared student briefly tells the content of the tragedy.
Conclusion : Shakespeare made Macbeth the complete embodiment of political despotism and ambition. Lady Macbeth is much like her husband. But this royal woman's heart turned to stone. All her feelings are subordinated to ambition. Even her love is ambitious. She loves Macbeth because he is superior to all other people. What is important to her is not the joy that loving woman receives from the reciprocal feelings of a man, and his ability to elevate himself and at the same time her. She wants to be the wife of the first person in the state. Such love happens, it can be sincere and strong in its own way, but, of course, it is a perversion of true love.
What distinguishes her from Macbeth is her determination. Her ambition is truly a passion, blind, impatient and indomitable. She is an iron woman, a devil in beautiful form. If Macbeth's ambition is a passion fighting with his moral consciousness, then in it it is a mania that has destroyed all other feelings. She is completely devoid of moral concepts.
What is strange about the title of Leskov’s work?
(Clash of concepts from different stylistic layers: “Lady Macbeth” is an association with Shakespeare’s tragedy, lady is a lady from high society, so we correlate the product with high content, sublime style. Mtsensk district (associations: Kukarsky district, Yaransky district) - the relationship between the tragedy and the remote Russian province).
Conclusion by name : the author expands the scope of what is happening in the essay. No matter which social group belongs to which social status a person (woman) possesses, he is capable of experiencing both high and low feelings, desires, and aspirations. Both good and evil coexist equally in it.
4.Analysis of the essay.
Who main character? (Katerina Lvovna Izmailova)
We pose the problematic question of the lesson: “Who is Katerina Izmailova -passionate nature or sick soul?
What kind of character did she have?Katerina Izmailova? Confirm with text.
(“the character was ardent,” i.e. passionate, she was accustomed to simplicity and freedom)
(text – beginning, 1 paragraph)
Katerina Izmailova could achieve a lot both in life and in love.
Tell her marriage story. (Fictional retelling-monologue (the story of Katerina’s marriage) in the first person. (Chapter 1)).
Conclusion : in the life of Katerina Izmailova there is no love, only boredom, so she is looking for activities and entertainment on the side.
Is Katerina Izmailova to blame for this?
(both yes and no. Yes, because her life was not filled spiritually: Katerina Izmailova did not love her husband, did not have a favorite activity, did not pray, did not read. No, because her husband did not love her either)
And passion had to find its manifestation, her ardent nature had to “unfold to its full extent”
Where did her passion begin?
(from the meeting with Sergei, from how she was weighed: “Wonderful”)
Outlandish earthly heaviness means monstrous, but not yet hidden power. And what does the peasant say to this: “Is our body strong enough?”
How do you understand his words? (it is not the body that leaves traces on the earth, but the human soul in human memory).
What is Sergei like? How is he behaving?
(appearance: “with a daring, handsome face”
Aksinya about Sergei: “How brave!”
With Katerina Izmailova: “Sergei whispered cheekily”)
Conclusion : he knows what he is doing, you can feel in him not love, but calculation. It confirms
For what? (for money, power)
What is Katerina Izmailova like in love?
She expected something special from life - love. And a chance meeting kindled her soul so much that she asks her father-in-law for her lover. Having been refused, she poisoned her father-in-law.
Does she have any regrets, any movement of conscience?
(no, passion has captured her soul and is beyond the limits of betrayal) “She has gone mad with her happiness.” But happiness comes in different forms. Leskov has these words (see epigraph): “There is righteous happiness, and there is sinful happiness. The righteous will not step over anyone, but the sinful will step over everything.”
What is Katerina Izmailova going through?
(through God's commandments - do not commit adultery, do not kill.)
Having killed once, he kills again with ease. Talk about killing your husband (chapters 7–8).
According to the Bible, the law of marriage is: “Two are one flesh.” And Katerina Lvovna crushed this flesh with her own hands - calmly, even with sharp pride in her invincibility.
Remember the epigraph to the essay. How was he understood?
(This is just “singing the first song when you’re excited to sing”, “when you’re getting excited” - being embarrassed, not yet daring to take decisive actions, and then it will go on its own.)
And here Katerina Lvovna lives, “reigns,” even carries a child under her heart. Everything seemed to have happened according to the ideal (remember, I wanted to give birth to a baby “for fun”). This high ideal - motherhood - collides with another high Christian ideal - do not commit adultery, because the child is not from your husband - from your lover. Let us remember Katerina from Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm,” who, having violated this divine law, was no longer able to live in peace: she admitted to treason because her conscience did not allow her to step over sinful happiness.)
- Does Katerina Izmailova have a conscience? (Leskov’s heroine doesn’t have this, only her wonderful dreams are still disturbing.)
Tell about Katerina Lvovna’s dreams.
1st dream – chapter 6 (the cat is just a cat for now).
2nd dream – chapter 7 (a cat that looks like Boris Timofeevich, who was killed).
Conclusion: It turns out that it’s not so easy to “sing a song.”
Dreams are symbolic. Is it possible that conscience is awakening in the young merchant’s wife? (Not yet.)
Symbolic words also sound in the mouth of grandmother Fedya (chapter 10: “Work hard, Katerinushka ...”) - read.
How did you understand? (amulets of the servant of God)
- How did Katerina work? (Killed Fedya.)
And before the next murder, “her own child turned for the first time under her heart, and her chest felt cold” (Chapter 10).
- Is it a coincidence that Leskov mentioned this detail?
(Nature itself, feminine nature warns her against the planned crime. But no, she does not heed the voice of the soul, the baby’s light did not break through the darkness of the soul: “He who began evil will wallow in it” (Shakespeare).
Unlike the first two murders, retribution came immediately. How did it happen?
- Why do you think - right away?
(A pure, angelic, sinless soul was destroyed. A little sufferer, a youth pleasing to God; even the name is symbolic: “Fedor” translated from Greek means “God’s gift.”)
Take a closer look at the reproduction of I. Glazunov’s painting “Boy”. What did the artist emphasize?
(Big-eyed youth against the background of icons, a hand on his chest as a paraphrase of passions for the murdered Dmitry)
Katerina’s arrest is a reproach for what she did before God. But Katerina Izmailova never mentioned God. What is this? Maybe all the people in Mtsensk district are atheists? Confirm your thought with the text (chapter 12): “Our people are devout...”
The words about Katerina Izmailova sound like an antithesis: “I got lost…”
Conclusion : the highest moral law has been violated, the commandment of God - “thou shalt not kill”; for the highest value on earth is human life. That is why the depth of the moral decline of Katerina and Sergei is so great.
What does passion unleashed lead to?
(Freedom, which knows no moral restrictions, turns into its opposite. A passionate nature, finding itself in the grip of the “freedom” of crimes, is inevitably doomed to death.)
So, earthly judgment, human judgment has been completed. Did he make a special impression on Katerina Lvovna? Confirm with the text (chapter 13).
(She still loves me.)
Tell us about the relationship between Katerina Izmailova and Sergei in hard labor.
Did hard labor change Leskov’s heroine?
(Yes, now this is not a cold-blooded killer, causing horror and amazement, but a rejected woman suffering from love.)
- Do you feel sorry for her? Why?
(She is a victim, an outcast, but she still loves, even stronger (chapter 14). The more reckless her love, the more frank and cynical is Sergei’s abuse of her and her feelings. The abyss of the former clerk’s moral decline is so terrible that they are even trying to reassure him seasoned convicts).
Bernard Shaw warned: “Fear the man whose God is in heaven.” How do you understand these words?
(God is conscience, an internal judge. There is no such God in the soul - man is terrible. Sergei remained like this. This was Katerina Lvovna before hard labor.)
The changes in Katerina will help to see the appeal to the symbolism of landscape scenes.
Independent work on landscape analysis (work on the text with a pencil, 3 minutes). (The table is filled in as work progresses.)
Questions on the board:
What color is most often found in descriptions of nature?
Find the image word that Leskov uses in this passage?
What is the symbolism of the landscape scene?
Option 1.Text, ch. 6.
“Golden Night”, “Paradise”,
white color, young apple tree color, apple tree filled with white flowers.
Symbolism.
White color in nature - “paradise”. But blackness, dirt, darkness in the soul is “hell”.
Option 2.
Text, ch. 15.
“The most bleak picture”, “hell”,
dirt, darkness, gray sky, the wind moans.
Symbolism.
Dirt, darkness on the street is “hell”, but light in the soul is “heaven” (cleansing pain)
Conclusion : through physical pain a person comes to awareness, a feeling of the soul. Shakespeare in his tragedy said about Lady Macbeth: “She is sick not in body, but in soul.”
Katerina Izmailova has a sick soul. But the limit of one's own suffering and torment awakens glimpses moral consciousness in Leskov’s heroine, who had previously known neither guilt nor remorse.
The Volga makes us remember another Katerina - from Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm”. We feel that the end is approaching. But Katerina Kabanova dies herself, and Katerina Izmailova takes with her another soul - Sonetka. For a moment, Katerina Lvovna’s soul seemed to enter a ray of light and again plunged into darkness.
5.Result of the conversation-analysis.
I would like to quote L. Anninsky: “Terrible unpredictability is revealed in the souls of heroes. What kind of “Thunderstorm” by Ostrovsky is there - this is not a ray of light, here a fountain of blood flows from the bottom of the soul: here “Anna Karenina” is foreshadowed - the vengeance of “demonic passion”. Here Dostoevsky’s problematics match – it was not for nothing that Dostoevsky published “Lady Macbeth...” in his magazine. You can’t fit Leskov’s heroine into any typology – a four-time murderer for love.”
How will you answer the question of the topic “Who is Katerina Izmailova -passionate nature or sick soul? Give your reasons.
6. Reflection .
What did you discover for yourself in this essay on classical Russian literature?
Homework: write a comparison essay between Katerina Kabanova and Katerina Izmailova.
Outline of a lesson in literature "The Mystery of the Female Soul" (based on Leskov's essay "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk")
Target:
- show the inextricable connection between capital and crime;
- point out the rebellion of the female soul against the deadening environment merchant life;
- reveal the tragedy, the mystery of the female soul.
Equipment: Epigraph: “He who began with evil will wallow in it.” (Shakespeare)
During the classes
I Updating previous knowledge, skills and abilities.
Teacher: Today in the lesson we will talk about love, and not just about love, but about love - a gift, giving, love - passion. You have received a homework assignment: to express your attitude to this concept poetically and prosaically.
Now - read what such concepts as love, gift - giving - passion mean to you? Beauty and attractiveness can be determined externally, and, most importantly, love gives beauty to the soul. U loving person the soul is very pure and bright. A person who is capable of truly loving deserves a lot. It is not without reason that they say that a person can be assessed by how he knows how to love another person. Love gives a lot of joy, love inspires. Love is a gold reserve, it is more valuable than any wealth. For the sake of love, you can sacrifice a lot, even your life.
Teacher: Love is a great joy and a heavy cross, revelation and mystery, great suffering and the greatest happiness, and the main thing is that only by love, a woman’s soul lives and is preserved, and to this day mysterious and enigmatic. It is this kind of love that will be discussed speech in Leskov’s essay “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk”.
2. What was Katerina like from Ostrovsky’s drama “The Thunderstorm”? What are the similarities and differences with Katerina Izmailova?
There are similarities between Ekaterina, from Ostrovsky’s drama “The Thunderstorm” and Ekaterina Izmailova. They are both married, but do not love their husbands at all, they live in boredom, a gray atmosphere reigns in their house, they have a common desire: to escape from such a gloomy life. They have connections on the side. They cheat on their husbands. And in this there is a big difference between them. Ekaterina from Ostrovsky’s drama “The Thunderstorm” is a very pious girl; at first she is afraid to cheat on her husband, considers it a sin, but gradually this concept dissipates. As for Ekaterina Izmailova, she is very decisive, she sweeps away everything in her path (she kills her husband’s father, her husband himself, and even her husband’s innocent nephew). This woman is capable of anything just to be with her lover. She is not afraid of anything or anyone, neither the condemnation of people, nor God, but killing a person is a great sin, but she doesn’t even think about it, she realizes absolutely nothing.
3. Is Katerina Izmailova punished for her atrocities, let’s read out the dreams (chapter 6 (a cat, for now - just a cat); chapter 7 (a cat that looks like the murdered Boris Timofeevich)).
Is it possible that conscience is awakening in the young merchant’s wife? Unlike the first two murders, retribution came immediately (chapter 11): “the walls of the quiet house, which had hidden so many crimes, shook from deafening blows: the windows rattled, the floors swayed: “Why do you think immediately?” (A pure, angelic, sinless soul has been destroyed).
Reasoning about strong characters: “Sometimes in our places such characters are created that, no matter how many years have passed since meeting them, you will never remember some of them without trembling” (chapter 1). What is your impression of the essay? (children's statement).
How did love - passion - originate? Word to Katerina Izmailova (retelling - monologue).
Reproductions of I. Glazunov for the essay are hung on the board: pay attention to the image of Katerina Izmailova. Is this how you imagine her?
What caused the passion? (Let's watch a short dramatized episode) occurs in the episode keyword- the answer, pay attention to this (boredom).
II Formation of new concepts.
Does Katerina keep one of God’s commandments: do not commit adultery? 1. (reading by role of Katerina’s dialogue with her husband, end of chapter 7). The teacher reads: “Katerina Lvovna was now ready for Sergei into fire, into water, into prison and to the cross. He made her fall in love with him to the point that there was no measure of her devotion to him. She went crazy with her happiness.” What does it mean? Does Katerina keep God's commandment: not to kill? Maybe we will find an excuse for the heroine (after all, this is all for the sake of happiness?).
5. Did hard labor change Leskov’s heroine?
Analysis of landscapes will help answer this question. What color is most often found in descriptions of nature? What is the symbolism of the landscape scene? (Chapter 6 is compared with Chapter 15).
6. So who is she, Katerina Izmailova - a passionate person or a sick soul?
The concepts of “Passionate nature” and “Big soul” are combined in Ekaterina Izmailova almost identically. She is a strong personality, she is not afraid of anything, she commits terrible murders, kills an innocent child who has not yet seen life, and all this was done in order to be close to Sergei. These actions cannot be justified in any way, but here she can be called a “Big Soul”, she simply does not understand what she is doing, she is not afraid of anything: neither people, nor God, one gets the feeling that she has lost her self-awareness , she cannot stop, and some terrible deeds “spring out” of her. But all this was done for the sake of love, she truly loved Sergei, and she would do anything for him. It was true love. Still, I believe that Katerina is a “Passionate nature”, she sacrificed everything for the sake of love. I believe that she did this because she was so bored with that life with her husband that it became impossible to live, and in search of true love, and, for fear of losing her, she was already capable of anything. She sacrificed her life when she saw Sergei with someone else, she felt so much pain that she could not stand it and committed suicide.
Conclusion: So what is the mystery of the female soul? Do not know? And I don't know. And it’s great that we don’t know this for sure: there will still be questions to ponder over the Russian classics.
One thing is true; the basis of the female soul - and the human soul in general - is love, which F. I. Tyutchev so surprisingly spoke about:
Union of soul with dear soul.
Their connection, combination,
And their fatal merger,
And... the duel is fatal.
Human judgment has been completed. The highest moral law has been violated, the commandment of God - “thou shalt not kill,” for the highest value on earth is life. That's why the depth is so great moral behavior Katerina and Sergei.
Let us remember Tyutchev:
There are two forces - two fatal forces, All our lives we are at their fingertips, From cradle days to the grave; One is death, the other is human judgment.
D/z . essay - reflection (optional)
1. “Fatal Duel” (love drama by Katerina Izmailova)
2. “The mirror of the soul is its deeds.” (W. Shakespeare).
“There is righteous happiness, and there is sinful happiness. The righteous will not cross anyone, but the sinful
". one of the reasons is the soulless, deadening emptiness of provincial life. It is not for nothing that Leskov’s word “boredom” becomes one of the key words when describing Katerina’s life: “Exorbitant boredom in a locked merchant’s mansion with a high fence and chained dogs more than once brought melancholy to the young merchant’s wife, reaching the point of stupor... With all the contentment and good life Katerina Lvovna's mother-in-law's house was the most boring thing... Katerina Lvovna walks and walks through the empty rooms, begins to yawn with boredom and climbs up the stairs to her matrimonial bedchamber... And she wakes up - again the same boredom, the Russian boredom of a merchant's house, from which “They say it’s even fun to hang yourself.”
It was these conditions of complete spiritual vacuum and melancholy that led to the fact that even such a bright and pure feeling as love turned into a blind and uncontrollable “animal” passion in the heroine’s soul.
Leskov emphasizes that the passion that flared up in Katerina’s soul is truly “animal” by the fact that in the heroine’s character the pagan, physical principle is sharply opposed to the spiritual principle. Katerina, although she is a woman, has enormous physical strength, and Leskov in every possible way emphasizes her “outlandish heaviness” and “bodily excess.” Passion for Sergei forces Katerina’s “excessiveness” to unfold with all the might of pagan power, and that’s all dark sides her nature is released. She begins to live as if in accordance with the words of Macbeth: “I dare everything that a man dares. And only a beast is capable of more.”
Katerina’s actions, committed under the influence of passion and at first not even causing much condemnation, inevitably lead her to a failure into “utter evil”, to an absolute contradiction with Christianity. This is especially emphasized by the fact that Fedya’s murder is the last and most terrible crime Catherine - she performs on the night of the Feast of the Entry of the Virgin Mary into the Temple.
Even love, for the sake of which she committed murder, for which she ended up in hard labor, for which she experienced all the bitterness of betrayal on the part of Sergei, and for which she drowned her rival Sonetka in the icy river, does not justify Katerina. The feeling does not justify the heroine, since what Katerina feels in herself cannot be called love. This is a “dark passion” that blinds a person to the point that he no longer sees the difference between good and evil, between truth and lies. This; is repeatedly emphasized by Leskov, who, condemning his heroine, does not leave her the slightest chance of justification in the eyes of the reader.
Katerina Lvovna Izmailova is a strong character, an extraordinary personality, a bourgeois woman trying to fight against the world of property that has enslaved her. Love turns her into a passionate, ardent nature.
Katerina did not see happiness in marriage. She spent her days in melancholy and loneliness, “from which it is fun, they say, even to hang yourself”; She had no friends or close acquaintances. Having lived with her husband for five whole years, fate never gave them children, while Katerina saw in the baby a remedy for constant melancholy and boredom.
“On the sixth spring of Katerina Lvovnina’s marriage,” fate finally made the heroine happy, giving her the opportunity to experience the most tender and sublime feeling- love, which, unfortunately, turned out to be disastrous for Katerina.
She couldn't do it. Loving Sergei, she did not harm him, she just decided to leave his life.
It seems to me that when she was dying, Katerina felt disappointment and grief in her soul, because her love turned out to be useless, unhappy, it did not bring good to people, it only destroyed several innocent people.
“Lady Macbeth of our district” - under this title the essay was published in the magazine “Epoch” No. 1 in 1865. The essay reflected one of N. S. Leskov’s Oryol impressions.
“Once an old neighbor who had lived for 70 years and went to rest under a blackcurrant bush on a summer day was poured boiling sealing wax into his ear by his impatient daughter-in-law. I remember how they buried him... His ear fell off... Then the executioner tormented her on Ilyinka. She was young, and everyone was surprised at how white she was.” (“How I learned to celebrate”, from childhood memories of N. S. Leskov)
Based on some of my own observations, “cautious” chapters of the essay were written.
As an employee of the Northern Bee magazine, he visited prisons (articles: “Holy Saturday in prison”, “Behind the prison gates”, etc.)
Conclusion
The emphasis on the authenticity and uncontrived nature of the material was fundamentally significant for Leskov.
2. Statement of the problem
From the point of view of the critic Vyazmitinov, the common people cannot have drama, but only criminal cases, because there is no moral struggle there.
Doctor Rozanov objects to him, arguing that uneducated people also have a dramatic struggle. But each nation has its own, with its own warehouse. “In a simple, uncomplicated life, of course, the struggle is simple, and only the final manifestations that fall within the scope of a criminal case are visible, but this does not mean at all that there is no drama in life at all.”
In fact, the heroes, having committed a crime and found themselves in a dramatic situation, do not experience pangs of conscience. Therefore, there is no real drama here, no personal choice, but a criminal case.
But it is no coincidence that in Leskov’s title KondovayaRussia and Shakespeare met so unexpectedly and meaningfully.
In the very comparison of the English lady and the Mtsensk merchant's wife there is a recognition of the well-known equality of the two heroines.
3. Comparison
Lady Macbeth and Ekaterina Izmailova
(homework is given to the student group in advance)
Conclusion
“Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk” shows Russian drama, ripened on the soil of merchant life, patriarchal, inert, motionless.
“Boredom”, “melancholy” - these words are repeated many times when describing a sleepy, well-fed, abundant merchant courtyard, creating a feeling of oppression, oppressive monotony, and lack of freedom.
Live human soul, no matter how insignificant her spiritual needs may be, cannot come to terms with a dead way of life.
4. Working with text
Analysis of the content and drawing up a quotation plan for the essay.
The story of Ekaterina Izmailova. What was she like before marriage?
And Sergei? What is he like?
“The thief took everything - in height, in face, in beauty, whatever kind of woman you want, now he, the scoundrel, will flatter her, and flatter her, and bring her to sin!”
And then love-passion flared up, which becomes the only content of life.
And personal freedom becomes freedom from morality
“But not all the road is good riddance, there are also problems”
Reading fragments of text
Ch. 5 “Boris Timofeevich ate mushrooms and gruel at night...”
Ch. 7 Conversation with Sergei “I am with you, my dear friend, I will not part alive”
Chapter 8 “Well, now you’re a merchant!”
Chapter 11 “The baby lay prostrate on the bed, and the two of them strangled him”
Ch. 13 “Katerina Lvovna’s stamped friend became very unkind to her”
“How you and I walked, sat through the long autumn nights, sent people away from the world with a cruel death...”
Chapter 15 “Curse your birthday and die”
5. Remember another heroine literary work, which belongs to the same social and everyday structure and which also comes into irreconcilable conflict with it.
Compare the characters of Katerina Kabanova and Ekaterina Izmailova (Homework is given to the study group in advance)
Conclusion
Leskov’s strong female character is in no way a “ray of light in a dark kingdom” and his artistic embodiment could satisfy D. Pisarev, who at one time sharply criticized “The Thunderstorm” in the article “Motives of Russian Drama.” In his opinion, nothing bright can be born from darkness and ignorance.
V. Kuleshov states: “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District is rightfully considered one of Leskov’s most brilliant works.” Its plot is fascinatingly interesting.
But there is no need to adjust her to Katerina from Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm.”
The insidious Mtsensk merchant's wife not only fights for the right to love the one she likes, but she is all flesh and blood of the “dark kingdom”, a mixture of a righteous woman and a sinner. This is not a pitiful story about a wasted life. Before us is a wild revelry of passion, removing all obstacles from the path.
And Zinovy Borisych, the husband, was strangled, and Boris Timofeich, the father-in-law, was poisoned with fungi and gruel, and little Fedya was taken out of the way so as not to share the inheritance, and Catherine dragged Sonnetka with her to the bottom from the prison barge.
No, it would be too unfair to equate this sinister, unbridled character even by the standards of Nastasya Filippovna from Dostoevsky.
6. Summing up the lesson
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk district story
Leskov points out exact time and the place where the story was written: “November 26, 1864 Kyiv.”
The work was originally an essay from a series women's portraits, conceived at the end of 1864. In a letter to N. N. Strakhov, an employee and critic of the Epoch magazine, on December 7, 1864, N. Leskov writes: ““Lady Macbeth of our County” is the 1st issue of a series of essays exclusively on typical female characters our (Oka and partly Volga) area. I propose to write twelve such essays..."
As for the remaining essays, the idea of writing remained unfulfilled.
As for “Lady Macbeth...”, then from an essay, according to the original plan of a “local” character, this work during its creation grew to artistic masterpiece of global significance.
Katerina Izmailova is a “villain unwillingly,” and not according to subjective data, a killer not by birth, but by the circumstances of her life. ( This material will help you prepare and pass the Unified State Exam 2012 in literature and the Russian language, as well as competently write an essay on the topic and story of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. A brief summary does not make it possible to understand the full meaning of the work, so this material will be useful for a deep understanding of the work of writers and poets, as well as their novels, novels, short stories, plays, poems.) Finding herself a slave to her own feelings, Katerina consistently overcomes whole line obstacles, each of which seems to her to be the last on the path to complete liberation and happiness. The persistence with which the heroine tries to subjugate circumstances to her will testifies to the originality and strength of her character. She stops at nothing, goes to the end in her terrible and, most importantly, useless struggle and dies only after completely exhausting the remarkable reserve of spiritual and vitality given to her by nature.
Leskov’s light self-irony, expressed in the title of the story, seems to indicate the transfer of Shakespeare’s character to a “lower” social sphere.
At the same time, self-irony is a purely Leskovian feature of social satire, consciously used by the writer, giving it an original coloring within the framework of the Gogolian direction of Russian literature.
Pikhter is a large wicker basket with a bell for carrying hay and other livestock feed.
A quitrent mayor is a peasant headman appointed by the landowner to collect quitrents.
Yasmen Falcon is a daring fellow.
Kitty is a leather tightening bag, purse.
Patericon - a collection of the lives of the reverend fathers.
Throne - a throne, or temple, holiday - a day of remembrance of an event or “saint” in whose name this temple was built.
Forshlag (German) - a small melodic figure (of one or more sounds) that decorates a melody, a trill. Roomy - shared.
Job is a biblical righteous man who meekly endured the trials sent to him by God.
“Outside the window in the shadows flashes...” is a not entirely accurately conveyed excerpt from Y. P. Polonsky’s poem “Challenge”, in the original - not “hollow”, but “cloak”.
Preview:
Literature lesson notes in 10th grade:
Lesson topic: Ivan Flyagin is a truth-seeker (based on N.S. Leskov’s story “The Enchanted Wanderer”).
The purpose of the lesson : understand who the righteous is, consider the main
Episodes from the life of I.S. Flyagina, see how the hero
Becomes righteous.
Lesson objectives.
Educational objectives:
Explain the meaning of the concept “righteous”;
Trace the evolution of the hero from the serf postillion
To “charm” and righteousness;
Reveal the meaning of the title of the story.
Developmental tasks:
Improve students' monologue speech;
Develop the ability to find artistic means
Expressiveness, determine their role;
Improve your ability to create your own
Statements (formulate conclusions);
Develop the creative potential of students.
Educational tasks:
To develop moral personality traits in students,
Views and beliefs;
Cultivate an attentive, caring attitude
To the native word.
Working methods:
Teacher's word;
Conversation on issues;
Compiling a table
Expressive reading.
Forms of work:
Collective:
Individual:
Work in groups
DURING THE CLASSES
Today we continue to work on N.S. Leskov’s story “The Enchanted Wanderer.”
One day Leskov had an argument with a 19th century writer. A.F. Pisemsky.
Pisemsky argued that there is no longer holiness in Rus', and in the soul of every person “nothing but abomination” is visible.
Such a confession from a friend and fellow writer amazed N.S. Leskova: “How can you really see nothing but rubbish?”
No, there is everything good and good that an artist has ever noticed.
the writer's eye.
Whose point of view do you agree with?
To refute the opinion of Pisemsky, N.S. Leskov set out to find people in Rus' whose lives would testify otherwise: he went looking for the righteous, he went with a vow not to rest until he found at least a small number of the righteous.
This is how essays, stories, stories appear in which Leskov refutes Pisemsky’s assertion.
Children themselves formulate the purpose of the lesson
Let's understand the concepts
Enchanted - one who has been bewitched.
A wanderer is a person who travels on foot, usually on a pilgrimage.
Righteous - 1. A believer who lives a righteous life.
2. A person who does not sin in any way against the rules of morality.
What is the meaning of the word righteous?
Who are called righteous?
(A person with a clear conscience and soul, imbued with truth, corresponding to the ideal of morality, beauty and justice, living righteously - DAL)
USHAKOV: a person who lives according to the commandments, moral precepts, a person in his actions, in his behavior who does not sin in anything.
I built semantic associations with the word righteous.
Do you agree with me?
Righteous: truth, goodness, selflessness, honesty, self-sacrifice, modesty, sincerity, humanity, responsiveness, holiness.
Is righteousness possible today?
Yes, it's possible. Addressing the topic of righteousness is even more important and relevant today, in our days, a time of mixing good and evil, when bad deeds are often no longer perceived as a sin, a vice, an anomaly.
Do you know people who can be called righteous?4. Dispute “Positive or bad guy Flyagin"
Our task is to analyze the story “The Enchanted Wanderer” and highlight those features of the Russian national character, which the author himself noticed and reflected, both positive and negative
Teacher: CHARACTER in psychology is defined as a set of human qualities.
IN work of art CHARACTER is drawn by the author and is the basis of the image. Tools for creating a hero's character:
Student:
- Portrait
- Speech
- Actions
- Relationships with other characters
- Inner monologues
Let's turn to the main character.
Under what circumstances does one meet the hero N.S. Leskova?
Find a description of Ivan Flyagin's appearance.
How Leskov draws his hero.
Please comment (Leskov notes external resemblance Ivan Flyagin with the legendary hero with I. Muromets. This is gigantic physical strength and power, we see in him a typical simple-minded, kind Russian hero. Although we see only a description of appearance, we are presented with the entire breadth of this person’s soul)
Appearance does not correspond to his lifestyle.
How do you imagine him?
What can you say about the first name, patronymic, last name of Ivan Severyanovich Flyagin?
(The name Ivan brings him closer to Ivan the Fool, Ivan Tsarevich who go through various trials. The patronymic Severyanovich translated from Latin means “severe” and reflects a certain side of character.
The surname indicates, on the one hand, a penchant for a wild lifestyle, but, on the other hand, it recalls biblical image man as a vessel, and the righteous as a pure vessel of God).
Thus, the name, patronymic, and surname of the hero turn out to be significant.
What do we learn about its origin?
(announced as a prayer son from his mother, whom she promised to God:
“from his mother...” From birth he was destined to serve God).
What does the hero do at the beginning of the story?
So, at the beginning of the story we have before us a serf postillion.
What is he, the serf postilion, Golovan - a good or evil person?
(Flyagin’s feelings during this period are not yet developed, primitive, instinctive.
The unconscious need for activity pushes him to the most opposite actions: killing a monk and saving the masters are side by side).
What does the monk tell him when he appears to him in a vision?
(demands to fulfill his mother’s promise and go to the monastery. But the hero deviates from his destiny and therefore is punished, accepts difficult trials. The monk predicts his fate: you will die...).
What was the reason that prompted him to travel for a long time?
(Ivan Flyagin could not get rid of the spell of the monk he killed, because this is a punishment for the sin of murder. The prediction became the fate of the hero:
“...and that’s why he went from one battle to another, enduring more and more, but he did not die anywhere.”
Before I. Flyagin, like before any hero, there is a choice of road:
where to go?
The Russian fairy tale, epic, real wanderer sooner or later finds himself at a crossroads.
Before I. Flyagin is an endless road, after passing which he will experience everything that is destined for him by fate. And he is destined for terrible trials and suffering.
Let's consider what I. Flyagina had to experience on her way, group work will help us with this
2. What did Ivan Severyanovich do?
3. Did he choose his calling himself?
4. How did serfdom influence the formation of Flyagin’s fate?
5. Once Ivan Severyanovich, when he was little, caused the death of a monk, and this monk came to him in a dream and said that his mother promised him to God at birth. But Ivan Severyanovich did not believe the dream and was not ready to go to the monastery. And there was a prediction for him that many times he would be on the verge of death, but he would not die until he came to the monastery.
So, how did his fate develop further, and what character traits were formed.
- reading an excerpt from chapter 2
. Ivan Flyagin ends up in the master's service
Word to the 1st group - A story about serving as a nanny.
What was the title of the episode?
Why does the master accept Flyagin for this unusual service?
(There is nothing that he cannot do; even the Pole says: “After all, you are a Russian man. A Russian man can handle everything.”)
What is Ivan’s attitude towards the child?
Why gives the child away?
How does the character's character manifest itself in this episode?
(love for children, natural kindness, behind external rudeness and cruelty, great kindness is hidden in I.S. We recognize this trait when he becomes a nanny. He truly became attached to the girl he was caring for, he is gentle in his treatment of her , caring)
For the first time, the hero experiences compassion and affection, for the first time, under the influence of an instant insight, he penetrates into the feelings of his mother, and, unwittingly being involved in a complex human fate, for the first time makes a decision not in his own favor, but in favor of the suffering person.
The hero's journey continues. Flyagin ends up at the Penza Fair.
What happens to the hero here?
What trials did fate give him?
6. What character traits did Ivan Severyanovich show in this episode?
Courage, bravery, ability to make quick decisions.
- reading an excerpt from chapter 4.
Word to the 2nd group - Battle with the Tatar. Against the backdrop.
What is the meaning of this episode in the plot structure of the story?
What is the real reason, which forced I. Flyagin to decide on a painful duel with the Tatar?
What new personality traits are revealed in this episode?
(pride, blind passion, conscientiousness, love for animals, demonstrates daring, reckless daring)
(the reason for many of Flyagin’s actions was a huge natural force that “flows like a living thing” through his veins. And this irrepressible energy pushes him to the most reckless actions.
He accidentally killed a monk who fell asleep on a cart of hay, in the excitement of driving fast. And although in his youth Flyagin is not too burdened by this sin, over the years he begins to feel that someday he will have to atone for it.
Flyagina's daring and freedom of feelings knows no bounds. In this episode he demonstrates his prowess when he flogs a Tatar.
No stranger to beauty.
Rather, he does not so much understand as feel. Very attached to the horse. He describes the horse vividly and picturesquely: “The mare was truly marvelous...”
He speaks as if he were a poet, an artist at heart. Due to his reckless daring, he is captured by the Tatars.
7. What was the reason that Ivan Severyanovich became a robber?
8. How can you comment on the hero’s action? Intransigence, susceptible to other people's influence.
9. What can you say about the hero?
Impulsive, gambling, able to adapt to any life situation, does not lose heart.
- reading an excerpt from chapter 9.
10. How is the hero characterized in this episode? Love of freedom, resourcefulness.
Having gained freedom, Ivan Severyanovich works at the market, helping to select horses for buyers. One prince invited him to serve as a coneser.
- reading an excerpt from 10 - 18 chapters.
11. How does Flyagin behave when communicating with the owner? Effortlessly, without fear.
-reading
Chapters.
12. Does Ivan Severyanovich know how to appreciate female beauty? What is the difference between his assessment and the prince’s assessment?
He knows how to sincerely appreciate beauty, not to measure it with money, to have compassion, and is the cause of the death of the gypsy woman.
After the tragic death of a gypsy woman, which was unwittingly caused by Ivan Severyanovich, he decided to surrender to the authorities. But along the way he meets an elderly married couple, whose only son is being taken as a soldier. Flyagin decided to go instead, taking pity on the old men.
- reading excerpts from chapter 19.
13. How does the hero behave when he gets to war?
14. Why does he confess to the murder?
Brave, desperate, capable of self-sacrifice.
6. Summing up.
So, let's see what we got, what character traits of a Russian person we need
managed to identify
1. A man of enormous stature with an open face, interesting, over
50, hero, a man who has seen a lot. Brave, courageous, knows how to quickly
decide. He knows how to adapt to any life situation and does not lose heart. Love of freedom, resourcefulness. Effortlessness, fearlessness. Capable of
self-sacrifice.
2. Succumbs to the influence of others. Impulsive, gambling. Goes on a drinking binge
caused the death of several people. Irreconcilable.
Word to the 3rd group - Life in captivity.
How does the story about life in captivity differ from the hero’s other stories?
What feelings does the hero experience for the first time when he finds himself in the conditions of an alien life and alien nature?
What character traits are demonstrated in this episode?
(craving for freedom, love for homeland)
Conclusion: We see how in captivity he begins to feel longing for his homeland, he says: “I want to go home, the longing has become... The landscape helps to feel the peculiarity of the hero’s perception of the world, his state of mind. And although he lived in captivity for 10 years, he was drawn to his homeland.
During this time he never managed to get used to the steppes. He escapes from captivity as soon as he has the opportunity.
Like all heroes, I. Flyagin passionately loves his Motherland.
What is always of great importance for a Russian person?
(Vera. That’s why Flyagin suffers so much among strangers in captivity. In the middle of the night he “crawled out slowly behind the headquarters and began to pray. So you pray,” says Flyagin, “that even the snow under your knees will melt and where the tears fell, you will see grass in the morning.”
Only love for the Motherland, for God, and Christian humility save Ivan from death.
Homecoming. Word to the 4th group
What is the fate of the hero who first received “legal paper” and felt like a free person?
(He goes into the service of the prince and does what he loves - he is a coneser.
“No, Ivan, serve with me. He’s sad, he feels useless, he can’t find himself, he’s alone in this world.”
What misfortune happened to Ivan Flyagin?
(the unexpected acquisition of freedom turns into new trials: the hero is gradually drawn into that habitual, everyday drunkenness, which has already become the scourge of Russia. Only an accident saves him from death).
What helped him get rid of his destructive passion?
(the narrator is naively convinced that the witchcraft power of the magnetizer frees him from bitter misfortune. Despite all the comic incongruity of Flyagin’s treatment for drunkenness, the magnetizer frees Flyagin from drunken passion, revealing to him “the beauty of nature and perfection”).
What new tests does the author set his hero before?
Word to the 5th group - Test of love.
Description of Pears.
Why does Flyagin kill Grusha?
Are you ready to answer for the murder of Grusha?
(he helps Grusha commit suicide, because he understands that her future life will turn into hell. I. Flyagin takes responsibility for this crime. He is ready to answer for his act and atone for it.
What character traits are demonstrated in this episode?
Conclusion: Thanks to his meeting with the gypsy Grusha, the hero, for whom there was nothing in the world higher than the beauty and perfection of a horse, discovers the magical power of female beauty over the human soul. He recognizes beauty, female beauty enchants him.
The purity and greatness of his feeling is that it is free from pride and possessiveness. The hero himself realizes that love for Pear has internally reborn him. We see here that Ivan can understand, love and sympathize. He is ready to commit a crime to save her soul.
He takes responsibility for the crime and is ready to answer for his actions and atone for it.
A different attitude towards someone else’s death and towards one’s own guilt for it appears when the hero spiritually grows to the point of personal responsibility towards other people.
What changes in the life and fate of the hero after the death of his beloved Grushenka?
(Ivan was very worried about the death of Grusha. After the death of the gypsy, he wanders to an unknown place, immersed in thoughts of how he can suffer.
On the way, he meets an old man and an old woman and goes instead of their son to fight in the Caucasus for 15 years. For his military exploits he is nominated for a reward and promoted to officer. But Ivan is still dissatisfied with himself. The voice of conscience haunts him. He becomes obsessed with the idea of self-sacrifice, he “really wants to die for the people” - this symbolizes the main characteristic of the Russian person: the willingness to suffer for others, to die for the Motherland)
How do we see the hero at the end of the story?
(at the end of the story, Ivan is acquitted, cleansed of sins. He became a novice, as the dying monk predicted. The hero’s soul is gradually cleansed, he gains folk wisdom.
The time has come to sum up our work.
Why can I. Flyagin be called a righteous man?
I.F. passes the path from sin to repentance and atonement. He has given up selfish motives and devotes himself entirely to people. He is characterized by such traits as: breadth of nature, willingness to stand up for the offended, a sense of compassion, patriotism - traits that reflect bright sides folk character.
Through compassion and helping people, he improves spiritually.
What is the meaning of the title of the story?
A wanderer is one who seeks truth, truth, and gets to the bottom of the meaning of life.
Life for Flyagin is a miracle, a charm. He is fascinated by the variety of life manifestations, situations in which he has become a participant: this is his interest in all living things, affection for a child, admiration for the courage and spiritual strength of the Tatars in a duel, fascination with the beauty of a woman, the fulfillment of his highest destiny in communion with God.
What is your attitude towards the hero?
Conclusion: in “The Enchanted Wanderer” Leskov showed how the type of “Russian righteous man” is formed in the dramatic circumstances of life.
The righteous do not strive for their good deeds to be noted by others. They love and do good for the sake of good.
Thus, N.S. Leskov, in his story “The Enchanted Wanderer,” through the image of the Russian serf Ivan Flyagin, showed moral and physical strength, spiritual generosity, the ability to come to the aid of those in need, and love for his people. Homeland. These are the main features of the Russian national character.
EXERCISE:
Write a mini-essay: “Are righteous people needed today?”
Katerina Lvovna Izmailova - main character essay by N. S. Leskov “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District”. It is no coincidence that Nikolai Semenovich compares Katerina Izmailova with Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth. The lives of these women were shrouded in death and murder.
Katerina Izmailova was born into a poor family and at the age of nineteen she married a rich merchant. The marriage was not concluded for love, so it cannot be said that Katerina Lvovna was happy. She spent her time bored and not experiencing strong emotions and feelings. She floated with the flow of life, not caring about anything. After meeting Sergei, the clerk, Katerina’s life changes.
In search of something new, new emotions, feelings, the main character falls in love with Sergei, who artificially creates this love, pursuing his own goal - to destroy the family and become a merchant.
Katerina Lvovna, having once fallen in love, can no longer return to her former life.
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Sergei becomes the center of her life, she loses herself in passionate love for him.
For the sake of her lover, Katerina commits murders, which she commits without spending much time thinking. Passion destroys fear, pity and sympathy in Katerina’s soul; this passion only gave rise to cruelty. The heroine’s hand even rises to the devout boy, Fedya, sent to her as salvation, cleansing from what he is doing and what kind of person he is turning into.
Katerina Lvovna was distinguished by physical strength, but was she really spiritually strong? All her thoughts were devoted to only one person. The feeling of passionate love turned out to be all-consuming, destructive for her. Katerina Izmailova was a passionate woman. She gave all of herself to a person who expected from her, on the contrary, not love, but benefit.
N.S. Leskov showed a different love, one that absorbs a person completely, leaving him no choice.
Having learned the story of Katerina Izmailova, passionate nature, it becomes scary how much one person can lose himself in another, how passion can turn out to be higher than reason and morality, bringing trouble and death.
Updated: 2018-02-28
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>Essays based on the work of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk district
The mystery of the female soul
What does a woman dream about? – A real mystery to this day. The female soul is so incomprehensible, and the soul of Ekaterina Lvovna, the main character of the essay, is no exception. What does she want, what motivates her and why does she not immediately show her character, characterized by assertiveness, passion and purposefulness. Apparently, it is love that changes people that way. It would seem that such a sublime and bright feeling should spiritualize a person, make him better, but in the case of the merchant’s wife, a terrible metamorphosis occurs, and she is driven by base and animal instincts.
So, plucking up courage, Katerina goes to her father-in-law with a request to let her lover go, and when he refuses, threatening her and shaming her, she poisons him without blinking an eye. Katerina’s mind is so clouded and her heart is engulfed in the fire of love that she does not notice how her chosen one is manipulating her. Then, inspired by Sergei’s ideas about their marriage, Katerina Lvovna decides to turn her beloved into a master, and for this, she cold-bloodedly kills her legal husband, the merchant Izmailov. Perhaps the most cruel act is the murder of a child - Fyodor Lyamin, a small heir claiming part of the capital merchant family Izmailovs. It's amazing that Catherine, bearing under her heart new life, committed such atrocity. Even more amazing is the behavior and action of the merchant’s wife towards her child. After all, she dreamed so much about motherhood, and this child is the fruit of love with Seryozhechka, dear to her heart. Katerina, as if spellbound in passion for the clerk. She sees nothing, before her there is only one desire to be close to her beloved, even if it is thorny path by stage. Ekaterina Lvovna is blind in her love.
As you know, there is a time to scatter stones and a time to collect stones. So Katerina paid for her crimes in full, and if for Sergei the punishment is hard labor, then for a woman it is the betrayal of her lover, the exposure of his vile disguise. Even understanding the futility of sinful actions, and also that Sergei’s love is just a dummy, an empty phrase, the main character is happy to continue to be deceived. But everything has its limit - the beloved man begins to mock Katerina, showing attention to other women, mocking the merchant’s wife. Overcome by jealousy and consumed by the pain of betrayal, Katerina kills herself by drowning herself in the Volga, not forgetting to take her main rival Sonetka with her.
Katerina, like any woman, wants to love and be loved, but in her desire she violates all moral laws and God's laws. Seeing no obstacles, she goes ahead, literally over corpses, towards her goal - the love and attention of an unworthy man. Despite all the crimes and evil in her soul, she is only a performer, an instrument in in capable hands the executioner, who is her beloved Sergei.