Analysis poems "To whom it is good to live in Russia" N.A. Nekrasov for those who pass the exam in Russian language and literature.
Ideological and artistic originality of the poem "Who in Russia should live well" (1865-1877).
1. The problematics of the work is based on the correlation of folklore images and specific historical realities.
The problem of national happiness is the ideological center of the work.
The images of seven wandering men are a symbolic image of Russia that has started off (the work is not finished).
2. The poem reflected the contradictions of Russian reality in the post-reform period: a) Class contradictions (ch. "Landlord" "Last Child"), b) Contradictions in the peasant consciousness (on the one hand, the people are a great worker, on the other, a drunken ignorant mass), c) Contradictions between the high spirituality of the people and ignorance, inertia, illiteracy, downtroddenness of the peasants (Nekrasov's dream of the time when the peasant "Belinsky and Gogol will suffer from the market"), d) Contradictions between the strength, the rebellious spirit of the people and humility, long-suffering, humility (images of Savely - the Holy Russian hero and Jacob the faithful, an exemplary serf).
The reflection of revolutionary democratic ideas in the poem is associated with the image of the author and the people's defender (Grisha Dobrosklonov). The position of the author differs in many respects from the position of the people (see the previous paragraph). The image of Grisha Dobrosklonov was based on N. A. Dobrolyubov.
3. The reflection of the evolution of the people's consciousness is associated with the images of seven men who are gradually approaching the truth of Grisha Dobrosklonov from the truth of the priest, Ermila Girin, Matrena Timofeevna, Savely. Nekrasov does not claim that the peasants accepted this truth, but this was not the author's task.
4. “Who should live well in Russia” - a work of critical realism:
a) Historicism (a reflection of the contradictions in the life of peasants in post-reform Russia (see above),
b) The image of typical characters in typical circumstances (a collective image of seven peasants, typical images of a priest, a landowner, peasants),
c) The original features of Nekrasov's realism are the use of folklore traditions, in which he was a follower of Lermontov and Ostrovsky.
5. Genre originality:
Nekrasov used the traditions of the folk epic, which allowed a number of researchers to interpret the genre “Who lives well in Russia” as an epic (Prologue, the journey of men across Russia, a generalized folk view of the world - seven men).
The poem is characterized by the abundant use of folklore genres: a) Fairy tale (Prologue), b) Bylina (traditions) - Saveliy, the Holy Russian hero, c) Song - ritual (wedding, harvesting, lamenting songs) and labor, d) Parable ( A woman's parable), e) Legend (About two great sinners), f) Proverbs, sayings, riddles.
1. Genre originality of the poem.
2. The composition of the poem.
3. The problems of the poem.
4. The system of characters in the poem.
5. The role of folklore in the poem.
“Who should live well in Russia” is the final work of Nekrasov. Conceived in 1863, the poem was never finished; death prevented it. The genre of the work - and researchers usually call it an epic poem or an epic poem - is quite unusual for the 19th century. The tradition of great epic works, closely connected with the life of the people and their creativity, has long been interrupted. We are interested in two questions: what are the genre properties of the epic and what are the reasons for its appearance?
The epicness of the poem is manifested both in the composition, and in the unhurried movement of the plot, and in the spatial breadth of the depicted world, and in the multitude of heroes inhabiting the poem, and in the huge temporal, historical extent, and, most importantly, in the fact that in the poem Nekrasov was able to get away from his lyrical subjectivity, the people themselves become the narrator and observer here.
Even the incompleteness of the poem, certainly unintentional, seems to be part of the design. The prologue, revealing the main idea - to find a happy one, sets such a long duration of events that the poem can grow as if by itself, adding more and more parts and chapters, united by the refrain: "Who lives happily, / freely in Russia?" The very first words: “In what year - count, / In what land guess ...” - set the scale of the place - this is all of Russia, and the scale of time is not only the present (the definition of peasants as “temporarily liable” gives a temporary guideline - shortly after the peasant reforms), but also the recent past, which is remembered by both the pop, and the landowner, and Matryona Timofeevna, and even more distant - the youth of Saveliy, and even further - folk songs from "A Feast for the Whole World" do not have a definite temporal confinement.
The question that the heroes are arguing about is also epic, because it is the central question for the people's consciousness of happiness and sorrow, truth and falsehood. It is decided by the whole world: the poem is many-voiced, and each voice has its own story, its own truth, which can only be found together.
The poem consists of four large, rather autonomous parts. Until now, the sequence of parts remains a question (the author's will of Nekrasov is unknown to us, the poem was not finished). In our publishing practice, there are two options - either "Prologue and the first part", "Peasant Woman", "Last Child", "Feast for the Whole World", or after the "Prologue and the First Part" the "Last Child" is placed, then "Peasant Woman" and in at the very end of "A Feast for the Whole World". Each of the options has its own advantages. "Last Child" and "A Feast for the Whole World" are more closely connected than the others, they have a single place of action, common heroes. The other sequence is more meaningful. Nekrasov's poem is so structured that the external plot does not matter much to her. Actually, there is no common plot. The "Prologue" offers a plot motivation - the search for a happy one, and then only the motive of the road, the endless wandering of seven men unites the narrative. In the first part, even individual chapters are quite independent, in "The Peasant Woman" the plot is connected with the events of the life of Matryona Timofeevna, in "The Last One" it represents the story of the clash between the peasants and the landowner, in "A Feast for the Whole World" there is no plot as such at all. The more important is the inner plot that unites the epic - the consistent movement of popular thought, aware of its life and destiny, its truth and ideals, a contradictory and complex movement that can never be completed. Gradual deepening into folk life, which appears in the first part in external crowding and polyphony, in the second - in a dramatic collision unfolding before our eyes, in "The Peasant Woman" - in an exceptional, heroic female character, and although the heroine talks about herself (and this speaks of a very high degree of self-consciousness), but this is a story not only about her private fate, but about the general female share. This is the voice of the people themselves, it sounds in the songs, of which there are so many in the "Peasant Woman". And finally, the last part, which consists entirely of songs in which the past, present and future of the people are comprehended and in which it appears before us in its deep, essential meaning.
The system of characters in the epic is complex. The most characteristic thing for her is the multiplicity. In the chapters of the first part "Country Fair", "Drunken Night", "Happy" in front of us great amount of people. Nekrasov said that he collected the poem "word by word", and these "words" became the voices-stories of the crowd. The construction of the system of characters is also connected with the conflict of the poem. If the original idea, which can be reconstructed from the dispute between the peasants in the Prologue, assumed the opposition of the peasants to the entire social pyramid from the official to the king, then changing it (turning to the image of the life of the people) also determined another conflict - the peasant world and the world, most directly related to peasant life - landlord. The landowners in the poem are represented quite diversely. The first of them is Obolt-Obolduev, whose story paints a general picture of landowner life in the past and present, and whose image connects many possible landowner types (he is both the guardian of patriarchal foundations, and the lyricist who sings of the estate idyll, and the despot-serf). The conflict confrontation of the worlds is most sharply presented in the "Last Child". The sharply grotesque image of the landowner also corresponds to the paradoxical anecdotal plot of the played "gum". Prince Utyatin is an escheated, half-dead, hating creature; his blind, dead eye, which “turns like a wheel” (a repeated image several times), grotesquely embodies the image of a dead life.
The peasant world is by no means homogeneous. The main division is based on the moral confrontation of those who seek the truth, like seven men who take a vow "... a controversial matter / According to reason, in a divine way, / According to the honor of the story", those who defend the people's honor and dignity, like Yakim Naked ("... we are great people / In work and in revelry"), who makes it possible to understand that happiness is not in "peace, wealth, honor" (the original formula), but in strict truth (the fate of Yermila Girin), who turns out to be a hero both in his rebellion and in his repentance, like Savely, those who express the moral strength of the entire peasant world, and those who separate from this world, from the lackey in the "Happy" to the traitor Gleb the elder in the legend "On two great sinners."
Grisha Dobrosklonov occupies a special place among the heroes of the poem. The son of a poor deacon, an intellectual raznochinets, he is depicted as a man who knows what happiness is, and happy, because he found his way. “For all the suffering, Russian / Peasantry, I pray!” - says Savely, and Grisha, continuing the theme of life for everyone, creates a song about "the share of the people, their happiness." Grisha's songs in "A Feast for the Whole World" naturally complete the song plot, simultaneously creating an image of the passage of time: "Bitter Time - Bitter Songs" - the past, "Both Old and New" - the present, "Good Time - Good Songs" - the future.
The value of folklore for the poem is enormous. Free and flexible poetic meter, independence from rhyme made it possible to convey a lively folk speech, saturated with sayings and proverbs, aphorisms, comparisons. An interesting technique is the use of riddles in which Nekrasov appreciates their figurative power: “Spring has come - snow has affected! / He is humble for the time being: / Flies - is silent, lies - is silent, / When he dies, then he roars. / Water - wherever you look! But the main role in the poem is played by the genres of folk poetry - a fairy tale (a magic tablecloth-self-assembly, a talking bird), lamentations and, most importantly, songs that increasingly strengthen their role by the end of the poem. "A Feast for the Whole World" can be called a folk opera.
A poem by N.A. Nekrasov's "Who Lives Well in Russia", on which he worked for the last ten years of his life, but did not have time to fully realize, cannot be considered unfinished. It contains everything that made up the meaning of the spiritual, ideological, life and artistic searches of the poet from youth to death. And this "everything" found a worthy - capacious and harmonious - form of expression.
What is the architectonics of the poem "Who should live well in Russia"? Architectonics is the “architecture” of a work, the construction of a whole from separate structural parts: chapters, parts, etc. In this poem, it is complex. Of course, the inconsistency in the division of the huge text of the poem gives rise to the complexity of its architectonics. Not everything is added, not everything is uniform and not everything is numbered. However, this does not make the poem less amazing - it shocks anyone who is able to feel compassion, pain and anger at the sight of cruelty and injustice. Nekrasov, creating typical images of unjustly ruined peasants, made them immortal.
The beginning of the poem -"Prologue" - sets the tone of the whole work.
Of course, this is a fabulous beginning: no one knows where and when, no one knows why seven men converge. And a dispute flares up - how can a Russian person be without a dispute; and the peasants turn into wanderers, wandering along an endless road to find the truth hidden either behind the next turn, or behind the nearby hill, or not at all achievable.
In the text of the Prologue, whoever does not appear, as if in a fairy tale: a woman - almost a witch, and a gray hare, and small jackdaws, and a chick, and a cuckoo ... Seven owls look at the wanderers in the night, the echo echoes their cries, an owl, a cunning fox - everyone has been here. In the groin, examining a small birdie - a chick of a warbler - and seeing that she is happier than a peasant, he decides to find out the truth. And, as in a fairy tale, the mother warbler, helping out the chick, promises to give the peasants plenty of everything they ask for on the road, so that they only find the truthful answer, and shows the way. The Prologue is not like a fairy tale. This is a fairy tale, only literary. So the peasants give a vow not to return home until they find the truth. And the wandering begins.
Chapter I - "Pop". In it, the priest defines what happiness is - “peace, wealth, honor” - and describes his life in such a way that none of the conditions for happiness is suitable for it. The calamity of the peasant parishioners in impoverished villages, the revelry of the landowners who left their estates, the desolated local life - all this is in the bitter answer of the priest. And, bowing low to him, the wanderers go further.
Chapter II wanderers at the fair. The picture of the village: "a house with an inscription: school, empty, / Clogged tightly" - and this is in the village "rich, but dirty." There, at the fair, a familiar phrase sounds to us:
When a man is not Blucher
And not my lord foolish—
Belinsky and Gogol
Will it carry from the market?
In Chapter III "Drunken Night" bitterly describes the eternal vice and consolation of the Russian serf peasant - drunkenness to the point of unconsciousness. Pavlusha Veretennikov reappears, known among the peasants of the village of Kuzminsky as a “master” and met by wanderers there, at the fair. He records folk songs, jokes - we would say, he collects Russian folklore.
Having recorded enough
Veretennikov told them:
"Smart Russian peasants,
One is not good
What they drink to stupefaction
Falling into ditches, into ditches—
It's a shame to look!"
This offends one of the men:
There is no measure for Russian hops.
Did they measure our grief?
Is there a measure for work?
Wine brings down the peasant
And grief does not bring him down?
Work not falling?
A man does not measure trouble,
Copes with everything
Whatever come.
This peasant, who stands up for everyone and defends the dignity of a Russian serf, is one of the most important heroes of the poem, the peasant Yakim Nagoi. Surname this - speaking. And he lives in the village of Bosov. The story of his unthinkably hard life and ineradicable proud courage is learned by wanderers from local peasants.
Chapter IV wanderers walk around in the festive crowd, bawling: “Hey! Is there somewhere happy? - and the peasants in response, who will smile, and who will spit ... Pretenders appear, coveting the drink promised by the wanderers "for happiness". All this is both scary and frivolous. Happy is the soldier who is beaten, but not killed, did not die of hunger and survived twenty battles. But for some reason this is not enough for the wanderers, although it is a sin to refuse a soldier a glass. Pity, not joy, are also caused by other naive workers who humbly consider themselves happy. The stories of the "happy" are getting scarier and scarier. There is even a type of princely "slave", happy with his "noble" illness - gout - and the fact that at least it brings him closer to the master.
Finally, someone sends the wanderers to Yermil Girin: if he is not happy, then who is! The story of Yermila is important for the author: the people raised money so that, bypassing the merchant, the peasant would buy a mill on the Unzha (a large navigable river in the Kostroma province). The generosity of the people, giving their last for a good cause, is a joy for the author. Nekrasov is proud of the men. After that, Yermil gave everything to his own, there was a ruble that was not given away - the owner was not found, and the money was collected enormously. Ermil gave the ruble to the poor. The story follows about how Yermil won the trust of the people. His incorruptible honesty in the service, first as a clerk, then as a lord's manager, his help for many years created this trust. It seemed that the matter was clear - such a person could not but be happy. And suddenly the gray-haired priest announces: Yermil is in prison. And he was planted there in connection with the rebellion of the peasants in the village of Stolbnyaki. How and what - the strangers did not have time to find out.
In Chapter V - "The Landlord" - the carriage rolls out, in it - and indeed the landowner Obolt-Obolduev. The landowner is described comically: a plump gentleman with a "pistol" and a paunch. Note: he has a "speaking", as almost always with Nekrasov, name. “Tell us Godly, is the landowner’s life sweet?” the strangers stop him. The landowner's stories about his "root" are strange to the peasants. Not feats, but disgrace to please the queen and the intention to set fire to Moscow - these are the memorable deeds of illustrious ancestors. What is the honor for? How to understand? The story of the landowner about the charms of the former master's life somehow does not please the peasants, and Obolduev himself bitterly recalls the past - it is gone, and gone forever.
To adapt to a new life after the abolition of serfdom, one must study and work. But labor - not a noble habit. Hence the grief.
"The Last". This part of the poem "To whom it is good to live in Russia" begins with a picture of haymaking in water meadows. The royal family appears. The appearance of an old man is terrible - the father and grandfather of a noble family. The ancient and vicious prince Utyatin is alive because, according to the story of the peasant Vlas, his former serfs conspired with the lord's family to depict the former serfdom for the sake of the prince's peace of mind and so that he would not refuse his family, due to a whim of an senile inheritance. The peasants were promised to give back the water meadows after the death of the prince. The "faithful slave" Ipat was also found - at Nekrasov, as you have already noticed, and such types among the peasants find their description. Only the peasant Agap could not stand it and scolded the Last One for what the world was worth. Punishment in the stable with whips, feigned, turned out to be fatal for the proud peasant. The latter died almost before the eyes of our wanderers, and the peasants are still suing for the meadows: "The heirs compete with the peasants until this day."
According to the logic of the construction of the poem “To whom it is good to live in Russia”, then follows, as it were, hersecond part , entitled"Peasant Woman" and having its own"Prologue" and their chapters. The peasants, having lost faith in finding a happy man among the peasants, decide to turn to the women. There is no need to retell what and how much "happiness" they find in the share of women, peasants. All this is expressed with such a depth of penetration into the suffering woman's soul, with such an abundance of details of the fate, slowly told by a peasant woman, respectfully referred to as "Matryona Timofeevna, she is a governor", that at times it touches to tears, then it makes you clench your fists with anger. She was happy one of her first women's nights, but when was that!
Songs created by the author on a folk basis are woven into the narrative, as if sewn on the canvas of a Russian folk song (Chapter 2. "Songs" ). There, the wanderers sing with Matryona in turn, and the peasant woman herself, recalling the past.
My disgusting husband
Rises:
For a silk whip
Accepted.
choir
The whip whistled
Blood splattered...
Oh! leli! leli!
Blood splattered...
To match the song was the married life of a peasant woman. Only her grandfather, Saveliy, took pity on her and consoled her. “There was also a lucky man,” recalls Matryona.
A separate chapter of the poem "To whom it is good to live in Russia" is dedicated to this powerful Russian man -"Savelius, Holy Russian hero" . The title of the chapter speaks of its style and content. The branded, former convict, heroic build, the old man speaks little, but aptly. “To not endure is an abyss, to endure is an abyss,” are his favorite words. The old man buried alive in the ground for the atrocities against the peasants of the German Vogel, the master's manager. The image of Saveliy is collective:
Do you think, Matryonushka,
The man is not a hero?
And his life is not military,
And death is not written for him
In battle - a hero!
Hands twisted with chains
Legs forged with iron
Back ... dense forests
Passed on it - broke.
And the chest? Elijah the prophet
On it rattles-rides
On a chariot of fire...
The hero suffers everything!
Chapter"Dyomushka" the worst thing happens: the son of Matryona, left at home unattended, is eaten by pigs. But this is not enough: the mother was accused of murder, and the police opened the child in front of her eyes. And it’s even worse that Saveliy the Bogatyr himself, a deep old man who fell asleep and overlooked the baby, was innocently guilty of the death of his beloved grandson, who awakened the suffering soul of his grandfather.
In chapter V - "She-wolf" - the peasant woman forgives the old man and endures everything that is left for her in life. Chasing after the she-wolf who carried away the sheep, Matryona's son Fedotka the shepherd pity the beast: the hungry, powerless, with swollen nipples mother of the wolf cubs sits down in front of him on the grass, suffers beatings, and the little boy leaves her the sheep, already dead. Matryona accepts punishment for him and lays down under the whip.
After this episode, Matryona's song lamentations on a gray stone above the river, when she, an orphan, calls a father, then a mother for help and comfort, complete the story and create a transition to a new year of disasters -Chapter VI "A Difficult Year" . Hungry, “Looks like kids / I was like her,” Matryona recalls the she-wolf. Her husband is shaved into the soldiers without a term and out of turn, she remains with her children in the hostile family of her husband - a "parasite", without protection and help. The life of a soldier is a special topic, revealed in detail. Soldiers flog her son with rods in the square - you can’t even understand why.
A terrible song precedes the escape of Matryona alone on a winter night (Head of the Governor ). She rushed backward onto the snowy road and prayed to the Intercessor.
And the next morning Matryona went to the governor. She fell at her feet right on the stairs so that her husband would be returned, and she gave birth. The governor turned out to be a compassionate woman, and Matryona returned with a happy child. They nicknamed the Governor, and life seemed to get better, but then the time came, and they took the eldest as a soldier. “What else do you want? - Matryona asks the peasants, - the keys to women's happiness ... are lost, ”and cannot be found.
The third part of the poem “To whom it is good to live in Russia”, which is not called that, but has all the signs of an independent part, - a dedication to Sergei Petrovich Botkin, an introduction and chapters, - has a strange name -"Feast for the whole world" . In the introduction, a kind of hope for the freedom granted to the peasants, which is still not visible, illuminates the face of the peasant Vlas with a smile for almost the first time in his life. But the first chapter"Bitter Time - Bitter Songs" - represents either a stylization of folk couplets telling about famine and injustice under serfdom, then mournful, “drawn-out, sad” Vahlat songs about inescapable forced anguish, and finally, “Corvee”.
Separate chapter - story"About an exemplary serf - Jacob the faithful" - begins as if about a serf of the slavish type that Nekrasov was interested in. However, the story takes an unexpected and sharp turn: not having endured the offense, Yakov first took to drink, fled, and when he returned, he brought the master into a swampy ravine and hanged himself in front of him. A terrible sin for a Christian is suicide. The wanderers are shocked and frightened, and a new dispute begins - a dispute about who is the most sinful of all. Tells Ionushka - "humble praying mantis".
A new page of the poem opens -"Wanderers and Pilgrims" , for her -"About two great sinners" : a tale about Kudeyar-ataman, a robber who killed an uncountable number of souls. The story goes in an epic verse, and, as if in a Russian song, the conscience wakes up in Kudeyar, he accepts hermitage and repentance from the saint who appeared to him: to cut off the century-old oak with the same knife with which he killed. The work is many years old, the hope that it will be possible to complete it before death is weak. Suddenly, the well-known villain Pan Glukhovsky appears on horseback in front of Kudeyar and tempts the hermit with shameless speeches. Kudeyar cannot withstand the temptation: a knife is in the pan's chest. And - a miracle! - collapsed century-old oak.
The peasants start a dispute about whose sin is heavier - "noble" or "peasant".In the chapter "Peasant sin" Also, in an epic verse, Ignatius Prokhorov talks about the Judas sin (sin of betrayal) of a peasant headman who was tempted to pay a heir and hid the will of the owner, in which all eight thousand souls of his peasants were set free. The listeners shudder. There is no forgiveness for the destroyer of eight thousand souls. The despair of the peasants, who admitted that such sins are possible among them, pours out in a song. "Hungry" - a terrible song - a spell, the howl of an unsatisfied beast - not a man. A new face appears - Grigory, the young godson of the headman, the son of a deacon. He consoles and inspires the peasants. After groaning and thinking, they decide: To all the fault: grow stronger!
It turns out that Grisha is going "to Moscow, to Novovorsitet." And then it becomes clear that Grisha is the hope of the peasant world:
"I don't need any silver,
No gold, but God forbid
So that my countrymen
And every peasant
Lived freely and cheerfully
All over holy Russia!
But the story continues, and the wanderers become witnesses of how an old soldier, thin as a chip, hung with medals, drives up on a hay wagon and sings his song - “Soldier's” with the refrain: “The light is sick, / There is no bread, / There is no shelter, / There is no death,” and to others: “German bullets, / Turkish bullets, / French bullets, / Russian sticks.” Everything about the soldier's share is collected in this chapter of the poem.
But here's a new chapter with a peppy title"Good time - good songs" . The song of new hope is sung by Savva and Grisha on the Volga bank.
The image of Grisha Dobrosklonov, the son of a sexton from the Volga, of course, combines the features of Nekrasov's dear friends - Belinsky, Dobrolyubov (compare the names), Chernyshevsky. They could sing this song too. Grisha barely managed to survive the famine: his mother's song, sung by peasant women, is called "Salty". A piece watered with mother's tears is a substitute for salt for a starving child. “With love for the poor mother / Love for the whole Vakhlachin / Merged, - and for fifteen years / Gregory already knew for sure / That he would live for happiness / Poor and dark native corner.” Images of angelic forces appear in the poem, and the style changes dramatically. The poet moves on to marching three lines, reminiscent of the rhythmic tread of the forces of good, inevitably crowding out the obsolete and evil. "Angel of Mercy" sings an invocative song over a Russian youth.
Grisha, waking up, descends into the meadows, thinks about the fate of his homeland, and sings. In the song, his hope and love. And firm confidence: “Enough! /Finished with the past calculation, /Finished calculation with the master! / The Russian people gathers strength / And learns to be a citizen.
"Rus" is the last song of Grisha Dobrosklonov.
Source (abridged): Mikhalskaya, A.K. Literature: A basic level of: Grade 10. At 2 o'clock. Part 1: account. allowance / A.K. Mikhalskaya, O.N. Zaitsev. - M.: Bustard, 2018
On February 19, 1861, a long-awaited reform took place in Russia - the abolition of serfdom, which immediately stirred up the whole society and caused a wave of new problems, the main of which can be expressed in a line from Nekrasov's poem: "The people are liberated, but are the people happy? ..". Singer folk life, Nekrasov did not stand aside this time either - since 1863, his poem “Who Lives Well in Russia”, which tells about life in post-reform Russia, begins to be created. The work is considered the pinnacle in the writer's work and to this day enjoys the well-deserved love of readers. At the same time, despite its seemingly simple and stylized fairy tale plot, it is very difficult to perceive. Therefore, we will analyze the poem “Who Lives Well in Russia” in order to better understand its meaning and problems.
History of creation
Nekrasov created the poem “Who Lives Well in Russia” from 1863 to 1877, and some ideas, according to contemporaries, arose from the poet as early as the 1850s. Nekrasov wanted to state in one work everything that, as he said, “I know about the people, everything that I happened to hear from their lips”, accumulated “by word” over 20 years of his life. Unfortunately, due to the death of the author, the poem remained unfinished, only four parts of the poem and a prologue were published.
After the death of the author, the publishers of the poem faced a difficult task - to determine in what sequence to publish the disparate parts of the work, because. Nekrasov did not have time to combine them into one. The task was solved by K. Chukovsky, who, relying on the writer's archives, decided to print the parts in the order in which they are known to the modern reader: "Last Child", "Peasant Woman", "Feast for the Whole World".
Genre, composition
There are many different genre definitions of “Who should live well in Russia” - they talk about it as a “poem-journey”, “Russian Odyssey”, even such a confusing definition is known as “the protocol of a kind of All-Russian peasant congress, an unsurpassed transcript of the debate on an acute political issue ". Nevertheless, there is also the author's definition of the genre, with which most critics agree: the epic poem. The epic involves the depiction of the life of an entire people at some decisive moment in history, whether it be a war or other social upheaval. The author describes what is happening through the eyes of the people and often turns to folklore as a means of showing the people's vision of the problem. The epic, as a rule, does not have one hero - there are many heroes, and they play a more connecting than plot-forming role. The poem "To whom it is good to live in Russia" fits all these criteria and can safely be called an epic.
Theme and idea of the work, heroes, problems
The plot of the poem is simple: “on the pillar path” seven men converge who argued about who lives best in Russia. To find out, they go on a journey. In this regard, the theme of the work can be defined as a large-scale narrative about the life of peasants in Russia. Nekrasov covered almost all spheres of life - during his wanderings, men will get acquainted with different people: a priest, a landowner, beggars, drunkards, merchants, a cycle of human destinies will pass before their eyes - from a wounded soldier to the once all-powerful prince. The fair, prison, hard work for the master, death and birth, holidays, weddings, auctions and the election of the burgomaster - nothing escaped the writer's gaze.
The question of who should be considered the main character of the poem is ambiguous. On the one hand, formally it has seven main characters - men wandering in search of a happy person. The image of Grisha Dobrosklonov also stands out, in whose person the author portrays the future people's savior and enlightener. But besides this, the image of the people as the image of the main character of the work is clearly traced in the poem. The people appear as a single whole in the scenes of the fair, mass festivities (“Drunk Night”, “Feast for the Whole World”), haymaking. Various decisions are made by the whole world - from the help of Yermil to the election of a burgomaster, even a sigh of relief after the death of the landowner breaks out from everyone at the same time. Seven men are not individualized either - they are described as briefly as possible, do not have their own separate features and characters, pursue the same goal and even speak, as a rule, all together. Minor characters(serf Yakov, village headman, Savely) are written by the author in much more detail, which allows us to talk about the special creation of a conditionally allegorical image of the people with the help of seven wanderers.
One way or another, the lives of the people are also affected by all the problems raised by Nekrasov in the poem. This is the problem of happiness, the problem of drunkenness and moral degradation, sin, the relationship between the old and the new way of life, freedom and lack of freedom, rebellion and patience, as well as the problem of the Russian woman, characteristic of many of the poet's works. The problem of happiness in the poem is fundamental, and is understood by different characters in different ways. For the priest, the landowner and other characters endowed with power, happiness is presented in the form of personal well-being, "honor and wealth." Peasant happiness consists of various misfortunes - the bear tried to bully, but could not, they beat him to death in the service, but they didn’t kill him to death ... But there are also such characters for whom there is no personal, personal happiness apart from the happiness of the people. Such is Yermil Girin, the honest burgomaster, such is the seminarian Grisha Dobrosklonov, who appears in the last chapter. In his soul, love for a poor mother outgrew and merged with love for the same poor homeland, for the happiness and enlightenment of which Grisha plans to live.
From Grisha's understanding of happiness, the main idea of the work grows: real happiness is possible only for someone who does not think about himself, and is ready to spend his whole life for the happiness of everyone. The call to love your people as they are, and to fight for their happiness, not remaining indifferent to their problems, sounds distinctly throughout the poem, and finds its final embodiment in the image of Grisha.
Artistic media
An analysis of Nekrasov’s “Who Lives Well in Russia” cannot be considered complete without considering the means of artistic expression used in the poem. Basically, this is the use of oral folk art - both as an object of image, to create a more reliable picture of peasant life, and as an object of study (for the future people's protector, Grisha Dobrosklonov).
Folklore is introduced into the text either directly, as a stylization: the stylization of the prologue as a fairy-tale beginning (the mythological number seven, a self-assembled tablecloth and other details speak eloquently about this), or indirectly - quotations from folk songs, references to various folklore plots (most often to epics).
Stylized as a folk song and the very speech of the poem. Let's pay attention to big number dialectisms, diminutive suffixes, numerous repetitions and the use of stable constructions in descriptions. Thanks to this, “To whom it is good to live in Russia” can be perceived as folk art, and this is not accidental. In the 1860s, an increased interest in folk art arose. The study of folklore was perceived not only as a scientific activity, but also as an open dialogue between the intelligentsia and the people, which, of course, was close to Nekrasov ideologically.
Conclusion
So, having examined Nekrasov’s work “Who Lives Well in Russia”, we can confidently conclude that, despite the fact that it remained unfinished, it still represents a huge literary value. The poem remains relevant until today and can arouse interest not only among researchers, but also among the ordinary reader who is interested in the history of the problems of Russian life. “Who should live well in Russia” was repeatedly interpreted in other types of art - in the form of a stage production, various illustrations (Sokolov, Gerasimov, Shcherbakova), as well as popular prints on this plot.
Artwork test
Two years after the introduction of new reforms, Nikolai Nekrasov began work on a work that became the pinnacle of his work. For many years he worked on the text, and as a result, a poem was created in which the author was not only able to portray the people's grief, but, together with his heroes, sought to answer the following questions: "What is the happiness of the people?", "How to achieve it?", "Can an individual be happy in the midst of universal grief?" An analysis of “Who is living well in Russia” is necessary in order to find out which images helped Nekrasov answer these difficult questions.
Intention
Starting the work, the author himself hardly knew the answer to these disturbing questions. These were difficult times in the history of the Russian people. The abolition of serfdom did not make life easier for the peasantry. The original plan of Nekrasov was that the wandering men, after a vain search, would return home. In the course of work, the storyline changed somewhat. The events in the poem were influenced by important social processes. Like the characters of his own, he seeks to answer the question: “Is it good to live in Russia?” And if at the first stage of work on the poem the author does not find grounds for a positive answer, then later representatives of the youth appear in society, who really find their happiness in going “to the people”.
A vivid example was a certain teacher who reported in a letter to Nekrasov that she was experiencing real tides of happiness in her work among the people. The poet planned to use the image of this girl in the development storyline. But he didn't. He died without completing his work. Nekrasov wrote the poem “To whom in Russia it is good to live” until the last days of his life, but it remained unfinished.
Art style
The analysis of “Who should live well in Russia” reveals the main artistic feature works. Since Nekrasov's book is about the people, and above all for them, in it he used folk speech in all its diversity. This poem is an epic, one of the goals of which was to depict life as it is. Fairy-tale motifs play a significant role in the narrative.
Folklore basis
Nekrasov borrowed a lot from folk art. The analysis of “To Whom in Russia to Live Well” allowed critics to identify epics, legends and proverbs that the author actively used in the text. Already in the prologue there are bright folklore motifs. Here appears both a warbler, and a self-assembled tablecloth, and many animalistic images of Russian folk tale. And the wanderer men themselves resemble the heroes of epics and fairy tales. The prologue also contains numbers that have a sacred meaning: seven and three.
Plot
The men argued about who should live well in Russia. Nekrasov, using this technique, reveals the main theme of the poem. Heroes offer several options for "lucky ones". Among them are five representatives of various strata. social society and the king himself. In order to answer such a disturbing question, wanderers set off on a long journey. But only the priest and the landowner manage to ask about happiness. In the course of the poem, general questions change to more specific ones. The men are already more interested in the happiness of the working people. Yes, and the idea of the story would be difficult to implement if ordinary men dared to visit the king himself with their philosophical problems.
Peasant images
There are many peasant images in the poem. The author pays close attention to some, while talking about others only in passing. The most typical is the portrait of Yakim Nagogo. The appearance of this character symbolizes the hard labor existence that is characteristic of peasant life in Russia. But despite the overwork, Yakim did not harden his soul. The analysis of “Who should live well in Russia” gives a clear idea of how Nekrasov saw or wanted to see representatives of the working people. Yakim, despite the inhuman conditions in which he is forced to exist, did not harden. He collects pictures for his son all his life, admiring and hanging them on the walls. And during a fire, he throws himself into the fire in order to save, above all, his beloved images. But the image of Yakima is different from more reliable characters. The meaning of his life is not limited to work and drinking. The contemplation of beauty is also of great importance to him.
Artistic techniques
In the poem, Nekrasov uses symbolism from the very first pages. The names of the villages speak for themselves. Zaplatovo, Razutovo, Dyryavino are symbols of the way of life of their inhabitants. Truth-seekers meet different people during their journey, but the question of what kind of life is good in Russia remains open. The disasters of the common Russian people are revealed to the reader. In order to give liveliness and persuasiveness to the narrative, the author introduces direct speech. The priest, the landowner, the mason Trofim, Matryona Timofeevna - all these characters talk about their lives, and their stories form a general bleak picture of Russian folk life.
Since the life of a peasant is inextricably linked with nature, its description is harmoniously woven into the poem. A typical everyday picture is created from many details.
The image of the landowners
The landowner is undoubtedly the main enemy of the peasant. The first representative of this social stratum, met by wanderers, gives a completely detailed answer to their question. Talking about the rich life of the landowners in the past, he claims that he himself has always been kind to the peasants. And everyone was happy, and no one felt grief. Now everything has changed. The fields are deserted, the peasant is completely out of hand. It's all because of the reform of 1861. But the next living example of the "noble class", which appears on the way of the peasants, has the image of an oppressor, tormentor and money-grubber. He leads a free life, he does not have to work. Everything for him is done by dependent peasants. Even the abolition of serfdom did not affect his idle life.
Grisha Dobrosklonov
The question posed by Nekrasov remains open. The peasant's life was hard, and he dreamed of changes for the better. None of those who meet on the way of wanderers is a happy person. Serfdom was abolished, but still not completely resolved. The reforms were a strong blow both for the landlord class and for the working people. However, without knowing it themselves, the men found what they were looking for in the image of Grisha Dobrosklonov.
Why only a scoundrel and a money-grubber can live well in Russia becomes clear when this character appears in the poem. His fate is not easy, like the fate of other representatives of the working class. But, unlike other characters in the work of Nekrasov, Grisha is not characterized by obedience to the circumstances.
It personifies the revolutionary moods that began to appear in society in the second half of the 19th century. At the end of the poem, albeit unfinished, Nekrasov does not give an answer to the question, in search of which wanderers-truth-seekers have wandered for so long, but makes it clear that people's happiness is still possible. And the ideas of Grisha Dobrosklonov will play an important role in it.
“Who in Russia should live well” Nekrasov
"Who in Russia to live well" analysis of the work - theme, idea, genre, plot, composition, characters, problems and other issues are disclosed in this article.
In February 1861, serfdom was abolished in Russia. This progressive event greatly stirred up the peasants and caused a wave of new problems. Nekrasov described the main one in the poem "Elegy", where there is an aphoristic line: "The people are liberated, but are the people happy?" In 1863, Nikolai Alekseevich began to work on a poem "Who in Russia to live well", which addresses the problems of all segments of the country's population after the abolition of serfdom.
Despite the rather simple, folklore style of narration, the work is quite difficult for correct perception, since it touches on serious philosophical issues. For many of them, Nekrasov was looking for answers all his life. And the poem itself, which was created for a long 14 years, was never completed. Of the planned eight parts, the author managed to write four that do not follow one after another. After the death of Nikolai Alekseevich, the publishers faced a problem: in what order should the parts of the poem be published. Today we are getting acquainted with the text of the work in the order proposed by Korney Chukovsky, who meticulously worked with the writer's archives.
Some of Nekrasov's contemporaries argued that the author had the idea of the poem back in the 50s, before the abolition of serfdom. Nikolai Alekseevich wanted to fit into one work everything he knew about the people and heard from many people. To some extent, he succeeded.
Many genre definitions have been selected for the poem "Who Lives Well in Russia". Some critics claim that this is a "poem-journey", others speak of it as a "Russian Odyssey". The author himself considered his work epic because it depicts the life of the people at a turning point in history. Such a period can be a war, a revolution, and in our case, the abolition of serfdom.
The author tried to describe the events through the eyes of ordinary people and using their vocabulary. As a rule, there is no main character in the epic. Nekrasov's poem "To whom it is good to live in Russia" fully meets these criteria.
But the question of main character The poem has been raised more than once; it haunts literary critics to this day. If approached formally, then the main characters can be considered arguing men who went to look for happy people in Russia. Perfect for this role Grisha Dobrosklonov- People's educator and savior. It is quite possible to admit that the main character in the poem is the entire Russian people. This is clearly reflected in the mass scenes of festivities, fairs, haymaking. Important decisions are made in Russia by the whole world, even a sigh of relief after the death of the landowner escaped from the peasants at the same time.
Plot The work is quite simple - seven men accidentally met on the road, who started a dispute on the topic: who lives well in Russia? To solve it, the heroes set off on a journey across the country. On a long journey, they meet a variety of people: merchants, beggars, drunkards, landowners, a priest, a wounded soldier, a prince. The disputants also had a chance to see many pictures from life: a prison, a fair, birth, death, weddings, holidays, auctions, elections of a burgomaster, etc.
Seven men are not described by Nekrasov in detail, their characters are practically not disclosed. Wanderers go together towards the same goal. But the characters of the second plan (the village headman, Saveliy, the serf Yakov and others) are drawn brightly, with many small details and nuances. This allows us to conclude that the author, in the person of seven men, created a conditionally allegorical image of the people.
Problems that Nekrasov raised in his poem are very diverse and relate to the life of different strata of society: greed, poverty, illiteracy, obscurantism, swagger, moral degradation, drunkenness, arrogance, cruelty, sinfulness, the difficulty of switching to a new way of life, boundless patience and thirst for rebellion, oppression.
But the key problem of the work is the concept of happiness, which each character decides on their own. For wealthy people such as the pop and the landowner, happiness is personal well-being. It is very important for a man to be able to get away from troubles and misfortunes: the bear chased, but did not catch up, they beat him hard at work, but they did not beat him to death, etc.
But there are characters in the work who do not seek happiness only for themselves, they strive to make all people happy. Such heroes are Yermil Girin and Grisha Dobrosklonov. In the mind of Gregory, love for his mother grew into love for the whole country. In the soul of the guy, the poor and unfortunate mother was identified with the same poor country. And the seminarian Grisha considers the enlightenment of the people the goal of his life. From the way Dobrosklonov understands happiness, the main idea of the poem follows: only the person who is ready to devote his life to the struggle for the happiness of the people can fully feel this feeling.
Oral folk art can be considered the main artistic means of the poem. The author makes extensive use of folklore in the pictures of the life of the peasants and in the description of the future protector of Russia, Grisha Dobrosklonov. Nekrasov uses folk vocabulary in the text of the poem in different ways: as a direct stylization (the prologue is composed), the beginning of a fairy tale (self-assembled tablecloth, the mythical number seven) or indirectly (lines from folk songs, references to various legends and epics).
The language of the work is stylized as a folk song. There are many dialectisms in the text, numerous repetitions, diminutive suffixes in words, stable constructions in descriptions. Because of this, many people perceive the work “Who Lives Well in Russia” as folk art. In the middle of the nineteenth century, folklore was studied not only from the point of view of science, but also as a way for the intelligentsia to communicate with the people.
Having analyzed in detail Nekrasov’s work “Who Lives Well in Russia”, it is easy to understand that even in its unfinished form it is a literary heritage and is of great value. And today the poem is of great interest to literary critics and readers. studying historical features Russian people, we can conclude that they have changed a little, but the essence of the problem remains the same - the search for one's happiness.