The conflict of the dramatic work is at the bottom. Essay “External and internal conflicts in the drama “At the Bottom”

Based on the play “At the Bottom” love affair, fitting into two love triangle“Ashes - Vasilisa-Natasha”, “Ashes-Vasilisa-Kostylev”. Its development leads to the fact that Ash kills Kostylev and ends up in prison, Natasha, crippled by Vasilisa, ends up in the hospital, and Vasilisa becomes the sovereign mistress of the shelter.

But the originality of the play is that it is not love that is decisive. Most heroes are not involved in development love story, and he himself occupies a secondary position, as it were, in relation to what Gorky portrays.

The first place here is social conflict between the masters of life, the Kostylevs, and the inhabitants of the shelter. And even more broadly between Russian reality and the fate of people who found themselves thrown out of active life to the bottom.

The social conflict of the work was perceived by contemporaries as a call for revolution, for a radical change in life. It was the conflict of the play that made it revolutionary - this clash between reality and the lives of the people of the shelter. But the most interesting thing is that even now the play has not lost its modern (universal) sound, it’s just that modern viewer and the reader's accents changed.

The figurative system of the play in resolving the conflict “At the Bottom”

The inhabitants of the shelter are representatives of two lives, vagabonds who have been thrown to the bottom by society and who are not needed by society.

Gorky shows that people find themselves at the bottom in different ways:

Satin - after prison,
The actor got drunk,
Tick due to wife's illness,
The Baron went broke
Ash because he is a hereditary thief.

The reasons that led people to this state have not lost their relevance. Thus, the reasons for the conflict between these people and reality are different.

The inhabitants of the shelter have different attitudes towards their situation, towards the fact that reality itself is such that it pushes them to the bottom and keeps them there. Some have come to terms with reality:

Bubnov

(“A person is a thing, you are superfluous everywhere... and all people are superfluous...”),

(“We must live according to the law”),

Natasha (dreams replace real life),
Baron (life replaced by memories of the past).

Others have a hard time experiencing their condition, hope or dream of changing it (Natasha, Ashes, Actor).

But neither the first nor the second know how to escape from here. Modern reading The play allows us to say that a person’s attitude to his position determines his attitude to reality.

Therefore, the third group of heroes is very important - Satin and Luka - they are the ones who seem to know what to do. The meaning of the images of Satin and Luke is that another

one conflict is the conflict between truth and compassion, between truth and white lies.

The humanitarian component of the conflict in Gorky's play

Luke is one of central characters, with his appearance in the dosshouse begin internal changes. According to the author, this character is rather negative

(“fanaticism of virtue”, “crafty old man”).

Luke takes pity on the man: he consoles the dying Anna, he tells Ash about wonderful life in Siberia, where you can do everything all over again, he tells the Actor about hospitals where you can recover from alcoholism. Gorky himself is sure that

“You shouldn’t feel sorry for a person.” The writer believes that “pity humiliates a person.”

However, it is Luke who influences people, it is he who makes them take a fresh look at their situation. It was he who last minute remains at the bedside of dying Anna. Consequently, the author’s rather unambiguous attitude towards the character does not make the image of Luke unambiguous, but defines its multidimensionality.

Satin stands out among others both in his attitude to life and his statements about it. His monologues about man and truth are Gorky’s credo. The image of this hero is ambiguous. He can be considered as a person provoking, for example, Ash to kill Kostylev. A person who deliberately refuses to do anything, whose monologues contradict his behavior. But you can consider his position from the point of view of Stoic philosophy: he consciously refuses to work for this society, which threw him to the sidelines of life, he despises it

(“Work? For what? To be well-fed?... Man is higher! Man is higher than satiety!”).

Thus, Satin is not unambiguous in the work.

The conflict in the play “At the Bottom” between compassion and truth is formally resolved in favor of truth: Luka’s consolations did not make the lives of the inhabitants of the shelter better (the Actor commits suicide, Ash goes to prison, Natasha goes to the hospital, Luka himself disappears). A person must know the truth about himself, says Gorky, then he can change this life. But the question posed by the writer remains a question, since the images of the characters do not provide an unambiguous solution, which is why the play has not lost its relevance.

The conflict between the inhabitants of the shelter and reality is also ambiguously resolved. On the one hand, as already mentioned, the very attitude of people determines their condition, their life path. On the other hand, the masters of life (Kostylev and Vasilisa) are the type of exploiters who are alien to humanity, their thoughts are aimed at profit, they benefit from the existing system. In the images of the Kostylevs, Gorky condemns the existing system. It is not without reason that contemporaries accept the play as a call to change the existing system. Thus, according to Gorky, you need to change your life - then the person will change. The resolution of the conflict between the inhabitants of the shelter and reality is taken out of the work by the author.

The unusual plot for its time (the life of a flophouse) and the universal conflict in the play “At the Lower Depths,” with the author’s clear and definite position, give an ambiguous interpretation of the work and make it relevant for any time.

Materials are published with the personal permission of the author - Ph.D. O.A. Mazneva (see “Our Library”)

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The revival of the name of Maxim Gorky after reconsidering the place of his work in Russian literature and renaming everything that bore the name of this writer must definitely happen. It seems that the most famous play from Gorky’s dramatic heritage, “At the Lower Depths,” will play a significant role in this. The genre of drama itself presupposes the relevance of the work in a society where there are many unresolved social problems, where people know what it’s like to spend the night and be homeless. M. Gorky's play “At the Lower Depths” is defined as a socio-philosophical drama. The drama of a work is determined by the presence in it of an acute conflict affecting a person’s relationship with the environment, with society. In addition, drama, as a rule, is characterized by a veiled author’s position. Although it may seem that the material of the play is too difficult to understand, the realism of the conflict and the absence of moralizing are truly the advantages of dramatic work. Gorky's play contains all of the above. It is interesting that “At the Lower Depths” is perhaps Gorky’s only book where there is no open didacticism, where the reader himself is invited to make a choice between two “truths of life” - the positions of Luke and Satin.

Among the features of the play we can name the presence in it of several varying degrees expressed conflicts. Thus, the presence of people among the heroes different layers society determines the development of social conflict. However, it is not very dynamic, since the owners of the Kostylev shelter have a social status that is not much higher than that of its inhabitants. But there is one more facet to the social conflict in the play: each of the night shelters carries a lot of contradictions related to their place in society, each hero has his own social conflict within himself, which threw them to the “bottom” of life.

The development of a love conflict is connected with the relationship between Vaska Ash and Natasha, into which the claims for love of Vasilisa and her husband interfere. Vaska Pepel, without the slightest doubt, leaves Vasilisa, who cheated on her husband with him, for the sake of a truly high feeling for Natasha. The heroine seems to return the thief Vaska to the true life values, relationships with her certainly enrich his inner world and awaken dreams of honest life. But envy older sister interferes with the successful outcome of this love story. The culmination is Vasilisa’s dirty and cruel revenge, and the denouement is the murder of Kostylev. Thus, love conflict resolved by the triumph of the disgusting Vasilisa and the defeat of two loving hearts. The author shows that there is no place for true feelings at the “bottom”.

The philosophical conflict in the drama is the main one; it affects all the heroes of the work to one degree or another. Its development is provoked by the appearance of the wanderer Luke in the shelter, who brings A New Look to the peace of the inhabitants of the “bottom”. Two life positions come into conflict: a white lie and the truth without embellishment. What turns out to be people need it more? Luke preaches pity and compassion, he instills hope for a different possibility, better life. Those heroes who believed him began to dream again, make plans, they had an incentive to live on. But the old man didn’t tell them about the difficulties that were inevitable on the path to a bright future. It seems to give impetus to the beginning of a new life, but the person must go further on his own, but will he have enough strength for this? Can illusions always become a support in difficulties? The antipodean hero Satin believes that pity humiliates a person; to live, a person needs the truth, no matter how cruel it may seem.

All philosophical thoughts in the play are expressed by the characters in direct dialogues and monologues. From Luke’s lips it sounds: “It’s true, it’s not always because of a person’s illness... you can’t always cure a soul with the truth...”. Satin says: “Lies are the religion of slaves and masters... Truth is god free man! Yes, exclamations that “only man exists, everything else is the work of his hands and his brain” are very attractive to us! Human! It's great! It sounds... proud! Human! We must respect the person!” The author's position in drama is hidden. Gorky does not directly evaluate the words of his heroes. True, in another way prose work“The Life of Klim Samgin” the author says that we love people for the good that we have done to them, and we do not love for the evil that they have brought. When a person is deceived, they hide something from him, they, of course, bring harm to him, since they are deprived of the right to information and, therefore, to an objectively made choice. From this point of view, Luke’s philosophy cannot be salutary; his pity and compassion are not identical to love for a person. But Satin is powerless to help the inhabitants of the shelter, since he has nothing to respect even himself, in fact, he does not see a person in himself, his words are not supported by action. In that common tragedy all the heroes. Words and dreams hang in the air, unable to find support in the people themselves.

At the end of the drama, one murder and one suicide occur. But the author does not pass judgment on any of them. life philosophies underlying the play. Rather, one can feel a general regret about the passivity and weakness of people who find themselves at the “bottom”, see their own guilt in what happened and realize the futility of helping someone who is not ready for it. The ambiguity and diversity of the play are associated with the depth of the problems raised. You can’t see Luka as a stupid “crafty” old man who lies all the time, but you can’t idealize his compassionate love. At the same time, Satin, at first glance, pronounces his monologue as if in delirium, phrases pop up in his inflamed brain, which he picked up from different places. But with his enthusiasm he is trying to infect the people, to rouse them to revolution. Although the substitution of values is obvious in his words. And perhaps in this way Gorky warned us about the substitution of values that has eternally existed in the revolution, which is its tragedy.

True drama is always modern. The relevance of the play “At the Bottom” will never die, in my opinion, because when reading or watching it on stage we think about eternal problems choosing your path. The current pathos of the work, in my opinion, is connected with the attempt of our entire society to rise from the “bottom”, to understand why some manage to get out, while others do not. Unfortunately, not everyone succeeds in the positive desire to raise their head. And some people don’t even try. This is also a philosophy of life. Thus, the vitality of the drama “At the Bottom” is due to its truthfulness.

In an interview about the play “At the Lower Depths” in 1903, M. Gorky defined its meaning as follows: “The main question that I wanted to pose is what is better, truth or compassion? What is more needed? Is it necessary to take compassion to the point of using lies? This is not a subjective question, but a general philosophical one. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the debate about truth and comforting illusions was associated with a practical search for a way out for the disadvantaged, oppressed part of society. In the play, this dispute takes on a special intensity, since we're talking about about the destinies of people [...]
What is truth and what is lie? Humanity has been asking this question for hundreds of years. Truth and lies, good and evil always stand side by side, one simply does not exist without the other. The collision of these concepts is the basis of many world-famous literary works. Among them is M. Gorky’s social and philosophical play “At the Lower Depths”. Its essence is in the collision life positions and the views of different people. The author asks a question characteristic of Russian literature about two types of humanism and its connection with […]
The drama opens with an exposition in which the main characters are already introduced, the main themes are formulated, and many problems are posed. Luke's appearance in the rooming house is the beginning of the play. From this point on, different life philosophies and aspirations begin to be tested. Luke's stories about the “righteous land” are the culmination, and the beginning of the denouement is the murder of Kostylev. The composition of the play is strictly subordinated to its ideological and thematic content. The basis of the plot movement is the testing of philosophy by life practice [...]
Name of the hero How he got to the bottom Peculiarities of speech, characteristic remarks What Bubnov dreams of In the past, he owned a dyeing workshop. Circumstances forced him to leave in order to survive, while his wife got along with the master. He claims that a person cannot change his destiny, so he floats with the flow, sinking to the bottom. Often displays cruelty, skepticism, lack of good qualities. "All people on earth are superfluous." It’s hard to say that Bubnov is dreaming of something, given [...]
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The play “At the Depths,” according to Gorky, was the result of “almost twenty years of observations of the world.” former people"". Basic philosophical problem The play is a dispute about the truth. Young Gorky, with his characteristic determination, took on very difficult topic, which they are still struggling with the best minds humanity. Unambiguous answers to the question “What is truth?” haven't found it yet. In the heated debates waged by M. Gorky’s heroes Luka, Bubnov, Satin, the uncertainty of the author himself, the inability to directly answer […]
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Topic: Features of genre and conflict in M. Gorky’s play “At the Depths”

Goals:

Educational:

1) study the history of the creation of the play;

2) identify genre nature plays;

3) identify the features of the conflict.

Educational:

improve the skills of systematically complex analysis of a dramatic work;
develop skills in independently searching for information on this topic;

Educational

to cultivate a culture of mental work among students based on such mental operations as analysis, synthesis, grouping, and comparison.

Lesson type: lesson-lecture with elements of conversation on the plot and genre originality plays.

Equipment:

computer (presentation in Microsoft program Power Point 2007-2010);
video projector, screen.

During the classes

Organizing time.

Introduction.

Today you got acquainted with M. Gorky’s novel “Mother,” which became, perhaps, the main work of Gorky the novelist. Now we will get acquainted with the dramatic works of M. Gorky. Your homework was to read the play “At the Bottom.” Let's turn to her.

A word about the creation of the play.

In 1900, when artists from the Art Theater traveled to Crimea to show Chekhov his plays “The Seagull” and “Uncle Vanya,” they met Gorky. The head of the theater, Nemirovich-Danchenko, told them that the theater had the task of not only “captivating Chekhov with its art, but also infecting Gorky with the desire to write a play.”

The following year, Gorky donated his play “The Bourgeois” to the Art Theater. First performance of Gorky's play Art Theater took place on March 26, 1902, in St. Petersburg, where the theater went on a spring tour. Appeared on stage for the first time new hero: revolutionary worker, machinist Nile, a man aware of his strength, confident of victory. And although the censorship erased all the “dangerous” passages from the play, and also erased Neil’s words: “The master is the one who works!”, “rights are not given, rights are taken,” nevertheless, the play as a whole sounded like a call for freedom, struggle .

The government feared that the performance had turned into a revolutionary demonstration. During the dress rehearsal of the play, the theater was surrounded by police, and policemen in disguise were stationed in the theater; Mounted gendarmes were riding around in the square in front of the theater.

Almost simultaneously with the play "The Bourgeois" Gorky was working on a second play, "At the Depths." In August 1902, Gorky handed over the play to Nemirovich-Danchenko. Rehearsals began, and Gorky now often had to visit Moscow. The actors and the director worked with enthusiasm, went to the Khitrov market, to the shelters where tramps lived, and Gorky talked a lot about the lives of his heroes, helping to better understand their lives and habits.

O. L. Knipper-Chekhova recalled how at one of the rehearsals Gorky said:“I read “At the Lower Depths” in the rooming house, to the real Baron, the real Nastya. You understand! They cried in the rooming house, shouting: “We are worse!”... They kissed me, hugged me...”On December 18, 1902, the play premiered. They endlessly called actors, directors, and the author. The performance turned into a stormy celebration of A. M. Gorky; he went on stage excited, confused - he did not expect such success. Large, slightly stooped, he frowned and, out of embarrassment, forgot to throw away the cigarette he was holding in his teeth, forgot that he had to bow.

Conversation on the content of the play (orally):

Questions for the class:

What is it built on? story line works?
Who are the inhabitants of the shelter? Name them.
Who is Klesh? What is known about him?
Who is Luka? Satin?

Luke

An elderly man (60 years old), a traveling preacher who consoles everyone, promises everyone deliverance from suffering, says to everyone: “You hope!”, “You believe!” Luka is an extraordinary personality, he has a great life experience and a keen interest in people. He doesn’t believe in anything, but he feels sorry for suffering people, so he tells them various comforting words. His whole philosophy is contained in the saying: “What you believe is what you believe.”

Satin

Unemployed man (40 years old). He loves the unknown rare words, because I used to serve in the telegraph office, read a lot and was educated person. The hero expresses the author’s position, he is far from the philosophy of Christian patience, for him there is one proud-sounding word - a man who “pays for everything himself: for faith, for unbelief, for love, for intelligence - a man pays for everything himself, and therefore he free.” He understands social injustice more clearly than others. He claims that a person needs the truth, whatever it may be!

Kostylev and Vasilisa

The figure of the hostel owner Kostylev (54), one of the “masters of life”, who is ready to squeeze the last penny even from his unfortunate and disadvantaged guests, is disgusting. His wife Vasilisa (26 years old) is just as disgusting with her immorality, she “has no soul,” she is “greedy for money.”

Vaska Ash

A young man (28 years old) is a hereditary thief, thirsting for a right life, he wants to become honest and decent person, because for a living, Ash earns his living through dishonest labor, he wants to fix all this. Vaska dreams of a free life in Siberia. And he thinks that by marrying Natasha, he will get what he wants. But in the end, having killed Kostylev, he goes to prison.

Natasha

Natasha – 20 years old, Vasilisa’s sister. Quiet, kind girl. She is full of passionate dreams about the future. Natasha wants to leave the shelter, to get out of this “bottom of life,” but she cannot. They want to marry Natasha to Ash, but the girl understands that nothing good will come of this. After all, Vaska treated her sister badly, which means he can do the same to her. She never got married, because... After beating his sister, he ends up in the hospital, and from there he leaves in an unknown direction.

Baron and Nastya

Nastya is a young girl (20 years old), passionately wanting something big, true love. True, her dreams cause malicious ridicule among those around her. Even her partner Baron makes fun of her. Nastya suffers from her hopelessness and still wants to go to the ends of the world.

Baron (33) is the only person who has no illusions about liberation. But he has a thread: “It’s all in the past!” If there is nothing ahead, then at least there is something behind. The Baron often recalled his origins ( old surname, houses in Moscow and St. Petersburg, carriages with coats of arms, etc.). But Nastya mocks him and says that none of this happened. “I understand what a person is like when they don’t believe him?”

Klesh and Anna

Andrey Mitrich (40 years old) is a mechanic, dreams of honest work. He hopes more than anyone to escape from this hole (“I’ll get out... I’ll rip off my skin, but I’ll get out!”), that this is not the end, but a temporary fall. Klesh thinks that after his wife's death, his life will become easier. He awaits her death as liberation!

Anna (30 years old) – his wife, seriously ill, near death. She considers herself the most unhappy woman. She is crushed by life, full of suffering and useless to anyone.

Actor

Was in the past famous actor, but soon sank, drank himself to death and even forgot his name! He is often absorbed in memories of his past glory. His only dream is to find the city that Luke talked about, where there is a free hospital for alcoholics. After all, he still hopes to return to the stage. But having learned that there is no “righteous land” and that there is no hospital, the actor commits suicide, because... cannot bear the collapse of his last hope.

Have you noticed the similarities between Gorky’s “people of the bottom” and the “little man”? What is it? How are they different?

(There are similarities. Both “little people” and people of the “bottom” - “humiliated and insulted” by life social types. However, the situation of the heroes of Gorky's play is much worse. The “little people” had hope (remember Gogol’s Bashmachkin or the hero-ideologists F.M. Dostoevsky), the “people of the bottom” have no such hope. There is nowhere to fall further).

What is the similarity between “people of the bottom” and the heroes of “vagrant stories”, for example, the story “Chelkash”, with which you are familiar?

(The heroes of the play are also tramps. But there is no romance here anymore. Chelkash - romantic image, this is a strong, strong-willed character. For him, the main thing is the sea and freedom. There is no romanticism in the play. reality. The people of the doss house argue about the truth, but they themselves don’t know what it is.)

Who really argues with Luke: Satin or the author himself?

Is the play “At the Bottom” an innovative work?
How would you define genre? What dramatic genres do you know?

Comedy, drama, tragedy, vaudeville, melodrama. “At the Bottom” is a drama. In the tragedy d.b. heroes and ideologists. Their conflict with society must become ideological. Remember, for example, the conflict between Katerina Kabanova and “ dark kingdom(Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm”) or Larisa Ogudalova’s conflict with the world of predatory merchants (“Dowry” by Ostrovsky). There is no such thing here. The actor shot himself - despair and lack of faith in his own strength. Luke leaves.)

What do you think is the salvation of people who have fallen “to the bottom” of life?

(Either go into the world of illusions, or fight for social injustice. Their salvation is social changes in Russia, this is what Gorky was leading the viewer to. 1917 will soon come. The proletariat will appear on the stage of history).

Lecture part:

In this new play The protest against capitalist society sounded even more sharply and boldly. Gorky showed in it a new, unfamiliar world - the world of tramps who have sunk to the very bottom of life.Gorky's play “At the Lower Depths” was written in 1902 for the troupe of the Moscow Art Public Theater. The name itself already has a huge meaning. People who have fallen to the bottom will never rise to the light, to a new life. The theme of the humiliated and insulted is not new in Russian literature. Here Gorky acts as a continuer of the traditions of Pushkin, Gogol, Nekrasov, Dostoevsky. However, the situation of Gorky’s “people of the bottom”, in contrast to the “little people,” is more depressing.

In the play, Gorky outlined the need for socio-historical changes that the revolution would bring.The play is based on an acute social conflict: the contradiction between a person’s actual position in society and his high purpose; the contradiction between the masses and the autocratic orders of landowner Russia, which reduce people to the tragic fate of vagabonds.

M. Gorky's play is innovative literary work. In its center - not only human destinies, so much a clash of ideas, a dispute about man, about the meaning of life.

Social conflict is expressed at several levels:

Conflict between the owners of the shelter, the Kostylev spouses, and the inhabitants of this shelter
Each of their heroes experienced their own social situation in the past. conflict. But everyone's backstory remains in the past. Gorky leaves her behind the scenes. Their life dramas do not become the basis of a dramatic conflict.
The love line in the play is connected with the social one. Kostylev is looking for Vasilisa, who cheats on him with Vaska Ash. The beginning of a love conflict is Natasha’s arrival at the shelter. Vaska Pepel's love for Natasha revives him to life. Gorky shows that the anti-human conditions of the “bottom” cripple a person. Vasilisa takes revenge on her lover. Social inequality wins.

In terms of genre, the play is a drama.There are no ideological conflicts with society. The philosophical reflections of the inhabitants of the shelter do not lead anywhere, they do not become a rebellion against social life. inequalities. The actor shot himself - despair and lack of faith in his own strength. Luka leaves.

The heroes of the play “At the Bottom” turned out to be generalized, collective images, although typical. Under the arches of the Kostylevo doss house there were people of very different characters and social status. They are all social. types. All heroes have nicknames instead of names.

M. Gorky offers readers two possible answers to the question of saving the night shelters:

1) go into the world of illusions and deceive yourself (but lies can only worsen the situation of rejected people.

2) fight social injustice (but there are no capable fighters “at the bottom”. The most they are capable of is cutting out the truth – the truth about a person!)

Two main problems in the play:

philosophical issues are reflected in the heroes’ disputes about man, goodness and truth, which raise the problem of humanism:

human problem;
the problem of truth

Conclusion.

The play “At the Bottom” is imbued with an ardent and passionate appeal to love a person, to make this name truly sound proud. The play had a huge political resonance, calling for the reconstruction of society, which was throwing people “to the bottom.”

Homework:

write out quotation characteristics heroes

In the play “At the Lower Depths,” the essential features of Gorky’s dramaturgy were revealed with particular vividness. Gorky was the successor best traditions classical dramaturgy, and especially the dramaturgy of Chekhov. But in the struggle for stage realism, he enriched Russian drama.

Gorky approved in dramaturgy new type socio-political drama. His innovation was also evident in his choice dramatic conflict, and in the method of depicting reality.

Main conflict, which is the basis of the play “At the Bottom,” is a contradiction between the people of the “bottom” and the orders that reduce a person to the tragic fate of a homeless tramp.

At the center of the play is a certain collective image of the human mass, which, however, is always individualized. Note that the same collective images We see two hostile camps - capitalists and workers - in the play "Enemies". The very names of Gorky’s plays are significant: “The Bourgeois”, “Summer Residents”, “Barbarians”, “The Last”. Thus, Gorky seeks to emphasize the socially generalized nature of his characters.

The conflict in Gorky's plays is always expressed not externally, not in complex intrigue, not in spectacular clashes, but in the internal movement of the play. The action develops slowly, without outwardly spectacular transitions. The severity of the dramatic conflict in Gorky is clearly expressed social character. The center of gravity of his plays is in the clash of ideas, in the struggle of worldviews, social principles, and political views.

The strength of Gorky's dramaturgy lies in the fact that the writer depicts the hero in all his complexity. “It is necessary to find in each depicted unit, in addition to the general class one, that individual core that is most characteristic of it and ultimately determines it social behavior", wrote Gorky.

Social qualities a person is not presented in his plays in an abstract, straightforwardly expressed form, a person is depicted in him with all his personal characteristics and properties. But behind the hero’s individual qualities we see his socio-political face in a sharp and clear light.

“A person for a play must be made in such a way that the meaning of his every phrase, every action is completely clear, so that he can be despised, hated and loved as if he were alive,” taught the great artist.

Expanding in his plays an acute struggle of worldviews and ideas, Gorky clearly defines his attitude to the events taking place. But a clear ideological assessment of the characters is expressed in Gorky’s plays not in the author’s direct judgments and comments. In his article “On Plays,” Gorky recalled that power artistic image in dramaturgy lies in its ability to reveal itself without direct authorial intervention.

“...The play requires that each unit acting in it be characterized in word and deed independently, without prompting from the author.”

This is associated with the high mastery of speech characterization in Gorky’s dramaturgy. It is significant that in the play “At the Lower Depths” the writer completely abandoned the “tramp” jargon. But what a beautiful speech characters the plays convey the diversity of their characters, moods, feelings and thoughts!

Gorky does not often use the form of an extended monologue. In his plays, dialogue predominates, a remark, sometimes said casually, but always extremely intense inner meaning ohm In their speech characteristics Gorky strove to ensure that the personality was characterized comprehensively: from the point of view of class, and from the point of view of individual characteristics. He ensured that every remark, every word of the hero revealed his character with maximum expressiveness.

The essence of Luke and the Actor clearly emerges in the peculiarities of speech. Luke's character, his intelligence, slyness, meaningful evasiveness, affectionate insinuation, tendency to life generalizations, consolation are expressed in those aphorisms, jokes and proverbs with which he peppers his speech. “A person lives differently... as the heart is adjusted, so he lives. Today he is good, tomorrow he is evil.” “In my opinion, not a single flea is bad: all are black, all jump.”

In the Actor’s speech one hears the tragedy of a man who once knew a different life, and now has lost even his name. Its intonation has a declamatory tone; its vocabulary retains echoes of the past. theater profession. “...On stage my name is Sverchkov-Zavolzhsky...” he says, “no one knows this, no one!” When the inhabitants of the shelter make fun of the Actor and convince him that he will not be able to escape from the shelter, the Actor exclaims: “Ignorants, savages... People without hearts! You will see - he will leave! etc. These fragmentary, incoherent phrases express the powerlessness of the deceased person.

The language of Gorky's plays is rich in aphorisms, which in an extremely compressed and condensed form usually express a serious thought. In the play “At the Lower Depths,” the speech of Luka, Satin, and Bubnov is aphoristic. But how different are the inner meaning and tonality of these aphorisms! In Luke they are of an abstract, ambiguous nature, in Satin they are definite and pathetic: “Man - this sounds proud!”, “Lies are the religion of slaves and masters,” etc. Bubnov’s aphorisms are imbued with the spirit of extreme despair; He says to Nastya: “You are superfluous everywhere... and all the people on earth are superfluous...”

Thus, Gorky's plays enriched Russian and world dramaturgy new content, brought new heroes to the stage, took a step forward in the artistic development of drama, revealing new possibilities for depicting a person in drama.

Man - it's true!
M. Gorky
Maxim Gorky is a talented artist who came to Russian classical literature with his own theme, view of the world, and the ability to interest the reader and viewer in an acute conflict, an urgent problem and its resolution. Bright
And the voice of Gorky the playwright also sounded boldly. In the play “At the Bottom” the author poses and tries to solve serious questions that fall into the category of “eternal”, each time confronting a new generation and its era. Questions of love and hate, the place of man in the world around him, problems of goodness and justice, truth and lies have always excited the minds of people and continue to excite them.
Gorky knows very well the traditions of Russian classical literature. He brings to readers and viewers the ideas of humanism, justice and truth. The play “At the Lower Depths” has not left the stages of Russian theaters for a century. Why is she so attractive? At the beginning of the twentieth century, the playwright revealed to the Russian audience an unfamiliar layer of the life of “former people.” And he didn’t just show the horrific living conditions of the night shelters, but took a philosophical look at the life of these outcasts of society. It turns out they ordinary people with your passions, joys and sorrows. The heroes of the play “At the Bottom” love and hate, suffer better life, cry and laugh. Each individual dreams of a different life, looking for an opportunity to get out of this world of darkness into freedom. The drunken Actor dreams of returning to the stage, Nastya is delirious with pure and selfless love, Ash strives for an honest life.
With the arrival of Luka in the shelter, the faith in its own rebirth grows stronger among its inhabitants, the illusion of the possibility of rebirth appears, and the more terrible and inevitable is the ending, when generally defenseless and naive people suffer a crushing defeat in this cruel and inhuman world.
Even the traditional love conflict in the play undergoes changes. It would seem sincere and deep love Vaska Ashes to Natasha turns into real hell and death for the heroine. In this world of “former people” a pure and selfless love. Everything here turns into evil, even a beautiful and sublime feeling.
In a musty basement there can be no revival of creativity and inspired WORK. Only robbery, slander, drunkenness and fights flourish here. Therefore, the inhabitants of the “bottom” are gradually dying or leaving: Anna and Natasha, Actor and Ash.
It seems that the author has found the cause of this evil - lies. Satin, in his passionate monologue, unites the carriers of this vice: slaves and masters. But everything is not so simple and unambiguous in the world and in Gorky’s play. Luke, who lies to people, is not a villain. He is pleasant to talk to and a necessary old man in the shelter, bringing comfort to the suffering. His philosophy of forgiveness and tolerance is rooted in Orthodoxy.
Rejecting the philosophy of Luke, they defend themselves in their own way and hide from life problems skeptics Bubnov and Baron. Cynicism and unbelief are their temporary refuge. But their death from drunkenness or in a random fight is inevitable.
Maxim Gorky brilliantly showed, when he was a night shelter, the hopelessness and fear of Russian society before reality in the pre-revolutionary era. A completely different truth was needed, one that could radically change the lives of these unfortunate people and bring them out of the “darkness.” The author saw a way out in the revolutionary reorganization of the world. He himself simultaneously feared and longed for this outcome. Being talented artist, Gorky could not help but feel and pass by new trends in society. All this was truthfully and boldly reflected in the writer’s work in general and in particular in the play “At the Bottom.”