Works about the native land. A word about the native land

Stories for children about the Motherland, about native land, about his native land. Stories to read at school, for family reading. Stories by Mikhail Prishvin, Konstantin Ushinsky, Ivan Shmelev, Ivan Turgenev.

Mikhail Prishvin

My homeland (From childhood memories)

My mother got up early, before the sun. One day I also got up before the sun to set a snare for quails at dawn. Mother treated me to tea with milk. This milk was boiled in a clay pot and always covered with a ruddy foam on top, and under this foam it was incredibly tasty, and it made tea wonderful.

This treat decided my life in good side: I started getting up before the sun to drink delicious tea with my mother. Little by little, I got so used to this morning getting up that I could no longer sleep through the sunrise.

Then in the city I got up early, and now I always write early, when I’m all animal and vegetable world awakens and also begins to work in its own way.

And often, often I think: what if we rose with the sun for our work! How much health, joy, life and happiness would come to people then!

After tea I went hunting for quails, starlings, nightingales, grasshoppers, turtle doves, and butterflies. I didn’t have a gun then, and even now a gun is not necessary in my hunting.

My hunt was then and now - in finds. It was necessary to find something in nature that I had not yet seen, and perhaps no one had ever encountered this in their life...

My farm was large, there were countless paths.

My young friends! We are the masters of our nature, and for us it is a storehouse of the sun with great treasures of life. Not only do these treasures need to be protected, they must be opened and shown.

Needed for fish pure water- We will protect our reservoirs.

There are various valuable animals in the forests, steppes, and mountains - we will protect our forests, steppes, and mountains.

For fish - water, for birds - air, for animals - forest, steppe, mountains.

But a person needs a homeland. And protecting nature means protecting the homeland.

Konstantin Ushinsky

Our fatherland

Our fatherland, our homeland is Mother Russia. We call Russia Fatherland because our fathers and grandfathers lived in it from time immemorial.

Stories for junior schoolchildren about the Motherland, about the native land. Stories that instill in children love and respect for their native land. Stories by Ivan Bunin, Evgeny Permyak, Konstantin Paustovsky.

Ivan Bunin. Mowers

We walked along high road, and they mowed in a young birch forest near her - and sang.

It was a long time ago, it was an infinitely long time ago, because the life that we all lived at that time will not return forever.

They mowed and sang, and the entire birch forest, which had not yet lost its density and freshness, still full of flowers and smells, responded loudly to them.

All around us were fields, the wilderness of central, primordial Russia. It was late afternoon on a June day... The old high road, overgrown with bushes, cut by dead ruts, traces of the ancient life of our fathers and grandfathers, stretched out before us into the endless Russian distance. The sun was leaning to the west, began to set in beautiful light clouds, softening the blue behind the distant hills of the fields and casting great light pillars towards the sunset, where the sky was already golden, as they are painted in church paintings. A flock of sheep was gray in front, an old shepherd with a shepherd sat on the boundary, winding a whip... It seemed that there was no, and there never was, neither time nor its division into centuries, into years in this forgotten - or blessed - country . And they walked and sang among its eternal field silence, simplicity and primitiveness with some kind of epic freedom and selflessness. And the birch forest accepted and picked up their song as freely and freely as they sang.

They were “distant”, from Ryazan. A small artel of them passed through our Oryol places, helping our hayfields and moving to the lower ranks, to earn money during the working season in the steppes, even more fertile than ours. And they were carefree, friendly, as people are on a long and long journey, on vacation from all family and economic ties, they were “eager to work,” unconsciously rejoicing in its beauty and efficiency. They were somehow older and more kindly than ours - in custom, in behavior, in language - neat and prettier clothes, with their soft leather shoe covers, white well-knitted boots, clean trousers and shirts with red red collars and the same gussets.

A week ago they were mowing the forest near us, and I saw, while riding on horseback, how they went to work, having had their afternoon break: they drank spring water from wooden jugs - so long, so sweetly, as only animals and good, healthy Russians drink farm laborers - then they crossed themselves and cheerfully ran to the place with white, shiny, razor-shaped braids on their shoulders, as they ran they entered the line, let the braids all at once, widely, playfully, and walked, walked in a free, even line. And on the way back I saw their dinner. They sat in a fresh clearing near an extinguished fire, using spoons to drag pieces of something pink out of cast iron.

I said:

- Bread and salt, hello.

They answered cordially:

- Good health, you are welcome!

The clearing descended to the ravine, revealing the still bright west behind the green trees. And suddenly, looking closer, I saw with horror that what they were eating were fly agaric mushrooms, terrible with their dope. And they just laughed:

- It’s okay, they’re sweet, pure chicken!

Now they sang: “Forgive me, goodbye, dear friend!”- moved through the birch forest, thoughtlessly depriving it of thick grasses and flowers, and sang without noticing it. And we stood and listened to them, feeling that we would never forget this early evening hour and would never understand, and most importantly, not fully express what the wonderful charm of their song was.

Its charm was in the responses, in the sonority of the birch forest. Its beauty was that it was in no way on its own: it was connected with everything that we and they, these Ryazan mowers, saw and felt. The beauty was in that unconscious, but blood relationship that was between them and us - and between them, us and this grain-bearing field that surrounded us, this field air that they and we breathed since childhood, this late afternoon, these clouds in the already pinkish west, with this snowy, young forest, full of waist-deep honey herbs, countless wild flowers and berries, which they constantly picked and ate, and this big road, its spaciousness and reserved distance. The beauty was that we were all children of our homeland and were all together and we all felt good, calm and loving without a clear understanding of our feelings, because we don’t need them, we shouldn’t understand them when they exist. And there was also a charm (already completely unrecognized by us then) that this homeland, this ours common Home was Russia, and that only her soul could sing the way the mowers sang in this birch forest responding to their every breath.

The beauty was that it was as if there was no singing at all, but just sighs, the rise of a young, healthy, melodious chest. One breast sang, as songs were once sung only in Russia and with that spontaneity, with that incomparable lightness, naturalness, which was characteristic of the song only to the Russian. It was felt that the man was so fresh, strong, so naive in ignorance of his strengths and talents and so full of song that he only needed to sigh lightly for the whole forest to respond to that kind and affectionate, and sometimes daring and powerful sonority with which these sighs filled him .

They moved, without the slightest effort, throwing scythes around them, exposing clearings in wide semicircles in front of them, mowing, knocking out the area of stumps and bushes and sighing without the slightest effort, each in their own way, but in general expressing one thing, doing on a whim something unified, completely integral , extraordinarily beautiful. And beautiful with a very special, purely Russian beauty were those feelings that they told with their sighs and half-words along with the responding distance, the depth of the forest.

Of course, they “said goodbye, parted” with their “darling side”, and with their happiness, and with hopes, and with the one with whom this happiness was united:

Forgive me, goodbye, dear friend,

And, darling, oh, goodbye, little side! —

they each sighed differently, with varying degrees of sadness and love, but with the same carefree, hopeless reproach.

Forgive me, goodbye, my dear, unfaithful one,

Has my heart become blacker than dirt for you? —

they said, complaining and yearning in different ways, differently striking at the words, and suddenly everyone at once merged in a completely consonant feeling of almost delight in the face of their death, youthful audacity in the face of fate and some kind of extraordinary, all-forgiving generosity - as if they were shaking their heads and throwing it at the whole forest:

If you don’t love, aren’t nice, God be with you,

If you find something better, you’ll forget! —

and all over the forest it responded to the friendly strength, freedom and chesty sonority of their voices, froze and again, loudly thundering, picked up:

Oh, if you find something better, you’ll forget,

If you find something worse, you will regret it!

What else was the charm of this song, its inescapable joy despite all its seemingly hopelessness? The fact is that man still did not believe, and could not believe, due to his strength and innocence, in this hopelessness. “Oh, yes, all the paths are closed to me, young man!” - he said, sweetly mourning himself. But those who really have no way or road anywhere do not cry sweetly and do not sing of their sorrows. “Forgive me, goodbye, my dear side!” - the man said - and knew that, after all, there was no real separation for him from her, from his homeland, that, no matter where his fate took him, his native sky would still be above him, and around him - the boundless native Rus', disastrous for him, spoiled, perhaps, only by his freedom, space and fabulous wealth. “The red sun set behind the dark forests, ah, all the birds fell silent, everyone sat down in their places!” My happiness has ended, he sighed, dark night with its wilderness surrounds me, - and yet I felt: he is so close in blood to this wilderness, alive for him, virgin and full of magical powers that everywhere he has shelter, lodging for the night, there is someone’s intercession, someone’s kind care, someone’s voice whispering: “Don’t worry, the morning is wiser than the evening, nothing is impossible for me, sleep well, child!” “And from all sorts of troubles, according to his faith, birds and forest animals, beautiful and wise princesses, and even Baba Yaga herself, who pitied him “because of his youth,” helped him out. There were flying carpets for him, invisible hats, milk rivers flowed, semi-precious treasures were hidden, for all mortal spells there were the keys of ever-living water, he knew prayers and spells, miraculous, again according to his faith, he flew away from prisons, casting himself as a clear falcon , having hit the damp Mother Earth, dense wilds, black swamps, flying sands defended him from dashing neighbors and enemies - and forgave him merciful god for all the daring whistles, the knives are sharp, hot...

There was one more thing, I say, in this song - this is what both we and they, these Ryazan men, knew well in the depths of our souls, that we were infinitely happy in those days, now infinitely distant - and irrevocable. For everything has its time, and for us the fairy tale has passed: our ancient intercessors abandoned us, the prowling animals fled, prophetic birds, self-assembled tablecloths were rolled up, prayers and spells were desecrated, Mother Cheese Earth dried up, life-giving springs dried up - and the end came, the limit of God's forgiveness.

Evgeny Permyak. A fairy tale about our native Urals

There is more than enough nonsense in this fairy tale. Into the forgotten dark times This story was created by someone’s idle tongue and spread around the world. Her life was so-so. Malomalskoye. In some places she hid, in some places she lived up to our age and got into my ears.

Don't let this fairy tale go to waste! Somewhere, for someone, maybe it will do. If it takes root, let it live. No - my business is my side. What I bought for is what I sell for.

Listen.

Soon as our land hardened, as the land separated from the seas, it was populated by all sorts of animals and birds, and from the depths of the earth, from the steppes of the Caspian region, a golden Snake snake crawled out. With crystal scales, with a semi-precious tint, a fiery interior, ore bones, copper veining...

He decided to gird the earth with himself. I conceived and crawled from the Caspian midday steppes to the cold midnight seas.

He crawled for more than a thousand miles as if on a string, and then began to wobble.

Apparently it was in the fall. The whole night found him. No way! Like in a cellar. Zarya doesn't even study.

The runner wagged. He turned from the Usa River to the Ob and headed for Yamal. Cold! After all, he came out of hot, hellish places. I went to the left. And he walked several hundred miles and saw the Varangian ridges. Apparently the snake didn't like them. And he decided to fly straight through the ice of the cold seas.

He waved, but no matter how thick the ice is, can it withstand such a colossus? Could not resist. Cracked. Donkey.

Then the Serpent sank to the bottom of the sea. What does he care about the immense thickness! It crawls along the seabed with its belly, and the ridge rises above the sea. This one won't drown. Just cold.

No matter how hot the fiery blood of the Snake-Snake is, no matter how boiling everything around is, the sea is still not a tub of water. You won't heat it up.

The runner began to cool down. From the head. Well, if you get a cold in your head, that’s the end of your body. He began to grow numb, and soon became completely petrified.

The fiery blood in him became oil. Meat - in ores. The ribs are like stones. The vertebrae and ridges became rocks. Scales - with gems. And everything else - everything that exists in the depths of the earth. From salts to diamonds. From gray granite to patterned jaspers and marbles.

Years have passed, centuries have passed. The petrified giant was overgrown with a lush spruce forest, pine expanse, cedar fun, larch beauty.

And now it will never occur to anyone that the mountains were once a living snake-snake.

And the years went by and went by. People settled on the slopes of the mountains. The snake was called the Stone Belt. After all, he girded our land, although not all of it. That’s why they gave him a formal name, a sonorous one - Ural.

I can’t say where this word came from. That's just what everyone calls him now. Though a short word, but it has absorbed a lot, like Rus'...

Konstantin Paustovsky. Collection of miracles

Everyone, even the most serious person, not to mention, of course, the boys, has his own secret and slightly funny dream. I had the same dream - to definitely get to Borovoe Lake.

From the village where I lived that summer, the lake was only twenty kilometers away. Everyone tried to dissuade me from going - the road was boring, and the lake was like a lake, all around there were only forests, dry swamps and lingonberries. The picture is famous!

- Why are you rushing there, to this lake! - the garden watchman Semyon was angry. -What didn’t you see? What a fussy, grasping people, oh my God! You see, he needs to touch everything with his own hand, look out with his own eye! What will you look for there? One pond. And nothing more!

- Were you there?

- Why did he surrender to me, this lake! I don't have anything else to do, or what? This is where they sit, all my business! - Semyon tapped his brown neck with his fist. - On the hill!

But I still went to the lake. Two village boys, Lyonka and Vanya, tagged along with me.

Before we had time to leave the outskirts, the complete hostility of the characters of Lyonka and Vanya was immediately revealed. Lyonka calculated everything he saw around him into rubles.

“Look,” he told me in his booming voice, “the gander is coming.” How long do you think he can handle?

- How do I know!

“It’s probably worth a hundred rubles,” Lyonka said dreamily and immediately asked: “But how much will this pine tree last?” Two hundred rubles? Or for all three hundred?

- Accountant! - Vanya remarked contemptuously and sniffed. “He’s worth a dime’s worth of brains, but he’s asking prices for everything.” My eyes would not look at him.

After that, Lyonka and Vanya stopped, and I heard a well-known conversation - a harbinger of a fight. It consisted, as is customary, only of questions and exclamations.

- Whose brains are they worth for a dime? My?

- Probably not mine!

- Look!

- See for yourself!

- Don't grab it! The cap was not sewn for you!

- Oh, I wish I could push you in my own way!

- Don’t scare me! Don't poke me in the nose! The fight was short but decisive.

Lyonka picked up his cap, spat and went, offended, back to the village. I began to shame Vanya.

- Of course! - said Vanya, embarrassed. - I fought in the heat of the moment. Everyone is fighting with him, with Lyonka. He's kind of boring! Give him free rein, he puts prices on everything, like in a general store. For every spikelet. And he will certainly clear the entire forest and chop it down for firewood. And I’m afraid more than anything in the world when the forest is being cleared. I'm so afraid of passion!

- Why so?

— Oxygen from forests. The forests will be cut down, the oxygen will become liquid and smelly. And the earth will no longer be able to attract him, to keep him close to him. Where will he fly? — Vanya pointed to the fresh morning sky. - The person will have nothing to breathe. The forester explained it to me.

We climbed the slope and entered an oak copse. Immediately red ants began to eat us. They stuck to my legs and fell from the branches by the collar. Dozens of ant roads, covered with sand, stretched between oaks and junipers. Sometimes such a road passed, as if through a tunnel, under the gnarled roots of an oak tree and rose again to the surface. Ant traffic on these roads was continuous. The ants ran in one direction empty, and returned with goods - white grains, dry beetle legs, dead wasps and a furry caterpillar.

- Bustle! - said Vanya. - Like in Moscow. An old man comes to this forest from Moscow to collect ant eggs. Every year. They take it away in bags. This is the best bird food. And they are good for fishing. You need a tiny little hook!

Behind an oak copse, on the edge of a loose sandy road, there stood a lopsided cross with a black tin icon. Red ladybugs with white speckles were crawling along the cross.

A quiet wind blew in my face from the oat fields. The oats rustled, bent, and a gray wave ran over them.

Beyond the oat field we passed through the village of Polkovo. I have long noticed that almost all of the regiment’s peasants differ from the surrounding residents in their tall stature.

- Stately people in Polkovo! - our Zaborievskys said with envy. - Grenadiers! Drummers!

In Polkovo we went to rest in the hut of Vasily Lyalin, a tall, handsome old man with a piebald beard. Gray strands stuck out in disarray in his black shaggy hair.

When we entered Lyalin’s hut, he shouted:

- Keep your heads down! Heads! Everyone is smashing my forehead against the lintel! It hurts in Polkovo tall people, and those who are slow-witted, build huts according to their short height.

While talking with Lyalin, I finally learned why the regimental peasants were so tall.

- Story! - said Lyalin. - Do you think we went so high in vain? Even the little bug doesn’t live in vain. It also has its purpose.

Vanya laughed.

- Wait until you laugh! - Lyalin remarked sternly. “I’m not yet learned enough to laugh.” You listen. Was there such a foolish tsar in Russia - Emperor Paul? Or wasn't it?

“It was,” said Vanya. - We studied.

- Was and floated away. And he did such a lot of things that we still have hiccups to this day. The gentleman was fierce. The soldier at the parade squinted his eyes in the wrong direction - he now gets excited and begins to thunder: “To Siberia! To hard labor! Three hundred ramrods!” This is what the king was like! Well, what happened was that the grenadier regiment did not please him. He shouts: “March in the indicated direction for a thousand miles!” Let's go! And after a thousand miles, stop for an eternal rest!” And he points in the direction with his finger. Well, the regiment, of course, turned and walked. What are you going to do? We walked and walked for three months and reached this place. The forest all around is impassable. One wild. They stopped and began cutting down huts, crushing clay, laying stoves, and digging wells. They built a village and called it Polkovo, as a sign that a whole regiment built it and lived in it. Then, of course, liberation came, and the soldiers took root in this area, and, almost, everyone stayed here. The area, as you can see, is fertile. There were those soldiers - grenadiers and giants - our ancestors. Our growth comes from them. If you don’t believe it, go to the city, to the museum. They will show you the papers there. Everything is spelled out in them. And just think, if only they could walk two more miles and come out to the river, they would stop there. But no, they didn’t dare disobey the order—they just stopped. People are still surprised. “Why are you guys from the regiment, they say, running into the forest? Didn't you have a place by the river? They say they are scary, big guys, but apparently they don’t have enough guesses in their heads.” Well, you explain to them how it happened, then they agree. “They say you can’t fight against an order! It is a fact!"

Vasily Lyalin volunteered to take us to the forest and show us the path to Borovoe Lake. First we passed through a sandy field overgrown with immortelle and wormwood. Then thickets of young pines ran out to meet us. Pine forest greeted us after the hot fields with silence and coolness. High in the slanting rays of the sun, blue jays fluttered as if on fire. Clear puddles stood on the overgrown road, and clouds floated through these blue puddles. It smelled of strawberries and heated tree stumps. Drops of either dew or yesterday’s rain glistened on the leaves of the hazel tree. Cones fell loudly.

- Great forest! - Lyalin sighed. “The wind will blow, and these pines will hum like bells.”

Then the pines gave way to birches, and water sparkled behind them.

- Borovoe? - I asked.

- No. It’s still a walk and a walk to get to Borovoye. This is Larino Lake. Let's go, look into the water, take a look.

The water in Larino Lake was deep and clear to the very bottom. Only near the shore she shuddered a little - there, from under the moss, a spring flowed into the lake. At the bottom lay several dark large trunks. They sparkled with a weak and dark fire when the sun reached them.

“Black oak,” said Lyalin. — Stained, centuries-old. We pulled one out, but it’s difficult to work with. Breaks saws. But if you make a thing - a rolling pin or, say, a rocker - it will last forever! Heavy wood, sinks in water.

The sun was shining in dark water. Beneath it lay ancient oak trees, as if cast from black steel. And butterflies flew over the water, reflected in it with yellow and purple petals.

Lyalin led us onto a remote road.

“Step straight,” he showed, “until you run into mosslands, a dry swamp.” And along the moss there will be a path all the way to the lake. Just be careful, there are a lot of sticks there.

He said goodbye and left. Vanya and I walked along the forest road. The forest became higher, more mysterious and darker. Streams of golden resin froze on the pine trees.

At first, the ruts that had long ago been overgrown with grass were still visible, but then they disappeared, and the pink heather covered the entire road with a dry, cheerful carpet.

The road led us to a low cliff. Beneath it lay mosshars - thick birch and aspen undergrowth warmed to the roots. The trees grew from deep moss. Small ones were scattered here and there on the moss. yellow flowers and there were dry branches with white lichen lying around.

A narrow path led through the mshars. She avoided high hummocks.

At the end of the path, the water glowed black and blue—Borovoe Lake.

We walked carefully along the mshars. Pegs, sharp as spears, stuck out from under the moss - the remains of birch and aspen trunks. Lingonberry thickets have begun. One cheek of each berry - the one turned to the south - was completely red, and the other was just beginning to turn pink.

A heavy capercaillie jumped out from behind a hummock and ran into the small forest, breaking dry wood.

We went out to the lake. The grass stood waist-high along its banks. Water splashed in the roots of old trees. A wild duckling jumped out from under the roots and ran across the water with a desperate squeak.

The water in Borovoe was black and clean. Islands of white lilies bloomed on the water and smelled sweetly. The fish struck and the lilies swayed.

- What a blessing! - said Vanya. - Let's live here until our crackers run out.

I agreed.

We stayed at the lake for two days.

We saw sunsets and twilight and a tangle of plants appearing before us in the light of the fire. We heard screams wild geese and the sounds of night rain. He walked for a short time, about an hour, and quietly rang across the lake, as if he was stretching thin, cobweb-like, trembling strings between the black sky and water.

That's all I wanted to tell you.

But since then I will not believe anyone that there are boring places on our earth that do not provide any food for the eye, the ear, the imagination, or human thought.

Only in this way, by exploring some piece of our country, can you understand how good it is and how our hearts are attached to its every path, spring, and even to the timid squeaking of a forest bird.

Stories about the Motherland, about our Russian land, about the endless expanses of our native land in the works of Russian classics famous writers and teachers Mikhail Prishvin, Konstantin Ushinsky, Ivan Shmelev, Ivan Turgenev, Ivan Bunin, Evgeny Permyak, Konstantin Paustovsky.

My homeland (From childhood memories)

Prishvin M.M.

This treat changed my life for the better: I started getting up before the sun to drink delicious tea with my mother. Little by little, I got so used to this morning getting up that I could no longer sleep through the sunrise.

Then in the city I got up early, and now I always write early, when the entire animal and plant world awakens and also begins to work in its own way.

And often, often I think: what if we rose with the sun for our work! How much health, joy, life and happiness would come to people then!

After tea I went hunting for quails, starlings, nightingales, grasshoppers, turtle doves, and butterflies. I didn’t have a gun then, and even now a gun is not necessary in my hunting.

My hunt was then and now - in finds. It was necessary to find something in nature that I had not yet seen, and perhaps no one had ever encountered this in their life...

My farm was large, there were countless paths.

My young friends! We are the masters of our nature and for us it is a storehouse of the sun with great treasures of life. Not only do these treasures need to be protected, they must be opened and shown.

Fish need clean water - we will protect our reservoirs.

There are various valuable animals in the forests, steppes, and mountains - we will protect our forests, steppes, and mountains.

For fish - water, for birds - air, for animals - forest, steppe, mountains.

But a person needs a homeland. And protecting nature means protecting the homeland.

Our fatherland

Ushinsky K.D.

Our fatherland, our homeland is Mother Russia. We call Russia Fatherland because our fathers and grandfathers lived in it from time immemorial.

We call it homeland because we were born in it. They speak in our native language, and everything in it is native to us; and as a mother - because she fed us with her bread, gave us drink with her waters, taught us her language, like a mother she protects and protects us from all enemies.

Our Motherland is great - the Holy Russian land! From west to east it stretches for almost eleven thousand miles; and from north to south four and a half.

Rus' is spread out not in one, but in two parts of the world: in Europe and in Asia...

There are many in the world, and besides Russia, all sorts of good states and lands, but a person has one birth mother- He has one homeland.

Russian song

Ivan Shmelev

I was looking forward to summer, watching its approach by signs well known to me.

The earliest harbinger of summer was the striped bag. They pulled him out of a huge chest, saturated with the smell of camphor, and dumped out of it a pile of canvas jackets and pants to try on. I had to stand in one place for a long time, take it off, put it on, take it off again and put it on again, while they turned me around, pinned me, lowered it and let it go - “half an inch.” I was sweating and spinning, and behind the still-unexposed frames, poplar branches with buds golden from glue swayed and the sky turned joyfully blue.

The second and important sign of spring-summer was the appearance of a red-haired painter, who smelled of spring itself - putty and paints. The painter came to put up the frames - “to let in spring” - to make repairs. He always appeared suddenly and said gloomily, swaying:

Well, where do you have something here?..

And with such an air he snatched the chisels from behind the ribbon of his dirty apron, as if he wanted to stab him. Then he began to tear off the putty and purr angrily under his breath:

And-ah and te-we-nay le-so...

Yes yehh and te-we-na-ay...

Ah-ehh and in the dark...

And in the same... we-we-mm!..

And he sang louder. And whether because all he sang was about the dark forest, or because he jumped and sighed, looking fiercely from under his brows, he seemed very scary to me.

Then we got to know him well when he pulled my friend Vaska by the hair.

That's how it was.

The painter worked, had lunch and fell asleep on the roof of the entryway, in the sun. Having purred about the dark forest, where “sy-toya-la ah yes and so-senka,” the painter fell asleep without saying anything else. He lay on his back, and his red beard looked into the sky. To get more wind, Vaska and I also climbed onto the roof to let the “monk” in. But there was no wind on the roof either. Then Vaska, having nothing better to do, began to tickle the painter’s bare heels with a straw. But they were covered with gray and hard skin, like putty, and the painter didn’t care. Then I leaned towards the painter’s ear and sang in a trembling thin voice:

And-ah and in that-we-nom le-uh...

The painter's mouth twisted, and a smile crept from under his red mustache onto his dry lips. It must have been pleasant for him, but he still did not wake up. Then Vaska suggested getting to work on the painter properly. And we started anyway.

Vaska dragged a large brush and a bucket of paint onto the roof and painted the painter’s heels. The painter kicked and calmed down. Vaska made a face and continued. He traced the green bracelet around the ankles, and I carefully painted thumbs and marigolds.

The painter snored sweetly, probably from pleasure.

Then Vaska drew a wide “enchanted circle” around the painter, squatted down and began to sing a song right over the painter’s ear, which I picked up with pleasure:

The redhead asked:

How did you shine your beard?

I am not paint, not putty,

I was lying in the sun!

I was lying in the sun

He kept his beard up!

The painter stirred and yawned. We became silent, and he turned on his side and painted himself. That's where it happened. I waved through the dormer window, and Vaska slipped and fell into the painter’s paws. The painter scolded Vaska and threatened to dip him in a bucket, but he soon became amused, stroked Vaska on the back and said:

Don't cry, you fool. The same one grows in my village. What a waste of the owner's paint, you fool... and he's still roaring!

From that incident the painter became our friend. He sang to us the whole song about the dark forest, how they cut down a pine tree, how “hey, how good is it for a good fellow to go to someone else’s distant place!” It was a good song. And he sang it so pitifully that I thought: was he singing it to himself? He also sang other songs - about the “dark autumn night”, and about the “birch tree”, and also about the “clean field”...

For the first time then, on the roof of the entryway, I felt a world unknown to me before - melancholy and freedom, hidden in a Russian song, the soul of my native people, unknown in its depths, tender and harsh, covered with a rough robe. Then, on the roof of the entryway, in the cooing of rock doves, in the dull sounds of a painter’s song, he opened up to me. new world- and the gentle and harsh Russian nature, in which the soul yearns and waits for something... Then, in my early days, - for the first time, perhaps - I felt strength and beauty folk word Russian, his softness, and affection, and expanse. It just came and fell tenderly into the soul. Then I came to know him: his strength and sweetness. And I still recognize him...

Village

Ivan Turgenev

Last day of June; for a thousand miles around Russia is our native land.

The whole sky is filled with an even blue; There is only one cloud on it - either floating or melting. Calm, warm... the air is fresh milk!

The larks are ringing; goofy pigeons coo; swallows soar silently; horses snort and chew; the dogs do not bark and stand quietly wagging their tails.

And it smells like smoke, and grass, and a little tar, and a little leather. The hemp plants have already entered into force and are releasing their heavy but pleasant spirit.

A deep but gentle ravine. On the sides, in several rows, are big-headed willows, fissured at the bottom. A stream runs through the ravine; at the bottom of it, small pebbles seem to tremble through light ripples. In the distance, at the end-edge of earth and sky, there is the bluish line of a large river.

Along the ravine - on one side there are neat barns, cubicles with tightly closed doors; on the other side there are five or six pine huts with plank roofs. Above each roof is a tall birdhouse pole; above each porch there is a carved iron steeply maned ridge. The uneven glass of the windows shimmers with the colors of the rainbow. Jugs with bouquets are painted on the shutters. In front of each hut there is a decorative bench; on the rubble the cats curled up in a ball, their transparent ears pricked up; beyond the high rapids the vestibule darkens coolly.

I am lying at the very edge of the ravine on a spread blanket; There are whole heaps of freshly mown, languidly fragrant hay all around. The clever owners scattered the hay in front of the huts: let it dry a little more in the hot sun, and then go to the barn! It will be nice to sleep on it!

Curly children's heads stick out from every heap; tufted hens look for midges and insects in the hay; a white-lipped puppy flounders in tangled blades of grass.

Fair-haired guys, in clean, low-belted shirts, in heavy boots with trim, exchange glib words, leaning their chests on an unharnessed cart, and grin at each other.

A chubby young woman looks out of the window; laughs either at their words or at the fuss of the guys in the piled hay.

Another pullet strong hands dragging a large wet bucket from the well... The bucket trembles and swings on a rope, dropping long fiery drops.

The old housewife stands in front of me in a new checkered coat and new cats.

Large blown beads in three rows wrapped around her dark, thin neck; the gray head is tied with a yellow scarf with red specks; he hung low over the dimmed eyes.

But the old eyes smile welcomingly; The whole wrinkled face smiles. Tea, the old lady is reaching her seventh decade... and now you can see: she was a beauty in her time!

Spreading your tanned fingers right hand, she holds a pot of cold, unskimmed milk, straight from the cellar; the walls of the pot are covered with dewdrops, like beads. In the palm of her left hand, the old woman brings me a large slice of still warm bread. “Eat to your health, visiting guest!”

The rooster suddenly crowed and busily flapped its wings; the locked calf mooed in response, slowly.

Oh, contentment, peace, excess of the Russian free village! Oh, peace and grace!

And I think: why do we need the cross on the dome of Hagia Sophia in Tsar-Grad, and everything that we, city people, are striving for?

Mowers

Ivan Bunin

We walked along the high road, and they mowed a young birch forest nearby - and sang.

It was a long time ago, it was an infinitely long time ago, because the life that we all lived at that time will not return forever.

They mowed and sang, and the entire birch forest, which had not yet lost its density and freshness, still full of flowers and smells, responded loudly to them.

They were “distant”, from Ryazan. A small artel of them passed through our Oryol places, helping our hayfields and moving to the lower ranks, to earn money during the working season in the steppes, even more fertile than ours. And they were carefree, friendly, as people are on a long and long journey, on vacation from all family and economic ties, they were “eager to work,” unconsciously rejoicing in its beauty and efficiency. They were somehow older and more solid than ours - in custom, in behavior, in language - neat and beautiful clothes, their soft leather shoe covers, white well-tied footwear, clean trousers and shirts with red, red collars and the same gussets.

A week ago they were mowing the forest near us, and I saw, while riding on horseback, how they went to work, having had their afternoon break: they drank spring water from wooden jugs - so long, so sweetly, as only animals and good, healthy Russians drink farm laborers - then they crossed themselves and cheerfully ran to the place with white, shiny, razor-shaped braids on their shoulders, as they ran they entered the line, let the braids all go at once, widely, playfully, and walked, walked in a free, even line. And on the way back I saw their dinner. They sat in a fresh clearing near an extinguished fire, using spoons to drag pieces of something pink out of cast iron.

I said:

Bread and salt, hello.

They answered cordially:

Good health, you are welcome!

It's okay, they're sweet, pure chicken!

Now they sang: “Forgive me, goodbye, dear friend!” - moved through the birch forest, thoughtlessly depriving it of thick grasses and flowers, and sang without noticing it. And we stood and listened to them, feeling that we would never forget this early evening hour and would never understand, and most importantly, not fully express what the wonderful charm of their song was.

Its charm was in the responses, in the sonority of the birch forest. Its beauty was that it was in no way on its own: it was connected with everything that we and they, these Ryazan mowers, saw and felt. The beauty was in that unconscious, but blood relationship that was between them and us - and between them, us and this grain-bearing field that surrounded us, this field air that they and we breathed since childhood, this late afternoon, these clouds in the already pinkish west, with this snowy, young forest, full of waist-deep honey herbs, countless wild flowers and berries, which they constantly picked and ate, and this big road, its spaciousness and reserved distance. The beauty was that we were all children of our homeland and were all together and we all felt good, calm and loving without a clear understanding of our feelings, because we don’t need them, we shouldn’t understand them when they exist. And there was also a charm (already completely unrecognized by us then) that this homeland, this common home of ours was Russia, and that only her soul could sing the way the mowers sang in this birch forest responding to their every breath.

Of course, they “said goodbye, parted” with their “darling side”, and with their happiness, and with hopes, and with the one with whom this happiness was united:

Forgive me, goodbye, dear friend,

And, darling, oh, goodbye, little side! -

they each sighed differently, with varying degrees of sadness and love, but with the same carefree, hopeless reproach.

Forgive me, goodbye, my dear, unfaithful one,

Has my heart become blacker than dirt for you? -

they spoke, complaining and yearning in different ways, emphasizing the words in different ways, and suddenly they all merged at once in a completely harmonious feeling of almost delight in the face of their death, youthful audacity in the face of fate and some kind of extraordinary, all-forgiving generosity - as if they were shaking their heads and threw it all over the forest:

If you don’t love, aren’t nice, God be with you,

If you find something better, you’ll forget! -

and all over the forest it responded to the friendly strength, freedom and chesty sonority of their voices, froze and again, loudly thundering, picked up:

Oh, if you find something better, you’ll forget,

If you find something worse, you will regret it!

What else was the charm of this song, its inescapable joy despite all its seemingly hopelessness? The fact is that man still did not believe, and could not believe, due to his strength and innocence, in this hopelessness. “Oh, yes, all the paths are closed to me, young man!” - he said, sweetly mourning himself. But those who really have no way or road anywhere do not cry sweetly and do not sing of their sorrows. “Forgive me, goodbye, my dear side!” - the man said - and knew that, after all, there was no real separation for him from her, from his homeland, that, no matter where his fate took him, his native sky would still be above him, and around him - the boundless native Rus', disastrous for him, spoiled, except for its freedom, space and fabulous wealth. “The red sun set behind the dark forests, ah, all the birds fell silent, everyone sat down in their places!” My happiness has ended, he sighed, the dark night with its wilderness surrounds me, - and yet I felt: he is so close to this wilderness, alive for him, virgin and filled with magical powers, that everywhere he has shelter, lodging, food. someone’s intercession, someone’s kind care, someone’s voice whispering: “Don’t worry, the morning is wiser than the evening, nothing is impossible for me, sleep well, child!” - And from all sorts of troubles, according to his faith, birds and forest animals, beautiful and wise princesses, and even Baba Yaga herself, who pitied him “because of his youth,” helped him out. There were flying carpets for him, invisible hats, milk rivers flowed, semi-precious treasures were hidden, for all mortal spells there were the keys of ever-living water, he knew prayers and spells, miraculous, again according to his faith, he flew away from prisons, casting himself as a clear falcon , having hit the damp Mother Earth, dense wilds, black swamps, flying sands defended him from dashing neighbors and enemies - and the merciful God forgave him for all the daring whistles, sharp, hot knives...

There was one more thing, I say, in this song - this is what both we and they, these Ryazan men, knew well in the depths of our souls, that we were infinitely happy in those days, now infinitely distant - and irrevocable. For everything has its time - the fairy tale has passed for us too: our ancient intercessors abandoned us, prowling animals fled, prophetic birds scattered, self-assembled tablecloths folded, prayers and spells were desecrated, Mother Cheese Earth dried up, life-giving springs dried up - and the end came , the limit of God's forgiveness.

A fairy tale about our native Urals

Evgeniy Permyak

There is more than enough nonsense in this fairy tale. In forgotten dark times, someone’s idle tongue gave birth to this tale and sent it around the world. Her life was so-so. Malomalskoye. In some places she hid, in some places she lived up to our age and got into my ears.

Don't let this fairy tale go to waste! Somewhere, for someone, maybe it will do. If it takes root, let it live. No - my business is my side. What I bought for is what I sell for.

Listen.

He decided to gird the earth with himself. I conceived and crawled from the Caspian midday steppes to the cold midnight seas.

He crawled for more than a thousand miles as if on a string, and then began to wobble.

Apparently it was in the fall. The whole night found him. No way! Like in a cellar. Zarya doesn't even study.

He waved, but no matter how thick the ice is, can it withstand such a colossus? Could not resist. Cracked. Donkey.

No matter how hot the fiery blood of the Snake-Snake is, no matter how boiling everything around is, the sea is still not a tub of water. You won't heat it up.

The runner began to cool down. From the head. Well, if you get a cold in your head, that’s the end of your body. He began to grow numb, and soon became completely petrified.

The fiery blood in him became oil. Meat - in ores. The ribs are like stones. The vertebrae and ridges became rocks. Scales - gems. And everything else - everything that exists in the depths of the earth. From salts to diamonds. From gray granite to patterned jaspers and marbles.

Years have passed, centuries have passed. The petrified giant was overgrown with a lush spruce forest, pine expanse, cedar fun, larch beauty.

And now it will never occur to anyone that the mountains were once a living snake-snake.

I can’t say where this word came from. That's just what everyone calls him now. Although it is a short word, it has absorbed a lot, like Rus'...

Collection of miracles

Konstantin Paustovsky

Everyone, even the most serious person, not to mention, of course, the boys, has his own secret and slightly funny dream. I had the same dream - to definitely get to Borovoe Lake.

From the village where I lived that summer, the lake was only twenty kilometers away. Everyone tried to dissuade me from going - the road was boring, and the lake was like a lake, all around there were forests, dry swamps and lingonberries. The picture is famous!

Why are you rushing there, to this lake! - the garden watchman Semyon was angry. - What didn’t you see? What a fussy, grasping people, oh my God! You see, he needs to touch everything with his own hand, look out with his own eye! What will you look for there? One pond. And nothing more!

Were you there?

Why did he surrender to me, this lake! I don't have anything else to do, or what? This is where they sit, all my business! - Semyon tapped his brown neck with his fist. - On the hill!

But I still went to the lake. Two village boys stuck with me - Lyonka and Vanya.

Before we had time to leave the outskirts, the complete hostility of the characters of Lyonka and Vanya was immediately revealed. Lyonka calculated everything he saw around him into rubles.

“Look,” he told me in his booming voice, “the gander is coming.” How long do you think he can handle?

How do I know!

“It’s probably worth a hundred rubles,” Lyonka said dreamily and immediately asked: “But how much will this pine tree last?” Two hundred rubles? Or for all three hundred?

Accountant! - Vanya remarked contemptuously and sniffed. - He himself has brains worth a dime, but he asks prices for everything. My eyes would not look at him.

After that, Lyonka and Vanya stopped, and I heard a well-known conversation - a harbinger of a fight. It consisted, as is customary, only of questions and exclamations.

Whose brains are they asking for a dime? My?

Probably not mine!

Look!

See for yourself!

Don't grab it! The cap was not sewn for you!

Oh, I wish I could push you in my own way!

Don't scare me! Don't poke me in the nose! The fight was short but decisive.

Lyonka picked up his cap, spat and went, offended, back to the village. I began to shame Vanya.

Of course! - said Vanya, embarrassed. - I got into a fight in the heat of the moment. Everyone is fighting with him, with Lyonka. He's kind of boring! Give him free rein, he puts prices on everything, like in a general store. For every spikelet. And he will certainly clear the entire forest and chop it down for firewood. And I’m afraid more than anything in the world when the forest is being cleared. I'm so afraid of passion!

Why so?

Oxygen from forests. The forests will be cut down, the oxygen will become liquid and smelly. And the earth will no longer be able to attract him, to keep him close to him. Where will he fly? - Vanya pointed to the fresh morning sky. - The person will have nothing to breathe. The forester explained it to me.

Bustle! - Vanya said. - Like in Moscow. An old man comes to this forest from Moscow to collect ant eggs. Every year. They take it away in bags. This is the best bird food. And they are good for fishing. You need a tiny little hook!

Behind an oak copse, on the edge of a loose sandy road, there stood a lopsided cross with a black tin icon. Red ladybugs with white speckles were crawling along the cross.

A quiet wind blew in my face from the oat fields. The oats rustled, bent, and a gray wave ran over them.

Beyond the oat field we passed through the village of Polkovo. I have long noticed that almost all of the regiment’s peasants differ from the surrounding residents in their tall stature.

Stately people in Polkovo! - our Zaborevskys said with envy. - Grenadiers! Drummers!

In Polkovo we went to rest in the hut of Vasily Lyalin, a tall, handsome old man with a piebald beard. Gray strands stuck out in disarray in his black shaggy hair.

When we entered Lyalin’s hut, he shouted:

Keep your heads down! Heads! Everyone is smashing my forehead against the lintel! The people in Polkov are painfully tall, but they are slow-witted - they build huts according to their short stature.

While talking with Lyalin, I finally learned why the regimental peasants were so tall.

Story! - said Lyalin. - Do you think we went so high in vain? Even the little bug doesn’t live in vain. It also has its purpose.

Vanya laughed.

Wait until you laugh! - Lyalin remarked sternly. - I’m not yet learned enough to laugh. You listen. Was there such a foolish tsar in Russia - Emperor Paul? Or wasn't it?

“Yes,” Vanya said. - We studied.

Was and floated away. And he did such a lot of things that we still have hiccups to this day. The gentleman was fierce. A soldier at the parade squinted his eyes in the wrong direction - he now gets excited and begins to thunder: “To Siberia! To hard labor! Three hundred ramrods!” This is what the king was like! Well, what happened was that the grenadier regiment did not please him. He shouts: “March in the indicated direction for a thousand miles!” Let's go! And after a thousand miles, stop for an eternal rest!” And he points in the direction with his finger. Well, the regiment, of course, turned and walked. What are you going to do? We walked and walked for three months and reached this place. The forest all around is impassable. One wild. They stopped and began cutting down huts, crushing clay, laying stoves, and digging wells. They built a village and called it Polkovo, as a sign that a whole regiment built it and lived in it. Then, of course, liberation came, and the soldiers took root in this area, and, almost, everyone stayed here. The area, as you can see, is fertile. There were those soldiers - grenadiers and giants - our ancestors. Our growth comes from them. If you don’t believe it, go to the city, to the museum. They will show you the papers there. Everything is spelled out in them. And just think, if only they could walk two more miles and come out to the river, they would stop there. But no, they didn’t dare disobey the order, they definitely stopped. People are still surprised. “Why are you guys from the regiment, they say, running into the forest? Didn't you have a place by the river? They say they are scary, big guys, but apparently they don’t have enough guesses in their heads.” Well, you explain to them how it happened, then they agree. “They say you can’t fight against an order! It is a fact!"

Vasily Lyalin volunteered to take us to the forest and show us the path to Borovoe Lake. First we passed through a sandy field overgrown with immortelle and wormwood. Then thickets of young pines ran out to meet us. The pine forest greeted us with silence and coolness after the hot fields. High in the slanting rays of the sun, blue jays fluttered as if on fire. Clear puddles stood on the overgrown road, and clouds floated through these blue puddles. It smelled of strawberries and heated tree stumps. Drops of either dew or yesterday’s rain glistened on the leaves of the hazel tree. Cones fell loudly.

Great forest! - Lyalin sighed. - The wind will blow, and these pines will hum like bells.

Then the pines gave way to birches, and water sparkled behind them.

Borovoe? - I asked.

No. It’s still a walk and a walk to get to Borovoye. This is Larino Lake. Let's go, look into the water, take a look.

Black oak,” said Lyalin. - Stained, centuries-old. We pulled one out, but it’s difficult to work with. Breaks saws. But if you make a thing - a rolling pin or, say, a rocker - it will last forever! Heavy wood, sinks in water.

The sun shone in the dark water. Beneath it lay ancient oak trees, as if cast from black steel. And butterflies flew over the water, reflected in it with yellow and purple petals.

Lyalin led us onto a remote road.

Walk straight,” he showed, “until you run into mosshars, a dry swamp.” And along the moss there will be a path all the way to the lake. Just be careful, there are a lot of sticks there.

He said goodbye and left. Vanya and I walked along the forest road. The forest became higher, more mysterious and darker. Streams of golden resin froze on the pine trees.

At first, the ruts that had long ago been overgrown with grass were still visible, but then they disappeared, and the pink heather covered the entire road with a dry, cheerful carpet.

The road led us to a low cliff. Beneath it lay mosshars - thick birch and aspen undergrowth warmed to the roots. The trees grew from deep moss. Small yellow flowers were scattered across the moss here and there, and dry branches with white lichen were scattered around.

A narrow path led through the mshars. She avoided high hummocks.

At the end of the path, the water glowed black and blue - Borovoe Lake.

A heavy capercaillie jumped out from behind a hummock and ran into the small forest, breaking dry wood.

The water in Borovoe was black and clean. Islands of white lilies bloomed on the water and smelled sweetly. The fish struck and the lilies swayed.

What a blessing! - Vanya said. - Let's live here until our crackers run out.

I agreed.

We stayed at the lake for two days.

We saw sunsets and twilight and a tangle of plants appearing before us in the light of the fire. We heard the cries of wild geese and the sounds of night rain. He walked for a short time, about an hour, and quietly rang across the lake, as if he was stretching thin, cobweb-like, trembling strings between the black sky and water.

That's all I wanted to tell you.

But since then I will not believe anyone that there are boring places on our earth that do not provide any food for the eye, the ear, the imagination, or human thought.

The theme of the Motherland is traditional for Russian literature; every artist turns to it in his work. But, of course, the interpretation of this topic is different every time. It is determined by the personality of the author, his poetics, and the era, which always leaves its mark on the artist’s work.

This sounds especially poignant in critical times for the country. Dramatic story Ancient Rus' brought to life such works full of patriotism as “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”, “The Tale of the Destruction of the Russian Land”, “The Devastation of Ryazan by Batu”, “Zadonshchina” and many others. Separated by centuries, they are all dedicated tragic events ancient Russian history, full of sorrow and at the same time pride for their land, for its courageous defenders. The poetics of these works is unique. To a large extent, it is determined by the influence of folklore, and in many ways by the pagan worldview of the author. Hence the abundance poetic images nature, a close connection with which is felt, for example, in “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”, vivid metaphors, epithets, hyperboles, parallelisms. How to artistic expression all this will be comprehended in the literature later, but for now we can say that for unknown author of a great monument is a natural way of narration, which he does not recognize as a literary device.

The same can be seen in the “Tale of the Ruin of Ryazan by Batu”, written already in the thirteenth century, in which the influence is very strong folk songs, epics, legends. Admiring the courage of the warriors defending the Russian land from the “filthy”, the author writes: “These are winged people, they do not know death... riding on horses, they fight - one with a thousand, and two with ten thousand.”

The enlightened eighteenth century gives birth new literature. The idea of strengthening Russian statehood and sovereignty dominates poets as well. The theme of the Motherland in the works of V.K. Trediakovsky and M.V. Lomonosov sounds majestic and proud.

“It’s in vain to look at Russia through distant countries,” Trediakovsky glorifies its high nobility, pious faith, abundance and strength. His Fatherland for him is “the treasure of all good things.” These “Poems in Praise of Russia” are replete with Slavicisms:

All your people are Orthodox

And they are famous everywhere for their courage;

Children deserve such a mother,

Everywhere they are ready for you.

And suddenly: “Vivat Russia!” Another viva!” This Latinism is a trend of the new, Peter the Great era.

In Lomonosov's odes, the theme of the Motherland takes on an additional perspective. Glorifying Russia, “shining in the light,” the poet paints an image of the country in its real geographical outlines:

Look at the high mountains.

Look into your wide fields,

Where is the Volga, Dnieper, where the Ob flows...

According to Lomonosov, Russia is a “vast power”, covered with “everlasting snow” and deep forests, inspires poets, gives birth to “newtons of their own and quick in mind.”

A. S. Pushkin, who in general moved away from classicism in his work, in this topic is close to the same sovereign view of Russia. In “Memoirs in Tsarskoe Selo” an image of a mighty country is born, which was “crowned with glory” “under the scepter of a great wife.” Ideological closeness to Lomonosov is reinforced here and on language level. The poet organically uses Slavicisms, giving the poem a sublime character:

Be comforted, mother of cities Russia,

Behold the death of the stranger.

Today they are weighed down on their arrogant heights.

The avenging right hand of the creator.

But at the same time, Pushkin brings a lyrical element to the theme of the Motherland, not characteristic of classicism. In his poetry, the Motherland is also a “corner of the earth” - Mikhailovskoye, and his grandfather’s possessions - Petrovskoye and the oak groves of Tsarskoye Selo.

The lyrical beginning is clearly felt in the poems about the Motherland by M. Yu. Lermontov. The nature of the Russian village, “plunging the thought into some kind of vague dream,” dispels the spiritual anxieties of the lyrical hero.

Then the anxiety of my soul is humbled, Then the wrinkles on my brow disappear, And I can comprehend happiness on earth, And in heaven I see God!..

Lermontov's love for the Motherland is irrational, it is “ odd love", as the poet himself admits ("Motherland"). It cannot be explained by reason.

But I love - why don’t I know?

Its steppes are coldly silent.

Its boundless forests sway.

Its river floods are like seas...

Later, F.I. Tyutchev will say aphoristically about his similar feeling for the Fatherland of Posts:

You can't understand Russia with your mind,

A common arshin cannot be measured...

But there are other colors in Lermontov’s attitude towards the Motherland: love for its boundless forests and burnt stubble is combined in him with hatred for the country of slaves, the country of masters (“Farewell, unwashed Russia”).

This motif of love-hate will be developed in the works of N. A. Nekrasov:

Who lives without sadness and anger

He does not love his homeland.

But, of course, this statement does not exhaust the poet’s feeling for Russia. It is much more multifaceted: it also contains love for its boundless distances, for its open space, which he calls healing.

All the rye is all around, like a living steppe.

No castles, no seas, no mountains...

Thank you, dear side,

For your healing space!

Nekrasov’s feelings for the Motherland contain pain from the awareness of its wretchedness and at the same time deep hope and faith in its future. So, in the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” there are the lines:

You're miserable too

You are also abundant

You are mighty

You are also powerless, Mother Rus'!

And there are also these:

In a moment of despondency, O Motherland!

My thoughts fly forward.

You are still destined to suffer a lot,

But you won't die, I know.

A similar feeling of love, bordering on hatred, is also revealed by A. A. Blok in his poems dedicated to Russia:

My Rus', my life, shall we suffer together?

Tsar, yes Siberia, yes Ermak, yes prison!

Eh, isn’t it time to separate and repent...

To a free heart what is your darkness for?

In another poem he exclaims: “Oh my, my wife!” Such inconsistency is characteristic not only of Blok. It clearly expressed the duality of consciousness of the Russian intellectual, thinker and poet of the early twentieth century.

In the works of poets such as Yesenin, familiar motifs of nineteenth-century poetry are heard, interpreted, of course, in a different way. historical context and other poetics. But just as sincere and deep is their feeling for the Motherland, suffering and proud, unhappy and great.