Definition of conflict in a literary work. Artistic conflict and its types

Artistic conflict, or artistic collision (from the Latin collisio - collision), is the confrontation of multidirectional forces operating in a literary work - social, natural, political, moral, philosophical - which receives ideological and aesthetic embodiment in artistic structure works as a contrast (opposition) of characters to circumstances, individual characters - or various sides of the same character - each other, themselves artistic ideas works (if they contain ideologically polar principles).

In Pushkin’s “The Captain’s Daughter,” the conflict between Grinev and Shvabrin over their love for Masha Mironova, which forms the visible basis of the romantic plot itself, recedes into the background before the socio-historical conflict - Pugachev’s uprising. The main problem Pushkin's novel, in which both conflicts are uniquely refracted, is a dilemma of two ideas about honor (the epigraph of the work is “Take care of honor from a young age”): on the one hand, the narrow framework of class-class honor (for example, the noble, officer oath of allegiance); on the other hand, universal

values of decency, kindness, humanism (fidelity to one’s word, trust in a person, gratitude for kindness done, desire to help in trouble, etc.). Shvabrin is dishonest even from the point of view of the noble code; Grinev rushes between two concepts of honor, one of which is imputed to his duty, the other is dictated by natural feeling; Pugachev turns out to be above the feeling of class hatred towards a nobleman, which would seem completely natural, and meets the highest requirements of human honesty and nobility, surpassing in this respect the narrator himself, Pyotr Andreevich Grinev.

The writer is not obliged to present the reader in a ready-made form with the future historical resolution of the things he depicts. social conflicts. Often such a resolution of socio-historical conflicts reflected in a literary work is seen by the reader in a semantic context unexpected for the writer. If the reader acts as literary critic, he can determine both the conflict and the method of resolving it much more accurately and far-sightedly than the artist himself. Thus, N.A. Dobrolyubov, analyzing the drama of A.N. Ostrovsky “The Thunderstorm”, was able to consider, behind the socio-psychological collision of the patriarchal merchant-bourgeois life, the most acute social contradiction of all of Russia - the “dark kingdom”, where, among general obedience, hypocrisy and voicelessness “tyranny” reigns supreme, the ominous apotheosis of which is autocracy, and where even the slightest protest is a “ray of light.”

In epic and dramatic works conflict lies at the heart of the plot and is its driving force, determining the development of action.

Thus, in “The Song about the Merchant Kalashnikov...” by M. Yu. Lermontov, the development of the action is based on the conflict between Kalashnikov and Kiribeevich; in N.V. Gogol's work "Portrait" the action is based on the internal conflict in Chartkov's soul - the contradiction between the awareness of the high duty of the artist and the passion for profit.

The conflict of a work of art is based on vital contradictions, and their detection is the most important function of the plot. Hegel introduced the term “collision” with the meaning of a collision of opposing forces, interests, and aspirations.

The science of literature traditionally recognizes the existence of four types of artistic conflict, which will be discussed further. Firstly, a natural or physical conflict, when the hero enters into a struggle with nature. Secondly, the so-called social conflict, when a person is challenged by another person or society. In accordance with the laws art world such a conflict arises in the clash of heroes who are possessed by opposing and mutually exclusive life goals. And for this conflict to be sufficiently acute, sufficiently “tragic”, each of these mutually hostile goals must have its own subjective rightness, each of the heroes must, to some extent, evoke compassion. So the Circassian woman (“Prisoner of the Caucasus” by A.S. Pushkin), like Tamara from M.Yu. Lermontov’s poem “The Demon,” comes into conflict not so much with the hero, but with society, and dies. Her “epiphany” costs her life. Or “The Bronze Horseman” – the confrontation between a little man and a formidable reformer. Moreover, it is precisely the ratio similar topics characteristic of Russian literature of the 19th century. It should be emphasized that the unquestioning introduction of a character into a certain environment that embraces him, presuming the supremacy of this environment over him, sometimes eliminates the problems of moral responsibility and personal initiative of a member of society, which were so significant for the literature of the 19th century. A variation of this category is a conflict between social groups or generations. Thus, in the novel “Fathers and Sons” I. Turgenev depicts the core social conflict of the 60s of the 19th century - the clash between liberal nobles and democratic commoners. Despite the title, the conflict in the novel is not of an ageist nature, but of an ideological nature, i.e. This is not a conflict between two generations, but essentially a conflict between two worldviews. The role of antipodes in the novel is played by Evgeny Bazarov (exponent of the idea of common democrats) and Pavel Petrovich Kirsanov (central defender of the worldview and lifestyle of the liberal nobility). The breath of the era, its typical features are palpable in the central images of the novel and in the historical background against which the action unfolds. The period of preparation for the peasant reform, the deep social contradictions of that time, the struggle of social forces in the era of the 60s - this is what was reflected in the images of the novel, constituted its historical background and the essence of the main conflict. The third type of conflict traditionally identified in literary studies is internal or psychological, when a person’s desires conflict with his conscience. For example, the moral and psychological conflict of I. Turgenev’s novel “Rudin”, which originated in the author’s early prose. Thus, the confessional elegy “Alone, I am alone again” can be considered an original preface to the formation storyline“Rudina”, which defines the opposition of the protagonist between reality and dreams, falling in love with existence and dissatisfaction with his own fate, and a significant share of Turgenev’s poems(“To A.S.”, “Confession”, “Did you notice, oh my silent friend...”, “When it’s so joyful, so tender...”, etc.) as a plot “blank” for a future novel. The fourth possible type of literary conflict is designated as providential, when a person opposes the laws of fate or some deity. For example, in the grandiose, sometimes difficult for the reader, “Faust”, everything is built on a global conflict - a large-scale confrontation between the genius of knowledge of Faust and the genius of evil Mephistopheles.

№9Composition of a literary work. External and internal composition.

Composition (from Latin composition - arrangement, comparison) - the structure of a work of art, determined by its content, purpose and largely determines its perception by the reader

A distinction is made between external composition (architectonics) and internal composition (narrative composition).

To the features external compositions include the presence or absence of:

1) dividing the text into fragments (books, volumes, parts, chapters, acts, stanzas, paragraphs);

2) prologue, epilogue;

3) attachments, notes, comments;

4) epigraphs, dedications;

5) inserted texts or episodes;

6) author's digressions (lyrical, philosophical, historical) Author's digression - an extra-plot fragment in literary text, serving directly to express the thoughts and feelings of the author-narrator.

Internal

The composition of the narrative is the features of the organization of the point of view of what is depicted. When characterizing internal composition questions need to be answered:

1) how is it organized speech situation in the work (who, to whom, in what form the speech is addressed, are there narrators and how many of them, in what order do they change and why, how does the speech situation organized by the author affect the reader);

2) how the plot is structured (linear composition, or retrospective, or with elements of a retrospective story, circular, plot framing; reportage type or memoir, etc.);

3) how the system of images is built (what is the compositional center - one hero, two or a group; how the world of people relates (main, secondary, episodic, extra-plot / extra-scene; double characters, antagonist characters), the world of things, the natural world, the world cities, etc.);

4) how individual images are built;

5) which one compositional role play strong positions text - literary works.

No. 10 Speech structure thin. works.

The narration could be:

FROM THE AUTHOR (objective form of narration, from the 3rd person): the apparent absence of any subject of narration in the work. This illusion arises because epic works the author does not directly express himself in any way - neither through statements on his own behalf, nor through the emotion of the tone of the story itself. Ideological and emotional comprehension is expressed indirectly - through combinations of details of the substantive imagery of the work.

ON BEHALF OF THE NARRATOR, BUT NOT THE HERO. The narrator expresses himself in emotional statements about the characters, their actions, relationships, and experiences. Usually, the author assigns this role to one of minor characters. The narrator's speech gives the main assessment of the characters and events in a literary work.

Example: " Captain's daughter» Pushkin, where the narration is told on behalf of Grinev.

The form of first-person narration is SKAZ. The narrative is constructed as an oral story of a specific narrator, equipped with his individual linguistic properties. This form allows you to show someone else's point of view, including one that belongs to another culture.

Another form is EPISTOLARY, i.e. letters from a hero or correspondence between several persons

The third form is MEMOIR, i.e. works written in the form of memoirs, diaries

Personification narrative speech is a powerful, expressive tool.

№ 11 Character system like component literary work.

When analyzing epic and dramatic works, a lot of attention has to be paid to the composition of the character system, that is, the characters in the work. For the convenience of approaching this analysis, it is customary to distinguish between main, secondary and episodic characters. It would seem a very simple and convenient division, but in practice it often causes bewilderment and some confusion. The fact is that the category of a character (main, secondary or episodic) can be determined according to two different parameters.

The first is the degree of participation in the plot and, accordingly, the amount of text that this character is given.

The second is the degree of importance of a given character for revealing aspects of artistic content. It’s easy to analyze in cases where these parameters coincide: for example, in Turgenev’s novel “Fathers and Sons” Bazarov - main character in both respects, Pavel Petrovich, Nikolai Petrovich, Arkady, Odintsova are secondary characters in all respects, and Sitnikov or Kukshina are episodic.

In some art systems we encounter such an organization of the system of characters that the question of their division into main, secondary and episodic ones loses all meaningful meaning, although in a number of cases differences between individual characters remain in terms of plot and volume of text. It’s not for nothing that Gogol wrote about his comedy “The Inspector General” that “every hero is here; the flow and progress of the play produces a shock to the whole machine: not a single wheel should remain rusty and not included in the work.” Continuing further by comparing the wheels in the car with the characters in the play, Gogol notes that some heroes can only formally prevail over others: “And in the car, some wheels move more noticeably and more powerfully, they can only be called the main ones.”

Quite complex compositional and semantic relationships can arise between the characters of a work. The simplest and most common case is the opposition of two images to each other. According to this principle of contrast, for example, the system of characters in Pushkin’s “Little Tragedies” is built: Mozart - Salieri, Don Juan - the Commander, the Baron - his son, the priest - Walsingham. A somewhat more complex case is when one character is opposed to all the others, as, for example, in Griboedov’s comedy “Woe from Wit,” where even quantitative relationships are important: it was not for nothing that Griboedov wrote that in his comedy “there are twenty-five fools for one smart person" Much less often than opposition, the technique of a kind of “doubleness” is used, when characters are compositionally united by similarity; a classic example is Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky in Gogol.

Often the compositional grouping of characters is carried out in accordance with the themes and problems that these characters embody.

№ 12 Actor, character, hero, character, type, prototype and literary hero.

Character(character) – in a prose or dramatic work artistic image a person (sometimes fantastic creatures, animals or objects), who is both the subject of the action and the object of the author’s research.

Hero. The central character, the main one for the development of the action, is called the hero of a literary work. Heroes who enter into ideological or everyday conflict with each other are the most important in the character system. In a literary work, the relationship and role of the main, secondary, episodic characters(as well as off-stage characters in dramatic work) are determined by the author's intention.

Character- a personality type formed by individual traits. The set of psychological properties that make up the image literary character, is called character. Incarnation in a hero, a character of a certain life character.

Type(imprint, form, sample) is the highest manifestation of character, and character (imprint, distinctive feature) is the universal presence of a person in complex works. Character can grow from type, but type cannot grow from character.

Prototype- a specific person who served the writer as the basis for creating a generalized image-character in a work of art.

Literary hero- This is the image of a person in literature. Also in this sense the concepts “actor” and “character” are used. Often, only the more important characters (characters) are called literary heroes.

Literary heroes are usually divided into positive and negative, but this division is very arbitrary.

Actor a work of art - a character. As a rule, the character takes an active part in the development of the action, but the author or someone from literary heroes. There are main and secondary characters. In some works the focus is on one character (for example, in Lermontov’s “Hero of Our Time”), in others the writer’s attention is drawn to a whole series of characters (“War and Peace” by L. Tolstoy).

13.The image of the author in a work of art.
The image of the author is one of the ways to realize the author’s position in an epic or lyric epic work; a personified narrator, endowed with a number of individual characteristics, but not identical to the writer’s personality. The author-narrator always takes figurative world works have certain spatio-temporal and evaluative-ideological positions, he, as a rule, is contrasted with all the characters as a figure of a different status, a different spatio-temporal plane. A significant exception is the image of the author in the novel in verse “Eugene Onegin” by A.S. Pushkin, either declaring his closeness to the main characters of the novel, or emphasizing their fictionality. The author, unlike the characters, can neither be a direct participant in the events described, nor the object of the image for any of the characters. (Otherwise, we may not be talking about the image of the author, but about the hero-narrator, like Pechorin from “A Hero of Our Time” by M. Yu. Lermontov.) Intraproducts plot plan appears to be a fictional world, conditional in relation to the author, who determines the sequence and completeness of the presentation of facts, the alternation of descriptions, reasoning and stage episodes, the transmission of direct speech of characters and internal monologues .
The presence of the author’s image is indicated by personal and possessive pronouns of the first person, personal forms of verbs, as well as various kinds of deviations from the plot action, direct assessments and characteristics of characters, generalizations, maxims, rhetorical questions, exclamations, appeals to an imaginary reader and even to characters: “Very doubtful, so that our chosen hero will be liked by the readers. The ladies will not like him, this can be said in the affirmative...” (N.V. Gogol, “Dead Souls”).
Being outside the plot action, the author can handle both space and time quite freely: freely move from one place to another, leave the “actual present” (action time), or delving into the past, giving the background of the characters (the story about Chichikov in the 11th Chapter “Dead Souls”), or looking ahead, demonstrating his omniscience with messages or hints about the immediate or distant future of the heroes: “... It was a redoubt that did not yet have a name, which later received the name of the Raevsky redoubt, or the Kurgan battery. Pierre did not pay much attention to this redoubt. He didn’t know that this place would be more memorable for him than all the places on the Borodino Field” (L.N. Tolstoy, “War and Peace”).
In literature, the second gender. 19th–20th centuries subjective narration with the image of the author is rare; it has given way to an “objective”, “impersonal” narrative, in which there are no signs of a personalized author-narrator and the author’s position is expressed indirectly: through a system of characters, plot development, with the help of expressive details, speech characteristics characters etc. P.

14. Poetics of the title. Title types.
Title- this is an element of text, and a completely special one, “pushed out”, it occupies a separate line and usually has a different font. The title is impossible not to notice - how beautiful hat, For example. But, as S. Krzhizhanovsky figuratively wrote, the title is “not a hat, but a head, which cannot be attached to the body from the outside.” Writers always take the titles of their works very seriously; sometimes they rework them many times (you probably know the expression “title pain”). Changing the title means changing something very important in the text...
By the title alone you can recognize the author or the direction to which he belongs: the name “Dead Moon” could only be given to the collection by hooligan futurists, but not by A. Akhmatova, N. Gumilyov or Andrei Bely.
Without a title, it’s completely unclear what it’s about. we're talking about in one poem or another. Here's an example. This is the beginning of B. Slutsky’s poem:

Didn't knock me off my feet. I scribbled with a pen,
Like a swallow, like a bird.
And you can’t cut it out with an axe.
You will not forget and you will not forgive.
And some new seed
You grow carefully in your soul.

Who... "didn't knock you off your feet"? It turns out that it's someone else's line. That's the name of the poem. Anyone who reads the title perceives the beginning of the poem with completely different eyes.

In poetry, all the facts of language and any “little things” of form become significant. This also applies to the title - and even if it... is not there. The absence of a title is a kind of signal: “Attention, now you will read a poem in which there are so many different associations that they cannot be expressed in one word...” The absence of a title indicates that a text rich in associations is expected, elusive to define.

Subject-descriptive titles - titles that directly designate the subject of the description, reflecting the content of the work in a concentrated form.

Figurative and thematic- titles of works that indicate the content of what is to be read, not directly, but figuratively, through the use of a word or combination of words in figurative meaning, using specific types of tropes.

Ideological and characteristic- titles of literary works, indicating the author’s assessment of what is being described, the author’s main conclusion, the main idea of the entire artistic creation.

Ideological and thematic, or polyvalent titles - those titles that indicate both the theme and the idea of the work.

Conflict

CONFLICT (literally “clash”). - IN in a broad sense K. should be called that system of contradictions that organizes a work of art into a certain unity, that struggle of images, social characters, ideas that unfold in every work - in epic and dramatic ones widely and completely, in lyrical ones - in primary forms. The concept of K. itself is quite diverse: we can talk about K. in the sense of the external opposition of characters: for example. Hamlet and his opponent, about a number of more particular K. - Hamlet and Laertes, etc. We can talk about the inner K. in Hamlet himself, about the internal struggle of his contradictory aspirations, etc. The same inconsistency and conflict can be seen in lyrical creativity, confronting different attitudes to reality, etc. K. in this sense is an integral moment in every plot (and often plotless, for example, lyrical) work, and a completely inevitable moment; social practice of any social group seems to be a continuous dialectical movement from one social contradiction arising along its path to another, from one social conflict to another. Resolving these contradictions, realizing them, “ public person, reproducing in artistic creativity your feelings and thoughts” (Plekhanov), thereby reproducing his contradictory relationships to contradictory objective reality and resolving them; So. arr. Every work of art appears, first of all, to be a dialectical unity - a unity of contradictions. Thus, it is always conflicting, at its core there is always a certain social K. Expressed in lyrics in the least tangible forms, K. appears extremely clearly in epic and drama, in various compositional contrasts of struggling characters, etc.

Literary encyclopedia. - At 11 t.; M.: Publishing House of the Communist Academy, Soviet Encyclopedia, Fiction. Edited by V. M. Fritsche, A. V. Lunacharsky. 1929-1939 .

Conflict

(from lat. conflictus - collision), a clash between the characters of a work of art, between heroes and society, between different motives in the inner world of one character. Conflict is a contradiction that determines the movement of the plot. Traditionally, conflicts are usually divided into internal (within the self-awareness, the soul of one hero) and external. Among external conflicts psychological (in particular, love), social, ideological (including political, religious, moral, philosophical) are distinguished. This identification of species is very arbitrary and often does not take into account relationships or mergers different conflicts in one work.
Different literary eras have been dominated by different conflicts. Ancient drama was dominated by plots depicting the futile confrontation between characters and fate. In the dramaturgy of classicism (in France - P. Corneille, J.B. Racine, Voltaire, in Russia - A.P. Sumarokov etc.) dominated by conflicts built on the confrontation between passion and duty in the souls of the heroes. (A.P. Sumarokov added to them the conflict between the ruler and his subjects.) In romantic literature There was a widespread conflict between an exceptional individual and a soulless society that rejected him. The options for this conflict were: expulsion or flight from society of a freedom-loving and proud hero (works by J.G. Byron, a number of works by A.S. Pushkin and M. Yu. Lermontov); tragic fate"savage" natural man"in the world of civilization, deprived of liberty(poem by M. Yu. Lermontov “Mtsyri”); the sad fate of an artist in a vulgar society that does not value beauty (in Germany - the works of E.T.A. Hoffman, in Russia - works by V.F. Odoevsky, N.A. Polevoy, M.P. Weather, story by N.V. Gogol"Portrait"); the image of the so-called extra person ”, unable to free himself from the painful boredom of existence, not finding a goal in life (Onegin in A.S. Pushkin, Pechorin in M.Yu. Lermontov, Beltov in A.I. Herzen, Rudin, Lavretsky, Litvinov and other characters from I.S. Turgenev).
A stable version of the conflict is characteristic of drama from antiquity to the present: this is the overcoming of obstacles by relatives (most often parents) by the young hero and heroine in love, who interfere with the marriage of the main characters.
Most of the conflicts in world literature can be reduced to a kind of pattern - several repeating types of conflict.
Some conflicts are not just a confrontation between characters, but a clash of opposing principles of existence, the symbols of which can be heroes or images of a work. Thus, Pushkin’s poem “The Bronze Horseman” depicts the tragic contradiction between three forces - an ordinary person, an ordinary person(Eugene), Power (its symbol is the monument to Peter I) and Element (its embodiment is the flood, the rebellious Neva). Such conflicts are typical for works on subjects of a mythological nature, with characters of a symbolic-mythological nature. So, in the novel Russian. Symbolist writer Andrei White“Petersburg” depicts not so much a clash of certain individual characters (Senator Ableukhov, revolutionary-terrorist Dudkin, provocateur Lippanchenko, etc.), but a conflict between two outwardly opposite, but internally related principles fighting for the soul of Russia - the West and the East.

Literature and language. Modern illustrated encyclopedia. - M.: Rosman. Edited by prof. Gorkina A.P. 2006 .

Synonyms:

Antonyms:

See what “Conflict” is in other dictionaries:

conflict- (from Lat. conflictus collision) a collision of multidirectional goals, interests, positions, opinions or views of the subjects of interaction, fixed by them in a rigid form. Any K. is based on a situation that includes either contradictory positions... ... Great psychological encyclopedia

- (from Latin conflictus) in psychology, a collision of two or more strong motives that cannot be satisfied at the same time. Psychologically, the conflict is associated with the fact that the weakening of one motivating stimulus leads to the strengthening of another and... ... Philosophical Encyclopedia

- (Latin conflictus - collision) - a way of interaction between people in which the tendency of confrontation, hostility, destruction of achieved unity, consent and cooperation prevails. Individuals may be in a state of conflict... Political science. Dictionary.

- (lat. conflictus, from confligere to collide). Clashes, disputes, strife. Dictionary foreign words, included in the Russian language. Chudinov A.N., 1910. CONFLICT lat. conflictus, from confligere, to collide. Clashes, disputes, strife... ... Dictionary of foreign words of the Russian language

Cm … Synonym dictionary

CONFLICT, conflict, husband. (lat. conflictus) (book). A clash between disputing dissenting parties. Conflict between workers and management. || Complication in international relations. Polish-Lithuanian conflict. Dictionary Ushakova. D.N.... ... Ushakov's Explanatory Dictionary

- (from lat. conflictus collision) clash of parties, opinions, forces... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

- (from lat. conflictus clash) contradiction in views and relationships, a clash of divergent, opposing interests, a heated dispute. Raizberg B.A., Lozovsky L.Sh., Starodubtseva E.B.. Modern economic dictionary. 2nd ed., rev. M... Economic dictionary

Disagreement between two or more parties (individuals or groups) in which each party tries to ensure that its own views or goals are accepted... Glossary of crisis management terms

- (lat. conflictus collision) in a broad sense, a collision, confrontation of the parties. The philosophical tradition considers conflict as a special case of contradiction, its extreme aggravation. In sociology, social culture is a process or situation in which one ... The latest philosophical dictionary

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, Glazyrin T.S.. Conflict of interests as the basis of corruption offenses threatens the authority of the state (municipal) service, affecting the organizational, legal and moral foundations...

Today in literary criticism there are many works devoted to the theory of conflict (V.Ya. Propp, N.D. Tamarchenko, V.I. Tyupa, Vl.A. Lukov, etc.). In a broad sense, conflict can be understood as “that system of contradictions that organizes a work of art into a certain unity, that struggle of images, social characters, ideas that unfolds in every work - in epic and dramatic works widely and completely, in lyrical ones - in primary forms".

There are conflicts in which the opposition of characters unfolds on the external level. For example, Hamlet and his opponents; Hamlet and Laertes. The same should be said about the internal conflict that arises within the character, like the struggle of his internal contradictions, such a conflict is transferred to the sphere of feelings (Hamlet).

This understanding of the conflict seems integral part in every plot-based work (and often in plotless ones).

Any work is based on conflict, to a greater or lesser extent of its manifestation. IN lyrical work the conflict is not as vividly presented as in an epic or dramatic work.

Vl.A. Lukov in his article proposes to understand conflict as “a contradiction that forms the plot, forms a system of images, the concept of the world, man and art, the features of the genre, expressed in composition, leaving an imprint on the speech and methods of describing the characters, which can determine the specific impact of the work on a person - catharsis".

Further in the same article, “Conflict (in a literary work),” the researcher talks about a conflict that is characterized not by a system of characters, but by a system of ideas, and subsequently it becomes philosophical, ideological and forms philosophical and ideological generalization.

The conflict unfolds through the plot. There are two types of plot conflict: Local transient plot, Stable conflict situation (state).

A local transitory plot is a plot in which the conflict has its beginning and its resolution within the framework of a specific plot. The type of plot conflict is well described in literary criticism. The local transitory plot is the so-called traditional, archetypal plot (since it goes back to historically early literature).

The study of the local transient plot was started by V. Ya. Propp. The scientist in his work “Morphology of a (Magic) Fairy Tale” (1928) examined the structure of the plot fairy tale. According to Propp, a fairy tale consists of three parts. In the first part of the fairy tale, a “shortage” is discovered (the kidnapping of the princess, the hero’s desire to find something without which the hero cannot have a full-blooded life: the merchant’s daughter wants The Scarlet Flower). In the second part of the fairy tale, there is a confrontation between the hero and the enemy, the victory of the hero over the enemy (Ivan Tsarevich defeats Koshchei the Immortal). In the third part, the hero of the fairy tale receives what he is looking for (“liquidation of the shortage”). He marries, thereby inheriting the throne ("accession"; see also: Function).

French structuralist scientists, relying on the work of Propp, tried to build universal models of event series in folklore and literature.

A stable conflict situation (state) is a type of conflict that has no resolution within the framework of a specific plot. A stable conflict situation (state) has become widespread in late XIX century in "New Drama".

Conflict (in literary criticism), or artistic conflict, is one of the main categories that characterize the content of a literary work (primarily dramas or works with clearly presented dramatic features).

As Vl.A Lukov wrote, “the origin of the term is connected with the Latin word conflictus - collision, blow, struggle, battle (found in Cicero).”

Often in works several conflicts develop at once, forming a system of conflicts.

Exist different types conflicts, which are based on different principles.

They can be open and hidden, external and internal, acute and protracted, solvable and insoluble, etc.

According to the nature of pathos, conflicts are: tragic, comic, dramatic, lyrical, satirical, humorous, etc.

There are also conflicts based on the development of the plot action: military, interethnic, religious (interfaith), intergenerational, family, which form the sphere social conflicts(for example, “The Iliad” by Homer; novels by W. Scott, V. Hugo, “War and Peace” by L. N. Tolstoy; social novel in the works of O. Balzac, C. Dickens, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin; novels about generations: "Fathers and Sons" by I. S. Turgenev, "Teenager" by F. M. Dostoevsky; "family chronicles": "Buddenbrooks" by T. Mann, "The Forsyte Saga" by D. Galsworthy, "The Thibaut Family" by R. Martin du Garat; the genre of “industrial novel” in Soviet literature, etc.). As mentioned above, the conflict can be transferred to the sensory sphere and determine psychological genre generalization (“The Sorrows of Young Werther” by I.V., Goethe). Conflicts that form philosophical, ideological genre generalizations (“What to do?” by N.G. Chernyshevsky).

Some artistic directions are associated with the creation of a cross-cutting (main) conflict. A striking example confirming this idea is the conflict that became the most productive in classicism - the conflict between duty and feeling. In romanticism, such a conflict was the conflict between ideal and reality.

In its most vivid manifestation, the conflict is presented in drama. In W. Shakespeare, the conflict is open, and in A.P. Chekhov is hidden, which can be explained by the time during which both famous playwrights worked.

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the emergence of new form conflict in drama - "discussion" ("A Doll's House" by G. Ibsen, dramas by D. B. Shaw, etc.), which is further developed and rethought in existentialist drama (J.-P. Sartre, A. Camus, J. Anuj) and in " epic theater"B. Brecht and challenged, brought to the point of absurdity in modernist anti-drama (E. Ionesco, S. Beckett, etc.). Often in literature one can find connections in the drama of Chekhov and Shakespearean conflicts (for example, in the dramaturgy of M. Gorky).

Recently, there has been a tendency to supplant conflict with such a category as dialogue (M. Bakhtin). "But here - according to Vl.A. Lukov - one can discern temporary fluctuations in relation to the fundamental categories of literary criticism, because behind the category of conflict in literature there is a dialectical development of reality, and not just artistic content". So, to summarize all of the above, it is necessary to emphasize that conflict is fundamental to almost every work.

A literary work of art, whether prosaic or lyrical, can do without many traditional signs of artistry. It would seem that the basis of a work is always a plot, but look at the experimental literature of modernism - the author, quite bold and confident in his own strengths as an artist of words, discards the plot without thinking or reduces it to a minimum.

An example of this is the texts of Virginia Woolf or James Joyce. Describe 40 pages in one second? Easily. This means that it is impossible to talk about the plot as the fundamental force of an artistic literary work. Maybe then the basis lies literary language, the instrument with which the author conveys this or that idea to his reader? But then how can we explain that works that are written very simply or even in downright bad style are extremely popular?

Actually the answer is simple. At the heart of any literary work is conflict.

Conflict in literature is quite broad concept. There is a classic understanding of conflict. In this case, it is perceived as a confrontation between good and evil, sublime and base, spiritual and carnal. These phenomena and functions are embodied by the heroes of the work or the “voice of the author,” that is, those judgments of the all-seeing author-storyteller that lie outside the plot, but comment on it and explain it.

There are also more complex conflicts, for example, the conflict between the author’s personality and the real outside world, which does not suit him one way or another. Such works cannot be considered outside of this conflict, because they will simply lose their meaning. An example is the work of the Dadaists - poets of the most experimental type. They wrote meaningless strings of words and sounds, symbolizing the madness of a world caught in war. If the works of the Dadaists are deprived of this common conflict for them - the conflict of the human soul in need of an orderly world, and an insane planet captured by bloodshed, then the set of words and sounds that embody the idea tied to the antagonism of these concepts will become a meaningless set of words and sounds.

A work needs conflict as a justification for the very existence of this work, its ideological core.

Types of conflicts

The type of conflict in the literature is distinguished by who is involved in the conflict. According to the oppositions “an aspect of personality is another aspect of the same personality,” “personality is another personality,” “personality is environment,” “personality is circumstances, fate, etc.”

Internal conflict

Internal conflict in a literary work is a conflict based on the opposition “an aspect of personality - another aspect of personality.” Quite a popular conflict in Russian literary classics. An example is Maxim Gorky’s epic novel “The Life of Klim Samgin.” Throughout the story, the title character vacillates between not wanting to participate in the revolutionary movements of the late 19th and early 20th centuries due to the anti-individualist ideologies of those times (and he is an extreme individualist) and between the desire to command respect and admiration, which is easily achieved by taking part in an uprising . He experiences both rejection of what is happening and morbid interest. More famous example- this is Raskolnikov from Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment. There, the intellectual position put forward by the hero, claiming exclusive rights, comes into conflict strong personality(the right to kill) and his moral feeling is guilt.

Interpersonal conflict

It is also called a personal conflict. This is a type of conflict based on the opposition “personality - personality.” Real people and groups of people come into conflict. The most typical example of interpersonal conflict in literature is the familiar conflict between Chatsky, the “new man” and fresh ideas and reformist spirit and " Famusov society”, retrograde and self-absorbed. If we talk about the conflict between the two heroes, then this is the conflict between Onegin and Lensky - a duel for purely personal reasons. Separately among interpersonal conflicts is the conflict between “fathers and children.” A confrontation between generations, the cultural and ideological gap between which is prohibitively large. Such conflicts arise in eras of great social upheaval, when the course of life changes too quickly and radically. In addition to Turgenev’s novel of the same name, an example of such a contradiction is Dostoevsky’s novel “The Teenager,” in which the main character dreams of great wealth, since money is power, and the father rushes between extreme religiosity and noble altruism. Naturally, people with such different worldviews do not find common ground and conflict.

Extrapersonal conflict

This type of conflict is the most vague and ambiguous. The hero here does not contradict anyone in particular or himself. He comes into confrontation with fate, life circumstances, the system, perhaps with divine forces. An example of such a conflict can be considered the play “At the Depths” by Maxim Gorky. The heroes of the work are in constant conflict with their low social status and inevitably lose in this battle. Such conflicts are at the heart of fairy tales. In addition to the fact that the fairy-tale hero has real enemies (Koschei, the cannibal, the dragon - it doesn’t matter), there is also the concept of a series of tests, a certain path that must be passed. The path of a fairy-tale hero, on which he encounters various real enemies or simply obstacles like an impenetrable forest, is also a literary conflict.

More than one type of conflict may occur in one work. Even more than that, in good work, capable of holding the reader's attention, there are usually several types of conflicts. Let's look at the example of "Eugene Onegin". Interpersonal conflict, used to develop the storyline, is, as mentioned above, a duel between the title character and the poet Lensky, followed by the murder of the latter. Internal conflict usually used to reveal inner world hero - these are Evgeniy’s feelings for Tatyana. The hero himself does not really understand what is going on in his heart. Extrapersonal conflict is Eugene as a product of the environment. He is a dandy, a playmaker, an aristocrat. He cannot do anything about these characteristics of his existence, although he is immensely bored with living like this.

In addition to the types of conflict in traditional literary criticism, there is a typology literary conflicts. There are much more types than types and it is much more difficult to classify works according to them.

Type of conflict in a literary work

To put it as simply as possible, the type of conflict is the soil on which it arose, the sphere of existence of the contradiction. The following types of literary conflicts are distinguished: psychological, social and everyday, love, symbolic, philosophical and ideological, there may be more of them, depending on the classification.

Psychological conflict- this is almost certainly also internal conflict. This type of conflict is often used in the literature of Romanticism and in the modern intellectual novel. For example, double life concierge from Muriel Barbery's novel The Elegance of a Hedgehog. A woman has a developed mind and a subtle artistic taste, but considers herself obligated to conform to the simple and rude image a narrow-minded woman, since she dropped out of school at the age of 12 and spent her entire life working as a low-skilled worker.

Social and domestic conflict is a conflict public relations. For example, you can take early work Dostoevsky "Poor People". Makar Devushkin’s poverty collides with his desire to help an equally deprived creature - Varvara. As a result, he drives himself into an even more disastrous state, and is unable to help the girl. His good intentions are dashed by social injustice.

Love conflict are problems of interaction between two loving friend friend characters or confrontation between lovers and the rest of the world. This is, naturally, Romeo and Juliet.

Symbolic conflict is a conflict between the image and the real world. As an example, we can take Guillaume Apollinaire’s play “The Breasts of Thérèse.” The real world, where Teresa is a girl, and the surreal world, where she lets out her breasts, come into conflict. Balloons into the sky and becomes a man - Teresius.

Philosophical conflict- conflict of worldviews. An example will be the worldview of the Karamazov brothers from the work of the same name by Dostoevsky. They argue about politics, God and humanity at every opportunity, as their views differ radically.

Ideological conflict is close to philosophical, but is aimed rather not at comprehending the essence of things, but at identifying oneself with a group. Especially popular in the literature of turning points. Thus, Russian prose writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries often resorted to ideological conflict to describe the pre-revolutionary years. Maxim Gorky in the story “The Song of the Falcon” allegorically contrasts the revolutionary (falcon) and the tradesman (snake). They will never understand each other, since the element of one is freedom, and the other is vegetation in the earth and dust.

Like types, there can be several types of conflicts in one work. But here you need to feel the fine line between a rich, versatile work that touches various topics, and superficial reading, which results when the author tries to use absolutely all literary resources known to him, regardless of expediency. In writing, taste and moderation are very important.

The meaning of the word CONFLICT in the Dictionary of Literary Terms

CONFLICT

- (from Latin conflictus - collision) - an acute clash of characters and circumstances, views and life principles, which forms the basis of the action of a work of art. K. is expressed in confrontation, contradiction, a clash between heroes, groups of heroes, the hero and society, or in the internal struggle of the hero with himself. The development of K. sets the plot action in motion. K. can be solvable or unresolvable (tragic K.), obvious or hidden, external (direct clashes of characters) or internal (confrontation in the soul of the hero). Of particular importance as a plot element is dramatic works(see drama).

Dictionary of literary terms. 2012