Famus society in A.S. Griboyedov’s comedy “Woe from Wit” - what is it like?

The comedy “Woe from Wit” was written during the years of intense struggle between the old, reactionary nobility and the revolutionary youth, who saw the country’s disaster in the serfdom. This struggle between past and future was the main theme of the comedy. “Woe from Wit” describes both camps - the outdated, feudal Famus society and its opponents (Chatsky with a few supporters).

A bright representative of the “past century” is the so-called Famus society. These are acquaintances and relatives of Pavel Afanasyevich Famusov, a rich, noble gentleman. This includes Prince and Princess Tugoukhovsky, old woman Khlestova, the Gorichi spouses, and Colonel Skalozub. All these people are united by one point of view on life: they are all rigid serf owners. They consider human trafficking to be normal. The serfs sincerely serve them, sometimes saving their lives, and the owners can even exchange the peasants for greyhounds... The main thing for Famus society is wealth. Their ideals are people in ranks.

People in this circle are also characterized by an indifferent attitude towards affairs. Famusov is a “manager in a government place”, during the whole day he addresses matters only once: at the insistence of Molchalin, the official signs the papers, not paying attention to the fact that there are “contradictions in them, and many of them are weekly.”

Another feature that united all the “fathers” was admiration for everything Western, in particular French. They believe that there is no better country in the world than France; they sincerely believe that they have “no salvation” without foreigners. Representatives of the “old world” try to adopt the language and cultural customs of the French, without realizing how absurdly they are doing this.

So, people in Famus’s circle are selfish and selfish. They spend all their time in social entertainment. During these amusements, they slander and gossip, and act hypocrites in front of each other. They are sycophants and businessmen, flatterers and sycophants. Famusov recalls his uncle Maxim Petrovich, a great nobleman: “When it was necessary to serve, he bent over backwards.”

The biggest fear for Famus society is education. Famusov believes that scholarship is a “plague” and assures that we should “take away all the books and burn them,” and Skalozub dreams of a school where “books will be saved for big occasions.”

The main question for the Famus society is the question of service. Everyone in this circle dreams of “reaching known degrees” and ensuring a comfortable existence for themselves. Famusov treats people who succeed in this, for example, Skalozub, with approval. And Chatsky, according to his scale of values, is a “lost” person who deserves only contemptuous regret: after all, although he has good data for a successful career, he does not serve. “But if you wanted to, it would be businesslike,” notes Famusov.

Famus society is a society with its own ideological ideas and views on life. They are sure that there is no other ideal than wealth, power and universal respect. “After all, only here they also value the nobility,” says Famusov about lordly Moscow. Griboyedov exposes the reactionary nature of feudal society and thereby shows where the dominance of the Famusovs is leading Russia.

Famus Society in the comedy Woe from Wit

The ideological and thematic content of the comedy is revealed in its images and in the development of the action.

A large number of characters representing Moscow noble society are supplemented by so-called off-stage images, i.e. ( This material will help you write competently on the topic of Famus Society in the comedy Woe from Wit. A summary does not make it possible to understand the full meaning of the work, so this material will be useful for a deep understanding of the work of writers and poets, as well as their novels, novellas, short stories, plays, and poems.) e. such characters who do not appear on stage, but about whom we learn from the stories of the characters. Thus, the Famus society includes such off-stage characters as Maxim Petrovich, Kuzma Petrovich, “Nestor of the noble scoundrels,” the landowner - a ballet lover, Tatyana Yuryevna, Princess Marya Alekseevna and many others. These images allowed Griboedov to expand the scope of the satirical picture beyond Moscow and include court circles in the play. Thanks to this, “Woe from Wit” grows into a work that gives the broadest picture of the entire Russian life of the 10-20s of the 19th century, faithfully reproducing the social struggle that unfolded with great force at that time throughout Russia, and not just in Moscow , between two camps: advanced, Decembrist-minded people and serf owners, the stronghold of antiquity.

Let us first dwell on the defenders of antiquity, on the conservative mass of the nobility. This group of nobles makes up the Famus society. How does Griboyedov characterize him?

1. People in Famus’s circle, especially the older generation, are staunch supporters of the autocratic-serf system, avid reactionary serf-owners. The past is dear to them, the century of Catherine II, when the power of the noble landowners was especially strong. Famusov recalls with reverence the queen’s court. Speaking about the nobleman Maxim Petrovich, Famusov contrasts Catherine’s court with the new court circle:

Then it’s not like now:

He served under the Empress Catherine.

And in those days everyone is important! forty pounds...

Take a bow and they won’t nod.

The nobleman in the case is even more so

Not like anyone else, and he drank and ate differently.

The same Famusov, a little later, speaks of the old people’s dissatisfaction with new times, with the policies of the young tsar, which seem liberal to them.

What about our old people? - How they will be taken with enthusiasm, They will judge their deeds, that the word is a sentence, - After all, they are all pillars, they don’t blow anyone’s lips, And sometimes they talk about the government in such a way that if someone overheard them... trouble! It’s not that new things were introduced - never, God save us!.. No...

It is precisely novelty that these “straightforward retired chancellors in mind,” enemies of free life, who “draw their judgments from forgotten newspapers from the times of Ochakov and the conquest of Crimea,” are afraid of. At the beginning of the reign of Alexander I, when he surrounded himself with young friends who seemed free-thinking to these old men, they left the service in protest. This is what the famous admiral Shishkov did, returning to government activity only when government policy took a sharply reactionary direction. There were especially many such Shishkovs in Moscow. They set the pace of life here; Famusov is convinced “that things won’t get done without them,” they will determine policy.

2. Famus society tightly guards its noble interests. A person here is valued only by his origin and wealth, and not by his personal qualities:

For example, we have been doing this since ancient times,

What honor is there between father and son; Be bad, but if you get enough

Two thousand ancestral souls,

He's the groom.

The other one, at least be quicker, puffed up with all sorts of arrogance,

Let yourself be known as a wise man,

But they won’t include us in the family, don’t look at us,

After all, only here they also value the nobility.

This is Famusov speaking. Princess Tugoukhovskaya shares the same opinion. Having learned that Chatsky is not a chamber cadet and is not rich, she ceases to be interested in him. Arguing with Famusov about the number of serf souls Chatsky has, Khlestova declares with resentment: “I don’t know other people’s estates!”

3. The nobles of the Famus circle do not see the peasants as people and brutally deal with them. Chatsky recalls, for example, one landowner who exchanged his servants, who had saved his honor and life more than once, for three greyhounds. Khlestova comes to Famusov for the evening, accompanied by a “blackamoor girl” and a dog, and asks Sophia: “Tell them to feed them already, my friend, get a handout from dinner.” Angry at his servants, Famusov shouts to the doorman Filka: “Get to work! to settle you!”

4. The goal in life for Famusov and his guests is career, honors, wealth. Maxim Petrovich, a nobleman of Catherine's time, Kuzma Petrovich, chamberlain of the court - these are role models. Famusov looks after Skalozub, dreams of marrying his daughter to him only because he “is a gold bag and aims to be a general.” Service in Famus society is understood only as a source of income, a means of achieving ranks and honors. They do not deal with matters on the merits; Famusov only signs the papers that are presented to him by his “businesslike” secretary. He admits this himself:

As for me, what matters and what does not matter.

My custom is this: Signed, off your shoulders.

Occupying the important post of “manager in a government place” (probably the head of the archive), Famusov accommodates his relatives:

When I have employees, strangers are very rare:

More and more sisters, sisters-in-law and children. . .

How will you begin to introduce yourself to a little cross, to a small town,

Well, how can you not please your loved one!

Patronage and nepotism are a common phenomenon in the world of the Famusovs. The Famusovs care not about the interests of the state, but about personal benefit. This is the case in the civil service, but we see the same thing among the military. The colonel, as if echoing Famusov, declares:

Yes, to get ranks, there are many channels;

I judge them as a true philosopher:

; I just wish I could become a general.

He makes his career quite successfully, frankly explaining this not by his personal qualities, but by the fact that circumstances favor him:

I am quite happy in my comrades,

Vacancies are currently open:

Then the elders will turn off others,

The others, you see, have been killed.

5. Careerism, sycophancy, servility to superiors, dumbness - all the characteristic features of the bureaucratic world of that time are especially fully revealed in the image of Molchalin.

Having begun his service in Tver, Molchalin, either a minor nobleman or a commoner, was transferred to Moscow thanks to the patronage of Famusov. In Moscow he is confidently advancing in his career. Molchalin understands perfectly well what is required of an official if he wants to make a career. It’s only been three years since he’s been in Famusov’s service, but he’s already managed to “receive three awards,” become the right person for Famusov, and enter his house. That is why Chatsky, who is well familiar with the type of such official, predicts Molchalin the possibility of a brilliant career:

However, he will reach the known degrees, | After all, nowadays they love the dumb.

Such dexterous secretaries in that “age of humility and fear”, when they served “persons, not business,” became noble people and achieved high positions in the service. Repetilov talks about his father-in-law's secretaries:

His secretaries are all boors, all corrupt,

Little people, writing creature,

Everyone has become a nobility, everyone is important today.

Molchalin has all the potential to later become an important official: the ability to curry favor with influential people, complete indiscriminateness in the means to achieve his goal, the absence of any moral rules, and in addition to all this, two “talents” - “moderation and accuracy.”

6. The conservative society of the Famusov-serf owners is afraid like fire of everything new, progressive, everything that could threaten its dominant position. Famusov and his guests show rare unanimity in the struggle to suppress the ideas and views of Chatsky, who seems to them a freethinker, a preacher of “crazy deeds and opinions.” And since they all see the source of this “freedom” and revolutionary ideas in education, then with a common front they oppose the sciences, educational institutions, and education in general. Famusov teaches:

Learning is the plague, learning is the reason, That now there are more crazy people, and deeds, and opinions.

He offers a decisive way to combat this evil:

Once evil is stopped:

Take all the books and burn them.

Famusov echoes.

Skalozub:

I will make you happy: universal rumor,

That there is a project about lyceums, schools, gymnasiums, -

There they will only teach in our way: one, two,

And the books will be saved like this: for big occasions.

Both Khlestova and Princess Tugoukhovskaya speak out against the hotbeds of enlightenment - “boarding houses, schools, lyceums”, a pedagogical institute, where “professors practice schisms and lack of faith.”

7. The education that representatives of Famus society receive makes them alien to their people. Chatsky is indignant at the educational system that reigns in the noble houses of Moscow. Here, the upbringing of children from a very young age was entrusted to foreigners, usually Germans and French. As a result, the nobles were torn away from everything Russian, their speech was dominated by “a mixture of French and Nizhny Novgorod languages”, from childhood the conviction was instilled “that we have no salvation without the Germans”, “this unclean spirit of empty, slavish, blind imitation” was instilled in everything foreign. “The Frenchman from Bordeaux,” having arrived in Russia, “did not meet either a Russian sound or a Russian face.”

This is the Famus society that Griboyedov depicted with such artistic skill in his comedy and which displays the typical features of the entire mass of serf-owning nobles of that time. This nobility, imbued with fear of the growing liberation movement, unitedly opposes the progressive people, whose representative is Chatsky.)

This society is depicted in Griboyedov’s wonderful comedy in bright, individualized images. Each of them is a truthfully drawn living face, with unique character traits and peculiarities of speech.

In his article “On Plays,” Gorky wrote: “The characters in a play are created exclusively and only by their speeches, that is, by purely verbal language, and not descriptive. This is very important to understand, because in order for the figures of the play to acquire artistic value and social persuasiveness on stage, in the portrayal of its artists, it is necessary that the speech of each figure be strictly original, extremely expressive... Let's take for example the heroes of our wonderful comedies: Famusov, Skalozub, Molchalin, Repetilov, Khlestakov, Gorodnichy, Rasplyuev, etc. - each of these figures was created in a small number of words and each of them gives a completely accurate idea of ​​​​its class, its era.”

Let's see how Griboyedov sketches the individual characters of his comedy.

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/ / / Famusov’s society in Griboyedov’s comedy “Woe from Wit”

Griboyedov cast all representatives of the “past century” in the image of Pavel Famusov. He was a famous and respected gentleman. Among his like-minded people are the Tugoukhovskys, the Gorichs, the old woman Khlestova and, of course, Famusov’s pride, Colonel Skalozub. These people were united by one view of life. The main thing for them is wealth, career, position in society. They were ardent supporters of serfdom. They do not have any moral principles; selling or exchanging a serf for a dog is a normal thing for them. People who have reached a high rank are the standard for such people.

In addition, representatives of the Famus society are united by a disdainful attitude towards business. For example, Famusov was a “manager in a government place,” but in all that time, he only got involved in business once, and then at the insistence of. He casually signs some papers without even reading them.

Also, representatives of the Famus society are united by a passion for everything foreign, or rather French. For them, French society is the standard of life. They firmly believe that foreign culture can save them. But, unfortunately, borrowing a language, traditions and customs, and behavior puts such people in a very comical position, although they do not notice it.

And so, the main features of representatives of Famus society are greed, thirst for power, and selfishness. Even when communicating with each other, they spread gossip, play hypocrisy to each other, and use foul language. Their main occupation is entertainment. Most of all they are afraid of the arrival of something new, they are afraid of changes. Famusov even opposes education, comparing it to the plague.

The only goal in life for such people is career advancement. Career is the main meaning of their life. It is for this reason that Famusov praises Skalozub, sets him up as an example to others, and despises Chatsky, although he sees in him the potential for a good career.

We can say that for Famus society it was an ideal in itself, because only in it were the traditions of the nobility, wealth and recognition honored.

In the comedy “Woe from Wit,” Griboedov revealed to us the utopian nature of Famus’s society and showed us where it could lead Russia.