Genre of Eugene Onegin. Evgeniy Onegin - Analysis

Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin was extremely attentive to determining the genre of each of his works. The world famous “Eugene Onegi” was no exception. The genre of Pushkin's work is a novel in verse. And this, first of all, is Pushkin’s innovation. After all, in the nineteenth century there were only two ways of writing work of art. The Russian poet invented the third. The history of writing, structure and genre of the novel “Eugene Onegin” is the topic of the article.

Pushkin called the work on creating the novel a feat. Besides “Eugene Onegin,” the author gave such a high assessment of his own creation only to “Boris Godunov.”

History of writing

It took Pushkin eight years to create the novel in verse. Pushkin began work on “Eugene Onegin” in 1923. Then the writer was in Chisinau. Initially, the author abandoned romanticism and decided to tell readers about his new hero in a realistic spirit. It is also worth saying that Pushkin planned to divide the work into nine chapters. But in the process of work, he changed the structure, creating eight.

The story about Onegin's journey, according to the original plan, was supposed to become part of the main text. But later the poet included this fragment of the plot in one of his lyrical digressions. In the first version of the novel, the author raised rather pressing political issues. But since the creation of “Eugene Onegin” took place during years of exile, the poet decided not to aggravate his already difficult situation. Therefore, he removed dangerous pages from the manuscript and burned them.

Composition of the novel

The work was published over several years separate chapters. Pushkin admitted that he wrote it without any clear plan. Nevertheless, the composition of “Eugene Onegin” is distinguished by its clarity. Each chapter is logically completed.

The main literary device that the poet used when creating his imperishable work is mirror symmetry. As the plot progresses, the characters seem to change places. First, Tatiana falls in love with Evgeniy. Onegin is indifferent to the love of a girl. He responds to her letter coldly. But later, after the protagonist’s duel with Lensky, an event that interrupts the love line, Onegin and Larina change places. He writes her a letter of confession. She rejects him. The peculiarity of the composition of the work is its ring construction. It is thanks to this technique that “Eugene Onegin” is perceived as a completed novel.

Main characters

Why did the author use the ring composition? With the help of this technique, Pushkin revealed changes in the character of the heroes. At the beginning of the work, Onegin leaves high society. The poet speaks not without irony about his hero, emphasizing that Eugene’s education was superficial, which was enough to be considered smart among the representatives of the capital’s aristocracy.

In the first chapters, Onegin is a secular slacker, unable to fill his leisure time with creativity or even reading. But later he appears in the role of a thinking, deep personality. Another trait lost by Eugene is richness in life. Pushkin's hero is initially indifferent to those around him. He is not even touched by the feelings that Tatyana has for him - an intelligent girl who compares favorably with other representatives of provincial society.

At the end of the novel, Onegin is an ardent lover. Tatyana, on the contrary, is reserved and cold. However, it is worth saying that despite all the external changes, both Onegin and Larina are still the same at heart. He is an arrogant aristocrat. She is a simple-minded and sincere village girl. After the disappointment that befell the heroine, she is forced to hide her feelings. As for Evgeny, his love is most likely explained by the external brilliance of Tatyana, now a society lady.

Epic

There are many heroes in Eugene Onegin. The works cover a significant period of time. “Eugene Onegin” tells both about life in the capital and about the life of the village nobility. A genre that has these features is the novel. It is the most common type today epic literature. What are the specifics classic novel? Which of its features are present in the work “Eugene Onegin”?

Genre large shape, in which the narrative focuses on the destinies different heroes, in literary criticism is called a novel. Its other features are a significant time period, a smoothly constructed series of events, and a considerable number of characters involved in the plot.

How is Eugene Onegin depicted by the author? The genre of this work, according to Pushkin’s definition, is a novel. Remembering character traits This type of epic, we can say that Onegin is not a lyrical hero. It cannot be called either positive or negative character. The poet is extremely objective in creating his portrait. Evgeny Onegin is quite contradictory and complex. The peculiarities of the genre of Pushkin’s work lie in the presence of not only an epic beginning.

Lyricism

The work about which we're talking about in this article has no analogues in world literature. The structure and genre of the novel “Eugene Onegin” is unique. It has both realism and historicity. Pushkin also endowed his work with features typical of a social novel. "Eugene Onegin", the genre of which is at the junction of two types of literature, contains both objective characteristics of the heroes and many lyrical digressions. But that's not all.

The genre and composition of “Eugene Onegin” have become the topic of numerous works on literary criticism. WITH light hand Byron, in the nineteenth century, the epic poem, consisting of separate chapters in verse, came into fashion. In Pushkin's work the description lyrical hero and his experiences are harmoniously combined with an objective, realistic depiction of events.

Retreats

The author's voice is heard in numerous lyrical inserts. In each of them, the poet talks about himself and shares with the reader his views on literature and culture. At the same time, Pushkin is not distracted from the main action. In one of the chapters, the poet recalls the days on which heyday came his work, about forced exile. The structure and genre of the work “Eugene Onegin” can be determined as follows: a novel in verse, which is a “collection motley chapters».

The themes of lyrical digressions in Pushkin’s work are very diverse. First, the reader learns about the morals of secular youth. Then love motives come to the fore. And finally, important in the development of the plot are landscape sketches. The novel depicts all seasons of the year in verse: sad summer, Golden autumn, winter with bitter frosts. The poet called spring “the morning of the year.” The landscape in Eugene Onegin is sometimes depicted through the perception of the characters.

Another theme of lyrical digressions in the novel is historical events. Thus, in the work “Eugene Onegin” Pushkin remembered Patriotic War 1812.

The novel in verse covers many events. There are many heroes in it. Nevertheless, “Eugene Onegin” is a deeply lyrical work. The reader, after reading it, learns no less about the author than about his heroes. In one work to Pushkin amazingly managed to connect the epic and the lyrical into a single whole.

Reflection of the Pushkin era

From this work the reader has the opportunity to learn almost everything about the time in which the poet lived. How did people dress? What was in fashion? What did Pushkin's contemporaries value most of all? The reader receives answers to all these questions after reading the novel in verse. The poet truthfully depicted the environment in which Onegin and Larina live. He reproduced the atmosphere of both noble salons and modest provincial evenings.

In art

Onegin - shining example the so-called " extra person", a character who appeared in literature in the first third of the eighteenth century. This hero is not capable of the feat that the Decembrists accomplished. But he cannot be considered a typical representative high society. Mental dissatisfaction and inability to change anything in one’s life are characteristic features of Onegin. And if we add to this the epic nature, variety of images, and extraordinary poetry of Pushkin’s work, it becomes clear why it was so often reflected in art.

“Eugene Onegin” was filmed several times by domestic and foreign filmmakers. Based on Pushkin's novel four operas were created, the music for which was written by such outstanding composers, like Tchaikovsky, Shchedrin, Prokofiev.

History of creation

Pushkin began work on Onegin in 1823, during his southern exile. The author abandoned romanticism as a leading creative method and started writing realistic novel in verse, although in the first chapters the influence of romanticism is still noticeable. Initially, it was assumed that the novel in verse would consist of 9 chapters, but Pushkin subsequently reworked its structure, leaving only 8 chapters. He excluded the chapter “Onegin’s Travels” from the work, which he included as an appendix. After this, the tenth chapter of the novel was written, which is an encrypted chronicle of the life of the future Decembrists.

The novel was published in verse in separate chapters, and the release of each chapter became a big event in modern literature. In 1831, the novel in verse was completed and published in 1833. It covers events from 1819 to 1825: from the foreign campaigns of the Russian army after the defeat of Napoleon to the Decembrist uprising. These were the years of development of Russian society, during the reign of Tsar Alexander I. The plot of the novel is simple and well known. At the center of the novel - love affair. A main problem is eternal problem feelings and duty. The novel “Eugene Onegin” reflected the events of the first quarter of the 19th century, that is, the time of creation and the time of action of the novel approximately coincide. Reading the book, we (the readers) understand that the novel is unique, because previously there was not a single novel in verse in world literature. Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin created a novel in verse similar to Byron’s poem “Don Juan”. Having defined the novel as “a collection of motley chapters,” Pushkin emphasizes one of the features of this work: the novel is, as it were, “open” in time, each chapter could be the last, but it could also have a continuation. And thus the reader draws attention to the independence of each chapter of the novel. The novel has become an encyclopedia of Russian life of the 20s of the century before last, since the breadth of coverage of the novel shows readers the whole reality of Russian life, as well as multiple plots and descriptions different eras. This is what gave V. G. Belinsky the basis to conclude in his article “Eugene Onegin”:

“Onegin can be called an encyclopedia of Russian life and in highest degree folk work."

In the novel, as in the encyclopedia, you can find out everything about the era: how they dressed, what was in fashion, what people valued most, what they talked about, what interests they lived. “Eugene Onegin” reflects the whole of Russian life. Briefly, but quite clearly, the author showed a fortress village, lordly Moscow, secular Petersburg. Pushkin truthfully depicted the environment in which the main characters of his novel, Tatyana Larina and Evgeny Onegin, live. The author reproduced the atmosphere of the city noble salons in which Onegin spent his youth.

Plot

The novel begins with a grumpy speech by the young nobleman Eugene Onegin, dedicated to the illness of his uncle, which forced him to leave St. Petersburg and go to the sick bed in the hope of becoming the heir of the dying man. The narration itself is told on behalf of the nameless author, who introduced himself as a good friend of Onegin. Having thus outlined the plot, the author devotes the first chapter to a story about the origin, family, and life of his hero before receiving news of a relative’s illness.

Lotman

"Eugene Onegin" is a difficult work. The very lightness of the verse, the familiarity of the content, familiar to the reader from childhood and emphatically simple, paradoxically create additional difficulties in understanding Pushkin’s novel in verse. The illusory idea of ​​the “understandability” of a work hides from consciousness modern reader great amount words, expressions, phraseological units, hints, quotes that he does not understand. Thinking about a poem that you have known since childhood seems like unjustified pedantry. However, once we overcome this naive optimism of the inexperienced reader, it becomes obvious how far we are from even a simple textual understanding of the novel. The specific structure of Pushkin’s novel in verse, in which any positive statement the author can immediately be imperceptibly turned into ironic, and the verbal fabric seems to slide, being transmitted from one speaker to another, making the method of forcibly extracting quotes especially dangerous. To avoid this threat, the novel should be considered not as a mechanical sum of the author’s statements on various issues, a kind of anthology of quotes, but as an organic art world, the parts of which live and receive meaning only in relation to the whole. A simple list of the problems that Pushkin “poses” in his work will not introduce us to the world of “Onegin”. Artistic idea implies a special type of transformation of life in art. It is known that for Pushkin there was a “devilish difference” between poetic and prosaic modeling of the same reality, even while maintaining the same themes and problematics.

Comments on the novel

One of the first comments on the novel was a small book by A. Volsky, published in 1877. Commentaries by Vladimir Nabokov, Nikolai Brodsky, Yuri Lotman, S. M. Bondi became classic.

Psychologists about the work

Influence on other works

• The type of “superfluous man” introduced by Pushkin in the image of Onegin influenced all subsequent Russian literature. The closest visual example is the surname "Pechorin" in Lermontov’s “Hero of Our Time,” just as Onegin’s surname is derived from the name of a Russian river. Many psychological characteristics are also similar.
• In the modern Russian novel "Onegin Code", written under a pseudonym Brain Down, we are talking about the search for the missing chapter of Pushkin’s manuscript.
• In Yesenin's poem "Anna Snegina".

Notes

Links

• Pushkin A. S. Evgeny Onegin: A Novel in Verse // Pushkin A. S. Complete collection works: In 10 volumes - L.: Science. Leningr. department, 1977-1979. (FEB)
• “Eugene Onegin” with full comments by Nabokov, Lotman and Tomashevsky on the “Secrets of Craft” website
• Lotman Yu. M. Novel in verses by Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”: Special course. Introductory lectures to the study of text // Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer; Articles and notes, 1960-1990; "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. - St. Petersburg: Art-SPB, 1995. - P. 393-462. (FEB)
• Lotman Yu. M. Roman A. S. Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”: Commentary: A manual for teachers // Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer; Articles and notes, 1960-1990; "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. - St. Petersburg: Art-SPB, 1995. - P. 472-762. (FEB)
• Onegin Encyclopedia: In 2 volumes - M.: Russian Way, 1999-2004.
• Zakharov N.V. Onegin Encyclopedia: thesaurus of the novel (Onegin Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. / Under the general editorship of N. I. Mikhailova. M., 2004) // Knowledge. Understanding. Skill. - 2005. - No. 4. - P. 180-188.
• Fomichev S. A. “Eugene Onegin”: Movement of the plan. - M.: Russian way, 2005.
• Bely A.A. “Génie ou neige” Literature Questions No. 1, . P.115.

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In 1823, Alexander Sergeevich began writing his famous novel"Eugene Onegin", while in southern exile. At that time, the poet was interested in the work of Byron, and the romantic motives of poetry English poet left their mark on Pushkin’s work during that period. But still, the work “Eugene Onegin” cannot be called romantic.

Genre originality of the novel

It should be noted that Alexander Sergeevich approached the issue of defining the genre of “Eugene Onegin” with special attention. The definition sounded like “a novel in verse.” But this definition is not enough to analyze genre originality novel.

Despite the fact that “Eugene Onegin” was spoken of as a collection of motley chapters, it remains a full-fledged work in which Pushkin synthesized both elements of the epic genre and elements lyrical works. Traits that are inherent epic genre- that's two storylines, large volume and emphasis of the narrative on life path a certain personality, including the process of its development and final formation.

“Eugene Onegin” includes an objective depiction of life, a description of objects and everyday life that surrounded people at that time. This also applies to a genre such as epic. Lyrical genre“Eugene Onegin” is manifested in the description of the inner world of the main character. Onegin comprehends the events that happened to him, and we know about his feelings and experiences. It was precisely these elements that helped Pushkin reveal main issue works from another side, create another life position, which would be different from other heroes.

But this added inconsistency to the main lyrical character, especially in view of the variety of functions of his image. The position of the lyrical hero is found in every chapter, and seems to act as a friend of the main character. And his position is rather vague; it is this that gives rise to the main contradictions in the work, but Pushkin ultimately decided not to change anything.

The transition from romanticism to realism

The lyrical hero in the role of the author plays the role of a chronicler of Onegin’s life, and constantly evaluates his actions and expresses his attitude towards his actions and thoughts. Pushkin creates the illusion of dialogue with the reader; he raises philosophical questions and issues literary character, thereby creating a transition from a romantic motif in Eugene Onegin to a realistic one.

Also, the illusion of conversation with readers makes the story easier and friendlier. Pushkin introduced lyrical digressions to emphasize the evolution of the narrative's views: from romantic to realistic. And peculiar, open ending indicates that the poet wanted to give a realistic quality to his novel.

The genre feature of “Eugene Onegin” lies in this - despite such an ending, Pushkin manages to create a holistic and complete work. Pushkin's innovation lies not only in the genre diversity of the work, but also in the composition of the work.

History of creation. "Eugene Onegin", the first Russian realistic novel, is Pushkin's most significant work, which has a long history of creation, covering several periods of the poet's work. According to Pushkin’s own calculations, work on the novel lasted for 7 years, 4 months, 17 days - from May 1823 to September 26, 1830, and in 1831 “Onegin’s Letter to Tatyana” was written. The publication of the work was carried out as it was created: first, individual chapters were published, and only in 1833 the first complete edition was published. Up until this time, Pushkin did not stop making certain adjustments to the text.The novel was, according to the poet, “the fruit of a mind of cold observations and a heart of sorrowful observations.”

Completing work on the last chapter of the novel in 1830, Pushkin sketched out a rough plan for it, which looks like this:

Part one. Preface. 1st canto. Handra (Chisinau, Odessa, 1823); 2nd canto. Poet (Odessa, 1824); 3rd canto. Young lady (Odessa, Mikhailovskoe, 1824).

Part two. 4th Canto. Village (Mikhailovskoe, 1825); 5th Canto. Name Day (Mikhailovskoe, 1825, 1826); 6th canto. Duel (Mikhailovskoe, 1826).

Part three. 7th canto. Moscow (Mikhailovskoe, St. Petersburg, 1827, 1828); 8th Canto. Wandering (Moscow, Pavlovsk, Boldino, 1829); 9th Canto. Big light(Boldino, 1830).

IN final version Pushkin had to make certain adjustments to the plan: for censorship reasons, he excluded Chapter 8 - “Wandering”. Now it is published as an appendix to the novel - “Excerpts from Onegin’s Journey”, and the final 9th ​​chapter - “Big Light” - has, accordingly, become the eighth. In this form, the novel was published in a separate edition in 1833.

In addition, there is speculation about the existence of chapter 10, which was written in Boldino autumn 1830, but was burned by the poet on October 19 , since it was dedicated to depicting the era of the Napoleonic wars and the birth of Decembrism and contained a number of dangerous political hints. Minor fragments of this chapter (16 stanzas), encrypted by Pushkin, have been preserved. The key to the cipher was found only at the beginning of the 20th century by the Pushkin scholar NO. Morozov, and then other researchers supplemented the decrypted text. But there is still ongoing debate about the legitimacy of the assertion that these fragments really represent parts of the unsurvived 10th chapter of the novel.

Direction and genre. “Eugene Onegin” is the first Russian realistic socio-psychological novel, and, importantly, not prose, but a novel in verse. For Pushkin, the choice of fundamental importance when creating this work was artistic method- not romantic, but realistic.

Starting work on the novel during the period of southern exile, when romanticism dominated the poet’s work, Pushkin soon became convinced that the peculiarities of the romantic method did not make it possible to solve the task. Although in terms of genre the poet is to a certain extent guided by Byron’s romantic poem “Don Juan,” he refuses the one-sidedness of the romantic point of view.

Pushkin wanted to show in his novel young man, typical of its time, against the broad background of a picture of contemporary life, to reveal the origins of the characters being created, to show their internal logic and relationship with the conditions in which they find themselves. All this led to the creation of truly typical characters who manifest themselves in typical circumstances, which is what distinguishes realistic works.

This also gives the right to call “Eugene Onegin” social novel, since in it Pushkin shows noble Russia 20s of the XIX century, raises the most important problems of the era and seeks to explain various social phenomena. The poet does not simply describe events from the life of an ordinary nobleman; he gives the hero a bright and at the same time typical secular society character, explains the origin of his apathy and boredom, the reasons for his actions. Moreover, the events unfold against such a detailed and carefully depicted material background that “Eugene Onegin” can be called a social and everyday novel.

It is also important that Pushkin carefully analyzes not only the external circumstances of the heroes’ lives, but also their inner world. On many pages he achieves extraordinary psychological mastery, which allows for a deeper understanding of his characters. That is why “Eugene Onegin” can rightfully be called a psychological novel.

His hero changes under the influence of life circumstances and becomes capable of real, serious feelings. And let happiness pass him by, this often happens in real life, but he loves, he worries - that’s why the image of Onegin (not a conventionally romantic, but a real, living hero) so struck Pushkin’s contemporaries. Many found his traits in themselves and in their acquaintances, as well as the traits of other characters in the novel - Tatyana, Lensky, Olga - the depiction was so true typical people that era.

At the same time, “Eugene Onegin” also has features of a love affair with the traditional for that era love story. The hero, tired of the world, goes traveling and meets a girl who falls in love with him. For some reason, the hero either cannot love her - then everything ends tragically, or he reciprocates her feelings, and although at first circumstances prevent them from being together, everything ends well. It is noteworthy that Pushkin deprives such a story of its romantic overtones and gives a completely different solution. Despite all the changes that have occurred in the lives of the heroes and led to the emergence of mutual feelings, due to circumstances they cannot be together and are forced to part. Thus, the plot of the novel is given obvious realism.

But the innovation of the novel lies not only in its realism. Even at the beginning of work on it, Pushkin wrote in a letter to P.A. Vyazemsky noted: “Now I’m not writing a novel, but a novel in verse - a devilish difference.” The novel as an epic work presupposes the author’s detachment from the events described and objectivity in their assessment; the poetic form enhances the lyrical principle associated with the personality of the creator. That is why “Eugene Onegin” is usually classified as a lyric-epic work, which combines the features inherent in epic and lyric poetry. Indeed, in the novel “Eugene Onegin” there are two artistic layers, two worlds - the world of “epic” heroes (Onegin, Tatyana, Lensky and other characters) and the world of the author, reflected in lyrical digressions.

Pushkin's novel is written Onegin stanza , which was based on a sonnet. But the 14-line tetrameter Pushkin iambic had a different rhyme scheme -abab vvgg deed LJ :

“My uncle has the most honest rules,
When I seriously fell ill,
He forced himself to respect
And I couldn't think of anything better.
His example to others is science;
But, my God, what a bore
To sit with the patient day and night,
Without leaving a single step!
What low deceit
To amuse the half-dead,
Adjust his pillows
It's sad to bring medicine,
Sigh and think to yourself:
When will the devil take you?”

Composition of the novel. The main technique in constructing a novel is mirror symmetry (or ring composition). The way to express it is by the characters changing the positions they occupy in the novel. First, Tatyana and Evgeniy meet, Tatyana falls in love with him, suffers because unrequited love, the author empathizes with her and mentally accompanies his heroine. When they meet, Onegin reads a “sermon” to her. Then a duel occurs between Onegin and Lensky - an event whose compositional role is the denouement of a personal storyline and the determination of the development of a love affair. When Tatyana and Onegin meet in St. Petersburg, he finds himself in her place, and all events are repeated in the same sequence, only the author is next to Onegin. This so-called ring composition allows us to return to the past and creates the impression of the novel as a harmonious, complete whole.

Another significant feature of the composition is the presence lyrical digressions in the novel. With their help, the image of a lyrical hero is created, which makes the novel lyrical.

Heroes of the novel . The main character, after whom the novel is named, is Eugene Onegin. At the beginning of the novel he is 18 years old. This is a young metropolitan aristocrat who received a typical secular upbringing. Onegin was born into a rich but ruined noble family. His childhood was spent in isolation from everything Russian and national. He was raised by a French tutor who,

So that the child does not get tired,
I taught him everything jokingly,
I didn’t bother you with strict morals,
Lightly scolded for pranks
And in Summer garden took me for a walk.”

Thus, Onegin’s upbringing and education were quite superficial.
But Pushkin’s hero still received the minimum knowledge that was considered mandatory among the nobility. He “knew enough Latin to parse epigraphs,” remembered “anecdotes of bygone days from Romulus to the present day,” and had an idea of ​​the political economy of Adam Smith. In the eyes of society, he was a brilliant representative of the youth of his time, and all this thanks to his impeccable French, graceful manners, wit and the art of maintaining a conversation. He led a typical lifestyle for young people of that time: he attended balls, theaters, and restaurants. Wealth, luxury, enjoyment of life, success in society and with women - this is what attracted the main character of the novel.
But secular entertainment was terribly boring to Onegin, who had already “yawned for a long time among the fashionable and ancient halls.” He is bored both at balls and at the theater: “... He turned away and yawned, and said: “It’s time for everyone to change; I put up with ballets for a long time, but I’m tired of Didelot.” This is not surprising - it took the hero of the novel about eight years to live a social life. But he was smart and stood significantly above typical representatives of secular society. Therefore, over time, Onegin felt disgusted with the empty, idle life. “A sharp, chilled mind” and satiety with pleasures made Onegin disappointed, “the Russian melancholy took possession of him.”
“Tormented by spiritual emptiness,” this young man fell into depression. He tries to look for the meaning of life in some activity. The first such attempt was literary work, but “nothing came from his pen,” since the education system did not teach him to work (“he was sick of persistent work”). Onegin “read and read, but to no avail.” However, our hero does not stop there. On his estate, he makes another attempt at practical activity: he replaces corvee (compulsory work on the landowner's field) with quitrent (cash tax). As a result, the life of serfs becomes easier. But, having carried out one reform, and that out of boredom, “just to pass the time,” Onegin again plunges into the blues. This gives V.G. Belinsky the basis to write: “The inactivity and vulgarity of life are strangling him, he doesn’t even know what he needs, what he wants, but he... knows very well that he doesn’t need it, that he doesn’t want it.” “What makes self-loving mediocrity so happy and happy.”
At the same time, we see that Onegin was not alien to the prejudices of the world. They could only be overcome by contact with real life. In the novel, Pushkin shows the contradictions in Onegin’s thinking and behavior, the struggle between the “old” and the “new” in his mind, comparing him with other heroes of the novel: Lensky and Tatyana, intertwining their destinies.
The complexity and inconsistency of the character of Pushkin’s hero is especially clearly revealed in his relationship with Tatyana, the daughter of the provincial landowner Larin.
In her new neighbor, the girl saw the ideal that had long been formed in her under the influence of books. A bored, disappointed nobleman seems to her romantic hero, he is not like other landowners. “Tatiana’s entire inner world consisted of a thirst for love,” writes V. G. Belinsky about the state of a girl left to her secret dreams all day long:

Her imagination has long been
Burning with bliss and melancholy,
Hungry for fatal food;
For a long time heartache
Her young breasts were tight;
The soul was waiting... for someone
And she waited... The eyes opened;
She said: it's him!

All the best, pure, bright things awakened in Onegin’s soul:

I love your sincerity
She got excited
Feelings that have long been silent.

But Eugene Onegin does not accept Tatiana’s love, explaining this by saying that he “was not created for bliss,” that is, for family life. Indifference to life, passivity, “desire for peace,” and inner emptiness suppressed sincere feelings. Subsequently, he will be punished for his mistake by loneliness.
Pushkin’s hero has such a quality as “direct nobility of soul.” He sincerely becomes attached to Lensky. Onegin and Lensky stood out from their environment for their high intelligence and disdainful attitude to the prosaic life of the neighboring landowners. However, they were completely opposite people in character. One was a cold, disappointed skeptic, the other an enthusiastic romantic, an idealist.

They will get along.
Wave and stone
Poetry and prose, ice and fire...

Onegin does not like people at all, does not believe in their kindness, and he himself destroys his friend, killing him in a duel.
In the image of Onegin, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin truthfully portrayed an intelligent nobleman, standing above secular society, but without a goal in life. He doesn’t want to live like other nobles, he can’t live any other way. Therefore, disappointment and melancholy become his constant companions.
A. S. Pushkin is critical of his hero. He sees both Onegin’s misfortune and guilt. The poet blames not only his hero, but also the society that formed such people. Onegin cannot be considered an exception among noble youth, this typical character for the 20s of the XIX century.

Tatyana Larina - Pushkin’s favorite heroine - represents a bright type of Russian woman of Pushkin’s era. It is not without reason that the wives of the Decembrists M. Volkonskaya and N. Fonvizina are mentioned among the prototypes of this heroine.
The very choice of the name “Tatyana,” not illuminated by literary tradition, is associated with “memories of antiquity or maiden times.” Pushkin emphasizes the originality of his heroine not only by the choice of name, but also by her strange position in family of origin: “She seemed like a stranger in her own family.”
The formation of Tatyana’s character was influenced by two elements: bookish, associated with French romance novels, and folk-national tradition. “Russian in soul” Tatyana loves the customs of the “dear old days”; she has been captivated since childhood scary stories.
Much brings this heroine together with Onegin: she is lonely in society - he is unsociable; her dreaminess and strangeness are his originality. Both Onegin and Tatyana stand out sharply against the background of their environment.
But it is not the “young rake”, but Tatyana who becomes the embodiment of the author’s ideal. Inner life The heroine’s character is not due to secular idleness, but to the influence of free nature. Tatyana was raised not by a governess, but by a simple Russian peasant woman.
Patriarchal way of life The life of the “simple Russian family” of the Larins is closely connected with traditional folk rituals and customs: here are pancakes for Maslenitsa, and sub-dish songs, and round swings.
The poetics of folk fortune-telling is embodied in Tatyana's famous dream. It seems to predetermine the fate of the girl, foreshadowing a quarrel between two friends, and the death of Lensky, and imminent marriage.
Endowed with a passionate imagination and a dreamy soul, Tatyana at first sight recognized in Onegin the ideal, the idea of ​​which she had formed from sentimental novels. Perhaps the girl intuitively felt the similarity between Onegin and herself and realized that they were made for each other.
The fact that Tatyana was the first to write a love letter is explained by her simplicity, gullibility, and ignorance of deception. And Onegin’s rebuke, in my opinion, not only did not cool Tatyana’s feelings, but strengthened them: “No, poor Tatyana is burning with a joyless passion.”
Onegin continues to live in her imagination. Even when he left the village, Tatyana, visiting the manor’s house, vividly feels the presence of her chosen one. Everything here reminds of him: a forgotten cue on the billiard table, “and a table with a dim lamp, and a pile of books,” and a portrait of Lord Byron, and a cast-iron Napoleon figurine. Reading Onegin’s books helps a girl understand Eugene’s inner world, think about his true essence: “Isn’t he a parody?”
According to V.G. Belinsky, “Visits to Onegin’s house and reading his books prepared Tatyana for rebirth from a village girl into a society lady.” It seems to me that she has stopped idealizing “her hero”, her passion for Onegin has subsided a little, she decides to “arrange her life” without Eugene.
Soon they decide to send Tatyana to Moscow - “to the brides fair.” And here the author fully reveals to us the Russian soul of his heroine: she touchingly says goodbye to “cheerful nature” and “sweet, quiet light.” Tatyana feels stuffy in Moscow, she strives in her thoughts “for life in the field,” and the “empty light” causes her sharp rejection:
But everyone in the living room is occupied
Such incoherent, vulgar nonsense;
Everything about them is so pale, indifferent,
They slander even boringly...
It is no coincidence that, having married and become a princess, Tatiana retained the naturalness and simplicity that distinguished her so favorably from society ladies.
Having met Tatiana at a reception, Onegin was amazed at the change that had happened to her: instead of “a timid, in love, poor and simple girl,” an “indifferent princess,” “a stately, careless legislator of the hall,” appeared.
But internally, Tatyana remained as internally pure and moral as in her youth. That is why she, despite her feelings for Onegin, refuses him: “I love you (why lie?), but I am given to another; I will be faithful to him forever.”
According to the logic of Tatyana’s character, such an ending is natural. Integral by nature, faithful to duty, brought up in the traditions of folk morality, Tatyana cannot build her happiness on her husband’s dishonor.
The author values ​​his heroine; he repeatedly confesses his love for his “sweet ideal.” In the duel of duty and feelings, reason and passion, Tatyana wins a moral victory. And no matter how paradoxical Kuchelbecker’s words sound: “The poet in the 8th chapter himself resembles Tatyana,” they contain great meaning, for the beloved heroine is not only an ideal woman, but rather a human ideal, the way Pushkin wanted her to be.

"Eugene Onegin" as a novel in verse. Features of genre and composition

“As for my studies, I Pushkin sought to create a satiated, dissatisfied and bored hero, indifferent to life and its joys - a real hero of the time, infected with the “disease of the century” - boredom. But at the same time, the author did not just strive to show the characteristic features of boredom, he wanted to find out its source, that is, where it comes from. Realizing that the genre romantic poem assumes a static character of the hero, Pushkin deliberately abandons it in favor of the novel - a genre within which the dynamics of the development of the hero’s character can be shown.

Pushkin builds a composition “ free romance", in the center of which is the figure of the author, who organizes relationships not only with the characters, but also with the readers. The novel is written in the form of a conversation between the author and the reader, hence the impression that it is being written in front of the reader’s eyes, making the latter a direct participant in all events.

The genre of "Eugene Onegin" - a novel in verse - suggests the presence of two artistic principles- lyrical and epic. The first is connected with the author’s world and his personal experiences and is manifested in lyrical digressions; the second assumes the objectivity of the narrative and the author’s detachment from the events described in the novel and represents the world epic heroes.

In a prose novel, the main thing is the hero and what happens to him. And in a poetic work, the compositional core is itself poetic form and the image of the author. In Eugene Onegin, as in a novel in verse, there is a combination of the constructive principles of prose (deformation of sound through the role of meaning) and poetry (deformation of meaning through the role of sound).

The poetic form determined both the composition and the features of the plot in Eugene Onegin. Special view stanzas - Onegin stanza- was invented by Pushkin specifically for this work. It is a slightly modified sonnet structure: fourteen lines of iambic tetrameter with a specific rhyme scheme. In the first quatrain (quatrain) the rhyme is cross, in the second it is paired, and in the third it is encircling. Schematically it looks like this: AbAb CCdd EffE gg ( in capital letters denoted by feminine rhyme, that is, the stress falls on the penultimate syllable of rhyming words, and lowercase - masculine, in which the stress falls on the last syllable of rhyming words).

Speaking about the composition of the work, it is important to note two points. Firstly, it is symmetrical (its center is Tatiana’s dream in the fifth chapter), and secondly, it is closed (the action began in the spring of 1820 in St. Petersburg and ended there five years later). There are two storylines in the novel - the line of friendship and love line, and the second is mirrored: in the third chapter, Tatyana writes a letter to Onegin and understands that her feelings are not mutual, and in the eighth they change roles.

Also important for understanding the composition of the work are landscape sketches, with the help of which the author helps the reader to delve deeper into the essence of the experiences of his characters and emphasizes the features of their characters. For example, the contrast between Onegin and Tatyana is more clearly visible in the example of the heroes’ attitude to rural nature.