A message on the topic of Russian literature of the 18th century. Russian poets of the 18th century

Keywords: Russian literature

The beginning of the 18th century, according to many modern researchers, does not quite coincide with the beginning of a new era in the development of Russian literature. The era of Peter the Great, with which traditional courses in the history of Russian literature of the 18th century begin, became a turning point in the history of Russian statehood and culture, but still it was hardly a turning point in literature. Rather, at this time the transition from Old Russian, medieval literature to modern literature, which had emerged in the second half of the previous century, continued. Profound qualitative changes in all areas of secularizing culture left their mark on literature, in which, already from the second half of the 17th century, interest in depicting the human personality increased, the dramatic understanding of life deepened, new kinds and types of literary works appeared (panegyric and love lyrics, school and court drama). It was in the second half of the 17th century that the active process of mastering the diverse Western European artistic experience and its original and creative processing began, which continued during the Peter the Great era.

The assimilation of new things did not mean a decisive break with Russian literary traditions, but in many ways made it possible to further develop a number of features of Russian national culture. The Russian 18th century was often called a period of “accelerated” development of literature, because in less than a hundred years Russian literature traveled a path that took much longer for most Western literatures. Following the emergence of the Baroque in Russia, classicism was established, and soon sentimentalism and literary movements arose and flourished, as a result of which the boundaries between them turned out to be very relative.

At the same time, Russian literature of the 18th century was created in conditions of constantly expanding, lively contacts between Russia and the West. Educated Russian people at this time, as a rule, knew French well, many of them read two or three modern European languages and at least one ancient one. The works of French, English, German philosophy, literature, and journalism were well known to them in the original, but throughout the 18th century the number and quality of translations from ancient and major European languages increased and improved. Russian literature and culture of the 18th century not only recognized itself as an organic part of the European cultural movement of its time, but also strived for creative competition with the literatures of other peoples of Europe, and above all, with the most famous and authoritative French literature of the 17th-18th centuries in those years.

An important aspect of the cultural reality of the 18th century. researchers consider a gradual rethinking of the goals and objectives of literary creativity. Literature, of course, had not yet become a profession proper; until the 1760s, it did not have a more or less distinct social, much less political, function, but the struggle for its social status turns out to be, according to the observations of V.M. Zhivov, an inevitable companion to the literary activity of a number of leading writers of the “eighteenth century”.

During this period, a new literary direction appeared - sentimentalism (M. Kheraskov, M. Muravyov, N. Karamzin, I. Dmitriev, etc.), characterized by an increased interest in the inner world of man. Sentimentalists believed that man is kind by nature, devoid of hatred, deceit, and cruelty, and that on the basis of innate virtue, public and social instincts are formed that unite people into society. Hence the belief of sentimentalists that it is the natural sensitivity and good inclinations of people that are the key to an ideal society. In the works of that time, the main place began to be given to the education of the soul and moral improvement. Sentimentalists considered sensitivity to be the primary source of virtue, so their poems were filled with compassion, melancholy and sadness. The genres that were preferred also changed. Elegies, messages, songs and romances took first place.

The main character is an ordinary person who strives to merge with nature, find peaceful silence in it and find happiness. Sentimentalism, like classicism, also suffered from certain limitations and weaknesses. In the works of this movement, sensitivity develops into melancholy, accompanied by sighs and abundantly moistened with tears.

And again, Russian reality invaded the world of poetry and showed that only in the unity of the general and personal, and with the subordination of the personal to the general, can a citizen and a person be realized. This was proven in his work by the “father of Russian poets” G.R. Derzhavin, who managed to show with his works that all aspects of life are worthy of poetry.

But in the poetry of the late 18th century, the concept of “Russian man” was identified only with the concept of “Russian nobleman”. Derzhavin took only the first step in understanding the national character, showing the nobleman both in the service of the Fatherland and in his home environment. The integrity and completeness of man's inner life had not yet been revealed.

After the reforms of Peter I, who “opened a window to Europe,” outwardly quite quickly (until the end of this century) synchronization of the literary process of Russia and the Western European region was established. In V. K. Trediakovsky’s treatise “A New and Brief Method for Composing Russian Poems” (1735), in “Letter on the Rules of Russian Poetry” (1739) by M. V. Lomonosov, in “Epistole on Poetry” (1748) by A. P. Sumarokov substantiated the syllabic-tonic system of versification, determined the stylistic norms of almost all poetic genres, and mastered the principles of classicism.

Lomonosov's odes can easily stand comparison with the odes of Pope and Voltaire, and the odes of G. R. Derzhavin even more reflect the spirit of new times. The classic tragedies of Sumarokov (“Khoreyev”, “Dimitri the Pretender”, etc.) are in no way inferior to the tragedies of Gottsched. The satirical comedy by D. I. Fonvizin “The Minor” is magnificent. The short story “Poor Liza” by the greatest Russian sentimentalist N. M. Karamzin made readers shed no less tears than Richardson’s “Clarissa” and “Julia, or the New Heloise” by Rousseau, and A. N. Radishchev in “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow” approached the pathos of Rousseau's treatises.

Largely learning from European writers of the 17th–18th centuries, Russian writers of the 18th century avoided the slavish dependence on ancient models characteristic of European classicists.

So, starting from the 18th century, a certain synchronization of Russian and European literatures took place, while domestic literature in a number of respects retained its independent development.

17. Literature of the Petrine era(end of the 17th – first quarter of the 18th century). Characteristics of the era. The process of “Europeanization of Russia”. Processes of “secularization” in ideology, culture, and everyday life. Transition from old culture to new. Meaning words in political struggle; journalism; propaganda of new moral and everyday norms. Translated prose, its role in the development of Russian literature and the formation of public opinion in the Petrine era (“The Honest Mirror of Youth”, “On the Sacking of Troy”, “On the Laws of War and Peace”, etc.). The birth of journalism: the Vedomosti newspaper.

The genre of travel to the Peter the Great era. The flourishing of oratory; genres of sermon, “words”. Their ideological content: praise of the acts of Peter I. Poetics of the genre. Oratory activities of Stefan Yavorsky, Feofan Prokopovich.

Handwritten literature - old in form, but new in content, stories, translated novels, adaptations of works of ancient Russian literature.

Original stories of the era (“The History of the Russian sailor Vasily Kariotsky”, “The History of Alexander, a Russian nobleman”, “The History of a certain nobleman’s son...”, etc.). Their difference from the stories of the late 17th century. Features of the poetics: secular content, a fictional plot developing along the line of revealing the character of the main character, whose fate is the result of his actions, and not the action of fate, as in ancient Russian stories. The meaning of the love theme in stories. Reflection of educational and journalistic ideas of Peter the Great's time in the stories. Features of poetics, baroque elements in stories, originality of composition and style. The influence of translated and original stories of Peter's time on the work of F. Emin and M. Chulkov.

Development of poetry. New genres: love song, cant. Panegyrics, their journalistic beginning.

Theater and dramaturgy of Peter's time. School theater. Poetics of school theater plays. Attempts to organize a secular theater. Interludes as a prototype of Russian comedies.

Development of folklore in the Peter the Great era. Dual attitude towards Peter in folklore works.

Baroque as a literary movement of the Peter the Great era. The emergence of the Baroque under the influence of Polish-Ukrainian-Belarusian influences and internal Russian needs. Baroque poetics. New genres, new ideological trends, new style. Enlightenment character of Russian Baroque.

In the literature of the 18th century, the old forms were preserved, but the content of the works changed, being influenced by the ideas of the Enlightenment and humanistic thought.

At the beginning of the 18th century. stories (“stories”) were popular, especially “the story of the Russian sailor Vasily Koriotsky,” which reflected the emergence of a new hero, figure, patriot and citizen. “stories” showed that a person can achieve success in life thanks to personal qualities, the virtues of a person, and not his origin. The influence of the Baroque style was manifested primarily in poetry, drama (represented mainly by translated plays), and love lyrics.

The foundations of the theory of Russian literature of modern times were laid by the writer and publicist F. Prokopovich in his works “Rhetoric” and “On Poetic Art”. He substantiated the principles of early classicism. In Russian literature, the beginning of the classical tradition was laid by the work of A.D. Kantemir, a poet, was the first to introduce into Russia the genre of poetic satire, which was developed by classicism.

In literature, starting from the 30s. The influence of classicism became evident. This direction arose under the influence of Western European, earlier in time. Russian classicism was subject to pan-European laws, but it was still characterized by a pronounced interest in antiquity and strict genre regulation. Translations of ancient authors (especially Horace and Anacreon) became very popular. In drama and poetry, the dominant place was given to ancient subjects. The national peculiarity of Russian classicism was its closer (compared to Western Europe) connection with the ideology of the Enlightenment, which manifested itself in the high civic pathos of art.

Classicism also acquired its own characteristic features - the pathos of absolute monarchy and national statehood. The direction of classicism reached its peak in the philosophical, solemn odes of Lomonosov with their ideas of national cultural progress and a wise monarch.

Russian classicism is represented by the names of M.M. Kheraskov, A.P. Sumarokov, its head, Ya.B. Knyazhnin, V.I. Maykov and others. Preaching high civic feelings, noble deeds, these literary figures proceeded from the idea of \u200b\u200bthe inseparability of interests nobility and autocratic statehood.

The founder of the new versification, which forms the basis of modern Russian poetry, was Vasily Kirillovich Trediakovsky (1703 - 1768). The new, syllabic-tonic system of versification became an essential element of the new literature. It is based on the alternation of unstressed and stressed syllables in a line.

At the origins of the new Russian drama was the author of the first Russian comedies and tragedies, Alexander Petrovich Sumarokov (1717-1777). He created 12 comedies and 9 tragedies, as well as about 400 fables. He took the plots of most tragedies from Russian history, for example, “Dmitry the Pretender.”

The influence of the ideas of the Enlightenment, Pugachev's peasant war, and then the French Revolution led to writers devoting their works to acute social and political problems. Denis Ivanovich Fonvizin (1744-1792) denounced the arbitrariness and ignorance of landowners in the comedy “The Minor.” Gavrila Romanovich Derzhavin (1743-1816) tried in his ode “Felitsa” to create the image of an “ideal monarch”, a comparison with which his contemporary rulers could not stand.

Classicism was replaced by sentimentalism. He is characterized by a deep interest in the experiences, feelings, and interests of the common man, especially those from the middle classes. The beginning of sentimentalism is associated with the name of Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin (1766-1826). The writer managed in his story “Poor Liza” to prove the simple truth that “even peasants know how to love” and are ready to give their lives for love.

The noble poetry of this time is not limited only to love lyrics. He is also familiar with genres of greater social significance, for example, satire, significant examples of which were first presented by Kantemir, although before him satirical elements appeared, for example, in the oratorical prose of Feofan Prokopovich, in the verses of Simeon of Polotsk or in “interludes”, which were often depicted in caricature as enemies of the policy of feudal expansion.

In the works of Lomonosov and Kantemir, older genres took shape - the solemn ode and satire. Trediakovsky’s work provided examples of artistic prose, poetic epic, and laid the foundation for the formation of a genre system of lyric poetry.

Sumarokov and his followers followed the line of lyricism and especially the line of comedy in a “decline” of high style. Lomonosov's theory classified comedy as a low genre, allowing it greater freedom from the “rules” and thereby “lowering” classicism in it. Broad aristocratic literature did not fail to take advantage of this relative freedom. Sumarokov in his “Epistole on Poetry” paid a lot of attention to comedy, to which he set a didactic task: “the ability of comedy to rule the temper by mockery - to make people laugh and to use its direct rules.”

N. M. Karamzin wrote in the genre of a sentimental journey, a sentimental story.

In a number of works that belong to the genre of classicism, elements of realism are clearly visible. D. I. Fonvizin in his comedies “The Brigadier” and “The Minor” realistically and aptly described the life of landowner estates, depicting the morals of their owners, sympathizing with the fate of the peasants, whose situation, in his opinion, required relief by softening the morals of the nobility, as well as their enlightenment .

Alexander Nikolaevich Radishchev (1749-1802) in artistic form, in his works, raised the problem of the need to eliminate serfdom and autocracy. In the book “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow,” which combines the genre of travel with a sensitive story, they are given vivid pictures of lawlessness and tyranny.

Beginning of the 18th century is an important period in the development of the Russian literary language. The literature of Peter the Great's era was distinguished by great linguistic diversity; along with the Church Slavonic language, foreign words were actively used in it, many of which have been preserved in modern Russian.

First of all, Russian classical poetics developed issues of poetic language, which had to be adapted to new tasks

Lexical norms of the literary language in the middle of the 18th century. were ordered by M.V. Lomonosov. In his treatise “On the Use of Church Books in the Russian Language” (1757), he used a scheme for dividing the literary language, known since antiquity, into three styles: high, middle and low. Its starting point was the use of “Slavic sayings”. But his reform preserved the conventions of bookish language, which differed from colloquial speech.

Classicism is most clearly represented by the works of Lomonosov, who promoted in his theoretical works (“Rhetoric”, “On the Use of Church Books in the Russian Language”, “Letter on the Rules of Russian Poetry”, etc.) a magnificent, high art of words, moralizing, which should promote solving problems of state order. In Lomonosov's work, problems that were naively and timidly put forward by the literature of the beginning of the century were posed and artistically resolved, advocating the strengthening and expansion of the socio-economic base of feudal Russia. Without leaving the genre framework of high poetry, he used ode, and partly tragedy and epic, to promote the tendency of a feudal-absolutist, military-bureaucratic monarchy in its European “cultural” forms.

The largest poet of the late 18th century. G.R. also considers Derzhavina. His merit was the democratization of the poetic word, combining the “high” style with the “low”, introducing elements of colloquial language into poetry. Sentimentalist writers, in particular N.M., played an important role in the formation of a new literary language. Karamzin. But, having proclaimed the rapprochement of the literary language with the spoken language, they focused on the “language of the salons.” Therefore, their innovations did not become the main direction in the formation of the literary language.

Another direction was the orientation towards the book Slavic language, defended by A.S. Shishkov, which contributed to the preservation of national roots in the language. By the beginning of the 19th century. Disputes about the development of the Russian language became part of the cultural life of society, which was an indicator of the growth of national self-awareness.

And all the achievements of the Renaissance. The literature of the 18th century had a huge impact on societies, which made an invaluable contribution to world culture. The Enlightenment gave impetus to the Great French Revolution, which completely changed Europe.

The literature of the 18th century performed mainly educational functions; great philosophers and writers became its heralds. They themselves possessed an incredible amount of knowledge, sometimes encyclopedic, and not without reason believed that only an enlightened person could change this world. They carried their humanistic ideas through literature, which consisted mainly of philosophical treatises. These works were written for a fairly wide range of readers capable of thinking and reasoning. The authors hoped in this way to be heard by a large number of people.

The period from 1720 to 1730 is called Enlightenment classicism. Its main content was that writers ridiculed based on examples of ancient literature and art. In these works one can feel pathos and heroism, which are aimed at the idea of creating a paradise state.

Foreign literature of the 18th century did a lot. She was able to show heroes who are true patriots. For this category of people, Equality, Fraternity and Freedom are the main priority. True, it should be noted that these heroes are completely devoid of individuality, character, they are possessed only by sublime passions.

Enlightenment classicism is being replaced by educational realism, which brings literature closer to concepts closer to people. Foreign literature of the 18th century received a new direction, more realistic and democratic. Writers turn to face the person, describe his life, talk about his suffering and torment. Through the language of novels and poems, writers call on their readers to mercy and compassion. Enlightened people of the 18th century began to read the works of Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, Montesquieu, Lessing, Fielding and Defoe. The main characters are ordinary people who cannot resist public morality, are very vulnerable and often weak-willed. The authors of these works are still very far from the realistic literary images of heroes of the 19th and 20th centuries, but a significant shift towards the description of more life-like characters is already noticeable.

Russian literature of the 18th century began with the reforms of Peter I, gradually replacing the positions of enlightened classicism with realism. Prominent representatives of this period were such authors as Trediakovsky and Sumarokov. They created fertile soil on Russian soil for the development of literary talents. Fonvizin, Derzhavin, Radishchev and Karamzin are undeniable. We still admire their talents and civic position.

English literature of the 18th century was distinguished by the formation of several different directions at once. The British were the first to use such genres as social and family novels, in which the talents of Richardson, Smollett, Stevenson, and, undoubtedly, Swift, Defoe and Fielding were revealed. Writers in England were among the first to criticize not the bourgeois system, but the bourgeois themselves, their moral and moral principles. True, Jonathan Swift aimed his irony at the bourgeois system itself, showing in his works its most negative aspects. English literature of the 18th century is also represented by a phenomenon called sentimentalism. It is filled with pessimism, disbelief in ideals and is aimed only at feelings, usually of love content.

In the era of Peter the Great in the 18th century. in response to the demands of the time, there was a rapid transformation of literature, updating its ideological, genre and thematic appearance. Peter's reform activities and the initiative to transform Russia determined the organic assimilation of enlightenment ideas by literature and new writers, and above all the political teachings of the enlighteners - the concept of enlightened absolutism. Enlightenment ideology gave modern forms to the traditional features of Russian literature. As D.S. Likhachev pointed out, in the era of accelerated construction of the Russian centralized state, state and social themes begin to dominate in literature, and journalism is rapidly developing.

Journalism will penetrate into other genres of literature, thereby determining its special, openly pedagogical character. Teaching as the most important tradition of young Russian literature was inherited by the new time and acquired a new quality: the Russian writer acted as a citizen who dared to teach the reign of the next monarch. Lomonosov taught Elizabeth to reign, Novikov and Fonvizin - first Catherine II, and then Paul I, Derzhavin - Catherine II, Karamzin - Alexander I, Pushkin - during the difficult time of the defeat of the Decembrist uprising - Nicholas I.

Journalism became a feature of Russian literature of the 18th century, determining the originality of its artistic appearance.

Undoubtedly, the most important and fundamental feature of the new literature was that it was literature created through the efforts of individual authors. A new type of writer appeared in society, whose literary activity was determined by his personality.

During this period, Russian classicism entered the historical arena, becoming a necessary stage in the development of Russian literature as pan-European literature. Russian classicism created a multi-genre art, which at first asserted its existence only through the poetic word; prose will begin to develop later - from the 1760s. Through the efforts of several generations of poets, many genres of lyrical and satirical poetry were developed. The classicist poets (Lomonosov, Sumarokov, Kheraskov, Knyazhnin) approved the genre of tragedy. Thus, the conditions were prepared for the organization and successful activities of the Russian theater. The Russian theater, created in 1756, began its work under the leadership of Sumarokov. Classicism, having begun the creation of national literature, contributed to the development of ideals of citizenship, formed the idea of a heroic character, included the artistic experience of ancient and European art in national literature, and showed the ability of poetry to analytically reveal the spiritual world of man.

Lomonosov, drawing on the artistic experience of mankind, wrote deeply national, original odes, expressing the spirit of a rising nation. The pathos of his poetry was the idea of affirming the greatness and power of Russia, the youth, energy and creative activity of a nation that believed in its strength and its historical vocation. Idea statements was born in the process of creative explanation and generalization of experience, the real practice of “Russian sons”. The poetry created by Lomonosov existed next to the satirical movement, the founder of which was Kantemir.

During the reign of Catherine II, the Russian Enlightenment finally took shape; journalist and writer Nikolai Novikov, playwright and prose writer Denis Fonvizin, and philosopher Yakov Kozelsky entered the public arena. Along with them, scientists S. Desnitsky, D. Anichkov, propagandist and popularizer of educational ideology, Professor N. Kurganov, and the compiler of one of the most popular books of the century, “Pismovnik,” actively worked with them. In the 1780s. Novikov created the largest educational center in Moscow on the basis of the Moscow University printing house he rented. IN

late 1780s A young writer, a student of Russian enlighteners, and a talented prose writer, Ivan Krylov, entered literature.

At the same time, the works of Alexander Radishchev also came out of print. The works of these authors are considered to be created in the tradition of educational realism. Their main issues are the ideas of the extra-class value of man, belief in his great role on earth, patriotic, civic and social activities as the main way of self-affirmation of the individual. The most important feature of showing reality is the disclosure of its social contradictions, a satirical and accusatory attitude towards it (Radishchev’s “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow”, the ode “Liberty”, Fonvizin’s comedies “The Brigadier” and “The Minor”).

At the same time, in Russia, almost simultaneously with other European countries, another literary movement was formed, called sentimentalism. The penetration of sentimentalism into Russian literature began already in the 1770s. It is especially noticeable in the work of M. Kheraskov and the poets of his circle, who united in the Moscow university magazine “Useful Amusement.” Russian writers knew the works of English, French and German sentimentalists very well and translated them intensively. Hence the understandable, peculiar commonality of themes, genres, motifs and even heroes among writers of this movement.

The creator of Russian sentimentalism as a new and original artistic system was Karamzin - poet, prose writer, publicist, literary and theater critic, publisher and author of the multi-volume History of the Russian State. A real literary school for Karamzin was the editing of the magazine “Children's Reading for the Heart and Mind” (1785–1789), published by Novikov, for whom Karamzin translated many works of European literature of the 18th century. Travel through European countries in 1789–1790. turned out to be a decisive moment in Karamzin’s literary fate. Undertaking the publication of the Moscow Journal, Karamzin acted both as a writer and as a theorist of a new direction, deeply and independently apprehending the experience of contemporary European literature, the main aesthetic principles of which were sincerity of feeling and “pure natural taste.”

Already in the first literary works of the writer, heroes of two types appear: the “natural man” and the civilized, enlightened man. The writer is looking for heroes of the first type in the peasant environment, an environment not spoiled by civilization that has preserved patriarchal foundations. Karamzin’s famous story “Poor Liza” (1791) attracted contemporaries with its humanistic idea: “even peasant women know how to love.” The main character of the story, the peasant woman Liza, embodies the writer’s idea of a “natural person”: she is “beautiful in soul and body,” kind, sincere, capable of loving devotedly and tenderly.

Perhaps Karamzin’s most significant work, “Letters of a Russian Traveler,” represents European life at the end of the 18th century. – morals and life, social structure, politics and culture of Karamzin’s contemporary Europe. The main character is a “sensitive”, “sentimental” person, this determines his attention to nature, interest in works of art, in every person he meets and, finally, his thoughts about the good of all people, about the “moral rapprochement of peoples”. In his 1802 article “On Love of the Fatherland and People’s Pride,” Karamzin wrote: “Our trouble is that we all want to speak French and don’t think about working on mastering our own language.” The bilingualism of Russian educated society seemed to Karamzin to be one of the main obstacles to the national self-determination of Europeanized Russian literature and culture, but the final solution to the problem of reforming the language of Russian prose and poetry belongs not to Karamzin, but to Pushkin.

Sentimentalism directly prepared the flowering of Russian romanticism at the beginning of the 19th century.

Test questions and assignments

Poetry: Simeon Polotsky, Sylvester Medvedev, Karion Istomin.

N. Karamzin “Poor Liza.”

Poetry V. Trediakovsky, M. Lomonosov, A. Sumarokov, G. Derzhavin.

There is a clear boundary between the creations of the first and second halves of the 18th century, and the works created at the beginning of the century are very different from those that followed.

In the West, major literary forms were already developing and preparations were underway for the creation of the novel genre, while Russian authors were still rewriting the lives of saints and praising rulers in clumsy, unwieldy poems. Genre diversity in Russian literature is poorly represented; it lags behind European literature by about a century.

Among the genres of Russian literature of the early 18th century it is worth mentioning:

hagiographic literature(origins - church literature),
Panegyric literature(texts of praise),
Russian poems(origins - Russian epics, composed in tonic versification).

Vasily Trediakovsky, the first professional Russian philologist who was educated in his homeland and consolidated his linguistic and stylistic mastery at the Sorbonne, is considered a reformer of Russian literature.

Firstly, Trediakovsky forced his contemporaries to read and his followers to write prose - he created a mass of translations of ancient Greek myths and European literature created on this classical basis, giving his contemporaries-writers a theme for future works.

Secondly, Trediakovsky revolutionaryly separated poetry from prose and developed the basic rules of syllabic-tonic Russian versification, drawing on the experience of French literature.

Genres of literature of the second half of the 18th century:

Drama (comedy, tragedy),
Prose (sentimental journey, sentimental story, sentimental letters),
Poetic forms (heroic and epic poems, odes, a huge variety of small lyrical forms)

Russian poets and writers of the 18th century

Gabriel Romanovich Derzhavin occupies a significant place in Russian literature along with D.I. Fonvizin and M.V. Lomonosov. Together with these titans of Russian literature, he is included in the brilliant galaxy of founders of Russian classical literature of the Enlightenment era, dating back to the second half of the 18th century. At this time, largely thanks to the personal participation of Catherine the Second, science and art were rapidly developing in Russia. This is the time of the appearance of the first Russian universities, libraries, theaters, public museums and a relatively independent press, although very relative and for a short period, which ended with the appearance of “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow” by A.P. Radishcheva. The most fruitful period of the poet’s activity dates back to this time, as Famusov Griboyedov called it, “the golden age of Catherine.”

Selected poems:

Fonvizin's play is a classic example of comedy in compliance with the traditional rules of creating plays:

The trinity of time, place and action,
Primitive typification of heroes (classicism assumed a lack of psychologism and depth of character of the hero, so they were all divided into either good and bad, or smart and stupid)

The comedy was written and staged in 1782. Denis Fonvizin’s progressiveness as a playwright lies in the fact that in a classic play he combined several issues (the problem of family and upbringing, the problem of education, the problem of social inequality) and created more than one conflict (a love conflict and a socio-political one). Fonvizin's humor is not light, serving solely for entertainment, but sharp, aimed at ridiculing vices. Thus, the author introduced realistic features into the classic work.

Biography:

Selected work:

The time of creation is 1790, the genre is a travel diary, typical of French sentimental travelers. But the journey turned out to be filled not with the bright impressions of the voyage, but with gloomy, tragic colors, despair and horror.

Alexander Radishchev published “Journey” in a home printing house, and the censor, apparently having read the title of the book, mistook it for another sentimental diary and released it without reading it. The book had the effect of a bomb exploding: in the form of scattered memories, the author described the nightmarish reality and life of the people he met at each station along the route from one capital to another. Poverty, dirt, extreme poverty, bullying of the strong over the weak and hopelessness - these were the realities of Radishchev’s contemporary state. The author received a long-term exile, and the story was banned.

Radishchev's story is atypical for a purely sentimental work - instead of tears of tenderness and enchanting travel memories, so generously scattered by French and English sentimentalism, an absolutely real and merciless picture of life is drawn here.

Selected work:

The story “Poor Liza” is an adapted European story on Russian soil. Created in 1792, the story became an example of sentimental literature. The author sang the cult of sensitivity and the sensual human principle, putting “inner monologues” into the mouths of the characters, revealing their thoughts. Psychologism, subtle portrayal of characters, great attention to the inner world of heroes are a typical manifestation of sentimental traits.

Nikolai Karamzin's innovation was manifested in his original resolution of the heroine's love conflict - the Russian reading public, accustomed mainly to the happy ending of stories, received a blow for the first time in the form of the suicide of the main character. And this meeting with the bitter truth of life turned out to be one of the main advantages of the story.

Selected work:

On the threshold of the Golden Age of Russian literature

Europe passed the path from classicism to realism in 200 years, Russia had to rush to master this material in 50-70 years, constantly catching up and learning from the example of others. While Europe was already reading realistic stories, Russia had to master classicism and sentimentalism in order to move on to creating romantic works.

The Golden Age of Russian literature is the time of development of romanticism and realism. Preparations for the emergence of these stages among Russian writers took place at an accelerated pace, but the most important thing that the writers of the 18th century learned was the opportunity to assign to literature not only an entertaining function, but also an educational, critical, morally formative one.