Analysis of the comedy Tartuffe. Character system of the classic comedy "Tartuffe" by Moliere

Sigov V.K.

The narrator writes one big novel all his life. And then they evaluate it. When the novel is finished and the author dies.
From Shukshin's working notes

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the birth of Vasily Makarovich Shukshin. And a quarter of a century has passed since the death of the wonderful writer, film director, and actor. Shukshin became famous as a writer in 1958. Over the course of 16 years, he published over a hundred stories, two novels, novellas, film scripts, works for the theater, and shot six films. He was generally recognized significant place V Russian culture XX century.

Shukshin’s film debut was the episodic role of a sailor dying from Grigory Melekhov’s saber in the film by S.A. Gerasimov " Quiet Don"Based on the novel by M. Sholokhov. Fellow villagers recalled that their fellow countryman’s first appearance on the screen was almost disappointing: “We saw Vasily in a cameo role. He rose up on his elbow, looked out from behind the fence and fell... They thought: probably nothing will come of him.” Today these words are also perceived as a metaphor: rose - looked out - fell... Short life and the amazing feeling of uniqueness, recognition of heroes, problems, situations that arises in everyone who gets acquainted with Shukshin’s work even today, when social realities have changed dramatically. Still, even in that long gaze of Shukshin the sailor there was something that stopped attention without words, something compressed, capacious and striking with hidden depth, knowledge that the dying hero seemed to be trying to convey to people. Later artist calls the highest art the ability to “speak so that you are understood. Silently they understood and silently said “thank you”" (6, 413. Hereinafter, Shukshin’s texts are quoted from the book: Shukshin V.M. Collected works: In 6 volumes - M., 1998, indicating the volume and page ).

The organicity and integrity of all manifestations of Shukshin’s creative personality have been noted more than once. The stories formed the central, most important link of that great “novel” that V. Shukshin “wrote” with everything available to him artistic ways. He develops a “language”, a system of images and concepts that denote the core of artistic reflection. Strives to “educate” the reader, to accustom him to the idea that “real literature is designed for repeated reading.” This is why Shukshin is gradually becoming “disillusioned” with cinema. It, according to his feelings, causes a bright, but not sufficiently stable impression. Literature is capable of touching the deepest, most intimate strings of the soul, and addresses the most important issues of choice and self-determination of the individual in the world. In a particular picture, a talented writer certainly contains a piece of the general. Shukshin's individual stories form a more significant artistic integrity. The author consciously strives for this. And an important task of the analysis is to discover the internal bonds that make the motley world of the writer’s heroes and conflicts whole, unified, and involved folk life in all its manifestations.

Interest in the historical past in Semka, the hero of the story “The Master,” became especially active after meeting one writer, for whom he was decorating an office to resemble a 16th-century hut. Then “he didn’t drink, read various books about antiquity, looked at ancient icons, spinning wheels... The writer had a lot of this stuff.” It turns out that the writer has piled up the intellectual (books), the utilitarian (spinning wheels) and the spiritual (icons) into one heap - “in bulk”. This attitude “towards antiquity” at the level of decoration and collection characterizes the state position as a whole, and perhaps not only in the 60s. It is possible to recognize the cognitive value of “antiquity” and preserve some “samples”, but supporting the liberated spiritual initiative is completely unthinkable. Semka explains the architectural secondary nature of the Talitsky church. Semka’s naive question: “Well, let’s say it’s a copy. So what? This doesn’t make it any less beautiful,” was left without an answer. Official “interest” in the “pride of the Russian people,” be it a song or a temple, can only be shown for show. Where beauty can really revive or at least awaken souls, no one is going to restore it.

In "The Master" the hero is brought closer to spiritual rebirth the slightly revealed beauty of a hidden church, and he turned onto the usual road with the indirect “support” of the “official” church.

The history of the “large, elevated” church, “obviously of late times,” briefly told in “The Master,” is the history of a nationalized church. We can say that church leaders, as depicted by Shukshin, enter into political struggle of its time. And thus they put spirituality under the attack of cunning politicking. Having become involved in a worldly struggle for power, having failed to maintain internal unity on a national basis, the church thereby predetermined its future position, in which it found itself by the will of Peter, who was most suitable for worldly power in terms of his qualities. These contradictions are also embodied in Shukshin’s novel “I came to give you freedom.” Here there is certainly condemnation of Razin from the side of conscience and religious consciousness, but the church curse is not indisputable.

There is a direct connection between the story “A Strong Man” and the story “The Master” and the novel about Razin. Here, too, a dispute flares up around a 17th-century church. At the beginning of “The Master,” Syomka “barks merrily with the foreman” - it was the collective farm foreman who became the hero of “A Strong Man.” The idea to restore the church comes to Syomka’s mind on Sunday, and on the same day of the week Shurygin accomplishes his plan.

Syomka Lynx could not restore, and Shurygin, stepping over common feelings, destroyed the symbol of national spirituality. “Who told you to?” “Stop being willful,” his fellow villagers tell him. The fact of the matter is that one’s own will is in modern conditions can realize itself only in matters of destruction. Naive hopes for the region, the center, are also refuted here: Shurygin the devil rushes to a well-deserved rest in the regional center, and in the story “The Master”, where the hero, who tried to resurrect the temple, unsuccessfully walked the steps of both the district and regional centers. Social order and destructive potential, which Shukshin anxiously notices in the national character, find each other.

The author's position is not limited to this sad statement. The discussion in “The Master” about the church, which “as if was deliberately hidden from idle gaze,” also seems significant. She is always ready to open up to “the one who came to her”, she is waiting for a true master who will still make Syomka’s dream come true.

However, the writer also notes the “skill” that is truly developed in modern conditions - spiritual camouflage and substitution. The image of the circus in the artistic world of Shukshin the prose writer performs the metaphorical functions of a “plausible” replacement for the temple, close to the latter to the same extent that the word “laughter” is close to the word “spirit”, and “circus” is close to “church”. This significance of the image is especially obvious in the story of the same as “The Master” and “Strong Man”, 1969 “Cherednichenko and the Circus”. Original title“Circus” most definitely indicated the central metaphor of the work. The sign that puts this story in line with “The Master” and some other works is the profession of the hero. By the age of fifty, he expects to become “deputy director of a small furniture factory, where he now worked as a planner.” That is, he is the “boss” of Syomka Rys, Andrei Erin (“Microscope”), a “colleague” of the heroes of “Dancing Shiva,” Matvey Ivanov (“I came to give you freedom”), Gleb Kapustin (“Cut”), etc.

The “circus” in this story is full of signs of a pagan arena hostile to Christianity. At the same time, it appeals to a consciousness that is not completely free from Christian layers, offering an “alternative” to the traditional temple, which is very reminiscent of it in appearance. “Culture” is trying to replace spirituality. Not only is some semblance of the form of a church important in the circus tent discussed in the story, but also its fundamental “unrootedness” in the soil, mobility - “here today, there tomorrow,” “lightness... extraordinary.” The performance is similar to a service; here, too, there are parishioners laughing in unison at the right moment, and “ministers” in the arena. Special place among them belongs to “a dark, long-haired clown with non-Russian surname" On Sunday the circus has not one, but three performances. This day, as it should be, is completely devoted to serving the “alternative” “deity”. Associated with biblical associations individual elements service-views. As it should be with the Antichrist, everything here is turned upside down. The biblical prophet Daniel remained alive in the lions' den thanks to the help of angels. Circus "Daniil", "a young boy in a red shirt, drove seven terrible lions around the arena, fenced off from the audience by a high cage, and lashed them with a whip." The Prophet Daniel, as you know, was also an interpreter of dreams. In a heavy sleep “on the night from Saturday to Sunday,” Cherednichenko visited paintings that made him remember the arenas of Rome during the time of Nero, in which early Christians were sacrificed to pagan passions: “I imagined God knows what - some kind of masks, the brass music of a circus orchestra sounded, lions roared ...” Finally, in search of Eva, Cherednichenko ends up in a part of the circus-church that is closed to parishioners, having previously “taken communion”: “I took two glasses of red wine from a stall.” The “altar” of the anti-church amazes the hero with the chaos reigning here: “Cherednichenko was tangled for a long time under the tarpaulin roof in some ropes, belts, cables...”

Against the background of the image of an anti-spiritual temple created at the beginning of the story, everything that follows is perceived as a natural social and everyday consequence. The “bread” of everyday existence, which Cherednichenko “plans” for himself, is predetermined in its qualities by the “spectacle”, the idol of the new world, shaping souls “in his own image and likeness.” “Shadow”, “market” morality with the cult of fame, material success, violence, aggressiveness, cruelty, socio-political demagoguery was just claiming its rights at the time when most of Shukshin’s works take place, but was already revealing remarkable abilities in subjugating souls. Its power knows no socio-cultural boundaries. From the point of view of the priests of the “state circus,” traditional moral values, conscientiousness, modesty, kindness. The categories of moral and immoral are in Shukshin’s works under the strong influence of Christian ideas about good and evil.

Life for show, the desire for models that are sent from above, for example, coming from the “chief engineer”, standard set benefits and attributes - this is all that Cherednichenko’s poor imagination can offer. Shukshin astutely noticed what “cultural-mass” politics is still aimed at: “Nothing frightens and surprises in a person more than his strange ability to learn a few simple everyday techniques... to adapt the mind and hands to move several levers in a huge machine of Life - and that’s it. And I’m happy.”

External diversity masks internal emptiness, wretchedness and monotony. The highest manifestations of existence, a holiday in this world coincide with what is everyday life in its “temples”: this is when “it turns out funny”, applause is heard. The very trip to a “temple”, cinema, circus, theater or to a demonstration, “May Day” (in modern terms - to a party, stadium, etc.) - in an inverted world - is infrequent, like a holiday, the only and obligatory attribute of “spiritual » life. Another question is that not everyone will decide to make life a continuous “concert”; this is the lot of the chosen few. Cherednichenko was frightened by his impulse because, having admired it from the outside, he was not ready to tolerate the idol in his daily neighborhood: “She would arrange a couple of concerts for me there, and then blindfold yourself in shame and run to the ends of the world.” He is a normal, moderately believing parishioner, far from the public ecstasy of the new “saints” and “fools.”

The story ends with the author’s allegorical reflection on the fate of the homeland and the future path of its people: “The huge steamship “Russia”... The guy and the girl were talking quietly. “We should sail somewhere... Far, far away! Yes?” “Where then?” should we swim?..", which waves will predetermine the choice of a person, a people, is still not clear. Somewhere the melody of “Amur Waves” sounds. The Amur carries water to the east, the ship sails to the west.

It is no coincidence that the story “The Freak” became the center of most disputes about the writer. Many ideas and motives of his work converged here. The hero became a true discovery of the writer. The problem of the work unites reflections and ideas characteristic of different periods of creativity. His hero embodies the attitude, mental qualities and spiritual guidelines (disorientation is also a kind of guideline) characteristic of the characters in many of Shukshin’s subsequent works. He “expresses through his state of mind, character, and views what his people live with him.” To the fact that “most in an expressive way lives" in Chudik, this is not the first time the writer has contacted us and returns more than once.

The plot also uses events from the author’s life. In his unfinished essay, “Only It Won’t Be an Economic Article,” he talks about a case like that what happened to Chudik in the store. Many details of the work emphasize a certain spiritual closeness between the hero and the author. The ability to “convey” to the hero events from his life, a reaction to them, gives rise to a coincidence in the main thing - character, emotional coloring of a direct moral attitude to life. And most likely, it is not the author who gives the hero what he has experienced and acquired, but feels that the best in him (conscientiousness, sensitivity, emotional sensitivity, openness, insecurity, vulnerability) comes from them, from his fellow countrymen. For the writer, the spirituality of life and creative potential a man of the people. The eccentricity of Shukshin’s favorite heroes is, in accordance with the tradition of Russian literature (Dostoevsky, Leskov, Rozanov), a form of manifestation of their spirituality, an outburst of their bright soul. “Freaks are not weird or eccentric. The only thing that distinguishes them from ordinary people is that they are talented and beautiful. They are beautiful because they are merged with the people’s destiny, they do not live separately... They decorate life” (Soviet culture. - 1969. - January 18).

This is not a victim of social circumstances. Nevertheless, specific “touches” social life reveal conflicting possibilities for further development(or degradation) type. The weirdo became the most “Shukshinsky” hero because he embodied to the maximum extent the writer’s understanding of the current moment of national life, the state of folk spirit, the “extremely uncomfortable position” in which the traditional character found himself. The transitional position of the hero is obvious even in purely cultural and everyday terms, especially if we take into account plot and biographical options such as: brother Dmitry, N.N. Knyazev, Kolka Paratov (“The wife saw off her husband to Paris...”), etc. So far he does not have the “germs” of hard-heartedness, selfishness, intolerance, careerism, snobbery towards his “brothers.” But there is no truly reliable immunity to these and other vices. Soon he can “open” them (“Microscope”). Neither blood nor sweat, which Andrei Erin examines, is an obstacle to this. It would be naive to expect automatic self-preservation based on morality and ethics alone. Shukshin considered it his duty to lay down his life in this struggle.

Scattered throughout Shukshin’s stories are numerous explicit and indirect “instructions” from the author to look for the true, hidden, intimate meaning of images and plots. A separate, author’s paragraph completes the story “Weird”: “His name was Vasily Egorovich Knyazev. He was thirty-nine years old. He worked as a projectionist in the village. He loved detectives and dogs. As a child I dreamed of being a spy." This is a kind of questionnaire that “introduces” a hero about whose soul and life it seems that “everything has already been said.” But is everything understood? Next to the standard columns - name, age, profession - an unexpected message about the hero’s dream and love is another author’s call for additional investigation “in the case” of the character. This is a replica in the ongoing dialogue of the “secret undeciphered fighter” with the reader. To say once again: “Shukshin loves his heroes...” is clearly not enough. “What am I, an idiot, or what, loving everyone?! or blessed? They don't want to think about it, devils. Or they don’t know how” (6, 411).

True, according to Shukshin, he can go to people in different ways. “Furiously” is the path of genius, “impatiently” is the path of talent, “secretly and indestructibly” the “thinking and intelligent” carries the truth. All these paths of truth in certain artistic connections and combinations are presented in the writer’s works. The genius of the “frantic” Razin colored the artist’s searches throughout his career in art. The “impatient” Vasyoka (“Stenka Razin”), Syomka Rys, Monya Kvasov (“Stubborn”) splash out their bright talent in their expressive contacts with the world. An underlying dialogue with the reader is tirelessly conducted at the level of the author's allusion, detail, association, metaphor.

The image of the fool in Shukshin’s interpretation is synthetic. He does not just present another option, but summarizes all possible paths and faces of truth, bringing them under the “common denominator” of spirituality. What Shukshin is “testing” is not so much the fool’s compliance with “modern norms and requirements,” but rather the hero’s ability to maintain an unclouded moral, spiritual attitude to a changing life. Do not succumb to the temptations of the “mind”, which turns into cunning, skill leading to opportunism (“like cheese in butter”), selfishness and indifference. Genius, divorced from a spiritual and moral foundation, turns, first of all, into cruelty and heartlessness. Thus, the unity of Morality and Truth is established as the most important measure of truth, beauty, vitality in the system of artistic and journalistic “statements” of Vasily Shukshin.

The Chudik's soul was shocked by the impressions received in an unfamiliar world, but he has salvation, an outlet. Returning home seemed to give the same balance and peace. The “Afterword” destroys the beautiful illusion. Even “simple” personal information turns out to be significant. “Earth” and the village are not at all some kind of “reserve of unclouded morality.” There are general processes going on here.

His profession characterizes the hero quite contradictorily. He shows the villagers a “movie”. Let us remember that Shukshin himself seriously sought moral justifications for his departure from the village and his film work. Let us also remember the significance that “spectacles” acquire in a godless world, which is discussed in the story “Cherednichenko and the Circus”, and not only in it. The eccentric, as is clear from the story, is a carpenter, gardener, artist, and he certainly knows the basic peasant affairs. And suddenly - a projectionist, vacation at the height of summer and, therefore, a rural harvest. Idleness and elegance at this time are perceived as foppishness, which is a step away from betrayal. This emphasis is especially noticeable in the story of the same 1967, “Two Letters.”

An unfamiliar world attracts the hero with its novelty; he does not yet know how easily, imperceptibly and irrevocably something more valuable than money is lost here. Already the first episode of the story (the incident in the store) not only shows the hero’s absolute selflessness, conscientiousness, his craving for people, dependence on their opinions, desire to do good and be liked, but also the costs of such dependence. The weirdo listens with pleasure, remembers, and later tries to copy the conversation of the “man in the hat” and “the man in the hat” standing in front of him. plump woman with painted lips." These are respected “cultured” “urban” people, and they stand in the social hierarchical ranks, according to the hero’s feelings, above him. From their conversation one can understand that they belong to the chosen few, the servants of “holy art,” and the intonation and essence of the assessments make one recall the image of the temple created in the story “Cherednichenko and the Circus.”

For the writer himself, it was important to preserve and emphasize a certain continuity in the problems and characterology of these stories. He never forgets about the “braces”, the common “roof” that unites completely independent works. Here, at least the questionnaire column - “age” - will tell you something. Chudik was 39 years old in 1967, Cherednichenko two years later - 41.

Six years later, in 1973, one of the options, points of view on the future of eccentrics in the modern world is realized in the story “Strokes to the Portrait.” At the very beginning, the hero’s surname is announced - the same one that was learned at the end of “Freak.” Nikolai Nikolaevich Knyazev is already 45 years old. He still saved external resemblance with his predecessor (short, blue-eyed), but his social status changed. This rural native lives in a regional town, his profession is in the same field as Chudik’s, but requires more activity. The TV master does not just “play the movie”, but provides the very opportunity to use the improved screen.

In connection with observations of the system of images in the story “Cherednichenko and the Circus”, we note that the “blue screen” becomes a kind of home version of the “circus-church” and takes its rightful place in the red corner. This meaning of “television” is emphasized in “Strokes to the Portrait” by the parallel of the icon - televisions: the aunt has a lot of icons in the adjacent room, Nikolai Nikolaevich’s room is filled with televisions.

The main coincidence of the plot and compositional structure of “The Freak” and “Strokes to the Portrait”, the “frame-by-frame” presentation of the material, and general spatio-temporal signs allow the writer to organize a frank “dialogue” between the namesake characters. Nikolai Nikolaevich has already completely changed places with many of those who bring pain and insult to Chudik. The female telegraph operator imposes on Chudik a faceless standard in the expression of “feelings”, offers him a commonly used cliché, instead of an unusual but sincere self-expression - citizen Knyazev himself demands at the post office to adhere to a strict form, to exclude personal relationships from public life. The weirdo dreamed of “drinking tea with raspberries on the veranda” - N. Knyazev denounces the summer resident Silchenko for his idleness. Chudik’s brother Dmitry suffers, living with a wife “obsessed with responsibility” - the hero of “Strokes to the Portrait” makes his wife hostage to his irrepressible ambitions.

The author reflects on the widespread nature of this destructive folk morality“coup”: in one of the episodes, Knyazev had the feeling that they wanted to “turn him upside down and hold him by the legs.” Most likely, the return to what was recently the norm is so painfully perceived.

The fact that the “second” Knyazev is not only a continuation, but also the antipode of the “first” is evidenced by significant details of the realistic and allegorical character. The weirdo, having received a summer vacation, goes to small town, where his brother lives for now in the “private sector” - “a man and a citizen” in one of the mise-en-scène chapters from his house in the regional town in the summer, and comes to the village on vacation. Chudik meets villagers going to work and answers their numerous questions in monosyllables: “To the Urals! To the Urals!.. Need some air!” - his antipode continuation, with all the desire to communicate, was able to speak only with one of the “collective and state farmers” rushing from work, namely the one whose TV had broken, the rest quite “expediently” “put their brick in the grandiose building” and rushed to their servings of “spiritual catering”, praying to the home TV idol.

Shukshin’s allegory also indicates the direction in which one should look for important reasons for the ongoing deformations of folk morality and worldview. The long-term work of the priests of the “state circus” is yielding results. They are also visible in the example of Chudik, and they manifest themselves especially openly in the activities and theories of the enthusiast and devotee of statehood N.N. Knyazeva.

Happily found by Knyazev, the “simple and visual” image of a hill-pyramid - an expedient state - has as its primary source a handful of land (native land), which each citizen does not just throw away, but gives, sacrifices for a common cause. The concept of mother earth in Shukshin’s works has a categorical and metaphorical meaning. This category is important for the entire socio-philosophical movement with which Shukshin is associated. “The epic source of strength from the mother - the native land - now appears not for the chosen ones, not for the heroes only, but for all of us as an extremely important and healing source, with that same magical living water when returning to its image, spirit and meaning, to its unchangeable purpose ... And the one who has lost this sense of earthly gravity, who knows only his life, without unbreakable connection past, present and future - eternal, it means that he has lost enormous joy and torment, happiness and pain of his deep existence,” wrote V. Rasputin (Irkutsk with us // Soviet culture. - 1979. - September 14. - P. 6) . Mother - the raw earth in the works of Shukshin himself is not a neutral category, it is either capable of breathing new strength, or causes a feeling of rejection. “Stepan put a handful of earth to his forehead... He buried himself in the ground and began to inhale the healing smell. And my head suddenly became clearer. And the pain suddenly went away. And even some distant, forgotten joy stirred under my heart - alive, alive” (“I came to give you freedom”). “Merican” Baev (“Conversations under a Clear Moon”) does not like to tinker in the ground. “Non-resistance” Makar Zherebtsov, who has also clearly left the earth, angrily calls out his fellow villagers: “Fuck you all!.. As you lived, so live - moles.”

Knyazev begins his discussion “about the earth” with a reminder of burial mounds, and ends with the image of “super” states that “imperceptibly” arise in the same place. What should be “buried” and put into the foundation of the “super”? The metaphorical meaning of the image of the earth in “Strokes to the Portrait” testifies to the hero’s refusal of traditional qualities in favor of “civicness.” Explains the new rules of behavior and life “television screen” as a symbol of the means of influencing mass consciousness. Silchenko tries to remember those devastated, official words that he heard from there more than once: “Work, be honest... defend the Motherland.”

The historical aspect of the metaphor leads to reflections on real pieces of land, with the socialization of which during the years of the “great turning point” the socio-economic foundations of the new state building were laid. It is also significant that Knyazev uses the image of an earthen hill only for lectures and propaganda speeches “among the broad masses of the working people.” His true goal and ideal are outlined in the treatise, in his eight “philosophical notebooks.” This is a state pyramid, a building of glass and concrete, an industrial, bureaucratic world.

For the writer, the spiritual potential of the hero-type depicted in the story “Freak” is eternally valuable. It is important whether he will be able to maintain a connection with the ancestral, folk tradition of moral, spiritualized existence (Vasily Yegorovich - Vasily the Tsar, Yegory, George the Victorious, guardian and defender of the land) or will there be a “short circuit” to himself (Nikolai Nikolaevich - Nikolai - “ victorious people"), fraught with "drying out", rationalization, denationalization of life.

The result of “super” development in personal terms was, on the one hand, a person who flew and, although not quite softly, “landed”, and on the other hand, he broke through “the layers of life above ... his head” and was “bruised general questions».

The weirdo feels the deadening touch new reality, but can still “escape” from it into the familiar world. Cherednichenko calmly agrees with the imposed existence, “finds ways” to get along with the state and not miss out on his own. He didn’t even dare to throw in his lot with one of the “priestesses” of the new world. Knyazev is the most dramatic figure. He sincerely accepted the propagated idea as his own. Enthusiastically trying to actually implement what the “planners” are calling for. He is all directed towards the public good, forward and higher. It broke through the thickness above your head, if you mean national-historical traditions, way of life, connections with ordinary people. And I saw emptiness. But I didn't understand this. I didn’t understand that his rush to the heights was actually a fall into the underworld “upside down.” But I realized that the “upper room”, where the “control panel” is, is a hoax; it is terribly empty. In 1972, Shukshin wrote: “No mind, no truth, no real power, not a single living idea!.. But with what help do they rule us? There remains only one explanation - with the help of our own stupidity" (6, 424).

Knyazev mastered formal state logic quite well. If on floor “X” the figures “no longer supported the ceiling: the ceiling sagged,” then on the next floor “y” “sagged.” He cannot and does not want to understand the main thing, that the pyramid is held up not by the “structure”, but by “figures”, behind which are the “population of the floors”, people. He made his way to the top with his head, where there was no one but himself. Artistically, this is realized in the system of Knyazev’s doubles, with whom he painfully encounters every time. As S.M. correctly noted. Kozlova (Poetics of stories by V.M. Shukshin. - Barnaul, 1993. - P. 109), such doubles are both the make-up artist Silchenko and Knyazev’s young colleague in the “branch of the national economy” from the chapter “On the problem of free time”. It seems that Knyazev is colliding nose to nose with own reflections- all “in hats”, “ties”, “with thoughts”, from the “rembit office”. The “minister” “from the state circus” did not understand him and clearly does not correspond to the height of his position, and the breakthrough to the Center, to the source, the generator of the idea, the discovery of which Knyazev is inspired, did not take place. It always ends at "security". The chairman of the village council and a policeman slowed down the unauthorized enthusiasm. And it is unlikely that at the Center Knyazev would have been able to discover anything other than what the enterprising and earthly Cherednichenko had already seen “behind the scenes”: chaos, emptiness, a black hole, tartar.

Knyazev’s attempt to reach and break into the upper room from the lower floors can also be interpreted as an option to overcome the national split, restore unity on the basis of sincerely accepted, officially consecrated ideas and attitudes. The result could be the complete eradication of “earth” (not only on the surface, but also in the depths) and “sky”: “We could... pave the entire globe! Dig a metro to Vladivostok! Build a staircase to the moon!”, the eradication of the traditional universe. Fortunately for life and unfortunately for Knyazev’s idea, his attempt is reminiscent of closing a faulty zipper: we connect at the top, and diverge at the bottom.

Shukshin sees what enormous efforts are being made to introduce a “new idea” into the mass consciousness, understands that some people manage to successfully overcome the influence, “not pay attention to it.” Popular common sense and the “gravity of the earth” are stronger. But there are many who have accepted the idea in one form or another as a guide to action. This is almost always associated with significant losses in human terms, impoverishment of personality, and the transformation of a person into a “figure”, a narrowly focused function. The black void living above established unidirectional movement. Fruitful popular energy is being pumped into a barren political furnace.

Returning to oneself, discovering in one’s own soul possibilities that have been forgotten or obscured by the circumstances of life - this is a simple task in essence, but the most difficult to implement. This, according to Shukshin, determines the possibility of organic development of national life in a changing world. The amazing ability of folk spirituality to manifest itself in unexpected forms and situations becomes the subject of artistic image in the story "Alyosha Beskonvoyny".

The power of time over a person leads, according to Shukshin, to vanity. Life closes behind you without a trace with every passing moment. The efforts spent trying to get through the events remain fruitless, the impressions melt away without a trace, the goals turn out to be ghosts every time. “Vanity destroys.” Time has no power over the hero of the story. But this is not at all a property of the world in which he was lucky enough to live, or the luck of fate. Kostya Valikov defended his right to peace of mind in the fight against persistent demands to live differently, like everyone else. And he did not find dull monotony. The hero’s desire and ability to spiritualize every moment of his existence makes his life rich and truly complete. Love to contradictory world, children, work closely related to nature, a reasonable understanding of what is proper and what is not, careful attitude to the spiritual side of existence - its foundations inner world.

In "Alyosha Beskonvoyny" there is no there is talk about religion and “spiritual” issues. Meanwhile, Alyosha’s nickname, in addition to expressing a somewhat vague meaning of irony, gentle banter at an unusual neighbor, and a shade of meaning, of course, revives people’s ideas about Aleksey, the man of God. Tales about him were among the most widespread in Rus'. It seems that in this case too, Shukshin’s hero most fully embodied the writer’s judgments about the deep popular attitude to spiritual and religious issues.

This attitude, in general, is very Russian, and more specifically speaking, peasant, masculine, alien to mysticism and extremes, common sense. Any excess, excess even in faith, and especially in its external manifestations, seems abnormal. Common sense suggests where the power of chastity and secrecy begins, the limits where what is addressed to everyone ends and what is directed inward, to oneself, exists.

With all its flights and aspirations, the “spirit” in Shukshin’s prose rests on the tangible dominance of the national-historical “firmament.” “So Alyosha thought, and while he was thinking so, his hands were busy,” - the Russian bathhouse, as a result, received the meaning of an important national sign in Shukshin’s picturesque story, and became a corner of spiritualized life.

On the other hand, this is somewhat unexpected, since the bathhouse, especially the “black” one, in folklore and mythological ideas was also a place of greater activity of evil spirits. In the story “Kalina Krasnaya” Lyuba Baikalova recalls this. Shukshin’s painting makes us remember Pushkin’s: “There is a Russian spirit there... it smells like Russia!” As well as the fact that the poet makes an emotional generalization by listing the most important representatives of the Russian fairy-tale-mythological “pantheon”, “pure” and “impure”. In Shukshin, spirituality is alive, but to some extent displaced from its traditional territory. At home, Alyosha’s high spiritual spirit is not understood. In response to his recollections of the poem composed by his daughter, his wife “didn’t say anything, she put her head back into the chest, from where there was a smell of mothballs.” “Alyosha the Unaccompanied” ends with a conversation about pigs, after which “Saturday is not over yet, but the bathhouse is already over.”

In the story, the author does not neglect the possibilities of associative expansion of the issue. The love story of the righteous sinner, Kostya Valikov "Ali crepe de Chine", opens up the possibility of the widest literary connections. Alyosha’s righteousness is emphasized by a clear religious-literary reminiscence: “Some bush will light up with a quiet fire from above... And suddenly unexpected joy will warm you up, it will become so good that you will stand and stand, and not notice that you are standing and smiling.” The motif of an angel appearing to the prophet in the form of a burning bush is found in both the Bible and the Koran.

Shukshin depicted the main national type of the mid-20th century, which all passed under the sign of his metaphor: “one foot on the shore, the other in the boat,” under the sign of continuous changes that were more intense than ever. A person who resists change and yet changes, who preserves and loses what is important, is the main character of the time, as well as of Shukshin’s work.

Folk character in its depiction ultimately expresses the tendency of life-building and creativity, rather than decay and degradation. Man is born for life, the Russian idea is realized in folk art, understood broadly as all manifestations of the spiritual principle of a person, from the construction of a temple to the preparation of a bathhouse.

Shukshin pronounces his words using a complex set of visual and expressive means. Brief Analysis Several of the writer's stories reveal the deep internal connections of his works. The factographer and the researcher, the observer and the ideologist are united in the artist. The writer synthesizes own point vision in the process of artistic thinking, and does not furnish it with more or less picturesque scenery. The nationality of his work has an organic nature. The author, forcing the reader to think and experience, overcomes the boundary between text and reality. The life of his heroes, through the emotions and reflections of the reader, merges with the ongoing existence of the people.

Keywords: Vasily Shukshin, criticism of the works of Vasily Shukshin, criticism of the works of Vasily Shukshin, analysis of the stories of Vasily Shukshin, download criticism, download analysis, download for free, Russian literature of the 20th century.

Creativity of Vasily Shukshin

How a villager started his creative path Shukshin, although later he moved on to posing problems of a universal human nature. He was born in Altai in the village of Srostki, changed a number of specialties, from 1955 to 1960 he studied at the directing department of VGIK and studied in the seminar of Mikhail Romm. Shukshin's classmate was Andrei Tarkovsky, who, as time has shown, was the most important Russian film director of the second half of the century. Young Vladimir Vysotsky also belonged to the same circle of acquaintances. Communication and classes at the seminar gave Shukshin a lot for personal and creative growth. He distinguished himself as a director, actor and novelist (since 1959).

As a writer, Shukshin occupies an intermediate place between representatives of rural and urban prose, since the heroes of his works are both rural residents and city dwellers (as a rule, in the first generation). The writer is interested not in the Soviet, but in the Russian national character, but in his comprehension of it he is more untendentious than the villagers and does not always evaluate it positively. The national receives a much more varied expression in Shukshin. (Pochvenniks have the same human type.)

The collections “Village Residents” (1963), “Over There” (1968), “Stoves and Benches” (1973) - in them Shukshin created a gallery of bright original characters Russian people, their contemporaries. Critics often and very rightly compare his stories with Chekhov’s “Motley Stories.” Indeed, the traditions of early Chekhov are very important for Shukshin and are manifested in the following qualities:

it is precisely the person both in early Chekhov and in Shukshin who is given a close-up;

both are characterized by the genre of the sketch and the laconicism inherent in this scene;

Peripeteia, that is, an unexpected reversal of events, plays a big role.

They are also related by humor. What brings Chekhov and Shukshin together is the variety of characters they recreate. In Shukshin, compared to Chekhov, dialogue is of greater importance, which is reflected in the influence of cinema. Shukshin's characters use modern vocabulary and expressions of modern colloquial language. in them to a greater extent, than the classic, the common origin manifests itself. Shukshin characterizes national types taking into account the transformation that they experienced under Soviet conditions. He also has new ones human types, which we do not meet in Chekhov's stories. The unique originality of the Shukshin style manifests itself. But, like Chekhov, Shukshin is a realist and strives to unconditionally follow the truth of life.

Shukshin comes into direct intertextual contact with Chekhov in the story “Step wider, maestro”: a type of modern Ionych, a degenerating intellectual. Main character the story is a 24-year-old university graduate, a young doctor Solodovnikov. He was sent to work in the village (a general pattern of those years). He is young, handsome, intelligent, ambitious, he has big life plans, and Solodovnikov believes that he will achieve a lot. He wants to return to Moscow, enroll in graduate school, and defend his doctoral dissertation by the age of forty. However, Shukshin emphasizes, these are only the moods of youth, because in the village Solodovnikov is bored, he does not see interesting cases in village practice. Therefore, every evening he joins the company of young people and every morning he is late for work and sleeps on the go until the middle of the day. He curses himself, wants to start a new life, master new knowledge - but evening comes, he is invited to a party, and out of lack of will he agrees. So everything beautiful words Solodovnikov's works are perceived as a tombstone to his youthful dreams.

In addition, Shukshin also conducts a creative dialogue with Gogol as the creator of the image of Khlestakov and gives a modern refraction of Khlestakovism in the story “Mille pardon, madam.” There is a definite decrease in type. The main character is a drunkard, a liar, the most worthless man in the village. At the same time, he really likes to artificially increase his worth. And since this is difficult in the village, he uses the arrival of the townspeople as an occasion to tell fables in which he looks like a hero and outstanding personality. (An important mission that he allegedly performed during the war behind German lines, an attempt on Hitler himself; at the same time, the narrator goes into a rage, there is sincerity in his voice, he seems to be experiencing his lies from the inside.) Looking at him, people doubt: maybe he’s not lying? Shukshin makes it clear that deep down Bronka has his own ideal, but the gap between the ideal and the real situation of a person is widening. This story also has strong comedic moments. Thus, Shukshin argues that what was inherited from the past is far from being overcome in Soviet society, as propaganda shows, and soviet man with ideal qualities created, rather, only on paper.

Shukshin is most interested in “a person looking for meaning and celebration in life.” Type looking for a hero striving for a more meaningful life, to expand the space of his inner world. Such a character seems strange to the people around him, tormented by stupidity, but the author always likes him. The hero of the story “In Profile and Full Face,” driver Ivan, wants to leave the village, citing the fact that he is bored with life, that his soul is aching, and that there are more opportunities in the city. The author, unlike another character, the old man, justifies Ivan and shows that the hero is looking for the meaning of life, which he has not yet found. The story “Microscope” is also indicative. The hero of the story, a collective farm carpenter, bought, after deceiving his wife, a completely unnecessary thing - a microscope. And completely opened up for him new world– the world of microorganisms. He has a dream to master the world of microbes and invent a new medicine. Shukshin is on the side of the hero, and not his wife, who forced him to sell the microscope, since the hero tried to become higher than himself.

A variation of the seeking hero type is the self-taught philosopher. Such a character appears in the series of stories “Strokes to the Portrait”. On the one hand, he attracts people with his concern for the public good, on the other hand, he repels and makes people laugh with his naive orthodoxy. The hero of the story, Knyazev, writes a treatise “On the State” and constantly thinks about perfection and order in the state. He likens the state to a pyramid divided into floors. If all ten people supporting the next floor worked normally, everything would be fine. And two out of ten work, they have to overwork, and everything goes awry. The hero proposes to lay “bells” on all floors of the state pyramid, which would inform the top about who is working and who is not. Knyazev does not understand that he is offering an improved model of a totalitarian system.

A type of didactor, a person who teaches others. (The USSR is a country of advice: “everyone gives advice to each other.”) It is doubly funny when a self-taught philosopher acts as a didactor and intellectual executor. The hero of the story “Cut” Gleb Kapustin uses the knowledge he has acquired to humiliate those who do not know. This type is alien to Shukshin. He concludes the story with the thought that the village listened to Gleb, but they did not love him.

Vasily Shukshin also develops his favorite, “trademark” type of weirdo. These are people who behave unusually, commit strange, absurd acts, but act as bearers of “moral talent.” A type of Shukshin crank is a truth-seeking hero, a person who is unable to come to terms with injustice, although he often suffers from it. A striking example is the story “The Resentment,” in which the prototype of the main character is the author himself. The most important thing for a writer is the moral side of a person. Although Shukshin does not avoid the disturbing phenomena of reality, his stories leave a bright feeling and force one to identify with those who are dear to the author.

Shukshin speaks from the position of a caustic satirist, characterizing the abuse of power, mockery of the people and the national. This led to the emergence satirical stories for the theater “And in the Morning They Woke Up” and the fairy tale “Until the Third Roosters”. The story for the theater (as the author himself defined the genre) “Until the Third Rooster” is Shukshin’s main work and the most significant. As the thaw winds down and totalitarian tendencies grow critical beginning in Shukshin’s work intensifies and reaches its maximum in the named fairy tale. In his early stories, Shukshin follows the principle of a realistically concrete depiction of characters, and in in this case refers to the tradition of grotesque realism. And if the elements of humor and gentle ridicule of the vices of contemporaries dominated in the stories, then in the story “Until the Third Roosters” irony, sarcasm and grotesque are dominant.

The narrative creatively develops the motifs of Russian folklore and partly literature. Subtitle: “The Tale of Ivan the Fool, how he went to distant lands to gain his wits.” All images in the work are revealed in two ways: firstly, in their traditional aspect, which is a means of moral characterization of the characters (if the hero is called the Serpent-Gorynych, we understand whether he is good or evil), secondly, fairy tale characters transferred to modern context and are endowed with the features of their contemporaries. Thus, Gorynych personifies Soviet power in Shukshin, characterized as totalitarian power; Baba Yaga, while retaining archetypal features, symbolizes the servants of power; devils personify those layers of society for which absolutely nothing is sacred, who trample on national values ​​and strengthen destructive tendencies in the life of society. The sage symbolizes the conformist part of the Soviet intelligentsia, which, creating the impression of its involvement in higher values, indirectly serves the government, or at least gets along well with it. Shukshin's Princess Nesmeyana personifies not all Soviet youth, but that part of it whose life is absolutely empty and meaningless. They are bored, they kill time and themselves. Finally, Ivan the Fool symbolizes the Russian people.

Gorynych also forces Ivan to entertain him with dancing. Ivan dances joylessly, and the Snake doesn’t like it: a Soviet person should feign great joy. “Why don’t you look like a falcon?” Only after morally crushing Ivan does the Serpent let him go. Humiliated and powerless, Ivan moves on, and almost everywhere he encounters evil, untruth, in particular in relation to himself, Ivan. In passing, a broad panorama of the life of Soviet society is given.

“Do you know what to do?” - "No". - “Well, sit down and think.” With his fabulous grotesque, Shukshin encourages the reader to think about what is happening in the country. Shukshin reveals anti-nationality state system and her immorality. It was a miracle that Shukshin’s story got into print, as the censorship took it for an ordinary fairy tale. Meanwhile, in the story “Until the Third Roosters” Shukshin practically went beyond the boundaries of official literature and became closer to unofficial, forbidden prose.