The play "At the Bottom" ends very spectacularly. The roommates—there is no longer Luka, no Ash, Anna has died, Kostylev has been killed—sing a song. This song plays throughout the play:

The sun rises and sets
And my prison is dark.
Days and nights are hourly
Guard my window.

Guard as you wish
I won't run away anyway.
I want to be free -
I cannot break the chain.

This time they do not have time to finish the song before the end of the second verse. The door breaks open, at the door is the Baron, who shouts: “Come here! In the wasteland ... there ... The actor ... strangled himself! And then Satin pronounces the last line of the play: "Eh ... ruined the song ... fool-cancer."

Who ruined the song? At first glance, everything is obvious: the song was ruined by the Baron. But it often happens that the first meaning pulls the second, and the second turns out to be deeper, more important and more reliable than the first.

What does "may or may not break the chain" mean? I may or may not start life over again, get out of this basement, out of this rooming house. Let us recall that the entire fourth act of the Actor—and not only the Actor, but also Nastya—says: “I will leave” (“He will leave,” says the Actor).

And next to the song, as another ideological pole of the play, a verse sounds. This poem by Beranger "Mad Men" is remembered by the Actor when he manages to abstain, not to drink. He says with surprise: “Here they are, two five-altyns. The street is chalk, but I don’t drink.”

Lord! If the truth is holy
The world does not know how to find the road -
Honor to the madman who will inspire
Mankind has a golden dream!

If tomorrow the earth is our way
Forgot to shine our sun -
Tomorrow would light up the whole world
The thought of some madman!

It is on these contrasts - light and darkness, prison and freedom - that the play "At the Bottom" exists.

One can find controversy about whether Luka is lying when he tells the Actor about a city where there is a hospital where drunkards are treated. The actor is filled with hope that he can recover and return to the stage, and Luka tells him: “I’ll name the city for you, but for now you refrain, don’t drink.” For a while, the Actor really manages not to drink. And why does Luke not name the cities? You can find, especially in popular textbooks, such a statement: "Luke lies to the Actor, and there were no hospitals." In fact, there were hospitals, and there was even a special magazine that the Sobriety Society published - there was a very broad campaign to combat alcoholism. I think that Luke does not name cities and hospitals, not because they do not exist, but because a person must free himself.

In the fourth act there is a very important moment when the Tatar prays, the Actor gets down from the bunk and says: "Prince, pray for me." To which the Tatar replies: "Pray yourself ..." What does this mean? Rudeness, inhumanity, selfishness, insensitivity of the roommates? No. One simply has to believe.

As Satin, who has already been fermented by the ideas of Luke, says, a person pays for everything himself - for faith, for unbelief. Man has to liberate himself - he does not need a guide. And then the Actor recalls this poem by Beranger. And here these two truths collide, which always collided with Gorky. The first is the truth of a real fact, the truth is obvious:

“What kind of truth do you need, Vaska? Bubnov asks Vaska Ash. “You know the truth about yourself, and everyone knows it about you.”

What does it mean? This means that Vaska is a thief, Nastya is a prostitute, Baron is a pimp, Satin is a card cheat. Here it is, the truth of this inhuman, undoubtedly real, but obviously not the only world.

Gorky says that there is another truth. There is the truth of human striving, the truth of the human ideal. And she is stronger, she is more important. In the fourth act, the Actor constantly feels that he needs to break the chain, he needs to leave. Another thing is that he can only leave the way he left, only by committing suicide.

There is an interesting intersection between the plot of the fourth act, “At the Bottom,” and the parable of the righteous land that Luke tells earlier: how one man asked the exiled engineer to show on the map where the righteous land is located. And he laid out his cards and said: "There is no righteous land anywhere." "How not?" And man lived and held on only because he believed in this righteous land, hoped for it. "You bastard, not a scientist!" - and in his teeth. And then he went and hanged himself.

And what is the truth? That this righteous land does not exist? Yes, it's not on the map. But does that mean it doesn't exist at all? It is very important.

This play, which was staged in December 1902 at the Art Theater, sounded like a revolutionary one. Because the meaning was this: as long as a person lives in the basement, he will not be able to free himself, he will not be able to be a person. We need to destroy this basement. But until the last performances (and the play is still being staged) it cannot be reduced to one idea, to one thought, it cannot be unambiguously interpreted once and for all.

Gorky was puzzled by how Ivan Moskvin played Luka. And Moskvin did not play a crook. Here we are faced with a situation very characteristic of Gorky. Gorky did not like his plays very much, he did not consider himself a significant playwright, but he tried to comment on and interpret his own plays. In particular, after returning to the USSR, he interpreted the play "At the Bottom" as a play directed against comforting lies. But everything that Gorky wanted to say, he said with the play itself. Its interpretation is only one of the possible ones. How convincing it is, each time the theater, the reader, the actors and the historian of literature decide in their own way.

Decryption

In 1904, Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky wrote a program article called "Balmont-lyric". It was devoted to the work of Konstantin Balmont, but there Annensky, as is often the case with poets, also determined the main theme of his own work. " I in the midst of nature, mystically close to him, and someone painfully and aimlessly linked to his existence. I want to draw attention to the word "linked", because this theme - meaningless, aimless, by someone (whether by God, or not by God, it is not clear by whom) the linked existence of man and nature - indeed, in many of Annensky's poems, it arises, develops and they deal with it differently. And the poem "Black Spring" was written just on this topic. It describes the funeral of a person. Moreover, they are described with such a Gogo-Levish under-illumination.

Under the rumble of copper - grave
There was a transfer
And, terribly bullied, waxy
Looked from the coffin nose.

Here it is, Gogol's illumination - a nose that looks like a person. And here one of the readers may recall the legend (and for Annensky, of course, this was important) that Gogol was buried alive. And then this theme of a living nose, a revived nose on a dead body, continues.

Breath, or something, he wanted
There, in an empty chest? ..
The last snow was dark white
And the loose path is hard ...

A nose that wants to breathe. The nose that personifies becomes a living existence. “The last snow was dark white, and the loose path is hard” - this, apparently, is the last path to the cemetery, the coffin that is being taken there.

And then this image: “the last snow was dark white” - Annensky begins to play out the theme of not only the death of a person, but also the dying winter. Each of us remembers when the snow turns black, becomes loose, spongy. Annensky is remarkably able to work with realities, work with objects. Snow that becomes mourning. And then a stanza, which is already connected with the death of winter and with the death of a person.

... And only frost, cloudy,
It poured on smoldering
Yes stupidly black spring
I looked into the jelly of the eye ...

This stanza is very expressive and wonderful. When it is said about "hoarfrost that pours on smoldering", the reader asks the question "Whose smoldering?". In fact, it is clear that the decay of both the human body (the coffin, apparently, is open, and frost is dripping on it), and nature, which is also covered with this frost, is disgusting. And thus, the dead man and the dying winter seem to be combined into one very gloomy picture, as is often the case with Annensky.

I want to draw attention to one of the most terrible, in my opinion, images in Russian poetry - jelly eye. Here, on the one hand, the open eyes of a dead man are described. The eyes are relaxed, relaxed, lethargic, some look senselessly at the death of nature. On the other hand, nature responds to this view, the black spring responds. It is mourning: these are black branches and black snow. And she (also a terrible and very expressive word) stupidly looks into this jelly eye. There are two stupid, meaningless views of nature and man on each other. And then this topic continues.

... From shabby roofs, from brown pits,
From green faces.
And there, across the dead fields,
From the swollen wings of birds...

"The roofs are shabby." This is also a very accurate image. Snow undermined, removed paint from them. “...From the brown pits” – these spring pits were exposed, and immediately the theme of the grave arises here: graves that are scattered in nature. And then a wonderful image "with green faces ...". The poem is called “Black Spring”, and we are waiting for the word “green”, because spring is when everything is green. It is not the lindens that turn green here—one could say, for example, from “green lindens”—here the faces turn green, the haggard faces, the tired faces of the people who take part in these funerals. And then the direct: "And there, across the dead fields." We are used to it: spring is, on the contrary, life is born. Annensky emphasizes something else - dead fields.

"From the swollen wings of birds ..." Also a very terrible epithet swollen because the body of the deceased is swollen. We are used to: in poetry, birds symbolize the beginning: rooks, starlings, flying birds. Here these birds obviously do not fly - they sit on these dead fields, not being able to take off, because they are swollen from the death of winter, from the moisture that overflows them. And the poem ends not with a metaphor, not with a symbol, as we would seem to have the right to expect from Annensky, it ends with a very direct allegory, a direct appeal.

O people! Heavy life trail
Along the rutted paths,
But there is nothing sadder
Like the meeting of two deaths.

This is the meeting of the death of man and the death of winter. Here I would like to draw attention to two more things. First: Annensky very skillfully works with the traditional, centuries-old cultural image of the end of winter and the awakening of spring. This is sometimes called the word "topos". How is it arranged? Winter is an old woman, winter is leaving, and everyone rejoices that a young spring is coming. I will remind you of two texts - one poetic, one pictorial. Poetic is the text that everyone at school probably learned, Fedor Tyutchev:

Winter is getting angry
Her time has passed
Spring is knocking on the window
And drives from the yard.

Spring and grief is not enough:
Washed up in the snow
And only became blush
Against the enemy.

And the second is a painting by Sandro Botticelli "Spring". None of the images on it embodies spring separately, but all of them together - young, blooming, beautiful girls in transparent clothes, their fresh bodies shine through clothes: everything wakes up, everything comes to life. Annensky works very expressively, but with him everything is exactly the opposite. He emphasizes not so much the birth of spring as the death of winter, because it is important for him to show this senseless, aimlessly cobbled together life of man and nature.

And the second thing I want to pay attention to is the signature: "March 29, 1906, Totma." Totma is a place not far from Vologda, the very north, where spring really comes very slowly, sadly, not joyfully. This is not an Italian, not a southern, not a Kyiv spring. But the date of March 29, 1906, seems to me even more interesting, because the Jewish Passover fell on March 29, 1906. And that makes the whole point. Easter in the Russian mind is the Christian Easter, its meaning is dying for the sake of resurrection. With Annensky, everything is exactly the opposite: for him, dying does not end with resurrection. Man dies, spring dies, but there is no divine intervention.

To demonstrate that this association is not accidental, I want to read Annensky's poem called "Palm Week" (that is, one of the weeks of Great Lent before Easter), in which the same theme and similar images appear.

In the yellow dusk of dead April,
Saying goodbye to the starry desert,
Palm week sailed away
On the last, on the dead snow floe;

Sailed away in fragrant smoke,
In the fading of funeral bells,
From icons with deep eyes
And from the Lazarus, forgotten in the black pit.

"In the yellow dusk of dead April", "on the last, on the dead snow floe." This is the dying winter. "...From the Lazarus, forgotten in the black pit" - here it is, the key image. If in the Gospel, as we remember, one of the main events, one of the main miracles of Christ is the resurrection of the dead, already beginning to decompose, swollen, if you like, Lazarus, then at Annensky Lazarus dies forever. He does not resurrect, and he is forgotten in the black pit.

Decryption

We will talk about one of the most famous poems by Sergei Yesenin "Letter to Mother", written in 1924. At first glance, this poem leaves a feeling of something absolutely integral, monolithic. And it has always produced an absolutely complete impression, ever since Yesenin began to read it in different living rooms and in different editions: pity, sympathy, tears. Let's read the memoirs of the publishing worker Ivan Evdokimov:

“I remember how a small cold shock went down my spine when I heard: “They write to me that you, hiding anxiety, / Saddened very much about me. / That you often go to the road / In an old-fashioned shabby hutch.
I glanced askance at him. At the window, the extremely melancholy and melancholy figure of the poet darkened. Yesenin shook his head pitifully: “... It was as if someone was in a tavern fight / I put a Finnish knife under my heart,” Yesenin’s voice stopped. It was evident that he went on with difficulty, grunted, stammered once again on the lines “/ In spring our white garden.”
Further, my impressions disappear, because my throat was clamped tightly and cruelly. Hiding and hiding, I wept in the depths of a huge ridiculous chair on which I sat in the darkening wall between the windows.

So more than once they reacted to Yesenin's poem. This is how they react to this day. However, this poem is by no means complete. It consists of scraps, quotations taken from completely different and incompatible traditions.

Let's read this poem and see what traditions Yesenin takes, what he touches on, what he uses.

Are you still alive, my old lady?
I'm alive too. Hello you, hello!
Let it flow over your hut
That evening unspeakable light.

"Unspeakable Light" is a quote from Blok. And the mystical Block:

And full of cherished trembling
Long awaited years
We will rush off-road
Into the unspeakable world.

Alexander Blok.“We live in an old cell…”

This quote is completely out of place in Yesenin's poem. For Blok, this phrase does not mean at all what it should mean for Yesenin. Farther:

They write to me that you, concealing anxiety,
She was very sad about me,
What do you often go to the road
In an old-fashioned ramshackle.

This is Nekrasov with his characteristic iconic rhyme “alarm” - “road”:

What are you greedily looking at the road
Away from cheerful girlfriends?
To know, the heart beat alarm -
Your whole face lit up all of a sudden.

Nikolay Nekrasov."Troika"

And you in the evening blue darkness
We often see the same thing:
Like someone is in a tavern fight for me
He put a Finnish knife under the heart.

The Finnish knife is a cruel urban romance, from a completely different opera.

Nothing, dear! Take it easy.
It's just painful bullshit.
I'm not such a bitter drunkard,
To die without seeing you.

The situation of cruel romance is aggravated, associations with romance are becoming stronger. But a sharp break:

I'm still just as gentle
And I only dream about
So that rather from rebellious longing
Return to our low house.

Gentle-rebellious. Lermontov, classical romance, Pleshcheev Alexey Pleshcheev(1825-1893) - writer, poet and author of romances, translator, critic., romance-ty-che-sky tradition. Completely different associations. And they intensify in the next stanza.

I'll be back when the branches spread
In spring, our white garden.

A typical romantic romance formula "don't wake me up". Further, “don’t worry” is another romance quotation formula. Further "early morning" - these are romantic associations. Now a cruel romance, now a salon romance and a romantic tradition, now a bitter Nekrasov, now a Blok quote. And all this is under the sign of Pushkin. About how Pushkin pops up in this poem, Dovlatov writes well, recalling in the "Reserve" about his work as an ex-chicken-breeder in Pushkinsky Gory:

“I’m moving into Arina Rodionovna’s room…“ The only truly close person turned out to be the serf nanny ... “Everything is as it should be ...“ ... She was at the same time condescending and grumbling, ingenuously religious and extremely businesslike ... “Bas-relief by Seryakov ...“ Proposal-ha-whether free - refused ... "
And finally:
- The poet now and then turned to the nanny in verse. Everyone knows such, for example, sincere lines ...
Then I forgot myself on se-kun-du and shuddered when I heard my own voice:
“Are you still alive, my old lady? / I'm alive too. Hello you, hello! / Let it flow over your bush-coy ... "
I froze. Now someone will shout; "Crazy and ignorant! This is Yesenin, ‚Letter to mother‘!“
I went on declaiming, frantically saying: “Yes, comrades, you are absolutely right. Of course, this is Yesenin. And really-but - "Letter to mother". But how close, mind you, is the intonation of Pushkin to the lyrics of Sergei Yesenin! How organically it is realized in Yesenin's poetics…” And so on.
I continued to recite. Somewhere at the end, a Finnish knife shone menacingly ... “Tra-ta-tita-tam in a tavern fight, tra-ta-tam, a Finnish knife under the heart ...” A centimeter from this menacingly gleaming blade, I managed to slow down . In the now-stu-pi-voice silence, I waited for the storm. Everyone was silent. The faces were excited and stern. Only one elderly tourist said meaningfully:
Yes, there were people...

Here is this Pushkin atmosphere, Pushkin's common big association. This is another additional piece taken by Yesenin for the emotional structure of this poem.

So, flaps, different traditions. Got it everywhere. And yet ... What unites the two quotes that I gave, Evdokimov and Dovlatov? The audience listens to all this with bated breath. Emotions response absolutely true. This verse-ho-your-re-ing really works. For what? What's the secret? I think there are three secrets.

Firstly, the fact is that Yesenin may be the first poet who so closely united his personal experience and poetry. What yesterday was a scandalous incident, today became the subject of a poem. Yesenin did not hide the bottom of his life. She was known to everyone and was known not so much through rumors as through lines. Yesenin shared with the public what was happening to him - of course, mythologizing, embellishing, putting light and shadows as he needed. But shared. He hid almost nothing. And at the same time, he turned to listeners and readers, to everyone, as to the only trusted friend who would understand: “You will understand me, but others will not. I will tell you this pain. And others - let them. Here is such an intonation - it could not help but influence the public and still influences.

And everyone, including Evdokimov in those memoirs, everyone feels that tomorrow something could happen to Yesenin. That this Finnish knife is realizable tomorrow in life. That they will hurt him or something irreparable will happen. And we now know that this irreparable happened. From this incredible, never-before-given connection between personal experience and verse, our response in many ways comes. It's almost inevitable. This is the first.

The second is, of course, Yesenin's poetics, which seems eclectic to the researcher, but even for him it still turns out to be one and whole. For what? Through keywords. My version is that such keywords are "shushun" and "very much". This incomprehensible dialect shushun (rarely anyone can imagine what it is - and it’s not necessary) - he somehow organizes everything, connects everything. And, connecting with the word "very much", also colloquial and somehow awkward, but at the same time sincere, he gives this amazing alliteration to "sh" and "g".

Let's read and listen: “Are you still alive, my old lady? / I'm alive too. Hello you, hello! / Let it flow over your hut / That evening unspeakable light. / They write to me that you, concealing your anxiety, / Have become very sad about me, / That you often go on the road / In an old-fashioned ramshackle. Here it is, this smoothness, this songlikeness that was always given to Yesenin, and this is the “sh”, which diverges in waves throughout the poem. These awkward and strange words that make everything real.

And third. Maybe the most important thing. There is a real, sincere note in this poem. A real big theme, the theme of the last elusive hope. Last chance, last meaning to cling to. The fact is that all of Yesenin's later work is characterized by the escape of meanings. He had nothing to live with, nothing to write about. Only about myself and eternal self-pity. A good, big Russian theme, but it is not enough for poetry - it was not enough for him either. And every time he seems to be looking for support, looking for something to cling to. And here is the old theme of the mother.

Whether he loved his mother or not, this can never be understood. He tried to love, but rather hated, judging by the statements of memoirists and even his own poems sometimes: "And the mother is like a witch from the Kyiv mountain." But here is an attempt to cling to another meaning through the connection of the mother with the homeland. And here is the last, decisive meaning, which is slipping away before our eyes.

I'll be back when the branches spread
In spring, our white garden.
Only you me already at dawn
Don't wake up like eight years ago.

Don't wake up what you dreamed
Don't worry about what didn't come true -
Too early loss and fatigue
I have experienced in my life.

Hope comes and goes. Meaning comes and goes. Whether he believes in his tenderness for his mother, returning to a low house, or not. It is on these fluctuations in meaning, on this last hope, that our perception of poems rests. And our sympathy for this poem, this poet, which cannot be canceled.

Decryption

In the 1923 essay "Kyiv-City" Bulgakov wrote:

“When heavenly thunder (after all, there is a limit to heavenly patience) kills every single modern writer and a new real Leo Tolstoy appears in 50 years, an amazing book will be created about the great battles in Kyiv.”

Actually, Bulgakov wrote a great book about the battles in Kyiv - this book is called The White Guard. And among those writers from whom he counts his tradition and whom he sees as his predecessors, Leo Tolstoy is most noticeable.

As previous "White Guard" works, one can name "War and Peace", as well as "The Captain's Daughter". All three of these works are called historical novels. But this is not just, and maybe not at all historical novels, these are family chronicles. At the center of each of them is the family. It is the house and family that Pugachev destroys in The Captain's Daughter, where Grinev recently dined with Ivan Ignatievich, at the Mironovs he meets Pugachev. It is Napoleon who destroys the house and family, and the French rule in Moscow, and Prince Andrei will say to Pierre: “The French ruined my house, killed my father, they are going to ruin Moscow.” The same thing happens in the "White Guard". Where friends of the Turbins gather at home, everything will be destroyed there. As will be said at the beginning of the novel, they, the young Turbins, will have to suffer and suffer after the death of their mother.

And, of course, it is no coincidence that a sign of this collapsing life is bookcases, where the presence of Natasha Rostova and the captain's daughter is emphasized. And the way Petliura is presented in The White Guard is very reminiscent of Napoleon in War and Peace. The number 666 is the number of the cell in which Petliura was sitting, it is the number of the beast, and Pierre Bezukhov in his calculations (not very accurate, by the way), adjusts the digital values ​​of the letters of the words “Emperor Napoleon” and “Russian Bezukhov” to the number 666. Hence the theme of the beast of the apocalypse.

There are many small echoes of Tolstoy's book and Bulgakov's novel. Nai-Tours in The White Guard burrs like Denisov in War and Peace. But this is not enough. Like Denisov, he violates the charter in order to get supplies for his soldiers. Denisov beats off a convoy with provisions intended for another Russian detachment - he becomes a criminal and receives punishment. Nai-Tours violates the charter in order to get felt boots for his soldiers: he takes out a pistol and forces the quartermaster general to give out felt boots. Portrait of Captain Tushin from "War and Peace": "a small man, with weak, awkward movements." Malyshev from the "White Guard": "The captain was small, with a long pointed nose, in an overcoat with a large collar." Both of them cannot tear themselves away from the pipe, which they are constantly smoking. Both of them end up on the battery alone - they are forgotten.

Here is Prince Andrei in War and Peace:

“The mere thought that he was afraid lifted him up: ‘I can’t be afraid,’” he thought.<…>“Here it is,” thought Prince Andrei, grabbing the flagpole.

And here is Nikolka, the youngest of the Turbins:

“Nikolka was completely stupefied, but at the same moment he coped with himself and, thinking with lightning speed:“ This is the moment when you can be a hero, ”he shouted in his piercing voice:“ Do not dare to get up! Listen to the command!“”

But Nikolka, of course, has more in common with Nikolai Rostov than with Prince Andrei. Rostov, hearing Natasha's singing, thinks: "All this, and misfortune, and money, and Dolokhov, and anger, and honor - all this is nonsense ... but here it is - real." And here are Nikolka Turbin's thoughts: "Yes, perhaps, everything is nonsense in the world, except for such a voice as Shervinsky's," this is Nikolka listening to Shervinsky, the Turbins' guest, sing. I'm not talking about such a passing, but also curious detail, like the fact that both of them are proclaiming a toast to the emperor's health (Nikolka Turbin does this obviously belatedly).

The similarity between Nikolka and Petya Rostov is obvious: both of them are younger brothers; naturalness, ardor, unreasonable courage, which ruins Petya Rostov; a crush in which both are involved.

In the image of the younger Turbine, there are features of quite a few characters in War and Peace. But something else is much more important. Bulgakov, following Tolstoy, does not attach importance to the role of a historical personality. First, Tolstoy's phrase:

"In historical events, the so-called great men are the labels that give the name to the event, which, like the labels, have the least connection with the event itself."

And now Bulgakov. Not to mention the insignificant hetman Skoropadsky, here is what is said about Petliura:

“Yes, there was none. Did not have. So, nonsense, legend, mirage.<…>Nonsense all this. It's not him, it's different. Not the other - the third.

Or such, for example, also an eloquent roll call. In War and Peace, at least three characters - Napoleon, Prince Andrei and Pierre - compare the battle to a chess game. And in The White Guard, Bulgakov will speak of the Bolsheviks as a third force that appeared on the chessboard.

Let us recall the scene in the Alexander Gymnasium: Alexey Turbin mentally turns to Alexander I, depicted in the picture hanging in the gymnasium, for help. And Myshlaevsky proposes to burn down the gymnasium, as in the time of Alexander Moscow was burned down so that no one would get it. But the difference is that Tolstoy's burned Moscow is a prologue to victory. And Turbines are doomed to defeat - they suffer and die.

Another quote, and quite frank. I think Bulgakov had a lot of fun when he wrote this. Actually, the war in Ukraine is preceded by “some clumsy peasant anger”:

“[Anger] ran through the blizzard and cold in holey bast shoes, with hay in his uncovered, matted head, and howled. In his hands he carried a great club, without which no undertaking in Russia can do.

It is clear that this is the "club of the people's war", which Tolstoy sang in "War and Peace" and which Bulgakov is not inclined to sing. But Bulgakov writes about this not with disgust, but as about inevitability: there could not be this peasant anger. Although Bulgakov does not have any idealization of the peasants, it is no coincidence that Myshlaevsky in the novel speaks sarcastically about the local “dostoevsky god-bearing peasants.” There is no admiration for the people's truth, no Tolstoy Karataev in the White Guard and there cannot be.

Even more interesting are the artistic overlaps, when the key compositional moments of the two books are connected with the general vision of the writers' world. The episode from War and Peace is Pierre's dream. Pierre is in captivity, and he dreams of an old man, a geography teacher. He shows him a ball that looks like a globe but is made of drops. Some drops spill and capture others, then they themselves break and spill. The old teacher says: "This is life." Then Pierre, reflecting on the death of Karataev, says: "Here, Karataev spilled and disappeared." The second dream that same night is dreamed by Petya Rostov, a musical dream. Petya sleeps in a partisan detachment, a Cossack sharpens his saber, and all the sounds - the sound of a sharpened saber, the neighing of horses - are mixed up, and it seems to Petya that he hears a fugue. He hears the harmonious harmony of voices, and it seems to him that he can manage. This is such an image of harmony, like the sphere that Pierre sees.

And at the end of the novel The White Guard, another Petya, Petya Shcheglov, sees in a dream a ball spraying spray. And this is also the hope that history does not end with blood and death, does not end with the triumph of the star of Mars. And the last lines of the "White Guard" - that we do not look at the sky and do not see the stars. Why don't we put aside our earthly affairs and look at the stars? Maybe then we will see the meaning of what is happening in the world.

So, how important is the Tolstoyan tradition for Bulgakov? In a letter to the government, which he sent at the end of March 1930, Bulgakov wrote that in the "White Guard" he strove to depict an intelligentsia-noble family, by the will of fate thrown during the years of the Civil War into the camp of the White Guard, in the tradition of "War and peace." Such an image is quite natural for a writer who is closely connected with the intelligentsia. For Bulgakov, Tolstoy was an indisputable, absolutely authoritative writer all his life, whom Bulgakov considered to follow as the greatest honor and dignity.

Decryption

The stories “Spravka” and “My first fee”, the plot and a significant part of the text of which are similar, were written between 1922 and 1928, rejected by the Soviet press in 1933 and printed in the 60s (“Spravka” in 1966 in the USSR, and "My first fee" - in 1963 abroad and in 1967 in the USSR). True, in a sense, "Spravka" was published during the author's lifetime - in the USSR, but also, as it were, abroad - in the journal International Literature, a showcase of Soviet supposedly free literature in the West (in English, "A Reply to an Inquiry") .

Babel was not yet a repressed author In 1939, Babel was arrested on charges of "anti-Soviet conspiratorial terrorist activities" and a spy, in 1940 he was shot., so one of the questions is: what is forbidden in this story? And the second question, which of the two options - "Reference" or "My first fee" - is final?

I'll start with the second question. It has not yet been unambiguously resolved by science, the author's will is unknown. Unless it is the author's will to consider Babel's readiness to publish this story in 1937 - although in a foreign language, but during his lifetime it was the version of "Help" that was published. And my answer is, of course, the final option is "Help". It is half as long, without repetitions about “my sister is a bitch, my sister is a badge” She stretched out her bare hands and parted the sashes of the window. Cooling stones whistled outside. The smell of water and dust was on the pavement ... Vera's head staggered.
- So - a badge ... Our sister is a bitch ...
I drooped.
Your sister is a bitch...
Vera turned to me. The shirt lay in a slant on her body.
Isaac Babel. "My first fee" blurring the final narrative effect. In the "First Fee" this happens several times, and in the "Help" - one shock time at the end “She pushed the money away.
“Do you want to spit, sister?”
Isaac Babel. "Reference". And without a whole initial voyeuristic piece about sex behind the wall, which the narrator is jealous of. This piece is also in another story, published in 1934, "Dante Street". So it would just be a repeat. Babel loved brevity, a point set in time, as he famously formulated in the story "Guy de Maupassant."

So, Help. The name is underlined anti-literary, reduced business. Babel said that the story should be accurate, like a military report or a bank check. The story is stylized as a response - either written or oral, but obviously fictional - given by the author to some literary authority or readership, comrades. This is the answer to the question of how the storyteller became a writer.

The reason, he says, was love. From the very first lines, we are struck by numerous paradoxes. Love, but to whom? To a middle-aged and ugly prostitute, similar to the image of the Virgin on the bow of a fishing boat. A woman who is completely unromantic, extremely businesslike and successful in this, besides a very family warehouse. Thus, an entire tradition of Russian and European literature is immediately activated and provocatively undermined, what can be called the “topos of prostitution”. Here and "Nevsky Prospekt" by Gogol, and "Notes from the Underground" by Dostoevsky, and "What is to be done?" Chernyshevsky, and Tolstoy's "Resurrection", and Chekhov's "Seizure", and many other texts of Russian classics. This archplot consists in the fact that an educated young hero encounters a prostitute and dreams of saving her, helping to buy herself out of a brothel. He is ready to marry her, give her an honest occupation, education, his name. He sees in her not a prostitute, but a sister, sometimes a sister in Christ, Mary Magdalene.

The conflict is resolved in different ways, but within some common framework. Gogol's Piskarev is rejected by a prostitute who does not want to change her lifestyle and dies from drugs. The young doctor Kirsanov from the novel What Is to Be Done? convinces Nastya to quit her profession, helps financially, heals her, excommunicates her from wine (a characteristic moment) and only then begins to live with her as with a mistress. But then she dies, giving way to the main character of the novel, Vera Pavlovna. Dostoevsky's hero pretends to be a hero a la Kirsanov, but in reality he only humiliates the prostitute Lisa, taking out his grievances on her. She eventually leaves him, turning out to be the type of a strong Russian woman. Rejects money - Russian prostitutes do not take money.

Babel's Faith does not need any salvation. She doesn’t particularly need another client, a 20-year-old storyteller, whom she drags with her around the city, doing various things, and then leaves one in the room, collecting on the road and seeing off an old woman friend who is going to her son in Armavir. Everything is very family friendly. The hero is waiting for her in the room - everything is extremely miserable and anti-romantic there. Vera finally arrives and prepares for sex like a doctor for an operation. Pronounces, yawning, the prosaic "Now let's do it." He asks the young hero about his life - whereas they usually ask a prostitute, wondering how she came to such a life.

The hero is clearly depressed by this and, as the reader guesses, does not feel at all in shape for the expected sexual initiation (“My first fee”, “My first goose” - Babel willingly takes such initiatory themes and gives such “first” titles). Answering Vera’s questions, the hero begins to compose a story about his life as a boy-prostitute for men, “a boy among Armenians”, flavoring it with details from the books he read: “Church warden - this was stolen from some writer, an invention of a lazy heart” . And on the go he squeezes the effects if it seems to him that the listener is losing interest in the story. He himself, together with Vera (the name, of course, is not accidental), begins to believe in his fiction, which he admits to the reader: “Self-pity tore my heart.”

He completely conquers Vera with his writing art, she firmly believes in the truth of his story, recognizes him as her sister (remember the clichéd “sister in Christ”), with whom in the end she does not want to “spit”.

He receives full confirmation of his successful initiation as a writer, since he presents his credentials to the bearer of precisely that profession and precisely that terrible reality, knowledge and participation in which he claims, and has complete success. As often happens with Babel, for example in Guy de Maupassant, verbal success leads to sexual success. There is an equal exchange between representatives of the two arts - a typical Babel barter. He is the art of the word to her, she is the art of love to him.

The whole story is a hymn to verbal art, its ability to master life in its most challenging incarnation. The hero transforms a lethargic 30-year-old woman with sunken breasts into a passionate lover, charges himself with love ardor, and, in addition, creatively endows his relationship with her with all conceivable role-playing incarnations. The pair of client-prostitute also takes on the appearance of a pair of equal lovers, a pair of masters of art (different arts), a pair of sisters (that is, lesbians), two brothers (in a metaphorical paragraph about a village carpenter who cuts a hut "for his fellow carpenter" ) - like same-sex lovers; finally, the Oedipal pair of son-mother, and the mother performs the sexual initiation of the hero.

The carpenter's felling of a typical Russian hut for the newlyweds (remember Sappho's “Above the rafters, carpenters!” and the entire corresponding wedding topos) may allude to the construction by Babel of his own coveted own house in Russian literature. After all, from the very beginning, already in the essay "Odessa" in 1915, he dreamed of surpassing the Russian classics - Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Gorky. What he does, having entered the territory of the topos of prostitution and turned it inside out. His prostitute does not need salvation, but needs literary conquest, like a naive reader. And the story ends with their joyful joint tea drinking on the Maidan. By the way, tea instead of wine is a constant recipe for traditional rescuers of prostitutes in Russian literature. But here they drink tea, purple as a brick, and hot as spilled blood, cooler than wine. Vera, as usual, does not take money from him, but not out of pride, but out of love and brotherhood. He puts two gold coins in his pocket as his first fee. These are the last words of the Help and the title of the first version of the story.

What is so unprintable by early 1930s Soviet standards in this story? First of all, of course, sex, and even sex with a prostitute, besides without any salvation, redemption, moral and political justification. This is a completely superman, Nietzschean, artistic arrogance towards a working woman from the bottom, who naively believes in the impudent inventions of a hero who, right in front of her eyes, is cheating, stealing from her supposedly hard life. But the main thing, of course, is the sophisticated equating of the two arts - writing and prostitution, which sounds like terrible blasphemy against the backdrop of the official ideology, according to which writers are engineers of human souls, they are called upon to serve the people and the high ideals of communism and at the same time present what is written as the truth. Isn't it the same truth as the truth in quotation marks, invented by the Babel narrator?

By the way, about the bitter truth of this narrator's life, about his difficult childhood. The great inventor and propagandist of a difficult childhood in Russian literature was, of course, Gorky, an older comrade, patron, foster literary father of Babel. But in Spravka, Babel upset Gorky himself by inventing and selling to the listener a childhood that could not be harder to imagine.

Gorky was also a persistent preacher of a beautiful invention - let us remember at least. In "Help" the hero perfectly and at the same time mockingly combines fiction with bitter truths. His hero seduces Vera not with uplifting deceit, but with humiliating deception, humiliating him. But this is how he finds his way to her heart.

Gorky also wrote a lot about prostitutes, especially the story “Get sick” is especially similar to Spravka, where there is a prostitute, and literary services, and inventions. By the way, the theme of conquering a prostitute by literary methods was already outlined by Dostoevsky in "About Wet Snow". There the hero tries to turn the prostitute's soul upside down with his arguments (false, of course), parodying Chernyshevsky's rescue topos. And when it seems to him that this is not enough, then with living pictures. But Dostoevsky - our sick conscience - condemns his writer. And Babel glorifies his.

How solid is the assumption that Spravka is anti-Gorky? After all, Gorky's name is not mentioned in the story. And yet, isn't it? “We lived in Aleshki, Kherson province” - these are the first words of the story that the hero braids to a gullible prostitute The real name of Maxim Gorky is Alexey Maksimovich Peshkov, Alyosha Peshkov is also the name of the main character of his autobiographical story "Childhood".. The Help was published in English in 1937, after Gorky's death.

Decryption

In the autumn of 1931, theatrical and cultural Moscow lived in anticipation of an important event. The Moscow Art Theater, the famous Moscow Art Theater, was supposed to stage a play by a Soviet playwright. The playwright was Alexander Afinogenov, and the play was called Fear. The performance was a fantastic success. The curtain was given 19 times, the author, director, troupe were called to the stage. Then Afinogenov was invited to the box of the party leadership, where they shook hands with him, shared their impressions of the play. The play was accepted for production by about 300 theaters across the country. And then the playwrights were paid royalties for each act - and Afinogenov earned 171 thousand rubles the next year. And the average salary was about 100-200 rubles. What was so special about this play, why did it enjoy such a fantastic success?

The play "Fear" tells about a physiologist, Professor Ivan Borodin, who works at the Institute of Physiological Stimuli and conducts experiments on animals. In this figure, contemporaries could easily recognize Academician Pavlov. But Professor Borodin extrapolates his conclusions regarding the behavior of animals to the behavior of people. And when, after a long struggle within the institute and some behind-the-scenes intrigues, Borodin decides to make a public report, he gathers an audience, rises to the pulpit and then delivers the following speech:

“... Eighty percent of all surveyed live under the eternal fear of shouting or losing social support. The milkmaid is afraid of the confiscation of a cow, the peasant is afraid of forced collectivization, the Soviet worker is afraid of continuous purges, the party worker is afraid of accusations of deviation, the scientific worker is afraid of accusations of idealism, and the worker of technology is accusations of sabotage. We live in an age of great fear. Fear makes talented intellectuals renounce their mothers, forge social origins, climb into high positions. Yes, yes, in a high place the danger of exposure is not so terrible. Fear follows a person. A person becomes distrustful, withdrawn, unscrupulous, slovenly and unprincipled...
The rabbit, which sees the boa constrictor, is unable to move, its muscles are numb, it obediently waits for the boa rings to squeeze and crush it. We are all rabbits! Is it possible to work creatively after that? Of course no!
<…>
Destroy fear, destroy everything that gives rise to fear, and you will see what a rich creative life the country will flourish!”

These are not the words that you expect to see in a Soviet play, and even more so you do not expect to find out that they aroused delight among the entire party leadership and the population of the country. How did Afinogenov decide to write them? If you look at the memoirs of contemporaries, it turns out that many of these remarks were memorized and written down in diaries, that this play was an intellectual shock for them, that they did not expect to hear such harsh words in the Soviet theater.

A few months before the appearance of the play, the country was shaken by the first show trials. These were the process of the Industrial Party and the Shakhty process Shakhty case and the case of the Industrial Party(1928 and 1930) - Lawsuits on charges of wrecking and sabotage in industry. In total, more than two thousand people were arrested on them.. Representatives of the old intelligentsia were accused of sabotage against the Soviet regime. Many of them were sentenced to death, and then the execution was replaced by imprisonment. The idea that the old intellectuals could not fit into the new Soviet life, but only harmed, was extremely popular, and the play responded to these events.

In addition, Afinogenov belonged to a literary group called RAPP, the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers. Then it was the most hated literary group, which is believed to have hounded Mayakovsky and did not give life to many writers and poets. Afinogenov was the leader of the drama section of this organization and wrote in his theoretical works that Soviet literature should use such an extraordinary artistic method that would use the achievements of dialectical materialism.

Now, when people talk about Soviet dialectical materialism, they remember empty, meaningless phrases. Everyone is used to the fact that this is some kind of emasculated method that does not carry any content. This was not the case in the 1930s. Then there was a strong belief in the teachings of Marx, that this teaching could scientifically explain the phenomenon of everyday social life - and build both literary practice and state practice in such a way that a just society could be built.

Afinogenov tried to read Marx and other theorists of dialectical thought and apply this method to the theatre. To more or less clarify what he might mean, I will quote the work of Anatoly Lunacharsky, who at that time was one of the most influential theorists. The article is titled "Thoughts on Dialectical Materialism in the Field of Theatre".

“We want to make the theater an instrument of struggle and construction of the proletariat. The theater must be a true court. He must prove good and evil in a new way, in a proletarian way. Moral judgment must be litigation. It is necessary to draw the class struggle in such a way that at first it gives rise to doubts, which are then resolved by the certainty of the moral victory of the positive principle. Various classes can be represented in the auditorium. Everyone can be excited in different ways. One believes that this is true, the other believes that this is not true. The goal pursued by the moral judgments of the theater is great, because the theater is a workshop, one of the greatest workshops of people. And is it only because we see on the stage masterful people, human images that are needed by the time? No. Because people are re-educated in the auditorium.”

The theater turned out to be not a place where the viewer had to have fun, it turned out to be a workshop in which a new person is forged. It is forged not only on the stage, but mainly in the hall. And it is extremely important to follow the viewer who is being provoked into dialogue. If we look at how Afinogenov's play was perceived in Soviet theaters, we can assume that Afinogenov achieved his goal.

This is especially indicative of the example of the Moscow Art Theater, the Moscow Art Theater. Prior to this, the most successful play both in terms of audience response and box office receipts was the play "Days of the Turbins" by Mikhail Bulgakov. Absolutely not a Soviet play, which caused such a flurry of criticism that it was either hushed up or vilified. She remained in the repertoire largely because Stalin loved her and went to see her. We know from the diaries of Soviet viewers that when the "Days of the Turbins" were on, the audience was very sympathetic to what was happening on stage - the audience fainted, allowed themselves to shout. They sympathized with the heroes who were perceived by official propaganda as non-Soviet.

In the case of "Fear" the situation was about the same. The fact is that the proletarian play was staged on the stage of the most non-Soviet theater in the country. It was clear that the audience reacted to what was happening. When Borodin uttered his accusatory remarks about a country paralyzed by fear, part of the audience clapped. It was clear that Borodin was not only on the stage, but also in the hall.

But after Borodin finished his speech, the old Bolshevik Klara rose to the podium and delivered a fiery speech that Borodin was wrong - because in his scientific constructions, supposedly objective, in fact, he subjectively took the side of the counter-revolution. For fear to disappear, a real Bolshevik needs to be infected with Bolshevik fearlessness in the same way as the revolutionaries did, who died in prisons and exiles that forged the October Revolution. And if the class struggle is carried through to the end, then fear in the sense that Borodin speaks of will die, and Soviet society will get rid of it and live with fearlessness. And here already most of the audience began to clap.

The main goal of both Afinogenov himself and the production was to excite the viewer by demonstrating the relevance of Borodin's ideas. What he says is most similar to the criticism that can be found in an emigre play or in uncensored letters. All his claims to the Soviet government - they were voiced at the level of the intelligentsia. Relatively speaking, if Facebook existed then, then the opposition-minded Facebook would have exchanged such replies. But here, right in the hall, these sentiments were rebuffed.

And this demonstration was all the more impressive because it was not directed on stage - the Soviet audience had already seen this many times, by that time there were many such cardboard plays in Soviet theaters, where there were bad whites and counter-revolutionaries who were exposed , and there were impeccable Bolsheviks. And then there was a very nice hero, a professor who scientifically tells his theory and is defeated.

This brings us to the main idea, which must be remembered, that literature in Soviet times was very often thought of as a tool, as a magical device that would make it possible to make an ideal Soviet citizen be born from an old person burdened by bourgeois remnants and wrong ideology. The theater had to create it.

Decryption

Speaking of Okudzhava's poetics, we too often repeat platitudes about his folklore - something that he himself emphasized all the time - about his openness and simplicity, melodiousness. But Okudzhava is an extremely complex poet. This is the main problem, that his such closed, such strong framework constructions, in which we so easily place ourselves, consist of many other people's quotes, dark circumstances that he hints at, the circumstances of his biography, which is unknown to us.

Okudzhava is very secretive. And perhaps the understanding of most of his poems is so difficult because the song is designed for instant perception and, after listening to the song, we create some kind of our own, personal image of its meaning. And there is no time to get a grasp of the song - there is no time to listen to it. Therefore, I think the time to analyze some of the most mysterious things about Okudzhava has come just now. Let's take for example such an obvious, seemingly simple thing as "Farewell to the New Year tree." It is also the longest of Okudzhava's songs. In fact, his short things are even more difficult, because there is more concentration.

Solzhenitsyn, in one private conversation, said very precisely about Okudzhava: "How few words and how wide it takes." Indeed, with the help of his associations, quite eclectic, coming from completely different sources, he rakes very widely.

“Farewell to the New Year Tree” brings to mind some distant pattern in our memory. But while the song is playing, while we are listening to it, we are so delighted with it that we completely forget, but how, in fact, do we know this time signature and even these specific words?

Somewhere he touched the old strings -
their roll call goes on…
So January rolled up, flew in,
mad as an electric train.

I'm sorry, but we've heard this somewhere before.

We are all a little away from life,
Living is just a habit.
It seems to me on the airways
Roll call of two voices.

Why, these are Akhmatova's "Komarov's Kroki", or "Komarov's Sketches", written when Oku-ja-va already knew Akhmatova, visited her and even sang to her. She probably read something to him then. Why, then, in "Farewell to the New Year Tree", in the first stanza, does he suddenly quote Akhmatova? And what do we actually know about the origin of this poem? What is it about and what is it about?

Its origin, according to Okudzhava's wife, is as follows. Okudzhava leaves for the shooting of the film "Zhenya, Zhenechka and Katyusha". In this shooting, Oleg Dal yells at his then companion. Everyone is dejectedly silent. Okudzhava says: “Why are you hiding your hands?” And then there is a stanza.

And refined like nightingales,
proud as grenadiers
what about your reliable hands
hiding your gentlemen?

However, firstly, there is a certain inconsistency in time - the shooting took place later than the poem was written. And secondly, the reason for the verse-creation is clearly insufficient. The poem was written in March 1966. What great and bitter event did Russian literature experience in March 1966? This is the loss of Akhmatova, her death on March 5th. And this is the last broken thread that connected Russian literature with the Silver Age. Here it becomes clear to us the meaning of farewell to the New Year tree, which actually looks like a very ambivalent poem.

We dressed you to the nines,
we have served you well.
Blowing loudly into cardboard pipes,
as if in a hurry to a feat.

What are we talking about here? There is a clear reference here to Akhmatov's "Poem Without a Hero", to that carnival, the ho-ro-water around the Christmas tree, which is described there, and to all the ho-ro-water of the Russian Silver Age. What is going on there? There is a farewell to the woman and a farewell to the era. It is quite obvious that we are talking about Akhmatova. Moreover, Okudzhava says:

But the fuss begins again.
Time judges in its own way.
And in the hustle and bustle you were taken down from the cross,
and there will be no sunday.

This is a clear indication of the theme of the poem: it is about the death of a beautiful woman, a woman whose fate was one huge way of the cross. Apart from Akhmatova, of course, you can’t see anyone here. And even more explicitly:

My spruce, spruce - a departing deer,
in vain you probably tried:
women of that cautious shadow
lost in your needles!

Why all of a sudden a deer? A deer that does not look like a New Year tree in any way and cannot be guessed in its silhouette. Apparently, Okudzhava was aware that in Akhmatova’s early poems, “a deer in a beast speaks with a silver voice about the northern lights.” And he might well have known that in a joke correspondence with Punin Nikolai Punin(1888-1953) - art critic, civil husband of Anna Akhmatova. Akhmatova signed "Deer", and sometimes Punin called her that. In any case, in Russian literary mythology, this nickname was quite well known.

But even if this deer appeared here by chance, according to the usual secret knowledge of poets, one cannot fail to see that the hidden plot of the poem is farewell to the holiday of Russian culture, farewell to the spirit of Christmas that Pasternak was, farewell to the spirit of a bitter and sad holiday that marked the fate of the Russian Silver Age. This is not just a farewell to a feminine, suffering image, this is an Akhmatov-style funeral service for an entire era that will not be repeated and will not be resurrected, because the Silver Age was not repeated in the 1960s, it was not given a resurrection - no, they did not reach this level, and Okudzhava understood this very well.

Aren't we complicating Okudzhava's poetics? Suddenly it's just a story about such a new-year-her failed love? I dare to assure you, we do not complicate, because Okudzhava himself always diligently hides a literary source. Why does he do it? Not because he is chasing originality, but precisely because in his mind to move too closely to a literary source, to refer to it too clearly - this is a bad form, this harms the originality of the text, and somehow betrays in the author's desire to be close to the hero. He never dedicated poetry to the memory of his great predecessors. He even has the poem “Lucky Pushkin”, which is dedicated to the memory of Pushkin, somehow deliberately smoothed out, all the pathos is reduced by irony. He could not afford to write "In Memory of Akhmatova", because for him Akhmatova was on a huge pedestal. And as he repeated: “It was difficult for me to open my mouth in front of her - I didn’t know what to say, my wife was talking.” Perhaps that is why he made such a wonderful impression on Akhmatova because for the most part he was silent or sang, and this is the optimal position for a poet.

Okudzhava tends to hide the sources of inspiration, because, for example, he later called the brilliant song about Francois Villon “The Prayer of Francois Villon” simply “Prayer”, and all questions about the origin of the song answered: “No way, then it was necessary to call her that, because it was impossible to say “Mo-lit-wa”. Nevertheless, when in Poland, where one could freely say “Mo-lit-va”, in an absolutely Catholic socialist country, such an oxymoron, record a record with this song, the name is re-re- generally led as "The Song of Villon." Why? Because this song has at its core Villon's picture of the world, Villon's ballad of contradictions, Villon's ballad of a poetic contest in Blois. "The Ballad of the Poetry Contest in Blois", or "The Ballad of Contradictions" is a ballad by the 15th-century French poet François Villon.. “Give a head to a smart one, give a horse to a coward” is a re-breaking, a continuation of Viyon’s poetics with its eternal “I am recognized by everyone, expelled from everywhere”, “out of people, the one that calls a dove a raven is most understandable to me” and so on. .

The myth of simple Okudzhava, everyday Okudzhava should be dispelled once and for all. Okudzhava is one of the most profound literary Russian poets. And, opening these subtexts, we will more correctly understand his place on our poetic ruler. In the auto-description of his method, Okudzhava is perhaps most accurate in the poem “From the Car Window”, which allows you to see the basis of his associative method, where the plan appears through the plan, the carnivals of the Silver Age - through the gatherings of the sixties, the prayer of Francois Villon - through the prayer of our contemporary.

The poem called "From the Car Window" best shows this double exposure of Okudzhava's worldview.

Low-growing forest on the way to Buzuluk,
all resembling a dusty army of goblin -
on foot, dashing songs finished singing,
knocked down legs, chilled, not eaten for days
and frozen, as if on the eve of parting.

Their gray-haired commander, all in a scab and tear,
writes letters home on a dull drum,
forgetting all the words, he smears the sheets.
The banners are frayed, the pockets are empty,
the orderly is insane, the orderly is ugly...
How monotonous the landscape of defeat is!

Or is it a farce flashed outside the window,
where a hurricane of passions rages,
where unknown comedians play,
selling fate and talents for pennies,
the judges themselves and the musicians themselves ...

Their gray-haired director, stunned by abuse,
writes a play on a drum torn to shreds,
forgetting all the words, he stains the sheets,
the scenery is crumpled, the pockets are empty,
Hamlet is deaf, and Romeo has long been ugly...
How monotonous the plot of our memory is!

Two similes, two metaphors, complementing each other - a stunted forest, equally similar to a defeated army and a beggarly wandering troupe. These two comparisons complement each other, helping to highlight the main plot of Okudzhava, the plot of the defeated army, the plot of the itinerant artist, the plot of pride in spite of defeat.

These plots are highlighted, of course, by superposition of words, rhymes, similarities. But the main thing is this frank confession - how monotonous the plot of my memory is, you will not see anything else there, no matter how you look.

Okudzhava, wherever he looks, sees the same cross-cutting world literary plot, the plot of victory in spite of defeat, the plot of bitter mockery of himself, always doomed to lose and always forced to hold on. This is also told by his “Old Soldier’s Song” (“The songs of our regiment are noisy ...”) - a song that the doomed old soldiers have nothing left but personal dignity.

Hands on the shutter, head in anguish,
And the soul has already taken off like.
Why do we write with blood in the sand?
Our letters are not needed by nature.

Sleep to yourself, brothers, everything will come again.
New commanders will be born,
new soldiers will receive
eternal government apartments.

Sleep to yourself, brothers, everything will return again,
everything must be repeated in nature,
and words, and bullets, and love, and blood,
there will be no time to reconcile.

The plot of eternal repetition or, according to Nietzsche, eternal return - this is the main theme of Okudzhava's lyrics. Wherever you look, you are faced with the same monotonous landscape. That is why one of the main means of achieving effect in his texts is to involve the broadest poetic context, because for him all world literature, in general, is about the same thing. And in "Farewell to the New Year Tree", and in "Villon's Prayer", and in the poem "From the Window of the Carriage" we see the same device, following our own fate in the present on the great examples of the future. And it turns out that we won’t come up with anything new, but we won’t lose to the end, because our past will join us in the last battle.

The author of the project "World of Bibigon" The presenters and experts are: 1. Arkhangelsky Alexander Nikolaevich Candidate of Philology, journalist, TV presenter, writer, cultural historian, author of more than 10 textbooks, including the textbook "Russian literature: a textbook for the 10th grade of a comprehensive school : At 2 o'clock"; 2. Bak Dmitry Petrovich Candidate of Philology, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University, Vice-Rector of the Russian State Humanitarian University; 3. Aleksey Nikolaevich Varlamov Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University, writer; 4. Volgin Igor Leonidovich Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Doctor of Philology, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University and the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky...

The author of the project "World of Bibigon" The presenters and experts are: 1. Arkhangelsky Alexander Nikolaevich Candidate of Philology, journalist, TV presenter, writer, cultural historian, author of more than 10 textbooks, including the textbook "Russian literature: a textbook for the 10th grade of a comprehensive school : At 2 o'clock"; 2. Bak Dmitry Petrovich Candidate of Philology, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University, Vice-Rector of the Russian State Humanitarian University; 3. Aleksey Nikolaevich Varlamov Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University, writer; 4. Volgin Igor Leonidovich Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Doctor of Philology, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University and the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky, member of the Union of Writers and the Union of Journalists of Russia; 5. Pasternak Elena Leonidovna Doctor of Philology, Lecturer at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University; 6. Smelyansky Anatoly Mironovich - laureate of the State Prize of the Russian Federation, Honored Art Worker of the Russian Federation, professor, doctor of art history, rector of the Moscow Art Theater School; 7. Kedrov Konstantin Alexandrovich poet, critic, candidate of philological sciences, doctor of philosophical sciences, twice nominated for the Nobel Prize, head of the poetic school of metacode and metametaphor, lecturer at the Literary Institute. A.M. Gorky; 8. Velikodnaya Irina Leonidovna Head of the Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts of the Scientific Library of Moscow State University, Candidate of Philological Sciences, Professor of Moscow State University; 9. Murzak Irina Ivanovna Professor, Candidate of Philological Sciences, Vice-Rector for International Relations of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (now MSGU); 10. Andrey Leonidovich Yastrebov Doctor of Philology, Professor, Head of the Department of History, Philosophy, Literature, Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU); 11. Korovin Valentin Ivanovich Head of the Department of Russian Literature, Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU), author of a textbook on literature for senior classes; 12. Sobolev Lev Iosifovich Honored Teacher of the Russian Federation, teacher of the Russian language and literature at the Moscow Gymnasium No. 1567; 13. Lekmanov Oleg Andershanovich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities, Leading Researcher at the Institute of World Literature. A.M. Gorky; 14. Spiridonova Lidia Alekseevna - Doctor of Philology, Head. Department of the Institute of World Literature. A.M. Gorky; 15. Anninsky Lev Alexandrovich - literary critic, writer, critic, publicist, candidate of philosophical sciences; 16. Ivanova Natalia Borisovna - Doctor of Philology, writer, publicist, literary and art critic, literary historian; 17. Kling Oleg Alekseevich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Department of Theory of Literature, Faculty of Philology, Moscow State University; eighteen. Golubkov Mikhail Mikhailovich - Doctor of Philology, Associate Professor of the Department of the History of Russian Literature of the 20th Century. Faculty of Philology, Moscow State University; 19. Pavlovets Mikhail Georgievich - Candidate of Philological Sciences, Head of the Department of Russian and Foreign Literature and Methods of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MSPU). 20. Agenosov Vladimir Veniaminovich - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute (MPGU), Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences

Literature can be interesting. Yes, even the school program! We chose online lectures and books that will help you fall in love with Tolstoy and Pushkin, teach you how to make up stories and write essays.

Lectures and online courses

A selection of video and audio materials that will help you fall in love with and understand the school curriculum in literature.

Lectures by Alexander Zholkovsky, which reveal the secrets of Pushkin, Pasternak, Mandelstam, Tolstoy, Chekhov - and artistic creativity in general.

Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman is a legend that everyone who is interested in Russian literature and culture should hear or read. Lectures can be found on bookshelves, but videos in which Lotman talks about the pre-revolutionary Russian world are much more impressive. Yes, they look a little “retro”, but the meaning is not lost from this.

Six Arzamas courses on the main Russian writers and poets of the 20th century, as well as materials on literature for every taste: anthologies, dictionaries, tutorials, tests and games.

A selection of Dmitry Bykov's lectures: speeches at the Moscow Institute of Open Education, open lessons, lecture hall "Direct Speech", recordings of programs on the air of "Echo of Moscow". Lively and unusually interesting stories about the work of Pasternak, Gorky, Mayakovsky, Akhmatova.

The Audeamus project was conceived as a distance learning platform, but now it works more like an archive of audio courses. Here you can find high-quality lectures on mysticism in Russian literature of the Silver Age, modern poetry, Russian folklore and the history of Russian journalism.

Interior with a woman reading. Painting by Carl Holsø. Denmark, before 1935

Doctor of Philology Sergey Zenkin explains the benefits of literature using six concepts from theory as an example. Inspiring article, after which you want to pick up a book.

Instructions for writing Eugene Onegin, Dostoevsky's novels and Chekhov's stories, and Igor Pilshchikov's lecture on why we don't understand the classics.

Audio lectures about the life and death of the great Russian writer, as well as his funny expressions, wise thoughts, personal items and a test for literary flair.

If you are familiar with the words "iamb", "trochee", "syllabo-tonic" and "foot", the village open this lecture. Arzamas' editor and former versifier is trying to help schoolchildren determine the size of a poem if it's a homework assignment.

Audio lectures by Marietta Chudakova about The Master and Margarita, playing Bulgakov's characters, as well as amazing statistics, recommendations for films and short stories, and other materials about Russian classics.

Books

A selection of books that will help develop the style, writing skills and teach you how to express your thoughts. Books for all ages.

642 ideas to write about

“Your cat dreams of world domination. She figured out how to swap bodies with you”… This book is a creative “simulator” for developing writing skills. It will come in very handy for anyone who wants to develop their imagination and learn how to express their thoughts succinctly. There are 642 beginnings of stories on its pages - funny, funny, sad, fantastic and even a little strange ... They need to be developed and turned into complete stories.

How to write cool texts

If your child wants to be a writer, journalist, poet, critic, blogger, or screenwriter, and loves to invent and tell exciting stories, How to Write Great Writing will help you hone your talent and take the next step in your craft. The book will be useful to all children who want to better study the school subject "Russian".

A creative notebook that helps teenagers understand themselves, think about important things and write down interesting thoughts on paper. Your child will be able to make a wish list, learn about himself in his own handwriting, overcome fears and get to know himself in the future. The book will inspire future writers, artists, collectors, inventors and explorers to discover and develop their talents.

Reader's diary

To teach a child to love books and look deep into each one, there is a magical tool - a reader's diary. Not the one that is forced to lead at school. Another. "Reader's Diary" by Martha Reitzes. In it, you can write down your impressions and favorite quotes, draw your favorite characters, compile a dictionary of incomprehensible words, come up with a crossword or mind map ... The diary will help develop writing skills, broaden your horizons, instill a love of literature and reading.

Write your adventure book

This book will teach your child to turn fictional stories into exciting stories and make them feel like a real writer! The most interesting thing is that in the album you can immediately practice and write down your stories. There are "preparations" for a haunted horror movie, a shark thriller, a spy detective, a chilling story about an abandoned cabin in the woods...

Book of my poems

To become a poet, you need not only talent and a special, poetic view of the world. Any poet must know the rules of versification and be able to use literary techniques. This tutorial contains entertaining versification lessons that will explain to your child what rhyme and meter are, line and stanza, how lines are assembled into poems and how to make them sound beautiful. Performing simple, interesting tasks, the child will learn to feel the rhythm and hear the music of the verse. And this will help him become a real poet!

book of my stories

Children love to make up stories. But to become a real writer, it is not enough to come up with an interesting plot - you need to be able to write it down. In the pages of this book, Louis Stowell shares the secrets of writing with aspiring authors and explains how to create compelling stories! Little writers will try their hand at different genres - diary notes of a schoolboy, a detective story about a murder mystery, a comic book about pirates, a fantasy story about an alien, and even a script for a movie.

Cherry's Diaries Series

An unusual graphic novel about a girl Cherry who wants to become a writer. . On the advice of the writer Madame Desjardin, she begins to keep a diary, because the writer must be able to build a story, collect facts, interview, and most importantly, observe. In addition to stunning watercolor shots, the comic contains Cherry's diary entries, her drawings and photographs. All this creates a unique personal story and provides an opportunity to look at the world through the eyes of a 10-year-old aspiring writer.

In the age of the Internet, knowledge is available to anyone - you just need to know the places where to find it. The editors of the Subculture Portal have selected ten lecturers who are able to tell about literature in a fascinating and informative way.

Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman is a classic that everyone who is interested in Russian literature and culture in general should read. Lectures can be found on bookshelves, but videos in which Lotman talks about the pre-revolutionary Russian world are much more impressive. We recommend watching the entire cycle.

Where to find: youtube

Many are familiar with Dmitry Bykov - he is a very media person, loves to talk about literature and does it very interestingly: he shares not so much facts as interpretations, refers to numerous sources and often expresses very original opinions.

3. Lectures by Andrey Astvatsaturov on Anglo-American literature of the 20th century

Astvatsaturov - the St. Petersburg king of American literature of the XX century. He teaches at the philological faculty of St. Petersburg State University and writes novels in his free time. We especially recommend to fans of Joyce, Salinger, Vonnegut and Proust - Astvatsaturov is really well versed in the issue. - We especially recommend his lectures to fans of Joyce, Salinger, Vonnegut and Proust, whose work Astvatsaturov understands really well. It will also be of interest to those who are concerned about the questions posed by modernists and the history of the 20th century in general.

Where to find: in contact with , youtube , the writer's own website

4. Lectures by Olga Panova on foreign literature of the 20th century.

If the previous two points are more interesting for a trained listener, then these lectures talk about literature from scratch, for beginners. Olga Panova builds the material in a very structured way and explains ideas and facts in sufficient detail. This does not detract from the lectures of fascination: Panova's rich erudition will allow even trained listeners to learn a lot of new things.

He teaches at the philological faculty of St. Petersburg State University. Another lecturer who can be recommended to those who are just starting to study literature as a science. Kaminskaya pays great attention to the historical context in which the writer worked. We especially recommend the lectures on Hermann Hesse and the Glass Bead Game.

6. Lectures by Boris Averin on Russian literature

A charismatic and highly educated lecturer, a real scientist, author of more than a hundred scientific papers. Boris Averin is not only a Nabokovologist, but also a specialist in sociology and the problem of memory. Through the prism of literature, he analyzes the important problems of society and the relationship of man with himself. Particularly interesting are the cycles of his lectures "Memory as a collection of personality", "Literature as self-knowledge", "Rational and irrational in literature and life".

7. Lectures by Konstantin Milchin on the latest Russian literature

Konstantin Milchin is worth listening to just because he is almost the only lecturer who talks about the literature of modern Russia and whose lectures can be found in the public domain. And since learning about the present, as a rule, is much more interesting than about the “traditions of antiquity,” it is definitely worth listening to. In addition, Milchin is a writer himself, so he speaks about techniques and techniques with great knowledge of the matter.

After getting acquainted with modern Russian literature, it's time to find out what is happening in the West. Alexandrov's course of lectures "Ecology of Literature" on the Culture TV channel is conveniently divided by country: French, English, Scandinavian writers. But we still recommend listening to it in its entirety.

9. Lectures by Pyotr Ryabov on the philosophy of anarchism and existentialism

Ryabov's lectures are distinguished by great enthusiasm for the subject: he talks about Sartre and Camus as if he knew them personally. In addition, his lectures are very relevant and suitable for those who like to tie abstract matters to today's agenda. Lectures on the philosophy of anarchism are invaluable if you want to get to know this movement and not read two kilos of books. And although anarchism is a personal philosophy, Ryabov knows how to maintain objectivity.

Reading fiction is not only a pleasant pastime, but also an expansion of one's horizons. True, the true meaning of the work, some plot twists, often even the motive of the characters' actions, the characters themselves are not always clear. Here, additional literature or lectures from professionals in their field come to the rescue. We don't always have time to read extra, so watching and attending lectures is a great option. There are many sites on the Web that offer thousands of lectures in audio and video formats. You just need to find something really high quality.

Dmitry Bykov

Perhaps Dmitry Bykov is one of the most famous teachers of Russian literature today. He has a special eye for the history of fiction and a clear talent for teaching. His lectures are not only informative, but also interesting. At times very categorical in his statements, he nevertheless does not repel listeners.

Live, his lectures are not cheap, but there are recordings on YouTube. For example, his lectures on Russian literature of the 19th century:

Or a series of lectures on the 20th century:

You can also sign up for Dmitry Bykov's lectures on literature, which he gives in different cities of Russia. For example, on May 15 in Moscow, he will talk about Francis Scott Fitzgerald, the author of the world-famous novel The Great Gatsby.

"Bibigon": lectures on the school curriculum

A whole playlist of lectures on Russian literature, which was filmed by the Kultura TV channel for their children-viewers. In accessible language, boring lecturers talk about famous writers and their legendary works that have become classics.

Yuliana Kaminskaya

Yuliana Kaminskaya is an associate professor at the Department of the History of Foreign Literature at St. Petersburg State University, she is well versed in foreign literature and knows how to tell interesting stories about it. Together with lektorium.tv, she created a full course of lectures, where you can not only listen to the analysis of individual works, but also learn interesting facts from the history of foreign literature. Kafka, Hesse, Camus, Sartre and many other masters of the artistic word became the heroes of her lectures.

Golden Pages of European Literature

That is the name of another project lektorium.tv. The lecturer is Alexey Mashevsky, a Russian poet and literary critic. He talks about both Russian and foreign writers. Gogol, Defoe, Byron and other classics were the focus of his lectures.

"The Glass Bead Game" with Igor Volgin

The Glass Bead Game TV show on the Kultura channel is an interesting discussion format where literary scholars and writers discuss classical literature. Its permanent host, Igor Volgin, is a professor at the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov and a specialist in the work of Dostoevsky. He invites interesting characters, so the discussion is always exciting to follow.

Vladimir Nabokov

We could not miss in our review Vladimir Nabokov, a famous Russian writer who lectured on literature in the United States in the middle of the 20th century. Having made a huge contribution to literary criticism, he was remembered for his unique vision of Russian literature. Listening to the audiobook "Lectures on Russian Literature" is not at all boring - try it and get great pleasure.

First part

The second part

"Fight club"

Lectures on various subjects are often held at the Garage Museum Education Center in Moscow. For example, lectures on the works of Umberto Eco and Franz Kafka will also be held on April 15 and 22.

Of course, this is not the whole list of online events and lectures that you can listen to in order to expand your horizons in the field of literature. We wish you to find a lecturer who you really like, and then you will receive not only knowledge, but also great pleasure.