Introduction
1. Eternal questions about the fate of Russia
2. Are there answers to eternal questions?
3. Study of the psychology of the Slav using the example of the heroes of “The Village”
Conclusion
Bibliography
Introduction
Ivan Alekseevich Bunin is a wonderful Russian writer, a man of great and complex destiny. In terms of the strength of his image, the refinement of his language, the simplicity and harmony of the architecture of his works, Bunin ranks among the outstanding Russian writers. His work, if we do not take into account his early imitative poems (and he, by the way, was a talented poet), is marked by originality and complete independence, although, of course, it was based on the rich traditions of Russian literature. Bunin’s greatest fame came from his realistic novels and short stories, such as “The Village”, “The Merry Yard”, “Night Conversation”, “Sukhodol” and others, which he himself considered among the works that sharply depicted the Russian soul, its peculiar plexuses, its light and dark, but almost always tragic underpinnings. The story "The Village", published in 1910, caused great controversy and was the beginning of Bunin's enormous popularity. This work, like the writer’s work as a whole, affirmed the realistic traditions of Russian classical literature. The story captures the richness of observations and colors, the strength and beauty of the language, the harmony of the drawing, the sincerity of tone and truthfulness. A.M. Gorky highly valued Bunin’s realistic work; he wrote about the story “The Village”: “I know that when the stupefaction and confusion passes... then serious people will say: “Besides the first artistic value Bunin's "Village" was the impetus that forced the broken and shaky Russian society think seriously no longer about the peasant, not about the people, but about the strict question - to be or not to be Russia.” He wrote to Bunin himself in December 1910: “... No one has taken the village so deeply, so historically... I don’t see what you can compare your thing with, I’m touched by it - very much. This modestly hidden, muffled groan about my native land is dear to me, noble sorrow is dear, painful fear for it - and all this is new.”
1. Eternal questions about the fate of Russia
Since time immemorial, people have tended to think about questions, the answers to which could not be given by some well-known phrases and dogmas. It is no coincidence that questions of this kind began to be called philosophical or eternal. Of course, the cultural heritage could not ignore such a significant part of the social and spiritual life of the people, so the creators, to the best of their abilities, actively offered possible answers encrypted in their works. Literature, of course, did not remain aloof from this difficult situation, but at the same time a most interesting activity. Beginning with ancient literature, right up to the present day there is a dispute about the fate of man and the people, about the meaning of existence, about faith, about God... There seems to be no end to these reflections.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Russia stood at a crossroads. Year by year the situation became more tense. Eternal questions with their relevance attracted the attention of the leading minds of enlightenment. Ivan Alekseevich Bunin himself wondered about them, and his work is direct proof of this. The life of human society is subject to changes, shocks and cataclysms. This world, according to Bunin, is disharmonious and unstable. In 1910, a large generalizing canvas was published - Bunin’s story “The Village”, in which philosophical, ethical, aesthetic problems are joined by topical social issues, which are revealed based on the material of Russian reality of the 20th century. This work is the pinnacle of Bunin’s pre-revolutionary creativity. With this story, which created a real storm in the literary world, the writer made enemies for himself, who never tired of repeating that he was a cold and evil writer who slandered peasant Russia and did not want to see anything bright and positive in it. Meanwhile, “The Village” was created by Bunin with such passion and torment with which he hardly ever wrote anything. Since childhood, he knew village life well, he had friends, first among the children, and then from the village youth, with whom he whiled away a lot of time, easily visiting their huts, and knew the peasant language to a fine degree. “My life was spent in the village, therefore, I have the opportunity to see the express,” Bunin said with knowledge, considering it the primary duty of every thinking person, especially a writer.
Despite the fact that Durnovka was chosen as the setting for the story and county town, the scope of life in it is much wider and larger-scale. The “village” is filled with rumors, disputes, conversations on trains, in bazaars, at gatherings, and in inns. There's a lot in it characters, which create the impression of a seething, polyphonic crowd. The heroes of the story are trying to understand their surroundings, to find some kind of support point that will help them stay in this powerful flow, to survive not only physically, but also spiritually.
At the center of the story are Tikhon and Kuzma, two siblings who adhere to different positions in life. Tikhon was firmly convinced that the most durable and reliable thing in the world is money, which gives prosperity, well-being, and confidence in tomorrow. Endowed with a strong character, strong will, peasant ingenuity and hard work, this descendant of a serf becomes the owner of the Durnovo estate. In order to achieve his goal, Tikhon subordinated his entire life to the pursuit of wealth. On this path, he has to make deals with his conscience and be tough towards his fellow villagers. Marriage for profit does not bring Tikhon family happiness, for he is even deprived of the joy of fatherhood. He has no heirs to whom he could pass on the wealth accumulated over his entire life. The hero's personal drama is aggravated by social discord, when seemingly unshakable foundations collapse. Tikhon Krasov is deeply amazed that in the fertile black earth region there can be hunger, ruin and poverty. “The owner should come here, the owner!” - he thinks. His brother Kuzma blames the government “empty talkers” for this, who “trampled and killed the people.”
Kuzma Krasov has a different understanding of life. This hero is presented to the reader as a truth-seeker, a people's poet who is trying to understand and comprehend the tragedy of his people, their misfortune and guilt. Condemning the atrocities of the ruling circles, Kuzma painfully perceives the poverty, backwardness, darkness of the peasantry, and their inability to rationally organize their lives. Tikhon and Kuzma Krasov are extraordinary and strong natures, persistently searching for the meaning and purpose of life. But whether they find him is another question... The author’s own thoughts about hopeless life in the village haunt us throughout the entire story. For example, they are clearly felt in the dialogue between Tikhon Krasov and his brother Kuzma. Tikhon says: “Sit in the village, sip some gray cabbage soup, vilify the thin bast shoes!” “Laptey! - Kuzma responds somewhere - For the second thousand years, brother, he’s been dragging them around, damn them three times! Who is to blame? The reader is faced with a truly serious question in scope, the answer to which cannot be a statement based on one’s own everyday experience, but on the generalizing experience of generations of predecessors.
« Merciless truth"Bunin's story was based on its author's deep knowledge of the "peasant kingdom." In it, Bunin shows the life of the peasantry on the eve of the first Russian revolution, the events of which completely destroy the usual course of life in the village. We see some peasant gatherings, burning landowners' estates, the revelry of the poor... The heroes of the story are trying to understand their surroundings, to find a foothold for themselves. But the turbulent events of the beginning of the century aggravate not only the social problems of the village, but also destroy normal human relations, lead the heroes of “The Village” to a dead end.
2. Are there answers to eternal questions in “The Village”?
Let us make an attempt to find answers to the eternal questions that interest us about the fate of Russia in the work being studied by I. A. Bunin “Village”. Subject to logic, let us turn to the text and find in it discussions about Russia by the main, and sometimes secondary, characters. One of the brightest dialogues is the conversation between Kuzma and Balashkin.
“And again he grabbed a cigarette and began to roar dully:
Dear God! Pushkin was killed, Lermontov was killed, Pisarev was drowned, Ryleev was strangled... Dostoevsky was dragged to execution, Gogol was driven crazy... And Shevchenko? And Polezhaev! Would you say the government is to blame? But after all, a master is like a slave, and a hat is like Senka. Oh, is there still such a side in the world, such a people, be they thrice damned?
Anxiously fiddling with the buttons of his long-skirted frock coat, now buttoning and then unbuttoning, frowning and grinning, the embarrassed Kuzma said in response:
Such people! Greatest people, and not “such”, let me tell you.
Don't you dare give out prizes! - Balashkin shouted again.
No, sir, I dare! After all, these writers are the children of this very people!
Why not Eroshka, why not Lukashka? I, brother, if I want to shake literature, I’ll find boots for all the gods! Why is it Karataev, and not Razuvaev, with Kolupaev, not the spider world-eater, not the pop-likhodite, not a corrupt clerk, not some Saltychikha, not Karamazov with Oblomov, not Khlestakov with Nozdrev, or, so as not to go far, not your scoundrel - brother?
Platon Karataev....
Lice ate your Karataev! I don’t see the ideal here!
And what about the Russian martyrs, ascetics, saints, holy fools for Christ’s sake, schismatics?
What-oh? What about the Colosseums, the Crusades, the religious wars, the countless sects? Luther, finally? No, you're naughty! For me, you can’t break a fang right away!”
The technique of putting deep, important things into the mouths of minor characters ideological content works of thought are not Bunin’s innovation. But he, of course, skillfully and talentedly uses this find, putting into Balashkin’s head thoughts that are probably inherent in the author himself. Balashkin’s arguments sound convincing and powerful. But Kuzma Krasov’s position in his discussions about Russia and the people is no less vital: “And Kuzma remembered his father, his childhood... “Rus, Rus!” Where are you rushing?" - Gogol’s exclamation came to his mind. - “Rus, Rus'!..” Ah, empty talk, there is no abyss for you! This would be cleaner - “the deputy wanted to poison the river”... Yes, but who should we exact the same from? Unhappy people, first of all, unhappy!.. And tears welled up in Kuzma’s small green eyes - suddenly, as has often begun to happen to him lately.” Or another quote from Kuzma: “A wanderer is a people, but a eunuch and a teacher are not a people? Slavery was abolished only forty-five years ago, so what should we exact from this people? Yes, but who is to blame for this? The people themselves!” For Kuzma, with his searching soul, it is generally typical to think about something high and eternal. Throughout the story we see the hero in communication with different people, representatives of different generations and views. Over time, his views transform depending on the experience gained. If in previous quotes Kuzma is at a crossroads, he doesn’t see further path development of his country, does not find answers about the fate of the people, then after Akim’s death, Kuzma’s view becomes more definite. I will quote Tikhon Ilyich’s dialogue with Kuzma: “Kuzma jumped up from his seat.
Lord, Lord! - he exclaimed in falsetto, - What a god we have! What kind of God can Deniska, Akimka, Menshov, Sery, you, me have?
“Wait,” Tikhon Ilyich asked sternly. - What kind of Akimki?
“I was lying there dying,” Kuzma continued, not listening, “did I think about him a lot?” I thought one thing: I don’t know anything about him and I can’t think! - shouted
Kuzma. - Not learned!
And, looking around with shifting, suffering eyes, buttoning and unbuttoning, he walked across the room and stopped right in front of Tikhon Ilyich’s face.
Remember, brother,” he said, and his cheekbones turned red. - Remember: our song is sung. And no candles will save you and me. Do you hear? We are Durnovites!
And, unable to find words from excitement, he fell silent. But Tikhon Ilyich was again thinking something of his own and suddenly agreed.
Right. Worthless people! Just think...”
From all the above statements, we cannot derive answers to the questions posed at the beginning of the work about the fate of Russia and the Russian people. Is this a coincidence? Is it a pattern? Does Bunin give answers and does he know them himself? Perhaps, in the story “The Village,” Ivan Alekseevich tried to sort out his head, put his thoughts in order and plunge deeper into discussions about the village, Russia, and the Russian people. It is unlikely that Bunin was able to unambiguously answer all the questions that interested him. “The Village” leaves us room for thought, while refuting the statement “The people are always right.”
3. Study of the psychology of the Slav using the example of the heroes of “The Village”
The study of the psychological nature of the Slavs is far from simple theme, to which many works, volumes and publications are devoted. Turning to Bunin, to his “Village”, we can draw some conclusions based on the characters and actions of the main characters of the story - the brothers Tikhon and Kuzma Krasov, because they are presented to the reader in development, in dynamics... Both of these heroes are looking for a way out, looking for the meaning of life , observe what is happening, but recognize life and the Russian people as lost. Quite justified, because what is happening before Kuzma’s eyes truly does not fit into the idea of the broad Russian soul, of the high destiny of the Russian people, which the Slavophiles so loudly declared.
For example, an old man lies dying. He’s still alive, and already there’s a pine coffin standing in the senets, and the daughter-in-law is already crumbling the dough for pies. And suddenly the old man recovered. Where was the coffin to go? How can you justify spending? Lukyan was then cursed for five years for them, lived with reproaches from the world, starved to death, and was riddled with lice and dirt. Or, if you please, on the night before Christmas, in a fierce snowstorm, men from Kolodziej strangled a guard in the Kurasovsky forest in order to divide the rope taken from the dead man for some witchcraft purposes.
But what especially struck the main character of the story, Kuzma, was that the village itself did not believe what it was doing. They strangled a man because of a rope, but did they believe in this rope? Oh, weak! This absurd and terrible deed was committed with merciless cruelty, but without faith, without firmness... “Yes, they have no faith in anything. “Everything has degenerated...” he adds sadly. Painting a picture of the village with these very colors, Bunin makes it clear that he does not see in Russia the force that can unite the Slavic peoples under the common faith of Orthodoxy, and does not share the opinion of the Slav-lovers. His life path is proof of this. After all, from emigration (France), he saw even more clearly what was happening in his homeland, setting out his thoughts in a manifesto on the tasks of the Russian Abroad “Mission of the Russian Emigration”. This gives us everything every right call Bunin an opponent of the Slavophile attitude towards the peasants.
The picture of village life that Bunin paints is bleak, the peasant’s psyche is bleak, even at the moments of the highest rise of social struggle, and the prospects for the future among these dead fields blocked by lead clouds are also bleak. The idiocy of village life is closely connected with the very way of village life, with village labor, with a narrow outlook, with the isolation and isolation of the interests and life of the village.
Bunin himself said this to a correspondent of one of the Odessa newspapers: “There was a lot of rumors and rumors about my last story “Village”. Most critics have completely missed my point. I was accused of being embittered towards the Russian people, they reproached me for my noble attitude towards the people, etc. And all this because I look at the situation of the Russian people rather bleakly. But what to do if the modern Russian village does not give reason for optimism, but, on the contrary, plunges into hopeless pessimism...”
Conclusion
Ivan Bunin village story
In the story “The Village” (Bunin also called it a novel), the author broke the tradition of “pink” love of the people and showed a new type of folk, peasant, “earthly” personality. The Bunin village, in its spiritual and vitality, not only bore fruit, but was also doomed to self-disintegration - economic and religious. The author showed true pictures of decline, impoverishment and at the same time aggravation social conflicts in a pre-revolutionary village.
The descriptions of nature are symbolic: winter, a blizzard are adjacent to a gloomy episode of an unwanted and incomprehensible wedding for many. Chaos, lack of harmony - all this manifests itself not only in interpersonal relationships in the village, but also in nature itself, which seems to echo everything that is happening.
And, of course, one cannot consider the story “Village” as a description of some specific place in Russia, where the described events could have occurred. The author’s text contains words of amazing precision that convey to the reader the meaning and scale of the work: “...Russia? Yes, it’s all a village...” This is how powerfully, truthfully and clearly Bunin gave his assessment of Russia and the time in which he lived. The work does not have a sharp, tightly twisted plot, but, as Tvardovsky puts it, it has great “thickness and density.” vital material"from the time of the first Russian revolution, and the images of peasants are endowed with features of such individuality that you forget that this is not real people, but the fruit of the author's imagination. The story “The Village” is one of the most significant works of the early 20th century, and I.A. Bunin is one of the brightest representatives literary galaxy late XIX– XX beginning of the century.
Bibliography
1. Bunin I.A. Antonov apples (novels and short stories) – Soviet Russia, M.: 1990
2. Kazak V. Lexikon of Russian literature of the 20th century = LexikonderrussischenLiteraturab 1917. - M.: RIK "Culture", 1996.
3. Mramornov O. About the book by Yu. Maltsev “Bunin” New world, №9, 1995
4. Nichiporov I. I.A. Bunin. Essay on creativity Rustrana.Ru, 07/19/2007
5. Smirnova L. I.A. Bunin “Russian literature of the late XIX - early XX centuries”, M.: Prosveshchenie, 1993
6. Sahakyants A. About Bunin and his prose. Preface to the collection of stories M.: Pravda, 1983
The main goal that the author set for himself was to reproduce exactly those incidents and events that affected Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century. Ivan Alekseevich showed the people in all their glory, without softening the nature of what was happening one bit. The work is a kind of psychological analysis, which was based on village life, which was quite familiar to the author himself.
The action described in the story takes place on the territory Russian Empire in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The main characters of the story are brothers who were born in a village with the discreet name “Durnovka”. Their names are Tikhon and Kuzma, and the surname of the main characters is Krasov.
At a young age, they are actively involved in trading and have excellent attitudes. But, at a certain moment, a quarrel arises between them, and they break off relations, practically ceasing to communicate with each other. Their roads diverge in different directions.
After parting, Tikhon decides to open a tavern and shop. At the same time, he buys land for pennies, and also acquires and sells the landowner’s grain. Of course, such activity brings him wealth and prosperity over time. He has a lot of money and decides to purchase a manor estate. The author notes that success in the financial direction does not bring Tikhon happiness and joy. He got married, but could not have children, since his wife constantly gave birth to still babies. That is why, having reached his fiftieth birthday, he realizes that he has no heirs at all and there is simply no one to continue his activities. He realizes that he has wasted his years of life and, as he approaches old age, he begins to drink heavily.
Kuzma, after a quarrel with his brother, led a completely different life. Even earlier, from his very childhood, he dreamed of getting a decent education. Knowing how to read and write, he begins to try himself in a variety of literature. This leads to the fact that Kuzma not only gets acquainted with the works of various writers, but also begins to write stories and poems. He even managed to publish own book. After re-reading his publication, he realizes that his work is imperfect. In addition, the books brought in virtually no income. That is why he also becomes disillusioned with his life, and like his brother, he begins to drink heavily. Strange thoughts constantly crept into Kuzma’s head - either he wanted to commit suicide, or he decided to devote the rest of his life to a monastery.
As old age approaches, both brothers realize that they absolutely cannot live without each other. It is precisely such deplorable and unsuccessful life moments that lead them to reconciliation.
Tikhon decides to take Kuzma with him and appoints him as manager of his rich house; his brother willingly agrees to work as manager of the estate.
Upon returning to his native village of Durnovka, where the brothers lived since birth, Kuzma experiences true relief and gladly begins to fulfill his direct duties as a manager. But after some time, Kuzma again becomes bored and sad. Conversations with his brother were rare; this was not enough for him. During the communication between Tikhon and Kuzma, only those issues that were business-oriented were discussed.
The author especially highlights the cook Avdotya, who lived on the estate. She did not pay any attention to Kuzma and this depressed him very much. The silent woman unwittingly made the manager’s life even worse and only increased the feeling of complete loneliness.
At a certain moment, Kuzma accidentally learns a secret that the cook Avdotya had been hiding for a long time. This woman had previously had an affair with his brother due to the fact that my own wife Tikhon could not have children. But this attempt by Tikhon to acquire offspring was not crowned with success. Avdotya also failed to become pregnant from her owner.
Every person in the village knew about this connection. That is why no one wanted to marry her. Avdotya was disgraced throughout the village.
In order to at least a little atone for his guilt before the cook, Tikhon promises her to find a husband. But it seems that the owner does not really care how the woman will feel in marriage. He seduces a real monster with a good dowry. When Kuzma finds out who exactly Avdotya's husband is planned to be, he refuses to participate in organizing the wedding event.
This man has a very sad character, he regularly beats his father, the old man is constantly beaten. But Avdotya has no other choice, and she agrees with the proposed solution. Kuzma, after a long pause, also agrees with Tikhon’s choice.
The wedding celebration was organized in February. The bride was constantly in tears. Kuzma also could not hold back his tears during the blessing of Avdotya’s bride. The guests invited to the celebration did not pay any attention to the fact that the bride was crying and behaved in the same way as people usually behave at celebrations in the village - they drank strong drinks and had fun freely.
Characteristics of the Krasov brothers
The images of the brothers created by the writer are completely different life values. Tikhon is almost completely sure that the main joy of a person is the presence large sum Money, which allows you to do whatever your heart desires. Kuzma believes that happiness is a quality education and knowledge of the fundamentals of the universe. The rich brother managed to achieve a lot during his activities - he earned a lot of money, became a very respectable person and respected by many people. The only thing he could not achieve was immortality, which every person receives after the appearance of heirs. After Tikhon's death, there will be nothing left. The memory of this person will simply be erased from his face.
The second brother, Kuzma, also failed to achieve what he wanted during his life. Yes, he received an education, but this scholarship could not bring him wealth, fame, and also deprived him of respect from others.
Both brothers, looking back on the years they have lived, can only observe sad consequences. Both main characters of the plot reached a dead end and turned out to be completely unnecessary - both for themselves and for those around them.
Characteristics of the cook Avdotya
In the work “The Village,” the author pays special attention to the life situation in which the cook Avdotya found herself. She lives in a village and is completely subordinate to the foundations formed in the area. Avdotya was used for his own purposes by the main character, Tikhon. This made her even more unhappy and ruined the woman’s whole life. Krasov understood perfectly well what he was doing, because in any case this woman would have been disgraced. Even if she gave birth, her reputation would be irreparably damaged. But such arguments could not stop a prudent and wealthy man. When he tried to atone for his mistakes, he ended up doing even worse - adding grief to the girl after the shame she had previously suffered.
The character traits of the heroine and obedience to her master turned Avdotya into a slave, as well as a victim of circumstances. IN in this case there was no longer any use in resisting. Adhering to established traditions, the unhappy, downtrodden cook agrees with all decisions made by outsiders. She is ready to perceive trouble in all its manifestations and accepts them as inevitable blows from the fateful horn.
The image of Avdotya is closed from the outside world, she stops communicating, becomes silent and indifferent to everyone around her. She does not know what love and affection are, as she is accustomed to being treated poorly by others.
Even in Kuzma, a guest of the estate, she sees another master, whose will she is obliged to unconditionally carry out. The cook does not notice at all that the main guest of their house himself needs help. And no less than herself.
All the main characters of the story “The Village” are unhappy. This is not a coincidence. Bunin shows that despite different life values, in general the Russian people are deeply unhappy.
At the center of the story Kuzma Krasov
Image of Russia Writer in the story "Village"
Why is E. Zamyatin’s novel “We” written in the form of the main character’s diary?
The novel “We” played an important role in the life and work of Yevgeny Zamyatin. The fact is that this novel could not be published in Russia. It ends up in Prague, where it is published in Czech in 1920. In 1924, an English translation of the novel from Czech appeared. For the first time in Russian, the novel “We” was published in 1927 in Prague in the magazine “Will of Russia”.
In the novel they rise the most important problems human life. The novel is written in the form of a confession, a diary. The main problem is a person's search for happiness. It is this search for happiness that leads human society to the form of existence depicted in the novel. But even this form of universal happiness turns out to be imperfect, since this happiness is grown by incubation, contrary to the laws of organic development.
The novel is written in the dystopian genre. This is one of the most popular genres of that period in literature. The world conceived by the author should seem to be perfect and absolutely satisfy all the people who live in it. But this is a world of technocracy, where a person is a cog in a huge mechanism.
Important characteristic single state becomes the motif of a machine, a mechanism.
The whole life of a person is subject to mathematical laws, measured mathematical quantities and scheduled strictly by the hour.
In my opinion, the form of diary entries implies optimal frankness. The frankness is much stronger than with a simple first-person narration. That is, no one ever lies in the diary.
The novel in the form of a diary allows you to feel the depth of the author’s experiences and trace the irreversible changes in his inner world.
Diary best form storytelling to express your personal thoughts and feelings.
“No nonsense, no ridiculous metaphors, no feelings: just facts. Because I’m healthy, I’m completely, absolutely healthy... Some kind of splinter was pulled out of my head, my head is light, empty..."
Zamyatin clearly and convincingly showed how a conflict arises between the human personality and the inhuman social order, a conflict that sharply contrasts dystopia with idyllic, descriptive utopia.
Given to you by dispassionate measure
Measure everything you see…
The image of Russia in I. Bunin’s story “The Village”.
“Bunin’s “Village” shocked us with the bleakness of its pictures of folk life, its staging general issues about the fate of Russia, which was torn apart from within, especially after the revolution of 1905, by irreconcilable contradictions” “No one has taken a village so deeply, so historically…” – Gorky wrote to the author. At the center of the story Tikhon and Kuzma, two siblings who adhere to different positions in life. Tikhon was firmly convinced that the most durable and reliable thing in the world is money, which gives prosperity, well-being, and confidence in the future. Endowed with a strong character, strong will, peasant ingenuity and hard work, this descendant of a serf becomes the owner of the Durnovo estate. In order to achieve his goal, Tikhon subordinated his entire life to the pursuit of wealth. On this path, he has to make deals with his conscience and be tough towards his fellow villagers. Marriage for profit does not bring Tikhon family happiness, for he is even deprived of the joy of fatherhood. He has no heirs to whom he could pass on the wealth accumulated over his entire life. The hero's personal drama is aggravated by social discord, when seemingly unshakable foundations collapse. Tikhon Krasov is deeply amazed that in the fertile black earth region there can be hunger, ruin and poverty. “The owner should come here, the owner!” - he thinks. His brother Kuzma blames the government “empty talkers” for this, who “trampled and killed the people.” Kuzma Krasov characterized by a different understanding of life. This hero is presented to the reader as a truth-seeker, a people's poet who is trying to understand and comprehend the tragedy of his people, their misfortune and guilt. Condemning the atrocities of the ruling circles, Kuzma painfully perceives the poverty, backwardness, darkness of the peasantry, and their inability to rationally organize their lives. Tikhon and Kuzma Krasov are extraordinary and strong natures, persistently searching for the meaning and purpose of life. But whether they find him is another question... The author’s own thoughts about hopeless life in the village haunt us throughout the entire story. For example, they are clearly felt in the dialogue between Tikhon Krasov and his brother Kuzma. Tikhon says: “Sit in the village, sip some gray cabbage soup, vilify the thin bast shoes!” “Laptey! - Kuzma responds somewhere - For the second thousand years, brother, he’s been dragging them around, damn them three times! Who is to blame? The reader is faced with a truly serious question in scope, the answer to which cannot be a statement based on one’s own everyday experience, but on the generalizing experience of generations of predecessors.
The end of the story seems too simple and does not follow from the actions of the main characters: the wedding of Deniska and Molodoy. Deniska is a slacker, she got used to it. The young woman was a widow, a cook, with whom Tikhon lived. But such an ending has a general meaning: the triumph of everyday life, vulgarity.
Image of Russia- one of the central ones in the prose and poetic works of I. A. Bunin. He never severed internal ties with Russia, he lived and worked with love for it. This love is already evident in the writer’s early prose. So, in the story “Antonov Apples” he admires the beauty native nature. Writer sad for the fading splendor of noble estates, nostalgically depicts their life. However, sadness about Russia's past is combined with a sense of inevitable change. in the story "Village" I. A. Bunin describes provincial Russia, speaks of terrible poverty, the physical and moral consequences of an unjust structure of life. Here are three guards in a huge garden. They sleep on damp straw, under the canopy of a rotten hut. Everyone is sick - fever, consumption, night blindness. Because of their illnesses, they are angry at everything, including the hospital, where they were not helped, and they speak badly about each other. But nothing, according to the author, can destroy the humanity in a Russian peasant: to Kuzma’s surprise, the guards, without knowing him, invite him to their simple dinner. The author reflected not only the bright features of the national character, but also its inconsistency, chaos, and “variegation.” Bunin is confident that Russia’s problems are rooted precisely in the spiritual, and not in the material, sphere. Modernity, the war with Japan, the revolution are reflected in the story only indirectly, as if in passing; its main material, as usual with Bunin, is everyday life, everyday life, in which, according to the author’s plan, one can see the image of Durnovka, the entire Russian village, and therefore the entire Russia. Bunin sees Russia exactly like that - as a country of villages. The idea of the author of the story is to portray the Russian people without idealization, the Russian soul - in its “tragic foundations.” Describing the rudeness, envy, hostility, and cruelty of the peasants, Bunin never allows himself an accusatory tone; he is extremely truthful and objective. However, this is not a cold statement of reality, but pity and compassion for the “rushing and unfortunate.” Only a truly Russian could write about Russia like that.\
1. Brief biography of A.I. Bunin.
2. Rich traditions of Russian literature.
3. The image of the beloved homeland in works.
4. Concerns about the “soul of the Russian person.”
5. "Village". Reality and poverty.
6. The writer’s worries about the future of Russia.
...Russia?.. Yes, it’s all a village...
I. A. Bunin
I. A. Bunin is one of the representatives of Russian realistic art literary prose and one of the greatest poets in Russia at the beginning of the century. The writer was born on October 22, 1870 in the city of Voronezh, in the family of an impoverished landowner. Bunin's father belonged to an old noble family. His mother played a significant role in the life and in shaping the inner world of the future writer. She loved Russian literature very much and she passed this love on to her son. The writer learned to read quite early. He grew up as an impressionable boy and from childhood had a bright and unusually varied imagination. In 1881, Bunin entered the gymnasium in Yelets, where he studied for only five years. Due to the fact that his family did not have sufficient funds, Bunin had to complete his gymnasium course at home and on his own. As a result, the future writer did not even manage to receive a gymnasium education, although this state of affairs did not in any way affect future fate writer. Bunin's work is noted unusual originality and complete independence, although he relied on the rich traditions of Russian literature. So the writers - A. S. Pushkin, A. K. Tolstoy, F. N. Tyutchev, A. A. Fet, A. N. Maikov, I. S. Nikitin, Ya. P. Polonsky - left an indelible mark on the soul writer, and their poetry is, as it were, part of the artistic world of Bunin himself. The writer’s book of poems “Under open air"is a diary dedicated to the seasons from the first and barely noticeable signs of spring to winter landscapes, where the image of the beloved homeland becomes obvious and more obvious:
Under the sky of deathly lead
The winter day is gloomily fading,
And there is no end to the pine forests,
And far from the villages.
One fog is milky blue,
Like someone's gentle sadness,
Above this snowy...
Generally for Bunin average Russia, where he spent all his childhood and youth, is a place that sank very deeply into the writer’s soul. He knew that it was the middle zone of Russia that showed the best Russian writers. A. A. Blok once said about the writer’s love for Russian nature: “Few people can know and love nature as I. A. Bunin can. Thanks to this love, the poet looks vigilantly and far away, and his colorful and sound impressions are rich.”
Bunin brought a lot of new things into literature by creating his works: “Village” (1910), “Sukhodol” (191 1), “Village Man” (1911), “ A good life"(1911), "Night Conversation" (1911), "Ignat" (1912), "Thin Grass" (1913), "The Cup of Life" (1913). The main thing that worried the writer was “the soul of the Russian man in in a deep sense, an image of the mental traits of a Slav,” and most importantly, how he lived and under what conditions. The writer became most famous for his realistic novels and short stories - “Village”, “Merry Yard”, “Night Conversation”, “Sukhodol”. According to the writer himself, these works “sharply depicted the Russian soul, its peculiar interweavings, its light and dark, but almost always tragic foundations.”
In 1910, the story “The Village” was published, which caused serious controversy and became the starting point for Bunin’s greater popularity. The writer's story was very realistic, it captured all the richness of his colors and observations, the beauty of the language, and most importantly the truthfulness of life. About the realistic story “The Village” M. Gorky wrote: “I know that when the stupefaction and confusion passes... then serious people will say: “In addition to its first artistic value, I. A. Bunin’s “Village” was the impetus that made the broken and the shaken Russian society is no longer seriously thinking about the peasant, not about the people, but about the strict question - to be or not to be Russia.”
Bunin portrays the village as a beggar, and the very picture of life in the village is absolutely bleak. And even at the moment of the highest rise of social struggle there is no hope for improvement, no development among the dead fields. The poverty of village life is connected with its way of life, with peasant labor, with a very small outlook, with isolation and isolation of the interests of its inhabitants and way of life. Bunin describes the village of that time in the following way: “White grain rushed obliquely, falling on a black, poor village, on bumpy, dirty roads, on horse manure, ice and water; the twilight fog hid the endless fields.” In December 1910, Gorky wrote to Bunin: “...No one has taken the village so deeply, so historically... I don’t see what your thing can be compared with, I was touched by it - very much. This modestly hidden, muffled groan about my native land is dear to me, noble sorrow is dear, painful fear for it - and all this is new.”
Poverty permeates every area of every person's life. In the story “The Cheerful Courtyard,” Anisya Minaeva, half-fainting from hunger, has been going to her unlucky son for quite a long time, she is trying in every possible way to overcome her weakness and eats the smallest blades of grass. Her reasoning about how she would like the peas to be ripe already, and she could secretly eat her fill. Such pipe dreams of the heroines of Bunin’s stories fully confirm and show the poverty that existed in those days. And the worst thing here is that the richest, black-earth region has not brought fruit for many years, and endless hunger is completely tormenting the people. This poverty contrasts greatly with a small but rich group of people: landowners, kulaks. All of Russia is famous for its grain trade, and only the richest part of the country eats this bread to their fill.
In his story “The Village,” the writer tried to show the thoughts and feelings of his characters, to reveal them from the inside. The writer depicted the real realities of that poor life and the way of life of people, and it was in all this that the tragedy of that everyday life lay. Bunin is also concerned about the future of the entire country and the future of the peasants. The writer managed to truthfully show in the story the inertia, rudeness, and lack of culture of the Russian inhabitants. All these were negative aspects of village life. Exactly in this real description In reality lies the true strength of the Bunin village. Gorky wrote about the story “The Village”: “This is a work of a historical nature; we have never written about a village like that.”
Bunin's talent is enormous, and it was appreciated not only by the writer's contemporaries, but also by ordinary readers. The writer’s work was likened to “matte silver”, the language that he mastered and used so skillfully was called “brocade”, and that objective psychological analysis was called “an icy razor”. L.N. Tolstoy himself spoke about fine arts writer: “It’s written in a way that I. S. Turgenev would not have written, and there’s nothing to say about me.”
Bunin’s harsh lines about the serf past of Russian peasants date back to 1907:
Who knows
Are their names simple? We lived in fear
They died in obscurity.
Sometimes chains were forged in the village,
They were driving to the settlement. Didn't subside
Monotonous woman's cry - and again
Days of labor, humility and fear passed...
“Russia is a special country; Russia has its own path of development. Russia has a great word ahead - it will tell the world
its new word: these are the provisions that express the soul of the social and spiritual movement over the last hundred years of the history of Russian identity in the 19th century, here is the history of Russian liberation movement. To hope for a future century is to hope for a bright future.
Herzen was saved by faith in socialism, in the ideal.
Yes, the purpose of the Russian person is undoubtedly pan-European and worldwide. Dostoevsky.
Propagandists, heroes, fighters, martyrs.”
Very interesting post. Dunin found the country at a moment when faith in the communal ideal, in the possibility of rebuilding folk life on an artel basis - has dried up. The alienness of such motives to the peasantry became obvious. As well as the futility of the activities of the populist “heroes, fighters, martyrs.” But hope for the future, the expectation of a “new century” that they foresaw, intensified. The writer wanted to understand what the man himself was striving for, what the self-awareness of the broad masses was at a turning point. The appeal to the “Russian soul” and its contradictions was, one might say, forced. Where, if not in its depths, can one see how historically developed and presently born needs relate? An attempt has been made to clarify the heterogeneous internal state people. The author did not openly express his thoughts, but “verified” them in the experience of the main and countless minor characters"Villages".
The coincidence, of course, is not accidental. The gaze of Bunin and Gorky was focused on the spiritual state of the people with one goal - to quickly determine the leading trends current life. But herein lies the reason for the divergence of writers. Gorky saw a bright prospect - overcoming passivity, disunity of the masses, their unification in building a new world. Bunin denied the possibility of any dramatic changes. Nevertheless, in his sincere and demanding love for the Motherland, he painfully perceived the sad consequences of the powerless situation of the peasants - their anarchic self-will or weakness of will and thoughts. Bunin's conclusions were pessimistic. But they were “directed” precisely towards those flawed phenomena that Gorky meticulously comprehended. Both couldn't help but feel a strong attraction to each other.
The closest relationship between Bunin and Gorky developed during their meetings in Capri. During this period, Bunin wrote novels and short stories: “Village” (1910), “Sukhodol” (1911),
stories “Night Conversation” (1911), “Merry Yard” (1911), “Zakhar Vorobyov” (1912), “Ignat” (1912). And Gorky publishes the just completed “Confession”, “Summer”, continues the “Okurov” duology, creates new stories from the cycle “Across Rus'”. Despite all the differences, the ideas about the fate of the people of the two authors had an undoubted internal connection with each other.
Recently, Ninov’s interesting book “Maxim Gorky and Iv. Bunin. History of relationships - problems of creativity." It is lively and detailed, involving large quantity documents trace the acquaintance in Yalta in 1899, the rapprochement and polemics of two contemporaries.
Bunin visited Capri several times when Gorky lived there: in March - April 1909, April - May 1910; lived from November 1911 to February 17, 1912, then from November 1912 to March 1913. According to Ninov, already at their first date, Bunin was carried away by Gorky’s thoughts about Russia, in particular the speeches of the old man Jonah from “Confession”. After leaving Capri, Bunin wrote to Gorky. “... returned to what you advised to return to - to the story about the village. And now your old man especially hurts me. Ah, this very Rus' and its history!”1 In “The Village,” Bunin, heeding Gorky’s advice, responded to his exclamation about “this very Rus' and its history” and to Jonah’s reasoning about the “great martyr - the people.” And then he developed this theme in “Sukhodol” and stories. During meetings with Gorky, the conversations were unusually lively, often turning into an argument. The works of both writers read here were heatedly discussed.
Bunin, as follows from his responses, was attracted by Gorky’s “Confession”, “Okurov Town”, and individual stories. He highly appreciated the tragic pictures of Russian life depicted by Gorky, with its ruined talents and latent moral forces. In the same place where Gorky showed the awakening of ordinary Russia (especially “Summer”, then “The Life of Matvey Kozhemyakin”), Bunin felt a beginning alien to himself.
Gorky also approached Bunin’s creations in a differentiated manner. He received the “village” enthusiastically. “And I see many advantages in this story, it worries me to the depths of my soul. Almost every page has something close to it, I can’t find words so worthy of Russian! The writer Ivan Bunin is of good blood and must take care of himself,” wrote Gorky to the author of “The Village.” And later: “I don’t see what your thing can be compared with, I was very touched by it. This modestly hidden, muffled groan about my native land is dear to me, noble sorrow is dear, painful fear for it - and all this is new.” Gorky was very impressed by the stories “The Good Life”, “The Cricket”, “Night Conversation”, “On the Road”. The story “Zakhar Vorobyov” evoked admiration. But the grim story of the death of mother and son in Bunin's story“The Merry Yard” gave rise to Gorky’s most unpleasant thoughts. He wrote to his first wife Peshkova after reading this story by Bunin: “All this is extremely beautifully done, but it makes a depressing impression. Listened to: Kotsyubinsky, who has a bad heart, Cheremnov - tuberculosis, Zolotarev - a man who cannot find himself, and me - my brain hurts, in my head, and in all my bones. Then they argued for a long time about the Russian people and their destinies...”
Regarding the story “Sukhodol,” as Kotsyubinsky testified, there was also a heated debate. Gorky could not react otherwise to the hopeless, from his point of view, coloring of many of Bunin’s works.
Communication between writers has repeatedly become difficult. Ninov cites a letter from Bunin dated February 1912, stored in the State literary museum Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev (Eagle), where relations with Gorky are called “coldly amiable and painfully friendly.” The disputes, however, did not affect Bunin and Gorky’s recognition of each other’s talent.
In February 1912, Alexey Maksimovich writes to Kachalov about Bunin: “You know, he began to write prose in such a way that if they say about him: this is the best stylist of our time, there will be no exaggeration.” Gorky not only retained this view, but also propagated it until the end of his life.
Bunin more than once gave the most flattering assessment of Gorky's achievements, and at those moments when the writer was subjected to harsh criticism. In 1910, to talk about Gorky’s separation from his homeland and the decline of his talent, Bunin sharply objected: “Personally, I continue to believe that Gorky’s very large artistic talent remains at the same height. Alexey Maksimovich spent his entire life in Russia and managed to absorb an abundance of impressions and knowledge of his native country. In addition, I generally consider the attempt to connect the decline or development of talent with isolation or attachment to one’s native land to be unsuccessful. Maxim Gorky at one time was a writer in Russia, but his talent is evolving, and, in my opinion, Gorky is moving towards ceasing to be an exclusively Russian writer and taking the position of a writer of universal humanity” (Odessa News, - 1910 - December 16). Bunin spoke with great warmth about his stay in Capri (1913), defended Gorky (1916) from attacks on his article “Two Souls”. In fairness, it must be added that while in exile, Bunin changed his attitude towards Gorky and negatively assessed his previous impressions of the writer.
Considerable experience has now been accumulated in comparative characteristics works of Bunin and Gorky about Russia. Convincing parallels are drawn between such works of writers as “Village” and “Summer” by Bunin, “Town of Butts” by Gorky, their common and deeply different features are revealed. The similarity of their work lies in merciless realism, rejection of the ugly sides of Russian reality, and discovery of the sources of its contradictions. Discrepancies - in understanding the move national history: according to Bunin, unpromising, fatally doomed; according to I Orky, accumulating strength, already entering a new period of ascent. Researchers have identified the opposite interpretation by writers of figures typical for Russia. They compared the “truth seekers”: Bunin’s heroes Kuzma Krasov, the “bazaar philosopher” Balashkin and Gorky’s Yakov Tiunov. Deniska Sery from the story “The Village” and Yegor Trofimov, the character of “Summer,” were no less expressively related, born in the “dead corners” of the country, but who also tasted the urban experience. The similar reaction of Bunin and Gorky to money-grubbers and property owners is correctly noted.
The main conclusion that researchers come to is that contemporary artists perceived the revolutionary events differently. Where Gorky saw a sign of the rebirth of the world, Bunin saw only senseless self-will, a spontaneous impulse. This point of view is based on the judgments of Bunin himself. He explained any manifestations of his people by their nature, formed in the dark, difficult life of the past. While working on the story “Sukhodol,” Bunin wrote that he “is not interested in men in themselves, but in the soul of Russian people in general (...), in the depiction of the features of the Slav’s psyche.” Bunin’s answer to the questionnaire “The World War and the Creative Forces of Russia” is known: “The deep soil principles of national psychology sharply contradict the practical, sober construction way of life.”
And yet, yet... It is impossible to equate statements with a complex work of art by a writer. One cannot help but feel the deeply polemical subtext of “The Village” in relation to the behavior of not only the peasant masses, but also the main character, the kind and wise Kuzma Krasov. Usually, no distinction is made between his thoughts and the author's thoughts. And then everything is simple. From Kuzma’s statements it is easy to derive Bunin’s concept. And in it a considerable place is devoted to criticism of this character. The creator of the story strived for the ideal human existence, which his hero, Kuzma, never found. Bunin debunks not the generally contradictory nature of the Russian peasant, but precisely those traits of his that prevented his dream from coming true. In this, Bunin is close to Gorky.
Kuzma, the bearer of moral qualities dear to Bunin, painfully perceives the fate of the village and his bitter lot. Dark impressions give rise to a craving for bright souls. And Kuzma sees them. Twice the story depicts his chance meeting with peasants who have “joyful eyes,” a “wonderfully kind” or “kindly exhausted” face, and a voice of “sweet readiness.” The scenes of Kuzma’s conversations with Odnodvorka, her son, who are modest, submissive, bringing goodness and love, are filled with special warmth. But these people seem to get lost among the senselessly cruel, coldly indifferent “Durnovites.”
The theme of Kuzma’s sad farewell to his past bright aspirations acquires a symbolic resonance towards the end of the story. The world surrounding Kuzma also acquires, by the will of the author, a generalizing meaning, imparting a special completeness to the tragic premonitions of the protagonist of “The Village”: “The sun had set, in the house with neglected gray windows there was a dim light, there was a gray twilight, it was unsociable and cold. The bullfinch, hanging in a cage near the window into the garden, died, lay upside down, feathers fluffed, red goiter inflated. “Ready!” - Kuzma said and took the bullfinch to throw it away.
Durnovka, covered with snow, so distant to the whole world on this sad evening in the middle of the steppe winter, suddenly terrified him. It's over! The burning head is cloudy and heavy, he’s about to lie down and won’t get up again...” The entire narrative, where almost every detail (frozen bullfinch, a tall ugly horse, fog “hiding the fields, eating up the snow,” etc.) has both concrete everyday significance and symbolic meaning.
Bunin is close not only to sad observations, the spirit of search, wandering and close fusion with Kuzma’s homeland, but also to his “deadly melancholy” on the eve of the impending catastrophe - the death of peasant Russia. And yet, we repeat, there is no identity between the positions of Kuzma and the writer.
About Kuzma we read: “... he went completely wild in Durnovka - he often did not wash his face, did not take off his tunic all day, and drank from the same bowl with Koshel. But the worst thing was that, fearing his existence, which was erasing him by leaps and bounds, he felt that it was still pleasant to him, that he seemed to have returned to that very rut that, perhaps, and it belonged to him from birth: it was not for nothing, apparently, that the blood of Durnovites flowed in him!” At first glance, this behavior of the hero is proof of the inner “guilt” of Kuzma, who inherited all the vicious qualities of the “Durnovites”. But is it? I think not.
Bunin repeatedly speaks of the unity of the small, musty village world from “ big land”, conveys images that deeply excite Kuzma: “the snow-gray expanse, the winter-blue distances seemed boundless, beautiful, like in a picture,” the smell of locomotive smoke, reminiscent of “what cities, people, newspapers, news exist in the world.” From the point of view of these inviting spaces, the pain Kuzma experienced from their appearance, his “savagery” is interpreted as a tragic loss of high
natural capabilities of a person, and not at all as an innate property. Behind the layer of thoughts of the characters, a complex structure of the author's conclusions is revealed.
Kuzma’s resignation to Durnov’s vegetation was logically prepared by the entire course of his life. Any period of it involves a painful state for Kuzma of contradictory ideas about the past and the present - about existence. In a dispute with everyone - Balashkin, Tikhon, Molodoy - is the main character of the story, who never achieves an answer to important questions. He is unable to get closer to the truth. And the reason here is not in a person, but outside him.
“Kuzma dreamed of learning and writing all his life,” but “in a country with more than a hundred million illiterate people,” he, like other self-taught people, remained “enlightened by nature without science.” The writer perceives this human situation with deep sympathy and at the same time with caustic irony towards those who were proud of such “enlightenment”. Later, Kuzma, traveling and observing his fellow countrymen, also remarks, not without a grin: “Creativity!.. Cave times, God forbid, cave times.”
In a passionate but futile pursuit of knowledge, Kuzma passes, as if as a punishment, through a gauntlet of people who do not have even a primitive understanding of what is happening. In the scene of the hero’s conversation with himself “from the outside,” words are heard that sum up the sad conclusion of his life: “For whom and why does this thin tradesman, already graying from hunger and strict thoughts, live in the world, who calls himself an anarchist and cannot really explain what does that mean he’s an anarchist?” This author’s reasoning anticipates and largely explains the frenzied confession of Kuzma himself at the end of his days: “I thought one thing: I don’t know anything about him and I don’t know how to think!.. I’m not learned!..”
Wild peasant life, the collapsing way of life in villages, and the unrest that swept through, indeed, led the writer to the idea of the contradictions of the “Russian soul.” But they deepened the author’s painful bewilderment about those merciless forces, by the will of which Kuzma “is not taught to think,” in a country of “more than a hundred million illiterate people,” children are taught by a soldier who, “stupid by nature,” “was completely confused in the service.” . And adults simply don’t know how to listen to each other. It is from the point of view of the peasants’ unpreparedness for a reasonable perception of the world that Bunin evaluates the revolutionary events that he did not accept. Deniska is ridiculous, carrying around with him, along with a songbook and tabloid books, the brochure “The Role of the Proletariat in Russia.” The rebellious men who “screamed around the district... burned and destroyed several estates, and then fell silent” are funny and pathetic. The writer, who denies the ideas of social struggle, certainly condemns the actions of the rebels here. Nevertheless, it is not at all by chance that haste, thoughtlessness and impulsiveness of actions are shaded everywhere.
Bunin saw in the soul of the Russian person an interweaving of self-will and passivity. This motif is in “The Village”. However, the story expresses a much more tragic concept of life. The insurmountably unconscious severance of any, primarily spiritual, connections between people lies the essence of Durnov’s vegetation - a mechanical, blind movement “in a circle.” Painting recreated by the writer national life did not at all correspond to the real state of affairs. For this, as you know, Borovsky criticized the story. But the absolutization of the ugly phenomena of reality is closely intertwined with the author’s objectively relevant thought about the inadmissibility, inhumanity of the current world order, about the need to awaken the consciousness of the masses captured by the elements. The writer saw only the prospect of this process in the area of moral revival, completely excluding the possibility of social self-determination of the peasantry.
The final chapters of the story are often interpreted erroneously: “Bunin closes the circle of his evidence of the historical guilt of the people” (Kucherovsky). Indeed, here the knot of Durnovsky contradictions is tightening. Everyone, except, perhaps, Tikhon, who is “shaking the dust from his feet” of his native village, finds himself on the brink of death and does nothing to save himself. But it is precisely this state that becomes the starting point for the conclusion (which sounds in the subtext) about the injustice of what is happening. The main spokesman for such experiences is Kuzma.
Over time, Kuzma increasingly feels united with the destinies of the Durnovites, at the same time sometimes with pain, sometimes indifferently understands loneliness, his own and those around him. A world terrible in its incomprehensible confusion opens up to him. These sentiments permeate all the episodes of the third part of the story. Dates and farewells to the “old testament man”, Ivanushka, who has long lost all understanding of reality. Kuzma's illness with her delirium about the affection of her daughter Klava and agonizing expectations of Molodoy's care. Finally, difficult relationships with Molodoy, the story of her wedding with Deniska. This marriage itself - a symbol of the union of the incompatible - plunges Kuzma into a new, hitherto unfamiliar “dull melancholy.” The shocks for a second make him and the unfortunate bride allies: “... horror flashed in their eyes, meeting for a moment.” So even the pitiful hope of calm is irrevocably destroyed.
Kuzma's mental pain is intensified by the author's empathy. It is expressed in everything - in a kind of intensification of drama, in depressing colors and symbolic detailing of scenes, in the repetition of individual tragic-sounding motifs. Here - (completion of the theme of a suffering people, grief over their inability to resist evil, the death of trampled beauty (The young bride in the crown was “even more beautiful and deader”), deep: sympathy for those who longed for salvation for the outcasts,
pessimistic forecast of the future. But everything is permeated by a familiar mood - bewilderment at the meaninglessness of what is happening. “You still have to get married someday,” says Deniska. “Now it’s too late... It’s not going to turn out so bad,” Molodaya echoes him, responding to Kuzma’s proposal to break the union, which dooms the future husband and wife to mutual hatred.
The story is crowned with the image of a terrible element - an “impenetrable blizzard” covering “ White light", "the sound of the wind." With him, with this beginningless and endless tornado, merges the same movement of horses, not controlled by anyone, rushing into the “violent dark mud,” taking the tear-stained, half-dead Young One to nowhere. The final picture exudes completely different (than, say, Kuzma’s previous observations) forebodings. He himself loses his grasp on reality. Here, apparently, lies the idea of universal doom. And the Durnovites are perceived as pitiful grains of sand in a deadly whirlwind they do not understand (an idea that would later form the basis of many of Bunin’s works on a “non-Russian” theme).. It can hardly be said that in this way the writer “punishes” the village. Rather, it’s the other way around: the flawed, “blind” souls of the Durnovites are one of the manifestations of global vices that the disunited peasant mass cannot and does not know how to resist. This is where the image of a cosmic storm comes from as an expression of a complex set of author’s experiences.
Bunin's appeal to the supposedly primordial substance of the national character is quite understandable. The writer was very sensitive to spiritual contradictions, to the state of human consciousness, morality. But he took little into account their social conditionality. Therefore, the need arose to “assign” certain phenomena to the psychology of the people as a whole. Often such a shift in emphasis led to the denial of really significant facts (a reflection of revolutionary unrest and sentiment in the “Village”).
Gorky once wrote to Bunin that in “Confession” “the class point of view suffered.” Ivan Alekseevich replied: “I am glad that the “class point of view” suffered - even if it suffers more than once.” He was distrustful of the idea of social development of the world. How then should we perceive different options Alexey Maksimovich’s repeated statement that “The Village” is a work of a historical nature, that “historically no one took a village like that?” We find an explanation in the correspondence of writers. Gorky commented on one peasant remark from the story: “The train began to arrive later” - because the day was shorter - after all, this is the way of thinking of the Slavs of the tenth century. And - that's right! Truly - terribly true." The terrible stability of naive ideas from the 10th to the 20th centuries attracted the attention of Gorky, who was looking for ways to awaken the people's consciousness - an active attitude towards life. “Village” reveals a complex layering of “multi-temporal” sensations and concepts. In this refined sphere - the state of the soul, the “way of thinking” - it appears tragic fate peasants deprived of light. An observation that I have come to many times
Meanwhile, from the moment the story was published, Bunin never ceased to be suspected of sympathizing with the nobles. He wrote to Alexei Maksimovich with bitter irony: “And the fact that some critics for some reason talk about my boots (as if they were “varnished”) about my estates, migraines and fears of peasant riots seemed even insulting. I may have migraines, but it’s unlikely that I’ll have estates, lands, or coachmen. Until now, at least, none of this has happened - in my entire life I have owned literally nothing except a suitcase.” The most incredible thing is that similar accusations against the writer can be heard today! But in Bunin’s deep visions there is a truth that we should know today, when the concept of “nobility” has no meaning at all.
This truth is expressed harshly. The author sought to actively influence the reader. And I achieved this impression. Shortly before his death (1947), he himself, having become a “detached” connoisseur of the story, said: “I was amazed by “The Village” - I completely hated it (and did not re-read it for a hundred years) - now I suddenly saw that it was extremely strong, cruel, original” ( publication by Boboreko). I would like to add that it is relevant.
