In his work “Who Lives Well in Rus',” Nekrasov tried to present everything he knew about the people. Of course, the writer could not help but turn to the topic of people's intercessors. Let's try to identify how the defenders of the people appear in the poem by analyzing the image of Savely, the Holy Russian hero.
Travelers learn about Savelia from the story of the “happy” Matryona Timofeevna Korchagina. Savely is the father of her father-in-law. He lived a long life and, as Matryona said, “he was also a happy man.”
In his youth, Savely, along with other peasants, endured cruel bullying from the landowner, who “ruined the people completely.” But the man was a freedom-loving man, so he rebelled against the German manager: “And it bends, but does not break, / Doesn’t break, doesn’t fall../ Isn’t it a hero? / But soon the peasant’s patience came to an end.” The men buried the German alive in a hole that he ordered them to dig. For this crime, Savely and his accomplices were exiled to hard labor. But even twenty years of “strict hard labor” did not break Savely, “branded, but not a slave,” he said. Already at home, another misfortune occurs: Savely neglected to look after his great-grandson Demushka, and the boy was eaten by pigs. The old man goes to the monastery. Nekrasov reflects the hidden potential of the Russian people in Savelia. High moral qualities, love of freedom and pride show that peasants are capable of revolution. But people are still only deciding on minor riots, and then after many years of patience.
Nekrasov emphasizes in his works that the people themselves are often to blame for all troubles, because they have come to terms with the current situation and do not start uprisings. In the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus',” the image of Savely is the embodiment of hidden strength, unrealized national potential.
Updated: 2017-04-14
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The poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” already in its title contains a question, the answer to which worried any enlightened person in Nekrasov’s time. And although the heroes of the work do not find someone who lives well, the author still makes it clear to the reader who he considers happy. The answer to this question is hidden in the image of Grisha Dobrosklonov, a hero who appears in the last part of the poem, but is far from the last in ideological terms.
For the first time, readers meet Grisha in the chapter “Good times - good songs”, during a feast, thanks to which the image of Grisha in “Who Lives Well in Rus'” is initially associated with the concept of national happiness. His father, the parish clerk, is loved by the people - it is not for nothing that he is invited to the peasant holiday. In turn, the clerk and sons are characterized as “simple, kind guys,” and, like men, they mow and “drink vodka on holidays.” So from the very beginning of creating the image, Nekrasov makes it clear that Grisha shares his entire life with the people.
Then the life of Grisha Dobrosklonov is described in more detail. Despite his origins from the clergy, Grisha was familiar with poverty from childhood. His father, Tryphon, lived “poorer than the last shabby peasant.”
Even the cat and dog chose to run away from the family, unable to bear the hunger. All this is due to the fact that the sexton has an “easy disposition”: he is always hungry and always looking for somewhere to drink. At the beginning of the chapter, his sons lead him, drunk, home. He boasts about his children, but he forgot to think about whether they were full.
Things are no easier for Grisha in the seminary, where the already meager food is taken away by the “economy grabber.” That is why Grisha has an “emaciated” face - sometimes from hunger he cannot sleep until the morning, he is still waiting for breakfast. Nekrasov several times focuses the reader’s attention on precisely this feature of Grisha’s appearance - he is thin and pale, although in another life he could have been a fine fellow: he has a wide bone and red hair. This appearance of the hero partly symbolizes all of Rus', which has the prerequisites for a free and happy life, but for now lives in a completely different way.
Since childhood, Grisha has been familiar first-hand with the main problems of the peasantry: overwork, hunger and drunkenness. But all this does not embitter, but rather strengthens the hero. From the age of fifteen, a firm conviction matures in him: he must live solely for the good of his people, no matter how poor and wretched they may be. In this decision, he is strengthened by the memory of his mother, the caring and hardworking Domnushka, who lived a short life because of her labors...
The image of Grisha’s mother is the image of a Russian peasant woman dearly loved by Nekrasov, resigned, unrequited, and at the same time carrying within herself a huge gift of love. Grisha, her “beloved son,” did not forget his mother after her death; moreover, her image merged for him with the image of the entire Vakhlachina. The last maternal gift - the song “Salty”, testifying to the depth of maternal love - will accompany Grisha all his life. He hums it in the seminary, where it is “gloomy, strict, hungry.”
And longing for his mother leads him to a selfless decision to devote his life to others who are equally deprived.
Note that songs are very important for characterizing Grisha in the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” by Nekrasov. They briefly and accurately reveal the essence of the hero’s ideas and aspirations, and his main life priorities are clearly visible.
The first of the songs sounding from Grisha’s lips conveys his attitude towards Rus'. It is clear that he perfectly understands all the problems that were tearing the country apart: slavery, ignorance and shame of the peasants - Grisha sees all this without embellishment. He easily selects words that can terrify even the most insensitive listener, and this shows his pain for his native country. And at the same time, the song sounds hope for future happiness, the belief that the desired will is already approaching: “But you will not die, I know!”...
Grisha's next song - about a barge hauler - strengthens the impression of the first, depicting in detail the fate of an honest worker who spends "honestly acquired pennies" in a tavern. From private destinies the hero moves on to the depiction of “all mysterious Rus'” - this is how the song “Rus” is born. This is the anthem of his country, full of sincere love, in which one can hear faith in the future: “The army is rising - innumerable.” However, someone is needed to become the head of this army, and this fate is destined for Dobrosklonov.
There are two paths, Grisha believes, one of them is wide, rough, but along it is a crowd greedy for temptations. There is an eternal struggle for “mortal blessings”. It is along it, unfortunately, that the wanderers, the main characters of the poem, are initially directed. They see happiness in purely practical things: wealth, honor and power. Therefore, it is not surprising that they fail to meet Grisha, who has chosen a different path for himself, “tight but honest.” Only strong and loving souls follow this path, wanting to intercede for the offended. Among them is the future people’s intercessor Grisha Dobrosklonov, for whom fate is preparing “a glorious path, ... consumption and Siberia.” This road is not easy and does not bring personal happiness, and yet, according to Nekrasov, this is the only way - in unity with all the people - and one can become truly happy. The “great truth” expressed in Grisha Dobrosklonov’s song gives him such joy that he runs home, “jumping” with happiness and feeling “immense strength” within himself. At home, his delight is confirmed and shared by his brother, who speaks of Grisha’s song as “divine” - i.e. finally admitting that the truth is on his side.
Work test
The theme of the “people's protector” runs through the entire work of N. A. Nekrasov, it also sounds in the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'.” Many writers and poets have tried to answer the question “What to do?” Nekrasov also looked for an answer to this in his work. What to strive for in life? What is the real happiness of a person in Russia? What needs to be done to make everyone happy? - he asked himself. The poet believed that to resolve these issues, people are needed who are able to join the fight and lead others. He showed such characters in the images of Yakim Nagogo, Ermila Girin, Savely Korchagin, Grisha Dobrosklonov. In Yakima, Nagom presents the peculiar character of the people's truth-seeker. He lives a miserable life, like all the peasantry, but is distinguished by his rebellious disposition. Yakim is ready to stand up for his rights. This is what he says about the people: Every peasant has a Soul that is like a black cloud, Angry, menacing - and it would be necessary for Thunder to thunder from there, to rain bloody rains. Ermila Girin is a man whom the people themselves chose as mayor, recognizing his justice. Even as a clerk, Ermila gained authority among the people for the fact that ... he would advise and make inquiries; Where there is enough strength, he will help out, He will not ask for gratitude, And if you give, he will not take it! But Yermila was also guilty: he shielded his younger brother from recruiting, but the people forgave him for his sincere repentance. Only Ermila’s conscience was not at peace: he left the mayor’s office and hired a mill. And again the people fell in love with him for his good treatment, for his even attitude towards the landowner and the poor, for his kindness. The “gray-haired priest” characterizes Ermila this way: He had everything he needed for happiness and peace, And money, and honor, An enviable, true honor, Not bought either by money or fear: by strict truth. With intelligence and kindness. From the priest’s statement it is clear that Girin achieved honor through “strict truth”, “intelligence and kindness”. He is concerned about the attitude of the people towards him, but Ermila himself judges himself even more strictly. He strives to alleviate the situation of the peasants, to help them financially, although he himself was not yet ready for a revolutionary action. Girin is already satisfied that his conscience is clear, that he makes the lives of others at least a little easier. Savely the hero represents a different type of Russian peasant. He is the embodiment of strength and courage. Despite the rods and hard labor, he did not accept his fate. “Branded, but not a slave,” he says about himself. Savely embodies the best traits of the Russian character: love for the homeland and people, hatred of oppressors, self-esteem. His favorite word - “push” - helps to see in him a person who knows how to cheer up his comrades, rally them, and captivate them. Savely is one of those who stood up well for the “patrimony.” Together with the men, he executes the hated manager, the German Vogel. People like Savely will not stand by at the time of peasant unrest. The most conscientious of the “people’s defenders” is Grisha Dobrosklonov. He devotes his entire life to the struggle, lives among the people, knows their needs, and is educated. The future of Russia, the poet believes, belongs to people like Grisha Dobrosklonov, for whom “fate was preparing a glorious path, a great name for the people’s intercessor, consumption and Siberia.” Grisha Dobrosklonov’s songs reflect his thoughts about life’s ideals, his hopes for a bright future: The people’s share, their happiness, Light and freedom First of all. In a moment of despondency, O Motherland! My thoughts fly forward. You are still destined to suffer a lot, But you will not die, I know. Saved in slavery, the heart is free - Gold, gold, the people's heart! The image of Grisha Dobrosklonov helps to understand that truly happy is the one on whose side the truth is, on whom the people rely, who chooses an honest path for himself, being a “people's defender.”
Poet-citizen, poet of the revolutionary struggle, N.A. Nekrasov, who wrote poems of amazing power and feeling about his comrades Dobrolyubov, Chernyshevsky, Pisarev, could not help but turn in his work to a new image for Russian literature - the image of the people's intercessor.
The poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” shows that forces are maturing among the people that are capable of defending the honor and dignity of people of low rank. The poet represents several characters of people who are ready to join the fight for the humiliated and insulted Russian people, who are in bondage. Among them are Saveliy, the Holy Russian hero, the people's truth-lover Yakim Nagoy, famous for his “strict truth, intelligence and kindness,” Yermil Girin, who knows “to whom he will give his whole life and for whom he will die,” Grisha Dobrosklonov.
Nekrasov portrays Savely the hero as one of those who stood up well for the “patrimony,” seeing in him the embodiment of people’s strength and courage. Neither the rod nor the hard labor reconciled him to his fate. “Branded, but not a slave,” he says about himself. It combines such qualities as self-esteem and hatred of oppressors, remarkable strength and love of freedom, love of nature and perseverance. Reading the lines dedicated to Savely, we understand that only the truly strong and courageous can be so patient and generous as to endure the suffering that befell them.
That's why we endured
That we are heroes.
This is Russian heroism.
Do you think, Matryonushka,
The man is not a hero?
And his life is not a military one,
And death is not written for him
In battle - what a hero!
Speaking about the folk heroes of the peasant kingdom of homespun Rus', Nekrasov finds amazing, truly epic comparisons:
.. .Hands are twisted with chains,
Feet forged with iron,
Back...dense forests
We walked along it - we broke down...
...And it bends, but does not break,
Doesn't break, doesn't fall...
Isn't he a hero?
The favorite word of the people's avenger Savely - naddai - helps to see in him a person capable of not only encouraging, but, most importantly, uniting, captivating and leading. This word will determine the fate of the proud hero. Recalling his youth, the old man Savely talks about how for eighteen years the peasants endured the tyranny of a cruel German manager, in whose power their whole life was actually in their power. Constant bullying on his part could not but arouse people's indignation. And one day they could not stand it and killed a German.
Tavern... a prison in Bui-gorod,
There I learned to read and write,
So far they have decided on us.
The solution has been reached: hard labor
And whip first...
...And life was not easy.
Twenty years of strict hard labor,
The settlement has been around for twenty years...”
Next to Savely in the poem stands another majestic image of a Russian peasant - the village righteous man Yermil Girin. The very appearance in the world of slavery and unbridled tyranny of people like him serves for Nekrasov as the basis for faith in the future victory of the people and the source of the cheerful feeling that permeates the poem:
People's power
Mighty force -
Conscience is calm,
The truth is alive!
Not through struggle, like Savely, but through labor and skill, Er-mil Girin wants to change the fate of the eternally oppressed. Literate, he becomes a clerk, and then, thanks to his humane attitude towards people, he is elected mayor. Honest, decent, smart, one day Girin, saving his brother from recruitment, commits an unfair act. And the sin he has taken upon his soul gives him no peace.
Doesn't drink, doesn't eat; that's how it ended
What's in the stall with the rope
His father found him.
“Ever since Vlasyevna’s son
I didn't put it in the queue
I hate the white light!
The image of Ermila Girin, who refused his position, is tragic, but cannot fail to evoke respect for his nobility, honesty, and compassion for people. The people around Girina appreciate him for this. And as the episode with the purchase of the mill shows, the people are ready to come to his aid at the right moment, to return kindness for kindness. The situation described by Nekrasov may not be the most typical, but it allows the poet to say that great strength is hidden in the unity and mutual assistance of the common people.
Yakim Nagoy is another man whom the wanderers met in their search for happiness in Rus'. It would seem which of him is the defender:
The chest is sunken; like a depressed Belly; at the eyes, at the mouth Bends like cracks on the dried earth;
And he himself looks like Mother Earth: his neck is brown,
Like a layer cut off by a plow,
Brick face
Hand - tree bark,
And the hair is sand.
The very first lines say about him:
He works himself to death
He drinks until he's half dead.
But there is a line in it that allows him to be ranked among the people’s intercessors: Yakim Nagoy protects the people’s soul. Exhausted, having lost strength and health, during a fire he saves not the accumulated thirty-five rubles, but the pictures hanging on the wall in the hut, the only joy of his miserable and gray existence. Pictures are a symbol of something beautiful that lurks in the tormented soul of the people; the case allows the poet to tell the reader about the spiritual beauty inherent in the working people, which, as we know, will “save the world.”
And yet, the future of Russia, Nekrasov is sure, lies with people like Grisha Dobrosklonov: literate, most conscientious people from the people who dedicated their lives to the fight for the people. The image of seminarian Grisha Dobrosklonov, for whom “fate was preparing a glorious path, a great name as a people’s intercessor, consumption and Siberia,” reflected not only the poet’s hopes for a bright future, but also his life ideals. To be in the din, where “it’s hard to breathe, where grief is heard,” is Dobrosklonov’s life goal. His songs do not even sound like a call to fight for liberation, but rather a statement that the struggle has already begun:
The army rises -
Countless!
The strength in her will affect
Indestructible!
This image, according to the poet, contained the only possible answer to the question posed in the poem about the possibility of happiness in Russia at that time. Nekrasov considered truly happy only selfless fighters for the people's good, those who, like Grisha Dobrosklonov, heard “immense strength in their chest,” whose ears were delighted by the “radiant sounds of the noble hymn” - “the embodiment of people’s happiness.”
As we see, both the hero of the poem and its author are full of faith that a person’s happiness lies in revolutionary service to the people. A faith based, as history has shown, on rather utopian ideas of that time, when people firmly believed that the Russian people would gather their strength and learn to be citizens.
“People's Intercessors”: Yakim Nagoy and Ermil Girin. Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov entered Russian poetry as the “people's sad man.” The folk poem became one of the central ones in his work. But the poet was never a simple writer of everyday life; as an artist, he was primarily concerned with the drama of the people.
In the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus',” the author himself appeared as the people’s “intercessor,” who not only expressed his attitude towards the people by the very fact of creating this work, but was able to understand their soul and truly reveal their character.
The theme of popular intercession is widely represented in the poem. Intercessor is one of her keywords. A people's defender is one who not only pities and sympathizes with the peasants, but serves the people, expresses their interests, confirming this with actions and deeds. The image of such a person is not the only one in the poem. His features were refracted in Ermil Girin, Savely, Grisha Dobrosklonov, and partly in Yakima Nagy.
Thus, Girin acted as a real defender of worldly interests: he defended the mill, which was needed by everyone. He sincerely, with pure thoughts, turned to the people for help, and people raised money for him, completely trusting him and not sparing their last penny. Then Yermil settled accounts with everyone. His honesty and selflessness are evidenced by the fact that he did not appropriate the “extra ruble” that he had left, but, not finding the owner, gave the money to the blind.
How did Girin win the honor and respect of almost the entire district? The answer is short: only “the truth.” People were drawn to him even when Yermil held the positions of clerk and mayor. He was “loved by all the people” because one could always turn to him for help and advice. And Yermil never demanded a reward:
Where there is enough strength, it will help out,
Doesn't ask for gratitude
And he won’t take it!
Only once did a case occur when the hero, as they say, “became his soul”: he “excluded” his brother from recruiting, instead of whom another person had to become a soldier. The realization that he acted dishonestly, unfairly, leads Girin almost to suicide. And only repentance in front of all the people frees him from the pangs of conscience. The story about Ermil Girin suddenly ends, and we learn that he nevertheless suffered for the people's cause, he was sent to prison.
It is impossible not to mention another national hero - Yakim Nagogo. It would seem that there is nothing unusual in his fate: he once lived in St. Petersburg, and because of a lawsuit with a merchant he went to prison.
Then he returned to his homeland and became a plowman. It is better than Nekrasov himself to imagine this image, which has become a generalized image of the Russian peasant:
The chest is sunken, as if depressed
Stomach; at the eyes, at the mouth
Bends like cracks
On dry ground...
But in the eyes of people, Yakim was a special person: during the fire, he rushed to save not money, but pictures that he lovingly collected for his son and looked at them in fascination. Talking about this unique folk “collector,” Nekrasov also opens a page in the life of a peasant, in which not only work and “drinking” could be the main ones.
The image of the people's intercessor was vividly embodied in Savely, the Holy Russian hero. Already in this very definition there is a meaning: heroes in epics have always been intercessors of the Russian land. Savely has powerful physical strength. But Nekrasov shows that the heroism of the Korezh peasant is not only based on this - Savely is characterized by will, patience, perseverance, and self-esteem. This hero is a rebel, he is capable of protest. However, his “intercession” was expressed not only in the fact that he saved Korezhina from the German, who had tortured the peasants with extortions. Savely is also a kind of folk philosopher and ascetic. His religiosity and ability to repent are symbols of high folk morality. Saveliy’s main prayer is for the people:
For all the suffering, Russian
Peasantry I pray!
Grisha Dobrosklonov in the poem is also a people's intercessor. Even as a child, he was imbued with acute pity and love for all the “Vakhlachina”. Although Nekrasov does not say directly, it seems that “intercession” will be effective, it will really be able to change the lives of the people. The road is open before Grisha, along which only strong souls walk,
Loving,
To fight, to work
For the bypassed
For the oppressed.
This hero is marked with the “seal of God’s gift.” According to Nekrasov, he is capable of suffering and sacrificing his life for the people.
Thus, the people's intercessor in the poem is presented as a person of exceptional destiny. This is an ascetic, that is, in my opinion, a bringer of effective good, and a righteous man. He necessarily comes from the people, he is familiar to the smallest detail with the life of peasants. The person who was chosen as an “intercessor” is smart, conscientious, and spiritual inner work is constantly happening in him. And most importantly, he is able to understand all the complexity and inconsistency of the peasant’s soul and live a pure, simple life together with his people.
