Literature tests according to the VYakorovina program. Interweaving of authentic and fantastic "History of one city" as a grotesque novel
Federal State Professional Educational Institution
Novokuznetsk State
humanitarian and technical college-boarding school "
Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Russian Federation
Methodical development
Topic: “M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Life and creativity. Fairy tales. "History of a City"
Developed by: Kuznetsova I. Yu.
Novokuznetsk, 2017
| CONTENT | Page |
| INTRODUCTION | 3 |
| METHODOLOGICAL NOTE | 3 |
| 1. Biography of the writer. | 5 |
| 2. Chronological tableM. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. | 6 |
| 3. Fairy talesM.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. | 8 |
| 4. "The history of one city." | 14 |
| 5. Testbased on the work of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin | 18 |
| CONCLUSION | 20 |
Introduction
Saltykov-Shchedrin is one of the world's greatest satirists. He devoted his whole life to the struggle for the liberation of the Russian people, criticizing autocracy and serfdom in his works, and after the reform of 1861, the remnants of serfdom that remained in the life and psychology of people. The satirist criticized not only the despotism and selfishness of the oppressors, but also the humility of the oppressed, their long-suffering, and slavish psychology.
If N.V. Gogol believed that his satire would help correct some of the shortcomings in the state structure of Russia, then the revolutionary democrat Shchedrin comes to the conclusion that it is necessary to destroy the old Russia, and calls for this in his works. Understanding that only the people can make a revolution, Shchedrin tries to awaken the self-consciousness of the people, calling them to fight. In all its splendor, the talent of the satirist was revealed in his fairy tales.
In parallel with the Turgenev chronicle of the spiritual quest of the advanced intelligentsia of the second half of the 19th century. in Russian literature, a satirical chronicle of socio-historical life was created, bringing to the surface the flaws and ugliness of the state structure of the Russian Empire. Its author was M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, a writer who was a rare combination in the Russian literary environment of an artist-denunciator and a high-ranking official who knew firsthand the social vices he denounced. For the philistine consciousness, this combination seems paradoxical, even mysterious. Why, one wonders, did an official who rose through the ranks to the position of vice-governor, instead of continuing his career growth, prefer to conflict with the government and ridicule it in his works with such force as no one else? And vice versa: why did the writer, who attacked the social order and foundations in his works with the most evil satire, give many years of his life to public service, honorably fulfilling his bureaucratic duties?
Meanwhile, there is no contradiction here. Both the merciless criticism that overwhelmed the works of Saltykov-Shchedrin, and the service zeal that distinguished him in all his posts, were dictated by the same feeling of protest against the Russian autocratic reality and the same goal - to serve all his creative, intellect -tual, moral forces for the cause of spiritual enlightenment and social improvement of society. These impulses ensured the indestructible unity of the "artist" and "official" in the personality of the writer. It was reflected even in the title of “prosecutor of Russian real life”, which was awarded to Saltykov-Shchedrin by his contemporaries, since in the difficult role of “prosecutor” Mikhail Evgrafovich acted not only in writing, but also in the service and social spheres of his activity.
And yet the soul of the writer, who spent most of his life dividing his forces between official duties and artistic creativity, belonged to literature. This is evidenced by his own confession: "I owe literature the best moments of my life."
Saltykov-Shchedrin managed to do an excellent job of exposing the vices of the society of his time. For two decades, his works, like a sponge, absorbed all the shortcomings of the life of the Russian Empire. In fact, these writings are historical documents, because the reliability of some of them is almost complete.
The creative heritage of Saltykov-Shchedrin does not lose its relevance for many years after the death of the writer. The images of his satire were often used by Vladimir Lenin, and thanks to the active propaganda of Turgenev, the works are well known to the Western reader.
The prose of Saltykov-Shchedrin is one of the most valuable examples of world satire. The style of criticism, framed in a fairy tale, was used by the writer very actively and became a role model for many writers in the future. The fairy tale, which is aimed at criticizing social imperfection, was used as a literary device even before Saltykov-Shchedrin, but it was he who was able to make this device a classic.
The researcher of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin's work D. Nikolaev in his monograph "M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Life and Work" (1985) defined the writer's place in Russian and world literature as follows: "The past centuries have given the world many outstanding writers - Swift, Dickens and Thackeray lived and worked in England, the victorious laughter of Rabelais, Molière and Voltaire sounded in France, Heine shone with caustic wit in Germany, Kantemir, Fonvizin, Novikov, Kapnist - this is not a complete list of Russian writersXVIIIcenturies devoted entirely to satire. Saltykov-Shchedrin, along with Griboyedov and Gogol, belonged to this phalanx of great scoffers.
Methodical note
This methodological development can be used by teachers of the humanities and students, when studying the topic: “Life and creativityM. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin". It examines the biography of the writer,major worksM. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin.
Biography of Saltykov-Shchedrin
Saltykov-Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich (1826 - 1889) - Russian realist writer, critic, author of sharp satirical works, known under the pseudonym Nikolai Shchedrin (the real name of the writer is Saltykov).
Childhood and education
Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin was born on January 15 (27), 1826 in the village of Spas-Ugol, Tver province, into an old noble family. The future writer received his primary education at home - a serf painter, a sister, a priest, a governess worked with him. In 1836, Saltykov-Shchedrin studied at the Moscow Noble Institute, from 1838 - at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum.
In 1845, Mikhail Evgrafovich graduated from the Lyceum and entered the military office. At this time, the writer is fond of the French socialists and George Sand, creates a number of notes, stories ("Contradiction", "A Tangled Case").
In 1848, in a brief biography of Saltykov-Shchedrin, a long period of exile begins - he was sent to Vyatka for free-thinking. The writer lived there for eight years, at first he served as a clerk, and after that he was appointed an adviser to the provincial government. Mikhail Evgrafovich often went on business trips, during which he collected information about provincial life for his works.
State activity. Mature creativity
Returning from exile in 1855, Saltykov-Shchedrin joined the Ministry of the Interior. In 1856-1857 his "Provincial Essays" were published. In 1858, Mikhail Evgrafovich was appointed vice-governor of Ryazan, and then Tver. At the same time, the writer was published in the journals Russky Vestnik, Sovremennik, and Library for Reading.
In 1862, Saltykov-Shchedrin, whose biography was previously associated more with a career than with creativity, leaves the public service. Having stopped in St. Petersburg, the writer gets a job as an editor in the Sovremennik magazine. Soon his collections "Innocent Stories", "Satires in Prose" are published.
In 1864, Saltykov-Shchedrin returned to the service, taking the post of manager of the state chamber in Penza, and then in Tula and Ryazan.
The last years of the writer's life
Since 1868, Mikhail Evgrafovich retired, actively engaged in literary activities. In the same year, the writer became one of the editors of Otechestvennye Zapiski, and after his death Nikolai Nekrasov is the editor-in-chief of the journal. In 1869 - 1870 Saltykov-Shchedrin created one of his most famous works - "The history of one city" (summary) , in which he raises the topic of relations between the people and the authorities. Soon the collections "Signs of the Times", "Letters from the Province", the novel "Gentlemen Golovlevs" were published.
In 1884, Otechestvennye Zapiski were closed, and the writer began to publish in the Vestnik Evropy magazine. In recent years, the work of Saltykov-Shchedrin culminates in the grotesque. The writer publishes collections "Tales" (1882 - 1886), "Little Things in Life" (1886 - 1887), "Peshekhonskaya Antiquity" (1887 - 1884).
Mikhail Evgrafovich died on May 10 (April 28), 1889 in St. Petersburg, was buried at the Volkovskoye cemetery.
2. Chronological table
| the date | Events in the writer's life | Artworks |
| 1826 | was born in a landowner's family (the village of Spas-Ugol, Tver province) | |
| 1836 | the third class of the Moscow Noble Institute, in 1838, as the best student, he was transferred to the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. | |
| 1844 | graduation from the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum; service in the office of the Minister of War | First publications (original poems, translations) |
| 1846-48 | is influenced by Belinsky's "natural school"; participates in the Petrashevsky circle; collaboration with Sovremennik (reviews). | the story "A Tangled Case", "Contradictions" |
| 1848 | revolutionary events in France; reaction; the young writer was arrested and exiled to Vyatka, where he served in the office of the governor. | |
| 1855 - … | death of NicholasI; return from exile; marriage; career advancement; vice-governor in Ryazan (1858), in Tver (1860) | “Provincial essays” (1856-57), in the journal “Russian Messenger” under the pseudonym N. Shchedrin; the story "Merry Life" ("Contemporary"); editing "Tver Gubernskie Vedomosti" |
| 61 years old... | Abolition of serfdom. The post of governor in Tver. Resignation at own request (health) - 1862 In society, interest in history (Klyuchevsky, Solovyov, Kostomarov). | Essay "Literary Writers", where the image of the city of Glupov first appears; conducts a monthly review "Our Public Life"; the image of Mitenka Kozelkov; |
| 1863-64 | Active work in Sovremennik (articles, fragments of future essays). He leaves the editorial office, serves as chairman of the state chamber in Poltava, then in Penza, then in Tula and Ryazan (translated due to disagreements with the authorities). | Controversy with the “Russian Word”, headed by D. Pisarev; "R.S." believed that the peasants needed to be prepared for an independent working life; Sovremennik defended society's readiness for revolution; Dostoevsky called this controversy "the split in the nihilists." |
| 68 year... | Resignation in the rank of real state councilor. Headed with N. Nekrasov "Patrimonial Notes". | Creates a satirical story "History of one city" (69-70). |
| “Domestic Notes” is under threat of closure (publications are suspended, including because of the works of S-Sch - “The Diary of a Provincial”, “A Hard Year”, “The Unfortunate Gudgeon” (“Modern Idyll”); mid-80s - arrest of employees , as a precaution cuts out several times from the magazine "Tales". | “Well-intentioned speeches” (1872-76) - deceitful phrases of modern politicians; “Pompadours and Pompadourses” (1863-1873), “Lords of Tashkent” (1869-1873); "Diary of a provincial in St. Petersburg" (1872-85), "In the environment of moderation and accuracy" (1874-85) “Modern idyll” (1883) - review novel. |
|
| 1875-1876 | Trip abroad with family (treatment). During a serious illness, Nekrasova becomes the editor of Otechestvennye Zapiski. | from Well-Intentioned Speeches he excludes everything about the Golovlevs (chapter "Family Court") and makes an independent novel - "Lord Golovlevs" (1875-1880); "Abroad" (1881). |
| 1884 | “Domestic Notes” are closed - a blow for the writer; traveled to Germany and France; | “Tales” (1883-1885) (23) "Unfinished conversations" (1884), "Poshekhon stories" (1883-1884), "Colorful letters" (1884-1885) “Poshekhonskaya antiquity” (1887-1888) |
| 1886-1889 | “I am deeply unhappy. Not one illness, but the whole situation in general keeps me irritable to such an extent that I don’t know a single minute of grace ... No help from anywhere, not the slightest compassion for a person who dies in the service of society ”- from a letter to the doctor N. Belogolovy; neither his wife nor his children shared his way of thinking, did not understand his interests. |
|
| 30.04 1889 | Died, buried in St. Petersburg at the Volkovo Cemetery |
3. Tales
M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin
« Fairy tales "- one of the most striking creations and the most read of the books of the great Russian satirist.
Saltykov-Shchedrin continued the satirical traditions of Fonvizin, Griboyedov, and Gogol. Shchedrin's gubernatorial activity allowed him to see more deeply the "vices of Russian reality" and made him think about the fate of Russia. He created a kind of satirical encyclopedia of Russian life. The tales summed up the 40-year work of the writer and were created over four years: from 1882 to 1886.
A number of reasons prompted Saltykov-Shchedrin to turn to fairy tales. The difficult political situation in Russia: moral terror, the defeat of populism, the police persecution of the intelligentsia - did not allow to identify all the social contradictions of society and directly criticize the existing order. On the other hand, the fairy tale genre was close to the nature of the satirist writer. Fantasy, hyperbole, irony, common to fairy tales, are very characteristic of Shchedrin's poetics. In addition, the fairy tale genre is very democratic, accessible and understandable to a wide range of readers, the people. The fairy tale is characterized by didacticism, and this directly corresponded to the journalistic pathos, the civic aspirations of the satirist.
Satire - accusatory literary work depicting the negative phenomena of life in a funny, ugly way.
Satirical techniques used in fairy tales by the writer.
Irony - ridicule, which has a double meaning, where the true is not a direct statement, but the opposite;
sarcasm - caustic and poisonous irony, sharply exposing phenomena that are especially dangerous for a person and society;
grotesque - extremely sharp exaggeration, a combination of real and fantastic, violation of the boundaries of plausibility; allegory,
allegory - a different meaning, hidden behind the external form.
Aesopian language - artistic speech based on forced allegory;
hyperbola - an exaggeration.
An approximate plan for analyzing a fairy tale
What is the main theme of the story?
The main idea of the tale (why?).
Plot features. How is the main idea of the tale revealed in the system of characters?
Features of the images of a fairy tale
:
a) images-symbols;
b) the originality of animals;
c) closeness to folk tales.
Satirical techniques used by the author.
Features of the composition: inserted episodes, landscape, portrait, interior.
Combination of folklore, fantastic and real
"Fairy tales" - this is a kind of result of the writer's artistic activity, since they were created at the final stage of his life and creative path. Shchedrin's book "Tales" includes 32 works, the first of which were written in 1869, and the last - in 1886.
Shchedrin's first tales ("The Tale of How One Man Feeded Two Generals", "The Conscience Lost", "The Wild Landowner") were published in Otechestvennye Zapiski.
“What Mr. Shchedrin calls fairy tales does not at all correspond to its name,” the censor wrote indignantly, “his fairy tales are the same satire and caustic satire, tendentious, more or less directed against the social and political system.”
The structure of fairy tales by Saltykov-Shchedrin
Zachin
Fairy story
folklore expressions
Folk vocabulary
Fairy tale characters
ending
Issues
Autocracy and the oppressed people ("Bear in the Voivodeship", "Eagle-philanthropist")
The relationship between a man and a master ("The Wild Landowner", "The Tale of How One Man Feeded Two Generals")
The state of the people ("Konyaga", "Kissel")
The meanness of the bourgeoisie ("Liberal", "Karas-idealist")
Cowardice of the layman ("The wise scribbler")
Seeking Truth ("The Fool", "Christ's Night")
Artistic Features
Folklore motifs (fairytale plot, folk vocabulary).
Grotesque (interlacing fantasy and reality).
Aesopian language (allegory and metaphor).
Social satire (sarcasm and real fantasy).
Reproof through denial (showing wildness and lack of spirituality).
Hyperbole.
In fairy tales, Saltykov-Shchedrin, using the techniques of allegory, tells about the modern world, with all its features and vices. There are three thematic tales: 1.theme of the people ;2. the theme of the power of the landowner ;3. the theme of philistine life and the main ideas of the era .
Issues
The tales of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin reflect that “special pathological condition", in which there was a Russian society in the 80sXIXcentury. However, they touch upon not only social problems (the relationship between the people and the ruling circles, the phenomenon of Russian liberalism, the reform of education), but also universal ones (good and evil, freedom and duty, truth and falsehood, cowardice and heroism).
Essentially a writercreated a new genre - a political fairy tale . The life of Russian society in the second half of the 19th century was captured in the richest gallery of characters.
Shchedrin showed the entire social anatomy, touched on all the main classes and strata of society: the nobility, the bourgeoisie, the bureaucracy, the intelligentsia.
AT"To the wise minnow"
Shchedrin paints an image of the intelligentsia that succumbed to panic, left the active struggle for the world of personal concerns and interests. The minnow, fearing for his life, walled himself up in a dark hole. "Outdone" everyone! And the result of his life can be expressed in the words: "He lived - trembled, died - trembled."
Shchedrin's wise gudgeon, the hero of the fairy tale of the same name, became the personification of the wingless and vulgar philistine. The meaning of life for this "enlightened, moderately liberal" coward was self-preservation, avoidance of clashes, of struggle. People like these fish can be called vulgar inhabitants. They are not concerned about the problems of Russia, they are far from moral problems, their whole life is filled with the arrangement of their everyday, comfortable existence. Shchedrin, as a worthy man, a true citizen, could not help being indignant at such a position in life.
Yes, in“The story of how one man fed two generals”
the writer shows the complete helplessness of two generals who find themselves on a desert island. Despite the fact that there was an abundance of game, fish, fruits around, they almost died of hunger, if not for the skill and resourcefulness of the peasant. In this tale, Saltykov-Shchedrin expresses the idea that Russia rests on the labor of a peasant who, despite his natural intelligence and ingenuity, dutifully submits to helpless masters. Thus, Shchedrin argues that it is not enough to formally abolish serfdom, it is necessary that the people come to self-knowledge, so that dignity, the desire to be free, awakens in a simple person.
The same idea is developed in the fairy tale"Wild Landlord"
But if the generals from the previous tale ended up on a desert island by the will of fate, then the landowner from this story all the time dreamed of getting rid of unbearable peasants, from whom there is a bad, servile smell. Therefore, the pillar nobleman Urus-Kuchum-Kildibaev oppresses the peasants in every possible way. And now the male world has disappeared. And what? After a while, “he was all overgrown with hair ... and his claws became iron.” The landowner has run wild, because without a peasant he is not even able to serve himself.
In a fairy taleWild Landlord" Shchedrin, as it were, generalized his thoughts on the reform of the "liberation" of the peasants, contained in all his works of the 60s. Here he poses an unusually acute problem of the post-reform relations between the feudal nobility and the peasantry completely ruined by the reform.
"Konyaga"
The theme is people's life. The main character is a man working in the field on a horse. Saltykov-Shchedrin describes the fields as an iron ring that bound the people. The horse cannot escape from this ring, and the images of the horse and the peasant merge, are parts of one whole. The writer shows that the life of a horse, his work is more like hard labor. A special place in the fairy tale is occupied by the legend of actions. In fact, this is the story of the stratification of Russian society, the story of how some people received privileges, while others were doomed to constant hard labor. Thus, the writer presents the peasant life as immoral, urges his contemporaries to respond to their mental pain and do everything to make life easier for the people. The deep faith of Saltykov-Shchedrin in the hidden forces of the people is visible in a fairy tale"Horse". A tortured peasant nag impresses with its endurance and vitality. Her whole existence lies in endless hard work, and in the meantime, well-fed idle dancers in a warm stall are surprised at her endurance, talk a lot about her wisdom, diligence, sanity. Most likely, in this tale of Saltykov-Shchedrin, the intelligentsia is meant by empty dances, which poured from empty to empty arguments about the Russian peasant, about the fate of the Russian people. It is obvious that the peasant-worker is reflected in the image of Konyaga.
In Shchedrin's fairy tales, as in all of his work, two social forces confront each other: the working people and their exploiters. The people appear under the masks of kind and defenseless animals and birds (and often without a mask, under the name "muzhik"), the exploiters - in the images of predators.
The fairy tale "Konyaga" is Shchedrin's outstanding work about the plight of the Russian peasantry in Tsarist Russia. Saltykov-Shchedrin's never subsided pain for the Russian peasant, all the bitterness of his thoughts about the fate of his people, his native country, were concentrated in the narrow boundaries of the fairy tale.
In almost all fairy tales, the image of the peasant people is depicted by Shchedrin with love, breathes indestructible power, nobility. The man is honest, straightforward, kind, unusually quick-witted and smart. He can do everything: get food, sew clothes; he conquers the elemental forces of nature, jokingly swims across the "ocean-sea". And the muzhik treats his enslavers with derision, without losing his self-esteem.
The images of fairy tales by Saltykov-Shchedrin came into use, became common nouns and live for centuries. Getting to know them, each new generation learns not only the history of their country, but learns to recognize and hate those vices of mankind that Saltykov-Shchedrin so maliciously and mercilessly ridicules.
"Fairy tales" - this is a kind of result of the writer's artistic activity, since they were created at the final stage of his life and creative path.
What are the objects of satire M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin?
government circles and the ruling class;
philistine-minded (liberal) intelligentsia;
the disenfranchised position of the people in Russia, their passivity and humility;
lack of spirituality.
The tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin had a great influence on the further development of Russian literature and especially the genre of satire.
The images of fairy tales came into use, became common nouns and live for many decades, and the universal types of objects of satire by Saltykov-Shchedrin are still found in our lives today, you just need to take a closer look at the surrounding reality and think ...
Saltykov-Shchedrin has a fairy tale-elegy "The Adventure with Kramolnikov". In it, the author tells about himself, about his writing activity, about his sorrows and joys, and at the same time about the torments of the Russian forced writer. "Kramolnikov was a native Poshekhon writer. He deeply loved his country. He devoted all the strength of his mind and heart to restoring the idea of light and truth in the souls of his relatives and maintaining in their hearts the belief that light would come and darkness would not embrace him This, in fact, was the task of all his activities.
To the genreliterary fairy tale inXIXcentury, many writers addressed: L.N. Tolstoy, V.M. Prishvin, V.G. Korolenko, D.N. Mamin-Siberian. The main feature of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin lies in the fact that they use the folklore genre to create an "Aesopian" narrative about the life of Russian society in the 1880s. Hence their main themes (power, intelligentsia, people) and problems (the relationship between the people and the ruling circles, the phenomenon of Russian liberalism, the reform of education). Borrowing from Russian folk tales images (primarily animals) and techniques (beginnings, proverbs and sayings, constant epithets, triple repetitions), M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin develops the satirical content inherent in them. At the same time, irony, hyperbole, grotesque, as well as other artistic devices serve the writer to denounce not only social, but also universal human vices. That is why the fairy tales of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin have been popular with the Russian reader for many decades.
"History of a city" (1869-1870)
“Terrible ... violence and rudeness, a terribly self-satisfied nonentity who does not want to hear about anything, wants to know nothing but himself. Sometimes this insignificance climbs to a height ... Then it really becomes scary for everything living and thinking "M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin
"History of a City" - the greatest satirical work, which shows the true events and facts of Russian life, raised by the author to the level of grandiose generalization.
Genre: satirical novel
The historical basis of the work
Leaving the service in 1868, Saltykov-Shchedrin is working on the creation of a literary work.
The impressions accumulated over the years of service are reflected in this work.
The image of the city of Glupov as the embodiment of the autocratic-landowner system arose in the writer's essays in the 60s.
In January 1869, the satirist creates the first chapters of the "Inventory for Town Governors", "Organchik", which are published in the first issue of the journal "Domestic Notes".
Work on the work was continued by the author in 1870.
Before us is a historical novel, grotesque.
The main character is the city of Foolov
The plot is a change of rulers
The main artistic technique is the grotesque.
The city itself is conditional, it either looks like the "northern Palmyra", or it looks like a city on seven hills, like Moscow.
The city of Foolov is an image-symbol, it personifies the Russian state of the 70-80sXIXcentury. The novel convinced that it could not continue like this: changes were needed.
The novel is written in the form of an annalistic narrative about persons and events dated to 1731-1826. The satirist indeed creatively transformed some historical facts.
The work caused a wave of indignation, protests of contemporaries, since it did not contain a description of a great history, but outlined the history of the strange city of Foolov. The work begins with a description of how the city of Foolov was formed. Its founders were bunglers and other tribes who got entangled in their own stupidity, could not organize their own lives and, as a result, went to look for a prince to do everything for them. The lack of self-awareness gradually led the Foolovites to the fact that they became subjects of a tyrant prince, for whom there was no humanity, respect for a person, even historical times begin with the word “I will constipate”. All the rulers of Foolov are briefly described in the inventory of the mayors. They are united only by complete absurdity, falling into Foolov, ruling and disappearing from Foolov. Symbolically, this inventory shows that if there is a totalitarian tyrannical system of power in the state, then the personality of the individual ruler does not matter. Anyone will automatically do what they are supposed to do. At first, the Foolovskaya government was just a series of different mayors. But gradually an administrative-bureaucratic apparatus began to form here, which is associated with the names of Borodavkin, Benevolensky and Mikaladze. All these mayors are the authors of the so-called supporting documents placed at the end of the work. Borodavkin was the first to think about state power. In his work, he writes about the complexities of the life of city governors and offers to raise and educate them separately, as well as to gather them for secret congresses, publish clericals, etc.
The next stage is presented in the work of Mikaladze. He proposes to put on a uniform for all mayors - this is a symbolic phenomenon associated with the depersonalization of power. From now on, everything is decided by the uniform, regardless of the "person contained in it."
Of particular importance belongs to the activities of Benevolensky. This hero issues decrees, each of which essentially justifies and resolves the complete lawlessness of power.
Thus, gradually the author shows that the Foolovskaya government has turned from a string of absurd faces into a soulless bureaucratic apparatus that is cruel to people. The ultimate expression of this mechanical inanimate phenomenon is in the work of Grim-Grumbling. In relation to it, the author allows two comparisons in the text. Firstly, he calls the hero Satan, since he hated living life. Secondly, he is labeled as an idiot. The idiot Grump-Burcheev has in common with the fact that he always achieves his goal with incredible perseverance, by any means. He fancies himself a reformer, he has ideals. This is a straight line, the absence of variegation, simplicity, brought to nudity. He intends to rebuild Foolov, turn it into a kind of barracks-type camp. Gloomy-Grumbling is trying with all his might to suppress, conquer living life. Therefore, his struggle with the river and defeat are symbolic.
As a result, the city of Foolov was subjected to a terrible punishment. “It” came from the north, Gloomy-Grumbling disappeared, and history stopped its course. This “it” has been characterized differently by different critics and researchers. Some were sure that this was a revolution sweeping away unjust power. Others have singled out here the motive of the apocalypse, that is, the end of the world. Shchedrin does not explain in detail what “it” is, he simply noted that at certain stages of history, life comes to a standstill. And catastrophic moments come when everything old collapses and a person, society, nation must again go through a situation of choice, a historical one.
Thus, Saltykov-Shchedrin still hopes that Glupov has a chance to become a normal place, that its inhabitants will still try to solve their problems on their own.
GOVERNERS OF THE CITY
Busty Dementy Varlamovich
He was appointed in a hurry and had some special device in his head, for which he was nicknamed "organ".
A number of Foolov's mayors are opened by Brodysty, in whose head an organ mechanism operates instead of the brain, playing only two phrases: "I will ruin" and "I will not tolerate." These shouting words became a kind of slogans, symbols of many years of intimidation and pacification of the peasants that existed in Russia, when the authorities restored "order" with the help of cruel reprisals and violence. In Brudasty's organ, Saltykov-Shchedrin displayed all the simplification of administrative leadership, which flowed from the very nature of the autocracy as a despotic usurper regime.
Pimple, major, Ivan Panteleevich
The symbol of emptiness and insignificance of power is Pimple - the mayor with a stuffed head. Explaining this image, as well as the generally unusual nature of the narrative in the "History of a City", the author wrote: "... A mayor with a stuffed head does not mean a person with a stuffed head, but precisely a mayor who controls the fate of many thousands of people. This is not even a laugh but a tragic situation."
pfeiffer Bogdan Bogdanovich ,
Guards sergeant, Holstein native. Having accomplished nothing, he was replaced in 1762 for ignorance.
Scoundrels
Onufry Ivanovich
,
former Gatchina stoker. He placed the streets paved with the forerunners and set up monuments from the extracted stone.
Interception-Zalkhvatsky
,
Archangel Stratilatovich, major.
He rode into Foolov on a white horse, burned the gymnasium and abolished the sciences.
sadilov Erast Andreevich,
State Councillor. Friend of Karamzin. He died of melancholy in 1825. He raised the tribute from the ransom to five thousand rubles a year.
Gloomy-Grumbling
,
"former scoundrel." Destroyed the old city and built another in a new place. Scoundrel - distorted from profos. (That's what they called under PeterIexecutioners in the army, and then wardens of military prisons.)
Gloomy-Grumbling is not only a comical figure, but also a terrible one. "He was terrible" - this phrase is repeated twice at the beginning of the chapter devoted to the all-powerful idiot. The appearance and actions of Grim-Burcheev instilled in the inhabitants of the city of Glupov only one feeling: "universal panic fear." Gloomy-Grumbling is a monumental grotesque-satirical image, which is a combination of the most disgusting qualities hostile to man. This is a humanoid idol "with a kind of wooden face", which "conquered every nature in itself", which is characterized by "mental petrification". It is "on all sides, tightly sealed being", which is alien to any "natural manifestations of human nature" and which operates "with the regularity of the most distinct mechanism".
Wartkin
Vasilisk Semyonovich.
The city government was the longest and most brilliant. Again, it petitioned for an institution in the Foolov Academy, but, having been refused, built a movable house.
"History of a City" - in essence, a satirical history of Russian society, ”wrote I.S. Turgenev. The whole life of the city of Foolov is absurd, contrary to normal human life. Its rulers are vicious, cruel puppets: their goal is the destruction of everything that thinks.
"The History of a City" is the history of the oppression of the people and a resolute condemnation of the meek humility that made possible the existence of a completely rotten reactionary system.
TEST on the work of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin
Exercise 1.
Allegory is:
1. One of the tropes, allegory, the image of some abstract idea in a specific, clearly presented image.
2. An artistic device that consists in using a transparent allusion to some well-known everyday, literary or historical fact instead of mentioning the fact itself.
3. Artistic opposition of characters, circumstances, concepts, images, compositional elements, creating the effect of sharp contrast.
Task 2.
Build these concepts as the force of impact increases:
1. ... irony
2. ... sarcasm
3. ... grotesque
4. … ………….satire
Task 3.
Satire is:
1. One of the types of comic, hidden mockery, based on the fact that a word or expression is used in a meaning opposite to the generally accepted one.
2. One of the types of comic, caustic, angry, mocking mockery.
3. One of the types of comic, the image of any shortcomings, vices of a person and society.
Task 4.
Hyperbole is:
1. One of the tropes, artistic exaggeration, the essence of which is to enhance any qualities.
2. One of the tropes, which consists in deliberately implausible artistic understatement.
3. One of the tropes, which consists in comparing objects or phenomena that have a common feature in order to explain one another.
Task 5.
From which fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are the answers given:
1. “Served (they) in some kind of registry; there they were born, brought up and grew old, therefore, they did not understand anything. They didn’t even know any words, except: “Accept the assurance of my perfect respect and devotion.”
2. “In a certain kingdom, in a certain state, he lived ... he lived and, looking at the light, rejoiced. He had enough of everything: peasants, and bread, and cattle, and land, and gardens. And he was ... stupid, he read the newspaper "Vest" and his body was soft, white and crumbly.
3. “And suddenly he disappeared. What happened here! - Whether the pike swallowed him, whether the crayfish was killed by claws, or he died of his own death and surfaced, - there were no witnesses to him. Most likely, he himself died.
Task 6.
Pick up the missing words from the right column so that the names of the fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are restored:
1. "... in the province" eagle
2. "...-patron" bear
3. "...- idealist" hare
4. "... - petitioner" crucian
5. "Selfless..." raven
Task 7.
Aesopian language is:
1. Artistic exaggeration.
2. Allegory.
3. Artistic comparison.
Task 8.
In Saltykov-Shchedrin's novel The History of a City, the mayors replace each other, which is accompanied by an increase in the writer's satire. Find the correspondence between the mayors and the characteristics of their activities:
1. Grotesque soulless automatism.
2. Unlimited despotism.
3. Punitive steadfastness.
4. Scrupulous clerical bureaucracy.
5. Cruel bureaucratic corrosiveness.
6. Idolatry possession.
. Grieving.
. Dvokurov.
. Ferdyshchenko.
. Busty.
. Ugryum-Burcheev.
. Wartkin.
Task 9.
About whom did M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin write: “If the word “fool” had been put instead of the word “organ”, then the reviewer probably would not have found anything unnatural ...”?
1. Gloomy-Grumbling.
2. Sadness.
3. Ferdyshchenko.
4. Busty.
Task 10.
Each image of the mayor is a generalized image of his era. The barracks ideal of which of the city governors incorporates the most striking signs of the reactionary political regimes of different countries and eras:
1. Wartkin.
2. Sadness.
3. Gloomy-Grumbling.
4. Busty.
Task 11.
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin does not belong to Peru:
1. "Poshekhonskaya antiquity".
2. "Lord Golovlyov".
3. "The history of one city."
4. "The day before."
Task 12.
The main "weapon" of the writer is:
1. Real image of reality
2. Laughter.
3. Vivid portrayal of characters.
4. Revolutionary.
Conclusion
The works of Saltykov-Shchedrin are relevant today; writer's satiredirected at those in power , and on those whoobeys them, suffers humiliation. The author opposes the unreasonable, consumerist attitude to the people, to the wealth of the country, against violence and rudeness, against the slavish, servile consciousness.
Common features of fairy talesSaltykov-Shchedrin :
a) In fairy tales, a connection with folklore is tangible: fairy-tale beginnings, folklore images, proverbs, sayings.
b) Tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are always allegorical, built on allegories. In some fairy tales acting
faces - representatives of the animal world, drawn zoologically correctly, but at the same time being allegorical characters, personifying certain class relations in society. In other fairy tales, the heroes are people, but here, too, the allegory is preserved. Therefore, fairy tales do not lose their allegorical meaning.
c) In fairy tales, skillfully combining the authentic with the fantastic, the writer freely switches the action from the animal world to the world of human relations; the result is a political witticism that was not found in folk tales.
d) The tales are built on sharp social contrasts, in almost every one of them representatives of antagonistic classes come face to face (generals and muzhik, landowner and muzhiks ...).
e) The whole fairy-tale cycle is permeated by the element of laughter, in some fairy tales the comic prevails, in others the comic is intertwined with the tragic.
f) The language of fairy tales is mostly folk, with the use of journalistic vocabulary, clerical jargon, archaisms and foreign words.
g) The fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin depict not just evil and kind people, the struggle between good and evil, like most folk tales of those years, they reveal the class struggle in Russia in the second halfXIXin.
“... what Mr. Saltykov calls fairy tales does not at all correspond to its purpose; his tales are the same satire, and caustic satire, directed against our social and political structure ... ". Yu.V.Lebedev
In The History of a City, the great satirist showed that the ghost of the state is served mainly by limited people, and this service leads to the fact that they lose all individual features and become, if not soulless slaves, then complete idiots.
It is easy to see that the mayors depicted by Saltykov-Shchedrin carry in their images a hint of certain tsars or ministers. However, they are not only the personification of the Russian ruling elite. The author's intention was much broader. He sought to expose the very system of autocracy. The mayors outwardly differ significantly from each other, but one thing is characteristic of all of them - all their actions are essentially directed against the people.
Karamzin N.M. there is a wonderful saying about history: “History in a sense is the sacred book of peoples: the main, necessary; a mirror of their being and activity; the tablet of revelations and rules; the covenant of ancestors to posterity; an explanation of the present and an example of the future”.
“The history of one city ”Saltykov-Shchedrin isthe first Russian dystopian novel, novel is a warning to future generations.
1 “I, the undersigned, declare that I do not belong to any secret societies, both within the Russian Empire and outside it, and henceforth I undertake, under whatever names they may exist, not to belong to them and have no relations with them have…"
2 Ostrovsky writes “Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky”, “Voevoda”; A.K. Tolstoy “The Death of Ivan the Terrible”, “Tsar Fedor Ioannovich”, “Tsar Boris”. Works in Sovremennik.
3 After entering the service, denunciations rained down on Saltykov-Shchedrin, he was threatened with a trial for abuse of power, provincial wits called him “Vice-Robespierre”. In 1868, the chief of the gendarmes reported to the tsar about Saltykov-Shchedrin as "an official imbued with ideas, disagreeing types of state benefit and legal order."
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin Test
Exercise 1
Allegory is:
1. One of the tropes, allegory, the image of some abstract idea in a specific, clearly represented image.
2. An artistic device that consists in using a transparent allusion to some well-known everyday, literary or historical fact instead of mentioning the fact itself.
3. Artistic opposition of characters, circumstances, concepts, images, compositional elements, creating the effect of sharp contrast.
Task 2
Build these concepts as the force of impact increases:
1) irony
2) sarcasm
3) grotesque
4) satire
Task 3
Satire is:
1. One of the types of comic, hidden mockery, based on the fact that a word or expression is used in a meaning opposite to the generally accepted one.
One of the types of comic, caustic, angry, mocking mockery.
One of the types of comic, the image of any shortcomings, vices of a person or society. Task 4
One of the tropes, artistic exaggeration, the essence of which is to enhance any qualities.
One of the tropes, which consists in a deliberate implausible artistic understatement.
One of the tropes, which consists in comparing objects or phenomena that have a common feature in order to explain one to another.
From which fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are excerpts:
1. “Served [they] in some registry; there they were born, brought up and grew old, therefore, they did not understand anything. They didn’t even know any words, except: “Accept the assurance of my perfect respect and devotion.”
2. “In a certain kingdom, in a certain state, he lived, was ..., lived and, looking at the light, rejoiced. He had enough of everything: peasants, and bread, and cattle, and land, and gardens. And there was one ... stupid, read a newspaper
"News" and the body was soft, white and crumbly.
3. “And suddenly he disappeared. What happened here! - Whether the pike swallowed him, whether the cancer was broken by claws, or he died by his own death and surfaced, - there were no witnesses to him. Most likely, he himself died ... "
Task 6
Pick up the missing words from the right column so that the names of the fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are restored:
1. "... in the voivodship". eagle
2. "... - philanthropist." bear
3. "... - an idealist." hare
4. "... - a petitioner." crucian carp
5. "Selfless...". crow
Task 7
Aesopian language is:
1. Artistic exaggeration.
2. Allegory.
3. Artistic comparison.
Task 8
In Saltykov-Shchedrin's novel The History of a City, the mayors replace each other, which is accompanied by an increase in the writer's satire. Find the correspondence between the mayors and the characteristics of their activities:
1. Grotesque soulless automatism. sadilov
2. Unlimited despotism. Dvoekurov
3. Punitive steadfastness. Ferdyshchenko
4. Scrupulous clerical bureaucracy. busty
5. Cruel bureaucratic corrosiveness. Gloomy-Grumbling
6. Idolatry possession. Wartkin
Task 9
About whom M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin wrote: “If the word “fool” had been put instead of the word “organ”, then the reviewer probably would not have found anything unnatural ...”
1. Gloomy-Grumbling.
2. Sadness.
3. Ferdyshchenko.
4. Busty.
Task 10
Each image of the mayor is a generalized image of his era. The barracks ideal of which of the city governors incorporates the most striking signs of the reactionary political regimes of different countries and eras:
1. Wartkin.
2. Sadness.
3. Gloomy-Grumbling.
4. Busty.
Task 11
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in his History of a City proves the hostility of state power to the people. The obedience of the people in the work is most clearly manifested:
1. In the psychological image of the personality of the peasant.
2. In the image of mass scenes.
3. In the depiction of scenes of folk "riots".
Task 12
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin does not belong to Peru:
1. "Poshekhonskaya antiquity".
2. "Gentlemen Golovlev".
3. "The history of one city."
4. "The day before."
Task 13
The meaning of "History of one city" is expressed in (eliminate unnecessary):
1. Breaking off all and all kinds of masks.
2. Showing the attitude of the progressive part of Russian society to the reform of 1861.
3. Mapping the evolution of Russian liberalism.
4. The exposure of state despotism in relation to the people.
5. The use of grotesque fantasy depicted.
Task 14
The main "weapon" of the writer is:
1. Real image of reality.
3. Vivid portrayal of characters.
4. Revolutionary.
Test based on the poem by M.Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri"
1. Epigraph to the poem by M.Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri" is taken from:
A) epics; b) the Bible; c) ancient Russian chronicles; d) the poems of Horace.
2. What is the meaning of the epigraph?
A) rebellion against fate;
B) repentance, hopeless humility;
C) protection of the human right to freedom.
3. Determine the genre of the work.
A) a ballad b) elegy; c) a poem-confession; d) a parable.
A) feminine rhymes; b) male rhymes; c) both.
5. What literary direction can the poem be attributed to?
A) sentimentalism
B) realism;
B) romanticism;
D) classicism.
6. What can be called a symbol of freedom in the poem?
A) steppe;
B) the Caucasus;
B) leopard;
D) a Georgian girl.
7. Highlight the features of romanticism in the poem "Mtsyri".
A) stormy, violent nature;
B) the death of a hero;
C) the hero is lonely and not understood by the world;
D) the introduction of the hero's dream into the plot of the poem;
D) the motive of struggle, rebellion.
8. What is the role of descriptions of nature in the poem "Mtsyri"?
A) nature is opposed to the monastery as freedom to captivity;
B) nature is opposed to the hero, enters into a fight with him;
C) nature deceives the hero, again directing him to the monastery;
D) nature is multifaceted: it opposes the hero, freedom, serves to develop the plot.
9. Determine the poetic size used by M.Yu. Lermontov in a poem.
A) anapaest; b) dactyl; c) amphibrachs; d) iambic.
10. What is the central moment in the plot of the poem?
A) escape from the monastery;
B) meeting with a girl;
C) fight with a leopard;
D) the death of Mtsyri.
11. In the confession of Mtsyri it sounds:
A) anger, indignation;
B) humility, repentance;
C) sadness, reflections;
D) assertion of one's innocence;
D) a call to abandon the fruitless struggle.
12. Why was the Caucasus chosen as the scene of the poem?
B) the nature of the Caucasus is akin to the nature of the protagonist;
C) connection with the history of Russia;
D) the scene corresponds to the romantic orientation of the poem.
13. What is the main idea of the work?
A) denial of the religious morality of asceticism and humility;
B) longing for will;
C) affirmation of the idea of fidelity to ideals in the face of death;
d) a call to fight against any manifestation of despotism.
Test for knowledge of the text based on the fairy tales of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin
Option 1
How did two generals end up on a desert island?
4) arrived on a magic carpet
2. What did the man cook the soup in?
1) In a pot 2) In a handful 3) In a coconut shell 4) In a vat
3. What newspaper did the generals read on the desert island?
1) Moskovskaya Pravda 2) Moskovskiye Vedomosti 3) Moscow Review 4) Vestnik Moskvy
4. How did the generals find the man on the island?
1) By the footprints in the sand 2) By the sounds of the balalaika 3) By the smell of chaff bread 4) By his cries
5. Who did this man work in St. Petersburg?
1) Cook 2) Blacksmith 3) Painter 4) Carrier
6. What was the landowner very dissatisfied with in his life in the fairy tale "The Wild Landowner"?
1) Small pension 2) Abundance of men 3) Absence of a wife 4) Absence of children
7. Whom did the landlord invite to visit?
1) Bear 2) Governor 3) Neighboring Generals 4) Judge
8. What way of walking the landowner considered the most decent and convenient?
1) On all fours 2) In a carriage 3) On horseback 4) In a cart
Option 2
In what form did the two generals arrive on the island?
In uniforms 2) In nightgowns 3) In fur coats and felt boots 4) Undressed
What object was swallowed by one of the generals for lack of dinner?
Button 2) Order 3) Slippers 4) Scarf
What way did the generals come up with so as not to die of hunger?
Sleep all the time 2) Learn to work 3) Find a man 4) Catch the beast
What did the man make bird snares out of?
From own hair 2) From own shirt 3) From own bast shoes 4) From fishing line
How did the generals return home?
4) The man built the ship
6. With whom did the landowner hunt hares?
1) With a wolf 2) With a boar 3) With a bear 4) With a fox
7. What did the wild landowner treat all the guests to?
1) Sausage 2) Gingerbread 3) Jam 4) Berries and mushrooms
8. Why didn't the landowner even feel the cold in autumn?
1) Put on a sheepskin coat 2) Sat on the stove 3) Overgrown with hair 4) Drank deeply
9. Who bothered to return the peasant to the landowner?
1) Provincial authorities 2) The landowner himself 3) Neighbors 4) Tsar
Test on the story of A.S. Pushkin "The Captain's Daughter"
1. The narration in "The Captain's Daughter" is conducted on behalf of:
A) compositions b) epigraphs; c) plug-in elements; d) direct author's assessment;
D) choosing a hero.
3. What historical figures are mentioned in the story?
A) Frederick II b) Count Minich; c) Grigory Orlov; d) Catherine I; e) Elizabeth I; e) Catherine P.
4. What are the artistic techniques that Pushkin did not use?used to create the image of Pugachev.
D) the attitude of other characters; e) plug-in elements.
5. What is the meaning of the title of the story?
Masha Mironova - ...
A) the only female character in the story; b) stands in the center of the plot;
C) a bearer of high morality and honor; d) the daughter of a deceased Russian officer.
6. Match the elements of composition and elements of developmentshitty plot.
A) exposition 1) scene of a duel with Shvabrin, letter from father
B) plot 2) release of Grinev, marriage to Masha
C) climax 3) Petrusha's childhood in the family estate
D) denouement 4) Grinev's acquaintance with the main character of the story.
7. For what purpose is Grinev's dream introduced into the story?
A) characterizes Grinev; b) portends the development of relations between two characters;
C) characterizes Pugachev; d) emphasizes Pugachev's bloodlust.
8. Who owns the statement "God forbid to see a Russian rebellion, senseless and merciless ..."?
9. Match the pairs of heroes whose characteristics are based on the principle of antithesis.
A) Pugachev; 1) Orenburg generals;
B) Shvabrin; 2) Catherine II;
C) Pugachev's "generals"; 3) Grinev.
10. What folklore genres does A.S. Pushkin to create the image of Pugachev?
A) epics; b) riddles; c) fairy tales; d) songs; e) proverbs, sayings; e) myths.
11. What chapter is preceded by an epigraph:
“At that time, the lion was full, even though he was ferocious from his birth.
"Why did you deign to come to my den?" -
he asked kindly. (A. Sumarokov)
a) "Court"; b) "Arrest"; c) "Attack"; d) "Uninvited guest"; e) "Rebellious settlement" 12.. What is the main theme of the story "The Captain's Daughter"?
A) the problem of love; b) the problem of honor, duty and mercy; c) the problem of the role of the people in the development of society; d) the problem of comparing tribal and service nobility.
13. How is Savelich shown in the story?
A) downtrodden, voiceless serfs;
B) obedient, slavishly devoted to their masters;
C) deep, endowed with self-esteem;
D) loving, faithful, selfless, caring assistant and adviser.
14. Mark the correct statement. Literary character is...
A) the image of a particular person, in which the typical features of the time are expressed through individual qualities; b) artistic depiction of a person; c) personal traits inherent in the hero.
15. What symbolic images are used by A.S. Pushkin in the story "The Captain's Daughter"?
A) way, road; b) grave; c) storm, snowstorm; d) eagle, raven; e) dagger; e) gallows.
16. What features of the Russian national character are shownA.S. Pushkin as Pugachev?
A) mind, sharpness; b) laziness, inactivity; c) daring, breadth of nature;
D) a tendency to drunkenness; e) memory of kindness, gratitude.
17. Whose portrait is this?“She was in a white morning dress, in a night cap and in a shower jacket. She seemed to be forty years old. Her face, full and ruddy, expressed importance and calmness, and her blue eyes and a slight smile had an inexplicable charm ... "
A) Maria Mironova; b) Vasilisa Egorovna; c) Catherine II;
D) Avdotya Vasilievna.
TEST9 M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin
Exercise 1
Allegory is:
1. One of the tropes, allegory, the image of some abstract idea in a specific, clearly represented image.
2. An artistic device that consists in using a transparent allusion to some well-known everyday, literary or historical fact instead of mentioning the fact itself.
3. Artistic opposition of characters, circumstances, concepts, images, compositional elements, creating the effect of sharp contrast.
Task 2
Build these concepts as the force of impact increases:
Task 3
Satire is:
1. One of the types of comic, hidden mockery, based on the fact that a word or expression is used in a meaning opposite to the generally accepted one.
2. One of the types of comic, caustic, angry, mocking mockery.
3. One of the types of comic, the image of any shortcomings, vices of a person or society.
Task 4
Hyperbole is:
1. One of the tropes, artistic exaggeration, the essence of which is to enhance any qualities.
2. One of the tropes, which consists in deliberately implausible artistic understatement.
3. One of the tropes, which consists in comparing objects or phenomena that have a common feature in order to explain one another.
Task 5
From which fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are excerpts:
1. “Served [they] in some registry; there they were born, brought up and grew old, therefore, they did not understand anything. They didn’t even know any words, except: “Accept the assurance of my perfect respect and devotion.”
2. “In a certain kingdom, in a certain state, he lived, was ..., lived and, looking at the light, rejoiced. He had enough of everything: peasants, and bread, and cattle, and land, and gardens. And he was stupid, he read the newspaper "Vest" and his body was soft, white and crumbly.
3. “And suddenly he disappeared. What happened here! - Whether the pike swallowed him, whether the cancer was broken by claws, or he died by his own death and surfaced, - there were no witnesses to him. Most likely, he himself died ... "
P. "The Tale of How One Man Feeded Two Generals"
P. "Wild landowner"
P. "Wise minnow"
Task 6
Pick up the missing words from the right column so that the names of the fairy tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are restored:
1. "... in the voivodeship." Eagle
2. "... - philanthropist." P bear
3. "... - an idealist." P hare
4. "... - petitioner." P crucian
5. "Selfless ...". P raven
Task 7
Aesopian language is:
1. Artistic exaggeration.
2. Allegory.
3. Artistic comparison.
Task 8
In Saltykov-Shchedrin's novel The History of a City, the mayors replace each other, which is accompanied by an increase in the writer's satire. Find the correspondence between the mayors and the characteristics of their activities:
1. Grotesque soulless automatism.
2. Unlimited despotism.
3. Punitive steadfastness.
4. Scrupulous clerical bureaucracy.
5. Cruel bureaucratic corrosiveness.
6. Idolatry possession.
P Sadtilov P Dvoekurov P Ferdyshchenko P Brudasty P Glum-Grumbling
P Wartkin
Task 9
About whom M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin wrote: “If the word “fool” had been put instead of the word “organ”, then the reviewer probably would not have found anything unnatural ...”
1. Gloomy-Grumbling.
2. Sadness.
3. Ferdyshchenko.
4. Busty.
Task 10
Each image of the mayor is a generalized image of his era. The barracks ideal of which of the city governors incorporates the most striking signs of the reactionary political regimes of different countries and eras:
1. Wartkin. 2. Sadness. 3. Gloomy-Grumbling.
4. Busty.
Task 11
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in his History of a City proves the hostility of state power to the people. The obedience of the people in the work is most clearly manifested:
1. In the psychological image of the personality of the peasant.
2. In the image of mass scenes.
3. In the depiction of scenes of folk "riots".
Task 12
M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin does not belong to Peru:
1. "Poshekhonskaya antiquity".
2. "Gentlemen Golovlev".
3. "The history of one city."
4. "The day before."
Task 13
The value of the writer's creativity is expressed in (eliminate the unnecessary):
1. Breaking off all and all kinds of masks.
2. Showing the attitude of the progressive part of Russian society to the reform of 1861.
3. Mapping the evolution of Russian liberalism.
4. Exposure of state despotism.
5. The use of grotesque fantasy depicted.
Task 14
The main "weapon" of the writer is:
1. Real image of reality.
3. Vivid portrayal of characters.
4. Revolutionary.
Grade 10 Answers to the test "M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin"
Grade 10I. A. Goncharov "Oblomov"
Option 1
Read the text fragment below and complete tasks A1 - A5; B1 - B4; C1.
In Gorokhovaya Street, in one of the large houses, the population of which would have been the size of an entire county town, Ilya Ilyich Oblomov was lying in bed in his apartment in the morning.
He was a man of about thirty-two or three years of age, of medium height, of pleasant appearance, with dark gray eyes, but with no definite idea, no concentration in his features. The thought walked like a free bird across the face, fluttered in the eyes, settled on half-open lips, hid in the folds of the forehead, then completely disappeared, and then an even light of carelessness glowed all over the face. From the face, carelessness passed into the poses of the whole body, even into the folds of the dressing gown.
Sometimes his eyes were darkened by an expression as if of weariness or boredom; but neither fatigue nor boredom could for a moment drive away from the face the gentleness that was the dominant and basic expression not only of the face, but of the whole soul; and the soul shone so openly and clearly in the eyes, in the smile, in every movement of the head and hand. And a superficially observant, cold person, glancing casually at Oblomov, would say: “There must be a kind man, simplicity!” A deeper and more sympathetic person, peering into his face for a long time, would walk away in pleasant thought, with a smile.
Ilya Ilyich's complexion was neither ruddy, nor swarthy, nor positively pale, but indifferent or seemed so, perhaps because Oblomov was somehow flabby beyond his years: from a lack of movement or air, or maybe that and another. In general, his body, judging by the matte, too white color of the neck, small plump hands, soft shoulders, seemed too pampered for a man.
His movements, when he was even alarmed, were also restrained by softness and laziness, not devoid of a kind of grace. If a cloud of care came over the face from the soul, the look became foggy, wrinkles appeared on the forehead, a game of doubt, sadness, fright began; but seldom did this anxiety solidify in the form of a definite idea, still more rarely did it turn into an intention. All anxiety was resolved with a sigh and faded into apathy or drowsiness.
A1. Determine the genre of the work from which the fragment is taken.
1) story; 3) true story;
2) a story; 4) a novel.
A2. What is the place of this fragment in the work?
1) opens the narrative;
2) completes the story;
3) is the culmination of the plot;
4) plays the role of an insert episode.
AZ The main theme of this fragment is:
1) description of the house where the main character lived;
2) the beauty of Gorokhovaya Street;
3) the state of the main character in the morning;
4) Oblomov's appearance.
A4 What was the dominant expression on the face of Ilya Ilyich Oblomov?
1) simplicity; 3) softness;
2) severity; 4) anger.
A5 What is the purpose of this fragment to suggest that Oblomov's soul shone brightly and openly in all his movements?
1) reveal the lack of a serious attitude to life in the hero;
2) show the low mental abilities of the hero;
3) characterize the psychological state of the hero;
4) describe the thoughtless attitude of the hero to life.
Q1 Indicate the term used in literary criticism as a means of artistic depiction that helps the author describe the character and express his attitude towards him (“neither positively pale”, “indifferent”, “little chubby”, “too pampered”).
Q2 Name the means of creating the image of the hero, based on the description of his appearance (from the words: "It was a man ...").
B3 From the paragraph beginning with the words: “It was ...”, write out a phrase that explains what was reflected in the face of Ilya Ilyich Oblomov.
Another characteristic feature of the artistic structure of the "history of one city" is that all events, scenes, plausible and reliable, are combined with fantastic figures and scenes, impossible in real life.
Let us take a look, for example, at the Inventory of the Mayors, in which Shchedrin acquaints us with the variety of persons who at various times ruled over Foolov. At first glance, there is nothing unusual: there is a surname, a first name and patronymic and a rank. And some are endowed with believable qualities.
At the same time, there are unusual characteristics and details.
So, foreman Ivan Matveyevich Baklan is described as follows: "He was three arshins and three vershoks tall, and boasted of what was happening in a straight line from Ivan the Great (the bell tower known in Moscow). It was broken in half during a storm that raged in 1761"
The Marquis de Sanglot "flyed through the air in the city garden and almost flew away completely, as he caught his tails on a spitz, and was removed from there with great difficulty."
State Councilor Nikodim Osipovich Ivanov "was so small that he could not contain lengthy laws. He died in 1819 from exertion, trying to comprehend some Senate decree."
Reliable, plausible and fantastic in Shchedrin's satire coexist, interact with each other. Thanks to this, certain aspects of life turn to the reader as if anew, their true essence is exposed.
In reality, internal life patterns are hidden in the monotonous everyday life. But if something unusual happens in this everyday life, a person stops and begins to think about what this could mean.
The combination of authentic and fantastic in Shchedrin's satire pursues a similar goal. The intrusion of science fiction into everyday reality is designed to draw the reader's attention to such patterns of life that usually eluded the eye.
Grotesque figures of mayors
In the inventory of the mayors, brief descriptions of Foolov's statesmen are given, the satirical appearance of the most stable features of Russian history, invariably repeated in all epochs and all times, is reproduced. Theophylact Benevolensky and Basilisk Borodavkin went down in history by the widespread and violent planting of lamush, mustard and bay leaves, Provence oil and Persian chamomile in Foolov. Amadeus Clementius glorified himself by diligently forcing the townsfolk to cook pasta. Onufry Vegodyaev laid out the streets paved by his predecessors and set up monuments from the extracted stone. Gloom-Grumbling destroyed the old city and built another in a new place. Interception-Zalikhvatsky burned down the gymnasium and abolished the sciences. The statutes and circulars, which the governors are famous for, bureaucratically regulate the life of the townsfolk down to everyday trifles, up to the decrees "On respectable baking pies."
The writer achieves sharpening and exaggeration of artistic images by various artistic means. Creating images of guards, the satirist widely uses a technique that could be called the technique of "puppetry".
Its mayors resemble vile and ferocious puppets. This technique was chosen by Shchedrin not by chance. It is based on the truth of life and deep thought. The need to create violence has entered into their flesh and blood, robbery has become a daily habit. Therefore, they are deprived of any human traits and even human appearance. Foolov's rulers are no longer people, but living puppets. They can perform their functions automatically. For this, as the example of Brodystoy proves, they don’t even need a head. In the head of this administrator, instead of the brain, there is something like a hurdy-gurdy ("organ"), playing two words-shouting: "I will ruin!" and "I will not stand it!". It tells about how the mechanism in Brodystoy's head once broke down, how he disappeared from the eyes of the townsfolk, having retired to his office. The clerk, who entered in the morning with a report, “saw such a sight in the office: the mayor’s body, dressed in a uniform, was sitting at a desk, and in front of him, on a pile of arrears registers, lay an empty mayor’s head in the form of a dandy paperweight. While the local master tried to fix the broken "organ", in Glupov a "revolt" began, the root cause of which was the indestructible love of the authorities. The enraged crowd ran to the house of the assistant to the mayor with a heart-rending cry: "Where did you do our father ?!".
This is how Shchedrin ridicules the bureaucratic thoughtlessness of the Russian state power, as well as the boundless confidence of the townsfolk in it. Another mayor with an artificial head, Pimple, adjoins Brudastom. Pimple has a stuffed head, so he is completely incapable of driving, and his motto is "rest, sir." And although the Foolovites sighed under the new ruler, the essence of their life has changed little: in both cases, the fate of the city was in the hands of the brainless authorities.
It is impossible not to notice that at the heart of Shchedrin's fantasy and grotesque lies the people's view of things, that many fantastic images are nothing more than detailed metaphors drawn from Russian proverbs and sayings. Both Brodasty's "organ" and Pimple's "stuffed head" go back to popular proverbs, sayings and phraseological expressions: "you can't fit a hat on a body without a head", "it's hard for a head without shoulders, it's bad for a body without a head", "at his head is stuffed with dust”, “to lose his head”, “even though it’s thick on his head, but his head is empty.” Rich in satirical meaning, folk sayings without any alteration fall into the description of Foolov's wars and civil strife.
An atmosphere of angry contempt, merciless mockery, and strong criticism surrounds all the figures of city governors. However, the satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin achieves the greatest intensity, strength, saturation in the image of Gloomy-Burcheev, where the soulless automatism of Organchik, and the punitive steadfastness of Ferdyshchenko, and the pedantry of Dvoekurov, and the cruelty of Wartkin, and the obsessive idolatry of Sadtilov have merged. "Glum-Grumbling was a scoundrel in the full sense of the word. Not only because he held this position in the regiment, but a scoundrel with all his being, with all his thoughts." In the concept of "scoundrel", in the narrow (professional) and broad (abusive) sense of the word, for the writer, all the evil that exists in a world hostile to life, human and natural, was combined. The story about Gloomy-Grumbling unfolds in a sternly tragic intonation. Here the author embraced with his satire and vividly displayed the whole set of various tricks of the anti-people power, all its political postulates, its entire legislative and administrative system based on coercion, drill, constant enslavement and oppression of the masses. The barracks ideal of Ugryum-Burcheev captures the exploitative regimes of not only one era and not one specific country, but many eras and many countries.
Grotesque image of the Foolovites
Foolov in Shchedrin's book is a special order of things, the constituent elements of which are not only the administration, but also the people - the Foolovites. Shchedrin exposes the weakest aspects of the people's worldview to satire. The writer shows that the mass of the people is basically politically naive, that it is characterized by inexhaustible patience and blind faith in the authorities, in the supreme power.
"We are habitual people," say the Foolovites. . The energy of administrative action is opposed to the energy of inaction, "rebellion" on your knees: "What do you want with us," some said, "whatever you like, cut into pieces; whatever you like, eat with porridge, but we do not agree!" - "From us, brother, you can't take anything!" - others said, - we are not like the others who have grown over with the body! There is nowhere to stab us, brother! And at the same time they stubbornly stood on their knees. "" You never know there were riots! - Foolov's old-timers proudly say about themselves. “We, sir, have such a sign about this: if they whip you, you already know that it’s a riot!”
When the Foolovites "take up their minds", then, "according to the old-rooted seditious custom", they either send a walker, or write petitions addressed to the high authorities: into an unknown distance - now, fellow chieftains, we will not endure for long! '' And indeed, the city again became quiet; the Foolovites did not undertake any new riots, but sat on the rubble and waited. When did the passers-by ask: how are you? then they answered: "Now our cause is right! Now, my brother, we have submitted a paper! ''" .
The "history of Foolov's liberalism" appears in a satirical light in the stories about Ionka Kozyrev, Ivashka Farafontiev and Alyoshka Bespyatov. Daydreaming and ignorance of practical ways to realize their dreams - these are the characteristic features of Foolov's liberals. The political naivety of the people resounds even in their very sympathy for their intercessors: "I suppose, Evseich, I suppose! - the Foolovites escort the truth-seeker Yevseich to prison, - you will live well everywhere with the truth!" . It should be noted that in his satire on the people, in contrast to the denunciation of city governors, Shchedrin strictly observes the boundaries of the satire that the people themselves created against themselves, widely using folklore. And if the satire on city governors is merciless in its revealing power, then laughter at the "townsfolk" is filled with warmth and sympathy. "In order to say bitter words of reproof about the people, he took these words from the people themselves, from them he received sanction to be their satirist," wrote A.S. Bushmin.
In the final chapters, the writer's thoughts are more and more clearly manifested that stupidity, passivity, which, it would seem, the author ridicules in the Foolovites, in fact form only "artificial impurities". Residents, according to the firm conviction of the author, can be capable of both protest and perseverance. There are in the mass of the people brave, courageous people, heroic personalities, lovers of truth, endowed with extraordinary moral strength. In this respect, the comparison with the river is symbolic, which, despite all the tricks of Ugryum-Burcheev, stubbornly flowed in the same direction.
"History of a City" as a grotesque novel
Introduction
A grotesque novel is a novel with a bizarre, grotesque style and phraseology, where seemingly completely unthinkable combinations of unbridled plot fiction and outwardly real fact with all everyday details are allowed. Here they laugh, and laughter turns into laughter, cry and giggle, breathe anger and talk about love. This style is associated with an age-old tradition: among the authors of such works are E. Rotterdamsokgo’s “Praise of Stupidity”, “Gargantua and Pantagruel F. Rabelais”, E. Hoffmann “Little Tsakhes”, “History of a City” M.E. Salykov-Shchedrin. The last work is a somewhat calmer version of the stylistic "Babylon".
Grotesque is a term that means a type of artistic imagery (image, style, genre) based on fantasy, laughter, hyperbole, a bizarre combination and contrast of something with something.
One of the masterpieces of Saltykov-Shchedrin, brilliantly realizing his concept of socio-political satire, through the grotesque was "The History of a City" (1869-1870). Already not only in terms of the social significance of the works, but also in terms of the scale of artistic talent and skill, magazine criticism put the name of the author of "The History of a City" next to the names of L. Tolstoy and Turgenev, Goncharov and Ostrovsky.
Saltykov-Shchedrin took a step forward in developing new principles of artistic typification. This circumstance caught the eye of both readers and critics. This new thing consisted in a broad appeal to fantasy, in the varied use of hyperbolization and artistic allegory. The new principles of artistic typification are determined by the broad "research" orientation that Saltykov's satire has adopted. In the genre of the grotesque, the ideological and artistic features of Shchedrin's satire were most clearly manifested: its political sharpness and purposefulness, the realism of its fantasy, the ruthlessness and depth of the grotesque, the sly sparkling humor.
Satire explores the "altars" of modern society, exposes their complete historical failure. One of these "altars" declared a monarchical state system. He is credited with wisdom, he is seen as the crown of reasonable historical management. To the democrat satirist, these monarchist ideas, of course, seemed completely untenable. If we extract from the principle of “disposition” proclaimed by the ideologists of autocracy all the historical results and modern results that this principle has brought with it, then with the help of logical conclusions, the satirist writer will certainly come across a comparison of tsarist policy with a mechanical organ or something similar to it. And the artistic imagination will complete the picture, give the necessary satirical distribution to the image that has arisen.
"History of a City" as a grotesque novel
In the work of Saltykov-Shchedrin, until the 1970s, the methods of artistic exaggeration did not go so far. The heroes of his satires, in general, fit into the framework of everyday-everyday plausibility. But already in the previous artistic practice of the satirist, there were such extraordinary comparisons and similes that predicted and prepared for the development and use of the techniques of satirical fiction, for example, the famous assimilation of a reactionary "trustworthy" layman to an enraged bug or the designation of the treacherous-renegade qualities of a liberal individual with the name "folded soul" and so on. further in the same way. In order to turn these likenings into a method of satirical typification, into a means of constructing a satirical image, the author had to artistically develop, activate the second member of the likening. His enraged bug should have, as it were, already expressed his bug thoughts, performed bug actions, revealed his bug character. This creates a grotesque image, a satirical-fantastic character.
Hyperbole and fantasy, Saltykov-Shchedrin argued, are special forms of figurative narration that by no means distort the phenomena of life. Literary research is subject, the satirist noted, not only actions that a person performs without hindrance, but also those that he would undoubtedly do if he could or dared.
The main function of artistic exaggeration is to reveal the essence of a person, his true motives, his speeches, deeds and actions. Hyperbole, as it were, breaks through the tangible features and veils of reality, bringing out the real nature of the phenomenon. The hyperbolic image riveted attention to the ugliness of evil, to the negative in life that had already become familiar.
Another, no less important function of the hyperbolic form was that it revealed the nascent, hidden. In other words, the techniques of hyperbole and fantasy allowed satire to capture artistically, designate the very tendencies of reality, some new elements that arise in it. Depicting readiness as a real reality, as something already molded into a new form, completing the life cycle, the satirist exaggerated, fantasized. But this is such an exaggeration that anticipated the future, hinted at what would happen tomorrow.
Saltykov-Shchedrin once stated that, while drawing a zealous pompadour governor who loved to write laws, he had no idea that Russian reality during the period of reaction would so soon fully confirm this hyperbolic plot.
Explaining the nature of the Aesopian form, which includes artistic exaggeration and allegory, Saltykov-Shchedrin noted that these latter did not obscure his thought, but, on the contrary, made it publicly available. The writer was looking for such additional colors that cut into the memory, vividly, intelligibly, boldly outlined the object of satire, made its idea clearer.
Shchedrin tells us the history of the city of Glupov, what happened in it for about a hundred years. And he begins this story with the "Inventory of the mayors." “Inventory to the Mayors” The entire content of the “History of a City” in a compressed form fits into this section of the book, therefore the “Inventory to the Mayors” best illustrates the methods by which Saltykov-Shchedrin created his work. It is here, in the most concentrated form, that we meet “bizarre and contrasting combinations of the real and the fantastic, the plausibility and the caricature, the tragic and the comic” that are characteristic of the grotesque. Probably, never before in Russian literature has such a compact description of entire eras, layers of Russian history and life been encountered. In the "Inventory" the reader is bombarded with a stream of absurdity, which, oddly enough, is more understandable than the real contradictory and phantasmagoric Russian life. Let's take the first mayor, Amadeus Manuylovich Klementy. Only seven lines are devoted to him (approximately the same amount of text is given to each of the 22 mayors), but each word here is more valuable than many pages and volumes written by contemporary Saltykov-Shchedrin (and contemporary us!) Official historians and social scientists. The comic effect is created already in the first words: the absurd combination of the foreign, beautiful and high-sounding for the Russian ear name Amadeus Klementy with the provincial Russian patronymic Manuilovich says a lot: about the fleeting "westernization" of Russia "from above", about how the country was flooded with foreign adventurers, about how alien the mores imposed from above were to ordinary people, and about many other things. From the same sentence, the reader learns that Amadeus Manuilovich ended up in the mayor’s office “for skillful cooking of pasta” - a grotesque, of course, and at first it seems funny, but after a moment the modern Russian reader understands with horror that in the one hundred and thirty years that have passed since little has changed: before our very eyes, numerous “advisors”, “experts”, “creators of monetary systems” and the “systems” themselves were discharged from the West, were discharged for crackling foreign chatter, for beautiful, exotic for the Russian ear surname ... And after all, they believed, they believed, like the Foolovites, just as stupidly and just as naively. Nothing has changed since then. Further, the descriptions of the "town governors" almost instantly follow one after another, piled up and mixed up in their absurdity, together making up, oddly enough, an almost scientific picture of Russian life. This description clearly shows how Saltykov-Shchedrin “constructs” his grotesque world. To do this, he really first "destroys" the plausibility: Dementy Vaolamovich Brudasty had "some special device" in his head. In the head of the mayor, instead of the brain, an organ mechanism operated, playing only two words-shouts: “I will not tolerate it!” and "I'll tear you apart!"
Answering Suvorin's accusations of exaggeration, of distorting reality, Saltykov-Shchedrin wrote: “If the word “fool” had been put instead of the word “organ”, then the reviewer probably would not have found anything unnatural ... After all, that’s not the point that Brodysty had an organ in his head, playing the romances “I won’t tolerate” and “I’m sorry”, but that there are people whose entire existence is exhausted by these two romances. Are there such people or not? (XVIII, 239).
To this well-calculated ironic question, of course, there was no positive answer. The history of tsarism is full of examples of "manifestations of arbitrariness and savagery." The entire modern reactionary policy of the autocracy convinced of the validity of such conclusions.
After all, the sacramental “raz-dawn” actually became the slogan of the post-reform decade of robbing the peasants, because everyone remembered a period of pacification, when “I will not tolerate” Muravyov the Hangman announced the cities and towns of Russia. After all, whole crowds of Muravyov's officials were in charge in Poland and the northwestern regions of Russia, restoring "order" with reprisals and violence.
Saltykov-Shchedrin typified in Organchik the simplification of administrative leadership, which stems from the very nature of the autocracy as a violent, usurping regime.
In The History of a City, the author exposed the deep immoralism of the autocracy, the excesses of favoritism, and the adventures of palace coups. This is followed by Anton Protasievich de Sanglot, who flew through the air, Ivan Panteleevich Pimple, who turned out to be with a stuffed head and was eaten by the marshal of the nobility. Eaten literally, his head is stuffed. In the "Inventory" there is something not so fantastic, but still very unlikely: the mayor Lamvrokakis died, eaten in bed by bedbugs; foreman Ivan Matveyevich Baklan is broken in half during a storm; Nikodim Osipovich Ivanov died of exertion, "struggling to comprehend some Senate decree," and so on. So, the grotesque world of Saltykov-Shchedrin is constructed, and the reader laughed at him to his heart's content. However, the absurd, fantastic world of Saltykov is not so absurd as it seems at first glance. More precisely, it is absurd, but the real world, the real country is no less absurd. In this "high reality" of Shchedrin's world, in the awareness of the modern reader of the absurdity of the structure of our life, lies the justification and purpose of Shchedrin's grotesque.
The image of Moody-Burcheev completed the gallery of Foolov's mayors. Russian tsarism, being embodied in a gloomy, grumbling guise, laid bare to the end its despotic nature and, what is especially important, revealed all its readiness, all its "bridling possibilities." The soulless automatism of Organchik, and the punitive steadfastness of Ferdyshchenko, and the administrative doctrinairism, pedantry of Dvoekurov, and the cruelty, bureaucratic thoroughness and corrosiveness of Wartkin, and the idolatrous obsession of Sadtilov merged in Gloomy-Grumbling. All these leadership qualities in Ugryum-Burcheev combined, merged. A new administrative alloy of unheard-of militant despotism was formed.
In this brilliant creation of Saltykov's fantasy, all the bureaucratic tricks of the anti-people government, all its political postulates - from subordination to espionage of the heart, its entire legislative and administrative system, based on coercion, on all kinds of drill, on the enslavement and oppression of the masses, are captured and satirically depicted in relief.
The famous barracks ideal of Ugryum-Burcheev embraces the most reactionary exploitative regimes of not just one epoch, but many epochs. And the matter is by no means limited to the Arakcheevshchina, the Batozh regimes of Nicholas 1, or the Russian autocratic-monarchist system in general as such. Saltykov-Shchedrin had in mind both French Bonapartism and Bismarck's militaristic regime. Moreover, Utryum-Burcheevism - this is a brilliant satirical generalization - quite recently openly, nakedly peeped through Hitlerism and peeps through to this day in the regimes, concepts, traditions and perspectives of the fascistized exploiting classes and states of our modern era. In contemporary reality, Shchedrin saw the rulers he had unmasked prospering in their places. However, he already knew everything about them and about their imminent future fate. And, turning them with his artistic imagination into something vile, inhuman, he triumphed in the joy of a moral victory won.
The laughter of the author is bitter. But there is also a high ecstasy in him that everything finally appears in its true light, the real price is announced for everything, everything is called by its name. The satirist does not doubt for a minute that in fact, in the human capacity, city governors no longer exist.
In the follow-up to the "Inventory", a detailed account of the "acts" of the mayors and a description of the behavior of the Foolovites, the writer turns to somewhat different methods of hyperbole and grotesque than those that created the satirical types of rulers. Undoubtedly, incriminating laughter sounded in folk episodes. Here, too, elements of artistic exaggeration and fantasy are not uncommon. For example, in the image of the fate of Ionka Kozyr, the author of the book “Letters to a friend about the establishment of virtue in the land”, the noble son of Ivashka Farafontiev, who was put on a chain and “died” for “blasphemous words”, that “equal to all people in food needs ... and who eats a lot, let him share with those who eat little, ”teachers Linkin and others. Nevertheless, a careful analysis of the text shows the difference in the figurative development of the folk theme. It is conditioned, of course, by ideological considerations. The author of The History of a City considered himself a defender of the people and more consistent than the people themselves, an enemy of their enemies.
Laughter in folk paintings is devoid of that emotional coloring, which is clearly visible in the satirical drawing of the city governor's world. The atmosphere of angry contempt and disgust, merciless mockery surrounds the figure of Brusty, Pimple or Gloomy-Grumbling. In a different emotional key, ivashki, "stupid people" are given. And here laughter is far from being simply cheerful or amusing. Notes of indignation penetrate here too. Most often, laughter in folk episodes is saturated with a bitter feeling. The farther to the end, to the chapters and pages, where the gloomy-burcheev regime is depicted, where the position of the Foolovites is shown more and more disastrous and difficult, the more often the narration is imbued with deeply tragic motifs. Laughter seems to freeze, giving way to the pathos of bitterness and indignation. Saltykov-Shchedrin sharply attacked the "sentimental people-lovers." Intolerable falseness is heard by the satirist in their touching words. Thus, the then liberal critic Suvorin pompously wrote about his love for the people and declared: “In America, in order to arouse sympathy for the oppressed, she (literature) idealized them, she presented their virtues in the foreground and explained their shortcomings by historical conditions.” From a comparison of Saltykov's and Suvorin's judgments, the fundamental difference between the liberal point of view on the people and the revolutionary-democratic point of view emerges as clearly as possible. The first considered the people only as an object of landlord philanthropy, as a passive victim, oppressed by history, who could only be helped by the tops of society; the second saw in the people an independent historical figure, but who had not yet risen to an active social struggle because of his unconsciousness, bad habits, brought up by centuries of slavery. Literature should not idealize the people, but soberly point out its shortcomings, and point out with the sole and noble goal of ridding the masses of them, thereby raising their social energy, their historical amateur activity. The same thing can be said about Saltykov-Shchedrin that Lenin said about Chernyshevsky, the author of the Prologue: he loved the people with a "yearning" love, yearning because of the lack of revolutionary spirit among the masses of the Great Russian population.
The collective characterization of the Foolovites was based on modern satire and the class structure of Russian society. In a number of cases, the author very aptly conveyed the difference in the economic and social status of estates and groups, the difference in their views, psychology, customs, and language. But the satirist traced, first of all, the common thing that united the different layers of the Foolovites. This is common - "awe", submission to the curbing "measures" of power, obedient adaptation to the circumstances that develop as a result of gross administrative interventions. This was clearly manifested in the scene of the election of a new mayor “The inhabitants rejoiced... They congratulated each other with joy, kissed, shed tears... In a fit of delight, Foolov's old liberties were also remembered. The best citizens..., having formed a nationwide veche, shook the air with exclamations: our father! Even dangerous dreamers appeared. Guided not so much by reason as by the movements of a noble heart, they argued that trade would flourish under the new city governor and that sciences and arts would arise under the supervision of district overseers. They didn't refrain from making comparisons. They remembered the old mayor who had just left the city, and it turned out that although he was also handsome and clever, but after all that, the new ruler should already be given the advantage by one volume that he was new. In a word, in this case, as in other similar cases, both the usual Foolovian enthusiasm and the usual Foolovian frivolity were fully expressed ... Soon, however, the townsfolk became convinced that their glee and hopes were, to a minimum, premature and exaggerated. .. The new mayor locked himself in his office ... From time to time he ran out into the hall ... he said “I won’t stand it!” - and again hid in the office. The Foolovites were horrified ... suddenly the thought dawned on everyone: well, how will he flog an entire nation in such a manner! ... they became agitated, made a noise and, inviting the superintendent of the public school, asked him the question: were there examples in history when people ordered, waged wars and concluded treatises with an empty vessel on their shoulders?
In the "rebellious" episodes of the "History" some of the essential aspects of popular movements are summarized, including in the recent era of reforms. The inertia and unconsciousness of the masses was most clearly expressed in unorganized, rebellious outbursts not clarified by consciousness and a clear understanding of the goals, which in no way alleviated the situation of the people and were marked by features of deep political backwardness.
In various forms of satirical and humorous ridicule, the writer clothed deep thought, accurate social observations.
In the collective characterization of the Foolovites, episodes and scenes in which laughter almost disappears played a significant role. Restrained harsh drama emanates from the pages, which described a lean year, a terrible drought that hit the ill-fated country. Realistically accurate and expressive, the author depicted terrible scenes of total death of people. Severe, stingy and gloomy to the point of despair, landscapes and everyday descriptions were interspersed with a sweeping, caustic laughter narration about "boss' care".
In Russian prose, there has never been a picture of a village fire more expressive in terms of verbal painting and heartfelt, heart-grabbing drama than the one given in The History of a City. Here is a tangible image of a fire blazing menacingly through dilapidated buildings, suffocating clouds of smoke, here is a sad, bitter lyricism with which the experiences of the victims of the fire are drawn, their powerless despair, longing, embracing their sense of hopelessness, when a person no longer groans, no longer curses, no longer complains , but longs for silence and with inevitable persistence begins to realize that "the end of everything" has come.
In the scenes of "rebellion on the knees" one can hear the screams of the flogged, the screams and groans of the crowd distraught with hunger, the ominous drumbeat of the punitive team entering the city. This is where bloody dramas take place.
The figurative generalizations of the satirist absorbed everything that he himself knew about the plight of the Russian countryside and what democratic literature and the progressive Russian press in general wrote about incredible poverty, about the ruin of the post-reform peasantry, about fires that annually “destroyed 24 parts” of all wooden and straw Russia, about police violence and reprisals. Saltykov's position regarding the peasantry was not the position of a beautiful-hearted people-lover-dreamer, but of a wise teacher, an ideologist who was not afraid to express the most bitter truths about the slavish habit of the masses to obedience. But never before or since has Shchedrin's criticism of the weak sides of the peasantry reached such sharpness, such strength of indignation, as precisely in The History of a City. The originality of this work lies in the fact that it is a two-sided satire: on the monarchy and on the political passivity of the masses. Shchedrin explained that in this case we are talking not about the fundamental properties of the people as "the embodiment of the idea of democracy", not about their national and social virtues, but about "superficial atoms", that is, about the features of a slave psychology developed by centuries of autocratic despotism and serfdom. Precisely because the masses of the people, by their obedience, opened up freedom for the unpunished arbitrariness of despotism, the satirist presented it in the accusatory image of the Foolovites. The author of The History of a City was not interested in the task of the historian, who seeks to capture the strengths and weaknesses of the peasant movement, but in the task of the satirist, who set himself the goal of showing the disastrous consequences of the passivity of the masses. Saltykov's main ideological plan, embodied in the paintings and images of the "History of a City", was the desire to enlighten the people, help them free themselves from the slave psychology generated by centuries of oppression and lack of rights, awaken their civic consciousness for a collective struggle for their rights, The very correlation of images in the work - one mayor commands a huge mass of people - is subject to the development of the idea that autocracy, despite all its cruelty and armament, is not as strong as it seems to a frightened layman who mixes ferocity with power, that the ruling elites are, in essence, a nonentity in comparison with the people's "whopper". It is enough for the oppressed mass to overcome the feeling of humility and fear, as there will be no trace left of the ruling elite. This idea is confirmed by the end of the novel with a formidable picture of “either a downpour, or a tornado” that angrily swooped down on Foolov: “there was a crash, and the former scoundrel instantly disappeared, as if melted into the air.” It remains a mystery whether this is an allegorical picture of a crushing popular revolt or a catastrophe sent down by nature itself, which W. threw down a reckless challenge, encroaching on the "eternal, miraculous."
Conclusion
In The History of a City, Shchedrin masterfully used the grotesque, with the help of which he created a logical, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, a comically absurd picture, but for all its absurdity and fantasticness, The History of a City is a realistic work that affects many pressing issues. The images of the city of Glupov and its mayors are allegorical, they symbolize autocratic-feudal Russia, power, in her reigning, Russian society. Therefore, the grotesque used by Saltykov-Shchedrin in the narrative is also a way to expose the disgusting for the writer, ugly realities of his contemporary life, as well as a means of identifying the author's position, Saltykov-Shchedrin's attitude to what is happening in Russia.
Describing the fantastically comic life of the Foolovites, their constant fear, all-forgiving love for their superiors, Saltykov-Shchedrin expresses his contempt for the people, apathetic and obedient-slavish, according to the writer, by their nature. The only time in the work that the Foolovites were free was in the presence of a mayor with a stuffed head. By creating this grotesque situation, Saltykov-Shchedrin shows that under the existing socio-political system, the people cannot be free. The absurdity of the behavior of the “strong” (symbolizing real power) of this world in the work embodies the lawlessness and arbitrariness perpetrated in Russia by high-ranking officials. The grotesque image of Grim-Burcheev, his “systematic delirium” (a kind of dystopia), which the mayor decided to bring to life at all costs, and the fantastic end of the reign is the realization of the idea of Saltykov-Shchedrin about the inhumanity, unnaturalness of absolute power, bordering on tyranny about the impossibility of its existence. The writer embodies the idea that autocratic-feudal Russia with its ugly way of life will sooner or later come to an end.
Thus, denouncing vices and revealing the absurdity and absurdity of real life, the grotesque conveys a special “evil irony”, “bitter laughter”, characteristic of Saltykov-Shchedrin, “laughter through contempt and indignation”. The writer sometimes seems absolutely ruthless to his characters, overly critical and demanding of the world around him. But, as Lermontov said, "the cure for the disease can be bitter." The cruel denunciation of the vices of society, according to Saltykov-Shchedrin, is the only effective means in the fight against the “disease” of Russia. Ridicule of imperfections makes them obvious, understandable to everyone. It would be wrong to say that Saltykov-Shchedrin did not love Russia, he despised the shortcomings, vices of her life and devoted all his creative activity to the fight against them.
Bibliography
1. Bushmin A.S. Saltykov-Shchedrin: The Art of Satire - M., Sovremennik, 1976
2. Bushmin A.S. Satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin. -- M.; L., USSR Academy of Sciences, 1959
3. Dobrolyubov N.A. Provincial essays on Shchedrin. - M., Goslitizdat, 1959
4. Kirpotin V.Ya. Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov. Life and work - M., 1955
5. Makashin S.A. M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in the memoirs of contemporaries. Foreword prepared text and comments. - M., Goslitizdat, 1957
6. Olminsky M.S. Articles about Saltykov-Shchedrin. - M., Goslitizdat, 1959
7. Pokusaev E.I. Saltykov-Shchedrin in the sixties. - Saratov, 1957
8. Pokusaev E.A. Revolutionary satire by Saltykov-Shchedrin. - M., Goslit. 1962
9. Saltykov-Shchedrin M. E. Selected works - M., Goslitizdat, 1965
10. Chernyshevsky N.G. Provincial essays on Shchedrin. - M., Goslitizdat, 1959.
Similar Documents
Satire as a revealing literary work depicting the negative phenomena of life in a funny, ugly way. Basic satirical techniques. The historical basis of the satirical novel by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin "History of one city", his images.
presentation, added 02/20/2012
"History of one city" M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin is a satirical work, the grotesque of its structure. The interweaving of the authentic and the fantastic, the grotesque in the depiction of the system of characters. Grotesque figures of mayors, stupid liberalism.
test, added 12/09/2010
Familiarization with the stylistic features of writing and the storyline of the satirical painting "The History of a City" by Saltykov-Shchedrin. The image of the general disbelief and loss of moral values of the nation in the novel "Crime and Punishment" by Dostoevsky.
abstract, added 06/20/2010
Studies of the poetics of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin from the 1920s to the 2000s. Peculiarities of color painting in the story "History of one city". Aesthetics and semantics of color in the story. Study of color tendencies in the literature of the epoch of the 18th and 19th centuries.
term paper, added 07/22/2013
The peculiarity of the genre of the work of the great Russian satirist Saltykov-Shchedrin "The History of a City". Characteristic features of the autocratic system, the foundations of society under absolutism, the problem of power and people in the book. Glupovsky mayors in the novel.
abstract, added 07/16/2011
Analysis of the judgments of critics and literary critics about the peculiarities of V. Pelevin's creative manner. Genre codes of utopia and dystopia in the novel "S.N.U.F.F.". Comparison of the satirical story by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin "The History of a City" and the novel under study.
thesis, added 10/26/2015
The history of the creation and evaluation of the critics of the novel by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin "Lord Golovlev". Themes and problems of the novel by Saltykov-Shchedrin, its relevance to the modern reader. The system of characters in the novel, its significance for the history of Russian literature.
thesis, added 04/29/2011
The history of the city with the "talking" name of Foolov. irreparable human vices. Characters of Saltykov-Shchedrin. A work that ridicules the eternal human vices, and not a parody of the history of Russia and not a satirical image of modernity.
creative work, added 02/03/2009
The concept of "genre", "fairy tale" in literary criticism. Satire as a weapon of class struggle tested for centuries in literature. Fairy tale world of Saltykov-Shchedrin. The connection of fairy tales with folklore traditions. Universal sound and distinctive features of Shchedrin's fairy tales.
term paper, added 05/15/2009
Characteristics of the satire genre. Laughter as a result of satirical creativity. An important type of satire, represented by artistic parodies. Expressive means of humor and satire in Saltykov-Shchedrin's fairy tales "The Wild Landowner" and "The Bear in the Voivodeship".