This book contains 2,000 original ideas for stories and novels

When analyzing a literary work, the concept of “idea” is traditionally used, which most often means the answer to the question allegedly posed by the author.

The idea of ​​a literary work - this is the main idea that summarizes the semantic, figurative, emotional content of a literary work.

Artistic idea of ​​the work - this is the content-semantic integrity of a work of art as a product of emotional experience and mastery of life by the author. This idea cannot be recreated by means of other arts and logical formulations; it is expressed throughout artistic structure work, the unity and interaction of all its formal components. Conventionally (and in a narrower sense), an idea stands out as the main thought, ideological conclusion and “life lesson” that naturally follows from a holistic comprehension of the work.

An idea in literature is a thought contained in a work. There are a great many ideas expressed in literature. Exist logical ideas And abstract ideas . Logical ideas are concepts that are easily conveyed without figurative means; we are able to perceive them with our intellect. Logical ideas are characteristic of nonfiction literature. Fictional novels and stories are characterized by philosophical and social generalizations, ideas, analyzes of cause and effect, that is, abstract elements.

But there is also a special type of very subtle, barely perceptible ideas in a literary work. Artistic idea is a thought embodied in figurative form. It lives only in figurative transformation and cannot be expressed in the form of sentences or concepts. The peculiarity of this thought depends on the disclosure of the topic, the author’s worldview, conveyed by the speech and actions of the characters, and on the depiction of pictures of life. It lies in the combination of logical thoughts, images, and all significant compositional elements. An artistic idea cannot be reduced to a rational idea that can be specified or illustrated. The idea of ​​this type is integral to the image, to the composition.

Formation artistic idea- it's complicated creative process. In literature it is influenced personal experience, the writer’s worldview, understanding of life. An idea can be nurtured for years and decades, and the author, trying to realize it, suffers, rewrites the manuscript, and looks for suitable means of implementation. All themes, characters, all events selected by the author are necessary for a more complete expression of the main idea, its nuances and shades. However, it is necessary to understand that an artistic idea is not equal to an ideological plan, that plan that often appears not only in the writer’s head, but also on paper. Exploring extra-artistic reality, reading diaries, notebooks, manuscripts, archives, literary scholars restore the history of the idea, the history of creation, but often do not discover the artistic idea. Sometimes it happens that the author goes against himself, yielding to the original plan for the sake of artistic truth, an internal idea.

One thought is not enough to write a book. If you know in advance everything that you would like to talk about, then you should not contact artistic creativity. Better - to criticism, journalism, journalism.

The idea of ​​a literary work comes from the visual image

The idea of ​​a literary work cannot be contained in one phrase and one image. But writers, especially novelists, sometimes struggle to formulate the idea of ​​their work. Dostoevsky about “The Idiot” he wrote: “The main idea of ​​the novel is to portray a positively beautiful person.” For such a declarative ideology Dostoevsky scolded: here he “distinguished himself”, for example, Nabokov. Indeed, the phrase of the great novelist does not clarify why, why he did it, what is the artistic and vital basis of his image. But here you can hardly take sides Nabokov, a down-to-earth second-line writer, never, unlike Dostoevsky who does not set himself creative super-tasks.

Along with the attempts of authors to determine the so-called main idea of ​​their work, opposite, although no less confusing, examples are known. Tolstoy to the question “what is “War and Peace””? answered as follows: “War and Peace” is what the author wanted and could express in the form in which it was expressed.” Reluctance to translate the idea of ​​your work into the language of concepts Tolstoy demonstrated once again, speaking about the novel “Anna Karenina”: “If I wanted to say in words everything that I had in mind to express in a novel, then I would have to write the very one that I wrote first” (from a letter to N. Strakhov).

Belinsky very accurately pointed out that “art does not allow abstract philosophical, much less rational ideas: it allows only poetic ideas; and the poetic idea is<…>It’s not a dogma, it’s not a rule, it’s a living passion, pathos.”

V.V. Odintsov expressed his understanding of the category “artistic idea” more strictly: “Idea literary composition is always specific and is not directly derived not only from the individual statements of the writer lying outside him (the facts of his biography, public life etc.), but also from the text - from replicas goodies, journalistic inserts, comments from the author himself, etc.”

Literary critic G.A. Gukovsky also spoke about the need to distinguish between rational, that is, rational, and literary ideas: “By idea I mean not only a rationally formulated judgment, statement, not even just the intellectual content of a work of literature, but the entire sum of its content, constituting its intellectual function, its goal and task." And he further explained: “To understand the idea of ​​a literary work means to understand the idea of ​​each of its components in their synthesis, in their systemic interconnection.<…>At the same time, it is important to take into account structural features works - not only the words-bricks from which the walls of the building are made, but the structure of the combination of these bricks as parts of this structure, their meaning."

The idea of ​​a literary work is an attitude towards what is depicted, the fundamental pathos of the work, a category that expresses the author's tendency (inclination, intention, preconceived thought) in the artistic coverage of a given topic. In other words, idea -it is the subjective basis of a literary work. It is noteworthy that in Western literary criticism, based on other methodological principles, instead of the category “artistic idea”, the concept of “intention”, a certain premeditation, the tendency of the author to express the meaning of the work is used.

The greater the artistic idea, the longer the work lives. The creators of pop literature who write outside of great ideas face very rapid oblivion.

V.V. Kozhinov called an artistic idea a semantic type of work that grows out of the interaction of images. An artistic idea, unlike a logical idea, is not formulated by an author’s statement, but is depicted in all the details of the artistic whole.

IN epic works the idea can be partly formulated in the text itself, as was the case in the narrative Tolstoy: “There is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness and truth.” More often, especially in lyric poetry, the idea permeates the structure of the work and therefore requires a lot of analytical work. A work of art as a whole is much richer than the rational idea that critics usually isolate, and in many lyrical works, isolating the idea is simply impossible, because it practically dissolves in pathos. Consequently, the idea of ​​a work should not be reduced to a conclusion or a lesson, and in general one should certainly look for it.

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General concept of the theme of a literary work

The concept of theme, as well as many other terms of literary criticism, contains a paradox: intuitively a person, even far from philology, understands what is being discussed; but as soon as we try to define this concept, to assign some more or less strict system of meanings to it, we find ourselves faced with a very difficult problem.

This is due to the fact that the topic is a multidimensional concept. Literally translated, “theme” is what is laid down, what is the support of the work. But this is where the difficulty lies. Try to answer the question unambiguously: “What is the basis of a literary work?” Once you ask this question, it becomes clear why the term “theme” resists clear definitions. For some, the most important thing is life material - something what is being depicted. In this sense, we can talk, for example, about the theme of war, about the theme of family relationships, about love adventures, about battles with aliens, etc. And each time we will reach the level of the theme.

But we can say that the most important thing in the work is what major problems of human existence the author poses and solves. For example, the struggle between good and evil, the formation of personality, the loneliness of a person, and so on ad infinitum. And this will also be a theme.

Other answers are possible. For example, we can say that the most important thing in a work is language. It is the language and words that represent the most important theme of the work. This thesis usually causes more difficulty for students to understand. After all, it is extremely rare that this or that work is written directly about words. It happens, of course, that this happens; it is enough to recall, for example, the well-known prose poem by I. S. Turgenev “Russian Language” or - with completely different accents - the poem by V. Khlebnikov “Perverten”, which is based on a pure language game, when a line is read the same from left to right and from right to left:

Horses, tramp, monk,

But it’s not speech, it’s black.

Let's go, young man, down with copper.

The rank is called with a sword on the back.

Hunger, why is the sword long?

In this case, the linguistic component of the topic clearly dominates, and if you ask the reader what this poem is about, we will hear a completely natural answer that the main thing here is the language game.

However, when we say that language is a topic, we mean something much more complex than the examples just given. The main difficulty is that a phrase said differently also changes the “slice of life” that it expresses. In any case, in the minds of the speaker and the listener. Therefore, if we accept these “rules of expression,” we automatically change what we want to express. To understand what we are talking about, it is enough to remember a joke known among philologists: what is the difference between the phrases “the young maiden trembles” and “the young maiden trembles”? One might answer that they differ in their style of expression, and this is true. But we, for our part, will pose the question differently: these phrases about the same thing or “young maiden” and “young girl” live in different worlds? Agree, intuition will tell you that it’s different. These are different people, they have different faces, they speak differently, they have different social circles. All this difference was suggested to us solely by language.

These differences can be felt even more clearly if we compare, for example, the world of “adult” poetry with the world of poetry for children. In children's poetry, horses and dogs do not “live”, horses and dogs live there, there is no sun and rain, there is sun and rain. In this world, the relationships between the heroes are completely different, everything always ends well there. And it is absolutely impossible to depict this world in the language of adults. That’s why we cannot take the “language” theme of children’s poetry out of the equation.

As a matter of fact, the different positions of scientists who have different understandings of the term “topic” are associated precisely with this multidimensionality. Researchers identify one or the other as the determining factor. This is also reflected in the training manuals, which creates unnecessary confusion. Thus, in the most popular textbook on literary criticism of the Soviet period - in the textbook by G. L. Abramovich - the topic is understood almost exclusively as a problem. This approach is, of course, vulnerable. There are a huge number of works where the basis is not problematic at all. Therefore, G. L. Abramovich’s thesis is rightly criticized.

On the other hand, it is hardly correct to separate the topic and the problem, limiting the scope of the topic exclusively to the “circle of life phenomena.” This approach was also characteristic of Soviet literary criticism in the mid-twentieth century, but today it is a clear anachronism, although echoes of this tradition are sometimes still noticeable in secondary and higher schools.

A modern philologist must be clearly aware that any infringement of the concept of “theme” makes this term non-functional for the analysis of a huge number of works of art. For example, if we understand a theme exclusively as a circle of life phenomena, as a fragment of reality, then the term retains its meaning when analyzing realistic works (for example, the novels of L. N. Tolstoy), but becomes completely unsuitable for analyzing the literature of modernism, where familiar reality is deliberately distorted, or even completely dissolves in a language game (remember the poem by V. Khlebnikov).

Therefore, if we want to understand the universal meaning of the term “topic,” we must talk about it on a different plane. It is no coincidence that last years the term “theme” is increasingly interpreted in line with structuralist traditions, when a work of art is viewed as a holistic structure. Then the “theme” becomes the supporting links of this structure. For example, the theme of a blizzard in Blok’s work, the theme of crime and punishment in Dostoevsky, etc. At the same time, the meaning of the term “theme” largely coincides with the meaning of another basic term in literary studies – “motive”.

The theory of motive, developed in the 19th century by the outstanding philologist A. N. Veselovsky, had a huge influence on the subsequent development of the science of literature. We will dwell on this theory in more detail in the next chapter; for now we will only note that motifs are the most important elements of the entire artistic structure, its “load-bearing supports.” And just as the load-bearing supports of a building can be made of different materials (concrete, metal, wood, etc.), the load-bearing supports of the text can also be different. In some cases, these are facts of life (without them, for example, no documentary filmmaking is fundamentally possible), in others, problems, in others, the author’s experiences, in fourths, language, etc. In a real text, as in real construction, possible and most often there are combinations of different materials.

This understanding of the theme as the verbal and subject supports of the work eliminates many misunderstandings associated with the meaning of the term. This point of view was very popular in Russian science in the first third of the twentieth century, then it was subjected to sharp criticism, which was more ideological than philological in nature. In recent years, this understanding of the topic has again found an increasing number of supporters.

So the theme can be properly understood if we return to the literal meaning of the word: that which is laid down as a foundation. The theme is a kind of support for the entire text (event-based, problematic, linguistic, etc.). At the same time, it is important to understand that the different components of the concept of “topic” are not isolated from each other, they represent a single system. Roughly speaking, a work of literature cannot be “disassembled” into vital material, issues and language. This is possible only for educational purposes or as an auxiliary technique for analysis. Just as in a living organism the skeleton, muscles and organs form a unity, in works of literature the different components of the concept of “theme” are also united. In this sense, B.V. Tomashevsky was absolutely right when he wrote that “the topic<...>is the unity of meanings of the individual elements of the work.” In reality, this means that when we talk, for example, about the theme of human loneliness in “A Hero of Our Time” by M. Yu. Lermontov, we already have in mind the sequence of events, the problems, the construction of the work, and the linguistic features of the novel.

If we try to somehow organize and systematize all the almost endless thematic wealth of world literature, we can distinguish several thematic levels.

See: Abramovich G. L. Introduction to literary criticism. M., 1970. pp. 122–124.

See, for example: Revyakin A.I. Problems of studying and teaching literature. M., 1972. S. 101–102; Fedotov O.I. Fundamentals of the theory of literature: In 2 parts. Part 1. M., 2003. P. 42–43; Without a direct reference to the name of Abramovich, a similar approach is also criticized by V. E. Khalizev, see: Khalizev V. E. Theory of Literature. M., 1999. P. 41.

See: Shchepilova L.V. Introduction to literary criticism. M., 1956. pp. 66–67.

This tendency manifested itself among researchers directly or indirectly associated with the traditions of formalism and - later - structuralism (V. Shklovsky, R. Jacobson, B. Eikhenbaum, A. Evlakhov, V. Fischer, etc.).

For more details on this, see, for example: Revyakin A.I. Problems of studying and teaching literature. M., 1972.. P. 108–113.

Tomashevsky B.V. Theory of Literature. Poetics. M., 2002. P. 176.

Thematic levels

Firstly, these are those topics that affect the fundamental problems of human existence. This, for example, is the theme of life and death, the fight against the elements, man and God, etc. Such themes are usually called ontological(from Greek ontos – essence + logos – teaching). Ontological issues dominate, for example, in most of the works of F. M. Dostoevsky. In any specific event, the writer strives to see a “glimmer of the eternal,” a projection of the most important issues of human existence. Any artist who poses and solves such problems finds himself in line with the most powerful traditions, which in one way or another influence the solution of the topic. Try, for example, to depict the feat of a person who gave his life for other people in an ironic or vulgar style, and you will feel how the text begins to resist, the topic begins to demand a different language.

The next level can be formulated in the most general form as follows: "A Man in Certain Circumstances". This level is more specific; ontological issues may not be affected by it. For example, industrial topics or private family conflict may turn out to be completely self-sufficient from the point of view of the topic and do not pretend to solve the “eternal” questions of human existence. On the other hand, the ontological basis may well “shine through” this thematic level. Suffice it to recall, for example, the famous novel by L. N. Tolstoy “Anna Karenina”, where the family drama is interpreted in the system eternal values person.

Next you can highlight subject-visual level. In this case, ontological issues may fade into the background or not be updated at all, but the linguistic component of the topic is clearly manifested. The dominance of this level is easy to feel, for example, in a literary still life or in humorous poetry. This is exactly how poetry for children, as a rule, is structured, charming in its simplicity and clarity. It makes no sense to look for ontological depths in the poems of Agnia Barto or Korney Chukovsky; often the charm of a work is explained precisely by the liveliness and clarity of the thematic sketch created. Let us recall, for example, the cycle of poems by Agnia Barto, known to everyone since childhood, “Toys”:

The owner abandoned the bunny -

A bunny was left in the rain.

I couldn't get off the bench,

I was completely wet.

What has been said, of course, does not mean that the subject-visual level always turns out to be self-sufficient, that there are no deeper thematic layers behind it. Moreover, the art of modern times generally tends to ensure that the ontological level “shines through” through the object-visual level. It is enough to recall M. Bulgakov’s famous novel “The Master and Margarita” to understand what we are talking about. Let's say, Woland's famous ball, on the one hand, is interesting precisely because of its picturesqueness, on the other - almost every scene in one way or another touches on the eternal problems of man: this is love, and mercy, and the mission of man, etc. If we compare the images of Yeshua and Behemoth, we can easily feel that in the first case the ontological thematic level dominates, in the second – the subject-figurative level. That is, even within one work you can feel different thematic dominants. So, in famous novel

M. Sholokhov's "Virgin Soil Upturned" one of the most striking images - the image of grandfather Shchukar - mainly correlates with the subject-visual thematic level, while the novel as a whole has a much more complex thematic structure.

Thus, the concept of “topic” can be viewed from different angles and have different shades of meaning.

Thematic analysis allows the philologist, among other things, to see some patterns in the development of the literary process. The fact is that each era actualizes its own range of topics, “resurrecting” some and seemingly not noticing others. At one time, V. Shklovsky noted: “each era has its own index, its own list of topics prohibited due to obsolescence.” Although Shklovsky primarily had in mind the linguistic and structural “supports” of the themes, without overly updating the realities of life, his remark is very prescient. Indeed, it is important and interesting for a philologist to understand why certain topics and thematic levels are relevant in a given historical situation. The "thematic index" of classicism is not the same as that of romanticism; Russian futurism (Khlebnikov, Kruchenykh, etc.) actualized completely different thematic levels than symbolism (Blok, Bely, etc.). Having understood the reasons for such a change in indices, a philologist can say a lot about the features of a particular stage in the development of literature.

Shklovsky V.B. On the theory of prose. M., 1929. P. 236.

External and internal theme. System of intermediary signs The next step in mastering the concept of “topic” for a novice philologist is to distinguish between the so-called"external" And themes of the work. This division is arbitrary and adopted only for the convenience of analysis. Of course, in a real work there is no “separately external” and “separately internal” theme. But in the practice of analysis, such a division is very useful, since it allows you to make the analysis specific and demonstrative.

Under "external" topic usually understand the system of thematic supports directly presented in the text. This is vital material and the plot level associated with it, the author’s commentary, and in some cases the title. In modern literature, the title is not always associated with the external level of the topic, but, say, in the 17th - 18th centuries. the tradition was different. There, a brief summary of the plot was often included in the title. In a number of cases, such “transparency” of titles causes modern reader smile. For example, the famous English writer D. Defoe, creator of “The Life and Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe,” used much more extensive titles in his subsequent works. The third volume of "Robinson Crusoe" is called: "Serious reflections of Robinson Crusoe throughout his life and amazing adventures; with the addition of his visions of the angelic world." And the full title of the novel, “The Joys and Sorrows of the Famous Mole Flanders,” takes up almost half the page, since it actually lists all the adventures of the heroine.

In lyrical works, in which the plot plays a much smaller role, and often is completely absent, the external theme can include “direct” expressions of the author’s thoughts and feelings, devoid of metaphorical veil. Let us recall, for example, the textbook famous lines of F. I. Tyutchev:

You can't understand Russia with your mind,

The general arshin cannot be measured.

She has become something special.

You can only believe in Russia.

There is no discrepancy here between about what it is said that What it is said, it is not felt. Compare with Blok:

I don't know how to feel sorry for you

And I carry my cross carefully.

Which sorcerer do you want?

Give me the robber's beauty.

These words cannot be taken as a direct declaration; a gap arises between about what it is said that What said.

The so-called "thematic image". The researcher who proposed this term, V. E. Kholshevnikov, commented on it with a quote from V. Mayakovsky - “felt thought.” This means that any object or situation in the lyrics serves as a support for the development of the author's emotions and thoughts. Let us recall the textbook famous poem by M. Yu. Lermontov “Sail”, and we will easily understand what we are talking about. At the “external” level, this is a poem about a sail, but the sail here is a thematic image that allows the author to show the depth of human loneliness and the eternal tossing of a restless soul.

Let's sum up the intermediate results. The external theme is the most visible thematic level directly presented in the text. With a certain degree of convention, we can say that the external theme includes what about what the text says.

Another thing - internal subject. This is a much less obvious thematic level. In order to understand internal topic, it is always necessary to abstract from what is directly said, to grasp and explain the internal connection of the elements. In some cases, this is not so difficult to do, especially if you have developed a habit of such recoding. Let’s say, behind the external theme of I. A. Krylov’s fable “The Crow and the Fox,” we would without much difficulty feel the internal theme - the dangerous weakness of a person in relation to flattery addressed to himself, even if Krylov’s text did not begin with an open morality:

How many times have they told the world,

That flattery is vile and harmful; but everything is not for the future,

And a flatterer will always find a corner in the heart.

A fable in general is a genre in which the external and internal thematic levels are most often transparent, and the morality that connects these two levels completely simplifies the task of interpretation.

But in most cases it's not that simple. The internal theme becomes less obvious, and correct interpretation requires both special knowledge and intellectual effort. For example, if we think about the lines of Lermontov’s poem “It’s lonely in the wild north...”, we can easily feel that the internal theme can no longer be interpreted unambiguously:

It's lonely in the wild north

There's a pine tree on the bare top,

And dozes, swaying, and snow falls

She is dressed like a robe.

And she dreams of everything in the distant desert,

In the region where the sun rises,

Alone and sad on a flammable cliff

A beautiful palm tree is growing.

We can easily see the development of the thematic image, but what is hidden in the depths of the text? Simply put, what are we talking about here, what problems worry the author? Different readers may have different associations, sometimes very far removed from what is actually in the text. But if we know that this poem is a free translation of a poem by G. Heine, and we compare Lermontov’s text with other translation options, for example, with a poem by A. A. Fet, then we will get much more compelling reasons for the answer. Let's compare with Fet:

In the north there is a lonely oak

It stands on a steep hill;

He sleeps, sternly covered

Both snow and ice carpet.

In a dream he sees a palm tree,

In a distant eastern country,

In silent, deep sadness,

Alone, on a hot rock.

Both poems were written in 1841, but what a difference between them! In Fet’s poem there are “he” and “she”, yearning for each other. Emphasizing this, Fet translates “pine” as “oak” - in the name of preserving the love theme. The fact is that in German “pine” (more precisely, larch) is a masculine word, and the language itself dictates the reading of the poem in this vein. However, Lermontov not only “crosses out” love theme, but in the second edition in every possible way enhances the feeling of endless loneliness. Instead of the “cold and bare peak” the “wild north” appears, instead of the “distant eastern land” (cf. Fet) Lermontov writes: “in the distant desert”, instead of the “hot rock” - “a flammable cliff”. If we summarize all these observations, we can conclude that the internal theme of this poem is not the melancholy of the separated, loving friend a friend of people, like Heine and Fet, is not even a dream of another wonderful life - in Lermontov the dominant theme is “the tragic insurmountability of loneliness with a common kinship of fate,” as R. Yu. Danilevsky commented on this poem.

In other cases, the situation can be even more complex. For example, I. A. Bunin’s story “The Gentleman from San Francisco” is usually interpreted by the inexperienced reader as the story of the absurd death of a rich American, whom no one feels sorry for. But a simple question: “What bad did this gentleman do to the island of Capri and why only after his death, as Bunin writes, “peace and tranquility returned to the island”?” – confuses students. This is due to the lack of analytical skills and the inability to “link” various fragments of text into a single, coherent picture. At the same time, the name of the ship - “Atlantis”, the image of the Devil, the nuances of the plot, etc. are missed. If you connect all these fragments together, it turns out that the internal theme of the story will be the eternal struggle between two worlds - life and death. The gentleman from San Francisco is terrifying by his very presence in the world of the living, he is alien and dangerous. That is why the living world calms down only when it disappears; then the sun comes out and illuminates “the unsteady massifs of Italy, its near and distant mountains, the beauty of which human words are powerless to express.”

It is even more difficult to talk about an internal topic in relation to large works that raise a whole range of problems. For example, only a qualified philologist with sufficient knowledge and the ability to abstract from the specific twists and turns of the plot can discover these internal thematic springs in L. N. Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace” or in M. A. Sholokhov’s novel “Quiet Don”. Therefore, it is better to learn independent thematic analysis on works of relatively small volume - there, as a rule, it is easier to feel the logic of the interrelations of thematic elements.

So, we conclude: internal theme is a complex complex consisting of problems, internal connections of plot and linguistic components. A correctly understood internal theme allows you to feel the non-randomness and deep connections of the most heterogeneous elements.

As already mentioned, the division of thematic unity into external and internal levels is very arbitrary, because in a real text they are merged. It is more of an analysis tool than the actual structure of the text as such. However, this does not mean that such a technique represents any kind of violence against the living organics of a literary work. Any technology of cognition is built on some assumptions and conventions, but this helps to better understand the subject being studied. For example, an X-ray is also a very conventional copy of the human body, but this technique will allow you to see what is almost impossible to see with the naked eye.

In recent years, after the appearance of a well-known study among specialists by A.K. Zholkovsky and Yu.K. Shcheglov, the opposition of external and internal thematic levels received another semantic nuance. The researchers suggested distinguishing between so-called “declared” and “elusive” topics. “Elusive” themes are most often touched upon in a work, regardless of the author’s intention. These are, for example, the mythopoetic foundations of Russian classical literature: the struggle between space and chaos, motives of initiation, etc. In fact, we are talking about the most abstract, supporting levels of the internal theme.

In addition, the same study raises the question of intraliterary topics. In these cases, thematic supports do not go beyond the literary tradition. The simplest example is a parody, the theme of which is, as a rule, another literary work.

Thematic analysis involves understanding the various elements of the text in their relationships at the external and internal levels of the topic. In other words, the philologist must understand why the external plane is an expression exactly this internal. Why, reading poems about pine and palm trees, we sympathize human loneliness? This means that there are some elements in the text that ensure the “translation” of the external plane into the internal one. These elements can be roughly called intermediaries. If we are able to understand and explain these intermediary signs, the conversation about thematic levels will become substantive and interesting.

In the strict sense of the word intermediary is the entire text. In essence, this answer is impeccable, but methodologically it is hardly correct, since for an inexperienced philologist the phrase “everything is in the text” is almost equal to “nothing.” Therefore, it makes sense to clarify this thesis. So, what elements of the text can you first pay attention to when conducting a thematic analysis?

Firstly, it is always worth remembering that no text exists in a vacuum. It is always surrounded by other texts, it is always addressed to a specific reader, etc. Therefore, often the “intermediary” can be located not only in the text itself, but also outside it. Let's give a simple example. The famous French poet Pierre Jean Beranger has a funny song called “Noble Friend.” It is a monologue of a commoner, to whose wife a rich and noble count is clearly not indifferent. As a result, the hero receives certain favors. How does the hero perceive the situation:

Last winter, for example.

The minister has appointed a ball:

The count comes for his wife, -

As a husband, I got there too.

There, squeezing my hand in front of everyone,

Called me my friend!..

What happiness! What an honor!

After all, I’m a worm compared to him!

Compared to him,

With a face like that -

With His Excellency himself!

It is not difficult to feel that behind the external theme - the enthusiastic story of a small person about his “benefactor” - something completely different is hidden. Beranger's entire poem is a protest against slave psychology. But why do we understand this way, since there is not a word of condemnation in the text itself? The fact of the matter is that in this case, a certain norm of human behavior acts as a mediator, which turns out to be violated. Elements of the text (style, plot fragments, willing self-deprecation of the hero, etc.) expose this unacceptable deviation from the reader’s idea of ​​a worthy person. Therefore, all elements of the text change polarities: what the hero considers a plus is a minus.

Secondly, the title can act as an intermediary. This does not always happen, but in many cases the title turns out to be involved in all levels of the topic. Let us recall, for example, Gogol’s “Dead Souls,” where the outer row (purchase Chichikov dead soul) and the internal theme (the theme of spiritual dying) are connected by the title.

In some cases, misunderstanding of the connection between the title and the internal theme leads to curious reading. For example, a modern reader quite often perceives the meaning of the title of L. N. Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace” as “war and peacetime,” seeing here a device of antithesis. However, in Tolstoy’s manuscript it is not “War and Peace”, but “War and Peace”. In the 19th century, these words were perceived as different. “Peace” – “the absence of quarrel, hostility, disagreement, war” (according to Dahl’s dictionary), “Mir” – “matter in the universe and force in time // all people, the whole world, the human race” (according to Dahl). Therefore, Tolstoy did not have in mind the antithesis of war, but something completely different: “War and the human race,” “War and the movement of time,” etc. All this is directly related to the problems of Tolstoy’s masterpiece.

Third, the epigraph is a fundamentally important mediator. The epigraph, as a rule, is selected very carefully; often the author abandons the original epigraph in favor of another, or the epigraph does not appear at all in the first edition. For a philologist, this is always “food for thought.” For example, we know that L.N. Tolstoy initially wanted to preface his novel Anna Karenina with a completely “transparent” epigraph condemning adultery. But then he abandoned this plan, choosing an epigraph with a much more voluminous and complex meaning: “Vengeance is mine and I will repay.” This nuance alone is enough to understand that the problems of the novel are much broader and deeper than a family drama. Anna Karenina’s sin is just one of the signs of the colossal “unrighteousness” in which people live. This change of emphasis actually changed the original concept of the entire novel, including the image of the main character. In the first versions we meet a woman of repulsive appearance, in the final version she is a beautiful, intelligent, sinful and suffering woman. The change of epigraphs reflected a revision of the entire thematic structure.

If we remember N.V. Gogol’s comedy “The Inspector General,” we will inevitably smile at its epigraph: “There’s no point in blaming the mirror if your face is crooked.” It seems that this epigraph has always existed and represents a genre remark of comedy. But in the first edition of The Inspector General there was no epigraph; Gogol introduces it later, surprised by the incorrect interpretation of the play. The fact is that Gogol's comedy was initially perceived as a parody of some officials, on some vices. But the future author " Dead souls“meant something else: he made a terrible diagnosis of Russian spirituality. And such a “private” reading did not satisfy him at all, hence the peculiar polemical epigraph, strangely echoing famous words Mayor: “Who are you laughing at! You’re laughing at yourself!” If you read the comedy carefully, you can see how Gogol emphasizes this idea at all levels of the text. universal lack of spirituality, and not at all the arbitrariness of some officials. And the story with the epigraph that appeared is very revealing.

Fourth, you should always pay attention to proper names: the names and nicknames of the characters, the location of the action, the names of objects. Sometimes the thematic clue is obvious. For example, N. S. Leskov’s essay “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk” already in the title itself contains a hint of the theme of Shakespearean passions so close to the writer’s heart, raging in the hearts of seemingly ordinary people Russian outback. The “talking” names here will be not only “Lady Macbeth”, but also “Mtsensk District”. “Direct” thematic projections have many of the names of the heroes in the dramas of classicism. We feel this tradition well in A. S. Griboyedov’s comedy “Woe from Wit.”

In other cases, the connection between the hero's name and the internal theme is more associative and less obvious. For example, Lermontov's Pechorin already refers to Onegin with his last name, emphasizing not only the similarities, but also the differences (Onega and Pechora are northern rivers that gave their names to entire regions). This similarity and difference was immediately noticed by the insightful V. G. Belinsky.

It may also be that it is not the hero’s name that is significant, but his absence. Let us remember the previously mentioned story by I. A. Bunin “The Gentleman from San Francisco.” The story begins with a paradoxical phrase: “A gentleman from San Francisco - no one remembered his name either in Naples or Capri...” From the point of view of reality, this is completely impossible: the scandalous death of a supermillionaire would have preserved his name for a long time. But Bunin has a different logic. Not only the gentleman from San Francisco, none of the Atlantis passengers are ever mentioned by name. At the same time, the old boatman who appears occasionally at the end of the story has a name. His name is Lorenzo. This is, of course, no coincidence. After all, a name is given to a person at birth; it is a kind of sign of life. And the passengers of Atlantis (think about the name of the ship - “non-existent land”) belong to another world, where everything is the other way around and where there should be no names. Thus, the absence of a name can be very significant.

Fifthly, it is important to pay attention to the style of the text, especially if we're talking about about fairly large and diverse works. Analysis of style is a self-sufficient subject of study, but this is not what we are talking about now. We are talking about thematic analysis, for which what is more important is not a scrupulous study of all the nuances, but rather a “change of timbres.” It is enough to recall M. A. Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita” to understand what we are talking about. The life of literary Moscow and the history of Pontius Pilate are written in completely different ways. In the first case, we feel the pen of a feuilletonist; in the second, we have before us an author who is impeccably accurate in psychological details. Not a trace remains of irony and ridicule.

Or another example. A. S. Pushkin’s story “The Snowstorm” is the story of two novels by the heroine, Marya Gavrilovna. But the internal theme of this work is much deeper than the plot intrigue. If we carefully read the text, we will feel that the point is not that Marya Gavrilovna “accidentally” fell in love with the person with whom she was “accidentally” and mistakenly married. The fact is that her first love is completely different from her second. In the first case, we clearly feel the author's soft irony; the heroine is naive and romantic. Then the style pattern changes. Before us is an adult, interesting woman, which very well distinguishes “book” love from real love. And Pushkin very precisely draws the line separating these two worlds: “It was in 1812.” If we compare all these facts, we will understand that Pushkin was not concerned Funny case, not an irony of fate, although this is also important. But the main thing for the mature Pushkin was the analysis of “growing up”, the fate of romantic consciousness. Such precise dating is not accidental. The year 1812 - the war with Napoleon - dispelled many romantic illusions. The heroine’s private fate turns out to be significant for Russia as a whole. This is precisely the most important internal theme of “Blizzard”.

At sixth In thematic analysis, it is fundamentally important to pay attention to how different motives relate to each other. Let us recall, for example, A. S. Pushkin’s poem “Anchar”. In this poem, three fragments are clearly visible: two approximately equal in volume, one much smaller. The first fragment is a description of the terrible tree of death; the second is a small plot, a story about how the ruler sent a slave to get poison to certain death. This story actually ends with the words “And the poor slave died at the feet / of the Invincible Lord.” But the poem does not end there. Last stanza:

And the prince fed that poison

Your obedient arrows

And with them he sent death

To neighbors in alien borders, -

This is already a new fragment. The internal theme - the verdict on tyranny - receives a new round of development here. The tyrant kills one to kill many. Like the anchar, he is doomed to carry death within himself. The thematic fragments were not chosen by chance; the last stanza confirms the legitimacy of the pairing of the two main thematic fragments. Analysis of the options shows that Pushkin chose his words most carefully at the borders fragments. It took a long time to find the words “But a man / Sent a man to the anchar with an imperious gaze.” This is not accidental, since this is where the thematic support of the text lies.

Among other things, thematic analysis involves studying the logic of the plot, the correlation of different elements of the text, etc. In general, we repeat, the entire text represents the unity of external and internal themes. We paid attention only to some components that an inexperienced philologist often does not update.

For an analysis of the titles of literary works, see, for example. in: Lamzina A.V. Title // Introduction to Literary Studies / Ed. L. V. Chernets. M., 2000.

Kholshevnikov V. E. Analysis of the composition of a lyric poem // Analysis of one poem. L., 1985. pp. 8–10.

Lermontov Encyclopedia. M., 1981. P. 330.

Zholkovsky A.K., Shcheglov Yu.K. To the concepts of “theme” and “ poetic world» // Scientific notes of Tartu State. un-ta. Vol. 365. Tartu, 1975.

See, for example: Timofeev L.I. Fundamentals of the theory of literature. M., 1963. pp. 343–346.

Idea concept literary text

Another basic concept of literary criticism is idea artistic text. The delimitation of the topic of an idea is very conditional. For example, L.I. Timofeev preferred to talk about the ideological and thematic basis of the work, without highlighting the differences too much. In O.I. Fedotov’s textbook, the idea is understood as an expression of the author’s tendency; in fact, we are talking only about the author’s attitude towards the characters and the world. “An artistic idea,” writes the scientist, “is subjective by definition.” In the authoritative textbook on literary criticism edited by L. V. Chernets, built on the dictionary principle, there was no place at all for the term “idea”. This term is not updated in the voluminous anthology compiled by N.D. Tamarchenko. Even more wary is the attitude towards the term “artistic idea” in Western criticism of the second half of the twentieth century. The tradition of a very authoritative school was reflected here “ new criticism"(T. Eliot, K. Brooks, R. Warren, etc.), whose representatives sharply opposed any analysis of the “idea,” considering it one of the most dangerous “heresies” of literary criticism. They even introduced the term “heresy of communication”, implying a search for any social or ethical ideas in the text.

Thus, the attitude towards the term “idea”, as we see, is ambiguous. At the same time, attempts to “remove” this term from the vocabulary of literary scholars seem not only incorrect, but also naive. Talking about an idea involves interpretation figurative meaning works, and the overwhelming majority of literary masterpieces are imbued with meanings. That is why works of art continue to excite the viewer and reader. And no loud statements by some scientists will change anything here.

Another thing is that one should not absolutize the analysis of an artistic idea. There is always a danger here of “breaking away” from the text, of leading the conversation into the mainstream of pure sociology or morality.

This is exactly what literary criticism of the Soviet period was guilty of; hence, gross errors arose in the assessments of this or that artist, since the meaning of the work was constantly “checked” with the norms of Soviet ideology. Hence the accusations of lack of ideas addressed to outstanding figures of Russian culture (Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Shostakovich, etc.), hence the attempts, naive from a modern point of view, to classify the types of artistic ideas (“idea - question”, “idea - answer”, “false” idea”, etc.). This is also reflected in the teaching aids. In particular, L.I. Timofeev, although he talks about the conventions of classification, still specifically singles out even “an idea is an error,” which is completely unacceptable from the point of view of literary ethics. An idea, we repeat, is the figurative meaning of a work, and as such it can be neither “correct” nor “wrong.” Another thing is that this may not suit the interpreter, but personal assessment cannot be transferred to the meaning of the work. History teaches us that the assessments of interpreters are very flexible: if, say, we trust the assessments of many of the first critics of “A Hero of Our Time” by M. Yu. Lermontov (S. A. Burachok, S. P. Shevyrev, N. A. Polevoy, etc. ), then their interpretations of the idea of ​​Lermontov’s masterpiece will seem, to put it mildly, strange. However, now only a narrow circle of specialists remembers such assessments, while the semantic depth of Lermontov’s novel is beyond doubt.

Something similar can be said about L. N. Tolstoy’s famous novel “Anna Karenina,” which many critics hastened to disavow as “ideologically alien” or not deep enough. Today it is obvious that the critics were not deep enough, but everything is in order with Tolstoy’s novel.

Such examples can go on and on. Analyzing this paradox of contemporaries’ lack of understanding of the semantic depth of many masterpieces, the famous literary critic L. Ya. Ginzburg perspicaciously noted that the meanings of masterpieces correlate with “modernity on a different scale,” which a critic not endowed with brilliant thinking cannot accommodate. That is why the evaluation criteria of an idea are not only incorrect, but also dangerous.

However, all this, we repeat, should not discredit the very concept of the idea of ​​a work and interest in this side of literature.

It should be remembered that an artistic idea is a very comprehensive concept and in any case we can talk about several of its facets.

Firstly, this author's idea, that is, those meanings that the author himself more or less consciously intended to embody. An idea is not always expressed by a writer or poet logically, the author embodies it differently - in the language of a work of art. Moreover, writers often protest (I. Goethe, L. N. Tolstoy, O. Wilde, M. Tsvetaeva - just a few names) when they are asked to formulate the idea of ​​a created work. This is understandable, because, let us repeat O. Wilde’s remark, “the sculptor thinks with marble,” that is, he does not have an idea “torn off” from the stone. Similarly, a composer thinks in sounds, a poet in verses, etc.

This thesis is very popular among both artists and specialists, but at the same time there is an element of unconscious deceit in it. The fact is that the artist almost always reflects in one way or another both on the concept of the work and on the already written text. The same I. Goethe repeatedly commented on his “Faust,” and L. N. Tolstoy was even inclined to “clarify” the meanings of his own works. It is enough to recall the second part of the epilogue and afterword to “War and Peace”, the afterword to “The Kreutzer Sonata”, etc. In addition, there are diaries, letters, memoirs of contemporaries, drafts - that is, a literary scholar has at his disposal quite extensive material that directly or indirectly affects problem of the author's idea.

Confirming the author's idea by analyzing the literary text itself (with the exception of comparing options) is a much more difficult task. The fact is that, firstly, in the text it is difficult to distinguish the position of the real author from the image that is created in this work (in modern terminology, it is often called implicit author). But even direct assessments of the real and implicit author may not coincide. Secondly, in general, the idea of ​​the text, as will be shown below, does not copy the author’s idea - the text “says” something that the author might not have meant. Thirdly, the text is a complex formation that allows various interpretations. This volume of meaning is inherent in nature itself artistic image(remember: an artistic image is a sign with an incremental meaning; it is paradoxical and resists unambiguous understanding). Therefore, each time we must keep in mind that the author, when creating a certain image, could have intended meanings that were completely different from those that the interpreter saw.

This does not mean that talking about the author’s idea in relation to the text itself is impossible or incorrect. It all depends on the subtlety of the analysis and the tact of the researcher. Parallels with other works of this author, a finely selected system of indirect evidence, the definition of a system of contexts, etc. are convincing. In addition, it is important to consider what facts of real life the author chooses to create his work. Often this very choice of facts can become a powerful argument in a conversation about the author's idea. It is clear, for example, that from countless facts civil war writers who sympathize with the Reds will choose one thing, and writers who sympathize with the Whites will choose another. Here, however, we must remember that a major writer, as a rule, avoids a one-dimensional and linear factual series, that is, the facts of life are not an “illustration” of his idea. For example, in M. A. Sholokhov’s novel “Quiet Don” there are scenes that sympathize Soviet power and the communists, it would seem, the writer should have omitted. Let's say, one of Sholokhov's favorite heroes, communist Podtelkov, in one of the scenes chops down captive whites, which shocks even the seasoned Grigory Melekhov. At one time, critics strongly advised Sholokhov to remove this scene, it did not fit so well into the linear understood idea. Sholokhov at one point listened to this advice, but then, against all odds, he reintroduced it into the text of the novel, because volumetric the author's idea without it would be flawed. The writer's talent resisted such notes.

But in general, analysis of the logic of facts is a very effective argument in a conversation about the author’s idea.

The second facet of the meaning of the term “artistic idea” is text idea. This is one of the most mysterious categories of literary criticism. The problem is that the idea of ​​the text almost never completely coincides with the author’s. In some cases these coincidences are striking. The famous “La Marseillaise,” which became the anthem of France, was written as a regimental marching song by officer Rouget de Lille without any pretensions to artistic depth. Neither before nor after his masterpiece, Rouget de Lisle created anything like it.

Leo Tolstoy, when creating Anna Karenina, had one thing in mind, but it turned out something else.

This difference will be even more clearly visible if we imagine that some mediocre graphomaniac tries to write a novel full of deep meanings. In a real text, not a trace of the author’s idea will remain; the idea of ​​the text will turn out to be primitive and flat, no matter how much the author wishes otherwise.

We see this same discrepancy, albeit with other signs, in geniuses. Another thing is that in this case the idea of ​​the text will be incomparably richer than the author’s. This is the secret of talent. Many meanings important to the author will be lost, but the depth of the work will not suffer from this. Shakespeare scholars, for example, teach us that the brilliant playwright often wrote “on the topic of the day”; his works are full of allusions to real political events in England in the 16th – 17th centuries. All this semantic “secret writing” was important for Shakespeare, it is even possible that it was these ideas that provoked him to create some tragedies (most often in this regard, “Richard III” is remembered). However, all the nuances are known only to Shakespeare scholars, and even then with great reservations. But the idea of ​​the text does not suffer at all from this. In the semantic palette of the text there is always something that is not subordinate to the author, something that he did not mean and did not think about.

That is why the point of view about which we already said, – what is the idea of ​​the text exclusively subjective, that is, always connected with the author.

Moreover, the idea of ​​the text connected with the reader. It can only be felt and detected by the perceiving consciousness. But life shows that readers often actualize different meanings and see different things in the same text. As they say, as many readers as there are Hamlets. It turns out that you cannot completely trust either the author’s intention (what he wanted to say) or the reader (what he felt and understood). Then does it even make sense to talk about the idea of ​​the text?

Many modern literary scholars (J. Derrida, J. Kristeva, P. de Mann, J. Miller, etc.) insist on the fallacy of the thesis about any semantic unity of the text. In their opinion, meanings are reconstructed every time a new reader encounters a text. All this is reminiscent of a children's kaleidoscope with an infinite number of patterns: everyone will see their own, and it is pointless to say which of the meanings is In fact and which perception is more accurate.

This approach would be convincing if not for one “but”. After all, if there is no objective semantic depth of the text, then all the texts will turn out to be fundamentally equal: the helpless rhymer and the brilliant Blok, the naive text of a schoolgirl and Akhmatova’s masterpiece - all this is absolutely the same, as they say, whoever likes what. The most consistent scientists of this direction (J. Derrida) precisely draw the conclusion about the fundamental equality of all written texts.

In fact, this neutralizes talent and crosses out the entire world culture, because it was built by masters and geniuses. Therefore, this approach, although seemingly logical, is fraught with serious dangers.

Obviously, it is more correct to assume that the idea of ​​the text is not fiction, that it exists, but does not exist in a once and for all frozen form, but in the form of a meaning-generating matrix: meanings are born whenever the reader encounters the text, but this is not a kaleidoscope at all, here there are their own boundaries, their own vectors of understanding. The question of what is constant and what is variable in this process is still very far from being resolved.

It is clear that the idea perceived by the reader is most often not identical to the author’s. In the strict sense of the word, there is never a complete coincidence; we can only talk about the depth of discrepancies. The history of literature knows many examples when the reading of even a qualified reader turns out to be a complete surprise for the author. Suffice it to recall the violent reaction of I. S. Turgenev to N. A. Dobrolyubov’s article “When will the real day come?” The critic saw in Turgenev’s novel “On the Eve” a call for the liberation of Russia “from the internal enemy,” while I. S. Turgenev conceived the novel about something completely different. The matter, as we know, ended in a scandal and Turgenev’s break with the editors of Sovremennik, where the article was published. Let us note that N.A. Dobrolyubov rated the novel very highly, that is, we cannot talk about personal grievances. Turgenev was outraged by the inadequacy of the reading. In general, as studies of recent decades show, any literary text contains not only a hidden author’s position, but also a hidden intended reader’s position (in literary terminology this is called implicit, or abstract, reader). This is a certain ideal reader for whom the text is built. In the case of Turgenev and Dobrolyubov, the discrepancies between the implicit and real readers turned out to be colossal.

In connection with all that has been said, we can finally raise the question of objective idea works. The legitimacy of such a question was already justified when we talked about the idea of ​​the text. The problem is, What considered an objective idea. Apparently, we have no other choice but to recognize as an objective idea some conditional vector quantity, consisting of an analysis of the author’s idea and the set of perceived ones. Simply put, we must know the author's intention, the history of interpretation, of which our own is a part, and on this basis find some of the most important points of intersection that guarantee against arbitrariness.

Right there. pp. 135–136.

Fedotov O.I. Fundamentals of the theory of literature. Part 1, M., 2003. P. 47.

Timofeev L.I. Decree. op. P. 139.

See: Ginzburg L. Ya. Literature in search of reality. L., 1987.

This thesis is especially popular among representatives of the scientific school called “receptive aesthetics” (F. Vodicka, J. Mukarzhovsky, R. Ingarden, especially H.R. Jauss and V. Iser). These authors proceed from the fact that a literary work receives its final existence only in the reader’s consciousness, therefore it is impossible to take the reader “out of brackets” when analyzing the text. One of the basic terms of receptive aesthetics is "expectation horizon"– is precisely intended to structure these relationships.

Introduction to Literary Studies / Ed. G. N. Pospelova. M., 1976. P. 7–117.

Volkov I.F. Theory of Literature. M., 1995. pp. 60–66.

Zhirmunsky V. M. Theory of Literature. Poetics. Stylistics. L., 1977. S. 27, 30–31.

Zholkovsky A.K., Shcheglov Yu.K. On the concepts of “theme” and “poetic world” // Scientific notes of the Tartu State University. un-ta. Vol. 365. Tartu, 1975.

Lamzina A.V. Title // Introduction to literary criticism. Literary work / Ed. L. V. Chernets. M., 2000.

Maslovsky V.I. Topic // Brief literary encyclopedia: In 9 vols. T. 7, M., 1972. pp. 460–461.

Maslovsky V.I. Topic // Literary encyclopedic dictionary. M., 1987. P. 437.

Pospelov G.N. Artistic idea // Literary encyclopedic dictionary. M., 1987. P. 114.

Revyakin A.I. Problems of studying and teaching literature. M., 1972. P. 100–118.

Theoretical poetics: concepts and definitions. Reader for students of philological faculties / author-compiler N. D. Tamarchenko. M., 1999. (Topics 5, 15.)

Timofeev L.I. Fundamentals of the theory of literature. M., 1963. pp. 135–141.

Tomashevsky B.V. Theory of Literature. Poetics. M., 2002. pp. 176–179.

Fedotov O.I. Fundamentals of the theory of literature. M., 2003. pp. 41–56.

Khalizev V. E. Theory of Literature. M., 1999. pp. 40–53.

Subject

Subject

(Greek theme - what is supposed to be), in literary criticism - the content of a work in its most general view or the content of any fragment of the work. In the literature of antiquity, the Middle Ages, Renaissance And classicism the topic of the essay was strictly related to his genre. Thus, the exploits of kings and generals were narrated in epic poems; their deeds were praised in solemn odah; the conflict between man and fate or the struggle between duty and passion was depicted in tragedies, and human vices were exposed in comedies. In the era romanticism the clear correlation between genre and theme was destroyed; it was preserved only in some genres. For example, idyll- a short poetic work about the simple joys of rural life, and elegy- a sad lyrical poem about lost youth and disappointed hopes. Various literary trends and currents (see Literary direction and current) have preference different topics. In classicism these are heroic themes, themes of service to the state, in romanticism - love themes, themes of loneliness, death, etc., in symbolism– religious and mystical themes.

Literature and language. Modern illustrated encyclopedia. - M.: Rosman. Edited by prof. Gorkina A.P. 2006 .

SUBJECT- the main idea, the main sound of the work.

Representing that indecomposable emotional-intellectual core that the poet seems to be trying to decompose with each of his works, the concept of theme is by no means covered by the so-called. content. The theme in the broad sense of the word is that holistic image of the world that determines the artist’s poetic worldview. Under the sign of this image, the artist combines the most diverse phenomena of reality. Thanks to this image, the synthetic activity of the artist is possible, which distinguishes him from the non-artist.

Every artist has his own theme, his own image of the world. But depending on the material through which this image is refracted, we have one or another reflection of it, i.e. one or another idea (specific topic), which determines exactly this work , where only one of the faces of the single image guiding the artist’s entire work is revealed. If, from this point of view, we approach, approximately, Lermontov, whose main theme is the Demon, then we can outline a number of particular themes that determined one or another plot of his individual works. The theme of a demon seeking salvation through love defines the plot of “The Demon”; theme of a demon stooping to human image , - the plot of “A Hero of Our Time,” etc. The concept of the theme will become even more prominent if we compare it with musical concept leit-motif, with what is usually called, when applied to a literary work, the “red thread”. Since a well-known theme, the main idea, influences the significance of a particular moment and individual moments are perceived against the background of the thematic whole, we can, of course, talk about a “red thread” running through the entire work. But at the same time, the concept of theme is by no means covered by the concept of “leit motif” or “red thread”. While the leit-motif, the guiding motive, runs through the entire work, then in the form of repetitions (repetition of the same sounds, thoughts, repetition of positions, repetition of descriptions in general or in particular, etc.), then in the form of different variations - if the leit-motif and the “red thread” clearly breaks through here and there, connecting individual parts - the theme itself remains outwardly unidentified, forming a mental center around which everything is located, but which is not fixed in any single phrase. For this reason, it seems completely wrong to define the theme of a well-known work only by this or that technique and repeating moment, because the theme comes through in every moment, it is everywhere and nowhere, as someone noted when applied to music, which can be extended to literature. A theme can only repeat itself, and its development lies in these repetitions. Proof of the validity of this thought is both the work of great writers in general (Lermontov’s theme is the demon, Tyutchev’s theme is the struggle between the day and night principles, etc.), and their individual works.

J. Zundelovich.

Subject. This is sometimes the name given to the derived verb stem of the common Indo-European language. on O, alternating with e, Wed Greek φέρομεν “we carry” (μεν - the end of the 1st l. plural), φέρετε “you carry” (τε - the end of the 2nd l. plural); most vowel sounds O, e at the end of T. called. thematic vowels, and the conjugation of verbs from T. to oh - thematic conjugation(cm.).

N.D. Literary Encyclopedia: Dictionary literary terms: In 2 volumes / Edited by N. Brodsky, A. Lavretsky, E. Lunin, V. Lvov-Rogachevsky, M. Rozanov, V. Cheshikhin-Vetrinsky. - M.; L.: Publishing house L. D. Frenkel, 1925

See what “theme” is in other dictionaries:

subject- y, w. theme, German Thema gr. theme installed; position. 1. The range of life phenomena, events that make up the content of a work of literature, painting, etc. or that underlie scientific research, report, etc. BAS 1. Here’s a topic for you... Historical Dictionary Gallicisms of the Russian language

Subject- THEME is the main idea, the main sound of the work. Representing that indecomposable emotionally intellectual core, which the poet seems to be trying to decompose with each of his works, the concept of theme is by no means covered by the so-called... ... Dictionary of literary terms

- (lat. theme). 1) content. 2) the main idea of ​​the essay. 3) in music: the main motive that must be developed by the composer. Dictionary foreign words, included in the Russian language. Chudinov A.N., 1910. TOPIC [gr. theme] linguistic with current... ... Dictionary of foreign words of the Russian language

TOPIC, themes, women. (Greek theme). 1. The subject of some kind of reasoning or presentation. Essay on the topic of Napoleonic wars. Choose collective farm life as the theme of the story. “Let me tell you a small incident on this topic.” Leskov. ||… … Dictionary Ushakova

Cm … Synonym dictionary

- “THEME”, USSR, Mosfilm, 1979, color, 99 min. Psychological drama. The “theme” stated in the previous film by director Gleb Panfilov, “I Ask for the Word,” found a direct continuation in this film. Panfilov undergoes in-depth research... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

TOPIC (in philosophy and history of science) a term introduced by J. Holton as key concept thematic analysis. The term “theme” is used by Holton in three different aspects: thematic concepts, hypotheses and methodologies. Holton doesn't... Philosophical Encyclopedia

Subject- [from the Greek thema, literally what is put (as the basis)], 1) the subject of description, research, conversation, etc. 2) In art (literature, theater, cinema, painting) the object of artistic depiction, the range of life phenomena captured in ... ... Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary

Proposal, subject of discussion, development task; Main thought. Wed. “We won’t talk about this topic, we’re talking about the mother.” And in general, let’s drop all topics for now. Au revoir. A. A. Sokolov. Secret. 20. Wed. He... private letters...... ... Michelson's Large Explanatory and Phraseological Dictionary (original spelling)

TOPIC, s, women. 1. Subject, main content of reasoning, presentation, creativity. Move to another topic. T. story. 2. Main motive piece of music. T. with variations. | adj. thematic, aya, oe (to 1 meaning). The thematic line of the novel... Ozhegov's Explanatory Dictionary

Female, Greek a proposal, position, task that is being discussed or explained. | Melody, tune, musical. Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary. IN AND. Dahl. 1863 1866 … Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary

Books

• Topic 1. Part 1. Food, products, in a restaurant (DVD), Bystrova Marina. Topic 1. Part 1. Increase your vocabulary quickly! DVD cards + usage examples + voice-over (Russian-English). Food, groceries, in a restaurant.

Subject Learn Russian words in a quick way! DVD... (gr. thema literally means something underlying) - this is an object of knowledge. Subjects

In ancient times, it was believed that the integrity of a literary work was determined by the unity of the main character. But Aristotle also drew attention to the fallacy of such a view, pointing out that the stories about Hercules remain different stories, although dedicated to one person, and the Iliad, which tells about many heroes, does not cease to be an integral work.

What gives a work its holistic character is not the hero, but the unity of the problem posed in it, the unity of the idea being revealed.

The subject of depiction in works of literature can be a variety of phenomena of human life, natural life, flora and fauna, as well as material culture (buildings, furnishings, views of cities, etc.).

But the main subject of knowledge in fiction is the characteristic features of human life. These are the social characters of people both in their external manifestations, relationships, activities, and in their internal, mental life.

Yesin: Subject -“the object of artistic reflection, those life characters and situations that seem to pass from reality into piece of art and form the objective side of its content.”

Tomashevsky:“Unity of meanings of individual elements of a work. It brings together the components of an artistic design.”

The plot may be the same, but the theme is different. In popular literature, the plot weighs heavily on the theme. Life very often becomes the object of depiction.

The topic is often determined by the author’s literary preferences and his belonging to a certain group.

The concept of internal theme is themes that are cross-cutting for the writer; this is the thematic unity that unites all his works.

The theme is the organizing beginning of the work.

Problem - this highlighting of some aspect, the emphasis on it, which is resolved as the work unfolds, is the writer’s ideological comprehension of the social characters that he depicted in the work. The writer highlights and enhances those properties, aspects, relationships of the characters depicted that he considers the most significant.

The problem is still to a greater extent than the subject depends on the worldview of the author. Therefore, the life of the same social environment can be perceived differently by writers who have different ideological worldviews.

Moliere in the comedy “Tartuffe,” having portrayed the main character as a scoundrel and a hypocrite who deceives straightforward and honest people, depicted all his thoughts and actions as manifestations of this main negative character trait. The name Tartuffe became a common noun for hypocrites.

Idea- this is what the author wants to say, why this work was written.

It is thanks to the expression of ideas in images that literary works have such a strong effect on the thoughts, feelings, will of readers and listeners, on their entire inner world.

The attitude to life expressed in a work, or its ideological and emotional assessment, always depends on the writer’s understanding of the characters he portrays and follows from his worldview.

The idea of ​​a literary work is the unity of all aspects of its content; This is a figurative, emotional, generalizing thought of the writer.

The reader is usually sinceregives in to the illusion that everything depicted in the productionknowledge is life itself; he is addicted to actionthe fate of the heroes, experiences their joys, sympathizes with themsuffering or internally condemns it. Whereinthe reader often does not immediately realize what essentialfeatures are embodied in the heroes and in the entire course of the artof the events being described and what significance the details havetheir actions and experiences.

But these detailsare created by the writer in order to, through them, elevate the characters of some heroes in the minds of the reader and reduce the characters of others.

Just by re-reading the works andby thinking about them, the reader can come to the realizationwhat general properties lives are embodied in those orother heroes and how they are comprehended and evaluated by the writertel. Literary criticism often helps him in this.