Composition
Goal: to familiarize students with the general characteristics and originality of Russian literature of the 19th century. from the point of view of history and literature; give an idea of the main trends in the literature late XIX- beginning of the 20th century; show the significance of Russian literature of this period in the development of the Russian and world literary process; to cultivate a sense of belonging and empathy for the history of Russia, love for its culture. equipment: textbook, portraits of writers and poets of the turn of the century.
Projected
Results: students know general characteristics and the originality of Russian literature of the 19th century. from the point of view of history and literature; have an idea of the main trends in literature of the late 19th - early 20th centuries; determine the significance of Russian literature of this period in the development of the Russian and world literary process. lesson type: lesson on learning new material.
DURING THE CLASSES
I. Organizational stage
II. Updating basic knowledge Checking homework (frontal)
III. Setting the goals and objectives of the lesson.
Motivation for learning activities
Teacher. The twentieth century began at zero o'clock on January 1, 1901 - this is its calendar beginning, from which world art of the 20th century counts its history. From this, however, it does not follow that at one moment a general revolution took place in art, establishing a certain a new style XX century Some of the processes that are essential for the history of art originate in the last century.
The last decade of the 19th century. opens in Russian and world culture new stage. Over the course of about a quarter of a century - from the early 1890s to October 1917 - literally every aspect of Russian life changed radically: economics, politics, science, technology, culture, art. Compared to the social and, to some extent, literary stagnation of the 1880s. The new stage of historical and cultural development was distinguished by rapid dynamics and acute drama. In terms of the pace and depth of changes, as well as the catastrophic nature of internal conflicts, Russia at that time was ahead of any other country. Therefore, the transition from the era of classical Russian literature to the new literary time was accompanied by far from peaceful processes in general cultural and intraliterary life, which were unexpectedly fast by the standards of the 19th century. - a change in aesthetic guidelines, a radical update of literary techniques.
The legacy of the turn of the 19th–20th centuries. is not limited to the work of one or two dozen significant literary artists, and the logic of the literary development of this time cannot be reduced to a single center or the simplest scheme of successive directions. This heritage is a multi-tiered artistic reality in which individual literary talents, no matter how outstanding they may be, are only part of a grandiose whole. When starting to study turn-of-the-century literature, one cannot do without brief overview social background and general cultural context of this period (“context” - environment, external environment, in which art exists).
IV. Working on the topic of lesson 1. teacher's lecture
(Students write theses.)
Literature of the late XIX - early XX centuries. existed and developed under the powerful influence of a crisis that gripped almost all aspects of Russian life. The great realist writers of the 19th century, who were ending their creative and life paths, managed to convey their sense of the tragedy and disorder of Russian life of this time with enormous artistic power: l. N. Tolstoy and A. P. Chekhov. Continuers of the realistic traditions of I. a. Bunin, A. I. Kuprin, l. N. Andreev, A. N. Tolstoy, in turn, created magnificent examples of realistic art. However, the plots of their works became more and more disturbing and gloomy from year to year, the ideals that inspired them became more and more unclear. The life-affirming pathos characteristic of Russian classics of the 19th century gradually disappeared from their work under the weight of sad events.
At the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries. Russian literature, which previously had high degree ideological unity, has become aesthetically multi-layered.
Realism at the turn of the century continued to be a large-scale and influential literary movement.
The most brilliant talents among the new realists belonged to the writers who united in the 1890s. to the Moscow circle “Sreda”, and in the early 1900s. who formed the circle of regular authors of the publishing house “Znanie” (one of its owners and actual leader was M. Gorky). In addition to the leader of the association, over the years it included L. N. Andreev, I. a. Bunin, V.V. Veresaev, N. Garin-Mikhailovsky, a. I. Kuprin, I. S. Shmelev and other writers. With the exception of I. a. There were no major poets among Bunin's realists; they showed themselves primarily in prose and, less noticeably, in drama.
Generation of realist writers of the early 20th century. received as an inheritance from A. P. Chekhov's new principles of writing - with much greater authorial freedom than before, with a much wider arsenal of artistic expression, with a sense of proportion obligatory for the artist, which was ensured by increased internal self-criticism.
In literary criticism, it is customary to call, first of all, three literary movements that declared themselves in the period 1890–1917 as modernist. These are symbolism, acmeism and futurism, which formed the basis of modernism as a literary movement.
In general, Russian culture of the late XIX - early XX centuries. amazes with its brightness, wealth, and abundance of talents in various fields. And at the same time, it was the culture of a society doomed to destruction, a premonition of which could be seen in many of her works.
2. familiarization with the textbook article on the topic of the lesson (in pairs)
3. Heuristic conversation
Š What new styles and trends have appeared in Russian culture at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries? How were they related to a specific historical setting?
♦ Which historical events late XIX - early XX centuries. influenced the destinies of Russian writers, were reflected in works of literature?
♦ What philosophical concepts had an impact on Russian literature at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries? what explains the special interest of writers in the philosophy of a. Schopenhauer, F. Nietzsche?
♦ How did the craving for irrationalism, mysticism, and religious quest manifest itself in Russian literature of this time?
♦ is it possible to say that at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries. Is realism losing the role of the dominant literary process that belonged to it in the 19th century?
♦ How do the traditions of classical literature and innovative aesthetic concepts compare in the literature of the turn of the century?
♦ What is unique? late creativity A. P. Chekhov? How justified is judgment a. Bely that a. P. Chekhov “most of all a symbolist”? What features of Chekhov's realism allow modern researchers to call the writer the founder of absurd literature?
♦ What character did the literary struggle take at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries? Which publishing houses, magazines, almanacs played a particularly important role in the development of Russian literature?
♦ How is the problem of the relationship between man and the environment solved in Russian literature at the turn of the century? What traditions of the “natural school” were developed in the prose of this time?
♦ What place did journalism occupy in the literature of this period? What problems were especially actively discussed on the pages of magazines and newspapers during these years?
V. Reflection. Summing up the lesson
1. “Press” (in groups)
The teacher’s general word - thus, the deep aspirations of the modernist movements that conflicted with each other turned out to be very similar, despite the sometimes striking stylistic dissimilarities, differences in tastes and literary tactics. That is why the best poets of the era rarely confined themselves to a particular literary school or movement. Almost a rule of their creative evolution has become the overcoming of directional frameworks and declarations that are narrow for the creator. That's why real picture literary process at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries. is determined to a much greater extent by the creative individuals of writers and poets than by the history of trends and movements.
VI. Homework
1. Prepare a message “the turn of the 19th–20th centuries. in the perception... (one of the representatives of Russian art of this time)", using memoir prose by A. Bely, Yu. P. Annenkov, V. F. Khodasevich, Z. N. Gippius, M. I. Tsvetaeva, I. V. Odoevtseva, and other authors.
2. individual task (3 students). Prepare “literary business cards” about the life and work of M. Gorky:
Autobiographical trilogy(“Childhood”, “In People”, “my universities”);
“We sing glory to the madness of the brave!” (“Song of the Falcon”);
LITERATURE OF THE END OF THE XIX - BEGINNING OF THE XX CENTURY
More than eighty years ago, Alexander Blok expressed hope for the attention and understanding of his future readers. Fifteen years later, another poet, Vladimir Mayakovsky, summing up the results of his literary work, directly addressed his “dear comrades and descendants.” Poets entrust the people of the future with the most important thing: their books, and in them - everything that they strived for, what they thought about, what people who lived in the “beautiful and furious” 20th century felt. And today, when we stand on the threshold of a new millennium, “you, from another generation,” history itself has given the opportunity to see the passing century in a historical perspective and discover Russian literature of the 20th century.
One of the most striking and mysterious pages of Russian culture is the beginning of the century. Today this period is called the “silver age” of Russian literature, following the “golden” XIX, when Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy reigned. But it would be more correct to call the “Silver Age” not all literature, but primarily poetry, as the participants in the literary movement of that era did. Poetry, which was actively looking for new ways of development, for the first time since Pushkin’s era at the beginning of the 20th century. came to the forefront of the literary process. We must remember that the term “Silver Age” is conventional, but it is significant that the very choice of this characteristic paid tribute to its predecessors, primarily A.S. Pushkin (more about this in the chapters on poetry).
However, at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. literature developed under different historical conditions than before. If you look for a word that characterizes the most important features of the period under consideration, it will be the word crisis. Great scientific discoveries shook the classical ideas about the structure of the world and led to the paradoxical conclusion: “matter has disappeared.” As E. Zamyatin wrote in the early 20s, “exact science blew up the very reality of matter,” “life itself today has ceased to be flat-real: it is projected not onto the previous fixed, but into dynamic coordinates,” and the most famous things in this new projection seems strangely familiar, fantastic. This means, the writer continues, that new beacons have loomed before literature: from the depiction of everyday life - to existence, to philosophy, to the fusion of reality and fiction, from the analysis of phenomena - to their synthesis. Zamyatin’s conclusion that “realism has no roots” is fair, although unusual at first glance, if by realism we mean “one bare image of everyday life.” A new vision of the world, thus, will determine the new face of realism of the 20th century, which will differ significantly from the classical realism of its predecessors in its “modernity” (definition by I. Bunin). The emerging trend towards the renewal of realism at the end of the 19th century. V.V. astutely noted Rozanov. “...After naturalism, the reflection of reality, it is natural to expect idealism, insight into its meaning... The centuries-old trends of history and philosophy - this is what will probably become in the near future the favorite subject of our study... Politics in in a high sense this word, in the sense of penetration into the course of history and influence on it, and Philosophy as the need of a perishing soul greedily grasping for salvation - this is the goal that irresistibly attracts us to itself...” wrote V.V. Rozanov (my italics - L. T.).
The crisis of faith had devastating consequences for the human spirit (“God is dead!” exclaimed Nietzsche). This led to the fact that a person of the 20th century. He began to increasingly experience the influence of irreligious and, what is truly scary, immoral ideas, for, as Dostoevsky predicted, if there is no God, then “everything is permissible.” The cult of sensual pleasures, the apology of Evil and death, the glorification of the self-will of the individual, the recognition of the right to violence, which turned into terror - all these features, testifying to the deepest crisis of consciousness, will be characteristic not only of the poetry of modernists.
At the beginning of the 20th century. Russia was shaken by acute social conflicts: the war with Japan, the first World War, internal contradictions and, as a result, the scope of the popular movement and revolution. The clash of ideas intensified, political movements and parties were formed that sought to influence the minds of people and the development of the country. All this could not but cause a feeling of instability, the fragility of existence, a tragic discord between a person and himself. “Atlantis” - such a prophetic name will be given to the ship on which the drama of life and death will unfold, I. Bunin in the story “The Gentleman from San Francisco”, emphasizing the tragic overtones of the work with a description of the Devil watching over people's destinies.
Each literary era has its own system of values, a center (philosophers call it axiological, value-centered), to which all paths of artistic creativity one way or another converge. Such a center that determined many distinctive features Russian literature The 20th century became History with its unprecedented socio-historical and spiritual cataclysms, which drew everyone into its orbit - from a specific person to the people and the state. If V.G. Belinsky called his 19th century predominantly historical; this definition is even more true in relation to the 20th century with its new worldview, the basis of which was the idea of an ever-accelerating historical movement. Time itself once again brought to the fore the problem of Russia’s historical path, forcing us to look for an answer to Pushkin’s prophetic question: “Where are you galloping, proud horse, And where will you land your hooves?” The beginning of the 20th century was filled with predictions of “unprecedented riots” and “unheard of fires”, a premonition of “retribution,” as A. Blok prophetically said in his unfinished poem of the same name. B. Zaitsev’s idea is well known that everyone was hurt (“wounded”) by revolutionism, regardless of their political attitude to the events. “Through revolution as a state of mind” - this is how a modern researcher defined one of characteristic features“well-being” of a person at that time. The future of Russia and the Russian people, fate moral values in a turning point in history, the connection between man and real story, the incomprehensible “variegation” of the national character - not a single artist could escape answering these “damned questions” of Russian thought. Thus, in the literature of the beginning of the century, not only the traditional interest in history for Russian art manifested itself, but a special quality of artistic consciousness was formed, which can be defined as historical consciousness. At the same time, it is absolutely not necessary to look for direct references to specific events, problems, conflicts, and heroes in all works. History for literature is, first of all, its “secret thought”; it is important for writers as an impetus for thinking about the mysteries of existence, for comprehending the psychology and life of the spirit of “historical man”.
But the Russian writer would hardly have considered himself to have fulfilled his destiny if he had not searched for himself (sometimes difficultly, even painfully) and offered his understanding of a way out to a person in a crisis era.
Without the sun we would be dark slaves,
It is beyond understanding that there is a radiant day.
K. Balmont
A person who has lost integrity, in a situation of a global crisis of spirit, consciousness, culture, social order, and the search for a way out of this crisis, the desire for an ideal, harmony - this is how one can define the most important directions of artistic thought of the border era.
Literature of the late XIX - early XX centuries. - a phenomenon that is extremely complex, acutely conflicting, but also fundamentally united, since all directions Russian art developed in a common social and cultural atmosphere and answered in their own way the same difficult questions raised by time. For example, not only the works of V. Mayakovsky or M. Gorky, who saw a way out of the crisis in social transformations, are imbued with the idea of rejection of the surrounding world, but also the poems of one of the founders of Russian symbolism, D. Merezhkovsky:
So life as a nothingness is terrible,
And not even struggle, not torment,
But only endless boredom and quiet horror.
The lyrical hero of A. Blok expressed the confusion of a person leaving the world of familiar, established values “into the damp night”, having lost faith in life itself:
Night, street, lantern, pharmacy,
Pointless and dim light.
Live for at least another quarter of a century -
Everything will be like this. There is no outcome.
How scary everything is! How wild! - Give me your hand, Comrade, friend! Let's forget ourselves again!
If the artists were mostly unanimous in their assessment of the present, contemporary writers answered the question about the future and ways to achieve it differently. The symbolists went into the “Palace of Beauty” created by the creative imagination, into mystical “other worlds”, into the music of verse. M. Gorky placed hope in the mind, talent, and active principles of man, who sang the power of Man in his works. The dream of human harmony with the natural world, of the healing power of art, religion, love and doubts about the possibility of realizing this dream permeate the books of I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, L. Andreev. I felt like “the voice of the street without a tongue” lyrical hero V. Mayakovsky, who took on his shoulders the entire burden of rebellion against the foundations of the universe (“down with it!”). The ideal of Rus' is “the country of birch chintz”, the idea of the unity of all living things is heard in the poems of S. Yesenin. Proletarian poets came out with faith in the possibility of social reconstruction of life and a call to forge the “keys of happiness” with their own hands. Naturally, literature did not give its answers in a logical form, although the journalistic statements of writers, their diaries, and memoirs are also extremely interesting, without which it is impossible to imagine Russian culture at the beginning of the century. A feature of the era was parallel existence and struggle literary trends, uniting writers with similar ideas about the role of creativity, the most important principles of understanding the world, approaches to depicting personality, preferences in the choice of genres, styles, and forms of storytelling. Aesthetic diversity and sharp demarcation of literary forces have become characteristic feature literature of the beginning of the century.
History of foreign literature of the late XIX – early XX centuries Zhuk Maxim Ivanovich
Specifics of the literary process of the late 19th – early 20th centuries
All the complexity and inconsistency of the historical and cultural development of the turn of the century was reflected in the art of this era and, in particular, in literature. There are several specific features, characterizing literary process of the late XIX – early XX centuries.
The literary panorama of the turn of the century is distinguished by its exceptional richness, brightness, artistic and aesthetic innovation. Such literary trends and trends are developing as realism, naturalism, symbolism, aestheticism And neo-romanticism. The emergence of a large number of new trends and methods in art was a consequence of changes in human consciousness at the turn of the century. As you know, art is one of the ways to explain the world. In the turbulent era of the late 20th and early 20th centuries, artists, writers, and poets are developing new ways and techniques for depicting people and the world in order to describe and interpret a rapidly changing reality.
Themes and problems of verbal art expand thanks to discoveries made in different fields of knowledge(C. Darwin, C. Bernard, W. James). Philosophical and social concepts world and man (O. Comte, I. Taine, G. Spencer, A. Schopenhauer, F. Nietzsche) were actively transferred by many writers to the field of literature, determining their worldview and poetics.
Literature at the turn of the century enriched in terms of genre. A great variety of forms is observed in the field of the novel, which was represented by a wide range of genre varieties: science fiction (G. Wells), socio-psychological (G. de Maupassant, Comrade Dreiser, D. Galsworthy), philosophical (A. France, O . Wilde), social-utopian (G. Wells, D. London). The popularity of the short story genre is being revived (G. de Maupassant, R. Kipling, T. Mann, D. London, O. Henry, A.P. Chekhov), drama is on the rise (G. Ibsen, B. Shaw, G. Hauptmann, A. Strindberg, M. Maeterlinck, A.P. Chekhov, M. Gorky).
The emergence of the epic novel is indicative of new trends in the novel genre. The desire of writers to comprehend the complex spiritual and social processes of their time contributed to the creation of dilogies, trilogies, tetralogies, multi-volume epics (“Rougon-Macquart”, “Three Cities” and “The Four Gospels” by E. Zola, a dilogy about Abbot Jerome Coignard and “ Modern history"A. France, "Trilogy of Desire" by Comrade Dreiser, cycle about the Forsytes by D. Galsworthy).
An essential feature of the literary development of the turn of the century era was interaction of national literatures. In the last third of the 19th century, a dialogue between Russian and Western European literature emerged: the work of l.n. Tolstoy, I.S. Turgeneva, F.M. Dostoevsky, A.P. Chekhov, M. Gorky had a fruitful influence on such foreign artists as G. de Maupassant, D. Galsworthy, K. Hamsun, Comrade Dreiser and many others. The problematics, aesthetics and universal human pathos of Russian literature turned out to be relevant for Western society at the turn of the century. It is no coincidence that during this period, direct contacts between Russian and foreign writers deepened and expanded: personal meetings, correspondence.
In turn, Russian prose writers, poets and playwrights followed European and American literature with great attention and adopted the creative experience of foreign writers. As you know, A.P. Chekhov relied on the achievements of G. Ibsen and G. Hauptmann, and in his novelistic prose - on G. de Maupassant. There is no doubt the influence of French symbolist poetry on the work of Russian symbolist poets (K. Balmont, V. Bryusov, A. Blok).
Another important part of the turn-of-the-century literary process is involvement of writers in events of socio-political life. In this regard, the participation of E. Zola and A. France in the Dreyfus affair, M. Twain’s protest against the Spanish-American War, R. Kipling’s support for the Anglo-Boer War, and B. Shaw’s anti-war position in relation to the First World War are indicative.
The unique feature of this literary era is perception of existence in paradoxes, which was especially clearly reflected in the works of O. Wilde, B. Shaw, M. Twain. Paradox has become not only a favorite artistic device of writers, but also an element of their worldview. Paradox has the ability to reflect the complexity and ambiguity of the world, so it is no coincidence that it became such a sought-after element of a work of art at the turn of the century. An example of a paradoxical perception of reality can be seen in many of B. Shaw's plays ("The Widower's Houses", "Mrs. Warren's Profession", etc.), M. Twain's short stories ("How I Was Elected for Governor", "The Clock", etc.), and the aphorisms of O. Wilde.
Writers expand the scope of what is depicted in a work of art. First of all, this concerns naturalist writers (J. and E. de Goncourt, E. Zola). They turn to depicting the life of the lower classes of society (prostitutes, beggars, tramps, criminals, alcoholics), to describing the physiological aspects of human life. In addition to naturalists, the realm of the depicted is expanded by symbolist poets (P. Verlaine, A. Rimbaud, S. Mallarmé), who sought to express the inexpressible content of existence in a lyrical work.
An important feature of the literature of this period is transition from an objective image of reality to a subjective one. For the work of many writers of this era (H. James, J. Conrad, J.-C. Huysmans, R. M. Rilke, the late G. de Maupassant), the primary thing is not the recreation of objective reality, but the depiction of a person’s subjective perception of the world.
It is important to note that interest in the area of the subjective was first identified in such a direction of painting at the end of the 19th century as impressionism, which had a great influence on the work of many writers and poets of the turn of the century (for example, E. Zola, G. de Maupassant, P. Verlaine, S. Mallarmé, O. Wilde, etc.).
Impressionism(from French. impression- impression) - a direction in art of the last third of the 19th - early 20th centuries, based on the artist’s desire to convey his subjective impressions, to depict reality in its endless mobility, variability, and to capture the wealth of nuances. The largest impressionist artists were Ed. Manet, C. Monet, E. Degas, O. Renoir, A. Sisley, P. Cezanne, C. Pissaro and others.
Impressionist artists tried not to depict an object, but to convey your impression of the object, those. express a subjective perception of reality. The masters of this movement sought to capture, unbiasedly and as naturally and freshly as possible, the fleeting impression of a rapidly flowing, constantly changing life. The subjects of the paintings were secondary for the artists; they took them from everyday life, which they knew well: city streets, artisans at work, rural landscapes, familiar and familiar buildings, etc. The impressionists rejected the canons of beauty that weighed heavily on academic painting and created their own.
The most important literary and cultural concept of the turn of the century era is decadence(late lat. decadentia- decline) is a general name for crisis, pessimistic, decadent moods and destructive tendencies in art and culture. Decadence does not represent a specific direction, movement or style, it is a general depressive state of culture, it is the spirit of the era expressed in art.
Decadent traits include: pessimism, rejection of reality, cult of sensual pleasures, loss of moral values, aestheticization of extreme individualism, unlimited personal freedom, fear of life, increased interest in the processes of dying, decay, poeticization of suffering and death. An important sign of decadence is the indistinction or confusion of such categories as the beautiful and the ugly, pleasure and pain, morality and immorality, art and life.
In the most distinct form, the motifs of decadence in the art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries can be seen in the novel by J.-C. Huysmans “On the contrary” (1883), the play by O. Wilde “Salome” (1893), and the graphics by O. Beardsley. The work of D.G. is marked by certain features of decadence. Rossetti, P. Verlaine, A. Rimbaud, S. Mallarmé, M. Maeterlinck and others.
The list of names shows that the mentality of decadence affected the work of a significant part of the artists at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, including many major masters of art, whose work as a whole cannot be reduced to decadence. Decadent tendencies are revealed in transitional eras, when one ideology, having exhausted its historical possibilities, is replaced by another. The outdated type of thinking no longer meets the requirements of reality, and the other has not yet formed enough to satisfy social and intellectual needs. This gives rise to feelings of anxiety, uncertainty, and disappointment. this was the case during the decline of the Roman Empire, in Italy in late XVI century and in European countries at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The source of the crisis mentality of the intelligentsia at the turn of the century was the confusion of many artists before the sharp contradictions of the era, before the rapidly and paradoxically developing civilization, which was in an intermediate position between the past and the future, between the outgoing 19th century and the yet to come 20th century.
Concluding the review of the specific features of literature at the turn of the century, it should be noted that the diversity of literary movements, genres, forms, styles, the expansion of themes, issues and spheres of what is depicted, innovative changes in poetics - all this was a consequence of the complex paradoxical nature of the era. Experimenting in the field of new artistic techniques and methods, developing traditional ones, the art of the late 19th - early 20th centuries tried to explain the rapidly changing life, to select the most adequate words and forms for a dynamic reality.
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Russian literature (in the person of Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy) was recognized as the highest art of speech due to its unique attitude towards the world and man, revealed by original artistic means. Russian psychologism, the ability of Russian authors to show the interconnection and conditionality of social, philosophical and moral problems, the genre looseness of Russian writers who created the free form of the novel, and then the short story and drama, were perceived as something new.
In the 19th century Russian literature adopted a lot from world literature, now it generously enriched it.
Having become the property of foreign readers, Russian literature widely acquainted them with the little-known life activity of a huge country, with the spiritual needs and social aspirations of its people, with their difficult historical destiny.
The importance of Russian literature increased even more on the eve of the first Russian revolution - both for Russian (which had grown significantly in number) and for foreign readers. The words of V.I. Lenin in the work “What to do?” are very significant. (1902) about the need to think “about the worldwide significance that Russian literature is now acquiring.”
AND literature XIX century, and the latest literature helped to understand what exactly contributed to the maturation of the explosion of popular anger and what was the general state of modern Russian reality.
L. Tolstoy’s merciless criticism of the state and social foundations of Russian life, Chekhov’s depiction of the everyday tragedy of this life, Gorky’s search for a true hero new history and his call “Let the storm blow harder!” - all this, despite the difference in the writers' worldviews, indicated that Russia found itself at a sharp turning point in its history.
The year 1905 marked the beginning of the “end of the “eastern” immobility” in which Russia was, and foreign readers were looking for an answer to the question of how all this happened in the most accessible source - Russian literature. And it’s quite natural that Special attention It has now begun to attract the work of modern writers, reflecting the mood and social aspirations of Russian society. At the turn of the century, translators fiction They pay great attention to which works are most successful in Russia, and rush to translate them into Western European languages. Released in 1898–1899 three volumes of “Essays and Stories” brought Gorky all-Russian fame, in 1901 he was already a European famous writer.
At the beginning of the 20th century. there was no doubt that Russia, having drawn a lot from the historical experience of Europe, was beginning to play a huge role in the global historical process, hence the increasingly increasing role of Russian literature in revealing changes in all areas of Russian life and in the psychology of Russian people.
Turgenev and Gorky called the liberated Russia “teenager” in the European family of nations; Now this teenager was turning into a giant, calling to follow him.
V.I. Lenin's articles about Tolstoy show that the global significance of his work (Tolstoy was already recognized as a world genius during his lifetime) is inseparable from the global significance of the first Russian revolution. Viewing Tolstoy as an exponent of the sentiments and aspirations of the patriarchal peasantry, Lenin wrote that Tolstoy with remarkable power reflected “the features of the historical originality of the entire first Russian revolution, its strength and its weakness.” At the same time, Lenin clearly outlined the boundaries of the material subject to the writer’s depiction. “The era to which L. Tolstoy belongs,” he wrote, “and which was reflected in remarkable relief both in his brilliant works of art and in his teaching, is the era after 1861 and before 1905.”
The work of the greatest writer of the new century, Gorky, was inextricably linked with the Russian revolution, who reflected in his work the third stage of the liberation struggle of the Russian people, which led him to 1905, and then to the socialist revolution.
And not only Russian, but also foreign readers perceived Gorky as a writer who saw a true historical figure of the 20th century. in the person of the proletarian and who showed how the psychology of the working masses changes under the influence of new historical circumstances.
Tolstoy depicted with amazing power a Russia already receding into the past. But, recognizing that the existing system is becoming obsolete and that the 20th century is the century of revolutions, he still remained faithful to the ideological foundations of his teaching, his preaching of non-resistance to evil through violence.
Gorky showed Russia as it replaced the old one. He becomes the singer of young, new Russia. He is interested in the historical modification of the Russian character, the new psychology of the people, in which, unlike previous and a number of modern writers, he looks for and reveals anti-humble and strong-willed traits. And this makes Gorky’s work especially significant.
The confrontation between two great artists in this regard - Tolstoy, who has long been perceived as the pinnacle of realistic literature of the 19th century, and the young writer, reflecting in his work the leading trends of modern times, was caught by many contemporaries.
K. Kautsky’s response to the novel “Mother” he had just read in 1907 is very characteristic. “Balzac shows us,” Kautsky wrote to Gorky, “more accurately than any historian, the character of young capitalism after the French Revolution; and if, on the other hand, I managed to understand Russian affairs to some extent, then I owe this not so much to Russian theoreticians as, perhaps to an even greater extent, to Russian writers, primarily Tolstoy and you. But if Tolstoy teaches me to understand the Russia that was, then your works teach me to understand the Russia that will be; understand the forces that bear new Russia».
Later, saying that “Tolstoy, more than any other Russian, plowed and prepared the ground for a violent explosion,” S. Zweig will say that it was not Dostoevsky or Tolstoy who showed the world the amazing Slavic soul, but Gorky allowed the amazed West understand what and why happened in Russia in October 1917, and will especially highlight Gorky’s novel “Mother”.
Giving a high assessment of Tolstoy’s work, V.I. Lenin wrote: “The era of preparation for the revolution in one of the countries oppressed by the feudal owners, thanks to Tolstoy’s brilliant illumination, appeared as a step forward in the artistic development of all mankind.”
Gorky became the writer who illuminated with great artistic force the pre-revolutionary moods of Russian society and the era of 1905–1917, and thanks to this illumination, the revolutionary era, which ended with the October Socialist Revolution, in turn, was a step forward in the artistic development of mankind. By showing those who walked towards this revolution and then carried it out, Gorky opened a new page in the history of realism.
Gorky’s new concept of man and social romanticism, his new coverage of the problem of “man and history,” the writer’s ability to identify the sprouts of the new everywhere, the huge gallery he created of people representing old and new Russia - all this contributed to both the expansion and deepening of artistic knowledge life. New representatives of critical realism also made their contribution to this knowledge.
So, for the literature of the early 20th century. The simultaneous development of critical realism, which at the turn of the century was experiencing a time of renewal, but without losing its critical pathos, and socialist realism, became characteristic. Noting this remarkable feature of the literature of the new century, V. A. Keldysh wrote: “In the context of the revolution of 1905–1907. for the first time, that type of literary relationship arose, which was later destined to play such a significant role in the world literary process of the 20th century: “old”, critical realism develops simultaneously with socialist realism, and the appearance of signs of a new quality in critical realism is largely the result of this interaction.”
Socialist realists (Gorky, Serafimovich) did not forget that the origins of a new image of life go back to the artistic quests of such realists as Tolstoy and Chekhov, while some representatives of critical realism began to master the creative principles of socialist realism.
Such coexistence would later be characteristic of other literatures during the years of the emergence of socialist realism in them.
The simultaneous flowering of a significant number of great and dissimilar talents, noted by Gorky as the uniqueness of Russian literature of the last century, was also characteristic of the literature of the new century. The creativity of its representatives develops, as in the previous period, in close artistic relationships with Western European literature, also revealing its artistic originality. Just like literature XIX century, she enriched and continues to enrich world literature. Particularly indicative in this case is the work of Gorky and Chekhov. Under the sign of the artistic discoveries of the revolutionary writer, Soviet literature will develop; his artistic method will have a great influence also on creative development democratic writers foreign world. Chekhov's innovation was not immediately recognized abroad, but starting in the 20s. it found itself in the sphere of intensive study and development. World fame first came to Chekhov the playwright, and then to Chekhov the prose writer.
The work of a number of other authors was also noted for innovation. Translators, as we have already said, paid attention in the 1900s. attention to both the works of Chekhov, Gorky, Korolenko, and the works of writers who came to prominence on the eve and during the years of the first Russian revolution. They especially followed the writers grouped around the publishing house “Znanie”. L. Andreev’s responses to Russian-Japanese war and the rampant tsarist terror (“Red Laughter”, “The Tale of the Seven Hanged Men”). Interest in Andreev’s prose did not disappear even after 1917. The trembling heart of Sashka Zhegulev found an echo in distant Chile. A young student of one of the Chilean lyceums, Pablo Neruda, will sign with the name of St. Andrew’s hero, whom he chose as a pseudonym, his first major work, “Festive Song,” which will receive a prize at the “Spring Festival” in 1921.
Andreev’s dramaturgy also gained fame, anticipating the emergence of expressionism in foreign literature. In “Letters on Proletarian Literature” (1914), A. Lunacharsky pointed out the overlap between individual scenes and characters in E. Barnavol’s play “Cosmos” and Andreev’s play “Tsar Hunger.” Later, researchers will note the impact of Andreevsky drama on L. Pirandello, O’Neill and other foreign playwrights.
Among the features of the literary process of the early 20th century. The extraordinary variety of dramaturgical searches and the rise of dramatic thought should be attributed. At the turn of the century, Chekhov's theater appeared. And before the viewer had time to master the innovation of Chekhov’s psychological drama that amazed him, a new, social drama by Gorky appeared, and then the unexpected expressionist drama of Andreev. Three special dramaturgies, three different stage systems.
Simultaneously with the enormous interest shown in Russian literature abroad at the beginning of the new century, interest in old and new Russian music, the art of opera, ballet, and decorative painting is also growing. A major role in arousing this interest was played by concerts and performances organized by S. Diaghilev in Paris, performances by F. Chaliapin, and the first trip of the Moscow Art Theater abroad. In the article “Russian Performances in Paris” (1913), Lunacharsky wrote: “Russian music has become a completely definite concept, including the characteristics of freshness, originality and, above all, enormous instrumental skill.”
Literature of the period under review was closely connected with the previous period. The literary movement continues to exist naturalism (biologism), in the works of E. Zola, acquiring new features in "Physiological Essays" in Rudyard Kipling, for whom reportage becomes a literary device in his stories about India, and soldier's slang makes his ballads accessible to millions. Symbolism is living out its last days.
Literary figures at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries were concerned not only with creative problems, but also with social injustice, imperialism, colonialism, militarism and war - the complexity and contradictory nature of life. Criticism of injustices social order, human relations, the fate of a creative personality in bourgeois society were dealt with by writers of a realistic direction.
Critical realism receives further development in the works of major European writers:
- Anatole France,
- Romain Rolland,
- Bernard Shaw and others
At this time, the creativity of remarkable US writers was developing:
- Mark Twain (1835-1910; “Pamphlets”, etc.),
- Jack London (1876-1916; " Iron heel", "Martin Eden"),
- Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945; "Sister Carey", "Trilogy of Desire"),
- E. Sinclair ("The Jungle"),
- F. Norris ("Octopus"),
- Thomas Mann (1875-1955; "Buddenbrooks", 1900; "Death in Venice", 1911),
- Heinrich Mann (1871-1950; "Empire", 1900s; "Loyal Subject", 1914),
- Boleslav Prus,
- Eliza Ozheshko,
- Maria Konopnitskaya,
- Jan Neruda, etc.
Significant changes are also taking place in Western European novel. Along with traditional literary genres (psychological, everyday novel, everyday drama, etc.), writers of the 20th century. are developing genre of philosophical novel
(A. France “On the White Stone”, T. Mann), giving new features to the art of everyday realism.
In an effort to sum up the development of bourgeois relations, writers create works telling about the fate of several generations of their heroes, developing the genre of the novel in the form of a family chronicle ("Buddenbrooks" by T. Mann, "The Forsyte Saga" by D. Galsworthy). John Galsworthy
(1867-1933) “The Forsyte Saga” was written over 40 years and created a brilliant work of literature of critical realism. Each author, exposing the ugly forms of social life, had his own creative style. So, Anatole France (1844-1924) in anti-bourgeois novels-pamphlets - “Penguin Island”, “The Gods Thirst”, “Rise of the Angels” - condemned violence, wars, religious fanaticism, and the hypocrisy of bourgeois morality. At the same time, France's work is permeated with love for man, nature and beauty. English writer composed famous science fiction novels: “The Time Machine”, “The Invisible Man”, “War of the Worlds”, etc. The theme of art occupies a large place in the work of the mentioned writers. The tragedy of the artist in the bourgeois world is captured in the novels of J. London ("Martin Eden"), Dreiser ("Genius"), and in the short stories and novels of T. Mann. The artist’s conflict with the bourgeois world is revealed in its most complete form in R. Rolland’s multi-volume novel “Jean-Christophe.”
At the turn of the century it happened renewal of dramaturgy. During these years, the English playwright B. Shaw brought English drama out of an ideological and artistic impasse. His play "Pygmalion" had already performed on the stages of all the leading theaters in the world.
The Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) was also an innovator, who gave the drama a problematic character.
Widely known in the world at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries. acquired the plays of the German playwright Gerhart Hauptmann (1862-1946). From naturalism ("Before Sunrise", 1889) to themes of social significance ("The Weavers", 1892), to convention and symbolism ("The Sunken Bell") and a satirical comedy of manners ("The Red Rooster", "Rats") - this is his creative path. For well-known reasons, during this period the emergence of socialist direction in art, the founder of which is considered to be the poets of the Paris Commune, primarily Eugene Potier, author of the famous "Internationale". In 1905-1909 In Denmark, Martin Andersen-Neske creates the epic Pelle the Conqueror. During the First World War, A. Barbusse’s novel “Fire” (1916) appeared, which truthfully reveals the essence of the war of 1914-1918. It should be noted that during this difficult period, moods of disappointment, disbelief, despair and death were widespread. We remember that the phenomenon is called decadence ("decadence" - "decline"). Decadence ideas were reflected in all literary movements and affected the creativity of many writers of that time, including the most important ones (Maupassant, G. Mann, M. Maeterlinck, R. Rolland, etc.). Many artists, hiding from the harsh reality, retreated into a narrow personal world, A
The 20th century brings new events, new phenomena, new discoveries, new names. Considered the most modern and fashionable avant-garde art:
- Italian futurism (Tommaso Marinetti),
- German expressionism (Bertolt Brecht, Johannes Becher),
- French Cubism (Guillaume Apollinaire, 1880-1918)
- and surrealism (Paul Eluard, Louis Aragon).
Here is Paul Eluard's poem "The Art of Dance":
The fragile rain holds the tiles
In balance. Ballerina
Will never learn
To flow and jump
Like rain.
Your orange hair in the emptiness of the Universe,
In the emptiness of the numbing glasses of silence And the darkness where my naked your hands
looking for a reflection.
Your heart is chimerical in shape,
And your love is similar to my departed desire.
O fragrant sighs, dreams and views.
But you weren't always with me.
My memory
Keeps a dejected picture of your appearance
And leaving.
Time, like love, cannot do without words.
The cubist Apollinaire was fond of formal searches, striving for a form freed from reality. He cultivated automatic creativity - the recording of associations that randomly arise in the poet's mind. But in his best poems the poet managed to express the bitterness of the era of the approaching world war. The expressionists demanded"revolution of the spirit"
- liberation of the soul from “self-oppressive matter” (bourgeois life). They depicted modern reality in flashy forms. The courage of denunciation was combined with a mood of despair. And innovation, divorced from tradition, often turned out to be external and empty. It was enough propaganda literature aimed at processing public consciousness
in preparation for world war. But works filled with the ideas of chauvinism and aggressive colonialism were on the margins of the literary process.
To get a clearer picture of the literature of this period, it makes sense to dwell on the work of individual writers. We chose R. Rolland (Nobel Prize awarded in 1915), R. Kipling (Nobel Prize 1907), R. Tagore (Nobel Prize 1913).
Rudyard Kipling (1865 - 1936)- prose writer, children's writer, poet, essayist was born in 1865 in India, where his father, an unsuccessful decorator and sculptor, went with his young wife in search of constant income, a quiet life and a solid position in society. Until the age of 6, the boy grew up in the circle of a friendly family, in his home. Indian nannies and servants pampered their charges. The world of idyll collapsed when he and his younger sister were sent to England in the care of distant relatives, in their private boarding school. The hostess of the boarding house did not like the independent boy. For Kipling, years of moral and physical torment began: interrogations with passion, prohibitions, sophisticated punishments, beatings, bullying. Rudyar thoroughly studied the science of hatred and learned the powerlessness of the victim. Revenge for humiliation will take place only in literary creativity(novel "The Light Has Gone Out", story "Black Sheep"). After a humiliating punishment (for some insignificant offense the boy was forced to go to school with the inscription “liar” on his chest), he became seriously ill, completely lost his sight for several months and was on the verge of insanity. He was saved by the arrival of his mother, who decided to take the children from the boarding school. After his mother left for India, Kipling continued his studies at a boys' school. Here he encountered the violence of the organization. Teachers achieved the desired results with severity, and, if necessary, with flogging, the elders mercilessly oppressed the younger, the strong - the weak;
independence of behavior was punished as sacrilege. In his stories, Kipling justified the system of cane education ("Stokes and Company", 1899), since, from his point of view, it accustoms the individual to fulfill a social role assigned to him, instills a sense of social duty, without which it is impossible to serve higher goals (in the West it is sometimes called one of the forerunners of totalitarianism). After 5 years, Kipling graduated from school as a mature man beyond his years, with an established value system. At the age of 17, he had already firmly decided to become a writer ( military career was closed due to poor health, and there was no money to continue education). He returns to India and gets a job as a correspondent in a newspaper in Lahore. The nomadic life of a colonial newspaperman encountered hundreds of people and situations, threw him into the most, forced me to risk my life. He wrote reports about wars and epidemics, wrote “gossip chronicles”, conducted interviews, and made many acquaintances. He turned into an excellent expert on local life and customs; even the British commander-in-chief, Earl Roberts of Kandahar, was interested in his opinion.
Kipling discovers a multifaceted, multi-structured India, where two great cultures, “West and East,” come into contact. His essays are written by an astute observer, an unnamed reporter who relays what he heard and saw with protocol precision.
Glory "people's poet" comes to Kipling after the release of his Barracks Ballads. His poems are original, they contain Kipling's "iron" style with a consistent "prose" of the verse. Kipling's ballads are " simple stories"from life, told by a dispassionate reporter, or from a folk background. These are monologues addressed to an invisible interlocutor, built on folklore and song models.
Ford through Kabul.
Kabul became at the waters of Kabul...
Saber out, sound the trumpet!..
Here half the platoon drowned,
The ford cost a friend his life,
When there is a spill, when the squadron is wide, they will come out sideways
This ford through Kabul and darkness.
...
We were ordered to occupy Kabul...
Saber out, sound the trumpet!..
But tell me - is it really
The ford will replace my friend,
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Ford through Kabul and darkness.
Swim and swim
Do not sleep in the grave of those who were destroyed
Damn ford through Kabul and darkness.
Why the hell do we need Kabul?
Saber, sound the trumpet!..
It's hard to live without those who are friends,
I knew what to take, damned ford.
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Ford through Kabul and darkness.
Oh Lord, don't let me stumble,
It's too easy to choke
Here, where there is a ford through Kabul and darkness.
We are being taken away from Kabul...
Saber out, sound the trumpet!..
How many of ours drowned?
How many lives did the ford cost?
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Ford through Kabul and darkness.
The rivers will become shallow in the summer,
But friends will not emerge forever,
We know this, both the ford and the darkness.
Translation by S. Kapilevich
In his works Kipling called on his contemporaries to action, since in action he saw the only salvation from the meaninglessness of the world. The action must be purposeful and sanctified by the idea. Kipling’s idea was the idea of a higher moral law, that is, a system of prohibitions and permissions dominating a person, the violation of which is strictly punishable ( "Law of the jungle"). Kipling saw the British Empire as such an idea, a law, a concentration of sanctioning truth; in it he discovered a legislator and leader leading the “chosen people” to salvation. Imperial messianism became his religion. To propagate these ideas, he uses the high style of ode, message, panegyric, parable, stylizing the verse as a church hymn.
Hymn before the battle
The earth trembles with anger
And the ocean is dark,
Our paths were blocked
Swords of hostile countries:
When the stream is wild
We will be pushed back by our enemies, Jehovah,
Heavenly thunder, God of Sich, help!...
From pride and revenge,
From the low way
From fleeing the field of honor
Protect invisibly.
Let him be unworthy
Cover of grace,
Without anger and calmly
Let me accept your death!...
Translation by A. Onoshkovich-Yatsyn
But life differed from the legend. The poet was afraid that the Empire would not fulfill the mission entrusted to it, therefore, in political poems of the 90s. he called on the country not to revel in easy victories, but to soberly look at its own weaknesses and understand its destiny as selfless and selfless service to the “great goal.” Kipling saw the “white burden” in the conquest of lower races for their own good, not in robbery and reprisals, but in creative work, not in arrogant complacency, but in humility and patience.
White's Burden
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
Like in exile, let's go
Their sons to serve
To the dark tines of the earth;
To hard labor
I don't have her love,
Rule the stupid crowd
Either devils or children.
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
Bear with it patiently
Threats and insults
And don’t ask for honors;
Be patient and honest
Don't be lazy a hundred times
So that everyone can understand
Repeat your order.
...
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
But this is not a throne, but work:
Oily clothes
And aches and itching.
Roads and piers
Set it up for the descendants,
Put your life on it
And lie down in a foreign land.
...
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
Forget how you decided
Achieve quick fame
You were a baby then.
In a merciless time,
During the dark times
It's time to step up as a man
Appear before the judgment of men!
Translation by V. Toporov
Thus, being mistaken, clinging to outgoing ideals and values, to historically doomed forms of statehood, Kipling nevertheless sincerely sought to serve the “common man”, sought to help him overcome suffering and loneliness, horror and despair, to teach him courage and perseverance in the face of the impending apocalypse.
Kipling's epitaphs expose the inhumanity of World War I:
Former clerk:
Do not Cry!
The army gave
Freedom for the timid slave.
Dragged by the collar
From the office to fate,
Where is he, found out what death means,
Got the courage to love
And, having fallen in love, he went to his death,
And he died.
Fortunately, maybe.
Coward:
I did not dare to look at death in an attack in broad daylight,
And the people, blindfolded, took me to her at night.
Newbie:
They quickly gave up on me
On the first day, the first bullet to the forehead.
Children love to jump up from their seats in the theater
I forgot that this is a trench.
Two:
A - I was rich, like a Rajah.
B - And I was poor.
Together:
- But to the next world without luggage
We're both going.
Translation by K. Simonov
In England in the 20th century, Kipling was considered the personification of everything retrograde and inhumane. After the First World War, others became the rulers of thought; “he is a laureate without laurels, a forgotten celebrity,” they mocked him then. In 1936, not a single major English writer appeared at Kipling's funeral in Westminster Abbey - for culture, his death occurred several decades earlier.
Only during the Second World War, during difficult times for England, was he remembered: his poetry in praise of the British Empire turned out to be in tune with wartime.
Concluding the conversation about Kipling, it is necessary to note the enormous popularity of his work in the 20-30s. in Soviet Union. Many of the best poets and writers of that time were fond of his prose and poetry: Issak Babel, Eduard Bagritsky, Vladimir Lugovskoy, Yuri Olesha, Konstantin Simonov. In 1922, Nikolai Tikhonov wrote his best ballads, in which the intonations and rhythms of the “iron Rudyard” are clearly heard.
The Western world abandoned the model that made voluntary submission to the “higher law” a moral obligation; the senseless massacre on the fronts of World War I completely discredited the idea of service in the name of the fatherland, the state. But this was relevant for a country that wanted to implement the great idea of creating a new type of state based on collectivism.
It is possible that it was precisely the Kipling element in the poems of young Soviet poets that fascinated readers. He was liked “for his courageous style, his soldier’s severity, sharpness and clearly expressed masculine, masculine and soldierly,” recalled K. Simonov. (Kipling was mainly published in the 2nd half of the 30s.) During the Great Patriotic War, the image of the “iron Rudyard” quickly collapsed, military reality quickly destroyed the “romantic” illusions of young Soviet writers and poets. “On the very first day at the front in 1941, I suddenly fell out of love with some of Kipling’s poems,” wrote K. Simonov, “Kipling’s military romance in 1941 suddenly seemed distant, small and deliberately intense. , similar to a breaking boy's bass."
IN post-war years In our country, Kipling was recognized only as the author of wonderful children's fairy tales and stories about Mowgli. IN Lately, when many prejudices about Kipling's work have been dispelled, interest is again shown in him and it is again recognized that in both his prose and his poetry there are many successes that have stood the test of time.
Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)
Rabindranath Tagore(1861-1941) - the most outstanding and influential personality of the 1st half of the 20th century. in India. He is a great humanist and literary genius of India. He was primarily a poet, but also a major prose writer and playwright. He is an original painter whose paintings have been exhibited in many countries around the world. He is a musician-composer whose songs are still sung in India. Tagore is a moral philosopher and political publicist, teacher and educator.
How creator-artist Tagore is deeply intimate, as a thinker - he is all citizenship. “He was not a political figure,” Jawaharlal Nehru wrote about Tagore, “but he took the fate of the Indian people too close to his heart and was too devoted to their freedom to be forever locked in his ivory tower with his poems and songs... Despite In the normal course of development, as he grew older, he became more radical in his views and views."
Creative path Tagore originates at the turn of the 70-80s. XIX century, when India was just beginning to emerge from the Middle Ages, and English colonial power seemed unshakable. Tagore was destined to see the formation and rise of the national liberation movement, which, with his participation, grew from small top national liberal organizations into a powerful popular force. He wanted to see Indian people free and happy. He called for unity of all the peoples of India against the colonialists. He did a lot to educate Indians; he condemned religious fanaticism, national and caste hatred.
He did not focus only on Indian problems, maintained wide international contacts, traveled to many countries of the East and West with public speeches about Indian culture and called for the rapprochement and mutual enrichment of cultures of different countries and peoples. At the age of seventy he came to the USSR in 1930. His Letters on Russia were banned in India by the British authorities.
Tagore is perhaps the most widely read and popular writer of the East. His works have been translated into dozens of languages around the world. In Tagore’s own poetic work, with all the diversity of themes, motives and moods, it is easy to detect two main and opposing themes. The predominant and leading theme is the theme of acceptance of life in all its fullness, the theme of irrepressible admiration for the beauty of the world, the lofty and lyrical glorification of happiness, love and good human feelings.
I contemplated the illuminated face of the world without closing my eyes,
Marveling at his perfection.
The second theme of dissatisfaction, protest and suffering was generated by reality.
We'll stop at love lyrics poet. Tagore's poetry is characterized by a special penetration into the depths of human feelings, combining artistic vision with philosophical understanding. His love lyrics are sometimes emotionally intense, sometimes subtly melodious, and sometimes it is a very simple story of the poet about falling in love and love experiences, but the poet always easily and freely rises to high generalization and comprehension of beauty. He knows how to show love as a rushing whirlwind that swoops in and merges lovers together and carries them beyond the boundaries of everyday life:
Go wild on the swing, elemental!
Swing again!
My friend is with me again, I can’t take my eyes off her.
Wake her up, storm a frantic voice...
Come, hurricane, crush, stun.
Tear off all the clothes, all the veils from the soul!
Let her stand naked without shame!
Rock us!...
I found my soul, today we are together
Let's get to know each other again without fear.
We are now united in a mad embrace.
Rock us!
Here's a simple story about lovers:
The woman who was dear to me
I once lived in this village.
The path to the lake pier led,
To the rotten walkways and shaky steps...
Without close participation girlfriends,
who lived there in those years,
I probably wouldn't know in the area
No lake, no grove, no village.
She took me to the Shiva temple,
Drowning in the dense forest shadow.
Thanks to meeting her, I
I remember the village fences.
I wouldn't know the lake, but this backwater
She swam across.
She loved to swim in this place,
In the sand are traces of her nimble feet.
Peasants wait on the shore of the ferry
And they discuss rural affairs.
I wouldn't be familiar with the crossing
If only she didn't live here.
The poet can coin his thought with masterful aphorism:
One thing is always one thing, and nothing more.
But two create the beginning of one.
The high humanity of Tagore’s love lyrics is revealed with particular brightness in the image of a woman in love and beloved.
Woman,
You are not only the creation of God, you are not a product of the earth,
Men create you from their spiritual beauty.
For the poet, O woman, a dear outfit was woven,
The golden threads of metaphors on your clothes are burning.
Painters have immortalized your feminine appearance on canvas.
In unprecedented grandeur, in amazing purity.
How many different incense and colors were brought to you as a gift,
How many pearls are from the abyss, how much gold is from the earth.
How many delicate flowers are torn off for you on spring days,
How many insects have been exterminated to color your feet?
In these saris and bedspreads, hiding my shy gaze,
You immediately became more inaccessible and a hundred times more mysterious.
Your features shone differently in the fire of desires.
You are half creature, half imagination - you.
Literary heritage Tagore’s work is great and multifaceted, it proves the global significance of the culture of the peoples of the East.
Romain Rolland (1866-1944)
Romain Rolland(1866-1944) - great French writer, born in Clamcy (Burgundy) in the family of a notary. He received an excellent, varied education, studying philosophy, art history, and literature. Already at the history department of the École Normale Supérieure, he dreamed of becoming a writer and made his first attempts at writing. In 1887, he plucked up courage and wrote to L.N. Tolstoy and received a detailed answer. Rolland admired Tolstoy's literary genius and listened to his thoughts about the people of art. Humanist and realist Romain Rolland began his literary career with several plays about the Great French Revolution and a series of biographies of great people - titans in art ("The Life of Beethoven", "The Life of Michelangelo", "The Life of Tolstoy"). The main work of the initial period of creativity is a 10-volume novel "Jean-Christophe"(1904-1912). This is a biography German composer Jean-Christophe Kraft, in his image the author conveyed some of the features of the innovator-rebel Beethoven. The action of the novel covers the last decades of the 19th - early 20th centuries. until the eve of the 1st World War. Jean-Christophe grew up in the family of a court musician in a provincial German town and throughout his life retained true democracy and sympathy for the common people.
Wilhelm's Germany ceased to be the Germany of the great Goethe and Beethoven. Works of the humanist composer does not find recognition, and he comes into conflict with the environment, not wanting to subordinate his work to the tastes of the bourgeois public.
The strength of the novel lies in its merciless criticism of the bourgeois system, the creation of a vivid image of a positive hero protesting against it with his art.
After a monumental narrative unfolding in several countries over several decades, Rolland created a small work - all of its action fits within the framework of one year and one small town of Clumcy - this is the story "Cola Brugnon" (1914, published 1919). An epic novel about Rolland's contemporaries, "Cola Breugnon" about the distant past. In "Jean-Christophe" a gloomy color prevails, in "Cola Brugnone" there are bright, light colors. It's hard to believe that both of these works were written by the same author. The action takes place back in 1616, Cervantes and Shakespeare are no longer there, this is the decline of the Renaissance, in France it is a time of senseless, cruel bloodshed.
The middle-aged Burgundian Cola is one of the few, but at the same time the only one. He is not only a craftsman, but also an artist; he not only works, but also thinks. In difficult conditions, he does not lose his sense of humor and self-esteem. The image of Kol, at first glance uncomplicated and unambiguous, turns as events unfold different faces
M. Gorky called “Brugnon’s Cola” an “excellent purely Gali poem”, having read it in its first, less successful translation. The unique originality of the story into Russian was able to be reproduced in 1932 by M. L. Lozinsky. Cola Brugnon's aphorisms and comparisons sounded rich and unforgettable. “...As soon as you find yourself in a crowd, you immediately lose your senses. A hundred wise men will give birth to a fool, and a hundred sheep will give birth to a biruku”; "We danced; I was as graceful as a pole"; “...for the sake of the spirit, one should not forget the belly”; “How I pity the poor, destitute people who do not know the pleasure of books!”; “Godfather, you see someone else’s eye, but you don’t see your own,” etc. In the language of the story, one can feel the influence of Renaissance literature (F. Rabelais “Gargantua and Pantagruel”) and French folklore.
Throughout his life, Romain Rolland remained a humanist; during the 1st and 2nd World Wars, he was one of the first to condemn the horrors of war. The anti-war theme was also reflected in his works.
