Ostrovsky's works: a list of the best. Ostrovsky's first work

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky is a great Russian playwright, author of 47 original plays. In addition, he translated more than 20 literary works: from Latin, Italian, Spanish, French, English.

Alexander Nikolaevich was born in Moscow into the family of a commoner official who lived in Zamoskvorechye, on Malaya Ordynka. This was an area where merchants had long settled. Merchant mansions with their blank fences, pictures of life and peculiar customs of the merchant world with early childhood sunk into the soul of the future playwright.

After graduating from high school, Ostrovsky, on the advice of his father, entered the law faculty of Moscow University in 1840. But legal sciences were not his calling. In 1843, he left the university without completing the course of study, and decided to devote himself entirely to literary activity.

Not a single playwright showed pre-revolutionary life with such completeness as A. N. Ostrovsky. Representatives of various classes, people different professions, origin, upbringing pass before us in artistically truthful images of his comedies, dramas, scenes from life, historical chronicles. The life, customs, characters of the townspeople, nobles, officials and mainly merchants - from “very important gentlemen”, rich bar and businessmen to the most insignificant and poor - are reflected with amazing breadth by A. N. Ostrovsky.

The plays were written not by an indifferent writer of everyday life, but by an angry denouncer of the world of the “dark kingdom”, where for the sake of profit a person is capable of anything, where the elders rule over the younger, the rich over the poor, where government, the church and society in every possible way support the cruel morals that have developed over centuries.

Ostrovsky's works contributed to the development of public self-awareness. Their revolutionary influence was perfectly defined by Dobrolyubov; he wrote: “By painting us a vivid picture of false relationships with all their consequences, through this he serves as an echo of aspirations that require a better structure.” It was not without reason that the defenders of the existing system did everything in their power to prevent Ostrovsky’s plays from being performed on stage. His first one-act “Picture of Family Happiness” (1847) was immediately banned by theater censorship, and this play appeared only 8 years later. The first big four-act comedy “Our People - Let's Number” (1850) was not allowed on stage by Nicholas I himself, imposing a resolution: “It was printed in vain, it is forbidden to play in any case.” And the play, heavily altered at the request of the censor, was staged only in 1861. The Tsar demanded information about Ostrovsky’s lifestyle and thoughts and, having received the report, ordered: “Keep under supervision.” The secret office of the Moscow Governor-General opened the “Case of the writer Ostrovsky”, and secret gendarmerie surveillance was established over him. The obvious “unreliability” of the playwright, who was then serving in the Moscow Commercial Court, worried his superiors so much that Ostrovsky was forced to resign.

The comedy “Our People – Let’s Be Numbered”, which was not allowed on stage, created wide fame for the author. It is not difficult to explain the reasons for such a great success of the play. The faces of the tyrant owner Bolshov, his unrequited, stupidly submissive wife, his daughter Lipochka, distorted by an absurd education, and the rogue clerk Podkhalyuzin appear before us as if alive. “The Dark Kingdom” is how the great Russian critic N.A. Dobrolyubov described this musty, crude life based on despotism, ignorance, deception and arbitrariness. Together with the actors of the Moscow Maly Theater Prov Sadovsky and the great Mikhail Shchepkin, Ostrovsky read comedy in a variety of circles.

The enormous success of the play, which, in the words of N. A. Dobrolyubov, belonged “to Ostrovsky’s brightest and most consistent works” and captivated with “the truth of the image and the correct sense of reality,” made the guardians of the existing system wary. Almost every new play by Ostrovsky was banned by censorship or not approved for performance by the theater authorities.

Even such a wonderful drama as The Thunderstorm (1859) was met with hostility by the reactionary nobility and the press. But representatives of the democratic camp saw in “The Thunderstorm” a sharp protest against the feudal-serf system and fully appreciated it. Artistic integrity of images, depth ideological content and the accusatory power of “The Thunderstorm” make it possible to recognize it as one of the most perfect works of Russian drama.

Ostrovsky is of great importance not only as a playwright, but also as the creator of Russian theater. “You have donated a whole library to literature. works of art“,” I. A. Goncharov wrote to Ostrovsky, “they created their own special world for the stage.” You alone completed the building, the foundation of which was laid by the cornerstones of Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol. But only after you, we Russians can proudly say: we have our own Russian national theater.” Ostrovsky's work constituted an entire era in the history of our theater. The name of Ostrovsky is especially strongly connected with the history of the Moscow Maly Theater. Almost all of Ostrovsky's plays during his lifetime were staged in this theater. They brought up several generations of artists who grew into wonderful masters of the Russian stage. Ostrovsky's plays played such a role in the history of the Maly Theater that it proudly calls itself the Ostrovsky House.

To play new roles, a whole galaxy of new actors had to appear and appeared, just as well as Ostrovsky, who knew Russian life. The national Russian school of realistic acting was established and developed on Ostrovsky's plays. Starting with Prov Sadovsky in Moscow and Alexander Martynov in St. Petersburg, several generations of metropolitan and provincial actors, right up to the present day, grew up playing roles in Ostrovsky’s plays. “Loyalty to reality, to the truth of life” – this is how Dobrolyubov spoke about Ostrovsky’s works – has become one of the essential features of our national performing arts.

Dobrolyubov pointed out another feature of Ostrovsky’s dramaturgy - “accuracy and fidelity vernacular" No wonder Gorky called Ostrovsky “the sorcerer of language.” Each character of Ostrovsky speaks in a language typical of his class, profession, and upbringing. And the actor, creating this or that image, had to be able to use the necessary intonation, pronunciation and other speech means. Ostrovsky taught the actor to listen and hear how people speak in life.

The works of the great Russian playwright recreate not only his contemporary life. They also depict the years of Polish intervention at the beginning of the 17th century. (“Kozma Minin”, “Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky”), and legendary times ancient Rus'(spring fairy tale “The Snow Maiden”).

In the pre-revolutionary years, bourgeois spectators gradually began to lose interest in Ostrovsky's theater, considering it obsolete. On the Soviet stage, Ostrovsky's dramaturgy was revived with renewed vigor. His plays are also performed on foreign stages.

L. N. Tolstoy wrote to the playwright in 1886: “I know from experience how your works are read, listened to and remembered by the people, and therefore I would like to help you now quickly become in reality what you are, undoubtedly - a national writer - in the broadest sense."

After the Great October Revolution socialist revolution the work of A. N. Ostrovsky became nationwide.

Biography, life story of Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky

Ostrovsky Alexander Nikolaevich, the great Russian playwright, was born on Malaya Ordynka in Moscow in 1823 on the 12th of April (or according to the old style on March 31) in the family of a judicial official Nikolai Fedorovich Ostrovsky. His mother, Lyubov Ivanovna, née Savvina, passed away when the boy was only eight years old. Alexander received a wonderful home education. At the age of 12, the boy was sent to the First Moscow Gymnasium, from which he graduated five years later in 1840. At the same time, Alexander entered Moscow University at the Faculty of Law. However, he left him already in 1843: jurisprudence ceased to interest the future playwright and Ostrovsky seriously decided to take up literature. Nevertheless, at the insistence of his father, he entered the service of the conscientious court in Moscow, and in 1845 he went to work in the office of the commercial court.

Serving in the courts for almost eight years and his father's practice as a lawyer gave the future playwright a wealth of material for plays. By 1846, Ostrovsky had already written a lot interesting scenes from the life of a merchant and had already sketched the comedy “The Insolvent Debtor,” which appeared in the magazine “Moskvityanin” in 1849 under the final title “Our People - We Will Be Numbered.” Alexander Nikolaevich became an employee of this magazine in 1851, leaving his service in court in order to finally devote himself to professional literary creativity. It should be noted that although the play evoked quite approving responses and, the influential Moscow merchants were offended for their class and began to complain to the “boss.” As a result, the comedy was banned from production, and Ostrovsky, by personal order of Emperor Nicholas I, was placed under police supervision. The supervision was lifted only after the accession of Emperor Alexander II. In 1861, the play was allowed to be staged in theaters.

Since 1853, for more than thirty years, almost every season, new plays by Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky appeared in the St. Petersburg Alexandrinsky and Moscow Maly theaters.

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It was Ostrovsky’s dramaturgy that played a decisive role in the development of Russian theater, in establishing a vibrant and original repertoire on the Russian stage, and contributed to the actual formation of the Russian national stage school. Ostrovsky founded an artistic circle in Moscow in 1865, becoming one of its leaders. On his initiative, the Society of Dramatic Russian Writers was formed in 1870. Alexander Nikolaevich was its permanent chairman from 1874 until the very end of his life.

In the period 1881-1884, Ostrovsky took an active part in the work of the state commission, whose task was to revise the regulations on the Imperial Theaters. On January 1, 1886, the great playwright was appointed head of the repertoire department of Moscow theaters. However, by this time, Alexander Nikolaevich’s health had already deteriorated greatly and he died on his Shchelykovo estate, which is located in the Kostroma province and where the Ostrovsky Museum-Reserve is now located, on the 14th (2nd old style) of June 1886.

Alexander Nikolaevich had an extremely deep personal relationship with one of the Maly Theater actresses, Lyubov Pavlovna Kositskaya-Nikulina, but both of them had families. Ostrovsky initially lived with the Moscow bourgeois Agafya Ivanovna in a civil marriage, but all their children died at an early age. Uneducated but clever woman, with an easily vulnerable and very subtle soul, she understood the playwright perfectly and was for him the very first reader of his plays and a critic of all his works. Ostrovsky lived with Agafya Ivanovna for about twenty years, and then in 1869, two years after her death, he married another artist of the Maly Theater, Maria Vasilievna Bakhmetyeva. She gave birth to Alexander Nikolaevich two daughters and four sons.

Born into the family of Nikolai Fedorovich Ostrovsky, the son of a priest who practiced as a lawyer in property and commercial matters, and the mother of Lyubov Ivanovna Savvina, the daughter of a sexton. The family was wealthy and lived in Zamoskvorechye on Malaya Ordynka. The family had four children who received an excellent education at home. Young Alexander I became acquainted with Russian literature early in my father’s library. His father wanted to make him a lawyer.

In 1835 - 1840, Alexander Ostrovsky studied at the 1st Moscow Gymnasium. In 1840 he entered the law faculty of Moscow University, but did not graduate because of a quarrel with one of the teachers.

In 1843, Alexander Ostrovsky, at the request of his father, entered the service as a scribe in a Moscow court for a salary of 4 rubles. Gradually it increased to 15 rubles. Alexander Ostrovsky worked in the courts until 1851.

In 1846, he wrote the comedy “The Insolvent Debtor” or “The Picture of Family Happiness” (later called “Our People – We Will Be Numbered!”) and partially published in the “Moscow City List” in 1847.

In 1850, the comedy "Our People - Let's Number" brought the first fame. Even before publication, it became popular in reading under the title "Bankrupt" and was banned from stage performance. By personal order of Emperor Nicholas I, Alexander Ostrovsky was placed under police supervision, which was removed only after the accession of Emperor Alexander II, and the premiere of the comedy “Our People - Let's Be Numbered” took place only in 1861.

In 1850 - 1851, Alexander Ostrovsky collaborated as a critic and editor with the conservative magazine Moskvityanin, as a playwright, under the influence of A.A. Grigoriev and his circle.

During this period, he wrote a number of comedies from merchant life “Poor Bride” (1851), “Don’t Get in Your Sleigh” (1852), “Poverty is not a Vice” (1853), “Don’t Live the Way You Want” (1854) .

On stage in 1853 Bolshoi Theater the play “Don’t Get in Your Own Sleigh” was staged and then for more than three decades almost every season in the Moscow Maly and St. Petersburg Alexandrinsky theaters new plays by Alexander Ostrovsky were staged.

In 1855, the comedy “A Hangover at Someone Else’s Feast” was written, where the word “tyrant” was uttered for the first time and led a whole gallery of colorful characters in the plays of Alexander Ostrovsky.

In 1856, Alexander Ostrovsky became a permanent contributor to the Sovremennik magazine. This year the comedy “Profitable Place” was written.

In 1856 - 1857 Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich sent a group of famous writers on a trip around Russia to study and describe various areas. Alexander Ostrovsky traveled from the upper reaches of the Volga to Nizhny Novgorod.

In 1858 he wrote the play “The Pupil”.

In 1859, the drama “The Thunderstorm” was written based on impressions from a trip to the Volga cities. In the same year, with the assistance of Count G.A. Kushelev-Bezborodko published the first two-volume collected works of Alexander Ostrovsky.

In 1863, Alexander Ostrovsky was awarded the Uvarov Prize and elected a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.

In 1865 – 1866 he founded the Artistic Circle.

In 1868, Alexander Ostrovsky wrote a cycle of comedies, “Simplicity is Enough for Every Wise Man,” and the play “Warm Heart.” Later the plays “Mad Money” (1869), “Forest” (1870), the poetic utopia “Snow Maiden” (1873), “Labor Bread” (1874), “Wolves and Sheep” (1875) were written.

In 1874, the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers and Opera Composers was formed, whose chairman Alexander Ostrovsky remained until his death.

In 1878, the plays “Dowry” and “The Last Victim” were written.

In 1881, he actively worked on the commission under the directorate Imperial theaters“to revise the regulations on all parts of theater management.”

In 1883, Alexander III awarded him an annual pension of 3 thousand rubles.

In 1885, Alexander Ostrovsky became the head of the repertory department of Moscow theaters and the head of the theater school.

Alexander Ostrovsky died on his Shchelykovo estate in the Kostroma province. He was buried in the church cemetery near the Temple in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the village of Nikolo-Berezhki. The Moscow Duma established a reading room named after A.N. Ostrovsky after his death.

(1823-1886)

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky was born in 1823 in Moscow: in Zamoskvorechye, in an old merchant and bureaucratic district. The father of the future playwright, an educated and skilled judicial official, and then a well-known solicitor (lawyer) in Moscow commercial circles, made a fair amount of wealth; climbing up career ladder, received the rights of a hereditary nobleman, became a landowner; It’s clear that he wanted to let his son work in the legal field as well.

Alexander Ostrovsky received a good education at home - from childhood he became addicted to literature, spoke German and French, knew Latin well, and willingly studied music. He successfully graduated from high school and in 1840 entered the law faculty of Moscow University. But Ostrovsky did not like the career of a lawyer; he was irresistibly attracted to art. He tried not to miss a single performance: he read and argued a lot about literature, and fell passionately in love with music. At the same time, he himself tried to write poetry and stories.

Having lost interest in studying at the university, Ostrovsky left his studies. For several years, at the insistence of his father, he served as a minor official in court. Here the future playwright has seen enough human comedies and tragedies. Having finally become disillusioned with judicial activities, Ostrovsky dreams of becoming a writer.

During Ostrovsky’s youth, peasants and merchants dressed, ate, drank and had fun differently from people of the enlightened classes. Even general Orthodox faith did not fully unite them with the educated. In the Russian land, it was as if there were two different worlds, little connected, little intelligible to each other. But in the mid-19th century, the boundaries of these worlds began to gradually collapse. Educated people began to look for ways to bridge the gap, to restore not so much the state - that was it! - how much spiritual and cultural unity the Russian people have. And simple people, faithful to the ancient way of life, with the development of business life, are increasingly forced to deal with the state of their day. It was necessary to go to the courts to resolve property and inheritance disputes, and to obtain permits for fishing and trade from various institutions. Officials deceived them, intimidated them and robbed them. Therefore, the smartest began to teach their children and began to adapt to “Europeanized” life. But at first, only the various external aspects of the upper classes were often mistaken for education.

Rich people, but just yesterday they lived in the old fashioned way and the new demands that the powerful makes upon them modern life, - this is the basis of the comedic conflicts of the young Ostrovsky, and even those where the funny is intertwined with the sad: after all, the quirks of those in power are not only funny, but also dangerous for the poor: the dependent and oppressed.

His all-Russian fame began with his second comedy - “We Will Be Numbered Our Own People!” (or “Bankrupt” 1849) The play was a huge success among readers after its publication in the magazine “Moskovityanin”. However, its production was banned on the orders of Tsar Nicholas 1 himself. The censorship ban lasted for eleven years.

Already in the comedy “Our People - We Will Be Numbered!” the main features of Ostrovsky’s dramaturgy emerged: the ability to show important all-Russian problems through family and everyday conflict, to create bright and recognizable characters not only of the main ones, but also minor characters. His plays sound juicy, lively folk speech. And each of them does not have a simple, thought-provoking ending.

After: as in the comedy “Our people - we will be numbered!” such a bleak picture was created, Ostrovsky wanted to show positive heroes capable of resisting immorality and cruelty modern relations. He was afraid to instill a sense of hopelessness in his spectacles. It is precisely these heroes who appeal to sympathy that appear in the comedy “Don’t Get in Your Own Sleigh” (1853) (the first of Ostrovsky’s plays to be performed on stage) and “Poverty is not a vice” (1954).

In 1956, Ostrovsky traveled along the Volga: from the source of the river to Nizhny Novgorod. The impressions he received fueled his creativity for many years. They were also reflected in “The Thunderstorm” (1959), one of his most famous plays. The play takes place in the fictional remote town of Kalinov. Ostrovsky showed in the play not only the external circumstances of the tragedy: the severity of the mother-in-law, the lack of will of the husband and his addiction to wine; the indifferent formal attitude of the Kalinovites towards faith; not only the imperious rudeness of rich merchants, poverty and superstition of the inhabitants. The main thing in the play is the inner life of the heroine, the emergence in her of something new, still unclear to her. Ostrovsky's drama seemed to capture people's Russia at a turning point, on the threshold of a new one historical era.

In 60 the nobleman hero also appears in Ostrovsky’s works. But one who is not busy with truth-seeking, but successful career. For example, in the comedy “Simplicity is enough for every wise man” there is a whole gallery of noble types who experience the abolition of serfdom in different ways. The main characters of “The Forest” are two of noble family Gurmyzhskikh: a rich and middle-aged landowner, squandering her estate with her lovers, and her nephew, an actor.

IN latest works In Ostrovsky, a woman is increasingly at the center of events. The writer seems to be disappointed in the moral merits of the active hero, “ business man”, whose interests and vitality are too often completely absorbed by the struggle for material success. At the end of his creative path he wrote the drama “Rich Brides”, but Ostrovsky’s most famous play is about fate: as they put it then, “girls of marriageable age” - “Dowry” (1878)

IN last decades Ostrovsky's life creates a kind of artistic monument to the Russian theater. In 1972, he wrote a poetic comedy, “Comedian of the 17th Century,” about the birth of the first Russian theater. But Ostrovsky’s plays about his contemporary theater are much better known - “Talents and Admirers” (1981) and “Guilty Without Guilt” (1983). Here he showed how tempting and difficult the life of actors is.

Having worked for the Russian stage for almost forty years, Ostrovsky created a whole repertoire - about fifty plays. Ostrovsky's works still remain on stage. And after a hundred and fifty years it is not difficult to see the heroes of his plays nearby.

Ostrovsky died in 1886 in his beloved Trans-Volga estate Shchelykovo, in the Kostroma dense forests: on the hilly banks of small winding rivers. The writer’s life, for the most part, took place in these core places of Russia: where from a young age he could observe the primordial customs and mores, still little affected by the urban civilization of his day, and hear the indigenous Russian speech.

A. N. Ostrovsky

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky is one of the most outstanding Russian playwrights, whose work has become important stage in development Russian literature And national theater. We can safely say that it was Ostrovsky’s works that laid the foundation for the Russian repertoire in the theater.

Ostrovsky's plays are known and loved by many generations of Russian viewers and readers. Based on them art films, the questions that Ostrovsky raises in his works are still relevant today.

Childhood and youth

The Russian playwright was born on March 13, 1823 in Moscow, in the family of a court official. The mother of the future playwright died early; there were six children in the family. Ostrovsky's father really wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. After graduating from the Moscow Gymnasium, Alexander entered the Faculty of Law of Moscow University. Ostrovsky never finished it.

In 1843, Ostrovsky was hired as a court scribe and worked in various Moscow courts until 1851. This period of his life greatly helped Ostrovsky in his future work. While working in the courts, he perfectly studied the world of the Russian merchants and the philistine class, which he later brilliantly described in his works. Many characters and personalities were taken by the playwright from his real life.

First plays

In 1847, Ostrovsky’s essays entitled “Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident” were published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Gorodnogo Leaflet”. However, the playwright gained wide popularity after the publication of the play “Our People - We Will Be Numbered.” This work, written in the comedy genre, was enthusiastically received by the public and received excellent reviews from critics. Gogol and Goncharov spoke approvingly of this play.

However, representatives of the merchant class did not like the work very much and after their complaint to the authorities, the play was banned from being staged, and its author was fired from his job. “We Will Be Numbered Our Own People” was allowed to be staged only after the death of Emperor Nicholas, in 1861. With the second play, Alexander Nikolaevich was much more fortunate. “Don’t Sit in Your Own Sleigh” was written by him in 1852 and already in 1853 appeared on the stage of theaters. Since 1856, Ostrovsky has been constantly working for the Sovremennik magazine.

Since 1853, every year Moscow and St. Petersburg theaters staged new plays by the playwright, and all of them were favorably received by both the public and domestic critics.

At the peak of popularity

In 1856, Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky went to the Volga region to study the way of life of the inhabitants of the region. It was after this trip that Ostrovsky wrote one of his most striking plays, “The Thunderstorm.” In 1859, the first collected works of Ostrovsky were published, which were enthusiastically received by critics. In the 1860s Ostrovsky began studying Russian history, he was especially interested in the period of the Time of Troubles.

In 1863 he was awarded the Uvarov Prize and became a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In the 60s, the playwright founded the Artistic Circle, which gave a start in life to many future stars of the Russian stage. In 1874, on the initiative of Ostrovsky, the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers and Opera Composers was founded. In 1885, Alexander Nikolaevich became the head of the repertoire of all Moscow theaters.

All his life Ostrovsky worked extremely hard, this seriously undermined his health. In June 1886, he died on his estate in the Kostroma province. Emperor Alexander III granted a large sum for the playwright's funeral, and also awarded a pension to his widow and allocated funds for the education of his children.

Ostrovsky's significance for Russian literature and his role in the development of Russian theater are undeniable and enormous. For Russian theater he was a figure on the same scale as Moliere for French theater, and Shakespeare is for English. He has 47 plays written by him personally, and several more were written in collaboration.

Ostrovsky's plays show life and everyday life ordinary people, his works are very realistic, but at the same time pose deep and eternal problems to the viewer.

Ostrovsky can be called the founder of the Russian theater; he created a new drama school and a new concept of acting.