Kuprin A. I. (1870 – 1938)
Kuprin’s creative gift manifested itself in the realistic reproduction of the entirety of outside world, in a bright, sharp and accurate transmission of the motley and diverse impressions of life.
The outstanding master of Russian artistic prose, Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin, went through a difficult and difficult life path. He was born on August 26, 1870 in the city of Narovchat, Penza province, into a poor bureaucratic family. The writer's father died when the boy was one year old; after that there was an orphanage, a military gymnasium, a cadet corps and a cadet school.
In 1890, Kuprin was enlisted in the 40th Dnieper Infantry Regiment, stationed in the Kamenets-Podolsk province.
In 1893, he tried to enter the Academy of the General Staff, but due to a conflict with General Dragomirov, he was not allowed to take the exams and was sent to his regiment.
This failure to a certain extent determined Kuprin's future life path. He retires and devotes himself entirely to writing.
Kuprin changed many jobs in the nineties: newspaper reporter, office worker at a factory, organizer of an athletic society in Kyiv, estate manager, land surveyor and others. At this time, he traveled the length and breadth of the country, especially its southern regions. These wanderings enriched the writer with great life experience.
In 1901, Kuprin moved to St. Petersburg, where he published in the magazine “God’s World” and in Gorky’s collections “Knowledge”, which grouped writers of a realistic direction. The story “The Duel,” written in 1904, brought him real fame, both in Russia and abroad. Before this, Kuprin published: in the “Russian Satirical Leaflet” (1889) the story “The Last Debut”, while working in Ukraine as a newspaper reporter - short stories, poems, editorials, “correspondence from Paris.” The period of writing “The Duel” was the highest flowering of Kuprin’s creativity.
Kuprin's "Duel" is considered a military story, but the problems that the author raised in it go beyond the boundaries of a military narrative. In this work, the author discusses the causes of social inequality among people, the ways of liberating humanity from spiritual oppression, and the relationship between man and society. The plot of the story is based on the fate of an officer who felt all the injustice of human relations in the conditions of barracks life. The heroes of the story, Shurochka Nikolaeva and Romashov, understand the inevitability of disappointment in such an existence, and strive to find a way out of this situation, but their paths are opposite. Shurochka needs “a big real society, light, music, worship, subtle flattery, intelligent interlocutors.” Such a life seems bright and beautiful to her. Romashov, who dreamed of brilliant career When faced with reality, he feels only disappointment and gradually plunges into a gray hopeless routine, from which it is almost impossible to find a way out. Shurochka promises to help Romashov make a career, believing that there is something special in her: “I will be found everywhere, I will be able to adapt to everything...”. But if Romashov is driven by nobility, then Shurochka is driven by calculating egoism. For the sake of her desires and aspirations, she is ready to sacrifice her feelings, and, most importantly, Romashov’s love and life. This terrible egoism forever separates her from Kuprin’s other heroines.
After meeting with the soldier Khlebnikov, in whom Romashov saw not a faceless “soldier’s unit” but a living person, it makes him think not only about his fate, but also about the fate of the people. Romashov enters into an unequal duel with the world, but the duel of honor turns into murder in a duel.
Kuprin treats the topic of love chastely; filled with this almost sacred awe wonderful story- "Garnet bracelet". The writer managed to show the great gift of love in everyday life. In the heart of the hero of the story, the poor official Zheltkov, a wonderful, but unrequited feeling flared up - love. This small, unknown and funny telegraph operator Zheltkov, thanks to this feeling, grows into a tragic hero.
“Pomegranate Bracelet”, “Olesya”, “Shulamith” sound not only as a hymn of love, but also as a song to everything bright, jubilant and beautiful that life carries within itself. This joy of life was not the result of Kuprin thoughtless attitude to reality; One of the constant motifs of his work was the contrast between the most perfect manifestation of this joy of life - love - and the difficult, absurd surrounding reality.
In Oles, pure, selfless and generous love is destroyed by dark superstition. Envy and anger destroy the love idyll of King Solomon and destroy Shulammith. Living conditions are hostile to human happiness, which resolutely fights for its existence, as Kuprin shows in his works.
Kuprin was convinced that man was born for creativity, for broad, free, intelligent activity. In the story “Gambrinus” (1907), he reveals the following image - Sashka, a violinist, “a Jew - a meek, cheerful, drunk, bald man, with the appearance of a shabby monkey, of unknown age” - the main attraction of a pub called Gambrinus. On the fate of this hero, Kuprin showed dramatic historical events in Russia: Russo-Japanese War, the revolution of 1905, the reaction and pogroms that followed. The basis of the story is shown in the words of Kuprin: “A person can be crippled, but art will endure everything and conquer everything.”
The first among Russian writers, Kuprin reveals in the story “The Pit” the theme of prostitution, the theme of corrupt love, where he was able to show the inner world of a person caught in these networks. Some literary scholars believe that this story, especially its first part, is in the nature of idealization, and that its very style is imbued with some sweetness.
Literary scholars had mixed views on Kuprin’s work. Some believe that all his works are simply an imitation of more successful writers: Maupassant, D. London, Chekhov, Gorky, Tolstoy. Maybe in his early works there was this borrowing, but the reader always saw in his works deep and varied connections with traditions classical literature. Other researchers believe that his heroes are too idealized and divorced from real life. This also applies to Romashov and Zheltkov, who do not understand the peculiarities of their lives. Yes, in almost all of his works this childish spontaneity is visible, which both attracts and irritates the reader.
If we consider the trends to which Kuprin adhered, then realism (critical and traditional) occupies the main place, followed by trends of decadence (“Diamonds”, “White Nights”). Romantic elation is characteristic of many of his stories.
The work of Kuprin the essayist is characterized by subtle observation, increased interest and attention to small, inconspicuous people. Some essays are interesting because they are, as it were, sketches for the writer’s later works (“Tramp”, “Doctor”, “Thief”).
The strength of Kuprin the artist is always revealed in revealing the psychology of people placed in various life circumstances, especially those in which nobility, dedication, and fortitude are manifested.
Kuprin did not accept socialist revolution, emigrated abroad, but returned to Russia in 1937, so that in 1938 he could “die on the land where he was born.”
LITERATURE.
1. Kuprin A.I. Selected works. M., 1965.
2. Volkov A. A. Kuprin’s creativity. M., 1981.
3. Kuleshov F. Kuprin’s creative path. M., 1987.
The life experience and creativity of A. I. Kuprin are extremely closely related to each other. In the writer's books important place occupies an autobiographical element. For the most part, the author wrote about what he saw with his own eyes, experienced in his soul, but not as an observer, but as a direct participant in life’s dramas and comedies. What was experienced and seen was transformed in different ways in creativity - these were both quick sketches and exact description specific situations, and deep socio-psychological analysis.
At the beginning of its literary activity The classic paid a lot of attention to everyday color. But even then he showed a tendency to social analysis. His entertaining book “Kyiv Types” contains not only picturesque everyday exoticism, but also a hint of the all-Russian social environment. At the same time, Kuprin does not delve into the psychology of people. Only as years passed did he begin to carefully and scrupulously study a variety of human material.
This was especially evident in such a theme of his work as the army environment. The writer’s first realistic work, the story “Inquiry” (1894), is associated with the army. In it, he described the type of person who suffers at the sight of injustice, but is spiritually restless, deprived strong-willed qualities and unable to fight evil. And such an indecisive truth-seeker begins to accompany all of Kuprin’s work.
Army stories are notable for the writer's faith in the Russian soldier. She makes such works as “Army Ensign”, “Night Shift”, “Overnight” truly spiritual. Kuprin shows the soldier as cheerful, with rough but healthy humor, intelligent, observant, and prone to original philosophizing.
The final stage of creative quest for early stage His literary activity was the story “Moloch” (1896), which brought real fame to the young writer. In this story, at the center of the action is a humane, kind, impressionable person who reflects on life. Society itself is shown as a transitional formation, that is, one in which changes are brewing, unclear not only acting persons, but also to the author.
Love occupied a large place in the work of A. I. Kuprin. The writer can even be called a singer of love. An example of this is the story “On the Road” (1894). The beginning of the story does not foreshadow anything sublime. A train, a compartment, a married couple - an elderly boring official, his young beautiful wife and a young artist who happened to be with them. He becomes interested in the official's wife, and she becomes interested in him.
At first glance, it is a story of a banal romance and adultery. But no, the writer’s skill turns a trivial plot into a serious topic. The story shows how a chance meeting illuminates the lives of two good people with honest souls. Kuprin built it in such a psychologically verified manner small piece that he was able to say a lot in it.
But the most remarkable work dedicated to the theme of love is the story “Olesya”. It can be called a forest fairy tale, drawn with the authenticity and precision of details inherent in realistic art. The girl herself is an integral, serious, deep nature; she has a lot of sincerity and spontaneity. And the hero of the story - a common person with an amorphous character. But under the influence of a mysterious forest girl, his soul brightens and, it seems, is ready to become a noble and integral person.
The work of A. I. Kuprin conveys not only the concrete, everyday, visible, but also rises to symbolism, implying the very spirit of certain phenomena. Such, for example, is the story “Swamp”. The overall coloring of the story is heavy and gloomy, similar to the swamp fog in which the action takes place. This almost plotless work shows the slow death of a peasant family in a forest lodge.
The artistic means used by the classic are such that there is a feeling of a disastrous nightmare. And the very image of a forest, dark and ominous swamp takes on an expanded meaning, creating the impression of some kind of abnormal swamp life smoldering in the gloomy corners of a huge country.
In 1905, the story “The Duel” was published, in which the techniques psychological analysis indicate Kuprin’s connection with the traditions of Russian classics of the 19th century. In this work, the writer showed himself to be a first-class master of words. He once again proved his ability to comprehend the dialectics of soul and thought, to draw artistically typical characters and typical circumstances.
A few words should also be said about the story “Staff Captain Rybnikov.” Before Kuprin, no one in Russian and foreign literature I didn’t create such a psychological detective story. The fascination of the story lies in the picturesque two-plane image of Rybnikov and the psychological duel between him and the journalist Shchavinsky, as well as in the tragic denouement that occurs under unusual circumstances.
The poetry of labor and the aroma of the sea pervade the stories “Listrigons”, which tell about Balaklava Greek fishermen. In this series, the classic showed the original corner in all its beauty Russian Empire. In the stories, the concreteness of the descriptions is combined with a kind of epicness and simple-minded fabulousness.
In 1908, the story “Shulamith” appeared, which was called a hymn female beauty and youth. This is a prose poem that combines sensuality and spirituality. There is a lot of bold, daring, frank in the poem, but there is no falsehood. The work tells about the poetic love of a king and a simple girl, which ends tragically. Shulamith becomes a victim dark forces. The killer's sword kills her, but he is unable to destroy the memory of her and her love.
It must be said that the classic always had an interest in “little”, “ordinary people”. He made such a person a hero in the story “The Garnet Bracelet” (1911). The message of this brilliant story is that love is as strong as death. The originality of the work lies in the gradual and almost imperceptible increase tragic theme. There is also a certain Shakespearean note. She breaks through the quirks of the funny official and captivates the reader.
The story “Black Lightning” (1912) is interesting in its own way. In it, the work of A.I. Kuprin is revealed from another side. This work depicts provincial, provincial Russia with its apathy and ignorance. But it also shows those spiritual forces that lurk in provincial cities and make themselves felt from time to time.
During the First World War, such a work as “Violets” came out from the pen of a classic, glorifying the spring season in a person’s life. And the continuation was social criticism, embodied in the story “Cantaloupe”. In it, the writer paints the image of a cunning businessman and hypocrite who profits from military supplies.
Even before the war, Kuprin began working on a powerful and deep social canvas, which he called darkly and briefly - “The Pit”. The first part of this story was published in 1909, and in 1915 the publication of “The Pit” was completed. The work created true images of women who found themselves at the bottom of their lives. The classic masterfully depicted personality traits characters and dark corners of the big city.
Finding himself in exile after the October Revolution and Civil War, Kuprin began writing about old Russia, as about an amazing past that always pleased and amused him. The main point his works of this period was to reveal inner world their heroes. At the same time, the writer often turned to the memories of his youth. This is how the novel “Junker” appeared, which made a significant contribution to Russian prose.
The classic describes the loyal mood of future infantry officers, youthful love, and such an eternal theme as mother's love. And of course, the writer does not forget nature. It is communication with nature that fills the youthful soul with joy and gives impetus to the first philosophical reflections.
“The Junkers” skillfully and knowledgeably describes the life of the school, while it provides not only educational, but also historical information. The novel is also interesting in the gradual formation of a young soul. A chronicle of the spiritual development of one of the Russian youths unfolds before the reader. late XIX– beginning of the 20th century. This work can be called an elegy in prose with great artistic and educational merits.
The skill of a realist artist and sympathy for the ordinary citizen with his everyday everyday worries were extremely clearly manifested in the miniature essays dedicated to Paris. The writer united them with one name - “Paris at home”. When A.I. Kuprin’s work was in its infancy, he created a series of essays about Kyiv. And after many years in exile, the classic returned to the genre of urban sketches, only the place of Kyiv was now taken by Paris.
French impressions were uniquely reunited with nostalgic memories of Russia in the novel “Zhaneta”. It soulfully conveyed the state of restlessness, mental loneliness, and unquenched thirst to find a loved one. The novel “Zhaneta” is one of the most masterful and psychologically fine works and, perhaps, the saddest creation of the classic.
The fabulous and legendary work “The Blue Star” appears to readers as witty and original in its essence. In this romantic fairy tale main theme is love. The plot takes place in an unknown fantasy country, where an unknown people live with their own culture, customs, and morals. And a brave traveler, a French prince, penetrates this unknown country. And of course, he meets a fairytale princess.
Both she and the traveler are beautiful. They fell in love with each other, but the girl considers herself ugly, and all the people consider her ugly, although she loves her for kind heart. But the fact was that the people who inhabited the country were real freaks, but considered themselves handsome. The princess was not like her compatriots, and she was perceived as ugly.
A brave traveler takes the girl to France, and there she realizes that she is beautiful, and the prince who saved her is also beautiful. But she considered him a freak, just like herself, and felt very sorry for him. This work has entertaining, good-natured humor, and the plot is somewhat reminiscent of good old fairy tales. All this made “Blue Star” a significant phenomenon in Russian literature.
In emigration, the work of A. I. Kuprin continued to serve Russia. The writer himself lived an intense, fruitful life. But every year it became more and more difficult for him. The stock of Russian impressions was drying up, but the classic could not merge with foreign reality. Taking care of a piece of bread was also important. And therefore one cannot help but pay tribute to the talented author. Despite his difficult years, he managed to make a significant contribution to Russian literature.
The life and work of Kuprin present an extremely complex and motley picture. It is difficult to summarize them briefly. All life experience taught him to call for humanity. All Kuprin's stories and stories have the same meaning - love for a person.
Childhood
In 1870 in the dull and waterless town of Narovchat, Penza province.
Orphaned very early. When he was one year old, his father, a small clerk, died. There was nothing remarkable in the city, except for the artisans who made sieves and barrels. The baby’s life went on without joy, but there were plenty of grievances. He and his mother visited acquaintances and obsequiously begged for at least a cup of tea. And the “benefactors” stuck their hand in for a kiss.
Wanderings and studies
Three years later, in 1873, the mother and her son left for Moscow. She was taken to a widow's house, and her son from the age of 6, in 1876, to an orphanage. Kuprin would later describe these establishments in the stories “The Runaways” (1917), “Holy Lies,” and “At Rest.” These are all stories about people whom life has mercilessly thrown out. This is how the story about the life and work of Kuprin begins. It's difficult to talk about this briefly.
Service
When the boy grew up, he was able to be placed first in a military gymnasium (1880), then in a cadet corps and, finally, in a cadet school (1888). The training was free, but painful.
So the long and joyless 14 war years dragged on with their senseless drills and humiliations. The continuation was adult service in the regiment, which was stationed in small towns near Podolsk (1890-1894). The first story that A. I. Kuprin will publish, opening military theme, - “Inquiry” (1894), then “Lilac Bush” (1894), “Night Shift” (1899), “Duel” (1904-1905) and others.
Years of wandering
In 1894, Kuprin decisively and dramatically changed his life. He retires and lives very meagerly. Alexander Ivanovich settled in Kyiv and began writing feuilletons for newspapers, in which he depicts the life of the city with colorful strokes. But knowledge of life was lacking. What did he see except military service? He was interested in everything. And Balaklava fishermen, and Donetsk factories, and the nature of Polesie, and unloading watermelons, and a flight to hot-air balloon, and circus performers. He thoroughly studied the life and way of life of the people who made up the backbone of society. Their language, jargons and customs. It is almost impossible to briefly convey Kuprin’s life and work, rich in impressions.
Literary activity
It was during these years (1895) that Kuprin became a professional writer, constantly publishing his works in various newspapers. He meets Chekhov (1901) and everyone around him. And earlier he became friends with I. Bunin (1897) and then with M. Gorky (1902). One after another, stories come out that make society shudder. “Moloch” (1896) is about the severity of capitalist oppression and the lack of rights of workers. “The Duel” (1905), which is impossible to read without anger and shame for the officers.
The writer chastely touches on the theme of nature and love. “Olesya” (1898), “Shulamith” (1908), “Garnet Bracelet” (1911) is known throughout the world. He also knows the life of animals: “Emerald” (1911), “Starlings”. Around these years, Kuprin can already support his family on literary earnings and gets married. His daughter is born. Then he gets divorced, and in his second marriage he also has a daughter. In 1909 Kuprin was awarded Pushkin Prize. Kuprin's life and work, briefly described, can hardly fit into a few paragraphs.
Emigration and return to homeland
Kuprin did not accept the October Revolution with the instinct and heart of an artist. He is leaving the country. But, publishing abroad, he yearns for his homeland. Age and illness fail. Finally, he finally returned to his beloved Moscow. But, after living here for a year and a half, he, seriously ill, died in 1938 at the age of 67 in Leningrad. This is how Kuprin’s life and work end. Summary and the description does not convey the bright and rich impressions of his life, reflected on the pages of books.
About the prose and biography of the writer
The essay briefly presented in our article suggests that everyone is the master of their own destiny. When a person is born, he is caught up in the flow of life. It carries some people into a stagnant swamp and leaves them there, some flounder, trying to somehow cope with the current, and some simply float with the flow - wherever it takes them. But there are people, like Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin, who stubbornly row against the tide all their lives.
Born in a provincial, unremarkable town, he will love it forever and will return to this simple, dusty world of harsh childhood. He will love the bourgeois and meager Narovchat inexplicably.
Maybe for the carved frames and geraniums on the windows, maybe for the vast fields, or maybe for the smell of dusty earth washed down by the rain. And maybe this poverty will draw him in his youth, after the army drill that he experienced for 14 years, to recognize Rus' in all the fullness of its colors and dialects. Wherever his paths will take him. And to the Polesie forests, and to Odessa, and to metallurgical plants, and to the circus, and to the skies on an airplane, and to unload bricks and watermelons. Everything is learned by a person full of inexhaustible love for people, for their way of life, and he will reflect all his impressions in novels and stories that will be read by his contemporaries and that are not outdated even now, a hundred years after they were written.
How can the young and beautiful Shulamith, the beloved of King Solomon, become old, how can the forest witch Olesya stop loving the timid townsman, how can Sashka the musician from “Gambrinus” (1907) stop playing. And Artaud (1904) is still devoted to his owners, who love him endlessly. The writer saw all this with his own eyes and left it to us on the pages of his books, so that we could be horrified by the heavy tread of capitalism in Moloch, nightmare life young women in “The Pit” (1909-1915), the terrible death of the beautiful and innocent Emerald.
Kuprin was a dreamer those who love life. And all the stories passed through his attentive gaze and sensitive, intelligent heart. Maintaining friendship with writers, Kuprin never forgot workers, fishermen, sailors, that is, those who are called ordinary people. They were united by inner intelligence, which is given not by education and knowledge, but by the depth of human communication, the ability to sympathize, and natural delicacy. He had a hard time emigrating. In one of his letters he wrote: “What more talented person, the more difficult it is for him without Russia.” Without considering himself a genius, he simply missed his homeland and, upon returning, died after a serious illness in Leningrad.
Based on the presented essay and chronology, you can write short essay“The life and work of Kuprin (briefly).”
Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin was born on August 26 (September 7), 1870 in the city of Narovchat (Penza province) into a poor family of a minor official.
1871 was a difficult year in Kuprin’s biography - his father died, and the poor family moved to Moscow.
Training and the beginning of a creative path
At the age of six, Kuprin was sent to a class at the Moscow Orphan School, from which he left in 1880. After this, Alexander Ivanovich studied at the military academy, the Alexander Military School. The time of training is described in such works by Kuprin as: “At the Turning Point (Cadets)”, “Junkers”. “The Last Debut” is Kuprin’s first published story (1889).
From 1890 he was a second lieutenant in an infantry regiment. During the service, many essays, stories, stories were published: “Inquiry”, “ Moonlit night", "In the Dark".
Creativity flourishes
Four years later, Kuprin retired. After this, the writer travels a lot around Russia, tries his hand at different professions. At this time, Alexander Ivanovich met Ivan Bunin, Anton Chekhov and Maxim Gorky.
Kuprin builds his stories of those times on life impressions gleaned during his travels.
Kuprin's short stories cover many topics: military, social, love. The story “The Duel” (1905) brought real success to Alexander Ivanovich. Love in Kuprin’s work is most vividly described in the story “Olesya” (1898), which was his first major and one of his most beloved works, and the story of unrequited love, “The Garnet Bracelet” (1910).
Alexander Kuprin also loved to write stories for children. For children's reading, he wrote the works “Elephant”, “Starlings”, “White Poodle” and many others.
Emigration and last years of life
For Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin, life and creativity are inseparable. Not accepting the policy of war communism, the writer emigrated to France. Even after emigration, in the biography of Alexander Kuprin, the writer’s fervor does not subside; he writes novellas, short stories, many articles and essays. Despite this, Kuprin lives in material need and yearns for his homeland. Only 17 years later he returns to Russia. At the same time, the writer’s last essay was published - the work “Native Moscow”.
After a serious illness, Kuprin died on August 25, 1938. The writer was buried at the Volkovskoye cemetery in Leningrad, next to the grave of Ivan Turgenev.
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A word about the work of A. I. Kuprin.
Question 36. The main themes and ideas of A. I. Kuprin’s prose.
A. I. Kuprin
2. Main themes and creativity:
a) “Moloch” - an image of bourgeois society;
b) image of the army (“Night shift”, “Campaign”, “Duel”);
c) conflict romantic hero with everyday reality (ʼʼOlesyaʼʼ);
d) the theme of the harmony of nature, human beauty (“Emerald”, “White Poodle”, “Dog Happiness”, “Shulamith”);
e) the theme of love (ʼʼGarnet braceletʼʼ).
3. The spiritual atmosphere of the era.
1. The work of A. I. Kuprin is original and interesting; it is striking in the author’s observation and the amazing verisimilitude with which he describes people’s lives. As a realist writer, Kuprin carefully looks at life and highlights the main, essential aspects of it.
2. a) This gave Kuprin the opportunity to create in 1896 major workʼʼMolochʼʼ, dedicated to the most important topic capitalist development of Russia. Truthfully and without embellishment, the writer depicted the true appearance of bourgeois civilization. In this work, he denounces hypocritical morality, corruption and falsehood in relations between people in a capitalist society.
Kuprin shows a large factory where workers are brutally exploited. The main character, engineer Bobrov, an honest, humane man, is shocked and outraged by this scary picture. At the same time, the author paints the workers as an uncomplaining crowd, powerless to take any action. active actions. In “Moloch” there emerged motifs characteristic of all subsequent work of Kuprin. Images of humanist truth-seekers will appear in a long line in many of his works. These heroes yearn for the beauty of life, rejecting the ugly bourgeois reality of their time.
b) Kuprin dedicated pages filled with enormous revealing power to a description of the tsarist army. The army was a stronghold of autocracy, against which in those years all the progressive forces of Russian society rose up. That is why Kuprin’s works “Night Shift”, “Hike”, and then “Duel” had great public resonance. Tsarist army, with its incompetent, morally degenerate command, appears on the pages of “The Duel” in all its unsightly appearance. Before us passes a whole gallery of idiots and degenerates, devoid of any glimmer of humanity. They are opposed main character story by Second Lieutenant Romashov. He protests with all his soul against this nightmare, but is unable to find a way to overcome it. This is where the title of the story comes from - “The Duel”. The theme of the story is drama ʼʼ little manʼʼ, his duel with the ignorant environment, which ends with the death of the hero.
c) But not in all of his works Kuprin adheres to the framework of a strictly realistic direction. His stories also have romantic tendencies. He places romantic heroes in everyday life, in real settings, next to ordinary people. And very often, in connection with this, the main conflict in his works becomes the conflict of the romantic hero with everyday life, dullness, and vulgarity.
IN wonderful story“Olesya”, imbued with genuine humanism, Kuprin glorifies people living among nature, untouched by money-grubbing and corrupting bourgeois civilization. Against the backdrop of wild, majestic, beautiful nature, strong, original people live - “children of nature”. This is Olesya, who is as simple, natural and beautiful as nature itself. The author clearly romanticizes the image of the “daughter of the forests”. But her behavior, psychologically subtly motivated, allows her to see the real prospects of life. Endowed with unprecedented power, the soul brings harmony into the obviously contradictory relationships of people. Such a rare gift is expressed in love for Ivan Timofeevich. Olesya seems to be returning the naturalness of his experiences that he had lost for so long. However, the story describes the love of a realist man and a romantic heroine. Ivan Timofeevich finds himself in the romantic world of the heroine, and she - in his reality.
d) The theme of nature and man worries Kuprin throughout his entire life. The power and beauty of nature, animals like component nature, a person who has not lost touch with it, living according to its laws - these are the facets of this topic. Kuprin is admired by the beauty of a horse (Emerald), the loyalty of a dog (White Poodle, Dog's Happiness), and women's youth (Shulamith). Kuprin glorifies the beautiful, harmonious, living world of nature.
e) Only where a person lives in harmony with nature is love beautiful and natural. In the artificial life of people, love, true love, which happens once every hundred years, turns out to be unrecognized, misunderstood and persecuted. In “The Garnet Bracelet,” the poor official Zheltkov is endowed with this gift of love. Great love becomes the meaning and content of his life. The heroine - Princess Vera Sheina - not only does not respond to his feelings, but also perceives his letters, a gift - Garnet bracelet- as something unnecessary, disturbing her peace, her usual way of life. Only after Zheltkov’s death does she realize that “the love that every woman dreams of” has passed by. Mutual, perfect love did not take place, but this lofty and poetic feeling, albeit concentrated in one soul, opens the way to the beautiful rebirth of another. Here the author shows love as a phenomenon of life, as an unexpected gift - poetic, illuminating life among everyday life, sober reality and sustainable life.
3. Reflecting on the individuality of the hero, his place among others, on the fate of Russia in times of crisis, at the turn of two centuries, Kuprin studied the spiritual atmosphere of the era, depicting “living pictures” of his surroundings.
A word about the work of A. I. Kuprin. - concept and types. Classification and features of the category "A Word about the Work of A. I. Kuprin." 2017, 2018.
