At the bottom there is a love conflict. Essay “The Theme of Love in Gorky’s Play “At the Depth”

The play “At the Bottom” is a deep, ambiguous work, in which the author poses complex philosophical and moral problems. Among them is the problem of truth and lies, true and false compassion, the problem of personality degradation, the problem of human relationships. Revealing last problem, the author cannot help but turn to the theme of love, which even in such inhumane conditions, like life in a flophouse, still exists and forces the characters to do crazy things to prove their feelings.

Life in a shelter, the inhabitants of which are trying to somehow exist, seems unreal and fantastic, because people are initially placed in conditions where nothing normal can happen. “The basement is like a cave. Ceiling – heavy stone vaults, smoked, with crumbling plaster. The light comes from the viewer and, from top to bottom, from the square window on the right side. The right corner is occupied by Ash’s room, fenced off by thin partitions; near the door to this room is Bubnov’s bunk. In the left corner there is a large Russian stove; in the left, stone wall there is a door to the kitchen where Kvashnya, Baron, Nastya live” - this is how the author describes the place of events. Dirt, cramped space, overcrowding, dampness, squalor, men in the same room with women - this is the interior against which the characters’ love unfolds. The wife of the owner of the shelter, Vasilisa, runs on dates with the thief Ash, which causes the constant jealousy of her hypocritical and greedy husband, Ash loves her sister Natasha, and Nastya, who earns her daily bread with the most humiliating craft in the world, dreams of a pure, selfless love. Human feelings have not died even in such terrible conditions: and here there is a place for compassion, empathy, hope and love.

Probably the most significant for the development of the plot of the play is the relationship between Ash and Natasha. Ash, the thief, the son of a thief, sees in the modest and kind Natasha, whom her sister constantly mocks, a symbol of something beautiful, bright, for which it is not a pity to give her life: “Even now, I will accept death! Take a knife, strike against the heart... I’ll die without groaning! Even - with joy, because - from clean hand..." At the same time, Ash does not understand that Vasilisa, a powerful and evil woman, will not give up hers so easily. The first act of the play ends with Vasilisa beating Natasha. Vasilisa tries to persuade Ash to kill her husband, to free her from him, and for this she promises to give him Natasha as his wife. But Natasha herself doesn’t like Pepla, she also lives in dreams: “I think, tomorrow... someone... someone... special will come... Or something will happen... also - unprecedented... I’ve been waiting for a long time... I’m always waiting... And so ... in fact - what can you expect?

Elder Luke persuades Ash to take Natasha from the shelter and go with her to Siberia, which he presents to Ash as an earthly paradise. Ash, trusting Luka, believes that life can be changed, he is ready to do anything for the sake of his love: “I said, I’ll give up stealing! By God, I’ll quit! If I said it, I’ll do it! I am literate... I will work... Do you think my life doesn’t disgust me? But I feel one thing: we must live... differently! We need to live better! I have to live like this... so that I can respect myself...” Natasha is also not averse to leaving with Ash, realizing that she has no other choice. But the heroes do not have time: the third act ends with Vasilisa throwing a boiling samovar over her sister, and Ash in this turmoil kills Kostylev with one blow. At the end of the play, we learn that Natasha has disappeared from the hospital, and Ash faces prison. What is further fate These heroes are unknown, but they are unlikely to find their happiness in a world of violence and oppression.

But the fate of another heroine of the play, Nastya, unfortunately, is quite definite. Nastya earns her bread on the street, all the shelters laugh at her, everyone despises her. Nastya goes into dreams, fantasies about great love, which she never had and never will have. She is the only one of the night shelters who reads books, however, these are pulp novels, from which she draws the plots of her fantasies: “By God... it happened! Everything was! He was a student... he was French... his name was Gastoshi... with a black beard... he wore patent leather boots... strike me with thunder in this place! And he loved me so much... he loved me so much!” Only Luka sympathizes with Nastya, saying: “If you believe, you had real love... that means she was!” In that scary world Nastya can only dream, forgetting about the humiliations and insults that she suffers in the real world.

In his play, Gorky shows how tragic are the fates of people who by nature cannot be predators. In the world of profit, they get the role of the victim, and all of them human feelings, including love, are shattered by a terrible reality. But people remain people because they cannot help but suffer, sympathize with each other and love.

The distinctive feature of the play is that most of characters do not play a role in the development of the dramatic intrigue Kostyleva - Natasha - Ashes. If desired, one could simulate a dramatic situation in which all the characters became...

Gorky's play "At the Lower Depths" was written in 1902 for the troupe of the Moscow Art Public Theater. Bitter for a long time I couldn’t find the exact title for the play. Initially it was called “Nochlezhka”, then - “Without the Sun”, and finally -...

The image of Satin leaves a dual feeling, a feeling of contrast between high thoughts, noble aspirations and the general passive existence of the hero. He is superior to everyone in intelligence and strength of character, but still feels comfortable in the Kostylevo shelter...

The dramaturgy of M. Gorky occupies a special place in Russian drama. At the beginning of the 20th century, Gorky turned to the theater and became a successor to the traditions of Russian dramaturgy XIX century. He believed that the main purpose of drama was to depict “man and people”, the influence...

Maxim Gorky's play “At the Lower Depths” reveals the philosophical and social problems of society at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The work “At the Bottom” draws the reader’s attention to the merciless world of people rejected by society who have sunk to its very bottom.

The main characters of the work are the residents of the shelter. All these people are unhappy in their own way, and each of them has their own life story. Some belonged to this world from birth, while others began their lives differently, but for some reason sank to the bottom.

This dirty world of poverty is ruled only by the desire to survive. It seems that there is no place for bright, sublime feelings here. Therefore, discover love conflict in this play, it’s unexpected, to say the least.

Conflict unfolds around love triangle: Vasily Ashes, Vasilisa and Natasha. It all begins with the appearance on the pages of the play of Vasilisa’s husband, Kostylev, who is looking for his young wife, whom he suspects of cheating on him with Vaska Ash. Everything looks pretty banal until the appearance younger sister Vasilisa, Natasha.

BETWEEN VASILY ASH AND NATASHA A REAL, PURE LOVE ARISES, WHICH YOU NEVER EXPECT TO MEET IN THE PLAY “AT THE BOTTOM.”

Vaska’s heart suddenly began to beat with a new, bright and disinterested feeling, which was strikingly different from the vulgar passion that he felt for Vasilisa.

The illusion of a bright future

But the world of outcasts does not give lovers a chance for a bright future. Vasilisa, out of jealousy ex-lover, takes revenge on his own sister. At the same time, she dreams of getting rid of her tyrant husband.

Her dream comes true: Vasily Ash kills Kostylev in a fight. Ash goes to jail. At the same moment, Natasha disappears from the pages of the play. The young people's dream of a bright life, which was so close, is crumbling.

The possibility of a better future for Vaska Pepel and Natasha was only an illusion, a deceptive feeling. The world of the outcasts never lets out of its clutches those who once found themselves in them.

The play “At the Bottom” depicts an unusual love conflict that does not fit into the usual idea of ​​love conflicts. Love line is not the main thing in Gorky’s work, however, it was she who demonstrated to the reader all the bitterness and ruthlessness of the world of people who once found themselves “at the bottom”

Essay » At the Lower Depths - Gorky » Features of the love conflict in M. Gorky’s play “At the Lower Depths”

The play “At the Lower Depths” by M. Gorky as a philosophical drama

Gorky wrote about the idea of ​​a play about the life of people at the bottom: “It will be scary. I already have plans ready, I see faces, figures, I hear voices, speeches, the motives for actions are clear, everything is clear. " Unclear until last moment All that remained was the genre and the title. The author thought about the title: “Without the Sun”, “Bottom”, “Nochlezhka”. And finally, it was born - “At the Bottom”.

All this dictates the play philosophical sound. Important point drama - appearance in Luka's rooming house. Outwardly, he does not affect the lives of its inhabitants in any way (and what can a poor, homeless old man do?), but nevertheless, in the minds of the shelters, thanks to Luka, intense work begins.

Development of the play as philosophical drama begins at the very moment when people at the bottom discover in themselves the ability to dream of a new, better life, reflect on your destinies. Philosophical issues reflected, first of all, in the heroes’ disputes about man, goodness and truth.

The play “At the Lower Depths,” which told viewers and readers about the life of Moscow tramps, is distinguished by its increased “ideology.” The paradox of M. Gorky's philosophical drama lies in the fact that the questions of existence, its philosophical aspects, are discussed by people expelled from society, the poor, the degraded. But it is they who remind readers and viewers of the enormous human possibilities.

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/ / Social issues Gorky's plays "At the Depths"

Despite the fact that Maxim Gorky's play "" is already more than a hundred years old, it continues to be staged in many theaters around the world. This work, which showed the life of people who have sunk to the bottom, has not lost its relevance in our time. Gorky showed us daily life the poorest segment of the population in its usual terms.

The action of the play takes place in a flophouse that sheltered people of different age categories, different professions. Many of them had another life before, but now they are all at the bottom of this life.

Speaking about the social conflict of the play, it is worth noting that it is ambiguous and multifaceted. It is revealed in the confrontation between the inhabitants of the shelter and its owners, and also manifests itself in the personal tragedy of each hero of the work and the reasons that forced them to sink to the bottom of life.

To understand the conflict between the inhabitants of the shelter and its owners, it is necessary to understand what kind of people they were.

So, the owner of the shelter was Mikhail Kostylev. He was a hypocritical and greedy man. On the one hand, he gave shelter to those in need, and on the other, he ripped off their last money for accommodation.

His wife Vasilisa also treated the residents of the shelter with disgust. She was in love with Vaska Pepla, and was constantly jealous of his sister Natalya. Natalya Vasilisa and her husband were bullied with special zeal. Natalya, on the contrary, was a quiet girl and did not allow herself to contradict her sister and her husband.

In the relationship between two sisters, Gorky showed us how social status affects the relationship between two people, even though they were sisters.

Vaska Pepel was one of the inhabitants of the Kostylevo shelter. He said to himself that since childhood he had been called a thief. Therefore, all his life he did nothing else except steal. It should be noted that Vasilisa encouraged Ash’s occupation by buying stolen things from him.

Another inhabitant of the shelter, Anna, had an unenviable fate. She was sick with a fatal disease and lived last days. Her husband, a mechanic, Kleshch had been waiting for his wife’s death for a long time. She was a burden to him. He thought that after Anna's death he would be able to earn money and live new life. But this was not destined to happen. Anna lived and endured, endured daily humiliation and beatings from her husband. There was no place for joy and happiness in her life. The girl no longer remembered when she ate her fill and put on something other than old rags.

The person who could not find use for his knowledge and skills, and now found himself in a shelter with its other inhabitants, was Satin. WITH early age he worked at the telegraph office and was fond of reading. But now he has become a beggar, not expecting anything from life. From the old days he only had a few intricate words left. foreign language which he loved to show off to others.

Orphan Nastya was forced to sell her body in order to somehow make ends meet. She was a dreamer. Nastya was fond of romance novels and believed that someday true love would befall her too. For her dreaminess and naivety, the girl endured daily ridicule from other inhabitants of the shelter.

Another inhabitant of the shelter was Bubnov. He ended up here because he found out about his wife’s betrayal and, not finding best option, went to Kostylev’s shelter.

In my opinion, the most tragic fall to the bottom was the fall of Baron. He was a former nobleman and held a high position. But now he is forced to spend time with those people whom he simply did not notice before. The Baron often recalled his past “well-fed” years. All that remained from that life was his arrogant manner of communicating with others.

The next inhabitant of the shelter was a man of the stage, a man who basked in applause, but who, succumbing bad habit, rolled down. The worst thing is that the Actor understands the cause of his suffering, but cannot do anything about it.

Now all these once different people equal in their lack of rights. They find themselves at the bottom of their lives and are forced to accept their fate. These people have no future, they only have memories of past life. They are all united by one road - the road down into the abyss. Such a life destroyed all human feelings and qualities in the inhabitants of the shelter and gave rise to not only social, but also moral degradation.

Old man Luka becomes a ray of light for the inhabitants of the shelter, who tried to “stir them up” by giving them hope. Unfortunately, it was already too late, no one could find the strength to climb up again. The actor commits suicide, Vaska Pepel was exiled to Siberia, and the rest of the inhabitants of the shelter suffered a worse fate.

Maxim Gorky in his play “At the Depths” tried to show us all the lack of rights of a person burdened social problems how important it is to be able to solve them in time in order to change your life.

The play “At the Bottom” is a deep, ambiguous work, in which the author raised complex philosophical and moral problems. Among them is the problem of truth and lies, true and false compassion, the problem of personality degradation, the problem of relationships between people. Revealing the last problem, the author cannot help but turn to the theme of love, which, even in such inhuman conditions as life in a flophouse, still exists and forces the characters to commit crazy acts in order to prove their feelings.

Life in a shelter, the inhabitants of which are trying to somehow exist, seems unreal and fantastic, because people are initially placed in conditions where nothing normal can happen. “The basement is like a cave. The ceiling is heavy stone vaults, smoked, with crumbling plaster. The light comes from the viewer and, from top to bottom, from the square window on the right side. The right corner is occupied by Ash’s room, fenced off by thin partitions; near the door to this room is Bubnov’s bunk. In the left corner there is a large Russian stove; in the left, stone wall there is a door to the kitchen where Kvashnya, Baron, Nastya live,” this is how the author describes the place of events. Dirt, cramped space, overcrowding, dampness, squalor, men in the same room with women - this is the interior against which the characters’ love unfolds. The hostel owner's wife, Vasilisa, goes on dates with the thief Ash, which arouses the constant jealousy of her hypocritical and greedy husband, Ash loves her sister Natasha, and Nastya, who earns her daily bread with the most humiliating craft in the world, dreams of pure, selfless love. Human feelings have not died even in such terrible conditions: and here there is a place for compassion, empathy, hope and love.

Probably the most significant for the development of the plot of the play is the relationship between Ash and Natasha. Ash, the thief, the son of a thief, sees in the modest and kind Natasha, whom her sister constantly mocks, a symbol of something beautiful, bright, for which it is not a pity to give her life: “Even now, I will accept death! Take a knife, strike against the heart... I’ll die without a sigh! Even - with joy, because - from a clean hand...” At the same time, Ash does not understand that Vasilisa, a powerful and evil woman, will not give up hers so easily. The first act of the play ends with Vasilisa beating Natasha. Vasilisa tries to persuade Ash to kill her husband, to free her from him, and for this she promises to give him Natasha as his wife. But Natasha herself doesn’t like Pepla, she also lives in dreams: “I think, tomorrow... someone... someone... special will come... Or something will happen... also - unprecedented ... I wait for a long time... I always wait... And so... in reality - what can you wait for?”

Elder Luke persuades Ash to take Natasha from the shelter and go with her to Siberia, which he presents to Ash as an earthly paradise. Ash, trusting Luka, believes that life can be changed, he is ready to do anything for the sake of his love: “I said, I’ll give up stealing! By God, I'll give it up! If I said it, I’ll do it! I am literate... I will work... Do you think my life doesn’t disgust me? But I feel one thing: we must live... differently! We need to live better! I have to live like this... so that I can respect myself...” Natasha is also not averse to leaving with Ash, realizing that she has no other choice. But the heroes do not have time: the third act ends with Vasilisa throwing a boiling samovar over her sister, and Ash in this turmoil kills Kostylev with one blow. At the end of the play, we learn that Natasha has disappeared from the hospital, and Ash faces prison. It is not known what the future fate of these heroes is, but it is unlikely that they will find their happiness in a world of violence and oppression.

But the fate of another heroine of the play, Nastya, unfortunately, is quite definite. Nastya earns her bread on the street, all the shelters laugh at her, everyone despises her. Nastya goes into dreams, fantasies about a great love that she never had and never will have. She is the only one of the night shelters who reads books, however, these are pulp novels, from which she draws the plots of her fantasies: “By God... it happened! Everything was! He was a student... he was French... his name was Gastoshi... with a black beard... he wore patent leather boots... strike me with thunder in this place! And he loved me so much... he loved me so much!” Only Luka sympathizes with Nastya, saying: “If you believe, you had true love... that means you had it!” In this terrible world, Nastya can only dream, forgetting about the humiliations and insults that she suffers in the real world.

In his play, Gorky shows how tragic are the fates of people who by nature cannot be predators. In the world of profit, they get the role of a victim, and all their human feelings, including love, are shattered by the terrible reality. But people remain people because they cannot help but suffer, sympathize with each other and love.

June 14 2011

Gorky's play “At the Depths” was written in 1902. For a long time, Gorky could not find an exact title for his work. Initially it was called “Nochlezhka”, then “Without the Sun” and, finally, “At the bottom”.

In Gorky, viewers saw for the first time an unfamiliar world of outcasts. World drama has never known such a harsh, merciless truth about the life of the lower social classes, about their hopeless fate. In the shelter there were people of very different personalities and social status.

A special burden in the drama falls on the conflict, violent clashes heroes on occasions that are significant to them. At the same time, there cannot be in a drama extra people- all heroes must be involved in the conflict. The presence of social tension is already indicated in the title of the play. But we can't talk about what social conflict organizes the drama. This tension is devoid of dynamics; all the heroes’ attempts to escape from the “bottom” are in vain. Perhaps the drama is organized by a love conflict, traditional for many plays. It would seem strange to see such a thing pure feeling in such an atmosphere of dirt and poverty. But Gorky’s heroes do not pay attention to the dirt and stench, they are accustomed to such a life, to each other, and almost do not notice those around them. Each hero exists as if on his own, living his own life. Therefore, at the beginning of the play, everyone present speaks at once, without expecting an answer, weakly reacting to the comments of others. Kvashnya is proud that she free woman, not related by marriage, and this makes Mite angry. He has his dying wife, Nastya, in his arms, fallen woman, is reading " Fatal love", which causes the Baron to laugh ironically. Prostitute Nastya dreams of a bright and pure love, but this only causes laughter from others. The girl is trying to get out of the vicious circle, leave the shelter and start a new one, but these are just her dreams.

But the play does contain a love line. It is created by the relationships between Vasilisa, Vaska Pepel, Kostylev’s wife, the owner himself and Natasha.

The plot of the love story begins when Kosta the Lion appears in the shelter. From a conversation with the inhabitants, it is clear that he is looking for his wife Vasilisa there, who is cheating on him with Vaska Ash. With the appearance of Natasha, the love plot begins to develop. For her sake, Vaska leaves Ashes to Vasilisa. As this conflict develops, it becomes clear to us that his relationship with Natasha enriches Vaska and revives him to a new life. Vaska Pepel never had a profession. There are no ideals for him, he does not strive to work, since he lives by theft. However, this person also retains kindness and naivety; he strives for purity and goodness. But Vaska Ash falls into slavery " powerful of the world this." The owner of the shelter, Kostylev, turns out to be an even lower person: he does not give Vasily the money for the stolen watch, believing that Ash already owes him a lot. His wife Vasilisa is also in bondage to her husband, who is twice her age. She is also unhappy, and her love for Vaska Ash is a challenge to family despotism. For the sake of Vasilisa, the thief is ready to commit - to kill Kostylev. Vasilisa was inflamed with terrible hatred for her sister Natalya when she learned about her lover’s betrayal. She is ready to kill her, just to keep Vasily for herself. Climax highest point in the development of the conflict, is fundamentally taken off stage by the author. We do not see how Vasilisa is scalded with boiling water. We learn about this from the noise and screams behind the stage and from the conversations of the night shelters.

The love conflict in the play, of course, is one of the facets of the social conflict. The love line shows that the anti-human conditions of the “bottom” cripple a person, and the most sublime feelings in such conditions lead not to personal enrichment, but to death or hard labor.

Having unleashed a love conflict in such a terrible way, Vasilisa achieves all her goals at once. Takes revenge on former lover Vaska Peplu and his rival Natasha, gets rid of unloved husband and becomes the sole mistress of the shelter. There is nothing human left in Vasilisa, and this shows us the monstrosity social conditions, in which the inhabitants of the shelter are forced to live.

But a love conflict cannot become the basis dramatic conflict plays, since, unfolding before the eyes of the night shelters, it does not affect them themselves. They do not participate in them, remaining only outside spectators.