Image of Grigory Alexandrovich Pechorin. Psychological characteristics of the main character of the novel “A Hero of Our Time”

"Hero of Our Time" - the first in our country psychological novel, in which Lermontov, by analyzing the actions and thoughts of the main character, reveals his inner world. But despite this, characterizing Pechorin is not an easy task. The hero is ambiguous, as are his actions, largely due to the fact that Lermontov created not a typical character, but a real, living person. Let's try to understand this person and understand him.

The portrait description of Pechorin contains a very interesting detail: “his eyes did not laugh when he laughed.” We can see that the hero is reflected even in his external description. Indeed, Pechorin never feels his life entirely; in his own words, two people always coexist in him, one of whom acts, and the second judges him. He constantly analyzes his own actions, which is “observation of a mature mind over itself.” Perhaps this is what prevents the hero from living life to the fullest and makes him cynical.

The most striking character trait of Pechorin is his selfishness. His desire at all costs to arrange everything exactly as it came to his mind, and nothing else. By this he reminds that he does not retreat until he gets what he wants. And, being childishly naive, Pechorin never realizes in advance that people may suffer from his petty selfish aspirations. He puts his own whim above the rest and simply does not think about others: “I look at the suffering and joy of others only in relation to myself.” Perhaps it is thanks to this trait that the hero moves away from people and considers himself superior to them.

The characterization of Pechorin should contain one more important fact. The hero feels the strength of his soul, feels that he was born for a higher goal, but instead of searching for it, he wastes himself on all sorts of trifles and momentary aspirations. He constantly rushes around in search of entertainment, not knowing what he wants. So, in pursuit of small joys, his life passes. Without any goal in front of him, Pechorin wastes himself on empty things that bring nothing but short moments of satisfaction.

Since the hero himself does not consider his life to be something valuable, he begins to play with it. His desire to enrage Grushnitsky or turn his gun on himself, as well as the test of fate in the chapter “Fatalist” - all these are manifestations of morbid curiosity generated by the hero’s boredom and inner emptiness. He does not think about the consequences of his actions, be it even his death or the death of another person. Pechorin is interested in observation and analysis, not the future.

It is thanks to the hero’s introspection that Pechorin’s characterization can be completed, since he himself explains many of his actions. He has studied himself well and perceives each of his emotions as an object for observation. He sees himself as if from the outside, which brings him closer to the readers and allows us to evaluate Pechorin’s actions from his own point of view.

Here are the main points that should be contained a brief description of Pechorina. In fact, his personality is much more complex and multifaceted. And it’s unlikely that a characterization can help to understand it. Pechorin needs to be found within himself, to feel what he feels, and then his personality will become clear to the heroes of our time.

The work “Hero of Our Time,” written by M.Yu. Lermontov, is considered the first psychological novel in Russian literature, aimed at revealing the human soul, mainly about Grigory Pechorin.

Pechorin is an attractive young officer under the age of thirty, of average height, but of a strong build: “... He was of average height; his slender, thin figure and broad shoulders proved a strong build.” He has delicate skin, blond hair, but with This is a dark mustache and eyebrows, has an unpleasant, penetrating and heavy look, sometimes arrogant, but indifferently calm. This man is mysterious and effective, his portrait combines features of strength and weakness, he is a complex nature, so one cannot judge him at first glance.

Pechorin is cruel and selfish. We see this already in the first chapter - he kidnaps Bela only because he liked this girl. Very soon Pechorin’s attitude towards the “poor girl” changed. Bela quickly tired of him, and he began to look for every excuse to leave her, at least for a while. Love for Vera was Pechorin’s deepest and most lasting affection, but he caused her a lot of suffering: “... you gave me nothing but suffering.” Gregory did not know how to truly love. He could only make those who treated him so devotedly and reverently suffer. But the problems of love relationships were not much different from friendships. From Pechorin’s words we can conclude that he is not capable of friendship: “Of two friends, one is always the slave of the other.” An example of this is Grushnitsky.

Pechorin, not perceiving friendship as a value, began to mock the cadet. Pretending that he was helping Grushnitsky, he told Mary some moments of his “friend’s” life, captured the girl’s attention and made her fall in love with him. Pechorin's hypocrisy destroyed what could be called "friendship" and led to a duel. In this scene, the author showed that in the face of death, the hero of the novel turned out to be as dual as we saw him throughout the entire work.

Pechorin is a person who is distinguished by tenacity of will. Psychological picture the hero is fully revealed. Still, you can have different attitudes towards the hero of the novel, condemn him or feel sorry for the woman tormented by society human soul, but one cannot help but admire the skill of the great Russian writer, who gave us this image, a psychological portrait of the hero of his time.

Updated: 2017-05-12

Attention!
If you notice an error or typo, highlight the text and click Ctrl+Enter.
By doing so, you will provide invaluable benefit to the project and other readers.

Thank you for your attention.

In the novel “Hero of Our Time,” Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov touches on the same problems that are often heard in his lyrics: why smart and energetic people cannot find a place for themselves in life, why do they “grow old in inaction”? The novel consists of five parts: “Bela”, “Maksim Maksimych”, “Taman”, “Princess Mary”, “Fatalist”. Each of them represents an independent work and at the same time is part of the novel. The central place in all the stories is occupied by the image of the young officer Pechorin. It is no coincidence that the novel takes place in the Caucasus, where at that time people who were critical of autocracy were exiled. As you know, Pushkin and Lermontov were exiled there. Pechorin belongs to this category of people. Grigory Aleksandrovich Pechorin, a young man of about twenty-five. In several places in the novel, the author gives a description of the hero’s appearance, indicating some of his character traits. For the first time, Pechorin appears in the novel before Maxim Maksimych in the fortress beyond the Terek (“Bela”): “He came to me in full uniform... He was so thin, white, his uniform was so new.” In “Maksim Maksimych” we learn that Pechorin was of average height and slender; “... broad shoulders proved a strong build, capable of withstanding all the difficulties of nomadic life and climate changes...”. In “Maxim Maksimych” Pechorin is a civilian, retired. Dressed in a velvet frock coat and dazzlingly clean linen. His gait was "casual and lazy." He did not wave his arms, which the author considers a sign of a secretive character. Pechorin has blond hair, a black mustache and eyebrows, a slightly upturned nose, white teeth, and brown eyes. The eyes "... did not laugh when he laughed." About Pechorin’s endurance, Maxim Maksimych explains that in the rain he could spend the whole day hunting. In “Maksim Maksimych” we learn that Pechorin was of average height and slender; “... broad shoulders proved a strong build, capable of withstanding all the difficulties of nomadic life and climate changes...”. In “Maxim Maksimych” Pechorin is a civilian, retired. Dressed in a velvet frock coat and dazzlingly clean linen. His gait was "casual and lazy." He did not wave his arms, which the author considers a sign of a secretive character. Pechorin has blond hair, a black mustache and eyebrows, a slightly upturned nose, white teeth, and brown eyes. The eyes "... did not laugh when he laughed." About Pechorin’s endurance, Maxim Maksimych explains that in the rain he could spend the whole day hunting.

Revealing the complex and contradictory character of Pechorin, the author shows us him in different life situations, in a clash with people of different social classes and nationalities: with smugglers, with highlanders, with a young aristocratic girl, with representatives of noble youth and other characters. Before us appears the image of a lonely, disappointed man who is at enmity with secular society, although he himself is part of it.

In Lermontov’s poems, the image of such a person is painted in romantic tones; the poet did not reveal in his lyrics the reasons for the appearance of such a hero. And in the novel “Hero of Our Time” Lermontov portrays Pechorin realistically. The writer is trying to show how a person’s character is influenced by the environment in which he lives. Pechorin has a lot in common with Evgeny Onegin from the novel of the same name in Pushkin’s poems. However, Pechorin lives in a different time, he is a man of the thirties of the 19th century, and this man’s disappointment in the society around him is stronger than that of Onegin.

Pechorin was born and raised in an aristocratic family. Nature endowed him with a sharp mind, a responsive heart and a strong will. But the best qualities of this person were not needed by society. “Fearing ridicule,” says Pechorin, “I buried my best feelings in the depths of my heart.” He fell in love and was loved; took up science, but soon realized that it did not give him fame and happiness. And when he realized that in society there is no selfless love, no friendship, no fair humane relations between people, he became bored.

Pechorin is looking for thrills and adventures. His mind and will help him overcome obstacles, but he realizes that his life is empty. And this increases his feeling of melancholy and disappointment. Pechorin is well versed in the psychology of people, so he easily wins the attention of women, but this does not bring him a feeling of happiness. He, like Onegin, “was not created for the bliss of family life. He cannot and does not want to live like the people of his circle.”

In the story of Princess Mary, whom Pechorin fell in love with himself and subjugated to his will, he appears both as a “cruel tormentor” and as a deeply suffering person. Exhausted Mary evokes a feeling of compassion in him. “It was becoming unbearable,” he recalls, “another minute and I would have fallen at her feet.”

Lermontov created true image his young contemporary, who reflected the features of an entire generation. In the preface to the novel, he wrote that Pechorin is “a portrait made up of the vices of our generation, in their full development.”

The title of the novel sounds the writer's irony over his generation and over the time in which it lives. Pechorin, of course, is not a hero in the literal sense of the word. His activities cannot be called heroic. A person who could benefit people wastes his energy on empty activities.

The author does not seek to condemn Pechorin, nor to make him better than he is. It should be noted that M. Yu. Lermontov revealed the psychology of his hero with great skill. The critic N. G. Chernyshevsky noted that “Lermontov was interested in the psychological process itself, its form, its laws, the dialectics of the soul...” L. N. Tolstoy also highly appreciated Lermontov’s role in the development of the socio-psychological novel.

18. N.V. Gogol about the specific genre nature of his comedies. New type comedy hero and comic techniques for his embodiment (“The Inspector General” + 1 comedy of your choice).

Gogol revealed the place of “The Inspector General” in his work and the level of artistic generalization to which he strove when working on a comedy in “The Author's Confession” (1847). The “thought” of the comedy, he emphasized, belongs to Pushkin. Following Pushkin’s advice, the writer “decided to collect in one pile everything bad in Russia<...>and laugh at everything at once." Gogol defined a new quality of laughter: in "The Inspector General" it is a "high" laughter, determined by the height of the spiritual and practical task facing the author. The comedy became a test of strength before working on a grandiose epic about modern Russia. After creating “The Inspector General,” the writer felt “the need for a complete essay, where there would be more than one thing to laugh at. Thus, "Inspector" - a turning point in the creative development of Gogol.

In "Theatrical Travel" Gogol draws attention to the fact that the playwright must find a situation that would affect all the characters, would include in its orbit the most important life concerns of all the characters - otherwise the characters simply will not be able to realize themselves and discover their character in a few hours of stage action . Therefore, a calm, “plain” course of life in drama is impossible - a conflict, an explosion, an acute clash of interests is necessary. In addition, there cannot be “extra” heroes not included in the conflict. But what then is the situation that the playwright must find in order to include all the heroes in its orbit and show their characters? In other words, what can form the basis of a dramatic conflict? Love affair? “But, it seems, it’s time to stop relying so far on this eternal plot,” asserts the second lover of art, and with him Gogol. “It’s worth taking a closer look around. Everything changed a long time ago in the world. Now the drama is more strongly tied to the desire to get a profitable place ", to shine and outshine the other at all costs, to take revenge for neglect, for ridicule. Don't people now have more rank, money capital, and a profitable marriage than love?" But, leaving the basis of the conflict in “The Inspector General” and rank, and a profitable marriage, and money capital, Gogol still finds a different plot, which has much more “electricity”: “But anything can get tied up,” summarizes the second art lover, “the very horror, the fear of anticipation, the threat of the law moving in the distance..."

It is this - “the very horror, the fear of expectation, the thunderstorm of the law moving in the distance” that takes hold of officials - that forms the dramatic situation of “The Inspector General”. The play begins with the very first phrase of the Governor: “I invited you, gentlemen, in order to tell you the most unpleasant news: an auditor is coming to us.” From this moment, fear begins to fetter the characters and grows from cue to cue, from action to action. The ever-increasing fear that seizes the officials in The Inspector General creates many comic situations. The mayor, giving orders, confuses his words; going to the imaginary auditor, he wants to put on a paper case instead of a hat. The comedy of Gorodnichy’s first meeting with Khlestakov is determined by the situation of mutual fear, which forces both to utter complete nonsense: “Don’t ruin them! Wife, small children... don’t make a person unhappy,” prays Skvoznik-Dmukhanovsky, sincerely forgetting that the little ones are then he has no children. Not knowing what to justify, he sincerely, just like a frightened child, admits to his own dishonesty: “Because of inexperience, by God, because of inexperience. ".

Fear immediately unites the heroes. Having started the action of the comedy with just one phrase, Gogol resorts to the technique of compositional inversion: the exposition and the plot have swapped places. The preparations of officials for the arrival of the auditor, their conversations about what needs to be done and who needs to be done, become an exposition from which we learn about the state of affairs in the city. But the exhibition reveals not only the shortcomings in the city (tell us in detail which ones). It shows the most important contradiction existing in the minds of officials: between with dirty hands and an absolutely clear conscience. They all sincerely believe that every smart person “has sins”, because he does not like to “miss what floats into his hands.” Exactly the same" smart person“they hope to meet in the auditor. Therefore, all their aspirations are not aimed at hastily correcting “sins”, but at taking only cosmetic measures that could enable the auditor to turn a blind eye to true position affairs in the city - of course, for a certain reward. The mayor sincerely believes that “there is no person who does not have some kind of sins behind him. This is already arranged this way by God himself, and the Voltaireans are in vain speaking against this.” Everyone agrees with this, and the only objection he encounters comes from Ammos Fedorovich Lyapkin-Tyapkin: “What do you think, Anton Antonovich, are sins? Sins and sins are different. I tell everyone openly that I take bribes, but with what bribes? "Greyhound puppies. That's a completely different matter." The objection concerns only the form, not the substance. It is in this openness and sincerity that this contradiction is manifested - between understanding one’s “sins” and an absolutely clear conscience. “He is not even a hunter to do lies,” Gogol writes about him, “but he has a great passion for hound hunting...” Going to Khlestakov, the Mayor reminds the officials: “Yes, if they ask why a church was not built at a charitable institution, which was previously "The amount was allocated for five years, then don’t forget to say that construction began, but burned down. I submitted a report about this. Otherwise, perhaps someone, having forgotten themselves, will foolishly say that it never began."

Just as the Governor does not feel guilty and acts not out of malice, but because it is the way it is, so do the other heroes of The Inspector General. Postmaster Ivan Kuzmich Shpekin opens other people’s letters solely out of curiosity: “...I love to death to know what’s new in the world. I’ll tell you that this is very interesting reading. You will read a letter with pleasure - this is how different passages are described... and what edification ...better than in Moskovskie Vedomosti!"

The judge tries to instruct him: “Look, you will get it someday for this.” Shpekin is sincerely perplexed: “Oh, priests!” He didn't even think that he was wrong. Gogol comments on this image as follows: “The postmaster is a simple-minded person to the point of naivety, looking at life as a meeting interesting stories to pass the time, which he reads in printed letters. There’s nothing left for the actor to do except be as simple-minded as possible.”

Gogol, creating a portrait of society and showing the imperfection of a person deprived of a moral law, finds a new type of dramatic conflict. It would be natural to expect that the playwright would go by introducing into the conflict a hero-ideologist, say, a true auditor, serving “the cause, not persons,” professing true ideas about the purpose of man and capable of exposing the officials of the county town. This is how, for example, the conflict “Woe from Wit” was built by A.S. Griboyedov, showing the failure of Famusov's society, pitting him against the hero-ideologist, Chatsky, expressing a true understanding of duty and honor. Gogol's innovation lies in the fact that he abandons the genre of comedy with a tall hero, relatively speaking, he removes Chatsky from the play.

This determined a fundamentally new nature of the dramatic conflict. In comedy there is neither an ideologue hero nor a conscious deceiver who leads everyone by the nose. Officials are deceiving themselves, literally imposing on Khlestakov the role of a significant person, forcing him to play it. The heroes, courting Khlestakov in every possible way, rush into nowhere, in pursuit of emptiness, a mirage. It is this circumstance that makes Yu. Mann talk about the “mirage intrigue” that turns into the situation of error in The Inspector General.

A mirage of intrigue ensues when Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky appear with news about the auditor.

Dobchinsky’s words (“He! He doesn’t pay any money and doesn’t go. Who else if not him? And the travel ticket is registered in Saratov”), supported by Bobchinsky’s remarks (“He, he, by God he’s... So observant: looked at everything. He saw that Pyotr Ivanovich and I were eating salmon... so he looked into our plates. I was filled with fear"), for a completely incomprehensible reason, they convince officials that Ivan Aleksandrovich Khlestakov is hiding behind "incognito damned." When Khlestakov appears, the mirage seems to materialize. In the scene of Gorodnichy’s first date with him, the comedy of which is based on a situation of mutual fear, Gorodnichy loses all doubts about this matter. And why? After all, everything speaks not in favor of Khlestakov, and even the Mayor notices this: “But what a nondescript, short one, it seems that he would crush him with his fingernail.” But he does not attach any significance to his observations, and only reading the letter to “soul Tryapichkin” will reveal the truth to him. The mirage intrigue lies in the transformation of Khlestakov into a significant person, into a statesman, that is, in filling the complete emptiness with fictitious content. Its development is determined not only by the fear and illogical thinking of officials, but by certain qualities of Khlestakov himself. Khlestakov is not just stupid, but “ideally” stupid. After all, it doesn’t immediately occur to him why he is so accepted in this city. “I love cordiality,” he says, having slept through after receiving the Governor, “and I admit, I like it better if they please me from the bottom of their hearts, and not just out of interest.” If the melting fear, clouding the mind, forces you to mistake an “icicle, a rag,” a “helicopter of dust” for an auditor. If it weren’t for Osip, who immediately inquires about another way out in the Gorodnichy’s house, and then urgently advises the master to leave (“By God, it’s time”), believing that they were pleasing after all “out of interest,” then he simply would not have been able to understand that staying longer is dangerous. He was never able to understand who he was being mistaken for: in a letter to Tryapichkin, he assures that “judging by his St. Petersburg physiognomy and suit” he was mistaken for the Governor General (and not at all for an auditor). Such simplicity and unintentionality allow him not to deceive anyone: he simply plays the roles that are imposed on him by officials. Within a few minutes in the scene of Khlestakov’s lies (act three, scene VI), the mirage grows to incredible proportions. In a few minutes, before the eyes of officials, Khlestakov makes a dizzying career. His exaggerations are purely quantitative: “a watermelon costs seven hundred rubles,” “thirty-five thousand couriers alone.” Having received an imaginary opportunity to order himself something from Paris, Khlestakov receives only... soup in a saucepan, arrived by boat directly from Paris. Such requests clearly characterize the poverty of nature. Being "with Pushkin on friendly foot", he cannot come up with a topic for conversation with him (“Well, brother Pushkin?” - “Yes, brother,” he would answer, “that’s how it all is...”). Due to Khlestakov’s unintentionality, it is difficult to catch him on a lie - he, lying, easily gets out of a difficult situation: “As you run up the stairs to your fourth floor, you only say to the cook: “Here, Mavrushka, overcoat...” Well, I’m lying - I forgot that I’m alive in the mezzanine. In “Notes for Gentlemen Actors,” Gogol writes that Khlestakov’s speech “is abrupt, and the words fly out of his mouth completely unexpectedly” - even for himself. That is why he corrects his lies so easily - simply without thinking about plausibility.

Building a comedy on the situation of fear and self-deception of officials, Gogol nevertheless does not abandon the love affair, or rather, parodies it. But still, the ideological and compositional role of the love affair is different. With her, another mirage seems to materialize and come close to the officials - the image of St. Petersburg, coveted, alluring. Thanks to the imaginary matchmaking, it becomes almost a reality: the Skvoznik-Dmukhanovsky family almost moves to St. Petersburg, Anna Andreevna dreams of a special “amber” in her room, the Mayor tries on an order ribbon over his shoulder. The materialized mirage of St. Petersburg is concretized in the naive thoughts of the heroes.

The image of St. Petersburg is introduced into comedy in different ways. Khlestakov lies about his situation in the city, the image of the capital appears in his letter to “soul Tryapichkin”, officials dream about it, Osip shares his memories of the city. In both cases, this is a city based on fear, a “fearful” city, only in one case Khlestakov is afraid of the state council, the department, where when he appears - “just an earthquake, everything trembles and shakes like a leaf,” and in In another case, he himself is afraid of the pastry chef, who can drag him by the collar “about the pies he has eaten at the expense of the income of the English king.” St. Petersburg and the Governor think exactly the same way. The only one of the heroes who does not feel fear at the mention of St. Petersburg is Osip: he stands outside the bureaucratic hierarchy based on fear, and he has nothing to fear.

And when both mirages, on the materialization of which the mirage intrigue is built, acquire almost material embodiment (the thunderstorm with the auditor turns into an incredible win, the matchmaking has taken place, and the Mayor is about to receive a new, St. Petersburg appointment), the whole building begins to fall apart: two imaginary endings follow (departure Khlestakov and the reading of the letter) and then - the true denouement, the “silent scene”, presenting the meaning of comedy in a completely different light. The importance Gogol attached to the “silent scene” is also evidenced by the fact that he defines its duration as one and a half minutes, and in “Excerpt from a letter... to a writer” he even speaks of two or three minutes of “petrification” of the heroes . According to the laws of the stage, one and a half, and even more so three minutes of immobility is an eternity. What is the ideological and compositional role of the “silent stage”?

One of the most important ideas of The Inspector General is the idea of ​​inevitable spiritual retribution, the judgment of which no person can escape. Therefore, the “silent scene” acquires a broad symbolic meaning, which is why it does not lend itself to any unambiguous interpretation. This is why interpretations of the “silent scene” are so varied. It is interpreted as an artistically embodied image Last Judgment, before which a person cannot justify himself by citing the fact that every intelligent person “has sins”; draw analogies between the “silent scene” and Karl Bryullov’s painting “The Last Day of Pompeii,” the meaning of which Gogol himself saw in the fact that the artist uses historical material to address a situation of strong “crisis felt by the whole mass.” The characters in “The Inspector General” experience a similar crisis in a moment of shock, like the heroes of Bryullov’s painting, when “the entire group, who stopped at the moment of impact and expressed thousands of different feelings,” is captured by the artist at the last moment of earthly existence. Later, in 1846, in the dramatic passages “The Denouement of The Inspector General,” Gogol proposed a completely different interpretation of the “silent” scene.” “Take a close look at this city, which is depicted in the play!” says the First Comic Actor. “Everyone agrees that there is no such city in all of Russia... Well, what if this is our soulful city and it sits each of us?.. Whatever you say, the auditor who is waiting for us at the door of the fob is terrible. As if you don’t know who this auditor is? Why pretend? This auditor is our awakened conscience, which will force us to suddenly and at once look into everything eyes on ourselves. Nothing will be hidden before this inspector, because he was sent by the Named Supreme Command and will be announced about it when it is no longer possible to take a step back. Suddenly, such a monster will be revealed to you, within you, that from horror hair will stand up. It’s better to revise everything that is in us at the beginning of life, and not at the end of it.”

One way or another, the appearance of the gendarme, announcing the arrival from St. Petersburg “by personal order” of the now current inspector, “strikes everyone like thunder,” says the author’s remark. “The sound of amazement unanimously flies from the ladies’ lips; the whole group, suddenly changing their position, remains petrified."

Gogol believed that the power of laughter can change the world and people in this world for the better. That is why the laughter in The Inspector General is predominantly satirical, aimed at denying the ridiculed vice. Satire, according to Gogol, is designed to correct human vices, and this is its high social significance. This understanding of the role of laughter determines its focus not on a specific person, an official, or a specific county town, but on the vice itself. Gogol shows how terrible the fate of a person struck by him is. This predetermines another feature of the funny in the play: the combination of the comic with the dramatic, which lies in the discrepancy between the original high purpose of man and his unrealized, exhaustion in the pursuit of life mirages. Both the final monologue of the Governor and the imaginary matchmaking of Khlestakov are full of drama, but the culmination of the tragic, when the comic completely fades into the background, becomes a “silent scene”. The grotesque is inherent in Gogol's artistic world. Clarify your ideas about the grotesque. Grotesque, exaggeration, sharply violating real features, turning out to be akin to the fantastic. In this case, not the phenomenon as a whole is often exaggerated, but some facet of it, which further violates the actual proportions and distorts the subject. In The Inspector General, much is built on exaggeration: not only Khlestakov’s stupidity is fantastically exaggerated, brought to “ideal,” but the essentially universal human desire to appear at least a little higher than you really are. The situation of delusion is comically exaggerated. But the main thing in which Gogol’s grotesque was realized was the mirage intrigue, which highlighted in a fantastic light the absurdity of human life in its pursuit of numerous mirages, when the best human forces are wasted in the desire to overtake the emptiness so brilliantly embodied by Khlestakov. The petrification of the “silent stage” emphasizes and grotesquely highlights the illusory, miraculous nature of goals, the achievement of which one sometimes devotes one’s whole life to.

Psychologism of Russian classical literature Andrey Borisovich Esin

M.Yu. Lermontov "HERO OF OUR TIME"

M.Yu. Lermontov

"HERO OF OUR TIME"

Lermontov's worldview took shape in the late 20s - early 30s of the 19th century, in the era of the ideological crisis of the advanced noble intelligentsia associated with the defeat of the December uprising and the Nikolaev reaction in all areas public life, including spiritual and ideological. The need to master the “mistakes of the fathers,” to rethink what seemed immutable to the previous generation, to develop one’s own moral and philosophical position is a characteristic feature of the era of the late 20s – 30s. Practical action turned out to be impossible due to both objective (the harsh policies of the autocracy) and subjective reasons: before action, it was necessary to overcome the ideological crisis, the era of doubt and skepticism; clearly define in the name of what and how to act. That is why in the 30s, the philosophical searches of its best representatives, their attempts to decide on the solution of the most general ideological and moral problems, acquired such exceptional importance for culture, for the present and future development of society:

The idea of ​​personality, its highest value for culture, acquired exceptional significance in the 30s and became Starting point in search of the advanced noble intelligentsia. If the generation of the late 10s - early 30s still thought of the individual in harmony with society and, based on the idea of ​​citizenship, limited individual freedom to the interests of the state and nation, then after the December uprising and the subsequent changes in politics, the illusory, utopian nature of this approach. Between the autocratic Nicholas regime and the free, thinking, progressive personality, a relationship of antagonism was inevitably established. At the same time, the autocracy is actively trying to neutralize the progressive intelligentsia, flirting with them, offering a kind of cooperation, and essentially trying to put their talent into its service - this is how Nicholas I tried to make Pushkin a court poet. In these conditions, personal freedom was increasingly perceived as the only real value, the only refuge of man. It is no coincidence that Lermontov’s Pechorin values ​​freedom so much: “I will put my life at stake a hundred times, even my honor, but I will not give up my freedom.” This confession sounds unexpected in the mouth of a nobleman and an officer, for whom honor has traditionally been the highest value - let us at least remember how Pushkin’s Grinev risked in the name of honor, let us remember the epigraph, which in many ways expresses the main idea of ​​the story: “Take care of honor from a young age.” Pechorin is a man of a different generation, and the fact that he is ready to put freedom above all else is very significant.

But for the progressive consciousness of the era, freedom alone is not enough, because this is a subjective value that dooms a person to loneliness. Already Onegin, in the last chapter of the novel (written around 1830), calls his freedom “hateful,” and this is not accidental. In the advanced consciousness of the era, the need to find higher, transpersonal ideals and values, to justify one’s individual existence with a sublime goal, powerfully asserts itself. In the meantime, there is no such goal - there is no moral basis for action, and freedom turns into a “burden”, dooming a person to inaction, melancholy, or to useless, random, thoughtless actions. A person who has fully realized his inner freedom persistently searches for what to apply this freedom to, how to use his rich inner possibilities. In other words, the 1930s were extremely characterized by an intense search for the meaning of life, reaching to the deepest layers, raising the most fundamental philosophical problems.

The objective historical impossibility of finding sublime, transpersonal ideals that would satisfy the strict requirements of the individual, would agree with the principle of internal freedom and would withstand the test of doubt, led the individual to realize the tragedy of his existence, gave rise to constant doubts, a complex internal struggle with himself.

The desire to independently comprehend reality, to reach the very roots in this comprehension, to strictly and meticulously understand the complex dialectics of life, not being satisfied with approximate solutions and questioning everything - this feature of the spiritual atmosphere gave rise to a special principle of human approach to reality - analyticity, i.e. e. the need and ability to dissect any phenomenon, consider the mechanisms hidden in it, understand its deep essence, and reach its logical conclusion in knowledge. Analysis becomes the most important feature of thinking, including artistic thinking.

Lermontov was a true exponent of the spiritual life of Russia in the 1930s, and his worldview reflected with exceptional completeness those characteristic properties public consciousness eras in question.

The properties of Lermontov’s worldview determine the problematic and thematic content of his novel “A Hero of Our Time.” Object artistic comprehension in the novel there becomes a character that is to a certain extent close to Lermontov himself. This does not mean, of course, that Pechorin is a self-portrait - Lermontov himself justifiably sneered at such an assumption in the “Preface”. But in Pechorin the same type of social consciousness is artistically reproduced - its main content is the process of philosophical self-determination in reality.

At the same time, the principle of typification in the novel is such that Pechorin appears as a person, to the maximum extent embodying all the characteristic features of the social consciousness of the 30s. By the will of the author, he is endowed with such features as extraordinary intensity of moral and philosophical searches (for Pechorin, the resolution of a moral and philosophical problem is much more important than how his personal life will turn out), exceptional willpower, an extremely similar mind, capable of penetrating to the very depths philosophical questions; finally, Pechorin is endowed with simply extraordinary human abilities. In other words, we have before us an exceptional person. Lermontov needed this principle of typification so that the questions that worried him could be raised by Pechorin at the most serious and authoritative level. Pechorin is a man who is ready to reflect insightfully and fearlessly about the deep moral and philosophical foundations of both the world as a whole and individual person in the world. This is exactly what Lermontov needed in the light of the entire problematic of the novel, which is clearly expressed philosophical character. The questions that Pechorin is struggling to resolve are questions that extremely occupied the artistic consciousness of Lermontov himself. These are problems of man and the world, the meaning of individual existence, will and fate, extraordinary talent and ordinary fate, the purpose of activity, the reasons for inactivity, etc. The ideological and moral searches of the hero appear as the main problematic content of the entire novel.

This kind of problem, as we remember, directly required a fairly developed and deep psychologism.

The substantive features of Lermontov's novel determined the emergence of an original psychological style in it. It could be called analytical psychologism - according to the leading principle of depicting mental life. This means that Lermontov can decompose any internal state into its components, analyze it in detail, and bring any thought to its logical conclusion. The psychological world in the novel (this applies, of course, primarily to the main character, Pechorin) appears as complex, filled with contradictions that need to be artistically identified, explained and unraveled. “I have an innate passion to contradict,” Pechorin says about himself and further characterizes his inner world: “ Whole life mine was just a chain of sad, unsuccessful contradictions to my heart or reason. The presence of an enthusiast fills me with a baptismal chill, and I think frequent intercourse with a sluggish phlegmatic would make me a passionate dreamer.”

It is not easy to understand such a psychological picture, therefore Lermontov’s psychological analysis is often structured as the discovery of hidden layers of the inner world, those motivations and mental movements that do not lie on the surface, are unclear at first glance even to the hero himself. Often this is an analysis of what is hidden behind a particular action or behavior. For example, Grushnitsky asks Pechorin if he was touched when looking at Princess Mary; he answers negatively. It is extremely important for Lermontov to reveal what psychological reasons are behind this answer, and Pechorin immediately names them: firstly, he wanted to piss off Grushnitsky; secondly, “an innate passion to contradict”; thirdly: “... I also admit that an unpleasant, but familiar feeling ran slightly through my heart at that moment; this feeling was envy; I boldly say “envy” because I’m used to admitting everything to myself.”

Pechorin's self-analysis is always very bold, and therefore every state of mind is written out in the novel clearly and in detail. Here, for example, is how Pechorin explains his relative calm after an unexpected meeting with Vera: “Yes, I have already passed that period of spiritual life when one is looking only for happiness, when the heart feels the need to love someone strongly and passionately - now I just want to be beloved, and then by very few; even it seems to me that one constant attachment would be enough for me: a pathetic habit of the heart!

Explaining the various psychological situations and positions, Pechorin reveals to the reader both the stable properties of his personality and the features of his mental makeup: logical thinking, the ability to see cause-and-effect relationships, the ability to doubt everything, the subordination of thoughts and emotional impulses to a strong will and clear reason. “One thing has always been strange to me: I have never become a slave to the woman I love; on the contrary, I always acquired invincible power over their will and heart, without trying at all.” Here Pechorin not so much reveals the psychological state that he is experiencing at the moment, but rather generalizes a number of similar psychological states: this is his mental life in general, and not at the moment. But the analysis, of course, does not end there - Pechorin asks himself an obligatory, fundamental question for himself: “Why is this? - Is it because I never value anything very much and that they were constantly afraid to let me out of their hands? or is it the magnetic influence of a strong organism? Or have I just never met a woman with a stubborn character?

No matter how the hero answers this specific question, the important thing is that he thinks, doubts, goes through options - in every somewhat complex case he looks for an answer, learns the world with the help of reason and logic. This is the peculiarity and specificity of the psychological make-up of his personality.

The most important question for an analyst is the question of the reasons and motives of human actions, actions, mental states, and their hidden meaning. The merit of Lermontov the psychologist is that he - perhaps for the first time in Russian literature - focused artistic attention not on external, plot, but on internal, psychological motivations of human behavior. The main character of the novel, himself highest degree prone to analysis, able to penetrate into the hidden motives of his own and others’ actions, in the last three parts bears the main narrative load in the system of psychological style: it is he who reveals psychological motives, explains the mental states - both his own and others. Here, for example, are Pechorin’s general thoughts on the connection between a person’s mental state and purely physical reasons: “I love to ride a hot horse through tall grass... Whatever sorrow lies in my heart, whatever anxiety torments my thoughts, everything will dissipate in a minute; the soul will become light, the fatigue of the body will overcome the anxiety of the mind”; “I came out of the bath fresh and alert, as if I was going to a ball. After this, say that the soul does not depend on the body!”

Here is a purely psychological explanation of antipathy towards Grushnitsky: “I don’t like him either: I feel that we will someday collide with him on a narrow road, and one of us will be in trouble.” Here is an explanation of the impression from the face of a blind boy: “I confess that I have a strong prejudice against all the blind, crooked, deaf, dumb, legless, armless, hunchbacked, etc. I noticed that there is always some strange relationship between a person’s appearance and his soul: as if with the loss of a member, the soul loses some kind of feeling.” But the psychological image does not end with this general consideration: then a more specific internal state is recorded and at the same time it is analyzed: “For a long time I looked at him with involuntary regret, when suddenly a barely noticeable smile ran across his thin lips and, I don’t know why, it had an effect. I was most unpleasantly impressed.” The analysis does not end here either - Pechorin cannot say “I don’t know why” and not try to explain the vague mental movement: “A suspicion was born in my head that this blind man is not as blind as he seems; It was in vain that I tried to convince myself that it was impossible to fake thorns, and for what purpose? But what to do? I am often prone to prejudice...” In the last part of the passage there is the doubt most characteristic of Pechorin; at the same time, the depiction of the psychological state is finally brought to an end: the last link is the hero’s suspicion, about which he will say elsewhere: “I like to doubt everything.”

And here, finally, is a masterpiece of analytical analysis of one’s own behavior and psychological state, a merciless disclosure of psychological reasons, motives for actions and intentions:

“I often ask myself why I am so persistent in seeking the love of a young girl whom I do not want to seduce and whom I will never marry? Why this female coquetry? Vera loves me more than Princess Mary will ever love me; If she seemed to me an invincible beauty, then perhaps I would have been attracted by the difficulty of the enterprise...

But nothing happened! Consequently, this is not the restless need for love that torments us in the first years of youth...

Why am I bothering? Out of envy of Grushnitsky? Poor thing! he doesn't deserve her at all. Or is this a consequence of that nasty but invincible feeling that makes us destroy the sweet delusions of our neighbor...

But there is immense pleasure in possessing a young, barely blossoming soul!.. I feel in myself this insatiable greed, absorbing everything that comes along the way; I look at the sufferings and joys of others only in relation to myself, as food that supports my mental strength. I myself am no longer capable of going mad under the influence of passion; My ambition was suppressed by circumstances, but it manifested itself in a different form, for ambition is nothing more than a thirst for power, and my first pleasure is to subordinate to my will everything that surrounds me.”

Here, psychological analysis reaches to the very depths of the ideological and moral content of character, to the core of the hero’s personality - his will. And let us pay attention to how analytical the above passage is: this is an almost scientific examination of a psychological problem, both in terms of methods for solving it and in terms of results. First, the question is posed - posed with all possible clarity and logical clarity. Then obviously untenable explanations are discarded (“I don’t want to seduce and I will never marry”). Next begins the discussion about more complex and deep reasons: How possible reasons the need for love (“Vera loves me more…”) and “sports interest” (“if only she seemed to me an invincible beauty…”) are rejected. From here the conclusion is drawn, which is now straightforwardly logical: "Hence..." Possible explanations are again considered (I would like to call them hypotheses), which still do not satisfy Pechorin, and finally analytical thought reaches the right way, referring to the positive emotions that Pechorin’s plan and the anticipation of its implementation give him: “But there is immense pleasure.” The analysis goes in a new circle: where does this pleasure come from, what is its nature? And here is the result - the cause of the causes, something indisputable and obvious: “my first pleasure...”. The problem, through a series of successive operations and constructions, is reduced to an axiom, to something that has long been decided and indisputable.

Psychological analysis, focused only on one, even the most gifted and complex personality, in a larger narrative risks becoming monotonous, but psychologism as a principle of depiction in Lermontov’s novel extends to other characters. True, this is done with the help of the same Pechorin: confidently and mercilessly penetrating into the recesses of his own soul, he freely reads in the souls of other people, constantly explaining the motives of their actions, guessing the reasons for this or that action, state of mind, giving an interpretation external signs feelings: “At that moment I met her eyes: tears were running in them; her hand, leaning on mine, trembled; cheeks were burning; she felt sorry for me! Compassion, a feeling that all women so easily submit to, let its claws into her inexperienced heart. During the entire walk she was absent-minded and did not flirt with anyone - and this is a great sign! “All the way home she talked and laughed every minute. There was something feverish in her movements; she didn’t look at me even once... And the princess rejoiced inwardly, looking at her daughter; and my daughter is simply having a nervous attack: she will spend the night without sleep and will cry.”

The psychological state of Bela, Maxim Maksimych, and the characters in the story “Taman” is not given to us in such detail, but, firstly, these characters themselves are psychologically quite simple, and, secondly, we see mainly only external manifestations of their feelings because Pechorin , this psychological narrator, does not yet cast his analytical gaze on them. But in “Princess Mary” and in “Fatalist” a kind of psychological atmosphere is created, psychologism becomes the principle of depicting a number of characters, largely subordinating both the plot and the details of the outside world, and this is very important for the formation of a psychological style, psychological narrative.

The fact is that the entire character of the main character, and the other characters, is partly constructed by Lermontov as a kind of riddle that requires revealing the essential behind the visible, and the internal behind the external. This kind of analytical attitude - to make the mysterious clear, to discover hidden motives of behavior, the causes of mental states - is a specific, characteristic feature of the psychologism of “A Hero of Our Time”. Here psychologism serves as a tool for realistic knowledge of what, at a first approximation, seems mysterious. This dictates a special structure of the narrative: a change of narrators, the organization of artistic time, the relationship between external and internal.

Thus, the connections between the internal, psychological state and the forms of its external expression turn out to be extremely interesting. Throughout all five stories we can see that the heroes are trying not to “give themselves away” outwardly, not to show their thoughts and experiences, to hide their emotional movements: Bela does not want to show her love for Pechorin and longing for him; Maxim Maksimych, stung by Pechorin’s attitude towards him, still “tries to assume an indifferent look”: “He was sad and angry, although he tried to hide it”; The heroes of “Princess Mary” constantly try to hide their emotional movements. This kind of behavior requires psychological decoding, and the innovation of Lermontov the psychologist consisted in the fact that he began to artistically reproduce precisely inconsistency external behavior to the internal state of the heroes, which was very rare or completely absent in previous literature (except, perhaps, Pushkin). It is much easier to depict in literature the complete correspondence of the external and the internal - then, in fact, there is no need for psychologism as a direct penetration into the spiritual life of a person, invisible to the eye: joy can be indicated by laughter, grief - by tears, emotional excitement - by trembling of hands, etc. Lermontov follows a more complex path: he reveals ambiguous, indirect correspondences between internal and external movements, which requires direct psychological commentary on the depiction of the portrait and behavior, their psychological interpretation. Another thing is that the emotional movements of most of the characters can be read quite easily from their faces and actions, especially since the commentator and interpreter in the novel is mainly such a deep psychologist, observer and analyst as Pechorin. Pechorin understands when people’s facial expressions and behavior are sincere, and when they “pretend”, it is clear what is behind it: “She could hardly force herself not to smile and hide her triumph; she managed, however, quite soon to assume a completely indifferent and even stern appearance”; “He was embarrassed, blushed, then laughed forcedly”; “Grushnitsky took on a mysterious appearance; walks with his hands behind his back and doesn’t recognize anyone.”

External manifestations of the internal state, although they do not contain much mystery here, still no longer directly express emotions and experiences, but require psychological interpretation. What is truly mysterious is the relationship between the external and the internal in the image of Pechorin himself.

The point here, firstly, is that by nature he knows how to better control himself, keep himself in control and even pretend, and those around him are not insightful and psychologically sophisticated enough to understand the reasons and motives of his behavior, what is worth behind one or another facial movement. Princess Mary does not notice that before the famous monologue “Yes, such has been my fate since childhood...” Pechorin was not actually touched, but only “adopted a deeply touched look.” This is natural, because the princess is still a completely inexperienced girl who does not distinguish between sincerity and acting. But even such an attentive person as Werner is deceived: “I’m surprised at you,” said the doctor, shaking my hand firmly. - Let me feel the pulse!.. Oh-ho! feverish!.. but nothing is noticeable on the face.”

Secondly, Pechorin is generally restrained: he lives primarily an internal life, preferring not to reveal emotional movements - no longer for the game, but for himself. This is how, for example, Maxim Maksimych describes Pechorin’s appearance and behavior after Bela’s death: “His face did not express anything special, and I felt annoyed; If I were him, I would die of grief. Finally, he sat down on the ground, in the shade, and began to draw something in the sand with a stick. You know, more for the sake of decency, I wanted to console him, I started talking; he raised his head and laughed... A chill ran through my skin from this laughter...” There is already a complexity here that cannot be immediately and unambiguously interpreted psychologically: the hero’s behavior may indicate indifference, but it may also indicate that his feelings are indifferent. this moment too much deep to find expression in traditional forms lamentations, sobs, etc.

Here the third reason becomes visible, due to which Pechorin’s internal state and its external manifestation almost always do not correspond to each other: his internal life is too complex and contradictory to find a complete and accurate external expression; in addition, it occurs primarily in the forms of thought, which generally cannot be reflected in any way fully in facial expressions, actions, etc.

All this creates such a mystery of the external behavior and appearance of the hero, which requires an indispensable penetration into the psychological processes associated with ideological and moral foundations character. “He was a nice guy, I dare to assure you; only a little strange,” Maxim Maksimych says about Pechorin, based on observations of external behavior. – After all, for example, in the rain, in the cold, hunting all day; everyone will be cold and tired, but nothing to him. And another time he sits in his room, smells the wind, assures him that he has a cold; If he knocks with a shutter, he will tremble and turn pale, but with me he went to hunt a wild boar one on one; It happened that you wouldn’t get a word for hours at a time, but sometimes, as soon as he started talking, you’d burst your stomach with laughter... Yes, sir, he was very strange.”

For Maxim Maksimych, in fact, there is not even a mystery here yet: just a strange character, you never know what kind of people there are in the world. But for the thoughtful reader, Pechorin, as he appears in the story “Bela,” is not just strange, but mysterious. We are already beginning to guess what is behind such contradictory behavior and what reasons it is caused by. The psychological mystery of the hero is enhanced by his portrayal through the eyes of another narrator - the “publisher” of the diary, “fellow traveler” Maxim Maksimych. At this stage, the external relates to the internal differently: there is still a contradiction and discrepancy, but the narrator is already trying to interpret external behavior, build some, at least hypothetical, conclusions about character and the psychological world: “...I noticed that he did not wave his arms - a sure sign of some secrecy of character”; his eyes did not laugh when he laughed: “this is a sign of either an evil disposition or a deep constant sadness" etc. Here the complexity of the relationship between the external and the psychological is already realized; It becomes clear that there is something to look for in the hero’s inner world, and thus, that subsequent psychological analysis on behalf of Pechorin himself, which will unfold in “Taman”, “Princess Mary” and “Fatalist”, becomes necessary.

Thus, the compositional and narrative structure of “A Hero of Our Time” is largely subordinated to psychologism as style dominant. The change of narrators is aimed at constantly strengthening the psychologism and making the analysis of the inner world deeper and more comprehensive. Maxim Maksimych’s narrative creates the preconditions for further psychological analysis based on mystery, the discrepancy between the external and the internal. The second story partly begins such an analysis, but, of course, in no way satisfies the reader’s curiosity, but only inflames it. In Pechorin's diary, psychological analysis becomes the main element of the narrative. However, this does not happen immediately. The psychological narrative in the first story, “Taman,” is still abrupt, occupied with external dynamics, as a result of which the analysis does not reach the underlying causes, the ideological and moral essence of character. Even at the beginning of "Princess Mary" the psychological mystery is still intensifying. “It’s fun to live in such a land! Some kind of gratifying feeling flowed through all my veins. The air is clean and fresh, like a child's kiss; the sun is bright, the sky is blue - what else seems to be more? Why are there passions, desires, regrets?..” But in fact: why did Pechorin suddenly remember this in the midst of this joyful nature, experiencing “some kind of gratifying feeling” about “passions, desires, regrets”? A completely unmotivated outward train of thought is alarming and makes us assume greater psychological depth than that expressed in diary entry. I remember the mysterious Sail:

Below him is a stream of lighter azure,

Above him is a golden ray of sun...

And he, the rebellious one, asks for a storm,

As if there is peace in the storms!

The riddle begins to be analytically resolved only in the course of further narration. And the analysis ends with “The Fatalist,” where psychologism touches on the deepest—philosophical—problems of character.

The structure of the literary time of the novel, especially its last three parts, is also subordinated to the tasks of analytical psychologism. The narration is conducted in diary form, which means that events and the experiences they cause are recorded on paper, even if in hot pursuit, but still with some time gap, some time after they occurred. The narrative always tells not about what is happening at the moment, but about something that has already happened. This also applies to the psychological states experienced by Pechorin, which is fundamentally important. The time distance between an experience and a story about it allows one to rationally comprehend and analyze the psychological state, understand it, look at it from the outside, and look for reasons and explanations. In other words, the picture of the inner world appears to us already “processed”, mediated by Pechorin’s subsequent reflections on it.

This is especially true for the emotional sphere, the area of ​​feelings: they are always under subsequent rational control, and we see not so much a direct experience as a memory of this experience, accompanied by constant analysis, analysis of the reasons and the “psychological chains” caused by it: “My heart sank painfully like after the first breakup. Oh, how I rejoiced at this feeling! Is it really youth with its beneficial storms that wants to return to me again, or is this just its farewell glance, its last gift as a keepsake?..” Here the distance between the time of experience and the time of narration about it is simply necessary: ​​after all, Pechorin needs some time to realize that he was happy and try to understand the reasons for his feelings.

Or here’s another example, similar, but perhaps even more expressive:

“...I fell on the wet grass and cried like a child.

And for a long time I lay motionless and cried bitterly, not trying to hold back my tears and sobs; I thought my chest would burst; all my firmness, all my composure disappeared like smoke; my soul became weak, my mind fell silent, and if at that moment anyone had seen me, he would have turned away with contempt.

When the night dew and mountain wind refreshed my burning head and my thoughts returned to normal order, I realized that chasing after lost happiness was useless and reckless...

However, I am glad that I can cry! However, perhaps this is due to frayed nerves, a night spent without sleep, two minutes at the barrel of a gun and an empty stomach.”

There are not even one, but two time gaps: Pechorin analyzes his emotional state after some time, “when the night dew and mountain wind refreshed... his burning head and thoughts returned to normal order,” and the entry in the diary is made a month and a half after the described events. The memory filter did its job, gave the picture of the inner world analytical clarity, but at the same time deprived it of spontaneity to an even greater extent.

As we see, a narrative directed from the present to the past, aimed at what has already been experienced, has great artistic advantages from the point of view of the tasks of analytical psychologism. In such a structure of artistic time, the real flow of mental life can be stopped and replayed in memory again and again, as in a slow motion replay. modern television, – the psychological state is then seen more clearly, previously unnoticed nuances, details, and connections are revealed in it. Such a structure of artistic time is perfectly suited for reproducing complex experiences.

However, such an organization of artistic time also has its disadvantages. Lermontov’s psychological depiction has certain limits, which are set for him precisely by the principle of narration “from the present to the past.” In such an image, feelings, experiences, and partly thoughts lose their spontaneity, are “purified”, and rationalized. The vividness in the transfer of experiences is lost, the emotional intensity is weakened, and the reader does not have the illusion of an experience unfolding directly before his eyes. Meanwhile, the diary form itself makes it possible to create such an illusion - for this it is only necessary to rearrange the structure of artistic time so that the entry in the diary reflects the psychological processes occurring at the very moment of writing. This technique was later successfully used by L. Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, and in Lermontov himself we once find this form of image - this is a recording before a duel:

“It’s two o’clock in the morning... I can’t sleep... But I need to fall asleep so that my hand doesn’t tremble tomorrow. However, it is difficult to miss at six steps. A! Mr. Grushnitsky! you will not succeed in your hoax... You think that I will offer my forehead to you without a dispute... but we will cast lots!.. and then... then... what if his luck prevails? if my star finally cheats on me?..

And maybe I’ll die tomorrow!.., and there won’t be a single creature left on earth who would understand me completely.”

Here, as it were, the process of experiencing itself is directly recorded; this is no longer a look from the present into the past, but a “direct transmission” of what is being experienced at the moment. Therefore it becomes different psychological drawing: he appears disordered, thoughts follow each other fragmentarily, pauses appear, indicated by ellipses. The liveliness and spontaneity in the transmission of the internal state increases, it becomes more natural, psychologically more reliable.

However, such reproduction experiences in its natural form, not passed through an analytical filter, is a unique case in Lermontov’s novel. Much more often we encounter direct fixation mental process. Here, analytical psychologism in the diary form of narration has much more possibilities, because if it is difficult to record emotions on the pages of a diary directly at the moment of experience, then recording the flow of thoughts is a much more natural situation.

There is one more limitation that is imposed on psychological drawing by the principle of analysis and the associated structure of artistic time. Lermontov's psychologism is focused mainly on the image of a stable, static person in the mental world and is much less suitable for reproducing internal dynamics, the gradual transition of one feelings and thoughts to others. Chernyshevsky drew attention to this feature of Lermontov’s psychologism, contrasting the psychological style of writing of Lermontov and Tolstoy. This property naturally followed from the general principles of Lermontov’s depiction of the inner world: in order to exhaustively analyze a particular psychological state, it must be stopped, recorded - only then can it be detailed analysis into components. The retrospective nature of psychological analysis also contributes to the static nature of the image: in memories, any mental state usually appears not as a process, but as something stable, settled.

Attention mainly to the static aspects of the inner world can hardly be considered a shortcoming of Lermontov's psychologism. Anyway, low dynamics psychological processes are more than compensated for by the fact that this approach to the inner world allows Lermontov to exhaustively analyze very complex psychological states. The artistic mastery of the inconsistency of a person’s mental life at any given moment, which became possible largely thanks to the depiction of psychological statics, is the undoubted merit of Lermontov the psychologist, a step forward in the development of psychologism.

And it cannot be said that in “A Hero of Our Time” we do not see the mobility of the inner world at all. The above applies primarily to the reproduction of feelings and emotional states, in the field of thought, Lermontov more than once shows us precisely the process, the movement - from one idea to another, from premises to conclusions. For example, in the following passage:

“The stars calmly shone on the dark blue vault, and I felt funny when I remembered that there were once wise people who thought that the heavenly bodies took part in our insignificant disputes over a piece of land or for some fictitious rights. So what? these lamps, lit, in their opinion, only to illuminate their battles and celebrations, burn with the same brilliance, and their passions and hopes have long faded away along with them... But what willpower was given to them by the confidence that the whole sky with its countless inhabitants looks at them with sympathy, although mute, but unchanging! our own happiness, because we know its impossibility and indifferently move from doubt to doubt.”

Here, an external impression gives rise to a memory, a memory gives impetus to reflection, and reflection goes through a number of stages according to the laws of logic. The dynamics of the thought process with all its patterns are recreated quite accurately and completely.

Sometimes we see images of individual emotional states in their movement: “I returned home, excited by two different feelings. The first was sadness. “Why do they all hate me?” I thought. “For what? Have I offended anyone? No. Am I really one of those people whose mere appearance already generates ill will?” And I felt that poisonous anger was little by little filling my soul.” Even if in a short period of mental life and not in such detail as later in L. Tolstoy, the process of transition from one feeling to another is traced and artistically recorded here; the movement of emotions is accompanied and mediated by the movement of thought.

The general principles of Lermontov's psychologism also determined the corresponding system of specific forms and techniques for depicting the inner world. The number of these forms is limited, and undoubtedly the leading role in their system is occupied by psychological introspection- one of the methods of depicting the inner world, when the bearer of the experience speaks about his experience. It is necessary to distinguish between its two main forms: introspection and self-disclosure of the hero. In the second method, the hero directly expresses his thoughts and feelings, conveys the flow of spiritual life, often in the form of confession; the time of the experience coincides with the time of its image: the hero talks about what he is experiencing now, at the moment. With the first method, we observe not the direct expression of the experience, but a story about the experience - about our own inner world, but as if from the outside. In terms of artistic time, the narrative is organized as a memory-analysis.

It was this second form that became the leading one in the system. psychological image at Lermontov's. It is important to note that in “A Hero of Our Time” there is no neutral narrator who could add something to Pechorin’s self-analysis, comment on his “autopsychologism,” and add new touches to the picture of the inner world. There is no need for such a narrator: Pechorin is a fairly subtle observer and analyst, he is not afraid to tell himself the truth about his thoughts and feelings, so introspection gives us enough full picture inner world, to which, in essence, there is nothing more to add. “I weigh and examine my own passions and actions with strict curiosity, but without participation,” Pechorin tells Werner. “There are two people in me: one lives in the full sense of the word, the other thinks and judges it.”

In addition, the problematic and thematic side of Lermontov’s novel, which was mentioned at the beginning, required focusing on the detailed reproduction of one character, who maximally embodied the moral searches of the social consciousness of the era and the ideological and philosophical tendencies characteristic of it. In this case, the form of psychological narration in the first person was just more suitable: it made it possible to reveal the inner world of only one character, but to do it with maximum depth and detail.

It is curious, however, that in the novel, besides Pechorin, there is another psychologically rich and interesting character– the character of Vera. Pechorin's analysis, aimed at her inner world, does not reveal all the mysteries of her soul, and since there is no neutral, omniscient narrator from whom we could learn about the mental life of this heroine, Lermontov again resorts to the same technique: psychological introspection. For this purpose, a letter from Vera is included in the novel, in which she analyzes her feelings for Pechorin, tries to explain its reasons, and traces its development. Thus, psychological introspection in “A Hero of Our Time” is a comprehensive and universal form of depicting complex mental movements. To reproduce simpler and more obvious experiences characteristic of other characters, we use, as already mentioned, the psychological interpretation given by main character actions, behavior, words, facial expressions of others.

Another important form of psychological depiction in a novel is internal monologue, those. such a reproduction of thoughts that directly records the work of consciousness at a given moment. Due to the above-mentioned features of the temporal structure, the possibilities for using this form turned out to be very limited: usually what we have before us is not a direct recording of the thought process taking place in the hero’s mind at the moment, but a recording of these thoughts “retrospectively,” already analytically processed. In those cases when we have a relatively direct recording of what the hero is thinking at the very moment of recording, i.e. Indeed, an internal monologue, it has some specific features. The main one is that internal speech in the novel is structured according to the laws of external speech: it is logically ordered, consistent, free from unexpected associations and side trains of thought, does not allow “abbreviated speech” (omission of words, logical constructions), it does not contain only internal speech syntactic constructions, etc. If we analyze, for example, such internal monologues of Pechorin as “I often ask myself...”, “There is nothing more paradoxical female mind...,” “I’m running through my entire past in my memory...”, then we can easily see that a person cannot always think in such rationally verified, harmonious phrases; human thinking is usually much more inconsistent and chaotic. (It is interesting to compare, in particular, the internal monologue “I run through my entire past in my memory...” and the “external” monologues similar in theme: “I have an unhappy character...” in “Bela”, “Yes, that was my fate..." in "Princess Mary". The speech manner and style are the same in all cases.)

This feature of internal monologues in the novel is connected, firstly, with diary form narratives: the form of expression of thoughts here is not just “external speech”, but written speech, which, of course, has its own rules of construction. Secondly (and more importantly), the rationality of internal monologues is explained by general principle psychologism - its analyticity: Lermontov set his task not so much to recreate the flow inner life in its real disorder, how much to give an exhaustive logical and psychological analysis of mental life. This, naturally, required conducting inner speech through the filter of written speech and requiring its orderliness.

The original psychological style of Lermontov's novel, where all techniques and forms of depiction are subordinated to the principle of analysis, arose naturally as a form of revealing the moral and philosophical foundations of character and ideological quest generation of the 30s. For the first time in Russian realistic literature, Lermontov created a major epic work, in which psychologism became the undisputed artistic dominant, the main property of the style. We can say that “A Hero of Our Time” is the first psychological novel in the full sense of the word in Russian literature of the 19th century.