A clash of characters and circumstances. The plot of a literary work
Conflict is an acute clash of characters and circumstances, views and principles of life;
Dialogue is a conversation between two, sometimes more, persons;
Monologue is the speech of one person in a work of art;
Remark - instructions or explanations of the author that accompany the actions of the characters, the intonation of their speech, gestures, and the setting of the action. Mostly, they are given in parentheses and used in the texts of plays.
DRAMA IN FIVE ACTS
Katerina is the main character of the play.
Kabanova is a rich merchant’s wife, Katerina’s mother-in-law.
Tikhon Kabanov is her son, Katerina’s husband.
Varvara is Tikhon’s sister.
Dikoy is a merchant, a significant person in the city.
Boris is Dikiy's nephew.
Kudryash is Varvara’s friend.
Kuligin is a self-taught watchmaker.
Exposition
Exposition - pictures of the Volga open space and stuffiness of Kalinovsky morals (D. I, appearances 1-4).
The beginning - to her mother-in-law’s nagging, Katerina replies with dignity and peace-lovingly: “You’re talking about me, Mama, in vain. Whether in front of people or without people, I’m still alone, I don’t prove anything of myself.” The first collision (D. I, phenomenon 5).
Next comes development of the conflict between the heroes, a thunderstorm gathers twice in nature (D. I, Rev. 9). Katerina admits to Varvara that she fell in love with Boris; an old lady's prophecy, a distant clap of thunder; end D. IV.
The thundercloud crawls as if alive; a half-mad old woman threatens Katerina with death in the pool and hell, and Katerina confesses to sin ( first climax ), falls unconscious. But the thunderstorm never hit the city, only pre-storm tension.
Second climax - Katerina pronounces the last monologue when she says goodbye not to life, which is already unbearable, but with love: “My friend! My joy! Farewell!” (D. V, iv. 4).
Denouement - Katerina’s suicide, the shock of the inhabitants of the city, Tikhon, who, being alive, envies his dead wife: “Good for you, Katya! But why did I stay to live and suffer!..” (D. V, Rev. 7).
Main theme –
Main theme –
a clash between new trends and old traditions, between the oppressors and the oppressed, between the desire of people for the free manifestation of their human rights, spiritual needs and the social, family and everyday order prevailing in pre-reform Russia.
The conflict between old social and everyday principles and new, progressive aspirations for equality, for the freedom of the human person.
Main conflict – Katerina and Boris with their environment.
Varvara Katerina
Boris Tikhon
Curly
Katerina's life
Katerina's life
parental home:
Relatives loved;
Attended church;
Walked;
Romantic attitude
to life
2. Katerina’s life in the house
Kabanikha:
Kabanikha's cruel attitude;
Constant spiritual rebellion;
Misunderstanding of her nature and aspirations
Tikhon;
Awareness of one's doom;
Closedness, disappointment in
family life;
Passionate desire for freedom, love,
fortunately.
Honesty, spontaneity;
Moral purity;
Determination, courage;
Passionate nature, depth of feelings;
The desire for freedom;
Poetic nature;
Extraordinary mind;
Kindness, selflessness.
tragedy
Ostrovsky himself called the play drama , thereby emphasizing the widespread nature of the play’s conflict and the everyday nature of the events depicted in it.
By all indications of the genre, the play "The Thunderstorm" - tragedy , since the conflict between the heroes leads to tragic consequences. There are also elements of comedy in the play (the tyrant Dikoy with his absurd, degrading demands, Feklusha’s stories, the arguments of the Kalinovites), which help to see the abyss that is ready to swallow Katerina and which Kuligin unsuccessfully tries to illuminate with the light of reason, kindness and mercy.
The tragic ending of the drama is Katerina’s protest against Kabanov’s concepts of morality, the affirmation of the strength of a free man, his victory over the “dark kingdom”
Is Katerina's death accidental?
Is Katerina's death accidental?
Could it have been avoided?
Could Katerina expect help, and if so, from whom?
Why did Ostrovsky call his play “The Thunderstorm”?
When do we encounter a thunderstorm in the play?
What changed in the city of Kalinov after the “thunderstorm”?
What is the name of an acute clash of characters in a literary work, which underlies the action and determines the course of the plot (precisely such a clash is outlined in the above passage)?
Read the passage and answer the questions after the text.
- What is this? hugging again? - Pavel Petrovich’s voice came from behind them.
Father and son were equally delighted to see him at that moment; There are touching situations from which you still want to get out of them as quickly as possible.
- Why are you surprised? - Nikolai Petrovich spoke cheerfully. “For once, I waited for Arkasha... I haven’t had time to look at him enough since yesterday.”
“I’m not surprised at all,” noted Pavel Petrovich, “I wouldn’t even mind hugging him myself.”
Arkady went up to his uncle and again felt the touch of his fragrant mustache on his cheeks. Pavel Petrovich sat down at the table. He was wearing an elegant morning suit, in the English style; There was a small fez on his head. This fez and casually tied tie hinted at freedom village life; but the tight collar of the shirt, though not white, but mottled, as it should be for morning dressing, rested with the usual inexorability on her shaved chin.
- Where is your new friend? - he asked Arkady.
- He's not at home; he usually gets up early and goes somewhere. The main thing is not to pay attention to him: he doesn’t like ceremonies.
- Yes, it’s noticeable. - Pavel Petrovich began, slowly, to spread butter on the bread. - How long will he stay with us?
- As necessary. He stopped here on his way to see his father.
- Where does his father live?
- In our province, eighty versts from here. He has a small estate there. He was formerly a regimental doctor.
- Te-te-te-te... That's why I kept asking myself: where did I hear this name: Bazarov?
- I think he was.
- Exactly, exactly. So this doctor is his father. Hm! - Pavel Petrovich moved his mustache. - Well, what exactly is Mr. Bazarov himself? - he asked with emphasis.
- What is Bazarov? - Arkady grinned. “Do you want me to tell you, uncle, what he actually is?”
- Do me a favor, nephew.
- He ____________________.
- How? - Nikolai Petrovich asked, and Pavel Petrovich raised a knife with a piece of butter at the end of the blade into the air and remained motionless.
“He is _______________,” repeated Arkady.
“_________________,” said Nikolai Petrovich. - This is from the Latin nihil, nothing, as far as I can tell; So this word means a person who... who doesn't recognize anything?
“Say: who doesn’t respect anything,” Pavel Petrovich picked up and started eating the butter again.
“Who views everything from a critical point of view,” Arkady noted.
- Doesn’t it matter? - asked Pavel Petrovich.
- No, it doesn’t matter. _____________ is a person who does not bow to any authority, who does not accept a single principle on faith, no matter how respectful this principle may be.
- So, is that good? - Pavel Petrovich interrupted.
I. S. Turgenev “Fathers and Sons”
Explanation.
Such a collision is called a conflict. Let's give a definition.
Conflict is a disagreement, a clash that underlies the struggle of the characters in a work of art (drama, story, story, poem, etc.); confrontation, contradiction between the characters depicted in a work of art, character and circumstances, various aspects of character.
Answer: conflict.
Answer: conflict
Read the passage and answer the questions after the text
“The same, Dikoy and Kuligin
Wild. Look, everything is soaked. (To Kuligin.) Leave me alone! Leave me alone! (With heart.) Stupid man!
Kuligin. Savel Prokofich, after all, this, your lordship, will benefit all ordinary people in general.
Wild. Go away! What a benefit! Who needs this benefit? Kuligin. Yes, at least for you, your lordship, Savel Prokofich. If only, sir, on the boulevard, on clean place, and put it. What's the cost? The consumption is empty: a stone column (shows with gestures the size of each thing), a copper plate, so round, and a hairpin, here’s a straight hairpin (shows with a gesture), the simplest one. I’ll put it all together and cut out the numbers myself. Now you, your lordship, when you deign to take a walk, or others who are walking, will now come up and see<...>And this place is beautiful, and the view, and everything, but it’s as if it’s empty. We, too, your lordship, have travelers who go there to see our views, after all, it’s a decoration - it’s more pleasing to the eye.
Wild. Why are you bothering me with all this nonsense! Maybe I don’t even want to talk to you. You should have first found out whether I am in the mood to listen to you, a fool, or not. What am I to you - equal, or what? Look, what an important matter you found! So he starts talking straight to the snout.
Kuligin. If I had minded my own business, well, then it would have been my fault. Otherwise, I am for the common good, your lordship. Well, what does ten rubles mean to society? You won't need more, sir.
Wild. Or maybe you want to steal; who knows you.
Kuligin. If I want to put my labors away for nothing, what can I steal, your lordship? Yes, everyone here knows me; No one will say anything bad about me.
Wild. Well, let them know, but I don’t want to know you. Kuligin. Why, sir, Savel Prokofich, honest man do you want to offend?
Wild. I'll give you a report or something! I don’t give an account to anyone more important than you. I want to think about you this way, and I think so. For others you fair man, but I think that you are a robber, that’s all. Did you want to hear this from me? So listen! I say I’m a robber, and that’s the end of it! So, are you going to sue me or something? So you know that you are a worm. If I want, I will have mercy, if I want, I will crush.
Kuligin. God be with you, Savel Prokofich! I, sir, small man, it won't take long to offend me. And I’ll tell you this, your lordship: “And virtue is honored in rags!”
Wild. Don't you dare be rude to me! Can you hear me!
Kuligin. I’m not doing anything rude to you, sir, but I’m telling you because maybe you’ll decide to do something for the city someday. You have strength, your dignity, something else; If only there was the will to do a good deed. Let’s just take it now: we have frequent thunderstorms, but we won’t install thunder diverters.
Wild (proudly). Everything is vanity! Kuligin. But what a fuss there was when there were experiments.
Wild. What kind of lightning taps do you have there?
Kuligin. Steel.
Wild (with anger). Well, what else?
Kuligin. Steel poles.
Wild (getting more and more angry). I heard that poles, you kind of asp; and what else? Set up: poles! Well, what else?
Kuligin. Nothing more.
Wild. What do you think a thunderstorm is, huh? Well, speak up!
Kuligin. Electricity.
Wild (stomping his foot). What other beauty there is! Why aren't you a robber? A thunderstorm is sent to us as punishment, so that we can feel it, but you want to defend yourself, God forgive me, with poles and some kind of rods. What are you, a Tatar, or what? Are you Tatar? A? speak! Tatar?
Kuligin. Savel Prokofich, your lordship, Derzhavin said: I decay with my body in dust, I command thunder with my mind.
Wild. And for these words, send you to the mayor, so he will give you a hard time! Hey, venerables! listen to what he says!
Kuligin. There is nothing to do, we must submit! But when I have a million, then I’ll talk. (Waving his hand, he leaves.)"
A.N. Ostrovsky “Thunderstorm”
What do they call sharp collision characters and circumstances underlying stage action(we see such a clash between Dikiy and Kuligin in the above fragment)?
The same ones, Dikoy and Kuligin
Wild. Look, everything is soaked. (To Kuligin.) Leave me alone! Leave me alone! (With heart.) Stupid man!
Kuligin. Savel Prokofich, after all, this, your lordship, will benefit all ordinary people in general.
Wild. Go away! What a benefit! Who needs this benefit?
Kuligin. Yes, at least for you, your lordship, Savel Prokofich. If only I could put it on the boulevard, in a clean place, sir. What's the cost? The consumption is empty: a stone column (shows with gestures the size of each thing), a copper plate, so round, and a hairpin, here’s a straight hairpin (shows with a gesture), the simplest one. I’ll put it all together and cut out the numbers myself. Now you, your lordship, when you deign to take a walk, or others who are walking, will now come up and see<...>And then this place is beautiful, and the view, and everything, but it’s as if it’s empty. We, too, Your Excellency, have travelers who come there to look at our views, after all, it’s a decoration - it’s more pleasing to the eye.
Wild. Why are you bothering me with all this nonsense! Maybe I don’t even want to talk to you. You should have first found out whether I am in the mood to listen to you, a fool, or not. What am I to you - equal, or what? Look, what an important matter you have found! So he starts talking straight to the snout.
Kuligin. If I had minded my own business, well, then it would have been my fault. Otherwise, I am for the common good, your lordship. Well, what does ten rubles mean to society? You won't need more, sir.
Wild. Or maybe you want to steal; who knows you.
Kuligin. If I want to put my labors away for nothing, what can I steal, your lordship? Yes, everyone here knows me; No one will say anything bad about me.
Wild. Well, let them know, but I don’t want to know you.
Kuligin. Why, sir, Savel Prokofich, would you like to offend an honest man?
Wild. I’ll give you a report or something! I don’t give an account to anyone more important than you. I want to think about you this way, and I think so. For others, you are an honest person, but I think that you are a robber, that’s all. Did you want to hear this from me? So listen! I say I’m a robber, and that’s the end of it! So, are you going to sue me or something? So you know that you are a worm. If I want, I will have mercy, if I want, I will crush.
Kuligin. God be with you, Savel Prokofich! I, sir, am a small person; it won’t take long to offend me. And I’ll tell you this, your lordship: “And virtue is honored in rags!”
Wild. Don't you dare be rude to me! Can you hear me!
Kuligin. I’m not doing anything rude to you, sir, but I’m telling you because maybe you’ll decide to do something for the city someday. You, your lordship, have a lot of strength; If only there was the will to do a good deed. Let’s at least take this now: we have frequent thunderstorms, but we won’t install thunder diverters.
Wild(proudly). Everything is vanity!
Kuligin. But what a fuss there was when there were experiments.
Wild. What kind of lightning taps do you have there?
Kuligin. Steel.
Wild(with anger). Well, what else?
Kuligin. Steel poles.
Wild(getting more and more angry). I heard that poles, you kind of asp; and what else? Set up: poles! Well, what else?
Kuligin. Nothing more.
Wild. What do you think a thunderstorm is, huh? Well, speak up!
Kuligin. Electricity.
Wild(stomping his foot). What other beauty there is! Why aren't you a robber? A thunderstorm is sent to us as punishment, so that we can feel it, but you want to defend yourself, God forgive me, with poles and some kind of rods. What are you, a Tatar, or what? Are you Tatar? A? speak! Tatar?
Kuligin. Savel Prokofich, your lordship, Derzhavin said:
My body is crumbling into dust,
I command thunder with my mind.
Wild. And for these words, send you to the mayor, so he will give you a hard time! Hey, venerables! listen to what he says!
Kuligin. There is nothing to do, we must submit! But when I have a million, then I’ll talk. (Waving his hand, he leaves.)
A. N. Ostrovsky. "Storm"
IN 1. To which of the three types of literature does the play “The Thunderstorm” belong? (Write your answer in the nominative case.)
AT 2. What device does the self-taught mechanic Kuligin propose to install on the boulevard in the first part of the fragment?
AT 3. The thunderstorm in the play is an allegorical image that has many meanings and has a special semantic capacity. What is this image called in literary criticism?
AT 4. What do you call the acute clash of characters and circumstances that forms the basis of a stage action? (We see such a clash between Dikiy and Kuligin in the above fragment.)
AT 5. What is the name of verbal communication between two or more persons, based on the alternation of their statements in a conversation?
AT 6. What is the name of a character's short utterance, a phrase that he utters in response to the words of another character?
AT 7. In the above fragment there are the author's explanations of the text of the play and the statements of the characters, in parentheses. What term denotes them?
C1. How does the above fragment help reveal the general conflict of the play “The Thunderstorm”?
C2. Which heroes of Russian literature can, together with Dikiy, be called ignorant and tyrant? Give reasons for your answer.
Answers and comments
Depending on the nature of the connections between events, there are two types of plots. Plots with a predominance of purely temporal connections between events are chronicles. They are used in epic works of large form (Don Quixote). They can show the adventures of heroes (“Odyssey”), depict the development of a person’s personality (“Childhood Years of Bagrov the Grandson” by S. Aksakov). A chronicle story consists of episodes. Plots with a predominance of cause-and-effect relationships between events are called plots of a single action, or concentric. Concentric plots are often built on such a classicist principle as unity of action. Let us recall that in Griboyedov’s “Woe from Wit” the unity of action will be the events associated with Chatsky’s arrival at Famusov’s house. With the help of a concentric plot, one conflict situation is carefully examined. In drama, this type of plot structure dominated until the 19th century, and in epic works of small form it is still used today. A single knot of events is most often untied in novellas and short stories by Pushkin, Chekhov, Poe, and Maupassant. Chronical and concentric principles interact in the plots of multilinear novels, where several event nodes appear simultaneously (“War and Peace” by L. Tolstoy, “The Brothers Karamazov” by F. Dostoevsky). Naturally, chronicle stories often include concentric micro-plots.
There are plots that differ in the intensity of the action. Event-filled plots are called dynamic. These events contain important meaning, and the denouement, as a rule, carries a huge content load. This type of plot is typical for Pushkin’s “Tales of Belkin” and Dostoevsky’s “The Gambler.” And vice versa, plots weakened by descriptions and inserted structures are adynamic. The development of action in them does not strive for a denouement, and the events themselves do not contain any particular interest. Adynamic plots in " Dead souls"Gogol, "My Life" by Chekhov.
3. Composition of the plot.
The plot is the dynamic side of the artistic form; it involves movement and development. The engine of the plot is most often a conflict, an artistically significant contradiction. The term comes from Lat. conflictus - collision. A conflict is an acute clash of characters and circumstances, views and life principles, which forms the basis of action; confrontation, contradiction, clash between heroes, groups of heroes, the hero and society, or the internal struggle of the hero with himself. The nature of the collision can be different: it is a contradiction of duty and inclination, assessments and forces. Conflict is one of those categories that permeate the structure of the entire work of art.
If we consider A. S. Griboedov’s play “Woe is Wit,” it is easy to see that the development of the action here clearly depends on the conflict that lurks in Famusov’s house and lies in the fact that Sophia is in love with Molchalin and hides it from daddy. Chatsky, in love with Sophia, having arrived in Moscow, notices her dislike for himself and, trying to understand the reason, keeps an eye on everyone present in the house. Sophia is unhappy with this and, defending herself, makes a remark at the ball about his madness. Guests who do not sympathize with him gladly pick up this version, because they see in Chatsky a person with views and principles different from theirs, and then it is very clearly revealed that it is not just family conflict(Sophia’s secret love for Molchalin, Molchalin’s real indifference to Sophia, Famusov’s ignorance of what is happening in the house), but also the conflict between Chatsky and society. The outcome of the action (denouement) is determined not so much by Chatsky’s relationship with society, but by the relationship of Sophia, Molchalin and Liza, having learned about which Famusov controls their fate, and Chatsky leaves their home.
In the vast majority of cases, the writer does not invent conflicts. He draws them from primary reality and transfers them from life itself into the realm of themes, issues, and pathos.
Several types of conflicts can be identified that are at the heart of dramatic and epic works. Frequently encountered conflicts are moral and philosophical: the confrontation between characters, man and fate (“Odyssey”), life and death (“The Death of Ivan Ilyich”), pride and humility (“Crime and Punishment”), genius and villainy (“Mozart and Salieri "). Social conflicts consist in the opposition of a character’s aspirations, passions, and ideas to the way of life around him (“ Stingy Knight", "Storm"). The third group of conflicts are internal, or psychological, those that are associated with contradictions in the character of one character and do not become the property of the outside world; this is the mental torment of the heroes of “The Lady with the Dog”, this is the duality of Eugene Onegin. When all these conflicts are combined into one whole, they speak of their contamination. This is achieved to a greater extent in novels (“Heroes of Our Time”) and epics (“War and Peace”). The conflict can be local or insoluble (tragic), obvious or hidden, external (direct clashes of positions and characters) or internal (in the soul of the hero). B. Esin also identifies a group of three types of conflicts, but calls them differently: conflict between individual characters and groups of characters; the confrontation between the hero and the way of life, the individual and the environment; internal conflict, psychological, when we're talking about about the contradiction in the hero himself. V. Kozhinov wrote almost the same about this: “TO . (from Latin collisio - collision) - confrontation, contradiction between characters, or between characters and circumstances, or within character, underlying the action of lit. works 5 . K. does not always speak clearly and openly; For some genres, especially idyllic ones, K. is not typical: they only have what Hegel called “situation”<...>In an epic, drama, novel, short story, K. usually forms the core of the theme, and the resolution of K. appears as the defining moment of the artist. ideas...” “Artist. K. is a clash and contradiction between integral human individuals.” "TO. is a kind of source of energy lit. production, because it determines its action.” “During the course of action, it can worsen or, conversely, weaken; in the end the conflict is resolved one way or another.”
The development of K. sets the plot action in motion.
The plot indicates the stages of action, the stages of the existence of the conflict.
An ideal, that is, complete, model of the plot of a literary work may include the following fragments, episodes, links: prologue, exposition, plot, development of action, peripeteia, climax, denouement, epilogue. There are three mandatory elements in this list: the plot, the development of the action and the climax. Optional - the rest, that is, not all of the existing elements must take place in the work. The components of the plot may appear in different sequences.
Prologue(gr. prolog - preface) is an introduction to the main plot actions. It may give the root cause of events: the dispute about the happiness of men in “Who Lives Well in Rus'.” It clarifies the author's intentions and depicts the events preceding the main action. These events can affect the organization of the artistic space - the place of action.
Exposition is an explanation, a depiction of the characters’ lives in the period before the conflict was identified. For example, the life of young Onegin. It may contain biographical facts and motivate subsequent actions. An exposition can set the conventions of time and space and depict events preceding the plot.
The beginning– this is conflict detection.
Development of action is a group of events necessary for the conflict to occur. It presents twists that escalate the conflict.
Unexpected circumstances that complicate a conflict are called twists and turns.
Climax - (from Latin culmen - top ) - moment highest voltage actions, extreme aggravation of contradictions; the pinnacle of conflict; TO. reveals the main problem of the work and the characters of the characters most fully; after it the effect weakens. Often precedes the denouement. In works with many plot lines, there may be not one, but several TO.
Denouement- this is the resolution of the conflict in the work; it completes the course of events in action-packed works, for example, short stories. But often the ending of works does not contain a resolution to the conflict. Moreover, in the endings of many works, sharp contradictions between the characters remain. This happens both in “Woe from Wit” and in “Eugene Onegin”: Pushkin leaves Eugene at “an evil moment for him.” There are no resolutions in “Boris Godunov” and “The Lady with the Dog.” The endings of these works are open. In Pushkin's tragedy and Chekhov's story, despite all the incompleteness of the plot, the last scenes contain emotional endings and climaxes.
Epilogue(gr. epilogos - afterword) is the final episode, usually following the denouement. In this part of the work, the fate of the heroes is briefly reported. The epilogue depicts the final consequences arising from the events shown. This is a conclusion in which the author can formally complete the story, determine the fate of the heroes, and summarize his philosophical, historical concept (“War and Peace”). The epilogue appears when resolution alone is not enough. Or in the case when, after the completion of the main plot events, it is necessary to express a different point of view (“The Queen of Spades”), to evoke in the reader a feeling about the final outcome of the depicted life of the characters.
The events related to the resolution of one conflict of one group of characters constitute a storyline. Accordingly, if there are different storylines, there may be several climaxes. In “Crime and Punishment” this is the murder of a pawnbroker, but this is also Raskolnikov’s conversation with Sonya Marmeladova.
