The theme of peasant life in Nekrasov’s works. Images of peasant children in works for children Works about peasants

Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov wrote a lot and simply about the life of peasants. He did not ignore the village children, he wrote for them and about them. Little heroes appear in Nekrasov’s works as fully formed personalities: brave, inquisitive, dexterous. At the same time, they are simple and open.

The writer knew the life of serfs well: at any time of the year, hard work from morning to evening, lordly squabbles and punishments, oppression and humiliation. Carefree childhood passed very quickly.

The poem “Peasant Children” is special. In this work, the author managed to reflect reality and naturalness. I used one of my favorite techniques - time travel. To get acquainted with a bright character, little Vlas, the writer takes the reader from the summer to the winter cold, and then returns him to the summer village.

Poem idea

The poet was prompted to write this poem by chance. This work is biographical, there is no fiction in it.

Just starting work, the writer had the idea to call his work “Children’s Comedy”. But during the work, when the verse turned from a humorous story into a lyric-epic poem, the name had to be changed.

It all happened in the summer of 1861, when a successful writer came to his village of Greshnevo to relax and go hunting. Hunting was Nikolai Alekseevich’s real passion, inherited from his father.

On their estate, where little Kolya grew up, there was a huge kennel. So on this trip the writer was accompanied by the dog Fingal. The hunter and his dog wandered through the swamps for a long time and, tired, most likely went to the house of Gavril Yakovlevich Zakharov, which stood on the Chaudet. The hunter took a break in the barn and fell asleep on the hay.

The hunter's presence was discovered by the village children, who were afraid to come close, but out of curiosity could not pass by.

This meeting brought back memories of Nikolai Alekseevich’s own childhood. Indeed, despite his noble origins, and his father’s prohibitions not to hang out with village children, he was very friendly with the peasants. I went with them to the forest, swam in the river, and took part in fist fights.

And even now, the grown-up Nekrasov was very attached to his native land and its people. In his thoughts about the fate of ordinary people, he often thought about the future and about the children who would live in this future.

After this meeting with the village tomboys, he was inspired to write a poem, which turned into a whole poem, calling his work simply “Peasant Children.”

The work on creating the poem lasted only two days. Afterwards the author made only a few small additions.

This is one of the writer’s works where human grief does not overflow.

On the contrary, the poem is imbued with peace and happiness, albeit short-lived.

The poet does not paint illusions about the future of the children, but also does not burden the verse with too sad predictions.

Story line

The acquaintance of the main characters occurs by chance, at a time when the awakened hunter enjoys unity with nature, its polyphony, in the form of bird calls.

I'm in the village again. I go hunting
I write my verses - life is easy.
Yesterday, tired of walking through the swamp,
I wandered into the barn and fell asleep deeply.
Woke up: in the wide cracks of the barn
The rays of the sun look cheerful.
The dove coos; flew over the roof,
The young rooks are calling;
Some other bird is also flying -
I recognized the crow just by the shadow;
Chu! some kind of whisper... but here’s a line
Along the slit of attentive eyes!
All gray, brown, blue eyes -
Mixed together like flowers in a field.
There is so much peace, freedom and affection in them,
There is so much holy kindness in them!
I love the expression of a child's eye,
I always recognize him.
I froze: tenderness touched my soul...
Chu! whisper again!

The poet is touched with trepidation and love by meeting the little ones, does not want to scare them away and quietly listens to their babble.
Meanwhile, the guys begin to discuss the hunter. They have big doubts: is this the master? After all, bars don't wear beards, but this one has a beard. Yes, someone noticed that:

And it’s clear that it’s not the master: how he rode from the swamp,
So next to Gavrila...

That's right, not a master! Although he has a watch, a gold chain, a gun, and a big dog. Probably a master after all!

While the little one is looking at and discussing the master, the poet himself breaks away from the storyline and is transported first to his memories and friendships with the same uneducated, but open and honest peasants in his childhood. He remembers all kinds of pranks that they did together.

He remembers the road that passed under his house. Who hasn't walked along it?

We had a long road:
People of working class scurried about
There are no numbers on it.
Vologda ditch digger,
Tinker, tailor, wool beater,
And then a city dweller goes to the monastery
On the eve of the holiday he is ready to pray.

Here the walkers sat down to rest. And curious children could get their first lessons. The peasants had no other training, and this communication became for them a natural school of life.

Under our thick old elms
Tired people were drawn to rest.
The guys will surround: the stories will begin
About Kyiv, about the Turk, about wonderful animals.
Some people will play around, so just hold on -
It will start from Volochok and will reach Kazan"
Chukhna will imitate, Mordovians, Cheremis,
And he will amuse you with a fairy tale, and tell you a parable.

Here the children received their first labor skills.

The worker will arrange, lay out the shells -
Planes, files, chisels, knives:
“Look, little devils!” And the children are happy
How you saw, how you fooled - show them everything.
A passerby will fall asleep to his jokes,
Guys get to work - sawing and planing!
If they use a saw, you can’t sharpen it in a day!
They break the drill and run away in fear.
It happened that whole days flew by here, -
Like a new passerby, there's a new story...

The poet is so immersed in memories that the reader understands how pleasant and close everything he talks about is to the narrator.

What the hunter doesn’t remember. He floats through the memories of his childhood, like a stormy river. Here you can go mushroom picking, swim in the river, and interesting finds in the form of a hedgehog or a snake.

Who catches leeches
On the lava, where the uterus beats the laundry,
Who is babysitting his sister, two-year-old Glashka,
Who carries a bucket of kvass to reap,
And he, tying his shirt under his throat,
Mysteriously draws something in the sand;
That one got stuck in a puddle, and this one with a new one:
I wove myself a glorious wreath,
Everything is white, yellow, lavender
Yes, occasionally a red flower.
Those sleep in the sun, those dance squatting.
Here is a girl catching a horse with a basket -
She caught it, jumped up and rode it.
And is it her, born under the sunny heat
And brought home from the field in an apron,
To be afraid of your humble horse?..

The poet gradually introduces the reader to the worries and anxieties of the life of village workers. But being moved by a beautiful summer picture shows its attractive, so to speak, elegant side. In this part of the work, Nikolai Alekseevich describes in detail the process of growing bread.

- Enough, Vanyusha! you walked a lot,
It's time to get to work, dear! -
But even labor will turn out first
To Vanyusha with his elegant side:
He sees his father fertilizing the field,
Like throwing grain into loose ground,
As the field then begins to turn green,
As the ear grows, it pours grain;
The ready harvest will be cut with sickles,
They will tie them up in sheaves and take them to Riga,
They dry it out, they beat and beat with flails,
At the mill they grind and bake bread.
A child will taste fresh bread
And in the field he runs more willingly after his father.
Will they wind up the hay: “Climb up, little shooter!”

The most striking character

Many readers who are unfamiliar with Nekrasov’s work consider an excerpt from the poem “Frost, Red Nose” by a small peasant to be a separate work.

Of course, this is no coincidence. After all, this part of the poem has its own introduction, main part and ending, in the form of the author’s reasoning.

Once upon a time in the cold winter time,
I came out of the forest; it was bitterly cold.
I see it's slowly going uphill
A horse carrying a cart of brushwood.
And, walking importantly, in decorous calm,
A man leads a horse by the bridle
In big boots, in a short sheepskin coat,
In big mittens... and he's as small as a fingernail!
- Great, lad! - “Go past!”
- You’re too formidable, as I can see!
Where did the firewood come from? - “From the forest, of course;
Father, you hear, chops, and I take it away.”
(A woodcutter’s ax was heard in the forest.)
- What, does your father have a big family?
“The family is big, but two people
Just men: my father and I...”
- So there it is! What is your name? - “Vlas”.
- How old are you? - “The sixth year has passed...
Well, dead! - the little one shouted in a deep voice,
He pulled the reins and walked faster.
The sun was shining on this picture so much,
The child was so hilariously small
It was as if it was all cardboard,
It was as if I was in a children's theater!
But the boy was a living, real boy,
And wood, and brushwood, and a piebald horse,
And the snow lying up to the windows of the village,
And the cold fire of the winter sun -
Everything, everything was real Russian...

The narrator was surprised and discouraged by what he saw. The boy was so tiny to perform a completely adult, and male work, that it was etched in his memory and eventually found its reflection in his work.

To the reader’s surprise, he does not lament or shed tears over the child’s difficult childhood. The poet admires the little man and tries to show him from all sides.

The tiny assistant, realizing his importance, immediately declares that he has no time to stop and start conversations, he is fulfilling an important mission - together with his father, he supplies the family with firewood. He proudly places himself next to his father - men: my father and me. A smart child knows how old he is, can handle a horse, and most importantly, he is not afraid of work.

Return to storyline

Returning from his memories, Nekrasov turns his attention to the urchins who continue to secretly attack his hideout. He mentally wishes for them to see their land always as attractive as it is now.

Play, children! Grow in freedom!
That's why you were given a wonderful childhood,
To love this meager field forever,
So that it always seems sweet to you.
Keep your centuries-old inheritance,
Love your labor bread -
And let the charm of childhood poetry
Leads you into the depths of your native land!..

The narrator decided to please and entertain the little one. He begins to give various commands to his dog. The dog eagerly follows all the orders of its owner. The children are no longer hiding, they happily perceive the performance that the master has given them.

All participants like this kind of communication: the hunter, the children, the dog. There is no longer any mistrust and tension described at the beginning of the acquaintance.

But then the summer rain came. The barefoot little girl ran into the village. And the poet can only admire this living picture once again.

The meaning of the poem "Peasant Children"

It must be said that the poem was written in the year of the abolition of serfdom. At this time, the issue of educating peasant children was very animatedly discussed at the government level. There was active talk about organizing schools in rural areas.

Writers also did not stand aside. One after another, publications were published about life, way of life and education, or rather, the lack of education among the people. Some authors did not have information about rural life, but also actively offered their views on the problem. Nekrasov easily stopped such limited ideas about the peasant way of life.

It is not surprising that on this wave “Peasant Children” became very popular. The poem was published in the fall of 1861.

The educational process in the villages progressed very poorly. Often the progressive intelligentsia took a region into their own hands and supervised it at their own expense.

Nikolai Alekseevich was such an innovator. He built a school with his own money, purchased textbooks, and hired teachers. He was helped in many ways by the priest Ivan Grigorievich Zykov. Thus, the children received the opportunity for primary education. True, at first education was optional. Parents themselves decided how much their child should study and how much they should help around the house. Given this circumstance, the educational process in Tsarist Russia moved very slowly.

Nekrasov is a true people's servant. His life is an example of selfless devotion to ordinary Russian people.


Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov is one of the few classical poets who created works about the existence of ordinary people. One of these creations is the charming poem “Peasant Children,” which says that one day a hunter entered a village barn and fell asleep from fatigue. And the traveler is discovered by children living in a small village. They look at him in surprise and discuss him loudly. The poet immediately depicts his childhood spent with peasant children, and also imagines how they supported adults. And although they worked willingly, the work also brought them unbearable torment, starting from powerlessness in the face of heat and severe frosts.

The poem teaches us to understand that, despite the fact that poor people worked until exhaustion, this work brought them not only torment, but also joy. The main idea is to respect the work of ordinary people, because they also have the opportunity to enjoy life, only they need to work hard and for a long time.

Summary of Peasant Children of Nekrasov

Reading the initial lines of this amazing poetic work, we find ourselves in a small barn, where a tired hunter wandered in and lay down to rest. He fell asleep soundly, as he had been hunting for a long time, and did not hear several pairs of inquisitive children’s eyes looking at him through the cracks, who could not understand whether the man was lying alive or lifeless. Finally he woke up, and immediately he heard the shimmering singing of birds. He managed to distinguish between a crow and a rook. And suddenly the stranger’s gaze came across tiny, nimble eyes. These were children who looked at the stranger with great interest. They quietly talked to each other and cast their gazes first at the man’s equipment, then at his dog. When the children noticed that the stranger was watching them, some of them ran away. And late in the evening it was already known that a rich gentleman had arrived at their settlement.

Having settled in the village for the summer, the master enjoys the beautiful places and time spent together with the children. The author describes their life in a variety of ways, which is filled with various games. And, of course, what is striking is that all the activities of rural children are very different from the leisure time of city children.

We see how some boy bathes in the river with pleasure, another babysits his sister. A mischievous girl rides a horse. At the same time, the guys help the adults. So Vanya tries his hand at harvesting bread, and then takes it home with a majestic look. They have no time to be sick and think about empty things. Days fly by for them instantly and happily. And they learn all the most informative things from their elders. But Nekrasov also notes another side of their fate. These children have no future. They play and work with pleasure, but none of them receive an education, and accordingly they will not become worthy and respected people in society.

In the poem, Nikolai Alekseevich inserted a bright moment where the work activities of children are described. One day in the cold winter, the poet, apparently hunting, meets a small child who is helping his father carry firewood. This happens on such frosty days! And he is forced to help, since there are only two men in their family. Then Nekrasov again returns us to the beginning of the poem. The rested hunter began to show the children how smart his dog was. But then a thunderstorm began, and the children ran home, and the narrator went on hunting.

Picture or drawing Peasant children

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I. Peasant children in Russian literature

What work about peasant children did we read in 5th grade?

Students will remember N. A. Nekrasov’s great poem “Peasant Children,” written later than Turgenev’s story.

Let us tell you that the story “Bezhin Meadow” is unique in many respects. The most important significance of this work in the history of Russian literature is that in it I. S. Turgenev, one of the first Russian writers, introduced the image of a peasant boy into literature. Before Turgenev, peasants were rarely written about at all. The book “Notes of a Hunter” drew the attention of the general public to the situation of the peasant in Russia, and “Bezhin Meadow,” in addition to poetic and heartfelt descriptions of Russian nature, showed readers living children, superstitious and inquisitive, brave and cowardly, forced from childhood to remain alone with world without the help of the knowledge accumulated by humanity.

Now we will try to take a closer look at the faces of these children...

II. Images of peasant boys, their portraits and stories, the spiritual world. Inquisitiveness, curiosity, impressionability.

First stage: independent work in a group

We will divide the class into four groups (of course, if the number of students in the class allows this), give the task: discuss the completion of homework and prepare a story about the hero according to plan. 10-15 minutes are allotted for work.

Story plan

1. Portrait of a boy.

2. The boy’s stories, his speech.

3. The boy's actions.

The teacher will try to ensure that each group has a strong student who can take charge of organizing the work.

Students discuss the characteristics of the hero and prepare to talk about him.

Second stage: presentation by group representatives, discussion of presentations

If students find it difficult to draw conclusions, the teacher helps them with the help of leading questions, bringing the conversation to the necessary conclusions.

“You would give the first, eldest of all, Fedya, about fourteen years. He was a slender boy, with beautiful and delicate, slightly small features, curly blond hair, light eyes and a constant half-cheerful, half-absent-minded smile. He belonged, by all accounts, to a rich family and went out into the field not out of necessity, but just for fun. He was wearing a motley cotton shirt with a yellow border; a small new army jacket, worn saddle-back, barely rested on his narrow shoulders; A comb hung from a blue belt. His boots with low tops were just like his boots - not his father’s.”

The last detail that the author draws attention to was very important in peasant life: many peasants were so poor that they did not have the means to make boots even for the head of the family. And here the child has his own boots - this suggests that Fedya’s family was wealthy. Ilyusha, for example, had new bast shoes and onuchi, but Pavlusha had no shoes at all.

Fedya understands that he is the oldest; The family's wealth gives him additional respectability, and he behaves patronizingly towards the boys. In the conversation, he, “as the son of a rich peasant, had to be the lead singer (he himself spoke little, as if afraid of losing his dignity).”

He starts a conversation after a break, asks questions, interrupts, sometimes mockingly, Ilyusha, who turns his story to him: “Perhaps you, Fedya, don’t know, but only there is a drowned man buried there...” But, listening to stories about mermaids and goblin, he falls under their charm and expresses his feelings with immediate exclamations: “Eka! - Fedya said after a short silence, “how can such forest evil spirits spoil a peasant’s soul, he didn’t listen to her?”; "Oh you! - Fedya exclaimed, shuddering slightly and shrugging his shoulders, - pfu!...”

Towards the end of the conversation, Fedya affectionately addresses Vanya, the youngest boy: it’s clear that he likes Vanya’s older sister, Anyutka. Fedya, according to village etiquette, first asks about his sister’s health, and then asks Vanya to tell her to come to Fedya, promising her and Vanya himself a gift. But Vanya simply refuses the gift: he sincerely loves his sister and wishes her well: “It’s better to give it to her: she’s so kind among us.”

Vania

The least is said about Van in the story: he is the smallest boy of those who went to the night, he is only seven years old:

“The last one, Vanya, I didn’t even notice at first: he was lying on the ground, quietly huddled under the angular matting, and only occasionally stuck his light brown curly head out from under it.”

Vanya did not crawl out from under the mat even when Pavel called him to eat potatoes: apparently he was sleeping. He woke up when the boys fell silent and saw the stars above him: “Look, look, guys,” Vanya’s childish voice suddenly rang out, “look at God’s stars, the bees are swarming!” This exclamation, as well as Vanya’s refusal of a gift for the sake of his sister Anyuta, paint us a picture of a kind, dreamy boy, apparently from a poor family: after all, already at the age of seven he is familiar with peasant concerns.

Ilyusha

Ilyusha is a boy of about twelve.

His face “...was rather insignificant: hook-nosed, elongated, blind, it expressed some kind of dull, painful solicitude; his compressed lips did not move, his knitted eyebrows did not move apart - it was as if he was still squinting from the fire. His yellow, almost white hair stuck out in sharp braids from under a low felt cap, which he pulled down over his ears every now and then with both hands. He was wearing new bast shoes and onuchi, a thick rope, twisted three times around his waist, carefully tightened his neat black scroll.”

Ilyusha is forced to work in a factory from early childhood. He says about himself: “My brother and Avdyushka are members of the fox workers.” Apparently, there are many children in the family, and the parents sent two brothers to the “factory workers” so that they would bring hard-earned pennies into the house. Maybe this is why there is a stamp of concern on his face.

Ilyusha's stories reveal to us the world of superstitions among which the Russian peasant lived, they show how people were afraid of incomprehensible natural phenomena and attributed unclean origins to them. Ilyusha narrates very convincingly, but mainly not about what he himself saw, but what different people told him.

Ilyusha believes in everything that peasants and servants tell: in goblins, water creatures, mermaids, he knows village signs and beliefs. His stories are filled with mystery and fear:

“Suddenly, lo and behold, the form of one vat began to move, rose, dipped, walked, walked through the air, as if someone was rinsing it, and then fell back into place. Then another vat's hook came off the nail and onto the nail again; then it was as if someone was going to the door, and suddenly he started coughing, choking, like some kind of sheep, and so loudly... We all fell in such a heap, crawling under each other... How scared we were about that time! »

A special theme of Ilyushin’s stories is the drowned and the dead. Death has always seemed to people to be a mysterious, incomprehensible phenomenon, and beliefs about the dead are timid attempts by a superstitious person to realize and comprehend this phenomenon. Ilyusha tells how the huntsman Yermil saw a lamb at the grave of a drowned man:

“...he’s so white, curly, and walks around handsomely. So Yermil thinks: “I’ll take him, why should he disappear like this?”, and he got down and took him in his arms... But the lamb is okay. Here Yermil goes to the horse, and the horse stares at him, snores, shakes its head; however, he scolded her, sat on her with the lamb and rode off again, holding the lamb in front of him. He looks at him, and the lamb looks him straight in the eye. He felt terrible, Yermil the huntsman: that, they say, I don’t remember sheep looking into anyone’s eyes like that; however nothing; He began to stroke his fur like that, saying: “Byasha, byasha!” And the ram suddenly bared his teeth, and he too: “Byasha, byasha...”

The feeling that death is always near a person and can take away both old and young is manifested in the story about the vision of Baba Ulyana, in the warning to Pavlusha to be careful near the river. In the tone of an expert, he sums up the boys’ impressions after Pavel’s story about the voice from the water: “Oh, this is a bad omen,” Ilyusha said with emphasis.”

He, like a factory worker, like an expert in village customs, feels like an experienced person, capable of understanding the meaning of signs. We see that he sincerely believes in everything he tells, but at the same time he perceives everything somehow detached.

Kostya

“...Kostya, a boy of about ten, aroused my curiosity with his thoughtful and sad gaze. His whole face was small, thin, freckled, pointed downwards, like a squirrel's; lips could barely be distinguished; but his large, black eyes, shining with a liquid brilliance, made a strange impression; they seemed to want to express something for which there were no words in the language - in his language, at least. He was short, frail in build, and dressed rather poorly.”

We see that Kostya is from a poor family, that he is thin and poorly dressed. Perhaps he is often malnourished and for him going out at night is a holiday where he can eat plenty of steaming potatoes.

“And even then, my brothers,” Kostya objected, widening his already huge eyes... “I didn’t even know that Akim was drowned in that booze: I wouldn’t have been so scared.”

Kostya himself talks about the meeting of the suburban carpenter Gavrila with a mermaid. The mermaid called the carpenter who was lost in the forest to her, but he laid a cross on himself:

“That’s how he laid down the cross, my brothers, the little mermaid stopped laughing, but suddenly she started crying... She cries, my brothers, she wipes her eyes with her hair, and her hair is as green as your hemp. So Gavrila looked, looked at her, and began to ask her: “Why are you, forest potion, crying?” And the mermaid said to him: “You shouldn’t be baptized,” he says, “man, you should live with me in joy until end of days; but I cry, I am killed because you were baptized; Yes, I won’t be the only one who will kill myself: you too will kill yourself until the end of your days.” Then she, my brothers, disappeared, and Gavrila immediately understood how he could get out of the forest, that is, get out... But since then he’s been walking around sadly.”

Kostya's story is very poetic, similar to a folk tale. We see in the belief told by Kostya something in common with one of P. P. Bazhov’s tales - “The Mistress of the Copper Mountain.” Like the main character of Bazhov's tale, the carpenter Gavrila meets with evil spirits in the form of a woman, miraculously finds his way after the meeting and then cannot forget about it, “he walks around sadly.”

Kostya’s story about the voice from the bully is filled with fear of the incomprehensible: “I was so afraid, my brothers: it was late, and the voice was so painful. So, it seems, I would have cried myself...” Kostya sadly tells about the death of the boy Vasya and the grief of his mother Theoklista. His story is like a folk song:

“It used to be that Vasya would go with us, with the kids, to swim in the river in the summer, and she would get all excited. Other women are fine, they walk past with troughs, waddle over, and Theoklista will put the trough on the ground and begin to call to him: “Come back, come back, my little light!” Oh, come back, falcon!’”

Repetitions and words give this story special expressiveness. will startle, click.

Kostya turns to Pavlusha with questions: he sees that Pavlusha is not afraid of the world around him and is trying to explain what he sees around him.

Pavlusha

Pavlusha, like Ilyusha, appears to be twelve years old.

He “... had tousled, black hair, gray eyes, wide cheekbones, a pale, pockmarked face, a large but regular mouth, a huge head, as they say, the size of a beer kettle, a squat, awkward body. The guy was unprepossessing - needless to say! - but still I liked him: he looked very smart and direct, and there was strength in his voice. He couldn’t flaunt his clothes: they all consisted of a simple, fancy shirt and patched ports.”

Pavlusha is a smart and brave boy. He actively participates in the conversation around the fire and tries to cheer up the boys when, under the influence of scary stories, they get scared and lose heart. After Kostya’s story about the mermaid, when everyone listens with fear to the sounds of the night and calls on the power of the cross for help, Pavel behaves differently:

“Oh, you crows! - Pavel shouted, - why are you alarmed? Look, the potatoes are cooked.”

When the dogs suddenly get up and rush away from the fire with convulsive barking, the boys get scared, and Pavlusha rushes after the dogs screaming:

“The restless running of an alarmed herd was heard. Pavlusha shouted loudly: “Gray!” Bug!..” After a few moments, the barking stopped; Pavel's voice came from afar... A little more time passed; the boys looked at each other in bewilderment, as if waiting for something to happen... Suddenly the tramp of a galloping horse was heard; She stopped abruptly right next to the fire, and, clutching the mane, Pavlusha quickly jumped off her. Both dogs also jumped into the circle of light and immediately sat down, sticking out their red tongues.

What's there? what's happened? - the boys asked.

“Nothing,” answered Pavel, waving his hand at the horse, “the dogs sensed something.” “I thought it was a wolf,” he added in an indifferent voice, breathing quickly through his entire chest.”

“I involuntarily admired Pavlusha. He was very good at that moment. His ugly face, animated by fast driving, glowed with bold prowess and firm determination. Without a twig in his hand, at night, he, without hesitation at all, galloped alone towards the wolf...”

Pavlusha is the only boy whom the author calls in the story by his full name - Pavel. He, in contrast to Ilyusha and Kostya, is trying to understand and explain the world, incomprehensible phenomena.

The boys appreciate their comrade's courage, turning their questions to him. Even the dog values ​​the boy's attention:

“Sitting down on the ground, he dropped his hand on the shaggy back of one of the dogs, and for a long time the delighted animal did not turn its head, looking sideways at Pavlusha with grateful pride.”

Pavlusha explains the incomprehensible sounds: he distinguishes the cry of a heron over the river, the voice in the boom explains the cry that “such tiny frogs” make; he distinguishes the sound of flying sandpipers and explains that they are flying to “where, they say, there is no winter,” and the land is “far, far away, beyond the warm seas.”

Pavlusha’s character is revealed very clearly in the story about a solar eclipse. Ilyusha eagerly recounts village superstitions about Trishka’s arrival, and Pavlusha looks at what is happening with an intelligent, critical, mocking look:

“Our master, Khosha, explained to us in advance that, they say, you will have foresight, but when it got dark, he himself, they say, became so afraid that it’s like. And in the yard hut there was a woman cook, so as soon as it got dark, hear, she took and broke all the pots in the oven with a grabber: “Who can eat now, when, he says, the end of the world has come.” So the stuff started flowing.”

Pavlusha creates intrigue by not immediately revealing what kind of creature it was with a huge head, describing how the frightened residents behaved. The boy tells the story leisurely, laughing at the men and, probably, at his own fear, because he, too, was in the crowd of people pouring out into the street and waiting for what would happen:

“- They look - suddenly some man is coming from the settlement from the mountain, so sophisticated, his head is so amazing... Everyone shouts: “Oh, Trishka is coming!” oh, Trishka is coming!“ - who knows where! Our elder climbed into a ditch; the old woman is stuck in the gateway, screaming obscenities, and she has frightened her yard dog so much that she is off the chain, through the fence, and into the forest; and Kuzka’s father, Dorofeich, jumped into the oats, sat down, and started shouting like a quail: “Maybe, they say, at least the enemy, the murderer, will take pity on the bird.” That’s how everyone was alarmed!.. And this man was our cooper, Vavila: he bought himself a new jug and put an empty jug on his head and put it on.”

What fascinates us most is the climax of the story, when Pavlusha returns from the river “with a full pot in his hand” and tells how he heard Vasin’s voice:

“- By God. As soon as I began to bend down to the water, I heard suddenly they called me in Vasya’s voice and as if from under the water: “Pavlusha, oh Pavlusha!” I listened; and he again calls: “Pavlusha, come here.” I walked away. However, he scooped up some water.”

The last phrase emphasizes the firmness and strength of character of the boy: he heard the voice of the drowned man, but was not afraid and scooped up water. He walks through life directly and proudly, responding to Ilyusha’s words:

“Well, it’s okay, let me go! - Pavel said decisively and sat down again, “you cannot escape your fate.”

Homework

You can invite children to make illustrations for the story at home, choose musical accompaniment for some fragments, and prepare an expressive reading of some superstition of the students’ choice.

Lesson 36

Images of peasant boys. The meaning of artistic detail. Pictures of nature in the story “Bezhin Meadow”

Speech development lesson

In literary works we find images of people, their lifestyles, and feelings. In the 19th century, there were 2 classes in Russian society: peasants and nobles - with a dissimilar culture and language, so some writers wrote about peasants, and others about nobles. In Krylov, Pushkin, Gogol and others we will see the image of peasants. They all portrayed peasants differently, but they also had many similarities. Ivan Andreevich Krylov, for example, in his fable “The Dragonfly and the Ant” uses the example of an ant as a peasant hard worker whose life is hard, and a dragonfly means the opposite. And we see this in many of Krylov’s fables.

Another writer, one of the greatest representatives of culture of the 19th century, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin. We know that Pushkin loved his Motherland and his people very much, so the writer was very concerned about the problems of Russian society. In Pushkin, the image of the peasantry is primarily manifested in his two most important works, “The Captain's Daughter” and “Dubrovsky.” In these works, Pushkin describes the life and morals of the peasants of that time; in his works he speaks of the simple Russian people not as a crowd, but as a close-knit team that understands that anti-serfdom sentiments are quite real. In the first work we see how the author describes the peasant uprising of Pugachev, in the second we see the confrontation between the peasantry and the nobility. In each of the works, the writer emphasizes the difficult condition of the peasants, as well as acute disagreements between the two classes, arising from the oppression of one class by the other.

In addition to Pushkin, Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol raises this topic. The image of the peasantry that Gogol paints is presented, of course, in his work “Dead Souls”. Gogol in his poem presented Russian society not only in greatness, but also with all its vices. The author introduces us in his work to many people from different power structures and paints terrible pictures of serfdom. Gogol says that the peasants are presented as slaves of the landowners, as a thing that can be given away or sold. But despite the fact that Gogol shows such an unflattering picture of the life of the peasantry and sympathizes with them, nevertheless, he does not idealize them, but only shows the strength of the Russian people. It is this idea that the author reflects in chapter 11:

“Oh, three! bird three, who invented you? to know, you could only have been born among a lively people, in that land that does not like to joke, but has spread out smoothly across half the world, and go ahead and count the miles until it hits your eyes. And not a cunning, it seems, road projectile, not grabbed by an iron screw, but hastily, alive, with one ax and a chisel, the efficient Yaroslavl man equipped and assembled you. The driver is not wearing German boots: he has a beard and mittens, and sits on God knows what; but he stood up, swung, and began to sing - the horses were like a whirlwind, the spokes in the wheels mixed into one smooth circle, only the road trembled and the stopped pedestrian screamed in fright! and there it rushed, rushed, rushed!.. And there you can already see in the distance, something dusting and boring into the air.
Aren't you, Rus, like a brisk, unstoppable troika, rushing along? The road beneath you smokes, the bridges rattle, everything falls behind and is left behind. The contemplator, amazed by God's miracle, stopped: was this lightning thrown from the sky? What does this terrifying movement mean? and what kind of unknown power is contained in these horses, unknown to the light? Oh, horses, horses, what kind of horses! Are there whirlwinds in your manes? Is there a sensitive ear burning in every vein of yours? They heard a familiar song from above, together and at once tensed their copper chests and, almost without touching the ground with their hooves, turned into just elongated lines flying through the air, and rushing, all inspired by God!.. Rus', where are you rushing, give me the answer? Doesn't give an answer. The bell rings with a wonderful ringing; The air, torn into pieces, thunders and becomes the wind; everything that is on earth flies past, and other peoples and states sidestep and give way to it.”

Gogol in this passage emphasizes the strength of the people and the strength of Rus', and also reflects his attitude towards the Russian simple working people.

Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, like previous authors, became interested in the topic of enslavement. The image of the peasantry is presented by Turgenev in his collection “Notes of a Hunter.” This collection consists of a number of stories not interconnected, but united by one theme. The author talks about the peasantry. Many believe that the author painted images of peasants that emphasize the most typical features of the Russian national character. Turgenev in his stories describes the life of the peasantry and the life of the peasants.

Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov expressed his views on serfdom in his work “Who Lives Well in Rus'?” Already in the title it is clear what the work is about. The main thing locally in the poem is the position of the peasants under serfdom and after its abolition. The author tells that several serfs set off on a journey to find out who would live well in Rus'. Peasants meet with different people, through meetings we see the attitude towards the peasant issue and towards peasants in general.

The theme of the peasantry played an important role in the work of Saltykov-Shchedrin. He expresses his criticism in satirical tales. The author truthfully reflected Russia, in which the landowners are omnipotent and oppress the peasants. But not everyone understands the true meaning of the fairy tale. In his fairy tales, Saltykov-Shchedrin ridicules the inability of landowners to work, their carelessness and stupidity. This is also discussed in the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner”. In the fairy tale, the author reflects on the unlimited power of the landowners, who oppress the peasants in every possible way. The author makes fun of the ruling class. The life of a landowner without peasants is completely impossible. The author sympathizes with the people.

In literary works we find images of people, their lifestyles, and feelings. By the 17th-18th centuries, two classes had emerged in Russia: peasants and nobles - with completely different culture, mentality and even language. That is why in the works of some Russian writers there are images of peasants, while others do not. For example, Griboedov, Zhukovsky and some other masters of words did not touch upon the topic of the peasantry in their works.

However, Krylov, Pushkin, Gogol, Goncharov, Turgenev, Nekrasov, Yesenin and others created a whole gallery

Immortal images of peasants. Their peasants are very different people, but there is also much in common in the writers’ views on the peasant. All of them were unanimous that peasants are hard workers, creative and talented people, while idleness leads to moral decay of the individual.

This is precisely the meaning of I. A. Krylov’s fable “The Dragonfly and the Ant.” In an allegorical form, the fabulist expressed his view of the moral ideal of the peasant worker (Ant), whose motto is to work tirelessly in the summer in order to provide food for himself in the cold winter, and of the slacker (Dragonfly). In winter, when the Dragonfly came to the Ant asking for help,

He refused the "jumper", although he probably had the opportunity to help her.

On the same topic, much later, M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin wrote the fairy tale “About how a man fed two generals.” However, Saltykov-Shchedrin solved this problem differently than Krylov: the idle generals, having found themselves on a desert island, could not feed themselves, but the peasant, the man, voluntarily not only provided the generals with everything they needed, but also twisted a rope and tied himself up. Indeed, in both works the conflict is the same: between a worker and a parasite, but it is resolved in different ways. The hero of Krylov’s fable does not allow himself to be offended, and the man from Saltykov-Shchedrin’s fairy tale voluntarily deprives himself of his freedom and does everything possible for the generals who are unable to work.

There are not many descriptions of peasant life and character in the works of A. S. Pushkin, but he could not help but capture very significant details in his works. For example, in the description of the peasant war in “The Captain’s Daughter,” Pushkin showed that it was attended by the children of peasants who had left agriculture and were engaged in robbery and theft; this conclusion can be drawn from Chumakov’s song about the “baby peasant son” who “stole” and “ held a robbery,” and then was hanged. In the fate of the hero of the song, the rebels recognize their fate and feel their doom. Why? Because they abandoned labor on earth for the sake of bloodshed, and Pushkin does not accept violence.

Russian writers' peasants have a rich inner world: they know how to love. In the same work, Pushkin shows the image of the serf Savelich, who, although a slave by position, is endowed with a sense of self-esteem. He is ready to give his life for his young master, whom he raised. This image echoes two images of Nekrasov: with Savely, the Holy Russian hero, and with Yakov the faithful, an exemplary slave. Saveliy loved his grandson Demochka very much, looked after him and, being an indirect cause of his death, went into the forests and then into a monastery. Yakov the faithful loves his nephew as much as Saveliy loves Demochka, and loves his master as Savelich loves Grinev. However, if Savelich did not have to sacrifice his life for Petrusha, then Yakov, torn by a conflict between the people he loved, committed suicide.

Pushkin has another important detail in Dubrovsky. We are talking about contradictions between the villages: “They (the peasants of Troekurov) were vain about the wealth and glory of their master and, in turn, allowed themselves a lot in relation to their neighbors, hoping for his strong patronage.” Isn’t this the theme sounded by Yesenin in “Anna Snegina”, when the rich residents of Radov and the poor peasants of the village of Kriushi were at enmity with each other: “They are axed, so are we.” As a result, the headman dies. This death is condemned by Yesenin. The topic of the murder of a manager by peasants was already discussed by Nekrasov: Savely and other peasants buried the German Vogel alive. However, unlike Yesenin, Nekrasov does not condemn this murder.

With Gogol’s work, the concept of a peasant hero appeared in fiction: carriage maker Mikheev, brickmaker Milushkin, shoemaker Maxim Telyatnikov and others. After Gogol, Nekrasov also had a clearly expressed theme of heroism (Savely). Goncharov also has peasant heroes. It is interesting to compare Gogol’s hero, the carpenter Stepan Probka, and the carpenter Luka from Goncharov’s work “Oblomov.” Gogol’s master is “that hero who would be fit for the guard,” he was distinguished by “exemplary sobriety,” and the worker from O6lomovka was famous for making a porch, which, although shaky from the moment of construction, stood for sixteen years.

In general, in Goncharov’s work, everything in the peasant village is quiet and sleepy. Only the morning is spent in a busy and useful way, and then comes lunch, a general afternoon nap, tea, doing something, playing the accordion, playing the balalaika at the gate. There are no incidents in Oblomovka. The peace was disturbed only by the peasant widow Marina Kulkova, who gave birth to “four babies.” Her fate is similar to the difficult life of Matryona Korchagina, the heroine of Nekrasov’s poem “Who Lives Well in Rus',” who “every year, then has children.”

Turgenev, like other writers, speaks of the peasant’s talent and creative nature. In the story “The Singers,” Yakov the Turk and a clerk compete in singing for an eighth of beer, and then the author shows a bleak picture of drunkenness. The same theme will be heard in Nekrasov’s “Who Lives Well in Rus'”: Yakim Nagoy “works to death, drinks until half to death...”.

Completely different motives are heard in the story “The Burmist” by Turgenev. He develops the image of a despot manager. Nekrasov will also condemn this phenomenon: he will call the sin of Gleb the elder, who sold the free people of other peasants, the most serious.

Russian writers were unanimous that the majority of peasants have talent, dignity, creativity, and hard work. However, among them there are also people who cannot be called highly moral. The spiritual decline of these people mainly occurred from idleness and from material wealth acquired and the misfortunes of others.