Analysis of realism. Genres and stylistic features of realistic prose
Realism is usually called a movement in art and literature, whose representatives strived for a realistic and truthful reproduction of reality. In other words, the world was portrayed as typical and simple, with all its advantages and disadvantages.
General features of realism
Realism in literature is distinguished by a number of common features. Firstly, life was depicted in images that corresponded to reality. Secondly, reality for representatives of this movement has become a means of understanding themselves and the world around them. Thirdly, the images on the pages of literary works were distinguished by the truthfulness of details, specificity and typification. It is interesting that the art of the realists, with their life-affirming principles, sought to consider reality in development. Realists discovered new social and psychological relationships.
The emergence of realism
Realism in literature as a form of artistic creation arose in the Renaissance, developed during the Enlightenment and manifested itself as an independent direction only in the 30s of the 19th century. The first realists in Russia include the great Russian poet A.S. Pushkin (he is sometimes even called the founder of this movement) and the no less outstanding writer N.V. Gogol with his novel “Dead Souls”. As for literary criticism, the term “realism” appeared within it thanks to D. Pisarev. It was he who introduced the term into journalism and criticism. Realism in the literature of the 19th century became a distinctive feature of that time, having its own characteristics and characteristic features.
Features of literary realism
Representatives of realism in literature are numerous. The most famous and outstanding writers include such writers as Stendhal, Charles Dickens, O. Balzac, L.N. Tolstoy, G. Flaubert, M. Twain, F.M. Dostoevsky, T. Mann, M. Twain, W. Faulkner and many others. All of them worked on the development of the creative method of realism and embodied in their works its most striking features in inextricable connection with their unique authorial characteristics.
Depiction of life in images that correspond to the essence of life phenomena, through typing the facts of reality. The art of realism is characterized by the spirit of artistic objectivity. The depiction of the world in a realistic work, as a rule, is not abstract and conventional in nature. A realist writer reproduces reality in life-like forms, creates the illusion of reality, makes one believe in his characters, strives to make them alive, to give them artistic persuasiveness. Realistic art depicts the depths of the human soul, attaches special importance to the motivation of the hero’s actions, the study of the circumstances of his life, the reasons that prompt the character to act one way and not another.
A true reflection of the world, a wide coverage of reality. All genuine art to a certain extent reflects reality, that is, it corresponds to the truth of life. However, realism as a method most consistently embodied the principles of a life-truthful reflection of reality. I. S. Turgenev, speaking about the connection between art and reality, argued: “I always need a meeting with a living person, direct acquaintance with some life fact, before I begin to create a type or compose a plot.” F. M. Dostoevsky also pointed out the real basis of the plot of the novel “Crime and Punishment”.
Historicism. Realism subordinated all artistic means to the task of an increasingly multifaceted and in-depth study of man in his relationship with society, with the historical process. In literature, historicism is usually understood as the idea of reality, embodied in images, developing naturally and progressively, of the connection between times in their qualitative differences.
The attitude towards literature as a means of a person’s knowledge of himself and the world around him. Realist writers turn to the cognitive capabilities of art, trying to deeply, fully and comprehensively explore life, depicting reality with its inherent contradictions. Realism recognizes the artist's right to illuminate all aspects of life without limitation. Any realistic work is based on life facts that have a creative refraction. In realistic works, each significant manifestation of individuality is depicted as conditioned by certain circumstances; the artist strives to identify what is characteristic, repeating in the individual, and natural in what seems random.
Realist writers, following the sentimentalists and romantics, showed interest in the life of the human soul, deepened the understanding of human psychology, reflected in works of art the work of the human consciousness and subconscious through identifying the hero’s intentions, motives for his actions, experiences and changes in mental states.
Reflection of the connection between man and environment. Realism gravitates towards a multifaceted and potentially exhaustive study and depiction of the world in all the richness of its connections, organically recreated by the artist. Realist writers create different situations for revealing character: I. A. Goncharov in the novel “Oblomov” shows the destructiveness for the hero of an ordinary situation, a familiar environment; Dostoevsky's heroes, on the contrary, find themselves in hysterical situations generated by the imperfection of the social system; L.N. Tolstoy includes his heroes in the cycle of significant historical events that reveal the essence of a particular character. The art of realism shows the interaction of man with the environment, the impact of the era, social conditions on human destinies, the influence of social circumstances on the morals and spiritual world of people. At the same time, a realistic work substantiates what is happening not only with socio-historical circumstances, but also with the psychology of the hero, his moral choice, i.e., the spiritual structure of the individual (in contrast to the works of the naturalistic school, in which a person was depicted as a derivative of heredity and environment). Thus, a realistic work explores the ability of an individual to rise above circumstances, to resist them, showing free will.
Typification of characters and circumstances. In literary criticism, the formula of F. Engels has been established, according to which “realism presupposes, in addition to the truthfulness of details, the truthful reproduction of typical characters in typical circumstances.” For a realistic work, it is important to establish connections between these two objects in the image. Literary hero of the realistic the work is created as a generalized image (type) of human individuality, most characteristic of a certain social environment, it embodies the characteristic features of persons of a certain category. The creative process of creating typical images is usually called typification. Literary forms: Epic: novel, story, poem, story. Lyrics: song, elegy. Drama: tragedy, historical chronicles. Of course, first of all, these are F. M. Dostoevsky and L. N. Tolstoy. Outstanding examples of literature of this direction were also the works of the late Pushkin (rightfully considered the founder of realism in Russian literature) - the historical drama “Boris Godunov”, the stories “The Captain’s Daughter”, “Dubrovsky”, “Belkin’s Stories”, the novel by Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov “Our Hero” time”, as well as Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls”. In Russia, Dmitry Pisarev was the first to widely introduce the term “realism” into journalism and criticism; before that time, the term “realism” was used by Herzen in a philosophical sense, as a synonym for the concept of “materialism.”
Each literary movement develops its own system of genres, which is its internal property. Within this system, a certain hierarchy of genres is established depending on their role in the literary process. Accordingly, those genres that occupy leading positions produce a tangible influence on other genres, on the poetics and style of the movement as a whole.
The fundamental difference between the genre system of realism is that for the first time in the history of literature, prose genres began to play a leading role in it - the novel, story, short story. Of course, this was due to the profound shifts and changes that occurred as a result of the stabilization of the bourgeois system and the “prosaicization” of life that has already been mentioned. Prose genres, and above all the novel, turned out to be the most suitable for the artistic development of the new realities of our time and their adequate reflection. Therefore, the novel reveals the possibilities inherent in it and acts as a truly universal genre in covering various spheres of life, in particular those that have traditionally been considered “unaesthetic” or “non-poetic”, and their “melting” into high achievements of art.
However, despite the powerful development of realism in the middle of the 19th century, it was not a comprehensive artistic movement. This applies not only to some types of art (for example, music, which remained predominantly romantic), but also to literature, certain types and genres of it. Realism appeared on a large scale in epic prose genres, but the same cannot be said about lyric poetry (in European and American literature of the mid-19th century, it, unlike prose, remained predominantly romantic) and partly about drama (in drama in most European countries, realism is established approximately in last third of the 19th century). Material from the site
What explains the weak development of lyric poetry in realistic literature? In answering this question, one should take into account, firstly, extra-literary factors, in particular the “prosaic” nature of the reality of the bourgeois era, which created a spiritual and emotional atmosphere unfavorable for the flourishing of lyric poetry. Secondly, internal factors - in particular, the specifics of realism as an artistic system focused on the external, primarily social world, its research and analytical reflection. This does not mean that the personality and the subjective world were not of interest to realists - we are talking about an overwhelming focus on what objectively exists, the deployment of a work in an objective space, which includes the personality and its inner world. Romanticism is an art whose axis is shifted to the area of subjectivity, the spiritual and mental life of the individual. Of course, this life did not stop in the era of bourgeois prose, but it was artistically embodied mainly in lyrical poetry of the romantic type or in forms close to it.
Before the emergence of realism as a literary movement, most writers had a one-sided approach to depicting a person. The classicists portrayed a person mainly in terms of his duties to the state and showed very little interest in him in his everyday life, in family and private life. Sentimentalists, on the contrary, moved on to depicting a person’s personal life, his spiritual feelings. The Romantics were also interested mainly in the spiritual life of man, the world of his feelings and passions.
But they endowed their heroes with feelings and passions of exceptional strength, and placed them in unusual conditions.
Realist writers portray a person in many ways. They draw typical characters and at the same time show in what social conditions this or that hero of the work was formed.
This ability to give typical characters in typical circumstances is the main feature of realism.
We call typical images those in which the most vividly, fully and truthfully embodied the most important features characteristic of a particular historical period for a particular social group or phenomenon (for example, the Prostakovs-Skotinins in Fonvizin’s comedy are typical representatives of the Russian middle-class nobility of the second half XVIII century).
In typical images, a realist writer reflects not only those traits that are most common at a certain time, but also those that are just beginning to appear and develop fully in the future.
The conflicts underlying the works of classicists, sentimentalists and romantics were also one-sided.
Classical writers (especially in tragedies) depicted the clash in the hero’s soul of the consciousness of the need to fulfill his duty to the state with personal feelings and drives. For sentimentalists, the main conflict grew out of the social inequality of heroes belonging to different classes. In romanticism, the basis of the conflict is the gap between dream and reality. Among realist writers, conflicts are as diverse as in life itself.
Krylov and Griboyedov played a major role in the formation of Russian realism at the beginning of the 19th century.
Krylov became the creator of the Russian realistic fable. Krylov's fables deeply truthfully depict the life of feudal Russia in its essential features. The ideological content of his fables, democratic in their orientation, the perfection of their construction, wonderful verse and a living colloquial language developed on a folk basis - all this was a major contribution to Russian realistic literature and influenced the development of the work of such writers as Griboyedov, Pushkin, Gogol and others.
Griboyedov, with his work “Woe from Wit,” gave an example of Russian realistic comedy.
But the true founder of Russian realistic literature, who gave perfect examples of realistic creativity in a wide variety of literary genres, was the great national poet Pushkin.
Realism- 19th - 20th centuries (from Latin realis- valid)
Realism can define heterogeneous phenomena united by the concept of vital truth: spontaneous realism of ancient literature, Renaissance realism, educational realism, “natural school” as the initial stage of the development of critical realism in the 19th century, realism of the 19th-20th centuries, “socialist realism”
- Main features of realism:
- Depiction of life in images that correspond to the essence of life phenomena, through typing the facts of reality;
- A true reflection of the world, a wide coverage of reality;
- Historicism;
- The attitude towards literature as a means of a person’s knowledge of himself and the world around him;
- Reflection of the connection between man and environment;
- Typification of characters and circumstances.
Realist writers in Russia. Representatives of realism in Russia: A. S. Pushkin, N. V. Gogol, A. N. Ostrovsky, I. A. Goncharov, N. A. Nekrasov, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, I. S. Turgenev, F. M. Dostoevsky, L N. Tolstoy, A. P. Chekhov, I. A. Bunin and others.
Material from Uncyclopedia
Realism (from Late Latin reālis - material) is an artistic method in art and literature. The history of realism in world literature is unusually rich. The very idea of it changed at different stages of artistic development, reflecting the persistent desire of artists for a truthful depiction of reality.
Illustration by V. Milashevsky for the novel by Charles Dickens “The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.”
Illustration by O. Vereisky for L. N. Tolstoy’s novel “Anna Karenina.”
Illustration by D. Shmarinov for F. M. Dostoevsky’s novel “Crime and Punishment.”
Illustration by V. Serov for M. Gorky’s story “Foma Gordeev”.
Illustration by B. Zaborov for the novel by M. Andersen-Nexo “Ditte - Child of Man.”
However, the concept of truth, truth is one of the most difficult in aesthetics. For example, the theorist of French classicism N. Boileau called for being guided by the truth and “imitating nature.” But the romantic V. Hugo, an ardent opponent of classicism, urged “to consult only nature, truth and your inspiration, which is also truth and nature.” Thus, both defended "truth" and "nature".
The selection of life phenomena, their assessment, the ability to present them as important, characteristic, typical - all this is connected with the artist’s point of view on life, and this, in turn, depends on his worldview, on the ability to grasp the advanced movements of the era. The desire for objectivity often forces the artist to depict the real balance of power in society, even contrary to his own political convictions.
The specific features of realism depend on the historical conditions in which art develops. National historical circumstances also determine the uneven development of realism in different countries.
Realism is not something given and unchangeable once and for all. In the history of world literature, several main types of its development can be outlined.
There is no consensus in science about the initial period of realism. Many art historians attribute it to very distant eras: they talk about the realism of cave paintings of primitive people, about the realism of ancient sculpture. In the history of world literature, many features of realism are found in the works of the ancient world and the early Middle Ages (in folk epic, for example, in Russian epics, in chronicles). However, the formation of realism as an artistic system in European literature is usually associated with the Renaissance (Renaissance), the greatest progressive revolution. A new understanding of life by a person who rejects the church sermon of slavish obedience is reflected in the lyrics of F. Petrarch, the novels of F. Rabelais and M. Cervantes, in the tragedies and comedies of W. Shakespeare. After centuries of medieval churchmen preaching that man is a “vessel of sin” and calling for humility, Renaissance literature and art glorified man as the supreme creature of nature, seeking to reveal the beauty of his physical appearance and the richness of his soul and mind. The realism of the Renaissance is characterized by the scale of images (Don Quixote, Hamlet, King Lear), the poeticization of the human personality, its capacity for great feeling (as in Romeo and Juliet) and at the same time the high intensity of the tragic conflict, when the clash of personality with the inert forces opposing it is depicted .
The next stage in the development of realism is the educational stage (see Enlightenment), when literature becomes (in the West) an instrument of direct preparation for the bourgeois-democratic revolution. Among the educators there were supporters of classicism; their work was influenced by other methods and styles. But in the 18th century. The so-called Enlightenment realism was also taking shape (in Europe), the theorists of which were D. Diderot in France and G. Lessing in Germany. The English realistic novel, whose founder was D. Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe (1719), acquired worldwide significance. In the literature of the Enlightenment, a democratic hero appeared (Figaro in the trilogy of P. Beaumarchais, Louise Miller in the tragedy “Cunning and Love” by I. F. Schiller, images of peasants in A. N. Radishchev). Enlighteners assessed all phenomena of social life and people's actions as reasonable or unreasonable (and they saw the unreasonable, first of all, in all the old feudal orders and customs). They proceeded from this in their depiction of human character; their positive heroes are, first of all, the embodiment of reason, the negative ones are a deviation from the norm, the product of unreason, the barbarism of former times.
Enlightenment realism often allowed for convention. Thus, the circumstances in the novel and drama were not necessarily typical. They could be conditional, as in the experiment: “Suppose a person finds himself on a desert island...”. At the same time, Defoe depicts Robinson’s behavior not as it could actually be (the prototype of his hero went wild, even lost his articulate speech), but as he wants to present the person, fully armed with his physical and mental strength, as a hero, conqueror of forces nature. Faust in I. V. Goethe, shown in the struggle for the establishment of high ideals, is also conventional. Features of a well-known convention also distinguish D. I. Fonvizin’s comedy “The Minor.”
A new type of realism emerged in the 19th century. This is critical realism. It differs significantly from both the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. Its flourishing in the West is associated with the names of Stendhal and O. Balzac in France, C. Dickens, W. Thackeray in England, in Russia - A. S. Pushkin, N. V. Gogol, I. S. Turgenev, F. M. Dostoevsky, L.N. Tolstoy, A.P. Chekhov.
Critical realism portrays the relationship between man and the environment in a new way. Human character is revealed in organic connection with social circumstances. The subject of deep social analysis has become the inner world of man; critical realism therefore simultaneously becomes psychological. Romanticism, which sought to penetrate the secrets of the human “I,” played a large role in the preparation of this quality of realism.
Deepening the knowledge of life and complicating the picture of the world in the critical realism of the 19th century. do not mean, however, some kind of absolute superiority over previous stages, for the development of art is marked not only by gains, but also by losses.
The scale of the images of the Renaissance was lost. The pathos of affirmation characteristic of the Enlighteners, their optimistic faith in the victory of good over evil, remained unique.
The rise of the labor movement in Western countries, the formation in the 40s. XIX century Marxism not only influence the literature of critical realism, but also give rise to the first artistic experiments in depicting reality from the perspective of the revolutionary proletariat. In the realism of such writers as G. Weert, W. Morris, and the author of “The International” E. Pothier, new features are outlined that anticipate the artistic discoveries of socialist realism.
In Russia, the 19th century is a period of exceptional strength and scope in the development of realism. In the second half of the century, the artistic achievements of realism, bringing Russian literature to the international arena, won it worldwide recognition.
The richness and diversity of Russian realism of the 19th century. allow us to talk about its different forms.
Its formation is associated with the name of A. S. Pushkin, who led Russian literature onto the broad path of depicting “the fate of the people, the fate of man.” In the conditions of the accelerated development of Russian culture, Pushkin seems to be catching up with its previous lag, paving new paths in almost all genres and, with his universality and his optimism, turning out to be akin to the titans of the Renaissance. Pushkin’s work lays the foundations of critical realism, developed in the work of N.V. Gogol and after him in the so-called natural school.
Performance in the 60s. revolutionary democrats led by N. G. Chernyshevsky gives new features to Russian critical realism (the revolutionary nature of criticism, images of new people).
A special place in the history of Russian realism belongs to L. N. Tolstoy and F. M. Dostoevsky. It was thanks to them that the Russian realistic novel acquired global significance. Their psychological mastery and insight into the “dialectics of the soul” opened the way for the artistic quests of 20th century writers. Realism in the 20th century all over the world bears the imprint of the aesthetic discoveries of L. N. Tolstoy and F. M. Dostoevsky.
The growth of the Russian liberation movement, which by the end of the century transferred the center of the world revolutionary struggle from the West to Russia, leads to the fact that the work of the great Russian realists becomes, as V. I. Lenin said about L. N. Tolstoy, “a mirror of the Russian revolution” according to their objective historical content, despite all the differences in their ideological positions.
The creative scope of Russian social realism is reflected in the wealth of genres, especially in the field of the novel: philosophical and historical (L. N. Tolstoy), revolutionary journalistic (N. G. Chernyshevsky), everyday (I. A. Goncharov), satirical (M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin), psychological (F. M. Dostoevsky, L. N. Tolstoy). By the end of the century, A.P. Chekhov became an innovator in the genre of realistic stories and a kind of “lyrical drama”.
It is important to emphasize that Russian realism of the 19th century. did not develop in isolation from the world historical and literary process. This was the beginning of an era when, in the words of K. Marx and F. Engels, “the fruits of the spiritual activity of individual nations become the common property.”
F. M. Dostoevsky noted as one of the features of Russian literature its “capacity for universality, all-humanity, all-response.” Here we are talking not so much about Western influences, but about the organic development in line with European culture of its centuries-old traditions.
At the beginning of the 20th century. The appearance of M. Gorky's plays "The Bourgeois", "At the Demise" and especially the novel "Mother" (and in the West - the novel "Pelle the Conqueror" by M. Andersen-Nexo) testifies to the formation of socialist realism. In the 20s Soviet literature declared itself with major successes, and in the early 30s. In many capitalist countries, a literature of the revolutionary proletariat is emerging. The literature of socialist realism is becoming an important factor in world literary development. It should be noted that Soviet literature as a whole retains more connections with the artistic experience of the 19th century than literature in the West (including socialist literature).
The beginning of the general crisis of capitalism, two world wars, the acceleration of the revolutionary process throughout the world under the influence of the October Revolution and the existence of the Soviet Union, and after 1945 the formation of the world system of socialism - all this affected the fate of realism.
Critical realism, which continued to develop in Russian literature until the October Revolution (I. A. Bunin, A. I. Kuprin) and in the West, in the 20th century. received further development, while undergoing significant changes. In critical realism of the 20th century. in the West, a variety of influences are more freely assimilated and intersected, including some features of the unrealistic movements of the 20th century. (symbolism, impressionism, expressionism), which, of course, does not exclude the struggle of realists against non-realistic aesthetics.
From about the 20s. In the literature of the West, there is a tendency towards in-depth psychologism, the transmission of the “stream of consciousness”. The so-called intellectual novel of T. Mann arises; subtext takes on special significance, for example, in E. Hemingway. This focus on the individual and his spiritual world in Western critical realism significantly weakens its epic breadth. Epic scale in the 20th century. is the merit of the writers of socialist realism (“The Life of Klim Samgin” by M. Gorky, “Quiet Flows the Don” by M. A. Sholokhov, “Walking in Torment” by A. N. Tolstoy, “The Dead Remain Young” by A. Zegers).
Unlike the realists of the 19th century. writers of the 20th century more often they resort to fantasy (A. France, K. Chapek), to convention (for example, B. Brecht), creating parable novels and parable dramas (see Parable). At the same time, in the realism of the 20th century. the document, the fact, triumphs. Documentary works appear in different countries within the framework of both critical realism and socialist realism.
Thus, while remaining documentary, the autobiographical books of E. Hemingway, S. O'Casey, I. Becher, such classic books of socialist realism as “Report with a Noose Around the Neck” by Yu. Fuchik and “The Young Guard” by A. A. Fadeeva.
