Comprehensive analysis of the text by M. Alekseev “Bread”. Sukhomlinsky V.A.

Good afternoon, dear son!

So you have flown away from your parents' nest - you live in a big city, study at a university, and want to feel like an independent person. I know from my own experience that, caught up in the stormy whirlwind of your new life, you remember little about your parental home, about your mother and me, and you hardly miss it. It will come later when you get to know life. ...The first letter to a son who has flown away from his parents' nest... I want you to keep it for the rest of your life, so that you keep it, re-read it, think about it. My mother and I know that every young generation is a little condescending towards the teachings of their parents: you, they say, cannot see and understand everything that we see and understand. Maybe this is so... Maybe, after reading this letter, you will want to put it somewhere away, so that it reminds you less of the endless teachings of your father and mother. Well, put it down, but just remember well where, because the day will come when you remember these teachings, you will say to yourself: after all, father was right... and you will need to read this old half-forgotten letter. You will find and read it. Keep it for life. I also saved the first letter from my father. I was 15 years old when I left my parents’ nest and went to study at the Kremenchug Pedagogical Institute. 1934 was a difficult year. I remember how my mother accompanied me to the entrance exams. I tied a new one into an old clean scarf, which was stored in a row at the bottom of the chest, and a bundle of food: flatbreads, two glasses of fried soybeans... I passed the exams well. There were few applicants with secondary education at that time, and the institute was allowed to accept seven-year graduates. My teaching began. It was difficult, very difficult to acquire knowledge when your stomach was empty. But then the bread of a new harvest appeared. I will never forget the day when my mother gave me the first loaf baked from new rye. The delivery was brought by Grandfather Matvey, a driver for a rural consumer society, who came to the city weekly to buy goods. The loaf was in a clean linen bag - soft, fragrant, with a crispy crust. And next to the loaf of bread is my father’s letter, the first letter I’m talking about: I keep it as the first commandment... “Don’t forget, son, about your daily bread. I don’t believe in God, but I call bread holy. for you, he will remain a saint for the rest of your life. Remember who you are and where you came from. Remember how hard it is to get this bread. Remember that your grandfather, my father Omelko Sukhomlin, was a serf and died at the plow in the field. Never forget about the people's roots . Don’t forget that while you are studying, someone is working to earn your daily bread. And when you learn and become a teacher, don’t forget about bread either. Bread is human labor, it is hope for the future, and the yardstick by which your and your children’s conscience will always be measured." This is what my father wrote in his first letter. Well, there was also a note that we received rye and wheat for workdays , that every week grandfather Matvey will bring me a loaf of bread. Why am I writing to you about this, son? Don’t forget that our root is the working people, the land, holy bread. And cursed will be the one who, with even one thought, one word, with one act he will express disdain for bread and labor, for the people who gave us all life... Hundreds of thousands of words in our language, but in the first place I would put three words: bread, labor, people. These are the three roots on which our state. This is the very essence of our system. And these roots are so tightly intertwined that it is impossible to break them or divide them. He who does not know what bread and labor are, ceases to be the son of his people. He loses the best spiritual qualities of the people, becomes a renegade , a faceless creature, unworthy of respect. He who forgets what labor, sweat and fatigue is, ceases to value bread. Whichever of these three mighty roots is damaged in a person, he ceases to be a real person; rot, a wormhole, appears inside him. I am proud that you know the work in the grain-growing field, you know how difficult it is to get bread. Do you remember how on the eve of the May Day holiday I came to your class (I think you were in ninth grade then) and conveyed a request from the collective farm machine operators: please replace us in the field on holidays, we want to rest. Do you remember how all of you young men didn’t want to wear overalls instead of a festive suit, get behind the wheel of a tractor, or be a trailer driver? But what pride shone in your eyes when these two days passed, when you returned home, feeling like hard workers. I don’t believe in this, I would say, chocolate idea of ​​communism: there will be plenty of all material goods, a person will be provided with everything, he will have everything as if at the wave of his hand, and everything will be so easy for him: if you want it, here you are on the table whatever your heart desires. If all this were so, then a person would turn into God knows what, probably into a satiated animal. Fortunately, this will not happen. Nothing will come to a person without tension, without effort, without sweat and fatigue, without anxiety and worry. Under communism there will be calluses, there will be sleepless nights. And the most important thing on which a person will always rest - his mind, conscience, human pride - is that he will always earn bread by the sweat of his brow. There will always be anxiety around the plowed field, there will be heartfelt concern, as for a living being, for a tender stalk of wheat. There will be an uncontrollable desire for the earth to give more and more - the bread root of man will always rest on this. And this root must be protected in everyone. You write that you will soon be sent to work on a collective farm. And very good. I'm very, very happy about this. Work well, don’t let yourself, your father, or your comrades down. Don't choose something cleaner and lighter. Choose to work directly in the field, on the ground. A shovel is also a tool that can be used to show skill. And during the summer holidays you will work in a tractor brigade on your collective farm (of course, if they don’t recruit people who want to go to virgin lands. If they do, be sure to go there). “You know the man who raised it by the ear of wheat,” you probably know this Ukrainian proverb well. Every person is proud of what he does for people. Every honest person wants to leave a piece of himself in his ear of wheat. I have been living in the world for almost fifty years, and I am convinced that this desire is most clearly expressed in those who work on the earth. Let's wait until your first student holidays - I will introduce you to an old man from a neighboring collective farm; he has been growing apple tree seedlings for more than thirty years. This is a true artist in his field. In every branch, in every leaf of a grown tree, he sees himself. If today all people were like this, we could say that we have achieved communist labor... I wish you health, goodness, happiness. Mom and sister hug you. They wrote to you yesterday. Kiss you. Your father.

Department of Education Administration

Krasnogvardeisky district

Methodical office

Preparation materials

for the unified state exam

Part C

Essay – reasoning based on the text

(Collection of materials prepared by RMO students

teachers of Russian language and literature)

Biryuch

Section 1. Municipal educational institution "Secondary school in Biryucha":

Section 2. Municipal educational institution Veselovskaya secondary school:

Section 3. Municipal educational institution Verkhnepokrovskaya secondary school:

Section 4. Municipal educational institution Zasosenskaya secondary school:

Section 5. Municipal educational institution Livenskaya No. 1 secondary school:

Section 6. Municipal educational institution Nikitovskaya secondary school:

Section 1.

Municipal educational institution "Secondary school in Biryucha"

In bread stores, if you notice, there is no noise. People buy bread respectfully, avoiding fuss and crowding. Having looked at the loaf, I unwrapped the plastic bag. A diving, dark-haired guy approached. Unceremoniously pushing me aside with his elbow, he quickly stuck his long-fingered, hairy hand behind the glass and began throwing loaf after loaf into a huge backpack. When the backpack became crowded, the guy tightened it with a cord and pressed it tightly with his knee, crushing the soft, pliable bread with the entire weight of his body and his fists.

I was taken aback. It was clearer than clear - this bread is not intended for the table.

What are you doing?

It was approaching break time, the store was empty, there were only a few women in it. The dark one glared with his drunken eyes.

Don't perform! – he distorted his face. - Understood?

Put the bread on the shelf. If you are now... But, suffocated with anger, I was unable to build up the phrase.

The dark one angrily narrowed his eyes and, until his fingers crunched, he brutally pressed his hairy finger into the loaf. The bread crumbled and fell at his feet.

“Pick it up,” I said, barely audible in a strangely drawn out voice. - Pick it up.

The dark one reached for the backpack.

“Pick it up,” I repeated more quietly.

Order, grandfather, wrap up. The rally is over! – he grabbed the straps of the backpack with his fingers, like a claw, and, suddenly raising his free hand, announced reconciliation:

Peace to the world!

I suffocated, losing power over myself.

Scoundrel! - I burst out. And forgetting about his age and ailments, he carefully grabbed his shirt and silently - with short nervous pushes - began to push him into a corner. He backed away, automatically dragging his backpack...

A tall, strongly built guy appeared at the door. Further details are not relevant to our conversation.

And it happened, this story happened recently, this summer...

(I. Tobolsky)

Loaf of earth and sky

On your table -

Nothing is stronger than bread

Not on earth.

It happens that a word, phrase, or words from a song get stuck on the ear or on the tongue. So here it is with me now:

Bread to the left, bread to the right,

Bread for happiness, bread for glory...

It was with these lines of the song that a new day of my childhood began, when early in the morning my parents turned on the radio. Yes, there are hundreds of thousands of words in our language, but three come first: bread, labor, people. These are the three roots on which the state and humanity rest. And whoever does not know what bread and labor are, ceases to be a son or daughter of his people and loses his spiritual qualities.

According to I. Tobolsky, such a “representative of lack of spirituality,” an insolent and scoundrel still comes across the path of almost every one of us. Yes, such types exist in our society, to be honest. “And this story happened recently, it happened this summer...” the author confirms. Without fuss, crowding, without noise, bread is bought respectfully in the store. And suddenly... the diving guy unceremoniously, brazenly, pushing away the elderly man with his elbow, begins throwing loaf after loaf into his huge backpack, pressing the bread with his knee, crushing it with the entire weight of his body. In response to the pensioner’s remark, he stares, his face distorted, and shouts: “Don’t speak!” And his face reacts angrily, he brutally squeezes the loaf. And when the bread began to crumble, the grandfather could not stand it and forced the scoundrel to stand up, thereby making it clear that from time immemorial there was a respectful attitude towards bread. How is it that there are still scoundrels living who don’t care about the most valuable thing in the world.

I share the position of the author of this text. When a person’s spirit is low, he becomes aggressive, does not notice the people around him, “floats on top of the crowd,” indifferent to everything that surrounds him. There is no holiness of feelings either for the old and elderly, or for bread, or respect, or shame and conscience. But when this dark-haired man heard the words spoken firmly and the imperious hand on his chest, he backed away... No, he’s still afraid of power. Why can only physical force stop such “moral monsters?” Where is the awareness that the bread lying on the shelves was created by the hands of many workers. After all, since childhood we were read:

If you have two strong hands,

Make sure there is a lot of bread!

Loaf is the oldest bread among the Slavs. We greet guests with a loaf of bread and salt lying on an embroidered towel, we put it on the festive table, we are alive thanks to it, a piece of bread. How can one not love and appreciate this creation of human hands?

In every little piece

The earth holds on.

In a small grain of wheat

Summer and winter

The power of the sun is stored

And native land.

Once upon a time I had to learn by heart V. Khodasevich’s poem “The Path of the Grain”, where the poet so subtly, intelligently and masterfully compares the path of growth of a grain that has fallen into a furrow and the growth of a person’s soul, which can descend into darkness and can come to life again thanks to wisdom: “To everything that lives follow the path of the grain.” The sower only throws the grain into the black earth, but the grain itself needs to germinate, break through, stretch out, throw out a spikelet, ripen... Such is the hard path of the grain! So a person, through labor, sweat, and effort, earns his daily bread, treating it with respect, in a fatherly manner.

Let's remember what Nastya and Mitrash put in (“Pantry of the Sun”) when they go to the treasured Palestinian land in their skating rink? Bread! Why are grandchildren Natasha and Anton rushing to see their grandmother? (“July Thunderstorm”) Enjoy delicious and filling pancakes, although the distance from their village to their grandmother’s was four kilometers long. The girl is only ten years old, but when she enters the rye, she is afraid of crushing the bread and walks along the side of the road.

Ah, country life! How many lives it saved, how many hungry children it fed! How many have this Russian field brought into the world, pricking the cursed stubble and ripe ear awns of the harvest-bearing field! It is only fitting for the immortal ear of bread to sing hymns, because this is a jewel, this is life, this is the Motherland.

And a person cannot stand firmly on this earth, he cannot live confidently without a feeling of love and respect, reverence for the creation of human hands - bread, white, rye, wheat, barley. One role of bread for all corners of the country is life and sincere respect.

It is a great blessing to have a fragrant loaf of bread on the table every day. There seems to be no person who would despise bread, would not know its taste, would not value it. With us, bread, as in ancient times, is the head of everything.

How do we really feel about bread? Lovingly? Carefully? Or maybe because it’s easy for us now - not so much? You run into the bakery and a minute later you come out with the treasured loaf...

I am grateful to the author of the text for the fact that he touched upon an important problem for our time - the attitude towards the primary product of the Russian people. We have achieved a European quality of life, but there remains less and less true, Russian, original quality of life.

Bread in Rus' has always been treated as God's blessing. To say a bad word about bread was considered sacrilege. “Bread and salt!” - says the Russian man, greeting guests on the threshold of the house. In honor of bread, hymns and songs were composed, rituals were performed, and holidays were held. All folk customs contain human wisdom, a respectful attitude towards bread, which was passed down from generation to generation, absorbed with mother's milk.

So I. Tobolsky speaks of a careful attitude towards bread: there is no noise in bread stores, “people buy bread respectfully, avoiding fuss and crowds.” He is painfully wounded by the behavior of the nimble, dark-haired guy who stuffs loaves of bread into a huge backpack, pressing “soft, pliable bread” with his knees and fists. The author does not hide his indignation and indignation.

I remember when I was a child, my grandmother would kneel down in the morning and always whisper the same prayer: “Give us our daily bread this day and forgive us our debts...”. I remember how she took the loaf out of the Russian oven, washed the top crust with cold water and laid it on an embroidered towel.

The lessons of our ancestors teach us to have a reverent attitude towards bread. I bow to the courage, dignity, and honor of the hero of the text, who could not ignore the ugly act. He knows exactly the price of bread. A small golden grain does not weigh a gram. And we need national forces to nurture it. It really is gold.

There is another quality of bread; It is bread, the ability to value and share it that a person’s spiritual generosity is verified. And therefore, the bread that you share in difficult times has no equal in taste!

Bread today is always at our service: black, white, butter. You can choose any: round or shaped, rye or wheat, with caraway seeds, poppy seeds, nuts, raisins... An abundance of bread! But do we have the right to treat him with disdain? Bread is the property of the people, the abundance of bread is one of the symbols of the greatness and power of the Motherland, and respect for it should become an immutable law.

Bread! How many human passions have raged because of him before and to this day. How incredibly interesting this is – bread! How much more can be invented, discovered, invented,

Talking about bread is as difficult as talking about life. After all, bread is our life.

It is to bread that man owes the birth of civilization.

In that basic prayer, which, according to legend, the Son of God himself bequeathed to people, the main words are about bread: “Give us this day our daily bread...”

As a child, you simply repeat these obscure words. And only years later the great simplicity of this request is revealed.

“Our daily bread,” that is, necessary, no more, no less, but as much as is needed for life. “Essential” is both existing, and real, and constituting the essence of being, and much more...

“Give us this day,” that is, “give us today.” One immediately imagines a crust of this bread, on which everything on earth depends—both flesh and spirit...

“Man does not live by bread alone...” But without bread he is dead! Therefore, when talking about bread, we always have to touch upon moral problems. This is such a lofty matter -

bread. This is not just food, it is food... “Bread, satiating the body, nourishes the soul...”. Bread -

the basis of life, bread is the head of everything.

It is difficult to separate bread and man; through the relationship to bread one can understand the essence of man, his essence.

The story recorded by I. Tobolsky is also on this topic.

In a bread store, a teenager casually throws bread into his backpack, not reacting to comments, and then, completely brutally, presses his hairy hand into the loaf so that the bread, crumbling, falls to his feet. The author still manages to make the guy pick up the “twisted” bread. He is extremely indignant at the behavior of the young man, rude and ignorant.

I. Tobolsky’s position is clear: this cannot be done with bread.

When satiety and prosperity are constantly prescribed in our homes, it is then that bread becomes familiar to the eye and feeling. It is simply unnoticeable given its everyday irreplaceability; it is too ordinary for us. But this was not always the case.

Your heart aches with pain when you read the lines from letters and memories of the war. It is impossible to come to an understanding of the bread of peace without knowing about the bread of war.

The bread of war... The most terrible memories are burning bread on the root, shafts of fire in the fields. The treacherous enemy almost always strikes the bread first. With what courage people saved bread for the front. And what could not be saved was burned so that not a single ear of corn would fall to the enemy.

At the front, soldiers shared a piece of bread among several people.

Everyone knows about the heroism of Leningraders, about 125 grams of bread “with fire and blood in half.”

Tanya Savicheva died in the hospital in the arms of a nurse in terrible agony from suffering from hunger, childhood trials, and extreme dystrophy.

Blockade days...When there was an ominous equal sign between bread and life.

The older generation knows the value of bread. The same cannot be said about some teenagers,

reminiscent of the hero from the text by I. Tobolsky. You often see buns and pies near trash cans. And one becomes ashamed of the behavior of the children, because they have been told more than once about caring for bread.

Everything rests on bread; everything is measured by bread. The moral wealth or wretchedness of a person is determined by the attitude towards bread. Bread is the measure of the human soul. Respect for bread is not respect for an insensitive slice containing protein and other components, it is memory, it is history, it is national culture, it is millions of problems, joys and sorrows. Bread is our past, present and future, it is our life!

I wish everyone that there is always plenty of bread on your table and that you can never get enough of it!

Bread on our table... It lies in front of us - meaningful with proverbs, caressed by sayings and, as it were, animated by people's faith in its life-giving power. Our ancestors said: “Give us this day our daily bread...” And today this prayer is like a talisman, like an eternal desire for good.

We are accustomed to the sight, taste, and smell of bread. It has become our daily food. Everyday communication has obscured that biblical, original meaning for us. But among the people there is a special concept of the value of bread - moral. After all, bread not only grows a person, it tests each of us for perseverance and courage, for hard work. Strengthening physical health also verifies moral health. Through the attitude towards bread you can see the true value of a person and understand his essence. This is exactly what I. Tobolsky reflects on in his text.

With pain in his heart, the author talks about an incident in a store, where among the customers “respectfully” buying bread, there was a “diving”, unceremonious guy who began to “throw” loaf after loaf into a huge backpack, while “crushing with the whole weight of his body” the pliable bread, and then “pressed” his “five” into one of the loaves, and the bread, crumbling, fell to the floor. This caused the terrible anger of the elderly man, who forgot about his years and illnesses and poured out all his negative feelings on the bastard, who had completely lost his fighting spirit. It is quite clear that this situation clearly highlights the narrator’s position: such an attitude towards bread is unacceptable.

One cannot but agree with this point of view. Yes, we have plenty of bread now. But sometimes it becomes scary when you see it on the floor, under your feet, in a landfill... After all, an ordinary loaf has absorbed the work of a huge number of people. Lack of thrift in handling bread is a sign of disrespect for them.

After reading the text, I remembered newsreel footage and stories of people of the older generation about blockade bread, black as a charred brick, the words of my first teacher about how during the hard times of war in school classes, children were given a tiny slice of bread during class. What happiness it was for them! And my mother, as a twelve-year-old girl, collected spikelets in the field to prevent even a handful of grain from which front-line bread was baked from dying. Therefore, today it is so necessary to listen to the inner voice of the older generation: “Take care of your bread, people! This is a priceless gift from our breadwinner, the earth!”

Heartfelt lines from the works of front-line soldiers will not let you forget about the past. Grigory Lyushnin, a future writer, while in a fascist concentration camp, wrote:

A crumb of bread fell to the ground - there was less bread by a crumb.

Somewhere in our unharvested field there are so many grains lying along the arable land!

If only we could gather them together, in a heap, we would bake white, fragrant bread.

We would get stronger and stronger, we would break the fascist prisons.

We would go out into battle again, under bombing.

Yes, you need to spare the bread crumbs.

With a shudder, reading the story about bread that is “not intended for the table” and about the young “scoundrel,” I think about one historical fact. For the sake of saving the richest collection (100 thousand samples) from 118 countries of the world during the Great Patriotic War, employees of the Institute of Plant Growing
sacrificed their lives, preserving grains for the sake of future harvests. Twenty-eight people went into immortality. To be near bread and slowly die of hunger is inhuman torture. This is fortitude, will, endurance, self-control!

Yes, bread determines the value of human actions. It seems to me that I. Tobolsky states in his article: anyone who is capable of dropping, stepping on, or crushing even a piece will be severely punished by life itself. I was shocked by the unknown fairy tale “The Girl Who Stepped on Bread.” It is a pity that it is not considered one of the writer’s popular works. If children and adults read it, then perhaps there would be much fewer examples like the one described. A certain proud and arrogant girl Inge, trying to get through a swamp, threw bread into the mud so that she could step on it and cross the puddle. But as soon as she stepped on the bread with one foot, it sank deeper and deeper, only “black bubbles began to appear,” and the girl could not escape. What a punishment! What a lesson! Bread does not forgive an arrogant, sloppy attitude towards it!

The attitude towards bread is an indicator of people’s culture, their upbringing, and, finally, patriotism. To be with bread is to constantly feel the warmth of life within yourself. Bread is necessary for us like sun, light, air. Therefore it is priceless. Let us always remember this!

Bread is the head of life!

V. Bakaldin

Bread... With this word, wonderful bakery products immediately appear in our imagination, without which it is impossible to even imagine our life. Bread is an ambassador of peace and friendship between peoples. Our lives are changing, values ​​are being rethought, but bread, father, bread-breadwinner remains the greatest value.

Many books have been written about bread, poems have been written, pictures have been drawn. I would like to give an example of the painting “Rye”. The artist seems to be telling us: “Here it is, our Russia, wide, free, rich in bread. How can you not love her, Mother Rus'?” They were escorted to the front with bread, and those returning from the war were greeted with bread. Bread was used to remember those who would never return. Dear guests are greeted with bread and salt. There is one word that is equivalent to the word “bread”. This word is life. What could be more important than bread? How can you learn to respect bread? How often do we disrespect bread, allowing ourselves to throw it on tables, on window sills, under our feet, believing that there is nothing wrong with that. How cruelly mistaken are those who think so, how disrespectful they are to those who raise him, to themselves:

Bread under the table!

Thrown straight into the dust.

Who is this who has his conscience torn apart?

Threw it away like junk?

The problem raised by I. Tobolsky in the text about a careful, sensitive attitude towards bread is so close to me! Your heart bleeds when you see an indifferent attitude towards bread. It is no coincidence that the hero of this text, an old, sick man, could not calmly watch from the side as a young dark-haired guy, with drunken eyes, unceremoniously put loaf after loaf into a backpack with his hairy hands, and when the backpack became crowded, the guy tied it with a cord and tightly pressed it with his knee, crushing the soft, pliable bread with the entire weight of his body. This picture was probably difficult to leave unnoticed, especially for those who grew this bread, who in the hungry years treasured every bread crumb, sharing the last piece with others. None of us, probably, remains indifferent to historical documents that speak about the fate of people who lacked a “crumb” of bread and died. Leningraders lived under blockade for 900 days. At this time, workers received 125 grams of bread, and city residents - 125 grams. In our country, which has healed the severe wounds of war, more than one generation of people has grown up who do not know what sleepless queues for bread are, what bread cards are, who do not know the feeling of hunger, are unfamiliar with the taste of bread mixed with roots, acorns, chaff, straw... And How much strength and health do grain growers give so that we always have a fresh loaf of bread on our table? We should remember that the bread on our table appears thanks to the hard work of people of one hundred and twenty professions. “When you are full, remember hunger” is a covenant, a warning from our ancestors, which we must not forget. And the hearts of older people who have experienced famine are filled with anger, pain, and pity when they see such treatment of bread. I. Tobolsky writes about this this way: “Forgetting about age and ailments, I carefully grabbed his shirt and silently - with short nervous pushes - began to push him into a corner.”

I believe that we must pass on to our children respect for bread - the main wealth of the country. So that our children do not grow up ignorant, so that they know how much work people put into it, with what efforts they get buns and gingerbread, so that for them, as for us, fathers and mothers, with the words Motherland, Friendship, Peace, Father, Mother The word was Bread.

Bread... When you say this word, an endless field of golden wheat, the weary hands of a combine operator, a ruddy loaf on the table of a village room appear before your eyes. From time immemorial, bread was not a simple food. The people treated him with reverence and sang him in their works of folklore.

A respectful, careful attitude towards our main food product is spoken of at the beginning of I. Tobolsky’s text. But, unfortunately, in our time, the exact opposite behavior of some people occurs. This kind of disrespectful, soulless attitude towards bread is discussed further in the text.

The loss of the spiritual and moral foundations of life, the leveling of eternal values ​​is one of the main problems of modern society. A disdainful attitude towards bread is a clear indicator of lack of spirituality and lack of morality. Therefore, the problem raised by the author of the text is very relevant.

I. Tobolsky does not teach, does not give instructions, but clearly expresses his attitude towards the act of the “darkie” through dialogue and succinct phrases. The author does not accept disrespectful attitude towards the shrine. He chokes with anger, forces the young man to pick up the twisted bread and leave the store. Did only this guy understand what he had actually done? After all, the answer is insolent words. The author gives the correct description of the young man - a bastard.

Yes, only an unscrupulous person who has nothing sacred in his soul can do this. I cannot but agree with I. Tobolsky in assessing the young man’s actions.

Bread has always been and remains a product that evokes a special, sacred feeling. A careful, respectful attitude towards him should be the norm in our society at all times. We must pass it on from generation to generation. No wonder the folk song says: “Bread is the head of everything.”

I remember my visit to the museum dedicated to the siege of Leningrad, and those small loaves that saved people’s lives in those distant harsh days of the war. Thousands of people died for the bread that starving children needed. These blockade loaves are not at all like ordinary bread, but they remind us, living today, of the true value equal to life itself. It is impossible to look at them without tears. I think we should bring that guy here, hastily unceremoniously and mercilessly stuffing bread into his backpack. Perhaps this would make the young man treat the national property differently, into which the work of hundreds of people has been invested - carefully, respectfully, with reverence.

Section 2.

Municipal educational institution Veselovskaya secondary school

What is culture, why is it needed? What is culture as a value system? What is the purpose of such a broad liberal arts education, which has always been our tradition? After all, it’s no secret that our education system, despite all its flaws, is one of the best, if not the best, in the world.

I keep repeating that the phenomenon of “Russian brains” is not ethgobiological, that it also owes its existence to this broad humanitarian basis of our education, I repeat Einstein’s famous words that Dostoevsky gives him more than mathematics. Recently, someone - I don’t remember who - said: if we didn’t teach literature, there would be no rockets, no Korolev, or much else.

I am convinced that Russian literature, Russian culture supported us in the war: “Wait for me” by Simonov, “In the Dugout” by Surkov, the same “Terkin”... Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony - it also helped Leningrad survive!

Russian literature is, among other things, an antidote to vulgarity and moral ugliness. We must not allow the teaching of literature to turn into “information” and for “Eugene Onegin” to be viewed only as an “encyclopedia of Russian life.” After all, the point of teaching is not to learn to write as brilliantly as Pushkin, or to “enjoy stylistic beauties” in your free time from serious matters. Literature lessons should first of all introduce high culture, a system of moral values.

A full life of Russian classics in school is a condition for the existence of our people, our state; this, as they say now, is a matter of national security. Without reading “Onegin”, without knowing “Crime and Punishment”, “Oblomov”, “Quiet Don”, we turn into some other people. What about “people”! We are no longer called anything other than “the population.” So we must somehow defend ourselves...

(V. Nepomnyashchy)

What is culture, why is it needed? What is the goal of that humanitarian education that has always been a tradition in Russia? V. Nepomnyashchy discusses culture as a system of values ​​in this text.

and Russian culture supported us during the war years.” I share the author's position. Yes, without Russian literature and culture there would not be much of what our country is proud of.

Do people need culture? I repeat after the author of the article: yes, it is necessary.

And I want to argue with the hero of Turgenev’s novel “Fathers and Sons,” who argued that “Raphael is not worth a penny,” that all art “is the art of making money.” Time showed that Bazarov was wrong. Almost a hundred years later he will say about Bulgakov’s novel “The White Guard”: “The Days of the Turbins do more good than harm. If people like the Turbins are forced to lay down their arms... it means the Bolsheviks are invincible.”

I agree with the opinion that Russian literature and art helped to survive during the war. With what impatience the Soviet soldiers awaited the appearance of the next chapter about Vasily Terkin. The image of a hard-working soldier, a defender of his land, raised the exhausted soldiers to battle “not for the sake of glory, for the sake of life on earth.”

What about the war song? Wasn't she needed at the front? Let us remember the words of the famous song: “Scribble, machine gunner, for the blue handkerchief that was on the shoulders of the dear ones.” And the soldier went on the attack to bring victory closer. Victory is home, meeting with loved ones and dear people.

Nowadays, the topic of culture as a value system, raised by the author V. Nepomniachtchi, is especially relevant. How painful it is to see disappointed people around us who have lost faith in beauty. And only culture, in my opinion, can strengthen goodness and beauty.

Culture... Value system... We often hear these words on TV, we see them in newspapers, on the pages of books. But each of us understands them in our own way. For one, culture is simply a manner of behavior, for another it is literature and painting, for a third it is education...

So what is culture? What is culture as a value system? What is the purpose of a broad liberal arts education? This is exactly what V. Nepomnyashchy reflects on in his text. The author emphasizes that “the phenomenon of “Russian brains” is not ethnobiological, that it owes its existence to the broad humanitarian basis of our education...”

Undoubtedly, only Russian literature can make a person educated, cultured, and educate him in the spirit of tolerance - “the antidote to vulgarity and ugliness.” Where, if not in literature lessons, studying the works of Russian classics: Dostoevsky, Pushkin, Tolstoy, Tvardovsky and others - do we become familiar with art, learn to live, look at the world with different eyes?! Therefore, “we cannot allow the teaching of literature to turn into “information.”

I, like the author, am convinced that “Russian literature, Russian culture supported us in the war”, that Russian people “must defend themselves” in order to “be a people” and not a “population”. You need to read “Onegin”, “Crime and Punishment”, “Quiet Don” so as not to turn into some other people. Literature is the truth, and one word of truth, according to A. Solzhenitsyn, moves the whole world.

“What is culture, why is it needed? What is culture as a value system? What is the purpose of that broad liberal arts education that has always been our tradition?” Literary critic V. Nepomnyashchiy asks a number of problematic questions, which he tries to answer himself.

It is well known that culture is a system of values ​​accumulated by humanity over the long history of its development. Indeed, our education system was one of the best, if not the best, in the world. The phenomenon of the existence of “Russian brains” is due to humanitarian education, which is an integral part of Russian culture. Dostoevsky gave more to Einstein than mathematics. Designer Korolev would not have created rockets if literature had not been taught. The author convinces that Russian literature and culture helped to survive in wartime, thereby emphasizing the need for culture.

I completely agree with the author. Yes, without literature there would not have been the widely known projects of our fellow countryman, academician, outstanding engineer and inventor: the Shabolovskaya TV tower, the metal-glass covering of the Metropol Hotel, GUM, the Main Post Office and many others. I would not have been able to make my discoveries in the field of physics and chemistry without the theory of the “three calms”.

The value of our culture is undeniable. As long as culture is alive, humanity will exist. Vera Inber wrote the poem “Pushkin is Alive” in 1943. During the bombing, a man could not leave Pushkin’s books and saved the “half-burnt volume.” Having regained consciousness in the hospital, the first thing he asked was: “What about Pushkin?”

He answered: “Pushkin is alive”

How timely is the thought that “we must not allow the teaching of literature to turn into “information.” Literature is spiritual culture. We find everything valuable in literature, which reveals a person’s capabilities in this world, determines his ability to understand the world and himself through the word, thanks to the word, in the word. I remember the words: “A child does not only learn conventional sounds when studying his native language, but drinks spiritual life and strength from the birthplace of his native word.”

Good storytellers come from early childhood. Turgenev appears in adolescence. “First Love” embraces everyone. Later, Tolstoy opens his tent, which accommodates Pierres and Bolkonskys, Marys and Natashas... And under his cover he keeps this giant as much as he wants. It is useless to resist, and there is no desire.

We can defend ourselves with such a spiritual reserve. And we are spiritual when, re-reading a favorite volume, we understand it in a new way. Culture is needed!

Section 3.

Municipal educational institution Verkhnepokrovskaya secondary school

The Kosovs' house is dressed up like a bride. Hanging on ropes around the house are bright silk dresses that shimmer provocatively in the sun, all kinds of shawls, outerwear, shoes, and fur hats.

In the old-fashioned way, it’s drying clothes from moths and mice, but at the same time it’s also a review of the well-being of the family, the dowry of the daughters. And needless to say, Daria Leontievna, the mistress of all this splendor, shines from head to toe!

I rejoice with all my heart together with Daria Leontievna and with pleasure walk around this whole motley, odorous parade and suddenly in a visible place, near the old porch, I notice two old, trampled, black felt boots without soles.

How did these fellows get here?

Daria Leontyevna laughs youthfully.

And I went to live from these fellows.

Live. They gave me these felt boots in the forest. First prize in life. And it’s a pity, I just can’t throw it away.

Oh, how you remember all your stitches and paths, and you don’t know how you ended up on today’s path. I was fourteen years old when I was assigned to logging.

And then one day I come to the barracks from the forest. “People say it’s New Year, Darka, tomorrow.” Eh, I think I should celebrate the New Year too. But as? How? Back then, during the war, we didn’t have enough bread or potatoes. Come on, I think I’ll at least have dry felt boots in the new year. She put it in the oven and lay down on the bunk. I think I'll lie there for a bit and take it out. And I woke up in the morning and the foreman was banging on an iron barrel. I jumped up, ran up to the stove, opened the damper, and all I had were shanks from my felt boots...

I'm in tears to the head of the logging station. Barefoot.

“So and so, I say, Vasily Yegorovich, my felt boots are burnt, what should I do?” “Do whatever you want, but make sure you’re at work by tomorrow morning, otherwise I’ll take you to court.”

I went home - eight miles to home. I cut out two flaps from my mother’s fur coat, wrapped my legs, and just like that I walked through the forest in winter. I came home, and what will you take home? Katya, my younger sister, is in the orphanage, the hut is not heated, it’s warmer outside. So I sat on the porch, crying. There comes an old man, Evgraf Ivanovich, he was a groom. “Why are you crying, girl?” - “I burned my felt boots. The boss gave me a day, but where can I get them?” “Nothing,” he says, “don’t cry.” Let’s go to my stable and we’ll think of something.”

So they came to the stable with grandpa warm, but I just sat down on the floor next to the stove, snuggled up to my own mother, and fell asleep. And in the evening, grandfather Evgraf wakes me up. I look and can’t believe my eyes: the burkas are warm, made like Shoni from felt from old collars.

I put on my burqas and ran all the way to the barracks without a break. It’s dark in the forest, maybe a little star will blink in the sky, and I’m running and singing songs of joy. I made it. They won't put you on trial.

And six months later, it was already spring, he came to us himself. Secretary of the district committee. “Tell me, who is your drummer?” - “Darka, they say, is the youngest girl, but she works well.” - "What do you want? - says the secretary. “What should I reward you with - a bonus for your hard work on the labor front?” “And give me my felt boots, I say.” - “There will be felt boots for you. The very best." And then in the fall he brought me black felt boots. Again by myself. He was a faithful man.

I wore them for a long time. Thrifty. The first five years were just like weekends, and then every day. These are the boots I have.

(F. Abramov)

There's no subtracting here,

Nor to add, -

This is how it was on earth...

A. Tvardovsky

I once read: “There is a gallery of Russian commanders in the Hermitage, there are museums of glory, but there is no gallery of a Russian woman. There is no monument in the faces of those on whom, perhaps, Russia stood and still stands.” I think that Fyodor Abramov erected this monument, created this gallery. And the novels, and novels, and stories of F. Abramov are this monument.

In each of his works there are women, women... What can you say about these heroines? That they are saints. Without them, nothing would have happened. There would be no bread during the war. There was no one to raise the Russian state after the war. It was raised by their hands and their strength - the men here only offered their shoulders. And you will also say that one is more beautiful than the other, one is more enduring and unlucky than the other. And each one counts, each one is separate, each one is unique, with its own unique life and destiny.

Together with the author, we peer into the heroine of the story “Valenki” Daria Leontyevna Kosova, admiring her, because “she shines from head to toe!” The first phrase uttered by the heroine is fascinating: Daria’s speech is unusual, unique. However, why be surprised, because the village has always spoken a richer language than the city. And Daria Leontyevna is from the people, a simple rural woman. We admire Daria, a hard worker, because during a kind of “inspection of the family’s welfare” her house is “dressed up like a bride”: dresses, all kinds of shawls, shawls, scarves, hats, shoes... It’s all acquired by her hands! We are amazed at the youth of her soul, despite the fact that she had to experience incredible difficulties in life: “she was twelve years old from her parents,” “her younger sister was in an orphanage,” and there was “not enough bread or potatoes to eat,” but at “fourteen years old...they were discharged for logging.”

What about felt boots? Two “old, trampled, black felt boots without soles”? After all, they are “in a prominent place”!

Against the backdrop of all the brightness of the outfits, they are a monument to that life when kindness, responsiveness, selfless work and responsibility for the assigned work were truly valued. From them, from these same felt boots, Daria Leontyevna “went to live,” and also from the spiritual kindness of the village groom Evgraf Ivanovich, from the secretary of the district committee, true to his word... These felt boots were once “the best” for young Darka, and not only because they are a bonus for hard work on the labor front, and it was also an opportunity to survive, withstand, hold out...

Rural women of the war years... They accompanied their fathers, husbands and brothers to the front. Everything that lay on men's shoulders fell on their shoulders. They plowed, sowed, and harvested. They didn't get enough sleep. They were malnourished. They sacrificed everything. Their labor feat is immortal!

My mother also had to experience the difficulties of that time. She worked equally with adults - there was no other way out, there was no time for the whims of children. “Once, the foreman, Aunt Nastya,” my mother recalled, “instructed me, a thirteen-year-old girl, to sow 3 centners of grain in the field (by hand!). That same field was located 9 kilometers from the village. By the time I arrived on oxen, almost half a day had passed. She carried sacks of grain on her stomach. But she sowed and tried. And tears and sweat mixed together...” And then, just like Abramov, there was the first award. Not felt boots, of course, but also no less precious - a glass of salt. Probably, from then on until the last days of her life, my mother treated every crumb of bread, every grain of salt with such care!

Everything does not pass without a trace. The lessons of fate are truly imprinted not only in the memory of descendants, they are also reflected on the pages of books.

Our “village prose” is beautiful: V. Astafiev, V. Belov, V. Rasputin, E. Nosov and, of course, Fyodor Aleksandrovich Abramov - an impeccably honest artist of words in depicting reality, for whom the primary hero of his works was a man of “hardworking soul” . Together with the writer, I also understand that the earth rests on people like Daria Leontyevna Kosova, like my mother, like thousands of other unknown working women. Behind them is our human history, the lives of worthy people.

From ancient times to the present day, people have used the wonderful words “Work is the basis of all life.” The fate of each of us depends only on him. The creators of Russian classics write a lot of flattering things about him.

In his text, Fyodor Abramov touched upon the problem of the role of work in human life. So “the Kosovs’ house is dressed up like a bride.” Around him, a moth- and mouse-proof outfit is drying in the sun. “In the old-fashioned way... this is a review of the well-being of the family, given to the daughters.”

The author, together with Daria Leontievna, happily walks around this fragrant parade and near the porch notices “two old, soleless, black felt boots.” Ah, felt boots, felt boots! Russian felt boots! How many memories are associated with you, how many tears have been shed and roads traveled! It would be a pity to throw them away, because this is a memory of the past, this is the first prize. They warmed not only Daria Leontyevna’s feet, but also her soul and heart. From them she felt the power of love for work and others. A difficult fate befell Darka. With pain in her chest, she remembers her trail stitches when, as a fourteen-year-old girl, she worked in logging in the most difficult conditions and lived in a barracks. She didn’t even have to celebrate the New Year, because “during the war, let alone bread, there wasn’t enough potatoes.” Daria Leontyevna will never forget the felt boots that burned in the oven, and the iron barrel into which the foreman was pounding, and his words “on trial I'll give it back."

And how much willpower, courage, and patience one must have to walk home through the forest 8 miles with almost bare feet, wrapped in rags! This is very difficult for modern youth to understand. Her groom, old man Evgraf Ivanovich, helped her out of trouble, sewing felt cloaks from old collars. So she ran in them “all the way to the barracks without a break”, she managed to do it, now they won’t bring her to trial. This is how Darka lived, because she loved and knew how to work. And how can you burn out, eradicate what entered the girl’s blood with her mother’s milk. After all, wealth and happiness are not given to anyone without difficulty. With her calloused hands she bought these silk dresses, all kinds of shawls, fur hats. For her hard work, the secretary of the district committee awarded her felt boots, which she wore “for five years only as a weekend, and then every day.” Work for her is great happiness and great joy. Another example of great hard work is my mother, Raisa Tikhonovna. She is 80 years old today. It seems to me that she is a friend and the same age as Daria Leontyevna. Hunger and need also forced me to leave for the Moscow region at the age of 15 in search of a better life. Waist-deep in water, she carried the peat to the shore, dried it, loaded it into wagons and sent it to God knows where. She worked tirelessly because she loved her small and large Motherland. She raised six beautiful daughters, and devoted her personal life to her native collective farm: she worked conscientiously in the field, as a milkmaid on a farm, as a cook...

Today I am very grateful to such women for the work that brought them to the pinnacle of glory, for a life worthy of example and respect. It is a pity, of course, that in those years they were not crowned with laurels or cast in bronze, because a working person rarely became the subject of a heroic image.

But still, I am immensely happy that our Earth and our great Russia rest on such people!

Section 4.

Municipal educational institution Zasosenskaya secondary school

The ship settlement was founded at the same time as the state-owned Sevastopol that the second Potemkin showed Catherine in 1787. This settlement was inhabited by ship carpenters, natives of Voronezh, Ryazan, Kaluga and other provinces, where this trade took root with the light hand of Peter.

Subsequently, retired sailors began to settle next to them, some doing cartage, some using skiffs for fishing, some gardening. Old-time sailors who started families also settled here.

Dasha’s father was such a sailor, who somehow arranged a hut for himself and his wife. He was killed in the Battle of Sinop, only a year has passed since then, and her mother died earlier.

Dasha grew up like a child of the bay and seaside. She swam like a dolphin, rowed no worse than the most seasoned oarsman and deftly set the sail. Her friends were sailors who came to her father.

But before her eyes, two battalions of these sailors, gleaming with guns on foot and dashingly singing songs, went together with battalions of army men to meet the enemy on Alma.

Dasha looked after them for a long time and... could not sit at home.

She sold her father’s skiff and nets, chickens and an eight-month-old hog - everything that could be sold in order to buy from a Greek water carrier his very elderly nag, along with a gig and harness. She exchanged his twenty-bucket barrel for two strong barrels, not heavy for a nag, fried fish, baked bread, collected various rags from herself and her neighbors for dressing wounds, and thought about how she could appear on the battlefield in her pink chintz dress. And they probably won’t allow it, and you never know what could come of it.

Her father's cap hanging on the wall gave her the idea to dress up as a cabin boy, of which there were quite a few in the navy.

She altered her father's sailor suit and trousers to suit her height, hid her long golden braid in the depths of his peakless cap and, having done everything she could, finally moved across the Belbek and Kacha rivers to the fatal Alma.

She made her way through the Cossack pickets, carrying herself dashingly like the most seasoned cabin boy, and stuck to the tail of some convoy so as not to be too conspicuous. But the convoy remained near Kacha, and under the cover of twilight it moved further and, just on the eve of the battle, reached the troops.

Having settled down in an open place, in the oak bushes, she watched with greedy eyes the movements of the battalions, the explosions of enemy grenades, everything that she could see from afar in the almost continuous smoke - gunpowder from the fires.

But then the wounded were brought to the rear, to the dressing stations, and others were carried on crossed guns, covered with greatcoats.

Then Dasha's work began.

Here, here! - she shouted to those who walked closer, and waved her arms invitingly.

They approached, and the ordinary water in her two barrels turned out to be such a miraculous, resurrecting drink for the wounded that she regretted with all her heart that she had not taken the third.

The bread and fried fish were quickly snapped up, and then she untied her bundle of clean rags to bandage the wounded.

She had never had to do this before, and the soldiers themselves showed her how to bandage her arm, leg, neck, and head. Bandaging her wounds and doing her best to hide her horror at such cruel mutilations of human bodies that she had never seen before, Dasha monotonously, but with great conviction, repeated to everyone:

It’s okay, it’ll heal...

And the wounded felt better just from the cabin boy’s melodious voice, and from his careful, dexterous thin hands, and from his sympathetic cornflower blue eyes.

After this memorable day, Dasha no longer wanted to part with her wounded, whom she bandaged with rags on Alma. She sold both the mare and the gig, came to the authorities and asked to be allowed to take care of the wounded in the hospital.

(According to S. Sergeev - Tsensky)

Eremenko O. P.

Why is it in critical situations that a person’s moral essence often manifests itself? Before reading the excerpt from the work of S. Sergeev-Tsensky, I probably would have answered without thinking too much. The author is not indifferent to the problem of human moral fortitude. It not only identifies the problem, but also emphasizes its relevance.

First, Sergeev-Tsensky introduces him to an ordinary girl, Dasha, who lives in the ship’s settlement. She grew up like a child of the bay and the sea: she swam like a dolphin, rowed no worse than the most seasoned rower. But in difficult moments in the life of her settlement, Dasha did not remain indifferent. The heroine sold everything that could be sold in order to buy “an elderly nag with a gig and harness. Dressed as a cabin boy, she, without hesitation, went to the fatal Alka. The author describes in detail Dasha's experiences, showing us that this is an ordinary person, with his fears and doubts. But at the same time, he is a courageous man who was not afraid of anything, who rushed to save the wounded, overcoming horror and fear. Dasha’s warmth helped the wounded; they felt better from the singing voice of the cabin boy, from the careful touches of her thin fingers, from the sympathetic cornflower blue eyes. It seems to me that anyone reading becomes close to the topic that the author develops. It is undeniable that Sergeev-Tsensky admires the girl’s courage, stamina, and bravery. He convinces us that it is precisely such people who are capable of feats. The author's position evokes only respect. He is not indifferent to such people, and encourages us, readers, to admire them.

I would like to join the author’s opinion. It’s not without reason that they say: “There is always a place for heroic deeds in life.” And life has repeatedly proven this. Let us remember the exploits of our fellow countrymen: . N. Davidenko, N. Litvinova. In Russian history there are many women who have accomplished feats. These are the wives of the Decembrists, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, V. Tereshkova... S. Sergeev - Tsensky invited me to think about what moral fortitude is. I agree with the author that conscience is memory, and memory is the basis of our culture and morality. In our modern life this is what is missing now.

Sergeev - Tsensky - Russian writer, born into the family of a teacher, lived in Crimea, traveled a lot around the country.

The writer's early works are imbued with sympathy for the tragic fate of the poor worker and faith in a better future. The lyrical story about the Russian village “The Sorrow of the Fields”, the stories “Movement”, “Tilted Helen” depicted various layers of Russian society gripped by the pre-revolutionary crisis.

Particularly popular was Sergeev-Tsensky's epic “Sevastopol Strada”, in which images of the heroic defenders of Sevastopol were created in the Crimean War.

The main issue in this passage is mercy.

“The wounded felt better just from the cabin boy’s melodious voice, from his careful thin hands, and from his sympathetic cornflower blue eyes.”

Dasha is a brave girl, these are the kind of girls that were needed in wartime.

She “watches with greedy eyes the movement of the battalions, the explosions of enemy grenades, everything that she could see from afar in the almost continuous smoke.” This is a heroine to be proud of.

A lot has been said about mercy in literature. I recently read V. Zakrutkin’s story “Mother of Man.”

This is also a war, but this time the Great Patriotic War. The main character of the story, Maria, raises her children, but when she finds a girl and a boy after the bombing, without hesitation for a minute, she brings them to her hut. But in our life there are examples when people take children from orphanages and orphanages. They put their soul, their heart into the upbringing of each child. Human souls have not become impoverished. Good lives and will live on earth.

I think that this passage is filled with ideological content; we can take an example from this girl.

To paraphrase F. Dostoevsky, I would like to end with the words: “Kindness will save the world”

Before me is a text by S. Sergeev-Tsensky - a story about the life of a girl Dasha. He raises a topical question for our time about the place of heroism in everyday life. When you read an excerpt from the writer’s work, you immediately understand that the heroine’s life is an example of heroism and selfless service to people.

Reading this text, you imagine a fragile Russian girl who “could not sit at home” when “battalions of sailors... went together with battalions of army men to meet the enemy on the Alma.” Dressed as a cabin boy, she tied into the tail of some convoy so as not to be conspicuous. I really want to be next to her and help and support her. After all, not every person can leave their beloved home and move into the unknown. “She didn’t do anything special,” someone will say. The author will answer you: “The wounded felt better from the cabin boy’s melodious voice, from his careful, dexterous thin hands, from his sympathetic cornflower blue eyes.” To act as Dasha does - to accomplish a feat in the name of people.

I believe that a person who lives only for himself and cares only about himself is not worthy of the high title of man.

It’s good that there are many examples of serving people in life. And they accomplish great feats, sometimes sacrificing themselves for the sake of others. Russian rescuers are the first to respond to calls for help, no matter where trouble occurs. They do not spare themselves when saving the victims.

And how enthusiastically Russian writers spoke about the place of heroism in life. Reading “The Legend of Danko” by M. Gorky, you understand how much this simple young man did for people, sacrificing his heart and life.

The examples given do not exhaust the entire topic, but they are enough to draw important conclusions: an ordinary person can provide all possible help to those in need, thereby performing a small feat for the sake of a big cause. No one should force him, he should have an inner consciousness, like Dasha.

From the text by S. Sergeev-Tsensky, I realized that there is a place for heroism in life now.

Mercy, sympathy, regret... These words are heard today in all media, in literature, in everyday life. This is probably explained by time: now society is stratified into rich and poor, the latter have lost faith in life, faith in themselves, in others. The role of man in history, selfless service to people, feat in everyday life, mercy - these questions are raised in his text by the Russian writer S. Sergeev-Tsensky. Among them, the most pressing, in my opinion, is the problem of mercy.

Why is this so topical now? If there were no people capable of self-sacrifice, then our life would become meaningless. In order to help the sailors, Dasha (the heroine of the text by S. Sergeev-Tsensky) “sold her father’s skiff and nets, chickens and an eight-month-old hog - everything that could be sold...”. She couldn’t just “sit at home” indifferently, so “on the eve of the battle she got to the troops,” although it was not easy. The girl had one desire: to somehow help the wounded. She succeeded because the ordinary water “in her two barrels” turned out to be a “miraculous, resurrecting drink.” Isn't this an example of selfless service to people?

Undoubtedly, Dasha is an example of mercy and heroism, because not every person will be able to bandage wounds, “hiding...deeper her horror at such cruel mutilations of human bodies that she had never seen before.” Her convincing and timely phrase: “Nothing, it will heal...” became hope and support for the wounded. And “from the cabin boy’s melodious voice..., from the sympathetic cornflower blue eyes” they found peace and faith.

The position of the author of this text is that a person should always be merciful, benefiting people selflessly and without hesitation. This is precisely the meaning of human life. The writer’s sincere, living words and his conviction show the relevance of the problems of mercy and self-sacrifice. What S. Sergeev-Tsensky is talking about turns an ordinary person into a Man with a capital M.

We can agree with the author’s opinion that if there were no people who give themselves to others, then life would become meaningless. This is not the first time that S. Sergeev-Tsensky raised these issues in his work. The theme of humanism, self-sacrifice, and compassion is also heard in the works of I. Turgenev, L. Tolstoy, F. Dostoevsky, M. Gorky. Natasha Rostova (“War and Peace”) is the same Dasha S. Sergeev-Tsensky. On her knees, she persuades her father to give the house to a hospital, freeing him of all things. The girl was not thinking about the wealth she had acquired, but about the Russian soldiers who needed to be helped, their lives saved at all costs.

Nowadays the problem of mercy is very acute. On the one hand, in everyday life there are many cases when people turn out to be indifferent to the pain and grief of another person, but, on the other hand, there are many clear examples of the opposite: humanitarian assistance to victims of natural disasters, catastrophes, and terrorist attacks. This much-needed assistance is provided not only by the emergency services, but also by ordinary people whose hearts ache for the pain and suffering of others. Here we cannot help but recall the children of the Beslan school, to whose aid all of Russia came.

Selflessness, service to people, love for them, dedication. These words are filled with a certain meaning only if they are supported by deeds. A Russian person with his broad, open soul is capable of such an act, which we call an everyday feat.

Section 5.

Municipal educational institution Livenskaya No. 1 secondary school

I look now and see, like on TV, my old homeland and I understand now that I always loved it, but something was always missing, and I could not only boast about it myself, but I didn’t really believe it when someone else said that she is so good. Was it not in search of some new, better homeland that I wandered around the north and wrote down folk tales?

However, fairy tales and grandiose phenomena of northern nature did not help.

Now that my entire homeland has been revealed to me, I realized that even then I found something native there, in the north. Why, among the great, almost daily discoveries, did I grab hold of northern honey, and so tightly that I wanted to tell me how it was discovered and what kind people discovered it.

Now on my table, in crystal vases under electric lights, this fragrant, sweet, aromatic and healing substance is playing, known to man for a very long time and has been in nature since the first bee found a flower somewhere. But this substance, known and used in nature, was brought to us from a place where there were never bees, and the abundant honey contained in the nectarines of tundra flowers was inaccessible to humans without bees. This honey that is now shining on the table, one can rightfully say, was created not only by bees, but also especially by the efforts of the people who arranged for our native Russian bee of the Trans-Oka meadows to work in the Arctic.

It is difficult to talk about things related to the senses of taste, smell, color. And it’s very difficult to talk about honey from the tundra, which no one has ever tried, about unprecedented honey.

It’s difficult, and at the same time, how you want, how interesting it is to be the very first to say about something unprecedented that no one has ever talked about! It seemed to me that polar honey is much tastier than ours and that the difference between southern and polar honey is the same as between northern and southern nature in terms of light. What artists call tone in the south is decomposed into dozens or more tones in the north; and that is why the color tones are softer and more subtle, and at the same time, of course, the shadows, clouds, waters, and mountains - everything around in the north is softer and more subtle, there is more of an intimate human element than a natural one, there is more joy associated with human labor, than joy - happiness received in the south for nothing.

So the honey collected from the flowers of the polar tundra touched me more from the side of human effort directed towards the unprecedented.

(According to M. Prishvin)

Man and nature... Man always strives to create something incredible, unprecedented. And often this unprecedented is created by the joint efforts of people and nature. This is exactly what M. Prishvin talks about in his essay. The polar honey, collected in the nectaries of tundra flowers by the bees of the Trans-Oka meadows, “touched me more from the side of human effort directed towards the unprecedented.”

When I read about northern honey, I remembered the story about the first Siberian apples, once grown in this dank and frozen land by true romantic Decembrists who settled in Siberia after many years of hard labor. These apples, which survived against all odds in a harsh climate, were a miracle created by the selfless labor and efforts of people. After all, for the Decembrists these apples were proof of life and hope...

Nowadays there is a lot of talk about nanotechnology and the development of stem cells, thanks to the research of which people are making a big step forward in science, industry, medicine, and genetics. But I still can’t take my eyes off the sun-yellow, slightly oblong lemon fruits. No, not from lemon, which grows in huge plantations in the south and is therefore perceived as completely ordinary. I admire the small lemon trees growing on windowsills in our middle zone. How much love and patience is required to grow this exotic wonder. And the taste of the fruits is many times more aromatic and juicier than those brought from afar.

The desire to create something incredibly new and unprecedented is one of the driving forces in the development of humanity. After all, a miracle, ordinary and extraordinary, must be performed so that people do not forget how to be surprised and admire.

“Where does the Motherland begin?” - we sang as children, without trying to answer this question. After reading the text by M. Prishvin, I thought: why do we love our Motherland, what exactly attracts us to our native lands? In his youth, the author lacked something in the Fatherland; he not only could not boast about it himself, but also did not believe the sincerity of others who said that it was good.

What does “love for the Motherland” mean? Should a person “love” her at all? The author strives to convey to the reader the idea that in order to love your Fatherland, you need to find it, that is, to know and really experience what “my Fatherland” is.

“Patriotism (from the Greek patris - homeland) - love for the homeland, fatherland...” “Motherland (fatherland, fatherland) is the territory historically belonging to a given people.” (Encyclopedic Dictionary). According to these definitions, it turns out that love for the Motherland is “love” for territory. It is clear that what we mean by the concept of “Motherland” is not just territory, and that it is, after all, a broader, more capacious concept. It includes not only the territory, but also the people living on it, and nature, and the state power acting on it, and much more.

Russian proverbs and sayings reveal the theme of love for the Motherland. “Where the pine tree is grown, there it is red,” “Love for the Motherland is stronger than death,” “You can even dream about your native land,” - this is what Russian people have said from time immemorial. A person does not know what exactly he means by Homeland, what he puts into this concept, and why this particular territory is his Homeland, he simply loves it.

Usually a person does not break down his love for his homeland into its components. Apparently, this knowledge is given to most people without searching, as a result of an imperceptible habit of the living conditions around them. But the author, hesitating, tries to find reasons for love, wanders around the North, writing down folk tales and admiring the “grand phenomena of northern nature.” And only later, when Prishvin’s entire homeland was revealed to him, did it become clear that he had always loved her, despite his doubts.

It becomes clear that the stages of spiritual growth help a person to more fully understand and experience the meaning of the Motherland. Only by developing and cultivating the spirit within himself can a person understand that there is a Motherland for him and his people.

So I found my favorite thing:

search and discover in nature

beautiful sides of the soul

human.

M. Prishvin

A traveler by vocation and by the circumstances of his life, M. Prishvin, who has seen many distant lands, southern and northern seas, carried with him everywhere the indelible memory of his native Oryol region. For every artist, especially an artist of words and a writer, the presence of a small homeland is of great importance. True masters of words, to whom M. Prishvin can rightfully be classified, bring with them into literature the special appearance of their native places and lands, their springs and winters, the charm of the discreet and unique beauty of their father’s land. Do we always understand how much this land means to us?

A person’s path to the Motherland... What is it? In what life circumstances is the true meaning of the word homeland revealed to us? The proposed story by M. Prishvin helps answer these questions.

“Love for one’s native nature is one of the most important signs of love for one’s country...” These are words with which it is difficult to disagree, because human communication with nature is a significant moment for both sides: by coming into contact with the earth, a person is freed from the vanity, the essence of things that have long been familiar to him phenomena is rediscovered. There are many things that connect man and nature - bread, for example. But it is difficult for us to see the sun in bread if we are not hungry. Prishvin saw this bright shining sun in the amber honey of the Arctic. Why exactly did northern honey awaken in him memories of the “old homeland”, where, according to the author, “there was always something missing, and I could not only boast about it myself, but I didn’t really believe it when someone else said, that she’s really that good”?

After a while, the author understood why, far from his homeland, among daily discoveries, he “grabbed precisely the northern honey,” created by the joint work of man and bees. And here I agree with Prishvin’s opinion that the people themselves, their work, their efforts to merge with nature and increase its wealth reveal the best sides of their soul as deeply as possible, the attitude of these same people to nature, and, therefore, to their native land. The last sentence of the text very accurately emphasizes the depth of the author’s thoughts about this: “So this honey, collected from the flowers of the polar tundra, touched me more from the side of human effort directed towards the unprecedented.”

We tend to strive for the unusual, the new. Man is the source of the unprecedented in nature. Agree, atoms existed in nature, but atomic energy in human hands acts like something unprecedented. America existed, but we learned about it thanks to Columbus. Turning on the TV, we don’t think for a moment that if it weren’t for Einstein and Planck, who thought about the theory of atomic structure, we wouldn’t have the usual benefits of civilization.

How can we explain a person’s desire to create and invent something? After all, the inventor does not only think about himself, because he is not always driven by vanity and the desire to become famous. Have you ever wondered why a geographer who discovered a new country passionately wants everyone to come to this country after him? I think to share the joy of discovery with other people.

What inspires people to work? What gives rise to the desire to create in a person? The answer to these questions is in the story of M. Prishvin: endless love for people, for the native land. This love led the writer across the north, along sultry shores and foreign roads, and helped him stand on the path of finding his homeland, on the path of understanding the true meaning of this word.

Don’t try to reduce the Motherland to the physical,

to the earth and nature... Look: by force

fate, we are cut off from all this, and she

is invisibly present in us.

What person will remain indifferent, indifferent to a large or small corner of the earth, to the native land in which he was born, grew up, admired the starry sky, sunrises and sunsets, listened to the exciting noise of trees and grass, bird songs? For every person, their own region is very dear, be it a city, a village or a village. Unfortunately, we all understand this when we find ourselves far from places dear to our hearts, and this is what happened to M. Prishvin, who admits that he always loved his old homeland, but something was always missing... I completely agree with the author’s opinion, we all in our youth we dream of distant countries and in these dreams we put the idea of ​​a happy life. About a life that is different from the one we are used to. And as the years pass, we look for any reminder of our former life, we spend years artificially creating a piece of our native land, be it northern honey or apple trees in the desert. After all, it is rare for a person to feel peace of mind and well-being when he finds himself outside of his native land for a long time. The first argument in favor of my opinion can be the fate of domestic writers, such as B. Pasternak, I. Brodsky, M. Tsvetaeva and many other representatives of the domestic intelligentsia, voluntarily or involuntarily torn from their native places. They experienced the most severe nostalgia and, in order to drown out their melancholy, they created masterpieces glorifying Russia, the Motherland, Rus', which brought them joy and happiness, like Prishvin’s polar honey. But homesickness is not only characteristic of the great, I have been convinced of this more than once.

In 1986, my older brother was drafted into the army, unlike modern guys, he was happy. He dreamed of serving abroad, and by the will of fate he ended up in Baikonur, where he served. In his letters, my brother admired the beauty of Kazakhstan; more and more often in his messages one could read about his future plans: to stay and work there. A year later, having learned that we were going to visit him, he asked to bring him a branch of a flowering linden tree as a gift, the one that he planted back in first grade, together with his father, under the windows of our house. After reading the letter, I snorted: “What kind of sentimentality...” And I was surprised when I saw that my mother was carefully putting a linden twig in an old magazine, so that she could take it safely thousands of kilometers away as a memory of home for her son. Of all the gifts and gifts brought from home, the one that most touched the mature brother was a small dry linden branch, which brought back memories of the house, the river, his classmates, and the old neighbor who grumbled in the evenings at the noisy youth. There was so much love and delight in these memories!

And in the morning, waking up before everyone else, I saw my sleeping brother, and on the pillow with the government seal - a reminder of the Motherland - a small twig. From all this a lump formed in my throat, my hand involuntarily reached for the map - three thousand miles to the tight little circle “Belgorod”, and from there another two hundred kilometers, where is your small homeland, which in five days of travel has become so dear, so desired. And only then did I understand how amazing and inexpressible the feeling of homeland is... What a bright joy and what the sweetest melancholy it gives, visiting us either in hours of separation, or in a happy hour of insight and resonance! And a person cannot stand firmly, he cannot live confidently without this feeling, without closeness to the deeds and destinies of his ancestors, without an internal comprehension of his responsibility for the place given to him in the huge general series of being what you are.

Section 6.

Municipal educational institution Nikitovskaya secondary school

Portnov walked slowly through the centuries-old forest. The mighty trunks swayed slightly and made noise from the weak breeze.

At his favorite spring, Semyon Grigorievich drank from a birch bark mug that hung nearby and sat down on a bench that he had built from a larch upturned by the wind. Although more than forty years have passed since then, the bench still stands.

Suddenly, behind the line of young pines, a rustling was heard, and the horned head of a young elk poked out from the thick, prickly needles. Without blinking, he gazed at the man. During his long life in the forest, Semyon Grigorievich saw elk countless times, but this was the first time he met them, nose to nose.

The beast noisily sucked in air, and then lowered its head. Only the trembling ends of the horns were visible. He was probably licking something. The forester, carefully so as not to disturb the animal, got up and moved along the plantings. Let the elk drink from the spring. But why wasn't he so bold?

When the forester turned around after about forty steps, he froze in amazement, because an elk was hobbling after him on three legs, and a wolf trap with a broken chain was dragging on his left front. The beast sought help from man!

The forester calmly approached the elk without any sudden movements. Squatted down. The beast, lowering its long-lipped muzzle, sniffed him restlessly, poking its nostrils into his canvas jacket. Large flies clung to the festering wound. The leg was very swollen. gently stroked the animal, it shuddered, tensed, and a dark brown spine stood up on the back of its head. The elk shook his head displeasedly and hobbled to the side. Semyon Grigorievich realized that now you couldn’t easily approach him, because he might move his horn or hit him with his hoof.

And then the forester remembered his lunch. He took bread and cucumbers out of the box. He cut them up, salted them thoroughly, and, coming close to the animal, handed him the food. The elk sniffed her incredulously, and then began to swipe away the treats with his rough tongue, touching the man’s palms with his soft, sparsely linty lips.

Semyon Grigorieviya crouched down and pressed the spring of the trap with all his might. The rusty doors opened, making a creaking sound. The prisoner, feeling relieved, stepped to the side.

The exhausted hunter sank to the ground...

And all around the forest rustled with its crowns, a magpie chirped, and the sun, tired during the day, was setting.

(According to V. Nikiforov)

How difficult it can sometimes be for wild animals to survive! What kind of trials does nature and man have in store for them! How often do animals need the help of us humans! One of such cases is discussed in the artistic narrative of V. Nikiforov.

The problem that the author is considering is relevant. It concerns each of us, and each person solves it in his own way. Of course, a person should, without hesitation, help a wild animal if necessary. Of course, it all depends on the specific situation.

The author shows in his article an example of human behavior in such a situation. He cites an incident from the life of a forester, Semyon Grigorievich Portnov, who saved a moose. The elk fell into a wolf trap. The beast sought help from man! The forester realized that “you can’t just approach the elk, because he might move his horn or hit him with his hoof.” Then he handed him his lunch and freed the prisoner from the trap. Semyon Grigorievich, without hesitation and without hesitating for a minute, acted as a person should do in such a situation.

It would seem that nothing special happened. However, another living being was saved. I wish I could meet more people like forester Portnov in my life!

I remembered M. Prishvin’s story “Moose,” which I read as a child. It was about how an old hunter took pity on a moose cow with two calves. At first, the grandfather thought that the elk calves would lag behind the moose cow, and he would capture them. He hoped that the moose would leave them. But it turned out that they were just like people. The mother did not abandon her elk calves. They were so funny that the grandfather forgot about his intentions.

Another true story occurred in the Zaoksky district of the Tula region. Many metropolitan artists often come here, to Polenov’s places. The artist set out in search of a place of exceptional beauty as the day was approaching evening. Unexpectedly, an elk met on her way. The woman got scared and began to run away, but the elk blocked her path to retreat with his body. She thought that the moose might need help, and she waited. The elk turned around and walked towards the edge of the forest. The artist guessed that she needed to go after the elk. And then she realized that she couldn’t do it without human help. A moose cow lay on the edge of a freshly plowed field. Her leg was pierced with thick steel wire. The woman was not at a loss and helped the animal.

I re-read V. Nikiforov’s article and involuntarily think: “What would I do in such a situation?” I think that I would help the animal. If only you had enough courage, of course.

Once again I am convinced that the author of the article is a thousand times right. Yes, sometimes the life of a living creature depends on a person who will always come to the rescue in difficult times. We must always remember this. Unfortunately, there are fewer and fewer wild animals every year. But conscience and responsibility do not allow us to put up with this.

“Nature teaches man wisdom, but she also needs help and protection.” It was these words of K. Paustovsky that came to mind after reading the text by V. Nikiforov. The writer examines the important moral problem of the relationship between man and nature, the responsibility of people for its preservation. Yes, today man, he alone is responsible for everything on earth...

This means that his actions must be reasonable and humane... But in reality, for some, nature is a home, a shrine that must be preserved and passed on to the next generation, and for others, it is only a source of enrichment.

For forester Semyon Grigorievich Portnov, the hero of the story by V. Nikiforov, nature is home. Forty years ago he “built a bench from a larch upturned by the wind,” “carefully so as not to disturb the beast,” he walks through the forest. And when he sees a wounded elk, without hesitation, he helps him. One person set a trap, another helped the animal...

Take care of all animals within nature,

Kill only the beasts within yourself.

I think that without observing this moral commandment, it is unlikely that each of us can consider ourselves a Human.

They talk a lot about the relationship between man and nature, make films, and write. How alarming the voices of Troepolsky, Astafiev, Rasputin and many, many others sound. B. Vasiliev in the novel “Don’t Shoot White Swans” writes with emotional pain about his attitude towards nature. It is the attitude towards nature that divides the characters into two camps: those who understand and love it, and others, greedy and cruel. Egor Polushkin lives by the laws of his heart and conscience. He suffers in soul when he sees how man has become disconnected from nature, how his native land is being destroyed. And Fyodor Buryanov only wants to take from her what he can gain for himself, and what remains for people, descendants, is indifferent to him.

Not long ago, all central channels showed a report from Rostov-on-Don: at the zoo, schoolchildren beat kangaroo cubs to death with sticks... Why? Where does so much cruelty and indifference come from in children's souls? How to correct the current situation? How to introduce the “infallible cult of nature” into the hearts of people? These are the questions that, in my opinion, cannot but concern a true citizen.

Of course, there are many problems in modern society, but it is everyone’s duty to protect nature and help it, so that “the forest can rustle with its crowns, the magpie chirps, and the sun, tired during the day, goes down.”

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The purpose of the lesson: Develop skills for independent work with text. Develop the ability to formulate a problem, highlight the author’s position, and create your own commentary on the text.

Development of linguistic interests and inclinations, cognitive abilities and creative abilities of students; the formation of competence in the field of independent activity, skills in working with information, the ability to see a problem and ways to solve it.

During the classes

1. Orthoepic warm-up.

Place emphasis in the words: at the same time, lurch, inquire, provision, growth, plum, tamed, pinches, busy, busy, call, understood.

2. Lexicographic and linguocultural portrait of the word “Bread”.

Speech by students based on the results of project work using a multimedia presentation.

3. Comprehensive text analysis.

Read the text expressively.

A word about bread

1. Bread... 2. Our language is rich, it can contain hundreds of thousands of words. 3. But try to find another word in it, just as vital, used more often than others, so polysemantic. 4. Perhaps the word “earth”. 5. And it’s not for nothing that our grandfathers and great-grandfathers put them side by side in a well-known saying: the earth is mother and bread is father...

6. For centuries and centuries, bread was, as it were, synonymous with life itself. 7. To this day we say: “earn money for bread,” but by this we mean not just bread as such, but our entire living wealth.

8. “Bread is the head of everything,” says ancient folk wisdom. 9. No matter how you think, you can’t think of anything better than bread. 10. “Bread on the table is a throne, but not a piece of bread and the table is a board.”

11. Let us bow to the man who grew the bread, and let us be honest and conscientious before his great and humble feat at the same time; before leaving the bakery with a loaf or a brick of warm bread, let us remember again and again with reverent heartfelt sympathy about the hands that sowed and grew this bread... 12. And at the same time, we will always remember the wise saying that came to us from the depths of centuries, born of popular experience: “Let the hand of the one who throws even a crumb of bread under his feet wither.” (M. Alekseev)

Determine the role of the title in the text.

(The title contains a definition of the genre in which the text is written. This is a word genre that was often used in ancient Russian literature, and was also often found in the titles of works. In words were called in ancient Russian literature both teachings and messages of an ecclesiastical nature, as well as works of a secular nature (for example, “The Lay of Igor’s Campaign”, “Words for the Teaching of All Peasants”, “A Lay on Letters, or Words”, “A Lay on the Week of All saints”) The word was spoken during a sermon, where the author’s position was clearly expressed. Therefore, this genre can be classified as journalism.

The word “bread” in the title shows the author’s deep respect for bread and the person who grew it. This author's attitude can be traced in the text itself - sentences (8, 9, 12).

Thus, having determined the role of the title, we identified the problem and the author’s position in the text.

Additional task: name works of literature whose titles contain the word “bread”.

Answer: K.G. Paustovsky “Warm bread”, S.A. Yesenin “Song of Bread”, V. Tendryakov “Bread for the Dog”, M. Alekseev “Bread is a noun”.

The word “bread” is polysemantic, using the dictionary entry from the current dictionary edited by Ozhegov, name the meaning of this word. What meanings of the word “bread” does the author use in this text? (Bread is the basis of life, prosperity)

Assignment: Find synonyms for the word “bread” in sentences No. 11, 12.

Answer: loaf and brick. (Additional comment: the suffix -ik- in the word brick expresses the subjective assessment of the speaker. This is a morphological means of expressiveness)

Question: What problem does the author of this text pose?

The problem of developing a respectful attitude towards bread and the person who raised it.

Read a fragment of the review where the linguistic features of the text are analyzed. Fill in the blanks with the numbers corresponding to the number from the list. Write down the sequence of numbers.

“The author of this text, speaking about the meaning of bread in human life, relies on the centuries-old experience of vulgar generations, and therefore uses such lexical means as _____3___ (5, 7), as well as _______6_______ (8, 10,) and ___8___ (7). When the author talks about a person who grew bread, his speech is especially emotional, therefore in sentence 11 it is worth noting such a lexical means of expressiveness as __5_.

When reading the text, we seem to hear the excited voice of the author, so such a syntactic means of expressiveness is used as _____9____(6).”

List of terms:

1. hyperbola;
2. lexical repetition;
3. book vocabulary;
4. metaphor;
5. oxymoron;
6. proverbs;
7. comparative turnover;
8. phraseological units;
9. expressive repetition;
10. inversion.

Answer: 3, 6, 8, 5, 9.

Complete the following tasks for the text:

1. In sentence 9, find a word formed in a suffixal way. (Answer: better.)

2. Write out particles 1-5 from sentences. (Answer: same, perhaps, and)

3. From sentence 4, write down a phrase with the connection management. (Answer: they installed them)

4. From sentences 8-10, find the one-part definitely - personal. (Answer: 9)

5. Find in the text sentence(s) with a separate definition(s), write down the number(s). (Answer: 3, 11, 12)

6. Among sentences 6-12, find a complex sentence, the parts of which are interconnected by a non-union and subordinating connection. (Answer: 11)

7. Which of the sentences 1-8 is connected with the previous one using repetition and a cognate word. (Answer: 7)

Today we looked at a text where the author strives to instill in his readers a respectful attitude towards bread. At the beginning of the lesson, we named the authors of works whose titles contain the word “bread”. How do these works solve the problem of developing a respectful attitude towards bread?

1. In the oral literature of the Russian people, mention of bread occurs frequently. This is not surprising, since ancient times it has been used as food; the fate of people until the next harvest depended on how rich the harvest was. Therefore, bread, welfare, and moral qualities of people have long been connected. In the following proverbs you can see how people treated bread, how they assessed its importance for themselves.

For example:

about wealth and money: “If you don’t fertilize the rye, you’ll collect a penny’s worth of bread”;

about good neighborliness: “A good neighbor is like bread”;

about hospitality: “Eat bread and salt, and listen to good people (the owner)”;

about friendship: “Whoever you hang out with, that’s who you’re like”;

about fun: “If there is bread, there will be song”;

about work: “Work until you sweat, eat bread when you want.”

These short phrases were passed on from mouth to mouth, teaching some wisdom to the new generation.

Phraseologism “bread and salt” greeted dear guests, punishing for misconduct planted on bread and water, and, wanting to emphasize their great desire, they said: “ Don’t feed him bread.”

2. A. Koltsov.

It's not in vain people
From ancient times to now
Our daily bread is calling
The very first shrine.
Gold words
We have no right to forget:
"Bread is the head of everything!" -
In the field, in the house, in the state!

S. Ya. Marshak. Human hands (excerpt from a poem)

Rye bowed her heavy head.
“Thank you, sun and gentle rain!
Thanks to the earth
What was my home
And strong hands,
To my old friends.

3. M. Alekseev in the story “Bread is a Noun” cites an episode when grandfather Drop, in a conversation with Samonka, a former fellow villager now living in Moscow, said, proving the paramount importance of peasant labor:

Well, well, it’s impossible to know now. Our work is different. There will be more cars, then... So you don’t want to stay in your native village? Badly. Otherwise, stay, I’ll give you my weapon,” the owner pointed to the wall where his old gun hung, “and I’ll retire.” You have experience. You are protecting an important facility in Moscow. And my object is the most important. Bread! What could be more important than bread?! Bread is a noun! - Grandfather Drop uttered these words especially solemnly and, like an orator, raised his hand up, raised it at the table and suddenly seemed to become taller. – Because we all exist because we eat our daily bread! - From the first glass he drank, his face, red from the frost, turned even redder, his jubilant eyes shone victoriously, and he repeated with a hoarseness in his voice: “Bread is a noun, and the rest of the food product is an adjective.” That's right, comrade commander!

Thus, the above examples convince us that the problem of developing a respectful attitude towards bread has been and remains important and relevant as long as man exists.

Homework: Write an essay on this text in Unified State Exam format.

V.A. Sukhomlinsky

LETTERS TO YOUR SON

The book includes the well-known works of V. A. Sukhomlinsky “I give my heart to children”, “The Birth of a Citizen”, as well as “Letters to my son”. These works are thematically interconnected and form a kind of trilogy in which the author raises topical problems of raising a child, teenager, and young man.

Intended for teachers, educators of secondary schools, public education workers, students and teachers of pedagogical universities.

1. Good afternoon, dear son!

So you have flown away from your parents' nest - you live in a big city, study at a university, and want to feel like an independent person. I know from my own experience that, caught up in the stormy whirlwind of your new life, you remember little about your parental home, about your mother and me, and you hardly miss it. It will come later when you get to know life. ...The first letter to a son who has flown away from his parents' nest... I want you to keep it for the rest of your life, so that you keep it, re-read it, think about it. My mother and I know that every young generation is a little condescending towards the teachings of their parents: you, they say, cannot see and understand everything that we see and understand. Maybe this is so... Maybe, after reading this letter, you will want to put it somewhere away, so that it reminds you less of the endless teachings of your father and mother. Well, put it down, but just remember well where, because the day will come when you remember these teachings, you will say to yourself: after all, father was right... and you will need to read this old half-forgotten letter. You will find and read it. Keep it for life. I also saved the first letter from my father. I was 15 years old when I left my parents’ nest and went to study at the Kremenchug Pedagogical Institute. 1934 was a difficult year. I remember how my mother accompanied me to the entrance exams. I tied a new one into an old clean scarf, which was stored in a row at the bottom of the chest, and a bundle of food: flatbreads, two glasses of fried soybeans... I passed the exams well. There were few applicants with secondary education at that time, and the institute was allowed to accept seven-year graduates. My teaching began. It was difficult, very difficult to acquire knowledge when your stomach was empty. But then the bread of a new harvest appeared. I will never forget the day when my mother gave me the first loaf baked from new rye. The delivery was brought by Grandfather Matvey, a driver for a rural consumer society, who came to the city weekly to buy goods. The loaf was in a clean linen bag - soft, fragrant, with a crispy crust. And next to the loaf of bread is my father’s letter, the first letter I’m talking about: I keep it as the first commandment... “Don’t forget, son, about your daily bread. I don’t believe in God, but I call bread holy. for you, he will remain a saint for the rest of your life. Remember who you are and where you came from. Remember how hard it is to get this bread. Remember that your grandfather, my father Omelko Sukhomlin, was a serf and died at the plow in the field. Never forget about the people's roots . Don’t forget that while you are studying, someone is working to earn your daily bread. And when you learn and become a teacher, don’t forget about bread either. Bread is human labor, it is hope for the future, and the yardstick by which your and your children’s conscience will always be measured." This is what my father wrote in his first letter. Well, there was also a note that we received rye and wheat for workdays , that every week grandfather Matvey will bring me a loaf of bread. Why am I writing to you about this, son? Don’t forget that our root is the working people, the land, holy bread. And cursed will be the one who, with even one thought, one word, with one act he will express disdain for bread and labor, for the people who gave us all life... Hundreds of thousands of words in our language, but in the first place I would put three words: bread, labor, people. These are the three roots on which our state. This is the very essence of our system. And these roots are so tightly intertwined that it is impossible to break them or divide them. He who does not know what bread and labor are, ceases to be the son of his people. He loses the best spiritual qualities of the people, becomes a renegade , a faceless creature, unworthy of respect. He who forgets what labor, sweat and fatigue is, ceases to value bread. Whichever of these three mighty roots is damaged in a person, he ceases to be a real person; rot, a wormhole, appears inside him. I am proud that you know the work in the grain-growing field, you know how difficult it is to get bread. Do you remember how on the eve of the May Day holiday I came to your class (I think you were in ninth grade then) and conveyed a request from the collective farm machine operators: please replace us in the field on holidays, we want to rest. Do you remember how all of you young men didn’t want to wear overalls instead of a festive suit, get behind the wheel of a tractor, or be a trailer driver? But what pride shone in your eyes when these two days passed, when you returned home, feeling like hard workers. I don’t believe in this, I would say, chocolate idea of ​​communism: there will be plenty of all material goods, a person will be provided with everything, he will have everything as if at the wave of his hand, and everything will be so easy for him: if you want it, here you are on the table whatever your heart desires. If all this were so, then a person would turn into God knows what, probably into a satiated animal. Fortunately, this will not happen. Nothing will come to a person without tension, without effort, without sweat and fatigue, without anxiety and worry. Under communism there will be calluses, there will be sleepless nights. And the most important thing on which a person will always rest - his mind, conscience, human pride - is that he will always earn bread by the sweat of his brow. There will always be anxiety around the plowed field, there will be heartfelt concern, as for a living being, for a tender stalk of wheat. There will be an uncontrollable desire for the earth to give more and more - the bread root of man will always rest on this. And this root must be protected in everyone. You write that you will soon be sent to work on a collective farm. And very good. I'm very, very happy about this. Work well, don’t let yourself, your father, or your comrades down. Don't choose something cleaner and lighter. Choose to work directly in the field, on the ground. A shovel is also a tool that can be used to show skill. And during the summer holidays you will work in a tractor brigade on your collective farm (of course, if they don’t recruit people who want to go to virgin lands. If they recruit you, be sure to go there). “You know the man who raised it by the ear of wheat,” you probably know this Ukrainian proverb well. Every person is proud of what he does for people. Every honest person wants to leave a piece of himself in his ear of wheat. I have been living in the world for almost fifty years, and I am convinced that this desire is most clearly expressed in those who work on the earth. Let's wait until your first student holidays - I will introduce you to an old man from a neighboring collective farm; he has been growing apple tree seedlings for more than thirty years. This is a true artist in his field. In every branch, in every leaf of a grown tree, he sees himself. If today all people were like this, we could say that we have achieved communist labor... I wish you health, goodness, happiness. Mom and sister hug you. They wrote to you yesterday. Kiss you. Your father.

2. Good afternoon, dear son!

I received your letter from the collective farm. It made me very excited. I didn't sleep all night. I thought about what you write and about you. On the one hand, it’s good that you are worried about the facts of mismanagement: the collective farm has a beautiful garden, but ten tons of apples have already been fed to the pigs; three hectares of tomatoes remained unharvested, I, the chairman of the collective farm, ordered the tractor drivers to plow the plot so that no traces remained... But, on the other hand, I am surprised that in your letter there is only bewilderment and nothing more, confusion in the face of these outrageous facts. What does this mean? You write: “When I saw this plot plowed in the morning, my heart almost burst out of my chest...” And then what? Still, what happened to your heart? Has it calmed down, apparently, and is beating evenly? And the hearts of your comrades didn’t burst out of anyone’s chest either?

Current page: 12 (book has 18 pages total) [available reading passage: 12 pages]

Bread

My country is wide...

I remember when I was a child, my grandmother knelt down in front of the icon in the morning and always whispered the same prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread...” The words were incomprehensible, but I knew: the grandmother was talking to God about bread...

My earliest memory: driving from the field. A tall cart with sheaves. I'm sitting at the very top. The horse's back is visible. The cart swings smoothly. Mosquitoes fly, the cart creaks. It smells like dust. The smell of warm ripe sheaves...

When I was five years old, my father went to work in the city. In the city he deserved all the honors of a working man - in our house we have half a chest of his father’s certificates of honor. But all his life his father yearned for land. I didn’t go for the plow, but, strangely, my father’s sighs are dear and understandable to me...

In 1947, after the drought, there was no bread. They collected acorns, dried them and crushed them into quinoa. In our village people swelled from the water and died. The strongest and healthiest men died first. My mother took the last thing out of the chest and tied it in a bundle: two old canvases left over from my grandmother, my father’s boots, an embroidered shrine, and took a clock off the wall... In Ukraine, in Shepetovka, my father and I exchanged two pounds of wheat for the entire bundle of goods. That's why we came. No bread was baked. The mother poured two handfuls of flour into the cast iron. The food could be drunk in a mug. And when the new bread was ripe, my sister and I went behind the combine and collected the dropped ears of rye. Mother made a small loaf of bread, about the size of a plate, and we kids sat by the stove and waited: when? Mother took out a loaf of bread, broke it and suddenly began to cry with joy that she could feed us. It is difficult to explain to those who have not lived through such days that there is nothing tastier than a piece of bread...

“Without bread there are no songs.” This is just one of many proverbs about bread. There are hundreds of thousands of words in our language. If you think about what is behind each of them, the word “BREAD” should be put in the very first place. The oldest profession on earth is plowing. Baked bread was found in an Egyptian tomb that stood for three and a half thousand years. A piece of petrified bread is kept in the Zurich Museum. Archaeologists found it in the mud of a dry lake. Six thousand years ago this bread was baked. In the Stone Age, when people did not yet know what metal was, they were already sowing grain...

Bread... There is no more important work on earth than throwing seeds into the raised ground in time and taking ripened grains from the ground in time...

Now, when you fly over the plain, you see two colors: green - forests and gardens, and yellow - bread. In the steppes, yellowness extends from horizon to horizon. Flying over the steppe, even from above you feel how hot it is on the ground now. Transparent glass waves of haze tremble and flow, and above the combines, if you look against the sun, there is white dust of broken straw. The entire steppe is covered in white haze.

We are flying over the Kherson region. We decide with the pilots: we will sit near one of the combines. Let's ask for water and get to know each other. Let's make a circle. The combine driver, holding the machine, twirls his cap over his head: sit down!..

Two. Grimy - only the eyes and teeth sparkle. Let's get acquainted. Nizbuzinskie. Father and son. Pyotr Andreevich and Anatoly.

- How long have you been together?

They look at each other and wipe their faces with their caps.

“Tolik first brought me grub to the combine.” And now we’ve been together for six years. He is already giving instructions to his father.

My son studies at the Novo-Kakhovsky Agricultural College. Every summer, when an internship is assigned, Anatoly is called by the director:

- Well, back to your father?

- To my father.

This is how father and son Nizbuzinsky work together during busy times.

We are sitting on the stubble. Father Nizbuzinsky took a cherry pie from the box.

- Try it - new bread.

We wash down our food with warm water from a can.

- How long have you been in these fields?

- Yes, almost all my life. My mother and father died at almost the same year, and good people assigned me to be raised on a state farm. Since then... I worked on the very first combine. Now I'm waiting for an assistant...

This is not the time for a long conversation. The minutes are counting on the field now.

– Come down to our “Ozhinki” holiday! – the younger one shouts from the combine. “We’ll finish in three days—they’ll bring a barrel of wine to the lake... Or come home.” It’s easy to find us: the Ingulets state farm, the village of Ingulets, the Ingulets River...

Let's get up. And now a hot white cloud rises above the combine of father and son...

Motor passions

Previously, I only saw this in movies: before you even catch the story with your eye, you’ve already missed it. The roar sounds like a medium-sized rocket is flying away. And on the sides there are spectators. Bags of straw tied to trees remind: a person can fly out of a car or along with a car... A car can be carried off the road into the thick of people. But this happens very rarely. And the spectators fearlessly share the danger with the racers. For the first time I stood among them and wondered just as excitedly: “Is it the wounded one or the one in the red car?” They rush by - you barely have time to see the numbers. Two... The rest are far behind, although they are also rushing like devils from the underworld. However, when you look closer, you begin to compare them with knights. The same courage, risk, thirst for victory before people’s eyes. The similarities are complemented by helmets and leather armor. “Wound or this one, on the red one?” I don’t know why, I, along with everyone else, am rooting for Ranul. A rope fence holds people back and prevents them from spilling onto the road along which these crazy knights are circling in blue smoke. In the previous car start, one car demolished the corner of the judge's bridge. The old judge was carried away on a stretcher, but the race was not delayed for a second and not a single person moved a step from the rope.

Blue smoke fills the space between the pine trees and the road. And there is the roar of motorcycles. “Runula or?..” Still Ranula! Happy, he holds his helmet in his hands. Hair stuck to wet forehead. Trees and human faces are probably still running before his eyes. The old judge, who managed to recover, puts on him a wreath of oak leaves, another judge carries silver-colored dishes, some girl runs towards him with three red carnation flowers.

- Ra-nu-la!..

Everyone has a holiday...

Tallinnians are almost indifferent to football. Reports of battles in England worried them no more than weather reports. I didn’t see any boys kicking a ball around on the lawns outside the city. There are occasional football games in Tallinn. Five to six thousand spectators gather, no more. But motorcycle racing makes the city deserted. One hundred thousand spectators gather at the Pirite highway ring. Tallinn has a little more than three hundred thousand inhabitants. Every third person is in a hurry to take a place closer to the road. And almost every third of the spectators can operate the car themselves. To work - on a motorcycle, for fishing - on a motorcycle, on a date - on a motorcycle, on a visit - on a motorcycle, on a trip (to Central Asia, for example) - on a motorcycle, a girl with her groom next to her. A fisherman on a motorcycle, an artist on a motorcycle, a young collective farmer on a motorcycle. Once more than a dozen have gathered, the race is sure to begin. Every Sunday there are competitions on collective farms and workers’ settlements. In Tallinn, of course, the strongest get into the Pirite ring. And not only Estonians are going to this ring. All major all-Union competitions are here, on the Pirite ring. And this inflames passions even more. A sixteen-year-old boy cannot imagine life without a pair of wheels. Of course, not everyone gets to the ring in Pirita. Not everyone participates even in small competitions. It’s just that the motorcycle has become an indispensable part of everyday life in Estonia. From July 1, the Estonian police strictly decreed that people should only drive with safety helmets. This, of course, will help protect the hottest heads on the roads.

Of course, Tallinn should be considered the motorcycle capital. But, having flown from Estonia to Latvia, I saw: a powerful rival was growing close to the Estonians. On the roads there are all helmets (it turns out that the Latvians also have a regulation - “not a single step without helmets”). “Pirite? Pirite - yes... - said one Riga racer, whom I would give more than fifty years. “You come to us in August, you will see the ring.”

...In the vicinity of Riga, the pilot and I landed at the edge of a small forest. We got out of the helicopter and smoked. We look, a boy with a bucket is rushing towards the car. The boy is thirteen years old. We think: the helicopter is running to have a look. No.

- Uncle, pour some gasoline...

- Why is this?

- Yes, it’s over, but we still have two more races...

The boy was offended:

- Come... My number is 24th.

We went up from above to look at the racers...

Here they are rushing along a white dusty road. Our friend, thirteen-year-old Kuzhneks Vilnis, also rode mopeds in the second race. Spectators at the start and finish were excited.

Motor passions have been raging all summer in the Baltics. And you say – football, Golden Goddess... To each his own.

The photo was taken from a helicopter. The pilot of the car is Vladislav Borzyi.

Dnieper necklace

My country is wide...

This is the Dneproges... People of the older generation hardly need explanations. Anyone who is now over fifty will immediately say: “Dneproges”. Thirty-four years ago, all the newspapers in the world published approximately the same photograph. Perhaps no other dam on earth has received so much fame. Let's look at a photograph taken a few days ago together.

Well, first of all, she is extremely beautiful! Industrial buildings are not often pleasing to the eye. This is true art right there. You walk on horseback - a mighty concrete bridge carries people, cars and backs up the water. If you look from the side, there is white lace on the river. Light, graceful arc. Concrete necklace... Whatever words you want will be true here. Don't be fooled by the size when looking at the photo. Buses and cars go on top of the dam. But they are not visible. They are smaller than the poppy seeds in this photo. Almost a million cubic meters of concrete went into the dam. This is a lot even in today's times. But do people who are twenty and thirty today know: the builders kneaded the concrete for the Dnieper dam with their feet. With your feet!!! Just like in Ukraine from time immemorial they knead clay and straw to make adobe bricks. “Rubber boots and off you go!” They kneaded with the song...” - This was told by Afanasy Afinogenovich Dmitrusenko, who built the dam and now lives in Dnepropetrovsk.

We got on the tram with him and arrived at the dam. Afanasy Afinogenovich runs his rough hand over the concrete and talks about the dam as if it were a living being. There are many “moles” and “scratches” on the dam, familiar only to this old man. It was his feet in rubber boots that kneaded the concrete, and his fingers hardened the scratches on the concrete. “And during the war the dam was blown up. Here, to the right of center, it was destroyed. The Dnieper flowed freely, as if there was no dam. I took a roundabout route from my unit and came here... I’m standing over there on the shore. He scooped up water with his helmet and rather splashed it on his face so that people wouldn’t see the tears...”

Let's imagine for a moment: there is no dam at this place. Blue water, smooth and calm, flows across the steppe. The scallops of foam near the stones turn white. This is the very place where the Cossacks’ smoking houses stood on the Dnieper. And now, right there on the banks, imagine a thousand carts drawn by oxen and horses. And a human anthill. There is no dam yet. The Dnieper is still foaming with white scallops on its rapids. And in the human anthill, if you then looked from above, you could see here and there mechanisms and people in blue overalls. The Americans wore blue. American engineers agreed to work in Russia for good money - in Russia, which “started something not very marketable.” The Americans honestly earned their gold rubles. Some of them went home even with our orders. But it’s unlikely that even the greatest well-wishers and optimists could have guessed then that the guys who kneaded concrete with their feet would go to build a dam on the Nile thirty years later. It is unlikely that the Newport News company, which supplied equipment to the Dnieper, could have imagined that in 1966 the Leningrad Elektrosila plant would produce the most powerful hydraulic turbines in the world...

On May 1, 1927, the first stone was laid at the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station. “What days those were!” “Afanasy Afinogenovich remembers how these first stones were laid, how fatigue overwhelmed the people in the barracks. The world did not believe the “venture”. And indeed it was great audacity to announce that an unprecedented dam would be built. It took five years to build the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station. And this is how the world saw her in the first photographs. At that time it was the largest hydroelectric station. At that time, this was our greatest victory. “It was the biggest holiday in my life. I remember everything: how the water rustled, how the first light bulb lit up, how they danced for joy on the dam... On October 10, 1932, everyone who built it gathered on the right bank. There were four thousand guests alone - workers from different parts of the world. I thought that my heart would jump out and fly that day. Ordzhonikidze arrived, Kalinin, Henri Barbusse..."

Komsomolskaya Pravda, which published a portrait of Afanasy Dmitrusenko on this day, devoted three pages to the holiday on the Dnieper. The dilapidated paper of the newspaper carefully preserves the joy that swept the country on October 10: “The Dnieper works for socialism,” “The era of industrialization has begun!”

“We should not be surprised,” wrote the Parisian “Revue de Monde,” “if Russia in the near future presents us with a dozen more Magnitogorsk and Dneprostroevs...”

The French newspaper looked ahead soberly. Looking at the photo of the industrial firstborn, how many Dnieper hydroelectric power stations have now been built? Let's try to count. On the Dnieper - Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, Kremenchugskaya. There are three hydroelectric power stations on the Volga, a fourth is under construction. There are two on the Angara, the third is under construction. It is being built on the Yenisei. And so on. And these are only those hydroelectric power stations that are larger than the first Dnieper. And how much bigger! There are six Dnieper hydroelectric stations in the Bratsk station alone. True, the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station also wants to rejuvenate and gain new strength. Now its power is 650 thousand kilowatts. Look at the photo. This energy is generated by turbines in a building located on the left edge of the dam. It has been calculated: the current regime of the Dnieper allows not to drain excess water through the spans, but to build another engine station. It can be placed on the right wing of the dam. It will take nineteen flights. Architects frown - “the unique beauty of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station will be ruined.” “But the strength doubles,” say the power engineers. We will also sigh if the dam loses its former beauty. But the arguments of the power engineers are too impressive...

How to finish thinking about the photo?.. When I go on business trips, I put an electric razor in my suitcase along with shirts and spare notebooks. Today, in the most remote place in the country, you find an outlet. Shave and smelt aluminum, turn on the machines, light the fires in the huts, turn on the switches of the synchrophasotrons. This is the electrification that Lenin dreamed of... It was difficult to start. That is why the Dnieper firstborn is so dear to us. How can we forget: “They kneaded the concrete with their feet”...

The photo was taken from an airplane. Aeroflot pilot - Vasily Grak.

Grandmother and granddaughter

Discovery of the world

- Grandma, is this wooden sand?

- No, it's sawdust.

- Grandma, who painted the flowers?

You can say: oh my god. Simple and easy answer. For a thousand years, all grandmothers on earth answered their grandchildren’s questions this way. But this grandmother doesn’t believe in God. And it’s not easy for her to answer. And the questions chain one after another:

- Grandma, why does the horse bite the flowers? What did the horse say to his daughter?

Grandma wants to rest. She unwraps a bundle on the grass and takes out tomatoes and two apples.

- Lena, Lena!

But Lena found a snail under the leaves:

- Grandma, what is this?!

Grandma herself sees such a monster for the first time...

Two people look with great curiosity at the creature that fits in the palm of their hand...

Do our questions about the world disappear with age?..

As soon as the helicopter’s wheels touch the ground and we open the doors, the picture is the same every time. A Hundred Eyes: “What’s inside?” And the indispensable question:

- How does he fly without wings?

– The screw... It’s what’s holding it on.

- It rests on air, right?

- For air.

– And if you lean the screw on the pillars, will it break?

I look at the thin propeller blades and don’t know what to answer.

“It’ll break,” the pilot comes to the rescue.

- But how?..

We all listen together, with our mouths open, to the explanations, but we don’t understand anything...

It's time to fly. The spinner of the blades turns into a silver circle. The kids, bending down from the wind, run to the sides. We hang over the meadow. Then we fly. Flexible blades hold tons of cargo above the ground... We sit down, and again a hundred eyes of village boys:

– What’s inside?..

From such boys grew up the man who invented wings and this car without wings.

For about two minutes he mastered the word in warehouses.

- Grünwald?

I told him what happened in 1410...

Then I met him and my father in Kaunas at the museum. We walked together past crossed spears, past painted Mongolian shields, past bows and crossbows, past old guns, past sabers and broadswords, past bronze cannons and modern automatic pistols.

- Dad, why do people fight?

My father and I looked at each other. Is it easy to answer this childish question?

Trakai

My country is wide...

If a person ends up in Lithuania, if he is curious, the road will definitely lead him here, to Trakai. It is an hour's drive from Vilnius.

If the picture had been in color, we would have seen turquoise water, green islands as light as clouds, and this castle on the island, made of red brick and white stone. A long bridge connects the castle to the “mainland”. Once upon a time, a long time ago, water approached the very walls of the fortress. The ditches filled with water. At sunset or in sight of the enemy, the bridges at the gates were raised, and the castle became a fortress. Entries in old chronicles, stone cannonballs and arrows, which can still be found on the island, tell us that the castle was surrounded more than once by crusader troops. The conquerors trampled and burned the lands around, but the castle stood. Cannonballs and arrows flew from the loopholes, and tar flowed. Dog knights broke their teeth on this nut many times. And yet there was a year when the castle could not stand. One can imagine a multi-week siege of the fortress. Smoke drifted over the lake. And one day, through the smoke, probably in boats, the crusaders rushed to the walls. The castle was burned and destroyed.

But again, even more impregnable, a fortress rose and was rebuilt on the island. Here, in Trakai, was the ancient capital of Lithuania, the castle was the residence of the great Lithuanian princes. And then Vilnius became the capital. The empty fortress became a prison, and then only bats remained to live on cramped spiral staircases, in echoing halls, under eaves and in narrow loopholes. Of course, time has not been kind to the construction. Half a thousand years! All that was left of the towers were ruins, the walls and castle looked like a sad pile of stone and bricks. But for Lithuanians too much is connected with this place on Lake Galve. The descendants of Kestutis and Vytautas, descendants of the masters who built the ancient fortress, decided to resurrect the castle. Several years of work, hard work of historians, master restorers, masons, carpenters. And now, far beyond the borders of Lithuanian land, they know the place: Trakai. And every summer the assault on the revived fortress begins. But, strangely, no one in the castle locks the gates or raises the bridges. Come in! Two hundred thousand tourists per year. When we started working, there were reproaches: it was expensive. But right before our eyes, the tourist’s dime pays off the costs. This makes it possible to finish beautifully started work.

However, even today the monument of Lithuanian antiquity is beautiful. You fly by plane: gentle hills, stripes of yellow grain on the hills, forest islands, lakes between the hills. And suddenly - a chain of lakes and curly islands, light as clouds. Almost two dozen small islands. And on one of them is this red and white fortress. A rare combination of antiquity and natural beauty!

Lithuanian landscape in the Trakai region.

For Lithuanians, Trakai is sacred. And for all of us together, this is a corner of unique beauty on earth, a memory of our past and a good lesson on how to cherish both the beauty and the memory of days gone by.

The photo was taken from a helicopter. Pilot – Eduard Mkhitaryants.

The Tale of the Mill

Met on the way

A mill lives in Lithuania. Only the wind knows how old she is. The white stones were overgrown with moss, in some places weeds had adapted to grow from the stones, and even a sunflower had established its roots between the stones. For many years now, the inside of the mill has smelled not of flour, but of dust that the wind collected along the roads and carried into the cracks under the roof. But, of course, like everyone else, the mill had its youth. How many different winds swept through! Every wind brought joy to the mill. There was a slight breeze and the carts creaked along the roads. The whole clearing is crowded with horses, men and women. They swear and laugh. They carry tight bags of warm grain to the mill. The miller, white with flour, turned his wings, exposed them to the wind - and he raked away the white, fragrant grind - for bread, for beer, for pies. A round stone millstone could not be turned by a hundred people, but the wings turned the millstone. The wind, born of the sea and dying in an unknown place, gave part of its strength to the mill. There was enough for many mills. They stood on the highest hills, and when there was a slight breeze, light wings began to spin. It looked like the mills were waving their arms and inviting each other to visit. And if there was no wind, everything calmed down. The carts did not creak, the large wooden gears did not creak in the mill. The miller went to the village, and only the mice rustled in the darkness, grinding the grains of bread. But a little wind...

And suddenly something happened. There were fewer and fewer carts with sacks, more and more often the miller hung a lock on the door white with flour and went to his farm. And such a day came - a strong wind, but no one came. Not a single horse on the hill, not a single man, and not even the miller appeared and opened the door. And then for many years the wind whistled uselessly in the lattice wings. There were days when the mill thought: have people stopped sowing grain? No, every autumn stripes of barley and wheat turned yellow on the hills. And the travelers, resting in the shade near the mill, took white crumpets out of their knapsacks. Once, in calm weather, when you could hear mosquitoes buzzing and hovering in a column, the mill heard strange sounds from afar: “Tobacco-tobacco-tobacco-tobacco...” A motor was running behind the village in the ravine. At the new mill people were cursing and laughing, and a white river of ground grains was pouring out from under the millstone. That day the old mill realized: there was nothing more to wait for. An old friend, the wind began to gradually break out its wings and peel away the lime between the stones. Wooden friends - mills - disappeared from year to year. One was dismantled for firewood in the winter, the other was accidentally burned by boys in the summer. Another one burned down during the war. And one tall mill made of white stone remained on the hills. People only called the old tower a mill out of habit. What is a mill if there are no wings!

There were fewer and fewer horses on the roads and more and more carts with motors. One day – the old mill couldn’t believe her eyes – an iron mill was flying over the hills. Often, often she flapped her wings and flew and flew. “Of course, it was a dream, mills cannot fly,” the old mill later decided. How was she supposed to know that people had found something new to do with their wings? The wings did not spin because of the wind; on the contrary, they themselves were screwed into the tight layers of wind. The new “mill” could hang above the ground and fly in any direction it wanted... But the old mill was becoming decrepit.

And suddenly a thought occurred to one of the people: the hills and the road between the hills will become more boring if the last mill disappears. One day the key creaked in the old lock, and the mill heard the following conversation:

- Let's make three floors. Downstairs - come in, drink kvass from the road, bread beer...

– We’ll make a staircase to the second tier. There will be pancakes here. Have lunch, relax.

– We’ll make the floor in a circle. It will be possible to turn like a millstone.

– At the very top there are also tables. For those who are not in a hurry. Let's hang an antique lamp...

And now the mill has new wings. The truck began to transport bricks, and the carpenters built a bridge around the mill. A carpenter and an artist are now busy inside. And soon the hungry traveler will turn off the road to the mill. In summer - cold kvass, apples, cucumbers. In winter - tea. And at any time of the year - pancakes. If you stand on the bridge, you can see the road, hills with stripes of grain, islands of forest. The old mill is part of this ancient land.

If some wind blows you onto the road near the village of Sheduva, you will immediately see the mill. If you drink Lithuanian kvass, raise your mug to the old and new wings, to the health of people who know how to preserve the beauty on earth.

Attention! This is an introductory fragment of the book.

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