They gave him small boots from Voznesensky. Analysis of Rozhdestvensky’s poem “On Earth is mercilessly small...

Robert Rozhdestvensky "On Earth is mercilessly small" http://goo.gl/9EL7ME

DISASSEMBLY PLAN:

0. Quoting a poem. So that the reader can draw certain conclusions for himself.
1. PART ONE. According to the “famous scheme of four interpretations.”
2. PART TWO. Extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people".
3. PART THREE. Continuation of extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people". But with a different hero.
4. PART FOUR. A little bit about everything.
5. PART FIVE. Rhythmic analysis.
6. PART SIX. Summing up and evaluating the poem.
7. PART SEVEN. Application. For the latest extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people". With another new hero.

0. I quote the poem:

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On the ground
mercilessly small


And a very small briefcase.

And one day -
beautiful morning -
knocked on his window
small,
it seemed
war...

They gave him small boots.
They gave me a small helmet
and small -
by size -
overcoat.

And when he fell -
ugly, wrong,
turning his mouth out in an attacking cry,
then all over the earth
there wasn't enough marble
to knock the guy out
in full growth!

1969
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PART ONE. According to the “famous scheme of four interpretations.”

Gasparov. Selected works 1-3. Applications. Medieval Latin poetics in the system of medieval grammar and rhetoric. Part two: Sermon. Quote:

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...the tradition of interpreting Scripture unexpectedly met with a completely different tradition - with that “interpretation of the poets”, which was part of the school grammar curriculum. The techniques were the same; the question was raised of how this text should be correctly understood; other texts of similar content were used for verification; to clarify the meaning of each word, other cases of use of this word were used; as a result, the text appeared as an indicative part of a large ideological system, acquiring many additional meanings. These meanings were classified according to the famous scheme of four interpretations - literal (historical), allegorical, tropological and anagogical, so, in the literal sense, “Jerusalem” meant the city in Judea, in the allegorical sense - the holy church, in the tropological sense - the soul of the believer, in the anagogical sense - the kingdom of heaven ( “what happened”, “what to believe”, “what to do”, “what to hope for”).
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Now the essence of the many controversial interpretations of this or that word according to the principle of “four” (interpretations) as Gasparov writes and their interactions with each other - which he does not write about, but as a starting point for our analysis we will try to determine the essence of the expression “little man” in a poem by Robert Rozhdestvensky. IN BRIEF:

1. IN A LITERAL HISTORICAL sense, this is an ordinary citizen who stood up to defend his country. Voluntarily or by order, the question is interesting. But it was.
2. IN AN ALLEGORICAL sense, this is a cog in a large system, from its point of view it may be: meaningless, not noticeable and of no use to anyone. However, he is part of this system - even if this system does not notice him. You definitely have to believe in this. Although this is true.
3. In the TROPOLOGICAL sense (in this case in the metonymic) there is Synecdoche - one as many and vice versa - where one “little man” who became a soldier turned into a victorious people. How fair this is, too, is an interesting question. What to do about it? We'll figure it out later.
4. IN ANAGOGICAL sense, as far as I can judge from the examples, this “little man” must recognize himself as a “system” - this is my opinion. What else can he hope for - that he brings benefit to society without any remuneration for his labors? For Robert Rozhdestvensky, this anagogical meaning is expressed in stone - in granite - the monument to the “Warrior-Liberator”.

Now, let's look at these “four” provisions in more DETAIL:

1. In addition to certain condensed formulations, there are also expanded ones. The definition of “little man” - citizen, as you understand, is incomplete. Because each of us is a citizen of his own country - a banker, a pilot... And a plowman and a worker... And what qualities did Robert Rozhdestvensky endow with his “little man” - let’s see:

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Once upon a time there was a small man.
His service was small.
And a very small briefcase.
He received a small salary...
===========================

As you understand, and as I hope I understand, our “little man” was either an accountant or a bank employee or a cultural worker or someone else, as they would say in Europe - an ordinary clerk. A cog, even in its own coordinate system.
A very remarkable detail in the description of this “little man” is “a very small briefcase.” The word “very” is a plug (literary term). Take it away and feel the “rhythmic laughter.” However, this plug is certainly justified. And, it is rhythmically highlighted. “Very” means a very small briefcase. Allegorically speaks of the very insignificance of the position of our “little man.” As one person correctly noted - Gogol’s Akaki Akakievich of the 20th century. Comparison of more than... -

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GOGOL N.V. THE TALE OF THE OVERCOAT. LITTLE MAN AKAKIY AKAKIEVICH BASHMACHKIN http://qoo.by/3een

The main character of the story The Overcoat is Akakiy Akakievich Bashmachkin. Gogol calls him a little man. Akaki Akakievich worked as a titular councilor (civil rank IX class) in St. Petersburg. His salary was 400 rubles a year. He really loved his job of manually copying papers and approached it with great responsibility and scrupulousness. However, his role in the department was insignificant and therefore young employees of the department often laughed at him.
One day the little man noticed that his overcoat was worn out, he took it to the tailor to have it repaired, but the tailor refused and said that he needed to sew a new one.
Akaki Akakievich had to greatly reduce his expenses, which were already small. When Akkaky received his salary for the holiday, he went with a tailor to get material for a new overcoat.
When the little man came to work in a new overcoat, he was invited to the name day of the assistant chief. Returning home late at night, Akaki Akakievich lost his overcoat and was forced to wear an old one, which is why he fell ill and died.
Later, the ghost of the titular councilor began to appear near the Kalinkin Bridge. He stole fur coats, coats and greatcoats from passers-by.
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Well, it’s not a fact that our “little man” was like that, however, as is customary, the life of such “little people” is by no means sugar. Well, for what reasons Robert Rozhdestvensky decided to exalt this “little man” remains a mystery to us. Although, perhaps, somewhere it will be possible to find the author’s thoughts on his unsightly little, but in general, the main character of the poem. But that comes later - if there is one. Now, this will both interfere and distract us from the analysis.

Unfortunately, Gasparov has nothing on what is called the “surrounding reality” accompanying the main character. How to parse it and whether it is possible from the position of “four interpretations” is unknown. But let's try.
Since in a historical sense there is nothing here except indirect associations, taken, rather, according to attributes to one of the three approximate signs of the poem, namely, machine guns and helmets are attributes of war: 1. an unnamed country - the Soviet Union - “On Earth, mercilessly small”; 2. unnamed war - the Great Patriotic War - “it seemed like a small war...”; and 3. unnamed monuments to the Soldiers-Liberators - “there wasn’t enough marble” - and all this may seem paradoxical to some, and even more so from the author’s position, but from the point of view of the verse, it absolutely does not mean that the speech in this poem is about the Soviet Union; however, according to the historical meaning of the poem, we took everything we could, therefore, we move on to the next point: allegorical.

2. If we take it as a whole, then allegorically, the entire poem is a caricature, a caricature. Everything about it is wrong. All. Even the last two lines about full-length monuments rather emphasize the caricature of the poem. But let's look in more detail. First line:

“On Earth is mercilessly small...” [for kindness] -

Only [so] this line doesn’t seem like a cartoon to me. To understand this, you need to replace the word “ruthlessness” - as the highest form of cruelty, with aggression or the same cruelty and get an Earth small for its cruelty or an Earth known for its small cruelty - and how to understand this? You say...: compared to the Universe, our Earth... oh yes - very, very small: a grain of sand in the ocean of Space - but what does ruthlessness have to do with it? The epithet is the same, and besides, it is a part of the Epithet that belongs to its other part - the small one. This is how the poet subordinated cruelty to the little miracle of the Earth. The earth is small, yes, but according to the poet, it is also mercilessly small.
We considered the lines of the main character in a historical sense. We will not consider them allegorically. Moreover, Akaki Akakievich is already one hundred percent. Now let's look at the rest of the “colors” accompanying our hero:

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And one day -
beautiful morning -
knocked on his window
small,
it seemed
war...
They gave him a small machine gun.
They gave him small boots.
They gave me a small helmet
and small -
by size -
overcoat.
===========================

“War knocked on the window”, didn’t look in - okay. However, this is probably correct, because war is noisy and breaks windows. Suddenly. Clear. For some reason, the association with the window is rustic. And that's okay. “It seemed like a small war” is another cartoon. And the war was dealt with. Let's move on to its attributes. Honestly? “Small machine gun” is not a briefcase, it’s another caricature. And the point is not even that there are (and even if there could be) small machines in the literal sense of the word - and we hold back laughter at this expression, but in the allegorical sense, what does this mean? It feels like the author completely forgot about his “little man” that he began to spout off from line to line. It’s good that the little one hasn’t given away the tank or plane to our little hero yet. Next... And here we fall into a trap. More precisely, they realized that they were in trouble. OK. Agree.
The trap, they call it, by contradiction, the man was literally big, so much so that everything that was not inherent to him, thanks to the light hand of the author, turned out to be small. Thank you, the last line: “and a small - in size - overcoat.” It's funny! However, if the overcoat turns out to be small in SIZE, then it is a trap. Well, it's accepted. And you don’t even know what to think now... - “matrix reloaded.” We sort it out point by point and get into trouble. Eh. And we don’t have examples of analyzes from “interpretations of poets.” OK. Let's sum it up here then.
Firstly, except for the “little man” - “there lived a little man” (1o11oooooo1 - if only so, otherwise “there lived a little man” 1o1oo11oooo), all the other lines with the main Epithet of the main character, the most on is - direct speech. To what extent all this justifies or has the right to life in this poem is difficult to judge. However, this is the case. At least in this verse and in my current state. And then we'll see.
In this case, I don’t yet see the point in sorting through the remaining points - tropological and anagogical. Maybe later, before, I will quote one small excerpt from the life of one “little man”, in some ways similar to the hero Robert Rozhdestvensky. Yeah.
Secondly, let's go.

PART TWO. Extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people". Boris Kremnev. Beethoven. Part one. Some paragraphs running one after another:

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Kapellmeister Beethoven lived, although not in need, but in constant surroundings of it. Around him were poor, destitute people, dying from disease and exhaustion. Rarely a year passed in the Electorate of Cologne without famine, when entire villages died out en masse. His country - the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation - was fragmented into many dwarf states, given over to the power of cruel and greedy autocratic princes. Unlimited rulers, they sought to outdo each other in luxury and debauchery, and drew funds from the same almost dried up source. Various exactions fell on the people. The Electorate of Cologne levied, for example, road tolls, fees for crossing the Rhine, taxes on salt, and tribute from Jews. Excesses were not collected except for the air. Here is one of the great many police regulations of that time: “Whoever does not prepare a tub of water at night pays a 12 kreuzer fine; who walks down the street with a pipe in his mouth - 10 kr.; who does not have a stable lantern - 12 kr.; who climbs over the fence - 20 kr., who drinks or makes noise in the tavern on Sundays - 15 kr. (for everyone must drink his glass in silence!); which of the young people will meet outside the city or in the gardens on Sunday or a holiday during worship - 10 kr.; who does not provide the prescribed number of killed sparrows - 6 kr. for each unit not presented, and whoever presents another bird instead of a sparrow - 12 kr.; who plays cards in a tavern - 40 kr., and who allows the game at home - 50 kr.; A man in the street who calls another “you” pays 8 kr.”
But the funds coming from countless extortions were not enough. And then the rulers engaged in human trafficking. They sold their subjects for cannon fodder. Here is what the Prussian Emperor Frederick II wrote about the Cologne Elector Clemens August:
“The Elector of Cologne placed as many mitres on his head as he could get. He was the Elector of Cologne, Bishop of Munster, Paderborn, Osnabrück and, moreover, Commander of the German Order. He supported from eight to twelve thousand people and traded them as a cattle dealer trades bulls.”
Ludwig Beethoven, with his characteristic insight, realized that in the society in which he lives, an ignorant person has only one opportunity to protect himself from complete lack of rights - to achieve security. Money gave independence. Big money brought freedom. They guaranteed against the many vicissitudes that life in a state where despotism reigns.
Ludwig was wealthy. He decided that he needed to make a fortune. Over the years, he invested the accumulated capital into business and purchased a wine cellar.
Trade went briskly and brought in good income. According to a contemporary, “the court conductor van Beethoven had money in deposits... He sold his wine to the Netherlands, from where merchants and connoisseurs came to him and bought wine.”
It would seem that prosperity awaited both him and his family - by that time he had married Maria Josepha Paul, and in 1740 their son Johann was born. But exactly what promised prosperity turned into disaster.
The bandmaster devoted most of his time to service at court and entrusted his wife with conducting trade. Gradually, Maria Josepha turned from a wine seller into its most ardent consumer. Even the cellar's regulars couldn't compete with her.
The further, the more. Maria Josepha was so addicted to wine that from morning to evening she would not part with her mug. It got to the point that many mothers in the city predicted the future of Frau Beethoven for their sons, who had an excessive love of alcohol, which frightened the youngsters a lot.
There was trouble in the house. Ludwig Beethoven, who loved calm and sedateness most of all, now lived in the incessant noise of scandals, screams, and drunken hysterical fun.
Johann grew up in such an environment. Naturally gifted with good abilities, he inherited a beautiful voice and musicality from his father. But from his mother he inherited a flabby will and a thoughtless attitude towards life. His abilities did not help, but rather harmed him. Difficulties teach a person to overcome obstacles and develop character. For Johann, both in childhood and in his youth, everything was easy. Thanks to his father, at the age of twelve he sang in the court chapel, at the age of sixteen he took the position of candidate court musician, and by the age of twenty-four he had already become a full-fledged court musician.
That is why Johann grew up as a careless rake, unable and unwilling to work.
In addition, the mother somehow, in a fit of drunken tenderness, decided to bring joy to her only son and treated him to wine. And since she believed that she loved her son, these treats were repeated several times. And little by little, Johann became accustomed to wine from childhood, and when he grew up, he became addicted to drinking.
So another drunkard appeared in the family.
Drastic measures were needed. And the old bandmaster accepted them. He married his son. With Maria Josepha, who had become a drunkard, he acted more harshly - he imprisoned her in a monastery near Cologne.
The blank walls of the monastery turned out to be safer than marriage - the old woman whiled away her life in the holy monastery until her death, without bothering anyone.
The son started drinking even more after his marriage.
Unfortunately, Johann found a good wife. Maria Magdalena Keverich was an extremely gentle and kind creature. Small in stature, thin and fragile, she looked not like a woman who had already been widowed and buried her first child before her marriage to Johann, but like an angular and timid teenager, fearfully looking at the world with sad gray eyes. Uncomplaining and meek, she seemed designed to be pushed around. And that was all Johann needed. Every year he became more and more swaggering, tormenting his wife. It often happened that he beat her, not at all embarrassed by the presence of children. He beat me because he couldn’t get the money, which he himself had drank shortly before.
So the empty scoundrel turned into a perpetually drunken family tyrant. It is not surprising that the neighbors, according to a contemporary, “could not remember Madame van Beethoven ever laughing - she was always serious.”
And, of course, it was not in vain that Frau Beethoven said to one of her neighbors:
“If you listen to my good advice, you will remain unmarried. You will have a wonderful, calm life, you will live for your own pleasure. For what is marriage? A little joy at the beginning and an unbroken chain of suffering later.”
Several years of “family happiness,” constant fear of her husband, and backbreaking work around the house, where everything was falling apart, severely exhausted Mary Magdalena. Next to her husband, she looked like an old woman, although she was six years younger than him.
In the end, the old bandmaster abandoned his son. With one wave of his small but strong hand, he cut off the unusable branch and began to live alone, withdrawn and unsociable.
Now it was as if his son did not exist for him. What else stirred the old man’s heart was pity for his daughter-in-law. He tried to help her, but he did it on the sly, secretly from Johann. He knew that he would take the money, drink, and beat his wife.
Probably out of good feelings for Mary Magdalena, the grandfather agreed to be the godfather of little Ludwig. And if the old conductor had not died three years later, who knows, maybe Beethoven’s childhood would have turned out completely differently.
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Before moving specifically to our main character in Boris Kremnev’s story, let me recall a certain moment from my own life that so succinctly coincides with what Beethoven’s author writes about. About taxes on sparrows... However, here's Europe for you. So much for Germany. Fragmented, really. Another point, how much they are not strong believers, is clearly described in this book - although it is not directly named. And if only our authors wrote about this.
Once upon a time, I watched a program on TV about the reign of Mao Zedong. There, there was approximately the same plot. When every Chinese peasant engaged in agriculture was obliged to destroy pests in the rice fields (or wheat fields, I don’t remember) - ordinary sparrows. Obliged, I emphasize. And a certain number of them. The carcasses had to be provided to the persons appointed for this purpose. The narrator was so surprisingly indignant at such tyranny of Mao’s tyranny that, I must admit, he infected me too - and what else can you call it! And here, on you - civilized Europe! And how many years did it take to reach today’s civilization... And does it still live? Financially, perhaps. But... - I wonder if we have had similar cases of tyranny of power... But what should Russia become in 20-30 years after the well-known events... - who? However, we digress a little. Let's continue. We're not done yet - if anything.
Oh, “everyman who calls another “you” – pay[...] 8 kr.” - may such educational wisdom not fade over the centuries!.. People! Respect the great personality in others, not only in yourself... Oh, heaven... Let's finally continue! -

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The courtyard of the baker Fischer's house, where Johann Beethoven lived with his family, was paved with cobblestones. But no matter how tightly the stones fit one another, grass made its way between them. She was not watered, she was not looked after, the stone squeezed and suffocated her, and yet she was ineradicably drawn to the light. The young body, strong and strong, was filled with vital juices. The grass was turning green. The grass was growing.
Ludwig grew up in exactly the same way. When he was very young, he crawled around the yard, crushed his nose on a cobblestone, smeared blood, dirt and tears across his face with his fist, and crawled on. No one took care of him, no one looked after him. On the contrary, when he grew older, he himself took care of his younger brothers: he dragged them into the yard for a walk, pulled them by the hair when they quarreled and were mischievous, and did not allow them to run away into the street, where the little ones were waylaid by the hooves of a horse or the wheels of a carriage.
From an early age, Ludwig lived alone, without a parental eye. The mother was just about ready to do the housework. Vain attempts to make ends meet were killing her strength.
In addition, lately Mary Magdalena began to get tired very quickly. Her already long face seemed to lengthen even more. The cheeks were sunken, the cheekbones became sharp and burned with fire. She often leaned against the wall and buried her face in her hands, coughing for a long time.
The only thing she could give her children was a gentle look and a soft, tired smile.
It turns out that this is not so little. Beethoven kept warm, grateful memories of his mother throughout his life. Sparkles of affection broke the unkind darkness of his childhood.
He grew up left to his own devices, from childhood he faced life one on one, got used to its shocks and did not pay attention to them.
He drew all his strength from himself and relied only on himself. Therefore, probably, much of what prevents people from living did not touch him. In the cold he went naked, in the slush and bad weather he ran barefoot. On dark evenings, when other children timidly huddled around adults, he slipped into the attic and looked for a long time into the distance shrouded in a cloudy haze, where the mighty Rhine rolled its waters menacingly.
He didn't care at all what they would say about him. He believed in himself early and firmly. “When Ludwig van Beethoven grew up,” recalls Cecilia Fischer, “he often walked around dirty and unkempt. Cecilia Fisher told him:
“You’re acting dirty again, Ludwig.” You need to take care of yourself, be clean and tidy.
He answered her:
- Well, so what? When I become an important gentleman, no one will even notice it.
At the age of six he went to primary school. His suit, full of holes and patches, caused a lot of ridicule. But then, when the boys became too annoying - they pulled at the dress, pinched him - he abruptly cut off all the harassment. It was done very simply: Ludwig beat the boys. Calmly, decisively. And since he was strong, much stronger than his peers, they immediately left him alone and tried not to hurt him again.
Much later, more than twenty years later, he wrote to one of his friends: “Strength is the morality of people who are different from the rest, it is my morality.”
But this powerful man never used force to harm others, but only used it to protect himself from the harm that others tried to cause him.
The nickname “Spagnol” - “Spaniard”, which firmly stuck to him, did not bother him at all. He received this nickname because he had a dark complexion and black hair.
During the five years spent at school, Ludwig learned little - reading, writing and the rudiments of Latin and arithmetic. Until the end of his days, he experienced an acute need for basic knowledge - he wrote with spelling errors, and never really learned to count. When he, already a world-famous composer, needed to multiply 251 by 22 to calculate his fee, he wrote out the number 251 twenty-two times in a column and added it up. He forever retained a naive respect for people who could count quickly and possessed the secrets of multiplication and division, incomprehensible to him.
But his musical development proceeded very quickly. No matter how ugly the methods were, the training brought rich fruits. No matter how barbarously the soil was cultivated, it gave excellent seedlings - it was very fertile.
I must say that the teachers were not so bad. In any case, they knew their craft perfectly. Johann Beethoven's drinking companion Tobias Pfeiffer was not only a regular at taverns, but also an excellent musician. He sang well, played the piano beautifully, and played the oboe superbly. He, albeit with drunken persistence and sometimes cruelty, sought from his student what every musician needs - finger fluency, the ability to sight read, that is, quickly, on the spot, without first learning, to play this or that piece. He taught Ludwig music, although he did not educate him musically. But at first, it was like laying the foundation, and this was necessary, although, of course, it would have been much better if both had been harmoniously combined.
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Well enough. We won't talk for long. Yes, and somewhere this is inappropriate. However, “a healthy mind in a healthy body.” The life of Ludwig Van Beethoven (who, by the way, died in complete poverty) is unlike others. However, if a person is strong (in anything) he can afford to be weak. It is precisely such people, in any difficult years for the country, that can be its defenders and heroes. Somewhere the “Akakievichs” can... - somewhere there - somewhere very far away. If we imagine that they... like “Mary Magdalene” are capable of enduring hardships so that there is not enough marble on Earth, exclusively, I emphasize, “Beethovens”. Why “to them”? Why not Mozart, for example? By the way, he was a small man, relative to his build. However, was he a small man, relative to the spirit? Definitely no. But Mozart was more of a child - a child of genius. Indeed, there may not have been such people among creative people at all... Boris Kremnev, for example, has something to say about Mozart. But these are all not just great people, but also famous ones. But our next hero (where there is one and another...) is Santiago, - I ask the reader to forgive me for another long quotation...

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PART THREE. Continuation of extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people". Quotes from Ernest Hemingway's story, "The Old Man and the Sea":

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“Fish,” he said, “I love and respect you very much.” But I will kill you before the evening comes.
“Let’s hope I succeed,” he thought. A small bird approached the boat from the north. She flew low over the water. The old man saw that she was very tired.
The bird sat down on the stern to rest. Then she circled around the old man’s head and sat down on the line, where she felt more comfortable. - How old are you? - the old man asked her. - This is probably your first trip?
The bird looked back at him. She was too tired to check whether the twine was strong enough, and only swayed, hugging it with her delicate paws.
“Don’t be afraid, the rope is tight,” the old man assured her. - Even too strong. You shouldn't be so tired on a windless night. Oh, the birds have gone wrong today!
“But the hawks,” he thought, “are going out to sea to meet you.” But he didn’t say this to the bird, and it wouldn’t have understood him anyway. Never mind, she will soon find out everything about the hawks.
“Take a good rest, little bird,” he said. - And then fly to the shore and fight, as every person, bird or fish fights. The conversation with the bird cheered him up, otherwise his back had become completely stiff during the night, and now he was in real pain. “Stay with me if you want, bird,” he said. “It’s a pity that I can’t set a sail and bring you to land, although a light wind is picking up now.” But I have a friend here whom I cannot leave. At that moment the fish suddenly rushed and knocked the old man onto his bow; she would have pulled him overboard if he had not put his hands on it and let go of the line.
When the string twitched, the bird took off, and the old man did not even notice how it disappeared. He felt the line with his right hand and saw that blood was flowing from his hand. “That’s right, the fish got hurt too,” he said out loud and pulled the line, checking to see if he could turn the fish in the other direction. Having pulled the line as far as it would go, he again froze in his previous position.
- Are you feeling bad, fish? - he asked. - God knows, it’s not easier for me myself. He looked around for the bird because he wanted to talk to someone. But the bird was nowhere to be found.
“You didn’t stay with me long,” the old man thought. - But where you flew, the wind is much stronger, and it will blow all the way to land. How did I let the fish hurt me with one quick jerk? That's right, I've gone completely stupid. Or maybe he just stared at the bird and thought only about it? Now I will think about business and eat tuna to gain strength.” “It’s a pity that the boy is not with me and that I don’t have salt,” he said out loud.

When the sun set, the old man, to cheer himself up, began to remember how once in a tavern in Casablanca he competed in strength with a powerful black man from Cienfuegos, the strongest man in the port. They sat for a whole day opposite each other, resting their elbows on the line drawn in chalk on the table, without bending their arms and tightly clasping their palms. Each of them tried to bend the other's hand to the table. There were bets all around, people came in and out of the room, dimly lit by kerosene lamps, and he did not take his eyes off the Negro's arm and elbow and his face. After the first eight hours had passed, the judges began changing every four hours to get some sleep. Blood oozed from under the nails of both opponents, and they all looked into each other’s eyes, and at each other’s hand, and at the elbow. People betting came in and out of the room; they sat on high chairs near the walls and waited to see how it would end. The wooden walls were painted a bright blue, and the lamps cast shadows on them. The black man's shadow was huge and moved on the wall when the wind shook the lamps.
The advantage passed from one to another all night long; they gave the black man rum and lit his cigarettes. After drinking rum, the black man made a desperate effort, and once he managed to bend the hand of the old man - who was not an old man at that time, but was called Santiago El Campeon - by almost three inches. But the old man straightened his hand again. After that, he no longer doubted that he would defeat the black man, who was a good guy and a great strongman. And at dawn, when people began to demand that the judge declare a draw, and he just shrugged his shoulders, the old man suddenly strained his strength and began to bend the black man’s hand lower and lower until it lay on the table. The fight began on Sunday morning and ended on Monday morning. Many of the bettors demanded a draw because it was time for them to go to work at the port, where they loaded coal for the Havana Coal Company or bags of sugar. If not for this, everyone would have wanted to see the competition through to the end. But the old man won, and won before the loaders had to go to work.
For a long time afterwards he was called the Champion, and in the spring he gave the black man his revenge. However, the stakes were no longer so high, and he easily won the second time, because the Negro from Cienfuegos’s faith in his own strength was broken in the first match. Then Santiago participated in several more competitions, but soon gave up this business. He realized that if he really wanted to, he would defeat any opponent, and decided that such fights were harmful to his right hand, which he needed for fishing. Several times he tried to compete with his left hand. But his left hand always failed him, did not want to obey him, and he did not trust it.
“The sun will bake it well now,” he thought. “She won’t dare to get numb anymore to spite me, unless it’s very cold at night.” I would like to know what this night promises me.”
A plane flying to Miami passed overhead, and the old man saw how the shadow of the plane scared off and lifted a school of flying fish into the air. “Since there are so many flying fish here, there must be a mackerel somewhere nearby,” he said and pressed his back harder into the forest, checking whether it was possible to drag the fish at least a little closer. But he soon realized that this was impossible, because the twine began to tremble again like a string, threatening to burst, and water drops were jumping on it. The boat slowly floated forward, and he followed the plane with his eyes until it disappeared.
===========================

Please, what does a person need power for if he is not able to really use it, as this or that athlete or gangster would say. Please laugh at this man, but what does he care about your laughter...
Perhaps that's enough quotes. Let's return to our analysis.

================================================

PART FOUR. A little bit about everything. I don’t know how justified such a long quotation is, however, what I want to note about our poem. Are we right about the “trap” that caught your humble servant? We will touch on this in more detail in the rhythmic analysis, which, at first, was not planned, but if the quotes did not convince the reader about the difference between “little people” and their capabilities, then, personally, our The opinion is clear - these are the people who are capable of great deeds. Somewhere “Akakievichs” are capable, I repeat. However, the problem of the “Akakievichs” is their downtroddenness and inability to stand up for themselves. And who knows what feelings they experience. All the rest... - and by no means “Akakievichs”, rather those who laugh at “them”, for this, excuse me, is the same human weakness - to laugh at “their kind” - why? - because a person cannot stand up for himself, is weak, frail and, somewhere, really looks comical? And how far have you gone from “them”? Isn’t this renegadery - the same “little innocence” that seems big against the background of the “Akakievichs”. And please, who did Robert Rozhdestvensky write his poem about? Is it really about “Private Ryan”? However, this is rather an echo of a system capable of such supposed manifestation of justice. If the reader doesn’t know, watch this film. I'm sure it will touch many women. No, our hero is a man full of strength, capable of working both in the field and in the factory, however, here he is - in simple service, where he does not need to show his physical endurance. And at the same time, why doesn’t he try to free his mental energy - then what is everything for? A person devoid of ambition is a “little man”... I would like to believe Robert Rozhdestvensky, however, there are simply very, very few such people. We are gradually freeing ourselves from the “trap”. Such people - and there are more of them than you can imagine - have nothing to do with portfolios. I remembered the teacher from the movie “We’ll Live Until Monday.” Where will you find such teachers? What was this briefcase for? And service... From my light hand:

===
Once upon a time there was a small man.
His job was small.
He received a small salary...
===

All. What, how, why, where - you won’t understand and won’t express it. And is it necessary? Please, here is the impersonal Synechdoche of the image of one “little man” and the “liberator people.” But who is this “little man” - Akaki Akakievich, Beethoven, Santiago? - All. But not Robert Rozhdestvensky. He, like a real idealist, paints a picture of “his little man” and clothes the whole people with “him.” In this case, another can take “another little person” and also compare “him” with the whole people - and who, in the end, will be right is unknown. Or, obviously, everyone.
I don’t know, perhaps Robert Rozhdestvensky is right (the answers to the poems are not in our minds) from his point of view and meaning, in particular. Or, more correctly, from the point of view of meaning, to a greater extent. But what about Rhythmics? This is definitely worth talking about. So,

================================================

PART FIVE. Rhythmic analysis. I quote the poem without taking into account the author’s breakdown - highlighting capital letters and numbering lines and parts:

===========================
I

4. And a very small briefcase.

5. He received a small salary...
6. And one day - a beautiful morning -
7. Knocked on his window
8. It seemed like a small war...

11. They gave me a small helmet
12. And a small - in size - overcoat.

13. ...And when he fell - ugly, wrong,
14. In an attacking cry, turning his mouth out,
15. Then there was not enough marble in the whole earth,
16. To knock a guy out in full force!
===========================

In the author's breakdown, the first part is presented in the form of one stanza and subsequent free division of lines. The second part is also free in this sense. But as you can see, the poem, as a whole, has a clear structure of square stanzas. Which, in the first part, are presented in the form of the same type of stanzas of a clause structure: three More and one Less - BBBm - endings for large lines are different in each stanza, for smaller ones - only masculine: 1. DDPm 2. PZHZhm 3. DPPm; D – dactylic ending, P – peonic, F – feminine, m – masculine. Almost all large endings, except for two lines in the second stanza - MORNING and WINDOW - are derivatives of the word “small”. Actually, this word “kills” the entire Rhythm of the first part of the verse. And at the same time, he holds a poem that cannot be called prose. The first part is either a prose poem or free verse. Both are based on the refrain parallelism of Anacruza. That’s why I didn’t want to talk about Rhythmik. But since we started, the rhythm of the first part, being in the territory of Dolnik - as Gasparov would say, Tridolnik, is a little crumpled and a little clumsy. The presented Dimensions of it (for pronounced ones I denote the first full-impact forms, for general ones I show):

1) Ferecrateus (HD3) - 11 - 1о1оо1...
2) Amphibrachium (Am3) - 4 - o1oo1oo1...
3) Anapest (An3) - 8, 9, 10 - oo1oo1oo1...
4) Glyconea (ХД4_а2) - 3, 5, 6, 7 - 1о1оо1о1...
5) Pkbs (HD4_a3) - 1 - 1о1о1оо1...
6) Trochee (DL X4) - 2 - 1о1оо11...
7) Amphibrachium (Am4=YAА5_a4) - 12 - o1oo0oo1oo1... = o1o0o0o1oo1...

Its effect, coupled with the constant Refrain of one word (in different modes), to put it mildly, causes nothing but rejection. As I already said - a caricature of a verse. The word “small”, as you understand, has a diminutive connotation. Against the backdrop of serious content, we get a comic plot. And here, at the very end of the first part - expansion and... a trap. The twelfth line is not the fourth - “And a very small briefcase” - where you remove the word “very” and you get “the laughter of Rhythm”: “and a small briefcase”, but the twelfth line could well afford to do without the compound word “in size” - “and a small overcoat,” a penton wind is not a peon wind. Please compare two elements of Rhythmics without the words already mentioned in two cases:

1. The Earth is mercilessly small
2. Once upon a time there was a small man.
3. His service was small.
4. And a small briefcase.

9. They gave him a small machine gun.
10. They gave him small boots.
11. They gave me a small helmet
12. And a small overcoat.

There is definitely a difference. However, the author did not go for it. Why? Very interesting. From the point of view of prose syntax, I have a feeling that nothing indicates a “trap”, because a small OVERCOAT IN SIZE speaks of a person’s small physique. Whereas for some reason something else came to mind, completely opposite [what lies between the lines]. - small [not] ACCORDING to [his large] SIZE OVERCOAT. This logically corresponds to a small helmet (not for his big head), small boots (not for his big legs) and, especially a small machine gun, this comical cartoon becomes understandable - when a person is big, so big that really, the machine gun in his hands is like toy. But can we trust these [between the lines]? Since [they] come from Rhythmics, the pause after the first word is significant. Yes, with a missed blow - o1000^001o - so [they] arrived. “Between the lines,” I mean. And it went silent, as if it had switched. Or, your humble servant from him. I especially don’t like logic in poetry (especially lopsided ones). But here, it's hard to argue. Moreover, the verse is civil and some logic should be present in it. The same first line, I remember. - And again [between the lines]... - “On Earth is mercilessly small” [for kindness]...

Another thing is that making Taktovik out of this poem is a piece of cake. Why Robert Rozhdestvensky didn’t do this remains a mystery. Elementary:

===

Once upon a time there was a small man
===

Dolnikovy Rhythm.

===
On Earth mercilessly small
Once upon a time there lived a small man
===

Tactical Rhythm. Or

===
On Earth small and ruthless
Once upon a time there was a small man
===

Tacto-divonic Rhythm. Roughly speaking, no, in order to get a poem with a clearly expressed Rhythm, the author issued it - the clerk. Like some of the revelations of Ecclesiastes:

===========================
1 The words of Ecclesiastes, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
2 Vanity of vanities, said Ecclesiastes, vanity of vanities, all is vanity!
===========================

But we won't believe it. Let's move on to the second part. Here. This is already Rhythm. Dynamic. You can feel it. Also, or better to say in general, we do not pay attention to the breakdown of the author, we immediately speak for Sizes, which are to some extent standard and at the same time two of them are rare - if we proceed from the two common ones that meet each other from time to time (An4 and Sappho). But in order:

1) Anapest (An4/Dimeter) - 13 - оо1оо1/оо1оо1оо
2) HD5_b2 (Anapest Dimeter) - 14 - 1о1оо1о/1оо1
3) Sappho (ХД5_а3) - 15 1о1о1/оо1о1оо
4) Faleh (ХД5_а2) - 16 - 1о1оо1о/1о1

The rhyme scheme is a cross. Alternance - d/m. True, Rhythmant - ROT-GROWTH - is openly dissonant. In the parlance of the beats, the second part is the Four-Beat Dimetral Tacto-Dolnik. That's all. A. No. If you try to read this verse out loud, then, of course, elements of tactfulness, if not present, can be depicted. But this is a declamatory Rhythm. We don't understand it.

================================================

PART SIX. Summarizing. It's difficult to judge. But let's try. If the main character of this poem is similar to “Dubinushka” from “Belorussky Station”, if he is able to combine Akaki Akakievich, Santiago and Beethoven in himself, then this poem is certainly good. If not, and the main character of the poem is some downtrodden intellectual, or even worse, a “sticky intellectual” (prototypes of those who laugh at the “Akakievichs”, but always fuss in front of those in power - for whom a stab in the back, sneakily, is not even discussed.. But) whom Robert Rozhdestvensky is trying to cheer up in this way (and how!), forget it - it’s more likely that Everest and Chomolungma will give birth to Everjo Mungloresto than we will expect valor from such “intellectuals”. “A healthy mind in a healthy body”, “take care of your honor from a young age”, “I’m going to you” - such people have neither one nor the other nor the third. And if the former still have a chance to act, then the latter have too much intelligence to understand what, how and why in our lives. Therefore, the poem is neither a plus nor a minus. But for the trap of “size”, from me personally - respect and respect. The author or the verse, it doesn’t matter.

================================================

PART SEVEN. Application. One more - final - extracurricular reading. With a few comments. In search of "little people". And how I forgot about him. According to some intelligence reports, this is the highest form of heroism. Something like this. And where will you find such people? Please. Mor Yokai. Sons of a man with a heart of stone. The last segment of one and three subsequent chapters:

===========================
The gendarme did not say a word. I just took off my helmet for a minute while the woman unwrapped the package.
Mrs. Baradlai suppressed her heart's excitement with an effort of will. The time has not yet come to give free rein to your feelings!
With a firm, decisive gait she walked up to the chest of drawers, opened the drawer and, taking out something wrapped in paper, handed it to the gendarme. It was a hundred gold pieces.
“Thank you,” she said.
In response, the gendarme muttered some words about God (what did he care about God!), saluted again and left the chambers.
Now it was possible to give free rein to grief!

IN FRONT OF A MAN WITH A HEART OF STONE

Yes, now you can.
You can, distraught with grief, a mother who has lost her head, run with her son’s bloody clothes through the enfilade of the hall, run to the portrait of her husband, a man with a heart of stone, and there collapse on the floor. Showing him these clothes with a sob!
- Look!.. Look!.. Look!..
Now you can cover these expensive clothes with kisses and tears.
“After all, he was my most beloved son!”
You can cry out to the portrait in a frenzy:
- Why did you take it away? After all, it was you who took it from me! Has he ever offended anyone on earth? He was innocent, like a child, like a youth. No one has ever loved me like he does! He was with me while he was a child, and responded to my call as an adult! left his beloved, renounced rank and glory in order to come with me. Who needed him to die? Who needed to break his heart? After all, he was as gentle as a dove, and only smiled softly if someone offended him! Malice never nested in this soul. Did I send him to his death? Not true! I did not doom him to death, even though at our parting I uttered bitter words: “I mourn not those of my sons who are doomed to death, but you, who will remain alive!” But still he shouldn’t have taken such cruel revenge on me! Such a monstrous thought could not have arisen in his soul, it was you who suggested it! It is so similar to the thoughts born in your cruel heart! You decided to cast me down - well, here I am lying here, prostrate! You wanted to trample me underfoot, and you trample me! You are planning to force me to admit that even after death you are free to strike me with your hand - I feel it and writhe in pain. There is no need for me to lie to you, pretending that I have superhuman strength. I have had a bitter lot, I am unhappy, as only a mother can be unhappy burying her beloved son. And you, you are ruthless! You are a father calling on his sons to follow you to the next world! Oh, be merciful to me. I won’t fight you, I will submit, just don’t take the rest! My other son is standing on the edge of the grave. Don’t push your second son there with your menacing hand, don’t call him, don’t take them all away from me one by one. And do not visit me, as you swore at your death hour. Lord knows I only wanted the best. I didn’t know that all this would bring such pain.
The woman now lay unconscious, prostrate in front of the portrait. Nobody bothered her.
But the portrait gave no answer. He still remained silent.

The fateful fate has come true. An inevitable fate in which nothing could be changed. Now Eden couldn’t announce publicly:
– Eugen Baradlai is me, not the other one!
Such a gesture would not only be senseless and useless, but also cruel to the family for which he had now become the only support. All that remained was to bow in sorrow and reverence before the bright memory of the brother who sacrificed himself.
“Among us, he alone turned out to be a true hero!”
True words. After all, ambition motivates a person to die for a cause that one worships and believes in. And to die for a cause that you worship, but in which you do not believe, is a sacrifice that exceeds the strength of an ordinary person. Eden and Richard were simply glorious fighters, but Enyo became the real hero.

Has this fatal, bloody mistake ever been explained?
Quite possible. Both sides had so many secrets, so many circumstances of this tragedy had to be carefully hidden, that neither one nor the other never risked making anything public. And by the time this sacred deception could be revealed, the condemning voice of the whole world would have branded such a sad fact with such unanimity that the authorities preferred to consign everything connected with this matter into oblivion. In addition, for the actions of one person, another paid with his life. The debt was paid.
Eden was now “bene lateb - securely covered!
In an instant, the roles changed: Yenya got a heroic end, Eden’s lot became peaceful work, a contemplative, silent life and hope for better times.
But there was still Richard!

PRISON TELEGRAPH

But didn’t Enyo send a message to Richard?
Of course yes. After all, he was a prisoner in the same dungeon as Richard.
The prison had a reliable, non-stop working telegraph. He served all the cells, it was impossible to interfere with him, no force could take him away from the prisoners.
The walls served as such a telegraph. There is no wall so thick that you cannot hear tapping.
When the wall in the next cell is knocked once, this means the letter “A”, two knocks quickly following each other - “B”, three short knocks - “C” and so on. The entire alphabet was transmitted in a similar way. (May the patient reader forgive me for bothering him with the ABCs - this great school of life.)
It was unthinkable to interfere with this kind of communication; it went around the entire building. Everyone understood the knocking, learned its simple wisdom on the very first day, and the silent conversation was carried on continuously. Any request that arose in one of the wings of the prison went further, was passed from cell to cell and finally reached where it was answered; and the answer, in the same order, made its way back to the questioner.
On the day when Yenya was destined to see the sunset for the last time, only one question was tapped on all the walls of the prison:
- How did the trial end?
- Death sentence.
- To whom?
- Baradlai.
- Which one?
- To the old man.
This cryptogram passed through Richard's camera. He asked again.
The wall repeated again:
- To the old man.
Richard, due to the habit of young people giving each other nicknames, had long called his younger brother “old man.” This affectionate nickname contained tenderness, a joke, and a definition of Yenyo’s serious character.
If everything that the prison walls once told each other about left its mark on them in the form of a bas-relief, archaeologists could read much more on these images than on the walls of Nineveh!

FIRST STRIKE OF THE DAGGER

The triumphant Alfonsina Plankenhorst, with the ecstasy of quenched passion in her eyes, threw the newspaper to Edith with the notice.
- Here you go, read it!
The poor girl, like a lamb caught in front of a tiger, did not try to defend herself: she did not even tremble, she just lowered her head.
The newspaper reported the execution of former government commissioner Eugen Baradlai. It was a completely reliable official message.
Edith didn't know Eugen. The real one. And yet she felt a sharp heartache for him: after all, he was one of the Baradlai brothers.
But she did not dare cry for him. Such tears were considered a crime; there were paragraphs in the law that prohibited expressing even the slightest sympathy for seditious people.
The charming fury, opening her huge sparkling eyes wide, spreading her crimson lips in a smile over a row of beautiful snow-white teeth, hissed right into her relative’s ear:
– I’ve already lost one!
And so she hit the air with her clenched fist, as if she were clutching an invisible dagger, the poisoned tip of which could overtake the victim at any distance.
- This one is already dead. I killed him! - she exclaimed and, without unclenching her fist, hit her chest, her beautiful chest, which could become the container of all the bliss of heaven.
Then she grabbed Edith by the shoulders and, glaring into her eyes with a gaze sparkling with evil triumph, exclaimed:
– The priest’s daughter is widowed, it’s time for the next one! Now this will be your lover!
To top off the cruelty, she presented Edith with a bundle containing a piece of black crepe.
- Here, take it for yourself! This is for your funeral dress.
And Edith thanked her for the gift.
...If Alfonsina only knew who she had brought from the world! The man whom she showered with kisses in the old days, who loved her more than anyone and continued to love her until her death, who forgave her even when the familiar handwriting told him whose hand had prepared his grave.
===========================

Yenyo is a hero, yes. But not a fighter... But how vividly such people characterize others - supposedly intelligent, well-mannered, highly moral and other renegades. Both pronounced and hidden. Where, about the second, we know well from the words of the first. And that is all.

Pees: I only hope that my large volumes of quotation did not disturb anyone’s passionate feelings. If so... Oh... Ladies and gentlemen! Well, you know what to do.

================================================

Another analysis for the Reviewer Magazine - a poem by Valery Gamayunov, “Invasion of the Grays” -

6 546 0

The poem tells about the fate of a seemingly small man. Once upon a time there was a small, nondescript, gray man. Everything about him was small: a small position in a small office, a small salary, a small briefcase and a small apartment, probably not even an apartment, but a room in a workers’ dormitory or in a communal apartment. And this man would have been very small and unnoticeable for the rest of his life if war had not knocked on the door of his house...

The little man in the army was given everything that he was used to having in pre-war life: everything familiar, familiar, small... He had a small machine gun, and his overcoat was small, and the flask with water was small, small tarpaulin boots... And the task before him it seemed to be a small one: to defend a section of the front measuring two meters by two... But when he fulfilled his sacred duty to the Motherland and the people... when he was killed and he fell into the mud, twisting his mouth in a terrible grimace of pain and death... then there was no there is enough marble in the whole world to erect a monument to his grave of the size he deserves...

Glorifying the military feat of a simple Russian soldier is the main and only theme of this courageous poem. This poem does not have a classical form. There are no refined beautiful metaphors in the spirit or, but behind its formal simplicity hides the rough and cruel truth of life. The author showed us life as it is. And thank him very much for this!

Here I would like to touch briefly on a topic that I raised in my articles published on the excellent website “Tree of Poetry”: why a good modern poet will never achieve the same level of public recognition that worthy authors of the past achieved. The fact is that there are much more people living now than before. Moreover, there used to be very few literate and reading people - just a few. These were mainly representatives of the nobility and various intelligentsia. And nowadays everyone is literate.

In any case, I want to believe so. There is no doubt that it is much easier to make a name for yourself among a hundred supportive readers than among a hundred thousand or a million. If in the 19th century you were included in the aristocratic drawing rooms of Moscow and St. Petersburg and if you won your readership there, then consider that you conquered all of Russia. And if you are also a chamberlain of the Court of His Imperial Majesty or, at worst, a cadet chamberlain (like ), then you will make the Sovereign Emperor of All Russia himself your reader, and this provided limitless literary possibilities.

Nowadays, you need to have access to the media: television, the editorial offices of thick magazines and literary newspapers. But this doesn’t always work out... So it turns out that during the “Silver” and “Golden Age” of Russian poetry it was easier for a worthy author to make a literary career than it is now. Moreover, the readers of that time knew a lot about literary sausage scraps, as they say... Not like now.

This is a wonderful poem Robert Rozhdestvensky tells about the fate of a seemingly small man. Once upon a time there was a small, nondescript, gray man. Everything about him was small: a small position in a small office, a small salary, a small briefcase and a small apartment, probably not even an apartment, but a room in a workers’ dormitory or in a communal apartment. And this man would have been very small and unnoticeable for the rest of his life if war had not knocked on the door of his house...

The little man in the army was given everything that he was used to having in pre-war life: everything familiar, familiar, small... He had a small machine gun, and his overcoat was small, and the flask with water was small, small tarpaulin boots... And the task before him it seemed to be a small one: to defend a section of the front measuring two meters by two... But when he fulfilled his sacred duty to the Motherland and the people... when he was killed and he fell into the mud, twisting his mouth in a terrible grimace of pain and death... then there was no there is enough marble in the whole world to erect a monument to his grave of the size he deserves...

Glorifying the military feat of a simple Russian soldier is the main and only theme of this courageous poem. This poem does not have a classical form. It does not contain exquisite beautiful metaphors in the spirit Blok or Gumilyov, but behind its formal simplicity hides the rough and cruel truth of life. The author showed us life as it is. And thank him very much for this!

Here I would like to touch briefly on a topic that I raised in my articles published on the excellent website: why a good modern poet will never achieve the same level of public recognition that worthy authors of the past achieved. The fact is that there are much more people living now than before. Moreover, there used to be very few literate and reading people - just a few. These were mainly representatives of the nobility and various intelligentsia. And nowadays everyone is literate.

In any case, I want to believe so. There is no doubt that it is much easier to make a name for yourself among a hundred supportive readers than among a hundred thousand or a million. If in the 19th century you were included in the aristocratic drawing rooms of Moscow and St. Petersburg and if you won your readership there, then consider that you conquered all of Russia. And if you are also a chamberlain of the Court of His Imperial Majesty or, at worst, a cadet chamberlain (like Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin), then you will make the Sovereign Emperor of All Russia himself your reader, and this provided limitless literary possibilities.

Nowadays, you need to have access to the media: television, the editorial offices of thick magazines and literary newspapers. But this doesn’t always work out... So it turns out that during the “Silver” and “Golden Age” of Russian poetry it was easier for a worthy author to make a literary career than it is now. Moreover, the readers of that time knew a lot about literary sausage scraps, as they say... Not like now.

With this article I would like to honor the memory of my closest relatives who participated in the Great Patriotic War. They, too, like the lyrical hero of this poem, were so small... and so big. May the memory of Ivanov Igor Mikhailovich(private engineer battalion); Ivanov Mikhail Nikolaevich(junior sergeant of the engineer battalion); Ivanov Yakov Nikolaevich(Major General of Artillery); Madykin Alexander Ivanovich(captain, deputy assistant commander of the engineering and construction brigade); Madykin Sergei Ivanovich(senior lieutenant of the engineer-construction troops, deputy company commander); Madykin Mikhail Ivanovich(sergeant of automobile troops); Frolov Boris Vasilievich(major military doctor, head of the hospital department in Gorky). May you rest in peace, my dears!

Robert Rozhdestvensky

On the ground

mercilessly small

Once upon a time there was a small man.

His service was small.

And a very small briefcase.

He received a small salary...

And one day -

beautiful morning -

"There are no Russian soldiers?

lost?
went on vacation?
Russia is not at war?

What are you proud of, ghouls?
Why didn't you get caught?
were conscripts transferred to contract soldiers?
Is it “unprofitable” for you to kill people?
Otherwise you would have killed even more?

damn you"

“Russia is not at war?”- yes, Kantor, Russia is at war. The whole country and millions of hearts - from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok. Humanitarian columns and the truth about the bombings and the dead people, which no one in the world will tell except us. He fights with faith and spirit. But this, unfortunately, is not enough - and we have to fight for real. The Russian people are fighting for their historical land - precisely against the Svidomo ghouls who are trying to clear the Donbass of “Russians”. Russia protects Donbass from those who, without a twinge of conscience and in the traditions of Western democracy, send tanks to unarmed people who in April 2014 tried to stop them with their bare hands. Having allowed the pro-American occupiers, who called themselves real Ukrainians, to occupy Kiev, Russia was simply obliged to prevent this from happening in the Donbass, not to allow Bandera’s “Aidar” and “Dnepr” battalions, zigging under swastikas, to march through the streets of Donetsk and Lugansk.

The fact that now Donbass has not been cleared of “Russian terrorists”, people who consider themselves part of the Russian world, is also the merit of guys like this young Buryat with a burnt face. These are what we are proud of. Just like our grandfathers and great-grandfathers, who fought the Nazis on the same lands - near Debaltsevo and Saur-Mogila. Don't you remember this? And the Russians will never forget.

“Are there no Russian soldiers? Conscripts were transferred to contract soldiers”?- yes, there are Russian soldiers there, if you call every citizen who feels his duty to the Motherland a soldier. Volunteers, vacationers, veterans of past wars, perhaps contract soldiers are coming from Russia... But most importantly, those coming are those who are aware of what is happening in Ukraine and make their own choice. Even in the retelling of Novaya Gazeta, which is known for its “democratic” attitude towards all non-American soldiers as occupiers, the Buryat soldier says that he made a choice voluntarily and fought for a just cause. Those who did not want to go could calmly refuse and go home. Compare this with how misunderstanding young men are forced into the Ukrainian army, which is supposedly fighting for their homeland against the “Russian occupiers.” Look at hundreds of examples of such soldiers sent to slaughter in the name of a great European Ukraine. This is where the powerless meat is, this is where the violence against the individual is. Why doesn't it infuriate you as a supporter of democracy and an admirer of the Enlightenment?

The only thing we ghouls regret and are annoyed about is that the Russian army did not officially enter Donbass, without allowing a single bomb to fall on the roofs of peaceful villages. For this we ask forgiveness from the victims and martyrs of Donbass who suffer for all of us. Yes, we would also like everything to be open or clear, like in Crimea. But we understand that this often happens when it is necessary through “I can’t” and when not everything is going according to clock. Russia is forced to react to the hidden aggression of the West in the same indirect way, without directly entering into conflict. The injured Buryat also understands this: “...and if they make the official entry of troops, Europe and NATO will be screwed.” It is not a shame to help people in the fight against evil in all possible ways, it is a shame not to help them at all.

Yes, this is a terrible and extremely complex war - it is both civil and domestic. Civil - because essentially the representatives of one people, the Russians, are fighting. Patriotic - because we are essentially fighting for our land against an external enemy, European fascism, which has made part of the Russian people its weapon. It’s a shame and scary to kill those who are your brother and friend by blood and roots, with whom you may have recently sung songs at the table. But this happens: Cain also rebelled against Abel. However, if we allow evil in the person of our brother to win, then we ourselves will become the same, sweet villains who bomb city blocks, being sure that there are only “terrorists” there.

And then - you can fight in different ways. Listen to a Russian Buryat as he grieves that he had to fight and kill: “I, of course, am not proud of what I did. What he destroyed, he killed. This, of course, is nothing to be proud of. But, on the other hand, I take comfort in the fact that this is all for the sake of peace, the peaceful citizens you look at - children, old people, women, men. I'm not proud of this, of course. Whatever he shot, he hit...” And compare them with the bravura reports of the so-called “ukropov” about the destruction of “Russian terrorists”, how they gave the old people and children the heat, listen to how the father of one of the airport “cyborgs” complained about how he it was scary when his son was captured by the militia, but he didn’t say a word about those whom his son bombed from that airport. And the Buryat himself in this interview tells how captured Ukrainians confessed to him that they killed civilians in Donbass: “I say: “Did you have anyone who killed civilians?” “There were,” he says. “Did you,” I say, “kill?” “Yes,” he says. [...] He killed innocent people. Peaceful citizens. Children were killed. How this bastard sits, shaking all over, praying that he won’t be killed. He begins to ask for forgiveness. God be your judge." Buryat says, just a boy: God is your judge, murderer of peaceful people, I do what I have to do - I save them.

And what is characteristic is that all this is understandable to a modest Buryat youth, who probably cannot boast of great knowledge, but it is completely incomprehensible to the outstanding, as many in narrow circles believe, writer and philosopher Cantor. It was not Kantor who burned in the tank and left the skin of his face near Debaltsevo, but this Buryat guy - who seems to be supposed to curse, denounce, and be indignant. But no, he understands everything, explains to the Novaya Gazeta journalist why and how, maybe he tells her everything too openly and naively, not realizing that they will try to use him. There is no anger or hatred in him at all - neither towards those who trained and sent him to Donbass, nor towards those who knocked out his tank. The cantor should listen to these essentially Christian words of a Buddhist, peer into the soul of this guy, as Robert Rozhdestvensky peered at the little soldier in a small helmet and overcoat. Maybe then the moralist known in narrow circles would have become a popularly beloved artist.

On Earth mercilessly small
Once upon a time there was a small man.
His service was small.
And a very small briefcase.

He received a small salary...
And one day - a beautiful morning -
knocked on his window
It seemed like a small war...

They gave him a small machine gun.
They gave him small boots.
They gave me a small helmet
and a small - in size - overcoat...

And when he fell, it was ugly, wrong,
turning his mouth out in an attacking cry,
then there was not enough marble in the whole earth,
to knock a guy out in full force!

R. Rozhdestvensky, 1967-1970

Now we are broadcasting a program “PROPERTY OF THE REPUBLIC” about songs based on poems by Robert Rozhdestvensky. Alexander Mikhailov recalled the poem.

The kid reads a poem by Robert Rozhdestvensky

Robert Rozhdestvensky - On Earth is mercilessly small

01. “Gravity of the Earth” - Lev Leshchenko
02. “Boat” - Victoria Daineko
03. “Love has come” - Valeria
04. “Song of the Gypsy” - Vladimir Presnyakov
05. “Echo of Love” - Zara and Alexander Marshall
06. “From dawn to dawn” - Tatyana Bulanova
07. “My years are my wealth” - Alexander Mikhailov
08. “Song about a distant homeland” - Quatro
09. “Call me, call me!” - group "Factory"
" 10. “Nocturne” - Tamara Gverdtsiteli and Dmitry Dyuzhev
11. “Thank you” - Renat Ibragimov