Rolland Jean Christophe analysis. Analysis of one of R. Rolland's novels (“Jean-Christophe”)

In 1912 Romain Rolland ends the novel in 10 volumes: Jean-Christophe / Jean-Christophe.

“Jean-Christophe was conceived from the very beginning as a novel about the “new Beethoven”; in his hero, Rolland embodied some of the traits of his beloved composer, whose music was dear to him for its heroic, life-affirming spirit. Shortly before the release of the first part of “Jean-Christophe,” Rolland’s short book “The Life of Beethoven” appeared and excited many readers. This was not just a biography. Here Rolland, in a concise and original form, expresses his own views on art and the duty of the artist. He quotes the words of the great composer that he would like to work “for the sake of suffering humanity,” for the sake of “the humanity of the future.” He shares Beethoven's opinion: "Music should strike fire from the human soul."

Reading Rolland’s “Life of Beethoven,” especially its first pages, we clearly see the motives that later unfolded in “Jean-Christophe.”

Rolland talks about harsh childhood Beethoven. His father was a singer, and his mother was a servant before her marriage; the family lived poorly.

“The father decided to capitalize on his son’s musical abilities and showed it to the public small miracle. From the age of four, he kept the boy at the harpsichord for hours or locked him with the violin, forcing him to play until exhaustion... It got to the point that Beethoven had to be almost forced to learn music. His adolescence was overshadowed by worries about bread, the need to earn food early... At the age of seventeen he had already become the head of the family, and he was charged with raising two brothers; he had to take on the humiliating hassle of assigning a pension to his father, a drunkard who was unable to support his family: the pension was given to his son, otherwise the father would have drunk it all away. These sorrows left a deep mark on the young man’s soul.”

The story of Jean-Christophe's childhood and youth, as told by Romain Rolland, is not just the author's fiction: it is the real facts of the biography of the greatest of German composers. And it is not for nothing that the majestic Rhine and its picturesque green banks become the poetic backdrop of the action - after all, here, on the banks of the Rhine, Beethoven spent the first twenty years of his life.

In the first books of Jean-Christophe the contact with the Life of Beethoven is especially obvious; Subsequently, the fate of Rollan's hero becomes isolated from the real source and develops in its own way. But in the character, in the spiritual appearance of Jean-Christophe, not only in his youth, but also in his mature years, much brings him closer to Beethoven. Not only a passionate passion for art, but also an indomitable, independent character, a stubborn reluctance to bow to those in power. And at the same time - the ability to steadfastly endure need and grief, the ability to preserve the will to creativity and love for people in the most difficult conditions. Jean-Christophe's music, like Beethoven's, is imbued with vital energy and the joy of being."

Romain Rolland(1866-1944) – classic of French literature. Winner of the Nobel Prize in 1915. The writer is similar in type to Hugo, an emotional optimist, a romantic. Rolland sings of heroes, strong in spirit, creatively, giving their bright talent to people. He believes that the ideal is achievable, at least one must strive for it, someday the majority of people on earth will become happy and spiritually developed (this is the highest goal).

“The world is perishing from suffocation in its calculating and vile egoism. The world is suffocating. Let's open the windows. Let's let some free air in. Let us breathe the breath of heroes." Rolland writes brightly, romantically, with inspiration, because his goal is to inspire the reader to sacrificial service to humanity. Above is a quote from Rolland’s first significant book, “The Life of Beethoven,” and he also wrote biographies of many outstanding creators: “The Life of Michelangelo,” “The Life of Tolstoy.” All these are vivid examples of heroes, fighters fighting against human misunderstanding, with their own shortcomings and ailments. Beethoven, the greatest composer, was deaf for most of his life and bravely overcame his illness.

Rolland’s main work of the period under study, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize, is a huge 10-volume novel-flow (this genre) “ Jean-Christoff"(1912). This is a detailed story of the life of one person, mainly the story of his spiritual life - from the moment of birth to death. Jean-Christoff is a brilliant composer, invented by Rolland, but Rolland took many aspects of his biography, many of his character traits from Beethoven. Jean-Christoff, in addition to talent, is endowed with a sublime pure soul, ardent open feelings, intolerance for evil and injustice - it is impossible not to love him. His relationships with women (he was very amorous), with the world, nature, God, and the search for the meaning of life are described very interestingly. The main question of the novel is: what is the meaning and purpose of art. The answer is traditional within the framework of the classical worldview: to serve the people and spiritually enrich them.

23.Kipling's work

KIPLING Joseph Rediard - English novelist and poet. R. in Bombay. From the age of 17 - employee of the Indian Military and Civil Newspaper; The essays, stories and poems published in it made up K.'s first books. Subsequently, he became a war correspondent (one of his last books was dedicated to the activities of the Irish Guard during the imperialist war). Autobiographical features are found in the novel “The Light Has Gone Out.” Received the Nobel Prize in 1907.

K.'s special position in English literature is marked not only by high distinctions - he is a doctor honoris causa of nine universities - not only by fees, 25 times higher than usual (a shilling per word in 1900, i.e. about 3 thousand rubles. per printed sheet), but also by the presence of four lifetime collected works, an extraordinary fact for England, which knows almost no lifetime collected works.

The ideology expressed by K.’s creativity is the ideology of the associates of British imperialism, who in fact created “Greater Britain” (an empire around the world). Expansion populates the most remote geographical locations with young men going to the colonies to make a career for themselves. They dream of the fate of the clerk Clive, who conquered India, settle down, get married, have children. Throughout the “Seven Seas” (K.’s book of poems), the problem of the “native born” is growing. These people form a sort of “irregular legion”; brotherhood and friendly support from the conquistadors bind them together. They bear the “white man’s burden” (a slogan coined by Kipling).

The colony (especially India, the birthplace of K. himself) for the “native-born” is not the exoticism of a traditional imperialist novel, but the business reality of everyday work. A representative of colonial naturalism, K. is the first in English literature to perceive India as a fact of everyday life.

The psychology of the mediocre conqueror is characterized by efficiency, self-confidence, sentimental nostalgia (homesickness), foreignness (jingoism). K. is the spokesman for the thoughts and feelings of a successful young official (the favorite hero of any average English novel), an agent of colonialism who carries it out “conscientiously.” In this environment, K.'s characters are household names, and many lines of his poems have become proverbs.

K.'s ideological baggage is imperialist, die-hard conservatism, racial pride, Anglo-Saxon chosenness. K.'s political position is that the fate of the Empire is above all; anyone who encroaches on its safety is criminal. Hence the hatred of possible encroachers on India - to Tsarist Russia(the novel “Kim”, “World with the Bear”, the story “The Man Who Was” and many others); hence the rabid German-eating during and after the World War. The existing system of competition, the survival of the strong, is correct (“Imperial Order”), and although some defects are evident in it, for example. bureaucracy (a number of early Indian stories), is not subject to sudden changes either to the right ("Old Exodus") or to the left. Reforms are acceptable, but the basis is the “freedom” achieved by our ancestors for everyone, which naturally applies only to whites. Or rather, there are different laws for whites and for coloreds. “The West is the West, the East is the East, and they cannot come together” (“The Ballad of the West and the East”) - a verse that has become a proverb. That's the burden white man to subjugate the East by persuasion or force to the great English civilization. The greatness of the task lies in the fact that its performers are nameless, and their path is difficult. But only these people, operating in places where “neither divine nor human law has power north of 53° latitude” (“The Tale of the Three Catcatchers,” a proverbial verse), are the only ones that are valuable, because they builders and workers of life (“Mary Gloucester”, “Tomlinson”, etc.) These are the prerequisites for K.’s literary activity. It is an expression of the colonial-aggressive predatory work of English imperialism, sometimes turns into a direct set of business instructions, instructions - how to do something or other (for example, the instruction in the “soldier’s song” “Robbery”). Three rows of facts are characteristic here: 1. Absolute protocol accuracy of the time and place of action: data that precisely establishes the route of the horse thief in “The Ballad of the West and the East”, the springboard for military operations in “The Ballad of Bo-Da-Ton”; This is even sharper, naturally, in prose. The author is present in the story as an observer of events or a person listening to a report about them. The story therefore resembles a diary entry. 2. Novels end with a moral; the short story is a conclusion that reveals the (colloquial) association by virtue of which it is told (this is how the whole book “At the stern of the steamship pipe” is structured). So. arr. the short story erases its edges and approaches an essay. It is characteristic that such a wonderful story as “The City of a Terrible Night” was first published in a book of travel essays. No less significant is the presence of a series of books of stories from English history, creatively completed by “The School History of England” (with Fletcher, 1911), a children's history textbook. 3. In order to finally confirm the authenticity of the presented material, K. cycles the short stories not only around some heroes, but also in Balzac style, with a random roll call: the episodic person of one short story is the hero of another. This technique becomes especially poignant when the character acts in both prose and verse (the narrator of “The Ballad of the Royal Joke,” the merchant Mahbub-Ali, is one of Kim’s teachers, and a number of other examples).

English criticism sees the literary tradition of K. in Bret Harte (cm.) But Hart records and explains the world, explores ch. arr. the spiritual content of the hero is, moreover, purely naturalistic and thereby objectivistic, while K.’s creativity is directly political-utilitarian; caring about protocol timing, Kipling neglects objective naturalism, but strives for applied and propaganda naturalism. Purely psychological works (the novel “The Light Has Gone Out”, a number of short stories) are the least successful for K. In this parallel, the only significant thing is that both authors went through the school of newspaper essays (cm.). Hence K.’s vigilance for purely professional details and the extraordinary versatility of his subjects, surprising many researchers.

The applied naturalism of K.'s prose found a very unique expression in his world-famous “animal” cycles, especially in the two “Jungle Books,” which were enthusiastically received by all critics. The cycle about Mowgli can be considered the founder of a new genre of stories about animals: C. J. D. Roberts and E. T. Seton, both senior contemporaries of K., came out with their fiction books about animals only after K. The second “animal” cycle, “ This is how fairy tales are”, is already a fairy tale development of established genres, a complex crossing of the traditions of a children's fairy tale with its natural magic, cognitive

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Introduction

The stable tradition of the “river novel” - according to the name common in France - i.e. the tradition of the multi-volume novel is one of the obvious confirmations of the connection between 20th century literature and realism and romanticism of the 19th century century.

Romain Rolland (1866-1944) is a writer who responded with his creativity to the most fundamental problems of the 20th century. He was a passionate fighter against fascism and war.

The ideological evolution of R. Rolland is very complex, creative activity which spans almost fifty years.

Romain Rolland was born in the city of Clamcy (Burgundy). His father was a notary. Since 1881, the family began to live in Paris, where, after graduating from the Lyceum, Rolland entered the Normal School, a higher educational institution that trains teachers.

The outstanding abilities of the young Rolland were especially revealed in his interest in music and literature. Rolland's love for art was also reflected in the anxiety with which he regarded its decline in the West, in his desire to find means of improving art.

In 1889, Rolland brilliantly completed his course at the Normal School and went to Rome, where he continued to study art. In 1891 he returned to Paris, and four years later he defended his dissertation on the history of European opera. In subsequent years, along with teaching at the Ecole Normale and the Sorbonne, Rolland devoted more and more time to creativity. He wrote many articles about music and worked on his first dramas.

1. The genre of “heroic biography”

Rolland could not be content with realism “in the spirit of Flaubert,” denial, and dispassionate description. A society that is dying from selfishness and lack of spirituality can only be changed by “great souls”, Heroes, and their moral example. In search of such samples, Rolland went beyond the national artistic tradition. As a student, Rolland wrote a letter to Tolstoy as a “guiding star,” asking him to answer painful questions about how to live, what art should be. Worldwide famous writer answered in October 1887 to a French student on 38 pages. Rolland was especially impressed by Tolstoy's condemnation of bourgeois art for its separation from the people, from life.

Much later, Rolland wrote: “I will never forget the fatherly help provided to the restless young man that I was then.” L. Tolstoy became his teacher for a long time. At the beginning of the century, he would write “The Life of Tolstoy,” along with other “heroic biographies” (“The Life of Beethoven,” “The Life of Michelangelo”).

In French history, Rolland was attracted to the pre-bourgeois period, attracted to the “heroic epic of France,” from Charlemagne to the revolution of 1789. Rolland began as a playwright, and in the 90s he wrote play after play. The theater answered Rolland's need for a platform, for effective art, capable of having a direct and immediate impact on consciousness. The aesthetics of the early Rolland was formed in dramatic practice, and his call for the creation of “new art for a new society” arose (in the preface to the book “People's Theater”, 1903).

The writer continues to search for positive, spiritually strong heroes, whose example could inspire his contemporaries, among the great people of different eras. This is how the idea of ​​epic biographies of great people - “Heroic Lives” - was born. Rolland creates “The Life of Beethoven” (1903), “The Life of Michelangelo” (1906), “The Life of Tolstoy” (1911).

Rolland gave the first place in the cycle to his favorite composer - “the powerful and pure-hearted Beethoven.” A brilliant connoisseur of music and a professional historian, Rolland created a number of outstanding works on musicians of the past and present (“Musicians of the Past,” 1908, “Musicians of Our Day,” 1908, “Handel,” 1910, etc.). But only Beethoven became the writer’s life partner. To study creative biography Rolland turned to Beethoven constantly. As a result, he created a six-volume work on Beethoven - “Great Creative Epochs”, the first volume of which was published in 1927, and the last was completed during the Second World War.

Rolland's book "The Life of Beethoven", published in 1903, was a great success. The fair idea of ​​this book, that Beethoven’s brilliant music was born of revolution, was developed by the author in subsequent works on the composer with greater persistence, although they are not without contradictions.

The biography of Michelangelo pays a certain tribute to the pessimistic sentiments of the 900s, although Rolland sought to polemicize with them. Michelangelo's creative path is shown as an endless chain of suffering. But at the same time, Michelangelo is depicted as a man of unbending will and indestructible energy.

In “The Life of Tolstoy,” Rolland noted the enormous importance of the work of the great Russian writer for the whole world and for himself personally. He was attracted to Tolstoy by his critical attitude to reality, bourgeois art, effective humanism, love for ordinary people and for life. The book was created shortly after the death of L. Tolstoy. Rolland said about this work: “I instinctively discarded everything in it that separated us, and laid only respect and love on his grave.” But, undoubtedly, the lack of a critical attitude towards Tolstoy’s philosophy in the book is explained by the fact that in those years much of it was close to Rolland. This was reflected in the last books of one of best works Rolland - the novel "Jean-Christophe".

2. The story that takes place before our eyes in the novel “Jean-Christophe”

The appearance of the “river novel” in Rolland’s work was predetermined, since the “heroic epic” meant for him not just a genre, but a way of thinking and a way of life. Following the “epic cycle” of dramas about the revolution - the ten-volume “Jean-Christophe” (“Dawn” (1904), “Morning” (1904), “Adolescence” (1905), “Revolt” (1906), “Fair in the Square” (1908), “Antoinette” (1908), “In the House” (1909), “Girlfriend” (1910), “The Burning Bush” (1911), “The Coming Day” (1912)).

When starting to create his “river,” Rolland defined its fundamental features as follows: “The hero is Beethoven in today's world.<…>The world that you see from the hero’s heart, as from a central point.” The appearance of such a “central point” meant turning to a new source of the epic - to the Personality. The hero of the novel finally broke with the status of a “shopkeeper” and acquired the status of Beethoven, a Genius endowed with maximum creative potential.

Even the name of the hero of the novel - Jean-Christophe Craft - is symbolic; it indicates these possibilities, this function of the guarantor of Rolland's optimism, his bets on the future (“what is important is not what was, but what will be”). “Kraft” - “strength”, “force of nature” (German), Jean - John the Baptist, who baptized Christ. Christophe - St. Christopher carrying Christ across the river. The special meaning and purpose of the hero is outlined by Kraft's origin, his birth in the border region of Germany, and then his move to Paris. Jean-Christophe is the realization of Rolland's favorite idea about universal brotherhood, the unity of humanity.

Another feature of Rolland’s “river” is formulated in “Dialogue of the Author with His Shadow” (preface to the first edition of “Fair on the Square”, 1908). The shadow is, naturally, a hero close to the author, but the author is ready to follow his own shadow along the path to the truth, to the future. The author discovers and establishes the most essential and intimate things in himself with the help of this unusual double, with the help of an unusual monologue in which the voice of the author and the voice of the hero merge. The image of the “hero-author” gives organic unity to the narrative, which sometimes seems multi-styled.

According to Rolland's definition, the composition of “Jean-Christophe” is a musical, “four-part symphony.” Parts of this symphony are the stages of the hero’s formation, the music of his soul, the endless and endlessly changing range of feelings and sensations that arise when in contact with the outside world. Starting with the vague images that arose in a newborn, and ending with the impressions of a lifetime, flashing through the fading consciousness of a dying person.

The fundamental principle of Rolland's epic is lyrical and poetic. He called his novel a “poem in prose” and declared that he “decidedly breaks with all the conventions established in French literature.” Rolland said that he was not writing a novel, but a “symbol of faith.” His task - to create a new humanity - implied cleansing, renewal, a return to the soul, and implied the release of spiritual energy in the free flow of the “romance-river”, disregarding any conventions.

The “flow” in “Jean-Christophe” does not develop, however, into the stream of consciousness of the hero of the novel. Monologue is determined more by the function of the author than of the hero. In the novel, it is often said “we” (the author and his “shadow”), there is an address to the hero (“you”), the presence of the author is obvious all the time, and the “shadow” - as it should be - obediently follows its creator. Christophe too often speaks in the voice of Rolland himself, and in some places the text of the novel is no different from Rolland’s journalism. For example, in the book “Fair in the Square” Christophe is no longer a shadow, but a pseudonym of the author, who provides an overview of the culture of France at the beginning of the 20th century in a slightly fictionalized form. And not through the “eyes of Olivier,” but with his own eyes, Rolland sees “true France,” substituting in its place this symbol of the French spirit, opposed to the “fair in the square.”

Rolland could not avoid the danger of turning the “shadow” into an illustration. The author’s thought gravitates over the hero, precedes him, awaits him at every stage, summing up and outlining further path. And every step is taken with visible pressure, the movement is often at the limit, for Jean-Christophe is not just Craft, but also John the Baptist. His psychology is individual - and at the same time typical, since he, Man as such, expresses the “hidden forces of the elements.”

This does not mean, however, that Jean-Christophe is just a “shadow”. “The Shadow” is full-blooded enough to live “its own” life, to go “its own” way, taking the author with it. For Rolland, “War and Peace” remained the “model of modern epic.” “Jean-Christophe” is an epic of “the world in which we live,” its hero represents “a generation moving from one war to another, from 1870 to 1914.” Rolland brought Christophe to the fields of social battles of a turning point, made him a harbinger of the “coming day,” the best option for a man who, in the heart of Europe, among raging passions, rises like a beacon gathering all people of good will.

The system of characters in “Jean-Christophe” is a circle of people close to the hero, his friends, a kind of large family that plays the role of the foundation of a society renewed by the spiritual energy and moral impulse of the members of such a community. Relations between them are regulated by feelings of love, friendship, those true values, which Christophe especially needs.

Only friendship establishes contact between different civilizations, French and German, since Christophe and Olivier are their personifications. Rolland challenged chauvinism by the fact that he made a German the hero of the novel, entrusting him with both his ethics and his aesthetics - completing his upbringing, his formation in Paris, in contact with Olivier, i.e. with "true France".

Christophe’s characteristic reaction to the outside world is not “German” or “French” - it is the reaction of an artist, a musician who every time “tunes” his soul, capturing in everything internal rhythms, melodies inaudible to others. Saturated with them, Christophe rises above ordinary existence, joins the “elements”, the “hidden forces”. But at the same time he does not leave the earth, since music for him is “everything that exists.”

By introducing himself to music, Christophe is introduced to joy, to love, and acquires such strength that allows him to overcome all obstacles. Music defines the highest - Beethoven's - parameters of Personality, and Rolland's “river novel” is the history of the formation of a hero corresponding to these parameters. “Jean-Christophe” is another biography of a heroic personality, along with Beethoven, Tolstoy, Michelangelo.

The gift of an artist that Christophe is endowed with is a kind of absolute pitch, the ability to make an unmistakable moral assessment of all things. Christophe begins his critical revision with art, with music, then passes judgment on society, first German, provincial, then French, metropolitan, and finally, the pan-European “fair in the square.”

Jean-Christophe fights not only against this “fair”, not only against decadence and total bourgeoisification. His rebellion takes on an existential meaning. He saw the death of loved ones early, and his life became “a struggle against a cruel lot.” He very early separated the internal from the external, separated the “essence”, which was identified with the need for freedom, with the search for the meaning of existence. The search was all the more dramatic because Christophe was “obsessed with disbelief” - “God no longer existed.”

Christophe forged his ethics in a society that resembled a “heap of ruins.” At first, he too had a desire to “destroy and burn” as a sign of protest, since “There is no God, everything is permitted.” However, the artist is guided by a healthy, natural instinct that transforms the energy of denial into the energy of affirmation. Absolute freedom, the art of which also visited Rolland, the freedom of the Nietzschean superman is the opposite of Rolland’s passionate humanism.

This particular era, the eve of the World War, is pushed back to the end of the epic as the background against which the eternal drama of Life and Death took place, outside real space, beyond even the personality, transforming into the beginning of Creativity, into the personification of the Future. Traditional religiosity, questioned, is replaced by a new faith, the hero acquires, in the words of Rolland, “religious value” - in the finale he gives way to Saint Christopher.

Conclusion

Romain Rolland delivered a merciless verdict on the passing century in his work. Having discovered symptoms of a serious social illness, signs of decline and degradation, Rolland called for the rebirth of man, for the creation of a new man as a condition for the transformation of society. Rolland saw the source of renewal in art and likened aesthetics to ethics.

Rolland was professional musician, the author of many works on the history of music, and to a large extent it was music that shaped a kind of Rolland epic, focusing on the “eternal foundations and secrets.” “To penetrate into the very essence of the element, to comprehend its hidden powers” ​​- Rolland transferred this task of music to verbal art.

In itself, such a task returned to the romantic tradition, despite Rolland’s negative attitude to the “poison of idealism,” to the “illusions” that the romantics were guilty of, to “rhetoric.” Rolland resolutely opposed the “predominance of words over things” with truth, “reality as it is.” Rolland's taste for “real things,” for Life, for Nature balanced his fascination with “hidden forces,” “moral truths,” which turned into rhetoric.

Christophe's life story is one of constant loss. Rolland generously gives a person the full measure of suffering in order to overcome evil and rise to joy, enriching his soul, this “huge spiritual kingdom.”

The uniqueness of Rolland's social novel is that the knowledge of life, social injustice, and inequality forms, first of all, the emotional sphere of the intensely experiencing hero. Educational novel in this case, a novel of “sentimental education”, the stages of which are indicated by the next emotional crisis.

Literature

rolland jean christophe heroic biography

1. Balakhonov V.E. Romain Rolland and his time ("Jean-Christophe"). - L., 1968. - 285 p.

2. Foreign literature of the 20th century (1871-1917): Textbook / Ed. V.N. Bogoslovsky, Z.T. Civil. - M.: Education, 1979. - 351 p.

3. Foreign literature of the 20th century: Textbook / Ed. L.G. Andreeva. - 2nd ed., rev. and additional - M.: Higher. school, 2004. - 559 p.

4. History of French literature. T. III. - M.: Nauka, 1963. - 375 p.

5. Kirnoze Z.I. French novel of the 20th century. - Gorky, 1977. - 295 p.

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Chapter VI

ROMAIN ROLLAN: HIGH HEROIC

The Making of a Writer: From Clumsy to the Normal School. — Drumzturg; struggle for a new theater. — “Heroic biographies”: great at heart. —— “Jean Christophe”: “the epic of modern life.” — “Cola Brugnon”: Burgundian character. — War years: “Above the fray.”

The world is dying, strangled by its cowardly and vile egoism. Let's open the windows! Let's let some fresh air in! Let the breath of heroes wash over us.

R. Rolland

R. Rolland left a multi-genre legacy - novels, drama, memoirs, diaries, letters. He was at the center of the social and political events of his time, communicated and corresponded with many people - from ordinary readers to famous writers, philosophers, statesmen who lived in different parts globe. His authoritative voice - the voice of a humanist, a truth-seeker - was listened to throughout the world. Rolland proceeded from the idea of ​​the high moral mission of literature and the responsibility of the writer. In 1915, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for “sublime idealism” and “sympathy and love for truth.”

The Making of a Writer: From Clumsy to the Normal School

Romain Rolland was born in 1986 in the town of Clamcy in the south of France. This city inherited the spirit of free people from the Middle Ages, and republicanism from the times of the revolution. It is in Clumsy that the novel Cola Breugnon takes place.

The writer's father owned a notary office in Klamsey. He had enviable health and lived to be 95 years old. His mother, a devout Catholic, loved her son madly and instilled in him a passion for music and admiration for Beethoven. Unlike his father, Rolland was in fragile health and was often ill, but he had an inexhaustible supply of creative energy. Thanks to his natural talent, Rolland became the pride of the local school; he especially shone in the humanities.

To help his son get a decent education, Rolland's father sells his office and moves to Paris, where he works as a bank employee. In IS86, Rolland becomes a student at the École Normale Supérieure. Rolland's interests were multifaceted: history, world literature, art history, music, philosophy. He was a writer and scientist; In his multi-genre heritage, research works, primarily musicological, occupy an important place.

Rolland and Tolstoy. Leo Tolstoy played a significant role in Rolland’s spiritual formation. In the 1880s, translations of the works of Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy appeared, and Russian literature firmly entered the cultural life Europe. In 1886, Melchior le Vogüe’s book “The Russian Novel” was published in France, becoming a notable page in the history of Russian-French literary connections. Introducing his compatriots to the works of Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, the author of the book noted the humanistic pathos of Russian writers and expressed the conviction that their influence could be “saving” for modern “exhausted art.”

Tolstoy was Rolland’s spiritual companion almost throughout the entire life of the French writer: Rolland corresponded with him, created a biographical book about him, Tolstoy’s name is constantly present in his letters, articles, diaries, and memoirs.

Rolland, based on the idea of ​​the moral mission of art, wanted it to carry “a small ray of Love”, “the divine light of Mercy”. “Neither Aeschylus nor Shakespeare could shake the souls of their compatriots more deeply than The Idiot, The Brothers Karamazov, Anna Karenina and the great epic, which in my eyes takes the place of the new Iliad among these masterpieces, shook us - “War and peace," wrote Rolland. Tolstoy’s article “So what should we do?”, containing harsh criticism of a society built on the oppression of some people by others, stunned Rolland. A Normal School student decides to send a letter to the Yasnaya Polyana sage with a list of questions, the main one among which was: “How to live?” Imagine Rolland’s surprise when, one evening in October 1887, a 17-page letter from Count Tolstoy himself arrived in his modest attic! The letter, beginning with the words “Dear brother,” written in French by the hand of the brilliant Russian writer, made an indelible impression on Rolland. Tolstoy, in the spirit of his doctrine, defended the thesis about the “false role” of science and art, which serve the privileged classes. Under the influence of Tolstoy, Rolland began to think about the “rotten civilization of exploiters.” Not all of Tolstoy’s views appealed to Rolland, but he was largely in tune with Tolstoy’s treatise “What is Art?”, and above all the idea that art and literature are called upon to morally influence society, to elevate and ennoble the souls of people.

Young scientist. In 1889, Rolland graduated from the Normal School and received a tempting offer for a two-year scientific trip to Rome for independent scientific studies. His stay in Italy turned out to be extremely fruitful for him. In his youth, he read books on the history of art with interest and was now able to get acquainted with wonderful museums, see masterpieces of sculpture and painting, listen to the famous Italian opera.

Scientific work in the field of music forced us to penetrate into the psychology of the composer and think about the nature of the creative process. In Italy, Rolland first had the idea of ​​writing about Beethoven. The first dates back to this time literary experiments the writer - sketches of plays from Italian and Roman history (Orsino, Caligula, Siege of Mantua, etc.). In Italy, two of his dissertations were prepared and defended in 1895: “The Origin of Modern Musical Theatre. The history of European opera before Lully and Scarlatti" and "On the decline of Italian painting in the 16th century." At the same time, the first attempt (unsuccessful) to break onto the stage with the opera “Niobe” took place.

Teacher. Uncertainty about the prospects for writing prompts Rolland to take up teaching (first at the Ecole Normale and later at the Sorbonne), which gives him financial independence; he devotes his free time to literary creativity - Work the teacher had her own positive sides- spiritual communication with students and listeners who saw in him not an ordinary teacher, but a bright, outstanding personality.

Perhaps his teaching activity “slowed down” Rolland’s writing plans. But at the same time, teaching helped him accumulate that extensive knowledge of art history, which later became the foundation of many of his works. Rolland the writer in many ways evolved from Rolland the psdagogue with his teacher, moral and educational attitude,

Playwright: the struggle for a new theater

Rolland's writing career begins with plays. In the late 189G - early 1900s, he worked primarily as a playwright. This was natural in its own way.

At the end of the 19th century, the birth of a “new drama” took place in Europe, which meant the breaking of outdated canons of entertainment theater. Rolland's plays, with their humanistic pathos and serious problems, form two genre-thematic groups: “Tragedies of Faith” and “Dramas of the Revolution.”

"Tragedies of Faith". The action of these plays takes place in the past, but history is only a background, a decoration. The main thing for Rolland is moral conflicts, good and evil in man. Rolland is looking for an answer to a question that is invariably relevant to him: what is the nature of the heroic in man? In “Saint Louis” (1897), the protagonist is the French king Louis IX, leader of the crusaders, a man of high moral qualities, the personification of generosity and a popular favorite, and therefore the object of envy of intriguers. And although the historical background in the drama is largely stylized and conventional, and the figure of the main character is idealized, the play expresses the deep, humanistic aspirations of its author. The theme of “hero and people” is broken down in the drama “Aert” (1898), which takes place in the 17th century in Holland. Young Prince Aert, generous, brave man, seeks to lead the movement against Spanish rule.

"Dramas of the Revolution". In the context of the intensity of the social struggle in France at the end of the 1890s (the Dreyfus affair, the confrontation between the forces of democracy and reaction), Rolland approaches the understanding of the most important historical lessons in the life of the country - the lessons of the Great French Revolution of 1789-1794, which a century later remained the subject of acute disputes. This is how “Dramas of the Revolution” appear.

The cycle opened with the play “Wolves” 0898), in which echoes of the Dreyfus affair are heard.

An honest officer of the revolutionary army, the nobleman d'Uaron, is accused of treason. Verra, a brave warrior driven by hatred of the aristocracy, insists on this. The Jacobin Tellier comes to the defense of the accused. Having a personal dislike for d'Uaron, he proves his innocence. But the acquittal of d'Huarope would mean the dismissal of Verre, the favorite of the soldiers, an experienced commander. To resolve the issue, the Commissioner of the Convention Quesnel arrives. Tellier advocates that justice must prevail under any circumstances. Quesnel, understanding Tellier's legal correctness, nevertheless accepts less on Verra's side, saves him from death, for such an outcome is needed by the revolution.

"Danton." The second drama of the cycle, “The Triumph of Reason” (1899), is dedicated to the fate of the Girondin party. The most significant drama in the cycle is Danton (1900). At its center is the problem of the revolutionary leader. There are two of them in the play, these are polar characters: Danton and Robespierre. Their confrontation is not only personal character, but also reflects the clash of two trends in the revolution; a similar conflict was reproduced by V. Hugo in the novel “The Ninety-Third Year,” showing the bearers of two principles; “revolution of violence” (Cimurdain) and “revolution of mercy” (Gauvain).

Danton and Robespierre began together as leaders of the masses who crushed the monarchy. But time has changed them. Danton is tired of the role of the “punishing sword”. The writer characterizes him this way: “Gargantua in the Shakespearean style, cheerful and powerful.” Tired of violence, blood and murder, he wants mercy and leniency, which, in his opinion, are more useful for the good of France than uncompromising terror.

Robespierre is stern and incorruptible, his devotion to the Revolution and the Republic is fanatical. Pity and condescension are alien to him. About people like Robespierre, Danton says: “Suffering does not touch them, they have one morality, one policy - to impose their ideas on others.” Akin to Robespierre is his friend Saint-Just. Any criticism of the all-powerful Salvation Committee, any dissent on the part of recent popular leaders is perceived as a crime and, worse, betrayal. The only means of fighting them is a guillotine knife. Legal proceedings are carried out not according to laws, but according to concepts. The following thesis was put into Robespierre’s mouth: “Revolutionary storms do not obey ordinary laws. The force that transforms the world and creates a new morality cannot be approached from the point of view of conventional morality,” the arrested Danton and his comrades appear before the Revolutionary Tribunal,

Rolland was one of the first to construct an entire act of his drama as a kind of transcript of a court hearing, a violent clash of points of view.

In his courageous speech, Danton brushes aside many accusations, in particular, that he lived in grand style while the people were starving. Simple people in the hall they sympathize with Danton. Saint-Just saves the situation: he reports that a caravan of ships with flour and fuel is arriving at the port in the evening. After this, the courtroom quickly empties, people rush to replenish their meager supplies. As a result, Danton and his friends are left alone, without moral support. The jury is on the side of the authorities. The verdict, a foregone conclusion, charges them with conspiracy against the Republic, punishable by death.

While working on a series of plays about the revolution, Rolland could not ignore the theme of the people. Here the writer was helped by the experience of Shakespeare, the author of historical chronicles, whose legacy Rollal carefully studied. The cycle “Dramas of the Revolution” concluded with the play “The Fourteenth of July”, in the center of which is the great event - the storming of the Bastille. According to Rolland, “here individuals disappear into the ocean of the people. To depict a storm, there is no need to write out a separate wave - you need to write the future sea.”

The drama expresses a powerful popular protest against the crimes of the monarchy and the entire feudal system. Rolland portrayed the participants in the storming of the Bastille brightly and catchily, showing the euphoria, heroism and faith in the triumph of justice that characterize the first steps of the revolution. The drama contains elements of a folk holiday performance, during which choirs sound, orchestras ring, and people form a round dance around the romantic symbol of Freedom. This play was a kind of prototype of the “mass action dramas” dedicated to class struggle, which were popular in the West in the 1930s.

"People's Theatre": "the art of action". Completing his work on the cycle of plays, Rolland summarizes his theoretical conclusions in the book “People's Theater. Experience of the aesthetics of the new theater" (1903). In this book, Rolland substantiates the program of the “art of action”, which has a moral impact on the audience. The people's theater should focus on a wide democratic audience. No matter how significant the plays of classical dramas are, the repertoire modern theater should be compiled by modern authors. Theater can draw spiritual strength from the people. Rolland is convinced that “folk theater is the key to the whole world of new art, to a world that art is only just beginning to anticipate.” Time has, however, shown Rolland’s good-naturedness. He later admitted that his plan to create folk theater collapsed when faced with real practice. The book was, he said, the product of "the enthusiastic faith of youth."

Does this mean, however, that the very idea of ​​such a theater is utopian, naive, incompatible with the very nature of the stage, for which family, socio-psychological plays are most natural? It seems that the answer to this question cannot be simplified and unambiguous. Theater reflects the times; in revolutionary eras, its problematics and style change. Suffice it to remember Mayakovsky’s “Mystery-bouffe”, Trenev’s “Yar Love”, Bulgakov’s “Days of the Turbins”, Sun. Ivanov and many others, whose artistic merits, longevity and stage success are undoubted.

"Heroic Biographies": Great at Heart

In the early 1900s, at a time of intense spiritual and creative quest, Rolland conceived a series of biographies of great people - statesmen, generals, scientists, artists. Only part of the plan was realized - this is a kind of triptych, which included the biographies of Beethoven, Michelangelo, and Tolstoy.

In the preface to the series, Rolland, in his characteristic emotional and pathetic manner, wrote: “There is stifling stale air around us. Decrepit Europe is hibernating in this oppressive, musty atmosphere... The world is suffocating. Let's open the windows! Let's let in some free air! Let the breath of a hero wash over us."

Who is the hero in Rolland's interpretation? These are not those who conquered with thought or force. For him, heroes are those who are big in heart. Without greatness of soul one cannot be either a great man or a great artist. The model for Rolland was “the powerful and pure-hearted Beethoven.”

Rolland addresses his hero, a contemporary, a close person: “Dear Beethoven!” He writes with admiration about how, tormented by illnesses, the collapse of love, and deafness, terrible for a musician, Beethoven creates his most life-affirming, jubilant work for choir to the words of Schiller - the Ninth Symphony with its final “Hymn to Joy.” And in harmony with the final chords of Beethoven’s masterpiece - the pathetic finale of Rolland’s essay: “What battle of Bonaparte, what sun of Austerlitz can compete in glory with this superhuman labor, with this victory, the most radiant of all that the spirit has ever won?” Beethoven's theme would dominate Rolland's entire life and creative pursuits.

The book about Michelangelo, the creative genius of the Renaissance, was written in the same tone. The material for this book was Rolland's research made in Italy. It was an extensive work, consisting of three parts, containing both biographical description and art historical analysis. The writer entitled the two main stages of the artist’s life as “Struggle” and “Detachment”, and called the last section “Loneliness”.

In 1911, after Tolstoy's death, he wrote his “heroic biography”, paying tribute to his beloved artist.

Beethoven, Michelangelo and Tolstoy are special type hero. Life's troubles are unable to extinguish their creative enthusiasm. Triumphing over a merciless fate, they turn out to be moral winners. Inner meaning their heroic life is determined by Rolland's favorite formula: Per aspera ad astra (through thorns to the stars).

"Jean Christophe": "an epic of modern life"

All of Rolland's previous work in the field of drama, journalism, and art criticism turned out to be a prologue to the creation of a large-scale prose form - the novel Jean Christophe (1904-1912). It became Rolland's main book and brought him European fame. In “Jean Christophe” the aesthetics, life philosophy and artistic methodology of the writer are most fully expressed.

Genre originality: “river novel”. The idea for the novel arose back in 1890, when Rolland was in Italy, where he was amazed by great works of art. Rolland thought about their creators, who seemed to him to be genuine titans. Then he was captivated by Beethoven's personality.

The history of world literature knows the “titanic” images of Prometheus, Faust, Manfred, built on the combination of reality and fantasy. Rolland puts the genius at the center and places him in a concrete, real environment. The writer introduced many facts of Beethoven's biography into the life of Jean Christophe, endowed his hero with Beethoven's character, his passion, and uncompromisingness.

Autobiographical motifs are noticeable in the novel: Rolland's fragility, poetry, and delicacy are reflected in the image of Olivier, Christophe's friend. Rolland's firmness and courage in defending his principles, his love for music is in Jean Christophe. The writer gave his hero the surname Kraft, i.e. strength.

At the center of the story is the fate of a brilliant musician, traced from birth to death. “This is a kind of intellectual and moral epic modern soul...,” wrote Rolland about “Jean Christophe.”

Of course, Rolland has a sonical-historical context, but the main thing is the image life path hero. Jean Christophe, with his high spirituality and moral purity, is the personification of “ the best people Europe,” with which the novelist pinned his hopes. The comparison of Jean Christophe with the Christian hero, Saint Christopher, is significant. The epigraph to the novel is significant: “To the free souls of all nations who suffer, fight and win.” Rolland made Jean Christophe a German, thereby emphasizing that great art is above national barriers. Christophe's close friend is French.

New vital material required a new form. Rolland writes a ten-volume epic novel, unlike the usual novel cycles, such as Zola's Rougon-Macquart and T. Mann's Buddenbrooks. “Jean Christophe” in its own way anticipated M. Proust’s epic “In Search of the Lost Time.”

Rolland devoted almost ten years of work and burning to the novel, living “in the armor of Jean Christophe.” The novel was published in separate parts in the magazine "Weekly Notebooks" (1904-J912), whose editor was the famous writer and friend of Rolland Charles Peguy. And in 1921, in the preface to the next edition of “Jean Christophe,” the writer proposed combining books that were similar in “atmosphere” and “sound” into four parts. As a result, the work appeared as a “four-movement symphony.”

Spiritual Odyssey of a Hero: Life as a Creative Process. The first part of the epic (“Dawn”, “Morning”, “Adolescence”) covers early years Christophe. Rolland explores the awakening of his feelings and heart in the narrow confines of his small homeland and puts the hero in the face of trials. The features here are especially clear.” novel-education”, the model of which was Goethe’s “Wilheim Meister” for Rolland, the internal theme is the collision of a brilliant child with the harsh realities of life and the formation in him of artistic talent and musical worldview.

In a provincial German town on the banks of the “old man of the Rhine,” a child is born who will live a long life. The child learns about the world around him, the warmth of his mother’s hands, colors, sounds, voices. “A huge stream of time rolls slowly... Islands of memories appear in the river of life.”

The future musician pays special attention to the skills that form the melodies. The family is in dire need. Jean Christophe's father Melchior Craft, a musician in the Duke's court orchestra, makes a living out of the modest family budget; mother Louise works as a cook. Jean Christophe learns the humiliation of poverty.

Grandfather gives his grandson an old piano. Touching the keys, Jean Christophe plunges into the world of enchanting sounds and tries to compose. For the first time in literature, Rolland lifts the curtain of secrecy over the composer's work. In the child’s perception, plovers merge with the surrounding world and nature. Uncle Gottfried, who loves his grandson, endowed with a sensitive soul, teaches: music should be “modest” and truthful,” help expose inner world"to the very bottom."

At the age of six, Jean Christophe composed pieces for the piano, then began performing in the court orchestra and composing music to order.

He doesn’t like this kind of art: “the very source of his life and joy is poisoned.” After the death of his grandfather and father, Jean Christophe is forced to take care of his mother and two younger brothers.

Maturation musical talent the hero is inseparable from his inner growth. Like many extraordinary people, Jean Christophe is lonely. He needs a close friend, a beloved woman.

Jean Christophe experiences many hobbies. His feelings are sublime, spontaneous, not always subordinate to common sense, and therefore usually do not find a worthy response. Christophe is a maximalist who sets a high standard in love and friendship, demanding complete dedication, excluding selfishness, lies, and frivolity. As the narrative develops, the “life of the soul” of the hero becomes the center of artistic attention, his emotions become hyperbolic and acquire a special scale and energy.

Hero and Society: The Rebellion of Jean Christophe. The second part of the epic includes the books “Revolt” and “Fair on the Square”, in which a new important stage in the hero’s life is recreated. First of all, Jean Christophe rebels against his former self, tears off his “yesterday, already dead shell,” and evaluates his early works harshly, as “warm water, cartoonishly funny nonsense.” With the fervor of youth, he attacks many classical composers, seeing falsehood and sentimentality in their works. With youthful maximalism, he is ready to do everything “again or redo it.” Christophe also appears in a local music magazine with shocking articles in which he subverts the authorities of the masters.

From the riot to musical field Jean Christophe moves on to a critical understanding of society. He notices the changes that took place in Germany at the end of the century: in the country of philosophers and musicians, a “suffocating atmosphere of crude militarism” was thickening. During a peasant festival, Jean Christophe, standing up for the girls, gets into a fight with the soldiers. To avoid prosecution, he is forced to leave Germany and flee to Paris.

The book “Fair on the Square” occupies a special place in the novel. The narration here takes on the character of a pamphlet, satirical intonations appear.

Christophe arrives in Paris, filled with illusions, because France is a country of freedom, unlike Germany with its class remnants. But in the French capital he sees only “ great comedy" Once Thackeray wrote about bourgeois-aristocratic society as a “vanity fair”, Jean Christophe opens another fair - a fair of general corruption, a gigantic marketplace. Jean Christophe calls contemporary art, which has become an object of sale and purchase, “intellectual prostitution.” Lies and vulgarity in art cause him a strong reaction. Christophe encounters representatives from different spheres of metropolitan society. Communication with politicians convinces him that for them “serving the people” is in fact only the realization of selfish interests, “a profitable but little-respected branch of trade and industry.” In the works of modern French composers Jean Christophe criticizes the anemic, naive nature of the plots. The champions " new music“He finds only “a tangle of professional tricks,” imitation of “superhuman acts,” and a lack of “naturalness.” In literature, Jean Christophe is irritated by decadent phenomena; in the theater - entertainment, the dominance of lightweight genres.

Overcoming illness heartache, Christophe continues to work. But his symphonic painting "David", on the basis of which - biblical story, is not understood by the public and fails. The fruit of the shock experienced is the hero’s serious illness.

In search of “another France”. The third part includes the books “Antoinette”, “In the House”, “Girlfriends”, surrounded by an atmosphere of gentle “spiritual concentration”. Jean Christophe is looking for “another France” that he could love, and finds it in the person of Olivier Janin.

Olivier is a young poet, intelligent, generous, “hating hate”, he admires Christophe’s music. Despite their external dissimilarity, they are close in spirit: both are distinguished by spiritual purity, commitment to high moral and ethical concepts. Thanks to Olivier, Christophe is convinced: there is true France, “an indestructible granite block.” Their relationship is a unique model of creative mutual enrichment of the cultures of the two countries. Rolland is not faithful to his moral postulate: culture is an international kinship of souls, which must triumph over national barriers.

Not without Olivier's help, the press finally pays favorable attention to Christophe. The long-awaited success comes to him. Jean Christophe helps Olivier get closer to Jacqueline Lantier, knowing that this will be detrimental to their friendship. This is what happens. Having married Jacqueline, Olivier, absorbed in joys family life, moves away from Christophe.

The fourth part of the novel includes two books: “The Burning Bush” and “The Coming Day.” This is the finale of the hero’s long, difficult life, his spiritual Odyssey.

Christophe's life is a persistent search for a kind of “symbol of faith.” Together with Opivier, they want to bring life to the “altar of the new god - the people.” In The Burning Bush, the novel includes the theme of political struggle; the hero must choose who to be with - with the labor leaders or against them. At the May Day demonstration, Jean Christophe meets Olivier; there is a clash with the police. Christophe kills the policeman, and Olivier, trampled by the crowd, later dies in hospital.

After the Parisian events, Jean Christophe flees to Switzerland and finds refuge in the house of Doctor Brown. There he experiences a new love - for the doctor's wife, Anna Brown. Christophe and Anna show physical and spiritual harmony; Anna, a sincere nature, a believer, suffers, cheating on her husband, even tries to commit suicide. They break up, and Christophe experiences another spiritual crisis.

And again love heals the hero from despair and returns him to creativity. Christophe meets Grazia, who was his student in her youth. Now she is a widow with two children. They want to get married. But an obstacle arises: Gracia's son, a sickly and unbalanced boy, is insanely jealous of his mother. After his death, Grazia herself passes away.

Christophe is left alone. He experiences a happy merger with nature, composes using the motifs of Spanish folk songs and dances like "bursts of flame." Jean Christophe's last wish is deeply symbolic: to unite the children of his departed friends - daughter Grazia and son Olivier. Life force leaves Christophe. One of the exciting scenes of the novel: images of people dear to him pass before the blurred gaze of the dying hero. The river of life, overflowing its banks, flows into the ocean of eternity.

“Musical novel”: a sounding word. The novel made a huge impression and promoted Rolland to the ranks of writers of world significance. Readers were struck by the originality and emotional strength of the main character and the artistic form of the work. Rolland made the musical “symphonic” principle the structure-forming principle in the novel. For a musician, life is full of internal integrity: its individual phases are like parts of a monumental symphonic composition. Rolland is in love with music. He hears it in the rhythms of Christophe's life. This is how a happy synthesis of sound and word is formed.

"Jean Christophe" showed a new genre variety. This is a “river novel”. In Rolland's style there is lyricism, expression, metaphor. This manner corresponded to the state of the main character, immersed in a world of sublime feelings and impulses.

The final, tenth book, “The Coming Day,” begins like this: “Life passes. Body and soul dry up like a stream. The years are marked in the core of the trunk of an aging tree. Everything in the world dies and is reborn. Only you, Music, are not mortal, you alone are immortal. You are the inner sea. You are as deep as a soul..."

The author is not only a prose writer with a poetic vision of the world, but also a musicologist who gravitates towards abstract, metaphorical and emotional vocabulary. The musicality of the novel is also determined by its sublime pathos. Not material calculations, not selfish pettiness, but breadth of soul, commitment to spiritual values, love, friendship, inspired creativity - this is the life credo of the main character. And it is close to its creator.

Romantic element. Musicality grows out of the romantic element of the novel, which is expressed in the thickening of colors, in the special strength of the characters’ experiences. It is inappropriate to approach a novel with measures of life-likeness, including psychological ones. Not only Jean Christophe, but also his friends feel stronger than ordinary people, and in connection with this they act more boldly, more recklessly.

The well-known duality of the novel, and especially of the main character, is also connected with romance. On the one hand, we can say that Jean Christophe is a representative figure, in the words of Rolland, “the heroic representative of a new generation moving from one war to another, from 1870 to 1914.” On the other hand, the image of the main character is symbolic: Jean Christophe is the embodiment of Good and Justice in the eternal confrontation between light and dark forces.

To a certain extent, Herzen’s formula is applicable to Rolland’s hero: “history in man.” The writer had the right to say that in no country on the globe Jean Christophe is no longer a stranger. The novel made Rolland an internationally significant figure, allowing him to hear people from different countries say: “Jean Christophe is ours. He is mine. He is my brother. He is myself."

"Cola Brugnon": Burgundian character

“Jean Christophe” is followed by the story “Cola Brugnon” (1914), which appeared on the eve of the First World War. This is a book of a completely different tone; a “new” Rolland appeared in it. While collecting material for the book, the writer visited his native places, Burgundy, and Clamcy. He immersed himself in history, folklore, folk traditions. Rolland placed at the center of the work a simple man, Cola Brugnon, a woodcarver. The narration is told on behalf of the hero, which gives the story a special, confidential intonation. While working on the story, Rolland was guided by the style of French medieval fabliaux, folklore, and the aesthetics of Rabelais.

The story, which takes place in 1616, conveys a historical flavor late Middle Ages: feudal civil strife, rude behavior of soldiers, folk peasant holidays with ritual games, anti-clerical sentiments among townspeople. The hero reads Plutarch; and this is a sign of the times: it was during the Renaissance that treasures were discovered ancient world. The story is structured like the diary of the main character. Before the readers is a series of episodes told with a kind smile, sometimes mockery or irony.

Cola Brugnon, completely different from Jean Christophe, is close to him internally. He is devoted to creativity, although he calls it prosaically: “work hunger.” Brugnon creates furniture, utensils, and skillfully inlays his products. Work for him is “an old comrade who will not betray.” “Armed with a hatchet, a chisel and a chisel with a fugaik in my hands, I reign at my workbench over the knotted oak, over the glossy maple,” writes Brugnon in his diary. For the hero, the products he created are like children who have scattered around the world.

The story conveys the poetry of labor. With the same inspiration as about the art of a musician, Rolland writes about the skill of this folk craftsman.

The writer admires people who know how to “sow, grow oats and wheat, prune, graft grapes, reap, knit sheaves, thresh grain, squeeze grapes... in a word, be the masters of French soil, fire, water, air - all four elements.”

Cola Brugnon's personal life is not going very well. His poetic feeling for Lasochka was not mutual. Kol's wife is grumpy, the children do not make their father very happy. Tender feelings His only daughter Martina, as well as his students Robinet and Capier, call on him.

Cola is an optimist. Neither the strife of his sons, nor the plague, nor the fire, nor feudal strife can crush his love of life. A continuator of the traditions of Rabelais, Rolland endows Brugnon with “pantagruelism”, an unchanging sense of the beauty of the world, the ability to rejoice and enjoy life.

The material of the novel is in harmony with his style: the writer uses rhythmic prose, includes jokes, proverbs, and sayings in the text of the work. “Cola Brugnon, an old sparrow of Burgundian blood, vast in spirit and belly.” All this was masterfully conveyed into Russian by M. L. Lozinsky (known to us from his translations of “ Divine Comedy"Dante, Shakespeare's Hamlet and other masterpieces of world literature).

In Rolland’s “Notes of Brygnon’s Grandson” we read: “And when Gorky writes that Cola Brygnon, which he likes more than all my books, is a Gallic challenge to war, then he is not so wrong.” In the early 1930s, an edition of the novel was published with illustrations by the artist E. A. Kibrik, which the author really liked. Composer D. B. Kabalevsky wrote the opera “Cola Brugnon” (1937) based on the novel.

War years: "Above the fray"

The First World War (1914-1918) was a historical watershed in the life of Europe, its cultures and literature. This war became fateful for Rolland and his spiritual quest; was a huge test, not only physical, but also moral, for many cultural masters.

Social activist and humanist. Rolland perceived the war both as a personal tragedy and as a crime against humanity and civilization. Instead of the universal brotherhood that Rolland dreamed of, he observed an orgy of hatred and the collapse of the foundations of culture. Out of compassion for the victims of the war, the writer refused to join the patriotic choir. His anti-war, pacifist position caused furious attacks and a stream of accusations against him, including accusations of treason. At first he was lonely. To survive under these conditions required considerable civic courage. Like Jean Christophe, Rolland, a man of fragile health, had the soul of an unbending fighter. He continued the tradition personified by Voltaire, Hugo and

During the war years, the writer became involved in the work of the International Red Cross in Geneva, providing assistance to war victims - refugees and prisoners of war. Rolland writes hundreds of letters, interceding for different people. And he receives news from all over Europe - his authority is so high, his name is so significant.

Rolland publishes the journalistic book “Above the Fight” (1915). The writer set himself the task of protecting himself from “mental militarism” and preserving the spiritual values ​​of “world civilization for the future.” He wrote in his book: “A great nation, embroiled in war, must defend not only its borders, it must also defend its mind...”

During the war, Rolland made many new friends. The writer was supported by Roger Martin du Gard, the future Nobel laureate doctor Alberta Schweitzer, the brilliant physicist Albert Einstein, the philosopher Bertrand Russell, and the playwright Bernard Shaw. Rolland promotes the unity of the anti-war forces of the advanced European intelligentsia.

In 1915, Rolland was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. The presentation noted “the sublime idealism of his literary work and the sympathetic accuracy with which he depicted the various human types.”

The beginning of correspondence between R. Rolland and M. Gorky dates back to 1916. Their twenty-year friendship and creative contacts are one of the most interesting pages of Russian-French literary ties. Rolland is friends with Stefan Zweig, who wrote the first book about him. The writer supports the anti-militarist speeches of John Reed, Henri Barbusse, the author of the anti-war novel “Fire”. He followed with interest the developments in Russia after October 1917. Rolland sympathized with the processes of renewal of life, but at the same time felt alarm about revolutionary violence.

War in artistic creativity and journalism. Rolland's artistic and journalistic heritage during the war period is varied and significant. At this time, the writer kept detailed diaries that were not intended for publication. They contain frank, impartial assessments of events, an analysis of the writer’s quests and doubts. Rolland does not spare nationalist writers and exposes the connection between war crimes and financial interests. During his stay in Moscow in 1935, Rolland donated the manuscripts of the “Diary of the War Years” to the V. I. Lenin Library with a request to publish them in 20 years, which was done in 1955.

A kind of continuation of the collection “Above the Fight” was the journalistic book “Forerunners” (1319), dedicated to memory those who became victims of terror and militarism: Jean Jaurès, Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht. Rolland calls them "martyrs for new faith- the universal brotherhood of peoples." Among them he includes Leo Tolstoy.

"Lilyuli": the power of laughter. Among the artistic works related to the theme of war is the farce play “Lilyuli”, written in a satirical Aristophanic manner. The pathos of the work lies in the exposure of the war and its ideological veils. Numerous active linden trees represent modern society. It is unfair, built on a class-hierarchical principle and resembles a masquerade carnival.

People live in a world of phantoms, fetishes, they believe in a blindfolded Mind, in Brotherhood and Freedom, which have lost their meaning and turned into their opposite. This state is actually ruled by Illusion (Lilyuli), who appears in the guise of a blond, blue-eyed, seductive girl, whom no one can resist. It is she who causes rivalry between two young men: Altair (French) and Antares (German), who begin a fratricidal struggle, believing that they are doing a just cause.

The only sane character in this absurd world is the hunchback Polichinelle, the bearer of laughter and at the same time common sense. Genetically he is “ brother Cola Breugnon”, the embodiment of folk straightforwardness, the ability to “cut the truth.”

"Pierre and Luce": "knife of war." Rolland's story "Pierre and Luce" (1920) was written in a different tone.

The heroes of the story, Pierre and Luce, are modern young people, their love faces the madness of war. Main character, 18-year-old Pierre Aubier, is the predecessor of " lost generation" - the generation that went through the crucible of war (heroes of the works of E. M. Remarque, E. Hemingway). Drafted into the army and given a six-month deferment, he, like many of his peers, feels the monstrous absurdity of what is happening.

Pierre meets Luce, a simple, sweet girl. Their feeling is pure, joyful and at the same time filled with sadness. The date of separation is inexorably approaching. But evil fate overtakes them first. Filled with deep tenderness for each other, immensely happy, they come to church and die under the rubble of a column that collapsed as a result of a bomb explosion.

"Clerambault": the hero's grave insight. Another aspect of the anti-war theme - the liberation of man from illusions and misconceptions - is revealed by Rolland in the novel Clerambault (1920).

The main character, Agenor Clerambault, is a middle-aged intellectual, a dedicated poet, and a little naive in public affairs. When the war begins, he will succumb to a jingoistic impulse, hatred of the “Huns,” and spy mania. These sentiments are gradually fading away. Clerambault's patriotic sentiments collapse after the news of the death of the son of Front-line Soldier Maksha. The reasoning of the young revolutionary Juliec Moreau, an admirer of Lenin, scares away Clerambault. In despair, seeing no other way out, the hero goes to the front, where he dies. Before dying, he forgives his enemy.

Later radical critics emphasized the ideological vulnerability of what they called "clerambism" (the hero's pacifist position).

After the First World War, Romain Rolland continued to write. It was an extremely fruitful and significant time for the writer. Rolland's work of this time is already considered in the course of literature of the 20th century.

First post-war years For Rolland there were sometimes intense spiritual quests associated with the challenges of the time. He had to engage in polemics with such radical communists as Henri Barbusse, the leader of Clarte. He contrasted supporters of revolutionary actions with his position as an opponent of violence, a champion of the spiritual and moral renewal of society.

In the 1920s, Rolland wrote a book about the Indian philosophers Ramakrishna and Vivekananda, the dramas “The Game of Love and Death” (1925), “Palm Sunday” (1926), “Leonids” (1927), and was intensively working on the major epic work “Enchanted” soul" (1922-1934), dedicated to the theme of the difficult quest of the Western intelligentsia. Rolland’s views are noticeably radicalized (collection “Farewell to the Past”, 1934), he expresses his sympathies for the USSR and, together with M. Gorky, strives to unite the “masters of culture” in confronting the fascist threat. In 1935 he came to the USSR and met with Gorky.

In 1939, Rolland wrote the drama Robespierre, in which he reflects on the revolution and the fate of its leaders. Meanwhile, the “purges” that began in the USSR worry Rolland; his attempts to help his “disappeared” (repressed) friends have no response. Only in the late 1980s were his notes relating to his stay in the USSR and meetings with Gorky made public. Rolland survived the German occupation; In recent years he has been working on his memoirs, completing a study on Beethoven, and writing a book about Charles Peguy.

Romain Rolland always had grateful readers and numerous friends in our country; M. P. Kudasheva, the translator of his works, later became the writer’s wife and the keeper of his archive. In 1966, the USSR celebrated the 100th anniversary of Rolland's birth. He was invariably the object of attention from Russian researchers (I. I. Anisimova, T. L. Motyleva, V. E. Balakhonov, I. B. Duchesne, etc.), however, their works reflected the ideological stereotypes of the pre-perestroika period. Several times, starting from the 1930s, collected works of the writer were published. As an artist of words and humanist thinker, Romain Rolland occupies an undeniable place in the history of world literature. In his work, the writer responded to the most important literary, aesthetic and socio-political problems of the 20th century. His vast legacy requires a historical approach and objective analysis.

Literature

Literary texts

Roman R. Collected works: in 14 volumes / R. Rolland; edited by I. I. Anisimov. - M., 1954-1958.

Roman R. Memoirs / R. Roland. - M., 1966.

Roman R. Articles, letters / R. Roland. - M., 1985.

Roman R. Fav. works / R. Roland; afterword 3. Kirnoze. - M., 1988. - (Ser. “Nobel Prize Laureates”).

Criticism. Teaching aids.

Balakhonov V. E. Romain Rolland and his time. Early years / V. E. Balakhonov. - L., 1972.

Duchesne I. B. “Jean Christophe” by Romain Rolland / I. B. Duchesne. - M., 1966.

Motyleva T. L. Romain Rolland /T. L. Motyleva. - M, 1969- - (Ser. ZhZL).

Motyleva T. L. The work of Romain Rolland / T. L. Motyleva. - M., 1959.