The image of Tatyana Larina in the novel Eugene Onegin. The image of Tatyana Larina in the novel “Eugene Onegin”
>Characteristics of the heroes Eugene Onegin
Characteristics of the hero Tatyana Larina
Tatyana Dmitrievna Larina is the main character of the novel in verse "Eugene Onegin", married to Princess N, Olga's sister. She is the epitome of a Russian woman. Even the heroine’s name has a common origin and indicates a connection with national roots. The distinctive features of this heroine are a pure soul, dreaminess, and directness. She showed that she could be both a steadfast friend and a heroic wife. Outwardly, Tatyana was the complete opposite of her rosy-cheeked and blond sister. She couldn't be called beautiful, but she was very pretty. There was nothing cutesy or vulgar about her, but only simplicity and naturalness. Since childhood, Tatyana was quiet and thoughtful. She preferred solitude to cheerful companies.
In the first part of the novel she was seventeen years old. She spent a lot of time reading sentimental novels, through which her inner world was formed. While waiting for sublime love, she met Onegin. It was he who became her romantic hero, to whom she, as befits the heroine of a French novel, wrote a letter. With this act, she violated all the norms of behavior of that time, but this timid girl had no shortage of courage. Having not met reciprocity, Tatyana was very upset. The girl’s peace of mind was disrupted for a long time. Onegin, in turn, acted nobly. Seeing her as a dreamy person, he did not dare to play with her feelings, but soon explained himself. Tatyana's romantic personality is also revealed in her passion for everything mysterious. She loves to tell fortunes at Christmas time and believes in omens and dreams. So, for example, in a dream she foresees the imminent death of Lensky at the hands of Onegin.
With Onegin's departure, she began to spend more time in his mansion, reading his books, studying various decorative items in order to better understand his nature. Soon, Tatiana’s mother took her to Moscow for a “bride fair” and the girl was given in marriage to an important general. At the end of the novel, Tatyana appears completely different. She became a socialite, a princess, a lady who set the tone in society. Despite such changes, she managed to maintain her inner qualities. When Onegin accidentally saw her, he noticed that she had the same simplicity, lack of pretense, nobility and spiritual subtlety. However, she behaved with restraint, politely, without betraying her emotions. Having fallen in love with the “new” Tatiana, Onegin began to write her one letter after another, but did not receive an answer to them. Despite the fact that love for Onegin still lived in her, she chose loyalty to her husband and humbly continued to fulfill her life’s duty.
The image of Tatyana Larina in the novel “Eugene Onegin” has long become symbolic for Russian literature. It is she who, as a rule, opens a gallery of beautiful female characters created by domestic writers. The text of the novel shows that Pushkin created this character very carefully and carefully. Dostoevsky wrote that the title of the novel should contain the name not of Tatyana, but of Tatyana - it was her who the famous novelist considered the main character of the work. The image of Tatyana not only appears as a portrait frozen in time and space, she is shown in her development, in the smallest traits of character and behavior - from a romantic girl to a strong woman.
At the beginning of Eugene Onegin, the author shows us a young seventeen-year-old girl (it is worth noting that Tatyana’s age is not stated in direct text, but Pushkin’s letter to Vyazemsky, in which he writes about the heroine of his novel, gives the answer to this question). Unlike her cheerful and frivolous sister, Tatyana is very quiet and shy. Since childhood, she was not attracted to noisy games with peers, she prefers loneliness - that is why, even with family members, she felt distant, as if she were a stranger.
They find her something strange,
Provincial and cutesy
And something pale and thin,
But it’s not bad at all...
However, this girl, so silent and unattractive, has a kind heart and the ability to feel very subtly. Tatyana loves to read French novels, and the experiences of the main characters always resonate in her soul.
Tatyana's love reveals her tender nature. The famous letter she writes to Onegin is a testament to her courage and sincerity. It must be said that for a girl of that time, confessing her love, especially by writing first, was practically equivalent to shame. But Tatyana does not want to hide - she feels that she must talk about her love. Unfortunately, Onegin simply cannot appreciate this, although, to his credit, he keeps the confession a secret. His indifference hurts Tatyana, who has difficulty coping with this blow. Faced with a cruel reality, so different from the world of her favorite French novels, Tatyana withdraws into herself.
And dear Tanya’s youth fades:
This is how the storm's shadow dresses
The day is barely born.
An interesting episode in the novel is the one that predicted death at the hands of Onegin. Tatyana's sensitive soul, which detects any anxiety, responds to the tension in the relationship between two former friends, and results in an alarming, strange nightmare that the girl had during Christmas time. The dream books do not give Tatyana any explanations about the terrible dream, but the heroine is afraid to interpret it literally. Unfortunately, the dream comes true.
The argument is louder, louder; suddenly Evgeniy
He grabs a long knife and instantly
Lensky is defeated; scary shadows
Condensed; unbearable scream
There was a sound... the hut shook...
And Tanya woke up in horror...
The final chapter of “Eugene Onegin” shows us a completely different Tatyana - a matured, sensible, strong woman. Her romanticism and dreaminess disappear - unhappy love has erased these traits from her character. Tatyana's behavior when meeting Onegin evokes admiration. Despite the fact that love for him has not yet faded in her heart, she remains faithful to her husband and rejects the main character:
I love you (why lie?),
But I was given to another;
I will be faithful to him forever.
Thus, the best image of the novel, which is perfectly described by the quote “Tatyana’s sweet ideal,” combines beautiful and worthy of imitation traits: sincerity, femininity, sensitivity, and at the same time amazing willpower, honesty and decency.
Pushkin is a poet whose work is extremely accessible to human understanding. The clarity of images and harmony of his works have educational significance. His lyre awakens good feelings in people. No matter what he describes, no matter what he talks about, in his lines one can feel the love for people and life.
“Eugene Onegin” is one of the poet’s iconic works. The form of this work is unusual and complex. This is a novel in verse; there have been no works of this kind in Russian literature before.
“Eugene Onegin” is a source of ideas about Russian life during the Pushkin period. One of the central figures of the novel is Tatyana, the daughter of the Larins landowners.
By showing the image of Tatyana, the only integral character in the novel, Pushkin demonstrates a real phenomenon in Russian life.
"...Thoughtfulness, her friend
From the most lullabies of days
The flow of rural leisure
I decorated her with dreams..."
Tatyana lives among ordinary people who are unfamiliar with the noise and bustle of the big world. They are naive and sweet in their own way.
Tatyana is drawn to someone whom she has not yet met, but who would be smarter, better, kinder than those around her. She mistakes her neighbor, landowner Evgeny Onegin, for such a person. Over time, sweet Tatiana falls in love with him.
He is truly smarter than those around her, more knowledgeable and reasonable. He is capable of good deeds (he alleviated the plight of his serfs):
“Our Evgeniy first conceived
Establish a new order.
Vintage corvee yoke
Replaced it with easy quitrent, -
And the slave blessed fate..."
But Onegin is far from ideal. Tatyana has not yet recognized this. He is an idle gentleman, lazy, spoiled by life, uneducated, not knowing what to do, because he has no mental strength for a fruitful life, and an empty life gnaws at him with melancholy.
Tatyana writes a letter to him, declaring her love. But Onegin cannot cope with his egoism; he does not accept her spiritual impulses.
After Onegin leaves the village, Tatyana tends to be in his house, reading books. She learned a lot and understood a lot. Onegin is not the way she imagined him. He is a selfish, selfish person, not at all the hero to whom her tender soul was yearning.
After time has passed, Onegin meets Tatyana again in St. Petersburg. She is the wife of an old general. And then Onegin looked at her in a new way. In wealth and nobility, she seems completely different. Love flared up in his soul. This time she herself rejected him, knowing his selfishness, knowing the emptiness of his soul and not wanting to break the word she gave to her husband.
This soul, kind Tatyana, knew how to love deeply. Having parted with Onegin and realizing that he was not the hero of her novel, she still continued to love him and suffered from it. Tatyana did not become the general’s wife of her own free will; her mother “begged” her to do so. She did not part with her love: in her soul she loved Onegin.
Tatiana's soul is the soul of the best Russian women, no matter how different their destinies, thoughts, deeds may be.
The genius of Pushkin lies in the fact that he invited society to take a fresh look at the fate of the Russian woman. He wrote a character hitherto unknown in Russian literature. Firmness of nature, strength, simplicity, naturalness, loyalty to one’s word, decency - these traits determined the integrity and strength of the heroine’s character. Tatiana's strong principles were unshakable throughout the entire story. She was disgusted by hypocrisy, insincerity, idle talk, everything that she called “the rags of a masquerade.”
Since childhood, Tatyana was close to the people, to folk poetry. Her soulmate is the nanny, to whom she confided her secrets. Throughout the entire narrative, Tatiana's inner world does not change. No external circumstances will force her to leave the true path, or “break her spiritual makeup.” The poet's admiration and love in the novel are given to Tatyana in full.
Conclusion
Pushkin combined two eras in himself: he had well-known features of the present and some echoes of the past, in the midst of which his own upbringing took place; on the other hand, with him a completely new period began, the period of modern literature.
With his novel “Eugene Onegin,” Pushkin taught everyone who wrote after him to depict the strength and suffering of a Russian woman just as simply and sincerely. Pushkin raised the importance of the Russian woman in our consciousness. He created the basis for those high ideals of women that we see in subsequent works of other authors.
“THE ROLE OF TATYANA LARINA IN PUSHKIN’S NOVEL “EVGENY ONEGIN”
“The novel in verse “Eugene Onegin” will forever remain one of the most remarkable achievements of Russian art.” Perhaps this is the only work where the whole of Russia of the Alexander era with its prejudices and at the same time with that truly Russian beauty that the poet could not help but glorify fit in its entirety. But why does the novel touch our souls so deeply? What makes us reread the novel again and again, why do we care about the problem, even, perhaps, the tragedy of an entire generation? Vissarion Grigoryevich Belinsky said that before Pushkin, “poetry that was first of all poetry - there was no such poetry yet!” “Pushkin was called to be a living revelation of its secrets in Rus'.”
But who became this revelation of poetry in the novel “Eugene Onegin”? Who became the key to understanding the novel? The author endows “holy dream-fulfilled, living and clear poetry” with only one heroine, who undoubtedly became the most beautiful Muse in all Russian literature - Tatyana. Tatyana becomes the Muse of the entire narrative, she is the Muse of the author himself, Pushkin’s bright dream, his ideal. We can safely say that the main character of the novel is Tatyana. That is why, perhaps, Dostoevsky said this: “Pushkin would have done even better if he had named his poem after Tatyana, and not Onegin, for undoubtedly she is the main character of the poem.” Indeed, you open the novel and begin to understand that Tatyana, like a heavenly body, sheds on the novel a joyfully playing ray of poetry, filled with the wondrous beauty of living play. In his draft in Mikhailovsky, Pushkin wrote: “Poetry, like a comforting angel, saved me, and I was resurrected in soul.” In this comforting angel we immediately recognize Tatyana, who, like a guiding star, is always next to the poet throughout the entire novel.
Tatyana was destined to become the true mistress of the novel and capture the hearts of readers. Pushkin intended her to be a symbol of Russia, his people, a Muse and poetry merging with her, for for the poet they are indivisible. The novel is dedicated to Tatiana; it is in her that Pushkin concluded all that is most kind, gentle and pure. Tatyana - “this is lyrical poetry, embracing the world of sensations and feelings, boiling with special force in a young chest.” And the reader feels this poetry just like Tatyana herself. For Pushkin, Tatyana is not just a beloved heroine, she is a dream heroine, to whom the poet is endlessly devoted, with whom he is madly in love.
Tatiana's role in the novel is very large; her image, like an invisible ray of sunshine, runs through the entire novel and is present in every chapter. The pure image of Tatyana only reveals even more clearly the tragedy of Onegin, of the entire society, but still the main mission of “sweet Tanya”, namely the mission, is to be Pushkin’s Muse, poetry itself, the personification of life in “Eugene Onegin”, a symbol of the Russian people, Russia, his native land , after all, Pushkin’s Muse must be firmly connected with its people, its homeland, this is precisely its apotheosis. Of course, only such an integral nature could be Pushkin’s Muse. Tatyana expresses the author’s feelings and thoughts, revealing his soul to us.
It is truly brilliant that Pushkin contrasts his Muse with the vulgarity of the world, making readers even more clearly aware of the tragedy of the entire generation, and Onegin in particular. The author turns to antiquity, to nature, as if he is tearing Tatyana away from everything earthly, trying to say that this girl is “the most perfect ether,” but at the same time, symbolizing poetry, Tatyana is full of life, and her closeness to the people, to antiquity only confirms: Tatyana stands firmly on its own ground. In Tatyana you can immediately feel “the smile of life, a bright look, playing with the tints of quickly changing sensations.”
Let's pay attention to how Pushkin draws his heroine to us. In the novel, the portrait of Tatyana is almost completely absent, which in turn makes her stand out from all the young ladies of that time; for example, the portrait of Olga is given by the author in great detail. In this sense, it is important that Pushkin introduces subtle comparisons of his heroine with the ancient gods of nature into the novel. Thus, the portrait of Tatiana is missing, as if the author is trying to convey to the reader that external beauty is often devoid of life if there is no beautiful and pure soul, and therefore devoid of poetry. But it would be unfair to say that Pushkin did not endow his heroine with external beauty as well as the beauty of the soul. And here, by appealing to the ancient gods, Pushkin gives us the opportunity to imagine the beautiful appearance of Tatiana. And at the same time, antiquity itself, which is an integral feature of the novel, only once again proves that Tatiana’s external beauty is inextricably linked with her rich spiritual world. It should also be noted here that Tatyana’s connection with antiquity in the novel is also a compositional feature, as it allows Pushkin to lead his heroine everywhere, embodying her in the images of ancient gods. So, for example, one of Tatiana’s most frequent companions is the image of the eternally young, eternally virgin goddess-hunter Diana. Pushkin’s very choice of this particular ancient goddess for his Tanya already shows her eternally young soul, her inexperience, naivety, her ignorance of the vulgarity of the world. We meet Diana already in the first chapter:
...the cheerful glass does not reflect Diana's face.
This line seems to foreshadow the appearance of a heroine who will become the Muse of the entire narrative. And, of course, one cannot but agree that Pushkin, like a true artist, paints not the face, but the face of his Muse, which truly makes Tatyana an unearthly creature. Next we will meet Diana, the constant companion of thirteen-year-old Tatiana. One has only to say that even the names “Tatiana” and “Diana” are consonant, which makes their connection closer. And here Tatyana embodies the main artistic feature of “Eugene Onegin” - this is the direct connection of the past, antiquity with the present. The Greeks even said that Pushkin stole the belt of Aphrodite. The ancient Greeks, in their religious worldview, full of poetry and life, believed that the goddess of beauty possessed a mysterious belt:
... all the charm was in him;
It contains both love and desires...
Pushkin was the first of the Russian poets to master the belt of Cyprus. Tatyana is just confirmation of this. In the composition, as mentioned earlier, this “belt of Cypris” also plays a big role. Let's look at the epigraph to the third chapter of the novel. In general, Pushkin’s epigraphs carry a huge semantic load, as we will see more than once. So, the epigraph to the third chapter is taken from the words of the French poet Malfilatre:
Elle était fille, elle était amoureuse. - “She was a girl, she was in love.”
The epigraph is taken from the poem “Narcissus, or the Island of Venus.” Pushkin quoted a verse from a passage about the nymph Echo. And, if we consider that the chapter talks about Tatyana’s flared up feelings for Onegin, then a parallel arises between her and Echo, who is in love with Narcissus (in the novel this is Onegin). The poem continued:
I forgive her - love made her guilty. Oh, if only fate would forgive her too.
This quote can be compared with the words of Pushkin, which fully reflected the author’s feeling for his dream heroine:
Why is Tatyana more guilty?
Because in sweet simplicity
She knows no deception
And believes in his chosen dream?
Because he loves without art,
Obedient to the attraction of feelings
Why is she so trusting?
What is gifted from heaven
With a rebellious imagination,
Alive in mind and will,
And wayward head,
And with a fiery and tender heart?
Won't you forgive her?
Are you frivolous passions?
It is important to note, although the obvious comparison of Tatiana with the ancient gods cannot be denied, she is a truly Russian soul, and this, without a doubt, is convinced of when reading the novel. From the moment of her first appearance in “Eugene Onegin” in the second chapter, Tatyana becomes, as it were, a symbol of Russia, the Russian people. The epigraph to the second chapter, where the author “for the first time consecrated the tender pages of a novel with such a name,” are the words of Horace:
“Oh, rus! Hor...” (“Oh Rus'! Oh Village!”)
This special epigraph is dedicated specifically to Tatyana. Pushkin, for whom the closeness of his beloved heroine to her native land, to her people, to her culture is so important, makes Tatyana a “national heroine.” In the epigraph, the word “Rus” contains the heroine’s connection with her people, and with Russia, and with antiquity, with traditions, with the culture of Rus'. For the author with the very name “Tatyana,” “memories of antiquity are inseparable.” The second chapter itself is one of the most important chapters of the novel from the point of view of composition: here the reader first gets acquainted with Tatyana, starting from this chapter, her image, symbolizing Russia, the Russian people, will now be present in all the landscapes of the novel. Let us note that Tatyana is a strong type, firmly standing on her own soil, which shows us the true tragedy of the Onegins, generated by a hypocritical and vulgar world - distance from their own people and traditions.
Already in the first descriptions of Tatyana, you notice her closeness to nature, but not just to nature, but to Russian nature, to Russia, well, and later you perceive her as a single whole with nature, with her native land.
In the Epithets “wild, sad, silent” one can discern another image that accompanies Tatyana everywhere and connects her with nature - the moon:
She loved on the balcony
Warn the dawn,
When on a pale sky
The round dance of the stars disappears...
...under the foggy moon...
Thanks to this moonlight, which Tatyana herself seems to exude, and the starry sky, Tatyana’s portrait was painted with the “movement of light.” In the novel, Tatiana is illuminated by the “ray of Diana.” Now the ancient goddess personifies the moon.
“The movement of the moon is at the same time the movement of the plot line of the novel,” writes Kedrov. During the “inspirational moon,” Tanya writes her infinitely sincere message to Onegin and ends the letter only when “the radiance of the moon’s ray goes out.” The endless starry sky and the running of the moon are reflected in Tatiana’s mirror at the hour of fortune telling:
The night is frosty, the whole sky is clear;
A wondrous choir of heavenly luminaries
It flows so quietly, so accordingly...
Tatiana in the wide yard
Comes out in an open dress
The mirror points for a month;
But alone in the dark mirror
The sad moon is trembling...
The elusive trembling of Tatiana’s soul, even the beating of her pulse and the trembling of her hand are transmitted to the universe, and “in the dark mirror the sad moon trembles alone.” The “wonderful chorus of luminaries” stops in a small mirror, and Tatyana’s path, together with the moon, with nature, continues.
One can only add that Tatiana’s soul is like the pure moon, exuding its wondrous, sad light. The moon in the novel is absolutely pure, there is not a speck on it. So Tatyana’s soul is pure and immaculate, her thoughts and aspirations are as high and far from everything vulgar and mundane, like the moon. Tatyana’s “wildness” and “sadness” do not repel us, but, on the contrary, make us feel that, like the lonely moon in the sky, she is unattainable in her spiritual beauty.
It must be said that Pushkin’s moon is also the mistress of the heavenly bodies, eclipsing everything around with its pure radiance. Now let's fast forward for a moment to the last chapters of the novel. And now we see Tatyana in Moscow:
There are many beauties in Moscow.
But brighter than all the heavenly friends
The moon in the airy blue.
But the one I don't dare
Disturb with my lyre,
Like the majestic moon
Among the wives and maidens, one shines.
With what heavenly pride
She touches the earth!
Once again we see our Tatyana in the image of the moon. And what? Not only did she eclipse the “freaks of the big world” with her majestically beautiful appearance, but also with her boundless sincerity and purity of soul.
And again “dear Tanya” in her native village:
It was evening. The sky was darkening. Water
They flowed quietly. The beetle was buzzing.
The round dances were already breaking up;
Already across the river, smoking, was burning
Fishing fire. In a clean field,
Immersed in my dreams,
Tatyana walked alone for a long time.
Tatyana's portrait becomes inseparable from the overall picture of the world and nature in the novel. After all, not just nature, but the whole of Russia, even the whole universe, with the majestic change of day and night, with the twinkling of the starry sky, with the continuous alignment of the “heavenly bodies”, organically enters into the narrative. “Through the eyes of Tatiana and the author, the cosmic background of the poem is created. In the continuous ignition of light, in the constant cosmic fire, there is a deep meaning: against this background the human soul, Tatyana’s soul, seeks love, is mistaken and regains its sight.”
In Eugene Onegin, nature appears as a positive principle in human life. The image of nature is inseparable from the image of Tatyana, since for Pushkin nature is the highest harmony of the human soul, and in the novel this harmony of the soul is inherent only in Tatyana:
Tatiana (Russian soul,
Without knowing why)
With her cold beauty
I loved Russian winter.
It is obvious that, just as in revealing the image of Onegin, Pushkin is close to Byron with his “Child Harold”, so in revealing the character of Tatiana, her natural principle, her soul, he is close to Shakespeare, who concentrated the positive natural principle in Ophelia. Tatiana and Ophelia help us see even more deeply the discord with ourselves of the main characters, Hamlet and Onegin, representing the ideal of harmony between man and nature. And even more than that, Tatyana proves with all her nature the impossibility of peace and tranquility in Onegin’s soul without complete unity with nature.
“In Pushkin, nature is not only full of organic forces - it is also full of poetry, which most testifies to its life.” That is why we find Tatyana with her infinitely sincere soul, with her unshakable faith, with her naively loving heart in the bosom of nature, in her eternal movement, in the swaying of her forest, in the trembling of a silver leaf on which a ray of sun lovingly plays, in the murmur stream, in the breeze:
Now she is in a hurry to the fields...
Now it’s either a hill or a stream
They stop you willy-nilly
Tatyana with her charm.
As if only nature can Tatiana tell nature her sorrows, the torment of her soul, the suffering of her heart. At the same time, Tatyana shares with nature and the integrity of her nature, the sublimity of her thoughts and aspirations, kindness and love, and selflessness. Only in unity with nature does Tatyana find harmony of spirit, only in this does she see the possibility of happiness for a person. And where else should she look for understanding, sympathy, consolation, who else should she turn to if not to nature, because she “seemed like a stranger in her own family.” As she herself writes to Onegin in a letter, “nobody understands her.” Tatyana finds peace and consolation in nature. So, Pushkin draws parallels between the elements of nature and human feelings. With this understanding of nature, the border between it and man is always moving. In the novel, nature is revealed through Tatyana, and Tatyana - through nature. For example, spring is the birth of Tatyana’s love, and love, in turn, is spring:
The time has come, she fell in love.
So the grain fell into the ground
Spring is animated by fire.
Tatyana, who is full of poetry and life, for whom it is so natural to feel nature, falls in love precisely in the spring, when her soul opens to changes in nature, blossoms in her hope for happiness, as the first flowers bloom in the spring, when nature awakens from sleep. Tatyana conveys to the spring breeze, rustling leaves, murmuring streams the trembling of her heart, the longing of her soul. The very explanation of Tatiana and Onegin, which takes place in the garden, is symbolic, and when “the longing for love drives Tatiana,” then “she goes to the garden to be sad.” Tatiana enters Onegin’s “fashionable cell,” and suddenly it becomes “dark in the valley,” and “the moon disappeared behind the mountain,” as if warning about Tatiana’s terrible discovery that she was destined to make (“Isn’t he a parody?”). Before leaving for Moscow, Tatyana says goodbye to her native land, to nature, as if sensing that she will not return back:
Sorry, peaceful valleys,
And you, familiar mountain peaks,
And you, familiar forests;
Sorry, heavenly beauty,
Sorry, cheerful nature;
Changing the sweet, quiet light
To the noise of brilliant vanities...
Forgive me too, my freedom!
Where and why am I running?
What does my fate promise me?
In this heartfelt address, Pushkin clearly shows that Tatyana cannot be separated from nature. And after all, Tatyana must leave her home just when her favorite time of year comes - the Russian winter:
Tatyana is afraid of the winter journey.
There is no doubt that one of the main purposes for which the image of Tatyana is introduced into the novel is to contrast her with Onegin, hypocrisy and the imperfection of light. This opposition is most fully reflected in Tatiana’s unity with nature, in her closeness to her people. Tatyana is a living example of a person’s inextricable connection with his country, with its culture, with its past, with its people.
Through the nature of Russia, Tatyana is connected with her culture and people. We already know that the author connects Tatyana’s name with “memories of antiquity,” but the most symbolic moment in this regard is the song of the girls that Tatyana Larina hears before meeting Onegin. “The Song of Girls” represents the second, after Tatiana’s letter, “human document” embedded in the novel. The song also talks about love (in the first version - tragic, but later, for greater contrast, Pushkin replaced it with the plot of happy love), the song introduces a completely new folklore point of view. Having replaced the first version of “Song of Girls” with the second, Pushkin gave preference to the example of wedding lyrics, which is closely related to the meaning of folklore symbolism in subsequent chapters. The symbolic meaning of the motif connects the episode with the heroine’s experiences. Onegin, on the contrary, does not hear this song, so we are still convinced that Tanya is truly a “folk” heroine in the novel. Let's turn to the last chapter of the novel:
...she's a dream
Strives for life on the field
To the village to the poor villagers,
To a secluded corner...
A living thread connecting Tatiana with the people runs through the entire novel. Separately in the composition, Tatiana’s dream is highlighted, which becomes a sign of closeness to the people’s consciousness. The descriptions of Christmastide preceding Tatyana’s dream immerse the heroine in an atmosphere of folklore:
Tatyana believed the legends
Of common folk antiquity,
And dreams, and card fortune-telling,
And the predictions of the moon.
She was worried about signs;
Let us note that Vyazemsky made a note to this part of the text:
Pushkin himself was superstitious.
Onegin Pushkin novel
Consequently, through Tatiana’s connection with Russian antiquity, we feel the kinship of the souls of the heroine and the author, and Pushkin’s character is revealed. In Mikhailovsky, Pushkin began an article where he wrote:
There is a way of thinking and feeling, there is a darkness of customs, beliefs and habits that belong exclusively to some people.
Hence the intense interest in signs, rituals, and fortune-telling, which for Pushkin, along with folk poetry, characterize the makeup of the people’s soul. Pushkin's faith in omens came into contact, on the one hand, with the conviction that random events repeat themselves, and on the other, with a conscious desire to assimilate the features of folk psychology. The exponent of this character trait of Pushkin was Tatyana, whose poetic belief in omens differs from the superstition of Hermann from The Queen of Spades, who, “having little true faith<…>, had a lot of prejudices." The signs that Tatyana believed in were perceived as the result of centuries-old observations of the course of random processes. Moreover, the era of romanticism, raising the question of the specifics of popular consciousness, seeing in tradition centuries-old experience and a reflection of the national mindset, saw in folk “superstitions” poetry and an expression of the people’s soul. It follows from this that Tatyana is an exclusively romantic heroine, as her dream proves.
So, Tatyana’s dream contains one of the main ideas of the novel: Tatyana could not feel so subtly if not for her closeness to the people. Pushkin purposefully selected those rituals that were most closely related to the emotional experiences of the heroine in love. During Christmas time, a distinction was made between “holy evenings” and “terrible evenings.” It is no coincidence that Tatyana’s fortune-telling took place precisely on those terrible evenings, at the same time when Lensky informed Onegin that he was called to his name day “that week.”
Tatyana's dream has a double meaning in the text of Pushkin's novel. Being central to the psychological characterization of the “Russian soul” of the heroine of the novel, it also plays a compositional role, connecting the content of the previous chapters with the dramatic events of the sixth chapter. The dream, first of all, is motivated psychologically: it is explained by Tatiana’s intense experiences after Onegin’s “strange” behavior that does not fit into any novel stereotypes during an explanation in the garden and the specific atmosphere of Christmastide - a time when girls, according to folklore, are trying to find out their fate enter into a risky and dangerous game with evil spirits. However, the dream also characterizes another side of Tatyana’s consciousness - her connection with folk life and folklore. Just as in the third chapter the inner world of the heroine of the novel was determined by the fact that she was “imagined” as “the heroine of her beloved creators,” now folk poetry is made the key to her consciousness. Tatyana's dream is an organic fusion of fairy-tale and song images with ideas imbued from Christmas and wedding rituals. Such an interweaving of folklore images in the figure of the Christmas “betrothed” turned out to be in Tatiana’s mind consonant with the “demonic” image of Onegin the vampire and Melmoth, which was created under the influence of the romantic “fables” of the “British muse”. Potebnya writes:
Tatyana Pushkina is “Russian at heart”, and she dreams of a Russian dream. This dream foreshadows getting married, although not to a sweetheart.
However, in fairy tales and folk mythology, crossing a river is also a symbol of death. This explains the dual nature of Tatyana’s dream: both ideas drawn from romantic literature and the folklore basis of the heroine’s consciousness force her to bring together the attractive and the terrible, love and death.
In "Eugene Onegin", in this immortal and inaccessible poem, Pushkin appeared as a great people's writer. He immediately, in the most “insightful”, most apt way, noted the very depths of society of that time. Having noted the type of the Russian wanderer, “the wanderer to this day and in our days,” guessing him with his genius instinct, he placed next to him the type of positive and undeniable beauty of the Russian woman. Pushkin was the first of all Russian writers to “bring before us the image of a woman whose strength of soul draws from the people.” The main beauty of this woman is in her truth, indisputable and tangible truth, and this truth can no longer be denied. The majestic image of Tatyana Larina, “found by Pushkin in the Russian land, brought out by him, has been placed before us forever in its indisputable, humble and majestic beauty.” Tatyana is evidence of that powerful spirit of people's life, which can highlight the image of such an undeniable truth. This image is given, it exists, it cannot be disputed, it cannot be said that it is fiction or fantasy, or perhaps an idealization of the poet:
You contemplate for yourself and agree: yes, this is, therefore, the spirit of the people, therefore, the vital force of this spirit is there, and it is great and immense.
In Tatyana one can hear Pushkin’s faith in the Russian character, in his spiritual power, and, therefore, hope for the Russian person. The very existence of Tatiana expresses the author's truth: without complete unity with her people, with her culture, with her native land, a nature so sublime and integral, full of poetry and life, cannot exist. It is unity with nature, Russia, people, culture that makes Tatyana an unearthly being, but at the same time so in love with life and all its manifestations that you involuntarily admire a soul so young, naive, but so firm and unshakable.
So, we already know that the novel is based on the opposition of Tatiana and Onegin, Tatiana and the St. Petersburg and Moscow light. It is not for nothing that Tatyana is opposed primarily to the light, since it is this light that gives birth to the Onegins, forces them to be at odds with themselves, and kills their best feelings. It’s interesting what V. G. Belinsky said about Pushkin’s Muse:
This is an aristocratic girl in whom seductive beauty and graceful spontaneity were combined with elegance of tone and noble beauty.
But the author, and not without reason, did not make “sweet Tanya” an aristocratic girl, in order to further show us the tragedy of society in general, and Onegin in particular. And, of course, Tatyana cannot seduce anyone, because this would be contrary to her entire nature. Only a person with such strength of soul, with such devotion to his ideals and dreams can resist the vulgarity and hypocrisy of the whole world.
And here we have Onegin as a typical representative of the youth of that time:
There was a pedant in his clothes
And what we called dandy...
How early could he be a hypocrite...
How quick and gentle his gaze was,
Shy and impudent, and sometimes
Shined with an obedient tear!...
How he knew how to seem new...
To amuse with pleasant flattery...
Tatyana is not like that: the purity of her soul reveals the tragedy of society. Because Tatyana is presented as a “district young lady, with sad thoughts in her eyes,” she is even dearer to our hearts. Don’t you immediately feel the sincerity in her, the light that she seems to exude? Tatyana is a type who stands firmly on her own ground. She is deeper than Onegin and, of course, smarter than him. She already feels with her noble instinct where and what the truth is, which is expressed in the ending of the poem. This is a type of positive beauty, the apotheosis of the Russian woman. Yes, precisely a Russian woman, because Tatyana is essentially a “folk” heroine. One can even say that such a beautiful type of Russian woman has almost never been repeated in Russian literature - except perhaps for Lisa in Turgenev’s “The Noble Nest”. Already in the first chapters of the novel, one can feel the opposition of Tatiana’s truly Russian soul to the “freaks of the big world,” which will be fully reflected at the end of the poem, when she is already directly in the world. But already at the very beginning, the author announces the appearance of a heroine, whose sincerity and soul shine through in her every word and gesture:
But it is enough to glorify the arrogant
With his chatty lyre;
They are not worth any passions
No songs inspired by them:
The words and nonsense of these sorceresses
Deceptive... like their legs.
In the last chapters of the novel, Tatyana is already directly presented in the world. And what? No, Tatyana is as pure in soul as before:
She was leisurely
Not cold, not talkative,
Without an insolent look for everyone,
Without pretensions to success,
Without these little antics,
No imitative ideas...
Everything was quiet, it was just there.
But the manner of looking down made it so that Onegin did not even recognize Tatyana at all when he met her for the first time, in the wilderness, in the modest image of a pure, innocent girl, who was so shy before him at first. He failed to distinguish completeness and perfection in the poor girl, which he still has to learn at the end of the novel. V. G. Belinsky believed that Onegin mistook Tatyana for a “moral embryo.” And this was after her letter to Onegin, which reflected all her experiences, feelings, childhood dreams, ideals, hopes. How readily did this girl trust Onegin’s honor:
But your honor is my guarantee,
And I boldly entrust myself to her...
By the way, Tatyana’s age only forces us to compare her at thirteen years old with a “worried soul” with Onegin at his eighteen years old, with the “jealous wives” of the world. An interesting fact is that, most likely, in the original version, Tatyana was seventeen years old, which is confirmed by Pushkin (November 29, 1824) in response to Vyazemsky’s remark regarding the contradictions in Tatyana’s letter to Onegin:
...a letter from a woman, seventeen years old at that, and in love!
Pushkin very accurately points out that Tatyana is much deeper than Evgeniy, emphasizing her age. Tatiana's age is another means of contrasting her with Onegin and society. Pushkin endows his beloved heroine with a subtle soul, sublime thoughts, and a “fiery heart.” Tatyana, at thirteen years old, is an exceptionally spiritually developed nature, with a special inner world, she is a firm and unshakable nature in her nobility, sincerity, and purity:
Tatiana loves seriously
And he surrenders unconditionally
Love like a sweet child.
Tatiana here represents another tragedy of Onegin: she passed him by in Eugene’s life, and carried her love throughout her life, although she was not appreciated by him. This is the tragedy of not only their novel, but also the tragedy of the human soul, because the very images of the heroes prove the impossibility of their joint happiness. And here a thirteen-year-old girl, perhaps, helps us understand, look into Eugene’s soul:
He is in his first youth
Was a victim of stormy delusions
And unbridled passions.
Indeed, the very presence of Tatyana in the novel clearly shows Onegin’s inner emptiness, generated, perhaps, as a tribute to light, fashion (“fashionable tyrant”), and Tatyana, of course, understands this. In the immortal stanzas of the novel, the poet depicted her visiting the house of a man still so mysterious to her. And here Tatyana is in his office, looking at his books, things, objects, trying to guess his soul from them, to solve her riddle, and finally, in thought with a strange smile, her lips quietly whisper:
What is he? Is it really imitation?
An insignificant ghost, or else
Muscovite in Harold's cloak,
interpretation of other people's whims,
A complete vocabulary of fashion words?...
Isn't he a parody?
In these words of Tatiana, the same tragedy of the world is exposed, about which so much has already been said earlier. And here she herself recognizes this very light for the first time, although she is far from it. In the draft versions, the condemnation of Onegin, and with him, as we understand, the world, was expressed in an even more harsh form:
Moskal in Harold's cloak...
The jester in Childe Harold's cloak...
He is a shadow, a pocket lexicon.
The view of Onegin as an imitative phenomenon, having no roots in Russian soil, makes Tatiana’s closeness to the people even more valuable. Yes, Tatyana had to unravel the soul shackled by the burden of light, she had to whisper it. And the exposure of this imitation, a disease of society, sounds even more terrible when it is uttered by a person as pure and naive as Tatyana.
In Moscow later, Tatyana already knows what to expect from society; she saw the reflection of this vicious light in Onegin. But Tatyana, in spite of everything, true to her feelings, did not betray her love. Secular court life did not touch the soul of “dear Tanya.” No, this is the same Tanya, the same old village Tanya! She is not spoiled; on the contrary, she has become even stronger in her desire for sincerity, truth, purity. She is depressed by this magnificent life, she suffers:
She's stuffy here... she's a dream
Striving for field life...
Simple maiden
With dreams, the heart of former days,
Now she has risen again in her.
It has already been said about comparing Tatyana with the moon, and here, in Moscow, Tatyana outshines everyone around her with her inner light:
She was sitting at the table
With the brilliant Nina Voronskaya,
This Cleopatra of the Neva;
And you would truly agree,
That Nina is a marble beauty
I couldn’t outshine my neighbor,
At least she was dazzling.
It was not for nothing that the author sat his Tatyana next to the “brilliant Nina Voronskaya,” since Nina is a collective image that contains external beauty, and even that, after all, “marble”, and internal emptiness. True, Pushkin’s Tatyana did not need to be explained, her soul “comes through in her every word, in every movement,” which is why Nina could not overshadow Tatyana. At the end of the novel, the kinship of the souls of Tatyana and Pushkin is most clearly expressed: the author trusts her to express his thoughts and feelings. Tatyana connects us with the author with her whole being. The answer to this question is the words of Kuchelbecker:
The poet in his eighth chapter is similar to Tatyana. For his lyceum friend, who grew up with him and knows him by heart, like me, the feeling with which Pushkin is filled is noticeable everywhere, although he, like his Tatyana, does not want the world to know about this feeling.
So, Tatyana is no longer only Pushkin’s muse, poetry, and, perhaps, life itself, but also the exponent of his ideas, feelings, thoughts says to Onegin:
But I was given to someone else
I will be faithful to him forever.
She said this precisely as a Russian woman, this is her apotheosis. She expresses the truth of the poem. It is in these lines that, perhaps, the entire ideal of the heroine is contained. Before us is a Russian woman, brave and spiritually strong. How can such a strong nature as Tatyana base her happiness on the misfortune of another? Happiness for her, first of all, lies in harmony of spirit. Could Tatyana, with her high soul, with her heart, have decided differently?
But the question of why Pushkin made his “affectionate Muse suffer so much” invariably worries the reader. Here, of course, it should be noted that being true to the truth, only the truth, he did not make her happy, he made her cry - about himself, about Onegin. Tatiana, in her misfortune, intensifies Onegin’s tragedy; the author threw him at Tatyana’s feet, forced him to curse his lot, to be horrified by his own life. He wrested from Evgeny the cruelest confession:
I thought: freedom and peace
Substitute for happiness. My God!
How wrong I was, how I was punished!
In Tatiana one can once again see the strength of the Russian spirit, drawn from the people. Tatyana is a woman of such spiritual beauty who humbled even the surrounding vulgarity. And this woman was “calm and free.” Pushkin took her away, leaving the word “fidelity” as the last word in her confession. Her beautiful soul was completely open to Pushkin; there was not a single dark corner where he “could not look with his mental gaze.” “Liberty and peace are a substitute for happiness,” she never looked for them, to please them she never fenced herself off from the world with contempt and indifference. She may not have known happiness in love, but she knew the high moral law that excludes selfishness (“Morality (morality) in the nature of things” by Necker), she knew her life goal, which with its even light was already capable of bestowing life to the end. Without looking back or thinking, she walked towards this goal; she walked firmly because she was “Russian in soul,” whole in her very being, and could not live any other way.
Tatyana cannot follow Onegin, because he is “a blade of grass carried by the wind.” She is not like that at all: even in despair, in the suffering consciousness that her life has been lost, she still has something solid and unshakable on which her soul rests. These are her childhood memories, memories of her homeland, the village soul in which her humble, pure life began - this is “the cross and the shadow of the branches over the grave of her poor nanny.” Oh, these memories and former images are more precious to her now, because they are the only ones left to her, but they are the ones who save her soul from final despair. And this is not a little, no, there is already a lot, because there is a whole foundation, there is something indestructible. Here is contact with the homeland, with the native people, with their shrine. “There are deep and strong souls,” says Dostoevsky, “who cannot consciously give up their shrine to shame, even out of endless suffering.”
But the tragedy of Onegin is even more terrible. After all, there is not a shadow of vindictiveness in Tatyana’s speech. That is why the fullness of retribution results, that is why Onegin stands “as if struck by thunder.” “She had all the trump cards in her hands, but she didn’t play.”
Which nation has such a loving heroine: brave and worthy, in love and adamant, clairvoyant and loving?
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Women whose behavior and appearance differ from the generally accepted canons of the ideal have always attracted the attention of both literary figures and readers. The description of this type of people allows us to lift the curtain of unknown life quests and aspirations. Tatyana Larina's image is ideal for this role
Family and childhood memories
Tatyana Larina belongs to the nobility by origin, but all her life she was deprived of an extensive secular society - she always lived in the village and never strived for an active city life.
Tatiana's father Dmitry Larin was a foreman. At the time of the actions described in the novel, he is no longer alive. It is known that he died young. “He was a simple and kind gentleman.”
The girl's mother's name is Polina (Praskovya). She was extradited as a girl under duress. For some time she was depressed and tormented, experiencing a feeling of attachment to another person, but over time she found happiness in family life with Dmitry Larin.
Tatyana also has a sister, Olga. She is not at all similar in character to her sister: cheerfulness and coquetry are a natural state for Olga.
An important person for Tatyana’s development as a person was her nanny Filipyevna. This woman is a peasant by birth and, perhaps, this is her main charm - she knows many folk jokes and stories that so captivate the inquisitive Tatyana. The girl has a very reverent attitude towards the nanny, she sincerely loves her.
Name selection and prototypes
Pushkin emphasizes the unusualness of his image at the very beginning of the story, giving the girl the name Tatyana. The fact is that for the high society of that time the name Tatyana was not characteristic. This name at that time had a pronounced folk character. In Pushkin's drafts there is information that initially the heroine had the name Natalya, but later Pushkin changed his intention.
Alexander Sergeevich mentioned that this image is not without a prototype, but did not indicate who exactly played such a role for him.
Naturally, after such statements, both his contemporaries and researchers of later years actively analyzed Pushkin’s environment and tried to find the prototype of Tatyana.
Opinions on this issue are divided. It is possible that multiple prototypes were used for this image.
One of the most suitable candidates is Anna Petrovna Kern - her similarity in character with Tatyana Larina leaves no doubt.
The image of Maria Volkonskaya is ideal for describing the tenacity of Tatyana's character in the second part of the novel.
The next person who bears a resemblance to Tatyana Larina is Pushkin’s sister Olga. In terms of her temperament and character, she ideally matches the description of Tatyana in the first part of the novel.
Tatyana also has a certain similarity with Natalya Fonvizina. The woman herself found a great resemblance to this literary character and expressed the opinion that she was the prototype of Tatyana.
An unusual suggestion about the prototype was made by Pushkin’s lyceum friend Wilhelm Kuchelbecker. He found that the image of Tatiana was very similar to Pushkin himself. This similarity is especially evident in chapter 8 of the novel. Kuchelbecker states: “the feeling with which Pushkin is filled is noticeable, although he, like his Tatyana, does not want the world to know about this feeling.”
Question about the heroine's age
In the novel, we meet Tatyana Larina during her growing up period. She is a girl of marriageable age.
The opinions of researchers of the novel on the question of the girl’s year of birth differed.
Yuri Lotman claims that Tatyana was born in 1803. In this case, in the summer of 1820 she just turned 17 years old.
However, this opinion is not the only one. There is an assumption that Tatyana was much younger. Such thoughts are prompted by the nanny’s story that she was married off at the age of thirteen, as well as the mention that Tatyana, unlike most girls her age, did not play with dolls at that time.
V.S. Babaevsky puts forward another version about Tatyana’s age. He believes that the girl should be much older than Lotman’s supposed age. If the girl had been born in 1803, then the girl’s mother’s concern about the lack of options for her daughter’s marriage would not have been so pronounced. In this case, a trip to the so-called “bride fair” would not yet be necessary.
Appearance of Tatyana Larina
Pushkin does not go into a detailed description of Tatyana Larina’s appearance. The author is more interested in the heroine's inner world. We learn about Tatyana's appearance in contrast to the appearance of her sister Olga. The sister has a classic appearance - she has beautiful blond hair and a ruddy face. In contrast to this, Tatyana has dark hair, her face is excessively pale, devoid of color.
We invite you to familiarize yourself with A. S. Pushkin’s “Eugene Onegin”
Her look is full of despondency and sadness. Tatyana was too thin. Pushkin notes, “no one could call her beautiful.” Meanwhile, she was still an attractive girl, she had a special beauty.
Leisure and attitude towards needlework
It was generally accepted that the female half of society spent their free time doing needlework. The girls, in addition, also played with dolls or various active games (the most common was burners).
Tatiana does not like to do any of these activities. She loves listening to the nanny's scary stories and sitting by the window for hours.
Tatyana is very superstitious: “She was worried about omens.” The girl also believes in fortune telling and that dreams don’t just happen, they carry a certain meaning.
Tatyana is fascinated by novels - “they replaced everything for her.” She likes to feel like the heroine of such stories.
However, Tatyana Larina’s favorite book was not a love story, but a dream book “Martyn Zadeka became later / Tanya’s favorite.” Perhaps this is due to Tatyana’s great interest in mysticism and everything supernatural. It was in this book that she could find the answer to the question that interested her: “he gives her joy / in all her sorrows / and sleeps with her without leaving.”
Personality characteristics
Tatyana is not like most girls of her era. This applies to external data, hobbies, and character. Tatyana was not a cheerful and active girl who was easily given to coquetry. “Wild, sad, silent” is Tatyana’s classic behavior, especially in society.
Tatyana loves to indulge in daydreams - she can fantasize for hours. The girl has difficulty understanding her native language, but is in no hurry to learn it; in addition, she rarely engages in self-education. Tatyana gives preference to novels that can disturb her soul, but at the same time she cannot be called stupid, rather the opposite. Tatyana's image is full of “perfections”. This fact is in sharp contrast to the rest of the characters in the novel, who do not possess such components.
Due to her age and inexperience, the girl is too trusting and naive. She trusts the impulse of emotions and feelings.
Tatyana Larina is capable of tender feelings not only in relation to Onegin. With her sister Olga, despite the striking difference between the girls in temperament and perception of the world, she is connected by the most devoted feelings. In addition, she develops a feeling of love and tenderness towards her nanny.
Tatiana and Onegin
New people coming to the village always arouse interest among the permanent residents of the area. Everyone wants to meet a newcomer, learn about him - life in the village is not distinguished by the variety of events, and new people bring with them new topics for conversation and discussion.
Onegin's arrival did not go unnoticed. Vladimir Lensky, who was lucky enough to become Evgeniy’s neighbor, introduces Onegin to the Larins. Evgeny is very different from all the inhabitants of village life. His manner of speaking, behaving in society, his education and ability to conduct a conversation pleasantly amaze Tatyana, and not only her.
However, “the feelings in him cooled down early,” Onegin “has completely lost interest in life,” he is already bored with beautiful girls and their attention, but Larina has no idea about this.
Onegin instantly becomes the hero of Tatiana's novel. She idealizes the young man; he seems to her like he came straight out of the pages of her books about love:
Tatiana loves seriously
And he surrenders unconditionally
Love like a sweet child.
Tatyana suffers for a long time in languor and decides to take a desperate step - she decides to confess to Onegin and tell him about her feelings. Tatyana writes a letter.
The letter carries a double meaning. On the one hand, the girl expresses indignation and grief associated with Onegin’s arrival and her love. She has lost the peace in which she lived before and this leads the girl to bewilderment:
Why did you visit us
In the wilderness of a forgotten village
I would never have known you.
I wouldn't know bitter torment.
On the other hand, the girl, having analyzed her position, sums up: Onegin’s arrival is salvation for her, it is fate. Due to her character and temperament, Tatyana could not become the wife of any of the local suitors. She is too alien and incomprehensible for them - Onegin is another matter, he is able to understand and accept her:
It is destined in the highest council...
That is the will of heaven: I am yours;
My whole life was a pledge
The faithful date with you.
However, Tatyana’s hopes were not justified - Onegin does not love her, but was just playing with the girl’s feelings. The next tragedy in the girl’s life is the news of the duel between Onegin and Lensky, and the death of Vladimir. Evgeniy is leaving.
Tatyana falls into a blues - she often comes to Onegin’s estate and reads his books. Over time, the girl begins to understand that the real Onegin is radically different from the Eugene she wanted to see. She just idealized the young man.
This is where her unfulfilled romance with Onegin ends.
Tatiana's dream
Unpleasant events in the girl’s life, associated with the lack of mutual feelings for the object of her love, and then death, two weeks before the wedding of Vladimir Lensky’s sister’s fiancé, were preceded by a strange dream.
Tatyana always attached great importance to dreams. This same dream is doubly important for her, because it is the result of Christmas fortune-telling. Tatyana was supposed to see her future husband in a dream. The dream becomes prophetic.
At first, the girl finds herself in a snowy clearing, she approaches a stream, but the passage through it is too fragile, Larina is afraid of falling and looks around for an assistant. A bear appears from under a snowdrift. The girl gets scared, but when she sees that the bear is not going to attack, but on the contrary, he offers her his help, extends his hand to him - the obstacle has been overcome. However, the bear is in no hurry to leave the girl; he follows her, which scares Tatyana even more.
The girl tries to escape from her pursuer - she goes into the forest. Tree branches catch her clothes, take off her earrings, tear off her scarf, but Tatyana, gripped by fear, runs forward. The deep snow does not allow her to escape and the girl falls. At this time, a bear overtakes her; he does not attack her, but picks her up and carries her further.
A hut appears ahead. The bear says that his godfather lives here and Tatyana can warm up. Once in the hallway, Larina hears the sound of fun, but it reminds her of a wake. Strange guests - monsters - are sitting at the table. The girl is overcome with both fear and curiosity; she quietly opens the door - the owner of the hut turns out to be Onegin. He notices Tatyana and heads towards her. Larina wants to run away, but she can’t - the door opens and all the guests see her:
... Fierce laughter
It sounded wild; everyone's eyes
Hooves, trunks are crooked,
Tufted tails, fangs,
Mustaches, bloody tongues,
Horns and fingers are bone,
Everything points to her
And everyone shouts: mine! my!
The imperious owner calms the guests - the guests disappear, and Tatyana is invited to the table. Olga and Lensky immediately appear in the hut, causing a storm of indignation on the part of Onegin. Tatyana is horrified by what is happening, but does not dare to intervene. In a fit of anger, Onegin takes a knife and kills Vladimir. The dream ends, it’s morning already.
Tatyana's marriage
A year later, Tatiana’s mother comes to the conclusion that it is necessary to take her daughter to Moscow - Tatiana has every chance of remaining a virgin:
At Kharitonya's alley
Cart in front of the house at the gate
Has stopped. To the old aunt
The patient has been suffering from consumption for four years,
They have arrived now.
Aunt Alina joyfully received the guests. She herself was unable to get married at one time and lived alone all her life.
Here, in Moscow, Tatiana is noticed by an important, fat general. He was struck by Larina’s beauty and “meanwhile he couldn’t take his eyes off her.”
Pushkin does not reveal the general’s age, as well as his exact name, in the novel. Alexander Sergeevich calls Larina’s admirer General N. It is known that he took part in military events, which means that his career advancement could occur at an accelerated pace, in other words, he received the rank of general without being at an advanced age.
Tatyana does not feel even a shadow of love towards this man, but still agrees to the marriage.
The details of their relationship with her husband are not known - Tatyana came to terms with her role, but she did not have a feeling of love for her husband - it was replaced by affection and a sense of duty.
Love for Onegin, despite the debunking of his idealistic image, still did not leave Tatyana’s heart.
Meeting with Onegin
Two years later, Evgeny Onegin returns from his journey. He does not go to his village, but visits his relative in St. Petersburg. As it turned out, during these two years, changes occurred in the life of his relative:
“So you're married! I didn’t know before!
How long ago?” - About two years. -
"On whom?" - On Larina. - “Tatyana!”
Onegin, who always knows how to restrain himself, succumbs to excitement and feelings - he is overcome by anxiety: “Is it really her? But definitely... No...".
Tatyana Larina has changed a lot since their last meeting - they no longer look at her as a strange provincial girl:
The ladies moved closer to her;
The old women smiled at her;
The men bowed lower
The girls walked by more quietly.
Tatyana learned to behave like all secular women. She knows how to hide her emotions, is tactful towards other people, there is a certain amount of coolness in her behavior - all this surprises Onegin.
Tatyana, it seems, was not at all stunned, unlike Evgeny, by their meeting:
Her eyebrow didn't move;
She didn't even press her lips together.
Always so brave and lively, Onegin was at a loss for the first time and did not know how to speak to her. Tatyana, on the contrary, asked him with the most indifferent expression on her face about the trip and the date of his return.
Since then, Evgeniy has lost peace. He realizes that he loves a girl. He comes to them every day, but feels awkward in front of the girl. All his thoughts are occupied only with her - from the very morning he jumps out of bed and counts the hours remaining until they meet.
But the meetings do not bring relief either - Tatyana does not notice his feelings, she behaves with restraint, proudly, in a word, just like Onegin himself towards her two years ago. Consumed by excitement, Onegin decides to write a letter.
Noticing a spark of tenderness in you,
“I didn’t dare believe her,” he writes about the events of two years ago.
Evgeniy confesses his love to a woman. “I was punished,” he says, explaining his past recklessness.
Like Tatyana, Onegin entrusts her with the solution to the problem that has arisen:
Everything is decided: I am in your will
And I surrender to my fate.
However, there was no answer. The first letter is followed by another and another, but they remain unanswered. Days pass - Evgeniy cannot lose his anxiety and confusion. He comes to Tatyana again and finds her sobbing over his letter. She was very similar to the girl he met two years ago. Excited Onegin falls at her feet, but
Tatyana is categorical - her love for Onegin has not yet faded, but Eugene himself ruined their happiness - he neglected her when she was unknown to anyone in society, not rich and not “favored by the court.” Evgeny was rude to her, he played with her feelings. Now she is the wife of another man. Tatyana does not love her husband, but she will “be faithful to him forever,” because it cannot be any other way. Another scenario is contrary to the girl’s life principles.
Tatyana Larina as assessed by critics
Roman A.S. Pushkin’s “Eugene Onegin” has become the subject of active research and scientific-critical activity for several generations. The image of the main character Tatyana Larina became the cause of repeated controversy and analysis.
- Yu. Lotman in his works he actively analyzed the essence and principle of writing Tatiana’s letter to Onegin. He came to the conclusion that the girl, having read novels, recreated “a chain of reminiscences primarily from the texts of French literature.”
- V.G. Belinsky, says that for Pushkin’s contemporaries the release of the third chapter of the novel became a sensation. The reason for this was Tatyana’s letter. According to the critic, Pushkin himself until that moment did not realize the power produced by the letter - he calmly read it, just like any other text.
The writing style is a little childish, romantic - this touches, because Tatyana was not yet aware of the feelings of love “the language of passions was so new and inaccessible to the morally dumb Tatyana: she would not have been able to understand or express her own feelings if she had not resorted to to the help of the impressions left on her.” - D. Pisarev I wasn’t so inspired by Tatyana’s image. He believes that the girl’s feelings are fake - she inspires them herself and thinks that it is the truth. While analyzing the letter to Tatiana, the critic notes that Tatiana is still aware of Onegin’s lack of interest in her person, because she suggests that Onegin’s visits will not be regular; this state of affairs does not allow the girl to become a “virtuous mother.” “And now, by your grace, I, a cruel man, must disappear,” writes Pisarev. In general, the image of a girl in his concept is not the most positive and borders on the definition of a “hillbilly”.
- F. Dostoevsky believes that Pushkin should have named his novel not after Evgeniy, but after Tatiana. Since this heroine is the main character in the novel. In addition, the writer notes that Tatyana has a much greater intelligence than Evgeniy. She knows how to act correctly in current situations. Her image is noticeably firm. “A firm type, standing firmly on its own soil,” Dostoevsky says about her.
- V. Nabokov notes that Tatyana Larina has become one of her favorite characters. As a result, her image turned “into the ‘national type’ of the Russian woman.” However, over time, this character was forgotten - with the beginning of the October Revolution, Tatyana Larina lost her significance. For Tatyana, according to the writer, there was another unfavorable period. During Soviet rule, the younger sister Olga occupied a much more advantageous position in relation to her sister.
