How Leskov saw the Russian national character. Lecture: Russian national character as depicted by Leskov

PICTURE OF THE RUSSIAN NATIONAL CHARACTER IN THE WORKS OF N. S. LESKOV

If all the Russian classics of the last century, already during their lifetime or soon after their death, were recognized by literary and social thought in this capacity, then Leskov was “ranked” among the classics only in the second half of our century, although Leskov’s special mastery of language was undeniable, they did not talk about him only fans of his talent, but even his ill-wishers noted. Leskov was distinguished by his ability to always and in everything go “against the current,” as he called later book biographer about him. If his contemporaries (Turgenev, Tolstoy, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Dostoevsky) cared primarily about ideological and psychological side their works, were looking for answers to the social demands of the time, then Leskov was interested in this to a lesser extent, or he gave such answers that, having offended and outraged everyone, rained down critical thunder and lightning on his head, plunging the writer into disgrace for a long time among critics of all camps and among “advanced” readers.

Our problem national character became one of the main literature of the 60-80s, closely connected with the activities of various revolutionaries, and later populists. Leskov also paid attention to her (and quite widely). We find the essence of the character of a Russian person revealed in many of his works: in the story “The Enchanted Wanderer”, in the novel “The Cathedral People”, in the stories “Lefty”, “Iron Will”, “The Sealed Angel”, “Robbery”, “Warrior” and others. Leskov introduced unexpected and, for many critics and readers, undesirable accents into solving the problem. This is the story of Lady Macbeth Mtsensk district", clearly demonstrating the writer’s ability to be ideologically and creatively independent of the demands and expectations of the most advanced forces of the time.

Written in 1864, the story is subtitled "Essay". But he should not be trusted literally. Of course, Leskov's story is based on certain life facts, but this designation of the genre rather expressed aesthetic position writer: Leskov opposed poetic fiction modern writers, a fiction that often tendentiously distorted the edit of life, the essay, newspaper and journalistic accuracy of his life observations. The title of the story, by the way, is very capacious in meaning, leads directly to the problem of the Russian national character, the Mtsensk merchant Katerina Izmailova is one of the eternal types of world literature - a bloody and ambitious villainess, whom the lust for power led along the steps from corpses to the radiance of the crown, and then mercilessly threw off into the abyss of madness.

There is also a polemical aspect to the story. The image of Katerina Izmailova argues with the image of Katerina Kabanova from Ostrovsky's "The Thunderstorm". At the beginning of the story, an inconspicuous but significant detail is reported: if Katerina Ostrovsky before her marriage was the same rich merchant’s daughter as her husband, then Leskov’s “lady” was taken into the Izmailovo family from poverty, perhaps not from the merchant class, but from the philistinism or peasantry. That is, Leskov’s heroine is an even greater commoner and democrat than Ostrovsky’s. And then there is the same thing as in Ostrovsky: marriage not for love, boredom and idleness, reproaches of the father-in-law and husband, that he is “not a relative” (there are no children), and, finally, the first and fatal love. Leskov’s Katerina was much less lucky with her heart-loving chosen one than Katerina Kabanova with Boris: her husband’s clerk Sergei is a vulgar and selfish man, a boor and a scoundrel. And then a bloody drama unfolds. For the sake of uniting with a loved one and elevating him to merchant dignity, the chilling details of murders (father-in-law, husband, young nephew - the legal heir of Izmailovo's wealth), a trial, a journey along a convoy to Siberia, Sergei's betrayal, the murder of a rival and suicide in the Volga waves.

Why was a social situation similar to Ostrovsky’s drama resolved in Leskov’s case so much? in a wild way? In the nature of Katerina Izmailova, first of all, the poetry of Kalinov’s Katerina is absent, and vulgarity hits the eyes. However, her nature is also very integral and decisive, but there is no love in her, and, most importantly, the Mtsensk “lady” does not believe in God. The most characteristic detail: before committing suicide, “he wants to remember a prayer and moves his lips, and her lips whisper” a vulgar and terrible song. The poetry of religious faith and the firmness of Christian morality elevated Katerina Ostrovsky to the heights of national tragedy, and therefore her lack of education, intellectual underdevelopment (one might say darkness), perhaps even illiteracy is not felt by us as a disadvantage. Katerina Kabanova turns out to be a bearer of a patriarchal, but also a culture. In his story, Leskov constantly emphasizes the God-forsakenness of the world he depicts. He quotes the words of the wife of the biblical Job: “Curse the day of your birth and die,” and then proclaims a hopeless verdict or diagnosis for the Russian man: “Who does not want to listen to these words, who is not flattered by the thought of death even in this sad situation , but it frightens, he must try to drown out these howling voices with something even more ugly than them. A simple person understands this perfectly well: he sometimes unleashes his bestial simplicity, begins to act stupidly, mocks himself, people, and feelings. Not particularly gentle and without that, he becomes extremely angry." Moreover, this passage is the only one in the story where the author openly interferes with the text, which is otherwise distinguished by its objective manner of narration.

Contemporary revolutionary-democratic criticism of the writer, who looked at this with hope and tenderness common man, calling Rus' to the ax, these ordinary people, did not want to notice Leskov’s story, published in the magazine “Epoch” by the brothers F. and M. Dostoevsky. The story gained unprecedented widespread popularity among Soviet readers, becoming, along with “Lefty,” Leskov’s most frequently republished work.

Pushkin has the lines: “The darkness of low truths is dearer to me / The deception that elevates us,” i.e. poetic fiction. So are the two Katerinas of two Russian classics. The power of Ostrovsky’s poetic invention acts on the soul, let’s remember Dobrolyubov, refreshingly and encouragingly; Leskov elevates it.” low truth"about the darkness (in a different sense) of the soul of a Russian commoner. In both cases, the cause was love. Just love. How little was needed to pile up a mountain of corpses in order to reveal “animal simplicity” to a not particularly gentle Russian person! And what kind of love is this, that murder becomes its part." Leskov's story is instructive, it makes us think, first of all, about ourselves: who are we, as one Ostrovsky character said, "what kind of nation are you?" what we are and why we are like this.

Research

on the topic

“Russian national character in the work

N.S. Leskova "The Enchanted Wanderer"

I've done the work:

teacher of Russian language and literature MKOU "Open (shift) comprehensive school urban district of the city of Mikhailovka, Volgograd region"

Klochkova Irina Vasilievna

Leskov is an original Russian writer...

Reading his books, you feel Rus' better

with all its good and bad...

M. Gorky “N.S. Leskov." 1923

Goals:

Show how the Russian national character is depicted in the work

N. S. Leskova “The Enchanted Wanderer”

Tasks:

1. Study the character of the Russian people in the works of N. S. Leskov.

2. Learn the language of N.S. Leskova.

"The Enchanted Wanderer".

Already in the title of the work - “The Enchanted Wanderer” -

encrypted certain meaning. N.A. Berdyaev believed

wandering important element Russian national

self-awareness. It is typical for Russian soil culture

feeling of limitless space. It comes from him

the desire to master these spaces, to walk through them. Kaliki

passersby, elders without tonsure, wandering preachers,

saints of the Russian land - they all embarked on a journey

across Rus', so that, like the “Russian Christ,” “to proceed from it,

blessing." The development of the world takes place through

wandering. At the same time, the wanderer

does not have his own home on earth,

because he walks in search of the Kingdom of God and preaches

his coming. The quest for the Kingdom of God is eternal

wandering in search of the meaning of life, because, as he believed

S.L. Frank, “the only human affair is

this is that, outside of all private, earthly affairs,

seek and find the meaning of life."

Ivan Severyanych Flyagin

"It was a man enormous growth, with dark open face and thick wavy hair lead-colored: his gray cast was so strange. He was dressed in a novice cassock with a wide monastic belt and a high black cloth cap... This new companion... looked like small years old over fifty, but he was in in every sense a hero, and a typical one at that. Simple-minded. A kind Russian hero, reminiscent of grandfather Ilya Muromets in beautiful picture Vereshchagin and in the poem of Count A.K. Tolstoy"

“Enchanted means “bewitched”, being in the grip of mythological forces.

“Bewitchment” constitutes the second side of the hero’s image, which correlates with his national character, just as its two principles—national and mythological—correlate in the story itself.

Having experienced a deep moral shock with the death of the gypsy woman, Ivan Severyanych is imbued with a completely new moral desire for him to “suffer.” If earlier long years In his life, he himself felt like a free son of nature, but now for the first time he is filled with a sense of duty to another person. By his own admission, the death of Grusha “crossed out” all of him. He thinks “only one thing, that Grusha’s soul is now lost” and his duty is “to suffer for her and rescue her from hell.”

Russian national character in Leskov's story .

Episode title

About the hero, quotes

Forey mischief, saving the count

The story with the cat

The “prayerful son” Golovan the monk’s postilion “decided on life” and saved the count’s family from imminent death (the cart was on the brink of an abyss). “I don’t know if I feel sorry for the gentlemen or if I feel sorry for myself.” In gratitude, he “begged” harmony from the count and “went from one guard to another, enduring more and more.”

Features of the language

The “enemy German” condemned the count’s savior “to litter a whole mountain of stone for a cat’s tail,” but “the gypsy saved me,” then Ivan “cried” and “became a robber.”

Conversational vocabulary

Mischief,

carelessness, frankness, fearlessness.

Conversational vocabulary

Resentment, revenge

Chapter

Episode title

About the hero, quotes

Nanny of the master's child.

Features of the language

“I went to market to get hired.” “The Russian man can handle everything.” Didn't take the banknotes from the officer. “I gave the child to the lady,” and he left with them.

Fight with the Kyrgyz

Savakirei.

Conclusion

Outdated words

“Beating with whips” for the horse. Kills the enemy. “Wonderful,” I say, what a horse! He knows how to control horses and tame their temper. He is captured by the Tatars. They had a doctor. He gets married, unbaptized children are born. “I can’t warm a place under me anywhere.”

“He loved that child.” Integrity, kindness.

The competition is reminiscent of the epic duel between a Russian hero and a busurman.

He knows how to endure pain: “...I put a penny in my mouth so as not to feel pain.” A sense of beauty is inherent. Irresponsibility towards children.

Chapter

Episode title

About the hero, quotes

Escape from the Tatars

Features of the language

Life with a prince.

“The biggest firework set off and left,” “he found himself in prison, from there he was sent to his province, flogged by the police and taken to his estate.”

Conclusion

Coneser with the prince. “He lived for three years not as a slave, but more as a friend and helper”

Conversational style

Meeting with Grusha

It turns out to be stronger than hostile circumstances

Outdated words.

“This is where the real beauty is!” “She stung me with her beauty and talent.”

The story of the “death of Pear”.

“Natural talent” was revealed.

Exclamatory sentences

“Have pity on me, my dear, stab me once with a knife against the heart.” “I didn’t stab her, but picked her up and pushed her down the steep side into the river.”

Knows how to appreciate beauty

Dialogical speech.

Feels guilty, sinful for what he has done. A new journey in the name of atonement for sin.

Chapter

Episode title

Wandering

About the hero, quotes

He enlists as a soldier for many years of service instead of a young peasant guy - the son of old, infirm parents. “Stayed in the Caucasus for more than 15 years” His name was Pyotr Serdyukov. Called to carry out a deadly order (stretch a rope across the river).

Features of the language

Flyagin's life in the monastery

The monastery is the last of his habitats described in the story. Temptation of the righteous by the demon. He prophesied in an empty cellar.

Conclusion

Kind, ready to sacrifice himself for the sake of another. Brave. “I fell in love with monastic life.”

The story is brought closer to the lives of prophetic dreams and visions, a comic reduction of the image.

Prophecy, obedience, peace and obedience. He likes it, he feels good in the monastery.

Inconsistency of character

Ivan Severyanych Flyagin:

Stale

Childishly naive

Frank

Closed

Fearless

Cruel

Harmony with the outside world

There is no peace in my soul

Self-esteem

Submission to fate

Reminds me of an epic hero

Looks like a hero from an adventure novel

The hero of the story, says M.L.Cherednikova- “an involuntary wanderer, for there is no place for this extraordinary person anywhere. He is “charmed”, bewitched, because he constantly experiences the power of circumstances in which he is not free to control his destiny. At the same time, the meaning of the name is also determined by the unique artistic nature of Ivan Severyanych, who is capable of experiencing the charm of life, beauty and love.”

N. I. Prutskov writes: “His whole life passes in various charms, in artistic, unselfish hobbies. Ivan Severyanich is dominated by the spell of love for life, for people, for nature and his homeland. Such natures are capable of becoming obsessed, they fall into illusions, into self-forgetfulness, into dreams, into an enthusiastically poetic state, not yet awakening to a conscious, organized historical life.”

Composition

In his work, N. S. Leskov tried to reveal the soul of the Russian person, to evaluate his unique character. That is why extraordinary personalities are always at the center of this writer’s works. In their depiction, the author reaches an extreme degree of typification, so they become symbols of the entire people as a whole.

Thus, in the story “The Enchanted Wanderer” Leskov shows the reader the beauty of the Russian national character. The bearer of this amazing gift is called Ivan Severyanovich Flyagin. The reader gets to know him during the narrator's journey across Lake Ladoga. It is thanks to the narrator’s observation and love for people that we, following him, see in Flyagin “a typical, simple-minded, kind Russian hero.”

How does the author describe it? This hero, of course, is of enormous height, with an open face and thick hair: “He wouldn’t have to walk around in a cassock, but would sit on a “forelock” and ride in bast shoes through the forest.” We already guess that this is not just a portrait, but a psychological portrait. With its help, the author laconically tries to tell that the appearance of the “Russian hero” is a complete consequence of his inner life, since he is a man of nature, completely pure and true. We are ready in advance to listen to this person, believe him and justify him, if necessary.

But if external beauty and masculinity can be realized just by looking at a person, then inner beauty is revealed, first of all, by deeds and behavior. So what are our hero's affairs?

Leskov considers the ambiguity of Flyagin’s nature to be a feature of the Russian national character. So, for example, a hero in the heat of the moment can kill someone to death (Ivan Severyanovich demonstrates his prowess when he fights a Tatar), but at the same time he is immediately ready to give his last to the hungry. This, according to the author, is where the broad, heroic soul of the Russian person manifests itself, which no one can understand with the mind, as Tyutchev said in his time.

If we recall another classic of Russian literature - Nekrasov, then we can say that not only a Russian woman, but also a Russian man can stop a galloping horse. Ivan tells how he pacifies a horse: “I will grit my teeth terribly at it, so sometimes even the brain will appear from the forehead in the nostrils along with the blood - that’s what pacifies it.”

The hero is generally very attached to horses. He describes them very vividly and vividly: “The mare was truly marvelous, not very tall, with arabic underparts, but swift, a small head, a full eye, like an apple, watchful ears; the barrel is the most sonorous, airy, the back is like an arrow, and the legs are light, chiseled, the most breathable.”

But Ivan Severyanych performs not only heroic deeds. He saves people from imminent death. Moreover, he does this not out of selfish motives or even out of a sense of duty. So, while still just a boy, the hero traveled with the count and countess to Voronezh. Along the way, the cart almost falls into the abyss. Ivan stops the horses, saves his owners, and almost dies, falling off a cliff.

Much later, after the death of Grusha, Flyagin wanders to an unknown destination and meets an old man and an old woman. And instead of their son he goes to fight in the Caucasus for fifteen years. Thus, behind the external rudeness and cruelty, hidden in Ivan Severyanovich is the enormous kindness and self-sacrifice characteristic of the Russian people.

This natural kindness is fully revealed in the hero when he becomes a nanny. He becomes truly attached to the girl he is caring for and considers her his own child. In dealing with the girl, the hero is caring and gentle. When he meets the mother of his pupil, he sincerely hesitates whether to give her the child or not. And the love that Flyagin felt for the child and because of which he did not want to part with his “daughter” helps him understand that it is necessary to give the child away, because a mother is a mother...

The hero also passes the test of female love, because only a real integral character capable of loving strongly and selflessly. Grusha appears in the life of Ivan Severyanovich. A true kinship of souls arises between them. But circumstances so happened that the hero helps Grusha commit suicide. He pushes the girl off a cliff into the river, because he understands that she future life will turn into hell. Flyagin takes responsibility for this crime. He is ready to pay for his actions and atone for it.

And the hero atones for his sin by nine years of captivity among the Tatars. During all this time, he was never able to get used to the steppes. In captivity, Flyagin is tormented by a mortal longing for his homeland, for everything from which he was excommunicated. In the middle of the night, the hero “crawled out slowly behind the headquarters... and began to pray: “You pray so much that even the snow under your knees will melt and where the tears fell, you will see grass in the morning.”

Much later, when Flyagin had already entered monasticism, he was put in a cellar for a long time as punishment. But the hero doesn’t even compare it with the steppe: “Well, no, sir: how can you compare? Here you can hear the church bells, and comrades visited.”

At the end of the story, we understand that, having arrived at the monastery, Ivan Severyanych does not calm down. He foresees war and is about to go there. He says: “I really want to die for the people.” These words symbolize the main property of the Russian character - the willingness to suffer for others and die for the Motherland.

In his story, Leskov claims that such beauty of the soul is characteristic only of the Russian person and only the Russian person can demonstrate it so fully and widely.

Other works on this work

Russian people are generally broad people...

wide as their land,

and extremely prone

to the fantastic, to the disorderly;

but the trouble is being wide

without much genius.

F.M. Dostoevsky

One can talk endlessly about the Russian character and its characteristics... There are so many things mixed up in a Russian person that you can’t even count them on your fingers.

What does it mean to be Russian? What is the peculiarity of the Russian character? How often do gray-haired academics ask this question in scientific debates, smart journalists in various shows, and ordinary citizens in table discussions? They ask and answer. They answer differently, but everyone notes our Russian “specialness” and is proud of it. You can’t lure a Russian person with a roll - Russians are so eager to preserve their own, dear, that they are proud of the most disgusting aspects of their identity: drunkenness, dirt, poverty. Russians make up jokes about how no one can outdrink them, happily showing their dirt to foreigners.

“Mysterious Russian soul”... What kind of epithets do we bestow on our Russian mentality. Is she so mysterious, the Russian soul, is she really so unpredictable? Maybe everything is much simpler? We Russians are capable of self-sacrifice in the name of our homeland, but we are not able to defend our interests as citizens of this country. We meekly accept all the resolutions and decisions of our leadership: we are choking in queues to replace our driver’s licenses; we lose consciousness in passport and visa services while waiting to receive a new passport; we upholster the thresholds tax office, in order to find out what number you now live under in this world. And this list can be continued endlessly. Limitless patience is what distinguishes a Russian person. How can one disagree with foreigners who personify us with a bear - huge, menacing, but so clumsy? We are probably rougher, certainly tougher in many cases. Russians have cynicism, emotional limitations, and a lack of culture. There is fanaticism, unscrupulousness, and cruelty. But still, mostly Russians strive for good.

For a Russian person, this is the most terrible accusation - the accusation of greed. All Russian folklore is based on the fact that being greedy is bad and greed is punishable. The catch, apparently, is that this same breadth can only be polar: drunkenness, unhealthy gambling, living for free, on the one hand. But, on the other hand, the purity of faith, carried and preserved through the centuries. Again, a Russian person cannot believe quietly and modestly. He never hides, but behind faith goes to execution, he walks with his head held high, striking his enemies.

Very accurately the character traits of the Russian person are noted in folk tales and epics. In them, the Russian man dreams of a better future, but he is too lazy to make his dreams come true. He still hopes that he will catch a talking pike or catch goldfish who will fulfill his wishes. This primordial Russian laziness and love of dreaming about the advent of better times has always prevented our people from living like human beings. And the tendency towards acquisitiveness, again mixed with great laziness! A Russian person is too lazy to grow or make something that his neighbor has - it is much easier for him to steal it, and even then not himself, but to ask someone else to do it. A typical example of this is the case of the king and rejuvenating apples. Of course, in fairy tales and satirical stories many features are greatly exaggerated and sometimes reach the point of absurdity, but nothing appears on empty space- there is no smoke without fire. Such a trait of the Russian character as long-suffering often goes beyond the bounds of reason. From time immemorial, Russian people have resignedly endured humiliation and oppression. The already mentioned laziness and blind faith in a better future are partly to blame here. Russian people would rather endure than fight for their rights. But no matter how great the patience of the people, it is still not limitless. The day comes and humility transforms into unbridled rage. Then woe to anyone who gets in the way. It’s not for nothing that Russian people are compared to a bear.

But not everything is so bad and gloomy in our Fatherland. We Russians have many positive traits character. Russians are deeply partisan and possess high strength spirit, they are able to defend their land to the last drop of blood. Since ancient times, both young and old have risen to fight against invaders.

A special conversation about the character of Russian women. Russian woman has unbending strength spirit, she is ready to sacrifice everything for loved one and follow him to the ends of the earth. Moreover, this is not blindly following a spouse, like oriental women, but quite conscious and independent decision. This is what the wives of the Decembrists did, going after them to distant Siberia and dooming themselves to a life full of hardships. Nothing has changed since then: even now, in the name of love, a Russian woman is ready to spend her entire life wandering around the most remote corners of the world.

Speaking about the peculiarities of the Russian character, one cannot fail to mention the cheerful disposition - a Russian sings and dances even in the most difficult periods of his life, and even more so in joy! He is generous and loves to go out on a grand scale - the breadth of the Russian soul has already become the talk of the town. Only a Russian person can give everything he has for the sake of one happy moment and not regret it later. Let's remember the poor artist who sold everything he had and showered his beloved with flowers. This is a fairy tale, but it is not so far from life - a Russian person is unpredictable and you can expect anything from him.

Russian people have an inherent aspiration for something infinite. Russians always have a thirst for a different life, a different world, they always have dissatisfaction with what they have. Due to greater emotionality, Russian people are characterized by openness and sincerity in communication. If in Europe people are quite alienated in their personal lives and protect their individualism, then a Russian person is open to being interested in him, showing interest in him, caring for him, just as he himself is inclined to be interested in the lives of those around him: both his soul wide open and curious - what is behind the soul of the other.

There are dozens of characters in our literature, each of which bears an indelible stamp of Russian character: Natasha Rostova and Matryona Timofeevna, Platon Karataev and Dmitry Karamazov, Raskolnikov and Melekhov, Onegin and Pechorin, Vasily Terkin and Andrei Sokolov. You can't list them all. Are there really no such people in life? The pilot saves the city at the cost of his life, not leaving the stalled plane until the last moment; a tractor driver dies in a burning tractor, taking it away from a grain field; a family of nine takes in three more orphaned children; the master spends years creating a unique, priceless masterpiece and then gives it away orphanage... You can continue ad infinitum. Behind all this there is also a Russian character. But aren't other people capable of this? Where is the line that will help distinguish a Russian person from the rest? And there is another side to him: the ability for unbridled revelry and drunkenness, callousness and selfishness, indifference and cruelty. The world looks at him and sees a mystery in him. For us, the Russian character is an alloy of the most best qualities, which will always prevail over dirt and vulgarity, and, perhaps, the most important of them is selflessly devoted love for one’s land. Tenderly stroking a birch tree and talking to it, greedily inhaling the heady aroma of arable land, reverently holding a poured ear of corn in your palm, seeing off a crane wedge with tears in your eyes - only a Russian person can do this, and may he remain like this forever and ever.

The Russian character is complex and multifaceted, but that’s what makes it beautiful. He is beautiful in his breadth and openness, cheerful disposition and love for his homeland, childish innocence and fighting spirit, ingenuity and peacefulness, hospitality and mercy. And we owe this entire palette of the best qualities to our homeland - Russia, a fabulous and great country, warm and affectionate, like the hands of a mother.

From all that has been said, we have to conclude that the only undeniable feature of the Russian character is inconsistency, complexity, and the ability to combine opposites. And is it possible on a land like Russian not to be special? After all, this feature did not appear with us today, but was formed day by day, from year to year, from century to century, from millennium to millennium...

And Leskov tried to create just such a Russian person in his works...

Russian national character

Many people consider N. S. Leskov to be the most Russian writer, since he knew the Russian people more widely than anyone else as they really are. One of the peaks of his work is the story “The Enchanted Wanderer” about a real Russian hero, in whose person the Russian national character is most widely revealed. The story is distinguished by its depth and sincerity, revealing both light and dark sides character. Main character Ivan Severyanych a common person from the people, born and raised in the Oryol province. His whole life is a series of various events, both important and minor. Through these interconnected events, the writer reveals the true image of the hero, bringing the story to its logical conclusion.

The more you read about Ivan Flyagin’s wanderings across the vast country, the more clearly the features of a Russian person appear in him. He has a daring and at the same time kind character. He has irrepressible fortitude and vitality. Tracing the path of his life, one can understand that he achieved purification. All the sins that he once committed, consciously or unconsciously, were prayed for and suffered through. In his attitude towards life he achieved truly folk wisdom and, in the end, turned into a real Russian hero. Ivan's childhood and youth were difficult. He took the wrong path more than once, but following his inner voice, got off it. One day, as a young postilion, he beat a poor monk to death. This event tormented him for the rest of his life. All his other sins were justified.

The author shows that his hero is far from ideal, but he is a real, living person who equally has both shortcomings and advantages. Fate has made Ivan more than once sharp turns, which suited his impulsive nature. But each time he was guided by his inner impulses, and not by reason, and was right in his own way. Some of his actions were completely inexplicable. For example, his desire to hang himself when it was unbearable to beat pebbles with a hammer in the garden anymore, or his reluctance to return the child to his own mother, and then running away with the same mother and child. There is not a drop of logic or rationality in his actions, but this is how the sincerity of the Russian character is manifested.

The naivety and simple-heartedness of this hero are especially clearly shown. At a certain stage, he saved the family of the count, who offered him to choose any reward for this. Ivan, without thinking twice, wished for an accordion, which he immediately threw away. All his money, which he earned from the prince who deceived Grushenka, he left to the owner before going to the tavern. As a result, he gave all his savings to the monastery as a contribution for the soul of his deeply beloved Grusha and went to war. For the sake of a beautiful horse that he liked, he is ready to fight a Tatar and endure ten years of captivity. Hearing Grusha’s singing, he threw five thousand government money at her feet, admiring her beauty. In a word, the Russian character is so contradictory that it is difficult to fully understand. But it is in these contrasts and contradictions that harmony lies.