Asiya Yanovna Esalnek Fundamentals of literary criticism. Analysis of a work of art. Drama Analysis

The method of conversation used in the study of epic and lyrical works, is also effective for dramatic purposes. Most methodologists recommend using it mainly when analyzing the development of an action, clarifying the conflict, issues and ideological meaning dramatic works. One cannot but agree with this, since the conversation makes it possible to widely use the text of the work and use the facts obtained by students as a result of independent work on the work.

Of particular importance when analyzing dramatic works is independent work students over the text of the work. Analysis of the speech and actions of characters helps students understand the essence of their characters and create in their imagination a specific idea of ​​their appearance. In this case, the student's analysis of a particular phenomenon or scene dramatic work to some extent it will resemble the actor’s work on the role.

Perceptual experience dramatic genre, acquired by students in the process of studying literature, is the most important aid for the perception of a dramatic work. This refers to the student’s certain knowledge of the specifics of the genre - its structure, elements, features of recreating characters, etc.

Another thing is the circle of historical and everyday realities, human relations, linguistic idioms.

So, merchant life, shown by Ostrovsky, or a certain “freedom” with which the wife and daughter of Gogol’s Gorodnichy perceive Khlestakov’s courtship will definitely require special commentary.

Sometimes, to activate the imagination of students, one should turn to historical and everyday commentary. This is done in cases where students who are far from the era depicted in the drama do not have the necessary ideas and knowledge and cannot recreate in their imagination the details of the external appearance of the character in the play, for example: the mayor’s uniform, Kabanikha’s clothes, etc. If students are not helped, then they will not have the appropriate ideas and will only learn the meaning of the word.

The action of the drama is manifested in the characters coming into conflict. This means that when analyzing drama, we must consider the development of action and the revelation of characters in organic unity. Also V.P. Ostrogorsky suggested that a teacher analyzing a dramatic work pose the following questions to students: Are people’s actions completely consistent with their characters? What motivates the hero to act? Does the idea or passion excite him? What obstacles does he encounter? Are they within him or outside of him?

“Some methodologists and practical teachers believe that the first stage of work is a commentary reading of each action, either in full or selectively. The selection of phenomena depends on the tasks that the teacher sets for himself.

From the point of view of other researchers and teachers, before moving on to work on actions, it is necessary to get an idea of ​​​​the play as a whole in the minds of students. Therefore, the first questions should fix the students’ attention on the entire play and help them comprehend it. The questions posed in this lesson should make students feel the main conflict and its emergence. This could be, for example, a question about the title of a play.

On initial stage studying dramatic work Simultaneously with the clarification of the main conflict, the students should become acquainted with the characters for the first time, with the role they play in the struggle. One can raise the question of their grouping. For this purpose, in some cases, the teacher dwells on the list of characters, especially in those plays in which names and surnames hint at the character of the character and speak about the author’s attitude towards them (“Minor”, ​​“Woe from Wit”, “Thunderstorm”, etc. .). The title of the play often helps clarify the main conflict (“Thunderstorm”, “Woe from Wit”, “ The Cherry Orchard" etc.). The path to clarifying the main conflict is also paved by establishing the boundaries of the play - where it began and how it ended.

The correlation of the beginning in a dramatic work and the end contributes to the emergence of a general view of the play.

It is important to draw the class's attention to the time covered by the play. What we see on stage always happens in the present. The time of the viewer and the time of action of the play seem to be combined, but days, weeks, and sometimes years pass between phenomena and actions.

The action of "Woe from Wit" covers the time from morning to evening, but in the theater it is compressed to several hours. Two weeks pass between acts III and IV of The Thunderstorm, but they directly determine the climax of the play.

The emergence of a conflict, its true causes, the foundations of existing relationships, the origins of characters are usually determined by life events that occur outside the play. Thus, at the first stage, the questions that the students will think about next, the angle from which they will view the play, are outlined.

Preparing to analyze a single action, the teacher determines for himself central problem work on it.

To solve this problem, phenomena are selected and basic questions are posed. Of course, action work also includes explanation unclear words and historical and theatrical commentary, but all this is subordinated main task. Therefore, we must give ourselves a clear account of what phenomena should be isolated for detailed analysis. The selection of phenomena for reading in class depends on the tasks that, according to the teacher, should be solved both when studying the entire play and when working on individual actions. This selection is determined in the process preliminary preparation teacher to study the entire play. It is then that the teacher outlines in which lesson and why it is necessary to turn to reading certain phenomena. In addition, during the preparation process, he must decide what is more appropriate to read himself, when to turn on the audio recording, what and for what purpose the students will read.”Methods of teaching literature: A textbook for students of pedagogy. institute, specialty No. 2101 “Russian”. language and literature" / Ed. Z.Ya. Res - M.: Education, 1977, p. 234-235..

But it is especially important to encourage the children to imagine what is happening on stage. One of the methodological techniques that encourages students to penetrate the text of the play is the creation of imaginary mise-en-scenes - in other words, during the process of analysis, they are asked to think about how they would arrange the characters in certain moment actions, imagine their positions, gestures, movements.

At the same time, the teacher makes sure that schoolchildren, working on a separate act, perceive it as part of a whole that occupies a certain place in the development of the action, in its forward movement towards the finale of the play; so that they understand how the main elements of the plot are implemented and how they are prepared in individual acts: exposition, plot, climax, denouement.

Children's observation of the development of action should be inseparable from a deep penetration into the characters of the characters.

By observing the behavior, actions, and experiences of the character in all changing situations, schoolchildren gradually clarify the essence of the character of the various characters.

The character's character social person, state of mind reveals speech. Therefore, when analyzing drama with the subject constant attention there must be a character's speech, its originality.

Prostakova's ignorance and rudeness are manifested in her every remark. The uncertainty of Khlestakov’s thoughts affects the construction of his monologue ( Act III comedy).

When analyzing a play, it is of great importance to clarify the subtext of the characters’ remarks. Work on clarifying the subtext of the characters’ speech can be done already in the 8th grade when studying “Woe from Wit” (act. 1, phenomenon 7, - Chatsky’s meeting with Sophia).

In the process of analysis, the observations of schoolchildren are generalized. For this Z.Ya. Rez suggests posing so-called summative questions after individual, particularly significant phenomena and the end of the action: “For example, after reading the I and II phenomena of The Inspector General, you can ask the questions: what have we learned about the life of the county town? How did the city officials appear before us? What is the nature of the measures taken by the mayor?

After Act I of “The Thunderstorm,” one can ask: what do the characters of the Wild and Kabanikha have in common and what are their differences? How is Katerina different from all the Kabanovs? Why is conflict inevitable between Katerina and the world of the Kabanovs? To establish connections between actions great importance have so-called perspective questions, asking students to imagine themselves as spectators who do not know how the action will unfold next. Do you think further fate Katerina (after the end of Act II)? - the teacher will ask. Is it possible to predict who will be the winner in the world of the Famusovs - Chatsky or Molchalin (after Act I “Woe from Wit”)? - the teacher asks a question to the class.”

Time of creation of the work, history of the concept, a brief description of era.

The connection of the play with any literary movement or cultural era(antiquity, Renaissance, classicism, Enlightenment, sentimentalism, romanticism, critical realism, symbolism, etc.). How did the features of this direction appear in the work? 1

Type and genre of dramatic work: tragedy, comedy (of manners, characters, positions, cloak and sword; satirical, everyday, lyrical, slapstick, etc.), drama (social, everyday, philosophical, etc.), vaudeville, farce, etc. Check the meaning of these terms in the reference literature.

Specifics of the organization of drama action: division into actions, scenes, acts, phenomena, etc.

The author's original components of the drama (for example, “dreams” instead of acts or actions in M. Bulgakov’s drama “Run”). characters). Features of names (for example, “speaking” names).

Main, secondary and off-stage characters. Peculiarities dramatic conflict

: tragic, comic, dramatic; social, everyday, philosophical, etc.

Features of dramatic action: external - internal; “on stage” - “behind the stage”, dynamic (actively developing) - static, etc. Features of the composition of the play. The presence and specificity of the main elements: exposition, increasing emotional tension, conflict and its resolution, a new increase in emotional tension, climaxes, etc. How are all the “sharp points” interconnected (especially emotional scenes

) works? What is the composition of the individual components of the play (acts, actions, phenomena)? Here we need to name specific episodes that are these “sharp points” of action. Specifics of creating dialogue in a play. Features of the sound of each character’s theme in dialogues and monologues. (

Brief Analysis

dialogical composition of one episode of your choice). Theme of the play. Leading topics. Key episodes (scenes, phenomena) that help reveal the theme of the work. Problems of the work. Leading problems and

key episodes

(scenes, phenomena) in which the problems are especially acute. The author's vision of solving the problems posed.

actions of characters (acting);

stage environment, costumes and scenery;

the mood and idea of ​​a scene or phenomenon.

The meaning of the play's title.

1. Artistic image. Types of imagery. 2. Types and genres of literature.

Artistic image –

there is a concrete - sensual form of reproduction of the transformation of reality. A category of aesthetics that characterizes the result of a creator’s (artist’s) comprehension of a phenomenon or process in ways characteristic of a particular type of art, objectified in the form of a process as a whole or its department. fragments.

From the point of view of the theory of knowledge, a concept is also an image. However, there is a difference between thin and thin. image and concept: A concept identifies common, essential features in an object; it is not individual. Hood. the image reproduces the object in its integrity, the image is individual.

1) There are sensory-figurative and conceptual-logical forms of mastering the world. A distinction is made between figurative representations as a phenomenon of consciousness and one’s own images as the sensory embodiment of representations (visual and auditory).. Contains a generalization. Even if the image is sketchy and unspoken, it carries integrity. Own the names of the heroes become popular names. because of the general meaning of thin. image. Creative typification is the selection of certain aspects of life phenomena and their emphasis, hyperbolization into fiction. image. Gogol “The Nose”, S-Shch. Two description options: a) a writer can describe, creating the illusion of verisimilitude b) secondary convention - deliberate destruction of verisimilitude, grotesque and fantasy.

2) Expressiveness(expressiveness): The image usually surpasses reasoning in terms of emotional strength. air estimates. Ideological and emotional. author's assessment -> dividing the characters into positive, negative, contradictory. (conditionally). Forms expressions assessments: a) explicit (Pushkin - Tatyana). b) implicit (Pushkin - Onegin). Evaluation help express

trails, st. figures. Creation of own objective world.

3) Self-sufficiency, the image is alive in itself. Being the embodiment of the general, essential in the individual, thin. an image can give rise to different meanings and interpretations.

Polysemy of thin. image.

The imagery of the art creates objective preconditions for disputes about the meaning of the art, for its various interpretations, and sometimes for polemical author’s concepts. Authors often do not want to define the idea of ​​their work -> controversy. Turgenev "O and D". Internal images.

– bear, window Internal form of a word

- increase in meaning.

For the image you need to have a key, a literary code. Image

– appearance, form, method (means) by which literature carries out its mission (see previous lecture).

As part of psychology and philology, images are specific representations, that is, the reflection by human consciousness of individual objects, facts, events, in their sensory perceived form.

They [images] are opposed to abstract concepts that capture the general permanent properties of reality and ignore individual traits.

RESULT: there are sensory-figurative and political-logical forms of mastering reality.

1. There are:

   figurative representations as a phenomenon of consciousness;

actually “images”, as the sensory embodiment of ideas.

There are images:;

scientific and illustrative;

factual information and journalistic

, which inform about facts that actually took place; artistic , are created when active participation imagination: they do not simply reproduce isolated facts, but condense and concentrate those that are significant for the author aspects of life

The artist’s imagination is not only a psychological stimulus for his work, but also a certain antiquity.

In the imagination there is a fictitious objectivity that does not have a complete correspondence in reality.

In modern science there is the concept of iconicity.

Sign – material object, acting as a representative, substitute of another object, property.

Definition of an artistic image - there are more than 70 of them!

One point of view:

Artistic image – a concrete sensory form of reproduction and transformation of reality.

According to the nature of their generality, artistic images are divided into:

individual(originality, uniqueness. Found among romantics and science fiction writers);

characteristic(is generalizing. It contains general traits of characters and morals inherent in that time);

typical(the highest level of a characteristic image. This is the most probable, exemplary for a certain era. The image of typical images was one of main goals, achieving the goals of realistic literature. Sometimes socio-historical objects of an era can be captured in an artistic image, as well as general human character traits of a person - eternal images);

image-motives(go beyond individual images of heroes), (this is a steadily recurring theme in the writer’s work, expressed using different aspects, using variation);

topaz(place, area, general place), (denote general and typical images created in the literature of an entire era, nation, and not in the work of an individual writer);

archetypes (beginning, image)(early 19th century, German romantics. Jung - understood the ARCHETYPE as a general human image, unconsciously passed on from generation to generation. Most often mythological images. Universal symbols: fire, sky, house, road, garden, etc.).

Image structure:

sounding, rhythmic surface of speech;

artistic speech (sequence of words and their relationships);

plot - the purpose of the movement of people and things;

plot – a system of main goals;

interacting images;

comprehension of the life meaning of the image.

Artistic image is a popular term that is used in various sciences. The most common definition is a subjective reflection of the objective world. An artistic image has a super task - it is always a certain thought embodied in art form. This is not just a description. Example: Pinocchio. The image is always concrete and figurative. But this concreteness always expresses something general, some thought. The image is plastic, emotional, it expresses the state of the hero, everything in him is in unity. What in reality can be an antithesis converges in the image. Example: drawing a heart for lovers in response to an abstract feeling. Potebnya: “If we are given poetic image, then we ask ourselves what is the circle of ideas, observations, thoughts, remarks, perceptions from which this image arose? It could arise from direct observations, it could arise from tradition, that is, with the help of other images.” Abstract, philosophical ideas depicted through objective realities, most often from nature. Example: Venevitinov’s poem “Branch”. Observation of nature is a source of artistic images. Turgenev has many prototypes: Rudin - Bakunin, Bazarov - Dobrolyubov. But the image, even if it is copied from life, is not literal, it is always autonomous, self-sufficient, it lives its own life.

Classification of images.

There are conventional and life-like images. Life-like is a reality that is mirror-like to life. Conditional are violations, deformations, they have two levels - the depicted and the implied. Life-like - character and type, conventional - symbol, allegory, grotesque.

Subject classification.

1st stage. Details from one-word details to detailed descriptions (interior, landscape, exterior, etc.). They are static and fragmented.

2nd stage. The plot structure: events, actions, moods, aspirations of a person. This is dynamism and evolution.

3rd stage. Subjective structure: characters, characters, image of the author, narrator, chorus.

4th stage. Image of the world.

Nature – Man – Society

Landscape portrait family

Interior system environment

Exterior of the characters people

Generalized semantic: motive, topos, archetype.

A motif is a word or a set of words that are repeated (in the work of a writer, a group of writers, or an era).

Topos is a designation of a place, repeated within a culture or nation (St. Petersburg. Forest, steppe).

Archetype (According to C. G. Jung) is the oldest mythological symbol generated by archaic collective consciousness. Example: the image of the prodigal son, Cain and Abel, Ahasfer, Faust.

Internal image structure:

1) internal form of the word. Example: ink.

2) comparison: A=B

3) co and opposition: A is not equal or equal to B.

Everything is figurative - the word, the people, and the action.

- Small forms of imagery.

From the point of view of many researchers, only what is created with the help of words is figurative. The possibilities and features of the word are a topic of discussion, and this is how futurism arises. A word in a work of art behaves differently than in ordinary speech - the word begins to realize an aesthetic function in addition to the nominative (nominative) and communicative. The purpose of ordinary speech is communication, discourse, transmission of information. The aesthetic function is different, it does not just convey information, but creates a certain mood, conveys spiritual information, a certain super-meaning, an idea. The word itself manifests itself differently. Context, compatibility, rhythmic beginning (especially in poetry) are important. Bunin: “Punctuation marks are musical notes.” Rhythm and meaning are combined. A word in a work of art does not have a specific meaning as in everyday speech. Example: crystal vase and crystal time by Tyutchev. The word does not appear in its meaning. The same flow of associations with the author. Crystal time - description of sounds in autumn. A word in an artistic context gives rise to individual associations. If the author’s and yours coincide, everything is remembered, if not, no. Any artistic trope is a deviation from the rules. Y. Tynyanov “The meaning of the poetic word.” “The word is a chameleon, in which each time not only different shades appear, but also different colors.” Emotional coloring of the word. A word is an abstraction; the complex of meanings is individual.

All methods of changing the basic meaning of a word are tropes. The word has not only a direct but also a figurative meaning. The definition usually given in textbooks is not entirely complete. Tomashevsky "Poetics of Speech". Example: the title of Shmelev’s story “The Man from the Restaurant.” First, a person means a waiter, and the word is used as the client usually calls him. Then the action develops, the hero reflects that the elite of society is vicious. He has his own temptations: the money he returns. The waiter cannot live with sin; the main word becomes “man” as the crown of nature, a spiritual being. Pushkin’s metaphor “The East is burning with a new dawn” - both the beginning of a new day and the emergence of a new powerful state in the east.

It is preferable to begin the analysis of a drama with the analysis of a small fragment, episode (phenomenon, scene, etc.). The analysis of an episode of a dramatic work is carried out practically according to the same scheme as the analysis of an episode of an epic work, with the only difference that the reasoning should be supplemented with the point of analysis of the dynamic and dialogic compositions of the episode.

So,

ANALYSIS OF AN EPISODE OF A DRAMATIC WORK

The boundaries of the episode are already determined by the very structure of the drama (the phenomenon is separated from other components of the drama); give the episode a title.

Characterize the event underlying the episode: what place does it occupy in the development of the action? (Is this an exposition, a climax, a denouement, an episode in the development of the action of the entire work?)

Name the main (or only) participants in the episode and briefly explain:

Who are they?

what is their place in the system of characters (main, main, secondary, off-stage)?

Reveal the features of the beginning and ending of the episode.

Formulate the question, the problem that is in the spotlight:

Identify and characterize the theme and contradiction (in other words, mini-conflict) underlying the episode.

Describe the characters participating in the episode:

their attitude to the event;

to the question (problem);

to each other;

briefly analyze the speech of the participants in the dialogue;

identify the characteristics of the characters’ behavior, the motivation for their actions (the author’s or the reader’s);

determine the balance of forces, grouping or regrouping of heroes depending on the course of events in the episode.

Characterize the dynamic composition of the episode (its exposition, plot, climax, denouement; in other words, according to what pattern the emotional tension develops in the episode).

Describe the dialogical composition of the episode: what principle is used to cover the topic?

Analyze the plot, figurative and ideological connections of this episode with other episodes of the drama.

Now let's move on to comprehensive analysis dramatic work. The success of this work is only possible if you understand the theory dramatic kind literature (see topic No. 15).

So,

The time of creation of the work, the history of the concept, a brief description of the era.

The connection between the play and any literary direction or cultural era (antiquity, Renaissance, classicism, Enlightenment, sentimentalism, romanticism, critical realism, symbolism, etc.). How did the features of this direction appear in the work?1

Type and genre of dramatic work: tragedy, comedy (of manners, characters, positions, cloak and sword; satirical, everyday, lyrical, slapstick, etc.), drama (social, everyday, philosophical, etc.), vaudeville, farce, etc. Check the meaning of these terms in the reference literature.

Specifics of the organization of drama action: division into actions, scenes, acts, phenomena, etc. The author's original components of the drama (for example, “dreams” instead of acts or actions in M. Bulgakov’s drama “Run”).

Playbill (characters). Features of names (for example, “speaking” names). Main, secondary and off-stage characters.

Features of dramatic conflict: tragic, comic, dramatic; social, everyday, philosophical, etc.

Features of dramatic action: external - internal; “on stage” - “behind the stage”, dynamic (actively developing) - static, etc.

Features of the composition of the play. The presence and specificity of the main elements: exposition, increasing emotional tension, conflict and its resolution, a new increase in emotional tension, climaxes, etc. How are all the “sharp points” (especially emotional scenes) of the work related to each other? What is the composition of the individual components of the play (acts, actions, phenomena)? Here we need to name specific episodes that are these “sharp points” of action.

Specifics of creating dialogue in a play. Features of the sound of each character’s theme in dialogues and monologues. (A brief analysis of the dialogic composition of one episode of your choice).

Theme of the play. Leading topics. Key episodes (scenes, phenomena) that help reveal the theme of the work.

Problems of the work. Leading problems and key episodes (scenes, phenomena) in which the problems are especially acute. The author's vision of solving the problems posed.

actions of characters (acting);

stage environment, costumes and scenery;

the mood and idea of ​​a scene or phenomenon.

The meaning of the play's title.

1. This point is revealed if such features are clearly expressed in the work (for example, in the classicist comedies of D. Fonvizin or in the comedy “Woe from Wit” by A. Griboyedov, which combined the features of three directions at once: classicism, romanticism and realism).

When analyzing a dramatic work, you will need the skills that you acquired while completing tasks to analyze an episode of the work.

Be careful and strictly adhere to the analysis plan.

Topics 15 and 16 are closely related to each other, so successful completion of the work is possible only with detailed study theoretical materials on these topics.

A.S. Griboyedov. Comedy "Woe from Wit"

N. Gogol. Comedy "The Inspector General"

A.N. Ostrovsky. Comedy "Our people - we will be numbered!"; dramas "The Thunderstorm", "Dowry"

A.P. Chekhov. Play "The Cherry Orchard"

M. Gorky. The play "At the Bottom"

1. The ideological and artistic meaning of the title of the play. The title is introduced into a work of any genre. What is his uniqueness in dramaturgy? The title of the play does not strive to fully cover life material, as in an epic work, where the title sometimes seems to muffle, absorbing its main idea in order to emphasize the importance of depicting reality in its entirety.

The title in dramaturgy does not, like the lyrics, give an extremely generalized and personal name (even to the point of frequent refusal of the title in poetry). In the play, the title more openly, purposefully leads to the very core of the central conflict, condenses the meaning of the work, often concentrating it to the point of an aphorism, a proverb, or a “sentence.” The poetics of the title refracts and common feature dramaturgy - its two-dimensionality, its symbolism.

In the play, the title “Forest” obviously sets up an assessment of the main conflict in the perspective of ontological values ​​- this impulse is then realized in the course of the play in the cross-cutting motif of the purchase and sale of forests as an everyday situation, as a social collision of the replacement of noble rule by merchants, as a philosophical understanding of the “ecology of the soul” .

2. The most specific feature of the drama genre is the originality of the action in it: in the play, all lines, monologues, dialogues, polylogues, details, facts, events in individual scenes, phenomena and acts are combined into a single integral conflict, into an end-to-end “stage action”.

In the very first scene of the play “The Forest,” in the very first dialogue, the dowry-less student Aksyusha, summoned by the lady for a conversation, asks the servant Karp about the sale of the forest by the mistress: she timidly hopes for a dowry - that is, the very first remarks related only to a specific local situation, and also with the general, prepared conflict of purchase and sale of forests. The dropout high school student Bulanov, ready to marry for profit, covets the possible dowry. On the other hand, the merchant Vosmibratov connects the purchase of the forest with the matchmaking of his son to Aksyusha, hoping to snatch the forest as a dowry.

3. Expressive means the characteristics of a hero in a dramatic work can be indirect ways of presenting him - this is what Neschastlivtsev’s letter and his comments by all the characters in the play are like in Act 1. Reading the nephew’s letter, depicting his knightly idealization of a “loving aunt” and comments to it, in which the sentimental self-attestation of oneself as the benefactress of a poor relative-pupil is refuted by the fact of the robbery of the heir, creates another contrasting correlation that ties up another main plot line of the play: the Gurmyzhskaya clash and Neschastlivtsev.

4. Already in Act 1, not only is the situation in the Penki estate recreated, not only is an acquaintance with its inhabitants and guests taking place, but the conflict of the play as a whole is being prepared: every line, every detail turns out to be a projection of the general conflict of the play. The specificity of “stage action” in drama lies in the fact that although the actions in it appear at the moment of their accomplishment, in the very course of them - but at the same time they refract the conflict of the play as a whole: the drama is distinguished by a shorter, more purposeful path of each scene to its central collisions.

5. If in an epic work the main fabric of the narrative language is the author’s speech, then in figurative system drama always dominates speech characteristic: in dramaturgy, “for a writer, the artistic word is the main and even the only means of development dramatic action. In the play, everything is accomplished through the word...” (V. Uspensky).

This feature of the drama was classically embodied by the “sorcerer of the word” (M. Gorky) Ostrovsky. He is the creator of “speech theater”, in which “every other action, every theatricality, facial expressions should serve only as a light seasoning of literary performance, action in the word...” (I. A. Goncharov). Ostrovsky's plays are not plays of intrigue, but plays of socio-psychological characters, and therefore the speeches of the heroes usually reveal not only some of the vicissitudes of the conflict, but are also a means of their self-characterization, revealing their hidden essence, the deep processes of their consciousness, the features of their thinking, emotions and feelings.

6. One of the most important ways of analysis dramatic genre is to consider the arrangement of characters in it: the ratio of the characters is one of the most effective means incarnations author's position.

Let us comprehend the correlation of images in phenomena 1 and 2 - these first scenes of the play are clearly built on the principle of parallelism: here the servant Karp alternately enters into dialogue with Aksyusha and Bulanov, while showing a fundamentally different attitude towards their requests.

Through unambiguous situations, the contrast of the characters of the young heroes is clearly manifested: the selfless, pure appearance of Aksyusha and the selfish, cynical type of Bulanov. These dialogues are manifested in a clear correlation and storylines plays: Aksyusha’s pursuit of happiness, Bulanov’s pursuit of wealth.

But not only this is intended to demonstrate the beginning of the play with this “rhyme” of situations: Aksyusha asks Karp to pass a note to someone, Bulanov orders the servant to fill cigarettes; Karp fulfills the first request, although he understands that it is contrary to the interests of the lady; the second request, despite the threat to complain to the lady, he refuses to fulfill.

This parallelism of unambiguous situations makes it possible to clearly demonstrate the author’s position: the property status of the heroes, the omnipotence of the masters of life and complete dependence on them are closely related to moral problems: Karp helps Aksyusha not because she is poor; - after all, Bulanov is poor, and not because Aksyusha is closer to the servants than Bulanov, who is eager to join the circle of the rich, - after all, Julitta is also a servant, and Karp pokes her like that. It is not the social and property status that determines whom and how Karp serves, but the moral, popular commandments of morality - and this “key” to the upcoming conflict is provided by the technique of parallelism in the arrangement of characters.

The cohesion, correlation, arrangement of characters, their mutual illumination, on which the first act of the drama is built, becomes one of the most important ways of revealing the concept of the play in subsequent acts.

7. “Stage action” in a play is expressed not only in external action, not only in statements, but also in silence, in a meaningful look, an eloquent gesture, a secret impulse - hence the importance of analyzing “non-verbal means” in a dramatic work artistic expression", pauses, remarks to the side, involuntary gestures, etc., expressed by remarks.

The emotional and semantic load of the remarks from Act 1, Phenomenon 7, in the dialogue between Gurmyzhskaya and Aksyusha is extremely effective.

Aksyusha says “downcast eyes”, “quietly”; Gurmyzhskaya delivers her lines, twice accompanying them with the author’s remark: “with laughter”; Aksyusha, unbroken and accepting Gurmyzhskaya’s challenge, pronounces her last remark before her departure, “looking into her eyes.”

Although in this phenomenon the heroines are not yet manifested in actions, it is saturated with “ stage action“- and the essence of the characters of its participants and conflict nodes are revealed extremely clearly in the stage directions.

It is preferable to begin the analysis of a drama with the analysis of a small fragment, episode (phenomenon, scene, etc.). The analysis of an episode of a dramatic work is carried out practically according to the same scheme as the analysis of an episode of an epic work, with the only difference that the reasoning should be supplemented with the point of analysis of the dynamic and dialogic compositions of the episode.

So,
ANALYSIS OF AN EPISODE OF A DRAMATIC WORK

1. The boundaries of the episode are already determined by the very structure of the drama (the phenomenon is separated from other components of the drama); give the episode a title.
2. Characterize the event underlying the episode: what place does it occupy in the development of the action? (Is this an exposition, a climax, a denouement, an episode in the development of the action of the entire work?)
3. Name the main (or only) participants in the episode and briefly explain:
   • Who are they?
   • what is their place in the system of characters (main, main, secondary, off-stage)?
4. Reveal the features of the beginning and ending of the episode.
5. Formulate the question, the problem that is in the spotlight:
   • author; characters.
6. Identify and characterize the theme and contradiction (in other words, mini-conflict) underlying the episode.
7. Describe the characters participating in the episode:
   • their attitude to the event;
   • to the question (problem);
   • to each other;
   • briefly analyze the speech of the participants in the dialogue;
   • analyze the author's remarks (explanations for speech, gestures, facial expressions, poses of the characters);
   • identify the characteristics of the characters’ behavior, the motivation for their actions (the author’s or the reader’s);
   • determine the balance of forces, grouping or regrouping of heroes depending on the course of events in the episode.
8. Characterize the dynamic composition of the episode (its exposition, plot, climax, denouement; in other words, according to what pattern the emotional tension develops in the episode).
9. Describe the dialogical composition of the episode: what principle is used to cover the topic?
10. Understand author's attitude to the event; correlate it with the culmination and idea of ​​the entire work as a whole; determine the author’s attitude to the problem.
11. Formulate the main idea (author's idea) of the episode.
12. Analyze the plot, figurative and ideological connections of this episode with other episodes of the drama.

Now let's move on to complex analysis of a dramatic work. The success of this work is possible only if you understand the theory of dramatic literature (see topic No. 15).

So,
1. The time of creation of the work, the history of the concept, a brief description of the era.
2. The connection of the play with any literary movement or cultural era (antiquity, Renaissance, classicism, Enlightenment, sentimentalism, romanticism, critical realism, symbolism, etc.). How did the features of this direction appear in the work? 1
3. Type and genre of dramatic work: tragedy, comedy (of manners, characters, positions, cloak and sword; satirical, everyday, lyrical, slapstick, etc.), drama (social, everyday, philosophical, etc.), vaudeville, farce, etc. Check the meaning of these terms in the reference literature.
4. Specifics of the organization of drama action: division into actions, scenes, acts, phenomena, etc. The author's original components of the drama (for example, “dreams” instead of acts or actions in M. Bulgakov’s drama “Run”).
5. Playbill (characters). Features of names (for example, “speaking” names). Main, secondary and off-stage characters.
6. Features of dramatic conflict: tragic, comic, dramatic; social, everyday, philosophical, etc.
7. Features of dramatic action: external - internal; “on stage” - “behind the stage”, dynamic (actively developing) - static, etc.
8. Features of the composition of the play. The presence and specificity of the main elements: exposition, increasing emotional tension, conflict and its resolution, a new increase in emotional tension, climaxes, etc. How are all the “sharp points” (especially emotional scenes) of the work related to each other? What is the composition of the individual components of the play (acts, actions, phenomena)? Here we need to name specific episodes that are these “sharp points” of action.
9. Specifics of creating dialogue in a play. Features of the sound of each character’s theme in dialogues and monologues. (A brief analysis of the dialogic composition of one episode of your choice).
10. Theme of the play. Leading topics. Key episodes (scenes, phenomena) that help reveal the theme of the work.
11. Problems of the work. Leading problems and key episodes (scenes, phenomena) in which the problems are especially acute. The author's vision of solving the problems posed.
12. Specifics of the author's remarks explaining:
    • actions of characters (acting);
    • stage environment, costumes and scenery;
    • the mood and idea of ​​a scene or phenomenon.
    • The specificity of the author's position expressed through remarks.
13. The meaning of the play's title.