Are you here: Fabrics used

Gorky Maxim

M. Gorky

Former people

The entrance street consists of two rows of one-story shacks, closely pressed together, dilapidated, with crooked walls and skewed windows; the leaky roofs of human dwellings, mutilated by time, are covered with patches of splints and overgrown with moss; Here and there high poles with birdhouses stick out above them, they are overshadowed by the dusty greenery of elderberries and gnarled willows - the pitiful flora of the city outskirts inhabited by the poor.

The glass windows of the houses, dull green with age, look at each other with the eyes of cowardly swindlers. In the middle of the street, a winding track crawls uphill, maneuvering between deep ruts washed out by rain. Here and there lie heaps of rubble and various debris overgrown with weeds - these are the remains or beginnings of those structures that were unsuccessfully undertaken by ordinary people in the fight against the streams of rainwater that was rapidly flowing from the city. Above, on the mountain, beautiful stone houses are hidden in the lush greenery of dense gardens, the bell towers of churches proudly rise into the blue sky, their golden crosses sparkle dazzlingly in the sun.

When it rains, the city releases its dirt onto Vezzhaya Street, and when it’s dry, it showers it with dust - and all these ugly houses seem to have also been thrown from there, from above, swept away like garbage by someone’s mighty hand.

Flattened to the ground, they dotted the entire mountain, half-rotten, weak, painted by the sun, dust and rain in that grayish-dirty color that a tree takes on in old age.

At the end of this street, thrown out of the city downhill, stood the long, two-story escheated house of the merchant Petunnikov. He is the last one in order, he is already under the mountain, further behind him there is a wide field, cut off half a mile by a steep cliff to the river.

Big, an old house had the gloomiest face among his neighbors. It was all crooked, in two rows of its windows there was not a single one that retained the correct shape, and the glass fragments in the broken frames had the greenish-muddy color of swamp water.

The walls between the windows were dotted with cracks and dark spots of fallen plaster - as if time had written his biography on the walls of the house in hieroglyphs. The roof, sloping towards the street, further increased its deplorable appearance; it seemed as if the house was bent to the ground and was meekly awaiting fate. last blow, which will turn it into a shapeless pile of half-rotten rubble.

The gate is open - one half of it, torn from its hinges, lies on the ground, and in the gap, between its boards, grass has sprouted, thickly covering the large, deserted courtyard of the house. In the depths of the courtyard there is a low, smoky building with a single-slope iron roof. The house itself is uninhabited, but in this building, formerly a blacksmith shop, there was now a “night shelter” maintained by retired captain Aristide Fomich Kuvalda.

Inside the shelter is a long, gloomy hole, four and six fathoms in size; it was lit - only on one side - by four small windows and a wide door. Its brick, unplastered walls are black with soot, the ceiling, from a baroque bottom, is also smoked black; in the middle of it there was a huge stove, the base of which was a forge, and around the stove and along the walls there were wide bunks with piles of all sorts of junk that served as beds for the night shelters. The walls smelled of smoke, the earthen floor smelled of damp, and the bunks smelled of rotting rags.

The room of the owner of the shelter was located on the stove, the bunks around the stove were place of honor, and they accommodated those overnight shelters who enjoyed the favor and friendship of the owner.

The captain always spent the day at the door to the lodging house, sitting in some semblance of an armchair, which he himself built from bricks, or in Yegor Vavilov’s tavern, located diagonally from Petunnikov’s house; there the captain dined and drank vodka.

Before renting this premises, Aristide Hammer had an office in the city for the recommendation of servants; going higher into his past, one could find out that he had a printing house, and before the printing house he, in his words, “simply lived! And he lived gloriously, damn it! He lived skillfully, I can say!”

It was broad-shouldered A tall man about fifty years old, with a pockmarked face, swollen from drunkenness, and a wide, dirty yellow beard. His eyes are gray, huge, and boldly cheerful; He spoke in a deep voice, with a rumble in his throat, and almost always a German porcelain pipe with a curved stem stuck out in his teeth. When he was angry, the nostrils of his large, humpbacked, red nose flared wide and his lips quivered, revealing two rows of large, wolf-like yellow teeth. Long-armed, lanky-legged, dressed in a dirty and torn officer's overcoat, in a greasy cap with a red band but without a visor, in thin felt boots that reached his knees - in the morning he was invariably in a severe state of hangover, and in the evening he was tipsy. He could not get drunk, no matter how much he drank, and he never lost his cheerful mood.

In the evenings, sitting in his brick chair with a pipe in his mouth, he received guests.

What kind of person? - he asked a ragged and depressed person approaching him, thrown out of the city for drunkenness or for some other good reason who had fallen down.

The man answered.

Provide legal paper to support your lies.

The paper was presented if there was one. The captain put it in his bosom, rarely interested in its contents, and said:

Everything is fine. For a night - two kopecks, for a week - a kopeck, for a month - three kopecks. Go and take a seat for yourself, but make sure it’s not someone else’s, otherwise they’ll blow you up. People living with me are strict...

Newcomers asked him:

Don’t you sell tea, bread or anything edible?

I only sell walls and roofs, for which I myself pay the swindler owner of this hole, the merchant of the 2nd guild Judas Petunnikov, five rubles a month,” Kuvald explained in a businesslike tone, “people come to me, unaccustomed to luxury... and if you I’m used to eating every day - there’s a tavern across the street. But it’s better if you, a wreck, unlearn this bad habit. After all, you are not a gentleman - so what do you eat? Eat yourself!

For such speeches, pronounced in an artificially stern tone, but always with laughing eyes, for Attentive attitude To his guests, the captain enjoyed wide popularity among the city residents. It often happened that the captain's former client came to his yard, no longer torn and depressed, but in more or less decent shape and with a cheerful face.

Hello, your honor! How are you doing?

Did not recognize?

Did not recognize.

Do you remember that I lived with you for about a month in the winter... when there was a raid and three people were taken away?

Well, brother, the police are under my hospitable roof every now and then!

Oh, my God! Back then you showed the private bailiff a fig!

Wait, you spit on memories and just say what you need?

Would you like to accept a small treat from me? How I lived with you at that time, and you told me...

Gratitude should be encouraged, my friend, because it is rare among people. You must be a nice fellow, and although I don’t remember you at all, I will go to the tavern with you with pleasure and drink to your successes in life with pleasure.

Are you still the same - are you still joking?

What else can you do while living among you Goryunov?

They walked. Sometimes the captain's former client, all unhinged and shaken by the treat, returned to the lodging house; the next day they treated themselves again, and one fine morning the former client woke up with the consciousness that he had drunk himself to the ground again.

Your honor! That's it! Am I on your team again? What now?

A position that cannot be boasted about, but, being in it, one should not whine,” the captain resonated. “It is necessary, my friend, to be indifferent to everything, without spoiling one’s life with philosophy and without raising any questions.” Philosophizing is always stupid, philosophizing with a hangover is inexpressibly stupid. A hangover requires vodka, not remorse and gnashing of teeth... take care of your teeth, otherwise there will be nothing to hit you with. Here's two kopecks for you - go and bring a box of vodka, a patch of hot tripe or lung, a pound of bread and two cucumbers. When we are hungover, then we will weigh the situation...

The state of affairs was determined quite accurately two days later, when the captain did not have a penny from the three-ruble or five-ruble coin that was in his pocket on the day the grateful client appeared.

We've arrived! That's it! - said the captain. “Now that you and I, fool, have completely drunk ourselves, let’s try again to take the path of sobriety and virtue.” It is rightly said: if you do not sin, you will not repent; if you do not repent, you will not be saved. We have fulfilled the first, but it is useless to repent, let’s save ourselves straight away. Go to the river and work. If you can’t vouch for yourself, tell the contractor to keep your money, otherwise give it to me. When we accumulate capital, I will buy you pants and other things that you need so that you can again pass for a decent person and a modest worker, persecuted by fate. In good pants you can go far again. March!

“Former People” (1897), This work was based on the writer’s personal impressions when he was forced to live in a rooming house on one of the outskirts of Kazan. In terms of genre, this work can be called an essay, since it is distinguished by the authenticity of the image, special attention to the details of everyday life, the absence of a dynamic plot, and detailed portrait characteristics. In this work, Gorky already evaluates the type of tramp differently (there is no romantic aura).

In the first part, significant space is devoted to the description: first of a dirty, dull, outlying street (with crooked walls and skewed windows of houses, “leaky roofs,” “cloudy green window glass from old age,” heaps of rubble and various garbage), then “an abandoned house merchant Petunnikov" (crooked, with broken glass, with walls riddled with cracks), where the "night shelter" is located. The shelter itself resembles a “long, gloomy hole” that bears little resemblance to human habitation. “The walls smelled of smoke, the earthen floor smelled of damp, and the bunks smelled of rotting rags.” From a description of the interior, Gorky moves on to detailed portrait characteristics of the shelters. The company is headed by "former people", "general staff" Aristide Kuvalda (former captain, owner of a flophouse), "a tall, broad-shouldered man of about fifty, with a pockmarked face, swollen from drunkenness", dressed in "a dirty and torn officer's overcoat, in a greasy cap with red band." This is followed by portrait characteristics of other shelters. This is the Teacher, “tall, stooped, with a long sharp nose and a bald skull”; and Alexey Maksimovich Simtsov, nicknamed Kubar (former forester), “thick as a barrel,” with a thick white beard, a small crimson nose and watery, cynical eyes,” and Luka Antonovich Martyanov, nicknamed Konets (former prison guard), “gloomy, a silent, black drunkard, and mechanic Pavel Solntsev (aka Obedok), a lopsided, consumptive man of about thirty, and “tall and bony, crooked in one eye” Kiselnikov, a former convict, nicknamed Taras and a Half, since his inseparable friend, former deacon Taras , was half a height shorter than him. There was also a “ridiculous”, long-haired, “with a stupid, high-cheekboned face” young man, nicknamed Meteor, and ordinary homeless men, for example, the old rag picker Tyapa. Gorky draws the reader’s attention to the indifference of these people to life, to their own and others’ fate, to apathy, powerlessness in the face of circumstances and at the same time to the growing bitterness in their souls: directed against prosperous people.

The dissatisfaction of former people with their lives results in an open conflict with the merchant Petunnikov in the second part of the essay. This conflict is clearly expressed social character. The captain, who noticed that part of Petunnikov’s factory stands on Vavilov’s land, persuades the innkeeper to file a lawsuit against the merchant. Aristide Kuvalda is driven not at all by the desire to profit, but simply to annoy the hated Judas (as Petunnikova Kuvalda calls himself). But the lawsuit, which promised six hundred rubles, ends in a settlement. Petunnikov’s son, an educated, businesslike and cruel man, convinces Vavilov to withdraw the lawsuit from the court, threatening to completely close the innkeeper’s drinking establishment. The shelters understand that they will have to leave their homes, since Petunnikov will not forgive them for their offense. And, indeed, Petunnikov demands to immediately “free the shack.” To top it all off, the Teacher dies, and Aristide Sledgehammer is blamed for his death. The community of homeless shelters finally disintegrates, and Petuniikov feels like a winner. Gorky pays great attention to the study of not only the life of “former people”, but also their inner world, psychology. He notes that the shelter gives rise to weak people, incapable of self-realization, of rebirth; people who deny everything, even their own lives. This position (and its ideologist is Aristide Kuvalda) is unpromising and destructive, there is absolutely no positive, creative principle in it. And discontent caused by powerlessness only gives rise to anger and despair. In fact, in the essay “Former People ~ Gorky pronounces a verdict on people of the bottom, inactive, powerless, degenerate, incapable of actions, of good human feelings(indicative in this regard is the episode with the death of the Teacher, when Hammer, who considered him his friend, did not even have human words). The stories of the tramp cycle reflect those social topics and problems that will later find their solution in Gorky's plays.

Gorky Basinsky Pavel Valerievich

"Former People"

Why did the problem of “former people” occupy Gorky so much? After all, the public in the broad sense, the one that created his unprecedented popularity, especially among young people, did not value this in him at all. Gorky precisely marked the end of the era of “Nadsonovism”, Chekhov’s “twilight”, the so-called “timelessness” of the 1890s. “Let the storm blow harder!..”

“Song of the Petrel” was published in 1901 in the magazine “Life” and was immediately banned by censorship along with the closure of the magazine itself. It is noteworthy that for the first time the “Song...” was sung by the little siskin from the story “ Spring melodies", which was distributed illegally and printed hectographically in Nizhny Novgorod and Moscow. What is noteworthy here is not that the siskin is a small bird. It is noteworthy that this siskin migrated to “Spring Melodies” from an earlier story - “About the Siskin, who lied, and about the Woodpecker, a lover of truth.” This story was published in 1893 in the Kazan newspaper “Volzhsky Vestnik” (the same one that once reported in its news department about the suicide attempt of “guild worker Alexei Maksimov Peshkov”).

In the story the little siskin sang:

And he launched into a sermon of Christ and Zarathustra at the same time:

“Respect and love each other and, as you march as a proud and brave squad towards victory, do not doubt anything, for what is higher than you?.. Turn back and see what you were before - there, at the dawn of life? All your faith then was not worth one drop of doubt now... Having learned to doubt everything so terribly, the time has come for you to believe in yourself, for only a great essence can reach the level of doubt that you have reached!”

This story, very weak artistically, was nevertheless considered by Vladislav Khodasevich to be key to understanding Gorky’s path. Gorky’s “truth” was on the side of Chizh, “who lied” (including by calling out the storm), and not of Woodpecker, “the lover of truth.” But it is unlikely that the revolutionary youth of the 1890s–1900s paid attention to such subtleties. And it is unlikely that she was at all interested in Gorky as a spiritual person. "Who cares?" There would be a storm!

But at that time Gorky, together with Peshkov, was lost in the desert of new doubts. I was tormented by the question of “ex”.

Quite quickly, criticism discovered in the heroes of early Gorky, along with their expansiveness, traits of a kind of decadence, “decadence.” In Nietzsche's hierarchy "animal - man - superman" they occupied the place after man, But to superman. These are, in Gorky’s words, “former people”: Grigory Orlov (“The Orlov Spouses”), Aristide Kuvalda (“Former People”), the baker Konovalov (“Konovalov”), Promptov (“The Rogue”), Foma Gordeev (“Foma Gordeev”) "), Ilya Lunev ("Three"), Satin ("At the Bottom") and others. In their face, a person begins to recognize himself as a problem. “Formers” have the opportunity to look at a person as if from the outside. Here the absurdity of life in a situation after the “death of God” is experienced as an insoluble tragedy.

The charm of nature and the freedom of instincts no longer provide a way out of the spiritual labyrinth. The world reveals its gray tones, which in early stories There is no less bitterness than bright, rich colors. It is not for nothing that the epithet “gray” in Gorky’s prose acquires a special semantic meaning. Thus, in the finale of the story “Twenty-six and one” it does not appear by chance: “And - she left, straight, beautiful, proud. We were left in the middle of the yard, in the dirt, under the rain and a gray sky without the sun...” Before us is not just a faded world that has lost its bright, rich colors after Tanya’s departure, but also an important image-symbol of a universe that has lost its last meaning, in which bakery workers, as a collective image of all humanity, are doomed to loneliness and to an existential search for themselves...

“Formers” are, as a rule, hopelessly ill people. But why? After all, they are physically strong men and have names that speak for themselves: Orlov, Kuvalda, Gordeev, Konovalov. But an excess of vitality suddenly takes on the character of a pathology and leads to a kind of “decadence”, mental breakdown, madness or even suicide.

What prevents Konovalov, with his golden hands and good health, from living and working as a baker? What makes the miller Tikhon from the story “Toska” leave his house, rush into a spree like into a pool? Why doesn't Foma Gordeev want to be a millionaire? Why does he run from " pure life"Grishka Orlov?

One strange thing can be noticed behind these characters. This is hatred, there is no other way to describe it, towards all social pillars. They have a fatal desire to burn the bridges that connect them to their environment. They do not have a strong and reliable connection with the world and seem to fall into a social precipitate. In the words of Gorky about Foma Gordeev, they are “atypical” as representatives of their classes.

Deprived of an ideal, a person either dies, like Konovalov, or goes crazy, like Foma Gordeev. Ilya Lunev in “Troy” breaks his head against the wall - a symbolic act!

The author's attitude towards these characters was not entirely clear. Gorky, especially in mature years, repelled the spiritual anarchism of which he suspected " underground man» Dostoevsky. Being himself a personality of a “motley” composition, he always admired people of integrity. To a large extent, this explains his sympathy for V.I. Lenin. Hence the lifelong interest in strong “business executives”, millionaire merchants. Image of Vassa Zheleznoy from play of the same name Gorky is much more interesting than the play by the revolutionary Rachel that exists somewhere on the periphery. But there is an understanding between both Vassa and Rachel. Both are strong-willed and “iron”. At least in public. Both will not fall into spiritual anarchism. It seems that Gorky’s coming to Stalin at the end of his life was not accidental, and the explanation for this also lies somewhere here. And finally, let us recall that perhaps Gorky’s most important lover was and until his last days remained Maria Ignatievna Budberg-Zakrevskaya, about whom Nina Berberova wrote a book called “The Iron Woman.”

Gorky considered himself a “heretic” and all his life he loved “heretics” who brought anxiety and a thirst for search into life, even at the cost of their own early death. But his mind was on the side of “positive” people, like V.G. Korolenko.

“In general, the Russian tramp is a more terrible phenomenon than I was able to say; this person is terrible first of all and most importantly - by his imperturbable despair, by the fact that he denies himself, casts himself out of life.”

This was said by Gorky in later years. It is not difficult to guess that there is a broader and deeper spiritual problem at stake here. The problem of "former people". Those who consciously “excite” themselves from human society voluntarily rush into the “chandala” (the lowest caste in India, below the “untouchables”, in fact, a person outside of any caste). And Alexey Peshkov himself, when he left Nizhny Novgorod, leaving a fairly “warm” and untroubled position as a clerk with A.I. Lanin, didn’t he do the same?

Gorky experienced this experience himself at the beginning of his journey. However, in an environment of tramping, he turned out to be the same “stranger among his own” as he was in the house of the Kashirins and then the Sergeevs, among the Kazan students and in Semenov’s bakery.

In the remarkable essay “Two Tramps” (1894), which Gorky published in portions in the Samara Gazeta and then (which is significant) did not include it in either his collections or collected works, there is important episode, where Alexey Peshkov (in the essay he is listed under the name Maxim) meets one of the two tramps who walked around Rus' with him. The tramp, his name is Stepok, goes with Maxim to the tavern and there he finds out that his friend has become a journalist.

This made him terribly angry!

“- So!.. So... what? It wasn’t by nature that you were a tramp... but out of curiosity?..

Are you looking? Also curiosity... And now back... didn’t you like it? L-cleverly done!..

I still want to walk around.

W-well... I don’t know... So you just... look like that’s all?..

So what?

Nothing... So I... - he bit his mustache. - Without any task, that means... I went home? On the stove?

No, there was a task. I wanted to know what kind of people...

To know…

Y-yes!.. Nothing more? I just looked and that’s it?

Maybe I’ll describe it... in the newspaper.

In the newspaper?! And who needs... to know about this? Or is this just for the sake of praise - like, how can I?!

He stood up and looked at me with evil narrowed eyes.

Do you know what, Maxim? - he asked.

This is very meanness! - he said expressively, shook his fist at me and, without saying goodbye, left ... "

The entire spiritual biography of Gorky, including his negative points, unfolds before us only because Gorky himself wanted to build it in a similar way. Find out where it ends real life and the creation of the myth begins, it’s difficult here.

One way or another, by the time he wrote his first major work, the story “Foma Gordeev,” Gorky had already said goodbye to the tramp “ideal” and was looking for a positive ideal, turning over the accumulated rich life and book experience in his head. What was left of the “former” Alyosha Peshkov was lifelong homelessness (Gorky, like Bunin, never had his own home) and a passion for lighting fires, which remained in him until old age and reached the point of ridiculousness: a heavy smoker, he never blew out matches, waited, while they burn in an ashtray watching the fire.

The former wanderer became a fire worshiper for life. In his later years, he lit fires almost every evening - in Sorrento, in Gorki, in Tesseli. In Tesseli, he even came up with a job for himself and his household: clearing away the thorny bushes on the way to the sea, most likely only in order to later make luxurious bonfires out of it.

Near the fire, his soul briefly found peace. At the end of the 1920s in Sorrento, he wrote: “Yesterday, in the garden, I lit a big fire, sat in front of it and thought: this is how I, thirty-five years ago, lit fires in Rus', on the edges of forests, in ravines, and then I had no worries, except for one thing - that the fire would burn well ... "

Otherwise, there was “a huge distance” between the ridiculous brute Grokhalo in a straw hat and multi-colored boots, who came to Samara to scare a decent audience, and the successful writer Gorky.

Perhaps this was precisely the reason for Gorky’s failure with Foma Gordeev, which the author took seriously. Gordeev was conceived as a titan crushing world injustice. He had to find his God in life, which, as the early Gorky believed, is part of the “heart and mind” of a person. He wrote to K.P. Pyatnitsky, already anticipating the failure of his first novel: “Do you know what to write? Two stories: one about a man who walked from top to bottom and below, in the mud, found - God! - another about a person, to<ото>He walked from the bottom up and also found - God! - and this God is one and the same...”

Top-down God - probably Christianity. This is the idea of the God-man, symbolizing the Divine principle in people. God is “bottom-up”, perhaps a “superman” in Gorky’s understanding. In his eyes, not only God goes to people, but man also rises to God. This position of his goes back to the Old Testament tradition: to the book of Job and the legend of Jacob’s struggle with God. The name of Thomas refers to Thomas the Unbeliever, who doubted the reality Christ's Resurrection and demanded material confirmation of this. However, following the logic of the development of the image of Gordeev, Gorky, as a realist writer, eventually realized that Thomas, confused in modern morality, was unable to complete the task assigned to him. As a result, the “master of life” Mayakin turned out to be a more integral type, who calmly defeated Foma. It seems that the writer himself did not expect this outcome of the novel and was dissatisfied.

The growing dissatisfaction with his own brainchild in the process of its creation (which was very painful!) is reflected in Gorky’s correspondence with different people. Here he writes to the publisher S.P. Dorovatovsky: “... I am free for my great job. Wish me success."

Here in the letter to him appears the detailed plan of “Thomas...” and the first worries: “For last days I have swallowed a lot of nasty things from life’s bounty and am in a rather wild mood. I’m afraid this wouldn’t resonate with “Foma.” This story gives me a lot of good moments and a lot of fear and doubts - it should be a broad, meaningful picture of modernity, and at the same time, against its background, an energetic, healthy man, looking for things to do within his strength, looking for space for his energy. He feels cramped, life crushes him, he sees that there is no place for heroes in it, they are knocked down by little things, just as Hercules, who defeated the hydras, would have been knocked down by a cloud of mosquitoes. Will this come out clearly and understandably enough for me? Tell me how you like the beginning, isn’t it drawn out, isn’t it boring, what does the public say about it, do they complain about the abundance of monologues in Ignat (Foma’s father - P.B.).”

The story has not yet been written, but has already been published in portions in the magazine “Life”, starting in February 1899. A common practice in those years. Chekhov also published “Drama on the Hunt” in the newspaper “News of the Day,” and then Gorky will publish the story “Childhood” in the newspaper “Childhood.” Russian word" The story was ordered for “5 sheets”, but it is growing, because the author cannot cope with main theme stated in a letter to the publisher. In individual pictures she is magnificent. For example, the scene of Gordeev’s drunken revelry on the Volga.

And what is his father like - Ignat! Gorky felt this merchant type well and, perhaps against his own reason, loved him spiritually. A rude, wild nature, capable of running a million-dollar business and easily blowing thousands in a drunken frenzy. But Foma, Foma... Everything in him is from Ignat - intelligence, strength, business qualities. But it still turned out to be a “decadent” and a weakling!

“My ‘Foma’ is becoming some kind of crocodile for me,” Gorky writes irritably to Chekhov. “I even saw him in a dream last time: lying in the mud, clicking his teeth and fiercely saying: “What are you doing to me, devil?” And what am I doing? I’ll spoil his appearance.” And in a letter to V.S. Mirolyubov again about this: “I am spoiling “Thomas”. Very angry".

S.P. Dorovatovsky: “And with “Foma” I strayed from the true path. Oh-ho-ho! I'll have to rebuild this whole thing from start to finish, and it will cost me dearly! I hurried and stretched it out. Woe! This thing makes me very angry."

To him: ““Thomas”? I ruined it. In the June book (sixth issue of Life magazine - P.B.) he is disgusting. Women fail. There is a lot of completely unnecessary things, and I don’t know what to do with what is needed, what is necessary...”

To A.P. Chekhov: “I’m not happy with myself, because I know I could write better. Foma is still nonsense. This offends me."

Nevertheless, at the end of writing (and publishing in the magazine) this work, Gorky asked Chekhov for permission to dedicate a separate edition of it to him. And at the same time he admitted: “...Foma is dim. And there is a lot of unnecessary stuff in this story. Apparently, I won’t write anything as harmoniously and beautifully as I wrote “The Old Woman Izergil.”

Noble Chekhov allowed. He generally appreciated Gorky, no matter how much Ivan Bunin later tried to dispute this fact in his memoirs. Chekhov saw great talent in him. But he didn’t like Foma Gordeev. In February 1900 (“Foma” had already been published as a separate book with a dedication: “To Anton Pavlovich Chekhov. - M. Gorky”) Chekhov wrote to the publisher and critic V.A. Posse: ““Foma Gordeev” was written monotonously, like a dissertation. All characters they speak the same way; and everyone's way of thinking is the same. Everyone speaks not simply, but on purpose; everyone has some kind of ulterior motive; they don’t say something, as if they know something; in fact, they don’t know anything, and this is their fa?on de parler - to talk and not say anything.”

Although Chekhov admitted: “There are wonderful places in Foma. Gorky will become a great writer, if only he does not get tired, grow cold, or become lazy.” But Chekhov highlighted the main internal “flaw” of Gorky’s artistic worldview. In all of it major works, starting with “Foma Gordeev” and ending with the main epic canvas, “The Life of Klim Samgin,” both in the speeches of the characters and in the writer’s general view of people there is “some kind of ulterior thought” that cannot be grasped and which interferes with a clear perception of the work. It seems that Gorky himself does not know what this thought is, but only feels that it should explain everything, put everything in its place.

Thomas was conceived as a self-sufficient spiritual person, but not like Chudra, Chelkash or Izergil, who rejected the “mental” attitude to life. Thomas had to synthesize in himself mind and will, nature and culture. Instead, with his creator, Thomas became lost in the spiritual wilderness.

Thomas compares himself to an owl that saw the light and went blind. But what kind of light did Thomas see? This is the constant “second thought” of the story. It is she who does not allow the hero to live normally.

Did Gorky himself see this light? It would be more correct to say this: he constantly foresaw. Like Zarathustra, he lived waiting for the sun to rise. Until it rose, his eyes saw twilight.

We are talking about spiritual vision. Because as a realist writer, Gorky undoubtedly grew a lot in Foma Gordeev. This is what Chekhov noted. However, Tolstoy did not admit this.

The memoirs of V. A. Posse tell about Gorky’s meeting with Tolstoy in Khamovniki in 1900.

“Have you read, Lev Nikolaevich, my “Foma Gordeev”? - asked Gorky.

It seems to me that Foma’s childhood was not made up.

No, everything is made up. Forgive me, but I don’t like it..."

The old man was relentless in his assessments.

From the book General Dima. Career. Jail. Love author Yakubovskaya Irina Pavlovna

Former friends Dima was always surrounded by friends. While he was a successful lawyer, many considered it an honor to communicate with Yakubovsky. Naturally, his circle of close friends included famous people holding a high position in society. But as soon as over Dima

From the book Notes of a Survivor author Golitsyn Sergey Mikhailovich

Former... former... former 1 December 1, 1934 is important milestone in the history of our country - before the murder of Kirov and after the murder. Came out the very next day new law: those accused of terrorism will be judged quickly, the investigation will be completed within ten days, there will be no cassation appeals

author

Former friends Among the people invited to my farewell were Felix Svetov and Vladimir Kornilov, friendship with whom ended in the same way - complete collapse. Felix, as I learned already in the West, wrote a long essay about me, at the very beginning of which he said about me:

From the book Lubyanka - Ekibastuz. Camp notes author Panin Dmitry Mikhailovich

Prisoners - Former Party Members Among us were prisoners from the 1937-38 imprisonment. Every extermination campaign always has a main purpose. During the first years Soviet power officers, nobles, workers, peasants, clergy, Cossacks, merchants, factory owners, homeowners,

From the book Raisins from a Bread author Shenderovich Viktor Anatolievich

Former allies In Uzbekistan at the beginning of the 2000s, the government banned the game of billiards - as contributing to the spread of drug addiction and crime. I tried to restore the logic of the decision and learned it: it turns out that many criminals were caught for

From the book First Meeting - last meeting author Ryazanov Eldar Alexandrovich

“Four wives took me to the hospital, three of them were ex-wives...” Directed by Roger Vadim, née Plemyannikov. Vadim made a French surname from his name. Before talking about the film director Rozhedim, I want to tell you, dear reader, about Brigitte Bardot. These two names

From the book Specialist in Siberia. German architect in the Stalinist USSR author Wolters Rudolf

"Former" Women. Letters. Propaganda. Parting. At the beginning of April, the long winter came to an end, and soon the contracted year of my work would also end. A month before the expiration of the contract, I had to declare its termination, otherwise it was automatically extended for another

From the book Journey to the Land of Ze-Ka author Margolin Yuliy Borisovich

From the book Memoirs. From serfdom to the Bolsheviks author Wrangel Nikolai Egorovich

Former fellow officers Of those officers who served in the Horse Guards at the same time as me, only a few lived to see our sad days. When I fled St. Petersburg at the end of 1918, only the following persons were still alive: Count Fredericks, Adjutant General, former

From Yeltsin's book. Swan. Khasavyurt author Moroz Oleg Pavlovich

Former prime ministers call for negotiations On October 24, in the NTV program “Itogi”, three former Russian prime ministers - Chernomyrdin, Kiriyenko and Stepashin (Primakov did not participate in the program, he watched Dorenko’s program on ORT) - were asked the question: “What is the way out of the situation in

From the book This Is Mine author Ukhnalev Evgeniy

People Before I start writing about my life after the camps, I would like to remember some good people, name some names so that their memory remains. For example, from the times of the Secondary Art School - the now living artist Proshkin. He makes good, fresh watercolors,

From the book Tablecloth by Lydia Libedinskaya author Gromova Natalia Alexandrovna

From the book Self-Portrait: The Novel of My Life author Voinovich Vladimir Nikolaevich

From the book History of Russian Chanson author Kravchinsky Maxim Eduardovich

Former To Recent years of peace before the October Revolution throughout Russian Empire The cabaret boom began. Having emerged in the domestic field with a huge delay, the French invention found fertile ground for development here. Perhaps the time is right? WITH

From book Everyday life old Russian gymnasium author Shubkin Nikolay Feoktistovich

Former students December 8 Yesterday evening two of them visited me former students my first issue. I will always have the warmest memories of this graduation and especially of the company to which these two students belonged. Smart, developed girls,

From the author's book

My former students May 23 My proud former students, now studying in different courses, began to arrive from the university. With most of them I have a good relationship, and meeting them is very pleasant. They are divided among themselves, of course, into different circles - according to

Current page: 1 (book has 4 pages in total)

Maksim Gorky
Former people

I

The entrance street consists of two rows of one-story shacks, closely pressed together, dilapidated, with crooked walls and skewed windows; the leaky roofs of human dwellings, mutilated by time, are covered with patches of splints and overgrown with moss; Here and there high poles with birdhouses stick out above them, they are overshadowed by the dusty greenery of elderberry and gnarled willows - the pitiful flora of the city outskirts inhabited by the poor.

The glass windows of the houses, dull green with age, look at each other with the eyes of cowardly swindlers. In the middle of the street, a winding track creeps up the mountain, maneuvering between deep ruts, washed out by the rains. Here and there lie heaps of rubble and various debris overgrown with weeds - these are the remains or beginnings of those structures that were unsuccessfully undertaken by ordinary people in the fight against the streams of rainwater that was rapidly flowing from the city. Above, on the mountain, beautiful stone houses are hidden in the lush greenery of dense gardens, the bell towers of churches proudly rise into the blue sky, their golden crosses sparkle dazzlingly in the sun.

When it rains, the city releases its dirt onto Vezzhaya Street, and when it’s dry, it showers it with dust—and all these ugly houses also seem to have been thrown from there, from above, swept away like garbage by someone’s mighty hand.

Flattened to the ground, they dotted the entire mountain, half-rotten, weak, painted by the sun, dust and rain in that grayish-dirty color that a tree takes on in old age.

At the end of this street, thrown out of the city downhill, stood the long two-story escheat house of the merchant Petunnikov. He is the last one in order, he is already under the mountain, further behind him there is a wide field, cut off half a mile by a steep cliff to the river.

The big old house had the gloomiest face among its neighbors. It was all crooked, in two rows of windows there was not a single one that retained the correct shape, and the glass fragments in the broken frames had the greenish-muddy color of swamp water.

The walls between the windows were dotted with cracks and dark spots of fallen plaster - as if time had written his biography on the walls of the house in hieroglyphs. The roof, sloping towards the street, further increased its deplorable appearance - it seemed that the house was bent to the ground and was meekly awaiting the final blow from fate, which would turn it into a shapeless pile of half-rotten rubble.

Inside the shelter is a long, gloomy hole, four and six fathoms in size; it was lit - only on one side - by four small windows and a wide door. Its brick, unplastered walls are black with soot, the ceiling, from the baroque bottom, is also smoked black; in the middle of it there was a huge stove, the base of which was a forge, and around the stove and along the walls there were wide bunks with piles of all sorts of junk that served as beds for the bunkhouses. The walls smelled of smoke, the earthen floor smelled of damp, and the bunks smelled of rotting rags.

The room of the owner of the shelter was located on the stove, the bunks around the stove were a place of honor, and those shelters who enjoyed the favor and friendship of the owner were placed on them.

Before renting this premises, Aristide Hammer had an office in the city for the recommendation of servants; going higher into his past, one could find out that he had a printing house, and before the printing house, he, in his words, “simply lived!” And he lived well, damn it! I lived skillfully, I can say!”

He was a broad-shouldered, tall man of about fifty, with a pockmarked face, swollen from drunkenness, and a wide, dirty yellow beard. His eyes are gray, huge, and boldly cheerful; He spoke in a deep voice, with a rumble in his throat, and almost always a German porcelain pipe with a curved stem stuck out in his teeth. When he was angry, the nostrils of his large, humpbacked, red nose would flare wide and his lips would quiver, revealing two rows of large, wolf-like yellow teeth. Long-armed, lanky-legged, dressed in a dirty and torn officer’s overcoat, in a greasy cap with a red band but without a visor, in thin felt boots that reached his knees - in the morning he was invariably in in serious condition hangover, and in the evening - tipsy. He could not get drunk, no matter how much he drank, and he never lost his cheerful mood.

In the evenings, sitting in his brick chair with a pipe in his mouth, he received guests.

- What kind of person? - he asked a ragged and depressed person approaching him, thrown out of the city for drunkenness or for some other good reason who had fallen down.

The man answered.

- Present legal paper to confirm your lies.

The paper was presented if there was one. The captain put it in his bosom, rarely interested in its contents, and said:

- Everything is fine. For a night - two kopecks, for a week - a kopeck, for a month - three kopecks. Go and take a seat for yourself, but make sure it’s not someone else’s, otherwise they’ll blow you up. People living with me are strict...

Newcomers asked him:

– Don’t you sell tea, bread or anything edible?

“I only sell walls and roofs, for which I myself pay the swindler - the owner of this hole, the merchant of the 2nd guild Judas Petunnikov, five rubles a month,” Kuvald explained in a businesslike tone, “people come to me, unaccustomed to luxury... and if you I’m used to eating every day - there’s a tavern across the street. But it’s better if you, a wreck, unlearn this bad habit. After all, you’re not a gentleman, so what do you eat? Eat yourself!

For such speeches, delivered in an artificially stern tone, but always with laughing eyes, for his attentive attitude towards his guests, the captain enjoyed wide popularity among the city goli. It often happened that the captain's former client would appear at his yard, no longer torn and depressed, but in more or less decent appearance and with a cheerful face.

- Hello, your honor! How are you doing?

- Did not recognize?

- Did not recognize.

– Do you remember that I lived with you for about a month in the winter... when there was a raid and three people were taken away?

- W-well, brother, under my hospitable roof every now and then there are police!

- Oh, my God! Back then you showed the private bailiff a fig!

- Wait, you spit on memories and just say what you need?

– Would you like to accept a small treat from me? How I lived with you at that time, and you told me...

– Gratitude should be encouraged, my friend, because it is rare among people. You must be a nice fellow, and although I don’t remember you at all, I will go to the tavern with you with pleasure and drink to your successes in life with pleasure.

- Are you still the same - are you still joking?

- What else can you do while living among you Goryunov?

- Your honor! That's it! Am I on your team again? What now?

“A position that cannot be boasted about, but, being in it, one should not whine,” the captain resonated. “You need, my friend, to be indifferent to everything, without spoiling your life with philosophy and without raising any questions.” Philosophizing is always stupid, philosophizing with a hangover is inexpressibly stupid. A hangover requires vodka, not remorse and gnashing of teeth... take care of your teeth, otherwise there will be nothing to hit you with. Here you go, here's two kopecks - go and bring a box of vodka, a patch of hot tripe or lung, a pound of bread and two cucumbers. When we are hungover, then we will weigh the situation...

The state of affairs was determined quite accurately two days later, when the captain did not have a penny of the three-ruble or five-ruble coin that he had in his pocket on the day the grateful client appeared.

- We've arrived! That's it! - said the captain. “Now that you and I, fool, have completely drunk ourselves, let’s try to take the path of sobriety and virtue again.” It is rightly said: if you do not sin, you will not repent; if you do not repent, you will not be saved. We have fulfilled the first, but it is useless to repent, let’s save ourselves straight away. Go to the river and work. If you can’t vouch for yourself, tell the contractor to keep your money, otherwise give it to me. When we accumulate capital, I will buy you pants and other things that you need so that you can again pass for a decent person and a modest worker, persecuted by fate. In good pants you can go far again. March!

The client went to hook on the river, laughing at the captain’s speeches. He vaguely understood their salt, but saw before him cheerful eyes, felt a cheerful spirit and knew that in the eloquent captain he had a hand that, if necessary, could support him.

And indeed, after a month or two of some kind of hard labor, the client, by the grace of the captain’s strict supervision of his behavior, had the material opportunity to again rise to a step above the place where he had fallen with the favorable participation of the same captain.

“W-well, my friend,” said Sledgehammer, critically examining the restored client, “we have pants and a jacket.” These are things of enormous significance - trust my experience. As long as I had decent pants, I played the role of a decent person in the city, but, damn it, as soon as my pants came off, I fell in people’s opinion and had to slide here out of town. People, my beautiful idiot, judge all things by their form, but the essence of things is inaccessible to them due to the innate stupidity of people. Get this off your chest and, having paid me at least half of your debt, go in peace, seek and may you find!

- I tell you, Aristide Fomich, how much am I worth? – the client inquired confusedly.

- A ruble and seven hryvnia... Now give me a ruble or seven hryvnia, and I’ll wait on you for the rest until you steal or earn more than what you now have.

- Thank you most humbly for your kindness! - says the touched client. - What a good fellow you are! right! Eh, in vain life has twisted you... What the hell were you in the right place?!

The captain cannot live without florid speeches.

- What do you mean - in its place? No one knows their real place in life, and each of us is not in our own way. The merchant Judas Petunnikov belongs in hard labor, but he walks the streets in broad daylight and even wants to build some kind of factory. Our teacher’s place is next to a good woman and among half a dozen guys, but he’s lying around in Vavilov’s tavern. Here you are - you are going to look for a place as a footman or a bellhop, but I see that your place is among the soldiers, for you are smart, hardy and understand discipline. Do you see what the thing is? Life shuffles us like cards, and only by chance - and then not for long - do we find ourselves in our place!

Sometimes such farewell conversations served as a preface to the continuation of the acquaintance, which again began with a good drink and again reached the point where the client got drunk and was amazed, the captain gave him revenge, and... both got drunk.

Such repetitions of the previous one did not spoil good relations between the parties. The teacher mentioned by the captain was precisely one of those clients who were repaired only to immediately collapse. In terms of his intellect, he was the man closest to the captain of all others, and perhaps it was precisely to this reason that he was obliged by the fact that, having descended to the lodgings, he could no longer rise.

With him, Hammer could philosophize in the confidence that he was understood. He appreciated this, and when the corrected teacher was preparing to leave the lodging house, having earned some money and with the intention of renting a corner in the city, Aristide Hammer saw him off so sadly, uttered so many melancholy tirades that both of them certainly got drunk and got drunk. Probably, Kuvalda deliberately arranged things in such a way that the teacher, no matter how hard he wanted, could not get out of his room. Was it possible for Hammer, a man with an education, fragments of which still shone in his speeches, with a habit of thinking developed by the vicissitudes of fate - could he not desire and not try to always see a person like him next to him? We know how to feel sorry for ourselves.

This teacher once taught something at the teacher's institute of the Volga city, but was removed from the institute. Then he served as a clerk at a tannery, as a librarian, tried several other professions, and finally, having passed the exam to become a private attorney in court cases, drank bitterly and ended up with the captain. He was tall, stooped, with a long pointed nose and a bald skull. On the bony, yellow face with a wedge-shaped beard, the eyes glittered restlessly, deeply sunken into their sockets, the corners of the mouth were sadly downturned. He made his living, or rather, his means of drinking, by reporting for local newspapers. It happened that he earned fifteen rubles a week. Then he gave them to the captain and said:

- Will! I'm returning to the fold of culture.

- Commendable! I sympathize with your decision, Philip, from the bottom of my heart, I will not give you a single glass! – the captain warned him sternly.

- I will be grateful!..

The captain heard in his words something close to a timid plea for relief and said even more sternly:

- Even if you cry, I won’t let you!

- Well, it’s over! – the teacher sighed and went to report. And a day later, much like two, he, thirsty, looked at the captain from somewhere in the corner with sad and pleading eyes and anxiously waited for his friend’s heart to soften. The captain made speeches saturated with deadly irony about the shame of weak character, about the bestial pleasure of drunkenness and on other topics appropriate to the occasion. We must give him justice - he was quite sincerely interested in his role as a mentor and moralist; but the skeptical habitues of the shelter, watching the captain and listening to his punitive speeches, said to each other, winking in his direction:

- Chemist! Deftly fights off! They say, I told you, you didn’t listen to me - blame yourself!

- His honor is a real warrior - he goes forward, but is already looking for the way back!

The teacher caught his friend somewhere in a dark corner and, clutching his dirty overcoat, trembling, licking his dry lips, with an inexpressible, deeply tragic look, looked into his face.

- Can not? – the captain asked gloomily. The teacher nodded affirmatively to the classroom.

- Wait another day, maybe you can handle it? – Sledgehammer suggested.

The teacher shook his head negatively. The captain saw that his friend’s thin body was still trembling with a thirst for poison, and took money out of his pocket.

“In most cases, it is useless to argue with fate,” he said at the same time, as if he wanted to justify himself to someone.

The teacher did not drink away all his money; he spent at least half of it on the children of Vezzhaya Street. Poor people are always rich in children; on this street, in its dust and holes, from morning to evening heaps of ragged, dirty and half-starved children were noisily fiddling around.

Children are the living flowers of the earth, but on Vezzhaya Street they looked like flowers that had withered prematurely.

The teacher gathered them around him and, having bought buns, eggs, apples and nuts, went with them to the field, to the river. There they first greedily ate everything that the teacher offered them, and then played, filling the air for a mile around them with noise and laughter. The long figure of the drunkard somehow shrank among the little people, they treated him as one of their own, and simply called him Philip, without adding uncle or uncle to his name. Hovering around him like vines, they pushed him, jumped on his back, slapped his bald head, and grabbed his nose. He must have liked all this; he did not protest against such liberties. He didn’t talk to them much at all, and if he did, it was cautiously and timidly, as if he was afraid that his words might stain them or even harm them. He spent several hours at a time with them, in the role of their plaything and comrade, looking at their animated faces with melancholy sad eyes, and then thoughtfully went to Vavilov’s tavern and there silently drank until he lost consciousness.

Almost every day, returning from reporting, the teacher brought a newspaper with him, and a general meeting of all former people was held near him. They moved toward him, drunk or hungover, variously disheveled, but equally pitiful and dirty.

Walking fat as a barrel, Alexey Maksimovich Simtsov, a former forester, and now a dealer in matches, ink, and blacking agent, an old man of about sixty, in a canvas coat and a wide hat that covered his thick and red face with a crumpled brim with a thick white beard, from which he His little crimson nose looked out into the light of God cheerfully and his watery, cynical eyes sparkled. He was nicknamed Kubar - the nickname aptly outlined his round figure and speech, similar to a buzz.

The End was crawling out from somewhere in the corner - a gloomy, silent, black drunkard, former prison guard Luka Antonovich Martyanov, a man who existed by playing “thong”, “three leaves”, “bank” and other arts, equally witty and equally unloved by the police. He ponderously lowered his large, brutally beaten body onto the grass, next to the teacher, sparkled with his black eyes and, extending his hand to the bottle, asked in a hoarse bass voice:

Mechanic Pavel Solntsev, a consumptive man of about thirty, appeared. His left side was broken in the fight, his face, yellow and sharp, like a fox’s, was twisted into a malicious smile. Thin lips revealed two rows of black teeth, destroyed by disease, and the rags on his narrow and bony shoulders dangled as if on a hanger. They called him Snack. He made his living by selling washbrushes of his own making and brooms made from some special grass, very convenient for cleaning clothes.

A tall, bony man with a crooked left eye came, with a frightened expression in his large round eyes, silent, timid, who had been imprisoned three times for theft by sentences of the magistrate and district courts. His last name was Kiselnikov, but his name was One and a half Taras, because he was just half a height taller than his inseparable friend Deacon Taras, who had been stripped for drunkenness and dissolute behavior. The deacon was a short and stocky man with a heroic chest and a round, curly head. He danced amazingly well and swore even more amazingly. They, together with Taras and a Half, chose cutting wood on the river bank as their specialty, and in his free hours the deacon told his friend and anyone who wanted to listen to fairy tales “ own composition", as he stated. Listening to these tales, the heroes of which were always saints, kings, priests and generals, even the inhabitants of the shelter spat with disgust and goggled their eyes in amazement at the imagination of the deacon, who, with narrowed eyes, told amazingly shameless and dirty adventures. This man's imagination was inexhaustible and powerful - he could compose and speak all day and never repeat himself. In his person perished, perhaps, a major poet, at least a remarkable storyteller, who knew how to enliven everything and even put his soul into stones with his nasty, but figurative and strong words.

There was also some ridiculous young man here, nicknamed Sledgehammer Meteor. One day he came to spend the night and from then on remained among these people, to their surprise. At first they didn’t notice him - during the day, like everyone else, he went out to look for food, but in the evening he constantly hung around this friendly company, and finally the captain noticed him.

- Boy! What are you on this earth?

The boy answered bravely and briefly:

- I’m a tramp...

The captain looked at him critically. The guy was some kind of long-haired, with a stupid, high-cheekboned face, adorned with an upturned nose. He was wearing a blue blouse without a belt, and the remainder of a straw hat stuck out on his head. Feet are bare.

- You're a fool! – Aristide Sledgehammer decided. -Why are you hanging around here? Do you drink vodka? No... Can you steal? Also no. Go, learn and come back when you are already a man...

The guy laughed.

- No, I’ll live with you.

- For what?

- And so...

- Oh, you are a meteor! - said the captain.

“I’ll knock his teeth out now,” Martyanov suggested.

- For what? – the guy inquired.

“And I’ll take a stone and hit you on the head,” the guy announced respectfully.

Martyanov would have beaten him if Sledgehammer had not intervened.

– Leave him... This, brother, is some kind of relative to all of us, perhaps. You want to knock out his teeth without sufficient reason; he, like you, wants to live with us without reason. Well, to hell with it... We all live without a sufficient reason for this...

“But it would be better for you, young man, to move away from us,” the teacher advised, looking at this guy with his sad eyes.

He didn’t answer and stayed. Then they got used to it and stopped noticing it. And he lived among them and noticed everything.

The listed entities were Main Headquarters captain; he, with good-natured irony, called them “former people.” Besides them, five or six ordinary tramps constantly lived in the shelter. They could not boast of such a past as the “former people”, and although they experienced the vicissitudes of fate no less than them, they were more complete people, not so terribly broken. Almost all of them are “former men.” Perhaps a decent man of a cultured class is superior to the same man from the peasantry, but a vicious man from the city is always immeasurably nastier and dirtier than a vicious man from the countryside.

A prominent representative of the former peasants was the old rag picker Tyapa. Long and ugly thin, he held his head so that his chin rested on his chest, and this made his shadow resemble a poker in its shape. His face was not visible from the front; in profile, one could only see his humped nose, drooping lower lip and shaggy gray eyebrows. He was the captain's first guest; they said about him that he had a lot of money hidden somewhere. Because of this money, about two years ago he was “shuffled” with a knife on the neck, and from then on he bowed his head. He denied that he had money, saying: “They shuffled just like that, mischief” and that from then on he was very comfortable collecting rags and bones - his head was constantly tilted to the ground. When he walked with a swaying, unsteady gait, without a stick in his hands and without a bag behind his back, he seemed like a man deep in thought, and at such moments Sledgehammer said, pointing his finger at him:

- Look, the conscience of the merchant Judas Petunnikov, having fled from him, is looking for refuge. Look how shabby, nasty, dirty she is!

Tyapa spoke in a hoarse voice, it was difficult to understand his speech, and this must be why he generally spoke little and loved solitude very much. But every time some fresh example of a person, pushed out of the village by need, appeared at the shelter, Tyapa fell into embitterment and anxiety at the sight of him. He pursued the unfortunate man with caustic ridicule that came out of his throat with an angry wheeze, set someone against the newcomer, finally threatened to beat and rob him with his own hands at night and almost always ensured that the intimidated peasant disappeared from the shelter.

Then Tyapa, calmed down, would hide in a corner somewhere, where he mended his rags or read the Bible, which was as old and dirty as he himself. He crawled out of his corner when the teacher was reading the newspaper. Tyapa listened silently to everything that was being read and sighed deeply, without asking anything. But when, after reading the newspaper, the teacher folded it, Tyapa extended his bony hand and said:

- Let me...

- What do you need?

- Give me, maybe there is something about us...

– Who is this about?

- About the village.

They laughed at him and threw him a newspaper. He took it and read in it that in one village the grain was destroyed by hail, in another thirty households burned down, and in the third a woman poisoned her husband - everything that is customary to write about the village and that portrays it as unhappy, stupid and evil. Tyapa read and hummed, expressing with this sound perhaps compassion, perhaps pleasure.

On Sunday he did not go out to collect rags, reading the Bible almost all day. He held the book, resting it on his chest, and became angry if anyone touched it or prevented him from reading.

“Hey, warlock,” Hammerhead told him, “what do you understand?” Give it up!

– What do you understand?

– And I don’t understand anything, but I don’t read books...

- And I’m reading...

- Well, stupid! - the captain decided. “When insects crawl into your head, it’s restless, but if thoughts also crawl into it, how will you live, old toad?”

“I won’t be long,” Tyapa said calmly.

One day the teacher wanted to know where he learned to read and write. Tyapa answered him briefly:

- In prison…

- You were there?

- For what?

- So... I was mistaken... So I took the Bible out of there. The lady alone gave... In prison, brother, it’s good...

- W-well? What is it?

- He’s teaching... I’ve learned to read and write... I got a book... It’s all for nothing...

When the teacher came to the shelter, Tyapa had been living there for a long time. He looked closely at the teacher for a long time - in order to look the man in the face, Tyapa bent his entire body to one side - listened to his conversations for a long time and one day sat down next to him.

- You were a scientist... Did you read the Bible?

- Read…

- That's it... Do you remember her?

- Well, I remember...

The old man bent his body to one side and looked at the teacher with a gray, sternly incredulous eye.

“Do you remember the Amalekites were there?”

-Where are they now?

- Disappeared, Tyapa, - died out...

The old man was silent and asked again:

- And the Philistines?

- And these too...

- Are they all extinct?

- So... Will we die out too?

“The time will come and we will die out,” the teacher promised indifferently.

- And from whom are we from the tribes of Israel?

The teacher looked at him, thought and began to talk about the Cimmerians, Scythians, Slavs... The old man sank even more and looked at him with some frightened eyes.

- You're lying all the time! – he wheezed when the teacher finished.

- Why am I lying? – he was amazed.

– Which peoples did you name? They are not in the Bible.

He got up and walked away, growling angrily.

“You’re losing your mind, Tyapa,” the teacher said after him with conviction.

Then the old man turned to him again and shook his dirty, hooked finger at him.

- From the Lord - Adam, from Adam - the Jews, which means all people are from the Jews... And we too...

- The Tatars are from Ishmael... and he is from a Jew...

- What do you want?

- Why are you lying?

And he left, leaving his interlocutor in bewilderment. But two days later I sat down with him again.

– Were you a scientist... should you know who we are?

“Slavs, Tyapa,” answered the teacher.

- Speak according to the Bible - there are no such people there. Who are we - Babylonians, or what? Or Edom?

The teacher launched into criticism of the Bible.

The old man listened to him attentively for a long time and interrupted:

- Wait, stop! So, among the nations known to God there are no Russians? Are we people unknown to God? Is not it? Which are written in the Bible - the Lord knew them... He crushed them with fire and sword, destroyed their cities and villages, and sent prophets to them for instruction - he pitied them, that means. He scattered the Jews and Tatars, but saved them... What about us? Why don't we have prophets?

– I-I don’t know! – the teacher drawled, trying to understand the old man. And he put his hand on the teacher’s shoulder, began to quietly push him back and forth and wheezed, as if he was swallowing something...

- Say so!.. Otherwise you talk a lot, as if you know everything. I’m sick of listening to you... you’re disturbing my soul... It would be better to remain silent!.. Who are we? That's it! Why don't we have prophets? Where were we when Christ walked the earth? Do you see? Oh you! And you’re lying – how can an entire people die? The Russian people cannot disappear - you’re lying... they are written in the Bible, but it’s unknown under what word... Do you know the people - what are they like? It is huge... How many villages are there on earth? All the people live there, real ones, big people. And you say - it will die out... A people cannot die, a person can... but God needs the people, they are the builder of the earth. The Amalekites did not die - they are Germans or French... And you... oh you!.. Well, tell me, why are we left out by God? Do we have neither plagues nor prophets from the Lord? Who will teach us?..

Tyapa's speech was strong; mockery, reproach and deep faith sounded in her. He spoke for a long time, and the teacher, who, as usual, was drunk and in a minor mood, finally felt as bad listening to him as if he were being sawed through with a wooden saw. He listened to the old man, looked at his mangled body, felt the strange, oppressive power of the words, and suddenly he felt painfully sorry for himself. He also wanted to say something strong, confident to the old man, something that would endear Tyapa in his favor, would force him to speak not in this reproachfully stern tone, but in a soft, fatherly affectionate tone. And the teacher felt something bubbling in his chest and rising to his throat.

- What kind of person are you?.. Your soul is torn... but you say it! As if you know anything... You would be silent...

“Eh, Tyapa,” the teacher exclaimed sadly, “that’s true!” And the people - right!.. They are huge. But - I’m a stranger to him... and - he’s a stranger to me... That’s the tragedy. But - let it go! I will suffer... And there are no prophets... no!.. I really talk a lot... and no one needs it... but - I will be silent... Just don’t talk to me like that... Eh, old man! you don't know... you don't know... you can't understand.

The teacher finally cried. He cried easily and freely, with copious tears, and these tears made him feel good.

“If you went to the village, you would apply there to be a teacher or a clerk... you would be well-fed and have some fresh air.” Why are you tossing around? - Tyapa wheezed sternly.

And the teacher kept crying, enjoying the tears. From then on they became friends, and former people, seeing them together, said:

– The teacher is wooing Tyapa, keeping him on course for money.

– It was Sledgehammer who taught him to find out where the old man’s capital was...

Perhaps, when they said this, they thought differently. These people had one funny trait: they loved to show themselves to each other worse than they really were.

A person, not feeling anything good in himself, sometimes does not mind showing off his bad.

When all these people gather around the teacher with his newspaper, the reading begins.

“Well,” says the captain, “what is the newspaper talking about today?” Is there a feuilleton?

“No,” says the teacher.

– The publisher is greedy... is there an editorial?

- There is... Gulyaeva.

- Yeah! Go ahead; He, the rogue, writes intelligently, a nail in his eye.

“The assessment of real estate,” the teacher reads, “made more than fifteen years ago, and to this day continues to serve as the basis for the collection of an assessment fee in favor of the city...”

“This is naive,” comments Captain Kuvalda, “he continues to serve!” That's funny! It is beneficial for the merchant who manages the affairs of the city that she continues to serve, well, she continues...

“The article was written on this topic,” says the teacher.

- Strange! This is a feuilleton topic... you need to write about it with pepper...

A small argument breaks out. The audience listens to him attentively, because so far only one bottle of vodka has been drunk. After the front line, they read the local chronicle, then the judicial one. If in these criminal departments the active and suffering person is a merchant, Aristide Hammer sincerely rejoices. They robbed a merchant - it’s great, it’s just a pity that it’s not enough. The horses killed him - it’s nice to hear, but it’s unfortunate that he survived. The merchant lost the lawsuit in court - magnificently, but it is sad that the legal costs were not imposed on him in double the amount.

The essay “Former People” was published in 1897, and it was based on Gorky’s youthful impressions when future writer was forced to live in a rooming house on one of the outlying streets of Kazan from June to October 1885. The reality of impressions determines genre originality works: before us is an artistic essay, where the main subject of the image is the life of homeless people, tramps, “former people” at its final and, probably, most tragic stage. The essay genre presupposes underdevelopment storylines, lack of deep psychological analysis, preference portrait characteristics the study of the inner world of the individual, the almost complete absence of the backstory of the heroes.

If the main subject of depiction in the physiological essay was not so much specific characters as the social roles of the heroes (a St. Petersburg janitor, a St. Petersburg organ grinder, Moscow merchants, officials, cab drivers), then in Gorky’s artistic essay the writer’s main attention is focused on the study of the characters of the heroes, united by their current social status“former” people who found themselves at the bottom of their lives - in a shelter run by the same “former” person, retired captain Aristide Kuvalda.

In “Former People” there is no image of an autobiographical hero familiar to the writer - the narrator tries to distance himself from what is happening and not reveal his presence, therefore his ideological and compositional role here is different than in romantic stories or in the “Across Rus'” cycle. He is not the interlocutor of the heroes, their listener, and generally does not turn out to be a character in the work. Only the details of the portrait of “an absurd young man, nicknamed Sledgehammer Meteor” (“The guy was some kind of long-haired, with a stupid, high-cheekboned face, adorned with an upturned nose. He was wearing a blue blouse without a belt, and the rest of a straw hat stuck out on his head. His feet were bare.”) , and most importantly, the characteristics of his attitude towards others (“Then they got used to him and stopped noticing him. But he lived among them and noticed everything”) give us reason to see in him the features of an autobiographical hero, who, however, is distanced from the narrator.

But the main thing that determines the difference between “Former people” and early stories, is the author’s transition from a romantic interpretation folk character to realistic.

The subject of Gorky’s depiction is still images of people from the people, but turning to realistic aesthetics allows the writer to show much more clearly the inconsistency of the people’s character, the contrast between the strong and weak, light and dark sides of it. This inconsistency turns out to be the subject of study in Gorky’s essay.

The turn to realism also marks a change artistic means comprehension of reality.

If romantic landscape in Gorky's early stories he emphasized the exclusivity of the characters' characters, and the beauty and spirituality of the southern night, the vastness of the free steppe, the horror of the hopeless forest could serve as a backdrop for the revelation romantic hero who affirms his ideal at the cost own life, then now the writer turns to a realistic landscape. He captures its anti-aesthetic features, the ugliness of the city outskirts; poverty, dimness, cloudiness color range are designed to create a feeling of remoteness and abandonment of the habitat of the night shelters: “The glass windows of the houses, cloudy green with age, look at each other with the eyes of cowardly swindlers. In the middle of the street, a winding track creeps up the mountain, maneuvering between deep ruts, washed out by the rains. Here and there there are heaps of rubble and various debris overgrown with weeds.” The description of the uninhabited house of the merchant Petunnikov and the lodging house, located in a former forge, set the context of the typical circumstances that shape the consciousness of the heroes.

Deprived of the romantic aura with which he was shrouded in Gorky’s first stories, the character of the tramp in “Former People” appeared in all his pitiful helplessness before life. The realist approach showed that these people cannot oppose anything to their tragic fate, at least the romantic ideal of freedom, like Makar Chudra, or love, like Izergil. Unlike romantic heroes, they do not even feed themselves with a romantic illusion. They do not carry within themselves some ideal that could be opposed to reality. Therefore, even having risen a little, having taken a step from the shelter, they return back, simply drinking away what they have earned together with Aristide Hammer, a former intellectual, now a poor philosopher and the owner of their monastery. This is exactly what happens with a teacher.

Gorky is far from idealizing tramping. “In general, the Russian tramp,” he wrote in one of his letters, “is a more terrible phenomenon than I was able to say, this person is terrible first of all and most importantly - by his imperturbable despair, by the fact that he denies himself, casts himself out of life.” Indeed, the most terrible accusation that Gorky makes against the inhabitants of the shelter is complete indifference to themselves and passivity in relation to their own fate. “I am... a former person,” Aristide Sledgehammer proudly declares himself. “Now I don’t give a damn about everything and everyone... and my whole life for me is the mistress who abandoned me, for which I despise her.”

It is precisely this attitude to life, and not just their social position at its “bottom,” that “former people” are united by. Aristide Sledgehammer becomes their ideologist, and his philosophically helpless maxims represent the full outline of the ideology that a flophouse can create. “A former intellectual, he has one more feature,” wrote one of the first critics of the essay L. Nedolin, “he knows how to formulate those moods that nest in the heads of ordinary tramps, without finding expression for themselves.” Realizing the meaninglessness of complete self-denial (“As a former person, I I must subdue within myself all the feelings and thoughts that were once mine... But what do I and all of you - what will we arm ourselves with if we throw these feelings away? some new ideology, which we are not able to articulate: “We need something different, different views on life, different feelings... we need something new... because we are new in life...”.

But if in the drama of Gorky Luk something can be contrasted with the indifference to the own “I” of Baron or Bubnov, then for “former people” pessimism and passivity in relation to life turn out to be the most accessible philosophy.

“Does it matter what you say and think,” asks the End. “We don’t have long to live... I’m forty, you’re fifty... there’s no one among us younger than thirty.” And even at twenty you won’t live such a life for long.” His laughter, “bad, corroding the soul” and contagious for his comrades, turns out to be the only possible emotional reaction to his own position in life, below which there is no longer anything. “The end says, as if hitting heads with a hammer:

All this is nonsense, dreams, nonsense!”

This despair was especially hateful to Gorky, who valued action in man, the ability for his own growth, internal, difficult, painstaking work self-improvement. Therefore, the “continuously growing man” became the ideal of the writer. Despair gives rise to anger, which, finding no way out, falls upon one’s neighbor:

“And suddenly brutal anger flared up among them, the bitterness of the driven people, exhausted by their harsh fate, awakened. Then they beat each other; they beat me cruelly, brutally; they beat and again, having made peace, got drunk, drinking everything away... So, in dull anger, in the melancholy that squeezed their hearts, in ignorance of the outcome from this vile life, they spent the days of autumn, waiting for the even harsher days of winter.”

Gorky is trying to understand how great the personal, social, and universal potential of “former people” is, whether they, finding themselves in unbearable social and living conditions, are able to preserve certain intangible, spiritual and spiritual values that could be opposed to a world that is unfair to them. This aspect of the essay’s problems determines the uniqueness of the conflict.

The conflict is clearly social in nature: “former people” led by Aristide Kuvalda are revealed in confrontation with the merchant Petunnikov and his son, an educated, strong, cold and intelligent representative of the second generation of the Russian bourgeoisie.

Gorky is not so interested in social aspect confrontation, as much as the unwillingness of the heroes to really comprehend their position, their needs, possible prospects. They are not interested in someone else's land on which the Petunnikovs built a house, or even in the money they expect to receive. This is just a spontaneous manifestation of the hatred of a poor drunkard towards a rich and hard-working person. Gorky characterizes the worldview of “former” people this way:

“Evil had a lot of attractions in the eyes of these people. It was the only weapon in terms of hand and strength. Each of them had long ago cultivated in himself a semi-conscious, vague feeling of acute hostility towards all people who were well-fed and not dressed in rags; each had this feeling in different degrees of its development.”

Gorky's essay shows the complete futility of such life position. The complete absence of any creativity, activity, internal growth, dynamics of self-improvement (qualities that were so important for Gorky the artist and manifested in the hero autobiographical trilogy, in the novel “Mother”), the inability to oppose reality with anything other than anger inevitably leads to the “bottom” and turns this anger against the “former” people themselves. Experiencing their defeat in the conflict, the heroes cannot comprehend it otherwise than in Sledgehammer’s maxim: “Yes, life is all against us, my brothers, scoundrels! And even when you spit in your neighbor’s face, the spit flies back into your own eyes.”

It seems that Gorky, having taken a realistic position, is unable to find a way to resolve the conflict between the high destiny of man and the tragic unfulfillment of it in “former” people. Its irresistibility forces the writer in the final landscape to return to the romantic worldview and only in nature, in the elements, to see a beginning that can provide some way out, to find a solution to the insoluble:

“There was something tense and inexorable in the gray, stern clouds that completely covered the sky, as if they, about to burst into a downpour, had firmly decided to wash away all the dirt from this unfortunate, exhausted, sad earth.”

Editor's Choice

How to reduce VAT and maintain profits

Instructions: Exempt your company from VAT. This method is provided for by law and is based on Article 145 of the Tax Code...

International accounting and reporting standards

The UN Center for Transnational Corporations began working directly on IFRS. To develop global economic relations there was...

How to fill out a tax return correctly

The regulatory authorities have established rules according to which each business entity is required to submit financial statements....

Crab salad with cheese - five best recipes

Light tasty salads with crab sticks and eggs can be prepared in a hurry. I like crab stick salads because...

Cutlets in foil in the oven

Let's try to list the main dishes made from minced meat in the oven. There are many of them, suffice it to say that depending on what it is made of...

Salad of crab sticks with corn, cheese and egg Crab salad with hard cheese

There is nothing tastier and simpler than salads with crab sticks. Whichever option you take, each perfectly combines the original, easy...

Potatoes with minced meat in the oven in foil

Let's try to list the main dishes made from minced meat in the oven. There are many of them, suffice it to say that depending on what it is made of...

Cutlets in foil in the oven

Half a kilo of minced meat, evenly distributed on a baking sheet, bake at 180 degrees; 1 kilogram of minced meat - . How to bake minced meat...

Minced meat in foil in the oven with filling

Want to cook a great dinner? But don't have the energy or time to cook? I offer a step-by-step recipe with a photo of portioned potatoes with minced meat...

New

Popular

Gorky former people summary. Former people

"Former People"

Maksim Gorky Former people

I

Maksim Gorky
Former people