Literature the period under review was closely related to the previous period. The literary movement continues to exist naturalism (biology), in the work of E. Zola, acquiring new features in "physiological essays" from Rudyard Kipling, whose reportage becomes literary reception in his short stories about India, and soldier's slang makes his ballads accessible to millions. Symbolism is living out its last days.

Literary figures at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries were worried not only about creative problems, but also social injustice, imperialism, colonialism, militarism and wars - the complexity and contradictions of life. Writers of the realistic direction were engaged in criticism of the injustices of the social system, human relations, the fate of the creative person in bourgeois society.

Critical realism is further developed in the works of the largest European writers:

• Anatole France,
• Romain Rolland,
• Bernard Shaw et al.

At this time, the work of remarkable writers of the United States was developing:

• Mark Twain (1835-1910; "Pamphlets", etc.),
• Jack London (1876-1916; "Iron Heel", "Martin Eden"),
• Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945; "Sister Carey", "The Trilogy of Desire"),
• E. Sinclair ("The Jungle"),
• F. Norris ("Octopus"),

• Thomas Mann (1875-1955; "Buddenbrooks", 1900; "Death in Venice", 1911),
• Heinrich Mann (1871-1950; "Empire", 1900s; "Loyal subject", 1914),

• Boleslav Prus,
• Eliza Ozheshko,
• Maria Konopnitskaya,

• Yana Neruda, etc.

There are significant shifts in Western European novel... Along with traditional literary genres(psychological, everyday novel, everyday drama, etc.) writers of the XX century. develop genre philosophical novel (A. France "On a White Stone", T. Mann), giving new features to the art of everyday realism.

In an effort to summarize the development of bourgeois relations, writers create works that tell about the fate of several generations of their heroes, develop the genre of the novel in the form of a family chronicle ("Buddenbrooks" by T. Mann, "The Forsyte Saga" by D. Galsworthy).

John Galsworthy(1867-1933) He wrote The Forsyte Saga for 40 years and produced a brilliant piece of critical realism literature.

Each author, exposing the ugly forms of social life, had his own creative style. So, Anatole France(1844-1924) in anti-bourgeois novels-pamphlets - "The Island of Penguins", "The Gods Thirst," "The Rise of Angels" - condemned violence, wars, religious fanaticism, hypocrisy of bourgeois morality. At the same time, Frans' work is permeated with love for man, nature and beauty. English writer H. Wells wrote the famous science fiction novels: "The Time Machine", "The Invisible Man", "War of the Worlds" and others. The theme of art occupies an important place in the works of these writers. The tragedy of the artist in the bourgeois world is depicted in the novels of J. London ("Martin Eden"), Dreiser ("Genius"), in the short stories and novels of T. Mann. The conflict between the artist and the bourgeois world is revealed in the fullest form in R. Rolland's multivolume novel Jean-Christophe.

At the turn of the century, there was renewal of drama... During these years the English playwright B. Shaw brought English drama out of the ideological and artistic impasse. His play "Pygmalion" even then bypassed the stages of all the leading theaters in the world.

The Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) was also an innovator, who gave the drama a problematic character.

Widely known in the world at the end of the XIX - beginning of the XX century. acquired plays by the German playwright Gerhart Hauptmann (1862-1946). From naturalism ("Before Sunrise", 1889) to themes of social significance ("Weavers", 1892), to conventions and symbolism ("The Sunken Bell") and satirical comedy morals ("Red Rooster", "Rats") - this is his creative path. For well-known reasons, during this period, socialist direction in art, the founder of which is considered the poets of the Paris Commune, especially Eugene Potier, the author of the famous "Internationale". In 1905-1909. in Denmark Martin Andersen-Neske creates the epic Pelle the Conqueror. During the First World War, A. Barbusse's novel "Fire" (1916) appeared, which truthfully reveals the essence of the war of 1914-1918. It should be noted that during this difficult period, moods of disappointment, disbelief, despair and death were prevalent. We remember that the phenomenon is called decadence ("decadence" - "decline"). Ideas of decadence reflected on all literary trends and touched creatively many writers of that time, including the largest (Maupassant, G. Mann, M. Maeterlink, R. Rolland, etc.). Many art workers, hiding from the harsh reality, left in their work in a narrow personal world, and portrayed the human personality in decline and destruction, sinking to unprincipledness, to admiration for vice. During this period, the process of mutual exchange of experience between artists from different countries of Europe, America and Asia intensified noticeably. The recognition of the value of the civilization of the East was the award of the Nobel Prize in 1913 an outstanding thinker and Indian writer Rabindranath Tagore.

The XX century brings new events, new phenomena, new discoveries, new names. The most modern and most fashionable is considered avant-garde art:

• Italian futurism (Tommaso Marinetti),
• German Expressionism (Bertolt Brecht, Johannes Becher),
• French Cubism (Guillaume Apollinaire, 1880-1918)
• and surrealism (Paul Eluard, Louis Aragon).

The fragile rain keeps the tiles
In balance. Ballerina
Will never learn
To pour and jump
Like rain.

Your orange hair in the void of the universe
In the void of numb glass of silence
And the darkness, where my bare hands are looking for your reflection.
Your heart is chimerical
And your love is similar to my departed desire.
About fragrant sighs, dreams and views.
But you were not always with me.
My memory
Keeps a dejected picture of your appearance
And leaving.
Time, like love, cannot do without words.

Cubist Apollinaire was fond of formal searches, strove for a form free from reality. He cultivated automatic creativity - the recording of associations that arise arbitrarily in the poet's mind. But in the best poems the poet managed to express the bitterness of the era of the impending world war.

Expressionists demanded "revolutions of the spirit"- liberation of the soul from "self-suppressing matter" (bourgeois life). They portrayed modern reality in flashy forms. The boldness of denunciation was combined with a mood of despair. And innovation, divorced from tradition, often turned out to be external and empty.

Enough and propaganda literature aimed at processing public consciousness in preparation for a world war. But works filled with ideas of chauvinism and aggressive colonialism were on the sidelines of the literary process.

To get a clearer idea of ​​the literature of this period, it makes sense to dwell on the work of individual writers. We chose R. Rolland (Nobel Prize awarded in 1915), R. Kipling (Nobel Prize 1907), R. Tagore (Nobel Prize 1913).

Rudyard Kipling (1865 - 1936)

Rudyard Kipling- novelist, children's writer, poet, essayist was born in 1865 in India, where his father, an unsuccessful decorator and sculptor, went with his young wife in search of a permanent job, quiet life and a solid position in society. Until the age of 6, the boy grew up in a friendly family, in his own home. Indian nannies and servants pampered their ward. The idyllic world collapsed when he was together with younger sister sent to England in the care of distant relatives, in their private boarding school. The hostess of the boarding house disliked the independent boy. For Kipling, years of moral and physical torment began: interrogation with addiction, prohibitions, sophisticated punishments, beatings, bullying. Rudyar has thoroughly studied the science of hatred and learned the powerlessness of the victim. Revenge for humiliation will take place only in literary creation (the novel "The Light Has Failed", the story "The Black Sheep"). After a humiliating punishment (for some insignificant offense, the boy was forced to go to school with the inscription "liar" on his chest), he became seriously ill, completely lost his sight for several months and was on the verge of insanity. He was saved by the arrival of his mother, who decided to pick up the children from the boarding house. After the departure of his mother to India, Kipling continued his studies at a men's school. Here he faced the violence of the organization. Teachers achieved the desired results by strictness, and, if necessary, by flogging, the elders ruthlessly oppressed the younger, the strong - the weak; independence of conduct was punished as sacrilege. In his stories, Kipling justified the system of stick education ("Stoke and Company", 1899), since, from his point of view, it teaches an individual to fulfill a certain social role, instills a sense of social duty, without which it is impossible to serve higher goals (in the West, it is sometimes called one of the forerunners of totalitarianism).

After 5 years, Kipling graduated from school beyond his years as a mature person with an established system of values. At 17, he was already determined to become a writer ( military career was closed due to poor health, and there was no money to continue education). He returns to India and gets a job as a correspondent for a newspaper in Lahore. The nomadic life of a colonial newspaperman confronted hundreds of people and situations, threw in the most incredible adventures, made me risk my life. He wrote reports on wars and epidemics, kept a "gossip", interviewed, made many acquaintances. He turned into an excellent connoisseur of local life and customs, even the British commander-in-chief, Count Roberts of Kandahar, was interested in his opinion.

Kipling discovers a multifaceted, multi-structured India, where two great cultures, "West and East", meet. His essays are written by an astute observer, an unnamed reporter who conveys what he has heard and seen with protocol accuracy.

Glory "folk poet" comes to Kipling after the release of his "Barracks Ballads". His poems are original, they contain Kipling's "iron" style with a consistent "prosaization" of the verse. Kipling's ballads are " simple stories"from life, told by an impassive reporter, or a native of the people. These are monologues addressed to an invisible interlocutor, built on folklore and song patterns.

Wade through Kabul.
Became Kabul by the waters of Kabul ...
Saber out, trumpet the campaign! ..
Here half a platoon drowned,
A ford cost a friend of his life,

When spilled, with a wide squadron they will come out sideways
This ford through Kabul and darkness.
...
We were ordered to occupy Kabul ...
Saber out, trumpet the campaign! ..
But tell me - really
A ford will replace my friend,
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Wade through Kabul and darkness.
Swim and swim
Do not sleep in the grave of those who were ruined
Bloody ford through Kabul and darkness.
What the hell do we need Kabul for?
Saber, trumpet the campaign! ..
It's hard to live without those who are friendly
Knew what to take, damn ford.
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Wade through Kabul and darkness.
Oh Lord, don't let me stumble
It's too easy to drown
Here where the ford through Kabul and darkness.
We are being taken away from Kabul ...
Saber out, trumpet the campaign! ..
How many of ours drowned?
How many lives did the ford cost?
Ford, ford, ford through Kabul,
Wade through Kabul and darkness.
The rivers will become shallow in the summer,
But friends do not surface forever,
We know this, both ford and darkness.
Translated by S. Kapilevich

In his works, Kipling called his contemporaries to action, since in action he saw the only salvation from the meaninglessness of the world. The action should be purposeful and consecrated by the idea. Kipling's idea was the idea of ​​a higher moral law, that is, a system of prohibitions and permits dominating a person, violation of which is severely punished ( "Law of the jungle"). Kipling saw the British Empire as such an idea, a law, a center of sanctioning truth, in which he found a legislator and a leader leading the "chosen nations" to salvation. Imperial messianism became his religion. To propagate these ideas, he uses the high syllable of an ode, message, eulogy, parable, stylizing a verse like a church hymn.

Anthem before the battle
The earth trembles with anger
And the ocean is dark
Our paths were blocked
Swords of hostile countries:
When the flow is wild
Enemies will press us, Jehovah,
Heavenly thunder, God of the Sich, help! ...
From pride and revenge
From the low path
Fleeing from the field of honor
Protect invisibly.
May it be unworthy
Shroud of grace
Without anger and calm
Let your death be accepted! ...
Translated by A. Onoshkovich-Yatsyn

But life was at odds with the legend. The poet was afraid that the Empire would not fulfill the mission entrusted to it, therefore, in the political verses of the 90s. he urged the country not to revel in easy victories, but to take a sober look at its own weaknesses and understand its destiny as disinterested and selfless service to the "great goal." Kipling saw the "burden of the whites" in the conquest of the lower races for their own good, not in robbery and reprisals, but in creative work, not in arrogant complacency, but in humility and patience.

The burden of the whites
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
As in exile, let's go
Your sons to serve
To the dark tones of the earth;
To hard labor,
There is no her fierce
Rule a dull crowd
Now devils, then children.
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
Bear it patiently
Threats and insults
And do not ask for honors;
Be patient and honest
Do not be lazy a hundred times
So that everyone understands
Its to repeat the order.
...
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
But this is not a throne, but labor:
Oiled clothes,
And aches and itching.
Roads and moorings
Set up descendants
Put your lives on it
And lie down in a strange land.
...
Your lot is the Burden of the Whites!
Forget how you decided
Get fast glory
Then you were a baby.
In a merciless time
In the midst of the dead
It's time to join as a man
Appear to the court of men!
Translation by V. Toporov

Thus, deluding himself, clinging to the outgoing ideals and values, to the historically doomed forms of statehood, Kipling nevertheless sincerely strove to serve. " common man", sought to help him overcome suffering and loneliness, horror and despair, to teach courage and resilience in the face of the impending apocalypse.

Expose the inhumanity of World War I in Kipling's epitaphs:

Former clerk:
Do not Cry!
The army gave
Freedom for the timid slave.
Dragged by the collar
From the office to fate,
Where is he, found out what death means,
Got up the courage to love
And, having fallen in love, he went to his death,
And he died.
Fortunately, maybe.
Coward:
I did not dare to look at death in attack in broad daylight,
And people, blindfolded, took me to her at night.
Newbie:
They quickly gave up on me
On the first day, the first bullet in the forehead.
Children like to jump up in the theater
I forgot that this is a trench.
Two:
A - I was rich like a raja.
B - And I was poor.
Together:
- But to the next world without luggage
We are both driving.
Translated by K. Simonov

In England in the 20th century, Kipling was considered the personification of everything retrograde and inhuman... After the First World War, others became the rulers of the minds, “this is a laureate without laurels, a forgotten celebrity,” they sneered at the time about him. In 1936, not a single major English writer attended Kipling's funeral at Westminster Abbey - for culture, his death had occurred several decades earlier.

Only during the years of World War II, in Hard times for England they remembered him: his poetry for the glory of the British Empire was consonant with wartime.

Concluding the conversation about Kipling, it is necessary to note the enormous popularity of his work in the 1920s and 1930s. in Soviet Union. Many of the best poets and writers of that time were fond of his prose and poetry: Issak Babel, Eduard Bagritsky, Vladimir Lugovskoy, Yuri Olesha, Konstantin Simonov. In 1922, Nikolai Tikhonov wrote his best ballads, in which the intonations and rhythms of the "iron Rudyard" are clearly heard.

The Western world abandoned the model, which made it a moral obligation to voluntarily obey the "higher law"; the senseless massacre on the fronts of World War I completely discredited the idea of ​​serving in the name of the fatherland and the state. But this was relevant for a country that wanted to implement the great idea of ​​creating a new type of state based on collectivism.

It is possible that it was Kipling's beginning in the poems of young Soviet poets that fascinated readers. He liked him "for his courageous style, his soldier's severity, perfection and clearly expressed masculine principle, male and soldier," K. Simonov recalled. (Mostly Kipling was published in the second half of the 1930s.) During the Great Patriotic War, the image of the "iron Rudyard" quickly collapsed, the military reality quickly destroyed the "romantic" illusions of young Soviet writers and poets. "On the very first day at the front in 1941, I suddenly fell out of love with some of Kipling's poems once and for all," wrote K. Simonov, "Kipling's military romance in 1941 suddenly seemed distant, small and deliberately tense, like a breaking boyish bass ".

In the post-war years, Kipling was recognized here only as the author of wonderful children's fairy tales and stories about Mowgli. V recent times When many prejudices about Kipling's work were dispelled, interest in him again manifests itself and it is again admitted that both in his prose and in his poetry there are many successes that have stood the test of time.

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)

Rabindranath Tagore(1861-1941) - the most outstanding and influential personality of the 1st half of the 20th century. in India. This is the great humanist and literary genius of India. He was primarily a poet, but also a major prose writer and playwright. He is an original painter, whose paintings have been exhibited in many countries of the world. He is a musician-composer whose songs are sung in India to this day. Tagore is a philosopher-moralist and political publicist, educator and educator.

How creator-artist Tagore is deeply intimate, as a thinker - he is all civic. “He was not a politician,” wrote Jawaharlal Nehru about Tagore, “but he took the fate of the Indian people too close to his heart and was too devoted to their freedom to forever lock himself in his ivory tower with his poems and songs ... Contrary to in the usual course of development, as he got older, he became more radical in his views and views. "

Creative way Tagore originates at the turn of the 70s and 80s. XIX century, when India was just beginning to emerge from the Middle Ages, and the British colonial power seemed unshakable. Tagore was destined to see the formation and rise of the national liberation movement, which, with his participation, grew from a small top national liberal organizations into a powerful popular force. He wanted to see the Indian people free and happy. He called for the unity of all the peoples of India against the colonialists. He did a lot to educate the Indians, he condemned religious fanaticism, ethnic and caste strife.

He did not confine himself only to Indian problems, maintained broad international relations, traveled to many countries of the East and West with public speeches about the culture of India and called for rapprochement and mutual enrichment of the cultures of various countries and peoples. At the age of seventy he came to the USSR in 1930. His "Letters on Russia" was banned in India by the British authorities.

Tagore is perhaps the most read and popular writer in the East. His works have been translated into dozens of languages ​​of the world. In Tagore's own poetic work, with all the variety of themes, motives and moods, it is easy to find two main and opposing themes. The predominant and leading theme is the acceptance of life in its entirety, the theme of irrepressible admiration for the beauty of the world, the lofty and lyrical glorification of happiness, love and good human feelings.

I contemplated the illumined face of the world, without closing my eyes,
Marveling at his perfection.

The second theme of dissatisfaction, protest and suffering was born of reality.

We will focus on love lyrics poet. Tagore's poetry is characterized by a special penetration into the depths of human feelings, combining artistic vision with philosophical understanding. His love lyrics are sometimes emotionally tense, sometimes exquisitely melodious, and sometimes it is a very simple story of the poet about falling in love and love experiences, but the poet always easily and freely rises to a high generalization and comprehension of the beautiful. He knows how to show love as a swooping whirlwind that swoops in and merges lovers together and takes them outside of everyday life:

Rush on the swing, the element!
Rock it again!
Again my friend is with me, I do not take my eyes off her.
Wake her up, storm frantic voice ...
Swoop in, hurricane, crush, stun.
Tear off all the clothes, all the covers from the soul!
Let her stand naked, not ashamed!
Rock us! ...
I found my soul, we are together today
Let's get to know each other again without fear.
We have merged in crazy embraces now.
Rock us!

And here's a simple story about lovers:

The woman who was nice to me
She once lived in this village.
The path to the lake pier led
To the rotten footbridge on the rickety steps ...
Without the close involvement of a friend,
Who lived there in those years,
Probably, I would not know around
No lake, no grove, no village.
She took me to the Shiva temple,
Drowning in the deep forest shade
Thanks to the acquaintance with her, I am alive
Memorized the village wattle fence.
I wouldn't know the lake, but this backwater
She swam across.
She loved to swim in this place,
In the sand are the traces of her nimble feet.
The peasants are waiting on the bank of the ferry
And discussing rural affairs.
The crossing would not be familiar to me,
If only she didn’t live here.

A poet can stamp his thought with masterful aphorism:

One is always one, and nothing else.
But two create the beginning of one.

The high humanity of Tagore's love lyrics is revealed with particular brightness in the image of a woman in love and beloved.

Female,
You are not only the creation of God, you are not the creation of the earth,
Men create you out of their spiritual beauty.
For a poet, oh woman, an expensive outfit was woven,
The golden threads of metaphors on your clothes are burning.
Painters immortalized your female appearance on canvas.
In still unprecedented grandeur, in amazing purity.
How many all kinds of incense, colors they brought you as a gift,
How many pearls from the depths, how much gold from the earth.
How many delicate flowers were torn off for you on spring days,
How many insects were exterminated to paint your feet.
In these saris and bedspreads, my shy hiding eyes,
Immediately you became inaccessible and more mysterious a hundred times.
Otherwise, your features shone in the fire of desires.
The creature you are half, the half-imagination is you.

Literary heritage Tagore is great and multifaceted, it proves the world significance of the culture of the peoples of the East.

Romain Rolland (1866-1944)

Romain Rolland(1866-1944) - great french writer, was born in Clamecy (Burgundy) in the family of a notary. He received an excellent, versatile education, studied philosophy, art history, literature. Already at the historical department of the Higher Normal School, he dreamed of becoming a writer and made his first attempts at writing. In 1887 he plucked up courage and wrote to Leo Tolstoy and received a detailed answer. Rolland also admired Tolstoy's literary genius and listened to his thoughts about the nationality of art. The humanist and realist Romain Rolland began his literary activity from several plays about the Great French Revolution and a cycle of biographies of great people - titans in art ("The Life of Beethoven", "The Life of Michelangelo", "The Life of Tolstoy"). The main work of the initial period of creativity is a 10-volume novel "Jean-Christophe"(1904-1912). This is the biography of the German composer Jean-Christoph Kraft, in his image the author conveyed some of the traits of the innovator-rebel Beethoven. The novel covers the last decades of the 19th - early 20th centuries. before the eve of the 1st World War. Jean-Christophe grew up in the family of a court musician in a provincial German town and for his life he retained genuine democracy, sympathy for the common people.

Wilhelm's Germany ceased to be the Germany of the great Goethe and Beethoven. Creativity of the composer-humanist does not find recognition, and he comes into conflict with the environment, not wanting to subordinate his work to the tastes of the bourgeois public. Christophe feels lonely, breaks with the German philistine and leaves for Paris. In Paris the same thing, but there he finds, like him, lonely humanists.

The strength of the novel lies in the merciless criticism of the bourgeois system, the creation bright image a positive hero protesting against him with his art.

After a monumental narrative unfolding in several countries over several decades, Rolland created a small thing - all its action fits within one year and one small town of Clamecy - the story "Cola Brunion" (1914, published in 1919). An epic novel about Rolland's contemporaries, "Cola Brunion" about the distant past. In "Jean-Christophe" gloomy coloring prevails, in "Cola Brunion" - bright, light colors. It is hard to believe that both of these works were written by the same author. The action takes place back in 1616, Cervantes and Shakespeare are no longer there, this is the sunset of the Renaissance, in France this is a time of senseless cruel bloodshed.

The middle-aged Burgundian Cola is one of the few, but at the same time the only one. He is not only a craftsman, but also an artist, he not only works, but also reflects. In difficult conditions, he does not lose his sense of humor and self-esteem. The image of Kol, at first glance uncomplicated, unambiguous, turns in different facets as events unfold. It is full of inner contrasts - and at the same time harmonious. A lot of grief falls to Kol's lot: the soldiers of a hostile feudal lord attack the town of Clamsie and rob the inhabitants, the city is visited by a plague that almost carried off Kol himself, Kol's wife dies, a quarrelsome but faithful friend of life, the mother of his children, all Kol's property perishes together with the house burned down during the epidemic, the most precious thing he had - wooden sculptures - perishes. But, despite these disasters, Cola never loses optimism, faith in the future. Thus, Cola is the embodiment of the writer's faith in a people capable of enduring all difficulties and preserving an eternally alive, vigorous soul.

"An excellent purely Gali poem" was called "Cola Brunion" by M. Gorky, having read it in the first, less successful translation. In 1932, M.L. Lozinsky was able to reproduce the unique originality of the story in Russian. Cola Brunion's aphorisms and comparisons sounded juicy and unforgettable. "... As soon as you find yourself in the crowd, you immediately lose your wits. One hundred wise men will give birth to a fool, and a hundred rams - a privet"; "We danced; I was graceful as a pole"; "... for the sake of the spirit one must not forget the belly"; "How sorry I am for the destitute poor fellows who are unfamiliar with the enjoyment of books!"; "Koum, you see a stranger's eye, but you cannot see yours," etc. The language of the story is influenced by the literature of the Renaissance (F. Rabelais "Gargantua and Pantagruel") and French folklore.

Throughout his life, Romain Rolland remained a humanist, during the 1st and 2nd world wars he was one of the first to condemn the horrors of war. The anti-war theme was also reflected in his works.

Introduction

In Russia in the late 19th - early 20th centuries. during the period of "unheard of changes" and "unprecedented revolts", scientific and technological progress and acute political cataclysms, profound and serious changes took place in art, which determined new and unique ways of its development.

On the one hand, the art of that time is a rejection of old artistic traditions, an attempt to creatively rethink the heritage of the past. Never before has an artist been so free in his work - creating a picture of the world, he received a real opportunity to orient himself to his own taste and preferences.

The culture of the late 19th - early 20th centuries is multifaceted. Sometimes it seems to be a continuous jumble of styles, trends, trends and schools, simultaneously interacting and opposing each other. The shocks experienced, wars, changes in the social structure, the influences of new values ​​and aspirations of the West, the growing interest of society in the sciences and art - all this greatly influenced the development of the culture of that time. The influx of creative energy, the emergence of new genres, the change and complication of the themes of the works became the beginning of a new era, which is called the Silver Age.

This period is still of great interest to both professionals and ordinary art lovers. My goal is to examine the literature in as much detail as possible, art, architecture and theatrical art of that era, since these areas of culture give the most accurate understanding of the essence Silver Age... I would like to consider and classify the main trends, highlight specific genres from them and describe them the most bright features... Also, my task is to list the main cultural figures who have contributed to the development of a particular art form.

Literature of the late 19th and early 20th centuries

Symbolism

The beginning of the Silver Age was laid by the Symbolists; symbolism became the first significant modernist movement in Russia. All changes in literature, new schools and trends are partly under his influence, even those that are created in contradiction to him. In Russian symbolism, there is no unity of concepts, it did not have a single school, not a single style, it was expressed in an abundance of ways of self-expression. And what united the Symbolists was a distrust of the mundane and banal, a desire to express their thoughts through symbols and allegories, whether it be fine art or literature; the desire to give your creation an even more vague, ambiguous color.

Initially, Russian symbolism has the same roots as Western - "the crisis of a positive worldview and morality." The desire to replace morality and logic with aesthetics, the position that "beauty will save the world" became the main principle of the early Russian Symbolists, as opposed to the ideology of populism. At the end of the 19th century, the intelligentsia and bohemians, who looked with some anxiety into the future, which did not promise anything good, took symbolism as a gulp fresh air... It became more and more popular, involving more and more talented people who, each with their own unique outlook on things, made the symbolism so many-sided. The Symbolists became an expression of longing for spiritual freedom, a tragic premonition of future changes, a symbol of trust in proven centuries-old values. The feeling of unhappiness and instability, fear of change and uncertainty united such people who were so different in philosophy and attitude to life. Symbolism is an amazing collection of many personalities, characters, intimate experiences and impressions that are stored deep in the soul of a poet, writer or artist. Only a sense of decline, nostalgic moods, melancholy unite many faces into one.

At the origins of Symbolism in St. Petersburg were Dmitry Merezhkovsky and his wife Zinaida Gippius, in Moscow - Valery Bryusov. The motives of tragic isolation, detachment from the world, volitional self-affirmation of the personality can be traced in the works of Gippius; social orientation, religious and mythological subjects - in Merezhkovsky; the balance of the opposite, the struggle for life and humility before death permeate Bryusov's work. The poems of Konstantin Balmont became very popular, who declared about the "search for correspondences" characteristic of the symbolists between sound, meaning and color. Balmont's enthusiasm for sound writing, colorful adjectives displacing verbs, leads to the creation of almost "meaningless", according to ill-wishers, texts, but this phenomenon later leads to the emergence of new poetic concepts.

A little later, the movement of the younger Symbolists developed, creating romantically colored circles in which, exchanging experiences and ideas, they honed their skills. A. Blok, A. Bely, V. Ivanov and many others paid great attention to moral and ethical ideals, trying to combine the interests of society with their own.

Literature and art at this time experienced a rapid rise, old styles were reborn, new ones appeared, and it is impossible to determine exactly where one ended and another began, the boundaries were ethereal and foggy, everything was in the air.

The history of symbolism is very tragic, as well as the history of many other genres. At first, symbolism was greeted more than coldly - the works that were not adapted to Russian society, had no relation to the land and the people, were incomprehensible to the broad masses, and practically laughed at. After a short period of prosperity, in opposition to the Symbolists, innovative trends with more down-to-earth and rigid principles begin to form. In the last decade before the revolution, symbolism experienced a crisis and decline. Some of the Symbolists did not accept the 1917 revolution and were forced to immigrate from the country. Many continued to write, but symbolism was inexorably fading away. Those who stayed in the country faced a rethinking of their previous values. The Symbolist had nothing to earn a living in post-revolutionary Russia.

In the early 1920s, several centers of Russian emigration were formed, including in Paris, Prague, Berlin, Harbin, Sofia. Taking into account the conditions of this or that country, the foundations of the cultural life of the Russian diaspora were formed here. The culture of the Russian emigration was based on the traditions of classical culture. These people considered their task to be the preservation and development of Russian culture. Russian newspapers played a significant role in establishing the spiritual life of the emigration; about a hundred of them were published. In countries such as Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria, educational institutions of the Russian diaspora have opened. Berlin has developed good conditions for the publication of works by emigrant authors. Among the foreign intelligentsia, various ideological and political currents arose, which reflected the search for ways to revive Russia and its culture, one of such currents is Eurasianism.

The complication of the international situation in the 30s contributed to the resumption of disputes among the emigrants about the fate of Russia and the possibility of returning to their homeland. The writer A. Kuprin and the poet M. Tsvetaeva returned to the USSR. But the strengthening totalitarian system forced many to abandon the idea of ​​returning home.

Chronological framework of the period.

The main sign of the beginning of the new period in the history of world literature we are considering is the emergence of completely new literary trends: naturalism and symbolism, the first of which was finally formed in France in the late 1860s - early 1870s. The end of the new period is associated with the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, which greatly influenced the history and culture of the whole world. It is with her, and not with the October Revolution in Russia, that the literature of the 20th century begins. Therefore, the period ends in 1914.

French literature.

Naturalism.

Naturalism is a literary movement that manifested itself most vividly in the last third of the 19th century, formed in the 1860s. We can say that naturalism is an extreme degree of realism, bringing the principle of likelihood to the limit.

The main features of naturalism: 1) Naturalism - frank, detailed description previously forbidden, cruel, disgusting, vile or intimate aspects of life. This trait was inherited from naturalists by many writers of the 20th century, and it was in the 20th century that it reached its limit, when there are absolutely no restrictions on writers.

2) Biologism - the explanation of all social and spiritual phenomena, primarily human character traits, biological, physiological reasons. Naturalists considered man to be primarily a biological being, an animal, an organism. All human actions are conditioned, firstly, by innate, hereditary traits of character, temperament, and secondly, by the external environment to which the human temperament adapts. Of course, to reduce everything only to physiology is stupidity, but the great merit of naturalists was that for the first time, when analyzing human behavior, they began to take into account such an important factor as heredity. A person is already born with a certain set of traits, abilities and shortcomings that determine his life.

Emile Zola (1840-1902)

The most famous French naturalist and theorist of naturalism. In general, he is one of the most remarkable, brilliant writers of the 19th century. Zola knew how to write really exciting, bright, colorful. He can be compared to Hugo.

Zola's first significant novel and the most naturalistic of them all - “ Teresa Raken"(1867). The heroes are simple people with a minimum level of spiritual, intellectual activity, so they are quite naturally shown in the novel primarily as biological individuals driven by instincts conditioned by temperament. “I was simply examining two living bodies, just as surgeons examine corpses” (from the Preface to the novel).

This is precisely a research novel: every action of the characters, every change in their lives is analyzed in detail and explained from the point of view of physiology and psychology, and this is quite interesting.

The main character, Teresa, is a woman whose strong, passionate temperament from childhood was suppressed by external circumstances, and she seemed cold, dispassionate, married her cousin, weak, sickly, indifferent to everything Camille. They were married by Mrs. Raken, Camille's mother. But Teresa's true temperament woke up unexpectedly for herself when she met a suitable strong man Laurent, Camille's friend. They became lovers and were happy with each other (however, their communication was limited only to the sexual sphere). After a while, they lost the opportunity to meet, and they could not live without each other. Soon they had the idea to remove the only obstacle between them, the husband. And while riding on the river in a boat, Laurent drowned him, so that no one suspected them. Everyone thought it was just an accident. To identify Camille's corpse, Laurent visited the morgue several times, which Zola described very vividly and in detail for the first time in world literature. The most terrible thing there was Camille's corpse, which had been in the water for a long time, turned green, swollen, half-decomposed.

And now, it would seem, the only obstacle to the happiness of lovers was removed, but the pleasure of love disappeared by itself, the passion disappeared, they tried to artificially ignite it, nothing happened. It seemed to them that between them in bed there was always a third person, the corpse of Camille. They see the corpse in all dark corners. They cannot sleep, they cannot live normally, they hate each other, but they cannot separate. Their very human nature, psyche and physiology do not accept murder.

Mistress Raken is paralyzed, she understands everything, but cannot speak or move. Laurent and Teresa, now husband and wife, talk about their crime in front of her, accuse each other of it. Mrs. Raken suffers immensely when she finds out who the killers of her son are, but she cannot do anything, and they enjoy it. In the end, both break down and commit suicide together. In the novel there are many bright unusual descriptions, psychopathological situations, but also a lot, too much of the implausible, incredibly disgusting. In describing the torture of criminals, Zola crossed the line of reasonable plausibility. In general, the novel makes an extremely difficult impression, there is no enlightenment in it, although, it would seem, the criminals are punished according to the law of the highest justice.

One of the important conclusions of the novel: confirmation of the irrationality, unpredictability of human nature. The assassins assumed that their happiness would continue, but it disappeared. It is impossible to foresee the reactions of one's own organism. Man is a mystery to himself.

One of the best novels of the cycle " Germinal»Describes the life of miners, one of the Makars, Etienne, became a miner. It is useful to read it to know how terrible the people lived in the 19th century. A family of ordinary miners of 10 people is described, almost all of them work at the mine (including children from the age of 10. They work in the most difficult conditions in the mine - it is terribly hot in summer, cold in winter. The mine often collapses, explosions of accumulated gas. Old grandfather, when he spits, his saliva is black from coal dust. The salary is scanty barely enough for food. When an economic crisis occurs, coal is poorly bought, the salary still decreases. The miners can not stand it and go on strike. In a fit of rage, women (miners' wives) are literally torn to pieces the shopkeeper, who for many years profited from them, selling them all the food at exorbitant prices, forgave debts if young girls were brought in. One of the brightest scenes of the novel is that the mine, as a result of a breakthrough of underground waters, floods and it all (a very large structure) slowly sinks into the ground and in its place a small lake is formed. And below there are people who did not have time to get out. But some of them manage to survive, they entered the connecting passages, drifts, into another old abandoned mine.

The strike ends with the defeat of the miners. However, the author believes that workers will surely win a better life and decent wages for themselves. Germinal is the name of the spring month, a symbol of hope for renewal. The meaning of the novel is to warn the owners of factories, factories, mines, if they do not improve the position of their workers, they will face a terrible bloody revolution.

Zola's Best Novel - Dr. Pascal". The main character, scientist biologist Dr. Pascal, a true devotee of science, who gave his whole life for the benefit of humanity, he set out to study the laws of heredity using the example of his own family (and he is Rougon) in order to learn how to manage them in order to fight hereditary diseases and shortcomings. He lives with his niece Clotilde, who was given to him for upbringing and an old servant. Both women are very religious and they really do not like that Pascal is an atheist, they love him and do not want him to go to hell, they consider his science and scientific works sinful, demonic, dream of burning all his papers, all that , in which he put his soul. Saving Pascal from supposed hell, they turn his real life into hell, he is forced to feud with the closest people, to protect the main business of his life from them. But the most interesting thing begins when 59-year-old Pascal, a bachelor who has never known either love or women, discovers to his horror that 25-year-old Clotilde, his own niece, loves him, and he loves her. Once they stop resisting their love, they know real happiness. Zola describes this sinful, incestuous relationship precisely as a true high love, before which everything else - age difference, family relations, the opinion of others - is negligible.

But after a while Pascal was scared of this love, scared for the future of Clotilde, he would soon die, and she would still live among people who do not understand this love. He insisted on parting, she went to Paris. But this did not bring anything good, both were terribly sad, he soon fell ill and died. Conclusion - you should never, under any circumstances, refuse true love, which is above all. But the ending is optimistic. Clotilde has a son from Pascal, after his death, and in him is all hope. This child is a symbol of the victory of love, nature itself, life itself over all stupid laws and human fears. The most important thing in life is happiness, which is given to people by nature: to love and bear children, and everything else is nonsense. The ending of the novel is a real hymn to a life that overcomes everything. In general, many of Zola's pages are an emotional hymn to life. Zola urges: you must not give up, leave life, you must live fully, rejoice and suffer, you must not be afraid of suffering, inconvenience, ridicule, otherwise you will never know life and true happiness.

In the novel "Doctor Pascal" there is a description of an extraordinary case - about how Uncle Macquart, a bitter drunkard, all already soaked in alcohol in the literal sense, once again got drunk, fell asleep without extinguishing the pipe, smoldering tobacco got on his pants, burned them and caught fire the alcoholized body - with a quiet blue flame. And it burned out all over, only a burnt chair and a pile of ashes remained. The scene is generally very characteristic of Zola: naturalism on the verge of fantasy.

Guy de Maupassant (1850-1893).

It was rumored that Maupassant was Flaubert's illegitimate son, as his mother was very friendly with Flaubert. But these are just stupid rumors.

Until the age of 30, Maupassant was a simple official. He wrote, but did not publish his works, considering them not perfect enough. In 1880 he published a short story that brought him great fame - "Donut". And since then he has written and published novels and short stories very much and very successfully. In his personal life, Maupassant was a typical don Juan, he collected mistresses, and this was reflected in his work. But the cheerful way of life did not last long, diseases and not only venereal diseases began to haunt him, he began to go blind and go crazy. Since 1891, he has been unable to write, in 1892, in a fit of insanity, he attempted suicide, in 1893 he died in an insane asylum.

Maupassant is one of the brightest, most talented French writers, an excellent stylist, like Flaubert, striving for artistic perfection, expressiveness and at the same time simplicity and precision of style.

He is also one of the most prominent representatives of the non-classical worldview in literature. In 1894, Leo Tolstoy, one of the most prominent representatives of the classical worldview, wrote the article "Preface to the works of Guy de Maupassant." Recognizing the real talent of the French writer, Tolstoy accused him of immorality. Maupassant "loved and portrayed that which should not have been loved and portrayed," namely, how women seduce men and men seduce women. Indeed, no one so much, frankly and purposefully in the 19th century, did not describe and praise the joy of physical love, sexual pleasure in itself. Maupassant knew how to do it brightly, exciting, erotic. He justified and sang a terrible thing for Tolstoy - adultery. Or maybe he just stated obvious fact- quite often family ties prevent people from being happy.

The second most important feature of the non-classical worldview is profound pessimism, the perception of life as a terrible Chaos.

Novels- the best part of Maupassant's work. Thematically, they can be divided into several groups.

1) Erotic novels... The main element of these short stories is a vivid description of the sexual experiences of the characters and the awakening of these experiences in the reader. The plot of these novellas is mainly a description of fleeting love adventures, not binding, but decorating life. The best erotic novels: "Stranger", "Magnetism", "Awakening", "Sisters of Rondoli".

« A trip out of town". The novella horrified Tolstoy. The family - not yet old spouses, their young daughter - went on a Sunday picnic by the river. Two tough guys invited the women to take a boat ride down the river, and they agreed. Mother got into one boat, daughter into another. And then Maupassant described how it happened that, in general, an ordinary, completely moral girl entered into intimacy with a person whom she sees for the first time in her life. She succumbed to natural instinct, nothing more. First of all, her feelings are described. Mother, too, wasted no time. This made a strong and clearly positive impression on both, both remembered this a year later and were even grateful to their casual lovers. Tolstoy's commentary: "This heinous crime is described as a funny joke."

A series of short stories about various relationships between men and women (although the actual erotic element is not always present in them) adjoins this group: "Carelessness", "At the Bedside." "Sign" - a decent woman, unexpectedly for her herself, wanted to imitate the prostitutes, who from the windows of their rooms gave special signs to passing men and they rose for intimate communication. And the heroine, for the sake of experiment, makes the same sign, and one man reacted: in order to avoid noise and scandal, he had to play the role to the end.

2) Novels about love, about a real high feeling, without the realization of which it is impossible to say that a person has experienced true happiness. Maupassant secretly, covertly asserts that it is not enough just to love (although this in itself is already wonderful), you must definitely strive to live with the one you love - to realize your love.

The best novel in this group, perhaps the best short story by Maupassant, is "Moonlight" (seminar). The novels "Julie Romaine", "Goodbye!" Are wonderful. "Our letters": a woman will never destroy the letters in which she declared her love. "Our love letters are our right to beauty, grace, charm, this is our intimate female pride."

The short story "Happiness" describes the happy life of a woman, the daughter of a rich man, who in her youth ran away from home with a simple soldier, then became an ordinary peasant wife, endured all the burden of peasant life, but lived life with a loved one. In the short story "Buatel", the parents did not allow the guy to marry a black woman, but for some reason he truly loved only her, only at the sight of her his heart sank sweetly. Then he had 14 children with another woman, but he did not know real happiness. "Regret": an elderly lonely man, remembering his senseless life, regrets that he did not dare to enter into a love affair with his friend's wife, whom he loved more than anything else. He suddenly remembered how one day they were alone on a walk, and she began to behave somehow strangely, but he did not understand what she was hinting at then, but only now, many years later, it happens in life. And he realized that he had missed his only chance to be happy.

A separate subspecies of novellas about love is about unhappy, ugly, inconspicuous women, who, nevertheless, are capable of deep love. An amazing story is told in the short story "Miss Gariette". Also not a bad story "Mademoiselle Pearl" (seminar).

3) Novels about injustice, horror and absurdity of life, Maupassant has an overwhelming majority of such short stories, from which we conclude that he was a pessimist. There are many short stories about the harshness, callousness, and greed of people. Such is the celebrated "Pyshka", which remarkably describes the time of the Franco-Prussian War (seminar).

"Christenings" - the peasants went to baptize the child, on the way went into a tavern, got drunk, dropped the child into the snow, and he died. "Beggar": a crippled beggar died from the fact that they refused to feed him and let him in for the night.

"Muiron" - the teacher's wife and three children died, he hated God, life, people, began to take revenge, kill his students, pouring crushed glass into their food. He believed that life is a nightmare, God is cruel, he loves to kill in different ways. And Moiron began to kill in return.

Bright novellas of this group: "Jewels", "Little Rock", "A Mug of Beer, Garcon!"

« Cupboard". When a prostitute receives clients in her room, her little son sits in a chair in our closet.

« Necklace". A young, poor woman wanted to go to the ball, and for this she borrowed a beautiful, expensive necklace from her friend for a while, and at the ball she lost it, she and her husband urgently folded everything they had, took a huge debt, bought exactly the same necklace, and then, exhausted all their lives, they paid off their debts. After 10 years, the heroine, who has grown old, grown older from a hard life, meets this friend and tells her the whole truth, the answer is murderous: it turns out that the necklace was not real, but fake and was actually worth a thousand times less than they paid. This is how life died because of a stupid accident. The meaning of the story is not that this is a punishment for something, but that such is life and it is impossible to escape from such terrible accidents.

The stunning short story "Loneliness" is a cry of horror from the protagonist, who suddenly discovered that every person is always alone, it is impossible to overcome the barrier of misunderstanding between people. Until the end, no one will understand you - no mother, no wife, no friend, no one - by and large, every person is always alone. This short story by Maupassant is very similar to Chekhov's wonderful but unknown story "Fear", when the hero is suddenly seized by fear of life, which he cannot understand and begins to fear it. He is passionately in love with his wife, the mother of his two children, but he knows for sure that she never loved him and lives with him out of mercy. This is terrible.

Several short stories very impressively describe various incidents of insanity. The most famous is the big short story or even the story of "The Eagle". The hero is seized by a strange inexplicable fear, he feels that he has fallen into the power of some invisible, but omnipotent extraterrestrial, alien creature Eagle, which feeds on his life forces. One day he woke up in the morning and found that the glass, which was full in the evening, was empty several times. He goes mad confident that soon these creatures will take over the earth completely. The same kind of short stories "He?", "Night", "Crazy?" etc.

4) optimistic - all other stories on a variety of topics that end well, there are fewer of them, but they are. The best among them are "Pope Simon", "Idyll", "Parisian Adventure", "Testament".

Novels.

Maupassant wrote 6 novels. The first and the best - " Life". About what life really is. A very useful novel for young girls. The main character, Jeanne, has just finished her studies at the convent (like Emma Bovary) came home to her parents' estate, full of the rosiest romantic ideas about life that she did not know. Zhanna is absolutely happy and believes that even greater happiness awaits her - love. And love comes as it seems to her. She actually marries the first man she liked, without really recognizing him. A few months later, it turned out that her husband did not love her, that he had married her parents' money, that he was callous and mean. He began to cheat on her with her own servant. Accidentally learning about this, she almost committed suicide, but then calmed down. Then it turned out that her parents, whom she considered an ideal couple, were cheating on each other, she found letters from her mother's lover. This was the second blow. Then she had a son, the adored Paul, whom she very spoiled, and he grew up as a dissolute worthless selfish who went to Paris and only demanded money from his mother. And she sent until she went broke, sold her beloved family estate and ended her life in poverty and loneliness. By that time, the husband had been killed by the husband of his mistress. When Jeanne complains to the only faithful servant Rosalie, she tells her that the life of peasant women, who are forced from morning to evening and from youth to death, physically hard work, is much worse.

But it cannot be said that there was no joy in Jeanne's life. The first months of marriage, she was very happy, and was grateful to her husband for that at least. She was very happy during the 15 years that she raised her son until he left. In the end, the son gives her a granddaughter for upbringing, and with this little screamer, life continues again. Rosalie sums it up at the end: "Life is not as good as people think, but not as bad either."

The novel quite frankly describes the most important and intimate experiences of a young woman, for example, after getting married, Jeanne knew absolutely nothing about the physical side of love.

The second novel, not so interesting, but very instructive - “ Dear friend". The career of the protagonist - Georges Duroy is described. In the beginning he is almost a beggar, in the end - he is the most famous rich journalist in Paris, married to the daughter of the richest banker. He is smart, impudent and handsome. He knows how to please the necessary, influential people and especially women. He also has good human feelings, but he quickly understands: “Every man for himself. Selfishness is everything. " He is capable of any betrayal, if it is beneficial. At one time he had such a situation: he is married to a woman who made him a journalist, he has two mistresses (one that he really likes, the other is the elderly wife of his banker boss Walter), and he also charms Walter's daughter, dreaming of marrying her. He cleverly and profitably managed to divorce and tricked him into marrying Walter's daughter, not loving her. There is no doubt that he will leave her in due time. Most importantly, the novel shows the complete and unconditional victory of such people in life. At the end, Durua triumphs.

Subsequent novels are distinguished by a deeper and more subtle psychologism, in which various cases of love are analyzed. But they are less interesting in the plot, the plot is not dynamic. Most of the novels are sad, even tragic. I will especially highlight the last two novels - "Strong as Death" and "Our Heart".

Modernism. French symbolism.

Modernism(from the word modern - new, modern) is a set of new anti-realistic trends in world art of the late 19th - first half of the 20th century. What directions were included in modernism? French Symbolism, Russian Symbolism, English Aestheticism, Russian Acmeism, Futurism, etc. Modernism was clearly manifested in painting and music. In general, the turn of the century is sometimes called the "Modern" era. In this course we will study the first, early stage in the development of modernism before 1914. After 1914, a mature, more complex modernism began.

The main features of modernism: 1. All different modernists are united by the denial of realism, the denial of the principle of plausibility. All modernists strive to transform reality in their works, to depict it not as it is.

2. A great influence on modernists of a non-classical worldview, most modernists have its features. 3. Modernism is characterized by a striving for artistic experiment, for a deliberate complication of form. Modernism is an elite art, focused on the most educated and prepared part of readers, simple people modernist works are difficult to understand.

French symbolism- the first direction of modernism. It finally took shape as a single literary movement in 1886, when the symbolism manifesto came out, and the word itself began to be widely used. However, in fact, symbolism began to take shape much earlier, starting in 1857, when Baudelaire's collection was published. But then symbolism was the property of individuals.

The main features of French symbolism. 1. A bold update of the content towards a non-classical worldview (in particular, the introduction of absolutely forbidden topics into poetry, descriptions of intimate, erotic, disgusting, base aspects of life). 2. Gravitation towards the expression of especially complex, refined, strange, often indefinite experiences, states, sensations, shades, half-tones of feelings. 3. Widespread use of new artistic means, unusual combinations of words, unusual metaphors, epithets that destroy the direct, clear meaning of the verse, but create a general refined, indefinite feeling. The formation of the poetics of a hint, when, instead of a direct clear meaning, there is only a hint of what the poet wanted to express: a hint is a symbol.

Many French Symbolists were called pr O sworn poets for their, to put it mildly, unhealthy lifestyle: alcohol, drugs, free love, prostitutes. In poetry and in life, they loved to break prohibitions.

All this fully and above all relates to the founder of symbolism Charles Baudelaire(1821-1867), although in fact he does not belong to the Symbolists, but to the late Romantics. He is related to romanticism by his love of hyperbole, deliberately bright epithets, metaphors, and bright contrasts. He has a modernist sophistication, but it does not prevail. However, Baudelaire is important primarily because he was one of the first in European literature to frankly and very clearly expressed a non-classical worldview, and therefore he is still the founder of symbolism and modernism in general.

His main creation is the famous, legendary, scandalous collection “ The flowers of Evil"(1857), which marked the beginning of European modernism. The first thing that is characteristic of him is absolute pessimism, global disappointment in the world in the spirit of Byron. Life appears in Baudelaire's poems as something terrible, disgusting, meaningless, real Chaos, where death, debauchery, evil, old age, poverty, disease, hunger, crime reign. This is how the world works, and there is no hope to change it. An ineradicable evil lives in the person himself, the lyrical hero of Baudelaire feels it in himself. Main question: how does he feel about it? Differently. There are poems, vivid, powerful, more traditional, in which Baudelaire condemns evil in the world and in himself, suffers from internal and external evil. The very first poem of the collection "Preface" plunges the reader into this terrible atmosphere of universal evil.

The wonderful poems "Atonement", "Confession", "Splin", "The Merry Dead", "Swimming" have approximately the same meaning. In other poems, he glorifies love and beauty as the salvation and rebirth of the soul, for example, the poem "Living Torch".

But Baudelaire has other poems, real Baudelaire, rebellious, unconventional, where he has a different attitude to evil - these are poems where the poet finds the positive in the negative, beauty in death, decay, pleasure in sin and vice, describes all this beautifully, colorfully. Baudelaire finds in evil what attracts a person to him, hence the name of the collection: flowers, that is, the beauty of evil. The pleasure that evil and vice gives is strange, it mixes many opposite feelings - joy and horror, pleasure and disgust. And yet a person is irresistibly drawn to these sensations.

One of the most famous poems Baudelaire's "Carrion" is about how, walking on a beautiful summer day with a friend outside the city, the author stumbles upon a decaying corpse of a horse, and begins to describe it in detail, relish, and sees in how worms swarm, a kind of beauty and harmony.

Hurrying to the feast, a buzzing cloud fly

They hovered over the vile heap,

And the worms crawled and swarmed in the belly,

Like thick black slime.

It all moved and rose and shone

As if, suddenly revived,

The monstrous body grew and multiplied,

Vague breath is full.

That was a shaky chaos, devoid of forms and lines,

Like a first sketch, like a stain,

Where the gaze of the artist sees the camp of the goddess,

Ready to lie down on the canvas. (translation by V. Levik)

A vivid poem "Hymn to Beauty", where beauty is glorified precisely as the beauty of evil, leading to crimes, to vice, to death, but giving unprecedented sensations.

But the most unprecedented, most monstrous poem by Baudelaire is “Martyr. Drawing by an unknown master. " In a luxurious boudoir, in an intimate setting, the headless corpse of a beautiful half-dressed woman is lying on a bed covered in blood in a shameless pose - her head is right there on the table. The description contains a fair amount of sophisticated eroticism. Death, horror, and obscene erotica are poeticized here.

Among silks, brocade, bottles, trinkets,

Pictures and statues and prints

Teasing the sensuality of sofas and cushions

And on the floor of stretched skins,

In a heated room, where the air is like in a greenhouse,

Where he is dangerous, spry and deaf,

And where are the obsolete, in their crystal tomb,

Bouquets give off the spirit, -

A headless female corpse streams on the blanket

Crimson living blood

And the white bed has already absorbed it,

Like water - a thirsty new.

Like a ghostly shadow that has arisen in the darkness

(How pale the words seem!)

Under a load of black braids and idle ornaments

Severed head

On the table lies like an unprecedented buttercup,

And, staring into the void,

Like twilight in winter, whitish, dull, sluggish,

The eyes look meaningless.

On a white sheet, tempting and bold

With my nakedness outstretched,

All seduction is shown by the body,

All fatal beauty.

Garter on the leg with an amethyst eye

As if wondering, looks at the world,

And a pink stocking with a golden border

Remained like a souvenir.

Here, in her extraordinary loneliness,

In a portrait - like herself

Attracted by the charm and secret sensuality,

Driving sensuality crazy -

All the festivities of sin, from sweet crimes,

To caresses, murderous like poison,

All that for which in the night, hiding in the curtain folds,

The demons are watching with delight. (Translation by V. Levik)

Poems of frankly erotic content: "The Dancing Snake", "Song of the Afternoon", "Decorations", "Pr O damned women ”, describing lesbian love.

Baudelaire also writes clearly anti-Christian verses: "The Defiant," "The Denial of St. Peter," "The Litany to Satan."

Baudelaire has a number of simply beautiful poems, entirely in the spirit of modernism, describing strange, sophisticated, complex sensations and experiences. "Cat". The unusual purr of a cat awakens strange sweet sensations in a person, extracted from the depths of the soul. "Troubled sky".

Your mysterious gaze seems to be moisturized.

Who can say if he is blue, green, gray?

He is dreamy, then gentle, then cruel,

That is empty as heaven, scattered il deep.

You're like the witchcraft of those long white days

When the soul is sadder in the drowsy darkness,

And nerves are inflated, and suddenly runs over,

Awakening a sleeping mind, a mysterious affliction.

Sometimes you are as beautiful as the earthly horizon

Under the autumn sun, softened by a veil.

As they gave in the rain, when their depth

Illuminated by a ray of anxious heavens!

Oh, in this climate, captivating forever, -

In a dangerous woman, - will I accept the first snow,

And delights sharper than glass and ice

Will I find it in the winter, night cold?

So, Baudelaire recorded the complexity of the structure of life, his attitude to evil is ambiguous. On the one hand, he knows that evil and vice lead to death, suffering, spiritual devastation. On the other hand, evil is insurmountable, because it gives a person pleasure and other unusual experiences that a person cannot refuse.

Also, the predecessors of the Symbolists include a certain Lautréamont(1846-1870), little is known about him. He is known for his collection of lyric prose Songs of Maldoror. These works are shocking, it seems the creation of a madman, but clever. Behind the outrageousness, of course, there is a rebellion against the bourgeoisie and, in general, against the unjust order of the world.

Paul Verlaine(1844-1896) - he is considered the first symbolist proper. As a person, he is known for his irresistible addiction to alcohol, as well as scandalous homosexual relationships - including with another Symbolist Arthur Rimbaud, which will be discussed later. During a quarrel, the unrestrained and drunk Verlaine shot at Rimbaud, lightly wounded, but for the attempt he was sent to prison. In prison, he sincerely repented of his sins, turned to God (which was seriously reflected in poetry). But religiosity did not save one from alcoholism and a very frivolous lifestyle. Verlaine's character was quite different from that of Baudelaire. Verlaine is a soft, gentle, sad, kind, weak person, there is no rebellious power in him, he expressed the corresponding feelings in his poetry.

Verlaine was the first to widely and consciously apply symbolist poetics (bold phrases, metaphors, violations of logical meaning, hint, uncertainty). Most of his poems expresses the subtlest nuances, feelings, semitones, elusive strange transitional states. This is what Verlaine is good at. There are many descriptions of nature, its transitional states - twilight, early morning etc. These states are completely merged with the same indefinite state of mind of the lyric hero. Verlaine's poems are musical and filled with sound writing (but you can feel it only by knowing French, because half of the charm of Verlaine's poems is lost during translation). In general, the content of his poetry is quite traditional, classical. There are some erotic poems, but not many.

Here is the poem "Prudence".

Give me your hand, don't breathe - let's sit under the foliage,

The whole tree is already ready for leaf fall,

But the gray foliage keeps cool

And the light of the moon is a shade of waxy.

Let's forget. Take a look in front of you.

Let the autumn wind take as its reward

Tired love, forgotten joy

And stroking the hair, hurt by the owl.

Let's get out of hopes. And, not tyrannizing the soul,

Hearts will learn the peace of dying

At the colors of the evening over the twilight of the crowns.

Be quiet before the twilight, as before the schema,

And remember: there is no need to disturb a prophetic dream

An unkind mother is an unsociable nature.

Arthur Rimbaud(1854-1891) - a very unusual person and poet. Extremely emotional, quick-tempered, reckless, impudent violator of all norms and laws, a natural rebel capable of any shocking, blasphemous act (once on the door of the church he wrote “Death to God!”). He hated the townspeople with fierce hatred. Most of all he loved to wander without a penny of money, to walk freely around the world. Freedom is his main principle of existence.

All of his best poems Rimbaud wrote at the age of 15, 16, in 1870 and 1871 (he was born on October 20, 1854). Being a maximalist, he set himself the maximum goal - to turn poetry into an instrument of the highest form of cognition - clairvoyance. Clairvoyance is a direct, intuitive, super-logical knowledge of all the secrets of being, the maximum expansion of consciousness. First of all, the poet must get to know man and humanity, and for this he needs to accommodate all possible human thoughts, emotions, states in his soul. An excerpt from a letter to Rimbaud: “A poet becomes a clairvoyant as a result of a long and strictly deliberate disorder of all his senses. He tries to experience on himself all kinds of love, suffering, madness, he absorbs all the poisons and leaves his quintessence for himself. This is an indescribable torment, which can only be endured with the highest exertion of all faith and with inhuman efforts, the torment that makes him a sufferer of sufferers, a criminal of criminals, an outcast of the outcast, but at the same time a sage of sages. After all, he cognizes the unknown, and even if, having lost his mind, he eventually lost the understanding of his visions, he still managed to contemplate them with his own eyes! Let him perish in this mad flight under the burden of the unheard of and inexpressible: other stubborn workers will come to replace him; they will start from the place where he wilted helplessly! " Rimbaud sought to artificially induce a state of clairvoyance - with prolonged insomnia, physical pain, alcohol, drugs. In this state, he wrote two cycles of prose poems "Insight" (1872) and "Time in Hell" (1873). In fact, these are fragments, scraps of some incomprehensible, poorly connected with each other thoughts, feelings, pictures, images - outside of any logic. In general, nothing good.

In 1873, an incomprehensible event, unprecedented in the history of world literature, takes place. 19-year-old Rimbaud, an unusually talented, almost brilliant poet, became disillusioned with poetry as such and abandoned it forever. Clairvoyance did not reveal any secrets to him, his poetry is understandable to no one and is not needed, except for a bunch of the same crazy as himself. Since that time, Rimbaud has not written a single line of poetry. He went on a journey to the exotic countries of Asia and Africa, he was a hired soldier, merchant, just a traveler. He died at the age of 37, from gangrene - blood poisoning, his leg was cut off, but it did not help.

So, the best poems Rimbaud wrote at the age of 15, 16. The main features of Rimbaud's poetry. 1. He develops the Baudelaire tradition. Introduces all new, indecent, prosaic themes in poetry. If Baudelaire poeticized evil, ugliness, death, then Rimbaud poeticized just petty, everyday indecent things. There are no taboo topics for him. For example, the poem "Evening Prayer" describes how the lyric hero drinks beer in a zucchini and it ends like this:

I get up from the table, I feel the urge ... / Calm, like the creator of both cedars and hyssop,

I shoot up a stream, skillfully sprinkling / Amber liquid on the family of heliotropes.

2. Very bright, colorful, bold metaphors and other means of expression, sometimes reaching the destruction of logic. 3. A bold, fresh outlook on life.

One of the best poems by Rimbaud "Lice Seekers", the boy's two older sisters are looking for lice in his hair and plunge him into an unusual, half-asleep, blissful state.

When on a child's forehead, combed to the blood,

A transparent swarm of shadows descends in a cloud,

The child sees the bent at the ready

Two affectionate sisters with the hands of gentle fairies.

Here, having seated him near the window frame,

Where flowers bathe in the blue air

They are fearless in his stubborn tangle

Wondrous and terrible fingers pierce.

He hears how he sings viscously and indistinctly

The breath of the timid inexpressible honey,

How it climbs back in with a slight whistle -

Saliva or a kiss? - in a half-open mouth ...

Drunk, he hears in silence as a hundredust

The beating of their eyelashes and thin fingers trembling,

Barely breathe out with a subtle crunch

Under the royal nail, a crushed louse ...

The wine of wonderful laziness awakens in him,

Like a sigh of harmonica, like delirium, grace,

And in the heart, melting with sweet lust,

It goes out, then the desire to sob burns.

Also good poems "Ophelia" and "Asleep in the hollow."

The most famous poem by Rimbaud "The Drunken Ship", describing an extraordinary journey on an uncontrollable ship - a fantasy-dream to see the beauty of the world.

Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906).

The great Norwegian playwright who made Norway famous. Norway is one of the four Scandinavian countries (together with Sweden, Finland and Denmark). A narrow strip of land on the western coast of the Scandinavian Peninsula, covered with mountains and indented by fjords, deep sea bays in the mountains. A harsh and beautiful northern land. In ancient times, it was glorified by the Vikings, fearless sailors and conquerors. In the 14th century it became dependent on Denmark, at the beginning of the 19th century it became dependent on Sweden. And only in 1905 Norway gained complete independence.

general characteristics creativity Ibsen.

1. His plays are interesting to read: dynamic plot, intellectual richness, acute formulation of real serious problems.

2. His favorite heroes are loners, rebels, always going against the majority, striving for independence, freedom from the opinions of other people. Often they strive to the mountains, in height, not to people, but from people (which, by the way, is not typical for Russian literature).

3. One of the most important problems posed in the work of Ibsen is the inhumanity of high equal requirements for a person

« Dollhouse"(1879) - one of the most popular, interesting plays by Ibsen. In it, for the first time, a woman in world literature stated that, in addition to the duties of a mother and wife, she “has ". The main character Nora said: “I I can no longer be satisfied with what the majority says and what the books say. I need to think about these things myself". She wants to reconsider everything - both religion and morality. Nora actually asserts the right of an individual to create his own moral rules and ideas about life, different from the generally accepted and traditional ones. That is, Ibsen again asserts the relativity of moral norms.

The main character - Nora - at first seems to be a carefree, frivolous young woman, a "doll", a "squirrel", as her husband calls her, she does not think about anything, except for the comfort of her apartment, in everything depends on her husband. But gradually she becomes a real independently-minded person, capable of serious deeds. Gradually it turns out that the external well-being of their family does not have solid, real grounds. She has a secret, it turns out that 8 years ago, at the beginning of their marriage, Nora saved her husband from death, from a dangerous illness, moreover, he did not know about the severity of his illness (the doctors told only her, but she hid from him), she got I borrowed money for the necessary trip to the south. But at the same time she broke the law, forged her father's signature on the bill. She did this in the name of the health and peace of the closest people of her dying father and sick husband. And for all 8 years she hid it from her husband, slowly, herself, denying herself everything, she paid off the debt. At the same time, she, of course, has to lie, which she does quite easily. And she is afraid to tell the truth. The fact is that her husband Helmer is very strict in the sense of morality, he is "an impeccable official" (his words), an impeccable person, irreconcilable to any violation of morality, including a lie, so Nora feels guilty. When a wife is afraid to tell the truth to her husband, especially that she saved him, such a family can hardly be called a real one. But there comes a moment when the truth is inevitably revealed, and, moreover, everyone can learn it. Learning about the "crime" of his wife, Helmer immediately began to accuse her of immorality, that she ruined his reputation in the eyes of society, cursed a hypocrite, a criminal. He didn't even try to figure out why she did it. It turns out that he never really loved her, as a person, it turns out that he is an ordinary egoist. He needs a wife as a decoration of life, nothing more. When the danger that everyone will find out about her "crime" suddenly disappears, and the husband tries to make peace, to pretend that nothing happened (after all, he was afraid only of what people would say), Nora, unexpectedly, first of all for her husband, appears completely different, a serious, independent person, speaks calmly, carefully. But in her words there is a riot.

In fact, this is a rebellion against all life around it, against its basic foundations and rules. In the short time that her husband chastised her, Nora learned a lot, rethought. I realized who her husband was, realized that her life was with him, and in general her whole past life was not real, but a doll, deceitful. In her eyes, generally accepted traditional values ​​and laws have collapsed, she no longer believes in them, because she does not consider herself a criminal and from the point of view of humanity she is not such, but from the point of view of the law that rules in our world, from the point of view of society, she is a criminal and can be punished. Nora decides on an unheard-of, rare in those days, rebellious act, she leaves her husband, whom she does not love and cannot respect; leaves her three children, arguing that she does not feel able to truly educate them, because before raising children, you need to educate yourself, to understand life yourself, to become a human being. For the first time, a woman in world literature said that in addition to the duties of a mother and wife, she has and other, equally sacred duties "-" duties to oneself". "I AM I can no longer be satisfied with what the majority says and what the books say. I need to think about these things myself". She wants to reconsider everything - both religion and morality. " I need to find out for myself who is right - society or me". Nora actually asserts the right of an individual to form his own moral rules and ideas about life, different from the generally accepted and traditional ones.

« Ghosts"(1881) is also one of Ibsen's best plays. Some secrets are constantly revealed in it, the heroes are constantly discovering something new for themselves, hence the tension. The main character is the widow Frou Alving. In the town, there was an opinion about her late husband, Captain Alving, as a noble, ideally decent, generous person, and the two of them as an ideal married couple. Suddenly she tells Pastor Manders the truth about their family life, which was “ a disguised abyss". All her life she skillfully concealed that her husband was actually a libertine and drunkard, creating a positive "image" for him. Sometimes she had to keep him company at night, drink with him so that he would not leave the house. She lied and dodged all her life for the sake of her son, so that a stain of shame would not lie on him. And now, it seems, Fra Alving has achieved the desired result: her husband is dead, he is in good standing. There is nothing to worry about. But just now she is beginning to doubt the correctness of her behavior.

An adult son, Oswald, a poor artist, comes from France. He turns out to be strikingly similar to his father - in everything, he also loves to drink very much. Once when the mother hears him in the kitchen pestering the servant, she screamed, it seemed to her that she was in front of the ghost of the late captain, who had also once molested the servant.

Then another one opens terrible secret, Oswald suffers from a serious mental illness - a direct result of his father's "fun" lifestyle. And at the end of the play, in front of his mother's eyes, he goes crazy, turns into an idiot. This is how the son pays dearly for the sins of his father. By the way, Ibsen was sure that there is such a law in life: if the punishment for sins and vices does not befall a person during his lifetime, then the punishment will overtake his children or grandchildren. In "Doll House" there is a minor character Dr. Rank, who dies of an illness caused by his father's drunkenness and debauchery. He says: " And in every family, one way or another, the same inexorable retribution is affected.».

In "Ghosts", of course, Mrs Alving is severely punished, punished for lying. Any hidden ill-being, illness, vice will someday manifest itself anyway and will strike with a vengeance. The play exposes any lie.

But this is still not the most important thing in the play. The most important thing in it is the exposure of traditional Christian morality, which requires a person to fulfill his duty first of all. Fru Alving calls ghosts outdated ideas, ideas that no longer correspond to living life, but still rule it out of habit, according to tradition. First of all, this is Christian morality, the bearer of which is the highly moral and demanding pastor Manders, a bit like Brand. It was to him that the young Frau Alving once ran, after a year of marriage with horror she learned about the vices of her husband, for whom she was married without her desire. She loved the pastor, and he loved her, she wanted to live with him, but he sternly sent her to her lawful husband with the words “ your duty is to humbly bear the cross placed on you by the higher will". The pastor considers that his act is the greatest victory over himself, over the sinful pursuit of his own happiness. " What right do we humans have to be happy? We must do our duty". It was he who condemned Fru Alving to a terrible existence with an unloved drinker, he deprived her of happiness, killed her life.

Gradually, talking to Oswald, Fru Alving finds the reason why her husband began to drink. The town is dominated by a gloomy religious outlook. "Here people are taught to look at work as a curse and punishment for sins, and at life as a vale of sorrow, from which the sooner the better it is to get rid of." "And there (in France) people ... enjoy life." Captain Alving in his youth was a very cheerful person, for his "extraordinary cheerfulness (...) there was no real way out here." “I was taught from childhood about the fulfillment of duty, responsibilities and the like. Our only conversation was about duty, duties - about my duties, about his duties. And I'm afraid our house has become unbearable for your father, through my fault. " Religious severity, moral exactingness kill the joy of life.

Fru Alving, like Nora, realized the need to free herself from ghosts, generally accepted religious ideas about life, to think independently and freely. " I can no longer put up with all these conventions that bind hand and foot. I want to achieve freedom».

Thus, this play most vividly reflected the opposition of morality and humanity, where the author is already completely on the side of humanity.

« Builder Solness"(1892) - one of the best plays by Ibsen. It glorifies rebellion against ordinary morality. Solness is the brightest type strong man... He is a successful, wealthy architect, his strong will easily overwhelms the will of other people whom he uses to his advantage. He always likes to be the first, the main, the best in everything. He also has a semi-mystical ability, thanks to which all his strong desires are embodied by themselves.

It seems that his life is absolutely prosperous and happy, then it is revealed what a terrible price he paid for his success. When he and his wife were young, they lived in an old house. Solness knew that the fire of the old house would give him the opportunity to show his talent as an architect, to lay the foundation for success (how exactly is not entirely clear). He had a strong desire for fire, and the fire happened, precisely because Solness badly wanted it. But as a result of the fire, his two young sons fell ill and died. But immediately after that, success came to Solness, as he expected. He paid for it with the lives of his sons, the happiness of his wife, and his personal happiness too. And in this he is absolutely sure and suffers from this, because since then his wife does not live, but mechanically exists, she is dead in soul. And Solness, who loves life, dreams of happiness, is bound to it by the laws of morality.

And suddenly a young girl appears, in love with Solness since childhood - Hilda. They suit each other, she has a strong soul, she loves to "take the breath away", ie. strong, extreme emotions. And Solness once conquered her with the power of his spirit. Hilda believes that you always need to achieve maximum happiness, the most crazy, fantastic, impossible. And as a symbol of such a spirit of breathtaking happiness - a castle with a tower at a dizzying height, which she demands that Solness build her. “And at the very top of the tower there is a balcony. I want to stand there and look down. In fact, she demands from Solness that he overcome his conscience and leave his wife, they would be happy together. Hilda hates the word duty, which is constantly pronounced by the wife of S. “You can hear something cold, piercing, hollowing in it. Debt, debt, debt. " "This is so ridiculous." “That you dare not lend a hand to your own happiness. Just because you have someone you know on the road! " Solness: "And whom you have no right to push off the road." Hilda: “Do you really have no right, in essence? But, on the other hand, all the same ... ". Hilda herself has not yet fully decided whether it is possible, for the sake of the happiness of two people who know how to enjoy life, to hurt a third person who is no longer able to be truly happy. This is the most important question of the play.

Solness admits that he is afraid of heights, he is dizzy. Hilda asks him to do the impossible - to climb to the height and, according to tradition, hang a wreath on the spire of the high house he built, to overcome himself. And Solness decided on this, he also decided to announce on the same day that he loves Hilda. This means that he has decided to overcome traditional moral norms and become happy. He rose to the top, and this is shown in the play as a feat, a long-awaited turn to something new and better. But at the height, his head started spinning, and he fell. He decided on the impossible, showed strength of mind, rebelled against age-old values, rose to such a height that was incompatible with life. He risked and died, but the very fact of risk and overcoming himself is much more important.

This play describes heroes who seek to overcome traditional morality, for whom it clearly prevents them from living, the most important thing is that they are described with the explicit sympathy of the author, and not with exposure. In fact, this play is about the fact that you need to live in such a way that it is breathtaking, to the maximum, to be happy, and for this you can even step over the eternal values.

Belgian literature.

Maurice Maeterlinck (1862-1949).

The most famous writer in Belgium, and also the most famous representative of the symbolist drama. The most striking feature of his work is the double world. Behind the visible earthly life is hidden something invisible, unknown and terrible. Maeterlinck is primarily a mystic.

Maeterlinck's most interesting play " There inside"(1894), it is very short, it is in the anthology. Two heroes stand in front of the house, look out the window at what is happening there, talk and do not dare to enter. The fact is that they are entrusted with telling the inhabitants of the house the terrible news: their daughter suddenly drowned herself. There, outside the window, they do not suspect anything, go about their daily activities, laugh, and these two must come in and destroy all this. And for them, these everyday affairs outside the window, in the house, acquire extraordinary interest and significance. The situation vividly conveys the tragedy of human life. Tragedy can knock on everyone's house at any moment, because we do not know what people, even those closest to us, have inside, in their souls. The drowned girl was very secretive, no one knew what was in her soul, no one even thought that she was capable of such a thing. When one of those standing enters the house, half of the village is going to look at the parents' reaction by the window.

Maeterlinck's later plays are more optimistic. The most famous among them " Blue bird"(1908). The work is in many ways very naive, childishly optimistic, but at the same time wise. The idea of ​​a double world was manifested in it in the clearest way.

The main characters - a boy Tiltil and a girl Mityl - go in search of a blue bird for a sick neighbor girl. The blue bird is a symbol of happiness. The old neighbor turns into a fairy and gives them a hat with a magic diamond, which helps to see the hidden essence, the soul of all phenomena, objects and creatures. They see the revived souls of a dog, a cat, bread, water, light, etc. All travel together to other worlds. I will not talk about all the worlds they visited, only the most interesting ones. 1) First, they go to the Land of Memories, where their deceased grandparents live. It turns out that the dead are just sleeping, but they wake up and rejoice as soon as the living remember them. Remember those who died often. 2) Cemetery. Something unexpected happened there. Tyltil turned the magic diamond and waited for the souls of the dead to emerge from the graves, but bouquets of flowers rose from the open graves. It turns out that there is no one in the graves. There are no dead, because people, their souls are immortal. 3) Gardens of Beatitudes. Bliss are living entities, there are two types of them. Bad, fat, rude - The bliss of being rich, drunk, knowing nothing, etc. There is Bliss, which is too early for children to know about. Good Beatitudes - The joy of being kind, just, etc. The main joy is the Joy of maternal love, appears in the form of mother Tiltil and Mityl, but only she is more elegant, more beautiful, younger. They want her to be always like this on earth. And she tells them that she is always like this, but only inside, in her soul: one must learn to see the inner beauty through an ordinary appearance. And this is the most important idea of ​​the play. 4) The kingdom of the future - children live there awaiting their birth on earth. Every day they become younger, decrease, the smaller the child, the closer the date of his birth.

Returning home and waking up in the morning (and their entire journey lasted one earthly night), they see everything in a new light, everything seems to them unusual, beautiful, significant, they know that everything has a hidden living soul, a secret is hidden everywhere. They never found the bluebird, but suddenly it turned out that the bluebird is their domestic bluebird, but in the end it flies away from them, because they and people have never learned to be kind and loving enough to be happy. Hence, happiness is in love and kindness.

In 1918 Maeterlinck wrote a sequel to The Blue Bird - “ Betrothal". How 16-year-old Tiltil is looking for a bride. The fairy collects 6 girls that he likes, and they all go to the country of their ancestors and the country of children, so that his ancestors and his children choose the best wife for him. The idea is as follows: a person does not exist by himself, he is a link in a huge chain of life, he is connected with ancestors and descendants, bears responsibility to them. When a person is born, a person comes into the world arranged by their ancestors, uses everything that others have created and should be grateful to them. On the other hand, he is responsible for the well-being of children and descendants in general, he must pass on the baton of life to them. And this responsibility to ancestors and descendants is the core of life that does not allow a person to fall, go astray and perish. This is the idea behind the play.

In 1911 Maeterlink received the Nobel Prize.

English aestheticism and Oscar Wilde.

English aestheticism is the second most important literary trend in modernism. The essence of aestheticism is simple - the most important value it is not goodness, not morality, but beauty. Beauty is above morality, or at least they are equal. Beauty cannot be judged from the point of view of morality, these are different phenomena lying on different planes. Beauty can be immoral, bring evil, but it will not lose its value for a person.

Human life should be built according to the laws of beauty, surrounded by beautiful things. And the highest beauty is found only in works of art. The meaning of human life is communication with art, own creativity or perception of works of art. The ordinary life of the average person is boring and meaningless. Salvation is only in art, there is real life. Art is higher than real life. It is always a beautiful lie, a fiction that has nothing to do with reality. Art, like beauty, is not subject to the judgment of morality. “There are no moral or immoral books. There are books written well and poorly written ”(Wilde's famous words from the preface to his only novel).

Oscar Wilde(1854-1900) - the brightest representative of English aestheticism in literature. A very unusual, bright writer and person.

Biography... Irish by nationality, he lived most of his life in London. After graduating from Oxford, as the son of wealthy parents, he led a typically secular frivolous life, roamed in the evenings, had fun, preached aestheticism, hedonism (the meaning of life is pleasure), contempt for generally accepted norms, including moral ones. He loved defiant, unusual clothes. He said: "You must either be a work of art yourself, or wear a work of art on yourself." Wilde's main talent was wit, many English aristocrats considered it happiness to talk to him or even just listen, Wilde himself knew how to enjoy witty conversation and give pleasure to the listeners. His name was the prince of the aesthetes.

True, he not only had fun, but also worked - he read public lectures on the art of the Renaissance, traveled to different cities of England, and once did a great deed, went on an almost year-long tour with lectures in America, the most unaesthetic country in the world, spoke to the simplest people, miners, and had success. When at the American customs, he was asked what values ​​he was carrying with him, Wilde said: "Nothing but his genius."

He was married and had two sons. And yet, secular entertainment was in the first place, the wife turned out to be ordinary and uninteresting. "I threw the pearl of my soul into a goblet of wine and walked along the path of delights to the sweet sounds of flutes." And this path led him to death. Very soon it was discovered that Wilde prefers not feminine beauty, but masculine. Wilde was friends with many young people younger than himself and not only friends. However, addiction to homosexual relationships was at that time quite widespread in London in certain circles - a decadent atmosphere reigned, an atmosphere of refined, perverted pleasures. 2 months after the release of the novel "The Portrait of Dorian Gray" in 1891, Wilde met an unusually handsome young man Alfred and fell in love with him, fell under the power of his charm, just as the artist Basil in the novel fell under the influence of Dorian. It turned out that in the novel, Wilde predicted his own destiny in the form of Basil. Attachment to a handsome young man leads to both death. The worst thing happened at the very peak of Wilde's popularity and fame - in 1895, when he was glorified by 4 comedies, which were staged with resounding success in theaters in England. Wilde inevitably came into conflict with Bozie's father, as he called Alfred, a quarrelsome and rude, he sued Wilde and accused of violation public morality... There was a difficult, shameful trial, during which Wilde was deliberately tried to humiliate and destroy. It turned out that many hated him, hated his success, his dissimilarity to the majority, his contempt for people like them. The townsfolk could not forgive him for the fact that he knows how to enjoy life, but they do not. He was sentenced to 2 years in prison, all his personal property was confiscated, all the things he loved, books, favorite trinkets, which were of no value to anyone, except for Wilde himself, were taken away, he was deprived of the right of paternity. All this is done to humiliate and insult more. Everyone turned away from him and his family, his mother died of worries. The wife was forced to change her name and leave England. It was a complete collapse, the destruction of man.

Wilde was placed in the most ordinary prison, along with the most common criminals, thieves, murderers, etc. He is a prince of aesthetes, accustomed to comfort, to perfect cleanliness, he was forced to constantly be in the mud, in the most humiliating conditions, to sleep on bare boards. The regime in the prison was the most brutal. Hard stupefying physical labor (Wilde never did it), corporal punishment for the slightest offense, constant bullying.

But all this was typical for the first year of serving the term, then the head of the prison changed, he became more humane towards Wilde. Then he was allowed to read, write. And then he wrote "Confession", in form it is a big letter to Bozi, to the one he continued to love. The whole story is not interesting, but the most important part of it, where Wilde describes the changes in his outlook on life. Previously, he valued only pleasures, now he understood the value of suffering, felt that the highest beauty lies in suffering and sadness. He realized that the only thing that can save in the most unbearable circumstances is humility before life as it is. Humility is the understanding that nothing happens just like that, suffering is always a just punishment for your own sins. Therefore, you need to be able to be happy and content with what you have. One must see the wisdom of life in everything. Wilde understood and began to preach that the main thing in life is love for people, not for oneself. This is the highest happiness. In fact, Wilde became a Christian, although he did not officially accept Christianity.

Before leaving prison, he was full of hope, believed that only now the real creativity begins, but everything turned out differently. After prison, he, a beggar, finding no support in anyone, was forced to leave for France, he lived in complete solitude, despondent, sick, broken. He turned out to be too weak a man, lost his fortitude and soon died.

His last work, which he began while still in prison, "The Ballad of Reading Prison" is a stunning, emotional description of the prison as a place where anyone is humiliated, destroyed, even if he accidentally stumbles.

Prison drove some crazy / Shame killed others

Children are beaten there, deaths are awaited there / Justice sleeps there,

There is a human law / the weak are fed up with tears.

Looks into the peephole of someone else's pupil / Ruthless as a whip.

There are forgotten by people / We must freeze.

There we are destined to rot forever, / To decay alive.

(Translated by N. Voronel)

The focus is on the execution of a prisoner who, in a fit of jealousy, killed his wife. Wilde describes his feelings, his horror of death. He as if asks the question: is it good to multiply death and suffering - to pay for death with death.

main feature works of Wilde, because of which it is worth reading - an extraordinary, vivid wit, irony and an abundance of paradoxes. A paradox is a bright, spectacular unexpected thought that contradicts the traditional, generally accepted opinion, or which itself contains some kind of contradiction, reflecting the inconsistency of life. In general, Wilde's paradoxes reflected a non-classical worldview. For example: "The only way to get rid of the temptation (the temptation to sin) is to give in to it."

By the way, the classical and non-classical worldviews are combined in his work.

For example, its beautiful fairy tales, subtle, lyrical, basically assert the most traditional Christian moral values: love, kindness, compassion, altruistic self-sacrifice. The best of them: "The Happy Prince", "The Giant-Egoist" (in this tale, one of the heroes - a little boy, because of whom the giant got rid of his selfishness - unexpectedly turns out to be the future savior, Christ), "The Nightingale and the Rose", " A devoted friend. " In the last tale, one of the heroes, in my opinion, is one of the brightest personifications, symbols of human hypocrisy.

The best work of O. Wilde is the novel “ The Picture of Dorian Grey».

The main character, an unusually handsome young man, Dorian Gray, with the help of Lord Henry, suddenly realized his beauty and youth, which will pass very quickly. Seeing his portrait, he very much wanted to change places with the portrait: so that his portrait would age, and he himself would remain young and beautiful forever. And his wish came true. The portrait not only grew old, but also reflected all the evil, immoral actions of Dorian.

Lord Henry - the second protagonist of the novel - is an unusually intelligent person, an interesting companion charmed Dorian and revealed to him his philosophy of life. Hedonism, a teaching that declares that the only meaning of life is pleasure, joy. There is no need to be afraid to be selfish, than altruism is better than selfishness: why is it better to inflict suffering on oneself than to another person, than another is better than me? Don't be afraid to break moral rules if necessary. Youth and beauty open up great opportunities for enjoyment for a person and it is necessary to have time to enjoy, because youth quickly passes.

Dorian learned all this very well, began to enjoy life, and every now and then he hurt other people. Because of him, a girl who loved him and was rudely rejected by him died. He seduced girls, married women, and then easily abandoned them, he visited dirty dens, where they sold drugs and love for money. At the same time, he himself remained for 18 years as a 20-year-old, and his portrait, which he locked in a secret room, became more and more terrible and disgusting. One day, Dorian went so far as to kill his friend, the artist who painted the portrait.

He was met by the brother of that first dead girl and wanted revenge, almost killed Dorian, but he accidentally died. Having experienced the fear of death for the first time, Dorian, who had been continuously enjoying himself for 18 years, suddenly lost the ability to enjoy life, he became afraid of everything. To be afraid that they will find the portrait, that they will find out who killed the artist, etc. In the end, he wanted to destroy the portrait so that no one would find out about his hidden immorality, stuck a knife into it and immediately fell down a dead and ugly old man, and the portrait became intact and the young Dorian Gray adorned it.

The meaning of the novel: Dorian touched the most important law of life: you have to pay for everything, you have to pay for pleasure with suffering, for a crime with punishment. This is how life works. Lord Henry also enjoyed life all his life, only he never committed crimes, and he, unlike Dorian, did not lose the ability to enjoy. At the end, he told Dorian: "You should never do that which you cannot chat about with people after dinner." That is, what needs to be hidden, which means that you are afraid that someone will find out. Committing major crimes (murder or theft) is not beneficial to the people themselves, striving for pleasure. My advice to you: enjoy life (this is the only meaning of life), you can commit minor sins, lie, offend someone, etc. But do not complicate your pleasure with large nasty things, you will have to pay for them.

H.G. Wells (1866-1946).

One of the founders of science fiction. The first samples were given by Edgar Poe. Then the Frenchman Jules Verne (1828-1905) became famous in this genre, but Verne's element is adventurous and entertaining. H.G. Wells is more serious, he raises social, moral problems, but he does not lose his fascination.

His most famous novels. " Time Machine"(1895). It was after Wells' novel that this phrase became widely used. The heroes go to the distant future and there they discover something strange and terrible. This is interesting, but it has nothing to do with the real future, as it seems to me.

« Dr. Moreau Island"(1896). A talented but power-hungry scientist on a desert island created his own kingdom from half-humans, half-beasts, which he himself surgically created from gorillas and forced to serve himself. But then they finished him off.

« Invisible Man"(1897). A talented, but very proud and irritable physicist Griffin made an incredible discovery, learned to make the human body invisible, he set up an experiment on himself, but he did not have invisible clothing and could not return to normal. Soon he entered into an inevitable conflict with people, he has a crazy idea - to seize power over the world, using his invisibility. He commits crimes with impunity, but he is soon killed. In this and the previous novel, the thought is this: not to love people and desire power over them is bad, it turns against you.

« War of the Worlds"(1898). Earth was attacked by aggressive Martians. The Martians are almost the same people, only after many millions of years. They are unusually mentally developed, they have powerful technology, but in the process of development, human feelings, conscience, etc. have disappeared as unnecessary. They are going to feed on human blood the way humans feed on animal meat. But soon they all die from the simplest earthly infection, like the flu.

Wells also wrote good stories. I especially recommend that you read the story "The Door in the Wall". A door in the wall appears unexpectedly where it has never been - this is a chance to get into the world of your dreams. But a person immersed in his ordinary life is afraid to break it, change it abruptly and enter the door in the wall in order to live the way he really wants, the person is actually afraid of fulfilling his true desires.

English neo-romanticists.

English neo-romanticists of this period made a huge contribution to the development of adventure literature. Robert Stevenson... He wrote several adventure novels for teenagers. The most famous is Treasure Island (1883). The cycle of stories "The Adventures of Prince Florizel" (1882) was well filmed in Soviet times.

But the best work of Stevenson is the story “ The strange story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”(1886) about how one scientist learned to divide himself into good and evil, at night he turned into an evil Mr. Hyde and went to do evil, but during the day he became perfectly good. But soon he completely began to turn into Hyde and committed suicide. There is an excellent Hollywood film adaptation called Mary Reilly (which adds another character, the maid at Mr. Jekyll's house).

American literature.

A few words must be said about the most important event in American history in the 19th century. In 1861-65, there was a Civil War between the North and South, the northern states under the leadership of President Abraham Lincoln wanted to force the southern states to abandon slavery, so that they would recognize blacks as equal citizens, and the southerners resisted. The northerners won, but the problem of the relationship between whites and blacks remains to this day, still many whites consider blacks to be people of an inferior race. And blacks tend to see white as their enemies and take revenge on them.

Mark Twain (1835-1910).

A classic of American literature. Real name Samuel Clemens. When he was a pilot on the Mississippi River, he was nicknamed "Two Measures" (Mark Twain), this is the average depth of the river.

Mark Twain is a satirist and comedian. His humor is rough, straightforward, folk, subtle, not always smart, but funny.

The story " Prince and the Pauper"(1882). England of the 16th century, two very similar boys - one a prince, the other a beggar - changed clothes for fun, and no one noticed this change. The beggar became a prince and the prince became a beggar. Medieval court ceremonies are described through the eyes of a beggar and look ridiculous and ridiculous. But the prince is not very sweet, he experienced the terrible life of the common people on his own skin.

Novel " Yankees at the court of King Arthur"(1889). Yankees - a skillful American worker from a mechanical plant comes to England in the 6th century, during the time of the legendary King Arthur, his round table, knights, etc. And through the eyes of this Yankee Twain ridicules the Middle Ages as such, people's way of life, traditions, customs, social injustice, religion, manner of dress, etc. The Yankee, armed with the technical knowledge and skills of the 19th century, seems to be a great sorcerer in the 6th century, he interferes with medieval life, trying to turn it into America of the 19th century, both in a technical and political sense. But none of this works.

Both books have a lot of really funny moments, but on the whole they are completely unconvincing, implausible, uninteresting.

Mark Twain wrote good stories, the funniest: "The famous galloping frog of Calaveras", "Watch", "Journalism in Tennessee", "How I edited the agricultural newspaper."

The best works of Twain. " The Adventures of Tom Sawyer a ”(1876) - a classic of children's literature. The main characters are essentially naughty hooligans, they constantly break the rules, all order, do the opposite, start fights, mock the teacher and the priest. Their bright life is a protest against everything boring, lifeless, against any violence, lack of freedom, lies and hypocrisy. And the school has been and still is in many ways a collection of all these negative qualities. Studying this book in school puts the teacher in a difficult position, you need to admire the hero who protests against the school. We have to pretend that the school has changed a lot for the better since then.

Best Twain Book - The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"(1885). The main character is actually a homeless person, he is used to living in freedom, without any benefits of civilization. He runs away from the old maid, who took him to her upbringing, as well as from his father's drunkard, and together with the fugitive slave, the Negro Jim, they sail on the Mississippi River on a raft across America. A lot of unusual, funny, sometimes scary things happen to them. The scariest episode of the book - Huck witnesses one inhuman custom. This vendetta is a blood feud. Two farm families are destroying each other, because 30 years ago, one of the representatives of one family in a drunken fight accidentally killed a representative of another family, he was killed in revenge by the relatives of the murdered man, the killer of that first murderer was also killed in turn by his relatives, and so in front of Huck's eyes almost the entire family was destroyed, one of two ill-fated families, including a boy, Huck's age, was killed.

And yet, overall, the book is funny. The funniest episode is at the very end, as Tom and Huck free Jim, who was caught by the owners and put in an ordinary barn. To free it, it is enough to tear off one board. But Tom doesn't like it, he has read a lot of adventure books about robbers, knights and pirates, and wants to subordinate real life to the rules of book life, so that everything is as it is there. Tom makes the unfortunate Jim do everything that in these books noble prisoners do, fleeing from impregnable prisons, dungeons. He must keep a diary on his shirt, either with blood, or a mixture of rust and tears (Tom doesn't care that Jim is illiterate), hollow out pathetic inscriptions on the stone wall ("Here, the unfortunate so-and-so languished"), since the walls of the barn are wooden, then Jim they let him out for a while so that he would bring a huge stone to his dungeon, on which it would be possible to make the necessary inscriptions. All of them are digging with old aluminum spoons. Tom and Huck make a monstrous pie in which they bake a rope ladder made from stolen sheets. And all this instead of breaking one board and freeing unfortunate Jim, who is so stupid and downtrodden that he obeys the boys in everything. It’s impossible to read it without laughing.

Jack London (1876 – 1916).

The famous American writer, one of the few truly beloved, read all over the world. His books are interesting, evoke strong vivid emotions, because they are written emotionally.

Biography. He lived pretty bright life... Born into an educated family, but very poor. Jack knew humiliating poverty, at the age of 10 he began to earn a living, at the age of 15 he learned the stupefying factory labor (this is described in the story "The Apostate"). At the age of 16, he is a sailor on a fishing schooner.

In 1896, gold was found in Alaska, and the second gold rush began (the first began in 1848, when gold was found in California), many Americans who decided to get rich quickly rushed to look for gold, including young London, he was in Alaska less than a year, didn’t find anything and left without salt, but the impressions lasted for a long time. After this trip, he felt a literary talent in himself and began to write stories about the life of gold diggers in Alaska - northern stories that brought him immense popularity. The first of them appeared in print in 1899, since then London has written a lot and successfully.

The end of the writer's life was sad, he became disillusioned with life in general, with a person, with himself, became a pessimist, regularly fell into prolonged depression, abused alcohol, developed severe kidney disease, experienced bouts of severe pain, drank strong painkillers, and once drank a lethal dose painkillers, whether by accident or on purpose, is unknown, but most researchers are inclined to the version of deliberate suicide. Life was clearly not nice to London.

The most important feature of London's creativity is love for everything unusual, bright, exotic. London is mainly interested in unusual, outstanding, especially strong in body and spirit people. Often in his works there is an adventure plot. Bright, detailed, impressive descriptions.

Stories.

Most of the best stories in London are similar - they praise the courage of strong-minded people who overcome the hardest obstacles, inhuman conditions, stubbornly striving for their goals or fighting for their lives. London's most famous and truly powerful story is “ Love of life". A wounded man dying of hunger and fatigue first wanders, then with his last strength he crawls across the tundra (this is happening in Alaska) in the hope of finding people. He did not give up until the end and won, survived in a hopeless situation. The same meaning in other situations is found in the stories "The Mexican" and "The Courage of a Woman."

The story "A Thousand Dozen" is interesting. The hero overcomes a lot of obstacles, shows perseverance and courage to deliver a thousand dozen eggs to Alaska, which he bought cheaply in America, and expects to sell them dearly in Alaska. At the very end, when he already considered himself a rich man, it turned out that all the eggs were rotten. He hanged himself.

The story "By the Path of False Suns" is remarkable, bright, strange, mysterious, philosophical. On the strangeness of human nature.

Among the northern stories, the Indian cycle stands out, stories about the life of the North Indians.

« Law of life". The Indians have such a law: the elderly, who became a burden for the tribe, were simply thrown to starvation when moving from one camp to another. The protagonist is such an old man who was abandoned. In the winter they left him a handful of brushwood. Here he sits near a small fire and remembers his life, he really wants his son to come back for him, but he understands that this is impossible, this is the law of life. The fire goes out, and hungry wolves approach it, it is doomed. From London's point of view, this law of life is universal: only the strong, the fit, the dexterous win and triumph, while the weak, the old, the sick are doomed to perish, to poverty. This is what happens in nature, and this is what happens in human society.

Two remarkable stories about animals - " Call of the ancestors», « White Fang". About the struggle for life, from the point of view of a wolf and a dog. Very interesting, classics of teenage literature.

novel "Sea Wolf"(1904) is also very interesting. The main character by the name of Van Weyden is a literary critic who found himself in an unusual environment for himself, on a fishing schooner "Ghost" among completely uneducated, rude, cruel sailors. It is very difficult for a pampered intellectual to survive where brute force reigns; on this schooner, the hero goes through a harsh school of life.

The most striking image of the novel is the captain of the "Ghost" - Larsen, nicknamed the Sea Wolf. The brightest example of a strong person. He is unusually strong physically, incredibly cruel, for any disobedience he immediately hits in the face, it costs him nothing to kill anyone and throw them overboard, he is a complete master on the schooner. Most of the sailors hate him, are afraid, want to kill him (one of the attempts at rebellion is described in the novel), but he only laughs, despises everyone, enjoys his strength, power and complete loneliness.

Quite unexpectedly, Larsen befriended Van Weyden. It turned out that he is an educated and intelligent person, he reads books. During the first part of the novel, they argue: an idealist and a gross materialist. Larsen is convinced that the bulk of people are rude animals, who first of all need to satisfy their most primitive selfish instincts. Selfishness is embedded in us by nature, which means that doing good to yourself to your detriment is unnatural. Life is completely meaningless, it is meaningless vanity, and Larsen also calls it swinish. The life of an individual is the cheapest thing in the world, unnecessary people are born in huge numbers continuously (Larsen means first of all the poor, workers), there are too many of them, there is not even enough work and food for everyone.

Van Weyden defends classical idealism - the immortality of the soul, faith in goodness, in traditional ideals, altruism, etc.

It is felt that London itself, partly sharing Larsen's views, is still more on the side of Van Weyden. As a result, no one wins the disputes, and Van Weyden wins the plot. At the end of the novel, he finds love and happiness, and Larsen is abandoned by the team, he remains completely alone and dies from a serious illness, in agony. All this is the result of the humanity of one and the inhumanity of the other.

London's best novel, undoubtedly " Martin Eden"(1909). One of the best works of world literature. The novel is to a very large extent autobiographical - about how Jack London himself turned from a simple guy to a great writer with a worldwide reputation.

Once Martin Eden, a sailor, for twenty years protected Arthur Morse from a gang of hooligans, who belonged to the wealthy and educated people. As a token of gratitude, Arthur invites Martin to dinner. The atmosphere of the house - paintings on the walls, many books, playing the piano - delights and enchants Martin. He is particularly impressed by Ruth, Arthur's sister. She seems to him the embodiment of purity, spirituality. Martin decides to be worthy of this girl. He goes to the library in order to join the wisdom available to Ruth, Arthur and the like (both Ruth and her brother are studying at the university).

Martin is a gifted and deep nature. He enthusiastically plunges into reading a variety of books. He sleeps 5 hours a day, the remaining 19 hours he satisfies his thirst for knowledge. He is simply interested in learning how the world as a whole works, the causes and essence of all processes, natural, social, psychological, and their interconnection. He's just interested to know. He is especially interested in literature, he has a desire to become a writer, he felt talent in himself and began to write short stories and novellas and sends him to the editors of various magazines, but no one publishes him, simply because he is unknown to anyone, and they themselves appreciate Martin's talent from editors are not smart enough.

He runs out of money, he is starving, he lives in poverty, but he continues to read and write, because he considers it his calling. At this time, he is experiencing a real spiritual uplift, he is happy, because he has a goal and he goes to it.

No one believes in him, in his talent, no one supports him, no one helps, even Ruth, with whom Martin is in love and with whom he was at first simply interesting, and then she was drawn to him as a strong man, for some time they were considered a bride and the groom, although Ruth's parents were clearly opposed, but so far they endured. Martin considered their relationship to be love, but he was wrong, there was no true understanding between them. The more Martin learned, the more educated he became, the less Ruth and her family understood him. Martin generally began to feel more and more lonely, because it turned out that most people, and even such educated people as Ruth and her relatives, are completely unable and unwilling to think independently, to penetrate into the essence and meaning of the events taking place. The thinking of most people is superficial, they are used to relying on generally accepted and generally accepted opinions. For them, what is right is what is recognized by the majority, what is written about in textbooks, in government newspapers. Martin had his own opinion on all issues. She and Ruth understood each other less and less, she dreamed that he would become a lawyer, like her father, so that he would have a steady, solid income, she needed a husband to provide her comfort. She is an ordinary bourgeois, but he is an unusual person. They are not a couple. He had to leave her himself. But he was blinded by the original image of the ideal girl he had created for himself when he first met. Ruth threw him when a scandal erupted around Martin: he was accidentally called by mistake in one newspaper a socialist-revolutionary, an enemy of American society (which was not the case). Ruth then stopped communicating with him.

In addition, his only friend commits suicide. Martin sinks into the deepest depression. And at this moment he becomes famous, all his works, which he sent out to different editions, begin to come out one after another, his name becomes known, he receives royalties from everywhere, he is invited everywhere. He achieved what he wanted, he is rich and famous, but now he does not need it. He realized that most people are not able to truly appreciate his works, his talent, his original mind are not needed by people, and he has already lost all desire to write for them, to reveal certain truths for them. They began to print him not because of talent, but because his name accidentally became known, became famous. When he became rich, Ruth tried to return to him, offered herself. But this just annoys Martin even more. And Martin Eden commits suicide.

The meaning of the novel. 1. Sharp, angry criticism of the philistine, bourgeois world, in which everything is measured by money and social status, and no one needs real talent and intelligence. London criticizes the bourgeoisie who do not know how and do not want to really, independently think, do not want to understand the essence of the current events, they prefer to adhere to the generally accepted opinion, which is held by the majority. 2. People like Eden, talented, intelligent, deep-minded, are almost always alone in this society, their life is tragic.

The novel is rather not realistic, but romantic, there are many exaggerations in it. For example, American society is described in too black, oversized colors. It is still capable of appreciating such talented people as London itself was. However, the novel says a lot of bitter truth about the bourgeoisie.

O.Henry (1862-1910).

One of the best storytellers (storytellers) in world literature, along with Chekhov, Maupassant. Real name William Porter. His life was sad. His beloved wife died early from tuberculosis. He himself, being a bank teller, was convicted of embezzling state money, this is a very dark story, but most likely he was really guilty, he was in prison for three years, the prison made about the same impression on him as on Wilde - a terrible one. But it was after prison that he began to write his wonderful, funny, light stories. He acquired money, fame, but not happiness, he himself remained sad, lonely, began to drink, and soon died.

The main features of his stories: 1. bright stylistic skill - an abundance of unusual, unexpected metaphors, phrases, puns (pun is a game on the polysemy of a word), ironic paraphrases - when what can be said briefly is said through a long description. For example, instead of saying he had no money at all, it is said: "he and the smallest coin have nothing in common."

2. A vivid plot with unexpected twists and turns and an unexpected ending. It is very difficult to guess how the next story of O. Henry will end. This fact is based on the belief that life is very difficult and unpredictable. Any situation can end with anything. Heroes may not be who they claim to be; when the hero really wants to go to prison, since he has nowhere to spend the night besides the prison, they do not take him, the passer-by himself gives him an umbrella, which he wants to steal. But when the desire to go to prison disappears, he is taken by force (story "Pharaoh and Chorale").

3. Brevity, conciseness in style and plot development. There is no unnecessary chatter.

4. The use is very interesting reception- exposure of the reception. A direct appeal from the author to the reader about the peculiarities of the literary form of this story - an apology for a hackneyed or too complex metaphor, reasoning about how another writer would have constructed the story, etc.

5. Combination of naive romantic idealism - belief in the highest spiritual values, optimism with realistic, bitter, skeptical irony.

Best stories: Pharaoh and Chorale, Gifts of the Magi, Gold and Love, While the Car Waits, Pig Ethics, Jimmy Valentine's Message, A Question of Height Above Sea Level, The Force of Habit, A Burning Lamp.

“All Greece and Rome ate only literature: schools, in our sense, did not exist at all! And how they have grown. Literature is actually the only school of the people, and it can be the only and sufficient school ... ”V. Rozanov.

DS Likhachev “Russian literature ... has always been the conscience of the people. Its place in the public life of the country has always been honorable and influential. She brought up people and strove for a just reconstruction of life. " D. Likhachev.

Ivan Bunin Word Tombs, mummies and bones are silent, - Only the word is given life: From the ancient darkness, on the world churchyard, Only Letters sound. And we have no other property! Know how to protect Though to the best of your ability, in the days of anger and suffering, Our immortal gift is speech.

General characteristics of the era The first question that arises when referring to the topic "Russian literature of the XX century" - from what moment to count the XX century. According to the calendar, from 1900 to 1901. ? But it is obvious that a purely chronological boundary, although significant in itself, gives almost nothing in the sense of differentiating epochs. The first frontier of the new century is the 1905 revolution. But the revolution passed, there was a certain lull - right up to the First World War. Akhmatova recalled this time in "Poem Without a Hero": And along the legendary embankment, not a calendar, the Real twentieth century was approaching ...

At the turn of the epochs, the perception of the world of a person who understood that the previous epoch was gone irrevocably became different. The socio-economic and general cultural prospects of Russia began to be assessed in a completely different way. New era was defined by contemporaries as "borderline". The former forms of life, labor, social and political organization became history. The established system of spiritual values, which had previously seemed unchanged, was radically revised. It is not surprising that the edge of the era was symbolized by the word "crisis". This "fashionable" word wandered through the pages of journalistic and literary-critical articles on a par with similar words "revival", "turning point", "crossroads", etc. Innokenty Annensky

Fiction also did not stand aside from public passions. Her social engagement was clearly manifested in the characteristic titles of her works - "Without a Road", "At the Bend" by V. Veresaev, "Sunset of the Old Century" by A. Amfiteatrov, "At the Last Line" by M. Artsybashev. On the other hand, most of the creative elite perceived their era as a time of unprecedented achievements, where literature was given a significant place in the history of the country. Creativity seemed to fade into the background, giving way to the worldview and social position of the author, his connection and participation in Mikhail Artsebashev

The end of the 19th century revealed the deepest crisis phenomena in the economy Russian Empire... The reform of 1861 by no means decided the fate of the peasantry, who dreamed of "land and freedom." This situation led to the emergence in Russia of a new revolutionary doctrine - Marxism, which relied on growth industrial production and a new progressive class - the proletariat. In politics, this meant a transition to the organized struggle of the united masses, the result of which was the violent overthrow of the state system and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The former methods of the Narodniks-Enlighteners and Narodniks-terrorists have finally become a thing of the past. Marxism offered a radically different, scientific method, thoroughly developed theoretically. It is no coincidence that "Capital" and other works of Karl Marx have become reference books for many young people who, in their thoughts, sought to build an ideal "Kingdom of Justice".

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the idea of ​​a rebel man, a demiurge, capable of transforming an era and changing the course of history, is reflected in the philosophy of Marxism. This appears most vividly in the work of Maxim Gorky and his followers, who persistently brought to the fore the Man with a capital letter, the owner of the earth, the fearless revolutionary challenging not only social injustice, but also the Creator himself. The rebel heroes of the novels, stories and plays of the writer ("Foma Gordeev", "Bourgeois", "Mother") absolutely and irrevocably reject the Christian humanism of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy about suffering and purification by them. Gorky believed that revolutionary activity in the name of reorganizing the world, transforms and enriches the inner world of a person. Illustration for the novel by M. Gorky "Foma Gordeev" Artists Kukryniksy. 1948 -1949 biennium

Another group of cultural figures cultivated towards the idea of ​​a spiritual revolution. The reason for this was the assassination of Alexander II on March 1, 1881 and the defeat of the 1905 revolution. Philosophers and artists called for the inner improvement of man. In the national characteristics of the Russian people, they looked for ways to overcome the crisis of positivism, whose philosophy became widespread at the beginning of the 20th century. In their quest, they sought to find new ways of development, capable of transforming not only Europe, but the whole world. At the same time, an incredible, unusually bright rise of Russian religious and philosophical thought takes place. In 1909, a group of philosophers and religious publicists, including N. Berdyaev, S. Bulgakov, and others, published the philosophical and journalistic collection Vekhi, whose role in the intellectual history of Russia in the 20th century is invaluable. "Milestones" and today seem to us as if sent from the future "- this is how another will say about them great thinker and truth-seeker Alexander Solzhenitsyn. The "milestones" revealed the danger of thoughtlessly serving any theoretical principles, exposing the moral inadmissibility of belief in the universal significance of social ideals. In turn, they criticized the natural weakness of the revolutionary path, emphasizing its danger to the Russian people. However, the blindness of society turned out to be much more terrible. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

The First World War turned into a catastrophe for the country, pushing it towards an imminent revolution. February 1917 and the anarchy that followed led to the October coup. As a result, Russia has acquired a completely different face. During the late XIX - early XX century, the main background of literary development was the tragic social contradictions as well as the ambiguous combination of difficult economic modernization and revolutionary movement. Changes in science took place at a rapid pace, philosophical ideas about the world and man changed, and art close to literature developed rapidly. Scientific and philosophical views at certain stages in the history of culture radically affect the creators of the word, who sought to reflect the paradoxes of time in their works.

The crisis of historical ideas was expressed in the loss of a universal point of reference, of one or another worldview foundation. No wonder the great German philosopher and philologist F. Nietzsche uttered his key phrase: "God is dead." She speaks of the disappearance of a solid worldview support, marking the onset of the era of relativism, when the crisis of faith in the unity of the world order reaches its culmination. This crisis in many ways contributed to the search for Russian philosophical thought, which experienced an unprecedented flowering during that period. V. Soloviev, L. Shestov, N. Berdyaev, S. Bulgakov, V. Rozanov and many other philosophers had a strong influence on the development different spheres Russian culture. Some of them have shown themselves in literary work. An important point in Russian philosophy of that time was an appeal to epistemological and ethical problems. Many thinkers focused their attention on the spiritual world of the individual, interpreting life in such close literature categories as life and destiny, conscience and love, insight and delusion. Together, they led a person to an understanding of the diversity of real, practical and internal, spiritual experience

Pictures have changed dramatically artistic directions and currents. The previous smooth transition from one stage to another, when at a certain stage of literature dominated by any one direction, has gone into oblivion. Different aesthetic systems now existed at the same time. Realism and modernism, the largest literary trends, developed in parallel with each other. But at the same time, realism was a complex complex of several "realisms". Modernism, on the other hand, was characterized by extreme internal instability: various trends and groupings were continuously transformed, emerged and disintegrated, united and differentiated. Literature seemed to be "unraveled". That is why, in relation to the art of the early 20th century, the classification of phenomena on the basis of "trends and trends" is deliberately conditional, not absolute.

A specific sign of the culture of the turn of the century is the active interaction of various types of art. Theatrical art flourished at this time. The opening of the Art Theater in Moscow in 1898 was the event of a large cultural significance... On October 14, 1898, the first performance of the play Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich by A. K. Tolstoy took place on the stage of the Hermitage Theater. In 1902, the famous Moscow Art Theater building (architect FO Shekhtel) was built at the expense of the largest Russian philanthropist S. T. Morozov. KS Stanislavsky and VI Nemirovich stood at the origins of the new theater. Danchenko. In his speech to the troupe at the opening of the theater, Stanislavsky especially emphasized the need to democratize the theater, to bring it closer to life. the emblem of the theater. The contemporary drama of Chekhov and Gorky formed the basis of his repertoire in the first years of its existence. The principles of performing arts developed by The art theater and being part of the general struggle for a new realism, had a great influence on the theatrical life in Russia as a whole.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Russian literature became aesthetically multi-layered. Realism at the turn of the century remained a large-scale and influential literary movement. So, in this era Tolstoy and Chekhov lived and worked. The brightest talents among the new realists belonged to the writers who united in the Moscow circle "Sreda" in the 1890s, and in the early 1900s who formed the circle of permanent authors of the Znaniye publishing house, the actual leader was M. Gorky. Over the years, it included L. Andreev, I. Bunin, V. Veresaev, N. Garin-Mikhailovsky, A. Kuprin, I. Shmelev and other writers. The significant influence of this group of writers was due to the fact that it fully inherited the traditions of the Russian literary heritage of the 19th century. The experience of A. Chekhov was especially important for the next generation of realists. A.P. Chekhov. Yalta. 1903 g

Themes and heroes of realistic literature The thematic range of works of realists at the turn of the century is undoubtedly wider, in contrast to their predecessors. For most writers at this time, thematic constancy is uncharacteristic. Rapid changes in Russia forced them to approach the topic in a different way, to invade the previously reserved layers of topics. The typology of characters was also noticeably updated in realism. Outwardly, the writers followed tradition: easily recognizable types could be found in their works " little man"or an intellectual who survived a spiritual drama. Characters got rid of sociological averaging, became more diverse in psychological characteristics and outlook." The diversity of the soul "of the Russian person is a constant motif of I. Bunin's prose. He was one of the first in realism to use foreign material in his works (" Brothers "," Dreams of Chang "," The gentleman from San Francisco "). The same became characteristic of M. Gorky, E. Zamyatin and others. The work of A. I. Kuprin (1870 -1938) is unusually wide in the variety of subjects and human characters.The heroes of his stories and stories are soldiers, fishermen, spies, loaders, horse thieves, provincial musicians, actors, circus performers, telegraph operators

Genres and stylistic features of realistic prose Significantly updated at the beginning of the 20th century genre system and the stylistics of realistic prose. The main place in the genre hierarchy was occupied at that time by the most mobile stories and essays. The novel practically disappeared from the genre repertoire of realism, giving way to a story. Beginning with the work of A. Chekhov, the importance of the formal organization of the text has noticeably grown in realistic prose. Some techniques and elements of form have gained greater independence in the artistic structure of the work. For example, the artistic detail was used more variedly. At the same time, the plot more and more often lost its value as the main compositional means and began to play a subordinate role. In the period from 1890 to 1917, three literary currents- symbolism, acmeism and futurism, which formed the basis of modernism as a literary movement

Modernism in artistic culture turn of the century was complex phenomenon... Within it, several currents can be distinguished that differ in their aesthetics and program settings (symbolism, acmeism, futurism, ego-futurism, cubism, suprematism, etc.). But in general, according to philosophical and aesthetic principles, modernist art opposed realism, especially the realistic art of the 20th century. However, the art of modernism in its literary process at the turn of the century in value is artistic and moral was largely determined by the common, for the majority major artists striving for our richest cultural heritage and, above all, freedom from aesthetic normativity, overcoming is not an incarnation. It contains within itself the silver quek of Russian culture. only literary clichés of the previous era, but also new artistic canons that were taking shape in their immediate literary environment. Literary school (current) and creative personality- two key categories of the literary process of the early 20th century. To understand the work of an author, it is essential to know the closest aesthetic context - the context of a literary trend or grouping.

The literary process at the turn of the century was largely determined by the common desire for most major artists to be free from aesthetic normativity, to overcome not only the literary clichés of the previous era, but also the new artistic canons that were taking shape in their immediate literary environment. The literary school (current) and the creative individual are two key categories of the literary process of the early 20th century. To understand the work of an author, it is essential to know the closest aesthetic context - the context of a literary trend or grouping.

The economic and political shaking in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (the emergence of the bourgeoisie, the abolition of serfdom) contributed to the emergence of new literary trends. Realism is replaced by proletarian literature, modernism (modern) appears.

Modernism includes: symbolism, acmeism and futurism.

Symbolism

Symbolism is the first largest movement to emerge in Russia. It was started by Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Valery Bryusov. Representatives of this movement gave a central meaning in their work to the symbol.

In 1812, the first collection of poems by Russian Symbolists was published.

Then came the second collection and the third. It was assumed that various poets were published in these collections. But it soon became clear that the author of all the poems in these collections was the novice poet Valery Bryusov, who signed the poems with various pseudonyms. His trick succeeded and the Symbolists got noticed. And soon new Symbolist authors began to appear.

Symbolists are divided into:

young symbols - Vyacheslav Ivanov, Andrey Bely, Alexander Blok.

senior Symbolists - Valery Bryusov, Soloviev, Balmont, Zinaida Gippius, Fyodor Sologub.

They preached art for art. But disputes arose between them. The elders defended the priority of religious and philosophical searches, and the younger symbolists were considered decoders.

Decode (translated from French - decline) - in literature this is a crisis type of consciousness, which is expressed in a feeling of despair, powerlessness. Therefore, representatives of this trend have a lot of despondency and sadness.

Acmeism - originated in 1910 and is genetically associated with symbolism. Representatives of this trend are: Vyacheslav Ivanov, Sergei Gorodetsky, Nikolai Gumelev, Alexey Tolstoy. Soon they united in the "Workshop of Poets" circle, which was joined by Anna Akhmatova, Zinkeyvich, Mindelshpam. Acmeists, unlike the Symbolists, advocated showing the values ​​of life, abandoning the unchaste desire of the Symbolists to cognize the unknowable. According to acmeists, the purpose of poetry is in the artistic development of the diverse world around us.

Futurism

Futurism (future) - international literary phenomenon... The most extreme in terms of aesthetic radicalism, which arose in Italy and and almost immediately arose in Russia after the publication of the futuristic society "Sadok of Judges". The authors-futurists were: Dmitry Burliuk, Khlebnikov, Kamensky, Mayakovsky. Futurists were divided into three groups:

ego-futurists - Igor Ignatiev, Olympov, Gnedov, etc.

cuba-futurists - Ivnev, Krisanf.

centrifuge - Boris Pasternak, Bobrov, Ageev, Bolshakov, etc.

Representatives of futurism called for cutting off everything old and creating new literature that can transform the world.

The Futurists said:

"From the height of skyscrapers, we gaze at their insignificance"

So they talked about Gorky, Gumilev and Blok.

Effective preparation for the exam (all subjects) -