* This work is not a scientific work, is not a final qualification work and is the result of processing, structuring and formatting the collected information intended for use as a source of material for independent preparation of educational works.

“War and Peace” is one of the few works in world literature of the 19th century that can rightfully be called an epic novel. Events of a large historical scale, general life, not private life, form the basis of its content, the historical process is revealed in it, an unusually wide coverage of Russian life in all its layers has been achieved, and as a result of this, the number of characters, in particular characters from the people's environment, is so large. It shows Russian national life and, most importantly, the history of the people and the path of the best representatives of the noble class to the people are the ideological and artistic core of the work. “War and Peace” is a work in which the writer sought to answer the questions: what is the calling of the Russian intelligentsia? What should thinking people do to benefit the Motherland? What can admiration for a strong personality lead to? What is the general role of the individual and the people in history? The breadth of coverage of the Russian nation in the work is amazing: noble estates, aristocratic metropolitan salons, village holidays and diplomatic receptions, the greatest battles and pictures of peaceful life, emperors, peasants, dignitaries, landowners, merchants, soldiers, generals. We meet more than 500 characters on the pages of the novel. All of them, especially the positive heroes, are in constant search. Tolstoy's favorite heroes are not flawless, but they strive for improvement, search for the meaning of life, tranquility for them is tantamount to spiritual death. But the path to truth and righteousness is difficult and thorny. The characters created by Tolstoy reflect the moral and philosophical research of the author of the novel himself. The novel tells about the events taking place during three stages of Russia's struggle with Bonapartist France. Volume 1 describes the events of 1805, when Russia, in alliance with Austria, waged a war on its territory with France. In the 2nd volume of 1806-1807, when Russian troops were in Prussia. The 3rd and 4th volumes are devoted to a broad depiction of the Patriotic War of 1812, which Russia waged on its native soil. In the epilogue, the action takes place in 1820.

Tolstoy begins his novel with the image of two elements: one - embodied in the Rostovs, Pierre, Andrei Bolkonsky, the other - secular society.

For Tolstoy, secular society is a symbol of deceit and pretense. This is Anna Pavlovna Scherer, portraying an enthusiast, offering guests a viscount, then an abbot. Thought, feeling, sincerity are somewhere else for her. This is a regular guest in Anna Pavlovna’s salon - Prince Vasily, who speaks like a “wound clock.” And here the automatism, the lack of freedom, the hypocrisy that has become the essence of man are emphasized. This is the beautiful Helen, who always smiles equally beautifully at everyone. When Helen first appears, her constant smile is mentioned three times. The “Little Princess” Bolkonskaya is not forgiven for her completely innocent coquetry only because with the hostess of the drawing room, and with the general, and with her husband, and with his friend Pierre, she speaks in the same capricious and playful tone, and Prince Andrei hears from her five times exactly the same phrase about Countess Zubova. The eldest princess, who does not love Pierre, looks at him “dullly and motionlessly,” without changing the expression of her eyes. Even when she is excited (by talking about an inheritance), her eyes remain the same, as the author carefully notes, and this external detail is enough to judge the poverty of her nature. Berg always speaks very precisely, calmly and courteously, without expending any spiritual strength, and always about what concerns him alone. The same impeccability is revealed in the state reformer and outwardly amazingly active figure Speransky, when Prince Andrei notices his cold, mirror-like, distant gaze, sees a meaningless smile, hears a metallic, distinct laugh. In another case, the “revitalization of life” is opposed by the lifeless look of the Tsar’s minister Arakcheev and the same look of Napoleonic Marshal Davout. The great commander Napoleon himself was always pleased with himself. Like Speransky, he has a “cold, self-confident face”, “a sharp, precise voice that finishes every letter. However, revealing the fleeting movements of the human soul, Tolstoy sometimes suddenly revives these metallic, distinct figures, these mirror eyes, and then Prince Vasily ceases to be himself, the horror of death takes possession of him, and he sobs at the death of the old Count Bezukhov. The “little princess” experiences sincere and genuine fear, anticipating her difficult birth. Marshal Davout forgets his cruel duty for a moment and is able to see a man, a brother, in the arrested Pierre Bezukhov. The always self-confident Napoleon on the day of the Battle of Borodino experiences confusion and a restless feeling of powerlessness. Tolstoy is convinced that “people are like rivers”, that every person contains all the possibilities, the abilities of any development. They flash before frozen, self-satisfied people at the thought of death and at the sight of mortal danger, but for these people “possibility does not turn into reality.” They are not able to leave the usual path; they leave the novel spiritually empty, vicious, and criminal. External immutability and staticity turn out to be the surest sign of internal coldness and callousness, spiritual inertia, indifference to general life, beyond the narrow circle of personal and class interests. All these cold and deceitful people are not able to understand the danger and difficult situation in which the Russian people are experiencing the invasion of Napoleon, or to be imbued with the “people's thought.” They can only be inspired by a false game of patriotism, like Anna Pavlovna Scherer or Julie Karagina, a wardrobe successfully acquired at a time when the fatherland is going through a terrible time, like Berg, the thought of being close to the highest power, or the expectation of awards and movement up the career ladder, like Boris Drubetskoy on the eve of the Battle of Borodino. Their ghostly life is not only insignificant, but also dead. It fades and crumbles from contact with real thoughts and feelings. Even the shallow but natural feeling of attraction of Pierre Bezukhov to Helen suppressed everything and hovered above the artificial babble of the living room, where “the jokes were sad, the news was not interesting, the animation was obviously fake.”

And Tolstoy contrasts this empty, false world with another world, which is especially close and dear to him - the world of the Rostovs, Pierre Bezukhov, Andrei Bolkonsky.

When Pierre Bezukhov first entered Anna Pavlovna's living room, she was frightened, because Pierre had something that was not characteristic of the world - an intelligent and natural look that distinguished him from everyone in this living room. Tolstoy calls Pierre a child. He is naive, he does not understand that he is in a toy house, he wants to talk about world politics with wind-up toys. He mistakes Helen for a “genius of pure beauty.” And “his smile was not like other people’s, merging with a non-smile. On the contrary, when a smile came, then suddenly, instantly, his serious face disappeared and another, childish, kind one appeared.” His smile seemed to say: “Opinions are opinions, but you see what a kind and nice fellow I am.” Tolstoy always believed that a person’s smile speaks volumes: “if a smile adds charm to the face, then the face is beautiful; if it does not change it, then it is ordinary; if it spoils it, then it is bad.” And Tolstoy carefully watches people’s smiles. About Vera Rostova, he says: “A smile did not grace Vera’s face, as usually happens; on the contrary, her face became unnatural and therefore unpleasant.” Andrei Bolkonsky knows the value of this whole world, the people of the world. Living rooms, gossip, balls, vanity, insignificance - this is a vicious circle that he sees and from which he wants to break out. This is why he goes to war. Prince Andrei has a “bored look”; expressions of boredom, fatigue and annoyance alternate on his face. However, the portrait of Andrei Tolstoy reflects the contradiction between the demonstrative expression of boredom and the inner passion of struggle. This is evident in Andrei's conversations with Pierre.

Tolstoy reveals another world to his readers - the world of the Rostovs. The charming image of Natasha Rostova appears on the pages of the novel. How does Tolstoy describe Natasha? “Thin, bare arms and small legs in lace pantaloons and open shoes.” These affectionate and diminutive suffixes come as if involuntarily from Tolstoy’s pen: the writer creates an image of childhood, joy, love, happiness. Everything Natasha does seems terribly indecent. Her sister Vera is an absolutely correct girl. She “was good, not stupid, studied well, was well brought up, her voice was pleasant,” what she said was always fair and appropriate. And Natasha, according to the countess, does God knows what: kisses Boris, at the table loudly asks what kind of cake there will be, bursts into laughter when she sees her father dancing. But Tolstoy loves Natasha and does not love Vera, Helen. Here Tolstoy poses the problem of the confrontation between intuitive and rational worldviews. Natasha comes into the novel not only as the embodiment of sincerity and vitality, opposing the deceit and deadness of the world, but also as the bearer of Tolstoy’s ideal of life without the torment and quest of cold reason, which threw Prince Andrei into a hopeless confusion of clashes of human interests. Natasha lives not by reason, but by feeling. The spontaneity of experience, the jubilant joy of life, seems to leave no room for reflection.

There are different thoughts and reasoning, and Tolstoy’s attitude towards them is different. Pierre in the Scherer salon expresses his attitude towards the French Revolution, and Prince Andrei talks about women, about war, about light. They cannot help but think; they live not only by personal interests, but also by the interests of humanity. But Berg talks only about what concerns him alone. The word “I” does not leave his tongue. Just as Pierre and Andrei are “alien bodies” in the salon of the social dead, so Berg and Vera are dead in the Rostov house.

Tolstoy reveals to us another female image - Princess Marya. It’s hard for her to live in her father’s house because he doesn’t understand her. Discussions about the rules of rational upbringing prevent him from penetrating his daughter’s inner world. Princess Marya's soul is full of religious delight, and her father is also an inept teacher, forcing her to study science and teach geometry. This very comparison is already imbued with subtle Tolstoyan irony: exact science - and faith, reason - and soul. It's incompatible, it's always a struggle.

The novel depicts two wars: 1805, abroad, and 1812, in Russia. It was impossible to show the second war without the first. Tolstoy said: “I was ashamed to write about our triumph in the fight against Bonaparte’s France, without describing the failures and our shame... If the reason for our failures and our triumph was not accidental and lay in the essence of the character of the Russian people and troops, then this character should have been expressed even brighter in an era of failures and defeats.” “The character of the people” or “the spirit of the army” - this is what Tolstoy says. And he wants to show the army and raise its spirit.

Historical figures appear in the novel - Kutuzov, Napoleon, Bagration, Murat and others. The image of Kutuzov is close to the author; he occupies a central place in the novel. In the campaign of 1805, Kutuzov wanted one thing - to withdraw the Russian army from the Austrian borders and, ultimately, to get out of this unnecessary war. Through the image of Kutuzov, Tolstoy conveys his dislike for pomp, for the pomp of clothes and phrases. Tolstoy wants us to see Kutuzov as he himself sees him and as the soldiers see him - “a plump face disfigured by a wound,” “a smile of the eyes” (the smile of a wise man). In the ranks, he sees not a gray mass of one-faced figures, but recognizes and singles out individual soldiers and officers. In Tolstoy, the theme arises of the unity of the commander with the soldiers, the theme of the unity of the individual with the masses.

In a small episode, when Nikolai Rostov greets the German owner of the house where he is staying, one of the main motifs of the epic begins to sound, a song of the unity of mankind arises. What do they exchange? Rostov: “Long live the Austrians! Long live the Russians!” German: “Long live the whole world!” This feeling of unity is the highest truth of human existence. “Both of these people looked at each other with happy delight and brotherly love, shook their heads as a sign of mutual love and parted smiling.” Tolstoy is concerned about this question. He sees dirt, abomination, deception where people are separated, he sees pure, perhaps inexplicable joy where people merge into some kind of human unity.

Tolstoy sees the distance behind every event, behind every person, behind every problem in life. He never forgets about the great human truth. A thirst for heaven lives in him. Already in the initial chapters, Tolstoy describes the first battles. You always feel that Tolstoy seems to have two points of view when he looks at the war. On the one hand, he very warmly, even lovingly describes the life of a soldier, enthusiastically describes battles, and on the other hand, notes of hatred for war break out from him. And this hatred is connected with one of the main themes of the novel, expressed in the exclamation: “Long live the whole world!”

What is war? How does a person feel when he becomes a victim? Can a commander organize a battle in such a way as to ensure victory for himself and defeat for the enemy? What is heroism and what do heroes look like? From the concatenation of images emerge answers to these questions that worried the artist and thinker. When describing the Battle of Shengraben, Tolstoy draws close-up figures of Bagration, Prince Andrei, Tushin, Timokhin, Dolokhov, Zherkov, Nikolai Rostov and other soldiers and officers. Tolstoy reflected in his diary: “How to describe what a separate “I” is?” He sought to find the originality of this “I”, and through understanding the originality of the personalities described, lead the reader to an awareness of the most important problems of social existence. Both are important here: the individual as separate and the individual as part of the general. But the very peculiarity of a person is best revealed in her communication with other people, in her reaction to events, in her social practice.

How does Tushin first appear before us? “A small, dirty, thin artillery officer... without boots, in only stockings,” smiles awkwardly at the sight of the adjutant and staff officer entering. He has big, smart and kind eyes. This is how Tolstoy draws a future hero. But Prince Andrei is attracted to him. And for the staff officer, Tushin is just a commander who dismissed the soldiers, a rather funny person and not amenable to persuasion. Tolstoy also draws other officers: Zherkov, the duty staff officer on an eglitic, beautiful horse. Tushin is still funny, and the staff officers are extremely picturesque. But a person is tested in battle, not now. In battle, Tushin acts based on trust in the common soldier. Tushin is busy with business, his “I”, his thoughts about himself are turned off, therefore, according to Tolstoy, this “I” increases in its significance (the enemy decided that where Tushin’s battery was, the main forces of the Russians were concentrated). Tolstoy continued in his work the deheroization of the former hero, begun by Lermontov, with a fluttering banner galloping on a beautiful horse across the battlefield, and at the same time showed that modest, unnoticed heroism of the common man, who decided the fate of the battles. The same Timokhin, the “red-nosed captain”, whom only the lazy do not shout at, played an important role in the battle, unexpectedly attacking the French. Tushin, Timokhin, the soldiers look very unpresentable in front of their superiors, but are formidable for the enemy. but the awards go not to them, but to the Zherkovs and Dolokhovs. But Zherkov is brave in front of his superiors and cowardly in battle. Timokhin and Tushin were not noticed by any of the authorities except Kutuzov and Prince Andrei. The time will come when this unity with the people will manifest itself in full force: during the war of 1812, the court pack led by the tsar will give conflicting orders to Kutuzov, secretly laughing at him, and then ordinary people will be his only and reliable support.

For Prince Andrei, the Battle of Shengraben meant an entire era of development. He molds himself in the image and likeness of his fictional Napoleon, but life pushes him towards ordinary people. Tolstoy does not yet look at everything “through the eyes of a peasant,” as in the last years of his life, but the folk epic that he creates leads the writer to this. Prince Andrei himself does not yet feel that he will reject his chosen path of struggle for personal glory and power, and does not attach importance to the fact that ordinary people are beginning to see him as their own, a loved one. But the time will come and he will understand what true greatness looks like and where to look for it.

Nikolai Rostov participates in the same battles as Prince Andrei, he sees almost as much, but his feelings and thoughts are connected only with part of what he has in common with the regiment. And when he, wounded, finds himself alone and sees the French running towards him, he turns from a dashing hussar into a “hare running away from the dogs.” But not only this person and his experiences are important to Tolstoy; the meaning of the phenomenon is important to Tolstoy. The fear of life made Rostov think about life, about his life. He was supposed to be a killer, but he became a victim. No, he shouldn’t be here, not at war. He's not made for killing. “And why did I come here!” - Rostov exclaims in bewilderment. But where there is no blood and murder, is there really peace?

In secular society there is also a struggle for money, for wealth. Prince Vasily's instinct suggests two sacrifices with the help of which he could get rich. In a word, Tolstoy’s instinct brings Prince Vasily closer to the beast, to the predator. He manages to marry Pierre to Helene because Pierre is naive and inexperienced. What seems to him and others, he takes as the truth, as a genuine feeling. Having become a rich man, Pierre felt himself in the center of attention, it seemed to him that everyone loved him. It is not easy for Pierre to understand that only his estates made him smart and handsome in the eyes of secular society. Therefore, the collision of the moral, but passive principle inherent in Pierre with the active predation of the Kuragin family ends with the victory of the forces of evil.

It is important for Tolstoy to find out what the true charm of a woman is; Helen’s beauty did not have that soul-elevating principle that is characteristic of human beauty and makes one look in silent delight at the statue of the Venus de Milo. Breasts, back, bare in the latest fashion, the smell of perfume - that’s what makes up Helen. The eyes and face are outside the artist’s field of vision. And here is how Tolstoy describes the appearance of Princess Marya: “It was not the dress that was bad, but the face and the whole figure of the princess... No matter how much this frame and the decoration of the face were modified, the face itself remained pitiful and ugly.” And suddenly a close-up detail: “big beautiful eyes, full of tears and thoughts.” This thought, these tears make the princess beautiful with that moral beauty that neither Helene, nor the little princess, nor Bourrienne with her pretty face has. There are two principles in the soul of Princess Marya - pagan and Christian. The dream of the joy of earthly love for a husband, a child, and thoughts of God, the fear that all this is a temptation of the devil. And after the failed matchmaking of Anatoly Kuragin and Princess Marya, she decides: “My calling is to be happy with another happiness, the happiness of love and self-sacrifice.”

But what about the world that the wounded Nikolai Rostov remembers with longing? This world lives only for him. Sonya, having read the letter from Nikolai, is happy. Petya is proud of his brother. The members of this family are tied to each other by some mysterious threads. And no considerations, no arguments of reason, according to Tolstoy, can compare with this intuitive feeling of blood relationship. After all, “War and Peace” is essentially a song of the triumph of feeling. After reading the letter, Countess Vera tells her mother: “We should rejoice at everything he writes, not cry.” This must be alien to both the Rostovs and Tolstoy himself. There is no need to do anything guided by cold considerations: let the feeling, the immediate feeling of joy and love, break through and unite all people into one family. When a person does everything according to calculation, thinking through his every step in advance, he breaks out of social life, alienates himself from the general, because calculation is selfish in its essence, and what makes people related is their intuitive feeling.

Whatever shortcomings Rostov may have, the person in him is alive. This is the difference between Nikolai and secular drones: even if he is quite limited, even if there is a lot of hussarism in him, but with him everything comes from the soul. Therefore, it is not surprising that Nicholas fell in love with the Tsar, fell in love as with a girl. This love gives a lot to understand Rostov’s character. DI. Pisarev, comparing Rostov with Drubetsky, notes: “Boris does not become enthusiastically servile towards anyone. He is always ready to subtly and decently flatter the person from whom he somehow hopes to make a cash cow for himself... He can only strive for benefits, and not for the ideal. In Rostov, on the contrary, ideals, idols and authorities grow like mushrooms at every step... To believe and love blindly, passionately, infinitely is the ineradicable need of his ebullient nature.” Is Alexander worthy of such deification? Tolstoy does not give a direct answer to this question, but this does not mean that he avoids expressing his direct attitude towards the tsar. He reveals the relationship gradually, exposing his hero from the inside, starting from the external appearance of the monarch, which seems to evoke sympathy, and showing the emptiness and insignificance of the hero’s inner world. The colors on this image are drawn in such a way that the reader develops contempt, rather than sympathy for the hero. Tolstoy’s attitude towards Alexander can be fully understood if we do not forget that Tolstoy loved “folk thought” in the novel, that the antithesis of the people-anti-people lies at the heart of the novel. Tolstoy's analyzing and unifying thought sees an internal similarity between Napoleon and Alexander. What they have in common is their childish attitude towards people, towards the people. They build their happiness on the misfortune of others. This is Tolstoy’s main thought - about the insignificance of those who live by themselves, their happiness, built on the misfortune of others. This immoral essence makes Napoleon related to Alexander, Prince Vasily and his children. The conviction of this would later develop in Tolstoy to the point of denying the exploitation of people.

The embodiment of Tolstoy's search for the meaning of life is Andrei Bolkonsky. One day at the Battle of Austerlitz, a turning point occurs in it. On this day the rise of Prince Andrei and his first deepest disappointment. What did Prince Andrei want from the battle? “...I want fame, I want to be known to people, I want to be loved by them... I want this alone, I live for this alone.” At this moment, Prince Andrei takes in his thoughts this path, which leads people, imbued with an unconscious feeling of unity with the common, to a break with this common. Prince Andrei wants to become above people. The dream of fame lived in his youth and in the soul of the writer. Parting with this dream was reflected in the pages of War and Peace. (In his diary of 1851, Tolstoy denounced himself for various sins, most often “vanity.” The desire to become famous possessed Tolstoy in the first years after he left the university. In the Caucasus, he already writes in his diary: “I am still tormented by a thirst... not for fame “I don’t want fame and I despise it, but to accept great influence in the happiness and benefit of people.”)

Prince Andrei feels disconnected from people. What is important to him is indifferent to others. For the first time he gets closer to the world that Napoleon personifies. At this time, Napoleon looked at the sun emerging from the fog and seemed to see how it would illuminate the field of his triumph. He did not think that his triumph would be a consequence of the suffering and death of people. The Napoleonic principle penetrates the blood of Prince Andrei like poison. During the battle, he grabs the banner and runs forward, confident that his entire battalion will run after him. This movement also corresponds to the inner impulse of Prince Andrei - the desire for glory. But here he is wounded: “What is this? I'm falling? My legs are giving way,” he thought and fell on his back. And with this cessation of external movement, his rush to glory abruptly stops. He sees the sky. It fills the gaze of Prince Andrei, and in this gaze there is no longer any place for earthly passions. What had been accumulating in his mind during these months of war now takes on a clear form: Prince Andrei finally realized the terrible contrast between vanity, lies, the struggle of vanities, pretense, bitterness, fear that reigns in this senseless war, and the calm grandeur of the “endless sky” . He comes to the denial of war, military affairs, and politics. The falsity of all this is clear to him, but where the truth is, where the greatness is - he does not know, although it seems to him that he feels “the greatness of something incomprehensible, but important.” These thoughts of Prince Andrei are not only himself, these are not only his quests, but also the thoughts and quests of Tolstoy himself. He himself is approaching an ideological turning point, the negation of politics as a way of fighting feudal autocracy. At the same time, it is important that Tolstoy brings his hero to the idea of ​​the insignificance of the desire for personal happiness if it, this happiness, is not connected with something larger, common, “with heaven.”

The significance of the novel "War and Peace" in the world

literature and art

Tolstoy's novel was hailed as a masterpiece of world literature. G. Flaubert expressed his admiration in one of his letters to Turgenev (January 1880): “This is a first-rate thing! What an artist and what a psychologist! The first two volumes are amazing... I happened to scream with delight while reading... Yes, it’s strong, very strong!” Later, D. Galsworthy called War and Peace “the best novel that has ever been written.” 1

These judgments of outstanding European writers are well known; they have been cited many times in articles and books about Tolstoy. Recently, many new materials have been published for the first time, indicating the worldwide recognition of Tolstoy's great epic. They are collected in the 75th volume of “Literary Heritage” (published in 1965).

R. Rolland wrote, for example, about how, as a very young man, a student, he read Tolstoy’s novel: this “work, like life, has neither beginning nor end. It is life itself in its eternal movement.”

Realist artists of the 20th century especially appreciated the truth of military descriptions. E. Hemingway admitted that he learned from Tolstoy to write about the war “as truthfully, honestly, objectively and modestly as possible.” “I don’t know anyone who writes about war better than Tolstoy,” he asserted in the book “People at War.”

The high moral pathos of “War and Peace” excites writers of the 20th century, witnesses of new devastating wars, to a much greater extent than Tolstoy’s contemporaries. The German writer Leonard Frank in his book “The Good Man” called the creator of “War and Peace” the greatest fighter for those conditions of human existence under which a person can truly be kind. In Tolstoy's novel he saw a passionate participation in the suffering that the war brought to all people and, above all, to the Russian people.

From Tolstoy’s book the whole world studied and Russia is studying.

In 1887, the American John Forest wrote to Tolstoy: “Your characters for me are living, real people, just like you yourself, and form an equally integral part of Russian life. In recent years, you, Dostoevsky and Gogol have populated the space that was previously for me a deserted desert, marked only by geographical names. Arriving now in Russia, I would look for Natasha, Sonya, Anna, Pierre and Levin with more confidence that I would meet them than the Russian Tsar. And if they told me that they died, I would be very upset and say: “How? All?".

The artistic laws discovered by Tolstoy in War and Peace constitute an indisputable model to this day. The Dutch writer Toin de Vries put it this way: “The novel “War and Peace” always captivates me the most. He is unique."

In our age it is difficult to find a person, no matter what language he speaks, who does not know “War and Peace.” Artists look for inspiration in the book, transforming it into traditional (S. Prokofiev’s opera) and new, unknown in Tolstoy’s time, forms of art, such as cinema and television. To help the reader understand the poetic word more deeply, clearly, more subtly. Its strength and beauty are the main task and condition for their success. They make it possible to see with one’s own eyes that real life, the love for which Tolstoy dreamed of awakening with his book.

“War and Peace” is the result of Tolstoy’s moral and philosophical quest, his desire to find the truth and meaning of life. Every work of Tolstoy is himself, each contains a piece of his immortal soul: “All of me is in my writings.”

1 T. Motyleva. About the global significance of Tolstoy.

M., “Soviet Writer”, 1957, p. 520.

The diverse world of a work of art is not only difficult, but even impossible to “squeeze” into some specific framework, “sort out on the shelves,” explain the thread with the help of logical formulas, concepts, graphs or diagrams. The wealth of artistic content actively resists such analysis. But it is still possible to try to discover some kind of system, under the necessary condition, of course, that it will not contradict the author’s intention.

What was most important to Tolstoy when creating War and Peace? Let us open the beginning of the third part of the second volume: “Meanwhile, life, the real life of people with their essential interests of health, illness, work, rest, with their interests of thought, science, poetry, music, love, friendship, hatred, passions, proceeded, as always, independently and outside of political closeness or enmity with Napoleon Bonaparte, and outside of all possible transformations. As you can see, the most important thing for a writer is real life,

understood as a powerful and indomitable element, opposing any phenomena, events, established laws, if they do not coincide with the interests of simple, ordinary people. This is what the system of images in War and Peace is based on.

Tolstoy fundamentally does not accept any theoretical scholasticism that is disconnected from real, simple, normal life. Thus, it is said about General Pfuhl in the novel that, out of love for theory, he “hated all practice and did not want to know it.” It is for this reason that Prince Andrei does not like Speransky with his “unshakable faith in the power of the mind.” And even Sonya turns out to be a “dummy” in the end, because in her virtue there is an element of rationality and calculation. Any artificiality, role, which a person tries to play, willingly or unwillingly, programmedness (as we would say today) is rejected by Tolstoy and his beloved heroes. Natasha Rostova says about Dolokhov: “He has everything planned, but I don’t like it.”

An idea arises of two principles in life: war and peace, evil and good, death and life. And all the characters in one way or another gravitate toward one of these poles. Some choose the purpose of life right away and do not experience any hesitation - Kuragins, Berg. Others go through a long path of painful hesitation, mistakes, searches, but ultimately “nail” on one of two shores. It was not so easy, for example, for Boris Drubetsky to overcome himself, his normal human feelings, before he decided to propose to the rich Julie, whom he not only does not love, but, it seems, generally cannot stand. Material from the site

The system of images in the novel is based on a fairly clear and consistent antithesis (opposition) of nationality and anti-nationality (or pseudo-nationality), natural and artificial, human and inhuman, and finally, “Kutuzovsky” and “Napoleonic”.

Kutuzov and Napoleon form two unique moral poles in the novel, towards which various characters gravitate or are repelled. As for Tolstoy's favorite heroes, they are shown in the process of constant change, overcoming isolation and selfish one-sidedness. They are on the road, on the go, and this alone makes them dear and close to the author.

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Every book you read is another life lived, especially when the plot and characters are so well developed. “War and Peace” is a unique epic novel; there is nothing like it in either Russian or world literature. The events described in it take place in St. Petersburg, Moscow, foreign estates of nobles and in Austria over the course of 15 years. The characters are also striking in their scale.

"War and Peace" is a novel in which more than 600 characters are mentioned. Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy describes them so aptly that the few apt characteristics bestowed upon the cross-cutting characters are enough to form an idea about them. Therefore, “War and Peace” is a whole life in all the fullness of colors, sounds and sensations. It's worth living.

The birth of an idea and creative quest

In 1856, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy began writing a story about the life of the Decembrist who returned after exile. The time of action was supposed to be 1810-1820. Gradually, the period expanded until 1825. But by this time the main character had already matured and became a family man. And in order to better understand him, the author had to return to the period of his youth. And it coincided with a glorious era for Russia.

But Tolstoy could not write about the triumph over Bonaparte's France without mentioning failures and mistakes. Now the novel already consisted of three parts. The first (as conceived by the author) was supposed to describe the youth of the future Decembrist and his participation in the War of 1812. This is the first period of the hero's life. Tolstoy wanted to devote the second part to the Decembrist uprising. The third is the hero’s return from exile and his future life. However, Tolstoy quickly abandoned this idea: the work on the novel turned out to be too large-scale and painstaking.

Initially, Tolstoy limited the duration of his work to 1805-1812. The epilogue, dated 1920, appeared much later. But the author was concerned not only with the plot, but also with the characters. "War and Peace" is not a description of the life of one hero. The central figures are several characters at once. And the main character is the people, which is much larger than the thirty-year-old Decembrist Pyotr Ivanovich Labazov, who returned from exile.

Work on the novel took Tolstoy six years, from 1863 to 1869. And this does not take into account the six that went into developing the idea of ​​​​the Decembrist, which became its basis.

The system of characters in the novel "War and Peace"

The main character in Tolstoy is the people. But in his understanding, he represents not just a social category, but a creative force. According to Tolstoy, the people are all the best that is in the Russian nation. Moreover, this includes not only representatives of the lower classes, but also those of the nobles who have a desire to live for the sake of others.

Tolstoy contrasts representatives of the people with Napoleon, the Kuragins and other aristocrats - regulars at Anna Pavlovna Scherer's salon. These are the negative characters in the novel "War and Peace". Already in the description of their appearance, Tolstoy emphasizes the mechanical nature of their existence, lack of spirituality, “animality” of actions, lifelessness of smiles, selfishness and inability to compassion. They are incapable of change. Tolstoy does not see the possibility of their spiritual development, so they remain forever frozen, distant from the real understanding of life.

Researchers often distinguish two subgroups of “folk” characters:

• Those who are endowed with “simple consciousness”. They easily distinguish right from wrong, guided by the “mind of the heart.” This subgroup includes such characters as Natasha Rostova, Kutuzov, Platon Karataev, Alpatych, officers Timokhin and Tushin, soldiers and partisans.
• Those who are “looking for themselves.” Upbringing and class barriers prevent them from connecting with the people, but they manage to overcome them. This subgroup includes such characters as Pierre Bezukhov and Andrei Bolkonsky. It is these heroes who are shown capable of development and internal change. They are not without shortcomings, they make mistakes more than once in their life quests, but they pass all tests with dignity. Sometimes Natasha Rostova is included in this group. After all, she too was once carried away by Anatole, forgetting about her beloved Prince Bolkonsky. The War of 1812 becomes a kind of catharsis for this entire subgroup, which makes them look at life differently and discard the class conventions that previously prevented them from living according to the dictates of their hearts, as the people do.

The simplest classification

Sometimes the characters in War and Peace are divided according to an even simpler principle - their ability to live for the sake of others. Such a character system is also possible. “War and Peace,” like any other work, is the author’s vision. Therefore, everything in the novel happens in accordance with Lev Nikolaevich’s worldview. The people, in Tolstoy’s understanding, are the personification of all the best that is in the Russian nation. Characters such as the Kuragin family, Napoleon, and many regulars at the Scherer salon know how to live only for themselves.

Along Arkhangelsk and Baku

• “Life-wasters,” from Tolstoy’s point of view, are the furthest from the correct understanding of existence. This group lives only for themselves, selfishly neglecting those around them.
• "Leaders" This is what Arkhangelsky and Buck call those who think they control history. For example, the authors include Napoleon in this group.
• “Wise men” are those who understood the true world order and were able to trust providence.
• "Ordinary people". This group, according to Arkhangelsky and Buck, includes those who know how to listen to their hearts, but do not particularly strive for anything.
• “Truth Seekers” are Pierre Bezukhov and Andrei Bolkonsky. Throughout the novel, they painfully search for the truth, strive to understand what the meaning of life is.
• The authors of the textbook include Natasha Rostova in a separate group. They believe that she is simultaneously close to both “ordinary people” and “sages”. The girl easily comprehends life empirically and knows how to listen to the voice of her heart, but the most important thing for her is family and children, as it should be, according to Tolstoy, for an ideal woman.

You can consider many more classifications of the characters in War and Peace, but they all ultimately come down to the simplest one, which fully reflects the worldview of the author of the novel. After all, he saw true happiness in serving others. Therefore, positive (“folk”) heroes know how and want to do this, but negative ones do not.

L.N. Tolstoy “War and Peace”: female characters

Any work is a reflection of the author's vision of life. According to Tolstoy, the highest purpose of a woman is to care for her husband and children. It is the keeper of the hearth that the reader sees Natasha Rostova in the epilogue of the novel.

All positive female characters in War and Peace fulfill their highest purpose. The author also imparts happiness to motherhood and family life to Maria Bolkonskaya. Interestingly, she is perhaps the most positive hero of the novel. Princess Marya has practically no flaws. Despite her varied education, she still finds her purpose, as befits a Tolstoy heroine, in caring for her husband and children.

A completely different fate awaited Helen Kuragina and the little princess, who saw no joy in motherhood.

Pierre Bezukhov

This is Tolstoy's favorite character. "War and Peace" describes him as a man who by nature has a highly noble character, so he easily understands the people. All his mistakes are due to the aristocratic conventions instilled in him by his upbringing.

Throughout the novel, Pierre experiences many mental traumas, but does not become embittered or become less good-natured. He is loyal and responsive, often forgetting about himself in an effort to serve others. Having married Natasha Rostova, Pierre found that grace and true happiness that he so lacked in his first marriage to the completely false Helen Kuragina.

Lev Nikolaevich loves his hero very much. He describes in detail his formation and spiritual development from the very beginning to the end. The example of Pierre shows that the main thing for Tolstoy is responsiveness and devotion. The author rewards him with happiness with his favorite female heroine - Natasha Rostova.

From the epilogue one can understand Pierre's future. By changing himself, he strives to transform society. He does not accept the contemporary political foundations of Russia. It can be assumed that Pierre will participate in the Decembrist uprising, or at least actively support it.

Andrey Bolkonsky

The reader first meets this hero in the salon of Anna Pavlovna Scherer. He is married to Lisa - the little princess, as she is called, and will soon become a father. Andrei Bolkonsky behaves extremely arrogantly with all the regulars of Sherer. But the reader soon notices that this is only a mask. Bolkonsky understands that those around him cannot understand his spiritual quest. He talks to Pierre completely differently. But Bolkonsky at the beginning of the novel is not alien to the ambitious desire to achieve heights in the military field. It seems to him that he is above aristocratic conventions, but it turns out that his eyes are just as blinkered as those of others. Andrei Bolkonsky realized too late that he should have given up his feelings for Natasha in vain. But this insight comes to him only before his death.

Like other “searching” characters in Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace,” Bolkonsky spends his entire life trying to find the answer to the question of what is the meaning of human existence. But he understands the highest value of family too late.

Natasha Rostova

This is Tolstoy's favorite female character. However, the entire Rostov family seems to the author to be the ideal of nobles living in unity with the people. Natasha cannot be called beautiful, but she is lively and attractive. The girl has a good sense of people's moods and characters.

According to Tolstoy, internal beauty does not combine with external beauty. Natasha is attractive due to her character, but her main qualities are simplicity and closeness to the people. However, at the beginning of the novel she lives in her own illusion. Disappointment in Anatol makes her an adult and contributes to the heroine’s maturation. Natasha begins to attend church and ultimately finds happiness in family life with Pierre.

Marya Bolkonskaya

The prototype of this heroine was Lev Nikolaevich’s mother. It is not surprising that it is almost completely devoid of flaws. She, like Natasha, is ugly, but has a very rich inner world. Like other positive characters in the novel “War and Peace,” in the end she also becomes happy, becoming the keeper of the hearth in her own family.

Helen Kuragina

Tolstoy has a multifaceted characterization of his characters. War and Peace describes Helen as a cutesy woman with a fake smile. It immediately becomes clear to the reader that there is no internal filling behind external beauty. Marrying her becomes a test for Pierre and does not bring happiness.

Nikolay Rostov

The core of any novel is its characters. War and Peace describes Nikolai Rostov as a loving brother and son, as well as a true patriot. Lev Nikolaevich saw in this hero the prototype of his father. Having gone through the hardships of the war, Nikolai Rostov retires to pay off his family's debts and finds his true love in Marya Bolkonskaya.

The specificity of the system of images of the novel “War and Peace” is determined primarily by a single center (“popular thought”), in relation to which all the heroes of the novel are characterized. The group of characters who are part of the popular “world” (the nation) or in the process of life’s quest finds a way to connect with it includes the author’s “favorite” heroes - Andrei Bolkonsky, Pierre Bezukhov, Natasha Rostova, Princess Marya. They belong to the type of novel heroes, in contrast to epic ones, to which Kutuzov belongs among the characters of the “world”. Epic images have such qualities as staticity and monumentality, since they embody unchanging qualities.

Thus, in the image of Kutuzov the best qualities of the Russian national character are represented. These qualities can also be found in novel heroes, but they are changeable, are constantly in the process of searching for truth and their place in life and, having gone through the path of mistakes and misconceptions, come to the solution of their problems through unity with the entire nation - the “world”. Such heroes are also called “heroes of the path”; they are interesting and important for the author, because they embody the idea of ​​the need for spiritual development, finding a path to self-improvement for every person. In contrast, among the novel characters, “heroes off the path” stand out, who have stopped in their internal development and embody the author’s thought: “calmness is spiritual meanness” (Anatole and Helen Kuragin, Anna Pavlovna Scherer, Vera, Berg, Julie and others). All of them are part of a group of characters who are outside the nation, separated from the national “world” and cause extreme rejection by the author.

At the same time, the criterion for determining a character’s place in the system of images in relation to “popular thought” is his behavior during the Patriotic War of 1812. That is why among the “heroes of the path” there is also such a character as Boris Drubetskoy, who goes through his own path of quest, but, preoccupied with selfish interests, he does not change for the better, but degrades spiritually. If at first he is inspired by the poetry of the purely Russian Rostov family, then in his desire to make a career at all costs and marry profitably, he becomes close to the Kuragin family - he enters the circle of Helen, and then, giving up his love for Natasha, for the sake of money and position in society marries Julie. The final assessment of this character is given during the Battle of Borodino, when Drubetskoy, at the moment of the highest unity of the entire nation, is concerned only with his selfish selfish interests, calculating which outcome of the battle is more profitable for him from the point of view of his career.

On the other hand, among the “off-path heroes” is Nikolai Rostov, who is closely related to the author’s most beloved family, which embodies the best features of the national character. Of course, this also applies to Nikolai Rostov, but this image is interesting to the writer from a different point of view. Unlike exceptional, extraordinary natures like Prince Andrei and Pierre, Nikolai Rostov is a typical average person. He embodied what is inherent in most noble youth. Tolstoy convincingly shows that the main danger lurking in such a character is the lack of independence, independence of opinions and actions. It is not for nothing that Nikolai feels so comfortable in the conditions of army life; it is not by chance that he always has idols whom he imitates in everything: first Denisov, then Dolokhov. A person like Nikolai Rostov can show the wonderful traits of his nature - kindness, honesty, courage, true patriotism, sincere love for loved ones, but he can, as follows from the conversation between Nikolai and Pierre in the epilogue, turn out to be an obedient toy in the hands of those who he obeys.

In the artistic canvas of War and Peace, threads of “linkages” are stretched between different groups of characters. The unity of all layers of society in the face of the danger threatening the fatherland, the entire nation, is shown through figurative parallels connecting representatives of various groups of the nobility and people: Pierre Bezukhov - Platon Karataev, Princess Marya - “God's people”, old Prince Bolkonsky - Tikhon, Nikolai Rostov - Lavrushka, Kutuzov - Malasha and others. But the “linkages” are most clearly manifested in peculiar figurative parallels, correlated with the opposition of two main contrasting human types. The critic N.N. came up with a successful name for them. Strakhov - “predatory” and “meek” types of people. In its most complete, complete, “monumental” form, this opposition is presented in the images of the epic heroes of the work - Kutuzov and Napoleon. Denying the cult of Napoleon, portraying him as a “predatory type,” Tolstoy deliberately reduces his image and contrasts it with the image of Kutuzov, a truly people’s leader who embodies the spirit of the nation, the simplicity and naturalness of the people, its humanistic basis (“the humble type”). But not only in the monumental epic images of Napoleon and Kutuzov, but also in the individual human destinies of other - novel - heroes, the ideas of the “predatory” and “meek” type are refracted, which creates the unity of the image system - the novel and realizing the genre characteristics of the epic. At the same time, the characters vary, duplicating each other and, as it were, flowing into each other. So, for example, Dolokhov turns out to be a smaller version of Napoleon in the “novel” part, a man who managed to introduce war and aggression in peacetime. Traits of Napoleon can be found in other characters, such as Anatol Kuragin, Berg and even Helen. On the other hand, Petya Rostov, like Kutuzov, manages to maintain a peaceful home life during the war (for example, in the scene when he offers raisins to the partisans). Similar parallels can be continued. We can say that almost all the characters in War and Peace gravitate toward the images of Napoleon and Kutuzov, the “predatory” and “meek” types, thus divided into people of “war” and people of “peace.” So it turns out that “War and Peace” is an image of two universal states of human existence, the life of society. Napoleon, according to Tolstoy, embodies the essence of modern civilization, expressed in the cult of personal initiative and a strong personality. It is this cult that brings disunity and general hostility into modern life. In Tolstoy he is opposed by the principle embodied in the image of Kutuzov, a man who has renounced everything personal, does not pursue any personal goal and, because of this, is able to guess historical necessity and through his activities contributes to the course of history, while to Napoleon it only seems that he is in control. historical process. Tolstoy's Kutuzov personifies the beginning of the people, while the people represent a spiritual integrity, poeticized by the author of War and Peace. This integrity arises only on the basis of cultural traditions and legends. Their loss turns the people into an angry and aggressive crowd, the unity of which is based not on a common principle, but on an individualistic principle. Such a crowd is represented by the Napoleonic army marching on Russia, as well as the people who tore Vereshchagin to pieces, whom Rostopchin dooms to death.

But, of course, the manifestation of the “predatory” type applies to a greater extent to those heroes who stand outside the nation. They embody a non-national environment that introduces an atmosphere of hostility and hatred, lies and falsehood into the national “world”. This is where the novel begins. Anna Pavlovna Scherer's salon is similar to a spinning workshop with its orderly, mechanical rhythm established once and for all. Here everything is subordinated to the logic of decency and decency, but there is no place for natural human feeling. That is why Helen, who belongs to this society, despite her external beauty, is recognized by the author as the standard of false beauty.

After all, Helen’s inner essence is ugly: she is selfish, selfish, immoral and cruel, that is, she fully corresponds to the type that is defined as “predatory”.

From the very beginning, Tolstoy’s favorite heroes, Prince Andrei and Pierre, look alien in this environment. Both cannot fit into this externally ordered world where everyone plays their roles. Pierre is too natural, and therefore unpredictable, and the free and independent Andrei Bolkonsky, who despises this world, will not allow anyone to make himself a toy in the hands of other people.

In genre form, "War and Peace" is not a historical novel, but... a family chronicle. "War and Peace" - a chronicle of the life of several families: the Bolkonskys, the Rostovs, the Kuragins; the life of Pierre Bezukhov, an unremarkable ordinary nobleman. And this approach to history has its own very deep correctness. The historical event is interesting not only in itself. It is prepared by something, formed, some forces lead to its implementation

And then it lasts as long as it affects the history of the country, the destinies of people. The history of a country can be viewed and studied from various points of view - political, economic, scientific. Or you can study it differently: through the prism of the ordinary destinies of the country’s citizens who shared a common share with their people. It is precisely this approach to the study of history that Tolstoy chooses in War and Peace.

“History..,” Tolstoy said in his youth, “is nothing more than a collection of fables and useless trifles, interspersed with a mass of unnecessary numbers and proper names...

Tolstoy puts forward his concept: HISTORY-SCIENCE, operating with a set of “facts”, he contrasts HISTORY-ART, based on the philosophical study of the laws of history by means of artistic creativity. “History-art, like any * art, goes not in breadth, but in depth, and the subject it could be a description of the life of all of Europe and a description of a month in the life of one man in the 16th century,” is how Tolstoy formulates his concept.

Tolstoy comprehended, brought together and in a rare fusion embodied in “War and Peace” the entire desire of Russian culture (Pushkin’s works. Gogol’s “Taras Bulba”) for “poetic insight” into history. He established the principles of art history as the main path of development of Russian historical literature. They are still relevant today.

For Tolstoy, everyday life, private life and historical life are one; these spheres are internally connected and interdependent. How a person behaves on the battlefield, at a diplomatic meeting, or at any other historical moment is determined by the same laws as his behavior in private life. And the true value of a person, in Tolstoy’s perception, depends not only on his real merits, but also on his self-esteem.

The heroes of "War and Peace" are divided into two types: "heroes of the path", that is, heroes with history, with development, interesting and important for the author in their spiritual movement, and "heroes off the path", - those who have stopped in their internal development. This rather simple, at first glance, scheme is very complicated by Tolstoy. Among the heroes without development are not only the symbol of inner emptiness Anatol Kuragin, Helen and Anna Pavlovna Scherer, but also Kutuzov and Platon Karataev. And in the movement, in the spiritual development of the heroes, the author explores the eternal search for self-improvement, marking the path of Pierre, Prince Andrei, Princess Marya, Natasha, and the spiritual regression of Nikolai Rostov or Boris Drubetsky.

Let's try to analyze the system of images of "War and Peace". It turns out to be very clear and subject to deep internal logic. The two “out of the way” heroes turn out to be not only characters in the novel, but also symbols that determine the direction of the spiritual movement and gravity of the other heroes. These are Kutuzov and Napoleon.

Kutuzova is the bright pole of the novel. The image of a people's commander for Tolstoy is ideal in all respects, so Kutuzov seems to have nowhere to develop: his spiritual task is to constantly live at this highest point of his development, not to allow himself a single selfish step.

The image of Napoleon is the dark pole of the novel. Cold selfishness, lies, narcissism, readiness to sacrifice other people's lives in order to achieve his low goals, without even counting them - these are the traits of this hero. He, too, is deprived of the path, for his image is the limit of spiritual degradation. The entire devilish “Napoleonic idea” that has occupied Russian society since 1805 is concentrated, comprehensively analyzed and branded by Tolstoy in the image of Napoleon.

And the spiritual path of the heroes of “War and Peace” can be directed “to Kutuzov,” that is, to the comprehension of the highest truth, the people’s idea of ​​​​the development of history, to self-improvement through self-denial, or “to Napoleon” - down an inclined plane: the path of those who afraid of constant intense spiritual work. And the spiritual path of Tolstoy’s favorite heroes goes through overcoming “Napoleonic” traits and ideas in themselves, and the path of others goes through their acceptance and familiarization with them. That is why all the heroes without development, who have stopped, who have chosen the easy path of refusing spiritual work, are united by “Napoleonic traits” and form their own special world in Russian society - the world of the secular mob, strengthening the “Napoleonic pole” of the novel. And the heroes who gravitate towards Napoleon, endowed with “Napoleonic” traits, turn out to be in the novel, as it were, “people of war”, objectively contributing to the outbreak of wars. Perceiving war as something not just difficult and terrible, but as an unnatural event, provoked by the basest thoughts and desires, Tolstoy shows how these thoughts and desires manifest themselves, how this psychology of war develops in people far from the battlefields - in the Kuragins, in maid of honor Scherer, in Vera Rostova...

In the image of the military man Kutuzov, Tolstoy embodies the very idea of ​​peace - the rejection of war, the desire to defeat not only the French army, but also the anti-human idea of ​​conquest itself.

Standing apart in the figurative system of the novel is another hero without development - Platon Karataev. We will talk about him and his role in “War and Peace” separately.

"Napoleonic idea" and the image of Napoleon. Philosophy of war in the novel.

For the author of "War and Peace" it is equivalent to the very "idea of ​​war", war in the philosophical understanding. Let's try to analyze the image of the man created by Tolstoy, who gave the name to the central idea of ​​the era and the novel - the image of Napoleon.

This literary character has very little in common with the real prototype. It is unlikely that the real Bonaparte was indifferent to his son, it is unlikely that he so naively dreamed of capturing Moscow, as Tolstoy portrays... Based on the mass of memoirs, notes, testimonies, based on the analysis of all the facts of his life, we can confidently say that Napoleon was in many ways different from what the author of War and Peace saw it as. But this doesn’t matter to Tolstoy. A historical writer, in this case he does not strive for historical accuracy. Tolstoy sets himself a fundamentally different task: he constructs the image of a conqueror, an enslaver - as if an impersonal, generalized historical personification of the “Napoleonic idea” itself.

Napoleon occupied the minds of his contemporaries by the fact that, relying only on his own strength and luck, he made a dizzying career. “The bad soldier is the one who does not strive to become a marshal,” he formulates. His path to the marshal's baton, to the title of first consul, to the royal crown, and then to the crown of "lord of half the world" is strewn with corpses. He inspires an invincible dream of glory, power, and might. And - unscrupulousness in means, the terrible principle of “winners are not judged.”

From the political sphere, the “Napoleonic idea” easily penetrates into all other spheres of life. In essence, there is nothing new in this idea. The fate of Napoleon only intensified certain processes in the social life of mankind. She awakened dormant low instincts in people. Public admiration for the “Hero” and the romantic halo over his head led to a shift in the boundaries of what was permitted. Russia, which thirsted for political, economic and social changes, was especially susceptible to the influence of the “Napoleonic idea.”

In "War and Peace" this idea is considered in two guises. Under her own name, she exists in the political and social sphere. In the sphere of private, personal life, it is, as it were, disguised - and therefore its hidden action is especially terrible.

Dreaming of glory, Prince Andrei sees himself repeating the feat of Napoleon, while in his personal life he displays “Napoleonic” traits - he leaves his wife at the most important moment, before the birth of a child, sacrifices his family for the sake of his dreamed glory - he does not realize the “Napoleonic” nature of his motives. And revealing this is Tolstoy’s most important task. That is why, sacrificing historical accuracy, the writer paints Bonaparte as a soulless monster. It requires a psychological equivalent of the “Napoleonic idea.” And in the image of Napoleon the idea itself takes on flesh and blood. Only by understanding and realizing the complete, absolute inhumanity of Napoleon can one overcome the Napoleonic traits in oneself.

For Tolstoy, it is fundamentally important that his Napoleon is a person completely captured by the “Napoleonic idea”, under the pressure of this idea he has lost his mind and will: “If Napoleon had now forbidden them to fight with the Russians, they would have killed him and gone to fight with the Russians, because they needed it..." Tolstoy proves that the "Napoleonic idea" is stronger than Napoleon, that a person enslaved by it becomes its absolute captive and hostage - there is no way back for him. Napoleon's guilt before history is enormous and irredeemable: having instilled his bloody idea in those around him, he causes terrible events with unpredictable, tragic consequences. This is exactly so, because his idea violates all moral laws, offering only one instead of ancient human commandments: “winners are not judged.”

Tolstoy sees the roots of modern nihilism precisely in the “Napoleonic idea.” Here we should pay special attention to the fact that even people who saw the terrible face of nihilism emerging in Russia before their contemporaries succumbed to the hypnosis of the “Napoleonic idea” and romanticized the image of Napoleon. Pushkin was fascinated by this powerful personality, Napoleon was the idol of young Lermontov... Each of them went through the path of re-awareness of Napoleon and his ideas.

Debunking the romantic image, Tolstoy shows his Napoleon in two projections. At first we see him through the eyes of Prince Andrei and Pierre*, captivated by Bonaparte, striving to imitate him. Before us is a living monument: “under a hat with a cloudy brow, with hands clenched in a cross,” majestic and great. We see the insane delight of the troops who saw their idol: “The troops knew about the presence of the emperor, looked for him with their eyes, and when they found a figure in a frock coat and hat separated from his retinue on the mountain in front of the tent, they threw their hats up and shouted: “Vive l” Empereur ..." On all the faces of these people there was one common expression of joy at the beginning of the long-awaited campaign and delight and devotion to the man in a gray frock coat standing on the mountain."

He appears not as a person, but precisely as the embodiment of an idea. And therefore the faces of the people greeting him also disappear: their personalities are leveled by the “idea”, everyone wears the same mask, “one common expression.” This is how Tolstoy shows the influence of Napoleon on the masses, this is the portrait of those “seized by the Napoleonic idea” - both the soldiers and Bonaparte himself. This view of the psychology of the crowd is closely related to Tolstoy’s view of the personality psychology of Napoleon. “It is not new for him to believe that his presence at all ends of the world, from Africa to the steppes of Muscovy, equally amazes and plunges people into the madness of self-forgetfulness... About forty lancers drowned in the river... Most washed back to this shore. .. But as soon as they got out... they shouted: “Vivat!”, looking enthusiastically at the place where Napoleon stood, but where he was no longer there, and at that moment they considered themselves happy. Napoleon allowed himself to get used to the idea that he is almost a deity, that he can and must decide the destinies of other people, doom them to death, make them happy or unhappy... Tolstoy knows: such an understanding of power always leads to crime, Tolstoy always finds a brilliantly precise formulation: presence. Napoleon “plunges people into the madness of self-forgetfulness.” That is, he directly says that the “Napoleonic idea” displaces personality and is incompatible with personality; to accept this idea, “the madness of self-forgetfulness” is necessary. Tolstoy reconstructs history as a continuous struggle of the “Napoleonic idea” with. "idea of ​​peace". The novel is not only about Russia and Russian history. The author looks at the struggle between the ideas of good and evil, the ideas of peace and war, in Gogol’s words, “through the eyes of his national element.”

It is precisely the positions that Tolstoy analyzes the War of 1812. The image of Napoleon he created, according to his plan, was supposed to approach not the reflection of the personality of a real person, but the type of conqueror that was created by Russian military stories and reflects the ethical assessment of the Russian people. In the people's system of moral values, a conqueror is disgusting only because he encroaches on someone else's freedom. “An invading enemy, an invader, cannot be kind and modest. Therefore, the ancient Russian historian does not need to have accurate information about Batu, Birger, Torcal Knutson, Magnus, Mamai, Tokhtamysh, Tamerlane, Edigei, Stefan Batory, or about any other who broke into Russian land of the enemy: he, naturally, by virtue of this act alone, will be proud, self-confident, arrogant, and will utter loud and empty phrases. The image of the invading enemy is determined only by his act - his invasion.

The image of Kutuzov is contrasted with Napoleon. What prevented Tolstoy from “transforming” Alexander I? First of all, of course, is that Alexander led the foreign campaign of Russian troops in 1813 - 1814. Although this campaign was a liberation campaign, the Russian army marched through foreign lands and conquered foreign cities. There was no righteousness for Tolstoy in such a victorious procession. And he emphasizes his negative attitude towards the campaign of 1813-1814 by the fact that he does not mention a word about it in the novel, where the war with the French is chosen as the central event. Is Kutuzov as “fitted” into the popular type of warrior-liberator as Napoleon is into the image of an invader?

And Kutuzov was chosen by Tolstoy as the embodiment of the national hero-liberator, primarily because under his leadership the enemy was defeated. The Fatherland was saved, but not a single Russian soldier set foot on foreign soil. Kutuzov's death occurs when the hero has completed his mission to the end and can leave the earth. The voice of the narrator sounds sublimely and dispassionately: “The representative of the people’s war had no choice but death. And he died.”

The novel depicts two wars: 1805 and 1812. And the role of the first war is to contrast with the Patriotic War in everything: in goals, in tasks, in meaning and significance. The war of 1805, which was not needed by the people and was not supported by them, is full of false patriotism, and therefore based on the “Napoleonic idea.” It is full of manifestations of false heroism: when exploits are performed in the name of the exploits themselves. That is why it ends in a shameful defeat for Russia. In the Patriotic War, the people defend their land, and therefore in it and only in it are true patriotism and true heroism possible.

Tolstoy's true heroes are as close to the heroes of Russian fairy tales and chronicles, just as Napoleon, his minions and followers are close to the images of anti-heroes and conquerors. And here Tolstoy is guided by the main, central postulate of folk morality: God is not in power, but in truth. Likhachev writes about this most important idea of ​​Tolstoy’s philosophy of history: “...for victory, only moral righteousness is needed. It lies at the basis of the chronicle philosophy of history and at the basis of the historical views of epics. The winner is always the inconspicuous Ivanushka the Fool.” "In Russian history, the weak old man Kutuzov wins; the inconspicuous and inconspicuous Tushin, Konovitsyn, Dokhturov win."

They don't show off and don't attract attention. Moreover, it is no coincidence that Kutuzov is indifferent to issues of fortification and other subtleties of military science. But he is the one who never makes mistakes. “The source of this extraordinary power of insight into the meaning of occurring phenomena lay in the folk feeling that he carried within himself in all its purity and strength,” explains D.S. Likhachev. This “folk feeling” of Kutuzov is his loyalty to popular morality, allowing this commander to wage war and win, guided only by the aspirations of the will of the Russian people, who want to liberate their land from invaders. That is why Kutuzov gives the decisive battle, according to Tolstoy, wherever necessary: ​​what is important is not the location of Borodin’s chosen field, but the fact that precisely at this moment the entire Russian army is united by a common impulse for victory, for freedom.