M.Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri": description, characters, analysis of the poem. Essay “Characteristics of the main character Mtsyri Character traits of Mtsyri key episodes quotes

Mtsyri is the hero of the poem by M. Yu. Lermontov. This is a young guy who was captured as a child, and then ended up in a monastery, where he was baptized.

The young man was lonely and silent, he lived in longing for his native land. Life in the monastery was a burden to him; he compared the monastery to a prison. The guy dreamed of being free and one night when there was a thunderstorm, he escaped.

For three days he wandered in search of his father's house. Mtsyri made his way through mountains and forests, suffered hunger, wild animals did not frighten him, he fought with a leopard. Mtsyri was not afraid, he longed for freedom.

The guy enjoyed nature, he felt that he was truly living and not existing. The singing of birds, fresh air, and the extraordinary beauty of nature captivated him.

Mtsyri is not afraid of death, he was ready to fight in order to live in freedom. But, unfortunately, the guy’s dreams of his native land and home were not destined to come true. The exhausted guy was found and returned to the monastery.

The young man fell ill, his end was near, he confessed. In his confession, he said that during these three days, despite the trials and suffering that he had to go through, he felt like a happy person. During these days, he understood what the meaning of life was. He does not regret escaping; he was ready to live in troubles and battles, but not in captivity. In the monastery he was suffocating; he needed freedom.

The young man asks to be taken to a blooming garden, from where the expanses of his homeland can be seen. In the last minutes of his life, he wishes to once again enjoy the splendor of nature and breathe the air of free life.

Mtsyri was never lucky enough to reach his native Caucasus. But he showed himself to be a freedom-loving person. Reading the poem, you feel with all your soul the sad fate of the hero, full of homesickness. His fearlessness and tenacity with which he tried to achieve his goal and gain freedom is worthy of respect.

Image of Mtsyri

Before you begin to analyze the image of the main character of the poem, it is worth paying attention to his name. The word “mtsyri” in the Georgian language has two meanings: the first is “novice”, the second is “stranger”, “stranger”. Both of them are undoubtedly important for understanding the hero: without family and shelter, as a child Mtsyri found himself far from his homeland and was raised in a monastery. That is, we initially see this deep internal split: the boy, in whose veins hot Caucasian blood and a craving for roots boiled, was forced to come to terms with the reclusive life of a novice far from home.

Mtsyri is an ideal romantic hero, whom the author treats with obvious sympathy. He is sharply opposed to the reality that surrounds him. However, the narration is told in third person only at the very beginning, while most of the poem is Mtsyri’s confession, full of his genuine experiences. He is hot and emotional, his gaze is enthusiastic, his soul is sensitive - he longs for life. Nature fascinates the hero with its beauty, but he, so drawn to the wonders of this world, is fenced off from it by cold monastery walls. This imprisonment for Mtsyri is akin to a slow and painful death - that’s why he escapes. And this is what the monk then hears in his confession:

You want to know what I did
Free? Lived - and my life
Without these three blissful days
It would be sadder and gloomier
Your powerless old age.

These words alone are enough to understand that Mtsyri was ready to give anything for this breath of freedom. This free moment alone with the enchanting wild world was the only truly important milestone in the hero’s fate, which dragged on like a dream.

In his dying delirium, he sees a goldfish, promising peace if he stays with it. But is this what Lermontov’s hero was looking for when leaving the walls of his prison? Both religious obedience and serene tranquility are alien to him. Mtsyri is attracted by his roots: images of people whom he never knew, but who could become a family for him, and his native lands, one glance at which would make his heart beat faster and more restlessly. Alas, the hero is not destined to reach the Caucasus, but the days spent in freedom transform his world.

Mtsyri realizes that the meaning of his life is not in a quiet pious existence, but in struggle. And he fights: with his own prison, with monks who do not want to understand that he will never become one of them, and, finally, with wild nature in the person of the leopard. He fights for himself, and, despite the tragic outcome, we understand that his spirit is firm and strong, which means that the hero is not defeated or broken. Mtsyri is free and bright internally, and this is sometimes much more difficult than breaking the physical shackles of bondage.

Option 3

In Lermontov's poem, the main character of the work was a boy from a Caucasian family. His fate was very difficult. Since childhood, he was captured by a Russian general. And since then he has never seen his home again. His life was very tragic and sad. She prepared many difficult trials for him.

The boy was courageous from childhood and did not complain to anyone about anything. He was a brave hero. While in captivity, the boy became seriously ill and one monk tried to cure him. And the general abandoned the boy in the monastery. The monk was still able to cure him, and the boy was nicknamed Mtsyri.

Now Mtsyri was captured by the monastery. Mtsyri has already begun to forget his native land and customs. But once Mtsyri swore to himself that someday he would return to his homeland, and this did not give him peace.
Mtsyri was timid, but very strong and resilient. In the monastery he was unable to make friends and had almost no contact with anyone. He only vaguely remembered his native land. He wanted to see his father and sisters again.

And somehow, one day at the monastery, the boy decides to run away from there. Just that day there was a strong thunderstorm, but he did not take cover from it like others, but ran in the other direction, he ran towards his house. He was guided by instinct and therefore decided to run away. He didn’t believe in his success, everything just happened somehow, of course. Lermontov admired his character, his courage to go to his freedom by any means. After all, Mtsyri strived for his dream, no matter what the circumstances.

Mtsyri was glad of freedom, because he did not betray his childhood oath. He merged with nature all this time. He enjoyed its beauty and the singing of birds. Nothing could stop him anymore. He was a very brave young man and even fought with a leopard. The young man, despite his wounds, continued on his way. He was a true fighter with a pure soul and heart. He would have a strong character, he would be ready to fight for his freedom. The man was strong in spirit.

But still, his fate decided that after three days he was still forced to go to the same monastery. But he was already all wounded and exhausted.

Before his death, he admits that he did not regret this escape and his action at all, that he truly lived only for these three days. And he asked to be moved to the garden, since nature was very important to him. The beauty of the natural world makes a very strong and pleasant impression on Mtsyri.

The prisoner dies not from his wounds, but from the fact that he was again in the monastery, from despair.

Mtsyri's essay main character (characterization)

"Once upon a time a Russian general
I drove from the mountains to Tiflis;
He was carrying a prisoner child"

These lines are the beginning of the famous story of Mtsyri. It talks about a highlander, who essentially can be considered an example of freedom and rebellion. In a few lines, the author described the childhood and youth of the main character. Mtsyri was captured and taken to Russia, but on the way he fell ill. A certain monarch decided to shelter him; he cared for the sick man and raised him. Despite a serious illness and serious trials in life, this strengthened a powerful spirit in the child. The boy grew up alone, he did not communicate with his peers, was not interested in them and did not trust his experiences to anyone. From the very childhood of the hero, two main characteristics can be distinguished: a strong spirit and a weak body. After all, he is very weak, thin and flexible, but this did not prevent him from enduring suffering.

Reading the work, we see that Lermontov shows Mtsyri as a rebel hero who decides to rebel against society. The released Mtsyri is now free and now he needs to get used to his new life. Absolutely everything attracts his attention; he watches with curiosity the trees, dew on the leaves, and even ordinary shadows. Describing these scenes, Lermontov shows the true soul of Mtsyri, he cannot be considered only a wild highlander, because inside him there is a philosopher and poet, and all this manifests itself as the hero feels freedom.

The feeling of love is also not alien to Mtsyri. He remembers his father and sisters with grief; for him these people were the most precious and holy. The guy didn’t miss his meeting with a beautiful girl; when he saw her, he couldn’t stop thinking for a long time. Her image appeared to Mtsyri even in a dream. Of course, we can assume that if it weren’t for the young man’s specific goal, his love could have developed quite well, he could have loved for a long time and been happy. Heading towards his homeland, Mtsyri follows to the Caucasus. Therefore, falling in love became a kind of test for him, through which he went through for the sake of his dream.

Freedom for the protagonist lasted three days, after which he was wounded and had to return to the monastery. But these three days still changed a lot in him, so only Mtsyri’s body returned to the monastery, and his soul was free from captivity. Characterizing Mtsyri, one can highlight the versatility of the hero; the author combined in him unique features that, to some extent, make one see a contradictory hero.

Characteristics of the main character of the poem Mtsyri for 8th grade. On literature. Character traits.

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It was not for nothing that the critic Belinsky called the poem “Mtsyri” Lermontov’s favorite brainchild, emphasizing that in it the great poet reflected his cherished dreams and ideals. The poem is autobiographical in nature and contains subtle hints about the personality and fate of the poet himself.

Yes, the author and his hero are spiritually close to each other. The characteristics of Mtsyri and the story of his life allow us to notice direct analogies. Like Lermontov, Mtsyri is a bright, extraordinary nature, ready to challenge the whole world and rush into battle in the name of freedom and for the sake of finding a homeland. A quiet, measured life within the monastery walls, endless fasting and prayer, complete humility and refusal of any resistance is not for a young novice. In the same way, Lermontov refused the tame court poet, a sugary regular at balls and high-society drawing rooms. Mikhail Yuryevich hated the country of slaves and masters to the same extent as his Mtsyri stuffy cell and the entire way of monastic life. And both of them - the author and the fruit of his creation - were endlessly lonely, deprived of the happiness of being understood, of being close to a close, dear, beloved soul. The joy of true friendship, the sweetness of true, devoted, mutual love, the opportunity to live where the heart yearns - all this passed them by, poisoning the soul with the bitterness of disappointment and the pain of unfulfilled hopes.

Romantic features of the poem

The hero of the poem is a vivid embodiment of Lermontov’s romantic worldview. In light of this, the characterization of Mtsyri, as well as the entire work, reflects the main features of this place of action in a romantic work - exotic countries, far from the shackles of civilization and its corrupting influence. For Lermontov, this is the Caucasus, which in his work became a symbol of freedom. The life and customs of the mountain people, sometimes wild, incomprehensible to the European consciousness, their tribal pride and belligerence, a heightened sense of honor and dignity, the power and pristine beauty of the mountains and all of the Caucasian nature captivated the poet in early childhood and won his heart for the rest of his life. And by a fateful play of chance, it was the Caucasus that became Mikhail Yuryevich’s second home, the place of his endless exiles and an inexhaustible source of creativity. So in the poem the whole plot takes place in Georgia, near the monastery that stood at the confluence of the Aragva and Kura.

Mtsyri's characterization includes the motif of rejection, misunderstanding on the one hand and pride, disobedience, challenge, struggle on the other, which is also typical of romantic works. The main character of the poem considers the years spent in the monastery to be lost, lost, erased from life. Confessing to an old monk who once nursed him, an exhausted child, saved him from physical death, but condemned him to spiritual death, for he was unable to become either a father or a friend to him, and so, telling about what he saw and did in freedom during escape, Mtsyri noted: he would not regret three lives in the monastery for the sake of one, filled with action, movement, struggle and freedom.

The monks will never understand the young man. They spend their lives humbly bowing their heads in prayer and trust in the Lord. The hero relies on himself, on his strengths and capabilities. An indicative characteristic of Mtsyri is that he escapes from his prison during a terrible thunderstorm, and the rampant nature of the elements pleases him, for him the storm is his sister, while the monks pray in horror for salvation. And the fight with the leopard, taken by Lermontov from mountain legends (also an element of romanticism - a connection with folklore) and Rustaveli’s “The Knight in the Skin of a Tiger” and so brilliantly rethought and reworked, fits surprisingly organically into the content of the work and helps to reveal the best personality traits of the young man. Here there is courage, and amazing courage, self-control, faith in one’s strengths and capabilities and testing them for strength, a complete fusion of a proud, rebellious spirit with the same rebellious nature. Without the episode “Fight with the Leopard,” the characterization of the hero Mtsyri would be incomplete, and his image itself would not be fully revealed.

What else, besides freedom, does a young man dream of? First of all, find your family, hug your relatives, find yourself under the roof of your father’s house. He dreams of his father and brothers, and recalls echoes of the lullaby that his mother once sang. In his dreams, he sees smoke over his native village, hears the guttural speech of his people. In essence, this is what constitutes the foundation, the spiritual core of every person: family, home, native language and native land. Take away one thing and a person will feel orphaned. And Mtsyri was deprived of everything - and right away! But it is important for Lermontov that he saved his memories, kept them within himself as his most precious and intimate. Like Lermontov himself, he cherished and cherished in the depths of his heart the image of people’s Russia with its boundless forests, rivers like seas and birches whitening on a hillock.

Hero and time

His poems make it clear: it was no coincidence that the author gave Mtsyri only three days of a bright, eventful, full-blooded life. The time had not yet come for rebels of this kind, just as the poet himself was far ahead of his era. Society, being in spiritual despondency after the defeat of the Decembrists and the death of Pushkin, could not rise to fight during the rampant reaction. And rare loners like Mtsyri were doomed to death. After all, the hero of the time, the portrait of a whole generation of Lermontov’s contemporaries, was not the mountain youth, but Pechorin, Grushnitsky, Doctor Werner - “superfluous people”, disappointed in life or playing at such.

And yet, it was Mtsyri who became the embodiment of the poet’s romantic ideals, a symbol of a bright, purposeful personality who is ready to burn in an instant, but brightly, and not to smolder as a worthless firebrand for many years.

Work:

Translated from Georgian - novice. This is the hero of the poem of the same name. The Caucasian youth ended up with the Russians. During the journey, he fell ill and was left in the monastery for treatment. M. dreams of finding freedom, escaping from the monastery, where he feels enslaved. The entire work is structured as a confession-monologue of a young man. Before his death, he tells the old monk about the three happy days he spent in freedom. M. is close to nature as the kingdom of natural existence, freedom and beauty. Nature in the poem is full of animation, huge and mysterious life. M. is surrounded by the voices, whispers and thoughts of nature, and he knows how to understand them. M. failed to achieve his ideal fatherland and even find the way to it. But the days spent by the young man outside the monastery walls, in freedom, in search of this road, are given as the focus of all the possibilities of life - its joys, dangers, struggles. He was excited by a young Georgian woman he met on the way, and he defeated the leopard. However, after three days spent in freedom, M. again ends up in the monastery. His desire for freedom does not fade, and for him there is only one way out - to die.

The author interprets the image of the main character of the romantic poem in an unusual way. Mtsyri is devoid of external signs of exclusivity; this is a weak young man. There is no aura of mystery and mystery, titanic individualistic traits characteristic of a romantic hero. The hero’s confession itself helps him convey the slightest emotional movement as accurately as possible. He not only talks about his actions and actions, but also motivates them. Mtsyri wants to be understood and heard. Talking about his motives, intentions, desires, successes and failures, he is equally honest and sincere with himself. Mtsyri confesses not in order to ease his soul or remove the sin for his escape, but in order to relive three blissful days of life in freedom:

You want to know what I did

Free? Lived - and my life

Without these three blissful days

It would be sadder and gloomier

Your powerless old age.

But romantic poems are characterized by the presence of an exceptional, contradictory personality, whose attitude to the world around him is ambiguous. The exclusivity and strength of Mtsyri are expressed in the goals that he sets for himself:

A long time ago I thought

Look at the distant fields

Find out if the earth is beautiful

Find out for freedom or prison

We are born into this world.

From childhood, after being captured. Mtsyri could not come to terms with captivity, life among strangers. He yearns for his native village, for communication with people close to him in customs and spirit, he strives to get to his homeland, where, in his opinion, “people are free like eagles” and where happiness and freedom await him:

I lived little, and lived in captivity.

Such two lives in one,

But only full of anxiety,

I would trade it if I could.

I knew only the power of thoughts,

One but fiery passion...

Mtsyri does not flee from his own environment to someone else’s in the hope of finding freedom and peace, but breaks with the alien world of the monastery - a symbol of an unfree life - in order to reach the land of his fathers. For Mtsyri, the homeland is a symbol of absolute freedom; he is ready to give everything for a few minutes of life in his homeland. Returning to his homeland is one of his goals, along with learning about the world.

Challenging fate itself, Mtsyri leaves the monastery on a terrible night when a storm breaks out, but this does not frighten him. He seems to identify himself with nature:

“Oh, as a brother, I would be glad to embrace the storm.”

During the “three blissful days” that Mtsyri spent in freedom, all the richness of his nature was revealed: love of freedom, thirst for life and struggle, perseverance in achieving his goal, unbending willpower, courage, contempt for danger, love for nature, understanding of its beauty and power:

Oh I'm like a brother

I would be glad to embrace the storm!

I watched with the eyes of a cloud,

I caught lightning with my hand...

The exceptional personality traits of the hero of romantic poems help to reveal the presence of a love plot in these poems. But Lermontov excludes this motive from the poem, since love could become an obstacle for the hero on the path to achieving his goal. Having met a young Georgian woman by the stream, Mtsyri is fascinated by her singing. He could follow her and connect with people. Finding himself in a very important situation for the romantic hero - in a situation of choice, Mtsyri does not change his goal: he wants to go to his homeland and, perhaps, find his father and mother. Having given up love, the hero chose freedom over it.

And Mtsyri had to pass one more test - a fight with a leopard. He emerges victorious in this fight, but he is no longer destined to return to his homeland. He dies in a foreign country, among strangers. Mtsyri was defeated in a dispute with fate, but the three days he lived in freedom personify his life if it had taken place in his homeland. The hero of Lermontov's poem finds the strength to admit his defeat and die, without cursing anyone and realizing that the reason for the failure lies within himself. Mtsyri dies, reconciling with the people around him, but freedom remains above all else for him. Before his death, he asks to be moved to the garden:

The glow of a blue day

I'll get drunk for the last time.

The Caucasus is visible from there!

Perhaps he is from his heights

He will send me farewell greetings,

Will send with a cool breeze...

For the hero, the monastery is a symbol of bondage, a prison with gloomy walls and “stuffy cells.” To remain in the monastery meant for him to forever abandon his homeland and freedom, and to be doomed to eternal slavery and loneliness. The author does not reveal the boy’s character, but gives only a few strokes of his behavior, and the personality of the captive highlander emerges clearly.
Mtsyri (translated from Georgian) is a non-serving monk, an alien, a foreigner, a stranger. Mtsyri is a person who lives not according to the far-fetched laws of the state, which suppress human freedom, but according to the natural laws of nature, which allow the individual to open up and realize his aspirations. But the hero is forced to live in captivity, within the walls of a monastery alien to him. Mtsyri’s idea of ​​freedom is connected with the dream of returning to his homeland. To be free means for him to escape from monastic captivity and return to his native village. The image of an unknown, but desired “wonderful world of anxiety and battles” constantly lived in his soul. Mtsyri’s personality, his character is revealed in what pictures attract the hero and how he talks about them. He is struck by the richness and brightness of nature, sharply contrasting with the monotony of monastic existence. And in the close attention with which the hero looks at the world around him, his love for life, desire for everything beautiful in it, sympathy for all living things is felt. In freedom, it revealed itself with renewed vigor. Mtsyri’s love for his homeland, which for the young man merged with the desire for freedom. In freedom, he experienced the “bliss of freedom” and became stronger in his thirst for earthly happiness. After living for three days outside the walls of the monastery, Mtsyri realized that he was brave and fearless. Mtsyri’s “fiery passion” - love for his homeland - makes him purposeful and firm.
Living in freedom for the main character means being in constant search, anxiety, fighting and winning, and most importantly - experiencing the bliss of “holy freedom” - in these experiences the fiery character of Mtsyri is very clearly revealed. Only real life tests a person and shows what he is capable of. Mtsyri saw nature in its diversity, felt its life, experienced the joy of communicating with it. Yes, the world is beautiful! - this is the meaning of Mtsyri’s story about what he saw. His monologue is a hymn to this world. And the fact that the world is beautiful, full of colors and sounds, full of joy, gives the hero the answer to the second question: why was man created, why does he live? Man is born for freedom, and not for prison. The origins of Mtsyri's tragedy are in the conditions that surrounded the hero from childhood. The circumstances in which he found himself left their mark on him, making him a “prison flower,” and determined the death of the hero. Such a defeat is at the same time a victory: life doomed Mtsyri to eternal slavery, humility, loneliness, but he managed to know freedom, experience the happiness of struggle and the joy of merging with the world. Therefore, his death, despite all the tragedy, makes us proud of Mtsyri and hatred of the conditions that deprive him of happiness.