Lecture, abstract. Analysis of the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. - concept and types. Classification, essence and features.

Fairy tale "The Wise Minnow"

Many fairy tales by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin are dedicated to exposing philistinism. One of the most poignant is “The Wise Minnow.” The fairy tale appeared in 1883 and over the past hundred years has become one of the most famous, a textbook tale of a satirist.

At the center of the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” is the fate of a cowardly man in the street, a man lacking a social outlook and with bourgeois demands. The image of a small, helpless and cowardly fish perfectly characterizes this trembling man in the street. In the work the writer puts important philosophical problems: what is the meaning of life and the purpose of man.

Saltykov-Shchedrin puts into the title of the tale a telling, unambiguously evaluative epithet: “The Wise Minnow.” What does the epithet “wise” mean? Synonyms for it are the words “smart”, “reasonable”. At first, the reader retains the belief that it was not in vain that the satirist characterized his hero this way, but gradually, as events unfold and gudgeon conclusions, it becomes clear that the meaning that the author puts into the word “wise” is undoubtedly ironic. The gudgeon considered himself wise, and the author called his fairy tale that way. The irony in this title reveals the worthlessness and uselessness of the average person, trembling for his life.

“Once upon a time there was a minnow,” and he was “enlightened, moderately liberal.” Smart parents lived in the river “Aridian eyelids” “Aridian eyelids lived in the river...” - the expression “Aridian (or Aredian) eyelids” means extreme longevity. It goes back to a biblical character named Jared, who, as stated in the Bible, lived 962 years (Genesis, V, 20). and, dying, bequeathed to him to live, looking both ways. The gudgeon understands that he is in danger of trouble from everywhere: from big fish, from neighboring minnows, from a man (his own father was once almost boiled in his ear). The gudgeon builds a hole for itself, where no one but him fits, swims out at night for food, and during the day “shivers” in the hole, lacks sleep, is malnourished, but does his best to protect his life. Crayfish and pike lie in wait for him, but he avoids death. The gudgeon has no family: “he would like to live on his own.” “And the wise gudgeon lived in this way for more than a hundred years. Everything was trembling, everything was trembling. He has no friends, no relatives; neither he is to anyone, nor anyone is to him.” Only once in its life does a gudgeon decide to crawl out of its hole and “swim like a goldeneye all over the river!”, but it gets scared. Even when dying, the gudgeon trembles. No one cares about him, no one asks his advice on how to live a hundred years, no one calls him wise, but rather a “dumb” and “hateful.” In the end, the gudgeon disappears to God knows where: even the pikes don’t need it, sick and dying.

The tale is based on the satirist’s favorite techniques - grotesque and hyperbole. Using the grotesque, Saltykov-Shchedrin brings to the point of absurdity the idea of ​​the squalor of a lonely, selfish existence and the fear for one’s life that suppresses all other feelings. And by using hyperbolization, the satirist emphasizes negative qualities gudgeon: cowardice, stupidity, narrow-mindedness and conceit that is exorbitant for a small fish (“Not a single thought will come to mind: “Let me ask the wise gudgeon how he managed to live for more than a hundred years without being swallowed by a pike, “He didn’t break a crayfish with his claws, nor did he catch a fisherman with a hook?”, “And what’s most offensive of all: I haven’t even heard of anyone calling him wise”).

The tale is distinguished by its harmonious composition. In a small work, the author manages to describe the entire life of the hero from birth to death. Gradually, tracing the course of the minnow’s life, the author evokes in the reader a variety of feelings: ridicule, irony, turning into a feeling of disgust, and in the end, compassion for the everyday philosophy of a quiet, wordless, but useless and worthless creature.

In this tale, as in all other tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin, there is a limited circle of characters: the gudgeon himself and his father, whose behests the son faithfully followed. People and other inhabitants of the river (pike, perch, crayfish and other minnows) are only named by the author.

The author in the fairy tale denounces the cowardice, mental limitations, and failure in life of the average person. Allegory (allegory) and the technique of zoological likening help the satirist to deceive the tsarist censorship and create a sharply negative, repulsive image. Zoological comparisons serve main goal satire - to show negative phenomena and people in a low and funny way. Comparing social vices with the animal world is one of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s witty satire techniques; he uses it both in individual episodes and in entire fairy tales. Attributing human properties to fish, the satirist simultaneously shows that humans also have “fishy” traits, and “minnow” is the definition of a person, an artistic metaphor that aptly characterizes ordinary people. The meaning of this allegory is revealed in the words of the author: “Those who think that only those minnows can be considered worthy citizens who, mad with fear, sit in a hole and tremble, believe incorrectly. No, these are not citizens, but at least useless minnows.”

In this tale, as in many of his other works, the writer combines fantasy with a realistic depiction of everyday life. Before us is a gudgeon - a small fish that is afraid of everything in the world. But we learn that this little fish “does not receive a salary,” “does not keep servants,” “does not play cards, does not drink wine, does not smoke tobacco, does not chase red girls.” This unusual combination achieves a sense of the reality of what is happening. The fate of the law-abiding official is also guessed in the fate of the gudgeon.

Saltykov-Shchedrin in the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” adds to the fairy tale speech modern concepts, thereby connecting the folklore beginning of the fairy tale with reality. Thus, Shchedrin uses the usual fairy-tale beginning (“once upon a time there was a minnow”), common fairy-tale phrases (“neither in a fairy tale can you tell, nor can you describe with a pen,” “began to live and live well,” “bread and salt”), folk expressions(“crazy chamber”, “out of nowhere”), colloquialisms (“disgraceful life”, “destroy”, “take a nap”) and much more. And next to these words there are words of a completely different style, belonging to real time: “chew with life”, “did exercise at night”, “will recommend”, “life process completes”.

Such a connection folklore motifs and fantasy with real, topical reality is one of the main features of Shchedrin’s satire and his new genre of political fairy tale. Exactly this special shape storytelling helped Saltykov-Shchedrin increase the scale artistic image, to give the satire on the small man in the street a huge scope, to create a real symbol of a cowardly person.

In the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow,” Saltykov-Shchedrin traditionally interweaves comic elements with tragic ones. With humor, the satirist conveys to the reader the fish’s opinion about man: “What about man? - what kind of malicious creature is this! no matter what tricks he came up with in order to destroy him, the minnow, in vain! And the seine, and the nets, and the tops, and the hole, and, finally... I’ll fish!”, describes the flattering speeches of the pikes: “Now, if everyone lived like this, it would be quiet in the river!” But they said it on purpose; they thought that he would recommend himself for praise - here, they say, I am! then bang! But he didn’t fall for this trick either, and once again, with his wisdom, he defeated the machinations of his enemies.” And the author himself constantly laughs at the gudgeon, his fears and imaginary victories over predators.

However, the death of the gudgeon, its slow decline and dying thoughts, Saltykov-Shchedrin, being an ardent opponent of such a cowardly and meaningless existence, describes with bitterness and even some pity: “In his hole it is dark, cramped, there is nowhere to turn, no Sunbeam He won’t look in there, and there’s no smell of warmth. And he lies in this damp darkness, blind, exhausted, useless to anyone...” The lonely and unnoticed death of the minnow is truly tragic, despite his entire previous worthless life.

How much Saltykov-Shchedrin despises such a humiliating life for a person! He reduces the entire biography of the gudgeon to a brief formula: “He lived and trembled, and he died and trembled.” This expression has become an aphorism. The author claims that one cannot live with the only joy in life: “Glory to you, Lord, I am alive!” It is this philosophy of life-fear that the author ridicules. Saltykov-Shchedrin shows the reader a terrible self-isolation and philistine alienation.

Before his death, the gudgeon asks himself rhetorical questions: “What joys did he have? Who did he console? Who gave good advice to whom? To whom kind word said? Whom did you shelter, warm, protect?” There is one answer to all these questions - no one, no one, none. These questions are introduced into the fairy tale for the reader, so that he asks himself and thinks about the meaning of his life. After all, even the minnow’s dreams are connected with his empty womb existence: “It’s as if he won two hundred thousand, grew by as much as half an arshin and swallows the pike himself.” This is how it would be, of course, if dreams became reality, because nothing else was implanted in the soul of the average person.

Saltykov-Shchedrin is trying to convey to the reader the idea that one cannot live only for the sake of preserving one’s life. The story of the wise minnow in an exaggerated form teaches the need to set high goals for oneself and go towards them. It is necessary to remember human dignity, about courage and honor.

The writer “forces” the gudgeon to die ingloriously. In the final rhetorical question, a devastating, sarcastic sentence is heard: “Most likely, he died himself, because what sweetness is it for a pike to swallow a sick, dying gudgeon, and also a wise one?”

fairy tale artistic political satirist

Saltykov-Shchedrin, “The Wise Minnow”, let’s start the analysis of the fairy tale with the personality of the writer.

Mikhail Evgrafovich was born in 1826 (January) in the Tver province. On his father's side he belonged to a very old and rich family of nobles, and on his mother's side he belonged to the class of merchants. Saltykov-Shchedrin successfully graduated and then took up the post of official in the military department. Unfortunately, the service interested him very little.

In 1847, his first literary works were published - “A Tangled Affair” and “Contradictions”. Despite this, it was only in 1856 that people started talking about him seriously as a writer. At this time he began to publish his “Provincial Sketches”.

The writer tried to open the readers' eyes to the lawlessness happening in the country, to ignorance, stupidity, and bureaucracy.

Let's take a closer look at the cycle of fairy tales written by the writer in 1869. This was a kind of synthesis of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s ideological and creative quest, a certain result.

Mikhail Evgrafovich could not fully expose all the vices of society and the failure of management due to the censorship that existed at that time. That is why the writer chose the form of a fairy tale. So he was able to sharply criticize the existing order without fear of prohibitions.

The fairy tale “The Wise Minnow,” which we are analyzing, is quite rich in artistic terms. The author resorts to the use of grotesque, antithesis, and hyperbole. An important role is played by these techniques that helped hide the true meaning of what was written.

The fairy tale appeared in 1883, it is famous to this day, it has even become a textbook. Its plot is known to everyone: there lived a gudgeon who was completely ordinary. His only difference was cowardice, which was so strong that the gudgeon decided to spend his entire life in a hole without sticking his head out of there. There he sat, afraid of every rustle, every shadow. This is how his life passed, no family, no friends. The question arises: what kind of life is this? What good has he done in his life? Nothing. Lived, trembled, died.

That's the whole story, but it's just the surface.

Analysis of the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” implies a deeper study of its meaning.

Saltykov-Shchedrin depicts the morals of contemporary bourgeois Russia. In fact, a minnow does not mean a fish, but a cowardly man in the street who fears and trembles only for his own skin. The writer set himself the task of combining the features of both fish and humans.

The fairy tale depicts philistine alienation and self-isolation. The author is offended and bitter for the Russian people.

Reading the works of Saltykov-Shchedrin is not very easy, which is why not everyone was able to comprehend the true intent of his fairy tales. Unfortunately, the level of thinking and development modern people not quite up to par.

I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the thoughts expressed by the writer are relevant to this day.

Read the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” again, analyze it based on what you have now learned. Look deeper into the intention of the works, try to read between the lines, then you will be able to analyze not only the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” yourself, but also all works of art.

After the successful attempt by the Narodnaya Volya on Tsar Alexander II (03/01/81), the time for reaction comes. Russian liberalism, even in its most harmless manifestations, is openly proclaimed as “treason” to the fatherland. Suspicion and cowardice penetrate the moral atmosphere of life. Spy mania is officially called "strict surveillance of each other." Informers are called fighters “against treason.”

The worst thing, Saltykov-Shchedrin believed, was the cowardice that had taken hold of the mood of some of the Russian intelligentsia. In this dark, reactionary time, the satirical writer undertakes with his fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” to remind his contemporaries of human dignity, of honor and shame, of wisdom, true and imaginary.

At first, the author, without much ironic “pressure,” calls the young minnow smart (“Both his father and his mother were smart...”; “And the young minnow had a mind...”). The first six paragraphs create the illusion of a story about “ordinary” fairy-tale (or fable) fish, about the kingdom of fish. Here and big fish swim, and crayfish live, and water fleas, and minnows live in whole herds..., a fishing team with a net is mentioned, and, finally, the sad and depressing memories of the gudgeon father about the fish soup, which he almost tasted. In short, fish are fish. Only they treat each other, as it should be in fairy tales, in a human manner, and even give each other instructions on how to live: “Look, son,” said the old gudgeon, dying, “if you want to chew on life, then keep your eyes open!” (The main motive, a warning, a reminder of the need to get away from the mass of life’s dangers and adversities, to take care of yourself, about your own safety and well-being).

From the seventh paragraph the fairy tale includes new motive. Clarifying our idea of ​​the wise minnow: “He was an enlightened minnow, moderately liberal, and very firmly understood that living life is not like licking a whorl.” This episode gives a direct hint at intelligent people, professing the principle of complete non-interference throughout life. Minnow wisdom is close to some everyday proverbial sayings hated by Saltykov-Shchedrin, masking the fishy philistine morality: “don’t fight the strong”; “every cricket should know its nest”; “my hut (hut) is on the edge”; “Ears don’t grow higher than the forehead” and others.

A household detail - the gudgeon didn’t even dare to get married, and “didn’t have children, although his father had big family...” A purely fabulous continuation immediately follows: “He reasoned like this: “Father could have lived by joking! At that time, the pike were kinder, and the perches didn’t bother with us small fry... So it’s not about family, but how to just live for yourself!”

Immediately after this, a purely everyday ironic transition: “He has no friends, no relatives; neither he is to anyone, nor anyone is to him. He doesn’t play cards, doesn’t drink wine, doesn’t smoke tobacco...”

The tale includes sparingly, but expressively, signs of a specific historical time: “He was a minnow... moderately liberal,” he dreamed of acquiring “ winning ticket", minnows "were not alienated from the public" and would be "worthy citizens."

Step by step tracing the course of the gudgeon's conclusions, the author evokes in the reader either a sly mockery, a sarcastic response, or a feeling of disgust. At the end of the work, there may even be compassion for the pitiful fate of a quiet, timidly silent, moderately neat creature. Shchedrinsky’s minnow, summing up the results of his long life, is revealed to a long and dreary truth (the author’s warning intonation is also heard here): “those who think that only those minnows can be considered worthy citizens who, mad with fear, sit in holes and trembling. No, these are not citizens, but at least useless minnows. They give no warmth or cold to anyone, no honor, no dishonor, no glory, no infamy... they live, take up space for nothing and eat food.” A swarm of questions confuses the minnow: “What joys did he have? Who was he comforting? Who did you say a kind word to? Whom did you shelter, warm, protect? Who has heard of him, who will remember his existence? The gudgeon is gnawed by resentment that other fish, which every now and then sneak past his holes and pass him by, are nothing other than a “dumb,” “a fool,” “a disgrace,” sincerely wondering “how the water tolerates such idols.”

So, The fairy tale “The Wise Minnow” contains an important moral lesson: cowardice, fear, philistine indifference to everything in the world except one’s own person sooner or later deprives human life of all meaning, worldly “wisdom” kills the mind, honor, and conscience in people. The fairy tale teaches honesty, civic courage and nobility, and reminds us of the price human life, about its meaning.

Fairy tale "The Wise Minnow". The question of the meaning of being, the purpose of man is acutely raised. The hero of the fairy tale “got too smart” and devoted his life only to himself. Moral and social ideals, from the point of view of which the gudgeon vegetation is exposed, were infinitely dear to Shchedrin. Therefore, with a bitter smile, he makes this “sage” understand the meaninglessness of his life.

Problems of the fairy tale "The Wise Minnow" by Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin

In the complex sense of Shchedrin’s tales, small in volume and large in their ideological content, the following topics can be distinguished: satire on the autocratic government and on the exploiting classes, depiction of the life of the people in Tsarist Russia, exposure of the behavior and psychology of the secularist-minded layers of the intelligentsia, disclosure of individual morality and propaganda of the socialist ideal and new morality.
In the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow,” Shchedrin exposed for condemnation the cowardice of that part of the intelligentsia who, during the years of political reaction, succumbed to a mood of shameful panic. Depicting the pitiful fate of a hero who went mad with fear and walled himself up in a dark hole for the rest of his life, the satirist showed his warning and contempt for all those who, obeying the instinct of self-preservation, plunge into the narrow world of their own needs instead of active social struggle.
The gudgeon's parents lived quietly and peacefully, did not interfere in the life of society, and therefore died a natural death. And they ordered their son to watch with both, protecting himself. Their son was smart and took his parents’ words literally. He protected himself not only from large fish, but also from crayfish and water fleas. Although they were smaller than him, they could cause more harm, in his opinion. He was completely mad with fear and was even afraid to have a wife and children.
Shchedrin also ridiculed the minnow’s thoughts about man, that is, about the government. How many different means he came up with to destroy the minnows, that is, the people, and they, knowing all these stupid means, still swallow them. “Even though this is the stupidest tool, with us minnows, the more stupid, the more accurate,” this is how the old minnow thinks about the life of a people who do not want to learn even from their mistakes.
That gudgeon did not live, but did nothing but tremble and rejoice that he was alive. Even the pikes began to praise him, hoping that he would come out of the hole. But he doesn't. I sat for more than a hundred years and thought that I was the smartest. But Saltykov-Shchedrin speaks about the wrong course of reasoning of the minnow, that the wrong minnows become worse citizens who sit in holes, tremble and therefore eat in vain. What is the benefit to society from their existence? No. Therefore, it did not consider the gudgeon smart, but only called it a fool.
Originality artistic skill Shchedrin turned out to be in great power of his laughter, in the art of using humor, hyperbole, grotesque and fantasy for realistic image reality and its assessment from progressive public positions. In his tales, those who tried to hide from the enemy, avoid social struggle, and live by their own needs die. He tried to instill in the reader a sense of social duty, to teach him to live social life, social needs. Only under these conditions can a person be called smart and wise.