What is the symbolic meaning of the name of the ship atlantis. The image-symbol of "Atlantis" in the story of I. A. Bunin "The Lord from San Francisco" (Second version). Final words of the teacher

Ivan Alekseevich Bunin portrayed the real life of Russia, therefore, reading his works, one can easily imagine how the Russian people lived on the eve of the revolution. Bunin picturesquely depicts the life of noble estates and common people, the culture of the nobility and the distorted huts of the peasants, and a thick layer of black soil on our roads. But all the same, the author is most interested in the soul of a Russian person, which is impossible to comprehend and fully understand.

Bunin feels that big changes will soon take place in society, which will lead to a catastrophe of life and a catastrophe of the social structure of life. Almost all the stories that he writes in the years 1913-1914 are devoted to this topic. But in order to convey the approach of catastrophe, to express all his feelings, Bunin, like many writers, uses images-symbols. One of the most striking such symbols is the image of a steamer from the story "The Lord from San Francisco", written by the author in 1915.

On the steamer with the self-explanatory name "Atlantis", the main character of the story goes on a long journey. He worked hard and long, earning his millions. And now he has reached the level where he can afford to go and see the Old World, rewarding himself in this way for his efforts. Bunin gives an accurate and detailed description of the ship on which his hero sits. It was a huge hotel with all the amenities: the bar was open around the clock, there were oriental baths here, and even its own newspaper was published.

"Atlantis" in the story is not only the place where most of the events take place. This is a kind of model of the world in which the writer and his characters live. But this world is bourgeois. The reader is convinced of this when he reads how this ship is divided. The second deck of the ship is given to the passengers of the ship, where fun goes on the snow-white deck all day long. But the lower tier of the steamer looks completely different, where people work around the clock in heat and dust, this is a kind of ninth circle of hell. These people, standing near the huge ovens, set the steamer in motion.

There are many servants and dishwashers on the steamer, who serve the second tier of the ship and provide them with a well-fed life. The inhabitants of the second and last deck of the ship never meet with each other, there is no relationship between them, although they sail on the same ship in terrible bad weather, and huge ocean waves boil and rage overboard. Even the reader feels the trembling of the steamer, which is trying to fight the elements, but bourgeois society pays no attention to this.

It is known that Atlantis is a civilization that strangely disappeared into the ocean. This legend about a lost civilization is included in the name of the steamer. And only the author hears and feels that the time is approaching for the disappearance of the world that exists on the ship. But time will stop on the steamer only for the rich gentleman from San Francisco, whose name no one remembered. This death of one hero indicates that very soon the death of the whole world will come. But no one pays attention to this, since the bourgeois world is indifferent and cruel.

Ivan Bunin knows that there is a lot of injustice and cruelty in the world. He saw a lot, so he anxiously waited for the Russian state to collapse. This also influenced his subsequent life: he was never able to understand and accept the revolution and the rest of his life, he spent almost thirty years in exile. In Bunin's story, the steamer is a fragile world where a person is helpless and nobody cares about his fate. A civilization is moving in a huge ocean that does not know its future, but it does not want to remember the past either.

I. Bunin wrote the instructive story "Mister from San Franciso" about a rich old American who goes on a journey, but the author suddenly ends his life. Bunin thus shows his position: you need to live today and now, you should not rely on the future, otherwise you may not have time to enjoy life.

A gentleman from San Francisco devoted his entire life to work in order to get rich, and then start living. As Bunin writes about the hero: “he did not live, but only existed” and relied on the future. And so the gentleman, in his fifty-eight years, decides to rest and go to Italy.

The author shows that happiness is not about money, so he gives names to other heroes of the work. The writer contrasts the image of the rich gentleman with the image of the boatman Lorenzo, who can sell the lobsters he caught for a pittance, and then, walking along the shore in his rags, enjoy a sunny day and admire the landscape. For Lorenzo, the life values ​​are work, a kind attitude towards people, the joy of communicating with nature. In this he sees the meaning of life, and the rapture of wealth is incomprehensible and unknown to him, this is a sincere person. Just a few lines by Bunin about this hero already reveal the author's attitude to Lorenzo and to the gentleman from San Francisco. Another hero named Luigi appears in the work. He is just a bellhop, a couple of sentences are said about him in the whole work, nevertheless, the author gives him a name, and the main character remains the "master".

The name of the steamer is symbolic - "Atlantis". The artificiality of civilization is surrounded by an ocean that embodies eternal life, the abyss, the Universe. The journey of the "lord" turns out to be a movement towards death together with a civilization doomed to destruction, this is evidenced by the image of the Devil in the story, who observes the ship from the rocks of Gibraltar.

Also, the writer depicts the "underwater womb" of a comfortable steamer can be compared with the dark and sultry bowels of hell. He paints the life of rich people who spend

huge sums of money for luxury vacations, and hellish working conditions for the workers in the hold who earn that money. The author shows where they go and for what - only dances, dances, card games and entertainment.

Using the antithesis technique, the author shows how at one point the money turned out to be useless. He depicts how in the hotel the already dead gentleman was put on a bed in the "smallest, worst, dampest and coldest" room of a beautiful hotel, as instead of a coffin he was given a box from under the water. A rich man has completely unexpectedly lost power and respect, and no amount of money will help the deceased to demand obedience from the workers or deference to him. His values ​​were not real.

Moreover, the gentleman was never able to enjoy his profit, he simply did not have time.

I. A. Bunin is a realist writer. According to the stories of Bunin, one can easily imagine the life of pre-revolutionary Russia in all its details: noble estates, life and culture of the class carried away by time, clay huts of peasants and fat black soil on the roads. The writer seeks to comprehend the human soul, to see the "signs" of the Russian national character.
As a sensitive artist, Bunin senses the approach of great social catastrophes, and the catastrophic nature of life becomes the main theme of his stories of 1913-1914. How in prose can a writer convey his premonitions, sensations, depict what is visible only to the prophetic look of a thinker?
Realist writers have often used symbolic images to expand the possibilities of realistic depiction.
Thus, the steamer Atlantis becomes a symbol in the story "The Lord from San Francisco", written in 1915. On it, the hero of the story goes to the Old World to "reward himself for years of labor." “There were many passengers, the steamer — the famous Atlantis — looked like a huge hotel with all the amenities — with a night bar, with oriental baths, with its own newspaper ...” Bunin’s Atlantis is not only the scene of the story. She is a model of the world in which the heroes of the writer and himself live. This is a model of the bourgeois world, divided into a snow-white deck and an underwater womb of a steamer, similar to the ninth circle of hell,
with gigantic furnaces and people drenched in sweat. It is they who set this "floating world" in motion. "A great multitude of servants in cooks, dishwashers and wine cellars" provides a calm and well-fed life for those who are upstairs, those who carelessly throw their feet on the arms of the chairs in the bar, sip on brandy and liqueurs, floating in waves of spicy smoke. " Inhabitants of the "upper" and "lower" worlds of "Atlantis" do not see each other, do not enter into any relationship, but they both float "in the icy haze", "in the midst of a storm with sleet". And overboard with a roar and roar goes the ocean, and the steamer trembles, overcoming the black mountains of waves. How not to recall here the very name of the ship: Atlantis is a whole civilization that disappeared in the depths of the ocean.
But so far only the prophet-writer can hear the disturbing rumble of the "ocean", the inexorable passage of time approaching its rush hour.
In the story, time will stop only for one passenger - a gentleman from San Francisco, whose name no one remembered. But the reader is left with a sense of anxiety, a sense of the inevitability of formidable events, the death of the whole world with its established order.
Bunin, seeing around him an abundance of social evil, ignorance, cruelty, witnessing the bloody massacre on the fields of the world war, with sorrow and fear expected the imminent collapse of the “great Russian power”. This determined his attitude to the revolution and further thirty years of "self-exile".
But even after the revolution, after two world wars and after the death of the author himself, the "Atlantis" created by him reminds us of how ghostly and fragile the world is, how small and sometimes helpless a person is in this world, where the ocean is constantly buzzing, raging and "crying from fierce malice "siren" Atlantis ".

The story of I.A. Bunin "" can be called a parable about human life. The author tried to show us that no money can buy human life. He reminded us that we will all die someday.

An enormous role in Bunin's story "" is played by the ocean liner "Atlantis". It was a ship equipped with the latest technology. The richest people traveled on it from America to Europe and back. There was everything that a person could need: a night bar with expensive alcohol and cigars, an oriental bath, a live orchestra played on the deck, and even a newspaper was published. Luxury and tranquility reigned around. Thousands of people worked on the ship, creating this comfort and coziness.

The passengers of the Atlantis led a very measured life. They were not worried about the raging ocean, everyone hoped for an experienced captain and for the ship itself.

Bunin is trying to show us that such carelessness can be very dangerous. It is enough to pay attention to the name of the liner and remember how the deep sea once swallowed up an entire country called Atlantis, in comparison with which the ship is a small sliver in the raging ocean.

It is worth noting that while reading a story, you involuntarily prepare yourself for something terrible, for some kind of disaster, the work constantly keeps you in suspense. And, indeed, a catastrophe is happening. True, it has the scale of one person, but from that it is no less tragic. The author showed us that death is a natural process that will affect all of us. And no matter how we try to postpone this moment, it will certainly come.

But do not be discouraged, because life goes on, and "Atlantis" sails on with its joy, care and pleasure.

Epigraph from the Apocalypse: "Woe to you, Babylon, mighty city!" According to the Revelation of John the Theologian, Babylon, "the great harlot, became a dwelling place for demons and a refuge for every unclean spirit ... woe, woe to you, Babylon, a mighty city! For in one hour your judgment has come" (Revelation 18).

San Francisco is one of the richest cities in America, named after Francis, as if by an irony of fate. And the lord himself - a rich man, a representative of the new world - comes from the city named after the preacher of poverty to the homeland of this preacher.

The motive of the story is the motive of death, death. Why is the giant ship named Atlantis? "Atlantis" is a lost mythological continent. The main event of the story is the death of a gentleman from San Francisco, quick and sudden, in one hour. The gentleman from San Francisco, a millionaire, does not notice the harbingers of death. It is noteworthy that he is going to go to Rome to listen to the Catholic prayer of repentance there (which is usually read before death), then the steamer Atlantis, which is a dual symbol in the story: on the one hand, the steamer symbolizes a new civilization, where power is determined by wealth and pride, that is, that from which Babylon died. Therefore, in the end, the ship, and even with that name, must sink. "Atlantis" is the personification of heaven and hell, and if the former is described as "modernized" paradise (waves of spicy smoke, radiance of light, cognacs, liqueurs, cigars, happy vapors, etc.), then the engine room is directly called the underworld: "to its last, the ninth circle was like the underwater womb of a steamer - the one where the gigantic furnaces giggled dully, devouring the breasts of coal with their red-hot jaws, thrown into them with a roar, doused with caustic, dirty sweat and waist-deep with naked people, crimson from the flame ... "

The gentleman from San Francisco, who in the story is never named by name, since, the author notes, no one remembered his name either in Naples or Capri, he is sent with his wife and daughter to the Old World for two whole years. to have fun and travel. He worked hard and is now wealthy enough to afford this kind of vacation.

At the end of November, the famous "Atlantis", which looks like a huge hotel with all the amenities, sets sail.

Life on the steamer is measured: get up early, drink coffee, cocoa, chocolate, take baths, do gymnastics, walk on decks to whet the appetite; then - go to the first breakfast; after breakfast they read the newspapers and calmly wait for the second breakfast; the next two hours are devoted to rest - all the decks are lined with long reed chairs, on which, covered with blankets, travelers lie, looking into the cloudy sky; then tea and biscuits, and in the evening that which is the main purpose of all this existence - lunch.

A wonderful orchestra plays exquisitely and tirelessly in a huge hall, behind the walls of which the waves of the terrible ocean roll with a roar, but the low-necked ladies and men in tailcoats and tuxedos do not think about it. After dinner, dancing begins in the ballroom, the men in the bar smoke cigars, drink liqueurs, and are served by blacks in red jackets.

Finally the steamer arrives in Naples, the family of the gentleman from San Francisco stays in an expensive hotel, and here their life also proceeds as usual: early in the morning - breakfast, after - visiting museums and cathedrals, lunch, tea, then - preparing for dinner and in the evening - a hearty lunch. However, December in Naples turned out to be rainy this year: wind, rain, mud on the streets. And the family of the gentleman from San Francisco decides to go to the island of Capri, where, as everyone assures them, it is warm, sunny and lemons are in bloom.

A small steamer, waddling on the waves from side to side, transports the gentleman from San Francisco with his family, seriously suffering from seasickness, to Capri. The funicular takes them to the small stone town on the top of the mountain, they are accommodated in the hotel, where they are welcomed, and they are preparing for dinner, having already fully recovered from seasickness.

Having dressed before his wife and daughter, the gentleman from San Francisco goes to the cozy, quiet reading room of the hotel, opens the newspaper - and suddenly the lines flash before his eyes, the pince-nez flies off his nose, and his body, wriggling, slides to the floor, Another guest who was present at the same time of the hotel, screaming, runs into the dining room, everyone jumps up from their seats, the owner tries to calm the guests, but the evening is already irreparably ruined.

The gentleman from San Francisco has lived all his life in strenuous and meaningless work, putting off "real life" and all the pleasures for the future. And exactly at that moment when he decides to finally enjoy life, death overtakes him. This is precisely death, its triumph. Moreover, death triumphs already during life, for the very life of rich passengers of a luxurious ocean steamer is terrible as death, it is unnatural and meaningless. The story ends with the material terrible details of the earthly life of the corpse and the figure of the Devil, "huge as a cliff", watching from the rocks of Gibraltar for a passing steamer.

The gentleman from San Francisco is transferred to the smallest and poorest room; his wife, daughter, servants stand and look at him, and this is what they expected and feared, happened - he dies. The wife of a gentleman from San Francisco asks the owner to allow the body to be transferred to their apartment, but the owner refuses: he values ​​these rooms too much, and tourists would begin to avoid them, since the whole of Capri would immediately become aware of what had happened. The coffin here is also impossible to get - the owner can offer a long box of soda bottles.

At dawn, a cabman carries the body of the gentleman from San Francisco to the pier, the steamer transports it across the Gulf of Naples, and the same Atlantis, on which he arrived with honor in the Old World, now carries him, dead, in a tarred coffin, hidden from the living deep below, in the black hold. Meanwhile, the same life continues on the decks as before, everyone has breakfast and dinner in the same way, and the ocean is still frightening behind the windows of the windows.