Werner analysis. The main characters of the "Hero of Our Time"

In the novel A Hero of Our Time, Lermontov makes fun of friendship with particular sarcasm. According to the author, there can be no true friendship, because each one, by virtue of his individuality, tries to enslave the other, remaking him in his own way.

A comparative description of Pechorin and Werner in the novel "A Hero of Our Time" will reveal the deep, inner world of these characters. It will help to understand why their friendship came to an end, and what was the reason for parting.

Appearance

Pechorin medium height. Age about 25 years old. Strong physique. Blond. The hair is slightly curly. Black mustache and thick, dark eyebrows. High forehead. Hands are small. The fingers are thin and long. Brown eyes. The gait is lazy, careless. It always looked neat and expensive.

Werner short stature. Middle aged. He was about 40 years old. Thin. Black eyes, like gimlets, drilled into the interlocutor during the conversation. Nervousness and inner restlessness jumped in the guise. He walked with a limp because one leg was shorter than the other. Looked untidy. Sloppy. Made a bad impression.

Upbringing. Occupation

Gregory hereditary nobleman. Aristocrat. A native of St. Petersburg. Rich. He received an excellent education and excellent upbringing. Military by occupation.

Werner representative of the nobility. Well educated and educated. Not rich. A man from the province Occupation medicine.

The character and personality of Pechorin and Werner

Pechorin:

• smart Educated;
• sharp on the tongue. Able to hurt a person with a word;
• materialist;
• silent. Stealthy;
• a good manipulator, playing on people's feelings;
• connoisseur of human souls. Subtle psychologist;
• proud. selfish;
• not afraid of responsibility for actions;
• loves women, but is in no hurry to tie the knot
• likes to think about the meaning of life.

Werner:

• educated. Smart;
• likes to joke. stinging;
• kind by nature;
• materialist;
• talkative. Likes to be listened to;
• connoisseur of human souls;
• loves women. Well versed in the psychology of female souls;
• proud. selfish;
• afraid to take responsibility;
• categorically against marriage;
• lover of philosophizing at leisure;
• generous and direct.

Attitude towards death

Pechorin each time it seems to tempt fate, challenging it. His actions are illogical, defy any explanation. He constantly risks himself, as if testing himself for strength. Leading death by the nose, he leads his game, not being afraid to stumble.

Werner takes death for granted. He is calm about the fact that someday he will have to die and just waits in the wings. Without worrying and not panicking about this, and I no longer tempt fate once again.

They could become good friends, but remained friends. The image of Werner in the novel contributes to the disclosure of the inner appearance of Pechorin. Next to Dr. Werner, Grigory feels as lonely as with other characters in this work.

Werner is a character in Lermontov's story "A Hero of Our Time". He meets in the chapter "Princess Mary", and serves as a doctor and friend of Pechorin. Werner, just like Pechorin, is a deep skeptic, a materialist, an egoist, and a person who has learned all the necessary “keys to the heart”. He does not particularly sympathize with his time and the people it gives rise to, although he is not cold towards them, but on the contrary, he vividly feels the spiritual beauty in people, which, without a doubt, is present in him.

He is short and thin, somewhat physically similar to a child. One leg is longer than the other - and the head is huge compared to the body. This is one of the few differences between him and Pechorin. Compared to him, Werner is ugly. Possessing kindness, he faithfully wears the nickname “Mephistopheles”, for which he thanks his keen eye and evil tongue, with which he penetrates into the essence of a person that he keeps behind his “mask”.

Pechorin thinks that his friend is endowed with the gift of foresight. Having no idea about the future, Werner says that in the future Grushnitsky will fall at the hands of Pechorin. Otherwise, the dialogues of the two friends look like two opponents worthy of each other are fighting in a verbal duel. Another difference between the two friends is that Werner is unwilling to change. His passion is to live in the rhythm familiar to life, without changing it. Werner warns Pechorin about Grushnitsky's conspiracy and about a possible murder (indeed, during a duel, bullets will not be put into Pechorin's pistol on purpose), although he is afraid of extra responsibility for someone. After the murder of Grushnitsky by Pechorin, he steps aside, wanting to have nothing to do with this act. Pechorin, in turn, recognizes such actions in Werner as cowardice and weakness, believing that the personal well-being for the doctor is much more important than their friendship.

Werner is similar due to his skepticism to Pechorin, but his human sincerity (Werner cried over a dying soldier) is more similar to Maxim Maksimych. There are many disagreements in this image, and any poet will find in it combinations of both strong vital qualities and weak ones. However, comparing Pechorin and Werner, the second is a more holistic personality, viable, able to find pluses in people.

Option 2

Werner is a military medic. After all, as you know, there should be a lot in common between friends, and Pechorin is a good friend of the hero.

“He is a skeptic and a materialist, like almost all doctors ...”, this is how the author describes Werner. And this is exactly what he is similar to the main character. You can even say that he is not averse to laughing at people. Also, the secondary hero of the work does not have great wealth and has always dreamed of them. As it later became clear that he did not want to do anything for his dream.

Werner also thinks about women that their mind is very stupid and impossible to understand. For him, they are complex and incomprehensible in their actions. But at the same time, Pechorin's friend is attentive to women and will achieve his goal, although he outwardly is not very handsome. As it soon became known that he despises the society in which noble people. Considering them worthless and useless people. But at the same time he is kind, because he would not cry over a soldier.

About his appearance, they say that he was not particularly pleasant. But he has clothes that are quite fashionable and always neat. He also has intelligent thoughts, because it was Pechorin who decided that he was a good conversationalist. The poet also lives in him, it is his inner world that has such features. He does not want to get married, because he believes that he is not ready and will not be able to have a family life. Then we learn that Werner turns out to be an unclean doctor, that is, rumors were spread about him and then many clients left him. In general, we don’t know anything about the future, perhaps it will continue to live as before. I think that Pechorin and Werner are quite similar characters, although there is a difference. He still tries to keep his feelings to himself, and it is better to stay under the mask. It is these people who do not reveal themselves to the end.

The military doctor does not want to achieve something and have a goal, it is easier for him to just watch what is happening. Also, when the time came for the duel, he still approves of Pechorin's decision, but when he comes, he has a sad expression on his face. From this we can conclude that the secondary hero is still nervous. And when such an incident occurred, he did not give in to the main character. I believe that this hero is still with a good heart, but it hurts somehow not decisive.

Composition Characteristics of Werner

One of my favorite works is "A Hero of Our Time". The writer Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov is the greatest genius of his time, who contributed to the treasury of not only Russian, but also world literature. This novel became central in the writer's work. This wonderful book, which touched me so deeply, has many interesting characters. Now we will talk about one of them, Dr. Werner.

What is special about this character? Immediately, among all the others, he is distinguished by a German surname. However, through the mouth of Pechorin, the author convinces us that he is Russian. Werner has a very unattractive appearance. It contrasts with his fortitude, insight and intelligence. Due to which he is popular with women. Kindness and sympathy, which are manifested in the episode with the dying soldier, are not alien to him.

Among the youth, he receives the nickname Mephistopheles. He secretly rejoices at this nickname. Like Mephistopheles, the character is evil-speaking and has the ability to foresee certain events. Thanks to the painstaking study of people, it is not difficult for him to penetrate the very essence of the nature of the interlocutor. In addition, the similarity with Mephistopheles does not end there. The expression "Mephistopheles' laughter" can also be applied to him. So, in a conversation with Grushnitsky, he taunts him when he changes his soldier's overcoat for a uniform. On the waters, he draws caricatures of wealthy clients whom he treats.

The doctor has a lot in common with the main character of the work - Pechorin. That is why he appears in the novel as his friend. So Werner is not inferior in the art of arguing and caustic phrases to Pechorin, he can endlessly talk on philosophical topics. Werner is the only interesting interlocutor for the protagonist in the novel. Both characters are selfish natures. But as the story progresses, we will begin to notice differences that will eventually even lead to a break in friendship.

Well, completely Werner opens up to the reader after the duel between Pechorin and Grushnitsky. He does not even shake hands with the hero and coldly says goodbye to him, referring to the imminent danger. He did not want to take responsibility for everything that happened.

Werner is a collective image of the Russian intelligentsia of those times. They could discuss any of the proposed topics, wore a mask of decency. However, passive contemplation and philosophizing that did not lead to any results were preferred to decisive actions and activity.

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Already at the first acquaintance with Lermontov's novel "A Hero of Our Time", the characterization of the characters, the analysis of their images become necessary for understanding the work.

Pechorin - the central image of the novel

The protagonist of the novel Grigory Pechorin, an extraordinary personality, the author painted "a modern man, as he understands him, and met him too often." Pechorin is full of apparent and real contradictions in relation to love, friendship, he is looking for the true meaning of life, he decides for himself the questions of the destiny of a person, the choice of a path.

Sometimes the main character is unattractive for us - he makes people suffer, destroys their lives, but there is a force of attraction in him that makes others obey his will, sincerely love him and sympathize with the lack of purpose and meaning in his life.

Each part of the novel is a separate story from the life of Pechorin, each has its own characters, and all of them, from one side or another, reveal the secret of the soul of the “hero of time”, making him a living person. Who are the characters who help us see "a portrait made up of the vices of the entire generation, in their full development"?

Maksim Maksimych

Maksim Maksimych, "a man worthy of respect," as the young officer-narrator says about him, open, kind, in many ways naive, content with life. We listen to his story about the history of Bela, we watch how he strives to meet Grigory, whom he considers an old friend and to whom he is sincerely attached, we clearly see why he suddenly "became stubborn, grumpy." Sympathizing with the staff captain, we involuntarily begin to be hostile towards Pechorin.

At the same time, with all his ingenuous charm, Maxim Maksimych is a limited person, he does not know what drives a young officer, and he does not even think about it. It will be incomprehensible for the staff captain and the coldness of his friend at the last meeting, which offended to the depths of his soul. “What does he have in me? I’m not rich, I’m not official, and in terms of years I’m not at all a match for him. ” The characters have completely different characters, views on life, worldview, they are people of different eras and different origins.

Like other main characters of Lermontov's "A Hero of Our Time", the image of Maxim Maksimych prompts us to think about the cause of Pechorin's selfishness, indifference and coldness.

Grushnitsky and Werner

The images of the characters are completely different, but both of them are a reflection of Pechorin, his “twins”.

Very young Junker Grushnitsky- an ordinary person, he wants to stand out, to impress. He belongs to the type of people who “have pompous phrases ready for all occasions, who are simply not touched by the beautiful and who are importantly draped in extraordinary feelings, sublime passions and exceptional suffering. To produce an effect is their delight.”

This is the counterpart of the main character. Everything that Pechorin experienced sincerely and through suffering - discord with the world, unbelief, loneliness - in Grushnitsky is just a pose, bravado and following the fashion of the time. The image of the hero is not just a comparison of the true and the false, but also the definition of their boundaries: in his desire to stand out, to have weight in the eyes of society, Grushnitsky goes too far, becomes capable of meanness. At the same time, it turns out to be “more noble than his comrades”, his words “I despise myself” before Pechorin’s shot are like an echo of the very disease of the era that Pechorin himself is afflicted with.

Dr. Werner it seems to us at first very similar to Pechorin, and this is true. He is a skeptic, insightful and observant, “studied all the living strings of the human heart” and has a low opinion of people, an “evil tongue”, under the guise of mockery and irony hides his true feelings, his ability to sympathize. The main similarity that Pechorin notes, speaking of a friend, is “we are rather indifferent to everything, except ourselves.”

The difference becomes apparent when we compare the descriptions of the characters. Werner turns out to be a cynic more in words, he is passive in his protest against society, limiting himself to ridicule and caustic remarks, he can be called a contemplative. The egoism of the hero is completely conscious; inner activity is alien to him.

His dispassionate decency betrays Werner: the doctor is not looking for changes in the world, much less in himself. He warns his friend about rumors and conspiracy, but does not shake hands with Pechorin after the duel, not wanting to take his own share of responsibility for what happened.

The character of these heroes is like a unity of opposites, both Werner and Grushnitsky set off the image of Pechorin and are important for our understanding of the entire novel.

Female images of the novel

On the pages of the novel, we see women with whom Gregory's life brings. Bela, Undine, Princess Mary, Vera. They are all completely different, each with its own character and charm. It is they who are the main characters in the three parts of the novel, telling about Pechorin's attitude to love, about his desire to love and be loved and the impossibility of this.

Bela

Circassian Bela, "a nice girl," as Maxim Maksimych calls her, opens a gallery of female images. Goryanka brought up on folk traditions and customs. The impetuosity, passion, ardor of the "wild" girl, living in harmony with the outside world, attract Pechorin, resonating in his soul. Over time, love awakens in Bela, and she gives herself to her with all the power of the natural openness of feelings and spontaneity. Happiness does not last long, and the girl, resigned to her fate, dreams only of freedom. "I myself will leave, I am not his slave - I am a princess, a prince's daughter!" Strength of character, desire for freedom, inner dignity do not leave Bela. Even grieving before her death that her soul would never meet with Pechorin again, she answers the offer to accept another faith that she “will die in the faith in which she was born.”

Mary

Image Mary Ligovskaya, princesses from high society, is written out, perhaps, in the most detail of all the heroines. Belinsky's quote about Mary is very accurate: “This girl is not stupid, but not empty either. Her direction is somewhat ideal, in the childish sense of the word: it is not enough for her to love a person to whom her feelings would attract, it is imperative that he be unhappy and walk in a thick and gray soldier's overcoat. The princess seems to live in an imaginary world, naive, romantic and fragile. And, although she feels and perceives the world subtly, she cannot distinguish between a secular game and genuine spiritual impulses. Mary is a representative of her time, environment and social status. At first, paying attention to Grushnitsky, then he succumbs to Pechorin's game, falls in love with him - and receives a cruel lesson. The author leaves Mary without telling whether she is broken by the experiment for the sake of exposing Grushnitsky, or, having survived the lesson, she will be able not to lose faith in love.

Faith

About Mary, the author tells a lot and in detail, Faith but we, the readers, see only in love for Pechorin. “She is the only woman in the world who would not be able to deceive” the hero, the one who understood him “perfectly, with all the petty weaknesses, bad passions.” “My love has grown together with my soul: it has darkened, but has not died out.” Faith is love itself, accepting a person as he is, she is sincere in her feelings, and perhaps such a deep and open feeling could change Pechorin. But love, like friendship, requires self-giving, for the sake of it you have to sacrifice something in life. Pechorin is not ready, he is too individualistic.

The main character of the novel reveals the motives of his actions and motives largely thanks to the images of Mary and Vera - in the story "Princess Mary" you can examine in more detail the psychological portrait of Gregory.

Conclusion

In the various stories of the novel A Hero of Our Time, the characters not only help us understand the most diverse features of Pechorin and, as a result, allow us to penetrate the author’s intention, follow the “history of the human soul”, and see the “portrait of the hero of the time”. The main characters of Lermontov's work represent different types of human characters and therefore paint the image of the time that created Grigory Pechorin.

Artwork test

Grigory Pechorin makes acquaintance with Dr. Werner on the waters in Pyatigorsk. The characters are very different, not only in character, but also in appearance, while they have so many common features that Werner is often called the double of the protagonist.

Character appearance

It is difficult to find similarities in their appearance, but there is something in both that makes them stand out from the crowd. In Pechorin, an aristocratic breed is felt: thin hands, light hair, black mustaches and eyebrows, a slightly upturned nose, broad shoulders, sad brown eyes.

Dr. Werner is short, thin, legs of different lengths, a disproportionately large head, his eyes are small and black.

The attitude of Pechorin and Werner to society

The perception of both characters in society is ambiguous. The doctors of the “water society” spread rumors that Dr. Werner was writing caricatures of patients, after which the physician lost his practice.

Gregory is also in constant conflict with the environment, but this is more likely due to his boredom. He is luckier, more attractive and richer than his "double", which becomes the cause of a quarrel with Grushnitsky and his friends. Pechorin and Werner are sharp-tongued, even a little evil ridiculing the shortcomings of others.

Pechorin serves in the army, but is wealthy, so he does not see the need to pursue ranks. Werner is poor, he dreamed of wealth, but did nothing for this. The doctor is bored with treating imaginary illnesses of wealthy patients (just remember what treatment he prescribed for Ligovsky), often laughs at them, but is able to sincerely cry over a dying soldier, which Pechorin once observed.

Heroes' thoughts about women

The opinions of both characters about the opposite sex are similar: Gregory believes that the female mind is extremely paradoxical, in order to convince a lady of anything, you need to forget even the elementary rules of logic. For Werner, the fair sex is like an enchanted forest: at first, monsters surround, but if you persist, a quiet green meadow opens.

Pechorin is more successful in relationships: he is young, smart, attractive and rich. But he himself is not able to love, sincere feelings are inaccessible to him, he is very quickly fed up with even the most beautiful and desirable woman. His attention brings only pain and suffering. Bela, through his fault, is deprived of her father's home, family, and then life. Vera almost loses her honor, and the young Princess Mary suffers such a blow from which she can hardly recover.

Werner, on the other hand, passionately loves women, and often achieves reciprocity, despite external unattractiveness.

The relationship between Pechorin and the doctor

The characters find common ground. Werner takes part in the fate of the main character of the novel, agrees to be his second. During the duel, he calls to expose the conspirators, sincerely caring for his younger friend. But it gives him the opportunity to make decisions on his own, retreating, having heard about his readiness to die in a duel. The doctor's attachment to Pechorin is stronger than the protagonist's attachment to him.

Psychological similarity of heroes

Pechorin is afraid of sincere feelings: passionate love, true friendship, and this is the real reason for his tragedy. Reason prevails over the emotional sphere. He probably realizes that he brings only pain and death to loved ones, destroys their lives, and therefore seeks death either in war or in a duel. He seems to be experimenting on others and on himself, regardless of other people's opinions and other people's feelings.

This is also characteristic of Werner in full measure, but he does not go into open confrontation, while Pechorin goes to the end, infuriating the interlocutor. Not without reason, when the doctor tells the main character that the princess is infatuated with Grushnitsky, both perceive this fact as the plot of a story that can decorate the boredom that reigns in the "water society". At the same time, Pechorin begins to actively act, and Werner continues to observe.

The image of Werner was necessary in order to demonstrate the danger of the individualistic philosophy inherent in romanticism. M. Yu. Lermontov clearly demonstrated the tragedy of the human soul, devoid of faith in anything.

Pechorin and Werner. Friends or pals?

The protagonist of Lermontov's novel is a man disappointed in life, he does not hope for sincere love, the thought of true and pure friendship also seems unrealistic to him. "Of two friends, one is always the slave of the other." He cannot be a slave, but to command is "tedious work." Pechorin becomes close to only one person in the novel - Dr. Werner. But even this short friendship fails.

What are the similarities and differences between Pechorin and Werner?

Like Pechorin himself, everything in Werner was unusual, starting even with his appearance. The appearance of the doctor at first sight "struck unpleasantly": Werner was small, thin and weak, in addition, one of his legs was shorter than the other, like Byron's.

At the first meeting, both heroes distinguished each other among the large and noisy society of young people. Pechorin liked the wit and difficult character of Werner, later in his journal he would make the following entry: “Werner is a wonderful person for many reasons. He is a skeptic and a materialist, like almost all doctors, and at the same time a poet, and in earnest - a poet in deed, always and often in words, although he has not written two poems in his life.

Both characters behave independently. They are ironic both to others and to themselves. Independence causes irritation in secular society. Therefore, the doctor, like Pechorin, had many ill-wishers and envious people. But, despite external independence and pride, both Pechorin and Werner hide their inner life full of drama. Pechorin knew and observed more than once what feelings were hidden under the mask of a strict skeptic, he wrote in his journal: “Usually, Werner surreptitiously mocked his patients; but I once saw him weep over a dying soldier.”

Pechorin, despaired of life and chose, in his own words, the path of hatred and evil. Werner honestly worked as a doctor, but he also acutely felt the injustice and imperfection of the world around him.

How are these characters different from each other?

According to Maxim Maksimych, Pechorin was the kind of person who was born in order for something to happen to him. Indeed, the main character more than once got into adventurous stories. During this time, he gathered a wealth of experience and knowledge, which he willingly applied in life, in dealing with people. And Werner, in whom one could easily discern “the imprint of a tried and high soul,” remained aloof. Pechorin creates adventures for himself, actively interfering in the fate and lives of those around him, often bringing people pain and suffering. Werner, dreaming of escaping poverty, would not have taken an extra step for money. He also experiments on people, but unlike Pechorin, he is passive, trying to avoid collisions with them. Pechorin, even in a conversation, goes to the end, infuriating the interlocutor. For him, happiness is “saturated pride.”

Werner blindly follows the lead of Pechorin, a stronger man, in the story of the duel, although this business is unpleasant for him, and he is afraid for his reputation. Tormented by moral doubts before the duel, Dr. Werner quickly calms down from Pechorin's simple joke about the meaninglessness and emptiness of human life. But when the deed is already done - Grushnitsky is killed, and a serious wound is inflicted on Princess Mary's feelings, Werner begins to realize the full depth of Pechorin's selfishness, he reproaches his friend for cold prudence, sending him a note: "There is no evidence against you, and you can sleep peacefully, if you can". But Werner himself showed in this situation no less indifference and cruelty than the main character, being an accomplice in the duel and all the intrigues.

Therefore, Pechorin does not experience disappointment in this person after parting. He is arrogantly calm, he assumed the following outcome of their relationship: “Here are the people! All of them are like this: they know in advance all the bad sides of an act, they help, advise, even approve of it ... - and then they wash their hands and turn away indignantly from the one who had the courage to take bear the full burden of responsibility."

Pechorin and Werner cannot be called friends. The friendly relations of these people broke up, without turning into friendship, broke up from the very first serious life test. After all, friendship only develops into something more when people find in each other not only an opportunity for entertainment, a way to disperse boredom, dispel loneliness. True friendship is a disinterested interest in the fate of a person close to you, it is self-sacrifice. Neither Pechorin nor Werner are capable of such deep feelings. Their destiny is loneliness, a joyless and meaningless living of life.

The image of Werner contributes to a more complete disclosure of the inner appearance of the protagonist. Next to the smart Werner, Pechorin is just as lonely as with other characters in the novel.