Mikhail Zoshchenko is a master of short satirical stories. Zoshchenko - unfortunate case - story

Zoshchenko would not be himself if it were not for his manner of writing. It was a language unknown to literature, and therefore not having its own spelling language. Zoshchenko was endowed perfect pitch and brilliant memory. During the years spent in the midst of poor people, he managed to penetrate the secret of their colloquial construction, with its characteristic vulgarisms, incorrect grammatical forms and syntactic constructions managed to adopt the intonation of their speech, their expressions, phrases, words - he studied this language to the subtlety and from the first steps in literature began to use it easily and naturally. In his language, expressions such as “plitoir”, “okromya”, “hresh”, “this”, “in him”, “brunette”, “drunk”, “for biting”, “fuck cry”, “ this poodle", "silent animal", "at the stove", etc. But Zoshchenko is a writer not only of a comic style, but also of comic situations. Not only his language is comical, but also the place where the story of the next story unfolded: a commemoration, a communal apartment, a hospital - everything is so familiar, familiar, everyday. And the story itself: a fight in a communal apartment because of a scarce hedgehog, a scandal at the wake because of a broken glass.

The 1920s saw the heyday of the main genre varieties the writer's work: a satirical story, a comic novel and a satirical-humorous story. Already at the very beginning of the 1920s, the writer created a number of works that were highly appreciated by M. Gorky. Published in 1922 "Stories of Nazar Ilyich Mr. Sinebryukhov"

Got everyone's attention. Against the background of the short stories of those years, the figure of the hero-storyteller, the grated, experienced man Nazar Ilyich Sinebryukhov, who went through the front and saw a lot in the world, stood out sharply. M. Zoshchenko seeks and finds a kind of intonation, in which the lyric-ironic beginning and the intimate-confiding note are fused together, removing any barrier between the narrator and the listener. Sometimes the narrative is quite skillfully built on the type of a well-known absurdity, beginning with the words "a tall man of short stature was walking." Such inconsistencies create a certain comic effect. True, as long as he does not have that distinct satirical which will be acquired later. In Sinebryukhov's Tales, such specifically Zoshchenko turns of comic speech, which remained in the reader's memory for a long time, appear as "as if suddenly the atmosphere smelled of me", "they will rob me like sticky and throw them away for their kind, for nothing that their own relatives", "second lieutenant wow, but bastard", "breaks the riots", etc. Subsequently, a stylistic game of a similar type, but with an incomparably sharper social meaning, will manifest itself in the speeches of other heroes - Semyon Semenovich Kurochkin and Gavrilych, on whose behalf the narration was conducted in a number of the most popular comic short stories by Zoshchenko in the first half of the 20s. The works created by the writer in the 1920s were based on specific and very topical facts gleaned either from direct observations or from numerous letters from readers. Their themes are motley and varied: riots in transport and in hostels, grimaces of the New Economic Policy and grimaces of everyday life, the mold of philistinism and philistinism, arrogant pompadourism and creeping servility, and much, much more. Often the story is built in the form of a casual conversation with the reader, and sometimes, when the shortcomings became especially egregious, frankly journalistic notes sounded in the author's voice. In a series of satirical short stories, M. Zoshchenko maliciously ridiculed the cynically prudent or sentimentally thoughtful earners of individual happiness, intelligent scoundrels and boors, showed in the true light of vulgar and worthless people who are ready to trample on everything truly human on the way to arranging personal well-being ("Matrenishcha", "Grimace of NEP", "Lady with flowers", "Nanny", "Marriage of convenience"). In Zoshchenko's satirical stories, there are no spectacular techniques for sharpening the author's thoughts. They are usually devoid of comedy intrigue. M. Zoshchenko acted here as a denouncer of spiritual Okurovism, a satirist of morals. He chose as the object of analysis the philistine-proprietor, the accumulator and money-grubber, who, from a direct political opponent, became an opponent in the sphere of morality, a hotbed of vulgarity. Circle operating in satirical works Zoshchenko's faces are extremely narrowed, there is no image of the crowd, the mass, visibly or invisibly present in humorous short stories. The pace of plot development is slow, the characters are deprived of the dynamism that distinguishes the heroes of other works of the writer. The heroes of these stories are less rude and uncouth than in humorous short stories. The author is primarily interested spiritual world, a system of thinking of an outwardly cultured, but all the more disgusting in essence, tradesman. Oddly enough, but in Zoshchenko's satirical stories there are almost no caricatured, grotesque situations, less comic and no fun at all. However, the main element of Zoshchenko's creativity of the 1920s is still humorous everyday life. Zoshchenko writes about drunkenness, about housing affairs, about losers offended by fate. Zoshchenko has short story"Beggar" - about a hefty and impudent subject who got into the habit of regularly going to the hero-narrator, extorting fifty kopecks from him. When he was tired of all this, he advised the enterprising earner to drop in less often with uninvited visits. “He didn’t come to see me again - he must have been offended,” the narrator remarked melancholy in the finale. Breaking the connection between cause and effect is the traditional source of the comic. It is important to capture the type of conflicts characteristic of a given environment and era and convey them by means of satirical art. Zoshchenko is dominated by the motive of discord, worldly absurdity, some kind of tragicomic inconsistency of the hero with the pace, rhythm and spirit of the times. Sometimes Zoshchenko's hero really wants to keep up with progress. A hastily assimilated modern trend seems to such a respected citizen not only as a ride of loyalty, but as an example of organic adaptation to revolutionary reality. Hence the passion for fashion names and political terminology, hence the desire to assert their "proletarian" insides through bravado rudeness, ignorance, rudeness. The dominance of a trifle, the slavery of trifles, the comicality of the absurd and absurd - this is what the writer pays attention to in a series of sentimental stories. However, there is also much here that is new, even unexpected for the reader who knew Zoshchenko the novelist. Satire, like all Soviet fiction changed significantly in the 1930s. creative destiny the author of "The Aristocrat" and "Sentimental Tales" was no exception. The writer who exposed philistinism, ridiculed philistinism, wrote ironically and parodicly about the poisonous scum of the past, turns his eyes in a completely different direction. Zoshchenko is fascinated by the tasks of socialist transformation. He works in the large-circulation newspapers of Leningrad enterprises, visits the construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal, listening to the rhythms of the grandiose process of social renewal. There is a turning point in all his work: from the worldview to the tonality of the narrative and style. During this period, Zoshchenko was seized by the idea of ​​​​merging satire and heroism together. Theoretically, this thesis was proclaimed by him at the very beginning of the 1930s, and practically implemented in "Returned Youth" (1933), "The Story of a Life" (1934), the story "The Blue Book" (1935) and a number of stories of the second half: 30s. The satirist saw the amazing vitality of all kinds of social weeds and by no means underestimated the abilities of the tradesman and the layman for mimicry and opportunism. However, in the 1930s, to solve eternal question about human happiness, new prerequisites arise, due to gigantic socialist transformations, cultural revolution. This has a significant impact on the nature and direction of the writer's work. Zoshchenko has teaching intonations that did not exist at all before. The satirist not only and even not so much ridicules, castigates, as patiently teaches, explains, interprets, referring to the mind and conscience of the reader. High and pure didactics was embodied with special perfection in a cycle of touching and affectionate stories for children written in 1937-1938.

The writer, in his own way, saw some of the characteristic processes of modern reality. He is the creator of the original comic novel, which continued the traditions of Gogol, Leskov, and early Chekhov in new historical terms. Z created his own unique thin style.

There are 3 main stages in his work.

1Years of two wars and revolutions (1914-1921) - a period of intense spiritual growth the future writer, the formation of his literary and aesthetic convictions.

2Civil and moral formation Z as a comedian and satirist, an artist of significant public theme falls on the October period. The first one falls on the 20s - the period of the flourishing of the writer's talent, who honed the pen of the accuser of social vices in such popular satirical magazines of that time as "Begemot", "Buzoter", "Red Raven", "Inspector", "Eccentric", "Laugher". ". At this time, the formation of Zoshchenko's short story and story takes place. In the 1920s, the main genre varieties in the writer's work flourished: a satirical story, a comic novel and a satirical-humorous story. Already at the very beginning of the 1920s, the writer created a number of works that were highly appreciated by M. Gorky. The works created by the writer in the 1920s were based on specific and very topical facts gleaned either from direct observations or from numerous letters from readers. Their themes are motley and varied: riots in transport and in hostels, grimaces of the New Economic Policy and grimaces of everyday life, the mold of philistinism and philistinism, arrogant pompadourism and creeping servility, and much, much more. Often the story is built in the form of a casual conversation with the reader, and sometimes, when the shortcomings became especially egregious, frankly journalistic notes sounded in the author's voice. In a series of satirical short stories, M. Zoshchenko maliciously ridiculed the cynically prudent or sentimentally thoughtful earners of individual happiness, intelligent scoundrels and boors, showed in the true light of vulgar and worthless people who are ready to trample on everything truly human on the way to arranging personal well-being ("Matrenishcha", "Grimace of NEP", "Lady with flowers", "Nanny", "Marriage of convenience"). In Zoshchenko's satirical stories, there are no spectacular techniques for sharpening the author's thoughts. They are usually devoid of comedy intrigue. M. Zoshchenko acted here as a denouncer of spiritual Okurovism, a satirist of morals. He chose as the object of analysis the philistine-proprietor, the accumulator and money-grubber, who, from a direct political opponent, became an opponent in the sphere of morality, a hotbed of vulgarity. the main element of the creative work of the 1920s is still humorous everyday life.

1 In 1920-1921 Zoshchenko wrote the first stories of those that were subsequently published: Love, War, Old Woman Wrangel, Fish female. (1928-1932).

2By the mid-1920s, Zoshchenko became one of the most popular writers. His stories The Bathhouse, The Aristocrat, The Case History, etc., which he himself often read to numerous audiences, were known and loved by all sections of society. activity (custom feuilletons for the press, plays, film scripts, etc.), Zoshchenko's true talent manifested itself only in stories for children, which he wrote for the magazines "Chizh" and "Ezh".

Stories by M.M. Zoshchenko

significant place Zoshchenko's work is occupied by stories in which the writer directly responds to real events day. The most famous among them are: "Aristocrat", "Glass", "History of the disease", "Nervous people", "Fitter". It was a language unknown to literature, and therefore not having its own spelling language. Zoshchenko was endowed with absolute pitch and a brilliant memory. During the years spent in the midst of poor people, he managed to penetrate the secret of their conversational construction, with its characteristic vulgarisms, incorrect grammatical forms and syntactic constructions, he managed to adopt the intonation of their speech, their expressions, turns, words - he studied this language to the subtlety and already from the first steps in literature, he began to use it easily and naturally. In his language, expressions such as "plitoire", "okromya", "hresh", "this", "in it", "brunette", "drunk", "for biting", "fuck cry", " this poodle", "a wordless animal", "at the stove", etc. But Zoshchenko is a writer not only of a comic style, but also of comic situations. Not only his language is comical, but also the place where the story of the next story unfolded: a commemoration, a communal apartment, a hospital - everything is so familiar, familiar, everyday. And the story itself: a fight in a communal apartment because of a scarce hedgehog, a scandal at the wake because of a broken glass. Some of Zoshchenko’s phrases have remained in Russian literature as euphemisms: “as if suddenly I smelled the atmosphere”, “they will rob me like sticky and throw them away for their kind, even if they are my own relatives”, “lieutenant to himself, but a bastard”, “disturbs the riots.” Zoshchenko while writing his stories, he himself laughed. So much so that later, when I read stories to my friends, I never laughed. He sat gloomy, gloomy, as if not understanding what he could laugh at.

Having laughed while working on the story, he then perceived it as longing and sadness. I took it as the other side of the coin.

The hero Zoshchenko is a layman, a man with poor morals and a primitive outlook on life. This inhabitant personified the whole human layer of the then Russia. the layman often spent all his strength on fighting all sorts of petty everyday troubles, instead of actually doing something for the good of society. But the writer did not ridicule the man himself, but the philistine features in him.

So, the hero of "The Aristocrat" (1923) was carried away by one person in fildekos stockings and a hat. While he "as an official" visited the apartment, and then walked along the street, experiencing the inconvenience of having to take the lady by the arm and "drag like a pike", everything was relatively safe. But as soon as the hero invited an aristocrat to the theater, "she and

unfolded its ideology in its entirety". Seeing cakes in the intermission, the aristocrat "approaches with a depraved gait to the dish and chop with cream and eats."

The lady has eaten three cakes and is reaching for the fourth.

"That's when the blood hit my head.

Lie down, - I say, - back!"

After this climax, events unfold like an avalanche, involving an increasing number of actors in their orbit. As a rule, in the first half of Zoshchenko's short story one or two, many - three characters are presented. And only when the plot progresses highest point When there is a need and a need to typify the described phenomenon, to sharpen it satirically, a more or less written group of people appears, sometimes a crowd.

Same with Aristocrat. The closer to the finale, the more faces the author brings to the stage. First, the figure of the barman appears, who, to all the assurances of the hero, ardently proving that only three pieces have been eaten, since the fourth cake is on the platter, "keeps indifferent."

No, - he answers, - although it is in the dish, but a bite was made on it and crumpled with a finger.

Here are amateur experts, some of whom "say - the bite is done, others - no." And, finally, the crowd attracted by the scandal, which laughs at the sight of the unlucky theater-goer, convulsively turning out his pockets with all kinds of junk before her eyes.

Only two remain in the final actors finalizing their relationship. The story ends with a dialogue between the offended lady and the hero dissatisfied with her behavior.

"And at the house she says to me in her bourgeois tone:

Pretty disgusting of you. Those without money don't travel with ladies.

And I say:

Not in money, citizen, happiness. Sorry for the expression."

As you can see, both sides are offended. Moreover, both sides believe only in their own truth, being firmly convinced that it is the opposite side that is wrong. The hero of Zoshchenko's story invariably regards himself as an infallible, "respectable citizen", although in reality he acts as a swaggering layman.

Mikhail Zoshchenko, satirist and humorist, a writer unlike anyone else, with a special view of the world, the system of social and human relations, culture, morality, and, finally, with his own special Zoshchenko language, strikingly different from the language of everyone before him and after him writers working in the genre of satire. But the main discovery of Zoshchenko's prose is his heroes, the most ordinary, inconspicuous people who do not play, according to the writer's sadly ironic remark, "a role in the complex mechanism of our days." These people are far from understanding the causes and meaning of the ongoing changes; they cannot, due to habits, attitudes, and intellect, adapt to the emerging relations in society. They cannot get used to the new state laws and regulations, so they end up in ridiculous, stupid, sometimes dead-end everyday situations from which they cannot get out on their own, and if they do succeed, then with great moral and physical losses.

In literary criticism, the opinion has taken root to consider Zoshchenko's heroes as philistines, narrow-minded, vulgar people whom the satirist castigates, ridicules, subjected to "sharp, annihilating" criticism, helping a person "get rid of morally obsolete, but not yet lost their power, remnants of the past swept away by the revolution." Unfortunately, the writer's sympathy for his heroes was not noticed at all, the anxiety for their fate hidden behind irony, that same Gogol's "laughter through tears", which is inherent in most short stories Zoshchenko" and especially his, as he called them, sentimental stories.

The ancient Greek philosopher Plato, demonstrating to his students how a person behaves under the influence of certain life circumstances, took a puppet and pulled one or the other thread, and it took unnatural poses, became ugly, pitiful, funny, deformed, turned into a pile of ridiculously combined parts and limbs. Zoshchenko's characters are like this puppet, and rapidly changing circumstances (laws, orders, public relations etc.), to which they cannot get used and adapt, are like threads that make them defenseless or stupid, miserable or ugly, worthless or arrogant. All this creates a comic effect, and in combination with colloquial words, jargon, verbal puns and blunders, specific Zoshchenko phrases and expressions (“what did you fight for?”, “an aristocrat is not a woman at all for me, but a smooth place”, “we holes are not attached”, “sorry, then sorry”, etc.) causes, depending on their concentration, a smile or laughter, which, according to the writer’s intention, should help a person understand what is “good, what is bad, and what "mediocre". What are these circumstances (“threads”) that are so merciless to those who did not play any significant “role in the complex mechanism of our days”?

In "Banya" - these are the orders in the city communal services, based on a disdainful attitude towards common man, who can afford to go only to the "ordinary" bath, where they take "a dime" for the entrance. In such a bath “they give two numbers. One for underwear, the other for a coat with a hat. And for a naked person, where to put the numbers? So the visitor has to tie "a number to his feet so as not to lose it at once." And it is inconvenient for the visitor, and he looks ridiculous and stupid, but what remains to be done ... - "do not go to America." In the stories "Nervous People", "Crisis" and "The Restless Old Man" it is the economic backwardness that has paralyzed civil construction. And as a result - “not just a fight, but a whole fight” in a communal apartment, during which the disabled Gavrilov “almost chopped off his last head” (“Nervous People”), the flight of the head of a young family, who “lived in a master’s bath” , rented for thirty rubles in, again, a communal apartment, seemed like a living hell, and, finally, the impossibility of finding a place for a coffin with the deceased, all because of the same housing disorder ("Restless Old Man"). Zoshchenko's characters can only cheer themselves up with hope: “In maybe twenty years, or even less, every citizen, I suppose, will have a whole room. And if the population does not increase rapidly and, for example, abortions are allowed for everyone, then two at a time. And then three per snout. With a bath” (“Crisis”).

In a nutshell, "Product Quality" is a thriving manufacturing hack and a shortage of basic commodities, forcing people to rush to "foreign products." In the stories "Medic" and "History of the disease" - this is a low level of medical care. What remains for the patient to do, how not to turn to a healer if he is threatened by a meeting with a doctor who “performed an operation with filthy hands”, “he dropped his glasses from his nose into the intestines and cannot find” (“Medic”)? And isn’t it better to “get sick at home” than to be treated in a hospital where, at the reception and registration point for patients, a poster “Issue of corpses from 3 to 4” hangs on the wall, and they offer to wash in the bath with an old woman (“History disease")? And what objections can there be from the patient, when the nurse still has “weighty” arguments: “Yes, this is one sick old woman sitting here. You don't pay attention to her. She has a high temperature and is not responding to anything. So you undress without embarrassment.

Zoshchenko's characters, like obedient puppets, resignedly submit to circumstances. And if someone “extremely cocky” suddenly appears, like the old peasant from the story “Lights big city”, who arrived from an unknown collective farm, in bast shoes, with a bag behind his back and a stick, who is trying to protest and defend his human dignity, then the authorities are of the opinion that he is “not exactly a counter-revolutionary”, but is distinguished by “exceptional backwardness in the political sense”, and administrative measures must be applied to him. Suppose, "report to the place of residence." It’s good that at least not to be sent to places not as remote as it was in the Stalin years.

Being an optimist by nature, Zoshchenko hoped that his stories would make people better, and those, in turn, would improve social relations. The "threads" that make a person look like a disenfranchised, pitiful, spiritually wretched "puppet" will break. “Brothers, the main difficulties are behind us,” exclaims a character from the story “The Sufferings of Young Werther”. “Soon we will live like fonbarons.” There should be only one central thread that controls human behavior - "the golden thread of reason and law," as the philosopher Plato said. Then the person will not be an obedient doll, but will be a harmonious personality. In the story “City Lights”, which has elements of a sentimental utopia, Zoshchenko, through the mouth of one of the characters, proclaims his formula for a moral panacea: “I have always defended the point of view that respect for the individual, praise and reverence bring exceptional results. And many characters from this are revealed, literally like roses at dawn. The writer associated the spiritual renewal of man and society with the familiarization of people with culture.

Zoshchenko, an intelligent person who received excellent upbringing, it was painful to watch the manifestation of ignorance, rudeness and spiritual emptiness. It is no coincidence that the events in the stories devoted to this topic often take place in the theater. Let us recall his stories “The Aristocrat”, “The Charms of Culture”, etc. The theater serves as a symbol of spiritual culture, which was so lacking in society and without which, the writer believed, it is impossible to improve society.

Finally, the good name of the writer has been completely restored. The works of the satirist are of great interest to modern readers. Zoshchenko's laughter is still relevant today.

Russian satirical writers in the 1920s were particularly bold and frank in their statements. All of them were heirs of the Russian realism XIX century.

The popularity of M. Zoshchenko in the 1920s could be envied by any venerable writer in Russia. But his fate was severe in the future: Zhdanov's criticism, and then - a long oblivion, after which the "discovery" of this remarkable writer for the Russian reader again followed. Zoshchenko began to be mentioned as a writer writing for the entertainment of the public. It is known that many were perplexed when the "Adventures of the Monkey" incurred the wrath of officials from the Soviet culture. But the Bolsheviks had already developed a flair for their antipodes. A. A. Zhdanov, criticizing and destroying Zoshchenko, who ridiculed stupidity and stupidity of Soviet life, against his own will, guessed in him a great artist, representing a danger to the existing system. Zoshchenko not directly, not in the forehead ridiculed cult of Bolshevik ideas, and with a sad smile protested against any violence against a person. It is also known that in his prefaces to the editions of Sentimental Tales, with the proposed misunderstanding and perversion of his work, he wrote: , presumably, will sound for some critics some kind of shrill flute, some kind of sentimental insulting offal.

One of the most significant stories of this book is "What the nightingale sang about." The author himself said about this story that it is "... perhaps the least sentimental of sentimental stories." Or again: “And what in this work of cheerfulness, perhaps, will seem to someone not enough, then this is not true. There is vivacity here. Not over the edge, of course, but there is.

"But" they will laugh at us in three hundred years! Strange, they will say, little people lived. Some, they will say, they had money, passports. Some acts of civil status and square meters of living space ... "

His moral ideals were directed to the future. Zoshchenko acutely felt hardness of human relationships, the vulgarity of his surrounding life. This can be seen from the way he deals with the topic. human personality in a little story about true love and genuine thrill of feelings”, about “absolutely extraordinary love”. Tormented by thoughts of the future a better life, the writer often doubts and wonders: “Will she be beautiful?” And then he draws the simplest, most common version of such a future: “Maybe everything will be free, for nothing. For example, they will impose some fur coats or mufflers for free in Gostiny Dvor. Next, the writer proceeds to create the image of the hero. His hero is the simplest person, and his name is ordinary - Vasily Bylinkin. The reader expects that the author will now begin to ridicule his hero, but no, the author seriously tells about Bylinkin's love for Liza Rundukova. All actions that accelerate the gap between lovers, despite their ridiculousness (the culprit is a chest of drawers not given by the bride's mother) is a serious family drama. Among Russian satirical writers, in general, drama and comedy exist side by side. Zoshchenko, as it were, tells us that, while people like Vasily Bylinkin, to the question: “What is the nightingale singing about?” - they will answer: "He wants to eat, that's why he sings", - we will not see a worthy future. Zoshchenko does not idealize our past either. To be convinced of this, it is enough to read the Blue Book. The writer knows how much vulgar and cruel humanity is behind him, so that he can immediately free himself from this heritage. True fame brought him small humorous stories that he published in various magazines and newspapers - in Literary Week, Izvestia, Ogonyok, Crocodile and many others.

Zoshchenko's humorous stories were included in various of his books. In new combinations, each time they made me look at myself in a new way: sometimes they appeared as a cycle of stories about darkness and ignorance, and sometimes - as stories about small purchasers. Often they were talking about those who were left out of history. But always they were perceived as stories sharply satirical.

Years have passed, changed living conditions our life, but even the absence of those numerous details of everyday life in which the characters of the stories existed did not weaken the power of Zoshchenko's satire. It’s just that earlier the terrible and disgusting details of everyday life were perceived only as a caricature, but today they have acquired the features of a grotesque, phantasmagoria.

The same thing happened with the heroes of Zoshchenko's stories: to the modern reader, they may seem unreal, completely invented. However, Zoshchenko, with his sharp feeling justice and hatred militant philistinism, never departed from the real vision of the world.

Even on the example of several stories, one can determine the objects of the writer's satire. In "Hard Times" the main "hero is a dark, ignorant man, with a wild, primitive idea about freedom and rights. When he is not allowed to bring a horse into the store, which must certainly be tried on a collar, he complains: “Well, it's a little time. They don't let a horse into the shop... And just now we were sitting in a beer-house with her - and at least henna. Nobody said a word. The manager even personally laughed sincerely ... Well, it's a little time.

A related character is found in the story "Point of View". This is Yegorka, who, when asked whether there are many "conscious women", declares that there are "not enough of them at all." Rather, he remembered one: “Yes, and that one knows how ... (Maybe it will end.” The most conscious is a woman who, on the advice of some healer, took six unknown pills and is now dying.

In the story "Capital Thing" the main character, Leshka Konovalov, is a thief posing as an experienced person. [At a meeting in the village, he was considered a worthy candidate for the position of chairman: after all, he had just arrived from the city (“... he rubbed himself in the city for two years”). Everyone takes him for [a kind of "metropolitan thing" - no one knows what he was doing there. However, Leshka's monologue betrays him with his head: “You can talk ... Why not say this when I know everything ... I know the decree or some order and note. Or, for example, the code... I know everything. For two years, maybe I've been rubbing it... Sometimes I sit in a cell, and they run to you. Explain, they say, Lesha, what kind of note and decree is this.

It is interesting that not only Lesha, who spent two years in the Crosses, but also many other heroes of Zoshchenko's stories are in full confidence that they know absolutely everything and can judge everything. Savagery, obscurantism, primitiveness, some kind of militant ignorance- these are their main features.

However, the main object of Zoshchenko's satire was a phenomenon that, from his point of view, represented the greatest danger to society. This blatant, triumphant philistinism. It appears in Zoshchenko's work in such an unattractive form that the reader clearly feels the need for an immediate struggle against this phenomenon. Zoshchenko shows it comprehensively: both from the economic side, and from the point of view of morality, and even from the standpoint of a simple petty-bourgeois philosophy.

The true hero Zoshchenko in all its glory appears before us in the story "The Bridegroom". This is Yegorka Basov, who was overtaken by a big misfortune: his wife died. Yes, not in time! "The time was, of course, hot - here to mow, here to carry, and to collect bread." What words does his wife hear from him before her death? “Well ... thanks, Katerina Vasilievna, you cut me without a knife. Decided to die at the wrong time. Be patient ... until autumn, and die in autumn. As soon as his wife died, Yegorka went to woo another woman. And what, again a misfire! It turns out that this woman is lame, which means that the hostess is defective. And he takes her back, but does not take her home, but throws off her property somewhere halfway. Main character story - not just a man crushed by poverty and want. This is a man with the psychology of an outright villain. He is completely devoid of elementary human qualities and primitive to the last degree. The features of the tradesman in this image are elevated to a universal scale.

And here is the story philosophical theme"Happiness". The hero is asked if there was happiness in his life. Not everyone will be able to answer this question. But Ivan Fomich Testov knows for sure that in his life "there was definitely happiness." What was it? And the fact that Ivan Fomich managed to insert mirror glass in a tavern for a great price and drink the money he received. And not only! He even made "purchases, in addition: he bought a silver ring and warm insoles." The silver ring is clearly a tribute to aesthetics. Apparently, from satiety - it is impossible to drink and eat everything. The hero does not know whether this happiness is great or small, but he is sure what it is - happiness, and he "remembered it for the rest of his life."

In the story "A Rich Life" a handicraft bookbinder wins five thousand on a gold loan. In theory, "happiness" suddenly fell on him, like on Ivan Fomich Testov. But if he fully “enjoyed” the gift of fate, then in this case money brings discord into the family of the protagonist. There is a quarrel with relatives, the owner himself is afraid to leave the yard - he guards the firewood, and his wife is addicted to playing loto. Nevertheless, the handicraftsman dreams: “Why is this the most ... Will there be a new draw soon? It would be nice for me to win a thousand for good measure ... " Such is the fate limited and petty person- to dream about what will not bring joy anyway, and not even guess why.

Among his heroes, it is easy to meet both ignorant chatterboxes-demagogues who consider themselves the guardians of some ideology, and "art lovers", who, as a rule, demand the return of their money for a ticket, and most importantly, endless, indestructible and all-conquering "terry" philistines. The accuracy and sharpness of each phrase is amazing. “I write about philistinism. Yes, we do not have philistinism as a class, but for the most part I make a collective type. In each of us there are certain traits of a tradesman, and an owner, and a money-grubber. I combine these characteristic, often obscured features in one hero, and then this hero becomes familiar to us and seen somewhere.

Among the literary heroes of the prose of the 1920s, characters in the stories of M. Zoshchenko occupy a special place. An infinite number of small people, often poorly educated, not weighed down by the burden of culture, but who realized themselves as "hegemons" in the new society. M. Zoshchenko insisted on the right to write about "an individual insignificant person." It was the "little people" of the new time, who make up the majority of the country's population, who were enthusiastic about the task of destroying the "bad" old and building the "good" new. Critics did not want to "recognize" a new person in the heroes of M. Zoshchenko. With regard to these characters, they either talked about the anecdotal refraction of the “old”, or about the writer’s conscious emphasis on everything that prevents the Soviet person from becoming “new”. It was sometimes reproached that he brought out not so much "a social type as a primitive thinking and feeling person in general." Among the critics were those who accused Zoshchenko of contempt for "a new man born of the revolution." The hypocrisy of the characters was undeniable. I really did not want to connect them with a new life. The heroes of Zoshchenko are immersed in everyday life.

Zoshchenko's military past (he volunteered for the front at the very beginning of the war, commanded a company, then a battalion, was awarded four times for bravery, was wounded, poisoned by poisonous gases, resulting in heart disease) was partly reflected in the stories of Nazar Ilyich Mr. Sinebryukhov (Great society history).

As you wish, comrades, I sympathize with Nikolai Ivanovich very much.

This nice man suffered for all six hryvnias, and he did not see anything particularly outstanding for this money.

Only that his character turned out to be soft and compliant. Another person in his place would have scattered all the movies and smoked the audience out of the hall. Therefore, six hryvnias do not lie on the floor every day. Need to understand.

And on Saturday, our darling, Nikolai Ivanovich, drank a little, of course. After pay.

And this man was the highest degree conscious. Another drunk person began to buzz and get upset, and Nikolai Ivanovich decorously and nobly walked along the avenue. Sang something there.

Suddenly he looks - in front of him is a movie.

“Give it to me, I think it’s all the same - I’ll go to the cinema. A man, he thinks, I am cultured, semi-intelligent, why should I talk drunkenly on the panels and hurt passers-by? Give, he thinks, I'll watch the tape in a drunken state. I never did".

He bought for his pure ticket. And sat in the front row.

He sat down in the front row and looked decorously and nobly.

Only, maybe, he looked at one inscription, suddenly he went to Riga. Therefore, it is very warm in the hall, the audience breathes and the darkness has a positive effect on the psyche.

Our Nikolai Ivanovich went to Riga, everything is decorous and noble - he does not touch anyone, the screen is not enough with his hands, he does not unscrew the light bulbs, but sits for himself and quietly goes to Riga.

Suddenly, the sober public began to express dissatisfaction with, therefore, Riga.

- Could, - they say, - comrade, for this purpose, take a walk in the foyer, only, they say, you distract those watching the drama with other ideas.

Nikolai Ivanovich - a man of culture, conscious - did not, of course, argue and get excited in vain. And he got up and went quietly.

“What, he thinks, to mess with the sober? You can't avoid scandal from them."

He went to the exit. Returns to the cashier.

“Just now,” he says, “lady, I bought a ticket from you, I ask you to return the money back.” Because I can’t look at the picture - it drives me in the dark.

Cashier says:

“We can’t give the money back, if you are being driven around, go to sleep quietly.”

There was an uproar and an uproar. Another would have been in the place of Nikolai Ivanych by the hair would have dragged the cashier out of the cash register and returned his most pure ones. And Nikolai Ivanovich, a quiet and cultured man, only once shoved the cashier:

“You,” he says, “understand, infection, I haven’t looked at your tape yet. Give, he says, my pure ones.

And everything is so decorous and noble, without scandal, - he asks to return his own money in general. This is where the manager comes in.

- We, - he says, - do not return money back - once, he says, it's taken, be kind enough to watch the tape.

Another would have spat in Nikolai Ivanovich's place and would have gone to inspect for his purest ones. A Nikolay

Ivanovich became very sad about the money, he began to explain himself fervently and went back to Riga.

Here, of course, they grabbed Nikolai Ivanovich like a dog, dragged him to the police. They kept it until the morning. And in the morning they took a three-ruble fine from him and released him.

I feel very sorry for Nikolai Ivanovich now. Such, you know, an unfortunate case: a person, one might say, did not even look at the tape, he just held on to a ticket - and, please, drive three-six hryvnias for this petty pleasure. And for what, one wonders, three six hryvnia?