Nekrasov to whom in Rus' to live well reading. Nekrasov to whom in Rus' to live well
Nikolay Alekseevich Nekrasov
Who lives well in Rus'
PART ONE
In what year - count
In what land - guess
On the pillar path
Seven men came together:
Seven temporarily liable,
tightened province,
County Terpigorev,
empty parish,
From adjacent villages:
Zaplatova, Dyryavina,
Razutova, Znobishina,
Gorelova, Neelova -
Crop failure, too,
Agreed - and argued:
Who has fun
Feel free in Rus'?
Roman said: to the landowner,
Demyan said: to the official,
Luke said: ass.
Fat-bellied merchant! -
Gubin brothers said
Ivan and Mitrodor.
Old man Pahom pushed
And he said, looking at the ground:
noble boyar,
Minister of the State.
And Prov said: to the king ...
Man what a bull: vtemyashitsya
In the head what a whim -
Stake her from there
You won’t knock out: they rest,
Everyone is on their own!
Is there such a dispute?
What do passers-by think?
To know that the children found the treasure
And they share...
To each his own
Left the house before noon:
That path led to the forge,
He went to the village of Ivankovo
Call Father Prokofy
Baptize the child.
Pahom honeycombs
Carried to the market in the Great,
And two brothers Gubina
So simple with a halter
Catching a stubborn horse
They went to their own herd.
It's high time for everyone
Return your way -
They are walking side by side!
They walk like they're running
Behind them are gray wolves,
What is further - then sooner.
They go - they perekorya!
They shout - they will not come to their senses!
And time does not wait.
They didn't notice the controversy
As the red sun set
How the evening came.
Probably a whole night
So they went - where not knowing,
When they meet a woman,
Crooked Durandiha,
She did not shout: “Venerable!
Where are you looking at night
Have you thought about going?..”
Asked, laughed
Whipped, witch, gelding
And jumped off...
"Where? .." - exchanged glances
Here are our men
They stand, they are silent, they look down...
The night has long gone
Frequent stars lit up
In high skies
The moon surfaced, the shadows are black
The road was cut
Zealous walkers.
Oh shadows! black shadows!
Who won't you chase?
Who won't you overtake?
Only you, black shadows,
You can not catch - hug!
To the forest, to the path
He looked, was silent Pahom,
I looked - I scattered my mind
And he said at last:
"Well! goblin glorious joke
He played a trick on us!
After all, we are without a little
Thirty miles away!
Home now toss and turn -
We are tired - we will not reach,
Come on, there's nothing to be done.
Let's rest until the sun! .. "
Having dumped the trouble on the devil,
Under the forest along the path
The men sat down.
They lit a fire, formed,
Two ran away for vodka,
And the rest for a while
The glass is made
I pulled the birch bark.
The vodka came soon.
Ripe and snack -
The men are feasting!
Kosushki drank three,
Ate - and argued
Again: who has fun to live,
Feel free in Rus'?
Roman shouts: to the landowner,
Demyan shouts: to the official,
Luke yells: ass;
Fat-bellied merchant, -
The Gubin brothers are screaming,
Ivan and Mitrodor;
Pahom shouts: to the brightest
noble boyar,
Minister of the State,
And Prov shouts: to the king!
Taken more than ever
perky men,
Cursing swearing,
No wonder they get stuck
Into each other's hair...
Look - they've got it!
Roman hits Pakhomushka,
Demyan hits Luka.
And two brothers Gubina
They iron Prov hefty, -
And everyone screams!
A booming echo woke up
Went for a walk, a walk,
It went screaming, shouting,
As if to tease
Stubborn men.
King! - heard to the right
Left responds:
Butt! ass! ass!
The whole forest was in turmoil
With flying birds
By swift-footed beasts
And creeping reptiles, -
And a groan, and a roar, and a rumble!
First of all, a gray bunny
From a neighboring bush
Suddenly jumped out, as if tousled,
And off he went!
Behind him are small jackdaws
At the top of the birches raised
Nasty, sharp squeak.
And here at the foam
With fright, a tiny chick
Fell from the nest;
Chirping, crying chiffchaff,
Where is the chick? - will not find!
Then the old cuckoo
I woke up and thought
Someone to cuckoo;
Taken ten times
Yes, it crashed every time
And started again...
Cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo!
Bread will sting
You choke on an ear -
You won't poop!
Seven owls flocked,
Admire the carnage
From seven big trees
Laugh, midnighters!
And their eyes are yellow
They burn like burning wax
Fourteen candles!
And the raven, the smart bird,
Ripe, sitting on a tree
At the very fire.
Sitting and praying to hell
To be slammed to death
Someone!
Cow with a bell
What has strayed since the evening
From the herd, I heard a little
human voices -
Came to the fire, tired
Eyes on men
I listened to crazy speeches
And began, my heart,
Moo, moo, moo!
Silly cow mooing
Small jackdaws squeak.
The boys are screaming,
And the echo echoes everything.
He has one concern -
To tease honest people
Scare guys and women!
Nobody saw him
And everyone has heard
Without a body - but it lives,
Without a tongue - screaming!
Owl - Zamoskvoretskaya
Princess - immediately mooing,
Flying over peasants
Rushing about the ground,
That about the bushes with a wing ...
The fox herself is cunning,
Out of curiosity,
Sneaked up on the men
I listened, I listened
And she walked away, thinking:
"And the devil does not understand them!"
And indeed: the disputants themselves
Hardly knew, remembered -
What are they talking about...
Naming the sides decently
To each other, come to their senses
Finally, the peasants
Drunk from a puddle
Washed, refreshed
Sleep began to roll them ...
In the meantime, a tiny chick,
Little by little, half a sapling,
flying low,
Got to the fire.
Pakhomushka caught him,
He brought it to the fire, looked at it
And he said: "Little bird,
And the nail is up!
I breathe - you roll off the palm of your hand,
Sneeze - roll into the fire,
I click - you will roll dead,
And yet you, little bird,
Stronger than a man!
Wings will get stronger soon
Bye-bye! wherever you want
You will fly there!
Oh you little pichuga!
Give us your wings
We will circle the whole kingdom,
Let's see, let's see
Let's ask and find out:
Who lives happily
Feel free in Rus'?
"You don't even need wings,
If only we had bread
Half a pood a day, -
And so we would Mother Rus'
They measured it with their feet!” -
Said the sullen Prov.
"Yes, a bucket of vodka," -
Added willing
Before vodka, the Gubin brothers,
Ivan and Mitrodor.
“Yes, in the morning there would be cucumbers
Salty ten, "-
The men joked.
“And at noon would be a jug
Cold kvass."
"And in the evening for a teapot
Hot tea…”
While they were talking
Curled, whirled foam
Above them: listened to everything
And sat by the fire.
Chiviknula, jumped up
And in a human voice
Pahomu says:
"Let go of the chick!
For a little chick
I'll give you a big ransom."
– What will you give? -
"Lady's bread
Half a pood a day
I'll give you a bucket of vodka
In the morning I will give cucumbers,
And at noon sour kvass,
And in the evening a seagull!
- And where, little pichuga, -
Gubin brothers asked, -
Find wine and bread
Are you on seven men? -
“Find - you will find yourself.
And I, little pichuga,
I'll tell you how to find it."
- Tell! -
"Go through the woods
Against the thirtieth pillar
A straight verst:
Come to the meadow
Standing in that meadow
Two old pines
Beneath these under the pines
Buried box.
Get her -
That box is magical.
It has a self-assembled tablecloth,
Whenever you wish
Eat, drink!
Quietly just say:
"Hey! self-made tablecloth!
Treat the men!”
At your request
At my command
Everything will appear at once.
Now let the chick go!”
Womb - then ask
And you can ask for vodka
In day exactly on a bucket.
If you ask more
And one and two - it will be fulfilled
At your request,
And in the third, be in trouble!
And the foam flew away
With my darling chick,
And the men in single file
Reached for the road
Look for the thirtieth pillar.
Found! - silently go
Straight, straight
Through the dense forest,
Every step counts.
And how they measured a mile,
We saw a meadow -
Standing in that meadow
Two old pines...
The peasants dug
Got that box
Opened and found
That tablecloth self-assembled!
They found it and shouted at once:
“Hey, self-assembled tablecloth!
Treat the men!”
Look - the tablecloth unfolded,
Where did they come from
Two strong hands
A bucket of wine was placed
Bread was laid on a mountain
And they hid again.
“But why aren’t there cucumbers?”
"What is not a hot tea?"
“What is there no cold kvass?”
Everything suddenly appeared...
The peasants unbelted
They sat down by the tablecloth.
Went here feast mountain!
Kissing for joy
promise to each other
Forward do not fight in vain,
And it's quite controversial
By reason, by God,
On the honor of the story -
Do not toss and turn in the houses,
Don't see your wives
Not with the little guys
Not with old old people,
As long as the matter is controversial
Solutions will not be found
Until they tell
No matter how it is for sure:
Who lives happily
Feel free in Rus'?
Having made such a vow,
In the morning like dead
Men fell asleep...
Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Rus'" has its own unique feature. All the names of the villages and the names of the heroes clearly reflect the essence of what is happening. In the first chapter, the reader can get acquainted with seven men from the villages of Zaplatovo, Dyryaevo, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Neyolovo, Neurozhayko, who argue about who lives well in Rus', and in no way cannot come to an agreement. No one is even going to yield to another ... So unusually begins the work that Nikolai Nekrasov conceived in order, as he writes, "to present in a coherent story everything that he knows about the people, everything that happened to be heard from his lips ..."
The history of the creation of the poem
Nikolai Nekrasov began working on his work in the early 1860s and finished the first part five years later. The prologue was published in the January issue of the Sovremennik magazine for 1866. Then painstaking work began on the second part, which was called "Last Child" and was published in 1972. The third part, entitled "Peasant Woman", was released in 1973, and the fourth, "A Feast for the Whole World" - in the fall of 1976, that is, three years later. It is a pity that the author of the legendary epic did not manage to fully complete his plan - the writing of the poem was interrupted by an untimely death - in 1877. However, even after 140 years, this work remains important for people, it is read and studied by both children and adults. The poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'" is included in the mandatory school curriculum.
Part 1. Prologue: who is the happiest in Rus'
So, the prologue tells how seven men meet on a high road, and then go on a journey to find happy person. Who in Rus' lives freely, happily and cheerfully - that's main question curious travelers. Each, arguing with the other, believes that he is right. Roman screams that the most a good life with the landowner, Demyan claims that the official lives wonderfully, Luka proves that, after all, the priest, the rest also express their opinion: “the noble boyar”, “the fat-bellied merchant”, “the minister of the sovereign” or the tsar.
Such a disagreement leads to a ridiculous fight, which is observed by birds and animals. It is interesting to read how the author displays their surprise at what is happening. Even the cow “came to the fire, stared at the peasants, listened to crazy speeches and began, cordially, to moo, moo, moo! ..”
At last, having kneaded each other's sides, the peasants came to their senses. They saw a tiny warbler chick flying up to the fire, and Pahom took it in his hands. The travelers began to envy the little bird that could fly wherever it wanted. They talked about what everyone wants, when suddenly ... the bird spoke in a human voice, asking to release the chick and promising a large ransom for it.
The bird showed the peasants the way to where the real tablecloth was buried. Wow! Now you can definitely live, not grieve. But the quick-witted wanderers also asked that their clothes not wear out. “And this will be done by a self-assembled tablecloth,” said the warbler. And she kept her promise.
The life of the peasants began to be full and cheerful. But they have not yet resolved the main question: who still lives well in Rus'. And friends decided not to return to their families until they find the answer to it.
Chapter 1. Pop
On the way, the peasants met the priest and, bowing low, asked him to answer “in conscience, without laughter and without cunning,” whether he really lives well in Rus'. What the pop said dispelled the ideas of the seven curious about his happy life. No matter how severe the circumstances are - a dead autumn night, or a severe frost, or a spring flood - the priest has to go where he is called, without arguing or contradicting. The work is not easy, besides, the groans of people leaving for another world, the weeping of orphans and the sobs of widows completely upset the peace of the priest's soul. And only outwardly it seems that pop is held in high esteem. In fact, he is often the target of ridicule. common people.
Chapter 2
Further, the road leads purposeful wanderers to other villages, which for some reason turn out to be empty. The reason is that all the people are at the fair, in the village of Kuzminskoye. And it was decided to go there to ask people about happiness.
The life of the village evoked not very pleasant feelings among the peasants: there were a lot of drunks around, everywhere it was dirty, dull, uncomfortable. Books are also sold at the fair, but low-quality books, Belinsky and Gogol are not to be found here.
By evening, everyone becomes so drunk that it seems that even the church with the bell tower is shaking.
Chapter 3
At night, the men are on their way again. They hear the conversations of drunk people. Suddenly, attention is attracted by Pavlush Veretennikov, who makes notes in a notebook. He collects peasant songs and sayings, as well as their stories. After everything that has been said is captured on paper, Veretennikov begins to reproach the assembled people for drunkenness, to which he hears objections: “The peasant drinks mainly because he has grief, and therefore it is impossible, even a sin, to reproach for it.
Chapter 4
Men do not deviate from their goal - by all means to find a happy person. They promise to reward with a bucket of vodka the one who tells that it is he who lives freely and cheerfully in Rus'. Drinkers peck at such a "tempting" offer. But no matter how hard they try to colorfully paint the gloomy everyday life of those who want to get drunk for free, nothing comes out of them. Stories of an old woman who has born up to a thousand turnips, a sexton rejoicing when they pour him a pigtail; the paralyzed former courtyard, who for forty years licked the master's plates with the best French truffle, does not impress the stubborn seekers of happiness on Russian soil.
Chapter 5
Maybe luck will smile on them here - the searchers assumed a happy Russian person, having met the landowner Gavrila Afanasich Obolt-Obolduev on the road. At first he was frightened, thinking that he saw the robbers, but after learning about the unusual desire of the seven men who blocked his path, he calmed down, laughed and told his story.
Maybe before the landowner considered himself happy, but not now. After all, in old days Gavriil Afanasyevich was the owner of the entire district, a whole regiment of servants and arranged holidays with theatrical performances and dancing. Even the peasants did not hesitate to invite the peasants to pray in the manor house on holidays. Now everything has changed: family estate Obolt-Obolduev was sold for debts, because, left without peasants who knew how to cultivate the land, the landowner, who was not accustomed to work, suffered heavy losses, which led to a deplorable outcome.
Part 2
The next day, the travelers went to the banks of the Volga, where they saw a large hay meadow. Before they could talk to local residents, as noticed at the pier three boats. It turns out that this is a noble family: two gentlemen with their wives, their children, servants and a gray-haired old gentleman named Utyatin. Everything in this family, to the surprise of travelers, occurs according to such a scenario, as if there was no abolition of serfdom. It turns out that Utyatin was very angry when he found out that the peasants were given freedom and came down with a stroke, threatening to deprive his sons of their inheritance. To prevent this from happening, they came up with a cunning plan: they persuaded the peasants to play along with the landowner, posing as serfs. As a reward, they promised the best meadows after the death of the master.
Utyatin, hearing that the peasants were staying with him, perked up, and the comedy began. Some even liked the role of serfs, but Agap Petrov could not come to terms with the shameful fate and told the landowner everything to his face. For this, the prince sentenced him to flogging. The peasants also played a role here: they took the “rebellious” to the stable, put wine in front of him and asked him to shout louder, for appearances. Alas, Agap could not bear such humiliation, got very drunk and died the same night.
Further, the Last (Prince Utyatin) arranges a feast, where, barely moving his tongue, he delivers a speech about the advantages and benefits of serfdom. After that, he lies down in the boat and gives up the spirit. Everyone is glad that they finally got rid of the old tyrant, however, the heirs are not even going to fulfill their promise to those who played the role of serfs. The hopes of the peasants were not justified: no one gave them meadows.
Part 3. Peasant woman.
No longer hoping to find a happy man among the men, the wanderers decided to ask the women. And from the lips of a peasant woman named Korchagina Matryona Timofeevna they hear a very sad and, one might say, scary story. Only in her parents' house she was happy, and then, when she married Philip, a ruddy and strong guy, a hard life began. Love did not last long, because the husband went to work, leaving his young wife with his family. Matryona works tirelessly and sees no support from anyone except old Savely, who lives a century after hard labor, which lasted twenty years. Only one joy appears in her hard fate- Demushka's son. But suddenly a terrible misfortune befell the woman: it is impossible to even imagine what happened to the child because the mother-in-law did not allow her daughter-in-law to take him into the field with her. Due to an oversight of the boy's grandfather, the pigs eat him. What grief for a mother! She mourns Demushka all the time, although other children were born in the family. For their sake, a woman sacrifices herself, for example, she takes upon herself the punishment when they want to flog her son Fedot for a sheep that was carried away by wolves. When Matryona was carrying another son, Lidor, in her womb, her husband was unfairly taken into the army, and his wife had to go to the city to look for the truth. It’s good that the governor’s wife, Elena Alexandrovna, helped her then. By the way, in the waiting room Matryona gave birth to a son.
Yes, the life of the one who was called “lucky” in the village was not easy: she constantly had to fight for herself, for her children, and for her husband.
Part 4. A feast for the whole world.
At the end of the village of Valakhchina, a feast was held, where everyone was gathered: the wandering peasants, and Vlas the headman, and Klim Yakovlevich. Among the celebrating - two seminarians, simple, kind guys - Savvushka and Grisha Dobrosklonov. They sing funny songs and tell different stories. They do it because ordinary people ask for it. From the age of fifteen, Grisha knows for sure that he will devote his life to the happiness of the Russian people. He sings a song about a great and mighty country called Rus'. Isn't this the lucky one that the travelers were so stubbornly looking for? After all, he clearly sees the purpose of his life - in serving the disadvantaged people. Unfortunately, Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov died untimely, before he had time to finish the poem (according to the author's plan, the peasants were to go to St. Petersburg). But the reflections of the seven wanderers coincide with the thought of Dobrosklonov, who thinks that every peasant should live freely and cheerfully in Rus'. In this was main idea author.
The poem of Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov became legendary, a symbol of the struggle for happy everyday life ordinary people, as well as the result of the author's reflections on the fate of the peasantry.
Nekrasov Nikolai
Who lives well in Rus'
Nikolai Nekrasov
Who lives well in Rus'
In what year - count, In what land - guess, On the pole path Seven men converged: Seven temporarily liable, Tightened province, Terpigorev district, Empty volost, From adjacent villages: Zaplatova, Dyryavina, Razutova, Znobishina. Gorelova, Neyolova Irregular crop, Agreed - and argued: Who lives happily, Freely in Rus'? Roman said: to the landowner, Demyan said: to the official, Luka said: to the priest. Fat-bellied merchant! The Gubin brothers Ivan and Mitrodor said. The old man Pakhom strained And said, looking at the ground: To the noble boyar, to the Minister of the Sovereign. And Prov said: to the tsar ... A man is like a bull: he will vtemyashitsya In the head, what a whim With a stake you won’t knock it out: they resist, Everyone stands on his own! Is such a dispute started, What do passersby think? In the groin of honeycombs Carried to the bazaar in the Great, And the two brothers of Gubin It's so easy with a halter To catch a stubborn horse Into their own herd. It's high time for everyone to return on their own way. They walk side by side! They go, as if gray wolves are chasing them, What is farther, then sooner. They go - perekorya! They shout - they will not come to their senses! And time does not wait. The dispute was not noticed. As the red sun set, As the evening came. Probably would have spent the whole night So they went - where they didn’t know, If only the woman they met, Crooked Durandiha, Wouldn’t shout: “Venerable! .. "Where? .." - Our men looked at each other, They stand, they are silent, they look down... The night has long gone, The stars are often lit In the high skies, The moon has surfaced, black shadows Have cut the road to Zealous walkers. Oh shadows! black shadows! Who won't you chase? Who won't you overtake? You only, black shadows, You can not catch - hug! He looked at the forest, at the path-path, looked silently at Pahom, looked - scattered his mind And finally said: “Well, the goblin played a glorious joke on us! There's nothing to do. Let's rest until the sun!.." Blaming the misfortune on the goblin, Under the forest by the path The peasants sat down. They lit a fire, formed, Two ran away for vodka, And the rest for a while A glass was made, Birch barks were pulled. The vodka came soon. The appetizer is in time The peasants are feasting! They drank three kosushki, Ate - and argued Again: who should live happily, Freely in Rus'? Roman shouts: to the landowner, Demyan shouts: to the official, Luka shouts: to the priest; Kupchin fat-bellied, Shouting brothers Gubin. Ivan and Mitrodor; Pakhom shouts: to the Most Serene Noble Boyar, Minister of the Sovereign. And Prov shouts: to the king! The visor is stronger than ever The perky men, Cursing swearing, It's no wonder that they'll grab each other's hair... Look, they've already grabbed onto each other! Roman hits Pakhomushka, Demyan hits Luka. And the two brothers of Gubin are ironing Prov hefty, And everyone shouts his own! A booming echo woke up, It went for a walk, it went for a walk, It went to shout, shout, As if to provoke Stubborn men. King! - to the right is heard, to the left it responds: Ass! ass! ass! The whole forest was alarmed, With flying birds, Fast-footed animals And creeping reptiles, And a groan, and a roar, and a rumble! First of all, a gray hare From a neighboring bush Suddenly jumped out, as if disheveled, And he took to his heels! Behind him, small jackdaws At the top of the birches raised a nasty, sharp squeak. And then at the warbler With fright, a tiny chick From the nest fell; Chirping, crying warbler, Where is the chick? - will not find! Then the old cuckoo woke up and decided to cuckle for someone; Ten times it was accepted, Yes, every time it went astray And it started again ... Cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo! Bread will sting, You will choke on an ear You will not cuckle! 1 Seven eagle owls have flocked, Admiring the carnage From seven large trees, Night owls are laughing! And their yellow eyes Burn like wax of ardent Fourteen candles! And the raven is a smart bird. Has ripened, sits on a tree At the fire. He sits and prays to the devil, So that someone will be slapped to death! A cow with a bell, That has strayed from the herd since the evening, barely heard Human voices Came to the fire, fixed her Eyes on the peasants. I listened to crazy speeches And began, cordial, Mumble, mumble, mumble! A stupid cow lows, Small jackdaws squeak. Violent guys shout, And the echo echoes everything. He has one concern To tease honest people, To scare guys and women! No one has seen him, And everyone has heard to hear, Without a body - but it lives, Without a language - it screams! The owl - the Princess of Zamoskvoretskaya - immediately looms, Flies over the peasants, Shying either on the ground, or on the bushes with its wing ... The fox itself is cunning, Out of woman's curiosity, Crept up to the peasants, Listened, listened And went away, thinking: "And damn them will not understand!" And indeed: the disputants themselves hardly knew, they remembered what they were making noise about... Having kneaded their sides decently to each other, the peasants finally came to their senses, They got drunk from the puddle, half a sapling, flying low, crept up to the fire. Pakhomushka caught him, brought him to the fire, looked at him And said: "A small bird, And a nail is agile! I breathe - you roll off your palm, I sneeze - you roll into the fire, I click - you roll dead, And yet you, a small bird, Are stronger than a man! Wings will get stronger soon, bye-bye! Wherever you want, you will fly there! Oh you little pichuga! Give us your wings, We'll fly around the whole kingdom, Let's look, explore, Ask - and find out: Who lives happily, Freely in Rus'? "" Wings would not be needed. If only we had bread Half a pood a day. And so we would measure Mother Rus' with our feet!
Said the sullen Prov. "Yes, a bucketful of vodka," the eager brothers Gubin, Ivan and Mitrodor, added to the vodka. "Yes, in the morning there would be ten Salted cucumbers," the men joked. "And at noon, a jug of Cold kvass." "And in the evening, a teapot of a hot teapot..." While they were chatting, A chiffchaff curled and circled Above them: she listened to everything And sat down by the fire. Chiviknula, jumped up And in a human voice Pakhomu says: "Let the chick go free! For a small chick I'll give a big ransom." - What will you give?
"I'll give you a piece of bread Half a pood a day, I'll give you a bucketful of vodka, I'll give you cucumbers in the morning, And at noon sour kvass, And in the evening a cup of tea!" - And where, small pichuga, Gubin brothers asked, Will you find wine and bread Are you for seven peasants?
"Find - you will find it yourself, And I, a small pichuga, I will tell you how to find it."
"Go through the forest, Against the thirtieth pillar A straight verst: You will come to a clearing. Standing in that clearing Two old pines, Under these pines Under these pines A box is buried Get it, That magic box: In it is a self-assembled tablecloth, Whenever you wish, Feed, water! Quietly just say: "Hey! self-assembled tablecloth! Treat the peasants!" According to your desire, At my command, Everything will appear immediately. Now - let the chick go!"
Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Rus'" tells about the journey of seven peasants across Russia in search of a happy person. The work was written in the late 60's - mid 70's. XIX century, after the reforms of Alexander II and the abolition of serfdom. It tells about a post-reform society in which not only many old vices have not disappeared, but many new ones have appeared. According to the plan of Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov, the wanderers were supposed to reach St. Petersburg at the end of the journey, but due to the illness and imminent death of the author, the poem remained unfinished.
The work “To whom it is good to live in Rus'” is written in blank verse and stylized as Russian folk tales. We suggest reading the online summary of “Who Lives Well in Rus'” by Nekrasov chapter by chapter, prepared by the editors of our portal.
Main characters
Novel, Demyan, Luke, Gubin brothers Ivan and Mitrodor, Pahom, Prov- seven peasants who went to look for a happy person.
Other characters
Ermil Girin- the first "candidate" for the title of lucky man, an honest steward, very respected by the peasants.
Matryona Korchagina(Governor) - a peasant woman who is known in her village as a "lucky woman".
Savely- husband's grandfather Matryona Korchagina. Centennial old man.
Prince Utyatin(Last child) - an old landowner, a tyrant, to whom his family, in collusion with the peasants, does not speak about the abolition of serfdom.
Vlas- a peasant, steward of the village, once owned by Utyatin.
Grisha Dobrosklonov- a seminarian, the son of a deacon, dreaming of the liberation of the Russian people; the revolutionary democrat N. Dobrolyubov was the prototype.
Part 1
Prologue
Seven men converge on the "pillar path": Roman, Demyan, Luka, the Gubin brothers (Ivan and Mitrodor), the old man Pakhom and Prov. The county from which they come is called by the author Terpigorev, and the “adjacent villages” from which the peasants come are referred to as Zaplatovo, Dyryaevo, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Neyolovo and Neurozhayko, thus, the poem uses artistic technique"speaking" names.
The men got together and argued:
Who has fun
Feel free in Rus'?
Each of them insists on his own. One shouts that the landowner lives most freely, the other that the official, the third - the priest, "fat-bellied merchant", "noble boyar, minister of the sovereign", or the tsar.
From the outside, it seems that the men found a treasure on the road and are now dividing it among themselves. The peasants have already forgotten what business they left the house for (one went to baptize a child, the other to the market ...), and they go no one knows where until night falls. Only here the peasants stop and, "blaming the trouble on the goblin", sit down to rest and continue the argument. Soon it comes to a fight.
Roman hits Pakhomushka,
Demyan hits Luka.
The fight alarmed the whole forest, the echo woke up, the animals and birds got worried, the cow mooed, the cuckoo forged, the jackdaws squeaked, the fox, eavesdropping on the peasants, decides to run away.
And here at the foam
With fright, a tiny chick
Fell from the nest.
When the fight is over, the men pay attention to this chick and catch it. It is easier for a bird than for a peasant, Pahom says. If he had wings, he would fly all over Rus' to find out who lives best on it. “We don’t even need wings,” the rest add, they would only have bread and “a bucket of vodka,” as well as cucumbers, kvass and tea. Then they would have measured the whole "Mother Rus' with their feet."
While the men are interpreting in this way, a chiffchaff flies up to them and asks to let her chick go free. For him, she will give a royal ransom: everything desired by the peasants.
The men agree, and the chiffchaff shows them a place in the forest where a box with a self-assembled tablecloth is buried. Then she enchants clothes on them so that they do not wear out, so that the bast shoes do not break, the footcloths do not decay, and the louse does not breed on the body, and flies away "with her dear chick." In parting, the warbler warns the peasants: they can ask for food from the self-collection tablecloth as much as they like, but you can’t ask for more than a bucket of vodka a day:
And one and two - it will be fulfilled
At your request,
And in the third be trouble!
The peasants rush to the forest, where they really find a self-assembled tablecloth. Overjoyed, they arrange a feast and give a vow: not to return home until they know for sure, "who lives happily, freely in Rus'?"
Thus begins their journey.
Chapter 1. Pop
Far away stretches a wide path lined with birch trees. On it, the peasants mostly come across “small people” - peasants, artisans, beggars, soldiers. Travelers don’t even ask them anything: what kind of happiness is there? Toward evening, the men meet the priest. The men block his way and bow low. In response to the priest's silent question: what do they need?, Luka talks about the dispute and asks: “Is the priest's life sweet?”
The priest thinks for a long time, and then replies that, since it is a sin to grumble at God, he will simply describe his life to the peasants, and they themselves will realize whether it is good.
Happiness, according to the priest, consists in three things: "peace, wealth, honor." The priest knows no rest: his dignity goes to him hard work and then the no less difficult service begins, the wailing of the orphans, the cries of the widows, and the groans of the dying do little to bring peace of mind.
The situation with honor is no better: the priest serves as an object for the witticisms of the common people, obscene tales, anecdotes and fables are composed about him, which do not spare not only himself, but also his wife and children.
The last thing remains, wealth, but even here everything has changed a long time ago. Yes, there were times when the nobles honored the priest, played magnificent weddings and came to their estates to die - that was the work of the priests, but now "the landowners have scattered in distant foreign land." So it turns out that the pop is content with rare copper nickels:
The peasant himself needs
And I would be glad to give, but there is nothing ...
Having finished his speech, the priest leaves, and the debaters attack Luka with reproaches. They unanimously accuse him of stupidity, that it was only in appearance that the priestly housing seemed free to him, but he could not figure it out deeper.
What did you take? stubborn head!
The men would probably have beaten Luka, but here, fortunately for him, at the bend in the road, the “priestly strict face” is once again shown ...
Chapter 2
The men continue on their way, and their road goes through empty villages. Finally, they meet the rider and ask him where the inhabitants have disappeared.
They went to the village of Kuzminskoe,
Today there is a fairground...
Then the wanderers decide to also go to the fair - what if the one “who lives happily” is hiding there?
Kuzminskoye is a rich, though dirty village. It has two churches, a school (closed), a dirty hotel and even a paramedic. That’s why the fair is rich, and most of all there are taverns, “eleven taverns”, and they do not have time to pour for everyone:
Oh, Orthodox thirst,
How big are you!
There are a lot of drunk people around. A peasant scolds a broken ax, grandfather Vavila is sad next to him, who promised to bring shoes to his granddaughter, but drank all the money. The people feel sorry for him, but no one can help - they themselves have no money. Fortunately, there happens to be a "master", Pavlusha Veretennikov, and it is he who buys shoes for Vavila's granddaughter.
Ofeni (booksellers) also sell at the fair, but the most base books, as well as portraits of “thicker” generals, are in demand. And no one knows if the time will come when a man:
Belinsky and Gogol
Will you carry it from the market?
By evening, everyone is so drunk that even the church with the bell tower seems to stagger, and the peasants leave the village.
Chapter 3
It's worth a quiet night. The men walk along the "hundred-voiced" road and hear snippets of other people's conversations. They talk about officials, about bribes: “And we are fifty kopecks to the clerk: We made a request,” women's songs are heard with a request to “fall in love.” One drunk guy buries his clothes in the ground, assuring everyone that he is "burying his mother." At the road post, the wanderers again meet Pavel Veretennikov. He talks with the peasants, writes down their songs and sayings. Having written down enough, Veretennikov blames the peasants for drinking a lot - "it's a shame to look!" They object to him: the peasant drinks mainly from grief, and it is a sin to condemn or envy him.
The objector's name is Yakim Goly. Pavlusha also writes his story in a book. Even in his youth, Yakim bought his son popular prints, and he himself loved to look at them no less than a child. When a fire broke out in the hut, he first of all rushed to tear pictures from the walls, and so all his savings, thirty-five rubles, burned down. For a fused lump, they now give him 11 rubles.
After listening to stories, the wanderers sit down to refresh themselves, then one of them, Roman, remains at the bucket of vodka for the guard, and the rest again mix with the crowd in search of a happy one.
Chapter 4
Wanderers walk in the crowd and call the happy one to come. If such a person appears and tells them about his happiness, then he will be treated to glory with vodka.
Sober people chuckle at such speeches, but a considerable queue is lined up from drunk people. The deacon comes first. His happiness, in his words, "is in complacency" and in the "kosushka", which the peasants will pour. The deacon is driven away, and an old woman appears, in which, on a small ridge, "up to a thousand raps were born." The next torturing happiness is a soldier with medals, "a little alive, but I want to drink." His happiness lies in the fact that no matter how they tortured him in the service, he nevertheless remained alive. A stonecutter with a huge hammer also comes, a peasant who overstrained himself in the service, but still, barely alive, drove home, a courtyard man with a "noble" disease - gout. The latter boasts that for forty years he stood at the table of the most illustrious prince, licking plates and drinking foreign wine from glasses. The men drive him away too, because they have a simple wine, “not according to your lips!”.
The line to the wanderers does not become smaller. The Belarusian peasant is happy that here he eats his fill of rye bread, because at home they baked bread only with chaff, and this caused terrible pain in the stomach. A man with a folded cheekbone, a hunter, is happy that he survived in a fight with a bear, while the bears killed the rest of his comrades. Even the beggars come: they are happy that there is alms on which they are fed.
Finally, the bucket is empty, and the wanderers realize that this way they will not find happiness.
Hey, happiness man!
Leaky, with patches,
Humpbacked with calluses
Get off home!
Here one of the people who approached them advises “ask Yermila Girin”, because if he does not turn out to be happy, then there is nothing to look for. Ermila is a simple man who deserved the great love of the people. The wanderers are told the following story: once Ermila had a mill, but they decided to sell it for debts. Bidding began, the merchant Altynnikov really wanted to buy the mill. Yermila was able to outbid his price, but the trouble is that he did not have money with him to make a deposit. Then he asked for an hour's reprieve and ran to the market square to ask the people for money.
And a miracle happened: Yermil received money. Very soon, the thousand necessary for the ransom of the mill turned out to be with him. And a week later, on the square, there was an even more wonderful sight: Yermil "counted on the people", handed out all the money and honestly. There was only one extra ruble left, and Yermil asked until sunset whose it was.
Wanderers are perplexed: by what sorcery did Yermil receive such trust from the people. They are told that this is not witchcraft, but the truth. Girin served as a clerk in the office and never took a penny from anyone, but helped with advice. Soon the old prince died, and the new one ordered the peasants to choose a burgomaster. Unanimously, “six thousand souls, with the whole patrimony” Yermila shouted - although young, he loves the truth!
Only once did Yermil "disguise" when he did not recruit his younger brother, Mitriy, replacing him with the son of Nenila Vlasyevna. But the conscience after this act tortured Yermila so much that he soon tried to hang himself. Mitrius was handed over to the recruits, and the son of Nenila was returned to her. Yermil, for a long time, did not walk on his own, “he resigned from his post,” but instead rented a mill and became “more than the former people love.”
But here the priest intervenes in the conversation: all this is true, but it is useless to go to Yermil Girin. He is sitting in jail. The priest begins to tell how it was - the village of Stolbnyaki rebelled and the authorities decided to call Yermila - his people would listen.
The story is interrupted by cries: the thief has been caught and is being flogged. The thief turns out to be the same lackey with a "noble disease", and after the flogging, he flies away as if he had completely forgotten about his illness.
The priest, meanwhile, says goodbye, promising to finish telling the story at the next meeting.
Chapter 5
On their further journey, the peasants meet the landowner Gavrila Afanasyich Obolt-Obolduev. The landowner is at first frightened, suspecting robbers in them, but, having figured out what the matter is, he laughs and begins to tell his story. He leads his noble family from the Tatar Oboldui, who was skinned by a bear for the amusement of the Empress. She granted cloth to the Tatar for this. Such were the noble ancestors of the landowner ...
Law is my wish!
The fist is my police!
However, not all strictness, the landowner admits that he more "attracted hearts with affection"! All the courtyards loved him, gave him gifts, and he was like a father to them. But everything changed: the peasants and the land were taken away from the landowner. The sound of an ax is heard from the forests, everyone is being ruined, instead of estates drinking houses are multiplying, because now no one needs a letter at all. And they shout to the landowners:
Wake up, sleepy landowner!
Get up! - study! work hard!..
But how can a landowner work, accustomed to something completely different from childhood? They did not learn anything, and “thought to live like this for a century,” but it turned out differently.
The landowner began to sob, and the good-natured peasants almost wept with him, thinking:
The great chain is broken
Torn - jumped:
One end on the master,
Others for a man! ..
Part 2
Last
The next day, the peasants go to the banks of the Volga, to a huge hay meadow. As soon as they got into a conversation with the locals, music was heard and three boats moored to the shore. They have a noble family: two gentlemen with their wives, little barchats, servants and a gray-haired old gentleman. The old man inspects the mowing, and everyone bows to him almost to the ground. In one place he stops and orders a dry haystack to be spread: the hay is still damp. The absurd order is immediately executed.
Strangers marvel:
Grandfather!
What a wonderful old man.
It turns out that the old man - Prince Utyatin (the peasants call him the Last) - having learned about the abolition of serfdom, "fooled", and came down with a blow. His sons were told that they had betrayed the landowner's ideals, that they could not defend them, and if so, they were left without an inheritance. The sons were frightened and persuaded the peasants to fool the landowner a little, so that after his death they would give the village poem meadows. The old man was told that the tsar ordered the serfs to be returned back to the landowners, the prince was delighted and stood up. So this comedy continues to this day. Some peasants are even happy about this, for example, the courtyard Ipat:
Ipat said: “You have fun!
And I am the Utyatin princes
Serf - and the whole story here!
But Agap Petrov cannot come to terms with the fact that even in the wild someone will push him around. Once he told the master everything directly, and he had a stroke. When he woke up, he ordered Agap to be whipped, and the peasants, in order not to reveal the deceit, led him to the stable, where they put a bottle of wine in front of him: drink and shout louder! Agap died the same night: it was hard for him to bow down...
Wanderers are present at the feast of the Last, where he speaks about the benefits of serfdom, and then lies down in the boat and falls asleep in it with songs. The village of Vahlaki sighs with sincere relief, but no one gives them the meadows - the trial continues to this day.
Part 3
peasant woman
“Not everything is between men
Find a happy
Let's touch the women!”
With these words, the wanderers go to Korchagina Matryona Timofeevna, the governor, beautiful woman 38 years old, who, however, already calls herself an old woman. She talks about her life. Then she was only happy, how she grew up in parental home. But girlhood quickly rushed by, and now Matryona is already being wooed. Philip becomes her betrothed, handsome, ruddy and strong. He loves his wife (according to her, he beat him only once), but soon he goes to work, and leaves her with his large, but alien to Matryona, family.
Matryona works for her elder sister-in-law, and for a strict mother-in-law, and for her father-in-law. She had no joy in her life until her eldest son, Demushka, was born.
In the whole family, only the old grandfather Savely, the “Holy Russian hero”, who lives out his life after twenty years of hard labor, regrets Matryona. He ended up in hard labor for the murder of a German manager who did not give the peasants a single free minute. Savely told Matryona a lot about his life, about "Russian heroism."
The mother-in-law forbids Matryona to take Demushka into the field: she does not work much with him. The grandfather looks after the child, but one day he falls asleep, and the pigs eat the child. After some time, Matryona meets Savely at the grave of Demushka, who has gone to repentance in the Sand Monastery. She forgives him and takes him home, where the old man soon dies.
Matryona also had other children, but she could not forget Demushka. One of them, the shepherdess Fedot, once wanted to be whipped for a sheep carried away by a wolf, but Matrena took the punishment upon herself. When she was pregnant with Liodorushka, she had to go to the city to ask for the return of her husband, who had been taken into the soldiers. Right in the waiting room, Matryona gave birth, and the governor, Elena Alexandrovna, for whom the whole family is now praying, helped her. Since then, Matryona has been "denounced as a lucky woman, nicknamed the governor's wife." But what kind of happiness is there?
This is what Matryonushka tells the wanderers and adds: they will never find a happy woman among women, the keys to female happiness are lost, and even God does not know where to find them.
Part 4
A feast for the whole world
There is a feast in the village of Vakhlachina. Everyone gathered here: both wanderers, and Klim Yakovlich, and Vlas the headman. Among the feasters are two seminarians, Savvushka and Grisha, good simple guys. They, at the request of the people, sing a "merry" song, then the turn comes for different stories. There is a story about “an exemplary slave - Jacob the faithful”, who all his life went after the master, fulfilled all his whims and even rejoiced at the master's beatings. Only when the master gave his nephew to the soldiers, Yakov took to drink, but soon returned to the master. And yet, Yakov did not forgive him, and was able to take revenge on Polivanov: he brought him, with his legs off, into the forest, and there he hanged himself on a pine tree above the master.
There is a dispute about who is the most sinful of all. God's wanderer Jonah tells the story of "two sinners", about the robber Kudeyar. The Lord awakened a conscience in him and imposed a penance on him: cut down a huge oak tree in the forest, then his sins will be forgiven him. But the oak fell only when Kudeyar sprinkled it with the blood of the cruel Pan Glukhovsky. Ignatius Prokhorov objects to Jonah: the peasant's sin is still greater, and tells the story of the headman. He hid the last will of his master, who decided to release his peasants before his death. But the headman, tempted by money, tore free.
The crowd is subdued. Songs are sung: "Hungry", "Soldier's". But the time will come in Rus' for good songs. Confirmation of this is two seminarian brothers, Savva and Grisha. The seminarian Grisha, the son of a sexton, has known since the age of fifteen that he wants to devote his life to the happiness of the people. Love for his mother merges in his heart with love for the whole vakhlachin. Grisha walks along his edge and sings a song about Rus':
You are poor
You are abundant
You are powerful
You are powerless
Mother Rus'!
And his plans will not be lost: fate prepares Grisha “a glorious path, a loud name people's protector, consumption and Siberia. In the meantime, Grisha sings, and it is a pity that the wanderers do not hear him, because then they would understand that they had already found a happy person and could return home.
Conclusion
This ends the unfinished chapters of the poem by Nekrasov. However, even from the surviving parts, the reader is presented with a large-scale picture of post-reform Rus', which, with torment, is learning to live in a new way. The range of problems raised by the author in the poem is very wide: the problems of widespread drunkenness, which is ruining a Russian person (it’s not without reason that a bucket of vodka is offered as a reward!) problems of women, ineradicable slave psychology (revealed using the example of Yakov, Ipat) and main problem people's happiness. Most of these problems, unfortunately, to one degree or another still remain relevant today, which is why the work is very popular, and a number of quotations from it have become part of everyday speech. Compositional technique the wanderings of the protagonists brings the poem closer to an adventure novel, thanks to which it is read easily and with great interest.
A brief retelling of “To whom it is good to live in Rus'” conveys only the most basic content of the poem; for a more accurate idea of the work, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with full version"To whom in Rus' it is good to live."
Test on the poem "Who lives well in Rus'"
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Retelling rating
Average rating: 4.3. Total ratings received: 14502.
© Lebedev Yu. V., introductory article, comments, 1999
© Godin I. M., heirs, illustrations, 1960
© Design of the series. Publishing house "Children's Literature", 2003
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Y. Lebedev
Russian odyssey
In the "Diary of a Writer" for 1877, F. M. Dostoevsky noticed salient feature, which appeared in the Russian people of the post-reform period - "this is a multitude, an extraordinary modern multitude of new people, a new root of Russian people who need the truth, one truth without conditional lies, and who, in order to achieve this truth, will give everything resolutely." Dostoevsky saw in them "the advancing future Russia."
At the very beginning of the 20th century, another writer, V. G. Korolenko, made a discovery that struck him from a summer trip to the Urals: hot-air balloon to the North Pole - in the distant Ural villages there were rumors about the Belovodsk kingdom and their own religious and scientific expedition was being prepared. Among the ordinary Cossacks, the conviction spread and grew stronger that “somewhere out there, “beyond the distance of bad weather”, “beyond the valleys, behind the mountains, behind the wide seas” there is a “blissful country”, in which, by the providence of God and the accidents of history, it has been preserved and flourishes throughout inviolability is a complete and whole formula of grace. This is real Dreamland of all ages and peoples, painted only with the Old Believer mood. In it, planted by the Apostle Thomas, the true faith flourishes, with churches, bishops, a patriarch and pious kings ... This kingdom knows neither punishment, nor murder, nor self-interest, since true faith gives rise to true piety there.
It turns out that back in the late 1860s, the Don Cossacks were written off with the Urals, collected a fairly significant amount and equipped Cossack Varsonofy Baryshnikov and two comrades to search for this promised land. Baryshnikov set out on his journey through Constantinople to Asia Minor, then to the Malabar coast, and finally to the East Indies ... The expedition returned with disappointing news: they could not find Belovodye. Thirty years later, in 1898, the dream of the Belovodsk kingdom flares up with renewed vigor, funds are found, a new pilgrimage is equipped. On May 30, 1898, a "deputation" of the Cossacks boarded a steamboat departing from Odessa for Constantinople.
“From that day, in fact, the foreign trip of the deputies of the Urals to the Belovodsk kingdom began, and among the international crowd of merchants, military men, scientists, tourists, diplomats traveling around the world out of curiosity or in search of money, fame and pleasure, three people got mixed up, as it were from another world, who were looking for ways to the fabulous Belovodsk kingdom. Korolenko described in detail all the vicissitudes of this unusual journey, in which, for all the curiosity and strangeness of the planned enterprise, the same Russia noted by Dostoevsky stood out. honest people, “who need only the truth”, who have “the desire for honesty and truth is unshakable and indestructible, and for the word of truth, each of them will give his life and all his advantages.”
By the end of the 19th century, not only the top of Russian society was drawn into the great spiritual pilgrimage, but all of Russia, all of its people, rushed to it.
“These Russian homeless wanderers,” Dostoevsky noted in a speech about Pushkin, “continue their wandering to this day and, it seems, will not disappear for a long time.” For a long time, “for the Russian wanderer needs precisely world happiness in order to calm down - he will not reconcile cheaper.”
“There was, approximately, such a case: I knew one person who believed in a righteous land,” said another wanderer in our literature, Luka, from M. Gorky's play “At the Bottom”. “There must be, he said, a righteous country in the world ... in that, they say, land - special people inhabit ... good people! They respect each other, they help each other - without any difficulty - and everything is nice and good with them! And so the man was going to go ... to look for this righteous land. He was poor, he lived badly ... and when it was already so difficult for him that at least lie down and die, he did not lose his spirit, but everything happened, he only smiled and said: “Nothing! I will endure! A few more - I’ll wait ... and then I’ll give up this whole life and go to the righteous land ... “He had one joy - this land ... And in this place - in Siberia, it was something - they sent an exiled scientist ... with books, with plans he, a scientist, and with all sorts of things ... A man says to a scientist: “Show me, do me a favor, where is the righteous land and how is the road there?” Now the scientist opened the books, spread out the plans ... looked, looked - no nowhere righteous land! “That's right, all the lands are shown, but the righteous one is not!”
Man - does not believe ... Should, he says, be ... look better! And then, he says, your books and plans are useless if there is no righteous land ... The scientist is offended. My plans, he says, are the most correct, but there is no righteous land at all. Well, then the man got angry - how so? Lived, lived, endured, endured and believed everything - there is! but according to the plans it turns out - no! Robbery! .. And he says to the scientist: “Oh, you ... such a bastard! You are a scoundrel, not a scientist ... “Yes, in his ear - one! And more!.. ( After a pause.) And after that he went home - and strangled himself!”
The 1860s marked a sharp historical turning point in the destinies of Russia, which from now on broke away from a sub-legal, "home-bound" existence and the whole world, all the people set off on a long path of spiritual quest, marked by ups and downs, fatal temptations and deviations, but the righteous path is precisely in passion , in the sincerity of his inescapable desire to find the truth. And perhaps for the first time, Nekrasov's poetry responded to this deep process, which embraced not only the "tops", but also the very "lower classes" of society.
1
The poet began work on a grandiose plan " folk book"In 1863, and ended up mortally ill in 1877, with a bitter consciousness of incompleteness, incompleteness of what was conceived:" One thing that I deeply regret is that I did not finish my poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'." It “should have included all the experience given to Nikolai Alekseevich by studying the people, all the information about him accumulated“ by word of mouth ”for twenty years,” recalled G. I. Uspensky about conversations with Nekrasov.
However, the question of the “incompleteness” of “Who should live well in Rus'” is highly controversial and problematic. First, the confessions of the poet himself are subjectively exaggerated. It is known that a writer always has a feeling of dissatisfaction, and the larger the idea, the sharper it is. Dostoevsky wrote about The Brothers Karamazov: "I myself think that even one tenth of it was not possible to express what I wanted." But on this basis, do we dare to consider Dostoevsky's novel a fragment of an unfulfilled plan? The same is with "Who in Rus' to live well."
Secondly, the poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'" was conceived as an epic, that is piece of art, depicting with the maximum degree of completeness and objectivity an entire era in the life of the people. Since folk life is boundless and inexhaustible in its countless manifestations, the epic in any of its varieties (epic poem, epic novel) is characterized by incompleteness, incompleteness. This is its specific difference from other forms of poetic art.
"This song is tricky
He will sing to the word
Who is the whole earth, Rus' baptized,
It will go from end to end."
Her own saint of Christ
Not finished singing - sleeping eternal sleep -
this is how Nekrasov expressed his understanding of the epic plan in the poem "Peddlers". The epic can be continued indefinitely, but you can also put an end to some high segment of its path.
Until now, researchers of Nekrasov’s work are arguing about the sequence of the arrangement of the parts of “Who Lives Well in Rus'”, since the dying poet did not have time to make final orders on this matter.
It is noteworthy that this dispute itself involuntarily confirms the epic nature of "Who should live well in Rus'." The composition of this work is built according to the laws of the classical epic: it consists of separate, relatively autonomous parts and chapters. Outwardly, these parts are connected by the theme of the road: seven men-truth-seekers wander around Rus', trying to resolve the question that haunts them: who lives well in Rus'? In the Prologue, a clear outline of the journey seems to be outlined - meetings with the landowner, official, merchant, minister and tsar. However, the epic is devoid of a clear and unambiguous purposefulness. Nekrasov does not force the action, he is in no hurry to bring it to an all-permissive result. As an epic artist, he strives for the completeness of the reconstruction of life, for revealing all the diversity folk characters, all indirectness, all the winding of folk paths, paths and roads.
The world in the epic narrative appears as it is - disordered and unexpected, devoid of rectilinear motion. The author of the epic allows "retreats, visits to the past, jumps somewhere sideways, to the side." According to the definition of the modern literary theorist G. D. Gachev, “the epic is like a child walking through the cabinet of curiosities of the universe. Here his attention was attracted by one hero, or a building, or a thought - and the author, forgetting about everything, plunges into him; then he was distracted by another - and he just as fully surrenders to him. But this is not just a compositional principle, not just the specifics of the plot in the epic ... The one who, while narrating, makes “digressions”, unexpectedly long lingers on one or another subject; he who succumbs to the temptation to describe both this and that and chokes with greed, sinning against the pace of the narration - he thereby speaks of the extravagance, abundance of being, that he (being) has nowhere to hurry. Otherwise: it expresses the idea that being reigns over the principle of time (whereas the dramatic form, on the contrary, sticks out the power of time - it was not without reason that, it would seem, only the “formal” demand for the unity of time was born there too).
The fairy-tale motifs introduced into the epic “Who Lives Well in Rus'” allow Nekrasov to freely and naturally handle time and space, easily transfer the action from one end of Russia to the other, slow down or speed up time according to fairy-tale laws. What unites the epic is not an external plot, not a movement towards an unambiguous result, but an internal plot: slowly, step by step, the contradictory, but irreversible growth of people's self-consciousness, which has not yet come to a conclusion, is still on difficult roads of search, becomes clear in it. In this sense, the plot-compositional friability of the poem is not accidental: it expresses, by its lack of assembly, the variegation and diversity folk life who thinks about herself differently, evaluates her place in the world, her destiny in different ways.
In an effort to recreate the moving panorama of folk life in its entirety, Nekrasov also uses all the wealth of oral folk art. But the folklore element in the epic expresses the gradual growth of people's self-consciousness: the fairy tale motifs of the Prologue are replaced by epic epic, then lyrical folk songs in "Peasant Woman" and, finally, the songs of Grisha Dobrosklonov in "A Feast for the Whole World", striving to become popular and already partially accepted and understood by the people. The men listen to his songs, sometimes nod in agreement, but they have not yet heard the last song, "Rus", he has not yet sung it to them. That is why the finale of the poem is open to the future, not resolved.
Would our wanderers be under the same roof,
If only they could know what happened to Grisha.
But the wanderers did not hear the song "Rus", which means they did not yet understand what the "embodiment of the happiness of the people" is. It turns out that Nekrasov did not finish his song, not only because death interfered. In those years, people's life itself did not sing his songs. More than a hundred years have passed since then, and the song begun by the great poet about the Russian peasantry is still being sung. In "The Feast" only a glimpse of the future happiness is outlined, which the poet dreams of, realizing how many roads lie ahead until his real incarnation. The incompleteness of “Who is to live well in Rus'” is fundamental and artistically significant as a sign of a folk epic.
“Who should live well in Rus'” both in general and in each of its parts resembles a peasant secular gathering, which is the most complete expression of democratic people's self-government. At such a meeting, the inhabitants of one village or several villages that were part of the "world" decided all the issues of joint secular life. The meeting had nothing to do with the modern meeting. There was no chairperson leading the discussion. Each community member, at will, entered into a conversation or skirmish, defending his point of view. Instead of voting, the principle of general consent was used. The dissatisfied were persuaded or retreated, and in the course of the discussion, a “worldly sentence” ripened. If there was no general agreement, the meeting was postponed to the next day. Gradually, in the course of heated debates, a unanimous opinion matured, agreement was sought and found.
An employee of the Nekrasov " Domestic notes”, the populist writer H. N. Zlatovratsky described the original peasant life: “This is the second day that we have gathering after gathering. You look out the window, then at one end of the village, then at the other end of the village crowds of owners, old people, children: some are sitting, others are standing in front of them, with their hands behind their backs and attentively listening to someone. This someone waves his arms, bends his whole body, shouts something very convincingly, falls silent for a few minutes and then again begins to convince. But then suddenly they object to him, they object somehow at once, the voices rise higher and higher, they shout at the top of their lungs, as befits for such a vast hall as the surrounding meadows and fields, everyone speaks, not embarrassed by anyone or anything, as befits a free gathering of equals. Neither slightest sign officiality. Sergeant Major Maksim Maksimych himself is standing somewhere on the side, like the most invisible member of our community... Here everything goes straight, everything becomes an edge; if someone, out of cowardice or out of calculation, takes it into his head to get away with silence, he will be ruthlessly taken to clean water. Yes, and there are very few of these faint-hearted, at especially important gatherings. I have seen the humblest, most unrequited men who<…>at gatherings, in moments of general excitement, completely transformed and<…>they gained such courage that they managed to outdo the obviously brave men. In the moments of its apogee, the gathering becomes simply an open mutual confession and mutual exposure, a manifestation of the widest publicity.
The whole epic poem by Nekrasov is a flaring up, gradually gaining strength, worldly gathering. It reaches its pinnacle in the final "Feast for the World". However, the general "worldly sentence" is still not pronounced. Only the path to it is outlined, many of the initial obstacles have been removed, and on many points there has been movement towards a common agreement. But there is no result, life has not stopped, gatherings have not been stopped, the epic is open to the future. For Nekrasov, the process itself is important here, it is important that the peasantry not only thought about the meaning of life, but also set off on a difficult, long path of truth-seeking. Let's try to take a closer look at it, moving from the "Prologue. Part One" to "Peasant Woman", "Last Child" and "Feast for the Whole World".
2
In the Prologue, the meeting of the seven men is narrated as a great epic event.
In what year - count
In what land - guess
On the pillar path
Seven men got together...
So epic converged and fairy-tale heroes to battle or to a feast of honor. The epic scale acquires time and space in the poem: the action is carried out to the whole of Rus'. The tightened province, Terpigorev district, Pustoporozhnaya volost, the villages of Zaplatovo, Dyryavino, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Neelovo, Neurozhaina can be attributed to any of the Russian provinces, districts, volosts and villages. The general sign of the post-reform ruin is captured. Yes, and the very question that excited the peasants concerns the whole of Russia - peasant, noble, merchant. Therefore, the quarrel that arose between them is not an ordinary event, but great controversy. In the soul of every grain grower, with his own private destiny, with his worldly interests, a question has awakened that concerns everyone, the entire people's world.
To each his own
Left the house before noon:
That path led to the forge,
He went to the village of Ivankovo
Call Father Prokofy
Baptize the child.
Pahom honeycombs
Carried to the market in the Great,
And two brothers Gubina
So simple with a halter
Catching a stubborn horse
They went to their own herd.
It's high time for everyone
Return your way -
They are walking side by side!
Each peasant had his own path, and suddenly they found a common path: the question of happiness united the people. And therefore, before us are no longer ordinary men with their individual destiny and personal interests, and the guardians of the entire peasant world, truth-seekers. The number "seven" in folklore is magical. Seven Wanderers- an image of a large epic scale. The fabulous coloring of the Prologue raises the narrative above everyday life, above peasant life, and gives the action an epic universality.
The fairy-tale atmosphere in the Prologue is ambiguous. Giving the events a nationwide sound, it also turns into a convenient device for the poet to characterize the national self-consciousness. Note that Nekrasov playfully manages with a fairy tale. In general, his handling of folklore is more free and uninhibited in comparison with the poems "Pedlars" and "Frost, Red Nose". Yes, and he treats the people differently, often makes fun of the peasants, provokes readers, paradoxically sharpens the people's view of things, makes fun of the limitations of the peasant worldview. The intonation structure of the narrative in “Who Lives Well in Rus'” is very flexible and rich: here is the author’s good-natured smile, and indulgence, and light irony, and bitter joke, and lyrical regret, and sorrow, and meditation, and appeal. The intonational and stylistic polyphony of the narration in its own way reflects a new phase of folk life. Before us is the post-reform peasantry, which has broken with the immovable patriarchal existence, with centuries of worldly and spiritual settledness. This is already wandering Rus' with awakened self-awareness, noisy, discordant, prickly and uncompromising, prone to quarrels and disputes. And the author does not stand aside from her, but turns into an equal participant in her life. He either rises above the disputants, then he is imbued with sympathy for one of the disputing parties, then he is touched, then he is indignant. As Rus' lives in disputes, in search of truth, so the author is in a tense dialogue with her.
In the literature about “Who is to live well in Rus'”, one can find the assertion that the dispute of the seven wanderers that opens the poem corresponds to the original compositional plan, from which the poet subsequently retreated. Already in the first part, there was a deviation from the intended plot, and instead of meeting with the rich and noble, the truth-seekers began to question the crowd.
But after all, this deviation immediately takes place at the “upper” level. Instead of a landowner and an official, scheduled by the peasants for questioning, for some reason there is a meeting with a priest. Is it by chance?
First of all, we note that the “formula” of the dispute proclaimed by the peasants signifies not so much the original intention as the level of national self-consciousness, manifested in this dispute. And Nekrasov cannot but show the reader his limitations: peasants understand happiness in a primitive way and reduce it to a well-fed life, material security. What is worth, for example, such a candidate for the role of a lucky man, who is proclaimed "merchant", and even "fat-bellied"! And behind the argument of the peasants - who lives happily, freely in Rus'? - immediately, but still gradually, muffled, another, much more significant and important question arises, which is the soul of the epic poem - how to understand human happiness, where to look for it and what does it consist of?
In the final chapter "A Feast for the Whole World", Grisha Dobrosklonov gives such an assessment current state people's life: "The Russian people are gathering strength and learning to be a citizen."
In fact, this formula contains the main pathos of the poem. It is important for Nekrasov to show how the forces that unite him are ripening among the people and what kind of civic orientation they are acquiring. The idea of the poem is by no means reduced to making the wanderers carry out successive meetings according to the program they have outlined. A completely different question turns out to be much more important here: what is happiness in the eternal, Orthodox Christian understanding of it, and is the Russian people capable of combining peasant "politics" with Christian morality?
Therefore, folklore motifs in the Prologue play a dual role. On the one hand, the poet uses them to give the beginning of the work a high epic sound, and on the other hand, to emphasize the limited consciousness of the disputants, who deviate in their idea of happiness from the righteous to the evil ways. Recall that Nekrasov spoke about this more than once a long time ago, for example, in one of the versions of the "Song of Eremushka", created back in 1859.
change pleasure,
To live does not mean to drink and eat.
There are better aspirations in the world,
There is a nobler good.
Despise wicked ways:
There is debauchery and vanity.
Honor the covenants forever right
And learn from Christ.
The same two paths, sung over Russia by the angel of mercy in "A Feast for the Whole World," are now opening up before the Russian people, who are celebrating the wake of the fortress and facing a choice.
In the middle of the world
For a free heart
There are two ways.
Weigh the proud strength
Weigh your firm will:
How to go?
This song resounds over Russia coming to life from the lips of the messenger of the Creator himself, and the fate of the people will directly depend on which path the wanderers will take after long wanderings and windings along the Russian country roads.
