Handsome cook or adventures summary. Mikhail Chulkov - A Pretty Cook, or The Adventures of a Depraved Woman
The book examines the little-known process of the development of the Western European picaresque novel in Russia (during the pre-Gogol period). The author draws parallels between Russian and Western traditions, traces the process of gradual "nationalization" of the picaresque novel in the Russian Empire.
A series: AIRO is the first publication in Russia
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by the LitRes company.
"Pretty cook" Chulkov
In 1770, that is, only two years after the release of the fourth part of The Mockingbird, Chulkov's novel A Pretty Cook or The Adventures of a Depraved Woman appeared. It was printed without the author's name, but according to both Chulkov's own data and others, it clearly belonged to him. If at the beginning of the XX century. the Russian researcher attributed it to I. Novikov, the author of a picaresque essay, which is yet to be discussed later - “The Adventures of Ivan the Gostiny Son”, then here we are talking simply about a delusion. The book has the designation "1st part", but the following parts have not been published. D. D. Blagoy believes that censorship prevented the publication of the sequel. But there is no evidence in favor of this assertion, while much is said against it. Indeed, in the available censorship reports, The Pretty Cook is neither called a forbidden book, nor mentioned as suspicious. Also, Chulkov, even in his previously reviewed bibliographic index, definitely cites only the first part of The Pretty Cook, although he lists in this list not only printed, but also unpublished, even unfinished works. And since in the printed first part one can already observe a distinct shift from the original social satire to an adventurous love story, the assumption that the continuation was contrary to censorship rules is completely unbelievable.
On the contrary, V. Shklovsky believes that as a result of the transformation of the heroine and the meeting of the main characters at the end of the first part, the novel is in principle completed to such an extent that Chulkov “could not” continue it at all. In fact, the end of the printed volume is a kind of conclusion. Only the conclusion that Chulkov was therefore no longer able to continue his romance is exaggerated. Attacks of repentance take place in almost all picaresque novels, but often form only a caesura within the story, and not its conclusion. Even such radical moral turns as those that took place with Simplicissimus at the end of the 5th book do not exclude "Continuatio" (Continuation. - Lat., approx. trans.). Just the example of the Grimmelshausen novel, as well as the continuations and pseudo-continuations of the Spanish picaresque novels, prove that unambiguously completed novels of this kind can later be continued again even from the point of view of action and in terms of composition. This is possible simply because the first-person form of the story does not preclude an undoubted conclusion as a result of the death of the central character. This means that the kaleidoscope of adventures is such a free compositional form that, in fact, an unlimited continuation remains possible. Therefore, one should also not compare a picaresque novel like The Pretty Cook with completely different conceived, aesthetically incomparably more ambitious novels, such as Tolstoy's War and Peace. And this is exactly what Shklovsky does to substantiate his thesis.
Instead of embarking on assumptions and hypotheses, it is only recommended to state that only the first part of The Pretty Cook has come out. This first part itself, taking into account the action and composition, is so internally closed that it can be read and evaluated as a small independent novel, precisely because the form of a picaresque novel does not require an unconditionally unambiguous and final conclusion.
The book begins with a dedication (actually a parody of a dedication) to "His Excellency... my most merciful sovereign." But the matter is limited to the title, and the name of the “sovereign” is not named, and the author claims that he is silent about the name only so that, given the dubious quality of the book, the dedication does not turn into satire instead of praise, as often happens with many books and dedications. But the author hoped that his book, which was not free from errors, would nevertheless find the favor of a high-ranking philanthropist, because this philanthropist, of course, is tolerant and virtuous, for only generosity and virtue contributed to his career advancement to an influential post.
Also, the subsequent appeal in verse to the reader connects the ironic rejection of one's "I" with the praise of others, also ironic, and a request for indulgence. The reader, as far as he has enough intelligence, will be able to read the book correctly (namely, from top to bottom, but not vice versa). But let him not judge this too harshly, for to err is human, and even people who know how to dance are not free from errors in dancing. The author, however, did not even learn to play the flute and jump to the beat, so that something may not work out for him all the more.
After this introduction, clearly reminiscent of The Mockingbird in manner and tone, the story itself begins. This is a story about the life of the “pretty cook” Martona, told in the first person and looking at the past. Her husband, a sergeant, fell in the Battle of Poltava, and since he was neither a nobleman nor a landowner, he left a nineteen-year-old widow in Kyiv without funds.
The “honest old woman” takes her under her protection and finds an unsuspecting young woman of a young butler of a certain nobleman as a lover. After a brief rejection, the helpless Martona agrees to a love affair. Thanks to the money that the butler hid from his master over and over again, he provides a luxurious life for himself and his partner. Not satisfied with the services of an old woman, they even get a maid and a servant, play the gentlemen, and the lovely Marton soon becomes famous in the city and enjoys success.
One day, a noble young man seeks her out and gives her an expensive snuffbox. For the sake of this new connection, Marton wants to end the old one, but the servant of the new acquaintance, who discovered the snuffbox, arranges a scene for Marton and threatens to take away all the things that she received thanks to him that evening. As soon as he leaves to carry out his threat, a new lover appears, consoles Marton and drives the returnee away. While he, full of horror, understands that the new lover is his own master, the master considers the appearance of a servant a simple mistake. The next morning, he even sends a servant to Martone to serve her. She apologizes to the one who asks for forgiveness, promises not to tell anything about his hidings or thefts, and after the reconciliation took place, both decide to rob the master, he is a new lover even more thoroughly than before.
Soon after, Sveton - such is the name of a young man of noble birth - receives a letter from his seriously ill father, who calls him home. In order not to lose Martona, he persuades her to come to the estate of one of his friends, located near his father's. On the way, he confesses to her that he is married, but he married only at the request of his parents, in reality he loves only Marton. He regularly visits Marton in her hideout, but his wife finds out about this, hides in the closet in the bedroom and finds the couple on a date. Sveton runs away, and Martona is beaten and kicked out.
She goes to Moscow and becomes a cook there for a certain secretary who pretends to be pious, does not miss a single divine service, but at the same time allows his wife to get her hands on money received in the form of bribes, about which his little son must submit a detailed report to his father daily. . It also does not bother him that his wife cheats on him with other men, if only incomes grow. Martona becomes the secretary's wife's favorite; after all, as the narrator substantiates with the help of one of the proverbs so numerous in her speech, “the fisherman sees the fisherman far in the reach.” The clerk (an illiterate, despite his profession) falls in love with a "pretty cook", who, testing him, asks a series of questions and receives stupid answers to them. Thanks to the beautiful clothes that he gives her, however, she becomes more prominent than the secretary's wife, who then, out of envy, expects her.
A job broker arranges for her a new job with a newly widowed retired lieutenant colonel who was looking for a young housekeeper. A seventy-year-old man falls in love with Marton and entrusts her with his entire household, but, jealous, does not let her out of the house. Only occasionally is she allowed to go to church. There, an attractive young man casts loving glances at her, but a jealous old man notices this, immediately leads her home and vows to die rather than let her go. Only with great difficulty does she manage to calm him down, resorting to loving assurances. A few days later, a man offers Marton his services as a servant. Between the submitted papers, she finds a love letter from Ahal, a young man from the church, who thus tries to get to know her. Marton sees the servant out, but with his help he keeps in touch with the new gentleman. After a conversation with the cook, it is decided that Ahal should visit Marton under the guise of her sister, dressed in a woman's dress. The cook thinks everything through, the intention is realized, and the lieutenant colonel is so touched by the tenderness with which the "sisters" meet that he even concedes his own bedroom to them. Akhal manages to persuade the lover to run away and marry. Since he himself, although of noble birth, is poor, Marton secretly brings valuable things and other property of the old man to his beloved in the following days, who agrees with her that they will meet at one of the city gates at a certain time in order to escape together from there. But when Marton arrives there at night, Akhal is nowhere to be found. She learns that this time she has become a deceived liar, that her alleged lover and fiancé were only interested in her money (or the lieutenant colonel). With repentance, she returns to the old man, who forgives her, but, upset by the escape, she falls ill so badly that she dies soon after. His sister, who in the meantime has learned all about Marton's frauds from the former housekeeper, orders her to be arrested and imprisoned.
The prisoner is utterly stunned when one day Ahal visits her. He repents of his deed, assures her of his love, and with the help of the guard officer Svidal, he manages to facilitate the release of Martona from prison. She is placed with a certain old woman, where officer Svidal visits her almost as often as Ahal. Eventually, a fight breaks out between the two, followed by a challenge. During the duel, Svidal falls, and his opponent, believing that he shot him, runs away from the city to escape punishment. Martona, who has fallen in love with Svidal, is much more sad about his imaginary death than about Akhal's escape. But suddenly the one who was considered dead appears to her, and tells that he loaded both pistols without a bullet and only pretended to be dead in order to get Akhal out of the way in this way. Both rejoice at the successful trick and conclude something like a marriage contract, according to which Svidal even assigns a permanent pension to his partner.
At this time, Martona meets a merchant of noble birth, who, for the money of her husband, surrounds herself with young rhymers and maintains a literary salon, which in reality serves more matrimonial purposes. And here, too, people of the same kind met, so that Martona becomes a close friend of the mistress of the house. She would very much like to eliminate her husband and persuades Marton's servant, who is reputed to be an expert in magic, to prepare poison for her for this purpose. But he conspires with his mistress and Svidal, and instead of a deadly drink, he mixes a drug that infuriates. When, after that, the merchant is seized by a fit of rage, he is tied up and becomes the object of insults from his wife. And the subsequent attempt of the sober and unleashed revenge on the slanderer is used by his wife to declare him insane. Only when the servant of Martona, having told the encrypted "fairy tale", exposes the merchant's malice, the spouse is rehabilitated. But he, showing generosity, refuses revenge and simply sends his wife to the village, which he presented to her.
Martona and Svidal live together happily and idly. But then she suddenly receives a letter from Ahal. He could not survive the separation from her and the murder of a friend and took poison. His last wish is to see her again before he dies. Accompanied by Svidal, she goes to him and finds the desperate man in a room completely draped in black cloth, decorated with symbols of death, where he tells what pangs of conscience he is experiencing. Then she confesses to him that Svidal deceived him, but now she repents of her act and is about to come herself to ask for forgiveness. But Ahal, tormented by remorse and poison, considers the appearance of Svidal a new test that the dead man has caused, and finally goes crazy. This melodramatic and moralizing scene concludes the story, begun in a realistic and frivolous manner.
Even from this review of the content, it becomes clear that Chulkov in his "Pretty Cook" continues the line that he already started in the picaresque fragments of "The Mockingbird". Now he adheres even more strictly to the model of the picaresque novel, only this time the "female version". As in Mockingbird, Chulkov still largely follows the usual pattern in his choice of types and subjects. The very image of a “lecherous woman”, a deceitful servant, a carefree officer, an old man in love, a greedy official playing the role of a pious, a shameless and vicious wife - all these are images that have long been known from picaresque literature and shvankov, with whom Chulkov, for the most part, had already met before. . The corresponding is valid in relation to such plots as a deceived deceiver, dressing a man as a woman, an unexpected discovery of a couple in love by a jealous wife who hid in a closet, etc.
But The Handsome Cook goes further in the "Russification" of individual types and the whole, and turns out to be much more unified than Chulkov's first work, whether it concerns the general composition, a continuous narrative perspective, as well as linguistic and stylistic design.
Before proceeding to a study in detail, it should be recalled that although both works of Chulkov are separated from each other by only a few years, these years account for events that were of great importance for all Russian literature and, to the greatest extent, for satirical prose. . The fourth part of The Mockingbird came out in 1768. The Pretty Cook follows in 1770. But the year 1769 lying between them was marked by the appearance of the “satirical magazines”, which were discussed earlier. Satirical images and problems of the middle and lower strata of the people are no longer a rarity in printed literature. Therefore, a purely satirical prose narrative from this social sphere can count on the interest of the Russian reader in 1770, and there is no need for an unconditional combination with knightly stories, which Chulkov resorted to in Mockingbird. But above all, Chulkov himself in 1769, as one of the most diligent publishers and authors of satirical journals, had ample opportunity for improvement in the field of satirical prose. This is true precisely for his satirical daily journal “This and that”, which has been published since 1769, is very colorful and diverse, while the monthly “Parnassian Scribbler” of 1770 contains pure literary polemics. There is no possibility here, and for the analysis of Chulkov's picaresque novels there is no need to dwell in more detail on the content and trends of his journals. However, it should be pointed out that in his weekly Chulkov continues to be ironic at his address, as he already did in The Mockingbird, that he again considers the goals and boundaries of his satire, expands its pictorial means, in some fragments also uses a picaresque story from first person and, above all, removes the superfluous, honing the style of his prose.
End of introductory segment.
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The following excerpt from the book A picaresque novel in Russia. On the history of the Russian novel before Gogol (Yuri Shtridter, 1961) provided by our book partner -
Your Excellency
Your Majesty!
Everything that exists in the world is made up of decay, therefore, this book attributed to you by me is made of decay. Everything in the world is insidious; and so this book now exists, it will stay for some time, and finally it will decay, disappear and fade out of everyone's memory. A person will be born into the world to survey glory, honor and wealth, taste joy and joy, go through troubles, sorrows and sadness; similarly, this book came into being in order to take down some shadow of praise, negotiations, criticism, indignation and reproach. All this will come true with her, and finally turn into dust, like the person who praised or defame her.
Under the guise and under the title of a book, my desire is to entrust myself to the patronage of your excellency: a desire common to all people who do not have royal portraits. Worthy people are being produced, therefore, your reason, virtues and indulgence have elevated you to this high degree. It is akin to you to show favors to the poor, but I am comfortable to deserve them with all diligence. Who you are, society will know about it when it has the happiness to use your benefits.
Your Excellency
gracious sovereign
lowest servant
The author of this book.
Forewarning
Neither animals nor cattle understand sciences,
Neither fish nor reptiles can read.
Flies do not argue about poems among themselves
And all the flying spirits.
They speak neither prose nor verse,
It so happened that they did not even look at the book.
For this reason visible
My favorite reader
Of course there will be a person
Who all his life
Works in sciences and affairs
And above the cloud the concept is bridged.
And as if he didn't have it in his mind,
That there is a limit to his mind and will.
I leave all creatures
To you, oh man! I bow my speech
And in a word you understand a lot,
Of course, you don’t know how to take books upside down,
And you will look at her from the head,
And you will see in it all my art,
Find all my errors in it,
But only you, my friend, do not judge them strictly,
Mistakes are akin to us, and weaknesses are decent,
Errors to create all mortals are common.
Since the beginning of the century, although we wander in the sciences,
However, we do not find such a sage,
Which would not have made mistakes in the whole century,
Even if he knew how to dance,
And I'm not taught either in a tune or dance,
So, therefore, I can give a miss.
Pretty cook
I think that many of our sisters will call me indiscreet; but as this vice is for the most part akin to women, then, not wanting to be modest against nature, I indulge in it with pleasure. He will see the light, having seen, he will disassemble; and having sorted out and weighed my affairs, let him call me what he pleases.
Everyone knows that we won the victory at Poltava, in which my unfortunate husband was killed in the battle. He was not a nobleman, he had no villages behind him, therefore, I was left without any food, I bore the title of a sergeant's wife, but I was poor. I was then nineteen years of age, and for that my poverty seemed to me even more unbearable; for I did not know how people behave, and could not find a place for myself, and so I became free because of the fact that we are not assigned to any positions.
At that very time, I inherited this proverb: “Shey-de, widow, sleeves are wide, it would be where to put unreal words.” The whole world turned on me and hated me so much in my new life that I did not know where to lay my head.
Everyone talked about me, blamed and slandered me for what I
dont know. Thus, I burst into tears; but an honest old woman, who was known to the whole city of Kiev, for I was then in it, took me under her protection, and regretted my misfortune so much that the next day in the morning she found a young and stately man for my amusement. At first I seemed stubborn, but two days later I willingly undertook to follow her advice and completely forgot my sadness, which I felt unapproachably for two weeks after the death of my husband. This man was more young than good, and I'm quite handsome, and "a red flower and a bee flies." He was the butler of a certain gentleman and spent money non-stop because it was directly master's, and not his own. Thus, they were proof of his love for me and served as an eternal pledge. Soon, almost the entire Gostiny Dvor found out that I was a great hunter to buy the necessary things and trifles, and almost every minute belongings grew in our house and the estate arrived.
I firmly knew this proverb that "wealth gives birth to honor." So, she hired herself a maid and began to be a mistress. Whether I knew how to command people or not, I don’t know about that myself, and then I didn’t need to go into such a trifle, but it’s enough that I didn’t want to take on anything myself, and rode my maid like a fool on a donkey. Mr. valet himself wanted to dominate no less than I did, for this reason he hired a boy to serve him when he talked with me, and he was hopeless with me, therefore, our domination was not interrupted for a minute, and we shouted at the servants like this , as on their own, they beat them and scolded them as much as we wanted, according to the proverb: “What is this pain for when a fool has a will.” Yes, we acted in such a way that "they beat with clubs, and paid with the ruble."
The more attire a woman has, the more she wants to walk around the city, and because of this, many of our sisters deteriorate and fall under bad consequences. I was satisfied with everything, and every clear day I was in the abyss, many recognized me and many wanted to make acquaintance with me.
Once, close to midnight, a man knocked at our gates, who not so much asked, but rather wanted to break in by force. We would not have let him in, but our strength was not enough, and we did not have a valet at that time; thus, I sent a servant to unlock, my old woman was preparing to meet him and ask, and then I hid and thought that Paris had not come for Helen because I was an enviable woman in that city; Or at least that's what I thought of myself.
Mikhail Chulkov
A Handsome Cook, or The Adventures of a Depraved Woman
Part I
His Excellency the Real chamberlain and various orders of the cavalier
To my most merciful sovereign
Your Excellency
Your Majesty!
Everything that exists in the world is made up of decay, therefore, this book attributed to you by me is made of decay. Everything in the world is insidious; and so this book now exists, it will stay for some time, and finally it will decay, disappear and fade out of everyone's memory. A person will be born into the world to survey glory, honor and wealth, taste joy and joy, go through troubles, sorrows and sadness; similarly, this book came into being in order to take down some shadow of praise, negotiations, criticism, indignation and reproach. All this will come true with her, and finally turn into dust, like the person who praised or defame her.
Under the guise and under the title of a book, my desire is to entrust myself to the patronage of your excellency: a desire common to all people who do not have royal portraits. Worthy people are being produced, therefore, your reason, virtues and indulgence have elevated you to this high degree. It is akin to you to show favors to the poor, but I am comfortable to deserve them with all diligence. Who you are, society will know about it when it has the happiness to use your benefits.
Your Excellency the Gracious Sovereign, the humblest servant
The author of this book.
Forewarning
Neither animals nor cattle understand sciences,
Neither fish nor reptiles can read.
Flies do not argue about poems among themselves
And all the flying spirits.
They speak neither prose nor verse,
It so happened that they did not even look at the book.
For this reason visible
My favorite reader
Of course there will be a person
Who all his life
Works in sciences and affairs
And above the cloud the concept is bridged.
And as if he didn't have it in his mind,
That there is a limit to his mind and will.
I leave all creatures
To you, oh man! I bow my speech
You are a dude
businessman,
Scribe.
And in a word you understand a lot,
Of course, you don’t know how to take books upside down,
And you will look at her from the head,
And you will see in it all my art,
Find all my errors in it,
But only you, my friend, do not judge them strictly,
Mistakes are akin to us, and weaknesses are decent,
Errors to create all mortals are common.
Since the beginning of the century, although we wander in the sciences,
However, we do not find such a sage,
Which would not have made mistakes in the whole century,
Even if he knew how to dance,
And I'm not taught either in a tune or dance,
So, therefore, I can give a miss.
Pretty cook
I think that many of our sisters will call me indiscreet; but as this vice is for the most part akin to women, then, not wanting to be modest against nature, I indulge in it with pleasure. He will see the light, having seen, he will disassemble; and having sorted out and weighed my affairs, let him call me what he pleases.
Everyone knows that we won the victory at Poltava, in which my unfortunate husband was killed in the battle. He was not a nobleman, he had no villages behind him, therefore, I was left without any food, I bore the title of a sergeant's wife, but I was poor. I was then nineteen years of age, and for that my poverty seemed to me even more unbearable; for I did not know how people behave, and could not find a place for myself, and so I became free because of the fact that we are not assigned to any positions.
At that very time, I inherited this proverb: “Shey-de, widow, sleeves are wide, it would be where to put unreal words.” The whole world turned on me and hated me so much in my new life that I did not know where to lay my head.
Everyone talked about me, blamed and slandered me with something that I did not know at all. Thus, I burst into tears; but an honest old woman, who was known to the whole city of Kiev, for I was then in it, took me under her protection, and regretted my misfortune so much that the next day in the morning she found a young and stately man for my amusement. At first I seemed stubborn, but two days later I willingly undertook to follow her advice and completely forgot my sadness, which I felt unapproachably for two weeks after the death of my husband. This man was more young than good, and I'm quite handsome, and "a red flower and a bee flies." He was the butler of a certain gentleman and spent money non-stop because it was directly master's, and not his own. Thus, they were proof of his love for me and served as an eternal pledge. Soon, almost the entire Gostiny Dvor found out that I was a great hunter to buy the necessary things and trifles, and almost every minute belongings grew in our house and the estate arrived.
I firmly knew this proverb that "wealth gives birth to honor." So, she hired herself a maid and began to be a mistress. Whether I knew how to command people or not, I don’t know about that myself, and then I didn’t need to go into such a trifle, but it’s enough that I didn’t want to take on anything myself, and rode my maid like a fool on a donkey. Mr. valet himself wanted to dominate no less than I did, for this reason he hired a boy to serve him when he talked with me, and he was hopeless with me, therefore, our domination was not interrupted for a minute, and we shouted at the servants like this , as on their own, they beat them and scolded them as much as we wanted, according to the proverb: “What is this pain for when a fool has a will.” Yes, we acted in such a way that "they beat with clubs, and paid with the ruble."
Mikhail Dmitrievich Chulkov
The novel is preceded by a letter to an anonymous benefactor "chamberlain and various orders of the cavalier", in order to draw the reader's attention to the fact that praise or indignation turn to dust, like the person who praises or denigrates this book. The author addresses the reader in verse, urging him to be attentive, but condescending.
The narrator tells that she was a nineteen-year-old widow, since her husband died near Poltava and, being a man of a simple rank, left her without any maintenance. And since the life of a poor widow corresponds to the saying “Shey-de, widow, wide sleeves, it would be where to put fairy-tale words,” the heroine easily agreed to the offer of a matchmaker to accept the patronage of a very handsome butler noble gentleman. With his money, the heroine dressed up, hired a maid, and soon attracted the attention of all of Kyiv, where she then lived, with her beauty and cheerfulness.
Soon a gentleman appeared at the gates of her house, who presented her with a golden snuffbox with diamonds, because of which Marton, that is the name of the narrator, concluded that a very important person was interested in her. However, the former boyfriend, seeing the snuffbox and recognizing in it the thing of his master, threatened to rob the ungrateful widow to the skin. Martona was frightened to the point that she fell ill, but the butler who returned with a cart, seeing the sick owner at the bedside, calmed down and expressed the deepest respect to the heroine and henceforth served his master's beloved.
Its owner, Sveton, soon received a letter from his elderly father, who foresaw his imminent death. Sveton did not dare to leave the city without his girlfriend, but his friend and neighbor on the estate suggested that they go together and leave Marton in his village under the guise of a relative. On the way, Sveton admitted that he was married, and had recently been married. This disturbed the narrator, as she foresaw the disasters that threatened her. Her premonition was fully justified, and during the next meeting with the beloved Sveton, the closet in the room where they were flirting suddenly opened and the furious wife of Sveton came out of it, who hurried to escape. Marton, on the other hand, endured a lot of slaps in the face from her deceived wife and found herself on the street without a penny and belongings. The silk dress she was wearing had to be exchanged for peasant clothes and she had to get to Moscow, enduring hardship and resentment.
In Moscow, the narrator managed to get a job as a cook for a secretary who lived on bribes and offerings from petitioners. The secretary's wife was not distinguished by virtues - she cheated on her husband and was prone to drunkenness, so she made the cook her confidante. The clerk who lived in the house entertained the heroine with his stories. In his opinion, the well-known Martone secretary and solicitor are a true example of intelligence and learning. The poets, on the other hand, are not at all what the heroine thinks of them. Somehow, an ode of some Lomonosov got into the office, so no one from the order could understand it, and therefore this ode was declared nonsense, inferior in all respects to the last clerical note. Marton had to endure the stupidity of the clerk, as he generously endowed her. Having dressed up with his help, she began to attract the attention of the hostess admirers. The wife of the secretary did not tolerate this and refused Martone from the place. The narrator was not interested in anyone in this house, and she left without regret.
Very soon, with the help of a pimp, the heroine found herself a place in the house of a retired lieutenant colonel. The childless widower, admired by the beauty and elegant attire of Marton, offered her to dispose of all his property and even promised to leave all his fortune to her, since he had no heirs. The heroine immediately agreed and began to "please his money." The old man's delight was so great that he did not allow the narrator to go to the former apartment for belongings and immediately gave her the keys to the chests and jewelry boxes of his dead wife. For the first time, the heroine saw such a quantity of pearls and, forgetting about decency, immediately began to re-string all the pearl headwear. The loving old man helped her.
Further, the narrator says that seclusion served as the price for a well-fed and prosperous life, since she was forbidden to leave the house. The only place she ever visited was the church, where she went with the lieutenant colonel. However, even there she managed to meet her next love. The elegant appearance and reverence of her lover allowed her to stand in the church near the kliros among respectable people. One day Martona caught the eye of a young man. Her owner, also noticing the attention of a handsome young man, barely coped with his excitement and at home demanded assurances of love and fidelity from the "Russian Elena".
Soon a petitioner came to their house with a large number of certificates in the hope of finding a place. The narrator found among the papers a note with declarations of love from Achel, a stranger from the church. It was not necessary to count on a place in the house of a jealous old man, but the maid gave Marton clever advice. Achel, dressed in a woman's dress, enters the house under the guise of the elder sister of the narrator. Their meetings with Marton took place literally in front of the jealous old man, who not only did not suspect anything, but also did not hide his admiration for the tenderness and love of the two imaginary sisters.
Achel became so attached to Martona that he asked her to marry him. The lovers got engaged. Martona did not suspect anything even when Achel advised her to get the old man's payment for our heroine's stay with him, in other words, to take out all the valuables. It was the easiest thing to take out pearls and money unnoticed, which the narrator did when she handed over the valuables to Achel. Secretly getting out of the old man's house, Martona discovered that Achel had disappeared along with things, and the search for him was fruitless.
The pretty cook had to go back to the widower. The narrator found him inconsolable with grief. He accepted it without reproach. The manager, who accepted Marton very rudely, was immediately fired, but he harbored a grudge and took revenge on the heroine. As soon as the lieutenant colonel died, his sister appeared, claiming the inheritance (she learned about everything from the offended steward), and managed not only to take possession of the property, but also to put Marton in prison.
In prison, the narrator had a hard time, but Achel unexpectedly showed up with his friend Svidal. They managed to free Martona. Once in the wild, the narrator quickly recovered, began to dress up and have fun again. The only thing that seriously upset her was the jealousy and rivalry between Achel and Svidal. The first believed that he had more rights to Marton because of a long acquaintance. During a card game in lobmer, both admirers quarreled to such an extent that Svidal challenged Achel to a duel. For several hours Martona remained in the dark about the fate of her lovers. Suddenly, Achel appears, reports that he killed Svidal, and, taking advantage of the heroine's fainting, disappears.
The narrator became seriously ill and recovered from her illness only when Svidal appeared. It turns out that, taking advantage of the duel, he pretended to be dead and forced Achel to flee forever from the city. He also explained that his ingenuity was not accidental, but dictated by love for the lovely Martone. Our heroine, taught by bitter experience, did not rely only on love and henceforth began to accumulate gold coins and expensive gifts.
Soon Marton met a young noblewoman who married a merchant. The company that gathered in the merchant's house was very funny and did not differ in nobility, but served as a good school for the heroine. The hostess herself generally had criminal intentions to lime her husband, a merchant. To this end, she hired a Little Russian from Marton's servants and persuaded him to prepare poison.
For the unlucky merchant, everything ended well, since the storyteller's servant did not poison him, but only caused temporary insanity with his tincture. For which he was richly rewarded. Suddenly, Martona received a letter from Achel, in which he reported his desire to die, as he was unable to bear the regret of the death of a friend and the loss of his beloved. In order to part with his life, Achel takes poison and dreams of saying goodbye to his beloved Marton. The narrator and her beloved Svidal went together to Achel, but only Marton entered the house. She learned that Achel was driven to despair by remorse and he, deciding to leave her a bill of sale for the estate, acquired with her own money, decided to die. The mere mention of Svidal's name drove him into a frenzy, and he could not realize that his friend was alive.
The story is told in the first person. The heroine, a girl named Marton, lost her husband at the age of nineteen and was left penniless. This forced her to become the kept woman of a noble gentleman. The butler gave her decent money, she began to dress well and earned a certain fame in Kyiv. The noble Mr. Swithon turned his attention to her, with whom her lover-butler served. Having become Swithon's kept woman, Martona became even prettier, but she did not save a penny for her future life, spending everything on outfits.
Swithon's wife found out about her husband's hobby, she beat the broken cook and she, in a torn dress, was forced to move to live in Moscow. There she got a job as a cook to the secretary, became his mistress and lived in clover. However, the secretary's wife did not tolerate this for long and drove Marton out. So she ended up in the house of a wealthy lieutenant colonel. The old man fell madly in love with her, gave away all the clothes and jewelry of his deceased wife, but forbade her to leave the house. Together they went only to the church, where the handsome Achel fell in love with her. He managed to get into the lieutenant colonel's house and persuaded Marton to steal money and jewelry from him. Martona did this, but Achel, having taken all the booty from her, disappeared without a trace. The cook returned to the lieutenant colonel, who very quickly forgave her. His manager wanted to open the owner's eyes to a dishonest mistress, but was immediately fired. He took revenge later: after the death of the lieutenant colonel, he brought his sister to the house, and put Marton in prison. Akhel managed to rescue her from prison with his friend Svidal. Both young men became lovers of Martona. This state of affairs did not suit them, and Achel challenged his comrade to a duel. Soon he returned to the cook and declared that he had killed Svidal.
After that, he left Moscow forever. Literally a few minutes later, Svidal appeared in front of Marton. He admitted that he pretended to be murdered for the sole purpose of making Achel leave Martona forever. Young people begin to live together, deceiving ordinary citizens. A little later, the cook received a letter from Achel, in which he confessed that he could not forgive himself for the murder of his comrade and wanted death. He took poison and asks Marton to come to him to say goodbye. The arriving cook enters the room alone and finds out that Achel has given her a rich estate as an inheritance. He once bought this house with the money that she stole from the lieutenant colonel. After that, Svidal appears before the eyes of the dying Achel. Achel is shocked, but the poison is already beginning to act and nothing can be changed.
1. Poetics, problems and genre originality of the novel by M.D. Chulkov "A pretty cook, or the adventures of a depraved woman."
Poetics and genre originality
novel by M.D. Chulkov "Pretty cook"
Mikhail Dmitrievich Chulkov's (1743-1792) novel "A Handsome Cook, or the Adventures of a Depraved Woman" was published in 1770, a year after the publication of "Letters of Ernest and Doravra". In its genre model, "The Pretty Cook" combines the tradition of an adventurous picaresque travel novel with the tradition of a psychological novel: the form of narration in "The Pretty Cook" - Marton's autobiographical notes - is close to the epistolary form in its personal character, the absence of a moralistic author's voice and the way the character of the heroine in her self-disclosure. However, having inherited the pan-European scheme for the development of the novel narrative, Chulkov took care to fit into the framework of this scheme a number of recognizable signs of national life.
His heroine Marton, whose character is in general correlated with the image of picaro, the hero of the picaresque novel of Western Europe, is the widow of a sergeant killed near Poltava - thus, the action of the novel receives its original historical link: the Battle of Poltava took place in 1709 - however, later in the novel there is a clear anachronism, since the “ode of Mr. Lomonosov” is mentioned (and the first ode of Lomonosov, as you know, was written in 1739, and by that time, 19-year-old at the beginning of the novel, Martone should have turned 49 years old, which does not fit in with the plot novel) - but, nevertheless, the initial stage in the biography of Martona is attributed to the Petrine era, and this makes us see in the character of the enterprising, active and roguish heroine a certain reflection of the general revival of individual initiative, which marked the era of state reforms.
The beginning of the novel finds Marton in Kyiv. The vicissitudes of fate subsequently throw her to Moscow. The novel mentions a wandering on foot, which Martona undertook not entirely of her own free will; however, the circumstances of this particular “adventure” are not disclosed in the novel, and the plot-forming motive of the journey in “The Pretty Cook” appears in its metaphorical aspect of “life's journey”. The Moscow period of the heroine’s life also has its own topographical references: Martona lives in the parish of Nikola on chicken legs, her lover Akhal lives in Yamskaya Sloboda, the duel between Akhal and Svidal takes place in Maryina Roshcha because of Martona’s favor, and all this gives Chulkov’s novel an additional household authenticity.
Yes, and in the very image of Martona, in the means that Chulkov uses to convey the warehouse of her character, the writer's desire to emphasize the national principle is noticeable. Martona's speech is richly equipped with proverbs and sayings; she tends to explain all the events of her life with the help of universal human wisdom, recorded in these aphoristic folklore formulas: “Shey-de widow has wide sleeves, it would be where to put fairy-tale words”, “a red flower and a bee flies”, “wealth gives birth to honor”, “before this time Makar dug the ridges, and now Makar got into the governors”, “the bear is wrong that he ate the cow, the cow that wandered into the forest is also wrong.” These and many other proverbs, generously scattered in the narrative of the novel, form the national basis of the character of the heroine. The democratic origin makes Marton an organic bearer of the national folk culture and the type of national consciousness embodied in the folklore genre. So the genre model of the novel as a whole and the character of the heroine in particular is a combination of the traditional features of the European novel, which is the same in its aesthetic nature, with an attempt at Russification that was successful for that era.
In this concretized national-historical, geographical, topographical and mental context, in which the story of the democratic heroine of the novel is placed, the functions of traditional Russian literary motifs are modified, due to which a reliable image of material life is created. The story of the heroine-adventurer is surrounded by a dense halo of everyday life motifs of food, clothing and money, which accompany literally every plot break in the novel and the turn of the heroine's fate; swings from misfortune to well-being and vice versa rigorously bring to life these base and satirical motives by genesis:
Everyone knows that we won the victory at Poltava, in which my unfortunate husband was killed in the battle. He was not a nobleman, he did not have villages behind him, therefore, I was left without any food<...>. At the very same time, I inherited this proverb: “Shey-de widow has wide sleeves, it would be where to put fairy-tale words.”
It is easy to see how the function of everyday writing motifs in Chulkov's novel changes: for all their apparent traditionalism, they cease to be a means of discrediting the heroine, while retaining the function of modeling the image of a reliable habitat. From a means of satirical denial of character, everyday motives turn into an artistic device for explaining this character. The passion for the material, which Marton is obsessed with at the beginning of the novel - "I would have agreed then to die rather than part with my estate, I honored and loved him so much" (264) - is not Marton's fundamental vicious property; it was instilled in her by the very conditions of her life, her poverty, the lack of support in life and the need to somehow support this life; as the heroine herself explains this property, “I firmly knew this proverb that “wealth gives birth to honor” (266). Thus, at the very beginning of the novel, its fundamentally new aesthetic orientation was set: not so much to evaluate the character as virtuous or vicious, but to explain it, showing the reasons that influence its formation and formation.
The demonstrative rejection of moral assessments and the desire for objectivity of the image, uniting the author's position of Chulkov, who gave the heroine herself the story of her turbulent life and dubious profession, with the position of the heroine, who calls a spade a spade throughout the story, is declared at the very beginning of the novel:
I think that many of our sisters will call me indiscreet; but as this vice is for the most part akin to women, then, not wanting to be modest against nature, I indulge in it with pleasure. He will see the light, having seen, he will sort it out, and having sorted out and weighed my affairs, let him call me what he pleases (264).
Such a position, new in itself, should have been perceived even more sharply due to the fact that both the heroine and the story of her life were an unprecedented phenomenon for Russian literature. A woman of easy virtue and the petty nobles surrounding her, judicial officials who take bribes, thieves, swindlers and rogues - Russian literature has not yet seen such heroes before Chulkov, at least in the national novel. The very subject of the narration, as it were, pushed the writer towards undisguised didactic moralizing, and the fact that in The Pretty Cook the moralistic pathos does not have declarative forms of expression, but is hidden in the system of artistic images and the special, dryish, protocol-accurate manner of Marton's life story, was of decisive importance. for the gradual formation of new aesthetic criteria for Russian belles-lettres. The desire of the new generation of Russian writers not to model, but to reflect life in a work of belles-lettres, not to evaluate, but to explain the character, determined two fundamental postulates that govern the narrative of the “lewd woman” about her voyage through the sea of \u200b\u200blife.
First of all, this is the idea of mobility, fluidity, changeability of life and the corresponding idea of the ongoing evolution of character. The dynamic concept of life, declared by Chulkov in the author's preface to the novel:
Everything in the world is insidious; So, now this book is there, it will stay for a while, and finally it will decay, disappear and go out of everyone's memory. A person will be born into the world to survey glory, honor and wealth, taste joy and joy, go through troubles, sorrows and sadness<...>(261).
finds its reinforcement in a similar statement by Martona, who is guided by the same idea of "rotation" in her worldview:
I have always held the opinion that everything in the world is impermanent; when the sun has an eclipse, the sky is constantly covered with clouds, the time changes four times in one year, the sea has an ebb and flow, fields and mountains turn green and white, birds molt, and philosophers change their systems - then as a woman who is born to change, one can love him until the end of her age (286).
As a result, the life reflected by the author and told to the reader by the heroine, who are equally guided by a dynamic idea in their worldview, appears as a kind of self-moving reality. Martona's life position is more passive than active: for all her active initiative, the heroine Chulkova is only able to build her own destiny to a certain extent, she is too dependent on the circumstances to which she is forced to adapt in order to defend her individual private life in the struggle against fate and chance. The entire biography of Martona in the social sense is built as a continuous chain of ups and downs, changes from poverty to wealth and vice versa, and all these changes do not happen at all at the request of the heroine, but in addition to it - in this respect, the heroine Chulkova can really be likened to a sailor who wears on the stormy waves of the sea of life.
As for the moral image of Martona, a more complex picture is created here, since the factual everyday writing style of narration and the personality of the democratic heroine herself excluded the possibility of an open psychological analysis. The spiritual path of Martona, the changes taking place in the character of the heroine, is one of the earliest examples of the so-called "secret psychology", when the process of character change itself is not depicted in the narrative, but can be determined from a comparison of the starting and ending points of evolution and reconstructed based on changing reactions of the heroine in similar circumstances.
And here it is important that Marton in his autobiographical notes appears simultaneously in two of his personal hypostases: the heroine of the story and the narrator, and between these two stages of her evolution there is an obvious temporary and hidden moral gap. Marton the heroine appears before the reader in the present tense of her life, but for Marton the narrator this stage of her life is in the past. This time gap is emphasized by the past tense of the narrative, which is especially noticeable in the objective.moral characteristics that the heroine Chulkova gives herself:
<...>people like me then don't have friends; the reason for this is our immoderate pride. (269);<...>virtue was unfamiliar to me (272);<...>I didn’t know what gratitude meant in the world, and I didn’t hear about it from anyone, but I thought that it was possible to live in the world without it (273); My conscience did not despise me in the least, for I thought that there were people in the world much more courageous than me, who in one minute would do more evil than I did in three days (292); Whether it was possible then to have philanthropy in me, about this, I tea, the reader will think (296).
From frank autocharacteristics accompanying just as frankly described morally dubious actions, grows an unsympathetic moral image of a woman-adventurer, who is least of all concerned about observing the rules of universal humanistic morality. But this Marton, who appears before the reader in the present tense of reading the novel, for Marten, the author of autobiographical notes, is "Marton then." What is Marton like now, from what moral positions she tells about her stormy and immoral youth - nothing is reported to the reader about this. But, by the way, the novel itself contains landmarks by which it is possible to reconstruct the general direction of changes in the character of the heroine, and the fact that she is changing is evidenced by the leitmotif of the narrative about her life. The story about the next incident in her fate is strictly accompanied by a final conclusion. Marton gains life experience in front of the reader, drawing concise conclusions from lengthy descriptions of the facts of his biography.
Entering the service of the secretary of the court and looking around in his house, she immediately reports: “At this time I learned that all secretarial servants use bribes in the same way as their master.” (276). Deceived by her lover Ahal, who ran away from her with money stolen jointly from an old and wealthy lieutenant colonel, Martona adds two more observations to her experience:
And although I saw further than they thought of me, I could not make out his [Ahal's] pretense, and in this case I really found out that no matter how sharp and intricate a woman is, she is always subject to the deceptions of a man, and especially at that time when she is passionate about them (294).
In this case, I explained that he [Ahal] had more need for my lover's belongings than for me, and was tempted not by my beauty, but by gold coins and pearls (296).
Finally, having heard about the imaginary death of Svidal, whom she, imperceptibly for herself, managed to truly love, Marton reports her discovery as follows:
In this case, I found out directly that that is the real passion of love. When I heard about the death of Svidal, my blood cooled, my larynx dried up, and my lips were parched, and I could hardly pronounce my breath. I thought that I had lost all the world when I lost Svidal, and the deprivation of my life seemed then to me nothing.<...>I was ready to endure everything and proceed without timidity to death, only to pay Svidal for the loss of his life, which was the reason for me, the unfortunate one in the world (304-305) -
and this is said by the same Martona, who ten pages earlier had not lamented for a second the death of a hussar lieutenant colonel, the cause of which was her unsuccessful flight with Ahal.
Gradually, but constantly gaining life experience, implicitly motivates changes in the character of the heroine, which are almost imperceptible throughout the story, but are clearly revealed in the comparison of the initial and final positions of the heroine in similar plot situations. These changes are especially evident in Marton's attitude to love: the professional priestess of free love and the corrupt woman of the beginning of the novel becomes simply a loving woman by the end of it; and if the story about her relationship with Sveton, one of the first lovers, is full of commercial terminology, then in the message about the declaration of love with Svidal, the bargaining motive appears in the opposite sense:
This first meeting was a bargain with us, and we didn’t talk about anything else, how we concluded a contract; he [Sveton] traded my charms, and I conceded them to him for a decent price, and we then pledged ourselves with receipts<...>(268). Thus, I really found out that he [Svidal] is alive and loves me as much as I do him, or maybe less, in which we did not dress up with him, but fell in love with each other without any bargaining (305).
Greedy and greedy, ready to die for her material wealth at the beginning of the novel, at its end Marton becomes just a prudent and prudent woman:
This wealth did not amuse me, for I had already seen enough of it, but I undertook to be more careful and set out to stock up for the right occasion (307).
Finally, tough and ungrateful - not because of her depravity of character, but because of the harsh circumstances of life, Marton in the finale of the novel discovers other feelings in herself: the news of Akhal's suicide makes her sincerely regret the lover who deceived her:
Akhalev's bad deed against me was completely wiped out from my memory, and only his good deeds were vividly represented in my memory (321).
From these comparisons, which are not emphasized in any way by Chulkov in his novel, but are entirely given to the reader's attention and thoughtfulness, the general direction of the heroine's moral evolution is revealed: if her eventful biography is a chaotic wandering at the behest of circumstances, fate and chance, then Martona's spiritual path is directed to direction of growth and moral improvement. So the dynamic picture of the world in Chulkov's novel is complemented by the dynamic spiritual life of the heroine, the genre model of the adventurous novel of adventures and wanderings is connected with the model of the novel - the education of feelings.
By chance, this ideological and artistic conception of the novel as a mirror of life itself in its constant and endless movement and renewal found in Chulkov's novel another way of its artistic expression. The text of the novel that has come down to us ends with the scene of the meeting of Svid-la Akhal, who is dying of remorse for the alleged murder, with his imaginary victim, after which there is the phrase: "The end of the first part." And it is still not exactly established whether the second part of the novel was written, but for some reason not published by Chulkov, or it did not exist at all: thus, it is not known whether Chulkov's novel was completed or not. From a purely plot point of view, it is cut short in mid-sentence: it is not known whether Akhal succeeded in his suicide attempt, it is not clear how the relationship between Martona, Akhal and Svidal will develop further, and, finally, what does the “pretty cook” have to do with it, since Martona’s service as a cook is sparingly mentioned in one of the initial episodes of the novel, and then this line does not find any continuation. However, from an aesthetic point of view, and that for a writer of the 18th century. no less, and perhaps more important, - didactic, in the novel "The Pretty Cook" all the most important things have already happened: it is obvious that Marton has changed, and changed for the better, and the woman writer is already a completely different person, from a height of his life experience, able to objectively understand and describe himself, despite all the delusions of his difficult and stormy youth.
Regardless of whether or not Chulkov had the intention to finish the second part, and whether the final phrase of the novel is a conscious hoax or evidence of an incomplete implementation of the plan, the fact remains that the novel was published and reached the reader in the very form in which we read it Now. And in this sense, the external fragmentation, the abruptness of the plot of the novel "The Pretty Cook" became an aesthetic fact in the history of Russian literature and a significant factor that determined the idea of Russian readers (and, importantly, writers) about the genre of the novel. The absence of a plot ending, an open perspective, the possibility of further movement, the feeling of which is given by the external incompleteness of the novel, gradually began to be recognized as an integral feature of this genre, an artistic device that formally expresses the idea of the lifelikeness of the novel, shaping it as a self-moving reality. We will see the same device in another experience of the novel, Karamzin's "Knight of Our Time"; needless to say, that he will find his final embodiment in Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin", where he will finally establish himself in his status as a deliberately used artistic device and a consciously achieved aesthetic effect? With all the aesthetic imperfections of the Russian democratic novel of the 1760s-1770s. its prefigurative significance for the history of Russian prose of the classical period cannot be overestimated. It is here, in these early experiences of the Russian novel, that a whole scattering of semi-conscious finds and discoveries is contained, which will take shape in a coherent genre system and sparkle with new brilliance under the pen of the great Russian novelists of the 19th century.
Summing up the conversation about the regularities of the ways of the formation of Russian prose, which loudly declared itself in journalism and novelism of the 1760s-1770s, it is necessary to note the incredible productivity of documentary genres and forms of first-person narration in both varieties of Russian prose of that time. And in satirical journalism, and in fiction 1760-1770. the imitation of a document, the epistolary, autobiographical notes, travel notes, etc., absolutely predominate. And this is a fundamentally important factor that determines the new aesthetic relationship between art and reality.
It is at this moment that Russian literature becomes aware of itself as life and strives to resemble life in its forms. In turn, life agrees to recognize literature as its reflection, generously endowing it with its attributes - endless variability, constant movement and development, the polyphony of different views and points of view expressed by literary personalities and characters ranging from Empress Catherine to a comely cook. And the time is not far off when the reverse process will arise in Russian narrative prose - life-building, attitude to life and one's own biography as a kind of aesthetic activity, the desire to liken the empirical life of a private person to a generalized aesthetic fact.
This naturally stimulated the flourishing of various literary forms of manifestation of the author's individuality in hitherto declaratively impersonal texts of Russian literature of the 18th century. And of course, it is deeply natural that the process of advancing the author's personality into the system of artistic images of the text was clearly embodied in the genre of the lyric-epic poem, which combines the objectivity of the narrative epic with lyrical subjectivism.
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