Read Faust Turgenev online. Tale by I.S.

Elena Kalinina, 11th grade student at State Budget Educational Institution Gymnasium No. 41 named after Erich Kästner

Research work on the story by I.S. Turgenev "Faust"

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The spiritual world of man

(literary criticism)

"The tragic meaning of love

in the story by I.S. Turgenev "Faust"

(creative essay)

Students of class 11 "A"

Gymnasium No. 41 named after. E.Kestner

Primorsky district

Kalinina Elena Anatolyevna

Scientific supervisor – teacher of Russian language and literature

Mazur Olga Ivanovna

State educational institution of secondary (complete) general education gymnasium No. 41 named after Erich Kästner

Primorsky district of St. Petersburg

Gymnasium address: 197349, St. Petersburg, st. M. Novikova, 1/3

Tel/fax: 349-98-07

Saint Petersburg

2010

Introduction. The theme of love in the works of I.S. Turgenev;

Stories from the 1850s about the tragic meaning of love;
Information about the tragedy of I.V. Goethe “Faust”;
The essence of love in the story "Faust";
Conclusion. Conclusions. Results;
Bibliography.

Introduction.

Love... is stronger than death and the fear of death. Only by her

only love holds

and life moves on.

I.S. Turgenev

The nineteenth century is called the “golden age” in literature. The literature of this time is a unique, exceptional, incomparable phenomenon. Fiction, as a rule, reflects the theme of love and idealizes a woman. Russian literature in particular, because Russian writers observe too little that is lofty and beautiful in life.

The gravitation of Russian literature towards the ideal was clearly expressed in the creation of female images.

In the overwhelming majority of cases, the image of a woman is a criterion for evaluating the hero, and love is a test situation for him.

In the system of realistic literature of the nineteenth century, it was difficult to create an ideal hero - a man: even the best of them discovered ineradicable vices and shortcomings, the main one being the inability to act actively and usefully.

In general, this was not required of a woman of that time. Her task is not so much to act as to experience, sympathize, to remain at the height of the ideal not so much in action as in her spiritual world. She must grow spiritually, become spiritually refined - this is her main task.

One of the writers who spoke in their works about the ideal of a woman is Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev. Together with his heroes, he “lived” many lives, experienced many love stories, usually sad ones: “First Love”, “Spring Waters”, “Asya”, “Rudin”, “On the Eve”, “Fathers and Sons”.

“The singer of beauty and youth,” Turgenev tenderly introduces us to his beautiful heroines: Asya, Gemma, Princess Zinaida, Elena, Natalya, Vera Eltsova and others.

With Turgenev’s work, the poetic image of the Russian hero’s companion, the “Turgenev girl,” personifying moral purity, determination, femininity and spiritual sublimity, entered not only literature, but also life.

The expression “Turgenev girls” has become a catchphrase. Along with the image of the “Turgenev girl”, the image of “Turgenev love” is also included in the works of writers. As a rule, this is first love, spiritualized and pure.

All Turgenev's heroes undergo tests of love - a kind of test of viability. A loving person is wonderful. Spiritually inspired. But the higher he flies on the wings of love, the closer the tragic denouement is, and the fall...

The feeling of love is tragic because the ideal dream that inspires the soul of a person in love is not feasible within the confines of the earthly, natural circle. Turgenev discovered the ideal meaning of love. Turgenev’s love is a clear confirmation of a person’s rich and not yet realized abilities on the path of spiritual improvement. The light of love for a writer is a guiding star on the path to the triumph of beauty and immortality. That is why Turgenev is so interested in first love, pure and chaste. Love that promises triumph over death in its beautiful moments.

Love is a feeling where the temporary merges with the eternal in a higher synthesis, impossible in married life and family love. This is precisely the secret of the ennobling influence of “Turgenev’s love” on the human heart, on all human life.

Such love, pure, spiritualized, influenced the life of the writer himself - love for the famous singer Pauline Viardot.

Turgenev first sees Pauline Viardot in the fall of 1843 on the stage of the opera house and falls in love with her. From that moment on, he begins to accompany her on all her trips around Europe. She becomes not only the love of his life, but the Muse who inspired Turgenev to write many works.

In the 1850s, Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev turned to the genre of stories and novels, in which he explored human nature. It was during these years that the stories “The Diary of an Extra Man” (1850), “The Calm” (1854), “Correspondence” (1854), “Faust” (1856), “Asya” (1858), and the novels “Rudin” (1856) were written. , “The Noble Nest” (1858), “On the Eve” (1859).

Reflecting in them on man, his complex dual In fact, the writer also raises a range of problems that arise in connection with these reflections, primarily the problem of love.

The key to unraveling the characters of many of Turgenev’s heroes is his article - the essay “Hamlet and Don Quixote” (1860). In the images of Hamlet and Don Quixote, as Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev believes, “two fundamental, opposite features of human nature are embodied - both ends of the axis around which it revolves” 1 .

The peculiarity of Don Quixote is faith in the truth that is outside the individual,” “the high principle of self-sacrifice.”

In Hamlet, “selfishness, and therefore lack of faith” stands out.

According to Turgenev, in a person these contradictory qualities will unite, but still, under the influence of certain conditions and circumstances, either the Hamletian or the Quixotic principle wins.

And Turgenev’s heroes often manifest themselves as Hamlets, then they are selfish and prefer reflection, self-examination, or like quixotes they are sacrificial, their life is illuminated by the thought of serving people.

A very important milestone in the history of Turgenev’s ideological philosophical development in the 1840s was an article on Goethe’s “Faust” (1845). The article is closely related to the writer’s work. A. Batyuto writes:

“Facts, thoughts, cursory observations, polemical statements and summaries, recorded in the writer’s correspondence, were remembered for a long time and often received a kind of rebirth in his novels and stories, sometimes growing on a completely different concrete - social and everyday basis into independent scenes and dialogue etc.” 2

Let's consider the content of Turgenev's article about the tragedy "Faust". The article solves not only literary-critical, but also ideological problems: about the driving forces of social development. About the interaction of the individual and society, the individual and nature, about idealism and realism in the worldview.

The image of Mephistopheles, which in Goethe is the embodiment of the spirit of negation and destruction, evokes the following interesting and deep reflection: “Mephistopheles is the demon of every person in whom reflection was born; he is the embodiment of that denial that arises in a soul exclusively occupied with its own doubts and perplexities; he is the demon of lonely and distracted people..." 1

This analysis of the tragedy “Faust” is noteworthy in that the philosophical problematics of such future works of Turgenev as “A Trip to Polesie”, “Faust”, “Hamlet of Shchigrovsky District” are practically already outlined here. Reflective people, preoccupied with the petty contradictions of their own lives, are able to ignore the real suffering of other people.

The study of Mephistophelian negation leads him not to the idea of the immorality and selfishness of reflection, but also to the idea that “reflection is our strength, our weakness, our death and our salvation” .

In the story “Faust” Turgenev raises problems similar to those that Goethe spoke about in the tragedy “Faust”.

ІІІ

The great German poet I.V. Goethe wrote his tragedy over the course of 60 years. The tragedy "Faust" is based on an ancient folk legend about Doctor Faustus, who entered into an alliance with the devil for the sake of knowledge and power over nature.

The main problem of Faust is outlined in the first chapter of the work, “Prologue in Heaven.” In the dispute between Mephistopheles and the Lord, two opposing points of view on man collide. Mephistopheles believes that man is a weak and pitiful creature. the grains of reason that he possesses did not drown out the animal nature in him, did not make his life happy. The dispute between the Lord and Mephistopheles is then resolved using the example of the fate of Faust.

Faust is a specific individual personality, and at the same time a symbol of all humanity. Depicting the difficult path of his hero, Goethe solves not only the question of the meaning of the life of an individual person, but also the question of the meaning of the life of all humanity.

The image of Faust embodies Goethe's great idea of man. He is a great scientist, a tireless seeker, a great humanist. Faust's life path is a search for the meaning of life, a search for happiness in the high meaning of this word. This path is long and thorny, filled with labor and difficult trials. The tragedy reveals the stages of this path.

At first, Faust seeks to find the meaning of life in science. He devoted his whole life to it, studied philosophy, law, medicine, theology, but did not find satisfaction. Science did not reveal to him the secrets of nature, did not allow him to comprehend the human spiritual world. Disappointment in science forced Faust to turn to the knowledge of living human life. Mephistopheles becomes Faust's assistant, with whom he enters into an agreement: Faust is ready to die and give his soul to the devil if with his help he feels complete satisfaction for at least one moment. A kind of cooperation is established between Faust and Mephistopheles, but at the same time there is a constant internal struggle. Faust seeks satisfaction on the path to high goals, while Mephistopheles tries to awaken the base animal nature in him and force him to surrender to selfish pleasures. First, Mephistopheles tries to involve Faust in the drunken revels of careless young revelers, then he wants to intoxicate him with passion for a woman, and then push him into the pool of sensuality (chapter “Walpurgis Night”) and, finally, leads him into the “big world”, to the palace of the emperor, trying seduce with all sorts of honors.

Although Faust is shown as an earthly man, capable of being exposed to passions, making mistakes and being mistaken, nevertheless, the high humane principle prevails in him. No matter how hard Mephistopheles tries, he cannot drown out Faust’s sublime aspirations.

An important stage in Faust's internal development, in his search for meaning in life, is his love for Margarita. Mephistopheles wanted to evoke selfish passion in Faust's soul, but in reality things turned out differently. Faust's love for Margarita results in a great feeling. It enriches Faust's soul with joy, awakens in it a sense of responsibility for another person. Margarita is the most poetic, brightest of the female images created by Goethe. It is Margarita’s childish spontaneity that delights Faust, a reflective man of modern times. “How unspoiled and pure,” he admires .

Love, which Gretchen thought would bring her happiness, turns into the source of her involuntary crimes. Brother Valentin dies in a duel with Faust. The mother dies from the sleeping pills that Margarita gives her, not suggesting any danger.

Condemned by rumor, disgraced, expelled from the city, Margarita drowns her newly born child in a stream. The unfortunate woman goes to prison and faces execution. She's going crazy. Faust enters the prison in order to take Margarita away with the help of Mephistopheles. But she drives away the spirit of evil, recoils from Faust and does not try to avoid punishment, considering herself to be to blame for everything.

The love story of Faust and Margarita is “the most daring and deepest in German drama.” (B. Brecht).

Faust realizes that he is guilty of the death of Margarita, and this consciousness makes him feel his responsibility even more strongly. Having matured, he rises to a new level of wandering, developing in the second part of the tragedy, in the sphere of public life. The image goes beyond a specific place and time and receives a broad, generalized meaning.

At the end of the work, Faust became blind. Death is approaching him. Lemurs (spirits of the dead who frighten the living) dig Faust's grave.

The angels take Faust's soul from Mephistopheles, and the action moves to heaven. In the heavenly spheres, the soul of Faust meets the soul of Margarita.

The finale is the apotheosis of the immortal essence of Margarita and Faust, the apotheosis of man, in which nothing can destroy humanity, love and free reason.

Having led man through trials and temptations, through heaven, through hell, Goethe affirms the greatness of man in the face of history, nature, the Universe and love...

A kind of result of all the work of I.S. Turgenev is a cycle of “Poems and Prose”. We can say that this cycle is the poetic testament of the writer.

The poems reflected all the main themes and motives of the writer’s work. The motives of sacrificial love, faith in the spiritual powers of man, as well as man’s fear of spiritual Eternity are heard here.

In my work I would like to cite one of the most interesting, in my opinion, poems in prose, which is called “Rose”.

This poem, of course, has motifs similar to the story “Faust”.

Rose.

……I bent down…..it was a young, slightly blossoming rose. Two hours ago I saw this very rose on her chest.

I carefully picked up the flower that had fallen into the dirt and, returning to the living room, placed it on the table in front of her chair.

So she finally returned - and, walking across the room with light steps, she sat down at the table.

Her face turned pale and came to life; the lowered, as if diminished, eyes ran around quickly, with cheerful embarrassment.

She saw a rose and grabbed it. She looked at its crumpled, stained petals, looked at me - and her eyes, suddenly stopping, shone with tears.

What are you crying about? – I asked.

Yes, about this rose. Look what happened to her.

Here I decided to show thoughtfulness.

“Your tears will wash away this dirt,” I said with a significant expression.

“Tears don’t wash, tears burn,” she answered and, turning to the fireplace, threw a flower into the dying flame.

Fire will burn her better than tears,” she exclaimed, not without boldness, “and her beautiful eyes, still sparkling with tears, laughed boldly and happily.

I realized that she too had been burned.

Like a burnt rose, like a heroine who “was burned” in the fire of love, the heart of Vera Nikolaevna Eltsova from the story “Faust” also “burned.”

“You must deny yourself,” says I.V. Goethe. Words about love and self-denial will also be heard in the epigraph to Turgenev’s Faust.

The problem of love and the related problem of happiness and duty in the stories of Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev are closely related to the writer’s understanding of the nature and psychology of man and his attitude to Eternity.

Love is given to his heroes as the highest revelation about the world. They do not immediately, not quickly, recognize the feeling in themselves, and then it becomes that point, that moment that fills their entire unfulfilled life. It is no coincidence that many stories of the 1850s (“Asya”, “Faust”) are constructed in the form of memoirs.

However, the other side of love is its immediate tragic essence. It elevates the hero, fills his life with happiness, but at the same time, no one and nothing can “stop the moment” of love (as Goethe’s Faust wanted to do) or make it eternal. The fact that love is transitory by nature is its tragic side. The tragic is in the very essence of love. Therefore, the only force capable of preserving a person is debt. The hero of Faust, Pavel Alexandrovich, comes to this idea about the need for absolute self-denial.

In the story “Faust,” love is an irresistible force that arises suddenly and embraces a person who seems to be completely protected from its power. All barriers that protect a person from this force are immaculate and artificial; All it takes is a careless touch and they will tear. The power of art is shown in this story as a direct assistant and accomplice of love: art always invariably strives to look “somewhere where no one has looked.”

The impracticability of personal happiness in love and the naivety of aspirations for it is one of the motives of Faust.

In this story, tragic motives are also most noticeable. The theme of love is revealed in a tragic aspect in Faust.

Love arises inexplicably, spontaneously, a person is powerless before its power, and often it leads her to death, like Vera Eltsova.

For his story, Turgenev chooses the form of a story in letters. There are nine letters before the readers.

There is also a fantastic element in the story in the form of a portrait of Yeltsova’s mother and a vision of her daughter in the garden, where she, with bated breath, goes on a date. These fantastic elements are simply explained by the emotional tension and the drama of the awakening of love colliding with the moral duty of a married woman that Vera experiences.

Why is the story called I.S. Turgenev "Faust"? It's not just because it's one thing from the most beloved works of the hero of the story Pavel Alexandrovich.

Like the hero of Goethe's tragedy, Pavel Alexandrovich is disappointed in life. He is not yet forty, but he feels like an old man. He became decrepit in soul and cooled down.

This is exactly how the reader sees the hero at the beginning of the story. After a long absence, he returns to his native estate. The house is in disrepair, and only “the garden has become surprisingly prettier” 1 . Nature is contrasted with Pavel Alexandrovich’s state of mind. The antithesis of “the outdated soul of the hero” and “eternally living nature” is intended to help the reader understand that everything in the world is transitory, only “blooming” nature is eternal

How to cure the boredom that has taken possession of the hero? The solution is: “I won’t be bored” 2 . There is a library. Here he finds several books, including Goethe's Faust. The hero recalls that he knew the book by heart, but did not pick it up for nine years.

The development of the action begins with the second letter, when the hero accidentally meets Vera Nikolaevna at a ball. He knew her once.

Pavel Alexandrovich recalls meetings with young Vera Nikolaevna, tells the story of her mother, who lived a passionate life, but wanted to protect her daughter from such a life, from unnecessary emotions. Vera Nikolaevna did not read a single book until she was seventeen. Her mother forbade her to read fiction, since books evoke feelings, thoughts, and desires. Mother believed that in Vera’s life there could only be useful or only pleasant things. She says: “I think you need to choose in advance in life: either what is useful or what is pleasant, and so decide once and for all. And I once wanted to combine both...” 3

This turns out to be impossible and leads to death or vulgarity.

When meeting Vera, Pavel Alexandrovich is struck by one circumstance: she has not changed at all in appearance (same voice, not a wrinkle on her face). The hero did not like this “constancy”: “It was not for nothing that she lived!” 1 Life always leaves marks on a person. Faith remained the same. The one he knew in his youth.

The hero decides that it is necessary to “awaken” the soul of Vera Nikolaevna. After all, her soul is not developed. And this soul can be awakened by reading a book to it. The book is “Faust” by Goethe.

The tragedy makes a strong impression on Vera Nikolaevna, she wants to re-read the book. Talking about her feelings after reading, Vera admits that “I didn’t sleep all night,” “these things were burning her head.” What “things” affected her? Vera Nikolaevna realizes that her life was in vain, since she never had love.

Like Faust, who inspired the love of young Gretchen, Pavel Alexandrovich “forced” Vera Nikolaevna to fall in love with him. He himself fell in love with Vera. The boredom went away, but the feeling of happiness did not come in return.

The climax of the story is the last ninth letter. Vera Nikolaevna fell ill, and this illness is not only a disease of the body, but also a disease of the soul. She loves the hero, but happiness is impossible. After all, love is a burn. A burn and instant awakening.

The ending of the work is tragic. Vera Nikolaevna died. And Pavel Alexandrovich settled here forever.

In the name of what was the story written? The answer is obvious. We all must humble ourselves before the Unknown.

“I stayed - the gentle creature was broken into pieces,” 2 – writes the hero.

The story ends with very important words: “Life is not a joke or fun, life is not pleasure... life is hard work... you cannot live only for yourself at 37 years old; must live with benefit, with a purpose on earth, fulfill one’s duty, one’s business.” 3 .

The story teaches the reader to be prepared for self-denial and raises the problem of feelings and duty.

Love is tragic because the happiness of those who love is impossible. The thirst for happiness always collides with moral duty, which leads, as it led Vera, to disaster. You have to choose; happiness without debt leads to selfishness. All that remains is debt and renunciation of happiness. The hero of the story comes to this conclusion.

With such a contrast between happiness and duty, a person’s life inevitably takes on a tragic character, as shown by I.S. Turgenev in “Faust” using the example of the destinies of Vera and Pavel Alexandrovich.

“Vera Nikolaevna fell in love so much that she forgot her mother, her husband, and her responsibilities; the image of a loved one and the feeling that filled her became life for her, and she rushed towards this life, without looking back at the past, without regretting what was left behind, and without fear of either her husband, or her deceased mother, or reproaches; she rushed forward and strained herself in this convulsive movement; the eyes, accustomed to the dense darkness, could not withstand the bright light; the past, from which she rushed away, overtook her, crushed her to the ground, destroyed her.” .

“We all,” says the finale of the story “Faust,” “must humble ourselves and bow our heads before the Unknown.” 1

But the stories of the 50s “do not make a gloomy and overwhelming impression and, without turning against life, reconcile with it” 2 .

Love, according to Turgenev, is capable of uniting the spiritual and physical principles in a person, at least for a moment, uniting a person with humanity and the world, giving a feeling of completeness and integrity of existence.

The tragic outcome of love in the stories is objectively opposed to the period of the origin of the feeling and its culmination. This is one of the values of human existence: let us remember the heartfelt experiences of the almost forty-year-old hero of the story “Faust”.

The best decoration of Turgenev's short stories is the unique beauty of their main female characters. Calling a woman Turgenev’s “spiritual deity,” the poet K. Balmont argued that it was her image that was “the best and most faithful artistic essence” 3 writers.

What leaves the charm of Turgenev's stories are the motifs of youth, art, and depictions of nature.

Let us remember how Goethe’s tragedy “Faust” affected Vera Nikolaevna. This work awakened in the heroine the dormant need for endless love and harmonious fusion with the world. And this is no coincidence. After all, art is the embodiment of harmony.

The landscape is present in Turgenev’s stories as a powerful life-giving force: “... a thunderstorm approached and broke out. I listened to the sound of the wind, the knocking and plopping of the rain, I watched how, with each flash of lightning, the church, built nearby over the lake, suddenly appeared black on a white background, then white on black, then again was swallowed up in darkness ... " 4

Researchers note that the story “Faust” is an elegy, of course not poetic, but prosaic. It represents the hero's memory of the loss of love he experienced.

To summarize, we can say that the story “Faust” calls for “the ability to accept life as an intrinsic value and in its most tragic meaning” 5

Bibliography.

Anikst A. Goethe's Faust. M, "Enlightenment", 1979
Balmont K. Favorites. M, 1983
Batyuto A.I. Turgenev – novelist // Selected works. St. Petersburg, 2004
Goethe I.V. Faust, M, “Fiction” 1992
Lebedev Yu.V. Turgenev. M, 1990 (series “ZhZL”)
Leites N.S. From Faust to the present day. M, "Enlightenment", 1987
Markovich V.M. Man in novels Turgenev, L, 1975
Nedzvetsky V.A. I.S. Turgenev, M, 1998
Petrov S.M. I.S. Turgenev.M, “Fiction”, 1979
Poltavets E.Yu. I.S. Turgenev, M, 1998
Pustovoit P.G. I.S. Turgenev, M, 1998
Turgenev I.S. Faust. PSSP. M, 1982
Turgenev I.S. Literary and everyday memories. M, "Pravda", 1987
Russian literature of the 19th century. 1850 – 1870., M. 2007

Turgenev I.S. "Selected Works". M. "thin" lit-ra", 1982

Batyuto A. “Turgenev – novelist” // Selected works. St. Petersburg, 2004

Turgenev Ivan

Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

A story in nine letters

Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren (*).

"Faust" (part 1).

(* You must renounce, renounce (German).)

LETTER FIRST

From Pavel Alexandrovich V... to Semyon Nikolaevich V...

On the fourth day I arrived here, dear friend, and, as promised, I take up the pen and write to you. A light rain falls in the morning: it is impossible to go out; Yes, and I want to chat with you. Here I am again in my old nest, which I haven’t been to - it’s scary to say - for nine whole years. What, what has not happened in these nine years! Really, when you think about it, I’ve definitely become a different person. And indeed it’s different: do you remember in the living room the small, dark mirror of my great-grandmother, with such strange curls in the corners - you used to keep thinking about what it saw a hundred years ago - as soon as I arrived, approached him and involuntarily became embarrassed. I suddenly saw how I have aged and changed lately. However, I’m not the only one who has aged. My little house, which has been dilapidated for a long time, is now barely standing, it’s all crooked, and has grown into the ground. My good Vasilievna, the housekeeper (you probably haven’t forgotten her: she treated you to such delicious jam), was completely dry and hunched over; When she saw me, she couldn’t even scream and didn’t cry, but only groaned and coughed, sat down exhausted on a chair and waved her hand. Old man Terenty is still invigorated, still stands straight and twists his legs as he walks, dressed in the same yellow nankeen pantaloons and shod in the same creaky goat shoes, with a high instep and bows, from which you were more than once moved by emotion... .But, my God! - how those pantaloons now dangle on his skinny legs! how his hair turned white! and his face completely shrank into a fist; and when he spoke to me, when he began to give orders and orders in the next room, I felt both funny and sorry for him. All his teeth have disappeared, and he mumbles with a whistle and hiss. But the garden has become surprisingly prettier: modest bushes of lilac, acacia, honeysuckle (remember, we planted them) have grown into magnificent solid bushes; birches, maples - all this stretched out and spread out; The linden alleys are especially good. I love these alleys, I love the delicate gray-green color and the delicate smell of the air under their arches; I love the motley grid of light circles on the dark earth - I don’t have sand, you know. My beloved oak tree has already become a young oak tree. Yesterday, in the middle of the day, I sat in his shadow on a bench for more than an hour. I felt very good. All around the grass was blooming so merrily; there was a golden light on everything, strong and soft; he even penetrated into the shadows... And what birds were heard! I hope you haven't forgotten that birds are my passion. The turtle doves cooed incessantly, the oriole whistled from time to time, the chaffinch did its sweet little dance, the blackbirds got angry and chattered, the cuckoo echoed in the distance; suddenly, like a madman, a woodpecker screamed piercingly. I listened, listened to all this soft, united hum, I didn’t want to move, but my heart was either laziness or tenderness. And more than one garden has grown: I constantly come across thick-set, hefty boys, whom I just can’t recognize as old boys I knew. And your favorite, Timosha, has now become such a Timofey that you cannot imagine. You were then afraid for his health and predicted consumption for him; And now you should look at his huge red arms, how they stick out from the narrow sleeves of his nankeen coat, and how round and thick his muscles bulge out everywhere! The back of my head is like a bull’s, my head is all covered in cool blond curls - a perfect Hercules of Farnese! However, his face changed less than the others, it didn’t even increase in volume very much, and his cheerful, as you said, “yawning” smile remained the same. I took him as my valet; I abandoned my St. Petersburg one in Moscow: he really loved to shame me and make me feel his superiority in the capital’s treatment. I didn’t find any of my dogs; everyone transferred. Only Nefka lived the longest - and she did not wait for me, as Argos waited for Ulysses; she did not have to see her former owner and hunting companion with her dull eyes. But the Shavka is intact and barks just as hoarsely, and one of her ears is also torn, and there are burrs in her tail, as it should be. I moved into your former room. True, the sun hits it, and there are a lot of flies in it; but it smells less of an old house than in other rooms. Strange thing! this musty, slightly sour and sluggish smell has a strong effect on my imagination: I won’t say that it was unpleasant to me, on the contrary; but it arouses sadness in me, and finally despondency. Just like you, I really love old pot-bellied chests of drawers with copper plaques, white armchairs with oval backs and crooked legs, glass chandeliers spotted with flies, with a large egg made of purple foil in the middle - in a word, all sorts of grandfather’s furniture; but I can’t see all this all the time: some kind of anxious boredom (that’s right!) takes possession of me. In the room where I settled, the furniture was the most ordinary, homemade; however, I left in the corner a narrow and long cabinet with shelves on which various old Testament blown dishes made of green and blue glass can barely be seen through the dust; and on the wall I ordered to hang, do you remember, that female portrait, in a black frame, which you called the portrait of Manon Lescaut. He darkened a little during these nine years; but the eyes are looking

just as thoughtfully, slyly and tenderly, the lips laugh just as frivolously and sadly, and the half-plucked rose just as quietly falls from thin fingers. The curtains in my room amuse me a lot. They were once green, but turned yellow from the sun: scenes from Arlencourt’s “The Hermit” are painted on them in black paint. On one curtain, this hermit, with a huge beard, bulging eyes and wearing sandals, is dragging some disheveled young lady into the mountains ; on the other - there is a fierce fight between four knights in berets and with puffs on their shoulders; one lies, en raccourci (from the perspective (French).), killed by a word, all the horrors are presented, and there is such imperturbable calm all around, and from the very curtains. such gentle reflections fall on the ceiling... A kind of spiritual peace has come over me since I settled here; I don’t want to do anything, I don’t want to see anyone, I have nothing to dream about, I’m too lazy to think, but I’m not too lazy to think; two things are different, as you yourself well know. Memories of childhood first rushed over me... wherever I walked, whatever I looked at, they appeared from everywhere, clear, clear to the smallest detail, and as if motionless in their distinct certainty... Then these memories were replaced by others, then... then I quietly turned away from the past, and only some kind of drowsy burden remained in my chest. Imagine! sitting on the dam, under a willow tree, I suddenly unexpectedly began to cry and would have cried for a long time, despite my already advanced years, if I had not been ashamed of a passing woman, who looked at me with curiosity, then, without turning her face to me, bowed directly and low and passed by. I would very much like to remain in this mood (of course, I won’t cry anymore) until my departure from here, that is, until September, and I would be very upset if any of the neighbors decided to visit me. However, there seems to be nothing to fear from this; I don’t even have close neighbors. You, I am sure, will understand me; You yourself know from experience how often beneficial solitude is... I need it now, after all kinds of wanderings.

Letter one

From Pavel Alexandrovich B...
to Semyon Nikolaevich V...
Seltso M...oe, June 6, 1850.

I have some rather important news to tell you, dear friend. Listen! Yesterday, before lunch, I wanted to take a walk - just not in the garden; I walked along the road to the city. Walking with quick steps along a long straight road without any purpose is very pleasant. You seem to be doing something, hurrying somewhere. I look: a stroller is coming towards me. “Isn’t it to me?” - I thought with secret fear... However, no: in the carriage sits a gentleman with a mustache, a stranger to me. I calmed down. But suddenly this gentleman, having caught up with me, orders the coachman to stop the horses, politely raises his cap and asks me even more politely: am I such and such? - calling me by name. I, in turn, stop and with the cheerfulness of a defendant being led to interrogation, I answer: “I am such and such,” and I myself look like a ram at the gentleman with a mustache and think to myself: “But I’ve seen him somewhere... That!"
-You don’t recognize me? - he says, meanwhile getting out of the stroller.
- No way, sir.
- And I recognized you immediately.
Word for word: it turns out that it was Priimkov, remember, our former university friend. “What is this important news? - you think at this moment, dear Semyon Nikolaich. “Priimkov, as far as I remember, was a rather empty fellow, although he was not evil or stupid.” That's right, my friend, but listen to the continuation of the conversation.
“I was very happy,” he says, “when I heard that you had come to your village, to our neighborhood.” However, I wasn’t the only one who was happy.
“Let me find out,” I asked, “who else was so kind...
- My wife.
- Your wife!
- Yes, my wife: she is an old friend of yours.
– May I know what your wife’s name is?
– Her name is Vera Nikolaevna; she was born Yeltsova...
- Vera Nikolaevna! – I exclaim involuntarily...
This is the very important news that I told you about at the beginning of the letter.
But maybe you don’t find anything important in this either... I’ll have to tell you something from my past... long past life.
When you and I left the university in 183..., I was twenty-three years old. You entered the service; I, as you know, decided to go to Berlin. But there was nothing to do in Berlin before October. I wanted to spend the summer in Russia, in the countryside, to be thoroughly lazy for the last time, and then get to work in earnest. To what extent this last assumption came true, there is no need to talk about it now... “But where should I spend the summer?” – I asked myself. I didn’t want to go to my village: my father had recently passed away, I had no close relatives, I was afraid of loneliness, boredom... And therefore I gladly accepted the offer of one of my relatives, my cousin, to stay with him on his estate, in T** *th province. He was a wealthy man, kind and simple, he lived as a gentleman and had lordly chambers. I moved in with him. My uncle had a large family: two sons and five daughters. In addition, there were a lot of people living in his house. Guests kept arriving, but it was still no fun. The days passed noisily, there was no opportunity for privacy. Everything was done together, everyone tried to distract themselves with something, come up with something, and by the end of the day everyone was terribly tired. There was something vulgar about this life. I was already beginning to dream about leaving and was only waiting for my uncle’s name day to pass, but on the very day of these name days at the ball I saw Vera Nikolaevna Eltsova - and stayed.
She was then sixteen years old. She lived with her mother on a small estate, about five miles from my uncle. Her father - a very remarkable man, they say - quickly reached the rank of colonel and would have gone even further, but he died at a young age, accidentally shot by a comrade while hunting. Vera Nikolaevna remained a child after him. Her mother was also an extraordinary woman: she spoke several languages and knew a lot. She was seven or eight years older than her husband, whom she married for love; he secretly took her away from her parents' house. She barely survived his loss and until her death (according to Priimkov, she died soon after her daughter’s wedding) she wore only black dresses. I vividly remember her face: expressive, dark, with thick, gray hair, large, stern, as if extinct eyes and a straight, thin nose. Her father - his last name was Ladanov - lived in Italy for fifteen years. Vera Nikolaevna's mother was born from a simple peasant woman from Albano, who the day after her birth was killed by a Trasteverine man, her fiancé, from whom Ladanov kidnapped her... This story caused a lot of noise in its time. Returning to Russia, Ladanov not only did not leave his home, he did not leave his office, he studied chemistry, anatomy, cabalistics, he wanted to prolong human life, he imagined that he could enter into relations with spirits, call the dead... His neighbors considered him a sorcerer. He loved his daughter extremely, he himself taught her everything, but he did not forgive her for her escape with Yeltsov, did not let either her or her husband come into his sight, predicted a sad life for both of them and died alone. Left a widow, Mrs. Yeltsova devoted all her leisure time to raising her daughter and received almost no one. When I met Vera Nikolaevna, just imagine, she had never been to any city in her life, not even her own district one.
Vera Nikolaevna did not resemble ordinary Russian young ladies: she had some special imprint on her. From the first time I was struck by the amazing calmness of all her movements and speeches. She seemed not to bother about anything, not worried, answered simply and intelligently, and listened attentively. The expression on her face was sincere and truthful, like that of a child, but somewhat cold and monotonous, although not thoughtful. She was rarely cheerful and not like others: the clarity of an innocent soul, more joyful than cheerfulness, shone throughout her entire being. She was short, very well built, a little thin, had regular and delicate features, a beautiful even forehead, golden brown hair, a straight nose, like her mother’s, rather full lips; The black-gray eyes looked somehow too straight from under fluffy, upward-curved eyelashes. Her hands were small, but not very beautiful: people with talents do not have such hands... and indeed, Vera Nikolaevna did not have any special talents. Her voice rang like that of a seven-year-old girl. I was introduced to her mother at my uncle’s ball and, a few days later, I went to see them for the first time.
Mrs. Eltsova was a very strange woman, full of character, persistent and focused. She had a strong influence on me: I both respected her and was afraid of her. Everything was done according to the system, and she raised her daughter according to the system, but did not restrict her freedom. The daughter loved her and believed her blindly. As soon as Ms. Eltsova gave her a book and said: don’t read this page - she would rather skip the previous page than look at the forbidden page. But Ms. Yeltsova also had her own idees fixes, her own skates. She, for example, was afraid like fire of everything that could act on the imagination; and therefore her daughter, until the age of seventeen, did not read a single story, not a single poem, and in geography, history and even natural history she often baffled me, the candidate, and not the last candidate, as you may remember. I once tried to talk to Ms. Eltsova about her hobby, although it was difficult to involve her in conversation: she was very silent. She just shook her head.
“You say,” she said at last, “to read poetic works.” And healthy And nice... I think we need to choose in advance in life: or useful, or pleasant, and so already decide, once and for all. And I once wanted to combine both... This is impossible and leads to death or vulgarity.
Yes, this woman was an amazing creature, an honest, proud creature, not without fanaticism and superstition of her kind. “I'm afraid of life,” she once told me. And indeed, she was afraid of her, afraid of those secret forces on which life is built and which occasionally, but suddenly, make their way to the surface. Woe to the one on whom they are played! These forces had a terrible effect on Yeltsova: remember the death of her mother, her husband, her father... It intimidated at least someone. I haven't seen her ever smile. It was as if she had locked herself and thrown the key into the water. She must have suffered a lot of grief in her lifetime and never shared it with anyone: she hid everything inside herself. She had so accustomed herself not to give free rein to her feelings that she was even ashamed to show her passionate love for her daughter; she never kissed her in front of me, never called her by a diminutive name, always Vera. I remember one word of hers; I once told her that all of us, modern people, are broken... “There’s no point in breaking yourself,” she said, “you have to break yourself completely or not touch yourself...”
Very few people went to Yeltsova; but I visited her often. I was secretly aware that she favored me; and I really liked Vera Nikolaevna. We talked with her, walked... Mother did not interfere with us; The daughter herself did not like to be without her mother, and I, for my part, also did not feel the need for a solitary conversation. Vera Nikolaevna had a strange habit of thinking out loud; At night, in her sleep, she spoke loudly and clearly about what had struck her during the day. One day, looking at me carefully and, as usual, quietly leaning on her hand, she said: “It seems to me that B. is a good person; but you can’t rely on him.” The relationship between us was the most friendly and even; only once did I think that I noticed there, somewhere far away, in the very depths of her bright eyes, something strange, some kind of bliss and tenderness... But maybe I was mistaken.

Current page: 1 (book has 6 pages in total)

Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

A story in nine letters

Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren.

"Faust" (part 1) (1)

Letter one

From Pavel Alexandrovich B...

to Semyon Nikolaevich V...

On the fourth day I arrived here, dear friend, and, as promised, I take up the pen and write to you. A light rain falls in the morning: it is impossible to go out; Yes, and I want to chat with you. Here I am again in my old nest, which I haven’t been to - it’s scary to say - for nine whole years. What, what has not happened in these nine years! Really, when you think about it, I’ve definitely become a different person. And indeed it’s different: do you remember in the living room the small, dark mirror of my great-grandmother, with such strange curls in the corners - you used to keep thinking about what it saw a hundred years ago - as soon as I arrived, approached him and involuntarily became embarrassed. I suddenly saw how I have aged and changed lately. However, I’m not the only one who has aged. My little house, which has been dilapidated for a long time, is now barely standing, it’s all crooked, and has grown into the ground. My good Vasilievna, the housekeeper (you probably haven’t forgotten her: she treated you to such delicious jam), was completely dry and hunched over; When she saw me, she couldn’t even scream and didn’t cry, but only groaned and coughed, sat down exhausted on a chair and waved her hand. Old man Terenty is still invigorated, still stands straight and twists his legs as he walks, dressed in the same yellow nankeen pantaloons and shod in the same creaky goat shoes, with a high instep and bows, from which you were more than once moved by emotion... But, my God! - how those pantaloons now dangle on his skinny legs! how his hair turned white! and his face completely shrank into a fist; and when he spoke to me, when he began to give orders and orders in the next room, I felt both funny and sorry for him. All his teeth have disappeared, and he mumbles with a whistle and hiss. But the garden has become surprisingly prettier: modest bushes of lilac, acacia, honeysuckle (remember, we planted them) have grown into magnificent solid bushes; birches, maples - all this stretched out and spread out; The linden alleys are especially good. I love these alleys, I love the delicate gray-green color and the subtle smell of the air under their arches; I love the motley grid of light circles on the dark ground - I don’t have sand, you know. My beloved oak tree has already become a young oak tree. Yesterday, in the middle of the day, I sat in his shadow on a bench for more than an hour. I felt very good. All around the grass was blooming so merrily; there was a golden light on everything, strong and soft; he even penetrated into the shadows... And what birds were heard! I hope you haven't forgotten that birds are my passion. The turtle doves cooed incessantly, the oriole whistled from time to time, the chaffinch did its sweet little dance, the blackbirds got angry and chattered, the cuckoo echoed in the distance; suddenly, like a madman, a woodpecker screamed piercingly. I listened, listened to all this soft, united hum, and I didn’t want to move, but my heart was either laziness or tenderness. And more than one garden has grown: I constantly come across thick-set, hefty boys, whom I just can’t recognize as old boys I knew. And your favorite, Timosha, has now become such a Timofey that you cannot imagine. You were then afraid for his health and predicted consumption for him; And now you should look at his huge red arms, how they stick out from the narrow sleeves of his nankeen coat, and how round and thick his muscles bulge out everywhere! The back of the head is like a bull’s, and the head is all covered in cool blond curls - a perfect Hercules of Farnese! (2) However, his face changed less than the others, it didn’t even increase in volume very much, and the cheerful, as you said, “yawning” smile remained the same. I took him as my valet; I abandoned my St. Petersburg one in Moscow: he really loved to shame me and make me feel his superiority in the capital’s treatment. I didn’t find any of my dogs; everyone transferred. Only Nefka lived the longest - and she did not wait for me, as Argos waited for Ulysses; (3) she did not have to see her former owner and hunting companion with her dull eyes. But the Shavka is intact and barks just as hoarsely, and one of her ears is also torn, and there are burrs in her tail, as it should be. I moved into your former room. True, the sun hits it, and there are a lot of flies in it; but it smells less of an old house than in other rooms. Strange thing! this musty, slightly sour and sluggish smell has a strong effect on my imagination: I won’t say that it was unpleasant to me, on the contrary; but it arouses sadness in me, and finally despondency. Just like you, I really love old pot-bellied chests of drawers with copper plaques, white armchairs with oval backs and crooked legs, glass chandeliers spotted with flies, with a large egg made of purple foil in the middle - in a word, all sorts of grandfather’s furniture; but I can’t see all this all the time: some kind of anxious boredom (that’s right!) takes over me. In the room where I settled, the furniture was the most ordinary, homemade; however, I left in the corner a narrow and long cabinet with shelves on which various old Testament blown dishes made of green and blue glass can barely be seen through the dust; and on the wall I ordered to hang, do you remember, that female portrait, in a black frame, which you called the portrait of Manon Lescaut. (4) He darkened a little during these nine years; but the eyes look just as thoughtfully, slyly and tenderly, the lips laugh just as frivolously and sadly, and the half-plucked rose just as quietly falls from thin fingers. The curtains in my room amuse me a lot. They were once green, but turned yellow from the sun: scenes from d’Arlencourt’s “The Hermit” were painted on them in black paint. (5) On one curtain, this hermit, with a huge beard, bulging eyes and sandals, is dragging some disheveled young lady into the mountains; on the other, there is a fierce fight between four knights in berets and puffs on their shoulders; one lies, en raccourci, killed - in a word, all the horrors are presented, and there is such an imperturbable calm all around, and from the very curtains such gentle reflections fall on the ceiling... A kind of spiritual peace has come over me since I settled here; I don’t want to do anything, I don’t want to see anyone, I have nothing to dream about, I’m too lazy to think; but don’t be too lazy to think: these are two different things, as you yourself well know. Memories of childhood first washed over me... wherever I walked, whatever I looked at, they arose from everywhere, clear, clear to the smallest detail, and as if motionless in their distinct definition... Then these memories were replaced by others, then... then I quietly turned away from past, and only some kind of drowsy burden remained in my chest. Imagine! sitting on the dam, under a willow tree, I suddenly unexpectedly began to cry and would have cried for a long time, despite my already advanced years, if I had not been ashamed of a passing woman, who looked at me with curiosity, then, without turning her face to me, bowed directly and low and passed by. I would very much like to remain in this mood (of course, I won’t cry anymore) until my departure from here, that is, until September, and I would be very upset if any of the neighbors decided to visit me. However, there seems to be nothing to fear from this; I don’t even have close neighbors. You, I am sure, will understand me; you yourself know from experience how beneficial solitude is often... I need it now, after all kinds of wanderings.

And I won't be bored. I brought several books with me, and here I have a decent library. Yesterday I opened all the cabinets and spent a long time rummaging through the moldy books. I found many interesting things that I had not noticed before: “Candida” in a handwritten translation from the 70s; (6) statements and journals of the same time; "The Triumphant Chameleon" (that is, Mirabeau); (7) “Le Paysan perverti” (8), etc. I came across children’s books, both my own, and my father’s, and my grandmother’s, and even, imagine, my great-grandmother: on one old, old French grammar, in a variegated binding, written in large letters: Ce livre appartient à m-lle Eudoxie de Lavrine and the year displayed is 1741. I saw books that I had once brought from abroad, among other things, Goethe’s Faust. You may not know that there was a time when I knew “Faust” by heart (the first part, of course) from word to word; I could not read enough of him... But other days mean other dreams, and over the past nine years I have hardly had to pick up Goethe in my hands. With what an inexplicable feeling I saw a small book that was too familiar to me (a bad edition of 1828). (9) I took it with me, lay down on the bed and began to read. How the whole magnificent first scene affected me! The appearance of the Spirit of the Earth, his words, remember: “On the waves of life, in the whirlwind of creation,” aroused in me a long-unexplored thrill and cold delight. I remembered everything: Berlin, and my student days, and Fraulein Klara Stich, (10) and Seidelmann in the role of Mephistopheles, (11) and the music of Radziwill (12) and everything and everyone... For a long time I could not fall asleep: my youth came and became before me like a ghost; fire, poison ran through her veins, her heart expanded and did not want to shrink, something rushed along its strings, and desires began to boil...

This is what dreams your almost forty-year-old friend indulged in, sitting alone in his lonely house! What if someone spied on me? Well, so what? I wouldn't be at all ashamed. Being ashamed is also a sign of youth; And do you know why I began to notice that I was trying? Here's why. Now I try to exaggerate to myself my cheerful feelings and tame the sad ones, but in my youth I did exactly the opposite. It happens that you rush around with your sadness like a treasure, and are ashamed of a cheerful impulse...

And yet it seems to me that, despite all my life experience, there is still something in the world, friend Horatio, that I have not experienced, (13) and this “something” is almost the most important.

Oh, what I've gotten myself into! Goodbye! Until another time. What are you doing in St. Petersburg? By the way: Savely, my village cook, tells you to bow. He also aged, but not too much, he gained weight and became a little flabby. He also makes chicken soups with boiled onions well, cheesecakes with a patterned border, and Pigus - the famous steppe dish Pigus, which will make your tongue turn white and stand on your tongue for a whole day. But he still dries out the fried food so that even if you knock it on the plate, it’s like real cardboard. However, goodbye!

Your P.B.

Letter two

From the same to the same

-You don’t recognize me? - he says, meanwhile getting out of the stroller.

- No way, sir.

- And I recognized you immediately.

Word for word: it turns out that it was Priimkov, remember, our former university friend. “What is this important news? - you think at this moment, dear Semyon Nikolaich. “Priimkov, as far as I remember, was a rather empty fellow, although he was not evil or stupid.” That's right, my friend, but listen to the continuation of the conversation.

“I was very happy,” he says, “when I heard that you had come to your village, to our neighborhood.” However, I wasn’t the only one who was happy.

“Let me find out,” I asked, “who else was so kind...

- My wife.

- Your wife!

- Yes, my wife: she is an old friend of yours.

– May I know what your wife’s name is?

– Her name is Vera Nikolaevna; she was born Yeltsova...

- Vera Nikolaevna! – I exclaim involuntarily...

This is the very important news that I told you about at the beginning of the letter.

But maybe you don’t find anything important in this either... I’ll have to tell you something from my past... long past life.

When you and I left the university in 183..., I was twenty-three years old. You entered the service; I, as you know, decided to go to Berlin. But there was nothing to do in Berlin before October. I wanted to spend the summer in Russia, in the countryside, to be thoroughly lazy for the last time, and then get to work in earnest. To what extent this last assumption came true, there is no need to talk about it now... “But where should I spend the summer?” – I asked myself. I didn’t want to go to my village: my father had recently passed away, I had no close relatives, I was afraid of loneliness, boredom... And therefore I gladly accepted the offer of one of my relatives, my cousin, to stay with him on his estate, in T** *th province. He was a wealthy man, kind and simple, he lived as a gentleman and had lordly chambers. I moved in with him. My uncle had a large family: two sons and five daughters. In addition, there were a lot of people living in his house. Guests kept arriving, but it was still no fun. The days passed noisily, there was no opportunity for privacy. Everything was done together, everyone tried to distract themselves with something, come up with something, and by the end of the day everyone was terribly tired. There was something vulgar about this life. I was already beginning to dream about leaving and was only waiting for my uncle’s name day to pass, but on the very day of these name days at the ball I saw Vera Nikolaevna Eltsova - and stayed.

She was then sixteen years old. She lived with her mother on a small estate, about five miles from my uncle. Her father - a very remarkable man, they say - quickly reached the rank of colonel and would have gone even further, but he died at a young age, accidentally shot by a comrade while hunting. Vera Nikolaevna remained a child after him. Her mother was also an extraordinary woman: she spoke several languages and knew a lot. She was seven or eight years older than her husband, whom she married for love; he secretly took her away from her parents' house. She barely survived his loss and until her death (according to Priimkov, she died soon after her daughter’s wedding) she wore only black dresses. I vividly remember her face: expressive, dark, with thick, gray hair, large, stern, as if extinct eyes and a straight, thin nose. Her father - his last name was Ladanov - lived in Italy for fifteen years. Vera Nikolaevna's mother was born from a simple peasant woman from Albano, who the day after her birth was killed by a Trasteverine man, her fiancé, from whom Ladanov kidnapped her... This story caused a lot of noise in its time. Returning to Russia, Ladanov not only did not leave his home, he did not leave his office, he studied chemistry, anatomy, cabalistics, he wanted to prolong human life, he imagined that he could enter into relations with spirits, call the dead... His neighbors considered him a sorcerer. He loved his daughter extremely, he himself taught her everything, but he did not forgive her for her escape with Yeltsov, did not let either her or her husband come into his sight, predicted a sad life for both of them and died alone. Left a widow, Mrs. Yeltsova devoted all her leisure time to raising her daughter and received almost no one. When I met Vera Nikolaevna, just imagine, she had never been to any city in her life, not even her own district one.

Vera Nikolaevna did not resemble ordinary Russian young ladies: she had some special imprint on her. From the first time I was struck by the amazing calmness of all her movements and speeches. She seemed not to bother about anything, not worried, answered simply and intelligently, and listened attentively. The expression on her face was sincere and truthful, like that of a child, but somewhat cold and monotonous, although not thoughtful. She was rarely cheerful and not like others: the clarity of an innocent soul, more joyful than cheerfulness, shone throughout her entire being. She was short, very well built, a little thin, had regular and delicate features, a beautiful even forehead, golden brown hair, a straight nose, like her mother’s, rather full lips; The black-gray eyes looked somehow too straight from under fluffy, upward-curved eyelashes. Her hands were small, but not very beautiful: people with talents do not have such hands... and indeed, Vera Nikolaevna did not have any special talents. Her voice rang like that of a seven-year-old girl. I was introduced to her mother at my uncle’s ball and, a few days later, I went to see them for the first time.

Mrs. Eltsova was a very strange woman, full of character, persistent and focused. She had a strong influence on me: I both respected her and was afraid of her. Everything was done according to the system, and she raised her daughter according to the system, but did not restrict her freedom. The daughter loved her and believed her blindly. As soon as Ms. Eltsova gave her a book and said: don’t read this page - she would rather skip the previous page than look at the forbidden page. But Ms. Yeltsova also had her own idees fixes, her own skates. She, for example, was afraid like fire of everything that could act on the imagination; and therefore her daughter, until the age of seventeen, did not read a single story, not a single poem, and in geography, history and even natural history she often baffled me, the candidate, and not the last candidate, as you may remember. I once tried to talk to Ms. Eltsova about her hobby, although it was difficult to involve her in conversation: she was very silent. She just shook her head.

“You say,” she said at last, “to read poetic works.” And healthy And nice... I think we need to choose in advance in life: or useful, or pleasant, and so already decide, once and for all. And I once wanted to combine both... This is impossible and leads to death or vulgarity.

Yes, this woman was an amazing creature, an honest, proud creature, not without fanaticism and superstition of her kind. “I'm afraid of life,” she once told me. And indeed, she was afraid of her, afraid of those secret forces on which life is built and which occasionally, but suddenly, make their way to the surface. Woe to the one on whom they are played! These forces had a terrible effect on Yeltsova: remember the death of her mother, her husband, her father... It intimidated at least someone. I haven't seen her ever smile. It was as if she had locked herself and thrown the key into the water. She must have suffered a lot of grief in her lifetime and never shared it with anyone: she hid everything inside herself. She had so accustomed herself not to give free rein to her feelings that she was even ashamed to show her passionate love for her daughter; she never kissed her in front of me, never called her by a diminutive name, always Vera. I remember one word of hers; I once told her that all of us, modern people, are broken... “There’s no point in breaking yourself,” she said, “you have to break yourself completely or not touch yourself...”

Very few people went to Yeltsova; but I visited her often. I was secretly aware that she favored me; and I really liked Vera Nikolaevna. We talked with her, walked... Mother did not interfere with us; The daughter herself did not like to be without her mother, and I, for my part, also did not feel the need for a solitary conversation. Vera Nikolaevna had a strange habit of thinking out loud; At night, in her sleep, she spoke loudly and clearly about what had struck her during the day. One day, looking at me carefully and, as usual, quietly leaning on her hand, she said: “It seems to me that B. is a good person; but you can’t rely on him.” The relationship between us was the most friendly and even; only once did I think that I noticed there, somewhere far away, in the very depths of her bright eyes, something strange, some kind of bliss and tenderness... But maybe I was mistaken.

Meanwhile, time passed, and it was time for me to get ready to leave. But I still hesitated. It happened that when I thought, when I remembered that soon I would no longer see this sweet girl to whom I had become so attached, I would feel terrible... Berlin began to lose its attractive power. I did not dare to admit to myself what was happening in me, and I did not understand what was happening in me - as if a fog was wandering in my soul. Finally, one morning everything suddenly became clear to me. “What else should I look for,” I thought, “where should I strive? After all, the truth will not be given into your hands. Isn’t it better to stay here and get married?” And, imagine, this thought of marriage did not frighten me at all then. On the contrary, I was glad for her. Moreover, on the same day I announced my intention, not to Vera Nikolaevna, as one might expect, but to Yeltsova herself. The old woman looked at me.

“No,” she said, “my dear, go to Berlin and break down some more.” You are kind; but this is not the kind of husband Vera needs.

I looked down, blushed, and, which will probably surprise you even more, immediately internally agreed with Yeltsova. A week later I left and since then I have not seen either her or Vera Nikolaevna.

I described my adventures to you briefly because I know you don’t like anything “spatial.” Arriving in Berlin, I very soon forgot Vera Nikolaevna... But, I admit, the unexpected news about her excited me. I was struck by the thought that she was so close, that she was my neighbor, that I would see her one of these days. The past, as if from the earth, suddenly grew in front of me and moved towards me. Priimkov told me that he visited me precisely with the aim of renewing our old acquaintance and that he hoped to see me at his place very soon. He told me that he served in the cavalry, retired as a lieutenant, bought an estate eight miles from me and intends to start farming, that he had three children, but that two died, leaving a five-year-old daughter.

- And your wife remembers me? – I asked.

“Yes, he remembers,” he answered with a slight hesitation. - Of course, she was still, one might say, a child then; but her mother always praised you very much, and you know how much she values every word of the deceased.

Yeltsova’s words came back to my mind that I was not fit for her Vera... “So, You it was good,” I thought, looking at Priimkov with amusement. He stayed with me for several hours. He is a very good, dear fellow, he speaks so modestly, looks so good-naturedly; it is impossible not to love him... but his mental abilities have not developed since we knew him. I will definitely go to him, maybe tomorrow. I am extremely curious to see what came out of Vera Nikolaevna?

You, villain, are probably laughing at me now, sitting at your director’s desk; But I’ll still write to you what impression it will make on me. Goodbye! Until the next letter.

The story “Faust” was written in the summer of 1856 and published in the Sovremennik magazine in No. 10, 1856.

The lyrical tone of the story is due to the fact that it was written at a turning point in life. In her, according to Turgenev, the whole soul flared up with the last fire of memories, hopes, youth.

The hero of the story returns to an old estate and falls in love with a married woman. These are autobiographical traits. The hero’s “noble nest” is Spasskoye.

The prototype of Vera Nikolaevna Eltsova could be Maria Nikolaevna Tolstaya, sister of Leo Tolstoy, whose simple and ingenuous relationship with her husband Turgenev could observe at the Tolstoy estate, located not far from Spassky. Like Vera, Maria Tolstaya did not like fiction, especially poetry. One day Turgenev, having stopped heated arguments with her about the charms of poetry, brought his story “Faust”. Maria’s four-year-old daughter Varenka witnessed how, while reading “Eugene Onegin,” Turgenev kissed her mother’s hand, and she pulled it away and asked not to do that in the future (the scene was repeated in “Faust”).

Literary direction and genre

The work "Faust" has the subtitle "A Tale in Nine Letters." However, the subtitle does not indicate the genre, but the narrative, “fairy-tale” character. The genre of “Faust” is a story, this is how it was perceived by Turgenev’s contemporaries and is considered now.

Contemporaries noted the lyricism of the story, Herzen and Ogarev condemned its romantic and fantastic elements. The question of the literary direction of the story is not at all simple. Turgenev is a realist writer. The typicality of the heroine is confirmed, for example, by the fact that Turgenev’s contemporaries noted the similarity of their mothers with Eltsova Sr., and had the same reading range as Vera. But many contemporaries called the heroes and events romantic. Pisarev described the story this way: “He took an exceptional person, made her dependent on another exceptional person, created an exceptional position for her and drew extreme consequences from these exceptional data.”

Literary scholars suggest calling Turgenev’s attitude to reality not romanticism, but romance, romantic pathos, which is also inherent in the realistic movement. We are talking about the appropriate use of romantic forms, means and techniques. Turgenev’s romance is a special attitude to life, the individual’s desire for a sublime ideal.

Issues

The problematics of Turgenev's Faust are closely related to the problematics of Goethe's Faust, which Turgenev reinterprets.

In 1845, Turgenev wrote an article about Goethe's Faust. Turgenev believed that the image of Goethe's Faust reflected the tragedy of individualism. For Faust there are no other people, he lives only by himself, this is the meaning of his life. From Turgenev’s point of view, “the cornerstone of a person is not himself, as an indivisible unit, but humanity, society.”

Goethe's "Faust" is connected in the minds of the main character of the story with student time, a time of hope. Pavel Alexandrovich finds this book the most successful in order to awaken in Vera the passions dormant in her. Vera perceives, first of all, the love storyline of “Faust” and realizes the inferiority of her own family life. Then she emerges into the state of freedom that her mother warned her against. In the finale, the hero reconsiders his youthful views on life and freedom. The hero realizes the endless complexity of existence, the fact that destinies are intricately intertwined in life, that happiness is impossible, and there are very few joys in life. The main conclusion of the hero echoes the epigraph from Faust: “Deny yourself, humble your desires.” Pavel Alexandrovich was convinced from his own experience that one must give up one’s innermost desires in order to fulfill a moral duty.

The problem of the spontaneity of love is raised in many of Turgenev’s works. Neither strict upbringing, nor rationality, nor a prosperous family can resist love. Both the hero and heroine feel happy only for a moment, only to then die or be broken for life.

The problem of love as a natural disaster is adjacent to the problem of everything dark and irrational in human life. Did the ghost of Vera’s mother really exist or was it her subconscious that told her to fulfill her duty?

Heroes of the story

Pavel Alexandrovich B- a landowner aged 35 who returned to his estate after 9 years of absence. He is in a state of reflection, mental silence. Pavel Aleksandrovich is glad to meet Semyon Nikolaevich Priimkov, a university friend, a kind and simple man.

The hero is curious to see how Priimkov’s wife Vera, with whom Pavel was in love at the age of 23, has changed. Seeing that Vera is the same, the hero decides to change her, awaken her soul with the help of Goethe's Faust. He does not understand the consequences of his educational experiment, unwittingly destroying someone else's life. Only more than two years later, the hero is able to analyze what happened and realizes that he had to escape, having fallen in love with a married woman, so that the beautiful creature would not be broken into pieces. Now, in a state where Pavel Alexandrovich looks with silent reproach at the work of his hands, he shares with his friend life lessons that life is not pleasure, but hard work, and its meaning is constant renunciation, the fulfillment of duty.

Vera Nikolaevna Eltsova met Pavel when she was 16 years old. She was not like all Russian young ladies. Pavel notes her calmness, simple and intelligent speech, and ability to listen. Turgenev constantly emphasizes her state as if “out of time.” She hasn't aged in 12 years. It combines “instant insight next to the inexperience of a child.”

This state of Vera was associated with her upbringing, during which only her intellect developed, but her spiritual impulses and passions were lulled. Pavel Aleksandrovich successfully describes her preserved state of mind, her coldness: “It’s as if she had been lying in the snow all these years.” Vera approaches life rationally: she is not afraid of spiders, because they are not poisonous, she chooses a gazebo for reading because there are no flies in it...

“Faust” and other books revealed the sensual side of life for Vera, and this scares her, because before that she only cried about the death of her daughter! It was not for nothing that her mother warned: “You are like ice: until you melt, you are strong as a stone, but when you melt, there will be no trace of you left.”

Vera Nikolaevna's mother, Mrs. Eltsova , - a strange woman, persistent and focused. A naturally passionate person, Ms. Eltsova married for love a man she was 7-8 years older than. She grieved the death of her beloved husband and devoted her life to raising her daughter.

She taught her daughter to live with reason in order to subjugate her passions. The mother was afraid to awaken her daughter’s imagination, so she did not allow her to read poetic works, choosing not the pleasant, but the useful.

The mystical side of the story is connected with the image of Mrs. Eltsova, who either watches what is happening from the portrait, or appears as a ghost. She herself was afraid of life and wanted to insure her daughter against the mistakes of passion. It is difficult to say what caused Vera’s fever and death: the ghost of her mother, whose advice she did not follow, or the violation of moral prohibitions and self-condemnation.

Plot and composition

The story consists of 9 letters written by Pavel Alekseevich B... to his friend Semyon Nikolaevich V... Eight of the nine letters were written in 1850 from the estate of Pavel Alexandrovich. The last one was written two years later from the wilderness in which he found himself after the sad events. The epistolary form of the story cannot mislead the reader, because its composition is classic for this genre. It includes portraits and landscapes, everyday life, philosophical reasoning and conclusions.

The following letters describe the history of the relationship between Pavel Alexandrovich and Vera in 1850 and memories of their youth. The ninth chapter is a story about Vera’s illness and death and the hero’s philosophical reflections on this matter.

Stylistic features

Many contemporaries noted the lyricism and poetry of the first letter and appreciated its descriptiveness of everyday life and the interior of an abandoned noble estate. Turgenev creates vivid images in the story with the help of tropes: youth comes like a ghost, running through the veins like poison; life is hard work; the death of Vera is a broken vessel, a thousand times more precious.