The ode “Vision of Murza” in the 1791 edition is dedicated to Catherine, but the poet did not sing of “Felitsa’s virtues” in it. Eight years later, Derzhavin considered it necessary to explain himself about the writing of “Felitsa”. Derzhavin valued “Felitsa” highly. The ode was also dear to him because, deviating from the tradition of a laudable and flattering ode, which was pleasing to the kings, he expressed his personal attitude towards the monarch and assessed her virtues.
Catherine, as we have seen, emphasized with her coldness during the official introduction that she was granting him the grace to praise herself, but not to evaluate her actions. To explain, Derzhavin decided to use the form of a conversation between Murza and the vision that appeared to him - Felitsa.
In “The Vision of Murza” in 1791, Derzhavin abandoned the idea of being Catherine’s “adviser”, as he wrote about it in prose in 1783; now he defends his principles of writing “Felitsa”, his sincerity as the decisive criterion for the new poetry he creates, your independence. To the “dashing world”, to the crowd of noble ill-wishers, to the Empress herself, Derzhavin wrote proud poems:
But let the muse prove to them here,
That I am not one of the flatterers;
What are the hearts of my goods
I don't sell for money
And what is not from other people's barns
I'll make outfits for you.
“The Vision of Murza” explained why Derzhavin did not write more poems about Felitsa. He wrote them once - not for money, without flattery. Now in Derzhavin’s poetic “anbar” there were no “outfits” for Catherine; faith in her virtues was no longer a “product” of his heart.
Derzhavin was not a political fighter. But all his activities as a poet were inspired by the high ideal of civil service to his homeland. In an effort to take the place of adviser under Catherine, he wanted to achieve maximum results. When this did not work out, I had to be content with little. In 1787, he published an expanded version of the arrangement of the 81st Psalm - “For the Ruler and the Judges.” In other odes he laid down certain "truths" as cautious advice or criticism of government action.
The “truths” about the court nobility, about the nobles surrounding Catherine, sounded most sharply in the ode “Nobleman”. Patriotic odes glorified true heroes and “great men” who devoted all their strength to serving the fatherland. All these civic poems played a significant role in social and literary life not only at the time of their appearance, but also later, in the first quarter of the 19th century. Derzhavin was rightfully proud of them.
Derzhavin’s poetic manifesto was the ode “God”. (Conceived in 1780, completed in February - March 1784, at the same time published in the magazine “Interlocutor of Lovers of the Russian Word”). Derzhavin was a religious person, and therefore his idealistic views on the structure of the world and faith in a creator God were expressed in his ode. But in this same ode a daring thought was affirmed: man, in his greatness, is equal to God.
This idea was born during the Renaissance; it inspired great humanists. Derzhavin, naturally in historical conditions, when Russian literature was solving fundamental Renaissance problems, picks up Shakespeare’s idea of man - free and active - as the highest value of the world. Shakespeare made Hamlet the exponent of this truth of the Renaissance: “What a masterful creature is man!.. In comprehension, he is similar to a deity! The beauty of the universe! The crown of all living things."
During the years of widespread sentimentalism in Europe with its cult of the private man, who realizes his greatness in intense feeling (Rousseau’s catchphrase - a man is great by his feeling - became the motto of this trend), and bourgeois realism, which made its hero an egoistic man who asserted his dignity in brutal struggle for well-being—Derzhavin’s ode was both programmatic and polemical in nature.
Based on Russian tradition, the poet puts forward and affirms in new times and on a different national soil the great Renaissance ideal of man, trampled upon by the bourgeois age. The prevailing religious morality strictly and cruelly threw a person under the feet of a “supreme being”, instilling in him that he was “nothing”, “a servant of God”, forcing him to speak with God only on his knees. And not to speak, but to pray and humbly ask for favors. Derzhavin spoke to God, spoke boldly: “You exist - and I am no longer nothing!”
I am the connection of worlds that exist everywhere,
I am an extreme degree of substance;
I am the center of the living
The initial trait of a deity.
These proud words belong to a boldly thinking and reasoning person, an independent person, tremblingly aware of his greatness and the power of the human mind.
Derzhavin's civic position and his philosophy of man determined the place of action in the world of the heroes he portrayed. Derzhavin defended not his private egoistic interests, but human rights; he raised his voice not for the well-being of his hearth, but for a life worthy of a person on earth. In his odes, the poet will describe and reveal the vast world of Russia or the world of moral life of a Russian figure, poet and citizen.
The prophetic spirit of the Bible freely enters Derzhavin’s poetic creations. The words of the biblical psalmist were filled with new content, expressing the Russian view and Russian feelings of the living personality of the poet. The poet became a prophet and judge, going out into the big world to fight for the truth (“To Rulers and Judges,” “Nobleman,” etc.).
Civil poems occupy a large place in Derzhavin’s creative heritage. They can be divided into two groups: patriotic and satirical. Derzhavin was a patriot; according to Belinsky, “patriotism was his dominant feeling.” The poet lived in the era of great military victories of Russia.
When he was 17 years old, Russian troops defeated the armies of the largest European commander, Frederick II, and occupied Berlin. At the end of the century, Russian troops led by Suvorov glorified themselves with an unprecedented campaign in Italy, during which Napoleonic legions were inflicted a crushing defeat. At the end of his life, Derzhavin witnessed the glorious victory of the people over Napoleonic France during the Patriotic War.
The victories that strengthened Russia's European authority and its glory were won by the heroic people and their talented commanders. That is why Derzhavin, in his solemn, pathetic odes, painted grandiose images of battles, glorified Russian soldiers (“Russian brave soldiers are the first fighters in the world”), and created majestic images of commanders. These odes capture the Russian 18th century and the heroism of the people. Highly appreciating the heroic past of his homeland, in 1807 he wrote a warning to Napoleon in his poem “To the Ataman and the Don Army”:
There was an enemy of the Chipchak - and where are the Chipchak?
There was an enemy of the Poles - and where are those Poles?
There was this one, there was that one, they are not; and Rus'?..
Everyone knows, shake it on your mustache.
Derzhavin praised a person when he deserved it. Therefore, the heroes of his poems were either Suvorov (“To the capture of Izmail”, “To victories in Italy”, “To the crossing of the Alpine mountains”, “Snigir”), or a hero soldier, or Rumyantsev (“Waterfall”), or a simple peasant girl (“Russian girls”).
He glorified the deeds of man, and not nobility, not “breed.” Derzhavin poeticized the morality of active life, heroism, and courage. At the same time, he denounced evil and with particular mercilessness those who retreated from the high responsibilities of man and citizen.
The ode “Nobleman” was written in 1794. A year before, Derzhavin was removed from his post as secretary of Catherine II. This service revealed to him the arbitrariness of the nobles, their crimes and impunity, the protection of the empress to her favorites and favourites. Derzhavin’s attempts to get fair decisions from Catherine on the cases he presented were unsuccessful.
It was then that he decided to turn to poetry. Evil and crimes must be publicly branded, the perpetrators - the nobles - must be exposed and condemned. He based his generalized satirical portrait of the nobleman on real material: in the actions denounced by the poet, the nobles recognized the features of the all-powerful favorites and dignitaries in the empire - Potemkin, Zubov, Bezborodko. While denouncing them, Derzhavin did not absolve the empress of guilt, who forgave all the criminal deeds of her favorites.
Poetry was the high platform from which Derzhavin the poet addressed the Russians with a fiery speech. He wrote about what he knew well, what he saw, what outraged him, he painted portraits “from the originals” - that’s why the poet’s poetic speech is full of energy, passion, it expresses deeply personal, hard-won convictions.
The poem ended with an expression of faith in the people (“O Russian vigilant people, Fatherly guarding morals”) and the creation of images of true nobles - glorious sons of the fatherland, patriots, heroes of peace and war. Among the figures of the era of Peter the Great, Derzhavin names Yakov Dolgorukov, who fearlessly spoke the truth to the formidable king, who did not want to “bend like a snake before the throne”; from his contemporaries - an honest husband and the greatest commander Rumyantsev. This is what the poet contrasts with Potemkin and Zubov.
Naturally, during Catherine’s lifetime the ode “The Nobleman” could not be published. It was first published in 1798, already under the new emperor.
Pushkin in his “Message to the Censor,” hotly and angrily denouncing tsarist censorship, proudly named the names of writers who fearlessly spoke the truth - Radishchev (“the enemy of slavery”), Fonvizin (“an excellent satirist”), Derzhavin, the author of “The Nobleman”:
Derzhavin is the scourge of nobles, at the sound of a formidable lyre
Their proud idols exposed them.
The Decembrist Ryleev highly appreciated the talent of Derzhavin the satirist and called his poetic works “fiery verses.”
In the 1790s. Derzhavin, who began so boldly and walked so jealously and persistently along the path of originality, experienced a crisis. The aesthetic code of classicism, which he bravely overcame, still had an influence on him. The power of tradition was enormous.
Often Derzhavin could not abandon the canons of the ode, conventional and rhetorical images, or break out of the captivity of a stable genre and stylistic system. And then the new, original, his, Derzhavin’s, was combined in poetry with the traditional. Hence Derzhavin’s “lack of self-control,” which manifested itself in different ways at the beginning and end of his work.
But it has never been as strong as in the odes of the late 80s - the first half of the 90s. Derzhavin writes “The Image of Felitsa”, “Waterfall”, “On the Capture of Ishmael”, “On the Death of Grand Duchess Olga Pavlovna” and similar poems, and “inconsistency” becomes their main poetic feature. Having in mind primarily such works, Pushkin stated: “Derzhavin’s idol is ¼ gold, ¾ lead...”. Belinsky said specifically about “Waterfall”: “He has the most excellent poems mixed with the most prosaic, the most captivating images with the coarsest and ugliest.”
The crisis that Derzhavin was experiencing was aggravated by social circumstances. The main one is the acutely realized need to determine one’s place—the place of the poet in society. The new things that Derzhavin brought to poetry came not only under the sign of aesthetic innovation. Having put forward the topic of personality and its freedom, Derzhavin naturally approached the question of the poet’s freedom from royal power. He remembered that his first noisy success was brought to him by the ode “Felitsa”, glorifying Catherine.
Thus, the question of the poet’s place in society turned out to be connected with the question of the subject of poetry. The original, original, civic principle in Derzhavin’s work pushed him away from the court, and the circumstances of Derzhavin’s life as an official connected him more and more tightly with power, with Catherine: from 1791 to 1793 he was the Empress’s secretary. A number of poems capture his desire for independence.
A remarkable monument to the poet’s struggle for his freedom is the letter of 1793 to “Khrapovitsky,” a friend of Derzhavin (he was also Catherine’s secretary). Refusing to write to order and responding, in particular, to Khrapovitsky’s (almost official) proposals to write an ode in honor of the Empress, Derzhavin expresses an important thought: a poet dependent on power, caressed by the court, receiving “monists, hryvnias, necklaces, priceless rings, stones.” , will definitely write “average poems.” On the true poet, says Derzhavin, “a duty is imposed” “from the destinies and the height of the throne.” And therefore his duty is not to sing the praises of kings, but to tell the truth:
You yourself will judge over time
Me for the hazy incense;
For the truth you will honor me,
She is kind to all ages.
The last link in this struggle for the poet’s independence, enshrined in poetry, is “Monument” (1795) - a reworking of the famous poem by Horace. It develops a deep understanding of the social role of the poet, his duty to the fatherland, which he can fulfill only by being free. Derzhavin believed that his courageous denunciations of nobles and royal favorites, his proclamation of the truth to the kings would be appreciated by posterity. That is why he took credit for the fact that he “spoke the truth to the kings with a smile.”
This formula - “with a smile” - is explained both by Derzhavin’s worldview (he was not a radical thinker and believed in the possibility of the coming of an “enlightened monarch”), and by the circumstances of his life. He himself explained his position this way: “Being a poet by inspiration, I had to tell the truth; a politician or a courtier in my service at court, I was forced to cover up the truth with allegory and hints.”
The poet defeated the courtier - Derzhavin spoke truth and truth to the kings, including Catherine II. And this position was appreciated by subsequent generations, and in particular by Pushkin and Chernyshevsky. The latter wrote about Derzhavin’s poetry and his “Monument”: “What did he value in his poetry? Serving for the common good.
Pushkin thought the same thing. It is interesting in this regard to compare how they modify the essential thought of Horace’s ode “Monument”, asserting their rights to immortality. Horace says: “I consider myself worthy of fame for writing poetry well”; Derzhavin replaces this with something else: “I consider myself worthy of glory for speaking the truth to both the people and the kings”; Pushkin - “for the fact that I acted beneficially on society and defended the sufferers.” Belinsky wrote about Derzhavin’s “Monument” that “this is one of the most powerful manifestations of his heroic strength.”
After leaving the post of secretary of Catherine II, Derzhavin turns to Anacreon. This interest in Anacreon coincided with the beginning of a widespread revision in Europe of the poetry of the ancient Greek lyricist. The greatest success enjoyed the Anacreontism updated from the standpoint of educational philosophy by Evariste Parni, a student of Voltaire.
In these circumstances, Derzhavin’s friend Nikolai Lvov published in 1794 his translation of a collection of odes to Anacreon. He attached an article to the book in which he freed the image of the famous poet from the distortion to which he was subjected both in the West and in Russia. His glory, Lvov argued, did not lie in the fact that he wrote only “love and drunken songs,” as Sumarokov, for example, thought. Anacreon is a philosopher, a teacher of life; in his poems there is scattered “a pleasant philosophy that delights every person.”
He not only participated in the amusements of the court of the tyrant Polycrates, but also “dared to advise him in state affairs.” Thus, Lvov raised the image of Anacreon to the level of the educational ideal of a writer - an adviser to the monarch.
The publication of Lvov’s collection “Poems of Anacreon of Tiy” with a preface and detailed notes is a major milestone in the development of Russian poetry, in the formation of Russian anacreontics. He contributed to the flowering of Derzhavin’s powerful talent, who in 1795 began to write anacreontic poems, which he called “songs.” For a long time he did not publish his “songs,” but in 1804 he published them as a separate book, calling it “Anacreontic Songs.”
History of Russian literature: in 4 volumes / Edited by N.I. Prutskov and others - L., 1980-1983.
Derzhavin's poetic creativity is distinguished not only by its picturesque brightness. A poet-painter, in a number of his poems he also becomes a poet-thinker. Giving amazing sketches of life and everyday life of the 18th century, where everything really “breathes the spirit of that time,” Derzhavin, in his poetic and philosophical contemplations, was often able to rise above his time, to feel its limitations and doom. Derzhavin’s joyful, sensual-anacreontic perception of life, his epicurean-cloudless, naive-materialistic enjoyment of all sorts of “sweets and coolness”, is darkened almost from the very beginning by one specter, one fatal thought - the thought of fragility, fleetingness, the inevitable passing of all these “sweets and coolnesses”. coolness" - the thought of death. The thought of death sounds with terrible force already in one of Derzhavin’s relatively early and most remarkable creations - the poems “On the Death of Prince Meshchersky”
I barely saw this light,
Death is already gnashing his teeth,
Like lightning, the scythe shines
And my days are cut down like grain.Nothing from the fatal claws,
No creature runs away:
The monarch and the prisoner are food for worms;
The tombs are consumed by the wrath of the elements;
Time is gaping to erase the glory:
Like fast waters flowing into the sea,
So days and years flow into eternity;
The greedy Death swallows the kingdoms.We are sliding on the edge of the abyss,
Into which we will fall headlong;
Let us accept our death with life;
We are born in order to die;
Without pity, Death strikes everything:
And the stars will be crushed by it,
And the suns will be extinguished by it,
And it threatens all the worlds...
The thought of inevitable, inescapable death enters as a tragic note into the joyfully triumphant, major-key choruses of Derzhavin’s poetry. And this is no coincidence. Feast pomp, festive splendor and
The sparkle of the noble-noble Catherine's Russia blossomed - Derzhavin felt this keenly - to a large extent, “the abyss on the edge.”
Derzhavin was not only a contemporary of the American and French revolutions, but also lived through the formidable peasant movement and the Pugachev uprising face to face. Before Derzhavin’s eyes, an abyss opened up that almost swallowed up the entire noble-serf system. “This world is like a wheel. This knitting needle turns up and down,” “Here is ascended to heaven on the throne, and there is Louis on the scaffold,” “One hour, one moment, it is convenient to defeat kingdoms, one breath of the elements, to transform giants into dust,” the poet never tires of repeating in his odah. Before Derzhavin’s eyes, the motley kaleidoscopic fates of numerous “builders of happiness,” as he called Catherine’s temporary workers, unfolded. From social oblivion they rose to the utmost heights of the empire and sometimes just as quickly fell from their instantaneous heights: “Today - God, and tomorrow - dust.”
In his career, Derzhavin knew the same continuous rhythm of ups and downs. That is why in Derzhavin’s poems, along with pictures of a luxurious, feasting life, the antithetical theme of all-destroying, all-consuming, all-lurking death is so persistently repeated: “Where there was food on the table, there is a coffin.” Derzhavin’s double perception of the life of his time reaches its highest artistic embodiment in his famous ode “Waterfall,” which Pushkin rightly considered his best work in general. In the image of a waterfall - a “diamond mountain”, with a “thundering roar” falling down into the valley, so that after a short time it “gets lost” without a trace “in the wilderness of a remote forest”, Derzhavin gave not only an allegorical image of the life fate of one of the most characteristic figures of the 18th century . - “the son of happiness and glory” of the “magnificent prince of Taurida”, but also a grandiose, embracing symbol of the entire “age of Catherine” in general. Derzhavin’s last poems, written by him with a slate pencil on a slate board, were the famous deeply pessimistic lines:
The river of times in its rush
Takes away all people's affairs
And drowns in the abyss of oblivion
Nations, kingdoms and kings.And if anything remains
Through the sounds of the lyre and trumpet,
Then it will be devoured by the mouth of eternity
And the common fate will not go away.
A directly optimistic perception of the world and a pessimistic thought about it - this is one of the main contradictions in Derzhavin’s work, suggested to the poet by his time and the limitations of his socio-historical outlook.
Derzhavin’s poetry outlines two ways to overcome the terrible thought of death. One of them is religion. Religious motifs occupy a prominent place in Derzhavin’s work. The most remarkable image of Derzhavin’s religious poems is his famous ode “God,” which, along with “Felitsa,” enjoyed particular popularity and for a long time was considered not only Derzhavin’s highest work, but also one of the greatest achievements of Russian literature in general (although Pushkin strongly protested against this, just
characteristically contrasting the ode “God” with the ode “On the Death of Prince Meshchersky”, and “Felitsa” with “Nobleman”). The first of all works of Russian literature, the ode “God” received the widest world fame: it was translated many times into all major European and some oriental languages (at least fifteen times into French, at least eight into German, etc.). But much closer, more organic for Derzhavin than the path of the heavenly consolations of religion, there was another path - the pagan-Horatian path of the greatest possible enjoyment of the “flying moment”, the joys of earthly existence (for example, “Invitation to dinner”):
So, how long is the bad weather still
Does not darken the red days,
And sip happiness
And he strokes us with his hand.
Until the frosts came,
The roses are fragrant in the garden,
We will hasten to smell them
Or (“To the first neighbor”):
As long as the golden hours flow
And the evil sorrows did not come, -
Drink, eat and be merry, neighbor!
The ending of “Ode on the Death of Prince Meshchersky” is similar to this.
This day or tomorrow to die,
Perfilyev! We must, of course:
Why should one be tormented and grieved?
That your mortal friend did not live forever?
Life is heaven's instant gift;
Set her at ease...
“The “peace” of life is, in Derzhavin’s mouth, the Horatian enjoyment of life. After the stunning stanzas of the ode, in which, according to Belinsky, “the cry of a soul suppressed by horror, a cry of unbearable despair” sounds, such an ending is somewhat unexpected and petty. But it is this that makes this poem one of the most typical works of the 18th century.
In connection with what has just been said, Anacreontic lyricism with its preaching of all sorts of earthly joys and pleasures occupies a very significant place in Derzhavin’s poetry. If Lomonosov contrasted heroism and anacreontics, poetry of state pathos and personal love feelings, giving unconditional preference to the first, Derzhavin managed to combine both in his work. Starting from the second half of the 90s, during the periods of disgrace under Paul and Alexander, anacreontic themes and motifs and closely related motifs of free and happy “rural” local life, sympathetically contrasted with the “crampedness” and “confinements” of the city, became especially intensified in Derzhavin’s poems and yard.
In 1794, one of Derzhavin’s closest personal and literary friends, N.A. Lvov, published a new complete translation of a Greek collection of poems attributed to Anacreon and translated at one time by Kantemir (during Lvov’s translations, the Greek original was also published). This, apparently, served as a direct literary impetus for Derzhavin to write his numerous adaptations and, in particular, imitations of Anacreon. In 1804, Derzhavin published his “Anacreontic Songs” as a separate collection, including a number of earlier love poems. In Derzhavin’s love poems, genuine feeling sometimes shines through - such, for example, is one of his early love songs, “Separation,” in which sincere pain and passionate, unquenchable tenderness break through the conventional “Sumarokov” form:
G. R. Derzhavin. "Anacreontic Songs". Frontispiece and title page. Engraving by Sanders based on a drawing by Tonchi (St. Petersburg, 1804)
Already inevitable fate
You're breaking up with me.
In a cruel lament
I say goodbye to you.I'm shedding tears,
I cannot bear sorrow;
I can't say in words -
I say with my heart: forgive me!Hands, chest, mouth and eyes
I kiss you.
I have no more urine
To share myself with you.I kiss, I die,
I give you my soul,
Or from your lips I wish
I will drink your soul.
Derzhavin’s “Anacreontic songs” most often do not go beyond the limits of healthy sensuality, colored and intensified by conventional “sensuality” that penetrates Derzhavin’s poetry from the victoriously blossoming
in the 90s of the XVIII century. sentimental school of Karamzin. But at the same time, Derzhavin’s “Anacreontic Poems,” which, in the fair words of Belinsky, testify to the poet’s “living” and “artistic sympathy for the artistic world of ancient Greece,” are distinguished by high merits. “That there was a deeply artistic element in Derzhavin,” writes Belinsky, “is best proven by his so-called “anacreontic” poems. And among them there is not a single one who is completely seasoned; but what contemplation, what poetry!” As an example of such “excellent poems,” Belinsky cites lines from the poem “The Birth of Beauty” about Zeus, who
I was inflamed with so much anger,
What, curly head
Shaking, he shook the whole sky,
Hell, sea and earth.
He enthusiastically notes the lines about Zeus’s creation of the goddess of beauty Aphrodite from sea foam:
He planted golden sands in his hair,
Flame in the cheeks and mouth,
The sky is blue in the eyes,
Foam - in the chest...
I don’t remember who exactly, but clearly an authoritative author (A. Men or A. Kuraev) expressed the opinion that the poem God by G. Derzhavin is an unsurpassed poetic work on the theme of the Creator!
Of course, the pre-Pushkin language is perceived today in an unusual and difficult way. But only at the beginning of reading. The Old Church Slavonic Russian language, for all its “heavyness”, is primordial, primitive. And it gives you the opportunity to CONSIDER the unspeakable!
Yes, it just so happened that our ancestors did not carry the origins of classical knowledge. This became the path of other ancient peoples living in a more fertile natural environment.
These other peoples gave the world Aristotle and his definition of God as a mind that thinks of itself. Clear, surprisingly succinct!
But the harsh living conditions of the northern peoples, say, our Pomors, gave rise to a STRENGTH of SPIRIT that is now unattainable for us! These were epic heroes of life!
Every seed loves its own soil. The seeds of the Byzantine faith in God have sprouted in our people. Maybe because it is this faith that pays the main attention to the SPIRIT?! After all, it is the Holy Spirit that is one of the three hypostases of the understanding of God by our faith.
Poetry, first of all, carries a sensual, spiritual image! So understanding God requires not only Aristotelian clarity (allowing you to FORM a thought!), but also poetic penetration into the essence of the Image (allowing you to feel His SPIRIT)!
The closeness of Gavril Romanovich Derzhavin to the Old Slavonic understanding of God as a spiritual essence may have been the reason for the unsurpassed poetic insight of this poet into the image of God.
So, first, let's read the text of the poem written in 1784.
O You, endless space,
Alive in the movement of matter,
Eternal with the passage of time,
Without faces, in three Faces of the Divine!
The spirit is everywhere present and united,
For whom there is no place and no reason,
Whom no one could comprehend
Who fills everything with Himself,
Encompasses, builds, preserves,
Whom we call: God!
Measure the ocean deep,
Count the sands, the rays of the planets,
Although a high mind could, -
You have no number or measure!
Spirits cannot be enlightened
Born from Your light,
To explore Your destinies:
Only the thought of ascending to You dares,
Disappears in Your greatness,
Like a moment gone by in eternity.
Chaos being before time
From the abyss you called to eternity,
And eternity, born before the age,
In Yourself You founded:
Making up myself,
Shining from Myself,
You are the light where the light came from.
Creating everything with one word,
Stretching out into the new creation,
You were, You are, You will forever be!
You contain a chain of beings within yourself,
You support it and live it;
You match the end with the beginning,
And you give life to death.
How sparks fly, strive,
Thus the suns will be born from You;
Like on a foul, clear day in winter
Specks of frost sparkle,
They rotate, they sway, they shine,
So are the stars in the abysses beneath You.
Shined the ignited millions
They flow in immeasurability;
They make your laws
Life-giving rays pour down.
But these lamps are fiery,
Or the red crystals of the mass,
Or waves of golden boiling host,
Or burning ethers,
Or together all the luminous worlds
Before You is like night before day.
Like a drop dropped into the sea,
The whole firmament is before You.
But what is the visible universe to me?
And what am I before You?
In that ocean of air,
Multiplying the worlds by a million
A hundred times other worlds - and then,
When I dare to compare with You,
I will only be one point;
And I am nothing before You.
Nothing! - But You shine in me
By the majesty of your kindnesses,
You portray yourself in me,
Like the sun in a small drop of water.
Nothing! - But I feel life,
I fly insatiably
Always a tall guy;
My soul yearns to be with you,
He delves into, thinks, reasons:
I am - of course, you are too!
You exist! - the rank of nature speaks,
My heart tells me that
My mind assures me:
You exist - and I am no longer nothing!
A particle of the whole universe,
Placed, it seems to me, in venerable
In the middle of nature I am the one
Where did you end the bodily creatures,
Where did you begin the heavenly spirits
And a chain of creatures connected everyone with me
I am the connection of worlds existing everywhere,
I am an extreme degree of substance;
I am the center of the living
The initial trait of the Deity;
My body is crumbling into dust,
I command thunder with my mind,
I am a king - I am a slave; I am a worm - I am a god!
But being so wonderful, I
When did it happen? - unknown;
But I couldn't be myself
I am your creation, Creator!
I am a creature of your wisdom,
Source of life, good Giver!
Soul of my soul and king!
Your truth needed it
So that the abyss of death may pass
My immortal existence;
So that my spirit is clothed in mortality
And so that through death I return,
Father! - to Your immortality!
Inexplicable, incomprehensible!
I know that my soul
Imaginations are powerless
And to draw Your shadows;
But if praise must be given,
That is impossible for weak mortals
There is nothing else to honor you with,
How can they only rise to You,
Lost in immeasurable joy
And grateful tears are shed.
Now let’s try to comprehend each of the eleven verses (or should it be more correct stanzas?) in a modern way, delving into Derzhavin’s Image of God.
1. “O You, infinite in space”
God exists everywhere, at every point in space.
The life generated by Him exists thanks to the general movement of all matter.
God is “eternal,” that is, He was before the emergence of time itself!
God cannot be imagined as a certain Person. He is the triune complex of the Father (Creator?), the Son (Love?) and the Holy Spirit (Life?). Perhaps this should be understood as the trinity of the Creator, the Life He created and His Love for everything created!
On the other hand, God is one and is everywhere. He is not the CAUSE of anything. He Himself is the origin of all causes! It cannot be comprehended by reason. He is All in All! And this saves everything.
(From the dictionary: “builds” - means founded, built).
2. “Measure the deep ocean”
God is not comparable to number and measure. He gave birth to the Spiritual World by His will and Word. This Spiritual World (the world of angels) is “enlightened,” that is, it has greater intelligence than man (according to the Law of God, which, of course, was studied by the poet). But even angels cannot comprehend God's destiny. Nevertheless, thought is allowed (and perhaps obligated) to rise to God. But, being at the limit of its capabilities from such an approach, the thought CANNOT BE PRESERVED, fixed, if only because, having approached God, it lives more intensely, is constantly renewed, pulsates in motion. And - disappears, “like a moment passed in eternity”!
3. “The existence of chaos before time”
Before time itself arose, nothing existed (did all the current galaxies fit into one point?). It was ETERNITY-NOTHING (abyss). She was in God.
For the emergence of at least SOMETHING, Chaos is probably needed first. And the greater the Chaos at the beginning, the greater Order then arises from it - the opposite of Chaos.
God "called" this Chaos. (He showed his Will and said “The Word”. An Explosion occurred. The Universe began to expand). But since EVERYTHING was originally in God, the expanding Universe already contained the “Pra-Genome” of all future genomes, that is, future Laws, sequences of transformation of Chaos into Order. (“Composing myself with myself, shining with myself from myself...”)
4. “You contain a chain of beings within yourself”
God creates a “chain” of interconnections. The “Pra-Gen” is unfolding with the main Law: EVERYTHING IN EVERYTHING.” Even death is periodically necessary so that new life is always born! Suns, specks of frost, stars - everything is from the Creator!
5. “Millions of illuminated luminaries”
...and everything else, from small to large - before God - “like the night before the day.”
6. “Like a drop dropped into the sea”
Here the poet approaches the main question of man: “And what am I before You?” Nothing?
7. “Nothing! “But You shine in me”
Yes, in comparison with Your greatness, it is nothing! But (and this is a manifestation of the deepest interconnectedness of EVERYTHING IN EVERYTHING) – you need me! You see Yourself in me, as in an elementary particle of the world You created, “like the sun in a small drop of water.”
And I feel life. General and your own. And, feeling this life, my soul, first of all, strives to know You (“My soul desires to be You”).
This is first and foremost. And immediately after that? And after that, I feel Your order to my mind to “delve into, think, reason...” And the first conclusion to which a thinking person comes (not out loud, but to himself!) should be: “What I am means, in “First of all, that You are, O God, Our Father!”
Here it is - the main Truth of Life!
8. “You exist!” - the rank of nature speaks"
So. And the soul and heart and mind affirm me – a human being – that I am Yours, O God, a particle. And, therefore, a particle of the entire “nature” of the universe! Not only that. Man is a connection in the chain of all beings, including spiritual beings - angels. What does it mean? Maybe it’s that only a person is allowed to comprehend all this? But, God, what kind of responsibility is this?! On the other hand, without responsibility, I will not be able to reach my limit - to become Your image and likeness? Finally, one more guess: perhaps there is some kind of trinity in me: the need to unite my understanding of the world with soul, heart and mind!
9. “I am the connection of worlds existing everywhere”
And again and again I return to the desire to know myself: am I a king or a slave, am I a worm or a god?
The answer is obviously how I manage my life, what do I try to achieve? How will I solve the problem of “freedom of choice” set by God for every person? The deadline for solving this divine task is my life in the real world. Next will be an exam. And Heaven’s decision: to bless my soul with eternal life, or to hear the hopeless: “Go away! I don't know you."
(From the dictionary: “existing” means existing, true).
10. “I am your creation, the Creator!”
But knowing yourself is inseparable from thoughts about God as the source of life, the giver of all blessings (read the prayer to the Holy Spirit)! And suddenly the poet finds a new definition of God as “The soul of my soul”!
Here it is: completely different from the Aristotelian understanding of God.
Aristotle penetrated into the essence of the Creator with thought (also, by the way, a semi-real instrument of life!)
Derzhavin's poetic premonition - used the instrument of spiritual life!!
"Soul of my soul"! Something incomprehensible in reality, raised to an equally incomprehensible degree! This is only possible through the poet's premonition!
"Soul of my soul"! And immediately a new question: how can the soul of man and the Soul of God unite again? It is easy for the poet to answer this question, because he studied the “Law of God”: “across the abyss of death”!
This is what it means, without rejecting the Experience of our ancestors, to move our worldview FURTHER!
11. “Ineffable, Incomprehensible!”
In the last verse, the poet tries to understand how a person should “praise” God in earthly life? Obviously, this method must also be some kind of semi-real?
We, people of the 21st century, try to restrain the manifestation of emotions as much as possible. In the 18th century this was not considered so necessary. Everything great is simple! Therefore, perhaps CLEANSING TEARS are this semi-real way of communication when a person tries to “touch God with the thought” in his prayer!
And if a modern person is unaccustomed to this method, he must look for his own, not forgetting the message of G. Derzhavin: “to delve into, think, reason...”. Unite Myth, logic and modern knowledge?!
1. Responsibilities of the “earthly gods.”
2. Autobiographical notes.
3. Portrait and landscape sketches.
Opposites placed side by side become more obvious.
Bonaventure
G. R. Derzhavin’s poem “To Rulers and Judges” is one of the poet’s satirical works, in which he denounces nobles and kings for their dishonorable actions. Thus, the odic text is filled with accusatory notes that could not have appeared in it before, since they belonged to “low calm.” The ode was not supposed to denounce, but to glorify the merits of the one to whom it was addressed. But the poet considered that such solemnity could become a suitable form in order to teach the nobles and kings a lesson. He takes God as his assistant, the only one who has the right to judge the nobles and whom they can hear and obey. At the same time, the use of such an image allows us to show that even all the unrighteous deeds of noble gentlemen reached even God himself. And he is outraged by their behavior.
The Almighty God has risen and judges
Earthly gods in their host...
The Almighty God takes on human characteristics. He becomes a judge who takes into his own hands the right to judge and condemn those who imagine themselves to be “earthly gods.” But having taken on such a mission, they follow it only halfway, that is, they do what is convenient for them. But the poet reminds that they still must condemn the actions of unrighteous and evil people.
... How long, rivers, how long will you be
Spare the unrighteous and evil?
The poet is still confident that he can influence the course of events with his creativity: poems and satirical odes. Therefore, a certain person appears before us who shows his attitude towards this world. At the same time, he does not pay any attention to their social position. Consequently, the poet himself decides to remind them of the duty they bear to people. After all, if they are “earthly gods,” then they must take under the protection of all those offended. And this is possible only when the law is observed, that is, the rule is the same for everyone on this earth. And no one has the right to turn it around the way he wants. In the poem “To Rulers and Judges” there are elements of faith that such “earthly gods” will not be afraid to defend their truth before the powers that be. Thus, the poet shows that every person with power can be asked for help. And they should not turn away from such petitioners.
Your duty is: to preserve the laws,
Don't look at the faces of the strong,
No help, no defense
Do not leave orphans and widows.
And there are many of them on our land. Therefore, the poet decides to list everyone, devoting two whole stanzas to this. This creates a very picturesque portrait of those who need help. They have no individual traits. The poet shows them en masse, thereby making it clear that there are many similar people. But the “earthly gods” must provide assistance to each of them. Researchers of Derzhavin’s work call this technique “figurative painting,” since through certain features, barely noticeable strokes, a completely concrete and believable image appears before us. Sometimes it has very vague definitions, such as innocent, unhappy, powerless. But such a generalization allows us to show that it is not only the orphaned and wretched who need help. It may also be necessary for those who are close to the “earthly gods” at the same social level.
Your duty: to save the innocent from harm,
Give cover to the unlucky;
To protect the powerless from the strong,
Free the poor from their shackles.
Perhaps there are autobiographical notes in this work. G.R. Derzhavin was from an impoverished but noble family. When he served in the Preobrazhensky Regiment, due to the lack of connections and money, he could not advance in the service. And no one from the circle of “earthly gods” extended a helping hand to him. Therefore, when the poet was able to address such people through his work, he focused their attention on the fact that there are those around them who need their help.
But all his calls have no meaning or power. And really, why look around when you yourself are happy and live in wealth and contentment. After all, you have not experienced the sorrows and humiliations that befell poor people. And the poet’s voice remains outside the windows of your house, and does not invade the magnificent decoration of the magnificent premises.
But the poet notices the worst thing that can happen in this world - indifference. Perhaps the “Earthly Gods” saw all the pain and injustice without the help of the poet. But they did not want to make any effort to help those who needed such support.
They won't listen! - they see and don’t know!
Covered with bribes...
Why does this really happen? The poet finds the answer to this question. The main culprit is bribery, that is, rewards. So in Derzhavin’s poem another problem is raised - bribery. It blinds people to all the injustice that is happening around them. But then heaven comes to the poet’s aid.
Atrocities shake the earth,
Untruth shakes the skies.
After this, the poet shows his indignation. Exclamation marks appear in the text, and indignation at what is happening appears in the intonation. And he shows that he is disappointed in the “earthly gods” and again reminds them that they may not be subject to condemnation. But he, as a poet, takes upon himself such a right, violating all the canons of the odic text. He does not exalt kings, but, on the contrary, lowers them to his level, a mere mortal. The poet shows that they are as passionate as he, a simple person. So why then should they be called just kings?
Kings! - I thought you gods were powerful,
No one is the judge over you, -
But you, like me, are equally passionate
And they are just as mortal as I am.
Derzhavin's poetic work is characterized by the use of not only portraits, but also landscape sketches. Therefore, to show what fate awaits the “earthly gods,” he uses the image of a withered leaf falling from a tree. After all, no one and nothing can influence the phenomena of nature and revive this leaf.
And you will fall like this,
Like a withered leaf falling from the tree!
And in the following lines, the poet reminds us of the most important thing: they are all not only mortal, but can have the same fate. He notices an equally important fact: in life there is one moment that equalizes everyone - death. After all, she will not choose between rich or poor, she comes to everyone.
And you will die like this,
How your last slave will die!
Then the poet understands that the only thing that can help him in this life is an appeal to the Almighty. After all, even the poet’s voice means nothing to the “earthly gods.” The poet notes that only the “God of the Right” is able to protect the weak and powerless.
Resurrect, God! God of the right!
And listen to their prayer...
In the last lines of the work, the poet shows that the cry to the Almighty comes from the very heart, since he gives away the most important thing in a person’s life - the right to judge the “unrighteous and evil.” Therefore, only one can be the only king of the earth.
Come, judge, punish the evil ones
And be one king of the earth!
Thus, in the poem “To Rulers and Judges,” the image of “earthly gods” is gradually drawn. We know practically nothing about them. But the poet represents their behavior and attitude towards other people. In the poet's poem, a new version of the portrait is formed. It cannot be depicted on canvas, since the appearance seems to be concrete, but in fact it is blurry. And only words could become a kind of brush for such a picturesque and believable portrait. It is not for nothing that some researchers noted that G. R. Derzhavin “ceases to describe individual properties of human nature, his poetry rather gravitates towards portraiture.”
Despite the fact that the poem “To Rulers and Judges” is an adaptation of Psalm 81, it contains many features that Derzhavin introduces into the work. He mixes both kings and slaves in one poetic canvas. They all walk under one sky, in which the Most High God sits. And only he can the poet entrust the right to judge, trying not even to allow “earthly gods” into this process, who are not able to help anyone or anything.
Who does Derzhavin address in the poem “Rulers and Judges”? What is the nature of this appeal (reproof, command, glorification)?
The poem (arrangement of Psalm 81) sounds like a direct angry appeal to the “earthly gods,” i.e., kings and rulers. In contrast to the established literary tradition of praising the “earthly gods” in odes and other poetic works, Derzhavin not only brings them down from their pedestal, but also judges them, reminding them of their duties to their subjects. The poem contains both reproof and instruction.
How does Derzhavin understand the purpose of rulers, “earthly gods”?
Earthly rulers must, as Derzhavin argues, strictly follow the laws, prevent their violation (“do not look at the faces of the powerful”), protect the disadvantaged and poor from injustice (“about the powerful protect the powerless”), take care of material needs and respect for civil rights so that everyone is equal and united before the law.
What is the real appearance of “rulers and judges”? Does he correspond to the poet's idea of an enlightened statesman?
In fact, the appearance of “rulers and judges” is very far from the classic poet’s ideas about an enlightened statesman. With their connivance, atrocities and injustices occur, and bribery flourishes. “Earthly gods” do not want to fulfill the duties assigned to them by the Almighty God. Derzhavin puts forward a very apt formula that reveals the basis of the activities of such a monarch, his attitude towards the lawlessness being committed: “They don’t listen! they see and don’t know! Covered with bribes of tow.” The insignificance of kings, their human weakness, their tendency to temptations become especially noticeable thanks to the antitheses: the ideal sovereign is a real sovereign, the king is a slave:
Kings! I imagined that you gods have power, No one is judge over you,
But you, like me, are passionate and also mortal, like me.
And you will fall like this,
Like a withered leaf falling from the tree!
And you will die like this,
How your last slave will die!
Does the poet hope to correct the evils of power?
No, Derzhavin does not harbor any hopes of correcting the evils of power. That is why he appeals to the Almighty to be “the only king of the earth” and to punish the crafty rulers and judges.
Indignation, contempt, irony towards earthly rulers. Even the expression “earthly gods” is perceived here as irony. Villainy, untruth, are covered with bribes, crafty - vocabulary that characterizes the vices of those in power. At the same time, we hear in the poem deep sorrow about the fate of the disadvantaged, who must be protected, “to pluck the poor from their shackles.” The poor, orphans, widows are the object of the author's sympathy. He calls them righteous and turns to God: “God of the righteous,” on whom those in need of protection rely with prayer and hope. The arrangement of the psalm ends with an energetic call and prayer to punish the villains and become the only king of the earth.
What style is the poem “To Rulers and Judges” written in?
The poem is written in a high style, which is chosen by the author not to praise the reigning persons, but to expose and demonstrate the high purpose of earthly power. Archaic vocabulary (risen, Almighty, host, look, cover, tear out, comb, ripple, listen) gives solemnity to the expression of Derzhavin’s thoughts and feelings.
Compare this poem with Lomonosov's ode. What do you think are the similarities and differences between these two works?
Similarities in the understanding of the purpose of supreme power: care for subjects, compliance with the law, protection from injustice; both Lomonosov’s odes and Derzhavin’s poem are full of teachings to monarchs. The difference is that Lomonosov, according to the laws of the odic genre, identifies progressive state ideas with the intentions of the reigning empress and her activities. Perhaps this is to some extent a wish, an image of what should be, what is ideal. But in Lomonosov’s odes we will not find Derzhavin’s denunciations of power.
