Teach text analysis, help students feel the tragedy of the situation in society “ little man”, trace the universal theme of “prodigal” children using the example of the image of Dunya, cultivate a sense of responsibility for one’s actions, good relations to people - these are the goals of this lesson.
In opening remarks I’m talking about the story “ Stationmaster”occupies a significant place in creativity and has great value for all Russian literature. It is almost the first time that life’s hardships, pain and suffering of the one who is called the “little man” are depicted. This is where the theme of “the humiliated and insulted” begins in Russian literature, which will introduce you to kind, quiet, suffering heroes and allow you to see not only meekness, but also the greatness of their souls and hearts.
Music is playing. Mussorgsky. "Tear"
What did you imagine while listening to the music? What episodes do you remember? What are you thinking about?
Why is the story called “The Station Agent”?
Read the epigraph to the story. What do you think is its meaning? Find words in the story that help you understand it.
(The epigraph is taken from the poem “Station.” Pushkin changed the quote, calling the stationmaster “a collegiate registrar (the lowest civil rank in pre-revolutionary Russia), and not the provincial registrar, which is of a higher rank”).
Students begin “ immersion" into the text, find and read excerpts from the words: “What is a stationmaster?” to the words: “From their conversations...”.
How do the images of station guards appear in the story?
Write down five or six key words or phrases that will help describe them. (“A real martyr”, “a trembling caretaker”, “people are peaceful, helpful, inclined to community”, “modest in their claims to honor”, “not too money-loving”).
Does Vyrin’s image coincide with these ideas? How did we see him for the first time? (“I see, like now, the owner himself, a man of about fifty, fresh and vigorous, and his long green frock coat with three medals on faded ribbons”).
Find another portrait of this hero in the story. What has changed in this portrait? (“It was definitely Samson Vyrin; but how he had aged. While he was getting ready to rewrite my travel document, I looked at his gray hair, at the deep wrinkles of his long-unshaven face, at his hunched back - and could not marvel at how three or four years could transform a vigorous a man into a frail old man”).
What caused these changes? (Students retell and read fragments from the story telling about what Samson Vyrin experienced).
The story about the caretaker begins with the words “It was a hot day. Three miles from the station it began to drizzle, and a minute later the pouring rain soaked me to the last thread.” Find how it ends (“It happened in the fall. Gray clouds covered the sky, cold wind blew from the reaped fields, carrying red and yellow leaves from the oncoming trees." Why are these different paintings Does Pushkin paint nature? What is their role? (Nature helps to understand the hero’s mood, comprehend his inner world, rejoices with him and empathizes).
What qualities in Vyrin’s character did you like? How does this person make you feel? (Samson Vyrin is a man humiliated by everyone, but filled with a sense of dignity. This evokes respect for him and sympathy for his grief).
Music is playing
Find a description of the room where the narrator stayed. What did he focus our attention on? Why? (In the pictures, which depict the story of the prodigal son. It seems to be predicted here further fate Dunya).
Prepare an oral story “Portrait of Dunya.” (This is done by a previously prepared student).
What role did Dunya play in Vyrin’s life? (“The house was held together by her...”)
What tells the narrator that Dunya won’t stay at the station for long? (she acted like “the girl who saw the light”). Pushkin never goes into detailed explanation actions of his heroes, but always brilliantly guesses what this or that person should have done in different situations. And although the caretaker himself is depicted in the foreground in the story, we understand from the very beginning that the image of Dunya plays an important role. And along with the problem of the “little man,” this work clearly reveals another problem that has universal significance (Remember the instructive pictures depicting the “prodigal son”) - “prodigal” children and their fate.
Remember the biblical “Parable of the Prodigal Son” (students retell the parable). What is its meaning? How does Dunya’s fate resemble the story of the hero of this parable? (Dunya leaves home, leaves her father).
Dunya leaves with ease or with pain parents' house? (The fact that Dunya did not leave her parents’ home with a light heart is evidenced by one meager phrase: “The coachman... said that Dunya cried all the way, although it seemed that she was driving of her own accord.”)
How is life between Dunya and Minsky? (She's happy).
Can this happiness be called cloudless? (No. She thinks about her father. When he appears, she faints. Her conscience torments her.)
Does Vyrin know that Dunya is happy? (No. But he knows well what happens in such cases). Find his thoughts on this matter in the text. (“Not her first, not her last, was lured away by a passing rake, but he held her there and abandoned her. There are a lot of them in St. Petersburg, young fools, today in satin and velvet, and tomorrow, you see, they are sweeping the street along with the naked taverns”).
What Vyrin thinks about and is afraid of is not fantasy, but reality, so we not only sympathize with the hero’s bitter loneliness, but think about the fact that the world in which the Vyrins live is not structured in the best way.
When we meet Dunya in last time? Did Vyrin's fears come true? How do we see Dunya at her father’s grave? (Working with text).
Pay attention to the reproduction of the painting “Dunya at her father’s grave.” What feelings does the picture of her silent grief evoke? Compare this illustration with reproductions of other artists (“The Return of the Prodigal Son”, “The Return of the Prodigal Son”, L. Spada “The Return of the Prodigal Son”, etc.) What are the similarities and differences in the depiction of the heroes. (In the paintings famous artists The “prodigal” son repented and was forgiven. Dunya also repented, but it was too late. Her father died, she did not receive his forgiveness, and her tears are all the more bitter.)
What commandment did Dunya break? What does her fate make you think about? (Dunya violated one of the main commandments: “Honor your father and mother,” and suffers greatly from this. The girl’s fate makes us think about responsibility for our actions to people close to us..)
The theme of a person who has gone astray and then repented is relevant at any time and for any age. “As you would have people do to you, do so to them,” Jesus once said. How do you understand these words? How can they be correlated with the story “The Station Agent”?
Pay attention to the picture illustrating the biblical story. This is the work “Christ and the Sinner,” shown for the first time at the XV Traveling Exhibition in 1887. “He who is without sin among you, be the first to throw a stone at her,” Christ answered the angry crowd when asked how to deal with a woman convicted of adultery, subject to stoning according to the law of Moses.
What do you think can connect two so different works(The story “The Station Agent” and Polenov’s painting)? (Call for forgiveness and preaching goodness).
What other works have you read that raise the problem of “prodigal” children?
Lesson summary.
What will you take away from class today? What did you learn? What are you thinking about?
It is good humane treatment preaches to people regardless of their situation. He doesn’t just talk about the fate of his heroes, but as if he looks into their souls and makes us live their lives and feelings, and warns us about possible mistakes.
Which of the two statements: “I know no other signs of superiority except kindness” (R. Rolland) and “As you want people to do to you, so do you to them” (from “The Bible”) - would you finish today's lesson and why?
At home, students write a miniature essay on one of the topics:
1. Do you find anything in common in the fate of Dunya (“Station Warden”) and Marya Gavrilovna (“Blizzard”); 2. Do I always act according to my conscience?
Literature used.
"Station Agent"
The story “The Station Warden” is included in Pushkin’s cycle of stories “Belkin’s Tales”, published as a collection in 1831.
Work on the stories was carried out during the famous “Boldino autumn” - the time when Pushkin came to the Boldino family estate to quickly resolve financial issues, but stayed for the whole autumn due to the cholera epidemic that broke out in the surrounding area. It seemed to the writer that there would never be a more boring time, but suddenly inspiration appeared, and stories began to come out from his pen one after another. So, on September 9, 1830, the story “The Undertaker” was completed, on September 14, “The Station Warden” was ready, and on September 20, “The Young Lady-Peasant” was finished. Then a short creative break followed, and in the new year the stories were published. The stories were republished in 1834 under the original authorship.
Analysis of the work
Genre, theme, composition
Researchers note that “The Station Agent” was written in the genre of sentimentalism, but the story contains many moments that demonstrate the skill of Pushkin the romantic and realist. The writer deliberately chose a sentimental manner of narration (more precisely, he put sentimental notes into the voice of his hero-narrator, Ivan Belkin), in accordance with the content of the story.
Thematically, “The Station Agent” is very multifaceted, despite its small content:
- topic romantic love(with escaping from one’s father’s house and following one’s loved one against the parents’ will),
- the theme of the search for happiness,
- theme of fathers and sons,
- "little man" theme - greatest theme for the followers of Pushkin, Russian realists.
The thematic multi-level nature of the work allows us to call it a miniature novel. The story is much more complex and more expressive in its semantic load than a typical sentimental work. There are many issues raised here, in addition to the general theme of love.
Compositionally, the story is built in accordance with the other stories - the fictional author-narrator talks about the fate of the station guards, downtrodden people and those in the most low positions, then tells a story that happened about 10 years ago, and its continuation. The way it begins
“The Station Agent” (an opening argument in the style of a sentimental journey) indicates that the work belongs to the sentimental genre, but later at the end of the work there is the severity of realism.
Belkin reports that station employees are people of a difficult lot, who are treated impolitely, perceived as servants, complain and are rude to them. One of the caretakers, Samson Vyrin, was sympathetic to Belkin. It was peaceful and kind person, with a sad fate - her own daughter, tired of living at the station, ran away with the hussar Minsky. The hussar, according to her father, could only make her a kept woman, and now, 3 years after the escape, he does not know what to think, for the fate of seduced young fools is terrible. Vyrin went to St. Petersburg, tried to find his daughter and return her, but could not - Minsky sent him away. The fact that the daughter lives not with Minsky, but separately, clearly indicates her status as a kept woman.
The author, who personally knew Dunya as a 14-year-old girl, empathizes with her father. He soon learns that Vyrin has died. Even later, visiting the station where the late Vyrin once worked, he learns that his daughter came home with three children. She cried for a long time at her father’s grave and left, rewarding a local boy who showed her the way to the old man’s grave.
Heroes of the work
There are two main characters in the story: father and daughter.
Samson Vyrin is a diligent worker and father who dearly loves his daughter, raising her alone.
Samson is a typical “little man” who has no illusions both about himself (he is perfectly aware of his place in this world) and about his daughter (for someone like her, neither a brilliant match nor sudden smiles of fate shine). Life position Samson - humility. His life and the life of his daughter takes place and must take place on a modest corner of the earth, a station cut off from the rest of the world. Don't meet here handsome princes, and even if they appear on the horizon, they promise girls only the fall from grace and danger.
When Dunya disappears, Samson cannot believe it. Although matters of honor are important to him, love for his daughter is more important, so he goes to look for her, pick her up and return her. He imagines terrible pictures of misfortunes, it seems to him that now his Dunya is sweeping the streets somewhere, and it is better to die than to drag out such a miserable existence.
Dunya
In contrast to her father, Dunya is a more decisive and persistent creature. The sudden feeling for the hussar is rather a heightened attempt to escape from the wilderness in which she was vegetating. Dunya decides to leave her father, even if this step is not easy for her (she supposedly delays the trip to church and leaves, according to witnesses, in tears). It is not entirely clear how Dunya’s life turned out, and in the end she became the wife of Minsky or someone else. Old Vyrin saw that Minsky had rented a separate apartment for Dunya, and this clearly indicated her status as a kept woman, and when she met her father, Dunya looked “significantly” and sadly at Minsky, then fainted. Minsky pushed Vyrin out, not allowing him to communicate with Dunya - apparently he was afraid that Dunya would return with her father and apparently she was ready for this. One way or another, Dunya has achieved happiness - she is rich, she has six horses, a servant and, most importantly, three “barchats”, so one can only rejoice at her successful risk. The only thing she will never forgive herself is the death of her father, who hastened his death by intense longing for his daughter. At the grave of the father, the woman comes to belated repentance.
Characteristics of the work
The story is riddled with symbolism. The very name “station warden” in Pushkin’s time had the same shade of irony and slight contempt that we put into the words “conductor” or “watchman” today. This means a small person, capable of looking like a servant in the eyes of others, working for pennies without seeing the world.
Thus, the stationmaster is a symbol of a “humiliated and insulted” person, a bug for the mercantile and powerful.
The symbolism of the story was manifested in the painting decorating the wall of the house - this is “The Return of the Prodigal Son.” The stationmaster longed for only one thing - the embodiment of the script of the biblical story, as in this picture: Dunya could return to him in any status and in any form. Her father would have forgiven her, would have reconciled himself, as he had reconciled all his life under the circumstances of fate, merciless to “little people.”
“The Station Agent” predetermined the development of domestic realism in the direction of works that defend the honor of the “humiliated and insulted.” The image of Father Vyrin is deeply realistic and amazingly capacious. This is a small man with a huge range of feelings and with every right to respect for his honor and dignity.
The history of the creation of Pushkin’s work “The Station Agent”
Boldino autumn in the works of A.S. Pushkin became truly “golden”, since it was at this time that he created many of his works. Among them are “Belkin’s Tales”. In a letter to his friend P. Pletnev, Pushkin wrote: “... I wrote 5 stories in prose, from which Baratynsky laughs and fights.” The chronology of the creation of these stories is as follows: “The Undertaker” was completed on September 9, “The Station Agent” was completed on September 14, “The Young Lady-Peasant” was completed on September 20, after an almost month-long break the last two stories were written: “The Shot” - October 14 and “Blizzard” "—October 20. The cycle of Belkin's Tales was Pushkin's first completed prose creation. The five stories were united by the fictitious person of the author, whom the “publisher” spoke about in the preface. We learn that I.P. Belkin was born “of honest and noble parents in 1798 in the village of Goryukhino.” “He was of average height, had gray eyes, brown hair, a straight nose; his face was white and thin.” “He led a very moderate life, avoided all kinds of excesses; never happened... to see him drunk..., to female He had a great inclination, but his modesty was truly girlish.” In the autumn of 1828, this sympathetic character “succumbed to a cold fever, which turned into a fever, and died...”.
At the end of October 1831, “Tales of the late Ivan Petrovich Belkin” were published. The preface ended with the words: “Considering it to be our duty to respect the will of our venerable friend the author, we offer him our deepest gratitude for the news he has brought us and we hope that the public will appreciate their sincerity and good nature. A.P.” The epigraph to all the stories, taken from Fonvizin’s “Minor” (Ms. Prostakova: “Then, my father, he is still a hunter of stories.” Skotinin: “Mitrofan for me”), speaks of the nationality and simplicity of Ivan Petrovich. He collected these “simple” stories, and wrote them down from different narrators (“The Caretaker” was told to him by titular adviser A.G.N., “The Shot” by Lieutenant Colonel I.P., “The Undertaker” by clerk B.V., “Blizzard” " and "Young Lady" by the girl K.I.), processing them according to her own skill and discretion. Thus, Pushkin, as a real author of stories, hides behind a double chain of simple-minded storytellers, and this gives him more freedom storytelling, creates considerable opportunities for comedy, satire and parody and at the same time allows you to express your attitude to these stories.
With the full name of the real author, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin, they were published in 1834. Creating in this cycle an unforgettable gallery of images living and acting in the Russian province, Pushkin talks about modern Russia with a kind smile and humor. While working on “Belkin’s Tales,” Pushkin outlined one of his main tasks: “We need to give our language more freedom (of course, in accordance with its spirit).” And when the author of the stories was asked who this Belkin was, Pushkin replied: “Whoever he is, stories must be written this way: simply, briefly and clearly.”
The analysis of the work shows that the story “The Station Agent” occupies a significant place in the work of A.S. Pushkin and is of great importance for all Russian literature. It is perhaps the first time that life’s hardships, pain and suffering of the one called the “little man” are depicted. This is where the theme of “the humiliated and insulted” begins in Russian literature, which will introduce you to kind, quiet, suffering heroes and allow you to see not only meekness, but also the greatness of their souls and hearts. The epigraph is taken from PA Vyazemsky’s poem “Station” (“Collegiate registrar, / Postal station dictator”). Pushkin changed the quote, calling the stationmaster a “collegiate registrar” (the lowest civilian rank in pre-revolutionary Russia), and not a “provincial registrar”, as it was in the original, since this one is of a higher rank.
Genre, genre, creative method
“The Stories of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin” consists of 5 stories: “Shot”, “Blizzard”, “Undertaker”, “Station Warden”, “The Young Lady-Peasant”. Each of Belkin's Tales is so small in size that one could call it a story. Pushkin calls them stories. For a realist writer reproducing life, the forms of the story and novel in prose were especially suitable. They attracted Pushkin because of their intelligibility to the widest circles of readers, which was much greater than poetry. “Stories and novels are read by everyone, everywhere,” he noted. Belkin's stories" are, in essence, the beginning of Russian highly artistic realistic prose.
Pushkin took the most typical romantic plots for the story, which may well be repeated in our time. His characters initially find themselves in situations where the word “love” is present. They are already in love or just long for this feeling, but this is where the unfolding and escalation of the plot begins. "Belkin's Tales" were conceived by the author as a parody of the genre romantic literature. In the story “The Shot” the main character Silvio came from the bygone era of romanticism. This is a handsome, strong, brave man with a solid, passionate character and an exotic non-Russian name, reminiscent of the mysterious and fatal heroes of Byron’s romantic poems. In "Blizzard" French novels and romantic ballads of Zhukovsky are parodied. At the end of the story, a comic confusion with the suitors leads the heroine of the story to a new, hard-won happiness. In the story “The Undertaker,” in which Adrian Prokhorov invites the dead to visit him, Mozart’s opera is parodied and scary stories romantics. “The Peasant Young Lady” is a small, elegant sitcom with dressing up in the French style, unfolding in Russian noble estate. But she kindly, funny and witty parodies the famous tragedy - Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
In the cycle of “Belkin’s Tales” the center and peak is “The Station Agent”. The story lays the foundations of realism in Russian literature. In essence, in terms of its plot, expressiveness, complex, capacious theme and ingenious composition, in terms of the characters themselves, this is already a small, condensed novel that influenced subsequent Russian prose and gave birth to Gogol’s story “The Overcoat.” The people here are depicted as simple, and their story itself would be simple if various everyday circumstances had not interfered with it.
Theme of the work “The Station Agent”
In "Belkin's Tales", along with traditional romantic themes from the life of the nobility and estate, Pushkin reveals the theme of human happiness in its broadest sense. Worldly wisdom, rules everyday behavior, generally accepted morality is enshrined in catechisms and prescriptions, but following them is not universal and does not always lead to success. It is necessary for fate to give a person happiness, for circumstances to come together successfully. “Belkin's Tales” shows that there are no hopeless situations, one must fight for happiness, and it will be, even if it is impossible.
The story “The Station Agent” is the saddest and most complex work in the cycle. This is a story about the sad fate of Vyrin and the happy fate of his daughter. From the very beginning, the author connects the humble story of Samson Vyrin with philosophical meaning the entire cycle. After all, the stationmaster, who does not read books at all, has his own scheme for perceiving life. It is reflected in the pictures “with decent German poetry” that are hung on the walls of his “humble but neat abode.” The narrator describes in detail these pictures depicting the biblical legend of the prodigal son. Samson Vyrin looks at everything that happened to him and his daughter through the prism of these pictures. His life experience suggests that a misfortune will happen to the daughter, she will be deceived and abandoned. He is a toy, a small man in the hands powerful of the world who turned money into the main criterion.
Pushkin stated one of the main themes of Russian literature of the 19th century century - the theme of the “little man”. The significance of this theme for Pushkin lay not in exposing the downtroddenness of his hero, but in the discovery in the “little man” of a compassionate and sensitive soul, endowed with the gift of responding to someone else’s misfortune and someone else’s pain.
From now on, the theme of the “little man” will be heard constantly in Russian classical literature.
Idea of the work
“There is no idea in any of Belkin’s Tales. You read it - sweetly, smoothly, smoothly; when you read it - everything is forgotten, there is nothing in your memory except adventures. “Belkin’s Tales” are easy to read, because they do not make you think” (“Northern Bee”, 1834, No. 192, August 27).
“True, these stories are entertaining, you cannot read them without pleasure: this comes from a charming style, from the art of storytelling, but they are not artistic creations, but just fairy tales and fables” (V.G. Belinsky).
“How long has it been since you re-read Pushkin’s prose? Make me a friend - read all of Belkin's Tales first. They need to be studied and studied by every writer. I did this the other day and I cannot convey to you the beneficial influence that this reading had on me” (from L.N. Tolstoy’s letter to PD Golokhvastov).
Such an ambiguous perception of Pushkin’s cycle suggests that there is some kind of secret in Belkin’s Tales. In "The Station Agent" it is contained in a small artistic detail- wall paintings telling about the prodigal son, which were in the 20-40s. a frequent part of the station environment. The description of those pictures takes the narrative from a social and everyday level to a philosophical one, allows us to comprehend its content in relation to human experience, and interprets the “eternal plot” about the prodigal son. The story is imbued with the pathos of compassion.
Nature of the conflict
Analysis of the work shows that in the story “The Station Agent” there is a humiliated and sad hero, the ending is equally both mournful and happy: the death of the stationmaster, on the one hand, and the happy life of his daughter, on the other. The story is distinguished by the special nature of the conflict: there are no negative characters here who would be negative in everything; there is no direct evil - and at the same time grief common man, the stationmaster, this does not make him any less.
A new type of hero and conflict entailed a different narrative system, the figure of the narrator - the titular adviser A.G.N. He tells a story heard from others, from Vyrin himself and from the “red-haired and crooked” boy. Dunya Vyrina's taking away by a hussar is the beginning of the drama, followed by a chain of events. From the postal station the action moves to St. Petersburg, from the caretaker’s house to a grave outside the outskirts. The caretaker is unable to influence the course of events, but before bowing to fate, he tries to turn history back, to save Dunya from what seems to the poor father to be the death of his “child”. The hero comprehends what happened and, moreover, goes to his grave from the powerless consciousness of his own guilt and the irreparability of the misfortune.
“Little man” is not only a low rank, the absence of a high social status, but also loss in life, fear of it, loss of interest and purpose. Pushkin was the first to draw the attention of readers to the fact that, despite his low origins, a person still remains a person and he has all the same feelings and passions as people of high society. The story “The Station Warden” teaches you to respect and love a person, teaches you the ability to sympathize, and makes you think that the world in which the station guards live is not structured in the best way.
The main characters of the analyzed work
The author-narrator speaks sympathetically about the “real martyrs of the fourteenth class,” stationmasters accused by travelers of all sins. In fact, their life is real hard labor: “The traveler takes out all the frustration accumulated during a boring ride on the caretaker. The weather is unbearable, the road is bad, the driver is stubborn, the horses are not moving - and the caretaker is to blame... You can easily guess that I have friends from the venerable class of caretakers.” This story was written in memory of one of them.
The main character in the story “The Station Agent” is Samson Vyrin, a man about 50 years old. The caretaker was born around 1766, into a peasant family. Late XVIII c., when Vyrin was 20-25 years old, this was the time of Suvorov’s wars and campaigns. As is known from history, Suvorov developed initiative among his subordinates, encouraged soldiers and non-commissioned officers, promoting them in their careers, cultivating camaraderie in them, and demanding literacy and intelligence. A peasant man under the command of Suvorov could rise to the rank of non-commissioned officer, receiving this rank for faithful service and personal bravery. Samson Vyrin could have been just such a person and most likely served in the Izmailovsky regiment. The text says that, having arrived in St. Petersburg in search of his daughter, he stops at the Izmailovsky regiment, in the house of a retired non-commissioned officer, his old colleague.
It can be assumed that around 1880 he retired and received the position of stationmaster and the rank of collegiate registrar. This position provided a small but constant salary. He got married and soon had a daughter. But the wife died, and the daughter was joy and consolation to the father.
Since childhood, she had to shoulder the entire women's work. Vyrin himself, as he is presented at the beginning of the story, is “fresh and cheerful,” sociable and not embittered, despite the fact that undeserved insults rained down on his head. Just a few years later, driving along the same road, the author, stopping for the night with Samson Vyrin, did not recognize him: from “fresh and vigorous” he turned into an abandoned, flabby old man, whose only consolation was a bottle. And it’s all about the daughter: without asking for parental consent, Dunya - his life and hope, for whose benefit he lived and worked - ran away with a passing hussar. The act of his daughter broke Samson; he could not bear the fact that his dear child, his Dunya, whom he protected as best he could from all dangers, could do this to him and, what is even worse, to herself - she became not a wife, but a mistress.
Pushkin sympathizes with his hero and deeply respects him: a man of the lower class, who grew up in poverty and hard work, has not forgotten what decency, conscience and honor are. Moreover, he places these qualities higher material goods. Poverty for Samson is nothing compared to the emptiness of his soul. It is not for nothing that the author introduces such a detail into the story as pictures depicting the story of the prodigal son on the wall in Vyrin’s house. Like the father of the prodigal son, Samson was ready to forgive. But Dunya did not return. My father’s suffering was aggravated by the fact that he knew very well how such stories often end: “There are a lot of them in St. Petersburg, young fools, today in satin and velvet, and tomorrow, you’ll see, sweeping the street along with the tavern’s nakedness. When you sometimes think that Dunya, perhaps, is disappearing right away, you will inevitably sin and wish for her grave...” An attempt to find her daughter in huge St. Petersburg ended in nothing. This is where the stationmaster gave up - he completely drank and died some time later, without waiting for his daughter. Pushkin created in his Samson Vyrin an amazingly capacious, truthful image of a simple, small man and showed all his rights to the title and dignity of a person.
Dunya in the story is shown as a jack of all trades. No one could cook dinner better than her, clean the house, or serve a passer-by. And the father, looking at her agility and beauty, could not get enough of it. At the same time, this is a young coquette who knows her strength, entering into conversation with a visitor without timidity, “like a girl who has seen the light.” Belkin sees Dunya for the first time in the story when she is fourteen years old - an age at which it is too early to think about fate. Dunya knows nothing about this intention of the visiting hussar Minsky. But, breaking away from her father, she chooses her female happiness, even if it may be short-lived. She chooses another world, unknown, dangerous, but at least she will live in it. It’s hard to blame her for choosing life over vegetation; she took a risk and won. Dunya comes to her father only when everything she could only dream of has come true, although Pushkin does not say a word about her marriage. But six horses, three children, and a nurse indicate a successful ending to the story. Of course, Dunya herself considers herself to blame for her father’s death, but the reader will probably forgive her, just as Ivan Petrovich Belkin forgives.
Dunya and Minsky, the internal motives of their actions, thoughts and experiences, are described throughout the story by the narrator, the coachman, the father, and the red-haired boy from the outside. Maybe that’s why the images of Dunya and Minsky are given somewhat schematically. Minsky is noble and rich, he served in the Caucasus, the rank of captain is not small, and if he is in the guard, then he is already high, equal to an army lieutenant colonel. The kind and cheerful hussar fell in love with the simple-minded caretaker.
Many of the actions of the heroes of the story are incomprehensible today, but for Pushkin’s contemporaries they were natural. So, Minsky, having fallen in love with Dunya, did not marry her. He could do this not only because he was a rake and a frivolous person, but also because objective reasons. Firstly, in order to get married, an officer needed permission from his commander; marriage often meant resignation. Secondly, Minsky could depend on his parents, who would hardly have liked a marriage with a dowry-free and non-noblewoman Dunya. It takes time to resolve at least these two problems. Although in the final Minsky was able to do it.
The plot and composition of the analyzed work
Russian writers have repeatedly turned to the compositional structure of Belkin's Tales, consisting of five separate stories. F. M. Dostoevsky wrote about his idea to write a novel with a similar composition in one of his letters: “The stories are completely separate from one another, so they can even be sold separately. I believe Pushkin was thinking about a similar form of the novel: five stories (the number of "Belkin's Tales"), sold separately. Pushkin’s stories are indeed separate in all respects: there is no cross-cutting character (in contrast to the five stories of Lermontov’s “Hero of Our Time”); No general content. But there is general reception the mystery, the “detective” that lies at the heart of each story. Pushkin's stories are united, firstly, by the figure of the narrator - Belkin; secondly, by the fact that they are all told. The storytelling was, I suppose, the artistic device for which the entire text was conceived. The narration as common to all stories simultaneously allowed them to be read (and sold) separately. Pushkin thought about a work that, being whole as a whole, would be whole in every part. I call this form, using the experience of subsequent Russian prose, a cycle novel.”
The stories were written by Pushkin in one chronological order, he arranged them not according to the time of writing, but based on compositional calculation, alternating stories with “unsuccessful” and “prosperous” endings. This composition imparted to the entire cycle, despite the presence of deeply dramatic provisions in it, a general optimistic orientation.
Pushkin builds the story “The Station Agent” on the development of two destinies and characters - father and daughter. Station warden Samson Vyrin is an old, honored (three medals on faded ribbons) retired soldier, a kind and honest person, but rude and simple-minded, located at the very bottom of the table of ranks, on the lowest rung of the social ladder. He is not only a simple, but a small man, whom every passing nobleman can insult, shout, or hit, although his lower rank of 14th class still gave him the right to personal nobility. But all the guests were met, calmed down and given tea by his beautiful and lively daughter Dunya. But this family idyll could not last forever and at first glance ended badly, because the caretaker and his daughter had different destinies. A passing young handsome hussar, Minsky, fell in love with Dunya, cleverly feigned illness, achieved mutual feelings and, as befits a hussar, took away a crying but not resisting girl in a troika to St. Petersburg.
The little man of the 14th grade did not reconcile himself with such insult and loss; he went to St. Petersburg to save his daughter, whom, as Vyrin, not without reason, believed, the insidious seducer would soon abandon and drive out into the street. And his very reproachful appearance was important for further development this story, for the fate of his Dunya. But it turned out that the story is more complicated than the caretaker imagined. The captain fell in love with his daughter and, moreover, turned out to be a conscientious, honest man; he blushed with shame at the unexpected appearance of the father he had deceived. And the beautiful Dunya responded to the kidnapper with a strong, sincere feeling. The old man gradually drank himself to death from grief, melancholy and loneliness, and despite the moralizing pictures about the prodigal son, the daughter never came to visit him, disappeared, and was not at her father’s funeral. Rural cemetery visited by a beautiful lady with three little barts and a black pug in a luxurious carriage. She silently lay down on her father’s grave and “lay there for a long time.” This is a folk custom last goodbye and remembrance, the last “I’m sorry.” This is the greatness of human suffering and repentance.
Artistic originality
In "Belkin's Tales" all the features of the poetics and stylistics of Pushkin's literary prose. Pushkin appears in them as an excellent short story writer, to whom a touching story, a short story with a sharp plot and twists and turns, and a realistic sketch of morals and everyday life are equally accessible. The artistic requirements for prose, which were formulated by Pushkin in the early 20s, he now implements in his own creative practice. Nothing unnecessary, only one thing necessary in the narrative, accuracy in definitions, conciseness and conciseness of style.
"Belkin's Tales" are distinguished by extreme economy artistic means. From the very first lines, Pushkin introduces the reader to his heroes and introduces him to the circle of events. The depiction of the characters' characters is just as sparse and no less expressive. The author gives almost no external portrait heroes, almost does not dwell on their emotional experiences. At the same time, the appearance of each of the characters emerges with remarkable relief and clarity from his actions and speeches. “A writer must continually study this treasure,” Leo Tolstoy said about “Belkin’s Tales” to a literary friend.
Meaning of the work
In the development of Russian artistic prose, a huge role belongs to Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin. Here he had almost no predecessors. Prose literary language was also at a much lower level compared to poetry. Therefore, Pushkin was faced with a particularly important and very difficult task of processing the very material of this area of verbal art. Among Belkin's Tales, The Station Warden was of exceptional importance for the further development of Russian literature. A very truthful image of a caretaker, warmed by the author’s sympathy, opens the gallery of “poor people” created by subsequent Russian writers, humiliated and insulted by the most difficult for the common man public relations the reality of that time.
The first writer who opened the world of “little people” to the reader was N.M. Karamzin. Karamzin’s word echoes Pushkin and Lermontov. The most great influence subsequent literature was influenced by Karamzin’s story “ Poor Lisa" The author laid the foundation for a huge series of works about “little people” and took the first step into this previously unknown topic. It was he who opened the way for such writers of the future as Gogol, Dostoevsky and others. A.S. Pushkin was the next writer whose sphere of creative attention began to include the whole of vast Russia, its open spaces, the life of villages, St. Petersburg and Moscow opened up not only from a luxurious entrance, but also through the narrow doors of poor houses. For the first time, Russian literature so poignantly and clearly showed the distortion of personality by an environment hostile to it. Artistic discovery Pushkin was directed towards the future; it paved the way for Russian literature into the still unknown.
This is interesting
In the Gatchina region Leningrad region in the village of Vyra there is a literary and memorial museum of the stationmaster. The museum was created based on the story “The Station Warden” by Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin and archival documents in 1972 in the preserved building of the Vyr Postal Station. Is the first museum in Russia literary hero. The postal station was opened in 1800 on the Belarusian postal route, it was the third
according to the station from St. Petersburg. In Pushkin’s time, the Belarusian large postal route passed here, which went from St. Petersburg to the western provinces of Russia. Vyra was the third station from the capital, where travelers changed horses. It was a typical postal station, which had two buildings: northern and southern, plastered and painted in pink. The houses faced the road and were connected to each other by a brick fence with large gates. Through them, carriages, carriages, carts, and chaises of travelers drove into the wide paved courtyard. Inside the yard there were stables with hay barns, a barn, a shed, a fire tower, hitching posts, and in the middle of the yard there was a well.
Along the edges of the paved courtyard of the post station there were two wooden stables, sheds, a forge, and a barn, forming a closed square into which the access road led from the highway. The courtyard was in full swing with life: troikas were driving in and out, coachmen were bustling about, grooms were leading away lathered horses and bringing out fresh ones. The northern building served as the caretaker's dwelling. It retained the name “Station Master's House”.
According to legend, Samson Vyrin, one of the main characters of Pushkin’s “Tales of Belkin,” got his surname from the name of this village. It was at the modest postal station Vyra A.S. Pushkin, who traveled here from St. Petersburg to the village of Mikhailovskoye more than once (according to some sources, 13 times), heard a sad story about a little official and his daughter and wrote the story “The Station Warden.”
In these places, folk legends arose that claim that it was here that the hero of Pushkin’s story lived, from here a passing hussar took away the beautiful Dunya, and Samson Vyrin was buried in the local cemetery. Archival research also showed that a caretaker who had a daughter served at the Vyrskaya station for many years.
Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin traveled a lot. The path he traveled across Russia was 34 thousand kilometers. In the story “The Station Warden,” Pushkin speaks through the lips of his hero: “For twenty years in a row, I traveled Russia in all directions; I know almost all postal routes; I know several generations of coachmen; I didn’t know a rare caretaker by sight, I didn’t deal with a rare one.”
Slow travel along postal routes, with long “sitting” at stations, became a real event for Pushkin’s contemporaries and, of course, was reflected in literature. The theme of the road can be found in the works of P.A. Vyazemsky, F.N. Glinka, A.N. Radishcheva, N.M. Karamzina, A.S. Pushkin and M.Yu. Lermontov.
The museum was opened on October 15, 1972, the exhibition consisted of 72 items. Subsequently, their number increased to 3,500. The museum recreates the atmosphere typical of postal stations of Pushkin's time. The museum consists of two stone buildings, a stable, a barn with a tower, a well, a saddlery and a forge. There are 3 rooms in the main building: the caretaker's room, the daughter's room and the coachman's room.
Gukovsky GL. Pushkin and Russian romantics. - M., 1996.
BlagoyDD. Creative path Pushkin (1826-1830). - M., 1967.
Lotman Yu.M. Pushkin. - St. Petersburg, 1987. Petrunina N.N. Pushkin's prose: paths of evolution. - L., 1987.
Shklovsky V.B. Notes on the prose of Russian classics. M., 1955.
A characteristic feature of Pushkin’s work is its deep content. An example of this is the story “The Station Warden” from the cycle “Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin” (1830), in which you can find an interesting life incident, love story, psychological drama, social type“little man”, philosophical understanding human actions etc. Depending on which aspect of the content the researcher pays attention to, the genre originality of “The Station Agent” is determined: fable-anecdote (B. Eikhenbaum), parody (V. Vinogradov), social story, philosophical parable (E. Vereshchagin, V. Kostomarov).
A fable is a short, entertaining story, and The Station Agent depicts just such a story. Dunya Vyrina ran away with Hussar Minsky; the father suffered for his daughter and even drank himself to death out of grief, assuming the usual course of events (the girl got tired of the master and ended up on the street along with the “tavern girl”), but in fact Dunya married Minsky, her fate became a happy exception to the general rule.
Parody is a comic imitation of a literary work, ridiculing cliched plot devices or artistic techniques, and “The Station Agent” by Pushkin, as V.N. Turbin convincingly proved (“Pushkin. Gogol. Lermontov” M., 1978, pp. 69 - 79), is an ironic adaptation of V.I. Karlgoff’s story “The Station Agent” (1826) and an episode from F.V. Bulgarin’s novel “Ivan Vyzhigin” (1830). Bulgarin portrayed a stationmaster - a fourteenth-class official and an excellent rogue who extorts bribes for horses from travelers, and they desperately quarrel with him, but pay the required bribe. The main character of Karlgoff's story, the stationmaster, is happy with his quiet position and life in the lap of rural nature, as he loves fishing and hunting. Once upon a time he fled from St. Petersburg, kidnapping the daughter of a merchant, his current wife. At Karlgof's happy with life the caretaker describes his story to the narrator: the latter was delayed at the station due to illness. Having nothing else to do, the patient examines the upper room and sees expensive guns, a pile of dishes and a whole cabinet of books in Russian and German, and on the walls there are good German engravings with views of Saxony (the stationmaster was German).
Pushkin preserved the plot moves of Bulgarin and Karlgof, but, as is known, filled them with completely different content. The stationmaster from "Belkin's Tales" became a Russian man, an unfortunate martyr of the fourteenth grade. His only and beloved daughter runs away from him with a dashing hussar captain. She completely forgets about her father and does not make herself known for five or six years. Finally, Dunya arrives at the station as a rich lady with children (the frivolous hussar, contrary to the literary cliche, turned out to be decent person and married her), but the joyful meeting of relatives did not work out: the daughter can only visit her father’s grave and order the local priest to “eternal memorial” for her father. Thus, Pushkin refutes both the smug, prosperous caretaker - the hero Karlgof, and the cunning caretaker-fraud - the hero Bulgarin and creates " sad story about the sad fate" of the station superintendent Samson Vyrin.
The story expresses a serious social content. In the history of Russian literature, “The Station Agent” is considered the first work in which the image of a “little man” is presented, that is, a type of hero with certain “signature” traits: a poor official, standing on the lowest rung of the social ladder, invisible, unable to adequately respond to ridicule and insults, obediently bearing the blows of fate and insults from the boss and any “decisive” person who would think of offending him. At the same time, the “little man” is portrayed by the writer in such a way that it evokes compassion and respect in the readers for the modest hero. Pushkin prefaced his story with an epigraph from a poem by P.A. Vyazemsky:
Collegiate registrar, Postal station dictator.
And then the author describes the life of a “road dictator” who suffers humiliation, abuse, even beatings from passing gentlemen, therefore, the epigraph takes on an ironic sound. The characterization of the caretaker, given at the beginning of the story, is sympathetic and polemical: “These much-maligned caretakers are generally peaceful people, naturally helpful, inclined to live together, modest in their claims to honor and not too money-loving.” In connection with the last quality noted by the narrator, one can recall the Bulgarin bribe-taking caretaker.
The character of Samson Vyrin as a “little man” was revealed in a clash with the hussar captain Minsky. Father comes to to the insidious seducer"To save his daughter, he does not have a long explanation with the poor old man, gives him money and puts him out on the street, and orders his footman not to let the caretaker into the house anymore. When Vyrin cunningly entered Dunya’s apartment, the captain no longer stood on ceremony: he “with a strong hand, grabbed the old man by the collar, and pushed him onto the stairs.” Why can you treat the caretaker so unceremoniously? The answer is simple: Vyrin is not an official, not rich, he cannot seriously take revenge for an insult, and his feelings, primitive and shallow from the point of view of the nobleman Minsky, do not deserve any attention. And indeed, every time the unfortunate father is kicked out by Minsky or his servant, the caretaker meekly leaves, since he has neither the character nor the means to fight the offender. When Vyrin’s friend, having learned the whole story with Dunya, advised him to complain, “the caretaker thought, waved his hand and decided to back down.” He probably did not believe in the success of his struggle with Minsky. This is how the story expresses the idea of an unjust structure of society, in which a person like Vyrin can be insulted with impunity. And all he can do is suffer and die from melancholy and loneliness.
“The Station Agent” is sometimes called the philosophical parable of the prodigal daughter. A parable is a moral and instructive genre in which life situations(that is, the similarities between them are revealed) and the technique of allegory (that is, allegory) is used. Apparently, it is no coincidence that the narrator twice mentions the pictures decorating the guest room in the caretaker's house. These pictures are illustrations of the biblical parable of the prodigal son (Gospel of Luke 15:11-32), although all participants cautionary tale are depicted in 19th-century German costumes and each picture is accompanied by “decent German verse.”
The life story of Samson Vyrin is similar to a well-known parable and at the same time not similar. Dunya, like the biblical prodigal son, ran away from her father to seek happiness and found it, unlike the prodigal son, who “squandered all his property” in a foreign land. The repentant prodigal son returned to his father on time and managed to ask his father for forgiveness, and Dunya upon her return found only a lonely grave - “a pile of sand in which a black cross with a copper image was dug.” She returned too late, and her belated repentance will not fix anything. And she has something to repent of: since she ran away with Minsky, she has never sent any news about herself to the unfortunate caretaker. He knew nothing about her and could imagine anything: “Whether she’s alive or not, God knows. Stuff happens. Not her first, not her last, was lured away by a passing rake, but he held her there and abandoned her.” The abandoned father drank himself to death out of grief and fussed with the village children (the crooked red-haired Vanka told how the caretaker taught him to carve pipes and gave all the children nuts), and at this time his beloved daughter was in wealth and contentment, babysitting her children - her own grandchildren Samson Vyrin, about which he knew nothing.
So, although Pushkin gave his work common name“The Stories of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin,” strictly speaking, is a cycle of five stories - small plot works with a limited number of characters and episodes, united in a cycle by the image of the narrator. The author probably used the word “story” not as literary term, but as a common designation in Russian for some story, incident, narrative (cf. the use of the word “story” in the following cases: “The Tale of Bygone Years”, “There is no sadder story in the world than the story of Romeo and Juliet”, “The Bronze Horseman” . Petersburg story", "The story of how Ivan Ivanovich quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich", etc.).
What is the genre uniqueness of Pushkin’s “The Station Agent”? From the above reasoning it follows that this is a socio-philosophical story, since this definition captures the main substantive moments of the work - the social and moral reasons for the death of Samson Vyrin.
The end of the caretaker's story - an inconsolable death and a lonely grave in an abandoned cemetery - is tragic. However, in the finale, the narrator, I.P. Belkin, does not “throw thunder and lightning” at Dunya and Minsky, who, with their selfishness and arrogant neglect, destroyed the poor old man. After all, the daughter came to her father, her repentance, although belated, took place. Perhaps Dunya’s cry at Samson Vyrin’s grave expressed sincere pity for her father and an understanding of her guilt in front of her?
In the famous Boldino autumn of 1830, A.S. Pushkin wrote in 11 days amazing work- "Belkin's Tales" - which included five independent stories, told to one person (his name is in the title). In them, the author managed to create a gallery of provincial images, truthfully and without embellishment to show life in contemporary writer Russia.
The story “The Station Agent” occupies a special place in the cycle. It was she who laid the foundation for the development of the theme of the “little man” in Russian literature of the 19th century.
Meet the heroes
The story of the station superintendent Samson Vyrin was told to Belkin by a certain I.L.P., a titular councilor. His bitter thoughts about the attitude towards people of this rank set the reader up in a not very cheerful mood from the very beginning. Anyone stopping at the station is ready to curse them. Either the horses are bad, or the weather and road are bad, or even the mood is not going well - and the stationmaster is to blame for everything. The main idea of the story is to show the plight of a common man without a high rank or rank.
All the demands of those passing by were calmly endured by Samson Vyrin, a retired soldier, a widower who raised his fourteen-year-old daughter Dunechka. He was a fresh and cheerful man of about fifty, sociable and sensitive. This is how the titular councilor saw him at their first meeting.
The house was clean and cozy, balsams grew on the windows. And Dunya, who learned how to manage a house early on, gave everyone who stopped tea tea from a samovar. She, with her meek appearance and smile, humbled the anger of all those who were dissatisfied. In the company of Vyrin and the “little coquette,” time flew by for the adviser. The guest said goodbye to the hosts as if they were old acquaintances: their company seemed so pleasant to him.
How Vyrin has changed...
The story “The Station Agent” continues with a description of the second meeting of the narrator with the main character. A few years later, fate again threw him to those parts. He approached the station with anxious thoughts: anything could have happened during this time. The premonition indeed did not deceive: instead of a cheerful and cheerful person A graying, long unshaven, hunched old man appeared before him. It was still the same Vyrin, only now very taciturn and gloomy. However, a glass of punch did its job, and soon the narrator learned Dunya's story.
About three years ago a young hussar passed by. He liked the girl, and he pretended to be sick for several days. And when he achieved mutual feelings from her, he took her secretly, without blessing, from her father. Thus, the misfortune that befell changed the long-established life of the family. The heroes of “The Station Agent,” father and daughter, will never meet again. The old man's attempt to return Dunya ended in nothing. He reached St. Petersburg and was even able to see her, richly dressed and happy. But the girl, looking at her father, fell unconscious, and he was simply kicked out. Now Samson lived in melancholy and loneliness, and his main companion was the bottle.
The story of the prodigal son
Even when he first arrived, the narrator noticed pictures on the walls with captions German. They depicted the biblical story of the prodigal son who took his share of the inheritance and squandered it. In the last picture, the humble youth returned to home to the parent who forgave him.
This legend is very reminiscent of what happened to Vyrin and Dunya, which is why it is no coincidence that it is included in the story “The Station Agent”. The main idea of the work is related to the idea of helplessness and defenselessness. ordinary people. Vyrin, well familiar with the foundations of high society, could not believe that his daughter could be happy. The scene seen in St. Petersburg was not convincing either - everything can still change. He waited for Dunya's return until the end of his life, but their meeting and forgiveness never took place. Perhaps Dunya simply did not dare to appear before her father for a long time.
Return of the daughter
On his third visit, the narrator learns of the death of an old acquaintance. And the boy who accompanied him to the cemetery will tell him about the lady who came after the station superintendent died. The content of their conversation makes it clear that everything turned out well for Dunya. She arrived in a carriage with six horses, accompanied by a nurse and three barchat. But Dunya no longer found her father alive, and therefore the repentance of the “lost” daughter became impossible. The lady lay on the grave for a long time - this is how, according to tradition, they asked forgiveness from a deceased person and said goodbye to him forever - and then she left.
Why did the daughter’s happiness bring unbearable mental suffering to her father?
Samson Vyrin always believed that life without blessings and as a mistress is a sin. And the fault of Dunya and Minsky, probably, first of all, is that both their departure (the caretaker himself convinced his daughter to accompany the hussar to the church) and the misunderstanding at the meeting in St. Petersburg only strengthened him in this conviction, which, in the end, will bring the hero to the grave . There is another important point - what happened undermined my father’s faith. He sincerely loved his daughter, who was the meaning of his existence. And suddenly such ingratitude: in all the years Dunya never made herself known. It was as if she had erased her father from her life.
Portraying a poor man of the lowest rank, but with a high and sensitive soul, A.S. Pushkin drew the attention of his contemporaries to the position of people who were at the lowest level of the social ladder. The inability to protest and resignation to fate make them defenseless in the face of life's circumstances. This turns out to be the stationmaster.
The main idea that the author wants to convey to the reader is that it is necessary to be sensitive and attentive towards every person, regardless of his character, and only this will help change the indifference and bitterness reigning in the world of people.
