Gorky's early work belongs to the literary direction. Early romantic works of Gorky. The play "At the Bottom". Analysis

Early work of M. Gorky

M. Gorky entered literature on the verge of two historical eras, he seemed to combine these two eras. The time of moral turmoil and disappointment, general discontent, mental fatigue - on the one hand, and the maturing of future events that have not yet been openly manifested - on the other, found its bright and passionate artist in early Gorky.

Gorky, in his twenty years, saw the world in such a terrifying variety that it seems incredible his bright faith in man, in his spiritual nobility, in his strength and capabilities. But the young writer was characterized by a striving for the ideal, for the beautiful - here he was a worthy successor to the best traditions of Russian literature of the past.

In the story "Chelkash" (1894), the writer does not idealize the romantic image of a vagabond and a thief who broke with his environment (his father was one of the richest people in the village). Although in comparison with the spiritually poor, greedy and pitiful Gavrila Chelkash is the winner. But the opposition proceeds along the line of the relation to property, to its enslaving essence. Gavrila's dream turns out to be a dream leading to slavery. Chelkash denies the "power of darkness", the power of money. "Chelkash listened to his joyful cries, looked at the beaming face, distorted with delight of greed, and felt that he - a thief, a reveler, cut off from everything he loved - would never be like this!"

For his stories, Gorky took earthly and real people, with all the contradictions and shortcomings.

He considered the measure of the value of a human person to be activity, the ability to act in the name of man. This motive sounds already in the first story of the writer - "Makar Chudra" (1892). The story of the amazing, proud love of Loiko Zobar and Radda is a hymn to freedom. “Well, falcon,” says Makar, “would you like to tell me one story? And you will remember it and, as you will remember it, you will be a free bird for your age ”.

Gorky's romanticism is not alien to drama. He assumes him. The fates of the heroes of his first stories are always dramatic. But this is a drama that gives rise to a protest against the slave position in society. Makar Chudra says at the beginning of the story to the author-narrator: “They are funny, those are your people. They huddled together and crush each other, and there are so many places on earth ... Well, he was born then, perhaps, to dig the earth, and even die ... Knows his will? Is the steppe breadth clear? Does the sea wave speak to his heart? He is a slave - as soon as he was born, he is a slave all his life, and that's it! "

This is what worries the artist, what becomes the central idea of ​​many of his stories of the early period. Everything was unusual in this story: the fate of the heroes, and their speech, and their appearance, and the author's speech. “I didn't want to sleep. I looked into the darkness of the steppe, and the regally beautiful and proud figure of Rudda was floating in the air in front of my eyes. She pressed her hand with a lock of black hair to the wound on her chest, and through her swarthy, thin fingers a drop of blood oozed, falling to the ground in fiery red stars ... "Already here is outlined the opposition of free and slave existence, which will be in different versions be present in all early romantic stories of the writer. It will change and deepen. Already - Falcon, Siskin - Woodpecker, Girl - Death, Larra - Danko. Faith in the power of man, in the power of action, in the power of love is also imbued with the fairy tale in verse "The Girl and Death" (published in 1917). The all-conquering hymn of "the joy of love and the happiness of life" - love without fear and doubt - is a vivid manifestation of that peculiarity of Gorky's talent and his life position, which characterizes the writer's career.

In the work of young Gorky, "unsolvable" questions sounded with renewed vigor: how to live? what to do? what is happiness? Questions that are eternal, if only because no generation has yet managed to avoid them.

In the fairy tale "About the Siskin Who Lied, and About the Woodpecker - Lover of Truth" , suddenly sounded other, "free, bold songs", reminiscent of a hymn to reason:

... Let's light our hearts with the fire of the mind,

And light will reign everywhere! ..

... Who honestly accepted death in battle,

Has he really fallen and defeated?

... Follow me who dared!

May the darkness disappear!

It is important for a writer to think that a "spark" can be sown, faith and hope can be awakened. In this tale, the artist noted the awakening of consciousness only for a moment. In Song of the Falcon (1895), the death of a proud and courageous bird already confirms the victory of that view of life, which was carried by the beautiful Falcon. "Earthly" Already defeated by the fact that he does not understand what a flight into the sky, freedom is, I am sure that "there is only empty space." His "real" outlook on life excludes the spirituality of human existence on earth.

The idea of ​​self-sacrifice naturally arises in the Song of the Falcon and becomes a hymn to action in the name of freedom and light. "The madness of the brave is the wisdom of life!" - does not contain only a statement of self-awareness, although this is important for the writer. So one would think if it were not for the words: "... and drops of your blood, hot, like sparks, will flare up in the darkness of life and many brave hearts will kindle with an insane thirst for freedom and light!"

The story "The Old Woman Izergil" (1894) can be called programmatic for the young Gorky. All the favorite and dear themes and thoughts of the young writer converge here. Everything here is fundamentally important for him. The composition of the story is strictly subordinated to the idea - the assertion of the correctness of the feat in the name of life. Three independent episodes are united by the images of the author and the old woman Izergil. The image of Izergil is controversial. It is realistic at the core. In the life of Izergil, unusual and bright, there were many things that can be regarded ambiguously. Good and evil - everything is mixed here, as in life. And yet there is something that kind of unites her with Danko. “There is always room for exploits in life” - this is the main idea, although the events in the life of the old gypsy woman cannot be regarded only as heroic, she often acted in the name of personal freedom.

Danko's spiritual beauty is contrasted with the wretchedness of Larra's existence. Individualism, contempt for people, Larra's egocentrism, who is sure that freedom is independence from people, from responsibilities to society, are debunked by the artist with such strength and energy that it seems that Larra's shadow, "restless and unforgiven", still wanders around the world. “... And everything is looking, walking, walking ... and death does not smile at him. And there is no place for him among people ... "

The punishment of loneliness is the theme of many contemporary and, I think, future works. Two different “I”, opposed with such force, Danko and Larra - these are two radically opposite attitudes to life, which live and oppose even now. It is because of the latter that Danko is interesting today. "What will I do for people ?!" - shouted Danko louder than thunder. " The death of Danko, with the torch of his heart illuminating the way to his tired and distraught people, is his immortality. This question was the main one for Danko, because without asking oneself such a question, one cannot live meaningfully, one cannot believe in anything and consciously act in life.

That is why the early work of the writer is so interesting today, who openly declared at the end of the last century about his faith in man, in his mind, in his creative, transforming capabilities.

Early romantic works of M. Gorky

The beginning of the 90s of the XIX century is a difficult and uncertain time. With the utmost realistic truthfulness, Chekhov and Bunin, Gorky's older contemporaries, depict this period in their works. Gorky himself declares the need to search for new ways in literature. In a letter to Pyatnitsky dated July 25, 1900, he writes: “The task of literature is to capture in colors, in words, in sounds, in forms, what is in a person the best, beautiful, honest, noble. In particular, my task is to awaken in a person pride in himself, to tell him that he is the best, the most sacred in life, and that apart from him there is nothing worthy of attention. The world is the fruit of his creativity, God is a particle of his mind and heart, .. "The writer understands that in real modern life a person is oppressed and deprived of rights, and therefore says:" The time has come for the romantic ... "

Indeed, in Gorky's early stories, traits of romanticism predominate. First of all, because they depict a romantic situation of confrontation between a strong person (Danko, Larra, Sokol) and the world around him, as well as the problem of a person as a person in general * The action of stories and legends was transferred to fantastic conditions (“He stood between the boundless steppe and the by sea ”). The world of works is sharply differentiated into light and darkness, and these differences are important when assessing the characters: after Larra, there is a shadow, after Danko - sparks.

Gorky uses elements of folklore. He animates nature (“The mist of the autumn night shuddered and looked around fearfully, revealing the steppe and the sea ...”). Man and nature are often identified and can even talk (Rahim's conversation with the wave). Animals and birds, acting in stories, become symbols (Uzh and Falcon). The use of the legend genre allows the writer to most clearly express his thoughts and ideas in allegorical form.

Gorky clearly gives preference to people who are free from the laws of society. His favorite characters are gypsies, beggars, thieves. It cannot be said that the writer idealizes thieves, but the same Chelkash in terms of moral qualities is incomparably higher than the peasant. A person obsessed with a dream, a person with a capital letter is much more interesting for a writer. The central figure of Gorky's early romantic creativity is introduced in the poem "The Man". Man is called to illuminate the whole world, to untangle the knots of all delusions, he is “tragically beautiful”. Danko is also depicted: “I am going to burn as brightly and deeply as possible to illuminate the darkness of life. And death for me is my reward ”. Gorky's concepts of "people" and "man" are directly opposed: "I want each of the people to be a" Man "!"

The question of human freedom is also fundamental for Gorky. The theme of a free man is the main theme of his first story "Makar Chudra", as well as many other works, including "Songs about the Falcon". The concept of "freedom" for a writer is associated with the concepts of "truth" and "feat". If in the story “Makar Chudra” Gorky is interested in freedom “from anything”, then in “Old Woman Izergil” - freedom “in the name”. Larra - the son of an eagle and a woman - is not enough man to be with people, but also not enough eagle to do without people. His lack of freedom is in his selfishness, and therefore he is punished by loneliness and immortality, and after him only a shadow remains. Danko, on the other hand, turns out to be a freer person, because he is free from himself and lives for the sake of others. Danko's act can be called a heroic deed, for a heroic deed for Gorky is the highest degree of freedom from self-love.

Bibliography

For the preparation of this work were used materials from the site coolsoch.ru/

The famous Russian philosopher of the XX century N.A. Berdyaev spoke about the beginning of M. Gorky's career in the following way: “Gorky appeared in literature with his refreshing word, and in his first stories he was strong, original and talented. It was necessary to tell the world about the tramps and their rebellion. This new force of vagabondage acted dazzlingly on modern society and was successful in the most bourgeois circles ... Everyone recognized that Gorky's tramps were a rebellious and revolutionary force ”(“ Revolution and Culture ”).
Gorky's early work (nineties of the XIX century) is represented by two streams, creative and realistic principles, merging into a single artistic whole. The writer seeks to get away from the gray, everyday life into a dream and a fairy tale. He was sure that “the time has come for the need for the heroic: everyone wants something exciting, bright ... so that it does not look like life, but is higher than it, better, more beautiful. It is imperative that the present literature begins to embellish life a little, and as soon as it begins, life will embellish, that is, people will heal faster, brighter ”(From a letter to Chekhov, 1900).
This attitude leads to the creation of a whole cycle of romantic works: "Makar Chudra", "The Girl and Death", "About the Little Fairy and the Young Shepherd", "Khan and His Son", "Old Woman Izergil", "Song of the Falcon".
The most important feature of Gorky's romantic creativity is the researcher V.V. Mikhailovsky considered the image of the "wonderful world", whose representatives are exceptionally solid, bright, strong, bold natures, outlined sharply, without half-tones: Loiko Zobar, Radda, the old khan, Danko, Sokol ... The writer frankly admires them, it is no coincidence that it is emphasized their outward beauty. For example, as a young gypsy Loiko Zobar appears: “The mustache fell on his shoulders and mixed with curls, his eyes burn like clear stars, and a smile is a whole sun, by God! As if it was forged from one piece of iron together with a horse. Stands all, as in blood, in the fire of the fire and sparkles with his teeth, laughing! I'll be damned if I didn't love him already as myself, before he said a word to me or just noticed that I, too, live in this world. "
And here is the description of the gypsy woman Radda: “Do you know my Nonka? The wench queen! Well, and Radda cannot be equated with her - a lot of honor to Nonka! About her, this Rudda, words can’t say anything. Maybe her beauty could be played on a violin, and even then for someone who knows this violin as his soul ”(“ Makar Chudra ”),
And here is a general portrait of Moldovans, young grape pickers: “They walked, sang and laughed; men - bronze, with a lush, black mustache and thick curls up to their shoulders, in short jackets and wide trousers; women are cheerful, flexible, with dark blue eyes, also bronze. Their hair, silk and black, was loose, the wind, warm and light, played with it, tinkling with coins woven into it. The wind flowed in a wide, even wave, but sometimes it seemed to jump over something invisible and, giving birth to a strong gust, fluttered the women's hair into fantastic manes that billowed around their heads. It made women look weird and fabulous. They went farther and farther from us, and night and fantasy dressed them more and more beautifully "(" The Old Woman Izergil ").
The main thing in the heroes of Gorky's early romantic works is an active attitude to life, the ability to fight for one's moral ideals and defend them even at the cost of one's life. And the point is not even the death of the hero, although the motive for death in such situations is stable (Radda and Zobar die, Danko dies, Falcon dies), but in the ideas that they defend. Loiko Zobar cannot drop his honor and humiliate himself even in front of his beloved girl; dying, the Falcon dreams only of once again ascending into the free space of the sky and fighting the enemy at last; at the cost of his life, Danko, ripping out a flaming heart from his chest and illuminating their path, leads people out of the dead forest. But the memory of them does not die. The beautiful love story of Zobar and Radda lives in the stories of Makar Chudra; about the death of the proud Falcon, the sea composes a solemn song and, rumbling and hitting the waves on the coastal rocks, sings it; sparks from Danko's heart, burning with love for people, still appear in the steppe before the thunderstorm ...
The writer finds the origins of romantic art in the international folklore of the peoples of the Volga region, Crimea, the Caucasus, gypsies, Moldovans ...
Nature is an indispensable part of the "wonderful world". Nature acts as a character in a number of stories: "Makar Chudra", "Old Woman Izergil", "Song of the Falcon" ... And the story itself usually sounds in the open, merging with the freedom of the elements of the sea, steppe, wind, sky.
Here, for example, is how the story “Makar Chudra” opens: “A damp, cold wind blew from the sea, spreading across the steppe a pensive melody of the splash of a wave running ashore and the rustle of coastal bushes. Occasionally his impulses brought with them shriveled, yellow leaves and threw them into the fire, fanning the flames; The darkness of the autumn night that surrounded us shuddered and shyly moved away, opening for a moment on the left - an infinite degree, on the right - an endless sea and right in front of me - the figure of Makar Chudra, an old gypsy ... "
And the legend about Danko ends with the following description: “And so the forest parted in front of them, parted and remained behind, dense and dumb, and Danko and all those people immediately plunged into the sea of ​​sunlight and clean air washed by rain. The thunderstorm was there, behind them, over the forest, and here the sun was shining, the steppe sighed, the grass glittered in rain diamonds and the river sparkled with gold ... Danko's torn chest ... "
And there are many such examples.
A.V. Lunacharsky noticed that no one before Gorky had created such a background, he “almost cannot iodine a person, start a story or a chapter of a novel without looking at the sky, not looking at what the sun, moon and stars are doing and the whole untold palette of heavenly vaults with the changing magic of the clouds. "

1. Childhood and adolescence of Gorky
2. The beginning of Gorky's creativity
3. Gorky's works "Makar Chudra", "Old Woman Izergil", "Girl and Death", "Song of the Falcon" and others.
4. The novel "Foma Gordeev". Summary
5. The play "At the Bottom". Analysis
6. The novel "Mother". Analysis
7. A cycle of stories "Across Russia"
8. Gorky's attitude to the revolution
9. Gorky in exile
10. Gorky's return to the USSR
11. Gorky's illness and death

Maxim GORKY (1868-1936)

M. Gorky appears in our minds as the personification of the mighty creative forces of the nation, as the real embodiment of the brilliant talent, intelligence and hard work of the Russian people. The son of a craftsman, a self-taught writer, who did not even finish elementary school, he escaped from the very bottom of life with a huge effort of will and intellect and in a short time made a rapid ascent to the heights of writing.

A lot is being written about Gorky now. Some unconditionally defend him, others overthrow him from the pedestal, blaming him for justifying Stalin's methods of building a new society and even direct incitement to terror, violence, and repression. They are trying to push the writer to the sidelines of the history of Russian literature and social thought, to weaken or completely eliminate his impact on the literary process of the 20th century. But still, our literary criticism is difficult, but consistently makes its way to the living, non-textual Gorky, freeing itself from past legends and myths, and from excessive categorical assessment of his work.

Let's try to understand the difficult fate of the great man, remembering the words of his friend Fyodor Chaliapin: “I know for sure that it was the voice of love for Russia. In Gorky, a deep consciousness spoke that we all belong to our country, our people and that we must be with them not only morally - as I sometimes console myself - but also physically, with all the scars, all the hardens, all the humps. "

1. Childhood and adolescence of Gorky

Alexey Maksimovich Peshkov (Gorky) was born on March 16 (28), 1868 in Nizhny Novgorod, in the family of a cabinetmaker. After the sudden death of his father on June 8, 1871, the boy and his mother settled in his grandfather's house. Alyosha was raised by his grandmother, who introduced him to the motley, colorful world of folk tales, epics, songs, developed imagination, an understanding of the beauty and power of the Russian word.

At the beginning of 1876, the boy entered a parish school, but after studying for a month, due to illness with smallpox, he left his studies. A year later, he was admitted to the second grade of primary school. However, after graduating from two classes, he was forced to leave school forever in 1878. By this time, my grandfather had gone bankrupt; in the summer of 1879, his mother had died of fleeting consumption.

At the suggestion of his grandfather, a 14-year-old teenager goes "into the people" - begins a working life full of hardships, exhausting work, homeless wanderings. Whoever he was: a boy in a shoe store, an apprentice in an icon shop, a nanny, a dishwasher on a steamer, a ten's manager, a loader at the pier, a baker, etc. He visited the Volga region and Ukraine, Bessarabia and Crimea, Kuban and the Caucasus.

"My walk in Russia was caused not by the desire for vagrancy," Gorky explained later, "but by the desire to see - where do I live, what kind of people are around me?" Wanderings enriched the future writer with a wide knowledge of folk life and people. This was also facilitated by the early awakening in him "passion for reading", continuous self-education. “I owe the best in me to books,” he would later remark.

2. The beginning of Gorky's creativity

By the age of twenty A. Peshkov perfectly knew the domestic and world art classics, as well as the philosophical works of Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Freud, V. Soloviev.

Life observations and impressions, the stock of knowledge required an exit. The young man began to try himself in literature. His creative biography begins with poetry. It is believed that A. Peshkov's first printed speech was "Poems on the grave of D. A. Latysheva", published in early 1885 in the Kazan newspaper "Volzhsky Vestnik". In 1888-1889 he created the poems "Only I was rid of troubles", "You are not lucky, Alyosha", "It is shameful to whine in my years", "I am sailing ...", "Do not scold my muse ..." and others For all the imitativeness and rhetoric, they clearly convey the pathos of the expectation of the future:

In this life, sick and unhappy,

I sing hymns to the coming, -

this is how the poem "Do not scold you my muse" ends.

From poetry, the novice writer gradually moved on to prose: in 1892 his first story, Makar Chudra, signed with the pseudonym Maxim Gorky, was published in the Tiflis newspaper Kavkaz.

V. Korolenko played an important role in the fate of Gorky, who helped him understand many secrets of literary skill. On the advice of Korolenko, Gorky moved to Samara and worked as a journalist. His stories, essays, feuilletons were published in Samara Gazeta, Nizhegorodsky Leaflet, Odessa News, and then in the thick central magazines Novoe Slovo, Russkaya Mysl, etc. In 1898, Gorky published two volumes of Sketches and stories ”that made him famous.

Later, summing up his 25-year creative activity, M. Gorky wrote: “The meaning of my 25-year work, as I understand it, comes down to my passionate desire to arouse an effective attitude to life in people” 2. These words can be used as an epigraph to all the writer's work. To excite in people an effective, active attitude to life, to overcome their passivity, to activate the best, strong-willed, moral qualities of the individual - this is the task that Gorky solved from the first steps of his work.

This feature was very clearly manifested in his early stories, in which he spoke, according to the correct definition of V. Korolenko, both as a realist and as a romantic. In the same year, 1892, the writer created the stories “Makar Chudra” and “Emelyan Pilyay”. The first of them is romantic in its method and style, the second is dominated by features of realistic writing.

In the fall of 1893, he published the romantic allegory "About the Chizh who Lied ..." and the realistic story "The Beggar", a year later the realistic story "The Poor Pavel" and the romantic works "The Old Woman Izergil", "Song of the Falcon" and "One Night" appeared. These parallels, which can be easily continued, indicate that Gorky did not have two special periods of creativity - the romantic and the realistic.

The division of the works of early Gorky into romantic and realistic, which was established in our literary criticism since the 40s, is somewhat arbitrary: the romantic works of the writer have a solid real basis, and the realistic ones carry a charge of romanticism, representing themselvesthe embryo of a renewed realistic type of creativity - neorealism.

3. Works by Gorky "Makar Chudra", "Old Woman Izergil", "Girl and Death", "Song of the Falcon"

Gorky's works "Makar Chudra", "Old Woman Izergil", "Girl and Death", "Song of the Falcon" and others, in which the romantic principle prevails, are connected by a single problematic. A hymn to a free and strong person sounds in them. A distinctive feature of all heroes is proud rebellion to fate and daring love of freedom, integrity of nature and heroism of character. Such is the gypsy Rudda - the heroine of the story"Makar Chudra".

Two strongest feelings possess her: love and Thirst for freedom. Radda loves the handsome Loiko Zobar, but does not want to submit to him, because above all she values ​​her freedom. The heroine rejects the age-old custom according to which a woman, having become a wife, becomes a slave to a man. A slave's lot is worse for her than death. It is easier for her to die with the proud knowledge that her personal freedom has been preserved, than to submit herself to the authority of another, even if this other is passionately loved by her.

In turn, the Zobar also values ​​his independence and is ready to do anything to preserve it. He cannot subdue Rudda, but he never wants to submit to her, and he cannot refuse her. Before the eyes of the whole camp, he kills his beloved, but he himself perishes. The author's words concluding the legend are significant: "The sea sang a gloomy and solemn hymn to a proud couple of handsome gypsies."

The allegorical poem "The Girl and Death" (1892), not only in its fabulous character, but also in terms of its main problems, is very indicative of Gorky's entire early work. This work vividly sounds the idea of ​​the all-conquering power of human love, which is stronger than death. The girl, punished by the king for laughing when he returns from the battlefield in deep sorrow after defeat in the war, boldly looks death in the face. And she retreats, because she does not know what to oppose to the great power of love, the great feeling of love for life.

The theme of love for a person, rising to sacrifice in the name of preserving people's lives, reaches a broad social and moral meaning in Gorky's story "The Old Woman Izergil". The composition of this work itself is already original, which is a kind of triptych: the legend of Larra, the story of the storyteller's life - the old gypsy Izergil and the legend of Danko. The plot and problems of the story are based on a clear opposition of heroism and altruism to individualism and egoism.

Larra, the character of the first legend - the son of an eagle and a woman - is depicted by the author as the bearer of individualistic, inhuman ideas and principles. For him, there are no moral laws of kindness and respect for people. He deals with the girl who rejected him cruelly and inhumanly. The writer strikes a blow at the philosophy of extreme individualism, which asserts that everything is allowed to a strong personality, up to any crime.

The moral laws of humanity, the author claims, are unshakable, they cannot be violated, for the sake of an individual, who opposed himself to the human community. And the personality itself cannot exist outside of people. Freedom, as the writer understands it, is a conscious need to respect moral norms, traditions and rules. Otherwise, it turns into a destructive, destructive force directed not only against the neighbor, but also against the adherent of such “freedom” himself.

Larra, whom the elders expel from the tribe for the murder of a girl and grant immortality at the same time, should, it would seem, triumph, “Which, however, he does in the beginning. But time passes, and life for Larra, who is alone, turns into a hopeless torment: “He has no life, and death“ does not smile at him. And there is no place for him among people ... This is how a person was punished for his pride, ”that is, for egocentrism. This is how the old woman Izergil concludes her story about Larra.

The hero of the second legend - the young man Danko - is a complete antipode to the arrogant self-lover Larre. He is a humanist, ready for self-sacrifice in the name of saving people. Out of the darkness "impenetrable swampy forests he leads his people to the Light. But this path is difficult, distant and dangerous, and Danko, in order to save people, without hesitation, tore his heart out of his chest. Illuminating the road with this "torch of love for people", the young man led his people to the sun, to life and died without asking people for anything as a reward for himself. " In the image of Danko, the writer embodied his humanistic ideal - the ideal of selfless love for people, heroic self-sacrifice in the name of their life and happiness. Izergil's realistic story about herself is like a connecting link between these two legends.

The individualistic killer Larra believed that happiness was in proud loneliness and in permissiveness, for which he was punished with a terrible punishment. Izergil lived a life among people, a life in its own way bright and eventful. She admires courageous, freedom-loving people with a strong will. Her rich life experience led her to a significant conclusion: “When a person loves exploits, he always knows how to do them and will find where it is possible. In life ... there is always a place for exploits. " Izergil herself knew both passionate love and exploits. But she lived mainly for herself. Only Danko embodied the highest understanding of the spiritual beauty and greatness of man, giving his life for the sake of people's lives. So in the very composition of the story its idea is revealed. Danko's altruistic feat takes on a sacred meaning. The Gospel of John says that Christ at the Last Supper addressed the apostles with the following words: "There is no more love if someone lay down his life for his friends." It is this kind of love that the writer poeticizes with the feat of Danko.

Using the example of the fate of his two characters-antipodes, Gorky poses the problem of death and immortality. The proud individualist Larra turned out to be immortal, but only a dark shadow runs from him across the steppe, which is difficult to even see. And the memory of Danko's feat is preserved in the hearts of people and is passed on from generation to generation. And this is his immortality.

The action of these and many other stories of Gorky unfolds in the south, where the sea and the steppe coexist - symbols of boundless and eternal cosmic life. The writer is attracted to immense spaces, where a person especially strongly feels the power of nature and his closeness to it, where no one and nothing hinders the free manifestation of human feelings.

Vivid, emotionally colored and lyrically heartfelt pictures of nature nowhere turn into an end in itself for the writer. They play an active role in the story, being one of the main elements of the content. In “Old Woman Izergil” he describes the Moldavians as follows: “They walked, sang, laughed, the men were bronze, with a lush, black mustache and thick curls up to their shoulders. Women and girls - cheerful, flexible, with dark blue eyes, also bronze ... They moved farther and farther from us, and night and fantasy dressed them in everything beautiful. " These Moldovan peasants do not differ much in their appearance from Loiko Zobar, Radda and Danko.

In the story "Makar Chudra" both the narrator himself and the everyday life of the gypsy life are presented in a romantic light. Thus, in reality itself, the same romantic traits are emphasized. They are also revealed in the biography of Izergil. This is done by the author in order to highlight an important idea: the fabulous, the romantic does not oppose life, but only in a brighter, emotionally sublime form expresses what is in one way or another present in reality.

The composition of many of Gorky's early stories contains two elements: a romantic plot and its realistic setting. They represent a story within a story. The figure of the narrator-hero (Chudra, Izergil) also gives the narration the character of reality, believability. The same features of reality are conveyed to the works by the image of the narrator - a young man named Maxim, who listens to the stories being told.

The themes of Gorky's early realistic stories are even more multifaceted. In this regard, the cycle of the writer's stories about tramps stands out. Gorky's tramps are a display of spontaneous protest. They are not passive sufferers thrown out of life. Their departure into the trash is one of the forms of unwillingness to come to terms with the share of the slave. The writer emphasizes in his characters what elevates them above the inert bourgeois environment. Such is the tramp and thief Chelkash from the story of the same name in 1895, opposed to the farm laborer Gavrila.

The writer does not idealize his character in the least. It is no accident that he often uses the epithet "predatory" to characterize Chelkash: Chelkash has a "predatory look", "predatory nose", etc. But contempt for the omnipotent power of money makes this lumpen and renegade more humane than Gavrila. And on the contrary, slavish dependence on the ruble turns the village guy Gavrila, who is inherently a good person, into a criminal. In the psychological drama that played out between them on a deserted seashore. Chelkash turns out to be more humane than Gavrila.

Among tramps, Gorky especially singles out people in whom love for work has not faded away, for intense reflections on the meaning of life and the purpose of man. This is how Konovalov from the story of the same name (1897). A good person, a dreamer with a soft soul, Alexander Konovalov constantly feels dissatisfaction with life and himself. This pushes him on the path of vagrancy and drunkenness. One of the valuable qualities of his nature was love for work. Having found himself after a long wandering in a bakery, he experiences the joy of work, showing artistry in his work.

The writer emphasizes the aesthetic emotions of his hero, his subtle sense of nature, and respect for women. Konovalov becomes infected with a passion for reading, he sincerely admires the audacity and courage of Stepan Razin, loves the heroes of Gogol's "Taras Bulba" for their fearlessness and fortitude, takes to heart the grievous hardships of the men from F. Reshetnikov's "Podlipovtsy". The high humanity of this tramp is obvious, the presence of good moral inclinations in him.

However, everything in him is impermanent, everything is changeable and not for long. The infectious enthusiasm for his favorite work disappeared, replaced by melancholy, he somehow suddenly cooled off to her and abandoned everything, either indulging in a binge, or going on a "run", in another vagrancy. It lacks a strong inner core, solid moral support, strong attachment, constancy. Konovalov's extraordinary, talented nature is dying, because he does not find the will to actively act. The winged definition of "knight for an hour" is fully applicable to it.

However, such are almost all Gorky tramps: Malva from the story of the same name, Semaga (“How Semaga was caught”), carpenter (“In the steppe”), Zazubrina and Vanka Mazin from the works of the same name, and others. Konovalov has that advantage over his fellow wanderings in that he is not inclined to blame others for his failed life. To the question: "Who is to blame for us?" - he answers with conviction: "We ourselves are to blame for ourselves ... Because we have no desire for life and we have no feelings for ourselves."

Gorky's close attention to the people of the "bottom of life" gave rise to a number of critics to declare him a singer of vagabondage, an adherent of the individualist-minded personality of the Nietzschean persuasion. This is not true. Of course, in comparison with the world of inert, spiritually limited petty bourgeois in Gorky tramps there is that "zest" that the writer seeks to outline as clearly as possible. The same Chelkash, in his contempt for money and 'in love for the mighty and free elements of the sea, with the breadth of his nature, looks nobler than Gavrila. But this nobility is very relative. For both he and Emelyan Pilyay and other tramps, having freed themselves from philistine greed, have also lost their labor skills. Gorky vagabonds like Chelkash are beautiful when they confront cowards and greedy people. But their power is disgusting when it is directed to the detriment of people. The writer excellently showed this in the stories "Artem and Cain", "My companion", "Former people", "Rogue" and others. Selfish, predatory, full of arrogance, contempt for everyone but themselves, the characters in these works are drawn in sharply negative tones. Gorky later called the antihumanistic, cruel, immoral philosophy of this type of "former people" fraudulent, stressing that it is a manifestation of "a dangerous national disease that can be called passive anarchism" or "anarchism of the vanquished."

4. The novel "Foma Gordeev". Summary.

The late 90s - early 900s were marked in the work of Gorky by the appearance of works of a large epic form - the novel "Foma Gordeev" (1899) and the story "Three" (1900).

The novel "Foma Gordeev" opens a series of Gorky's works about the "masters of life." It recreates the artistic history of the formation and development of the Russian bourgeoisie, shows the ways and means of the initial accumulation of capital, as well as the process of "breaking" a person out of his class due to disagreement with his morality and norms of life.

The history of the first hoarding is depicted by the writer as a chain of crimes, predation and deceit. Almost all the merchants of the Volga city, where Foma Gordeev takes place, made their millions "through robberies, murders ... and the sale of counterfeit money." Thus, the commercial adviser Reznikov, who began his career by opening a brothel, quickly became rich after "strangling one of his guests, a rich Siberian."

In the past, a large steamship owner Kononov was prosecuted for arson, and he increased his wealth at the expense of his mistress, whom he hid in prison on false charges of theft. The merchant Gushchin succeeds, once deftly robbing his own nephews. The rich Robists and Bobrov are guilty of all sorts of crimes. The group portrait of the Volga merchant class serves as a household and social background against which the detailed types of early accumulators appear: Ananiy Shurov, Ignat Gordeev and Yakov Mayakin. Being clearly individualized, they embody the typical features of the Russian bourgeoisie during the period of initial capital accumulation.

The old, pre-reform merchants are represented by the image of Anania Shurov. This merchant is wild, dark, straightforwardly rude. He is in many ways related to the well-known figures of A. Ostrovsky, M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, G. Uspensky. At the heart of his wealth is a criminal offense. In the past, a serf peasant, Shurov became rich after he sheltered a counterfeiter who had escaped from hard labor in his bathhouse, then killed him, and set fire to a bathhouse to cover up the crime.

Shurov became a major timber merchant, drove rafts along the Volga, built a huge sawmill and several barges. He is already old, but even now, as in his younger years, he looks at people "harshly, mercilessly." According to Shurov, all his life "besides God, he was not afraid of anyone." However, he also builds his relationship with God on considerations of profit, sanctimoniously covering up his dishonorable deeds with His name. Calling Shurov "the manufacturer of sins", Yakov Mayakin notes, not without poisonousness: "It has long been about him both in hard labor and in hell they cry - they yearn, wait - they will not wait."

Another version of the "knight of primitive accumulation" is Ignat Gordeev. He, too, was a peasant in the past, then a barge haule, who became a large Volga steamer-owner. But he gained wealth not by criminal offenses, but by his own labor, energy, extraordinary perseverance and enterprise. "In all his powerful figure," the author notes, "there was a lot of Russian healthy and rough beauty."

He is not petty stingy and not so obsequiously greedy as other merchants, he has Russian prowess and breadth of soul. The chase for the ruble sometimes bothered Ignata, and then he gave full vent to passions, unrestrainedly indulging in drunkenness and debauchery. But a period of riots and revelry passed, and he again became quiet and peaceful. In such abrupt transitions from one mood to another - the originality of the character of Ignat, who was not without reason called "shaly". These are personality traits. Ignat was then reflected in the individual appearance of his son Thomas.

The central figure of the merchant class in the novel is Yakov Mayakin, the owner of a rope factory and trade shops, godfather of Foma Gordeev. Mayakin is close in spirit to the patriarchal part of the merchant class. But at the same time he is drawn to the new, industrial bourgeoisie, confidently moving to replace the nobility. Mayakin is not just a representative of the economically growing bourgeoisie. He seeks to find a historical and socio-philosophical substantiation of the activities of the merchants as one of the most important estates of Russian society. He argues with conviction that it was the merchants who "for centuries carried Russia on their shoulders", with their diligence and labor "they laid the foundation of life - they themselves lay in the ground instead of bricks."

Mayakin speaks with conviction, enthusiastic and beautiful, with pretentious eloquence about the great historical mission and merits of his class. A talented lawyer of the merchants, intelligent and energetic, Mayakin persistently returns to the idea that the weight and importance of the Russian merchants are clearly underestimated, that this class is removed from the political life of Russia. The time has come, in his conviction, to squeeze the nobles and allow the merchants, the bourgeoisie to be at the helm of state power: “Let us have room for work! Include us in the construction of this very life! "

The Russian bourgeoisie, which by the end of the century realized itself as a great economic force in the state and was dissatisfied with its removal from the leading role in the political life of the country, speaks through the lips of Mayakin.

But Mayakin combines correct thoughts and views with cynicism and immorality towards people. To achieve wealth and power, in his opinion, should be done by any means, without disdaining anything. Teaching the peasant Thomas "the politics of life," Mayakin elevates hypocrisy and cruelty into an immutable law. “Life, brother, Thomas,” he teaches the young man, “is very simply staged: either gnaw at all, or lie in the mud ... Approaching a person, hold honey in your left hand, and a knife in your right ...”

Mayakin's reliable successor is his son Taras. In his student years, he was arrested and deported to Siberia. The father was ready to disown him. However, Taras turned out to be all father. After serving his exile, he entered the office of the manager of the gold mines, married his daughter and dexterously chopped off his rich father-in-law. Soon, Taras began to manage a soda plant. Returning home, he energetically enters "into business" and leads it on a larger scale than his father. He does not have a fatherly inclination to philosophize, he talks only about business, extremely briefly and dryly. He is a pragmatist, convinced that each person "should choose a job within his abilities and do it as best he can." Looking at his son, even Yakov Mayakin, a very businesslike man himself, admiring his son's efficiency, is somewhat perplexed by the callous coldness and pragmatism of the "children": "Everything is fine, everything is pleasant, only you, our heirs, are deprived of any living feeling!"

Afrikan Smolin is in many ways similar to the younger Mayakin. He more organically than Taras absorbed the mode of action of the European bourgeois, having spent four years abroad. He is a Europeanized bourgeois businessman and industrialist who thinks broadly and acts cunningly and cunningly. "Adriasha is a liberal," says the journalist Yezhov, "a liberal merchant is a cross between a wolf and a pig ..." dexterous.

But Gorky was interested not only in the problem of the formation and growth of the Russian bourgeoisie, but also in the process of its internal disintegration, the conflict between a morally healthy personality and the environment. This is the fate of the novel's protagonist, Foma Gordeev. Compositionally and in terms of plot, the novel is built as a chronicle description of the life of a young man who rebelled against the morality and laws of bourgeois society and, as a result, suffered a collapse of his ideals.

The novel traces in detail the history of the formation of the personality and character of Thomas, the formation of his moral world. The starting point in this process was many natural inclinations and properties inherited by Foma from his parents: kindness, a tendency to withdrawal and solitude from his mother, and dissatisfaction with the monotony of life, the desire to break the bonds of money-grubbing that bind a person - from his father.

The fairy tales, to which in childhood his aunt Anfisa, who replaced his early deceased mother, introduced Foma, drew vivid pictures of life to his childhood imagination, which was not at all like a monotonous, gray existence in his father's house.

Father and godfather tried to instill in Thomas their understanding of the purpose and meaning of life, interest in the practical side of merchant activity. But these teachings did not go to Thomas for the future; they only intensified the feeling of apathy and boredom in his soul. Having reached adulthood, Thomas retained in his character and behavior "something childish, naive, distinguishing him from his peers." As before, he did not show serious interest in the business in which his father had invested his whole life.

Ignat's sudden death stunned Thomas. The only heir to a huge fortune, he was to become the master. But, deprived of his father's grip, he turned out to be impractical in everything, lacking in initiative. Thomas feels neither happiness nor joy from the possession of millions. “... I feel sick! he complains to his kept woman Sasha Savelyeva. He does just that: from time to time he indulges in revelry, sometimes making scandalous fights.

Foma's drunken intoxication gave way to oppressive melancholy. And more and more Thomas is inclined to think that life is arrangedit is unfair that people of his class enjoy undeserved benefits. More and more often he quarrels with his godfather, who is the personification of this unjust life for Thomas. Wealth, the position of the "owner" becomes a heavy burden for him. All this results in a public revolt and denunciation of the merchants.

During the celebrations at Kononov's, Thomas charges the merchants with crimes against people, accuses them of not building life, but a prison, turning an ordinary person into a forced slave. But his solitary, spontaneous rebellion is fruitless and doomed to failure. Foma often recalls an episode from his childhood when he scared an owl in a ravine. Blinded by the sun, she rushed helplessly through the ravine. This episode is projected by the author on the behavior of the hero. Thomas, too, is blind as an owl. Mentally blind, “spiritually. He passionately protests against the laws and morals of a society that is based on injustice and selfishness, but there is no clearly conscious aspirations at the heart of his protest. Merchants easily deal with their renegade, imprisoning him in an insane asylum and taking away his inheritance.

The novel "Foma Gordeev" drew numerous responses from readers and critics. The opinion of many readers was expressed by Jack London, who wrote in 1901: “You close the book with a feeling of nagging melancholy, with disgust for a life full of“ lies and debauchery ”. But this is a healing book. Social ulcers are shown in it with such fearlessness ... that its purpose is not in doubt - it affirms the good. " Since the beginning of the 20th century, Gorky, without leaving work on / prose works, actively and successfully tries himself in drama. From 1900 to 1906 he created six plays that were included in the golden fund of the Russian theater: "Bourgeois", "At the bottom", "Summer residents", "Children of the sun", \ "Enemies", "Barbarians". Different in subject matter and artistic level, they, in essence, also solve the author's main super task - "to arouse in people an effective attitude to life."

5. The play "At the Bottom". Analysis.

One of the most significant plays of this kind of dramatic cycle is undoubtedly the drama"At the bottom" (1902). The play was a stunning success. Following the staging of the Moscow Art Theater in 1902, she bypassed many theaters in Russia and foreign countries. “At the Bottom” is a stunning picture of a kind of cemetery where outstanding people are buried alive. We see Satin's mind, Natasha's spiritual purity, Tick's diligence, striving for an honest life at Ash, the honesty of the Tatar Asan, an unquenched thirst for pure, sublime love at the prostitute Nastya, etc.

The people living in the wretched basement shelter of the Kostylevs are placed in extremely inhuman conditions: they have been deprived of their honor, human dignity, the possibility of love, motherhood, honest, conscientious work. World drama has never known such a harsh truth about the life of the lower strata.

But the social and everyday problems of the play are organically combined here with the philosophical one. Gorky's work is a philosophical debate about the meaning and purpose of human life, about a person's ability to "break the chain" of destructive circumstances, about the attitude towards man. In the dialogues and remarks of the heroes of the play, the word "truth" is most often heard. Of the characters who willingly use this word, Tambourines, Luka and Satin stand out.

At one pole of the dispute about truth and man stands the former furrier of Diamonds, "who, as he assures, always tells everyone only the truth:" But I don't know how to lie. What for? In my opinion, bring the whole truth as it is. Why be ashamed? " But his "truth" is cynicism and indifference towards the people around him.

Let us remember how cruelly and indifferently and cynically he comments on the main events of the play. When Anna asks not to make noise and let her die in peace, Bubnov declares: "Noise is not a hindrance to death." Nastya wants to escape from the basement, declares: "I'm superfluous here." Bubnov immediately summarizes mercilessly: "You are superfluous everywhere." And he concludes: "And all people on earth are superfluous."

In the third act, the locksmith Klesh pronounces a monologue about his own hopeless existence, about how they doom to hunger and deprivation a man who has "golden hands" and who is eager to work. The monologue is deeply sincere. This is the cry of despair of a person whom society throws out of life as unnecessary slag. And Bubnov declares: “It's great! How I played in the theater. " A distrustful skeptic and cynic in relation to people, Bubnov is dead at heart and therefore brings people disbelief in life and in a person's ability to "break the chain" of unfavorable circumstances. The Baron, another "living corpse", a man without faith, without hope, has gone not far from him.

The antipode of Bubnov in his view of man is the wanderer Luke. For many years, critical spears have been crossed around this Gorky “character, which was largely facilitated by the contradictory assessments of Luka's image on the part of the author himself. Some critics and literary scholars literally destroyed Luka, calling him a liar, a preacher of harmful consolation and “even an unwitting accomplice to the masters of life. Others, while partly recognizing Luke's kindness, nevertheless considered her harmful and even the very name of the character was derived from the word "crafty." Meanwhile, Gorky Luke bears the name of the Christian evangelist. And this says a lot if we bear in mind the presence of “significant” names and surnames of the characters in the writer's works.

Luke is Latin for "light". With this semantic meaning of the character's image, Gorky's plan from the time he created the play echoes: "I really want to write well, I want to write with joy ... let the sun on the stage, a cheerful Russian sun, not very bright, but loving everything, embracing everything." The wanderer Luke appears in such a "sun" in the play. It is designed to dispel the darkness of hopelessness among the inhabitants of the shelter, fill it with kindness, warmth and light.

“In the middle of the night there is no way or road to be seen,” Luka sings meaningfully, clearly hinting at the loss of the meaning and purpose of life by the night lodgers. And he adds: “Ehe-he ... gentlemen people! And what will become of you? Come on, even though I'm here to litter. "

Religion plays an essential role in Luke's worldview and character. The image of Luke is a kenotic type of a wandering folk sage and philosopher. In his wandering way of life, in his seeking for the city of God, “the righteous land,” the eschatologism of the people's soul, hunger for the coming transformation, was deeply expressed. The Russian religious thinker of the Silver Age G. Fedotov, who pondered a lot on the typology of Russian soulfulness, wrote that in the wanderer type "lives predominantly the kenotic and Christocentric type of Russian religiosity, eternally opposed in it to everyday liturgical ritualism." This is precisely Gorky's character.

A deep and wholehearted nature, Luke fills Christian dogmas with living meaning. Religion for him is the embodiment of high morality, kindness and help to man. His practical advice is a kind of minimum program for the inhabitants of the shelter. He calms Anna down by talking about the blessed existence of the soul after death (as a Christian, he piously believes in this). Ashes and Natasha - pictures of a free and happy family life in Siberia. The actor seeks to inspire hope for a cure from alcohol. Luke is often accused of lying. But he never lied.

Indeed, at that time in Russia there were several hospitals for alcoholics (in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg), and in some of them the poor were treated free of charge. Siberia is the place where Ash was easiest to start a new life. Ashes himself admits that he began to steal because no one from childhood called him otherwise than "thief" and "thief son". Siberia, where no one knows him and where hundreds of people were sent in accordance with the Stolypin reforms, is an ideal place for Ash.

Luke calls the people of the “bottom” not to reconcile with the circumstances, but to action. He appeals to the inner, potential capabilities of a person, calling on people to overcome passivity and despair. Luke's compassion and attention to people is effective. He is driven by nothing more than a conscious desire to "awaken in people an effective attitude towards life." “Whoever wants it hard will find it,” Luka says with conviction. And it’s not his fault that the Actor and Ash didn’t turn out the way he advised them.

The image of Satin is also ambiguous, which also became the subject of conflicting opinions. The first, traditional point of view: Satin, unlike Luke, calls for an active struggle for a person. The second, diametrically opposed to the first, claims that Satin is Satan, who "corrupts the night shelters, hinders their attempts to leave the bottom of life" 5. It is easy to see that both of these views on personality and the role of Satin in the play are overly categorical.

Satin and Luca are not opponents, but like-minded people in their views on a person. It is no coincidence that after the departure of Luca, Satin protects him from the attacks of the Baron. Satin defines Luke's role on him as follows: "He ... acted on me like acid on an old and dirty coin." Luka stirred the soul of Satin, forced him to determine his position in relation to a person.

Luke and Satin agree on the main thing: both of them are sure that a person is able to break the chain of unfavorable circumstances, if he strains his will, overcomes passivity. “A man can do anything, if only he wants to,” says Luka. “There is only a man, all the rest is the work of his hands and his brain,” Satin supports him. There are also differences between them in their views on a person. _ Satin is a maximalist approach to the problem of pity. “Pity humiliates a person,” he says.

Christian Luke calls first of all to understand a person, and having managed to understand, one must feel sorry for him. “I’ll tell them,” says Luka, “to regret a person in time - it’s good.” To regret in time means to save sometimes from death, from an irreparable step. Luke is more flexible in this matter, more merciful than Satin. Speaking about the need to pity people, Luke appeals to the highest moral authority: “Christ pitied everyone and commanded us.”

Under the influence of Luke, some of the lodgers softened, became kinder. This primarily applies to Satin. In the fourth act, he jokes a lot, warns the inhabitants of the basement against rude antics. The Baron's attempt to teach Nastya a lesson for her insolence he suppresses with the advice: “Give it up! Don't touch ... don't hurt a person. " Satin also does not share the Baron's proposal to make fun of the Tatar, who is praying: “Leave me alone! He's a good guy, don't bother! " Remembering Luka and his views on man, Satin confidently declares: "The old man was right!" Both Luke's kindness and pity are not passive, but effective - this is what Satin understood. “Whoever has not done good to whom has done something bad,” says Luka. Through the lips of this character, the author affirms the idea of ​​active good, the position of active attention and help to people. This is the most important moral and philosophical result of Gorky's debate play.

During the 1905 revolution, Gorky actively helped the Bolsheviks. He meets Lenin, promotes the publication of the newspaper "New Life".

6. The novel "Mother". Analysis.

After the suppression of the December armed uprising, Gorky, fearing arrest, moved to Finland, and then, in order to raise money for the Bolshevik Party, to America. Here he writes a number of publicistic articles, the play "Enemies" and the novel"Mother" (1906), which requires a different understanding, not according to the canons of "the first work of socialist realism", as we have been accustomed to doing for decades. Lenin's assessment of this novel is widely known: “... The book is necessary, many workers took part in the revolutionary movement unconsciously, spontaneously, and now they will read Mother with great benefit for themselves. A very timely book. "

This assessment significantly influenced the interpretation of the novel, which began to be viewed as a kind of manual for organizing the revolutionary movement. The writer himself was dissatisfied with such an assessment of his work. “For such a compliment, I, of course, thanked Lenin,” he said, “but, I confess, it became somewhat annoying… It is still not good to reduce my work (…) to something like a committee proclamation. After all, I tried to approach several big, very big problems in my thing. "

Indeed, the novel “Mother” contains a big and important idea - the idea of ​​motherhood as a life-giving, creative force, although the plot of the work is directly attached to the events of the first Russian revolution, and the prototypes of the central characters are the Sormovo worker - revolutionary P. Zalomov and his mother.

The nature and results of the revolution amazed Gorky with their cruelty from both sides. As a humanist writer, he could not help but see the certain rigidity of the Marxist doctrine, in which man was viewed only as an object of social, class relations. Gorky, in his own way, tried to combine socialism with Christianity. This idea will be used by the writer in the basis of the story "Confession" (1908), where his God-seeking sentiments were clearly manifested. The origins of these sentiments are already contained in the novel "Mother", in which the writer seeks to overcome the opposition of atheism and. Christianity, give their synthesis, their own version of Christian socialism.

The scene at the beginning of the novel is symbolic: Pavel Vlasov brings home and hangs on the wall a picture of Christ going to Emmaus. The parallels here are obvious: the Gospel story about Christ, who joins two travelers going to Jerusalem, was needed by the author to emphasize Paul's resurrection to a new life, his way of the cross for the sake of the happiness of people.

The novel "Mother", like the play "At the Bottom", is a two-level work. Its first level is social and everyday life, revealing the growth of the revolutionary consciousness of the young worker Pavel Vlasov and his friends. The second is a parable, which is a modification of the gospel story of the Mother of God, blessing the Son on the crucifixion for the salvation of people. This is clearly demonstrated by the finale of the first part of the novel, when Nilovna, addressing the people during the May Day demonstration, speaks of the path of the cross of children in the name of holy truth: “Children are walking in the world, our blood is following the truth… for everyone! And for all of you, for your babies they have doomed themselves to the way of the cross ... Our Lord Jesus Christ would not have existed if people had not perished for his glory ... "And the crowd" excitedly and dully "responds to her:" God speaks! God, good people! Listen!" Christ, dooming himself to suffering in the name of people, is associated in the mind of Nilovna with the path of his son.

The mother, who saw the truth in the case, the son of Christ, became for Gorky a measure of moral height, he placed her image at the center of the narrative, linking through the feelings and actions of the mother the political definition of "socialism" with the moral and ethical concepts: "soul", "faith", "love".

The evolution of the image of Pelageya Nilovna, rising to the symbol of the Mother of God, reveals the author's thought about the spiritual enlightenment and sacrifice of the people, who give the most precious thing to achieve a great goal - their children.

In the chapter that opens the second part of the novel, the author describes Nilovna's dream, in which the impressions of the past day - the May Day demonstration and the arrest of his son - are intertwined with religious symbolism. Against the background of the blue sky, she sees her son singing the revolutionary anthem "Get up, get up, working people." And, merging with this hymn, the chant "Christ is risen from the dead" solemnly sounds. And in a dream, Nilovna sees herself in the guise of a Mother with babies in her arms and in her womb - a symbol of motherhood. After waking up and talking with Nikolai Ivanovich, Nilovna "wanted to go somewhere along the roads, past forests and villages, with a knapsack on her shoulders, with a stick in her hand." This impulse united a real desire to fulfill the commission of Paul's friends connected with revolutionary propaganda in the countryside, and. at the same time a desire to repeat the difficult path of the Mother of God in the footsteps of the Son.

So the real social and everyday plan of the narrative is translated by the author into a religious-symbolic, evangelical. The finale of the work is also noteworthy in this respect, when the mother, captured by the gendarmes, transforms the revolutionary confidence of her son ("We, workers will win") into the Gospel prophecy about the inevitable triumph of the truth of Christ: "A resurrected soul will not be killed."

The humanistic nature of Gorky's talent was also reflected in his portrayal of three types of revolutionaries who played an active role in the political life of Russia. The first of them is Pavel Vlasov. The novel shows in detail his evolution, the transformation of a simple working guy into a conscious revolutionary, the leader of the masses. Deep dedication to a common cause, courage and unbending will become the hallmarks of Paul's character and behavior. At the same time, Pavel Vlasov is stern and ascetic. He is convinced that "only reason will free a person."

In his behavior there is no harmony of thought and feeling, reason and emotions necessary for a true leader of the masses. Rybin, wise with a lot of life experience, explains to Pavel his failure in the “swamp penny” business in the following way: “You speak well, but not to your heart - that's it! It is necessary to throw a spark in the heart, in the very depths. "

Pavel's friend Andrei Nakhodka calls him an "iron man" for a reason. In many cases, the asceticism of Pavel Vlasov prevents him from revealing to his spiritual beauty and even thoughts, it is no coincidence that the mother feels her son “closed”. Let us remember how harshly he cut short on the eve of the demonstration to Nilovna, whose mother's heart feels the trouble hanging over her son: "When will there be mothers who will send their children to death with joy?" Paul's selfishness and arrogance are even more clearly seen in his sharp attack on mother's love. "There is love that prevents a person from living ..." His relationship with Sasha is also very ambiguous. Pavel loves a girl and is loved by her. NV his plans do not include marrying her, since family happiness, in his opinion, will interfere with his participation in the revolutionary struggle.

In the image of Pavel Vlasov, Gorky embodied the characteristics of the character and behavior of a rather large category of revolutionaries. These are strong-willed, purposeful people, completely devoted to their idea. But they lack a broad outlook on life, a combination of unbending adherence to principles with attention to people, harmony of thought and feeling.

Andrey Nakhodka is more flexible and richer in this respect. Natasha, kind and sweet Yegor Ivanovich. It is with them, and not with Pavel, that Nilovna feels more confident, safely opens her soul, knowing that these sensitive people will not offend her heartfelt impulses with a rude, careless word or deed. The third type of revolutionary is Nikolai Vesovshchikov. This is a revolutionary maximalist. “Having barely passed the basics of the revolutionary struggle, he demands weapons in order to immediately settle accounts with the“ class enemies ”. The answer given to Vyesovshchikov by Andrey Nakhodka is characteristic: "First, you see, you need to arm your head, and then your hands ..." centuries of proven moral commandments.

The image of Nikolai Vesovshchikov contains a great author's generalization and warning. The same Nakhodka tells Pavel about Vyesovshchikov: “When people like Nikolai feel their resentment and break out of patience - what will it be? The sky will be splattered with blood. And the earth in it, like soap, will foam ... ”Life has confirmed this forecast. When such people seized power in October 1917, they filled the earth and sky with Russian blood. The prophetic warnings of the Gospel of Maximus, as critic G. Mitin called the novel Mother, were, alas, not heard.

Since the beginning of the 1910s, Gorky's work has been developing, as before, in two main directions: exposing philistine philosophy and psychology as an inert, spiritually wretched force and affirming the inexhaustibility of the spiritual and creative forces of the people.

A broad, generalizing canvas of the life of district Russia is drawn by Gorky in stories"Okurov town" (1909) and "The Life of Matvey Kozhemyakin" (1911), where there are "humiliated and insulted", victims of petty bourgeois savagery (Sima Devushkin), where all sorts of militant hooligans, anarchists (Vavila Burmistrov), and there are its philosophers and lovers of truth, intelligent observers of life (Tiunov, Kozhemyakin), convinced that “our body is broken, and our soul is strong. Spiritually, we are all still teenagers, and there is no end to life ahead of us. Rus will rise, you just believe in it. "

7. A cycle of stories "Across Russia".

The writer expressed this faith in Russia, in the Russian people in a series of stories"Across Russia" (1912-1917). The author, he said, turned here to depicting the past in order to illuminate the paths to the future. The cycle is built in the travel genre. Together with the narrator - "passing" we, as it were, make a journey through the country. We see central Russia, the freedom of the southern steppes, Cossack villages, we are present at the spring awakening of nature, we sail along the leisurely rivers, admire the nature of the North Caucasus, we breathe the salty wind of the Caspian Sea. And everywhere we meet with a mass of diverse people. On extensive life material

Gorky shows how the gifted nature of the Russian person makes its way through the age-old strata of lack of culture, inertia and scarcity of existence.

The cycle opens with the story "The Birth of a Man", which tells about the birth of a child on the way to a casual companion of the author-storyteller. Its action takes place against the backdrop of the beautiful Caucasian nature. Thanks to this, the described event acquires a sublimely symbolic meaning under the pen of the writer: a new person was born, who, perhaps, is destined to live in a happier time. Hence, the words "passing" full of optimism, illuminating the appearance of a new man on earth: "Shumi, Oryol, be firm, brother, stronger ..." The very image of the child's mother, a young Oryol peasant woman, rises to the height of a symbol of motherhood. The story sets the tone for the whole cycle. “An excellent job is to be a man on earth,” - in these words of the narrator one can hear Gorky's optimistic faith in the triumph of the bright beginnings of life.

Many features of the Russian national character are embodied by the writer in the image of Osipe, the headman of the carpentry artel, from the story "The Icebreaker". Degree, somewhat melancholy, even lazy Osip, in moments of danger, is filled with energy, burns with youthful enthusiasm, becomes a true leader of the workers who risked crossing the ice to the other bank of the Volga during the flood that began. In the image of Osip, Gorky affirms the active, strong-willed principle of the Russian national character, expresses confidence in the creative forces of the people, which have not yet really begun to move.

The picture of folk life, and especially of the folk types depicted by Gorky, appears complex, sometimes contradictory, and variegated. In the complexity and diversity of the national character, the writer saw the originality of the Russian people, due to its history. In 1912, in a letter to the writer O. Runova, he noted: “The natural state of a person is variegation. The Russians are especially variegated, which makes them significantly different from other nations. " Showing the contradictory nature of the people's consciousness, resolutely opposing passivity, Gorky created an impressive gallery of types and characters.

Here is the story "Woman". For his heroine Tatiana, the search for personal happiness is combined with the search for happiness for all people, with the desire to see them kinder and more dear. “Look, you are approaching a person with goodness, your freedom, your strength is ready to give him, but he does not understand this, and - how to accuse him? Who showed him good things? " she muses.

People outraged the young prostitute Tanya from the story "Light gray with blue" and "consoled", as with alms, simple wisdom, "can you punish everyone who is to blame?" But they did not kill her kindness, a bright view of the world.

The telegraph operator Yudin, inclined to pessimism (the story "Book"), somewhere in the depths of his soul glimmered a longing for a better life and "tender compassion for people." Even in a lost person, such as the drunken haggard Mashka, the instinct of maternal love awakens a sense of kindness and self-sacrifice ("Passion-face").

A very important, if not fundamental, meaning for the entire book is the story, "The Light Man" - about the 19-year-old typesetter Sasha, passionately in love with life. "Eh, brother Maksimych, he confesses to the narrator, - my heart grows and grows endlessly, as if all of me is just one heart." This young man is drawn to books, to knowledge, trying to write poetry.

All stories of the cycle are united by the image of the author-narrator, who is not just an observer of events, but their participant. He deeply believes in the renewal of life, in the spiritual potential and creative powers of the Russian people.

A positive, life-affirming beginning in the work of Gorky of this period was embodied in "Tales of Italy" - twenty-seven romanticized artistic sketches about Italian life, which are preceded by the epigraph from Andersen: "There are no fairy tales better than those created by life itself", testifying to reality, but not at all about the fabulousness of what is described. In them the "little man" is poeticized - a man of a broad soul and an active creative deed, through whose labor reality is transformed. The author's view of such a “little great man” is expressed through the mouth of one of the builders of the Simplon Tunnel: “Oh, sir, a little man, when he wants to work, is an invincible force. And believe me: in the end this little man will do whatever he wants. "

In the last pre-revolutionary years, Gorky worked hard on autobiographical stories Childhood (1913-1914) and In People (1916). In 1923, he completed these memoirs with the book My Universities.

Starting from the richest traditions of Russian autobiographical prose, Gorky supplemented this genre with the depiction of the simplicity of a man from the people, showing the process of his spiritual formation. There are many gloomy scenes and pictures in the works. But the writer is not limited to portraying only the "leaden abominations of life." He shows how through "a layer of all bestial rubbish ... a bright, healthy and creative one grows triumphantly ..., arousing an unshakable hope for our revival to a bright, human life."

This conviction, meetings with numerous people strengthen the strength and shape the character of Alyosha Peshkov, his active attitude to the surrounding reality. At the end of the story "In People" a meaningful image of "half-asleep land" appears, which Alyosha passionately wants to wake up, to give "a kick to her and to himself," so that everything "turns into a joyful whirlwind, a festive dance of people in love with each other, into this life, started for the sake of another life - beautiful, cheerful, honest ... "

8. Gorky's attitude to the revolution.

Gorky's attitude to the events of the February and especially the October revolutions was complex. Unreservedly condemning the old system, Gorky associated with the revolution hopes for genuine social and spiritual emancipation of the individual, for the construction of a new culture. However, all this turned out to be an illusion, which prompted him to come up with a series of protesters and warning articles, which he called "Untimely Thoughts." They were published by Gorky from April 1917 to June 1918 in the newspaper Novaya Zhizn published by him. They reflected both Gorky's love for Russia and pain for her. And the writer himself appears here as a tragic figure.

These sentiments especially intensified in Gorky after the victory of the October Revolution, because, as L. Spiridonova rightly writes, the author of a thorough and deep monograph about Gorky based on the richest archival documents, the writer was “for democracy, but against extreme forms of manifestation of the dictatorship of the proletariat, for socialism as an idea, but against the violent measures of its implementation, coupled with the violation of human rights and freedom of conscience. "

The outburst of the Red Terror, the indifference of the revolutionary authorities to the fate of people evoked in Gorky a desperate protest against murders, arrests, lynching, pogroms and robberies, against the very idea that hundreds of thousands of people could be exterminated for the triumph of justice. “The great happiness of freedom should not be overshadowed by crimes against the individual, otherwise we will kill freedom with our own hands,” the writer warned.

With indignation, he wrote that "class hatred swept over the mind, and conscience died." Gorky watched with alarm how people who were far from the true ideals of freedom, happiness and justice, who had clinging to the revolution, crawl out and gain power on the surface of Russian life. The writer defends the people from this kind of "shameless adventurers" - the interbolsheviks, who, in his opinion, regard Russia as an experimental field, "material for social experiments." One of them - G. Zinoviev - Gorky portrayed in the play "Worker Slovotekov".

Gorky was the first to ring the bells, seeing the beginning of the plunder of national cultural values ​​and their sale abroad. He opposed the call to "Rob the loot", because it led to the impoverishment of the country's economic and cultural treasures. Gorky protested especially fiercely against the disdainful attitude towards figures of science and culture, towards the Russian intelligentsia, the "brain of the nation", seeing in all this a threat to culture and civilization.

The consequences of such a position were not slow to show. By order of Zinoviev, a search was carried out in the writer's apartment, articles began to appear in the newspapers Pravda and Petrogradskaya Pravda accusing Gorky of the fact that the newspaper he published was "sold to the imperialists, landowners and bankers."

In response to this, Gorky wrote on June 3, 1918 in Novaya Zhizn: "Nothing else could have been expected from a government that is afraid of light and glasnost, cowardly and anti-democratic, trampling on elementary civil rights, persecuting workers, sending punitive expeditions to the peasants." ... A month after this publication, the newspaper "New Life" was closed.

9. Gorky in exile.

At the insistent proposal of Lenin, Gorky left his homeland in October 1921. The first three years of forced emigration, he lives in Berlin, then - in Sorrento.

Abroad, Gorky, as if making up for lost time, begins to write eagerly and feverishly. He creates the story “My Universities”, a cycle of autobiographical stories, several memoir essays, the novel “The Artamonovs Case”, begins work on the epic “The Life of Klim Samgin” - a monumental artistic study of the spiritual life of Russia at the turn of the century, where the writer depicts “ the story of an empty soul ”,“ an intellectual of average value ”Klim Samgin, who, with his twilight consciousness, a type of a split soul, echoes the“ underground ”characters of Dostoevsky.

10. Return of Gorky to the USSR

In 1928, the writer returned to his homeland. He returned with a firm conviction to take an active part in the construction of a new life, as it seemed to him, which was returning to normal after the revolutionary cataclysms of life. It was this, and not material considerations, as some modern publicists try to assure us, that his return was dictated. One of the proofs of this is the memoirs of F. Chaliapin: “Gorky sympathized with me, he said:“ Here, brother, you don't belong. ” When this time in 1928 we met in Rome ... he told me sternly: "And now, Fyodor, you have to go to Russia ...".

However, despite the obvious sympathy for Gorky of Stalin and his inner circle, despite the intense literary, organizational and creative activity of the writer, life was not easy for him in the 30s. Ryabushinsky's mansion on M. Nikitskaya, where the writer was settled with a whole staff of attendants, rather looked like a prison: a high fence, security. Since 1933, the head of the NKVD G. Yagoda, who introduced his agent P. Kryuchkov to Gorky as his secretary, was invisibly present here.

All correspondence of the writer was carefully examined, suspicious letters were confiscated, Yagoda followed his every step. “I am very tired ... How many times I wanted to visit the village, even to live as in the old days ... I do not succeed. As if surrounded by a fence - do not step over, ”- he complains to his close friend I. Shkapa.

In May 1934, the writer's son, Maxim, a great athlete and a promising physicist, suddenly dies. There is evidence that Yagoda poisoned him. Several months later, on December 1, the murder of S.M. Kirov, whom Gorky knew very well and deeply respected, was committed. The "ninth wave" of repression that began in the country literally shook Gorky.

Rolland, who visited Moscow in 1935, after a meeting with Gorky, keenly noticed that Gorky's “secret places of consciousness” were “full of pain and pessimism” 12. French journalist Pierre Herbar, who worked in Moscow in 1935-1936 as editor of the magazine La literature internationale, writes in his memoirs, published in Paris in 1980, that Gorky "bombarded Stalin with violent protests" and that "his patience was exhausted." There is evidence that Gorky wanted to tell the intelligentsia of Western Europe about everything, to draw their attention to the Russian tragedy. He urges his French friends and colleagues L. Aragon and A. Gide to come to Moscow. They came. But the writer could no longer meet with them: on June 1, 1936, he fell ill with the flu, which then turned into pneumonia.

11. Illness and death of Gorky.

From June 6, the central press begins to publish daily official bulletins on the state of his health.

On June 8, Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov visit the writer. This visit was tantamount to the last goodbye. Two days before his death, the writer felt some relief. There was a deceptive hope that this time, too, his body would cope with the disease. Gorky said to the doctors who had gathered for the next consultation: "Apparently, I will jump out." This, alas, did not happen. On June 18, 1936, at 11:10 am, Gorky died. His last words were: "The end of the novel - the end of the hero - the end of the author."

According to the official version of those years, Gorky was deliberately killed by his attending physicians L. Levin and D. Pletnev, who were repressed for this. Later, materials were published that refuted the violent death of the writer. Recently, controversy has flared up again about whether Gorky was killed or died as a result of an illness. And if killed, then by whom and how. A special chapter of the already mentioned monograph by Spiridonova, as well as V. Baranov's book "Bitter, without makeup", is devoted to a detailed consideration of this issue.

It is unlikely that we will fully learn the secret of Gorky's death: the history of his illness was destroyed. One thing is certain: Gorky hindered the deployment of mass terror against the creative intelligentsia. With his death, this obstacle was removed. R. Rolland wrote in his diary: “The terror in the USSR began not with the murder of Kirov, but with the death of Gorky,” and explained: “... The mere presence of his blue eyes served as a bridle and protection. Eyes closed. "

The tragedy of Gorky in the last years of his life is further evidence that he was neither a court writer nor a thoughtless apologist for socialist realism. The creative path of M. Gorky was different - filled with the eternal dream of the happiness and beauty of human life and soul. This path is the main one for Russian classical literature.

4 / 5. 1

(1868–1936) By the beginning of the century, Gorky possessed knowledge in many areas of culture, showed great erudition. The idea that Gorky was primarily a publicist and not an artist was taken up in the 1980s and 1990s by contemporary criticism, which “in the bustle of changing ideas” was losing the objectivity of its assessments. others - "a talented nugget from the people", for the third - a "stormy petrel of the revolution." After the publication of the novel "Mother" Symbolist criticism announced the final fall of Gorky's talent, his "end" as an artist. In the 1930s, Gorky - the founder of the literature of socialist realism. First literary experiences Maxim Gorky(Alexey Maksimovich Peshkov) belong to the 80s. Peshkov's first acquaintance with the Narodniks and Marxists dates back to this time. The name of the writer appears in print in 1892 - his story was published in the Tiflis newspaper Kavkaz "Makar Chudra". Around the work of Gorky, the struggle of various ideological and artistic trends flared up. In 1889, Gorky brought Korolenko the poem “ Song of the Old Oak". The poem was unsuccessful, weak. After Korolenko's criticism, Gorky destroyed it, but a line remained in his memory that expressed the main idea of ​​the poem: "I came into the world to disagree." The pathos of "disagreement", "denial" will permeate his work of the 90s. H The initiating writer called for active "disagreement" with existing reality. In the early period of his work, Gorky wrote several works in which the traditions of the revolutionary-democratic satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin are even tangible. ("Conversation to the Soul", 1893; "Wise Radish"; stories about the "masters of life"). Denouncing the "leaden abominations" of life, the artist opposed them with his ideal of moral and social relations between people. In the mind of a young writer literature should be a "scourge" and a "noble bell" calling for action. The pathos of protest and the desire to awaken in the reader an active attitude to life, to influence his social psychology were expressed primarily in the heroic and romantic works of Gorky, built on a legendary and fantastic plot basis. This was clearly expressed in the legends about Danko and Larra included in the story "Old Isergil" (1895). The Legend of Larra directed against the pseudo-heroics of individualism, which was poeticized by the Symbolists, the legend of Danko Gorky's belief in the ability of the human spirit to create the beauty of the world determined the social and moral optimism of his works. In the early work of Gorky, the writer's thought about the hero of life was not yet based on the prevailing worldview and was full of many contradictions. Later, when he finally freed himself from the influence of populist ideology and began to reflect on the ideals of socialism as a social and moral doctrine close to him, he would already refute Nietzsche. dedicated to the peasant theme. The Russian village of the end of the century as depicted by Gorky is full of internal contradictions. Gorky destroys the Narodniks' illusions about the harmony of the village "peace" ("Conclusion", 1895; "Shabry", 1896). The pictures of village life in these works resemble the sketches of rural life in the works of the writers of the sixties. But the pathos of Gorky's stories was different. Gorky wrote primarily about the spiritual health of the Russian peasant, about his social and moral quests, still hidden, but real creative forces. The story “ Kirilka "( 1899). Gorky talks about the awakening of the public consciousness of the Russian peasant, predicting the inevitability of an explosion of contradictions in Russian life. Gorky's heroes are not of average dignity, but outstanding natures, they are united by the rarest qualities of character, unusual actions. Gorky seeks to put his heroes in extremely acute situations, to show a person at the turning points of his fate, self-determination in difficult turns of life. Gorky's landscape usually had a generalizing meaning, a philosophical content. The landscape symbolism expressed the author's premonitions of a social storm, a public explosion. Such is the scene of an impending thunderstorm in "Former People" (1897), pictures of the storm in "Song of the Petrel" (1901), thunderstorms in "Chelkash" (1895). In stories "For their sake" « Bell "," Obsession ", Gorky painted a gallery of entrepreneurs - from small first accumulators to the latest type of bourgeois. In these stories, for the first time in the writer's work, the theme of generations also appears: the very successes of the "masters of the modern situation" push them to death: the more they "triumph", the sooner it will come. Gorky tried to show Russian life in its historical movement ... ("Foma Gordeev", 1899; " Three", 1900) and drama (" Bourgeois ", 1901; " At the bottom", 1902; " Summer residents ", 1904). In the novel "Foma Gordeev", published in 1899 in the magazine "Life", a theme was set that would sound in full force in the work of Gorky in subsequent years - the internal decomposition of the bourgeois class, the historical doom of the existing world order ... "Foma Gordeev" became the first novel by the writer about the fate of generations. Gorky himself defined the work on the novel as "a transition to a new form of literary life." In the novel, a string of first accumulators passes before the reader, who have become "masters of life." But it was not these people who were brought to the fore, but the bourgeois of the new formation who inherited the money of their fathers and adopted new methods of handling capital. The central hero of this circle is Yakov Mayakin - the "ideologist" and the leader of the new merchant class, not only interested in the fate of the Altyn put into circulation, but also striving for power and social influence. He glorifies bourgeois progress, the merchant class, which he regards as the only life-giving force in Russian economic and cultural life. Therefore, Mayakin demands a living "space" for the merchants, a share in governing the country. Gorky wrote that he gave Mayakin the features of Nietzscheism. As for the attitude of the writer himself to the hero, here Gorky's polemic with the philosophy of Nietzsche is already heard, which the writer considered the philosophy of "masters", justifying their power over people. The tragedy of Thomas is that he cannot oppose anything to the immoral power of this world. He revolts, but his revolt is doomed, it is the revolt of a weak loner. In the early 1900s, Gorky turned to drama, seeing in the theater a platform from which he could directly address the mass democratic reader. The first work of Gorky the playwright was the play "Bourgeois" ( Scenes in the Bessemenovs 'House) (1901) The main conflict of Gorky's play is the clash of the bourgeois-proprietors' world with the opposing Nile camp, bourgeois ideology and ethics with new views of the world and man, emerging among the progressive democratic intelligentsia. The play is based on ideological disputes, clashes of various ideological platforms. At one pole - the Nile and Fields, democratically minded intellectuals are drawn to them, on the other - the Bessemenovs (both of the older and younger generations). The play "Bourgeois" is usually compared with "Three Sisters". The theme of philistinism and tense anticipation of the future is at the center of both plays. But if in Chekhov's play philistinism sets in, then in Gorky's play a different situation develops: a new force is actively advancing on the whole way of life - new people whose dream of the future is already based on real foundations in the present. The main conflict "Bourgeois" is clearly expressed in the ideological struggle. Gorky's second play "At the bottom", written during the winter and summer of 1902, brought him worldwide fame. She was the writer's response to the most pressing social, philosophical and moral problems of the time. Ideological topicality immediately attracted the attention of the Russian public to the play. A sharp struggle between various ideological currents unfolded around it. Critics of the reactionary monarchist trend saw in it a revolutionary preaching that undermined social foundations. Liberal criticism presented the writer as a preacher of Christian morality. The populist critics questioned the realistic content of Gorky's work, and his humanism was regarded as a proud contempt for the little man. The history of the struggle around the play emphasized its ideological relevance. Thematically, the play completed the cycle of Gorky's works about "tramps." It reflects the actual facts and events of our time. In this sense, it was a sentence to the social order, which threw many people endowed with intelligence, feeling, talent, to the "bottom" of life, led them to a tragic death. Gorky argued that a society that distorted the human in man cannot exist. The characters of the play - Actor, Ashes, Nastya, Natasha, Tick - strive to break free from the "bottom" of life, but feel their own powerlessness in front of this "prison". They have a feeling of the hopelessness of their fate and a craving for a dream, an illusion that gives at least some hope for the future. When the illusory hopes become apparent, these people die. The loss of hope caused the death of his soul, said Gorky about the fate of the Actor. Works hard, passionately wants to return to work life Tick. Luke appears as the bearer of the idea of ​​consoling deception in the play. The principle of his relationship to a person is the idea of ​​compassion. Throughout the play, Gorky shows the inhumanity of passive compassionate humanism. Subjectively, Luke, the bearer of the idea of ​​such humanism, is honest, arouses sympathy even for the gloomy Tick; he wants to help people by instilling in them, albeit an illusory, hope for the future. For Luke, a person is weak and insignificant in front of the circumstances of life, which, in his opinion, cannot be changed. And if so, it is necessary to reconcile a person with life, instilling a comforting "truth" convenient for him. And there are as many such truths as there are those who are eager to find it: the truth and truth of life become relative concepts. And it turns out that even in this world, where compassion would be the natural expression of a humane attitude towards a person, a comforting lie leads to a tragic outcome. And it comes in the fourth act of the play. Illusions dissipated. The Actor dies, Nastya rushes about. The shelter is a picture of complete destruction. The so-called "Heroless" composition drama. If in the play "At the Bottom" Gorky summed up the theme of the "tramp" in his work, then in other plays a new stage was marked in the development of the theme of the intelligentsia. Gorky writes plays "Summer Residents" (1904), "Children of the Sun" (1905), "Barbarians" (1905). The central problem of the plays is the intelligentsia and the people, the intelligentsia and the revolution. The cycle of these plays was opened “ Summer residents". Gorky himself defined the main theme of the play in a letter to the director : “I wanted to portray that part of the Russian intelligentsia that came out of the democratic strata and, having reached a certain height of social position, lost touch with the people - her relatives by blood, forgot about their interests and the need to expand life for him ...”. In this Gorky judgment, the meaning of the images of Ryumin and Kaleria is revealed. These intellectuals, posing as antipodes of the bourgeoisie, are actually people of the same life and ideological direction, the product of the same environment as the Basovs, Suslovs, who, without hiding their credo, declare the "right to rest" after the unrest of the social movement. All these people have fenced off from life and its demands. Gorky tears off the mask of spiritual sophistication and complexity from the bourgeoisie. Here again the writer's thought about decadence as a spiritual mask of the bourgeois resounds. Renegade intellectuals, "summer residents", Gorky opposes the democratic intelligentsia. This is the doctor Marya Lvovna, Vlas, Sonya. Marya Lvovna's monologue about the appointment of the intelligentsia in modern Russian life, as Gorky himself pointed out, was the "key" to the play. “We must all be different, gentlemen! Children of laundresses, cooks, Children of healthy working people - we must be different! After all, there have never been educated people in our country connected with the mass of the people by blood kinship ... This blood relationship should nourish us with an ardent desire to expand, rebuild, illuminate the life of our people who are just working all their days, suffocating in the darkness and dirt ... They sent us ahead of themselves to find a way for them to a better life. ""Summer Residents" is Gorky's most "Chekhovian" play. But the play's conflict acquired a socio-ideological character in Gorky. The problem of relations between the intelligentsia and the people, the intelligentsia and the revolution became the leading one in another play by Gorky of this cycle - "Children of the Sun". The stratum of the Russian intelligentsia is depicted - these are people of science and art, sincerely devoted to their work and sincerely mistaken in social issues of life. Therefore, the theme of the intelligentsia sounds in this play in a different way. The central character of the play, Protasov, a scientist, dreams of the victory of man over death, he is full of faith in man, in the possibility of his creative thought and is on the verge of some great scientific discovery. Protasov's monologue about Man directly echoes the thoughts expressed by Gorky in the poem "Human". In the summer of 1905, Gorky wrote the third play of this cycle - "Barbarians", in which the playwright, using new material, developed a theme outlined in "Foma Gordeev" - the theme of the contradictions between bourgeois progress and civilization. Gorky contrasted the existing social world order, its ideology and ethics in the play " Enemies " and the novel "Mother", a world of new human relations, new people with a new social psychology, emerging in the revolutionary struggle. The idea of ​​writing a play about the labor movement arose in Gorky in the early 1900s, but the idea was realized only after 1905. –Real revolutionary events in Russia in the 1900s. This is a plot of a new type, it is determined by the clash of classes, political trends. "Enemies" - the first work in Russian drama, which shows an open political clash of social camps, political views, moral concepts. The play, as it were, summed up the creative searches of Gorky the playwright and marked a new stage in the development of his dramatic style. Earlier in the dramas of Gorky, conflicts were expressed primarily in the clash of ideological views and philosophical concepts. This also determined the type of their plot movement. The ideological and ethical ideals of the heroes collided with reality and were tested by it. In Enemies, the basis of all conflicts is the unfolding political struggle. Socio-political circumstances test everything: both political and ethical views, and a person's attitude to art.