Romanticism in Russian poetry of the early 19th century. Russian romanticism in literature, painting, theatrical art. Main features and principles
The first half of the nineteenth century can rightfully be called the "era of romanticism." As a literary trend, as a method of depicting a person and reality, romanticism was formed at the beginning of the century, but it occupies a leading place in the period that followed the events of 1812 and which is commonly called the "twenties". From that time on, for a long time period (until the 1840s), it was Romanticism that would determine the general character of Russian culture (and literature, in particular).
What contributed to this? First of all, let us dwell on the historical prerequisites for the emergence of Russian romanticism, because it is historical events, the features of a particular era form in the public mind those moods, feelings and ideas that are inevitably reflected in various literary trends and methods.
The mood that prevailed in Russian society in the 1820s, what can be called the "spirit of the era", was largely determined by the victorious conclusion of the war with Napoleonic France.
"Meanwhile, the war with glory was over. Our regiments were returning from abroad. ... The officers, who went on a campaign almost as youths, returned, having matured in the quarrelsome air, hung with crosses. The soldiers were talking merrily among themselves, interfering every minute with German and French words. Unforgettable time! Time of glory and delight! How strongly the Russian heart beat at the word fatherland !"
These lines from Pushkin's story "The Snowstorm" (1830) can be considered the most complete and expressive socio-historical characterization of the twenties of the nineteenth century. The Patriotic War of 1812, the foreign campaigns of 1813-1815, the triumphal capture of Paris, the "Battle of the Nations" at Waterloo - all these historical events gave many examples of amazing courage and fortitude, striking military feats and extraordinary manifestations of mercy, rapid ups and tragic falls of human beings. fate. Russian commanders - generals P. I. Bagration, N. N. Raevsky, Ya. P. Kulnev, A. P. Yermolov and others - showed amazing valor and in the eyes of their contemporaries were legendary personalities, titans.
It is not surprising that in the public consciousness it has grown stronger and occupied one of the leading places confidence in the extraordinary abilities of a person, the ability to radically change their fate and the fate of the whole world. A prominent role in the formation of this truly romantic idea was played by such historical figure like Napoleon Bonaparte. It is impossible to overestimate the importance of his nature and fate in the history of world romantic culture. Napoleon seemed to serve as the most convincing confirmation of the favorite idea of romanticism - the idea of an exceptional person. A poor Corsican lieutenant becomes a general of the French army, then a consul, emperor of France, almost reaches world domination: at the beginning of the nineteenth century, centuries-old monarchies are overthrown by the will of Napoleon, he authoritatively "redraws" the map of Europe, destroying old states and creating new ones, his troops fight in Africa. And all this is achieved thanks to the personal qualities of Bonaparte: his exceptional courage, intelligence, energy, willpower, and finally, inhuman cruelty and selfishness.
When the emperor visited the plague barracks in Jaffa, where veterans of his army were dying of an incurable disease, contemporaries believed in Bonaparte's victory over death itself, and this act full of courage and mercy was sung by historians, painters, and poets, including A. S. Pushkin, who wrote the poem "Hero" in 1830. For many years, the personality and fate of Napoleon Bonaparte will inspire several generations of romantic writers.
Another idol of the Romantic generation of the 1820s was J. G. Byron.. Not only the work of the great English romantic poet, but also his personality had a strong impact on the mental warehouse, worldview, and actions of people of that time. Byron's early manifestation of exceptional poetic talent, his disregard for noble origins and literary authorities, independent behavior and demonstrative disillusionment (which became the fashion for European youth in the first third of the century), his exotic journey through the countries of the East, "rebellious" speeches in the House of Lords, separation from his homeland, pursuing the poet, wandering around European countries, friendship with the Carbonari (leaders of the Italian national liberation movement), finally, death in the Greek city of Missolungi, where Byron came to participate in liberation war against the Turkish yoke - all this made Byron see the same exceptional, extraordinary personality as Napoleon.
Another socio-historical prerequisite for the formation of Russian romanticism was the nature of the reign of Alexander I in the 20s of the nineteenth century. The young emperor, who came to power in 1801, promised and even began to carry out certain social reforms: a commission led by M. M. Speransky worked on a draft constitution, an imperial decree on "free tillers" was issued, censorship was weakened, various social circles were not prosecuted by law, and associations. But now, after the end of the war with Napoleon, "the wonderful beginning of the days of Alexander" has been replaced by a clear turn towards reaction. Work on the creation of the Russian constitution stopped, many ministries headed statesmen, adhering to conservative views, censorship increased, manifestations of "freethinking" were persecuted in literature, and in social activities, and in education. The Russian peasantry, the victorious people, not only did not receive the desired liberation from serfdom, but also learned an even more terrible form of enslavement - military settlements, where the peasant farmer also "pulled the soldier's strap." All this could not but arouse in the public consciousness feelings of dissatisfaction with the existing order of things, with reality itself, which is also one of the leading ideas of romanticism. Thus, the socio-historical situation of the 1820s prepared the development and dominant role in the Russian culture of romanticism.
It is also necessary to identify the historical and cultural prerequisites for the emergence and development of Russian romanticism. On the one hand, an undoubted and beneficial influence on the ideology and poetics of the romantic direction had the achievements of classicism and sentimentalism, which were the leading trends in Russian literature of the previous era - in the 18th century. On the other hand, after the victorious foreign campaigns of the Russian army, during the period of active foreign policy life of the state Russian society and its culture were open to the influence of Western European romanticism, which by that time had already become the leading trend in the culture of Germany and England, France and Italy. All variety romantic creativity foreign writers became accessible and delighted the Russian public: readers "reveled" in the play of fantasy in the stories of the German prose writer E.T.A. etc.), the rebellious power and spicy exoticism of Byron's poems, the deep philosophical reflections of the French writers Lamartine and Chateaubriand. Russian literature sensitively accepted all the discoveries of the Western European masters of the artistic word, and Russian romanticism, which became the leading literary trend in the first third of the nineteenth century, in terms of its artistic perfection, diversity and complexity literary phenomena included in it, is not inferior to the top examples of world literature.
Like any literary movement, Russian romanticism included a complex set of ideas. Let's dwell on the most significant of them.
1. The cult of an extraordinary personality was most clearly manifested in the romantic work. A romantic hero is always an extraordinary, bright, exceptional nature. This applies both to the characters of ballads and poems, stories and novels, and to the lyrical hero of romantic poetry. The immensity of the inner world, the strength of passions, the power of personality, amazing talents - romantic writers generously endowed their heroes with such properties. Exceptional, fully romantic personalities are Voinarovsky, main character poems by K. F. Ryleev, who gave all his strength, thoughts, his life for the freedom of his native Ukraine; and the heroes of Gogol's story "Taras Bulba", where old Taras and his eldest son Ostap appear as the embodiment of daring and courage, and the youngest son Andriy - the all-conquering power of love that forced him to abandon his Fatherland, family, comrades, love, which the young Cossack and on the verge of death; and freedom-loving Mtsyri, whose strength of soul was sung by M. Yu. Lermontov in the poem of the same name. A truly cosmic immensity of the inner world is distinguished by the lyrical hero of Lermontov's poetry, who hears how "a star speaks with a star" and asserts:
In my soul, like in the ocean,
The hopes of the broken cargo lies.
("No, I'm not Byron..." 1832)
At the same time, it should be noted that the romantic hero is not necessarily the focus of extraordinary virtues. Not positivity, but exclusivity, first of all, attracted romantic writers, so they could make the main character, or even sing in their works, both a selfish jealous man (the poem "Gypsies"), and murderous criminals (another Pushkin's poem - "The Brothers-Robbers "), and cruel sorcerers (Gogol's stories "The Evening on the Eve of Ivan Kupala" and "Terrible Revenge"), and even the spirit of evil itself (Lermontov's poem "The Demon"). Of course, in most of these works, as in many other works of Russian romanticism, the terrible and evil that is in the souls of such characters is condemned. But it is impossible not to notice that these extraordinary villains attract the attention of romantic writers much more often than positive, but ordinary natures. Only when Russian literature manages to overcome this cult of an exceptional personality, depicts the life of an ordinary person with sympathy and understanding, will there be a change in literary trends, and realism will take the leading place.
2. No less significant in the ideology of Russian romanticism was the feeling of dissatisfaction with the surrounding reality. It was it that was the "driving spring"romantic worldview, did not allow one to plunge into peace of mind, detachment and numbness. That is why there can be no "passive" or "conservative" romanticism in principle, this is a literary trend, which is based on the desire to "push off" from the reality that does not satisfy the romantic, and consequently an impulse to move.This discontent could be expressed in romantic literature in a variety of forms:
in direct statements of the narrator in stories and poems or the lyrical hero of the poem -
And life, as you look around with cold attention,
Such a funny and stupid joke.
(M. Yu. Lermontov "Both boring and sad..." 1840);
character's mouth
I lived little and lived in captivity,
Such two lives in one
But only full of anxiety
I would change if I could.
(M. Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri" 1839);
in the actions and lifestyle of the hero, clearly directed against the existing order of things -
We lived in grief, among worries,
We are tired of this share,
And agreed among themselves
We have a lot to test a different one:
We took as comrades
Damascus knife and dark night;
Forgotten shyness and sadness
And the conscience was driven away.
(A. S. Pushkin "Brothers-robbers" 1822);
in the tragic plot twists caused by the injustice and imperfection of the surrounding reality, vengeful fate, the evil will of higher powers -
The timid rider does not jump, he flies;
The baby yearns, the baby cries;
The rider drives, the rider rode ...
In his arms was a dead baby.
(V. A. Zhukovsky "Forest King" 1818);
finally, in that feeling of "light sadness", which, like a haze, envelops the most "peaceful" in mood romantic descriptions:
The moon's flawed face rises from behind the hills...
O quiet skies of thoughtful luminaries,
How your brilliance fluctuates in the twilight of the forests!
How pale you gilded the shore!
I sit thinking in the soul of my dreams;
By the past times I fly with memories ...
About my spring days, how quickly you disappeared,
With your bliss and suffering!
(V. A. Zhukovsky "Evening" 1806).
There was another, more "hidden" form of discontent, when it manifested itself not so much in condemning the surrounding reality, but in an enthusiastic description of something distant, unattainable. Thus, the glorious historical past of Ukraine, sung in "Taras Bulba" by N. V. Gogol, set off the hopelessness of the contemporary writer's existence, in which the ridiculous litigation of two landowners, heroes of "The Tale of how Ivan Ivanovich quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich" endlessly lasts.
3. An essential role in the complex of leading ideas of romanticism was played by romantic duality. In the works of romantic writers, the real, in many ways imperfect, reality was opposed to the ideal world, the center of all the best. The opposition of the real and ideal worlds determines the main conflict of the romantic work. The options for depicting the ideal world in the works of writers belonging to the romantic movement are extremely diverse, but one can still dwell on the most common ones.
Quite a lot of writers (and among them those whom we call Decembrist writers) found their own perfect world in the past. Most often for the poets K. F. Ryleev and V. K. Kyuchelbeker, for the author of romantic stories A. A. Bestuzhev, ancient Novgorod was such an ideal. In their image, the ancient Russian city looked like a perfect state formation, the embodiment of true democracy, since all the most important issues in it were decided by the city Veche, expressing "the opinion of the people." The same degree of idealization distinguished the images of Russian historical figures. In an effort to give his contemporaries an example to follow, Ryleev in his "Dumas" creates a whole gallery of exceptional heroes, reminding readers of the people who made up the glory of Russia. But Ryleyevsky Ivan Susanin, Princess Olga, Volynsky, Peter 1 embody not so much historical truth how much the poet-citizen's dream of an ideal ruler or a true patriot.
"Glorious death for the people!
Singers, hero in retribution,
From age to age, from generation to generation
They will pass on his work.
Enmity to untruth will boil
Indomitable in descendants,
And sacred Rus' will see
Injustice in the wreckage."
So, sitting in a fortress, in chains,
Volynsky thought rightly
Pure in heart and right in deeds,
He carried his lot proudly.
(K. F. Ryleev "Volynsky" 1822)
This is how the supporters of civil romanticism saw the past of Russia, opposing this perfect image modern bleak reality.
The search for an ideal world was also carried out in another direction, the writers turned to the image of the "natural environment". These could be peoples not spoiled by civilization: proud mountaineers, free gypsies. So, in Lermontov's poem "Mtsyri" such an ideal way of life of the mountaineers was created, and the hero strives with all his heart
In that wonderful world of worries and battles,
Where rocks hide in the clouds
Where people are free as eagles.
(M. Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri" 1839)
The concept of "natural environment" no less often applied to nature. She could act as an ideal world where the tormented soul calms down and happiness is found.
It used to be everything - and the sun behind the mountain,
And the smell of lindens, and the slightly noisy waves,
And the rustle of cornfields, streamed by the breeze,
And the dark forest, bent over the stream,
And the shepherd in the valley has a simple song,
Dissolving the whole soul with joy,
It merged with a charming dream;
All life distance was before you...
(V. A. Zhukovsky "Turgenev ..." 1813)
Such an understanding of nature permeates the best landscape sketches of the literature of Russian romanticism: a lyrical digression about the Ukrainian night in the story "May Night or the Drowned Woman" and a description of the Zaporizhzhya steppes in the story "Taras Bulba", created by Gogol; views of the Caucasus Mountains in the romantic poems of Pushkin and Lermontov; pictures of a quiet evening or a mysterious night in Zhukovsky's elegies.
Part of the Russian romantics, and above all, Zhukovsky, associated their understanding of the ideal world with otherworldly reality, the unknown "tam". If earthly life most often brought suffering to the lyrical hero or characters of ballads, then beyond the coffin, in the "heavenly country" the separated met, virtue was rewarded, lovers united.
This coffin is a door closed to happiness;
It will open ... I wait and hope!
A companion awaits me behind him,
Appeared to me for a moment in my life.
(V. A. Zhukovsky "Theon and Eschines" 1814)
But wherever romantic writers searched for their ideal world, reality was inevitably opposed to any of the chosen options.
4. Another essential idea of Russian romanticism was the belief in the independence of the hero's inner world from the environment. A romantic personality is never influenced by the reality that contrasts with it, the exceptional abilities, the strength of the hero's feelings, his convictions and attitude remain unchanged until the end of the story. It is impossible to imagine a romantic character who cheated on himself. So, Lermontov's Mtsyri, whom fate itself returned to the walls of the monastery, continues to dream of freedom until the last moment of his life. Fortitude and courage - these are the distinguishing properties of Ostap, the hero of Gogol's story "Taras Bulba", and they invariably accompany the character both in his student youth, and in battles with the Poles, and in captivity, and on the chopping block. The formidable lord Ordal can send Arminius into exile, separating the poor singer from the princess Minvana, but their love is stronger than social inequality, and human opinion, and time, and distance, and even death itself (Zhukovsky's ballad "Aeolian harp"). The hero of Pushkin's poem Aleko, having voluntarily joined a free tribe of gypsies, cannot accept their philosophy of life, their understanding of freedom, and therefore is doomed to the eternal loneliness of an egoist:
Leave us, proud man!
You weren't born for the wild
You only want freedom for yourself...
(A. S. Pushkin "Gypsies", 1824)
In this immutability of the hero's inner world there was also an unconditional artistic weakness of the romantic method, which does not take into account and does not show the influence of the environment on the personality; but also its amazing beneficent power, since it was the literature of romanticism, like no other, that called on a person to believe in his own strength, to resist the destructive influence of life circumstances. It is no coincidence that the romantic direction comes to the fore in the most difficult historical eras.
This set of ideas should have been fit certain traits of poetics. We note the most significant of them.
1. Great importance had the principles by which the image of a romantic hero was carried out. First of all, it is necessary to designate the canons, the obligatory details of a romantic portrait. He had to very clearly indicate the originality of nature, the richness of the inner world of the character. Romantic writers certainly emphasized such features of appearance as "burning" ("flaming", "sparkling", etc.) eyes, a high forehead, marble-white skin, free curly curls, a mouth twisted in a sad smile.
Such, typically romantic, is the description of the appearance of Andriy, the hero of Gogol's story "Taras Bulba": "... his eye sparkled with clear firmness, a velvet eyebrow arched in a bold arch, tanned cheeks shone with all the brightness of virgin fire, and, like silk, a young black moustache".
The canonical details of a romantic portrait can be found in a wide variety of works of the 1st third of the 19th century: "... and nothing changed on his high forehead" (A. S. Pushkin "Prisoner of the Caucasus"), "... a flame suddenly flashed in his eyes" (K. F. Ryleev "Voynarovsky"), "... a crown of rainbow rays did not decorate his curls" (M. Yu. Lermontov "Demon").
It is noteworthy that in describing the costume of a romantic character, writers most often adhered to one of two polar options. In the first case, the hero "dressed" in a black cloak (camisole, caftan, frock coat, etc.), which was supposed to serve as a contrasting background for the marble brow and fiery gaze. At the same time, there was no detailed description of the costume - nothing should have distracted from the face, overshadowed by the seal of exclusivity.
And he sees: he runs up to a deer
With a long rifle in hand
Wrapped in black doha
And in a long-haired chebak,
The hunter is agile and agile...
(K. F. Ryleev. "Voynarovsky", 1825)
In the second case, on the contrary, the description of the character's clothes is striking in its richness of colors and detailed detailing, but this is due to the national or historical character of this costume. As in the first case, the main purpose of such a description was to emphasize the originality of the romantic personality, which was carried out when the character was "immersed" in a historical or exotic-national context. In general, ethnographicism, an interest in the cultural and everyday identity of a particular nationality was characteristic of the ideology of romanticism. Romantics sought to fulfill their eternal search for the "folk spirit" by turning to the folklore of a particular nation, lovingly studying and describing rituals, customs, household items and costumes. It is thanks to romantic literature that diverse national cultures have become close and interesting to a wide range of readers. The variety of national costumes of a distant historical era is fully presented in Gogol's story "Taras Bulba".
With the care of a professional ethnographer and the skill of a painter, the author recreates the details of ancient attire, whether it concerns the clothes of the Zaporizhzhya Cossacks ("The Bursaks suddenly changed; instead of the previous soiled boots, morocco red with silver horseshoes appeared on them; bloomers as wide as the Black Sea, with a thousand folds and with fees, they were tied with a golden spectacle; long straps were attached to the ochkur, with tassels and other trinkets for the pipe. Kazakin, scarlet in color, cloth bright as fire, girdled with a patterned belt; chased Turkish pistols were tucked into the belt; the saber rattled at the legs. ); or Polish knights ("... Polish knights, one more beautiful than the other, stood on the shaft. Copper hats shone like the sun, feathered with white feathers like a swan. Others wore light hats, pink and blue, with tops turned to one side. Caftans with folding sleeves, embroidered with gold and simply lined with laces .... "); or a wealthy Jewish townswoman ("On her head was a red silk scarf; pearls or beads in two rows adorned her headphones; two or three long, all in curls, curls fell out from under them...").
No less significant for the characterization of the romantic hero was landscape against which he appeared before the reader. The natural background was supposed to clearly indicate the unusual nature of the hero, to serve as a kind of parallel to his state of mind. Writer usage natural images for this purpose was called romantic parallelism. The following parallels were especially often drawn by the authors of romantic works:
1) emotional experiences of the central character - a storm,
storm:
And at the hour of the night, a terrible hour,
When the storm scared you
When, crowding at the altar,
You lay prostrate on the ground
I ran. Oh I'm like a brother
I would be happy to embrace the storm!
With the eyes of the clouds I followed
I caught lightning with my hand ...
Tell me what's between these walls
Could you give me in return
That friendship is short, but alive,
Between a stormy heart and a thunderstorm?...
(M. Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri", 1839);
2) power, breadth of the hero's soul - an endless element (sea, ocean, dense forests, steppes, etc.):
"... they felt the proximity of the Dnieper. Here it sparkles in the distance and separated from the horizon with a dark stripe. It blew cold waves and spread closer, closer and, finally, embraced half of the entire surface of the earth. This was the place of the Dnieper, where it, hitherto rapids, finally took his own and roared like the sea, overflowing at will, where the islands thrown into the middle of it forced it even further out of the coast and its waves spread widely over the earth, not meeting either cliffs or elevations.
(N. V. Gogol "Taras Bulba", 1835);
3) the greatness of the inner world of the character - a mountain on top of which the hero "places":
How often is a prisoner over the village
Sitting motionless on the mountain!
Clouds were smoking at his feet...
(A. S. Pushkin "Prisoner of the Caucasus", 1821).
The same "rules" were followed by romantic painters, depicting
reflecting as a background in the portraits they create snowy
mountain peaks or thunderclouds.
Thus, all the variety of methods of depicting a romantic hero pursued one goal - to fully indicate his exclusivity.
2. The disclosure of the unusual properties of a romantic hero was facilitated by and plot works. He invariably included bright, exceptional events, since it was in such storylines and twists that the originality of the character was most manifested. A romantic work is full of descriptions of adventures, mysterious or mystical incidents, battles, fights, stories of love or hate. Lyudmila, the heroine of Zhukovsky's ballad, is taken to the cemetery by a dead groom:
The rider and Lyudmila are racing.
Timidly the maiden embraced
Another gentle hand
Leaning your head against him.
Skok, in the summer through the valleys,
On hillocks and on plains,
The horse blazes, the earth trembles;
Sparks splash from hooves;
Dust rolls after clubs;
Jump past them in rows
Ditches, fields, mounds, bushes;
Bridges shatter with thunder.
(V. A. Zhukovsky "Lyudmila", 1808)
He is captured by the Circassians, and then escapes from it with the help of a mountain woman in love with him, the hero of Pushkin's poem "Prisoner of the Caucasus". Fights for the freedom of Ukraine against the tyranny of Peter 1, the title character of Ryleev's poem "Voynarovsky"; exiled to Yakutia, he unexpectedly meets his wife there, from whom he was separated and who voluntarily went to Siberia to find her beloved. The life of the heroes of Gogol's story "Taras Bulba" is full of remote adventures, heroic battles, explosions of various feelings, tragic events. The heroes of Gogol's stories, included in the collection "Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka", enter the world of devils and witches, sorcerers and mermaids, and these characters fully manifest their inherent exceptional properties of the soul in all the extraordinary incidents that fall to their lot. Wanders through the mountains of the Caucasus, fights with the leopard Lermontov's Mtsyri.
The plots of romantic works are varied, but they are always characterized by the fascination and brightness of the events that make up the plot, the lack of interest in everyday, unhurried existence. Romantic writers were convinced that only the extraordinary life of an exceptional hero is worthy of depiction.
3. The exclusivity of the hero and his fate had to correspond special romantic style. It is emotionally charged speech., which is achieved thanks to the writer's generous use of various tropes: epithets, comparisons, metaphors, personifications, etc.
What is visible to the eyes is this flame of clouds,
Flying across the quiet sky
This trembling of the shining waters,
These pictures of the shores
In the fire of a magnificent sunset -
These are such bright features -
They are easily caught by the winged thought,
And there are words for their brilliant beauty.
(V. A. Zhukovsky "The Unspeakable", 1819)
But the romantic style is characterized not only by the saturation of the language with various tropes, but also by the unity of the speech manner and characters, and the narrator. This is fully felt in Gogol's story "Taras Bulba". Picturesqueness, abundance of used metaphors, comparisons, epithets, etc., constant excitement, elation of intonation is inherent in the speech of all the heroes of the story, be it the stern Taras ("As the two ends of this broadsword do not unite into one and do not form one saber, so we, comrades, will no longer see each other in this world!"); or the ardent Andriy ("It is not heard in the world, it is impossible, not to be< ... >so that the most beautiful and best of wives would suffer such a bitter part when she was born so that everything that is best in the world would bow before her, as before a shrine ... "); or pathetic Yankel ("Who would dare to bind the pan Andria? now he is such an important knight ... dalibug, I didn’t recognize. And the shoulder pads are in gold, and gold on the belt, and gold everywhere, and all the gold; just like the sun looks in the spring, when every bird in the garden squeaks and sings and every herb smells, so he shines all in gold ... ").
The same heightened emotionality the author’s word also distinguishes, in particular, numerous, as it should be in a romantic story, lyrical digressions: “So here it is, Setch! Here is the nest from where all those proud and strong, like lions, fly out! Ukraine!" The unity of the spiritual mood of the author and the hero, manifested primarily in the style of the work, - crucial moment romantic poetics, inevitably having a profound effect on the reader.
Romanticism remained the leading trend in Russian literature of the twenties and thirties of the nineteenth century.. The complex of romantic ideas influenced the formation of both the generation that came to Senate Square on December 14, 1825, and those young people who, during the years of the Nikolaev reaction, were ready to challenge earth and heaven, plunge into world sorrow or disappointment, but not turn into "moderate and tidy" silent ones who flourished so much in post-Decembrist Russia. Features of romantic poetics dominated Russian literature for several decades, readers with all their hearts immersed themselves in the bright and enchanting world of romantic literature.
Russian romanticism dominated the era that we now call the "golden age of Russian poetry." Russian romanticism gave us the mysterious ballads and light elegies of V. A. Zhukovsky, the Little Russian stories of N. V. Gogol full of laughter and miracles and the southern poems of A. S. Pushkin, saturated with passions and thirst for will, the poetry of K. F. Ryleev and the boundless power of M. Yu. Lermontov's creativity. Romantics were such dissimilar writers as V. F. Odoevsky and E. A. Baratynsky, A. A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky and N. V. Kukolnik, N. A. Polevoy and A. I. Odoevsky. Romanticism was paid tribute at the beginning of its creative way those writers who will be the pride of the literature of Russian realism: N. A. Nekrasov, I. S. Turgenev, A. K. Tolstoy, F. I. Tyutchev. Romanticism was the leading trend in the entire Russian culture of the first third of the 19th century; many great figures of Russian art worked within this trend: painters O. A. Kiprensky, K. P. Bryullov, I. K. Aivazovsky, sculptor I. P. Martos, composer A. N. Verstovsky, architect A. A. Shtakenshneidr and many others. Therefore, Russian romanticism should be considered one of the most important and interesting stages in the development of Russian culture in general, and literature in particular.
Similar information.
Romanticism is an ideological trend in art and literature that appeared in Europe in the 90s of the 18th century and became widespread in other countries of the world (Russia is one of them), as well as in America. The main ideas of this direction is the recognition of the value of the spiritual and creative life of each person and his right to independence and freedom. Very often, in the works of this literary trend, heroes with a strong, rebellious disposition were depicted, the plots were characterized by a bright intensity of passions, nature was depicted in a spiritualized and healing way.
Having appeared in the era of the Great French Revolution and the world industrial revolution, romanticism changed such a direction as classicism and the Enlightenment as a whole. In contrast to the adherents of classicism, who support the ideas of cult significance human mind and the birth of civilization on its foundations, romantics put mother nature on a pedestal of worship, emphasize the importance of natural feelings and the freedom of aspirations of each individual.
(Alan Maley "The Graceful Age")
The revolutionary events of the late 18th century completely changed the course of everyday life, both in France and in other European countries. People, feeling acute loneliness, were distracted from their problems by playing various games of chance, and having fun with the most different ways. It was then that the idea arose to imagine that human life is an endless game, where there are winners and losers. In romantic works, heroes were often depicted opposing the world around them, rebelling against fate and fate, obsessed with their own thoughts and reflections on their own idealized vision of the world, which sharply disagrees with reality. Realizing their defenselessness in a world ruled by capital, many romantics were in confusion and confusion, feeling infinitely lonely in the life around them, which was the main tragedy of their personality.
Romanticism in Russian literature of the 19th century
The main events that had a huge impact on the development of romanticism in Russia were the War of 1812 and the Decembrist uprising of 1825. However, distinguished by originality and originality, Russian romanticism of the early 19th century is an inseparable part of the pan-European literary movement and possesses its common features and basic principles.
(Ivan Kramskoy "Unknown")
The emergence of Russian romanticism coincides in time with the maturing of a socio-historical turning point in the life of society at a time when the socio-political structure of the Russian state was in an unstable, transitional state. People of advanced views, disappointed in the ideas of the Enlightenment, promoting the creation of a new society based on the principles of reason and the triumph of justice, resolutely rejecting the principles of bourgeois life, not understanding the essence of antagonistic life contradictions, felt feelings of hopelessness, loss, pessimism and disbelief in a reasonable solution to the conflict.
Representatives of romanticism considered the human personality, and the mysterious and beautiful world of harmony, beauty and high feelings contained in it, to be the main value. In their works, representatives of this trend depicted not the real world, too base and vulgar for them, they displayed the universe of feelings of the protagonist, his inner world, filled with thoughts and experiences. Through their prism and outlines appear real world, with which he cannot come to terms and therefore tries to rise above him, not obeying his social and feudal laws and morals.
(V. A. Zhukovsky)
One of the founders of Russian romanticism is the famous poet V.A. Zhukovsky, who created a number of ballads and poems that had a fabulous fantastic content (“Ondine”, “The Sleeping Princess”, “The Tale of Tsar Berendey”). His works have a deep philosophical meaning, the desire for a moral ideal, his poems and ballads are filled with his personal experiences and reflections, inherent in the romantic direction.
(N. V. Gogol)
The thoughtful and lyrical elegies of Zhukovsky replace the romantic works of Gogol ("The Night Before Christmas") and Lermontov, whose work bears a peculiar imprint of an ideological crisis in the minds of the public, impressed by the defeat of the Decembrist movement. Therefore, the romanticism of the 30s of the 19th century is characterized by disappointment in real life and leaving for a fictional world where everything is harmonious and perfect. Romantic protagonists were portrayed as people cut off from reality and having lost interest in earthly life, conflicting with society, and denouncing the mighty of the world this in their sins. The personal tragedy of these people, endowed with high feelings and experiences, consisted in the death of their moral and aesthetic ideals.
The mindset of progressively thinking people of that era was most clearly reflected in the creative heritage of the great Russian poet Mikhail Lermontov. In his works “The Last Son of Liberty”, “Novgorod”, which clearly trace the example of the republican freedom of the ancient Slavs, the author expresses his ardent sympathy for the fighters for freedom and equality, those who oppose slavery and violence against the personality of people.
Romanticism is characterized by an appeal to historical and national sources, to folklore. This was most clearly manifested in the subsequent works of Lermontov (“The Song about Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich, the young guardsman and daring merchant Kalashnikov”), as well as in a cycle of poems and poems about the Caucasus, which was perceived by the poet as a country of freedom-loving and proud people who opposed the country of slaves and masters under the rule of the tsar-autocrat Nicholas I. The images of the main characters in the works of Izmail Bey "Mtsyri" are depicted by Lermontov with great passion and lyrical pathos, they bear the halo of the chosen ones and fighters for their Fatherland.
The early poetry and prose of Pushkin (“Eugene Onegin”, “The Queen of Spades”), the poetic works of K. N. Batyushkov, E. A. Baratynsky, N. M. Yazykov, the work of the Decembrist poets K. F. Ryleev, A. A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky, V. K. Kuchelbeker.
Romanticism in foreign literature of the 19th century
The main feature of European romanticism in foreign literature The 19th century is fantastic and fabulous works of this direction. For the most part, these are legends, fairy tales, novellas and short stories with a fantastic, unrealistic plot. The most expressive romanticism manifested itself in the culture of France, England and Germany, each of the countries made its own special contribution to the development and spread of this cultural phenomenon.
(Francisco Goya" Harvest " )
France. Here literary works in the style of romanticism, they wore a bright political color, largely opposed to the newly-minted bourgeoisie. According to French writers, the new society that emerged as a result of social changes after the French Revolution did not understand the value of the personality of each person, destroyed its beauty and suppressed the freedom of the spirit. Most famous works: the treatise "The Genius of Christianity", the stories "Attalus" and "Rene" by Chateaubriand, the novels "Delphine", "Korina" by Germaine de Stael, the novels by George Sand, Hugo "Notre Dame Cathedral", a series of novels about the musketeers by Dumas, the collected works of Honore Balzac .
(Karl Brullov "Horsewoman")
England. In English legends and traditions, romanticism was present for a long time, but did not stand out as a separate direction until the middle of the 18th century. English literary works are distinguished by the presence of a slightly gloomy Gothic and religious content, there are many elements of national folklore, the culture of the working and peasant class. Distinctive feature the content of English prose and lyrics - a description of travel and wanderings to distant lands, their study. A striking example: "Oriental Poems", "Manfred", "Childe Harold's Journey" by Byron, "Ivanhoe" by Walter Scott.
Germany. The foundations of German romanticism were greatly influenced by the idealistic philosophical worldview, which promoted the individualism of the individual and his freedom from the laws of feudal society, the universe was viewed as a single living system. German works written in the spirit of romanticism are filled with reflections on the meaning of human existence, the life of his soul, and they are also distinguished by fabulous and mythological motifs. The most striking German works in the style of romanticism: fairy tales by Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm, short stories, fairy tales, Hoffmann's novels, Heine's works.
(Caspar David Friedrich "Stages of life")
America. Romanticism in American literature and art developed a little later than in European countries (30s of the 19th century), its heyday falls on the 40s-60s of the 19th century. Such large-scale historical events as the US War of Independence at the end of the 18th century and the Civil War between North and South (1861-1865) had a huge impact on its appearance and development. American literary works can be conditionally divided into two types: abolitionist (supporting the rights of slaves and their emancipation) and eastern (supporters of plantation). American romanticism is based on the same ideals and traditions as European, in its rethinking and understanding in its own way in the conditions of a peculiar way of life and pace of life of the inhabitants of a new, little-known continent. American works of that period are rich in national trends, they have a keen sense of independence, the struggle for freedom and equality. Outstanding Representatives American Romanticism: Washington Irving ("The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", "Ghost Groom", Edgar Allan Poe ("Ligeia", "The Fall of the House of Usher"), Herman Melville ("Moby Dick", "Typey"), Nathaniel Hawthorne ( "The Scarlet Letter", "The House of Seven Gables"), Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ("The Legend of Hiawatha"), Walt Whitman, (poetry collection "Leaves of Grass"), Harriet Beecher Stowe ("Uncle Tom's Cabin"), Fenimore Cooper ( "The Last of the Mohicans").
And although romanticism reigned in art and literature for a very short time, and heroism and chivalry were replaced by pragmatic realism, this in no way diminishes his contribution to the development of world culture. Works written in this direction are loved and read with great pleasure by a large number of fans of romanticism around the world.
Romanticism- a concept that is difficult to give precise definition. In different European literatures, it is interpreted in its own way and is expressed differently in the work of various “romantic” writers. Both in time and in essence, this literary movement is very close to; in many writers of the epoch, these two trends even merge completely. Like sentimentalism, the romantic trend was a protest against pseudoclassicism in all European literatures.
Romanticism as a literary movement
Instead of the ideal of classical poetry - humanism, the personification of everything human, at the end of the XVIII - early XIX century, Christian idealism appeared - the desire for everything heavenly and divine, for everything supernatural and miraculous. At the same time, the main goal of human life was no longer the enjoyment of the happiness and joys of earthly life, but the purity of the soul and peace of conscience, the patient endure of all the misfortunes and sufferings of earthly life, the hope for a future life and preparation for this life.
Pseudoclassicism demanded from literature rationality, submission of feeling to reason; he fettered creativity in those literary forms, which were borrowed from the ancients; he obligated writers not to go beyond ancient history And ancient poetics. Pseudoclassics introduced a strict aristocracy content and form, brought exclusively "court" moods.
Sentimentalism set against all these features of pseudoclassicism the poetry of free feeling, admiration for its free sensitive heart, before its “beautiful soul”, and nature, artless and simple. But if the sentimentalists undermined the significance of false classicism, they did not begin a conscious struggle against this trend. This honor belonged to the "romantics"; they put forward great energy, a broader literary program and, most importantly, an attempt to create a new theory of poetic creativity against the false classics. One of the first points of this theory was the denial of the 18th century, its rational “enlightenment” philosophy, and the forms of its life. (See Aesthetics of Romanticism, Stages in the development of Romanticism.)
Such a protest against the rules of obsolete morality and social forms life was reflected in the passion for works in which the main characters were protesting heroes - Prometheus, Faust, then "robbers", as enemies of outdated forms social life... With the light hand of Schiller, even a whole "robber" literature arose. The writers were interested in the images of "ideological" criminals, fallen people, but retaining the high feelings of a person (such was, for example, the romanticism of Victor Hugo). Of course, this literature no longer recognized didacticism and aristocracy - it was democratic was far from edifying and, according to the manner of writing, approached naturalism, accurate reproduction of reality, without choice and idealization.
Such is one current of romanticism created by the group protesting romantics. But there was another group peaceful individualists, which freedom of feeling did not lead to social struggle. These are peaceful enthusiasts of sensitivity, limited by the walls of their hearts, lulling themselves into quiet delights and tears by analyzing their sensations. They, pietists and mystics can fit in with any church-religious reaction, get along with the political one, because they have moved away from the public into the world of their tiny "I", into solitude, into nature, broadcasting about the goodness of the Creator. They recognize only "internal freedom", "educate virtue". They have a "beautiful soul" - schöne Seele of German poets, Rousseau's belle âme, Karamzin's "soul"...
Romantics of this second type are almost indistinguishable from "sentimentalists". They love their "sensitive" heart, they know only tender, sad "love", pure, sublime "friendship" - they willingly shed tears; "sweet melancholy" is their favorite mood. They love sad nature, foggy or evening landscapes, the gentle glow of the moon. They dream willingly in cemeteries and near graves; they like sad music. They are interested in everything "fantastic" up to "visions". Following carefully the whimsical shades of the various moods of their hearts, they take on the image of complex and obscure, "vague" feelings - they try to express the "inexpressible" in the language of poetry, to find a new style for new moods unknown to pseudo-classics.
This is precisely the content of their poetry and was expressed in that vague and one-sided definition of “romanticism” that Belinsky made: “this is a desire, aspiration, impulse, feeling, sigh, groan, complaint about unfulfilled hopes that had no name, sadness for the lost happiness, which God knows what consisted of. This is a world alien to any reality, inhabited by shadows and ghosts. It is a bleak, slow-moving… present that mourns the past and sees no future in front of it; finally, it is love that feeds on sadness and which without sadness would not have anything to support its existence.
It originated at the end of the 18th century, but reached its greatest prosperity in the 1830s. From the beginning of the 1850s, the period begins to decline, but its threads stretch through the entire 19th century, giving rise to such trends as symbolism, decadence and neo-romanticism.
Rise of Romanticism
Europe, in particular England and France, is considered the birthplace of the direction, from where the name of this artistic direction came from - "romantisme". This is explained by the fact that the romanticism of the 19th century arose as a result of the French Revolution.
The revolution destroyed the entire hierarchy that existed before, mixed society and social strata. The man began to feel lonely and began to seek solace in gambling and other entertainment. Against this background, the idea arose that all life is a game in which there are winners and losers. The main character of each romantic work is a man playing with fate, with fate.
What is romanticism
Romanticism is everything that exists only in books: incomprehensible, incredible and fantastic phenomena, at the same time associated with the affirmation of the personality through its spiritual and creative life. Mainly events unfold against the backdrop of expressed passions, all the characters have clearly manifested characters, and are often endowed with a rebellious spirit.
Romantic writers emphasize that main value in life - the personality of a person. Each person is a separate world full of amazing beauty. It is from there that all inspiration and lofty feelings are drawn, as well as a tendency to idealization.
According to novelists, the ideal is an ephemeral concept, but nevertheless having the right to exist. The ideal is beyond everything ordinary, therefore the main character and his ideas are directly opposed to worldly relations and material things.
Distinctive features
The features of romanticism both lie in the main ideas and conflicts.
The main idea of almost every work is the constant movement of the hero in physical space. This fact, as it were, reflects the confusion of the soul, its continuously ongoing reflections and, at the same time, changes in the world around it.
Like many artistic movements, Romanticism has its own conflicts. Here the whole concept is based on the complex relationship of the protagonist with the outside world. He is very egocentric and at the same time rebels against base, vulgar, material objects of reality, which one way or another manifests itself in the actions, thoughts and ideas of the character. The following literary examples of romanticism are most pronounced in this regard: Childe Harold - the main character from Byron's "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" and Pechorin - from Lermontov's "A Hero of Our Time".
If we summarize all of the above, it turns out that the basis of any such work is the gap between reality and the idealized world, which has very sharp edges.
Romanticism in European Literature
European romanticism of the 19th century is remarkable in that, for the most part, its works have a fantastic basis. These are numerous fairy-tale legends, short stories and stories.
The main countries in which romanticism as a literary movement manifested itself most expressively are France, England and Germany.
This artistic phenomenon has several stages:
- 1801-1815 years. The beginning of the formation of romantic aesthetics.
- 1815-1830 years. The formation and flourishing of the current, the definition of the main postulates of this direction.
- 1830-1848 years. Romanticism takes on more social forms.
Each of the above countries has made its own, special contribution to the development of the aforementioned cultural phenomenon. In France, the romantic ones had a more political coloring, the writers were hostile towards the new bourgeoisie. This society, according to French leaders, ruined the integrity of the individual, her beauty and freedom of spirit.
In English legends, romanticism has existed for a long time, but until the end of the 18th century it did not stand out as a separate literary movement. English works, unlike French ones, are filled with Gothic, religion, national folklore, the culture of peasant and working societies (including spiritual ones). In addition, English prose and lyrics are filled with travel to distant lands and exploration of foreign lands.
In Germany, romanticism as a literary trend was formed under the influence of idealistic philosophy. The foundations were individuality and the oppressed by feudalism, as well as the perception of the universe as a single living system. Almost every German work is permeated with reflections on the existence of man and the life of his spirit.
Europe: examples of works
The following literary works are considered the most notable European works in the spirit of romanticism:
The treatise "The Genius of Christianity", the stories "Atala" and "Rene" Chateaubriand;
The novels "Delphine", "Corinne, or Italy" by Germaine de Stael;
The novel "Adolf" by Benjamin Constant;
The novel "Confession of the son of the century" by Musset;
The novel Saint-Mar by Vigny;
Manifesto "Preface" to the work "Cromwell", the novel "Notre Dame Cathedral" by Hugo;
Drama Henry III and his court”, a series of novels about musketeers, “The Count of Monte Cristo” and “Queen Margot” by Dumas;
The novels "Indiana", "The Wandering Apprentice", "Horas", "Consuelo" by George Sand;
Manifesto "Racine and Shakespeare" by Stendhal;
The poems "The Old Sailor" and "Christabel" by Coleridge;
- "Oriental Poems" and "Manfred" Byron;
Collected Works of Balzac;
The novel "Ivanhoe" by Walter Scott;
The fairy tale "Hyacinth and the Rose", the novel "Heinrich von Ofterdingen" by Novalis;
Collections of short stories, fairy tales and novels of Hoffmann.
Romanticism in Russian literature
Russian romanticism of the 19th century was born under the direct influence of Western European literature. However, despite this, he had his character traits, which were tracked in previous periods.
This artistic phenomenon in Russia fully reflected all the hostility of the foremost workers and revolutionaries to the ruling bourgeoisie, in particular, to its way of life - unbridled, immoral and cruel. Russian romanticism of the 19th century was a direct result of rebellious moods and anticipation of turning points in the history of the country.
In the literature of that time, two directions are distinguished: psychological and civil. The first was based on the description and analysis of feelings and experiences, the second - on the propaganda of the fight against modern society. The general and main idea of all novelists was that the poet or writer had to behave according to the ideals that he described in his works.
Russia: examples of works
The brightest examples of romanticism in literature Russia XIX century is:
The stories "Ondine", "The Prisoner of Chillon", the ballads "The Forest King", "Fisherman", "Lenora" by Zhukovsky;
Compositions "Eugene Onegin", "The Queen of Spades" by Pushkin;
- "The Night Before Christmas" by Gogol;
- "Hero of our time" Lermontov.
Romanticism in American Literature
In America, the direction received a slightly later development: its initial stage dates back to 1820-1830, the subsequent one - 1840-1860 of the 19th century. Both phases were exceptionally influenced by civil unrest, both in France (which served as the impetus for the creation of the United States), and directly in America itself (the war for independence from England and the war between North and South).
The artistic trends in American romanticism are represented by two types: abolitionist, which advocated emancipation from slavery, and eastern, which idealized plantation.
American literature of this period is based on a rethinking of knowledge and genres captured from Europe and mixed with a peculiar way of life and pace of life on a still new and little known mainland. American works are richly flavored with national intonations, a sense of independence and the struggle for freedom.
American romanticism. Examples of works
The Alhambra cycle, the stories The Ghost Groom, Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving;
The novel "The Last of the Mohicans" by Fenimore Cooper;
The poem "The Raven", the stories "Ligeia", "The Gold Bug", "The Fall of the House of Usher" and others by E. Alan Poe;
The novels The Scarlet Letter and The House of Seven Gables by Gorton;
The novels Typei and Moby Dick by Melville;
The novel "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe;
Poetically arranged legends of Evangeline, The Song of Hiawatha, Longfellow's The Courtship of Miles Standish;
Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" collection;
"Woman in the Nineteenth Century" by Margaret Fuller.
Romanticism as a literary movement had enough strong influence on musical, theatrical art and painting - it is enough to recall the numerous productions and paintings of those times. This happened mainly due to such qualities of the direction as high aesthetics and emotionality, heroism and pathos, chivalry, idealization and humanism. Despite the fact that the age of romanticism was rather short-lived, this did not in the least affect the popularity of books written in the 19th century in the following decades - the works of literary art of that period are loved and revered by the public to this day.
Romanticism as an artistic movement arose in a number of European countries at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. The most important milestones that determined its chronological framework were the Great French revolution 1789-1794 and the bourgeois revolutions of 1848.
Romanticism was a complex ideological and philosophical phenomenon that reflected the reaction of various social groups to bourgeois revolutions and bourgeois society.
Anti-bourgeois protest was characteristic of both conservative circles and the progressive intelligentsia. Hence the feelings of disappointment and pessimism that are characteristic of Western European romanticism. For some romantic writers (the so-called passive ones), the protest against the "money bag" was accompanied by a call for the return of the feudal-medieval order; among progressive romantics, the rejection of bourgeois reality gave rise to a dream of a different, just, democratic system.
Russian romanticism, in contrast to European with its pronounced anti-bourgeois character, retained a strong connection with the ideas of the Enlightenment and adopted some of them - the condemnation of serfdom, the promotion and defense of education, and the defense of popular interests. The military events of 1812 had a huge impact on the development of Russian romanticism. The Patriotic War caused not only the growth of civil and national self-awareness of the advanced layers of Russian society, but also the recognition of the special role of the people in the life of the national state. The theme of the people has become very significant for. Russian romantic writers. It seemed to them that by comprehending the spirit of the people, they were joining the ideal principles of life. The desire for nationality marked the work of all Russian romantics, although their understanding of the “people's soul” was different.
So, for Zhukovsky, nationality is, first of all, a humane attitude towards the peasantry and, in general, towards poor people. He saw its essence in the poetry of folk rituals, lyrical songs, folk signs and superstitions.
In the works of the romantic Decembrists, the notion of the people's soul was associated with other features. For them, the national character is a heroic character, a national identity. It is rooted in the national traditions of the people. They considered such figures as Prince Oleg, Ivan Susanin, Yermak, Nalivaiko, Minin and Pozharsky to be the brightest spokesmen for the people's soul. Thus, Ryleev's poems "Voinarovsky", "Nalivaiko", his "Dumas", A. Bestuzhev's stories, Pushkin's southern poems, later - "The Song about the Merchant Kalashnikov" and poems of the Caucasian cycle Lermontov are devoted to the understandable folk ideal. In the historical past of the Russian people, romantic poets of the 20s were especially attracted by crisis moments - periods of struggle with Tatar-Mongol yoke, free Novgorod and Pskov - with autocratic Moscow, the fight against the Polish-Swedish intervention, etc.
Interest in national history Romantic poets were born with a sense of high patriotism. Blossomed in the period Patriotic War 1812, Russian romanticism took it as one of its ideological foundations. In artistic terms, romanticism, like sentimentalism, paid great attention image of the inner world of man. But unlike the sentimentalist writers, who sang "quiet sensibility" as an expression of "languid and sorrowful heart", the romantics preferred the depiction of extraordinary adventures and violent passions. At the same time, the undoubted merit of romanticism, especially its progressive direction, was the identification of an effective, strong-willed principle in a person, the desire for high goals and ideals that lifted people above everyday life. Such a character was, for example, the work of the English poet J. Byron, whose influence was experienced by many Russian writers of the early 19th century.
Deep interest in inner world of a person aroused in the romantics indifference to the outward beauty of the heroes. In this, romanticism also radically differed from classicism with its obligatory harmony between the appearance and the inner content of the characters. Romantics, on the contrary, sought to discover the contrast between the external appearance and the spiritual world of the hero. As an example, we can recall Quasimodo (“Notre Dame Cathedral” by V. Hugo), a freak with a noble, exalted soul.
One of the important achievements of romanticism is the creation of a lyrical landscape. For romantics, it serves as a kind of decoration that emphasizes the emotional intensity of the action. In the descriptions of nature, its "spirituality" was noted, its relationship with the fate and fate of man. A bright master of the lyrical landscape was Alexander Bestuzhev, already in early stories whose landscape expresses the emotional overtones of the work. In the story “The Reval Tournament”, he depicted the picturesque view of Revel in this way, corresponding to the mood of the characters: “It was in the month of May; the bright sun rolled towards noon in transparent ether, and only in the distance the canopy of the sky touched the water with a silvery cloudy fringe. The bright spokes of the Reval bell towers burned across the bay, and the gray loopholes of Vyshgorod, leaning on the cliff, seemed to grow into the sky and, as if overturned, pierced into the depths of the mirror waters. 13
The originality of the themes of romantic works contributed to the use of a specific dictionary expression - an abundance of metaphors, poetic epithets and symbols. So, the sea, the wind was a romantic symbol of freedom; happiness - the sun, love - fire or roses; in general, pink color symbolized love feelings, black - sadness. The night personified evil, crime, enmity. The symbol of eternal variability is a sea wave, insensibility is a stone; images of a doll or a masquerade meant falsehood, hypocrisy, duplicity.
V. A. Zhukovsky. V. A. Zhukovsky (1783-1852) is considered to be the founder of Russian romanticism. Already in the first years of the 19th century, he became famous as a poet, glorifying bright feelings - love, friendship, dreamy spiritual impulses. A large place in his work was occupied by lyrical images. native nature. Zhukovsky became the creator of the national lyrical landscape in Russian poetry. In one of his early poems, the elegy "Evening", the poet reproduced a modest picture of his native land in this way:
All is quiet: the groves are sleeping; peace in the neighborhood
Stretched out on the grass under the bowed willow,
I listen how it murmurs, merged with the river,
A stream overshadowed by bushes.
A reed sways over the stream,
The voice of the noose, sleeping in the distance, wakes the villages.
In the grass of the crotch I hear a wild cry... 14
This love for the depiction of Russian life, national traditions and rituals, legends and tales will be expressed in a number of Zhukovsky's subsequent works. In 1808 he created a poetic work, the ballad "Lyudmila". Although its plot was borrowed from the work of the German poet Buter, nevertheless Zhukovsky transfers the action of the ballad to Russia, depicting Russian life at the end of the 18th century. The fantastic plot of the ballad has all the features characteristic of romantic works of this kind: the return of the missing fiance, his midnight trip with Lyudmila, accompanied by a string of mysterious visions, which “with the late moon rising in a light, bright round dance, twisted into an airy chain. Here they rushed after them.
Here the airy faces sing: As if a light breeze winds in the dodder leaves, As if a stream splashes. After "Lyudmila" he created the ballads "Gromoboy" (1810), "Svetlana" (1808-1812). They were written by the poet on plots taken from Russian medieval life, abound with descriptions of folk life, rituals, in particular, Christmas divination:
Once a Epiphany Eve
The girls guessed;
Shoe behind the gate
Taking it off their feet, they threw it;
Weed the snow; under the window
listened to, fed
Counting chicken grains.
Burning wax was drowned
In a bowl of clean water
They put a golden ring,
emerald earrings,
Spread out white boards
And they sang in tune over the bowl
The songs are subservient." 15
The poet subtly and impressively depicts the excited state of the girl, tormented by anxiety for the fate of her beloved and fear of night miracles:
Here is one beauty
Sits down by the mirror.
With secret timidity she
Looks in the mirror
Dark in the mirror, all around
Dead silence.
Candle with tremulous fire
A little sheet of radiance ...
Shyness excites her chest,
She's scared to look back
Fear blurs the eyes.
The fire crackled,
The cricket cried plaintively,
Midnight Herald. 16
The depiction of the miraculous and mysterious in Zhukovsky's ballads, which, according to Belinsky, delivers "sweet-terrible pleasure", determined the extraordinary success of his works.
With the beginning of the Patriotic War of 1812, Zhukovsky became a warrior of the noble militia, with whom he was near Mozhaisk on the day of Borodin, and then ended up in the Tarutinsky camp. Here, under the impression of military events and a general patriotic upsurge, he creates his best civil poem "A Poet in the Camp of Russian Soldiers", later published by the journals "Bulletin of Europe" and "Son of the Fatherland". "A Singer in the Camp ..." was, in essence, a passionate publicistic work of the emerging civic romanticism, further development which will take place in the early 1920s. Written after the Russian army left Moscow, at a time when the turning point in hostilities had not yet been felt, the poem was addressed to the patriotic feeling of the Russian people, reminded them of the glorious fighting traditions of their ancestors, starting with the Kiev prince Svyatoslav, Dmitry Donskoy and ending with Suvorov . A significant place in the poem was given to the image national hero M. I. Kutuzov and his associates - General Yermolov, Raevsky, Konovnitsyn and others. They were followed by the commanders of the Cossack and partisan detachments: “Whirlwind-ataman” Platov, “fiery fighter” Denis Davydov, fearless Seslavin, who “flies anywhere with winged shelves. There is thrown into the dust and the sword and shield. And the path is strewn with enemies. The poet spoke with great feeling about love for his native land:
The country where we first tasted the sweetness of being, Fields, native hills, Sweet light of the native sky, Familiar streams, Golden games of youth And lessons of the first years. What will replace your beauty? Oh, Holy Motherland, What heart does not tremble, blessing You? 17
At the same time, much in the course of military events remained incomprehensible to the author, for example, the national liberation character of the great struggle of the Russian people. Zhukovsky did not understand the strategic plan of Kutuzov either, although he glorified in the poem the experience and firmness of the "hero under the gray hairs." Despite this, the poet's appeal to the high patriotism of his compatriots found a warm response in their hearts. The contemporaries of The Singer in the Camp of Russian Warriors read with excitement and delight. The poem was copied by hand and distributed in hundreds of lists.
The popularity of the poet drew the attention of high society and the king himself to him. He was close to the court. Thus began the long court service of Zhukovsky. First, he became a reader of the Empress Dowager, then the teacher of the bride of Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich (the future Emperor Nicholas I), and later - the teacher of his son. During the years of difficult court service, Zhukovsky did not bother about a personal career, he sought, along with knowledge, to convey to the members of the royal family the ideas of humanism and enlightenment. And although young friends sometimes reproached the poet for the fact that his talent begins to fade in the court atmosphere, they never doubted his human decency and spiritual qualities. The degree of confidence in Zhukovsky of those who knew him is evidenced by the fact that the Decembrists (in particular, N. Muravyov) informed him of the existence of the Union of Welfare and invited him to join them. Zhukovsky refused, but knowing about the conspiracy, he did not betray his friends, despite his closeness to the court.
In his youth, Zhukovsky actively participated in literary life. At the beginning of the 19th century, he was a member of the "Friendly Literary Society", which included Andrei Turgenev, Merzlyakov, Voeikov and others, then the secretary of "Arzamas". His natural sociability, wit, and penchant for joking were clearly reflected in the protocols of this society and his letters to the “Arzamas”. Zhukovsky arranged his own “Fridays” and “Saturdays”, which brought together friends, writers and musicians. This time was illuminated for him by a cordial friendship with Pushkin, whose constant defender he remained until the end of the poet's life. He sought to mitigate the fate of the disgraced Pushkin, interceded for him before Alexander I and Nicholas I. Zhukovsky did a lot for other writers as well. He secured the release from the soldiery of Baratynsky, the ransom of Shevchenko from serfdom, the return of Herzen from exile, defended N. I. Turgenev, I. V. Kireevsky, helped N. V. Gogol.
The views of the poet, even in his youth, were far from radicalism, later he condemned the uprising on Senate Square. But at the same time, he used every opportunity to alleviate the plight of the exiles. Being an opponent of "tyranny", the oppression of man by man, he proved his loyalty to his convictions by a bold civil act, freeing his serfs. His archive contains letters from unknown, poor people who asked him for intercession - among them were orphans, widows, serfs. Zhukovsky helped and saved their letters.
In the late period of his work, Zhukovsky did a lot of translations and created a number of poems and ballads of fabulous and fantastic content (“Ondine”, “The Tale of Tsar Berendey”, “The Sleeping Princess”).
Ballads occupied one of the central places in the work of Zhukovsky, he turned to this form of poetic work throughout his life. In literary circles, he even received the nickname "ballade". Under his influence, the ballad genre began to "grow in breadth." A number of followers also appeared - they were P. A. Pletnev, V. K. Kuchelbeker and even the young Pushkin. Critics ambiguously evaluated Zhukovsky's ballads. The journalist Grech, who did not approve of the spread of the ballad genre, wrote: “Ah, dear creator of Svetlana, how many souls do you have to answer for? How many young people have you seduced into murder? 18 Perhaps one of the reasons for this attitude was the novelty and complexity of this genre. The ballad, which became one of the favorite genres of romantic poets, turned out to be the most convenient poetic form for embodying those moral and class shifts that occurred at the beginning of the 19th century, the complexities of the human psyche.
Zhukovsky's ballads are full of deep philosophical meaning, they reflect his personal experiences, and reflections and features inherent in romanticism in general.
The poet's personal life was not cloudless, from a young age he felt the bitterness of social inequality, then - unfulfilled dreams of happiness with his beloved girl, a feeling for which he retained for many years. Melancholic moods, close to Zhukovsky himself, color most of his creations. They are intensified by the consciousness of the unfaithfulness of worldly blessings, the foreboding of losses. The poet tries to find a solution to social and individual problems in an ethical way. The main theme of his ballads is crime and punishment. Zhukovsky denounced the base passions of man - selfishness, greed, ambition. He believed that a crime is committed when a person has failed to curb these passions and has forgotten his moral duty.
So, Warwick - the hero of the ballad of the same name - seized the throne, killing the rightful heir, his nephew. The greedy Bishop Gatton ("God's Judgment on the Bishop") does not give bread to the starving people. Punishments for crimes in Zhukovsky's ballads are either pangs of conscience, or - in cases where repentance does not occur - nature becomes the judge of human crimes. Nature in Zhukovsky's ballads is always fair, and it often carries out retribution: for example, the Avon River, in which the little heir to the throne was drowned, overflows its banks, and the criminal Warwick drowns in its furious waves; the greedy Bishop Gatton was bitten by mice that bred in his full barns. The crime must be punished.
Zhukovsky, like other Russian romantics, was characterized to a high degree by the desire for a moral ideal. This ideal for him was philanthropy and independence of the individual. He asserted them both with his work and with his life.
The “era of Zhukovsky” in Russian literary romanticism ends with the 20s of the 19th century, but the significance of his work is enduring. In addition to the poetic heritage of the poet, Zhukovsky's great merit is his achievements in the field of Russian versification. In this regard, he can be considered one of the initiators of a new, national school Russian literature. Belinsky rightly remarked that "without Zhukovsky we would not have had Pushkin."
