In the story "The Signal" (1887) no love story, but the marked motif is manifested in it even more sharply. The heroes of the story do not paint pictures, do not discuss philosophical problems and cannot determine the fate of mankind. They are small people living in small interests: a garden of cabbage, a salary, oppression of the authorities - their interests do not go further. But in their conversations about these subjects, Semyon and Vasily pose the same question as Gelfreich, who created his picture of Ilya Muromets.
In his youth, Semyon was in the war, served as a batman, and he could not accomplish outstanding feats that could determine the outcome of the battle. But for Garshin, Semyon is a man big soul, and his feat lies in the fact that he did not get angry at life and people, although he had every reason for this.
True, passivity and fatalism are clearly noticeable in his attitude to life. These are the features that irritate his interlocutor Vasily. “Not talent-fate,” Vasily Semyon objects, “we are stuck with you for a century, but people. There is no beast in the world more predatory and angrier than a man". The position of Vasily is the position of a person who does not want to submit to fate and therefore enters into a struggle with people and circumstances. But for Garshin, the laws of struggle have their own harsh dialectic: a person who is embittered, who has lost faith in people, even in his just anger against the perpetrators of evil, can cause the death of innocent people. Here Semyon and Vasily change places. Semyon actively takes part in the fight against evil, saving a train with people who are unaware of the danger that threatens them, and Vasily recognizes his rightness and the unrighteousness of the path he has taken. But Semyon's activity is of a special kind. It is based on self-sacrifice, and if he raises a red flag, then this flag is dipped in his own blood.
The question of what is good and evil is posed in this story somewhat simplified and unambiguous, in the spirit of Tolstoy's morality of non-resistance to evil by violence, but thanks to the simplicity of the plot and the noble heroic sacrifice of its protagonist, the story produces a strong emotional impact. It was to this goal that Garshin aspired, since he intended it for the people.
For Garshin, morality has always been simple, but the question of why this simple morality cannot be realized in people's lives was infinitely complex. Garshin in each of his stories, with painful sharpness, raised the question of truth and untruth, of the various manifestations and forms of modern evil, and therefore his short stories were filled with great and deep content.
Gleb Uspensky rightly wrote: “... in his little stories and fairy tales, sometimes in a few pages, the whole content of our life has been positively exhausted, in the conditions in which both Garshin and all his readers had to live.
When I say “the entire content of our life”, I am not using here some pompous and thoughtless phrase - no, it was precisely everything that our life gave the most important thing to his mind and heart (ours does not mean only Russian, but the life of people of our time in general), all up to last line experienced, re-felt by him with the most burning feeling, and precisely for this reason it could only be expressed in two, and even such small, books. The same idea was expressed by another contemporary of Garshin - P. F. Yakubovich.
Both the revolutionary poet and the greatest prose writer, the essayist sociologist, essentially acknowledged a fact that was unusual both in the literature of the 1980s and in previous Russian literature. Short stories reflected the main content of the era.
Later, thanks to Korolenko, Chekhov, Bunin, this idea will no longer be perceived as a paradox. Garshin managed to open up new possibilities for the small genre. He combined the strict objectivity of the narrative with lyrical excitement and a clearly articulated author's point of view.
In subjective lyrical experiences, he discovered social basis. He combined the realism of descriptions with a romantic transformation of life, specific images- with allegorical and symbolic generalizations, everyday sketches - with a philosophical understanding of reality.
To the dull pessimism and rosy optimism, not uncommon in the literature of the 1980s, Garshin countered with his doubts, questions, wise skepticism and, at the same time, the pathos of asceticism. In the usual course of everyday life, he managed to see the tragedy, and in tragic fate outstanding heroes are features of the new morality.
He created new type hero - a man of sensitive conscience and bare nerves, who felt personally responsible for public untruth, a hero who will become one of the main democratic literature late XIX V.
History of Russian literature: in 4 volumes / Edited by N.I. Prutskov and others - L., 1980-1983
Ivanov Semyon Ivanovich - main character story "Signal" by Garshin. He former soldier, orderly. Semyon Ivanovich becomes a "watchman on railway". He lives, "a sick and broken man", together with his wife Arina in a booth, in which there is "half a dozen arable land." In Semyon's worldview, the eternal peasant attraction to the land is combined with the awareness of the responsibility of his new "iron" position. His philosophy: “to whom the Lord will give what talent-fate, it is so.”
Another of his neighbors in the distance is “a young man”, “thin and wiry”, Vasily Stepanovich Spiridov. He is convinced: “It is not the talent-fate that seizes us for a century, but people.<...>If you blame all filthiness on God, but sit and endure it yourself, then, brother, it’s not a man to be, but cattle.
Having quarreled with his superiors, Vasily leaves the service and goes to Moscow to seek "rule for himself." Obviously to no avail: a few days later he returns and unscrews the rail shortly before the arrival of the passenger train. Semyon notices this and tries to prevent the crash: he wets his handkerchief with his own blood and with such a red flag goes out to meet the train. He loses consciousness from severe bleeding, and then the flag is picked up by Vasily, who was watching what was happening from afar. The train is stopped. Last phrase story - the words of Vasily: "Knit me, I turned the rail away."
The story "Signal" by Garshin entered the circle of textbook reading of teenagers, but its interpretation by Soviet literary critics was rather simplified. To the on-duty and low-content phrase that Garshin calls for “heroism, self-sacrifice for the good of the people” in “Signal”, was added the consideration that “Semyon is shown as a supporter of meek humility and is opposed to a person who passionately hates the owners modern life. At the same time, a supporter of the struggle comes to a crime, and a preacher of humility - to the feat of self-sacrifice. Garshin is charged with following the “reactionary Tolstoy “theory” of “non-resistance to evil by violence”.
However, the content of the story testifies to somewhat different goals of the author: Vasily's conflicts with his superiors are often caused by his character, his rather free attitude to his own duties. And his crime is incommensurable with the insult inflicted on him. It seems that here Garshin follows not so much the “Tolstoyism” not loved by the ideologists of Bolshevism and their relatives, but expresses a conviction that is generally characteristic of Russian writers of the 2nd half of XIX c: any radicalism is destructive, it carries only evil and has no moral justification.
For the sake of affirming this idea, Garshin gives such a symbolic, in many ways literary finale in “Signal” (was it really necessary for Semyon to wet his handkerchief with blood?! Is it really that a person on the rails, waving any object, is not an alarm signal for the driver ?!) . Where radicalism is, there are crimes, there is the blood of innocent victims, the writer says. Decades later, the flag in Vasily’s hand, red from Semyon’s blood, began to express the meaning of the bloody radicalism of the 20th century in a fatal way. - Bolshevism, and in itself the feat of Semyon revealed its heavy resemblance to the usual "feat" Soviet era: as a rule, this is the self-sacrifice of some because of the crime of others (and not opposition to the elements, etc.).
Subject. "ANALYTICAL READING OF V. M. GARSHIN'S STORY
"SIGNAL"
The purpose of the lesson: to continue work on the formation of students' ability to analyze the work in the unity of form and content, to convey to students the humanistic idea of the book, to develop the ability of students to give comparative characteristic literary heroes on the example of V.M. Garshin's story "Signal".
Analyzing the content of the story, identify the moral position of students in relation to such concepts as feelings of resentment and revenge, dignity and pride, justice and mercy, responsibility for their actions.
Give an advance task:
A)P prepare a biography of V. M. Garshin, read the stories “Red Flower”, “Artist”, “Four Days”, “Coward”, note extreme situations, in which the heroes of Garshin find themselves, allowing to identify pain points, attitude towards people, the writer's attention to spiritual world person.
b) Find in explanatory dictionaries meaning of words: offend, offend, revenge
During the classes
1. Message from students about V. M. Garshin(Slide 1,2,3,4,5)
2. Reading the story "Signal" by the teacher to the words: “No, you can’t run to the booth and you won’t be in time to return back in time ...”, (dictionary work in the course of reading), (slide 6)
Dictionary(slide 7)
First line − border fortifications,
orderly (obsolete)- before the revolution: a soldier who is with an officer for personal services
dell- valley with gentle slopes
crutch- in the text a thick nail with an end bent at a right angle, or a support, a support of this form (spec.)
rail- German word, came to us from English, "go off the rails" − phraseological turn- violate the habitual way of life, the right way, will, self-control.
3. How, in your opinion, will Semyon and Vasily behave in this situation? What in the text gives reason to think so?
(Work in pairs "Find a match" (slide-8, check out slide 9)
| Semyon served as an orderly with an officer and did a whole campaign with him. He was starving, and cold, and roasted in the sun, and made transitions for forty and fifty miles in heat and cold; it happened to be under bullets, yes, thank God, not a single one hurt. Since then, he has had to taste a lot of grief. He helped the boss in the kitchen, chopped firewood, yard, chalked the platform ... began to think about how he would start his own household, buy a cow, buy a horse. A lot, - he says, - I have taken grief in my lifetime, and my century is not God knows how much. God did not give happiness. So to whom what talent-fate the Lord will give, so it is. Good is not sought from good. Here you have a home, it is warm, and there is little land. | Basil He was a young man, thin and wiry. Not talent-fate seizes us with you for a century, but people. There is no beast in the world more predatory and more evil than man. A wolf does not eat a wolf, but a man eats a man alive. Still, there is no creature crueler. It would not be human anger and greed - it would be possible to live. Everyone strives to grab you by the living, and bite off a bite, and devour you. If you dump all filthiness on God, but sit and endure it yourself, then this, brother, is not to be a man, but to be cattle. To a poor man, in a booth there or somewhere, what a life! These flayers are eating you. All the juice is squeezed out, and when you get old, they will throw it away, like some kind of oilcake, to feed the pigs. They need to be taught, bloodsuckers ... His wife worked for him, did not sleep day and night; exhausted completely, waiting for her husband .... puffy face from tears, red eyes. |
The guys wrote down, exchanged views.
4. Continued reading. Discussion:
What impression did the story make?
Heroes. Who are they, how do you feel about them?
5. What is a story? How is it built?
(exposition, plot, development of action, climax, denouement)
(To tell that in 1877 there was a war with Turkey, Garshin signed up as a volunteer, was wounded in one of the battles. Russia fought all the time, they were drafted into the army for 25 years, returned crippled, disabled, if they managed to get married, then the wife was left alone with the children .)
(Slide " Turkish war" 10)
What did Semyon experience in the war?
Semyon Ivanov “had to experience a lot of grief”: he went to the war, “served as a batman with an officer and did a whole trip with him.” “Every day three times Semyon brought him (officer) from the regimental kitchens, from the ravine, hot and lunch, Walks with a samovar in an open place, bullets whistle, click into stones; Semyon is scared, he cries, but he goes. Semyon is accustomed to doing his duty, conscientiously doing his job.
What awaited him upon his return? How does the hero relate to the vicissitudes of fate?
When he returned home, the old father died, the son also died, “the economy did not work out”, “we went to new places of happiness to look for.” Semyon does not grumble at fate, does not blame anyone, does not curse, he believes that everything is from God. “God did not give happiness. To whom what talent-fate the Lord will give, so it is.
7. Tie
Acquaintance with Vasily. They have one fate, both are married, have no children, live in the same conditions, do one thing, but Vasily is angry at the whole world: “Not talent-fate seizes us with you for a century, but people. There is no beast in the world more predatory and more evil than man. A wolf does not eat a wolf, but a man eats a man alive. Semyon is trying to live in harmony with the world, with people, trying to get close to Vasily, to find an excuse for him.
8. The plot develops
How does resentment at fate, the desire for revenge, ripen in Vasily?
“If you dump all filthiness on God, but sit and endure it yourself, then, brother, you don’t have to be a man, but cattle ... These flayers eat you. They squeeze out all the juice, and when you get old, they will throw it away, like some kind of cake... Oh, if only there was strength and power!
And who did he hurt? Wife, the only one close person. “The wife worked for him, didn’t sleep day and night, got completely exhausted, waiting for her husband.”
In a fit of anger and despair, he tries to make a passenger train wreck. Decides to take revenge.
Whom does he take revenge on? To the mighty of the world this?
There are people there too... "There, in the third grade, it's packed with people, small children... Now they're all sitting, they don't think about anything." They may have been offended too.
9. Climax
How does the story end?
What made Semyon do this?
Christian, Orthodox person, sorry for the innocent and sorry for Vasily, his sin to cover. The final part of the story sounds solemnly, read out: (slide 12)
“And it became black in his eyes and empty in his soul, and he dropped the flag. But the bloody banner did not fall to the ground: someone's hand grabbed it and raised it high towards the approaching train.
(Pay attention to the syllable, polyunion, inversion).
Why Vasily returned, helped? (Force selfless love, the courage of another person, perhaps, awakened Vasily's conscience and compassion.)
There is no final.
This is how the characters of the characters, the motives of their actions, that is, the author's intention, are revealed in the composition.
IN our real life it is not often possible to find the truth, people face injustice, feel resentment.
(Slide 13)
Resentment(according to V. I. Dahl) - every untruth, to the one who must endure it; everything that offends, dishonors and causes pain, loss or reproach. A mockery, a bad word about someone.
offend… whom − inflict, offend, offend, cause trouble to someone.
Resentment(according to S.I. Ozhegov) - unfairly caused grief, insult, as well as the feeling caused by such grief.
Is it necessary to “swallow” the insult or endure, because there is a sense of self-worth. Share your life experience.
10. How to find harmony, love for the world, for people? What path does Garshin suggest?
The truth is in the soul of a person, it is impossible for the whole world to hold a grudge. Anger, despondency - big sin. Bible truth: "God is not in power, but in righteousness."
11. How do you understand the title of the story "Signal"?
direct and figurative meaning words "signal"
(Slide 14)
1. Symbol to transmit any information or messages over a distance.
2. Translated. Warning, message about something unwanted, pick up synonyms.
Signal- this is a prohibitory sign, a metaphor addressed to all of us.
The 10 Christian commandments are the main prohibitory signals for us.
In the story "The Signal" (1887) there is no love story, but the marked motif appears in it even more sharply. The heroes of the story do not paint pictures, do not discuss philosophical problems and cannot determine the fate of mankind. They are small people living in small interests: a garden of cabbage, salary, oppression of the authorities - their interests do not go further. But in their conversations about these subjects, Semyon and Vasily pose the same question as Gelfreich, who created his picture of Ilya Muromets.
In his youth, Semyon was in the war, served as a batman, and he could not accomplish outstanding feats that could determine the outcome of the battle. But for Garshin, Semyon is a man of great soul, and his feat lies in the fact that he did not get angry at life and people, although he had every reason for this.
True, passivity and fatalism are clearly noticeable in his attitude to life. These are the features that irritate his interlocutor Vasily. “Not talent-fate,” Vasily Semyon objects, “we are stuck with you for a century, but people. There is no beast in the world more predatory and more evil than man. The position of Vasily is the position of a person who does not want to submit to fate and therefore enters into a struggle with people and circumstances. But for Garshin, the laws of struggle have their own harsh dialectic: a person who is embittered, who has lost faith in people, even in his just anger against the perpetrators of evil, can cause the death of innocent people. Here Semyon and Vasily change places. Semyon actively takes part in the fight against evil, saving a train with people who are unaware of the danger that threatens them, and Vasily recognizes his rightness and the unrighteousness of the path he has taken. But Semyon's activity is of a special kind. It is based on self-sacrifice, and if he raises a red flag, then this flag is dipped in his own blood.
For Garshin, morality has always been simple, but the question of why this simple morality cannot be realized in people's lives was infinitely complex. Garshin in each of his stories, with painful sharpness, raised the question of truth and untruth, of the various manifestations and forms of modern evil, and therefore his short stories were filled with great and deep content.
Gleb Uspensky rightly wrote: “... in his little stories and fairy tales, sometimes in a few pages, the whole content of our life has been positively exhausted, in the conditions in which both Garshin and all his readers had to live.
When I say “the entire content of our life”, I am not using here any pompous and thoughtless phrase - no, it was precisely everything that gave the most important thing to his mind and heart our life (ours - does not mean only Russian, but the life of people of our time in general), everything to the last line was experienced, felt by him with the most burning feeling, and precisely for this reason it could be expressed only in two, and even such small, books. The same idea was expressed by another contemporary of Garshin - P.F. Yakubovich.
Both the revolutionary poet and the greatest prose writer, the essay sociologist, essentially acknowledged a fact that was unusual both for the literature of the 1980s and for previous Russian literature. Short stories reflected the main content of the era.
Later, thanks to Korolenko, Chekhov, Bunin, this idea will no longer be perceived as a paradox. Garshin managed to open up new possibilities for the small genre. He combined the strict objectivity of the narrative with lyrical excitement and a clearly articulated author's point of view.
Semyon Ivanov serves as a watchman on the railroad. He is a man of experience, but not very lucky. Nine years ago, in 1878, he went to war, fought with the Turks. He was not wounded, but lost his health.
Returned to native village- the economy did not work out, the son died, and he and his wife went to new places of happiness to look for. Not found.
Met Semyon during the wanderings of a former officer of his regiment. He recognized Semyon, sympathized and found him a job at the railway station, over which he was in charge.
Semyon got a new booth, as much firewood as you wanted, a garden, a salary - and he and his wife began to acquire a household. Semyon's work was not a burden, and he kept his entire section of the road in order.
Semyon also met his neighbor Vasily, who looked after the adjacent plot. They began, meeting on rounds, to interpret.
Semyon endures all his troubles and failures stoically: "God did not give happiness." Vasily, on the other hand, believes that his life is so poor, because others profit from his work - rich people and bosses, all of them are bloodsuckers and flayers, and he hates all of them fiercely.
Meanwhile, an important audit arrives from St. Petersburg. Semyon put everything in order ahead of time, he was praised. But on Vasily's site, everything turned out differently. He had long been in a quarrel with the roadmaster. According to the rules, this master had to ask permission for a garden, but Vasily neglected, planted cabbage without permission - he ordered to dig it out. Vasily got angry and decided to complain about the master to the big boss. Yes, he not only did not accept the complaint, but he shouted at Vasily and hit him in the face.
Vasily threw a booth on his wife - and went to Moscow to seek justice now for this boss. Yes, apparently, I did not find it. Four days passed, Semyon met Vasily's wife on the rounds, her face was swollen from tears, and she did not want to talk to Semyon.
Just at that time, Semyon went into the forest to cut willows: he made pipes from it for sale. Returning, I heard strange sounds near the railway embankment - as if iron tinkled against iron. He crept closer and sees: Vasily tampered with the rail with a crowbar and turned the path. I saw Seeds - and run away.
Semyon stands over the broken rail and does not know what to do. You can't put it in place with your bare hands. Vasily had the key and the crowbar - but no matter how much Semyon called him to return - he did not get through. The passenger train is due soon.
“Here, at this rounding, he will go off the rail,” Semyon thinks, “and the embankment is tall, eleven sazhens, wagons will fall down, and there are small children ...” Semyon rushed to the booth for a tool, but realized that he would not have time . I ran back - there is already a distant whistle - a train is coming soon.
It was then that a light illuminated his head. Semyon took off his hat, took out a handkerchief from it, crossed himself, struck himself in the right hand with a knife above the elbow, a stream of blood spattered. He soaked his handkerchief in it, put it on a stick (the willow that he brought from the forest came in handy) - and raised a red flag - a signal to the driver that the train should be stopped.
But, apparently, Semyon hurt his hand too deeply - the blood gushing without stopping, it gets dark in his eyes and only one thought in his head: "Help, Lord, send a shift."
Semyon could not stand it and lost consciousness, fell to the ground, but the flag did not fall - the other hand picked it up and lifted it high towards the train. The driver manages to slow down, people jump out onto the embankment and see a man covered in blood, lying unconscious, and next to another, with a bloody rag in his hand ...
This is Vasily. He looks around the audience and says: "Knit me, I turned the rail off."
