Ip idle talk (Iudushka Golovlev) artistic discovery of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Prior to this, in Russian literature, in Gogol, Dostoevsky, there were images that vaguely resemble Judas, but these are only slight hints. Neither before nor after Saltykov-Shchedrin has anyone been able to portray the image of a windbag with such force and accusatory clarity. Yudushka Golovlev is a one-of-a-kind type, an ingenious find by the author.
Saltykov-Shchedrin, creating his novel, set himself the task of showing the mechanism of family destruction. The soul of this process was, without any doubt, Porfish the blood-drinker. It goes without saying that the author paid special attention to the development of this particular image, which is interesting, among other things, because it is constantly changing, right up to the last pages, and the reader can never be sure what exactly this image will turn out to be in the next chapter. We observe the portrait of Judas in dynamics. Seeing for the first time an unsympathetic outspoken child, sucking up to his mother, eavesdropping, tinkering, the reader can hardly imagine that disgusting, shuddering creature who commits suicide at the end of the book. The image changes beyond recognition. Only the name remains unchanged. Just as Porfiry becomes Judas from the first pages of the novel, so Judas dies. There is something surprisingly petty about this name, which so accurately expresses the inner essence of this character.
One of the main features of Judas (not counting, of course, idle talk) is hypocrisy, a striking contradiction between well-intentioned reasoning and dirty aspirations. All attempts by Porfiry Golovlev to snatch a bigger piece for himself, keep an extra penny, all his murders (you can’t call his policy towards relatives otherwise), in a word, everything he does is accompanied by prayers and pious speeches. Remembering Christ through every word, Judas sends his son Petenka to certain death, harasses his niece Anninka, and sends his own newborn baby to an orphanage.
But not only with such charitable speeches Judas plagues the household. He has two more favorite topics: family and household. On this, in fact, the scope of his outpourings is limited due to complete ignorance and unwillingness to see anything that lies outside his little world. However, these everyday conversations, which mother Arina Petrovna is not averse to telling, in the mouth of Judas turn into endless moralizing. He simply tyrannizes the whole family, bringing everyone to complete exhaustion. Of course, all these flattering, sugary speeches do not deceive anyone. Mother from childhood does not trust Porfishka: he overacts too much. Hypocrisy, combined with ignorance, does not know how to mislead.
There are several powerful scenes in Gospodye Golovlyov that make the reader almost physically feel the state of oppression from the enveloping speeches of Judas. For example, his conversation with his brother Pavel, who is dying. The unfortunate dying man is suffocating from the presence of Judas, and he, allegedly not noticing these throwings, makes fun of his brother in a kindred way. The victims of Judas never feel so defenseless as when his idle talk is expressed in harmless banter that has no end. The same tension is felt at the point in the novel where Anninka, almost exhausted, tries to escape from her uncle's house.
The longer the story goes on, the more people fall under the yoke of Judas tyranny. He harasses everyone who enters his field of vision, while remaining invulnerable himself. Yet even his armor has cracks. So, he is very afraid of the curse of Arina Petrovna. She saves this weapon of hers as a last resort against her blood-drinking son. Alas, when she actually curses Porfiry, this does not produce the effect on him that he himself was afraid of. Another weakness of Judas is the fear of Evprakseyushka's departure, that is, the fear of breaking the established way of life once and for all. However, Evprakseyushka can only threaten her departure, but she herself remains in place. Gradually, this fear of the owner Golovlev is blunted.
The whole way of life of Judas is a transfusion from empty to empty. He considers non-existent income, imagines some incredible situations and solves them himself. Gradually, when there is no one alive around who could be eaten, Judas begins to harass those who appear to him in his imagination. He takes revenge on everyone indiscriminately, it is not known for what: he reproaches his dead mother, fines the peasants, robs the peasants. This happens with the same false tenderness that has ingrained into the soul. Only is it possible to say the soul about the inner essence of Judas Saltykov-Shchedrin does not speak about the essence of the blood-drinking Porfishka other than ashes.
The end of Judas is rather unexpected. It would seem that a selfish man who walks over corpses, a hoarder, who has ruined his entire family for the sake of his gain, can commit suicide, nevertheless Judas, apparently, begins to realize his guilt. Saltykov-Shchedrin makes it clear that although the realization of emptiness and uselessness has come, resurrection, purification is no longer possible, as well as further existence.
Judas Golovlev is indeed an eternal type, firmly established in Russian literature. His name has already become a household name. You can not read the novel, but know this name. It is used infrequently, but still occasionally heard in speech. Of course, Judas is a literary exaggeration, a collection of various vices for the edification of posterity. These vices are primarily hypocrisy, idle talk, worthlessness. Judas is the personification of a person who goes directly to self-destruction and is not aware of this until the very last moment. No matter how exaggerated this character is, his flaws are human, not fictional. That is why the type of windbag is eternal.
Lord Golovlev is a novel about a family, but, first of all, it is a novel about real and imaginary values, about why a person lives on Earth. In Lords Golovlyov, the author explores the nature of what inexorably alienates people from each other. He explores such aspirations that begin with a frenzied desire to best arrange their home, to ensure the future of their kind. Home, family, clan, these are real values, not imaginary ones. And it is to them that the ancestor and head of the family, Arina Petrovna Golovleva, selflessly gives all her bright life talent.
And it seems to be succeeding: the power of the Golovlev family is undeniable. She herself proudly realizes this: What a colossus she built! But when the goal seems to be achieved, it turns out that it was illusory, that everything is lost, and life, one's own and those of one's loved ones, was senselessly sacrificed. The novel, dedicated to the stubborn creation of a family stronghold, ends in a complete human collapse: the desolation of the house and the collapse of family ties.
So, the novel depicts a family consisting of the head Arina Petrovna and her children. Golovleva is an imperious and energetic landowner, the mistress of the entire estate, a complex and purposeful nature, but spoiled by unlimited power over her family and others. She single-handedly rules the entire estate, turning her husband into an unnecessary appendage and crippling the lives of hateful children. Her passion is hoarding. With all sorts of acquisitions, enrichment, the most vivid memories of the life of Arina Petrovna are connected. And the children, once again listening to her stories about this, perceive the words of their mother as a fascinating fairy tale.
Money relations are the main, the strongest thread that binds Arina Petrovna and her sons Stepan, Pavel and Porfiry. The eldest son, Stepan, by nature observant and witty, but inactive, the hateful Styopka the dunce, drank himself and died. Another son Pavel eventually hated the company of living people and lived in his fantasy world alone with himself. And so his bleak life proceeded, until a fatal illness got the better of him.
The youngest son, Porfiry, is perhaps the most prominent figure in this family. The despotic power of Arina Petrovna, material dependence on his mother brought up deceit and servility in him. From childhood, Porfiry knew how to entangle his good friend mother with a web of lies and toadying, for which he received from other family members the nickname Judas and the bloodsucker. These nicknames perfectly reflect his essence. Not Judas, namely Judas, since he was deprived of the scope of a real Judas the traitor. During his worthless life, Porfiry did not commit a single real act.
Treachery and sycophancy are the features that characterize him. He betrays everyone and always. All Judas deeds are so petty and insignificant that they cause indignation and disgust. Even when addressing God, he is frankly practical. The Lord for him is something like the highest authority, to which you can turn with your vile petitions.
So why is the Golovlev family doomed to extinction? Why mother and children never found a common language. The answer is quite clear: despotism, the habitual suppression of the personality of the younger ones, led to the inability of the headmen to manage their own destinies. Future crashes, children prepared here at home. Golovlev's youth return to their rich but hated native corner only to perish.
At the end of the novel, Shchedrin showed an empty and depopulated stronghold, in which there is everything. I don't live in a desert! Judas boasts, but at the same time there is no one here. The image of silence, frightening in its power, the shadows crawling around the house are not at all accidentally repeated in the novel. And the scene of Judas with dead souls is shocking: the deceased mother, brothers, long-dead servants. Turning away from living life, the hero communicates with ghosts, until the sudden awakening of a wild conscience makes him ask with horror: What has happened! where... everything... The entire burden of responsibility for the death of the Golovlev family falls on Porfiry. Saltykov will make him wake up for everyone. Judas finally understands that there are real human relationships, the laws of human connection. He is aware of the selfish disunity of the Golovlev family and will take responsibility for all the numerous family sins. Porfiry himself will pass the death sentence on himself; he will be found frozen not far from the grave of his mother.
Russia, mid-19th century Serfdom is already on the wane. However, the Golovlev family of landowners is still quite prosperous and is increasingly expanding the boundaries of their already vast estates. The credit for this belongs entirely to the hostess - Arina Petrovna Golovleva. She is an adamant, obstinate, independent woman, accustomed to the complete absence of any opposition. Arina Petrovna's husband, Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev, remained careless and idle as he was young. He spends his life writing rhymes in the spirit of Barkov, imitating the singing of birds, secret drunkenness and stalking yard girls. That is why Arina Petrovna directed her attention exclusively to economic affairs. Children, for the sake of whom all the enterprises seemed to be created, were, in fact, a burden to her. There were four children: three sons and a daughter.
The eldest son Stepan Vladimirovich was known in the family under the names Styopka the Stooge and Styopka the mischievous. From his father he adopted inexhaustible mischief, from his mother - the ability to quickly guess the weaknesses of people; he used these talents for mimicry and other buffoonery, for which he was mercilessly beaten by his mother. Having entered the university, he did not feel the slightest urge to work, but instead became a jester with wealthy students, thanks to which, however, he did not starve with the meager allowance. Having received a diploma, Stepan wandered around the departments until he completely lost faith in his bureaucratic talents. The mother “threw out to her son a piece”, which consisted of a house in Moscow, but, alas, even with this stock, Styopka the Stupid went bankrupt, partly eating the “piece”, partly losing. Having sold the house, he tried to beg now for tobacco, now for money from the wealthy peasants of his mother, who lived in Moscow, but he was forced to admit that he was no longer able to wander and there was only one way left for him - back to Golovlevo for free allowance. And Stepan Vladimirovich goes home - to the family court.
The daughter, Anna Vladimirovna, also did not live up to her mother's expectations: Arina Petrovna sent her to the institute in the hope of making her a free house secretary and accountant, and Annushka ran away with a cornet one night and got married. Her mother "threw out a piece" to her in the form of a stunted village and a capitalist, but two years later the young capital lived and the cornet ran away, leaving his wife with her twin daughters, Anninka and Lyubinka. Then Anna Vladimirovna died, and therefore Arina Petrovna was forced to shelter orphans. However, these unfortunate events indirectly contributed to the rounding of the Golovlev estate, reducing the number of shareholders.
The middle son, Porfiry Vladimirovich, received from Styopka the Stooge the nicknames Judas and Krovopivushki from his childhood. From infancy he was extraordinarily affectionate, and also liked to tinker a little. Arina Petrovna was wary of his ingratiations, recalling how, before the birth of Porfisha, the old seer muttered: “The rooster cries, threatens the mother hen; mother hen - cackle-tah-tah, but it will be too late! - but she always gave the best piece to her affectionate son because of his devotion.
The younger brother, Pavel Vladimirovich, was the complete personification of a man, devoid of any deeds. Maybe he was kind, but did not do good; maybe he wasn't stupid, but he didn't do anything smart. From childhood, he remained outwardly gloomy and apathetic, in his thoughts experiencing fantastic events, unknown to anyone around him.
Papa refused to participate in the family trial of Stepan Vladimirovich, predicting to his son only that the witch would “eat him!”; the younger brother Pavel declared that his opinions would still not be listened to, and it is already known in advance that the guilty Styopka "to be torn to pieces ...". With such a lack of resistance, Porfiry Vladimirovich convinced his mother to leave Styopka the Stooge under supervision in Golovlev, having previously demanded from him a paper with a waiver of hereditary claims. So the dunce remained in his parents' house, in a dirty dark room, on meager (just not to die) feed, coughing over a pipe of cheap tobacco and sipping from a damask. He tried to ask that they send him boots and a short fur coat, but in vain. The outside world ceased to exist for him; no conversations, deeds, impressions, desires, except to get drunk and forget ... Longing, disgust, hatred consumed him until they turned into a deep mist of despair, as if the lid of the coffin had slammed shut. On a gray December morning, Stepan Vladimirovich was found dead in bed.
Ten years have passed. The abolition of serfdom, coupled with the preparations that preceded it, dealt a terrible blow to Arina Petrovna's authority. Rumors exhausted the imagination and inspired horror: what is the name of Agashka Agafya Fedorovna? How to feed a horde of former serfs - or let them out on all four sides? And how to release, if education does not allow you to give, or accept, or cook for yourself? In the midst of the fuss, Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev died quietly and humbly, thanking God that he did not allow himself to appear before his face along with the serfs. Despondency and confusion seized Arina Petrovna, which Porfiry took advantage of with crafty, truly Judas dexterity. Arina Petrovna divided the estate, leaving only the capital for herself, with the best part allocated to Porfiry, and worse to Pavel. Arina Petrovna continued, as usual, to round up the estate (now her son), until she completely belittled her own capital and moved, offended by the ungrateful Porfish, to her youngest son, Pavel.
Pavel Vladimirovich undertook to water and feed his mother and nieces, but forbade anyone to interfere with his orders and visit him. The estate was plundered before our eyes, and Pavel drank alone, finding solace in the fumes of drunken fantasies that gave a victorious outlet to his heavy hatred for his blood-drinking brother. This is how his mortal illness found him, without giving him time and considerations to make a will in favor of the orphans or his mother. Therefore, Pavel's estate went to the hated Porfish-Judas, and mother and nieces left for the village, once "abandoned" by Arina Petrovna's daughter; Judas escorted them affectionately, inviting them to visit in a kindred way!
However, Lyubinka and Anninka quickly grew homesick in the hopeless silence of the impoverished estate. After a few lines to please the grandmother, the young ladies left. Unable to endure the emptiness of helpless loneliness and despondent idleness, Arina Petrovna nevertheless returned to Golovlevo.
Now the family results are as follows: only the widowed owner Porfiry Vladimirovich, mother and deacon's daughter Evprakseyushka (the unlawful consolation of a widower) inhabit the once flourishing estate. The son of Yudushka Vladimir committed suicide, having despaired of getting help from his father to feed his family; another son, Peter, serves as an officer. Judas does not even remember them, neither the living nor the deceased, his life is filled with an endless mass of empty deeds and words. He experiences some anxiety, anticipating the requests of his nieces or son, but besides, he is sure that no one and nothing will lead him out of a senseless and useless pastime. And so it happened: neither the appearance of the completely desperate Peter, who lost state money and prayed to his father for salvation from dishonor and death, nor the formidable maternal “I curse!”, Not even the imminent death of his mother - nothing changed the existence of Judas. While he was busy and counting his mother's inheritance, the twilight enveloped his consciousness more and more densely. It was a little light in the soul with the arrival of Anninka's niece, a living feeling seemed to peep through his usual empty talk - but Anninka left, fearing life with her uncle more than the fate of a provincial actress, and Judas was left with only unlawful family joys with Evprakseyushka.
However, Evprakseyushka is no longer as unresponsive as she used to be. Previously, she needed a little for peace and joy: kvass, soaked apples, and in the evening to turn into a fool. Pregnancy lit up Evprakseyushka with a premonition of an attack, at the sight of Judas she was overtaken by an unaccountable fear - and the resolution of expectation by the birth of her son fully proved the correctness of instinctive horror; Judas sent the newborn to an orphanage, forever separating him from his mother. The evil and invincible disgust that seized Evprakseyushka soon degenerated into hatred for the escheat master. A war of petty cavils, wounds, deliberate nastiness began - and only such a war could be crowned with victory over Judas. For Porfiry Vladimirovich, the thought was impossible that he himself would have to languish in labor instead of the usual idle talk. He faded completely and became completely wild, while Yevprakseyushka darted into a child of carnal lust, choosing between a coachman and a clerk. But in the office, he dreamed of tormenting, ruining, depriving, sucking blood, mentally taking revenge on the living and the dead. The whole world, accessible to his meager contemplation, was at his feet...
The final settlement for Yudushka came with the return of Anninka’s niece to Golovlevo: she didn’t come to live, but to die, coughing muffledly and pouring vodka on the terrible memory of past humiliations, of drunken stupor with merchants and officers, of lost youth, beauty, purity, the beginnings of talent, about the suicide of Sister Lyubinka, who soberly judged that there was not even a reason to live, if there was only shame, poverty and the street ahead. On dreary evenings, my uncle and niece drank and reminisced about Golovlev's deaths and mutilations, for which Anninka furiously blamed Judas. Each word of Anninka breathed such cynical hatred that suddenly a previously unknown conscience began to wake up in Judas. Yes, and the house, filled with intoxicated, prodigal, tormented ghosts, contributed to endless and fruitless mental torment. The terrible truth lit up before Judas: he has already grown old, and all around he sees only indifference and hatred; why did he lie, talk idle, oppress, hoard? The only bright point in the darkness of the future was the thought of self-destruction - but death seduced and teased, but did not go ...
Toward the end of Holy Week, in a wet March blizzard, at night Porfiry Vladimirovich decided to suddenly go to say goodbye to his mother’s grave, but not in the way they usually say goodbye, but to ask for forgiveness, fall to the ground and freeze in cries of death agony. He slipped out of the house and wandered along the road, feeling neither snow nor wind. Only the next day did the news come that the stiffened corpse of the last Golovlev gentleman had been found, Anninka was lying in a fever and did not regain consciousness, therefore the rider carried the news to her second cousin, who had been vigilantly following everything that was happening in Golovlev since last autumn.
Retold by R. A. Kharlamova.
Critics called Saltykov-Shchedrin “the great master of laughter,” but when we read his chronicle novel The Golovlevs, we don’t laugh, because a heavy, oppressive feeling permeates this work from beginning to end. Something sinister, unkind emanates even from the pictures of the spring revival. In the novel there is not a single hint of the poetry of a noble nest, old linden alleys, a fragrant garden, which we find in the works of Turgenev, Goncharov, Nekrasov and other Russian classics who made attempts to create family novels. Saltykov-Shchedrin presents pictures of a ruthless and harsh nature, a fading noble life, and everything speaks of hopelessness and extinction.
His novel "G.G." Saltykov-Shchedrin titled: "Episodes from the life of one family." Indeed, each chapter is a complete story, but in general, the novel is a single work of art about the tragic fate of the "escheat family", about the degradation and death of its individual members. Each chapter (“Family Court”, “In a Kindred Way”, “Escheat”, “Calculation” and others) tells about death, more precisely about the killing of one of the representatives of the Golovlev family.
The Golovlev family is doomed to death: here everyone hates each other and everyone longs for the death of their neighbor in order to quickly become an heir, and therefore the entire Golovlev family is “escheated”. The head of the "family" is a frivolous person, always drunk, leading the lowest way of life. Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev has been hating his wife, Arina Petrovna, for 40 years, and she herself is "filled with contemptuous hatred for her jester husband." And, apparently, this hatred was inherited by all close relatives of the Golovlevs, despite the fact that “aunt” and “uncle”, “sister” and “brother” spoke to each other here. In reality, the “uncle” ate from the same bowl with the dog Trezorka, and the “aunt” died from “moderation” (that is, from hunger).
Throughout the novel, readers are presented with a gallery of dying relatives: Styopka the Stupid dies; Lubinka commits suicide; we learn about Anninka's death at the end; buried Arina Petrovna, "wishing everyone well"; the stiff corpse of Golovlev-master (Iudushka-Porfiry) was found, who ended his life in the mud by the road no better than a stray dog.
The Golovlev estate itself is a kind of state, that is, feudal Russia in miniature. Relationships and business relations in the family are social relations. The main incentive of the Golovlev family is hoarding and acquisitiveness, and it is because of this that a tragedy is played out here: relatives who have violated moral and family foundations die one after another. Everyone dies differently, but almost everyone has a shameful and painful death. “The Golovlevs are death itself, always waiting for a new victim,” writes the satirist.
The ill-fated "sword of Damocles" seems to be hanging over the Golovlev family. Before the eyes of the bloodthirsty Judas, everyone dies, and the reasons for this largely lie in the past of the family, whose grandfathers and great-grandfathers were “naughty, empty-minded and worthless drunkards.” Helplessness, laziness and unsuitability for work were brought up in all representatives of the Golovlev family from the very beginning: they despised work, considering it the lot of "mean people" (that is, the common people). The only thing that the Golovlevs knew how to do was to morally cripple and humiliate their servants and loved ones. So gradually they all perish, becoming victims of the depravity and crimes of others, or commit suicide, having lived a life in vain.
The great Russian writer M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin was engaged in writing the novel "Lord Golovlevs" in the period from 1875 to 1880. According to literary critics, the work consists of several separate works, which over time were combined into one whole. Some of the short stories that later became the basis of the work were published in the journal Otechestvennye Zapiski. However, only in 1880 the novel was created by the writer in its entirety.
Like most of the works of Saltykov-Shchedrin, the novel “Lord Golovlev”, a brief summary of which we recall today, is riddled with a kind of melancholy and hopelessness. True, this does not prevent one from easily perceiving the confident and clear literary style of the writer.
difficult time
In part, such “sadness-longing” is attributed by critics to the fact that the described events of the novel do not occur at the best time for Russia. The brilliant age of strong emperors has already ended, the state is experiencing a certain decline. In addition, the abolition of serfdom is coming - an event with which neither the landlords nor the majority of the peasants know what to do. Both those and others do not really imagine the future way of life. Undoubtedly, this adds some wariness to society, which is reflected in the novel.
However, if you look at the events described from a slightly different angle, it becomes obvious that it is not a matter of a radical change in the historical era and the usual way of life. There are all signs of the usual decomposition of certain social strata (and this does not have to be precisely the noble caste). If you carefully study the literature of that time, you can clearly see: as soon as the primary accumulation of capital ended, subsequent generations of craft, trade and noble families squandered it uncontrollably. This is exactly the story that Saltykov-Shchedrin told in the novel “Lord Golovlevs”.
This phenomenon was associated with a more or less stable economic system, the absence of global wars, as well as the rule of fairly liberal emperors. In other words, the efforts that were required from the ancestors in order to survive, earn capital and give birth to viable offspring were no longer required. Such trends were observed in the history of all the once powerful world empires, the existence of which was nearing decline.
nobles
Saltykov-Shchedrin in the novel “Lord Golovlevs” (a brief summary, of course, does not convey the true moods of the author), using the example of a single noble family, tries to describe precisely this order of things. The once powerful noble Golovlev family is experiencing the first signs of confusion and uncertainty about the future in connection with the impending abolition of serfdom.
But in spite of everything, the capital of the family and possessions are still multiplying. The main merit in this belongs to the hostess - Arina Petrovna Golovleva, a wayward and tough woman. With an iron fist, she rules over her many estates. However, not everything is in order in the family itself. Her husband is Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev, an extremely careless person. He practically does not engage in extensive farming, devoting himself all day to the dubious muse of the poet Barkov, running after yard girls and drunkenness (still secret and dimly expressed). This is how the older characters, the Golovlevs, are briefly characterized in the novel.
Arina Petrovna, tired of fighting the vices of her husband, devotes herself entirely to economic affairs. She does this so enthusiastically that she even forgets about her children, for the sake of which, in essence, wealth is increased.
Styopka-stupid
The Golovlevs have four children - three sons and a daughter. In the novel "Lord Golovlevs" chapters are devoted to describing the fate of noble descendants. The eldest son, Stepan Vladimirovich, was an exact copy of his father. He inherited from Vladimir Mikhailovich the same eccentric character, mischief and restlessness, for which he was nicknamed Styopka the Stupid in the family. From his mother, the eldest son inherited a rather interesting trait - the ability to find the weaknesses of human characters. Stepan used this gift exclusively for buffoonery and mocking people, for which he was often beaten by his mother.
Entering the university, Stepan showed an absolute unwillingness to study. Stepan devotes all his free time to revelry with richer students, who take him to their noisy companies exclusively as a jester. Considering that the mother sent a rather meager amount of support for his education, this way of spending time helped the eldest offspring of the Golovlevs to exist quite well in the capital. Having received a diploma, Stepan begins long ordeals in various departments, but he still does not find the desired job. The reason for these failures lies in the same unwillingness and inability to work.
The mother nevertheless decides to support the unlucky son and gives him a Moscow house as a possession. But it did not help. Soon Arina Petrovna learns that the house has been sold, and for very little money. Stepan partially mortgaged it, partially lost it, and now he humiliates himself to the point of begging for wealthy peasants who live in Moscow. Soon he realizes that there are no more prerequisites for his further stay in the capital. On reflection, Stepan returns to his native estate so as not to think about a piece of bread.
Runaway Anna
Happiness did not smile at Anna's daughter either. The Golovlevs (the analysis of their actions is quite simple - they talk about the desire to give the children a foundation for building their lives) sent her to study. Her mother hoped that after graduation, Anna would successfully replace her in household matters. But even here the Golovlevs made a mistake.
Unable to bear such betrayal, Anna Vladimirovna dies. Arina Petrovna is forced to give shelter to the two remaining orphans.
younger children
The middle son - Porfiry Vladimirovich - was the exact opposite of Stepan. From a young age, he was very meek and affectionate, helpful, but he liked to gossip, for which he received from Stepan the unpleasant nicknames Yudushka and Kropivushka. Arina Petrovna did not particularly trust Porfiry, treating him more with caution than with love, but she always gave him the best pieces during meals, appreciating devotion.
The younger one, Pavel Vladimirovich, is presented in the novel as a lethargic and infantile man, not like the rest of the Golovlevs. An analysis of his character reveals a certain kindness, although, as emphasized later in the novel, he did not do good deeds. Pavel was rather intelligent, but he did not show his mind anywhere, living gloomy and unsociable in a world known to him alone.
The bitter fate of Stepan
So now we know who the Golovlevs are. We will continue to recall the summary of the novel from the moment when Stepan, having failed in the capital, returns to his native estate for a family court. It is the family that must decide the fate of the unlucky eldest son.
But the Golovlevs (Saltykov-Shchedrin quite vividly describes the discussions on this topic) almost withdrew themselves and did not develop a common opinion to solve the problem that had arisen. The first to rebel was the head of the family, Vladimir Mikhailovich. He showed extreme disrespect to his wife, calling her a "witch", and refused any discussion of Stepan's fate. The main motive for this reluctance is that it will still be the way Arina Petrovna wants. The younger brother Pavel also avoided solving this problem, saying that his opinion definitely does not interest anyone in this house.
Seeing complete indifference to the fate of his brother, Porfiry enters the game. He, allegedly pitying his brother, justifies him, says a lot of words about his unfortunate fate and begs his mother to leave his older brother under supervision in Golovlev (the name of the estate gave the surname to the noble family). But not just like that, but in exchange for Stepan's refusal of the inheritance. Arina Petrovna agrees, not seeing anything wrong in this.
This is how the Golovlevs changed Stepan's life. Roman Saltykov-Shchedrin continues with a description of the further existence of Stepan, saying that this is a living hell. He sits all day in a dirty little room, eats meager food and is often applied to alcohol. It seems that, being in his parents' house, Stepan should return to normal life, but the callousness of his relatives and the lack of basic amenities gradually drive him into gloomy melancholy, and then into depression. The absence of any desires, longing and hatred, with which memories of his unhappy life come, bring the eldest son to death.
After years
The work of "Lord Golovlev" continues ten years later. Much is changing in the leisurely life of a noble family. First of all, everything is turned upside down by the abolition of serfdom. Arina Petrovna is at a loss. She doesn't know how to keep housekeeping. What to do with the peasants? How to feed them? Or maybe you need to let them go on all four sides? But they themselves seem to be not yet ready for such freedom.
At this time, Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev quietly and peacefully passes away. Arina Petrovna, despite the fact that she clearly did not love her husband during her lifetime, falls into despondency. Porfiry took advantage of this state of hers. He persuades his mother to share the estate fairly. Arina Petrovna agrees, leaving herself only the capital. The younger gentlemen Golovlevs (Judushka and Pavel) divided the estate among themselves. An interesting fact is that Porfiry managed to bargain for himself the best part.
Wanderings of an old woman
The novel “Lord Golovlevs” tells how, continuing to follow her usual way of life, Arina Petrovna tried to further increase her filial estate. However, the mediocre management of Porfiry leaves her without money. Offended by the ungrateful and mercenary son, Arina Petrovna moves to the youngest. Pavel undertook to feed and water his mother along with his nieces in exchange for complete non-interference in the affairs of the estate. The aged Mrs. Golovleva agrees.
But the estate was run very badly because of Paul's penchant for alcohol. And while he "safely" quietly drank himself, finding consolation in intoxicating himself with vodka, the estate was plundered. Arina Petrovna could only silently observe this disastrous process. In the end, Pavel finally lost his health and died, without even having time to write off the remains of his mother's estate. And once again Porfiry took possession of the property.
Arina Petrovna did not wait for mercy from her son and, together with her granddaughters, went to a wretched village, once “abandoned” by her daughter Anna. Porfiry did not seem to drive them away, on the contrary, having learned about the departure, he wished good luck and invited them to visit him more often in a relative way, writes Saltykov. Gentlemen Golovlevs are not famous for affection for each other, but education obliges.
The grown-up granddaughters of Arina Petrovna Anninka and Lyubinka, having left for a remote village, very quickly cannot stand her monotonous life. After arguing a little with their grandmother, they rush to the city, looking for a better life, as it seems to them. After grieving alone, Arina Petrovna decides to return to Golovlevo.
Children of Porfiry
And how do the remaining gentlemen of the Golovlevs live? The summary of the description of how they while away their days is depressing. Once blooming, today the huge estate is deserted; there are almost no inhabitants left in it. Porfiry, having become a widow, got himself a consolation - the deacon's daughter Evprakseyushka.
Porfiry's sons also did not work out. The eldest, Vladimir, desperate to get part of the inheritance from his stingy father for food, committed suicide. The second son - Peter - serves as an officer, but dejected by the lack of money and complete indifference of his father, he loses government money in the capital. In the hope that now, finally, Porfiry will help him, he arrives in Golovlevo and throws himself at his feet, begging him to save him from dishonor. But the father is adamant. He is not at all interested in either the dishonor of his son or the requests of his own mother, writes Saltykov-Shchedrin. Messrs. Golovlevs, and Porfiry in particular, do not waste energy on relatives. Being in frank stupidity and idle talk, Judas reacts exclusively to the priest's daughter, with whom she is forbidden to amuse herself.
Arina Petrovna, completely despairing, curses her son, but even this did not make any impression on Porfiry, however, like the subsequent death of his mother.
Porfiry diligently counts the remaining crumbs of money bequeathed to him by his mother, and again he thinks of nothing and no one except Evprakseyushka. The arrival of Anninka's niece slightly melted his stony heart. However, she, having lived for some time with a crazy uncle, decides that the life of a provincial actress is still better than rotting alive in Golovlev. And pretty quickly leaves the estate.
The worthlessness of existence
The remaining gentlemen of the Golovlevs dispersed to different places. The problems of Porfiry, whose life is again going on as usual, now concern his mistress Eupraxia. The future is seen by her as completely bleak next to such a stingy and angry person. The situation is aggravated by Evpraksia's pregnancy. Having given birth to a son, she is completely convinced that her fears were not groundless: Porfiry gives the baby to an orphanage. Evpraksia, on the other hand, hated Golovlev with a fierce hatred.
Without thinking twice, she declares a real war of nit-picking and disobedience to the evil and unbalanced master. What is most interesting, Porfiry really suffers from such tactics, not knowing how to spend time without his former mistress. Golovlev finally withdraws into himself, spending time in his office, hatching some terrible and known only to him plans for revenge on the whole world.
Without heirs
The pessimistic picture is complemented by the suddenly returned niece Anna. Completely exhausted by a beggarly existence and endless drinking with officers and merchants, she falls ill with an incurable disease. The fatal point in her life is the suicide of her sister Lubinka. After that, she no longer thinks of anything but death.
But before her death, Anninka set a goal for herself: to bring to the attention of her uncle all the meanness and filthiness of his essence. Drinking with him all night long in an empty estate, the girl drove Porfiry crazy with endless accusations and reproaches. Judas, in the end, realizes how worthless he lived his life, hoarding, humiliating and offending everyone around him. In an alcoholic frenzy, the simple truth begins to reach him that people like him simply have no place on this earth.
Porfiry decides to ask for forgiveness at his mother's grave. He is going on the road and goes into the bitter cold to the cemetery. The next day he was found frozen on the side of the road. Everything is bad with Anna. A woman is unable to fight a deadly disease that takes her strength every day. Soon she falls into a fever and loses consciousness, which no longer returns to her. And so a horse courier was sent to the neighboring village, where the second cousin of the Golovlyovs lived, who vigilantly followed the latest events on the estate. The Golovlevs no longer had direct heirs.
The reality reflected in the novel. The novel The Golovlevs was written by Shchedrin between 1875 and 1880. Separate parts of it were included as essays in a cycle called "Well-intentioned speeches." Within the framework of this cycle, for example, the chapters "Family Court", "In a Kindred Way", "Family Results" were printed. But, having received ardent approval from Nekrasov and Turgenev, Shchedrin decided to continue the story of the Golovlevs and separate it into a separate book. Its first edition appeared in 1880.
The crisis of the social system of Russia, which so sharply seized various spheres of her life, had a special effect on the disintegration of family relations. Family ties that once connected members of numerous noble families began to break before our eyes. The fragility of property and economic relations and the rottenness of the morality that held people united by family ties affected. The veneration of the elders has faded, the concern for the upbringing of the younger has faded. Ownership claims became decisive. All this was brilliantly shown by Shchedrin in the novel The Golovlevs, which became one of the highest achievements of Russian realism.
Three generations of one "noble nest". The writer recreated the life of a landlord family in pre-reform and especially post-reform Russia, the gradual disintegration of the "noble nest" and the degradation of its members. Decomposition captures three generations of the Golovlevs. Arina Petrovna and her husband Vladimir Mikhailovich belong to the older generation, their sons Porfiry, Stepan and Pavel belong to the middle generation, and the grandchildren Petenka, Volodenka, Anninka and Lyubinka belong to the younger generation. One of the features of the composition of Shchedrin's book is that each of its chapters includes the death of one of the Golovlevs as the most important result of the existence of the "fraudulent family". The first chapter shows the death of Stepan, the second - Pavel, the third - Vladimir, the fourth - Arina Petrovna and Peter (there is a multiplication of deaths before our eyes), the last chapter tells about the death of Lyubinka, the death of Porfiry and the dying of Anninka.
The writer outlines a kind of predestination for the degradation of members of the ramified Golovlev family. Stepan once recalls the details that characterize the order in Golovlevo: “Here is Uncle Mikhail Petrovich (colloquially Mishka-buyan), who also belonged to the number of “hateful” and whom grandfather Pyotr Ivanych imprisoned to his daughter in Golovlevo, where he lived in the servants' room and ate from one cup with the Trezorka dog. Here is Aunt Vera Mikhailovna, who, out of mercy, lived in Golovlev's estate with brother Vladimir Mikhailovich and who died of moderation, "because Arina Petrovna reproached her with every piece eaten at dinner, and with every log of firewood "used to heat her room." It becomes clear that children in this family initially cannot respect their elders if they keep their parents in the position of dogs and at the same time starve. Another thing is also clear: children will repeat this practice in their own behavior. Shchedrin characterizes in detail the way of life and traces the fate of all the named representatives of the three generations.
Vladimir Mikhailovich and Arina Petrovna. Here is the head of the family - Vladimir Mikhailovich Golovlev known for his careless and mischievous character, idle and idle life. He is characterized by mental depravity, writing "free poems in the spirit of Barkov", which his wife called "filth", and their author - "windmill" and "stringless balalaika". Idle life increased the dissoluteness and "diluted" the brains of Golovlev Sr. Over time, he began to drink and lie in wait for the "maids". Arina Petrovna at first treated this with disgust, and then waved her hand at the "toadstool girls." Golovlev Sr. called his wife a "witch" and talked about her with his eldest son Stepan.
Arina herself Petrovna was the absolute mistress of the house. She used a lot of strength, energy and wolf's grip to expand her possessions, accumulate wealth and increase capital. Despotic and uncontrollable, she ruled the peasants and households, although she did not know how to cope with all four thousand souls that belonged to her. She devoted her whole life to acquiring, striving for accumulation and, as it seemed to her, to creation. However, this activity was meaningless. In her zeal and hoarding, she is very reminiscent of Gogol's Plyushkin. Her son Stepan talks about his mother like this: “How much, brother, she has rotted good - passion!<...>There’s an abyss of fresh stock, and she won’t even touch it until she eats all the old rot!” She keeps her rich supplies in cellars and barns, where they turn into decay. The writer endows Arina Petrovna with terrible cruelty. The novel begins with the fact that the mistress of the estate is cracking down on the Moscow innkeeper Ivan Mikhailovich, an innocent person, giving him as a recruit.
Arina Petrovna talks a lot about "family ties." But this is just hypocrisy, because she does nothing to strengthen the family and methodically ruins it. According to Shchedrin, the children “did not touch a single string of her inner being,” since these strings themselves did not exist, and she turned out to be the same “stringless balalaika” as her husband. Her cruelty towards children knows no bounds: she can starve them, keep them locked up, like Stepan, not be interested in their health when they are sick. She is convinced that if she “thrown away a piece” to her son, then she should no longer know him. Arina Petrovna hypocritically announces that she “accumulates money” for orphan girls and takes care of them, but feeds them rotten corned beef and showers reproaches on these “beggars”, “parasites”, “insatiable wombs”, and in a letter to Porfiry angrily calls them “ puppies." She tries to belittle her children, already humiliated, even more, specifically choosing suitable insults for this. "What are you, like a mouse on the rump, pouted!" she shouts to Pavel. And in other cases, she resorts to such comparisons, which should coarsen the statement, trample the interlocutor into the dirt. “What was it like for me to find out that he had thrown a parental blessing, like a gnawed bone, into a garbage pit? she asks. “For nothing, a pimple on the nose will not jump up,” the mother instructs her hateful children. And right there, he sanctimoniously tries to frame everything with deanery, references to God and the Church. And he necessarily accompanies these actions with falsehood and lies. This is how she greets her sons when they appear at the family court: solemnly, heartbroken, with dangling legs. And Shchedrin remarks: “In general, in the eyes of the children, she loved to play the role of a respectable and dejected mother ...” But the constant thirst for enrichment, rounding off the estate and hoarding killed in her and completely perverted the feelings of her mother. As a result, that “family stronghold”, which she seemed to erect, collapsed. It is curious that the name Peter and patronymic Petrovich, Petrovna especially often flash in the list of Golovlyovs, deafly recalling the etymology of this word (“stone”). But all the bearers of this name, up to Petenka, leave the stage one by one and die. The "stone" of the stronghold turns out to be undermined and destroyed. Brother Mikhail Petrovich dies, then her husband, then the eldest and youngest sons, the daughter and grandchildren die. And Arina Petrovna actively contributes to this. Everything that she seemed to create turned out to be illusory, and she herself turned into a pitiful and disenfranchised host with dull eyes and a hunched back.
Shchedrin characterizes in detail the life and fate of the eldest son of the landowner - Stepan. Accustomed under the guidance of his father to “play tricks” from childhood (either he will cut the scarf of the girl Anyuta into pieces, then he will put flies in the sleepy Vasyutka’s mouth, then he will steal a pie from the kitchen), he does the same in his forties: on the way to Golovlevo he steals with his companions a damask of vodka and sausage and is going to “send to hailo” all the flies that have stuck around his neighbor’s mouth. It is no coincidence that this eldest son of the Golovlevs is nicknamed in the family Styopka the Stooge and the “lanky stallion” and plays the role of a real jester in the house. He is distinguished by a slavish character, intimidated, humiliated by those around him, he does not leave the feeling that he, “like a worm, will die of hunger.” Gradually, he finds himself in the position of a hanger-on, living on the edge of the "gray abyss", in the role of a hateful son. He drinks himself, forgotten and despised by everyone, and dies either from a dissolute life, or starved to death by his own mother.
The eternal type of Porfiry Golovlev. Most vividly in Shchedrin's novel, Stepan's brother is drawn - Porfiry Golovlev. WITH childhood, he was endowed with three nicknames. One - "an outspoken boy" - was probably due to his predilection for whispering. The other two especially accurately expressed the essence of this Shchedrin hero. He was nicknamed Judas, the name of a traitor. But in Shchedrin this gospel name appears in a diminutive form, since Porfiry's betrayals are not grandiose, but everyday, everyday, albeit vile, causing a feeling of disgust. So, during the family court, he betrays his brother Stepan, and then he does the same with his younger brother, Pavel, contributing to his imminent death. The dying Paul addresses him with indignant words: “Judas! Traitor! Let mother go around the world! This time the word "Judas" is heard without its diminutive suffix. Betrays Porfiry and many other people depicted in the novel. Porfiry's third nickname is "The Blood Drinker". Both brothers represent him as a vampire. According to Stepan, "this one will fit into the soul without soap." “And his mother, the“ old witch ”, will eventually decide: he will suck the estate and capital out of her.” And in the eyes of Paul, Porfiry looks like a "blood drinker." “He knew,” notes the author, “that the eyes of Judas exude poison, that his voice, like a snake, crawls into the soul and paralyzes the will of a person.” And that is why he is so confused by his "bad image." This ability of Judas to suck blood from people is especially clearly manifested first in the scene at the bedside of the sick Pavel, and then in the episode of the mother’s preparations, when he is ready to inspect her chests and take away her tarantass from her.
Judas has such properties as constant flattery, sycophancy and servility. At that time, when his mother was in power, he obsequiously listened to her, smiled, sighed, rolled his eyes, spoke gentle words to her, agreed with her. “Porfiry Vladimirych was ready to tear the robes on himself, but he was afraid that in the village, perhaps, there would be no one to repair them.”
Even more disgusting is the hypocrisy of Porfiry Golovlev. The author of the novel, speaking about the behavior of his hero at the bedside of a dying man, notes: this hypocrisy "was to such an extent the need of his nature that he could not interrupt the comedy once started." In the chapter “Family Results”, Shchedrin emphasizes that Yudushka was “a hypocrite of a purely Russian kind, that is, simply a person devoid of any moral standard”, and this property was combined in him with “ignorance without borders”, hypocrisy, lies and litigiousness. Each time, this hypocrite and deceiver strives to turn to God, to remember the Scriptures, while raising his hands in prayer and rolling his eyes languidly upwards. But when he portrays a prayer, he thinks of something else and whispers something that is not at all divine.
Judas is characterized by "mental debauchery" and idle talk. He, according to the author, goes into a "binge of idle thought." From morning to evening, he "languished over a fantastic work": built all sorts of unrealistic assumptions, "taking into account himself, talking with imaginary interlocutors." And all this was subject to his predatory and “thirst for acquisition”, because in his thoughts he tyrannized, tormented people, imposed fines on them, ruined and sucked blood. Idlethinking finds for itself an excellent form of embodiment - idle talk, the master of which was Shchedrin's hero. This manifests itself during the trial of Stepan and in the episodes when his mother became a listener to his idle talk. Each of his low deeds, each of his slander and complaint against people, he invariably furnishes with empty talk and false phraseology. At the same time, according to Shchedrin, he does not talk, but “pulls the rigmarole”, “gathers”, “rants”, “annoys”, “itches”. And therefore, it was not just idle talk, but “a stinking ulcer that constantly sharpened pus out of itself” and an unchanging “deceitful word”. Shchedrin, portraying Porfiry Golovlev, relies on Gogol's traditions. Like Sobakevich, he praises his faithful serf servants. Like Plyushkin, he hoards and sits in a greasy dressing gown. Like Manilov, he indulges in meaningless reverie and idle calculations. But at the same time, brilliantly combining the comic with the tragic, Shchedrin creates his own, unique image, which has entered the gallery of world types.
The satirist perfectly reproduces the relationship between the mistress of the estate and Judas with representatives of the third generation of the Golovlevs. It turns out that the latter are victims of the ruthless attitude of greedy money-grubbers and hypocrites, cruel or criminally indifferent people. This applies, first of all, to the children of Judas himself.
The third generation, Vladimir, Petenka and nieces. Vladimir, when starting a family, he counted on his father's financial assistance, especially since Judas promised to support him. But at the last moment the hypocrite and traitor refused the money, and Vladimir shot himself in a fit of despair. Another son of Judas - Petenka- squandered public money. He also comes to the rich father, counting on help. Having entangled his son with Jesuit phraseology, defining his son’s request as extortion “for lousy deeds,” Yudushka kicks out Petenka, who turned out to be convicted and died on the road, not reaching the place of exile. With his mistress, Yevprakseyushka, Iudushka takes on another son, whom he sends to a Moscow orphanage. The baby could not endure the roads in the winter and died, becoming another victim of the "bloodsucker".
A similar fate awaits the granddaughters of Arina Petrovna, the nieces of Judas - Lubinka and Anninka, twins left after the death of their mother. Defenseless and deprived of help, embroiled in a lawsuit, they cannot withstand the pressure of life circumstances. Lyubinka resorts to suicide, and Yudushka, who did not find the strength to drink poison, turns Anninka into a living dead and pursues Golovlyovo with his harassment, anticipating the agony and death of this last soul from the Golovlev family. So Shchedrin conveyed the story of the moral and physical degeneration of three generations of a noble family, the decay of its foundations.
genre of the novel. Before us chronicle novel, consisting of seven relatively independent chapters, similar to Shchedrin's essays, but held together by a single plot and rigid chronology, subject to the idea of steady degradation and death. At the same time, this is a family novel, comparable to E. Zola's epic Rougon-Macquart. With all his pathos, he debunks the idea of \u200b\u200bthe integrity and strength of the noble family and testifies to the deep crisis of the latter. The peculiarity of the genre determined the originality of such components of the novel as landscape with his stingy laconicism, gloomy coloring and gray, poor colors; images of everyday things that play a special role in the possessive world of the Golovlevs; portrait, emphasizing the steady "escheat" of the characters; a language that perfectly reveals the essence of the reproduced characters and conveys the position of the satirist himself, his bitter irony, sarcasm and apt formulas of his naked speech.
Questions and tasks:
As the crisis of the Russian social system and the disintegration of familiesny relations affected in the novel by M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin?
What do you see as the features of the composition of this satirist's book?
What is remarkable in the appearance and behavior of senior membersof the "failed" family?
How did the life of Styopka the Stooge turn out?
To what means of artistic representation do youM.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin resorts to strikingness when depictingthe defeat of Porfiry Golovlev?
What awaits in the life of the representatives of the third generationGolovlyov?
How do you define the genre of Shchedrin's work?
