Kuprin, "Olesya": analysis of the work, problems, theme, main characters. Olesya Kuprin analysis of problems

During the years of the growth of revolutionary sentiments, when society was in constant search for insight and the truth of life, the work of A.I. Kuprin was formed. At the heart of his numerous works lay the complex psychological theme of knowledge. He attracted readers with the capacious, accessible and dynamic content of his works. The most famous of them is the story "Olesya". The analysis of this book offers you the Wise Litrecon.

It is interesting that in the very work of A.I. Kuprin can be divided into two periods, the line between which can be clearly seen in the subject and style of writing works.

1. At the beginning of his career, the writer paid much attention to purely everyday topics. Most likely, this was due to the rich life experience of A.I. Kuprin, who tried himself in many fields of activity. Feeling all the hardships of life and knowing the features of the life of the poor, the writer created life texts based on what he saw, heard and felt.
2. The second period of his work begins with the February Revolution. It was then that his works were permeated with the desire for democratic change. In addition, the subject matter of the texts also changed: A.I. Kuprin mainly described the beggarly and devastated life of a Russian emigrant.

The famous story "Olesya" belongs to the early period of the writer's work, which was first published in 1898 in the newspaper "Kyivlyanin" with the subtitle "From the memories of Volyn". Later, in 1905, Kuprin completed the introduction to the story, in which he described the history of the creation of the work itself. Here are interesting facts about the spelling of "Olesya":

1. The story "Olesya" is based on a real story from the life of the landowner Ivan Timofeevich Poroshin, who once visited the writer. He told his own love story with the Polissya witch.
2. The work also contains autobiographical details: the main character is a writer, like the writer himself, he spent 6 months in Polesie, which also coincides with real facts.
3. Initially A.I. Kuprin wanted to publish the story in the Russian Wealth magazine as a continuation of the 'Polesye cycle'. But the editors of the magazine refused the writer, so the fate of the work has changed slightly. They were confused by the anti-religious background of the work: believers were negative characters, in contrast to the "servants of the devil."

Genre, direction

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, disputes flared up in the literary environment between representatives of the two leading trends in literary thought: realism and modernism. Alexander Ivanovich adhered to the realistic tradition, and therefore his story "Olesya" gathered the features of this trend. So, for example, the love of the main characters Olesya and Ivan Timofeevich was doomed to death in reality, so the author could not exchange the truth of life for beautiful and unrealizable dreams. And yet there is a place for romanticism in Kuprin's work: civilization is presented in gloomy colors, nature plays an independent role in the work, and the main character has everything.

The genre of the work is a story. Main features: chronicle plot, a small number of characters and the author's assessment of events experienced in real life. In addition, we see other features characteristic of the story: the whole plot revolves around one hero - Ivan Timofeevich, whose character manifests itself against the background of what is happening.

Composition and conflict

The composition of the work is a retrospective, as the author delves into memories from the past, when fate brought him to Polesie. There he got acquainted with the amazing story of the intellectual Ivan Timofeevich.

In addition to the retrospective, numerous oppositions form the basis of the composition. We can say that the whole story is a collection of various conflicts. Even at the very beginning, we see a struggle between technological progress and a quiet, peaceful life in the pagan Polesie. The reader sees a vivid confrontation between civilization and wildlife, which live according to different laws. Nature and civilization are the main conflict in the story "Olesya". The author sees depravity, vulgarity and stupidity in the city and people, but in nature - nobility, beauty and genuine generosity.

In addition, the plot is based on one of the main conflicts: Olesya and people (village residents). It becomes clear that this opposition is so strong that it is impossible to eliminate it. Olesya's efforts (going to church) only led to tragic consequences both for herself and for the village, which suffered from witches' spells.

Essence: what is the story about?

The essence of the work "Olesya" is very simple. In the small village of Perebrod on the outskirts of Polissya, the young writer Ivan Timofeevich, by the will of fate, wanders during the next forest trip to the house of the local witch Manuilikha. At that time, the hero could not even imagine what this chance meeting would lead to.

There he meets the beautiful Olesya, who charms him. From that moment begins their fantastic love story. The young sorceress is trying in every possible way to avoid meeting Ivan, because the cards predicted her death from an unexpected guest. Olesya's fate was sealed.

Main characters and their characteristics

The main characters of the story are the young sorceress Olesya and the writer-nobleman Ivan Timofeevich. The main character is a young village girl, 25 years old, who lives in the forest with her grandmother Manuilikha. Olesya is illiterate, but very smart. She loves nature and a quiet life away from people. Ivan Timofeevich, the central character of the story, on the contrary, is a very literate and well-read person by the nature of his occupation. He came to Polissya on official business, but by the will of fate fell in love with a young sorceress.

The reader sees that for the peasants the witch's lair is a forbidden place where a person's foot should not enter, but Kuprin's attitude towards Olesya and her grandmother is completely different. We do not see negative ratings in the description. He, on the contrary, exposes the main character in a more favorable light, because even her illiteracy does not look bad against the background of kindness and modesty.

Topics

The theme of the book "Olesya" is romantic and realistic at the same time:

1. The main theme of the story "Olesya"- the love line of Olesya and Ivan Timofeevich. In the center is a pure and real feeling, for which the main character is ready for any sacrifice. For the sake of the chosen one, she goes to shame, knowing in advance about the pain that she will have to endure.
2. Despite the fact that the theme of love occupies a central place, the work is clearly visible and the theme of the relationship between nature and man, which begins to unfold from the very beginning of the work. The author shows us the confrontation between civilization and wildlife.
3. Against the backdrop of nature reveals and natural man theme brought up by the cradle of nature. Such were Olesya and Manuilikha - open and free from prejudices and clichés. We can say that the main character embodies the same moral ideal, because she is distinguished by kindness, responsiveness and fortitude. She does not seek to take possession of the chosen one, but gives him freedom.
4. Dream Theme also appears in the text. Unlike the villagers, whose thinking is mired in prejudices, Olesya lives by a dream, not by standards.

Problems

The problems of the story "Olesya" are diverse and interesting even today:

• In the first place, of course, tragic love main characters. The story of their love was originally doomed to a tragic ending, because the cruelty of this world does not allow breaking the standards and rules. Society is not ready to accept those who do not want to live according to patterns, which is why Olesya is forced to leave her native forests.
• The problem of cruelty permeates the entire text: the villagers go to church, but do not learn to forgive and love. They torture and kill their own kind (for example, a horse thief who had nails driven into his heels), but at the same time maintain an appearance of decency and piety.
• The author reveals the world of human feelings against the backdrop of a love line. In his story, not everything is as clear as one would like. Ivan's love is sincere, but at the same time he is not able to stand up for her. Kuprin describes his hesitation, ridiculous for a real feeling: how will Olesya look in a dress among his acquaintances? Should she go to church? But the heroine openly admits that she will not be jealous and captive to the chosen one: he is free, and let him not take her into his world, just give her love here and now.
• The Problem of Destiny also occupies an important place in the story. The writer shows how cruelly fate can play with people's lives. This is not so much a predestination of fortune-telling as a logical balance of forces and circumstances: Olesya is not a couple for the master. After all, even a great and pure feeling cannot overcome what was previously predetermined by fate.

Details

Details in the story "Olesya" play a special role. So, for example, even the embodiment of love has its own innovative facets: at the beginning of the birth of pure and sincere feelings, we see how nature rejoices and pours out sunlight, but at the end of the work, nature also dies with the death of love: an icy hail strikes the seedlings of the villagers.

The language of the story is quite simple. A.I. Kuprin tried to make the work as accessible as possible for a simple layman who seeks to comprehend the truth of life. The author tried not to overload the text with quick-witted expressive means in order to convey his main thoughts to the readers.

Meaning

The main idea of ​​the story "Olesya" is that there is essentially nothing behind a "civilized" society, because people who grew up far from civilization can turn out to be much smarter and more prudent. A natural person outside the crowd does not lose his individuality and does not submit to stereotyped thinking. The crowd is submissive and promiscuous, and often the worst of its members, not the best, take over.

In this regard, we can single out the main idea - the need for people to turn to nature to restore harmony. Olesya has become that very model of a pure and open person, living in relationship with the environment.

Criticism

The story "Olesya" - the famous works of A.I. Kuprin, which was duly appreciated by the writer's contemporaries. K. Barkhin called the work a "forest symphony", noting the literary charm of the work's language.

“I like this thing because it is all imbued with the mood of youth. After all, if you wrote it now, you would write even better, but that immediacy would no longer be in it ... ”(M. Gorky - A. Kuprin based on the memoirs of Kuprina-Iordanskaya,“ Years of Youth ”, 1960)

The story was rated very highly by Soviet critics, who saw in it a protest against bourgeois society:

With the protest against the internal enslavement of man, Kuprin’s motifs are connected with the well-known restlessness, lack of accommodation in the bosom of capitalist society, vagrancy in the spirit of Hamsun ... , "Forest Wilderness", etc.). (article "Russian Literature" in the "Literary Encyclopedia in 11 volumes", Moscow, 1929 -1939, volume 10 (1937))

Thus, the story "Olesya" occupies an important place, both in the work of A.I. Kuprin, and in the history of Russian classical literature.

The beautiful Olesya and her grandmother, the ancient Manuilikha, are hermit sorceresses who happily lived in their forest corner outside the current time and social space. The catastrophe came as soon as their microcosm came into contact with the big world - the authorities, the church, the peasants. Kuprin inherits the traditions of the author of the story "Cossacks" and overcomes them. The peasant world is hostile to Olesya, she is a child of nature. The people are men hammering nails into the heels of a thief, women beating a girl in God's temple. The magazine "Russian wealth" refused to publish the story, not agreeing with the interpretation of the people as an inert mass.

"Olesya" is one of the most heartfelt, probably, not only in our literature, works about love. The plot of the story is simple. A gentleman from the city comes to the province, is fascinated by the beauty of the "savage" villager, who loses her head at the courteous, knowledgeable resident of the capital. Love relationships develop quickly and violently, but the romance of the characters is doomed. Belonging to different classes, different levels of education, the habit of different lifestyles - everything is against their union. A break is coming. A plot from the category of "wandering", on which many foreign and domestic classics (from N. M. Karamzin to L. N. Tolstoy, I. A. Bunin) built their works. "Naturally, each writer gave this plot his own twist. According to "Kuprin is also original in his own way. Usually, unable to withstand the pressure of circumstances, having cooled down, the man left, while the woman, in the halo of the author's and readers' sympathies, remained alone with her troubles, repentance. Ivan Timofeevich and Olesya parted at the peak of mutual feelings, convinced that that separation will make them unhappy for the rest of their lives. They part, although the master is ready to disregard the opinion of the world and enter into a marginal marriage. The initiator of the separation from Kuprin is a woman, and she does not regret what happened at all.

The critics who wrote that love here is "killed" by social relations are right, but this is not the main truth about the "forest symphony". In the relationship between the main characters, the psychological conflict plays a more significant role than the social one. He and she, unlike readers, perceive social reality as the norm of life. Not the threats of a thieving police officer, not a woman's pogrom at the church are the main reasons that Olesya leaves Ivan Timofeevich - they are in the mismatch of their natures, in her foreboding that such a mismatch will sooner or later break their union, make you regret former love.

In a certain sense, the character of Olesya is higher and wiser than the character of Nadezhda from I. A. Bunin's story "Dark Alleys". This judgment, of course, is not entirely justified: one story was created according to the canons of romantic poetics, the other - but to the canons of realistic poetics. But it’s hard not to compare these two plot-related works, not to note: Olesya leaves so that Ivan Timofeevich would never look at her the way Nikolai Alekseevich looked at Nadezhda from Bunin’s story years later, voluntarily or involuntarily comparing what is and what was: "Oh, how good you were! .. How hot, how beautiful! What a flock, what eyes!"

Symbolism, prediction, understatement are the effective springs of plot development. The mystical content of the character of a good sorceress is essential. Olesya knows everything in advance, this is the guarantee of her strength and weakness, victories and troubles. She understands that she is burdened with "supernatural knowledge" inaccessible to others, she knows that one has to pay for this: "all fortune-tellers are unfortunate." After the first meeting, she “reads” the character of her lover: “Your kindness is not good, not cordial. This divination predetermined her disappearance, which coincided in time with the threat of reprisals from the village. Olesya understands the peasants: after all, black power, He (Kuprin's italics) helps her... Note that the last sentimental-tragic meeting of lovers takes place before a thunderstorm and before a threat and is not at all perceived by Ivan Timofeevich as the last one, but Olesya perceives it that way. In retrospect, everything she said then appears as a touching farewell monologue.

Olesya causes deep sympathy, Ivan Timofeevich - sympathy. She is a whole person, he is different. Representing the city dweller in his internal monologues - and Kuprin was a master of this form - the author points to the painful split of the character, and the monologues themselves speak of the mind, insight of the village woman. (Note that a simple, open divination is not shown in internal monologues.) Offering Olesya a hand and heart, Ivan Timofeevich is having an internal argument with himself: “I did not even dare to imagine what Olesya would be like in a fashionable dress, talking in the living room with my wives colleagues ... "Offering to transport his grandmother to the city, he says to himself: "To be honest, the thought of my grandmother greatly jarred me." The hero can be understood as a human being, but this resignation does not decorate him. The spiritual level of Ivan Timofeevich is not much higher than the level of Nikolai Alekseevich Bunin, who came to the rhetorical question: "What nonsense! .. Nadezhda ... my wife, mistress of my St. Petersburg house, mother of my children?"

Of course, both writers are far from banal assessments of whether this or that character is “bad” or “good”, they first of all talk about the fact that life is more complicated than ethical formulas, that a person’s guilt and misfortune can merge into one whole. The guilt and misfortune of the characters depicted in these stories is rooted in the existence of different views on the "dark alleys", nature, on man, on God himself. They are different - Ivan Timofeevich and Olesya. He is just a bad good person, she is a "sweet ideal", a bright image from the "poetic legends" that he came to collect.

The author emphasizes the originality of Olesya. The secret of the girl's birth is not revealed. Manuilikha's beloved grandmother, aggressive, tearful, greedy, untidy, only resembles a granddaughter with a forest soul. The author resolutely breeds the girl and the peasants, the people. The rough, dry speech of the villagers is contrasted with the melodious, metaphorical, "magic" speech of the soothsayers. Poor fortune-tellers foresee evil ("shame ... the lady of clubs"), but their charms are powerless to prevent the inevitable. The awakening of feelings cannot be stopped, like the onset of morning, spring.

Olesya's actions are determined by such character traits as love of freedom, self-control, pride. Even love did not dull all this in her: the sacrifice of Ivan Timofeevich is not accepted. The locals, the narrator notes, are always ready to "kiss ... boots" whether the gentleman, the official. The author contrasts the knowledge-hungry mind of the girl with the mental laziness, stupidity of the villagers, otherwise he would hardly have paid so much attention to Yarmola's futile attempts to learn the spelling of his surname. They, hunters, cultivators, greedily take everything they can from nature, it helps nature. Olesya cannot stand the sight of a gun; on the pages of the story she appears from a song, with orphan finches in her apron. For her, everything in nature is beautiful, but people believe that a strong wind is a sign that "the witcher was born." Nature explains Olesya's behavior, the season, the earth, "thirsty ... motherhood", "that fresh insinuating and powerful drunken smell of spring." Nature, however, warns her, sends a sign of trouble: on the evening that decided her fate, the forest turned into a formidable "crimson reflection of the dying dawn ..."

Kuprin belongs to the category of artists who can work with a thin brush. A definition for a noun, a repetition of the same expression, an "accidental" mention of an extraneous interior detail - these and other dashed elements play an important role in its artistic whole. His paintings cannot be confused with the "pastel" of B.K. Zaitsev, with the "graphics" of I.A. Bunin.

Olesya says that she is not afraid of wolves as much as she is afraid of people. It is symbolic that the author named the village closest to the swamp "Volchee". Another name - "Perebrod" - is associated with the word "rabble", denoting fermented wine. About the drunkenness of the villagers - "barbarians", by the definition of Manuilikha - who lived around the spacious square "from church to bar" not once said. The symbolism in the story is varied. The image of the "road", "path", "path", "forest corridor" is symbolic, where the author most often describes homeless lovers. The breakage of the spindle thread is symbolic when Ivan Timofeevich comes on his first date to Olesya; meaningfully repeated mention of the "low shaky bench" on which he sits in the "hut on chicken legs", and much more.

History of creation

A. Kuprin's story "Olesya" was first published in 1898 in the newspaper "Kievlyanin" and was accompanied by a subtitle. "From memories of Volyn". It is curious that the writer first sent the manuscript to the Russian Wealth magazine, since before that the Kuprin story “Forest Wilderness”, also dedicated to Polesie, had already been published in this magazine. Thus, the author counted on creating the effect of continuation. However, "Russian wealth" for some reason refused to release "Olesya" (perhaps the publishers were not satisfied with the size of the story, because by that time it was the author's largest work), and the cycle planned by the author did not work out. But later, in 1905, "Olesya" came out in an independent edition, accompanied by an introduction from the author, which told the story of the creation of the work. Later, a full-fledged "Polesye cycle" was released, the apex and decoration of which was "Olesya".

The author's introduction has been preserved only in the archives. In it, Kuprin said that he was a guest in Polissya with a friend of the landowner Poroshin, he heard from him many legends and tales related to local beliefs. Among other things, Poroshin said that he himself was in love with a local witch. Kuprin will later tell this story in the story, at the same time including in it all the mysticism of local legends, the mysterious mystical atmosphere and the piercing realism of the situation surrounding him, the difficult fate of the Polissya inhabitants.

Analysis of the work

The plot of the story

Compositionally, "Olesya" is a retrospective story, that is, the author-narrator returns in his memories to the events that took place in his life many years ago.

The basis of the plot and the leading theme of the story is the love between the city nobleman (panych) Ivan Timofeevich and a young resident of Polissya, Olesya. Love is bright, but tragic, since its death is inevitable due to a number of circumstances - social inequality, the abyss between the characters.

According to the plot, the hero of the story, Ivan Timofeevich, spends several months in a remote village, on the edge of Volyn Polissya (the territory called Little Russia in tsarist times, today - the west of the Pripyat lowland, in northern Ukraine). A city dweller, he first tries to instill culture in the local peasants, heals them, teaches them to read, but the classes are unsuccessful, as people are overwhelmed by worries and they are not interested in either education or development. Ivan Timofeevich increasingly goes hunting in the forest, admires the local landscapes, sometimes listens to the stories of his servant Yarmola, who talks about witches and sorcerers.

Lost one day while hunting, Ivan finds himself in a forest hut - the same witch from Yarmola's stories - Manuilikha and her granddaughter Olesya - lives here.

The second time the hero comes to the inhabitants of the hut in the spring. Olesya tells fortunes to him, predicting an early unhappy love and adversity, up to a suicide attempt. The girl also shows mystical abilities - she can influence a person, inspiring her will or fear, stop the blood. Panych falls in love with Olesya, but she herself remains emphatically cold with him. He is especially angry that the panych stands up for her with her grandmother before the local police officer, who threatened to disperse the inhabitants of the forest hut for their supposed divination and harm to people.

Ivan falls ill and does not appear in the forest hut for a week, but when he arrives, it is noticeable that Olesya is happy to see him, and the feelings of both flare up. A month of secret dates and quiet, bright happiness passes. Despite the obvious and perceived inequality of lovers, Ivan makes an offer to Olesya. She refuses, arguing that she, a servant of the devil, should not go to church, and therefore, get married, entering into a marriage union. Nevertheless, the girl decides to go to church to make a pleasant panycha. Local residents, however, did not appreciate Olesya's impulse and attacked her, beating her badly.

Ivan hurries to the forest house, where the beaten, defeated and morally crushed Olesya tells him that her fears about the impossibility of their union have been confirmed - they cannot be together, so she and her grandmother will leave her house. Now the village is even more hostile to Olesya and Ivan - any whim of nature will be associated with her sabotage and sooner or later they will be killed.

Before leaving for the city, Ivan again goes to the forest, but in the hut he finds only red beads of woods.

Heroes of the story

Olesya

The main character of the story is the forest sorceress Olesya (her real name Alena is reported by her grandmother Manuilikha, and Olesya is the local version of the name). A beautiful, tall brunette with intelligent dark eyes immediately attracts Ivan's attention. The natural beauty in the girl is combined with the natural mind - despite the fact that the girl cannot even read, there is perhaps more tact and depth in her than in the city.

Olesya is sure that she is “not like everyone else” and soberly understands that for this dissimilarity she can suffer from the people. Ivan does not believe too much in Olesya's unusual abilities, believing that there is more centuries-old superstition here. However, he cannot deny the mysticism of the image of Olesya.

Olesya is well aware of the impossibility of her happiness with Ivan, even if he makes a strong-willed decision and marries her, therefore it is she who boldly and simply manages their relationship: firstly, she takes self-control, trying not to be imposed on the panych, and secondly, she decides to part seeing that they are not a couple. Secular life would be unacceptable for Olesya, her husband would inevitably become burdened by her after it became clear that there were no common interests. Olesya does not want to be a burden, to tie Ivan hand and foot, and leaves on her own - this is the heroism and strength of the girl.

Ivan Timofeevich

Ivan is a poor, educated nobleman. City boredom leads him to Polissya, where at first he tries to do some business, but in the end, only hunting remains from his occupation. He treats the legends about witches like fairy tales - a healthy skepticism is justified by his education.

(Ivan and Olesya)

Ivan Timofeevich is a sincere and kind person, he is able to feel the beauty of nature, and therefore Olesya at first interests him not as a beautiful girl, but as an interesting person. He wonders how it turned out that nature itself brought her up, and she came out so tender and delicate, unlike rude, uncouth peasants. How did it happen that they, religious, although superstitious, are ruder and tougher than Olesya, although it is she who should be the embodiment of evil. For Ivan, a meeting with Olesya is not a lordly fun and a difficult summer love adventure, although he understands that they are not a couple - in any case, society will be stronger than their love, will destroy their happiness. The personification of society in this case is unimportant - be it a blind and stupid peasant force, be it urban residents, Ivan's colleagues. When he thinks of Oles as his future wife, in a city dress, trying to keep up a small talk with his colleagues, he simply comes to a standstill. The loss of Olesya for Ivan is the same tragedy as finding her as a wife. This remains outside the scope of the story, but most likely Olesya's prediction came true in full - after her departure, he felt bad, even thinking about intentionally leaving life.

Final conclusion

The culmination of events in the story falls on a big holiday - the Trinity. This is not an accidental coincidence, it emphasizes and enhances the tragedy with which Olesya's bright fairy tale is trampled by people who hate her. There is a sarcastic paradox in this: the servant of the devil, Olesya, the sorceress, turns out to be more open to love than the crowd of people whose religion fits into the thesis "God is Love."

The author's conclusions sound tragic - the joint happiness of two people is impossible, when happiness for each of them individually is different. For Ivan, happiness is impossible apart from civilization. For Olesya - in isolation from nature. But at the same time, the author argues, civilization is cruel, society can poison relations between people, morally and physically destroy them, but nature cannot.

Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin often in his works painted the ideal image of a “natural” person, one who is not subject to the corrupting influence of light, whose soul is pure, free, who is close to nature, lives in it, lives with it in one impulse. A striking example of the disclosure of the theme of "natural" man is the story "Olesya".

The story described in the story did not appear by chance. Once A.I. Kuprin stayed in Polissya with the landowner Ivan Timofeevich Poroshin, who told the writer the mysterious story of his relationship with a certain sorceress. It was this story, enriched with fiction, that formed the basis of Kuprin's work.

The first publication of the story took place in the magazine "Kievlyanin" in 1898, the work was subtitled "From the memories of Volyn", which emphasized the real basis of the events taking place in the story.

Genre and direction

Alexander Ivanovich worked at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century, when the controversy between two trends gradually began to flare up: realism and modernism, which was just beginning to assert itself. Kuprin belongs to the realistic tradition in Russian literature, so the story "Olesya" can be safely attributed to realistic works.

According to the genre, the work is a story, since it is dominated by a chronicle plot that reproduces the natural course of life. The reader lives through all the events, day after day, following the main character Ivan Timofeevich.

essence

The action takes place in the small village of Perebrod, Volyn province, on the outskirts of Polissya. The young master-writer is bored, but one day fate takes him to the swamp to the house of the local witch Manuilikha, where he meets the beautiful Olesya. A feeling of love flares up between Ivan and Olesya, but the young sorceress sees that her death awaits if she connects her fate with an unexpected guest.

But love is stronger than prejudice and fear, Olesya wants to deceive fate. For the sake of Ivan Timofeevich, a young witch goes to church, although she is forbidden to enter there due to her occupation and origin. She makes it clear to the hero that she will commit this bold act, which can lead to irreparable consequences, but Ivan does not understand this and does not have time to save Olesya from the angry mob. The heroine is severely beaten. In retaliation, she sends a curse on the village, and on the same night there is a terrible thunderstorm. Knowing the power of human anger, Manuilikha and her pupil hurriedly leave the house in the swamp. When a young man comes to this dwelling in the morning, he finds only red beads, as a symbol of their short but true love with Olesya.

Main characters and their characteristics

The main characters of the story are the master writer Ivan Timofeevich and the forest sorceress Olesya. Completely different, they got together, but could not be happy together.

1. Characteristics of Ivan Timofeevich. He is a kind, sensitive person. He was able to discern in Oles a living, natural beginning, because he himself was not yet completely killed by secular society. The mere fact that he left the noisy cities for the village speaks volumes. The heroine for him is not just a beautiful girl, she is a mystery to him. This strange sorceress believes in conspiracies, guesses, communicates with spirits - she is a sorceress. And it all attracts the hero. He wants to see, to learn something new, real, not covered up by falsehood and far-fetched etiquette. But at the same time, Ivan himself is still in the power of the world, he thinks about marrying Olesya, but he is embarrassed by how she, a savage, will appear in the halls of the capital.
2. Olesya is the ideal of a “natural” person. She was born and lived in the forest, nature was her tutor. Olesya's world is a world of harmony with the outside world. In addition, she is in harmony with her inner world. It is possible to note such qualities of the main character: she is wayward, straightforward, sincere, she does not know how to play pranks, pretend. The young sorceress is smart, kind, one has only to remember the first meeting of the reader with her, because she gently carried the chicks in her hem. One of the main features of Olesya can be called insubordination, which she inherited from Manuilikha. Both of them seem to be against the whole world: they live aloof in their swamp, do not profess an official religion. Even knowing that you can’t escape fate, the young sorceress still tries, flatters herself with the hope that everything will work out with Ivan. She is original and unshakable, despite the fact that love is still alive, she leaves, leaves everything, without looking back. The image and characterization of Olesya are available.

Topics

• The main theme of the story- Olesya's love, her readiness for self-sacrifice - is the center of the work. Ivan Timofeevich was lucky to meet with a real feeling.
• Another important semantic branch is the theme of confrontation between the ordinary world and the world of natural people. The inhabitants of the village, the capitals, Ivan Timofeevich himself are representatives of everyday thinking, riddled with prejudices, conventions, clichés. The worldview of Olesya and Manuilikha is freedom, open feelings. In connection with these two heroes, the theme of nature appears. The environment is the cradle that brought up the main character, an indispensable assistant, thanks to which Manuilikha and Olesya live far from people and civilization without need, nature gives them everything they need for life. This topic is most fully disclosed in this.
• The role of the landscape in the story is huge. It is a reflection of the feelings of the characters, their relationship. So, at the beginning of the novel, we see a sunny spring, and at the end, a break in relations is accompanied by a strong thunderstorm. We wrote more about this in this.

Problems

The subject matter of the story is varied. First, the writer sharply outlines the conflict between society and those who do not fit into it. So, once Manuilikha was cruelly expelled from the village, Olesya herself was beaten, although both sorceresses did not show any aggression towards the villagers. Society is not ready to accept those who differ from them in at least something, who do not try to pretend, because they want to live according to their own rules, and not according to the template of the majority.

The problem of attitude towards Olesya manifests itself most clearly in the scene of her going to church. For the Russian Orthodox people of the village, it was a real insult that the one who serves evil spirits, in their opinion, appeared in the temple of Christ. At the church, where people ask for God's mercy, they themselves administered a cruel and merciless judgment. Perhaps the writer wanted to show on the basis of this antithesis that the idea of ​​righteousness, kindness, and fairness has been distorted in society.

Meaning

The idea of ​​the story is that people who grew up far from civilization turn out to be much nobler, more delicate, more polite and kinder than the “civilized” society itself. The author hints at the fact that the herd life stupefies the personality and erases its individuality. The crowd is submissive and promiscuous, and often the worst of its members, not the best, take over. Primitive instincts or acquired stereotypes, such as misinterpreted morality, lead the collective to degradation. So, the inhabitants of the village show themselves to be more savages than two witches living in a swamp.

Kuprin's main idea is that people must turn to nature again, must learn to live in harmony with the world and with themselves, so that their cold hearts will melt. Olesya tried to open the world of real feelings to Ivan Timofeevich. He failed to understand it in time, but the mysterious sorceress and her red beads will remain in his heart forever.

Conclusion

Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin in his story "Olesya" tried to create the ideal of man, to show the problems of the artificial world, to open people's eyes to the driven and immoral society that surrounds them.

The life of the wayward, unshakable Olesya was to some extent destroyed by the touch of the secular world in the person of Ivan Timofeevich. The writer wanted to show that we ourselves destroy the beauty that fate gives us, simply because we are blind, blind in soul.

Criticism

The story "Olesya" is one of the most famous works of A.I. Kuprin. The strength and talent of the story were appreciated by the writer's contemporaries.

K. Barkhin called the work a "forest symphony", noting the smoothness and beauty of the work's language.

Maxim Gorky noted the youthfulness and immediacy of the story.

Thus, the story "Olesya" occupies an important place, both in the work of A.I. Kuprin, and in the history of Russian classical literature.

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Kuprin's story "Olesya" is one of the most famous works of the author. And this is not surprising: an unusual plot, artistically perfect, thoughtful composition, a wide system of artistic images can not only make you pick up the story, but also read it to the end in one breath.

The main characters of the story

After his retirement, Kuprin traveled a lot and collected material for writing. It so happened that Kuprin had a chance to visit Ukraine in 1897, namely, in the present village. Kuzmivka, which then had the name Kazimirka in the Rivne region. The stay of 6 months did not pass without a trace: a series of stories that came out excited the readers. The story "Olesya" was written in 1898. Its main ones are Ivan Timofeevich - a writer, a writer, a city dweller who ended up in a village for some time and Olesya - a village girl with supernatural powers and the ability to conjure. The rest of the characters in the story are also not faceless.

We offer you to get acquainted with the problems of the story of Alexander Kuprin, one of the most famous works of the author.

According to the laws of the genre, there are few of them: Yarmola is the servant of Ivan Timofeevich, Mishchenko Nikita Nazarovich is the clerk, Evpsikhy Afrikanovich is a police officer, a blind lyre-singer and Manuilikha is Olesya’s grandmother, also a witch.

The love that arose between the two main characters is unique. In addition to the fact that she arose between a gentleman with urban customs and a simple rural girl, the relationship is also surprising in that it connects two worlds: the mysterious, unknown witchcraft (the ability to conjure a girl) and the ordinary, devoid of supernaturalness (Ivan Timofeevich, not endowed with any unusual gift ).

A priori, their love could not be happy - social conflict and the intervention of society contributed to the breakdown of relations.

Truth and Fiction: Character Prototypes

The first thing that interests you after reading the story is: which of everything told is true, and which is fiction? Could such a story actually happen?

Kuprin himself argued that the text of the narrative is based on real events. In the introduction to the story (it was not published), the author says that he happened to visit Ivan Timofeevich Poroshin in the Rivne region. One evening, he told Kuprin an unusual story about the love of a witch girl and a landowner, and later admitted that he, Poroshin, was this landowner, and this story was not fiction.

Analyzing the text of the story, one can draw an analogy between the image of Ivan Timofeevich and the personality of Kuprin. The protagonist, like the author himself, a writer, a writer. He, like Kuprin, unexpectedly arrives in the village and stays there for six months. Some character traits also have similarities with Kuprin.

Thus, we note that there are autobiographical moments in the image of Ivan Timofeevich, but it is an erroneous action to identify the character and personality of Kuprin.

The hero of the story is different, his character traits have only a partial similarity, and the events experienced by Ivan Timofeevich never happened in Kuprin's real life.

Has a prototype and witch girl Olesya. Beloved Poroshina was called Solomiya Manuilovna Kovalik. She was a local native and really knew how to conjure, the woman lived to a very advanced age, and died in 1954, having outlived Kuprin himself by 16 years.

It is likely that other characters also had prototypes, but information about them has not been preserved. Although, it is possible that they were also collective images - Kuprin liked to spend time in the company of young people and listen to local legends, therefore he could “copy” a portrait characteristic not from a specific person, but to combine the personal characteristics of several people into one image, and the events that occurred with different people, while adding a share of literary fiction.

Kuprin planned the publication of the story on the pages of "Russian wealth", in this magazine his stories about Volhynia and Polissya had already been published, but the editors of the magazine did not support the author's intention and refused to publish it.

Appeal to "Kievlyanin" was more successful. In 1898, the reader was able to read "Olesya" for the first time, and in 1905, an independent edition of the story was published.

Today, "Olesya" enjoys wide interest among readers. The theme of unity with nature and harmonious existence has not lost its relevance even now. And the story of an unusual, pure and kind love, which does not have a happy ending, is touching for many.