Bulgakov "The White Guard" - essay "Thalberg's Flight. (Analysis of an episode of Bulgakov's novel "The White Guard")"
In the complex events of a turning point, in the tragic days of the war, a person most often faces the problem of moral choice, and then the character of the hero is revealed especially fully and deeply. Such is the situation in the novel by M. A. Bulgakov "The White Guard", which describes the events of the terrible fratricidal Civil War. Without condemning either the "whites" or the "reds", the author shows how, even in such a tragic time, people managed to remain faithful to the moral criteria of honor, goodness and justice. Such people in the novel are Turbins, Colonel Malyshev, Colonel Nai-Tours. But always, at all times there were people who cared not about the spiritual and not about keeping their military honor spotless, but about their personal well-being. Such is Captain Sergei Ivanovich Talberg, husband of Elena Turbina. This man entered the Turbin family, but he is alien to her in spirit, and the brothers tolerate him only for the sake of Elena. Just for the sake of not worrying her, the brothers are worried that he was delayed and justify his delay with a "revolutionary ride". And the joy that he returned, they feel only for Elena. Since her marriage, “a kind of crack has formed in the vase of turbine life,” says the author, explaining the reason with the “two-layered eyes” of Captain Thalberg. Already in the portrait of the hero, the insincerity of this person is felt: “two-story eyes” do not express sincere feelings, just like the “eternal patented smile”. He is held straight and firm, turning like an automaton. “Slowly and cheerfully,” he tells the Turbins about the attack on the train that he was escorting, but his self-confidence is false - he skillfully disguises his anxiety and only, having called Elena into the bedroom, admits to her the real state of affairs: he needs to run.
The essence of the character of Sergei Ivanovich Talberg is the ability to adapt. He changes his beliefs depending on the changing political situation. In March 1917, Thalberg was the first "who came to the military school with a wide red armband", immediately becoming a member of the military revolutionary committee. When the Ukrainian nationalists arrived, "Thalberg became irritable and dryly declared that this was not what was needed, this was a vulgar operetta," and the roots of these people in Moscow, "even though these roots are Bolshevik." He repeats the same words about "operetta" when the hetman arrives, but referring them to Moscow, and when the German occupation leaves, referring them already to the hetman's ministry. Thalberg does not seem to want to notice that this is not just an operetta, but with great bloodshed, the main thing for him is to join the winners in time. He does not serve for two months, saying that the nationalists who came after the Germans "have no roots" - he sees "roots" in the regular German army, well-armed and strong. At the same time, he slowly learns Ukrainian grammar and then takes part in the election of the "hetman of all Ukraine." After that, “water poured out of the vessel”: the Turbin brothers lost a common language with Sergei Ivanovich, and Talberg became annoyed and “very angry” when Nikolka “tactlessly” reminded him of his former convictions. People of honor, Turbins do not change their views under this or that power, but Captain Thalberg is not like that, for whom it is important to successfully adapt in this life. Now he must flee: after his articles in the Vesti newspaper, he cannot stay in the City, where the Petliura troops will come. He is taken on a train to Germany - "Thalberg found connections ...". But when he leaves, he does not take Elena with him, and this is not a departure, but a hasty flight. The author draws the chaos of a devastated room, scattered things and considers it unworthy: "never run away with a rat's run into the unknown from dangers." It is more worthy to wait "until they come to you," even if "a blizzard howls." But Thalberg runs like a rat from a sinking ship, and actually betrays Elena. He explains this by the fact that he cannot take her “on wanderings and the unknown”, and Elena is silent out of pride. But even so, it is clear that it is more dangerous not to leave in a German staff car for Germany, but to stay in the City, where the Petliura troops come, and then the power will change again, and no one is protected from the violence and bloody arbitrariness of this element. Talberg does not even want to tell his brothers that the Germans are leaving the City, leaving it to Elena. Only for a moment did Sergei Ivanovich's eyes fill with one feeling - tenderness for Elena at parting. Parting with the house of the Turbins, with the immortal "Faust", which Talberg will no longer have to hear performed by Elena, Talberg loses his last connection with people of a different spiritual culture, other life principles than himself. Now he has to “politely and ingratiatingly” smile at German officers, look for a new place in life, having won it at the cost of betrayal.
.Why, if from April he had begun the formation of officer corps, we would now have taken Moscow. Understand that here in the City he would have raised an army of fifty thousand, and what an army! Selected, the best, because all the junkers, all the students, high school students, officers, and there are thousands of them in the City, would all go with a dear soul.
What do we know about the "White Guard"? Much and little at the same time. Not much, since the name of Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov is associated with another work that has become a classic - The Master and Margarita. Little, because often the novel itself remains in the shadow of theatrical productions and films, the play "Days of the Turbins" (and these are two completely different works, I dare to assure you). Little, because we basically do not have a large empirical stock of knowledge about the Civil War.
But why do we know so much at the same time? Firstly, all the real prototypes of the heroes of the novel are established for certain. Dr. Alexei Turbin - Bulgakov himself, who lived during the action of the "White Guard" in Kyiv, a doctor. Lieutenant Viktor Myshlaevsky was written off from a line officer, staff captain Petr Alexandrovich Brzhezitsky, who fought during the Great War and after it in the ranks of the 70th Kyiv division. The "General Staff careerist" Talberg was drawn from the husband of Mikhail Afanasyevich's sister, Leonid Sergeevich Kraum. The hero is negative, Bulgakov deliberately denigrated this image. However, I have no goal to justify Kraum and get into the Bulgakov family affairs. But with Sergei Ivanovich Talberg, I will try to do this a little later.
Another fact for the fact that we know so much about the Turbins and their environment is the fact that, despite the ban, it was possible to read the novel in the USSR. Yes, even though this is the late Soviet Union, this is the rarest rarity and the most terrible shortage for book lovers, but there was an opportunity to read The White Guard. In particular, the well-known journalist Oles Buzina recalls this (link to a post with this text in public). That is, the very essence of the work from the late 1980s could be known to the interested public.
Well, and probably the most important thing. Bulgakov is now perhaps the most popular classical Russian writer. Bulgakov is the legacy of the "Silver Age" of Russian literature. And by this, a lot of attention is riveted to him. He is the object of study, his life and creative path are the subject of controversy. In this regard, the "White Guard" is not the last. Moreover, an extremely positive trend has emerged in the post-Soviet state. More and more societies are being created that restore the history of the White movement. And through the restoration of such a memory, there is a revival of the national identity of Russians.
So what is this article about? That's right, about the "White Guard". About her characters. I advise you to carefully read the epigraph. He is not accidental, and his last lines are the most expressive. Junkers, students, high school students, officers... Mikhail Afanasyevich quite clearly indicates that his heroes belong to different strata of society. In this quote, taken from the fiery speech of Dr. Turbin, we can not find all the characters. If, for example, Nikolka is a cadet, a number of his friends are students, Myshlaevsky and Karas are officers, and a platoon of high school students (albeit mixed with the same junkers and students) is completely cut out by the Petliurists, then representatives of the intelligentsia are not mentioned here. This does not mean that Bulgakov neglects them, no. The intelligentsia simply does not have a task to fight. And she did it all civilian. And even in the "White Guard". There is also a mass of ordinary people, desperate, "God-bearing", ready to seize on anything, if only it would bring peace and stability (this applies equally to Russians and Ukrainians).
The purpose of this article is to reveal in the images of heroes the features that Bulgakov appropriated to them, characteristic of the stratum of society to which this or that hero belongs. Of course, the following can be objected here. Like, most of the actors - officers, belong to the same part of Russian society, have common moral values and identical views. The remark is quite reasonable, especially on the last two points. However, even within the officer corps, I tend to see some differentiation.
DOCTOR ALEXEY TURBIN
As already mentioned, Bulgakov portrayed himself in the image of Turbin. Everything converges: participation in the Great War, private medical practice after it, mobilization into the army of the hetman. Of course, Turbin is an officer and considers himself a member of this class: “ Tomorrow, I have already decided, I am going to this very division, and if your Malyshev does not take me as a doctor, I will go as a simple private". Purely officer outlook. Privates, as you know, in the Ice Campaign were lieutenants and captains, and company commanders were colonels. It is quite appropriate to say that Bulgakov, himself a medical officer in the All-Union Socialist Republic, makes a reference to this episode. Aleksey Turbin - colonel, junior doctor of the Hussar Belgrade (the prototype was the 12th Belgorod Lancers) regiment, and then the head of the hospital. In the plot of The White Guard, he was recently demobilized. Does it matter that the Russian army has not existed, in fact, since February 197? Probably had. The officers, the military class as a whole, felt that someone had betrayed them. But not their Emperor, they still cherish the hope of restoring lawful order in the country. In a country that is not limited to Kyiv, Ukraine.
And yet Alexei Vasilyevich belongs to the intelligentsia. How different its representatives will be illustrated below. Why an intellectual and not an officer? And it's simple: by profession. The doctor is traditionally an intelligent profession. They, and especially district doctors somewhere in the outback, enjoyed tremendous respect both in high society and among ordinary people. No joke, but the most common profession among the deputies of the first State Duma was not lawyers, lawyers or professors, but doctors.
Turbin is a representative of its passionate part. His ideals are monarchism, faith and freedom. He perfectly understands where the legs of all the troubles of Russia grow from: at the feast, more than once there is a call to hang up Leiba Bronstein (the so-called "Trotsky") on the nearest pillar. In general, such a worldview is not typical for an intellectual. I will explain in the words of Colonel Malyshev:
He [Malyshev] suddenly stopped, screwed up his eyes a little and spoke in a lowered voice: “Only… how can I put it… Here, you see, doctor, one question… Social theories and… um… are you a socialist?” Is not it? How are all intelligent people?
This gives full reason to say that Turbin corresponds to the marker, the characteristic layer of officers. Not all officers, of course, were monarchists. I'm not even sure the majority. But I won’t be mistaken if I say that there are many like Turbine, you just need to look. Therefore, the case of this character is unique.
LIEUTENANT VICTOR MYSHLAEVSKY, LIEUTENANT FYODOR STEPANOV (KARAS)
These characters are slightly different from each other. Victor Viktorovich is hot, life is seething in him, he will completely pass for a dashing hussar from Denis Davydov's unit. A sort of lieutenant (funny, isn't it?) Rzhevsky. He is loved by women, he is not averse to drinking, but he also fights desperately. He knows that if he betrays his service, he will betray himself. Remember the episode at the very beginning of the novel. Frozen to hell, Myshlaevsky was somehow warmed up, ground, and given vodka to drink. And all why? It's just that he didn't leave his post under the Red Tavern. Steppe, snowstorm, frost, but even after the end of combat duty, he remains in place, so the change to the position did not come. The readiness to sacrifice oneself is a characteristic feature of the Russian army at all times.
And what about Karas-Stepanov? Do not think that these are two antagonists. Fyodor Nikolaevich is just as desperately brave, he is serving in this troubled time, he knows that the hetman's palace has sunk into the ground, the inhabitants of the City still need to be protected. And he does this until the moment when the futility of resistance even reaches the top (and this happened much earlier). True, Stepanov is more reasonable. Perhaps a little more intelligent than Myshlaevsky. No wonder he is trying to graduate from the university and combine it with military service. Right, and he is a good commander.
The identification of these characters is justified by two things. First, they are both childhood friends. They know each other, speaking in colloquial language (by the way, Bulgakov's trick from the "White Guard"), as flaky. They have a similar fate. Yes, and how else? The task of an officer is to fight, which they did with honor. This is their duty, they did not give up on them. Secondly, which follows from the first, both Myshlaevsky and Karas belong to the stratum of rather young officers. If Turbin, their age, is already a colonel, then they are in the lower ranks. They are all young, they are not even thirty. What does this mean? The fact that they were brought up by the war. They have a winning mentality, they are warriors. But they lack some charm. What, say, Tolstoy Prince Bolkonsky from "War and Peace" possessed. Not enough education, manners for high society. These are not shortcomings. It just happened. Well, by class, they did not come from aristocratic families. Although the concept of "estate" by the beginning of the twentieth century was very conditional. Social elevators in the Russian Empire made it possible to move from one state to another without hindrance, if there was an opportunity and desire. There was a blurring of the concept of "nobility". However, this topic is not new and has been covered in detail by professional historians.
As for our heroes. They can't help being cute. Myshlaevsky with his masculinity and inner strength, Karas with his ability to combine courage and calculation. This is probably the most typical image of a Russian officer in today's perception by people of the 21st century.
COLONEL FELIX NAY-TOURS, COLONEL ALEXEY MALYSHEV
But this is just the type of senior officers. Not by rank, but by age. But here one important difference is just as strictly present, as in the previous case. Nai-Tours is an aristocrat. This can be seen from the descriptions of the life of his family, his habits and manners. The war made him more rigid, callous. Remember this case when he orders (!) and threatens (!!!) one of the highest ranks of the hetman's army - General Makushin. Remember this episode? Tell me, Nye wasn't so wrong, was he?
But there is another case in contrast. That very failed battle between the junkers and the vanguard of the Petliurist army that had entered the City. Nai-Tours understood everything instantly, as soon as he heard the report of the "picket" sent for reconnaissance:
Mr. Colonel, there are no units of ours, not only on Shulyavka, but nowhere else, - he took a breath. - We have machine-gun fire in the rear, and the enemy cavalry has now passed far along Shulyavka, as if entering the City ...
He saves his junkers, let's be honest. There is a common stereotype that the love of a father and son is a stingy, low-emotional, almost silent, but very strong substance. It is this feeling that guides the combat officer. He is not afraid to die, afraid not to save the lives of these young boys.
Nai-Tours is my favorite Bulgakov character. Not only in the White Guard, but in general. He is called the textbook image of an officer of the Russian army. Well, it's impossible not to agree with this.
That's about Colonel Malyshev. The only thing is that he is less aristocratic, but the image of the character even benefits from this. The specifics of his work in the hard times of the Civil War are the same cadets and students. The colonel himself (the only character who retained the real name of his prototype - pilot Alexei Fedorovich Malyshev) is well aware of this. Surprisingly, almost always the self-characteristics of the characters evoke sympathy. Probably because they are true. Or overly self-critical.
“I won’t waste words, I don’t know how to speak, because I didn’t speak at rallies,” this is the absence of that very aristocracy. But can it cause rejection? No. It is immediately clear: the colonel is a man of deeds and words. Words in the sense that they will fulfill an order, a promise or an oath. The episode with the dispersal of the Junker squad by Nai-Tours is characteristic and key for this character. In the life of Malyshev, captured in the novel, such is this passage:
Mr. Lieutenant, in three hours Petliura will get hundreds of living lives, and the only thing I regret is that at the cost of my life and even yours, even more dear, of course, I cannot stop their death. About portraits, guns and rifles, I ask you not to talk to me anymore.
[To Myshlaevsky's proposal to burn down the building of the gymnasium where the division was based]. Sometimes you don’t understand the fine line of this image of a Russian officer roughly carved into a granite rock. The same as Turbin, Myshlaevsky, Nai-Tours. The same as the real heroes of the Russian movement were: Kolchak, Kornilov, Markov, Yudenich. You don’t understand, because doubt always hovers somewhere nearby: “isn’t this irony in the words of Malyshev?”. Almost all of his phrases evoke similar feelings. Either he is really cynical (if so, then let's forgive the combat officer for such a character trait), or he is really laconic and withdrawn. I do not want to draw a conclusion, I will leave it to you.
The only thing I will add. I like this character in both cases. In Bulgakov's version, Malyshev destroys his documents and disappears when Petlyura enters the city. In the latest adaptation of the novel (with Khabensky as Alexei Turbin), the colonel shoots himself out of desperation. You know, this is exactly the most correct outcome for the life path of this image, no matter how blasphemous it may sound.
NCO OFFICER NIKOLKA TURBIN, JUNKER
Here we can definitely say that the whole stratum of youth is displayed in the face of one character. Yes, and what youth! But really, what is it? Ready to fight for an idea from Petersburg to Vladivostok? Forever living in their ideals and dreams? Too brave and fearless? Yes, exactly like that.
Nikolka Turbin wants to be like his older brother in many ways. Still, a military officer, took place in the profession. I won't exaggerate if I say that Alexei Turbin is a matter of personal pride for Nikolka. Hence, so many copies by the younger brother of the elder. Turbin Jr. is hot. And brave. He did not abandon Nai-Thurs, despite orders from him. And the two of them stood with one machine gun against a whole platoon of Kozyr-Leshko. In principle, if we recall the beginning of the Russian Time of Troubles, then Zimny, with its replicated "assault", was defended precisely by the junkers. Probably, the self-sacrifice of the Russian youth is taken from there. The best part of it, again. After all, who are the junkers? These are future officers, they realized and infected themselves only in this way. These are people who received education, combining it with understanding the basics of military service. Education, by the way, is not yet higher. But neither with Soviet higher education, nor even with the current one, can such "secondary special educational institutions" be compared in terms of level. They are orders of magnitude stronger.
Nikolka Turbin is smart and quick-witted. But naive. What can be considered a characteristic feature of his age, his social stratum. But naive in a good way: he believes in the best. Doesn't stop believing, even when everything has fallen to dust. But this does not prevent him from objectively assessing reality.
CAPTAIN SERGEY TALBERG
As planned by Bulgakov, the most unsympathetic character on the "this" side of the war. "This side" is the "White Guard". Thalberg is presented as callous, selfish and materialistic. He is dry even with his wife, disdains the friends of the family where he was taken, arrogant. This is how the author draws it. Perhaps this is Thalberg. But remember, at the very beginning, I promised that I would try to justify him? Now is the time to do it.
Let's look at Sergei Ivanovich from a slightly different angle. He, unlike many officers, is in business. Yes, he is a staff member, and in “Days of the Turbins” one of the officers in a hut somewhere near Kyiv, before shooting himself, exclaims: “Staff bastard! As I understand the Bolsheviks! ”, But Bulgakov himself simply could not stand all this brethren. But, nevertheless, Thalberg is in the service. By the way, he occupies not the last position under the hetman, which, no doubt, requires certain abilities.
Now let's look at the second episode. Thalberg's return is much later than promised and the immediate departure. He goes to Denikin. He served under the command of Anton Ivanovich. Thalberg is guided by careerist considerations. However, he rushes into the thick of it, to the South, into the most combat-ready White Army. At a time when not everything is lost for Russia. Here, sorry, not up to motives. The dry fact remains: Captain Thalberg is going to fight, going to places where even staffs are deprived of comfort. Rides into the unknown, basically. The officer is doing his duty. From this angle, it seems to me, few people looked at this figure.
VASILY LISOVICH, ENGINEER
If Dr. Turbin impresses the reader as a representative of the intelligentsia, then Lisovich, or Vasilisa, is his antagonist. He is stingy (in the truest sense of the word), lives gray. Too frugal. Remember what he and his wife, Wanda, used to have for dinner. The quality of this food. Lisovich is a mixture of Korobochka from Gogol's "Dead Souls" and Pavlusha Chichikov from the same place. Perhaps the circumstances of the Civil War made him such. But apparently, this is his life credo. Turbines always treated him with some rejection, as can be inferred from Bulgakov's description of this man. Unfortunately, the majority of the Russian intelligentsia in those years turned out to be Lisoviches. Not in terms of life or stinginess. And in terms of wrestling. They preferred to sit out and wait out the storm. They saw their salvation in the device. The same officers from the Turbin family and their friends do not find a response in the hearts of the Lisovich couple. They are afraid that "get under the distribution." Simply because they were neighbors. This reality will manifest itself fifteen or twenty years later, during the Stalinist repressions. But now, or rather, then, in 1918, 1919, there were Russian units defending Kyiv, there was Petliura with his Ukrinism.
Remember, when Vasilisa was robbed, everything was immediately found. Both materially and spiritually. In the material - a rich table for the defenders, which were Karas, Turbins and Myshlaevsky, whom Lisovich did not trust. In the spiritual - a kind of openness in front of the same officers, sweetly dozing Karas. Vasilisa, in a sincere conversation, reveals to Lieutenant Stepanov that she is a cadet by conviction. This conversation is a confession to yourself. It is quite possible that Lisovich realized the mistake of his existence, his refusal to fight. Realized late when he was robbed. Exactly the same is true for the Russian intelligentsia when it starts to be killed.
There remains one layer that has not been touched upon in the narrative. This is the layman layer. There is no point in talking too much about him. Mikhail Afanasyevich quite critically describes the masses of the people. Intimidated, no longer ready for anything, no sympathy for anyone. Able only to hold on to the fact of its existence on this Earth. I fully share this interpretation. A characteristic episode: a passer-by, a man of about forty or forty-five, decently dressed, walking along the street, makes a remark to the junkers, who will go into battle tomorrow and who have already seen the terrible death of their comrades. They say that you, cadets, are sitting, you need to defend your homeland. Again. This is what a man says to boys who are not even twenty. Dear, didn’t the idea come to your mind to take a rifle yourself and get in line? Did not come. Here it is, the unwillingness to fight. Not even for some abstract and distant ideals. Unwillingness to fight for their freedom and honor, shifting it to others. No sympathy for those others. Isn't it hypocrisy? Unfortunately, such is Bulgakov's society.
What does the White Guard teach us? Much. We already know such pompous words as "self-sacrifice", "courage", "honor". We know it's good and beautiful. On the paper. But that's not the point. The only important thing is that it was in the people themselves. In real people. It is important to remember that ideals exist, they are not illusory. They are not in the air, they are here nearby. The White Guard teaches us that people are the embodiment of these ideals. Remember the smart and brave Dr. Turbin, when it seems to you that your thoughts have reached a dead end and they cannot get out of there. Remember the image of a Russian officer when you lack the mental strength to fight on. Such a passionate and daring officer as Myshlaevsky, such a reasonable Karas, such a professional as Malyshev and such a principled one as Nai-Tours.
Pre-revolutionary Russia - the ideal of Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov. And no matter how hard his contemporaries-writers tried to abandon it in their works, he returned to it again and again, as to the best time in his life. All Bulgakov's works are deeply biographical, and he does not hide this, however, as well as his assessment of what is happening, both in the narrative and in the present.
Although Bulgakov began to write before the revolution of 1917, his first works were published after it. In 1925, the first two parts of the novel The White Guard were published in the Rossiya magazine, which immediately attracted the attention of society.
The novel is the story of the Turbin family, who previously lived happily and prosperously. But a revolution breaks into the peaceful course of life - from day to day Petlyura with his army can enter the City. Elena is worried - it is already evening, the whole family is at home, and only her husband, Sergei Ivanovich Talberg, is not there. She is alarmed. Doorbell. But it's not him... The author writes: “The hoarse kitchen cups knocked eleven. And the murdered Thalberg introduced himself. Of course, the money train was attacked, the convoy was killed, and there was blood and brains on the snow. Elena sat in the semi-darkness, a crumpled crown of hair pierced by flames, tears flowed down her cheeks. Killed. Killed ... ”And suddenly - such a long-awaited call.
The brothers are more pleased not with the possible return of Talberg, but with the happiness of Elena, who flies like a storm through the kitchen, through the dark bookstore, into the dining room ... Talberg tells how their train was attacked at Borodinka, forty miles from the City. And if it had been Petliura, as everyone feared, he would not be standing here now. Then Sergei Ivanovich recalls Elena for a few words. He informs him that he must leave immediately, that the Germans are leaving the City and that he, Thalberg, is being taken on the staff train leaving tonight. The hero is sure that in less than three months he will return to the City with Denikin's army, which is now being formed on the Don. Until then, he can't take Elena into the unknown and she'll have to stay in the City.
Elena, who has grown thin and aged, packs things for her husband on the road. Throughout the chapter, the mood and inner state of a woman is conveyed not by direct narration, but through a change in her face and figure. No extra words are needed here - and so everything is clear.
The room is disgusting: “Never pull the lampshade off the lamp! The lampshade is sacred. Never run like a rat into the unknown from danger. Talberg fled. And on the long way of the City there is already a train: "Talberg is being taken: Talberg has connections ...".
Elena, of course, knew that he would not return, that he would give up first, get scared and run away. He will run away, leaving her, the woman he loved, his friends, relatives, the hetman to the mercy of fate... This is a person who changes his mind very quickly. And Thalberg was the first to put on a red armband at the military school in March 1917. He, as a member of the military committee, arrested the famous General Petrov.
Elena understood that something terrible was threatening her husband, and therefore she did not object to his so quick, spontaneous departure. She is proud of her husband, who once wrote in the Vesti newspaper: “Petlyura is an adventurer who threatens the land with his operetta with death ...”. And therefore, quite naturally and calmly, Elena perceives Sergey's words that he cannot take her into the unknown, doom her to wandering. Talberg reassures his wife that, according to his calculations, Petlyura will soon collapse, and the Germans are already leaving. It is impossible for him not to be there, because he can ruin his career with this: “I am sure that in less than three months, well, at the latest - in May, we will arrive in the City. Don't be afraid of anything."
This he says to Elena easily, but when she asks that it would be necessary to inform the brothers about the betrayal of the Germans, she hesitates, blushes deeply and shifts this mission to her wife. Thalberg is cowardly, but, meanwhile, proud and arrogant. He abandons his happy family life for a possible career. He also runs out of fear. And he doesn’t take his wife with him, not because he is worried about her, but because if he offered to take Elena as well, he might even stay in the City if his “connections” didn’t like this request. Farewell, and now Thalberg rushes on the train.
And only twice do we see the manifestation of at least some emotions in Sergei Ivanovich - when saying goodbye to his wife, “there was a moment when only one thing pierced his two-story eyes - tenderness”, and when he, already on the train, realizes what he is leaving, running.
Sergei Ivanovich Talberg is the exact opposite of the Turbins. He easily changes his principles, beliefs, without much effort and remorse. He is always where it is easier to live.
Talberg flees, destroying the only family in the Turbin clan with his cowardice.
And now there is one less person in the House. There was no traitor, but faithful and devoted friends remained, a close-knit family, although incomplete. The symbol of Bulgakov's beloved pre-revolutionary Russia stands. Everything is still the same in it - the big clock strikes in the same way, the fireplace still warms .... And yet no one knows what will follow this so far first deprivation ...
The development of actions in the novel is conveyed through the perception of a real eyewitness of the events of 1918, since the prototype of Alexei Turbin was the author himself, M.A. Bulgakov, who "during the war and the constant change of authorities was called to serve as a doctor." He writes that hatred and malice ruled people who could not figure out the rightness or injustice of the demands of numerous parties, social or estate groups, or even just gangs hiding behind revolutionary slogans. There were hungry landless peasants, and there were landowners who took most of the crop. By that time, people had accumulated a lot of ammunition, weapons, with which they wanted to win back their right to bread and life.
The situation in the City (meaning Kyiv) had been tense for a long time, and there was not much time left before the explosion. At the very center of this explosion were the inhabitants of the City and the officers of the White Guard, who happened to see a senseless and endless change of power, but in this situation people behaved differently. So, for example, Alexei Turbin, the eldest of the brothers, was opposed to revolutions, bloodshed, but he understood the peasants with their "hearts burning with unquenched malice." The peasants also hated the German officers, who left their notes on scraps of paper: “To give a Russian pig for a pig bought from her 25 marks.” The peasants were outraged by the mockery of the Germans over the Ukrainians, but they also saw the enemy in the Ukrainian hetman, under whom “landlords with fat faces” again sat on their necks. Senior Turbin did not condemn the common people for their hatred for Russian officers, for the "Muscovites", since hostile relations arose between people because they were "knocked off the screws of life by war and revolution."
"In the fire of revolutions" each person made his own moral choice. When the Turbin brothers and their comrades were striving to fulfill their duty by defending the City, the engineer Lisovich, the Turbins' neighbor, and those like him arranged their own, personal affairs. The staff officer Shchetkin, who turned himself into a civilian, left for his cozy apartment and, having drunk coffee, fell asleep sweetly: he was not going to save anyone. Meanwhile, the cadets, led by Nai-Tours, were supposed to “spin under a shrapnel sky”, protecting the townspeople, among whom were the staff officer Shchetkin and the layman Lisovich, who diligently and ingeniously arranged more and more hiding places for money stolen and accumulated under all authorities. Lisovich was never bothered by thoughts about decency, honor, or civic consciousness: "He carefully put aside counterfeit (money) intended for the cab driver and for the market." To cheat, to deceive people is the old talent of this opportunist, who lives quietly without conviction, without a sense of duty to people and the Fatherland. For him, in troubled times, one thing is important: to learn how to reliably hide “katerinka” and “petrovka”, gold and silver.
Both officers of the "White Guard" and insufficiently trained junkers participated in the defense of the City. The younger Turbin, Nikolai, was about to die at a time when Lisovich was counting and hiding money. Each in his own way saw his place in this "fire". “Folk teachers, paramedics, Ukrainian seminarians who, by the will of fate, became ensigns, hefty sons of beekeepers, staff captains with Ukrainian surnames ... everyone speaks Ukrainian, everyone loves Ukraine,” ... and everyone is armed. When those very Muscovites (White Guard) officers died for Ukraine, they were considered enemies by some representatives of the Ukrainian nation, sometimes by former colleagues. For example, after participating in the First World War, the village teacher Kozyr turned into a colonel in the Petliura army, he now fought against the tsarist army. An explanation for this can be found: "... the war for Kozyr was a vocation, and teaching was only a long and major mistake." Who to serve and whom to kill was not a matter of principle for him, as long as his military career developed well. People like Kozyr cannot understand why one of the commanders, seeing how his four officers and two cadets died under the blows of a hundred cavalry, shot himself in the mouth, saying before that: “Staff bastard. I understand the Bolsheviks very well.” He was a man with the highest sense of responsibility for the lives of his subordinates, faithful to the oath and duty of the defender of the Fatherland.
A deeply decent and honest person, with a high sense of duty, loyalty to the oath, with self-esteem was such a representative of the White Guard as Colonel Malyshev. He turned out to be a far-sighted military commander who managed to find out that the hetman and his entourage shamefully fled abroad, just like the commander of the army. Therefore, Malyshev saves his "foolish children" from death, who wanted to lay down their lives in the defense of the City and its inhabitants from the Petliurists. Deceived, drawn into an adventure, people could be killed in a slaughter with well-armed, twenty times their number of Petlyura's troops. Colonel Malyshev took responsibility for deciding the fate of the soldiers and officers of the division entrusted to him. He ordered to tear off shoulder straps, go home and not take unnecessary risks.
M.A. Bulgakov displayed in the novel the harsh, cruel truth of History, showed different characters, destinies, moral choices of people in the most difficult circumstances of the era of wars and destruction. Some heroes (for example, Turbins, Nai-Tours, Malyshev) remained true to such moral values as honest service to society and the country, selflessness, decency, patriotism and courage, and were ready to die without changing their principles. Other characters, like Lisovich, accumulated wealth, others, like Kozyr, made a military career, used the war to improve their own well-being. Or, for example, staff officer Sergei Talberg, who neglected even such a feeling as love for a loved one. He betrays his friends, his wife and, acting in his own interests, secretly prepares to flee abroad, making his choice in accordance with his own convictions. Thalberg does not suffer from remorse about duty or responsibility to people and country.
Probably, a person has the right to choose: to stay alive or "burn out in the fire of revolutions." But it is difficult to agree that all means are good, and therefore it is impossible to forgive meanness, dishonesty, greed for blood, betrayal. One cannot but agree with the point of view of M. Bulgakov, who recalled the well-known truths: there is nothing higher than eternal values, that is, life itself, love for each other, loyalty and decency.
Reviews
You are smart as always. Try to compare and isolate the purely in a fierce struggle, while remaining outside the bounds of predilections. It seems to me that you succeed for one simple reason: you are smart.
And I have one serious complaint for you. Namely. Reading your talented critical articles, I do not dare to fish my own out of the table. I'm afraid to goof off: the bar you set is high.
As for the ill-wishers, so become a camel. Let them bark. And you spit. And publish again. If you really get it, then share it. From childhood to this day, I have been fighting not jokingly, both virtual and real.
Low bow.
Talberg Sergei Ivanovich is the husband of Elena Turbina, a traitor and opportunist. Seeing the coming changes, T. decides to flee abroad, leaving his wife and relatives behind. Elena knew that he would not return, that he would be the first to surrender, get scared and run away, leaving her, the woman she loved, her friends, relatives, and the hetman to the mercy of fate. T. cannot but leave, he is afraid of ruining his career. This is a person who changes his mind very quickly. He was the first to put on a red armband at the military school in March 1917. T., as a member of the military committee, arrested the famous General Petrov.
T. easily says to his wife: "I'm sure that in less than three months, well, at the latest in May, we will come to the city. Don't be afraid of anything." When she asks him to inform the brothers about the betrayal of the Germans, he hesitates, blushes deeply and shifts this mission to her. T. is cowardly, but meanwhile proud and arrogant. He abandons his happy family life for a possible career. He runs out of fear. Only twice do we see the manifestation of at least some emotions in T.: at parting with his wife, “there was a moment when only one thing pierced his two-story eyes - tenderness,” and when he, already on the train, realizes that he is leaving, from what leaves, runs. T. is the exact opposite of the Turbins. He easily changes his principles, beliefs, without much effort and remorse. He is always where it is easier to live.
M.A. Bulgakov was born and raised in Kyiv. All his life he was devoted to this city. It is symbolic that the name of the future writer was given in honor of Archangel Michael, the guardian of the city of Kyiv. The action of the novel by M.A. Bulgakov's "White Guard" takes place in the very famous ...
The novel "The White Guard" is a disturbing, restless novel, telling about the harsh and terrible time of the Civil War. The action of the novel takes place in the writer's favorite city - Kyiv, which he simply calls the City. The seventh chapter is also very disturbing,...
The novel "White Guard" was first published (not completely) in Russia, in 1924. Completely - in Paris: volume one - 1927, volume two - 1929. The White Guard is largely an autobiographical novel based on the writer's personal impressions of Kyiv...
The White Guard is a work that continues the traditions of Tolstoy's War and Peace in depicting history and man against the backdrop of great historical events. Bulgakov is interested in the inner world of a person who has fallen into such a cycle of events when it is difficult to maintain ...
Alexei Turbin is the oldest in the family, a military doctor, he is 28 years old. The concept of honor for A., as for all the Turbins, is above all. This is one of the best representatives of the white movement. He fights with the new orders to the end, although he understands that he has nothing ...
