The 30-40s of the 19th century were the time of the crisis of educational and subjective-romantic concepts. Enlighteners and romantics are brought together by a subjective view of the world. Reality was not understood by them as an objective process that develops according to its own laws, independent of the role of people. In the fight against social evil, the thinkers of the Enlightenment relied on the power of the word, moral example, and the theorists of revolutionary romanticism - on the heroic personality. Both those and others underestimated the role of the objective factor in the development of history.
Revealing social contradictions, romantics, as a rule, did not see in them an expression of the real interests of certain sections of the population and therefore did not connect their overcoming with a specific social, class struggle.
The revolutionary liberation movement played an important role in the realistic cognition of social reality. Until the first powerful uprisings of the working class, the essence of bourgeois society, its class structure, remained largely a mystery. The revolutionary struggle of the proletariat made it possible to remove the seal of mystery from the capitalist system, to expose its contradictions. Therefore, it is quite natural that it was in the 30s and 40s of the 19th century that realism was asserted in literature and art in Western Europe. Exposing the vices of feudal and bourgeois society, the realist writer finds beauty in objective reality itself. His positive hero is not exalted above life (Bazarov in Turgenev, Kirsanov, Lopukhov in Chernyshevsky, and others). As a rule, it reflects the aspirations and interests of the people, the views of the advanced circles of the bourgeois and noble intelligentsia. Realistic art eliminates the openness of the ideal and reality, which is characteristic of romanticism. Of course, in the works of some realists there are indefinite romantic illusions where we are talking about the embodiment of the future (“The dream of a funny man” by Dostoevsky, “What to do?” Chernyshevsky ...), and in this case we can rightfully speak of the presence in their work of romantic tendencies. Critical realism in Russia was the result of the convergence of literature and art with life.
The realists of the 20th century pushed the boundaries of art widely. They began to depict the most ordinary, prosaic phenomena. Reality entered their works with all its social contrasts, tragic dissonances. They decisively broke with the idealizing tendencies of Karamzinists and abstract romantics, in whose work even poverty, in Belinsky's words, appeared "tidy and washed."
Critical realism took a step forward along the path of democratization of literature also in comparison with the work of the 18th century enlighteners. He captured the contemporary reality much wider. Serf-owning modernity entered the works of critical realists not only as the arbitrariness of the feudal lords, but also as the tragic state of the masses of the people - the serfs, the destitute urban people. In the works of Fielding, Schiller, Diderot and other writers of the Enlightenment, the middle-class man was portrayed mainly as the embodiment of nobility, honesty, and thus opposed the depraved dishonest aristocrats. He revealed himself only in the sphere of his high moral consciousness. His daily life, with all its sorrows, sufferings and worries, remained, in essence, outside the narration. Only revolutionary-minded sentimentalists (Rousseau, and especially Radishchev) and individual romantics (Su, Hugo, and others) develop this theme.
In critical realism, there has been a tendency to completely overcome the rhetoric and didacticism that were present in the works of many enlighteners. In the works of Diderot, Schiller, Fonvizin, alongside typical images embodying the psychology of the real classes of society, there were heroes embodying the ideal features of enlightenment consciousness. The guise of the ugly is not always balanced in critical realism, the image of the proper, which is mandatory for the enlightenment literature of the 18th century. The ideal in the work of critical realists is often affirmed through the denial of the ugly phenomena of reality.
Realistic art performs an analytical function not only by revealing the contradictions between the oppressors and the oppressed, but also by showing the social conditionality of man. The principle of sociality - the aesthetics of critical realism. Critical realists lead in their work to the idea that evil is rooted not in a person, but in society. Realists are not limited to criticism of mores and contemporary legislation. They raise the question of the inhuman nature of the very foundations of bourgeois and feudal society.
In the study of life, critical realists went further than not only Xu and Hugo, but also the 18th-century educators Diderot, Schiller, Fieldini, Smolett sharply criticized feudal modernity from realistic positions, but their criticism went in an ideological direction. They denounced the manifestations of serfdom not in the economic field, but mainly in the legal, moral, religious and political spheres.
In the works of the enlighteners, a large place is occupied by the image of a depraved aristocrat who does not recognize any restrictions on his sensual desires. The depravity of the rulers is portrayed in enlightenment literature as a product of feudal relations, in which the aristocratic nobility knows no prohibition to their feelings. The work of the enlighteners reflected the lack of rights of the people, the arbitrariness of the princes who sold their subjects to other countries. Writers of the 18th century sharply criticize religious fanaticism (“The Nun” by Diderot, “Nathan the Wise” by Lessinia), oppose prehistoric forms of government, support the struggle of peoples for their national independence (“Don Carlos” by Schiller, “Egmant” by Goethe).
Thus, in the enlightenment literature of the 18th century, criticism of feudal society proceeds primarily on an ideological plane. Critical realists expanded the thematic range of the art of the word. A person, no matter what social stratum he belongs to, is characterized by them not only in the sphere of moral consciousness, he is also drawn in everyday practical activity.
Critical realism characterizes a person universally as a specific historically formed individuality. The heroes of Balzac, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Chekhov and others are portrayed not only in the loftiest moments of their lives, but also in the most tragic situations. They depict a person as a social being, formed under the influence of certain socio-historical causes. Characterizing the Balzac method, G.V. Plekhanov notes that the creator of The Human Comedy "took" passions in the form that bourgeois society of his day gave them; he watched with the attention of a naturalist how they grow and develop in a given social environment. Thanks to this, he became a realist in the very sense of the word, and his writings are an indispensable source for studying the psychology of French society during the Restoration and Louis Philippe. However, realistic art is something more than a reproduction of a person in social relations.
Russian realists of the 19th century also depicted society in contradictions and conflicts, in which, reflecting the real movement of history, they revealed the struggle of ideas. As a result, reality appeared in their work as an "ordinary stream", as a self-moving reality. Realism reveals its true essence only on the condition that art is considered by writers as a reflection of reality. In this case, the natural criteria of realism are depth, truth, objectivity in revealing the inner connections of life, typical characters acting in typical circumstances, and the necessary determinants of realistic creativity are historium, the artist's national thinking. The realium is characterized by the image of a person in unity with his environment, the social and historical concreteness of the image, conflict, plot, the widespread use of such genre structures as a novel, drama, story, short story.
Critical realism was marked by an unprecedented spread of epic and dramaturgy, which in a noticeable way pressed poetry. Among the epic genres, the novel gained the greatest popularity. The reason for its success is mainly that it allows the realist writer to fulfill the analytical function of art to the fullest extent, to expose the causes of the emergence of social evil.
Critical realism brought to life a new type of comedy, based on a conflict not traditionally love, but social. Her image is Gogol's Inspector General, a sharp satire on Russian reality in the 30s of the 19th century. Gogol notes the obsolescence of the comedy with a love theme. In his opinion, in the "mercantile age" they have more "electricity" "rank, money capital, profitable marriage than love." Gogol found such a comedic situation that made it possible to penetrate into the social relations of the era, to subject the thieves and bribe-takers to ridicule. “Comedy,” writes Gogol, “should knit by itself, with all its mass, into one big knot. The plot should embrace all the faces, not just one or two - touch on what excites more or less the characters. Every hero is here."
Russian critical realists depict reality from the standpoint of an oppressed, suffering people, who act in their works as a measure of moral and aesthetic assessments. The idea of nationality is the main determinant of the artistic method of Russian realistic art of the 19th century.
Critical realism is not limited to denunciation of the ugly. He also depicts the positive aspects of life - diligence, moral beauty, the poetry of the Russian peasantry, the desire of the advanced noble and raznochintsy intelligentsia for socially useful activities, and much more. At the origins of Russian realism of the 19th century stands A.S. Pushkin. An important role in the ideological and aesthetic evolution of the poet was played by his rapprochement with the Decembrists during his southern exile. He now finds support for his creativity in reality. The hero of Pushkin's realistic poetry is not separated from society, does not run away from it, he is woven into the natural and socio-historical processes of life. His work acquires historical concreteness, it intensifies criticism of various manifestations of social oppression, sharpens attention to the plight of the people (“When I am thoughtful in a city, I wander ...”, “My ruddy critic ...” and others).
In Pushkin's lyrics one can see contemporary social life with its social contrasts, ideological searches, the struggle of advanced people against political and feudal arbitrariness. The poet's humanism and nationality, along with his historicism, are the most important determinants of his realistic thinking.
Pushkin's transition from romanticism to realism manifested itself in Boris Godunov mainly in a concrete interpretation of the conflict, in recognition of the decisive role of the people in history. The tragedy is imbued with deep historicism.
Pushkin was also the ancestor of the Russian realistic novel. In 1836 he completes The Captain's Daughter. Its creation was preceded by work on the "History of Pugachev", which reveals the inevitability of the uprising of the Yaik Cossacks: "Everything foreshadowed a new rebellion - the leader was missing." “Their choice fell on Pugachev. It was not difficult for them to persuade him.”
The further development of realism in Russian literature is associated primarily with the name of N.V. Gogol. The pinnacle of his realistic work is Dead Souls. Gogol himself considered his poem as a qualitatively new stage in his creative biography. In the works of the 30s (The Inspector General and others), Gogol depicts exclusively negative phenomena of society. Russian reality appears in them as its deadness, immobility. The life of the inhabitants of the outback is depicted as devoid of a reasonable beginning. It has no movement. The conflicts are comic in nature, they do not affect the serious contradictions of the time.
Gogol watched with alarm how everything truly human disappears under the “crust of the earth” in modern society, how a person becomes shallow, vulgarized. Seeing in art an active force of social development, Gogol does not imagine creativity that is not illuminated by the light of a lofty aesthetic ideal.
Gogol in the 1940s was critical of Russian literature of the romantic period. He sees its drawback in that it did not give a true picture of Russian reality. Romantics, in his opinion, often rushed "above society", and if they descended to him, then only to whip him with the scourge of satire, and not pass on his life as a model for posterity. Gogol includes himself among the writers he criticizes. He is not satisfied with the predominantly accusatory orientation of his past literary activity. Gogol now sets himself the task of a comprehensive and historically concrete reproduction of life in its objective movement towards the ideal. He is not at all against denunciation, but only in the case when it appears in combination with the image of the beautiful.
The continuation of the Pushkin and Gogol traditions was the work of I.S. Turgenev. Turgenev gained popularity after the release of the Hunter's Notes. Huge achievements of Turgenev in the genre of the novel ("Rudin", "Noble Nest", "On the Eve", "Fathers and Sons"). In this area, his realism acquired new features. Turgenev - novelist focuses on the historical process.
Turgenev's realism expressed itself most clearly in the novel Fathers and Sons. The work is distinguished by acute conflict. It intertwines the destinies of people of various views, various positions in life. Noble circles are represented by the brothers Kirsanov, Odintsova, the raznochintsy intelligentsia - Bazarov. In the image of Bazarov, he embodied the features of a revolutionary, opposed to all sorts of liberal talkers like Arkady Kirsanov, who clung to the democratic movement. Bazarov hates idleness, sybarism, manifestations of nobility. He considers it insufficient to confine oneself to the vestment of social vices.
Turgenev's realism is manifested not only in the depiction of the social contradictions of the era, the clashes of "fathers" and "children". It also consists in revealing the moral laws that govern the world, in affirming the enormous social value of love, art...
Turgenev's lyricism, the most characteristic feature of his style, is connected with the glorification of the moral greatness of man, his spiritual beauty. Turgenev is one of the most lyrical writers of the 19th century. He treats his characters with ardent interest. Their sorrows, joys and sufferings are, as it were, his own. Turgenev correlates a person not only with society, but also with nature, with the universe as a whole. As a result, the psychology of Turgenev's heroes is the interaction of many components of both the social and natural series.
Turgenev's realism is complex. It shows the historical concreteness of the conflict, the reflection of the real movement of life, the veracity of details, the "eternal questions" of the existence of love, old age, death - the objectivity of the image and the tendentiousness, the lyrium penetrating the soul.
Many new things were introduced into realistic art by writers - democrats (I.A. Nekrasov, N.G. Chernyshevsky, M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, etc.). Their realism was called sociological. What it has in common is the denial of the existing feudal system, showing its historical doom. Hence the sharpness of social criticism, the depth of the artistic study of reality.
A special place in sociological realism is occupied by "What is to be done?" N.G. Chernyshevsky. The originality of the work is in the promotion of the socialist ideal, new views on love, marriage, in the promotion of the path to the reorganization of society. Chernyshevsky not only reveals the contradiction of contemporary reality, but also offers a broad program for the transformation of life and human consciousness. The writer devotes the greatest importance to labor as a means of forming a new person and creating new social relations. Realism "What to do?" has features that bring it closer to romanticism. Trying to imagine the essence of the socialist future, Chernyshevsky begins to think typically romantically. But at the same time, Chernyshevsky strives to overcome romantic daydreaming. He fights for the realization of the socialist ideal based on reality.
New facets of Russian critical realism are revealed in the works of F.M. Dostoevsky. In the early period ("Poor People", "White Nights", etc.), the writer continues the tradition of Gogol, drawing the tragic fate of the "little man".
Tragic motives not only do not disappear, but, on the contrary, are even more intensified in the writer's work in the 60-70s. Dostoevsky sees all the troubles that capitalism has brought with it: predation, financial scams, growing poverty, drunkenness, prostitution, crime, and so on. He perceived life primarily in its tragic essence, in a state of chaos and decay. This determines the acute conflict, intense drama of Dostoevsky's novels. It seemed to him that any fantastic situation would not be able to overshadow the fantasticness of reality itself. But Dostoevsky is looking for a way out of the contradictions of modernity. In the struggle for the future, he hopes for a determined, moral re-education of society.
Dostoevsky considers individualism, concern for one's own well-being to be the most characteristic feature of bourgeois consciousness, therefore the debunking of individualistic psychology is the main direction in the writer's work. The pinnacle of the realistic depiction of reality was the work of L.M. Tolstoy. The huge contribution of the writer to the world artistic culture is not the result of his genius alone, it is also a consequence of his deep nationality. Tolstoy in his works depicts life from the standpoint of "one hundred million agricultural people," as he himself liked to say. Tolstoy's realism manifested itself primarily in the disclosure of the objective processes of development of contemporary society, in understanding the psychology of various classes, the inner world of people of various social circles. Tolstoy's realistic art was clearly manifested in the epic novel War and Peace. Having put “folk thought” as the basis of the work, the writer criticized those who are indifferent to the fate of the people, the motherland and live an egoistic life. Tolstoy's historicism, which feeds his realism, is characterized not only by an understanding of the main trends in historical development, but also by an interest in the everyday life of the most ordinary people, who nevertheless leave a noticeable mark on the historical process.
So, critical realism, both in the West and in Russia, is an art that both criticizes and affirms. Moreover, it finds high social, humanistic values in reality itself, mainly in democratic, revolutionary-minded circles of society. Positive heroes in the work of realists are truth-seekers, people associated with the national liberation or revolutionary movement (Stendhal's Carbonari, Balzac's Neuron) or actively resisting the corrupting attention of individualistic morality (Dickens). Russian critical realism created a gallery of images of fighters for popular interests (by Turgenev, Nekrasov). This is the great originality of Russian realistic art, which determined its world significance.
A new stage in the history of realism was the work of A.P. Chekhov. The novelty of the writer is not only in the fact that he is an outstanding master of the minor ethical form. Chekhov's attraction to the short story, to the story, had its reasons. As an artist, he was interested in the "little things of life", all the everyday life that surrounds a person, influencing his consciousness. He depicted social reality in its usual, everyday course. Hence the breadth of his generalizations, despite the apparent narrowness of his creative range.
Conflicts in Chekhov's works are not the result of a confrontation between heroes who clash with each other for one reason or another, they arise under the pressure of life itself, reflecting its objective contradictions. Features of Chekhov's realism, aimed at depicting the patterns of reality that determine the fate of people, found a vivid embodiment in "The Cherry Orchard". The play is very meaningful in its content. It contains elegiac motifs associated with the death of the garden, the beauty of which is sacrificed for material interests. Thus, the writer condemns the psychology of the mercantelium, which the bourgeois system brought with it.
In the narrow sense of the word, the concept of "realism" means a concrete historical trend in the art of the 19th century, which proclaimed the basis of its creative program to be in line with the truth of life. The term was first put forward by the French literary critic Chanfleurie in the 50s of the 19th century. This term has entered the lexicon of people from different countries in relation to various arts. If, in a broad sense, realism is a common feature in the work of artists belonging to different artistic movements and trends, then in a narrow sense, realism is a separate direction, different from others. Thus, realism is opposed to the previous romanticism, in overcoming which it, in fact, developed. The basis of realism of the 19th century was a sharply critical attitude towards reality, which is why it was called critical realism. The peculiarity of this direction is the staging and reflection in artistic work of acute social problems, the conscious desire to pass judgment on the negative phenomena of public life. Critical realism was focused on portraying the lives of the underprivileged sections of society. The work of artists of this trend is similar to the study of social contradictions. The ideas of critical realism were most clearly embodied in the art of France in the first half of the 19th century, in the work of G. Courbet and J.F. Millais ("Gatherers" 1857).
Naturalism. In the visual arts, naturalism was not presented as a clearly defined trend, but was present in the form of naturalistic tendencies: in the rejection of social assessment, social typification of life and the substitution of external visual authenticity for revealing their essence. These tendencies led to such features as superficiality in the depiction of events and passive copying of secondary details. These features appeared already in the first half of the 19th century in the work of P. Delaroche and O. Vernet in France. Naturalistic copying of the painful aspects of reality, the choice of all kinds of deformities as themes determined the originality of some works of artists gravitating towards naturalism.
The conscious turn of the new Russian painting towards democratic realism, nationality, modernity was marked at the end of the 50s, along with the revolutionary situation in the country, with the social maturity of the raznochintsy intelligentsia, with the revolutionary enlightenment of Chernyshevsky, Dobrolyubov, Saltykov-Shchedrin, with the people-loving poetry of Nekrasov. In "Essays on the Gogol Period" (in 1856), Chernyshevsky wrote: "If painting is now generally in a rather miserable position, the main reason for this must be considered the alienation of this art from modern aspirations." The same idea was cited in many articles of the Sovremennik magazine.
But painting was already beginning to join modern aspirations - first of all in Moscow. The Moscow School did not enjoy even a tenth of the privileges of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, but it depended less on its ingrained dogmas, the atmosphere in it was more lively. Although the teachers at the School are mostly academics, but academics are secondary and vacillating, they did not suppress their authority as they did at the Academy F. Bruni, the pillar of the old school, who at one time competed with Bryullov's painting "The Copper Serpent".
Perov, recalling the years of his apprenticeship, said that they came there “from all over the great and multi-tribal Russia. even from the Solovetsky islands and Athos, and in conclusion there were also from Constantinople. God, what a diverse, diverse crowd used to gather within the walls of the School! .. ".
The original talents that crystallized out of this solution, from this motley mixture of "tribes, dialects and states", finally sought to tell about how they lived, what was vitally close to them. In Moscow, this process was started, in St. Petersburg it was soon marked by two turning points that put an end to the academic monopoly in art. First: in 1863, 14 graduates of the Academy, headed by I. Kramskoy, refused to paint a graduation picture on the proposed plot "Feast in Valhalla" and asked to be given a choice of plots for them. They were refused, and they defiantly left the Academy, forming an independent artel of artists on the type of communes described by Chernyshevsky in the novel What Is To Be Done?. Second event - creation in 1870
Association of traveling exhibitions, the soul of which was the same Kramskoy.
The Association of the Wanderers, unlike many of the later associations, did without any declarations and manifestos. Its charter only stated that the members of the Association should conduct their material affairs themselves, not depending on anyone in this respect, as well as organize exhibitions themselves and take them to different cities ("move" them around Russia) in order to acquaint the country with Russian art . Both of these points were of significant importance, asserting the independence of art from the authorities and the will of artists to communicate widely with people not only in the capital. The main role in the creation of the Partnership and the development of its charter belonged, in addition to Kramskoy, Myasoedov, Ge - from St. Petersburg, and from Muscovites - Perov, Pryanishnikov, Savrasov.
On November 9, 1863, a large group of graduates of the Academy of Arts refused to write competitive works on the proposed theme from Scandinavian mythology and left the Academy. The rebels were led by Ivan Nikolaevich Kramskoy (1837-1887). They united in an artel and began to live in a commune. Seven years later, it broke up, but by this time the "Association of Artistic Mobile Inserts", a professional and commercial association of artists who stood on close ideological positions, was born.
The Wanderers were united in their rejection of "academicism" with its mythology, decorative landscapes and pompous theatricality. They wanted to portray living life. The leading place in their work was occupied by genre (everyday) scenes. The peasantry enjoyed special sympathy for the Wanderers. They showed his need, suffering, oppressed position. At that time - in the 60-70s. XIX century - the ideological side
art was valued more than aesthetic. Only with time did the artists remember the inherent value of painting.
Perhaps the greatest tribute to ideology was given by Vasily Grigoryevich Perov (1834-1882). Suffice it to recall such of his paintings as "The arrival of the police officer for the investigation", "Tea drinking in Mytishchi". Some of Perov's works are imbued with genuine tragedy ("Troika", "Old Parents at the Son's Grave"). Perov painted a number of portraits of his famous contemporaries (Ostrovsky, Turgenev, Dostoevsky).
Some canvases of the "Wanderers", painted from life or under the impression of real scenes, enriched our ideas about peasant life. The painting by S. A. Korovin “On the World” shows a skirmish at a rural meeting between a rich man and a poor man. V. M. Maksimov captured the rage, tears, and grief of the family division. The solemn festivity of peasant labor is reflected in the painting by G. G. Myasoedov “Mowers”.
In the work of Kramskoy, the main place was occupied by portraiture. He painted Goncharov, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Nekrasov. He owns one of the best portraits of Leo Tolstoy. The writer's gaze does not leave the viewer, from whatever point he looks at the canvas. One of the most powerful works of Kramskoy is the painting "Christ in the Desert".
The first exhibition of the Wanderers, which opened in 1871, convincingly demonstrated the existence of a new direction that had been taking shape throughout the 60s. It had only 46 exhibits (unlike the bulky exhibitions of the Academy), but carefully selected, and although the exhibition was not deliberately programmatic, the overall unwritten program loomed quite clearly. All genres were presented - historical, everyday life, landscape portraiture - and the audience could judge what the "Wanderers" brought to them. Only the sculpture was unlucky, and even then the unremarkable sculpture of F. Kamensky), but this type of art was “unlucky” for a long time, in fact, the entire second half of the century.
By the beginning of the 90s, among the young artists of the Moscow school, there were, however, those who worthily and seriously continued the civic itinerant tradition: S. Ivanov with his series of paintings about immigrants, S. Korovin - the author of the painting "On the World", where it is interesting and the dramatic (really dramatic!) collisions of the pre-reform village are thoughtfully revealed. But they were not the ones who set the tone: the World of Art, which was equally distant from the Wanderers and the Academy, was approaching. What did the Academy look like at that time? Her artistic former rigoristic attitudes disappeared, she no longer insisted on the strict requirements of neoclassicism, on the notorious hierarchy of genres, she was quite tolerant of the everyday genre, she only preferred it to be “beautiful” and not “muzhik” (an example of “beautiful” non-academic works - scenes from the ancient life of the then popular S. Bakalovich). For the most part, non-academic production, as it was in other countries, was bourgeois-salon, its “beauty” was vulgar prettiness. But it cannot be said that she did not put forward talents: G. Semiradsky, mentioned above, was very talented, V. Smirnov, who died early (who managed to create an impressive large painting “The Death of Nero”); one cannot deny certain artistic merits of painting by A. Svedomsky and V. Kotarbinsky. About these artists, considering them to be carriers of the "Hellenic spirit", Repin spoke approvingly in his later years, they impressed Vrubel, just like Aivazovsky, also an "academic" artist. On the other hand, none other than Semiradsky, during the period of reorganization of the Academy, decisively spoke out in favor of the everyday genre, pointing to Perov, Repin and V. Mayakovsky as a positive example. So there were enough vanishing points between the “Wanderers” and the Academy, and the then vice-president of the Academy I.I. Tolstoy, on whose initiative the leading "Wanderers" were called to teach.
But the main thing that does not completely discount the role of the Academy of Arts, primarily as an educational institution, in the second half of the century is the simple fact that many outstanding artists came out of its walls. This is Repin, and Surikov, and Polenov, and Vasnetsov, and later - Serov and Vrubel. Moreover, they did not repeat the "revolt of the fourteen" and, apparently, benefited from their apprenticeship. More precisely, they all benefited from the lessons of P.P. Chistyakov, who was therefore called the "universal teacher". Chistyakova deserves special attention.
There is even something mysterious in the general popularity of Chistyakov among artists very different in their creative individuality. The taciturn Surikov wrote long letters to Chistyakov from abroad. V. Vasnetsov addressed Chistyakov with the words: "I would like to be called your son in spirit." Vrubel proudly called himself a Chistyakovite. And this, despite the fact that as an artist Chistyakov was secondary, he wrote little at all. But as a teacher he was one of a kind. Already in 1908, Serov wrote to him: "I remember you as a teacher, and I consider you the only (in Russia) true teacher of the eternal, unshakable laws of form - that's all you can teach." Chistyakov's wisdom was that he understood what could and should be taught as the foundation of the necessary skill, and what was impossible - what comes from the artist's talent and personality, which must be respected and treated with understanding and care. Therefore, his system of teaching drawing, anatomy and perspective did not fetter anyone, everyone extracted from it what they needed for themselves, there was room for personal talents and searches, and a solid foundation was laid. Chistyakov did not leave a detailed presentation of his "system", it is reconstructed mainly according to the memoirs of his students. This was a rationalistic system, its essence was a conscious analytical approach to the construction of form. Chistyakov taught "to draw with a form." Not contours, not “drawing” and not shading, but to build a three-dimensional form in space, going from the general to the particular. Drawing, according to Chistyakov, is an intellectual process, "deriving laws from nature" - he considered this the necessary basis of art, no matter what the artist's "manner" and "natural shade" were. Chistyakov insisted on the priority of drawing and, with his penchant for playful aphorisms, expressed it this way: “Drawing is a male part, a man; painting is a woman.
Respect for the drawing, for the constructed constructive form, is rooted in Russian art. Whether Chistyakov with his “system” was the cause here, or the general orientation of Russian culture towards realism was the reason for the popularity of the Chistyakov method, one way or another, Russian painters up to and including Serov, Nesterov and Vrubel honored the “unshakable eternal laws of form” and were wary of “dilution” or subjugation of the colorful amorphous element, no matter how much they love color.
Among the Wanderers invited to the Academy were two landscape painters - Shishkin and Kuindzhi. Just at that time, the hegemony of the landscape began in art both as an independent genre, where Levitan reigned, and as an equal element of everyday, historical, and partly portrait painting. Contrary to the predictions of Stasov, who believes that the role of the landscape will decrease, in the 1990s it increased like never before. The lyrical "landscape of mood" prevailed, leading its lineage from Savrasov and Polenov.
The Wanderers made genuine discoveries in landscape painting. Alexey Kondratievich Savrasov (1830-1897) managed to show the beauty and subtle lyricism of a simple Russian landscape. His painting "The Rooks Have Arrived" (1871) made many contemporaries take a fresh look at their native nature.
Fyodor Alexandrovich Vasiliev (1850-1873) lived a short life. His work, cut off at the very beginning, enriched domestic painting with a number of dynamic, exciting landscapes. The artist was especially successful in transitional states in nature: from sun to rain, from calm to storm.
Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin (1832-1898) became the singer of the Russian forest, the epic latitude of Russian nature. Arkhip Ivanovich Kuindzhi (1841-1910) was attracted by the picturesque play of light and air. The mysterious light of the moon in rare clouds, the red reflections of dawn on the white walls of Ukrainian huts, the slanting morning rays breaking through the fog and playing in the puddles on the muddy road - these and many other picturesque discoveries are captured on his canvases.
Russian landscape painting of the 19th century reached its peak in "the work of Savrasov's student Isaac Ilyich Levitan (1860-1900). Levitan is a master of calm, quiet landscapes. A very timid, shy and vulnerable person, he could only relax alone with nature, imbued with the mood of a landscape he loved.
Once he came to the Volga to paint the sun, air and river expanses. But there was no sun, endless clouds crawled across the sky, and the dull rains stopped. The artist was nervous until he was drawn into this weather and discovered the special charm of the lilac colors of Russian bad weather. Since then, the Upper Volga, the provincial town of Ples, has firmly entered his work. In those parts, he created his "rainy" works: "After the Rain", "Gloomy Day", "Above Eternal Peace". Peaceful evening landscapes were also painted there: “Evening on the Volga”, “Evening. Golden reach”, “Evening ringing”, “Quiet abode”.
In the last years of his life, Levitan drew attention to the work of French impressionist artists (E. Manet, C. Monet, C. Pizarro). He realized that he had a lot in common with them, that their creative searches were going in the same direction. Like them, he preferred to work not in the studio, but in the air (in the open air, as the artists say). Like them, he brightened the palette, banishing dark, earthy colors. Like them, he sought to capture the transience of being, to convey the movements of light and air. In this they went further than him, but they almost dissolved three-dimensional forms (houses, trees) in light-air flows. He avoided it.
“Levitan's paintings require a slow examination,” wrote a great connoisseur of his work, K. G. Paustovsky, “They do not stun the eye. They are modest and accurate, like Chekhov's stories, but the longer you look at them, the sweeter the silence of provincial settlements, familiar rivers and country roads becomes.
In the second half of the XIX century. account for the creative flowering of I. E. Repin, V. I. Surikov and V. A. Serov.
Ilya Efimovich Repin (1844-1930) was born in the city of Chuguev, in the family of a military settler. He managed to enter the Academy of Arts, where P. P. Chistyakov became his teacher, who brought up a whole galaxy of famous artists (V. I. Surikov, V. M. Vasnetsov, M. A. Vrubel, V. A. Serov). Repin also learned a lot from Kramskoy. In 1870 the young artist traveled along the Volga. Numerous sketches brought from the trip, he used for the painting "Barge haulers on the Volga" (1872). She made a strong impression on the public. The author immediately moved into the ranks of the most famous masters.
Repin was a very versatile artist. A number of monumental genre paintings belong to his brush. Perhaps no less impressive than the "Barge haulers" is made by the "Religious procession in the Kursk province." The bright blue sky, the clouds of road dust pierced by the sun, the golden glow of crosses and vestments, the police, the common people and the crippled - everything fit on this canvas: the greatness, strength, weakness and pain of Russia.
In many of Repin's paintings, revolutionary themes were touched upon ("Refusal of confession", "They did not wait", "The arrest of the propagandist"). The revolutionaries in his paintings are kept simply and naturally, avoiding theatrical poses and gestures. In the painting “Refusal of Confession”, the condemned man, as if on purpose, hid his hands in his sleeves. The artist clearly sympathized with the heroes of his paintings.
A number of Repin's paintings are written on historical themes ("Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan", "Cossacks composing a letter to the Turkish Sultan", etc.) - Repin created a whole gallery of portraits. He painted portraits of - scientists (Pirogov and Sechenov), - writers Tolstoy, Turgenev and Garshin, - composers Glinka and Mussorgsky, - artists Kramskoy and Surikov. At the beginning of the XX century. he received an order for the painting "The Ceremonial Meeting of the State Council." The artist managed not only to place such a large number of those present on the canvas, but also to give a psychological description of many of them. Among them were such well-known figures as S.Yu. Witte, K.P. Pobedonostsev, P.P. Semenov Tyan-Shansky. It is hardly noticeable in the picture, but Nicholas II is very subtly drawn.
Vasily Ivanovich Surikov (1848-1916) was born in Krasnoyarsk, in a Cossack family. The heyday of his work falls on the 80s, when he created three of his most famous historical paintings: "Morning of the Streltsy Execution", "Menshikov in Berezov" and "Boyar Morozova".
Surikov knew the life and customs of past eras well, he knew how to give vivid psychological characteristics. In addition, he was an excellent colorist (color master). Suffice it to recall the dazzling fresh, sparkling snow in the painting "Boyar Morozova". If you come closer to the canvas, the snow, as it were, “crumbles” into blue, blue, pink strokes. This painting technique, when two or three different strokes merge at a distance and give the desired color, was widely used by the French Impressionists.
Valentin Alexandrovich Serov (1865-1911), the composer's son, painted landscapes, canvases on historical themes, worked as a theater artist. But fame brought him, above all, portraits.
In 1887, the 22-year-old Serov was vacationing in Abramtsevo, the dacha near Moscow of the philanthropist S. I. Mamontov. Among his many children, the young artist was his man, a participant in their romps. Once, after dinner, two people accidentally lingered in the dining room - Serov and 12-year-old Verusha Mamontova. They were sitting at a table on which peaches were left, and during the conversation Verusha did not notice how the artist began to sketch her portrait. The work dragged on for a month, and Verusha was angry that Anton (as Serov was called at home) was forcing her to sit in the dining room for hours.
In early September, The Girl with Peaches was finished. Despite its small size, the painting, painted in rose gold tones, seemed very "spacious". There was a lot of light and air in it. The girl, who sat down at the table as if for a minute and fixed her gaze on the viewer, enchanted with clarity and spirituality. Yes, and the whole canvas was covered with a purely childish perception of everyday life, when happiness is not conscious of itself, and a whole life lies ahead.
The inhabitants of the "Abramtsevo" house, of course, understood that a miracle had happened before their eyes. But only time gives final estimates. It put "The Girl with Peaches" among the best portrait works in Russian and world art.
The following year, Serov managed to almost repeat his magic. He painted a portrait of his sister Maria Simonovich ("The Girl Illuminated by the Sun"). The name stuck a little inaccurate: the girl is sitting in the shade, and the glade in the background is illuminated by the rays of the morning sun. But in the picture everything is so united, so united - morning, sun, summer, youth and beauty - that it is difficult to think of a better name.
Serov became a fashionable portrait painter. Famous writers, artists, artists, entrepreneurs, aristocrats, even kings posed in front of him. Apparently, not to everyone he wrote, his soul lay. Some high-society portraits, with a filigree technique, turned out to be cold.
For several years Serov taught at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. He was a demanding teacher. An opponent of the frozen forms of painting, Serov, at the same time, believed that creative searches should be based on a solid mastery of the technique of drawing and pictorial writing. Many outstanding masters considered themselves students of Serov. This is M.S. Saryan, K.F. Yuon, P.V. Kuznetsov, K. S. Petrov-Vodkin.
Many paintings by Repin, Surikov, Levitan, Serov, "Wanderers" ended up in Tretyakov's collection. Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov (1832-1898), a representative of an old Moscow merchant family, was an unusual person. Thin and tall, with a bushy beard and a quiet voice, he looked more like a saint than a merchant. He began collecting paintings by Russian artists in 1856. The hobby grew into the main business of his life. In the early 90s. the collection reached the level of a museum, absorbing almost the entire fortune of the collector. Later it became the property of Moscow. The Tretyakov Gallery has become a world famous museum of Russian painting, graphics and sculpture.
In 1898, in St. Petersburg, in the Mikhailovsky Palace (the creation of K. Rossi), the Russian Museum was opened. It received works by Russian artists from the Hermitage, the Academy of Arts and some imperial palaces. The opening of these two museums, as it were, crowned the achievements of Russian painting of the 19th century.
Realism is usually called a direction in art and literature, whose representatives strove for a realistic and truthful reproduction of reality. In other words, the world was portrayed as typical and simple, with all its advantages and disadvantages.
General features of realism
Realism in literature is distinguished by a number of common features. First, life was portrayed in images that corresponded to reality. Secondly, the reality for the representatives of this trend has become a means of knowing themselves and the world around them. Thirdly, the images on the pages of literary works were distinguished by the truthfulness of details, specificity and typification. It is interesting that the art of the realists, with their life-affirming positions, strove to consider reality in development. Realists discovered new social and psychological relations.
The emergence of realism
Realism in literature as a form of artistic creation arose in the Renaissance, developed during the Enlightenment and emerged as an independent trend only in the 30s of the 19th century. The first realists in Russia include the great Russian poet A.S. Pushkin (he is sometimes even called the founder of this trend) and no less outstanding writer N.V. Gogol with his novel Dead Souls. As for literary criticism, the term "realism" appeared within it thanks to D. Pisarev. It was he who introduced the term into journalism and criticism. Realism in the literature of the 19th century became a hallmark of that time, having its own characteristics and characteristics.
Features of literary realism
Representatives of realism in literature are numerous. The most famous and outstanding writers include Stendhal, C. Dickens, O. Balzac, L.N. Tolstoy, G. Flaubert, M. Twain, F.M. Dostoevsky, T. Mann, M. Twain, W. Faulkner and many others. All of them worked on the development of the creative method of realism and embodied in their works its most striking features inextricably linked with their unique authorial features.
Realism is a trend in literature and art, truthfully and realistically reflecting the typical features of reality, in which there are no various distortions and exaggerations. This direction followed romanticism, and was the forerunner of symbolism.
This direction originated in the 30s of the 19th century and reached its peak by the middle of it. His followers sharply denied the use of any sophisticated techniques, mystical trends and idealization of characters in literary works. The main feature of this trend in literature is the artistic depiction of real life with the help of ordinary and well-known readers of images that are part of their daily lives for them (relatives, neighbors or acquaintances).
(Alexey Yakovlevich Voloskov "At the tea table")
The works of realist writers are distinguished by a life-affirming beginning, even if their plot is characterized by a tragic conflict. One of the main features of this genre is the authors' attempt to consider the surrounding reality in its development, to discover and describe new psychological, social and social relations.
Having replaced romanticism, realism has the characteristic features of art, seeking to find truth and justice, wishing to change the world for the better. The main characters in the works of realist authors make their discoveries and conclusions after much thought and deep introspection.
(Zhuravlev Firs Sergeevich "Before the wedding")
Critical realism is developing almost simultaneously in Russia and Europe (approximately 30-40s of the 19th century) and soon emerges as the leading trend in literature and art throughout the world.
In France, literary realism is primarily associated with the names of Balzac and Stendhal, in Russia with Pushkin and Gogol, in Germany with the names of Heine and Buchner. All of them experience the inevitable influence of romanticism in their literary work, but gradually move away from it, abandon the idealization of reality and move on to depicting a wider social background, where the life of the main characters takes place.
Realism in Russian literature of the 19th century
The main founder of Russian realism in the 19th century is Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin. In his works "The Captain's Daughter", "Eugene Onegin", "Tales of Belkin", "Boris Godunov", "The Bronze Horseman" he subtly captures and masterfully conveys the very essence of all important events in the life of Russian society, represented by his talented pen in all its diversity , colorfulness and inconsistency. Following Pushkin, many writers of that time came to the genre of realism, deepening the analysis of the emotional experiences of their heroes and depicting their complex inner world (Lermontov's Hero of Our Time, Gogol's The Inspector General and Dead Souls).
(Pavel Fedotov "The Picky Bride")
The tense socio-political situation in Russia during the reign of Nicholas I aroused a keen interest in the life and fate of the common people among progressive public figures of that time. This is noted in the later works of Pushkin, Lermontov and Gogol, as well as in the poetic lines of Alexei Koltsov and the works of the authors of the so-called "natural school": I.S. Turgenev (a cycle of stories "Notes of a Hunter", stories "Fathers and Sons", "Rudin", "Asya"), F.M. Dostoevsky ("Poor People", "Crime and Punishment"), A.I. Herzen (“The Thieving Magpie”, “Who is to blame?”), I.A. Goncharova ("Ordinary History", "Oblomov"), A.S. Griboyedov "Woe from Wit", L.N. Tolstoy ("War and Peace", "Anna Karenina"), A.P. Chekhov (stories and plays "The Cherry Orchard", "Three Sisters", "Uncle Vanya").
Literary realism of the second half of the 19th century was called critical, the main task of his works was to highlight existing problems, to raise issues of interaction between a person and the society in which he lives.
Realism in Russian Literature of the 20th Century
(Nikolai Petrovich Bogdanov-Belsky "Evening")
The turning point in the fate of Russian realism was the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, when this trend was in crisis and a new phenomenon in culture, symbolism, loudly declared itself. Then a new updated aesthetics of Russian realism arose, in which the main environment that forms the personality of a person was now considered History itself and its global processes. The realism of the early 20th century revealed the complexity of the formation of a person's personality, it was formed under the influence of not only social factors, history itself acted as the creator of typical circumstances, under the aggressive influence of which the main character fell.
(Boris Kustodiev "Portrait of D.F. Bogoslovsky")
There are four main currents in the realism of the early twentieth century:
- Critical: continues the tradition of classical realism of the mid-19th century. The works focus on the social nature of phenomena (creativity of A.P. Chekhov and L.N. Tolstoy);
- Socialist: displaying the historical and revolutionary development of real life, conducting an analysis of conflicts in the conditions of the class struggle, revealing the essence of the characters of the main characters and their actions committed for the benefit of others. (M. Gorky "Mother", "The Life of Klim Samgin", most of the works of Soviet authors).
- Mythological: reflection and rethinking of real life events through the prism of the plots of famous myths and legends (L.N. Andreev "Judas Iscariot");
- Naturalism: an extremely truthful, often unsightly, detailed depiction of reality (A.I. Kuprin "The Pit", V.V. Veresaev "Notes of a Doctor").
Realism in foreign literature of the 19th-20th centuries
The initial stage of the formation of critical realism in Europe in the middle of the 19th century is associated with the works of Balzac, Stendhal, Beranger, Flaubert, Maupassant. Merimee in France, Dickens, Thackeray, Brontë, Gaskell in England, the poetry of Heine and other revolutionary poets in Germany. In these countries, in the 30s of the 19th century, tension was growing between two irreconcilable class enemies: the bourgeoisie and the labor movement, there was a period of upsurge in various spheres of bourgeois culture, a number of discoveries were made in natural science and biology. In countries where a pre-revolutionary situation has developed (France, Germany, Hungary), the doctrine of scientific socialism of Marx and Engels arises and develops.
(Julien Dupre "Return from the fields")
As a result of a complex creative and theoretical debate with the followers of romanticism, critical realists took for themselves the best progressive ideas and traditions: interesting historical themes, democracy, folklore trends, progressive critical pathos and humanistic ideals.
The realism of the early twentieth century, having survived the struggle of the best representatives of the "classics" of critical realism (Flaubert, Maupassant, France, Shaw, Rolland) with the trends of new unrealistic trends in literature and art (decadence, impressionism, naturalism, aestheticism, etc.) is acquiring new character traits. He refers to the social phenomena of real life, describes the social motivation of the human character, reveals the psychology of the individual, the fate of art. The modeling of artistic reality is based on philosophical ideas, the author's attitude is given, first of all, to the intellectually active perception of the work when reading it, and then to the emotional one. The classic example of an intellectual realistic novel is the works of the German writer Thomas Mann "The Magic Mountain" and "The Confession of the Adventurer Felix Krul", dramaturgy by Bertolt Brecht.
(Robert Kohler "Strike")
In the works of the 20th century realist authors, the dramatic line intensifies and deepens, there is more tragedy (the work of the American writer Scott Fitzgerald "The Great Gatsby", "Tender is the Night"), there is a special interest in the inner world of man. Attempts to portray the conscious and unconscious life moments of a person lead to the emergence of a new literary device, close to modernism, called the “stream of consciousness” (works by Anna Zegers, V. Koeppen, Y. O'Neill). Naturalistic elements appear in the work of American realist writers such as Theodore Dreiser and John Steinbeck.
The realism of the twentieth century has a bright life-affirming color, faith in man and his strength, this is noticeable in the works of American realist writers William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Jack London, Mark Twain. The works of Romain Rolland, John Galsworthy, Bernard Shaw, Erich Maria Remarque enjoyed great popularity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Realism continues to exist as a trend in modern literature and is one of the most important forms of democratic culture.
At the beginning of the lesson, the teacher explains to the students the essence of the concept of realism, talks about the concept of "natural school". Further, the postulates of naturalism of the French writer Emile Zola are given, the concept of social Darwinism is revealed. A detailed story is given about the features of Russian realism of the late XIX - early XX centuries, the most significant works of Russian writers are considered, how they form the literature of that period.
Rice. 1. Portrait of V. Belinsky ()
The key event for Russian realism in the middle of the 19th century was the release in the 40s of two literary collections - this is the collection "Physiology of Petersburg" and "Petersburg Collection". Both of them came out with a preface by Belinsky (Fig. 1), where he writes that Russia is divided, there are many classes in it that live their own lives, they know nothing about each other. People of different classes speak and dress differently, believe in God and earn their living. The task of literature, according to Belinsky, is to acquaint Russia with Russia, to break down territorial barriers.
Belinsky's concept of realism had to endure many difficult trials. From 1848 to 1856 it was even forbidden to mention his name in print. Issues of Otechestvennye Zapiski and Sovremennik with his articles were confiscated in libraries. Profound changes began in the very camp of progressive writers. The "natural school" of the 1940s, which included various writers - Nekrasov and A. Maikov, Dostoevsky and Druzhinin, Herzen and V. Dal - was possible on the basis of a united anti-serfdom front. But by the end of the 40s, democratic and liberal tendencies intensified in it.
The authors opposed "tendentious" art, for "pure artistry", for "eternal" art. On the basis of "pure art" Botkin, Druzhinin and Annenkov united in a kind of "triumvirate". They mistreated the true disciples of Belinsky, such as Chernyshevsky, and in this they received support from Turgenev, Grigorovich, Goncharov.
These individuals did not simply advocate the aimlessness and apolitical nature of art. They challenged the pointed tendentiousness that the Democrats wanted to give to art. They were satisfied with the outdated level of tendentiousness, although they could hardly come to terms with it during Belinsky's lifetime. Their position was typically liberal, and they were later completely satisfied with the limited "glasnost" that was established as a result of the tsarist reform. Gorky pointed to the objectively reactionary meaning of liberalism in the context of the preparations for a democratic revolution in Russia: “The liberals of the 1860s and Chernyshevsky,” he wrote in 1911, “are representatives of two historical trends, two historical forces that, from then until our time determine the outcome of the struggle for a new Russia.
The literature of the middle of the 19th century developed under the influence of the concept of V. Belinsky and received the name "natural school".
Emile Zola (Fig. 2) in his work "Experimental Novel" explained that the task of literature is the study of a certain period in the life of its heroes.
Rice. 2. Emile Zola ()
In his ideas about man, E. Zola relied on the study of the famous French physiologist C. Bernard (Fig. 3), who considered man as a biological being. Emile Zola believed that all human actions are based on blood and nerves, that is, the biological motives of behavior determine a person's life.
Rice. 3. Portrait of Claude Bernard ()
The followers of E. Zola were called social Darwinists. For them, Darwin's concept is important: any biological individual is formed, adapting to the environment and fighting for survival. The will to live, the struggle for survival and the environment - all these principles will be found in the literature of the turn of the century.
Zola's imitators appeared in Russian literature. For Russian realism-naturalism, the main thing was to photographically reflect reality.
Naturalist writers of the late 19th century were characterized by: a new look at the estates from the outside, a realistic presentation in the spirit of a psychological novel.
One of the most striking manifestos of the literature of that time was the article by the critic A. Suvorin (Fig. 4) “Our poetry and fiction”, which answered the questions “Do we have literature?”, “How to write?” and "What does an author need?". He complains that new people from the works of this time - representatives of different classes - are engaged in old, familiar activities for literary heroes (fall in love, marry, divorce), and writers for some reason do not talk about the professional activities of heroes. The writers are not aware of the occupations of the new heroes. The biggest problem writers face is not knowing the material they are writing about.
Rice. 4. Portrait of Suvorin ()
“A fiction writer should know more or should choose for himself some one corner as a specialist and try to become, if not a master, then a good worker,” wrote Suvorin.
At the end of the 80s, a new wave appeared in literature - this is M. Gorky, Marxists, a new idea of what sociality is.
Rice. 5. Collection of partnership "Knowledge" ()
"Knowledge" (Fig. 5), a book publishing partnership in St. Petersburg, organized in 1898-1913 by members of the Literacy Committee (K.P. Pyatnitsky and others) for cultural and educational purposes. Initially, the publishing house produced mainly popular science books on natural science, history, public education, and art. In 1900, M. Gorky joined Znanie; at the end of 1902 he headed the publishing house after its reorganization. Gorky united realist writers around Knowledge, reflecting the oppositional moods of Russian society in their works. Having released in a short time the collected works of M. Gorky (9 vols.), A. Serafimovich, A.I. Kuprin, V.V. Veresaeva, Wanderer (S. G. Petrova), N.D. Teleshova, S.A. Naydenova et al., "Knowledge" has gained fame as a publishing house that focuses on a broad democratic circle of readers. In 1904, the publishing house began publishing the Collections of the Knowledge Association (up to 1913, 40 books were published). They included works by M. Gorky, A.P. Chekhov, A.I. Kuprin, A. Serafimovich, L.N. Andreeva, I.A. Bunina, V.V. Veresaeva and others. Translations were also published.
Against the background of the critical realism of the majority of the “Znanievists”, Gorky and Serafimovich, representatives of socialist realism, stood out, on the one hand, and Andreev and some others, subject to the influences of decadence, on the other. After the revolution of 1905-07. this division has intensified. Since 1911, the main editing of the collections "Knowledge" passed to V.S. Mirolyubov.
Along with the release of collected works of young writers and collections, the Knowledge partnership published the so-called. "Cheap Library", in which small works of "Knowledge" writers were printed. In addition, on the instructions of the Bolsheviks, Gorky published a series of socio-political brochures, including works by K. Marx, F. Engels, P. Lafargue, A. Bebel and others. circulation - about 4 million copies).
During the years of reaction that came after the revolution of 1905-07, many members of the Knowledge partnership left the publishing house. Gorky, forced to live abroad during these years, broke with the publishing house in 1912. M. Gorky's letters speak more and more about the timeliness of literature and its usefulness, that is, the need to develop the reader and instill in him the correct worldview.
At this time, the division into friends and foes is characteristic not only of writers, but also of readers. The main reader for Gorky and the Znanevites is the new reader (the working man, the proletariat, who is not yet accustomed to reading books), and therefore the writer needs to write simply and clearly. The writer must be the teacher and leader of the reader.
The Znaniev concept in literature will form the basis of the concept of Soviet literature.
Since what is stated in a work of art should be clear and understandable, the main path for Znaniev literature is allegory I (allegory, an abstract concept is illustrated by a specific object or image).
For each concept: "valor", "faith", "mercy" - there were stable images that were understood by readers. In this period of literature, such concepts as “stagnation” and “revolution”, the world “old” and “new” are in demand. In each of the stories of the partnership there is a key image-allegory.
Another important feature of realism at the end of the 19th century is the appearance of writers from the provinces: Mamin-Sibiryak, Shishkov, Prishvin, Bunin, Shmelev, Kuprin and many others. The Russian province appears unknown, incomprehensible, in need of study. The Russian outback of this time appears in two guises:
1. something motionless, alien to any movement (conservative);
2. something that keeps traditions, important life values.
The story "Village" by Bunin, "Uyezdnoe" by Zamyatin, the novel "Small Demon" by F. Sologub, stories by Zaitsev and Shmelev and other works that tell about the provincial life of that time.
- Naturalism ().
- "Natural school" ().
- Emile Zola ().
- Claude Bernard ().
- Social Darwinism ().
- Artsybashev M.P. ().
- Suvorin A.S. ().
Publishing house of the partnership "Knowledge"
XX century
Teacher's book ∕ lecture notes
Yaroslavl, 2014
Topic 1.
Russian literature at the turn of the century: an overview lesson
Temporary boundaries
Teacher:
Russian literature of the late 19th - early 20th century, or the literature of the "Silver Age", is one of the brightest stages in the centuries-old history of Russian literature. This stage was preceded by several literary epochs: ancient Russian literature, numbering 7 centuries; literature of the 18th century; 19th century literature.
Compared to these periods, the stage of Russian literature at the turn of the century is much smaller in terms of its length in time. It begins in the 1890s and ends in the late 1910s. – early 1920s The end of this stage is associated with 1921.
Question:
why this year?
Answer:
this year Alexander Blok (one of the largest symbolist poets) died and in which Nikolai Gumilyov (one of the largest acmeist poets) was shot.
[The teacher shows their portraits.]
But, of course, the “silver age”, that artistic worldview that was born at the turn of the century, continued to exist later: on the one hand, other writers and poets, contemporaries of A. Blok and N. Gumilyov, were alive; on the other hand, the culture of the turn of the century was reflected in the work of young writers belonging to a different era. Among them, for example, we can name Daniil Andreev and Arseny Tarkovsky.
The meaning of the name
The teacher invites the audience to hold an object made of silver in their hands and asks the question: why is the stage of the turn of the century in Russian literature called the “Silver Age”?
Sample answer:
1. "silver" as opposed to the "golden age" of Russian literature (A. Pushkin) [the idea of 4 centuries: from golden to iron];
2. silver as an analogue of the Moon - a symbol of the subconscious, a symbol of duality (light side and dark side).
Persons
Teacher:
Despite the fact that the period of the turn of the century in Russian literature lasted only about 30 years, it contained a huge number of famous names. So, in the 1890s-1900s, the work of the great Russian writers Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov continued (they completed the “classical” 19th century of Russian literature), and at the same time new writers and poets appeared who determined a new, emerging culture.
These are prose writers M. Gorky, A. Kuprin, I. Bunin, A.N. Tolstoy, I. Shmelev, M. Prishvin, E. Zamyatin.
Poets A. Blok, V. Bryusov, I. Annensky, D. Merezhkovsky, Z. Gippius, F. Sologub, K. Balmont, Andrey Bely, Vyach. Ivanov, Velimir Khlebnikov, N. Gumilyov, M. Voloshin, M. Kuzmin.
In the 1910s, A. Akhmatova, S. Yesenin, V. Mayakovsky, O. Mandelstam, M. Tsvetaeva, N. Klyuev, V. Khodasevich, I. Severyanin, B. Pasternak entered Russian literature.
[The teacher shows their portraits and reads a stanza from their poems.]
But literature during this period did not exist in an airless space, it was part of the general spiritual culture, which was also on the rise at that time. So, among the names of famous philosophers of the turn of the century, one can name V. Solovyov, S. Bulgakov, N. Berdyaev, P. Florensky, V. Rozanov; among artists - M. Vrubel, K. Korovin, V. Serov, A. Benois, L. Bakst and others, among composers - S. Rachmaninov, A. Scriabin, I. Stravinsky; among theatrical figures - K. Stanislavsky, V. Komissarzhevskaya, V. Meyerhold.
[The teacher shows the works of these artists and puts on music by S. Rachmaninov and A. Scriabin.]
The main trends in the development of Russian art at the turn of the century
1. A sharp democratization of art: a rapid increase in the quantitative composition of the audience: many readers → many poets (the appearance of cinema - "demand (large audience) gives rise to supply (cinema - a mass art form)").
2. Literature was sharply divided into mass and elite (the titles of V. Bryusov's collections are "Me eum esse", "Tertia Vigilia").
3. A sharp increase in contacts with world literature (any fact of European art becomes the property of a Russian person and vice versa; books by Russian writers are quickly translated into foreign languages; Russian and foreign ones begin to resemble each other).
4. Active interaction of different types of arts: the development of a synthetic form of art - theater; poets use musical terms for the titles of their works (K. Balmont's poem "Moonlight Sonata"); Scriabin conceives color music for "Prometheus", his "Mystery" was supposed to include music, noises, mobile architecture, dance, poetry, smells).
5. Creative universalism: M. Kuzmin - poet and musician, Mayakovsky - poet and artist [the teacher shows V. Mayakovsky's drawings].
6. Attraction to miniaturization in terms of genre.
7. Professionalization in art: combining practice and theorist in one person (S. Taneev - theorist and composer; the same - A. Bely, V. Bryusov, Vyach. Ivanov).
8. Inclination towards a pure form, emancipation, liberation of the text from rigid structures (the process of loosening the syllabo-tonic (dolnik, tactician, vers libre)); discrepancy between sound and meaning → silence, a blank sheet of paper (V. Gnedov, “The Poem of the End”).
9. Attraction to polyphony (I. Stravinsky, "Petrushka"; A. Blok, "12").
Homework:
Read the stories of A.P. Chekhov: "Chameleon", "Death of an Official", "Ionych", "Man in a Case", "About Love", "Gooseberry", "Lady with a Dog", "Thick and Thin", "Intruder ”,“ Literature teacher ”,“ Jumper ”,“ Student ”.
Topic 2
Russian literature at the turn of the century (continued). Life and career of A.P. Chekhov
"Classical" literature of the 19th century and literature of the turn of the century
At the turn of the century, culture and literature are undergoing changes in how the surrounding reality begins to be perceived. These changes manifested themselves in several aspects:
1. The 19th century was characterized by optimism, faith and hope in social progress (“War and Peace”), in lofty ideals; at the turn of the century, faith in social reconstruction collapses, pessimism prevails, ideas of the relativity of faith and unbelief, good and evil, high love and physical pleasures, a sense of fin de siecle, decadence (the work of F. Sologub).
2. In the 19th century, the hero is a small person, literature is literature of compassion and humanism [the teacher reads out excerpts from "The Overcoat" by N. Gogol and "Poor People" by F. Dostoevsky], - at the turn of the century, the writer and the hero focus on their own suffering, literature is the literature of psychological masochism, extreme individualism, egocentrism, it is characterized by the aestheticization of death.
3. The culture of the 19th century is monocentric (Pushkin and the poets of the Pushkin Pleiades), literary trends in it succeeded each other (romanticism followed sentimentalism, realism followed romanticism) - the culture of the turn of the century is polycentric (there are no main and secondary writers), literary trends in it exist in parallel (realism, symbolism, acmeism, futurism).
4. The 19th century flourished realism(lat.realis - “essential”, “real”, from res - “thing”), which is characterized by plausibility, depth of immersion in reality; - blooms at the turn of the century modernism(Italian modernismo - "modern trend"; from lat. modernus - "modern, recent": it includes impressionism, expressionism, symbolism, acmeism, futurism), which is characterized by an orientation towards urban culture, scientific methods of cognition, as well as on subconsciousness and irrationality, deformation of real proportions, construction, modeling of new forms.
The originality of Russian realism at the turn of the century
Teacher:
However, realism in the literature of the 20th century is also still present. But at the same time, it differs significantly from the “classical” realism of the 19th century. The realism of the turn of the century is based on the artistic discoveries of the prose of A.P. Chekhov, which record the changes that have occurred in the minds of a Russian person:
1. In the realism of the 19th century, the hero comes to a conclusion (Raskolnikov rethinks his life in hard labor), in the realism of the turn of the century, the hero is always missing something, and none of the previous means can help him, while life in a fixed world is seen as vulgarity ("Lady with a dog").
2. In the realism of the 19th century, there are antagonist heroes (Pechorin and Grushnitsky), in the realism of the turn of the century, no one is unconditionally right, all contrasts lose their tense character (Lopakhin is the one who cuts down the cherry orchard, and at the same time tries with all his might to help the mistress of this garden - Ranevskaya).
3. In the realistic works of the turn of the century, the thematic spectrum expands sharply, and previously forbidden topics invade literature (Kuprin, "The Pit").
4. In the realistic works of the turn of the century, the typology of characters is being updated (the diversity of heroes in A. Kuprin's prose).
5. Changes take place in the writer's personality at the turn of the century: writers become light on their feet (M. Gorky, "Across Rus'"; A. Kuprin, changing professions).
