// Images of peasants in Nekrasov's poem "Who should live well in Rus'"
The famous poem by N.A. Nekrasov "" opens and describes to readers the images of peasants who happened to experience the hardships and difficulties of the post-reform period in Russia. Nekrasov introduces us to ordinary, peasant men who decided to find out who is really happy in Russia - a landowner, a merchant, a priest, or the tsar himself?
Seven wanderers make a detour of the Russian lands in search of the truth. They meet different characters on their way, but they never refuse to help anyone. Travelers rescue Matryona Timofeevna, having learned that her crop is dying. The illiterate province also felt the help of the peasants.
Thanks to the wanderings of heroes, Nikolai Alekseevich introduces readers to various persons who occupy absolutely different position in society. This is the clergy, and the merchants, and the nobility. And against the background of them, the author can contrastly highlight the representatives of the peasantry - the travelers themselves, with their hallmarks character and behaviour.
In the course of reading the poem, we meet a poor peasant named Yakim Nagoi. He, working all his life, remained in the lavas of the most impoverished segments of the population. Most of the inhabitants of the village of Bosovo resemble him.
Analyzing the portrait this hero, in which Nekrasov compares him with mother earth itself, calling his neck brown, and his face brick, you can guess what kind of work he does every day and does for the benefit of others. However, Yakim is not upset because of his position, because he believes in the peasants, that they have a bright and worthy future.
Another Nekrasov character was distinguished by his incorruptibility and honesty. Plus, he was extraordinarily smart.
Using the example of this hero, Nekrasov shows how solidary the peasants were. The people trusted Yermila during the purchase of the mill, for which he takes the side of the peasants and supports their rebellion.
Repeatedly, when describing the image of a real peasant, Nekrasov mentions the heroes, whom many of them resembled. The image of Saveliy is a vivid confirmation of this. He is tall, powerful and strong. And despite such peasant features, Savely is unusually sincere, kind and pure man. He treats Matryona Timofeevna with trepidation and love. Savely often falls into philosophical reflections on whether the common people should endure all those humiliations and hardships that fell on the working shoulders.
As for female images, to which Nekrasov paid considerable attention, their description merged into one in the person of Matryona Timofeevna. This is a woman who strove with all her might to fight for happiness, for freedom. She was strong, possessed extraordinary endurance and stamina. Her fate was not easy. She, having married, endured the trials of misfortune and, in the end, set to hard work on a par with the peasants.
Very often she splashed out her emotions with the help of songs. Nekrasov calls the song the soul of the people, because in it the peasants poured out all their pain, all the bitterness that burdened their hard lives.
In addition, there are in the text of the poem and the characters of the landlord servants, who took the abolition of serfdom hard. They are so accustomed to serving and running errands that they have completely lost the feeling dignity and became faceless.
This is Jacob, who cracks down on himself in front of the master in order to take revenge on him. This is Klim and Ipat. These people are despised by ordinary peasants and even more hated by the landowners. After all, they sold out, became spineless and low creatures.
In this field, Nikolai Nekrasov describes the strongest stratification that occurred among the peasants. And the reason for everything was the reform of 1861.
Nekrasov, in the text of his poem, did not forget to mention that the peasants were unusually religious. Their faith in God, in the Almighty was the strongest of all. They turned to him for help, looking for protection and support. Only with hope and faith could the representatives of the peasants move forward towards a happy life.
In the poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'", Nikolai Alekseevich revealed the images of typical representatives of the peasant class. The writer is trying to say that the peasants are not just slaves, they are a force that, in the end, can manifest itself and show itself. Therefore, it must be reckoned with and endowed with its own own rights and freedoms.
Introduction
Starting work on the poem "Who Lives Well in Rus'", Nekrasov dreamed of creating a large-scale work that would reflect all the knowledge about the peasants he had accumulated over his life. WITH early childhood before the eyes of the poet passed "the spectacle of the disasters of the people", and the first childhood impressions prompted him to further study the way of life. peasant life. Hard work, human grief, and at the same time - the enormous spiritual strength of the people - all this was noticed by Nekrasov's attentive gaze. And it is precisely because of this that in the poem “To whom it is good to live in Rus'”, the images of the peasants look so reliable, as if the poet personally knew his heroes. It is logical that the poem, in which the main character is the people, has a large number of peasant images, but it is worth looking at them more closely - and we will be struck by the diversity and liveliness of these characters.
The image of the main characters-wanderers
The first peasants the reader meets are the truth-seekers who argued about who lives well in Rus'. For the poem, it is not so much their individual images that are important, but the whole idea that they express - without them, the plot of the work would simply fall apart. And, nevertheless, Nekrasov gives each of them a name, native village(the names of the villages are already eloquent in themselves: Gorelovo, Zaplatovo ...) and certain traits of character and appearance: Luka is an inveterate debater, Pahom is an old man. And the views of the peasants, despite the integrity of their image, are different, each does not deviate from his views until the fight. On the whole, the image of these peasants is a group image, and therefore the most basic features, characteristic of almost any peasant, stand out in it. This is extreme poverty, stubbornness and curiosity, the desire to find the truth. Note that describing the peasants dear to his heart, Nekrasov still does not embellish their images. He also shows vices, mainly general drunkenness.
The peasant theme in the poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” is not the only one - during their journey, the peasants will meet both the landowner and the priest, they will hear about the life of different classes - merchants, nobles, clergy. But all other images in one way or another serve to more fully reveal the main theme of the poem: the life of peasants in Russia immediately after the reform.
The poem contains several crowd scenes- a fair, a feast, a road along which many people go. Here Nekrasov portrays the peasantry as a single entity that thinks the same way, speaks unanimously and even sighs at the same time. But at the same time, the images of the peasants depicted in the work can be divided into two large groups: honest working people who value their freedom and peasant slaves. In the first group, Yakim Nagoi, Ermil Girin, Trofim and Agap are especially distinguished.
Positive images of peasants
Yakim Nagoi - typical representative the poorest peasantry, and himself similar to "mother earth", to "a layer cut off by a plow".
All his life he works "to death", but at the same time remains a beggar. His sad story: he once lived in St. Petersburg, but started a lawsuit with a merchant, ended up in prison because of her and returned from there "like a peeled velvet" - nothing surprises listeners. There were many such destinies in Rus' at that time ... Despite hard work, Yakim has enough strength to stand up for his compatriots: yes, there are many drunken men, but there are more sober ones, they are all great people "in work and in revelry." Love for truth, for honest work, the dream of transforming life (“there should be thunder”) - these are the main components of the image of Yakim.
Trofim and Agap complement Yakim in some way, each of them has one main character trait. In the image of Trofim, Nekrasov shows the infinite strength and patience of the Russian people - Trofim once demolished fourteen pounds, and then returned home barely alive. Agap is a lover of truth. He is the only one who refuses to participate in the performance for Prince Utyatin: “The possession of peasant souls is over!”. When they force him, he dies in the morning: it is easier for a peasant to die than to bend back under the yoke of serfdom.
Ermil Girin is endowed by the author with intelligence and incorruptible honesty, for which he is chosen as burgomaster. He "didn't twist his soul," but once having strayed from the right way, could not live not in truth, before the whole world brought repentance. But honesty and love for their compatriots do not bring happiness to the peasants: the image of Yermila is tragic. At the time of the story, he is sitting in prison: this is how his help to the rebellious village turned out.
Images of Matryona and Savely
The life of the peasants in Nekrasov's poem would not have been fully depicted without the image of a Russian woman. For disclosure " female share", which" grief is not life! the author chose the image of Matrena Timofeevna. “Beautiful, strict and swarthy,” she tells in detail the story of her life, in which she was happy only then, how she lived with her parents in the “girls hall”. After that, hard work began, along with men, work, nit-picking relatives, and the death of the firstborn mangled the fate. Under this story, Nekrasov singled out a whole part in the poem, nine chapters - much more than the stories of the rest of the peasants occupy. It conveys it well special treatment, love for a Russian woman. Matryona impresses with her strength and stamina. She bears all the blows of fate without a murmur, but at the same time she knows how to stand up for her loved ones: she lies down under the rod instead of her son and saves her husband from the soldiers. The image of Matryona in the poem merges with the image folk soul- long-suffering and long-suffering, which is why the speech of a woman is so rich in songs. These songs are often the only way to pour out your longing...
Another curious image adjoins the image of Matrena Timofeevna - the image of the Russian hero, Savely. Living out his life in the family of Matrona (“he lived a hundred and seven years”), Savely thinks more than once: “Where are you, strength, gone? What were you good for?" The strength was all gone under rods and sticks, wasted during overwork on the German and wasted away in hard labor. In the image of Saveliy is shown tragic fate Russian peasantry, heroes by nature, leading a life completely unsuitable for them. Despite all the hardships of life, Savely did not become embittered, he is wise and affectionate with the disenfranchised (the only one in the family protects Matryona). Shown in his image is the deep religiosity of the Russian people, who were looking for help in faith.
The image of the peasant-serfs
Another type of peasants depicted in the poem are serfs. The years of serfdom have crippled the souls of some people who are accustomed to crawling and can no longer imagine their lives without the power of the landowner over themselves. Nekrasov shows this on the examples of the images of the serfs Ipat and Yakov, as well as the headman Klim. Jacob is the image of a faithful serf. He spent his whole life on fulfilling the whims of his master: “Jakov had only joy: / To groom, protect, appease the master.” However, one cannot live with the master “ladok” - as a reward for the exemplary service of Yakov, the master gives his nephew as a recruit. It was then that Jacob's eyes were opened, and he decided to take revenge on his offender. Klim becomes the boss thanks to the grace of Prince Utyatin. A nasty master and a lazy worker, he, singled out by a master, flourishes from feeling own importance: "Proud pig: itched / O master's porch!". Using the example of the headman, Klima Nekrasov shows how terrible yesterday's serf who got into the bosses is one of the most disgusting human types. But it is difficult to lead an honest peasant heart - and in the village Klim is sincerely despised, not afraid.
So from various images peasants "Who should live well in Rus'" develops whole picture people as a huge force, already beginning to rise little by little and realize its power.
Artwork test
N. A. Nekrasov’s poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'” was created over a period of more than ten years (1863-1876). The main problem that interested the poet was the position of the Russian peasant under serfdom and after the “liberation”. About the essence of the royal manifesto, N. A. Nekrasov speaks in the words of the people: “You are good, royal letter, but you are not written about us.” Paintings folk life written with epic breadth, and this gives the right to call the poem an encyclopedia of Russian life of that time.
Drawing numerous images of peasants, various characters, the author divides the heroes into two camps, as it were: slaves and fighters. Already in the prologue we get acquainted with the peasants-truth-seekers. They live in villages characteristic names: v Zaplatovo, Dyryavino, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Neyolovo, Crop failure. The purpose of their journey is to find happy person in Rus'. Traveling, peasants meet with different people. After listening to a story about his “happiness”, having received advice to find out about the happiness of the landowner, the peasants say:
You are past them, the landowners!
We know them!
Truth-seekers are not satisfied with the "noble" word, they need the "Christian word":
Give me a Christian word!
Noble with a scolding,
With a push and with a poke,
That is unsuitable for us.
Truth seekers are hardworking, always striving to help others. Hearing from a peasant woman that there are not enough working hands to remove the bread in time, the peasants offer:
And what are we, godfather?
Come on sickles! All seven
How will we become tomorrow - by evening
We will harvest all your rye!
Just as willingly, they help the peasants of the Illiterate province mow the grass.
Most fully, Nekrasov reveals the images of peasant fighters who do not reproach their masters, do not reconcile themselves to their slavish position.
Yakim Nagoi from the village of Bosovo lives in dire poverty. He works to death, escaping under the harrow from the heat and rain.
The chest is sunken; like a depressed
Stomach; at the eyes, at the mouth
Bends like cracks
On dry ground...
Reading the description of the appearance of a peasant, we understand that Yakim, all his life toiling on a gray, barren piece of land, himself became like the earth. Yakim admits that most of his labor is appropriated by "shareholders" who do not work, but live on the labors of peasants like him:
You work alone
And a little work is over,
Look, there are three equity holders:
God, king and lord!
All my long life Yakim worked, experienced many hardships, went hungry, went to prison, and, "like a peeled velvet, he returned to his homeland." But still, he finds the strength in himself to create at least some kind of life, some kind of beauty. Yakim decorates his house with pictures, loves a well-aimed word, his speech is full of proverbs and sayings. Yakim is the image of a new type of peasant, a rural proletarian who has been in a latrine trade. And his voice is the voice of the most advanced peasants: . Every peasant has
Soul that black cloud -
Angry, formidable - and it would be necessary
Thunders rumble from there,
Pour bloody rain...
WITH the poet has great sympathy for his hero Yermil Girin, the village headman, fair, honest, intelligent, who, according to the peasants,
At seven years of a worldly penny
Didn't squeeze under the nail
At the age of seven, he did not touch the right one,
Didn't let the guilty
I didn't bend my heart...
Only once did Yermil act out of conscience, giving the son of the old woman Vlasyevna instead of his brother to the army. Repentant, he tried to hang himself. According to the peasants, Yermil had everything for happiness: peace of mind, money, honor, but his honor is special, not bought by "neither money nor fear: strict truth, intelligence and kindness."
The people, defending the worldly cause, in difficult times help Yermil to save the mill, show exceptional trust in him. This act confirms the ability of the people to act together, in peace. And Ermil, not being afraid of the prison, took the side of the peasants when "the patrimony of the landowner Obrubkov rebelled." Ermil Girin is a defender of peasant interests.
next and most vivid image in this row is Saveliy, the hero of the Holy Russian, a fighter for the cause of the people. In his youth, he, like all peasants, for a long time endured cruel bullying from the landowner Shalashnikov and his manager. But Savely cannot accept such an order, and he rebels along with other peasants, he buried the German Vogel alive in the ground. "Twenty years of strict hard labor, twenty years of settlement" Savely received for this. Returning as an old man to his native village, he retained good spirits and hatred for the oppressors. "Branded, but not a slave!" he says about himself. Savely to old age retained a clear mind, cordiality, responsiveness. In the poem, he is shown as a people's avenger:
...Our axes
They lay - for the time being!
He speaks contemptuously of the passive peasants, calling them "dead ... lost."
Nekrasov calls Saveliy a Holy Russian hero, emphasizing his heroic character, and also compares him with folk hero Ivan Susanin. The image of Savely embodies the desire of the people for freedom.
This image is given in the same chapter with the image of Matryona Timofeevna not by chance. The poet shows together two heroic Russian characters. Matrena Timofeevna goes through many trials. She lived freely and cheerfully in her parents' house, and after marriage she had to work like a slave, endure the reproaches of her husband's relatives, in the fights of her husband. She found joy only in work and in children. She had a hard time with the death of her son Demushka, a year of hunger, and begging. But in difficult moments she showed firmness and perseverance: she fussed about the release of her husband, who was illegally taken as a soldier, she even went to the governor himself. She stood up for Fedotushka when they wanted to punish him with rods. Recalcitrant, resolute, she is always ready to defend her rights, and this brings her closer to Savely. Having told wanderers about her hard life, she says that “it’s not de-lo to look for a happy woman among women.” In a chapter entitled "A Woman's Parable", a Yankee peasant speaks of the female lot:
Keys to female happiness
From our free will
Abandonedlost
God himself.
But Nekrasov is sure that the "keys" must be found. The peasant woman will wait and achieve happiness. The poet speaks about this in one of Grisha Dobroskponov's songs:
You are still in the family as long as a slave,
But the mother is already a free son!
Nekrasov, with a special feeling, created images of truth-seekers, fighters, in which the strength of the people, the will to fight against the oppressors was expressed. However, the poet could not help but turn to dark sides peasant life. The poem depicts peasants who have become accustomed to their slave position. In the chapter "Happy", the truth-seekers meet with a courtyard man who considers himself happy because he was Prince Peremetiev's favorite slave. The courtyard is proud that his daughter, along with the young lady, “learned both French and all kinds of languages, she was allowed to sit down in the presence of the princess.” And the courtyard himself stood for thirty years at the chair of the Most Serene Prince, licked the plates after him and drank the remnants of overseas wines. He is proud of his "closeness" to the masters and his "honorable" disease - gout. Simple freedom-loving peasants laugh at a slave who looks down on his fellow peasants, not understanding all the baseness of his lackey position. The courtyard of Prince Utyatin, Ipat, did not even believe that the “freedom” was declared to the peasants:
And I am the Utyatin princes
Serf - and the whole tight tale!
From childhood to old age, the master in every possible way mocked his slave Ipat. All this the footman took for granted: ... redeemed
Me, the last slave,
In the winter in the hole!
Yes, how wonderful!
Two holes:
In one he will lower in the net,
In another moment it will pull out -
And bring vodka.
Ipat could not forget the master's "favors": the fact that after swimming in the hole the prince "brings vodka", he will plant him "nearby, unworthy, with his princely person."
A submissive slave is also "an exemplary slave - faithful Jacob." He served with the cruel Mr. Polivanov, who "in the teeth of an exemplary serf ... seemed to blow with his heel." Despite such treatment, the faithful slave protected and pleased the master until my very old age. The landowner severely offended his faithful servant by recruiting his beloved nephew Grisha. Yakov “fooled”: first he “drank the dead”, and then he brought the master into a deaf forest ravine and hung himself on a pine tree above his head. The poet condemns such manifestations of protest in the same way as servile obedience.
With indignation, Nekrasov speaks of such traitors to the people's cause as the headman Gleb. He, bribed by the heir, destroyed the "free" given to the peasants before his death by the old master-admiral, than "for decades, until recently, eight thousand souls were secured by the villain."
To characterize the yard peasants, deprived of a sense of their own dignity, the poet finds contemptuous words: slave, serf, dog, Judas. Nekrasov concludes the characteristics with a typical generalization:
People of the servile rank -
Real dogs sometimes:
The more severe the punishment
So dear to them, gentlemen.
Creating various types of peasants, Ne-krasov claims: there are no happy ones among them, the peasants, even after the abolition of serfdom, are still destitute and dispossessed, only the forms of oppression have changed. But among the peasants there are people capable of conscious, active protest. And therefore the poet believes that a good life will come in Rus' in the future:
More Russian people
No limits set:
Before him is a wide path.
Nekrasov conceived "Who should live well in Rus'" shortly after the reform of 1861, as a result of which millions of peasants were actually robbed. The government managed to suppress popular revolts, but the peasant masses did not calm down for a long time. In this difficult time, without losing hope for a better future, the poet took up a comprehensive artistic research folk life.
At the center of the poem collective image Russian peasant. The poem reflects the peasant joys and sorrows, the peasant thirst for freedom and happiness. The reform of 1861 did not improve the situation of the people, and it is not for nothing that the peasants say about it:
You are good, royal letter,
Yes, you are not written about us ...
The plot of the poem is very close to the folk tale about the search for happiness and truth. The heroes of the poem are looking for the "Unwhacked province, the Ungutted volost, the Izbytkov village." As in folk tales about truth and falsehood, on the "pillar path" "seven men came together." And as in fairy tales, the disputants disagree, quarrel, and then, with the help of a wonderful bird that says human language, reconcile and go to look for a happy one. A description of what the truth-seekers saw during their wanderings in Rus', stories about themselves of people who consider themselves happy, make up the content of the poem. Walkers for happiness see a bleak, disenfranchised, hungry life people in provinces with self-explanatory names: Frightened, Shot, Illiterate. Peasant “happiness,” the poet exclaims bitterly, “leaky with patches, humpbacked with calluses!” There are no happy peasants. Who is busy looking for happiness in the poem “Who in Rus' should live well”?
First of all, these are seven men-truth-seekers, whose inquisitive thought made them think about the fundamental question of life: “Who has a fun, free life in Rus'?” Peasant types are represented in various ways. These are peasants from different villages. Each went about his business, but then they met, argued. And the villages are named, and the provinces, and the peasants are listed by name, but we understand that events cannot be attributed to any particular year, or to any particular place. Here is the whole of Rus' with its eternal sore concerns. In principle, each of the seven already has his own answer to the question:
Who has fun
Feel free in Rus'?
Roman said: to the landowner,
Demyan said: to the official,
Luke said: ass.
Fat-bellied merchant! -
Gubin brothers said
Ivan and Mitrodor.
Old man Pahom looked down
And he said, looking at the ground:
noble boyar,
Minister of the State.
And Prov said: to the king ...
They did not get the direct answer that the peasants were looking for. The answer came in a different sense. The priest has his own claims to a new life, the landowner and the merchant have their own. Nobody praises the new time, everyone remembers the old.
The great chain is broken
Torn - jumped,
One end on the master,
Others for a man.
Isn't our current situation similar to that reconstructed by Nekrasov? Men are deprived - both in the past and in the present. With bitter irony, Nekrasov describes in the chapter "Happy" how the wanderers prepared a whole bucket of vodka to treat the most successful peasant. But the result was only a bitter list of people's misfortunes. The old woman is happy that a turnip has grown in her garden, a soldier - that he was mercilessly beaten with sticks, but remained alive. The stonemason is happy with his young strength, and the weak one - that he returned alive from hard work. The peasants are disgusted by another "happy" lackey who, after forty years of service, is sick not with some kind of peasant hernia, but with a "noble" lordly disease - gout.
Happiness, according to Nekrasov, is not at all in the primitive sense in which seven peasant walkers understood it, but in resistance, struggle, opposition to grief and untruth, it is not simply divided between peasants and gentlemen. The author's sympathies demonstrate his undoubted spiritual affinity with the democratic, raznochinsk movement. It is not for nothing that he writes with such sympathy about the disturbers of social peace: the former convict Saveliy, who raised "the whole Korezhina" against the landowner Shalashnikov, who buried the cruel steward alive; Yermila Girin, who was imprisoned for protecting the interests of the peasants, the robber Kudeyara. Among the peasants who have risen to the consciousness of their disenfranchised position is Yakim Nagoi, who understood who gets the fruits peasant labor. The author creates in the poem the image of another seeker of peasant happiness - “ people's protector» Grisha Dobrosklonova. Hungry childhood, the harsh youth of the son of a laborer and a rural deacon brought him closer to the people, accelerated his spiritual maturation and determined him life path:
... about fifteen
Gregory already knew for sure
What will live for happiness
Wretched and dark
native corner.
Grisha Dobrosklonov resembles Dobrolyubov in many traits of his character, in whom Nekrasov saw the "ideal public figure". He is a fighter for national happiness who wants to be there, "where it is difficult to breathe, where grief is heard." He sees that a people of many millions is awakening to struggle:
The army rises
Innumerable!
The strength will affect her
Invincible!
This thought fills his soul with joy and confidence in victory. To the main question of the poem - who lives well in Rus'? - Nekrasov responds with the image of Grisha Dobrosklonov, " people's protector". That's why the poet says:
Would our wanderers be under their native roof,
If only they could know what happened to Grisha.
Difficult, but beautiful is the path that Grisha Dobrosklonov follows. But it is on it that true happiness awaits a person, since, according to Nekrasov, only one who devotes himself to the struggle for the good and happiness of the people can be happy. Name Nekrasov's poem has long been catch phrase which has received a second life today, as once again the society faces the questions posed by the great classics of the XIX centuries: “Who is to blame?”, “What to do?” and “Who is living well in Rus'?”
Works on Literature: Images of Peasants in the Poem “Who Lives Well in Rus'”
In the poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'," N.A. shows the life of the Russian peasantry in post-reform Russia, their plight. The main problem of this work is the search for an answer to the question, "who lives happily, freely in Rus'", who is worthy and not worthy of happiness? The author introduces into the poem the image of seven wandering peasants traveling around the country in search of the lucky ones. This group portrait, therefore, in the form of seven "temporarily liable" are given only common features characteristic of the Russian peasant: poverty, curiosity, unpretentiousness. The peasants do not seek happiness among the working people: peasants, soldiers. Their idea of happiness is associated with the images of the clergy, merchants, nobility, and the king. Peasants-truth-seekers have a sense of their own dignity. They are deeply convinced that the working people are better, higher, smarter than the landowner. The author shows the hatred of the peasants for those who live at their expense. Nekrasov also emphasizes the love of the people for work, their desire to help other people. Having learned that Matryona Timofeevna's harvest is dying, the peasants offer her help without hesitation; they also help the peasants of the Illiterate Governorate in mowing.
Traveling in Russia, men meet various people. Revealing the images of the heroes met by the truth-seekers allows the author to characterize not only the position of the peasantry, but also the life of the merchants, the clergy, the nobility ... But the author pays the main attention to the peasants.
The images of Yakim Nagogoy, Ermila Girin, Savely, Matrena Timofeevna combine both general, typical features peasantry, such as, for example, hatred for all "shareholders" who pull from them vitality as well as individual traits.
Yakim Nagoi, personifying the mass of the poorest peasantry, "works to death", but lives as a pauper, like most peasants in the village of Bosovo. His portrait testifies to constant hard work:
And myself to mother earth
He looks like: a brown neck,
Like a layer cut off with a plow,
brick face...
Yakim understands that the peasantry - great power; he is proud of his belonging to it. He knows what the strength and weakness of the "peasant soul" are:
Soul that black cloud -
Angry, formidable - and it would be necessary
Thunders rumble from there ...
And everything ends with wine ...
Yakim refutes the opinion that the peasant is poor because he drinks. He reveals true reason such a situation - the need to work for the "shareholders". The fate of Yakim is typical for the peasants of post-reform Rus': he "once lived in St. Petersburg", but, having lost a lawsuit with a merchant, ended up in prison, from where he returned, "tattered like a velcro" and "took up the plow."
Another image of the Russian peasant is Yermila Girin. The author endows him with incorruptible honesty and natural intelligence. The peasants respect him for being
At seven years of a worldly penny
Didn't squeeze under the nail
At the age of seven, he did not touch the right one,
Did not let the guilty
I didn't bend my heart...
Having gone against the "peace", having sacrificed public interests for the sake of personal ones, - having given up a neighbor's boy as a soldier instead of her brother - Yermila is tormented by remorse and comes to the thought of suicide. However, he does not hang himself, but goes to repent to the people.
The episode with the purchase of the mill is important. Nekrasov shows the solidarity of the peasantry. They trust Yermila, and he takes the side of the peasants during the riot.
The author's idea that Russian peasants are heroes is also important. For this purpose, the image of Savely, the Holy Russian hero, is introduced. Despite the unbearable hard life, the hero has not lost his best qualities. He treats Matryona Timofeevna with sincere love, deeply worries about the death of Demushka. About himself, he says: "Branded, but not a slave!". Savely acts as a folk philosopher. He reflects on whether the people should continue to endure their lack of rights, their oppressed state. Savely comes to the conclusion: it is better to "underbear" than "be patient", and he calls for a protest.
Savelia's combination of sincerity, kindness, simplicity, sympathy for the oppressed and hatred for the oppressors makes this image vital and typical.
A special place in the poem, as in all of Nekrasov's work, is occupied by the display of the "women's share". In the poem, the author reveals it on the example of the image of Matrena Timofeevna. This is a strong and persistent woman fighting for her freedom and her female happiness. But, despite all efforts, the heroine says: "It's not a matter of looking for a happy woman between women."
The fate of Matryona Timofeevna is typical for a Russian woman: after marriage, she ended up with a "girlish holyday" in hell; misfortunes rained down on her one after another ... Finally, Matryona Timofeevna, like the peasants, is forced to overwork herself at work in order to feed her family.
In the image of Matrena Timofeevna, there are also features of the heroic character of the Russian peasantry.
In the poem "To whom it is good to live in Rus'," the author showed how serfdom morally cripples people. He leads us in front of a string of courtyard people, servants, serfs, who, for many years of groveling before the master, have completely lost their own "I" and human dignity. This is Jacob the faithful, taking revenge on the master by killing himself in front of his eyes, and Ipat, the serf of the Utyatin princes, and Klim-Some peasants even become oppressors, receiving little power from the landowner. The peasants hate these slave-serfs even more than they do the landowners, they despise them.
Thus, Nekrasov showed the stratification among the peasantry associated with the reform of 1861.
The poem also notes such a feature of the Russian peasantry as religiosity. It's a way to get away from reality. God is the supreme judge, from whom the peasants seek protection and justice. Faith in God is the hope for a better life.
So, N. A. Nekrasov in the poem "Who Lives Well in Rus'" recreated the life of the peasantry in post-reform Russia, revealed the typical character traits of Russian peasants, showing that this is a force to be reckoned with, which gradually begins to realize its rights.
