The cognitive significance of Ostrovsky's plays. H

A. N. Tolstoy famously said: “Great people do not have two dates of their existence in history - birth and death, but only one date: their birth.”

The significance of A. N. Ostrovsky for the development of Russian dramaturgy and the stage, his role in the achievements of all Russian culture are undeniable and enormous. He has done as much for Russia as Shakespeare did for England or Molière for France. Continuing the best traditions of Russian progressive and foreign dramaturgy, Ostrovsky wrote 47 original plays (not counting the second editions of Kozma Minin and Voyevoda and seven plays in collaboration with S. A. Gedeonov (Vasilisa Melentyeva), N. Ya. Solovyov ("Happy Day", "The Marriage of Belugin", "Wild Woman", "Shines, but does not warm") and P. M. Nevezhin ("Which", "Old in a New Way"). In the words of Ostrovsky himself, this is "a whole folk theater».

Ostrovsky's immeasurable merit as a bold innovator is in the democratization and expansion of the subject matter of Russian dramaturgy. Along with the nobility, bureaucracy and merchants, he also portrayed ordinary people from poor townspeople, artisans and peasants. The heroes of his works were also representatives of the working intelligentsia (teachers, artists).

In his plays about modernity, a wide strip of Russian life from the 40s to the 80s of the 19th century is recreated. In his historical works reflected the distant past of our country: the beginning and middle of the XVII century. Only in the original plays of Ostrovsky there are more than seven hundred speaking characters. And besides them, in many plays there are crowd scenes, in which dozens of persons participate without speeches. Goncharov correctly said that Ostrovsky "wrote all of Moscow's life, not the cities of Moscow, but the life of Moscow, that is, the Great Russian state." Ostrovsky, expanding the themes of Russian drama, solved the urgent ethical, socio-political and other problems of life from the standpoint of democratic enlightenment, protecting the interests of the whole people. Dobrolyubov rightly argued that Ostrovsky in his plays “captured such general aspirations and needs that permeate everything Russian society whose voice is heard in all the phenomena of our life, whose satisfaction is a necessary condition for our further development. When realizing the essence of Ostrovsky's work, one cannot fail to emphasize that he continued the best traditions of progressive foreign and Russian national-original dramaturgy consciously, from the very first steps of his writing activity. While plays of intrigue and situations prevailed in Western European dramaturgy (remember O. E. Scribe, E. M. Labish, V. Sarda), Ostrovsky, developing the creative principles of Fonvizin, Griboedov, Pushkin and Gogol, created the dramaturgy of social characters and morals .

Boldly expanding in his works the role of the social environment, circumstances that comprehensively motivate the behavior of the characters, Ostrovsky increases the proportion of epic elements in them. This makes his “plays of life” (Dobrolyubov) related to his contemporary domestic romance. But for all that, epic tendencies do not weaken their stage presence. By the most diverse means, starting with the always acute conflict, about which Dobrolyubov wrote so thoroughly, the playwright gives his plays a vivid theatricality.

Noting the invaluable treasures bestowed on us by Pushkin, Ostrovsky said: “The first merit of a great poet is that through him everything that can become wiser becomes smarter ... Everyone wants to think and feel sublimely with him; everyone is waiting for him to tell me something beautiful, new, which I do not have, which I lack; but he will say, and it will immediately become mine. That is why both love and worship of great poets” (XIII, 164-165).

These inspired words, spoken by the playwright about Pushkin, can rightfully be redirected to him as well.

The deeply realistic work of Ostrovsky is alien to narrow everydayism, ethnography and naturalism. The generalizing power of his characters in many cases is so great that it gives them the properties of a common noun. Such are Podkhalyuzin (“Our people - we will settle!”), Tit Titych Bruskov (“Hangover in someone else's feast”), Glumov (“Enough simplicity for every wise man”), Khlynov (“Hot Heart”). From the very beginning of his career, the playwright consciously strove for the nominality of his characters. “I wanted,” he wrote to V.I. Nazimov in 1850, “so that the public stigmatizes vice in the name of Podkhalyuzin in the same way that it stigmatizes with the name of Harpagon, Tartuffe, Nedorosl, Khlestakov and others” (XIV, 16).

Ostrovsky's plays, imbued lofty ideas democracy, deep feelings of patriotism and genuine beauty, their positive characters, expand the mental, moral and aesthetic horizons of readers and viewers.

The great value of the Russian critical realism the second half of the 19th century lies in the fact that, containing the achievements of domestic and Western European realism, it is enriched by the acquisitions of romanticism. M. Gorky, speaking about the development of Russian literature, in the article “On how I learned to write,” rightly noted: “This fusion of romanticism and realism is especially characteristic of our great literature, it gives it that originality, that strength, which more and more noticeably and deeply influences the literature of the whole world.

The dramaturgy of A. N. Ostrovsky, representing in its generic essence the highest expression of critical realism of the second half of the 19th century, along with realistic images of the most diverse aspects (family, social, psychological, socio-political), also carries romantic images. The images of Zhadov are fanned with romance (“ Plum”), Katerina (“Thunderstorm”), Neschastlivtseva (“Forest”), Snegurochka (“Snow Maiden”), Meluzova (“Talents and Admirers”). To this, following A.I. Yuzhin, Vl. I. Nemirovich-Danchenko and others, A. A. Fadeev also drew attention. In the article “The Tasks of Literary Criticism,” he wrote: “Our great playwright Ostrovsky is considered by many to be a writer of everyday life. What kind of writer is he? Let's remember Katherine. The realist Ostrovsky consciously sets himself "romantic" tasks.

Ostrovsky's artistic palette is extremely multicolored. He boldly, widely refers in his plays to symbolism ("Thunderstorm") and fantasy ("Voevoda", "Snow Maiden").

Satirically denouncing the bourgeoisie (“Hot Heart”, “Dowry”) and the nobility (“There is enough simplicity for every wise man”, “Forest”, “Sheep and Wolves”), the playwright brilliantly uses conventional means of hyperbolicism, grotesque and caricature. Examples of this are the scene of the mayor’s trial of the townsfolk in the comedy “Hot Heart”, the scene of reading a treatise on the dangers of reforms by Krutitsky and Glumov in the comedy “Enough Stupidity for Every Wise Man”, Baraboshev’s anecdotal story about speculation in sugar sand, discovered along the banks of rivers (“Pravda - good, but happiness is better).

Using a wide variety of artistic means, Ostrovsky proceeded in his ideological and aesthetic development, in his creative evolution towards an increasingly complex disclosure of the inner essence of his characters, drawing closer to Turgenev's dramaturgy and paving the way for Chekhov. If in his first plays he depicted characters in large, thick lines (“Family Picture”, “Own people - let's settle!”), Then in later plays he uses a very subtle psychological coloring of images (“Dowry”, “Talents and Admirers”, “Guilty Without Guilt”).

The writer's brother, P. N. Ostrovsky, was rightly indignant at the narrow everyday standard with which many critics approached the plays of Alexander Nikolaevich. “They forget,” said Pyotr Nikolaevich, “that first of all he was a poet, and a great poet, with real crystal poetry, which can be found in Pushkin or Apollo Maikov! .. Agree that only a great poet could create such a pearl folk poetry like "Snow Maiden"? Take at least Kupava's "complaint" to Tsar Berendey - after all, this is purely Pushkin's beauty verse!!" .

The mighty talent of Ostrovsky, his nationality admired true connoisseurs of art, starting with the appearance of the comedy “Our people - let's get it right!” and especially with the publication of the tragedy "Thunderstorm". In 1874, I. A. Goncharov stated: “Ostrovsky is undoubtedly the most major talent V contemporary literature”And predicted his “longevity”. In 1882, in connection with the 35th anniversary of Ostrovsky's dramatic activity, as if summing up his creative activity, the author of Oblomov gave him an assessment that has become classic and textbook. He wrote: “You alone completed the building, the foundation of which was laid by the cornerstones of Fonvizin, Griboedov, Gogol ... Only after you, we Russians can proudly say:“ We have our own Russian, national theater ... I welcome you, as the immortal creator of an endless line of poetic creations, from The Snow Maiden, The Governor's Dream to Talents and Admirers, inclusive, where we see and hear with our own eyes the primordial, true Russian life in countless, burning images, with its true appearance, warehouse and dialect » .

The entire progressive Russian community agreed with this high appraisal of Ostrovsky's activities. L. N. Tolstoy called Ostrovsky a writer of genius and truly folk. “I know from experience,” he wrote in 1886, “how your things are read, listened to and remembered by the people, and therefore I would like to help you to become now as soon as possible in reality what you are undoubtedly - a nationwide in the very writer in a broad sense. N. G. Chernyshevsky, in a letter to V. M. Lavrov dated December 29, 1888, stated: “Of all those who wrote in Russian after Lermontov and Gogol, I see a very strong talent in only one playwright - Ostrovsky ...” . On March 3, 1892, having visited the play “Abyss”, A.P. Chekhov informed A.S. Suvorin: “The play is amazing. The last act is something I wouldn't write for a million. This act is a whole play, and when I have my own theater, I will stage only this one act.

A. N. Ostrovsky not only completed the creation of domestic drama, but also determined all its further development with his masterpieces. Under his influence, a whole “Ostrovsky School” appeared (I. F. Gorbunov, A. F. Pisemsky, A. A. Potekhin, N. Ya. Solovyov, P. M. Nevezhin). Under his influence, the dramatic art of L. N. Tolstoy, A. P. Chekhov and A. M. Gorky was formed. For the author of War and Peace, Ostrovsky's plays were examples of dramatic art. And so, having decided to write The Power of Darkness, he began to re-read them again.

Concerned about the development of domestic dramaturgy, Ostrovsky was an exceptionally sensitive, attentive tutor, teacher of novice playwrights.

In 1874, on his initiative, in collaboration with the theater critic and translator V. I. Rodislavsky, the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers was created, which improved the position of playwrights and translators.

Throughout his life, Ostrovsky fought to attract new forces to dramaturgy, to expand and improve the quality of the Russian nationally original theatrical repertoire. But disregard for the artistic successes of other peoples was always alien to him. He stood for the development of international cultural ties. In his opinion, theatrical repertoire“should consist of the best original plays and of good, having undoubted literary merit, translations of foreign masterpieces” (XII, 322).

Being a man of versatile erudition, Ostrovsky was one of the masters of Russian literary translation. With his translations, he promoted outstanding examples of foreign drama - plays by Shakespeare, Goldoni, Giacometti, Cervantes, Machiavelli, Grazzini, Gozzi. He made (based on the French text by Louis Jacollio) a translation of the South Indian (Tamil) drama "Devadasi" ("La Bayadère" - by the national playwright Parishurama).

Ostrovsky translated twenty-two plays and left sixteen plays from Italian, Spanish, French, English and Latin, started and unfinished. He translated poems by Heine and other German poets. In addition, he translated the drama of the Ukrainian classic G. F. Kvitka-Osnovyanenko “Shira Love” (“Sincere Love, or Dear is more expensive than happiness”).

A. N. Ostrovsky is not only the creator of brilliant plays, an outstanding translator, but also an outstanding connoisseur of performing arts, an excellent director and theorist who anticipated the teachings of K. S. Stanislavsky. He wrote: "I each my new comedy, long before the rehearsals, I read it several times in the circle of artists. In addition, he played with each of his roles separately” (XII, 66).

Being a theatrical figure large scale, Ostrovsky passionately fought for a radical transformation of his native stage, for turning it into a school of public morals, for the creation of a folk private theater, for raising the acting culture. Democratizing the themes, defending the nationality of works intended for the theater, the great playwright resolutely turned the national stage to life and its truth. M. N. Ermolova recalls: “Together with Ostrovsky, truth and life itself appeared on the stage.”

On the realistic plays of Ostrovsky, many generations of outstanding Russian artists were brought up and stageally grew up: P. M. Sadovsky, A. E. Martynov, S. V. Vasiliev, P. V. Vasiliev, G. N. Fedotova, M. N. Ermolova, P. A. Strepetova, M. G. Savina and many others, up to modern ones. The artistic circle, which owed its emergence and development primarily to him, provided significant material assistance to many ministers of the muses, contributed to the improvement of acting culture, put forward new artistic forces: M. P. Sadovsky, O. O. Sadovskaya, V. A. Maksheeva and others. And it is natural that the attitude towards Ostrovsky of the entire artistic community was reverent. Big and small, metropolitan and provincial artists saw in him their favorite playwright, teacher, ardent defender and sincere friend.

In 1872, celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the dramatic activity of A. N. Ostrovsky, provincial artists wrote to him: “Alexander Nikolaevich! We all developed under the influence of that new word that you introduced into the Russian drama: you are our mentor.

In 1905, to the words of a reporter from Peterburgskaya Gazeta that Ostrovsky was outdated, M. G. Savina replied: “But in this case, Shakespeare cannot be played, because he is no less outdated. I personally am always pleased to play Ostrovsky, and if the public has ceased to like him, it is probably because not everyone now knows how to play him.

Ostrovsky's artistic and social activities were an invaluable contribution to the development of Russian culture. And at the same time, he was very upset by the lack of the necessary conditions for the realistic staging of his plays, for the realization of his bold plans for a radical transformation of theatrical art, for a sharp increase in the level of dramatic art. This was the playwright's tragedy.

Around the mid-70s, Alexander Nikolayevich wrote: “I am firmly convinced that the position of our theaters, the composition of the troupes, the directors in them, as well as the position of those who write for the theater, will improve over time, that the dramatic art in Russia will finally emerge from the driven , an abandoned state ... but I can’t wait for this prosperity. If I were young, I could live with hope in the future, now there is no future for me” (XII, 77).

Ostrovsky never saw the dawn he desired - a significant improvement in the position of Russian playwrights, decisive changes in the field of theater. He passed away largely unsatisfied with what he had accomplished.

The progressive pre-October public assessed the creative and social activities of the creator of The Thunderstorm and The Dowry differently. She saw in this activity an instructive example of high service to the motherland, a patriotic feat of a folk playwright.

However, only the Great October Socialist Revolution brought true national fame to the playwright. It was at this time that Ostrovsky found his mass audience - the working people, and for him a truly rebirth came.

In the pre-October theatre, under the influence of vaudeville melodramatic traditions, in connection with the cool and even hostile attitude of the directorate of the imperial theaters, the highest government spheres, the plays of the "father of Russian drama" were more often staged carelessly, impoverished and quickly removed from the repertoire.

The Soviet theater determined the possibility of their full realistic disclosure. Ostrovsky becomes the most beloved playwright of the Soviet audience. His plays have never been staged so often as at this time. His works had not previously been published in such huge editions as at that time. His dramaturgy was not studied as closely as in this era.

Superbly oriented in the work of Ostrovsky, V. I. Lenin often used in a sharply journalistic sense apt words, winged sayings from the plays “Hangover at a strange feast”, “Profitable Place”, “Mad Money”, “Guilty Without Guilt”. In the fight against the reactionary forces, the great leader of the people especially widely used the image of Titus Titych from the comedy "Hangover at a Strange Feast". In 1918, probably in the fall, while talking with P. I. Lebedev-Polyansky about the publication of the Collected Works of Russian Classics, Vladimir Ilyich told him: "Don't forget Ostrovsky."

On December 15 of the same year, Lenin visited the performance of the Moscow Art Theater"Sufficient simplicity for every wise man." In this performance, the roles were played by: Krutitsky - K. S. Stanislavsky, Glumova - I. N. Bersenev, Mamaeva - V. V. Luzhsky, Manefa - N. S. Butova, Golutvin - P. A. Pavlov, Gorodulina - N. O. Massalitinov, Mashenka - S. V. Giatsintova, Mamaev - M. N. Germanova, Glumov - V. N. Pavlova, Kurchaev - V. A. Verbitsky, Grigory - N. G. Alexandrov.

The wonderful ensemble of actors brilliantly revealed the satirical pathos of the comedy, and Vladimir Ilyich watched the play with great pleasure, laughing heartily.

Lenin liked the whole artistic ensemble, but Stanislavsky's performance in the role of Krutitsky aroused his special admiration. And most of all he was amused by the following words of Krutitsky when he read the draft of his memorandum: “Any reform is already harmful in its essence. What does the reform include? The reform includes two actions: 1) the abolition of the old and 2) putting something new in its place. Which of these actions is harmful? Both are the same."

After these words, Lenin laughed so loudly that some of the spectators paid attention to this and someone's heads were already turning in the direction of our box. Nadezhda Konstantinovna looked reproachfully at Vladimir Ilyich, but he continued to laugh heartily, repeating: “Wonderful! Amazing!".

During the intermission, Lenin never ceased to admire Stanislavsky.

“Stanislavsky is a real artist,” said Vladimir Ilyich, “he has reincarnated into this general so much that he lives his life in great detail. The viewer does not need any explanation. He himself sees what an idiot this important-looking dignitary is. In my opinion, the art of the theater should follow this path.

Lenin liked the play “Enough Stupidity for Every Wise Man” so much that he, talking on the twentieth of February 1919 with the actress O. V. Gzovskaya about the Art Theater, remembered this performance. He said: “You see, Ostrovsky’s play ... Old classical author, and Stanislavsky's game sounds new to us. This general reveals a lot of things that are important to us... This is agitation in the best and noblest sense... If everyone were so able to reveal the image in a new, modern way, it would be wonderful!

Lenin's obvious interest in the work of Ostrovsky, of course, was reflected in his personal library, located in the Kremlin. This library contains almost all the main literature published in 1923, in connection with the centenary of the birth of the playwright, who created, in his words, a whole folk theater.

After the Great October revolution all anniversaries associated with the life and work of A. N. Ostrovsky are celebrated as national holidays.

The first such national holiday was the centenary of the playwright's birth. During the days of this holiday, following Lenin, the position of the victorious people towards Ostrovsky's legacy was especially clearly expressed by the first commissar of public education. A. V. Lunacharsky proclaimed the ideas of ethical and everyday theater in the broadest sense of the word, responding to the burning problems of the new, just emerging socialist morality. Struggling with formalism, with the "theatrical" theater, "devoid of ideological content and moral tendency," Lunacharsky opposed the dramaturgy of A. N. Ostrovsky to all varieties of self-contained theatricality.

Pointing out that Ostrovsky is “alive for us,” the Soviet people, proclaiming the slogan “back to Ostrovsky,” A. V. Lunacharsky urged theatrical figures to move forward from the formalistic, narrow-minded, naturalistic theater of “everyday life” and “petty tendentiousness.” According to Lunacharsky, “simply imitating Ostrovsky would mean dooming oneself to death.” He urged to learn from Ostrovsky the principles of a serious, meaningful theatre, bearing in itself "universal notes", and the extraordinary mastery of their embodiment. Ostrovsky, wrote Lunacharsky, “is the greatest master of our everyday and ethical theatre, at the same time so playing with forces, so amazingly scenic, so capable of captivating the audience, and his main teaching these days is this: return to the theater of everyday and ethical and, together with so thoroughly and entirely artistic, that is, really capable of powerfully moving human feelings and human will.

The Moscow Academic Maly Theater took an active part in the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Ostrovsky's birth.

M. N. Ermolova, unable, due to illness, to honor the memory of the playwright deeply appreciated by her, on April 11, 1923 wrote to A. I. Yuzhin: “Ostrovsky great apostle of life's truth, simplicity and love for younger brother! How much he did and gave to people in general, and to us, artists, in particular. He instilled in our souls this truth and simplicity on the stage, and we sacredly, as best we could and could, aspired after him. I am so happy that I lived in his time and worked according to his precepts together with my comrades! What a reward it was to see the grateful tears of the public for our labors!

Glory to the great Russian artist A. N. Ostrovsky. His name will live forever in his bright or dark images because they are true. Glory to the immortal genius!” .

The deep connection between the dramaturgy of A. N. Ostrovsky and Soviet modernity, his enormous significance in the development of socialist art, were understood and recognized by all the leading figures in the dramatic and stage arts. So, in 1948, in connection with the 125th anniversary of the playwright, N.F. Pogodin said: “Today, after a century that has elapsed since the significant appearance in Russia young talent, we experience the mighty influence of his unfading creations.

In the same year, B. Romashov explained that Ostrovsky teaches Soviet writers"the constant desire to discover new layers of life and the ability to embody what was found in bright art forms... A. N. Ostrovsky is a colleague of our Soviet theater and young Soviet dramaturgy in the struggle for realism, for innovation, for folk art. The task of Soviet directors and actors is to in order to more fully and deeply reveal in theatrical productions the inexhaustible riches of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy. A. N. Ostrovsky remains ours true friend in the struggle for the implementation of the tasks facing modern Soviet drama in its noble cause - the communist education of the working people.

For the sake of truth, it should be noted that the distortion of the essence of Ostrovsky's plays by formalistic and vulgar sociological interpreters took place in the Soviet era as well. Formalist tendencies were clearly reflected in the play "The Forest" staged by V. E. Meyerhold at the theater named after him (1924). An example of a vulgar sociological embodiment is the play The Thunderstorm, staged by A. B. Viner at the Drama Theater named after the Leningrad Council of Trade Unions (1933). But it was not these performances, not their principles, that determined the face of the Soviet theatre.

Revealing the popular position of Ostrovsky, sharpening the social and ethical problems of his plays, embodying their deeply generalized characters, Soviet directors created wonderful performances in the capitals and on the periphery, in all the republics that are part of the USSR. Among them, the Russian stage especially sounded: “Profitable place” in the Theater of the Revolution (1923), “Hot heart” in the Art Theater (1926), “In a crowded place” (1932), “Truth is good, but happiness is better” (1941 ) at the Moscow Maly Theatre, "Thunderstorm" (1953) at the Moscow Theater named after V. V. Mayakovsky, "Abyss" at the Leningrad Theater named after A. S. Pushkin (1955).

The contribution of the theaters of all the fraternal republics to the stage realization of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy is enormous, indescribable.

In order to more clearly imagine the rapid growth of stage performances of Ostrovsky's plays after October, let me remind you that from 1875 to 1917 inclusive, that is, in 42 years, the drama Guilty Without Guilt was played 4415 times, and in one year 1939 - 2147. Scenes from the backwoods " Late love”For the same 42 years, they passed 920 times, and in 1939 - 1432 times. The tragedy "Thunderstorm" from 1875 to 1917 took place 3592 times, and in 1939 - 414 times. With special solemnity, the Soviet people celebrated the 150th anniversary of the birth of the great playwright. Throughout the country, lectures were given about his life and work, his plays were broadcast on television and radio, conferences were held in the humanitarian educational and research institutes on the most pressing issues of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy and its stage embodiment.

The results of a number of conferences were collections of articles published in Moscow, Leningrad, Kostroma, Kuibyshev.

April 11, 1973 in Bolshoi Theater took place ceremonial meeting. In his opening speech, S. V. Mikhalkov, chairman of the All-Union Jubilee Committee for the 150th anniversary of the birth of A. N. Ostrovsky, Hero of Socialist Labor, secretary of the board of the Writers' Union of the USSR, said that "Ostrovsky's life is a feat", that his creativity is dear to us "not only because" it played a big progressive role in the development of Russian society in the 19th century, but also because it faithfully serves people today, because it serves our Soviet culture. That is why we call Ostrovsky our contemporary.”

He ended his opening speech with gratitude to the great hero of the day: “Thank you, Alexander Nikolaevich! A big thank you from all the people! Thank you for the great work, for the talent given to people, for the plays that today, stepping into the new century, teach you to live, work, love - they teach you to be a real person! Thank you, the great Russian playwright, for the fact that even today for all the peoples of the multinational Soviet country you remain our favorite contemporary! .

Following S. V. Mikhalkov, a speech on the topic "The Great Playwright" was said by M. I. Tsarev, People's Artist of the USSR, Chairman of the Presidium of the Board of the All-Russian Theater Society. He claimed that " creative heritage Ostrovsky is the greatest achievement of Russian culture. It is on a par with such phenomena as the painting of the Wanderers, the music of the "mighty handful". However, Ostrovsky's feat also lies in the fact that artists and composers made a revolution in art by united forces, while Ostrovsky made a revolution in the theater alone, being at the same time a theorist and practitioner of the new art, its ideologist and leader ... At the origins of the Soviet multinational theater, our direction , our acting skills stood the son of the Russian people - Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky ... The Soviet theater reveres Ostrovsky. He has always learned and continues to learn from him to create great art- the art of high realism and genuine nationality. Ostrovsky is not only our yesterday and our today. He is our tomorrow, he is ahead of us, in the future. And this future of our theater is joyfully presented, which will open in the works of the great playwright huge layers of ideas, thoughts, feelings that we did not have time to open.

In order to promote the literary and theatrical heritage of Ostrovsky, the Ministry of Culture of the RSFSR and the All-Russian Theater Society from September 1972 to April 1973 held an All-Russian review of performances by drama, musical drama and children's theaters, anniversary. The review showed both successes and miscalculations in the modern reading of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy.

Theaters of the RSFSR prepared more than 150 premieres based on plays by A. N. Ostrovsky especially for the anniversary. At the same time, more than 100 performances have moved into the posters of the anniversary year from previous years. Thus, in 1973 in the theaters of the RSFSR there were more than 250 performances based on 36 works of the playwright. Among them, the most widespread are the plays: “Enough Stupidity for Every Wise Man” (23 theaters), “Profitable Place” (20 theaters), “Dowry” (20 theaters), “Mad Money” (19 theaters), “Guilty Without Guilt” (17 theaters), "The Last Victim" (14 theaters), "Talents and Admirers" (11 theaters), "Thunderstorm" (10 theaters).

In the final show of the best performances, selected by zonal commissions and brought to Kostroma, the first prize was awarded to the Academic Maly Theater for the performance "Mad Money"; second prizes were awarded to the Central children's theater for the performance "Jokers", Kostroma Regional drama theater for the play "Talents and Admirers" and the North Ossetian Drama Theater for the play "Thunderstorm"; the third prizes were given to the Gorky Academic Drama Theater for the play “Enough Stupidity for Every Wise Man”, to the Voronezh Regional Drama Theater for the play “It Shines, But It Doesn't Warm” and to the Tatar Academic Theater for the play “Own People - Let's Settle Up!”.

The All-Russian review of performances, dedicated to the 150th anniversary of the birth of A. N. Ostrovsky, ended with the final scientific and theoretical conference in Kostroma. The review of the performances and the final conference confirmed with special persuasiveness that Ostrovsky's dramaturgy, which reflected contemporary Russian reality in deeply typical, truthful and vivid images, does not age, that with its universal human properties it continues to effectively serve our time.

Despite the breadth of coverage, the review of performances, caused by the anniversary of A. N. Ostrovsky, could not provide for all the premieres. Some of them entered service with a delay.

Such, for example, are The Last Sacrifice staged by I. Vs. Meyerhold in Leningradsky academic theater dramas named after A. S. Pushkin, and The Thunderstorm, carried out by B. A. Babochkin at the Moscow Academic Maly Theater.

Both of these directors, focusing on the universal content of the plays, created mostly original performances.

In the Pushkin Theater from the beginning to the end of the action there is a fierce struggle between dishonesty and honesty, irresponsibility and responsibility, frivolous burning of life and the desire to base it on the principles of trust, love and fidelity. This performance is an ensemble performance. Organically fusing deep lyricism and drama, it impeccably plays the heroine of the play by G. T. Karelina. But at the same time, the image of Pribytkov, a very rich industrialist, is clearly idealized here.

In the Maly Theater close-up, sometimes in a convincing reliance on the means of caricature (Wild - B. V. Telegin, Feklusha - E. I. Rubtsova), is shown " dark kingdom”, that is, the power of social arbitrariness, terrifying savagery, ignorance, inertia. But in spite of everything, young forces strive to exercise their natural rights. Here, even the quietest Tikhon utters words of obedience to his mother in an intonation of boiling discontent. However, in the performance, the overly emphasized erotic pathos argues with the social, reducing it. So, for example, here the bed is played out, on which Katerina and Varvara lie down in the course of the action. Katerina's famous monologue with a key, full of deep socio-psychological meaning, has turned into a purely sensual one. Katerina tosses about on the bed, clutching the pillow.

Obviously contrary to the playwright, the director “rejuvenated” Kuligin, made him equal to Kudryash and Shapkin, forced him to play the balalaika with them. But he is over 60 years old! The boar rightly calls him an old man.

The vast majority of the performances that appeared in connection with the anniversary of A. N. Ostrovsky were guided by the desire for a modern reading of his plays, while carefully preserving their text. But some directors, repeating the mistakes of the 1920s and 1930s, took a different path. So, in one performance, the characters of "The Slaves" speak on the phone, in another - Lipochka and Podkhalyuzin ("Our people - let's settle!") Dance tango, in the third Paratov and Knurov become lovers of Kharita Ogudalova ("Dowry"), etc.

In a number of theaters, there has been a clear tendency to perceive Ostrovsky's text as raw material for directorial fabrications; rewiring, free combinations from various pieces and other gag. They were not deterred by the greatness of the playwright, who must be spared from the disrespectful attitude to his text.

Modern reading, directing and acting, using the possibilities of the classical text, highlighting, emphasizing, rethinking one or another of its motives, has no right, in our opinion, to distort its essence, violate its stylistic originality. It is also worth remembering that Ostrovsky, allowing certain abbreviations of the text to be staged, was very jealous of its meaning, not allowing any of its changes. So, for example, at the request of the artist V.V. Samoilov to remake the ending of the second act of the play “Jokers”, the playwright answered Burdin with irritation: “You have to be crazy to offer me such things, or consider me a boy who writes without thinking and does not value his work at all, but only values ​​the caress and disposition of the artists and is ready for them to break his plays as they please ”(XIV, 119), There was such a case. In 1875, at the opening of the Public Theatre, the provincial artist N. I. Novikov, playing the role of a mayor in Gogol's The Inspector General, made an innovation - in the first phenomenon of the first act he released all the officials on stage, and then he went out himself, greeting them. He hoped for applause. It turned out the other way around.

Among the spectators was A. N. Ostrovsky. Seeing this gag, he became extremely indignant. “Excuse me,” said Alexander Nikolayevich, “is it really possible to allow such things to an actor? Is it possible to treat Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol with such disrespect? After all, it's a shame! Some Novikov took it into his head to remake a genius about which he probably has no idea! "Gogol probably knew better than Novikov what he wrote, and Gogol should not be remade, he is already good."

Ostrovsky's dramaturgy helps the builders of communism in the knowledge of the past. Revealing the hard life of working people under the rule of class privileges and a heartless chistogan, it contributes to understanding the greatness of the social transformations carried out in our country, and inspires them to further active struggle for successful build communist society. But the significance of Ostrovsky is not only cognitive. The range of moral and everyday problems that are posed and solved in the plays of the playwright, in many of its aspects, echoes our modernity and retains its relevance.

We deeply sympathize with his democratic heroes, full of life-affirming optimism, for example, teachers Ivanov (“Hangover in someone else’s feast”) and Korpelov (“Labor bread”). We are attracted by his deeply humane, sincerely generous, warm-hearted characters: Parasha and Gavrilo ("Hot Heart"). We admire his heroes, who defend the truth in spite of all obstacles - Platon Zybkin (“Truth is good, but happiness is better”) and Meluzov (“Talents and admirers”). We are in tune with Zhadov, who is guided in his behavior by the desire for the public good (“Profitable Place”), and Kruchinina, who has set the goal of her life as active goodness (“Guilty Without Guilt”). We share the aspirations of Larisa Ogudalova for love "equal on both sides" ("Dowry"). We cherish the playwright's dreams about the victory of the people's truth, about the end of devastating wars, about the onset of an era of peaceful life, about the triumph of understanding love as a "good feeling", a great gift of nature, the happiness of life, so vividly embodied in the spring fairy tale "The Snow Maiden".

The democratic ideological and moral principles of Ostrovsky, his understanding of good and evil are organically included in moral code builder of communism, and this makes him our contemporary. The plays of the great playwright deliver high aesthetic pleasure to readers and spectators.

Ostrovsky's work, which defined a whole epoch in the history of Russian stage art, continues to have a fruitful impact on Soviet dramaturgy and the Soviet theater. By refusing Ostrovsky's plays, we impoverish ourselves morally and aesthetically.

The Soviet audience loves and appreciates Ostrovsky's plays. The decline of interest in them is manifested only in those cases when they are interpreted in a narrow everyday aspect, muffling their common human essence. Obviously in the spirit of the judgments of the final conference, as if participating in it, A. K. Tarasova in the article “Belongs to Eternity” states: “I am convinced that the depth and truth of feelings, high and bright, penetrating Ostrovsky’s plays, will forever be revealed to people and will forever be excite them and do better ... the change of times will entail a change of emphasis: but the main thing will remain forever, will not lose its cordiality and instructive truth, because integrity and honesty are always dear to man and people.

On the initiative of the Kostroma party and Soviet organizations, warmly supported by the participants of the final conference of the Ministry of Culture of the RSFSR and the WTO, a resolution was adopted on regular holding in Kostroma and the Shchelykovo Museum-Reserve of periodic festivals of the works of the great playwright, new productions of his plays and their creative discussions. The implementation of this resolution will undoubtedly contribute to the promotion of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy, its correct understanding and more vivid stage embodiment.

The 88th volume of the Literary Heritage (Moscow, 1974) became a real event in Ostrov studies, in which very valuable articles about the work of the playwright, his numerous letters to his wife and other biographical materials, reviews of the stage life of his plays abroad were published.

The anniversary also contributed to the release of a new Complete collection Ostrovsky's writings.

2

The work of A. N. Ostrovsky, which is part of the treasury of world progressive art, is the glory and pride of the Russian people. And that is why for Russian people everything that is connected with the memory of this great playwright is dear and sacred.

Already in the days of his funeral, among the progressive figures of the Kineshma Zemstvo and the inhabitants of Kineshma, the idea arose of opening a subscription for the construction of a monument to him. This monument was supposed to be installed on one of the squares in Moscow. In 1896, the democratic intelligentsia of the city of Kineshma (with the help of the Moscow Maly Theater) organized the A. N. Ostrovsky Music and Drama Circle in memory of their glorious countryman. This circle, having rallied around itself all the progressive forces of the city, became a hotbed of culture, science and socio-political education in the broadest sections of the population. They opened the Theater. A. N. Ostrovsky, a free library-reading room, a folk tea shop with the sale of newspapers and books.

On September 16, 1899, the Kineshma district zemstvo assembly decided to give the name of A. N. Ostrovsky to the newly built public elementary school in the Shchelykovo estate. On December 23 of the same year, the Ministry of Public Education approved this decision.

The Russian people, deeply honoring the literary activity of Ostrovsky, carefully protects the place of his burial.

Especially frequent visits to the grave of A. N. Ostrovsky became after the Great October socialist revolution when the victorious people got the opportunity to reward the worthy - worthy. Soviet people, arriving in Shchelykovo, go to the churchyard of Nikola on Berezhki, where, behind an iron fence, a marble monument rises above the grave of the great playwright, on which the words are carved:

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky

At the end of 1917, the Shchelykovo estate was nationalized and passed into the jurisdiction of local authorities. The "old" house was occupied by the volost executive committee, then it was handed over to the colony of the homeless. The new estate, which belonged to M. A. Shatelen, passed into the possession of the commune of Kineshma workers; soon it was transformed into a state farm. None of these organizations even ensured the preservation of the estate's memorial values, and they were gradually destroyed.

In connection with the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ostrovsky on September 5, 1923, the Council of People's Commissars decided to remove Shchelykovo from the jurisdiction of local authorities and transfer it to the People's Commissariat of Education for the department of Glavnauka. But at that time, the People's Commissariat of Education did not yet have the people or material resources necessary to turn Shchelykovo into an exemplary memorial museum.

In 1928, by decision of the Council of People's Commissars, Shchelykovo was transferred to the Moscow Maly Theater with the condition that a memorial museum be organized in the house of A. N. Ostrovsky.

The Maly Theater opened a rest house in the estate, where the Sadovskys, Ryzhovs, V. N. Pashennaya, A. I. Yuzhin-Sumbatov, A. A. Yablochkina, V. O. Massalitinova, V. A. Obukhova, S V. Aidarov, N. F. Kostromskoy, N. I. Uralov, M. S. Narokov and many other artists.

At the beginning, there was no unanimity in the staff of the Maly Theater on the question of the nature of the use of Shchelykov. Some of the artists perceived Shchelykovo only as a place of their rest. "Therefore, the old house was inhabited by resting workers of the Maly Theater - all, from top to bottom." But gradually, the team came up with ideas about combining a rest home and a memorial museum in Shchelykovo. The artistic family of the Maly Theatre, improving the holiday home, began to turn the estate into a museum.

There were enthusiasts for organizing a memorial museum, primarily V. A. Maslikh and B. N. Nikolsky. Through their efforts, in 1936, the first museum exposition was deployed in two rooms of the "old" house.

Work on the arrangement of the memorial museum in Shchelykovo was interrupted by the war. During the Great Patriotic War, the children of artists and employees of the Maly Theater were evacuated here.

After the Great Patriotic War, the management of the Maly Theater began to repair the "old" house, organizing a memorial museum in it. In 1948, the first director of the museum was appointed - I. I. Sobolev, who turned out to be an exceptionally valuable assistant to the enthusiasts of the Maly Theater. “He,” writes B. I. Nikolsky, “helped us for the first time restore the arrangement of furniture in the rooms, indicated how and where the table stood, what kind of furniture, etc.” . Through the efforts of all Shchelykov's enthusiasts, three rooms of the "old" house (dining room, living room and office) were opened for sightseers. A theatrical exposition was opened on the second floor.

In commemoration of the 125th anniversary of the playwright's birth, an important decree was adopted regarding his estate. On May 11, 1948, the Council of Ministers of the USSR declared Shchelykovo state reserve. At the same time, in memory of the playwright, the Semenovsko-Lapotny district, which includes the Shchelykovo estate, was renamed Ostrovsky. In Kineshma, a theater and one of the main streets were named after Ostrovsky.

But the obligations imposed by the decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR could not be fulfilled by the Maly Theater: it did not have sufficient material resources for this. And at the suggestion of its directorate, party and public organizations, the Council of Ministers of the USSR on October 16, 1953 transferred Shchelykovo to the All-Russian Theater Society.

Shchelykov's transition under the auspices of the WTO marked a truly new era for him. WTO leaders have shown genuine state concern for the Memorial Museum of A. N. Ostrovsky.

Initial amateur attempts to create a memorial museum were replaced by its construction on a highly professional, scientific basis. The museum was provided with a staff of scientists. The "old" house was overhauled, but in fact it was restored. The collection and study of literature on the work of Ostrovsky began, the search for new materials in archival repositories, the acquisition of documents and objects interior decoration from private individuals. great attention began to devote to the exposition of museum materials, gradually updating it. The employees of the memorial museum not only replenish and store its funds, but also study and publish them. In 1973, the first "Shchelykovsky collection" was published, prepared by the museum staff.

Since the time of A. N. Ostrovsky, major changes have taken place in the environment of the old house. In the park, much is overgrown or completely dead (garden, kitchen garden). For the decrepitude of years, all office premises disappeared.

But the main impression of the mighty North Russian nature, in the midst of which Ostrovsky lived and worked, remained. In an effort to give Shchelykov, if possible, the appearance of the time of Ostrovsky, the WTO began to restore and improve its entire territory, in particular, the dam, roads, and plantations. They did not forget the cemetery where the playwright was buried, and the church of Nikola-Berezhka, located on the territory of the reserve, the Sobolevs' house, which Alexander Nikolayevich often visited, was restored. This house has been turned into a social museum.

Enthusiasts Shchelykov, keeping the old ones, establish new traditions. Such a tradition is the annual solemn rallies at the grave of the playwright - on June 14th. This "memorable day" became not a mourning, but a bright day of pride for the Soviet people as a writer-citizen, a patriot who devoted all his strength to serving the people. Artists and directors, literary and theater critics, representatives of Kostroma and local party and Soviet organizations give speeches at these meetings. The meetings end with the laying of wreaths on the grave.

Turning Shchelykovo into a cultural center, into the center of research thought addressed to Ostrovsky, since 1956 interesting scientific and theoretical conferences have been organized and held here to study the dramaturgy of A. N. Ostrovsky and its stage embodiment. At these conferences, which bring together the largest theater critics, literary critics, directors, playwrights, artists, and artists, the performances of the season are discussed, experience in their productions is shared, common ideological and aesthetic positions are worked out, ways for the development of dramaturgy and stage art are outlined, etc. .

On June 14, 1973, with a huge gathering of people, a monument to A.N. Ostrovsky and the Literary and Theater Museum were opened on the territory of the reserve. Representatives of the Ministry of Culture of the USSR and the RSFSR, the WTO, the Writers' Union, guests from Moscow, Leningrad, Ivanovo, Yaroslavl and other cities came to the opening ceremony of the monument and the museum.

The monument, created by the sculptor A.P. Timchenko and the architect V.I. Rovnov, is located at the intersection of an asphalt driveway and a path leading to the memorial museum, facing it.

The solemn rally was opened by Yu. N. Balandin, First Secretary of the Kostroma Regional Committee of the CPSU. Addressing those present, he spoke about the unfading glory of the great Russian playwright, the creator of the Russian national theater, about his close connection with the Kostroma Territory, with Shchelykov, about what Alexander Nikolayevich is dear to the Soviet people, the builders of communism. S. V. Mikhalkov, M. I. Tsarev and representatives of local party and Soviet public organizations also spoke at the rally. S. V. Mikhalkov noted the importance of Ostrovsky as greatest playwright who made an invaluable contribution to the treasury of classical Russian and world literature. M. I. Tsarev said that here, in Shchelykovo, the works of the great playwright, his huge mind, artistic talent, sensitive, warm heart, become especially close and understandable to us.

A. A. Tikhonov, the first secretary of the Ostrovsky district committee of the Communist Party, very well expressed the mood of all those gathered, reading a poem by the local poet V. S. Volkov, a pilot who lost his sight in the Great Patriotic War:

Here it is, the Shchelykovskaya estate!

The memory of the year will not grow old.

To honor the immortality of Ostrovsky,

We are gathered here today.

No, not the skeleton of an obelisk stone

And not the crypt and the cold of the grave,

As alive, as native, close,

Today we honor him.

The granddaughter of the playwright M. M. Shatelen and the best producers of the region - G. N. Kalinin and P. E. Rozhkova also spoke at the rally.

After that, the honor of opening the monument to the great playwright was given to the chairman of the All-Union Jubilee Committee - S. V. Mikhalkov. When the canvas covering the monument was lowered, Ostrovsky appeared before the audience, sitting on a garden bench. He is in creative thought, in wise inner concentration.

After the opening of the monument, everyone went to the new building, decorated in the Russian style. M. I. Tsarev cut the ribbon and invited the first visitors to the opened Literary and Theater Museum. The exposition of the museum "A. N. Ostrovsky on the stage of the Soviet theater "includes the main stages of the playwright's life, his literary and social activities, the stage performance of his plays in the USSR and abroad.

The Literary and Theater Museum is an important link in the entire complex that makes up the A. N. Ostrovsky Museum-Reserve, but the memorial house will forever remain its soul and center. Now this house-museum, through the efforts of the WTO, its leading figures, is open to sightseers throughout the year.

The WTO is radically reorganizing the rest house located on the territory of the reserve. Turned into the House of Creativity, it is also intended to serve as a kind of monument to the playwright, reminding not only of his creative spirit in Shchelykovo, but also of his wide hospitality.

3

The modern Shchelykovo estate is almost always crowded. Life abounds in her. Here in the spring and summer in the House of Creativity, the heirs of Ostrovsky work and rest - artists, directors, theater critics, literary critics of Moscow, Leningrad and other cities. Tourists come here from all over the country.

The theater workers who come to Shchelykovo exchange experiences, discuss productions of the past season, and hatch plans for new works. How many new stage images are born here in friendly conversations and disputes! With what lively interest questions of theatrical art are discussed here! How many creative, significant ideas appear here! It was here that V. Pashennaya conceived her production of Thunderstorms, staged in 1963 at the Moscow Academic Maly Theatre. “I was not mistaken,” she writes, “in deciding to rest not in a resort, but in the midst of Russian nature ... Nothing distracted me from my thoughts about The Thunderstorm ... I was again seized by a passionate desire to work on the role of Kabanikh and on the whole play "Storm". It became clear to me that this play is about the people, about the Russian heart, about the Russian man, about his spiritual beauty and strength.

The image of Ostrovsky acquires a special tangibility in Shchelykovo. The playwright becomes closer, more understandable, dearer both as a person and as an artist.

It is important to note that the number of tourists visiting the memorial museum and the grave of A. N. Ostrovsky is growing every year. In the summer of 1973, from two hundred to five hundred or more people visited the memorial museum daily.

Their notes left in the guest books are curious. Tourists write that the life of Ostrovsky, a fine artist, a rare ascetic of labor, an energetic public figure, and an ardent patriot, arouses admiration in them. They emphasize in their notes that Ostrovsky's works teach them the understanding of evil and good, courage, love for the motherland, for truth, for nature, for grace.

Ostrovsky is great in the versatility of his work, in that he depicted both the dark realm of the past and the bright rays of the future that arose in the then social conditions. The life and work of Ostrovsky arouse in sightseers a legitimate sense of patriotic pride. Great and glorious is the country that gave birth to such a writer!

The regular guests of the museum are workers and collective farmers. Deeply excited by everything they saw, they note in the museum diaries that the works of A. N. Ostrovsky, drawing enslaving working man the conditions of pre-revolutionary, capitalist Russia inspire the active construction of a communist society, in which human talents will find their full expression.

The miners of Donbass in December 1971 enriched the museum's diary with such brief but expressive words: “Thanks to the miners for the museum. We will take home the memory of this house, where the great A. N. Ostrovsky lived, worked and died.” On July 4, 1973, the workers of Kostroma noted: "Here everything tells us about the most precious thing for a Russian person."

The house-museum of A. N. Ostrovsky is very widely visited by students of secondary and higher schools. It attracts scientists, writers, artists. On June 11, 1970, employees of the Institute of Slavic Studies arrived here. “We are fascinated and captivated by Ostrovsky's house,” they expressed their impressions of what they saw. On July 13 of the same year, a group of Leningrad scientists visited here, who "saw with pride and joy" that "our people know how to appreciate and store so carefully and so touchingly everything that concerns the life ... of the great playwright." On June 24, 1973, Moscow scientists wrote in the guest book: “Shchelykovo is a cultural monument of the Russian people of the same importance as the Yasnaya Polyana estate. Preserving it in its original form is a matter of honor and duty for every Russian person.”

Frequent guests of the museum are artists. On August 23, 1954, People's Artist of the USSR A.N. Gribov visited the museum and left an entry in the guest book: “Magic house! Here everything breathes real - Russian. And the land is magical! Nature itself sings here. The creations of Ostrovsky, glorifying the beauties of this region, are becoming closer, clearer and dearer to our Russian heart.”

In 1960, E. D. Turchaninova expressed her impressions of the Shchelykovo Museum in the following way: “I am glad and happy that ... I managed to live in Shchelykovo more than once, where the nature and the atmosphere of the house where the playwright lived reflect the atmosphere of his work” .

Foreign guests also come to Shchelykovo to admire its nature, visit the writer's office, visit his grave, and more and more every year.

The tsarist government, hating the democratic dramaturgy of Ostrovsky, deliberately left his ashes in the wilderness, where for many years it was a feat to drive. The Soviet government, bringing art closer to the people, turned Shchelykovo into a cultural center, into a center of propaganda for the work of the great national playwright, into a place of pilgrimage for working people. The narrow, literally impassable path to Ostrovsky's grave became a wide road. People of various nationalities travel along it from all sides to bow to the great Russian playwright.

Eternally alive and loved by the people, Ostrovsky, with his unfading works, inspires Soviet people - workers, peasants, intellectuals, innovators in production and science, teachers, writers, performers of theatrics - to new successes in the name of the good and happiness of their native Fatherland.

M. P. Sadovsky, describing the work of Ostrovsky, perfectly said: “Everything in the world is subject to change - from human thoughts to the cut of a dress; only truth does not die, and no matter what new trends, new moods, new forms in literature appear, they will not kill Ostrovsky's creations, and "the people's path will not grow to this picturesque source of truth."

4

Speaking about the essence and role of dramaturgy and dramatic writers, Ostrovsky wrote: “History left the name of the great and brilliant only for those writers who knew how to write for the whole people, and only those works survived the centuries that were truly popular at home: such works over time become understandable and valuable for other peoples, and finally for the whole world” (XII, 123).

These words perfectly characterize the meaning and significance of the activity of their author himself. The work of A. N. Ostrovsky had a huge impact on the dramaturgy and theater of all the fraternal peoples that are now part of the USSR. His plays began to be widely translated and staged on the stages of Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Georgia and other fraternal nations from the end of the 50s of the XIX century. Their stage figures, playwrights, actors and directors perceived him as a teacher who paved new paths for the development of dramatic and stage arts.

In 1883, when A. N. Ostrovsky arrived in Tiflis, members of the Georgian drama troupe turned to him with an address in which they called him "the creator of immortal creations." “Pioneers of art in the East, we have seen and proved with our own eyes that your purely Russian folk creations can stir the hearts and act on the minds of not only the Russian public, that famous name Yours is just as loved by us, among the Georgians, as by you, inside Russia. We are infinitely happy that our humble share has fallen to the high honor of serving, with the help of your creations, as one of the links in the moral connection between these two peoples, which have so many common traditions and aspirations, so much mutual love and sympathy.

The powerful influence of Ostrovsky on the development of the dramatic and stage art of the fraternal peoples further intensified. In 1948, the outstanding Ukrainian director M. M. Krushelnitsky wrote: “For us, workers of the Ukrainian stage, the treasury of his work is at the same time one of the sources that enrich our theater with the life-giving power of Russian culture.”

More than half of A. N. Ostrovsky's plays were performed on the stages of the fraternal republics after October. But of these, “Own people - we will count!”, “Poverty is not a vice”, “Profitable place”, “Thunderstorm”, “Enough simplicity for every sage”, “Forest”, “Snow Maiden”, “Wolves and sheep” , "Dowry", "Talents and admirers", "Guilty without guilt". Many of these performances have become major events in theatrical life. The beneficial influence of the author of "Thunderstorm" and "Dowry" on the dramaturgy and stage of the fraternal peoples continues today.

Ostrovsky's plays, acquiring more and more admirers abroad, are widely staged in theaters of people's democratic countries, especially on the stages Slavic states(Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia).

After the Second World War, the plays of the great playwright increasingly attracted the attention of publishers and theaters in the capitalist countries. First of all, they became interested in the plays “Thunderstorm”, “Enough Simplicity for Every Wise Man”, “Forest”, “Snow Maiden”, “Wolves and Sheep”, “Dowry”. At the same time, the tragedy "Thunderstorm" was shown in Paris (1945, 1967), Berlin (1951), Potsdam (1953), London (1966), Tehran (1970). The comedy Enough Stupidity for Every Wise Man was staged in New York (1956), Delhi (1958), Bern (1958, 1963), London (1963). The comedy "Forest" was in Copenhagen (1947, 1956), Berlin (1950, 1953), Dresden (1954), Oslo (1961), Milan (1962), West Berlin (1964), Cologne (1965), London (1970) , Paris (1970). Performances of The Snow Maiden took place in Paris (1946), Rome (1954), Aarhus (Denmark, 1964).

The attention of foreign democratic viewers to the work of Ostrovsky is not weakening, but increasing. His plays are conquering more and more stages of the world theater.

It is quite natural that in recent times the interest of literary critics in Ostrovsky has also increased. Even during his lifetime, progressive domestic and foreign criticism placed A. N. Ostrovsky among the most important playwrights in the world as the creator of unfading masterpieces that contributed to the formation and development of realism. Already in the first foreign article about Ostrovsky, published by the English literary critic W. Rolston in 1868, he is perceived as an outstanding playwright. In 1870, Jan Neruda, the founder of realism in Czech literature, argued that Ostrovsky’s dramaturgy surpassed, ideologically and aesthetically, the plays of any playwright of the 19th century, and, predicting its prospects, wrote: “In the history of dramaturgy, Ostrovsky will be given an honorable place ... thanks to the truth of the image and true humanity he will live for centuries.

All subsequent progressive criticism, as a rule, considers his work among the luminaries of world drama. It is in this spirit that, for example, the Frenchmen Arsene Legrel (1885), Emile Durand-Greville (1889), and Oscar Methenier (1894) write their prefaces to Ostrovsky's plays.

In 1912, Jules Patouillet's monograph Ostrovsky and His Theater of Russian Morals was published in Paris. This huge work (about 500 pages!) is an ardent propaganda of Ostrovsky's work - a deep connoisseur, a truthful depiction of Russian customs and a wonderful master of dramatic art.

The researcher defended the ideas of this work in his further activities. Refuting critics who did not underestimate the skill of the playwright (for example, Boborykin, Vogüé and Valishevsky), Patuille wrote about him as a "classic of the stage", who was the complete master of his business already in the very first major play - "Own people - we will settle!" .

The interest of foreign literary and theater critics in Ostrovsky increased after the October Revolution, especially after the end of the Second World War. It was at this time that the extremely original essence, genius, greatness of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy, which rightfully took its place among the most brilliant works of world dramatic art, becomes increasingly clear for progressive foreign researchers of literature.

So, E. Wendt in the preface to the Collected Works of Ostrovsky, published in 1951 in Berlin, states: “A. N. Ostrovsky, the greatest dramatic genius of Russia, belongs to the brilliant era of Russian critical realism of the second half of the 19th century, when Russian literature took the leading place in the world and had a profound influence on European and American literature. Calling theaters to stage plays by Ostrovsky, he writes: “And if the leaders of our theaters open the work of the greatest playwright to the German stage 19th century, then this will mean an enrichment of our classical repertoire, similar to the discovery of the second Shakespeare.

According to the Italian literary critic Ettore Lo Gatto, expressed in 1955, the tragedy "Thunderstorm", which bypassed all the stages of Europe, remains forever alive as a drama, because its deep humanity, "not only Russian, but also universal" .

The 150th anniversary of A. N. Ostrovsky contributed to a new sharpening of attention to his dramaturgy and revealed its enormous international possibilities - the ability to respond to the moral problems not only of their compatriots, but also of other peoples the globe. And that is why, according to the decision of UNESCO, this anniversary was celebrated all over the world.

Time, great connoisseur, has not erased the colors characteristic of Ostrovsky's plays: the further, the more it confirms their universal essence, their undying ideological and aesthetic value.

In connection with the 35th anniversary of Ostrovsky’s activity, Goncharov wrote to him: “You alone built a building, at the base of which you laid the cornerstones of Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol. But only after you, we, Russians, can proudly say: "We have our own, Russian, national theater." It, in fairness, should be called the Ostrovsky Theater.

The role played by Ostrovsky in the development of Russian theater and dramaturgy may well be compared with the importance that Shakespeare had for English culture, and Molière for French. Ostrovsky changed the nature of the Russian theater repertoire, summed up everything that had been done before him, and opened up new paths for dramaturgy. His influence on theatrical art was exceptionally great. This is especially true of the Moscow Maly Theatre, which is also traditionally called the Ostrovsky House. Thanks to the numerous plays of the great playwright, who established the traditions of realism on the stage, the national school of acting was further developed. A whole galaxy of remarkable Russian actors based on the material of Ostrovsky's plays was able to vividly show their unique talent, to affirm the originality of Russian theatrical art.

At the center of Ostrovsky's drama is a problem that has gone through all of Russian classical literature: the conflict of man with the adverse conditions of life opposing him, the diverse forces of evil; assertion of the individual's right to free and all-round development. A broad panorama of Russian life is revealed to readers and viewers of the great playwright's plays. This is, in essence, an encyclopedia of life and customs of an entire historical era. Merchants, officials, landlords, peasants, generals, actors, businessmen, matchmakers, businessmen, students - several hundred characters created by Ostrovsky gave a total idea of ​​Russian reality in the 40-80s. in all its complexity, diversity and inconsistency.

Ostrovsky, who created a whole gallery of wonderful female images, continued that noble tradition, which has already been determined in the Russian classics. The playwright exalts strong, wholesome natures, which in a number of cases turn out to be morally superior to a weak, insecure hero. These are Katerina (“Thunderstorm”), Nadya (“The Pupil”), Kruchinina (“Guilty Without Guilt”), Natalia (“Labor Bread”), and others. Reflecting on the originality of Russian dramatic art, about its democratic basis, Ostrovsky wrote: “ Folk writers want to try their hand at a fresh audience, whose nerves are not very malleable, which requires strong drama, big comedy, causing frank, loud laughter, hot, sincere feelings, lively and strong characters". In essence, this is a characteristic of the creative principles of Ostrovsky himself.

The dramaturgy of the author of "The Thunderstorm" is distinguished by genre diversity, a combination of tragic and comic, everyday and grotesque, farcical and lyrical elements. His plays are sometimes difficult to attribute to one particular genre. He wrote not so much drama or comedy as "plays of life", according to Dobrolyubov's apt definition. The action of his works is often carried out on a wide living space. The noise and talk of life burst into action, becoming one of the factors determining the scale of events. Family conflicts develop into social ones.

The skill of the playwright is manifested in the accuracy of social and psychological characteristics, in the art of dialogue, in apt, lively folk speech. The language of the characters becomes for him one of the main means of creating an image, an instrument of realistic typification.

A great connoisseur of oral folk art, Ostrovsky widely used folk traditions, the richest treasury of folk wisdom. The song can replace his monologue, a proverb or saying become the title of the play.

The creative experience of Ostrovsky had a tremendous impact on the further development of Russian drama and theatrical art. V. I. Nemirovich-Danchenko and K. S. Stanislavsky, the founders of the Moscow Art Theatre, sought to create “a folk theater with approximately the same tasks and in the same plans as Ostrovsky dreamed of.” The dramatic innovation of Chekhov and Gorky would have been impossible without mastering the best traditions of their remarkable predecessor.

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky (1823-1886) rightfully occupies a worthy place among the largest representatives of world drama.

The significance of the activities of Ostrovsky, who for more than forty years annually published in the best magazines in Russia and staged plays on the stages of the imperial theaters of St. Goncharov, addressed to the playwright himself.

“You brought a whole library of works of art as a gift to literature, you created your own special world for the stage. You alone completed the building, at the foundation of which you laid the cornerstones of Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol. But only after you we are Russians, we can proudly say: “We have our own Russian, national theater.” It, in fairness, should be called Ostrovsky's Theatre.

Ostrovsky began his creative way in the 40s, during the lifetime of Gogol and Belinsky, and completed it in the second half of the 80s, at a time when A.P. Chekhov was already firmly established in literature.

The conviction that the work of a playwright, creating a theater repertoire, is a high public service permeated and directed Ostrovsky's activity. He was organically connected with the life of literature.

In his younger years, the playwright wrote critical articles and participated in the editorial affairs of Moskvityanin, trying to change the direction of this conservative journal, then, while publishing in Sovremennik and Otechestvennye Zapiski, he became friends with N. A. Nekrasov, L. N. Tolstoy , I. S. Turgenev, I. A. Goncharov and other writers. He followed their work, discussed their works with them and listened to their opinion about his plays.

In an era when state theaters were officially considered "imperial" and were under the control of the Ministry of the Court, and the provincial entertainment institutions were given to the full disposal of business entrepreneurs, Ostrovsky put forward the idea of ​​​​a complete restructuring of theatrical business in Russia. He argued the need to replace the court and commercial theater with a folk one.

Not limited to the theoretical development of this idea in special articles and notes, the playwright during for long years practically fought for its implementation. The main areas in which he realized his views on the theater were his work and work with actors.

Dramaturgy, the literary basis of the performance, Ostrovsky considered its defining element. The theatre's repertoire, which gives the viewer the opportunity to "see Russian life and Russian history on the stage", according to his concepts, was addressed primarily to the democratic public, "for which people's writers want to write and are obliged to write." Ostrovsky defended the principles of the author's theater.

He considered the theaters of Shakespeare, Moliere, and Goethe to be exemplary experiments of this kind. The combination in one person of the author of dramatic works and their interpreter on stage - the teacher of actors, the director - seemed to Ostrovsky a guarantee of artistic integrity, the organic activity of the theater.

This idea, in the absence of directing, with the traditional orientation of the theatrical spectacle to the performance of individual, "solo" actors, was innovative and fruitful. Its significance has not been exhausted even today, when the director has become the main figure in the theater. It is enough to recall B. Brecht's theater "Berliner Ensemble" to be convinced of this.

Overcoming the inertia of the bureaucratic administration, literary and theatrical intrigues, Ostrovsky worked with actors, constantly directing productions of his new plays at the Maly Moscow and Alexandrinsky Petersburg theaters.

The essence of his idea was to implement and consolidate the influence of literature on the theater. Fundamentally and categorically, he condemned the more and more felt from the 70s. subordination of dramatic writers to the tastes of the actors - the favorites of the stage, their prejudices and whims. At the same time, Ostrovsky did not conceive of dramaturgy without the theatre.

His plays were written with the direct expectation of real performers, artists. He emphasized that in order to write a good play, the author must have full knowledge of the laws of the stage, the purely plastic side of the theatre.

Far from every playwright, he was ready to hand over power over stage artists. He was sure that only a writer who created his own uniquely original dramaturgy, his own special world on the stage, has something to say to the artists, has something to teach them. Ostrovsky's attitude to modern theater determined by his artistic system. The hero of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy was the people.

The whole society and, moreover, the socio-historical life of the people appeared in his plays. Not without reason, critics N. Dobrolyubov and A. Grigoriev, who approached Ostrovsky’s work from mutually opposite positions, saw in his works complete picture the existence of the people, although they differently assessed the life depicted by the writer.

This orientation of the writer to the mass phenomena of life corresponded to the principle of ensemble play, which he defended, the consciousness inherent in the playwright of the importance of unity, the integrity of the creative aspirations of the team of actors participating in the performance.

In his plays, Ostrovsky portrayed social phenomena that had deep roots - conflicts, the origins and causes of which often date back to distant historical eras.

He saw and showed the fruitful aspirations arising in society, and the new evil rising in it. The bearers of new aspirations and ideas in his plays are forced to wage a hard struggle against the old, consecrated by tradition, conservative customs and views, and the new evil collides in them with the centuries-old ethical ideal of the people, with strong traditions of resistance. social injustice and moral wrong.

Each character in Ostrovsky's plays is organically connected with his environment, his era, the history of his people. At the same time, an ordinary person, in whose concepts, habits and speech itself, his kinship with the social and national peace, is the focus of interest in Ostrovsky's plays.

The individual fate of a person, the happiness and unhappiness of an individual, ordinary person, his needs, his struggle for his personal well-being excite the viewer of dramas and comedies of this playwright. The position of a person serves in them as a measure of the state of society.

Moreover, the typical personality, the energy with which individual characteristics the life of the people “affects” a person, in the dramaturgy of Ostrovsky it has an important ethical and aesthetic significance. The characterization is wonderful.

Just like Shakespeare's playwrights tragic hero, be it beautiful or terrible in terms of ethical assessment, belongs to the sphere of beauty, in the plays of Ostrovsky characteristic hero to the extent of its typicality, it is the embodiment of aesthetics, and in a number of cases, spiritual wealth, the historical life and culture of the people.

This feature of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy predetermined his attention to the play of each actor, to the performer's ability to present a type on stage, to vividly and captivatingly recreate an individual, original social character.

Ostrovsky especially appreciated this ability in the best artists of his time, encouraging and helping to develop it. Addressing A. E. Martynov, he said: “... from several features sketched by an inexperienced hand, you created the final types, full of artistic truth. That's why you are dear to the authors.

Ostrovsky ended his discussion about the nationality of the theatre, about the fact that dramas and comedies are written for the entire people: "...dramatic writers must always remember this, they must be clear and strong."

The clarity and strength of the author's creativity, in addition to the types created in his plays, finds expression in the conflicts of his works, built on simple life incidents, reflecting, however, the main collisions of modern social life.

In his early article, positively evaluating the story of A.F. Pisemsky “The Mattress”, Ostrovsky wrote: “The intrigue of the story is simple and instructive, like life. Because of the original characters, because of the natural and in the highest degree The dramatic course of events shows through a noble thought, obtained by worldly experience.

This story is truly a work of art." The natural dramatic course of events, original characters, depiction of the life of ordinary people - listing these signs of true artistry in Pisemsky's story, the young Ostrovsky undoubtedly proceeded from his reflections on the tasks of drama as an art.

Characteristically, Ostrovsky attaches great importance to the instructiveness of a literary work. The instructiveness of art gives him a reason to compare and bring art closer to life.

Ostrovsky believed that the theater, gathering within its walls a large and diverse audience, uniting it with a sense of aesthetic pleasure, should educate society, help simple, unprepared spectators “to understand life for the first time”, and give educated ones “a whole perspective of thoughts that you can’t get rid of” (ibid.).

At the same time, abstract didactics was alien to Ostrovsky. “Anyone can have good thoughts, but only a select few can own minds and hearts,” he reminded, ironically at writers who replace serious artistic problems with edifying tirades and a naked trend. Knowledge of life, its truthful realistic image, reflection on the most relevant for society and difficult questions- this is what the theater should present to the public, this is what makes the stage a school of life.

The artist teaches the viewer to think and feel, but does not give him ready-made solutions. Didactic dramaturgy, which does not reveal the wisdom and instructiveness of life, but replaces it with declaratively expressed common truths, is dishonest, since it is not artistic, while it is precisely for the sake of aesthetic impressions that people come to the theater.

These ideas of Ostrovsky found a peculiar refraction in her attitude to historical dramaturgy. The playwright argued that "historical dramas and chronicles<...>develop people's self-knowledge and educate a conscious love for the fatherland.

At the same time, he emphasized that not a distortion of the past for the sake of one or another tendentious idea, not designed for the external stage effect of melodrama on historical plots and not the transcription of scientific monographs into a dialogic form, but a truly artistic recreation of the living reality of bygone centuries on the stage can be the basis of a patriotic performance.

Such a performance helps society to know itself, encourages reflection, giving a conscious character to the immediate feeling of love for the motherland. Ostrovsky understood that the plays that he creates every year form the basis of the modern theatrical repertoire.

Defining the types of dramatic works, without which an exemplary repertoire cannot exist, he, in addition to dramas and comedies depicting modern Russian life, and historical chronicles, named extravaganzas, fairy-tale plays for festive performances, accompanied by music and dances, designed as a colorful folk spectacle.

The playwright created a masterpiece of this kind - the spring fairy tale "The Snow Maiden", in which poetic fantasy and picturesque setting are combined with deep lyrical and philosophical content.

History of Russian literature: in 4 volumes / Edited by N.I. Prutskov and others - L., 1980-1983

The playwright almost did not put in his work political and philosophical problems, facial expressions and gestures, through playing with the details of their costumes and everyday environment. For amplification comic effects the playwright usually introduced minor persons into the plot - relatives, servants, accustomers, casual passers-by - and side circumstances of everyday life. Such, for example, are Khlynov’s retinue and the gentleman with a mustache in The Hot Heart, or Apollo Murzavetsky with his Tamerlane in the comedy Wolves and Sheep, or the actor Schastlivtsev under Neschastlivtsev and Paratov in The Forest and The Dowry, etc. The playwright, as before, sought to reveal the characters of the characters not only in the very course of events, but to no lesser extent through the peculiarities of their everyday dialogues - "characterological" dialogues, aesthetically mastered by him in "His People ...".

Thus, in the new period of creativity, Ostrovsky acts as an established master with a complete system of dramatic art. His fame, his social and theatrical connections continue to grow and become more complex. The very abundance of plays created in the new period was the result of an ever-increasing demand for Ostrovsky's plays from magazines and theaters. During these years, the playwright not only worked tirelessly himself, but found the strength to help less gifted and novice writers, and sometimes actively participate with them in their work. So, in creative collaboration with Ostrovsky, a number of plays by N. Solovyov were written (the best of them are “The Marriage of Belugin” and “Wild Woman”), as well as P. Nevezhin.

Constantly contributing to the staging of his plays on the stages of the Moscow Maly and St. Petersburg Alexandria theaters, Ostrovsky knew well the state of theatrical affairs, which were mainly under the jurisdiction of the bureaucratic state apparatus, and was bitterly aware of their glaring shortcomings. He saw that he did not portray the noble and bourgeois intelligentsia in its ideological quest, as did Herzen, Turgenev, and partly Goncharov. In his plays, he showed the everyday social life of ordinary representatives of the merchant class, bureaucracy, the nobility, a life where personal, in particular love, conflicts manifested clashes of family, monetary, property interests.

But Ostrovsky's ideological and artistic awareness of these aspects of Russian life had a deep national and historical meaning. Through the everyday relations of those people who were the masters and masters of life, their general social condition was revealed. Just as, according to Chernyshevsky's apt remark, the cowardly behavior of the young liberal, the hero of Turgenev's story "Asya", on a date with a girl was a "symptom of the illness" of all noble liberalism, its political weakness, so the everyday tyranny and predatory behavior of merchants, officials, and nobles acted symptom more terrible disease their complete inability to at least to some extent give their activities a nationwide progressive significance.

This was quite natural and natural in the pre-reform period. Then the tyranny, arrogance, predation of the Voltovs, Vyshnevskys, Ulanbekovs was a manifestation of the "dark kingdom" of serfdom, already doomed to be scrapped. And Dobrolyubov correctly pointed out that although Ostrovsky's comedy "cannot provide a key to explaining many of the bitter phenomena depicted in it," nevertheless "it can easily lead to many analogous considerations related to that life, which it does not directly concern." And the critic explained this by the fact that the "types" of petty tyrants, bred by Ostrovsky, "not infrequently contain not only exclusively merchant or bureaucratic, but also nationwide (i.e., nationwide) features." In other words, Ostrovsky's plays of 1840-1860. indirectly exposed all the "dark kingdoms" of the autocratic-feudal system.

In the post-reform decades, the situation changed. Then "everything turned upside down" and the new, bourgeois system of Russian life began to gradually "fit in". to take part in the struggle for the destruction of the remnants of the "dark kingdom" of serfdom and the entire autocratic-landowner system.

Nearly twenty of Ostrovsky's new plays on contemporary themes gave a clear negative answer to this fatal question. The playwright, as before, depicted the world of private social, household, family and property relations. Not everything was clear to him in the general tendencies of their development, and his "lyre" sometimes made not quite, "correct sounds" in this respect. But on the whole, Ostrovsky's plays contained a certain objective orientation. They exposed both the remnants of the old "dark kingdom" of despotism and the newly emerging "dark kingdom" of bourgeois predation, money hype, the destruction of all moral values ​​in an atmosphere of general buying and selling. They showed that Russian businessmen and industrialists are not capable of rising to the realization of the interests of the general public. national development that some of them, such as Khlynov and Akhov, are only capable of indulging in gross pleasures, others, like Knurov and Berkutov, can only subordinate everything around them to their predatory, "wolf" interests, while others, such as Vasilkov or Frol Profits, profit interests are only covered by outward decency and very narrow cultural needs. Ostrovsky's plays, in addition to the plans and intentions of their author, objectively outlined a certain prospect of national development - the prospect of the inevitable destruction of all remnants of the old "dark kingdom" of autocratic serf despotism, not only without the participation of the bourgeoisie, not only over its head, but along with the destruction of its own predatory "dark kingdom"

reality depicted in everyday plays Ostrovsky, was a form of life devoid of a nationwide progressive content, and therefore easily revealed internal comic inconsistency. Ostrovsky devoted his outstanding dramatic talent to its disclosure. Based on the tradition of Gogol realistic comedies and stories, rebuilding it in accordance with the new aesthetic demands put forward by the "natural school" of the 1840s and formulated by Belinsky and Herzen, Ostrovsky traced the comic inconsistency of the social and everyday life of the ruling strata of Russian society, delving into the "world of details", examining the thread behind thread "the web of daily relationships." This was the main achievement of the new dramatic style created by Ostrovsky.

Page 1 of 2

Life and work of A.N. Ostrovsky

The role of Ostrovsky in the history of the development of Russian drama 4

Life and work of A.N. Ostrovsky 5

Childhood and youth 5

First passion for theater 6

Training and service 7

First hobby. First plays 7

Conversation with father. Ostrovsky's wedding 9

The beginning of a creative journey 10

Traveling in Russia 12

Thunderstorm 14

The second marriage of Ostrovsky 17

The best work of Ostrovsky - "Dowry" 19

Death of a great playwright 21

Genre originality of A.N. Ostrovsky. Significance in world literature 22

Literature 24

The role of Ostrovsky in the history of the development of Russian drama

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky ... This is an unusual phenomenon. His role in the history of the development of Russian drama, stage art and all national culture hard to overestimate. For the development of Russian drama he did as much as Shakespeare in England, Lone de Vega in Spain, Molière in France, Goldoni in Italy and Schiller in Germany.

Despite the harassment inflicted by the censorship, the theatrical and literary committee and the directorate of the imperial theaters, despite the criticism of reactionary circles, Ostrovsky's dramaturgy gained more and more sympathy every year both among democratic spectators and among artists.

Developing the best traditions of Russian dramatic art, using the experience of progressive foreign dramaturgy, tirelessly learning about the life of his native country, constantly communicating with the people, closely connecting with the most progressive contemporary public, Ostrovsky became an outstanding depiction of the life of his time, who embodied the dreams of Gogol, Belinsky and other progressive figures. literature about the appearance and triumph on the national stage of Russian characters.

The creative activity of Ostrovsky had a great influence on the entire further development of progressive Russian drama. It was from him that our best playwrights studied, he taught. It was to him that aspiring dramatic writers were drawn in their time.

The strength of Ostrovsky's influence on the writers of his day can be evidenced by a letter to the playwright poetess A. D. Mysovskaya. “Do you know how great was your influence on me? It was not love for art that made me understand and appreciate you: on the contrary, you taught me to love and respect art. I am indebted to you alone for the fact that I withstood the temptation to fall into the arena of miserable literary mediocrity, did not chase after cheap laurels thrown by the hands of sweet and sour half-educated. You and Nekrasov made me fall in love with thought and work, but Nekrasov gave me only the first impetus, you are the direction. Reading your works, I realized that rhyming is not poetry, and a set of phrases is not literature, and that only by processing the mind and technique, the artist will be a real artist.

Ostrovsky had a powerful impact not only on the development of domestic drama, but also on the development of the Russian theater. The colossal importance of Ostrovsky in the development of the Russian theater is well emphasized in a poem dedicated to Ostrovsky and read in 1903 by M. N. Yermolova from the stage of the Maly Theater:

On the stage, life itself, from the stage blows the truth,

And the bright sun caresses and warms us ...

The live speech of ordinary, living people sounds,

On stage, not a “hero”, not an angel, not a villain,

But just a man ... Happy actor

In a hurry to quickly break the heavy fetters

Conditions and lies. Words and feelings are new

But in the secrets of the soul, the answer sounds to them, -

And all the mouths whisper: blessed is the poet,

Tore off the shabby, tinsel covers

And shed a bright light into the kingdom of darkness

The famous artist wrote about the same in her memoirs in 1924: “Together with Ostrovsky, truth itself and life itself appeared on the stage ... The growth of original drama began, full of responses to modernity ... They started talking about the poor, the humiliated and insulted.”

The realistic direction, muffled by the theatrical policy of the autocracy, continued and deepened by Ostrovsky, turned the theater onto the path of close connection with reality. Only it gave life to the theater as a national, Russian, folk theater.

“You brought a whole library of works of art as a gift to literature, you created your own special world for the stage. You alone completed the building, at the foundation of which the cornerstones of Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol were laid. This wonderful letter was received among other congratulations in the year of the thirty-fifth anniversary of literary and theatrical activity, Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky from another great Russian writer - Goncharov.

But much earlier, about the very first work of the still young Ostrovsky, published in Moskvityanin, a subtle connoisseur of elegance and a sensitive observer V. F. Odoevsky wrote: this man is a great talent. I consider three tragedies in Rus': “Undergrowth”, “Woe from Wit”, “Inspector”. I put number four on Bankrupt.

From such a promising first assessment to Goncharov's anniversary letter, a full, busy life; labor, and led to such a logical relationship of assessments, because talent requires, first of all, great labor on itself, and the playwright did not sin before God - he did not bury his talent in the ground. Having published the first work in 1847, Ostrovsky has since written 47 plays and translated more than twenty plays from European languages. And all in all, in the folk theater he created, there are about a thousand actors.

Shortly before his death, in 1886, Alexander Nikolayevich received a letter from L. N. Tolstoy, in which the brilliant prose writer admitted: “I know from experience how people read, listen and remember your things, and therefore I would like to help you have now quickly become in reality what you undoubtedly are - a writer of the whole people in the broadest sense.

Life and work of A.N. Ostrovsky

Childhood and youth

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky was born in Moscow into a cultural, bureaucratic family on April 12 (March 31, old style), 1823. The family had its roots in the clergy: the father was the son of a priest, the mother was the daughter of a sexton. Moreover, his father, Nikolai Fedorovich, himself graduated from the Moscow Theological Academy. But he preferred the career of an official to the craft of a clergyman and succeeded in it, as he achieved material independence, a position in society, and a noble rank. This was not a dry official, closed only in his service, but widely educated person, as evidenced by at least his passion for books - the Ostrovsky's home library was very solid, which, by the way, played an important role in the self-education of the future playwright.

The family lived in those wonderful places in Moscow, which then found authentic reflection in Ostrovsky's plays - first in Zamoskvorechye, at the Serpukhov Gates, in a house on Zhitnaya, bought by the late father Nikolai Fedorovich on the cheap, at auction. The house was warm, spacious, with a mezzanine, with outbuildings, with an outbuilding that was rented out to the tenants, and with a shady garden. In 1831, grief befell the family - after giving birth to twin girls, Lyubov Ivanovna died (she gave birth to eleven children in total, but only four survived). The arrival of a new person in the family (his second marriage, Nikolai Fedorovich married the Lutheran Baroness Emilia von Tessin), naturally, brought some European innovations to the house, which, however, benefited the children, the stepmother was more caring, helped the children in learning music, languages, formed a social circle. At first, both brothers and sister Natalya shunned the newly-minted mother. But Emilia Andreevna, good-natured, calm in character, attracted their children's hearts to herself with care and love for the remaining orphans, slowly achieving the replacement of the nickname “dear aunt” with “dear mother”.

Now everything is different with the Ostrovskys. Emilia Andreevna patiently taught Natasha and the boys music, French and German, which she knew perfectly, decent manners, and social etiquette. Musical evenings started up in the house on Zhitnaya Street, even dancing to the piano. There were nannies and wet nurses for newborn babies, a governess. And now they ate at the Ostrovskys, as they say, in a nobility way: on porcelain and silver, with starched napkins.

Nikolai Fedorovich liked all this very much. And having received, according to the rank achieved in the service, hereditary nobility, whereas earlier he was listed "from the clergy", he grew his sideburns with a cutlet and now accepted the merchants only in the office, sitting at a vast table littered with papers and plump volumes from the code of laws of the Russian Empire.

First passion for theater

Everything then pleased, everything occupied Alexander Ostrovsky: and cheerful parties; and conversations with friends; and books from papa's extensive library, where, of course, Pushkin, Gogol, Belinsky's articles and various comedies, dramas, and tragedies were read in magazines and almanacs; and, of course, the theater with Mochalov and Shchepkin at the head.

Everything then delighted Ostrovsky in the theater: not only the plays, the acting, but even the impatient, nervous noise of the audience before the start of the performance, the sparkle of oil lamps and candles. a marvelously painted curtain, the very air of the theater hall - warm, fragrant, saturated with the smell of powder, makeup and strong perfumes that sprayed the foyer and corridors.

It was here, in the theater, in the gallery, that he met one remarkable young man, Dmitry Tarasenkov, from the newfangled merchant sons, who passionately loved theatrical performances.

He was not small in stature, a broad-chested, stocky young man five or six years older than Ostrovsky, with blond hair cut in a circle, with a sharp look in his small gray eyes and a stentorian, truly deacon's voice. His powerful shout of "bravo", as he met and saw off the famous Mochalov from the stage, easily drowned out the applause of the stalls, boxes and balconies. In his black merchant's undercoat and blue Russian shirt with a slanting collar, in chrome accordion boots, he strikingly resembled the good fellow of old peasant tales.

They left the theater together. It turned out that both live not far from each other: Ostrovsky - on Zhitnaya, Tarasenkov - in Monetchiki. It also turned out that both of them compose plays for the theater from the life of the merchant class. Only Ostrovsky is still just trying on and sketching comedies in prose, while Tarasenkov writes five-act poetic dramas. And, finally, it turned out, thirdly, that both fathers - Tarasenkov and Ostrovsky - were resolutely against such hobbies, considering them empty pampering, distracting their sons from serious studies.

However, father Ostrovsky did not touch his son’s stories or comedies, while the second guild merchant Andrei Tarasenkov not only burned all Dmitry’s writings in the stove, but invariably rewarded his son with fierce blows of the stick for them.

From that first meeting in the theater, Dmitry Tarasenkov began to drop in more and more often on Zhitnaya Street, and with the Ostrovskys moving to their other property, in Vorobino, on the banks of the Yauza, near the Silver Baths.

There, in the quiet of a garden pavilion overgrown with hops and dodder, they used to read together for a long time not only modern Russian and foreign plays, but also tragedies and dramatic satires by ancient Russian authors...

“My great dream is to become an actor,” Dmitry Tarasenkov once said to Ostrovsky, “and this time has come to finally give my heart without a trace to theater, tragedy. I dare it. I must. And you, Alexander Nikolaevich, will either soon hear something beautiful about me, or mourn my early death. I don't want to live the way I've lived until now. Away with all vain, all base! Farewell! Today at night I leave my native penates, I leave this wild kingdom for an unknown world, for sacred art, for my beloved theater, for the stage. Farewell, friend, let's kiss on the path!

Then, a year or two later, recalling this farewell in the garden, Ostrovsky caught himself in a strange feeling of some kind of awkwardness. Because, in essence, there was in those seemingly sweet farewell words of Tarasenkov something not so much false, no, but as if invented, not quite natural, or something, similar to that lofty, ringing and strange recitation with which dramatic products are filled notebooks of our geniuses. like Nestor Kukolnik or Nikolai Polevoy.

Training and service

Alexander Ostrovsky received his initial education at the First Moscow Gymnasium, entering the third grade in 1835 and completing his course of study with honors in 1840.

After graduating from high school, at the insistence of his father, a wise and practical man, Alexander immediately entered Moscow University, Faculty of Law, although he himself wanted to engage mainly in literary work. After studying for two years, Ostrovsky left the university, having quarreled with Professor Nikita Krylov, but the time spent within its walls was not wasted, because it was used not only for studying the theory of law, but also for self-education, for students' hobbies for social life, for communication with teachers. Suffice it to say that K. Ushinsky became his closest student friend, he often visited the theater with A. Pisemsky. And the lectures were given by P.G. Redkin, T.N. Granovsky, D. L. Kryukov ... In addition, it was at this time that the name of Belinsky thundered, whose articles in the “Notes of the Fatherland” were read not only by students. Carried away by the theater and knowing the entire repertoire going on, Ostrovsky all this time independently re-read such classics of drama as Gogol, Corneille, Racine, Shakespeare, Schiller, Voltaire. After leaving the university, Alexander Nikolaevich decided in 1843 to serve in the Constituent Court. This happened again at the firm insistence with the participation of the father, who wanted a legal, respected and profitable career for his son. This also explains the transition in 1845 from the Constituent Court (where cases were decided “according to conscience”) to the Moscow Commercial Court: here the service - for four rubles a month - lasted five years, until January 10, 1851.

Having heard enough and seen enough in court, every day the clerk Alexander Ostrovsky returned from public service from one end of Moscow to the other - from Voskresenskaya Square or Mokhovaya Street to Yauza, to his Vorobino.

A blizzard blew through his head. Then the characters of the stories and comedies invented by him made noise, scolded and cursed each other - merchants and merchants, mischievous fellows from the trading rows, dodgy matchmakers, clerks, rich merchant daughters, or for everything ready for a stack of iridescent banknotes judicial lawyers ... To this unknown country , called Zamoskvorechye, where those characters lived, was only slightly touched once by the great Gogol in “The Marriage”, and he, Ostrovsky, may be destined to tell everything about it thoroughly, in detail ... head fresh stories! What ferocious bearded faces loom before my eyes! What a juicy and new language in literature!

Having reached the house on the Yauza and kissed the hand of his mother and father, he sat down impatiently at the dinner table, ate what he was supposed to. And then he quickly went up to his second floor, to his cramped cell with a bed, a table and a chair, in order to sketch two or three scenes for a play he had long conceived, “A Petition of Claim” (that was originally, in drafts, the first play by Ostrovsky “The Picture of a Family” was called). happiness").

First hobby. First plays

Was already late fall 1846. City gardens, groves near Moscow turned yellow and flew around. The sky darkened. But it didn't rain. It was dry and quiet. He walked slowly from Mokhovaya along his favorite Moscow streets, enjoying the autumn air filled with the smell of fallen leaves, the rustle of carriages rushing past, the noise around the Iverskaya chapel of a crowd of pilgrims, beggars, holy fools, wanderers, wandering monks who collected alms "for the splendor of the temple", priests, for some misdeeds of those who were dismissed from the parish and are now “staggering between the yards”, peddlers of hot brisket and other goods, dashing fellows from the trading shops in Nikolskaya ...

When he finally reached the Ilyinsky Gate, he jumped on a carriage passing by and drove it for a while for three kopecks, and then again with a cheerful heart walked towards his Nikolovorobinsky Lane.

Then youth and hopes that had not yet been offended by anything, and faith in friendship that had not yet deceived, rejoiced his heart. And the first hot love. This girl was a simple philistine from Kolomna, a seamstress, a needlewoman. And they called her in a simple, sweet Russian name - Agafya.

Back in the summer, they met at a walk in Sokolniki, near a theater booth. And since then, Agafya has been frequenting the white-stone capital (not only for her own and her sister Natalyushka’s business), and now she is thinking of leaving Kolomna and settling in Moscow, not far from Sashenka’s dear friend, at Nikola’s in Vorobin.

The sexton had already beaten four hours on the bell tower when Ostrovsky finally approached the spacious father's house near the church.

In the garden, in a wooden arbor, braided with already dried hops, Ostrovsky saw, still from the gate, brother Misha, a law student, leading a lively conversation with someone.

Apparently, Misha was waiting for him, and when he noticed, he immediately informed his interlocutor about this. He impetuously turned around and, smiling, greeted the “friend of infancy” with a classic wave of the hand of the theatrical hero leaving the stage at the end of the monologue.

It was the merchant's son Tarasenkov, and now the tragic actor Dmitry Gorev, who played in theaters everywhere, from Novgorod to Novorossiysk (and not without success) in classical dramas, in melodramas, even in the tragedies of Schiller and Shakespeare.

They hugged...

Ostrovsky spoke about his new idea, about a multi-act comedy called “Bankrupt” and Tarasenkov offered to work together.

Ostrovsky considered. Until now, everything - and his story and comedy - he wrote alone, without comrades. However, where are the grounds, where is the reason for refusing to cooperate with this dear person? He is an actor, a playwright, he knows and loves literature very well, and just like Ostrovsky himself, he hates untruth and all kinds of tyranny...

At first, of course, something did not go well, there were disputes and disagreements. For some reason, Dmitry Andreevich, and for example, at all costs wanted to slip into the comedy another fiance for Mamselle Lipochka - Nagrevalnikov. And Ostrovsky had to spend a lot of nerves in order to convince Tarasenkov of the complete uselessness of this worthless character. And how many catchy, obscure or simply unknown words Gorev threw to the actors of the comedy - even to the same merchant Bolshov, or his stupid wife Agrafena Kondratievna, or the matchmaker, or the daughter of the merchant Olympiad!

And, of course, Dmitri Andreevich could not come to terms with Ostrovsky's habit of writing a play not at all from the beginning, not from its first picture, but, as it were, randomly - now one thing, now another phenomenon, now from the first, then from the third, say, act.

The whole point here was that Alexander Nikolayevich had been thinking about the play for so long, knew it in such minute details, and now saw it in its entirety, that it was not difficult for him to snatch out of it that particular part that seemed to him, as it were, to bulge all the others.

In the end, this worked out, too. Having argued slightly among themselves, they decided to start writing the comedy in the usual way - from the first act ... Gorev worked with Ostrovsky for four evenings. Alexander Nikolayevich dictated more and more, striding back and forth across his small cell, while Dmitry Andreevich took notes.

However, of course, Gorev sometimes threw, grinning, very sensible remarks or suddenly offered some really funny, incongruous, but juicy, truly merchant's phrase. So they wrote together four small phenomena of the first act, and that was the end of their collaboration.

Ostrovsky's first works were "The Tale of How the Quarterly Overseer Started to Dance, or Only One Step from the Great to the Ridiculous" and "Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident". However, both Alexander Nikolayevich and the researchers of his work consider the play “The Picture of Family Happiness” to be the true beginning of his creative biography. It is about her towards the end of his life that Ostrovsky will remember: “The most memorable day for me in my life: February 14, 1847. From that day on, I began to consider myself a Russian writer and, without doubts or hesitations, believed in my vocation.”

Yes, indeed, on this day, the critic Apollon Grigoriev brought his young friend to the house of Professor S.P. Shevyrev, who was supposed to read his play to the audience. He read well, talentedly, and the intrigue was captivating, so the first performance was a success. However, despite the juiciness of the work and the good reviews, it was only a test of myself.

Conversation with father. Ostrovsky's wedding

Meanwhile, papa Nikolai Fedorovich, having acquired four estates in various Volga provinces, finally looked favorably at the tireless request of Emilia Andreevna: he quit his service in the courts, the practice of law and decided to move with his whole family to permanent residence in one of these estates - the village of Shchelykovo.

It was then, while waiting for the carriage, that papa Ostrovsky called to the already empty office and, sitting down on an upholstered chair left as unnecessary, said:

For a long time I wanted, Alexander, for a long time I wanted to preface you, or simply to express my displeasure to you at last. You dropped out of the university you serve in court without proper zeal; God knows who you know - shop assistants, innkeepers, philistines, other petty riffraff, not to mention all sorts of gentlemen feuilletonists ... Actresses, actors - so be it, although your writings do not console me at all: I see a lot of trouble , but there is little sense! .. This, however, is your business. - not a baby! But think for yourself what manners you learned there, habits, words, expressions! After all, you do what you want, and from the nobles and the son, I dare to think, a respectable lawyer - then remember ... Of course, Emilia Andreevna, due to her delicacy, did not make a single reproach to you - it seems so? And he won't. Nevertheless, to put it bluntly, your masculine manners and these acquaintances offend her! .. That is the first point. And the second point is this. I have learned from many that you started an affair with some bourgeois woman, a seamstress, and her name is something like that ... too in Russian - Agafya. What a name, have mercy! However, this is not the point ... The worse thing is that she lives in the neighborhood, and, apparently, not without your consent, Alexander ... So, remember this: if you don’t leave all this or, God forbid, get married, or just bring that Agafya to yourself, then live as you know, but you won’t get a penny from me, I’ll stop everything once and for all ... I don’t expect an answer, and be silent! What I say is said. You can go and get ready... However, wait, here's another thing. All your and Mikhail's little things and some furniture you needed, I ordered the janitor, as soon as we leave, to transport to our other house, under the mountain. You will live there as soon as you return from Shchelykovo, on the mezzanine. Come on, enough of you. And Sergey will live with us for the time being... Go!

Throwing Agafya Ostrovsky cannot and will never do ... Of course, it will not be sweet for him without his father's support, but there is nothing to do ...

Soon he and Agafya were completely alone in this little house on the banks of the Yauza, near the Silver Baths. Because, not looking at papa's anger, Ostrovsky finally moved “that Agafya” and all her simple belongings to his mezzanine. And brother Misha, having decided to serve in the State Control Department, immediately left first for Simbirsk, then for St. Petersburg.

The father's house was quite small, with five windows along the facade, for warmth and decency it was sheathed with a board painted in dark Brown color. And the house was nestled at the very foot of the mountain, which rose steeply in its narrow alley to the church of St. Nicholas placed high on its top.

From the street it looked like a one-story house, but behind the gate, in the courtyard, there was also a second floor (in other words, a three-room mezzanine), looking through the windows into the neighboring courtyard and onto the wasteland with the Silver Baths on the river bank.

The beginning of the creative path

Almost a whole year has passed since papa and his family moved to the village of Shchelykovo. And although Ostrovsky was then often tormented by insulting need, nevertheless, their three small rooms greeted him with sunshine and joy, and even from afar he heard, climbing the dark, narrow stairs to the second floor, a quiet, glorious Russian song, of which his fair-haired, vociferous Ganya knew a lot. . And in this very year, in need, tormented by service and daily newspaper work, alarmed, like everyone around after the Petrashevsky case, and sudden arrests, and the arbitrariness of censorship, and “flies” buzzing around writers , It was in this difficult year that he finished the comedy “Bankrupt” that had not been given to him for such a long time (“Own people - let's settle”).

This play, completed in the winter of 1849, was read by the author in many houses: at A.F. Pisemsky, M.N. Katkov, then at M.P. to listen to “Bankrupt”, Gogol came a second time (and then came to listen and again - already at the house of E. P. Rostopchina).

The performance of the play in Pogodin's house had far-reaching consequences: "Our people - we will settle" appears. in the sixth issue of Moskvityanin for 1850, and since then once a year the playwright publishes his plays in this journal and participates in the editorial work until the publication was closed in 1856. Further printing of the play was forbidden, Nicholas I's handwritten resolution read: "Printed in vain, play is forbidden." The same play was the reason for the secret police supervision of the playwright. And she (as well as the very participation in the work of "Moskvityanin") made him the center of controversy between Slavophiles and Westerners. The author had to wait more than a decade for this play to be staged: in its original form, without the intervention of censorship, it appeared in the Moscow Pushkin Theater only on April 30, 1881.

The period of cooperation with Pogodin's "Moskvityanin" for Ostrovsky is both rich and difficult at the same time. At this time, he writes: in 1852 - “Do not sit in your sleigh”, in 1853 - “Poverty is not a vice”, in 1854 - “Do not live as you want” - plays of the Slavophile direction, which , despite conflicting reviews, everyone wished a new hero to the domestic theater. So, the premiere of “Don’t Get into Your Sleigh” on January 14, 1853 at the Maly Theater delighted the public, not least thanks to the language and characters, especially against the backdrop of a rather monotonous and meager repertoire of that time (the works of Griboedov, Gogol, Fonvizin were given extremely rare; for example, The Inspector General went only three times throughout the season). A Russian folk character appeared on the stage, a man whose problems are close and ionic. As a result, Kukolnik’s “Prince Skopin-Shuisky” that had previously made noise in the 1854/55 season was played once, and “Poverty is not a vice” - 13 times. In addition, they played in the performances of Nikulina-Kositskaya, Sadovsky, Shchepkin, Martynov ...

What is the complexity of this period? In the struggle that unfolded around Ostrovsky, and in his own revision of some of his convictions ”In 1853, he wrote to Pogodin about revising his views on creativity: : 1) that I do not want to make myself not only enemies, but even displeasure; 2) that my direction is beginning to change; 3) that the outlook on life in my first comedy seems young and too harsh to me; 4) that it is better for a Russian person to rejoice at seeing himself on stage than to yearn. Correctors will be found even without us. In order to have the right to correct the people without offending, it is necessary to show them that you know the good behind them; this is what I am doing now, combining the lofty with the comic. The first sample was “Sled”, the second one I am finishing”.

Not everyone was happy with it. And if Apollon Grigoriev believed that the playwright in the new plays “sought not to give a satire of tyranny, but a poetic image of the whole world with very diverse beginnings and buckthorn”, then Chernyshevsky held a sharply opposite opinion, inclining Ostrovsky to his side: “In the last two works Mr. Ostrovsky fell into sugary embellishment of that which cannot and should not be embellished. The works came out weak and false”; and immediately gave recommendations: they say, the playwright, “having thereby damaged his literary reputation, has not yet ruined his beautiful talent: it can still appear as fresh and strong if Mr. Ostrovsky leaves that muddy path that led him to “Poverty no vice."

At the same time, vile gossip was spreading around Moscow, as if “Bankrupt” or “Own People We Get Together” was not Ostrovsky’s play at all, but, to put it simply, it was stolen by him from the actor Tarasenkov-Gorev. They say that he, Ostrovsky, is nothing but a literary thief, which means that he is a swindler among swindlers, a man without honor and conscience! The actor Gorev is the unfortunate victim of his trusting, most noble friendship...

Three years ago, when these rumors spread, Alexander Nikolaevich still believed in the high, honest convictions of Dmitry Tarasenkov, in his decency, in his incorruptibility. Because a man who loved the theater so wholeheartedly, who read Shakespeare and Schiller with such excitement, this actor by vocation, this Hamlet, Othello, Ferdinand, Baron Meinau, could not even partly support those gossip poisoned by malice. But Gorev, however, was silent. Rumors crawled and crawled, rumors spread, spread, but Gorev was silent and silent ... Ostrovsky then wrote a friendly letter to Gorev, asking him to finally appear in print in order to finish off these vile gossip at once.

Alas! There was neither honor nor conscience in the soul of the drunkard-actor Tarasenkov-Gorev. In his cunning answer, he not only admitted that he was the author of the famous comedy “Our people - we will settle,” but at the same time hinted at some other plays that he allegedly transferred to Ostrovsky for preservation six or seven years ago. So now it turned out that all the works of Ostrovsky - with perhaps a small exception - were stolen by him or copied from the actor and playwright Tarasenkov-Gorev.

He did not answer Tarasenkov, but found the strength to sit down again to work on his next comedy. Because at that time he considered all the new plays he was composing to be the best refutation of Gorev's slander.

And in 1856, Tarasenkov again emerged from oblivion, and all these Pravdovs, Alexandrovichs, Vl. Zotov, “N. A." and others like them again rushed at him, at Ostrovsky, with the same abuse and with the same passion.

And Gorev, of course, was not the instigator. Here she climbed on him dark force that once drove Fonvizin and Griboyedov, Pushkin and Gogol, and now drives Nekrasov and Saltykov-Shchedrin.

He feels it, he understands. And that is why he wants to write his answer to the libelous note of the Moscow police leaflet.

Calmly, he now outlined the history of his creation of the comedy “Our people - we will settle” and the insignificant participation in it of Dmitry Gorev-Tarasenkov, which had long been printed certified by him, Alexander Ostrovsky.

“Gentlemen feuilletonists,” he finished his answer with icy calm, “are carried away by their unbridledness to the point that they forget not only the laws of decency, but also those laws in our fatherland that protect the person and property of everyone. Do not think, gentlemen, that a writer who honestly serves the literary cause will allow you to play with your name with impunity! And in the signature, Alexander Nikolayevich identified himself as the author of all nine plays he has written so far and have long been known to the reading public, including the comedy “Our people - let's get it right”.

But, of course, Ostrovsky's name was known first of all thanks to the comedy Don't Get in Your Sleigh staged by the Maly Theatre; they wrote about her: “... from that day on, rhetoric, falsehood, gallomania began to gradually disappear from Russian drama. The actors spoke on the stage in the same language as they really speak in life. A whole new world began to open up for the audience.”

Six months later, The Poor Bride was staged in the same theater.

It cannot be said that the entire troupe unambiguously accepted Ostrovsky's plays. Yes, this is impossible in a creative team. After the performance of Poverty is Not a Vice, Shchepkin declared that he did not recognize Ostrovsky's plays; several more actors joined him: Shumsky, Samarin and others. But the young troupe understood and accepted the playwright immediately.

The St. Petersburg theatrical stage was more difficult to conquer than the Moscow one, but it soon submitted to Ostrovsky's talent: over two decades, his plays were presented to the public about a thousand times. True, this did not bring him much wealth. The father, with whom Alexander Nikolayevich did not consult when choosing his wife, refused him financial assistance; the playwright lived with his beloved wife and children in a damp mezzanine; besides, Pogodinsky's "Moskvityanin" paid humiliatingly little and irregularly: Ostrovsky begged for fifty rubles a month, bumping into the stinginess and stinginess of the publisher. Employees left the magazine for many reasons; Ostrovsky, in spite of everything, remained faithful to him to the end. His last work, which saw the light on the pages of "Moskvityanin", - "Don't live the way you want to." On the sixteenth book, in 1856, the magazine ceased to exist, and Ostrovsky began working in Nekrasov's magazine Sovremennik.

Traveling in Russia

At the same time, an event occurred that significantly changed Ostrovsky's views. The chairman of the Geographical Society, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich, decided to organize an expedition with the participation of writers; the purpose of the expedition is to study and describe the life of the inhabitants of Russia involved in navigation, about which to write essays for the Marine Collection published by the ministry, covering the Urals, the Caspian, the Volga, the White Sea, the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov ... Ostrovsky in April 1856 began a journey along the Volga: Moscow - Tver - Gorodnya - Ostashkov - Rzhev - Staritsa - Kalyazin - Moscow.

And so Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky was brought to the provincial city of Tver, to the merchant of the second guild Barsukov, and trouble immediately overtook him.

Sitting on a rainy June morning, in a hotel room at the table and waiting for his heart to finally calm down, Ostrovsky, now rejoicing, now annoyed, went over in his soul one after another the events of the last months.

In that year, everything seemed to succeed. He was already a friend in Petersburg, with Nekrasov and Panaev. He has already stood on a par with the famous writers who were the pride of Russian literature - next to Turgenev, Tolstoy, Grigorovich, Goncharov ... The most excellent actors and actresses of both capitals endowed him with their sincere friendship, honoring him as if theatrical art.

And how many other friends and acquaintances he has in Moscow! It is impossible to count ... Even on a trip here, to the Upper Volga, he was accompanied by Gury Nikolayevich Burlakov, a faithful companion (both a secretary and a scribe, and a voluntary intercessor for various road affairs), silent, blond, with glasses, still quite a young man. He joined Ostrovsky from Moscow itself, and since he ardently worshiped the theater, then, in his words, he wanted to be “at the stirrup of one of the mighty knights of Melpomene (in ancient Greek mythology, the muse of tragedy, theater) Russian”

To this, grimacing at such expressions, Alexander Nikolayevich immediately replied to Burlakov that, they say, he does not at all look like a knight, but that, of course, he is sincerely glad to his kind friend-comrade on his long journey ...

So everything was going great. With this sweet, cheerful companion, making his way to the sources of the beautiful Volga, he visited many coastal villages and cities of Tver, Rzhev, Gorodnya or once Vertyazin, with the remains of an ancient temple, decorated with frescoes half-erased by time; the most beautiful city of Torzhok along the steep banks of the Tvertsa; and further, farther to the north - along the piles of primitive boulders, through swamps and bushes, along bare hills, among deserted and wildness - to the blue Lake Seliger, from where Ostashkov, almost drowned in spring water, and the white walls of the hermitage of the Nile, were already clearly visible, sparkling behind the thin net of rain, like the fabulous city of Kitezh; and, finally, from Ostashkov - to the mouth of the Volga, to the chapel called the Jordan, and a little further to the west, where our mighty Russian river flows out from under a fallen birch overgrown with mosses in a barely noticeable stream.

Ostrovsky's tenacious memory greedily grabbed everything he saw, everything he heard that spring and that summer of 1856, so that later, when the time comes, either in a comedy or in a drama, all this suddenly came to life, moved, spoke in its own language, boiled with passions. .

He was already sketching in his notebooks ... If only there was a little more time free from worldly needs, and most importantly - more peace in the soul, peace and light, it would be possible to write at once not only one, but four more plays with good for actors roles. And about the sad, truly terrible fate of a serf Russian girl, a landowner's pupil, cherished by a whim of a master, and ruined by a whim. And a comedy could be written, long conceived according to the bureaucratic tricks he once noticed in the service, “Profitable Place”: about the black lies of Russian courts, about the old beast-thief and bribe-taker, about the death of a young, unspoiled, but weak soul under the yoke of vile worldly prose. Yes, and recently, on the way to Rzhev, in the village of Sitkovo, at night near the inn, where gentlemen officers were drinking, he flashed an excellent plot for a play about the diabolical power of gold, for which a person is ready to rob, to kill, to do anything. betrayal...

He was haunted by the image of a thunderstorm over the Volga. This dark expanse, torn apart by the sparkle of lightning, the sound of rain and thunder. These foamy shafts, as if in a rage, rushing to the low sky littered with clouds. And anxiously screaming seagulls. And the rattle of waves rolling stones on the shore.

Something every time arose, was born in his imagination from these impressions, deeply sunk into his sensitive memory and ever awakening; they have long blunted and shielded by themselves resentment, insult, ugly slander, washed his soul with the poetry of life and aroused insatiable creative anxiety. Some obscure images, scenes, fragments of speeches had tormented him for a long time, had long pushed his hand to paper in order to capture them at last either in a fairy tale, or in a drama, or in a legend about the violent antiquity of these steep banks. After all, he will never forget now the poetic dreams and sorrowful everyday life that he experienced in his many months journey from the sources of the Volga nurse to Nizhny Novgorod. The charm of the Volga nature and the bitter poverty of the Volga artisans - barge haulers, blacksmiths, shoemakers, tailors and boat craftsmen, their exhausting work for half a week and the great untruth of the rich - merchants, contractors, dealers, barge owners who make money on labor bondage.

Something must have really ripened in his heart, he felt it. He tried to tell in his essays for the "Sea Collection" about the hard life of the people, about the merchant's lies, about the deaf peals of a thunderstorm approaching the Volga.

But such was the truth there, such sadness in these essays, that, having placed four chapters in the February issue of the fifty-ninth year, the gentlemen from the naval editorial office no longer wished to print that seditious truth.

And, of course, the point here is not whether he was paid well or badly for essays. It's not about that at all. Yes, he now does not need money: “Library for Reading” recently published his drama “The Pupil”, and in St. Petersburg he sold the two-volume collection of his works to the eminent publisher Count Kushelev-Bezborodko for four thousand silver. However, those deep impressions that continue to disturb his creative imagination cannot, in fact, remain in vain! excited and what the high-ranking editors of the "Sea Collection" did not deign to make public ...

“Storm"

Returning from the Literary Expedition, he writes to Nekrasov: “Dear Emperor Nikolai Alekseevich! I recently received your circular letter on leaving Moscow. I have the honor to inform you that I am preparing a whole series of plays under the general title Nights on the Volga, of which I will deliver one to you personally at the end of October or at the beginning of November. I don't know how much I can do this winter, but two by all means. Your most obedient servant A. Ostrovsky.”

By this time, he had already connected his creative fate with Sovremennik, a magazine that fought to attract Ostrovsky to its ranks, whom Nekrasov called “our, undoubtedly, the first dramatic writer. To a large extent, the transition to Sovremennik was facilitated by acquaintance with Turgenev, Leo Tolstoy, Goncharov, Druzhinin, Panavy. agreed on the characters ”and other plays; readers are already used to the fact that Nekrasov’s magazines (first“ Sovremennik ”, and then“ Domestic Notes ”) open their first winter issues with Ostrovsky’s plays.

It was June 1859. Everything bloomed and smelled in the gardens outside the window in Nikolovorobinsky Lane. The grasses smelled, dodder and hops on the fences, rose hips and lilac bushes, jasmine flowers swelled with unopened jasmine flowers.

Sitting, lost in thought, at the desk, Alexander Nikolayevich stared out the wide-open window for a long time. His right hand still held a sharpened pencil, and the plump palm of his left continued, as an hour ago, to lie calmly on the finely written pages of the manuscript of the comedy he had not finished.

He remembered the humble young woman who walked side by side with her unsightly husband under the cold, condemning and stern look of her mother-in-law somewhere on a Sunday festivity in Torzhok, Kalyazin or Tver. I recalled dashing Volga guys and girls from the merchant class who ran out at night into the gardens above the extinguished Volga, and then, which happened often, hid with their betrothed, who knows where, from their native unsweet home.

He himself knew from childhood and youth, living with his father in Zamoskvorechye, and then visiting familiar merchants in Yaroslavl, Kineshma, Kostroma, and more than once heard from actresses and actors what it was like for a married woman to live in those rich, behind high fences and strong locks of merchant houses. They were slaves, slaves of her husband, father-in-law and mother-in-law, deprived of joy, will and happiness.

So this is the kind of drama that ripens in his soul on the Volga, in one of the county towns of the prosperous Russian Empire ...

He pushed aside the manuscript of an unfinished old comedy and, taking a blank sheet from a pile of paper, began to quickly sketch out the first, still fragmentary and unclear, plan for his new play, his tragedy from the cycle “Nights on the Volga” he had planned. Nothing, however, in these short sketches satisfied him. He tossed away sheet after sheet and again wrote either separate scenes and pieces of dialogue, or thoughts that suddenly came to mind about the characters, their characters, about the denouement and the beginning of the tragedy. There was no harmony, certainty, precision in these creative attempts - he saw, he felt. They were not warmed by some single deep and warm thought, some one all-encompassing artistic image.

The time has passed past noon. Ostrovsky got up from his chair, threw a pencil on the table, put on his light summer cap, and, having told Agafya, went out into the street.

He wandered along the Yauza for a long time, stopping here and there, looking at the fishermen sitting with fishing rods over the dark water, at the boats slowly sailing towards the city, at the blue desert sky above.

Dark water... a steep bank over the Volga... the whistling of lightning... a thunderstorm... Why does this image haunt him so much? How is he connected with the drama in one of the Volga trading towns, which has been worrying and worrying him for a long time? ..

Yes, in his drama cruel people tortured a beautiful, pure woman, proud, tender and dreamy, and she rushed into the Volga from longing and sadness. It's like that! But a thunderstorm, a thunderstorm over the river, over the city...

Ostrovsky suddenly stopped and stood for a long time on the bank of the Yauza, overgrown with stiff grass, looking into the dull depths of its waters and nervously pinching his round reddish beard with his fingers. Some new, amazing thought, suddenly illuminating the whole tragedy with poetic light, was born in his confused brain. A thunderstorm!.. A thunderstorm over the Volga, over a wild abandoned city, of which there are many in Rus', over a woman restless in fear, the heroine of a drama, over our whole life - a killer thunderstorm, a thunderstorm - a herald of future changes!

Here he rushed straight across the field and wastelands, quickly to his mezzanine, to the study, to the table and paper.

Ostrovsky hurriedly ran into the office and, on some piece of paper that came to hand, finally wrote down the title of the drama about the death of his rebellious Katerina, who was thirsting for freedom, love and happiness - “Thunderstorm”. Here it is, the reason or the tragic reason for the denouement of the whole play is found - the mortal fright of a woman weary of the spirit from a thunderstorm that suddenly burst over the Volga. She, Katerina, brought up from childhood with a deep faith in God - the judge of man, must, of course, imagine that sparkling and thundering thunderstorm in the sky as the punishment of the Lord for her impudent disobedience, for her desire for will, for secret meetings with Boris. And that is why, in this spiritual confusion, she will throw herself on her knees in front of her husband and mother-in-law in order to cry out her passionate repentance for everything that she considered and will consider to the end as her joy and her sin. Rejected by everyone, ridiculed, all alone, having not found support and a way out, Katerina will then rush from the high bank of the Volga into the pool.

So much has been decided. But much remained unresolved.

Day after day he worked on the plan of his tragedy. He began it with a dialogue between two old women, a passer-by and a town, in order to tell the viewer about the city, about its wild customs, about the family of the merchant-widow Kabanova, where the beautiful Katerina was married, about Tikhon, her husband, about the richest tyrant in the city, Savel Prokofich Wild and about other things that the viewer should know. So that the viewer can feel and understand what kind of people live in that provincial Volga town and how the heavy drama and death of Katerina Kabanova, a young merchant, could have happened in it.

Then he came to the conclusion that it was necessary to unfold the action of the first act not somewhere else, but only in the house of that tyrant Savel Prokofich. But this decision, like the previous one - with the dialogue of the old women - he abandoned after a while. Because neither in either case did it turn out to be worldly naturalness, ease, there was no true truth in the development of action, and after all, a play is nothing but a dramatized life.

And indeed, after all, a leisurely conversation on the street between two old women, a passer-by and a city one, about exactly what the spectator sitting in the hall should definitely know, will not seem natural to him, but will seem deliberate, specially invented by the playwright. And then there will be nowhere to put them, these talkative old women. Because subsequently they will not be able to play any role in his drama - they will talk and disappear.

As for the meeting of the main characters at Savel Prokofich Diky's, there is no natural way to gather them there. Truly wild, unfriendly and gloomy throughout the city, the well-known scolder Savel Prokofich; what kind of family meetings or fun gatherings can he have in the house? Decidedly none.

That's why, after much deliberation, Alexander Nikolayevich decided that he would start his play in a public garden on the steep bank of the Volga, where everyone can go - take a walk, breathe clean air, cast a glance at the open spaces beyond the river.

It is there, in the garden, that the town's old-timer, self-taught mechanic Kuligin, will tell what the viewer needs to know to his recently arrived nephew Boris Grigoryevich Savel Diky. And there the viewer will hear the undisguised truth about the characters in the tragedy: about Kabanikh, about Katerina Kabanova, about Tikhon, about Varvara, his sister, and about others.

Now the play was structured in such a way that the viewer would forget that he was sitting in the theatre, that before him were the scenery, the stage, not life, and the actors in disguise spoke of their sufferings or joys in words composed by the author. Now Alexander Nikolayevich knew for sure that the audience would see the very reality in which they live from day to day. Only that reality will appear to them illuminated by the author's high thought, his sentence, as if different, unexpected in its true essence, not yet noticed by anyone.

Alexander Nikolaevich never wrote so sweepingly and quickly, with such quivering joy and deep emotion, as he now wrote “Thunderstorm”. Unless another drama, “The Pupil”, also about the death of a Russian woman, but completely disenfranchised, tortured by a fortress, was written once even faster - in St. Petersburg, with her brother, in two or three weeks, although she was almost thought of over two years.

So the summer passed, September flashed imperceptibly. And on October 9, in the morning, Ostrovsky finally put the last point in his new play.

None of the plays had such success with the public and critics as The Thunderstorm. It was printed in the first issue of the Library for Reading, and the first presentation took place on November 16, 1859 in Moscow. The performance was played weekly, or even five times a month (as, for example, in December) with a crowded hall; the roles were played by the favorites of the public - Rykalova, Sadovsky, Nikulina-Kositskaya, Vasiliev. And to this day this play is one of the best known in Ostrovsky's work; It's hard to forget Wild, Boar, Kuligin, Katerina - it is impossible, just as it is impossible to forget will, beauty, tragedy, love. Having heard the play in the author’s reading, Turgenev wrote to Fet the very next day: “A most amazing, magnificent work of a Russian, powerful, completely self-mastered talent.” Goncharov rated it no less highly: “Without fear of being accused of exaggeration, I can honestly say that there has never been such a work as a drama in our literature. She undeniably occupies and probably will for a long time occupy the first place in high classical beauties. Everyone also became aware of Dobrolyubov's article on Groza. The grandiose success of the play was crowned with a large Uvarov Academic Prize for the author of 1,500 rubles.

He has now truly become famous, the playwright Alexander Ostrovsky, and now all of Russia is listening to his word. That is why, one must think, censorship finally allowed his beloved comedy, which had been scolded more than once, which had once worn out his heart, to the stage, “Our people - we will settle down.”

However, this play appeared before the theatrical audience crippled, not the same as it was once published in The Moskvityanin, but with a hastily attached well-intentioned end. Because three years ago, when publishing his collected works, the author had to, albeit reluctantly, albeit with bitter pain in his soul, nevertheless bring to the stage (as they say, under the curtain) the quartermaster, who, in the name of the law, takes the clerk under judicial investigation Podkhalyuzin “in the case of concealing the property of the insolvent merchant Bolshov”.

In the same year, a two-volume edition of Ostrovsky's plays was published, which included eleven works. However, it was the triumph of The Thunderstorm that made the playwright a truly popular writer. Moreover, he then continued to touch upon this topic and develop it on other material - in the plays “Not everything is Shrovetide for a cat”, “The truth is good, but happiness is better”, “Hard days” and others.

Quite often in need himself, Alexander Nikolaevich at the end of 1859 proposed the creation of a “Society for Assistance to Needy Writers and Scientists”, which later became widely known as the “Literary Fund”. And he himself began to conduct public readings of plays in favor of this fund.

Ostrovsky's second marriage

But time does not stand still; everything runs, everything changes. And Ostrovsky's life changed. A few years ago, he married Marya Vasilyevna Bakhmetyeva, an actress of the Maly Theater, who was 2 years younger than the writer (and the romance dragged on for a long time: five years before the wedding, their first illegitimate son had already been born), - one can hardly call it completely happy: Marya Vasilievna she herself was nervous in nature and did not really delve into the experiences of her husband