The poem “To whom it is good to live in Russia” is the pinnacle of N.A. Nekrasov. He himself called her "his favorite brainchild." Nekrasov devoted many years of tireless work to his poem, putting into it all the information about the Russian people, accumulated, as the poet said, “by word of mouth” for twenty years. In no other work of Russian literature have the characters, habits, views, hopes of the Russian people been manifested with such force and truth as in this poem.
The plot of the poem is very close to the folk tale about the search for happiness and truth. The poem opens with the "Prologue" - the chapter richest in folklore elements. It is in it that the main problem of the poem is constant: "who lives happily, freely in Russia." The heroes of the poem - seven (one of the traditional significant numbers) peasants - come from the "Unwhacked province, Ungutted volost, Izbytkova village". The seven men who argued in the Prologue are endowed with the best qualities of a national character: pain for their people, disinterestedness, a burning interest in the main issues of life. They are interested in the basic question, what is truth and what is happiness.
The description of what the truth-seekers saw during their wanderings in Russia, the stories about themselves of the imaginary “happy ones”, to whom the peasants turned, constitute the main content of the poem.
The composition of the work is built according to the laws of the classical epic: it consists of separate parts and chapters. Outwardly, these parts are connected by the theme of the road: seven men-truth-seekers wander around Russia, trying to resolve the question that haunts them: who lives well in Russia? And here one of the most important motifs of Russian folklore sounds - the motif of wandering. Even the heroes of Russian fairy tales went to look for common happiness, to find out if it exists at all - peasant happiness. The very nature of the poem is also combined with the Russian fairy tale. The journey of the Nekrasov peasants is, in fact, a spiritual journey.
The first chapter "Pop" opens with the image of a "wide path". This is one of the important poetic symbols of Russian literature, which embodies the idea of movement, striving forward. This is an image of not only the life, but also the spiritual path of a person.
The meeting with the priest in the first chapter of the first part of the poem shows that the peasants do not have their own, peasant understanding of happiness. Men still do not understand that the question of who is happier - a priest, a landowner, a merchant or a king - reveals the limitations of their ideas about happiness. These representations are reduced only to material interest. It is no coincidence that the priest proclaims the formula of happiness, while the peasants passively agree. "Peace, wealth, honor" - this is the formula for the happiness of the priest. But his story makes the men think about a lot. The life of a priest reveals the life of Russia in its past and present, in its various estates. As with the laity, among the priests only the higher clergy live well. But the clergy cannot be happy when the people, their breadwinner, are unhappy. All this testifies to a deep crisis that has engulfed the entire country.
In the next chapter, "Country Fair", the protagonist is the crowd, wide and varied. Nekrasov creates pictures in which the people themselves spoke, spoke about themselves, revealing the best and most unattractive features of their lives. But in everything: both in beauty and in ugliness - the people are not pathetic and not petty, but large, significant, generous.
In the next chapter, "Drunken Night," the celebratory feast culminates. From the depths of the people's world emerges a strong peasant character, Yakim Nagoi. It appears as a symbol of the working peasant life: "At the eyes, at the mouth, there are bends, like cracks in the dried earth." Nekrasov for the first time in Russian literature creates a realistic portrait of a working peasant. Defending the feeling of peasant pride with labor,
Yakim sees social injustice towards the people.
You work alone
And a little work is over,
Look, there are three equity holders:
God, king and lord!
In the image of Yakim, the author shows the emergence of spiritual inquiries among the peasants. "Spiritual bread is higher than earthly bread."
In the chapter "Happy" the entire peasant kingdom is involved in a dialogue, in a dispute about happiness. In their miserable life, even a tiny bit of luck already seems like happiness. But at the end of the chapter there is a story about a happy man. This story about Yermil Girin advances the action of the epic, marks a higher level of the people's idea of happiness. Like Yakim, Yermil is endowed with a keen sense of Christian conscience and honor. It would seem that he has "everything that is necessary for happiness: peace of mind, money, and honor." But at a critical moment in his life, Yermil sacrifices this happiness for the sake of the truth of the people and ends up in prison.
In the fifth chapter of the first part, "The Landowner", the wanderers treat the masters with obvious irony. They already understand that noble “honor” is worth little. The wanderers spoke to the master as boldly and uninhibitedly as Yakim Nagoi. The landowner Obolt-Obolduev is most amazed by the fact that the former serfs shouldered the burden of the historical question “Who should live well in Russia?”. As in the case of the priest, the story of the landowner and about the landowner is not just a denunciation. It is also about a general catastrophic, gripping crisis. Therefore, in the subsequent parts of the poem, Nekrasov leaves the outlined plot scheme and artistically explores the life and poetry of the people.
In the chapter “Peasant Woman”, Matryona Timofeevna appears before the wanderers, embodying the best qualities of the Russian female character. Harsh conditions honed a special female character - independent, accustomed to relying on her own strength everywhere and in everything.
The theme of spiritual slavery is central in the chapter "Last Child". A terrible "comedy" is played by the characters of this chapter. For the sake of the half-mad Prince Utyatin, they agreed to pretend that serfdom had not been abolished. This proves that no reform makes yesterday's slaves free, spiritually complete people.
The chapter "A Feast for the Whole World" is a continuation of "Last Child". It depicts a fundamentally different state of the world. This is people's Russia, already awakened and at once speaking. New heroes are being drawn into the festive feast of spiritual awakening. All the people sing songs of liberation, judge the past, evaluate the present, begin to think about the future. Sometimes these songs contrast with each other. For example, the story "About an exemplary serf - Jacob the faithful" and the legend "About two great sinners." Yakov takes revenge on the master for all the bullying in a servile way, committing suicide in front of him. The robber Kudeyar atones for his sins, murders and violence not by humility, but by the murder of the villain - Pan Glukhovsky. Thus, the morality of the people justifies righteous anger against the oppressors and even violence against them.
According to the original plan, the peasants had to make sure that it was impossible to find a happy person in Russia. But he appeared in life - "a new hero of a new era", a raznochinets democrat. The author introduces a new face into the poem - the people's protector Grisha Dobrosklonov, who sees his happiness in serving the people.
Despite the fact that Grisha’s personal fate was difficult (“Fate prepared a glorious path for him, a loud name of the people’s intercessor, consumption and Siberia”), he believes in a bright future for the people, which will come as a result of the struggle. And, as if in response to the growth of the people's consciousness, the songs of Grisha begin to sound, knowing that the happiness of the people can be achieved only as a result of the nationwide struggle for the "Unwhacked province, Ungutted volost, Izbytkovo village."
The poem, conceived about the people and for the people, becomes a denunciatory act against the landowners.
Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Russia" is often called an encyclopedia of the life of the Russian peasantry. This is the largest work of the poet, which stands out against the background of his other works with an acute social theme and idea due to the colorful and at the same time realistic depiction of simple life.
Seven men, tired of endless work and poverty, set off in search of an understanding of happiness, they want to know if in Russia the one who lives freely. And in this search of theirs, they find themselves in secondary roles, although they appeared before the reader at the very beginning of the poem, and created the impression of the main characters, but after that they gave way to other characters who can be combined into a large and diverse image of the people.
The people are the main character of the poem. Nekrasov reflects in his work on his condition, reveals his psychology, the norms of the relationship of his representatives.
The poem is written in a living colloquial language, understandable to everyone. The linguistic wealth of the work is enormous - the author uses numerous vernaculars, dialects and archaisms. Thus, a special national flavor is created, decorating the poem and giving it a completely inimitable appearance.
The novelty of the genre of the epic poem used by Nekrasov in this case dictates the fragmentation of the poem, built from internally open chapters. It is united by the image-symbol of the road. The whole poem is divided into stories of life, the fate of many people. Each chapter in itself could become the plot of some folklore work. Together, they reflect the fate of the entire Russian people, their difficult path from slavery to freedom. That is why only in the last chapter does the image of the people's protector Grishka Dobrosklonov appear - a man ready to lead people to freedom.
Nekrasov had a negative attitude towards the situation in the country, considered the landowners, along with the churchmen, the sources of all the troubles of the peasants. Therefore, the reader receives non-personal portraits of representatives of these social groups. The priest described in the work is a typical representative of the clergy who lived at the expense of his parishioners. So the impression was created that the churchmen live on alms.
The author believes that the real carriers of the Russian worldview are mostly ordinary people of the lower strata. Trying to prove the truth of his opinion, he presents the reader with a gallery of positive folk images, the central place in which is occupied by Savely and Matrena Timofeevna.
Savely is shown by Nekrasov as a Russian epic hero. The act that sent Saveliy to hard labor becomes an analogue of a feat, a kind of manifestation of a readiness to defend freedom and die.
Matryona is presented as real. She is fighting a terrible battle for her own life, this is an eternal struggle with emerging circumstances. She was given in marriage to a stranger and sent to a foreign land. In the husband's family, a young woman becomes a stranger and hated, she does not meet with sympathy, understanding, respect, and even more so, no love. After Matryona's son dies, and her husband is illegally recruited. It seems that she is about to break down, but she shows indescribable firmness of character, and no adversity can wear her out.
Along with wonderful, respectable images, Nekrasov is not afraid to show drunkards, who, after a popular celebration, cannot even crawl home and fall asleep in ditches. The author shows the dirt, devastation, poverty, illiteracy of the Russian people, which are often the result of the laziness of the people themselves.
“Who in Russia should live well” is a storehouse of folk characters, culture and traditions. The nationality in it is shown in two ways, from the positive and negative sides. The poet did what others could not. He created a real folk work.
The poet set himself the task of understanding and capturing peasant Russia, the Russian folk character in all its versatility, complexity and inconsistency within one work. And the life of the people in "To whom in Russia ..." appears in all its diversity of manifestations. We see the Russian peasant in labor (the speech of Yakim Nagogoy, mowing in The Last, the story of Matryona) and struggle (the story of Yakim and Yermila, the lawsuit of the Vakhlaks, the massacre of Vogel), in moments of rest (“Country Fair”, “Feast”) and revelry (“Drunk Night”), in a time of grief (“Pop”, Matrena’s story) and moments of joy (“Before Marriage”, “Governor”, “Feast”), in the family (“Peasant Woman”) and the peasant collective (“Last Child ”,“ Feast ”), in relations with landowners (“Landlord”, “Last Child”, “Savelius, hero of the Holy Russian”, tales in “Feast”), officials (“Demushka”, a story about Yermil) and merchants (the story of Yakim, Yermila's lawsuit with Altynnikov, Lavin's fight with Eremin).
The poem gives a vivid picture of the economic situation of the post-reform, "free" peasantry (names of villages and counties, stories of a priest and "lucky ones", the plot situation of the chapter "Last Child", the songs "Merry", "Salty", "Hungry" and a number of details in the chapter "Feast") and legal "changes" in his life ("... instead of the master / Tear will be the volost").
Folk life is drawn by Nekrasov strictly realistically. The author does not close his eyes to the negative phenomena of people's life. He boldly speaks of darkness and underdevelopment (illiteracy, belief in “poor” signs), rudeness (“As if he didn’t beat him?”), Swearing, drunkenness (“Drunk Night”), parasitism and servility serfs (footman Peremetyev, Ipat, serfs in the Prologue of the chapter "Peasant Woman"), the sin of social betrayal (Gleb the headman, Yegorka Shutov). But the shadowy sides of folk life and consciousness do not obscure the main thing in the poem, that which forms the basis of folk life, is decisive for the folk character. Such a basis of folk life in Nekrasov's poem is labor.
Reading "To whom in Russia ...", we feel the greatness of the labor feat of the Russian peasantry, this "sower and keeper" of the Russian land. A man “works to death”, his “work has no measure”, with an effort from exorbitant labor “the peasant navel cracks”, “horse efforts” are carried by fellow villagers of Matryona, “peasant women” appear as “eternal toilers”. With the labor of a peasant, in the spring they dress themselves with the greenery of cereals, and in the fall the fields are undressed, and although this labor does not save from poverty, the peasant loves to work (“Last Child”: mowing, the participation of wanderers in it; Matryona’s story). The Russian peasant, in the image of Nekrasov, is smart, observant, inquisitive (“a comedy with Petrushka”, “they care about everything”, “who has seen how he listens ...”, “he greedily catches the news”), stubborn in striving for the set goals (“a man, what a bull ...”), sharp-tongued (many examples!), kind and responsive (episodes with Vavilushka, with Brmil at the fair, help of the Vakhlaks to Ovsyannikov, the family of the sexton Dobrosklonov), has a grateful heart (Matryona about governor), sensitive to beauty (Matryona; Yakim and pictures). Nekrasov characterizes the moral qualities of the Russian peasantry with the formula: "gold, gold is the heart of the people." The poem reveals the thirst for justice inherent in the Russian peasantry, shows the awakening and growth of its social consciousness, manifested in a sense of collectivism and class solidarity (support for Yermil, hatred for the Last, beating Shutov), in contempt for lackeys and traitors (attitude towards the lackey Prince Peremetiev and Ipat, to the story of Gleb the headman), in rebellion (rebellion in Stolbnyaki). The folk environment as a whole is depicted in the poem as "good soil" for the perception of liberation ideas.
The masses of the people, the people, are the protagonist of the epic "Who should live well in Russia." Nekrasov not only painted vivid portraits of individual representatives of the people's environment. The innovative nature of Nekrasov's intention was manifested in the fact that the central place in the work is occupied by the collective image of the Russian peasantry.
Researchers have repeatedly noted the high "population density" of the poem "Who Lives Well in Russia". In addition to the seven wanderers and the main characters, dozens and hundreds of images of peasants are drawn in it. Some of them are briefly characterized, in the images of others only some characteristic touch is noticed, the third ones are only named. Some of them are present "on the stage", are included in the action, others are known to wanderers-truth-seekers and the reader only from the stories of "stage" characters. Along with individual, the author introduces numerous group images into the poem.
Gradually, from chapter to chapter, the poem acquaints us with various variants of people's destinies, various types of characters of heroes, with the world of their feelings, their moods, concepts, judgments and ideals. A variety of portrait sketches, speech characteristics, an abundance of crowd scenes, their polyphony, the introduction of folk songs, sayings, proverbs and jokes into the text - everything is subordinated to the single goal of creating the image of the peasant masses, the constant presence of which is felt when reading every page of "Who in Russia should live well" .
Against the background of this peasant mass, the author of the epic draws close-up images of the best representatives of the Russian peasantry. In each of them, some sides, facets of the national character and worldview are artistically captured. So, the image of Yakim reveals the theme of heroic people's labor and the awakening of the people's consciousness, Savely is the embodiment of the heroism and love of freedom of the peasantry, his rebellious impulses, the image of Yermila is evidence of the love of truth, the moral beauty of the people and the height of their ideals, etc. But this common is revealed in a unique individuality of fate and character of each. Any character in “Whom in Russia...”, whether it is Matryona, who “revealed” her whole soul to wanderers, or a “yellow-haired, hunched-over” Belarusian peasant flashing in the crowd, is realistically accurate, vitally full-blooded, and at the same time everyone makes some micro part of the general concept of "people".
All chapters of the epic are united through the image of seven men-truth-seekers. The epic, generalized conditional nature of this image gives all the real-everyday events depicted in it a special significance, and the work itself - the character of the "philosophy of folk life". Thus, the concept of “people”, somewhat abstract in the Prologue, gradually, as the reader gets to know the wanderers, Yakim, Yermil, Matryona, Savely, the many-sided and motley peasant mass, is filled for him with the brightness of life colors, concrete-figurative realistic content.
In “To whom in Russia it is good to live,” Nekrasov wanted to show the process of awakening self-awareness in the masses of the people, their desire to comprehend their situation and find ways out. Therefore, the author constructed the work in such a way that his folk heroes wander, observe, listen and judge, moreover, as the circle of their observations expands, their judgments become more mature and deep. The pictures of life in the poem are refracted through their perception by men-truth-seekers, that is, the author chooses an epic path or a way of depicting reality.
The epic breadth of the image of life in “Who Lives Well in Russia” is also manifested in the fact that, along with the peasantry, all social groups and classes of Russia (priests, landowners, officials, merchants, bourgeois entrepreneurs, intelligentsia) are represented here, moreover, in a wide variety of typical individuals. , the interweaving of their destinies, the struggle of their interests.
N. A. Nekrasov occupies a special place in the history of Russian literature. He is the creator of his own "Nekrasov" school. In his poetry, Nekrasov reflected the essential features of his time and had a significant impact on the social atmosphere of his time.
The fate of the simple peasant and the Russian people as a whole lies at the center of this poet's work. A vivid confirmation of this is the poem "To whom it is good to live in Russia." This work was written over the course of fourteen years, from 1863 to 1877, but was not completed. Nekrasov himself said that he collected it "by word of mouth for twenty years." “I decided to state,” the poet wrote, “everything that I know about the people, everything that I happened to hear from their lips…”.
The protagonist of the poem is the Russian people. He is shown as the bearer of the best features of the Russian national character. In his poem, the author sought to create a generalized image of the Russian people. It was created thanks to all the characters in the poem. These are the central characters (Matryona Timofeevna, Savely, Grisha Dobrosklonov, Ermila Girin), and episodic (Agap Petrov, Gleb, Vavila, Vlas, Klim and others), and the “polyphony” of the crowd (chapter “A Feast for the Whole World”).
Nekrasov brings heroic natures to the fore. These are, first of all, Matrena Timofeevna and Savely. They are described in the part "Peasant Woman" - the only part in the poem that is written in the first person. By this, the author emphasizes the exclusivity of Matrena Timofeevna, as well as the fact that her voice is the voice of the people themselves. Therefore, the heroine very often sings folk songs. Hence the “Peasant Woman” is also the most folklore part of the poem, completely built on folk poetic images and motifs.
Korchagina is one of the candidates for the "happy" ones, which the author and the characters of the poem are looking for. But her fate is difficult and tragic, just like the fate of almost all Russian peasant women: “It’s not a matter of looking for a happy woman between women! ..”. Happy Matrena Timofeevna felt only before marriage. She had a happy and carefree childhood. From the age of five, they began to accustom her to feasible work (“she carried her father for breakfast, grazed ducklings”, “ted hay”, and so on):
So I got used to it...
And a good worker
And sing and dance the huntress
I was young.
Once again, Matryona Timofeevna was lucky in her life - she got a kind and loving husband. We can say that Matrena Timofeevna was happy with her husband. But the whole further life of Korchagina is a continuous misfortune and misfortune. First, her first-born son tragically dies. Inadvertently, a pig bit him. Then they unfairly took her husband to the soldiers, and the family was left without a breadwinner. Later, Matryona Timofeevna was publicly flogged with rods (she stood up for her son-shepherd). But even this was not enough for fate. The family of Matrena Timofeevna burned down twice more, "the god of anthrax visited us three times." However, despite all this, the image of Matrena Timofeevna is a heroic image. She persevered, endured all the tests. Korchagina managed to save her son from whips, her husband from soldiery. She retained her own dignity, the strength that she puts into her work. Not without reason, at the beginning of The Peasant Woman, this heroine is shown as part of nature itself, at its most fertile time - the harvest:
... It's a wonderful time!
There is no more fun, more elegant,
Richer there is no time!
Despite all the difficulties, Matrena Timofeevna retained a great love for people. And Nekrasov says about her:
Saved in slavery, free heart,
Gold, gold, people's heart.
But these words can fully apply to another hero of the poem - "Savel, the Holy Russian hero." He himself considers his life righteous and happy. This "lucky man" spent twenty years in hard labor. He suffered for a common cause, for the truth - he became the instigator of the massacre of the German bloodsucker Fogil. “Branded, but not a slave,” Savely himself proudly says about himself. Thus, freedom is one of the conditions for happiness in the understanding of the Russian people. But, in addition to freedom, Savely has many more qualities that make him the best representative of the national character.
First of all, Savely is a man of mighty physical strength. But he is not only a hero of the body, but also a hero of the spirit. At the end of his life, the hero goes to the monastery and becomes the spokesman for popular religiosity, faith in God of the Russian people. And therefore, Savely is called the “Holy Russian” hero. Thus, at the end of life, the seal of holiness is placed on him. But the prayer of Elder Savely is earthly in nature:
For all the terrible, Russian
Peasantry I pray.
Consequently, the main features of the national character, according to Nekrasov, are love for freedom, patience, heroic stamina and endurance, diligence, energy, kindness, generosity, responsiveness, love for nature and for all living things. But, in addition to all these positive qualities, Nekrasov also sees many negative features in the Russian national character. This is the immaturity of the people's consciousness (Klim Lavin), the attraction to voluntary servility (Ipat), the narrowness of thinking (Sidor), the tendency to betrayal (Gleb).
As a result, the author draws a controversial image of the Russian people, which combines protest and passivity, perseverance and softness, determination and long-suffering. And so it turns out that
You are poor
You are abundant
You are powerful
You are powerless
Mother Russia!
The protagonist of the poem by N. A. Nekrasov “Who should live well in Russia” is the Russian people. This is a collective image in which the characters are drawn and at the same time the collective image of the people is recreated.
On the pages of the work before us is a whole gallery of the most diverse representatives of the peasant world. Among them are seven wandering peasants, and artisans, and soldiers, and coachmen, and lapotniks. Here is a man with an earring, a man with a rolling pin, a man with rims, women, girls, a pregnant woman with a child, a stonemason, a Belarusian peasant, a bear hunter, reapers, koreznitsy, a feisty old believer, wanderers and pilgrims. This is a noisy, colorful, truly "people's sea". According to their social status and occupation, the representatives of the people in the poem belong to several groups: peasant farmers, workers, artisans, courtyards, soldiers, coachmen.
Depending on the attitude of the representatives of the common people to serfdom, several groups can also be distinguished. For example, some peasants consider their slave position justified and servile in front of their bars. These are traitor men, such as the headman Gleb and Yegorka Shutov, and “people of the servile rank”: Sidor, Yakov the faithful, Ipat, the slave of Peremetyev. In the nicknames of these people, their attitude to life is already felt. For peasants, the worst sin is betrayal of the people. Such a betrayal was committed by the “villain” elder Gleb, to whom the dying admiral entrusted a golden chest containing the will for eight thousand peasants, and he burned the will. There is no popular forgiveness for this Judas. A betrayal of a different kind is carried out by Egor Shutov. He is a spy and informer, he also has no forgiveness, and therefore the peasants of fourteen villages drive him through the villages, scolding him as a “vile man” and beating him. There are also such peasants who, in their habit of slavery, reach the point of absurdity. For example, the muzhik Sidor, even after being imprisoned, continues to regularly send his master a quitrent from there. And about Jacob the faithful, an exemplary serf, the people even composed a parable. This peasant is spiritually devoted to his paralytic master to such an extent that “in retaliation” for the insults he had brought the master into a dense forest and hanged himself in front of his eyes. Unfortunately, such examples are taken from life. Spiritual servility was common in those years, and many took pride in being their bar's favorite slaves and their wives favorite slaves. So, even after the announcement of peasant freedom, the lackey Ipat still cherishes the fact that "the princes have a serf".
There were in the general mass those who did not accept their slave position. For example, Agap Petrov seethes with a fierce hatred for the landlords, he refuses the role of a comedian destined for him in the estate of Prince Utyatin, and reproaches other peasants who take part in the fun. But Agap's rebellion was broken as soon as the steward had drunk him unconscious. Or Ignatius Prokhorov, a peasant who was engaged in carting, stigmatizes the elder Gleb for treason, but that's all. Headman Vlas is convinced that the master should be praised only in the coffin, but he is full of despair and lacks faith in goodness. Klim Lavin also does not go further than exposing the bar, officials and soldiery, and Kalinushka, mentioned in the song "Corvee", will never forget his hunger, master's lashes, "opened skins", but the most he dares is to sink his own grief in wine.
The wanderers-truth-seekers are dissatisfied with their position, and this dissatisfaction grows stronger in the course of the story, but they are not yet ready to participate in active action.
Yakim Nagoi suffered for his life and poverty, and overwork. He has a rebellious disposition, he believes in the people, defends the interests of the peasants, becoming a kind of tribune. A consciousness of human dignity is already awakening in him, but he “drinks half to death”, and outbursts of anger fade away just as quickly.
Another group of characters are those who rise up against oppression and become champions of people's rights. This is the Old Believer Kropilnikov, angrily denouncing the oppressors and urging the people not to obey them. His life is spent in jail. Ermil Girin is an honest, disinterested lover of truth, he is the keeper of folk customs. He openly fights
merchant Altynnikov, actively defends the interests of the people, participating in the rebellion of the peasants of the village of Stolbnyaki. There are many crimes on the conscience of the robber Kudeyar, but he atones for his sins, and then takes revenge for the bullying of the peasants, killing Pan Glukhovsky.
The image of Savely Korchagin is depicted most vividly and in detail. This "Holy Russian hero" is endowed with the features of an epic hero. We see his power and prowess, he enters into combat with a bear, Shalashnikov's rods do not frighten him, he courageously endures hard labor and a settlement. Saveliy despises the slavish obedience of fellow villagers, and his image becomes a symbol of the possibilities of the peasantry. K. I. Chukovsky believed that the image of Savely Korchagin “belongs to the number of the most monumental” of all the images created by Nekrasov.
Folk traits are embodied in the image of Matrena Timofeevna. This peasant woman recognized both the severity of serf oppression and the sorrows of life, but did not bend, but retained her human dignity, spiritual beauty and fortitude.
The generalized image of the people in Nekrasov's epic is the poverty and poverty of the peasants, their hungry life. Let us recall at least the names of the “adjacent villages” where the seven truth-seekers come from: Zaplatovo, Dyryavino, Razutovo, Znobishino, Gorelovo, Ne-yelovo ... Whole villages of peasants go out in the fall “to beg”, “as a profitable trade”. We see the exhausting labor of the peasants, their lack of rights and oppression, recruitment. But we also see the responsiveness of the common people to other people's suffering, the awakening in them a sense of their own dignity, spiritual nobility, diligence, a craving for beauty and a desire for a new, free life. And if “such good soil” is ready, then the yoke of long-term slavery “has not yet set limits for the Russian people, there is a wide path before them.”
