Levin and kitty love story. Necessarily combined with physical labor, without which good health is impossible

Heroes of Leo Tolstoy play

In winter, everyone plays warming games, in autumn - in collective games (in the sense, they collect and stock up), in summer - in mobile games, and in spring, of course, in love games.
One of these games was described by Leo Tolstoy in the novel Anna Karenina. In the fourth part of the novel, Kitty Shcherbatskaya and Konstantin Levin turn the declaration of love into a kind of game.
Tolstoy, L. N. Anna Karenina: [a novel in eight parts] / Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. - M.: Association "Books of Enlightened Mercy", 1994. - 840 p., ill. - (Library of Russian classics).

“…- Wait a minute,” he said, sitting down at the table. - I have long wanted to ask you one thing.
He looked straight into her kind, though frightened, eyes.
- Please ask.
“Here,” he said, and wrote initial letters: k, v, m, o: e, n, m, b, h, l, uh, n, i, t?

These letters meant: “when you answered me: this can't be did that mean never, or then?” There was no chance that she could understand this complicated phrase; but he looked at her with such an air that his life depended on whether she would understand these words.
She looked at him seriously, then rested her furrowed forehead on her hand and began to read. From time to time she glanced at him, asking him with her eyes: “Is this what I think?”

I understand,” she said, blushing.
- What is the word? he said, pointing to the n, which meant the word never.
- This word means never she said, but it's not true!

He quickly erased what he had written, handed her the chalk, and stood up. She wrote: t, i, n, m, i. about.
…He suddenly beamed: he understood. It meant: "then I could not answer otherwise."
He looked at her questioningly, timidly:

Only then?
"Yes," she replied with a smile.
- And t ... And now? - he asked.
- Well, read it. I will say what I would like. I would very much like to! - She wrote the initial letters: h, c, m, s, i, p, h, b. It meant: "so that you can forget and forgive what happened."

He grabbed the chalk with tense, trembling fingers and, breaking it, wrote the initial letters of the following: “I have nothing to forget and forgive, I did not stop loving you.”
She looked at him with a fixed smile.
“I understand,” she said in a whisper.
He sat down and wrote a long sentence. She understood everything and, without asking him: right? took the chalk and immediately answered.

For a long time he could not understand what she had written and often looked into her eyes. An eclipse of happiness came over him. There was no way he could substitute the words that she understood; but in her lovely eyes shining with happiness, he understood everything he needed to know. And he wrote three letters. But he had not finished writing yet, and she was already reading behind his hand and finished it herself and wrote down the answer: Yes.

Do you play secretaire? - said the prince, coming up. “Well, let’s go, however, if you want to be in time for the theater.”

I note that the lovers did not play secretaire at all - “secretary”.
Although such a game was popular in the XIX century.
She concluded as follows. Two subjects were randomly chosen. It was necessary to compose a poem about them, indicating in it the similarities and differences between the key words.

Here are the poems composed by Vasily Andreevich Zhukovsky:

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS IN A GAME CALLED “SECRETARY”

star and ship

The star of heaven floats in the abyss of heaven,
An abyss of stormy waves - an earthly ship is sailing!
Who leads the star on the sea - we do not know;
But on the sea the ship - the star of heaven leads!

bull and rose

A difficult task for a poor poet?
The rose has needles, the bull has horns
-Here's a resemblance. Difference w: easy love hand
Sow a bouquet of roses for a cute item;
And from the bulls you can’t tie a bouquet in any way.

Kitty and Levin were playing a game of their own invention. How to call it: a game of phrases, words or letters? - in general, it doesn't matter. The main thing is that during the game they reached complete mutual understanding and harmony.

But not only Levin and Kitty declared their love in this way. Who else? - Leo Tolstoy and Sophia Bers. The writer reproduced his own declaration of love in the novel.

Quote characteristic of Kitty Shcherbatskaya from the novel "Anna Karenina"

"Anna Karenina" quotes to the image of Kitty Shcherbatskaya

Author about Kitty:
“Princess Kitty Shcherbatskaya was eighteen years old. She went out the first winter. Her success in society was greater than that of her two older sisters, and more than even the princess had expected. Not only were the burdens dancing at Moscow balls almost all in love with Kitty, already in the first winter two serious parties appeared: Levin and, immediately after his departure, Count Vronsky.

Levin on Kitty:
“When he thought about her, he could vividly imagine her all, especially the charm of this, with an expression of childlike clarity and kindness, a small blond head, so freely set on stately girlish shoulders. The childlike expression of her face, combined with the subtle beauty of her figure, made up her special charm, which he remembered well; but what always, like a surprise, struck in her was the expression of her eyes, meek, calm and truthful, and especially her smile ...

Dolly about Kitty's illness:
“... she was convinced that her guesses were correct, that Kitty’s grief, Kitty’s incurable grief, consisted precisely in the fact that Levin made an offer and that she refused him, and Vronsky deceived her, and that she was ready to love Levin and hate Vronsky”

Kitty after meeting Varenka:
“She found this consolation in the fact that, thanks to this acquaintance, a completely new world, which had nothing in common with her past, an exalted, beautiful world, from the height of which one could look at this past calmly. This life was revealed by religion, but a religion that had nothing in common with that which Kitty had known since childhood...; ordered, but which could be loved "

Kitty before the wedding:
“Her whole life, all desires, hopes were focused on this one person, still incomprehensible to her ... She could neither think nor desire anything outside of life with this person; but this new life did not yet exist, and she could not even imagine it clearly.

Kitty after the wedding:
“... This poetic, charming Kitty, for the first time, could not only weeks, but even days family life to think, remember and fuss about tablecloths, furniture, mattresses for visitors, a tray, a cook, dinner, etc.”

Kitty during her brother Levin's illness:
“When she saw the patient, she felt sorry for him. And pity in her female soul produced .... the need to act, find out all the details and help them "

Kitty after the birth of her son
“Her gaze, already bright, brightened even more as he approached her. On her face there was that very change from earthly to unearthly, which happens on the face of the dead, but there is a farewell, here is a meeting ”

1870 - Tolstoy thinks more about the problems of family and marriage. The reality surrounding him contributed to this. In January 1872, Anna Stepanovna Pirogova, the unofficial wife of the landowner Bibikov, threw herself under a train. The Tolstoy family knew the deceased well, it is her fate that is reflected in Anna Karenina (1873 - 1877).

The idea of ​​the novel is the image of a married woman from high society who ruined herself. Tolstoy wanted to make this woman compassionate, not guilty. The work on the novel lasted 4 years.. the main idea romance - family. The prototype of Karenina was Pushkin's eldest daughter Maria Hartung.

Brief plot of the novel: The main character of the novel, Anna Karenina, throws herself under a train in the finale. It's secular married woman, mother of an 8-year-old son, who occupied high position in society thanks to her husband. She falls in love with a young officer Vronsky, leaves her husband and goes to her lover. But the possibility of happiness with a loved one remains a dream: high society turns a blind eye to betrayal, but cannot forgive sincere and open love.

2 storylines: Karenina and Levin.

The novel begins with the thought "All happy families are alike, each family is unhappy in its own way." These words are the "psychological key" to the novel: the focus is on unhappy families. Then the phrase "Everything is mixed up in the Oblonskys' house." The novel begins with the collapse of the family, the destruction of human relations.

the main problem The work is revealed on the example of several married couples: Anna - Alexey Karenin, Dolly - Stiva Oblonsky, Kitty - Konstantin Levin.

Symbols of the novel:

1. The railroad appeared recently, already in Tolstoy's novel. Karenina and Vronsky meet at the railway station. An evil that threatens humanity.

1. The first meeting between Karenina and Vronsky at the station - in a couple of minutes a man dies under the wheels of a train - a prototype of the death of the heroine.

1. A strong snowstorm upon Anna's return to St. Petersburg is a warning of a storm that will shake up Anna's life

1. The gleam in Anna's face when she realized that she loved Vronsky - "He resembled the terrible brilliance of a fire in the middle of a dark night"

1. The racing scene is an immoral absurd life where there is a fierce struggle.

1. Candle - a symbol of Anna's love

The protagonists of the novel, written off from Tolstoy's entourage: Oblonsky - Obolensky, Levin - Leo Tolstoy, Vronsky - Vorontsov, Shcherbatsky - Shcherbatovs. But these are not portraits, but only the basis. These are collective images related to the writer by type.

Image of Karenin. Tolstoy studied Greek language, was carried away by the Odyssey. “Karenon - Homer has a head”, therefore Karenin - his mind prevails over his heart, feelings. There are different interpretations about Karenin's prototype:

1. CM. Sukhotinin (his wife left him, married Ladyzhensky). He was not a typical official.
2. P.A. Valuev (widely educated person, liberal formalist). Minister. Like Karenin, he was busy with cases of "foreigners." Under him, a case arose about the sale of Bashkir lands, which was one of the reasons for the resignation.
3. V.A. Islavin (a childhood friend of Tolstoy, held a high position).
4. A.M. Kuzminsky (brother-in-law of Tolstoy, an ambitious judicial figure).
5. Baron Mengden (an active but callous person, held a high position, heavy character, attractive, small in stature)

Stiva Oblonsky is also a collective type.

Dolly is like all the mothers and wives of many children that Tolstoy knew. It has the features of his wife (they had 5 children).

Vronsky is a typical Guards officer from an aristocratic family. Tolstoy compiled this image from the memory of the Crimean campaign or those whom he knew when he was in St. Petersburg. Characteristic: energy, firmness of character, ambition, attitude towards comrades and women.

Levin - it can be called a portrait of Tolstoy. He invested in Levin his views, manners, a tendency to rebel against generally recognized authorities, sincerity, a negative attitude towards the Zemstvo and the court, a passion for farming, relations with peasants, and disappointment in science. Like Tolstoy, Levin lives in the countryside, not in the city. Researchers call Levin's portrait a photograph of Tolstoy's 70s, because only one period of Tolstoy's life was reflected in Levin's experiences. The main thing that distinguishes Tolstoy and Levin is creativity. Instead of creativity, Levin writes an article about agricultural workers, it reflects Tolstoy's passion for agriculture, which had already passed during the writing of Anna Karenina.

Shcherbatsky family. Typical for all landowners who spent winters in Moscow. At this time, they took out their daughters to the balls. The same was the family of Shcherbatov, the director of the Elk Factory. At one time Tolstoy was fond of his daughter Praskovya. Similar families: Trubetskoy, Lvov, Sukhotin, Gorchakov.

Oblonsky family. The novel begins with a conflict in this family. Steve cheated on Dolly with a young governess. Dolly cannot forgive him. Anna intervened, everything was decided. Tolstoy considers this family unhappy. Dolly has 6 kids and they worry all the time difficult situations. Stiva is a kind, sociable person, loves life very much, but the role of a family man is not for him. He does not know how to manage money, because of this, his wife and children are always in need. Stiva is prone to hobbies with other women. Dolly is very loyal. She dreams of taking revenge on her husband and invents the image of a man in love with her, but she is always busy with home and children. She is offended by her husband because he lives happily, and she grew old early because of children and family life. Spouses quarrel and reconcile, feel happy. All this is thanks to Dolly: she forgave the betrayal, constantly turns a blind eye to her husband's lifestyle, is insightful, kind. At the wedding, Kitty and Levin recalls her love for her husband. After a visit to Anna and Vronsky, he reconsiders a lot for himself: using Anna's example, he sees that happiness is not in money, not in clothes, not in having free time, and not in how much a husband expresses his love. Anna has all this, but she is unhappy and full of fears. She thinks with horror about the only child of Anna and Vronsky (the girl Anya), and is glad that she has six of them. This family is not perfect, but they are living people who together overcome obstacles, misunderstandings, negative sides each other. They know how to forgive, ask for forgiveness and love, raise children and build a life together.

Levin family. Levin is a landowner, lives in the countryside, runs a large and complex household. The ancestral home "was Levin's whole world." He proudly speaks of the patriotism and aristocracy of his ancestors. There comes a period of ruin of the "noble nests", Levin understands the inevitability of this system. He tries to understand the mystery of new public relations and your place in life. He is a dreamer, soberly looks at life and fights for his happiness, keeping peace of mind. He is close to nature (he rejoices when he hears the rustle of dry leaves and sees how the grass grows under them), its natural laws, he sees this as a guarantee of his happiness and family well-being. Communicates with peasants. The marriage with Kitty is happy, they understand each other, but Levin's spiritual needs are outside the family. It's important to him further development Russia. The ideal is a large and friendly peasant family that cares about everything. Western theories of transformation are unsuitable for Russia; specifics must be taken into account. In a peasant country, workers must be interested in work, then they will understand the state. Levin is looking for the truth of life. The description of Levin's life forms one of 2 storylines in the novel, but does not conflict with the general idea and composition. Anna's mental anguish and Levin's search for the truth are interrelated aspects of life in the post-reform era, showing the crisis in people's lives and ways to overcome it.

The Karen family. Alexey Alexandrovich Karenin Anna's husband, a high-ranking statesman, influential in secular society. He is respected for honesty, decency, prudence. He is hardworking, purposeful and orderly in affairs and feelings. He lives according to schedule. Work takes up all his time. Sometimes he treats his wife and son with disdain, hides his true feelings. He loves his family and cherishes her. When Karenin finds out about the connection between Anna and Vronsky, his weakness manifests itself - the inability to show his feelings. It depends on generally accepted norms. Does not fight for his love, tries to find a reasonable solution, instead of increasing his tenderness for his wife, closes in work. He decided to leave everything as it is, but constantly reminds Anna of decorum. He forgives her and disinterestedly loves when Anna is in a serious condition after the birth of her daughter. He sincerely cares about her, is ready to raise the daughter of Anna and Vronsky. Anna comes to her senses and again leaves him, he again weakens, although he is a fighter by nature. Vronsky, on the contrary, shows character and determination. At the end of the novel, it turns out that Karenin is still weak person hiding behind the uniform. After the death of Anna, his career stops, and stagnation in household chores, too, until Countess Lidia Ivanovna took over them. He is still a follower, begins to attend a secret religious circle. After Anna's death and Vronsky's departure, he brings up their daughter.

Analysis of "family thought" in the novel. The novel presents 2 storylines - Anna Karenina and Konstantin Levin. The first is an unhappy path, the second is a happy one. Tolstoy showed the crisis of the old family based on public morality. He contrasts artificial family life with natural relationships. I tried to outline ways out of the crisis.

Way one. Karenina deliberately breaks with her husband, and therefore with the legalized norms of morality in a noble society. The reason is the awakening of a sense of personality and true love. This is a tragedy of the individual and society. Anna defends her right to life, love, happiness without secular shackles. Anna's death is a lesson from Tolstoy the teacher. According to the writer, the family is the most important thing in a person's life. Anna left her husband and child, sacrificed family ties for the sake of love. This is its strength and at the same time its sin. According to Tolstoy, it could not have happened otherwise. Suicide is the impulse to which she surrendered herself after the quarrel with Vronsky, a fatal accident. On the other hand, there is the motive of retribution. She wants to punish him. Last words Vronsky: "You will repent of this." Another motive for repentance: Anna sees death as the only way out for Alexei Alexandrovich, Seryozha and for her. At the moment of these thoughts, the candle goes out in the room (Symbol! Love went out). And Anna herself is like a burnt out candle, which no longer has a base to continue to burn and live. Before her death, she was tormented by nightmares about "a dirty, ugly peasant in a cap who is doing something with iron." Inwardly, not yet consciously, Anna was ready for death. She said to Kitty: "I stopped by to say goodbye to you." Dolly likewise: "So goodbye, Dolly." Anna rethinks her relationship with Vronsky. Thoughts towards cheerful company“You won’t leave yourself,” they are addressed to herself. She has nowhere to go, but she doesn't want to die either. She clings to life, but without a chance: she writes a note to Vronsky, but it does not reach her, she goes to visit Dolly, but neither Dolly nor Kitty understand her, they cannot help. Anna tries to console herself with love for Seryozha, but she blames herself for having exchanged her love for her son and was able to live without her. She was finished off by a note from Vronsky, written in a careless handwriting. No, I won't let you torture me, she thought. The thought and memory of the man crushed at the station on the day of her first meeting with Vronsky pushed her to a decision. “There, in the very middle, and I will punish him and get rid of everyone and myself.” She crossed herself and rushed between the cars. Anna didn't want to die. She fell on her hands and tried to get up immediately, horrified by what she had done. But it was already too late: "something huge, inexorable pushed her in the head." It was fate. Anna felt the impossibility of fighting. And again Tolstoy the teacher: one cannot resist punishment, one could only ask for forgiveness. He brutally describes Anna's death. It is important that even after death Anna wants to live. “curly hair at the temples”, “a lovely face with a half-open ruddy mouth”, in “open eyes, begging for life, a terrible expression that reminds Vronsky of her words that he would repent.”

Way two. Levin is like Tolstoy. The marriage of Kitty and Levin made him the most happy man, a family man, but his gap in relations with society did not smooth out. He perceives capitalism as a universal disaster, resists its onset. For him, the main farm - he fertilizes the land with love, grows crops. But the feeling that the question of changing the socio-economic structure of the entire country cannot be resolved in this way leads Levin into contradictions. He compares his personal life with the life of the peasants and concludes that the solution of problems is at the heart of the rapprochement of the ruling classes with the people. The truth is on the side of the people. The common good as a result of the moral improvement of an individual will come by itself, regardless of outside efforts. Levin's spiritual quest is the path of Tolstoy's reflections on own life 10 years after War and Peace. These searches continue the line of Olenin (“Cossacks”), Andrei Bolkonsky and Pierre Bezukhov, with the difference that Levin, unlike his predecessors, is looking for the reasons for his own failures not in the absence of useful activity, but in economic structure society. Through the mouth of Levin, Tolstoy showed what the upheaval of Russian history consisted of. “It happened to me that the life of our circle - the rich, the scientists - not only disgusted me, but lost all meaning. The actions of the working people, who create life, appeared to me as a single real deed. I have renounced the life of our circle, recognizing that this is not life. Tolstoy proclaimed his ideal "the life of a simple working people that makes life, and the meaning that he gives it.

Shcherbatskaya Kitty (Ekaterina Alexandrovna) is a princess, the youngest in the family. The prototype is the wife of L. Tolstoy Sofia Andreevna. Blinded by Count Alexei Vronsky, Kitty expects him to ask for her hand at the next ball. She overcomes her heartfelt inclination towards Konstantin Levin, who has come to propose to her, and refuses him, although she has known and loved him since childhood. Tolstoy depicts the conflicting experiences of the heroine, who simultaneously suffers from her cruelty with Levin and enjoys dreams of a brilliant future with Vronsky.

At her elder sister's, Dolly Oblonskaya, Kitty meets Anna Karenina, whom she admires and, wishing to make a witness to her happiness, begs to come to the ball. But at the ball, full of consciousness of her attractiveness and natural grace, Kitty will face a cruel blow. Vronsky, fascinated by Anna, forgets about her. She feels destroyed and leaves the ball.

Some time later, Kitty, together with Princess Shcherbatskaya, goes abroad to the Sodensky waters in order to restore peace of mind and forget about the insult inflicted. In Soden, Kitty becomes close to Madame Stahl and her pupil Varenka. She admires Varenkin's selfless service to the sick, love for God, and, in dire need of finding inner peace, decides to follow her example, devoting herself to those in need of help. But Tolstoy shows how gradually the jealousy of the wife of the sick painter Petrov, whom Kitty is caring for, the ironic remarks addressed to Madame Stahl, Prince Shcherbatsky, who arrived from Karlsbad in Soden, destroy the atmosphere of high spirituality with which the heroine hastened to surround her new acquaintance. Finally, her awareness of the unnaturalness and deliberateness of the chosen path of life "according to the rules" prompt Kitty to abandon the decision to imitate Varenka and return her to an instinctive life "according to her heart."

Returning to Russia, this heroine of the novel "Anna Karenina" goes to stay with her sister Dolly in her village Ergushevo and on the way she accidentally meets Levin, with whom a few months later, at a dinner hosted by the Oblonskys, she declares her love with the help of a game secretaire : they write with chalk on the table only the initial letters of their questions and answers. The next day they get engaged. All the time before the wedding, Kitty helps Levin, lost from happiness and surging self-doubt, to feel confident. After the wedding, they go to the village of Levina Pokrovskoye.

The beginning of their family life is turbulent. They slowly and difficultly get used to each other, now and then quarreling over trifles. Levin receives news that brother Nikolai is dying in county town and goes to him. Kitty is traveling with her husband, and it is she who manages to relieve last days brother-in-law, to distract him from the horror of non-existence with his energetic and confident help. Here, in the county town, the doctor announces Kitty's pregnancy. Levin and his wife return to Pokrovskoye and, having invited the Shcherbatskys, Dolly Oblonskaya and their children, hosting Sergei Ivanovich Koznyshev and Varenka, they are having fun. The idyllic stay there for Kitty is saddened by the broken declaration of love between Koznyshev and Varenka, which she wanted. When the time comes for childbirth, Levin and his wife move to Moscow. Kitty Shcherbatskaya, having lost the habit of social life and bustle in the capital, tries not to go anywhere. The long-awaited birth goes well: Kitty gives birth to a boy. Arriving in Pokrovskoye, the heroine plunges into the care of her son and everyday affairs at home.

The image of this heroine, who dreamed of marriage and found happiness in family life, embodies the author's idea of ​​the appointment of a woman as the guardian of the hearth. He is associated with family theme, which runs through many of Tolstoy's works.

Ekaterina Shcherbatskaya- the heroine of the novel by L. Tolstoy "Anna Karenina". Kitty is a princess, a beautiful young girl from a good family, the younger sister of Dolly Oblonskaya, later Levin's wife.

At the beginning of the novel, Kitty is just beginning to appear. She is sweet, pretty, she is driven by the desire to please. Count Vronsky gives her signs of attention, and she is carried away by a handsome young man. At the same time, K. Levin proposes to her, and she refuses, not feeling special affection for him, but not wanting to offend him either.

Soon Vronsky leaves without proposing to Kitty. She deeply experiences the betrayal of Vronsky, feels abandoned and humiliated. Kitty develops a deep depression, and her parents take her abroad to improve her health. A deep impression is made on Kitty by her acquaintance with Madame Stahl's ward, Varenka. Thanks to Varenka, a spiritual life opens up for Kitty, she feels a desire to help the suffering and needy. She compares herself to the spiritually exalted and selfless Varenka, who sacrificed her love and found peace in serving people.

From abroad Kitty returns healthy, though not as cheerful as before. Fate again brings her to Levin, whom she now looks at in a completely different way. Levin proposes to her again, and she accepts. After the wedding, she becomes a happy wife, supporting her husband in everything. She proves to be a great hostess, arranging the life of a young family. Kitty generously and diligently takes care of Levin's sick brother until his death. After the birth of her first child, she also becomes a caring mother. At the end of the novel, Kitty lives happy life with my beloved husband and son.

The image of Kitty Shcherbatskaya embodies the features of an ideal woman-wife, as L. Tolstoy himself imagined her, beautiful, at the same time with a high pure soul and skillful in everyday matters.