What are the main stages of Gogol's creative path? Life and creative path

Brief biography

N.V. Gogol was born on March 20 (April 1), 1809 in the town of Velikiye Sorochintsy, Mirgorod district, Poltava province, into a middle-income landowner family, where in addition to Nikolai there were five more children. Initially, Gogol studied at the Poltava district school (1818-19), and in May 1821 he entered the newly founded Nizhyn Gymnasium of Higher Sciences. Gogol was a fairly average student, but distinguished himself in the gymnasium theater as an actor and decorator. The first literary experiments in poetry and prose date back to the gymnasium period. However, the thought of writing has not yet “come to mind” for Gogol; all his aspirations are connected with “public service”; he dreams of a legal career. In December 1828 he arrived in St. Petersburg, where a series of blows and disappointments awaited him: he failed to get the desired place; The poem "Hanz Küchelgarten" caused harsh and mocking reviews.

Gogol first served in the Department state economy and public buildings of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Then - in the department of appanages. His stay in the offices caused Gogol deep disappointment in the “state service,” but it provided him with rich material for future works that depicted bureaucratic life and the functioning of the state machine. During this period, “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka” (1831-1832) was published. They aroused almost universal admiration.

The pinnacle of Gogol’s fiction is the “St. Petersburg story” “The Nose” (1835; published in 1836), in the fall of 1835 he began writing “The Inspector General,” the plot of which was suggested by Pushkin; the work progressed so successfully that on January 18, 1836, he read the comedy at an evening with Zhukovsky (in the presence of Pushkin, P. A. Vyazemsky and others), and already on April 19, the play premiered on the stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. May 25 - premiere in Moscow, at the Maly Theater. In June 1836, Gogol left St. Petersburg for Germany (in total, he lived abroad for about 12 years). He spends the end of summer and autumn in Switzerland, where he begins to work on the continuation of Dead Souls. The plot was also suggested by Pushkin.

In September 1839, Gogol arrived in Moscow and began reading chapters of Dead Souls in the presence of his old friends. There was universal delight. In May 1842, “The Adventures of Chichikov, or Dead Souls” was published. After the first, very commendable reviews, the initiative was seized by Gogol’s detractors, who accused him of caricature, farce and slander of reality. In June 1842 Gogol goes abroad. Three years anniversary. (1842-1845), which followed the writer’s departure abroad, was a period of intense and difficult work on the 2nd volume of Dead Souls. In 1847, “Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends” was published in St. Petersburg. The release of Selected Places brought a real critical storm upon its author. Gogol cannot recover from the blows he received. In April 1848, Gogol finally returned to Russia.

In the spring of 1850, he made an attempt to organize his family life- makes an offer to A. M. Vielgorskaya, but is refused. On the night of February 11-12, 1852, in a state of deep mental crisis, the writer burns the white manuscript of the 2nd volume (only 5 chapters survived in incomplete form; published in 1855). On the morning of February 21, 1852, Gogol died in his last apartment in the Talyzin house in Moscow. The writer's funeral took place with a huge crowd of people at the cemetery of the St. Daniel's Monastery.

More details:

http://az.lib.ru/g/gogolx_n_w/text_0202.shtml (From the Brogkaus and Efron encyclopedia)
http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/ (From Wikipedia)
http://www.tonnel.ru/ (Vinogradov I.A. Biography of N.V. Gogol)

Chronology of life and creativity

1809, March 20 – Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol was born in the town of Bolshie Sorochintsy
1818-1819 – studied at the Poltava povet school
1820 – Life in Poltava at the home of teacher G. Sorochinsky, preparation for the second grade of the gymnasium
1821-1828 – Study at the Nizhyn Gymnasium of Higher Sciences, book. Bezborodko
1825, March 31 – Death of Gogol’s father Vasily Afanasyevich Gogol-Yanovsky, end of Gogol’s childhood
1828, end of December - Gogol arrives in St. Petersburg
1829 – The poem “Italy” (without signature) was published in the magazine “Son of the Fatherland”, the publication of the poem “Hanz Küchelgarten” under the pseudonym V. Alov,
service in the Department of State Economy and Public Buildings
1830 – Gogol – scribe in the Department of Appanages
1830 – The story “Bisavryuk, or the Evening on the Eve of Ivan Kupala” was published (without signature) in Otechestvennye zapiski. Meeting Zhukovsky
1831, May – Meeting A. S. Pushkin
1831-1835 – Gogol works as a history teacher at the Patriotic Institute
1831, September – Publication of the first part of “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka”
1832 – Publication of the second part of “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka”
1834-1835 – Gogol – associate professor in the department general history at St. Petersburg University
1835 – “Arabesques” and “Mirgorod” were published. "Dead Souls" started
1835, November-December – “The Inspector General” was written
1836, April 11 – Publication of the first issue of Sovremennik, where “Pram”, “Morning” were published business man»
1836, April 19 – Premiere of “The Inspector General” at the Alexandria Theater
1836, June 6 – Gogol’s departure abroad
1836-1839 – Life abroad. Meeting A. A. Ivanov
1839, September - 1840, May - Gogol in Russia. Meeting V. G. Belinsky
1840, May 9 – Meeting M. Yu. Lermontov
1842, May – “Dead Souls” was released
1842-1848 – Life abroad
1842, December – First performance of “Marriage” in St. Petersburg
1842-1843 – Publication of the Works of N.V. Gogol, where “The Overcoat” and “Theater Travel” were first published
1844 – Creation of a fund to help needy young students. Death of Gogol's sister M.V. Trushkovskaya
1845, spring – Gogol's illness in Frankfurt
1845, summer – Burning of one of the editions of the second volume of “Dead Souls”
1846 – “The Inspector’s Denouement” and the preface to the second edition of “Dead Souls” were written
1847 – “Selected passages from correspondence with friends.” "Author's Confession"
1847, June-August – Exchange of letters between Gogol and Belinsky regarding “Selected passages from correspondence with friends”
1848, February - Gogol in Jerusalem
1848, autumn - The beginning of the “romance” with A.M. Vielgorskaya. Meeting Goncharov, Nekrasov, Grigorovich. Gogol settles in Moscow
1850 – Gogol in Optina Pustyn and Vasilyevka
1850, autumn -1851, spring – Life in Odessa
1851 – Gogol’s last stay in Vasilyevka. Meeting I. S. Turgenev
1952, January 26 – death of E.M. Khomyakova
1852, night from February 11 to 12 – burning of the second volume of “Dead Souls”
1852, February 21 - at 8 o'clock in the morning N.V. Gogol died
February 21 – Gogol’s funeral at the Danilov Monastery cemetery

Source: Zolotussky Igor Petrovich. Gogol / Zolotussky Igor Petrovich. - 2nd ed., corrections and additions. - M.: Young Guard, 1984. - 528 pp.: ill. - (Life wonderful people; Biographical series, Issue 11(595)). – from 523-524.

“Literature has taken up my whole life”

Major works

Collections of stories:

“Evenings on a farm near Dikanka”, part 1, 1831 (“ Sorochinskaya fair", "The Evening on the Eve of Ivan Kupala", publ. 1830 under the name "Basavryuk", " May night, or the Drowned Woman", "The Missing Letter");
“Evenings on a farm near Dikanka”, part 2, 1832 (“The Night Before Christmas”, “ Terrible revenge", "Ivan Fedorovich Shponka and his aunt", "Enchanted Place").
“Mirgorod”, 1835 (part 1 – “ Old world landowners", "Taras Bulba", new. ed. 1839-41;
part 2 – “Viy”, “The story of how Ivan Ivanovich and Ivan Nikiforovich quarreled”)
“Arabesques”, 1835 (stories “Nevsky Prospekt”, “Notes of a Madman”, “Portrait”, 1st ed.;
chapters from the unfinished novel “Hetman”;
articles, including “A few words about Pushkin”, “About Little Russian songs”, etc.)

"The Nose" (1836)
"The Carriage" (1836)
"The Overcoat" (1942)

"The Inspector General" (1836)
“Theatrical tour after the presentation of a new comedy” (1842)
"Marriage" (1842)
"The Players" (1842)

Poem (in prose):

“Dead Souls” (vol. 1, 1842; vol. 2 destroyed by the author, partially published 1855)

"Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends" (1847)

Spiritual evolution and spiritual prose

The tragedy of Gogol’s personality lay in the fact that, as a deep religious philosophical thinker, he was almost not understood by his contemporaries, and his artistic creativity was misinterpreted. “Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends,” which was not understood by the reading public and rejected by critics as reactionary, can be considered his spiritual testament to his descendants. Only a few with the exception of his closest friends, M.P. Pogodin, S.P. Shevyrev, S.T. Aksakov, V.A. Zhukovsky and some others, the prophetic calling of N.V. Gogol was obvious. For most, this side of the writer remained closed. Misunderstanding and condemnation of contemporaries, failures in personal life, the worsening illness accelerated the death of the writer. Strictly speaking, we simply do not know the real Gogol. We didn’t read it or read it through someone else’s eyes - school teacher literature, Belinsky or another critic. Gogol himself encountered this during his lifetime: “Do not judge me and do not draw your own conclusions: you will be mistaken, like those of my friends who, having created from me their own ideal of a writer, in accordance with their own way of thinking about a writer, began from demand that I meet the ideal they themselves created.” The real Gogol must be sought in his works and in his prayers and testaments to friends. He did everything he could in this life. Said everything I could say. Then it’s up to the readers to hear or not to hear... Two days before his death, he wrote on a piece of paper: “Be not dead, but living souls...”

Literature:

Gogol N.V. Collected works: in 7 volumes. T.6: Articles / N.V. Gogol. - M.: Khudozh. lit., -560s.
Gogol N.V. Spiritual prose / N.V. Gogol. - M.: Russian book, -560 p.
Gogol N.V. Selected passages from correspondence with friends / N.V. Gogol. - M.: Sov.Russia, 1990.-432p.
Vinogradov I.A. Gogol the artist and thinker: Christian foundations of the worldview: / I. A. Vinogradov. - M.: Heritage, 2000. - 448 p.
Barabash Yu. Gogol: The Mystery of “The Farewell Tale” ( Selected passages from correspondence with friends" Experience of unbiased reading) / Yu. Barabash. - M.: Khudozh. Lit., 1993.- 269 p.

N.V. Gogol “Spiritual Testament”. Fragments

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. I give all the property I have to my mother and sisters. I advise them to live together in the village and, remembering that having given themselves to the peasants and all people, remember the saying of the Savior: “Feed My sheep!” May the Lord inspire everything that they must do. Reward the people who served me. Yakima to be released. Semyon also, if he serves the count for ten years. I would like our village, after my death, to become a refuge for all unmarried girls who would give themselves to raise orphans, daughters of poor, indigent parents. Education is the simplest: the Law of God and continuous exercise in labor in the air near the garden.

Advice to Sisters

In the name of the Father and the Son... I would like that after death a temple would be built in which frequent commemorations would be held for my sinful soul. For this purpose, I put half of my income from my writings as a basis. If the sisters do not get married, they will turn their house into a monastery, building it in the middle of the courtyard and opening a shelter for poor girls living without a place. Life should be the simplest, be content with what the village produces and not buy anything. Over time, the monastery can turn into a monastery, if later in their old age the sisters have a desire to accept the monastic rank. One of them may be the abbess. I would like my body to be buried, if not in the church, then in the church fence, and that funeral services for me would not stop.

To my friends

Thank you very much, my friends. My life has been adorned with you. I consider it my duty to tell you now parting words: Do not be embarrassed by any events that happen around you. Do your own thing, praying in silence. Society will only get better when every private person takes care of himself and lives as a Christian, serving God with the tools that are given to him, and trying to have a good influence on the small circle of people around him. Everything will be in order then, they will settle on their own then right relationship between people, limits will be determined that are legal for everything. And humanity will move forward.

Be not dead, but living souls. There is no other door except the one indicated by Jesus Christ, and everyone, if you are a thief and a robber, should climb differently.

Source:

Gogol N.V. Spiritual prose / N.V. Gogol; Comp. and comment. V.A.Voropaeva, I.A.Vinogradova; Entry Art. V.A.Voropaeva.- M.: Russian Book, 1992.- 560 pp.: 1 p. portrait; 16 l. ill..- P.442-443.

N.V. Gogol Selected Prayers

Draw me to you, my God, by the power of your holy love. Do not leave me for a moment of my existence: accompany me in my work, for which you brought me into the world, so that in completing it, I will abide entirely in You, my Father, presenting You alone day and night before my mental eyes. Do it, may I remain in peace, may my soul become desensitized to everything except You, may my heart become desensitized to everyday sorrows and storms, which are raised by Satan to disturb my spirit, may I not place my hope on anyone living on earth , but only to You, my Lord and Master! I believe that You alone are able to lift me up; I believe that this very thing is the work of my hands, and I am working on it now, not from my will, but from Your holy Will. You planted in me the first thought about him; You grew her, and you also grew me for her; You gave me the strength to bring to an end the work You inspired, building my entire salvation: sending sorrow to soften my heart, raising persecution to frequently resort to You and to receive the strongest love for You, with it may my whole soul inflame and ignite from now on, glorifying every minute holy name Yours, glorified always now, and ever, and forever and ever. Amen.

Lord, let me remember forever my... ignorance, my lack of knowledge, my lack of education, so that I may not form a careless opinion about anyone or anything. (Do not judge anyone and avoid making opinions. May I remember every minute the words of Your Apostle. Not everything will be done.)
God! Save and have mercy on poor people. Have mercy, Creator, and show Your hand over them. Lord, bring us all out of darkness into the light. Lord, drive away all the deceptions of the evil spirit that deceive us all. Lord, enlighten us, Lord, save us. Lord, save your poor people. ... The heavenly harmony and wisdom of Christ, which accompanied God during the creation of the world, would be nothing without it. Show Your love for mankind for the sake of Your Holy Blood, for the sake of the sacrifice made for us. Bring in holy order, and disperse wicked thoughts, call harmony out of chaos, and save us, save us, save us. Lord, save and have mercy on your poor people.

God, let me love more more people. Let me collect in my memory all the best in them, remember closest to all my neighbors and, inspired by the power of love, be able to depict. Oh, let love itself be my inspiration.

I pray for my friends. Hear, Lord, their desires and prayers. God save them. Forgive them, God, as well as me, a sinner, for every sin against You.

Source:

Gogol N.V. Spiritual prose / N.V. Gogol; Comp. and comment. V.A.Voropaeva, I.A.Vinogradova; Entry Art. V.A.Voropaeva.- M.: Russian Book, 1992.- 560 p.: 1 p. portrait; 16 l. ill..- P.442-443.

Aphorisms by N.V. Gogol

The Russian man has an enemy, irreconcilable, dangerous enemy, without which he would have been a giant. This enemy is laziness.
What Russian doesn't like driving fast?
There is no death in the literary world, and the dead also interfere in our affairs and act together with us, just like the living.
Words must be handled honestly.
You marvel at the preciousness of our language: every sound is a gift: everything is grainy, large, like the pearl itself, and, truly, another name is even more precious than the thing itself.
The lady is pleasant in every way.
There is no word that would be so sweeping, lively, so bursting out from under the very heart, so seething and vibrant, like an aptly spoken Russian word. In every word there is an abyss of space, every word is immense.
No matter how stupid the words of a fool are, sometimes they are enough to confuse an intelligent person

Source: Wisdom of Millennia: Encyclopedia/Auth.-comp. V.Balyazin.- M.: OLMA-PRESS, 2000.-848 p.//Chapter “Gogol Nikolai Vasilyevich”: p. 552-554

Statements by N.V. Gogol

About myself and my work

I am considered a mystery to everyone; no one can solve me completely.
There is hardly the highest of pleasures than the pleasure of creating.
Work is my life; If you don't work, you don't live.
Honor me as you please, but only from my present career will you recognize my real character; just believe that noble feelings always fill me, that I have never humbled myself in my soul and that I have doomed my whole life to goodness. You call me a dreamer, reckless, as if I wasn’t laughing at them inside myself. No, I know too many people to be a dreamer.
The thing I’m sitting and working on now... doesn’t look like a story or a novel, long, long, several volumes... If God helps me complete my poem as it should, then this will be my first decent creation . All Rus' will respond to him.
(Gogol Pogodin about “Dead Souls”)
My essay is much more important and significant than one might assume from its beginning... I can die of hunger, but I will not betray a reckless, thoughtless creation...
...There is a time when it is impossible to otherwise direct society or even an entire generation towards the beautiful until you show the full depth of its real abomination; There are times when you shouldn’t even talk about the lofty and beautiful without immediately showing, as clear as day, the paths and roads to it for everyone. (Gogol about "Dead Souls")

About national motives and national character

...True nationality does not lie in the description of the sundress, but in the very spirit of the people.
Ukrainian songs do not break away from life for a moment and are always true to the moment and the state of feelings at that time. Everywhere this broad will of Cossack life penetrates them, everywhere they breathe. Everywhere one can see the strength, joy, power with which the Cossack abandons the silence and carelessness of his homely life in order to delve into all the poetry of battles, dangers and riotous feasting with his comrades.
Eh, three! Bird-three, who invented you? To know, you could only have been born to a lively people... Eh, horses, horses, what kind of horses... Rus', where are you rushing to? Give me the answer... The bell rings with a wonderful ringing, the air rattles and becomes torn into pieces by the wind, everything that is on the earth flies past, and, looking askance, other peoples and states step aside and make way for it.

About satire, humor, laughter

How much do we have good people, but how much there is also chaff, from which there is no life for the good... On to their stage! Let all the people see! Let them laugh! Oh, laughter is a great thing!
And for a long time yet it was determined for me by the wonderful power to walk hand in hand with my strange heroes, to look around at the whole enormously rushing life, look at it through laughter visible to the world and invisible, unknown to him tears!

You marvel at the preciousness of our language: every sound is a gift; everything is grainy, large, like the pearl itself, and, truly, another name is even more precious than the thing itself.
Every nation is unique, each with its own in your own words which reflects his character. The word of a Briton will echo with heart knowledge and wise knowledge of life; The short-lived word of a Frenchman will flash and spread like a light dandy; the German will intricately come up with his own, not accessible to everyone, clever and thin word; but there is no word that would be so sweeping, lively, would burst out from under the very heart, would seethe and vibrate so vividly, like a well-spoken Russian word.
Before you is a community - the Russian language. Deep pleasure calls you, the pleasure of plunging into all immeasurability and studying its wonderful laws.

About other types of art

We made a toy out of the theater, like those trinkets with which children are lured, forgetting that this is a pulpit from which a live lesson is read to a whole crowd at once, where, with the solemn brilliance of lighting, with the thunder of music, with unanimous laughter, a familiar, hidden vice is revealed and, with the secret voice of universal participation, a familiar, timidly hidden sublime feeling is exposed.
(“Petersburg Notes” 1836)
All of Europe is for watching, and Italy is for living.
Architecture is also a chronicle of the world: it speaks when both songs and legends are already silent and when nothing speaks about the lost people.

Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol was born on March 20 (April 1), 1809 in the town of Velikie Sorochintsy, Mirgorod district, Poltava province. The writer came from a middle-income landowner family: they had about 400 serfs and over 1000 acres of land. The writer's ancestors on his father's side were hereditary priests, but his grandfather Afanasy Demyanovich left the spiritual career and entered the hetman's office; it was he who added to his surname Yanovsky another - Gogol, which was supposed to demonstrate the origin of the family from a well-known in Ukrainian history XVII century of Colonel Evstafy (Ostap) Gogol (this fact, however, does not find sufficient confirmation).

The writer's father, Vasily Afanasyevich, served at the Little Russian Post Office. Mother, Marya Ivanovna, who came from the landowner Kosyarovsky family, was known as the first beauty in the Poltava region; she married Vasily Afanasyevich at the age of fourteen. In addition to Nikolai, the family had five more children. The future writer spent his childhood years in his native estate Vasilievka (another name is Yanovshchina), visiting with his parents the surrounding places - Dikanka, which belonged to the Minister of Internal Affairs V.P. Kochubey, Obukhovka, where the writer V.V. Kapnist lived, but especially often in Kibintsy, the estate of a former minister, a distant relative of Gogol on his mother’s side - D. P. Troshchinsky. The early artistic impressions of the future writer are connected with Kibintsy, where there was an extensive library and a home theater. They were supplemented by historical legends and bible stories, in particular, the prophecy told by the mother about the Last Judgment and the inevitable punishment of sinners. Since then, Gogol, in the words of researcher K.V. Mochulsky, constantly lived “under the terror of retribution from beyond the grave.”

At first, Gogol studied at the Poltava district school (1818-1819), then took private lessons from the Poltava teacher Gabriel Sorochinsky, living in his apartment, and in May 1821 he entered the newly founded Nizhyn Gymnasium of Higher Sciences. Gogol was a rather mediocre student, but excelled in the gymnasium theater as an actor and decorator. The first literary experiments in poetry and prose belong to the gymnasium period, mainly “in the lyrical and serious kind,” but also in a comic spirit, such as, for example, the satire “Something about Nezhin, or the law is not written for fools” (not preserved). Most of all, however, Gogol was occupied at this time by the thought of public service in the field of JUSTICE; This decision arose not without the influence of Professor N. G. Belousov, who taught natural law and was subsequently dismissed from the gymnasium on charges of “freethinking” (during the investigation, Gogol testified in favor of the professor).

After graduating from the gymnasium, Gogol in December 1828, together with one of his closest friends A. S. Danilevsky, came to St. Petersburg. But only disappointment awaits him: he cannot get the desired place; the poem "Hanz Küchelgarten", written, obviously, back in high school and published in 1829 (under the pseudonym V. Alov), receives murderous

reviews from reviewers (Gogol immediately buys up almost the entire circulation of the book and burns it); to this, perhaps, were added the love experiences that he spoke about in a letter to his mother (dated July 24, 1829). All this makes Gogol suddenly leave St. Petersburg for Germany.

Upon returning to Russia (in September of the same year), Gogol finally managed to enter the service - first in the Department of State Economy and Public Buildings, and then in the Department of Appanages. Official activity does not bring Gogol satisfaction, but new publications (the story “Bisavryuk, or the Evening on the Eve of Ivan Kupala”, articles and essays) are drawing increasing attention to the reading Russian public. The writer makes extensive literary acquaintances, in particular V. A. Zhukovsky, P. A. Pletnev, who at his home in May 1831 (apparently the 20th) introduced Gogol to A. S. Pushkin.

In the autumn of the same year, the first part of the collection of stories from Ukrainian life“Evenings on a farm near Dikanka” (in next year the second part appeared), enthusiastically received by Pushkin: “This is real gaiety, sincere, relaxed, without affectation, without stiffness. And in places what poetry!..” At the same time, the “gaiety” of Gogol’s book was revealed various shades- from light-hearted banter to dark comedy, close to black humor. Despite the completeness and sincerity of the feelings of Gogol’s characters, the world in which they live is tragically conflicted: natural and family ties are dissolved, mysterious unreal forces invade the natural order of things (the fantastic is based mainly on folk demonology). Already in “Evenings” Gogol’s extraordinary art of creating a whole, complete artistic cosmos that lives according to its own laws was revealed.

After the publication of his first prose book, Gogol became famous. In the summer of 1832, he was greeted with enthusiasm in Moscow, where he met M. P. Pogodin, S. T. Aksakov and his family, M. S. Shchepkin and others famous figures culture. Gogol's next trip to Moscow, equally successful, took place in the summer of 1835. By the end of this year, he left pedagogy (since the summer of 1834 he held the position of associate professor of general history at St. Petersburg University) and devoted himself entirely to literary work.

The year 1835 was unusually fruitful: the following two collections of prose works were published - “Arabesques” and “Mirgorod” (both in two parts), work began on the poem “Dead Souls”, the comedy “The Inspector General” was mostly completed, the comedy “Grooms” (future) was written "Marriage"). Reporting on the writer’s new achievements, including the upcoming premiere of “The Inspector General” at the St. Petersburg Alexandrinsky Theater (April 19, 1836), Pushkin noted in Sovremennik: “Mr. Gogol is going even further. We wish and hope to have frequent opportunities to talk about him in our magazine.” By the way, Gogol actively published in Pushkin’s magazine, in particular as a critic (article “On the Movement magazine literature in 1834 and 1835").

“Mirgorod” and “Arabesque” marked new

art worlds on the Gogol map

universe. Thematically close to “Evenings”

(“Little Russian” life), mirgorod cycle, which unites the stories “Old World Landowners”, “Taras Bulba”, “Viy”, “The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich”, reveals a sharp change in perspective and pictorial scale: in a number of cases, instead of strong and sharp characteristics - vulgarity and the facelessness of ordinary people, instead of poetic and deep feelings - sluggish, almost animal reflexes. Ordinariness modern life was set off by the colorfulness and extravagance of the past, but the more strikingly deep internal conflict was manifested in it, in this past (for example, in “Taras Bulba” - the clash of an individualizing love feeling with communal interests).

The world of the “Petersburg Tales” from “Arabesques” (“Nevsky Prospekt”, “Notes of a Madman”, “Portrait”; they are joined by “The Nose” and “Overcoat” published later, in 1836 and 1842 respectively) - this is the world modern city with its acute social and ethical conflicts, character fractures, and an alarming and ghostly atmosphere.

Of the highest degree Gogol’s generalization reaches in “The Inspector General,” where “ prefabricated city"as if imitating the life activity of any larger social association, up to the state, Russian Empire, or even humanity as a whole. Instead of the traditional active engine of intrigue - a rogue or an adventurer - an involuntary deceiver (the imaginary auditor Khlestakov) was placed at the epicenter of the collision, which gave everything that happened an additional, grotesque illumination, enhanced to the limit by the final “silent scene”. Freed from the specific details of the “punishment of vice”, conveying first of all the very effect of general shock (which was emphasized by the symbolic duration of the moment of petrification), this scene left the possibility of a variety of interpretations, including eschatological - as a reminder of the inevitable Last Judgment.

In June 1836, Gogol (again together with Danilevsky) went abroad, where he spent a total of more than 12 years, not counting two visits to Russia - in 1839-1840 and in 1841-1842. The writer lived in Germany, Switzerland, France, Austria, the Czech Republic, but most of all in Italy, continuing to work on “Dead Souls.”

The generality characteristic of Gogol now received spatial expression: as the Chichikov scam developed (the purchase of the “revision souls” of dead people), Russian life was supposed to reveal itself in a variety of ways - not only from the “lowest ranks of it,” but also in higher, more significant manifestations. At the same time, the full depth of the key motif of the poem was revealed: the concept of “dead soul” and the antithesis “alive-dead” that followed from the STSYUDZ from the sphere of concrete word usage (dead peasant, “revision soul”) moved into the sphere of figurative and symbolic semantics. There was a problem of death and revival human soul and in connection with this - society as a whole, the Russian world first of all, but through it and everything modern humanity. The complexity of the concept is associated with the genre specificity of “Dead Souls” (the designation “poem” indicated the symbolic meaning of the work, special role narrator and positive authorial ideal). After the release of the first volume of Dead Souls (1842), work on the second volume (started back in 1840) was especially intense and painful. In the summer of 1845, in a difficult mental state, Gogol burned the manuscript of the second volume, later explaining his decision precisely by the fact that the “paths and roads” to the ideal, the revival of the human spirit, did not receive sufficiently truthful and convincing expression. As if compensating for the long-promised second volume and anticipating general movement the meaning of the poem* Gogol in “Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends” (1847) turned to a more direct, journalistic explanation of his ideas. The need for internal Christian education and re-education of each and every person was emphasized with particular force in this book, without which no social improvements are possible. At the same time, Gogol was also working on works of a theological nature, the most significant of which was “Reflections on the Divine Liturgy” (published posthumously in 1857).

In April 1848, after a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to the Holy Sepulcher, Gogol finally returned to his homeland. He spent many months in 1848 and 1850-1851 in Odessa and Little Russia, in the fall of 1848 he visited St. Petersburg, in 1850 and 1851 he visited Optina Pustyn, but most of the time he lived in Moscow.

By the beginning of 1852, the edition of the second volume was re-created, chapters from which Gogol read to his closest friends - A. O. Smirnova-Rosset, S. P. Shevyrev, M. P. Pogodin, S. T. Aksakov and others. The Rzhev archpriest Father Matvey (Konstantinovsky), whose preaching of tireless moral self-improvement largely determined Gogol’s mentality in the last period of his life, disapproved of the work.

On the night of February 11-12, in the house on Nikitsky Boulevard, where Gogol lived with Count A.P. Tolstoy, in a state of deep mental crisis, the writer burns new edition second volume. A few days later, on the morning of February 21, he dies.

The writer's funeral took place with a huge crowd of people at the cemetery of the St. Daniel's Monastery (in 1931, Gogol's remains were reburied at the Novodevichy cemetery).

From a historical perspective, Gogol's creativity was revealed gradually. For his immediate successors, representatives of the so-called natural school, of paramount importance were social motives, the removal of all prohibitions on the topic and material, everyday concreteness, as well as humanistic pathos in the depiction " little man" At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Christian philosophical and moral problematics of Gogol’s works were revealed with particular force. Subsequently, the perception of Gogol’s work was supplemented by a sense of its special complexity and irrationality. art world and the visionary courage and non-traditionality of his visual style. “Gogol’s prose is at least four-dimensional. He can be compared with his contemporary, the mathematician Lobachevsky, who blew up the Euclidean world...” - V. Nabokov appreciated Gogol’s work. All this determined special place Gogol's creativity in modern world culture.

20. Pushkin’s tragedy “Boris Godunov”. The problem of historicism.

http://www.a4format.ru/pdf_files_bio2/47551782.pdf

21. Creativity and fate of Koltsov.

Alexey Vasilievich Koltsov

Future poet was born in Voronezh on October 3, 1809, into a large merchant family of cattle dealer Vasily Petrovich Koltsov, who through hard work rose to the level of the people, a tough and stubborn owner, who had his own opinion on everything and did not yield to anyone. Involuntarily, Alyosha, as the heir to his father’s affairs, adopted many of his character traits. Since childhood, the boy was engaged in driving and selling cattle. He was well-fed, dressed, but rarely treated kindly; Domostroy reigned in the family.

Nobody studied Alexei, but he, nevertheless, mastered literacy with the help of a Voronezh seminarian and in 1818 entered the first class of the district school. A year and a half later, Alyosha’s father took Alyosha out of school, and for the semi-literate teenager a working life began, in which there was one joy - the Don steppe, and the villages and farmsteads scattered across it, and at night the howling of wolves and the silence of the stars. Secretly, in fits and starts, I read penny publications - poems by I. Dmitriev, French novels, folk tales and "The Arabian Nights"; from the age of 16, hiding from everyone, he tried to compose verses. It is known that his first poem (later destroyed) was called “Three Visions.” Having met the Voronezh bookseller Kashkin and made friends with the poetically gifted seminarian Serebryansky, Koltsov learned a lot about versification from his interactions with them. The young man entered a circle of young people who were fond of literature, whose idols were Zhukovsky, Delvig, Pushkin and other Russian poets; wrote imitative poems, by the end of the 1820s he had caught his melody and found new poetic images.

At the same time, Alexey Koltsov fell in love with the serf girl Dunyasha, who lived in their house, bought by his father from one of the neighboring landowners. The father, not wanting a “misalliance,” sold the girl to the Don during one of his son’s absences, where she soon got married. The poet's mental wound affected him all his life.

Soon after this, Alexey handed over poems to his acquaintance Sukhachev for publication in Moscow, where he published them anonymously in 1830. A series of accidents became a pattern: often visiting both capitals on his father’s business, Alexey met the Moscow writer Stankevich, and through him, Belinsky, who helped him publish several poems in the magazine “Listok” and in the “Literary Gazette”. The publication was preceded by a recommendation from Stankevich, “a native poet who has never studied anywhere and, busy with commercial affairs on behalf of his father, often writes on the road, at night, while sitting on horseback.” Acquaintance with the critic soon grew into a cordial friendship. Two articles by Belinsky, “Poems by Koltsov” (1835) and “On the life and writings of Koltsov” (1846), played an exceptional role in creative destiny poet. The great critic saw in his friend a great poet akin to Pushkin and Lermontov. He even called him "brilliant."

In 1835, at the expense of Stankevich, “Poems of Alexei Koltsov” (18 plays: “Don’t make noise, rye,” “Reflection of a peasant,” “Peasant feast” and others) were published, warmly received by the public and critics. The aspiring poet made acquaintances with V. Zhukovsky, P. Vyazemsky, V. Odoevsky, N. Polev, A. Pushkin, who published Koltsov’s poem “Harvest” in Sovremennik (1836). The writers treated the young poet with an extraordinary literary world tenderness.

Polevoy’s words about Koltsov as a “pure, kind soul” are very characteristic - “with him he warmed himself as if by a fireplace.” New friends helped Alexey not only in literary matters, but also in everyday matters. In any case, many of my father’s affairs, including trials, the poet decided in the capitals with their supportive help.

This was followed by a time of unprecedented creative growth for the poet. His thoughts were published in Otechestvennye Zapiski, Sovremennik, Literaturnaya Gazeta, and Moscow Observer. lyric poems(“God’s Peace”, “Prayer”, “Mower”, “Flower”). Koltsov zealously collected oral folk art, compiled a collection of “Russian proverbs, sayings, rivers and sayings”, recorded folk songs. In 1837, the heartfelt "Forest" was released, dedicated to memory Pushkin, about whom Alexey Vasilyevich Koltsov wrote: “The sun is shot through.”

The poet was forced to spend most of his time not with new friends, but in his homeland, in Voronezh, in constant worries about his daily bread and big family, which eventually began to weigh on him. And because of his “poetic liberties,” he lost his already small emotional contact with his family. “I absolutely cannot live at home, in the circle of merchants now; in other circles too... I have a very bleak future ahead of me. It seems that I will fulfill one thing with all precision: the crow... And, By God, I look terribly like her, all that remains is to say: she didn’t get to the peahens, but lagged behind the crows. Nothing more will come to me than that.”

Two years before the death of Koltsov A.V. wrote: “I don’t want to be a rich man - and never will be... There is no voice in my soul to be a merchant, but my soul tells me everything day and night, it wants to give up all trade activities - and sit in the upper room, read, study. I would like to now, first, study well your Russian history, then natural history, world history, then learn German, read Shakespeare, Goethe, Byron, Hegel, read astronomy, geography, botany, physiology, zoology...” Alas, two years were not enough for him, to cope with these tasks, besides, almost all this time he was seriously ill. The powerful organism was broken by backbreaking labor, acute experiences, many excesses that were characteristic of this man, consumption and a bad disease contracted from one of the Voronezh odalisques with whom he was passionately in love.

Friends suggested that Koltsov open in northern capital bookstore, to become the manager of A. Kraevsky’s “Notes of the Fatherland,” but the poet could not tear himself away from family affairs, from the intricate trades and debts of his father, with which he was tied more tightly than leather belts. On his last trip to Moscow and St. Petersburg in 1841, Koltsov, although he won one of his father’s two cases in court, spent all the money, and besides, most of The herd he drove died from an epizootic. Things weren't any better at home. Poems were written less and less...

In Voronezh, consumption finished off the poet. On October 29, 1842, he died, his hand was clasped in the hand of an old nanny... He was buried at the Mitrofanevskoye cemetery. On the monument to the poet, his father wrote: “Enlightened by nature without science, rewarded by the monarch’s grace, he died at the age of 33 and had no marriage for 26 days at the 12th hour.” Today that cemetery does not exist - this is already the center of Voronezh, but “several graves have been memorialized, surrounded by a wall and cared for” - among them is the last refuge of Alexei Koltsov. On the monument, instead of his father’s epitaph, there are lines from the poet himself: In the soul of passion, the fire flared up more than once, But in fruitless melancholy It burned and went out...

Already half a century after Koltsov’s death, the circulation of his publications exceeded a million copies, and the number of readers exceeded a hundred million. Many of his “plays” were translated into beautiful songs and romances in which “the soul of the people sings” - M. Glinka, A. Varlamov, A. Dargomyzhsky, A. Gurilev, N. Rimsky-Korsakov, M. Mussorgsky, M. Balakirev , A. Rubinstein, S. Rachmaninov, A. Glazunov and other Russian composers.

It is very difficult to briefly describe Gogol's work - his literary heritage and significance for the development of Russian literature were too multifaceted.

The Master's Path

It is difficult to divide a writer’s creative path into distinct stages characterized by general topics and genres of works. Materiality and mysticism, humor and tragedy, realism and romance always coexisted in his stories, novellas, and plays.

Conventionally, they try to divide Gogol’s work, like any other writer, into stages: the beginning of the journey is the collections “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka”.

In this collection of stories on themes of Ukrainian folklore, allegedly retold from the words of an old Cossack, the writer in a fairy-tale and fantastic style describes the past and present of Ukrainian peasants, their way of life and prejudices, not forgetting about social contradictions; youth - collections of stories "Mirgorod" and "Arabesques" combine works on various topics and in different genres.

They contain a real knightly novel "Taras Bulba", a literary thriller "Viy" with a description of the life of the small nobility and officials, reflections on the topic of art, history, the complexity of human relationships; maturity - plays.

"The Inspector General", "Marriage", "Players", the plot of which not only sharply ridiculed contemporary writer reality, but to this day has not lost its relevance.

Exceptions to the rules

Despite this typical division for the work of any writer, many researchers of Gogol’s work believe that, in fact, only two works can be attributed to separate stages of development, namely, to the beginning of the path and to the pinnacle of creativity:

1. "Hanz Küchelgarten" - the beginning of creativity. The writer's first work. During the writer’s youth, all landowners and nobles whiled away their time by scribbling poetry on romantic themes. Gogol did not escape this either. His only rhymed work did not delight either his contemporaries or future generations.
2. “Dead Souls” is the crowning achievement of the great master’s creation. The work, called a “poem” by the author, absorbed all of Gogol’s writing experience and combined all aspects of his work.

The story “The Overcoat” also stands out. A terrible story about the primitive dreams of a man in a harsh world, about his willingness to give his worthless life for a pathetic coat. This work is still relevant now, despite consumer abundance, no less than in the time of Gogol.

Separately, I would also like to say about mysticism, which is somehow present in most of his works. In "Terrible Revenge" and " Dead souls", in "The Night Before Christmas" and "The Overcoat" - mysticism not only frightens the reader, but also helps explain the worldview of the characters.

Significance in history

The writer's work has had a huge impact on all Russian literature of the nineteenth - twentieth centuries. He was highly valued, both during the life and after the death of the writer (probably the only example in history). Without Gogol there would be no Bulgakov. The works of the great author are translated into all languages of the world. Many of them were filmed.

Such popularity of his characters and plots is explained by the fact that the problems raised in his works: veneration of rank, corruption, superstition, quarrelsomeness, poverty, exist to this day in all countries of the world and will exist for a long time. But even when they disappear, Gogol’s books will serve as a source of knowledge about these disgusting phenomena.

Heading

Description * It is very difficult to briefly describe Gogol's work - his literary heritage and significance for the development of Russian literature were too multifaceted. The path of a master The creative path of a writer is difficult to divide into distinct stages, characterized by common themes and genres of works. Materiality and mysticism, humor and tragedy, realism and romance always coexisted in his stories, novellas, and plays. Conventionally, they try to divide Gogol’s work, like any other writer, into stages: the beginning of the journey is the collections “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka”. In this collection of stories on themes of Ukrainian folklore, allegedly retold from the words of an old Cossack, the writer in a fairy-tale and fantasy style describes the past and present of Ukrainian peasants, their way of life and prejudices, not forgetting about social contradictions; youth - collections of stories "Mirgorod" and "Arabesques" combine works on various topics and in different genres. They contain a real knightly novel "Taras Bulba", a literary thriller "Viy" with a description of the life of the small nobility and officials, reflections on the topic of art, history, the complexity of human relationships; maturity - plays. “The Inspector General”, “Marriage”, “Players”, the plot of which not only sharply ridiculed the contemporary reality of the writer, but has not lost its relevance to this day. Exceptions to the Rules Despite this typical division for the work of any writer, many researchers of Gogol’s work believe that, in fact, only two works can be attributed to separate stages of development, namely, to the beginning of the path and to the pinnacle of creativity: 1. " Hanz Kuchelgarten" - the beginning of creativity. The writer's first work. During the writer’s youth, all landowners and nobles whiled away their time by scribbling poetry on romantic themes. Gogol did not escape this either. His only rhymed work did not delight either his contemporaries or future generations. 2. “Dead Souls” is the crowning achievement of the great master’s creation. The work, called a “poem” by the author, absorbed all of Gogol’s writing experience and combined all aspects of his work. The story “The Overcoat” also stands out. A terrible story about the primitive dreams of a man in a harsh world, about his willingness to give his worthless life for a pathetic coat. This work is still relevant now, despite consumer abundance, no less than in the time of Gogol. Separately, I would also like to say about mysticism, which is somehow present in most of his works. In "Terrible Revenge" and "Dead Souls", in "The Night Before Christmas" and "The Overcoat" - mysticism not only frightens the reader, but also helps explain the worldview of the characters. Significance in history The writer’s work had a huge influence on all Russian literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He was highly valued both during the life and after the death of the writer (probably the only example in history). Without Gogol there would be no Bulgakov. The works of the great author are translated into all languages of the world. Many of them were filmed. Such popularity of his characters and plots is explained by the fact that the problems raised in his works: veneration of rank, corruption, superstition, quarrelsomeness, poverty, exist to this day in all countries of the world and will exist for a long time. But even when they disappear, Gogol’s books will serve as a source of knowledge about these disgusting phenomena.