Germinal read the summary. "Germinal", an artistic analysis of the novel by Émile Zola

Victor Astafiev

You fell like a stone.

I died under it.

Vl. Sokolov

A story told in passing, heard in passing, fifteen years ago.

I've never seen her, that girl. And I won't see it again. I don’t even know her name, but for some reason it popped into my head - her name was Lyudochka. "What's in a name? It will die like a sad noise...” And why do I remember this? In fifteen years, so many events have happened, so many people were born and died of natural causes, so many died at the hands of villains, got drunk, got poisoned, burned, got lost, drowned...

Why does this story, quietly and separately from everything, live in me and burn my heart? Maybe it's all about its depressing ordinariness, its disarming simplicity?

Lyudochka was born in a small dying village called Vychugan. Her mother was a collective farmer, her father a collective farmer. Due to his early oppressive work and long-standing, inveterate drunkenness, my father was frail, frail, fussy and dull. The mother was afraid that her child would not be born a fool, she tried to conceive him during a rare break from her husband’s drinking, but still the girl was bruised by her father’s unhealthy flesh and was born weak, sick and tearful.

She grew up like wilted roadside grass, played little, rarely sang or smiled, at school she did not get C grades, but she was silently diligent and did not stoop to straight Ds.

Lyudochka's father disappeared from life long ago and unnoticed. Mother and daughter lived freer, better and more cheerful without him. Men would visit my mother, sometimes they drank, sang at the table, stayed overnight, and one tractor driver from a neighboring timber industry enterprise, having plowed the garden, had a hearty dinner, stayed for the whole spring, grew into the farm, began to debug it, strengthen it and multiply it. He traveled seven miles to work on a motorcycle, at first he carried a gun with him and often threw crumpled, feather-dropping birds out of his backpack onto the floor, sometimes he took out a hare by its yellow paws and, hanging it on nails, deftly skinned it. For a long time afterwards, the skin hung over the stove, turned outward, with a white trim and red spots scattered with stars on it, so long that it began to break, and then the wool was cut from the skins, spun together with linen thread, and shaggy shawls were knitted.

The guest did not treat Lyudochka in any way, neither good nor bad, did not scold her, did not offend her, did not reproach her, but she was still afraid of him. He lived, she lived in the same house - and that’s all. When Lyudochka completed ten grades at school and became a girl, her mother told her to go to the city to get settled, since she had nothing to do in the village, she and herself - her mother stubbornly did not call the guest master and father - were planning to move to the timber industry enterprise. At first, the mother promised to help Lyudochka with money, potatoes and whatever God would send - in her old age, you see, she will help them too.

Lyudochka arrived in the city by train and spent the first night at the station. In the morning, she went to the station hairdresser and, after sitting in line for a long time, she spent even longer getting herself into a city look: she got a perm and a manicure. She also wanted to dye her hair, but the old hairdresser, who herself dyed it like a copper samovar, advised against it: they say, your hair is “me-a-ah-kanky, fluffy, little head, like a dandelion, but from the chemicals your hair will break and fall off.” . Lyudochka agreed with relief - she didn’t so much want to put on makeup as she wanted to be in the hairdresser’s, in this warm room emanating cologne aromas.

Quiet, seemingly constrained in a village way, but dexterous in a peasant way, she offered to sweep up the hair on the floor, dispensed soap for someone, handed someone a napkin, and by the evening she had learned all the local customs, waylaid an auntie named Gavrilovna at the exit to the hairdresser’s , who advised her not to wear makeup, and asked her to be her student.

The old woman looked carefully at Lyudochka, then studied her unburdensome documents, asked a little, then went with her to the city municipal administration, where she registered Lyudochka to work as a hairdresser's apprentice.

Gavrilovna took the student to live with her, setting simple conditions: to help around the house, not to go out longer than eleven, not to bring guys into the house, not to drink wine, not to smoke tobacco, obey the mistress in everything and honor her as your own mother. Instead of paying for the apartment, let them bring a carload of firewood from the timber industry enterprise.

As long as you are a student, you will live, but as soon as you become a master, go to the hostel. God willing, you will arrange your life. - And, after a heavy pause, Gavrilovna added: “If you get pregnant, I’ll drive you away.” I didn’t have children, I don’t like squeaks, and besides, like all the old masters, I struggle with my feet. When the weather is good, I howl at night.

It should be noted that Gavrilovna made an exception to the rule. For some time now she had been reluctant to let boarders in at all, and even refused to let girls in at all.

Long ago, during the Khrushchev era, two students from a financial college lived with her. Wearing trousers, dyed, smoking. Regarding smoking and everything else, Gavrilovna gave strict instructions straight out and without beating around the bush. The girls curled their lips, but resigned themselves to the demands of everyday life: they smoked on the street, came home on time, did not play their music loudly, but did not sweep or wash the floor, did not put away the dishes after themselves, and did not clean the restroom. That would be okay. But they constantly raised Gavrilovna, referred to examples of outstanding people, and said that she was living wrong.

And that would be all right. But the girls didn’t really distinguish between their own and someone else’s, they would eat the pies off the plate, they would scoop the sugar out of the sugar bowl, they would wash out the soap, they were in no hurry to pay the rent until you reminded it ten times. And this could be tolerated. But they began to manage the garden, not in the sense of weeding and watering - they began to pick what was ripe, and use the gifts of nature without asking. One day we ate the first three cucumbers from a steep manure ridge with salt. Those cucumbers, the first, Gavrilovna, as always, grazed and groomed, knelt down in front of the ridge, onto which in winter she dragged manure in a backpack from the horse yard, putting a coin for it to the old robber, the lame Slyusarenko, talking to them, to the cucumbers: “Well, grow up, grow up, take heart, kids! Then we’ll take you to okro-o-oshechka-oo, to okro-o-oshechka-oo-oo” - and we’ll give them some warm water, under the sun in a heated barrel.

Why did you eat cucumbers? - Gavrilovna approached the girls.

What's wrong with that? They ate and ate. It's a pity, isn't it? We'll buy you something at the market!

I don’t need any information! You really need this!.. For pleasure. And I was saving the cucumbers...

For myself? You are selfish!

Who-who?

Selfish!

Well, what about you...! - offended by the unfamiliar word, Gavrilovna made the final conclusion and swept the girls out of the apartment.

Victor Astafiev

You fell like a stone.

I died under it.

Vl. Sokolov

A story told in passing, heard in passing, fifteen years ago.

I've never seen her, that girl. And I won't see it again. I don’t even know her name, but for some reason it popped into my head - her name was Lyudochka. "What's in a name? It will die like a sad noise...” And why do I remember this? In fifteen years, so many events have happened, so many people were born and died of natural causes, so many died at the hands of villains, got drunk, got poisoned, burned, got lost, drowned...

Why does this story, quietly and separately from everything, live in me and burn my heart? Maybe it's all about its depressing ordinariness, its disarming simplicity?

Lyudochka was born in a small dying village called Vychugan. Her mother was a collective farmer, her father a collective farmer. Due to his early oppressive work and long-standing, inveterate drunkenness, my father was frail, frail, fussy and dull. The mother was afraid that her child would not be born a fool, she tried to conceive him during a rare break from her husband’s drinking, but still the girl was bruised by her father’s unhealthy flesh and was born weak, sick and tearful.

She grew up like wilted roadside grass, played little, rarely sang or smiled, at school she did not get C grades, but she was silently diligent and did not stoop to straight Ds.

Lyudochka's father disappeared from life long ago and unnoticed. Mother and daughter lived freer, better and more cheerful without him. Men would visit my mother, sometimes they drank, sang at the table, stayed overnight, and one tractor driver from a neighboring timber industry enterprise, having plowed the garden, had a hearty dinner, stayed for the whole spring, grew into the farm, began to debug it, strengthen it and multiply it. He traveled seven miles to work on a motorcycle, at first he carried a gun with him and often threw crumpled, feather-dropping birds out of his backpack onto the floor, sometimes he took out a hare by its yellow paws and, hanging it on nails, deftly skinned it. For a long time afterwards, the skin hung over the stove, turned outward, with a white trim and red spots scattered with stars on it, so long that it began to break, and then the wool was cut from the skins, spun together with linen thread, and shaggy shawls were knitted.

The guest did not treat Lyudochka in any way, neither good nor bad, did not scold her, did not offend her, did not reproach her, but she was still afraid of him. He lived, she lived in the same house - and that’s all. When Lyudochka completed ten grades at school and became a girl, her mother told her to go to the city to get settled, since she had nothing to do in the village, she and herself - her mother stubbornly did not call the guest master and father - were planning to move to the timber industry enterprise. At first, the mother promised to help Lyudochka with money, potatoes and whatever God would send - in her old age, you see, she will help them too.

Lyudochka arrived in the city by train and spent the first night at the station. In the morning, she went to the station hairdresser and, after sitting in line for a long time, she spent even longer getting herself into a city look: she got a perm and a manicure. She also wanted to dye her hair, but the old hairdresser, who herself dyed it like a copper samovar, advised against it: they say, your hair is “me-a-ah-kanky, fluffy, little head, like a dandelion, but from the chemicals your hair will break and fall off.” . Lyudochka agreed with relief - she didn’t so much want to put on makeup as she wanted to be in the hairdresser’s, in this warm room emanating cologne aromas.

Quiet, seemingly constrained in a village way, but dexterous in a peasant way, she offered to sweep up the hair on the floor, dispensed soap for someone, handed someone a napkin, and by the evening she had learned all the local customs, waylaid an auntie named Gavrilovna at the exit to the hairdresser’s , who advised her not to wear makeup, and asked her to be her student.

The old woman looked carefully at Lyudochka, then studied her unburdensome documents, asked a little, then went with her to the city municipal administration, where she registered Lyudochka to work as a hairdresser's apprentice.

Gavrilovna took the student to live with her, setting simple conditions: to help around the house, not to go out longer than eleven, not to bring guys into the house, not to drink wine, not to smoke tobacco, obey the mistress in everything and honor her as your own mother. Instead of paying for the apartment, let them bring a carload of firewood from the timber industry enterprise.

As long as you are a student, you will live, but as soon as you become a master, go to the hostel. God willing, you will arrange your life. - And, after a heavy pause, Gavrilovna added: “If you get pregnant, I’ll drive you away.” I didn’t have children, I don’t like squeaks, and besides, like all the old masters, I struggle with my feet. When the weather is good, I howl at night.

Stories –

Victor Astafiev
LYUDOCHKA

You fell like a stone.
I died under it.
Vl. Sokolov
A story told in passing, heard in passing, fifteen years ago.
I've never seen her, that girl. And I won't see it again. I don’t even know her name, but for some reason it popped into my head - her name was Lyudochka. "What's in a name? It will die like a sad noise...” And why do I remember this? In fifteen years, so many events have happened, so many people were born and died of natural causes, so many died at the hands of villains, got drunk, got poisoned, burned, got lost, drowned...
Why does this story, quietly and separately from everything, live in me and burn my heart? Maybe it's all about its depressing ordinariness, its disarming simplicity?

Lyudochka was born in a small dying village called Vychugan. Her mother was a collective farmer, her father a collective farmer. Due to his early oppressive work and long-standing, inveterate drunkenness, my father was frail, frail, fussy and dull. The mother was afraid that her child would not be born a fool, she tried to conceive him during a rare break from her husband’s drinking, but still the girl was bruised by her father’s unhealthy flesh and was born weak, sick and tearful.
She grew up like wilted roadside grass, played little, rarely sang or smiled, at school she did not get C grades, but she was silently diligent and did not stoop to straight Ds.
Lyudochka's father disappeared from life long ago and unnoticed. Mother and daughter lived freer, better and more cheerful without him. Men would visit my mother, sometimes they drank, sang at the table, stayed overnight, and one tractor driver from a neighboring timber industry enterprise, having plowed the garden, had a hearty dinner, stayed for the whole spring, grew into the farm, began to debug it, strengthen it and multiply it. He traveled seven miles to work on a motorcycle, at first he carried a gun with him and often threw crumpled, feather-dropping birds out of his backpack onto the floor, sometimes he took out a hare by its yellow paws and, hanging it on nails, deftly skinned it. For a long time afterwards, the skin hung over the stove, turned outward, with a white trim and red spots scattered with stars on it, so long that it began to break, and then the wool was cut from the skins, spun together with linen thread, and shaggy shawls were knitted.
The guest did not treat Lyudochka in any way, neither good nor bad, did not scold her, did not offend her, did not reproach her, but she was still afraid of him. He lived, she lived in the same house - and that’s all. When Lyudochka completed ten grades at school and became a girl, her mother told her to go to the city to get settled, since she had nothing to do in the village, she and herself - her mother stubbornly did not call the guest master and father - were planning to move to the timber industry enterprise. At first, the mother promised to help Lyudochka with money, potatoes and whatever God would send - in her old age, you see, she will help them too.
Lyudochka arrived in the city by train and spent the first night at the station. In the morning, she went to the station hairdresser and, after sitting in line for a long time, she spent even longer getting herself into a city look: she got a perm and a manicure. She also wanted to dye her hair, but the old hairdresser, who herself dyed it like a copper samovar, advised against it: they say, your hair is “me-a-ah-kanky, fluffy, little head, like a dandelion, but from the chemicals your hair will break and fall off.” . Lyudochka agreed with relief - she didn’t so much want to put on makeup as she wanted to be in the hairdresser’s, in this warm room emanating cologne aromas.
Quiet, seemingly constrained in a village way, but dexterous in a peasant way, she offered to sweep up the hair on the floor, dispensed soap for someone, handed someone a napkin, and by the evening she had learned all the local customs, waylaid an auntie named Gavrilovna at the exit to the hairdresser’s , who advised her not to wear makeup, and asked her to be her student.
The old woman looked carefully at Lyudochka, then studied her unburdensome documents, asked a little, then went with her to the city municipal administration, where she registered Lyudochka to work as a hairdresser's apprentice.
Gavrilovna took the student to live with her, setting simple conditions: to help around the house, not to go out longer than eleven, not to bring guys into the house, not to drink wine, not to smoke tobacco, obey the mistress in everything and honor her as your own mother. Instead of paying for the apartment, let them bring a carload of firewood from the timber industry enterprise.
- As long as you are a student, you will live, but as soon as you become a master, go to the hostel. God willing, you will arrange your life. - And, after a heavy pause, Gavrilovna added: “If you get pregnant, I’ll drive you away.” I didn’t have children, I don’t like squeaks, and besides, like all the old masters, I struggle with my feet. When the weather is good, I howl at night.
It should be noted that Gavrilovna made an exception to the rule. For some time now she had been reluctant to let boarders in at all, and even refused to let girls in at all.
Long ago, during the Khrushchev era, two students from a financial college lived with her. Wearing trousers, dyed, smoking. Regarding smoking and everything else, Gavrilovna gave strict instructions straight out and without beating around the bush. The girls curled their lips, but resigned themselves to the demands of everyday life: they smoked on the street, came home on time, did not play their music loudly, but did not sweep or wash the floor, did not put away the dishes after themselves, and did not clean the restroom. That would be okay. But they constantly raised Gavrilovna, referred to examples of outstanding people, and said that she was living wrong.
And that would be all right. But the girls didn’t really distinguish between their own and someone else’s, they would eat the pies off the plate, they would scoop the sugar out of the sugar bowl, they would wash out the soap, they were in no hurry to pay the rent until you reminded it ten times. And this could be tolerated. But they began to manage the garden, not in the sense of weeding and watering - they began to pick what was ripe, and use the gifts of nature without asking. One day we ate the first three cucumbers from a steep manure ridge with salt. Those cucumbers, the first, Gavrilovna, as always, grazed and groomed, knelt down in front of the ridge, onto which in winter she dragged manure in a backpack from the horse yard, putting a coin for it to the old robber, the lame Slyusarenko, talking to them, to the cucumbers: “Well, grow up, grow up, take heart, kids! Then we’ll take you to okro-o-oshechka-oo, to okro-o-oshechka-oo-oo” - and we’ll give them some warm water, under the sun in a heated barrel.
- Why did you eat cucumbers? - Gavrilovna approached the girls.
- What's wrong with that? They ate and ate. It's a pity, isn't it? We'll buy you something at the market!
- I don’t need any information! You really need this!.. For pleasure. And I was saving the cucumbers...
- For myself? You are selfish!
-Who-who?
- Selfish!
- Well, what about you...! - offended by the unfamiliar word, Gavrilovna made the final conclusion and swept the girls out of the apartment.
From then on, she allowed only guys, most often students, into the house to live, and quickly brought them into God's form, taught them how to do housework, wash floors, cook, and do laundry. She even taught two of the smartest guys from the Polytechnic Institute how to cook and how to operate a Russian stove. Gavrilovna allowed Lyudochka to come to her because she recognized in her a village relative who had not yet been spoiled by the city, and she began to feel burdened by loneliness, she would collapse - there was no one to give water, and that she gave a strict warning without leaving the cash register, so how could it be otherwise? Just disband them, the young people of today, give them some slack, they will immediately go crazy and ride you wherever they want.
Lyudochka was an obedient girl, but her studies were a little difficult, the barbering trade, which seemed so simple, was difficult for her, and when the appointed period of study had passed, she was unable to pass the master's degree. She worked as a cleaner at a hair salon and remained on staff, continuing her practice - cutting the heads of pre-conscripts with a clipper, carnally cutting schoolchildren with electric scissors, leaving a ponytail on the bare head above the forehead. She learned to do shaped haircuts “at home”, cutting the hair of the terrible fashionistas from the village of Vepeverze, where Gavrilovna’s house was located, to look like schismatics. She created hairstyles on the heads of fidgety disco girls, like those of foreign hit stars, without charging anything for it.
Gavrilovna, sensing a weakness in the guest’s character, sold all the household chores and all the household chores to the girl. The old woman’s legs were hurting more and more, the veins on her calves stood out, lumpy, black. Lyudochka’s eyes stung as she rubbed the ointment into the mangled legs of the housewife, who was working her last year before retirement. Gavrilovna called Mazi te “bonbeng”, also “mamzin”. The smell from them was so fierce, Gavrilovna’s screams were so heartbreaking that the cockroaches scattered among the neighbors, every single flie died.
- Wow, she’s our little job, wow, she’s such a beauty of a human being, she’s such a bother! - Having calmed down, Gavrilovna spoke out in the darkness. - Look, rejoice, even though you are stupid, you will still become some kind of master... What drove you out of the village?
Lyudochka endured everything: the ridicule of her girlfriends, who had already become masters, and the city’s homelessness, and her loneliness, and the morality of Gavrilovna, who, however, did not hold a grudge, did not drive her away from the apartment, although her stepfather did not bring the promised car of firewood. Moreover, for patience, diligence, for help around the house, for use in illness, Gavrilovna promised to give Lyudochka a permanent residence permit, register the house in her name, if she continued to behave just as modestly, take care of the hut, the yard, bend her back in the garden and he will look after her, the old woman, when she is completely deprived of legs.

From work from the station to the final stop, Lyudochka rode the tram, then walked through the dying Vepeverze park, in human terms - the park of the carriage and locomotive depot, planted in the thirties and destroyed in the fifties. Someone decided to dig a ditch and lay a pipe along it across the entire park. And they dug it up. And they laid it, but, as is usual with us, they forgot to bury the pipe.
A black pipe, with crooked knees, like a snake trampled by cattle, lay in the steamed clay, hissing, steaming, bubbling like a hot mud. Over time, the pipe became covered with soapy mucus and mud, and a hot river flowed along the top, swirling rainbow-poisonous rings of fuel oil and various household items. The trees above the ditch became sick, wilted, and peeled off. Only poplars, gnarled, with burst bark, with horned dry branches on the top, resting their paws of roots on the earth's firmament, grew, littered fluff and in the autumn dropped brittle leaves sprinkled with wood scabies around. A bridge of four blocks was thrown across the ditch. Every year, depot craftsmen attached sides from old platforms to it instead of railings, so that drunken and lame people would not fall into the hot water. The children and grandchildren of the depot craftsmen carefully broke those railings every year.
When the steam locomotives stopped running and the depot building was occupied by new cars - diesel locomotives, the pipe became completely clogged and stopped working, but some hot mess of dirt, fuel oil, and soapy water still flowed down the ditch. The railings to the bridge were no longer erected. Over the years, all kinds of woodland and bad grass crawled to the ditch and grew as he wanted: elderberry, raspberry, willow grass, wolfberry, wild currant that did not bear berries, and everywhere - spreading wormwood, cheerful burdock and thorns. Here and there, this impenetrable tree was pierced by crooked bird cherry trees, two or three willows, one stubborn birch blackened with mold grew, and, receding ten fathoms, politely rustling with their leaves, crooked lindens bloomed in the middle of summer. Newly planted fir trees and pines tried to take root here, but they didn’t get beyond infancy - the trees were cut down for the New Year by the quick-witted residents of the village of Vepeverze, the pine trees were plucked by goats and all sorts of lascivious cattle, just like that, out of boredom, they were broken off by walking hand-to-handers until such to the extent that they had one or two paws left that they couldn’t reach. The park, with its stubbornly standing gate frame and basketball court posts and just posts dug in here and there, completely overwhelmed by the shoots of weedy poplars, looked as if it had been bombed or invaded by undaunted enemy cavalry. There was always a stench here in the park, because puppies, kittens, dead piglets were thrown into the ditch, everything and anything that was unnecessary burdened the house and human life. That’s why the park was always, but especially in winter, black with crows and jackdaws; the raven roar echoed the surroundings, scratching people’s ears like sharp locomotive slag.

Astafiev created the story “Lyudochka” in 1987. The work is written within the framework of village prose (a trend in Russian literature). Depicting all the horrors of the city, Astafiev does not idealize the village itself, showing the moral decline of the peasants.

Main characters

Lyudochka– a young girl who could not survive the violence and indifference of her loved ones and committed suicide.

Stepfather- the husband of Lyudochka’s mother, from an early age he was “in exile and camps,” and avenged the girl.

Other characters

Strekach– a criminal, went to prison more than once.

Artemka-soap- was the “leader” among the “punks” in the park.

Gavrilovna- an elderly woman, a hairdresser, with whom Lyudochka lived.

Lyudochka's mother– woman 45 years old; I was used to dealing with everything myself, so I ignored my daughter’s trouble.

The narrator heard this story “about fifteen years ago.” Lyudochka was born in the village of Vychugan and “grew like withered roadside grass.” The girl's father disappeared long ago. Mother soon began to live with the tractor driver.

After finishing ten classes, Lyudochka left for the city. After spending the night at the station, the girl went to the hairdresser. There she met the old hairdresser Gavrilovna and asked to become her student. Gavrilovna allowed Lyudochka to stay with her, transferring housework to the girl. Lyudochka never learned to become a hairdresser, so she worked part-time as a cleaner in a hairdresser.

The girl got from work through the semi-abandoned park of the carriage and locomotive depot - "Vepeverze". In the center of the park there was a ditch filled with sewage overgrown with dense thickets, in which garbage was floating. The park was a favorite place for the “punks,” among whom the main one was Artemka-soap. Once, when a guy pestered Lyudochka during a haircut, she hit him hard. After that, Artemka forbade everyone from pestering the girl. One day Artemka took Lyudochka to a disco. “In the menagerie pen, people behaved like animals.” Frightened by the noise and “bodily shame,” Lyudochka ran home.

Strekach soon returned to the village from prison. Now he has become the leader of the local punks. One day, when Lyudochka was returning home through the park, Strekach attacked and raped her, and forced the others to rape the girl. Without remembering herself, Lyudochka barely made it home. Gavrilovna assured that nothing bad had happened.

Lyudochka went home. There are two houses left in her native village - one of her mother, and the second of the old woman Vychuganikha, who died in the spring. Lyudochka was met by her pregnant mother. She immediately realized “what trouble had happened to her.” "But through that trouble<…>all women must pass sooner or later.” While walking by the river, Lyudochka saw her stepfather splashing around like a child. The girl guessed that he had no childhood. She wanted to cry to him, maybe he would take pity on her. In the morning Lyudochka returned to the village.

The girl remembered how long she had been in the hospital. A lonely guy was dying next to her. All night she tried to distract him with conversations, but then she realized that the guy expected from her not consolation, but sacrifice. The girl thought about her stepfather: he was probably one of the “strong people”, with a “powerful spirit”.

When Lyudochka was returning from work through the park, the guys again began to crowd her. The girl promised to return, changing into second-hand clothes. At home, Lyudochka put on an old dress, untied the rope from the village bag (this rope had previously been on her cradle) and went to the park. Throwing a rope onto a poplar with a crooked branch with the thought: “no one cares about me,” she hanged herself.

Lyudochka was buried in the city cemetery. The funeral was held at Gavrilovna's. After drinking vodka, Lyudochka’s stepfather went to the park, where Strekach’s company was located at that time. The man tore off the criminal’s cross and, dragging him into the “impassable weeds,” threw him into the gutter. “The guys felt a real, unimaginative godfather.”

Artemka-soap soon went to school and got married. The death of Lyudochka and Strekach was not even written about in the local newspaper, so as “not to spoil the positive percentage with dubious data.”

Conclusion

In the story “Lyudochka,” Viktor Astafiev reflects on the philosophical issues of loneliness in a crowd, people’s indifference to each other, touches on environmental problems, crime, and the moral decline of society.

Story test

Check your memorization of the summary content with the test:

Retelling rating

Average rating: 4.5. Total ratings received: 435.

In the magazine "New World", in the September issue of 1989, Astafiev published his story ("Lyudochka"). Analysis of this work is the topic of this article. The author's photo is presented below.

Problems of the story

This story is about youth, but there is no youth in the characters that Astafiev created. They are all lonely people, suffering somewhere deep within themselves and wandering around the world. These worn-out shadows cast their dark sensations on the souls of readers. In particular, Astafiev’s characters are struck by loneliness, which is constant and eerie in the work. The main character of the story “Lyudochka” (Astafiev) strives to break out of this circle. The problem of the work lies in the clash between the inner and outer world. It can be noted that already the first lines of the story, in which the heroine of the work is compared to the roadside withered grass, suggests that she, like this grass, is not capable of life.

Parents' attitude towards Lyudochka

The attitude of the parents towards Lyudochka is an important point that should be addressed when conducting the analysis. Astafiev (“Lyudochka”) depicts the main character’s relationship with her parents as far from ideal. Lyudochka leaves the house where she spent her childhood. There are also lonely people who are strangers to her. The girl’s mother had long ago become accustomed to the structure of her own life. And the stepfather was indifferent to the main character. Astafiev notes that they simply lived in the same house, and that’s all. The girl felt like a stranger among people.

The problem of mental loneliness

Our society is sick, this is clear to everyone today. But to choose the right treatment, you need to make a correct diagnosis. The best minds in the country are struggling with this, trying to conduct their own analysis. Astafiev (“Lyudochka”) made a very accurate diagnosis for one terrible disease that struck the country. The writer saw the main character of the story in spiritual loneliness. Her image reflected the pain of many of our compatriots. The story “Lyudochka” (Astafiev) is still very relevant today. Its problems are close and familiar to many people living today.

The story created by Astafiev easily fits into the modern one. One of the main features of the author’s talent is the ability to cover problems that concern many writers: the disintegration of the village, the decline of morality, economic mismanagement, the rise of crime. Viktor Petrovich shows us a gray, everyday, ordinary life. In the “home-work-home” circle live Gavrilovna, a woman who lost her health in a hairdresser, and her friends, who take all the blows of fate for granted. And the main character should be in this circle, as our analysis shows. Astafiev (“Lyudochka”) portrays her as by no means an exceptional heroine capable of changing this world. She is forced to exist in difficult conditions and understand that there is no way out.

The tangled fate of Lyudochka

When the main character of the work graduated from 9th grade and became a girl, her mother told her that Lyudochka should go to the city to get settled, since she had nothing to do in the village. The main idea of ​​the story is to depict the complicated fate of a girl who is squeezed by economic constraints (in order to somehow survive in the city, she had to agree to any job), as well as the cruel mores of the city, which are unacceptable for the village. The writer masterfully revealed the character of Lyudochka, as well as the moral problems of his contemporary generation, and analyzed them. Astafiev (“Lyudochka”) was able to speak clearly about many serious things, to evoke compassion and sympathy for the unfair fate of the main character.

Why did Lyudochka commit suicide?

Lyudochka, having arrived home, did not even find proper support from her mother, since she was preoccupied with her own problems. The main character was capable of a desperate act, determined in herself, like everyone else. She was always the first to throw herself into the river as a child. And now, with a noose around her neck, Lyudochka, as in childhood, pushed off with her feet and covered her ears with her palms, as if she had thrown herself into a bottomless and boundless pool from a high-washed shore. On the one hand, the girl decided to solve all her problems in this way, without interfering with anyone, but on the other hand, her determination can be envied. The characterization of Lyudochka Astafiev is very remarkable. The determination of the main character is not characteristic of many young people of our time.

Interconnectedness of destinies

The writer strives to give such an image in the story that the reader has the opportunity not only to see, but also to feel the living current of life in the picture that stands before him. When analyzing Astafiev's story "Lyudochka", it is necessary to note another important point. The plot is not simply and not only a visible event connection, but also something more - a hidden subtextual one, which holds the entire work together with the movement of the author’s thought. In our case, these are thoughts about the interconnectedness of destinies, living in a split, disconnected, but still in one world, on one land. Lyudochka took upon herself the sins of so many: her mother, Strekoch, Gavrilovna, the school, the youth of the town, the Soviet police. This is something that Dostoevsky could not yet agree with - the atonement of someone’s sins by those who do not understand and are innocent. A short life, monotonous, hopeless, indifferent, gray, without love and affection - the tragedy of a girl. Her death is her rise. Only after her death did Lyudochka suddenly become necessary to her mother, Gavrilovna. She was finally noticed. Astafiev’s story is very touching, because the reader can feel how kind-hearted and caring the author is towards this girl.

The tragedy of the "little man"

The tragedy of the “little man” is revealed in this work. Astafiev continues in it one of the most favorite themes in Russian literature of the 19th century. The work describes the fate of one unfortunate village girl who came to the city in search of happiness, but stumbled upon the cruelty and indifference of people. Lyudochka was abused, but the worst thing was not this: the people she loved did not want to understand her. Therefore, the girl committed suicide, not finding moral support in any of them.

Astafiev created the following image of Lyudochka: she is an ordinary Russian girl, of which there are many. Since childhood, the main character was not distinguished by either intelligence or beauty, but she retained in her soul respect for people, mercy, decency and kindness. This girl was weak-willed. That is why Gavrilovna, who sheltered her in the city, blamed all the housework on Lyudochka. The girl did it with pleasure and was not offended by it.

Language features in the story

We are conducting an ideological and artistic analysis of Astafiev's story "Lyudochka". We have described the ideological basis of the work; now we move on to the artistic features of this story.

The writer put a large number of stable phrases and aphorisms into Gavrilovna’s mouth (“killer whale,” “swallow,” “blue-winged little dove,” “my little darling”). With the help of these expressions, the author characterizes the housewife; her individual qualities receive an emotional assessment. The spirit and style of their time are inherited by Astafiev’s heroes. Their speech is not just talk. She is the exponent of all moral and mental forces. One can only applaud the writer for his excellent knowledge of jargon ("homies", "get your claws out", "godfather", "fuck off"). Russian sayings, proverbs and other phrases occupy a significant place among the visual means used by the writer. And this is no coincidence - they contain enormous expressive possibilities: expressiveness, emotionality, a high degree of generalization. The author conveys his worldview to the reader in a flexible, succinct, artistically expressive language. Reading the work “Lyudochka” by Astafiev, one can notice that the accuracy and liveliness characteristic of folk speech give the characters’ speech stable turns (“worked like a horse,” “bend your back,” “got it in your head”). The author's language is colorful, rich, and unique in its melodic sound. In addition to simple personifications (for example, “the village suffocated in wild growth”), he uses many complex ones, filled with metaphors and epithets, creating a separate picture. That’s why the story turned out to be so vivid, rich and unforgettable.

Reception of contrast

Viktor Astafiev (“Lyudochka”) does not focus his attention exclusively on the shadow sides of life. Analysis of the work shows that there is also a bright beginning in it, brightening up many adversities. It comes from the hearts of numerous workers who are not translated into Rus'. I remember the haymaking scene, the episode when the main character and her mother were throwing a haystack, and then Lyudochka washed off the dust and hay dust from herself in her native river with a joy known only to people who have worked to their hearts’ content. The technique of contrast, which Astafiev successfully used here, emphasizes the spiritual closeness with human nature, which is impossible to feel in a city mired in poverty, the darkness of ignorance and complete backwardness.

What is so attractive about the story “Lyudochka” by Astafiev?

This story is attractive because the author, in such a small work, was able to pose a number of important problems to the reader. The writer depicted in a vivid artistic form pictures of the real lives of many people. However, Astafiev's main task was probably to show us all into what abyss we were moving. And if we don’t stop in time, humanity faces complete degeneration. This is precisely the idea that the story “Lyudochka” suggests. Astafiev encourages us to think about the world around us and about our own soul, try to change ourselves, learn to have compassion for our neighbors and love people, see the beauty of this world and try to preserve it. After all, beauty, as we know, will save the world.