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For the first time as a separate book, the most famous work of Chernyshevsky - the novel "What is to be done?" - was published in 1867 in Geneva. The publication of the book was initiated by Russian émigrés; by that time, the novel had been banned by censors in Russia. In 1863, the work still managed to be published in the Sovremennik magazine, but the issues where its individual chapters were printed were soon banned. Summary "What to do?" The youth of those years passed Chernyshevsky to each other by word of mouth, and the novel itself was in handwritten copies, so the work made an indelible impression on them.

Is it possible to do something

The author wrote his sensational novel in the winter of 1862-1863, while in the dungeons of the Peter and Paul Fortress. The dates of writing are December 14-April 4. From January 1863, censors began to work with individual chapters of the manuscript, but, seeing only a love line in the plot, they allowed the novel to be published. Soon the deep meaning of the work reaches the officials of tsarist Russia, the censor is removed from office, but the deed is done - a rare youth circle of those years did not discuss the summary of "What is to be done?" With his work, Chernyshevsky wanted not only to tell Russians about the “new people”, but also to arouse in them a desire to imitate them. And his bold call echoed in the hearts of many of the author's contemporaries.

The youth of the late 19th century transformed Chernyshevsky's ideas into their own lives. Stories about the numerous noble deeds of those years began to appear so often that for some time they became almost commonplace in everyday life. Many suddenly realized that they were capable of an Action.

The presence of a question and a clear answer to it

The main idea of ​​the work, and it is twice revolutionary in its essence, is the freedom of the individual, regardless of gender. That is why the main character of the novel is a woman, since at that time the dominance of women did not go beyond their own living room. Looking back at the life of her mother and close acquaintances, Vera Pavlovna early realizes the absolute mistake of inaction, and decides that her life will be based on work: honest, useful, giving the opportunity to exist with dignity. Hence the moral - the freedom of the individual comes from the freedom to perform actions that correspond to both thoughts and possibilities. This is what he tried to express through the life of Vera Pavlovna Chernyshevsky. "What to do?" chapter by chapter draws readers a colorful picture of the step-by-step construction of "real life." Now Vera Pavlovna leaves her mother and decides to open her own business, now she realizes that only equality between all members of her artel will correspond to her ideals of freedom, her absolute happiness with Kirsanov depends on Lopukhov's personal happiness. interconnected with high moral principles - this is the whole of Chernyshevsky.

Characterization of the author's personality through his heroes

Both writers and readers, as well as omniscient critics, are of the opinion that the main characters of a work are a kind of literary copies of their creators. Even if not exact copies, then they are very close in spirit to the author. The narrative of the novel "What is to be done?" is conducted in the first person, and the author is an acting character. He enters into conversation with other heroes, even argues with them and, like a “voice-over”, explains to both the characters and the readers many moments that they do not understand.

At the same time, the author brings to the reader doubts about his writing abilities, says that "even he speaks the language poorly", and certainly there is not a drop of "artistic talent" in him. But for the reader his doubts are unconvincing, this also refutes the novel, which was created by Chernyshevsky himself, "What is to be done?" Vera Pavlovna and the rest of the characters are so accurately and versatile written out, endowed with such unique individual qualities that an author who does not have true talent would be unable to create.

New but so different

The heroes of Chernyshevsky, these positive "new people", according to the author, from the category of unreal, non-existent, at one fine time should themselves firmly enter our life. Enter, dissolve in the crowd of ordinary people, push them back, reborn someone, persuade someone, and push the rest of the unyielding people out of the crowd, ridding society of them like a field of weeds. The artistic utopia, which Chernyshevsky himself was clearly aware of and tried to define through the name, is "What is to be done?" A special person, in his deep conviction, is able to radically change the world around him, but how to do this, he must determine for himself.

Chernyshevsky created his novel as a counterweight to Turgenev's Fathers and Sons, his “new people” do not at all look like the cynical and annoying nihilist Bazarov, annoying with his peremptory attitude. The cardinality of these images in the implementation of their main task: the hero of Turgenev wanted to “clear a place” around him from everything that had outlived his own, that is, to destroy, while the characters of Chernyshevsky tried more to build something, create something, before destroying it.

Formation of the "new man" in the middle of the 19th century

These two works of great Russian writers became for the readers and the literary community of the second half of the 19th century a kind of beacon - a ray of light in the dark kingdom. Both Chernyshevsky and Turgenev loudly proclaimed the existence of a "new man", his need for the formation of a special mood of society, capable of carrying out cardinal changes in the country.

If you reread and translate the summary "What to do?" Chernyshevsky into the plane of revolutionary ideas that deeply struck the minds of a separate part of the population of those years, then many of the allegorical features of the work will become easily explainable. The image of "the bride of her suitors" seen by Vera Pavlovna in her second dream is nothing more than "Revolution" - this is the conclusion drawn by the writers who lived in different years, who studied and analyzed the novel from all sides. The rest of the images that are narrated in the novel are also marked by allegory, regardless of whether they are animated or not.

A little about the theory of reasonable egoism

The desire for change not only for oneself, not only for one's loved ones, but also for everyone else runs like a red thread through the whole novel. This is completely different from the theory of calculating one's own benefit, which Turgenev reveals in Fathers and Children. In many ways, Chernyshevsky agrees with his fellow writer, believing that any person not only can, but must reasonably calculate and determine his individual path to his own happiness. But at the same time, he says that you can enjoy it only when surrounded by the same happy people. This is the fundamental difference between the plots of the two novels: in Chernyshevsky's heroes forge well-being for everyone, in Turgenev's Bazarov creates his own happiness without looking back at others. The closer we are through our novel Chernyshevsky.

What is to be done ?, the analysis of which we give in our review, is, in the end, much closer to the reader of Turgenev's Fathers and Sons.

Briefly about the plot

As the reader, who has never picked up Chernyshevsky's novel, has already been able to determine, the main character of the work is Vera Pavlovna. Through her life, the formation of her personality, her relationship with others, including men, the author reveals the main idea of ​​his novel. Summary "What to do?" Chernyshevsky without listing the characteristics of the main characters and the details of their lives can be conveyed in several sentences.

Vera Rozalskaya (aka Vera Pavlovna) lives in a fairly well-to-do family, but everything in her own home disgusts her: her mother with her dubious activities, and acquaintances who think one thing, but say and do something completely different. Having decided to leave her parents, our heroine is trying to find a job, but only with her close spirit, Dmitry Lopukhov, gives the girl that freedom and the way of life she dreams of. Vera Pavlovna creates a sewing workshop with equal rights to its income for all seamstresses - a rather progressive undertaking for that time. Even her sudden outbreak of love for her husband's close friend Alexander Kirsanov, which she became convinced of while caring for the sick Lopukhov with Kirsanov, does not deprive her of her sanity and nobility: she does not leave her husband, she does not leave the workshop. Seeing the mutual love of his wife and close friend, Lopukhov, staging a suicide, frees Vera Pavlovna from any obligations to him. Vera Pavlovna and Kirsanov are getting married and are quite happy with this, and a few years later Lopukhov appears again in their lives. But only under a different name and with a new wife. Both families live in the neighborhood, spend a lot of time together and are quite satisfied with the circumstances that have developed in this way.

Does Being Determine Consciousness?

The formation of Vera Pavlovna's personality is far from the regularity of the character traits of those of her peers who grew up and were brought up in conditions similar to her. Despite her youth, lack of experience and connections, the heroine clearly knows what she wants in life. It is not for her to marry successfully and become an ordinary mother of the family, especially since by the age of 14 the girl knew a lot and understood. She sewed beautifully and provided the whole family with clothes, at the age of 16 she began to earn money, giving private piano lessons. The mother's desire to give her in marriage meets with a firm refusal and creates her own business - a sewing workshop. The work "What is to be done?" Is about broken stereotypes, about bold deeds of a strong character. Chernyshevsky, in his own way, provides an explanation for the well-established assertion that consciousness determines the being in which a person is. He determines, but only in the way he decides for himself - either following the path he has chosen not, or finds his own. Vera Pavlovna left the path prepared for her by her mother and the environment in which she lived, and created her own path.

Between the realms of dreams and reality

Determining your path does not mean finding it and walking along it. There is a huge gap between dreams and their embodiment. Someone does not dare to jump over it, but someone gathers all their will into a fist and takes a decisive step. This is how Chernyshevsky responds to the problem raised in his novel What Is to Be Done? The analysis of the stages of the formation of Vera Pavlovna's personality instead of the reader is carried out by the author himself. He leads him through the embodiment of the heroine of her dreams of her own freedom in reality through vigorous activity. Let it be a difficult, but straight and quite passable path. And according to him, Chernyshevsky not only directs his heroine, but also allows her to achieve what she wants, letting the reader understand that only through activity can the cherished goal be achieved. Unfortunately, the author emphasizes that not everyone chooses this path. Not every.

Reflection of reality through dreams

In a rather unusual form, he wrote his novel "What is to be done?" Chernyshevsky. Vera's dreams - there are four of them in the novel - reveal the depth and originality of those thoughts that cause real events in her. In her first dream, she sees herself freed from the basement. This is a kind of symbolism of leaving her own home, where she was destined for an unacceptable fate. Through the idea of ​​liberating girls like her, Vera Pavlovna creates her own workshop, in which each seamstress receives an equal share of her total income.

The second and third dream explain to the reader through real and fantastic dirt, reading Verochka's diary (which, by the way, she never kept) what thoughts about the existence of different people take possession of the heroine at different periods of her life, what she thinks about her second marriage and about the very necessity of this marriage. Explanation through dreams is a convenient form of presentation of the work, which Chernyshevsky chose. "What to do?" - the content of the novel , reflected through dreams, the characters of the main characters in dreams are a worthy example of Chernyshevsky's application of this new form.

Ideals of a bright future, or the Fourth dream of Vera Pavlovna

If the first three dreams of the heroine reflected her attitude to fait accompli, then her fourth dream is dreams of the future. It is enough to recall it in more detail. So, Vera Pavlovna dreams of a completely different world, incredible and beautiful. She sees many happy people living in a wonderful house: luxurious, spacious, surrounded by amazing views, decorated with gushing fountains. In it, no one feels destitute, for all there is one common joy, one common prosperity, in it everyone is equal.

Such are the dreams of Vera Pavlovna, and this is how Chernyshevsky would like to see reality ("What is to be done?"). Dreams, and they, as we remember, about the relationship between reality and the world of dreams, reveal not so much the spiritual world of the heroine as the author of the novel himself. And his full awareness of the impossibility of creating such a reality, a utopia that cannot be accomplished, but for which it is still necessary to live and work. And this is also the fourth dream of Vera Pavlovna.

Utopia and its predictable ending

As everyone knows, their main work is the novel What Is to Be Done? - Nikolai Chernyshevsky wrote while in prison. Deprived of family, society, freedom, seeing reality in dungeons in a completely new way, dreaming of a different reality, the writer set it out on paper, himself not believing in its implementation. Chernyshevsky did not doubt that the "new people" are capable of changing the world. But the fact that under the rule of circumstances not everyone will survive, and not everyone will be worthy of a better life - he also understood that.

How does the novel end? The idyllic coexistence of two close-minded families: the Kirsanovs and the Lopukhovs-Beumont. A small world created by active people full of nobility of thoughts and deeds. Are there many such happy communities around? Not! Is this not the answer to Chernyshevsky's dreams of the future? Whoever wants to create his own prosperous and happy world will create it, whoever does not want to - will go with the flow.

The novel by N. G. Chernyshevsky "What is to be done?" created by him in the chamber of the Peter and Paul Fortress in the period from 12/14/1862 to 04/04/1863. in three and a half months. From January to April 1863, parts of the manuscript were transferred to the commission on the writer's case for censoring. The censorship found nothing reprehensible and allowed the publication. The oversight was soon discovered and the censor Beketov was removed from office, but the novel was already published in the Sovremennik magazine (1863, No. 3-5). The bans on the issues of the magazine did not lead to anything and the book was distributed throughout the country in "samizdat".

In 1905, under Emperor Nicholas II, the ban on publication was lifted, and in 1906 the book was published in a separate edition. The reaction of readers to the novel is interesting, as they are divided in opinions into two camps. Some supported the author, others considered the novel devoid of artistry.

Analysis of the work

1. Socio-political renewal of society through revolution. In the book, the author, due to censorship, could not expand on this topic in more detail. It is given by half-hints in the description of Rakhmetov's life and in the 6th chapter of the novel.

2. Moral and psychological. That a person with the power of his mind is able to create in himself new given moral qualities. The author describes the whole process from small (the fight against despotism in the family) to large-scale, that is, revolution.

3. Women's emancipation, norms of family morality. This topic is revealed in the history of Vera's family, in the relationship of three young people before Lopukhov's alleged suicide, in Vera's first 3 dreams.

4. Future socialist society. This is a dream of a beautiful and bright life, which the author unfolds in the 4th dream of Vera Pavlovna. Here is the vision of lightened labor with the help of technical means, that is, the technogenic development of production.

(Chernyshevsky writes a novel in the chamber of the Peter and Paul Fortress)

The pathos of the novel is the propaganda of the idea of ​​transforming the world through revolution, the preparation of minds and the expectation of it. Moreover, the desire to actively participate in it. The main goal of the work is the development and implementation of a new method of revolutionary education, the creation of a textbook on the formation of a new worldview for every thinking person.

Story line

In the novel, it actually covers the main idea of ​​the work. It was not for nothing that at first even the censors considered the novel nothing more than a love story. The beginning of the work, deliberately entertaining, in the spirit of French novels, aimed to confuse the censorship and, along the way, attract the attention of the majority of the reading public. The plot is based on an uncomplicated love story, which hides the social, philosophical and economic problems of that time. Aesop's narrative language is permeated through and through with the ideas of the coming revolution.

The plot is as follows. There is an ordinary girl Vera Pavlovna Rozalskaya, whom the selfish mother tries in every possible way to pass off as a rich man. Trying to avoid this fate, the girl resorts to the help of her friend Dmitry Lopukhov and enters into a fictitious marriage with him. Thus, she gains freedom and leaves her parents' house. In search of earnings, Vera opens a sewing workshop. This is not an ordinary workshop. There is no hired labor here, women workers have their share of the profits, therefore they are interested in the prosperity of the enterprise.

Vera and Aleksandr Kirsanov are mutually in love. To free his imaginary wife from remorse, Lopukhov fakes a suicide (it is with his description that the whole action begins) and leaves for America. There he acquired a new name, Charles Beaumont, became an agent of an English firm and, fulfilling its assignment, came to Russia to acquire a stearic plant from the industrialist Polozov. Lopukhov at Polozov's house meets his daughter Katya. They fall in love with each other, the affair ends with a wedding. Now Dmitry is announced to the Kirsanov family. Friendship begins with families, they settle in the same house. Around them, a circle of "new people" is formed who want to arrange their own and social life in a new way. Lopukhov-Beumont's wife Ekaterina Vasilievna also joins the business, arranges a new sewing workshop. Such is the happy ending.

main characters

The central character of the novel is Vera Rozalskaya. She is especially sociable, belongs to the type of "honest girls" who are not ready to compromise for a profitable marriage without love. The girl is romantic, but, despite this, she is quite modern, with good administrative inclinations, as they would say today. Therefore, she was able to interest the girls and organize a sewing production and more than one.

Another character in the novel is Dmitry Sergeevich Lopukhov, a student at the Medical Academy. Somewhat closed, prefers loneliness. He is honest, decent and noble. It was these qualities that prompted him to help Vera in her difficult situation. For her sake, he drops out of his last year and begins to engage in private practice. Considered the official husband of Vera Pavlovna, he behaves towards her in the highest degree decent and noble. The apogee of his nobility is his decision to stage his own death in order to allow Kirsanov and Vera, who love each other, to unite their fates. Just like Vera, he refers to the formation of new people. Smart, adventurous. This can be judged if only because the British firm entrusted him with a very serious matter.

Kirsanov Alexander is the husband of Vera Pavlovna, Lopukhov's best friend. He is very impressed by his attitude towards his wife. He not only loves her dearly, but is also looking for something to do for her in which she could fulfill herself. The author feels deep sympathy for him and speaks of him as a courageous person who knows how to carry on to the end the work he has undertaken. At the same time, the person is honest, deeply decent and noble. Not knowing about the true relationship of Vera and Lopukhov, falling in love with Vera Pavlovna, disappears from their house for a long time, so as not to disturb the peace of his loved ones. Only Lopukhov's illness compels him to appear for the treatment of a friend. The fictitious husband, realizing the state of the lovers, imitates his death and makes room for Kirsanov next to Vera. Thus, lovers find happiness in family life.

(In the photo, the artist Karnovich-Valois in the role of Rakhmetov, the play "New People")

A close friend of Dmitry and Alexander, the revolutionary Rakhmetov is the most significant hero of the novel, although little space is allotted to him in the novel. In the ideological outline of the narrative he played a special role and is devoted to a separate digression in chapter 29. The person is extraordinary in all respects. At the age of 16, he left the university for three years and wandered around Russia in search of adventure and character education. This is a person with already formed principles in all spheres of life, in material, physical and spiritual. At the same time, he has an ebullient nature. He sees his future life in serving people and prepares for this, tempering his spirit and body. He even refused his beloved woman, because love can limit his actions. He would like to live like most people, but he cannot afford it.

In Russian literature, Rakhmetov became the first practical revolutionary. Opinions about him were completely opposite, from indignation to admiration. This is the ideal image of a revolutionary hero. But today, from the standpoint of knowledge of history, such a person could only arouse sympathy, since we know how accurately history has proved the truth of the words of the Emperor of France Napoleon Bonaparte: "Revolutions are conceived by heroes, performed by fools, and scoundrels use its fruits." Perhaps the voiced opinion does not quite fit into the framework of the image and characteristics of Rakhmetov formed for decades, but this is really so. The above does not in the least detract from the qualities of Rakhmetov, because he is a hero of his time.

According to Chernyshevsky, using the example of Vera, Lopukhov and Kirsanov, he wanted to show ordinary people of the new generation, of whom there are thousands. But without the image of Rakhmetov, the reader could have a deceptive opinion about the main characters of the novel. According to the writer, all people should be like these three heroes, but the highest ideal that all people should strive for is the image of Rakhmetov. And with this I completely agree.

NIKOL AY GAVRILOVICH CHERNYSHEVSKY-ROMANIST AND RUSSIAN DEMOCRATIC BELELETRICS OF THE 60S

The development of Russian realism in the 60s and 80s took place under the sign of the formation of a "sociological" (or social) trend, which replaced the "psychological" trend in the Russian literary and historical process. In Russian literary science, this conditional typological differentiation of concepts has been fixed, indicating the difference in the divine principles of embodiment in a literary work of the relationship between personality and environment. In this current, it is customary to single out the line, conventionally designated as social and ethical, in the direction of which the creativity of L. Tolstoy and F. Dostoevsky proceeded, and the revolutionary democratic (or educational), which gave the Russian literature the schools of Chernyshevsky, Nekrasov, Saltykov-Shchedrin.

Chernyshevsky went down in the history of Russian literature primarily as the author of the novel "What is to be done?" The traditions of Chernyshevsky as a novelist were most consistently embodied in the democratic literature of the 60s and 80s of the 19th century, which consolidated in its artistic practice the discovery in the field of psychology research of “new” people from the common community, who became the heroes of the novel What Is to Be Done?

The creation of the novel was preceded by a significant stage in the spiritual development of N.G. Chernyshevsky, reflected in his journalistic and literary critical activities, which was associated with the journal "Contemporary". As a leading literary critic of the magazine (1853-1862), Chernyshevsky defended his dissertation for a master's degree in Russian literature ("Aesthetic relations of art to reality") in 1855, in which he acts as the successor to V.G. Belinsky, completing the work begun by the critic on the theoretical substantiation of realism, the problems of the nationality of art. The main subject of research in Chernyshevsky's dissertation was the central question of aesthetics - the relationship of art to reality. The critic formulates the main aspects of the relationship between art and life: philosophical and epistemological (“the reproduction of life is a common characteristic feature of art”, art is a “textbook of life”) and socio-axiological (“works of art have another meaning - explanations of life ... and the sentence about the phenomena of life "). These aesthetic principles formed the basis of the theory

critical realism, provided a methodological key for the scientific forecasting of the development of Russian literature.

Following the logic of the outlined principles of approach to art, Chernyshevsky formulated the aesthetic ideal of the beautiful, according to the concepts of “common people” (life “in contentment with a lot of work, which, however, does not come to exhaustion”), gave a characteristic of the revolutionary democratic interpretation of this ideal, providing for satisfaction material, mental and moral needs of man: "noble aspirations for everything high and beautiful, science recognizes in man as essential as the need to eat and drink." For the first time in Chernyshevsky's aesthetics, the socialist ideal of man as a comprehensively developed personality was proclaimed.

Asserting that "practical life embraces not only material, but also mental and moral human activity," Chernyshevsky thereby expands the sphere of manifestation of lofty acts. According to Chernyshevsky, they can be performed not only by selected individuals, but also by representatives of the masses (“And there were always, everywhere, thousands of people, whose whole life was a continuous series of lofty feelings and deeds ... it depends on the person himself to what extent his life is filled beautiful and great. "In his literary-critical works, Chernyshevsky substantiates the program of the activity of a positively beautiful person. Thus, in the review" A Russian Man on Rendez-vous "(1858), dedicated to Turgenev's story" Asya ", the critic recreates the image of a hero of the new era, painting him as a public figure whose words do not diverge from deeds. The new hero, in his opinion, will not come from among the Enlightened aristocratic intelligentsia, who have lost their civic positions, but from among the democratic youth who will find effective ways of rapprochement with the people: the article “Not is the beginning of change? "(1861),

In a review of "Childhood and Adolescence" and war stories. L. Tolstoy "(1856) Chernyshevsky expresses his opinion about the originality of the talent of the young writer who came to literature. Considering the features of Tolstoy's psychological analysis, he points out that most of all Count Tolstoy is concerned with "the mental process itself, its forms, its laws, the dialectic of the soul, in order to be expressed in a definitive term." In the same article, Chernyshevsky draws the readers' attention to the fact that Tolstoy's work is marked by a keen interest in the "moral side" of the phenomena of reality, in socio-ethical problems.

Affirming the necessity of expressing the heroic in literature, Chernyshevsky persistently pursued the idea that at this historical stage in the development of literature, the most fruitful path is the "Gogolian trend," a trend predominantly critical. In his work "Essays on the Gogol Period of Russian Literature" (1855-1856), he develops the theory of realistic art, arguing that his further path is a creative synthesis of life, politics, science and poetry. Chernyshevsky's aesthetic attitudes will be embodied in the novel What Is to Be Done? (1863), which was written by him in the Alekseevsky ravelin of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

The artistic method of Chernyshevsky the novelist

In a letter to N. Nekrasov dated November 5, 1856, Chernyshevsky wrote that he pinned special hopes on him as a poet, in whose work the “poetry of the heart” was harmoniously combined with the “poetry of thought” and that “the poetry of the heart has the same rights as and the poetry of thought. " Time has confirmed Chernyshevsky's forecast regarding Nekrasov, who opened a new page in the history of Russian poetry. Chernyshevsky himself artistically embodied the principles outlined by him in the novel "What is to be done?" In it, the author concretized the concept of "poetry of thought", understanding by this the poeticization of natural science, political, socialist ideas, acting in this case as an ideological supporter of A. Herzen. At the same time, the poetry of the heart engages the author no less: acting as the heir to the traditions of the Russian novel (first of all, the novel by I. Turgenev), Chernyshevsky rethinks it and presents this side of the life of his heroes in the light of the theory of “reasonable egoism” - ethics “ new "people, heroes of the new time.

In this case, the intellectual, rationalistic principle becomes poetic content and takes on an art form corresponding to it. The aesthetic substantiation of the new type of artistic thinking is associated with the name of V. Belinsky, who wrote in his article "A Look at Russian Literature of 1847": "Now the very limits of the novel and the story have expanded," talent ", when" the thought element ... has merged even with the artistic one. "

Author of "What is to be done?" begins the story with an explanation of the special aesthetic position of the narrator, who discusses his artistic tastes and concludes the dialogue with the “discerning” reader by admitting that he “does not have a shadow of artistic 370

Ayaznta ". This statement contains a clear allusion to the closeness of the narrative manner of the novel to the works of A. Herzen, noting the peculiarities of the style of which Belinsky wrote: “The power of thought is the main force of his talent; the artistic manner of correctly grasping the phenomena of reality is a secondary, auxiliary force of his talent "(" A Look at Russian Literature of 1847. This Article ").

Indeed, in the novel "What is to be done?" scientific and sociological thought organizes the structure of the work, determines the features of its plot-compositional structure, the system of images of the work, and stimulates the reader's aesthetic experiences. Having made philosophical and sociological thought a genre motivation for the work, Chernyshevsky thereby expanded the idea of ​​\ u200b \ u200bthe artistry of a work of realistic art.

"What to do?"

The studies devoted to the novel contain a significant number of versions explaining its complex architectonics. Attention was drawn to the "internal structure" of the work according to the "four belts", to the "double plot" (family-psychological and "secret", Aesopian), "multi-stage" and "cyclical" series of closed plots (stories and chapters). Attempts have been made to prove that the peculiarity of the structure of the novel lies in the fact that the front ends are "a set of stories" united by the author's analysis of the social ideal and ethics of "new people".

Indeed, in the plot lines of the novel, one can note the adherence to certain traditions that were embodied in the works of Russian writers of the middle of the century. This is the motive of the girl's suffering in her own family, alien to her in spirit, and a meeting with a man of high civic ideals ("Rudin", "On the Eve", "Break"), the situation of a love triangle, from which a woman finds a way out ("Noble Nest", " Thunderstorm"). However, the nature of the combination of genetically derived schemes of the novel's situations demonstrates the author's innovative approach to solving the problem. The novel "What is to be done?" for all the apparent mosaicism of the construction, it has a continuous narrative line. This is a story about the formation of a young generation of builders of a new life. Therefore, the story of Vera Pavlovna's life naturally (sometimes even contrary to traditional ideas about the "main" and "secondary" characters) includes stories about Dmitry Lopukhov and Alexander Kirsanov, Katya Polozova and Nastya Kryukova, Rakhmetov.

Originality of the genre novel consists in combining three content-structural elements in it: a description of the intimate and family life of the heroes, an analysis of the process of mastering a new ideology and morality, and the characteristics of ways of realizing ideals in reality.

l The function of the author-narrator also gives artistic unity to the novel.

Chernyshevsky goes into conversation with a variety of readers. This is evidenced by the wide range of intonation tools used by the narrator, which include and irony, and mockery, and sarcasm, and pathos. Ironically, words are sometimes heard that characterize the level of moral development of the "good" reading "public", still "illegible and slow-witted", which the novelist will have to win over to his side. Chernyshevsky uses the technique of a literary mask, veiling his own point of view in this way. With tendencies ".

A special role in the structure of the novel belongs to Vera Pavlovna's “dreams”, which cannot be regarded as out-of-plot “inserts” necessary to mask revolutionary and socialist ideas. "Dreams" by Vera Pavlovna are an interpretation of the key elements of the event plot. In the first two dreams, Vera Pavlovna's relationship with the "vulgar people" of the old world is completed and her transition to the "society of pure people" is traced. The third dream psychologically substantiates the plot about the second marriage of the heroine, and the fourth presents the spiritual world of the developed personality of Vera Pavlovna and creates an image of a beautiful future.

The fourth dream of Vera Pavlovna plays an especially important role in the artistic structure of the novel. It was in this dream that the qualitatively new facet of the realistic method of Chernyshevsky the novelist, who included “idyllic” pictures of a bright future, was most clearly manifested in his work. Based on the experience of the works of utopian socialists, in a special author's digression, the author asserts that “sheer nonsense that the idyll is inaccessible; it is not only a good thing for almost all people, but also possible, very possible. " Several years earlier, Chernyshevsky substantiated the "idyllic" poetics of the future novel, characterizing the features of the works of the utopian socialists; “... the first manifestations of new social aspirations always have the character of enthusiasm, dreaminess, so that they are more like poetry than serious science. "

Note that Chernyshevsky departs from the "canon" adopted in utopian novels and conveys the function of narrating about the future heroine. The change in the “subject” of the narrative is a significant fact: Vera Pavlovna's “dream” is, first of all, the result of the “processing” of the experiences experienced by the individual psyche, therefore it characterizes the heroine's self-awareness at a certain stage of her life. Chernyshevsky was aware that the "idyllic" image of the coming communism created in the novel could not be the fruit of pure fantasy, she "was not able to create for her paintings not a single element, except for those given to her by reality."

One of the vivid images of "sleep" is the "crystal palace" in which people of the future live. His image goes back to the survey of "Paxton's Palace", compiled by Chernyshevsky in 1854 and published in the August issue of "Notes of the Fatherland" (the area described in it is called Seidengam, and in the novel Seidengam). This palace was built in London's Gaid Park for the 1851 World's Fair, and then reopened three years later at Seidengem. From this description subsequently and

the poetics of the fourth "dream" of Vera Pavlovna is being formed. Such details of the image as "huge, magnificent halls" capable of accommodating a huge number of people during lunch and rest hours, greenhouses, glass, orchestras, magnificent table setting - all these "fantastic" elements of the life of ordinary people who know how to work and enjoy, undoubtedly, go back to the description of the real celebration of the opening of the Crystal Palace.

Between Vera Pavlovna's "dream" and the magazine review, there is a similarity of a different order. We can talk about the coincidence of the compositional methods of unfolding the image of the history of mankind in both descriptions. In the description of the Crystal Palace, the reader got acquainted with the museum expositions of the Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Byzantine and so on chambers, the exhibits of which reflected the milestones in the history of mankind. In the novel, the movement of time in the understanding of the heroine is presented as a movement from the era, the symbol of which was the Phoenician goddess Astarte (a slave woman), to the image of the Greek Aphrodite (queen-half-slave), to be replaced by the goddess of the Middle Ages - grieving Integrity, etc.

It should be noted the important role of poetic inclusions in "sleep". They serve several functions. They can be viewed as a lyrical version of the main theme of the novel - the theme of liberation, which sounded in the journalistic digressions of the author-narrator. Poetic inserts introduce into the novel the motive of an “inspired poet” who sings a hymn to the sun, light, and love. Interestingly, Vera Pavlovna's fourth dream is preceded by lines from A. Koltsov's "Russian Song" quoted by Chernyshevsky from memory, which at the very beginning of the chapter "pick up" lines from Goethe's May Song and Schiller's poem "Four Centuries". The symbolism of the unification of poets in the heroine's dream is unconditional: Chernyshevsky "erases" the temporal and stylistic difference in the manners of each of the poets, thereby indicating the timeless nature of man's striving for freedom. At the same time, it can be assumed that in this way Chernyshevsky points to the "sources" of the moral state of the heroine, brought up on the educational ideas of Goethe, the romantic pathos of Schiller's poetry, the national poetry of Koltsov and Nekrasov.

Thus, the "utopia" of Chernyshevsky, created in the dream of Vera Pavlovna, is not the fruit of pure fiction of the author, just as the image of the heroine's workshop cannot be called the creation of the author's fantasy. artels of translators and binders, household - 374

0btx communes), which set themselves the goal of forming the public consciousness of the common people. In the novel itself, the fourth dream is compositionally located between the story of two workshops - Vera Pavlovna and Mertsalova - and immediately precedes the message about the construction of a new workshop and hopes that “in two years, instead of two sewing ones, there will be four, five, and there will soon be ten, and twenty ". But if for Chernyshevsky and his associates the communes were a sign of the future and their appearance inspired hope for the accomplishment of a social revolution, for such writers as F. Dostoevsky, N. Leskov, they were alien phenomena of Russian life. In "Crime and Punishment" F. Dostoevsky ridiculed the ideas of the commune, embodying his negative attitude towards them in the image of the morally unscrupulous Lebezyatnikov, and N. Leskov devoted his novel "Nowhere" to exposing the insolvency of the socialist "hostel", tracing the tragedy of people with pure souls - Liza Bakhareva, Reiner, who tied themselves to the "new" people.

In his novel, Chernyshevsky introduced the reader to different types of “new people”, continuing the series begun by Bazarov Turgenev. - Tsalov) and "special" (Rakhmetov). However, the image of Rakhmetov in the plot of the novel is motivated socially and psychologically: the need for change is ripe in society, so it has given rise to a new breed of man. Rakhmetov is almost devoid of individuality (a short biography of the hero, "breaking out" from his environment, is more a means of typification, rather than individualization of the hero). Grotesque is one of the central episodes, memorable to the reader, with the bed, studded with nails, the "romantic story" with the young widow is exaggerated. It is curious that the love story about Rakhmetov becomes known to the reader from the words of Kirsanov, who gives an appropriate assessment of his friend's behavior on "rendez-vous". This is a significant fact of the novel: it reflects Chernyshevsky's conviction that there is no insurmountable border between "ordinary" and "special" people. It is no coincidence that the author "trusts" Rakhmetov to explain Lopukhov's act and hand over a note from him to Vera Pavlovna. Chernyshevsky does not show a “special” hero in the field of practical activity, as happens by “ordinary” people who conduct educational work among the people: Lopukhova and Mertsalova - with the girls in the workshop, Lopukhov - with students and factory workers. Imagining the personality traits of a professional

revolutionary, Chernyshevsky experienced some difficulties in to specifically portray Rakhmetov's “underground” activities. Apparently, it can be explain by the fact that the image of Rakhmetov is known # degree "limited" its "feature": in case of victory or doomAffairsHe mustassimilate with "ordinary" people, accepting themimagelife. The second of named options and is being considered democratic fiction of the 60-70s, in which a complex public resulting situation collapse of hopes of an ambulance peasant revolution.

The plot and compositional side of the novel "What is to be done?" has long attracted researchers with its magnificent and complex architectonics. They tried to explain this complexity from different positions. Attention was drawn to the "internal structure" of the work (in four belts: vulgar people, new people, higher people and dreams), "double plot" (family-psychological and "secret", "Aesopian"), "multistage" and "cyclicality" a series of closed plots (stories, chapters), "a set of stories", united by the author's analysis of the social ideal and ethics of new people. The genesis of the plot lines of the novel, in many ways representing the contamination of several plots traditional for Russian literature of the middle of the century, carried out in the creative practice of I.S.Turgenev, I.A. alien to her in spirit, and a meeting with a man of high aspirations; a plot about the position of a married woman and a family conflict, known as the "triangle"; plot of a biographical story). one

All these interesting observations help to comprehend the process of the formation of Chernyshevsky's novel on the path of cyclization of stories and novellas, to genetically reconstruct the typological genealogy of a number of its plot positions. Without them, the literary innovation of Chernyshevsky the novelist will look unconvincing. However, the genetic approach sometimes pushed to the background the clarification of the nature of the qualitatively new plot situations “What is to be done?”, And the excessive “anatomy” of the work into a number of “closed”, “plug-in” plots hardly helped to reveal its plot-compositional integrity and solidity. Apparently, it is more expedient to talk not about "closed" plots and "double" centers, but about new and interconnected plot situations, integrated into a single artistic structure of the novel.

It contains a cross-cutting story of the formation of the young generation of builders of a new life that runs through the entire work, capturing its social, ethical-philosophical and moral-psychological aspects. In the narrative about the life of Vera Pavlovna, naturally and logically (sometimes even contrary to the traditional ideas about the main, secondary and "inserted" characters), there are stories about Dmitry Lopukhov and Alexander Kirsanov, Katya Polozova and Nastya Kryukova, Rakhmetov and the young widow he saved, "the lady in mourning ”and“ a man of about thirty ”, which appeared in the chapter“ Change of scenery ”. And this happened because the story of the formation and fate of a new woman absorbed not only the intimate and love experiences of the heroine, but also the whole process of her involvement in the great cause of restructuring the social, family, legal and moral and ethical foundations of society. The dream of personal happiness naturally grew into the socialist dream of the happiness of all people.

Structural unity "What is to be done?" is carried out primarily in the subjective form of manifestation of the author's position, when the image of the author-narrator is introduced into the novel. A wide range of intonation and stylistic means of the narrator, including good nature and frankness, mystification and insolence, irony and ridicule, sarcasm and contempt, gives reason to speak of Chernyshevsky's intention to create in this image the impression of a literary mask, designed to effect the author's influence on the heterogeneous readers of the book: “noble "The reader (friend), the" discerning "reader (the enemy) and that" kind "reading" public ", still" illegible and slow-witted ", which the novelist will have to win over to his side. Seeming at first glance "scissors" between the real author and the narrator, who does not have "not a shadow of artistic talent" (third section of the "Preface"), become less noticeable in the course of further narration. It is noteworthy that such a polysemantic stylistic manner, in which the serious was interspersed with joke and irony, was typical in general for Chernyshevsky, who loved to mystify the interlocutor even in everyday life.

Chernyshevsky and in other works written in the Peter and Paul Fortress, seeks to create the impression of objectivity of the narrative by introducing a narrator with a liberal orientation ("Alferyev") or even several narrators ("Tale in a Tale"). This manner will be typical for some works about “new people” by other authors (I. Kushchevsky, “Nikolai Negorev, or the Prosperous Russian”; A. Osipovich-Novodvorsky, “An Episode from the Life of Neither Pea nor Crow”, 1877). However, in "What is to be done?" the functions of a conservative interlocutor are transferred to the “discerning reader,” personifying the reactionary principle both politically, morally, ethically and aesthetically. In relation to him, the narrator acts as an antagonist and irreconcilable polemicist. Compositionally, they are firmly "tied to each other" (XI, 263).

The call to devote oneself to the revolution, the glorification of the revolutionary - the "engine of the engines" of social progress, the socio-economic substantiation of the behavior and character of people, the propaganda of materialism and socialism, the struggle for women's equality, the establishment of new moral and ethical norms of human behavior - this is far from a complete complex of social political and philosophical and moral problems that worried the author-storyteller in conversations with a reader who still has so much "confusion and nonsense in his head." Formulated in lyrical digressions, conversations and polemics with the "discerning reader", the author's "intervention" becomes a structural and organizing factor in the narrative. And here the author-storyteller himself substantiates the “main requirements of artistry”, new principles of plot formation, “without any tricks”, “mystery”, “showiness” and “embellishment”. The novelist's creative laboratory opens up before readers when, in the narrator's digressions, he gets acquainted with the new principles of materialistic aesthetics that underlie the novel, with reflections on the relationship between fiction and life material, on different concepts of plot and composition, on outdated definitions of the main and secondary characters, etc. Thus, in the presence of the reader, a new poetics, an original artistic structure of a socio-philosophical novel was formed.

Let us consider how other forms of genre structural unity are realized in the novel "What is to be done?"

From the plot and compositional side, all the meetings of the heroine with other characters (including Rakhmetov and the "lady in mourning") are interconnected and are part of a cross-cutting event plot in which the "personal" and ideological are in indissoluble artistic unity. To be convinced of this, it is necessary to abandon the outdated and misleading habit of viewing Vera Pavlovna's “dreams” as out-of-plot “inserts” and “episodes” needed only to mask dangerous revolutionary and socialist ideas.

"Dreams" by Vera Pavlovna represent an unusually bold artistic interpretation of the event plot at the key, critical stages of the heroine's spiritual life and are realized in two varieties. In one case, these are artistic and symbolic paintings, affirming the typological unity and interconnection of the heroine's personal liberation and the liberation of all girls in general from the "basement" ("Vera's first dream"), female emancipation and social renewal of all mankind ("The fourth dream of Vera Pavlovna"); in the other - a retrospective and extremely "compressed" presentation of events that influenced the perception of the world and the psychology of the heroine and predetermined new plot twists. It is through "The Second Dream of Vera Pavlovna" that the reader learns about the disputes in the Lopukhov circle about the natural science works of the German chemist Liebig (about the different growing conditions of a wheat ear, about the importance of drainage work), philosophical discussions about the real and fantastic desires of people, about the laws of historical progress and the American Civil War. At her home youth “university” Vera Pavlovna, having assimilated the idea that “life has work as its main element,” decided to organize a labor partnership of a new type.

Both varieties are artistically convincing and original because psychological impressions of people who are in a state of dream are used here (reflection of real events, conversations and impressions in fantastic grotesque images or in overlapping paintings, fancifully shifting the temporal and spatial boundaries of real "primary sources") ... Natural in the complex of dreams of the heroine are the symbolic images of the "Bride of her suitors", which first arose as a bold artistic allegory of the revolution in a conversation between Lopukhov and Vera Pavlovna during a quadrille (IV section of the first chapter), and her younger sister - "The Bright Beauty", personifying Love Equality ("The Third Dream of Vera Pavlovna", the first part of her "Fourth Dream"). It is noteworthy that it is precisely in these summit plot moments that the structural unity of the novel, the relationship between the personal and the public, love and revolutionary activity, was especially clearly manifested.

Thus, the story of Vera Pavlovna's first and second marriages, about the love and happiness of a young woman, goes in sync with the story of her spiritual development, crowned with the organization of a labor commune and its leadership and the recognition of the sacredness of revolutionary feat. "Forget what I told you, Sasha, listen to her!" (XI, 335) - she whispers excitedly to her husband, shocked by the fate of the "lady in mourning" and her fiery appeals:

My darling, bolder

Trust in fate!

And even earlier, Rakhmetov will give her a lesson in humanity, moral fortitude and loyalty to social ideals (see XI, 210–223), who, from that memorable visit to her, unexpectedly for the reader, but naturally for the author and his heroine, the central character of the novel.

This is how Chernyshevsky's book about love, socialism and revolution was created.

Drawing on traditional plot situations, contaminating and rethinking them, the author of "What is to be done?" in his artistic decisions, in fact, he laid the foundations for a new plot-compositional construction, which would later be used in other works about “new people”. This includes a fundamentally new solution to the hero's situation on "rendez-vous", which Chernyshevsky's predecessors (for example, Turgenev) interpreted as an impracticable opportunity for a thoughtful and seeking girl to find her happiness through meeting a man of lofty aspirations.

Chernyshevsky was optimistic about the possibility of an ideological "conversion" of a woman under the influence of a man with concepts and views unusual for people in her circle. Even women from privileged circles of society found themselves in the sphere of such a spiritual revival (Katerina Vasilievna Polozova, a young widow rescued by Rakhmetov). But the author undoubtedly saw the main reserve in replenishing the ranks of "new people" in the female democratic environment, even envisaging the possibility of a moral revival of the so-called "fallen woman" (Nastya Kryukova). The description of the relationship between Lopukhov and Vera Rozalskaya translated the traditional "rendez-vous" plot situation into a new plot version of the "conversion". The ideological and moral-ethical influence on the consciousness of the heroine was carried out through Lopukhov's educational conversations, reading the books recommended by him, social-philosophical discussions taking place in the “society of pure people”. Plot-organizing factors in the history of Vera Pavlovna and Lopukhov, in its, so to speak, internal justification were the new moral and ethical views of the heroes (the theory of "reasonable egoism"), and in the external, event-driven manifestation - a fictitious marriage, which then became valid.

The “selfishness” of the characters in “What is to be done?”, Their “theory of calculating benefits” “reveals the true motives of life” (XI, 66). He is intelligent because he is subordinate to their natural striving for happiness and goodness. The personal benefit of a person must correspond to the general human interest, which Chernyshevsky identified with the interest of the working people. There is no lonely happiness, the happiness of one person depends on the happiness of other people, on the general welfare of society. That is why Lopukhov frees Vera from domestic oppression and forced marriage, and Kirsanov cures Katya Polozova and helps her free herself from the illusion of “happiness” with Zhan Solovtsov, a contender for her huge inheritance.

The new moral and ethical doctrine, which in a new way regulates the personal and social relationships of people, thus underlies the plot situations unusual for the literature of the middle of the century. This doctrine also determines the optimistic outcome of the tangled "triangle" (the love of a married woman for her husband's friend), over the solution of which literature fought so unsuccessfully. Convinced that Vera Pavlovna loves Kirsanov, Lopukhov "leaves the stage." Subsequently, about his deed, he will write: "What a great pleasure - to feel yourself acting like a noble person ..." (XI, 236).

The plot situation of the "new conversion" incorporated a whole complex of ideas of the novelist, including the process of forming a new person - a socialist, and the implementation of the idea of ​​women's emancipation, and the formation of a morally healthy family. Various versions of it were artistically tested by Chernyshevsky in the story "Alferyev" (the hero's relationship with Serafima Antonovna Chekmazova is a negative version; with Lisa Dyatlova - an example of comradely norms in relations between a man and a woman, incomprehensible and suspicious for the older generation), in "Tales in a Story" (the story of Lizaveta Sergeevna Krylova), in the "Prologue" (Nivelzin and Lidia Vasilievna Savelova, Levitsky and Anyuta, Levitsky and Mary), in the "Story of a girl" (Liza Svilina).

In the fiction about “new people”, the situation of the hero on “rendez-vous” in her new interpretation of the “new conversion” will be artistically presented in two typological solutions, coming from Turgenev and Goncharov, in one case, and from Chernyshevsky in the other. The Bazarov-Volokhov typological "model" (Evgeny Bazarov - Odintsova, Mark Volokhov - Vera), testifying to the difficulties of "converting" (complicated by the theory of "freedom of passions"), is seen in few novels. Of these, the works of 1879 stand out: N. Arnoldi ("Vasilisa") and O. Shapir ("One of the many"). The first of them tells the tragic story of Vasilisa Nikolaevna Zagorskaya, who courageously broke with the aristocratic environment, but failed to organically merge with the revolutionary environment and accept the new ideals of the Russian political émigré Sergei Borisov. A long and complex novel of a “new” man and a woman who came out of privileged circles (Mikhail Nezhinsky and Eva Arkadyevna Simborskaya), in the work of O. Shapir, also ends with the heroine's suicide.

The second version of the "conversion", coming from "What is to be done?", Was artistically refracted in a much larger group of works. Among them are "Difficult Time" by V. Sleptsov (Maria Nikolaevna Shchetinina - Ryazanov), "Step by Step" by I. Omulevsky (Lizaveta Mikhailovna Prozorova - Svetlov), "Roman" by A. Osipovich-Novodvorsky (Natalia Kirikova - Alyosha), " Andrey Kozhukhov "S. Stepnyak-Kravchinsky (Tanya Repina - Kozhukhov) and others. By the beginning of the new century, this process becomes common and widespread. In social democratic organizations, it has become common for girls to leave their privileged position in society. The ideas of socialism entered the minds of Natasha, Sasha, Sophia and Lyudmila (M. Gorky's story "Mother"), and they, in turn, pass them on to the working youth.

In the novel "What is to be done?" the differentiation of "new people" is clearly traced. It turned out to be extremely stable in the artistic practice of democratic literature for at least two decades.

Chernyshevsky's contemporaries understood very well the creative difficulties in depicting a new type of contemporary figure. “We generally think that a modern young man cannot be chosen as a hero of the novel,” writes S. S. Rymarenko, a landowner, in a handwritten lecture on I. S. Turgenev’s novel Fathers and Sons in the spring of 1862. action is more subject to the jurisdiction of the III Department, rather than the artist of modern society. I think comments here are a superfluous matter, everyone understands what I want to say without them. " Rymarenko foresees only two possibilities for the writer: “One of two things - either talk about him in obscurity, or portray him in a completely different light against the present. Both are unenviable. " 2

Chernyshevsky followed the path of differentiating “new people” into “ordinary” (Lopukhov, Kirsanov, Vera Pavlovna, Mertsalov, Polozova) and “special” (Rakhmetov), ​​filling these concepts with a deep social and ideological meaning, while maintaining a high level of artistic impressionability. The conditional allocation of two types in the system of positive characters has its own philosophical and socio-historical grounds. Especially often mentioned in this connection is the influence of Chernyshevsky's philosophical and anthropological ideas when singling out “extraordinary people” into a “special breed” as having the right to this isolation due to the innate properties of their individual “nature”. This is the influence of anthropologism on the artistic method of the author "What is to be done?" it is often exaggerated, some critics of the novel with this approach tendentiously note in the image of Rakhmetov even "duality", "straightforwardness", "schematism" and other "shortcomings" and deviations from realism. Incorrect accents in defining the worldview, anthropological and artistic and aesthetic aspects in the typological structure of the “new people” are largely explained by the ignorance of the relationship between the novel and the revolutionary reality of the 1960s, on the one hand, and the underestimation of the artistic and logical means of complex recreation of the image of an intellectual figure - with another. The "circumstances" of life, social being, and not biologically given properties of human nature, determine the behavior and morality of "new people" - both "special" and "ordinary".

Differentiation of heroes "What is to be done?" is confirmed by the practice of "landowners" figures, which provides, in addition to organizing "underground", according to the name of the time, society, also forms of legal influence on social strata, to which, for example, one of the memoirists (M.N. Sleptsova) referred to "the publication of popular books , organization of reading rooms with very cheap fees, organization of a network of Sunday schools ”. 3

The author's foresight of Chernyshevsky lies in the fact that, having sensitively grasped these two aspects of social activity in life, he “transferred” them to the level of artistic typology. However, the novelist did not oppose “special people” to “ordinary people”, leaders of the revolutionary underground to ordinary leaders of the liberation movement, but outlined the dialectical relationship between them, introducing the images of “a lady in mourning” and “a man of about thirty” as a transitional link. In the future, the democratic literature of the 60-70s. will reflect the expansion of the relationship between the "exceptional" and the "ordinary", which will be observed in the history of several generations of revolutionary fighters.

In the sphere of activity of "ordinary" people, Chernyshevsky included legal educational work in Sunday schools (teaching Kirsanov and Mertsalov in a collective of workers of a sewing workshop), among the advanced part of the student body (Lopukhov could spend hours talking with students), at factory enterprises (classes in a factory office for Lopukhova - one of the ways to "influence the people of the whole plant" - XI, 193), in the scientific field. The name of Kirsanov is associated with a scientific and medical plot of the collision of a common doctor with the "aces" of a private St. Petersburg practice - in the episode of Katya Polozova's treatment; his experiments on the artificial production of albumen are hailed by Lopukhov as "a complete revolution of the whole question of food, of the entire life of mankind" (XI, 180).

But most of all, the readers of the novel were worried about the legendary figure of a "special" person. Under the conditions of the first revolutionary situation, the selection of "special people" - revolutionaries from among the new heroes, the recognition of their central position in the general arrangement of the novel's characters was undoubtedly a civil and creative feat of the writer. Despite the fact that the writer did not have the opportunity to tell in detail about those aspects of life in which Rakhmanov (the original surname of Rakhmetov in the draft of the novel) was the "protagonist" (XI, 729), he still managed to recreate the moral and psychological appearance of a professional revolutionary, to acquaint with his social, ideological and moral ideas, to trace the paths and conditions of the formation of a new hero of our time, even to hint at some specific aspects of his practical activities.

Of course, all this is achieved by special ways of artistic generalization, in which historically specific names and events disappear, and allegorical means serve as additional creative finds to recreate the mysterious “underground” activity of the Rakhmetovs, hidden from the eyes of “enlightened people”. The artistic influence on the reader was carried out using a whole complex of means, including the author's intervention (section XXXI - "Conversation with a discerning reader and expelling him", etc.), the ambiguous use of artistic (event) time, 1859 to 1861 (abroad and in Russian conditions), an artistic and symbolic comparison of the hero with the burlak leader Nikitushka Lomov. The novel introduces deliberately grotesque, at first glance "implausible" episodes from Rakhmetov's life: the famous "test" of the hero on a bed studded with nails (Rakhmetov prepares for possible torture and hardship), and the "romantic story" of his relationship with the young widow he saved ( the author's refusal to have a love affair when portraying a professional revolutionary). The narrator can suddenly move from the semi-legendary high style of stories and rumors about the master of a “very rare breed” to the everyday scene of a conversation between a now “cunning”, “sweet”, “cheerful person” with Vera Pavlovna (section XXX of the third chapter). In the entire section, a well-thought-out lexico-stylistic system of allegory was consistently carried out (Rakhmetov "was engaged in other people's affairs, or nobody's, in particular," etc.).

In the "Rakhmetov's" parts of the novel, new plot situations are presented for the first time, which will become pivotal in the structure of subsequent works about professional revolutionaries. The description of Rakhmetov's three-year wandering around Russia, introduced into the narrative as a private episode in the biography of the hero who achieved "the respect and love of ordinary people", turned out to be unexpectedly popular among the readers of the novel, and then received creative development in many works based on the plot of "going to the people" and meetings of the hero with commoners. Suffice it to recall the observation of one memoirist who, in two or three phrases by Chernyshevsky about how Rakhmetov “pulled the strap” with the barge haulers, saw “the first hint of“ going to the people ””. 4 And at the end of the summer of 1874, in the midst of the historical "march to the people", D. M. Rogachev repeated the path of Rakhmetov, setting off with the barge haulers along the Volga. For two years of wandering, he was a barge haule, a loader and a laborer.

The motive of "walking", "wandering" and meetings underlies many works about "new people". Among them are “Stepan Rulev” by N. Bazhin, “An Episode from the Life of Neither a Pea or a Crow” by A. Osipovich-Novodvorsky, “Nov” by I. Turgenev, “Along the Hills and Vesti” by P. Zasodimsky, etc. Genetically go back to episodes "Going to the people", mastered by democratic literature, plot twists and turns of M. Gorky's story "Mother" in connection with the description of Rybin, Nilovna and Sophia's trips to villages and villages.

Attention of many readers "What is to be done?" attracted Rakhmetov's trips abroad. In an atmosphere of strengthening ties of revolutionaries with the Russian political emigration and, in particular, with the Russian section of the First International, Rakhmetov was perceived even as a propagandist of the "Western movement". 5 In the literature after Chernyshevsky, plot situations have become commonplace, reflecting the trips of "new people" abroad and the life of the Russian political emigration ("Step by Step" by I. Omulevsky, "Vasilis" by N. Arnoldi, "One of the Many" by O. Shapir, " Two brothers ”by K. Stanyukovich,“ Andrey Kozhukhov ”by S. Stepnyak-Kravchinsky and others). Chernyshevsky returned to this plot in Siberian exile, telling in the novel "Reflections of Radiance" about the foreign wanderings of his new hero Vladimir Vasilyevich, a member of the Paris Commune.

No less (if not more) popular among the readers was the "erotic episode" from the life of Rakhmetov. Rakhmetov's rigorism in relation to women has noticeably influenced young people, for example, on the eve of mass going to the people. It was believed that family life with its joys was not created for revolutionaries doomed to death. It was suggested that the charters of some revolutionary circles "introduce celibacy as a requirement from the members." Rakhmetov's rigism was followed by the most prominent revolutionaries of the seventies - A. Mikhailov, D. Lizogub, S. Khalturin, M. Ashenbrenner and others.

It is difficult to overestimate the literary implications of the plot first told by Kirsanov about his extraordinary friend. Rakhmetov's version of "rendez-vous" is firmly rooted in works about professional revolutionaries, largely determining their plot and compositional structure. Stepan Rulev with N. Bazhin, Ryazanov with V. Sleptsov ("Difficult Time"), Teleniev with D. Girs ("Old and Young Russia"), Pavlusha Skripitsyn (in the first part of the novel by V. Bervi -Flerovsky "For life and death") and Anna Semyonovna with her theory of celibacy (in the second part of the same work), Lena Zubova and Anna Vulich at S. Stepnyak-Kravchinsky ("Andrey Kozhukhov") and, finally, Pavel Vlasov at M Gorky ("Mother").

However, due to the active invasion of women in the revolutionary movement of the 70s. In the fiction about “new people”, another plot version was also developed, by the way, also provided for by Chernyshevsky in the tragic story of “a lady in mourning” and “a man of about thirty” as an alternative to Rakhmetov's attitude to marriage. It was embodied, for example, in the description of the relationship between Skripitsyn and Anyuta, Pavlov and Masha, Ispoti and Anna Semyonovna in the already mentioned novel by Bervy-Flerovsky, Zina Lomova and Boris Mayevsky, Tanya Repina and Andrei Kozhukhov - in the work of S. Stepnyak-Kravchinsky. These plot love-intimate situations usually ended tragically. Life has confirmed that in the absence of political freedoms, in an atmosphere of gendarme repression, a revolutionary is deprived of family happiness.

The Rakhmetov type of professional revolutionary, artistically discovered by Chernyshevsky, had a tremendous impact on the life and struggle of several generations of revolutionary fighters. Lenin saw the greatest merit of Chernyshevsky as a novelist in the fact that “he not only showed that every right-thinking and really decent person should be a revolutionary, but also something else, even more important: what should be a revolutionary, what should be his rules, how to achieve his goal, he should go, what ways and means to achieve its implementation. " Artistic principles discovered by Chernyshevsky in the novel "What is to be done?" to recreate the heroic character of a professional revolutionary, proved to be extremely convincing for his followers, who set themselves the task of preserving the heroic ideal in life and in literature. A number of stable signs of a revolutionary were used:

refusal of noble privileges and material wealth (Vasily Teleniev, an army officer, retired and lives by lessons; Sergei Overin, being the heir of two hundred souls, "abandoned" the peasants, that is, abandoned them; Arkady Karamanov breaks with his father and gives up the land peasants);

tremendous physical strength and ability to endure hardships (Telenev is a good swimmer, he tests his physical strength in the fight against a rural strongman; Overin checks his endurance by plunging a lancet into the palm of his right hand; Stozharov can sleep on nails, like Rakhmetov, the author calls him a rigorist) ; refusal of love for a woman in the name of a great public goal (love is not included in the life calculations of Telenev; Overin, delighted with Liza's courageous behavior during arrest, is ready to marry her, but abandons his intention, having learned that Malinin loves her; Stozharov leaves his beloved girls - Vary Barmitinova; Svetlov declares to Khristina Zhilinskaya that he will never marry, and reads her a Circassian song from Lermontov's poem "Izmail-Bey", familiar to readers also from the novel "What to do?"; Seliverstov is unhappy in his personal life, but he has “There is a business, there is another love, greater, there is another happiness, more complete” - a common cause);

great theoretical training, ideological conviction and dedication to the cause of the people (Teleniev defends his theoretical positions in a dispute with Markinson, conducts propaganda work with the peasants, reckoning himself among those educated people who wish well to the peasants; Overin "calculates the range of historical events in Russia", creates a new science - "historical algebra", according to which the nobility is equal to zero; all this prepared him for a decisive step - to lead a peasant uprising; Svetlov promotes progressive ideas through the adult school and does not hesitate to sympathize with the rebellious workers of the Yeltsin factory).

All these characteristic elements of the "Rakhmetov's" ideological and artistic structure with an emphasis on the "exclusivity" of the heroes make it possible to speak of the undoubted influence of Chernyshevsky on the works of democratic fiction.

1863, "Contemporary"

1867 (Geneva), 1906 (Russia)

"What to do?"- a novel by the Russian philosopher, journalist and literary critic Nikolai Chernyshevsky, written in December - April, during his imprisonment in the Peter and Paul Fortress of St. Petersburg. The novel was written in part in response to Ivan Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons.

History of creation and publication

Chernyshevsky wrote the novel while in solitary confinement at the Alekseevsky Ravelin of the Peter and Paul Fortress, from December 14, 1862 to April 4, 1863. Since January 1863, the manuscript has been transferred in parts to the commission of inquiry on the Chernyshevsky case (the last part was submitted on April 6). The commission, and after it the censors, saw only a love line in the novel and gave permission to print. The oversight of the censorship was soon noticed, and the responsible censor, Beketov, was removed from office. However, the novel had already been published in the journal Sovremennik (1863, no. 3-5). Despite the fact that the issues of Sovremennik, in which the novel What Is to Be Done? Were published, were banned, the text of the novel in handwritten copies spread throughout the country and caused a lot of imitations.

“They talked about Chernyshevsky’s novel not in a whisper, not quietly, but at full throat in the halls, at the entrances, at Mrs. Milbret’s table and in the basement pub of Shtenbokov’s passage. They shouted: 'disgusting', 'lovely', 'abomination', etc. - all in different tones. "

"For the Russian youth of that time, it [the book" What is to be done? "] Was a kind of revelation and turned into a program, became a kind of banner."

The clearly entertaining, adventurous, melodramatic beginning of the novel was supposed not only to confuse the censorship, but also to attract a wide audience of readers. The external plot of the novel is a love story, but it reflects new economic, philosophical and social ideas of the time. The novel is permeated with hints of the coming revolution.

• In the novel by N. G. Chernyshevsky "What is to be done?" aluminum is mentioned. In the "naive utopia" of Vera Pavlovna's fourth dream, it is called the metal of the future. And this great future by now (mid XX - XXI century) aluminum has already reached.
• The “Lady in Mourning” appearing at the end of the work is Olga Sokratovna Chernyshevskaya, the writer's wife. At the end of the novel, we are talking about the release of Chernyshevsky from the Peter and Paul Fortress, where he was at the time of writing the novel. He did not wait for release: on February 7, 1864, he was sentenced to 14 years in hard labor, followed by settlement in Siberia.
• The main characters with the surname Kirsanov are also found in the novel by Ivan Turgenev "Fathers and Sons".

Literature

• Nikolaev P. Revolutionary novel // Chernyshevsky N.G. What to do? M., 1985

Screen adaptations

• 1971: Three-part television play (directors: Nadezhda Marusalova, Pavel Reznikov)

Notes (edit)

see also

Links

Categories:

• Literary works alphabetically
• Nikolay Chernyshevsky
• Political novels
• Novels of 1863
• Novels in Russian

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See what is "What to do? (Novel)" in other dictionaries:

- "What to do?" philosophical question of various thinkers, religious figures, prophets, as well as literary works with this title: "What to do?" novel by Nikolai Chernyshevsky, his main work. "What to do?" book ... ... Wikipedia

The name of the famous socio-political novel (1863) by Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky (1828 1889). The main question, which in the 60 70s. XIX century. was discussed in youth circles, there was, as the revolutionary P. N. Tkachev writes, “the question of ... Dictionary of winged words and expressions

Date of birth: June 16, 1965 Place of birth: Makeevka, Ukrainian SSR, USSR ... Wikipedia

History of creation

Chernyshevsky himself called these people a type that "was recently born and is rapidly disintegrating", is a product and a sign of the times.

These heroes are characterized by a special revolutionary morality, based on the educational theory of the 18th century, the so-called "theory of reasonable egoism." This theory is that a person can be happy if his personal interests coincide with public ones.

Vera Pavlovna is the main character of the novel. Her prototypes are Chernyshevsky's wife Olga Sokratovna and Marya Aleksandrovna Bokova-Sechenova, who fictitiously married her teacher, and then became the wife of the physiologist Sechenov.

Vera Pavlovna managed to escape from the circumstances that surrounded her since childhood. Her character was tempered in a family where her father was indifferent to her, and for her mother she was just a profitable commodity.

Vera is as entrepreneurial as her mother, thanks to which she manages to create sewing workshops that give good profits. Vera Pavlovna is smart and educated, balanced and kind to her husband and girls. She is not a prude, not hypocritical and smart. Chernyshevsky admires Vera Pavlovna's desire to break outdated moral foundations.

Chernyshevsky emphasizes the similarity between Lopukhov and Kirsanov. Both doctors, engaged in science, both from poor families and achieved everything with hard work. For the sake of helping an unfamiliar girl, Lopukhov refuses a scientific career. He is more rational than Kirsanov. This is evidenced by the plan of the imaginary suicide. But Kirsanov is capable of any sacrifice for the sake of friendship and love, avoids communication with a friend and beloved in order to forget her. Kirsanov is more sensitive and charismatic. Rakhmetov believes him, embarking on the path of improvement.

But the main character of the novel (not according to the plot, but in theory) is not just a "new man", but a "special man" the revolutionary Rakhmetov. He generally refuses egoism as such, from happiness for himself. A revolutionary must sacrifice himself, give his life for those he loves, live like the whole people.

He is an aristocrat by birth, but has broken with the past. Rakhmetov earned money as a simple carpenter, barge haule. He had the nickname "Nikita Lomov", like a hero-barge haule. All funds Rakhmetov invested in the cause of the revolution. He led the most ascetic lifestyle. If the new people are called Chernyshevsky salt of the earth, then revolutionaries like Rakhmetov are "the color of the best people, engines of engines, salt of the salt of the earth." The image of Rakhmetov is covered with an aura of mystery and understatement, since Chernyshevsky could not say everything directly.

Rakhmetov had several prototypes. One of them is the landowner Bakhmetev, who in London transferred almost all his fortune to Herzen for the cause of Russian propaganda. Rakhmetov's image is collective.

Rakhmetov's image is far from ideal. Chernyshevsky warns readers against admiration for such heroes, because their service is unrequited.

Stylistic features

Chernyshevsky makes extensive use of two means of artistic expression - allegory and silence. Vera Pavlovna's dreams are full of allegories. The dark basement in the first dream is an allegory of the lack of freedom of women. Lopukhov's bride is a great love for people, real and fantastic dirt from the second dream - the circumstances in which the poor and the rich live. The huge glass house in the last dream is an allegory of the communist happy future, which, according to Chernyshevsky, will surely come and give joy to everyone without exception. The silence is associated with censorship prohibitions. But a certain mystery of images or plot lines does not spoil the pleasure of reading at all: "I know more about Rakhmetov than I say." The meaning of the ending of the novel, which is interpreted in different ways, the image of a lady in mourning, remains vague. All songs and toasts of a funny picnic are allegorical.

In the last tiny chapter, "A Change of Scenery," the lady is no longer in mourning, but in smart clothes. In a young man of about 30, the liberated Rakhmetov is guessed. This chapter depicts the future, albeit the near-term.

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