Fantastic story “Viy” To this day, the story remains one of Gogol’s most mysterious. In a note to it, Gogol indicated that “this whole story is folk legend” and that he conveyed it exactly as he heard it, changing almost nothing. However, still not

A secular story. The movement towards a secular story began already in early work A. A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky: “Evening at the Bivouac” (1823), which influenced Pushkin’s story “The Shot,” and “A Novel in Seven Letters,” which reveals the conflict between an extraordinary hero and a secular

The story "The Overcoat". Halfway from the first volume " Dead souls“The second is Gogol’s last St. Petersburg story “The Overcoat”, which differs sharply from “Nevsky Prospect”, “The Nose” and “Notes of a Madman” in the peculiarities of its humor and the scale of comprehension of its themes.

DETECTIVE STORY

Russian history in the “court of conscience” The time when A. N. Ostrovsky wrote historical dramas in verse, takes little more than a decade. In 1862, a version of the play “Kozma Zakharyich Minin, Sukhoruk” was published, in 1872 - “Comedian XVII century" After that, leaving history and

“Kirdzhali” Tale (story, 1834)

Probably, many have heard this ancient “Russian folk” satirical story, a fairy tale that exposes the self-interest and arbitrariness of feudal judges. But still Who wrote “Shemyakin Court”? Based on what events? And was there any reason to ridicule the judges of that time? Let's try to understand all these issues.

About what…

Who is Shemyaka?

Who wrote “Shemyakin Court”?

The story of the Shemyakin trial is conveyed in two versions - poetic and prose. IN different corners Russian state, many manuscripts were found dated to the 17th and XVIII century mi., popular prints"Shemyakina court". The plot was mentioned in many tales of foreigners about travel around Russia XVII centuries, which highlighted in the story the attitude of Russian people to the state of legal proceedings of that time. The story has become widely popular among the people and may well lay claim to the title of one of best works Russian folklore. IN late XVIII centuries, the plot received literary treatment. It was made by A. Osipov (or A. Olenin), F. Zadubsky, P. Svinin and several other literature publishers. At detailed analysis descriptive devices of the story, mostly moral, many modern writers found in printed works late reworking of Russian ancient legend created through the efforts folk art based on folk tales.

Hidden meaning...

Source: www.vvd.su

The judicial system in our country is worked out to the smallest detail, and it is constantly being modernized and changed. Over the past ten years, it has been possible to implement aspects of publicity...

In this lesson, you will remember the genre of satire, learn about the origin and distribution of the plot of the story “Shemyakin’s Court”, consider the plot of this work, analyze it, conduct comparative characteristics themes of judging in other works.

You can also draw such a parallel as modern newspaper parodies, as a rule, of politicians or other influential people, where they appear ugly and stupid. That is, they often laugh at what actually frightens, irritates, or interferes with life.

All over the world, and especially in Russia, the court has often been and is such a thing. The injustice of the Russian court caused criticism back in the 15th-16th centuries (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Satirical depiction of judges ()

The corruption of judges, their chicanery and the injustice of the trial, the fact that the poor always lose, and the rich win, that an unequal, dishonest trial occurs - all Russian literature and numerous historical documents moan about this. The theme of the unrighteousness of the court is the theme of the story “Shemyakin Court”.

The story "Shemyakin Court" exists in different options. In the 17th century you can see two options - poetic and prosaic, which are also known in XVIII-XIX centuries. There were numerous popular prints of Shemyakin's Court.

Popular prints- simple, but very colorful, rich drawings with some text. These are pictures for the people that were published, and then peasants (and sometimes poor city dwellers) hung them on their wooden walls (Fig. 3).

Rice. 3. Popular picture ()

“The Shemyakin Court” is a popular, favorite story, which thus spread throughout Russia. In the end, the story became so popular that it had already become part of folklore - tales about the Shemyakin trial began to be told. This interesting case when not oral tradition receives a written treatment, but on the contrary - from the book an oral story, existing among the people without an author, is obtained. It turns out that there are many texts of this work, but there is no single, ideal one. What is important here is not the order of words, but the story itself, the plot.

Once upon a time there lived two brothers. One is rich, the other is poor, wretched. The poor man constantly turned to the rich man for help. One day he needed to bring firewood from the forest, but he didn’t have his horse (Fig. 4).

He went to his older (rich) brother and asked for a horse. He swore, but gave me the horse, although without a collar.

Clamp- a horseshoe-shaped device (wooden arch), which is hung and attached to the horse’s back. Shafts are attached to the collar, and thus the weight falls on the collar and does not put pressure on the horse's neck. This is no less valuable a device than a wheel. It was made in the Middle Ages. The antiquity of the clamp was unknown.

The poor brother does not have a collar, and he can’t think of anything better than tying a sleigh with firewood to the horse’s tail (Fig. 5).

Rice. 5. A poor man leads a horse by the reins ()

With this load (with firewood) he tries to drive into his yard and breaks off the unfortunate horse's tail. Next, he tries to return the horse with the torn off tail to his brother. The rich brother is angry and hits the court with his forehead - he decides to sue his younger brother.

The brothers go to the city where the trial will take place. They settle down for the night in the house of a priest. While the rich brother and the priest eat and drink, the poor man lies on the stove and eats nothing. He is jealous, he is interested in what the rich brother and his priest friend are eating. A hungry, curious poor man hangs from the stove, cannot hold on, falls and kills his owner to death. small child. After which the unfortunate priest also goes to hit the judge with his forehead.

Then the three of them go. The poor man thinks that this will be the end of him - he will be sued. To bring everything together at once, he throws himself headfirst from the bridge - he wants to commit suicide. And again he becomes an unwitting killer. The fact is that a sleigh passes just under this bridge. A certain young man takes his old father to the doctor (or, according to another version, to the bathhouse). The old man dies. After this, the son of the murdered man is sent to the same court.

The situation becomes completely hopeless for the poor man, who is a bungler and a klutz and always unwittingly commits some ugly acts.

This whole trio appears in court, where Judge Shemyaka sits, and present their case. The poor man thinks: “Well, what can I do?”. He takes the stone, ties it with a scarf and puts it in his bosom. The rich brother presents his case to the judge. Shemyaka asks the defendant: “Tell me how it happened”. He pulls out a stone hidden in a scarf from his bosom and says: "Here you go, Judge". The judge thinks that this is a bribe and there is gold or silver. After this, the judge interviews the next plaintiff - the priest. Pop lays out the case. The judge asks the poor man again: “How was it?”. He again does not answer, but only shows the stone. The third plaintiff also tells his story, and everything repeats all over again.

What was the Shemyakin trial like? What did the experienced and wise judge award? Regarding the horse, he said this: “ Let the horse stay with the younger brother, and when the tail grows back, let him return it to the older brother.”. Regarding the priest's son, he says the following: “Let the priest’s wife live with her younger brother, give birth to a child from him and return back to her husband with the child.”. Regarding the third case, the judge was also not at a loss: “The murder has been committed, we must take revenge in the same way. Let the poor man stand under the bridge, and let the son of the dead old man rush on top of him and beat him to death.”

After listening to the wise judge, the plaintiffs naturally became frightened. Everyone began to promise the unfortunate poor man money so that he would not carry out the judge’s decisions. The poor man takes the money and, joyful, goes home. But not right away, because a man sent from Judge Shemyaka comes and says: “Give me what you promised the judge”. The poor man unfolds his handkerchief, shows the stone and says: “If the judge had ruled against me, I would have hit him with this stone.”. The answer is submitted to the judge. The judge is glad, he praises God prayer of thanksgiving: “It’s good that I judged by him, otherwise he would have beaten me to death.”.

As a result, everyone is more or less happy that they got off cheap. But the one who is most pleased is the poor man who goes away singing songs because his pockets are full of money. But it could have turned out very badly.

For people of the 17th-18th centuries, this story evoked a lively reaction, namely great pleasure - they laughed. If we perceive this story realistically, as a life-descriptive story, then the result is pure trouble and nonsense. It's time to cry, not laugh. But still, this is satire, farce, clownery, farce. This should be understood as an anecdote, as a kind of deliberately distorted, comic and, in its own way, cheerful way of life.

Also, this text should have been received with joy, because it has a certain pathos - the victory of the weak over the strong. The poor man got into trouble, but happily got out of it.

Most of the people to whom this text was addressed are simpletons (people poor and weak in socially). Everything in life was wrong, but here the poor man wins. Moreover, he wins not because he has intelligence, or money, or strength - he has none of these. He's generally a mercenary. He's even stupid. But he becomes the people's favorite trickster simpleton. He somehow manages to do everything himself magically, he is triumphant. His simplicity turns out to be stronger than worldly customs, worldly wisdom, cunning and experience of the judge. This brought unconditional joy.

At the center of the story is ridicule of judicial procedures, judicial chicanery and pharisaism. This topic is as old as the world. Many peoples have been involved in this to one degree or another - both in folklore and in the theater.

All stories about judges can be divided into two groups: stories about wise and correct judges and stories about stupid and dishonest judges. An ideal and wise judge is biblical Solomon. Solomon is a judge-sage and virtuoso who acts paradoxically. The most famous story, when two women argued about whose child it was. Solomon, not knowing the truth, made a wonderful decision: since they are arguing for him, let no one get it, let each get half, let the warrior cut the child in half. After which one of the mothers, who claims motherhood, says: “Okay, don’t let me or her get it.”. The second one says with tears: “No, I refuse, then let the second woman take him”. After which Solomon gives the child, naturally, to the one who wanted to save his life. It was real mother(Fig. 6).

Rice. 6. Judgment of Solomon ()

Solomon acts in an unexpected, paradoxical way and in such a crooked, roundabout way achieves truth and truth. And we, the listeners of this story, admire his skill and virtuosity.

In any case, the story about the trial should be intricate, intricate, with non-obvious behavior of the judge. He can be an evil bribe-taker, he can be righteous and wise like Solomon, but he must act in an unconventional, paradoxical way.

Shemyaka's decision is an example of casuistry. He seems to act logically, but in fact he makes absurd decisions, acting against obvious things, against common sense. But this is how the whole story is structured. This is a series of all sorts of tricks and paradoxical events, some kind of clown antics of the poor man and Judge Shemyaka.

But Shemyaka outwitted himself, outwitted himself, fell for his own hook. And his paradoxical solutions serve the cause of truth. Because the poor man, of course, is a loser and a fool, but there is no evil intention in him, everything he does, he does involuntarily. And the rich peasant (his brother) and the priest, it would seem, normal people, which personify the normal course of things and worldly order, reliability social life. But they act very badly. They are actually dragging an innocent person to court because he commits all his actions unintentionally. And their actions are shown to be morally condemnable, because they wanted to rip off the last of the poor man and punish him for something for which he was essentially not guilty. Strictly speaking, the poor man deserved a slap in the face. It is impossible to live like this, he is generally dangerous for peaceful people with his strange ways of living, lying on the stove, throwing himself from bridges, etc. But he has no bad intent, which means there is no corpus delicti, which means there is nothing to judge him for.

If we summarize all of the above, it turns out that we are dealing with something incredible. In the ordinary world, everything happens differently: of course, the court had to be on the side of the priest and the rich, of course, you can’t deceive the judge like that, you can’t outwit him, of course, the poor man had to lose.

Never-before-seen- this is a genre of folklore where incredible things happen: bears fly across the sky (Fig. 7), cows jump over the moon, as in English folklore.

Rice. 7. Bear flying across the sky ()

This is a world that doesn’t exist, but you want it to exist. Everything in it is upside down: the weak wins, the court turns out to be right. This fairy world people's desires, people's fantasies about life. That's why he's so beautiful.

There are a lot of incredible things in Russian folklore. And not only in Russian.

This is a borrowed story, borrowed, that is, taken from our neighbors - from the Europeans. Similar stories are found in German and Polish literature of that time. Scientists have also found large number parallels in the East. Eat similar stories in Indian, Tibetan, Muslim traditions. This is the so-called wandering plot - one of those stories that wander from people to people, reflecting something very important and typical for people.

There is one Tibetan story that coincides almost exactly with the story “The Shemyakin Court”. It's about how a poor brahman asked another man for a bull to work with. A similar story happened: the bull ran away from the yard when it was already returned. On the way to court, the brahman falls from the wall of the weaver, who dies, then he sits on infant, which is covered with clothes. The judge decides to gouge out the eye of the bull's owner because he "did not see" the bull when he was brought in, the weaver's widow must marry a Brahman, and the child is returned to the unfortunate mother in the same way as in the "Shemyakin Court".

It seems that the story is the same, but a horse is not a bull, and a Russian peasant is not an Indian Brahman. The details and intonation of the narrator create different images. As a result, completely national characters emerge who bear the imprint of the local area, the local peculiarities of language, worldview, etc.

Therefore, the story “The Shemyakin Court” is very local, all grown on Russian soil, although the seeds were brought from abroad. This story is reflected in our language. Until now, when it comes to an unjust, bad, crooked trial, they say: "Shemyakin Court".

“The Tale of Ruff Ershovich” is an untitled work of the 16th-17th centuries. This is also a satirical story.

Namelessness is ordinary thing for the literature of that time, at least in Russia. Especially when the story is based on folklore.

This is a story about what was happening in Russia at that time. Again, the theme of this story is court.

There is much that is incomprehensible to the modern reader in this story, because many realities of that time are described. To fully understand it, you need to know the then social relations: who is who, what the names of certain classes mean, etc. On the other hand, the reader still finds it funny and still understands quite a lot, because a method of constructing a narrative that is understandable to us was used.

The story features humanized animals - fish. We all know fairy tales and fables in which a similar thing happens: a bear is a big boss, a powerful person; the fox is a cunning one who represents characteristic social elements, and the like. This principle is simple and clear.

In this story, the action takes place among fish in Lake Rostov. There really is such a lake; on its shore stands the city of Rostov the Great. In the story they are going to trial there big people- judges. Sturgeon, Beluga, Catfish - all these are large, venerable, imposing fish. They represent the boyars (chiefs). Smaller fish, worse fish mean worse people, respectively. The perch represents the forces of law and order. He is something like the police, and he has a snout to match. The smallest, lousiest, most worthless fish, representing the smallest, lousiest, most worthless person, is the Ruff fish.

Ruff is a small, bony and spiny fish. He has needles on his back with which he stabs his opponent. Ruff represents in this story the type of plebeian (pugnacious, annoying, nosy) - such a very disrespectful and dashing type.

This Ruff is accused of having, by deception, cunning, and through all sorts of machinations, escaped from the lake of its rightful owners. Naturally, Yorsh denies it. On the contrary, he wants to accuse, denigrate, and call his accusers more unpleasant names.

This story was read and listened to with pleasure by “small” people - the poor, who did not like rich and sedate people and were irritated in every possible way. Therefore, sympathy may have been on Ruff's side. Although it is difficult to figure out which of them is right.

There are different manuscripts that have different alternative endings. In one version, Ruff is condemned and beaten with whips, and the lake is returned to its true owners. In another ending, Ruff spits in the eyes of his judges and hides in the brushwood (in the thickets).

This duality of the ending shows the duality of this story, because it is impossible to say exactly on whose side the author’s sympathy is. Everyone looks stupid and depressed, as expected in satire.

Ruff is obviously a dashing, unpleasant, antisocial character, but he has the charm of a rogue, a swindler, a clever and very cocky guy who succeeds in everything. And this charm partly speaks in his favor. This story and the position of the narrator are ambivalent - dual.

The essay “The Little Humpbacked Horse” is well known to everyone. This is a fun one folk spirit a verse where the dashing Little Humpbacked Horse - a mythical character - acts with his master - the simpleton Ivan, who becomes a prince.

Pyotr Pavlovich Ershov (Fig. 8), a younger contemporary of Pushkin, when writing this work, drew inspiration from folk poetry and from Russian classics, including pre-Petrine classics.

Rice. 8. Pyotr Pavlovich Ershov ()

The action takes place in some conventional pre-Petrine antiquity. The Muscovite kingdom is presented before any innovations and reforms according to the Western model. Accordingly, the story contains many realities of that time, including literary ones.

It is quite natural that Ershov turned to the literature of the past and, in particular, to the famous “The Tale of Ersha Ershovich.” Ershov has his own fish court, which reproduces the judicial procedure of that time.

Let's look at the difference between the fish court in "Ruff Ershovich" and in "The Little Humpbacked Horse". In the folk story everything is serious. Of course, everything is funny and comical, but the procedural norms of that time are discussed seriously. A detailed enumeration, the realism of the description of the judicial procedure, combined with the fact that the heroes are fish, creates the main comic effect.

Ershov’s comic effect is created according to the same laws, but he does not intend to seriously describe the judicial procedure. His description is purely decorative. That is, there is no element of satire here, social criticism and serious content is completely absent. He uses this to draw a funny, a bright picture and entertain the reader.

In “The Little Humpbacked Horse”, during the course of the action, the hero Ivan arrives at the court of the fish king (Fish-Whale). He needs to find some thing buried at the bottom of the sea. He comes to the decision to send a ruff for this thing (the chest with the queen’s ring). Because he is a walker, runs everywhere along all sea (and not only sea) coasts, knows every bottom. He'll definitely find what he needs.

“Bream, having heard this order,
The decree was written by the name;

Som (he was called an adviser)

I signed the decree;
The black cancer laid down the decree
And I attached the seal.
Two dolphins were called here
And, having given the decree, they said,
So that, on behalf of the king,
We've covered all the seas
And that ruff reveler,
Screamer and bully,
Wherever found
They brought me to the sovereign.
Here the dolphins bowed
And they set out to look for the ruff.”

In this passage we meet catfish and ruff, which are also in the folk story, but at the same time, dolphins, which are not and cannot be in it. The dolphins carry out the assignment rather stupidly, because it is useless to search the seas for such a drunkard as the ruff. Of course, he is in a simpler place - in the pond, where they find him doing his favorite pastime - he fights and swears. Here's the scene:

“Look: in the pond, under the reeds,
Ruff fights with crucian carp.

"Attention! Damn you!
Look, what a soda they have raised,
Like important fighters!" -
The messengers shouted to them.

"Well, what do you care? -
Ruff shouts boldly to the dolphins. -
I don't like to joke,
I’ll kill everyone at once!” -
"Oh, you eternal reveler
And a screamer and a bully!
That's it, rubbish, you should go for a walk,
Everyone would fight and scream.
At home - no, I can’t sit still!..”

Everyone knows this type in life: a loudmouth, a drunkard, a bully, a brawler.

In the end, Ruff is sent to retrieve the chest, and he fulfills the task with honor. But before executing, it acts as follows:

“Here, having bowed to the king,
Ruff went, bent over, out.
He quarreled with the royal servants,
Dragged after the roach
And the little bastards are six
He broke his nose on the way.
Having done such a thing,
He boldly rushed into the pool.”

Ruff, of course, is a stupid character, but he is useful - he carries out the assignment. There is a certain charm in this work, as well as in the folk tale.

There is also a duality in the view of characters in Russian literary tradition- both folk and author's. He seems to be both a dashing man and a petty hooligan, but at the same time he is brave, savvy and understands the matter when necessary.

It is worth paying attention to a funny moment: the author Pyotr Ershov could not help but think about the correspondence between his last name and his character. His literary son is doubly Ersh Ershovich.

References

1. Korovina V.Ya. and others. Literature. 8th grade. Textbook in 2 hours - 8th ed. - M.: Education, 2009.

2. Merkin G.S. Literature. 8th grade. Textbook in 2 parts. - 9th ed. - M.: 2013.

3. Kritarova Zh.N. Analysis of works of Russian literature. 8th grade. - 2nd ed., rev. - M.: 2014.

1. Internet portal “Akademik” ()

2. Internet portal "Festival" pedagogical ideas. “Open lesson” » ()

Homework

1. Explain why the story “The Shemyakin Court” is a satirical work.

3. Analyze the image of the poor man in the story. How does he relate to you? Why?

   The teacher continues:
-Have you ever had a disagreement with your peers: classmates, comrades, relatives?
-How did you resolve your problems and come to an agreement?
-Did anyone help you with this: parents, teachers, peers?
-What character traits do you think are necessary to resolve such conflicts?
A note appears on the board: Kindness, patience, friendliness, sensitivity, the ability to forgive, the ability to understand another, clarity and certainty own position etc.

   The teacher continues to ask questions:
-Do you think this private incident with individuals, say, with you, is worthy of being reflected in literature? Why?

After listening to the answers, the teacher continues:
   Already in Russian medieval literature(XVI century) begins to form secular literature, which closely studies a person. At this time, a genre called “story” (meaning “narration”, “story”) arose. Central location These works are occupied by the image of a man who finds himself in a difficult life situation, from which he must independently find a way out. Writers of the Middle Ages peer closely at the peculiarities of the Russian character. In the 17th century a satirical version of the “story” appears, which is consistently oriented towards the popular, folklore ideal.
   The satirical story willingly used episodes from fairy tales, at the same time it raised very serious moral and social problems.

   Next, students are offered a logical chain of keywords.
Task: using these combinations of words, write your “satirical stories” in pairs of threes and come up with their names. It is necessary to remember to observe the logical sequence of these words:
1. Two brothers: rich and poor
2. Horse without a tail
3. Got off the floor
4. Surrender yourself to death
5. Shemyaka judge
6. Stone wrapped in a scarf
7. The poor man praised God

After the allotted time has passed, students read their stories, match them, and analyze them.

Semantic stage : students read the medieval "Tale of Shemyakin's Court."

Text of the story:
   In some places there lived two farmer brothers: one rich, the other poor. The rich man lent money to the poor man for many years, but could not correct his poverty.
   After some time, a poor man came to a rich man to ask for a horse so that he would have something to bring firewood for himself. The brother did not want to give him a horse, he said: “I loaned you a lot, but I couldn’t fix it.” And when he gave him a horse, and he took it and began to ask for a collar, his brother was offended by him and began to blaspheme his misery, saying: “You don’t have your own collar.” And he didn’t give him a collar.
   The poor man went from the rich man, took his wood, tied it by the horse’s tail and brought it to his yard. And he forgot to put up the gateway. He hit the horse with a whip, but the horse, with all its strength, rushed with the cart through the gateway and tore off its tail.
   And so the poor man brought a horse without a tail to his brother. And his brother saw that the horse had no tail, and he began to abuse his brother, saying that, having begged the horse from him, he had ruined it. And, without taking back the horse, he went to beat him with his forehead in the city, to the judge Shemyaka.
   And the poor brother, seeing that his brother went to attack him, went after his brother himself, knowing that they would still send for him from the city, and if he didn’t go, he would also have to pay the bailiffs travel tickets.
   And they both stopped in a certain village, not reaching the city. The rich man went to spend the night with the priest of that village because he knew him. And the poor man came to that priest, and when he arrived, he lay down on his bed. And the rich man began to tell the priest about the death of his horse, for which he was going to the city. And then the priest began to dine with the rich man, but the poor man is not invited to eat with him. The poor man began to watch from the floor to see what the priest and his brother were eating, broke free from the floor and crushed the priest’s son to death. And he also went with his rich brother to the city to beat the poor man with his brow for the death of his son. And they came to the city where the judge lived, and the poor man followed them.
   They walked across the bridge near the city. And one of the residents of the city took his father to the bathhouse to wash. The poor man, knowing that he would be destroyed by his brother and the priest, decided to put himself to death. And rushing, he fell on the old man and crushed his father to death. They grabbed him and brought him to the judge.
   He was thinking about how to get rid of the misfortune and what to give to the judge. And, not finding anything, he thought of this - he took the stone, wrapped it in a scarf, put it in his hat and stood before the judge.
   And so his brother brought a petition, a lawsuit against him for a horse, and began to hit Judge Shemyaka with his forehead. Shemyaka, having listened to the petition, says to the poor man: “Answer!” The poor man, not knowing what to say, took a wrapped stone from his hat, showed it to the judge and bowed. And the judge, believing that the poor man had promised him a bribe, said to his brother: “If he tore off the tail of your horse, do not take your horse from him until the horse grows a tail. And when the tail grows, then take it.” he has his own horse."
   And then another trial began. The priest began to search for the death of his son, for the fact that he had run over his son. The poor man again took the same knot out of his hat and showed it to the judge. The judge saw and thinks that in another case another bundle of gold promises, he says to the priest. “If he kills your son, give him your wife’s hit, until he gets you a child from your hit; at that time, take the hit from him along with the child.”
   And then the third trial began for the fact that, throwing himself from the bridge, he killed the old man's father from his son. The poor man, taking a stone wrapped in a scarf from his hat, showed it to the judge for the third time. The judge, believing that for the third trial he will promise him a third knot, says to the one whose father was killed: “Get onto the bridge, and let the one who killed your father stand under the bridge. And you yourself fall from the bridge on him and kill him in the same way, like he is your father."
   After the trial, the plaintiffs and the defendant left the order. The rich man began to ask the poor man for his horse, and he answered: “According to the judge’s decree, as he says, its tail will grow, at that time I will give your horse.” The rich brother gave him five rubles for his horse, so that he would give it to him, even without a tail. And he took five rubles from his brother and gave him the horse. And the poor man began to ask the priest according to the judge's decree, so that he could get a child from her, and having obtained it, he would give the priest back to him with the child. The priest began to hit him with his forehead so that he would not take his priest. And he took ten rubles from him. Then the poor man began to say to the third plaintiff: “By the judge’s decree, I will stand under the bridge, but you climb onto the bridge and throw yourself at me just as I did at your father.” And he thinks: “If I throw myself, you won’t hurt him, but you’ll hurt yourself.” He also began to make peace with the poor man, and gave him a bribe so that he would not throw himself at himself. And so the poor man took for himself from all three.
   The judge sent a servant to the defendant and ordered him to take those three knots shown. The servant began to ask him: “Give me what you showed the judge in bundles from your hat; he ordered me to take it from you.” And he, taking out a tied stone from his hat, showed it. Then the servant says to him: “Why are you talking about the stone?” And the defendant said: “This is to the judge. I say, whenever he decided not to judge by me, I killed him with that stone.”
   The servant returned and told everything to the judge. The judge, after listening to the servant, said: “I thank and praise God for judging by him. If I had not judged by him, he would have killed me.”
   Then the poor man went home, rejoicing and praising God.
(The collar is part of the harness; a wooden frame, upholstered with felt, placed around the horse’s neck. The squalor here is poverty. A police officer. A shaky cradle.)

On stages of reflection Students are asked to discuss the following questions:
-What is your attitude towards Shemyaka?
-How do you assess the court case in Russia?
-Which of the two brothers is right: the rich man? poor man?
-What is your attitude towards your poor brother?

Necessary note. Discussion can take place face to face or in groups. The following is a cross-discussion on the issue: Do you think the poor brother is a positive or negative image? (YES, positive." NO, negative)
   Usually the teacher asks to write down arguments in defense of each statement in the cross-discussion table, but on this lesson The teacher invites you to justify your position on controversial issue using keywords. As a result, a table like this could appear: Is the question a problem?