Eugene Onegin is a hero of his time. Essay “Onegin and Pechorin: advanced people of their time”
It is difficult not to notice the similarities between Onegin and Pechorin, just as it is impossible to ignore the differences in their characters. Both of them are “superfluous people” of their time. Even V.G. Belinsky, comparing these two images, noted: “Their dissimilarity is much less than the distance between Onega and Pechora... Pechorin is the Onegin of our time.”
Despite the difference in eras in which the images were created - Onegin in the era of Decembrism, freethinking, in the era of dreams and hopes for a quick transformation social order, Pechorin - during the cruel Nikolaev regime that followed the defeat of the Decembrist uprising - both of them were dissatisfied with life, did not find use for their remarkable forces and because of this they are forced to waste time. Both of them do not like the social structure, but both of them are passive and do not take any action to change it. AND Pushkin's Onegin, and Lermontov's Pechorin personify spiritual crisis noble intelligentsia, who expressed their dissatisfaction with life by refusing social activities and, not finding use for her powers, she wasted her life fruitlessly.
Both Onegin and Pechorin belong to the same social environment. Both of them are educated. Both at first accepted life as it came, enjoyed it, taking advantage of the privileges high society, to which they belonged, but both of them gradually came to deny the light and deep dissatisfaction with the life of society and their own too. Both began to understand that this life was empty, that behind the “external tinsel” there was nothing worth it, boredom, slander, envy reigned in the world, people spend internal forces souls to gossip and anger. Idleness, absence high interests trivialize their existence. “But his feelings cooled down early,” says Pushkin about his hero. We read approximately the same thing in Lermontov, where the author reports that his hero very early “was born of despair, covered with courtesy and a good-natured smile.” The fact that both heroes are smart, educated people, undoubtedly, further aggravates their conflict with society, because these qualities allow them to see all the negative sides, all the vices. This understanding seems to elevate Onegin and Pechorin above the young people of their generation; they do not fit into their circle. What makes the heroes akin is the fact that they both succeeded in the “science of tender passion,” and the fact that neither one nor the other were able to surrender to love with all their hearts and souls. A great, all-consuming passion, for which many were ready to give their lives, could not touch our heroes: in their relationships with women, as with the world, there was coldness and cynicism. Onegin considered love to be “satiated pride” that is unworthy of him. Pechorin's love consisted of achieving power over his beloved. He could only take, but was not able to give. He never allowed himself to fall in love without reciprocating feelings. For him, seeking someone’s love is the height of baseness: “When meeting a woman, I always unmistakably guessed whether she would love me... I never became a slave to the woman I loved; on the contrary, I have always acquired invincible power over their will and heart, is it because I never value anything very much...” Unable to love, Onegin and Pechorin did not value the love of others - hence Onegin’s coldness towards Tatyana, and the unrequited love of Bela and Princess Mary for Pechorin.
He who cannot truly love is incapable of true friendship, and vice versa. So, Onegin kills his friend Vladimir Lensky, although, as the eldest in age and wise with experience, he could dissuade the passionately in love poet, blinded by jealousy. But he didn’t do it - disappointed with life, despising own existence, he was not able to value the lives of others enough. Can't find it common language, having met many years later, and Pechorin with Maxim Maksimych. Kind, gentle and simple-minded, Maxim Maksimych could not explain Pechorin’s cruelty, could not understand what was guiding the actions of his former colleague. Yes, it couldn’t be otherwise: the old soldier was like everyone else, he was part of a society that Lermontov’s hero despised, with which he, an extraordinary person, was simply bored. It was not for nothing that he always strove for people who could argue with him. Personal freedom and independence for both heroes is the best thing that can be in life, to which they are ready to prefer everything else. It is not for nothing that Onegin, remembering the past, writes in a letter to Tatyana:
* Your hateful freedom
* I didn’t want to lose.
Pechorin declares on this occasion: “Twenty times I will put my life, even my honor, on the line, but I will not sell my freedom.” Realizing that life is wasted, Lermontov’s hero does not value it at all. Freedom comes first, honor comes second, and life comes last. We find the meaning of Pechorin’s behavior and actions in the diary of the hero in the story “Princess Mary”. Reading it, you realize that Pechorin is a victim of his time. He lost faith in people, in ideas, and this is the result of the era that came after the defeat of the Decembrist uprising, an era of moral poverty, vulgarity and cowardice. All this can be attributed to Onegin. V. G. Belinsky said very well when comparing the two heroes: “The roads are different, but the result is the same.” Despite the external dissimilarity, despite the difference in character, both are “superfluous people” who were ahead of their time and therefore did not find a common language with their contemporaries, unable to express and realize themselves.
Onegin's explanation with Tatiana in the garden. (Analysis of the episode of the fourth chapter of the novel by A.S. Pushkin.) (by SSSoft.ru) A.S. Pushkin Every writer in his works asks the eternal question: what is the meaning of life, and tries to answer it. A. S. Pushkin in his...
I liked his features, his involuntary devotion to dreams, his inimitable strangeness, and his sharp, chilled mind. I was embittered, he was gloomy; We both knew the game of passion, Life tormented both of us; In both hearts...
The letters of Tatiana and Onegin stand out sharply from the general text Pushkin's novel in verses "Eugene Onegin". Even the author himself gradually highlights them: an attentive reader will immediately notice that there is no longer a strictly organized “Onegin stanza”, but a noticeable...
Outline of the eighth chapter: Onegin appears in St. Petersburg secular society; The narrator tells where Onegin went after killing Lensky in a duel; Onegin meets Tatiana at a social event, a characteristic of St. Petersburg society; Onegin fell in love with Tatiana;...
ONEGIN IS A HERO OF HIS TIME. In the novel “Eugene Onegin” A.S. Pushkin gave an image of that part of the educated youth of the 20s of the 19th century who, being critical of secular society, were forced to live in it. Loneliness, inability to adapt to life, inability to apply one’s mind, education to socially useful work - this is what characterizes Onegin. It is for this that Belinsky called Onegin “smart uselessness,” “ extra person».
Onegin received a typical upbringing and education for the noble circle of that time. They taught him “everything in jest,” did not bother him with “strict morality,” and when he finally entered into an independent life, he “could perfectly express himself and write in French; he danced the mazurka easily and bowed at ease,” in a conversation he could “touch everything lightly.” This was quite enough for social life, “and the world decided that he was smart and very nice.” Onegin plunges headlong into social life, full of entertainment: balls, theaters, lunches, dinners, love interests. Life flowed aimlessly and was “monotonous and colorful.”
Nevertheless, for his circle Onegin was a fairly educated person. He read Adam Smith, knew ancient literature, works by contemporary Western writers. Pushkin himself notes the originality of his hero. Onegin was distinguished from many by “involuntary devotion to dreams, inimitable strangeness and a sharp, chilled mind.” Naturally, such a person could not be satisfied for long with the aimless and empty life of light.
"Free, in color best years“,” Onegin becomes disillusioned with social life and falls into the blues: “nothing touched him, he did not notice anyone.” He tries to find a point of application of his strength, tries to read, write, but “nothing came out of his pen.” Nothing worked out for him and could not work out, because Onegin was not prepared for work throughout his entire previous life: “he was sick of persistent work.”
Onegin leaves for the village and becomes the complete owner of “factories, waters, forests, lands.” He is pleased that he “changed his previous path for something.” In the village, he tries to do something useful, to introduce something new into the lives of the peasants: “He replaced the ancient corvée with an easy quitrent.” But this was done without any purpose, in order “just to pass the time,” and therefore the hero’s activity does not bring him satisfaction and remains unfinished. The landowner neighbors surrounding Onegin are alien to him in spirit, limited and busy talking about “haymaking, about wine, about the kennel, about their relatives.” His life here is filled with the same boredom and consciousness of his uselessness as in St. Petersburg.
His relationship with Lensky is tragic. An empty quarrel with a friend leads to a duel. On the fateful morning before the duel, he appeared as a “ball of prejudice,” a slave of secular convention. It is from here that the breakdown in his life begins, a hasty flight from the village, a restless wandering around native land and a growing sense of one’s own inferiority and uselessness: “Why wasn’t I wounded by a bullet in the chest? Why am I not a frail old man... I am young, the life in me is strong, what should I expect? Melancholy, melancholy!..” In such spiritual turmoil, at the end of the novel he reveals his soul to Tatyana in a letter to her. Onegin is now completely different from that metropolitan dandy who, in the wilderness of a village garden, “gave Tatyana a bad mark for behavior”! He became not only older, but also richer spiritually, more meaningful, deeper, simply more humane. In an explanation with Tatyana, he says: “I want to hug your knees. And, sobbing at your feet, Pour out prayers, confessions, penalties, Everything that I could express...” This open, sobbing confession determines the answer to the question: “Isn’t he a parody?”
No, Onegin is not a parody, not an accidental fashionable phenomenon, but a living sad fate, conditioned by the entire way of life of noble society. At the end of the novel, Pushkin will confirm the outcome of the hero’s life: He lived without a goal, without work, Until the age of twenty-six, Languishing in the inactivity of leisure, Without service, without a wife, without business, Couldn’t do anything.” And the meaning of the entire novel seems even more bitter. The hero of the novel is not a “hero” at all, but only a sad example snatched by the poet from the thick of life.
"Eugene Onegin" was created by Pushkin as the first book in Russia to realistically describe the life of the nobles. In this novel, a complex image of the secular dandy Eugene Onegin is created in verse.
Onegin - who is he?
The young man, despising the society around him, nevertheless follows the rules established by him. He doesn't try to change elite, looks at everything around him with indifference and boredom. His upbringing and natural composure do not allow him to speak out in St. Petersburg living rooms with an accusation against society.
He expresses his protest with contemptuous silence. The author, in the image of Eugene, creates the type of “suffering” egoist. This person has an extraordinary mind, which does not allow him to experience pleasure in life; he is dissatisfied with himself and other people. However, he will never dare to transform himself and environment to change position: " Hard work he was sick."
Friends, then enemies
Arriving in the village, Evgeniy enjoys peaceful life just a couple of days, and then satiety and boredom come again. He feels that here too he will be useless and worthless, superfluous, like everywhere else. Only one person from the village environment becomes close to him - this is the young poet Lensky.
Onegin and Lensky are sincere friends, since they are similar. Both were representatives of the thinking intelligentsia from the nobility, both are higher in outlook and interests than the nobility from the provinces. And both friends do not understand what they want from life. Evgeny's friendship with Lensky reveals the true essence of Onegin - he is in fact not a “parody”, not some kind of “fashionable fad”, but smart and good man. Together with Lensky, he discusses issues of philosophy, remaining with him alien and incomprehensible to the nobles. Friends are doomed to loneliness, because in their development and aspirations they are much better than others, having a good education, having a deep mind and feelings. Society takes revenge on them, who despise its rules, takes revenge by destroying this friendly union. The stupid laws of the code of honor force Onegin to kill his only friend.
Unrequited feelings
Consider the image of Tatiana. Onegin and Larina are close in many qualities - they like to read, they are smart, they know how to reason, they do not like secular society, they have honesty. The difference between these two personalities is that Evgeniy, who grew up far from the village, is indifferent to ordinary people and nature, while Tatyana is attached to them with all her soul.
If Onegin had responded to Tatiana’s feelings, it is unknown whether he would have been able to change. He is not capable of love, so his selfishness and frivolity led to a break with Tatyana. Knowing how to read people's souls well, Onegin was able to assess the girl's personality from the first moment. But the circumstances turned out to be such that Eugene, because of his own selfishness and fear of breaking the rules of the world, which he despises, pushed Tatyana away.
After for long years Evgeniy's quest, seeing Larina again, belatedly acquires feelings for her. However, he already understands that time has passed, he himself destroyed his happiness. Tatyana still loves Onegin, but family is more important to her than love. As a result, Evgeniy again feels unnecessary and alien. Human feelings appear weak in the face of public opinion. Tatyana and Evgeniy are divided by this opinion, although they were very close to their inner world.
Pushkin created the image of a man who is a symbol of that time. This is a personality that was destroyed by the education system and the surrounding society.
Pushkin is a great Russian poet, the founder of Russian realism, the creator of Russian literary language. One of his greatest works is the novel “Eugene Onegin”.
Onegin is a secular St. Petersburg young man, a metropolitan aristocrat.
Describing his hero, Pushkin talks in detail about his upbringing and education. Onegin received what was typical for aristocratic youth of that time home education and the education of a French tutor:
Monsieur I "Abbe, poor Frenchman
So that the child does not get tired
I taught him everything jokingly,
I didn’t bother you with strict morals,
Lightly scolded for pranks
And in Summer garden took me for a walk.
Having become a young man, Onegin leads a life typical of young people of that time: balls, restaurants, visiting theaters. But Evgeny Onegin, by his nature, stands out from the general mass of young people. Pushkin notes his “involuntary devotion to dreams, inimitable strangeness and sharp, chilled mind,” a sense of honor, nobility of soul. This could not but lead Onegin to disappointment in the life and interests of secular society.
When Evgeniy is overcome by the blues, he tries to engage in some useful activity. Nothing came of his attempt to write!
Onegin locked himself at home.
Yawning, he took up the pen.
I wanted to write, but it’s hard work
He felt sick; Nothing
It did not come from his pen.
Later, having left for the estate that he received from his uncle, Onegin tries to start organizing the peasants:
He is the yoke of the ancient corvée
I replaced it with a light quitrent...
But all his activities as a landowner were limited to this reform.
Even such strong feelings as love and friendship could not save Eugene Onegin from spiritual emptiness. He rejected Tatyana’s love, since he valued “freedom and peace” above all else.
Onegin killed his friend Lensky, as secular prejudices prevailed in the hesitations that he experienced after receiving a challenge to a duel.
It seems to me that Pushkin condemns his hero: he behaved selfishly towards the people around him, although Onegin later realized this. He can be called a hero of his time, because Eugene, just like the hero of Lermontov’s work Pechorin, was above the society in which he was located. Very few people could understand him. I think that is why Eugene Onegin was the way he is.
Essays on literature: Eugene Onegin - a hero of his time Young noble intellectual early XIX century, Eugene Onegin is smart, noble, capable of feeling deeply and strongly. He was able to immediately appreciate Tatyana with her discreet external beauty and a rich inner world. Onegin is tactful in his relations with Lensky: He tried to keep the cooling word in his mouth and thought: it’s stupid for me to interfere with His momentary bliss. The repentance of Onegin, who killed a friend in a duel, is deep and sincere: “He could have discovered his feelings, and not bristled like an animal; he should have disarmed the young heart...” Onegin’s mind was also manifested in the fact that he early realized the worthlessness of secular society and felt feeling like a stranger and a superfluous person in high society living rooms. It was hard and unbearable for him to see in front of him just a long row of dinners, to look at life as a ritual and to follow the decorous crowd without sharing any general opinions, no passions. But Onegin's wonderful inclinations are suppressed social conditions, the environment in which he grew up and lived. It is no coincidence that Pushkin places in the first chapter of the novel short description life of the main character. From this description we learn who raised Eugene and how, what he was taught, how he spent his time when the time came for his “rebellious youth.”
Onegin's upbringing, as Pushkin showed, his reading circle, his sphere of interests - all this is devoid of national foundations. It is not for nothing that foreign language vocabulary predominates in the hero’s biography, conveying the peculiarity of high society culture, far from national Russian origins. Onegin's predominant state is boredom. Nothing could dispel his melancholy laziness. The thirst for monotonous pleasures in the absence of a real, living matter has taken root in Onegin’s psychology, and he is unable to overcome it.
“He was sick of persistent work,” notes Pushkin. And since, according to the author, only in work could they manifest themselves creative forces personality, then the outcome of Onegin’s life is joyless: Having lived without a goal, without work, Until the age of twenty-six, Languishing in the inactivity of leisure, Without service, without a wife, without business, He did not know how to do anything. Love also passed by, because the hero’s feelings became scarce - he suppressed the involuntary excitement experienced at the sight of Tatyana and upon receiving her letter. Only later, shocked by the murder of Lensky and meeting Tatyana again, Onegin gained the ability to do great and strong feeling. In the very first chapters, Onegin is deprived of the very ability to love. His attitude towards love is entirely rational and feigned. It is maintained in the spirit of acquired secular “truths”, the main objective whom - to charm and seduce, to seem in love, and not really be one: How early he could be a hypocrite, To harbor hope, to be jealous, To disbelieve, to force to believe, To seem gloomy, to languish... This "" science of tender passion" - necessary accessory secular salons and living rooms. And finally, Onegin’s friendship with Lensky ended tragically.
In the motivations for Onegin’s behavior, Pushkin constantly pits the impulses of his soul against the usual rules of behavior instilled by the secular environment... No matter how Onegin’s noble mind protested against the duel, social conventions shaped by the world still prevailed. Observing the unspoken law of honor established by secular society, Evgeniy kills Lensky in a duel. In the novel, Pushkin traces the socio-psychological content of the image of Onegin. Onegin's character was formed in certain social conditions, in a certain historical era. Consequently, Onegin is presented in the novel as a national-historical type of Russian life, ultimately generated by the autocratic-serf system.
His skepticism and disappointment are a reflection of the general “illness of modern Russians,” which gripped a significant part of the noble intelligentsia at the beginning of the century. Pushkin condemns not so much the hero as the secular environment that shaped him as a person. Onegins are doomed to inaction. They are no longer capable of selfless love, nor for friendship. This is where the idea of a public court arises and the blame falls not on the hero, but on the socio-historical way of Russian life. Pushkin is a great Russian poet, the founder of Russian realism, the creator of the Russian literary language. One of his greatest works is the novel "Eugene Onegin".
Onegin is a secular St. Petersburg young man, a metropolitan aristocrat. Describing his hero, Pushkin talks in detail about his upbringing and education. Onegin received a home education typical of aristocratic youth of that time and the upbringing of a French tutor: ... Monsieur I "Abbe, a wretched Frenchman, So that the child would not be exhausted, Taught him everything in jest, Didn't bother him with strict morals, Scolded him slightly for pranks And walked in the Summer Garden drove. Having become a young man, Onegin leads a typical life for young people of that time: balls, restaurants, visiting theaters. But Evgeny Onegin, by his nature, stands out from the general mass of young people.
Pushkin notes his “involuntary devotion to dreams, inimitable strangeness and sharp, chilled mind,” a sense of honor, nobility of soul. This could not but lead Onegin to disappointment in the life and interests of secular society. When Evgeniy is overcome by the blues, he tries to engage in some useful activity. Nothing came of his attempt to write! ... Onegin locked himself at home.
Yawning, he took up the pen. He wanted to write, but the persistent work was sickening to him; nothing came from his pen. Later, having left for the estate that he received from his uncle, Onegin tries to start organizing the peasants: He replaced the ancient corvée with an easy quitrent with a yoke... But all his activities as a landowner were limited to this reform. Even such strong feelings as love and friendship could not save Eugene Onegin from spiritual emptiness.
He rejected Tatyana’s love, since he valued “freedom and peace” above all else. Onegin killed his friend Lensky, as secular prejudices prevailed in the hesitations that he experienced after receiving a challenge to a duel. It seems to me that Pushkin condemns his hero: he behaved selfishly towards the people around him, although Onegin later realized this. He can be called a hero of his time, because Eugene, just like the hero of Lermontov’s work Pechorin, was above the society in which he was located. Very few people could understand him. I think that is why Eugene Onegin was the way he is. "Eugene Onegin" - the first Russian realistic novel and the only novel in verse in Russian literature.
The complexity of the image of E. Onegin can be traced throughout the entire novel. This lies at least in the fact that we see how very different Onegin is at the beginning and at the end of the novel. At the beginning of the novel, he is a young womanizer who goes from ball to ball.
But even during this period we observe his complexity: he did not go to the theater to watch magnificent productions, not to see the brilliant Istomina on stage. Onegin - an "honorary citizen of the scenes" - is more interested in meetings and affairs with "charming actresses" than the stage, art, he likes to point "a double lorgnette at the boxes of unfamiliar ladies." Difficult, controversial nature Onegin does not fit into the usual schemes: the hero is not a model, not a villain, he constantly deceives the reader’s expectations. Without responding to Tatyana’s feelings, he did not, however, become a “fatal seducer”, did not start a complete love game, did not betray her trust. His rebuke was cruel, but it was neither base nor dishonorable. “In that terrible hour, you acted nobly,” Tatyana will tell him. But the same Onegin thoughtlessly insulted Lensky, did not dare to refuse the duel, killed his friend... Now I want to express my opinion about the end of the novel. I think the novel could have been continued.
The fact is that Pushkin treated people like Onegin with some degree of contempt. It even seems to me that Pushkin probably loved some girl similar to Tatyana, and this girl was probably conquered by some person similar to Evgeniy. And based on all this, I believe that the end of the novel could not be happy. After all, when the first readers of the novel reproached Pushkin for ending the novel this way, he answered them: “You advise others for Onegin...” The complexity of the image of Onegin also lies in the fact that he did not fall in love with Tatyana immediately, but later, when she had already married the prince. And why this happened, we read in the novel. Yes, I remember most of all those lines when Pushkin gives an explanation of why Eugene fell in love with Tatiana: But as an indifferent princess, But as an unapproachable goddess. And especially the following lines: What is given to you does not attract you, the serpent certainly calls you To himself, to the mysterious tree: the Forbidden fruit Give it to you. And without him, heaven is not heaven for you.
I think that it is Eugene Onegin, and no one else, who is the hero of his time. He is in the novel a man who was killed by his upbringing and Savor, which no one could understand. This is my opinion about Eugene Onegin, the hero of his time.
