A work of realistic literature from the end of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th. Essay “Russian literature of the late 19th - early 20th centuries (review)

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The chronological boundary is from 1900 – 1901, but it gives almost nothing in the sense of delimiting eras. The first milestone of the new century is the revolution of 1905. The revolution passed, there was some calm - until the First World War. Akhmatova recalled this time in “Poem Without a Hero”: And along the legendary embankment, the real twentieth century, not the calendar one, was approaching... From what moment should we count the 20th century?

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At the turn of the eras, the worldview of a person who understood that the previous era was gone forever became different. The socio-economic and general cultural prospects of Russia began to be assessed completely differently. The new era was defined by contemporaries as “borderline.” general characteristics era

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General characteristics of the era

Became history old forms life, work, social political organization. The established, previously seemingly unchangeable, system of spiritual values ​​was radically revised. It is not surprising that the edge of the era was symbolized by the word “Crisis”. This “fashionable” word roamed the pages of journalistic and literary-critical articles along with the similar words “revival”, “turning point”, “crossroads”, etc.

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A CRISIS???

If there are ideas of time, then there are also forms of time V.G. Belinsky

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End XIX century exposed the deepest crisis phenomena in the economy Russian Empire

The reform of 1861 by no means decided the fate of the peasantry, who dreamed of “land and freedom.” This situation led to the emergence in Russia of a new revolutionary teaching - Marxism, which relied on growth industrial production and a new progressive class - the proletariat. In politics, this meant a transition to an organized struggle of united masses, the result of which was to be a violent overthrow political system and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The former methods of populist educators and populist terrorists have finally become a thing of the past.

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The First World War turned out to be a disaster for the country, pushing it towards an inevitable revolution. February 1917 and the ensuing anarchy led to the October Revolution. As a result, Russia acquired a completely different face. Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the main background literary development there were tragic social contradictions, as well as an ambivalent combination of difficult economic modernization and the revolutionary movement.

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Changes in everything

At a fast pace Changes were taking place in science, philosophical ideas about the world and man were changing, and arts close to literature were rapidly developing. Scientific and philosophical views at certain stages in the history of culture, words radically influence the creators, who sought to reflect the paradoxes of time in their works.

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Why and how does literature change?

Literary scholars answer this question from the present, analyzing the past. Writers, writing in the present, even if they describe the past, try to comprehend and show the future emerging in the present.

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XVIII century

New Russian literature was born in the 18th century and embodied on its pages an individual, living person. The person becomes central figure public life, and literature begins to study it deeply

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19th century

19th century writers embodied inner world man on the background real paintings life, and historical time was necessary basis creating an artistic image. The works show the “history of the soul” of a person, its development over time. The main theme of the century: HERO AND TIME or MAN AND SOCIETY

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A writer, unless he is a Wave and the ocean is Russia, cannot help but be outraged when the elements are outraged. A writer, if only he is the nerve of a great people, cannot help but be struck when freedom is struck. Ya.P.Polonsky

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The emergence of new heroes

Historical transformations (wars, revolutions) could not but affect art. In search of ways out of the crisis, writers began to look for special people and bring them to the pages of their books. Those that can prevent the country from sliding into the abyss.

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“A poet in Russia is more than a poet” (E. Yevtushenko)

When artists accept revolution as a way to reorganize life, a new era is born, and with it a new artistic thinking, new issues Literary manifestos appear that are united by nihilism - the absolute denial of the past.

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Time stopped. Is it possible for man in such an era?

We have to fight, fight, create new art, reorganize life. The new “picture of the world” sacrifices details. Therefore, laconic forms arise that can reveal the deep essence of the phenomenon. A person’s personality is depicted in a dramatic collision with everything that opposes it hostile world

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Man - as the center of the literary universe gives way to the elements

Elements and evolution are incompatible. Real man no longer exists, because... there is no historical time, but there is absolute (aesthetic) time. The place of the human soul is occupied by a social function. The general becomes more significant than the private.

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Proletarian poets

Bravely, comrades, keep up! Having become stronger in spirit in the struggle, Let us pave the way for ourselves to the kingdom of freedom with our breasts! L. Radin We are blacksmiths, and our spirit is young, We forge the keys to happiness!.. Rise higher, heavy hammer, Knock harder on the steel chest! F. Shkulev

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Man-God in the works of modernist poets

A wingless spirit, overwhelmed by the earth, a self-forgotten and a forgotten god... Just one dream, and again, inspired, you rush upward from vain worries V. Soloviev

The last decade of the 19th century opens up in Russian and world culture new stage. Over the course of about a quarter of a century - from the early 1890s to October 1917 - literally every aspect of Russian life changed radically - economics, politics, science, technology, culture, art. Compared to the social and to some extent literary stagnation of the 1880s new stage historical and cultural development was characterized by rapid dynamics and acute drama. In terms of the pace and depth of change, as well as the catastrophic nature internal conflicts Russia at this time was ahead of any other country.

Therefore, the transition from the era of classical Russian literature to the new literary time was accompanied by a far from peaceful nature of general cultural and intraliterary life, an unexpectedly rapid - by the standards of the 19th century - change of aesthetic guidelines, and a radical renewal of literary techniques. Russian poetry developed especially dynamically at this time, again - after the Pushkin era - coming to the forefront of the country's general cultural life. Later, the poetry of this time was called the “poetic renaissance” or “silver age.” Having arisen by analogy with the concept of the “golden age,” which traditionally denoted the Pushkin period of Russian literature, this phrase was initially used to characterize the peak manifestations of poetic culture of the early 20th century - the work of A. Blok, A. Bely, I. Annensky, A. Akhmatova, O. Mandelstam and others brilliant masters words. However, gradually the term “ silver Age"began to define that part of the whole artistic culture Russia at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries, which was associated with symbolism, acmeism, “neo-peasant” and partly futuristic literature. Today, many literary scholars have made the definition of “Silver Age” synonymous with the concept of “culture of the turn of the century,” which, of course, is inaccurate, since a number of significant phenomena of the turn of the century (primarily associated with revolutionary theories) can hardly be compared with what was originally called art of the Silver Age.

What was new compared to the 19th century at the turn of the two centuries was, first of all, man’s worldview. The understanding of the exhaustion of the previous era grew stronger, and directly opposite assessments of the socio-economic and general cultural prospects of Russia began to appear. Common denominator ideological disputes that flared up in the country towards the end of the 19th century were defined new era as a border era: the previous forms of life, work, and political organization of society were irretrievably becoming a thing of the past, and the system of spiritual values ​​itself was being decisively revised. Crisis - keyword era, wandering through the pages of journalistic and literary-critical articles (the words “revival”, “turning point”, “crossroads”, etc., which are similar in meaning, were often used).

She quickly joined the discussion of current issues fiction, traditionally for Russia, has not stood aloof from public passions. Her social engagement was manifested in the titles of her works that were characteristic of that era. “Without a Road”, “At the Turning” - V. Veresaev calls his stories; “The Decline of the Old Century” - echoes the title of the chronicle novel by A. Amphitheaters; "U last line“- M. Artsybashev responds with his novel. Awareness of the crisis of the time, however, did not mean recognition of its futility.

Against, most of masters of words felt their era as a time of unprecedented achievements, when the importance of literature in the life of the country increased sharply. That's why it's so great attention began to be paid not only to creativity itself, but also to ideological and public position writers, their connections with political life countries.

Despite all the differences in positions and views, there was something in common in the worldview of the writers of the turn of the century, which was brilliantly captured in his time by the outstanding literature connoisseur Professor Semyon Afanasyevich Vengerov in the preface to the three-volume “History of Russian Literature of the 20th Century” (1914) that he conceived. The scientist noted that uniting the social activist M. Gorky and the individualist K. Balmont, the realist I. Bunin, the symbolists V. Bryusov, A. Blok and A. Bely with the expressionist L. Andreev and the naturalist M. Artsybashev, the pessimist-decadent F. Sologub and the optimist A. Kuprin was a challenge to the traditions of everyday life, “aspiration to the heights, to the distance, to the depths, but only away from the hateful plane of gray vegetation.”

Another thing is that development paths new literature writers imagined it differently. In the 19th century, Russian literature had a high degree of ideological unity. It has developed a fairly clear hierarchy of literary talents: at one stage or another, it is not difficult to identify masters who served as reference points for an entire generation of writers (Pushkin, Gogol, Nekrasov, Tolstoy, etc.). Here's the legacy turn of XIX-XX centuries is not limited to the work of one or two dozen significant literary artists, and the logic of literary development of that time cannot be reduced to a single center or the simplest scheme changing directions. This legacy is a multi-tiered artistic reality, in which individual literary talents, no matter how outstanding they may be, turn out to be only part of a grandiose whole.

When starting to study turn-of-the-century literature, one cannot do without brief overview social background and general cultural context of this period (context - environment, external environment, in which art exists).

At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, all aspects of Russian life were radically transformed: politics, economics, science, technology, culture, art. Various, sometimes directly opposite, assessments of the socio-economic and cultural prospects for the country's development arise. What is becoming common is the feeling of the onset of a new era, bringing a change in the political situation and a revaluation of previous spiritual and aesthetic ideals. Literature could not help but respond to the fundamental changes in the life of the country. There is a revision of artistic guidelines, a radical renewal literary devices. At this time, Russian poetry was developing especially dynamically. A little later, this period will be called the “poetic renaissance” or the Silver Age of Russian literature.

Realism at the beginning of the 20th century

Realism does not disappear, it continues to develop. L.N. is still actively working. Tolstoy, A.P. Chekhov and V.G. Korolenko, M. Gorky, I.A. have already powerfully declared themselves. Bunin, A.I. Kuprin... Within the framework of the aesthetics of realism, the creative individuality of writers of the 19th century found a vivid manifestation, their civil position And moral ideals- realism equally reflected the views of authors who share a Christian, primarily Orthodox, worldview - from F.M. Dostoevsky to I.A. Bunin, and those for whom this worldview was alien - from V.G. Belinsky to M. Gorky.

However, at the beginning of the 20th century, many writers were no longer satisfied with the aesthetics of realism - new aesthetic schools began to emerge. Writers unite in various groups, push creative principles, participate in polemics - literary movements are established: symbolism, acmeism, futurism, imagism, etc.

Symbolism at the beginning of the 20th century

Russian symbolism, the largest of the modernist movements, arose not only as a literary phenomenon, but also as a special worldview that combines artistic, philosophical and religious principles. The date of emergence of the new aesthetic system is considered to be 1892, when D.S. Merezhkovsky made a report "On the causes of the decline and on new trends in modern Russian literature." It proclaimed the main principles of future symbolists: “ mystical content, symbols and the expansion of artistic impressionability." Central location in the aesthetics of symbolism, it was assigned to a symbol, an image with a potential inexhaustibility of meaning.

The symbolists contrasted the rational knowledge of the world with the construction of the world in creativity, the knowledge of the environment through art, which V. Bryusov defined as “comprehension of the world in other, non-rational ways.” In mythology different nations Symbolists found universal philosophical models with the help of which it was possible to comprehend the deep foundations human soul and solving spiritual problems of our time. WITH special attention representatives of this trend also related to the heritage of Russian classical literature- new interpretations of the works of Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Tyutchev were reflected in the works and articles of the symbolists. Symbolism gave culture the names of outstanding writers - D. Merezhkovsky, A. Blok, Andrei Bely, V. Bryusov; the aesthetics of symbolism had a huge influence on many representatives of other literary movements.

Acmeism at the beginning of the 20th century

Acmeism was born in the bosom of symbolism: a group of young poets first founded the literary association “Poets Workshop”, and then proclaimed themselves representatives of a new literary movement - acmeism (from the Greek akme - the highest degree of something, blossoming, peak). Its main representatives are N. Gumilev, A. Akhmatova, S. Gorodetsky, O. Mandelstam. Unlike the symbolists, who strive to know the unknowable, to comprehend the highest essences, the Acmeists again turned to the value human life, the diversity of the bright earthly world. The main requirement for artistic form works have become picturesque clarity of images, verified and precise composition, stylistic balance, precision of details. Acmeists assigned the most important place in the aesthetic system of values ​​to memory - a category associated with the preservation of the best domestic traditions and world cultural heritage.

Futurism at the beginning of the 20th century

Derogatory comments about previous and modern literature were given by representatives of another modernist movement - futurism (from the Latin futurum - future). A necessary condition The existence of this literary phenomenon was considered by its representatives to be an atmosphere of outrageousness, a challenge to public taste, and a literary scandal. The Futurists' desire for mass theatrical performances with dressing up, painting faces and hands was caused by the idea that poetry should come out of books onto the square, to sound in front of spectators and listeners. Futurists (V. Mayakovsky, V. Khlebnikov, D. Burliuk, A. Kruchenykh, E. Guro, etc.) put forward a program for transforming the world with the help of new art, which abandoned the legacy of its predecessors. At the same time, unlike representatives of other literary movements, in substantiating their creativity they relied on fundamental sciences - mathematics, physics, philology. The formal and stylistic features of Futurism poetry were the renewal of the meaning of many words, word creation, the rejection of punctuation marks, special graphic design of poems, depoetization of language (the introduction of vulgarisms, technical terms, the destruction of the usual boundaries between “high” and “low”).

Conclusion

Thus, in the history of Russian culture, the beginning of the 20th century was marked by the emergence of diverse literary movements, various aesthetic views and schools. However, original writers, true artists of words, overcame the narrow framework of declarations, created highly artistic works that outlived their era and entered the treasury of Russian literature.

The most important feature of the beginning of the 20th century was the universal craving for culture. Not being at the premiere of a play in the theater, not being present at an evening of an original and already sensational poet, in literary drawing rooms and salons, not reading a newly published book of poetry was considered a sign of bad taste, unmodern, unfashionable. When a culture becomes a fashionable phenomenon, it is good sign. “Fashion for culture” is not a new phenomenon for Russia. This was the case during the time of V.A. Zhukovsky and A.S. Pushkin: let’s remember “The Green Lamp” and “Arzamas”, “Society of Lovers” Russian literature"etc. At the beginning of the new century, exactly one hundred years later, the situation practically repeated itself. The Silver Age replaced the Golden Age, maintaining and preserving the connection of times.

LITERATURE OF THE END OF THE XIX - BEGINNING OF THE XX CENTURY

More than eighty years ago, Alexander Blok expressed hope for the attention and understanding of his future readers. Fifteen years later, another poet, Vladimir Mayakovsky, summing up his literary work, will directly address “dear comrades and descendants.” Poets entrust the people of the future with the most important thing: their books, and in them - everything that they strived for, what they thought about, what people who lived in the “beautiful and furious” 20th century felt. And today, when we stand on the threshold of a new millennium, “you, from another generation,” history itself has given the opportunity to see the passing century in a historical perspective and discover Russian literature of the 20th century.

One of the most striking and mysterious pages of Russian culture is the beginning of the century. Today this period is called the “silver age” of Russian literature, following the “golden” XIX, when Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy reigned. But it would be more correct to call the “Silver Age” not all literature, but primarily poetry, as the participants in the literary movement of that era did. Poetry, which was actively looking for new ways of development, for the first time after Pushkin’s era at the beginning of the 20th century. came to the forefront of the literary process. We must remember that the term “Silver Age” is conventional, but it is significant that the very choice of this characteristic paid tribute to its predecessors, primarily A.S. Pushkin (more about this in the chapters on poetry).

However, on turn of the 19th century and XX century literature developed in other historical conditions than before. If you look for a word that characterizes the most important features of the period under consideration, it will be the word crisis. Great scientific discoveries shook the classical ideas about the structure of the world and led to the paradoxical conclusion: “matter has disappeared.” As E. Zamyatin wrote in the early 20s, “exact science blew up the very reality of matter,” “life itself today has ceased to be flat-real: it is projected not onto the previous fixed, but into dynamic coordinates,” and the most famous things in this new projection seems strangely familiar, fantastic. This means, the writer continues, that new beacons have loomed before literature: from the depiction of everyday life - to existence, to philosophy, to the fusion of reality and fiction, from the analysis of phenomena - to their synthesis. Zamyatin’s conclusion that “realism has no roots” is fair, although unusual at first glance, if by realism we mean “one bare image of everyday life.” A new vision of the world, thus, will determine the new face of realism of the 20th century, which will differ significantly from the classical realism of its predecessors in its “modernity” (definition by I. Bunin). The emerging trend towards the renewal of realism at the end of the 19th century. V.V. astutely noted Rozanov. “...After naturalism, a reflection of reality, it is natural to expect idealism, insight into its meaning... The centuries-old trends of history and philosophy - this is what will probably become in the near future the favorite subject of our study... Politics in in a high sense this word, in the sense of penetration into the course of history and influence on it, and Philosophy as the need of a perishing soul greedily grasping for salvation - this is the goal that irresistibly attracts us to itself...” wrote V.V. Rozanov (my italics - L. T.).

Crushing consequences for human spirit had a crisis of faith (“God is dead!” exclaimed Nietzsche). This led to the fact that a person of the 20th century. He began to increasingly experience the influence of irreligious and, what is truly scary, immoral ideas, for, as Dostoevsky predicted, if there is no God, then “everything is permissible.” The cult of sensual pleasures, the apology of Evil and death, the glorification of the self-will of the individual, the recognition of the right to violence, which turned into terror - all these features, testifying to the deepest crisis of consciousness, will be characteristic not only of the poetry of modernists.

At the beginning of the 20th century. Russia was shaken by acute social conflicts: the war with Japan, the first World War, internal contradictions and, as a result, the scope of the popular movement and revolution. The clash of ideas intensified, political movements and parties were formed that sought to influence the minds of people and the development of the country. All this could not but cause a feeling of instability, the fragility of existence, a tragic discord between a person and himself. “Atlantis” - such a prophetic name will be given to the ship on which the drama of life and death will unfold, I. Bunin in the story “The Gentleman from San Francisco”, emphasizing the tragic overtones of the work with a description of the Devil watching over people's destinies.

Each literary era has its own system of values, a center (philosophers call it axiological, value-centered), to which all paths of artistic creativity one way or another converge. Such a center that determined many distinctive features Russian literature The 20th century became History with its unprecedented socio-historical and spiritual cataclysms, which drew everyone into its orbit - from a specific person to the people and the state. If V.G. Belinsky called his 19th century primarily historical; this definition is even more true in relation to the 20th century with its new worldview, the basis of which was the idea of ​​an ever-accelerating historical movement. Time itself has once again brought the problem to the forefront historical path Russia, forced to look for an answer to the prophetic Pushkin's question: “Where are you galloping, proud horse, and where will you put your hooves down?” The beginning of the 20th century was filled with predictions of “unprecedented riots” and “unheard of fires”, a premonition of “retribution,” as A. Blok prophetically said in his unfinished poem of the same name. B. Zaitsev’s idea is well known that everyone was hurt (“wounded”) by revolutionism, regardless of their political attitude to the events. “Through revolution as a state of mind” - this is how a modern researcher defined one of characteristic features“well-being” of a person at that time. The future of Russia and the Russian people, fate moral values in a turning point in history, the connection between man and real story, incomprehensible “variegation” national character- not a single artist could escape answering these “damned questions” of Russian thought. Thus, in the literature of the beginning of the century, not only did the interest in history, traditional for Russian art, manifest itself, but it also formed special quality artistic consciousness, which can be defined as historical consciousness. At the same time, it is absolutely not necessary to look for direct references to specific events, problems, conflicts, and heroes in all works. History for literature is, first of all, its “secret thought”; it is important for writers as an impetus for thinking about the mysteries of existence, for comprehending the psychology and life of the spirit of “historical man”.

But the Russian writer would hardly have considered himself to have fulfilled his destiny if he had not searched for himself (sometimes difficultly, even painfully) and offered his understanding of a way out to a person in a crisis era.

Without the sun we would be dark slaves,

It is beyond understanding that there is a radiant day.

K. Balmont

A person who has lost integrity, in a situation of a global crisis of spirit, consciousness, culture, social order, and the search for a way out of this crisis, the desire for ideal, harmony - this is how one can define the most important directions of artistic thought of the border era.

Literature of the late XIX - early XX centuries. - a phenomenon that is extremely complex, acutely conflicting, but also fundamentally united, since all directions Russian art developed in a common social and cultural atmosphere and answered in their own way the same difficult questions raised by time. For example, not only the works of V. Mayakovsky or M. Gorky, who saw a way out of the crisis in social transformations, are imbued with the idea of ​​​​rejection of the surrounding world, but also the poems of one of the founders of Russian symbolism, D. Merezhkovsky:

So life as a nothingness is terrible,

And not even struggle, not torment,

But only endless boredom and quiet horror.

The lyrical hero of A. Blok expressed the confusion of a person leaving the world of familiar, established values ​​“into the damp night”, having lost faith in life itself:

Night, street, lantern, pharmacy,

Pointless and dim light.

Live for at least another quarter of a century -

Everything will be like this. There is no outcome.

How scary everything is! How wild! - Give me your hand, Comrade, friend! Let's forget ourselves again!

If the artists were mostly unanimous in their assessment of the present, contemporary writers answered the question about the future and ways to achieve it differently. The symbolists went into the created creative imagination“Palace of Beauty”, into mystical “other worlds”, into the music of verse. M. Gorky placed hope in the mind, talent, and active principles of man, who sang the power of Man in his works. The dream of human harmony with the natural world, of the healing power of art, religion, love and doubts about the possibility of realizing this dream permeate the books of I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, L. Andreev. I felt like “the voice of the street without a tongue” lyrical hero V. Mayakovsky, who took on his shoulders the entire burden of rebellion against the foundations of the universe (“down with it!”). The ideal of Rus' is “the country of birch chintz”, the idea of ​​​​the unity of all living things is heard in the poems of S. Yesenin. With faith in the possibility of social reconstruction of life and a call with my own hands Proletarian poets began to forge the “keys of happiness.” Naturally, literature did not give its answers in a logical form, although the journalistic statements of writers, their diaries, and memoirs are also extremely interesting, without which it is impossible to imagine Russian culture at the beginning of the century. A feature of the era was parallel existence and struggle literary trends, uniting writers with similar ideas about the role of creativity, the most important principles of understanding the world, approaches to depicting personality, preferences in the choice of genres, styles, and forms of storytelling. Aesthetic diversity and sharp demarcation of literary forces have become characteristic feature literature of the beginning of the century.