“The theme of the protection of nature in modern prose (V. Astafiev, V. Rasputin). Man and Nature in Modern Literature (Ch. Aitmatov. "The Scaffold", V. "Farewell to Mother")

“A person will destroy the world sooner than learn to live in it” (W. Schwebel)

Man is a part of nature, its creation. He uses the generous gifts of nature, enjoys the beauty of its landscapes. But, unfortunately, it is not always reasonable and careful about it. Wastes from various industries are dumped into clean rivers, age-old forests are cut down, lakes with fish are drained, and rivers are redirected. The man is busily cutting off the branch on which he sits, without realizing it. But without clean water and air, without fertile, living land, humanity is doomed to a slow and painful death. And nature, forced to defend itself against human aggression, begins to take revenge on him. She takes revenge with floods, earthquakes and other, no less terrible, disasters.

Russian literature has always been interested in the problem of the relationship between man and nature. Writers admired the beauty of their native nature, showed a close relationship between man and nature. Since the 20th century, the attention of writers has also been directed to environmental problems. Particularly acute and close attention to the problem of ecological disaster, the barbaric attitude of man to nature, to “our smaller brothers” was paid in his work by the wonderful writer Valentin Grigoryevich Rasputin. In the story “Farewell to Matera”, he showed how cruel and ruthless a person can be to all living things on the way to achieving their goals.

The village of Matera stood for three hundred years, and no one knows how old the island on which it stands is. And now people decide that the problem of providing the region with electricity can be solved only by flooding it, as hundreds of large and small villages, villages, villages, farms, cities were once flooded. Not only people oppose the destruction of the village, nature itself, as it were, postpones the deadline for the flooding of Matera, prolongs its life for several days - it sends heavy rains on the days of the last field work, makes it possible for Daria and her fellow villagers to say goodbye to their native land, where their parents are buried, where their roots remain.

Rasputin, with great love and respect, draws the harmonious world of Matera, where for many years people lived in unity with nature, without disturbing her peace, without harming her. Nature has fed more than one generation of the inhabitants of Matera, and now it is being killed. Nature is crying, symbolized by a small amusing animal named Boss.

The inhabitants of Matera, old men and women, are also part of Matera. Their lives will also be destroyed and thrown under the feet of progress, which is called upon to transform nature for the benefit of man. But the construction of a hydroelectric power station, as a result of which the island of Matera will be flooded, the destruction of the cemetery, the burning of houses and forests - all this is more like a war with the natural world, and not its transformation.

It is no coincidence that Rasputin has the name of the island - Matera. In this word, the word "mother" is heard. Matyora-mother symbolizes nature in the work. This means that the attitude of a person to nature should be, as to a mother, careful and caring. Unfortunately, the younger generation in the story has lost a sense of kinship not only with their native land, but also with loved ones.

Rasputin's story ends tragically. People have destroyed the beautiful, poetic world of Matera. People without a soul and without God, destroying the harmonious world of nature, are doomed to destroy themselves. And, bitter as it may seem, the words of Wilhelm Schwebel turn out to be prophetic:"Man will destroy the world rather than learn to live in it."

It is difficult to find literature in the world in which so much attention would be paid to the topic: man and nature. The names of almost all writers are associated with picturesque places. Pushkin cannot be separated from Mikhailovsky, Tolstoy from Yasnaya Polyana. The relationship of man to nature is one of the most topical problems of our time. Writers, economists, scientists are sounding the alarm: nature is in danger, it needs to be saved. Now it cannot be said that man is the king of nature. The conquest of nature turned out for us the destruction of its wealth, the struggle with it - moral self-destruction. Being on the verge of an ecological catastrophe, we see our involvement, we begin to reflect on the place of nature in our lives. In the seventies, Viktor Astafiev wrote "The Last Bow" and "Tsar-Fish". The stories of “Tsar-Fish” are about poachers who violate the prohibitions on hunting and fishing. Astafiev is sure: “The mystery on earth and the stars in the sky were thousands of years before us. The stars went out or broke into fragments, instead of them others blossomed in the sky. And the trees in the taiga died and were born, one tree was burned by lightning, washed away by the river, another sowed seeds into the water, in the wind. The writer talks about what we did with the taiga: “No, we only wounded it, damaged it, trampled it, scratched it, burned it with fire. But they couldn’t convey their fear, their confusion, they didn’t instill hostility, no matter how hard they tried. In the chapter “King-fish”, the image of the king-fish symbolizes nature itself. In this chapter, a man enters the fight against a huge sturgeon. The duel ends in favor of nature. Having lost his conscience, a person is defeated, and the magic king-fish swims to the bottom of the Yenisei. In his works, Valentin Rasputin writes about the protection of nature. In the story "Farewell to Matera" he shows the suffering of people who leave their homeland. It seems to me that nature is crying and suffering along with people. There is a tree on the island, they tried to cut it down, cut it down, set it on fire. People can't do anything with it. Nature also resists people. But will she survive this fight? When we fight nature, we destroy ourselves. In the story "Fire" the same problem is raised. “To cut down a forest is not to sow bread,” says the protagonist of the story. They cut it down with the current technology in years. And what's next? Then hunger, poverty.” After all, along with nature, man also perishes. Modern writers teach us to think about what we do with nature. Too much grief and suffering brings us technological progress. He strikes at nature, which means he strikes deadly blows at us. Such an attitude towards nature leads to catastrophes that shake the whole world. I remember the words of Prishvin: “To protect nature means to protect the Motherland.”

Mastery of the image of nature in one of the works of Russian literature of the XX century. (V.P. Astafiev. "King-fish".)

Each writer in any of his works touches on the theme of nature. This may be a simple description of the place of unfolding events or an expression of the feelings of the hero, but the author always shows his position, his attitude to nature. Usually there are two points of view here: some believe that man is the creator and he must conquer all life that lives on earth; others, on the contrary, prove that nature is a temple and every person is obliged to obey its laws. Each writer insists on his own and often refuses to understand and comprehend the position opposite to his own. Astafiev, in his work “King-Fish”, tries to understand this problem and find an answer to an important question for everyone: what is nature - a temple or a slave of man? The protagonist of this narrative in the stories of Ignatich is a fisherman. All his life he has been fishing and knows how to do it as well as possible. Not a single fish in any place of the river, even in the most remote and uninhabited, will be able to escape from its nets. He conquered the river. Here he is the king, the king of nature. And he behaves like a king: he is neat, he brings all his affairs to the end. But how does he manage the wealth entrusted to him? Ignatich is fishing. But why is she in such large quantities to him? His family is well-to-do enough to live and feed themselves even without this “gain”. He does not sell the fish he catches. And in order to engage in fishing, he has to hide from fish supervision, because this occupation is considered poaching. What drives him? And here we see our king of nature from the other side. All his actions are driven by greed. In addition to him, there are many good fishermen in the village, and there is an unannounced competition between them. If your nets bring more fish, then you are the best. And because of this selfish desire, people exterminate fish, which means they gradually destroy nature, squander what is valuable on earth. But why does nature need a king who does not value the wealth he owns? Will she submit and not overthrow him? Then the king-fish appears, the queen of the rivers, sent to fight the king of nature. Every fisherman dreams of catching the king fish, because this is a sign from above. The belief says: if you catch a king fish, let it go and do not tell anyone about it. This fish symbolizes the peculiarity of the person who caught it, his superiority over others. What happens to Ignatich when he meets this messenger of nature? Two feelings oppose him: on the one hand, the desire to master the king-fish, so that later the whole village would know about his skill, on the other hand, superstitious fear and a desire to release the fish in order to get rid of this unbearable burden for him. But still, the first feeling wins: greed takes precedence over conscience. Ignatich decides to pull the fish out of the water at all costs and pass for the best fisherman in the entire area. He vaguely understands that he cannot cope alone, but he suppresses the thoughts that he could call on his brother for help, because then he will have to share with him both prey and glory. And greed destroys him. Ignatich finds himself in the water one on one with the “fish”. The wounded king of nature and the queen of rivers meet in an equal battle with the elements. Now the king of nature no longer controls the situation, nature conquers him, and gradually he humbles himself. Together with the fish, clinging to each other and calming down from this touch, they are waiting for their death. And Ignatich asks: “Lord, let this fish go!” He himself can no longer do this. Their fate is now in the hands of nature. So, it means that it is not man who creates nature, but nature rules over man. But nature is not so merciless, it gives a person a chance to improve, she is waiting for repentance. Ignatich is a smart person, he understands his guilt and sincerely repents of his deed, but not only this: he recalls all his past actions, analyzes his life. This incident makes him remember all the old sins and misdeeds and think about how he will live on if he survives here and now. It may seem that Astafiev only confused the reader with his thoughts, but nevertheless he gives an answer to a difficult question: nature is a temple where a person cannot manage at his own discretion, but he must help this temple to enrich itself, because a person is a part of nature , and he is called upon to protect this only home for all living things. The work "King-fish" is written as a narrative in stories. The book consists of many short stories, essays, stories. Some stories are written in art style, others - in journalistic. This diversity allows a much more accurate assessment of the situation and unfolding events, look at a large number of problems from different angles and find the only correct solution. Different styles make the events taking place in the story more realistic. This book gives a lot of good lessons and advice. In this work, Astafyev seems to be asking us: are we using what is given to us correctly, are we wasting the wealth given to us - nature? The truth written here brightens the memory and thoughts and makes you look at the world with different eyes.

"King fish"(1972-1975) is defined by the author himself as "narration in stories". Written in the first person, the author himself tells about his trips to his native land, to the banks of the Yenisei. Pictures of Siberian nature. It tells about the fate of the family of the author-narrator: his father, a frivolous and dissolute man, about his brother Kolya. The fate of his brother was tragic: having gone hunting for foxes in winter, he and his two friends find themselves in a hut littered with snow. Kolya, after a severe cold, fell ill - "planted" his heart, died early.

Pictures of people's lives in the Siberian village of Chush. Poaching, barbaric destruction of nature. The hero of the story "Lady" is a dissolute and idle man, nicknamed so by the locals. The story "At the Golden Hag" tells about one of the inhabitants of the village of Chush, Utrobin, whom everyone calls the Commander. He is a dashing poacher, one of the episodes of his life is described in detail: The Commander on a motor boat leaves with a catch from the fishery pursuing him. This happens on a significant day for the hero: on this day, his beloved daughter Taika should receive a school certificate. Her father has a special relationship with her. Taiko is his whole life, all his hopes for the future. Successfully leaving the fishery, the Commander disembarks and finds out that his daughter was run over by a drunk driver. Woe to the Commander. He calls the drunk driver a "land poacher" to himself.

The hero of the story "Tsar-fish" is Ignatich, the elder brother of the Commander. He is a respectable person, who hardly drinks, and who deserves universal respect. Like other residents of the village, Zinoviy Ignatievich poachers on the river. During one of these trips for fish, he comes across a sturgeon of unprecedented size - the "king-fish" on a hook. The fish overturns the boat, the catcher almost sank with her. Their duel takes place, Ignatich begins to think that this is a werewolf, the hero recalls his former life, condemns himself for greed, cruelty to nature, recalls how once, as a young guy, he offended a girl, Glakha Kuklina. Hero's Remorse. He releases the fish.

The hero of the second part of "Tsar-fish" is Akim. He was born in the village of Boganida on the banks of the Yenisei. His mother gave birth to him very early, later Akim, his sister Kasyanka, other brothers and sisters grow up at the fishing artel, on the artel's ear. All artel workers treat children warmly and cordially, in the story "Ear on Boganid" it is shown bright picture a common feast, where no one is offended, where the custom has been preserved since the war to feed all the guys indiscriminately with brigade fish soup.

After the death of their mother, the children were sent to Orphanage, and Akim, already grown up, works in different places - on the Yenisei as a buoy man, in a geological detachment. In the village, fate pushed him against Goga Gertsev. Goga Gertsev is not a local, an urban person who grew up in a cultural family. He graduated from the university, a geologist. Gertsev considers himself a superman, treats people with contempt, including Akim. Goga wanders alone in the taiga in the hope of finding a valuable deposit and becoming famous. In one of his wanderings, Gertsev meets a young Muscovite Elya, and the two of them go to the taiga. Elya became seriously ill, and her companion died while fishing, falling and drowning in the water. Sick and helpless Elya is found in his hunting hut by Akim, who went to the fur trade. He very carefully and selflessly takes care of the patient, saves her, abandoning his hunting business. Elya, who has recovered, manages to be sent home by plane to Moscow. Akim says goodbye to her at the airport, in parting he gives her the last money so that she can take a taxi, not catch a cold, not get sick again. The author put this story as the basis for the plot of the story "The Dream of the White Mountains" in the second part of the "King-Fish". The last story of the book is called "There is no answer for me" - this is a lyrical reflection of the author about the past, present and future of his native land, about man and nature, about memory.

The story "Farewell to Matera"(1976) begins with a description of spring in the Siberian village of Matera, standing on an island in the middle of the Angara. This is the last spring for Matera - the island must go under flooding in connection with the construction of a hydroelectric power station on the Angara, a new village is being built for the villagers. The few remaining on the island must leave. The old women talk about the upcoming departure with Daria, she is the oldest of them. During a tea party at Daria's, Bogodul, a resident of Matera, reports that the village cemetery is being destroyed. Daria goes there and resolutely drives the newcomers away. They explain that they are acting on the instructions of the sanitary and epidemiological station, that the island needs to be prepared for flooding. Old women resolutely defend the cemetery, restore order there again. Daria talks about the fact that something is wrong in the world, that everyone is running somewhere, not knowing where. He remembers his parents, their wise unhurried life. He says that they used to live according to their conscience, recalls the former Matera. Daria's son Pavel, who lives in a new village, comes to Daria, she asks him to transport the ashes of his parents. Pavel says that there are already many worries. The village is preparing to move. The hut of Petrukha, the son of Katerina, was declared a monument of wooden architecture, a sign was nailed on and money was promised for the house. At first, Petruha is proud of this, but then threatens not to wait for the final settlement with him.

At night, when everyone is sleeping, a unique animal comes out into the world - the Master of the island. If there are brownies in the huts, then there must be a Master on the island. He walks around the island, watches everything that happens, thinks that the island could still live for a long time.

Nastasya, Daria's friend, leaves the island. Her heavy farewell to her home. Daria accompanies her. Petrukha's hut caught fire. His mother and other old women believe that Petruha himself set fire to his house, and curse him for it.

For the last time life burst on Matera at the time of haymaking. Its former residents came together, worked together, joyfully, and it was sad to go back without having lived enough in Matera.

A grandson, Pavel's son, came to visit Daria. Their conversations, Daria became aware that her grandson was going to the construction of a hydroelectric power station. It upsets her, their arguments. Andrei speaks in newspaper phrases, grandmother speaks about the soul, that if you live not according to your conscience, then you can lose yourself along the way.

The last days are coming to Matera. The remaining residents gather at Daria's and talk about their lives. Pavel tells Daria that the graves cannot be moved. After that, Daria goes to the cemetery, says goodbye to the graves of her father and mother, asks for their forgiveness. Daria's decision to clean up the hut before seeing her off. Her thoughts are that the truth is in the memory, whoever has no memory has no life.

A tree in the middle of the island, which everyone calls the "royal leaf". He is unusually powerful, many local legends are associated with him. It is believed that the island is attached to the river bed with "royal foliage", and while it stands, Matera will be alive. Firefighters try to cut it down, burn it, but nothing happens. The tree continues to stand, but everything around it is already empty.

Daria cleans up her hut, whitewashes the walls, decorates the hut with fir branches, then leaves the house. For the last inhabitants of Matera, they sail on a boat. A heavy fog fell, all around there was only water and fog, nothing but water and fog. The last inhabitants of the island in the barracks of Bogodul are waiting for the decision of their fate. Fog drifted through the open door, a dreary howl was heard - it was the farewell howl of the Master.

Keywords

AUTHOR'S CONCEPTION / PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS / ARTISTIC CONFLICT / HUMAN COMMUNITY AND NATURE / AUTHOR'S CONCEPT / MORAL ISSUES / THINKLESS PROGRESS / IMPENDING DISASTER/ PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS / ARTISTIC CONFLICT / HUMAN COMMUNITY AND NATURE / MORAL PROBLEMS / THOUGHTLESS PROGRESS / APPROACHING CATASTROPHE

annotation scientific article on linguistics and literary criticism, author of scientific work - Timofeeva Natalia Vasilievna

Under consideration philosophical problems Viktor Astafiev's short story "The Tsar-Fish". In the story, one of the chapters is also called, the philosophical meaning of which is that a person must and will be held accountable for a thoughtless attitude not only to nature, but also to his own kind. Basic artistic conflict in the story of a clash of human collectivity, solidarity and aggressiveness of personal will, using people for its own purposes. In the hierarchy of values of the human community for V. Astafiev, one of the highest is openness, a state in which a person releases the tension that fettered him, the soul softens, opens towards another person and the world around him. It is in this state that most often threads of trust and affection are stretched between people, the feeling of involvement in everything that happens in human community and nature. Astafiev emphasizes the bleak results of attempts to revive the harmony of the relationship between man and nature. However, he still has the hope that there are still people on earth who deserve “the highest dignity on earth to be called a man”, that the grains of love, “dropped by a good hand into their native tears and then irrigated land, will certainly sprout.” Bibliography 3.

The text of the scientific work on the topic "Philosophical concept of the world and man in the story of Viktor Astafiev "Tsar-fish""

BBK 83.3(2 Rus=Rus)6-022

N. V. Timofeeva

THE PHILOSOPHICAL CONCEPT OF THE WORLD AND MAN IN VICTOR ASTAFYEV'S STORY "KING-FISH"

Viktor Astafiev's story "The Tsar-Fish" was published in the magazine "Our Contemporary" in 1976, although some chapters appeared in print as early as 1973.

The main philosophical problems are contained in the chapter "King-fish", the title of which is also the title of the story. The philosophical meaning of this story is that a person must and will be held accountable for a thoughtless attitude not only to nature, but also to his own kind.

In historical and literary terms, the story "Tsar Fish" is in many ways a phenomenon of "village prose", but this does not exhaust its significance. It constitutes that part of "village prose" in which the problems of the village recede into the background. In the 60-80s. 20th century such works made up a whole layer of Russian literature: “Commission” by S. Zalygin, “Farewell to Matera” and “Fire” by V. Rasputin, “White steamboat” and “Blach” by Ch. Aitmatov, “Once upon a time there was Semuzhka” by F. Abramov and others. In these works, the relationship between man and nature is considered in all, exposed by the end of the 20th century, sharpness and ugliness.

Delight before the grandeur of nature, correlating the fleeting earthly human life with infinite and immortal nature we find in the Russian classics, in the poems of G. Derzhavin, A. Pushkin, M. Lermontov, in the prose of I. Turgenev, S. Aksakov, L. Tolstoy and other Russian writers and poets. But since the beginning of the 20th century, the danger of the death of nature, the disappearance of its beauty and greatness under the onslaught of the “steel cavalry” of technical progress, the insufficient development of which is presented as an absolute proof of the economic and social backwardness of Russia, has become obvious. The rejection of blind admiration for progress was outlined in the works of A. Kuprin, A. Tolstoy, S. Yesenin, M. Bulgakov, A. Platonov, M. Prishvin, K. Paustovsky ... Russian literature of the XX century. warily met the idea of a machine paradise, and therefore has a single anti-technocratic orientation.

In the story "Drop" (one of the chapters of the story "Tsar-fish") the narrator from the places crippled by "progress" finds himself in the world of virgin nature. There, at the sight of a drop ready to fall and bring down the harmony of the universe - a symbol of the fragility, beauty and grandeur of nature, the hero-narrator reflects: “It only seems to us that we have transformed everything, including the taiga. No, we only wounded her, damaged, trampled, scratched, burned with fire. But they couldn’t convey their fear, their confusion, they didn’t instill hostility, no matter how hard they tried. .

"Village prose", having joined in the dialogue about nature, technological progress and man, turned its elegiac look at the past of the Russian village, where, according to the "villagers", the relationship between the peasant and the land was harmonious. Environmental problems were perceived in the 60-80s. 20th century as a result of the collapse of the village.

The work "Tsar-fish" has a complex genre nature. So, N. Yanovsky, following the author, calls the work "a story in stories", T. Vakhitova - both a "story" and "a story in stories": the chapters that make up the work are called "stories".

The title of the story originates in the reinterpreted folk poetry. True, in Russian folklore there is no identical character with such a “name”, but in the image of the king-fish, an ancient folklore layer is felt, associated with Russian fairy tales and legends about the mighty fish. No less legitimate is the reference to a fruitful linguistic tradition, where the concepts of "king", "royal" are associated with the concept of supremacy, the highest degree of manifestation of any properties or qualities. In Astafiev's tsar-fish, in addition to the real natural, folklore, literary content, there is also an objective material, "material". But this “substantiality” of the king-fish, recorded by V. Dahl, is also ambiguous. On the one hand, this is the first fish, the royal “present”, on the other hand, this is the royal “kus”, which the unworthy have been tempted and claim. The temptation of wealth, things - one of the common vices of the time when Astafiev's book was published. With the help of the image of the king fish, the writer translates the topic of the time, the topic of the fight against consumerism, into the category, if not eternal, then traditional for Russian literature. It is not for nothing that the mention of the king-fish is associated in the narrative with ancient times, grandfathers.

The commandment put into the mouth of the Chushan “grandfather” is a stylization of the folklore text: “And if you, robyata, have something for your soul, a grave sin, what a shame, barnacles - do not mess with the fish king. Codes come across - push right away. ” Here stylization is one of the methods of parody. The folklore motif of the indestructible power of an omnipotent being is parodied, and not a specific folklore character. Astafiev's satire contains a significant tragic element.

Here, the myth about man, the king of nature, popular in the ideology of the New Age, becomes the subject of satire. Astafiev, probably specifically recalls the popular mythologeme of the 20th century: "The king of the rivers and the king of all nature are in the same trap." The “king of all nature”, embodied in the face of a businesslike, neat, non-drinking, almost positive “mechanic” Zinovy Ignatievich Utrobin, turns out to be no less vulnerable than the fish he caught, because he is a poacher both literally and figuratively. The plot scheme of the “productive” story about the hard “labor” of hunters and fishermen is brought here to absurdity and thus parodied: by their “work”, Astafyev’s hunters, fishermen and poachers bring not a happy future, but “the last hour of nature” and their last hour.

The dangerous "work" of Ignatich was not caused by the desire to overcome hunger, to find a piece of bread - he already has it, being a good worker. And here one more aspect of the theme of nature is obvious, another object of Astafiev’s satire: greed, greed (“insatiable womb” - the image of colloquial speech punningly correlates with the hero’s surname) make the Chushan fisherman sin against people and nature. The reduced image of the king-fish also personifies greed: “Why didn’t he notice before what a disgusting fish it looked like! Repulsive and tender is her woman's meat, entirely in layers of candle, yellow fat, barely held together by cartilage, thrust into a bag of skin - everything, everything is disgusting, nauseating, obscene. Because of her, because of such a bastard, a man was forgotten in a man! Greed overwhelmed him! As far as he remembers himself, everyone is in a boat, everyone is on the river, everyone is chasing after her, after this cursed fish. The tsar fish becomes an obsessive mania, it is close to the seductive Shamanka (the head of “Boye”), who was dreamed of by young hunters, unattainable to the white mountains. "Tsar-fish" - a thirst for enrichment, greed makes you risk your life and shed human blood and the blood of "our smaller brothers."

The king fish, this huge and beautiful sturgeon, is on a par with the faithful dog Boye, with the Turukhansk lily, with the taiga and the hunters, peasants, fishermen who inhabit it, with the autobiographical hero. Therefore, her salvation (as well as the salvation of Ignatich) in the story symbolizes the triumph of life, the salvation of nature, and therefore life itself from destruction by man. The king-fish turns into a universal, “comprehensive” image that unites all chapters, pairing conflicting feelings, thoughts, events, characters into a single lyric-journalistic and tale-lyrical narration about how and why “a person was forgotten in a person”. The origins of the troubles are seen by the writer in the fact that in the pursuit of the king-fish, the poachers forgot about their peasant origin and human destiny: I haven’t looked into the library since school - once. He was the chairman of the school parent committee - was moved, re-elected - does not go to school.

Obviously, the story got its name not only from the most vivid story, but from the most voluminous, significant symbolic image, a related and folklore prototype, and literary images of A. Kuprin (“Listrigons”), E. Hemingway (“The Old Man and the Sea”). This image argues with the images of these works: Astafiev’s “king of nature” does not triumph, proving his superiority over the mighty fish, but begging for her salvation.

In Tsar-Ryba, the village, as such, is practically non-existent. There is the village of Chush (out of many possible names, the author chose a comic-punning version), references to Boganid have been preserved, Plakhino, Sushkovo and other "stations", fishing "huts" are mentioned. In this you can see the northern "specificity" - traditional for Central Russia and even the south of Siberia, numerous settlements there are a rarity. But you can also see something else. The narrative, with the exception of the chapter "Not enough heart", covers the events of the post-war. This is the time of a demographic upheaval, accelerated by the liberalization of public life (removal of restrictions on leaving the village), and, as a result, empty villages and villages.

Numerous completed and unfinished construction projects, mentioned with pain and bitterness in "Tsar Fish", also made their "contribution" to this process.

In the image of the “departure” of the village, Astafiev’s work turned out to be consonant with the work of V. Shukshin, V. Rasputin (“Deadline”, “Farewell to Mother”, “Fire”), V. Abramov (“Wooden Horses”, “Alka”, “Brothers and sisters") and other writers. “Every time I fly away from Krasnoyarsk and the plane, with its nose into space, trembles, gets nervous, drives itself into a rage, roars like a wild stallion and rushes from Pokrovskaya Mountain, I survey my native places.

Fate was pleased to give me another gift - flying along the rocky corridor of the Yenisei, the plane sometimes passes over my village, and for some reason it always seems to me: I see him for the last time and say goodbye to him forever.

The main artistic conflict in Tsar Fish unfolds as a clash between the good principles of human collectivity and solidarity, the manifestations of which the writer constantly notices and highlights in his characters, and human individualism. In the hierarchy of human community values, openness for V. Astafiev is one of the highest. There is a motif of straightening and, at the same time, softening of a person, whether he is a hero or a narrator, that runs through the whole work in "King-Fish". A person suddenly releases the tension that for some reason fettered him, the soul softens, opens towards another person and the world around him. It is in this state that the threads of trust and affection are most often stretched between people, the feeling of belonging to the human community and nature intensifies. According to the writer, such people as Pavel Yegorovich, a buoy keeper, are characterized by inner freedom, softness of soul, in contrast to those people whose main pathos was self-affirmation. Pavel Yegorovich, as it were, is initially straightened, because he does not seek to take from life, but, on the contrary, is ready to give everything of his own, “up to the heart.” That is why, according to the writer, “the life of such people is light, envyingly free.”

According to the author's concept, this is true freedom, and not at all the one that seems to be characteristic of Goga Gertsev. True openness presupposes the activity of the soul, sincerity, kindness, which is precisely what is not observed in Hertsev. Instead of kindness, it contains the aggressiveness of a personal will that uses people for its own purposes. His freedom is self-affirmation in independence from people, in exaltation above them.

It should be noted that it is Pavel Egorovich's initial openness, its invulnerability and indestructibility that is the essential moment of the author's concept of man. It was as if nature itself had happily taken care to instill in Pavel Yegorovich that sincerity that nothing can overcome. The hero does not become, but remains the way nature made him. Man here is taken by V. Astafiev mainly as a natural, generic being, in his, as it were, prepersonal essence. So the community of people on Boganid is also prepersonal in a certain sense.

The basis of the community of people on Boganid is work, joint work. Is it strong enough, will the harmony of interpersonal ties be maintained on it? The answer to this question is given by the writer in the chapter of the story, which tells the story of three hunters who remained for the winter surrounded by boundless tundra and taiga, among endless snows and deserted people. It is in this episode that the Boganid "world" looks like in a mirror.

Those fishers were also united by work. But as soon as they were forced to interrupt it, the stability of their relationship was immediately greatly shaken. Unity collapses because it is not supported, not provided by the highest principle in the person himself, which makes him a personality - spirituality. The ability to rise above the randomness of conditions and circumstances, to see in another person a close, dear being with an unfading inner, spiritual vision.

Akim - main character"King-fish". Like the autobiographical hero, he acts in most of the story chapters, and in the second part he is the main actor, expressing the author's ideas about the human type, if not perfect, but close to the author.

Naturally, Akim is far from the "ideal", and Astafiev does not set out to create perfect image neither in "Tsar-fish", nor in other works. Even grandmother Katerina Petrovna receives from fellow villagers and the autobiographical hero of "The Last Bow" the ironic nickname "general" for imperiousness and "morality". In general, the hero of Astafiev is more inclined to associate the concept of “ideal” with the aesthetics of the “socialist” canon, which is alien to him, than with ideas about the “truth of life”.

In Akim, the author notes a weakened strong-willed beginning, external unattractiveness, mediocrity. Astafiev deliberately “lowers” the features of a “high” hero in him: “colorless” liquid hair, naivety, extravagance ... But for all that, Akim is the only character who can withstand a duel with a cannibal bear. He alone openly opposes the satirical "anti-hero" of Astafiev's prose - the narcissistic champion of personal freedom Goge Gertsev.

Discrepancy between social position, the appearance of the character, the perception of him by others and his spirituality has long been the basis of the intrigue of the works of Russian literature from N. M. Karamzin to F. M. Dostoevsky. In the 20th century, M. Bulgakov also developed a similar motif in his “sunset novel” The Master and Margarita. Both Yeshua and the Master are initially perceived by others as naive and short-sighted eccentrics, both are suspected of insanity. The truth of their way of life and way of thinking becomes apparent only with the passage of the novel's "time". Transforming this motive, Astafiev showed the defenselessness of good in the face of aggressive, assertive, evil that has acquired the features of attractiveness (Goga Gertsev).

The complex, contradictory problem of the relationship between man and nature can only very conditionally be correlated with the figure of Akim. Therefore, the role of the autobiographical hero-narrator is so great in the narrative. He not only talks about the events, but also participates in them, expresses feelings about what is happening, reflects ... This gives the story, which includes essays ("At the Golden Hag", "The Black Feather Flies") and lyric-philosophical chapters ( “Drop”, “There is no answer for me”), a special kind of lyricism and publicism.

In Russian folklore, images from the natural world: bylinochka, rakita, birch - are associated with mythology, rituals and the tradition of song existence. Astafyevskaya taiga, king-fish, a drop through folklore acquire sacred properties. Among the consonant Astafiev images are the image of the taiga and the starodub in the story "Starodub", the image of the taiga in the story "Tsar-fish".

Symbolic images, perceived as sacred, sacred, are created in the "Tsar-fish" and through the association of what is depicted with historical events, their signs and emblems. Let's remember the clash between Akim and Goga Gertsev over the Kiryaga-wooden medal. The cynic Gertsev makes a lure out of a medal (a sacred emblem of war in the public mind, a sign of a patriotic idea) received by an invalid for military prowess. “Even in the village of Chush, overpopulated with all sorts of combs, only one person could rob a war invalid, exchange the last medal.”

This is expressive and bright, but not at all new to Russian literature of the 20th century. artistic approach.

The consciousness of a person who finds himself on the verge of death is able to build his own "mythology". Astafevsky Ignatich recalls the woman he once offended, and the king-fish appears to him as taking revenge for this. Ignatich's repentance before the tsar-fish, personifying nature, before a woman insulted in her youth, before parents and children "for all human sin" was, as it were, predicted by Dostoevsky's heroes: "Take yourself and make yourself responsible for all human sin."

Through all the work of the writer passes the motive "the river - the savior-destroyer". The Yenisei “took” the mother from the autobiographical hero of “The Last Bow” and “Tsar-Fish”, and therefore he is the “destroyer”. But he also brings people “food” and beauty, and therefore he is the “breadwinner”. He can execute and pardon, and this is his sacred, almost divine function in the story, connecting him with the image of the king-fish, which, in terms of symbolic content, can be correlated with the image of the distressed, but no less majestic Siberian taiga.

But there is also an implicit tragic consonance of this image with the fate of Akim. The king-fish goes into the dark depths of the Yenisei, pierced by deadly hooks. Homeless Akim is also doomed for goodness to neglect, ridicule and contempt.

Akim also has the right to declare himself: "And I am free." But Akim's freedom is the freedom to choose between good and evil. His position is close to the author's worldview.

The ideas of "King-fish" were developed by the author in later works. published in the 80s and 90s. chapters of "The Last Bow" ("Petrushka", "Zabyonnaya little head"), in the "things" of this period, the environmental theme is one of the main ones. In the story "Shadow of the Fish" (2000), the kingfish-like beauty now coexists with menacing ugliness. Such a neighborhood revealed itself already in Astafiev's prose of the 60-70s. ("Starodub", "Blue Twilight", "Tsar-Fish"). Later, in the 90s, Astafiev emphasizes the bleak results of attempts to revive

harmony between man and nature. And yet, the author remains hopeful that there are still people on earth who deserve “the highest dignity on earth - to be called a man”, that the seeds of love, “dropped by a good hand into their native tears and then irrigated land, will certainly sprout.” How can one make sure that, by transforming the earth, one can preserve and increase earthly wealth? Renovating, saving and enriching the beauty of nature? How to avoid, prevent the sad consequences of an unreasonable encroachment on the natural laws of nature? These deep moral issues raises Astafiev in the story "Tsar-fish". Awareness of them, according to Astafiev, is necessary for everyone in order not to trample, not to damage nature with soullessness and spiritual deafness. The work of V. Astafiev is not closed, it directly addresses life with questions, and the solution of these questions depends only on people.

Towards the end of his life, Astafyev admitted that he was no longer able to write anything like “Tsar-Fish”, and not because there was not enough talent, but there was not enough spiritual strength: “Let other guardians of the word come and reflect their“ deeds ”and ours, they will comprehend the meaning of the tragedy of mankind, including they will tell about the crushing of Siberia, its conquest, by no means by Yermak, but by thundering, thoughtless progress, pushing and pushing ahead of itself a formidable, all-destroying weapon, for the production of which it was burned, melted, brought into dumps already a large part of the earthly inheritance that we inherited for life from our ancestors and bequeathed to us by God. They, the riches of the earth, are given to us not for blind advancement to a disastrous edge, but for the triumph of reason. We are already living in debt, robbing our children, and they have a difficult fate ahead of them, much more difficult than ours.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Astafiev V.P. Tsar-fish // Collection. cit.: in 4 vols. - Vol. 4. - M .: Young guard, 1981. - 558 p.

2. Dal V.I. Explanatory Dictionary of the Living Great Russian Language: in 4 volumes - T. 4. - M .: Russian language, 1991. - 685 p.

3. V. P. Astaf’ev, Comments, in: Collected Works. cit.: in 15 volumes - V. 6. - Krasnoyarsk: PIK "Offset", 1997. - 432 p.

The article was received by the editors on 06/25/2010

PHILOSOPHICAL CONCEPTION OF THE WORLD AND A MAN IN VICTOR ASTAFIEV’S STORY "TSAR FISH”

The main philosophical problems of Victor Astafiev’s story "Tsar Fish" are considered in the paper. One of the chapters has the same title. The philosophical meaning of this story lies in the fact that a man must be responsible for his thoughtless attitude not only to the nature, but to the people like him. The principal artistic conflict of the story is the collision of human collectivity, solidarity and aggression of personal will, using people for his sake. Openness is the highest value in the hierarchy of human values for V. Astafiev. It is the state, when internal tension may suddenly disappear; human soul is softened, and becomes open for another person and the surrounding world. It is under this condition when the threads of trust and amity arise among people, and the feeling of belonging to the human community and the nature becomes more intensified. V. Astafiev points out the results of unsuccessful attempts to revive the harmony in relations between a man and nature. Nevertheless, the author hopes that there are the people on the Earth who deserve "the highest dignity in our universe - the dignity to be called a man", that the seeds of love "sown with a kind hand into native land irrigated with tears and sweat will sprout".

Key words: philosophical problems, artistic conflict, human community and nature, author’s conception, moral problems, thoughtless progress, approaching catastrophe.

Among the foundations of human existence, nature rightfully belongs to one of the first places. From the Russian epic about the plowman to modern "village prose," our literature connected the life and fate of man with the fate of Russian nature. We understand that in relations with nature, man has crossed the moral line, and therefore the writers are sounding the alarm, warning about the consequences of an impending environmental catastrophe.

The problem of the "dialogue" of man and nature was constantly considered by the Russian literature XIX century. For Russian writers, nature was not only a landscape that formed an aesthetic taste; Russian literature connected ideas about the naturalness of human existence, about the origins of moral concepts with thoughts about nature. An immoral attitude towards nature leads to the destruction of man himself, inner beauty personality should include a sense of love for the native nature.

It is this idea that modern writers affirm, for example, V. Astafiev in "Tsar-fish", V. Rasputin in the stories "Farewell to Mother" and "Fire", Ch. Aitmatov in the novels "And the day lasts longer than a century", "Blach" and etc.

Old women live in close unity with nature in the stories of V. Rasputin. Caring for the "home", "clan" is the main part of their understanding of the world. It stands in the depths of Siberia, on the Angara, a small island and a village on it with the same name - Matera. ("Farewell to Matera"). "And quietly, calmly lay the island, all the more dear, the land appointed by fate itself ... From edge to edge, from coast to coast, there was enough expanse, and wealth, and beauty, and savagery, and every creature in pairs - everything , having separated from the mainland, she kept in abundance - is that why she was called by the loud name of Matera? Matera saw bearded Cossacks setting up an Irkutsk prison on the Angara, witnessed a fierce battle between Kolchak and partisans, created a "community" - a collective farm. Like the whole country. Matera sent her sons to defend the Motherland and, like numerous villages throughout the vast Russia, became orphaned without waiting for many of them. Huge technical ideas also touched Matera - the village is subject to flooding during the construction of the hydroelectric power station. Matera for Daria is not only an island, land, but also people. A man among people is like a "royal leaf", a mighty tree symbolizing "eternal nature", an example of resilience. Man is only a link in the chain of human generations. The feeling of this participation in everything living and eternal is opposed to the destructive power of immorality. It is no coincidence that the destruction of the island begins with the destruction of the cemetery. As if observing a rite, Daria escorts her hut on her last journey. She not only whitewashed the walls, but also scrubbed the floors, washed the windows. Everything she does is incomprehensible to the arsonists: "Are you out of your mind, grandma? Are you going to live? We will set fire tomorrow, and she will whiten." A rural, illiterate person, Daria thinks about what should worry everyone in the world: why do we live? She is sure: "Who has no memory, no life." Aspiration into the distance, like the grandson of Daria - Andrey, the desire to be at the "forefront" of the construction of the century

turn into spiritual callousness, the loss of a sense of "small homeland." According to the critic Y. Seleznev, the essence of the problem of the story is the need to choose: what is your homeland - land or territory? "The land is being liberated. The territory is being seized. The owner is on the ground; on the territory - the conqueror, the conqueror. About the land that "belongs to everyone - who was before us and who will come after us," you cannot say: "After us, even a flood ... "A person who sees a "territory" in the earth is not too interested in what was before him, what will remain after him ..: Who are we on this earth - masters or temporary aliens: they came, stayed and left on their own - neither the past We don't have a future? We took everything we could, and there is at least a flood, "small", "mother" or "global" ...

For one, nature is a home, for others it is a habitat. In V. Astafiev's book "Tsar-fish" nature is also the educator of the soul. It fills the soul of a person with a sense of beauty, helps him to know his existence as a drop of the universal stream of being, to make sure of the significance of each particular life. The beneficial effect of nature gives rise in a person "confidence in the infinity of the universe and the strength of life." The heroes of Astafiev do not change the feeling of unity of all living things in the most tragic situations. Let us recall the hunter Kultysh from "Starodub", who, dying, holds in his hand, like a candle, a bright yellow flower with coal burning in the middle - as a symbol of love, devotion, selflessness. Death is not terrible in this unceasing stream of universal being, it marks only a change in the forms of life and is natural in itself. Much more terrible manifestations of unnaturalness - that people kill, destroy what has been created. So the problem "man - nature" develops in Astafiev into a more global one - "creation - destruction". The terrible disease of our time is poaching. Its origins are in the lack of spirituality, in the irrepressible thirst for profit, in the general "brutality".

So why is "a man forgotten in a man"? - V. Astafyev reflects. Poaching is becoming not only a profitable trade, but also a style of behavior: "All grabbers are similar in their gut and muzzle!" While the river poacher, Commander, fished, another, land ", crushed his daughter drunk. The worst thing, Astafyev says in The Staff of Memory, is that nature begins to adapt to poaching (species of plants and animals disappear), it defends itself with epidemics and the appearance of various deadly viruses. And the destroyer will not leave by nature, she will catch up and punish him. In the central chapter of the story "Tsar-Fish", the poacher Ignatich caught a huge sturgeon, but could not cope with it. The fish dragged him into the water, and for a long time there were the king of the river and the king of all nature - a man in one At the moment of retribution, when the fear of death and remorse torment the poacher, there is suddenly a merger of the eternally changing roles of torturer and martyr - man and nature. nature appears before Ignatich long. An ominous set of comparisons and metaphors depicting the king-fish: "The forehead, as if cast from concrete, on which, like a nail, stripes were scratched, buckshot of the eyes rolling silently under the armor of the forehead ..." The author did not accidentally choose not an animal, but fish - a creature as if inanimate. A real revolution takes place in the soul of Ignatich, when he begins to understand that the fish is alive, that she, like himself, has the right to life. V. Astafiev calls on his readers to restore the harmony of man and nature, for the struggle with nature is tantamount to a struggle with life itself.

Recreation of images of animals, birds, fish: Horned mother deer, Akbar and Tatchaynar by Ch. Aitmatov; The owner of the island at V. Rasputin; Bim at G. Troepolsky, Teddy and Arcturus at Kazakov

Here is a far from complete list of animalistic images in contemporary literature. Raising a hand against "our smaller brothers" is like violating the ancient biblical law "thou shalt not kill."

"Man himself can only see his real face in the mirror of nature," wrote M.M. Prishvin. The Chernobyl disaster became a terrible ecological tragedy for us. The works of Y. Shcherbakov "Chernobyl" and the play of V. Gubarev "Sarcophagus" are devoted to this topic. The consequences of this national tragedy will affect the life and health of more than one generation. Those who read the play "Sarcophagus" cannot but agree with the author's assessment of irresponsibility and unprofessionalism, which caused the disaster at the nuclear power plant. Chernobyl is the last warning to mankind. The symbol of the tragedy was the phrase "Star Wormwood", going back to the lines from the "Revelation" of St. John the Theologian: "The third angel blew his trumpet, and a large star fell from heaven, burning like a lamp, and fell on a third of the rivers and on the sources of water. The name of this star "wormwood," and a third of the waters became wormwood, and many of the people died from the waters, because they became bitter." This star can also rise above our house, if a person does not realize himself as a particle of the vast world of nature, if he does not accept you for immediate execution of the words of the poet. Fedorov:

To save myself and the world,
We need, without wasting years,
Forget all cults
And enter
Infallible
Cult of nature.

“The theme of the protection of nature in modern prose (V. Astafiev, V. Rasputin). Man and Nature in Modern Literature (Ch. Aitmatov. "The Scaffold", V. "Farewell to Mother")

Mastery of the image of nature in one of the works of Russian literature of the XX century. (V.P. Astafiev. "King-fish".)

annotation scientific article on linguistics and literary criticism, author of scientific work - Timofeeva Natalia Vasilievna

Related Topics scientific works on linguistics and literary criticism, author of scientific work - Timofeeva Natalia Vasilievna

The text of the scientific work on the topic "Philosophical concept of the world and man in the story of Viktor Astafiev "Tsar-fish""