How Nekrasov portrays the life of the common Russian people. The image of the people in N. Nekrasov's poem “Who Lives Well in Russia. The Russian people in the image of N.A. Nekrasov

In the second half of the 19th century, a trend called the "natural school" prevailed in Russian literature. Writers such as Grigorovich and Nekrasov were born within its walls. The main thing that was required of a follower of this school was loyalty to the truth of life, an image of unadorned reality; at the same time, the works of these writers are characterized by a social connotation, an emphasis on political and, so to speak, political and moral problems of the modern world.

Not all adherents of "natural

Schools "became widely known - like, for example, Nekrasov or Gogol (who, by the way, was a kind of teacher for them). The latter won the fame of a master of detail: the subject and everyday characteristics in his works are unmatched. Nekrasov's peculiarity -" weakness for the sick and humiliated "He is traditionally called a folk poet, and, in particular, the pictures of village life are especially true in his portrayal of village life; nevertheless, the poem" Railway "(1864) proves that Nekrasov's attention was also drawn to the workers (in this case - to the builders of the railway connecting Moscow and St. Petersburg).

Usually the theme of Nekrasov's poetry is defined as "the suffering of the people"; this is undoubtedly true, but too generalized. Expanding the problematic in more detail will highlight more specific issues. First, the social base, the conditions for the impoverishment of the masses: serfdom, after its abolition - the general lack of the ability to improve in any way their own position among people at the lower levels of society. Hence the question, aptly formulated by the poet: "Who lives happily, at ease in Russia?" Third, the humiliation of the working class and the subordinate class, which is expressed either in slavish obedience to fate, or in silent patience, which, according to Nekrasov, should eventually burst. An important topic that does not occupy such an extent to any other writer or poet is the female share. Only Nekrasov dedicated so many poems to her.

In the works of Nekrasov, I think, he is attracted not so much by the questions he addresses, but by the means by which he achieves a realistic image and what, as a result, the people's life is obtained in his interpretation. In order to analyze this, it is enough to consider several works from different years.

One of the earliest poems by Nekrasov is "Troika" (1846). It is completely devoted to women's fate, monotonous and inevitable for any country girl. The very atmosphere of a peasant house, a family is vividly depicted here: not only the girl, but also her husband and mother-in-law changes from work, both black and hard - they become unreasonably cruel, always swearing and waving their fists from fatigue. Here Nekrasov first formulated the "life credo" of the Russian people - "dull patience" and "senseless eternal fear." It is more or less clearly reflected in almost all of the poet's poems. Nekrasov even hinted at the most probable reason for this state: what happens is not what you dream about, but what is inevitable, historically must happen. In addition, peasant women were practically powerless and silently submissive, as stated in the lines of another, later, poem - "Yesterday, at six o'clock ...".

The same patience and humility are present in the 1855 poem "The Forgotten Village". The situation described here reflects well the "slave psychology" of the Russian serf peasantry. Long-term slavery has weaned the peasants from independence, and now you can hear everywhere:

When the master arrives - the master will judge us ...

………………………………

The master will say the word ...

The constant expectation of the expression of the will of the master leads to misfortune for the peasants themselves:

Nenila died; on a foreign land

The rogue neighbor has a hundredfold harvest ...

The free bread-grower fell into the soldiers,

And Natasha herself is not raving about the wedding ...

But the master, in fact, does not care about his serfs: as long as he receives money, he lives in peace, their problems do not bother him. On the other hand, the peasants do not care about this question about their owner either, but in their opinion, since he is the owner, he is obliged to protect them. This is how a mutual misunderstanding of serfs and landowners is formed, from which, in turn, follows the wilderness and desolation in the villages. If help is really needed, then it is necessary to beg, beg from the "owners of luxurious chambers" ("Reflections at the front door", 1863), and they do not know anything, do they know, and do not want to. It is symbolic in the poem that the one to whom the petitioners came is asleep. Indeed, least of all he is worried about their problems, he is, as it were, in a constant dream - Nekrasov even calls on him: "Awake!" The poem evokes an atmosphere of complete hopelessness. And yet the people do not remain silent, their sorrow is "crying". "Where there are people, there is a groan" - this, by the way, is another detail of the people's portrait. "Endless groan" not only helps him to live, but also serves, to some extent, a manifestation of dissatisfaction: the former "dumb" hard workers are no longer silent.

Nekrasov allows an opinion opposite to his own to sound. This is expressed by the general in the poem "Railroad". In a dispute with a fellow traveler (or author), the general denies the merit of the workers in the construction of the railway and attributes it to Count Kleinmichel (who financed this project). In his opinion, a dirty and uneducated peasant is not capable of creating anything; from his lips the reader hears the phrase: "Or is Apollo of Belvedere for you worse than a stove pot?" It is addressed to the companion author, but since Because of his views, the general equated that with the builders, then this conclusion may well be attributed to them. This is really so: the people are driven by practicality, they are not in those conditions when you can admire works of art:

We struggled in the heat, in the cold,

With your back always bent

We lived in dugouts, fought hunger,

Frozen and wet, sick with scurvy.

We were robbed by literate foremen,

The bosses whipped, the need pressed ...

Nekrasov advocated not to hide the horrors of poverty, saw nothing shameful for those who knew them. He considered it quite natural not to hide this from women, because in his lyrics there is so often a combination of the intimate with the social that it would seem incompatible. One of the striking examples is the poem "Morning" (1874). It is constructed as a monologue, addressed to a friend, where the author reveals and explains her oppressed state: "It is tricky not to suffer here." Here Nekrasov connects a gray, dull village ("a nag with a drunken peasant" is a characteristic detail) and an event-motley "rich city" (although its landscape does not differ from the village in terms of color): a convict is taken to the "shameful square", the prostitute returns home, officers galloping to a duel, someone died, someone committed suicide. Everything is poor, disgusting, dirty, awful ... But, according to Nekrasov, this is what deserves to be "sung" in poetry:

Let the changeable fashion tell us

That the topic is old - "the suffering of the people"

And that poetry should forget it, -

Do not believe, young men! she is not getting old.

Reply left Guru

In the early 60s of the XIX century, it seemed that a small effort was enough, and the people would overthrow serfdom, and with it the autocracy, a happy time would come. But serfdom was abolished, but freedom and happiness never came. Hence the poet's real realization that this is a long historical process, to the final result of which neither he nor the younger generation (in the poem he is personified by Vanya) will not survive. Why is the poet so pessimistic? In the work, the people are depicted in two hypostases: a great worker, deserving universal respect and admiration for his deeds, and a patient slave who can only be pitied without offending with this pity. It is this slavish obedience that makes Nekrasov doubt the imminent change in people's life for the better. The narrative opens with a picture of nature, written juicy, plastic and visually. The very first peasant-like word “vigorous”, which is so unusual for landscape lyrics, gives a special feeling of freshness and taste of healthy air and turns out to be a daring claim to democracy, nationality of the work. The beauty and harmony of nature is a reason to talk about the world of people.

Glorious autumn! Frosty nights
Clear, quiet days….
There is no disgrace in nature!

Unlike nature, human society is full of contradictions, dramatic collisions. In order to tell about the severity and heroism of the people's labor, the poet turns to a technique well-known in Russian literature - the description of the dream of one of the participants in the story. Vanya's dream is not only a conventional device, but the real state of a boy, in whose disturbed imagination the story of the suffering of the road builders gives rise to fantastic pictures with the dead who revived under the moonlight.

Chu! formidable exclamations were heard!
Stomp and gnashing of teeth;
A shadow ran over frosty glass ...
What is there? Dead crowd!

In the picture of a dream, labor appears both as an unprecedented suffering, and as a feat realized by the people themselves (“God's warriors”). Hence that lofty pathetic manner in which it is spoken of people who brought to life barren jungles and found a grave in them. The picture of fresh and beautiful nature, which opens the poem, not only contrasts with the picture of a dream, but also correlates with it in grandeur and poetry.

... Brothers! You are reaping our fruits!
We are destined to rot in the earth ...
Do you all remember us poor
Or forgotten for a long time? ..

The biggest problem disclosed by Leskov in the tale "Lefty" is the problem of the lack of demand for the talents of the Russian people.
Leskov is overwhelmed not only with feelings of love and affection for his people, but also with pride in the talents of his compatriots, for their undisguised sincere patriotism.
The main character Lefty means all the poor talented people of that time who did not have the opportunity to develop their talent and apply their skills. These people, possessing a natural gift, performed such things that the vaunted Englishmen never dreamed of. If Lefty had at least a little knowledge of arithmetic, the flea would also dance. Be Lefty more selfish and lazy, he could steal a flea and sell it, because he was not paid a penny for his work.
However, the sovereign, amazed at the art of the overseas masters, did not even remember the talents of his people. And even when Platov proved that the weapon was made by Tula craftsmen, the king felt sorry that they had embarrassed the hospitable English.
At the same time, Levsha, being abroad, did not forget for a minute about the Motherland and parents. He refused to all the tempting offers of the British: "We are committed to our homeland ..."

As Pushkin's novel “Eugene Onegin”, which Belinsky called “the encyclopedia of Russian life”, and Nekrasov’s poem “Who Lives Well in Russia” can be rightfully considered an encyclopedia of Russian folk life of the middle of the last century. The author called the poem “his favorite child”, and collected material for it, as he himself put it, “by word of mouth for twenty years”. It embraces the life of the people unusually broadly, raises the most important issues of its time and includes the treasures of folk speech.
In that

The work reflected the contemporary life of the poet. It solved the problems that worried the minds of progressive people: in what direction will the historical development of the country go, what role the peasantry is destined to play in history, what are the fate of the Russian people.
Nekrasov creates a whole gallery of pictures of village life, and in this sense the poem has something in common with Turgenev's "Notes of a Hunter". But, as a realist, a writer of everyday life, Nekrasov goes further than Turgenev, showing them with encyclopedic completeness, delving into not only the thoughts and moods of his heroes, but also into the social and economic way of life.
Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Russia" begins with the question: "In what year - count, in what land - guess." But it is not difficult to understand what period Nekrasov is talking about. The poet is referring to the reform of 1861, according to which the peasants, having no land of their own, fell into even greater bondage.
Throughout the entire poem, there is the idea of \u200b\u200bthe impossibility of living like this further, about the hard peasant lot, about peasant ruin. This moment of the hungry life of the peasantry, whom “grief-misfortune has tortured,” sounds with special force in the song called “Hungry” by Nekrasov. Moreover, the poet does not exaggerate, showing poverty, poverty of morals, religious prejudices and drunkenness in peasant life.
The position of the people is depicted with the utmost clarity by the names of those places where the peasants-truth-seekers come from: Ter-pygorev district, Empty volost, Pull-up province, the villages of Zaplatovo, Dyryavino, Znobishino, Razutovo, Gorelovo, Neyelovo, Neurozhayka. The poem very vividly depicts the joyless, powerless, hungry life of the people. “Peasant happiness,” the poet exclaims bitterly, “full of holes with patches, hunchbacked with calluses!” The peasants are people who "did not eat their fill, drank heavily."
The author treats with undisguised sympathy those peasants who do not put up with their hungry, powerless existence. Unlike the world of exploiters and moral monsters, slaves like Yakov, Gleb, Ipat, the best of the peasants in the poem retained their true humanity, the ability to sacrifice themselves, and spiritual nobility. These are Matryona Timofeevna, the hero Savely, Yakim Nagoy, Ermil Girin, Agap Petrov, seven truth seekers and others. Each of them has his own task in life, his own reason to “seek the truth,” but all of them together indicate that peasant Russia has already awakened and revived. Truth-seekers see such happiness for the Russian people:
I don’t need any silver
No gold, but God forbid
So that my fellow countrymen
And to every peasant
Lived freely, cheerfully
In all holy Russia!
In Yakima NagoM the peculiar character of the people's truth-lover, the peasant “righteous man” is presented. Yakim is hardworking, he is ready to stand up for his rights, an honest worker with a great sense of his own dignity. Hard life did not kill the love of beauty in him. During a fire, he saves not money, but "pictures", having lost the accumulated wealth over a whole century - "thirty-five rubles." This is how he speaks of the people:
Every peasant
Soul that black cloud -
Angry, formidable - and it should be
Thunders thunder from there,
To pour bloody rains
And everything ends with wine.
Yermil Girin is also remarkable. A competent man, he served as a clerk, became famous throughout the district for his justice, intelligence and disinterested devotion to the people. Yermil proved himself to be an exemplary headman when the people elected him to this position. However, Nekrasov does not make him a righteous man. Yermil, taking pity on his younger brother, appoints Vlasyevna's son to recruits and then, in a fit of remorse, almost commits suicide. Yermil's story ends sadly. He is imprisoned for his performance during the riot. The image of Yermil testifies to the spiritual forces lurking in the Russian people, the wealth of moral qualities of the peasantry. But only in the chapter “Savely, the Bogatyr of the Holy Russian” peasant protest turns into a riot, ending with the murder of the oppressor. True, the reprisal against the German manager is still spontaneous, but such was the reality of serf society. Serf riots arose spontaneously, as a response to the brutal oppression of the landlords and the administrators of their estates. Nekrasov shows the difficult and complex path along which the growth of rebellious sentiments and the formation of Savely's consciousness went: from tacit patience to passive resistance, from passive resistance to open protest and struggle.
Savely is a consistent fighter for the interests of the people, despite the rods and hard labor, he did not accept his fate, remained a spiritually free man. "Branded, but not a slave!" - he replies to people who called him "branded". Savely embodies the best features of the Russian character: love for the motherland and the people, hatred for the oppressors, a clear understanding of the irreconcilability of the interests of landowners and peasants, a courageous ability to overcome any difficulties, physical and moral strength, self-esteem. The poet sees in him a genuine fighter for the people's cause.
Not the meek and obedient are close to the poet, but the recalcitrant and courageous rebels, such as Savely, Yakim Nagoy, whose behavior speaks of the awakening consciousness of the peasantry, of its boiling protest against oppression. Nekrasov wrote about the oppressed people of his country with anger and pain. But the poet managed to notice the “hidden spark” of the mighty inner forces inherent in the people, and looked ahead with hope and faith:
The host rises -
Innumerable
The strength in it will affect
Unbreakable!

  1. What is happiness in your opinion? Peace, wealth, honor - Isn't it, dear friends? They said, "So." NA Nekrasov So what is happiness? Happiness is a person's state of mind ...
  2. One of the most famous works of N. A. Nekrasov is the poem "Who Lives Well in Russia". It can rightfully be called the pinnacle of Nekrasov's creativity. Written by the author in his mature years, she absorbed ...
  3. There is, perhaps, not a single poet whose work lacks landscape lyrics. After all, the ability to feel the beauty of nature, to see its unique charm in constantly changing pictures, in my opinion, is a necessary accessory of the poetically gifted ...
  4. Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov is a poet of the mid-nineteenth century. His poems and poems are remembered and loved to this day. We know Nekrasov from such works as "The Poet and the Citizen", "Reflections at ...
  5. Each writer develops a unique style based on his artistic goals. The selection of means of expression is carried out depending on the theme and idea of \u200b\u200bthe work. In the poem "Frost, Red Nose" plays a very important role ...
  6. The landowner was ruddy, dignified, squat, sixty years old; The mustache is gray, long, Great bites. Taking the wanderers for robbers, the landowner draws out his pistol. Having learned who they are and why they are traveling, he laughs, sits down with comfort ...
  7. The name of N.A.Nekrasov was forever entrenched in the minds of a Russian person as the name of a great poet who came to literature with his new word, was able to express high-pitched sounds in unique images and sounds ...
  8. The poem "Who lives well in Russia" Nekrasov conceived as a "people's book". He began writing it in 1863 and ended up terminally ill in 1877. The poet dreamed that his book ...
  9. In his epic poem "Who Lives Well in Russia" N. A. Nekrasov sharply raises the question of happiness. This eternal theme finds its original embodiment in the poet's work. He shows us ...
  10. Once, from the window of his apartment on Liteiny Prospekt in St. Petersburg, Nekrasov saw how the janitors and the policeman drove away a group of petitioners from the entrance of the opposite house. The Minister of State Property lived in that house ...
  11. N.A.Nekrasov went down in the history of Russian literature as a realist poet, painting true pictures of Russian reality, and as an outstanding journalist. His name is associated with the names of the most popular magazines of the XIX century "Contemporary" and ...
  12. Reflections of seven epic men. became national. The beauty of the epic isolation of the action is supported by the words of Grigory Dobrosklonov about the purpose of his life, which, even in the form of expression, coincide with the dispute of seven men in the prologue ...
  13. In the work of N.A.Nekrasov, work took one of the most honorable places. The poet in his poems truthfully told about how the Russian people live and work, showed him as a true builder ...
  14. "Who Lives Well in Russia" is an epic poem. In its center is the image of post-reform Russia. Nekrasov wrote a poem for twenty years, collecting material for it "by word". The poem is unusually wide ...
  15. Characteristic is the rearrangement made by Nekrasov: in the folklore text, at the first bow, a volyushka rolled away, at the second, the face faded, at the third, the bride's legs began to shake; Nekrasov rearranges these moments (at first, “the quick legs shook,” then ... The theme of the people in the work of N. A. Nekrasov The most distinct sign of the maturity of Nekrasov's poetic talent was the development of the theme of the people in his lyrics. some noticeable attention. Now he writes a number ...
  16. For lyrics, the most subjective kind of literature, the main thing is the state of a person's soul. These are feelings, experiences, reflections, moods, expressed directly through the image of the lyric hero, acting as if the author's confidant. Lyric Nekrasov ...
  17. Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov was born in Ukraine on November 28 (December 10), 1821 in Nemyriv, where his father was then serving. Soon Major Alexei Sergeevich Nekrasov retired and in the fall of 1824 ...

The first folk poet, he wrote about the people and for the people, knowing their thoughts, needs, concerns and hopes. Communication with the people filled the life of Nekrasov with special meaning and constituted the main content of his poetry.

"On the road"

Nekrasov the poet is very sensitive to the changes that are taking place in the folk environment. In his poems, the life of the people is depicted in a new way, not like those of their predecessors.

The motive of the road runs through all the poet's work - a cross-cutting motive for Russian literature. The road is not just a segment connecting two geographical points, it is something more. "If you go to the right, you will lose your horse, if you go to the left, you will not be alive yourself, if you go straight, you will find your destiny." Road-way is a choice life path, goals.

On the subject chosen by Nekrasov, there were many poems in which daring troikas rushed, bells rang under the arc, and the songs of the coachmen sounded. At the beginning of his poem, the poet reminds the reader about this:

Boring! boring! .. The coachman is daring,
Dispel my boredom with something!
Sing a song or something, buddy
About recruiting and separation ...

But immediately, abruptly, decisively, he breaks off the usual and familiar poetic course. What amazes us about this poem? Of course, the driver's speech, completely devoid of the usual folk song intonations. It seems as if naked prose unceremoniously burst into poetry: the driver's speech is clumsy, rude, saturated with dialectal words. What new opportunities does this "down-to-earth" approach to depicting a person from the people open up for Nekrasov the poet?

Note: in folk songs, as a rule, we are talking about "a daring coachman, about a" good fellow "or" red maiden ". Everything that happens to them applies to many people from the folk environment. The song reproduces events and characters of national significance and sound. Nekrasov is interested in something else: how people's joys or hardships are manifested in the fate of this very, only hero. The poet depicts the general in peasant life through the individual, the unrepeatable. Later, in one of his poems, the poet joyfully greets his village friends:

All familiar people,
Every man is a friend.

So it happens in his poetry that no man is a unique personality, a unique character.

Perhaps none of Nekrasov's contemporaries dared to come close to a peasant so closely on the pages of a poetic work. Only he could then not only write about the people, but also "speak with the people"; letting in peasants, beggars, artisans with their different perceptions of the world, different language in poetry.

With ardent love the poet treats nature - the only treasure of the world, which "strong and well-fed lands could not take away from the poor hungry." Thinly feeling nature, Nekrasov never shows it in isolation from man, his activities and state. In the poems "Uncompressed Band" (1854), "Village News" (1860), in the poem "Peasant Children" (1861), the image of Russian nature is closely intertwined with the disclosure of the soul of the Russian peasant, his heavy life destiny... A peasant who lives in the middle of nature and deeply feels it, rarely has the opportunity to admire it.

Who are we talking about in the poem "Uncompressed Strip"? As if about a sick peasant. And the trouble is comprehended from the peasant point of view: there is no one to clean the strip, the grown crop will be lost. The land-nurse is also animating in a peasant way here: "the ears seem to whisper to each other." I was going to die, but this rye, ”said the people. And with the onset of the hour of death, the peasant thought not of himself, but of the land, which would be left an orphan without him.

But you read the poem and more and more you feel that these are very personal, very lyrical poems, that the poet looks at himself through the eyes of a plowman. And so it was. "Uncompressed strip" Nekrasov wrote seriously ill, before leaving abroad for treatment in 1855. The poet was overcome by sad thoughts; it seemed that the days were already numbered, that he might not return to Russia either. And here the courageous attitude of the people to troubles and misfortunes helped Nekrasov withstand the blow of fate, preserve spiritual strength. The image of the "uncompressed strip", like the image of the "road" in the previous verses, takes on a figurative, metaphorical meaning in Nekrasov: this is both a peasant field, but also a "field" of writer's work, to which the sick poet stronger than deathhow stronger than death is the love of the farmer for work on the earth, for the laboring field.

"Song to Eremushka" (1859)

In this Song, Nekrasov condemns the "vulgar experience" of opportunists crawling towards the blessings of life, and calls on the younger generation to devote their lives to the struggle for the people's happiness.

The task

Reading and independent analysis or commentary on Nekrasov's poems: "On the road", "I'm going at night", "I don't like your irony ...", "Uncompressed strip", "Schoolboy", "Song to Eremushka", "Funeral", " Green Noise ”,“ Morning ”,“ Prayer ”, fragments from the cycle“ On the Weather ”.

The analysis of poems is carried out at three levels:
- figurative and linguistic (vocabulary, paths);
- structural and compositional (composition, rhythm);
- ideological (ideological and aesthetic content).

In the poem "Yesterday at six o'clock," Nekrasov first introduced his Muse, the sister of the offended and oppressed. In his last poem "O Muse, I am at the door of the coffin" the poet remembers for the last time "this pale, in blood, / with the Knut excised Muse". Not love for a woman, not the beauty of nature, but the suffering of the tortured poverty of the poor - this is the source of lyrical feelings in many of Nekrasov's poems.

Nekrasov's lyric themes are varied.

The first of the artistic principles of Nekrasov's lyrics can be called social. The second is social analyticism. And this was new in Russian poetry, absent from Pushkin and Lermontov, especially from Tyutchev and Fet. This principle permeates two of Nekrasov's most famous poems: "Reflections at the front entrance" (1858) and "Railroad" (1864).

"Reflections at the front door" (1858)

In "Reflection ..." a specific isolated case is the arrival of men with a request or complaint to a certain statesman.

This poem is about contrast. The poet opposes two worlds: the world of the rich and the idle, whose interests boil down to "red tape, gluttony, play," "shameless flattery," and the world of the people, where "crying grief" reigns. The poet paints their relationship. The nobleman is full of contempt for the people, this is revealed with utmost clarity in one line:

Drive!
Ours does not like the ragged rabble! "

The feelings of the people are more complicated. "Dolgonko" walkers wandered from a distant province in the hope of finding help or protection from the grandee. But the door slammed in front of them and they leave,

Repeating: "God judge him!"
Spreading hopelessly hands
And as long as I could see them,
We walked bareheaded ...

The poet is not limited to the depiction of hopeless obedience and the endless groan of the people. "Will you wake up full of strength? .." - he asks and leads the reader to the answer to this question with the whole poem: "Happy are deaf to good", the people have nothing to wait for salvation from the nobles, he must take care of his own fate.

Two principles of reflecting reality in Nekrasov's lyrics naturally lead to the third principle - revolutionary. The lyrical hero of Nekrasov's poetry is convinced that only a popular, peasant revolution can change the life of Russia for the better. This side of the lyrical hero's consciousness was especially strongly manifested in poems dedicated to Nekrasov's associates in the revolutionary-democratic camp: Belinsky, Dobrolyubov, Chernyshevsky, Pisarev.

Literature

School curriculum for grade 10 in answers and solutions. M., SPb., 1999

Yu.V. Lebedev Comprehension of the people's soul // Russian literature of the 18th – 19th centuries: reference materials. M., 1995

IMAGE OF THE PEOPLE IN THE POEM of N.A. NEKRASOVA "WHO LIVES WELL IN RUSSIA"

Enough! Completed with past settlement. The settlement with the master is over! The Russian people are gathering strength And learning to be a citizen!

ON. Nekrasov

As Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin", which Belinsky called "the encyclopedia of Russian life", and Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Russia" can with good reason be considered an encyclopedia of Russian folk life of the middle of the last century. The author called the poem "his favorite brainchild", and collected material for it, as he himself put it, "by word of mouth for twenty years." It embraces folk life unusually broadly, raises the most important questions of its time and includes the treasures of folk speech.

This work reflected the life of the contemporary poet. It solved the problems that worried the minds of progressive people: in what direction will the historical development of the country go, what role the peasantry is destined to play in history, what are the fate of the Russian people.

Nekrasov creates a whole gallery of pictures of village life, and in this sense the poem has something in common with Turgenev's "Notes of a Hunter". But, as a realist, a writer of everyday life, Nekrasov goes further than Turgenev, showing them with encyclopedic completeness, delving into not only the thoughts and moods of his heroes, but also into the social and economic way of life.

Nekrasov's poem "Who Lives Well in Russia" begins with the question: "In what year - count, in what land - guess." But it is not difficult to understand what period Nekrasov is talking about. The poet is referring to the reform of 1861, according to which the peasants, having no land of their own, fell into even greater bondage.

Throughout the entire poem, there is the idea of \u200b\u200bthe impossibility of living like this further, about the hard peasant lot, about peasant ruin. This moment of the hungry life of the peasantry, which "anguish-misfortune tormented", sounds with special force in the song called "Hungry" by Nekrasov. Moreover, the poet does not exaggerate, showing poverty, poverty of morals, religious prejudices and drunkenness in peasant life.

The position of the people is depicted with the utmost clarity by the names of those places where the peasants-truth-seekers come from: Ter-pygorev district, Empty volost, Pull-up province, the villages of Zaplatovo, Dyryavino, Znobishino, Razutovo, Gorelovo, Neyelovo, Neurozhayka. The poem very vividly depicts the joyless, powerless, hungry life of the people. "Peasant happiness," the poet exclaims bitterly, "full of holes with patches, hunchbacked with calluses!" The peasants are people who "did not eat their fill, drank deeply."

The author treats with undisguised sympathy those peasants who do not put up with their hungry, powerless existence. Unlike the world of exploiters and moral monsters, slaves like Yakov, Gleb, Ipat, the best of the peasants in the poem retained their true humanity, the ability to sacrifice themselves, and spiritual nobility. These are Matryona Timofeevna, the hero Savely, Yakim Nagoy, Yermil Girin, Agap Petrov, seven truth seekers and others. Each of them has his own task in life, his own reason to “seek the truth,” but all of them together indicate that peasant Russia has already awakened and revived. Truth-seekers see such happiness for the Russian people:

I don’t need any silver, No gold, but God grant, So that my fellow countrymen And every peasant Live freely, cheerfully In all holy Russia!

In Yakima Nagom, the peculiar character of the folk lover of truth, the peasant "righteous man" is presented. Yakim is hardworking, he is ready to stand up for his rights, an honest worker with a great sense of his own dignity. Hard life did not kill the love of beauty in him. During a fire, he saves not money, but "kartinochki", having lost the accumulated wealth for a whole century - "thirty-five rubles." This is how he speaks of the people:

Every peasant has a Soul that a black cloud is Anger, formidable, and the thunders ought to thunder from there, To pour bloody rains, And everything ends with wine.

Yermil Girin is also remarkable. A competent man, he served as a clerk, became famous throughout the district for his justice, intelligence and disinterested devotion to the people. Yermil proved himself to be an exemplary headman when the people elected him to this position. However, Nekrasov does not make him a righteous man. Yermil, taking pity on his younger brother, appoints Vlasyevna's son as a recruit and then, in a fit of remorse, almost commits suicide. Yermil's story ends sadly. He is imprisoned for his performance during the riot. The image of Yermil testifies to the spiritual forces lurking in the Russian people, the wealth of moral qualities of the peasantry. But only in the chapter "Savely, the bogatyr of the Holy Russian" peasant protest turns into a revolt, ending with the murder of the oppressor. True, the reprisal against the German manager is still spontaneous, but such was the reality of a serf society. Serf riots arose spontaneously, as a response to the brutal oppression of the landlords and the administrators of their estates. Nekrasov shows the difficult and difficult path along which the growth of rebellious moods and the formation of Savely's consciousness went: from silent patience to passive resistance, from passive resistance to open protest and struggle.

Savely is a consistent fighter for the interests of the people, despite the rods and hard labor, he did not accept his fate, remained a spiritually free man. "Branded, but not a slave!" - he answers the people who called him "branded". Savely embodies the best features of the Russian character: love for the motherland and the people, hatred for the oppressors, a clear understanding of the irreconcilability of the interests of landowners and peasants, a courageous ability to overcome any difficulties, physical and moral strength, self-esteem. The poet sees in him a genuine fighter for the people's cause.

Not the meek and obedient are close to the poet, but the recalcitrant and courageous rebels, such as Savely, Yakim Nagoy, whose behavior speaks of the awakening consciousness of the peasantry, of its boiling protest against oppression. Nekrasov wrote about the oppressed people of his country with anger and pain. But the poet was able to notice the "hidden spark" of the mighty inner forces inherent in the people, and looked ahead with hope and faith:

The army rises - Innumerable, the Force in it will affect the Enduring!