"Fairy tales" by M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, the formation of the genre. creative story. perception. Fairy tales “for children of a fair age” as a work of a new genre in Russian literature. The history of the creation of "Fairy Tales"

A special place in the work of Saltykov-Shchedrin is occupied by fairy tales with their allegorical images, in which the author was able to say more about Russian society of the 60-80s of the 19th century than the historians of those years. Saltykov-Shchedrin writes these fairy tales “for children of a fair age,” that is, for an adult reader whose mind is in the state of a child who needs to open his eyes to life. The fairy tale, due to the simplicity of its form, is accessible to anyone, even an inexperienced reader, and therefore is especially dangerous for those who are ridiculed in it.
The main problem of Shchedrin's fairy tales is the relationship between the exploiters and the exploited. The writer created a satire on Tsarist Russia. The reader is presented with images of rulers (“Bear in the Voivodeship”, “Eagle Patron”), exploiters and exploited (“ Wild landowner”, “The story of how one man fed two generals”), ordinary people (“ The wise minnow", "Dried roach").
The fairy tale “The Wild Landowner” is directed against the entire social system, based on exploitation, anti-people in its essence. Preserving the spirit and style of a folk tale, the satirist talks about real events his contemporary life. The piece begins as ordinary fairy tale: “In a certain kingdom, in a certain state, there lived a landowner...” But then the element appears modern life: “And that stupid landowner was reading the newspaper “Vest”.” “Vest” is a reactionary-serf newspaper, so the stupidity of the landowner is determined by his worldview. The landowner considers himself a true representative of the Russian state, its support, and is proud of the fact that he is hereditary Russian nobleman, Prince Urus-Kuchum-Kildibaev. The whole meaning of his existence comes down to pampering his body, “soft, white and crumbly.” He lives at the expense of his men, but he hates and is afraid of them, and cannot stand the “servile spirit.” He rejoices when, by some fantastic whirlwind, all the men were carried away to who knows where, and the air in his domain became pure, pure. But the men disappeared, and such hunger set in that it was impossible to buy anything at the market. And the landowner himself went completely wild: “He was all overgrown with hair, from head to toe... and his nails became like iron. He stopped blowing his nose a long time ago and walked more and more on all fours. I’ve even lost the ability to pronounce articulate sounds...” In order not to die of hunger, when the last gingerbread was eaten, the Russian nobleman began to hunt: if he spots a hare, “like an arrow will jump from a tree, grab onto its prey, tear it apart with its nails, and eat it with all the insides, even the skin.” The landowner's savagery indicates that he cannot live without the help of a peasant. After all, it was not for nothing that as soon as the “swarm of men” was caught and put in place, “flour, meat, and all kinds of living creatures appeared at the market.”
The stupidity of the landowner is constantly emphasized by the writer. The first to call the landowner stupid were the peasants themselves; representatives of other classes called the landowner stupid three times (a technique of threefold repetition): the actor Sadovsky (“However, brother, you are a stupid landowner! Who gives you a wash, stupid?”) generals, whom he instead of “beef -ki” treated him to printed gingerbread and candy (“However, brother, you are a stupid landowner!”) and, finally, the police captain (“You are stupid, Mr. Landowner!”). The stupidity of the landowner is visible to everyone, and he indulges in unrealistic dreams that he will achieve prosperity in the economy without the help of the peasants, and thinks about English machines that will replace the serfs. His dreams are absurd, because he cannot do anything on his own. And only one day the landowner thought: “Is he really a fool? Could it be that the inflexibility that he so cherished in his soul, when translated into ordinary language, means only stupidity and madness?” If we compare the well-known folk tales about the master and the peasant with the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin, for example, with “The Wild Landowner,” we will see that the image of the landowner in Shchedrin’s fairy tales is very close to folklore, and the peasants, on the contrary, differ from those in fairy tales. In folk tales, a smart, dexterous, resourceful man defeats a stupid master. And in “The Wild Landowner” there arises collective image workers, breadwinners of the country and at the same time patient martyrs and sufferers. Thus, modifying a folk tale, the writer condemns the people's long-suffering, and his tales sound like a call to rise up to fight, to renounce the slave worldview.

Outstanding Achievement last decade creative activity Saltykov-Shchedrin’s book “Fairy Tales,” which includes thirty-two works. This is one of the brightest and most popular creations of the great satirist. With a few exceptions, fairy tales were created over four years (1883-1886), at the final stage creative path writer. The fairy tale is only one of the genres of Shchedrin’s creativity, but it is organically close artistic method satirical

For satire in general, and in particular for Shchedrin’s satire, the usual techniques are artistic exaggeration, fantasy, allegory, bringing together those accused social phenomena with phenomena of the animal world.

These techniques, associated with folk fairy tales, in their development led to the appearance in Shchedrin’s work of individual fairy tale episodes and “inserted” fairy tales within works, then to the first separate fairy tales and, finally, to the creation of a cycle of fairy tales. Writing a whole book of fairy tales in the first half of the 80s. This is explained, of course, not only by the fact that by this time the satirist had creatively mastered the fairy tale genre.

In an environment of government reaction, fairy-tale fiction to some extent served as a means of artistic camouflage for the most acute ideological and political intentions of the satirist.

Approximation of shape satirical works to a folk tale also opened the way for the writer to a wider readership. Therefore, for several years Shchedrin has been working enthusiastically on fairy tales. In this form, the most accessible to the masses and loved by them, he pours all the ideological and thematic richness of his satire and creates a kind of small satirical encyclopedia for the people.

In the complex ideological content of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s tales, three main themes can be distinguished: satire on the government leaders of the autocracy and on the exploiting classes, a depiction of the life of the masses in Tsarist Russia, and an exposure of the behavior and psychology of the philistine-minded intelligentsia.

But, of course, it is impossible to draw a strict thematic distinction between Shchedrin’s tales and there is no need for this. Usually the same fairy tale, along with its main theme, also affects others. Thus, in almost every fairy tale, the writer touches on the life of the people, contrasting it with the life of the privileged strata of society.

“The Bear in the Voivodeship” stands out for its sharp satirical attack directly on the government leaders of the autocracy. The tale, mockingly ridiculing the king, ministers, and governors, is reminiscent of the theme of “The Story of a City,” but this time the royal dignitaries are transformed into fairy-tale bears rampaging through the forest slums.

There are three Toptygins in the fairy tale. The first two marked their activities to pacify “internal enemies” with various kinds of atrocities. Toptygin 3rd differed from his predecessors, who longed for the “brilliance of bloodshed,” by his good-natured disposition. He limited his activities only to observing the “old established order” and was content with “natural” atrocities.

However, even under the leadership of Toptygin the 3rd, the forest never changed its former physiognomy. “Both day and night it thundered with millions of voices, some of which represented an agonizing cry, others a victorious cry.”

The cause of the people's misfortunes lies, therefore, not in the abuse of the principles of power, but in the very principle of the autocratic system. Salvation does not lie in replacing the evil Toptygins with good ones, but in eliminating them altogether, that is, in overthrowing the autocracy as an anti-people and despotic state form. This is the main idea of ​​the fairy tale.

In terms of the sharpness and boldness of its satire on the monarchy, next to “The Bear in the Voivodeship” can be placed the fairy tale “The Eagle Patron,” which exposes the activities of tsarism in the field of education. Unlike Toptygin, who dumped “the works of the human mind into a waste pit,” the eagle decided not to eradicate, but to establish the sciences and arts, to establish a “golden age” of enlightenment.

When creating an enlightened servant, the eagle defined its purpose as follows: “...she will comfort me, but I will keep her in fear. That's all." However, there was no complete obedience. Some of the servants dared to teach the eagle itself to read and write. He responded to this with massacre and pogrom. Soon there was no trace left of the recent “golden age”. The main idea of ​​the fairy tale is expressed in the words: “eagles are harmful to enlightenment.”

The fairy tales “The Bear in the Voivodeship” and “The Eagle Patron,” which were intended for higher administrative spheres, were not allowed for publication by censorship during the writer’s lifetime, but they were distributed in Russian and foreign illegal publications and played their revolutionary role.

With caustic sarcasm, Shchedrin attacked the representatives of mass predation - the nobility and bourgeoisie, who acted under the patronage of the ruling political elite and in alliance with it. They appear in fairy tales either in the usual social image of a landowner (“Wild Landowner”), a general (“The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals”), a merchant (“Faithful Trezor”), a kulak (“Neighbors”), or this is more often in the images of wolves, foxes, pikes, hawks, etc.

Saltykov, as V.I. Lenin noted, taught Russian society“to distinguish under the smoothed and pomaded appearance of the education of the feudal landowner his predatory interests...” This satirist’s ability to expose the “predatory interests” of the serf owners and arouse popular hatred towards them was clearly manifested already in Shchedrin’s first fairy tales - “The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals” and “The Wild Landowner.”

With the techniques of witty fairy tale fiction Shchedrin shows that the source is not only material well-being, but also the so-called noble culture is the work of the peasant.

What would have happened if the man had not been found? This is proven in the story of a wild landowner who expelled all the peasants from his estate. He became wild, overgrown with hair from head to toe, “walked more and more on all fours,” “he even lost the ability to utter articulate sounds.”

Along with the satirical denunciation of the privileged classes and estates, Saltykov-Shchedrin touches on the second main theme of the works of the fairy-tale cycle in the tale of two generals - the position of the people in an exploitative society. With bitter irony, the satirist depicted the slavish behavior of a man.

Among the abundance of fruits, game and fish, the worthless generals died on the island from hunger, since they could only get hold of partridge in a fried form. Wandering helplessly, they finally came across the sleeping “lounger” and forced him to work.

He was a huge man, a jack of all trades. He took apples from the tree, and got potatoes from the ground, and made a snare for catching hazel grouse from his own hair, and made a fire, and baked various provisions to feed the voracious parasites, and collected swan fluff so that they could sleep softly. Yes, this is a strong man! The generals could not resist his strength.

Meanwhile, he resignedly submitted to his enslavers. He gave them ten apples each, and took “one sour one” for himself. He himself made a rope so that the generals would keep him on a leash at night. Moreover, he was grateful to “the generals for the fact that they did not disdain his peasant labor.” It is difficult to imagine a more vivid depiction of the strength and weakness of the Russian peasantry in the era of autocracy.

The screaming contradiction between the enormous potential power and class passivity of the peasantry is presented on the pages of many other Shchedrin fairy tales. With bitterness and deep compassion, the writer reproduced pictures of poverty, downtroddenness, long-suffering, mass ruin of the peasantry, languishing under the triple yoke of officials, landowners and capitalists.

The democratic writer’s never-ending pain for the Russian peasant, all the bitterness of his thoughts about the fate of his people, home country concentrated within the narrow confines of the fairy tale “The Horse” and expressed themselves in exciting images and paintings filled with high poetry.

The tale depicts, on the one hand, the tragedy of the life of the Russian peasantry - this enormous but enslaved force, and on the other, the author’s sorrowful experiences associated with the unsuccessful search for an answer to the most important question: “Who will free this force from captivity? Who will bring her into the world?

The tale of Konyaga expresses the writer’s desire to raise the consciousness of the masses to the level of their historical calling, to arm them with courage, to awaken their enormous dormant forces for collective self-defense and active liberation struggle.

Saltykov-Shchedrin believed in the victory of the people, although the specific paths to this victory were not entirely clear to him as a peasant democrat-socialist. Until understanding historical role He did not reach the proletariat; he ended his literary activity on the eve of the proletarian stage of the liberation struggle.

A significant part of Shchedrin's tales is devoted to exposing the behavior and psychology of the intelligentsia, intimidated by government persecution and succumbing to shameful panic during the years of political reaction. Representatives of this category of people found a satirical reflection in the mirror of Shchedrin’s fairy tales in the images of the wise gudgeon, dried roach, selfless hare, sensible hare, Russian liberal.

By depicting the pitiful fate of the hero of the fairy tale “The Wise Minnow”, distraught with fear, who walled himself up in a dark hole for life, the satirist exposed the common intellectual to public shame, expressed contempt for those who, submitting to the instinct of self-preservation, retreated from active social struggle into the narrow world of personal interests .

One of the most similar topics on the topic is similar to “The Wise Piskar” caustic satyrs on liberalism - the fairy tale “Liberal”. The noble-minded liberal at first timidly asked the government for reforms “if possible,” then “at least something,” and ended up acting “in relation to meanness.” V.I. Lenin repeatedly used this famous Shchedrin fairy tale to characterize the evolution of bourgeois liberalism, which easily retreated from the “ideal” to “meanness,” that is, to reconciliation with reactionary politics.

Shchedrin always hated cowardly, corrupt liberals, all those people who hypocritically masked their pathetic social grievances with loud words. He felt no other feeling towards them other than open contempt. More complex was the satirist’s attitude towards those honest but misguided naive dreamers, of whom the title character is a representative. famous fairy tale"Crucian idealist."

As a sincere and selfless champion of social equality, the idealist crucian acts as an exponent of the socialist ideals of Shchedrin himself and, in general, the advanced part of the Russian intelligentsia. But the naive faith of the crucian carp in the possibility of achieving social harmony through the mere moral re-education of predators dooms all his lofty dreams to inevitable failure. The ardent preacher of the desired future paid cruelly for his illusions: he was swallowed by a pike.

By mercilessly exposing the irreconcilability of class interests, exposing the destructiveness of liberal compromise with reaction, ridiculing the naive faith of simpletons in the awakening of the generosity of predators - all of this Shchedrin's tales objectively brought the reader to an awareness of the need and inevitability of a social revolution.

The rich ideological content of Shchedrin's tales is expressed in a publicly accessible and vivid artistic form. “A fairy tale,” said N.V. Gogol, “can be a lofty creation when it serves as an allegorical garment, clothing a lofty spiritual truth, when it tangibly and visibly reveals even to a commoner a matter that is accessible only to a sage.” These are precisely Shchedrin’s tales. They are written in real vernacular- simple, concise and expressive.

Words and images for your own wonderful tales the satirist overheard in folk tales and legends, in proverbs and sayings, in the picturesque talk of the crowd, in all the poetic elements of the living folk language.

And yet, despite the abundance folklore elements, Shchedrin's tale, taken as a whole, is unlike folk tales; it does not repeat traditional folklore schemes either in composition or in plot. The satirist did not imitate folklore models, but freely created on the basis of them and in their spirit, creatively revealed and developed them deep meaning, took them from the people in order to return them to the people ideologically and artistically enriched.

Therefore, even in cases where themes or individual images of Shchedrin’s fairy tales find a correspondence in previously known folklore stories, they are always distinguished by the originality of interpretation of traditional motifs, novelty ideological content and high artistic perfection. Here, as in the fairy tales of Pushkin and Andersen, the artist’s enriching influence on the genres of folk poetic literature is clearly manifested.

Based on the folklore, fairy tale and literary fable tradition, Shchedrin gave unsurpassed examples of laconicism in the artistic interpretation of complex social phenomena. In this regard, especially noteworthy are those fairy tales in which representatives of the zoological world act.

Images of the animal kingdom have long been inherent in fables and satirical tale about animals, which was, as a rule, the work of the lower social classes.

Under the guise of a story about animals, the people gained some freedom to attack their oppressors and the opportunity to speak in an intelligible, funny, witty manner about serious things. This popular form artistic storytelling found wide application in Shchedrin's tales.

Masterful embodiment of the accused social types in the images of animals, Shchedrin achieved a vivid satirical effect. The very fact of likening representatives of the ruling classes and the ruling caste of the autocracy to predatory animals, the satirist declared his deepest contempt for them.

The meaning of Shchedrin’s allegories is easily understood both from the figurative paintings themselves, corresponding to the poetic structure folk tales, and due to the fact that the satirist often accompanies his allegories with direct hints at their hidden meaning, he switches the narrative from the fantastic to the realistic, from the zoological to the human sphere.

“The crow is a fertile bird and agrees to everything. Mainly, she is good because the class of “men” is represented by a craftswoman” (“Eagle the Patron”).

Toptygin ate the little siskin. “It’s the same as if someone drove a poor tiny high school student to suicide through pedagogical measures...” (“Bear in Voivodeship”). From this one hint it became clear to the thinking reader that we're talking about about administrative police persecution of advanced students.

The satirist was inventive and witty in choosing the images of animals and in distributing among them the roles that they had to play in small social comedies and tragedies.

In the “menagerie” presented in Shchedrin’s fairy tales, hares study “statistical tables published by the Ministry of Internal Affairs” and write correspondence to newspapers; bears go on business trips, receive money for travel and strive to get into the “tablets of history”; the birds are talking about the capitalist railway worker Guboshlepov; Pisces talk about the constitution and even debate about socialism.

But this is precisely the poetic charm and irresistible artistic persuasiveness of Shchedrin’s fairy tales, that no matter how the satirist “humanizes” his zoological pictures, no matter what complex social roles he assigns to his “tailed” heroes, the latter always retain their basic natural properties.

History of Russian literature: in 4 volumes / Edited by N.I. Prutskov and others - L., 1980-1983.

A brief analysis of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s fairy tale “The Wild Landowner”: idea, problems, themes, image of the people

The fairy tale “The Wild Landowner” was published by M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in 1869. This work is a satire on the Russian landowner and the ordinary Russian people. In order to bypass censorship, the writer chose specific genre“fairy tale”, within the framework of which a deliberate fable is described. In the work, the author does not give his characters names, as if hinting that the landowner is a collective image of all landowners in Rus' in the 19th century. And Senka and the rest of the men are typical representatives of the peasant class. The theme of the work is simple: the superiority of the hardworking and patient people over the mediocre and stupid nobles, expressed in an allegorical manner.

Problems, features and meaning of the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner”

Saltykov-Shchedrin's tales are always distinguished by simplicity, irony and artistic details, using which the author can absolutely accurately convey the character of the character “And that stupid landowner was reading the newspaper “Vest” and his body was soft, white and crumbly,” “he lived and looked at the light and rejoiced.”

The main problem in the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner” is the problem difficult fate people. The landowner in the work appears as a cruel and ruthless tyrant who intends to take away the last thing from his peasants. But after hearing the prayers of the peasants for better life and the landowner's desire to get rid of them forever, God grants their prayers. They stop bothering the landowner, and the “men” get rid of oppression. The author shows that in the world of the landowner, the peasants were the creators of all goods. When they disappeared, he himself turned into an animal, grew overgrown, and stopped eating normal food, since all the food disappeared from the market. With the disappearance of the men, the bright one left, rich life, the world has become uninteresting, dull, tasteless. Even the entertainment that previously brought pleasure to the landowner - playing pulque or watching a play in the theater - no longer seemed so tempting. The world is empty without the peasantry. Thus, in the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner” the meaning is quite real: the upper strata of society oppress and trample the lower ones, but at the same time cannot remain at their illusory heights without them, since it is the “slaves” who provide for the country, but their master is nothing but problems, we are unable to provide.

The image of the people in the works of Saltykov-Shchedrin

The people in the work of M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin are hardworking people in whose hands any business “argues.” It was thanks to them that the landowner always lived in abundance. The people appear before us not just as a weak-willed and reckless mass, but as smart and insightful people: “The men see: although their landowner is stupid, he has been given a great mind.” Peasants are also endowed with such important quality as a sense of justice. They refused to live under the yoke of a landowner who imposed unfair and sometimes insane restrictions on them, and asked God for help.

The author himself treats the people with respect. This can be seen in the contrast between how the landowner lived after the disappearance of the peasantry and during his return: “And suddenly again there was a smell of chaff and sheepskins in that district; but at the same time, flour, meat, and all kinds of livestock appeared at the market, and so many taxes arrived in one day that the treasurer, seeing such a pile of money, just clasped his hands in surprise...”, it can be argued that the people are driving force society, the foundation on which the existence of such “landowners” is based, and they, of course, owe their well-being to the simple Russian peasant. This is the meaning of the ending of the fairy tale “The Wild Landowner”.

Having nevertheless decided to complete the planned cycle of fairy tales, Saltykov actually resorted to “breaking” within the genre, which had a very noticeable effect on “Chizhikov Mountain” - the first fairy tale written after the closure of “Otechestvennye Zapiski” and published in December 1884 in “Russians” statements." The tale is a satire on a bourgeois-noble family. Saltykov was not happy with the fairy tale. “I feel,” he wrote to Sobolevsky on January 9, 1885, “that two or three “Chizhikov’s grief” - and the reputation of my fairy tales will be significantly undermined. Feoktistov, perhaps, was telling the truth that particular affairs are not at all suitable for me” (XX, 122). And after “Chizhikov’s Grief,” Saltykov continued to work intensively on fairy tales (“Such a verse attacked me,” he wrote on January 9, 1885 to V. M. Sobolevsky). But, enhancing their fantastic flavor, he abandons “particular” plots as, in his opinion, weakening the power of satire.

Many fairy tales encountered censorship obstacles when going to press, which affected the timing of their publication and obligated the author to make some mitigating amendments. For the legal publication of “The Crow the Petitioner,” which had undergone two years of ordeal, it was necessary to tone down a number of the most sensitive passages, and it appeared only on the eve of Saltykov’s death. The fairy tales “The Bear in the Voivodeship”, “Dried Roach”, “The Eagle Patron” and “The Bogatyr” during the author’s lifetime could not break through censorship barriers at all.

The censorship history of fairy tales testifies to Saltykov’s exceptional ideological fortitude. Of course, some muting of the ideological sharpness of the works was inevitable. However, the writer’s desire to overcome censorship obstacles by means of allegorical skill remained constant.

Censorship delays and prohibitions determined the extent of the underground distribution of fairy tales in Russia and their reproduction in the foreign emigrant press. The range of fairy tales illegally printed or published abroad is limited to eight works that have experienced censorship persecution to varying degrees. These are “The Wise Minnow”, “Selfless Hare”, “Poor Wolf”, “Virtues and Vices”, “Bear in the Voivodeship”, “Deceitful Newspaper Man and Gullible Reader”, “Dried Roach”, “Eagle Patron”.

In Russia, fairy tales were distributed in small editions in lithographed and hectographed editions, carried out by the Flying Hectograph of the People's Party, the General Student Union, and the hectograph “Public Benefit.” They were usually printed from lists or from uncorrected proofs of Otechestvennye Zapiski, and therefore contained large number errors and deviations from the final text of the tale. The first to be published in 1883 by the free hectograph “Public Benefit” were brochures entitled “Fairy tales for children of a fair age. M. E. Saltykov", including " The wise minnow», « Selfless hare", "Poor wolf." This publication was published eight times during 1883 (before the publication of fairy tales in Otechestvennye zapiski) in different formats (six times with an indication of the release date and two times without an indication). The publication was distributed by members of Narodnaya Volya, as evidenced by the seal (“Book Agents of Narodnaya Volya”) on a number of surviving copies. One of the publications with a date of release, unlike all the others, contains only one fairy tale - “The Most Muddy Minnow”.

This was followed by illegal editions of fairy tales, removed by Saltykov from the proofs of the February issue of Otechestvennye Zapiski for 1884. In the spring and summer of 1884, two illegal publications appeared in Moscow, reproducing the fairy tales “The Bear in the Voivodeship” and “Virtues and Vices” based on uncorrected proofs "Domestic Notes". The first of them, printed by the Flying Hectograph of the People's Party, had the title “New Tales of Shchedrin.” It appeared, apparently, at the beginning of May 1884: under the handwritten text of the fairy tales, the signature is “Shchedrin” and the date is “April 29, 1884.” In the same year, two editions of a lithographed publication appeared under the title “(New) Fairy Tales for Children of a Fair Age. Shchedrin”, carried out by the General Student Union. In the first issue, “Virtues and Vices” and “Bear in the Voivodeship” were published, in the second - “Dried Roach” and “Deceitful Newspaper Man and Gullible Reader.” In 1892, which by that time had not been authorized for printing, appeared as a separate hectographed edition of “Dried Roach” note_272, and in 1901 - “Eagle the Patron”. The latest edition was carried out “in favor of the Kyiv Fund for Assistance to Political Exiles and Red Cross Prisoners” note_273.

Of particular interest is the second edition of “Fairy Tales for Children of a Fair Age,” lithographed in 1884 in Moscow by the General Student Union and including the fairy tales “Dried Roach” and “The Deceiver Newspaper Man and the Gullible Reader.” This issue, very rare (only four copies are known), attracts attention with its design and preface, entitled “To Russian Society from the Moscow Central Circle of the General Student Union.” Cover drawing by unknown artist, is a half-open curtain. On its closed part the title of the collection, the author's surname and imprint are indicated, while the slightly open part presents the reader with the behind-the-scenes side of autocratic reality: here is the site where the quarterly delivers the "unwell-intentioned" by the collar, the editorial office of the newspaper "Slops", representatives of the emerging bourgeoisie, captured by the writer in the images The Derunovs and Razuvaevs, the peasant they robbed, one of Shchedrin’s “scoundrels” scribbling a denunciation, in the very corner is a character from the fairy tale “The Sensible Hare”, and next to them a policeman in full uniform and a pig helping him, having grabbed the raised part of the curtain, are trying to lower it so that the reader does not see the ugliness of the reality opening before him. Reflecting the close connection and interweaving of Shchedrin's satire with modern reality, the artist at the same time emphasized its revolutionary role and the fear of it by the ruling classes in Russia. This same idea is reinforced by a short preface, which talks about the attitude of Russian society to the closure of Otechestvennye Zapiski and calls for a fight against the oppressors.

Saltykov-Shchedrin's "Fairy Tales" played a huge role in revolutionary propaganda, and in this respect they stand out among all other works of the satirist. As numerous memoirs of leaders of the revolutionary populist movement testify, the satirist’s fabulous miniatures were a constant and effective ideological weapon in their revolutionary practice note_274. Frequent appeals of populist propaganda to the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are predetermined by their social acuity and the power of psychological impact on the reader. Moreover, he had at his disposal mainly prohibited fairy tales, which had a strong impact on the masses from the point of view of instilling hatred towards the autocratic serfdom system and its moral, social and everyday way of life. Saltykov’s “fairy tales” “had a revolutionaryizing influence,” recalled P. R. Rovensky, a participant in the populist movement note_275. And this influence was deep and lasting. Reading the later written memoirs of the populists, we catch many of the nuances of their relationship to the legacy of Saltykov-Shchedrin and are once again convinced of the enduring significance that his works - and first of all "Fairy Tales" - played in the revolutionary development of Russian society.

Foreign publications of fairy tales were initially carried out on the pages of the newspaper “Common Cause”, published in Geneva with the direct participation of N. A. Belogolovy, one of the writer’s closest friends. “The Wise Minnow”, “Selfless Hare”, “Poor Wolf”, “Virtues and Vices”, “Bear in the Voivodeship (Toptygin 1st)”, “Dried Roach”, “Eagle Patron” were published here. Soon after the newspaper publication, these works were published by M. Elpidin's publishing house in Geneva in the form of collections and separate brochures.

As in the Russian illegal press, the first booklet published in Geneva in 1883 was “Three Fairy Tales for Children of a Fair Age. N. Shchedrin”, containing “The Wise Minnow”, “The Selfless Hare” and “The Poor Wolf”. Subsequently, this brochure was republished by M. Elpidin in 1890 and 1895, and in 1903 it was published in Berlin by G. Steinitz as the 69th issue of the “Collection of the best Russian works.”

In 1886, the publishing house of M. Elpidin published a second collection entitled “New fairy tales for children of a fair age. N. Shchedrin." It included “Virtues and Vices”, “Bear in the Voivodeship” and “Dried Roach”. In the 90s a photomechanical reproduction of this collection appeared twice (in 1893; the third edition was published without a year). In 1903, G. Steinitz published this brochure in Berlin as the 72nd issue of the “Collection of the Best Russian Works.” Simultaneously with this publication, in 1886, the Elpidina publishing house published the fairy tale “The Eagle Patron” as a separate brochure. This tale was written in 1891 and 1898. was republished by Elpidin, and in 1904 it was included in the brochure “Three Revolutionary Satires” (“Collection of the best Russian works”, issue 77), published in Berlin by G. Steinitz; in Berlin, a year earlier, I. Rade carried out a separate publication of the fairy tale “The Bear on voivodeship".

Saltykov did not manage to write all of the tales planned for the cycle. From the letters of Saltykov, the memoirs of Belogolov and L.F. Panteleev, the titles and partly the content of unrealized fairy tales are known. Saltykov reported to Nekrasov about the first of them on May 22, 1869: “I want to write children's story entitled: “The Tale of How a Sexton Wanted to Conduct the Bishop’s Service,” and dedicate it to Ant(onovich)” (XVIII, book 2, p. 26). On February 8, 1884, he wrote to Mikhailovsky: “It’s terribly offensive: I was planning to write a fairy tale called “The Motley People” (there is already a hint about this in the fairy tale “Dried Roach”), when suddenly I see that Uspensky is treating the same subject! note_276. Well, I’ll take mine not today, but tomorrow” (XIX, book 2, p. 279). The concept of the fairy tale was transformed into the last of the “Motley Letters” in 1886.

On May 13, 1885, Saltykov informed Sobolevsky that he was writing a new fairy tale, “Dogs,” which he was going to soon send to Russkie Vedomosti. The tale, obviously, was not written, since no further mentions of it are found in Saltykov’s letters (XX, 181, 182).

As Belogolovy testifies, in mid-1885, simultaneously with “The Bogatyr,” Saltykov decided to write two more fairy tales – “The Forgotten Balalaika” and “The Sun and the Pigs,” “but both of these fairy tales had not yet been sufficiently thought out by him” note_277. In the first of them, as the memoirist points out, Saltykov wanted to present the ideologist of late Slavophilism I. S. Aksakov. In the second, the satirist apparently intended to develop the idea of ​​that dramatic scene, which, under the title “The Triumphant Pig, or the Conversation of a Pig with the Truth,” was included in the sixth chapter of the essays “Abroad.” Let us recall that the pig begins his attack on the Truth by denying the existence of the sun in the sky, declaring: “But in my opinion, all these suns are one false teaching.” It is known that reactionaries usually called the ideas of democracy and socialism “false teaching.” Apparently, Saltykov intended to dedicate the fairy tale “The Sun and the Pigs” to the defense of precisely these ideas.

The sixth of the fairy tales unrealized by the satirist is about an exiled revolutionary who, despite all the persecution, remains adamant in his convictions. From Saltykov’s letters it is known that in 1875-1876. he was going to write the story "Lousy" - about tragic fate and the courage of a revolutionary, the prototype of which should have been “Chernyshevsky or Petrashevsky.” The cycle “Cultural People”, for which the story was designed, remained unfinished. Ten years later, Saltykov wanted to devote a fairy tale to the same topic and spoke about it to Panteleev as “almost ready”: “I bring out a person who lives in a big city, takes a conscious and active part in the process public life, she influences him and suddenly, by magic, she finds herself among the Siberian deserts. At first, she lives by the continuation of those interests that just yesterday worried her, she feels as if in an environment of battling passions; but gradually the images begin to move into the distance; some kind of fog descends, the outlines of the past barely appear, finally everything disappears, dead silence reigns. Only occasionally, on an impenetrable night, is the ringing of the bell of a passing troika heard, and the words reach him: “Are you still not reformed?” " note_278. The idea of ​​​​a fairy tale about a political exile was not realized, obviously, primarily due to censorship difficulties, but separate motives This idea was reflected in the fairy tales “The Fool” and “The Adventure with Kramolnikov.”

The table below contains information about the appearance of fairy tales in the Russian legal, illegal and emigrant press note_279.

1. The story of how one man fed two generals/OZ. 1869. No. 2

2. Conscience/OZ is gone. 1869. No. 2

3. Wild landowner/OZ. 1869. No. 3

4. Toy business people/OZ. 1880.№1

5. Wise minnow/OZ. 1884. No. 1/"Fairy tales for children of a fair age" (1883)/OD. 1883, September

6. Selfless hare/OZ. 1884. No. 1/"Fairy tales for children of a fair age" (1883)/OD. 1883, September

8. Crucian idealist/Sat. "XXV years". (SPb., 1884) / "Fairy tales for children of a fair age" (1883) / OD. 1883, September

9. Virtues and vices / Sat. "XXV years". (SPb., 1884)/"New Tales of Shchedrin" (1884)/OD. 1884, November

10. The deceiving newspaperman and the gullible reader/Sb. "XXV years". (SPb., 1884) / "(New fairy tales for children of a fair age. Shchedrin" (M., 1884. Issue 2) / OD. 1884, November

26. Hyena/Sat. "23 Tales" (St. Petersburg, 1886)

28. Raven-petitioner/Sat. "In memory of V.M. Garshin" (St. Petersburg, 1889)

32. Dried roach/Full. collection Op. in 20 volumes (M., 1937. T. 16)/"(New fairy tales for children of a fair age. Shchedrin"/"(New fairy tales for children of a fair age. N. Shchedrin" (Geneve. 1886)

Censorship persecution did not allow the satirist to give a complete set of his tales. In September 1886, the first edition of the collection of fairy tales, “23 Tales,” appeared, and in October 1887, the second edition, supplemented by “A Christmas Tale,” appeared. These collections did not include eight fairy tales. Saltykov did not include three tales from 1869 (“The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals”, “The Lost Conscience”, “The Wild Landowner”) because they had already been published three times and the last time in a book that had not yet been sold note_280. Five fairy tales that did not receive censorship permission were also not included in the collection (“The Bear in the Voivodeship,” “The Eagle Patron,” “Dried Roach,” “The Crow Petitioner,” “The Bogatyr”).

The publication of fairy tales in cheap brochures intended for mass distribution among the people, planned by Saltykov in 1887, also did not take place. The censorship allowed the book “23 Fairy Tales” in two editions, and prohibited the publication of the same fairy tales, but in separate brochures. At first glance, the actions of the censorship authorities seem inconsistent, but a closer acquaintance with the surviving records shows the opposite. The journal of the St. Petersburg Censorship Committee dated April 15, 1887 reports that “Mr. Saltykov’s intention to publish some of his fairy tales in separate brochures costing no more than three kopecks, and therefore for common people, more than strange. What Mr. Saltykov calls fairy tales does not at all correspond to its name; his fairy tales are the same satire, and the satire is caustic, tendentious, more or less directed against our social and political structure. In them, not only vices are ridiculed, but also established authorities, and higher classes, and established national habits. These tales, appearing from time to time in periodicals, constantly raise doubts among the authorities monitoring the press about whether they should be banned. And this is the kind of work Mr. Saltykov wants to propagate among the simple, uneducated population. This is not the kind of food the common people need, whose morality is already God knows how stable it is.” note_281. The conclusion of the censorship committee indicates that the authorities perfectly understood the revolutionary influence of Shchedrin’s works, including fairy tales, on the broad masses of Russian society and tried by all means to weaken this influence and prevent the dissemination of fairy tales in large circulations of cheap publications.

IN recent months life Saltykov was preparing for publication a collection of his works, in which he intended to give a complete cycle of fairy tales. However, this time, too, in volume VIII of the Collected Works, published in 1889, after the author’s death, only twenty-eight works of the fairy-tale cycle were placed - “The Tale of That...”, “Conscience Lost” and “Wild Landowner” were added, but Of the fairy tales that had not been previously censored, only “The Petitioner Raven” was included here, which by this time had nevertheless managed to be published in the collection “In Memory of Garshin.” The fairy tales “The Bear in the Voivodeship”, “The Eagle Patron” and “Dried Roach”, distributed in Russian and foreign underground publications, were legally published in Russia only in 1906, in the fifth edition Full meeting works of Saltykov, published by A.F. Marx (appendix to Niva). The fairy tale “The Bogatyr” was lost in the writer’s archive and was first published only in 1922, and added to the collection of fairy tales in 1927 note_282. Thus, the fairy tale cycle, created in 1869-1886, in its entirety became available to the reader only forty years after its completion.

Literature about Saltykov-Shchedrin, exciting wide circle issues related to his social, artistic, literary-critical and journalistic practice are extensive. Since the appearance of “Provincial Sketches,” criticism has closely followed the development of the satirist’s work. True, the value of the lifetime literature about him is insignificant. The only exceptions are articles by Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov about “Provincial Sketches,” which have enduring scientific significance, and partly articles by N. K. Mikhailovsky about the works created by the writer in the 70s and 80s.

Liberal-populist criticism that dominated the heyday literary activity writer, did not put forward such representatives who would be able to give a deep and correct interpretation of the revolutionary-democratic satire of Saltykov-Shchedrin. Critical thought 1870-80s. realized the futility of her attempts to penetrate into the secrets of Shchedrin’s satire, to explain its true meaning and role in social and social development. One of its prominent representatives, A. M. Skabichevsky, wrote: “Such powerful writers as Shchedrin require critics equal to them in magnitude, and, to the greatest regret, Shchedrin is unlikely to receive such a correct and deep assessment during his lifetime. deserves it. In this respect, he shares the same fate with Gogol, who still remains unexamined and not fully appreciated. And yet - for such talents the Belinskys and Dobrolyubovs are required" note_283.

Current Russian criticism has lightly touched on fairy tales, but has failed to appreciate them and reveal their ideological and artistic aspects. True, these satirical miniatures, appearing at the time of the most severe reaction of the 80s, immediately took their place in the revolutionary-democratic and literary-social movement, they were closely followed by all of advanced Russia, reading them in legal newspapers and magazines, getting acquainted with them in lists, hectographed editions and thin Elpidin brochures with prohibited works of the cycle. The role of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s fairy tales in the spiritual life of the society of that time was, first of all, that they instilled hatred of autocracy and serfdom, awakened the people’s self-awareness, and affirmed their faith in a bright future. To understand the peculiarities of the existence of Shchedrin’s fairy tales in Russian society of that time, it is necessary to consider the most significant moments of this process associated with the speeches of Saltykov’s contemporary (lifetime) criticism - bourgeois-liberal and populist criticism.

The perception of Shchedrin's fairy tales by current Russian criticism is largely due to the nature of their publication: they were published as separate satirical miniatures, for the reader and critics not yet united by a common thought (this will become clear later), and for the writer himself, not yet formed into a single fairy tale cycle, breaking which was produced repeatedly during the process of its creation. Therefore, the critic took a wait-and-see attitude, considering the tales appearing in different publications as individual performances of the satirist, carried out outside the usual cycles for Saltykov. Therefore, during the period of the most intensive work on fairy tales in the Russian press, the “Poshekhonsky Stories”, “Motley Letters” and “Little Things in Life” published at the same time were considered more often and more consistently than the fairy tales that appeared from time to time. The breakdown associated with censorship circumstances and the closure of Otechestvennye Zapiski led to the fact that one of the most outstanding and, by its nature, the final cycle in the satirist’s work received the slightest reflection in criticism. The rare reviews that appeared in various magazines and newspapers were most often of a review and informational nature and the ideological and aesthetic content of fairy tales; their role in social and revolutionary reality was almost not touched upon.

The process of perception of fairy tales by Russian criticism begins in 1869, when the first fairy tales appeared. However, criticism was not immediately able to discern their social meaning and see in the fairy tales “The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals,” “Conscience Lost,” and “The Wild Landowner” as the beginning of a new satirical cycle in the writer’s work. Focusing on the general title (“For Children”), critics for the most part viewed the first fairy tales as works truly intended for children, works full of humor and belonging to a writer whose talent “has not yet faded and, perhaps, has not weakened, it still has there is no tension visible, which is so noticeable in our other accusers or laughers” note_284. The classification of Saltykov among the “exposers” and “laughmakers” is an attempt to obscure the true meaning of the great social and political satire contained in these works. True, with the appearance of the entire cycle in print, criticism realized that the purpose of the first fairy tales “for children” was only a witty cover that allowed Saltykov to touch upon the most serious social and public problems in these works. “It goes without saying,” a critic of “Russian Thought” wrote in 1887, “that these fairy tales were not written for children at all, and some of them are far too tough for many adults” note_285. However, it is still impossible to judge the perception of fairy tales by Russian society based on responses to their first examples, because the main works of the cycle are ahead and the opinion about them will be formed by criticism of the second half of the 80s. However, “will be formed” is said, perhaps, not entirely accurately, because no serious works on fairy tales appeared in Russian criticism of that time, not a single large article about them.

“Saltykov-Shchedrin fairy tales” - Here Saltykov-Shchedrin became seriously interested in literature. “The story of how one man fed two generals.” "Eagle Patron". Some plans (at least six fairy tales) remained unrealized. 6. If Gogol’s is “laughter through tears,” then how can one define Shchedrin’s? Genre originality. In terms of genre, the fairy tales of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin are similar to Russian folk tales.

“Gentlemen Golovlevs” - -What is it! Saltykov-Shchedrin "Lord Golovlevs". "Niece." Pavel Vladimirovich and Vladimir Mikhailovich die. Stepan dies. Volodya's suicide. Ideological and thematic content of the novel. "In a related way." "Family Court" Suicide of Lyubinka Death of Judas. Judas' binge of idle thinking. Depth and breadth of concept.

“Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin” - 4. Mother, Olga Mikhailovna Zabelina. Education of young Saltykov. In our family, it was not so much stinginess that reigned, but some kind of stubborn hoarding.” 2. Daughter of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin Son of M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. Father, Evgraf Vasilyevich Saltykov. She appeared angry, unforgiving, with her lower lip bitten, resolute in her hand, angry.”

“The history of a city, a lesson” - The writer’s works are still relevant today. Checking the mastery of difficult words and expressions. What is “The Story of a City” in terms of genre? Brief retelling Chapters “On the Roots of the Origin of the Foolovites.” How can you explain the names of the peoples listed by the writer? (Literature lesson for 8th grade).

“Works of Shchedrin” - Cruel and merciless laughter in “The History of a City” has a cleansing meaning. The language of Shchedrin's tales is deeply folk, close to Russian folklore. Saltykov-Shchedrin. At the end of the 60s. No. The images of Foolov's inhabitants are also fantastic. Heyday fairy tale genre Shchedrin falls in the 80s.

“Lesson of Saltykov-Shchedrin” - 1869 – 1886. . As a result, no writer was subjected to such persecution as Saltykov-Shchedrin. Purpose of the lesson: Features: Fantasy, reality + tragic, grotesque, hyperbole, Aesopian language. Cover of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s book “The History of a City.” Saltykov-Shchedrin. Evgrafovich. Satire writer-satirist hyperbole grotesque “Aesopian language.”

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