Socialist realism (socialist realism) - artistic method literature and art (leading in the art of the Soviet Union and other socialist countries), which is an aesthetic expression of the socialist-conscious concept of the world and man, conditioned by the era of struggle for the establishment and creation of a socialist society. Image life ideals under socialism it determines both the content and the basic artistic and structural principles of art. Its emergence and development are associated with the spread of socialist ideas in different countries, with the development of the revolutionary labor movement.
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✪ Lecture "Socialist realism"
✪ The offensive of ideology: the formation of socialist realism as a state artistic method
✪ Boris Gasparov. Socialist realism as a moral problem
✪ Lecture by B. M. Gasparov “Andrei Platonov and socialist realism”
✪ A. Bobrikov "Socialist realism and the studio of military artists named after M.B. Grekov"
Subtitles
History of origin and development
Term "socialist realism" first proposed by the Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the USSR SP I. Gronsky in the Literary Newspaper on May 23, 1932. It arose in connection with the need to direct RAPP and the avant-garde to artistic development Soviet culture. Decisive in this regard was the recognition of the role classical traditions and understanding of new qualities of realism. In 1932-1933 Gronsky and head. The fiction sector of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, V. Kirpotin, vigorously promoted this term [ ] .
At the 1st All-Union Congress of Soviet Writers in 1934, Maxim Gorky stated:
“Socialist realism affirms being as an act, as creativity, the goal of which is the continuous development of man’s most valuable individual abilities for the sake of his victory over the forces of nature, for the sake of his health and longevity, for the sake of the great happiness of living on the earth, which he, in accordance with the continuous growth of his needs, wants treat the whole as a beautiful home for humanity united in one family.”
The state needed to approve this method as the main one for better control over creative personalities and better propaganda of their policies. In the previous period, the twenties, there were Soviet writers who sometimes took aggressive positions towards many outstanding writers. For example, RAPP, an organization of proletarian writers, was actively engaged in criticism of non-proletarian writers. RAPP consisted mainly of aspiring writers. During the period of the creation of modern industry (the years of industrialization), Soviet power needed art that would raise the people to “deeds of labor.” A rather motley picture was presented by fine arts 1920s Several groups emerged within it. The most significant group was the Association of Artists of the Revolution. They depicted today: the life of the Red Army soldiers, workers, peasants, leaders of the revolution and labor. They considered themselves the heirs of the “Itinerants”. They went to factories, mills, and Red Army barracks to directly observe the lives of their characters, to “sketch” it. It was they who became the main backbone of the artists of “socialist realism”. It was much harder for less traditional masters, in particular, members of the OST (Society of Easel Painters), which united young people who graduated from the first Soviet art university [ ] .
Gorky returned from exile in a solemn ceremony and headed the specially created Union of Writers of the USSR, which included mainly writers and poets of Soviet orientation.
Characteristic
Definition from the point of view of official ideology
For the first time, the official definition of socialist realism was given in the Charter of the USSR SP, adopted at the First Congress of the SP:
Socialist realism, being the main method of Soviet fiction and literary criticism, requires the artist to provide a truthful, historically specific depiction of reality in its revolutionary development. Moreover, truthfulness and historical specificity artistic image reality must be combined with the task of ideological remodeling and education in the spirit of socialism.
This definition became the starting point for all further interpretations until the 80s.
« Socialist realism is a deeply vital, scientific and most advanced artistic method that developed as a result of the successes of socialist construction and the education of Soviet people in the spirit of communism. The principles of socialist realism ... were a further development of Lenin’s teaching on the partisanship of literature.” (Great Soviet encyclopedia, )
Lenin expressed the idea that art should stand on the side of the proletariat in the following way:
“Art belongs to the people. The deepest springs of art can be found among the broad class of working people... Art must be based on their feelings, thoughts and demands and must grow with them.”
Principles of socialist realism
- Ideology. Show the peaceful life of the people, the search for ways to a new better life, heroic deeds to achieve happy life for all people.
- Specificity. Show the process in reality historical development, which in turn must correspond to the materialistic understanding of history (in the process of changing the conditions of their existence, people also change their consciousness and attitude towards the surrounding reality).
As the definition from the Soviet textbook stated, the method implied the use of the heritage of world realistic art, but not as a simple imitation of great examples, but with a creative approach. “The method of socialist realism predetermines the deep connection of works of art with modern reality, the active participation of art in socialist construction. The objectives of the method of socialist realism require from each artist a true understanding of the meaning of the events taking place in the country, the ability to evaluate phenomena public life in their development, in complex dialectical interaction."
The method included the unity of realism and Soviet romance, combining the heroic and romantic with “a realistic statement of the true truth of the surrounding reality.” It has been argued that in this way humanism " critical realism" was supplemented by "socialist humanism".
The state gave orders, sent people on creative trips, organized exhibitions - thus stimulating the development of the necessary layer of art. The idea of “social order” is part of socialist realism.
In literature
The writer, in the famous expression of Yu. K. Olesha, is an “engineer human souls" With his talent he must influence the reader as a propagandist. He educates the reader in the spirit of devotion to the party and supports it in the struggle for the victory of communism. Subjective actions and aspirations of the individual had to correspond to the objective course of history. Lenin wrote: “Literature must become party literature... Down with non-party writers. Down with the superhuman writers! The literary cause must become part of the general proletarian cause, the “cogs and wheels” of one single great social-democratic mechanism, set in motion by the entire conscious vanguard of the entire working class.”
A literary work in the genre of socialist realism should be built “on the idea of the inhumanity of any form of exploitation of man by man, expose the crimes of capitalism, inflaming the minds of readers and viewers with just anger, and inspire them to the revolutionary struggle for socialism.” [ ]
Maxim Gorky wrote the following about socialist realism:
“It is vitally and creatively necessary for our writers to take a point of view from the height of which - and only from its height - all the dirty crimes of capitalism, all the meanness of its bloody intentions are clearly visible and all the greatness is visible heroic work proletariat-dictator."
He also stated:
“...the writer must have a good knowledge of the history of the past and knowledge social phenomena modernity, in which he is called upon to simultaneously perform two roles: the role of midwife and gravedigger.”
Gorky believed that main task socialist realism is the education of a socialist, revolutionary view of the world, a corresponding feeling of the world.
Belorussian Soviet writer Vasil Bykov called socialist realism the most advanced and proven method
So what can we, writers, masters of words, humanists, who have chosen the most advanced and proven method of socialist realism as the method of their creativity?
In the USSR, such foreign authors as Henri Barbusse, Louis Aragon, Martin Andersen-Nexe, Bertolt Brecht, Johannes Becher, Anna Seghers, Maria Puymanova, Pablo Neruda, Jorge Amado and others were also classified as socialist realists.
Criticism
Andrei Sinyavsky in his essay “What is socialist realism”, having analyzed the ideology and history of the development of socialist realism, as well as its features typical works in literature, concluded that this style is in fact not related to “real” realism, but is a Soviet version of classicism with admixtures of romanticism. Also in this work, he believed that due to the erroneous orientation of Soviet artists towards realistic works of the XIX centuries (especially critical realism), deeply alien to the classicistic nature of socialist realism - and, in his opinion, due to the unacceptable and curious synthesis of classicism and realism in one work - the creation of outstanding works of art in this style is unthinkable.
Socialist realism is the artistic method of Soviet literature.
Socialist realism, being the main method of Soviet fiction and literary criticism, requires the artist to provide a truthful, historically specific depiction of reality in its revolutionary development. The method of socialist realism helps the writer to promote further rise creative forces of the Soviet people, overcoming all difficulties on the path to communism.
“Socialist realism requires the writer to truthfully depict reality in its revolutionary development and provides him with comprehensive opportunities for the manifestation of individual talent and creative initiative, presupposes the richness and diversity of artistic means and styles, supporting innovation in all areas of creativity,” says the Charter of the Writers’ Union USSR.
The main features of this artistic method were outlined back in 1905 by V.I. Lenin in his historical work “Party Organization and Party Literature,” in which he foresaw the creation and flourishing of free, socialist literature under the conditions of victorious socialism.
This method was first embodied in the artistic work of A. M. Gorky - in his novel “Mother” and other works. In poetry, the most striking expression of socialist realism is the work of V.V. Mayakovsky (poem “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin”, “Good!”, lyrics of the 20s).
Continuing the best creative traditions of the literature of the past, socialist realism at the same time represents a qualitatively new and highest artistic method, since it is determined in its main features by completely new social relations in a socialist society.
Socialist realism reflects life realistically, deeply, truthfully; it is socialist because it reflects life in its revolutionary development, that is, in the process of creating a socialist society on the path to communism. It differs from the methods that preceded it in the history of literature in that the basis of the ideal to which the Soviet writer calls in his work is the movement towards communism under the leadership of the Communist Party. In the greeting of the CPSU Central Committee to the Second Congress of Soviet Writers, it was emphasized that “in modern conditions, the method of socialist realism requires writers to understand the tasks of completing the construction of socialism in our country and the gradual transition from socialism to communism.” The socialist ideal is embodied in a new type of positive hero, which was created by Soviet literature. Its features are determined primarily by the unity of the individual and society, impossible in previous periods of social development; the pathos of collective, free, creative, creative work; high feeling Soviet patriotism - love for one's socialist Motherland; partisanship, a communist attitude to life, brought up in Soviet people by the Communist Party.
Such an image of a positive hero, distinguished by bright character traits and high spiritual qualities, becomes a worthy example and subject of imitation for people, and participates in the creation of a moral code for the builder of communism.
What is qualitatively new in socialist realism is the nature of the depiction of the life process, based on the fact that the difficulties of development of Soviet society are difficulties of growth, carrying within themselves the possibility of overcoming these difficulties, the victory of the new over the old, the emerging over the dying. Thus, the Soviet artist gets the opportunity to paint today in the light of tomorrow, that is, to depict life in its revolutionary development, the victory of the new over the old, to show the revolutionary romance of socialist reality (see Romanticism).
Socialist realism fully embodies the principle of communist partyism in art, since it reflects the life of the liberated people in its development, in the light of advanced ideas expressing the true interests of the people, in the light of the ideals of communism.
The communist ideal, a new type of positive hero, the depiction of life in its revolutionary development based on the victory of the new over the old, nationality - these main features of socialist realism are manifested in infinitely diverse artistic forms, in the variety of writers' styles.
At the same time, socialist realism also develops the traditions of critical realism, exposing everything that interferes with the development of the new in life, creating negative images that typify everything that is backward, dying, and hostile to the new, socialist reality.
Socialist realism allows the writer to give a vitally truthful, deeply artistic reflection of not only the present, but also the past. Historical novels, poems, etc. have become widespread in Soviet literature. By truthfully depicting the past, a writer - a socialist, a realist - strives to educate his readers using the example of the heroic life of the people and their best sons in the past, and illuminates our lives today with the experience of the past.
Depending on the scope of the revolutionary movement and the maturity of the revolutionary ideology, socialist realism as an artistic method can and does become the property of leading revolutionary artists in foreign countries, at the same time enriching the experience of Soviet writers.
It is clear that the embodiment of the principles of socialist realism depends on the individuality of the writer, his worldview, talent, culture, experience, and skill of the writer, which determine the height of the artistic level he has achieved.
Gorky "Mother"
The novel tells not just about the revolutionary struggle, but about how in the process of this struggle people are reborn, how spiritual birth comes to them. “A resurrected soul will not be killed!” - Nilovna exclaims at the end of the novel, when she is brutally beaten by police and spies, when death is close to her. “Mother” is a novel about the resurrection of the human soul, seemingly tightly crushed by the unjust system of Life. This topic could be explored especially broadly and convincingly using the example of a person like Nilovna. She is not only a person of the oppressed masses, but also a woman on whom, due to her darkness, her husband takes out countless oppressions and insults, and, moreover, a mother who lives in eternal anxiety for her son. Although she is only forty years old, she already feels like an old woman. In the early version of the novel, Nilovna was older, but then the author “rejuvenated” her, wanting to emphasize that the main thing is not how many years she lived, but how she lived them. She felt like an old woman, having not truly experienced either childhood or youth, without feeling the joy of “recognizing” the world. Youth comes to her, in essence, after forty years, when the meaning of the world, man, her own life, and the beauty of her native land begin to open up to her for the first time.
In one form or another, many heroes experience such spiritual resurrection. “A person needs to be renewed,” says Rybin and thinks about how to achieve such renewal. If dirt appears on top, it can be washed off; and “how to cleanse a person from the inside”? And so it turns out that the very struggle that often embitters people is the only one capable of purifying and renewing their souls. “Iron Man” Pavel Vlasov is gradually freeing himself from excessive severity and from the fear of giving vent to his feelings, especially the feeling of love; his friend Andrei Nakhodka - on the contrary, from excessive softness; “son of thieves” Vesovshchikov - from distrust of people, from the conviction that they are all enemies of each other; Rybin associated with the peasant masses - from distrust of the intelligentsia and culture, from the view of all educated people as “masters”. And everything that happens in the souls of the heroes surrounding Nilovna also happens in her soul, but it happens with special difficulty, especially painfully. From an early age she was accustomed to not trusting people, to fear them, to hide her thoughts and feelings from them. She teaches her son this too, seeing that he has entered into an argument with life that is familiar to everyone: “I only ask one thing - do not talk to people without fear! You have to be afraid of people - they all hate each other! They live by greed, they live by envy. Everyone is happy to do evil. As soon as you begin to expose and judge them, they will hate you and destroy you!” The son replies: “People are bad, yes. But when I found out that there is truth in the world, people became better!”
When Paul says to his mother: “We all perish from fear! And those who command us take advantage of our fear and intimidate us even more,” she admits: “I lived in fear all my life - my whole soul was overgrown with fear!” During the first search at Pavel's, she experiences this feeling with all its severity. During the second search, “she was not so afraid... she felt more hatred for these gray night visitors with spurs on their feet, and the hatred absorbed the anxiety.” But this time Pavel was taken to prison, and the mother, “closing her eyes, howled long and monotonously,” just as her husband had howled in animal anguish before. Many times after this, Nilovna was overcome by fear, but it was increasingly drowned out by hatred of her enemies and the consciousness of the high goals of the struggle.
“Now I’m not afraid of anything,” says Nilovna after the trial of Pavel and his comrades, but the fear in her has not yet been completely killed. At the station, when she notices that she is recognized by a spy, she is again “persistently squeezed by a hostile force... humiliating her, plunging her into dead fear.” For a moment, she feels a desire to throw away her suitcase with leaflets containing her son’s speech at the trial and run. And then Nilovna inflicts the final blow on her old enemy - fear: “... with one big and sharp effort of her heart, which seemed to shake her whole, she extinguished all these cunning, small, weak lights, commandingly saying to herself: “Shame!” Don't disgrace your son! No one is afraid...” This is a whole poem about the fight against fear and victory over it!, about how a person with a resurrected soul gains fearlessness.
The theme of “resurrection of the soul” was the most important in all of Gorky’s works. In the autobiographical trilogy “The Life of Klim Samgin,” Gorky showed how two forces, two environments, fight for a person, one of which seeks to revive his soul, and the other - to devastate it and kill it. In the play “At the Bottom” and in a number of other works, Gorky depicted people thrown to the very bottom of life and yet retaining hope for revival - these works lead to the conclusion about the indestructibility of the human in man.
Mayakovsky's poem "Vladimir Ilyich Lenin""-hymn to the greatness of Lenin. Lenin's immortality became the main theme of the poem. I really didn’t want, in the poet’s words, “to descend to a simple political retelling of events.” Mayakovsky studied the works of V.I. Lenin, talked with people who knew him, collected material bit by bit and again turned to the works of the leader.
To show Ilyich’s activities as an unparalleled historical feat, to reveal all the greatness of this brilliant, exceptional personality and at the same time to imprint in the hearts of people the image of a charming, down-to-earth, simple Ilyich, who “loved his comrade with human affection” - in this he saw his civic and poetic problem V. Mayakovsky,
In the image of Ilyich, the poet managed to reveal the harmony of a new character, a new human personality.
The appearance of Lenin, the leader, the man of the coming days is given in the poem in inextricable connection with the time and business to which his whole life was selflessly given.
The power of Lenin's teaching is revealed in every image of the poem, in every line of it. V. Mayakovsky, with all his work, seems to affirm the gigantic power of influence of the leader’s ideas on the development of history and the fate of the people.
When the poem was ready, Mayakovsky read it to workers in factories: he wanted to know whether the images reached him, whether they bothered him... For the same purpose, at the request of the poet, the poem was read in V.V. Kuibyshev’s apartment. He read it to Lenin’s party comrades and only after that he sent the poem to print. At the beginning of 1925, the poem “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” was published as a separate edition.
The largest figure of socialist realism was Maxim Gorky. His works, in general terms, really met the requirements of socialist realism, so the writer returned from emigration in a solemn atmosphere and headed the created Union of Writers of the USSR, which included mainly writers and poets of a pro-Soviet orientation. They wrote in accordance with the principles of socialist realism, which included nationalism, partisanship and concreteness. The principle of nationality required that the heroes of the works come from the people (most often they were workers and peasants). Party membership called for abandoning the truth real life and replace it with party truth, glorifying heroic deeds, the search for a new life, and the revolutionary struggle for a bright future. And reality, in accordance with the principle of concreteness, was shown in the process of historical development on the basis of the doctrine of historical materialism.
Among the most famous writers socialist realism - Alexander Alexandrovich Fadeev(1901-1956), one of the leaders of the Union of Writers of the USSR. His most famous works are the novels “Destruction” (1926) and “The Young Guard” (1945). I also received great support Alexander Serafimovich(present, name Alexander Serafimovich Popov, 1863-1949). Already in early works(early 1900s) he wrote about the lack of rights of the working masses in Russia, about their struggle for freedom. He became a popular proletarian writer after the release of the heroic epic “The Iron Stream” in 1924. It reflects the process of transformation of the anarchic spontaneous mass of the peasant poor under the leadership of the “iron commander” Kozhukh into a conscious fighting force welded together by a single goal of the struggle for the proletarian revolution, into an “iron stream”.
The most popular writer in Soviet times was Nikolai Alekseevich Ostrovsky(1904-1936). His main novel“How the Steel Was Tempered” (1932), which showed the development of a revolutionary, enjoyed enormous popularity in the country. Dmitry Andreevich Furmanov(1891-1926), author of the novel “Chapaev” (1923), created the iconic image of the hero Soviet era. One of the first novels about the paths of the intelligentsia in the revolution and the Civil War, “Cities and Years,” which became a classic of Soviet literary literature, was written by Konstantin Aleksandrovich Fedin(1892-1977).
A true classic Soviet literature became Mikhail Alexandrovich Sholokhov(1905-1984), laureate Nobel Prize in literature in 1965 for the novel “ Quiet Don"(1928-1940). The main merit of Sholokhov the artist is to reveal in the very common man bright personality, sometimes outstanding personality, turning this person into a memorable, down to the smallest detail, easily imaginable, convincing, truly living image. Sholokhov is the author of the novel “Virgin Soil Upturned” about collectivization on the Don (vol. 1-1932, vol. 2-1959), the cycle “Don Stories”, and the novel “They Fought for the Motherland.”
Alexey Nikolaevich Tolstoy(1882-1945) began writing even before the revolution; not accepting the revolution, Tolstoy emigrated. He later considered these years the most difficult of his life. At this time he wrote the story “Nikita’s Childhood” and fantasy novel"Aelita." In 1923, Tolstoy returned to the USSR. This was an active period of his work: the trilogy “Walking in Torment”, the historical novel “Peter I”, the fantasy novel “Engineer Garin’s Hyperboloid”, the children’s book “The Golden Key, or the Adventures of Pinocchio” (1936), based on Italian fairy tales. Being a very talented writer, he enjoyed enormous popularity and was promoted in every possible way by the Soviet party press. After Gorky's death, he firmly took the place of the patriarch of Soviet literature.
Creativity has become truly popular Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky(1910-1971), who not only became a great poet, but also in this very tough
A.T. Tvardovsky
I was killed near Rzhev,
In a nameless swamp
In the fifth company, on the left,
During a brutal attack.
I didn't hear the break
I didn’t see that flash, - Like falling into an abyss from a cliff - And neither the bottom nor the tire.
In the summer, in forty-two,
I am buried without a grave.
time managed to stay an honest man. Fame came to the poet only after the publication in 1936 of the poem “The Country of Ant,” which tells the story of the peasant Nikita Morgunk’s search for a country of universal happiness. His poems and poems were readily published in magazines and were received favorably by critics. In 1939, the poet was drafted into the army. He served as a war correspondent during the Finnish and Great Patriotic Wars. From 1940 until the Victory, the poet did not interrupt his literary studies and worked on the “Front Chronicle”, the hero of which was not a soldier, but a peasant who, by the will of fate, ended up in the war. From this cycle grew the poem “Vasily Terkin”, completed in 1945. Vasily Terkin is a real folk hero, folklore character. Tvardovsky’s poem earned a commendable review even from such a demanding critic as I.A. Bunin, who was categorically opposed Soviet power. War impressions formed the basis for Tvardovsky’s next poem, “House by the Road (1946), in which the motif of inescapable sadness and grief over losses sounds. In the same year, 1946, the poet created a kind of requiem for the dead - the poem “I was killed near Rzhev.”
In the post-war years, he wrote the poem “Beyond the Distance, the Distance,” in which the author tries to have an honest conversation with the reader, but already understands that this is impossible. Therefore, the poem “Terkin in the Other World” (1963), although it was published, did not receive any responses, and the poem “By Right of Memory” (1969), in which Tvardovsky tried to tell the truth about Stalinism, was published only in 1987. Nationality , democracy, accessibility of his poetry are achieved by rich and varied means of artistic expression.
Tvardovsky played a huge role as editor-in-chief magazine " New world”, which became a symbol of the “sixties”. His help and support had a tangible impact on the creative biography of many writers. It was during this period that works were published in the magazine A. I. Solzhenitsyn(1918-2008) “One day in the life of Ivan Denisovich” and “Matryonin’s yard”. Realistic clarity of image, intonation flexibility, richness and bold variation in the strophic structure of poetry, skillfully and with a subtle sense of proportion used sound writing, alliteration and assonance - all this is harmoniously combined in Tvardovsky’s poems, making his poetry one of the most outstanding phenomena of literature.
“Semi-forbidden” literature This includes the works of E. Zamyatin, M. Bulgakov, A. Platonov, M. Zoshchenko, A. Green, as well as those writers who, not wanting to write in accordance with ideological requirements, went into children's literature ( Y. Olesha, K. Chukovsky) or began to write historical novels (Yu. Tynyanov).
Evgeniy Ivanovich Zamyatin(1884-1937) was a Bolshevik in his youth, participated in the revolutionary movement, but over time moved away from it. He began writing even before the revolution; his works received the approval of a number of famous writers, including Gorky. In 1921, Zamyatin became one of the organizers of the group “ Serapion's brothers"(L.N. Lunts, N.N. Nikitin, M.L. Slonimsky, I.A. Gruzdev, K.A. Fedin, V.V. Ivanov, M.M. Zoshchenko, V.A. Kaverin, E .G. Polonskaya, N.S. Tikhonov). In their declarations, the group, in contrast to the principles of proletarian literature, emphasized its apolitical nature, opposed ideology in art, defending the old thesis of idealistic aesthetics about the disinterest in aesthetic pleasure.
In 1921, Zamyatin created his main work - the novel “We” about life in totalitarian state. This book was the first one not allowed to reach readers. The author's subsequent works were also not published. In 1931, he managed to travel abroad, where his novel was published, which had a significant influence on the dystopias of D. Orwell, O. Huxley, and R. Bradbury that were published later. In Russian, the novel “We” was published in 1952 in New York, and in Russia only in 1988.
M. Bulgakov
One of the peaks of Russian literature of the 20th century. - creation Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov(1891 - 1940). A doctor by profession, he began writing in the 1920s. By the mid-1920s, he had two stories to his creative credit (“Diaboliada”, “ Fatal eggs"), autobiographical "Notes on Cuffs", dozens of stories, essays, feuilletons - all this made up three books of selected prose, published in Moscow and Leningrad. At the beginning of 1925, the story “ Heart of a Dog”, not permitted for publication and saw the light only several decades later.
In 1923-1924. he writes his main work of that time - the novel “ White Guard"("Yellow Ensign"), biographically correlated with the events of the "quick fall" and "Petliurism" experienced by the author in the Civil War in Kyiv at the turn of 1918-1919. ( full text the novel was published in the late 1920s in Paris and in 1966 in Moscow). In 1925, based on the outline of this novel, Bulgakov wrote a play, which in 1926 was staged at the Moscow Art Theater called “Days of the Turbins,” but after the 289th performance it was banned. The same fate awaited his plays “Running”, “Zoyka’s Apartment”, “Crimson Island”, “Cabal of the Holy One”. By 1929, all his plays were removed from the repertoire, not a single line of his works was published, he was not hired anywhere, and he was denied travel abroad. The work of this great writer was condemned and not accepted either by the authorities, or by critics, or by his fellow workers. And in this situation, he began to write his main work - the novel “The Master and Margarita”. A novel about the freedom of the artist, about the freedom of creativity, about human freedom, about good and evil, about betrayal and cowardice, about eternal love and mercy. Bulgakov began writing a book that obviously could not be published in the USSR, and wrote it for the remaining 11 years of his life. Over the years of working on the novel, the author's concept has changed significantly - from satirical novel to philosophical work, in which the satirical line is only a component of a complex compositional whole. The novel was published only in 1967.
Made a great contribution to Russian literature Andrey Platonovich Platonov(present, surname Klimentov, 1899-1951). He began writing at the age Civil War as a war correspondent. Gradually, Platonov went from blind faith in revolutionary transformations to the dramatic collapse of hopes of building a revolutionary paradise. This is clearly visible in his stories of the 1920s, the stories “Epifansky Locks” and “ Hidden Man" In 1929, Platonov wrote the novel “Chevengur,” which was banned from publication and was subject to severe criticism. In it, the writer brought to the point of absurdity the ideas of the communist reorganization of life that possessed him in his youth, showing their tragic impracticability. The features of reality acquired a grotesque character in the novel, and in accordance with this, the surreal style of the work was formed. The reorganization of life has become central theme the story “The Pit” (1930), which took place during the First Five-Year Plan. The “common proletarian house”, the foundation pit for which the heroes of the story are digging, has become a symbol of communist utopia, “earthly paradise”. Like Chevengur, it was published only in the late 1980s. The publication of the chronicle story “For Future Use” (1931), in which the collectivization of agriculture was shown as a tragedy, made the publication of most of Platonov’s works impossible. The publication of Platonov's works was permitted in the years Patriotic War, when the prose writer worked as a front-line correspondent and wrote war stories. But after the publication of the story “Return” (1946), which was subjected to severe criticism, the writer’s name was erased from the history of Soviet literature. And the discovery of this author occurred already in the late 1980s.
Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko(1895-1958) famous for his humorous and satirical stories. By the mid-1920s, Zoshchenko was one of the most popular writers. His stories, which he often read himself to large audiences, were known and loved in all levels of society. In the collections of the 1920s " Humorous stories", "Dear Citizens", etc. Zoshchenko created a new type of hero for Russian literature - a Soviet man who has not received an education, does not have the skills of spiritual work, does not have cultural baggage, but strives to become a full participant in life, to become equal to the "rest of humanity." The reflection of such a hero produced a strikingly funny impression.
In the 1930s, he moved away from the form of satirical stories - he wrote the story “Youth Restored,” in which he tries to overcome his depression from what is happening around him. In 1935, a collection of short stories, The Blue Book, appeared, which the writer himself considered a novel, a short history human relations. It caused devastating reviews and a ban on writing anything beyond the scope of satire for some minor shortcomings. Nevertheless, Zoshchenko began working on his main book, the novel “Before Sunrise,” in which he anticipated many discoveries of the science of the unconscious. The publication of the first chapters of the novel in the magazine “October” in 1943 caused a real scandal; streams of slander and abuse fell upon the writer. Therefore, the appearance of the resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks “On the magazines “Zvezda” and “Leningrad”” in 1946, which criticized Zoshchenko and Akhmatova, became natural. It led to their public persecution and a ban on the publication of their works. The reason was the publication children's story Zoshchenko “The Adventures of a Monkey” (1945), in which there was a hint that in the Soviet country monkeys live better than people. After this, the writer’s difficult mental state worsened; he almost could not write. The reinstatement of Zoshchenko in 1953 in the Writers' Union, as well as the publication of the book in 1956, could no longer correct the situation.
The work of a representative of romantic realism occupies a special place in Russian literature. Alexandra Green(present, name Alexander Stepanovich Grinevsky, 1880-1932). Since childhood, Green loved books about sailors and travel, and dreamed of going to sea as a sailor. He tried many professions and participated in the revolutionary movement. His first stories appeared in 1906, but to his own style he came only in 1909, when his first romantic novel, “Reno Island,” was published. This was followed by other works of this direction (“Lanphier Colony”, “Zurbagan Shooter”, “Captain Duke”). During the years of the revolution, Greene began to write his most famous novel « Scarlet Sails", a book about the power of love and the human spirit (published in 1923). In 1924 Green moved to Feodosia. The calmest and happiest years of his life passed here. At this time, at least half of his works were written, including the novels " Gold chain" and " Running on the Waves ". Green was not only a magnificent landscape painter and master of plot, but also a very subtle psychologist. He knew how to find traits of courage and heroism in the most ordinary people. And of course, rarely has any writer written so carefully about the love of a man and a woman. After 1925, the writer’s books were no longer published. Recent years The life of the seriously ill Green was spent in lack of money and melancholy. Real fame came to him only after his death, in the 1960s, in the wake of the rise that our country was experiencing.
Fate was sad and Yuri Karlovich Olesha(1899-1960), who became famous for his fairy tale novel “Three Fat Men” (1924, published in 1928). The book was immediately accepted by children and continues to be a favorite children's reading. The genre of a fairy tale, the world of which is naturally hyperbolic, corresponded to Olesha’s need to write metaphorical prose. The novel was imbued with the author's romantic attitude towards the revolution. Nevertheless, the critics were skeptical, because the author did not call for heroic struggle and labor. This was followed by the novel "Envy" (1927) about " superfluous person"Soviet reality, stories and plays in which he truthfully wrote about what was happening in the country. In the 1930s, many of the writer’s friends and acquaintances were repressed; the main works of Olesha himself have not been published or officially mentioned since 1936 (the ban was lifted only in 1956). But Olesha continued to write without a single word of falsehood. His autobiographical notes were published in 1961 under the title “Not a Day Without a Line.” Narrative style Olesha is distinguished by a bizarre combination of colors and unexpected associative connections.
He became famous for his historical novels Yuri Nikolaevich Tynyanov(1894-1943), one of the founders of scientific literary criticism in our country (many of his works on literary criticism and literary criticism). Scientific research and fiction merged already in his first novel “Kuchlya” (1925), the idea of writing which was suggested by K. Chukovsky after hearing Tynyanov’s brilliant lecture about Kuchelbecker. The novel, written rather unevenly, but remaining one of the examples of reproducing the “spirit of the era” in fiction, was destined to become the flagship of the genre of the “Soviet historical novel” required by the situation. In 1927, Tynyanov’s second historical novel was published - “The Death of Vazir-Mukhtar”, based on an in-depth study of the life and work of Griboedov, representing a completely mature work with a unique style. With the novel “Pushkin” (parts 1-3, 1935-1943), Tynyanov intended to complete the trilogy (Kuchelbecker, Griboyedov, Pushkin). Gradually, writing became his second and main profession - from the late 1920s, persecution of “formalists” began. Nevertheless, he headed the research work related to the publication of the “Poet's Library” series, conceived by M. Gorky, and also did translations. Despite serious illness, he worked until the last day, writing the third part of his novel about Pushkin.
Boris Leonidovich Pasternak(1890-1960) began publishing in 1913. He was part of a small group of poets, the Centrifuge, formed in 1914, close to Futurism but influenced by the Symbolists. Already in these years, those features of his talent emerged that were fully expressed in the 1920s and 1930s: poeticization of the “prose of life”, seemingly dim facts of human existence, philosophical reflections on the meaning of love and creativity, life and death. Although Pasternak's early poems are complex in form and densely saturated with metaphors, they already feel an enormous freshness of perception, sincerity and depth. But Pasternak considered his real poetic birth to be the summer of 1917 - the time of the creation of the book “My Sister is Life” (published in 1922).
Pasternak's literary activity was varied. He wrote prose, was engaged in translations, achieving high skill in this art, and was the author of poems and a novel in verse “Spektorsky” (1925). But the most significant is still his lyrics. He had the talent to express deep and subtle human feelings and thoughts through soulful pictures of nature. Admiration for the beauty of the world, the desire to find beauty everywhere is characteristic of Pasternak. His poems were included in the collections “Second Birth” (1932), “On Early Trains” (1943), “When It Goes Wild” (1956-1959).
The late 1920s and early 1930s saw a short period of official Soviet recognition of Pasternak's work. He took an active part in the activities of the USSR Writers' Union and in 1934 made a speech at its first congress, at which N.I. Bukharin called for Pasternak to be officially named the best poet Soviet Union. But the poet’s subsequent work was increasingly compatible with the demands of socialist realism. Therefore, from the late 1930s until the end of his life, he was mainly engaged in translations - he translated Shakespeare, Schiller, Verlaine, Goethe.
Pasternak considered the pinnacle of his creativity to be the novel Doctor Zhivago, written from 1945 to 1955. The novel is a broad canvas of the life of the Russian intelligentsia against the backdrop of the dramatic period from the beginning of the century to the Civil War. He touched on intimate issues human life- the mysteries of life and death, questions of history, Christianity, Jewry. An important part of the book was the poems of the main character, in which the writer summed up his thoughts. Soviet publishing houses refused to publish the novel, and it was published abroad in 1957. This led to real persecution of Pasternak in the Soviet press, his expulsion from the Union of Writers of the USSR, outright insults against him from the pages of Soviet newspapers, at meetings of workers. And the awarding of the Nobel Prize to him in 1958 only intensified the persecution, which continued until the death of the writer.
Composition
Gorky's novel was published in 1907, when, after the defeat of the first Russian revolution, reaction set in in the country and the brutal Black Hundred terror raged. “The Mensheviks retreated in panic, not believing in the possibility of a new upsurge of the revolution, they shamefully renounced the revolutionary demands of the program and the revolutionary slogans of the party...” Only the Bolsheviks “were confident in the new upsurge of the revolutionary movement, prepared for it, and gathered the forces of the working class.”
In the heroes of his novel, Gorky was able to show the ineradicable revolutionary energy and will of the working class to win. (This material will help you write competently on the topic of Socialist realism in the novel Mother. The summary does not allow you to understand the whole meaning of the work, so this material will be useful for a deep understanding of the work of writers and poets, as well as their novels, stories, stories, plays, poems .) “We, the workers, will win,” says Pavel Vlasov with deep conviction. Neither the dispersal of demonstrations, nor exiles, nor arrests can stop the mighty growth of the liberation movement, break the will of the working class to victory, he argued in his novel great writer. He showed that the ideas of socialism are leading people more and more powerfully. He portrayed these people who grew and became stronger in the struggle for the triumph of the ideas of socialism in our country. The people shown by Gorky embodied the best traits of a revolutionary fighter, and their lives were an example for readers of how to fight for the liberation of the people.
The optimism of the novel was especially significant during the years of reaction. Gorky's book sounded like evidence of the invincibility of the labor movement, like a call for a new struggle.
In the 1905 article “Party organization and party literature,” V.I. Lenin, characterizing the literature of the future socialist society, wrote: “It will be free literature, because it is not self-interest or career, but the idea of socialism and sympathy for the working people that will recruit more and more strength into its ranks."
The idea of socialism, the Bolshevik party spirit is the source of Gorky’s strength as an artist who managed to create the image of a Bolshevik, a fighter for socialism. This image found its further development in the heroes best works Soviet literature. Clarity of a revolutionary goal, strength of spirit, allowing one to overcome any obstacles without being afraid of them, readiness for a feat in the name of the liberation of the people - these are the features of this image, introduced by Gorky into world literature and which had a huge influence on advanced, progressive literature of the whole world, on all its subsequent development.
We recognize the best features of Gorky’s heroes in Levinson from Fadeev’s “Destruction,” and in N. Ostrovsky’s Pavel Korchagin. In new historical conditions they display the heroic traits of the Bolshevik revolutionaries, first shown by Gorky.
It took the brilliant insight of a great artist to be able, at the dawn of the labor movement, to see these main features of the Bolsheviks, to embody them in the living images of the heroes of the work, in their actions, thoughts and feelings.
The closest connection with the revolutionary struggle of the proletariat helped Gorky create a new artistic method - the method of socialist realism. And this allowed him to see what other realist writers of his time could not see.
Socialist realism is based on Bolshevik partisanship, on the artist’s understanding of reality from the point of view of the struggle for socialist ideals. IN fiction Gorky carried out Lenin’s call to show the masses “in all its greatness and in all its charm our democratic and socialist ideal... the closest, most direct path to complete, unconditional, decisive victory.”
And in the same article “Party organization and party literature” V.I. Lenin described the features of the new, free literature, literature based on Bolshevik partisanship. First of all, Lenin noted the idea of socialism as the main feature of this literature. He further indicated that new literature will proceed from sympathy for the working people, from the experience of the workers’ struggle. Lenin saw its essential feature in scientific understanding life, in the ability to see life in development, to see something new and advanced being born in it. And finally, he spoke about the nationality of socialist literature / addressed to tens of millions of working people and expressing their interests.
These main features distinguish the method of socialist realism, theoretically substantiated by Lenin and for the first time practically, creatively implemented by Gorky in the plays “Philistines”, “Enemies” and in the novel “Mother”. New creative principles found their most vivid and complete embodiment in this novel; it was a response to the main demand of the era - to create a new, free literature expressing the advanced, revolutionary aspirations of the working class.
It is based on the idea of socialism, the socialist ideal “in all its greatness and in all its charm.”
Gorky finds his heroes among the workers; they are the bearers of the socialist ideal. Gorky shows the workers in revolutionary development, in the struggle of the old, dying, and the new, emerging, advanced, to which in life, as Comrade Stalin teaches, the future belongs. The socialist ideal, a person - a fighter for socialism - as the bearer of this ideal, the ability to show tomorrow's, advanced, without breaking away from today, in which this advanced is born, unity with the people fighting for freedom - this is expressed in the novel "Mother" the main features of socialist realism.
