The theme of love in literature has found its fullest disclosure in the cycle of stories by A. Bunin "Dark Alleys". The entire cycle consists of thirty-eight stories. All stories in the collection are united by the theme of unhappy love. In his stories, he shows love openly and boldly. Bunin's love is in a sense criminal, it transcends norms, goes beyond the ordinary. In his work, love is a special synthesis of spirit and flesh.
Spirit is a high and beautiful love that penetrates souls and binds them to each other. And the love of the flesh, in another way, carnal pleasures. Such love gives only physical pleasure. As an example, let us analyze Bunin's story "Dark Alleys".
The story "Dark Alleys" was written by Bunin in exile, under the influence of the poem "An Ordinary Story". The plot is based on a meeting of two elderly people after years of separation. More precisely, the story speaks of thirty years.
Since their last meeting, a whole life has passed, which they have lived separately. In his youth, Nikolai Alexandrovich left Nadezhda, who later received her freedom and became the hostess of the inn. The meeting of the main characters raises a whole storm of feelings, memories and experiences. After a conversation with Nadezhda, Nikolai Aleksandrovich understands that it will not be possible to return the past. He leaves soon. Leaving, he realizes that if he had not left this maid, he could now have a happy family.
So the composition of the story can be divided into three compositional parts: the arrival of the hero at the inn, the meeting of former lovers, reflections on the way after the meeting.
The first part of the work is an episode showing the meeting of lovers, how they get to know each other. This episode shows the portrait characteristics of the heroes. The social difference between the characters is also shown.
The second part of the work is the main part. Here we see a description of the feelings, emotions and experiences of the heroes. Social constraints are dropped. Now the heroes appear before each other not as a hostess and a serviceman, but as a man and a woman in love. This part allows you to get to know the heroes better. The author clearly shows us how the heroes relate to this love. Nadezhda has never been married, she saved herself for her beloved. And Nikolai married another woman and was devoted to her, he was also devoted to his son.
The third part of the work is Nikolai's departure. For him, social norms are important, which he cannot neglect. But at the same time he is tormented by the thought that his life could be much better if he stayed with her.
All Bunin's stories are permeated with unhappy love that goes beyond the ordinary. Whether it is sincere love or just passion, but it is always unhappy. The heroes of the stories are forced to leave for one reason or another. It can be a difference in social strata, age, or just a forced separation. One way or another, according to Bunin, love remains a drama, and sometimes a tragedy.
Storybook " Dark alleys"I.A. Bunin wrote away from his homeland, while in France and worried about the consequences of the October Revolution and the difficult years of the First World War. The works included in this cycle are filled with motives of the tragic fate of a person, the inevitability of events and longing for their native land. The central theme of the collection of short stories "Dark Alleys" is love, which turns out to be closely associated with suffering and fatal outcome.
Central to understanding the writer's intention is the story of the same name from the collection "Dark Alleys". It was written in 1938 under the influence of a poem by N.P. Ogarev's "An Ordinary Story", where the image of dark alleys is used, as well as the philosophical thoughts of L.N. Tolstoy that happiness in life is unattainable, and a person only catches his "lightning", which must be appreciated.
Analysis of the work of I.A. Bunin "Dark alleys"
The plot of the work is based on the meeting of two elderly people after years of separation. To be precise, the story speaks of 35 years since the last parting. Nikolai Alekseevich arrives at the inn, where the hostess Nadezhda meets him. The woman calls the hero by name, and he recognizes her as his former lover.
Since then, a whole life has passed, which the loved ones were destined to spend separately. The thing is that in his youth Nikolai Alekseevich left a beautiful maid, who then received freedom from the landowner and became the mistress of the inn. The meeting of the two heroes raises inside them a whole storm of feelings, reflections and experiences. However, the past cannot be returned, and Nikolai Alekseevich leaves, imagining how life could have turned out differently if he had not neglected the feelings of Nadezhda. He is sure that he would be happy, reflects on how she would become his wife, mother of children and mistress of the house in St. Petersburg. True, all this will remain unrealizable dreams of the hero.
Thus, there are three main plot points in the story "Dark Alleys":
- Stopping the hero at the inn
- Meeting ex-lovers
- Reflections on the way after what happened
The first part of the work is an episode before the heroes recognize each other. The portrait characterization of the characters prevails here. It is the social difference between people that is significant. For example, Nadezhda addresses the newcomer "Your Excellency", but the hero allows himself "Hey, who is there."
The pivotal moment is the meeting, which marks the second part of the plot. Here we see a description of feelings, emotions and experiences. Social boundaries are thrown back, allowing for better learning actors, oppose their thoughts. Meeting with Nadezhda for the hero is a rendezvous with his conscience. The reader understands that she has retained her inner integrity. Nikolai Alekseevich, on the contrary, feels his life is useless, aimless, sees only its ordinariness and vulgarity.
The third part of the story is the direct departure and conversation with the driver. For the hero, social boundaries are important, which he cannot neglect even for the sake of high feelings. Nikolai Alekseevich is ashamed of his words and revelations, regrets that he kissed the hand of the innkeeper and former lover.
Such a plot structure makes it possible to present love and past feelings as a flash that unexpectedly illuminated the ordinary and boring life of Nikolai Alekseevich. A story based on the hero's memories is an artistic technique that allows the author to tell about familiar things in a more exciting way and to make an additional impression on the reader.
In the text of the work, there are no instructive intonations, condemnation of the actions of the heroes, or, conversely, manifestations of pity for them. The story is based on the description of the feelings and emotions of the characters, which open up to the reader and it is he who will have to assess what happened.
Characteristics of the main characters of the story "Dark Alleys"
The image of Hope appears in a positive light. We do not learn much about her from the story, but this is enough to draw certain conclusions. The heroine is a former serf, who is now the owner of the state-owned postal station. Having aged, she continues to look beautiful, feel light and “not for her age”. Nadezhda was able to settle well in life thanks to her intelligence and honesty. Kucher, in a conversation with Nikolai Alekseevich, notes that she “gets richer, gives money in growth”, i.e. on loan. Practicality and enterprise are inherent in the heroine.
She had to go through a lot. The feelings of Nikolai Alekseevich's act were so strong that Nadezhda confesses that she wanted to kill herself. However, she was able to survive the hardships and become stronger.
The woman continues to love, but she failed to forgive the betrayal of her beloved. She boldly declares this to Nikolai Alekseevich. The wisdom of Hope evokes sympathy for the reader. For example, to the general's attempts to justify his past act, she replies that everyone has youth, but love never. These words of the heroine also say that she can and can truly love, but this does not bring her happiness.
The image of Nikolai Alekseevich is in many ways opposed to Nadezhda. He is a nobleman and general, a representative of high society. He made a good career, but in his personal life the hero is unhappy. His wife left him, and his son grew up to be an impudent and dishonest person. The hero looks tired, while his former lover is full of strength and desire to act. Once upon a time he gave up love and did not know it, having spent his whole life without happiness and pursuing false goals. "Everything passes. Everything is forgotten ”- this is the position of the hero in relation to happiness and love.
Nikolai Alekseevich is already about 60 years old, but when he meets Nadezhda, he blushes like a young man. The military man recalls with shame that he abandoned his beloved, but does he have the strength to fix what happened? No. The hero again chooses the easiest path and leaves.
The character's spiritual weakness, the inability to distinguish between true feelings and a "vulgar, ordinary story" doom him and Hope to suffering. Nikolai Alekseevich can only remember the past, his love, which "gave him the best moments of his life."
The love between Nadezhda and Nikolai Alekseevich turns out to be doomed, and the history of their relationship is full of drama. Why did it happen like this? There are several reasons. This is also the weakness of the hero, who pushed away a loved one and did not see the future in his feelings for her. This is the role of prejudice in society, which excludes the possibility of a relationship, and even more so a marriage between a nobleman and an ordinary maid.
The difference in views on love also predetermined the dramatic fate of the heroes. If for Nadezhda feelings for a loved one are loyalty to herself, a driving force that inspires and helps her in life, then for Nikolai Alekseevich love is a moment, a history of the past. The irony is that this very moment, this part of life associated with a former lover, became the best moment in all years.
"Dark alleys" are traditionally defined by Bunin's researchers as an encyclopedia of love. Yuri Maltsev lists in detail "various shades of love and its most bizarre varieties" presented in this book: "There is also a sublime feeling of adoration, alien to carnal attraction" ("Natalie"), "here is animal love-function" ("Kuma"), "And the venal" love "of a prostitute" ("Young Lady Klara"), "There is also love-enmity (" The steamer "Saratov" ", where the carnal attraction of the heroes to each other is combined with rivalry of characters and mutual spiritual enmity) and" love despair " ("Zoya and Valeria"), "there is love-witchcraft (" Iron Wool "), and love as joyful intoxication (" Swing "), and love-self-forgetfulness (" Cold Autumn "), and love-pity, inseparable from tenderness and compassion ”(“ Tanya ”,“ Rusya ”,“ Madrid ”,“ Three rubles ”).
Moreover, according to the researcher, “the very varieties of feelings, in turn, are split into even more subtle shades. So, for example, love-pity in the story "Business Cards" in a strange (but understandable) way is combined with the shamelessness of voluptuousness, and tenderness - with "hatred of passion and love."
However, among the forty stories of the book, there is one that deeply and convincingly reveals the other side of a person's inner life and relationships between people. Dislike. The earliest story of the cycle - "Caucasus" is devoted to this topic.
In many stories of "Dark Alleys" love, regardless of its shade and variety, appears as a painfully sweet coincidence with a loved one, complete dissolution in him. The young hero of the story "The Raven", in a demonstration of the external indifference towards him by the "young, light-footed" nanny of his eight-year-old sister, feels "joyful fear" of "common happiness to be near each other."
The same light serenity of happiness permeated his exclamation: "How much quivering tenderness was for us even in this one - in joint efforts to drag her, now and then touching each other's hands."
The heroine of the story "Cold Autumn", who took her beloved to war thirty years ago and survived his death, asks herself: "Yes, but what happened in my life?" And he answers to himself: “Only that cold autumn evening. And this is all that was in my life - the rest is an unnecessary dream. "
Parting with a fellow traveler, accidentally met on the ship, the hero of the story "Business Cards" kisses her "cold hand with that love that remains somewhere in the heart for life ...".
The hero of the story "The Late Hour" is carried away by his memory into his past, imperceptibly transforming the story-memory of his beloved girl into a mental conversation with her: “... with joyful fright I met the sparkle of your waiting eyes. And we sat, sat in a kind of bewilderment of happiness. With one hand I hugged you, hearing the beating of your heart, with the other I held your hand, feeling all of you through it. "
The nameless heroes of the "Caucasus" are deprived of this dissolution in each other. Each of them is self-centered. The hero "thieves" lives as a "recluse" In the numbers filmed for meetings with a married woman, "from date to date with her." He is flattered that the one who comes to him is "pale with the beautiful pallor of a loving, excited woman."
However, the pallor of the heroine, and the breaking voice, and fussiness (“throwing her umbrella anywhere, hurrying to lift the veil and hug me”) are by no means a manifestation of love, but of fear of exposure.
The presentiment of inevitable retribution for secret dates leaves no room for another feeling in the soul of the heroine. A real person, with whom she lives from date to date, supplanted the ominous image of a “cruel, proud” husband, created by her exalted imagination, who guesses everything and is ready for decisive and terrible actions: “It seems to me ... he suspects something, that he knows something , - maybe I read some of your letter, picked up the key to my table ... Now for some reason he is literally following my every step ... "
The plan of the heroes-conspirators ("to leave in the same train to the Caucasian coast and live there in some completely wild place for three or four weeks"), although it is called "our", belongs not to both of them, but to one of them - him, not her. It was he who “knew this coast, once lived for some time near Sochi, - young, lonely, - remembered those autumn evenings among black cypress trees, near cold gray waves…” for the rest of his life.
The hero is driven by a completely understandable desire to repeat the impressions he received in his youth, enriching them with the presence of his “beloved, excited woman” next to him.
Despite the hero's admission that the nervous behavior of the woman who came to him shocked him with “pity and delight,” the author does not allow him to feel the depths of these feelings of the hero. True, the obsessive, sticky fear of the heroine (for the hero, in many respects, far-fetched, ephemeral, because he will never be destined to meet her "cruel" husband-officer) will also be passed on to the hero of the story. He runs along the station and the platform, "pulling his hat over his eyes and burying his face in the collar of his coat." Sitting in the compartment, the place of a future secret meeting with her, he "immediately pulled down the window curtain", "locked the door with a lock."
After the second call, the hero "froze with fear." Seeing the tall figure of her husband through the window, he "recoiled from the window, fell into the corner of the sofa." Finally, he shoves the money to the conductor who carried her things with an “icy hand”.
The forbidden relationship (which undoubtedly refers to the relationship between a single man and a married woman) in Bunin often increases the power of love, the indomitable attraction of people to each other, demolishing conventional barriers with a stream of insane, all-consuming passion that does not know logical arguments and boundaries of decency. One of Bunin's researchers sees in this even "a certain sign of authenticity, because ordinary morality, like everything established by people, turns out to be a conditional scheme, into which the element of natural life does not fit."
This is shown most powerfully in "Sunstroke": "We entered a large, but terribly stuffy, hotly heated room ... and as soon as they entered and the footman closed the door, the lieutenant rushed to her so impetuously and both of them choked so fiercely in the kiss that they remembered for many years then this minute: I have never experienced anything like this in my entire life, neither the one nor the other. "
However, the "criminality" of the position of the heroes of the "Caucasus" does not enhance their reciprocity. The haste of "thieves" meetings in the alley near the Arbat does not let the heroes go in a safe, locked compartment. Even when left alone and without haste, moving towards their dream - "south, sea", they feel neither peace, nor calmness, nor a tide of all-consuming tenderness.
The hero is covered with ice of fear. The tightness of the heroine, tormented by suspicions, is expressed in a “pitiful” smile, the absence of the most natural gesture - a kiss from a companion - and a nervous monologue, which again falls into the dark shadow of her husband pursuing his unfaithful wife, and the threat of imminent retribution.
The constant anxiety, incessant fear and anxiety of the heroes are amplified by the cityscape. On the day of departure, "cold rains were falling in Moscow," "it was dirty, gloomy." “It was a dark, disgusting evening” (and people were scurrying about “in the dark light of station lights”), when the hero was driving to the station and everything inside him “froze from anxiety and cold”.
The hero's soul could be warmed by love for his pitifully smiling companion. But the fact of the matter is that there is no love. Therefore, the sunny morning landscapes outside the window of the train of joy in
They do not inspire the soul: "behind the muddy from dust and heated windows there was a flat scorched steppe, dusty wide roads were visible, carts drawn by oxen ... Then went the boundless expanse of naked plains with mounds and burial grounds, an intolerable dry sun, a sky like a dusty cloud ..." ...
According to Bunin, a person can be bestowed from above "the painful beauty of adoration" and "bodily rapture." (The hero of the story "Natalie" feels "two loves at once, so different and so passionate", perceiving their interlacing as God's punishment.)
This "painful beauty of adoration" and "bodily rapture" is given to experience many heroes of "Dark Alley" in the moments of the highest rise and exacerbation of feelings. Following his adored girl, creaking in silence in the snow, the hero of "Clean Monday" looks with affection "at her little footprint, at the stars that have left new black boots in the snow." Then what happens in everyday life can be called a miracle, but which is natural for the world of people who love: "she suddenly turned around, feeling this:" Really, how you love me! " She said with quiet bewilderment, shaking her head. "
The hero of the story "In a Familiar Street" did not linger in the memory of the name of his beloved ("the daughter of a clerk in Serpukhov, who left her poor family there, went to Moscow for courses"). But as a single moment ("I don't remember anything else") "poetry of memory" left! details of the tender, tender meeting with her: “there were those weak, sweetest lips in the world, there were hot tears from an excess of happiness, the heavy languor of young bodies, from which we leaned our heads on each other's shoulder, and her lips were already burning, like in the heat, when I unbuttoned her blouse, I kissed the milky girl's breast with a hard, unripe strawberry tip ... ”.
The memory of the hero of the story "Rus" also retained one of the most unforgettable moments: "once she wet her feet in the rain", "and he rushed to shoe and kiss her wet narrow feet - there was no such happiness in his whole life."
The hero of the story "Natalie" Meshchersky confesses, kneeling near the bed of his beloved woman: "And then you are at the ball - so tall and so terrible in your already feminine beauty, - how I wanted to die that night, delighted with my love and death! Then you are with a candle in your hand, your mourning and your integrity in it. It seemed to me that that candle in your face became a saint. "
Such immersion in the "painful beauty of adoration" and "bodily rapture" is not given to the heroes of the "Caucasus". "After that not a single day without ... these short meetings and desperately long, insatiable and already unbearable in their unresolved kisses." This phrase, with all the seeming "fit" into the plot of the "Caucasus" (short meetings, unresolved kissing) is still a memory of the hero of another story - "The Raven".
The relationship between the hero and the heroine of the "Caucasus", with all the tension of the circumstances of their meetings, is painfully monotonous.
Paradoxically, there is not a single kiss in the story of a man and a woman meeting secretly in hotel rooms, sleeping in a locked compartment, and finally having a rest in the Caucasus (“when she entered, she did not even kiss me”).
The story itself about the days of freedom obtained with such tricks on the blessed Caucasian land resembles not a poem about daring lovers who achieved the desired goal, but a leisurely story about spouses who were tired of living together, tired of each other: “then we went ashore,” “bathed and lay in the sun until breakfast ”; "The fever subsided", "we opened the window." The lack of dynamism is made up for by the masterfully painted landscapes of the Caucasus.
But do not forget: the story is told on behalf of one of the participants in the story. Therefore, long-term admiration of the unique views of the Caucasus at different times of the day also means switching the attention of the hero-storyteller from his companion to the wondrous beauty of the southern region. In this regard, the phrase “I woke up early, while she slept, before tea, which we drank at about seven, walked along the hills into the thickets, is indicative.”
In the description of the morning Caucasus, there is not even a hint that it is seen by a hotel recluse recently suppressed by fear. “The hot sun was already strong, clean and joyful. In the forests, an azure glow was shining, a fragrant mist was dispersed and melted, behind the distant wooded peaks stood the eternal whiteness of the snowy mountains ... "
The majesty and serenity of nature are in harmony with the serene state of the hero. It is probably supported by the perception of the Caucasus as a good old acquaintance with whom a new meeting took place, and also by the absence of a neurasthenic companion nearby. (Despite the joint escape, the hero again has the right to say about himself: "young, lonely")
Little is said about the heroine: of course she “cried”. This verb is used twice and both times reduced to oxymoronic constructions. At first, the heroine sheds tears at the sight of the amazing clouds piling up over the sea: "they glowed so magnificently that she sometimes lay down on the couch ... and cried."
Another woman “cried joyfully” at the sight of yapping checkers running to the lighted window. In fact, there is no oxymoron, psychologically everything is explainable and justified. The clouds glowing magnificently in the rays of the sunset cause tears of despair: "Two more, three weeks - and Moscow again."
The Caucasus, contrary to the "daring" plan of the heroes, did not rid them of their inner seclusion and emptiness. (Apparently, there really is nothing more depressing than a dream come true.) Surrendered to the carefree contemplation of Caucasian nature, the hero does not notice the torment of his companion.
The heroine, with masochistic persistence, continues to torment herself with a hysterical premonition of returning to her jealous husband. The Caucasus did not unite the heroes, did not bring them closer. But in the conditions of freedom of the Caucasus, which has pushed aside the cramped hotel room and compartment walls, the abyss that separates the heroes and predicts their imminent separation has become obvious.
Each of them continues to be in a world created exclusively for himself. There is no place for another in this world. This behavior is no longer typical for spouses who have become hateful to each other, but for egocentric adolescents. However, both of them are firmly held in their arms by the imperious force of indifference to others - dislike.
After a viscous, as if marking time, narration about the "hopelessly happy" Caucasian days of two unloving heroes, the ending of the story - the suicide of an officer husband who could not find his wife who had deceived him - sounds like a bolt from the blue.
The one who kept at bay killed himself. "The executioner is the victim." A victim of the notions of officer and marital honor, a victim of the conditions accepted in society, a victim of his unbridled, "cruel" jealousy.
Judging by the pompous threatening phrase conveyed in the retelling of his wife ("I will stop at nothing, defending my honor, the honor of my husband and officer"), and the effective, carrying out of the threat (shaved, put on a snow-white tunic, drank a bottle of champagne, coffee and shot himself in the whiskey with two revolvers), the third unnamed hero of the "Caucasus" is moved by anything, but not love. "
It is possible that it was painful suspiciousness, unjustified jealousy and endless threats from her husband, coupled with a lack of tenderness and attention (what is usually called love) that pushed the woman, brought to a nervous breakdown, to miserable adultery in inconspicuous rooms on the Arbat.
"Dark Alleys" is a book of stories. The name is given by the opening
the book of the story of the same name and refers to the poem by N.P.
Ogareva "An Ordinary Story" (Nearby, a scarlet rosehip bloomed //
There was a dark linden alley). The source is indicated by Bunin himself in
the note "The Origin of My Stories" and in a letter to NA Teffi. The author worked on the book from 1937 to 1944. Among
sources and implications mentioned by Bunin and numerous
criticism, we will point out the main ones: Plato's "Feast", the Old Testament story about
"Seven Egyptian executions", "Feast during the plague" by A.S. Pushkin,
"Song of Songs" ("Spring, in Judea"), "Antigone" by Sophocles
("Antigone"), "Decameron" by Boccaccio, lyrics by Petrarch, Dante
« New life"(" Swing "), Russian fairy tales" Animal milk, "
"Medvedko, Usynya, Gorynya and Dubina heroes", "The Tale of Peter and
Fevronia "," Lokis "by Prosper Merimee (" Iron Wool "),
verses by N.P. Ogareva (see above), Ya.P. Polonsky ("In one
familiar street "), A. Feta (" Cold autumn ")," Evenings on the farm
near Dikanka "(" Late Hour ")," Dead Souls "by N.V. Gogol
("Natalie"), "The Noble Nest" by I. S. Turgenev ("Clean
Monday "," Turgenevsky ", in the words of Teffi, the end of" Natalie "),
"The Cliff" by I. I. Goncharov ("Business Cards", "Natalie"),
A.P. Chekhov ("Business Cards"), novels by Marcel Proust
("Late Hour"), "Spring in Fialta" by V. V. Nabokov ("Henry") and many others. dr.
There are forty stories in the book, making up three sections: in the 1st - 6
stories, in the second - 14, in the third - 20. In 15 stories
the narration is from the 1st person, in the 20s - from the 3rd, in the 5th -
there are transitions from the person of the narrator to the first person. thirteen
stories are named by names, nicknames or pseudonyms of women
characters, one - by the nickname of the male ("Raven"). Noting
the appearance of their heroines (they much more often "possess" names and
portrait characteristics), 12 times Bunin describes
black-haired, three times his heroines are red-brown, only once
meets ("The Raven") a blonde. 18 times events happen
in summer, 8 - in winter, 7 - in autumn, 5 - in spring. Thus, we
we see that the most common stamp of sensual
heroine (blonde) and sensual season (spring) least
used by Bunin. The author himself pointed out that the content
books are "not frivolous, but tragic."
Work on the composition continued until 1953, when the book
"Dark Alleys" included two stories: "Spring in Judea" and
"Lodging for the night", which closed the book.
Only 11 times Bunin names his male heroes, 16 times - heroines, in
the last seven stories, the heroes do not have names at all, everything
more acquiring the features of "naked essences" of feelings and passions.
The book opens with the story "Dark Alleys". Sixty
Nikolai Alekseevich, a retired military man, “in the cold autumn
bad weather "(the most frequent time of the year in the book), stopping
relax in a private room, admits the hostess,
"Dark-haired, ... beautiful woman not for her age" (she is 48 years old) -
Hope, a former serf, her first love, which gave him “her
beauty "and so no one else and did not love, seduced
them and subsequently received free. His "legal" wife
cheated on him, the son grew up a scoundrel, and here is a chance meeting:
past happiness and past sin, and his love is the mistress and
a usurer who has not forgiven him anything. And, as off-screen, they sound
Ogarev's poetic lines, once read to Nadezhda and
the main melody of the book - failed love, sick
memory, separation.
The last story - "Lodging", becomes a mirror image
the first, with the difference that only the outlined watercolor lines
plots acquire plot density (as if written in oil)
and completeness. Autumn cold provincial Russia
replaced by the wilderness of Spain on a hot June night,
the upper room is an inn. His mistress is an old woman,
lodging for a passing Moroccan who is interested in
a young niece of "15 years old" helping the mistress
serve. It is quite remarkable that Bunin, describing the Moroccan,
points to those similar to Nikolai Alekseevich (the hero of the first
story) features of appearance: the Moroccan had “a face,
eaten by smallpox "and" in the corners upper lip curled tight
black hair. Curled the same here and there on the chin, "
Nikolai Alekseevich - "hair ... with fleece on the temples to
the corners of the eyes curled slightly ... the face with dark eyes kept
here and there traces of smallpox. " Such coincidences are hardly accidental.
Moroccan - anti ego of Nikolai Alekseevich, girl -
Nadezhda returned to her youth. Repeats at a "reduced" level
Dark Alley situation: Moroccan tries to dishonor
girl (the result of the love of Nikolai Alekseevich and Nadezhda), love
degenerates into animal passion. The only named
the creature in the last story is an animal, a dog Negro (Negro
- Moroccan, a pun rare for Bunin), and it was she
puts an end to the book about animal and human passions:
bursting into the room where the Moroccan rapes the girl, "with a stranglehold
"Rips out" his throat. " Animal passion punished by animals
the final chord: love, deprived of its
human (= mental and spiritual) component, brings death.
The compositional axis (axis of symmetry) of the book "Dark Alleys" is
middle (20th) story "Natalie" - the largest in volume
in the book. There is a gap between physical and mental
personified in the images of two main characters: Sonya Cherkasova, daughter
"Ulan Cherkasov" (ulan - "maternal uncle" of the protagonist,
therefore, Sonya is his cousin); and Natalie
Stankevich - Sonya's gymnasium friend who is visiting her estate.
Vitaly Petrovich Meshchersky (Vitik) - main character comes to
summer holidays to my uncle in the estate "to seek love without romance",
to "violate the purity"
comrades. He begins an affair with 20-year-old Sonya, who
predicts that Meshchersky will immediately fall in love with her friend
Natalie, and, according to Sonya, Meshchersky “will go crazy
from love for Natalie, and will kiss with Sonya. Surname
the main character may refer to Olya Meshcherskaya from "Light
breath ", the image of both ideal and carnal female
attractiveness.
Meshchersky, indeed, is torn between the "painful beauty
adoration of Natalie and ... bodily rapture of Sonya. " Here
the biographical subtext is read - Bunin's complex relationship with
G. Kuznetsova, a young writer who lived in the house of the Bunins
from 1927 to 1942, and, quite possibly, Tolstoy (hero
"The devil" is torn between love for his wife and for the country
girl Stepanida), as well as a plot from "The Idiot" (love of the book.
Myshkin to Nastasya Filippovna and Aglaya at the same time).
Sonya awakens sensuality in Meshchersky. She is beautiful. She has
"Blue-lilac ... eyes", "thick and soft hair", which "casts a chestnut", she comes to Meshchersky at night for
"Exhaustingly passionate dates", which became for both "sweet
habit. " But the hero has a spiritual and spiritual attraction to
Natalie, who next to Sonya "seemed almost a teenager."
Natalie is a completely different type of woman. She has golden hair ...
black eyes ", which are called" black suns ". She
"Folded ... like a nymph" ("youthful perfection of build"), she
"Thin, strong, thoroughbred ankles." Something comes from her
"Orange, golden". Her appearance brings both light and
a sense of inevitable tragedy, accompanied by "ominous
omens ": bat hitting Meshchersky in the face,
a rose that fell out of Sonya's hair and faded in the evening. Tragedy
really comes: Natalie accidentally at night, during a thunderstorm,
sees Sonya in Meshchersky's room, after which relations with
interrupts him. Before that, they confess their love to each other,
why Meshchersky's betrayal looks inexplicable for a girl and
unforgiving. A year later, she marries a cousin
Meshchersky.
Meshchersky becomes a student in Moscow. "Next January"
"Spending Christmastide at home," he arrives on Tatyana's day at
Voronezh, where he sees Natalie with her husband at the ball. Without introducing myself,
Meshchersky disappears. After another year and a half, dies of a blow
Natalie's husband. Meshchersky arrives for the funeral service. His love for
Natalie is cleansed of everything earthly and in the church, in service time,
he cannot take his eyes off her, "as from an icon", and
the angelic nature of his love is also emphasized by the fact that,
looking at her, he sees “the monastic slenderness of her dress,
making her especially blameless. " Here is the purity of feelings
emphasized by a triple semantic relationship: an icon, a nun,
purity.
Time passes, Meshchersky finishes his courses, loses at the same time
father and mother, settles in his village, "converges with
a peasant orphan Gashey, ”she gives birth to his son. To the hero himself in this
time 26 years. At the end of June, passing through, returning from behind
border, he decides to visit Natalie, who lives a widow with
a four-year-old daughter. He asks to forgive him, says that with that
terrible stormy night loved "only ... one" her, but that
now he is connected with another woman by a common child. but
they are unable to part - and Natalie becomes his "secret wife".
“In December, she dies 'in a premature birth.'
Tragic denouement: death in war or from illness, murder,
suicide, - every third plot of the book ends (13
stories), and death is most often a consequence of either
- I. The undisguised sinfulness of love-passion and betrayal-deceit:
"Caucasus" - the suicide of a husband-officer who finds out about his wife's betrayal,
who fled south with her lover and there, in the south, in Sochi, not finding
her, letting bullets "from two revolvers" into his whiskey;
"Zoya and Valeria" - accidental death under the wheels of the train of the deceived
and humiliated Georges Levitsky - 5th year student
of the Faculty of Medicine, a doctor who rests in the summer cottage
Danilevsky, where a 14-year-old hunt for him "secretly"
Dr. Zoika's daughter: “she was very physically developed ...
was ... the gaze of oily blue eyes and always wet lips ...
for all the fullness of the body ... graceful coquetry of movements ", and
where he falls in love with the doctor's niece who came to visit
Valeria Ostrogradskaya, "a real Little Russian beauty",
"Strong, well-behaved, with thick dark hair, with velvety
eyebrows, ..., with menacing eyes of the color of black blood ... with
bright shine of teeth and full cherry lips ", which
flirting with Zhorik at the same time, falls in love with Dr. Titov, a friend
of the Danilevsky family (the head of the family himself calls Titov "an impudent
gentleman ", and his wife - Klavdia Alexandrovna, although she
for 40 years, "in love with a young doctor"), and, having received
resign, at night in the park ("here I kissed you for the first time")
Zhorik, “immediately after the last minute ... abruptly and disgustingly
pushing him away ", after which the tear-stained youth on a bicycle
hurries to the train that night - to escape to Moscow - to meet
his absurd death under the wheels of a train;
"Galya Ganskaya" - where the main character goes from 13-year-old
"Playful, graceful" girl in love with her friend
father-artist (Galya is half-orphan, her mother died), also an artist,
to a young woman, mistress of the same artist for
so that, upon learning of his departure to Italy (without her knowledge and
warnings of future separation), take a lethal dose of poison;
"Heinrich" - the murder by the husband of his unfaithful wife;
"Dubki" - a young (25-30 years old) beautiful wife, Anfisa, similar to
Spanish woman, falls in love with a 23-year-old master, invites him to her
night, while her husband, the 50-year-old head Laurus, leaves for the city, but
spouse who returned from the road due to a blizzard, exposing
uninvited guest, executes his wife by faking her suicide through
hanging;
"Young Lady Klara" - the murder of a capricious prostitute by a client;
"Iron Wool" - the suicide of "a beautiful girl from a rich and
old peasant yard "," wondrous charm: face
transparent, whiter than the first snow, azure eyes, like saints
adolescents ", married" at the very dawn of life "and
raped by the groom on the first wedding night "under the shrines" after
of how she told her young spouse that she had made a vow
Mother of God to be clean. She finds herself devoid of innocence
after which he runs away into the forest, where he hangs himself, mourned by the sitting
at her feet beloved - "the great bear";
"Steamer" Saratov "- murder by a deceived officer-lover (his
name is Pavel Sergeevich) his beloved, returning
back to my abandoned husband,
"Accommodation" - see above;
or - II. Sudden death occurs at the moment the heroes acquire
the highest happiness of true pure love:
"Late Hour" - the first and happy love of 19-year-old heroes
interrupted by her sudden mysterious death, which he recalls
half a century later;
"In Paris" - sudden death by blow on the 3rd day after Easter
Nikolai Platonovich - a former general who was once abandoned in
Constantinople by his wife, who accidentally met his
last true love (their happiness lasts no more
four months) - Olga Alexandrovna, a black-haired beauty "
about thirty ", working as a waitress,
"Natalie" - see above;
"Cold Autumn" - death at the front of the 1st World War in Galicia of the groom and
the memory of the only autumn farewell evening preserved
his bride throughout her long and difficult life: she
later married “a man of a rare, beautiful soul,
an elderly retired soldier "who died of typhus, raised
the niece of her husband who remained in her arms (“a child of seven
months "), which, having become" completely French ", turned out to be
"Completely indifferent" to her adoptive mother - and in the end
choosing one day out of the whole course of years: “... and what
after all, it was in my life? ... only that cold autumn evening ";
"The Chapel" is a half-page parable story that sums up all
conversations about love and death: “... my uncle is still young ... and when
very in love, they always shoot themselves ... ", - the words of a child from
children's conversation about the resting on a "hot summer day, in the field,
behind the garden of the old manor "in the" long-abandoned cemetery "
near the "crumbling chapel".
Bunin explores the path of love in all its manifestations: from
1. Natural lust: "Guest" - who came to visit friends Adam
The kitchen girl deprives Adamych of innocence on the chest in the hallway,
"Smelling like the fumes of the kitchen: muddy hair ... filled with gray
blood and like oily hands ... full beet-colored knees ”;
"Kuma" - "connoisseur and collector of ancient Russian icons", husband's friend
converges in his absence with godfather - "shining thirty
merchant beauty "lady, committing not only deception and
adultery, but also violating the purity of the spiritual connection between godparents
parents, and not even loving the godfather ("... I her ... probably
I will hate it immediately ”);
"Young lady Klara" - "Irakli Meladze, son of a rich merchant", killing
bottle the prostitute "young lady Klara" in her apartment ("the mighty
brunette "with a porous chalky face, densely covered with
powder, ... orange lips with cracks, ... wide gray
parted among flat hair of the color of wax "), after she
refuses to immediately surrender to him: "Impatient, how
boy! .. let's have another glass and let's go ... ");
through: 2. A kind of somatic catharsis, when an accidental relationship
turns out to be cleared and raised to the rank of the only and
unique love, as in the stories: "Antigone" is a student
Pavlik comes to the estate to see a wealthy uncle and aunt. His uncle
- a disabled general, looks after him and takes him in a gurney
new sister Katerina Nikolaevna (the general calls her "my
Antigone" mocking the situation of the Sofokles tragedy “Oedipus in
Colon "- Antigone accompanies her blind father - Oedipus),
"Tall, stately beauty ... with big gray eyes, all
shining with youth, strength, purity, shine of sleek
hands, matte whiteness of the face. " Pavlik dreams: if he could take it ...
evoke her love ... then say: be my wife ... "and
a day later, entering his room to exchange books (she
read by Maupassant, Octave Mirbeau), Antigone easily and unexpectedly
given to him. The next morning, her aunt discovers that her
the nephew spends the night with his hired sister, and the sister is expelled, and in
the moment of parting "he is ready ... to scream in despair";
"Business cards" - on the steamer "Goncharov" a passenger "from the 3rd
class "(" drunk, sweet face, thin legs "," abundant,
somehow cleaned up dark hair"," Slim as a boy ", married
for "kind, but ... not at all interesting person»)
meets and the next day "desperately" is given to the traveling 1st
class "tall, strong brunette", famous writer,
and then betrays his dream: "a schoolgirl ... most of all
dreamed of ... ordering business cards for herself, "and he, touched by her
"Poverty and innocence", seeing off, kisses "her
cold hand with that love that remains somewhere in the heart for the whole
a life";
k - 3. Deification of loved ones or spiritual take-off caused by
love: "Late hour" - the hero, remembering the deceased beloved, thinks:
“If there is a future life and we meet in it, I will be there
on my knees and kiss your feet for everything that you gave me on
earth ";
"Rusya" is a hero, riding on a train with his wife past acquaintances in the young
years of places, recalls how he served "in one summer cottage"
tutor for the heroine's younger brother - Marusya Viktorovna
(Rus) - a young artist with a long black braid,
"Iconographic" "dry and hard ... hair", "a swarthy face with
small dark moles, narrow regular nose, black
eyes, black eyebrows "and fell in love with her. And at night, already about
himself, he continues his memories - about their first closeness:
“Now we are husband and wife,” she said then, and “he no longer dared
touching her, only kissing her hands ... and ... sometimes like
something sacred ... cold chest ", and a week later was" with
shame ... kicked out of the house "by her half-mad mother,
which put Rusya before a choice: "mother or he!", but still
the hero truly loves only that, his first love. "Amata
nobis quantum amabitur nulla! » , - he says, grinning,
to his wife;
"Smaragd" - a conversation between two young heroes on a golden summer night, fragile
his dialogue - Tolya, her - Xenia (she: “I'm talking about this sky
among the clouds ... how can you not believe that there is heaven, angels,
God's throne ", he:" And golden pears on the willow ... "), and when
she, "jumping off the windowsill, runs away" after his awkward
kiss, he thinks: "stupid to the point of holiness!";
"Zoya and Valeria" - Georges wanders through the garden, around the "eternal
religiosity of the night "and he" internally, without words prays for some
heavenly mercy ... "- here is a prayer on the eve of the fatal
meetings with Valeria;
so that, finally, it ends with the story "Clean Monday".
Before us is a meeting of two personified principles, which by virtue of
the tragic dichotomy of human existence into spiritual and
corporeal cannot coexist in one life
space: “we were both rich, healthy, young and so good
themselves, that in restaurants, at concerts we were escorted
glances ". He “hails from the Penza province, ... is handsome in the south,
hot beauty, ... even "indecently handsome", inclined "to
talkativeness, to simple-hearted gaiety "," ... her beauty was
some kind of Indian ..: dark amber face, ... somewhat
ominous in its density hair, softly shiny, like black
sable fur, eyebrows, eyes, black as velvet coal,
"... an amazing body in its smoothness." They meet, visit
restaurants, concerts, lectures (including A. Bely), he
often visits her (“she lived alone - her widowed father,
an enlightened man of a noble merchant family, lived in retirement in
Tver "), so that, sitting" beside her in the semi-darkness ", kiss" her hands,
legs ... ", tormented by their" incomplete proximity "-" I'm not a wife
I'm good, ”she said one day in response to his talk about
marriage.
They are immersed in the real Moscow semi-bohemian-semi-cultural
life: “new books by Hoffmannsthal, Schnitzler, Tetmayer,
Przybyshevsky ", a gypsy choir in a" separate study "," skit "
Art Theater, " new story Andreeva ", but gradually
next to this familiar "sweet life" that seems to him
completely natural, a different, opposite to it appears:
she calls him to Ordynka to look for "the house where Griboyedov lived," and
later, in the evening - to the next tavern, where, unexpectedly, “with
quiet light in the eyes ", reads by heart the chronicle legend about
death of the Murom prince Peter and his wife, tempted
"Flying serpent for fornication", about their death in "one day", "in one
the coffin "of the reposed and before the death of the" one-time "
monastic tonsure, and the next day, after a skit, in
the night calls him to her, and they become close for the first time. She
says that he is leaving for Tver, and two weeks later he receives
a letter where she asks not to look for her: “I will go ... to obedience,
then, maybe ... tonsure. "
It takes "almost two years" spent in the "dirty taverns", he
comes to his senses, and in the 14th year, “under New Year"Accidentally hitting
to Ordynka, enters the Martha-Mariinsky monastery (once
she talked about her), where among the "string ... nuns or
sisters "sees her," covered with a white kerchief ", directing" gaze
dark eyes into the darkness, as if just on "him - and quietly leaves
away.
The final of "Clean Monday" resembles the final of the "Noble Nest",
Turgenevskaya Liza also goes to the monastery, but the reasons for leaving
different. Bunin has an external irrationality behind an act
the heroine hides a long tradition of leaving the world (accepting
monasticism by spouses) - hence the meaning of the plot she told,
very frequent in hagiographic literature. In addition, it is important that
that the heroine gives her beloved the opportunity to stay with her - she
expects him to "speak" to her on Forgiveness Sunday
language: ask for forgiveness according to Christian tradition and go with her
to service, not to a restaurant, but on Clean Monday, when
this does not happen, she kind of brings the last sacrifice to the world
- gives his beloved the most valuable thing - his virginity, so that
no longer have a way back and go to the monastery to pray for
sin is an act quite in the spirit of that spiritually troubled time.
For Liza, such heating is not yet necessary - she is closer in spirit to
everyday life and her departure fits well into the model
behavior of a believing girl.
It is also important here that the departure of the heroine to the Martha-Mariinsky monastery
leaves her the opportunity to return to the world - since the sisters of this
the monastery did not take a vow of celibacy. Thus, the possibility
spiritual revival of the hero is proportional to the possibility of his
connections with your beloved. That after several years
devastation, he voluntarily comes to the monastery for the service (that
which was previously impossible in his spiritual lukewarmness),
says he has changed. Perhaps all this time she was waiting from
him with such a step - and then she can return to him.
Perhaps her departure was her deliberate appeal to him -
to be reborn and horrified by the emptiness of his life? Here
Bunin has brilliantly preserved both options for the future: she is among
"Nuns and sisters", but we do not know if she is a nun (and then
connection is impossible) - or "sister", and then the path to return to
the world is real. The hero knows about this, but he is silent ...
The whole book is forty (not according to the number of days in Great Lent?) options
dialogue between Soul and Body, and both Soul and Body acquire
human forms and destinies in each of the stories,
merging in moments of high love and losing each other in minutes
falls.
3. The certificate of V.N. Murovtseva-Bunina.