In the story of N.M. Karamzin "Poor Liza" tells the story of a peasant girl who knows how to love deeply and selflessly. Why did the writer portray such a heroine in his work? This is explained by Karamzin's belonging to sentimentalism, a literary trend then popular in Europe. In the literature of sentimentalists, it was argued that not nobility and wealth, but spiritual qualities, the ability to deeply feel, are the main human virtues. Therefore, first of all, sentimentalist writers paid attention to the inner world of a person, his innermost experiences.
The hero of sentimentalism does not strive for exploits. He believes that all people living in the world are connected by an invisible thread and there are no barriers for a loving heart. Such is Erast, a young man of the nobility, who became Lisa's hearty chosen one. It seemed to Erast that he had found in Lisa what his heart had been looking for for a long time. He was not embarrassed that Lisa was a simple peasant girl. He assured her that for him "the most important thing is the soul, the innocent soul." Erast sincerely believed that over time he would make Lisa happy, "take her to him and live with her inseparably, in the village and in the dense forests, as in paradise."
However, reality cruelly destroys the illusions of lovers. Still, there are barriers. Burdened with debts, Erast is forced to marry an elderly rich widow. Upon learning of Lisa's suicide, "he could not console himself and considered himself a murderer."
Karamzin created a touching work about offended innocence and trampled justice, about how in a world where people's relationships are based on self-interest, the natural rights of the individual are violated. After all, the right to love and be loved is given to a person from the very beginning.
In the character of Lisa, resignation and defenselessness attract attention. In my opinion, her death can be regarded as a quiet protest against the inhumanity of our world. At the same time, Karamzin’s “Poor Liza” is an amazingly bright story about love, imbued with soft, gentle, meek sadness, turning into tenderness: “When we see each other there, in a new life, I will recognize you, gentle Liza!”.
“And peasant women know how to love!” - with this statement, Karamzin made society think about the moral foundations of life, called for sensitivity and condescension towards people who remain defenseless before fate.
The influence of "Poor Lisa" on the reader was so great that the name of Karamzin's heroine became a household name, received the meaning of a symbol. The ingenuous story of a girl who was involuntarily seduced and deceived against her will is the motif underlying many plots in 19th-century literature. The topic started by Karamzin was subsequently addressed by the largest Russian realist writers. The problems of the “little man” were reflected in the poem “The Bronze Horseman” and the story “The Stationmaster” by A.S. Pushkin, in the story "The Overcoat" by N.V. Gogol, in many works by F.M. Dostoevsky.
Two centuries after writing the story of N.M. Karamzin's "Poor Liza" remains a work that primarily touches us not with a sentimental plot, but with its humanistic orientation.
Sentimentalism in the story of Karamzin N.M. "Poor Lisa".
The touching love of a simple peasant girl Liza and a Moscow nobleman Erast deeply shook the souls of the writer's contemporaries. Everything in this story: from the plot and recognizable landscape sketches of the Moscow region to the sincere feelings of the characters, was unusual for readers of the late 18th century.
The story was first published in 1792 in the Moscow Journal, edited by Karamzin himself. The plot is quite simple: after the death of her father, young Lisa is forced to work tirelessly to feed herself and her mother. In the spring, she sells lilies of the valley in Moscow and there she meets the young nobleman Erast. The young man falls in love with her and is ready even for the sake of his love to leave the light. The lovers spend evenings together, until one day Erast announces that he must go on a campaign with the regiment and they will have to part. A few days later, Erast leaves. Several months pass. One day, Liza accidentally sees Erast in a magnificent carriage and finds out that he is engaged. Erast lost his estate at cards and, in order to improve his shaken financial situation, he marries a wealthy widow. In desperation, Liza throws herself into the pond.
Artistic originality.
Karamzin borrowed the plot of the story from European love literature. All events were transferred to "Russian" soil. The author emphasizes that the action takes place in Moscow and its environs, describes the Simonov and Danilov monasteries, Sparrow Hills, creating the illusion of authenticity. For Russian literature and readers of that time, this was an innovation. Accustomed to happy endings in old novels, they met in Karamzin's work with the truth of life. The main goal of the writer - to achieve compassion - was achieved. The Russian public read, sympathized, sympathized. The first readers of the story perceived the story of Lisa as a real tragedy of a contemporary. The pond under the walls of the Simonov Monastery was named Lizina Pond.
Disadvantages of Sentimentalism.
The credibility in the story is only apparent. The world of heroes that the author depicts is idyllic, invented. The peasant woman Lisa and her mother have refined feelings, their speech is literate, literary and does not differ in any way from the speech of Erast, who was a nobleman. The life of the poor villagers resembles a pastoral: “Meanwhile, a young shepherd drove his flock along the river bank, playing the flute. Lisa fixed her eyes on him and thought: “If the one who now occupies my thoughts was born a simple peasant, a shepherd, and if he now drove his flock past me: ah! I would bow to him with a smile and say affably: “Hello, dear shepherd boy! Where are you driving your flock? And here green grass grows for your sheep, and flowers bloom here, from which you can weave a wreath for your hat. He would look at me with an affectionate air - he would, perhaps, take my hand ... A dream! The shepherd, playing the flute, passed by and with his motley flock hid behind a nearby hill. Such descriptions and reasoning are far from realism.
The story became a model of Russian sentimental literature. In contrast to classicism with its cult of reason, Karamzin affirmed the cult of feelings, sensitivity, compassion: heroes are important for their ability to love, feel, and experience. In addition, unlike the works of classicism, "Poor Liza" is devoid of morality, didacticism, edification: the author does not teach, but tries to arouse the reader's empathy for the characters.
The story is also distinguished by its “smooth” language: Karamzin abandoned grandiloquence, which made the work easy to read.
We will talk about the next era after the Enlightenment and how it manifested itself in the Russian cultural space.
The Age of Enlightenment was built on the education of the senses. If we believe that feelings can be educated, then at some point we must admit that it is not necessary to educate them. You need to pay attention and trust them. What was previously considered dangerous will suddenly turn out to be important, capable of giving us an impetus to development. This happened during the transition from the Enlightenment to sentimentalism.
Sentimentalism- translated from French "feeling".
Sentimentalism offered not just to educate feelings, but to reckon with them, to trust them.
A cross-cutting theme of classicism in European culture is the struggle between duty and feeling.
A cross-cutting theme of sentimentalism is that the mind is not omnipotent. And it’s not enough to cultivate feelings, you need to trust them, even if it seems that this is destroying our world.
Sentimentalism first manifested itself in literature as classicism in architecture and theater. This is not accidental, because the word "sentimentalism" is associated with the transfer of shades of feelings. Architecture does not convey shades of feelings; in the theater they are not as important as the performance as a whole. Theater is a "fast" art. Literature can be slow and convey shades, which is why the ideas of sentimentalism were realized with greater force.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau's novel The New Eloise describes situations that were unthinkable in previous eras - the friendship of a man and a woman. This topic has only been discussed for a couple of centuries. For the era of Rousseau, the question is colossal, but then there was no answer. The era of sentimentalism is focused on those feelings that do not fit into the theory and contradict the ideas of classicism.
In the history of Russian literature, Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin became the first outstanding sentimentalist writer (see Fig. 1).
Rice. 1. Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin
We talked about his Letters of a Russian Traveler. Try to compare this work with "Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow" by Alexander Nikolayevich Radishchev. Find common and different.
Pay attention to the words with "with": sympathy, compassion, interlocutor. What is in common between the revolutionary Radishchev and the sentimental Karamzin?
Having returned from his trip and having written “Letters from a Russian Traveler”, which were published in 1791, Karamzin proceeds to publish the “Moscow Journal”, where in 1792 a short story “Poor Liza” appears. The work turned all Russian literature upside down, determined its course for many years. The story of several pages has echoed in many classic Russian books, from The Queen of Spades to Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment (the image of Lizaveta Ivanovna, the sister of an old pawnbroker).
Karamzin, having written "Poor Lisa", entered the history of Russian literature (see Fig. 2).
Rice. 2. G.D. Epifanov. Illustrations for the story "Poor Lisa"
This is a story about how the nobleman Erast deceived the poor peasant woman Lisa. He promised to marry her and did not marry, he tried to pay off from her. The girl committed suicide, and Erast, saying that he had gone to war, tied the knot with a rich widow.
There were no such stories. Karamzin changes a lot.
In the literature of the XVIII century, all heroes are divided into good and bad. Karamzin begins the story by saying that everything is ambiguous.
Perhaps no one living in Moscow knows the surroundings of this city as well as I do, because no one is more often than me in the field, no one more than me wanders on foot, without a plan, without a goal - where the eyes look - through meadows and groves. over hills and plains.
Nikolai Karamzin
We meet the storyteller's heart before we see the characters. Previously, in literature, there was a binding of characters to a place. If this is an idyll, events unfolded in the bosom of nature, and if a moralizing story, then in the city. Karamzin from the very beginning places the heroes on the border between the village where Lisa lives and the city where Erast lives. The tragic meeting of the city and the village is the subject of his story (see Fig. 3).
Rice. 3. G.D. Epifanov. Illustrations for the story "Poor Lisa"
Karamzin introduces something that has never been in Russian literature - the theme of money. In building the plot of "Poor Lisa" money plays a huge role. The relationship between Erast and Lisa begins with the fact that a nobleman wants to buy flowers from a peasant woman not for five kopecks, but for a ruble. The hero does it with a pure heart, but he measures feelings in money. Further, when Erast leaves Liza and when he accidentally meets her in the city, he pays her off (see Fig. 4).
Rice. 4. G.D. Epifanov. Illustrations for the story "Poor Lisa"
But after all, Lisa, before committing suicide, leaves her mother 10 imperials. The girl had already contracted the city's habit of counting money.
The ending of the story is incredible for that time. Karamzin talks about the death of heroes. Both in Russian literature and in European literature, the death of loving heroes has been spoken about more than once. A cross-cutting motive - the lovers united after death, like Tristan and Isolde, Peter and Fevronia. But for the suicide Liza and the sinner Erast to reconcile after death was incredible. The last phrase of the story: "Now, maybe they are reconciled." After the final Karamzin talks about himself, about what is happening in his heart.
She was buried near the pond, under a gloomy oak, and a wooden cross was placed on her grave. Here I often sit in thought, leaning on the receptacle of Liza's ashes; in my eyes a pond flows; Leaves rustle above me.
The narrator turns out to be no less important participant in the literary action than his characters. It was all incredibly new and fresh.
We said that ancient Russian literature valued not novelty, but the observance of rules. The new literature, of which Karamzin turned out to be one of the conductors, on the contrary, appreciates freshness, the explosion of the familiar, the rejection of the past, the movement into the future. And Nikolai Mikhailovich succeeded.
The story "Poor Liza", written in 1792, became the first sentimental story in Russian literature. The love story of a peasant woman and a nobleman did not leave readers of that time indifferent. So what is the sentimentalism of "Poor Lisa"?
Sentimentalism is a direction in literature where the feelings of the characters come first, despite their low or high position.
The plot of the story unfolds before the reader the love story of a poor peasant girl and a nobleman. The author, from an enlightening position, defends the extra-class value of a person, refuses prejudices. “Even peasant women know how to love,” writes Karamzin, and this statement was new for Russian literature.
Examples of sentimentalism in the story "Poor Lisa" include the constant experiences and suffering of the characters, the expression of their feelings. Also, this genre can be attributed to such features as the author's lyrical digressions, a description of nature.
Landscape sketches in the story create a certain mood and resonate with the experiences of the characters. So, the thunderstorm scene emphasizes the fear and confusion in Lisa's soul, tells the reader that ahead is a tragic turn of events.
The literature of sentimentalism opened the world of human feelings and experiences for readers of the 18th century, made it possible to feel the fusion of the human soul with nature.
“Poor Lisa” is a tragic love story. A simple, peasant girl Liza, who lives in the vicinity of Moscow, goes to the city to sell flowers. There she meets a young man named Erast. They fall in love with each other.
The plot of the story is based on a system of internal and external conflicts. The external conflict is a social contradiction: he is a nobleman, she is a peasant woman. The heroes suffer because of social prejudice, but then they begin to believe that the power of love will overcome them. And at some point it seems to the reader that the love story will have a happy ending. But there are other conflicts in the story that develop the action in a tragic way. This is an internal conflict in the soul of Erast, which arose due to the prevailing life circumstances. The hero leaves for the location of the active army, and Lisa remains to wait for him, believing the promises and confessions of her lover. Having lost money and property in cards, Erast is unable to pay the resulting debts. And then he finds the only way out: to marry a rich bride. Lisa accidentally learns about the betrayal and decides to drown herself. The motive for suicide was also new to Russian literature. Upon learning of the death of his beloved, Erasmt painfully experiences his betrayal. We learn about this at the end of the story.
This story causes sympathy in the hearts of readers for the characters of the story. The author also sympathizes with his characters. The author's position is visible in the title of the story. We also cannot call Erast a negative hero, this image evokes sympathy for the sincere repentance that he feels, realizing the horror of his act, the depth of betrayal that led to Lisa's death. The author's position is also expressed through direct statements belonging to the narrator in the story: “Reckless young man!
At the end of the 18th century, sentimentalism, like classicism, which came to us from Europe, was the leading literary trend in Russia. N. M. Karamzin can rightly be considered the head and propagandist of the sentimental trend in Russian literature. His "Letters from a Russian Traveler" and stories are an example of sentimentalism. So, the story "Poor Lisa" (1792) is built in accordance with the basic laws of this direction. However, the writer departed from some of the canons of European sentimentalism.
In the works of classicism, kings, nobles, generals, that is, people who performed an important state mission, were worthy of depiction. Sentimentalism, on the other hand, preached the value of an individual, even if insignificant on a national scale. Therefore, Karamzin made the main character of the story the poor peasant woman Liza, who was left without a father-breadwinner early and lives with her mother in a hut. According to sentimentalists, the ability to deeply feel, benevolently perceive the world around is possessed by both people of the upper class and low origin, "for even peasant women know how to love."
The sentimentalist writer did not have the goal of accurately reflecting reality. Lizin's earnings from the sale of flowers and knitting, on which the peasant women live, could not provide them. But Karamzin depicts life without trying to convey everything realistically. Its purpose is to arouse compassion in the reader. This story, for the first time in Russian literature, made the reader feel the tragedy of life with his heart.
Already contemporaries noted the novelty of the hero of "Poor Lisa" - Erast. In the 1790s, the principle of a strict division of heroes into positive and negative was observed. Erast, who killed Lisa, contrary to this principle, was not perceived as a villain. A frivolous but dreamy young man does not deceive a girl. At first, he has sincere tender feelings for the naive villager. Without thinking about the future, he believes that he will not harm Lisa, that he will always be by her side, like a brother and sister, and they will be happy together.
The language in the works of sentimentalism has also changed. The speech of the heroes was “freed” from a large number of Old Slavic words, became simpler, close to colloquial. At the same time, it became saturated with beautiful epithets, rhetorical phrases, and exclamations. The speech of Lisa and her mother is florid, philosophical (“Ah, Liza!” she said. “How good everything is with the Lord God! .. Ah, Liza! Who would want to die if sometimes we didn’t have grief!”; about a pleasant moment in which we will see each other again." - "I will, I will think about her! Oh, if she would come sooner! Dear, dear Erast! Remember, remember your poor Lisa, who loves you more than herself!" ).
The purpose of such a language is to influence the soul of the reader, to awaken humane feelings in it. So, in the speech of the narrator "Poor Liza" we hear an abundance of interjections, diminutive forms, exclamations, rhetorical appeals: "Ah! I love those objects that touch my heart and make me shed tears of tender sorrow! "Beautiful poor Liza with her old woman"; “But what did she feel when Erast, embracing her for the last time, pressing her to his heart for the last time, said: “Forgive me, Liza!” What a touching picture!
Sentimentalists paid great attention to the image of nature. Events often unfolded against the background of picturesque landscapes: in the forest, on the banks of the river, in the field. Sensitive natures, the heroes of sentimentalist works, acutely perceived the beauty of nature. In European sentimentalism, close to nature, "natural" man was supposed to have only pure feelings; that nature can uplift the soul of man. But Karamzin tried to challenge the point of view of Western thinkers.
"Poor Liza" begins with a description of the Simonov Monastery and its environs. So the author connected the present and past of Moscow with the history of an ordinary person. Events unfold in Moscow and in nature. "Natura", that is, nature, following the narrator, closely "observes" the love story of Lisa and Erast. But she remains deaf and blind to the experiences of the heroine.
Nature does not stop the passions of a young man and a girl at a fatal moment: "not a single star shone in the sky - no ray could illuminate delusions." On the contrary, “the darkness of the evening nourished desires.” An incomprehensible thing happens to Lisa’s soul: “It seemed to me that I was dying, that my soul ... No, I can’t say this!”. Liza's closeness to nature does not help her in saving her soul: she seems to give her soul to Erast. The storm breaks out only after - "it seemed that all nature complained about Liza's lost innocence." Lisa is frightened of thunder, "like a criminal." She perceives the thunder as a punishment, but nature did not tell her anything earlier.
At the moment of Lisa's farewell to Erast, nature is still beautiful, majestic, but indifferent to the heroes: “The dawn, like a scarlet sea, spilled over the eastern sky. Erast stood under the branches of a tall oak ... all nature was silent. The "silence" of nature at the tragic moment of parting for Lisa is emphasized in the story. Here, too, nature does not suggest anything to the girl, does not save her from disappointment.
The heyday of Russian sentimentalism falls on the 1790s. The recognized propagandist of this direction, Karamzin, developed in his works the main idea: the soul must be enlightened, made it cordial, responsive to other people's pain, other people's suffering and other people's worries.
