1. General characteristics of the scene.
2. Kalinovskaya “elite”.
3. People's dependence on tyrants.
4. “Free Birds” by Kalinov.
“Cruel morals, sir, in our city, cruel!” - this is how A. N. Ostrovsky characterizes the setting of the play through the mouth of one of the characters, the observant and witty self-taught inventor Kuligin. It is noteworthy that the play begins with a scene in which the same hero admires the view of the Volga. The author, as if by chance, contrasts the beauty of nature, the immensity of its vastness, with the sanctimonious provincial life. People who have weight in Kalinovsky society, the overwhelming majority try to present themselves in the best light to outsiders, and “they eat their own family.”
One of the prominent representatives of the Kalinov “elite” is the wealthy merchant Savel Prokofich Dikoy. In the family circle, he is an unbearable tyrant, whom everyone is afraid of. His wife trembles every morning: “Fathers, don’t make me angry! Darlings, don’t make me angry!” However, Dikoy is capable of getting angry without any particular reason: then he is happy to attack his household and hired workers with abuse. Dikoy constantly underpays everyone who serves him, so many workers complain to the mayor. To the admonitions of the mayor, who suggested that the merchant pay his workers as expected, Dikoy calmly replied that from these underpayments he had accumulated significant sums, and should the mayor worry about such trifles?
The baseness of the Wild’s nature is also manifested in the fact that the displeasure that he does not have the right to express to the culprit is taken out by the rabid merchant on his unrequited family members. This man, without a twinge of conscience, is ready to take away the due share of the inheritance from his nephews, especially since their grandmother’s will left a loophole - the nephews have the right to receive the inheritance only if they are respectful to their uncle. “...Even if you were respectful to him, who would forbid him to say that you are disrespectful?” — Kuligin says judiciously to Boris. Knowing local customs, Kuligin is convinced that Dikiy’s nephews will be left with nothing - Boris is in vain to endure his uncle’s scolding.
Kabanikha is not like that - she also tyrannizes her household, but “under the guise of piety.” Kabanikha’s house is a paradise for wanderers and pilgrims, whom the merchant’s wife welcomes according to the old Russian custom. Where did this custom come from? The Gospel tells us that Christ taught his followers to help those in need, saying that what was done for “one of these little ones” was ultimately done as if for Himself. Kabanikha sacredly preserves ancient customs, which for her are almost the foundations of the universe. But she does not consider it a sin that she “sharpens iron like rust” to her son and daughter-in-law. Kabanikha's daughter finally can't stand it and runs away with her lover, the son gradually becomes a drunkard, and the daughter-in-law throws herself into the river out of despair. Kabanikha’s piety and piety turn out to be only a form without content. According to Christ, such people are like coffins that are neatly painted on the outside, but inside are full of uncleanness.
Quite a few people depend on Dikoy, Kabanikha and the like. The existence of people living in constant tension and fear is bleak. One way or another, they raise a protest against the constant suppression of the individual. Only this protest most often manifests itself in an ugly or tragic way. Kabanikha’s son, who dutifully endures the edifying teachings of his domineering mother in family life, escapes from home for a few days and forgets about everything in a continuous drunkenness: “Yes, he’s tied up! As soon as he leaves, he’ll start drinking.” The love of Boris and Katerina is also a kind of protest against the oppressive environment in which they live. This love does not bring joy, although it is mutual: a protest against the hypocrisy and pretense common in Kalinov forces Katerina to confess her sin to her husband, and a protest against returning to a hateful way of life pushes the woman into the water. Varvara’s protest turns out to be the most thoughtful - she runs away with Kudryash, that is, she breaks out of the atmosphere of bigotry and tyranny.
Kudryash is a remarkable personality in his own way. This brawler is not afraid of anyone, not even the formidable “warrior” Dikiy, for whom he worked: “...I will not slave before him.” Kudryash does not have wealth, but he knows how to place himself in the company of people, including people like Dikoy: “I am considered a rude person, why is he holding me? Therefore, he needs me. Well, that means I’m not afraid of him, but let him be afraid of me.” Thus, we see that Kudryash has a developed sense of self-esteem, he is a determined and brave person. Of course, he is by no means some kind of ideal. Curly is also a product of the society in which he lives. “To live with wolves is to howl like a wolf” - in accordance with this old proverb, Kudryash would not mind breaking off the Wild’s sides if he could find several equally desperate guys for company, or “respect” the tyrant in another way, by seducing his daughter.
Another type of person, independent of Kalinov’s tyrants, is the self-taught inventor Kuligin. This man, like Kudryash, knows perfectly well what the ins and outs of the local bigwigs are. He has no illusions about his fellow citizens, and yet this man is happy. Human baseness does not obscure the beauty of the world for him, superstition does not poison his soul, and scientific research gives his life a high meaning: “And you are afraid to even look at the sky, it makes you tremble! Out of everything, you have created a scare for yourself. Eh, people! I’m not afraid.”
Alexander Ostrovsky's play "The Thunderstorm" was created by the playwright on the eve of the reform of 1861. The need for socio-social changes has already matured, there are debates, discussions, and movement of social thought. But there are places in Russia where time has stopped, society is passive, does not want change, is afraid of it.
This is the city of Kalinov, described by Ostrovsky in his play “The Thunderstorm”. This city did not really exist, it is the writer’s fiction, but thereby Ostrovsky shows that in Russia there are still many such places where stagnation and savagery reign. Despite all this, the city is located in a beautiful area, on the banks of the Volga. The surrounding nature simply screams that this place could be paradise! But the residents of this city do not have happiness, in the full sense of the word, and it is their own fault.
The inhabitants of Kalinov are mostly people who do not want any changes and are illiterate. Some live reveling in the power that money gives them, others put up with their humiliating situation and do nothing to get out of this situation. Dobrolyubov called the Kalinovsky Society the Dark Kingdom.
The main negative characters of the play are Savel Prokofievich Dikoy and Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova.
Wild merchant, an important person in the city. To describe him briefly, he is a tyrant and a miser. He simply does not consider everyone below him in position to be people. Dikoy can easily cheat an employee, and he doesn’t want to give his own nephew the inheritance left to him by his grandmother. At the same time, he is very proud of these qualities.
The rich merchant's wife Kabanikha is a real punishment for her family. From this domineering, grumpy person there is no peace for anyone in the house. She wants everyone to obey her unquestioningly and to live according to the laws of Domostroy. Kabanikha cripples the lives of her children and at the same time takes credit for such an existence.
The boar's son, the meek, cowardly Tikhon, is afraid to say an extra word against his domineering mother and cannot even protect his wife, whom the boar constantly reproaches and humiliates. But her daughter Varvara learned to lie and live a double life in order to get away from her mother’s influence, and she is quite happy with this state of affairs.
Boris, Dikiy's nephew, is completely dependent on his uncle, although he has received an education, he is not a stupid person, and does not make any moves to free himself from this dependence. With his lack of independence and indecision, he destroys the woman he loves.
The tradesman Kuligin, a self-taught inventor, is an intelligent man, aware of the depth of stagnation and savagery in society, but he, too, cannot do anything in this situation and escapes from reality, trying to accomplish the impossible, to invent a perpetual motion machine.
The person who can give at least some resistance to the rudeness and tyranny of the Dikiy is his employee Vanya Kudryash, a minor hero of the play, who, however, plays a significant role in the unfolding action.
The only pure and bright person in this city, Kabanikha’s daughter-in-law Katerina. She cannot live in this swamp, where there is no love, no normal human relationships, where lies and hypocrisy rule. She protests against this with her death; having decided to take this terrible step, she, at least for a moment, gains such a desired will.
Ostrovsky called his play “The Thunderstorm” for a reason, the name is meaningful. The impending changes in society, like thunderclouds, are gathering over the heads of the inhabitants of the “dark kingdom”. Katerina, in her confusion, thinks that the thunderstorm was sent to her as punishment for treason, but in fact, the thunderstorm must finally destroy this dominance of stagnation, slavery and evil.
All events in the dramatic work called “The Thunderstorm,” written by Ostrovsky, take place on the territory of the city of Kalinov. The city is a district town and is located on one of the banks of the Volga. The author says that the area is distinguished by beautiful landscapes and is pleasing to the eye.
The tradesman Kulagin talks about the morals of the city residents, his opinion is that each of the residents has quite cruel morals, they are used to being rude and cruel, such problems were often caused by existing poverty.
The center of cruelty becomes two heroes - the merchant Dikoy and Kabanikha, who are shining representatives of ignorance and rudeness addressed to the people around them.
Dikoy, holding the position of a merchant, is a fairly rich man, stingy and has great influence in the city. But at the same time, he was used to holding power in his hands quite cruelly. He is sure that a thunderstorm is sent to people every time as a punishment for their wrong actions and therefore they must endure it, and not install lightning rods on their houses. Also from the story, the reader learns that Dikoy manages his household well and has a correct attitude towards financial matters, but this is all that limits his horizons. At the same time, it is worth noting his lack of education; he does not understand why electricity is needed and how it actually works.
Therefore, we can conclude that the majority of merchants and townsfolk living in the town are uneducated people, unable to accept new information and change their lives for the better. At the same time, books and newspapers are available to everyone, which they can read regularly and improve their inner intelligence.
Anyone who has a certain amount of wealth is not used to treating any officials or government officials with respect. They treat them with some disdain. And the mayor is treated like a neighbor and communicates with him in a friendly manner.
The poor segments of the population are accustomed to sleeping no more than three hours a day; they work day and night. The rich try in every possible way to enslave the poor and get even more money through the work of others. That’s why Dikoy himself doesn’t pay anyone for their work, and everyone receives their salary only through a lot of abuse.
At the same time, scandals often occur in the city that do not lead to anything good. Kuligin tries to write poems himself, he is self-taught, but at the same time he is afraid to show his talent, because he is afraid that he will be swallowed up alive.
Life in the city is boring and monotonous; all residents are accustomed to listening to Feklusha more than reading newspapers and books. It is he who tells others that there are countries where there are people who have a dog's head on their shoulders.
In the evening, residents of the town do not go out for walks along the narrow streets; they try to lock the door with all the locks and stay inside the house. They also release dogs to protect them from possible robbery. They are very worried about their property, which they sometimes get through backbreaking labor. That's why they try to always be at home.
The first image is of the young artist Chartakov. We get to know him at the very beginning of the story, when he was next to the art shop.
The theme of love in the well-known novel is raised repeatedly and from different angles. It is worth noting that the word “love” has several meanings. In most cases, when a person hears this word
Lyubov Andreevna is the main character of Chekhov’s play “The Cherry Orchard”. This woman is the main representative of the female half of the nobility of that time with all their vices and positive traits.
Hello, dear father! Your daughter Dunya is writing to you. I know that you have not forgotten me, and you worry about me as before.
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is a famous short story writer and lover of taciturnity. He always managed to convey both a cheerful atmosphere and sad reality on two or three sheets of paper.
“Cruel morals, sir, in our city, cruel!” - this is how the city of Kalinov is described by its resident, Kuligin, who knows it well from the inside and has experienced these very cruel morals.
The city described in the drama is fictional, but the events taking place in “The Thunderstorm” are based on real events. It is also worth paying attention to the fact that the name of the city begins with “k”, and most cities in Russia begin with this letter. With this Ostrovsky wants to show that similar events can happen anywhere and in similar cities
There are a huge number in the country.
Especially in one of the cities on the Volga, notorious for the number of drowned people found in the river.
First of all, everyone in the city of Kalinov tries to please the rich, everything is built on lies and the love of money, and “with honest work you can never earn more than your daily bread.” The rich try to take advantage of the poor, consider them “lower class” people, and their problems are trifles. And among themselves they interfere with each other’s trade out of envy, they are at enmity. The most important thing for everyone is their own income; there are no moral values in this city. And for any word here, according to
Kuligin, “they will eat you, they will swallow you alive.”
The wanderer Feklusha describes the city as “a promised land with pious merchants, generous and kind, but she understands all the darkness of this city and does this only out of the understanding that the more you flatter the merchants and the rich, the less likely it is that they will drive you away. The rich treat those who ask for money with great disgust.
This city is quiet, but this silence can be called dead: everyone sits in their homes and, because of their own laziness, does not go out, with the exception of young girls and boys.
Naturally, the darkness of the city lies not in the place itself, but in the people living in it. The description of the city and, in principle, the actions in the drama begin with admiration for the Volga. However, then the true face of the city is gradually revealed more and more, and its gloomy description begins and intensifies precisely from the beginning of the description of the people living in the city of Kalinov.
Dramatic events of the play by A.N. Ostrovsky's "The Thunderstorm" takes place in the city of Kalinov. This town is located on the picturesque bank of the Volga, from the high cliff of which the vast Russian expanses and boundless distances open up to the eye. “The view is extraordinary! Beauty! The soul rejoices,” enthuses local self-taught mechanic Kuligin.
Pictures of endless distances, echoed in a lyrical song. Among the flat valleys,” which he sings, are of great importance for conveying the feeling of the immense possibilities of Russian life, on the one hand, and the limitations of life in a small merchant town, on the other.
Magnificent paintings of the Volga landscape are organically woven into the structure of the play. At first glance, they contradict its dramatic nature, but in fact they introduce new colors into the depiction of the scene of action, thereby performing an important artistic function: the play begins with a picture of a steep bank, and it ends with it. Only in the first case does it give rise to a feeling of something majestically beautiful and bright, and in the second - catharsis. The landscape also serves to more vividly depict the characters - Kuligin and Katerina, who subtly sense its beauty, on the one hand, and everyone who is indifferent to it, on the other. The brilliant playwright so carefully recreated the scene of action that we can visually imagine the city Kalinov, immersed in greenery, as he is depicted in the play. We see its high fences, and gates with strong locks, and wooden houses with patterned shutters and colored window curtains filled with geraniums and balsams. We also see taverns where people like Dikoy and Tikhon are carousing in a drunken stupor. We see the dusty streets of Kalinovsky, where ordinary people, merchants and wanderers talk on benches in front of the houses, and where sometimes a song can be heard from afar to the accompaniment of a guitar, and behind the gates of the houses the descent begins to the ravine, where young people have fun at night. A gallery with vaults of dilapidated buildings opens to our eyes; a public garden with gazebos, pink bell towers and ancient gilded churches, where “noble families” walk decorously and where the social life of this small merchant town unfolds. Finally, we see the Volga pool, in the abyss of which Katerina is destined to find her final refuge.
Residents of Kalinov lead a sleepy, measured existence: “They go to bed very early, so it’s difficult for an unaccustomed person to endure such a sleepy night.” On holidays, they walk decorously along the boulevard, but “they only pretend to be walking, but they themselves go there to show off their outfits.” The inhabitants are superstitious and submissive, they have no desire for culture, science, they are not interested in new ideas and thoughts. The sources of news and rumors are pilgrims, pilgrims, and “passing kaliki.” The basis of relationships between people in Kalinov is material dependence. Here money is everything. “Cruel morals, sir, in our city, cruel! - says Kuligin, addressing a new person in the city, Boris. “In philistinism, sir, you will see nothing but rudeness and stark poverty.” And we, sir, will never get out of this crust. Because honest work will never earn us more than our daily bread. And whoever has money, sir, tries to enslave the poor in order to make even more money from his free labors. He testifies: “And among themselves, sir, how they live! They undermine each other's trade, and not so much out of self-interest as out of envy. They are at enmity with each other; they get drunken clerks into their high mansions... And they... write malicious clauses about their neighbors. And for them, sir, a trial and a case will begin, and there will be no end to the torment.”
A vivid figurative expression of the manifestation of rudeness and hostility that reigns in Kalinov is the ignorant tyrant Savel Prokofich Dikoy, a “scold man” and a “shrill man,” as its residents characterize it. Endowed with an unbridled temper, he intimidated his family (dispersed “to attics and closets”), terrorizes his nephew Boris, who “got to him as a sacrifice” and which, according to Kudryash, he constantly “rides.” He also mocks other townspeople, cheats, “shows off” over them, “as his heart desires,” rightly believing that there is no one to “calm him down” anyway. Swearing, swearing for any reason is not only the usual way of treating people, it is his nature, his character, the content of his entire life.
Another personification of the “cruel morals” of the city of Kalinov is Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova, a “hypocrite,” as the same Kuligin characterizes her. “He gives money to the poor, but completely eats up his family.” Kabanikha firmly stands guard over the established order established in her home, jealously guarding this life from the fresh wind of change. She cannot come to terms with the fact that the young people do not like her way of life, that they want to live differently. She doesn't swear like Dikoy. She has her own methods of intimidation, she corrosively, “like rusting iron,” “sharpens” her loved ones.
Dikoy and Kabanova (one - rudely and openly, the other - “under the guise of piety”) poison the lives of those around them, suppressing them, subordinating them to their orders, destroying bright feelings in them. For them, the loss of power is the loss of everything in which they see the meaning of existence. That’s why they hate new customs, honesty, sincerity in the expression of feelings, and the attraction of young people to “freedom.”
A special role in the “dark kingdom” belongs to the ignorant, deceitful and arrogant wanderer-beggar Feklusha. She “wanders” through cities and villages, collecting absurd tales and fantastic stories - about the depreciation of time, about people with dog heads, about scattering chaff, about a fiery serpent. One gets the impression that she deliberately misinterprets what she hears, that she takes pleasure in spreading all these gossip and ridiculous rumors - thanks to this, she is willingly accepted in the houses of Kalinov and towns like it. Feklusha does not carry out her mission unselfishly: she will be fed here, given something to drink here, and given gifts there. The image of Feklusha, personifying evil, hypocrisy and gross ignorance, was very typical of the environment depicted. Such feklushi, carriers of nonsense news that clouded the consciousness of ordinary people, and pilgrims were necessary for the owners of the city, as they supported the authority of their government.
Finally, another colorful exponent of the cruel morals of the “dark kingdom” is the half-crazed lady in the play. She rudely and cruelly threatens the death of someone else's beauty. These terrible prophecies, sounding like the voice of tragic fate, receive their bitter confirmation in the finale. In the article “A Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom” N.A. Dobrolyubov wrote: “In The Thunderstorm the need for the so-called “unnecessary faces” is especially visible: without them we cannot understand the heroine’s face and can easily distort the meaning of the entire play...”
Dikoy, Kabanova, Feklusha and the half-crazy lady - representatives of the older generation - are exponents of the worst sides of the old world, its darkness, mysticism and cruelty. These characters have nothing to do with the past, rich in its own unique culture and traditions. But in the city of Kalinov, in conditions that suppress, break and paralyze the will, representatives of the younger generation also live. Someone, like Katerina, closely bound by the way of the city and dependent on it, lives and suffers, strives to escape from it, and someone, like Varvara, Kudryash, Boris and Tikhon, humbles himself, accepts its laws or finds ways to reconcile with them .
Tikhon, the son of Marfa Kabanova and Katerina’s husband, is naturally endowed with a gentle, quiet disposition. He has kindness, responsiveness, the ability to make sound judgment, and the desire to break free from the clutches in which he finds himself, but weak-willedness and timidity outweigh his positive qualities. He is used to unquestioningly obeying his mother, doing everything she demands, and is not able to show disobedience. He is unable to truly appreciate the extent of Katerina’s suffering, unable to penetrate her spiritual world. Only in the finale does this weak-willed but internally contradictory person rise to open condemnation of his mother’s tyranny.
Boris, “a young man of decent education,” is the only one who does not belong to the Kalinovsky world by birth. This is a mentally gentle and delicate, simple and modest person, and, moreover, his education, manners, and speech are noticeably different from most Kalinovites. He does not understand local customs, but is unable either to defend himself from the insults of the Wild One, or to “resist the dirty tricks that others do.” Katerina sympathizes with his dependent, humiliated position. But we can only sympathize with Katerina - she happened to meet on her way a weak-willed man, subordinate to the whims and whims of his uncle and doing nothing to change this situation. N.A. was right. Dobrolyubov, who claimed that “Boris is not a hero, he stands far from Katerina, and she fell in love with him in the desert.”
Cheerful and cheerful Varvara - the daughter of Kabanikha and the sister of Tikhon - is a vitally full-blooded image, but she emanates some kind of spiritual primitiveness, starting with her actions and everyday behavior and ending with her thoughts about life and rudely cheeky speech. She adapted, learned to be cunning so as not to obey her mother. She is too down to earth in everything. Such is her protest - escaping with Kudryash, who is well acquainted with the customs of the merchant environment, but lives easily” without hesitation. Varvara, who learned to live guided by the principle: “Do what you want, as long as it’s covered and covered,” expressed her protest at the everyday level, but on the whole she lives according to the laws of the “dark kingdom” and in her own way finds agreement with it.
Kuligin, a local self-taught mechanic who in the play acts as an “exposer of vices,” sympathizes with the poor, is concerned with improving people’s lives, having received a reward for the discovery of a perpetual motion machine. He is an opponent of superstitions, a champion of knowledge, science, creativity, enlightenment, but his own knowledge is not enough.
He doesn’t see an active way to resist tyrants, and therefore prefers to submit. It is clear that this is not the person who is able to bring novelty and fresh air into the life of the city of Kalinov.
Among the characters in the drama, there is no one, except Boris, who does not belong to the Kalinovsky world by birth or upbringing. All of them revolve in the sphere of concepts and ideas of a closed patriarchal environment. But life does not stand still, and tyrants feel that their power is being limited. “Besides them, without asking them,” says N.A. Dobrolyubov, - another life has grown, with different beginnings ... "
Of all the characters, only Katerina - a deeply poetic nature, filled with high lyricism - is focused on the future. Because, as noted by academician N.N. Skatov, “Katerina was brought up not only in the narrow world of a merchant family, she was born not only by the patriarchal world, but by the entire world of national, people’s life, already spilling over the boundaries of patriarchy.” Katerina embodies the spirit of this world, its dream, its impulse. She alone was able to express her protest, proving, albeit at the cost of her own life, that the end of the “dark kingdom” was approaching. By creating such an expressive image of A.N. Ostrovsky showed that even in the ossified world of a provincial town, a “folk character of amazing beauty and strength” can arise, whose pen is based on love, on a free dream of justice, beauty, some kind of higher truth.
Poetic and prosaic, sublime and mundane, human and animal - these principles are paradoxically united in the life of a provincial Russian town, but in this life, unfortunately, darkness and oppressive melancholy prevail, which N.A. could not better characterize. Dobrolyubov, calling this world a “dark kingdom.” This phraseological unit is of fairy-tale origin, but the merchant world of "The Thunderstorm", we are convinced of this, is devoid of that poetic, mysterious and captivating that is usually characteristic of a fairy tale. “Cruel morals” reign in this city, cruel...
Drama A.N. Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm” is truly unique for its conflicts, one of which is social, it occupies a central place in the play, thanks to it the author exposes all the vices of the “dark kingdom” that dominate the city of Kalinov.
The work begins with a remark from Kuligin, in which he praises the Volga expanses, but against the backdrop of all the abundance of beauty we observe a cruel scene of Dikiy’s violence against his nephew Boris. With this contrast, Ostrovsky shows that behind the external, seemingly pleasant to the eye, veil hides a terrible way of life - domostroy
Our experts can check your essay according to the Unified State Exam criteria
Experts from the site Kritika24.ru
Teachers of leading schools and current experts of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation.
In it, according to Kuligin, cruel morals triumph: only those who have power and money can “speak”. Prominent representatives of powerful people are Dikoy, a significant person in the city, and Kabanikha, a rich merchant’s wife, for whom everything is “under the guise of piety.” These people behave immorally: behind their high fences they terrorize their households. Dikoy, whose surname highlights the main trait of his character - savagery, cannot live a day without offending anyone, while Kabanikha constantly teaches life lessons to his son Tikhon and his wife Katerina. Savel Prokofievich and Marfa Ignatievnaya are bright representatives of the “dark kingdom”, their souls have become hardened due to the thirst for power over everyone, they look down on people, and do not consider them such at all.
Other residents of the Volga town are simple people who want to live a quiet life. But in the conditions of a patriarchal way of life, this is impossible. Varvara, the ungrateful and deceitful daughter of Kabinikha, lives by the motto “as long as everything is sewn and covered,” she is a hypocrite to her mother when necessary, so as not to succumb to her attacks. Her brother, Tikhon, is completely spineless; all he does is indulge his mother and obey her will.
Glasha and Feklusha are the lowest stratum of society. They are happy to serve their masters.
Boris is a decently educated young man with a difficult fate. Every day I am forced to listen to sayings addressed to me from Dikiy.
Another resident of the city, who differs from others in his sincerity, honesty, and his desire to do something useful for society, is Kuligin, a tradesman, a self-taught watchmaker. He has a promising idea for building a lightning rod, but he has no money for its implementation. It is unlikely that he will ever realize his plans, because in the conditions of the “dark kingdom” this is impossible.
All the ordinary people of the city of Kalinov are part of the “dark kingdom”, they are not able to take any measures to free themselves from the life they live, because they are powerless by cruel morals, all they can do is “go with the flow”.
The only opposing character is Katerina, Tikhon’s wife, according to Dobrolyubov, “a ray of light in the dark kingdom,” whose image helps shed light on all the vices of the “dark kingdom” and give birth to something new and bright in the “dead” city. This is a bright, sincere, vulnerable nature who is not used to living according to the laws of house-building. Although Katerina is married to Tikhon, she loves someone else - Boris. She experiences mental suffering every day due to the fact that she is cheating on her albeit unloved husband. When a thunderstorm comes, Katerina attributes this phenomenon to God's punishment, her vulnerable soul cannot stand it and she commits suicide.
The playwright Ostrovsky negatively portrayed the inhabitants of the fictional city of Kalinov and its morals, thereby he wanted to show how sad the situation is in the provincial cities of Russia.
Updated: 2018-06-08
Attention!
Thank you for your attention.
If you notice an error or typo, highlight the text and click Ctrl+Enter.
By doing so, you will provide invaluable benefits to the project and other readers.
