Evgenia Safonova,
Petra-Dubravska school,
Samara Region

Written on Nizhny Novgorod land

On the meaning of Pushkin's story "The Undertaker"

Pushkin's prose is presented in modern programs wide at school. Along with the textbook "The Captain's Daughter", "Dubrovsky", "The Queen of Spades" are included in the study and "Belkin's Tale". There is no way to dwell in detail on the history of their readership and critical perception, but nevertheless, one cannot but note a very characteristic moment. Even a cursory glance reveals a very peculiar temporal sequence of inclusion of Pushkin's stories in the reader's circle of perception. The most actively studied and studied at school most often are three, and even autonomously taken: "Station Master", "Shot" and "Snowstorm". At the lesson, limiting himself to talking about individual works, voluntarily or involuntarily, the teacher and the entire cycle reduced to their content and meaning, sometimes only mentioning the rest. Sometimes the “Shot” was replaced by another story of the cycle - “The Young Lady-Peasant Woman”. As for The Undertaker, it turned out to be the most closed work for school study and, as a result, much less “read”. A serious objective reason for the "rejection" of the fifth story from the study of the entire cycle at school is the difficulty of its perception. More L.N. Tolstoy very accurately noted, while studying with Yasnaya Polyana students, the striking and difficult for direct perception features of The Undertaker they read: “the author’s frivolous attitude to faces”; “comic characteristics”; "understatement".

What to do? Is it possible to talk about the conceptual study of Belkin's Tales, ignoring the story "The Undertaker"? Creating five extremely dissimilar (in terms of subject matter, in style) stories, Pushkin combined them into a cycle, thereby revealing their integrity, closeness in spirit.

The Undertaker was written first (September 9, 1830), thus setting the direction for the entire cycle. As a result, he took the middle place in the cycle, becoming between the Snowstorm and the Stationmaster. Thus, the question arises about the creative logic of the movement of the author's thought, which cannot be comprehended without including the story "The Undertaker" in the school study.

When reading a work, certain images, especially when reading intermittently, usually evoke certain thoughts in the reader - such thoughts are natural and do not kill the emotionality of perception. Let's ask the students to fix the questions that arise in the course of self-acquaintance with the text in the left column of the notebook. And on the right, write down your answer options, if any appeared during further reading. Difficult to understand artistic text just needs some work. The homework system should be built in such a way that the main block is prepared for the lesson, and not after the lesson, so that students learn to ask questions themselves and look for answers in the text, so that the teacher analyzes written works in advance and builds work on the analysis of a work of art on the basis of them in the lesson . Empathy deepens when what students are interested in on their own is further developed in the lesson. Then knowledge becomes necessary for the students themselves and gives rise to new questions.

One student without special training will start a conversation about the main character in the lesson. It’s not scary if, at the same time, you talk about the character as if it were a real person you just met. When revealing the initial perception, a naive-realistic approach is quite justified.

Imagine a literary hero as your friend, the writer introduced you to him, showing him in different circumstances and from different angles. Let's talk about it now: how do you imagine it? How is it unusual or, conversely, common? Why did Pushkin decide to offer readers the image of the undertaker Adrian Prokhorov? What is the secret of this character?

For what purpose, in your opinion, is the hero-undertaker presented by Pushkin? Either to study the representative of this profession, or to have fun, or even to capture the author's own gloomy state of health at the time of writing. What is the mood of the story? What brings a dark note to the beginning of the story?

The leading motive of the narrative is an indication of the gloomy nature of Adrian Prokhorov, his gloom. A gloomy note is also introduced by the character's craft. The epigraph to the story also tunes in on her. In Pushkin, epigraphs always have a special semantic role that organizes the whole. . “Do not we see every day the coffins, the gray hairs of the decrepit universe”- words from Derzhavin's "Waterfall".

Do you think the style of the epigraph correlates with the general style of the story? The lofty, solemn sound of lines from Derzhavin, their cosmic philosophy, on the one hand, and an insignificant farce from the life of a Moscow undertaker, on the other. Contrast or combination?

The contrast seems to be the lofty style of the epigraph against the background of the initial, deliberately reduced phrase about the undertaker's luggage, heaped onto the funeral urns. It is clear that death does not cause special feelings in the hero for a long time. Irony sounds in the description of the sign, “Depicting a portly (!) Cupid (!) ... with the caption: “Here simple and painted coffins are sold and upholstered, they are also rented (!) And old ones (!) Are repaired””. Is all this a clear inconsistency with the epigraph? Maybe the author deliberately puts his “low” hero face to face with the eternal questions of being? After all, they stand not before the elect, but before any mortal. How does a person understand his purpose in life? Does he care about meaning?

Pushkin's humanism is revealed in the fact that any person in the world is a part of the universality and truth of the universe. The author of the story "The Undertaker" offers to see in an ordinary person something more, significant (while not making the hero better, not embellishing the character). Combining the universal scale of death in the epigraph and the everyday, comic story with the "dead" in the story itself, Pushkin establishes a system of relations: life-death, being-life. Pushkin again poses questions to readers. What is the meaning of life? How to achieve happiness, what is it? Is it possible to call the hero an "ordinary" person? What does a “simple” person dream about? Thus, the writer, opening Belkin's world to readers, seems to open the doors, but not to the funeral master's shop, but to Russian life, to the circle of "eternal" questions and problems.

In order to understand the character of the hero and his role in the ideological direction of the story, let's choose the starting point, clearly indicated in the text, character trait of the image-character and try to develop it. Prokhorov's "gloominess" is that artistic detail, without which it is impossible to comprehend the story.

What is the reason for this darkness? How does it show up in the story? What underlies the character of the hero: a merchant's profit (someone else's death as a means of profit), a cynical attitude towards the world and people (calmly drinks tea on coffins placed in the room) or something else?

What could be a joyful event for this person? The move to a new place is long-awaited, but there is not a shadow of joy in the feelings of the hero: “Approaching the yellow house, which had so long seduced his imagination and finally bought by him for a decent sum, the old undertaker felt with surprise that his heart did not rejoice.”

Said as if in passing. But in fact, we have the key to the inner world of the hero. In the manuscript it was originally “pink house”. What associations arise in connection with this color? What did the author want to say by replacing the color? Yellow in the spectrum of Russian culture is believed to tend to express negative-negative meanings. Elegiac memories of the "dilapidated shack" is also a signal; It is no coincidence that Adrian's further reaction is even more difficult to explain: “felt With surprise This their indifference." Lack of joy is a serious symptom of a person's inner state. But “surprise” at this circumstance is already the beginning of a reaction that could lead to a number of serious changes in attitude to life. Is the stability of life always the key to contentment and success? What is the synonym for the word “stability” here? The immobility, the immutability of life is a kind of non-existence elevated to the absolute. The "gloominess" of the undertaker is not just an attribute of the profession. Next to “gloominess” there is “thoughtfulness” in the text: the hero "gloomy and thoughtful", "as usual ... immersed in sad reflections." There is a certain chain of transitions: gloomy–sullen–frowning–pensive.

What is the reason for the hero's thoughtfulness? What is he dissatisfied with in life?

Let's compare Adrian Prokhorov with other characters in the story. “Merry” Schultz is the antipode of “gloomy” Adrian. Why do we put keywords in quotation marks? How should they be understood in the context of the work?

In the “gloom” of Prokhorov lies dissatisfaction with life, ripening, as we will see later, protest. The following opposition is being created: “gloominess-gaiety” as “thoughtfulness-thoughtlessness in relation to life”. As for the outside, a cheerfully smiling Schultz is sitting at Prokhorov's samovar against the backdrop of coffins leaning against the walls and calmly drinking tea.

In the story there is another named character of the first plan, the function of which, at the initial perception, is not clear to students. This is a watchman - a Chukhonian Yurko. Together with Prokhorov and Schultz, he forms a kind of semantic “triangle”. Is he opposed to the protagonist or, on the contrary, correlated with him? Great events are happening around, the life of the capital city is going on, and Yurko spends his days at his booth. The historical events of Moscow pass by. This exclusion from historical events, from the life of the city - the same immutability, because nothing can change his life: he is always next to his booth, like Adrian next to the coffins.

But how are the characters different? Pushkin has no characters duplicating each other. The heroes, as we said, form a “triangle”, that is, they are all comparable and opposed at the same time. Let us once again pay attention to the fact that Adrian, unlike Yurko, who is satisfied with everything in life, intuitively feels the absurdity of hopelessness, joylessness, and the inferiority of his existence. Therefore, he is gloomy and thoughtful. He has a need to see the perspective of life, its dynamics, which should destroy the immutability of being, that is, designate the meaning and meaning of further existence. In this case, the invitation to the housewarming party of the dead is Prokhorov's "rebellion". “Why is my craft not more honest than others?” - “…is the undertaker the brother of the executioner?..” What are we talking about here? About the dignity of human existence, no less.

The story of what is happening in reality is replaced by an image of what is happening in a dream. But how does it change? Imperceptibly. What is the meaning of the invisibility of such a transition? Why is it necessary for the author that the reader of this work for the first time cannot distinguish reality from sleep until the very end?

The earliest "epigraph" to Boldino's works of 1830 was the poem "Demons". Maybe in it we will find the key to the answer to the question asked?

Are there situations in the poem on the verge of reality and illusion? (“What is there in the field?” - “Who knows them? a stump or a wolf?”; Do they bury a brownie, // Do they marry a witch?) Before us is not just a specific image of a snowstorm, a description of events - we have an image inner world man, where can be what's in real life impossible.

What is the role of the fantastic in the poem about demons and in the story about the appearance of the dead? The incomprehensible, unknown in Pushkin does not belong to the outer world, but to the world of the “inner man” and is another key to understanding the nature of the image-character. This fantasy is not fiction as such, but a method of depicting the inner essence, psychology, character of the hero. What is the source of the supposed joy in Hadrian's dream? Adrian is waiting for a "joyful event" - the death of a profitable client, the merchant Tryukhina. But, having come true in a dream, the desire does not bring him joy, but becomes just a household detail, everyday chores. This means that profit and profit are not the defining components in the life of the hero. One more detail should be paid attention to, which also casts doubt on acquisitiveness as the main feature of the character. Not forgetting his own benefit, Adrian, however, does not pace like other merchants on Razgulay near Tryukhina, like a raven that smells a dead body. What for merchants is the joy of gain, for Prokhorov is rather the usual chores of a coffin master.

What is his meeting with dead acquaintances? How does the character feel here? What is the point of talking to the skeleton? What is awakening like? On the one hand, hope and ghostly joy from a profitable order disappear. But they are suddenly replaced by ... a new joy. What is she in? Ghost or real? It is a burst of joy in the light of the sun of living life.

The “gloomy” hero at the beginning of the story becomes “overjoyed” at the end. And this is dynamics. “Oh is it! - said the overjoyed undertaker... Well, if so, let's have some tea call your daughters." A failed funeral does not cause any annoyance or irritation. The result is a bright major splash. Thus, there is a refutation of the initial situation, a denial of the immobility and hopelessness of existence. This means that at the heart of a person's character is not money-grubbing, not a cynical attitude towards the world and people. The hidden dominant of the story is an urgent need for joy. It carries the designation of the obligatory awakening of a person to life, the desire to enjoy, to be a full-fledged participant in being.

Why is this shown by Pushkin in the life story of some undertaker? Pushkin emphasizes that the desire for the joy of life is inherent in any person, that everyone in this world is self-sufficient and worthy of respect. A “small” person in terms of social status is not at all such in terms of spirituality: both Adrian Prokhorov, and Samson Vyrin from The Stationmaster, and other heroes of Pushkin declare their right to ordinary well-being and dignity, understood in a direct, narrower sense - to feel like a man next to the powerful of this world, and more broadly - to be a man in his own eyes.

Will something change in the life of the undertaker from the moment of awakening? Outwardly, perhaps, everything will remain as before, but “internally” the hero is already different. The word “thinking” means the work of thought, the search for the meaning of life. “Thoughtfully”, a person instinctively “anticipates” another, more interesting side of being. Awakening from a nightmare, the hero of this new life he feels that he receives - for the first time in many years - the joy of his being in the world, of communicating with other people.

What unites the story "The Undertaker" with other works of the "Belkin" cycle? Ultimately, this is a question that concludes Pushkin's main conceptual idea - about a person's place in life, about happiness, honor and dignity.

As mentioned above, the next story after The Undertaker was the story The Stationmaster. Comparison of characters and the question: what is the connection between these two stories? - can be homework for the next lesson.

With a variety of topics, the cycle of "Tales" is endowed with a single meaning. Already in the first story of the cycle "The Undertaker" - the idea is affirmed that the life of the smallest person, in some ways even an outcast among fellow artisans, can be given against the background of cosmic existence (an epigraph from Derzhavin). The question of the life and death of a person, the value of life, was raised by Pushkin on a large scale and deeply both in The Shot, and in The Snowstorm, and in The Stationmaster, and in The Young Lady-Peasant Woman.

In September 1830, Pushkin arrived at his father's estate in Boldino. Here he finished the last chapters of Onegin, wrote several scenes and tragedies, about thirty poems and "five prose stories", which he reported in a letter to Pletnev. "Tales of Belkin" (his first creation in prose) Pushkin wrote with pleasure and enthusiasm, "experiencing joy from inspiration." In the stories created in September-October, one could feel the maturity of the talent, the strength and inner freedom of the writer. This quality of the works was immediately noted by his contemporaries. Pushkin wrote that Baratynsky "neighed and struggled" while reading them, and Kuchelbeker admitted that he laughed "from a good heart" and wished their author knew that his works "dispelled the blues of his unfortunate friend."

"Five stories"

Even not the deepest analysis of Belkin's Tales will allow us to notice that the author spoke with a smile and good humor about post-Decembrist Russia and ordinary people, their hopes, disappointments, suffering, everyday petty tragedies and comic adventures. Pushkin refused authorship and gave it to Ivan Petrovich Belkin, a retired officer, a meek, kind young man. Interested in belles-lettres at his leisure, Belkin collected these “simple” stories from various storytellers and processed them at his own discretion. Thus, the real author of these stories is hidden behind a double chain of narrators, which gives him the freedom of narration, the opportunity for satire and parody, and allows him to express his attitude towards them.

A full analysis of Belkin's Tales shows that the stories included in the cycle are very entertaining. But not all of them are funny. The Belkin cycle includes five works. They are all different types, none of these stories is similar to the other. Some of these stories are serious and sad. So, “The Stationmaster” is a serious and a little sad story, “Snowstorm” and “The Young Lady-Peasant Woman” are partly playful, in “The Undertaker” there is also an irony that affects typical Russian reality, and “Shot” is a romantic short story with a sharp plot and an unexpected ending. Let's talk about these stories in more detail.

"Shot"

Judging by the date of October 14, 1830, indicated by the author, this story was written one of the last in the Belkin Tale cycle. We begin our analysis of The Shot with the plot and compositional features of the work. Initially, the work consisted of one chapter and contained the life impressions of the author himself, up to autobiographical realities (Pushkin's duel with officer Zubov). The epigraph of the story "Shot" refers the reader to the work of Marlinsky "Shot at the bivouac", which contains the motif of "delayed shot". Having finished the work on October 12, the author attributed that the ending was lost. Only 2 days later Pushkin added the second chapter, repeating the composition of the first. Both chapters are built on the principle of a "mysterious novel".

In the first of them main character Silvio keeps a secret. In the second chapter, the author introduces new characters - the count and his wife, but the reader is waiting for the resolution of the mystery and he is not left with the feeling that between completely different people- the count and Silvio, there is some kind of connection. The mystery is revealed in the Count's insert story. Thus, the short story turns out to be compositionally complex: two different episodes, and inside each there is an additional story. The second prehistory continues the first. This construction of the work expands the temporal boundaries and creates plot tension. Further analysis of Belkin's Tales shows that the virtuoso construction of the story "The Shot" from different angles revealed the appearance of the protagonist. Although there are few actors, the work seems "densely populated" because it depicts different social worlds.

"Blizzard"

The next work of "Belkin's Tales", the analysis of which we will begin with plot and compositional features, is the story "Snowstorm". The plot is based on a curious incident - the unforeseen marriage of a young military man to a provincial girl. For him, this is a fun adventure, for a girl - the collapse of the first love. The two storylines converge at the end of the work. The story begins with a small exposition, which describes the life of one estate. A poor warrant officer appears, who cannot count on the hand of the daughter of the owner of the estate. They correspond for a long time and decide to get married in secret. On the way, the ensign got into a snowstorm and got to the church only in the morning. Meanwhile, the hussar Burmin, who was passing by, decided to play a joke and, introducing himself as the groom of a girl who was very ill at that time and noticed the “substitution” of the groom only after the wedding, got married to her and left to serve.

For several years, the girl rejects all suitors and then a handsome colonel appears. Marya Gavrilovna liked him, but he could not marry her. He has a wife, but he does not know her name or the name of the estate where she lives. Burmin tells an amazing story about how a few years ago he joked with an unfamiliar girl. Marya Gavrilovna's exclamation "So it was you!" speaks of a happy ending to this story. The story can be conditionally divided into two parts: "Maria Gavrilovna and Vladimir", "Maria Gavrilovna and Burmin". Each has its own "highlight". The beauty of the construction of this story once again emphasizes the genius of its author, who unmistakably found a formula that could express his intention. Irony permeates the whole story, as does the next work of Belkin's Tales - The Undertaker, an analysis of which is presented below.

"Undertaker"

The plot of the story resembles romantic works, but it tells far from romantic things, but about typical Russian reality. Compositionally, the story "The Undertaker" is divided into two parts. The first tells about the move of the protagonist and his acquaintance with the neighbors. The second tells about the dreams of the undertaker, where he is visited by the dead deceived by him. The main character is saved only by awakening. The work ends the same as it begins - family chores. In the strangest of the five stories, the author talks about the fear of death.

Maybe that's why I'm ugly main character that coffins are placed in his house. The silver wedding celebration even offers a toast to the health of the dead. Isn't the undertaker living at their expense? He is so grateful to them that he even invites them to a feast in his sleep. When meeting with his first dead man, who has already turned into a skeleton, the undertaker goes numb with horror and his legs give way. After all, even he deceived him, passing off a pine coffin for an oak one. As the analysis of Belkin's Tales shows, Pushkin in this work shows what shocks a person needs to go through in order to stop living by deceit. As V. Gippius noted, the "charm" of this work is not only in the "sober" truth, "but also in the sober irony."

In the cycle, the work “The Stationmaster” stands somewhat apart. The story is close in its poetics to sentimentalism. This is evidenced by the character of the hero and an unusual ending, both mournful and happy. But the theme of the little man, which the author raises, distinguishes the work from traditional sentimental stories. Here, although there is no direct evil, the grief of the protagonist does not become less from this. On the contrary, it takes on a tragic character. There are no negative characters here, they are all good in their own way - the caretaker, and Dunya, and the hussars. But that didn't stop the disaster from happening.

By its nature, the work is not accusatory, but epic. It shows a deep philosophical view the author on the life and wisdom of a great artist. Throughout the work, the reader unfolds the tragedy of a man who does not bow to fate and tries to save his daughter. Unable to change or influence the course of events, the old caretaker descends into the grave from the realization of his own impotence. And the happy ending of the story (after all, Dunya is doing well) further emphasizes the tragedy that has played out before the reader. In the last "forgive" of the daughter are pain, remorse and suffering.

"Young lady-peasant"

The story is based on the romantic relationship between Alexei and Lisa. They are the children of landlords who are at enmity with each other, but then reconciled. There is no trace of romantic poetics in the story. Everything is simple here - heroes, love, and the atmosphere of village life. "The Young Lady-Peasant Woman" is an easy, cheerful story with a happy ending. It is built on a real-life basis. Meanwhile, this playful, Christmas story is quite serious in its meaning. The protagonist of the work is ready to step over the social prejudices imposed on him. title of nobility and marry a peasant woman. Their exposure and denial is the main idea of ​​the work.

Concluding the analysis of Belkin's Tales, it should be noted that they became a turning point in the history of fiction. The main feature of these works is the simplicity and brevity of presentation. The author avoids unnecessary embellishments and does not explain the actions of his characters. But the brilliant Pushkin always guesses how this or that character should act (due to social skills or individual qualities). Therefore, the reader feels the truth and sees real people.

>Compositions based on The Undertaker

the main idea

The story "The Undertaker" was written by A. S. Pushkin in 1830 in the village of Bolshoe Boldino and entered the cycle of "Tales of the late Ivan Petrovich Belkin." This is one of the most original stories in terms of plot and composition. The story of the undertaker begins with a description of the main character and his way of life. In fact, the undertaker Adrian Prokhorov is the only character in the work that the author describes.

This is a gloomy and gloomy resident of Moscow, who moved with the whole family to a new house and is trying to equip his life. Adrian's main concern is to quickly receive an order from the relatives of deceased people, in order to get ahead of the competition. It would seem that there is nothing unusual in his craft. He, like everyone else, earns money by doing his job. However, as the plot develops, it becomes clear that for him people are not people, but potential coffin fillers. The death of others became life for him.

One circumstance makes everything clear. During a feast at a neighbor's on the occasion of a silver wedding, all artisan guests offer to drink for their customers. Adrian alone has no one to drink to, because his clients are long dead. The guests of the feast make fun of this topic, which greatly offends the undertaker. Returning home drunk and angry, he tells his worker Aksinya that he intends to invite his former clients, that is, the dead, to the housewarming instead of the neighbors. Adrian pays no attention to Aksinya's persuasion to change his mind and cross himself.

As a result, he has a dream in which the dead came to visit him - those people for whom he made coffins. In one of them he recognizes the foreman who was buried during the pouring rain; in another - a retired sergeant of the guard - Pyotr Petrovich Kurilkin. From fear, he loses consciousness, and waking up the next morning, he realizes that it was just a dream. Resentment against the neighbors is quickly forgotten, and the hero's mental balance is restored.

It remains only to understand for what purpose the author portrayed a person of just such a profession. The main emphasis in the story is on the gloomy and gloomy character of Adrian Prokhorov. Perhaps that is why Pushkin chose such a gloomy craft for his hero. Even the epigraph to the work is chosen in accordance with the content. In my opinion, the author wanted to show that any person has an inherent desire to enjoy life. It doesn't matter if he's an undertaker or a shoemaker. Even the “smallest” person in terms of social status deserves respect and understanding.

Evgenia Safonova,
Petra-Dubravska school,
Samara Region

Written on Nizhny Novgorod land

On the meaning of Pushkin's story "The Undertaker"

Pushkin's prose is widely represented in modern school programs. Along with the textbook "The Captain's Daughter", "Dubrovsky", "The Queen of Spades" are included in the study and "Belkin's Tale". There is no way to dwell in detail on the history of their readership and critical perception, but nevertheless, one cannot but note a very characteristic moment. Even a cursory glance reveals a very peculiar temporal sequence of inclusion of Pushkin's stories in the reader's circle of perception. The most actively studied and studied at school most often are three, and even autonomously taken: "Station Master", "Shot" and "Snowstorm". At the lesson, limiting himself to talking about individual works, voluntarily or involuntarily, the teacher and the entire cycle reduced to their content and meaning, sometimes only mentioning the rest. Sometimes the “Shot” was replaced by another story of the cycle - “The Young Lady-Peasant Woman”. As for The Undertaker, it turned out to be the most closed work for school study and, as a result, much less “read”. A serious objective reason for the "rejection" of the fifth story from the study of the entire cycle at school is the difficulty of its perception. More L.N. Tolstoy very accurately noted, while studying with Yasnaya Polyana students, the striking and difficult for direct perception features of The Undertaker they read: “the author’s frivolous attitude to faces”; “comic characteristics”; "understatement".

What to do? Is it possible to talk about the conceptual study of Belkin's Tales, ignoring the story "The Undertaker"? Creating five extremely dissimilar (in terms of subject matter, in style) stories, Pushkin combined them into a cycle, thereby revealing their integrity, closeness in spirit.

The Undertaker was written first (September 9, 1830), thus setting the direction for the entire cycle. As a result, he took the middle place in the cycle, becoming between the Snowstorm and the Stationmaster. Thus, the question arises about the creative logic of the movement of the author's thought, which cannot be comprehended without including the story "The Undertaker" in the school study.

When reading a work, certain images, especially when reading intermittently, usually evoke certain thoughts in the reader - such thoughts are natural and do not kill the emotionality of perception. Let's ask the students to fix the questions that arise in the course of self-acquaintance with the text in the left column of the notebook. And on the right, write down your answer options, if any appeared during further reading. A literary text that is difficult to perceive simply needs such work. The homework system should be built in such a way that the main block is prepared for the lesson, and not after the lesson, so that students learn to ask questions themselves and look for answers in the text, so that the teacher analyzes written works in advance and builds work on the analysis of a work of art on the basis of them in the lesson . Empathy deepens when what students are interested in on their own is further developed in the lesson. Then knowledge becomes necessary for the students themselves and gives rise to new questions.

One student without special training will start a conversation about the main character in the lesson. It’s not scary if, at the same time, you talk about the character as if it were a real person you just met. When revealing the initial perception, a naive-realistic approach is quite justified.

Imagine a literary hero as your friend, the writer introduced you to him, showing him in different circumstances and from different angles. Let's talk about it now: how do you imagine it? How is it unusual or, conversely, common? Why did Pushkin decide to offer readers the image of the undertaker Adrian Prokhorov? What is the secret of this character?

For what purpose, in your opinion, is the hero-undertaker presented by Pushkin? Either to study the representative of this profession, or to have fun, or even to capture the author's own gloomy state of health at the time of writing. What is the mood of the story? What brings a dark note to the beginning of the story?

The leading motive of the narrative is an indication of the gloomy nature of Adrian Prokhorov, his gloom. A gloomy note is also introduced by the character's craft. The epigraph to the story also tunes in on her. In Pushkin, epigraphs always have a special semantic role that organizes the whole. . “Do not we see every day the coffins, the gray hairs of the decrepit universe”- words from Derzhavin's "Waterfall".

Do you think the style of the epigraph correlates with the general style of the story? The lofty, solemn sound of lines from Derzhavin, their cosmic philosophy, on the one hand, and an insignificant farce from the life of a Moscow undertaker, on the other. Contrast or combination?

The contrast seems to be the lofty style of the epigraph against the background of the initial, deliberately reduced phrase about the undertaker's luggage, heaped onto the funeral urns. It is clear that death does not cause special feelings in the hero for a long time. Irony sounds in the description of the sign, “Depicting a portly (!) Cupid (!) ... with the caption: “Here simple and painted coffins are sold and upholstered, they are also rented (!) And old ones (!) Are repaired””. Is all this a clear inconsistency with the epigraph? Maybe the author deliberately puts his “low” hero face to face with the eternal questions of being? After all, they stand not before the elect, but before any mortal. How does a person understand his purpose in life? Does he care about meaning?

Pushkin's humanism is revealed in the fact that any person in the world is a part of the universality and truth of the universe. The author of the story "The Undertaker" offers to see in an ordinary person something more, significant (while not making the hero better, not embellishing the character). Combining the universal scale of death in the epigraph and the everyday, comic story with the "dead" in the story itself, Pushkin establishes a system of relations: life-death, being-life. Pushkin again poses questions to readers. What is the meaning of life? How to achieve happiness, what is it? Is it possible to call the hero an "ordinary" person? What does a “simple” person dream about? Thus, the writer, opening Belkin's world to readers, seems to open the doors, but not to the funeral master's shop, but to Russian life, to the circle of "eternal" questions and problems.

In order to understand the character of the hero and his role in the ideological direction of the story, let's choose the starting point, clearly indicated in the text, character trait of the image-character and try to develop it. Prokhorov's "gloominess" is that artistic detail, without which it is impossible to comprehend the story.

What is the reason for this darkness? How does it show up in the story? What underlies the character of the hero: a merchant's profit (someone else's death as a means of profit), a cynical attitude towards the world and people (calmly drinks tea on coffins placed in the room) or something else?

What could be a joyful event for this person? The move to a new place is long-awaited, but there is not a shadow of joy in the feelings of the hero: “Approaching the yellow house, which had so long seduced his imagination and finally bought by him for a decent sum, the old undertaker felt with surprise that his heart did not rejoice.”

Said as if in passing. But in fact, we have the key to the inner world of the hero. In the manuscript it was originally “pink house”. What associations arise in connection with this color? What did the author want to say by replacing the color? Yellow in the spectrum of Russian culture is believed to tend to express negative-negative meanings. Elegiac memories of the "dilapidated shack" is also a signal; It is no coincidence that Adrian's further reaction is even more difficult to explain: “felt With surprise This their indifference." Lack of joy is a serious symptom of a person's inner state. But “surprise” at this circumstance is already the beginning of a reaction that could lead to a number of serious changes in attitude to life. Is the stability of life always the key to contentment and success? What is the synonym for the word “stability” here? The immobility, the immutability of life is a kind of non-existence elevated to the absolute. The "gloominess" of the undertaker is not just an attribute of the profession. Next to “gloominess” there is “thoughtfulness” in the text: the hero "gloomy and thoughtful", "as usual ... immersed in sad reflections." There is a certain chain of transitions: gloomy–sullen–frowning–pensive.

What is the reason for the hero's thoughtfulness? What is he dissatisfied with in life?

Let's compare Adrian Prokhorov with other characters in the story. “Merry” Schultz is the antipode of “gloomy” Adrian. Why do we put keywords in quotation marks? How should they be understood in the context of the work?

In the “gloom” of Prokhorov lies dissatisfaction with life, ripening, as we will see later, protest. The following opposition is being created: “gloominess-gaiety” as “thoughtfulness-thoughtlessness in relation to life”. As for the outside, a cheerfully smiling Schultz is sitting at Prokhorov's samovar against the backdrop of coffins leaning against the walls and calmly drinking tea.

In the story there is another named character of the first plan, the function of which, at the initial perception, is not clear to students. This is a watchman - a Chukhonian Yurko. Together with Prokhorov and Schultz, he forms a kind of semantic “triangle”. Is he opposed to the protagonist or, on the contrary, correlated with him? Great events are happening around, the life of the capital city is going on, and Yurko spends his days at his booth. The historical events of Moscow pass by. This exclusion from historical events, from the life of the city - the same immutability, because nothing can change his life: he is always next to his booth, like Adrian next to the coffins.

But how are the characters different? Pushkin has no characters duplicating each other. The heroes, as we said, form a “triangle”, that is, they are all comparable and opposed at the same time. Let us once again pay attention to the fact that Adrian, unlike Yurko, who is satisfied with everything in life, intuitively feels the absurdity of hopelessness, joylessness, and the inferiority of his existence. Therefore, he is gloomy and thoughtful. He has a need to see the perspective of life, its dynamics, which should destroy the immutability of being, that is, designate the meaning and meaning of further existence. In this case, the invitation to the housewarming party of the dead is Prokhorov's "rebellion". “Why is my craft not more honest than others?” - “…is the undertaker the brother of the executioner?..” What are we talking about here? About the dignity of human existence, no less.

The story of what is happening in reality is replaced by an image of what is happening in a dream. But how does it change? Imperceptibly. What is the meaning of the invisibility of such a transition? Why is it necessary for the author that the reader of this work for the first time cannot distinguish reality from sleep until the very end?

The earliest "epigraph" to Boldino's works of 1830 was the poem "Demons". Maybe in it we will find the key to the answer to the question asked?

Are there situations in the poem on the verge of reality and illusion? (“What is there in the field?” - “Who knows them? a stump or a wolf?”; Do they bury a brownie, // Do they marry a witch?) Before us is not just a specific image of a snowstorm, a description of events - we have before us an image of the inner world of a person, where there may be something that is impossible in real life.

What is the role of the fantastic in the poem about demons and in the story about the appearance of the dead? The incomprehensible, unknown in Pushkin does not belong to the outer world, but to the world of the “inner man” and is another key to understanding the nature of the image-character. This fantasy is not fiction as such, but a method of depicting the inner essence, psychology, character of the hero. What is the source of the supposed joy in Hadrian's dream? Adrian is waiting for a "joyful event" - the death of a profitable client, the merchant Tryukhina. But, having come true in a dream, the desire does not bring him joy, but becomes just a household detail, everyday chores. This means that profit and profit are not the defining components in the life of the hero. One more detail should be paid attention to, which also casts doubt on acquisitiveness as the main feature of the character. Not forgetting his own benefit, Adrian, however, does not pace like other merchants on Razgulay near Tryukhina, like a raven that smells a dead body. What for merchants is the joy of gain, for Prokhorov is rather the usual chores of a coffin master.

What is his meeting with dead acquaintances? How does the character feel here? What is the point of talking to the skeleton? What is awakening like? On the one hand, hope and ghostly joy from a profitable order disappear. But they are suddenly replaced by ... a new joy. What is she in? Ghost or real? It is a burst of joy in the light of the sun of living life.

The “gloomy” hero at the beginning of the story becomes “overjoyed” at the end. And this is dynamics. “Oh is it! - said the overjoyed undertaker... Well, if so, let's have some tea call your daughters." A failed funeral does not cause any annoyance or irritation. The result is a bright major splash. Thus, there is a refutation of the initial situation, a denial of the immobility and hopelessness of existence. This means that at the heart of a person's character is not money-grubbing, not a cynical attitude towards the world and people. The hidden dominant of the story is an urgent need for joy. It carries the designation of the obligatory awakening of a person to life, the desire to enjoy, to be a full-fledged participant in being.

Why is this shown by Pushkin in the life story of some undertaker? Pushkin emphasizes that the desire for the joy of life is inherent in any person, that everyone in this world is self-sufficient and worthy of respect. A “small” person in terms of social status is not at all such in terms of spirituality: both Adrian Prokhorov, and Samson Vyrin from The Stationmaster, and other heroes of Pushkin declare their right to ordinary well-being and dignity, understood in a direct, narrower sense - to feel like a man next to the powerful of this world, and more broadly - to be a man in his own eyes.

Will something change in the life of the undertaker from the moment of awakening? Outwardly, perhaps, everything will remain as before, but “internally” the hero is already different. The word “thinking” means the work of thought, the search for the meaning of life. “Thoughtfully”, a person instinctively “anticipates” another, more interesting side of being. Having awakened from a nightmare, the hero feels this new life, he receives - for the first time in many years - the joy of his stay in the world, from communicating with other people.

What unites the story "The Undertaker" with other works of the "Belkin" cycle? Ultimately, this is a question that concludes Pushkin's main conceptual idea - about a person's place in life, about happiness, honor and dignity.

As mentioned above, the next story after The Undertaker was the story The Stationmaster. Comparison of characters and the question: what is the connection between these two stories? - can be homework for the next lesson.

With a variety of topics, the cycle of "Tales" is endowed with a single meaning. Already in the first story of the cycle "The Undertaker" - the idea is affirmed that the life of the smallest person, in some ways even an outcast among fellow artisans, can be given against the background of cosmic existence (an epigraph from Derzhavin). The question of the life and death of a person, the value of life, was raised by Pushkin on a large scale and deeply both in The Shot, and in The Snowstorm, and in The Stationmaster, and in The Young Lady-Peasant Woman.

The story "The Undertaker" is one of the five "Tales of the late Ivan Petrovich Belkin", written in 1830 in the so-called Boldin autumn. Pushkin published them anonymously, because they were very different from the usual romantic stories and marked the beginning of a new direction - realism. The story "The Undertaker" was written first. Preparing the story for publication, Pushkin made The Undertaker the third in a row.

The writer introduces the image of the narrator Belkin, who is not identical to the person himself

Pushkin. In each story, the thirty-year-old Pushkin searches for the meaning of human existence.

Issues

The Undertaker is the strangest of Pushkin's five stories. Solving the problem of the fear of death, Pushkin depicts a hero who constantly encounters it. Laughter in the face of death is a person's defensive reaction to the frightening unknown. From the very first sentence, the main problem is posed: how does a person who daily observes death live?

Does it change a person? Is Adrian gloomy because he has coffins in his kitchen and living room?

Tied to the toast at the silver wedding of Schultz's cobbler neighbor

Another problem with the story. One of the guests offers to drink to the health of the dead. If the undertaker lives at the expense of the dead, can he rejoice in the death of a person, profit from it? The Undertaker is so grateful to his dead, whose funeral he became rich, that he even invites them to a feast.

When the dead come to him (in a dream), Adrian's legs give way. The horror reaches its extreme point when the undertaker meets with his first deceased - retired guard sergeant Pyotr Petrovich Kurilkin, who has turned into a skeleton (as if the saying “the smoking room is alive, alive”) comes to life. The undertaker even buried his first deceased dishonestly, selling him a pine coffin as if it were oak.

What upheavals must a person go through in order to stop living a lie?

Heroes of the story

Undertaker Adrian is the main character of the story. Despite the housewarming in the long-desired yellow house, the undertaker is sad. His whole life is full of anxiety. He worries whether the heirs of the dying merchant Tryukhina will call another undertaker.

And his profit is dishonest, as his dreams speak of. In the first dream, the undertaker dreamed that the merchant Tryukhina had died after all. The undertaker promised to take care of everything and not take too much, but at the same time he exchanged a meaningful look with the clerk, that is, he was just about to take too much.

The hero has two daughters, brought up in strictness, who do not suffer at all from the sinister profession of their father. There are many episodic characters in the story: the shoemaker Schultz, who invited the undertaker and his family to visit, the Chukhon guard Yurko, who invited the undertaker to drink to the health of the dead, the skeleton of the retired sergeant Kurilkin. The last two heroes push the undertaker to awaken his conscience, but the outcome remains unknown.

Genre

The Undertaker is part of the Belkin Tales series. In Pushkin's time, a story was what we call a story today: a small prose work with a small number of characters, telling about one event in one storyline. So from the point of view of modern literary criticism, “The Undertaker” is a story.

In the middle of the 19th century mystical themes followed by awakening were common.

Plot and composition

The story "The Undertaker" can be conditionally divided into two parts: the first tells about the undertaker's move, meeting his neighbor and celebrating his silver wedding. Everyone there got quite drunk and drank to the health of those they work for.

The second part is the undertaker's dreams. The first, about the death and burial of the merchant Tryukhina, is very realistic. Both the reader and the undertaker perceive it as life. The undertaker dreams that after a tiring day of the merchant's funeral, he returns home.

And here begins the second part of the dream, phantasmagoric: all the dead people buried by him (and deceived) come to the undertaker. Only awakening saves him from death. The attack of the dead is the moment of the highest tension, the climax. The exposition is a story about the move, the development of the action is a cobbler's feast, the undertaker's dreams, the denouement is a happy awakening.

In the ring composition, everything ends the same as it began - family chores. All mystical warnings are forgotten.

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