The story of the undertaker
The story “The Undertaker” was written on September 9 . It was told to the author by clerk B.V. The writer tells in detail about the housewarming party of the undertaker Andrian Prokhorov. The hero moved with his daughters to Nikitskaya Street with Basmannaya, he immediately opened a funeral shop. Soon he is invited to visit by his neighbor Gottlieb Schultz, a German by birth. During the celebration, one of those who came offers to raise a glass to those who earn money in the process of work. He offers Prokhorov to “drink to the health of the dead.”
This attitude greatly angered the main character. He promised to invite the dead people he served to his housewarming party. After some time, Andrian prepared the deceased woman for the funeral. Upon returning home late at night, he saw a man at the gate whom he invited into the house. It was the late foreman.
Entering the home, the undertaker sees the people who were buried by him. Here P.P. Kurilkin appears, from whom only a skeleton remained at the funeral... At this moment, Prokhorov wakes up and realizes that everything that happened was just a bad dream . The story remains unfinished; the reader has the opportunity to finish it on his own.
Literary circle "Belkin"
All events are not fictitious. All similarities between the characters and living people are preserved for history. Please consider coincidences with real events in the past and present not a coincidence, and take them to heart.
Stories from Belkin
Prehistory
One day Lyudmila P-va decided to collect the rent for the room she was renting out: all the deadlines had passed. She knocked on the door and broke in, but the tenant didn’t open it. Then she and her husband opened the lock, and there was a note on the table: “Don’t wait for dinner, there’s no money, it’s very cold in Russia, I’ll pirate at home for now. Write: Somalia, coast. Your friend, Dudur." Lyudmila read it, cried, but there was nothing to do - she sat down to write to Dudur. Since then she has been writing constantly.
Once Ira K-kh was sitting in Uncle Petya’s old rusty Zaporozhets and remembering her youth and the yard. Suddenly, from behind, someone hugged my chest and whispered languid words in my ear. The stranger smelled of cheap 777 port. “Uncle Petya,” Ira guessed from the fumes. - Maybe you can read poetry? - Uncle suggested, touching his hand to the secret. “Go away,” Ira shouted to him. - Otherwise I’ll write about you somewhere. And she wrote. Since then, no one has seen Uncle Petya, but Ira constantly writes and writes and...
Natalya Ya-y had her own house in the fraternal republic and two children. She got up at first light, fed Borka, milked Zorka, poured millet into a bowl for the chickens, poured milk from a jug for the children - she spun around all day. One day, towards evening, a guy walked past the fence. Natalya looked at the strong, confident step of the visiting projectionist and missed the moment - she was pecked painfully by a black chicken. "What am I doing here?" - flashed in Natalya’s head. Hobbling, she caught up with the guy, left her husband, took the children, moved to the outskirts of the big city, and gave birth to a son. She had a great goal - to become a star!
Since childhood, Ira M-ko was taught that it is ugly for girls to swear. Ira learned everything right away. But it happened that in Irina’s presence the attending doctors uttered a new and indecent word for a girl’s ear. Ira reprimanded them, to which the doctors only tightened the straitjacket on Ira and continued to express themselves. When the doctors stopped coming and the injections were cancelled, Ira quickly found the reason for their swearing - a book forgotten by one of the patients with the frightening title “Fornication and Mudo”. “What the hell!” Ira exclaimed after reading it. A month later, Ira was discharged. Since then, she has been reading quickly, swearing well, and dreams of writing the book “The Thing of Yebudo.”
Oleg Z-v was sitting without money. The grandfather who rented the apartment to him doubled the price. Zhuchka, my grandfather's dog, pissed all over the hallway, and the rented refrigerator was filled with some kind of rot so that all the local mosquitoes flocked to the stench. Waving them off, Oleg accidentally pressed the remote control button and the TV turned on. The shiny face of the writer Dmitry Bykov flashed on the screen. “It’s good for them writers - they’re fattening,” Oleg thought and decided to become a writer.
The hang glider carried Kostya Mr. straight to the high voltage. The steering rod of the vehicle is jammed. Kostya’s whole life flashed before Kostya’s eyes: his native Ukrainian village, the Buryak people, the villages with watermelons, his native Verkhovyna state farm, and his wife Lesya with her one-year-old daughter in her arms. “Lord,” Kostya prayed, “Save and preserve!” Don't let your child die! If I’m alive, I’ll go to Moscow State University, give birth to a son, become a writer and... and... I’ll give up flying!” Kostya didn’t get on the wires. He sank firmly to the ground - he had to fulfill his promise.
Alla L-yu learned to read and write early. Already from the first grade, she bombarded teachers with her essays. The stories were about hot summer, lush June meadows, birds and love. While the girl was little, the teachers were touched by her stories and praised her, but Alla grew up, and the stories did not change, which irritated the teachers to fury. More and more often, Alla heard criticism addressed to her, more and more they poked her nose with Pushkin and Tolstoy. By the end of school, she already had a pseudonym and a strong desire to stand on a par with Belinsky or Dobrolyubov.
Once Igor Shn stood at the machine printing photographs and thought: “Well, I have a job - I’ll press the button, send it to print, and the machine – slap-slap, stamps and stamps. No physical or moral effort for me. Not life, but some kind of stencil. Tracing paper. Solid stamp” Then the receptionist turned to Igor and began to write down his order in a notebook. “At least this guy is somehow exerting himself, he’s at least writing,” thought Igor. I thought and thought and also decided to write everything down.
Life in Marina V's house has changed since she took on a lodger, a woman of no particular age, but with a massive overhanging forehead. The tenant carefully hid her name, but strictly followed order. Cleaned the carpet, swept away the dust, handed over EVERYTHING! empty bottles accumulated by Marina over the year. The money from the sale of glass containers was enough for a computer and even left over for the Internet. “Write, write, otherwise it’s all done with a pen, like in the old days,” the lodger admonished Marina. - Yes, and in general - stop drinking like that. You have a talent. If you come around, I’ll introduce you to mine. His name is Pasha. Marina was afraid of the tenant, and she really wanted to see Pasha, so she obeyed, sat down at the computer and began to write.
Yuri S. was caught selling his pictures at the “Juice-Water-Beer” kiosk. First in the police, and then in court, he spent a long time proving that he wrote them himself. Oil. In response, the lawyers only laughed and repeated: writers write, and artists draw, and they gave him such a fine that he lost the desire to draw for a long time. But Yuri figured out how to get around the law. He started writing texts and now, when they took him away, he boldly said that he wrote it - and shoved his verses under the judge’s nose. True, the fine grew from time to time.
Ira I-na had already been flying for 3 hours from London to Goa. She cursed her life and the bottomless inheritance she inherited after her divorce from her third husband. “What can I do to kill time?” she thought. She looked at her neighbor, a gray-haired, bald old man, and was stunned. She recognized Woody Allen in the wrinkled, skeletal-looking figure, who in his best years would not have given him a hangover. A neighbor from the very airport was constantly typing something on his laptop. “I’ll talk,” thought Ira and began to talk. When the plane landed in Poaggi, V. Alen did not stop talking, and Ira, in order to remember everything, barely had time to write down after him. So she became a writer.
Once upon a time, in the Health magazine, Felix L-in saw a reproduction of a painting by Rembrandt’s Doctor Tulp, where men with musketeer beards eagerly look at a dead man. Soon after graduating, Felix became a gynecologist. Many years later. One day, while flipping through the pages of the Internet, Felix stared at Repin’s painting “Zaporozhye Cossacks writing a letter to the Turkish Sultan,” where cheerful men with naked, tanned and strong bodies took a lonely kobzar into a circle. Felix's imagination ran wild to such an extent that he imagined himself in the place of the writer. “They were free to do it!” - Felix thought and immediately decided - I’ll become a writer.
The famous Moscow editor Nina Shva was returning one day from the open air. The road went through the forest. She sometimes “dabbled” with sketches in the open air, thus nostalgic for the times of her carefree artistic youth. The muse often visited her in those years. The sketchbook weighed down pleasantly, but weighed heavily on my shoulder. Wanting to rest, Nina stopped and saw a squirrel on the trunk of a pine tree right in front of her nose. With her eyes bulging, the animal looked at Nina. I looked and looked - the squirrel at Nina, Nina at the squirrel. This would have gone on forever if the squirrel had not suddenly said: “Give.” Nina hiccupped in surprise and looked at her pocket. An acorn had been stored there since last summer. With shaking hands, Nina took out the fruit and handed it to the squirrel. The red-tailed creature instantly climbed onto Nina’s palm and, without allowing the benefactor to come to his senses, instantly bit Nina’s finger. So the editor had another wound and another idea was born.
Teacher and poet Alexey A-ov was sitting on a bench near Chistye Prudy, drinking beer and rhyming with the word “fucked up.” It turned out well. His wife, for the sake of saving money, sent him to Zhulebino for a head of cabbage and a bunch of radishes. Alexey has long been accustomed to deceiving his wife, buying everything in a nearby store, a step away from the house. He spent his free time writing rhymes and contemplating with beer. Suddenly, Nina Sh-va appeared before him, noisily and brightly. "I found! Eureka!" - Nina exclaimed and, like a truce after a battle, raised her finger, bandaged to the extreme, above her head. “Don’t pretend to be Archimedes!” - Alexei interrupted her impulse. Nina sat down on the bench and began to tell Alexey the incident with the talking squirrel. - Tell me, Nina, did this squirrel just say “give”? That's all? - Alexey asked. “No, she still bit,” confirmed Nina, poking a ball of bandage under the poet’s nose. - So you didn’t write anything? – Alexey whispered. “Nothing,” Nina answered in the same whisper. — Seeing a talking squirrel is very rare these days. I think we can work together, Nina. – Alexey summarized, presenting the editor with a bottle of Budweiser he had stored away.
Part 1. In the hollow
Despite his young age, Leonid had a poor memory. When sending their son to physics and mathematics courses, the parents strictly punished the guy: when you enter the house, don’t forget to say hello. While he was driving, he began to read. He stole the book (the nonsense of some American) from his older sister. While reading, he turned into the first ancient building with a beautiful twisted gate and went up to the third floor. - Can? – Lenya asked when he leaned against the oval table. - And who are you? – a bearded man with glasses turned to him. - Me..Me? - Leonid hesitated, trying to remember who he was and why he was here, but when he saw the book in his hands, he exclaimed: - I am a reader! “Thank God I’m not a writer,” the audience exhaled and accepted Leonid into their ranks.
Once Lada Ch-va turned to Denis S-vu with a request: - Tomorrow they will discuss me at Belkin, will you defend me if anything happens? “I’ll protect you,” Denis promised, beating his chest. Denis’s father never saw his four-barreled “Bee” submachine gun again.
One day Oleg Z-v sat and suffered. His brainchild, the Belkin site, has dropped to an unattainable depth in the rankings. Nobody visited the site, with the exception of 2-3 Belkinites. Just when he was thinking about whether I should leave the moderators, Denis knocked on the door. — Oleg, is it possible to post an announcement with such content on the website? - “whoever found an automatic knife with switchable self-guiding blades, please return it in order to avoid the unpredictable.” The next day, the site’s rating was higher than the presidential one. “Come to the circle more often, don’t forget us,” Oleg admonished Denis.
Kostya Mr. was gnawed by doubts: am I writing correctly? For the second year now, he was editing his story “Problems of the canopy during the dynamics of landing with a parachute on a potato field.” The text consisted of only 900 characters. The story had already been discussed 13 times, it seemed, at every literary meeting in Moscow, and yet it seemed far from ideal to Kostya. The author himself constantly found fault with the line of family relationships between the main character, the quiet and hard-working Kostya, and his wife, the homebody and house-builder Lyusya. Everything in their relationship was peaceful to the point of cloying ideality. Then Kostya Mr. decided: “Oh – it was-wasn’t-wasn’t!” “I’ll read the story to my wife, maybe she can give me some advice?” And he had just begun to read when a plate of dumplings flew at him. Catching dumplings in his mouth on the fly, Kostya finally realized that in the finale the hero must definitely get a divorce!
Former graduate student, linguist, and now associate professor of the Department of Public Speaking, Nadya G-na, somehow decided: I’m tired of not having a man - let me find myself a handsome one! And since beautiful people at that time were only found on the Internet, she wrote there. The most beautiful one was found in China, however, he turned out to be a handsome Russian-speaking Finn. But there is nothing to be done - at least someone was able to appreciate her love text adapted to the normative vocabulary. For a whole year, a friend fooled the girl - he promised to come and sign. However, he set a condition: if you learn to write letters so that I at least understand something, I will get married. But he never arrived...
Starting with Deacon Eremey, who served as a clerk in the executive chamber under Elizaveta Petrovna, everyone in Lyubov S’s family was a writer. Even the most recent relative also served as a proofreader in some regional newspaper. Lyuba was filled with pride: the family’s business is God’s will. She even signed up for membership in the Writers' Union. One problem - Lyuba did not like children. But such is the writer’s plan - Lyuba could write only for them.
Once Ira M-sh met Lera T-va and dragged her friend to the Opera club. They ate mousses, washed down scorching ratatouille with young Beaujolais, and Ira spent a long time telling Lera about her meeting with her teacher, an old Jewish woman named Gurvich. Lera was horrified, listening to the conditions in which the teachers lived, how much they received, and, in gratitude for the mental anguish, for the catharsis, she told Ira her impressions of the trip to India. A week later, Ira had already dashed off a text about an elephant, and Ler had written a story about the difficulties faced by teachers. A month later, the Opera club burned down.
Vladimir Ch-ov left the sports club in the evening. He needed a release, but as luck would have it, all the hooligans fled, like “Ours” at the sight of riot police. “It’s good that I pumped up my triceps today. Nice! I’ll go, maybe I’ll catch some scribbler, maybe he won’t run away? At least it won’t be so boring,” Vova dreamed.
Natalya Ya-na came to her husband’s room and said. “Give me the money,” he says. - Otherwise I don’t understand what I’m wearing. And I’m a writer! They look up to me. We writers must... “Shut up,” Natalya’s husband abruptly interrupted Natalya’s tirade, took out his wallet and began to unfasten one banknote at a time. Natalya went to the flea market and bought a monocle for 30,000 rubles, a powder compact for 20,000, a boa for 17,000 and a fan for 41,000 rubles. But the husband still owed Natalya another $3,000.
Ira M-ko loved children. I even got 2 of my own. But somehow I came to the house of creativity, saw Igor Sh-na’s child, and could not restrain myself. “Give me, let me play with him, cuddle him,” she begged Igor. “If you play, you’ll get it back, double the amount,” Igor joked. Ira, who had been taught to repay debts since childhood, “gave birth” to new children around Easter. Now, when guests come to Igor Sh-n, he takes them off the shelf and shows them to his friends. Boasts. And Ira is going to the camp site again - she loves children.
The artist Yuri S-in was looking for a model for the painting: to be a woman and to be beautiful. But fellow artists, knowing that Yura would not do anything other than sit and draw, refused. Then Yurin, a poet he knew, a certain Serge Bo, told his friend: “You’ve been driving around the literary studios.” The girls there are relaxed and glamorous. Maybe they'll give... pose? Yura walked around all the literary schools until he saw Fatima - a dark-haired, sultry brunette in the body, a graduate of the Literary School. And although Yuri was looking for a thin blonde, he agreed to Fatima. Very quickly the girl got bored of posing for Yuri - she didn’t like it when strawberries and cream were applied to the body with a brush. Since then, Yuri has been drawing little, but hanging around more and more in circles - looking for his ideal.
The big-faced tenant kept her word - she brought Marina V-to and Pasha together. - So this is Felix! – exclaimed the deceived Marina, pointing at Pasha. Her disappointment knew no bounds. That same day, she kicked out the tenant and sat down at the computer to cry out her resentment. It turned out to be a story. Good. But the number of bottles in the corridor quickly grew.
Once Lera T-va brought a huge cake for discussion. The calculation was correct - by the evening everyone would be hungry, they would attack, and no one would criticize. Lera believed in people. And so it happened. For some reason, it was hard for all the “Belkinites” to eat cake and discuss Leroux. They choked and gently chided Lera for the text. They talked, but the cake got stuck in the throat, not allowing the words to come out. But Yura S-in accidentally intercepted lunch from another Fatima. He said everything for everyone. Even for Natalya. Since then, the circle members have not eaten cake, and no one has seen Leroux.
Tanya Ch-aya was tired, and the plans also included distributing all the Belkinites, all the Veelkites into rooms at the rest house, so that they wouldn’t get too drunk or quarrel. “Why did I go to this institute? – Tanya thought, “after all, there is one higher thing, but where else?” I won't write anything anyway. And how to pass the exam? Or maybe - well, them! Let them do whatever they want?” When two years ago, a professor at the Institute of Psychiatry named after. Serbsky called Tanya to his office when he tried to convince her that the institute’s patients were not willing to do her future dissertation, that the real “material” was concentrated exclusively in Literature, Tanya believed it, and entered higher literary courses at the state expense. She was ready for anything (2 years in Kashchenko is not a pound of raisins!), but Lit-t sucked her dry. —Are you writing everything? – Volodya Ch-va’s head appeared in the doorway. - Give it up. Let's go into the yard and play role-playing games - it's spring! “It’s begun!” Tanya thought, sighed tiredly, and reached for a phenazepam tablet.
Once, having read Gorky, Proust, and Homer, Nikolai K-ko scribbled down a text, approached the famous poet and teacher Alexei A-vu with it and handed him a two-volume book. “Read at your leisure,” he winked slyly. “Okay,” the poet looked at him unkindly, and went to look for leisure. He knew that Kolya would not let you down, but 2 (two) volumes!! this is too much! Kolya suffered from uncertainty, waited for the verdict, but called only a month later, then another month and another, but the poet never picked up the phone. The epic with the answer continues to this day.
Oleg Z. completed the letter “R”, hid the brush in the refrigerator, burned McDonald’s and flew off into space like a mosquito. He was a simple, even everyday person. (added starik)
Alexey A. went to the writer’s institute every day. He was an assistant professor there. He taught writing there, and he wrote on the subway. I traveled and wrote, wrote and traveled. But one day in the subway it seemed to him that the subway was an inverted sky, that is, as it was, everything moved, shifted, mixed, lost stability. And Alexey A. was horrified. “You all go…” said Alexey A. and got on the bike. On a three-wheeler. He was a simple Wise Serpent (everything with a capital letter). (added marina)
Yura S. liked to dress up as an oriental woman in the evenings and walk around Moscow. Through the burqa, Moscow was mysterious. One day Yu.S. was walking along a pond and saw a homeless person on the shore. Yu.S. winked at her. This is how the story “Fatima” appeared, on which he and his personality earned 250 US dollars. True, Yu-nu’s personality has not yet given Yu-e’s share. And he won't give it up. (added by starik)
One day two significant writers were drinking on some significant literary occasion at Demo. They drank heavily. And in the end they didn’t have enough money to pay for the drink. Of course, they were grabbed by the guards, disarmed, and immobilized. And they stand their ground. Then the security began to call the police. “Oh,” exclaimed here, in the midst of the challenge, the 1st writer, turning to the 2nd, “I have Belkin money.” And he pulled out from a hidden inner pocket an envelope tightly stuffed with thousands. Here the guards themselves immobilized, and then released the writers who had paid generously, even escorted them to the door, even asked them to come in again. That’s why Belkin No. 1 didn’t come out on time. This is how Great Russian literature did not suffer irreparable losses this time. Belkin helped here too. (added starik)
One day two important writers wanted to have a drink. Let's gather for a strong drink, my brothers. Well, straight away - it caught fire, itched right in all their literary places. And you think...Oh, no! Come on! That is, it is completely significant and cultural to NOT get drunk like that, that is, to the point of squealing, to the point of pig, but to drink mentally for a significant, again, literary reason. The reason is significant, but money is ridiculous to say directly, it’s even shameful to name the amount directly, directly it’s insignificance - not the amount. - ABOUT! - the first writer exclaimed here. Why do we need “Demo” with its demonic prices, with its demonic riot police... Let's go! Let's break ourselves free, into the meadows and over the river. Let's buy pervacha for a chervonets, a cucumber for a ten-kopeck piece and we'll be consoled, brother, we'll be happy. And they went, scorched by the sun, into the meadows, into the arable lands. And the hell they got into, they got into the middle of nowhere, one might say, they freaked out, they got dirty in the pockets, in the ridges. And neither pervacha nor cucumber shines, What kind of thing is there! The mosquitoes are ringing and the frogs are croaking. “Thirds!” - said the second writer and was just about to use foul language, when - wow! Such singing, such natural belkants with metzes, rang out. ABOUT! - the first writer exclaimed again. They don’t sing “Inesil”, they don’t sing her darling, they flow... I feel it, brother, it’s going to break away. And they came to the slope. And on the slope there is a house with three windows. In two windows he was drying off, and in the third there was a man sitting, listening to the gramophone. “The music,” he says, “is good, not without a soul,” he says, “music with tears.” Would you like a drink? “How could I not want to, they were exhausted here in your bosoms, in your pampas, kick them by the leg, they got away.” - Well, come in, what’s your name... my name is Vanka. Petrovich, after my father, and our last name is Belkin. Yes, our whole village here is Belkins. Both girls and women are all Belkins. And our writers sat there spiritually and culturally. And completely free. And they took all the girls with them. They threw away their spinning wheels and brooms and began to write too. They're maracing! (added marina) Season 3
One day Igor Sh. was looking through old photographs and found in them the still young and slender N.V.Sh., now a respectable, strict woman, and he immediately decided to play a joke on her.
I took it and posted, as if on her behalf, an advertisement of the following nature on the website of venerable prose writers: “I write novels in ten months. I review and bring it to mind. I submit it to the editor. I'm dialing. Inexpensive." What started here! Offended users of the site immediately began bombarding unfortunate N.V.Sh. with posts, demanding that she either remove the ad or include them in the list of writers and reviewers. Swearing on the most sacred thing that she had at hand at that time - D. Gardner’s book “Autumn Light”, N.V.Sh. I denied the announcement as best I could. But it’s too late - the mechanism has started. The first to be touched by the speed with which N.V.Sh. produced novels, became private assistant professor A.V. In a lively, pioneering frenzy, he immediately proclaimed: “And I will write a novel in 7 months!” Perhaps everything would have ended with this slogan if Mr. Z...OFF, a man with a mustache and strong internal legitimacy, had not joined the chat at that time. With one eye he read those left for N.V.Sh. protests, and helped others with their hands to fix broken things in the house: intercom, microphone and telephone (he is still a jack of all trades). Having reached the boastful review of the private assistant professor, Z...OFF even dropped the screwdriver from his hands, causing him to immediately begin to slightly shake and short of breath. Apparently, this is why on the site, with his hand, abracadabra that was fateful for future generations appeared: “Game? Swim? Marathon? AK, I’m participating - I’m writing a novel in six months. We're detecting it!" What started here again! Everyone began to assure that they would write for both 5 and 4, and someone named either Przezhin or Kpezhin, who would publish two novels at once in one month. Natalya Ya-na even joined him, but, after thinking hard, she crossed out one novel, replacing it with a play. At this point even Igor Sh. himself realized that he had gone too far, and in a joke on N.V.Sh. admitted. Everyone began to blame Igor, saying that it was too late to change anything, that 5-6 pages of the novel had already been written, and that an agreement had been reached with the editors. And the variants of the name of the marathon were already seriously fighting for primacy: users were divided into those who liked the private assistant professor's - Stakanofon (the assistant professor, I must admit, confused the letter K with X on the keyboard) and Mr. Z...OFF's version - Martofon (where did it come from? Mr. Z...OFF could not admit such a name even to himself). For some reason, the female audience liked the second number more. Having thought hard about what this could lead to and how it would end, Igor Sh. took all this correspondence and instantly deleted it (he himself, the father of 4 children, had never taken part in any competitions). Less than two days have passed, but a wave of incomprehensible “backgrounds” has swept across all literary sites. Playwrights have created Dramafon, comedians have Petrosyanofon, science fiction writers have Lukyanofon, and even the short erotic story competition Bablofon has appeared on the Sberbank website. And in each such “background” the main criterion was not the text itself, or even the time in which it could be written, but the number of characters! And only the venerable prose writers were left without their seemingly hard-won Martophone. Sometimes they sadly opened the site page and looked with hope to see if a new call would arise either from N.V.Sh. or from private assistant professor A-va. But the days passed, and there was no smell of any “background”... ... but in secret, far, far after midnight, somewhere feathers creaked and creaked, cough... cough... cough... cough... ... 34643, 44665, 67323, 17934, 85003... 40
Oops! Are you not local?
Themes and problems of "Belkin's Tales"
Each of the works included in the cycle of “Belkin’s Tales” has its own theme, characters, and idea. However, an analysis of “Belkin’s Tale” shows that the main thing for Pushkin was to show different layers of society: the heroes who appear before us become typical representatives of people of their circle and occupation.
Pushkin in “Belkin's Tales” poses a number of important problems that will subsequently be developed by Russian literature. In "The Station Agent" this is the problem of the little man, the relationship between fathers and children, ingratitude and feelings of guilt. In “The Shot” there is a role of chance and moral values. In “The Snowstorm” and “The Peasant Young Lady” the theme of love and the question of what obstacles a person is ready to overcome for her sake will be raised. The Undertaker talks about the life desires and aspirations of a person, about the social relations that existed in society.
Blizzard and its brief overview
Next on the list is the story “Blizzard” , it appeared on October 20 . Belkin’s biography states that he heard the story from the girl K.I.T.
The main characters have come up with a romantic life line with an escape and a secret wedding, after which they must receive forgiveness for the offense committed from their parents. But the plans were not destined to come true due to a raging snowstorm. Marya Gavrilovna had to become the wife of a stranger. As for her fiancé, he will soon be overtaken by death. Fate unexpectedly offers its own interesting denouement to the story.
Maria Gavrilovna and Burmin, through forced loneliness and the war they endured, deserve happiness, in the field of which they find true and sincere love.
There are many interesting events in the history of the creation of Belkin's Tales. They were published in 1831 and were received by the audience as a series of fascinating “anecdotes.” But some critics argue that these creations are simple only in appearance, but in fact they hide a deeper meaning. This should be mentioned when preparing a report or project in high school. The student's message will become more interesting and informative if you use data from Wikipedia, which indicates which stories are included in the collection.
Ivan Petrovich Belkin
Pushkin hid his authorship of the stories by their non-existent creator I.P. Belkin. In the preface on behalf of the publisher, he wrote: “Having taken the trouble to publish I. P. Belkin’s Stories, now offered to the public, we wanted to add to them at least a brief biography of the late author...
Ivan Petrovich Belkin was of average height, had gray eyes, light brown hair, and a straight nose; He was white-faced and thin... He was born from honest and noble parents in 1798 in the village of Goryukhin... He received his initial education from a village sexton... In 1815 he entered service in the infantry ranger regiment..., in which he remained until 1823. The death of his parents... forced him to resign and come to the village of Goryukhino...
Ivan Petrovich led a very moderate life, avoiding all kinds of excesses; it never happened... to see him drunk...; He had a great inclination towards the female sex, but his modesty was truly girlish... Ivan Petrovich fell ill with a cold fever that turned into a fever in the fall of 1828, and died... The stories were his first experience (Publisher)"
(Note: In “The History of the Village of Goryukhino” Pushkin clarified the biography of I.P. Belkin. Born on April 1, 1801. For 3 months, before the start of the war with Napoleon, he studied at the Moscow boarding school of Karl Ivanovich Meyer. In 1817, he became a cadet in an infantry regiment. He returned in Goryukhino in the fall of 1825)
"Peasant Young Lady"
The story is based on the romantic relationship between Alexei and Lisa. They are the children of landowners who were at war with each other, but then reconciled. There is not a trace of romantic poetics in the story. Everything is simple here - heroes, love, and the atmosphere of village life. “The Peasant Young Lady” is a light, cheerful story with a happy ending. It is built on a real everyday basis. Meanwhile, this humorous, Christmas story is quite serious in its meaning. The main character of the work is ready to step over the social prejudices imposed by his noble title 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 artistic prose. The main feature of these works is simplicity and conciseness of presentation. The author avoids unnecessary embellishments and does not provide explanations for the actions of his heroes. But the brilliant Pushkin always guesses what this or that character should do (due to social skills or individual qualities). Therefore, the reader feels the truth and sees real people.
Stationmaster
Pushkin's little man is the progenitor of Gogol's Akakiy Bashmachkin. An official who can be beaten by noble travelers. Confident that his daughter Dunya, stolen by a passing hussar, was abandoned by him, he wishes her death. However, everything happens the other way around. Hussar Minsky, who turned out to be a worthy man, married Duna. The father's expectations were not justified; his daughter became rich and noble. However, the experienced reader understands that Samson Vyrin still lost his daughter. Vyrin's world and Minsky's world are separated by a huge hole that he is unable to overcome. Dunya was able to step over it without hesitation only thanks to her blind love for Minsky and feminine spontaneity.
However, she did not have the courage to go further and step over the rules of the “decent” society in which she found herself. In fact, she abandoned her father. Her subsequent visit to her father’s grave is just an attempt to calm her conscience. If the end had been as Vyrin expected, it would have been another story about an unfortunate, gullible girl and a scoundrel-seducer, of which there were many at that time. However, with Pushkin everything is much deeper and more realistic. It would seem that the happy ending of the story leaves a tragic aftertaste.
