Evgeny Onegin of our days. Evgeny Onegin in our days. This is not a school essay at all. Is it really the same Tatyana?

Modern Tatyana Larina will immediately send the idiot Onegin to three letters!

The novel “Eugene Onegin” turns 190 this year. Since the first chapter was published in 1825, teachers have been explaining to schoolchildren: Onegin repented and understood everything, but Tatyana, forever left with a broken heart, has to keep her face with all her might.
But if you read the book with an open mind, it turns out that PUSHKIN was talking about something completely different. Tatiana literally did as Dale CARNEGIE advised - she turned lemon into lemonade. She grieved, and then improved her life so much that Onegin began to bite his elbows and fell in love with her himself. But the young brilliant woman was no longer interested. Summary: girls, don’t waste your time on unrequited love, but rather do something useful!
This is how this story would sound today.

Onegin is a young major, the son of a retired KGB general. Having acquaintances, the father managed to place his son in a prestigious university (apparently, the Faculty of Economics of MGIMO). However, at some point I got hooked on the credit needle. Banks willingly gave him loans secured by a huge plot of land near Moscow, seized from a state farm in the dashing 90s. “Having served excellently and nobly, his father lived in debt. He gave three balls every year, and finally squandered it.”

How a London dandy is dressed

Onegin loves parties and goes to nightclubs. Witty, fluent in English and French (he was forced to learn it at MGIMO), he has a magnetic effect on women.
Metrosexual (dandy), “he spent at least three hours in front of the mirrors and came out of the dressing room like a windy Venus, When, having put on a man’s outfit, the Goddess goes to a masquerade party.” Onegin knows all the fashion trends, goes to the gym, and loves expensive watches. He carries a Verta smartphone in his pocket. Externally - a mix of Nagiyev and Urgant. To be considered a handshake person, he gets a manicure and polishes his nails in a salon. “You can be a smart person and think about the beauty of your nails.”

His father lived in debt

Father dies. According to the Civil Code, repayment of the loan after the death of the borrower is made by his heirs. One bank sued Onegin, other banks set collectors against him. Onegin cannot save and increase money, he only knows how to spend:
“Eugene, hating litigation, Satisfied with his lot, provided them with the inheritance, not seeing a great loss in it, or foreknowledge from afar of the death of his old uncle.”

My uncle has the most honest rules

Soon he actually received a message that his uncle was dying and wanted to say goodbye to him. My uncle has his own house in a wealthy village in the Tver or Smolensk region. Onegin went there, “And already yawned in advance, Getting ready, for the sake of money, For sighs, boredom and deception (And thus I began my novel); But, having flown to my uncle’s village, I found Him already on the table, Like a ready-made tribute to the land.” My uncle inherited shares in enterprises, large luxurious plots in the forest and plots of land.

And youthful heat and youthful delirium

Onegin, having nothing better to do, became friends with Lensky.
Lensky, also a rich heir and poet, is going to marry Olga Larina. The hospitable Larin family accepts Evgeniy as a potential groom for their other daughter, Tanya.
Tatyana is a unique girl, her hobbies seem strange to Onegin. First of all, she's obsessed with horror movies. “And children’s pranks were alien to Her: terrible stories in the winter in the dark of night Captivated her heart more.” In our time, Tanya, clinging to the screen, would revel in the cult horror films “Scream”, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “The Blair Witch Project” and “The Shining”, read King and watch the TV-3 channel. She puts quotes from Stephen King as her status on social networks.
Secondly, she is too interested in romance novels. “She liked novels early on; They replaced everything for her; She fell in love with the deceptions of both Richardson and Rousseau." Writer Vladimir Nabokov, analyzing the texts of these novels, noticed that their heroines remain faithful to their husbands, and Tatyana will subsequently do just that.

I can’t sleep, nanny, it’s so stuffy here...

The parents notice that Tanya does not attract Onegin with either her beauty or her ruddy freshness; she has a “pale color and a dull appearance.” Mom feeds her daughter with organic milk without antibiotics and makes lingonberry water especially for her: Tanya needs vitamins and minerals.
In addition, the girl clearly needs to work on her image. She doesn’t wear makeup, doesn’t curl her hair, she has circles under her eyes from insomnia and frequent nightmares: “And meanwhile the moon was shining And with a languid light illuminated Tatiana’s pale beauty And her flowing hair.”
Tanya is indifferent to brands. She gave the Louis Vuitton bag, a gift from her parents, to her cheerful fashionista sister. Her favorite item in her wardrobe is a dark crimson beret with the inscription “Paris”.

Don't deny it - I read it

Having read novels, the girl is waiting for a handsome prince. She yearns for love instead of preparing for admission. When Onegin appeared in sight, Tatyana “was completely stunned, glowed and said in her thoughts: “Here he is!” To attract the attention of her neighbor in the capital, Tanya writes him a letter declaring her love: “I’m writing to you - what more? What more can I say? Now, I know, it is in your will to punish Me with contempt.”
It is not for nothing that popular wisdom advises girls not to rush into recognition, but to wait for it from a man. Tanya seemed to Onegin to be a simpleton who humiliatingly runs after him. Dressed in a white coat, the major still did not take advantage of the uninteresting prey, which itself fell into his hands. He reprimanded Tanya from above: “Learn to control yourself. Not everyone will understand you like I do; Inexperience leads to disaster."

Slave of honor

On January 25, Lensky and Onegin are invited to Tatiana’s name day. According to the novel, name days are celebrated at home, and today the golden youth would go to a nightclub.
Onegin did not want to go, but Lensky persuaded him. At the club, under the influence of alcohol, Evgeniy became irritated and decided, to spite the unlucky groom, to hit on Olga. He easily managed to attract the attention of a girl: after all, even earlier, out of sporting interest, he could seduce almost anyone: “The less we love a woman, the easier she likes us, and the more surely we destroy her Among the seductive networks.”
However, Onegin did not want to quarrel with his friend. He ordered Veuve Clicquot champagne for 10 thousand rubles, drank straight from the bottle and handed the bottle to Lensky as a sign of reconciliation. He took the bottle and splashed Onegin in the face.
The club security pushed the hooligans out into the air. Unfortunately, Onegin had a pistol in his pocket. With one shot, right on the threshold of the club, he killed the slave of honor.
The criminal case was closed almost immediately: the glamorous scumbag was absolved from justice by his rich relatives. He is leaving abroad.

Isn't he a parody? Have you really solved the riddle?

Tatyana is racking her brains: what is Onegin, who rejected her, like? She tried to understand the man: “He was probably right... he’s not interested in someone like me... he read so many smart books...” She asked the servants of the Onegin house for those books, stacked them on her window and began to study one after another, special paying attention to the marks left by Evgeniy’s well-groomed fingernail.
Then I found his account on Facebook and hung out on it for a long time. Gradually, an epiphany came: Tanya realized that Onegin was just a rich slacker, disappointed in everything in the world, mediocrely killing time on social networks. A parody of a man, he didn’t even try to do something good and necessary.

How to be a petty slave with your heart and mind

Onegin lived in Europe for several years and finally returned to the capital. At the ball he meets Tatiana. Now she is a famous party girl, socialite, princess, wife of a serious businessman. Evgeny falls in love, starts following her everywhere, bombarding her with text messages.
Onegin was an experienced hunter of women. “He no longer fell in love with beauties, but was somehow drawn in; If they refused, I was instantly consoled; They will change - I was glad to relax. He looked for them without rapture, and left them without regret.”
Tatiana worried him more and more, because none of the usual methods of seduction worked. No matter how hard Eugene tried, the princess remained indifferent. He had written thoughtful messages to women before (via social media or email), knowing that the target would certainly take one or another bait from the letter. He turned his Facebook into a nature reserve, where he placed cunning traps and snares, luring shaggy game.
But Tatyana was an intelligent and decent person. She easily saw through the manipulations. “Why do you have me in mind? Is it not because I must now appear in the highest society; That I am rich and noble?

Is it really the same Tatyana?

Tanya is no longer the same naive girl who once declared her love to Onegin. While he was abroad, she graduated from a prestigious university and got married. A brilliant, well-educated young woman is fluent in languages ​​(“Who there in the crimson beret speaks Spanish to the ambassador?”). She is respected in society: “The ladies moved closer to her; The old women smiled at her; The men bowed lower, Catching the gaze of her eyes.”
Her husband, a former general, now the owner of a large business, gave his wife the opportunity to engage in charity work. Tatyana needs to flash in the world and shine on glossy magazine pages so that her Heart for Children foundation can raise more money for those who need it. People know that, like Chulpan Khamatova, Tatyana will not allow abuse.

But I was given to someone else and I will be faithful to him forever

Onegin is tormented, gradually falls more and more in love, and when he sees the familiar oval face on the cover of a magazine, he bitterly asks himself again and again: “How did I miss it? I missed my happiness."
One day he came to Tatyana during the day and saw tears in her eyes. The day before there was a tiring presentation, she went to bed late and didn’t get enough sleep. Tanya has a letter in her hands with another request for help. She is upset: due to the crisis, revenues to the fund have decreased.
Evgeny, like someone possessed, starts talking about love again. Tatyana notices that he is in a terrible state and urgently needs to be calmed down. “I love you, why lie,” she says. Trying to gently bring him back to reality, she adds: “But I was given to someone else!” Her sympathy for Onegin is sincere, she really loves him a little, although not as much as before. Old feelings burned away.
Tanya has a smart and sensitive husband who loves her with all his heart. Respect and mutual understanding reign between the spouses - the self-absorbed Onegin did not even notice this for several months. A decent married woman, Tatyana would not have become his mistress. In vain he ran around. He no longer had a chance.

Quote

F. M. DOSTOEVSKY:
- Pushkin would have done even better if he had named his poem after Tatyana, and not Onegin, because she is undoubtedly the main character of the poem.

How old was old lady Larina?

Alas, Tatyana is not a child, the old woman said, groaning

Tanya Larina's mother was forcibly married when she was no more than 20 years old. Olga in the first chapters of the novel is a little younger than Lensky, who is 18. That means she is 16-17 years old. Tatiana and Olga are the same age, the age difference is very small. So, Tatyana is approximately 17-19. She was not a late child in the family - the poet would certainly have paid attention to this fact. This means Tanya was born when her mother was young. It turns out that the old woman was no more than 42 years old, and possibly younger.

PEARLS FROM SCHOOL ESSAYS
* Onegin liked Byron, so he hung it over his bed.
* By the example of his entire life, A.S. Pushkin teaches us that in Russia a talented person must be able to shoot well!
* In the image of Tatyana, Pushkin reflected the fullness of the Russian woman.
* Lensky went out to the duel in trousers. They separated and a shot rang out.
* Girls like Olga have long been tired of Onegin, and Pushkin too.
* Pushkin was shot in a duel by a French dentist.
* He first learned colloquial Russian from his nanny Arina Rodionovna.

The young rake, Evgeny Onegin, was traveling to the village to visit his dying uncle, who left him a rich inheritance after his death, and thought about how boring it was to spend time at the bedside of the sick.

But, my God, what boredom it is to sit with a sick person day and night, without leaving a single step! What low deceit is to amuse a half-dead, to straighten his pillows, to sadly offer medicine, to sigh and think to himself: When will the devil take you!

Evgeniy was born in St. Petersburg. His father lived in debt and wasted money. In his youth, the boy was raised by hired French teachers, devoting not too much time to science. When Evgeniy grew up, he plunged headlong into all the delights of social life, endless balls, feasts and holidays, visiting theaters, not to enjoy a play, but only to appear in society. And the world favorably received Onegin, because the young man followed all his conventions, spoke easily in French, dressed in the latest fashion and spent three hours in front of the mirror, could show off a sharp epigram and anecdote.

He had no desire to rummage
In chronological dust
History of the earth:
But jokes of days gone by
From Romulus to the present day
He kept it in his memory.

All possible luxury items brought to Russia from Paris decorated the young man’s office. But the “science of tender passion” occupied a special place in his life; he early learned to disturb the hearts of courtly coquettes and young girls.

However, Evgeniy was not happy. His feelings cooled down early, the noise of the world bored him, and beauties were not long the subject of his usual thoughts. The betrayals have become tiresome, the friends are tired. He was overcome by melancholy; he did not want to commit suicide, but lost interest in the whole world. He tried to read, but books did not interest him either.

Onegin's father died, and a whole regiment of lenders immediately reached out to him. Eugene, hating litigation, simply provided them with his entire father's inheritance and was left completely without funds.

His father then died. The greedy regiment of Lenders gathered in front of Onegin. Each has his own mind and sense: Eugene, hating litigation, Satisfied with his lot, gave them the inheritance...

Soon Onegin received a report from the manager that his uncle was dying and wanted to say goodbye to him. And Evgeniy immediately, having prepared himself for the sake of money for lies, boredom and deception, went to the village, but when he got there, he did not find his uncle alive.
Onegin turned out to be a villager, the owner of factories, waters, forests and lands. For several days, nature, secluded fields, the beauty of forests and the babbling brook seemed new and interesting to the young man. However, all this was not for long - and the blues returned to him in the village.

Then he saw clearly
That in the village the boredom is the same,
Although there are no streets or palaces,
No cards, no balls, no poems.
Handra was waiting for him on guard,
And she ran after him,
Like a shadow or a faithful wife.

Eugene settled in a wonderful place, in a castle built “in the taste of smart antiquity.” He established a new order on his estate, replacing corvée with a light quitrent, which made his peasants incredibly happy. The neighbors saw terrible harm in this and decided that he was “a most dangerous eccentric.” At first, all the surrounding nobles stopped by to see Onegin, but since he, hearing them approaching, mounted his horse and rode away, the neighbors stopped their friendship with him and decided that he was ignorant and crazy.

At the same time, a new landowner arrived in his village, who, like Onegin, “gave a reason for a strict analysis of the neighborhood.” His name was Vladimir Lensky. He came from Germany, where he became a fan of Kant, fell in love with poetry, the work of Schiller and Goethe, and began to write poetry himself. The light had not yet tired him, and the young man’s soul was full of love, faith in friendship and foggy dreams.

Handsome man, in full bloom,
Kant's admirer and poet.
He's from foggy Germany
He brought the fruits of learning:
Freedom-loving dreams
The spirit is ardent and rather strange,
Always an enthusiastic speech
And shoulder-length black curls.

Lensky was alien to village life, and the endless conversations of local landowners “about haymaking, about wine, about the kennel, about their relatives.” In addition, Vladimir was rich and good-looking, so everywhere he was accepted as a groom and all “their daughters were predicted to marry their half-Russian neighbor.”

All this forced Lensky to seek acquaintance with Onegin. They met, at first, due to the difference in characters, they were boring to each other, but then they began to see each other every day and truly became friends. Friends constantly argued, Eugene listened with a smile to the poet’s ardent judgments, but did not cool his ardor.

They got along. Wave and stone
Poetry and prose, ice and fire
Not so different from each other.
First by mutual difference
They were boring to each other;
Then I liked it;
then we got together every day on horseback
And soon they became inseparable.
So people (I am the first to repent)
There's nothing to do, friends.

Vladimir told Evgeniy his love story. Since childhood, he was in love with Olga Larina, the daughter of their neighbor Dmitry Larin, a friend of his father. They played together. Everything about Olga attracted Lensky: “Always modest, always obedient, always as cheerful as the morning, as simple-minded as the life of a poet, sweet as the kiss of love; eyes like the sky, blue, smile, flaxen curls.”

Her older sister's name was Tatyana. She was not as beautiful as Olga, she seemed like a stranger in her family, she never played with other children, did not like dolls, and often spent her days alone near the window. She liked the novels of Richardson and Rousseau early on; they largely replaced real life for her. That's why she was a naive and dreamy girl.

So, she was called Tatyana.
Not your sister's beauty,
Nor the freshness of her ruddy
She wouldn't attract anyone's attention.
Dick, sad, silent,
Like a forest deer, timid,
She is in her own family
The girl seemed like a stranger.
She didn't know how to caress
To your father, nor to your mother;
Child herself, in a crowd of children
I didn’t want to play or jump
And often alone all day
She sat silently by the window.

The Larins lived the quiet, simple life of rural landowners on the estate of the head of the family. Often in the evenings, neighbors and friends gathered with them “to complain, and to curse, and to laugh about something.” Tatiana and Olga's parents sacredly observed the centuries-old traditions of the Russian people.

They kept life peaceful
Habits of a dear old man;
At their Shrovetide
There were Russian pancakes;
Twice a year they fasted;
Loved the round swing
Podblyudny songs, round dance;
On Trinity Day, when people
Yawning, listens to the prayer service,
Touchingly on the beam of dawn
They shed three tears;
They needed kvass like air,
And at their table there are guests
They carried dishes according to rank.

Tatyana's father "was a kind fellow, belated in the last century." In her youth, her mother was in love with the brave sergeant and player, but at the behest of her parents she was led to the crown with Dmitry Larin.

And, in order to dispel her grief,
The wise husband left soon
To her village, where she is
God knows who I'm surrounded by
I tore and cried at first,
I almost divorced my husband;
Then I took up housekeeping,
I got used to it and was satisfied.
This habit has been given to us from above:
She is a substitute for happiness.

Larin loved his wife sincerely, trusted her in everything and spent his days happily, “peacefully”, without worries or hassles, next to her.

And so they both grew old.
And finally they opened
In front of the husband are the doors of the coffin,
And he accepted the new crown.
He died an hour before lunch
Mourned by his neighbor,
Children and faithful wife
Purely more cordial than others.
He was a simple and kind gentleman,
And where his ashes lie,
The tombstone reads:
Humble sinner
Dmitry Larin,
The Lord's servant and foreman,
Under this stone he tastes peace.

Lensky visits the grave of Tatiana and Olga’s father, “and, full of sincere sadness, Vladimir immediately inscribed a tombstone madrigal for him.” At the grave of his parents, he reflects on the meaning of life.

So our windy tribe
Growing, worrying, seething
And he presses towards the grave of his great-grandfathers.
Our time will come, our time will come,
And our grandchildren in good time
They will push us out of the world too!

One evening Lensky persuaded his friend to go with him to the Larins. Evgeny did not mind, he was interested in seeing Olga, the girl with whom Vladimir was so in love. They were received cordially and the evening passed unnoticed. Returning home, Onegin told Lensky that if he had chosen, he would undoubtedly have fallen in love with Tatyana, because there is nothing individual in Olga’s features, there is no life in them, “she is round, red-faced, like this stupid moon.” Vladimir was offended and remained silent the whole way.

Meanwhile, Onegin’s appearance in the Larins’ house made a great impression on everyone. Many began to secretly explain that the wedding of Evgeniy and Tatiana was just around the corner. Tatyana listened to this gossip with annoyance, but deep down she was glad for it. She fell in love with Evgeniy. All the images of the heroes of the novels that she read so greedily merged for her in one Onegin. She also imagined herself as the heroine of the novel, Clarissa, Julia and Delphine.

The time has come, she fell in love;
So the grain fell into the ground
Spring is enlivened by fire.
Her imagination has long been
Burning with bliss and melancholy,
Hungry for fatal food;
Long-time heartache
Her young breasts were tight;
The soul was waiting... for someone,
And I waited...
The eyes opened;
She said: it's him!

The melancholy of love resulted in real suffering for Tatyana. She became even sadder and with her sadness retired to the grove or garden. Love weighed heavily on the girl, but it was a painfully pleasant burden.

And then, one day, she decided to reveal her feelings to Onegin and wrote him a letter. In it, the girl naively and unvarnished expressed her loving and suffering soul.

I am writing to you - what more?
What more can I say?
Now, I know, it is in your will to punish Me with contempt.
But you, to my unfortunate fate
Keeping at least a drop of pity,
You won't leave me.
I know you were sent to me by God,
Until the grave you are my keeper...
You appeared in my dreams,
Invisible, you were already dear to me,
Your wonderful gaze tormented me,
Your voice was heard in my soul
A long time ago... no, it was not a dream!
You barely walked in, I instantly recognized
Everything was stupefied, on fire
And in my thoughts I said: here he is!

Having confessed her love, she asked Eugene to resolve her doubts about who he is - an angel or an insidious tempter, the unknown is worse than the bitter truth. Let him with one word either revive the hopes of her heart, or interrupt this heavy dream. Tatyana sent her nanny's grandson with this letter to Onegin and eagerly awaited the answer.

But a day passed, and still there was no answer. He was not there the next day either. Tatyana, pale as a shadow, spent all her time waiting. Lensky arrived, and when Tatyana’s mother asked where his friend was, he replied that he promised to be there today, but apparently the post office was delayed. And finally, when it was already getting dark, Onegin appeared. Wanting a quick explanation, the girl got up and went out into the alley. Evgeniy was already waiting for her there. He stood like a menacing shadow, “shining in his gaze.” As if scorched by fire, the girl stopped.

But the consequences of an unexpected meeting
Today, dear friends,
I am not able to retell it;
I owe it after a long speech
And take a walk and relax:
I'll finish it sometime later.

Onegin, as was said earlier, had long been disillusioned with love, “the less we love a woman, the easier it is for her to like us.” But Tatiana's letter touched him, the language of girlish dreams awakened a swarm of thoughts in him. Perhaps for a moment his former ardor was revived, but he did not want to deceive the gullibility of an innocent soul. Having met Tatyana on an alley in the garden, he told her that her sincerity was dear to him, if he wanted to become a husband and father, he would not have looked for anyone other than her, but he was not created for bliss, this was alien to his soul. Marriage will be torment for both; he, having gotten used to it, will instantly stop loving her. He loves her with the love of a brother, and nothing else can happen between them. “Learn to control yourself; Not everyone will understand you like I do; “Inexperience leads to trouble,” - this is how Onegin ended his rebuke. Tatyana listened to him through tears, not seeing anything around. Then Evgeny escorted the grief-stricken girl into the house.
After this explanation, Tatyana began to fade and fade, sleep left her, her smile and virginal peace disappeared, nothing could stir her soul anymore.

Alas, Tatyana is fading, turning pale, fading and silent! Nothing occupies her, nothing moves her soul.

And the love of Vladimir and Olga grew stronger. They met constantly, walked arm in arm in the garden, read novels to each other, and played chess. Lensky wrote love poems in Olga's album. But Olga didn’t read them.

Vladimir would have written odes, but Olga didn’t read them. Have poets ever tearfully read their creations into the eyes of their dear ones? They say that there are no higher awards in the world. Indeed, blessed is the modest lover, Who reads his dreams to the subject of songs and love, to a pleasantly languid beauty! Blessed... although, perhaps, she is entertained in a completely different way.

Onegin, meanwhile, lived as a hermit, walked, read and slept, and played billiards. Solitude and silence constituted his entire life.

He got up at seven o'clock in the summer
And went light
To the river running under the mountain;
Imitating the singer Gulnara,
This Hellespont swam,
Then I drank my coffee,
Looking through a bad magazine
And got dressed...

Walking, reading, deep sleep,
Forest shadow, murmur of streams,
Sometimes black-eyed whites
Young and fresh kiss,
An obedient, zealous horse is bridle,
Lunch is quite whimsical,
A bottle of light wine,
Solitude, silence:
That's life
Saint Onegin;
And he is insensitive to her
Surrendered, red summer days
In careless bliss, apart from
Forgetting both the city and friends,
And the boredom of holiday activities.
Autumn has come.
The day was getting shorter
Mysterious forest canopy
With a sad noise she exposed herself,
Fog lay over the fields,
Noisy caravan of geese
Stretched to the south: approaching
Quite a boring time;
It was already November outside the yard.
And now the frost is crackling
And they shine silver among the fields...
The river shines, covered in ice.
Boys are a joyful people
Skates cut the ice noisily.

Evgeniy practically never left his estate and communicated only with Lensky, who could only talk about Olga. He was happy; their wedding was soon to take place. The poet was sure that he was loved, and this filled his soul with joy. One day Lensky brought Onegin an invitation to Tatyana’s name day, saying that it was indecent to appear in the house twice and never show there again. Evgeny, after thinking, agreed.

That year the autumn weather stayed in the yard for a long time,
Winter was waiting, nature was waiting.
Snow only fell in January...
Winter!.. The peasant, triumphant,
On the firewood it renews the path;
His horse smells the snow,
Trotting along somehow;
Fluffy reins exploding,
The daring carriage flies;
The coachman sits on the beam
In a sheepskin coat and a red sash.
Here is a yard boy running,
Having planted a bug in the sled,
Transforming himself into a horse;
The naughty man has already frozen his finger:
It's both painful and funny to him,
And his mother threatens him through the window...

On the night before her name day, Tatyana, who sincerely believed in all signs, had a terrible dream. She walks through a snowy clearing and sees that a noisy, dark stream is bubbling in the snowdrifts in front of her, with two shaky poles thrown across it. She stops and waits for someone to help her get to the other side. Suddenly a huge, disheveled bear rises from a snowdrift and hands her a clawed paw. She fearfully leans on it and climbs across the stream. The girl moves on, and the bear follows her. She quickens her pace, but the bear does not lag behind. She runs into the forest, falls, the bear quickly grabs her and carries her to a lonely hut. Having come to her senses, Tatyana sees herself in the hallway, the bear is not nearby. Entering the room, the frightened girl sees monsters sitting at the table, with horns, dog and rooster heads, witches, dwarfs, crayfish and spiders. And Onegin sits among them. He rules at this table, he gives a sign - and everyone laughs, he drinks - and everyone drinks, he frowns - everyone is silent. Suddenly a wind blew from the half-open door, extinguishing the fire of the lamps. Onegin goes to the girl and reveals her to the gaze of hellish ghosts. Hooves, trunks, fangs, bloody tongues and bone fingers point to her. And everyone shouts: “Mine, mine”! Onegin shouts menacingly: “Mine!” And the whole gang hides in the frosty darkness. Evgeniy quietly sits her down on a bench in the corner. Suddenly Lensky and Olga enter. Onegin begins to scold the uninvited guests. The argument between them is getting louder. Evgeniy grabs a long knife and stabs Lensky. An unbearable scream is heard, the hut is shaking... Tatyana woke up in horror. She was troubled by the dream, but she did not dare to tell it to her sister.

But an ominous dream promises her
There are many sad adventures.
A few days later she
I kept worrying about that.
But with a crimson hand
Dawn from the morning valleys
Brings the sun behind him
Happy name day holiday.

The guests began to gather. All the surrounding landowners and their families arrived. We sat at the table. In the midst of the fun, Lensky and Onegin appeared. The friends were joyfully greeted and seated directly opposite Tatiana. The girl did not hear their greetings, she felt stuffy, sick, tears were rolling down from her eyes. The poor thing almost fainted, but she overcame herself and sat at the table. Onegin could not stand girls' fainting spells. He was already angry that he found himself in such a noisy company, but when he saw Tatyana’s reverent outburst, he became even more angry and decided to enrage Lensky and take revenge on him for bringing him here. The others did not notice the girl's excitement.

Meanwhile the fun continued. The wine flowed like a river. Congratulations began. When it was Onegin’s turn, he, probably feeling sorry for the poor girl, silently bowed to her, and his gaze was so tender that Tatiana’s heart quickened. However, Evgeny did not change his mind about taking revenge on Lensky. When the dancing began, Onegin, secretly grinning, approached Olga, danced one dance with her, then another, started talking to her about trifles, whispered some vulgar madrigals in her ear, and gently squeezed her hand. A proud blush flared on the girl’s face. Lensky couldn't believe his eyes. He invites her to a mazurka, but she refuses - she has already promised to dance it with Onegin. Lensky, unable to bear such a blow, runs out of the holiday in anger and rushes home on horseback with the thought of a duel.
Lensky is unable to bear the blow; Cursing women's pranks, she comes out, demands a horse, and gallops. A couple of pistols, Two bullets - nothing more. Suddenly his fate will be resolved.

Noticing Lensky's disappearance, Evgeniy became bored. Olga also became bored. The holiday ended, the guests stayed overnight with their hospitable hosts, and only Onegin went home to sleep.

In the morning, Zaretsky, a former brawler and ataman of a gambling gang, and now a single father of a family, a peaceful landowner and an honest man, came to Evgeniy. He brought Onegin a challenge to a duel from Lensky.

He was pleasant, noble,
Short call, il cartel:
Courteously, with cold clarity
Lensky invited his friend to a duel.

Onegin replied to the envoy that he was always ready. Zaretsky took his leave and left, leaving Evgeni alone with his thoughts. Onegin was dissatisfied with himself, he understood that he was wrong, he made fun of his first timid love. But it was too late.

Lensky, on his estate, was impatiently awaiting an answer. He was afraid that Evgeny would somehow laugh it off and refuse the duel, and when Zaretsky brought him a positive answer, he was very happy. Tomorrow before dawn, the former friends will have to meet near the mill and shoot. Vladimir did not want to see Olga before the duel, but he could not stand it and went to her. At the sight of his beloved, his jealousy and annoyance disappeared. However, his determination was unshakable. He thought that he would be Olga's savior from the unworthy corrupter Onegin. The duel was finally decided.

Before dawn, the enemies, as previously agreed, met at the mill. The seconds, Zaretsky on Vladimir’s side and the French servant Guillot on Evgeny’s side, prepared their pistols and counted out thirty-two steps. The command was given to converge. Onegin, without ceasing to advance, raised his pistol and fired. Lensky fell. He was killed.

He lay motionless and strange
There was a languid world on his brow.
He was wounded right through the chest;
Smoking, blood flowed from the wound.
One moment ago
Inspiration beat in this heart,
Enmity, hope and love,
Life was playing, blood was boiling, -
Now, as if in an empty house,
Everything in it is quiet and dark;
It fell silent forever.
The shutters are closed, the windows are whitewashed with chalk.
There is no owner.
And where, God knows.
There was no trace.

Evgeny, overcome with horror at the realization of what he had just done, hurried away. Zaretsky took the body of the murdered young man to the estate.

But whatever it is, reader,
Alas, young lover,
Poet, thoughtful dreamer,
Killed by a friend's hand!
There is a place: to the left of the village,
Where did the pet of inspiration live?
Two pine trees have grown together by their roots;
The streams twisted beneath them
Streams of the neighboring valley.
The plowman likes to relax there,
And plunge the reapers into the waves
The ringing jugs come;
There by the stream in the thick shade
A simple monument was erected.

Driven by spring rays,
The snow has already flown from the surrounding mountains, running away in muddy streams.
To the flooded meadows.
Nature's clear smile
Through a dream he greets the morning of the year;
The skies are shining blue.
Still transparent, forests
It's like they're turning green.
Bee for field tribute
Flies from a wax cell.
The valleys are dry and colorful;
The herds rustle and the nightingale
Already singing in the silence of the night.

As time went. Horrible events, a rather forgotten Moscow, with golden crosses and ancient buildings. The Larins stayed with their old aunt.

And so every day Tatyana is forced to go to family dinners, she is introduced to her grandparents and other numerous relatives. All the daughters of her mother’s friends try to make friends with her, dress her in fashion and trust her with their heartfelt secrets, demanding in return that she also open up to them. But the girl is of little interest in all this, and she does not want to reveal her heart to anyone. Prim, secular youths find Tanya unattractive, but she doesn’t care about that either. Mother takes Tatiana to the Assembly and other secular places. At one of the noisy balls, Tatyana meets her future husband.

And meanwhile he doesn’t take his eyes off her
Some important general.
The aunties blinked at each other
And Tanya was elbowed at once,
And each one whispered to her:

Take a quick look to your left. -"Left? Where? what is there?"
- Well, whatever it is, look...
In that pile, see? ahead,
Where there are still two in uniform...
Now he moved away... now he became sideways...
-"Who? Is this general fat?”

Onegin (I’ll take up him again),
Having killed a friend in a duel,
Having lived without a goal, without work
Until twenty-six years old,
Languishing in idle leisure
Without work, without wife, without business,
I didn't know how to do anything.
He was overcome with anxiety
Wanderlust (A very painful property, a voluntary cross for few)
He left his village
Forests and fields solitude,
Where is the bloody shadow
Appeared to him every day
And began wandering without a goal,
Available to the senses alone;
And travel for him,
Like everything else in the world, I’m tired of it;
He returned and hit
Like Chatsky, from the ship to the ball.

Eugene Onegin, after long wanderings and numerous adventures, which also bored him, returned to St. Petersburg and went to one of the balls in the house of Prince N, his old acquaintance. The crowd hesitated, a whisper ran through the hall, and the mistress of the house appeared with an important general. She was magnificent, not cold, not talkative, without any antics or imitative tricks. She was nobility itself. There was no hint of vulgarity in it. All the ladies moved closer to her, the men caught her gaze, and the general who came with her lifted his nose and shoulders higher.

The appearance of the dazzling hostess reminds Onegin of some familiar features. But he is unable to believe himself. Eugene asks the prince sitting next to him who he sees in front of him. And he says with a smile that this is Tatyana Larina, his wife. The princess also recognized Onegin, but did not show her excitement in any way. Evgeny wanted to talk to her, but was embarrassed and could not utter a word. Tatyana disappeared, but he remained motionless. That evening Onegin quickly left the social event and went home. His thoughts were filled only with Tatyana.

Is it really the same Tatyana?
which he is alone with,
At the beginning of our romance,
In a remote, distant place,
In the good heat of moralizing,
I once read instructions,
The one from whom he keeps
A letter where the heart speaks
Where everything is outside, everything is free,
That girl... is this a dream?..
The girl he
Neglected in humble fate,
Was she really with him now?
So indifferent, so brave?

And the next morning they brought Eugene a note from Prince N, in which he invited him to the evening. Onegin, wishing with all his heart to see Tatyana again, immediately agreed. He eagerly awaited the hour appointed in the invitation. Exactly on time, he entered the prince’s house and found the princess alone. Like the last time, Onegin could not utter a word, and only the arrival of her husband interrupted the private conversation that was so painful for Eugene. Other guests arrived, very interesting people. The fun has begun. But Onegin was busy all evening only with Tatyana, no longer seeing in her a simple-minded girl in love with him, but an indifferent princess, the goddess of the Neva. There was no doubt - Evgeny was in love with Tatiana. But she didn't notice him. He came to the prince’s house every day, but the princess sometimes greeted him with just a bow, and spoke to him several times while visiting.

Love for all ages;
But to young, virgin hearts
Her impulses are beneficial,
Like spring storms across the fields:
In the rain of passions they become fresh,
And they renew themselves and mature,
And mighty life gives
And lush color and sweet fruit.
But at a late and barren age,
At the turn of our years,
The dead trace of passion is sad:
So the storms of autumn are cold
A meadow is turned into a swamp
And they expose the forest around.

Onegin began to dry out, doctors suspected consumption, but he knew the true reason.

Tormented by passion, he decided to write
A letter to Tatiana, as she once did to him.

In the letter, he admitted all his mistakes, his cruelty, and blamed himself for Lensky’s death. But he felt that he was already punished by being deprived of Tatyana’s company. Onegin asked that he not be suspected of cunning; his declaration of love was open and sincere. And his fate is in Tatyana’s hands.

Once I met you by chance,
Noticing a spark of tenderness in you,
I didn't dare believe her:
I didn’t give in to my sweet habit;
Your hateful freedom
I didn't want to lose.
One more thing separated us...
An unfortunate victim
Lensky fell...
From everything that is dear to the heart,
Then I tore my heart out;
Stranger to everyone, not bound by anything,
I thought: freedom and peace
Substitute for happiness. My God!
How wrong I was, how I was punished...
No, I see you every minute
Follow you everywhere
A smile of the mouth, a movement of the eyes
To catch with loving eyes,
Listen to you for a long time, understand
Your soul is all your perfection,
To freeze in agony before you,
To turn pale and fade away... that's bliss!

But there was no answer. Onegin wrote several more letters, but did not receive an answer to them either. One day he met Tatyana in a meeting, but on her face he read only anger - and realized that there was no hope.

After that, Evgeniy locked himself in his office and began reading everything indiscriminately. But only his eyes read, and his thoughts were far away. His heart was yearning. Days passed, winter ended. Onegin, pale and looking like a dead man, decided to see Tatyana for the last time. Arriving at Prince N's house, he did not find anyone in the hallway and went into the princess's room. Tatyana sat alone, all in tears, not dressed, pale, and reading some letter. Now one could easily recognize her as the old Tanya Larina. Evgeny fell at her feet. She shuddered and remained silent, there was no anger in her eyes, only silent reproach was read in them. Finally she quietly asked him to get up. She reminded him of his rebuke in the alley, but did not blame him for it, although for her love then it was a terrible test. Then Onegin acted, albeit cruelly, but nobly. What is he doing now? Why is he pursuing her? Is it really because she is now rich and noble? Or maybe because her shame, if she responded to his passion, would immediately become noticeable in society, and this would bring him the glory of a seducer? In any case, his letters humiliate her. She would give anything now to have it all back. But now it's too late. Evgeniy must leave her. She was given to someone else and will be faithful to him forever.

I got married.
You must,
I ask you to leave me;
I know it's in your heart
And pride and direct honor.
I love you (why lie?)
But I was given to another;
I will be faithful to him forever.

With these words Tatyana left. Onegin remained standing, as if struck by thunder, with his heart immersed in a storm of terrible sensations.

And here is my hero,
In a moment that is evil for him,
Reader, we will now leave,
For a long time... forever.
Behind him, we are quite on the same path
Wandered around the world.
Let's congratulate each other on the shore.
Hooray! It’s long overdue (isn’t it?)!

Gloomy and tired of life, Evgeniy Aleksandrovich Onegin, middle manager in the state. company was sent to establish a branch in a provincial city. Having arrived, he realizes that there are no clubs, no theater, no cinema here, he spends his evenings at home on the Internet, but then he is invited to a corporate event by his colleagues, and there he meets the Larin family, their two daughters, and the poet Lensky, who works a layout designer, and writes poetry on stikhikh.ru, enjoying some popularity there. He becomes friends with Lensky and goes with him to the bar in the evenings to chat. Lensky is in love with Olga, and the eldest Larina, Tatyana, is in love with Onegin. Onegin hints to Lensky to remember about Article 134 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, and he himself bans Tatyana from VKontakte after a couple of her frank long letters. Instead, he starts writing to Olga with all his might and liking her photos of herself on the beach in a bikini and the pies she baked in a pink frame. Probably to save Lensky, because he is hot and does not want to listen to him. The philological maiden Tatiana is crying. The pink girl Olga is happily being behaved. One is 17, the other is 15. Olga begins to comment with all her might on Onegin’s posts, which are all links with comments: “Yesterday in this shithouse I tried to drink decent whiskey: the Chaldean did not understand what “single malt” was and tried to sell me “expresso” in addition “- I won’t go there again, and I don’t recommend it to you”, “Local boutiques - I’m crap (((”, “New Pelevin is complete shit”, etc. Lensky is angry, runs to Onegin with the aim of punching him in the face, he knocks him out with the first blow. Well, then the cops, the protocol, letters to the board - in short, Onegin is recalled back to Moscow. Lensky rushes after him to Moscow, but loses ardor along the way and gets a job on a cable TV channel, first as a translator, and then as an editor screenwriter, rents a two-room apartment in Chertanovo, goes to poetry evenings at the Bulgakov House every night, each time returning home with a new philological maiden without problems of illegal age - and is completely satisfied with his fate. And Onegin 10 years later (he was sent on long business trips abroad so that the incident would be forgotten , and then returned to the central board with a promotion) meets the head of the provincial branch with his young wife, Tatyana, at the corporate New Year. After a couple of glasses, he calls her to the restaurant’s winter garden and passionately hugs her, and she answers him: “Come on, cool down, Onegin, you’ve run away, you shabby macho. You should have grabbed it earlier.” And Onegin, sad, goes back to the bar.

If we also consider versions of the unwritten but planned tenth chapter, then this incident forces Onegin to reconsider his entire life, resign from the corporation and go to FBK to Navalny to organize street protests and investigations. But I don’t believe in these versions: the characters’ characters develop logically from beginning to end, and the existing ending is logical and true. As well as the ending of my script for a modern series, which I would call “Onegin will not come” - after all, everyone calls them either stupidly or absurdly, so it’s better that way.

Alexander Pushkin introduces the reader to the main character of his novel, Evgeny Onegin. "a philosopher at eighteen" going to the ball. At the age of 17, Evgeny Onegin was an adherent of secular fashion, attended balls,
learned " It’s too early to be a hypocrite", in his young years he already became a genius in "the science of tender passion." It is obvious that our hero had many sexual relationships with married women, and with girls to whom he “I gave lessons in private in silence.”
At the balls Evgeny Onegin "killed eight years, losing life's best color", by the age of 26. More precisely, according to Pushkin: « Having lived without a goal, without work, until the age of twenty-six.”

While registering the inheritance of a wealthy uncle, Evgeny Onegin, at the age of 26, found himself in a remote village. All his mistresses remained in St. Petersburg, and then the young landowner’s daughter Tatyana Larina, having read romance novels, childishly falls in love with a mysterious young man, and sends a love letter to Onegin and offers herself to him: “ That’s the will of heaven: I’m yours!”

The novel does not indicate Tatyana Larina’s age when she sent this letter to Evgeniy. Pushkin gives only frank hints about Tatyana Larina’s young age. “She seemed like a stranger in her own family.” . She didn’t play with dolls or burners, she didn’t go to the meadow with her younger sister Olenka and her “little friends,” but she avidly read English romance novels.

British Muse of Tall Tales
The girl's sleep is disturbed.

Pushkin does not have random words, but there are precise definitions: adolescent – ​​age from 7 to 15 years, states the famous explanatory dictionary of Vladimir Dahl, a contemporary of the poet.

Eugene Onegin denies intimacy to this adolescent girl who has read romance novels; he understands that her feelings are immature.
...having received Tanya's message,
Onegin was deeply touched...
Perhaps the feeling is an ancient ardor
He took possession of it for a minute;
But he didn't want to deceive
The gullibility of an innocent soul.

It turns out that Evgeny Onegin did not want to destroy the innocent girl, and therefore refused her, tactfully taking all the blame upon himself so as not to traumatize Tatyana. And at the end of the date he gave the girl good advice:

Learn to control yourself;
Not everyone will understand you like I do;
Inexperience leads to trouble.

Pushkin himself explained everything about the relationship between Evgeny and Tatyana and himself assessed the actions of his hero.

You will agree, my reader,
What a very nice thing to do
Our friend is with sad Tanya.

Evgeniy acted nobly, keeping the very fact of Tatyana’s letter secret, He didn’t brag to his friends and compromise the young girl. He is a real man!

Who isn't bored of being a hypocrite?
Repeat one thing differently
It is important to try to assure that
What everyone has been sure of for a long time,
All the same objections to hear,
Destroy prejudices
Which were not and are not
A GIRL IS THIRTEEN YEARS OLD!

Let's open the fourth chapter of "Eugene Onegin", it begins with the famous lines:

The less we love a woman,
The easier it is for her to like us.

But usually no one delves into the continuation of Pushkin’s lines, although they are contains the solution to the mystery of the novel!

And the more likely we destroy it
Among seductive networks.
Debauchery used to be cold-blooded
Science was famous for love,
Trumpeting about myself everywhere
And enjoying without loving.
But this is important fun
Worthy of old monkeys
Vaunted grandfather's times...

In a letter to his younger brother Lev, 23-year-old Alexander Pushkin put it more specifically: “The less they love a woman, the sooner they can hope to possess her, but this fun is worthy of an old monkey of the 18th century.”

Nanny Tatyana Larina really went down the aisle at the age of 13, but debauchery "old monkeys" wasn’t there, because her husband Vanya was even younger!
And that's it, Tanya! THIS SUMMER
We haven't heard about love;
Otherwise I would have driven you away from the world
My deceased mother-in-law.
THIS SUMMER (that is, at your age, Tatyana) the nanny had already walked down the aisle, and she was 13 years old.

Why then did our ideal burn with passion for the married Tatyana?

After long wanderings, Onegin returned to St. Petersburg.

And travel for him,
Like everyone else in the world, we’re tired;
He returned and hit
Like Chatsky, from the ship to the ball.

At the very first ball, Onegin saw for the first time a society lady, a general's wife, the most beautiful lady in the capital, he immediately fell in love with her and tried to get closer, risking his reputation and the reputation of Tatyana and her husband. Onegin hardly recognized the same girl Tatyana in the secular beauty.

Is it really the same Tatyana?
which he is alone with,
At the beginning of our romance,
In a remote, distant place,
In the good heat of moralizing,
I once read instructions...

“Is it really the same Tatyana?
That GIRL... Is this a dream?
That GIRL he
neglected in humble fate?

"This was not news to you.
Humble GIRL love?– Tatyana herself reprimands the hero.

This is another confirmation of the age of Tatyana’s okrokovitsa. If she had been an adult girl at her first meeting with Onegin, she would hardly have changed beyond recognition. And after 3-4 years, a 13-year-old girl transformed from an ugly duckling into a real beauty.

* * *
Why did Pushkin indicate the age of his beloved heroine Tatyana Larina - 13 years?

In other Pushkin works, all his heroines in love were older. Dunyasha, the daughter of a stationmaster, ran away with a hussar after 14 years. The peasant young lady Liza, Masha Troekurova, the lover of the young Dubrovsky, and Marya Gavrilovna from “The Snowstorm”, who made a secret escape from her father’s house down the aisle, turned 17 years old. The captain's daughter Masha is 18 years old.

Yes, Pushkin deliberately made Tatyana so young!
If Evgeny Onegin had rejected the love of 17-year-old Tatyana Larina, questions might really have arisen for him. Soulless, callous man!

It was precisely at such a young age of Tatyana Larina that Pushkin was able to emphasize the high morality of his beloved hero Onegin, whom he largely copied from himself.

By the way, at the beginning of the 19th century, completely different morals reigned in Russia, and if 26-year-old Onegin had become close to 13-year-old Tatyana, this would not have caused indignation or rejection of society, but would have looked quite normal.

Unfortunately, in modern society there is an opinion that Tatyana is a victim, a sufferer, and Evgeny Onegin is a ladies' man, causing her deep mental trauma. In fact, Onegin is a hero of our time.
It's time to finally restore justice! A 26-year-old man quite naturally refused intimacy to a 13-year-old girl, and the progressive public condemns him for this noble act!

***
Pushkin always reported the age of his heroes and heroines in his works.
Lensky “nearly eighteen years.”
How old was Olga then, whom 17-year-old Lensky was going to marry? Maximum 12 years. Where is that written?

Pushkin only indicated that Olga was the younger sister of 13-year-old Tatyana. A little boy Lensky (that is, at the age of 8) he was a “touched witness of her INFANTY amusement.”(Infant - up to 3 years old. From 3 to 7 - child).

We consider: if the boy Lensky was 8 years old, then Olga was 2–3 years old. By the time of the duel, he was almost 18, and she was 12 years old. And how indignant Lensky was when young Olga danced with Onegin?

Just out of diapers,
Coquette, flighty child!
She knows the trick,
I've learned to change!

Olga was Lensky's bride at the age of 12, but don't forget what time it was. This is what I wrote Belinsky in an article about Onegin:

“A Russian girl is not a woman in the European sense of the word, not a person: she is something else, like a bride... She is barely twelve years old, and her mother, reproaching her for laziness, for inability to hold on..., says to her: “Aren’t you ashamed, madam: you’re already a bride!”

And at the age of 18, according to Belinsky, “she is no longer the daughter of her parents, not the beloved child of their hearts, but a burdensome burden, goods ready to languish, excess furniture, which, just behold, will fall off the price and will not get away with it.”

This attitude towards girls and early marriages are explained not by the savagery of Russian customs, but by common sense. Families in Russia, as a rule, had large families - the church prohibited abortion, and many children were born.

The parents tried to quickly marry the girl (“an extra mouth”) into someone else’s family, while she looked young. And the dowry required for her was less than for a withered maiden. Proverb: The age-old girl is like an autumn fly!

In the case of the Larins, the situation was even more acute. The girls' father, Dmitry Larin, died, and the mother urgently needed to find a home for her daughter-brides!
Literary critic Yuri Lotman in the comments to the novel “Eugene Onegin” he wrote:

“Young noblewomen married early in the 19th century. True, the frequent marriages of 14–15-year-old girls in the 18th century began to go out of common practice, and 17–19 years became the normal age for marriage. Early marriages, which were the norm in peasant life, were not uncommon at the end of the 18th century for provincial noble life not affected by Europeanization.

Nikolai Gogol's mother was married at the age of 14.23-year-old poet Vasily Zhukovsky fell in love with Masha Protasova when she was 12 years old. The hero of “Woe from Wit” Chatsky fell in love with Sophia when she was 12–14 years old.”

“However, the young novel reader’s first hobbies began much earlier. And the surrounding men looked at the young noblewoman as a woman already at that age at which subsequent generations would have seen in her only a child.”

Literary parallels.

In Russian literature there is only one heroine who comes close to Tatyana Larina in the love of readers - this is Natasha Rostova from the novel “War and Peace” by Leo Tolstoy.

Natasha Rostova is also a noblewoman; we first meet her in the novel on her name day. In love with officer Drubetsky, she caught Boris in a secluded place and kissed him on the lips. Embarrassed Boris also confessed his love to the girl, but asked not to kiss again for 4 years and “Then I will ask for your hand.”

The love situation is exactly like in “Eugene Onegin,” but it does not cause any controversy among readers or condemnation of officer Drubetsky. Count Rostov, Natasha's father, recalls the past years in small talk, and reminds the girls that their mothers got married at the age of 12 - 13.

The first Russian novel in verse. A new model of literature as an easy conversation about everything. Gallery of eternal Russian characters. A revolutionary love story for its era, which became the archetype of romantic relationships for many generations to come. Encyclopedia of Russian life. Ours is everything.

comments: Igor Pilshchikov

What is this book about?

The capital's rake Eugene Onegin, having received an inheritance, leaves for the village, where he meets the poet Lensky, his bride Olga and her sister Tatyana. Tatyana falls in love with Onegin, but he does not reciprocate her feelings. Lensky, jealous of the bride's friend, challenges Onegin to a duel and dies. Tatyana gets married and becomes a high society lady. Now Evgeny falls in love with her, but Tatyana remains faithful to her husband. At this moment the author interrupts the narration - “the novel ends nothing» 1 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. IV. C. 425. ⁠ .

Although the plot of Eugene Onegin is uneventful, the novel had a huge impact on Russian literature. Pushkin brought to the literary forefront socio-psychological types that would occupy readers and writers of several subsequent generations. This is an “extra person”, an (anti) hero of his time, hiding his true face behind the mask of a cold egoist (Onegin); a naive provincial girl, honest and open, ready for self-sacrifice (Tatyana at the beginning of the novel); a poet-dreamer who dies at the first collision with reality (Lensky); Russian woman, the embodiment of grace, intelligence and aristocratic dignity (Tatiana at the end of the novel). This is, finally, a whole gallery of character portraits representing Russian noble society in all its diversity (cynic Zaretsky, “old men” Larina, provincial landowners, Moscow bar, metropolitan dandies and many, many others).

Alexander Pushkin. Around 1830

Hulton Archive/Getty Images

When was it written?

The first two chapters and the beginning of the third were written in the “southern exile” (in Chisinau and Odessa) from May 1823 to July 1824. Pushkin is skeptical and critical of the existing order of things. The first chapter is a satire on modern nobility; at the same time, Pushkin himself, like Onegin, behaves provocatively and dresses like a dandy. Odessa and (to a lesser extent) Moldavian impressions are reflected in the first chapter of the novel and in Onegin's Travels.

The central chapters of the novel (from the third to the sixth) were completed in the “northern exile” (in the Pskov family estate - the village of Mikhailovskoye) in the period from August 1824 to November 1826. Pushkin experienced himself (and described in Chapter Four) the boredom of life in the village, where in winter there is no entertainment except books, drinking and sleigh rides. The main pleasure is communicating with neighbors (for Pushkin this is the Osipov-Wulf family, who lived on the Trigorskoye estate not far from Mikhailovsky). The heroes of the novel spend their time in the same way.

The new Emperor Nicholas I returned the poet from exile. Now Pushkin constantly visits Moscow and St. Petersburg. He is a “superstar”, the most fashionable poet in Russia. The seventh (Moscow) chapter, begun in August-September 1827, was completed and rewritten on November 4, 1828.

But the age of fashion is short-lived, and by 1830 Pushkin’s popularity was fading. Having lost the attention of his contemporaries, during the three months of the Boldino autumn (September - November 1830) he wrote dozens of works that made him famous among his descendants. Among other things, in the Nizhny Novgorod family estate of the Pushkins, Boldin, “Onegin’s Journey” and the eighth chapter of the novel were completed, and the so-called tenth chapter of “Eugene Onegin” was partially written and burned.

Almost a year later, on October 5, 1831, Onegin’s letter was written in Tsarskoe Selo. The book is ready. In the future, Pushkin only rearranges the text and edits individual stanzas.

Pushkin's office in the Mikhailovskoye museum-estate

How is it written?

“Eugene Onegin” concentrates the main thematic and stylistic findings of the previous creative decade: the type of disappointed hero is reminiscent of romantic elegies and the poem “Prisoner of the Caucasus”, the fragmentary plot is about it and other “southern” (“Byronic”) poems of Pushkin, stylistic contrasts and the author's irony - about the poem "Ruslan and Lyudmila", conversational intonation - about friendly poetic messages Arzamas poets "Arzamas" is a literary circle that existed in St. Petersburg in 1815-1818. Its members included poets and writers (Pushkin, Zhukovsky, Batyushkov, Vyazemsky, Kavelin) and political figures. The people of Arzamas opposed conservative policies and archaic literary traditions. Relations within the circle were friendly, and the meetings were like fun get-togethers. For Arzamas poets, the favorite genre was a friendly message, an ironic poem full of hints, understandable only to the recipients. ⁠ .

For all that, the novel is absolutely anti-traditional. The text has neither a beginning (the ironic “introduction” is at the end of the seventh chapter) nor an end: the open ending is followed by excerpts from Onegin’s Travels, returning the reader first to the middle of the plot, and then, in the last line, to the moment the work begins author above the text (“So I lived in Odessa then...”). The novel lacks traditional signs of a novel plot and familiar characters: “All types and forms of literature are naked, openly revealed to the reader and ironically compared with each other, the conventionality of any method of expression is mockingly demonstrated by" 2 Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer. Articles and notes (1960-1990). "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. St. Petersburg: Art-SPb, 1995. P. 195. ⁠ . The question “how to write?” worries Pushkin no less than the question “what to write about?” The answer to both questions is “Eugene Onegin.” This is not only a novel, but also a meta-novel (a novel about how a novel is written).

Now I’m not writing a novel, but a novel in verse - a devilish difference

Alexander Pushkin

The poetic form helps Pushkin get by without an exciting plot (“...now I’m not writing a novel, but a novel in verse—diabolical difference" 3 Pushkin A.S. Complete works. In 16 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1937-1949. T.13. C. 73. ⁠ ). The author-narrator plays a special role in the construction of the text, whose constant presence motivates countless deviations from the main intrigue. Such digressions are usually called lyrical, but in reality they turn out to be very different - lyrical, satirical, literary polemical, whatever. The author talks about everything he deems necessary (“The novel requires chatter" 4 Pushkin A.S. Complete works. In 16 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1937-1949. T. 13. P. 180. ⁠ ) - and the narrative moves with an almost motionless plot.

Pushkin's text is characterized by a multiplicity of points of view expressed by the author-narrator and characters, and a stereoscopic combination of contradictions that arise when different views on the same subject collide. Is Evgeniy original or imitative? What kind of future awaited Lensky - great or ordinary? All these questions are given different, and mutually exclusive, answers in the novel. “Behind this construction of the text lay the idea of ​​the fundamental incompatibility of life in literature,” and the open ending symbolized “the inexhaustibility of possibilities and endless variability reality" 5 Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer. Articles and notes (1960-1990). "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. St. Petersburg: Art-SPb, 1995. P. 196. ⁠ . This was an innovation: in the Romantic era, the points of view of the author and the narrator were usually merged into a single lyrical self, and other points of view were corrected by the author's.

Onegin is a radically innovative work not only in terms of composition, but also in style. In his poetics, Pushkin synthesized the fundamental features of two antagonistic literary movements of the early 19th century - Young Karamzinism and Young Archaism. The first direction was oriented toward the average style and colloquial speech of an educated society and was open to new European borrowings. The second united high and low styles, based, on the one hand, on book-church literature and the odic tradition of the 18th century, on the other, on folk literature. Giving preference to one or another linguistic means, the mature Pushkin was not guided by external aesthetic standards, but made his choice based on how these means work within the framework of a specific plan. The novelty and unusualness of Pushkin’s style amazed his contemporaries, but we have become accustomed to it since childhood and often do not feel stylistic contrasts, much less stylistic nuances. Having abandoned the a priori division of stylistic registers into “low” and “high,” Pushkin not only created a fundamentally new aesthetics, but also solved the most important cultural task - the synthesis of linguistic styles and the creation of a new national literary language.

Joshua Reynolds. Laurence Stern. 1760 National Portrait Gallery, London. Pushkin borrowed the tradition of long lyrical digressions from Stern and Byron

Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council

Richard Westall. George Gordon Byron. 1813 National Portrait Gallery, London

Wikimedia Commons

What influenced her?

“Eugene Onegin” relied on the broadest European cultural tradition from French psychological prose of the 17th-18th centuries to the romantic poem contemporary to Pushkin, including experiments in parody literature, "defamiliarizing" Defamiliarization is a literary technique that turns familiar things and events into strange ones, as if seen for the first time. Defamiliarization allows you to perceive what is being described not automatically, but more consciously. The term was introduced by literary critic Viktor Shklovsky. ⁠ literary style (from French and Russian irocomic Irocomic poetry is a parody of epic poetry: everyday life with drinking and fighting is described in high calm. Among the typical examples of Russian irocomic poems are “Elisha, or the Irritated Bacchus” by Vasily Maykov, “Dangerous Neighbor” by Vasily Pushkin. ⁠ And burlesque In burlesque poetry, the comic effect is based on the fact that epic heroes and gods speak in rude and vulgar language. If initially irocomic poetry, where the low was spoken of in a high syllable, was opposed to burlesque, then by the 18th century both types of poetry were perceived as one comic genre. ⁠ poetry to Byron’s “Don Juan”) and plot narration (from Stern to Hoffmann and the same Byron). From irocomics, “Eugene Onegin” inherited a playful clash of styles and a parody of elements of the heroic epic (for example, the “introduction” imitating the beginning of a classical epic). From Stern and Sternians Laurence Sterne (1713-1768) - English writer, author of the novels A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy and The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Sternism is the name given to the literary tradition that his novels laid: in Stern’s texts, lyricism is combined with ironic skepticism, the chronology of the narrative and its coherence are disrupted. In Russian literature, the most famous Sternian work is “Letters of a Russian Traveler” by Karamzin. ⁠ Inherited are rearranged chapters and omitted stanzas, constant distraction from the main plot thread, a game with a traditional plot structure: the beginning and the denouement are absent, and the ironic “introduction”, in Sternian style, is transferred to chapter seven. From Stern and from Byron - lyrical digressions, occupying almost half of the novel's text.

Initially, the novel was published serially, chapter by chapter, from 1825 to 1832. In addition to entire chapters, published in separate books, what we would now call teasers appeared in almanacs, magazines and newspapers - small fragments of the novel (from a few stanzas to a dozen pages).

The first consolidated edition of Eugene Onegin was published in 1833. The last lifetime edition (“Eugene Onegin, a novel in verse. The work of Alexander Pushkin. Third edition”) was published in January 1837, a week and a half before the poet’s death.

"Eugene Onegin", second edition of the 1st chapter. St. Petersburg, printing house of the Department of Public Education, 1829

"Onegin" Directed by Martha Fiennes. USA, UK, 1999

How was she received?

In different ways, including in the poet’s immediate circle. In 1828, Baratynsky wrote to Pushkin: “We have released two more songs from Onegin.” Everyone interprets them in their own way: some praise them, others scold them, and everyone reads them. I really love the extensive plan of your Onegin; but the greater number do not understand it.” The best critics wrote about the “emptiness of content” of the novel ( Ivan Kireevsky Ivan Vasilyevich Kireevsky (1806-1856) - religious philosopher and literary critic. In 1832, he published the magazine “European,” which was banned by the authorities because of an article by Kireyevsky himself. He gradually moved away from Westernizing views towards Slavophilism, however, the conflict with the authorities repeated - in 1852, because of his article, the Slavophil publication “Moscow Collection” was closed. At the heart of Kireyevsky’s philosophy is the doctrine of “integral thinking,” which transcends the incompleteness of rational logic: it is achieved primarily through faith and asceticism. ⁠ ), stated that this “brilliant toy” cannot have “claims to either the unity of content, or the integrity of the composition, or the harmony of presentation” (Nikolai Nadezhdin), they found in the novel “a lack of connection and plan” ( Boris Fedorov Boris Mikhailovich Fedorov (1794-1875) - poet, playwright, children's writer. He worked as a theater censor and wrote literary reviews. His own poems and dramas were not successful. He often became the hero of epigrams; a mention of him can be found in Pushkin: “Perhaps, Fedorov, don’t come to me, / Don’t put me to sleep - or don’t wake me up later.” It's funny that one of Fedorov's quatrains was mistakenly attributed to Pushkin until the 1960s. ⁠ ), “many continuous deviations from the main subject” were considered “tiring” (aka) and, finally, they came to the conclusion that the poet “repeats himself” (Nikolai Polevoy) Nikolai Alekseevich Polevoy (1796-1846) - literary critic, publisher, writer. He is considered the ideologist of the “third estate”. He introduced the term “journalism” into use. From 1825 to 1834 he published the Moscow Telegraph magazine; after the magazine was closed by the authorities, Polevoy’s political views became more conservative. Since 1841, it has been publishing the magazine “Russian Messenger”. ⁠ , and the last chapters mark the “complete fall” of Pushkin’s talent (Thaddei Bulgarin) Thaddeus Venediktovich Bulgarin (1789-1859) - critic, writer and publisher, the most odious figure in the literary process of the first half of the 19th century. In his youth, Bulgarin fought in Napoleonic detachment and even took part in the campaign against Russia, but by the mid-1820s he became an ultra-conservative and, in addition, an agent of the Third Section. He published the magazine “Northern Archive”, the first private newspaper with a political department “Northern Bee” and the first theatrical almanac “Russian Waist”. Bulgarin's novel "Ivan Vyzhigin" - one of the first Russian picaresque novels - was a resounding success at the time of publication. ⁠ .

In general, “Onegin” was received in such a way that Pushkin abandoned the idea of ​​continuing the novel: he “curtailed its remaining part to one chapter, and responded to the claims of the Zoils with “The Little House in Kolomna,” the whole pathos of which lies in the affirmation of absolute creative freedom will" 6 Shapir M.I. Articles about Pushkin. M.: Languages ​​of Slavic Cultures, 2009. P. 192. ⁠ .

One of the first to realize the “enormous historical and social significance” of “Eugene Onegin” Belinsky 7 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. T. 7. P. 431. ⁠ . In the 8th and 9th articles (1844-1845) of the so-called Pushkin cycle (formally it was a very detailed review of the first posthumous edition of Pushkin’s works), he puts forward and substantiates the thesis that “Onegin” is a picture poetically true to reality Russian society into the famous era" 8 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. T. 7. P. 445. ⁠ , and therefore “Onegin” can be called an encyclopedia of Russian life and highly popular work" 9 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. C. 503. ⁠ .

Twenty years later, the ultra-left radical Dmitry Pisarev, in his article “Pushkin and Belinsky” (1865), called for a radical revision of this concept: according to Pisarev, Lensky is a meaningless “idealist and romantic”, Onegin from the beginning to the end of the novel “remains the most insignificant vulgarity”, Tatyana - just a fool (in her head “the amount of brain was very insignificant” and “this small amount was in the most deplorable condition" 10 Pisarev D.I. Complete works and letters in 12 volumes. M.: Nauka, 2003. T. 7. P. 225, 230, 252. ⁠ ). Conclusion: instead of working, the heroes of the novel do nonsense. Pisarev's reading of Onegin was ridiculed Dmitry Minaev Dmitry Dmitrievich Minaev (1835-1889) - satirist poet, translator of Byron, Heine, Hugo, Moliere. Minaev gained fame thanks to his parodies and feuilletons, and was the leading author of the popular satirical magazines Iskra and Alarm Clock. In 1866, due to collaboration with the magazines Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo, he spent four months in the Peter and Paul Fortress. ⁠ in the brilliant parody “Eugene Onegin of Our Time” (1865), where the main character is presented as a bearded nihilist - something like Turgenev’s Bazarov.

Another decade and a half later, Dostoevsky in his "Pushkin's speech" Dostoevsky gives a speech about Pushkin in 1880 at a meeting of the Society of Lovers of Russian Literature, its main thesis was the idea of ​​the poet’s nationality: “And never before has any Russian writer, either before or after him, united so sincerely and kindly with his people, like Pushkin." With a preface and additions, the speech was published in the Writer's Diary. ⁠ (1880) put forward a third (conditionally “soil-based”) interpretation of the novel. Dostoevsky agrees with Belinsky that in “Eugene Onegin” “real Russian life is embodied with such creative power and with such completeness as has never happened before.” Pushkin" 11 Dostoevsky F. M. Diary of a Writer. 1880, August. Chapter two. Pushkin (essay). Pronounced on June 8 at a meeting of the Society of Lovers of Russian Literature // Dostoevsky F. M. Collected Works in 15 volumes. St. Petersburg: Nauka, 1995. T. 14. P. 429. ⁠ . Just like for Belinsky, who believed that Tatyana embodies the “type of Russian women" 12 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. T. 4. P. 503. ⁠ , Tatyana for Dostoevsky is “a positive type, not a negative one, this is a type of positive beauty, this is the apotheosis of the Russian woman,” “this is a solid type, standing firmly on its own soil. She is deeper than Onegin and, of course, smarter his" 13 ⁠ . Unlike Belinsky, Dostoevsky believed that Onegin was not suitable as a hero at all: “Perhaps Pushkin would have done even better if he had named his poem after Tatyana, and not Onegin, for undoubtedly she is the main character poems" 14 Dostoevsky F. M. Diary of a Writer. 1880, August. Chapter two. Pushkin (essay). Pronounced on June 8 at a meeting of the Society of Lovers of Russian Literature // Dostoevsky F. M. Collected Works in 15 volumes. St. Petersburg: Nauka, 1995. T. 14. P. 430. ⁠ .

Excerpts from Onegin began to be included in educational textbooks as early as 1843. of the year 15 Vdovin A.V., Leibov R.G. Pushkin at school: curriculum and literary canon in the 19th century // Lotmanov collection 4. M.: OGI, 2014. P. 251. ⁠ . By the end of the 19th century, a gymnasium canon was emerging that identified the “main” works of art of the 1820s-40s: “Woe from Wit”, “Eugene Onegin”, “Hero of Our Time” and “Dead Souls” occupy an obligatory place in this series. Soviet school curricula in this regard continue the pre-revolutionary tradition - only the interpretation varies, but it is ultimately based in one way or another on Belinsky’s concept. And the landscape-calendar fragments of “Onegin” are memorized from elementary school as virtually independent, ideologically neutral and aesthetically exemplary works (“Winter! Peasant, triumphant...”, “Driven by the spring rays...”, “The sky was already breathing in autumn. .." and etc.).

How did Onegin influence Russian literature?

"Eugene Onegin" is quickly becoming one of the key texts of Russian literature. The problematics, plot moves and narrative techniques of many Russian novels and stories directly go back to Pushkin’s novel: the main character as an “extra person” who is unable to find use for his remarkable talents in life; a heroine who is morally superior to the protagonist; contrasting “pairing” of characters; even a duel in which the hero gets involved. This is all the more striking since “Eugene Onegin” is a “novel in verse,” and in Russia, from the mid-1840s, a half-century era of prose began.

Belinsky also noted that “Eugene Onegin” had “a huge influence on both modern... and subsequent Russian literature" 16 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. T. 4. P. 501. ⁠ . Onegin, like Lermontov’s Pechorin, is “the hero of our time,” and vice versa, Pechorin is “the Onegin of our time" 17 Belinsky V. G. Complete works. In 13 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959. T. 4. P. 265. ⁠ . Lermontov openly points out this continuity with the help of anthroponymy: the surname Pechorin is formed from the name of the northern river Pechora, just like the surnames of the antipodes Onegin and Lensky - from the names of the northern rivers Onega and Lena, located very far from one another.

Behind this construction of the text lay the idea of ​​the fundamental incompatibility of life in literature.

Yuri Lotman

Moreover, the plot of “Eugene Onegin” clearly influenced Lermontov’s “Princess Mary”. According to Viktor Vinogradov, “Pushkin’s heroes were replaced by heroes of modern times.<...>Onegin's descendant Pechorin is corroded by reflection. He is no longer able to surrender even to a belated feeling of love for a woman with that immediate passion like Onegin. Pushkin's Tanya was replaced by Vera, who nevertheless cheated on her husband, betraying Pechorin" 18 Vinogradov V.V. Lermontov’s prose style // Literary heritage. M.: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1941. T. 43/44. P. 598. ⁠ . Two pairs of heroes and heroines (Onegin and Lensky; Tatyana and Olga) correspond to two similar pairs (Pechorin and Grushnitsky; Vera and Princess Mary); a duel takes place between the heroes. Turgenev’s “Fathers and Sons” reproduces a somewhat similar set of characters (antagonists Pavel Kirsanov and Evgeny Bazarov; sisters Katerina Lokteva and Anna Odintsova), but the duel takes on an openly travesty character. The theme of the “superfluous man” raised in “Eugene Onegin” runs through all the most important works of Turgenev, to whom, in fact, this term belongs (“The Diary of an Extra Man,” 1850).

“Eugene Onegin” is the first Russian meta-novel that created a special tradition. In the novel “What to do?” Chernyshevsky talks about how to find a plot for a novel and build its composition, and Chernyshevsky’s parodic “insightful reader” vividly resembles Pushkin’s “noble reader,” to whom the author-narrator ironically addresses. Nabokov's "The Gift" is a novel about the poet Godunov-Cherdyntsev, who writes poetry, wanting to write like Pushkin, whom he idolizes, and at the same time is forced to work on the biography of Chernyshevsky, whom he hates. In Nabokov, as well as later in Pasternak’s novel “Doctor Zhivago,” poetry is written by a hero who is not equal to the author—a prose writer and a poet. Similarly, in Eugene Onegin, Pushkin writes a poem by Lensky: it is a parody poem, written in the poetics of Lensky (the character), not Pushkin (the author).

What is the “Onegin stanza”?

All of Pushkin's poems written before 1830 were written astronomical iambic Not divided into stanzas. ⁠ . The exception is Onegin, the first major work in which the poet tried out a strict strophic form.

Each stanza “remembers” its previous uses: the octave inevitably refers to the Italian poetic tradition, Spenserian stanza A nine-line stanza: eight verses in it are written in iambic pentameter, and the ninth in hexameter. Named after the English poet Edmund Spenser, who introduced this stanza into poetic practice. ⁠ - to English. Apparently, this is why Pushkin did not want to use a ready-made strophic structure: unusual content requires an unusual form.

For his main work, Pushkin invented a unique stanza that had no direct precedents in world poetry. Here is the formula written down by the author himself: “4 croisés, 4 de suite, 1.2.1. et deux." That is: quatrain cross rhyme, The most commonly used type of rhyme in quatrains, lines rhyme alternately (abab). ⁠ quatrain adjacent rhyme, Here adjacent lines rhyme: the first with the second, the third with the fourth (aabb). This type of rhyme is most common in Russian folk poetry. ⁠ quatrain girdle rhyme In this case, the first line rhymes with the fourth, and the second with the third (abba). The first and fourth lines seem to encircle the quatrain. ⁠ and the final couplet. Possible strophic patterns: one of the varieties odic A stanza of ten lines, the lines are divided into three parts: the first has four lines, the second and third have three each. The rhyming method is abab ccd eed. As the name suggests, in Russian poetry it was used primarily for writing odes. ⁠ stanzas 19 Sperantov V.V. Miscellanea poetologica: 1. Was there a book. Shalikov the inventor of the “Onegin stanza”? // Philologica. 1996. T. 3. No. 5/7. pp. 125-131. pp. 126-128. ⁠ And sonnet 20 Grossman L.P. Onegin stanza // Pushkin / Ed. N.K. Piksanova. M.: Gosizdat, 1924. Coll. 1. pp. 125-131. ⁠ .

Romance requires chatter

Alexander Pushkin

The first rhyme of the stanza is women's Rhyme with stress on the penultimate syllable. ⁠ , final - men's Rhyme with stress on the last syllable. ⁠ . Female rhyme pairs do not follow female ones, and male ones do not follow male ones (alternance rule). The meter is iambic tetrameter, the most common metrical form in the poetic culture of Pushkin’s time.

Formal rigor only sets off the expressiveness and flexibility of poetic speech: “Often the first quatrain sets the theme of the stanza, the second develops it, the third forms a thematic turn, and the couplet gives a clearly formulated resolution Topics" 21 ⁠ . The final couplets often contain witticisms and thus resemble short epigrams. At the same time, you can follow the development of the plot by reading only the first quatrains 22 Tomashevsky B.V. The tenth chapter of “Eugene Onegin”: The history of the solution // Literary heritage. M.: Zhur.-gaz. association, 1934. T. 16/18. pp. 379-420. C. 386. ⁠ .

Against the backdrop of such a strict regulation, the retreats stand out effectively. Firstly, there are inclusions of other metrical forms: letters of the heroes to each other, written in astronomical iambic tetrameter, and a song of girls written in trochee trimeter with dactylic endings Rhyme with stress on the third syllable from the end. ⁠ . Secondly, these are the rarest (and therefore very expressive) pairs of stanzas, where a phrase begun in one stanza is completed in the next. For example, in chapter three:

Tatyana jumped into another hallway,
From the porch to the yard, and straight into the garden,
Flying, flying; look back
He doesn't dare; ran around instantly
Curtains, bridges, meadow,
Alley to the lake, woods,
I broke the siren bushes,
Flying through the flower beds to the stream
And gasping for breath, onto the bench

XXXIX.
Fell...

The interstrophic transfer metaphorically depicts the heroine's fall onto the bench after a long running 23 Shapir M.I. Articles about Pushkin. M.: Languages ​​of Slavic Cultures, 2009. pp. 82-83. ⁠ . The same technique is used in describing the death of Lensky, who falls, killed by Onegin’s shot.

In addition to numerous parodies of Onegin, later examples of Onegin's stanza include original works. However, this stanza turned out to be impossible to use without direct references to Pushkin’s text. Lermontov in the very first stanza of “The Tambov Treasurer” (1838) declares: “I am writing Onegin in size.” Vyacheslav Ivanov, in the poetic introduction to the poem “Infancy” (1913-1918), stipulates: “The size of the treasured stanzas is pleasant,” and begins the first line of the first stanza with the words “My father was one of the unsociable...” (as in Onegin: “My uncle of the most honest rules..."). Igor Severyanin composes a “novel in stanzas” (!) under the title “Royal Leandra” (1925) and in the poetic introduction he explains: “I am writing in Onegin’s stanza.”

There were attempts to vary Pushkin’s find: “Other stanzas similar to Onegin’s were invented as a matter of competition. Almost immediately following Pushkin, Baratynsky wrote his poem “The Ball”, also in fourteen lines, but with a different structure... And in 1927, V. Nabokov wrote the “University Poem”, inverting the rhyme order of the Onegin stanza from end to to the beginning" 24 Gasparov M. L. Onegin stanza // Gasparov M. L. Russian verse of the early 20th century in the comments. M.: Fortuna Limited, 2001. P. 178. ⁠ . Nabokov did not stop there: the last paragraph of Nabokov’s “The Gift” only looks prosaic, but in fact it is a Onegin stanza written down in a line.

"Onegin" (Onegin). Directed by Martha Fiennes. USA, UK, 1999

Mstislav Dobuzhinsky. Illustration for "Eugene Onegin". 1931–1936

Russian State Library

Why are the secondary characters interesting in the novel?

The locations of the novel change from chapter to chapter: St. Petersburg (new European capital) - village - Moscow (national-traditional patriarchal center) - South of Russia and the Caucasus. The characters vary amazingly according to toponymy.

Philologist Maxim Shapir, having analyzed the system of naming characters in Pushkin’s novel, showed that they are divided into several categories. The “steppe” landowners - satirical characters - are endowed with telling names (Pustyakov, Petushkov, Buyanov, etc.). The author names Moscow bars without surnames, only by first name and patronymic (Lukerya Lvovna, Lyubov Petrovna, Ivan Petrovich, Semyon Petrovich, etc.). Representatives of the St. Petersburg high society - real people from Pushkin’s circle - are described in half-hints, but readers easily recognized real people in these anonymous portraits: “An old man who joked in the old way: / Excellently subtle and clever, / Which is somewhat funny now” - His Excellency Ivan Ivanovich Dmitriev, and “Avid for epigrams, / Angry master at everything” - His Excellency Count Gavriil Frantsevich Moden 25 Shapir M.I. Articles about Pushkin. M.: Languages ​​of Slavic Cultures, 2009. P. 285-287; Vatsuro V. E. Comments: I. I. Dmitriev // Letters of Russian writers of the 18th century. L.: Nauka, 1980. P. 445; Proskurin O. A. / o-proskurin.livejournal.com/59236.html. ⁠ .

Other contemporaries of the poet are named by their full names when it comes to the public side of their activities. For example, “The Singer of Feasts and languid sadness” is Baratynsky, as Pushkin himself explains in the 22nd note to “Eugene Onegin” (one of the most famous works of early Baratynsky is the poem “Feasts”). “Another poet” who “depicted the first snow for us in a luxurious style” is Prince Vyazemsky, the author of the elegy “The First Snow,” Pushkin explains in the 27th note. But if the same contemporary “appears on the pages of the novel as a private person, the poet resorts to asterisks and reductions" 26 Shapir M.I. Articles about Pushkin. M.: Languages ​​of Slavic Cultures, 2009. P. 282. ⁠ . Therefore, when Tatyana meets Prince Vyazemsky, Pushkin reports: “V. somehow got hooked on her” (and not “Vyazemsky somehow got hooked on her,” as modern publications print). The famous passage: “Du comme il faut (Shishkov, forgive me: / I don’t know how to translate)” did not appear in this form during Pushkin’s lifetime. At first the poet intended to use the initial “Sh.”, but then replaced it with three asterisks Typographic sign in the form of an asterisk. ⁠ . A friend of Pushkin and Baratynsky, Wilhelm Kuchelbecker, believed that these lines were addressed to him, and read them: “Wilhelm, forgive me: / I don’t know how translate" 27 Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer. Articles and notes (1960-1990). "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. St. Petersburg: Art-SPb, 1995. P. 715. ⁠ . By adding names for the author that are only hinted at in the text, modern editors, Shapir concludes, simultaneously violate the norms of Pushkin’s ethics and poetics.

Francois Chevalier. Evgeny Baratynsky. 1830s. State Museum of Fine Arts named after. A. S. Pushkin. Baratynsky is mentioned in the novel as “The Singer of Feasts and languid sadness”

Karl Reichel. Pyotr Vyazemsky. 1817. All-Russian Museum of A. S. Pushkin, St. Petersburg. In the lines “Another poet in a luxurious style / Painted the first snow for us,” Pushkin had in mind Vyazemsky, the author of the elegy “The First Snow”

Ivan Matyushin (engraving from an unknown original). Wilhelm Kuchelbecker. 1820s. All-Russian Museum of A. S. Pushkin, St. Petersburg. During Pushkin’s life, in the passage “Du comme il faut (Shishkov, forgive me: / I don’t know how to translate) asterisks were printed instead of the surname. Kuchelbecker believed that they were hiding the name “Wilhelm”

When do the events described in the novel take place and how old are the characters?

The internal chronology of Eugene Onegin has long intrigued readers and researchers. In what years does the action take place? How old are the characters at the beginning of the novel and at the end? Pushkin himself wrote without hesitation (and not just anywhere, but in the notes included in the text of Onegin): “We dare to assure that in our novel time is calculated according to the calendar” (note 17). But does the novel's time coincide with the historical one? Let's see what we know from the text.

During the duel, Onegin is 26 years old (“...Having lived without a goal, without labor / Until he was twenty-six years old...”). Onegin broke up with the Author a year before. If the Author’s biography repeats Pushkin’s, then this separation occurred in 1820 (in May Pushkin was exiled to the south), and the duel took place in 1821. This is where the first problem arises. The duel took place two days after Tatiana’s name day, and Tatiana’s name day is January 12 (old style). According to the text, the name day was celebrated on Saturday (in drafts - on Thursday). However, in 1821, January 12 fell on a Wednesday. However, perhaps the name day celebration was postponed to one of the next days (Saturday).

If the main events (from Onegin’s arrival in the village to the duel) still take place in the period from the summer of 1820 to January 1821, then Onegin was born in 1795 or 1796 (he is three to four years younger than Vyazemsky and three to four years younger older than Pushkin), and began to shine in St. Petersburg when he was “almost eighteen years old” - in 1813. However, in the preface to the first edition of the first chapter it is directly stated that “it contains a description of the social life of a St. Petersburg young man at the end of 1819 of the year" 28 Pushkin A.S. Complete works. In 16 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1937-1949. T. 6. P. 638. ⁠ . Of course, we can ignore this circumstance: this date was not included in the final text (editions of 1833 and 1837). Nevertheless, the description of metropolitan life in the first chapter clearly refers to the end of the 1810s, and not to 1813, when the Patriotic War had just ended and the foreign campaign against Napoleon was in full swing. The ballerina Istomina, whose performance Onegin watches in the theater, had not yet danced in 1813; Hussar Kaverin, with whom Onegin is carousing at the Talon restaurant, has not yet returned to St. Petersburg due to borders 29 Baevsky V. S. Time in “Eugene Onegin” // Pushkin: Research and materials. L.: Nauka, 1983. T. XI. pp. 115-130. C. 117. ⁠ .

"Onegin" is a poetically true picture of Russian society in a certain era

Vissarion Belinsky

Despite everything, we continue to count down from 1821. When Lensky died in January 1821, he was “eighteen years old,” which means he was born in 1803. The text of the novel does not say when Tatyana was born, but Pushkin told Vyazemsky that Tatyana’s letter to Onegin, written in the summer of 1820, is “a letter from a woman, also 17 years old, and also in love.” Then Tatyana was also born in 1803, and Olga was a year younger than her, maximum two (since she was already a bride, she could not be less than fifteen). By the way, when Tatyana was born, her mother was hardly more than 25 years old, so the “old lady” Larina was about forty at the time she met Onegin. However, there is no indication of Tatiana’s age in the final text of the novel, so it is possible that all the Larins were a couple of years older.

Tatyana arrives in Moscow at the end of January or February 1822 and (in the fall?) gets married. Meanwhile, Evgeniy wanders. According to the printed "Excerpts from Onegin's Travels", he arrives in Bakhchisarai three years after the Author. Pushkin was there in 1820, Onegin, therefore, in 1823. In stanzas not included in the printed text of the Travels, the Author and Onegin meet in Odessa in 1823 or 1824 and part: Pushkin goes to Mikhailovskoye (this happened in the last days of July 1824), Onegin to St. Petersburg. At a reception in the fall of 1824, he meets Tatiana, who has been married “about two years.” Everything seems to fit, but in 1824 Tatyana could not speak with the Spanish ambassador at this reception, since Russia did not yet have diplomatic relations with Spain 30 Eugene Onegin: A Novel in Verse by Aleksandr Pushkin / Translated from the Russian, with a Commentary, by Vladimir Nabokov. In 4 vols. N.Y.: Bollingen, 1964. Vol. 3. P. 83; Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer. Articles and notes (1960-1990). "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. St. Petersburg: Art-SPb, 1995. P. 718. ⁠ . Onegin's letter to Tatiana, followed by their explanation, is dated spring (March?) 1825. But is this noble lady really only 22 years old at the time of the final date?

There are many such minor inconsistencies in the text of the novel. At one time, literary critic Joseph Toibin came to the conclusion that in the 17th note the poet had in mind not historical, but seasonal chronology (the timely change of seasons within the novel time) 31 Toybin I.M. “Eugene Onegin”: poetry and history // Pushkin: Research and materials. L.: Nauka, 1979. T. IX. P. 93. ⁠ . Apparently he was right.

"Eugene Onegin". Directed by Roman Tikhomirov. USSR, 1958

Mstislav Dobuzhinsky. Illustration for "Eugene Onegin". 1931–1936

Russian State Library

How does the text of Onegin that we know today compare with the one that Pushkin’s contemporaries read?

Contemporaries managed to read several versions of Onegin. In the editions of individual chapters, the poems were accompanied by various kinds of additional texts, not all of which were included in the consolidated edition. Thus, the prefaces to a separate edition of Chapter One (1825) included the note “Here is the beginning of a large poem that will probably not be finished...” and a dramatic scene in verse “A Conversation between a Bookseller and a Poet.”

Initially, Pushkin conceived a longer work, perhaps even in twelve chapters (at the end of a separate edition of chapter six we read: “The end of the first part”). However, after 1830, the author’s attitude towards the forms of storytelling changed (Pushkin is now more interested in prose), readers towards the author (Pushkin is losing popularity, the public believes that he has “written himself out”), and the author towards the public (he becomes disappointed in it - I would like to say “ mental abilities" - aesthetic readiness to accept "Onegin"). Therefore, Pushkin broke off the novel mid-sentence, published the former ninth chapter as the eighth, and published the former eighth (“Onegin’s Travels”) in excerpts, placing it at the end of the text after the notes. The novel acquired an open ending, slightly camouflaged by a closed mirror composition (it is formed by the characters’ exchange of letters and a return to the Odessa impressions of the first chapter at the end of “The Journey”).

Excluded from the text of the first consolidated edition (1833): the introductory note to chapter one, “Conversation between a bookseller and a poet,” and some stanzas published in editions of individual chapters. Notes for all chapters are included in a special section. The dedication to Pletnev, originally prefixed to the double edition of chapters four and five (1828), is placed in note 23. Only in the last lifetime edition (1837) do we find the familiar architectonics: The general form of the text structure and the relationship of its parts. A concept of a larger order than composition - understood as the arrangement and relationships of details within large parts of the text. ⁠ the dedication to Pletnev becomes the dedication of the entire novel.

In 1922 Modest Hoffman Modest Ludwigovich Hoffman (1887-1959) - philologist, poet and Pushkin scholar. His fame was brought to him by The Book of Russian Poets of the Last Decade, an anthology of articles on Russian symbolism. Since 1920, Hoffmann worked at the Pushkin House and published a book about Pushkin. In 1922, Hoffmann went on a business trip to France and did not return. In exile he continued to study Pushkin studies. ⁠ published the monograph “Missing stanzas of Eugene Onegin.” The study of draft editions of the novel began. In 1937, on the centenary of the poet’s death, all known printed and handwritten versions of Onegin were published in the sixth volume of the academic Complete Works of Pushkin (editor of the volume is Boris Tomashevsky). This edition implements the principle of “layer-by-layer” reading and presentation of draft and white manuscripts (from final readings to early versions).

The main text of the novel in the same collection was printed “according to the 1833 edition with the text arranged according to the 1837 edition; censorship and typographical distortions of the 1833 edition were corrected according to autographs and previous editions (individual chapters and excerpts)" 32 Pushkin A.S. Complete works. In 16 volumes. M., Leningrad: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1937-1949. T. 6. P. 660. ⁠ . Subsequently, this text was reprinted in scientific and mass publications, with rare exceptions and with some spelling variations. In other words, the critical text of Eugene Onegin, to which we are accustomed, does not coincide with any of the publications published during Pushkin’s lifetime.

Joseph Charlemagne. Scenery sketch for Pyotr Tchaikovsky's opera "Eugene Onegin". 1940

Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images

No: they are the dynamic "equivalent" text 33 Tynyanov Yu. N. About the composition of “Eugene Onegin” // Tynyanov Yu. N. Poetics. History of literature. Movie. M.: Nauka, 1977. P. 60. ⁠ , in their place the reader is free to substitute anything he wants (compare with the role of improvisation in some musical genres). Moreover, it is impossible to fill in the gaps consistently: some stanzas or parts of stanzas have been abbreviated, while others were never written.

Further, some stanzas are present in the manuscripts but not in the printed text. There are stanzas that were present in the editions of individual chapters, but excluded from the consolidated edition (for example, an extensive comparison of “Eugene Onegin” with Homer’s “Iliad” at the end of chapter four). There are stanzas printed separately as excerpts from Eugene Onegin, but not included either in a separate edition of the corresponding chapter or in a consolidated edition. Such, for example, is the excerpt “Women” published in 1827 in the Moskovsky Vestnik - the initial stanzas of chapter four, which in a separate edition of chapters four and five were replaced by a series of numbers without text.

This “inconsistency” is not an accidental oversight, but a principle. The novel is filled with paradoxes that transform the history of the text's creation into an artistic device. The author plays with the text, not only excluding fragments, but also, conversely, including them “under special conditions.” Thus, the author’s notes contain the beginning of a stanza that is not included in the novel (“It’s time: the pen asks for rest...”), and the final two stanzas of chapter six in the main text and in the notes are given by the author in different editions.

Manuscript of "Eugene Onegin". 1828

Wikimedia Commons

"Eugene Onegin". Directed by Roman Tikhomirov. USSR, 1958

Was there a so-called tenth chapter in Eugene Onegin?

Pushkin wrote his novel without yet knowing how he would finish it. The tenth chapter is a continuation option rejected by the author. Because of its content (a political chronicle of the turn of the 1810s-20s, including a description of the Decembrist conspirators), the tenth chapter of Onegin, even if it had been completed, could hardly have been published during Pushkin’s lifetime, although there is information that he gave it to Nikolai to read I 34 Lotman Yu. M. Pushkin: Biography of the writer. Articles and notes (1960-1990). "Eugene Onegin": Commentary. St. Petersburg: Art-SPb, 1995. P. 745. ⁠ .

The chapter was written in Boldin and was burned by the author on October 18 or 19, 1830 (there is a Pushkin note about this in one of the Boldin workbooks). However, what was written was not completely destroyed. Part of the text has been preserved in the form of the author’s cipher, which was solved by Pushkin scholar Pyotr Morozov in 1910. The cryptography hides only the first quatrains of 16 stanzas, but does not in any way record the remaining 10 lines of each stanza. In addition, several stanzas survived in a separate draft and in messages from the poet’s friends.

As a result, from the entire chapter, an excerpt of 17 stanzas has reached us, none of which is known to us in its completed form. Of these, only two have a complete composition (14 verses), and only one is reliably rhymed according to the scheme of the Onegin stanza. The order of the surviving stanzas is also not entirely obvious. In many places the text is analyzed hypothetically. Even the first, perhaps the most famous line of the tenth chapter (“The ruler is weak and crafty,” about Alexander I) can only be read tentatively: Pushkin’s code says “Vl.”, which Nabokov, for example, deciphered as "Lord" 35 Eugene Onegin: A Novel in Verse by Aleksandr Pushkin / Translated from the Russian, with a Commentary, by Vladimir Nabokov. In 4 vols. N.Y.: Bollingen, 1964. Vol. 1.Pp. 318-319. ⁠ . ⁠. On the other hand, the short English haircut is contrasted with the romantic German à la Schiller. This is the hairstyle of Lensky, a recent Göttingen student: The University of Göttingen was one of the most advanced educational institutions of the time. Among Pushkin’s acquaintances there were several graduates of Gottingen, and all of them were distinguished by free-thinking: the Decembrist Nikolai Turgenev and his brother Alexander, Pushkin’s lyceum teacher Alexander Kunitsyn. ⁠ "black curls up to shoulders" 38 Muryanov M.F. Portrait of Lensky // Questions of literature. 1997. No. 6. P. 102-122. ⁠ . Thus, Onegin and Lensky, opposite to each other in everything, even differ in hairstyles.

At a social event, Tatyana “wears a raspberry beret / Speaks to the Spanish ambassador.” What does this famous detail indicate? Is it really about the fact that the heroine forgot to take off her headdress? Of course not. Thanks to this detail, Onegin understands that in front of him is a noble lady and that she is married. A modern historian of European costume explains that the beret “appeared in Russia only at the beginning of the 19th century, simultaneously with other Western European headdresses that tightly covered the head: wigs and powdered hairstyles in the 18th century excluded their use. In the 1st half of the 19th century, the beret was only a women's headdress, and, moreover, only for married ladies. Being part of the ceremonial dress, it was not worn either at balls, or in the theater, or at dinner parties. evenings" 39 Kirsanova R. M. Costume in Russian artistic culture of the 18th - first half of the 20th centuries. (Encyclopedia experience). M.: TSB, 1995. P. 37. ⁠ . Berets were made from satin, velvet or other fabrics. They could be decorated with plumes or flowers. They were worn obliquely, so that one edge could even touch the shoulder.

At the Talon restaurant, Onegin and Kaverin drink “comet wine.” What kind of wine? This is le vin de la Comète, a champagne from the 1811 vintage, the superior quality of which was attributed to the influence of the comet, now called C/1811 F1, which was clearly visible in the Northern Hemisphere from August to December 1811 of the year 40 Kuznetsov N. N. Comet Wine // Pushkin and his contemporaries: Materials and research. L.: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1930. Issue. XXXVIII/XXXIX. pp. 71-75. ⁠ .

Perhaps Pushkin would have even done better if he had named his poem after Tatyana, and not Onegin, because she is undoubtedly the main character of the poem

Fedor Dostoevsky

In addition, in the novel, which seems to be written in the same language as you and I speak, in reality there are many outdated words and expressions. Why do they become obsolete? Firstly, because the language changes; secondly, because the world it describes is changing.

During the duel, Onegin’s servant Guillo “stands behind the nearby stump.” How to interpret this behavior? All illustrators depict Guillot perched nearby near a small stump. All translators use words meaning "the lower part of a felled, sawed or broken tree." The Dictionary of the Pushkin Language interprets this passage in exactly the same way. However, if Guillo is afraid of dying from a random bullet and hopes to hide from it, then why does he need a stump? No one thought about this until the linguist Alexander Penkovsky showed, using a variety of texts from Pushkin’s era, that at that time the word “stump” had another meaning, in addition to the one it has today - the meaning of “tree trunk” (not necessarily “ felled, sawn or broken") 41 Penkovsky A. B. Studies of the poetic language of the Pushkin era. M.: Znak, 2012. pp. 533-546. ⁠ .

Another large group of words is outdated vocabulary, denoting outdated realities. In particular, horse-drawn transport has become exotic these days - its economic role has been leveled, the terminology associated with it has disappeared from the common language and today is mostly unclear. Let's remember how the Larins are going to Moscow. “On a skinny and shaggy nag / A bearded postilion sits.” The postilion (from German Vorreiter - the one who rides in front, on the lead horse) was usually a teenager or even a small boy, so that it would be easier for the horse to carry him. The postilion must be a boy, but for the Larins he is “bearded”: they have not gone out for so long and have been sitting around in the village that they already have a postilion got old 42 Dobrodomov I. G., Pilshchikov I. A. Vocabulary and phraseology of “Eugene Onegin”: Hermeneutical essays. M.: Languages ​​of Slavic Cultures, 2008. pp. 160-169. ⁠

What comments to “Eugene Onegin” are most famous?

The first experience of scientific commentary on “Eugene Onegin” was undertaken back in the century before last: in 1877, the writer Anna Lachinova (1832-1914) published under the pseudonym A. Volsky two editions of “Explanations and Notes to the Novel by A. S. Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”. Of the monographic commentaries on Onegin published in the 20th century, three are of greatest importance - Brodsky, Nabokov and Lotman.

The most famous of them is the commentary by Yuri Lotman (1922-1993), first published as a separate book in 1980. The book consists of two parts. The first - "Essay on the life of the nobility of Onegin's time" - is a coherent presentation of the norms and rules that regulated the worldview and everyday behavior of a nobleman of Pushkin's time. The second part is the actual commentary, following the text from stanza to stanza and from chapter to chapter. In addition to explaining incomprehensible words and realities, Lotman pays attention to the literary background of the novel (the metaliterary polemics that spill out onto its pages and the various quotes with which it is permeated), and also interprets the behavior of the characters, revealing in their words and actions a dramatic clash of points of view and behavioral norms .

Thus, Lotman shows that Tatyana’s conversation with the nanny is comic qui pro quo "Who instead of whom." Latin expression meaning confusion, misunderstanding, when one thing is mistaken for another. In the theater, this technique is used to create a comic situation. ⁠ in which interlocutors belonging to two different sociocultural groups use the words “love” and “passion” in completely different meanings (for the nanny, “love” is adultery, for Tatyana it is a romantic feeling). The commentator convincingly demonstrates that, according to the author's plan, Onegin killed Lensky unintentionally, and readers familiar with dueling practice understand this from the details of the story. If Onegin wanted to shoot his friend, he would have chosen a completely different dueling strategy (Lotman tells which one).

How did Onegin end? - Because Pushkin got married. Married Pushkin could still write a letter to Onegin, but could not continue the romance

Anna Akhmatova

Lotman's immediate predecessor in the field under discussion was Nikolai Brodsky (1881-1951). The first, trial edition of his commentary was published in 1932, the last lifetime edition was published in 1950, then the book was published posthumously several times, remaining the main textbook for the study of Onegin in universities and pedagogical institutes until the publication of Lotman’s commentary.

Brodsky's text bears deep traces vulgar sociologism Within the framework of Marxist methodology, a simplified, dogmatic interpretation of the text, which is understood as a literal illustration of political and economic ideas. ⁠ . Just look at the explanation for the word “Bolivar”: “A hat (with large brims, a flared cylinder at the top) in honor of the leader of the national liberation movement in South America, Simon Bolivar (1783-1830), was fashionable in the environment that followed political events, which sympathized with the struggle for independence of the small people" 43 Brodsky N. L. “Eugene Onegin”: A Novel by A. S. Pushkin. Teacher's manual. M.: Education, 1964. P. 68-69. ⁠ . Sometimes Brodsky's commentary suffers from an overly straightforward interpretation of certain passages. For example, about the line “The jealous whisper of fashionable wives,” he seriously writes: “With a casually thrown image of a “fashionable wife,” Pushkin emphasized the disintegration of family foundations in... secular circle" 44 Brodsky N. L. “Eugene Onegin”: A Novel by A. S. Pushkin. Teacher's manual. M.: Education, 1964. P. 90. ⁠ .

Nevertheless, Nabokov, who made fun of Brodsky’s strained interpretations and depressingly clumsy style, was, of course, not entirely right in calling him an “ignorant compiler” - “uninformed.” compiler" 44 Eugene Onegin: A Novel in Verse by Aleksandr Pushkin / Translated from the Russian, with a Commentary, by Vladimir Nabokov. In 4 vols. N.Y.: Bollingen, 1964. Vol. 2. P. 246. ⁠ . If we exclude the predictable “Sovietisms”, which can be considered inevitable signs of the times, in Brodsky’s book one can find a fairly good real-life and historical-cultural commentary on the text of the novel.

"Onegin" Directed by Martha Fiennes. USA, UK, 1999

The four-volume work of Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) was published in the first edition in 1964, the second (corrected) in 1975. The first volume is occupied with an interlinear translation of Onegin into English, the second and third with an English commentary, the fourth with indexes and a reprint of the Russian text. Nabokov's commentary was translated into Russian late; The Russian translations of the commentary published in 1998-1999 (there are two of them) can hardly be considered successful.

Not only does Nabokov’s commentary exceed the volume of work of other commentators, Nabokov’s translation itself also performs commentary functions, interpreting certain words and expressions in the text of Eugene Onegin. For example, all commentators, except Nabokov, explain the meaning of the adjective in the line “Discharged in his wheelchair.” “Discharged” means “discharged from abroad.” This word has been replaced in modern language by a new word with the same meaning; now the borrowed “imported” is used instead. Nabokov does not explain anything, but simply translates: “imported.”

The volume of literary quotations identified by Nabokov and the literary and memoir parallels he provided to the text of the novel is not surpassed by any of the previous or subsequent commentators, and this is not surprising: Nabokov felt himself like no one else at home From English - “like home.” ⁠ not only in Russian literature, but also in European (especially French and English).

The discrepancy between personality and its lifestyle is the basis of the novel

Valentin Nepomnyashchiy

Finally, Nabokov was the only commentator on Onegin in the 20th century who knew the life of a Russian noble estate not from hearsay, but from his own experience, and easily understood much of what Soviet philologists did not catch. Unfortunately, the impressive volume of Nabokov’s commentary is created not only due to useful and necessary information, but also thanks to a lot of information that has the most distant relation to the commented work 45 Chukovsky K. I. Onegin in a foreign land // Chukovsky K. I. High art. M.: Soviet writer, 1988. pp. 337-341. ⁠ . But it's still very interesting to read!

In addition to the comments, the modern reader can find explanations of incomprehensible words and expressions in the “Dictionary of the Pushkin Language” (first edition - the turn of the 1950-60s; additions - 1982; consolidated edition - 2000). Outstanding linguists and Pushkin scholars who had previously prepared a “large academic” edition of Pushkin participated in the creation of the dictionary: Viktor Vinogradov, Grigory Vinokur, Boris Tomashevsky, Sergei Bondi. In addition to the listed reference books, there are many special historical-literary and historical-linguistic works, the bibliography of which alone takes up a hefty volume.

Why don't they always help? Because the differences between our language and the language of the early 19th century are not point-blank, but cross-cutting, and with every decade they only grow, like “cultural layers” on city streets. No commentary can exhaust the text, but even the minimum necessary for understanding commentary on the texts of Pushkin’s era should already be line-by-line (and maybe even word-by-word) and multifaceted (real commentary, historical-linguistic, historical-literary, poetry, textual). Such a commentary was not created even for “Eugene Onegin”.