Thus, in “Arap” Ibrahim is depicted as a person whose character reflects the features of the new people of Peter the Great’s era.
Historicism is combined in Pushkin's realism with a deep understanding of the role of social differences.

Historicism is a category that contains a certain methodological content. Historicism involves considering phenomena in their development, relationships, in the process of formation, from a historical point of view. In relation to art, we should talk about a special creative principle of perception of reality, a unique artistic quality. Having emerged as a conscious principle of artistic thinking at the beginning of the 19th century, historicism manifested itself with enormous force in Pushkin’s work.

Historicism was one of the foundations of Pushkin’s realistic system; it is associated with the reproduction of reality in its natural movement, in the process of development, understanding of personality in its historical conditioning. Historicism opened up new possibilities for understanding life; the very character of artistic typification and, ultimately, the aesthetic concept of reality is inseparable from it.

It is quite obvious that the problem of historicism is still relevant today.

Many famous literary scholars were involved in the development of the problem of historicism in the works of A. S. Pushkin.

At one time, Pushkin's historicism was often interpreted as an expression of his break with freedom-loving traditions; the poet's appeal to history was interpreted in the spirit of a certain objectivism and fatalism /B. Engelhardt/, a complete break with the heritage of the Enlightenment / P.N. Sakulin/, reconciliation with Nikolaev reality /I. Vinogradov/ etc. The inconsistency of such ideas has long been revealed in our literary science. Nowadays this stage of Pushkin studies has already passed.

And yet, no matter how significant the achievements in the study of Pushkin’s historicism are, we cannot be content with them. Now we need to go further in understanding Pushkin and his artistic system, and, consequently, in understanding the specifics of Pushkin’s historicism. A number of aspects of this problem urgently require new approaches and other solutions.

The fact is that ideas about Pushkin’s realism are often too general, summary in nature and do not sufficiently take into account the unique features of the poet’s creative individuality. It was rightly noted / in particular, B.N. Bursov/ that, speaking about Pushkin, we strive more to establish the general principles of realism in general and often leave aside the question of this specific character specifically for Pushkin’s artistic system. This has a direct bearing on the problem of historicism. We sometimes think more about identifying its general principles /depicting phenomena in a natural development and historical conditionality, etc./ than about their individual and unique refraction in the poet’s work.

“Historicism,” according to I.M. Toibin, is not identical to historical or philosophical-historical views. This is, of course, true. And yet, the formation of historicism as a certain artistic quality took place in close connection with the development of philosophical and historical thought.”

In works on Pushkin's historicism, primary attention is paid, as a rule, to characterizing the poet's views on history, which are also considered in isolation from the general movement of contemporary philosophical and historical thought. With this approach, the specificity of historicism as a special “creative quality” / B.V. Tomashevsky/, as an organic element of the artistic system, is erased. There is still a noticeable gap between the analysis of the historical and philosophical-historical ideas of the poet, on the one hand, and the research of his artistic practice, on the other.

Ultimately, this is due to the fact that researchers of Pushkin’s historicism do not sufficiently take into account the aesthetic nature of art. There is a tendency to equate theoretical and artistic thought. Therefore, the poet’s system of theoretical (historical) views is directly, directly transferred to Pushkin’s artistic work.

This situation leads to unjustified logicalization and schematization of his work, and prevents us from fully understanding the nature of artistic phenomena, as well as the originality of artistic historicism. Meanwhile, the true relationship between theoretical and artistic thought is more complex than it appears in works on Pushkin’s realism and historicism.

The principles of historicism, which increasingly penetrated into all spheres of human knowledge, although they led to the inevitable rapprochement of scientific and artistic creativity and their mutual enrichment, were nevertheless refracted differently in each of these spheres.
Of course, the historical method itself is universal, universal. It constitutes one of the most important aspects of dialectics. However, the specific forms in which the historical method manifests itself in the field of artistic creativity are diverse. This variety of forms of artistic historicism lies in the very nature of art, in the uniqueness and eternity of a work of art, in the creative individuality of the writer.

General, universal / “generalizing” /, in essence, philosophical principles of the historical approach receive a specific refraction in specific norms, inseparable from the nature of imaginative thinking, national identity, from the categories of genre, poetics and style - all that without which there is no artistic individuality.

Thus, the problem of the historicism of Pushkin’s work is essentially at the same time the problem of the possibilities of his realism, the originality of his artistic system.

Although the issues of Pushkin's historicism have been touched upon in many works, there are few special studies devoted to them.

The famous work of B. Engelhardt “The Historicism of Pushkin” / in the book. Pushkinist, ed. S.A. Vengerova, published in 1916 / published a long time ago, contains many interesting observations and thoughts, but now it is methodologically outdated. S. M. Petrov’s work “The Problem of Historicism in Pushkin’s Worldview and Works” is mainly devoted to the general characteristics of Pushkin’s philosophy of history. The most valuable special work on Pushkin’s historicism is the article by B.V. Tomashevsky “Pushkin’s Historicism”, which puts forward a definition of the essence of Pushkin’s historicism and outlines the main milestones of its development. And yet, no matter how significant and informative this article is, it does not solve the problem, remaining rather just an introduction to the topic. After all, it mainly analyzes Pushkin’s statements on historical issues; As for the direct analysis of creativity, the author does not pose such a task. I.M. made a great contribution to the development of this problem. Tóibín. In his monograph “Pushkin. Creativity of the 1830s and issues of historicism”, Pushkin’s lyrics, “Little Tragedies”, “The Bronze Horseman”, “The Captain’s Daughter” are analyzed in detail.

In our work, we tried to systematize the available critical material on the problem of historicism in the works of A.S. Pushkin; trace the evolution of Pushkin’s historical views using the example of works from different times.
Problems of history in the artistic world of A.S. Pushkin

Historicism is rightfully considered one of the key problems of Pushkin’s worldview and creativity. It was historicism, the spirit of which permeated the poet’s works, that opened up unprecedented possibilities for artistic comprehension of reality in literature, introduced a living and reverent sense of the dynamics and continuity of the historical process, and became the basis of the realistic method and style.

At one time, B.V. Tomashevsky rightly emphasized that “historicism is not an innate feature of Pushkin’s creative appearance, a feature with which he was born.” To this we can add that it was also not the result of the poet’s personal experience alone. Historicism was formed by an era, a time marked by a widespread and extraordinary impulse of historical consciousness, historical interests; he was closely connected with the general movement of Western European and Russian philosophical and historical thought. That is why one of the urgent tasks of Pushkin studies is to identify this process and reveal it using specific material.

Indicated since the end of the 18th century. a new era of national liberation movements, grandiose upheavals and shifts in the destinies of peoples and states gave a powerful impetus to the formation of historical thinking. To replace the rationalistic and metaphysical concepts of the 18th century. ideas of historical regularity, recognition of the power of historical laws, an understanding of the historical process in its internal unity, in its dynamics come. The time is coming for the intensive development of historical thought and the flourishing of historical science. Several leading trends can be identified in this pan-European movement.

One of them is the rapprochement of history with philosophy, increased interest in issues of historical methodology, in the problems of the philosophy of history. Along with the development of specific historiographical themes, philosophical and historical issues are rapidly developing; history becomes the subject and object of philosophical constructions.

On the other hand, there is an equally intense convergence of history with social quests. Sociality becomes an essential feature of historical consciousness, historical thinking. The complex process of formation of the historical method, closely connected with the general movement of historical thought, was reflected in Russia. Here, its special intensity falls on the period after 1825, when, in connection with the defeat of the Decembrists and the need to resolve the most important issues raised by the course of social development, interest in historical issues sharply increased.

The new era, when open political struggle was practically impossible, sharpened attention as never before to questions of theory, to problems of a philosophical, historical, and moral order. Hence the wide spread of philosophical interests among the intelligentsia. Philosophy was intended to provide a method for solving the most important questions of reality. Under these conditions, the very development of historical knowledge was closely intertwined with philosophy. First of all, it was necessary to determine the methodological principles of historical research and develop a new quality of historical thinking. That is why questions of the philosophy of history become especially acute and relevant in Russian social life of these years; a desire is revealed to apply general philosophical principles to the history of mankind, to clarify the nature and meaning of the historical process and the place in it of the human person, people, and state. History in this regard is also a “science of sciences,” like philosophy itself, it is “a practical test of concepts about the world and man, an analysis of philosophical synthesis.”

On the pages of magazines and in the journalism of these years, abundant literature appeared on philosophical and historical problems; The demand for a philosophical approach to history is being put forward everywhere. P. Ya Chaadaev devotes his “Philosophical Letters” to questions of the philosophy of history / he called them “Letters about the philosophy of history” /. The article “Philosophy of History” /from Cousin/, published in the “Moscow Telegraph” /1827, part 14/ distinguishes between history, which illuminates individual events, stages and eras of mankind, and the philosophy of history, designed to answer its general, philosophical questions.

The very concept of philosophy of history turned out to be ambiguous; different contents and different meanings were put into it.
First of all, it was about developing the most general, theoretical principles for understanding the historical process, about the philosophical foundations of historical science. The old rationalist philosophy of history, which took as the starting point of its sentiments the idea of ​​an abstract, always equal “natural man,” has clearly revealed its inconsistency.

At the same time, it very soon becomes obvious that in Russia in the 1850s the content of the philosophy of history is expanding immensely, that it is increasingly going beyond its immediate borders, refracting the most important facets of public consciousness; she found herself at the intersection of philosophy, history, morality, psychology, coming into contact with all these spheres.

In general, the movement of Russian philosophical historical thought of the 1830s can be conditionally distinguished into two movements, one of which was based primarily on the ideas of German idealistic philosophy, on the romantic ideas of Schellianism, first of all, the other was oriented on the methods of the French historical school, on its sociological doctrines. In practice, however, these currents did not exist in their pure form; on the contrary, they were closely intertwined with each other.

In parallel with the general evolution of Russian philosophical and historical thought in the late 1820s and early 1830s, the emphasis in it increasingly shifted from the assimilation of Schelliegian concepts to the perception of the ideas and methods of the French historical school with its keen interest in social history and its conflicts. The deepening of social contradictions in the life of Russian society, the need to understand these processes in the light of the historical past and in comparison with the course of history in the West - all this prompted us to turn to the experience of French historians of the restoration era.

The question of the features and principles of romantic historiography has become increasingly relevant in Russian society since the late 1920s. The names of Thierry and Guizot are increasingly appearing on the pages of magazines; extracts from their works and reviews of them are published. The ideas and methods of new historiography influence Russian historians, publicists, writers, people of various beliefs and views. In the disputes that unfolded around the ideas and methods named by historians, the corresponding ideological differences were refracted in their own way.

This range of problems, in which questions of the philosophy of history, its methodology and questions of understanding the history of Russia merged, became particularly acute at the turn of the 20s and 30s in connection with the publication of the XII volume of “History of the Russian State” by N.M. Karamzin and the appearance of “History of the Russian People” by N. Polevoy. The fierce discussions that flared up around these “Stories” became the most important milestone in the history of the spiritual development of society, in the history of Russian self-awareness. During the discussions, the basic concepts of the Russian historical process were formed, and the ideological demarcation to which the origins of the future Slavophilism and Westernism go back was outlined.

These discussions, which became a unique school of philosophical and historical thought, had a serious influence on the development of Russian literature. They also played an important role in the formation of Pushkin’s historicism.

Philosophical and historical issues occupied a huge place in Pushkin’s thoughts and work. It was in the 30s that the system of Pushkin’s philosophical and historical views finally took shape, which undoubtedly represented one of the most significant achievements of Russian philosophical and historical thought of that time.

To understand the depth and originality of Pushkin’s views, they should be considered not in isolation, but in the process of formation, against the appropriate historical background. This is necessary not only because it is against the surrounding background that the features of Pushkin’s philosophy of history will appear in the most vivid form, but also because only such a path of research will make it possible to identify the true process of formation of Pushkin’s historical thinking, to understand it in real historical connections, in the corresponding historical context.

It is known that the role of one of the most important ideological and philosophical-aesthetic centers in Russia after the defeat of the Decembrists fell to the lot of the wise men, grouped around the “Moskovsky Vestnik”. Historical issues occupied an exceptionally large place in their theories and thoughts. The evolution of wise men - ideological, philosophical, literary - is inseparable from the general movement of historical thought. It is necessary to consider Pushkin’s relationship with the circle of wise men, with the evolution of their historical and philosophical-historical views. Since we are talking about the problem of the formation of Pushkin’s historical principles, it is natural that of particular interest should be the question of his relationship with such Moscow Schellians as S. Shevyrev and, especially, M. Pogodin - undoubtedly the largest historian associated with the circle of wise men.

Philosophical and historical issues occupied a huge place in Pushkin’s thoughts and creativity. It was in the 30s that the system of Pushkin’s philosophical and historical views finally took shape, which undoubtedly represented one of the most significant achievements of Russian philosophical and historical thought of that time.

Pushkin did the most important thing before the “Gogol period”: a decisive turn towards the people as a force determining the historical destinies of science, and towards the depiction of reality, comprehended from the point of view of these popular and historical destinies. The honor of the discovery belonged to the poet, in the direction of which it moved further / in the person of its most prominent representatives, including Gogol / Russian literature. It is quite difficult for a modern reader to appreciate the radical nature of the revolution carried out by Pushkin in the mid-1820s. But only because the idea expressed by the poet and picked up by his successors has long become our property.

Meanwhile, this was truly a “guiding” thought, i.e. the principle that formed the basis of a whole trend, which on Russian soil has produced undeniable and impressive results. And Dostoevsky, who stood at the origins of the movement, was already able to see them correctly and think through them in all the depth and fruitfulness of their possible consequences. The further time passed, the more it confirmed the fundamental significance of the “new word” spoken by Pushkin. At the end of the 1870s, Dostoevsky wrote: “... the word” of Pushkin is still a new word for us.” In other words, none of those who came after Pushkin, with all the brilliance of individual talents (Gogol, Lermontov, Turgenev, Goncharov, Herzen, Nekrasov), expressed another, more fundamental, more comprehensive idea that could displace or stand next to “ guiding” Pushkin’s thought.

Pushkin’s path to the principles of realistic creativity began with reflection on the problems of modern history and disputes around Karamzin’s “History of the Russian State.” In “History...” Pushkin saw the realized possibility of such a narration, in which the author’s subjective beliefs and passions do not exclude other judgments that necessarily follow from the “true /i.e. complete, not truncated or distorted in favor of one’s own concept/story of events.” This opportunity seemed so important to Pushkin that he took advantage of it as a technique when, being in the same position as Karamzin, he wrote “The History of the Pugachev Revolt” /1834/. It is no coincidence, therefore, that Pushkin saw the main drawback of the volumes of “The History of the Russian People” by N. Polevoy in tendentiousness, in the frivolous and petty desire to constantly contradict Karamzin, in “excessive arrogance.” “Respect for names sanctified by glory...the first sign of an enlightened mind. Only fickle ignorance is allowed to dishonor them, just as once upon a time, by decree of the ephors, only the inhabitants of Khnos were allowed to dishonor publicly” /vol. 11, p. 120/.

N. Polevoy's contemptuous attacks on Karamzin are all the more strange because the opinions expressed by N. Polevoy were not based either on the author's personal beliefs, no matter how they relate to the real history of the Russian people, or on this history. The willful interpretation of historical persons and events, “the violent direction of the narrative towards some known goal” /vol. 11, p. 121/ in the form of one’s own or borrowed favorite idea gives the story the character of a novel, while the novel itself at the present stage of literary development should have , according to Pushkin, all the advantages of real history - a truthful, impartial story about the past and present.

Pushkin firmly established himself on this conviction, formed while working on “Boris Godunov”, “Poltava”, “Eugene Onegin” by 1829-1830, when he wrote a review of N. Polevoy. The genre of the work (drama, poem, novel) did not change anything in the essence of the new aesthetic position: in relation to it, Pushkin was indifferent not only to the choice between one or another dramatic and epic genre, but also to the choice between all these genres together and science /history/ , since here and there the absolute advantage was on the side of the strict conclusions of historical science. Pushkin's historical works were occupied with problems outside of which he could not imagine the further evolution of the leading genres of modern literature. The problems of history were for him the problems of literature.

The first step from romanticism to realism was expressed in the rejection of arbitrary interpretation of characters and events. The final chapters of “Eugene Onegin,” in contrast to the beginning of the novel /1823/, were written by an artist who finally threw off the shackles of the romantic approach to depicting reality and found solid support for a realistic narrative. From now on, the assessment of people and events in an epic and dramatic story is given not from a personal point of view, no matter what it is dictated, but from the point of view of the people and the historical perspectives of their fate. This is the nature of Pushkin’s objectivity, which marked the original essence of his realism with a special stamp. “What develops in tragedy,” Pushkin reasoned in 1830, analyzing M. Pogodin’s drama “Marfa the Posadnitsa,” “what is its purpose? Man and people. Human fate, people's fate...What does a dramatic writer need? Philosophy, dispassion, the state thoughts of a historian, insight, liveliness of imagination, no prejudice of a favorite thought. Freedom". This “freedom” implied complete dependence on historical truth. “A dramatic poet, impartial as fate,” wrote Pushkin in the same analysis of M. Pogodin’s drama, “had to portray as sincerely as a deep, conscientious study of the truth and the vividness of the imagination... it served him, the rebuff of perishing freedom, as a deeply deliberate blow , who established Russia on its enormous foundation. He should not have been cunning and leaned towards one side, sacrificing the other. It was not he, not his political opinion, not his secret or obvious partiality / in relation to the autocratic claims of John or, on the contrary, to the freedom of Novgorod / that should speak in the tragedy, but the people of bygone days, their minds, their prejudices. It’s not his place to justify or blame. His job is to resurrect the past century in all its truth.”

An epic and dramatic writer, just like a historian, needed to peer into the facts, compare them correctly, looking for internal connections, separating the main from the secondary, and draw only those conclusions that are suggested by the logic of historical situations, their modifications, and their mutual conditionality. Objecting to N. Polevoy regarding his reasoning about medieval Rus', Pushkin wrote: “You understood the great dignity of the French historian / Guizot /. Understand also that Russia has never had anything in common with the rest of Europe; that its history requires a different thought, a different formula, like the thoughts and formulas introduced by Guizot from the history of the Christian West.”

Pushkin's interest in social heterogeneity within one state unity comes from an increasingly persistent desire to study not the statics, but the dynamics of social life, to penetrate into the hidden patterns of historical changes. Hence the poet’s primary attention to those classes whose interests most decisively influence the fate of science: the peasantry - the nobility.

Everything is moving, everything is changing. Any infringement is tolerable for a certain time. If it affects one or a few, it does not affect the course of things. But things take a different turn when constraint threatens to interfere /“The Bronze Horseman”/. That is why / and this was clear to Pushkin already in “Boris Godunov” / the decisive word at any stage of the historical life of a nation belongs to the people, although this does not at all indicate their infallibility and does not eliminate possible mistakes and misconceptions. But be that as it may, not only the word, the very silence of the people is quite eloquent, for in any case - whether they shout or remain silent - the people are the main characters of history /“Boris Godunov”/. This conviction became the main tenet of Pushkin's realistic system. By the end of the 1820s, its specificity was clearly expressed by two important concepts: historicism and nationality. B.V. Tomashevsky wrote: “The main features of Pushkin’s realism are advanced humanistic ideas, nationality and historicism. These three parts, in their inextricable connection, characterize the originality of Pushkin’s creativity in its most mature expression.”

For the mature Pushkin there is no history outside the people and there is no people outside history. If the people create history, then history, in turn, creates the people. It shapes his character/“way of thinking and feeling”/, she determines his needs and aspirations, which should be formulated not from the point of view of any, including “the most advanced humanistic ideas”, but from the point of view captured in its originality of concrete historical reality. All urgent, socially important needs arise from within the people's life. “...Only the history of the people,” wrote Pushkin, “can explain their true demands.” And, explained and unexplained, they always and certainly influence the further course of things. Just as the history created by the people is not completed and is open at every moment of the coming present, in the same way the national character created by history is mobile and incomplete. Pushkin could not be the creator of either a complete historical concept that predicts the future, or a complete concept of national character that ignores the future.

If for Pushkin turning to history meant studying the hidden springs of the historical process and national character, turning to history for Gogol meant studying precisely the national character, moreover, in its distinctive features that sharply distinguish a people from other peoples and sharply express the natural properties of their soul. In the past, Gogol sought to discern the primordial elements of national life, unclouded by any later additions, arising from the depths of the primordial harmony between man and the organic conditions of his life. The character of the people here is nothing more than the embodiment of the creative “spirit of the earth”, acting in all natural manifestations of people’s life and only in them and thanks to them finding a unique appearance, thoughts, and image.

Pushkin relied primarily on documents and chronicles, while Gogol tried to delve into the spirit of the people, and the documented outline of events, the meager presentation of facts, and naive chronicle moralizing were less fruitful for his thoughts than works of folk art. Drawing the past, Gogol was not embarrassed by the inaccuracy of chronological approximations: the day and date of the battle, the correct relation were not included in his plans, since the elements of a national character declared themselves in every event of national history, whenever it occurred, and in none of them with exhaustive completeness /avg. “Taras Bulba”/. Hence the need for rapprochement arose.

As for Pushkin, he did not deviate from chronology, tried to adhere to an accurate presentation of facts, and in the past he was attracted by eras of deep social changes and emerging preconditions for the course of things already revealed in the present or probable in the future / Time of Troubles, the time of Peter I, peasant wars / . However, any era could, in principle, become the subject of his artistic research, since the originality of each of them was assumed by itself.

Between the extremes of heroism and idyll, war and peace, the life of science flows, and, taken together, they exhaust all possibilities for expressing the national spiritual substance. Like any substance, it is constant in its properties. This is the stable essence of any historical phenomena, which only record its changeably visible forms. This change of phenomena in the general historical process did not represent any mystery for Gogol, unlike Pushkin, because his concept of the course of things completely coincided with the concept of organic growth and the conformity of historical development with the conformity of organic transformations.

The people as the custodian of the spiritual building principles of the nation, and history as the possibility of their implementation lasting in time - this is what stood for Gogol behind those concepts that, like Pushkin, turned out to be at the center of his philosophical and aesthetic program.

Despite the difference in the specific content of these concepts, in both cases the people were the main figures in history; and here and there the fate of the nation was decided for his benefit; and here and there these convictions entailed conclusions that opened up new ways of artistic understanding of the world. They indicated the objective dimensions, relationships of objects and phenomena /hierarchy of things/ in this world and at the same time - an objective point of view from the positions of which they should be judged /hierarchy of values, independent of personal preferences or officially recognized and legitimized dogmas/.

For Pushkin, the question of “necessary” and “unnecessary” milestones, of misconceptions and false roads lasting centuries, did not and could not exist. Assessment from the point of view of moral benefit and moral truth and lies, justification in relation to specific people, their words and actions, is not applicable, according to Pushkin, to the historical process. In particular, because it involves abstracting from time and place and absolutizing some moral needs and truths to the detriment of all others.

The history of both individual peoples and humanity is not subject to the law of continuous moral improvement. Conquest in some areas does not imply conquest in all others. Therefore, along with moral achievements, moral losses are also possible. Cassius and Brum - exponents of traditional Roman valor and republican virtues - did not keep the course of things in the same direction; they promoted Caesar - the “ambitious disturber” of “the fundamental decrees of the fatherland. Precisely because moral valor is not always combined with the strength of circumstances.”

The moral factor is not the only factor among those that operate in history. This does not mean that it is permissible to discount it. People's movements are driven by different motives, and moral ideas play a significant role here. But these ideas are flexible. Brutus did not win the case not because he was “the defender and avenger of the fundamental decrees of the fatherland,” but because in the eyes of the majority they had lost this meaning and no longer expressed a common opinion. In other words, Brutus fought for noble ideas that had lost the meaning of real force.

According to Pushkin, history does not need a moral assessment, but a correct explanation.

The people are educated by their own historical experience. The job of writers is to ease this difficult experience by preventing the possible costs of the historical process with a deep analysis of the present, those of its social trends that are making their way now and can become a real force in the near or distant future. After all, not all of these trends, which appear as usual, under the slogan of the common good and justice, really reflect popular demands and correspond to popular ideals.

It is clear why, from the late 1820s, Pushkin’s attention was so persistently attracted not only to Russian history, but also to the history of Western Europe. Starting from the era of Peter I and later, when Russia, as a result of the Napoleonic wars, was involved in the cycle of European events, it entered a new phase of existence. “After the death of Peter I,” wrote Pushkin, “the movement transmitted by a strong man still continued... Among the ancient order of things were interrupted forever; the memories of antiquity gradually disappeared.” The period of more or less isolated development ended, and the East Slavic state appeared on the European stage as a new and powerful power. The defeat of Napoleon and the influence of Russia on the political situation in Europe showed this clearly:

The storm of the twelfth year has come - who helped us here?
The frenzy of the people, Barclay, winter or the Russian god?
But God helped - the murmur became lower.
And soon by the force of things
We found ourselves in Paris
And the Russian Tsar is the head of kings.

From that moment on, the problems of Russia's present and future could not be considered otherwise than in the context of pan-European problems. Hence the whole peculiarity of his Europeanism - the most important feature of the literature he created. Pushkin understood the European character of Russian literature as a necessity, as a task of the time, as a prerequisite for art that would like to remain on the basis of reality. Now the time has come when Russia could and should take the most active part in the intellectual life of Europe. It was about the full participation of the creative genius of Russia in the production and decision general issues the present and future of the entire European civilization, which, with the recent appearance of a victorious Slavic country on the European stage, also lost its Western exclusivity and from now on, willy-nilly, embraced the European East.

In French literature, Pushkin did not see ideas that were consistent, first of all, with its own historical experience, which unambiguously indicated the importance of the people: “We do not believe that the current irritable, reckless, incoherent French literature is a consequence of political unrest. A revolution has taken place in French literature, alien to the political revolution that overthrew the old monarchy of Louis XIV” /12.70/. Pushkin was repulsed by the “short-sighted pettiness of today’s French novelists” /According to B.V. Tomashevsky, this refers to Balzac/ and, most importantly, the lack of positive ideas that could serve as a reliable guide on the difficult historical paths of European humanity. “The purpose of the art of art is an ideal, not a moral teaching.”

Pushkin did not see in contemporary Western literature any fundamentally important, new ideas that corresponded to the spirit and meaning of the revolutionary era. It is not by chance that the thought flashed through his mind: “The liberation of Europe will come from Russia, because only there the prejudice of the aristocracy does not exist at all. In other countries they believe in the aristocracy, some despising it, others hating it, others out of profit, vanity, etc. There is nothing like this in Russia. They don’t believe in it.” Aristocracy here means closed isolation, the opposition of a part to the whole, the opposition of the interests and beliefs of a few to the interests and beliefs of the many. Liberation here should be understood as liberation specifically from the aristocracy, whatever it may be, and therefore from any prejudices of the type of wealth, talent and from any selfish interests in favor of the interests of the people and their ideals. Realistic Russian literature followed this path, approaching the people the more it approached the genius of the great poet. Nationality and historicism became the general and distinctive principles of Russian realism. In order to characterize the specific features of Pushkin's historicism, as it had developed by the time of his most mature works, it is necessary to consider throughout Pushkin's entire creative career his appeal to the historical theme, his interpretation of historical facts, his historical views on evolution, as well as their relationship with the general system of Pushkin's creativity .

If we turn to Pushkin and his biography, we will notice that his very interest in history grew throughout his life and gradually concentrated on those historical eras that seemed to him key in the destinies of the Russian people, and his very understanding of the historical process and attitude towards historical issues were modified and progressed until they became an integral basis of his creative thinking.

During his lyceum years, we do not notice Pushkin’s special interest in history. Actually historical subjects are almost completely absent.

But in Pushkin we always find an amazing combination of the personal and the general, the historical. Already a lyceum student, Pushkin, who glorified the victory of Russian weapons in the fight against the Napoleonic invasion and the establishment of peace on earth, is a person capable of expressing the element of great feelings that have a general, national meaning and significance: “This boy, nicknamed the “Frenchman” in the Lyceum, knows , it turns out, the wonderful, great Russian word “mir”, which in Russian means “peace”, and “silence”, and “universe”, and “light”, and “harmony”, and “society”, and “peasant community”... How did the young poet know that great word - peace? Where did you overhear him? In Russian nature, in the Russian village, in the Russian elements, in the Russian people. That is why it is so fresh, rings so strongly in the Lyceum’s marble hall among the Roman icons.”

In 1815, the name appears for the first time in the Russian press: Alexander Pushkin. This is how “Memoirs in Tsarskoe Selo” was signed in the “Russian Museum”, where they were accompanied by an unusual editorial note about “a young poet whose talent promises so much.” And a year later, the society of lovers of Russian literature included 2 poems by the promising author in its “Collection of Exemplary Russian Works.” 17-year-old Pushkin is already included in the circle of Russian classics. Since 1816, he has been preparing a collection of his poems for publication. Among them are such pearls as “Licinia”, “Memories in Tsarskoe Selo”, “Singer”.

Pushkin's lyceum records amaze with the diversity of their themes, ideas, images, genres, stanzas and sizes. From epigrams and humorous poems to elegies and patriotic odes, all the main lyrical types have been tried here, incl. and such original ones as noel, cantata, my epitaph, my testament, etc. The young man Pushkin with equal confidence masters a light, playful meter /“The Lady Laughs”/ and an angry, insidious and explosive verse /“The proud Quirites bowed to the yoke”/.

All this corresponds to the diversity of Pushkin’s lyrical themes: a friendly joke and a mournful romance are written almost simultaneously with a civil proclamation and a military anthem. Carefree songs about “tender passion” and the “amber cup” give way to anxious thoughts about great political events, like the fire of Moscow or the Battle of Waterloo. In “Roman” indignant satire there is a protest against royal despotism. A modern political theme breaks through ancient mythology, straining youthful verse and giving it its first battle temper.

This fermentation of various poetic styles does not nevertheless obscure the basic desire of the novice author for the truth of life, for an accurate reflection of the world, for clear and true painting. The essence of Pushkin's realism lies in the combination of life's truth with an ennobled and purified perception of the world. Life is beautiful in the eyes of a great artist, and he conveys it truthfully and admiringly in all its authenticity, in all its charm.

The poet's creative responsiveness turns him to the sad phenomena of everyday life, often perceived through historical material. In 1815, the poet wrote a political satire - the poem “Licinia”, one of the most mature achievements of the Lyceum period: The despot’s favorite rules the weak Senate, He stretched out his yoke against Rome, dishonors the fatherland...

For the first time in Pushkin’s poetry, “unfortunate people” are named, which will remain his main theme until the end. The poem acutely poses the problem of vicious power, resolved in the spirit of sharp civil protest: “I am a Roman at heart, freedom boils in my chest.” The liberation idea here is clothed in bright plastic images. The courageous energy of the verse also enhances the civic pathos. The feeling of Roman indignant eloquence is achieved not by mechanical reproduction of the ancient meter, but by the internal intonation of speech, imparting to the “Alexandrians” of the 18th century the sound of the insidious formulas of classical Latin.

In June 1816, an old nobleman and prominent poet Yuri Neledinsky-Meletsky, author of the famous song “Will I go out to the river,” came to the lyceum. He received orders from the palace to write a cantata in honor of the marriage of Grand Duchess Anna Pavlovna to Prince William of Orange. But the elderly lyricist, not counting on his own strength, turned to Karamzin for help, who sent him to the lyceum to Vasily Lvovich’s nephew.

The lyceum poet sincerely loved Neledinsky, who was considered Batyushkov’s predecessor and was even listed in the honorary ranks of “Arzamas”. And this mellifluous lyricist bowed to the young talent. Was it possible to avoid such an offer?
Neledinsky announced the topic and outlined it possible development. Having accepted the proposed program, the poet immediately wrote historical stanzas in extremely courageous and picturesque verse, in which the events of Napoleonic epilogue are outlined in quick strokes - the fire of Moscow, the Congress of Vienna, “One Hundred Days”, Waterloo. Some stanzas, designed in the conventional style of decorative Battleism of the 18th century, are magnificent in their images and the power of the verse: He flew like a thunderstorm in the foul darkness And shed a blaze of glory.

Pushkin very successfully used a technique here that later served him when he was forced to develop official greetings: he turned to historical paintings or portraiture, only in conclusion restrainedly uttering the necessary praise.

The Lyceum's lecturers failed to arouse in their most lively and receptive listener a deep interest in any subject beyond their student's own curiosity, and were not even able to truly support his creative needs in accordance with his enormous talent.

Fascinated by the Russian past, conceiving poems about Igor, Olga, Vladimir, the aspiring poet did not meet at the lyceum a worthy mentor capable of correctly guiding his living historical needs. Adjunct Professor Kaidanov conducted an official course in his lectures, which sharply contradicted the emerging views of his brilliant listener.

As the future great historian, Pushkin did not have a teacher at the Lyceum. Pushkin's growth outgrew the experience of his best teachers and rapidly overtook the problems of school curricula. He became the greatest writer not thanks to the lyceum teachers, but in spite of their system, above which this “youth with a fiery seal, with a secret glow of rays” (as his friend Vyazemsky beautifully said about him) never ceased to rise with his plans and visions.

Since 1816, the poet begins to converge with Karamzin. At this time, Karamzin gave public readings of an as yet unpublished history, which was often discussed by his learned listeners. For the young poet, such interviews were extremely valuable. The interest of the older poets - Zhukovsky and Batyushkov - in the era of Prince Vladimir was reflected in the creative plans of their student. But Pushkin thought of developing the motifs of Russian antiquity not in a solemn epic form, but in his favorite genre of the comic poem, which he conceived back in 1814. The extraordinary adventures of the knights in the manner of funny stories and magical tales seemed to open the way for him for a living story in the spirit of his favorite humorous and folk poets.

After “Toliad”, “Monk”, “Bova” - a whole series of unfinished experiments - Pushkin again takes on this genre that eludes him and is seductive. To saturate the funny story with the characteristic features of the past, he remembers heroic episodes of antiquity and picturesque details of everyday life from Karamzin’s readings. Deeply alien to the monarchical tendencies of the historiographer, the young poet is captivated by legends about the exploits of the Kyiv knights and remembers archaic Slavic terms and rare Varangian names. All this was reflected in the songs of the great poem that Pushkin began to write in the last year of his lyceum life.

At Karamzin's in the summer of 1816, Pushkin met the hussar cornet Chaadaev. Chaadaev was the grandson of the famous historian and noble publicist of Catherine’s time, Prince Shcherbakov, a prominent collector of manuscripts and books, the author of “The Chronicle of Many Rebellions” and “The Tale of the Impostors Who Were in Russia.” Karamzin made extensive use of materials from Shcherbatov’s “Russian History” and received the grandson of his prominent predecessor with invariable friendliness.

Chaadaev himself, despite his youth - he was 22 years old at the time - had already taken part in major events in modern history: he fought at Borodin, Kulm, Leipzig and Paris. Military campaigns did not interrupt his intense mental work. Pushkin’s acquaintance with him had a huge influence on the formation of the poet’s worldview.
On March 26, 1820, the last song of “Ruslan and Lyudmila” was completed.

During the era of the creation of the poem, the circle of Pushkin’s historical ideas expanded enormously. The sixth song of “Ruslan and Lyudmila” already gives the first outline of the poet’s interpretation of the destinies of Russia: for him, a true hero is first of all people, organically merged with his country - a conviction that Pushkin will retain to the end. If his philosophy of history had not yet taken shape in its final forms in 1820, the singer of the mighty ascents of national history already appears before us in the final song of “Ruslan and Lyudmila.” At the heights of ancient legend rises a heroic representative of the people, carrying out their historical mission.

Thus, preserving the tradition of the magical knightly novel, by the end of the poem Pushkin in a new way combines the fantastic elements of the Old Slavonic fairy tale with the dramatic facts of ancient Russian history. In the sixth song, the poem comes closest to the historical narrative: the siege of Kyiv by the Pechenegs already represents an artistic transformation of a scientific source. This is Karamzin's first creative revision. The picture of the battle, full of movement and plastically clear in each of its episodes, already heralds the famous battle picture of 1828: “The East is burning with a new dawn...” Pushkin especially appreciated this last song of “Ruslan”. The tone of the poem changes noticeably here. Fiction is replaced by history. The gardens of Chernomor are obscured by a true picture of the capital city before an attack by the enemy: ...Kievans crowd on the city wall and see: in the morning fog the tents turn white across the river, the shields shine like a glow; Riders flash through the fields, raising black dust in the distance; The marching carts are coming, the fires are blazing on the hills.
Trouble: the Pechenegs have risen!

This is already a reliable and accurate description of the war of the 10th century with its weapons, tactics and even means of communication. This is already the beginning of historical realism. The picture of the defense of Kyiv foreshadows the battlefield system of the late Pushkin, who usually depicted the location of two camps before the battle - in “Poltava”, “Delibash”, “Journey to Arzum”.

“In the creative evolution of Pushkin, the significance of the last song “Ruslan” is enormous. Here, for the first time, the people appear in his work as an active force in history. He is shown in his worries, hopes, struggles and victories. The great theme of national struggle and glory enters the poem. At the last stage of his fabulous wanderings, the hero becomes the liberator of his homeland. All wounded in battle, he holds in his right hand the victorious sword that liberated the Grand Duchy from enslavement. The fairy tale takes on a historical perspective. “The legends of deep antiquity” resonate with modern times: through the vivid picture of the expulsion of the Pechenegs, the theme of Russia’s deliverance from foreign invasion in 1812 sounds.” The poem is woven into verses that glorified the great events of the Patriotic War back at the Lyceum. Ruslan grows into the bearer of the historical mission of his people, and the magical poem ends with a patriotic chord.

Thus, the light genre of cheerful classicism, unfolding and rushing towards the glorification of the liberation feat, approaches the last stage of the narrative towards historical realism.

Pushkin's creative growth over the three years of his work on “Ruslan and Lyudmila” is truly amazing. A gifted lyceum student turns into the country's first writer. Under his pen, “burlesque” is reborn into heroism. An epic parody turns into a historical battle. The legendary adventures of knights and wizards are reflected in the mighty strong-willed rise of a Russian warrior defending the honor and inviolability of his land. In the development of his plan, Pushkin grows from a poet-comedian into a singer of national greatness and national glory. If the roots of his poem are still intertwined with “The Monk” and “The Shadow of Fonvizin,” its leafy crown is already rising to “Poltava” and “The Bronze Horseman.”

On July 26, 1820, Pushkin created his first romantic poem - the epilogue to “Ruslan and Lyudmila”. This final fragment is somewhat at odds in style with the spirit of the poem it is intended to conclude. This is not so much an afterword to a magical saga as an overture to a cycle of modern poetic short stories.

During the St. Petersburg period of Pushkin’s life, we find examples of his appeal to historical events in the ode “Liberty.” But these examples are present there only as arguments proving the main thesis of the inviolability of the law. The historical philosophy that is invested in the interpretation of these examples comes down to the formula: “Klia is a terrible voice,” i.e. the verdict of history, the fatal retribution that befalls all violators of the eternal law. The worldview contained in the basis of “Liberty”, despite all the historical examples contained in it, should be characterized as ahistorical. In this ode, Pushkin proceeds from the main provisions of the 18th century enlighteners, formulated in the doctrine of natural law. During this period, Pushkin does not raise the question of the historical origin of social evil. The struggle within society is seen as a struggle of man against man, the strong against the weak. It is not people, but the unchanging “eternal law” that will save society from disasters. This epithet “eternal” in combination with the epithet “fatal” sufficiently characterizes the attitude towards reality, which is metaphysical in nature. Violation of the eternal law, no matter who it comes from, entails historical retribution - a new crime and new social disasters. A similar system of views is characteristic of the ideology of noble revolutionaries: their educational program naturally included ideas of abstract egalitarianism - legal equality before the law, alien to any desire for significant social restructuring. These were somewhat weakened ideas bourgeois revolution, ideas that are philanthropic in their psychology. The main evil was seen in the tyranny of the state and police, i.e. abuse of management and property rights; the salvation of society from tyranny was seen in a “reasonable” limitation of power, but with the preservation of the social structure of society.

This worldview did not change much during the romantic period of Pushkin’s work. In Pushkin's southern poems, in a somewhat abstract form, a romantic hero is depicted - a loner, whose consciousness has risen above the vicious society surrounding him. He is depicted as a fugitive from this society that comes into conflict with it. But this conflict is of an individualistic order, its expression is a betrayal of friendship and love. To aggravate the conflict, Pushkin transfers the hero to the exotic environment of primitive consciousness, close to harmonious nature. With this type of awareness of reality, one cannot speak of genuine historicism. Such a depiction of reality excludes historical study.

Meanwhile, it is in the south that Pushkin more often returns to the historical theme. Pushkin’s deep sympathy for the outcasts of modern society becomes the theme of his unfinished Kishinev poem of 1821, “The Robber Brothers.” It is connected with the idea of ​​the poem about the famous leader of the 17th century uprisings.

The surviving passage depicts ordinary robbers, but this is only an introduction to a larger poem on a different topic - about Cossack raids of the Razin type and about the love tragedy on the plow of the leader of the Volga freemen. This is clear from the plan, where it is no longer the forest murderers who kill lonely travelers, but the fighting Cossacks - the captain and his chieftain, as ranks and representatives of the Cossack army.

The title of the poem was apparently free from the criminal or philistine understanding of the term “robbery” as a shameful and terrible matter; it retained a certain shade of daring, youth, bold challenge, even social protest / as in a number of later plans of the creator of “Dubrovsky” /. To develop this forbidden topic, Pushkin turns to folklore. Based on historical legends, he proposes to freely present the events of the ancient freemen. The leader of the rebellious golytba will appear in the person of an anonymous chieftain, acting in a different era, but retaining the main features of his character.

The introduction to the main part of the poem / “On the Volga, in the silence of the night, the pale sail turns white...”/ is the usual beginning of a whole cycle of songs about Stepan Razin, which Pushkin would develop in his folk ballad of 1826 / “How a sharp-nosed boat sails along the wide Volga river.” …”/.

It is not surprising that such a poem was burned in 1823. Judging by the plan, the continuation would show historical Cossack campaigns, revealing in full the powerful natures of their famous atamans.
U
in the epilogue of the first romantic poem - “Prisoner of the Caucasus” - Pushkin promised to sing “Mstislav’s ancient duel”. He had already begun drawing up a plan for a new poem, but even here things did not go any further. From this plan one can only conclude that Pushkin, encouraged by the success of “Ruslan and Lyudmila,” wanted to write a second fairy tale poem, choosing the North Caucasus, familiar to him from fresh impressions, as the setting. From history, Pushkin wanted to take only the episode of the duel between Mstislav and Rededei, the prince of rhinoceroses. Everything else was taken from epics and fairy tales.

The poem combines episodes of the trip of Ilya and Dobrynya, episodes of the duel between Ilya Muromets and his son, an episode of the treasure sword from the fairy tale about Bova, some episodes about Ruslan, etc. These historical themes were suggested to Pushkin by his friends - the Decembrists, who were patriotically passionate about Russian antiquities and idealized the veche system ancient Rus'. Pushkin lingered the longest on the plot suggested to him about Vadim’s uprising against the autocratic power of Rurik. We can say with almost certainty that this topic was suggested to Pushkin by Vladimir Raevsky. The romantic Pushkin was going to write a drama based on the latest classical model. The historical masquerade characteristic of classicism is fully present in Pushkin’s “Vadim”.

By the way, it is necessary to find out what topics were understood in these years as historical topics. Interest in historical topics in the Decembrist environment was combined with the idealization of the veche system in Novgorod. Episodes related to the struggle for freedom especially attracted the attention of the Decembrists. Therefore, the early period of the Novgorod and Kyiv states, then the era of Novgorod’s long struggle for its independence, were considered especially worthy of historical study and historical depiction in works of art.

Later eras are less interesting to the Decembrists. Of these, only A. Kornilovich focused his attention on the Peter the Great era. The events of the 18th century were already presented as a kind of modernity, and somewhere in the Middle Ages there was a border separating history from the present time. The criterion for historicity was antiquity. Historical stories of the 20s gravitate toward the Middle Ages.

Pushkin’s note, known as “Notes on Russian History of the 18th Century,” dates back to the same years as “Vadim.” This note covers the events of Russian history from Peter to Paul with remarkable assessments of Peter / who “was not afraid of people’s freedom, for he trusted his power” / and Catherine, “this Tartuffe in a skirt and crown.” The newest task of Russian statehood is formulated with all clarity: “Our political freedom is inseparable from the liberation of the peasants.” With the poet's usual passionate attention to the political struggle of Russian writers, a remarkable summary of the illustrious empress's “victories” over her native literature is given: the imprisonment of Novikov, the exile of Radishchev, the persecution of Knyazhnin.

A careful analysis of this journalistic note shows that it has the character of an introduction to some work that has not reached us. The note that reached us, dated August 2, 1822, introduced as a preface the events that accompanied the author’s conscious life. Critical policy review is central. Both in terms of its purpose and content, it is more correct to classify this note as a journalistic rather than a historical work. It, however, contains one historical idea, to which Pushkin remains faithful even when he radically changes his historical views. He proves that the autocracy of Peter for some time was a progressive historical factor, since it opposed the claims of large feudal lords for an even greater and vicious enslavement of the peasantry.

A victory for the rulers could lead Russia to “monstrous feudalism.” But then the role of the autocracy changes. From a progressive force, under Catherine, it turns into a force that is corrupting Russian society, having a detrimental effect on the destinies of the entire people. Pushkin puts forward a Decembrist program consisting of two points: representative government and the abolition of serfdom. Pushkin saw in his friends - young progressive nobles - those who were called upon to carry out a political revolution and destroy the evil associated with autocracy and serfdom.

In his poetic work, Pushkin touched upon a historical theme in the ballad “Song of the Prophetic Oleg.” While in “Vadim” Pushkin did not care at all about historical accuracy or historical coloring, here it is historical coloring that is the subject of Pushkin’s special concern. He turns to a certain chronicle and tries to maintain possible accuracy in the events mentioned. This ballad is characterized by a certain isolation of the historical plot from the big questions that occupied Pushkin during the years of very acute political tension within the country. The ballad was written in the same year as “Vadim” and “Note”, but it did not at all reflect the central issues of the time. In general, the historical theme in Pushkin’s work is characterized by a close connection between modern demands and the era chosen for depiction. Pushkin almost never turns to history outside of its connection with modernity, and “Song of the Prophetic Oleg” seems to be some kind of picture that is in no way connected with Pushkin’s other works.

The turning point in Pushkin’s work is the year 1823, when he began creating “Eugene Onegin.” The truth begins to become clear to him that the people are not an object.

“Precious for the Russian people to the memory of Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin,” Pushkin “with reverence and gratitude” dedicated “Boris Godunov” - “this work, inspired by his genius.”

The era of the Time of Troubles (late 16th – early 17th centuries) attracted the attention of Russian playwrights as an exceptionally dramatic, turning point in Russian history. The characters of its main characters - Godunov, False Dmitry, Shuisky - were full of genuine drama and acute contradictions. This theme was most clearly reflected in Russian drama of the first third of the 19th century, as is known, in Pushkin’s tragedy “Boris Godunov” /1825/.

Pushkin considered the writing of this tragedy his literary feat, understood its political meaning and said: “There was no way I could hide all my ears under the cap of a holy fool - they stick out.” Interest in the history of Pushkin is natural and deep. The most bitter thoughts about the fate of Russia did not give rise to historical pessimism in him. By this time, the X and XI volumes of Karamzin’s “History of the Russian State” had been published, and this sharpened attention to the era of the “Time of Troubles.” It was a turning point, critical time in the history of Russia: Polish intervention, popular discontent, the shaky power of impostors.

“Boris Godunov” originates as a plan, out of the need to understand the world through history, the history of Russia. Staying in Mikhailovskoe and being in contact with people’s life played no less a role here than Karamzin’s great work, “The History of the Russian State.” Attempts to comprehend the “mechanism” of human history are not an abstract philosophical task, but a burning personal need of Pushkin, who was beginning to realize himself as a social poet, endowed, moreover, with a certain prophetic mission; “This is an attempt to penetrate the mystery of the historical destinies of Russia, to comprehend scientifically as a unique personality, to restore the historical and spiritual genealogy that Peter’s revolution “cancelled.” He peers into the character of Russian statehood, connected with the character of the people, studies the era of one of those shocks to which this statehood was subjected.”

From Karamzin, Pushkin also found a version of Boris’s involvement in the murder of Tsarevich Dmitry, the son of Ivan the Terrible, in Uglich. Modern science leaves this question open. For Pushkin, this version helps to show Boris’s torment of conscience with psychological depth. Doubts about Boris's involvement in the crime were very widespread.

In a letter to S. Shevyrev, Pogodin writes: “Be sure to write the tragedy “Boris Godunov.” He is not to blame for Dmitry’s death: I am absolutely convinced of this... We must remove from him the disgrace imposed, over the centuries, by Karamzin and Pushkin. Imagine a person whom all circumstances have come to blame, and he sees this and trembles from future curses.” It was this interpretation that Pogodin based his drama about Boris Godunov, contrasting it with Pushkin’s. In 1831, he completed the drama “The Story in Persons of Tsar Boris Fedorovich Godunov.”

The very title “History in the Faces...” in its own way emphasizes the author’s point of view on history and the features of the artistic development of the historical theme. The past is revealed to them not through the struggle of social forces, but through the clash of virtuous and vicious individuals. Pogodin comes to the conviction: the purpose of history is “to teach people to curb passions,” which sounds completely in the spirit of Karamzin, and this specific, fairly rational moralism will continue to be one of the characteristic features of his views.

But Pushkin also disagreed with Karamzin in many respects in the interpretation of this material. The problem of the relationship between the drama “Boris Godunov” and the story of Karamzin is very complex; it cannot be simplified. One must see both what connects her with Karamzin and the deep difference between them. The fact is that Karamzin’s “History” is both a historical scientific work and at the same time a work of art. Karamzin recreated the past in pictures and images, and many writers, using factual materials, disagreed with Karamzin in their assessments. In the historical past of Russia, Karamzin wanted to see an amicable alliance and harmony between the tsars and the people / “History belongs to the tsar” /, and Pushkin saw a deep gap between the autocracy of the tsar and the people.

The drama is distinguished by a completely new quality of historicism. Before Pushkin, neither the classicists nor the romantics were able to recreate the exact historical era. They took only the names of heroes of the past and endowed them with the thoughts of people of the 19th century. Before Pushkin, writers could not show history in its movement; they modernized it, made it modern.

Pushkin's historicism of thinking lies in the fact that he saw history in development, in the change of eras. According to Pushkin, in order to make material from the past topical, it does not need to be artificially adapted to the present. Pushkin’s motto: “It is necessary to recreate the historical truth, and then the past in itself will be relevant, because the past and the present are connected by the unity of history.”

Pushkin amazingly accurately recreated the historical past. The readers of Pushkin’s drama face an era of troubled times: here are the chronicler Pimen, the boyars, the “fool,” etc. Pushkin not only recreates the external features of the era, but he reveals the main social conflicts. Everything is grouped around the main problem: the king and the people.

First of all, Pushkin shows the tragedy of Boris Godunov and gives us his explanation. It is in the understanding of Boris Godunov and his tragic fate, first of all, that Pushkin differs from Karamzin.

According to Karamzin, Boris’s tragedy is entirely rooted in his personal crime; he is a king - a criminal who ascended the throne illegally. For this he is punished by God's judgment, torments of conscience. Condemning Boris as a criminal tsar who shed innocent blood, Karamzin defended the legality of succession to the throne. For Karamzin, this is a moral and psychological tragedy. He views the tragedy of Boris from a religious and edifying perspective.

Much in this understanding of life and the fate of Boris was close to Pushkin. This is a theme of crime and punishment. Pushkin further enhances this moral and psychological drama by the fact that for Pushkin Boris is an extraordinary person. The tragedy of a criminal conscience is revealed in Boris’s monologues; Boris himself admits: “the one whose conscience is unclean is pitiful.” Unlike the tragedies of the classicists, the character of Boris is shown broadly, multifacetedly, even in evolution. If at first Boris is impenetrable, then later he is shown as a man with a broken will. He is also shown as a loving person, a father.

He cares about enlightenment in the state and teaches his son how to govern the country / “First tighten, then loosen” /, in the nakedness of his suffering he is somewhat reminiscent of Shakespeare’s heroes / Macbeth, Gloucester in “Richard III”/. And the fact that he addresses the holy fool by name - Nikolka and calls him unfortunate, like himself, is related to himself, this is not only evidence of the immensity of Boris’s suffering, but also hope for the possible redemption of this suffering.

It is important to take into account that Pushkin shows the people's point of view on what he did. Boris is not just a usurper king. Pushkin emphasizes that it was not an adult opponent who was killed, but a baby. Boris stepped through the blood of an innocent baby - a symbol of moral purity. Here, according to Pushkin, the moral feeling of the people is offended and it is expressed through the lips of the holy fool: “I will not, Tsar, pray for King Herod, the Mother of God does not command.”

No matter how great the significance of Boris’s moral and psychological drama is, for Pushkin the main thing in the drama is the tragedy of Boris as a tsar, ruler, statesman, whom he looks at from a political point of view. Pushkin shifts the emphasis from Boris’s personal suffering to the consequences of the crime for the state, the social consequences.

How is Boris portrayed as a king? He is an extraordinary statesman. Although he ascended the throne through a crime, he set himself not only ambitious goals. He sincerely wanted the good of the state and the happiness of his subjects.

He outlined extensive plans for the transformation of the state. Following Ivan the Terrible, he pursues a progressive policy – ​​a policy of a centralized state. He relies not on the noble nobility, but on the serving nobility; he wants to value people not by their birth, but by their intelligence. Cares about the development of science. And yet, despite his subjective intentions and even certain generosity, promises to the people, the people do not accept him, he came across a blank wall of misunderstanding of the people, the people turned away from him.

And the tragedy of Boris is that for the people he remains a despot king, a tyrant, a serf owner. In the famous monologue “I have reached the highest power,” he poses this question alone with himself: how can we explain that the people are against it and are failing? He himself sees God's judgment, which sent him punishment for his crime. An idea that will be picked up by Russian literature: no noble goals can be justified and achieved by immoral actions. This same monologue contains a unique answer to the other side of the problem: why don’t the people support him? After all, Boris treats the people like the mob, like an animal, “they only know how to love the dead.”

For the people, the main question is the question of serfdom, of social enslavement, but it was Boris who destroyed St. George’s Day. He believes that people only understand the language of force, which is why there are executions in the country. And objectively, from the depths of the drama, the thought arises that the point is not in the personal qualities of Boris, the point in principle is that the tsarist power is despotic and that at all times there was a deep gap between the autocracy and the people.

Boris's immorality in the daily practice of tsarist power. And to prove that it’s not just a matter of personal crime, Pushkin shows the fate of Dmitry the Pretender - False Dmitry / Grishka Otrepiev /. Pushkin calls the impostor “a dear adventurer.” In terms of his human qualities, he differs in many ways from Boris; he is capricious, fickle, and adapts to conditions. He is a tool of the Polish aristocrats. At first, people flock to him. But when the impostor ascends the throne through the murder of Fyodor and Maria (Godunov’s wife) and essentially becomes a toy in the hands of the boyars, the people recoiled from him. Pushkin ends the tragedy with a meaningful phrase: “The people are silent in horror.

The people are silent. While the impostor had no real power. The people supported him, wanting to express their rejection of Boris, the people kept the dream of an ideal king, associated with the image of an innocently destroyed baby. But when the impostor ascended the throne through a crime, the people realized that they were facing a despot, a tyrant.

Thus, Pushkin’s drama shows not only the tragic fate of the kings, cut off from the people, but also the tragedy of the people themselves, who won and at the same time found themselves defeated due to the lack of a specific political program that would allow them to consolidate their victory.

The theme of the people runs through the entire play. They not only talk about the people in the play, but for the first time in drama, Pushkin brought the people onto the stage. The people became the center of the tragedy “Boris Godunov”, but in the general concept of “people” the idea of ​​the peasantry and the urban “rabble” of all classes are still merged together. But it is important to note that all classes, in their opposition to the boyars, are combined into one concept “people”. If in Shakespeare the people were the background of the action, then in Pushkin they are the protagonist /folk scenes on the Maiden Field/. Pushkin shows the heterogeneity of the opinions of the crowd. Some sincerely beg Boris to accept the royal crown, but the majority are devoid of any special monarchical feelings and are deeply indifferent to everything that is happening. Pushkin's depiction of the people is distinguished by duality and inconsistency. On the one hand, the people are a powerful rebellious force, a formidable spontaneous mass. The fate of the kings and the fate of history depend on the support of the people, and on the other hand, the people are shown as a politically immature mass, they are a toy in the hands of the boyars, the boyars take advantage of the actions of the people, and the people still remain in slavery. Thus, the leading main philosophical and historical thought of Pushkin: the people are the source of moral judgment. It was especially relevant during the period of its creation - on the eve of December 1825. Pushkin objectively addressed the advanced noble youth, spoke about the weakness of the noble movement, calling for them to join the people.

In the historical concept underlying the tragedy, there is another feature that limits the broad understanding of historical events, a feature noted in a letter to Benckendorf / April 16, 1830 /: rejecting intentions to hint at close political circumstances, but admitting that some similarities with recent events in tragedy can be found, Pushkin adds: “All rebellions are similar to each other.” Pushkin believed that he would completely agree with historical truth if in an artistic generalization it would be based not only on the experience of Russian history of the early 19th century, but also on historical examples of imposture, usurpation, popular unrest of other times, other peoples, for all rebellions are the same. While working on “Boris,” he turns to Tacitus, whom he studies in those chapters that talk about the impostors of imperial Rome. Pushkin believed that it was enough to preserve the historical flavor of customs, speech, and external behavior in order to avoid reproaches of distorting historical truth. But the psychology of the characters had to be reconstructed not only from monuments, but also on the basis of knowledge of “human nature.” And therefore, not only in the chronicles, but also in Tacitus, Pushkin looked for historical analogies, typical features, characteristic formulas for depicting the events of the reign of Boris Godunov. Pushkin's reviews of the heroes of the tragedy are constantly based on historical analogies. So, in a letter to Raevsky /1829/ he writes: “There is a lot of Henry IV in Dmitry. Like him, he is brave, gentle and just as boastful as he is indifferent to faith, both renounce their law in order to achieve a political goal, both are adherents of pleasure and war, both are carried away by chimerical plans, conspiracies take up arms against both.” When it comes to Boris’s involvement in the murder of Dmitry, Pushkin, objecting to Pogodin, writes: “And Napoleon, the murderer of Engensky, and when? Exactly 200 years after Boris.”

What was the political subtext of “Boris Godunov” that Pushkin so insisted on?

In the squares there are rebellious whispers wandering, Minds are boiling - they need to be cooled... Only with vigilant severity can we restrain the people... In the historical tragedy of 1825, as in the early “Vadim”, these are clear echoes of the era of the Holy Alliance and military migrations. In the spirit of Pushkin’s previous characterizations of Alexander I, as a participant in the Guards conspiracy on March 11, Pimen’s exclamations are heard in the tragedy: “We have named the regicide Master,” and the cry of the holy fool: “No, no! You can’t pray for King Herod!” The end of Boris’s reign (“sixth year already”)/ is marked by the dark mysticism of the tsar: he locks himself with magicians, fortune-tellers, and witches, seeking in their sorcery the solace of his indignant conscience. The analogy with Alexander I of the era of his last rapprochement with Archimandrite Foschius and Metropolitan Seraphim is obvious here.

Godunov’s exclamation is also extremely characteristic: “The rebellious Pushkin family is disgusting to me,” obviously reflecting the reaction of the angry emperor to the famous epigrams, noels and “Liberty.”

Away from the main stream of events, as if in the shadows and in the distance, one of the most significant and majestic figures of this historical fresco is revealed. As almost always with Pushkin, this is a figure of thought and speech, in this case an ancient writer, scientist of medieval Rus', historian, biographer and memoirist - the chronicler Pimen. In the original edition of his monologue, the artistic attraction of the learned monk to the creative recreation of the past was even more pronounced: Before me again come people who have long since left the world - Rulers to whom I was subjugated, Both enemies and old friends, Comrades of my flourishing life And in the noise of battles and in sweet conversations... He is not dispassionate and not cut off from life, this old publicist, angrily rebelling against the evil of the world and the vices of the system. Under a monastic hood, he is a political thinker, above all concerned with the “government of the state.”

The inexperienced monk Grigory Otrepiev made a mistake when he compared him to an imperturbable clerk who “calmly looks at the right and the guilty, listening indifferently to good and evil...”. In fact, the chroniclers defended their idea of ​​serving the homeland and protecting its national power. No wonder Pimen “fought under the towers of Kazan and repelled the army of Lithuania at Shuisky...”. He remains a faithful warrior in his “Tale of Bygone Years.” This is not a calm registration of current incidents, it is a menacing sentence and a “terrible voice” to posterity in the name of the steady triumph of truth and justice, at least in the distant future.

Such was this kindred image. The author of “Boris Godunov” himself more than once branded in his poems the “crowned soldier” in the name of the struggle for a free homeland, reflected in the appearance of the ancient ruler the features of a monk, whose injured conscience and dark mysticism threatened new disasters for the country and people. But when Pushkin was finishing “Boris Godunov,” Alexander I was dying in Taganrog.

“Boris Godunov” marks a new stage in addressing the historical theme. This stage differs from the previous time in the principle of historical fidelity. To create the tragedy, Pushkin turned to the study of historical sources, from which he tried to restore not so much the true coherence of circumstances as the color of the era, national identity, “spirit of the times,” which gave the work the character of historical authenticity. But the very understanding of the historical process is not without features of historical romanticism.

It is known that Pushkin wanted to continue his historical chronicle in the future and planned to write after “Boris Godunov” “False Dmitry” and “Vasily Shuisky”.

By this time, Pushkin had already developed a certain view of history, different from Shakespeare’s. This view proceeds from the fact that history has a purpose. In relation to the plot of “Boris Godunov”, this goal is to awaken the conscience of people and it is “set” at the very beginning of the tragedy, in the words of Pimen: “We angered God, we sinned: / We called the regicide Master.” The entire historical process depicted in the tragedy seems to be aimed at ensuring that these words become an expression of the entire people, “the opinion of the people”; and here it is necessary to note that this process is cleared of accidents by Pushkin; there is “correctness” and purposefulness in it; and each assessment moves the action towards the remark that will be the end of the tragedy: “The people are silent,” and will mean that the people, having once sinned, no longer want to condone lies and crime.

“The most striking thing is that Pushkin, who only recently wrote about the “lessons of pure atheism” and still considers himself not so much a believer as a seeker of faith, in practice creates - not without the influence of Karamzin - a deeply religious concept of the historical process as such an action, the main the face of which is that highest, directing will, which in the European manner is called providence, and in Russian - Providence. In contrast to the faceless “fate” of ancient tragedy and the equally faceless and blind “fate” of European rationalism, the power of Providence - Providence is value-determined, i.e. connects the course of history with the state of conscience of man and people. Hence the complete absence of “accidents” in the historical process: what seems random, in the end, is always justified by the ultimate goal of the historical process,” says V. Nepomnyashchiy.

In this sense, a travesty parallel to “Boris Godunov” is a funny and brilliant poem - a joke “Count Nulin”, in which Pushkin, by his own admission, “parodied history and Shakespeare” / the poem “Lucretia”/.

We find the relationship between big history and private history, seriousness and parody, in the prehistory of “Count Nulin.” Pushkin wrote: “At the end of 1825 I was in the village. Re-reading Lucretia, Shakespeare's rather weak poem, I thought, what if Lucretia had the idea to slap Tarquin? Perhaps this cooled his enterprise, and he was forced to retreat in shame? Lucretia would not have stabbed herself to death, Publicola would not have gone berserk, Brutus would not have expelled the kings, and the world and the history of the world would not have been the same. So, we owe the republic, consuls, dictators, Cotons, Caesar to a seductive incident, similar to what happened recently in my neighborhood, in Novorzhevsky district. The idea of ​​parodying Shakespeare presented itself to me. I could not resist the double temptation and wrote this story at two in the morning.”

Parody as imitation, exaggeratedly repeating the features of the original, a mocking-critical attitude towards the source with possible veneration and even admiration for its qualities we find in “The History of the Village of Goryukhin”.

The meaning of parodying the events of Roman history described in Shakespeare's poem is that historical events and events in the private lives of people appear to be subject to the same or at least similar laws, the human microcosm and the historical macrocosm reveal their unity / so in “Boris Godunov” the historical process and the state of human conscience are united, and neither there nor there is a place for blind chance: in its guise the will that moves history reveals itself. A few years later, Pushkin would speak directly on this topic, calling “chance” “a powerful, instantaneous instrument of Providence.” Even later, recalling in “A Note on “Count Nulin” how he “parodied” history and Shakespeare, he drops the phrase: “Count Nulin” was written on December 13 and 14. There are terrible encounters.”

If this is indeed the case, then Pushkin once again demonstrated his prophetic, almost visionary gift: the poem, depicting an unsuccessful attempt at a love affair and thereby parodying the tragic events of the history of Rome, was written simultaneously with the Decembrists’ speech, which ended in defeat. Pushkin had extremely scanty information about what was happening in the capital, but there is a legend coming from him about his unsuccessful attempt to secretly come to St. Petersburg on the eve of the uprising.

If among the Decembrists, who sought to exalt the ideas of liberty, the leading historical themes were those of Novgorod and Pskov, then starting from the second half of the 20s, in accordance with the current situation and the emergence of the problem of the state, the theme of Peter I acquired the most important place in literature and journalism.

Both of these themes /Novgorod liberty and Peter I/ are perceived in conjunction, considered in the light of the events of December 14, and receive different interpretations.

N.M. Karamzin assessed Peter I very controversially. On the one hand, this is a sovereign who has done a lot for the greatness of Russia and the strengthening of autocracy in it, and on the other hand, he committed such a “complete appropriation of European customs”, which caused enormous damage to the country.

The passion for the new in his actions crossed all boundaries. “We have become citizens of the world, but in some cases we have ceased to be citizens of Russia - Peter is to blame for this.”

Life itself by that time had revealed the tragic weakness of the military revolution. The defeat of the Decembrists became a real, albeit sad, fact. An intermediate, transitional time has arrived in the history of Russia. Under these conditions, Pushkin comes to the idea of ​​a “peaceful revolution”, to the idea of ​​​​the possibility of achieving the desired changes, the elimination of serfdom through the expansion of education and humanity, and acts as a great educator. He pins his hopes on enlightened absolutism, an enlightened monarch. Peter I was an example for Pushkin.

Pushkin's historical worldview was formed in the poet's attempts to resolve the contradictions between the ideas of reason and the practical results of history; between the great ideas born of the French Revolution and the reaction and despotism that later established itself throughout Europe; between the greatness and glory of the Russian people and the terrible reality of their life. Pushkin realized that the question of an ideal state is not resolved speculatively, as was typical of many thinkers of the 18th century, but by studying historical patterns, objective laws of reality in their national-historical refraction and development. “The history of a people alone can explain its true demands,” wrote Pushkin. That is why he attached great importance to the practical value of historical science and the correctness of its method. He won this idea through bitter experience of himself and his friends - the Decembrists.

Pushkin had in mind the historical novel he had conceived from the era of Peter I. The poetic idea associated with the theme of Peter arose in Pushkin back in 1824. The poetic passage “How the Tsar’s Blackamoor Planned to Marry” dates back to this year, which is close in plot to “The Blackamoor of Peter the Great.”

N. L. Brodsky explains Pushkin’s appeal to the theme of Peter by political motives, the poet’s desire to use the image of Peter to remind him of his progressive reforms in order to influence both public opinion and government policy. However, Pushkin long ago rejected the romantic method of allusion, the application of history to a modern situation.

Pushkin's political views after December 14 were strictly determined by the concept of the Russian historical process that Pushkin developed in the second half of the 20s. Pushkin’s understanding and depiction of the personality and activities of Peter I should be considered, first of all, in the aspect of this concept.

One of the most basic provisions of Pushkin's philosophy of history is the idea that the national history of each people is part of world history. The problems of the historical development of Russia are comprehended by Pushkin in a world-historical aspect. Thus, in the novel he compares the era of Peter with France during the regency.

Thus, the theme of Peter I is included in Pushkin’s work and worldview as a reflection of his understanding of the Russian historical process. Pushkin’s thoughts after 1825 were always occupied with the search for ways and forces for the progressive development of Russia in the spirit of “true enlightenment,” that is, people's freedom. The evolution of themes and ideas in Pushkin’s historical novel, including “Arap Peter the Great,” is closely related to this problem.

Considering “Arap” against the backdrop of historical fiction of the 30s, Belinsky wrote: “If this novel had been finished as well as it began, we would have had an excellent historical Russian novel, depicting the morals of the greatest era of Russian history...”.
At the beginning of the novel, Pushkin gives an expressive and historically accurate picture of the life of the highest noble society of France in the first quarter of the 18th century. Emphasizes the material and moral decline of the careless and frivolous aristocracy. This decline was accompanied by brilliance and free-thinking in the life and spiritual culture of France.

Pushkin gives such a comprehensive and contrasting description of the time of Peter, the new culture. Pushkin contrasts the image of a disintegrating state, the moral decline of the old aristocracy, the depravity, and carelessness of its head - the regent Duke of Orleans - with the image of Peter's young Russia, the harsh simplicity of the St. Petersburg court, and Peter's concerns for the state. Young Russia is shown full of creative strength and constructive work.

The era of Peter is revealed mainly from the side of culture, morals, and customs. Pushkin sees the manifestation of national character and people's life in these years in the peculiarities of culture, life, and ways of thinking. The author sought to reveal the era of Peter in the clash of the new with the old, in the contradictory and comic combination of old habits and new orders introduced by Peter.

The morals and customs of Western European society were poorly perceived by Russian noble society.

Remarkable in its artistic expressiveness, internal comedy and historical fidelity, the picture of Peter's assembly shows that Western European enlightenment was only externally perceived by the Russians. Only directly near Peter does a group of truly enlightened people form - Feofan Prokopovich, Konnevich and others mentioned in the novel. Thus, in the era of Peter the Great, Pushkin notes both the genuine enlightenment that distinguished Peter himself and some figures of his time, and the “half-enlightenment” with which Pushkin would characterize the majority of noble society of the 18th and early 19th centuries.

Pushkin notes the emergence of Peter the Great's intelligentsia, one of whose representatives was the Tsar's Arab Ibrahim. He is one of Peter’s associates, a nobleman who is aware of his responsibility to the state. A sense of duty, and not fear of the tsar or careerist considerations, brought him back from a brilliant, but frivolous and declining France. In the name of duty, in the name of the honor of being an assistant to a great man, Ibrahim sacrifices fun and pleasure, exchanges a refined life for a harsh environment and work. He even decides to leave the woman he loves, putting his duty above his personal feelings.

Pushkin portrays Ibrahim as an exceptionally intelligent and educated person. Peter highly valued his godson. It is characteristic that not a single trait of servile court psychology can be found in Ibrahim. Ibrahim is not a flatterer-favorite, but takes his position on personal merit, he is respectful to Peter and at the same time full of dignity and independence. All these features of Ibrahim impressed Pushkin. In a historical sense, Ibrahim is “a chick of Petrov’s nest,” a representative of the new Petrine intelligentsia. Ibrahim is contrasted with Korsakov - an empty and frivolous dandy who does not think about his duty to his homeland, nor about Peter I, nor about the state. Korsakov is not stupid, but he lacks genuine education; he strives only for entertainment, admires Paris and is disdainfully surprised by the simple lifestyle of the king. The spiritual appearance of Ibragim and Korsakov corresponds to their moral and psychological qualities. Ibrahim loves the woman dear to him passionately and seriously, the way he treats everything. Korsakov looks at love with his characteristic frivolity. Korsakov's philosophy is a sybaritic, hedonistic philosophy that later blossomed magnificently among the Russian nobility of the 18th century.

Historically truthfully reproducing the customs and life of the Peter the Great era, Pushkin also reveals one of its main conflicts - the struggle between the new principles of life and morality and the foundations of the old pre-Petrine Rus', represented in the novel by the family of the noble boyar Rzhevsky. The action of the novel reflects the last years of the reign of Peter I, and Pushkin historically correctly softens the severity and strength of this struggle, which continued at that time mainly in the field of everyday and moral relations. Pushkin shows the old boyars with subtle differentiation: Prince Lykov, limited, stupid, personifies the boyars who have abandoned the former opposition, Rzhevsky, still clings to the old Rus' and is dissatisfied with the new order. Rzhevsky is not a political opponent of Peter. In her youth, when Princess Sophia fought to strengthen her power, Rzhevsky was, apparently, on the side of the Naryshkins; he had to save his life during the Streltsy riot. But still, he remained in the future in secret opposition to the new order, despite the successes of Peter’s reforms. He boasts of his boyar family and does not like unborn people who came to power. Rzhevsky is a man of character and natural intelligence. But his character often manifests itself in tyranny, and his intelligence does not prevent him from being funny and limited with his boyar arrogance. Pushkin uses these events, and at the same time, the typical aspects of the personality of the old boyar, emphasizing the spiritual superiority of Peter over him, as the bearer of new principles of life, to reveal the limitations of the old boyar Rus'. Thus, Pushkin paints a broad historical background in his novel, shows the still emerging, but already fading struggle of the old, pre-Petrine, with the new, gives specific historical characteristics of three types of culture: aristocratic France, Petrine Russia and old boyar Rus'. Pushkin’s image of Peter I is drawn against this background.

Drawing Peter I, Pushkin developed the main motives of the “Stanzas” / “On the eternal throne was a worker” and “With an autocratic hand he boldly sowed enlightenment”/. Through the mouth of Ibrahim, the author emphasizes in Peter a quick and strong mind, strength and flexibility of thought, and a variety of interests and activities. Ibrahim “day by day became more attached to the sovereign, better comprehended his lofty soul. Ibrahim saw Peter in the Senate, challenged by Buturlin and Dolgoruky, examining important legislative requests, in the Admiralty Collegium asserting the maritime greatness of Russia, saw him with Feofan, Gavriil Buzhinsky and Konnevich in their leisure hours, examining translations of foreign publicists or visiting the factory of a merchant, a working artisan and the office of a scientist " Pushkin portrays the image of Peter I approximately in the spirit of that ideal of an enlightened, law-abiding, science- and art-loving ruler who understands his people, whose image was portrayed by Holbach and Diderot in their journalism.

Peter's Europeanism and his hostility to reactionary antiquity do not prevent him from being a completely Russian person. As Pushkin portrays, Peter loved those Russian morals and customs that did not seem to him to be a manifestation of a patriarchal dynasty. Peter's penchant for broad, simple fun, good-natured slyness - all this complements the image of Peter, who, according to Pushkin, embodies the traits of a national character. Some Decembrists saw in Peter’s very personality, in his behavior, tastes and sympathies, a manifestation of an anti-national character. With his novel, Pushkin challenged this point of view.

Emphasizing the democratic customs of Peter, his simplicity and humanity, Pushkin polemicized with the official pompous image of Peter as an emperor towering above his subjects, which appealed to the arrogant Nicholas II in his cold and empty swagger.

The interpretation of the image of Peter as a great historical figure shows how far Pushkin has stepped in his philosophical and historical worldview compared to the purely educational notes of 1822. Without at all diminishing Peter's outstanding personal qualities, Pushkin helps the reader understand and feel the historical pattern of Peter's transformations and their necessity. Peter is depicted as the son of his age.

The pathos of “Blackamoor Peter the Great” is the glorification of the transformative, creative activity of Peter I and his associates. Pushkin, with his novel, as well as his “Note on Education,” affirmed the value of what was so hated by Nicholas I. In contrast to the reactionary noble nationalism, Pushkin, with his entire cycle of works about Peter, defended the program of the Decembrists, proclaiming the necessity and inevitability of further progressive, anti-serfdom policies. Pushkin called on the government to transform Russia in this direction. With the image of Peter the Great, he revealed the squalor and worthlessness of Nicholas I. Showing the humanity of Peter, Pushkin seemed to demand forgiveness of the “dear convicts” - the Decembrists. The entire novel, being a strictly objective depiction of the times of Peter I, was, as Pushkin once put it when reading the last volumes of Karamzin’s history, “as vital as yesterday’s newspaper.”

By 1829, the theme of Peter lost not its general interest for Pushkin, but its political relevance. The poet is convinced that no progressive policy is acceptable for the government of Nicholas I. Relations between Pushkin and the Tsar are becoming increasingly strained.
In 1828, Pushkin created a work in which other aspects of the image of Peter are revealed - the poem “Poltava”. Here we have before us the struggle of Peter and his transformed Russia against external enemies. Peter is the hero of the Battle of Poltava. Pushkin tries to accurately recreate the historical era - “when Russia was young.” He reveals the past through the living human destinies, characters.

Therefore, the lyrical theme, the theme of the unusual love of young Maria and the old Hetman Mazepa, also occupies a large place. This love theme connects “Poltava” with Pushkin’s previous romantic poems. But this topic recedes into the background compared to the main topic - the glorification of Peter as a commander. Pushkin understands the huge role this battle played in the historical destinies of Russia. The battle could only be won by a transformed Russia. The romantic poem seems to develop into a national heroic epic. The work is based not on an event from personal life, but on an event of national significance.

The image of Peter, the creator of victory, is revealed in contrast with Hetman Mazepa and the Swedish king Charles XII. In his depiction of these historical figures, as well as the historical past in general, Pushkin stands on a strong position of historicism and historical accuracy. He carefully studies the development of this topic by his predecessors / “Mazeppa” by Byron, “Voinarovsky” by Ryleev/. In Pushkin’s portrayal, Mazepa is a criminal pursuing personal, selfish goals, he wants to tear Ukraine away from Russia, negotiates with the Jesuits, even dreams of a throne, and the people do not support him. “Mazepa acts in my poem exactly as in history, and his speeches explain his historical character,” notes Pushkin.

The poet is also accurate in his depiction of Charles XII. Pushkin does not hide his personal courage, but he is waging a war of conquest, he has no progressive goals, he acts for ambitious reasons. His defeat is predetermined, and Karl himself feels it.
Pushkin's position and his deep historicism are especially emphasized in the epilogue. It turns out that history itself gives a true assessment of events and historical figures. The Battle of Poltava became a monument to Peter: “Only you erected it, hero!” Pushkin deeply studies the history of Peter and begins to write a scientific-historical work, “The History of Peter I.” He raised enormous material, and although the work remained unfinished, Peter's concept here given is quite clear. Pushkin begins to distinguish both light and dark sides in Peter's activities. If in the 20s Pushkin shows Peter only as a great and enlightened monarch, now he also sees a cruel despot. He shows that Peter’s reform was built on the blood of the people; now he sees the selective influence on a person of any, even enlightened, autocracy.

Pushkin embodied this, deeper than before, interpretation of Peter’s theme in his last brilliant poem “The Bronze Horseman” /1833/.

“The Bronze Horseman” - this poem brought together all the motifs that had previously been separated into different works and different genres. Hence the unimaginable semantic load.

During the first Boldino autumn, Pushkin was already captivated by the idea of ​​universality, by the idea of ​​modern man falling out of historical existence into private life. The first idea is developed in the cycle of “Little tragedies”, consistently representing the “history of mankind” in modern times.

The second cycle is “Belkin’s Tales” and “The History of the Village of Goryukhin”. The cycles relate to each other in the same way, in any case, in the same way as five years earlier in Mikhailovsky the tragic “Boris Godunov” was opposed by the anecdotal “Count Nulin”, born of “the idea of ​​parodying history and Shakespeare” / “Notes about “Count Nulin””, 1830/.

“The Bronze Horseman” is a philosophical-historical, lyric-epic poem, reflecting all the complexity and depth of Pushkin’s thoughts on history. At the same time, the poem is of a generalized symbolic nature; its images and paintings receive a metaphysical, symbolic interpretation. The very image of the Bronze Horseman is a real-life monument to Peter, Falcone, but in Pushkin’s poem this statue is endowed with the features of a living creature. The rider’s face flares up with anger, “what a thought is on his brow,” he gallops after Eugene, becomes a symbol of the state founded by Peter. The picture of flooding and rampant natural disasters is symbolic.
Three reigns are directly mentioned in The Bronze Horseman. They are the three key epochal-temporal points of poetic action, three cultural-historical layers:

The era of Peter and the construction of St. Petersburg:
On the shore of desert waves He stood, full of great thoughts, And looked into the distance.

The era of Alexander I: “A hundred years have passed”, the main action of the poem is the alarming days of the flood of 1824:
In that terrible year, the late Tsar still ruled Russia with glory. He went out onto the balcony, sad and confused, and said: “The Kings cannot cope with God’s elements.” He sat down and in thought with sorrowful eyes looked at the evil disaster.

And, finally, some designations and noticeable milestones of the “third” reign; third era - Nicholas I:
And before the younger capital, old Moscow faded... Thus, the author introduces modernity - the 30s, enriching the poem with new social and historical experience. This chain testifies to Pushkin’s desire for broad historical generalizations, his claim to the artistic expression of the philosophy of history.

The introduction introduces the historical past. We see Peter I pondering great plans for the transformation of Russia, “to open a window to Europe” by founding a new capital. The very background against which he is depicted – gloomy wild nature – further emphasizes the grandeur of Peter’s plans, his gaze directed into the distance.

Here, as in “Poltava,” history was the judge of Peter’s deeds, and history had the last word. A hundred years have passed, and we see how wonderfully the harsh region has been transformed. The austere, beautiful northern capital is, as it were, proof of the necessity and rationality of Peter’s activities, and the entire introduction sounds like a solemn hymn to the glory of Peter and his deeds. Thus, in the introduction, Pushkin’s position in relation to Peter’s reforms is quite clearly defined: these reforms are justified by necessity, i.e. in the introduction, Pushkin does not introduce anything new in his assessment of Peter compared to the 20s.

Following the odic introduction comes the main plot part of the poem, where he talks about the flood of 1824, i.e. Pushkin's modernity. And the more significant the introduction, the more contrasting is modern St. Petersburg life. In this part, the connection with the past, with the founding of St. Petersburg, is preserved, and this connection is established through the monument to Peter. Peter as a living person is replaced by a monument. The Bronze Horseman is, as it were, Peter taken from a historical perspective, this is the work of Peter. Pushkin is now interested not in the life of Peter, but in the life of Russia after Peter’s reforms. Before us is a city of social contrasts, human grief and worries, even nature is gloomy in St. Petersburg. And then the only living person appears - petty official Evgeniy. Pushkin does not idealize this hero. Evgeniy is a poor worker, although he is a descendant of an old family, all his worries are about a piece of bread, with him the theme of the “little man” enters Russian literature. But he has bright dreams, love lives in his heart. And suddenly he witnesses a terrible flood, his bride dies before his eyes. Evgeniy is shocked, he is now worried about who is to blame for the death of people, and dejected, extremely exhausted, he finds himself in front of the Bronze Horseman. And thoughts appear in him: it was Peter I who founded the city on a rotten swamp, madness enlightens the mind of King Lear, and for the first time Eugene’s thoughts became clearer during madness, for the first time his thoughts from everyday ones go back to thoughts about Russia and the state that Peter founded. Evgeniy sees the cause of disasters in the capital and the state. The last meeting with the monument cast in metal “the ruler of half the world” momentarily turns the “poor madman” into a rebel filled with hatred and indignation: He became gloomy Before the proud idol And, clenching his teeth, clenching his fingers, As if overcome by black power, “Good, miraculous builder! – He whispered, trembling angrily, “Too bad for you!” …” And suddenly he started to run headlong.

But Eugene’s rebellion is futile, it is a powerless outburst of a lone protest, he can do nothing against the autocratic ruler of Russia.

The poem ends with a picture of an abandoned, deserted island where Eugene is buried. The sad picture of the abandoned grave speaks of the author’s sympathy for Eugene.

In this work, the bright and majestic image of the creator, the creator - Peter, is contrasted with the image of the terrible and merciless Bronze Horseman, trampling all living things. And it seems that one of the deeply hidden political ideas of this poem, banned by Nicholas I, was the idea that Russian absolutism, which once played a progressive role in the development of the country, a hundred years after Peter, turned into a reactionary force that delayed any movement forward.

And the more hostile Pushkin’s attitude towards Nicholas I became, the brighter the image of Peter I / “The Feast of Peter I” / as a great figure of his country seemed to the poet. Pushkin noted in his notes that Peter forgave many noble criminals, invited them to his table and celebrated his reconciliation with them with cannon fire.

This is what Pushkin reflected in the poem “The Feast of Peter I”: Peter makes peace with his subjects, with the disgraced Dolgoruky: Letting go of the guilt, he has fun: The mug foams with him alone; And kisses him on the forehead, brightens his heart and face; And forgiveness triumphs, Like victory over the enemy.

That is why there is noise and shouts in St. Petersburg - a town, and gunfire, and the thunder of music, and a squadron on the river; That is why, in a joyful hour, the royal cup is full, and the Neva is far shaken by heavy gunfire... The degree of sobriety in assessing the facts testifies to how far Pushkin was superior to his contemporaries, even later, who approached the theme of Peter the Great. Here is what, for example, is said about the tsar in N. A. Polevoy’s work “The History of Peter the Great”: “He was born destined, he fulfilled God’s predestination, he could not live otherwise, and his existence constituted his feat...”, “...Point to his mistake is impossible, for we do not know whether what is necessary in the future, which has not yet come for us, but which he has already foreseen, seems to us a mistake... In private, family life, the virtues of man and Christian were united in Peter the Great. He was a kind son, a gentle brother, a loving husband, a child-loving father, a homely owner, a quiet family man, a loyal friend.” Is this a characteristic of Peter? What a Christian and protector Peter was in his family life, Pushkin did not ignore this. What was the need for endless severity so that the former queen - nun Evdokia Lopukhina was flogged and transported from Suzdal to Moscow and then to New Ladoga, and Princess Maria Alekseevna was imprisoned in Shlisselburg? And the dearest Empress Catherine, the “Marlenburg girl,” was approximately punished for adultery with Chamberlain von Mons: Peter drove her around the scaffold, on which the severed head of her lover stuck out; Only on his deathbed, it seems, did Peter forgive his wife.

In 1830 universality of history and ahistoricality modern man Pushkin's works diverged into different cycles. A new stage in the development of historical views is associated with the political events of 1830. This year was marked by a wave of new revolutions that reached the Russian borders, and most importantly, by the unrest of the Russian serf peasantry, the reason for which was cholera, but in which Pushkin clearly discovered other, deeper reasons.

Pushkin's historical views of this time were reflected with particular clarity in two of his articles. One of them is an analysis of Pogodin’s historical drama “Marfa Posadnitsa”, the second is about the second volume of N. Polevoy’s “History of the Russian People”, it was an introduction to the work he planned about the French Revolution.

The meaning of his historical reflections is in the following remark: “The human mind, according to a popular saying, is not a prophet, but a guesser; he sees the general course of things and can deduce deep assumptions from it.”

The history of the past is a source of assumptions about the future. The article about Polevoy also outlines the features of the Russian historical process associated with the fate of the Russian aristocracy in its struggle with the lesser nobility. It was in this form that Pushkin comprehended the social struggle that determined the fate of the ruling class in Russia.

It is also characteristic of the period of the 1930s that Pushkin began independent historical studies. The unfinished history of the French Revolution is followed by “The History of Pugachev” and then “The History of Peter”. Until now, Pushkin, when developing this or that historical plot, relied primarily on ready-made historical works, borrowing the factual side from them and subjecting it to his own interpretation. Thus, “Boris Godunov” is based on “The History of the Russian State” by Karamzin, and “Poltava” is based on “The History of Little Russia” by D. N. Balmysh-Kamensky. Pushkin turned little to primary sources, more for historical flavor.

Pushkin's research in the 1930s presents a completely different picture. For the sake of “The History of Pugachev,” Pushkin studies archives, makes a huge number of extracts from documents, critically reviews all previous works from their factual side, goes to the scene of events, where he collects oral evidence about the events that interest him.

Until 1830, even the authenticity of the events depicted did not always seem significant to Pushkin, and the poet did not renounce well-known legends or facts in the authenticity of which he was not completely sure, as long as these facts had their poetic dignity.

For new historical topics that arose in connection with reflections on the Russian rebellion, Pushkin sought to establish the facts in their authenticity and accuracy, since only from the exact facts of the past can one draw conclusions about the future. And Pushkin no longer trusts the conclusions of other historians, because... knows that the very selection of facts, the degree of trust in sources, and the reliability of the story depend on the point of view of the historian and the coverage he gives to the facts. The main historical themes reflected in the artistic work of the 30s are first developed in independent historical research. At the same time, the historical theme is now taken in a direct, genetic relation to the present, and not in the analogy with modern events, as was the case in the 20s.

For the 30s. Characteristic are historical reviews in which, recovering from the events of the past, Pushkin brings the story to the present. In 1830 we have two reviews in the poems “My Genealogy” and “The Nobleman”. In the first of them, Pushkin dwells on the key events of Russian history, the mention of which is subordinated to the plot of the poem - the history of the family. The wars of Alexander Nevsky, the struggle of Ivan IV with the boyars, Kozma Minin and the liberation of Moscow, Peter and the resistance to his activities, palace coups of the 18th century, the new nobility from the descendants of the royal lackeys, the impoverishment of ancient families - these are the main topics of this review.

The “Lyceum Anniversary” of 1836 also represents, in essence, a historical run through the main events in the history of the past quarter century.

But the most developed overview of historical events is the poem “Yezersky” (“Genealogy of my hero”), which is an introduction to the plot developed in “The Bronze Horseman”, which directly emerged from the unfinished “Yezersky”. All these reviews have a very close connection with historical remarks, preserved in fragmentary form in Pushkin’s rough notes.

Pushkin’s “Roslavlev” has been little studied. This is a gap in Pushkin studies. The theme of the novel was closely connected with other creative ideas of the poet and with the novel “Eugene Onegin”. And here Pushkin deeply penetrated into the historical and political connections of his contemporary reality. The year 1812 was the starting point in the development of the noble liberation movement. The novel was begun by Pushkin at a time of his deep reflection on the fate of the advanced noble intelligentsia and its historical role, during the years of fierce debate that had already begun around the problem of nationality and Russia’s relationship to the West. Pushkin worked on the novel after his general historical worldview and views on the problem of the historical genre had developed. “Roslavlev” is an important stage in the development of Pushkin’s historical novel. This was Pushkin’s second, after “Arap Peter the Great,” experience in the genre of historical novel; it preceded the creation of “The Captain’s Daughter.” Even by choosing the genre, Pushkin sought to emphasize the historical veracity of his work. The form of “notes” was successfully used by the poet in “Belkin’s Tales”, in “The History of the Village of Goryukhin” and later in “The Captain’s Daughter”. Pushkin seemed to contrast the historical unreliability of the fictional narrative with the documentary evidence of eyewitnesses.

The following sketch of “Roslavlev’s” plan has been preserved. “Moscow is 20 years old. – Polina Zagoskina. – Her family, her character. – M-me de Stael in Moscow. - Lunch given to her by the prince. - Her note. - War with Napoleon. Young Count Mamontov. “We are coming from Moscow.”

A comparison of this plan with the text of the written part of the novel shows that Pushkin went very little beyond the plan, talking only about the capture of French officers, including Sinecourt, and about the effect on Polina of the news of the fire of Moscow. Apparently, the central events were supposed to begin after this, and the written or surviving passage is only an introduction to the novel.

This passage represents a compositional device common in Pushkin’s historical novel. Such an introduction is the story about Ibrahim’s stay in Paris in “The Blackamoor of Peter the Great,” and in “The Captain’s Daughter” about Grinev’s family and upbringing. In both cases, these stories precede the main content of the narrative. In the same way, in “Roslavl”, before talking about the most important events in Polina’s life, Pushkin characterizes her and the environment around her. There is no doubt that the text of the introduction ends just before the beginning of the novel, since Polina’s patriotic mood reaches that highest tension, which must be followed by the action. It is difficult to judge the twists and turns of the plot, the subsequent events and the fate of the characters. The “historical incident” in the novel was supposed to capture the expulsion of Napoleon from Russia, and the “romantic” one, naturally and organically entering the frame of historical events, was to show further relationships, obviously the love of Polina and Sinecourt, and end with the tragic death of the hero.

In Pushkin’s “Roslavl” the people act not only as a judge, a historically decisive force, but also as an active participant in events. True, it is still an elemental force. But Pushkin showed in the novel that this force, this element, is driven by the consciousness of the need to fight the enemy invader. “Never,” notes Polina, “Europe will dare to fight a people who are cutting off their own hands and burning their capital.” This new interpretation of the role of the people in history was reflected in Pushkin’s departure from the views of the enlighteners of the 18th century.

The people are a spontaneous, but active and decisive force in major historical events; the people are kind, but they become bitter against the enemy. The consciousness of national independence and a sense of patriotism are highly characteristic of him, and this feeling drives him in moments of “disaster for the fatherland.” This feeling awakened in 1812, when the mighty forces of the Russian people emerged. This is the interpretation of the role of the people in Pushkin’s novel. In “Roslavl” Polina is an exponent of the patriotic feelings of the masses, a true patriot. She is clear evidence that the Russian patriotic woman, even in the serf era, carried heroic traits and had a high consciousness. The image of Polina makes a significant addition to the gallery of images of Russian women created by Pushkin: his genius painted not only the sweet and captivating Tatyana, but submissive to her lot, but also the image of a courageous and determined patriot. Proud and silent, Polina awakens at a terrible hour for her homeland. She is full of not only internal, but also external activity, she has the thought of killing Napoleon, she turns to the past, to the images of heroic people, in her opinion, reminds Marfa Posadnitsa, Princess Dashkova and others.

“Roslavlev” by Pushkin is a historical novel about 1812. But his problems were also politically relevant in the 1930s. Being a truthful historian in his depiction of 1812, Pushkin showed, however, such features of the life of noble society that were preserved 20 years later.

Pushkin again raises and positively resolves the question of Russia's attitude to European enlightenment. Pushkin believed that the Russian historical process has its differences from the “history of the Christian West,” but Russia’s progress is possible only along the path of enlightenment. Pushkin saw the development of enlightenment as the main content of the historical development of Russia after the “impetus” given to it by Peter I.

Carrying out the ideas of revolutionary patriotism and enlightenment in his novel, drawing the image of Polina, Pushkin defended the shadows of the “dear convicts”, the advanced, enlightened nobility, whose representatives were the Decembrists. Showing the advanced noble intelligentsia of his time as the bearer of historical progress, as an exponent of the feelings and aspirations of the people, Pushkin not only fought against the autocratic serfdom system and reactionary ideology, but also objectively correctly reflected reality, revealing the historical truth.

The more impenetrable and difficult the reality of Nicholas's time seemed to Pushkin, the more sublime and brighter the glorious era of 1812 and its figures seemed to the poet.

Pushkin's novel about 1812 remained unfinished. What was the reason for stopping work on “Roslavlev”? Some researchers believe that due to the obvious impossibility of carrying it through the tsarist censorship, since the spirit of political criticism and opposition emanated from the novel.

N.V. Izmailov suggests that Pushkin abandoned his work because the topic itself lost its relevance due to the end of the Polish events.

But the real reason for the cessation of work on the novel lies in the general evolution of Pushkin’s political quests and thoughts, which was reflected in the change in his work in 1832.

The novel “Eugene Onegin” and the adjacent works of 1829-1831, right up to the novel about 1812, revealed the social weakness of the group of nobility from which the Decembrists came and to which the poet himself belonged. Ruin, decline, powerlessness and forced dependence on power - these are the characteristic features established by Pushkin in the social fate of this nobility. And if we consider sequentially the historical content of “The Genealogy of My Hero”, “Arap Peter the Great”, “The Captain’s Daughter”, “Roslavlev”, “Eugene Onegin”, “Novel in Letters”, and then “The Bronze Horseman” and “Tales of Belkin”, then a broad picture of historical development arises, the gradual decline of the progressive nobility from which the Decembrists emerged; after 1825, only Protestants remained alone.

Pushkin blamed the dramatic fate of the enlightened nobility on the policies of the monarchy throughout the 18th century and right up to his time. However, in 1829-1831. Pushkin also drew attention to another, subjective reason that depended on the nobility itself - its policy in the fortress village.

Pushkin believed that the material ruin of the advanced nobility deprived them of social independence. And the latter was a necessary prerequisite for the implementation of the most important historical line of the enlightened nobility - to be the defender and representative of the people before the state authorities / “Notes on the nobility” /. On the other hand, the impoverishment of the people deeply worried Pushkin, who felt the crisis of the feudal-serf system more and more acutely. He writes “The History of the Village of Goryukhin,” in which he states the deep decline of the serf village precisely as a result of the landowner’s complete “neglect” towards the peasantry.

The peasant theme gradually captured Pushkin, both as an artist and as a historian and publicist. Naturally, the fate of Polina and the single Protestant in general now occupies Pushkin less and begins to unite with the problem of the situation of the peasantry /“Dubrovsky”/. This, I think, should explain the cessation of work on “Roslavlev”. The question of the origins and development of the Decembrist movement was losing its recent relevance for Pushkin. The Decembrists seem to have remained in the historical past. Therefore, the novel about 1812, the Decembrist chapter of “Eugene Onegin” and other creative ideas of Pushkin related to this topic remain unfinished.

In 1773-1775 in the southeast Russian Empire A peasant war broke out - an anti-serfdom uprising led by Emelyan Pugachev. The events of the uprising were reflected in two works by Pushkin: in the monograph “The History of Pugachev” and the story “The Captain’s Daughter”. While working on them, the poet-historian became a recognized expert on “Pugachevism”; in one of his notes to A.I. Turgenev, he himself certified himself – in a humorous form – as Pugachev’s historiographer. But with his “History of Pugachev” the scientific historiography of the last Peasant War in Russia actually began. Pushkin approached the creation of this book with the arsenal and skills of an experienced professional, collected and critically studied a mass of historical sources and, relying on them, masterfully fulfilled his main task, which was “a clear presentation of rather confusing events,” gave impressive pictures of the elements of the popular movement and desperate struggle of the rebels with the troops of Catherine II. Pushkin’s painstaking work with sources is evidenced both by the pages of “The History of Pugachev” and, in particular, by the numerous handwritten preparations for this book: copies and summaries of documents in “archival” notebooks, recordings of stories from contemporaries of the uprising and notes in a travel notebook. Some of these materials were later used when writing “The Captain's Daughter”.

Among the sources of Pushkin’s works about Pugachev, a special place belongs to materials collected during a trip undertaken in August-September 1833 to the Volga region and Orenburg region, where he met with old people, including former Pugachevites, who still vividly remembered Pugachev and his time . Stories, legends and songs heard and recorded by Pushkin in the Volga villages, Orenburg, Uralsk, Berdskaya Sloboda covered the events of the uprising and the figure of Pugachev from the position of the people.

This helped Pushkin overcome the official-official assessment of the uprising, more clearly understand its social meaning, better understand the personality of Pugachev - the true leader of the popular movement, and see in his character those positive qualities that constitute the integral and typical features of a Russian man from the common people. This interpretation of the image of Pugachev was embodied with particular strength and expressiveness in the story “The Captain's Daughter”. In this work, as in “The History of Pugachev,” Pushkin took the position of historicism, and when covering events and in the characteristics of the characters, he largely relied on real facts, documents and legends, organically and figuratively introducing them into the fabric of the artistic narrative.

Following the established rules of his artistic prose, Pushkin strove for an in-depth disclosure of his native antiquity in concise and clear sketches. The principle of extreme laconicism and highest expressiveness formed the basis of “The Captain's Daughter”.

It would be difficult to name another historical novel with such extreme economy of compositional means and with greater emotional richness. In “The Captain's Daughter”, an intimate historical story is combined with Russian political chronicles and gives a broad picture of the era in its domestic customs and state life: fictional characters, heroes of family notes, unknown representatives of provincial families come into contact with such figures as Pugachev, Catherine II, the Orenburg governor Reinsdorp, Pugachevites Khlopush and Beloborodov.

Having rejected the principle of documentary and locality, Pushkin in “The Captain's Daughter” achieved more - genuine artistic and historical truth. This activity of creative acquisition is not contradicted by the fact that “The Captain’s Daughter” was written in the form of an eyewitness memoir. But these memoirs of Grinev are only a conventional artistic form, and the reader feels this convention well: he has no doubt that he is not dealing with genuine documentary notes, but with art, with the creation of a writer, with an aesthetic illustration.

Pushkin approached the assessment of his “History of Pugachev” as a demanding researcher, noting that this book is the fruit of conscientious two-year work, but at the same time pointing out its imperfections. The latter was expressed in the fact that he was unable to cover individual events of the Pugachev movement with the necessary completeness due to the inaccessibility of the most important documentary sources that were kept secretly in the state archive. In addition, in anticipation of the likely censorial comments of Nicholas I, Pushkin was forced to limit himself in covering a number of politically pressing issues on the eve of the Pugachev movement, its very course and immediate results.

The book also reflected impressions from trips to memorable places of the Peasant War: Orenburg, Berdskaya Sloboda, the former Ural fortresses of Tatishchev, Nizhne-Ozernaya, Rassypnaya.

When Pushkin was finishing a novel about the rebellious nobleman Dubrovsky, he heard oral stories about the 18th century officer Shvanvich, who went over to Pugachev’s side and served him “with all diligence.”

Such a historical figure extremely sharpened the theme of the class defection of the young master in favor of the serf masses subject to him. The guardsman participating in the people's revolution acted as a new romantic hero. In the 1775 government report on the punishment of Pugachev and his accomplices, there was a maxim about second lieutenant Shvanvich, who was supposed to be “deprived of ranks and nobility, defamed by breaking his sword,” because he, “being in the villainous crowd, blindly obeyed the impostor’s orders , preferring a vile life to an honest death.”

In 1833, while working on “The History of Pugachev,” the universality of history and the panhistorical nature of modern man collided. Their meeting was preceded by three years of studying history: Russian greatness - Peter and Russian rebellion - Pugachev. The new poem assumed that history would not just be seen from the present, in the fate and character of modern man who had fallen out of historical existence. That is why the original plot idea was worked out biographically.

On January 31, 1833, Pushkin sketched out a plan for a historical novel from the era of Pugachev with the main character exiled for rioting to a distant garrison: “a steppe fortress - Pugachev approaches - Shvanvich betrays the fortress to him ... becomes Pugachev’s accomplice,” etc. [Grossman, Pushkin, 1958 .].

For a long time it was believed that Pushkin first worked on “Dubrovsky” /autumn 1832 - February 1833/ and only at the end of January 1833 the plan for “The Tale of Shvanvich” appeared. However, recently N.N. Petrunina finally established that “Shvanvich” was conceived even earlier than “Dubrovsky” - “no later than August 1832, maybe earlier.”

Thus, for some time in the poet’s thoughts there seemed to be two plans, where at the center was a popular revolt and the nobleman involved in it. “The story of Shvanvich,” notes N.N. Petrukhina, “at a certain stage led Pushkin to “Dubrovsky.” The experience of artistic work on “Dubrovsky” returned the poet to the story of Shvanvich and at the same time forced him to look for new ways to develop the old plan.”

In one case, the hero becomes the historically real Shvanvich, and the action of the story was immediately determined by the 1770s, in another work the fictional V. A. Dubrovsky, judging by the person, fell into approximately the same era, but then Pushkin made the dating more vague and clearly brought the narrative (in language, everyday details) closer to its time.

A true incident that happened in the early 1830s. with a poor nobleman, “who had a lawsuit with a neighbor for land, was forced out of the estate, and, left with some peasants, began to rob, first the clerks, then others,” at first could be perceived by the poet himself as an analogue of the story of the Pugachevo nobleman, as well one, recent case of collaboration between a nobleman and a rebellious people, moreover, a case that life itself has put into a ready-made romantic form.

Love, marriage, personal happiness - this is the magic circle outlining the sphere of women's rebellion in Pushkin's era. There are more cases for a man to come into conflict with society, since his social functions and his system of dependence on society are more complex and diverse.

In “Dubrovsky” the hero turns out to be the victim of a non-accidental personal feeling, even if it is deeply socially motivated. An old nobleman and guards officer is left without a piece of bread and without a roof over his head; not only is his estate, to which he had an indisputable right to own, unlawfully taken away, but his honor and moral dignity are trampled upon.
“Dubrovsky” became an experience of organic merging of pictures of reality and the author’s historical concept.

The conflict between Dubrovsky and Troekurov is the real plot of the story here. Moreover, clothed in the flesh of living images, Pushkin’s favorite socio-historical idea loses its abstract straightforwardness, deepens and becomes enriched.
In the initial sketch, where the future Troekurov is named Narumov, his “great weight in the opinion of landowners and neighbors” is explained by “his rank and wealth.” Subsequently, Pushkin gave his character a different, historical surname - Troekurov and emphasized his belonging to the ancient Russian nobility / the Troekurov princes are listed among the descendants of Rurik from the princes of Yaroslavl /, explaining his power over his neighboring landowners and provincial officials not just by wealth and connections, but also noble family.

Thus, Pushkin’s idea of ​​the opposing forces that existed in the Russian nobility, known from a number of other works of the poet, underwent a certain complication in the novel. The decline of some ancient surnames in the 18th – early 19th centuries. did not interfere with the rise of others. It has been noted many times that Pushkin initially motivated the difference between the destinies of Troekurov and Dubrovsky by the fact that “the glorious year of 1762 separated them for a long time. Troyekurov, a relative of Princess Dashkova, went up the mountain” /VIII, 755/. These words were crossed out because they contradicted the chronological timing of the events. But in them one can see a sign that by the time he was working on the novel, it became clear to Pushkin that 1762 and other palace coups of the 18th century. were accompanied not only by the rise of the new nobility, but also by the stratification of the old nobility.

Already V. O. Klyuchevsky saw behind Dubrovsky’s literary, romantic rebellion the real historical type of Russian nobleman of the Alexander era, a noble rebel with a crippled fate. But at the center of Pushkin’s novel is not so much the rebellion against society itself or its reflection in the hero’s consciousness, but rather its prerequisites and the subsequent fate of the rebel; not a paroxysm of social-critical passion or even the idea of ​​individual revenge, but the fatal influence of lawlessness on Dubrovsky’s entire fate. The hero characterizes his robbery itself as an inevitable step, forced by an act of autocratic tyranny / “Yes, I am that unfortunate person whom your father deprived of a piece of bread, kicked out of his father’s house and sent to rob on the highways.”/. The revolt turns out to be an involuntary rebellion, and the hopeless tragedy of his situation, realized by the hero himself, is the flip side of the romantic daring and pathos of justice that worldly rumor connected him with the robberies.

The broad picture of the life of the Russian provincial nobility, emerging from the pages of “Dubrovsky” and based on Pushkin’s concept of the historical development of the noble class, belongs to the highest achievements of the Russian social novel of modern times. In this picture, the pathos of high historicism is paradoxically combined with the inconsistency of indications of the time to which the events of the novel are confined - an inconsistency that betrays Pushkin’s hesitation. Apparently, at the time of writing “Dubrovsky,” Pushkin was occupied with the task of reproducing not only the life of society at a certain historical moment / as was the case when working on “Roslavlev” /, but also the social situation that remained typical from the second half of the 18th century to the present, having developed according to Pushkin, as a result of the processes caused by Peter’s reforms.

This feature of “Dubrovsky,” which makes it possible to attribute his actions both to the end of the 18th century and to Pushkin’s modernity, led to the fact that in the research literature the view of “Dubrovsky” as a social novel from modern life coexisted for a long time with an attempt to see experience in it historical narrative. It is this feature / and not the absence of historical persons and events in “Dubrovsky” / that allows us to confidently assert that this is a novel in which, for the author’s intention, the essence of the depicted social phenomena is more important than the tangible concreteness of the historical moment.

In “Dubrovsky” there is no peasant uprising, but only an unstable impulse of peasants and servants to revolt. With the exception of the scene in the manor's courtyard, the peasants do not appear in the written chapters of the novel. The heroes of “Dubrovsky”, belonging to the folk environment, are street servants, i.e. personal servants of masters, serf artisans, yard workers, etc. They are connected with the master more closely than the peasants. The patriarchal connection between the servants and the “noble” landowner is rooted, according to Pushkin, in a long tradition. And the merger of the possessions of Dubrovsky and Troekurov inevitably affects their personal destinies and interests, pushing them to follow the young Dubrovsky. However, the actions of the servants are in no way reminiscent of an uprising. In the robber fortress, the laws of the master's estate remain in force: Dubrovsky controls all the actions of the robbers, he is free to impose a taboo on the possessions of Troekurov, who is hated by his people, and even dissolve his gang.

The theme of the people is organically included in the socio-political problematics of “Dubrovsky”, but is not dominant in it. The people are the natural environment in which the village life of a nobleman takes place. In “Dubrovsky” Pushkin showed that this environment is by no means passive. Both the discord of the masters and the outrages of the clerks electrify the masses and cause their response.

The folk scenes in “Dubrovsky” can be compared with the folk scenes in “Boris Godunov”: the peasants and servants crowding in the manor’s courtyard are concerned not only with their future fate. Their ethical sense is outraged by the lawlessness being committed before their eyes. In “Dubrovsky,” as in “Boris Godunov,” Pushkin makes the people the judge of what is happening, appealing to their sense of justice as the highest moral criterion. Moreover, unlike “Boris Godunov,” in “Dubrovsky” the crowd is differentiated. It identifies groups of peasants and courtyards, which are characterized by different moods and varying degrees of activity. Moreover, among the courtyards there are instigators who are capable of leading the crowd. This is the blacksmith Arkhip, who at a certain moment comes to the forefront of the narrative. Going further in his revenge than the young master expected, he essentially directs subsequent events, cutting off Dubrovsky’s path to retreat, placing him outside the law with his actions.

Gradually, Pushkin’s hero comes from imaginary values ​​to true ones. Pushkin makes the young Dubrovsky realize that in the existing society, a victim of social institutions - a person who once found himself outside the law, cannot find modest human happiness, that all attempts of an outcast to return to civil existence are doomed to failure.

In “The Captain's Daughter,” Pushkin moved the action from the landowner’s estate to the “steppe fortress.” “The Captain's Daughter” is the last major work on a historical theme. The theme of the story - the peasant uprising of 1773-1775 - is as natural and important in the ideological and creative evolution of the poet as the theme of Peter I and the theme of 1812. But, unlike “Arap Peter the Great” and “Roslavlev,” “The Captain’s Daughter” was completed: Pushkin’s interest in the problem of the peasantry turned out to be more stable.

The content of the novel was not immediately determined, and the original plan, which was based on the historical fact of the participation of the guards officer Shvanvich in the Pugachev uprising, underwent an almost complete change. The plot of “The Captain's Daughter,” which combined a historical event—the Pugachev uprising with the chronicle of a noble family—developed only in 1834, after Pushkin’s trip to the Volga and the Urals and the end of “The History of Pugachev.” In November 1836, the novel appeared on the pages of Sovremennik.

The theme of “The Captain's Daughter” is unusual for Russian literature of the late 18th century. Radishchev called for a peasant revolution, but did not give an artistic image of it. There is no depiction of the peasant uprising in Decembrist literature. Ryleev in “Dumas” did not create the images of either Razin or Pugachev.

Despite its small volume, “The Captain's Daughter” is a novel with a wide thematic scope. It vividly reflected the life of the people, their uprising, images of peasants and Cossacks, landowner life, provincial society and the life of a fortress lost in the steppes, the personality of Pugachev and the court of Catherine II. The novel depicts people representing different strata of Russian society, revealing the morals and way of life of that time. “The Captain's Daughter” gives a broad historical picture, covering the Russian reality of the era of the Pugachev uprising.

The problems of “The Captain's Daughter” are unusually acute and diverse. The situation and demands of the people, the relationship between landowners and the peasantry and the problems of state internal policy, serfdom and the moral and everyday aspects of the life of the nobility, the duties of the nobility to the people, the state and their class - these are the main issues raised by Pushkin in the story. The most important of them is the question of the historical and political meaning and significance of the peasant uprising.
A historical story about the 18th century, at the same time, it is a political novel of the 30s. The depiction of the struggle of the people against the nobility - the peasant uprising - is given in “The Captain's Daughter” in the most detailed form. The contradictions within the nobility themselves attract much less attention. Pushkin strives to reveal and show the whole range of phenomena associated with the uprising of the peasantry. The wide spread of the movement, its causes, the origins and beginning of the uprising, its course, the social and national composition of the participants in the movement, the ordinary mass of the rebels and their leaders, reprisals against landowners and the attitude of the rebels towards civilians, the psychology of the peasant masses, the politics of the noble monarchy and the noble reprisals against peasantry - all this is reflected in the novel.

The most important aspects of the peasant uprising are revealed and shown by Pushkin. Despite the censorship, Pushkin shows the social orientation of the movement and the people’s hatred of the nobility quite clearly. At the same time, he reveals another side of the Pugachev movement - the inherent humanity of the participants in the uprising in relation to the “common people”. When the Belogorsk fortress was captured, the Cossacks took away only the “officers’ quarters.” The anger of Pugachev himself against Shvabrin, who oppresses an orphan from the people (Masha Mironova), is terrible. And at the same time, the author says in “The Missing Chapter”: “The heads of individual detachments sent in pursuit of Pugachev... autocratically punished both the guilty and the innocent.” Pushkin was impartial, painting a historically accurate picture of a peasant uprising, showing purely feudal methods of dealing with serfs.

The fact that the peasants, at the first approach of Pugachev’s troops, instantly became “drunk” with hatred of the landowners, is shown by Pushkin to be strikingly true.

The people depicted in “The Captain's Daughter” are not an impersonal mass. With his characteristic artistic laconicism, Pushkin shows the serf peasantry in an individualized manner. At the same time, he did not paint pictures of the everyday life of the peasantry, their way of life. In the foreground were the themes of uprising and reprisals against the landowners, so Pushkin individualized the images of the peasants in the aspect of their political consciousness, their relationship to the landowners and to Pugachev as the leader of the movement.

Pushkin characterizes the political consciousness of the rebellious peasantry as spontaneous. The typical side, the basis of this consciousness, however, is a clear understanding by each participant of the movement of its social orientation. Pushkin shows this very clearly in the scene of Grinev’s arrival in Berdskaya Sloboda. The peasants on guard capture Grinev and, without thinking about the reasons for the strange phenomenon that the officer’s voluntary arrival to Pugachev must have seemed to them, they have no doubt that “now” or in the “light of God,” but “father” will order the noble landowner to be hanged. But this typical thing with varying strengths of logic and action appears in the Berd guard, in the peasant at the outpost in “The Missing Chapter,” in Andryushka the zemsky, in the Belogorsk Cossacks, in Pugachev’s closest assistants. Pushkin shows the various stages of this consciousness and, thus, achieves the individualization of images. At the same time, a single image of the rebel people is created.

In Pushkin’s depiction, the people are a spontaneous, but not a blind, non-reasoning force. Although its consciousness is immature, the people are not wax from which leaders mold what they want. The image of the people as a passive mass, submissive to their noble leaders, is given in Zagoskin’s historical novel. Pushkin, on the contrary, shows that the attitude of the people towards Pugachev is the result of the understanding by the masses of the social, anti-serfdom orientation of the uprising. The image of the people and the image of their leader merge into one in the novel, reflecting historical truth.

Pushkin emphasized the lack of idealization, realism in the depiction of Pugachev, and the artistic and historical fidelity of the image. The image of Pugachev is revealed in all the complexity and inconsistency of his personality, combining the qualities of an outstanding person, the leader of a mass popular movement with the features of a dashing, experienced Cossack who has wandered a lot around the world. The first and main feature of Pushkin’s Pugachev is his deep connection with the people. Genuine realism is manifested in all its strength in the typical contrast between the attitude of the nobility and the people towards Pugachev.

Some critics saw the “hare sheepskin coat” motif as a purely formal device for the successful development of the plot. There is no doubt that this motive is deeply meaningful, revealing in the image of Pugachev the features of natural nobility and generosity.

The nobility and humanity of Pugachev are contrasted with the cruelty and selfishness of the “enlightened” nobleman Shvabrin. The image of Pugachev is revealed in his relationship with Grinev. The author very fully puts into Grinev’s ideas about Pugachev the official interpretation of the leader of the peasant uprising: a monster, a villain, a murderer. Throughout the novel, Pushkin shows the opposite - Pugachev’s humanism, his ability to show mercy and justice to kind and honest people. This was by no means an idealization of Pugachev. Pushkin was interested in the activities of Pugachev as the leader of the peasant uprising. Pushkin's Pugachev is gifted, talented as a military leader, and in this regard is contrasted with the mediocre and cowardly Orenburg governor, Lieutenant General Reinedorp. Many times in the novel, Pushkin emphasizes Pugachev’s inquisitiveness, intelligence, sharpness, and the absence of features of slavish humiliation in him. All these features reveal the appearance of the true Pugachev. For Pushkin, they expressed, at the same time, the national character of the Russian people.

But the image of Pugachev and his closest associates also shows the weakness of the movement, its political immaturity. The monarchical form of Pugachev’s political program, his entire image of the tsar-father was rooted in the mood of the people themselves, in their aspirations for a “people's tsar”. Pugachev is characterized by distrust and hostility towards every “master”. Pugachev's good nature and simple-heartedness are also traits of the people's character. The leading image of Pugachev is the greatness and heroism that so impressed Pushkin. This is expressed by the symbolic image of the eagle that the fairy tale speaks of, an image in which Pushkin also shows the tragedy of Pugachev’s fate.

Pushkin endows Savelich with some of the traits and characteristics characteristic of part of the serf peasantry. This is a type that reflects one of the aspects of feudal reality, which depersonalized the peasant.

The image of Shvabrin depicts the typical features of the “golden” noble youth of Catherine’s time, who perceived Voltairianism only as the basis for cynical skepticism and for a purely selfish and crudely epicurean attitude to life. Shvabrin’s character and behavior also contain the features of that adventuristic noble officer who carried out palace coup 1762. He is filled with indifference and contempt for simple and honest petty people; his sense of honor is very poorly developed. External education and brilliance were combined in Shvabrin with internal moral emptiness. The image of Catherine II is of great importance in the ideological content of the novel.

Drawing the image of Catherine II, Pushkin reveals the connection that really existed between the “Kazan landowner” and wide circles of the nobility. This connection is shown through such details as Ekaterina’s high assessment of Captain Mironov’s personality. The change in Catherine’s face when reading the request for pardon from Grinev, who was friends with Pugachev, and her cold, calm refusal reveal the queen’s mercilessness towards the popular movement. Without denouncing Catherine directly, Pushkin simply painted the image of the autocrat as a “Kazan landowner”, historically truthful. Pushkin showed what was truly significant in the policy of Catherine II at the time of the Pugachev uprising and in her attitude towards the rebels.

With his “History of the Pugachev Rebellion” and “The Captain’s Daughter,” the poet raises the “question of questions” - about the past, present and future of the people, the enlightened nobility, the authorities; Much less often, one special reason for these searches was considered: the influence of the internal, personal motives of Pushkin himself on the “formation” of his heroes. Pugachev's time undoubtedly gave Pushkin more scope for archival research and general historical reasoning than recent times; but at the same time, Pushkin’s “Shakespearean” historicism was decisively opposed to the allusive method, when the story of the uprisings in the 1770s would be entirely reduced to straightforward allusions to the latest uprisings: for the poet it is important that there was a real, not speculative, historical connection; the continuity of these and these events, when the interaction of the past and the modern is revealed as if by itself.

The riots of 1831 were a special “introduction” to the “History of the Pugachev Rebellion,” as well as to Pushkin’s secret “Notes on the Riot,” published only a few decades later.

The extreme similarity between the 1770s and the 1830s was noticed, of course, by more than one Pushkin, but hardly a single person in the country could imagine that soon “The History of Pugachev” would be written and published.

The theme of Pushkin - Pugachev has been studied well, and the sequence of events is, in general, clear. In January 1830, Pushkin wrote and then published the following words in Literaturnaya Gazeta: “Karamzin is our first historian and our last chronicler. With his criticism he belongs to history, simplicity and anonymity to the chronicle. Its criticism consists of a scientific comparison of legends, a careful search for the truth, and a clear and faithful depiction of events. His moral reflections, with their monastic simplicity, give his narration all the inexplicable charm of the ancient chronicle.”

As we see, the poet senses the edge of time; the end of one era of history writing - and the beginning of a completely different one. The last chronicler - these words mean that Karamzin’s manner, a special combination of modern science and ancient “monastic simplicity,” is no longer possible and is becoming a thing of the past.

The future lies in serious historical criticism - Pushkin clearly sees this, but at the same time he does not hide his regret about the disappearance of the “inexplicable charm of the ancient chronicle.” The poet even seems to envy Karamzin, who could still write like this: Pushkin would like to, but it’s impossible, it’s too late - the era is different, the problems are different... He is working on “The History of Pugachev” and on “The Captain’s Daughter” separately, while “on -Karamzinsky” would require a unified historical and artistic narrative.

The title “Note on Rebellion” is mentioned three times in Pushkin’s letters and drafts, but not “Notes on Pugachev”: Pushkin, addressing the Tsar, seems to accept the Tsar’s formulation – “History... of Rebellion.”

In the final part of his work, Pushkin clearly expressed those thoughts, because of which in many ways he undertook to write “The History of Pugachev”: there are two main forces in the country - the government, the people; Of course, society and the nobility are also taken into account, but they are creative; the destructive forces or conservative possibilities of power seem immeasurably greater in the 1830s.

Where, in which direction this force will go, according to Pushkin, is a question that has not yet been resolved: civilization, enlightenment, Europeanism - the historical course begun by the reforms of Peter is dear to the poet who wants to preserve and improve what has been achieved.

But what is the goal? What will the people say? Pushkin reveals problems of the Russian past that “almost did not exist” 10–15 years earlier in the circle of both Karamzin and the Decembrists.

The poet-historian talks not about whether Pugachev is good or bad, but about the existence, not accidental, historical, of Pugachev’s truth, of Pugachev’s people’s enthusiasm, talent, mass energy, people’s morality, and a peasant’s view of things.

Arguing that “The History of Pugachev” should be published, Pushkin noted: “The historical page on which the names of Catherine, Rumyantsev, Suvorov, Bibikov, Mikhelson, Voltaire are found should not be lost for posterity.”

For Pushkin, history is the source of understanding the present and the key to predicting the future. Therefore, in historical study it is important for him to grasp the actual trends in the course of things, regardless of subjective likes and dislikes. In his historical reviews there is no longer any exaltation of the nobility and its attempts to achieve political advantages.

It is the law of historical necessity, which determines the “general course of things,” that determines the interpretation of events that we find in Pushkin’s works of the 30s. In this, he decisively departed from the point of view that dictated his depiction of people and actions in the 20s.

For Pushkin, history is already a picture of the progressive movement of humanity, determined by the struggle of social forces, taking place in different conditions for each country. It is this continuous movement that draws the present into the general course. For Pushkin, the criterion of historicism is no longer determined by the historical remoteness of events of the past, nor in the depiction of the present. In this regard, the story “ Queen of Spades”, written simultaneously with “The Bronze Horseman”. Every thing in it actor is a representative of a certain historical and social formation. The Countess is a representative of the outgoing government, Lisa is an impoverished companion, Hermann is a predatory seeker of happiness, making his way in a new society and ready to take any risk and even commit a crime. The change of generations in this novel characterizes the change of different ways of life in Russian society.

So in the 30s, Aleko’s romantic character was replaced by a typical character, conditioned historically and socially. And this is precisely the main feature of the realistic art created by Pushkin.

Pushkin's historical novel is one of the most significant phenomena in the work of the great Russian poet. It reflected his ardent love for the Motherland, many of his cherished thoughts and truly patriotic feelings. Pushkin's historical novel still amazes with its depth of thought, the truth of its depiction of the past, the historical typicality of the paintings and characters created in it, the high perfection and beauty of the artistic form. “Boris Godunov” and “The Captain's Daughter” ensured the triumph of realism in the development of historical themes, in the development of the historical genre in Russian literature. The realism of Pushkin and his historical genre will prepare the “War and Peace” of L. N. Tolstoy.

It is difficult to name another writer of the 19th century who would have such a striking historical sense, such a strong and deep historical consciousness as Pushkin.

Whether we read the stanzas of his “glorious chronicle” or listen to the powerful iambics of the “St. Petersburg story”, whether we plunge into the figurative world of “The Captain’s Daughter” or lyrical thoughts about the change of generations, about the “vicissitudes of times” - we are involuntarily captured by the scale of the poet’s historical ideas, that sensitivity , with which the dynamics of history are conveyed to them. The image of history itself appears before us in all reality. Mature Pushkin not only thinks in historical categories. Tremendous faith in history, in its progressive course, in the triumph of its rational forces becomes one of the sources of the unique bright color of Pushkin’s poetry and gives it a special charm. This side of Pushkin’s creative image is so significant and organic that it could not help but attract the attention of researchers. As it was studied, it became more and more clear that the problem of historicism is not of particular importance, that in all respects it is one of the leading and most significant problems of Pushkin studies.

But it cannot be said that Pushkin was characterized by some special type of narrative historicism. The very nature of historicism, and consequently the poet’s artistic thinking as a whole, has undergone significant evolution. According to the currently established concept, the development of Pushkin's historicism went through two stages. The first, when Pushkin implemented the national-historical principle in his work, and the second, when it was replaced by the sociological principle. This means that at first the national-historical principle of approach to the phenomena of reality, without taking into account the social factor, prevailed in Pushkin’s work. The characteristics of the conditions were dominated not by social characteristics, but by historical and national ones. In the 1830s, Pushkin's attention was attracted by the aggravated class and class contradictions. And he comes to a new view of reality. Now in his worldview the social factor comes to the fore: the very idea of ​​development as applied to social life is closely connected with the understanding of class and class differences and clashes; the concept of nation is differentiated; the characteristics of a person are no longer dominated by general national-historical features, but by social ones, in accordance with the place and position occupied by a person in society.

And yet it should be recognized that the named concept of the evolution of Pushkin’s realism and historicism needs significant clarifications and additions. Firstly, in Pushkin’s works of this period, the national principle continues to retain its significance, and the poet’s search for national forms still remains relevant.

Secondly, this concept in its pure form leads to an inevitable schematization of late creativity. In reality, the picture of creativity is much more complex and difficult to fit into any framework.

So, it is possible to solve the problem of the historicism of Pushkin’s work only if the nature of the art itself is taken into account. Questions of the relationship between aesthetic and scientific knowledge, their similarities and differences, put forward by life itself, by all artistic development and repeatedly illuminated in world aesthetic thought, deeply worried Pushkin and his contemporaries.

A particular and specific expression of this general problem of the relationship between art and science was the question of the relationship between fiction and history.

This process of penetration of history into the spiritual life of Russian society found diverse manifestations and had no less diverse consequences: a keen interest in antiquity and in various kinds of documentary and historical materials is awakening everywhere.

Unlike authors who adhere to the principle of illustrativeness in covering history and who strongly appealed to documents, naked documentaryism is alien to Pushkin the artist. Pushkin usually only starts from the document, but then takes the path of creative transformation, artistic invention.

If this active creative transformation was not achieved and Pushkin tried to passively include “hidden” documents in his works, in their “nature,” he failed. Let us present this fact. While working on “Dubrovsky,” he was attracted by the trial between Lieutenant Colonel Kryukov and Lieutenant Muratov, which was considered in October 1832 in the Kozlovsky district court. As is known, Pushkin included a copy of the court decision, without any alterations, in his manuscript. Commentators have long noted that the resolution in the case of Dubrovsky and Troekurov in Pushkin's story is an authentic document. But here’s what’s characteristic: the work remained unfinished, and not the least role in this was played by the fact that it turned out to be impossible to achieve an organic unity of opposing principles, in particular empirical documentaryism and the tradition of book “robber” romance.

The creation of “Savelich’s account” in “The Captain’s Daughter” is based on an archival document. It is curious, however, how Pushkin treated this document. It turns out that, having been included in the artistic system of “The Captain’s Daughter,” this document began to perform a function directly opposite to the source. In “The Captain's Daughter”, “Savelich's account” serves to identify not only such traits of the serf as diligence and devotion. but also to an even greater extent - albeit indirectly - the generosity of Pugachev. As we see, during the creative process, the empirical document is aesthetically transformed beyond recognition.

Having rejected the principle of documentary and locality, Pushkin in “The Captain's Daughter” achieved more - genuine artistic and historical truth. This activity of creative transformation is not contradicted by the fact that “The Captain’s Daughter” was written in the form of an eyewitness memoir.

It must be said that Grinev’s memoirs are only a conventional artistic form, and the reader feels this convention well. In other words, the reader has no doubt that he is dealing not with genuine documentary notes, but with art, with the creation of a writer, with an aesthetic illusion. From the very beginning, a process of “co-creation” is established between the author and the reader. The reader is actively involved in this process, his imagination and thoughts are mobilized, which is served by a variety of means: a system of epigraphs (which must be thought through and “matched” with the content of the chapters), the tone of the narrative, and sometimes a direct appeal to the reader, to whom unique aesthetic tasks.

This nature of art, with its conventionality and at the same time the activity of reproducing moving history, naturally determines the specific nature of historicity itself. works of art- in contrast to documentary, scientific historicity.

Literature:
- Pushkin A. S. Complete works in 10 volumes - L., 1997.
- Abramovich S. L. Pushkin in 1836. – L., 1989.
- Alekseev M.P. Pushkin: a comparative historical study. – L., 1987.
- Alekseev M.P. Pushkin and world literature. – L., 1987. – 613 p.
- Anoshkina V.N., Petrov S.M. History of Russian literature in the 19th century. 1800 – 1830s. – M., 1989.