Does the description of the heroine Olesya change by the end? The story of A. I. Kuprin “Olesya”. The image of the main character

Olesya is the main character of A.I. Kuprin’s work “Olesya”. The writer portrayed her as a natural, mysterious girl-witch, as if straight from the pages of a fairy tale.

Externally, the girl is described as a very beautiful tall, dark-eyed brunette, twenty-four years old. The original beauty of her face, thick dark hair, beautiful hands, albeit rough from work, a slender and strong body, a fresh and ringing voice, elegance and nobility of manners distinguished her favorably from other village girls.

Alena, or Olesya as she was called, grew up with her grandmother Maynulikha, who, along with her granddaughter, was expelled by the villagers due to suspicions of witchcraft. Life in the forest, away from society and in unity with nature, radically determined her character. Such a life became a paradise for the girl, which she would never exchange for the city.

Olesya is smart, brave and independent. She could stand up for herself in any situation, was not afraid of anything, and had a broad outlook, despite the lack of education. The girl combined such qualities as curiosity, originality, pride, self-confidence and tact.

With the advent of Ivan Timofeevich, Olesya learned what true love is. From the very beginning of communication, the girl realized that a relationship with the young master would not turn out well for her, but still she loved him with all her heart and completely surrendered to her feelings.

For the sake of her loved one, she fulfilled his request to visit church, even though the girl did not like to be in public. In the village, Olesya, like her grandmother, was considered a witch, so visiting the church had sad consequences. The ignorance and hostility of people turned into an attack on the girl, which is why she subsequently had to leave her place of residence.

The whole image of the girl showed the reader her moral purity, naturalness and sublimity, contrasting her noble character with the hypocrisy and malice of the village inhabitants.

Essay on the topic Olesya

Olesya is the heroine of the famous story by Alexander Ivanovich Kuprin. The work was written at the end of the nineteenth century, when technological progress came to replace the old Russian life.

The main character of the story “Olesya” appears to us as a believer. We know from the work that she lives in the forest near the village. Her upbringing follows from this. She can't read, but she's very smart. In a further conversation with Olesya, Ivan Timofeevich compares her to young ladies, pointing out that she speaks no worse than them. And also, the text says that she asked him about the world around him: natural phenomena, peoples and countries, the structure of the universe and famous people.

She first appears in the text when the hero finds himself in a hut. He hears a woman's voice, which is described as clear, fresh and strong. The author gives Full description appearance, as Ivan Timofeevich sees her. The young sorceress did not look like the local “girls”; Alexander Ivanovich portrays her as a tall brunette, then we learn that she is twenty-four years old. At this meeting she was wearing a white shirt. The hero of the story believes that the charm of her face lies in the great dark eyes and broken eyebrows. This gives light feeling there is cunning, power and naivety in her. She walked next to the lost guest resolutely, with a capricious look.

When the sorceress does see off the guest, she calls her name. It turns out that her real name is Alena, but “in local terms it’s Olesya.” By the way, Alena means “shining”, “bewitching”, which is exactly how we met her. Women with this name have their own opinion on everything. This is confirmed by the words of Ivan Timofeevich that she stubbornly refuted his explanations. Also, Alena and Olesya can be addressed by the name Lesya, which is a kind of bridge. The name Olesya is close in meaning to “forest”, that is, a girl from the forest, which is how our heroine is represented. The owner of this name can be called a monogamous person, she is affectionate and has curiosity about everything.

The conflict situation in the work is the appearance of Olesya in the church. She decided to take this action, despite any prohibitions. The clerk described to Ivan Timofeevich what happened there. Her action seems naive, but on the other hand, she is the same as us. Perhaps this was the first time she managed to meet such a person. After what happened, she did not reproach him. The heroine considers herself guilty.

I believe that the image of Olesya should be an example to the modern reader. She is a truly sincere person with pure soul. And, despite the conflict in the village, the young witch remained just as kind and generous.

Option 3

Kuprin has a huge amount different works. And, of course, there are also those that are studied by children at school. And here is one of them called “Olesya”. The main character was an ordinary peasant woman named Olesya. And although her parents always called her Alena, in the course of the story the author calls her Olesya. If you compare her with other girls, she is the most beautiful of them. She is used to always helping her parents in everything and therefore is not afraid of work. Her hands became hard and stiff from constant and sometimes hard work.

After her parents died, her grandmother took her in. She taught how to treat and prepare various infusions, lotions and medicines using herbs that grow in the forest. That's where they go all the time. That is why many residents consider not only the grandmother, but also the girl to be witches. Since Olesya did not study anywhere, but with her any interlocutor will not be interested, and she knows how to bewitch and win over. In addition, she has never been to parties or small talk, but from birth she has delicacy, politeness, and tact. And there was not a single situation from which the girl could not extricate herself. She knew how to stand up for herself and not give offense. Sometimes, in order to find out her fate, as well as what awaits her in the future, a girl resorts to fortune telling on cards. But sometimes she has no one to communicate with. In order to save herself and Olesya, the grandmother decided to go into the forest, where no one could find them and there they would live peacefully and would not need to be afraid of anyone. But the girl is not worried about this, she likes the clean air here, as well as the inhabitants of this forest. Many times the grandmother persuaded her granddaughter to go to church, but the girl does not want to, because she thinks that she really has abilities that not everyone can have.

And although she told her grandmother that she would never be able to love anyone, fate decreed otherwise. And soon she met a young and very handsome man named Ivan. At first, the girl didn’t even want to admit her feelings for the guy, but her heart had long been given to him. And only after they parted did Olesya realize that life without him seemed unthinkable. As a result, Ivan invites her to seal their relationship by marriage, but the girl decided to take pity on her beloved and, so that he would not lose his reputation, refused. And so that it would not hurt so much, and she would not survive the separation, she decided to leave at night while no one was looking. And on the table she left the same beads that he had recently given her as a sign of love.

Olesya is a positive hero, because despite the fact that all the residents hate her, she still remains kind and sympathetic.

“Olesya” Kuprin A.I.

Olesya (Alena) is a 25-year-old girl who lives with her grandmother in the forest. Her grandmother Manuilikha, who came from Russians or gypsies, was considered a witch in the village. For this, the residents drove her and her granddaughter into the forest.
O. is the personification of natural, natural life. She first appears as fairy creature accompanied by almost tame finches. “The original beauty of her face, once seen, could not be forgotten, but it was difficult, even after getting used to it, to describe. His charm lay in those large, shiny, dark eyes, to which the thin eyebrows, broken in the middle, gave an elusive shade of slyness, power and naivety; in the dark-pink tone of the skin, in the willful curve of the lips, of which the lower one, somewhat fuller, stood out with a decisive and capricious look.” O. is not familiar with civilization, all social norms of behavior are alien to her. The girl is guided by the call of free will, integral natural impulses, and the skills of witchcraft. O. falls in love with Ivan Timofeevich despite the fact that she saw all his bad traits in fortune telling. Furthermore, she knows for sure that this love will ruin her. But O. understands that there is no escape from fate. When, after his illness, Ivan Timofeevich visits the girl again, she kisses him and asks if he loves her. O. gives himself entirely to his feelings. For the sake of her beloved, she agrees to go to church, although she is sure that her “family is cursed forever and ever,” and her soul has been sold to the devil since birth. In the church, the girl is attacked by a crowd of angry peasants who beat her with stones. From the pain, and even more from the humiliation she experienced, the girl falls ill. The next day, heavy rain and large hail broke out in the village. Residents decided that this was the work of a young witch. O., together with her grandmother, was forced to leave her hut and leave these places. O. leaves a string of coral beads to his beloved as a keepsake.

The image of Olesya makes the reader remember amazing fairy-tale beauties who, in addition to their beauty, had many talents. The girl grew up in unity with nature and is close to it. It is no coincidence that already at the moment of meeting, the main character first of all pays attention to the birds that the girl brings into the house. She herself calls them “tame,” although they are ordinary wild forest birds.
Olesya compares favorably with local village girls. This is how the author says about it: “There was nothing in her like the local “girls”, whose faces, under ugly bandages covering the forehead on top, and the mouth and chin below, wear such a monotonous, frightened expression. My stranger, a tall brunette of about twenty to twenty-five years old, carried herself easily and slenderly. A spacious white shirt hung freely and beautifully around her young, healthy breasts. The original beauty of her face, once seen, could not be forgotten...”
It is no wonder that the main character admires the girl and cannot take his eyes off her. Olesya is considered a witch. She really has skills that most people don't have. ordinary people. Secret knowledge passed down from generation to generation only by a select few. Olesya’s grandmother and mother are the bearers of such knowledge, so the girl herself is considered a witch.
Olesya grew up away from society, so lies, hypocrisy, and hypocrisy are alien to her. Local residents consider Olesya a witch, but how ignoble, cruel and heartless they themselves are compared to her! Main character In the story, upon closer acquaintance with Olesya, he becomes convinced of how pure, sublime, and kind the girl is. She has an amazing gift, but she would never use it for evil. There are rumors about Olesya and her grandmother; they are blamed for all the troubles that happen to them. local residents. The ignorance, stupidity and malice of the latter sharply contrast with the moral beauty of Olesya. The girl is as pure as the nature around her,
Olesya says that she and her grandmother do not maintain relationships with the people around them at all: “Do we really touch anyone! We don't even need people. Once a year I just go to a place to buy soap and salt... And I also give my grandmother some tea - she loves tea from me. Or at least not see anyone at all.” Thus, the girl seems to draw a line between herself and others. The hostile wariness of others towards the “witchers” leads to such withdrawal. Olesya and her grandmother agree not to maintain relationships with anyone at all, just to remain free and independent of the will of others.
Olesya is very smart. Despite the fact that she received virtually no education, she is very knowledgeable about life. She is very inquisitive, she is interested in everything that a new acquaintance can tell her. The love that arose between Ivan Timofeevich and Olesya is a sincere, pure and beautiful phenomenon. The girl is truly worthy of love. She is a completely special creature, full of life, tenderness, compassion. Olesya gives all of herself to her beloved, without demanding anything in return.
Olesya teaches Ivan Timofeevich an excellent lesson in moral purity. The master falls in love with a beautiful witch and even proposes to her
become his wife. Olesya refuses, because she understands perfectly well that she has no place next to an educated and respected person in society. She understands that later Ivan Timofeevich may regret his rash act. And then he will involuntarily begin to blame the girl for the fact that she does not correspond to the image usual for his society.
She willingly sacrifices herself in order to fulfill his absurd, in general, demand - to attend church. Olesya commits this act, which entails such tragic consequences. Local residents were hostile to the “witch” because she dared to appear in a holy place. Olesya's random threat is taken too seriously by local residents. And now, as soon as something bad happens, Olesya and her grandmother will be to blame.
The girl also sacrifices herself when she decides to suddenly leave without telling her beloved anything. This also reveals the nobility of her character.
The whole image of Olesya testifies to her purity, kindness and nobility. This is why it becomes so difficult when you find out that a girl has separated from her lover. Nevertheless, this ending is the pattern. The love between Olesya and the young master has no future, the girl understands this perfectly and does not want to be an obstacle to the well-being of her loved one.

Olesya is like the delightful beauties of fairy tales, who, in addition to unwritten beauty, were gifted with various rare talents. A girl who grew up in the forest loves nature. Stands out noticeably against the background ordinary girls. The narrator notes the following: “There was nothing like the locals about her.” The faces of those girls wore a frightened expression similar to each other. Olesya gave the impression of being calm and confident person. And Olesya’s face was originally beautiful.

The main character, not surprisingly, is fascinated by her: “...my heart was tied to this charming girl, incomprehensible to me, by thin, strong invisible threads.”

The villagers consider Olesya a witch. She herself said that her family was cursed and her soul was sold to the devil. However, Olesya, who grew up outside of society, is kind. She is not cynical, not prude and not hypocritical. Although the locals consider her and her grandmother to be the plague of these places, meanwhile, compared to Olesya, they themselves look cruel, rude and callous.

The anger of the villagers is contrasted with the moral qualities of Olesya. She is strong-willed and close to nature and its purity. There are bad conversations about Oles and his grandmother. They are even blamed for any problems that happen to the villagers. Although they don't actually have a relationship with each other. Olesya is surprised: “Are we touching anyone!”

Observant, Olesya is inquisitive.

She asks about everything that the young master could tell. Love arises between her and Ivan Timofeevich, pure and real. Olesya is worthy of such love - she is lively, attentive, pure. She gives her all.

Olesya readily fulfills the stupid demand - to go to church, and this has led to tragic consequences.

The villagers attacked the heroine, believing that they were punishing the “witch.” The threat posed by Olesya hotly is taken seriously by the locals. Now any incident, for example a random hailstorm, seems to them like a curse sent by a witch. This poses a threat to Olesya. She suddenly leaves with her grandmother.

The image of Olesya is pure and noble. It’s a pity for the heroine when you read about the hardships she experienced. For example, about her separation from her beloved. But Olesya has this too young man- a master committed to the opinion of society cannot have a future.

Effective preparation for the Unified State Exam (all subjects) - start preparing

Updated: 2017-03-17

Attention!
If you notice an error or typo, highlight the text and click Ctrl+Enter.
Thus you will provide invaluable benefits project and other readers.

Thank you for your attention.

History of creation

A. Kuprin’s story “Olesya” was first published in 1898 in the newspaper “Kievlyanin” and was accompanied by a subtitle. "From memories of Volyn." It is curious that the writer first sent the manuscript to the magazine “Russian Wealth”, since before this the magazine had already published Kuprin’s story “Forest Wilderness”, also dedicated to Polesie. Thus, the author hoped to create a continuation effect. However, “Russian Wealth” for some reason refused to publish “Olesya” (perhaps the publishers were not satisfied with the size of the story, because by that time it was the author’s largest work), and the cycle planned by the author did not work out. But later, in 1905, “Olesya” was published in an independent publication, accompanied by an introduction from the author, which told the story of the creation of the work. Later, the full-fledged “Polessia Cycle” was released, the pinnacle and decoration of which was “Olesya”.

The author's introduction is preserved only in the archives. In it, Kuprin said that while visiting a friend of the landowner Poroshin in Polesie, he heard from him many legends and fairy tales related to local beliefs. Among other things, Poroshin said that he himself was in love with a local witch. Kuprin will later tell this story in the story, at the same time including in it all the mysticism of local legends, the mysterious mystical atmosphere and piercing realism of the situation surrounding him, the difficult fate of the Polesie inhabitants.

Analysis of the work

Plot of the story

Compositionally, “Olesya” is a retrospective story, that is, the author-narrator returns in memories to the events that took place in his life many years ago.

The basis of the plot and the leading theme of the story is the love between the city nobleman (panych) Ivan Timofeevich and the young resident of Polesie, Olesya. Love is bright, but tragic, since its death is inevitable due to a number of circumstances - social inequality, the gap between the heroes.

According to the plot, the hero of the story, Ivan Timofeevich, spends several months in a remote village, on the edge of Volyn Polesie (the territory called Little Russia in tsarist times, today the west of the Pripyat Lowland, in northern Ukraine). A city dweller, he first tries to instill culture in the local peasants, treats them, teaches them to read, but his studies are unsuccessful, since people are overcome by worries and are not interested in either enlightenment or development. Ivan Timofeevich increasingly goes into the forest to hunt, admires the local landscapes, and sometimes listens to the stories of his servant Yarmola, who talks about witches and sorcerers.

Having gotten lost one day while hunting, Ivan ends up in a forest hut - the same witch from Yarmola’s stories lives here - Manuilikha and her granddaughter Olesya.

The second time the hero comes to the inhabitants of the hut is in the spring. Olesya tells fortunes for him, predicting a quick, unhappy love and adversity, even a suicide attempt. The girl also shows mystical abilities - she can influence a person, instilling her will or fear, and stop bleeding. Panych falls in love with Olesya, but she herself remains distinctly cold towards him. She is especially angry that the gentleman stands up for her and her grandmother in front of the local police officer, who threatened to disperse the inhabitants of the forest hut for their alleged sorcery and harm to people.

Ivan falls ill and does not come to the forest hut for a week, but when he comes, it is noticeable that Olesya is happy to see him, and the feelings of both of them flare up. A month of secret dates and quiet, bright happiness passes. Despite the obvious and realized inequality of lovers by Ivan, he proposes to Olesya. She refuses, citing the fact that she, a servant of the devil, cannot go into church, and therefore, get married, entering into a marriage union. Nevertheless, the girl decides to go to church to please the gentleman. Local residents, however, did not appreciate Olesya’s impulse and attacked her, beating her severely.

Ivan hurries to the forest house, where the beaten, defeated and morally crushed Olesya tells him that her fears about the impossibility of their union have been confirmed - they cannot be together, so she and her grandmother will leave their home. Now the village is even more hostile towards Olesya and Ivan - any whim of nature will be associated with its sabotage and sooner or later they will kill.

Before leaving for the city, Ivan goes into the forest again, but in the hut he finds only red olesin beads.

Heroes of the story

Olesya

The main character of the story is the forest witch Olesya (her real name is Alena, according to grandmother Manuilikha, and Olesya is the local version of the name). A beautiful, tall brunette with intelligent dark eyes immediately attracts Ivan’s attention. The girl's natural beauty is combined with a natural intelligence - despite the fact that the girl does not even know how to read, she has, perhaps, more tact and depth than the city girl.

Olesya is sure that she is “not like everyone else” and soberly understands that for this dissimilarity she can suffer from the people. Ivan doesn’t really believe in Olesya’s unusual abilities, believing that there is more to it than a centuries-old superstition. However, he cannot deny the mysticism of Olesya’s image.

Olesya is well aware of the impossibility of her happiness with Ivan, even if he makes a strong-willed decision and marries her, so it is she who boldly and simply manages their relationship: firstly, she exercises self-control, trying not to impose herself on the gentleman, and secondly, she decides to separate , seeing that they are not a couple. Social life would be unacceptable for Olesya; her husband would inevitably become burdened by her after the absence of common interests. Olesya does not want to be a burden, to tie Ivan hand and foot and leaves on her own - this is the heroism and strength of the girl.

Ivan Timofeevich

Ivan is a poor, educated nobleman. City boredom leads him to Polesie, where at first he tries to do some business, but in the end the only activity left is hunting. He treats legends about witches as fairy tales - a healthy skepticism is justified by his education.

(Ivan and Olesya)

Ivan Timofeevich - sincere and a kind person, he is able to feel the beauty of nature, and therefore Olesya at first interests him not as beautiful girl, but as an interesting personality. He wonders how it happened that nature itself raised her, and she came out so tender and delicate, unlike the rude, uncouth peasants. How did it happen that they, religious, although superstitious, are ruder and tougher than Olesya, although she should be the embodiment of evil. For Ivan, meeting Olesya is not a lordly pastime or a difficult summer love adventure, although he understands that they are not a couple - society in any case will be stronger than their love and will destroy their happiness. The personification of society in this case is unimportant - be it a blind and stupid peasant force, be it city residents, Ivan’s colleagues. When he thinks of Olesya as his future wife, in a city dress, trying to carry on small talk with his colleagues, he simply comes to a dead end. The loss of Olesya for Ivan is as much a tragedy as finding her as a wife. This remains outside the scope of the story, but most likely Olesya’s prediction came true in full - after her departure he felt bad, even to the point of thinking about intentionally leaving this life.

Final conclusion

The culmination of events in the story occurs at big celebration- Trinity. This is not a coincidence; it emphasizes and intensifies the tragedy with which Olesya’s bright fairy tale is trampled by people who hate her. There is a sarcastic paradox in this: the servant of the devil, Olesya, the witch, turns out to be more open to love than the crowd of people whose religion fits into the thesis “God is Love.”

The author's conclusions sound tragic - it is impossible for two people to be happy together when the happiness for each of them individually is different. For Ivan, happiness is impossible apart from civilization. For Olesya - in isolation from nature. But at the same time, the author claims, civilization is cruel, society can poison relations between people, destroy them morally and physically, but nature cannot.