How does the author relate to Melekhov? Quoted description of Grigory Melekhov from the novel “Quiet Don”
Grigory Melekhov is the central character of the novel “ Quiet Don”, unsuccessfully searching for his place in a changing world. In the context of historical events, he showed the difficult fate of the Don Cossack, who knows how to passionately love and selflessly fight.
History of creation
Contemplating new novel, Mikhail Sholokhov did not imagine that the work would eventually turn into an epic. It all started innocently. In mid-autumn 1925, the writer began the first chapters of “Donshchina” - this was the original name of the work in which the author wanted to show the life of the Don Cossacks during the years of the revolution. That’s how it started - the Cossacks marched as part of the army to Petrograd. Suddenly the author was stopped by the thought that readers were unlikely to understand the motives of the Cossacks in suppressing the revolution without a backstory, and he put the manuscript in a far corner.
Only a year later the idea was fully matured: in the novel, Mikhail Alexandrovich wanted to reflect the lives of individual people through the prism of historical events that happened in the period from 1914 to 1921. The tragic fates of the main characters, including Grigory Melekhov, had to be included in the epic theme, and for this it was necessary to become better acquainted with the customs and characters of the inhabitants of the Cossack farm. The author of “Quiet Don” moved to his homeland, to the village of Vishnevskaya, where he plunged headlong into the life of the “Don region”.
In search of bright characters and a special atmosphere that settled on the pages of the work, the writer traveled around the area, met with witnesses of the First World War and revolutionary events, collected a mosaic of tales, beliefs and elements of folklore of local residents, and also stormed Moscow and Rostov archives in search of the truth. about the life of those hard years.
Finally, the first volume of “Quiet Don” was released. It showed Russian troops on the war fronts. In the second book the February revolution and October Revolution, the echoes of which reached the Don. In the first two parts of the novel alone, Sholokhov placed about a hundred heroes, later they were joined by another 70 characters. In total, the epic spanned four volumes, the last being completed in 1940.
The work was published in the publications “October”, “Roman-newspaper”, “ New world" and "Izvestia", rapidly gaining recognition among readers. They bought magazines, flooded the editors with reviews, and the author with letters. Soviet bookworms perceived the tragedies of heroes as personal shocks. Among the favorites, of course, was Grigory Melekhov.
It’s interesting that Grigory was absent from the first drafts, but a character with that name appeared in early stories writer - there the hero is already endowed with some features of the future “resident” of “Quiet Don”. Researchers of Sholokhov’s work consider the Cossack Kharlampy Ermakov, who was sentenced to death in the late 20s, to be the prototype of Melekhov. The author himself did not admit that it was this man who became the prototype of the book Cossack. Meanwhile, Mikhail Alexandrovich, while collecting the historical basis of the novel, met Ermakov and even corresponded with him.
Biography
The novel sets out the entire chronology of Grigory Melekhov’s life before and after the war. The Don Cossack was born in 1892 on the Tatarsky farm (Veshenskaya village), while exact date The writer does not indicate his birth. His father Panteley Melekhov once served as a constable in the Ataman Life Guards Regiment, but was retired due to old age. Life young guy For the time being, it passes in serenity, in ordinary peasant affairs: mowing, fishing, caring for the farm. At night there are passionate meetings with the beautiful Aksinya Astakhova, a married lady, but passionately in love with a young man.
His father is dissatisfied with this heartfelt affection and hastily marries his son to an unloved girl - meek Natalya Korshunova. However, a wedding does not solve the problem. Grigory understands that he is unable to forget Aksinya, so he leaves his legal wife and settles with his mistress on the estate of a local gentleman. On a summer day in 1913, Melekhov became a father - his first daughter was born. The couple’s happiness turned out to be short-lived: life was destroyed by the outbreak of the First World War, which called Gregory to repay his debt to his homeland.
Melekhov fought selflessly and desperately in the war; in one of the battles he was wounded in the eye. For his bravery, the warrior was awarded the Cross of St. George and a promotion in rank, and in the future three more crosses and four medals will be added to the man’s awards. The hero's political views were changed by his acquaintance in the hospital with the Bolshevik Garanzha, who convinces him of the injustice of the tsarist rule.
Meanwhile, a blow awaits Grigory Melekhov at home - Aksinya, heartbroken (by the death of her little daughter), succumbs to the charms of the son of the owner of the Listnitsky estate. Arriving on leave common-law husband did not forgive the betrayal and returned to his legal wife, who later bore him two children.
In the outbreak of the Civil War, Gregory takes the side of the “reds”. But by 1918, he became disillusioned with the Bolsheviks and joined the ranks of those who staged an uprising against the Red Army on the Don, becoming a division commander. The death of his older brother Petro at the hands of a fellow villager, an ardent supporter of the Soviet regime, Mishka Koshevoy, awakens even greater anger towards the Bolsheviks in the hero’s soul.
Passions are also boiling on the love front - Grigory cannot find peace and is literally torn between his women. Because of his still-living feelings for Aksinya, Melekhov cannot live peacefully in his family. Constant betrayals Natalya's husband is pushed to have an abortion, which destroys her. The man endures the premature death of a woman with difficulty, because he also had peculiar, but tender feelings for his wife.
The Red Army's offensive against the Cossacks forces Grigory Melekhov to go on the run to Novorossiysk. There, the hero, driven into a dead end, joins the Bolsheviks. The year 1920 was marked by Gregory’s return to his homeland, where he settled with Aksinya’s children. The new government began persecuting the former “whites,” and while escaping to Kuban for a “quiet life,” Aksinya was mortally wounded. After wandering around the world a little more, Gregory returned to his native village, because the new authorities promised amnesty to the Cossack rebels.
Mikhail Sholokhov put an end to the story at the very interesting place, without telling readers about Melekhov’s further fate. However, it is not difficult to guess what happened to him. Historians urge curious fans of the writer’s work to consider the year of death of his favorite character as the date of death of his favorite character - 1927.
Image
The author conveyed the difficult fate and internal changes of Grigory Melekhov through a description of his appearance. By the end of the novel, a carefree, stately young man in love with life turns into a stern warrior with gray hair and a frozen heart:
“...knew that he would no longer laugh as before; knew that his eyes were sunken and his cheekbones were sticking out sharply, and in his gaze the light of senseless cruelty began to shine through more and more often.”
Gregory is a typical choleric person: temperamental, hot-tempered and unbalanced, which manifests itself both in love affairs and in relationships with the environment in general. The character of the main character of "Quiet Don" is an alloy of courage, heroism and even recklessness; he combines passion and humility, gentleness and cruelty, hatred and endless kindness.
Gregory is a typical choleric person Sholokhov created a hero with an open soul, capable of compassion, forgiveness and humanity: Grigory suffers from a gosling accidentally killed in the mowing, protects Franya, not being afraid of an entire platoon of Cossacks, saves Stepan Astakhov, his sworn enemy, Aksinya’s husband, in the war
In search of the truth, Melekhov rushes from the Reds to the Whites, eventually becoming a renegade who is not accepted by either side. The man appears to be a true hero of his time. Its tragedy lies in the story itself, when a calm life was disrupted by shocks, turning peaceful workers into unhappy people. The character’s spiritual quest was accurately conveyed by the novel’s phrase:
“He stood on the brink in the struggle of two principles, denying both of them.”
All illusions were dispelled in the battles of the civil war: anger towards the Bolsheviks and disappointment in the “whites” forces the hero to look for a third way in the revolution, but he understands that in “the middle it is impossible - they will crush you.” Once a passionate lover of life, Grigory Melekhov never finds faith in himself, remaining at the same time a national character and an extra person in the current fate of the country.
Screen adaptation of the novel "Quiet Don"
The epic of Mikhail Sholokhov appeared on movie screens four times. Based on the first two books, a silent film was made in 1931, where the main roles were played by Andrei Abrikosov (Grigory Melekhov) and Emma Tsesarskaya (Aksinya). There are rumors that, with an eye on the characters of the heroes of this production, the writer created a continuation of “Quiet Don”.
A poignant picture based on the work was presented to the Soviet audience in 1958 by the director. The beautiful half of the country fell in love with the hero performed by. The mustachioed handsome Cossack was in love with, who convincingly appeared in the role of the passionate Aksinya. She played Melekhov's wife Natalya. The film's collection of awards consists of seven awards, including a diploma from the Directors Guild of the USA. Yevgeny Tkachuk, and.
For “Quiet Don” Mikhail Sholokhov was accused of plagiarism. Researchers considered the “greatest epic” stolen from a white officer who died in the Civil War. The author even had to temporarily postpone work on writing a sequel to the novel while a special commission investigated the information received. However, the problem of authorship has not yet been resolved.
Beginning actor of the Maly Theater Andrei Abrikosov woke up famous after the premiere of Quiet Don. It is noteworthy that before this, in the temple of Melpomene, he had never appeared on stage - they simply were not given a role. The man also didn’t bother to get acquainted with the work; he read the novel when filming was already in full swing.
Quotes
“You have a smart head, but the fool got it.”
"The blind man said, 'We'll see.'
“Like a steppe scorched by fires, Gregory’s life became black. He lost everything that was dear to his heart. Everything was taken from him, everything was destroyed by merciless death. Only the children remained. But he himself still frantically clung to the ground, as if, in fact, his broken life was of some value to him and to others.”
“Sometimes, remembering your whole life, you look, and it’s like an empty pocket, turned inside out.”
“Life turned out to be humorous, wisely simple. Now it seemed to him that from eternity there had not been such a truth in it, under the wing of which anyone could warm up, and, embittered to the brim, he thought: everyone has their own truth, their own furrow.
“There is no truth in life. It can be seen that whoever defeats whom will devour him... But I was looking for the bad truth.”
Introduction
The fate of Grigory Melekhov in the novel “Quiet Don” by Sholokhov becomes the focus of the reader’s attention. This hero, who by the will of fate found himself in the midst of difficult historical events, has been forced to search for his own path in life for many years.
Description of Grigory Melekhov
Already from the first pages of the novel, Sholokhov introduces us to unusual fate grandfather Gregory, explaining why the Melekhovs differ in appearance from the rest of the inhabitants of the farm. Grigory, like his father, had “a drooping kite nose, in slightly slanting slits there were bluish almonds of hot eyes, sharp slabs of cheekbones.” Remembering the origin of Pantelei Prokofievich, everyone in the farmstead called the Melekhovs “Turks.”
Life changes Gregory's inner world. His appearance also changes. From a carefree, cheerful guy, he turns into a stern warrior whose heart has hardened. Gregory “knew that he would no longer laugh as before; knew that his eyes were sunken and his cheekbones were sticking out sharply,” and in his gaze “a light of senseless cruelty began to shine through more and more often.”
At the end of the novel, a completely different Gregory appears before us. This is a mature man, tired of life, “with tired squinting eyes, with the reddish tips of a black mustache, with premature gray hair at the temples and hard wrinkles on the forehead.”
Characteristics of Gregory
At the beginning of the work, Grigory Melekhov is a young Cossack living according to the laws of his ancestors. The main thing for him is farming and family. He enthusiastically helps his father with mowing and fishing. He is unable to contradict his parents when they marry him to the unloved Natalya Korshunova.
But, for all that, Gregory is a passionate, addicted person. Contrary to his father's prohibitions, he continues to go to night games. He meets Aksinya Astakhova, the neighbor’s wife, and then leaves his home with her.
Gregory, like most Cossacks, is characterized by courage, sometimes reaching the point of recklessness. He behaves heroically at the front, participating in the most dangerous forays. At the same time, the hero is not alien to humanity. He is worried about a gosling he accidentally killed while mowing. For a long time suffers because of the murdered unarmed Austrian. “By obeying his heart,” Grigory saves his sworn enemy Stepan from death. He goes against an entire platoon of Cossacks, defending Franya.
In Gregory, passion and obedience, madness and gentleness, kindness and hatred coexist at the same time.
The fate of Grigory Melekhov and his path of quest
The fate of Melekhov in the novel “Quiet Don” is tragic. He is constantly forced to look for a “way out,” the right road. It's not easy for him in the war. His personal life is also complicated.
Like the beloved heroes of L.N. Tolstoy, Grigory goes through a difficult path life's quest. At the beginning, everything seemed clear to him. Like other Cossacks, he is called up for war. For him there is no doubt that he must defend the Fatherland. But, getting to the front, the hero understands that his whole nature is opposed to murder.
Grigory moves from white to red, but even here he will be disappointed. Seeing how Podtyolkov deals with captured young officers, he loses faith in this power and the next year he again finds himself in the White Army.
Tossing between the whites and the reds, the hero himself becomes embittered. He loots and kills. He tries to forget himself in drunkenness and fornication. In the end, fleeing the persecution of the new government, he finds himself among the bandits. Then he becomes a deserter.
Grigory is exhausted from tossing and turning. He wants to live on his land, raise bread and children. Although life hardens the hero and gives his features something “wolfish,” in essence, he is not a killer. Having lost everything and not having found his way, Grigory returns to his native farm, realizing that, most likely, death awaits him here. But a son and a home are the only things that keep the hero alive.
Gregory's relationship with Aksinya and Natalya
Fate sends the hero two passionately loving women. But Gregory’s relationship with them is not easy. While still single, Grigory falls in love with Aksinya, the wife of Stepan Astakhov, his neighbor. Over time, the woman reciprocates his feelings, and their relationship develops into unbridled passion. “So unusual and obvious was their crazy connection, they burned so frantically with one shameless flame, people without conscience and without hiding, losing weight and blackening their faces in front of their neighbors, that now for some reason people were ashamed to look at them when they met.”
Despite this, he cannot resist his father’s will and marries Natalya Korshunova, promising himself to forget Aksinya and settle down. But Gregory is unable to keep his vow to himself. Although Natalya is beautiful and selflessly loves her husband, he gets back together with Aksinya and leaves his wife and parental home.
After Aksinya's betrayal, Grigory returns to his wife again. She accepts him and forgives past grievances. But he was not destined for peace family life. The image of Aksinya haunts him. Fate brings them together again. Unable to withstand the shame and betrayal, Natalya has an abortion and dies. Grigory blames himself for the death of his wife and experiences this loss cruelly.
Now, it would seem, nothing can stop him from finding happiness with the woman he loves. But circumstances force him to leave his place and, together with Aksinya, set off on the road again, the last for his beloved.
With the death of Aksinya, Gregory's life loses all meaning. The hero no longer has even a ghostly hope for happiness. “And Gregory, dying of horror, realized that it was all over, that the worst thing that could happen in his life had already happened.”
Conclusion
In conclusion of my essay on the topic “The Fate of Grigory Melekhov in the novel “Quiet Don””, I want to fully agree with critics who believe that in “Quiet Don” the fate of Grigory Melekhov is the most difficult and one of the most tragic. Using the example of Grigory Sholokhov, he showed how the whirlpool of political events breaks human destiny. And the one who sees his destiny in peaceful labor suddenly becomes brutal killer with a devastated soul.
Work test
The collapse of the age-old way of life folk life captured in his novel “Quiet Don” by M. Sholokhov (the first book was published in 1928, the final chapters of the fourth book in 1940). We emphasize: this is not just a book about the revolution and civil war, but a work about the fate of the people in turning points historical development, a narrative about the fundamental problems of existence “at the crossroads of the century.” Sholokhov’s novel showed a desire to “embrace everything” and “get to the essence”, to show the situation of the “beginning of time”, the beginning new history. The work is characterized by the scale and depth of its depiction of life. Suffice it to remember that the plot, which began near the Melekhovo kuren on the banks of the Don, gradually expanding, captures into the orbit of the author’s image a farm, a village, a steppe, our own and other people’s lands, different cities, large number heroes representing all social strata and the most important shades political views, pictures of the world and fierce battles of the First World War and Civil War. All this, as well as the “folk thought” that determines the writer’s view of what is happening, allows us to speak of Sholokhov’s work as an epic. The author captured the conflict state of the world, showed how tragic events history has destroyed the peaceful life of man on earth, the traditional ties of people through kinship, brotherhood, community, and joint work, contrasting them with the intransigence of class confrontation. This fault is especially clearly visible in the history of the Melekhov family. Sholokhov shows historical events through the private destinies of specific people, thereby continuing the traditions of Pushkin and Tolstoy. But for the first time, the central hero of the epic novel becomes a simple Cossack, seeking truth not only for himself, but for the entire people. Gregory's path is full of painful doubts, hesitations, mistakes and losses. The author does not hide how much the gray-haired and “dead soul” Grigory at the end of the novel differs from the brutally handsome and dashing Cossack as we met him at the beginning of the story. But never and nowhere does the “charm of a man” who is sincere, honest, passionately wanting to understand what is happening, fail to betray him; nowhere is the hero opposed to his people. Despite open pressure and numerous campaigns against Sholokhov, the author did not lead Grigory to any clear political choice, did not complete the work with episodes of Melekhov’s service in the Red Army. At the end of the work, the plot circle closes: tired of blood and fighting, without waiting for an amnesty, the hero goes to his home, from which he left for a large and hostile world. He, a simple worker, distracted from his favorite work by the war, is imperiously called to his native land, no matter what, waiting for its owner in the spring. The Father Don, personifying the very soul of the freedom-loving working Cossacks, and Mother Earth are waiting for him. It is symbolic that Gregory throws weapons into the waters of his native river, the same for everyone, thereby expressing his attitude towards the fratricidal and senseless war. And, finally, one more image, symbolizing what gives a person support: the image of a house destroyed by war, but the only one, dear.
Grigory Melekhov is a truly epic hero. His individual fate embodied a whole range of contradictions in people’s life at a turning point, longing for truth, blood, pain and love, which no historical explosions can “undo.” In “The Quiet Flow of the Flow”, contrary to the tradition of the revolutionary 20s, class criteria for assessing life recede before the epic breadth and analytical depth of the depiction of time and man, before the polyphony of opinions and feelings, the wisdom of the writer’s philosophical view, affirming the eternal values of human life on earth.
Creating the image of Grigory Melekhov, the main character of the novel “Quiet”
Don,” M. A. Sholokhov achieves artistic integrity in the depiction of his actions, thoughts and feelings, no matter how different and contradictory they may be. The basis of Gregory’s personality is complete truthfulness to oneself, spontaneity, and uncompromisingness. He doesn't know how to hide his feelings. And this character trait repeatedly brings him into conflict with others. But with all his complexity and contradictions, Grigory Melekhov remains integral, true to himself, his thoughts, ideas, and beliefs.
The writer does not isolate his hero, does not separate him from the rest of the Cossacks. Knowing well the history of the Don Cossacks, Mikhail Alexandrovich shows the reader the life and customs of these people. The Don Cossacks, who did not know serfdom, were a special type of peasantry. Cossacks differed from peasants not only in that from an early age they were prepared for military service, from childhood they were brought up with courage, daring, and resourcefulness. The tsarist government cultivated a sense of class isolation among the Cossacks, despising the “muzhik” and the “urban” worker. They were trained to serve as servants loyal to the “tsar, throne and fatherland.”
The Cossack family was built on patriarchal principles. The father was the eldest in her and the absolute master of the house. At his request, the gathering could publicly flog his disobedient son. From childhood, the Cossack had to absorb the fear of disobedience. Obedience and respect for elders were brought up not only in childhood, but were also instilled in military service. Thus, Cossacks of older years of service were given the right to punish young Cossacks.
The environment that raised and raised Grigory Melekhov is comprehensively shown in “Quiet Don”. This is, first of all, of course, the Melekhov family - grandfather Grigory Melekhov, who brought a captive Turkish woman from Turkey. “From then on, Turkish blood began to interbreed with Cossack blood. That’s where the hook-nosed, wildly beautiful Melekhovs, and in the street style – Turks, came to be in the village.”
“...the youngest, Grigory, took after his father: half a head taller than Peter, although six years younger, the same as his father’s, a drooping kite nose, slightly slanting slits with blue almonds of hot eyes, sharp slabs of cheekbones covered with brown, ruddy skin. Grigory stooped in the same way as his father, even in their smile they both had something in common, a little beastly.”
How the family of middle peasants Melekhov lived can be seen from the words of its head, Pantelei Prokofievich: “... even without the current harvest, we have enough for two years of bread. We have, thank God, up to our nostrils in our bins, and there are some of them somewhere.” But the Melekhovs are first and foremost working family. In portraying her, M. A. Sholokhov does not remain silent about the harsh disposition of Pantelei Prokofievich, nor about the difficult lot of a woman, nor about the possessive habits under the roof of the Melekhov kuren. But, despite the fact that the wayward owner asserted his power with the help of a crutch, an atmosphere of friendship, mutual caring, and love reigned in the family. There were actually three families living in the house, but there were no clashes between them, no quarrels broke out that would destroy family relationships.
The Melekhovs were known not only for their loyalty to the patriarchal way of life, but also for their spirit of love of freedom and proud rebellion. The origins of the story about them are covered with romance tragic story Prokofy, who did not want to obey the farm rules and became a victim of prejudice. And Panteley Prokofievich, and his children, and even grandchildren are portrayed as people of high human worth.
The depiction of the tragic fate of the Melekhov family is one of
greatest artistic achievements in Sholokhov's novel. The story of the Melekhov family is, in essence, the story of how the foundations of social injustice were destroyed in old village. On the quiet Don, irreconcilable currents awoke and met. Mighty blows shake the Melekhov house. Panteley Prokofievich feels how unknown and frightening in its novelty forces are tearing the roots that forever, it seemed, connected the Cossacks with the monarch, with the ataman power. Grigory struggles, unable to escape from the circle of contradictions that surround him.
In all modern world literature one cannot find a figure as expressive as he is controversial. Equally captivating the eyes of readers and encouraging them, looking around, to look for Grigory Melekhov among non-fictional living people.1
Grigory Melekhov grew up in an atmosphere of admiration for the Cossack military virtues. Cossacks in uniforms with shoulder straps, wearing all the insignia, went to church and to the village gathering. St. George's crosses and medals evoked reverence, deep respect, and this respectful attitude towards titles and royal awards was instilled in childhood.
“Serve as you should,” father inspired Gregory, who was drafted into the army before the imperialist war. The Tsar’s service will not be wasted.” And he signed the letter: “Your parent, senior officer Panteley Melekhov.” My father was not just a father, but also a senior officer. This military rank, in the deep conviction of Pantelei Prokofievich, obliged him to additional respect.
Work was Gregory's need; he could not imagine his life outside of work. And more than once during the war, with a dull, heart-grabbing melancholy, Grigory recalled his close people, his native farm, work in the fields: “It would be nice to take the chapigi with your hands and follow the plow along the wet furrow, greedily taking in with your nostrils the damp and insipid smell of loosened earth, the bitter aroma of grass cut with a ploughshare.”
From childhood, Gregory was brought up with humanity, love for the earth, nature, and the animal world. While mowing, Grigory accidentally cut the chick in two, picked it up, “with a sudden feeling of acute pity, he looked at the dead lump lying in his palm.”
Grigory Melekhov, before the war and the revolution that shook the whole country, did not think about social issues. He loves his family, his kuren, and is attached to his native farm. He never had a feeling of rejection of the order of life in which he grew up. Even breaking up with his family and becoming a farm laborer did not distance Gregory from farm life. And when Aksinya suggested leaving everything and going to the mines, to the mines, “far away,” Grigory
In the difficult family drama, in the little things of everyday life, in the trials of war, the deep humanity of Grigory Melekhov is revealed. His character is characterized by a heightened sense of justice, consciousness of the dignity of his human personality, strong, passionate love across all the innumerable manifestations of life. And it is natural that Gregory, thrown into the heat of war, experiences his first battle heavily and painfully, and cannot forget the Austrian he killed. “I cut down a man in vain and because of him, the bastard, my soul is sick,” he complains to his brother Peter. Gregory develops a feeling of rejection of the imperialist war, a vague awareness of its aimlessness and destructiveness...
Grigory, like all Cossacks, is a man of agricultural labor, endowed with a feeling of an inextricably strong connection with the surrounding world of life, he is sensitive to everything beautiful. Gregory’s inherent sense of understanding a person is also revealed in the history of his relationships with Aksinya and Natalya. Love for the proud Aksinya, whose fiery, destructive beauty does not fade over the years, life with Natalya - a beautiful woman of a different kind, faithful and loving wife- mother - help us to grasp and understand a lot in Gregory.
Gregory is a man of strong passions, decisive actions and actions. His love for Aksinya, full of dramatic vicissitudes, shocks with its strength and depth. Having returned from the hospital on leave after being wounded, Grigory learns that Aksinya has “confused” with the young Lisnitsky... Grigory, a simple Cossack, terribly and brutally beat the plump-chested centurion, abandoned Aksinya, and returned to the farm, to his native kuren. But neither Aksinya’s betrayal, nor life with Natalya, nor the children extinguished the strong, passionate feeling. During the long nights at the front, he remembered and yearned for Aksinya.
Gregory is distinguished by a developed feeling self-esteem, consciousness of oneself as a full-fledged person. In a class society built on the subordination and oppression of some by others, it inevitably had to lead and did lead to sharp clashes.
During the conscription, a group of officers inspected the equipment of the Cossack recruits. White-handed officers evoke a hostile feeling in Grigory. His fingers, “rough and dark,” touched the “white, sugar fingers” of one of the officers. He pulled his hand back and, wincing in disgust, wiped it on the lining of his overcoat. Grigory looks at the officer with an evil smile, and the officer, meeting his gaze, could not stand it and shouted: “How are you looking? How do you look, Cossack? This same Gregory, when the sergeant came at him with his fists near the well, says with terrible force of hatred: “That’s what... if you hit me, I’ll still kill you!” Understood?" And the sergeant hastily moved away from Gregory.
IN gray everyday life army service Grigory acutely feels the “impenetrable silent wall” between himself and the well-dressed officers—idlers. This is the feeling of a man - a worker who feeds on the labor of his hands and, not realizing the class division of society, nevertheless clearly understands that landowners and officers are people of another world, and despises this world of parasites and slackers standing above them. These feelings will grow in Gregory and during the years of the civil war they will more than once burst into heavy, scorching hatred of the oppressors and parasites.
Gregory is always ready to stand up for the trampled dignity of a person. He rushes at the Cossacks who raped the maid Franya, they tied him up and threatened to kill him. And when the officer during the examination asked why a button on his overcoat was torn off, Grigory, remembering what happened in the stable, for the first time in a long period of time almost cried from shame and the consciousness of his powerlessness. This is how Grigory Melekhov finds himself imperialist war.
It seems that we learned a lot about Gregory from the everyday environment in which he and his family lived, from those complex and confusing relationships that he had with Natalya and Aksinya. A dark-skinned Cossack with a sullen, bestial look stands before us as if alive, hot-tempered to the point of recklessness, proudly protecting his human dignity, decisive, sharp, gentle and rude... Remarkable strength is felt in his stooped figure, in his quick glance, and his deft work acumen, in his dashing Cossack landing. And yet, there will be a certain incompleteness in our ideas about Grigory Melekhov until we understand what he thought about the war, with what ideas about the nature of its meaning he was plunged into the bloody abyss of battles.
In the hospital, Gregory met a smart and sarcastic soldier - the Bolshevik Garanzha. Under the fiery power and truth of his words, the foundations on which Gregory’s consciousness rested began to smoke. “These foundations were rotten, the monstrous absurdity of war undermined them with rust, and only a push was needed. An impetus was given, a thought awoke, it exhausted, pressed down Gregory’s simple, ingenuous mind.” The truth about the unnecessaryness of war, revealed to him by Garanzha, seemed terrible to Gregory. The dream leaves him, Grigory wakes up Garanzhu at night, angrily and anxiously asks: “You say that for the needs of the rich they are driving us to death, but what about the people? Does he not understand? Gregory struggles with the question: how to stop the war? “... Everything must be put upside down?.. And under the new government, where will you go?.. What will you give to shorten the war?..” Garanzha answered everything. And Grigory, parting with him, excitedly thanked him: “Well, Little Russian, thank you for opening my eyes. Now I’m sighted and... angry!”
The importance of the first cannot be underestimated political school Gregory. It was fully felt in the first months after the October Revolution, when Gregory, taking the side of the Bolsheviks, led the Cossacks against the White Guards.
Even if the truth discovered by Garanzha did not possess him for long, it nevertheless gave a strong impetus to unprecedented thoughts and feelings...
Grigory is going home on leave. Dissatisfaction with the war, rage against those who drove people to slaughter, combined with offended personal feelings, erupted in the scene of the brutal beating of Listnitsky. The family, the farm, oiled his troubled heart, caressed him with honor and undisguised flattery. Well, the first gentleman of St. George in the farmstead came on leave! The old people talked to him as an equal. Grigory caught respectful, amazed glances, the women and girls took off their hats at his bow, and did not hide the admiration of the women and girls. The family looked after him attentively, almost ingratiatingly. Panteley Prokofievich walked proudly next to him on the way to the Maidan or to church. Well, how could the poor head not get dizzy! Not everyone received such an honor. In the foggy distance of memories, the great truth discovered by Garanzha faded, the harsh bitterness of his words was forgotten. The order established from time immemorial seemed inviolable, the concepts of Cossack honor and military valor, nurtured throughout life, again acquired their exciting, primordial value. “Grigory came from the front one person, and left another. Not putting up with the senselessness of war in his soul, he honestly cherished his Cossack glory...” And this Gregory “seized the opportunity to express selfless courage, took risks, acted extravagantly, went to the Austrians in disguise, took down outposts without bloodshed, the Cossack horse-rided and felt that that pain had gone away irrevocably for the person who crushed him in the first days of the war.”
With the beginning of this historical event, as a war fraught with the most serious and unexpected consequences, in an atmosphere of a brewing revolutionary crisis, it was important to find out and bring to the fore Gregory’s social and political feelings. M.A. Sholokhov pits Melekhov against people with sharply expressed opposite social likes and dislikes. The Cossack Chubatiy and the soldier Garanzha, like litmus tests, contribute to the manifestation of different traits in the image of Melekhov.
The imperialist war brought Grigory together with Chubaty at the front. Chubaty professes a disgusting and wretched philosophy of hatred and contempt for man. This is who fully expressed the ideal of the Cossack - the grunt, the faithful servant of the “tsar, the throne and the fatherland”, which was so loved by the ruling classes of Tsarist Russia! To Grigory, who recalled with heightened pain the Austrian he had killed, Chubaty cynically lectured: “Cut down a man boldly... Don’t think about how or what. You are a Cossack, your job is to chop without asking... You cannot destroy an animal without need - a heifer, say, or whatever - but destroy a person. He’s a filthy man... Evil spirits, he stinks on the earth, he lives like a mushroom - a toadstool.” Gregory was initially hostile towards Chubaty. He shoots Chubaty when he, for no reason whatsoever, cut down a captured Magyar. “If I killed you, it would be one less sin on my soul,” Grigory says directly and openly later, when Chubaty reminded him of the skirmish.
That unconscious humanism, which was absorbed with the milk of his working mother, defeated the destructive philosophy of Chubaty in Grigory’s soul. The obvious senselessness of the war provokes restless thoughts, melancholy, and acute discontent in him. Thus, the writer, as it were, leads Gregory to a meeting with Garanzha, to the perception of a great human truth. Democracy and humanism gain victory over proprietary and class prejudices in Gregory for some time.
Gregory's intense search for the great truth, suitable for all the people, begins. By creating this image of a restless seeker of truth, the writer revealed in him the complex theme of the tragedy of a man who was crippled by the forces of the past, entangling and blinding him on a difficult path.1 Subsequently, he will abandon these searches as naive childhood dreams and will think, seek the truth, suitable only for the Cossacks. Grigory goes home from the hospital firmly convinced that he knows where and on which side the truth lives in the world.
After returning from home, rested, once again imbued with his “Cossack” identity, Grigory became close to Chubaty. There are no more clashes and quarrels between them. Chubaty's influence affected Grigory's psyche and character. “Pity for the man has disappeared,” Gregory’s heart has “hardened, become coarse.” And we suddenly feel quite clearly the terrible connection that exists between the centuries-old Cossack way of life and the anti-human, degenerate philosophy of Chubaty. The Melekhov family, the circumstances of their life and Chubaty came into contact with something very significant in the reader’s perception...
The writer covers relatively little of Gregory’s life at the front after returning from home. This is stated either in general terms or in Gregory’s memoirs. M.A. Sholokhov focuses on the internal transformations of the hero. “With cold contempt he played with someone else’s and his own life... he knew that he would no longer laugh as before; he knew that his eyes were sunken and his cheekbones were sticking out sharply; he knew that it was difficult for him, when kissing a child, to look openly into clear eyes; Gregory knew what price he paid for a full bow of crosses and production.” This is, as it were, the result of what Gregory the man came to the revolution with.
But Garanja planted a living seed in his soul. The words of the smart, evil neighbor in the hospital ward were not forgotten. Grigory once outlined to Chubatom
Finding the meaning of life, your path
The Great October Revolution and the Civil War posed the question to Grigory Melekhov, as well as to all Cossacks: with whom to go and where to go?
The Bolsheviks brought peace to the tormented country. The majority of Cossacks - front-line soldiers, exhausted by the war, took the side of the Bolsheviks. Grigory Melekhov was among them.
Gregory came to the revolution with weak, undeveloped sympathies for the Bolsheviks. He did not have strong political convictions, and he would not have them throughout the entire civil war. But the events associated with the uprising were of decisive importance for the whole future fate Gregory. It was necessary to show Melekhov from all sides: the attitude of the Cossacks towards him, painful doubts about the correctness of the chosen path, the behavior of the sailors in battle, love for Aksinya, grief after the death of Natalya... Self-characteristics that came to the fore in psychological analysis, the psychological significance of the events had to convey tense inner life Gregory, their search for the right path.
The combination of the Cossack rebels with the whites sharpens Gregory’s understanding of the incompatibility of the interests of the Cossacks with the goals of the counter-revolutionary movement. A whole series of scenes follows: a clash with Fitzkhalaurov, indignation at the English officer. In this chain of events, the writer reveals Gregory’s growing antipathy towards the White Guards, shows the deep connection of spontaneous patriotic feeling with Melekhov’s working nature. The hostile attitude towards the “cadets” manifests itself in the harshest form: refusal to carry out Fitzkhalaurov’s orders, cancellation of Ermakov’s combat mission.
Melekhov's further stay in the White Army becomes uninteresting. And it is no coincidence that Sholokhov says almost nothing about this period of Gregory’s life. There is not a single event associated with it. Sick with typhus, he is brought home on the eve of the counter-revolutionary movement. In fact, he no longer takes part in the fight. He follows along with those retreating, not as part of a military unit, but on his own. It is as if he were observing the decomposition and collapse of the army from the outside. At night, in the steppe, listening to an ancient Cossack song, which was sung by a cavalry regiment passing by, repeating its words to himself, Gregory, with aching melancholy, with tears, experiences all the shame of the inglorious struggle against the Russian people. This is one of those events that prepared Grigory for the transfer to serve in the Red Army.
The sequence of events reveals the internal logic of Melekhov’s actions, the pattern of his fate. In accordance with the truth of the turbulent revolutionary era, the writer constantly confronts his hero with the need for immediate action. Every time Gregory has to choose between two things: life will not give him the opportunity to evade decisions. He himself didn’t know how to wait and hide, and he didn’t want to. A chain of actions is created that are tightly connected and condition each other. Outwardly, he found himself in some kind of vicious circle: in the war he became an officer; for this, the Red Army soldiers of one of the regiments that entered Tatar almost killed him; he ran; then again he had to hide from arrest; joined the uprising.
The sequence of actions and their character reveal a combination of objective and subjective factors in the fate of Grigory Melekhov. M.A. Sholokhov achieves here a complete merging of the truth of history and the truth of character. It is in this fusion that the greatest artistic persuasiveness and authenticity of the image of Grigory Melekhov lies. His fluctuations and flights from one side to the other during the civil war were inevitable. The painful search for the path to follow continues. “I wanted to turn away from everything seething with hatred, hostile and incomprehensible world. There, behind, everything was confused and contradictory. It was difficult to find the right path; As if in a muddy path, the soil began to clog under your feet, the path became fragmented, and there was no certainty whether he was following the right one. He was drawn to the Bolsheviks - he walked, led others along with him, and then he began to think, his heart grew cold. “... Who should I lean against?”
But life more than once gave Gregory the opportunity to choose. Before Podtyolkov’s execution, he could have gone to the Red Army, but he didn’t leave and ended up in the White Cossack camp; during the uprising he could obey in time to Soviet power, did not do this and rolled with the defeated white army to the sea; He could have served in the Red Army until the end of the war, but he returned to the farmstead, in the difficult situation of an imminent anti-Soviet uprising, and ended up in Fomin’s gang. The criticism expressed the idea that, by bringing Grigory Melekhov into Fomin’s gang, the writer executed his hero in a spectacle of a bloody parody of the ideals that he once professed and defended with arms in his hands during the days of the Veshensky rebellion.1
The fourth volume of “The Quiet Don” is a book of results. Every scene, picture, detail is executed here deep meaning and meanings. They are selected and evaluated with that measure of artistic tact and expediency that does not allow anything superfluous or unnecessary. Sholokhov keeps the reader in extreme tension.
In the eighth part of “The Quiet Don,” Grigory, demobilized from the Red Army, returns home. In the stormy, faded autumn steppe, he recalls his distant childhood, dreams of a peaceful life, of happiness with Aksinya.
We haven't seen him for a long time. We said goodbye to him in Novorossiysk, when a patrol of red horsemen came around the corner to meet Gregory and his companions, also participants in the Verkhnedonsky. From the words of Prokhor Zykov, we learned that Grigory served in the Red Army, fought with Wrangel and the White Poles. Many events took place during this time in the farmstead. Gregory’s mother died without waiting for her “little one,” “desired.”
Dunyasha married Koshevoy, who became the chairman of the Council. Aksinya returned to her kuren, having recovered from typhus. What happened to Gregory? What has he become now?
As if again, after long separation, when all the changes are seen more sharply, more clearly, we peer at Gregory through the eyes of his random companion - “name”. In such a choice life situation the author's mature skill was revealed. After all, Sholokhov could convey the appearance of the present Gregory in a variety of circumstances: when meeting with close people - Aksinya,
Dunyashka, Prokhor, and finally, in the author’s objectified description, Sholokhov gives the appearance of Gregory as perceived by a random female guide. An author's portrait in this place would lack the spontaneity of feeling; Aksinya and Dunyashka, from the excitement and joy of meeting, would not have been able to see Gregory the way the studying, curious, worldly, experienced eyes of his “name” saw him: “He is not very old, although he is gray-haired. And kind of eccentric,” she thought. - All his eyes are frowning, why are they squinting? How, tell me, is he so tired, how, tell me, did they carry a cart on him... But he’s nothing of himself. Only gray hair a lot and his mustache is almost gray. And so it’s okay. What is he thinking about?"
The unwise woman seems to be talking to herself, you can even hear a conversational intonation here. And this “squinting his eyes” Grigory, “weary, how, say, they drove a cart on him,” she saw, not only reminds us of those seven years of war during which he “did not get off his horse.” This Gregory awakens pity, a nagging - melancholy presentiment. Oh, I can’t believe that he has reached a peaceful family haven! Life had much more grief and loss in store for him...
The writer found an image of great emotional power and expressiveness, which not only recreated the appearance of Gregory, “killed” by grave delusions, a war that reminded him of his past, but also an image in which a premonition of a tragic ending sounds. The ability to see, feel and excite in this way distinguishes a perfect master.
Critics about the tragedy of Grigory Melekhov
The life of Grigory Melekhov was not easy; his journey ends tragically in “Quiet Flows the Don.” Who is he: a victim of delusions who experienced the full brunt of historical retribution, or an individualist who broke with the people and became a pitiful renegade? In the critical literature about Sholokhov and his novel, debates about the essence of the tragedy of Grigory Melekhov still continue. At first, the prevailing opinion was that this was a renegade tragedy. This view is most clearly expressed in the work of L. Yakimenko:
“...the tragedy of Grigory Melekhov is ultimately precisely in isolation from the revolutionary people, who affirm in life the high ideals of the new society. Grigory Melekhov’s break with the laboring Cossacks and revolt were the result of unresolved hesitations and anarchic denial of the new reality. His defection becomes tragic, since this confused man from the people went against himself, against millions of workers just like himself.”1
But Doctor of Philology V.V. Agenosov refutes this point of view: “The renegade does not evoke sympathy - even those who in the ranks of the Red Army mercilessly dealt with the real Melekhovs cried over the fate of Gregory. Grigory did not become a beast, did not lose the ability to feel, suffer, and did not lose the desire to live.”
“The tragedy of Grigory Melekhov is a tragedy of historical error,” - given point view, going back to the article by B. Emelyanov “On the Quiet Don and Its Critics,” which appeared in 1940, is currently most sharply and consistently pursued by A. Britikov and N. Maslin. According to this theory, Gregory carried within himself many features of the Russian national character, the Russian peasantry. “One cannot but agree with this, but “he wanders like a blizzard in the steppe” not because he is an owner, like any peasant, but because in each of the warring parties he does not find absolute moral truth, which he strives for with the inherent Russian people maximalism,” writes V.V. Agenosov.
V. Hoffenschefer argued that in the eighth part of the novel the story of the tragedy of Gregory as a typical representative of the Cossacks ends and the story of an unfortunate man broken by trials begins.2
There is another way of looking at this issue. G. A. Frolov, a researcher of the work of M. A. Sholokhov, writes: “The origins of the tragedy of Grigory Melekhov lie in the fact that he the most typical representative Don Cossacks, who became victims of revolutionary violence. The fate of Gregory in the novel is universalized, it actualizes important problems for the 20th century: man - revolution - power - freedom. Through the broken fate of Gregory, through the collapse of the Melekhov family, Sholokhov showed the fate of the Russian peasantry at a turning point in history, in its rejection or contradictory attitude towards the revolution. And Grigory Melekhov, being one of the leaders of the uprising, fights not only for his kuren and allotment of land. This is a fight against violence, against an inhuman regime, against forms of enslavement, a fight for a free Don, for the idea of freedom. And this is the truly correct “third path” of Sholokhov’s hero, chosen in torment and doubt.”
Much has been written about Sholokhov’s novel; critics have been arguing about its characters for decades, but the character of Grigory Melekhov and his tragic fate still remain mysterious, because none of the existing concepts covers the image in its entirety.
The tragedy of Grigory Melekhov is the tragedy of the Don and the entire Russian Cossacks as a whole. This is what M. A. Sholokhov himself said about this to the correspondent “ Soviet Russia": "Gregory, in my opinion, is a kind of symbol of the middle peasant Cossacks. Those who know the history of the civil war on the Don, who know its course, know that it was not just Grigory Melekhov and dozens of Grigori Melekhovs who staggered until 1920.”1
And in a conversation with V. Vasiliev, he noted: “... the social appearance of Grigory Melekhov embodies features characteristic not only of a certain layer of the Cossacks, but also of the peasantry in general. After all, what happened among the Don Cossacks during the years of the revolution and civil war happened in similar forms among the Ural, Kuban, Siberian, Semirechensk, Transbaikal, Terek Cossacks and among the Russian peasantry”2.
It has long been indisputable that the fate of Gregory uniquely refracts the path of the historical errors of the Cossacks during the years of the Civil War. If you follow Gregory step by step along his entire path, from memorable meetings with Izvarin and Podtyolkov to Novorossiysk, to joining the ranks of Budyonny’s cavalry, then you will notice the amazing commonality of his fate, the consonance of moods, the kinship of illusions with the fate, moods and illusions of the Cossacks .
Even the outline of the external fate of Grigory Melekhov during the Veshensky uprising uniquely reflects the ebbs and flows in the mood of the Cossack masses
[It is more important for Sholokhov to show that not only the external fate of Gregory coincides with the fate of the Cossacks during the days of the uprising, but also his thoughts and moods are surprisingly consonant with those thoughts and moods that engulfed the Cossacks. A writer with an astonishing succession As if reluctantly, Grigory Melekhov became involved in the fight against the Reds, but gradually bitterness came to him. But the same sentiments were also captured by the Cossacks, who, too, succumbing to bitterness, took prisoners less and less, and more and more often engaged in robberies. The idea of the ideological and moral community of Grigory Melekhov with the Cossack masses receives its artistic implementation in the compositional structure, in the logic of plot development.
Grigory Melekhov is closely connected with the Cossack masses, personifying their intelligence and prejudices, those features of the Cossacks that developed historically and manifested themselves in the heated situation of the civil war. The path of historical error that befell the Cossacks, the social roots that gave birth to the “Don Vendee”, uniquely determined the fate of Grigory Melekhov: he found himself a participant in a reactionary movement, historically doomed. But this was a movement of the masses awakened by the revolution, so the process of overcoming prejudices and destroying illusions that pushed people onto the wrong path of fighting the revolution was inevitable. These were hard lessons that became a turning point in the movement of the Cossacks towards a new life.
Grigory Melekhov fully experienced the bitterness of the collapse of illusions and the painful feeling of shame. However, the difficult experiences of searching for the truth did not pass without a trace for him. Spontaneous impulses are replaced by the ability to think. Moral and psychological prerequisites for the evolution of character in the direction that the masses of the Cossacks suffered at a difficult cost are outlined.
Grigory Melekhov - main character M. Sholokhov's epic novel "Quiet Don". His image cannot be called typical, because it also contains special individual traits.
Grigory Melekhov is an ordinary Don Cossack, who grew up in a fairly wealthy family with a patriarchal way of life. From the very first pages of the novel, he is depicted in everyday peasant life, which helps the reader to immediately see the main character traits of Gregory. He reveals a love for nature and for all living things: “with a sudden feeling of acute pity” he looks at a duckling accidentally cut with a scythe during meadow mowing. In addition, the hero is characterized by sincerity and honesty. He forever retains his love for Aksinya in his soul, and immediately admits to his wife Natalya that he feels nothing for her: “And I feel sorry for you... to die, during these days we became close, but there is nothing in my heart... Empty.” However, I think that all this can be attributed to the typical traits of a hero.
In my opinion, the individual traits of Grigory Melekhov include his desire to find his way in life, to find himself. The hero seeks the truth, despite all the difficulties and vicissitudes of fate. He is an uneducated and politically illiterate person, so he is easily instilled with different views on war and life in general. However, Gregory does not give up and, when those around him offer him different paths, he firmly answers: “I myself am looking for an entrance.”
Throughout his life, the hero often commits terrible offenses, but Gregory looks for the root of all mistakes in himself, in his actions. He is not without self-condemnation. The war could not destroy his soul and all that goodness that was originally in it. She broke the hero, but did not break him completely. By the end of the novel, the most important values for Melekhov are home, family, and children. War, murder and death only disgust him. Therefore, one can even say that Gregory is an epic hero who takes upon himself all historical responsibility. His image is equal to the image of an entire people. And Melekhov’s path to truth is the tragic path of man’s wanderings, full of mistakes and losses, evidence of man’s deep connection with history. This is the special individuality inherent only in the image of Gregory.
Melekhov is a complex hero, combining both typical and individual traits. However, this gives his image versatility and tragedy, making it memorable and very original.