Why Dead Souls is a poem. Why did Gogol call "Dead Souls" a poem? The question is open
Work " Dead Souls“, which Gogol wrote, today remains one of the most brilliant creations not only of this writer, but also in Russian literature in general. This work can safely be called the pinnacle of the talent of Nikolai Vasilyevich, who was able to very accurately depict contemporary Russia, show the life of all segments of the population, the failure of the bureaucratic apparatus and squalor. No one doubts the genius of the work, only for many decades now both fans of creativity and critics cannot understand why Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem?
According to the writer himself, the idea to write this creation was given to him by Pushkin, who all the time admired the manner of writing Gogol’s works and his ability to revive his heroes by describing just a few character traits. Alexander Sergeevich himself had an idea to write a similar poem, but he decided to give it to his friend. Many believe that this is the answer to the question of why Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem, because the work was originally conceived in exactly this form.
Nikolai Vasilyevich only took the idea from Pushkin, because when writing the work he began to go deeper and describe in more detail not only the character of the heroes, but also their fate, the life of the entire country at that time. IN different periods the writer called his creation a novel, an essay, a story, but why Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem, focusing on this particular genre, remains a mystery. There is an assumption that he did this after seeing all the richness and breadth of the lyrical elements.
The poem is constructed very clearly and clearly, main character Chichikov travels throughout Russia to become the owner of large sums of money by buying up dead souls. Manilov, Nozdrev, Sobakevich, Korobochka, Plyushkin are not just the names of the landowners whom he visited, they are the way of life, thinking and feelings of people of this class. Nikolai Vasilyevich wanted to write not one volume, but three, which would take the heroes to another level, where they could be morally reborn.
Gogol's poem "Dead Souls" should take pride of place next to such world works as Homer's "Odyssey" and Dante's "Divine Comedy". The first work describes the life of the ancient Greeks, the second medieval feudalism, and Gogol described life in Russia in the first half of the 19th century. He also wanted his heroes to go through hell, purgatory and heaven, to show the moral decline of society, which is exciting, but that among all this disorder and rot there was a clearing - the path to spiritual rebirth.
After getting acquainted with this work, it becomes clear that it was written in an unconventional form and has no analogues in the whole world. Perhaps this is precisely the answer to the question of why Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem. In the structure of the work, a significant role is given to lyrical digressions, which is typical for this genre. It is in the digressions that the thoughts of the writer can be traced, who shares with the reader his experiences about the situation in his native country. Gogol completed his first volume, leaving the assumption that the state awaits the revival and enlightenment of the souls of the entire people. The writer wanted to recreate an ideal world, so he called his creation a lyric-epic poem.
A poem is a lyric-epic genre in which the narrative of historical events and events in the lives of heroes is revealed through the assessment and perception of the narrator. “Dead Souls” is one of the most brilliant works of Russian world culture. This poem is the pinnacle of Gogol's creativity. She shows Gogol's contemporary Nikolaev Russia with its bureaucratic apparatus and the decomposition of serfdom. The poem shows the fall of human personality.
In his “Author's Confession,” Gogol indicates that Pushkin gave him the idea to write “Dead Souls.” Pushkin admired Gogol’s ability to “guess a person and suddenly present him with a few features as if he were alive...”, so he gave Gogol his own plot, which he planned to turn into a poem. Gogol followed Pushnik's advice. In the process of work, the concept of the poem gradually began to deepen. Nikolai Vasilyevich conceived not one, but three volumes in which it was possible to show Rus' not “from one side,” but comprehensively. The second and third volumes were, according to the author’s thoughts, to bring goodies and show the moral revival of Chichikov. The writer himself did not immediately determine the genre of his work. At first the work was conceived as a novel. But already in 1836, in a letter to Zhukovsky, Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem. Breadth and richness of the work lyrical elements, allowing the writer to reveal his attitude towards the depicted, and inspired Gogol with the idea of calling “Dead Souls” a poem.
“Dead Souls” in its entirety began to be thought of by Gogol as a work that, in terms of the breadth of its coverage of life, should stand in line with such poems as Homer’s “Odyssey”, which depicts life ancient Greece, or Dante’s poem “The Divine Comedy”, which reflected the ideology of feudal medieval society Western Europe. Like the last poem, “Dead Souls” was supposed to depict the “hell”, “purgatory” and “paradise” of Gogol’s contemporary Russia. Gogol felt like an artist called upon not only to show acute social problems and the moral decline of society, but also to show the way to spiritual revival
All this determined the originality of the genre specificity of the work. It is obvious that Gogol's poem is unconventional, and this artistic construction has no analogues in the world.
The structure of the poem is distinguished by clarity and clarity: all parts are interconnected by the plot-forming hero Chichikov, who travels in order to obtain large funds. A special feature of the composition is N.V. Gogol’s use of an insert story - “The Tale of Captain Kopeikin.” Despite its apparent independence, it is genre-related with the entire work: within the framework of “ Dead souls” as a poem another poem arises.
Lyrical digressions occupy a significant place in the ideological and compositional structure of the work, which is typical for the poem as literary genre. In his lyrical digressions, Gogol touches on the most pressing, most important social issues. Thanks to them, we constantly feel the presence of the author, who shares his thoughts and experiences with us. Two of the most important themes of the author's reflections - the theme of Russia and the theme of the road - merge in a lyrical digression that concludes the first volume. It sounds Gogol's faith in the revival of Russia and that the soul of the people will appear alive and beautiful.
An ideal world cannot be recreated epically, since spiritual world the lyrics describe. Therefore, Gogol defines the genre of the work as lyric-epic, calling “Dead Souls” a poem.
The work “Dead Souls” by Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol is known to everyone since school days. However, not everyone can correctly determine the genre of this masterpiece. The reader associates the poem with a poetic work, and not with prose. But Gogol himself, many of his contemporaries and critics undoubtedly classify “Dead Souls” as a poem. In this article we will briefly touch on the topic of “Why is “Dead Souls” a poem?”
Poem as a genre
In our usual understanding, a poem is a poetic work of medium or large size. When we talk about this genre, the first thing that comes to mind from Russian literature is “Vasily Terkin” by Tvardovsky. The greatest work of all times, Homer's Iliad is also a poem. However, there are works that were not written in poetic form, but are still considered a poem. Vivid examples are “Dead Souls” by Gogol and “Moscow-Petushki” by Erofeev.
What distinguishes a poem from other genres?
- the presence of lyrical digressions;
- is based on a narrative about an event;
- close attention to moral and social issues;
- the main character is depicted in interaction with other characters;
- the main character is an unknown person, but the events that happen to him are significant and interesting;
- the presence of antiheroes.
Why is “Dead Souls” a poem?
“Dead Souls” by N.V. Gogol is a great prose work of world literature. Many people are concerned with the question of why a work written not in poetic form is called a poem. Firstly, the author himself called his brainchild a poem. In his notes and letters to friends, he defines the work as a poem or novel.
He created something between a novel and an epic. According to the plot, the main character travels a lot, many adventurous events take place in his life, which is also typical for the poem genre.
The presence of lyrical digressions and generalizations are perhaps the main factors in classifying this work as a poem. It would seem that all the heroes in “Dead Souls” are completely different people with their own way of life and views on the world. But at the same time, the landowners are similar in one thing: they are all typical representatives of landowner Russia. They have lost their human appearance and live only by instincts, having long forgotten what a soul is.
Critics were generally positive about the author's definition of the genre for his work. V. G. Belinsky believed that “Dead Souls” was written in an exclusively poetic manner, K. Aksakov compares it with the ancient epic, and the critic O. I. Senkovsky, defining Gogol’s work, called “Dead Souls” a poem not in verse.
Lyrical digressions in the poem
“Dead Souls” is considered a poem also because there are a lot of lyrical digressions in the work. The author's constant reflections and monologues integrated so organically into the plot that without them it would have lost its special charm. in them N.V. Gogol reflects on the future fate of Russia and the fate of landowners and serfs. It is thanks to lyrical digressions that the reader understands how much the author loves his country and how worried he is about its fate. Russia is the only positive character in the work. Any of the landowners who met on Chichikov’s path is an anti-hero, and only Russia is described by the author with love and indescribable delight.
Why “Dead Souls” by N.V. Gogol called it a poem?
“Dead Souls” N.V. Gogol is a phenomenon as brilliant and amazing as the work of A.S. Pushkin "Eugene Onegin". Both texts (from the point of view of genre definition) turn out to be the author's innovation in the system of genres of Russian literature of the nineteenth century. How unusual it seemed to literary society at that time to define lyrical work as a “novel” (albeit “in verse”), and the definition of “poem” in relation to a prose text sounds just as surprising.
Vissarion Grigorievich Belinsky, the great critic of the nineteenth century, characterizes Gogol's work as a novel, building a clear system of evidence. However, knowing this point of view very well, Gogol, in the second edition of Dead Souls, defines the genre of the work as “poem”. There are a number of significant reasons for this, which can be discovered through a detailed analysis of the text.
Firstly, according to the definition, a poem is a lyric-epic genre in which any significant and significant characters are brought to the fore. It is safe to say that the work of N.V. Gogol is not just a text, it is not just a story about the fate and adventures of Chichikov, about his amazing scam, about a daring and incredible idea, and so on. No, the text of the poem is also the place of the author’s tangible existence: the reader cannot help but discover a living writer’s spirit, reflected in the lyrical digressions in which Gogol discusses the fate of Russia. That is, the subtle lyrics of the author’s soul, his sincere experiences are closely intertwined with the main storyline outlined in the work.
Secondly, the heroes of “Dead Souls” are a kind of “anti-heroes”. They are significant, known to all the people, they have become famous, but all their actions and deeds are characterized by negative side, they cause hostility. Lermontov, presenting Pechorin to the reader as a hero of his time, described the typical nature of the modern generation in the same tones (it is worth saying that not without a shadow of regret). So is Gogol: he shows all the most vile, exposes to the reader the ordinary and to everyone famous Russia- not a strong state with great victories and a long history, but a country with its own ugly, base passions and nasty vices, in which it is not brave liberating heroes who act, but petty and greedy landowner souls. Manilov, Korobochka, Sobakevich, Nozdryov and Plyushkin - these are the most significant characters of that time: low and stupid characters, immoral and absolutely dead, empty; however, these are the heroes of their time, these are the morals of Russia, boldly and vividly shown by the great writer.
Thirdly, it is worth noting that Gogol called “Dead Souls” a poem also because he considered the very idea of his work to be significant and very important: he thought of it as a significant impulse for the spiritual revival of Russia.
It is possible that it was precisely this attitude towards his idea that gave N.V. the reason to Gogol defined the genre of his work as “poem”.
When Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol decided to create a work now called “Dead Souls,” he set himself a special goal - to be able to comprehensively depict the vast Russia. The writer realized that for this he would need to turn to some genre that was not hackneyed by other writers. Even just starting “Dead Souls,” the author wrote in his diary the words that his new creation was neither a novel, nor a story, nor a short story.
It is believed that the idea of creating a work in the genre of a poem was given to Gogol by Pushkin, who repeatedly admired the writer’s talent. And I once wanted to create a prose poem myself. But Gogol used only the basis of the idea and developed it widely. What Alexander Sergeevich did not talk about.
Gogol began to delve into the plot and thoroughly describe not only the character of the characters, but also their lives against the backdrop of the unfolding historical events of that time. Having defined the genre of the new work as a poem, the writer wanted to highlight those special features that belong to this work: epicness, generalization and many lyrical digressions in the text.
The writer said that a special type of work has appeared in literature, which is a kind of middle ground between the novel and the epic. He called such creations lesser kinds of epic. The main character was private person, whose actions meanwhile became significant for many people.
Such heroes, by their behavior, exposed the vices of modernity, which others carefully tried to hide from the public eye. Wanting his new work to be considered “a lesser kind of epic,” Gogol calls it a poem.
The poem has a clearly structured composition. Its main character travels around the country with the desire to become the owner of big Money, everywhere buying the dead souls of peasants for next to nothing. Landowners who became sellers of souls are not just people who wanted to get money for free.
These are invented images showing the typical views, desires and habits of people of that class. The author wanted to show how low the spiritual qualities of Russian landowners had fallen. He wanted to create not one, but three volumes of the poem, in which the heroes could still change and be reborn morally. The author dreamed of such a turn in Russian history.
When you first read this work, you realize that it was truly created in a non-standard form. It is hardly possible to find something similar from any other Russian or foreign author. In it, a huge role is assigned to lyrical digressions. But they are precisely what characterizes the poem.
In them, the author expresses his own thoughts, unobtrusively introducing his own “I” into the narrative. Gogol finished the first book, leaving the idea that our country would face changes and the fall of the black haze from the souls of the people. He wanted to revive the ideal world, so he called his work a lyric-epic poem.
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