The problem of the role of personality in history. As L.N.
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Historical science and fiction connects a lot. In the creative heritage of the great Russian writers there are a number of such works that historians are interested in professionally, and among them one of the first places is occupied by Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace". Leonid Brezhnev spoke about the enduring relevance of those common human problems that are touched upon in it at a solemn meeting dedicated to the presentation of the Golden Star medal to the hero-city of Tula. "The writer," he noted, "pondered a lot about the problems that concern us too," the problems of war and peace. Not all of Tolstoy's ideas are in tune with our era. But the main idea of his great novel, the idea that ultimately the people, the masses decide the fundamental questions of history, determine the fate of states and the outcome of wars - this deep thought is true today, as always "1.
Hundreds of studies are devoted to Tolstoy's worldview and his work, in which "War and Peace" takes a place worthy of this remarkable work. The novel is considered in general works on the historical views of the writer, there are a number of works specially devoted to the philosophy of history of the author of "War and Peace", the historical realities described in the novel 2. The purpose of this article is to analyze Tolstoy's views on the laws of the historical process, on the role of the individual and the masses in history, as well as in comparing these views with public opinion in those years when the writer was working on the text of the novel.
The aggravation of social and ideological and political contradictions, which ended with the fall of serfdom in Russia, led to very significant shifts in the literary process, including a new upsurge historical genre... Reality demanded from writers a response to the burning issues of our time, and sometimes this was only possible through a rethinking of the country's historical past with a direct or veiled comparison of it with the present. "War and Peace" Tolstoy wrote in 1863 - 1868, but the emergence
1 "Pravda", 19.I.1977.
2 See N.I. Kareev. Historical philosophy in the novel by Count Leo Tolstoy "War and Peace". "Bulletin of Europe", 1887, N 7; A. K. Borozdyan. Historical element in the novel "War and Peace". "The Past Years", 1908, N 10; M. M. Rubinstein. Philosophy of history in Leo Tolstoy's romance "War and Peace". "Russian Thought", 1911, N 7; V.N. Pertsev. Philosophy of history of L. N. Tolstoy "War and peace. In memory of L. N. Tolstoy". M. 1912; K.V. Pokrovsky. Sources of the novel "War and Peace". Ibid; P. N. Apostolov (Ardens). Leo Tolstoy over the pages of history. M. 1928; A.P. Skaftmov. The image of Kutuzov and the philosophy of history in L. Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace". "Russian Literature", 1959, N 2; L. V. Cherepnin. Historical views of L. N. Tolstoy. "Questions of history", 1965, N 4.
the idea of the novel goes back to a much earlier time and is associated with the intention to take up the Decembrist theme. The writer himself spoke in detail about how in 1856 he began to write a story "with a well-known direction, the hero of which was supposed to be a Decembrist returning with his family to Russia," but then moved from the present to 1825 - the era of "delusions and misfortunes "his hero, and later transferred the action" to the era of the war of 1812 and the events preceding it "3.
Literary critics argued and still continue to argue about how much the final text of War and Peace corresponds to the author's intention. Without interfering in these disputes, it can be stated that in fact, of course, we are not talking about family romance, but about a huge epic canvas. In "War and Peace" over 500 actors, about 200 of them are real historical figures, including the highest rank, among the rest, many also had quite real prototypes.
Tolstoy treated what historians might call the source base of the novel with the utmost responsibility and seriousness. While preparing for work on the novel "The Decembrists", he collected many memoirs and epistolary texts, questioned contemporaries of events in detail. When the idea was transformed, Tolstoy extended the search to more early era, began to collect scientific and scientific publications about the Napoleonic wars. While in Moscow on August 15, 1863, he acquired six volumes of A.I. "," Traveling notes of the artillery of lieutenant colonel I. Radozhitsky "(in 4 volumes), seven-volume" History of the consulate and empire "by A. Thiers and some other books 5. Later, the writer continued collecting literature personally and through his loved ones. In his article "A Few Words on the Book" War and Peace "(1868), Tolstoy noted:" An artist should be guided, like a historian, by historical materials. Wherever historical figures speak and act in my novel, I did not invent, but used materials from which during my work a whole library of books was formed, the titles of which I do not find necessary to write here, but which I can always refer to "( . 16, p. 13).
It does not at all follow from what has been said that Tolstoy believed that the writer had the same ends and means as the historian. On the contrary, he emphasized in every possible way that "the task of the artist and the historian is completely different", that the latter shows the "doer", and the writer must depict the "man", that "the historian deals with the results of the event, artists before the very fact of the event", which are often used As a historian, sources “do not say anything to a writer, they do not explain anything” (vol. 16, pp. 12-13). Tolstoy clearly distinguished fictional or semi-fictional characters from real historical figures. In the first case, he strove to preserve the spirit of the times, not free to conjecture what he needed, while in the second case "he tried not to allow inventions, but, selecting real facts, he subordinated them to his plan."
If we talk about the results of the writer's assimilation of historical sources and literature, then they are assessed by specialists as follows: "In general, the sources of the novel testify to a colossal
3 L. N. Tolstoy. Full composition of writings. In 90 vols. T. 13. M. 1955, pp. 54 - 56 (further references to this edition are given in the text).
4 See, in particular, S. M. Petrov. Russian historical novel of the 19th century. M. 1964, p. 325 and others; E. E. Zaydenshnur. "War and Peace" by Leo Tolstoy. Making a great book. M. 1966, pp. 5 - 7.
5 E. E. Zaydenshnur. Decree. cit., p. 329.
6 Ibid., P. 334.
Tolstoy's preparatory work to study the era of the 12th year, clarify the nature and process of his artistic creation, give a clear idea that "War and Peace" is a kind of artistic mosaic, composed of scenes and images of infinitely diverse origins, that this novel to a large extent it is not only historically plausible, but historically valid and that during its creation there was a constant struggle between the objective artist and the subjective thinker "7.
As you know, the novel contains a significant number of historical and philosophical digressions, where the writer openly invades areas that are usually occupied by scientists. Together with the article "A few words ...", already mentioned above, the digressions set out in detail and argue the "methodological credo" of the author of "War and Peace", that is, they give what is usually so lacking in the analysis of works of historical fiction. In this case, as N. I. Kareev rightly noted, "the artist turns into a scientist, the novelist becomes a historian." Tolstoy's historical views reflect his complex and highly contradictory worldview; naturally, they themselves are internally contradictory.
The article "A few words ..." consists of six points. “Studying the era,” Tolstoy declares in one of them, “... I came to the evidence that the reasons for the ongoing historical events are inaccessible to our minds” (vol. 16, p. 13). And although the conviction of the "pre-eternity" of all that is happening is an idea innate in people, each person realizes and feels "that he is free at every moment when he performs any action" (vol. 16, p. 14). From this, the writer continues, a contradiction arises that seems insoluble, since, considering history from a general point of view, a person inevitably sees in it a manifestation of the "eternal law", and looking at events from individual positions, he cannot refuse and does not renounce faith into the effectiveness of the individual's intervention in history. Tolstoy finds another contradiction not in the minds of people, but in Reality itself: it consists in the fact that there are actions that depend and do not depend on the will of an individual person. "The more abstract and therefore the less our activity is connected with the activities of other people, the freer it is, and, conversely, the more our activity is connected with other people, the more unfree it is." Power, according to the writer, is the strongest, inextricable, difficult and constant connection with other people, and therefore it "in its true meaning is only the greatest dependence on them" (vol. 16, p. 16). It follows that those whom historians call historical figures are the least free in their actions. “The activities of these people,” Tolstoy declares, “was interesting to me only in the sense of illustrating the law of predestination that, in my opinion, governs the historian), and the psychological law that makes a person who performs the most unfree act to fake in his imagination a whole series of retrospective inferences aimed at proving to him his freedom "(vol. 16, p. 16).
Similar thoughts are repeatedly stated in the novel either in a specific form in connection with any of the events described, or in the form of abstract discourses of a historical and philosophical nature. One of them is placed at the beginning of the second part of the fourth volume: “The totality of the causes of phenomena is inaccessible to the human mind. But the need to look for reasons is embedded in the human soul.
7 K.V. Pokrovsky. Decree. cit., p. 128.
8 N.I. Kareev. Decree. cit., p. 238.
laziness, of which each separately can be considered a cause, grasps at the first, most understandable rapprochement and says: this is the reason ... There are no reasons for a historical event and cannot be, except for the only cause of all causes. But there are laws governing events, partly unknown, partly groping by us. The discovery of these laws is possible only when we completely renounce the search for reasons in the will of one person, just as the discovery of the laws of planetary motion became possible only when people renounced the idea of the affirmation of the earth "(vol. 12, p. 66 - 67).
By referring to the mysterious laws of history, to the "cause of all causes," Tolstoy substantiated the uselessness of any deliberate attempts to slow down or accelerate the development of events. In one of the philosophical digressions of the novel, he wrote: "If we assume that human life can be controlled by reason, then the possibility of life is destroyed." And he continued somewhat below: "If we assume, as historians do, that great people lead humanity to the achievement of certain goals, consisting either in the magnitudes of Russia or France, or in the equilibrium of Europe, or in spreading the ideas of revolution, or in general progress, or in whatever it may be, it is impossible to explain the phenomena of history without the concepts of chance and genius ... Chance made the situation; genius took advantage of it, - says history "(vol. 12, p. 238).
In the above reasoning, the idea that the historical process develops independently of the will of an individual person and under the influence of objective causal connections that are formed outside of his consciousness appears quite clearly. This position, correct in its basic essence, was consonant with progressive trends in the historical thought of the decades under consideration. After all, "War and Peace" appeared when the recognition of historical determinism in one form or another was not characteristic of all professional historians, when semi-official historiography for the most part did not recognize it and continued to periodize civil history by reigns, and the history of wars by great generals.
Pointing absolutely correctly to the existence of objective causal relationships that determine the development of society, and to the fact that the historical process does not depend on the conscious efforts of an individual person, Tolstoy, firstly, proclaimed the laws of history not only unknown, but also practically unknowable, and secondly , could not see the dialectical relationship of the individual efforts of individuals with the direction and pace of social development. All this led the writer to conclusions of a fatalistic nature. "Fatalism in history," he declared, "is inevitable for explaining unreasonable phenomena (that is, those whose rationality we do not understand). The more we try to reasonably explain these phenomena in history, the more unreasonable and incomprehensible they become for us" (i.e. 11, p. 6).
Tolstoy was also driven to fatalism by the fact that all causal dependencies in history seemed to him the same in their significance, and the results of individual efforts were equal in the sense of their decisive influence on the course of events. In one of the philosophical digressions of War and Peace, he wrote: “The actions of Napoleon and Alexander, on whose words it seemed that the event would take place or not, were just as little arbitrary as the actions of every soldier who went on a campaign It could not be otherwise because in order for the will of Napoleon and Alexander (those people on whom the event seemed to depend) to be fulfilled, it was necessary to coincide
circumstances, without one of which the event could not have happened. It was necessary that millions of people, in whose hands there was real power, the soldiers who fired, carried provisions and guns, it was necessary that they agree to fulfill this will of single and weak people and be led to this by countless complex and varied reasons "( vol. 11, p. 5).
Such an assessment of the role of individual activity in the history of mankind did not correspond to the advanced views of the era in which the novel War and Peace was created. In understanding the dialectics of the relationship between the lawful and the accidental in this area, the Russian revolutionary democrats have made great strides, not to mention K. Marx and F. Engels. The first of them, in one of the letters relating to 1871, summarizing the thoughts that had been expressed earlier, wrote: “It would be, of course, very convenient to create world history if the struggle was undertaken only under the condition of infallibly favorable chances. history would be mystical if "chances" did not play any role. These accidents are, of course, themselves part of the general course of development, counterbalanced by other accidents. But acceleration and deceleration to a large extent depend on "accidents" there is also such a "case" as the character of the people who initially stood at the head of the movement "9.
Researchers have repeatedly considered the question of the ideological origins of Tolstoy's historical views. Some of them refer to the German idealistic philosophy of the first half of the 19th century. "Tolstoy's theory," wrote MM Rubinstein in 1912, "is of a metaphysical nature and ... fits the character of previous constructions of this kind, such as those given, for example, by Herder or the metaphysics of German idealism." Later, A.P. Skaftmov, among the ideological "predecessors" of Tolstoy's views on the philosophy of history, named Kant, Schelling, and especially Hegel. Other researchers categorically deny the influence of Hegelianism on Tolstoy, referring to his statements indicating that he sharply ridiculed Hegel's works for the way they were presented, that he condemned the Hegelian philosophy of history for completely ignoring the moral principle 12.
We think that the contradiction here is largely apparent. After all, firstly, Tolstoy's attitude to Hegel was not unchanged, and the usually negative statements cited date from the end of the 1860s. or a later time. Secondly, the main provisions of the Hegelian philosophical system were so often set forth in the Russian press of the 40s - 60s of the 19th century. without references to its creator, that acquaintance with these provisions, their partial perception by the writer was not only possible, but also inevitable, despite the fact that he did not like Hegel and did not consider it necessary to read his works. It is no coincidence that Tolstoy himself, criticizing Hegel in his treatise "So what should we do?", Wrote: "When I began to live, Hegelianism was the basis of everything: it was stories and treatises, in art, in sermons, in conversations. A person who did not know Hegel had no right to speak; anyone who wanted to know the truth studied Hegel. Everything was based on him "(vol. 25, p. 332). Although the "pure" Hegelianism in the Russian public
9 K. Marx and F. Engels. Op. T. 33, p. 175.
10 M. M. Rubinstein. Decree. cit., p. 80.
11 A.P. Skaftmov. Decree. cit., p. 80.
12 N.N. Gusev. Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. Materials for the biography from 1855 to 1869. M. 1957, p. 222, 678.
there was almost no thought, it had a significant impact on its main currents 13. If at the first stage Hegel's philosophical constructions were creatively mastered by progressive thinkers, including revolutionary democrats, then after the Crimean War the Hegelian system increasingly turned into an ideological weapon of reaction.
Noting the ongoing shifts and expressing a general attitude towards Hegel's philosophy, I. G. Chernyshevsky wrote in 1856: “We are just as few followers of Hegel as Descartes or Aristotle. Hegel now belongs to history, now has a different philosophy and sees well disadvantages of the Hegelian system "14. However, such statements by Chernyshevsky reflected rather a sense of self than the actual state of affairs. “The sharply critical, negative attitude of the Russian socialists of the 60s-70s to Hegel,” A. I. Volodin rightly notes, “does not mean that they remained outside the influence of his philosophy. It would be wrong to assert that this philosophy is not included in the composition of the ideological sources of their worldview "15.
The same can be said about Tolstoy. Regardless of how much he realized this, his historical views in their essence had much in common with Hegelianism, which is easily confirmed by comparing the philosophical digressions of the novel with the text of Hegel's Philosophy of History. Skaftymov, who partially carried out such a comparison, made the following conclusion regarding the theory of the historical process in the author of War and Peace: “The initial basis of Hegel's philosophy, and also the philosophy of Tolstoy himself, did not allow this theory to go beyond fatalism. Necessity was interpreted by Hegel as the leading one. the power of the “world spirit” or “providence”; also Tolstoy also leads the same “necessity” or set of reasons to the will and goals of “providence.” Ultimately, the will of people loses all meaning, and the driving force of history is some otherworldly ( inhuman) will ... The difference in the assessment of "great people" is that Hegel completely rejected the moral criterion ... while Tolstoy, on the contrary, brought this criterion to the fore.
Tolstoy's characteristic way of assimilating foreign theoretical doctrines through their critical revision was even more evident in the case of Proudhon, with whom the writer met in 1861 during a trip abroad. Tolstoy liked Proudhon for his independence of thought and directness in presenting his opinions. However, it was then that the theorist of anarchism was finishing a book in which he acted as an apologist for war and a defender of the law of force, which in no way corresponded to the views of the great Russian writer. Proudhon's book was called War and Peace, that is, exactly like the novel that Tolstoy began writing two years later. This makes it probable that Tolstoy "put a certain polemical meaning in his title and that this polemic was directed entirely against Proudhon."
The decisive influence on Tolstoy was exerted by ideological and theoretical clashes within Russia and all the real surrounding him.
13 "Hegel and Philosophy in Russia. 30s of the XIX century - 20s of the XX century." M. 1974 pp. 6 - 7, etc.
14 N.G. Chernyshevsky. Full composition of writings. T. III. M. 1947, pp. 206 - 207.
15 A.I. Volodin. Hegel and Russian Socialist Thought of the 19th Century. M. 1973, p. 204.
16 A.P. Skaftmov. Decree. cit., pp. 85 - 86.
17 N.N. Gusev. Decree. cit., p. 411.
18 N.N. Ardens (N.N. Apostolov). On the philosophy of history in War and Peace. "Uchenye zapiski" Arzamas Pedagogical Institute, 1957, vol. I, p. 49.
reality. However, the ways of this impact were very complex. One of the most knowledgeable biographers of the writer, having analyzed the contents of the entries in his diary at the end of the 1850s, said: “Based on these records, we cannot classify Tolstoy as one of the socio-political trends that existed at that time. a democrat, not a liberal, not a conservative, not a Westerner, not a Slavophil "19. This conclusion, which is correct in the end, deserves a certain concretization, especially as regards Slavophilism and revolutionary democracy.
When it comes to Slavophiles, Tolstoy's statement is most often cited: "I hate all these choral principles and structures of life, and communities, and brothers of the Slavs, some kind of invented, but I just love a certain, clear and beautiful and moderate, and I find all this in folk poetry and language and life "(vol. 61, p. 278). But one should not forget that these words refer to 1872, that is, to the time when very serious shifts took place both in the views of the writer and in Slavophilism. Tolstoy's complete rejection of Slavophil concepts, which is reflected in the above statement, did not appear immediately. B. I. Bursov, who studied Tolstoy's ideological and artistic quests in the second half of the 50s of the 19th century, stating the writer's negative attitude towards the Slavophiles, makes a reservation that he did have "several more or less sympathetic comments about them," in particular their views on family life"Pointing out the direction and reasons for the writer's ideological evolution in this area, Bursov writes:" The critical attitude towards the Slavophiles is growing stronger and stronger as Tolstoy gets to know the state of affairs in Russia better and better. "
During the period when the novel War and Peace was being worked on, the attitude of its author to the revolutionary democratic ideology was very contradictory. Bursov notes: "The revolutionary democrats are the true leaders of their era, the true defenders of the people. Tolstoy somehow had to feel this. But, of course, he could not agree with them: his attitude to political reality was opposite to the position of the revolutionary democrats." Indeed, the writer was attracted by a lot to N.G. Chernyshevsky, N.A. and called only for the moral self-improvement of each individual. Speaking about the 60s of the XIX century, biographers of Tolstoy and researchers of his work rightly note that then he "hardly saw the positive significance of the ideas of the revolutionary camp and, in any case, had a sharply negative attitude to the type of revolutionary commoner", which many pages "War and Peace" was a polemic against the ideology and practical activities of the revolutionaries of the sixties 22.
However, what has been said does not at all exclude the fact that between the revolutionary-democratic ideology of the 60s and the philosophy of history
19 N.N. Gusev. Decree. cit., p. 215.
20 B.I.Bursov. Ideological and artistic searches of L. N. Tolstoy in the second half of the 1850s. "Tolstoy's Creativity". M. 1959, p. 30.
21 Ibid., P. 32.
22 V. V. Ermilov. Tolstoy is a novelist. "War and Peace", "Anna Karenina", "Resurrection". M. 1965, pp. 34 - 35. It is known that simultaneously with the first books of "War and Peace" Tolstoy enthusiastically wrote for home theater in Yasnaya Polyana the plays "Infected Family" (1863) and "Nihilists" (1866), which were directed against the revolutionary underground (for more details see: M.P. Nikolaev. L.N. Tolstoy and N.G. Chernyshevsky. Tula. 1969, pp. 65 - 71; NN Gusev. Decree. Cit., Pp. 617 - 618, 664 - 665).
the author of "War and Peace" had a certain similarity that his views were influenced by the works of the most prominent revolutionary democrats. This will become clear if we remember how the writer understood the role of the masses in history.
Assessing the merits of Tolstoy and having in mind above all "War and Peace", literary critics note that he "made a huge step forward in portraying the people." The issue of attitude towards the people attracted the attention of the progressive public, but it became especially acute in the era of the fall of serfdom. It is safe to say that Tolstoy chose the events of 1805-1812. precisely because they allowed him to make this most relevant in the 60s of the XIX century. the question is the ideological core of his novel. It is no coincidence that R. Rolland wrote in his book "The Life of Tolstoy": "The greatness of War and Peace lies primarily in the resurrection of a historical era, when whole peoples and nations came into motion and clashed on the battlefield. Nations are the true heroes of this novel."
Based on the above ideas, Tolstoy compared "great people" with labels that give a name to what is happening, but "least of all have connections with the event itself" (vol. 11, p. 7). The driving force of history is, in his opinion, not rulers or governments, but the spontaneous actions of the masses. Reading "History of Russia from Ancient Times" by S. M. Solovyov, Tolstoy was very critical of the concept of the state school in historiography, which asserted that the state had a decisive influence on the historical process. The writer categorically rejected the conclusion of S.M. Solovyov that the Russian centralized state arose as a result of the actions of the then rulers 25. He declared: "It was not the government that produced history," but the people, and it was not "a series of outrages that made the history of Russia," but folk labor... And then Tolstoy posed questions, the perfectly obvious answer to which confirmed his point of view: “Who made brocade, cloth, dresses, damask, in which the tsars and boyars sported? who mined gold and iron, who brought out horses, bulls, rams, who built houses, palaces, churches, who transported goods? Who raised and gave birth to these people of a single root? en] Khmeln [itzky] was transferred to R [Russia], not T [Turkey] and P [more]? " (vol. 48, p. 124).
According to Tolstoy, the spontaneous actions of people, diverse in their aspirations, form a resultant in each specific situation, the direction and strength of which are strictly determined by the laws of social development. The story, the writer asserts in War and Peace, is “the unconscious, common, swarm life of mankind,” and explains: “There are two sides of life in every person: personal life, which is the more free, the more abstract its interests are, and life spontaneous, swarming, where a person inevitably fulfills the laws prescribed to him. A person consciously lives for himself, but serves as an unconscious instrument to achieve historical, universal goals. A perfect act is irreversible, and his actions, coinciding in time with millions of other people's actions, acquire historical significance. The higher a person stands on the social ladder, the more people he is associated with, the more power he has over other people, the more obvious is the predetermination and inevitability of his every action "(vol. 11, p. 6).
23 B.L.Suchkov. Historical destinies of realism. M. 1973, pp. 230 - 231.
24 Romain Rolland. Collected Works. In 14 volumes. T. 2.M. 1954, p. 266.
25 For more details see: L.V. Cherepnin. Historical views of the classics of Russian literature. M. 1968, p. 304.
One of the philosophical digressions in the 3rd volume of "War and Peace" contains the following statement: "While the historical sea is calm, the ruler-administrator, with his fragile boat resting against the ship of the people and moving himself, should seem that the ship is moving by his efforts, But as soon as a storm rises, the sea agitates and the ship itself moves, and then delusion is impossible. The ship goes on its huge, independent course, the test does not reach the moving ship, and the ruler suddenly from the position of a sovereign, a source of strength, turns into an insignificant one. , a useless and weak person "(vol. 11, p. 342). Recognition of the historical role of the people and the simultaneous indication of the "weakness" of the strength of the individual, the futility of the individual's conscious efforts are characteristic of Tolstoy. Exactly the same way goes his reasoning in the fragment of the 4th volume of the novel, ending with the words: "In historical events, the prohibition of eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge is most obvious. Only one unconscious activity bears fruit, and a person playing a role in a historical event never understands it. meaning. If he tries to understand it, he is amazed at its sterility "(vol. 12, p. 14).
Tolstoy's views on the role of the masses and personality in history were personified, as it were, in the image of MI Kutuzov. The great Russian commander in "War and Peace" has a more significant impact on the course of events than any other historical figure, but not because he imposes his will on people, but because he surrenders to the stream of life and consciously helps the cause move in direction of the resultant, which is formed by the unconscious efforts of many people. In this sense, the image of Kutuzov is very contradictory, and the researchers are absolutely right who see this as a reflection of the features inherent in the writer's worldview as a whole. “The historical inconsistency in the creation of the image of Kutuzov,” wrote, for example, N. N. Ardens, “was undoubtedly a direct consequence of the inconsistency of the very artistic idea of the writer, contained in this image. Tolstoy as an artist-thinker "26.
In search of the "laws" and "causes" of history, scientists, according to Tolstoy, should first of all turn to the study of the interests and actions of ordinary people. "To study the laws of history," he wrote, "we must completely change the subject of observation, leave alone the kings, ministers and generals, and study the homogeneous, infinitely small elements that lead the masses. No one can say how much a person is given to achieve this. by understanding the laws of history; but it is obvious that on this path only lies the possibility of grasping historical laws and that on this path the human mind has not yet put one millionth part of the efforts that historians put on the description of the deeds of various kings, generals and ministers and on the presentation of their considerations on the occasion of these acts "(vol. 11, p. 267).
These are, in the most brief summary, the general theoretical premises on which the author of War and Peace based his concepts of people's war and patriotism, his views on military science, strategy and tactics, from which he proceeded in specific assessments of events and historical figures. For example, the "cudgel of the people's war" is associated with the provision on the "swarm life" of people in society, which until then "nailed the French" with "stupid simplicity, but expediency",
26 N.N. Ardens (N.N. Apostolov). Leo Tolstoy's creative path. M. 1962, p. 188.
until the Napoleonic invasion of Russia suffered a complete collapse. From this and other general provisions - disregard for the patriotic phrase of the upper strata and praise for the artless dedication of ordinary people, hence the condemnation of chauvinism and very tangible pacifist notes in the novel, hence the bullying not only of figures like General Pful, but military theory in general, hence partly justified, and sometimes an exaggerated belief in the moral factor of military affairs. Tolstoy proceeded from the same general premises in his assessments of the commanders. All the vanity of Napoleon does not give, judging by the novel, any real military results, while the wise calmness of Kutuzov, his manner of intervening in affairs only in the most necessary cases bear fruit, much more tangible.
How did all this correlate with what was expressed in the press of that time?
In a number of works, undoubtedly known to Tolstoy, N. A. Dobrolyubov also condemned the underestimation of the role of the people in historical development. “Unfortunately,” he declared, “historians almost never avoid a strange fascination with personalities, to the detriment of historical necessity. At the same time, disregard for folk life, in favor of any exclusive interests. "27. Protesting against the transformation of history into a" general biography of great people, "Dobrolyubov wrote: monarchical, and liberal - you can't read all of them. But how many historians of the people appeared in Europe who would look at events from the point of view of people's benefits, consider what the people won or lost in a certain era, where there was good and bad for the masses, for people in general, and not for several titled personalities? conquerors, generals, etc.? "28.
Tolstoy regularly read "Sovremennik" and could hardly fail to pay attention to the review "Politics" prepared by N. G. Chernyshevsky in the first issue of the magazine in 1859. The review contained thoughts that were consonant with those that were later set forth in the philosophical digressions of War and Peace. In particular, it said: "The law of progress is nothing more, nothing less than a purely physical necessity, like the need for rocks to erode a little, rivers flow from mountain heights in lowlands, water vapor rise up, rain falls down. Progress is just a law of growth .. To reject progress is as absurd as to reject the force of gravity or the force of chemical affinity Historical progress is slow and difficult, so slowly that if we limit ourselves to too short periods, then the fluctuations produced in the progressive course of history by the accidents of circumstances may obscure in our eyes the operation of the general law "29.
It would be a mistake not to see that the theoretical doctrines of early Slavophilism, formed in the pre-reform period, could have a certain impact on Tolstoy's assessment of the role of the people in history and on the very concept of "people". Some points of contact in this area are evidenced by the memoirs of the Austrian and German public figure J. Frebel, with whom Tolstoy met in Kissingen in August 1860. In their
27 N.A. Dobrolyubov. Collected Works. In 9 vols. T. 3.M. -L. 1962, p. 16.
28 Ibid. T. 2, pp. 228-229.
29 N.G. Chernyshevsky. Collected Works. T. VI. M. 1949, pp. 11 - 12.
In his memoirs, Frobel wrote: “Count Tolstoy had a completely ... mystical idea about the“ people ”... According to this view, the“ people ”is a mysterious, irrational being, from whose depths unexpected things will appear - a new structure of the world. commitment to communal ownership of land, which, in his opinion, should have continued after the liberation of the peasants. In the Russian artel, he also saw the beginnings of a future socialist order. " The memoirist points out the similarity of Tolstoy's ideas with those of MA Bakunin; however, in many respects they can be compared with the doctrines of early Slavophilism, in which there was no desire for a socialist reorganization of society, but otherwise there was much similar to what Frobel heard from Tolstoy.
Reviews of the first books of War and Peace began to appear long before the end of the novel. Tolstoy equally disagreed with those who accused him of lack of patriotism, and with those who saw him as a patriot of the Slavophile persuasion. In the versions of War and Peace, passages have been preserved that are a response to reproaches in the writer's primary attention to the upper strata of society and the aristocracy. They assert that the life of merchants, coachmen, seminarians, convicts, peasants cannot be interesting, for it is monotonous, boring and too connected with "material passions." In saying this, Tolstoy clearly had in mind the heroes of A. N. Ostrovsky, F. M. Dostoevsky, N. G. Pomyalovsky, G. I. and N. V. Uspensky and opposed himself to these authors, declaring: "I am an aristocrat because that he was brought up from childhood in love and respect for the upper classes and in love for the graceful, expressed not only in Homer, Bach and Raphael, but also in all the little things of life ... All this is very stupid, maybe criminal, daring, but this so. And I announce to the reader in advance what kind of person I am and what he can expect from me "(vol. 13, pp. 238 - 240).
Of course, in the words cited there is a lot of transient irritation, impatience and that internal contradiction, which has already been mentioned. in Yasnaya Polyana, he is outraged that the gendarmes are looking for lithographic and printing presses from him for reprinting proclamations (vol. 60, p. 429). However, we cannot ignore this evidence, one way or another confirming the negative attitude of the author of "War and Peace" to some features of the ideology of the sixties and showing that the conclusions of researchers who noted in Tolstoy those years not only the "aristocracy of thought", but and "some adherence ... to external aristocracy" 31.
To compare Tolstoy's views with other views on the events he describes, it is advisable to consider the responses to the well-known work of M.I.Bogdanovich on the war of 1812, which appeared in 1859. This court historiographer, under the influence of public opinion, which went to the left after the Crimean War, was forced to abandon the straightforwardness inherent in his predecessor A.I. Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, remaining, of course, on completely loyal positions.
One of the reviewers of Bogdanovich was a certain A. B., who published a detailed analysis of his work in two issues of the "Military Collection" for 1860. It is symptomatic that A. B. puts the sources of sy-
30 Cit. Quoted from: N.N. Gusev. Decree. cit., p. 369.
31 T. I. Polner. "War and Peace" by Leo Tolstoy. M. 1912, p. 7.
the sides of the warring parties are inextricably linked with the existing "forms of social order" and "aspirations of the people's life" 32. At first, the reviewer writes, Napoleon invariably had success in military operations, as he relied on new "aspirations" and destroyed "obsolete forms." But in 1812 the picture became completely different, for France was waging a war of conquest and could not have internal unity. "The revolutionary force ..." writes AB, "left Napoleon from the minute he betrayed his revolutionary vocation." A direct continuation of these thoughts of the reviewer are his judgments about the relationship between war and politics. Outlining the "modern view of science and foundations" that should guide the readers of the reviewed essay, A. B. wrote, in particular, the following: the course of the war and its consequences for the state and Russian life; the depiction of military operations is an important, but not exclusive task of the whole work. For the structure of the military element in the state is always in close connection with its organism, and the quality of troops - with the spirit of the people and their civilization " 34.
The same ideas, only in a more generalized form, were expressed by the reviewer when he tried to characterize the changes that took place in historical science after the publication of the "descriptions" of Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky: historical research, it is necessary to completely abandon not only the concepts that were taken out about it from school, but also developed later, under the influence of the recent authorities of science.We are talking here about the significance that popular life in all its manifestations acquired in historical contemplation: biographies of government officials , the external relations of states, being in the background, acquire a completely different meaning in relation to their people's life; but the development of this essential element of history, in addition to hard work and extensive knowledge, requires a view free from social prejudices, a bright understanding of the instincts of the masses and a warm him feelings "35.
Speaking a lot about the "people's spirit", A.B. sharply dissociates himself from any attempts to pass off various kinds of superstition as its manifestation. For example, the reviewer was sharply rebuffed by the place of work where Bogdanovich precisely from this point of view interprets the rumors spread in 1812 about a comet, Last Judgment, etc. We believe, the reviewer declares, that there were rumors, "but we do not think so that such qualities could characterize the spirit of the Russian people.Superstition, as a sign of lack of education among the masses, as a temporary condition of their life, cannot be the main element of the national spirit, especially Russian, when religious mysticism did not take root in our commoner, despite the duration the Byzantine influence of our civilization "36.
It is curious to know how the reviewer relates to the zemstvo militia. Bogdanovich, having highlighted the relevant facts in some detail, said: "People's armaments on a large scale, like the militia of 1807 and the militias of 1812 and 1855, cannot be useful, because, demanding the supply of food on an equal basis with the regular troops, they are far inferior to them in combat -
32 "Military collection", 1860, N 4, p. 486.
33 Ibid., P. 487.
34 Ibid., P. 489.
36 Ibid., P. 520.
le "37. The reviewer sharply objected to this formulation of the question, arguing that the zemstvo army would be cheaper than regular troops, and that they would fight at least no worse than them, especially if the warriors" were inspired by the cause for which the war was being waged. " cited a number of examples from the history of the people's liberation and revolutionary wars and especially emphasized that the issue under discussion is closely related "to one of the important branches of state life - the organization of the armed force." and tried to prove that the zemstvo militia is the most consistent and most revolutionary of the possible solutions to this issue.
Of the private assessments concerning the coverage of historical figures, we will focus on two. The first of these refers to M.B. Barclay de Tolly. The reviewer noted with satisfaction that the Russian Minister of War was described by Bogdanovich "in Pushkin's way." While fully agreeing with the general interpretation of this figure, the reviewer argued with the author on only one issue: he argued that Barclay did not have a previously prepared and detailed plan for "luring" Napoleonic troops into the interior of Russia. "The retreat to the capital," declared A. B., "was forced by circumstances, and did not happen because of a previously accepted intention." And then he continued: "The author, challenging the idea of retreat from foreigners out of patriotism, took the general character of the war of 1812, formed under the influence of a variety of data, following a well-known definite plan." On the whole, the striving to exalt Barclay, characteristic of Bogdanovich, finds the sympathy and support of the reviewer 40.
As for Kutuzov, here the reviewer not only does not argue with Bogdanovich, but goes even further in unreasonably belittling the role of this commander, in denigrating his image as a whole. According to A.B., foreign historians are not impartial to Kutuzov to the same extent as former Russian historians, only "some are disposed to blame unconditionally, others to glorify the Smolensk prince unconditionally" 41. The reviewer considers Bogdanovich's position to be ambiguous and contradictory. "The depiction of the personality and military activities of the prince in the essay under consideration," says the review, "did not come out quite clear under the influence, it seems, of two contradictory aspirations: to preserve the popularity of the new commander-in-chief, which he enjoyed among his contemporaries, not to take him off the pedestal of the savior of the Fatherland , erected to him by some of our writers with the light hand of Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, and at the same time not to distort for this purpose completely the facts, which inexorable logic does not obey a predetermined verdict "42.
The review published by Voenny Sbornik reflected the perception of Bogdanovich's work by the progressive part of society 43. This is confirmed by the closeness of its conclusions to those assessments of the war of 1812, which were expressed by the Russian revolutionary democrats, in particular Belinsky and Chernyshevsky. Grades first detail
37 M.I.Bogdanovich. History of the Patriotic War of 1812. T. III. SPB. 1860, p. 400.
38 "Military collection", 1860, No. 6, pp. 456, 457.
39 Ibid., No. 4, p. 514.
40 Ibid., No. 6, pp. 469 - 470, etc.
41 Ibid., P. 473.
42 Ibid., P. 472.
43 See V. A. Dyakov. On the peculiarities of the development of Russian military-historical thought in the pre-reform thirty years. "Questions of the military history of Russia". M. 1969, pp. 85 - 86.
analyzed in the literature 44. As for Chernyshevsky, his views can be judged, for example, by the review of IP Liprandi's essay "Some remarks drawn mainly from foreign sources on the real reasons for the death of Napoleon's hordes in 1812". In this review, dating back to 1856, Chernyshevsky wrote that "the Russian people and Russian troops, and not exclusively frost and hunger" contributed to the victory over the French army. At the same time, he condemned Liprandi for abusive epithets in relation to Napoleon, argued that "one must be moderate, even speaking about the enemy."
Thus, the most important area where Tolstoy's point of view came close to the position of the progressive public of the era of the fall of serfdom was the attitude towards the people and the definition of the role of the masses in history. Discrepancies prevailed in two areas. One of them - general theoretical - is associated with the role of the individual in the historical process: neither the revolutionary democrats, nor the revolutionary populists who developed the doctrine of subjective sociology, of course, could in no way agree with the preaching of the fatalistic passivity of the individual, which was contained in War and Peace. Another area is specific assessments of such historical figures as Alexander I, Napoleon, Kutuzov, Barclay de Tolly and some others. Here, the progressive public was rather on the side of Bogdanovich, whose position corresponded to the views of liberal figures who actively participated in the preparation and implementation of reforms in the 1860s, while Tolstoy basically followed Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, whose point of view was more close to opponents of even curtailed bourgeois transformations 46.
The above does not exhaust the topic, but allows us to draw some general conclusions.
Tolstoy's sociological views cannot be studied statically and in isolation from the specific conditions of the ideological and socio-political struggle of that time. The constantly developing worldview of the writer has undergone a number of significant changes, including at the turn of the 50s - 60s and in the 70s of the XIX century. NN Gusev is right in stating that "the philosophical and philosophical-historical views set forth in War and Peace are only a stage in the complex and difficult evolution of Tolstoy's world outlook, which continued for a long period." The writer's views have not been constant even during the few years he worked on the novel. "Some tendencies of the novel," experts reasonably note, "grew as it was created ... The greatness of the" heroes "is exposed more decisively, the meaning of the personality is destroyed more consistently, and the protest against the senselessness of war and its horrors becomes brighter."
As for the specific conditions that influenced the author of War and Peace, it is not enough to take into account only the moral and psychological collisions through which he went through; it is not enough to bear in mind only the factors of the literary process associated with the development of the Russian historical novel. Absolutely necessary
44 V. E. Ileritsky. Historical views of V.G.Belinsky. M. 1953, pp. 126 - 127, 208 - 211, etc.
45 N.G. Chernyshevsky. Full composition of writings. T. III, pp. 490 - 494.
46 The ideological and political essence of the divergences of various directions of social thought with the author of "War and Peace" was revealed in the reviews of the novel, among which it is quite easy to single out the voices expressing the opinion of the revolutionary camp, liberals and conservatives (for a detailed review of reviews, see N.N. Gusev, op. Cit., Pp. 813 - 876).
47 Ibid., P. 812.
48 K. V. Pokrovsky. Decree. op. p. 111.
also know and take into account the socio-political situation, the vicissitudes of ideological and theoretical clashes, including philosophical and historical discussions. Without this, it is difficult to identify the origins of Tolstoy's historical views and it is even more difficult to correctly assess these views, for the task is not so much to ascertain their coincidence or non-coincidence with our own views, but to find out the relationship between Tolstoy's views and the corresponding doctrines of the mid-60s of the past. century to determine the place of the novel in the social and political life of its time.
Tolstoy's worldview was contradictory at all stages of his evolution. "The contradictions in Tolstoy's views," wrote V. I. Lenin, "are not the contradictions of his only personal thought, but a reflection of those highly complex, contradictory conditions, social influences, historical traditions that determined the psychology of various classes and various strata of Russian society in pre-reform, but pre-revolutionary era "49. Special studies make it possible to concretize this deep definition in relation to individual stages of the writer's work. Some researchers characterize the period under consideration as follows: “On the one hand, emancipation from Christian moral norms and the recognition of objective laws that restrict human moral freedom brings Tolstoy closer to the most advanced thinkers of the time. moral freedom of a person, now, on the contrary, he differs from them in the extremes of its denial and in the conclusions that he draws in this regard from the protection of the rights of the individual. personality is uniquely combined with the position that the conscious will of a person cannot change life, and with a fatalistic acceptance of the current course of things. "
The contradictory ideological and political positions of the author of "War and Peace" determined those differences in the assessments of the novel that appeared in the first years after its publication. Tolstoy's historical views were criticized from diametrically opposed points of view. Particularly harsh criticism from the progressive forces was explained by the fact that noble liberalism still prevailed in the writer's views, and although the democratic stream was very tangible, it had not yet received its full development. Criticism from the left regarding Tolstoy's historical views did not stop afterwards, but its political acuteness weakened, while criticism from the right intensified and its political intensity increased.
Lenin not only pointed out the inconsistency of Tolstoy's worldview and condemned any attempts to use the "anti-revolutionary side" of his teaching, but also called for studying the views and work of the writer 51. With the death of Tolstoy, wrote Vladimir Ilyich, "pre-revolutionary Russia has become a thing of the past, the weakness and powerlessness of which was expressed in philosophy, outlined in the works of brilliant artist... But in his legacy there is something that has not gone into the past, that belongs to the future. ”52 These Leninist words are especially important for Soviet historians, because they are also interested in the part of Tolstoy's legacy that has passed into the past and that part of it that belongs to our time and will be needed to our descendants.
.Composing War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy was creating not just a novel, he was creating a historical novel. Many pages in it are devoted to a specifically Tolstoyan understanding of the historical process, his philosophy of history. early XIX century. These are Emperor Alexander I and Napoleon Bonaparte, General Bagration and General Davout, Arakcheev and Speransky.
And among them is a character-sign with a very special semantic fullness - Field Marshal Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov, His Serene Highness Prince Smolensky - a genius Russian commander, one of the most educated people of his time.
Kutuzov, depicted in the novel, is strikingly different from the real historical person. Kutuzov for Tolstoy is the embodiment of his historical innovations. He is a special figure, a person endowed with the instinct of wisdom. It is like a vector, the direction of action of which determines the sum of thousands and millions of causes and actions performed in the historical space.
"History, that is, the unconscious, swarming, common life of mankind, uses every minute of the life of the kings for itself, as an instrument for its own purposes."
And one more quote: "Every action ... in the historical sense is involuntary, is in connection with the entire course of history and is determined eternally."
Such an understanding of history makes every historical person a fatal person and makes his activity meaningless. For Tolstoy, in the context of history, she acts as a passive hallmark of the social process. Only by understanding this, it is possible to explain the actions, or rather, the non-actions of Kutuzov on the pages of the novel.
In Austerlitz, having a superior number of soldiers, an excellent disposition, the generals, the same one that he will later lead to the Borodino field, Kutuzov melancholy remarks to Prince Andrei: “I think that the battle will be lost, and I told Count Tolstoy so and asked him to pass it on to the Tsar ".
And at a meeting of the military council before the battle, he simply, like an old man, allows himself to fall asleep. He already knows everything. He knows everything in advance. He undoubtedly possesses that "swarm" understanding of life, about which the author writes.
However, Tolstoy would not have been Tolstoy if he had not shown the Field Marshal as a living person, with passions and weaknesses, with the ability to magnanimity and malice, compassion and cruelty. He is going through the campaign of 1812 hard. "To what ... what they have brought!" Kutuzov suddenly said in an agitated voice, clearly imagining the situation in which Russia was. " And Prince Andrew sees tears in the eyes of the old man.
"They will eat my horse meat!" - he threatens the French. And fulfills his threat. He knew how to keep his word!
Collective wisdom is embodied in his inaction. He does things not at the level of understanding them, but at the level of some innate instinct, as the peasant knows when to plow and when to sow.
Kutuzov does not give a general battle to the French, not because he does not want it — the sovereign wants it, the whole staff wants it — but because it is contrary to the natural course of things, which he is unable to express in words.
When this battle takes place, the author does not understand why Kutuzov chooses Borodinskoe from dozens of similar fields, no better and no worse than others. Giving and accepting the battle in Borodino, Kutuzov and Napoleon acted involuntarily and senselessly. Kutuzov at the Borodino field does not make any orders, he only agrees or disagrees. He is focused and calm. He alone understands everything and knows that at the end of the battle the beast received a mortal wound. But it takes time for him to die. The only textbook-historical decision Kutuzov makes in Fili, one against all. His unconscious popular mind defeats the dry logic of military strategy. Leaving Moscow, he wins the war, subjugating himself, his mind, his will to the elements of the historical movement, he became this element. This is precisely what Leo Tolstoy convinces us: "The person is the slave of history."
- New!
In 1867, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy finished work on the work "War and Peace". Talking about his novel, Tolstoy confessed that in War and Peace he "loved popular thought." The author poeticizes simplicity, kindness, morality ...
"War and Peace" is a Russian national epic, which reflects the character of a great people at the moment when its historical destinies were being decided. Tolstoy, trying to cover everything that he knew and felt at that time, gave in the novel a code of life, customs, ...
Tolstoy portrays the Rostov and Bolkonsky families with great sympathy, because: they are participants in historical events, patriots; they are not attracted by careerism and profit; they are close to the Russian people. Characteristic features of the Rostovs Bolkonskys 1. Older generation ....
In the novel by L.N. Tolstoy describes the life of several families: the Rostovs, Bolkonsky, Kuragin, Berg, and in the epilogue also the families of Bezukhovs (Pierre and Natasha) and Rostovs (Nikolai Rostov and Marya Bolkonskaya). These families are very different, each is unique, but without a common, ...
A.S. Pushkin
I Ideological concept of the novel.
II Formation of the personality of Peter I.
1) The formation of the character of Peter I under the influence of historical events.
2) The intervention of Peter I in the historical process.
3) The era that forms the historical figure.
III Historical and cultural value of the novel.
The creation of the novel "Peter the First" was preceded by the lengthy work of AN Tolstoy on a number of works about the Peter the Great era. In 1917 - 1918 the stories "Obsession" and "Peter's Day" were written, in 1928 - 1929 he wrote the historical play "On the Rack". In 1929, Tolstoy begins work on the novel "Peter the First", the third unfinished book due to the death of the writer is dated 1945. The ideological concept of the novel found its expression in the construction of the work. Creating the novel, A.N. Tolstoy least of all wanted it to turn into a historical chronicle of the reign of the progressive tsar. Tolstoy wrote: "A historical novel cannot be written in the form of a chronicle, in the form of history. First of all, we need a composition ..., the establishment of a center ... of vision. In my novel, the center is the figure of Peter I." The writer considered one of the tasks of the novel to be an attempt to depict the formation of a personality in history, in an era. The entire course of the narrative was supposed to prove the mutual influence of personality and era, to emphasize the progressive significance of Peter's transformations, their regularity and necessity. Another task, he considered "identifying the driving forces of the era" - the solution of the problem of the people. In the center of the novel's narration is Peter. Tolstoy shows the process of the formation of Peter's personality, the formation of his character under the influence of historical circumstances. Tolstoy wrote: "Personality is a function of the era, it grows on fertile soil, but, in turn, a large, big personality begins to move the events of the era." The image of Peter in the depiction of Tolstoy is very multifaceted and complex, shown in constant dynamics, in development. At the beginning of the novel, Peter is a lanky and angular boy, furiously defending his right to the throne. Then we see how a statesman grows out of a young man, an astute diplomat, an experienced, fearless commander. Life becomes Peter's teacher. The Azov campaign leads him to the idea of the need to create a fleet, "Narva confusion" - to the reorganization of the army. On the pages of the novel, Tolstoy depicts the most important events in the life of the country: the uprising of the archers, the reign of Sophia, the Crimean campaigns of Golitsyn, the Azov campaigns of Peter, the arrow revolt, the war with the Swedes, the construction of St. Petersburg. Tolstoy selects these events to show how they affect the formation of Peter's personality. But not only circumstances affect Peter, he actively intervenes in life, changes it, disregarding the age-old foundations, orders "to be considered noble". How many "chicks of Petrov's nest" this decree united and rallied around him, how many talented people he gave the opportunity to develop their abilities! Using the technique of contrast, contrasting scenes with Peter to scenes with Sophia, Ivan and Golitsyn, Tolstoy assesses the general nature of Peter's intervention in the historical process and proves that only Peter can stand at the head of the transformations. But the novel does not become a biography of Peter I. The era that forms the historical figure is also important to Tolstoy. He creates a multifaceted composition, shows the life of the most diverse strata of the population of Russia: peasants, soldiers, merchants, boyars, nobles. The action takes place in various places: in the Kremlin, in the hut of Ivashka Brovkin, in the German settlement, Moscow, Azov, Arkhangelsk, Narva. The era of Peter is also created by the image of his companions, real and fictitious: Alexander Menshikov, Nikita Demidov, Brovkin, who advanced from the lower classes and fought with honor for the cause of Peter and Russia. Among Peter's associates, there are many descendants of noble families: Romodanovsky, Sheremetyev, Repnin, who, not out of fear, but out of conscience, serve the young tsar and his new goals. Roman A.N. Tolstoy's "Peter the First" is valuable for us not only as a historical work, Tolstoy used archival documents, but as a cultural heritage. The novel contains many folklore images and motives, used folk songs, proverbs, sayings, jokes. Tolstoy did not manage to complete his work, the novel remained unfinished. But from its pages there are images of that era and its central image - Peter I - a reformer and statesman, vitally connected with his state and era.
Raised the question of the role of the individual and the people in history. Tolstoy was faced with the task of comprehending artistically and philosophically the war of 1812: "The truth of this war is that it was won by the people." Carried away by the thought of popular character war, Tolstoy was unable to resolve the issue of the role of the individual and the people in history; in part III of the third volume, Tolstoy enters into a dispute with historians who assert that the course of the entire war depends on "great men." Tolstoy tries to convince that the fate of a person does not depend on their will.
Portraying Napoleon and Kutuzov, the writer almost never shows them in the sphere of state activity. He focuses his attention on those qualities that characterize him as the leader of the masses. Tolstoy believes that it is not a brilliant person who directs events, but events guide him. Tolstoy portrays the advice in Fili as advice that makes no sense, because Kutuzov has already decided that Moscow should be abandoned: "By the power handed to me by the sovereign and the fatherland, an order to retreat."
Of course, this is not so, he has no power. Leaving Moscow is a foregone conclusion. It is not up to individuals to decide where history will turn. But Kutuzov was able to understand this historical inevitability. It is not he who speaks this phrase, fate speaks through his lips.
It is so important for Tolstoy to convince the reader of the correctness of his views on the role of the individual and the masses in history that he considers it necessary to comment on each episode of the war from the position of these views. Thought does not develop, but is illustrated by new facts in the history of the war. Any historical event was the result of the interaction of thousands of human wills. One person cannot prevent something that must happen due to the confluence of many circumstances. The offensive became a necessity for many reasons, the sum of which led to the Battle of Tarutino.
The main reason is the spirit of the army, the spirit of the people, which played a decisive role in the course of events. Tolstoy wants to emphasize with a wide variety of comparisons that great people are sure that the fate of humanity is in their hands, that ordinary people do not speak or think about their mission, but do their job. The personality is powerless to change anything. The story of Pierre's meeting with Karataev is the story of meeting with the people, Tolstoy's figurative expression. Tolstoy suddenly saw that the truth was in the people, and therefore he learned it, drawing closer to the peasants. Pierre must come to this conclusion with the help of Karataev.
Tolstoy decided this at the last stage of the novel. The role of the people in the war of 1812 - main topic third part. The people are the main force determining the fate of the war. But the people neither understand nor recognize the game of war. puts before him the question of life and death. Tolstoy is a historian, thinker, he welcomes guerrilla warfare.
Finishing the novel, he sings the "club of the people's will", considering the people's war an expression of just hatred of the enemy. In War and Peace, Kutuzov is shown not at the headquarters, not at court, but in the harsh conditions of war. He inspects, speaks affectionately with officers and soldiers. Kutuzov is a great strategist, he uses all means to save the army. Sends a detachment led by Bagration, entangles the French in the nets of their own cunning, accepting the proposal for an armistice, energetically advancing the army to join forces from Russia.
During the battle, he was not just a contemplator, but fulfilled his duty. Russian and Austrian troops were defeated. Kutuzov was right - but this realization did not soften his grief.
To the question: "Are you injured?" - he replied: "The wound is not here, but where!" - and pointed to the fleeing soldiers.
For Kutuzov, this defeat was a severe mental wound. Having assumed command of the army when the war of 1812 began, Kutuzov set his first task to raise the spirit of the army. He loves his soldiers.
The battle of Borodino shows Kutuzov as an active, extremely strong-willed person. With his bold decisions, he influences the course of events. Despite the Russian victory at Borodino, Kutuzov saw that there was no way to defend Moscow. All of Kutuzov's last tactics were determined by two tasks: the first - the destruction of the enemy; the second is the preservation of the Russian troops, for its goal is not personal glory, but the fulfillment of the will of the people, the salvation of Russia. Kutuzov is shown in various situations of life.
The portrait characteristic of Kutuzov is peculiar - "a huge nose", the only seeing eye, in which thought and concern shone. Tolstoy repeatedly notes Kutuzov's senile obesity and physical weakness. And this testifies not only to his age, but also to hard military work, a long combat life.
The expression on Kutuzov's face conveys the complexity of the inner world. His face bears the stamp of concern in front of decisive matters. Unusually rich speech characteristic Kutuzov. He speaks with soldiers in simple language, with exquisite phrases - with an Austrian general.
The character of Kutuzov is revealed through the statements of soldiers and officers. This whole multifaceted system of methods for constructing the image of Tolstoy sums up, as it were, a direct characterization of Kutuzov as the bearer of the best features of the Russian people.
Philosophy of history in Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace", the role of the individual and the role of the masses
In the epic novel War and Peace, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy was especially concerned with the question of the driving forces of history. believed that even outstanding personalities were not given a decisive influence on the course and outcome of historical events. He argued: "If we assume that human life can be controlled by reason, then the possibility of life will be destroyed." According to Tolstoy, the course of history is governed by the highest superintelligent foundation - God's providence. In the finale of the novel, historical laws are compared with the Copernican system in astronomy: "Just as for astronomy, the difficulty of recognizing the movement of the earth was to abandon the direct sense of the immobility of the earth and the same sense of planetary motion, so for history, the difficulty of recognizing the subordination of a person to the laws of space, time and the reason is to give up the immediate sense of the independence of his personality.
But just as in astronomy the new view said: "it is true, we do not feel the movement of the earth, but, having allowed its immobility, we come to nonsense; by allowing a movement that we do not feel, we come to laws," so in history, the new view says : "True, we do not feel our dependence, but, having allowed our freedom, we come to nonsense; while allowing our dependence on the external world, time and reasons, we come to laws." In the first case, it was necessary to abandon the consciousness of immobility in space and recognize the motion that is imperceptible to us; in the present case, in the same way, it is necessary to abandon the perceived freedom and recognize the dependence that we do not feel. "The freedom of a person, according to Tolstoy, consists only in realizing such dependence and trying to guess what was foreseen in order to follow it as much as possible. For the writer, the primacy was obvious feelings over reason, the laws of life over the plans and calculations of individual people, even brilliant ones, the real course of the battle over the previous disposition, the role of the masses over the role of great commanders and rulers.
Tolstoy was convinced that "the course of world events is predetermined from above, depends on the coincidence of all the arbitrariness of people participating in these events, and that the influence of Napoleons on the course of these events is only external and fictitious," since "great people are labels that give a name to an event, which, like labels, have the least connection with the event itself. " And wars do not come from the actions of people, but by the will of providence. According to Tolstoy, the role of the so-called "great people" is reduced to following the highest command, if they are given to guess it. This is clearly seen in the example of the image of the Russian commander M.I.Kutuzov.
The writer is trying to convince the nys that Mikhail Il-larirnovich "despised both knowledge and intelligence and knew something else that was supposed to solve the matter." In the novel, Kutuzov is opposed to both Napoleon and the German generals in the Russian service, who are related to each other by the desire to win the battle, only thanks to a detailed plan developed in advance, where they are vainly trying to take into account all the surprises of living life and the future actual course of the battle. The Russian commander, in contrast to them, has the ability to "calmly contemplate events" and therefore "will not interfere with anything useful and will not allow anything harmful" thanks to supernatural intuition. Kutuzov only affects the morale of his army, since "with many years of military experience he knew and with his senile mind he understood that it was impossible for one person to lead hundreds of thousands of people fighting death, and he knew that the fate of the battle was not decided by the orders of the commander-in-chief, there was no place, on which the troops stand, not the number of guns and killed people, but that elusive force called the spirit of the army, and he watched this force and led it, as far as it was in his power. " This explains the angry Kutuzov rebuke to General Volzogen, who, on behalf of another general with a foreign surname, M. B.
Barclay de Tolly, reports on the retreat of the Russian troops and the capture of all the main positions on the Borodino field by the French. Kutuzov shouts at the general who brought the bad news: "How you ... how dare you! .. How dare you, sir, tell me this. You know nothing. Tell General Barclay from me that his information is unfair and that the real move is I, the commander-in-chief, know better than him ... The enemy is repulsed on the left and defeated on the right flank ...
Please go to General Barclay and convey to him the next day my indispensable intention to attack the enemy ... Repulsed everywhere, for which I am blessed
to God and our brave army. The enemy is defeated, and tomorrow we will chase him out of the sacred Russian land. "Here the field marshal is lying, for the true outcome of the Borodino battle, which was unfavorable for the Russian army, which resulted in the abandonment of Moscow, is no worse known to him than Volzogen and Barclay. However, Kutuzov prefers to draw this a picture of the course of the battle that can preserve the morale of the troops subordinate to him, preserve that deep patriotic feeling that “lay in the soul of the commander-in-chief, as well as in the soul of every Russian person.” Tolstoy sharply criticizes the Emperor Napoleon. troops to the territory of other states, the writer considers Bonaparte to be an indirect killer of many people.
In this case, Tolstoy even comes into some conflict with his fatalistic theory, according to which the outbreak of wars does not depend on human arbitrariness. He believes that Napoleon was finally put to shame in the fields of Russia, and as a result, "instead of genius, there is stupidity and meanness that have no examples." Tolstoy believes that "there is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness and truth."
The French emperor after the occupation of Paris by the allied forces "no longer makes sense; all his actions are obviously pitiful and disgusting ...". And even when Napoleon again seizes power during a hundred days, he, according to the author of "War and Peace", is only needed by history "to justify the last cumulative action." When this action was completed, it turned out that “the last role had been played. The actor was ordered to undress and wash off the antimony and blush: he would no longer be needed.
And several years pass in the fact that this man, alone on his island, plays in front of him a miserable comedy, intrigues and lies, justifying his actions, when an excuse is no longer needed, and shows the whole world what it was that people accepted for the strength when an invisible hand led them. The manager, after finishing the drama and undressing the actor, showed him to us. - Look what you believed! Here it is! Can you see now that it was not he, but I who moved you? But, blinded by the force of the movement, people did not understand this for a long time. "
Both Napoleon and other characters in Tolstoy's historical process are nothing more than actors playing roles in a theatrical production directed by an unknown force. This latter, in the face of such insignificant "great people", manifests itself to humanity, always remaining in the shadows. The writer denied that the course of history can be determined by "countless so-called accidents." He defended the complete predetermination of historical events.
But, if in his criticism of Napoleon and other military leaders-conquerors Tolstoy followed the Christian teaching, in particular, the commandment "Thou shalt not kill", then with his fatalism he actually limited the ability of God to endow man with free will. The author of "War and Peace" left for people only the function of blindly following what was foreseen from above. However, the positive significance of Leo Tolstoy's philosophy of history lies in the fact that he refused, in contrast to the overwhelming majority of contemporary historians, to reduce history to the deeds of heroes, designed to drag along an inert and thoughtless crowd. The writer pointed to the primary role of the masses, the aggregate of millions and millions of individual wills.
As for what exactly determines their resultant, historians and philosophers argue to this day, more than a hundred years after the publication of War and Peace.
You have read the finished development: Philosophy of history in Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace", the role of the individual and the role of the masses
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Composition based on the novel "War and Peace". Tolstoy's main idea is that a historical event is something that develops spontaneously, it is an unforeseen result of the conscious activity of all people, ordinary participants in history. Is a person free in their choice? The writer claims that a person consciously lives for himself, but serves as an unconscious instrument to achieve historical universal human goals. A person is always determined by many factors: society, nationality, family, level of intelligence, etc. But within this framework, he is free in his choice. And it is a certain amount of identical "choices" that determines the type of event, its consequences, etc.
Tolstoy notes about the participants in the war: “They were afraid, rejoiced, became indignant, reflected, believing that they knew what they were doing and what they were doing for themselves, but they were still an involuntary instrument of history: they were us work. This is the unchangeable fate of all practitioners. Providence forced all these people, who tried to achieve their goal, to assist in the implementation of one huge result, for which not a single person - neither Napoleon, nor Alexander, and even more so any of the participants in the war - did not even hope. "
According to Tolstoy, a great man carries within himself the moral foundations of the people and feels his moral obligation to people. Therefore, Napoleon's ambitious claims betray in him a person who does not understand the meaning of the events that are taking place. Considering himself to be the ruler of the world, Napoleon is deprived of that inner spiritual freedom, which consists in the recognition of necessity. "There is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness and truth," Tolstoy proclaims such a sentence to Napoleon.
Tolstoy emphasizes the moral greatness of Kutuzov and calls him a great man, since he set the interest of the whole people for the purpose of his activities. Comprehension of the historical event was the result of Kutuzov's renunciation of "everything personal", the subordination of his actions to a common goal. It expresses the soul of the people and patriotism.
For Tolstoy, the will of one person is worth nothing. Yes, Napoleon, believing in the power of his will, considers himself to be the creator of history, but in fact he is a toy of fate, "an insignificant instrument of history." Tolstoy showed the inner lack of freedom of individualistic consciousness, embodied in the personality of Napoleon, since real freedom is always associated with the implementation of laws, with the voluntary submission of the will to a "high goal". Kutuzov is free from the captivity of vanity and ambition, and therefore understands the general laws of life. Napoleon sees only himself, and therefore does not understand the essence of events. So Tolstoy objects to the claims of one person to a special role in history.
The life path of the protagonists of War and Peace, Prince Andrei Bolkonsky and Count Pierre Bezukhov, is a painful search, together with Russia, for a way out of personal and social discord to “peace”, to an intelligent and harmonious life of people. Andrei and Pierre are not satisfied with the petty, selfish interests of the "upper world", idle talk in secular salons. Their souls are open to the whole world. They cannot live without thinking, without planning, without solving for themselves and for people the main questions about the meaning of life, about the purpose of human existence. This brings them together, is the basis of their friendship.
Andrei Bolkonsky is an extraordinary personality, a strong nature that thinks logically and does not look for the beaten track in life. He tries to live for others, but separates himself from them. Pierre is an emotional person. Sincere, direct, sometimes naive, but immensely kind. Character traits of Prince Andrey: firmness, imperiousness, cold mind, ardent patriotism. A well-formed view of the life of Prince Andrew. He seeks his "throne", glory, power. The ideal for Prince Andrew was the French emperor Napoleon. In an effort to test his officer rank, he goes to the army.
The feat of Andrei Bolkonsky during the Austerlitz battle. Disappointment in their ideals, previous ordeals and imprisonment in a home circle. The beginning of the renewal of Prince Andrei: the transfer of the Bogucharov peasants to free farmers, participation in the work of the Speransky committee, love for Natasha.
Pierre's life is a path of discovery and disappointment. His life and searches convey that great phenomenon in Russian history, which is called the Decembrist movement. Pierre's character traits are intelligence, prone to dreamy philosophical considerations, confusion, weak will, lack of initiative, inability to practically do something, exceptional kindness. The ability to awaken others to life with their sincerity, friendly sympathy. Friendship with Prince Andrey, deep, sincere love for Natasha.
Both of them begin to understand and realize that the separation of people, the loss of spirituality is the main reason for the troubles and suffering of people. This is war. Peace is harmony between people, a person’s harmony with himself. The war of 1812 awakens Prince Andrew to active work. Perception of the French attack as a personal disaster. Andrei goes to the active army, refuses the offer to become an adjutant of Kutuzov. Andrey's courageous behavior on the Borodino field. Fatal wound.
The Battle of Borodino is the culmination in the life of Prince Andrey. Suffering at the end of his life helped him understand the new Christian love. Empathy, love for brothers, for those who love, for those who hate us, love for the enemy, which God preached on earth and which Andrey did not understand. Deeply "civilian" Pierre Bezukhov in the war. Pierre, being an ardent patriot of the Motherland, gives his funds to form an encirclement regiment, dreams of killing Napoleon, for which he remains in Moscow. The captivity and purification of Pierre by physical and mental suffering, the meeting with Platon Karataev helped Pierre's spiritual rebirth. He becomes convinced of the need to restructure the state and after the war becomes one of the organizers and leaders of the Decembrists.
Prince Andrey and Pierre Bezukhov - people so different in character become friends precisely because both are thinking and trying to understand their purpose in life. Everyone is constantly looking for the truth and meaning of life. That is why they are close to each other. Noble, equal, moral people. Prince Andrei Bolkonsky and Count Pierre Bezukhov are the best people in Russia.
Reflections of L. Tolstoy on the role of personality in history in the novel "War and Peace"
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- War and Peace is a novel about the greatness of the Russian people.
- Kutuzov is a "representative of the people's war."
- Kutuzov the man and Kutuzov the commander.
- The role of personality in history according to Tolstoy.
- Philosophical and Historical Optimism of Tolstoy.
There is no other work in Russian literature where the power and greatness of the Russian people would be conveyed with such persuasiveness and strength as in the novel "War and Peace". With all the content of the novel, Tolstoy showed that it was the people who rose up to fight for independence that drove out the French and ensured victory. Tolstoy said that in every work an artist should love the main idea, and he admitted that in War and Peace he loved “popular thought”. This thought illuminates the development of the main events of the novel. "People's thought" also lies in the assessment of historical figures and all other heroes of the novel. Tolstoy's portrayal of Kutuzov combines historical grandeur and folk simplicity. The image of the great people's commander Kutuzov occupies a significant place in the novel. The unity of Kutuzov with the people is explained by the "popular feeling that he carried in himself in all its purity and strength." Thanks to this spiritual quality, Kutuzov is the "representative of the people's war."
For the first time, Tolstoy shows Kutuzov in the military campaign of 1805-1807. at the review in Braunau. The Russian commander did not want to look at the ceremonial uniform of the soldiers, but began to examine the regiment in the state in which it was, pointing out to the Austrian general the broken soldiers' shoes: he did not reproach anyone for this, but he could not see how bad it was. The life behavior of Kutuzov is, first of all, the behavior of an ordinary Russian person. He "always seemed to be a simple and ordinary person and spoke the simplest and most common speeches." Kutuzov is really very simple with those whom he has reason to consider comrades in the difficult and dangerous business of war, with those who are not busy with court intrigues, who love their homeland. But not all Kutuzov is so simple. This is not a simpleton, but a skillful diplomat, a wise politician. He hates court intrigues, but he understands their mechanics very well and, with his folk slyness, often prevails over experienced intriguers. At the same time, in a circle of people alien to the people, Kutuzov knows how to speak in an exquisite language, so to speak, striking the enemy with his own weapon.
In the Battle of Borodino, Kutuzov's greatness was manifested, which consisted in the fact that he led the spirit of the army. LN Tolstoy shows how the Russian spirit in this people's war surpasses the cold prudence of foreign military leaders. So Kutuzov sends Prince Viteburgsky "to take command of the first army", but he, before reaching the army, asks for more troops, and immediately the commander recalls him and sends the Russian - Dokhturov, knowing that he will stand up for the Motherland to death. The writer shows that the noble Barclay de Tolly, seeing all the circumstances, decided that the battle was lost, while the Russian soldiers fought to death and held back the French onslaught. Barclay de Tolly is not a bad commander, but he lacks the Russian spirit. And Kutuzov is close to the people, the national spirit, and the commander gives the order to attack, although the army in such a state could not advance. This order came "not from cunning considerations, but from a feeling that lay in the soul of every Russian person," and upon hearing this order, "the exhausted and hesitant people were comforted and encouraged."
Kutuzov the man and Kutuzov the commander in War and Peace are inseparable, and this has a deep meaning. The human simplicity of Kutuzov reveals the very nationality that played a decisive role in his military leadership. The commander Kutuzov calmly surrenders to the will of events. In fact, he does little to lead the troops, knowing that the "fate of battles" is decided by "an elusive force called the spirit of the army." Kutuzov the commander-in-chief is as unusual as the "people's war" does not resemble an ordinary war. The meaning of his military strategy is not to "kill and exterminate people", but to "save and pity them." This is his military and human feat.
The image of Kutuzov from beginning to end is built in accordance with Tolstoy's conviction that the war was going on, "never coinciding with what people invented, but proceeding from the essence of the attitude of the masses." Thus, Tolstoy denies the role of personality in history. He is sure that no man is able to turn the course of history by his own will. The human mind cannot play a guiding and organizing role in history, and military science, in particular, cannot have practical meaning in the living course of a war. For Tolstoy, the greatest force of history is the element of the people, irrepressible, indomitable, not amenable to leadership and organization.
The role of personality in history, according to Leo Tolstoy, is negligible. Even the most ingenious person cannot direct the movement of history at will. It is created by the people, the masses, and not by an individual.
However, the writer denied only such a person who puts himself above the masses, does not want to reckon with the will of the people. If the actions of an individual are historically conditioned, then she plays a certain role in the development of historical events.
Although Kutuzov does not attach decisive importance to his "I", however, Tolstoy is shown not as passive, but as an active, wise and experienced commander who, with his orders, helps the growth of popular resistance, strengthens the spirit of the army. This is how Tolstoy assesses the role of personality in history: “A historical personality is the essence of a label that history hangs on this or that event. This is what happens to a person, according to the writer: "A person consciously lives for himself, but serves as an unconscious instrument for achieving historical universal human goals." Therefore, in history, fatalism is inevitable when explaining "illogical", "unreasonable" phenomena. Man must learn the laws historical development, but due to the weakness of reason and the wrong, or rather, according to the writer's thought, unscientific approach to history, the realization of these laws has not yet come, but it must come. This is the writer's peculiar philosophical and historical optimism.
The meaning of the historical process. The role of personality in history.
Exercise. Underline the abstracts of the article, prepare an answer to the questions:
- What is the meaning of the historical process, according to Tolstoy?
What are Tolstoy's views on the causes of the war of 1812 and his attitude to the war?
- What is the role of personality in history?
- What does the personal and swarm life of a person mean? What is the ideal human being? What heroes are characterized by this ideal being?
For the first time, this topic is considered in detail in the historical and philosophical discourse on the causes of the war of 1812 (the beginning of the second and the beginning of the third parts of the third volume). This reasoning is polemically directed against the traditional concepts of historians, which Tolstoy considers a stereotype that requires rethinking. According to Tolstoy, the beginning of a war cannot be explained by someone's separate will (for example, the will of Napoleon). Napoleon is objectively involved in this event in the same way as any corporal who goes to war that day. The war was inevitable, it began according to an invisible historical will, which is made up of "billions of wills". The role of personality in history is practically negligible. The more people are connected with others, the more they serve "necessity", i.e. their will intertwines with other wills and becomes less free. Therefore, public and state leaders are less subjectively free. "The king is a slave to history." (How is this thought of Tolstoy manifested in the depiction of Alexander?) Napoleon is mistaken when he thinks that he can influence the course of events. "... The course of world events is predetermined from above, depends on the coincidence of all the arbitrariness of the people participating in these events, and ... the influence of Napoleons on the course of these events is only external and fictitious" (vol. 3, part 2, ch.XXVII). Kutuzov is right that he prefers to strictly follow the objective process, rather than impose his own line, “not interfere” with what is about to happen. The novel ends with the formula of historical fatalism: "... it is necessary to give up non-existent freedom and recognize the dependence we do not feel."
Attitude to the war. The war turns out to be not a duel between Napoleon and Alexander or with Kutuzov, it is a duel of two principles (aggressive, destructive and harmonious, constructive), which are embodied not only in Napoleon and Kutuzov, but also in characters appearing at other levels of the plot (Natasha, Platon Karataev and etc.). On the one hand, war is an event that is contrary to all humanity, on the other, it is an objective reality that means personal experience for the heroes. Tolstoy's moral attitude to war is negative.
A kind of "war" is also taking place in peaceful life. Heroes representing secular society, careerists are condemned - a kind of "little Napoleons" (Boris, Berg), as well as those for whom war is the place of realization of aggressive motives (nobleman Dolokhov, peasant Tikhon Shcher-baty). These heroes belong to the sphere of "war", they embody the Napoleonic principle.
"Personal" and "swarm" life of a person. It may seem that such a vision of the world is deeply pessimistic: the concept of freedom is denied, but then a person's life loses its meaning. In fact, this is not the case. Tolstoy divides the subjective and objective levels of human life: a person is in a small circle of his biography (microcosm, "personal" life) and in a large circle of universal history (macrocosm, "swarm" life). A person is subjectively aware of his "personal" life, but cannot see what his "swarm" life consists of.
On the “personal” level, a person is endowed with sufficient freedom of choice and is able to take responsibility for his actions. A person lives unconsciously with his "swarm" life. At this level, he himself cannot decide anything, his role will forever remain the one that history has given him. The ethical principle arising from the novel is as follows: a person should not consciously relate to his "swarm" life, put himself in any relationship with history. Any person who tries to consciously participate in the general historical process and influence it is delusional. The novel discredits Napoleon, who mistakenly believed that the fate of the war depended on him - in fact, he was a toy in the hands of an inexorable historical necessity. In reality, he turned out to be only a victim of a process that, as he thought, started by himself. All the heroes of the novel who tried to be Napoleons sooner or later part with this dream or end badly. One example: Prince Andrei overcomes illusions associated with state activities in Speransky's office (and this is correct, no matter how "progressive" Speransky is).
The law of historical necessity is fulfilled by people unknown to themselves, blindly, knowing nothing except their private goals, and only truly (and not in the "Napoleonic" sense) great people are able to renounce the personal, imbued with the goals of historical necessity, and this is the only way to become a conscious guide of the higher will (for example, Kutuzov).
Ideal being is a state of harmony, agreement (with the world, that is, a state of "peace" (in the sense: not a war). For this, personal life must be reasonably consistent with the laws of a "swarm" life. Wrong being is enmity with these laws, the state of "war", when the hero opposes himself to people, tries to impose his will on the world (this is the way of Napoleon).
Positive examples in the novel are Natasha Rostova and her brother Nikolai (harmonious life, taste for her, understanding of her beauty), Kutuzov (the ability to react sensitively to the course of the historical process and take his reasonable place in it), Platon Karataev (this hero has a personal life practically dissolves into the "swarm", he does not seem to have his own individual "I", but only a collective, national, universal "We").
Prince Andrey and Pierre Bezukhov on different stages their way of life, they then become like Napoleon, thinking that they can influence the historical process with their personal will (Bolkonsky's ambitious plans; Pierre's passion first for Freemasonry, and then for secret societies; Pierre's intention to kill Napoleon and become the savior of Russia), then they acquire a correct view of the world after deep crises, emotional upheavals, disappointments. Prince Andrey died after being wounded in the Battle of Borodino, having experienced a state of harmonious unity with the world. For Pierre, a similar state of enlightenment came in captivity (note that in both cases, the heroes, along with simple, empirical experience, also receive a mystical experience through sleep or vision). (Find it in the text.) However, it can be assumed that ambitious plans to return to Pierre again, he will be carried away by secret societies, although Platon Karataev might not have liked this (see Pierre's conversation with Natasha in the epilogue).
In connection with the idea of "personal" and "swarm" life, the dispute between Nikolai Rostov and Pierre about secret societies is indicative. Pierre sympathizes with their activities ("The Tugendbund is a union of virtue, love, mutual help; this is what Christ preached on the cross"), and Nikolai believes that « secret society- therefore, hostile and harmful, which can only give rise to evil,<…>make you a secret society, you start to resist the government, whatever it may be, I know that it is my duty to obey it. And now tell me Arakcheev to go at you with a squadron and chop - I will not think for a second and I will go. And then judge as you like. " This dispute does not receive an unambiguous assessment in the novel; it remains open. You can talk about "two truths" - Nikolai Rostov and Pierre. We can sympathize with Pierre together with Nikolenka Bolkonsky.
The epilogue ends with Nikolenka's symbolic sleep on the topic of this conversation. An intuitive sympathy for Pierre's cause is combined with dreams of a hero's glory. This is reminiscent of Prince Andrew's youthful dreams of "his Toulon", which were once debunked. Thus, in Nikolenka's dreams there is an undesirable “Napoleonic” principle for Tolstoy — there is it in Pierre's political ideas as well. In this regard, the dialogue between Natasha and Pierre in Ch. XVI of the first part of the epilogue, where Pierre is forced to admit that Platon Karataev (a man with whom the main moral criteria are associated for Pierre) would “not approve” of his political activities, but would approve of “family life”.
"The Way of Napoleon".
The conversation about Napoleon comes in the very first pages of the novel. Pierre Bezukhov, realizing that he is shocking the society gathered in the salon of Anna Pavlovna Scherer, solemnly, "with despair", "becoming more and more animated", asserts that "Napoleon is great," "that the people saw him as a great man." Smoothing out the "blasphemous" meaning of his speeches ("The revolution was a great thing, - continued Monsieur Pierre, showing his great youth with this desperate and defiant introductory sentence ..."), Andrei Bolkonsky admits that "It is necessary to distinguish between the actions of a private person, a commander or an emperor in the actions of a statesman", also considering that Napoleon is "great" in the embodiment of these latter qualities.
The conviction of Pierre Bezukhov is so deep that he does not want to participate in the “war against Napoleon”, since this would be a fight with “the greatest man in the world” (vol. 1, part 1, ch. 5). A sharp change in his views, which took place in connection with the internal and external events of his life, leads to the fact that in 1812 he sees in Napoleon the Antichrist, the embodiment of evil. He feels “the need and inevitability” to kill his former idol, to perish, or to end the misfortune of all Europe, which, in Pierre’s opinion, originated from Napoleon alone ”(vol. 3, part 3, chapter 27).
For Andrei Bolkonsky, Napoleon is an example of the implementation of ambitious plans that form the basis of his spiritual life. In the upcoming military campaign, he thinks in terms “no worse” than Napoleon's (vol. 1, part 2, ch. 23). All the objections of his father, the "arguments" about mistakes "which, in his opinion," made Bonaparte in all wars and even in state affairs "cannot shake the hero's confidence that he is" after all a great commander "(i.e. .1, part 1, chapter 24). In addition, he is full of hopes, following the example of Napoleon, to start his own "path to glory" ("As soon as he found out that the Russian army was in such a hopeless situation, it occurred to him that ... here he is, that Toulon ..." —t. 1, part 2, chapter 12). However, having accomplished the feat conceived (“This is it! - Prince Andrew, grabbing the flagstaff and hearing with delight the whistle of bullets, obviously directed against him” - part 3, ch. 16) and having received the praise of his “hero”, he “not only did not become interested "in Napoleon's words, but" did not notice or immediately forgot them "(vol. 1, part 3, ch. 19). He seems to Prince Andrey insignificant, petty, self-righteous in comparison with the lofty meaning of life that has revealed to him. In the war of 1812, Bolkonsky was one of the first to take the side of the "common truth".
Napoleon is the embodiment of voluntarism and extreme individualism. He seeks to impose his will on the world (i.e. huge masses of people), but this is impossible. The war began in accordance with the objective course of the historical process, but Napoleon thinks that he started the war. Having lost the war, he feels despair and confusion. Tolstoy's image of Napoleon is not devoid of grotesque satirical shades. For Napoleon, theatrical behavior is characteristic (see, for example, the scene with the "Roman king" in Chapter XXVI of the second part of the third volume), narcissism, vanity. The scene of Napoleon's meeting with Lavrushka is expressive, wittily "conjectured" by Tolstoy in the wake of historical materials.
Napoleon is the main emblem of the voluntaristic path, but many other heroes follow this path in the novel. They can also be likened to Napoleon (cf. "little Napoleons" - an expression from the novel). Vanity and self-confidence are characteristic of Bennigsen and other military leaders, the authors of all kinds of "dispositions", who accused Kutuzov of inaction. Many people of a secular society are also spiritually similar to Napoleon, because they always live, as it were, in a state of "war" (secular intrigues, careerism, the desire to subordinate other people to their own interests, etc.). First of all, this applies to the Kuragin family. All members of this family aggressively interfere in the lives of other people, try to impose their will, use others to fulfill their own desires.
Some researchers have pointed to a symbolic connection between the love story (the invasion of the treacherous Anatole into Natasha's world) and the historical one (Napoleon's invasion of Russia), especially since the episode on Poklonnaya Gora uses an erotic metaphor (“And from this point of view, he [Napoleon] looked at lying in front of him, an oriental beauty unseen before him [Moscow],<…>the certainty of possession agitated and terrified him ”- ch. XIX of the third part of the third volume).
Its embodiment and antithesis to Napoleon in the novel is Kutuzov. A conversation about him also arises in the very first chapter, with the fact that Prince Andrew is his adjutant. Kutuzov is the commander-in-chief of the Russian army opposing Napoleon. However, his concerns are directed not at victorious battles, but at keeping the "naked, exhausted" troops (vol. 1, part 2, chap. 1-9). Not believing in victory, he, an old military general, experiences "despair" (Rana is not here, but where! - said Kutuzov, pressing his handkerchief to his wounded cheek and pointing at the fleeing ones "- vol. 1, part 3, ch. 16 ). For those around him, the leisurely and immediacy of his behavior
The true meaning of life. The final phrase in the novel provokes the reader to draw a pessimistic conclusion about the meaninglessness of life. However, the internal logic of the plot of "War and Peace" (in which it is not by chance that all the diversity of a person's life experience is recreated: as A. D. Sinyavsky said, "the whole war and the whole world at once") suggests the opposite.