A. Block. "Stranger" (analysis)

The theoretical basis of the poetry of the Symbolists was the philosophy of intuitive creativity, the expression of vague feelings and subtle ideas through incoherent unsystematic symbols. The so-called cryptography of the unspoken. The second most important symbolist category was the obligatory musicality of the verse.

The reader must independently decipher the poetry of the hints of Alexander Blok and take part in the creative work, adding to the picture of the fantasy or conditional reality of the poetic landscape, the worldview or the ineffable experience of the creator.

One of Blok's hobbies was the philosophy of Vladimir Solovyov, from the ideal of total unity which in his work came the symbol of the eternal feminine principle, or femininity. The surrounding world of the beginning of the century, with its tragic contradictions and social catastrophes, seemed terrible to the poet, so even the central poetic cycle of this period was named.

Block. "Stranger" (analysis)

As a result of avoiding the "terrible" existence, the lyrical hero of the poem forms its own, beautiful and poetic, world. If you take a poem that Blok wrote at the time - "Stranger" - the analysis will show that you can conditionally divide it into two parts. And in the first, consisting of six quatrains, for some reason everything that he did not like: a wild and deaf hot air; Dust and boredom, child crying; Noisy couples walking between ditches; Creak, screech; Lackeys and drunkards with red eyes.

A. Blok "Stranger" (analysis of the 1st part)

The poem was created in 1906. This period of life for Blok was difficult - starting with family troubles, ending with a break with the poets-symbolists. Time was also troubled in terms of social upheavals. The poet did not leave feeling of trouble, the contradictory tragedy of life, which gave rise to a "dull darkness".

It was born as a result of aimless wanderings through the Petersburg neighborhoods and trips to Ozerki to the dacha. Sublime and solemn quatrains, where the heroine is beautiful in its mysteriousness, are interspersed with quatrains-utterances of the disappointed life of the hero, who has an unconscious anxiety in his soul. He believes that the world is dying, rolling into darkness, into the abyss, it needs to be saved. In it reigns lawlessness and unbelief.

The lyrical hero of the poem in search of an outlet goes into rampant and drunkenness. Now he is himself and a friend, and a drinking companion. The wine "humbles" and "deafens" it. A real world where ditches, dust, wits and their squealing ladies, a meaninglessly croaking disk of the moon, fades into the background when, at the "appointed" hour, She enters the room.

Block. "Stranger" (analysis of the second part)

The hero doubts the reality of what is happening. In the presence of symbols of ambiguity: sleep and fog ("dream", the window - foggy). Her image of the hero is not able to cover the whole, in full consciousness, there are details (the girl's silken camp, a hat with a veil and feathers, a hand in rings, blue eyes). The second part also consists of six quatrains. The last is the result, the conclusion.

The secret of this poem is that one can not say for sure whether a real Stranger is real or imaginary. Block analysis of his creation, decomposition into the components of his wonderful magical world, probably would not approve. Yes, it does not give anything! Every reader must decide everything for himself.

Do you need a more detailed analysis? The "stranger", Blok, as well as his other poems, hardly need him. It is better to read, feel, follow the imagination of the poet and receive from the beauty and musicality of his fantasies an unspeakable pleasure!