Analysis of "Dead Souls". Analysis of the work "Dead Souls" by Gogol

"Dead Souls" - the main work of Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol not only in terms of the scale and depth of artistic generalizations. For this author work on it has become a lengthy process of writing and human self-knowledge. The analysis of the "Dead Souls" will be presented in this article.

Gogol noted after the publication of the first volume that the main subject of his work is not at all the ugly landowners and not the province, but "mystery", which should suddenly reveal itself to readers in the following volumes.

"The pale beginning" of the grand design

The search for a genre, a change in design, work on the text of the first two volumes, as well as the thinking of the third, are fragments of the grandiose "construction" that Nikolai Vasilievich carried out only partially. In analyzing the "Dead Souls", it should be understood that the first volume is only a part in which the outlines of the whole are outlined. This "pale beginning" of labor, by definition of the writer. It was not for nothing that Nikolai Vasilyevich compared him to the porch attached to the "palace" by the provincial architect.

How did the idea of the work arise?

Features of composition and plot, originality of the genre are associated with the deepening and development of the original design of "Dead Souls." Pushkin stood at the origins of the work. As Nikolai Vasilyevich said, the poet advised him to set to work on a large work and even suggested a plot from which he himself wanted to create "something like a poem." However, it is not so much the story itself as the "thought" contained in it was Pushkin's "clue" to Gogol. The future author of the poem was well known to real stories, which are based on scams with the so-called "dead souls". In the youthful years of Gogol in Mirgorod, one of such cases occurred.

"Dead Souls" in Russia from the time of Gogol

"Dead Souls" - serfs who died, but continued to be counted alive until the next "revision tale." Only after it they were officially considered dead. It was after the "revisionist tale" that the landlords ceased to pay a per capita tax for them-a special tax. The peasants who existed on paper could be pledged, donated or sold, than the scammers sometimes used, tempting the landowners not only to get rid of the serfs who did not bring income, but also to get money for them.

The buyer of "dead souls" at the same time became the owner of a very real estate. The adventure of the protagonist of the work, Chichikov, is a consequence of the "inspirational thought" that overshadowed him, - the guardian council will give 200 rubles for each serf.

Adventurous-picaresque novel

The basis for the so-called adventurous-picaresque novel gave "anecdote" with "dead souls". This kind of novel was always very popular, because it was very entertaining. Gogol's older contemporaries created works in this genre (VT Narezhny, FV Bulgarin, and others). Their novels, despite their rather low artistic level, were very successful.

Modification of the genre of the adventurous picaresque novel in the process of work

The genre model of the work we are interested in is an adventurous and picaresque novel, as the analysis of Dead Souls shows. It, however, strongly changed in the process of the writer's work on this creation. This is evidenced, for example, by the author's designation "poem", which appeared after the general plan and the main idea was corrected by Gogol (Dead Souls).

The analysis of the work reveals the following interesting features. "All Russia will appear in it" - Gogol's thesis, which not only emphasized the scale of the "Dead Souls" concept in comparison with the original desire "to show Russia from one side", but also meant a radical revision of the genre model chosen earlier. Nikolai Vasilievich was close to the framework of the traditional adventurous and picaresque novel, because he could not accommodate the wealth of the new plan. Only in one of the ways of the vision of Russia has Chichikov's Odyssey turned.

The adventure-picaresque novel, having lost its leading significance in Dead Souls, remained a genre shell for the epic and moralizing poem.

Features of the image Chichikov

One of the techniques that is used in this genre is the mystery of the origin of the hero. The main character was in the first chapters either a man from the common people or a foundling, and at the end of the work, having overcome life's obstacles, he suddenly turned out to be the son of wealthy parents, received an inheritance. Resolutely refused to Nikolay Vasilyevich from such a template.

Carrying out the analysis of the poem "Dead Souls", it is necessary to note without fail that Chichikov is a man of the "middle". The author himself says about him that he is "not bad appearance", but not handsome, not too thin, but not too fat, not very old and not very young. From the reader is hidden the life story of this adventurer until the final, eleventh chapter. In this you will see by reading carefully "Dead Souls". The analysis of the chapters reveals the fact that the author tells the story only in the eleventh. Having decided to do this, Gogol begins by emphasizing the "vulgarity," the mediocrity of his hero. He writes that his "modest" and "dark" origins. Nikolai Vasilyevich again rejects extremes in the definition of his character (not a scoundrel, but also not a hero), but he stops at Chichikov's main quality - the "acquirer", the "master."

Chichikov is an "average" person

In this hero, therefore, there is nothing unusual - this is the so-called "average" person, in which Gogol strengthened the line, which is characteristic of many people. Nikolai Vasilievich sees in the replacement of everything else his passion for profit, in pursuit of the ghost of a light and beautiful life, the manifestation of "human poverty", the poverty of life goals and spiritual interests - all that many people so carefully hides. The analysis of the "Dead Souls" shows that Gogol needed a biography of the hero not so much to reveal the "secret" of his life at the end of the work, how many to remind the readers that this is not an exceptional man, but quite ordinary. Anyone can discover in himself some "part of Chichikov."

"Positive" characters of the work

In adventurous and picaresque novels, the traditional plot "spring" is the persecution of the malicious, greedy and vicious people of the protagonist. Fought for their own rights, the rogue on their background seemed almost "perfect model." As a rule, he was helped by compassionate and virtuous people who naively expressed the ideals of the author.

However, Chichikov in the first volume of the work no one pursues. Also in the novel there are no characters who could at least to some extent follow the writer's point of view. While analyzing the work Dead Souls, we can see that only in the second volume there are "positive" heroes: the landowner Kostanzhoglo, the farmer Murazov, the governor who is intransigent to the abuses of various officials. But these characters, unusual for Nikolai Vasilyevich, are very far from the novel patterns.

What interests Nikolai Vasilyevich first?

Fictitious, artificial were the plots of many works written in the genre of adventure-picaresque novel. The emphasis was on adventures, "adventures" of heroes-rogues. And Nikolai Vasilievich is interested not in the adventures of the protagonist in themselves, not in their "material" result (Chichikov eventually got the same status fraudulently), but their moral and social content, which allowed the author to make a cheating "mirror" reflecting modern Russia In the work "Dead Souls". Analysis shows that this is a country of landlords who sell "air" (that is, dead peasants), as well as officials who provide assistance to the fraudster, instead of hindering him. The plot of this work has a great semantic potential - different layers of other meanings, symbolic and philosophical, are superimposed on its real basis. It is very interesting to analyze the landlords ("Dead Souls"). Each of the five characters is very symbolic - in their depiction, Nikolai Vasilievich uses the grotesque.

Deceleration of plot movement

Gogol's movement slows down consciously, each event accompanied by detailed descriptions of the material world in which the heroes live, as well as their appearance, with arguments about their human qualities. Not only the dynamics, but also the significance, loses the adventurous and picaresque plot. Each event of the work causes an "avalanche" of author's assessments and judgments, details, facts. The novel's action, contrary to the requirements of this genre, almost completely stops in the last chapters. This can be seen by independently doing an analysis of Gogol's poem "Dead Souls." For the development of the action, only two events from the rest of the events that occur from the seventh to the eleventh chapter matter. This is the departure from the city of Chichikov and the design of the deed.

Demanding readers

Nikolai Vasilievich to the readers is very demanding - he wants them to penetrate into the very essence of the phenomena, and not slip on their surface, they reflect on the hidden meaning of the work Dead Souls. It should be analyzed very carefully. It is necessary to see beyond the "objective" or informative meaning of the author's words, but the most important meaning is symbolically generalized. Just as necessary, as Pushkin in "Eugene Onegin," the co-creation of readers to the author of "Dead Souls." It is important to note that the artistic effect of Gogol's prose is not created by what is being described, what is depicted, but by the way it is done. You will be convinced of this, having once analyzed the work "Dead Souls". The word is a subtle instrument, which Gogol mastered perfectly.

Nikolai Vasilievich stressed that the writer, addressing people, should take into account the fear and insecurity that live in those who commit bad deeds. And approval, and reproach must bear the word "lyrical poet." Reasoning about the dual nature of the phenomena of life is the favorite theme of the author of the work that interests us.

This is a short analysis ("Dead Souls"). About Gogol's work you can say a lot. We have singled out only the main points. It is also curious to dwell on the images of the landlords and the author. You can do this yourself, based on our analysis.