Soloukhin, "Blackboards": a summary of the chapters

Vladimir Soloukhin's books have always been a classic example of Russian prose. Written in a living language, dedicated to current topics, they attracted the attention of contemporaries. All this applies to the work called "Blackboards".

Soloukhin tells a lot of interesting things to his readers. "Blackboards" (a brief summary of this work we will consider in this article) are one of the most important works of the writer.

In his novel, the author draws attention to the fact that in the Soviet era, as a result of the ideological struggle, the priceless monuments of ancient Russian art, the icons of ancient writing, whose significance is enormous, were destroyed or forgotten.

What does the Blackboard project say? Summary of the chapters

In this small prose work the author tells that once in his life came the passion for collecting. However, it was not just collecting stamps or coins, he collected works of masters of ancient Russia, to convey to the new generation the traditional people's world outlook and the beauty of products of religious life.

The work was published in 1969. It consists of 15 parts, author's afterword and notes.

Contents of the first part of the work

A lot of interesting reveals before the readers Soloukhin Vladimir. "Blackboards" (the first part will be briefly discussed below) is a narrative of how one person tries to preserve the unique heritage of Ancient Rus.

The story is preceded by a kind of lyrical introduction. The author recalls stories about collectors and collectors - strange, in general, people who lived and live in our world.

Everyone knows the collectors of stamps or philatelists, but the author seems to be bored with their occupation, because the brand is just a piece of paper that often does not represent any artistic value. Often people play with stamps in a certain game, paying for rare of them fabulous money.

We examined the first part of the work "Blackboards" (short content). Soloukhin in this introductory part calls himself a collector, a man whose soul is imbued with love for the beautiful. Therefore, he seeks in his old and often unnecessary things his treasure. Let it be an old postcard or a hand-written book, etc. The writer himself admits that as a child, his passion was the gathering of eggs of wild birds. Now Soloukhin is interested in Russian icons of the ancient style of writing.

The author of his unusual collecting

In the second part, the author says that in his childhood often there were massive burning of icons as alien ideological artifacts. The pioneers, who secretly burned home icons from their parents, even praised them in school as heroes. However, according to the writer, icons represent not only the image of religious worship, but also a work of ancient Russian art, to which one must be treated very carefully. The author tells in detail about the work of two of his familiar restorers, who returned the original form to the black boards that survived during the destruction of the icons. And what a beauty it was when a black layer of soot and dirt was removed from the icons and the restorers looked at the face of 16 or even 15th century!

The content of the work in the 4th and 5th chapters

A lot of stories hasten to share with readers Soloukhin Vladimir. "Blackboards" (a summary of the chapters is offered to your attention in this article) is a complete work about how the writer began to collect his first icons - those blackened from time boards from his fellow villagers. In the third chapter, he describes in detail all five of the first icons of his future collection.

In the fourth chapter, the writer tells how he began to look for icons in the ancient village of Snegirev, once belonged to the princes Saltykov. For this he visited the old church in the village. In this church, Father John served as a respected and strong person. Even in the 30s of the last century, he did not give up priesthood, although he was forced to do so, but along with the icons he kept a portrait of Stalin on the wall, sincerely honoring this terrestrial leader along with the honored God. By the time Soloukhin began to collect icons, the priest had long been buried, but his granddaughter continued living in the village, in which the author intended to ask for old icons. In addition to icons, the granddaughter of the priest managed to take for a time two handbooks, which were devoted to the description of the temples of the central provinces of the Russian Empire.

Organization of a rescue expedition: an overview of the 5th and 6th chapters

Solowkhin tells stories that are understandable to the readers. The "Black Boards" (a brief summary of the next part entitled "Stavrovo" is considered below) is a hymn of old Russian life.

After a short introduction, the author in the fifth chapter narrates about the village located under the city of Vladimir. In Greek, "stavros" is a cross, hence the name of this place. This village is unusual in that since the 17th century it belonged to either royal people or churches, so two large and beautiful churches with everything necessary for church services were built here. However, much has changed since then: under the Soviet regime, both churches were used for agricultural needs, as a result of such use, one of the temples was destroyed, and the other became a miserable sight.

In the fifth chapter Soloukhin tells how he together with his friend-artist decided to organize expeditions to different villages to save the ancient icons. He himself called these expeditions rescue.

In the sixth chapter the author continues his story. He says that the rescue expedition led him to a village where the monastery stood for many years. In the village they went to the chairman of the collective farm with a friend and announced to him that they were collecting everything that was old. They began to bring a lot of things, including black boards of icons.

Review of the 7th, 8th and 9th chapters

Many Russian icons of the ancient letter were collected by Soloukhin. "Black Boards" (a summary of the 7th, 8th and 9th chapters of the work is presented below) is a book that every person can realize his dream. The writer's dream was gathering.

In support of this, the story follows in the work that the author became more and more attached to his hobby. He already at night thought about the old icons and made plans for their salvation. However, not everything was easy. Often praying people were afraid to show and hand over to the author and his friend icons, which they with great difficulty saved from destruction.

In the eighth chapter the author continues the story that church people, like an old deaf and blind guardian of a devastated but not demolished church, are afraid to talk about old icons, believing that they want to destroy them.

Soloukhin describes his visit to one of the abandoned churches, in which were stored many icons that have become completely worthless and decayed. The abomination of desolation causes him the most sad thoughts.

In the ninth chapter, Soloukhin continues the story of his adventures. This time he decided to enter a closed church, the parishioners of which, fearing her ruin, purposely hid the keys from her. The author with great difficulty managed to persuade devout women to show him the contents of the church.

The author summarizes the work

So, we got acquainted with the work "Blackboards". Summary (Soloukhin called his book a return to the sources) of this story was considered by us in this article.

In the last chapters of his work the author summarizes the narrative. So, in the 10th chapter, he talks about his journey for the ancient icons to the old nun who assumed the role of their keeper. In Chapter 11 Soloukhin, making a lyrical digression, tells readers about the peculiarities of Old Russian iconography, enumerating the most famous images. In the 12th chapter, the author describes the sad results of his searches, which once again ended in vain, because the icons that he found on the farmyard of one of the collective farms perished from mold and dampness. In the 13th chapter Soloukhin with a sad laugh recalls how the village women were afraid to give him the icons, believing that he takes them to scold. In the 14th chapter the author tells how he tried to save the icon, which was nailed in the hut like a regular plaque, but the stern mistress did not want to give it away. In the 15th chapter, he describes the salvation of his last icon - "The Savior in the Force" - and the restoration of its ancient appearance.

Soloukhin, "Blackboards": a short summary. Afterword

Afterword is the compositional finale of the work, in which the author, last time addressing the readers, again repeats the key moments of his story.

We have studied the work "Blackboards" (short content). Soloukhin Vladimir Alekseevich in the afterword says that times are gradually changing, and people stop throwing or burning icons, seeing in them an artistic value. And this inspires some optimism, which allows us to hope that the art of the ancient icon painters will be at least partially preserved.