The story of Tolstoy describes the life of a sixteen-year-old boy Nikolai Irtenevich. Ahead of him are exams and admission to the university. Different people will meet on his life path. Many of his friends do not lead the best way of life: they smoke, drink alcohol, gossip. They try to win Nicholas to their side, but the young man chooses the righteous path. Dmitry Nekhlyudov, a decent, honest, intelligent person, becomes his ideal. He repeatedly helps Nicholas out, helps in his studies.
The hero finds a common language with his brother Volodya, but spends little time with the sisters Katya and Lyuba. His father is almost never at home. He will marry a second time. All family members do not like the stepmother.
Nikolai shows sympathy for many ladies, but these signs of attention are just a temporary hobby of the hero.
The young man successfully passes the exams. His dream has come true. In the capital, he finds new comrades who do not have the best influence on him. Nikolai fails the exam and therefore does not proceed to the next course. He is upset because he has violated all of his moral principles. From that moment on, he decides to strictly follow his rules.
The reader has the opportunity to observe the moral and ethical growth of the hero of the story.
the main idea
The story teaches its reader that it is necessary to be aware of their mistakes, analyze them and never make them again in the future. As the saying goes: "It is necessary to learn from mistakes."
Chapter 1. What I consider the beginning of youth
Nikolai Irteniev is sixteen years old. A kind, purposeful, honest person dreams of successfully passing the university entrance exams. The hero begins to communicate with Dmitry Nekhlyudov, a sane and entertaining young man. For Irteniev, he is a role model.
Chapter 2. Spring
Nikolai loves spring. He enjoys nature, which awakens after a long winter sleep.
Chapter 3. Dreams
The young man dreams of studying at the university, how he will donate a scholarship to the poor and needy. Nikolai wants to become popular.
Chapter 4. Our family circle
His father is often absent from home. He is interested in gambling. He is now in a period of good luck and is therefore in a great location. His brother Volodya is completely different from him in character. Volodya loves social events and socializing with friends over a glass of champagne. Lyuba and Katya, Nikolai's sisters, have become adult young ladies and dream of a wedding.
Chapter 5. Rules
In order to understand the meaning of life, Nikolai takes a blank notebook and begins to keep records of the rules and norms of behavior in society. At the request of his father, a monk comes to Nikolai's house to listen to the confessions of each family member.
Chapter 6. Confession
Nicholas confesses to a monk, talks about all his sins. At night, he wakes up and remembers that he forgot to tell the old man about another bad deed. This thought does not give the young man peace and early in the morning he decides to go to the temple.
Chapter 7. Travel to the monastery
Nikolai leaves home for the first time himself. For about half an hour he waits for the monk to correct his mistake. At this moment, he feels the views of people on him. He is sure that all confessors condemn him.
Chapter 8. Second Confession
He is waiting for the monk and pours out his whole soul. Now he is really happy, his soul is easy. Nikolai rushes home on the wings of happiness, but this joy quickly dissipates, since at home his small troubles await.
Chapter 9. How I Prepare for the Exam
All the household, except for Volodya and Saint-Jerome, who is the tutor, go to the village. Good spring weather does not allow Nikolai to study in peace.
Chapter 10. Exam of History
Nikolai is taking an exam in history. He is lucky and comes across a question that he knows very well and therefore gets a mark "5".
Chapter 11. The Mathematics Exam
The next exam is in mathematics. Except for 2 questions, he learned all the tickets. Dmitry Nekhlyudov quickly clarifies the unlearned question to his comrade. But, unfortunately, the young man comes across another topic. He is upset. Having exchanged tickets with the applicant, he receives a mark "5".
Chapter 12. Latin exam
The Latin language teacher gives Nikolai a task that was not given in advance for study. He is unable to cope with the task and receives a grade "2". The young man feels hurt because of the injustice.
Chapter 13. I'm big
Nikolai passes the exam excellently and celebrates this event in a decent institution with his comrades. The father gives him a horse as a present.
Chapter 14. What did Volodya and Dubkov do
Volodya and Dubkov are fond of gambling. Maps are their addiction. Then all the comrades go to the restaurant together.
Chapter 15. Congratulations to me
Comrades congratulate Nikolai on the beginning of a new life. Friends drink champagne and have fun. The hero notices that Dmitry leads a more correct life than the rest of his comrades: he does not drink alcohol, does not brag about his love affairs and does not smoke.
Chapter 16. Quarrel
Nikolai repeats the behavior of his friends, does not want to lag behind them. As a result, a conflict arises between the hero and a certain Kolpikov. At this moment Dubkov breaks in with his inappropriate ridicule. Nikolai tells him everything he thinks about, insults him. Dmitry calms down a friend.
Chapter 17. I'm going to make visits
At the behest of his father, Nikolai goes to visit the Valakhins, Ivins, Kornakovs. Nikolai is "at ease" only with Dmitry, and with the rest he is shackled.
Chapter 18. Valakhins
Many years ago, the hero felt sympathy for Sonya Valakhina. When he sees a beautiful girl again, he feels affection for her.
Chapter 19. The Kornakovs
Nikolai learns from the Kornakovs that members of his family are direct descendants of the prince.
Chapter 20. Ivin
Nikolai goes to the Ivins. The hero does not like the attitude of the Ivins towards him. The mother complains and whimpers endlessly, and the younger Ivin and his father do not seem to notice the guest and reluctantly answer his questions.
Chapter 21. Prince Ivan Ivanovich
Nikolai visits his relative, the prince. The elderly man is friendly with the hero, but such an affectionate attitude is just a prank. Nikolai believes that Ivan Ivanovich is unpleasant because of his family ties.
Chapter 22. Sincere conversation with my friend
Nikolai goes to see Comrade Nekhlyudov at his dacha. Dima talks about his sympathy for Lyubov Sergeevna, who lived at their house.
Chapter 23. The Nekhludoffs
Nikolai meets his friend's family, as well as Lyubov Sergevna. The hero did not like the girl.
Chapter 24. Love
The young man liked Nekhlyudova's aunt, kind-hearted Sofia Ivanovna. She is respectful of the rest of the family.
Chapter 25. I'm Getting Acquainted
In Dima's family, a discussion is unfolding about the relationship between Dmitry and Lyuba. This love affair is not supported by the mother and sister Varya. Despite what is happening, Nikolai feels comfortable visiting. Here they reckon with him and take him for his own.
Chapter 26. I appear from the most advantageous side
After tea, everyone goes to the garden. Nikolai sympathizes with Varenka, but remembers that he is not indifferent to Sonya.
Chapter 27.Dmitry
Nikolai dreams of marrying Varya and creating a happy family with her. Dmitry had a toothache. An annoyed young man beats the servant. Dmitry is uncomfortable in front of a friend. After the incident, the friends talk until dawn.
Chapter 28. In the village
The long-awaited meeting took place. The whole family of Nikolai is assembled. The father looks lively and joyful.
Chapter 29. The relationship between us and girls
Nikolay and Volodya spend a little time with their sisters Katya and Lyuba. There is a close relationship between the boys.
Chapter 30. My Activities
This summer Nikolai is taking on a new hobby. Playing the piano and reading novels are his main hobbies. Katya introduced Nikolai to the sheet music. By playing a musical instrument, the young man wants to win the hearts of young ladies.
Chapter 31 Comme il faut
Nikolay wants to be Comme il faut - a man who speaks excellent French, neatly dressed.
Chapter 32. Youth
Nikolay is having a great summer vacation.
Chapter 33. Neighbors
Nikolai's father communicates well with the Epifanovs. The young man is not very enthusiastic about these people.
Chapter 34. Father's marriage
Signs of my father's attention to the neighbor Avdotya became increasingly visible. Father is already over forty, but the neighbor is still in her prime.
Chapter 35. How We Received This News
The father officially announces his marriage to all family members.
Chapter 36. University
Autumn has come. Volodya and Nikolai went to study in the capital. Nikolai does not maintain close relations with anyone.
Chapter 37. Heart affairs
The young man sympathizes with many ladies, but all these signs of attention are temporary and not serious.
Chapter 38. Light
Nikolai attends a secular party for the first time. From worries, he behaves stupidly.
Chapter 39. Revelry
Nikolai's classmate is holding a feast. It is boring, but everything creates a kind of fun. And then they spread the rumor that everything was at the highest level.
Chapter 40. Friendship with the Nekhlyudovs
This winter Nikolai made frequent visits to the Nekhlyudovs. He feels comfortable in this family.
Chapter 41. Friendship with Nekhlyudov
The friendship of Nikolai and Dima has become not as strong as before. One day they even quarreled.
Chapter 42. Stepmother
The whole family is not happy with the stepmother. Avdotya treats his father well, but gives him a lot of inconvenience.
Chapter 43. New comrades
While preparing for exams, Nikolai closely communicates with a couple of fellow students. They are very entertaining guys.
Chapter 44. Zukhin and Semenov
One of Nikolai Zukhin's friends, a young man of eighteen years old, interesting, well-read. But the second, Semenov, does not often attend lectures. He gets into debt and goes to serve in the army.
Chapter 45. I'm Falling Down
Having contacted new comrades, Nikolai begins to show a negligent attitude towards studying at the university. He does not pass the session and remains for the second year. Relatives advise him to go to study in another specialty.
One stage of adolescence has come to an end. Now we can only hope for a happier next period.
The Bronze Horseman of A.S. Pushkin is an unusual work. Fates and human mental pain are intertwined in a poetic form. Times overlap. Tsar Peter builds a city on the Neva, which has become the most beautiful city
There was no devilry in this play. It is enough that the characters themselves create.
HEART WORKS
Heart affairs occupied me quite a lot this winter. I've been in love three times. Once I passionately fell in love with a very plump lady who rode with me in the Freytag arena, as a result of which every Tuesday and Friday - the days on which she went - I came to the arena to look at her, but every time I was so afraid that she would see me , and therefore he always stood so far from her and ran so quickly from the place where she was supposed to pass, and so casually turned away when she looked in my direction that I did not even take a good look at her face and still don’t know, whether she was definitely pretty or not.
Dubkov, who was familiar with this lady, once caught me in the arena, where I stood, hiding behind the footmen and the fur coats that they kept, and having learned from Dmitry about my passion, he so frightened me with the offer to introduce me to this Amazon that I headlong I fled from the arena, and at the mere thought of what he had told her about me, he no longer dared to enter the arena, even before the footmen, fearing to meet her.
When I was in love with unfamiliar and especially married women, shyness came to me a thousand times stronger than that which I experienced with Sonechka. I was afraid more than anything in the world that my subject would not know about my love and even about my existence. It seemed to me that if she knew about the feeling that I felt for her, it would be such an insult to her that she could never forgive me. And in fact, if this Amazon knew in detail how I, looking at her from behind the lackeys, imagined, having kidnapped her, taken to the village and how to live with her there and what to do with her, perhaps she would be very fair. offended. But I could not clearly understand that, knowing me, she could not yet suddenly find out all my thoughts about her and that therefore there was nothing shameful just to get to know her.
Another time I fell in love with Sonechka when I saw her at my sister's. My second love for her has long since passed, but I fell in love for the third time due to the fact that Lyubochka gave me a notebook of poems rewritten by Sonechka, in which Lermontov's "Demon" was in many darkly amorous places underlined with red ink and laid with flowers. Remembering how Volodya kissed his young lady's wallet last year, I tried to do the same, and indeed, when I started dreaming one evening in my room, looking at a flower and applying it to my lips, I felt some pleasantly tearful disposition and was again in love or so assumed for several days.
For the third time, finally, this winter, I fell in love with the young lady with whom Volodya was in love and who was visiting us. In this young lady, as I now remember, there was absolutely nothing good, and precisely that good that I usually liked. She was the daughter of a well-known Moscow smart and learned lady, small, slender, with long fair-haired English letters and a transparent profile. Everyone said that this young lady was even smarter and more learned than her mother; but I could not judge this in any way, because, feeling a kind of servile fear at the thought of her intelligence and learning, I spoke to her only once, and then with inexplicable trepidation. But Volodya's delight, who was never shy of those present in expressing his delight, communicated to me with such force that I passionately fell in love with this young lady. Feeling that Volodya would be unpleasant to hear that two brothers were in love with one girl, I did not tell him about my love. On the other hand, in this feeling, I was most pleased with the thought that our love is so pure that, despite the fact that its subject is one and the same lovely being, we remain friendly and ready, if the need arises, to sacrifice ourselves for each other. friend. However, Volodya, it seems, did not quite share my opinion about the willingness to sacrifice, because he was so passionately in love that he wanted to slap and challenge one real diplomat to a duel, who, they said, was supposed to marry her. I was very pleased to sacrifice my feelings, perhaps because it was not worth a lot of work, since I only once pretentiously talked with this young lady about the dignity of learned music, and my love, no matter how hard I tried to support it, passed the next week.
Chapter XXXVIII
The secular pleasures that, when entering the university, I dreamed of indulging in imitation of my older brother, completely disappointed me this winter. Volodya danced a lot, dad also went to balls with his young wife; but I must have been considered either still too young or incapable of these pleasures, and no one introduced me to those houses where balls were given. Despite the promise of frankness with Dmitry, I did not tell anyone, and he, too, about how I wanted to go to balls and how painful and annoying it was that they forgot about me and, apparently, looked like some kind of philosopher who I therefore pretended to be.
But this winter there was an evening at Princess Kornakova's. She herself invited all of us and, by the way, me, and for the first time I had to go to the ball. Volodya, before leaving, came to my room and wanted to see me dress. I was very surprised and puzzled by this act on his part. It seemed to me that the desire to be well dressed was very embarrassing and that it was necessary to hide it; he, on the other hand, considered this desire to be so natural and necessary that he said quite frankly that he was afraid that I would not be disgraced. He told me to put on patent leather boots by all means, was horrified when I wanted to put on suede gloves, put on my watch in a special manner and took me to the Kuznetsky Most to the hairdresser. They cursed me. Volodya walked away and looked at me from afar.
Now it's good, but is it really impossible to smooth out these vortices? - he said, referring to the hairdresser.
But no matter how much Mr. Charles smeared some sticky essence on my vortices, they nevertheless stood up when I put on my hat, and in general my curled figure seemed to me even much worse than before. My one salvation was the affectation of negligence. Only in this form did my appearance look like something.
Volodya, it seems, was of the same opinion, because he asked me to break the curl, and when I did it, and yet it was not good, he no longer looked at me and all the way to the Kornakovs he was silent and sad.
Together with Volodya, I entered the Kornakovs boldly; but when the princess invited me to dance and for some reason, despite the fact that I was driving with one thought to dance a lot, said that I did not dance, I felt intimidated and, left alone between strangers, fell into my usual irresistible, ever-increasing shyness. I stood silently in one place all evening.
During the waltz, one of the princesses came up to me and, with official courtesy common to the whole family, asked me why I wasn’t dancing. I remember how timid I was at this question, but at the same time, completely involuntarily for me, a smug smile blossomed on my face, and I began to speak in French in the most pompous language with introductory sentences, such nonsense that I now, even after dozens of years, I'm ashamed to remember. This must have been the effect of the music on me, energizing my nerves and drowning out what I thought was a part of my speech that I didn’t quite understand. I said something about high society, about the emptiness of people and women, and, finally, I was so lying that I stopped at half a word of some phrase, which there was no way to finish.
Even a secular princess was embarrassed and looked at me reproachfully. I was smiling. At this critical moment, Volodya, who, noticing that I was talking hotly, probably wanted to know what it was like to atone for what I didn’t dance in conversations, came up to us with Dubkov. Seeing my smiling face and the frightened face of the princess, and hearing the terrible nonsense with which I ended, he blushed and turned away. The princess got up and walked away from me. I still smiled, but at that moment I suffered so much with the consciousness of my stupidity that I was ready to sink into the ground and that at all costs I felt the need to move and say something in order to somehow change my position. I went up to Dubkov and asked him how much he danced waltzes with her. It was as if I was playful and cheerful, but, in essence, I was begging for help from that very Dubkov, to whom I shouted: "Be quiet!" - at lunch at Yar's. Dubkov pretended not to hear me and turned the other way. I moved up to Volodya and said through force, trying to give the same joking tone to the voice: "Well, Volodya, is he worn out?" But Volodya looked at me as if he wanted to say: “You don’t talk to me like that when we are alone,” and silently walked away from me, apparently afraid that I would not cling to him somehow.
"My God, and my brother is leaving me!" - I thought.
However, for some reason I lacked the strength to leave. Until the end of the evening I stood gloomily in one place, and only when everyone, dispersed, crowded in the hallway and the footman put my greatcoat on the end of my hat, so that it rose, I laughed painfully through tears and, without addressing anyone in particular, said -So: "Comme c'est gracieux".
KUTEZH
Despite the fact that, under the influence of Dmitry, I had not yet indulged in the usual student pleasures called revelry, it happened to me already this winter to participate in such an amusement, and I took out of him a not entirely pleasant feeling. This is how it was. At the beginning of the year, once at a lecture, Baron Z., a tall, blond young man with a very serious, correct face, invited all of us to his house for a friendly evening. All of us means all the comrades, more or less comme il faut of our course, among whom, of course, were not Grap, not Semyonov, not Operov, not all these inferior gentlemen. Volodya smiled contemptuously when he learned that I was going to a freshman carouse; but I expected an extraordinary and great pleasure from this still completely unknown to me the passing of time and punctually at the appointed time, at eight o'clock, was at Baron Z.
Baron Z., in an unbuttoned frock coat and a white waistcoat, received guests in the lighted hall and living room of a small house in which his parents lived, who gave him the ceremonial rooms for the evening of this celebration. In the corridor I could see the dresses and heads of curious maids, and in the sideboard there was a glimpse of the dress of a lady whom I took for the very Baroness. There were about twenty guests, and all were students, with the exception of Mr. Frost, who had arrived with Ivin, and one ruddy tall civilian who was in charge of the feast and who was introduced to everyone as a relative of the Baron and a former student of the University of Dorpat. Too bright lighting and ordinary state decoration of the front rooms at first acted so coolly on all this young society that everyone involuntarily kept to the walls, excluding some daredevils and the Dorpat student, who, having already unbuttoned his vest, seemed to be at the same time in each room and in every corner of every room, and seemed to fill the whole room with his sonorous, pleasant, incessant tenor. The comrades, on the other hand, were more silent or talked modestly about professors, sciences, exams, and generally serious and uninteresting subjects. Everyone, without exception, glanced at the door of the buffet and, although they tried to hide it, had an expression that said: "Well, it's time to start." I, too, felt that it was time to begin, and waited for the beginning with impatient joy.
After tea, which the footmen had brought to the guests, the Dorpat student asked Frost in Russian:
Can you make a junk, Frost?
FRIENDSHIP WITH NON-COOL
This winter I very often saw not only Dmitry alone, who often visited us, but also with his entire family, with whom I began to get in touch.
The Nekhlyudovs - mother, aunt and daughter - spent all the evenings at home, and the princess loved to have young people come to her in the evenings, men of this kind who, as she said, were able to spend the whole evening without cards and dancing. But there must have been few such men, because I, who went to see them almost every evening, rarely met their guests. I got used to the faces of this family, to their different moods, made myself a clear idea of their mutual relations, got used to the rooms and furniture, and when there were no guests, I felt completely free, except for those cases when I was left alone in the room with Varenka. ... It seemed to me that she, as a not very beautiful girl, would very much like me to fall in love with her. But this embarrassment was beginning to pass. She so naturally showed the appearance that she did not care to talk to me, to her brother or to Lyubov Sergeevna, that I also learned the habit of looking at her simply as a person to whom there is nothing shameful and dangerous to show the pleasure brought by his company. During all the time I met her, she seemed to me - for days - sometimes very ugly, sometimes not too bad a girl, but I never even asked myself about her: whether I was in love or not. I happened to talk to her directly, but more often I talked to her, addressing Lyubov Sergeevna or Dmitry to her in front of her, and I especially liked this last method. I took great pleasure in speaking in front of her, listening to her singing, and generally knowing about her presence in the same room in which I was; but the thought of what my relationship with Varenka would later be, and the dreams of self-sacrifice for his friend, if he fell in love with my sister, rarely crossed my mind. If such dreams and thoughts came to me, then, feeling content with the present, I unconsciously tried to drive away the thought of the future.
Despite this rapprochement, however, I continued to consider it my imperative duty to hide from the whole society of the Nekhlyudovs, and especially from Varenka, my real feelings and inclinations and tried to show myself as a completely different young man from what I was in reality, and even such that it could not be in reality. I tried to appear passionate, admired, gasped, made passionate gestures when I seemed to like something very much, at the same time I tried to seem indifferent to any extraordinary incident that I saw or told me about; tried to seem like an evil mocker, having nothing sacred, and at the same time a subtle observer; tried to seem logical in all his actions, accurate and accurate in life, and at the same time despising everything material. I can safely say that I was much better in reality than that strange creature that I was trying to represent; but nevertheless, even as I pretended to be, the Nekhludoffs loved me and, to my happiness, did not believe, as it seemed, my pretense. Lyubov Sergeevna alone, who considered me the greatest egoist, atheist and mocker, did not seem to love me and often argued with me, was angry and amazed me with her fragmentary, incoherent phrases. But Dmitry remained in the same strange, more than friendly relations with her and said that no one understood her and that she was doing extremely much good to him. His friendship with her continued to grieve the entire family in the same way.
Once Varenka, talking to me about this connection incomprehensible to all of us, explained it as follows:
Dmitry is proud. He is too proud and, in spite of all his intelligence, he loves praise and surprise very much, he always loves to be the first, and the aunt in the innocence of her soul is in admiration before him and does not have enough tact to hide this admiration from him, and it turns out that she flatters him, only not feignedly, but sincerely.
I remembered this reasoning, and then, analyzing it, I could not help but think that Varenka is very clever, and with pleasure, as a result, elevated her in my opinion. This kind of elevation, owing to the intelligence and other moral virtues I discovered in her, I did, although with pleasure, with a certain strict moderation and never reached the point of rapture, the extreme point of this elevation. So, when Sofya Ivanovna, who did not get tired of talking about her niece, told me how Varenka, as a child, four years ago, gave all her dresses and shoes to peasant children without permission, so they had to be taken away later, I still I did not immediately accept this fact as worthy of raising her in my opinion, but also mentally teased her for such an impractical view of things.
When the Nekhlyudovs had guests, and sometimes Volodya and Dubkov, by the way, I smugly and with a certain calm consciousness of the strength of a domestic man retired to the last plane, did not speak and only listened to what others were saying. And everything that others said seemed to me so incredibly stupid that I was inwardly surprised how such an intelligent, logical woman, like a princess, and her entire logical family could listen to these nonsense and respond to them. If it had occurred to me then to compare with what others said, what I said myself when I was alone, I would probably not be in the least surprised. I would have been even less surprised if I had believed that our household - Avdotya Vasilievna, Lyubochka and Katenka - were the same women as everyone else, not in the least lower than others, and I would have remembered what Dubkov, smiling cheerfully, said in whole evenings. , Katya and Avdotya Vasilievna; almost every time Dubkov, having found fault with something, read with feeling the verses: "Au banquet de la vie, infortuné convive ..." or excerpts from "The Demon", and in general with what pleasure and what nonsense they talked for several hours in a row.
Of course, when there were guests, Varenka paid less attention to me than when we were alone - and then there was no reading, no music, which I very much loved to listen to. Talking to guests, she lost her main charm for me - calm judgment and simplicity. I remember how her conversations about the theater and the weather with my brother Volodya strangely struck me. I knew that Volodya, more than anything in the world, avoided and despised platitudes, Varenka also always laughed at pretendingly entertaining conversations about the weather, etc., - why, when they got together, they both constantly spoke the most unbearable vulgarities, and as if ashamed of each other for a friend? Every time after such conversations, I secretly got angry at Varenka, the next day I made fun of the former guests, but found even more pleasure in being alone in the Nekhlyudovs' family circle.
Be that as it may, I began to find more pleasure in being with Dmitry in his mother's living room than with him alone, face to face.
FRIENDSHIP WITH NON-CHOOL
It was at this time that my friendship with Dmitry was only in the balance. I started discussing it too long ago not to find any flaws in it; and in our first youth we love only passionately and therefore only perfect people. But as soon as the fog of passion begins to diminish little by little, or clear rays of reason involuntarily begin to pierce through it and we see the object of our passion in its present form, with advantages and disadvantages, some shortcomings, like unexpectedness, brightly, exaggeratedly strike our eyes, feelings of attraction to novelty and the hope that perfection in another person is not impossible encourage us not only to cool down, but to aversion to the previous object of passion, and we, without regret, abandon it and run forward to seek new perfection. If the same did not happen to me in relation to Dmitry, then I owe only to his stubborn, pedantic, more rational than heartfelt affection, which I would be too ashamed to change. Moreover, we were bound by our strange rule of candor. Having dispersed, we were too afraid to leave in the power of one another all the confidants, shameful for ourselves, moral secrets. However, our rule of frankness has long been, obviously for us, not observed and often embarrassed us and produced strange relations between us.
Almost every time I came to Dmitri's house, I found his university friend, student Bezobedov, with whom he studied. Bezobedov was a small, pockmarked, thin man, with tiny, freckled hands and huge unkempt red hair, always ragged, dirty, uneducated, and even poorly trained. Dmitry's relationship with him, as well as with Lyubov Sergeevna, was incomprehensible to me. The only reason why he could choose him from all his comrades and get along with him could only be that there was no student worse than Bezobedov in the whole university. But that must be why Dmitry was pleased to show him friendship in spite of everyone. In all his relations with this student, this proud feeling was expressed: "Well, they say, I don't care who you are, everyone is equal to me, and I love him, so he is good too."
I wondered how it was not hard for him to constantly force himself and how unfortunate Bezobedov endured his awkward situation. I really didn't like this friendship.
Once I came to Dmitry's in the evening in order to spend the evening with him in his mother's drawing-room, talk and listen to Varenka's singing or reading; but Bezobedov was sitting at the top. Dmitriy answered me in a sharp tone that he could not go downstairs, because, as I see, he had guests.
And what's so funny? he added. - It's much better to sit here and chat. - Although I was not at all tempted by the thought of sitting for two hours with Bezobedov, I did not dare to go into the living room alone, and with vexation in my soul at the strangeness of my friend sat down on a swinging chair and silently began to swing. I was very annoyed with Dmitri and Bezobedov because they deprived me of the pleasure of being downstairs; I waited for Bezobedov to leave soon, and was angry with him and Dmitry, silently listening to their conversation. “A very pleasant guest! Sit with him! " - I thought when the footman brought tea and Dmitry had to ask Bezobedov five times to take a glass, because the timid guest at the first and second glasses considered it his duty to refuse and say: "Eat yourself." Dmitry, apparently forcing himself, occupied the guest with a conversation, into which several times in vain he wanted to draw me in. I was gloomily silent.
“There is no need to make such a face that no one dares to suspect that I am bored,” I mentally turned to Dmitry, silently swinging evenly in my chair. More and more, with some pleasure, I kindled in myself a feeling of quiet hatred for my friend. “What a fool,” I thought about him, “he could have spent a pleasant evening with his dear relatives, —no, he is sitting with these cattle; and now time is passing, it will be too late to go to the living room, ”and I looked from behind the edge of the armchair at my friend. And his hand, and his posture, and his neck, and in particular the back of his head and knees seemed to me so disgusting and insulting that I would gladly do him some, even greater, nuisance at that moment.
Finally Bezobedov got up, but Dmitry could not immediately let go of such a pleasant guest: he offered him to spend the night, to which, fortunately, Bezobedov did not agree and left.
After seeing him off, Dmitry returned and, smiling a little smugly and rubbing his hands - it must be that he did manage to keep up the temper, and that he finally got rid of boredom - began to walk around the room, occasionally glancing at me. He was even more disgusting to me. "How dare he walk and smile?" I thought.
Why are you mad? he said suddenly, stopping opposite me.
I’m not at all angry, ”I replied, as they always answer in such cases,“ but I’m just annoyed that you are pretending to be in front of me, and in front of Bezobedov, and in front of yourself.
What nonsense! I never pretend to anyone.
I do not forget our rule of frankness, I am telling you directly. As I am sure, - I said, - this Bezobedov is unbearable to you as well as to me, because he is stupid and God knows what it is, but you are pleased to show importance in front of him.
Not! And first of all, Bezobedov is a wonderful person ...
And I say yes; I will even tell you that your friendship with Lyubov Sergeevna is also based on the fact that she considers you to be a god.
Yes, I tell you that no.
And I say yes, because I know this from myself, - I answered with the heat of restrained annoyance and with my frankness wishing to disarm him, - I told you and I repeat that I always think that I love those people who tell me pleasant, but as I sort it out well, I see that there is no real affection.
No, - Dmitry continued, adjusting his tie with an angry movement of his neck, - when I love, neither praise nor abuse can change my feelings.
Not true; after all, I confessed to you that when dad called me rubbish, I hated him for some time and wished him death; so are you ...
Speak for yourself. It's a pity if you are so ...
On the contrary, ”I cried, jumping up from my chair and looking into his eyes with desperate courage,“ it’s not good what you’re saying; didn’t you tell me about your brother - I don’t mention it to you, because it would be dishonest - didn’t you tell me ... and I’ll tell you how I understand you now ...
And I, trying to prick him even more painfully than he did me, began to prove to him that he did not love anyone, and to express to him everything for which, it seemed to me, I had the right to reproach him. I was very pleased that I told him everything, completely forgetting that the only possible purpose of this statement, which is to make him confess the shortcomings that I denounced in him, could not be achieved at the present moment, when he was heated ... In a calm state, when he could confess, I never told him this.
The argument was already turning into a quarrel, when suddenly Dmitry fell silent and left me in another room. I started to follow him, continuing to speak, but he did not answer me. I knew that in the graph of his vices there was irascibility, and now he was overcoming himself. I cursed all his schedules.
So this is what our rule led us to say to each other everything we felt, and never to the third to say anything about each other. Sometimes, carried away by frankness, we reached the most shameless confessions, passing off, to our shame, an assumption, a dream for a desire and a feeling, like, for example, what I have just told him; and these confessions not only did not tighten the bond that united us any longer, but dried the very feeling and separated us; and now, all of a sudden, pride did not allow him to make the most empty confession, and in the heat of the dispute we used those weapons that we ourselves had given each other and which struck terribly painfully.
Chapter XLII
Despite the fact that dad wanted to come with his wife to Moscow only after the new year, he arrived in October, in the fall, at a time when there was still an excellent ride with dogs. The Pope said that he changed his mind because his case in the Senate had to be heard; but Mimi said that Avdotya Vasilievna was so bored in the village, talked so often about Moscow and so pretended to be unwell that dad decided to fulfill her wish.
Because she never loved him, but only buzzed everyone's ears with her love, wanting to marry a rich man, ”added Mimi, sighing thoughtfully, as if saying:“ Some people would not have done this for him if he could appreciate them. ". Some people were unfair to Avdotya Vasilievna; her love for dad, a passionate, devoted love of selflessness, was visible in every word, look and movement. But such love did not prevent her at all, together with the desire not to part with her adored husband - to wish for an extraordinary cap from Madame Annette, a hat with an extraordinary blue ostrich feather and blue, Venetian velvet, a dress that would skillfully expose her slender white chest and arms, until now not yet shown to anyone, except for the husband and the maids. Katya, of course, was on the side of her mother, but between us and my stepmother immediately, from the day of her arrival, some strange, comic relationship was established. As soon as she got out of the carriage, Volodya, making a serious face and dull eyes, scraping and swaying, went up to her hand and said, as if introducing someone:
I have the honor to congratulate my dear mother on her arrival and kiss her hand.
Ah, dear son! - said Avdotya Vasilievna, smiling with her beautiful, monotonous smile.
And don't forget your second son, ”I said, going up to her hand too, trying to involuntarily take over the expression on Volodya’s face and voice.
If we and the stepmother were confident of mutual affection, this expression could mean a disregard for the expression of signs of love; if we were already badly disposed towards each other, it could mean irony or contempt for pretense, or a desire to hide our real relationship and many other feelings and thoughts from the present father; but in the present case this expression, which was very much in the spirit of Avdotya Vasilievna, meant absolutely nothing and only concealed the absence of any relationship. Later I often noticed in other families, when their members had a presentiment that the real relationship would not be very good, this kind of comic, fake relationship; and this relationship was involuntarily established between us and Avdotya Vasilievna. We almost never left them, we were always sickly courteous with her, spoke French, bowed and called her chère maman, to which she always responded with jokes of the same kind and a beautiful monotonous smile. One whiny Lyubochka, with her goose feet and simple conversations, fell in love with her stepmother and, very naively and sometimes awkwardly, tried to bring her closer to our whole family; but the only person in the whole world to whom, in addition to her passionate love for dad, Avdotya Vasilievna had at least a drop of affection, was Lyubochka. Avdotya Vasilievna even showed her some kind of enthusiastic surprise and timid respect, which surprised me very much.
At first, Avdotya Vasilievna often loved, calling herself a stepmother, to hint at how children and households always look at their stepmother with a bad and unfair attitude and, as a result, how difficult her situation is. But, foreseeing all the unpleasantness of this situation, she did nothing to avoid it: to caress the one, to give it, not to be grumpy, so that it would be very easy for her, because she was naturally undemanding and very kind. And not only did she not do this, but, on the contrary, anticipating all the unpleasantness of her situation, she prepared herself for defense without attack, and, assuming that all the household wanted to make her troubles and insults by all means, she saw intent in everything and considered it the most worthy for herself to endure in silence and, of course, by her inaction, without winning love, she won resentment. Moreover, in her there was such a lack of that highly developed faculty of understanding in our house, which I have already spoken of, and her habits were so opposed to those that had taken root in our house that this alone was badly in her favor. She always lived in our neat, tidy house, as if she had just arrived: she got up and went to bed now late, now early; now she went out, now she didn’t go out for dinner; either had supper or not. She went almost always when there were no guests, half-dressed and was not ashamed to show herself to us and even the servants in a white skirt and a shawl thrown over, with bare hands. At first I liked this simplicity, but then very soon, precisely because of this simplicity, I lost the last respect I had for her. Even stranger for us was that in her there were, with and without guests, two completely different women: one, with guests, a young, healthy and cold beauty, magnificently dressed, not stupid, not clever, but cheerful; the other, without guests, was already an elderly, emaciated, yearning woman, slovenly and bored, though loving. Often, looking at her, when she, smiling, rosy from the winter cold, happy with the consciousness of her beauty, returned from visits and, taking off her hat, went to look around in the mirror, or, rustling with a lush ball gown open dress, ashamed and together proud in front of the servants, passed into the carriage, or at home, when we had small evenings, in a closed silk dress and some kind of thin lace around a delicate neck, shone on all sides with a monotonous but beautiful smile, - I thought, looking at her: what would those who admired her if they saw her as I saw her when she, in the evenings staying at home, after twelve o'clock, waiting for her husband from the club, in some kind of hood, with unkempt hair, like a shadow walked through the dimly lit rooms. Either she went up to the pianos and played them, wincing with tension, the only waltz that she knew, then she took the book of the novel and, after reading a few lines from the middle, threw it, then, so as not to wake people, she went to the sideboard herself, took out a cucumber and cold veal and ate it, standing at the sideboard window, then again, tired, yearning, wandered aimlessly from room to room. But most of all, we were separated from her by the lack of understanding, which was expressed mainly in her characteristic manner of condescending attention, when people talked to her about things that were incomprehensible to her. It was not her fault that she made the unconscious habit of smiling slightly with her lips and bowing her head when she was told things that were of little interest to her (and apart from herself and her husband, nothing interested her); but this smile and tilt of the head, often repeated, were unbearably repulsive. Her gaiety, as if laughing at herself, at you and at the whole world, was also awkward, not communicated to anyone; its sensitivity is too sweet. And most importantly, she was not ashamed to constantly tell everyone about her love for dad. Although she did not lie at all, saying that her whole life was in love for her husband, and although she proved it with her whole life, but, in our understanding, such a shameless, incessant statement about her love was disgusting, and we were ashamed of her, when she said this in front of strangers, even more than when she made mistakes in French.
She loved her husband more than anything else in the world, and her husband loved her, especially at first and when he saw that he was not the only one who liked her. Her only purpose in life was to gain the love of her husband; but she did, it seemed, on purpose everything that could be unpleasant to him, and everything in order to prove to him the full power of her love and readiness for self-sacrifice.
She loved clothes, her father loved to see her in the light as a beauty, arousing praise and surprise; she sacrificed her passion for dressing up for her father and became more and more accustomed to staying at home in a gray blouse. The Pope, who always considered freedom and equality as a necessary condition in family relations, hoped that his beloved Lyubochka and his kind young wife would come together sincerely and amicably; but Avdotya Vasilievna sacrificed herself and considered it necessary to show the real mistress of the house, as she called Lyubochka, indecent respect, which painfully insulted the Pope. He played a lot this winter, in the end he lost a lot and, as always, not wanting to mix the game with family life, he hid his gambling business from everyone in the household. Avdotya Vasilievna sacrificed herself and, sometimes sick, even pregnant at the end of winter, considered it her duty, in a gray blouse, with an unkempt head, even at four or five o'clock in the morning, swaying, go to meet dad, when he sometimes, tired, lost, ashamed , after the eighth penalty, was returning from the club. She asked him absently if he was happy in the game, and with condescending attentiveness, smiling and shaking her head, listened to what he told her about what he was doing in the club and what he was asking her for the hundredth time. never wait for it. But although losing and winning, on which, according to his game, the whole fortune of dad depended, did not interest her in the least, she again met him every night, when he returned from the club. To these meetings, however, in addition to her passion for self-sacrifice, she was prompted by a still hidden jealousy, from which she suffered to the greatest extent. No one in the world could convince her that dad was returning late from the club, and not from his mistress. She tried to read his love secrets on Dad's face; and without reading anything, with some delight of grief she sighed and indulged in the contemplation of her misfortune.
As a result of these and many other incessant sacrifices in the treatment of the Pope with his wife in the last months of this winter, in which he lost a lot and therefore was mostly out of sorts, an intermittent feeling of quiet hatred, that restrained aversion to the object of affection, which is expressed an unconscious desire to do all possible minor moral troubles to this subject.
NEW COMMANDS
Winter passed imperceptibly, and it was already beginning to melt again, and the schedule of exams had already been nailed down at the university, when I suddenly remembered that I had to answer out of eighteen subjects that I had listened to and of which I had not heard, wrote down and prepared none. It’s strange how such a clear question is: how to hold the exam? - never introduced himself to me.
But all this winter I was in such a fog, which came from the delight that I was big and that I was comme il faut, that when it occurred to me: how can I take the exam? - I compared myself with my comrades and thought: "They will keep, and most of them are not comme il faut yet, therefore, I have an additional advantage over them, and I must withstand." I only came to lectures because I was so used to it and because my dad was sending me out of the house. Moreover, I had many acquaintances, and I often had fun at the university. I loved this noise, talking, laughing in audiences; During a lecture, he loved to dream about something and observe his comrades, sitting on the back bench, with the uniform sound of the professor's voice; he sometimes liked to run off to Matern's with someone to have a drink of vodka and a bite to eat and, knowing that they could be scolded for this, after the professor, shyly hiding in the door, enter the lecture hall; liked to participate in the trick when the course for the course crowded with laughter in the corridor. It was all very fun.
When everyone began to walk more carefully to the lectures, the physics professor finished his course and said goodbye to the exams, the students began to collect notebooks and prepare in batches, I also thought that I had to prepare. Operov, with whom we continued to bow, but were in the coldest relations, as I said already, offered me not only notebooks, but also invited me to prepare for them with him and other students. I thanked him and agreed, hoping with this honor to completely make amends for my former disagreement with him, but I only asked that everyone should gather at my place every time, since I have a good apartment.
They answered me that they would prepare for breaks, first at one, then at another, and where it is closer. For the first time they gathered at Zukhin's. It was a small room behind a partition in a large house on Trubny Boulevard. On the first appointed day I was late and came when they were already reading. The small room was all lit up, not even with a vakshtaf, but with makhorka, which Zukhin smoked. On the table was a bottle of vodka, a glass, bread, salt and a mutton bone.
Zukhin, without getting up, invited me to drink vodka and take off my coat.
You, I think, are not used to such a treat, ”he added. All were in dirty cotton shirts and bibs. Trying not to show my contempt for them, I took off my coat and lay down comradely on the sofa. Zukhin, occasionally consulting with notebooks, read, others stopped him, asking questions, and he explained succinctly, intelligently and accurately. I began to listen attentively and, not understanding much, because I did not know the previous one, I made a question.
Eh, father, you can't listen if you don't know this, "said Zukhin," I'll give you notebooks, you go through it by tomorrow; but what can I explain to you.
I felt ashamed of my ignorance, and at the same time feeling the full justice of Zukhin's remarks, I stopped listening and began observing these new comrades. By subdividing people into comme il faut and not comme il faut, they obviously belonged to the second category and, as a result, aroused in me not only a feeling of contempt, but also a certain personal hatred that I felt towards them for not being comme il faut, they seemed to consider me not only their equal, but even kindly patronized me. This feeling was aroused in me by their feet and dirty hands with gnawed nails, and one long nail on the fifth finger at Opera, and pink shirts, and bibs, and curses that they affectionately addressed to each other, and a dirty room, and Zukhin's habit constantly blowing their nose a little, pressing one nostril with a finger, and in particular their manner of speaking, using and intonating certain words. For example, they used the words: fool instead of fool, as if instead of exactly, magnificent instead of beautiful, moving, etc., which seemed to me bookish and disgustingly dishonorable. But I was even more excited by this comme il faut hatred of the intonations they made to some Russian and especially foreign words: they spoke machine instead of machine, activity instead of activity, on purpose instead of narcotic, in the fireplace instead of in the fireplace, Shakespeare instead of Shakespeare, etc. etc., etc.
Despite, however, this, at that time for me irresistibly repulsive appearance, I, anticipating something good in these people and envying the cheerful camaraderie that united them, felt attracted to them and wanted to get closer to them, no matter how it was difficult for me. I already knew the meek and honest Operov; but now the lively, unusually intelligent Zukhin, who evidently excelled in this circle, was extremely pleasant to me. He was a small, stout brunette with a somewhat swollen and always glossy, but extremely intelligent, lively and independent face. This expression was especially given to him by a low but humped forehead over deep black eyes, bristly short hair and a frequent black beard, which always seemed unshaven. He seemed not to think about himself (which I always especially liked in people), but it was clear that his mind never remained without work. He had one of those expressive faces that, a few hours after you see them for the first time, suddenly completely change in your eyes. It happened at the end of the evening, in my eyes, with the face of Zukhin. Suddenly new wrinkles appeared on his face, his eyes went deeper, his smile became different, and his whole face changed so that I could hardly recognize him.
When they finished reading, Zukhin, the other students and I, to prove our desire to be a comrade, drank a glass of vodka, and there was almost nothing left in the bottle. Zukhin asked who had a quarter to send some old woman who served him for vodka. I was about to offer my money, but Zukhin, as if not hearing me, turned to Operov, and Operov, taking out a beaded purse, gave him the required coin.
Look, don’t drink it, ”said Operov, who himself did not drink anything.
Probably, - answered Zukhin, sucking the brain out of a lamb bone (I remember at that time I thought: this is why he is so smart that he eats a lot of the brain).
I suppose, - continued Zukhin, smiling slightly, and his smile was such that you involuntarily noticed it and were grateful to him for this smile. - Though I drink it, it doesn’t matter; now, brother, let's see who will hit whom, whether he is me or I is him. It's done, brother, ”he added, boastingly clicking his forehead. - Here Semyonov would not have failed, he has something very tight.
Indeed, the same Semyonov with gray hair, who made me so happy in the first exam that he looked worse than me, and who, having passed the second entrance exam, carefully attended lectures for the first month of his student days, finished off even before rehearsals and by the end of the course did not show up at the university at all.
Where is he? someone asked.
I have lost sight of him too, - continued Zukhin, - for the last time we smashed the Lisbon together. Great thing came out. Then, they say, there was some kind of story ... Here's the head! What fire is in this man! What a mind! It's a pity if it disappears. And he will probably disappear: not such a boy, so that with his impulses he sat at the university.
After talking a little more, everyone began to disperse, agreeing to gather at Zukhin's for the next days, because his apartment was closer to everyone else. When everyone went out into the yard, I felt a little ashamed that everyone was walking, and I was driving alone in a droshky, and I, ashamed, suggested that Operaov take him. Zukhin went out with us and, having borrowed a ruble from Operov, went on a visit for the whole night. Dear Operov told me a lot about the character and lifestyle of Zukhin, and when I arrived home, I did not sleep for a long time, thinking about these new people I recognized. For a long time, without falling asleep, I hesitated, on the one hand, between the respect for them, to which their knowledge, simplicity, honesty and poetry of youth and daring disposed me, on the other hand, between their dishonorable appearance repulsing me. Despite all the desire, it was literally impossible for me at that time to get along with them. Our understanding was completely different. There was an abyss of shades that made up for me all the charm and the whole meaning of life, completely incomprehensible to them, and vice versa. But the main reason for the impossibility of rapprochement was my twenty-ruble cloth on a frock coat, a droshky and a Dutch shirt. This reason was especially important to me: it seemed to me that I was unwittingly insulting them with signs of my well-being. I felt guilty in front of them and, now humbled, now indignant at my undeserved humility and turning to arrogance, I could not enter into an even, sincere relationship with them. The coarse, vicious side of Zukhin's character was so drowned out at that time for me by that strong poetry of boldness, which I sensed in him, that it did not in the least affect me unpleasantly.
For two weeks almost every day I went to study at Zukhin's in the evenings. I did very little, because, as I said, I lagged behind my comrades and, not having the strength to do it alone in order to catch up with them, I only pretended to listen and understand what they were reading. It seems to me that my comrades also guessed about my pretense, and I often noticed that they missed places that they themselves knew and never asked me.
Every day I more and more excused the dishonesty of this circle, being drawn into their life and finding a lot of poetry in it. Only one word of honor that I gave to Dmitry, not to go anywhere to go out with them, kept me from wanting to share their pleasures.
Once I wanted to boast to them of my knowledge of literature, especially French, and started a conversation on this topic. To my surprise, it turned out that, although they pronounced foreign titles in Russian, they read much more than me, knew and appreciated English and even Spanish writers, Lesage, whom I had never even heard of at that time. Pushkin and Zhukovsky were literature for them (and not, as for me, yellow-bound books that I read and taught as a child). They equally despised Dumas, Xu and Feval, and judged, especially Zukhin, much better and clearer about literature than I did, which I could not help but confess. In my knowledge of music, I also had no advantage over them. To my greater surprise, Operov played the violin, another of the students who studied with us played the cello and the piano, and both of them played in the university orchestra, knew the music well and appreciated good music. In short, everything I wanted to boast to them, excluding the pronunciation of French and German, they knew better than me and were not at all proud of it. I could boast of being secular in my position, but I did not have it, like Volodya. So what was the height from which I looked at them? My acquaintance with Prince Ivan Ivanitch? pronunciation of French? droshky? dutch shirt? nails? Isn't it all nonsense? - sometimes began to come to me dullly under the influence of a feeling of envy of camaraderie and good-natured young joy, which I saw in front of me. They were all on the "you". The simplicity of their treatment reached the point of rudeness, but even under this rude appearance, the fear of insulting each other at least a little was constantly visible. The scoundrel, the pig, used by them in an affectionate sense, only jarred me and gave me a reason for inner ridicule, but these words did not offend them and did not prevent them from being among themselves on the most sincere friendly foot. In dealing with each other, they were as careful and delicate as there are very poor and very young people. Most importantly, I sensed something broad, riotous in this character of Zukhin and his adventures in Lisbon. I had a presentiment that these binges had to be something completely different than that pretense with burnt rum and champagne, in which I participated with Baron Z.
ZUKHIN AND SEMENOV
I do not know what class Zukhin belonged to, but I know that he was from the S. gymnasium, without any fortune and, it seems, was not a nobleman. He was at that time about eighteen years old, although he looked much more. He was unusually intelligent, especially understanding: it was easier for him to immediately embrace a whole polysyllabic object, to foresee all its particulars and conclusions, than to discuss the laws by which these conclusions were made through consciousness. He knew that he was smart, was proud of it, and because of this pride, he was equally simple to handle and good-natured with everyone. He must have experienced a lot in life. His ardent, receptive nature has already managed to reflect in itself love, and friendship, and deeds, and money. Although to a small extent, although in the lower strata of society, there was no thing for which he, having experienced it, would not have either contempt, or some indifference and inattention stemming from the too great ease with which he got everything. ... He seemed to take on everything new with such ardor only so that, having achieved his goal, he would despise what he had achieved, and his capable nature would always achieve both the goal and the right to contempt. With regard to science, it was the same: doing a little, not writing down, he knew mathematics excellently and did not boast, saying that he would knock the professor down. It seemed to him a lot of nonsense in what was read to him, but with his unconscious practical trickery characteristic of his nature, he immediately faked what the professor needed, and all the professors loved him. He was straightforward in relations with the authorities, but the authorities respected him. He not only disliked and disliked science, but despised even those who were seriously engaged in what came to him so easily. The sciences, as he understood them, did not occupy a tenth of his abilities; life in his student position did not represent anything to which he could completely surrender himself, and ardent, active, as he said, nature demanded life, and he went into a revelry of the kind that was possible within his means, and gave himself up to him with a passion heat and desire to leave myself, the more strength I have. Now, before the exams, Operov's prediction came true. He disappeared for about two weeks, so we have been preparing for the last time with another student. But on the first exam, pale, emaciated, with trembling hands, he appeared in the hall and brilliantly entered the second year.
From the beginning of the course, there were eight people in the gang of booters, the head of which was Zukhin. Among them at first were Ikonin and Semyonov, but the first retired from society, unable to bear the frenzied revelry that they indulged in at the beginning of the year, the second retired because even this seemed not enough to him. In the early days, everyone in our course looked at them with some horror and told each other their exploits.
The main heroes of these exploits were Zukhin, and at the end of the course - Semyonov. All of the last time Semyonov was looked at with some kind of horror, and when he came to the lecture, which happened quite rarely, there was excitement in the audience.
Semyonov, just before the exams, finished his revelry career in the most energetic and original way, which I witnessed thanks to my acquaintance with Zukhin. This is how it was. Once in the evening, we had just met Zukhin, and Operov, leaning his head down to the notebooks and placing beside him, in addition to a tallow candle in a candlestick, a tallow candle in a bottle, began to read in his thin voice his small-written physics notebooks, when the hostess entered the room and announced Zukhin that someone came to him with a note.
Zukhin went out and soon returned, head bowed and with a pensive face, holding an open note on gray brown paper and two ten-ruble bills.
Gentlemen! an extraordinary event! - he said, raising his head and somehow solemnly and seriously looking at us.
Well? got the money for the condition? - said Operov, leafing through his notebook.
No, gentlemen! I don't read any more, - continued Zukhin in the same tone, - I tell you, an incomprehensible event! Semyonov sent me with a soldier here twenty rubles, which he once borrowed, and writes that if I want to see him, then come to the barracks. Do you know what this means? he added, looking around us all. We were all silent. - I'm going to him now, - continued Zukhin, - let's go, whoever wants.
Now everyone put on their frock coats and prepared to go to Semyonov.
Wouldn't it be embarrassing, - said Operov in his thin voice, - that we all, as an unusual thing, will come to look at him?
I completely agreed with Operov's remark, especially with regard to me, who was almost unfamiliar with Semyonov; but it was so pleasant for me to know myself as participating in a common comradely affair and so anxious to see Semyonov himself that I did not say anything to this remark.
Nonsense! - said Zukhin. - Why is it embarrassing that we all go to say goodbye to a comrade, wherever he is. Trivia! Come on who wants to.
We took cabs, put a soldier with us and drove off. The non-commissioned officer on duty no longer wanted to let us into the barracks, but Zukhin somehow persuaded him, and the same soldier who came with the note led us into a large, almost dark, dimly lit room with several nightlights, in which on both sides recruits in gray greatcoats sat and lay on the bunks, with shaved foreheads. Entering the barracks, I was struck by a special heavy smell, the sound of snoring of several hundred people, and, passing behind our guide and Zukhin, who was walking with firm steps in front of everyone between the bunks, I looked with trepidation at the position of each recruit and applied to each one that remained in my memory the knocked down sinewy figure of Semyonov with long, disheveled, almost gray hair, white teeth and gloomy shining eyes. In the most extreme corner of the barracks, at the last earthen pot filled with black oil, in which a burnt fuse was hanging smoky and smoking, Zukhin quickened his pace and suddenly stopped.
Great, Semyonov, - he said to one recruit with the same shaved forehead as the others, who, in thick soldier's underwear and a gray overcoat, sat with his feet on the bunk and, talking with another recruit, was eating something. It was he, with his gray hair cropped to a comb, a shaved blue forehead and his usual gloomy and energetic expression. I was afraid that my glance would offend him, and therefore I turned away. Operov, it seems, also shared my opinion, stood behind everyone; but the sound of Semyonov's voice, when he greeted Zukhin and the others with his usual abrupt speech, completely reassured us, and we hurried to come forward and give - I my hand, my tablet from Opera, but Semyonov even before us extended his big black hand, saving us by doing this, from an unpleasant feeling, it would seem to do him an honor. He spoke reluctantly and calmly, as always:
Hello, Zukhin. Thanks for stopping by. Ah, gentlemen! sit down. Let go, Curly, - he turned to the recruit, with whom he had dinner and talked. - We'll talk to you afterwards. Sit down. What? surprised you, Zukhin? BUT!
Nothing from you surprised me, 'replied Zukhin, sitting down beside him on the bunk, a little with the expression with which a doctor sits on a patient's bed,' I would be surprised if you came to the exams, like that. Tell me, where did you disappear and how did it happen?
Where had you been? - he answered in his thick, strong voice, - he disappeared in taverns, in taverns, in general in establishments. Yes, you all sit down, gentlemen, there is a lot of room here. Put your legs up, you! - he shouted imperiously, showing for a moment his white teeth, at the recruit, who on his left side was lying on a bunk, resting his head on his hand, and looked at us with lazy curiosity. - Well, I used to. And bad. And good, - he continued, changing the expression of his energetic face with each abrupt sentence. - You know the story of the merchant: the canal died. They wanted to kick me out. That there was money - he squandered everything. Yes, it would be all right. Debt death remained - and disgusting. There was nothing to pay. Well, that's all.
How could such a thought come to you? - said Zukhin.
And here's how: once in "Yaroslavl", you know, on Stozhenka, he drank with some gentleman from the merchants. He's a recruiting supplier. I say: "Give me a thousand rubles and I'll go." And went.
Why, you’re a nobleman, ”said Zukhin.
Trivia! Kirill Ivanov did everything.
Who is Kirill Ivanov?
Who bought me (while he especially - and strange, and funny, and mockingly flashed his eyes and seemed to smile). Senate permission was taken. I took another drink, paid my debts and went on. That's all. Well, they can't whip me. There are five rubles. Or maybe war ...
Then he began to tell Zukhin his strange, incomprehensible adventures, incessantly changing the expression of his energetic face and gloomily glittering eyes.
When it was no longer possible to remain in the barracks, we began to say goodbye to him. He extended his hand to all of us, firmly shook ours and, without getting up to see us off, said:
Come back sometime, gentlemen, we are still, they say, only in the next month, - and again he seemed to smile.
Zukhin, however, after walking a few steps, came back again. I wanted to see their farewell, I also paused and saw that Zukhin took money out of his pocket, handed it to him, and Semyonov pushed his hand away.
Then I saw that they were kissing, and I heard Zukhin, again approaching us, shouted quite loudly:
Goodbye head! Yes, I probably won't finish my course - you will be an officer.
In response, Semyonov, who never laughed, laughed with a ringing, unusual laugh, which struck me extremely painfully. We went out.
All the way home, which we walked on foot, Zukhin was silent and constantly blew his nose a little, putting his finger first to one, then to the other nostril. Arriving home, he immediately left us, and from that very day he drank until the exams.
I'm failing
Finally came the first exam, differentials and integrals, and I was still in some strange fog and did not realize clearly what awaited me. In the evenings, after the company of Zukhin and other comrades, I found the thought that it was necessary to change something in my convictions, that something in them was wrong and not good, but in the morning, with the sunlight, I again became comme il faut, was very pleased with this and did not want any changes in himself.
In such a frame of mind, I arrived at the first exam. I sat down on a bench in the side where the princes, counts and barons sat, began to talk to them in French, and (oddly enough to say) I did not even think that I would now have to answer from a subject that I didn’t I do not know. I looked coolly at those who came up to be examined, and even allowed myself to make fun of some.
Well, Grap? - I said to Ilenka when he was returning from the table, - are you afraid?
Let's see how you are, ”said Ilenka, who since entered the university had completely rebelled against my influence, did not smile when I spoke to him, and was ill-disposed towards me.
I smiled contemptuously at Ilenka's answer, in spite of the fact that the doubt he expressed made me afraid for a minute. But the fog again obscured this feeling, and I continued to be distracted and indifferent, so that even immediately after I was examined (as if it was the most trifling thing for me), I promised to go with Baron Z. to have a snack at Matern's. When I was summoned along with Ikonin, I straightened the coat-tails of my uniform and very calmly walked over to the examination table.
A slight frost of fright ran down my spine only when the young professor, the one who had examined me in the entrance exam, looked me straight in the face and I touched the note paper on which the tickets were written. Ikonin, although he took the ticket with the same swaying of his whole body, with which he had done it in the previous exams, answered something, albeit very badly; I did what he did in the first exams, I did it even worse, because I took another ticket and didn’t answer the other one. The professor looked regretfully in my face and said in a low but firm voice:
You will not transfer to the second year, Mr. Irteniev. Better not to go to the exam. We need to cleanse the faculty. And you too, Mr. Ikonin, ”he added.
Ikonin asked permission to be reexamined as if it were alms, but the professor answered him that in two days he would not have time to do what he had not done during the year, and that he would not go over in any way. Ikonin again piteously, humiliatedly pleaded; but the professor refused again.
You can go, gentlemen, ”he said in the same quiet but firm voice.
Only then did I decide to leave the table, and I felt ashamed that by my silent presence I seemed to have taken part in Ikonin's humiliated pleas. I don’t remember how I walked past the students, how I answered their questions, how I went out into the hallway and how I got home. I was insulted, humiliated, I was truly unhappy.
For three days I did not leave the room, did not see anyone, found, as in childhood, pleasure in tears and cried a lot. I was looking for pistols with which I could shoot myself if I really wanted to. I thought that Ilenka Grap would spit in my face when he met me, and, having done this, would act justly; that Operov rejoices in my misfortune and tells everyone about him; that Kolpikov was absolutely right in disgracing me at Yar; that my stupid speeches with Princess Kornakova could not have had other consequences, etc., etc. All the difficult moments in my life, painful for pride, came to my mind one after another; I tried to blame someone for my misfortune: I thought that someone had done all this on purpose, invented a whole intrigue against myself, grumbled at the professors, at my comrades, at Volodya, at Dmitry, at my dad for giving me to university; grumbled at Providence for allowing me to live to such a shame. Finally, feeling my final death in the eyes of all those who knew me, I asked my dad to go to the hussars or to the Caucasus. Dad was displeased with me, but seeing my terrible grief, he consoled me, saying that, no matter how bad it was, the whole matter could still be improved if I moved to another faculty. Volodya, who also did not see anything terrible in my misfortune, said that at another faculty I would at least not be ashamed of my new comrades.
Our ladies did not understand at all and did not want or could not understand what an exam is, what it is not to pass, and they regretted me only because they saw my grief.
Dmitri visited me every day and was extremely gentle and meek all the time; but that is why it seemed to me that he had grown cold towards me. It always seemed to me painful and insulting when he, coming to my top, silently sat down close to me, a little with the expression with which a doctor sits down on the bed of a seriously ill patient. Sophia Ivanovna and Varenka sent me through him books that I had previously wished to have, and wished me to come to them; but it was in this attention that I saw a proud, insulting for me condescension towards a person who had already fallen too low. Three days later I calmed down a little, but until I left for the village I never left the house and, all thinking about my grief, idly wandered from room to room, trying to avoid all my family.
I thought, thought, and finally, once late in the evening, sitting alone downstairs and listening to Avdotya Vasilievna's waltz, I suddenly jumped up, ran upstairs, took out a notebook on which it was written: "The Rules of Life", opened it, and a moment of repentance came over me and moral impulse. I cried, but no longer tears of despair. Having recovered, I decided to write the rules of life again and was firmly convinced that I would never do anything wrong again, I would never spend idle and never change my rules.
How long did this moral impulse last, what it consisted of and what new beginnings it put into my moral development, I will tell in the next, happier half of my youth.
Over the last part of L.N. Tolstoy worked in 1856. In August 1856, he started the third edition and wrote in his diary what "Youth" dictated "with pleasure to tears." By September, the work was completed, but Tolstoy is not satisfied. On September 28, 1856, he wrote: “I finished Youth, it’s bad ...” Tolstoy sends it for review to the critic A. Druzhinin.An answer from Druzhinin strengthens Tolstoy's belief in the possibility of publishing Youth.
The transition from "Boyhood" to "Youth" is logical and natural; these works are connected by the motives of friendship - they complete "Adolescence", they also begin "Youth". At first it seems that there have been no changes in the natural course of life and in the hero. But this is not the case. The life and creative experience of the writer himself has been significantly enriched. Changed under the influence of the Crimean War, his views, attitude to what was happening and, above all, to himself.
In "Youth", as in Tolstoy's diary, an ever-increasing critical and distrustful attitude towards what is happening, which is directed primarily at himself, is manifested. The last part of the trilogy has become an artistic embodiment of those thoughts, feelings, ideas that are captured in the diary in the process of immediate emotional turmoil.
For the hero Tolstoy, and his personality is projected onto the writer himself in a completely natural way, friendship is the way out of loneliness, searches and doubts. She is the path to spiritual activity, to the attainment of lofty goals in life.
The content of the second chapter ("Spring"), contrary to the title, goes far beyond the description of nature. "Spring" is rather a symbol of human transformation, renewal.
The striving for self-improvement and moral renewal leads Nikolenka to thoughts about spiritual purification, the need for confession. Remembering that he forgot to confess one of his sins, the hero goes to the monastery. Nikolenka is unpleasantly amazed that the cabbies are indifferent to his diligence. It is at this moment that he feels that pride has crept into his heart, pride is one of the sins from which the young man cannot free himself.
Questions of morality become the main for Tolstoy in "Youth", and the study of the spiritual life of the hero - the main artistic task. According to N.G. Chernyshevsky, Tolstoy's merit was that he discovered the dialectic of the soul, conveyed "the psychological process, its forms, its laws ...", i.e. the transition of some feelings to others.
Constant self-examination, dissatisfaction with oneself, unswerving striving for the truth, readiness to convict oneself of lies or insincerity - these are the characteristic qualities of Nikolenka Irteniev.
Nikolenka's friend, Dmitry Nekhlyudov, also contributes to the hero's spiritual quest. It is this surname that the hero of the story "The Landlord's Morning" bears, bothering to get closer to the peasants. The same Dmitry Nekhlyudov will become a man with a dead, but still capable of resurrection soul in Tolstoy's last novel, Resurrection.
Dmitry Nekhlyudov in Yunost is a man who seeks and constantly reflects on the main issues of life. He understands the need to fulfill his moral duty to people. With this, Nekhlyudov is opposed to Volodya and his friend Dubkov, for whom Dmitry's behavior and thoughts are incomprehensible and are the subject of ridicule. Their self-righteousness and lightness in the novel are opposed by the demanding seriousness of Dmitry.
Nikolenka is influenced not only by Dmitry Nekhlyudov. From the moment he entered the university, he goes through a kind of period of insight. It turns out that his peers, who have not gone through home education, who lived and studied without tutors, are prepared for the exam no worse than young nobles, and often respond better. This makes Nikolenka think, but still does not get rid of the lordly habits: now, having become a student, he must have a trotter, a coachman and, on occasion, flaunt it. These scenes of the novel are also important in the sense that they emphasize the impossibility of Tolstoy's complete merging with his hero. With all the seeming unity, the author never felt disdain for the commoners and peasants.
Nikolenka is opposed by Semyonov and Zukhin, from whom a young man can learn to disregard social fuss. Active, achieving everything exclusively by his labor, Zukhin is the opposite of the hero, and the young man acutely feels this hidden opposition. Zukhin is stronger than him in physics and fiction. He read more than Nikolenka. His tastes are expressed clearly and definitely.
Tolstoy allows both the hero and the reader to make a choice: you can follow the road of Dubkov, whose apartment is “unusually good”: “everywhere there were carpets, paintings, curtains, colorful wallpaper, portraits ... pistols, pouches and some kind of cardboard animal heads ". The inner rhyme "portraits - pistols - tobacco pouches" (poetry here is a kind of poeticization) is opposed here by the prosaic, almost metaphorical phrase "cardboard animal heads". The picture is reduced, reduced to a primitive way of life, fakes (animal heads are made of cardboard).
The complex inner work taking place in Nikolenka is convincingly conveyed in the chapter "What did Volodya and Dubkov do".
The real and the fake, the true and the false - these categories will become extraordinarily important for Tolstoy throughout his entire life as a writer. The seemingly high, the seemingly interesting, the seemingly important is resolutely opposed to the whole present. This is manifested, in particular, in the test of the hero by love. Nikolenka recalls the object of her adoration only when she has already passed five stations on the way, and it is somehow cold: she instills in herself the idea that "we have to think about her." Feeling is devoid of poetry, and without poetry, according to Tolstoy, true love is hardly possible. You cannot instill this feeling in yourself. If you are trying to do this, it means that it is false, not real. And again the contrast - in "Youth" this is one of the main artistic techniques. In contrast, the memory of the childhood home is given, where everything was warmed by true love, where every thing says a lot to the heart: "a latch, a slanting floorboard, a chest, an old candlestick", everything that is "so friendly with each other" in an old house where he constantly lives memory of the mother. These memories are truly poetic, colored with true feeling.
Much of what is revealed or has just been outlined in "Youth" will then develop, be filled with new meaning and artistic generalization in the subsequent works of L.N. Tolstoy. His trilogy is a wonderful start to a great life as a writer and, at the same time, a weighty claim for the future.
In the section on the thick question "youth" "I'm falling through" a brief but detailed content given by the author Vadim tenants the best answer is Nikolai Irteniev is the protagonist of Leo Tolstoy's story "Youth". A summary of the story of Leo Tolstoy "Youth"
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Answer from Crocus[guru]
Once upon a time there was Nikita. He was 7 years old. His parents lived in the village, they were many years old. They kept courtiers and cattle: pigs, pigs, cows and horses. The courtiers ate little, but the cattle wanted to eat every day and basl to different voices throughout the village. Nikita also had a brother, a younger one, who did not obey his parents a damn thing and ran all day around the village with a local shantrap. When Nikita began to approach 8 years old, his father, dad Carlo, took a piece of wood and slapped Nikita on the head so that he would not fool around at the dinner table and modestly chew his filthy gum. Mother immediately began to scream in a squeaky falsetto and suddenly called Nikita Nikolenka: “My dear child, Nick ... hic ... Nick ... deerkaaaaa, but what is this delatza. You will knock the last nonsense out of him, you damned Herod, you Karlo Ivanovich, why are you doing that? " It seemed to her that something seduced her, the archangel whispered in her ear that this was the way it should be and nothing else. Okay, everyone agreed, Kolka so Kolka. Even Vovka, his brother, burst into uncontrollable laughter, pointing his finger at Niki ... Nikolenka and twirling it at his temple. By the fall, Pope Carlo said that soon he and Nikolenka would go to Moscow, that he had to go to school, there was no way to wander around, science had to be crammed. So a carriage drove up to the house, the whole family got into it, and the little dog on the porch laughed and sat down, where they say they all went, the old horse won't take you. Then mama got off the mare, Vovka also rolled down and the mare immediately felt better and she cheerfully clucked along the road, raising clouds of dust, with dad Karlo Ivanovich and snotty Nikolenka proudly sitting on the cart. Upon arrival in Moscow, settling in the Metropol hotel, Carlo went to the village council to register and assign Nikola to the gymnasium. Pushkin. Nikolenka, left alone, felt sad and sniffled, but suddenly he heard the ringing laughter of a girl sitting on the road, among dog poop and watching Nikolenka through theatrical binoculars. The virgin's name was Katenka. The daughter of a lone organ-grinder, who in the past served as Denikin's orderly, and now lives on alms at the local church. From such impudence, Nikola lost his voice and the button fell off his pants, the only one that held the strap, also the only one, the second cat ate at home for Easter, he was not given eggs, so he took revenge. Even more embarrassed, Nikolenka pulled on his pants and, showing his tongue, began picking his nose, looking with his eyes for something to launch into this impudent mug in pink leggings and a straw grandmother's hat. When he returned, Papa Carlo saw how two shabby doves chirped sweetly, sitting on a log and dangling their legs, about how they would leave for Ukraine, when they became big, they would give birth to a dozen naked Nikolai Katenkovichi and buy a locomotive to go to their parents for sausage and potatoes