Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov, a poet and prose writer, is often compared to Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin. Is such a coincidence random? Not at all, these two lights marked with their creativity the golden age of Russian poetry. They both worried about the question: “Who are they: the heroes of our time?” A brief analysis, you see, will not be able to give an answer to this conceptual question, which the classics tried to thoroughly understand.
Unfortunately, the life of these talented people was cut short early from the bullet. Fate Both of them were representatives of their time, divided into two parts: before and after the uprising on Senate Square. In addition, as you know, critics compare Pushkin's Onegin and Lermontov's Pechorin, presenting readers with a comparative analysis of the characters. “The hero of our time”, however, was written after the death of Pushkin.
The image of Grigory Alexandrovich Pechorin
Analysis of the novel “A Hero of Our Time” clearly defines its main character, which forms the entire composition of the book. Mikhail Yuryevich portrayed in him an educated young nobleman of the post-Decembrist era - a person struck by unbelief - who does not carry good, does not believe in anything, his eyes do not burn with happiness. Fate bears Pechorin, like an autumn leaf, along a disastrous trajectory. He stubbornly "chases ... for life", searches for it "everywhere." However, the noble concept of honor in him is more likely connected with egoism, but not with decency.
Pechorin would be glad to gain faith by going to the Caucasus to fight. It has a natural spiritual strength. Belinsky, characterizing this hero, writes that he is no longer young, but has not yet found a mature attitude towards life. He rushes from one adventure to another, painfully wanting to find an "inner core", but he does not succeed. Invariably there are dramas around him, people are dying. And he rushes on, like the Eternal Jew, Agasfer. If the word “boredom” is the key word for Pushkin’s
image of Onegin , then the word “misery” is the key word to understand the image of Lermontovsky Pechorin.
Novel composition
Initially, the plot of the novel brings the author, the officer sent to serve in the Caucasus, with a veteran who went through the Caucasian War, and now as quartermaster Maxim Maximovich. Wise in life, scorched in battle, this man, worthy of all respect, was the first, according to Lermontov’s intention, to begin the analysis of heroes. The hero of our time is his acquaintance. The author of the novel (on whose behalf the story is being narrated) Maxim Maximovich tells of the “glorious small” twenty-five-year-old ensign Grigory Alekseevich Pechorin, a former colleague of the narrator. The first is the story of Bel.
Pechorin, having resorted to the help of the brother of the highland princess Azamat, steals this girl from his father. Then she bored him, sophisticated in women. With Azamat, he pays off with the hot horse of a dzhigit Kazbich, who, having urchin, kills a poor girl. A scam grows into a tragedy.
Maxim Maximovich, remembering the past, got excited and handed over to the interlocutor the travel diary left by Pechorin. The following chapters of the novel are separate episodes of the life of Pechorin.
The short story "Taman" brings Pechorin with smugglers: a flexible girl, like a cat, a pseudo-blind boy and a "smuggler", a sailor Yanko. Lermontov presented here a romantic and artistically completed analysis of the characters. The “hero of our time” introduces us to a simple smuggling: Yanko crosses the sea with cargo, and the girl sells beads, brocade, ribbons. Fearing that Gregory would reveal them to the police, the girl first tries to drown him, dropping him from the boat. But when she fails, she and Yanko swim away. The boy, on the other hand, remains miserable without a livelihood.
The next fragment of the diary is the story “Princess Mary”. Bored Pechorin is treated after being wounded in Pyatigorsk. Here he is friends with the cunk Grushnitsky, Dr. Werner. Bored, Gregory finds an object of sympathy - Princess Mary. She is resting here with her mother - Princess Ligovskaya. But the unexpected happens - a long-standing sympathy of Pechorin arrives in Pyatigorsk, married lady Vera, together with her aging husband. Vera and Gregory decide to meet on a date. They succeed, because, fortunately for them, the whole city is represented by a visiting magician.
But the junker Grushnitsky, wanting to compromise both Pechorin and Princess Mary, believing that she would be on a date, follows the main character of the novel, enlisting the company of a dragoon officer. Catching no one, the junker and dragoons dissolve gossip. Pechorin “by noble notions” challenges Grushnitsky to a duel, where he kills him by firing the second.
Lermontov’s analysis of heroes introduces us to the pseudo-orderliness in the officer environment . The hero of our time upsets Grushnitsky’s despicable plan. Initially, the pistol handed to Pechorin was unloaded. In addition, having chosen the condition - to shoot from six steps, the junker was sure that he would shoot Grigory Alexandrovich. But he was disturbed by excitement. By the way, Pechorin suggested the opponent save his life, but he began to demand a shot.
Verin husband guesses what’s the matter, and leaves Pyatigorsk with his wife. And Princess Ligovskaya blesses his marriage to Mary, but Pechorin does not even think about marriage.
The action-packed short story Fatalist brings Pechorin with Lieutenant Vulich in the company of other officers. He is confident in his april and in the argument, heated by philosophical argument and wine, he plays "hussar roulette". Moreover, the gun does not produce a shot. However, Pechorin claims that he has already noticed the sign of death on the lieutenant’s face. He really doesn’t die without any reason, returning to stand.
Conclusion
Where did the Pechorins come from in the 19th century Russia? Where did the idealism of youth disappear?
The answer is simple. The 30s marked the era of fear, the era of the suppression of all progressive III (political) gendarme police. Born of Nicholas I’s fear of the possibility of a remake of the Decembrist uprising, it “reported on all matters”, was engaged in censorship, censorship, and possessed the broadest powers.
Hopes for the development of the political system of society became seditious. Dreamers began to be called "troublemakers." Active people aroused suspicion, meetings - repression. It is time for denunciations and arrests. People began to be afraid to have friends, to trust them with their thoughts, dreams. They became individualists and Pechorin painfully tried to gain faith in themselves.