Andrei Platonov is an author who is a recognized word master in Russian literature. In this article we will tell you about the work "The Secret Man" by Platonov. A summary will introduce you to this story. She saw the light in 1928. The story came out as a separate edition ("The Secret Man" by Platonov). A summary of the events described in the work is as follows.
Summary: the beginning of events
Thomas Pukhov, the main character, was not gifted with sensitivity. For example, he cut boiled sausage on the tomb of his wife, as he was hungry due to the absence of the hostess. Having become entranced, after her burial Pukhov goes to bed. Someone is knocking loudly on his door. This is the guard of the office of his boss, who brings the hero a ticket to clear the snow from the railway tracks. Pukhov at the station signs in this order - try not to sign at that time!
Pukhov clears the way from snow drifts
Together with other workers who serve a snowplow carrying two locomotives, the protagonist begins to clear the way from snow drifts so that the Red Army armored trains and trains can pass. 60 versts from this place is the front. A snow blower on one snow block decelerates sharply. Smashing their heads, workers fall. The assistant driver is defeated to death . The workers are surrounded by a horse detachment of Cossacks, ordering them to deliver a snowplow and steam locomotives to a station occupied by whites. Arriving at the place, the red armored train shoots the Cossacks, stuck in the snow, and frees the comrades.
Rest at Liski station
They rest at Liski station for three days. Pukhov on the wall of the barracks reads an announcement that a set of mechanics is being conducted to the Southern Front, in the technical units. He offers Zvorichny, his friend, to go south, explaining this by saying that there is already nothing to do on the snowplow: spring is approaching. A revolution will pass, but nothing will remain for the workers. Zvorychny does not agree, as he does not want to leave his wife and son.
The main character goes to the Crimea
Pukhov in a week with five locksmiths sent to Novorossiysk. On three ships, the Reds equip the landing, consisting of 500 people, to the rear of Wrangel, to the Crimea. Pukhov goes on a steamboat called "Shan", serves on it a steam engine. Last night the landing party passes through the Kerch Strait, but the ships lose each other due to the storm. The raging element does not allow to land on the coast of Crimea. People are forced to return to the city of Novorossiysk.
Life in Novorossiysk
Here comes the news that the Red troops took Simferopol. Pukhov spends four months in the city as a senior installer of the base related to the Azov-Black Sea Shipping Company. He misses the lack of work: there are few steamships, and the main character is mainly engaged in the preparation of reports on breakdowns of mechanisms. Often he walks around the surroundings, enjoying nature. The main character, remembering the deceased spouse, is sad, having buried herself in the ground, heated by his breath, with his face. Wets it with reluctant, rare drops of tears Pukhov - "innermost man" Platonov. The summary of the story allows only a casual mention of his state of mind.
Pukhov in Baku, meeting with Sharikov
We continue our story. Andrei Platonov further writes that after a while Pukhov leaves the city of Novorossiysk, but is sent not to home, but to Baku in order to reach the homeland along the coast of the Caspian and then along the Volga. In Baku, he meets with Sharikov, a sailor, establishing a shipping company in the Caspian. This person gives him a business trip to the city of Tsaritsyn in order to attract a qualified proletariat to Baku. Arriving there, the protagonist shows some mechanic who met him at the factory’s office, Sharikov’s mandate. This person reads it, after which, smearing with saliva, glues a piece of paper to the fence - an interesting detail, which is introduced by Andrei Platonov. "The Secret Man" Pukhov looks at a piece of paper and drives a nail so that the wind does not tear off the document. After that, he goes to the station, where he takes the train. Pukhov asks passengers where they are going. The meek voice of one person replies that they also do not know. “He is coming, and we are with him,” he says.
Life at home
Pukhov returns to his homeland, settles in the house of Zvorichny, who worked as a secretary of a workshop cell, and serves here as a mechanic on a hydraulic press . After a week, he goes to live in his apartment, which he calls the “alienation strip,” since Pukhov is bored here. The main character often goes to visit his friend Zvorychny and tells him various stories about the Black Sea - so that he does not drink tea for nothing. Thomas, returning home, recalls that the human dwelling is called the center. He complains that his house does not look like a hearth at all: no fire, no women. Very interesting are the thoughts of the protagonist, which was created by Platonov ("The Hidden Man"). An analysis of them, unfortunately, is not the subject of our article. However, the transformation that he ultimately undergoes, we will try to describe briefly further.
Pukhov's failed venture
White approach the city. Gathered in units, the workers are defending themselves. Hurricane fire shells the city armored train of white. Thomas proposes to organize several platforms of sand in order to put them on an armored train from a slope. But they are scattered to smithereens without causing him any harm. Workers rushed to the attack, falling under machine gun fire. Two armored trains of the Red Army in the morning come to the aid of the workers: the city is saved.
After these events, the cell is sorted: is Pukhov a traitor? Or maybe he came up with this stupid undertaking because it is simply a silly man? They decided on that. Thomas Pukhov is burdened by work in the workshop - gloom, not heaviness. Remembering Sharikov, he writes a letter to him.
Pukhov again in Baku
The answer comes in a month. A friend invites him to work in Baku at the oil fields. Thomas goes there, serves as a driver on one of the engines, pumping oil from the well to the oil storage. Time goes by, the main character is getting well. He regrets only one thing: that he has aged a little and there is already nothing desperate in his soul, as it was before.
Awareness of Thomas Pukhov
Once, the main character, whose life tells us Platonov’s novel “The Hidden Man,” went fishing from Baku. He spent the night with his friend Sharikov, to whom his brother returned from captivity. Suddenly awakened sympathy for people suddenly clears up in the soul of Pukhov. He walks with pleasure, feeling the affinity for his body of all other bodies, the luxury of life, as well as the fury of nature, bold, incredible in action and in silence. Gradually, the protagonist realizes the most painful and important: desperate nature passed into people, into revolutionary courage. A spiritual foreign land leaves Pukhov, and he feels the familiar warmth of his homeland, as if he had returned to his mother from an unwanted wife. Warmth and light strained over the world, gradually turned into human power. He met the driver, saying: "Good morning!" He replies: "The revolution is complete."
So ends the "Concealed Man" by Platonov. The summary introduces the reader only to the main events. After reading the original work, you will get to know the main character better and better understand why Platonov used such an unusual definition in his relation - "innermost man." The heroes of the story are very interesting. Their characters deserve a closer look.