"Dark Alleys" (read the summary below) - I.A. Bunin, on which he worked for eight years. There are no recurring stories. Each story is the fate of an individual person: unique, inimitable, one of a kind, like a fingerprint. What made the author combine them into one book? Of course, love. The life path may be different, but the “dark alleys” of each of us ultimately lead to only one thing - to love ...
I. A. Bunin, a summary of “The Dark Alley”
Cold autumn weather. One of the Tula roads, flooded and rugged by endless rains. To a long hut, combining a post office on one side and a small private hotel on the other, a dirty tarantass drove up. A slender old military man came out of it, with a gray mustache, but still black-browed. He famously ran up to the porch of the hut, then went to the upper room to the left.
It was clean, warm and dry. Before he could call the owners, a dark, also black-browed, and out of age beautiful woman entered the room with a light step. Rounded shoulders, a large chest under a red blouse, “light legs”, red worn Tatar shoes - nothing escaped his gaze. The visitor started that conversation, which usually takes place between people whose paths accidentally crossed, but more likely they will never see each other. Talked yes
and forgot. It turned out that this woman is the mistress of the inn. This fact surprised him, but he praised her for her cleanliness and comfort. She squinted and inquiringly looked at him, answered: "And I love purity ... under gentlemen it grew, Nikolai Alekseevich." Either her words, or her voice, or her name uttered by her, or maybe all together, abruptly and unexpectedly evoked vivid pictures of youth ... The man quickly sat up and blushed: “Hope! You?" Of course, it was she - that same Hope, who thirty, and perhaps thirty-five years ago, was his lover. Ah, how long has it been! Youth, love, and history, in essence, was "vulgar, ordinary."
But this is not the end. Summary "Dark Alley" continues. After all, the fact that for one is a complete trifle, which can sometimes be remembered with pleasant sadness, for the other is the love of all life, with which you can’t part for a minute. She knew everything. She understood that Nikolenka was not the same anymore, and she had given all her youth, beauty and fever to him, and not become her, nor his wife, nor anyone else. I tried to put my hands on myself. But fate decreed otherwise ...
Nikolai Alekseevich blushes, hides a stingy tear and repents only before God, because she, apparently, has not been angry with him for a long time. But Hope did not forgive him, and is not going to forgive. It's impossible. Feelings are madly mixed. Love, delight, resentment, disappointment and hatred - wherever that, go figure it out. Therefore, just as her love for him will remain unchanged, so is what has settled nearby.
Repentance and tears instantly disappeared from his face. Nikolai Alekseevich said that his life did not work out. The wife whom he loved extremely deceived and abandoned him “even more insulting” than he Hope. The son is an unprecedented arrogant and loafer, a man without a heart and honor. Maybe he really did not appreciate and betrayed the true that was originally offered to him. After this unexpected confession, she came up and kissed his hand, and he kissed her, and they said goodbye. When we drove on, he became unbearably ashamed. The last words, some kind of stupid, somewhere even childish repentance, kissing hands ... The former military man blushed deeply, but instantly he was ashamed of these vile feelings. After all, the time spent with her was the best and most magical in his life: "A scarlet rose hip was in bloom around, dark linden alleys stood ..." Closing his eyes, he shook his head: I wonder what would happen next, what if he had not abandoned her, and this woman, Nadezhda, the mistress of the constant room, would become his life partner, the manager of his Petersburg house, the mother of his children? This concludes the Dark Alley. The question remained unanswered ...
What is the story “Dark Alleys” about?
The summary of the work, as well as the entire text, makes the reader think about whether this is a story of great love or a “vulgar, ordinary” affair? In life, you have to watch hundreds, if not thousands, of such dramas. But this is on the one hand. Or rather, this is the tip of the iceberg. What is hidden under the dark water? Summary “Dark Alley” told the story of two people. Hope carried love for one man through the years.
Yes, this love was muddy with a touch of resentment, sharp pain and deep disappointment. But she was. Nikolai Alekseevich, betraying and insulting one, also knew this feeling, but thanks to another. And he did not give up. And he continued to protect what came to life in his soul, and was subsequently trampled and mixed with mud. Why do we so cherish what hurts and achs? Why is "everything passes, but not everything is forgotten"?