Problems of social structure have always been, it is them in their tales that Saltykov-Shchedrin analyzes and criticizes. By this, he shows love for the Motherland, indifference to what is happening with his native people and in his beloved land.
Saltykov-Shchedrin - accuser of social inequality
Saltykov-Shchedrin knew firsthand all the flaws of the serfdom. Growing up in a noble family, he absorbed hatred for the enslavement of peasants from childhood. Saltykov Shchedrin himself speaks of his childhood, where the suffering, fear and hunger of the peasants caused pain in the writer's young soul.
Shchedrin goes to study at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. Unfortunately, the educational institution is not what it was under Pushkin: the teaching staff has weakened. The idea that their task was “the execution of the bosses” was planted in the heads of students. Nevertheless, the lyceum years had a fruitful effect on the writer's worldview, it was there that he met Petrashevsky. The friendship of the famous utopian and writer becomes very strong.
Already in his first works Saltykov-Shchedrin criticized the social system and public order. For this, Nicholas I refers the writer to Vyatka. There Saltykov-Shchedrin is further strengthened in the idea of exposing the social structure.
Upon returning from exile, Saltykov-Shchedrin works in the Ministry, gets acquainted with Nekrasov and begins work in "Domestic Notes" and "Sovremennik". Whether it be writing or public service, everyone around noted the unique performance of Mikhail Evgrafovich.
Fairy Tale - the Writer's Crown
Tales are the crown of creativity of Saltykov-Shchedrin. On the one hand, the appeal to this genre was due to political motives. In 1881, the Volunteers killed Alexander II. After this event, print media are severely censored. Accordingly, it was necessary to invent a new form in order to draw the reader's attention to criticism of social problems. This prompted Saltykov-Shchedrin to resort to the Aesopian genre - a fairy tale.
There was another reason for the writer to turn to a fairy tale: as he believed, this genre is closest to the people, through it you can convey your thoughts to any reader. The used means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin did not leave indifferent the majority of society.
"Tales for children of fair age" - that was the name of the first Saltykov-Shchedrin collection, which included 28 fairy tales. Why does a writer call his audience this way? Children with the help of fairy tales learn the world around them, and, according to Saltykov-Shchedrin, adults must open their eyes to the surrounding reality.
The writer himself appears in the guise of a narrator - a good-natured narrator, through whose stories sarcastic laughter emerges. Critics described Saltykov-Shchedrin as "the prosecutor of Russian reality."
Most often, in one fairy tale several relevant topics are raised. They can be reduced to four: exposing the unlimited power of the tsar, the ruling class, liberalism, and also the writer is concerned about the problem of the people.
The artistic originality of the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin
In its volume, the tale does not exceed the story. But it revealed the most essential in people and their behavior.
The idea is achieved through all possible means of creating a comic. In the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin, the following artistic features can be noted:
1. Connection with folk tales:
- Reasons: "Yes, they were," "In a certain kingdom."
- Numerals in a non-numeric meaning: "The Far Far Away Kingdom."
- Quotes: "At the command of the pike."
- Fairytale epithets: "Beasts are fierce."
- Fairytale names: "Ivan the Fool."
2. Traced fabled tradition. Often they are called fables in prose, because allegorical language shows human vices through the images of animals ("The Wise Squealer").
3. The combination of the real and the fantastic is the main source with the help of which the comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin is achieved.
4. Fairy tales are characterized by aphoristic language.
Humor and satire: a distinction of concepts
Before analyzing the means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin, it is necessary to determine what the author uses: humor or satire. These two concepts relate to the comic effect, but they have a significant difference: humor is a good laugh that does not go personal. Everything is different with satire: it is an evil, caustic grin. As a rule, it makes fun of human or social vices. Protest and righteous anger are satire's companions.
It is satirical laughter that Saltykov-Shchedrin uses in fairy tales. Such a laugh should make readers wonder if everything is okay in the existing order.
How a writer achieves comic
Consider the means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin.
The writer uses several tricks:
- Hyperbole (exaggeration). For example, a clerk who lives and trembles for 100 years in his hole (the tale "The Wise clerk").
- Grotesque (a combination of reality and fiction). We can say that the grotesque is inherent in most of Shchedrin's tales. After all, his heroes, as a rule, find themselves in a semi-real semi-fantastic world ("The Story of How One Man Fed Two Generals" - real generals fantastically move the author to an uninhabited island).
- Allegory (through images of animals human and social vices are shown). For example, the tale "The Selfless Hare", which condemns slavish obedience, overpowering the instinct of self-preservation. And it is elevated to nobility.
- Aesopian language. A reception in which the author’s speech is ironic is full of omissions and allegories. (The generals, having arrived on the island, “cried for the first time after they closed the registry”).
As you can see, various means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin are used. An essay on this topic should cover every trick.
Analysis of comic tools in the tale "Wild Landowner"
Let us analyze one of the tales in order to characterize the means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin. "Wild Landowner" is one of the most popular works of the writer of this genre. The tale tells of a landowner who was left without serfs. It seemed to him that, having lost the “man”, he would heal well, but the opposite happened. The landowner was so wild that he looked like an animal.
Saltykov-Shchedrin raises an important idea in the tale: the unlimited power of the landlord class over the peasantry, the dullness and worthlessness of the life of the landlords. The author conveys his thought using characteristic means: hyperbole, grotesque, synecdoch and antithesis.
The image of the landowner is hyperbolic after the peasants have disappeared: overgrown with wool, claws, lost the ability to speak. If we talk about the grotesque, it is enough to give as an example the fact that peasants disappeared from the estate. In addition, Saltykov-Shchedrin easily moves from real to fantastic: here the landowner lives with serfs - the situation is real, runs wild "without a man" - fantastic, the man has appeared - life has become realistic again.
In the composition of the tale, an antithesis is used - a contrast: the well-fed life of a landowner with a man is opposed to life without a man. In order to give the phenomenon of slavish subjugation of the peasantry to a large-scale character, the writer resorts to a synecdoch, a technique in which the whole is highlighted through a part: the “man” in a fairy tale is the whole peasantry as a whole.
The author’s language is ironic, his tone is characteristic of the Aesopian language (the landowner couldn’t utter articulate sounds, “but he hadn’t got a tail yet”).
We examined the means of creating a comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin. The composition will be incomplete if you do not allocate artistic means: metaphors (“fireball”) and epithets (“golden word”, “friable body”).
The author uses folklore motifs. This achieves the comic in the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin. The work on The Wild Landowner is no exception. It should be noted: inception (“in a certain kingdom”), sayings (“live and live”), folklore images of animals (judicious bear, cowardly hare, smart mouse), three repetitions (the landowner received guests three times when the peasants disappeared).
Tales of Shchedrin - a monument to satire. Using the folk poetic tradition, the writer was able to embody a rich ideological content.