The books of Romain Rolland are like an era. His contribution to the struggle for the happiness and peace of mankind is invaluable. The people of Roland were loved and considered a true friend by the working people of many countries, for whom he became a “people's writer”.
Childhood and students
Romain Rolland (photo above) was born in the small town of Clamsy in southern France in January 1866. His father was a notary public, like all men in the family. Rollan’s grandfather took part in the storming of the Bastille, and his love of life became the basis of the image of one of the best heroes created by the writer, Cola Brunion.
In his hometown, Rolland graduated from college, then continued his studies in Paris, was a teacher at the Sorbonne. In one of his philosophical treatises, he wrote that the main thing for him is life lived for the benefit of people and the search for truth. Rolland corresponded with Leo Tolstoy, and this strengthened his search for the origins of art.
Romain loved the music that his mother taught him from an early age, he graduated from the prestigious Ecole Normal school, where he studied history. After graduation, he went to Rome in 1889 for a scholarship to study history. Impressed by Shakespeare's plays, he began to write historical dramas about the events of the Italian Renaissance. Returning to Paris, he wrote plays and was engaged in research work.
The French Revolution Cycle
In 1892 he married the daughter of a famous philologist. In 1893, Rolland defended a dissertation in music at the Sorbonne, after which he taught at the music department. The life of Romain Rollan for the next 17 years is to give lectures, engage in literature and the first works.
Rolland was greatly alarmed by the state of art, seeing that the bourgeoisie had reached an impasse, and he set courageous innovation as his task. In those days, France was close to a civil war - in such a conflict, the first works of the writer originate.
Literary activity began with the play "Wolves", released in 1898. A year later, the play "The Triumph of the Mind" was staged. In 1900, the writer wrote the drama "Danton", which was shown to the public the same year.
Another drama that occupies an important place in Rollan's revolutionary cycle is July Fourteenth, written in 1901. In it, the writer showed the power and awakening of the rebellious people. The historical events that Rolland wanted to reproduce were clearly visible already in the first dramas. In them a large place is allotted to the people, whose power and strength the writer felt with his whole being, but the people remained a mystery to him.
Folk theater
Romain Rolland nurtured the idea of ​​the People's Theater and, along with dramas, wrote articles on this topic. They entered the book "People's Theater", published in 1903. His creative ideas are strangled by the bourgeois society that has befallen the writer.
Having abandoned the plans for the creation of the People’s Theater, Rolland takes up the novel "Jean-Christophe", wanting to embody in it what could not be done in theatrical undertakings. Subsequently, he will say that Jean-Christophe avenged him at this vanity fair.
At the beginning of the century there was a turn in the work of the writer. Rolland no longer turns to history, but searches for a hero. In the preface to Beethoven's Life, published in 1903, Romain Rolland writes: “Let the hero breathe us.” He tries to emphasize in the appearance of the famous musician the features that impress him. That is why Beethoven’s biography received a peculiar connotation in his interpretation, which did not always correspond to historical truth.
Jean-Christophe
In 1904, Rolland began writing the novel "Jean-Christophe", which he conceived back in the 90s. It was completed in 1912. All stages of the hero’s life, full of constant search, which brought him misfortune and victory, pass before the reader from birth to his lonely death.
The first four books telling about the childhood and youth of the hero reflect Germany and Switzerland of those years. The writer does his best to show that only a genius can come out of the people. Uncompromising and not accustomed to retreat, Christophe faced the bourgeois public. He had to leave his homeland and flee from Germany. He comes to Paris and expects to find what he needs. But all his dreams crumble to dust.
The fifth to tenth books tell about the life of a hero in France. They cover the sphere of culture and art that excited the author of the book, and he flaunted and exposed the true essence of bourgeois democracy. In the diary of the writer back in 1896 there is a record of the original intent of the novel: "It will be a poem of my life." In a way, it is.
Heroic lives
In 1906, Romain Rolland writes "The Life of Michelangelo" and simultaneously works on the fourth book of Christophe. The internal similarity of these two works is clearly visible. The parallel between the ninth book and Tolstoy’s Life, which was published in 1911, can be seen in the same way.
Kindness, heroism, spiritual loneliness, purity of heart - what attracted Rollan to the Russian writer, became the experiences of Christophe. On the “Life of Tolstoy” the cycle “Heroic Lives” conceived by Romain about the life of Garibaldi, F. Millet, T. Payne, Schiller, Mazzini stopped and remained unwritten.
Cola Bruyon
The next masterpiece was the book of Romain Rolland "Cola Bruyon", published in 1914. The writer recreated the historical past here, and the reader clearly feels his admiration for French culture, a tender and ardent love for his native land. The action of the novel takes place in the hometown of Rolland Clamsay. The novel presents a record of the life of the protagonist - a woodcarver, talented, witty, with a rare love of life.
Years of struggle
During the war years, the strengths and weaknesses of Rollan's work are exposed. He clearly sees the crime of war and treats both warring parties equally. Feelings of painful discord are seen in collections of anti-war articles written by the writer from 1914 to 1919.
The writer calls the time between two wars "years of struggle." At this time, a bold and frank confession, Farewell to the Past, was published in 1931. Here he honestly opened his inner quests in life and work, sincerely admitted his mistakes. In 1919 - 1920, the history of the Freethinking Man, Clarembo, and the novels Pierre and Luce and Lilyuli were released.
The writer continued in these years the cycle of dramas about the French Revolution. In 1924 and 1926, the plays of Romain Rolland “The Game of Love and Death” and “Palm Sunday” were released. In 1928, he wrote the drama "Leonids," according to critics, the most "unsuccessful and anti-historical."
Charmed soul
In 1922, the writer embarks on the cycle "Enchanted Soul." This huge work of Rolland writes eight years. Christophe has a lot in common with the heroine of this novel, which is why the work is perceived as something familiar for a long time. Annette is looking for "his place in the tragedy of mankind" and thinks that she has found. But she is far from the goal, and the heroine lurking in her energy cannot be used for the benefit of the people. Annette is alone. Her support is only in herself, in her spiritual purity.
As events unfold in the novel, the denunciation of bourgeois society occupies an increasingly important place. The conclusion reached by the heroine of the novel is “to break, destroy” this order of death. Anneta realizes that her camp has been found and her social duty is worth nothing next to motherhood and love, eternal and unshakable.
Her son Mark, in which the heroine has invested all the best that could give him, will continue the mother’s business. He occupies most of the last parts of the epic. A young man fashioned from "solid material" becomes a member of the anti-fascist movement and is looking for a way to the people. In Mark, the author gives the image of an intellectual who is occupied with ideological searches. And before the eyes of readers appears a human person in all its manifestations - joy and sorrow, triumph and disappointment, love and hate.
The novel “Enchanted Soul”, written in the 30s, still does not lose its relevance. Saturated with politics and philosophy, it remains a narrative of a man with all his passions. This is a great novel in which the author raises vital issues, it clearly shows a call to the struggle for the happiness of mankind.
New world
In 1934, Rolland marries a second time. His partner in life was Maria Kudasheva. They return from Switzerland to France, and the writer joins the ranks of the fighters against Nazism. Romain stigmatizes every manifestation of fascism, and after “The Enchanted Soul” in 1935, two remarkable collections of journalistic speeches of the writer are published: “Peace through the Revolution” and “Fifteen Years of Struggle”.
They contain the biography of Romain Rollan, his political and creative development, his quest, entry into the anti-fascist movement, and the transition "to the side of the USSR." Just like in Farewell to the Past, there is a lot of self-criticism, the story of his path to the goal through obstacles - he walked, fell, dodged to the side, but stubbornly continued to walk until he reached a new world.
In these two books, the name of M. Gorky, whom the writer considered his comrade in arms, was mentioned many times. They have been texting since 1920. In 1935, Rolland came to the USSR and, despite his illness, sought to learn as much as possible about the Soviet Union. Returning from the country of the Soviets, seventy-year-old Rolland told everyone that he had noticeably increased strength.
Shortly before the war, in 1939, Romain Rolland published the play "Robespierre", which completed the cycle dedicated to the French Revolution. Throughout the drama is the theme of the people. The writer spent four years of Hitler’s occupation in Wesel. Rolland's last public appearance was a reception in honor of the anniversary of the revolution at the Soviet embassy in 1944. He died in December of that year.
Reader reviews
They write about Romain Rolland that he has a rare encyclopedia for those years - he is well versed in music and painting, in history and philosophy. He also understands human psychology quite well and realistically shows why a person does this, what moves and goes on in his head, how it all began.
The writer's literary heritage is extremely diverse: essays, novels, plays, memoirs, biographies of people of art. And in every work he naturally and vividly shows the life of a person: childhood, years of growing up. From his inquiring mind many feelings and feelings are not hidden.
It would seem that it is difficult to depict the world of a child through the eyes of an adult, but in Rolland it turns out incredibly lively and talented. He delights in his flowing and light style. The works are read in one breath, like a song thoroughly saturated with music, whether it is a description of nature or domestic life, a person’s feelings or his appearance. The author’s well-aimed remarks are striking in their simplicity and at the same time depth, each of his books can be literally sorted into quotes. With the help of his heroes, Romain Rolland expresses his opinion to the reader about everything: about music and religion, politics and emigration, journalism and questions of honor, about old people and children. In his books is life.