Nikolai Ostrovsky how the steel was tempered summary. Nikolai Ostrovsky "how the steel was tempered". The history of writing the novel "How the Steel Was Tempered"

The list of books that are constantly talked about, but no one reads them, is headed, of course, by the work of Joyce and Proust, but on the local scale of the Russian-speaking space, “How the Steel Was Tempered” is undoubtedly among them. Who hasn't heard? Everyone heard. And who read? I still haven’t read either, although, strictly speaking, for me, who specialized in Soviet literature of the 1920s (the “20s” in literary criticism traditionally means a somewhat wider period - from the late 1910s, i.e. from 1917-18, and until about the mid-1930s, so Ostrovsky’s book fits into this framework completely) this is also a professional omission, but more than that, I didn’t even see the famous film. No, it is clear that the 35+ generation read without exception, in order, wrote essays, passed exams, etc., but my peers already got "Mother's Heart" and "Stories about Seryozha Kostrikov" at best when they were pioneers , we have not grown up to the Komsomol and "How the Steel Was Tempered". And yet, in today's terms, the "brand" itself does not lose weight at all. Over the past few weeks, I have personally heard the title of Ostrovsky's book at least three times in a variety of situations: in a repeat of Maxim Galkin's concert the year before last (Maxim has an interlude where he talks about the existence of the so-called "naive-Ukrainian" language), in speeches by Sergei Barkhin at the opening of the exhibition of Oleg Sheintsis (Barkhin said about Sheintsis that he was so hardworking that it was as if he alone read "How the Steel Was Tempered") and in a documentary television film about Viktor Astafyev and Georgy Zhzhenov (Astafyev told how the Germans did not become shoot at them, fearing that you never know, the Komsomol foolishly, instead of escaping, will start firing at them at the risk of their own lives - having read "How the Steel Was Tempered").

A striking phenomenon, by the way: the original source has long been forgotten, abandoned, and not only the brand in the form of a book title continues to live in culture, not only the formula taken out of context "life is given to a person once and you need to live it so that it is not excruciatingly painful. ..", but also the mythological image of its protagonist. Pavka Korchagin is still a household name, and what this character is, there is no particular need to explain to anyone.

The fact that the artistic merit of "How the Steel Was Tempered" is minimal and in this sense it can hardly compete with other "unreadable" books like "Ulysses" or "In Search of Lost Time" was a revelation for me. Actually, even in the 30-50s, no one declared “How the Steel Was Tempered” to be such a directly outstanding literary masterpiece, even according to the most official concepts, Fadeev, Sholokhov, but certainly not Nikolai Ostrovsky, were “great” writers. Why, despite this, his work nevertheless turned out to be a textbook is also understandable. It was imposed not so much as a literary, but as a life, behavioral model. And not even a model, but an ideal. And in this respect, as well as in some others, "How the Steel Was Tempered" is a work characteristic of the literature of its time (of a certain, of course, direction). Characteristic to the point of normativity - its lack of artistic quality is primarily due to the fact that the author strives for full compliance with the ideals of literature of this kind, and at the same time does not have the opportunity to resort to outright falsification of facts (this is a very curious feature of the "well-intentioned" writings of the late 1920s - 1930s-early 1930s: they were read by those who had the events of the revolution and civil war were still in memory, frankly lying until most of the witnesses were destroyed in the late 30s and early 40s, it turned out to be even more difficult, which, by the way, at the same time explains why even the most loyal and loyal, by the standards of this most interesting era, books subsequently Soviet for the most part were not welcomed and not republished by the authorities) - as a result, I am forced to resort either to defaults or to explanations of the depicted events and actions of characters that are strange in today's terms, and even in terms of the 60-70s already.

Almost the entire first part of "How the Steel Was Tempered" is devoted, in the language of Soviet history textbooks, to "the prerequisites, causes and course of establishing Soviet power in Ukraine". And everything seems to be in accordance with the official version: the Germans and the Hetmanate, the Petliurist bandits with Jewish pogroms, the proletariat, who understands the strength of the Bolsheviks and follows them. But both Pavka Korchagin and his entourage in this first part are not yet leaf character of Soviet heroic mythology.His "revolutionary activity" begins with the fact that the priest Vasily punished Korchagin and kicked him out of school, suspecting that Pavka poured shag into his dough - however, Korchagin really did it (I am ready to argue that in a similar plot 50 1990s, the character would have suffered innocently, as well as that there could not already be in a book written at least ten years later, so many "positive" Jewish comrades, and especially Jewish women, and Ostrovsky has a lot of them.) Then Pavka "offended" in the dishwasher at the station buffet - but offended, again, because he really fell asleep at work, and through his fault there was a big flood at the station.Further, when the Bolsheviks distribute weapons to everyone in Shepetovka, and Korchagin is late for the distribution, he takes the rifle on the road from the oncoming boy - not a bourgeois, not a class enemy, but the most ordinary boy who turned out to be weaker and became a victim of the robber Korchagin. Finally, he steals the revolver of a German officer, determined to stay with the neighbors Leshchinsky - from the enemy, from the class, but still steals, alone, and for no particular reason, simply because he liked the weapon. And all this happens even before the hero becomes "conscious" and learns about the "class struggle".

And after that, with Ostrovsky, everything is like in medieval courtly novels, with which, by the way, if you are puzzled, in "How the Steel Was Tempered" you can trace genre, thematic, plot, characterological, stylistic, etc. on all levels of text organization analogy. And also, just like in classic comedies, Ostrovsky awards unpleasant characters or unreliable, with a "double bottom" people with characteristic surnames: Chuzhanin, Razvalikhin, Tufta, Dubava. But these are particulars, and the most significant thing is that the dignity of the hero in Ostrovsky is determined solely by the origin and loyalty to this origin, just as a medieval knight must be faithful to the honor of the family, with the difference compared to medieval concepts that now proletarian origin is considered "noble". This proletarian position is carried out in the book as harshly as possible. Korchagin's first love is Tonya Tumanova - a sweet, in fact, girl, the daughter of a forester, that is, not a bourgeois, but a completely progressive intellectual - but progressive only for her "class", and therefore Pavka is unworthy, later he meets her again when heroically he lays a narrow-gauge railway with other Komsomol members to deliver firewood to the city and for this he removes passengers from the train, including Tonya and her husband, also an intellectual, and they do not want to voluntarily share their labor enthusiasm - then Korchagin threatens them. In general, this is a characteristic technique for Ostrovsky, when, after some time, Pavka again encounters obvious or hidden "class enemies" from his childhood, in order to make sure once again: no matter how much you feed the wolf ... Pop Vasily with his daughters turns out to be one of the organizers of the Polish rebellion in the town. Nelly Leshchinskaya, the daughter of a neighbor lawyer, in whose deep car Korchagin comes to fix electric lighting - an arrogant cocaine addict, etc.

It is not surprising that with such a keen class instinct, Korchagin loses not only the "bourgeois" Tonya, but also a reliable comrade Rita Ustinovich. In general, by universal standards, Korchagin is a typical loser: despite colossal efforts, he achieved nothing for himself, did not acquire property, did not start a family, lost his health ... That is the pathos of the work - in new concept happiness: it is required to present his fate not as a failure, but as a triumph. And this is also a very characteristic motive for the literature of the 1920s and 1930s: the motive of the sacrifice of the individual for the sake of the collective, suffering today for the sake of happiness tomorrow, reality for the sake of the idea - "so that the harsh earth bleeds, so that new youth rises from the bones." Only if for really great writers, in truly significant works - I don’t even take Babel or Pilnyak, but at least in Fadeev’s “Defeat” - this sacrifice, for all its heroic context, is somehow perceived as a tragedy, as an occasion for reflection, then Ostrovsky presents it schematically. "How the Steel Was Tempered" is not a novel, but the scheme of a novel, with "epic" beginnings like: "A sharp merciless class struggle seized Ukraine." With a "new family" of party and Komsomol workers instead of relatives and lovers ("lost the feeling of a separate personality" - this is how the peak of the "moral" development of the hero is characterized). With the need to kill the one who is the enemy, and the enemy to consider that of a different origin. With readiness to die for the sake of the cause (this is the "new birth", and, it would seem, here the condo socialist realism merges with the mythopoetics of the "spontaneous" writers, as well as in comparing the revolution with a snowstorm, with a snowstorm).

The second part, however, is practically unreadable, since there is almost nothing either human or artistic in it. Ostrovsky writes in the language that in Soviet publications (I have a book published before my birth in 1977 at hand) I had to comment in line-by-line, and compound abbreviations and slang derivatives of these abbreviations recognizable in the 20-30s - nashtaoker, provincial party school, Komsa ... - clogs it terribly. But it also gives a sense of time - not historical, but literary. Since the end of the 1910s, everyone has been mastering this language, some for heroic epics, others for satires and parodies ("And I went, went to petrocomproms, tailed for a long time and porches in the district committee ..." - Gippius wrote in 1919 still in Petrograd; “when a child for the fourth year babbles the same indistinct, unintelligible words like “sovnarkhoz”, “uezemelkom”, “sovbur” and “revolutionary military council”, then this is no longer a touching, eye-caressing baby, but forgive me, a rather decent fellow who fell into quiet idiocy" - Averchenko scoffed in "A Dozen Knives in the Back of the Revolution" already abroad), and the most subtle and gifted tried to taste this strange language, hear these eerie words in the howl of a revolutionary snowstorm or decompose into elementary particles meaning, to combine a linguistic remake with archaism, as, for example, Pilnyak (all these Pilnyakov's "head-boom!" or "to whom - tators, and to whom - lyators"), whose poetics, by the way, was witty and accurately parodied by Dmitry Bykov in "Spelling ("And out of sinful fury, stomping with hooves, comrade Gurfinkel hobbles heavily"). But there is no poetry at all in Ostrovsky's style, so much so that it is difficult to talk about style at all - a novel, especially the second part, with an endless struggle on the labor and ideological front (party meetings are described, where first the "workers' opposition" of the Trotskyists is smashed, then the Trotskyist-Kamenev " new opposition" - it is curious that Stalin is never mentioned in the 1977 edition, but briefly - repressed soon after the release of the first edition of the novel Yakir) is written more in the language of Soviet journalism than in fiction of any ideological consistency. Fiction, using the language of highly ideological journalism, when reading, really gives an effect that is both frightening and funny in its own way. But in any case, in comparison with Nikolai Ostrovsky, both Sholokhov and Fadeev are writers, if not great, as they were declared, then at least real ones.

It is all the more curious that at the level of individual micro-themes and leitmotifs, "How the Steel Was Tempered" can still conceal some surprises. For example, you can trace the "Italian theme" in the book. In the second part, it is constantly mentioned that Pavka reads a lot and voraciously, but apart from the classics of Marxism-Leninism, with the exception of "Capital", by the way, also completely abstract, only Furmanov's "Mutiny" appears as a specific title, in the episode where the already sick Korchagin , while being treated in Evpatoria, he meets a woman who will become his party comrade in the future - Dora Rodkina, although the circumstances of the acquaintance would seem to hint at the possibility of some kind of romantic context, but the Komsomol ideal is monastic-ascetic (i.e. again or "medieval"), and even when Korchagin eventually marries the daughter of his mother's friend Taya Katsyum, it is practically a "immaculate marriage": the hero is physically almost incapacitated (if he is fit for something as a man, and not just as an agitator and the organizer of party work - there are no direct hints of this in the book), Taya, in turn, is more passionate about Marxism and Komsomol-party work, and they got married in order to tear Taya away from the family where her father, the old-fashioned underdog, ate her. However, if we return to the topic of Korchagin's reading, it turns out that as a teenager-worker he was fond of brochures, where stories about the adventures of Garibaldi were printed, a little later, The Gadfly becomes his favorite book, dedicated, again, to the Italian revolutionaries, already a "conscious" young man Korchagin discovers "Spartacus" by Giovagnoli, and in the library he transfers this book to the same shelf with Gorky's works. In the light of this “line”, it becomes clear why, promising a mother who misses her son and complaining that she sees him only crippled, a paradise life after the victory of the “world revolution”, Korchagin tells her: “One republic will become for all people, and you, old women and old people who are working - to Italy, the country is so warm over the sea. There is never a winter there, mama. We will put you in bourgeois palaces, and you will warm your old bones in the sun. And we, bourgeois, will go to America to finish ".

In this unremarkable, simply stupid passage, however, two themes are voiced that today give practical relevance to interest in Ostrovsky's novel. The first is the aggressive "internationalist" Soviet plans, on the one hand, largely coinciding with the Orthodox-imperial ones, and on the other, completely not based on so-called "patriotism", since Ostrovsky, we must pay tribute, is very consistent in his ideological obstinacy and his "patriotism" is aimed exclusively at the idea, at the system and at the class, but not at the country, not at the state, not at the people (Ukrainians, Jews, Latvians and Poles fight against Ukrainians, Jews, Latvians and Poles, the front line runs between classes, and not between countries and peoples; episodes on the Soviet-Polish border are very characteristic in this light). Which, however, does not at all make the supposedly "new" Russia harmless to the rest of the world; on the contrary, it reminds once again that the "peaceful" Soviet Union in fact, he was the main arsonist of the Second World War. In a book published even before the National Socialists came to power in Germany, as in hundreds of other Soviet novels, poems, not to mention the journalism of that time, and not in the late 1910s and early 1920s, when the prospect of "exporting the revolution" seemed possible to many and, probably, in fact was partly probable, and already in the early 1930s, when the official doctrine of the USSR proclaimed "peacefulness", it is directly and unambiguously reminded every now and then that at the first opportunity, the Russians will go to war against the civilized world . Take, for example, one more episode - in the carriage at Nelly Leshchinskaya, whom Korchagin, threatening, says, "so far" we have peace, since "the bourgeoisie have come up with diplomacy" - but, they say, beware ... And another - with regards to the age category of Ostrovsky. In yet another passage, he calls Ledenev's 50-year-old character an "old man." Korchagin's mother is hardly older than 50 - but she is also an "old woman" with him. Yes, and Pavka himself, in his early twenties, and at the very end of the novel, in his early thirties, is physically worked out material, living on the same idea. Again the essentially medieval "ideal" of the victory of the "spirit" over the "body".

In fact, such a cult of youth and moral strength, which gives a weak, imperfect human body and physical strength is also characteristic of any totalitarian ideologies, regardless of their political coloring. It is clear why "How the Steel Was Tempered" is still popular in China. It would have been returned to the Russian "pantheon" today - but Ostrovsky is still doing well in some ways, it is precisely the ideological limitations that lead to the schematization of the plot and characters that deprive the book not only of the volume inherent in any more or less fiction, but also of the possibility read it differently than contemporaries and the author himself - which without much difficulty nowadays can be done with " Quiet Don", and even with a seemingly permeated love for the Young Guard party." on stylistic inferiority) sounds and can be used, in essence, in a fairly universal context, even if today's guardians of Orthodox spirituality. , dying, could say: all life and all forces were given to the most beautiful thing in the world - the struggle for the liberation of mankind. And we must hurry to live. After all, an absurd illness or some tragic accident can interrupt it.

But all the same, "How the Steel Was Tempered" did not and will not become my "desktop" book purely formally - this place of honor is firmly occupied by "Hydrocentral" by Marietta Shaginyan.

The autobiographical novel by Nikolai Ostrovsky is divided into two parts, each of which contains nine chapters: childhood, adolescence and youth; then mature years and illness.

For an unworthy act (he poured makhra into the dough for the priest), the cook's son Pavka Korchagin is expelled from school, and he ends up "into the people." “The boy looked into the very depths of life, at its bottom, into the well, and musty mold, swamp dampness smelled of him, greedy for everything new, unknown.” When the stunning news “The Tsar was thrown off” burst into his small town like a whirlwind, Pavel had no time to think about his studies at all, he works hard and, like a boy, without hesitation, hides weapons despite the ban from the bosses of the suddenly surging Germans. When the province is flooded with an avalanche of Petliura gangs, he becomes a witness to many Jewish pogroms, ending in brutal murders.

Anger and indignation often seize the young daredevil, and he cannot but help the sailor Zhukhrai, a friend of his brother Artem, who worked in the depot. The sailor more than once had a kindly conversation with Pavel: “You, Pavlusha, have everything to be a good fighter for the working cause, only now you are very young and have a very weak concept of the class struggle. I'll tell you, brother, about the real road, because I know: you will be good. I don’t like quiet and smeared ones. Now the whole earth is on fire. The slaves rose and old life must go to the bottom. But for this we need brave lads, not sissies, but people of a strong breed, who, before a fight, do not climb into the cracks, like a cockroach, but beat without mercy. Knowing how to fight, strong and muscular Pavka Korchagin saves Zhukhrai from under the escort, for which Petliurists seize him on a denunciation. Pavka was not familiar with the fear of an inhabitant defending his belongings (he had nothing), but ordinary human fear seized him with an icy hand, especially when he heard from his escort: “Why carry him, sir cornet? A bullet in the back and it's over." Pavka was scared. However, Pavka manages to escape, and he hides with a girl he knows, Tonya, with whom he is in love. Unfortunately, she is an intellectual from the “rich class”: the daughter of a forester.

Having passed the first baptism of fire in the battles of the civil war, Pavel returns to the city where the Komsomol organization was created, and becomes its active member. An attempt to drag Tonya into this organization fails. The girl is ready to obey him, but not completely. Too dressed up, she comes to the first Komsomol meeting, and it is hard for him to see her among the faded tunics and blouses. Tony's cheap individualism becomes unbearable for Pavel. The need for a break was clear to both of them ... Pavel's intransigence leads him to the Cheka, especially in the province it is headed by Zhukhrai. However, the Chekist work has a very destructive effect on Pavel's nerves, his concussion pains become more frequent, he often loses consciousness, and after a short respite in hometown Pavel goes to Kyiv, where he also ends up in the Special Department under the leadership of Comrade Segal.

The second part of the novel opens with a description of a trip to a gubernatorial conference with Rita Ustinovich, Korchagin is assigned to her as assistants and bodyguards. Borrowing a “leather jacket” from Rita, he squeezes into the carriage, and then drags a young woman through the window. “For him, Rita was untouchable. It was his friend and comrade in purpose, his political instructor, and yet she was a woman. He felt it for the first time at the bridge, and that's why he cares so much about her embrace. Pavel felt deep, even breathing, somewhere very close to her lips. From proximity was born an irresistible desire to find those lips. By straining his will, he suppressed this desire. Unable to control his feelings, Pavel Korchagin refuses to meet with Rita Ustinovich, who teaches him political literacy. Thoughts about the personal are pushed aside in the mind of a young man even further when he takes part in the construction of a narrow gauge railway. The season is difficult - winter, Komsomol members work in four shifts, not having time to rest. Work is delayed by bandit raids. There is nothing to feed the Komsomol members, there are no clothes and shoes either. Work to the full strain of strength ends with a serious illness. Pavel falls, stricken with typhus. His closest friends, Zhukhrai and Ustinovich, having no information about him, think that he is dead.

However, after his illness, Pavel is back in the ranks. As a worker, he returns to the workshops, where he not only works hard, but also puts things in order, forcing the Komsomol members to wash and clean the workshop, to the great bewilderment of his superiors. In the town and throughout Ukraine continues class struggle, Chekists catch enemies of the revolution, suppress bandit raids. The young Komsomol member Korchagin does many good deeds, defending his comrades at meetings of the cell, and his party friends in the dark streets.

“The most precious thing for a person is life. It is given to him once, and he must live it in such a way that it would not be excruciatingly painful for the aimlessly lived years, so that he would not burn shame for a vile and petty past, and so that, dying, he could say: all life, all strength were given to the most beautiful in the world. - struggle for the liberation of mankind. And we must hurry to live. After all, an absurd illness or some tragic accident can interrupt it.

Having witnessed many deaths and killing himself, Pavka valued every passing day, accepting party orders and statutory orders as responsible directives of his being. As a propagandist, he also takes part in the defeat of the "workers' opposition", calling the behavior of his own brother "petty-bourgeois", and even more so in verbal attacks on the Trotskyists who dared to oppose the party. They do not want to listen to him, and after all, Comrade Lenin pointed out that we must bet on the youth.

When it became known in Shepetovka that Lenin had died, thousands of workers became Bolsheviks. The respect of the party members pushed Pavel far ahead, and one day he found himself at the Bolshoi Theater next to Rita Ustinovich, a member of the Central Committee, who was surprised to learn that Pavel was alive. Pavel says that he loved her like a Gadfly, a man of courage and infinite endurance. But Rita already has a friend and a three-year-old daughter, and Pavel is sick, and he is sent to the sanatorium of the Central Committee, carefully examined. However, a serious illness, which led to complete immobility, progresses. No new best sanatoriums and hospitals are able to save him. With the thought that “we must stay in line,” Korchagin begins to write. Next to him are good kind women: first Dora Rodkina, then Taya Kyutsam. “Has he lived his twenty-four years well, has he lived badly? Going through his memory year after year, Pavel checked his life like an impartial judge and with deep satisfaction decided that life was not lived so badly ... Most importantly, he did not sleep through the hot days, found his place in the iron struggle for power, and on the crimson banner there is a revolution and his few drops of blood.”

Option 2

Nikolai Ostrovsky divided his autobiographical novel into two parts of nine chapters each: childhood, adolescence, youth, then mature years, illness.

Pavka Korchagin, the son of the cook, poured makhra into the dough for the priest. For this, he was expelled from school. He does not work like a child at all when the news of the overthrow of the king arrives. The child saw with his own eyes how the Petliurists staged many Jewish pogroms, and often this ended in brutal murders.

The boy is filled with anger and indignation. He helps his brother's friend Zhukhrai, who works at the depot. He often gave advice to the young man. The strong and courageous Pavel was caught by the Petliurists thanks to a denunciation. He felt real fear, because he heard that they wanted to kill him. Fleeing, the young man takes refuge with Tony, the girl he loves. But she is from a different society - intelligent and rich.

Having become a participant in the civil war, the guy returns and becomes a member of the Komsomol organization. Pavel tries to attract Tonya to her as well. But all to no avail. The girl comes to the meeting dressed up, and looks ridiculous among the working youth. They both understand that they are too different and cannot be together. The young man begins his work in the Cheka, but it has a bad effect on his health and nerves. After resting at home for a while, Pavel travels to Kyiv, where he joins the Special Department.

At the beginning of the second part, a trip to the conference is described together with Rita Ustinovich. The young man is her assistant and bodyguard. Seeing in her not only a comrade, but also a woman, he ceases to see her. In a cold winter, a guy with other workers is building a narrow gauge railway. The work is hard, the guys almost do not rest, gang raids constantly interfere. Clothes and shoes, as well as food, are very scarce. Because of these conditions, Pavka fell ill with typhus. Friends do not have any news about him, they think that he is dead.

After recovering from his illness, the young man enters the workshop as a worker. In addition to his duties, Pavel organized all the workers and put things in order in the room. The young man is a reliable comrade, which he repeatedly proved at party meetings.

A Komsomolets member appreciates every passing day and perceives orders as the purpose of his existence. The guy openly opposes everyone who dared to contradict the party line. Even if they were his family.

Somehow Pavka ended up at the Bolshoi Theater next to Rita Ustinovich, a member of the Central Committee. He confesses his feelings, but it's too late. The woman has a friend and a daughter. The man became seriously ill and was sent for examination. Because of his illness, he is almost immobile and no hospitals or doctors can help him. In order to be in the ranks, Paul begins to write.

Essay on literature on the topic: Summary How the steel was tempered Ostrovsky N. A

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1. The autobiographical novel by Nikolai Ostrovsky is divided into two parts, each of which contains nine chapters: childhood, adolescence and youth; then mature years and illness. For an unworthy act (he poured makhra into the dough for the priest), the cook's son Pavka Korchagin was expelled from school, and Read More ......
2. “How the Steel Was Tempered” is a novel that reflects its era, its historical moment with amazing accuracy: the revolution, the civil war, the enthusiasm for socialist construction. Korchagin is one of the brightest representatives of his generation. He and the era are one, they create each other. Korchagin's predecessor can be Read More ......
3. “How the Steel Was Tempered” is a novel that reflects its era, its historical moment with amazing accuracy; revolution, civil war, enthusiasm for socialist construction. Korchagin is one of the brightest representatives of his generation. He and the era are one, they create each other. Korchagin's predecessor can be Read More ......
4. It is strange that Ostrovsky's magnificent, albeit somewhat naive, work in Lately less and less mentioned in school programs This is how it always is: either we admire on the orders of our superiors, and even not with what we need, or we deny indiscriminately. Books should be considered regardless Read More ......
5. Everyone knows that the famous novel “How the Steel Was Tempered” was written by Russian writer Nikolai Ostrovsky. However, not everyone knows about the authors of this novel. It turns out that Anna Karavaeva and Mark Kolosov, on the instructions of the Komsomol, were sent on a creative business trip to help the sick and blind Read More ......
6. In the early spring of 1932, the editors of the magazine, Young Guard, brought the manuscript of a young, unknown author of the novel, How the Steel Was Tempered. The novel felt the power and truth of life. The author of the manuscript was N. Ostrovsky. Defeated by a cruel, incurable disease, he began to write his novel from a feeling of deep Read More ......
7. The novel “How the Steel Was Tempered” testifies that Ostrovsky, comprehending the paths of the revolution in Russia and the fate of the individual in this revolution, came at the same time to discoveries in the aesthetic solution of the topic. And it was “The Gadfly” that was for him a kind of tuning fork in the social and moral Read More ......

On December 22, 1936, exactly 80 years ago, the Soviet writer Nikolai Alekseevich Ostrovsky passed away. The whole life of this amazing man was riddled with struggle. First, for the ideas of revolution and the construction of a new state, then with an incurable disease and its manifestations. The main book of his entire short life (Ostrovsky died at the age of 32) was the novel "How the Steel Was Tempered", which made him famous not only in the Soviet Union, but also beyond its borders. In a novel written in the genre socialist realism, described the events of the Civil War, as well as the post-war years of recovery National economy and new socialist construction. In the main character of the work, Pavel Korchagin, Nikolai Ostrovsky himself was reflected.

Nikolai Ostrovsky was born on September 16 (September 29, according to the new style), 1904, in the village of Viliya, Ostrog district, Volyn province. Russian Empire(today the territory of the Rivne region of Ukraine). Nicholas was youngest child in the family, he had two sisters Nadezhda and Ekaterina and brother Dmitry. His father, Alexei Ivanovich Ostrovsky, was a retired non-commissioned officer in the Russian army. He took part in the Russian-Turkish (Balkan) war of 1877-1878. For his bravery and heroism, he was awarded two St. George's crosses. After his resignation, Alexei Ostrovsky worked at a distillery, and he always enjoyed authority among his fellow villagers. The mother of the future writer Olga Osipovna Ostrovskaya was an ordinary housewife and came from a family of Czech immigrants. Unlike her husband, she was illiterate, but stood out for her figurative speech, bright character, subtle humor and wit. In her speech one could hear a large number of Czech, Russian and Ukrainian proverbs.

In the village of Viliya, the Ostrovskys lived in relative prosperity, they had their own pretty big house, land and garden. Among the closest relatives of the family were teachers, soldiers, priests, workers of two local factories. At the same time, Nikolai Ostrovsky from childhood stood out for his learning abilities. The boy was drawn to knowledge. In 1913 he graduated with honors from the parochial school (he was only 9 years old). He was taken to school ahead of schedule "because of his outstanding abilities." It is worth noting that childhood was one of the brightest and happiest memories in the rather difficult and tragic life of Nikolai Ostrovsky.

Happy life The family collapsed in 1914 when the father lost his job. The house and land had to be sold, the family moved to Shepetovka, a large railway station 85 kilometers from the village. Here Nikolai Ostrovsky enters a two-year school, which he graduated in 1915. Since the family was experiencing financial difficulties, Ostrovsky began to work for hire early. Already in 1916, at the age of 12, he first became a buffet worker at the local railway station, and then a warehouse worker, an assistant fireman at a local power station.

At that time, Nikolai Alekseevich assessed his education as insufficient, while he was always fond of reading. Among his favorite authors were Jules Verne, Walter Scott, Dumas senior. Reading book after book, sometimes he himself tried to come up with his own stories. While working at the power plant in Shepetovka, he made friends with the local Bolsheviks, unbeknownst to himself, having joined the revolutionary activities, pasted leaflets. He accepted the October Revolution of 1917 with joy, he was delighted with revolutionary calls and ideals. In many ways, this was facilitated by the romantic and adventurous literature he read in large volumes. In many of the works he read, brave heroes fought for freedom and justice against tyrants in power. After the October Revolution, Ostrovsky himself became a participant in such a struggle, which captivated him with his head.

On July 20, 1919, Nikolai Ostrovsky joined the Komsomol and in August went to the front to fight the enemies of the revolution. He served in the division of Kotovsky, and then in the famous 1st Cavalry Army, commanded by Budyonny. In August 1920, he was seriously wounded in the head and stomach by shrapnel near Lvov. Nikolay was wounded in the head above the right superciliary arch, it was not penetrating, but caused severe concussion of the brain and weakened vision in the right eye. He spent more than two months in hospitals, after which he was demobilized from the Red Army. Returning home from the army, he worked for some time in the organs of the Cheka, but then moved to Kyiv.

From that moment on, his biographies of hospitals, clinics, sanatoriums, examinations by doctors occupied most his life. Pain and swelling of the knee joints persisted and caused great inconvenience. Already in the second half of 1922, an 18-year-old boy was recognized by a medical commission as an invalid of the second group. In August of the same year, he was sent to Berdyansk, where he was supposed to undergo sanatorium treatment. After a month and a half of treatment, a short-term remission occurred. In 1923-1924 he was appointed military commissar of Vseobuch. Later he was sent to Komsomol work. At first he was the secretary of the district committee of the Komsomol in Berezdovo, then Izyaslavl. In 1924 he joined the party.

At the same time, his illness is progressing very quickly, doctors cannot help him. Over time, the disease leads to paralysis. From 1927 until the end of his life, the writer was bedridden and suffered from an incurable disease. According to the official version, Nikolai Ostrovsky's state of health was affected by the injury, as well as difficult working conditions, he had been ill with typhus and other infectious diseases. The final diagnosis that was made to him was "progressive ankylosing polyarthritis, gradual ossification of the joints."

In the autumn of 1927, he begins to write his autobiographical novel, which he calls The Tale of the Cats. The manuscript of this book, on which he worked for more than 6 months and the creation of which cost him superhuman efforts, he sent by mail to Odessa to his former comrades for review. Unfortunately, the manuscript was lost on the way back, and its fate remains unknown to this day. At the same time, Nikolai Alekseevich, who endured not such blows of fate, did not lose courage and did not despair, although fate did not prepare anything good for him.

To all his troubles, a gradual loss of vision is added, which could be caused by a complication from the transferred typhus. The disease of the eyes, which led to blindness, developed gradually, in early 1929 he completely lost his sight and even thought about suicide. However, in the end, the desire to live and fight wins. He has an idea for a new literary work, which he called "How the steel was tempered."

The novel was completed in mid-1932. But the manuscript sent to the magazine "Young Guard" received a devastating review, and the derived types of characters were called "unreal". However, Ostrovsky did not give up and achieved a second review of his work, enlisting the support of party bodies. As a result, the editor-in-chief of the Young Guard Mark Kolosov and the executive editor Anna Karavaeva, who was a famous writer of her time, took an active part in editing the novel. Ostrovsky himself acknowledged the great participation of Karavaeva in the work on the text of the novel "How the Steel Was Tempered", he also noted the work on the book of Alexander Serafimovich. As a result, the novel was not only published, but also retained its original title, although it was proposed to change it to "Pavel Korchagin" after the name of the protagonist of the work.

The novel begins to be published in April 1934, and immediately it becomes extremely popular. Libraries line up for books. Among the Soviet youth, the book becomes so in demand that the novel is published again and again, its collective discussions and readings are held. Only during the life of the writer, he was published 41 times. In general, the novel "How the Steel Was Tempered" became the most published work of Soviet literature in 1918-1986, the total circulation of 536 publications amounted to more than 36 million copies. The book was very popular in China as well.

In 1935, recognition, fame and prosperity came to Ostrovsky. In the same year, he was given an apartment in Moscow, a car, the construction of a country house in Sochi began, in which the writer was able to relax only one summer of 1936. On October 1, 1935, he was awarded the country's highest state award, the Order of Lenin, becoming the fifth among Soviet writers to receive this high award. For his contemporaries, he became one step with Chapaev, Chkalov, Mayakovsky. In 1936, he was enrolled in the Political Directorate of the Red Army with the rank of brigade commissar, which he rejoiced a lot about. He wrote to his friends: “Now I have returned to duty along this line, which is very important for a citizen of the Republic.”

In the summer of 1935, he made a public promise to write a new work, called "Born by the Storm", it was a novel in three parts, of which the writer managed to prepare only the first before his death. At the same time, critics considered the new novel weaker than the previous work, and Ostrovsky himself was not very pleased with it, noting its artificiality. He did not have time to finish it, on December 22, 1936, he died, barely finishing work on the first part of the book, he was only 32 years old. On the day of the funeral, the first edition of the novel "Born by the Storm" was released, which the workers of the printing house typed and printed in record time, having learned about Ostrovsky's death. The writer was buried in Moscow at the Novodevichy cemetery. From 1937 to 1991, Prechistensky Lane was named after him, where he lived from 1930 to 1932. Today in the capital there is Pavel Korchagin Street - this is the only Moscow street that was named after the hero of a literary work. Streets in many cities of Russia and countries former USSR bear the name of Nikolai Ostrovsky, monuments to the writer have been erected in many cities.

Based on materials from open sources

How the Steel Was Tempered is an autobiographical novel based on real events, written and published in 1934.

Meaning of Roman

The novel has become for more than one generation Soviet people a symbol of courage, valor, honor, and disobedience to fate. This is a book about a man who completely and completely gave himself to his homeland, society and the good cause of communism. Even when main character lost his arms, legs, eyes, and one arm, he did not give up, but with the help of a stencil invented by him, he began to write a book. In short, the meaning of the book is not to give up.

History of creation

Ostrovsky began working on the book in 1930. The work was extremely difficult, because the writer was blind and deprived of a hand. Therefore, I worked with a special stencil. Writing became his life's work, because he had nothing to lose. He wrote a lot, even at night. The hand began to ache and swell. Therefore, the story was written under dictation. The first part of the novel was completed in 1931. The publisher approved it. In 1932, the author received an order for the second volume of the novel. In the middle of the same year, the order was completed. The first time the story was published in a magazine in 1932, immediately gaining great popularity. The novel was finally completed in 1934. After 1956, in connection with the "exposure of Stalin's personality cult," Khrushchev's censorship deleted a good half of the text from the novel.

Summary

Pavel Korchagin is 12 years old. He lives in the Ukrainian town of Shepetovka, goes to school. Soon he was expelled from there due to the fact that he poured tobacco into the Easter dough, wanting to take revenge on the teacher-priest for the humiliation. He goes to work at a local restaurant as a dishwasher. He is beaten and humiliated by the waiter Proshka, but after a while, brother Artyom stands up for Pavel. From the age of 16, Pavka has been working in a boiler room at a power plant. Fate brings him to the Bolshevik sailor Zhukhrai, whom he saved from the hands of the tsarist secret police, while going to prison, although he soon got out of there by a lucky chance. Zhukhrai told Pavel about the Bolsheviks, about Lenin, taught him how to fight. Also, for some time, Pavel met with Tonya Tumanova, fate separated them. In 1917, the Germans came to Shepetovka. Paul often came into conflict with them. Finally he managed to escape from Shepetovka. Korchagin fought in the Civil War, first in the army, then in the army. In the war, he lost his eyes. Because of this, he could not fight. For some time he worked in the Cheka, built railway engaged in other physical labor. Everything was until fate made a real invalid out of him. He lost his voice, legs, one arm. He spent the rest of his days in the Crimea. His mother came to take care of him, he saw little of his wife Margorita, because she also did a lot of work, both physical and political. First, Pavel wrote a book about "Kotovtsy", telling in it how he once fought in the army of Kotovsky, but unfortunately the manuscripts were lost. And then Korchagin began to write the book "How the steel was tempered"

1942 film adaptation

The first film adaptation of the work was released in 1942 during the Second World War, the film reinforced the fighting spirit of the Soviet people in the fight against the Nazi invaders. Cast:

Vladislav Perist-Petrenko - Pavel Korchagin

Daniil Sagal as sailor Zhukhrai

Irina Fedotova - Tonya Tumanova

Oleksandr Khvylya - Dolynyk

Boris Runge - Seryozhka

Composer - Lev Schwartz

In addition to the USSR, the film was shown in Greece, the USA and Sweden in 1944.

1956 film adaptation

In 1956, a film was released on the television screens of the USSR. The action described in the film took place after the main character became disabled.

Vasily Lanovoy - Pavel Korchagin

Elza Legend - Rita Ustinovich

Lev Perfilov - Klavichek

Ada Rogovtseva - Christina

Konstantin Stepankov - Akim

Alexander Lebedev - Nikolai Okunev

Valentina Telegina - moonshiner

Evgeny Morgunov - urka

Dmitry Milyutenko - Tokarev

Pavel Usovnichenko - Zhukhray

Vladimir Marenkov - Ivan Zharky

Nikolai Grinko - station manager

Felix Yavorsky - Victor Leshchinsky

Evgeny Leonov - Sukharko (gymnasium student)

Director: Alexander Alov, Vladimir Naumov

Cinematographer: Ilya Minkovetsky, S. Shakhbazyan

Composer: Yuri Shchurovsky

Artist: Vulf Agranov

1975 film adaptation

Unlike previous film adaptations, this film consisted of several series and was in color. In essence, it completely repeated the plot of the novel. Gained great popularity. He appeared on Soviet television more than once.

Vladimir Konkin - Pavel Korchagin

Natalya Sayko - Tonya Tumanova

Mikhail Golubovich - Artyom Korchagin

Konstantin Stepankov - Zhukhrai

Antonina Lefty - Rita Ustinovich

Lyudmila Efimenko - Taya

Antonina Maksimova - Ekaterina Mikhailovna Korchagina

Yuri Rotstein - Tsvetaev

Les Serdyuk - Salomyga

Sergey Ivanov - Seryoga Bruzzak

Lev Prygunov - Philo

Vladimir Talashko - Red Army soldier Okunev

Elza Radzina - Irina Alexandrovna, newspaper editor

Lev Perfilov - man

Georgy Kulikov - Chairman of the Railway Forestry Committee

Director: Nikolai Mashchenko

Operator: Alexander Itygilov

Artist: Viktor Zhilko, Eduard Sheikin

2000 film adaptation

In 2000, together with Ukraine, she made a 20-episode film based on the novel of the same name by Ostrovsky. In it was recognized as the best series of the year.

Andrey Saminin - Pavka Korchagin

Elena Eremenko - Tonya Tumanova

Alexander Zhukovin as German officer Zindel

Svetlana Prus - Rita Ustinovich

Natalia Morozova - Komsomol agitator

Vitaly Novikov - gang leader

Also working on the film:

Directed by: Han Gang

Artist: Sergey Brzhestovsky

The fate of the novel after perestroika

After perestroika and the collapse of the USSR, the work "became irrelevant", more precisely, it was made irrelevant by the gang that came to power in 1991, declaring it "deceitful Soviet propaganda". Nowadays it is difficult to find a person born after the collapse of the country who would watch a movie, let alone read a book. But real communist patriots will never forget their hero.

As the Steel Was Tempered
Summary of the novel
The autobiographical novel by Nikolai Ostrovsky is divided into two parts, each of which contains nine chapters: childhood, adolescence and youth; then mature years and illness.
For an unworthy act (he poured makhra into the dough for the priest), the cook's son Pavka Korchagin is expelled from school, and he ends up "into the people." “The boy looked into the very depths of life, at its bottom, into the well, and musty mold, swamp dampness smelled of him, greedy for everything new, unknown.” When in his little

The town was swept up in a whirlwind by the stunning news of “the Tsar was thrown off”, Pavel had no time to think about his studies, he works hard and, like a boy, without hesitation, hides his weapon in defiance of the ban from the bosses of the suddenly surging Germans. When the province is flooded with an avalanche of Petliura gangs, he becomes a witness to many Jewish pogroms, ending in brutal murders.
Anger and indignation often seize the young daredevil, and he cannot but help the sailor Zhukhrai, a friend of his brother Artem, who worked in the depot. The sailor more than once had a kindly conversation with Pavel: “You, Pavlusha, have everything to be a good fighter for the working cause, only now you are very young and have a very weak concept of the class struggle. I'll tell you, brother, about the real road, because I know: you will be good. I don’t like quiet and smeared ones. Now the whole earth is on fire. The slaves have risen and the old life must be put to the bottom. But for this we need brave lads, not sissies, but people of a strong breed, who, before a fight, do not climb into the cracks, like a cockroach, but beat without mercy. Knowing how to fight, strong and muscular Pavka Korchagin saves Zhukhrai from under the escort, for which Petliurists seize him on a denunciation. Pavka was not familiar with the fear of an inhabitant defending his belongings (he had nothing), but ordinary human fear seized him with an icy hand, especially when he heard from his escort: “Why carry him, sir cornet? A bullet in the back and it's over." Pavka was scared. However, Pavka manages to escape, and he hides with a girl he knows, Tonya, with whom he is in love. Unfortunately, she is an intellectual from the “rich class”: the daughter of a forester.
Having passed the first baptism of fire in the battles of the civil war, Pavel returns to the city where the Komsomol organization was created, and becomes its active member. An attempt to drag Tonya into this organization fails. The girl is ready to obey him, but not completely. Too dressed up, she comes to the first Komsomol meeting, and it is hard for him to see her among the faded tunics and blouses. Tony's cheap individualism becomes unbearable for Pavel. The need for a break was clear to both of them ... Pavel's intransigence leads him to the Cheka, especially in the province it is headed by Zhukhrai. However, the KGB work is very destructive on Pavel's nerves, his concussion pains become more frequent, he often loses consciousness, and after a short respite in his hometown, Pavel goes to Kiev, where he also ends up in the Special Department under the leadership of Comrade Segal.
The second part of the novel opens with a description of a trip to a gubernatorial conference with Rita Ustinovich, Korchagin is assigned to her as assistants and bodyguards. Borrowing a “leather jacket” from Rita, he squeezes into the carriage, and then drags a young woman through the window. “For him, Rita was untouchable. Ego was his friend and comrade in purpose, his political instructor, and yet she was a woman. He felt it for the first time at the bridge, and that's why he cares so much about her embrace. Pavel felt deep, even breathing, somewhere very close to her lips. From proximity was born an irresistible desire to find those lips. By straining his will, he suppressed this desire. Unable to control his feelings, Pavel Korchagin refuses to meet with Rita Ustinovich, who teaches him political literacy. Thoughts about the personal are pushed aside in the mind of a young man even further when he takes part in the construction of a narrow gauge railway. The season is difficult - winter, Komsomol members work in four shifts, not having time to rest. Work is delayed by bandit raids. There is nothing to feed the Komsomol members, there are no clothes and shoes either. Work to the full strain of strength ends with a serious illness. Pavel falls, stricken with typhus. His closest friends, Zhukhrai and Ustinovich, having no information about him, think that he is dead.
However, after his illness, Pavel is back in the ranks. As a worker, he returns to the workshops, where he not only works hard, but also puts things in order, forcing the Komsomol members to wash and clean the workshop, to the great bewilderment of his superiors. In the town and throughout Ukraine, the class struggle continues, the Chekists catch the enemies of the revolution, and suppress bandit raids. The young Komsomol member Korchagin does many good deeds, defending his comrades at meetings of the cell, and his party friends in the dark streets.
“The most precious thing for a person is life. It is given to him once, and he must live it in such a way that it would not be excruciatingly painful for the aimlessly lived years, so that he would not burn shame for a vile and petty past, and so that, dying, he could say: all life, all strength were given to the most beautiful in the world. - struggle for the liberation of mankind. And we must hurry to live. After all, an absurd illness or some tragic accident can interrupt it.
Having witnessed many deaths and killing himself, Pavka valued every passing day, accepting party orders and statutory orders as responsible directives of his being. As a propagandist, he also takes part in the defeat of the "workers' opposition", calling the behavior of his own brother "petty-bourgeois", and even more so in verbal attacks on the Trotskyists who dared to oppose the party. They do not want to listen to him, and after all, Comrade Lenin pointed out that we must bet on the youth.
When it became known in Shepetovka that Lenin had died, thousands of workers became Bolsheviks. The respect of the party members pushed Pavel far ahead, and one day he found himself at the Bolshoi Theater next to Rita Ustinovich, a member of the Central Committee, who was surprised to learn that Pavel was alive. Pavel says that he loved her like a Gadfly, a man of courage and infinite endurance. But Rita already has a friend and a three-year-old daughter, and Pavel is sick, and he is sent to the sanatorium of the Central Committee, carefully examined. However, a serious illness, which led to complete immobility, progresses. No new best sanatoriums and hospitals are able to save him. With the thought that “we must stay in line,” Korchagin begins to write. Next to him are good kind women: first Dora Rodkina, then Taya Kyutsam. “Has he lived his twenty-four years well, has he lived badly? Going through his memory year after year, Pavel checked his life like an impartial judge and with deep satisfaction decided that life was not lived so badly ... Most importantly, he did not sleep through the hot days, found his place in the iron struggle for power, and on the crimson banner there is a revolution and his few drops of blood.”