Village prose of the 50s and 80s. Blog "village prose"

The concept of “village” prose appeared in the early 60s. This is one of the most fruitful directions in our domestic literature. It is represented by many original works: “Vladimir Country Roads” and “A Drop of Dew” by Vladimir Soloukhin, “A Habitual Business” and “Carpenter’s Stories” by Vasily Belov, “Matrenin’s Yard” by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, “The Last Bow” by Viktor Astafiev, stories by Vasily Shukshin, Evgeny Nosov , stories by Valentin Rasputin and Vladimir Tendryakov, novels by Fyodor Abramov and Boris Mozhaev. The sons of peasants came to literature, each of them could say about themselves the very words that the poet Alexander Yashin wrote in the story “I Treat You to Rowan”: “I am the son of a peasant... Everything that happens on this land, on which I am not alone, concerns me he knocked out the path with his bare heels; in the fields that he still plowed with a plow, in the stubble that he walked with a scythe and where he threw hay into stacks.”

“I am proud that I came from the village,” said F. Abramov. V. Rasputin echoed him: “I grew up in the village. She fed me, and it’s my duty to tell about her.” Answering the question why he writes mainly about village people, V. Shukshin said: “I couldn’t talk about anything, knowing the village... I was brave here, I was as independent here as possible.” S. Zalygin wrote in “An Interview with Myself”: “I feel the roots of my nation right there - in the village, in the arable land, in our daily bread. Apparently, our generation is the last that saw with its own eyes the thousand-year-old way of life from which almost everyone came out of. If we don’t talk about him and his decisive alteration within a short period of time, who will say?”

Not only the memory of the heart nourished the theme of “small homeland”, “sweet homeland”, but also pain for its present, anxiety for its future. Exploring the reasons for the acute and problematic conversation about the village that literature had in the 60-70s, F. Abramov wrote: “The village is the depths of Russia, the soil on which our culture grew and flourished. At the same time, the scientific and technological revolution in which we live has affected the village very thoroughly. Technology has changed not only the type of farming, but also the very type of peasant... Together with the ancient way of life, the moral type is disappearing into oblivion. Traditional Russia is turning over the last pages of its thousand-year history. Interest in all these phenomena in literature is natural... Traditional crafts are disappearing, local features of peasant housing that have developed over centuries are disappearing... Language is suffering serious losses. The village has always spoken a richer language than the city, now this freshness is being leached, eroded..."

The village seemed to Shukshin, Rasputin, Belov, Astafiev, Abramov as the embodiment of the traditions of folk life - moral, everyday, aesthetic. In their books there is a noticeable need to look at everything connected with these traditions and what broke them.

“Business as usual” is the title of one of V. Belov’s stories. These words can define the internal theme of many works about the village: life as work, life in work is a common thing. Writers depict the traditional rhythms of peasant work, family worries and anxieties, everyday life and holidays. There are many lyrical landscapes in the books. Thus, in B. Mozhaev’s novel “Men and Women,” the description of the “unique in the world, fabulous flooded Oka meadows” with their “free variety of herbs” attracts attention: “Andrei Ivanovich loved the meadows. Where else in the world is there such a gift from God? So as not to plow and sow, but the time will come - the whole world will go out, as if on a holiday, in these soft manes and in front of each other, playfully with a scythe, alone in a week to spread fragrant hay for the whole winter of the cattle... Twenty-five! Thirty carts! If the grace of God was sent down to the Russian peasant, then here it is, here, spread out in front of him, in all directions - you can’t even see it with your eyes.”

In the main character of B. Mozhaev’s novel, the most intimate thing is revealed, what the writer associated with the concept of “call of the earth.” Through the poetry of peasant labor, he shows the natural course of a healthy life, comprehends the harmony of the inner world of a person living in harmony with nature, enjoying its beauty.
Here is another similar sketch - from F. Abramov’s novel “Two Winters and Three Summers”: “... Mentally talking with the children, guessing from their tracks how they walked, where they stopped, Anna did not even notice how she went out to Sinelga. And here it is, her holiday, her day, here it is, the hard-earned joy: the Pryaslina brigade at the reaping! Mikhail, Lisa, Peter, Grigory... She got used to Mikhail - from the age of fourteen she mows for a man and now there are no mowers equal to him in all of Pekashin. And Lizka also does the swathing - you’ll be jealous. Not into her, not into her mother, into Grandma Matryona, they say, with a catch. But small, small! Both with scythes, both hitting the grass with their scythes, both with grass falling under their scythes... Lord, did she ever think that she would see such a miracle!”

Writers have a keen sense of the deep culture of the people. Reflecting on his spiritual experience, V. Belov emphasizes in the book “Lad”: “Working beautifully is not only easier, but also more enjoyable. Talent and work are inseparable." And again: “For the soul, for the memory, it was necessary to build a house with carvings, or a temple on the mountain, or to weave such lace that would take the breath away and make the eyes of a distant great-great-granddaughter light up. Because man does not live by bread alone.”
This truth is professed by the best heroes of Belov and Rasputin, Shukshin and Astafiev, Mozhaev and Abramov.

In their works, it is necessary to note the pictures of the brutal devastation of the village, first during collectivization (“Eves” by V. Belov, “Men and Women” by B. Mozhaev), then during the war years (“Brothers and Sisters” by F. Abramov), during the post-war hard times (“Two Winters and Three Summers” by F. Abramov, “Matrenin’s Dvor” by A. Solzhenitsyn, “Business as Usual” by V. Belov).

The writers showed the imperfection and disorder of the heroes' daily life, the injustice perpetrated against them, their complete defenselessness, which could not but lead to the extinction of the Russian village. “There is neither subtracting nor adding here. This is how it was on earth,” A. Tvardovsky will say about this. The “information for thought” contained in the “Appendix” to Nezavisimaya Gazeta (1998, No. 7) is eloquent: “In Timonikha, the native village of the writer Vasily Belov, the last man, Faust Stepanovich Tsvetkov, died. Not a single man, not a single horse. Three old women."
And a little earlier, Novy Mir (1996, No. 6) published Boris Ekimov’s bitter, difficult reflection “At the Crossroads” with dire forecasts: “The poor collective farms are already eating up tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, dooming those who will live on this land to even greater poverty.” the earth after them... The degradation of the peasant is worse than the degradation of the soil. And she is there."
Such phenomena made it possible to talk about “Russia, which we lost.” So the “village” prose, which began with the poeticization of childhood and nature, ended with the consciousness of a great loss. It is no coincidence that the motif of “farewell”, “last bow”, reflected in the titles of the works (“Farewell to Matera”, “The Last Term” by V. Rasputin, “The Last Bow” by V. Astafiev, “The Last Sorrow”, “The Last Old Man of the Village” "F. Abramov), and in the main plot situations of the works, and in the premonitions of the heroes. F. Abramov often said that Russia says goodbye to the village as to its mother.
In Russian literature, the genre of village prose is noticeably different from all other genres. What is the reason for this difference? You can talk about this for an extremely long time, but still not come to a final conclusion. This happens because the scope of this genre may not fit within the description of rural life. This genre can also include works that describe the relationship between people in the city and the countryside, and even works in which the main character is not a villager at all, but in spirit and idea, these works are nothing more than village prose.
There are very few works of this type in foreign literature. There are significantly more of them in our country. This situation is explained not only by the peculiarities of the formation of states and regions, their national and economic specifics, but also by the character, “portrait” of each people inhabiting a given area. In the countries of Western Europe, the peasantry played an insignificant role, and all national life was in full swing in the cities. In Russia, since ancient times, the peasantry occupied the most important role in history. Not in terms of power (on the contrary - the peasants were the most powerless), but in spirit - the peasantry was and, probably, remains the driving force of Russian history to this day. It was from the dark, ignorant peasants that Stenka Razin, and Emelyan Pugachev, and Ivan Bolotnikov came out; it was because of the peasants, or rather because of serfdom, that that cruel struggle took place, the victims of which were tsars, poets, and part of the outstanding Russian intelligentsia of the 19th century. Thanks to this, works covering this topic occupy a special place in the literature.
Modern rural prose plays a big role in the literary process these days. This genre today rightfully occupies one of the leading places in terms of readability and popularity. The modern reader is concerned about the problems that are raised in novels of this genre. These are issues of morality, love of nature, good, kind attitude towards people and other problems that are so relevant today. Among contemporary writers who have written or are writing in the genre of village prose, the leading place is occupied by such writers as Viktor Petrovich Astafiev (“The Fish Tsar”, “The Shepherd and the Shepherdess”), Valentin Grigorievich Rasputin (“Live and Remember”, “Farewell to Matera” "), Vasily Makarovich Shukshin (“Village Residents”, “Lyubavins”, “I Came to Give You Freedom”) and others.

Vasily Makarovich Shukshin occupies a special place in this series. His unique creativity has attracted and will continue to attract hundreds of thousands of readers not only in our country, but also abroad. After all, it is rare to meet such a master of the folk word, such a sincere admirer of his native land as this outstanding writer was.
Vasily Makarovich Shukshin was born in 1929, in the village of Srostki, Altai Territory. And through the entire life of the future writer, the beauty and severity of those places ran like a red thread. It was thanks to his small homeland that Shukshin learned to appreciate the land, the work of man on this land, and learned to understand the harsh prose of rural life. From the very beginning of his creative career, he discovered new ways in depicting a person. His heroes turned out to be unusual in their social status, life maturity, and moral experience. Having already become a fully mature young man, Shukshin goes to the center of Russia. In 1958, he made his debut in cinema (“Two Fedoras”), as well as in literature (“A Story in a Cart”). In 1963, Shukshin released his first collection - “Rural Residents”. And in 1964, his film “There Lives a Guy Like This” was awarded the main prize at the Venice Film Festival. World fame comes to Shukshin. But he doesn't stop there. Years of intense and painstaking work follow. For example: in 1965, his novel “The Lyubavins” was published and at the same time the film “There Lives Such a Guy” appeared on the screens of the country. Just from this example alone one can judge with what dedication and intensity the artist worked.
Or maybe it’s haste, impatience? Or the desire to immediately establish oneself in literature on the most solid - “novel” basis? This is certainly not the case. Shukshin wrote only two novels. And as Vasily Makarovich himself said, he was interested in one topic: the fate of the Russian peasantry. Shukshin managed to touch a nerve, penetrate our souls and make us ask in shock: “What is happening to us”? Shukshin did not spare himself, he was in a hurry to have time to tell the truth, and with this truth to bring people together. He was obsessed with one thought that he wanted to think out loud. And be understood! All the efforts of Shukshin, the creator, were aimed at this. He believed: “Art is, so to speak, to be understood...” From his first steps in art, Shukshin explained, argued, proved and suffered when he was not understood. They tell him that the film “There Lives a Guy Like This” is a comedy. He is perplexed and writes an afterword to the film. At a meeting with young scientists, a tricky question is thrown at him, he hesitates, and then sits down to write an article (“Monologue on the Stairs”).

The feeling of the Motherland is amazing and inexpressible... What a bright joy and what the sweetest melancholy it gives, visiting us either in hours of separation, or in a happy hour of soulful relaxation. Leonid Leonov Leonid Leonov All recent years have been like this All recent years the so-called rural called rural prose most of all prose has been most concerned with the moral moral health of a person - the health of a person - and the person of the present, and the person of the present, and the person of the future. man of the future. Valentin Rasputin Valentin Rasputin Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Village prose is a direction in Russian literature of the 1920s, comprehending the dramatic fate of the peasantry, the Russian village in the 20th century, marked by keen attention to issues of morality, to the relationship between man and nature. The largest representatives, “patriarchs” of the movement are considered to be F.A. Abramov, V.I. Belov, V.G. Rasputin. A bright and original representative of the “village prose” of the younger generation was the writer and film director V.M. Shukshin. Also, village prose is represented by the works of V. Lipatov, V. Astafiev, E. Nosov, B. Mozhaev and other authors. F.A.Abramov V.I.Belov V.G.Rasputin V.M.ShukshinV. AstafievaB. Mozhaeva Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Fedor Aleksandrovich Abramov () “I am proud that I came from the village” Reader reviews: “Abramov is a unique author, very sincere and truthful. His works sink into the soul and are remembered down to the smallest detail.” “Stunning books about life and work, about love and war. Classic." “You definitely need to read such books so as not to be Ivans who do not remember their kinship.” Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Fedor Abramov was born in the village of Verkola, Arkhangelsk region. From his third year at the Faculty of Philology of Leningrad State University he joined the people's militia. After being wounded, he was taken out of the besieged city across the ice of Lake Ladoga. As a non-combatant, he was left in the rear units, then taken into the counterintelligence agencies of Smersh, where he served until the end of the war. Returning to Leningrad State University, he graduated with honors, then headed the department of Soviet literature there for several years. Abramov dedicated all his work to his native northern village. His main brainchild was a tetralogy about the large Pryaslin family and their village Pekashino. The first novel, Brothers and Sisters (1958), takes place in the spring and summer of 1942; the second - Two winters and three summers (1968); the events of the third - Crossroads (1973) - take place in 1951. The final novel, “Home,” tells about a village in the 70s. The novels show the entire history of the country through the history of the family. For the writer, Pryaslina is the “strongest root” of life. They are by no means ideal people, but the village and the whole country depend on them. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Valentin Rasputin was born in the village of Atalanka, Irkutsk region. After graduating from the local elementary school, he was forced to move fifty kilometers from his home, where the high school was located (the famous story “French Lessons” would later be created about this period). After school, he entered the Faculty of History and Philology of Irkutsk University. He made his debut as a storyteller (the first collections The Edge of the Sky and Bonfires of New Cities were published in 1966). The first work that brought him fame was the story Money for Maria (1967). The writer's talent was revealed in full force in the story "The Deadline" (1970). This was followed by the stories “Live and Remember” (1974) and “Farewell to Matera” (1976), which placed their author among the best modern Russian writers. In 1981, new stories were published: “Natasha”, “What to convey to the crow”, “Live and love forever”. The appearance of Rasputin's story "Fire" in 1985 aroused great interest among the reader. In recent years, the writer has devoted a lot of time to social and journalistic activities. Lives and works in Irkutsk. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Viktor Petrovich Astafyev () “We sang the last lament - there were about fifteen mourners for the former village. We sang her praises at the same time. As they say, we cried well, at a decent level. Worthy of our history, our village, our peasantry.” Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Victor Astafiev was born in the village of Ovsyanka, on the banks of the Yenisei. At the age of seven, he lost his mother - she drowned in the river. He will never get used to this loss. He still “can’t believe that mom is not here and never will be.” His grandmother, Ekaterina Petrovna, became the boy’s intercessor and nurse. “I began my independent life immediately, without any preparation,” Astafiev would later write. Astafiev’s work equally embodied two important themes - military and rural. The war appeared in his works as a great tragedy (“The Cheerful Soldier”, “So I Want to Live”, “Cursed and Killed”, etc.). The rural theme was initially most fully embodied in the first book of “The Last Bow”, the story “Ode to the Russian Garden”, the story Life to Live, Many Zatesyahs... In them there is a feeling of a small homeland with its farmstead and arable land as a harmonious universe. Poeticization of the naturalness of the natural and economic cycle of life. Inclusion in it as a measure of the truth of human existence. The originality of national characters. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Vasily Ivanovich Belov (1932) “Not loving the peasantry means not loving yourself, not understanding or humiliating them means cutting the branch on which we are sitting. What, however, we often did in the past, we do now, not without success...” Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Vasily Belov was born in the village of Timonikha, Vologda region. His father Ivan Fedorovich died in the war, his mother Anfisa Ivanovna raised five children alone (in his memoirs “Years of No Return” Belov describes in detail all the village relatives). After seven years of studying at a village school, he worked as an accountant, then graduated from the Federal Educational Institution, where he received a specialty as a mechanic, motor mechanic and electrician. He served in the army in Leningrad. He published the first poems “On Guard of the Motherland” in the newspaper of the Leningrad Military District, and then went to study at the A. M. Gorky Literary Institute in 1964. Belov constantly lives in Vologda, without breaking ties with his “small homeland” Timonikha, from which he draws material for of his creativity, starting with the story “The Village of Berdyayka” and the book of poems “My Forest Village” (both). They were followed by a book of short stories, “Sultry Summer” (1963) and “River Bends” (1964). The publication of the story “A Habitual Business” (1966) brought Belov wide fame and established his reputation as one of the founders and leaders of “village prose.” This reputation was strengthened by the release of the story “Carpenter's Stories” (1968). The novels “Eves” (1976), The Year of the Great Turning Point (1987) and The Sixth Hour () are devoted to the life of the village and collectivization. Many of Belov’s stories and tales, by the definition of the critic Yu. Seleznev, are not rich in external events, sharp plot twists... They also lack entertaining intrigue. But they are rich in man. According to another critic, M. Lobanov: It is not the husk of speech that is accessible to him, but the spirit of the folk language and its poetry. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Vasily Makarovich Shukshin () “I couldn’t talk about anything, knowing the village... I was brave here, I was here as independent as possible.” Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

His homeland is the village of Srostki, Altai Territory, his parents are peasants. After leaving school, Shukshin served in the navy, worked as a loader, mechanic, teacher, and school director. Then he graduated from the directing department of VGIK, after which his triumphant path in cinema as a director, actor and screenwriter began. His debut in prose took place in 1961, when his stories were published by the October magazine, and two years later (simultaneously with the release of his first film Such a Guy Lives), his first collection of stories, Village People, was published. Subsequently, during the author's lifetime, the collections There, Far Away (1968), Countrymen (1970), and Characters (1973) were published. The heroes of the stories were usually villagers who in one way or another encountered the city, or, conversely, city dwellers who found themselves in the village. At the same time, a village person is most often naive, simple-minded, and friendly, but the city does not greet him kindly and quickly ends all his good impulses Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

In addition to the stories, Shukshin created two novels - the traditional family Lyubavins (1965), which tells about a village in the twenties, and the film novel about Stepan Razin, I Came to Give You Freedom (1971). In addition, he wrote such film stories as Kalina Krasnaya (1973), which became Shukshin’s most famous film, Call me into the bright distance... (1975), as well as the fantastic fairy tale-parable Until the Third Rooster (1974), an unfinished story parable And in the morning they woke up... (1974), fairy tale Point of View (1974). Shortly before his sudden death, Shukshin received permission to shoot a film about Razin, whose personality he considered extremely important for understanding the Russian character. In the words of the critic V. Sigov, he has rampant love of freedom, reckless and often aimless activity, the ability to rush and fly, the inability to moderate passions... - that is, those traits and qualities that Shukshin gave to many of his other characters in full representing the contemporary village. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Boris Andreevich Mozhaev () “It’s time to wake up. It's time to understand the simple truth - everything starts from the ground. There is no strong power whose land does not feed its people. The man must be reborn if we want to live in prosperity and be an independent state Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Boris Mozhaev was born in the village of Pitelino, Ryazan province. In 1940, after graduating from school, he entered the shipbuilding faculty. In 1941 he was mobilized and served in the Soviet Army until 1954. In 1948 he graduated from the Higher Engineering and Technical School of the Navy in Leningrad. As a cadet, he attended lectures at the Faculty of Philology of Leningrad University. He served in the navy as a military engineer in Port Arthur and Vladivostok. After demobilization, he became the Far Eastern correspondent for Stroitelnaya Gazeta, and subsequently worked for Izvestia. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

In fact, Mozhaev’s first work on a village theme was the story Polyushko-Field (1965). In 1966, a work was published in the New World that placed Mozhaev among the most prominent representatives of village prose - the story Zhivoy (originally it was given the title From the Life of Fyodor Kuzkin). Mozhaev also wrote the tragicomic History of the Village of Brekhova, written by Pyotr Afanasyevich Bulkin (1968), Staritsa Proshkina (1966), Without a Purpose (1965) and other stories and essays about the life and existence of the Soviet village. But his main work was the novel duology Men and Women. The action of the novel, as well as some of the writer’s other works, takes place in the fictional Tikhanovsky district of the Ryazan region. Talent, a keen polemical gift, and deep erudition made Mozhaev a prominent publicist and essayist, combining competence, vivid language and fearlessness. No matter how rampant the censorship, Mozhaev defended the economic independence of the worker, the economic independence of the farmer - from year to year, from genre to genre, be it an essay or a novel, an article or a script. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Mozhaev’s prose is characterized by sharp journalisticism, a documentary basis for many of his works, as well as a penchant for satire, humor, and anecdote. His heroes are mostly brave, active people, possessing the boundlessness of human perseverance, generated by a love of independence. Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Sources: Literature. Grade 11. textbook by ed. V.P. Zhuravleva Website "Wikipedia" Website "Centralized Library System of Apatity" Website "Yandex - Pictures" Ermolova Oksana Vladimirovna

Village prose is one of the trends in Russian literature of the last century. It originated in the 50s. The works of representatives of this movement have been studied by schoolchildren in Russian literature classes for decades. Many stories and stories by "village" writers have been filmed by both Soviet and Russian filmmakers. The work of the brightest representatives of village prose is the topic of the article.

Features of village prose

Valentin Ovechkin is one of the first prose writers to glorify the life of the Russian hinterland on the pages of his works. The very definition of village prose did not immediately enter literary criticism. The affiliation of the authors, who today are commonly called "village writers", to a certain direction in prose has long been questioned. Nevertheless, over time, the term gained its right to exist. And this happened after the publication of Solzhenitsyn’s story “Matrenin’s Dvor”. Village prose began to be understood not just as works dedicated to village residents, but also as a complex of artistic and stylistic features. What are they?

Writers-"villagers" in their works raised issues of ecology and the preservation of national Russian traditions. talked about history, culture, moral aspects in the life of the inhabitants of the outback. One of the brightest representatives of village prose is F. Abramov.

In his small, succinct works, he was able to show the life of an entire generation, whose representatives, as we know, especially experienced the consequences of the historical events of the 20s of the last century and the hardships of the post-war period. But the work of this prose writer will be briefly discussed below. First, it’s worth giving a list of “village” writers.

Representatives of village prose

F. Abramov stood at the origins of the literary movement. V. Belov and V. Rasputin are also placed on a par with this writer. It would be impossible to explore the theme of Russian village prose without mentioning such works as “The Fish Tsar” by Astafiev, “Water of Life” by Krupin and, of course, “Matrenin’s Dvor” by Solzhenitsyn. Vasily Shukshin made an important contribution to the development of village prose. A bright rustic flavor is present on the pages of Vasily Belov’s books. The list of writers who dedicated their works to the morals and traditions of the Russian village also includes N. Kochin, I. Akulov, B. Mozhaev, S. Zalygin.

Interest in “village” writers was observed in the 80s. However, with the collapse of the USSR, other genres became popular. Today, the books of Vasily Belov, Fyodor Abramov, Valentin Rasputin, and the stories of Alexander Solzhenitsyn have found a new life. They are regularly reissued, and feature films are made based on them (the films “Live and Remember” in 2008, “Matrenin’s Dvor” in 2013).

Fedorov Abramov

One of the most famous representatives of village prose was born in the Arkhangelsk region, but spent most of his life in Leningrad. Abramov volunteered for the front in 1941 and went through the entire war. And only after graduation was he able to obtain a higher education at the Faculty of Russian Philology.

Abramov is called the patriarch of village prose for the scrupulousness with which he tried to comprehend the causes of the tragedy of the peasantry and the social characteristics of the village. Addressing this topic put Abramov on a par with the most significant figures in Soviet literature of the sixties and seventies.

Why were so many forced to leave their homes in the 50s and go to the city? Abramov, along with Shukshin and Rasputin, tries to answer this question in his works, which have long become classics of Russian prose. At the same time, the fate of the hero who left the village is always tragic. Abramov's style, like the style of other country writers, is not characterized by grotesqueness or imagery. The most significant work in the work of this prose writer is the novel “Brothers and Sisters”.

Vasily Belov

This writer is a native of the village of Timonikha, Vologda region. Belov knew firsthand about the hardships of village life. His father died during the Second World War, his mother, like millions of Soviet women, was forced to raise children on her own. And she had five of them. In one of his works, “Years of No Return,” the writer told about the life of his relatives - village residents.

Belov lived for many years in Vologda, not far from his small homeland, from which he drew material for literary creativity. The story “An Ordinary Business” brought wide fame to the writer. And it was this work that secured him the title of one of the representatives of village prose. In Belov's stories and stories there are no sharp plot twists, there are few events in them and there is almost no intrigue. Belov's advantage is his ability to skillfully use the folk language and create vivid images of village residents.

Valentin Rasputin

A famous prose writer once said that it was his duty to talk about the village and glorify it in his works. He, like the other writers discussed in this article, grew up in the village. Graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology. His debut in literature was the publication of the story “The Edge Near the Sky.” “Money for Maria” brought fame.

In the seventies, the books of Rasputin Valentin Grigorievich enjoyed considerable popularity among the Soviet intelligentsia. The most famous works are “Farewell to Matera”, “Live and Remember”. It was they who put the prose writer among the best modern Russian writers.

Other Valentin Grigorievich - collections that included the stories “The Last Term”, “Ivan’s Daughter, Ivan’s Mother”, “Fire” and the stories “Bonfires of New Cities”, “Siberia, Siberia”. More than once, filmmakers have turned to the work of this writer. In addition to “Live and Remember,” it is worth mentioning other films created based on the works of Rasputin. Namely: “Vasily and Vasilisa”, “Meeting”, “Money for Maria”, “Rudolfio”.

Sergey Zalygin

This author is often considered a representative of rural prose. Sergei Pavlovich Zalygin held the position of editor of Novy Mir for several years. Thanks to him and some other writers, publication resumed in the late 80s. As for the work of Zalygin himself, he created such stories as “Oskin Argish”, “To the Mainland”, “Morning Flight”, “Ordinary People”.

Ivan Akulov

“Kasyan Ostudny” and “Tsar Fish” are stories included in the list of the most significant works of village prose. Their author, Akulov Ivan Ivanovich, was born into a peasant family. The future writer lived in the village until he was nine years old. And then the family moved to the city of Sverdlovsk. Ivan Akulov went through the war and was demobilized in 1946 with the rank of captain. His creative path began in the 50s. But, oddly enough, he did not start writing about the war. In his literary works, he recreated the images that he remembered in his childhood - images of simple villagers who endured a lot of adversity, but did not lose strength and faith.

Vasily Shukshin

It is worth telling about this writer, known not only as a representative of rural prose, but also as a director and screenwriter, possessing a rare original talent. Vasily Shukshin was from the Altai region. The theme of a small homeland ran like a red thread in his work. The heroes of his books are contradictory; they cannot be classified as either negative or positive characters. Shukshin’s images are alive and real. After the end of the war, the future writer and director, like many young people, moved to the big city. But the image of the village remained in his memory, and later such works of short prose as “Cut”, “Mother’s Heart”, “Kalina Krasnaya” appeared.

"Matrenin's Dvor"

Solzhenitsyn cannot be classified as a representative of village prose. Nevertheless, the story “Matrenin’s Dvor” is one of the best works reflecting the life of rural residents. The heroine of the story is a woman devoid of self-interest, envy, and anger. The components of her life are love, compassion, work. And this heroine is by no means the author’s invention. Solzhenitsyn met the prototype of Matryona in the village of Miltsevo. The heroine of Solzhenitsyn's story is an illiterate village resident, but she attracts the attention of readers, as Tvardovsky said, no less than Anna Karenina.

"VILLAGE" PROSE of the 60-80s

Not only the memory of the heart nourished the theme of “small homeland”, “sweet homeland”, but also pain for its present, anxiety for its future. Exploring the reasons for the acute and problematic conversation about the village that literature had in the 60-70s, F. Abramov wrote: “The village is the depths of Russia, the soil on which our culture grew and flourished. At the same time, the scientific and technological revolution in which we live has affected the village very thoroughly. Technology has changed not only the type of farming, but also the very type of peasant... Together with the ancient way of life, the moral type is disappearing into oblivion. Traditional Russia is turning over the last pages of its thousand-year history. Interest in all these phenomena in literature is natural... Traditional crafts are disappearing, local features of peasant housing that have developed over centuries are disappearing... Language is suffering serious losses. The village has always spoken a richer language than the city, now this freshness is being leached, eroded..."

Here is another similar sketch - from F. Abramov’s novel “Two Winters and Three Summers”: “... Mentally talking with the children, guessing from their tracks how they walked, where they stopped, Anna did not even notice how she went out to Sinelga. And here it is, her holiday, her day, here it is, the hard-earned joy: the Pryaslina brigade at the reaping! Mikhail, Lisa, Peter, Grigory...

She got used to Mikhail - from the age of fourteen she has been mowing for a man, and now there are no mowers equal to him in all of Pekashin. And Lizka also does the swathing - you’ll be jealous. Not into her, not into her mother, into Grandma Matryona, they say, with a catch. But small, small! Both with scythes, both hitting the grass with their scythes, both with grass falling under their scythes... Lord, did she ever think that she would see such a miracle!”

Writers have a keen sense of the deep culture of the people. Reflecting on his spiritual experience, V. Belov emphasizes in the book “Lad”: “Working beautifully is not only easier, but also more enjoyable. Talent and work are inseparable." And again: “For the soul, for the memory, it was necessary to build a house with carvings, or a temple on the mountain, or to weave such lace that would take the breath away and light up the eyes of a distant great-great-granddaughter.

Because man does not live by bread alone.”

This truth is professed by the best heroes of Belov and Rasputin, Shukshin and Astafiev, Mozhaev and Abramov.

Not a single man, not a single horse. Three old women."

And a little earlier, Novy Mir (1996, No. 6) published Boris Ekimov’s bitter, difficult reflection “At the Crossroads” with dire forecasts: “The poor collective farms are already eating up tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, dooming those who will live on this land to even greater poverty.” the earth after them... The degradation of the peasant is worse than the degradation of the soil. And she is there."

Such phenomena made it possible to talk about “Russia, which we lost.” So the “village” prose, which began with the poeticization of childhood and nature, ended with the consciousness of a great loss. It is no coincidence that the motif of “farewell”, “last bow”, reflected in the titles of the works (“Farewell to Matera”, “The Last Term” by V. Rasputin, “The Last Bow” by V. Astafiev, “The Last Sorrow”, “The Last Old Man of the Village” "F. Abramov), and in the main plot situations of the works, and in the premonitions of the heroes. F. Abramov often said that Russia says goodbye to the village as to its mother.

In order to highlight the moral issues of works of “village” prose, we will pose the following questions to eleventh-graders: - Which pages of the novels and stories of F. Abramov, V. Rasputin, V. Astafiev, B. Mozhaev, V. Belov were written with love, sadness and anger? - Why did the man of the “hardworking soul” become the primary hero of “village” prose? Tell us about it. What worries him? What questions do the heroes of Abramov, Rasputin, Astafiev, Mozhaev ask themselves and us, the readers?