What trends are there in the literature? Literary directions (theoretical material)

1. The central place is given to the symbol*
2. The desire for a higher ideal prevails
3. A poetic image is intended to express the essence of a phenomenon
4. Characteristic reflection of the world in two planes: real and mystical
5. Sophistication and musicality of verse

Option 1

A. Classicism

B. Sentimentalism

B. Romanticism

G. Realism

1. Reflection of the idea of ​​harmony, strict orderliness of the world, faith in the human mind.

2. Contains a contrast between reality and dreams.

3. Opposes the abstraction and rationality of the works of classicism. It reflects the desire to depict human psychology.

4. The main character is lonely and not understood by others, he opposes society.

5. The actions and actions of the heroes are determined from the point of view of feelings, the sensitivity of the heroes is exaggerated.

6. The plot and composition obey accepted rules (the rule of three unities: place of time, action).

7. Portrayal of typical characters in typical circumstances.

8. Main genres - comedy, ode.

9. Idealization of the village way of life, the heroes are ordinary people.

10. The name of the direction in translation means “material, real.”

11. Replaces classicism.

12. Civil (educational) orientation of the works.

13. M.Yu. Lermontov "Mtsyri"

14. G.R. Derzhavin Ode “Felitsa”

15. N.V. Gogol "Dead Souls"

16. V.A. Zhukovsky "Svetlana"

17. M.V. Lomonosov

18. N.M. Karamzin

19. D.I. Fonvizin

20. L.N. Tolstoy

Test on the topic " Literary directions»

Option 2

When answering test questions, indicate only the letter that corresponds to the literary direction.

A. Classicism

B. Sentimentalism

B. Romanticism

G. Realism

I. Which literary movement does the characteristic correspond to?

1. The actions and deeds of the heroes are determined from the point of view of reason.

2. Idealization of the natural world (a special landscape).

3. An exceptional hero acts in exceptional circumstances.

4. Main genres - elegy, ballad.

5. The hero is individual and at the same time embodies typical traits.

6. The name of the direction in translation means “Exemplary”

7. Representatives of the lower classes are endowed with a rich spiritual world.

8. Replaces romanticism and exists to this day.

9. Unusual and exotic depiction of events, landscapes, people.

10. Dividing comedy heroes into positive and negative.

11. The work shows a special interest in the surrounding reality, the ideal world is contrasted with the real.

12. A hero is judged by how he can show feelings, and not by the benefit he brings to the state.

II. What literary movement do the works belong to?

13. V.A. Zhukovsky Elegy “Sea”

14. M.Yu. Lermontov "Hero of Our Time"

15. M.V. Lomonosov “Ode on the day of Elizabeth Petrovna’s accession to the throne”

16. A.S. Pushkin "Eugene Onegin"

III. Which literary movement does the writer's work belong to?

17. G.R. Derzhavin

18. A.P. Chekhov

19. M.V. Lomonosov

20. N.M. Karamzin

Evaluation criteria

"5" - 18-20 points (90% correct answers)

"4" - 14-17 points (70%-89% correct answers)

"3" - 10-13 points (50%-69% correct answers)

"2" - 0-9 points (less than 49% correct answers)

In modern literary criticism, the terms “direction” and “current” can be interpreted differently. Sometimes they are used as synonyms (classicism, sentimentalism, romanticism, realism and modernism are called both movements and directions), and sometimes a movement is identified with a literary school or group, and a direction with an artistic method or style (in this case, the direction includes two or more currents).

Usually, literary direction call a group of writers similar in type of artistic thinking. We can talk about the existence of a literary movement if writers are aware of the theoretical foundations of their artistic activity and promote them in manifestos, program speeches, and articles. Thus, the first programmatic article of the Russian futurists was the manifesto “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste,” which stated the basic aesthetic principles of the new direction.

In certain circumstances, within the framework of one literary movement, groups of writers may be formed, especially close to each other in their aesthetic views. Such groups formed within any direction are usually called literary movement. For example, within the framework of such a literary movement as symbolism, two movements can be distinguished: “senior” symbolists and “younger” symbolists (according to another classification - three: decadents, “senior” symbolists, “younger” symbolists).

CLASSICISM(from lat. classicus- exemplary) - artistic direction in European art turn of XVII-XVIII - early XIX century, formed in France at the end of the 17th century. Classicism asserted the primacy of state interests over personal interests, the predominance of civil, patriotic motives, and the cult of moral duty. The aesthetics of classicism is characterized by the rigor of artistic forms: compositional unity, normative style and subjects. Representatives of Russian classicism: Kantemir, Trediakovsky, Lomonosov, Sumarokov, Knyazhnin, Ozerov and others.

One of the most important features of classicism is the perception ancient art as a model, an aesthetic standard (hence the name of the direction). The goal is to create works of art in the image and likeness of ancient ones. In addition, the formation of classicism was greatly influenced by the ideas of the Enlightenment and the cult of reason (the belief in the omnipotence of reason and that the world can be reorganized on a rational basis).

Classicists (representatives of classicism) perceived artistic creativity as strict adherence to reasonable rules, eternal laws, created on the basis of the study of the best examples ancient literature. Based on these reasonable laws, they divided works into “correct” and “incorrect”. For example, even best plays Shakespeare. This was due to the fact that Shakespeare’s heroes combined positive and negative traits. And the creative method of classicism was formed on the basis of rationalistic thinking. There was a strict system of characters and genres: all characters and genres were distinguished by “purity” and unambiguity. Thus, in one hero it was strictly forbidden not only to combine vices and virtues (that is, positive and negative traits), but even several vices. The hero had to embody one character trait: either a miser, or a braggart, or a hypocrite, or a hypocrite, or good, or evil, etc.

The main conflict of classic works is the hero’s struggle between reason and feeling. At the same time, a positive hero must always make a choice in favor of reason (for example, when choosing between love and the need to completely devote himself to serving the state, he must choose the latter), and a negative one - in favor of feeling.

The same can be said about genre system. All genres were divided into high (ode, epic poem, tragedy) and low (comedy, fable, epigram, satire). At the same time, touching episodes were not supposed to be included in a comedy, and funny ones were not supposed to be included in a tragedy. IN high genres"exemplary" heroes were depicted - monarchs, "commanders who could serve as role models. In the low ones, characters were depicted who were seized by some kind of "passion", that is, a strong feeling.

There were special rules for dramatic works. They had to observe three “unities” - place, time and action. Unity of place: classical dramaturgy did not allow a change of location, that is, throughout the entire play the characters had to be in the same place. Unity of time: the artistic time of a work should not exceed several hours, or at most one day. Unity of action implies that there is only one storyline. All these requirements are related to the fact that the classicists wanted to create a unique illusion of life on stage. Sumarokov: “Try to measure the clock for me in the game for hours, so that I, having forgotten myself, can believe you*.

So, character traits literary classicism:

Purity of the genre (in high genres funny or everyday situations and heroes could not be depicted, and in low genres tragic and sublime ones could not be depicted);

Purity of language (in high genres - high vocabulary, in low genres - colloquial);

Heroes are strictly divided into positive and negative, while positive heroes, choosing between feeling and reason, give preference to the latter;

Compliance with the rule of “three unities”;

The work must affirm positive values ​​and the state ideal.

Russian classicism is characterized by state pathos (the state (and not the person) was declared the highest value) combined with faith in the theory of enlightened absolutism. According to the theory of enlightened absolutism, the state should be headed by a wise, enlightened monarch, requiring everyone to serve for the good of society. Russian classicists, inspired by Peter's reforms, believed in the possibility of further improvement of society, which they saw as a rationally organized organism. Sumarokov: “ Peasants plow, merchants trade, warriors defend the fatherland, judges judge, scientists cultivate sciences.” The classicists treated human nature in the same rationalistic manner. They believed that human nature is selfish, subject to passions, that is, feelings that are opposed to reason, but at the same time amenable to education.

SENTIMENTALISM(from English sentimental- sensitive, from French sentiment- feeling) is a literary movement of the second half of the 18th century, which replaced classicism. Sentimentalists proclaimed the primacy of feeling, not reason. A person was judged by his capacity for deep experiences. Hence the interest in the hero’s inner world, the depiction of the shades of his feelings (the beginning of psychologism).

Unlike classicists, sentimentalists consider the highest value not the state, but the person. They contrasted the unjust orders of the feudal world with the eternal and reasonable laws of nature. In this regard, nature for sentimentalists is the measure of all values, including man himself. It is no coincidence that they asserted the superiority of the “natural”, “natural” person, that is, living in harmony with nature.

Sensitivity also underlies the creative method of sentimentalism. If classicists created generalized characters (prude, braggart, miser, fool), then sentimentalists are interested in specific people with individual fates. The heroes in their works are clearly divided into positive and negative. Positive people are endowed with natural sensitivity (responsive, kind, compassionate, capable of self-sacrifice). Negative - calculating, selfish, arrogant, cruel. The carriers of sensitivity, as a rule, are peasants, artisans, commoners, and rural clergy. Cruel - representatives of power, nobles, high clergy (since despotic rule kills sensitivity in people). Manifestations of sensitivity often acquire a too external, even exaggerated character in the works of sentimentalists (exclamations, tears, fainting, suicide).

One of the main discoveries of sentimentalism is the individualization of the hero and the image of the rich spiritual world of the commoner (the image of Liza in Karamzin’s story “Poor Liza”). The main character of the works was ordinary person. In this regard, the plot of the work often represented individual situations of everyday life, while peasant life was often depicted in pastoral colors. New content required a new form. The leading genres were family novel, diary, confession, novel in letters, travel notes, elegy, epistle.

In Russia, sentimentalism originated in the 1760s (the best representatives are Radishchev and Karamzin). As a rule, in the works of Russian sentimentalism, the conflict develops between the serf peasant and the serf-owner landowner, and the moral superiority of the former is persistently emphasized.

ROMANTICISM - artistic movement in European and American culture late XVIII- first half of the 19th century century. Romanticism arose in the 1790s, first in Germany, and then spread throughout Western Europe. The prerequisites for its emergence were the crisis of Enlightenment rationalism, the artistic search for pre-romantic movements (sentimentalism), the Great French Revolution, and German classical philosophy.

The emergence of this literary movement, like any other, is inextricably linked with the socio-historical events of that time. Let's start with the prerequisites for the formation of romanticism in Western European literature. The Great French Revolution of 1789-1899 and the associated revaluation of Enlightenment ideology had a decisive influence on the formation of romanticism in Western Europe. As you know, the 15th century in France passed under the sign of the Enlightenment. For almost a century, French educators led by Voltaire (Rousseau, Diderot, Montesquieu) argued that the world could be reorganized on a reasonable basis and proclaimed the idea of ​​natural equality of all people. It was these educational ideas that inspired the French revolutionaries, whose slogan was the words: “Liberty, equality and fraternity.”

The result of the revolution was the establishment of a bourgeois republic. As a result, the winner was the bourgeois minority, which seized power (previously it belonged to the aristocracy, the upper nobility), while the rest were left with nothing. Thus, the long-awaited “kingdom of reason” turned out to be an illusion, as were the promised freedom, equality and brotherhood. There was general disappointment in the results and results of the revolution, deep dissatisfaction with the surrounding reality, which became a prerequisite for the emergence of romanticism. Because at the heart of romanticism is the principle of dissatisfaction with the existing order of things. This was followed by the emergence of the theory of romanticism in Germany.

As you know, Western European culture, in particular French, had a huge influence on Russian. This trend continued into the 19th century, which is why the Great French Revolution also shocked Russia. But, in addition, there are actually Russian prerequisites for the emergence of Russian romanticism. First of all, this is the Patriotic War of 1812, which clearly showed the greatness and strength of the common people. It was to the people that Russia owed the victory over Napoleon; the people were the true heroes of the war. Meanwhile, both before the war and after it, the bulk of the people, the peasants, still remained serfs, in fact, slaves. What had previously been perceived as injustice by progressive people of that time now began to seem like a blatant injustice, contrary to all logic and morality. But after the end of the war, Alexander I not only did not abolish serfdom, but also began to pursue a much tougher policy. As a result, a pronounced feeling of disappointment and dissatisfaction arose in Russian society. This is how the soil for the emergence of romanticism arose.

The term “romanticism” when applied to a literary movement is arbitrary and imprecise. In this regard, from the very beginning of its occurrence, it was interpreted in different ways: some believed that it comes from the word “romance”, others - from chivalric poetry created in countries speaking Romance languages. For the first time, the word “romanticism” as a name for a literary movement began to be used in Germany, where the first sufficiently detailed theory of romanticism was created.

The concept of romantic dual worlds is very important for understanding the essence of romanticism. As already mentioned, rejection, denial of reality is the main prerequisite for the emergence of romanticism. All romantics reject the world around them, hence their romantic escape from existing life and the search for an ideal outside of it. This gave rise to the emergence of a romantic dual world. For romantics, the world was divided into two parts: here and there. “There” and “here” are an antithesis (opposition), these categories are correlated as ideal and reality. The despised “here” is modern reality, where evil and injustice triumph. “There” - some poetic reality, which the romantics contrasted with reality. Many romantics believed that goodness, beauty and truth, crowded out of public life, were still preserved in the souls of people. Hence their attention to the inner world of a person, in-depth psychologism. The souls of people are their “there”. For example, Zhukovsky was looking for “there” in the other world; Pushkin and Lermontov, Fenimore Cooper - in free life uncivilized peoples (Pushkin’s poems “Prisoner of the Caucasus”, “Gypsies”, Cooper’s novels about the life of Indians).

Rejection and denial of reality determined the specifics of the romantic hero. It is fundamentally new hero, the like of him was not known in previous literature. He is in a hostile relationship with the surrounding society and is opposed to it. This is an extraordinary person, restless, most often lonely and with a tragic fate. The romantic hero is the embodiment of romantic rebellion against reality.

REALISM(from the Latin realis - material, real) - a method (creative attitude) or literary direction that embodies the principles of a life-truthful attitude to reality, aimed at artistic knowledge of man and the world. The term “realism” is often used in two meanings: 1) realism as a method; 2) realism as a direction formed in the 19th century. Both classicism, romanticism, and symbolism strive for knowledge of life and express their reaction to it in their own way, but only in realism does fidelity to reality become the defining criterion of artistry. This distinguishes realism, for example, from romanticism, which is characterized by a rejection of reality and the desire to “recreate” it, rather than display it as it is. It is no coincidence that, turning to the realist Balzac, the romantic George Sand defined the difference between him and herself: “You take a person as he appears to your eyes; I feel a calling within myself to portray him the way I would like to see him.” Thus, we can say that realists depict the real, and romantics depict the desired.

The beginning of the formation of realism is usually associated with the Renaissance. The realism of this time is characterized by the scale of images (Don Quixote, Hamlet) and the poeticization of the human personality, the perception of man as the king of nature, the crown of creation. The next stage is educational realism. In the literature of the Enlightenment, a democratic realistic hero appears, a man “from the bottom” (for example, Figaro in Beaumarchais’s plays “The Barber of Seville” and “The Marriage of Figaro”). New types of romanticism appeared in the 19th century: “fantastic” (Gogol, Dostoevsky), “grotesque” (Gogol, Saltykov-Shchedrin) and “critical” realism associated with the activities of the “natural school”.

The main requirements of realism: adherence to the principles of nationality, historicism, high artistry, psychologism, depiction of life in its development. Realist writers showed the direct dependence of the social, moral, and religious ideas of heroes on social conditions, and paid great attention to the social and everyday aspect. Central problem realism - the relationship between plausibility and artistic truth. Plausibility, a plausible representation of life is very important for realists, but artistic truth is determined not by plausibility, but by fidelity in comprehending and conveying the essence of life and the significance of the ideas expressed by the artist. One of the most important features of realism is the typification of characters (the fusion of the typical and the individual, the uniquely personal). The persuasiveness of a realistic character directly depends on the degree of individualization achieved by the writer.

Realist writers create new types of heroes: the type of “little man” (Vyrin, Bashmachki n, Marmeladov, Devushkin), the type of “superfluous man” (Chatsky, Onegin, Pechorin, Oblomov), the type of “new” hero (nihilist Bazarov in Turgenev, “new people” of Chernyshevsky).

MODERNISM(from French modern- newest, modern) - a philosophical and aesthetic movement in literature and art that arose at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries.

This term has different interpretations:

1) denotes a number of non-realistic movements in art and literature at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries: symbolism, futurism, acmeism, expressionism, cubism, imagism, surrealism, abstractionism, impressionism;

2) used as symbol aesthetic searches of artists of non-realistic movements;

3) denotes a complex complex of aesthetic and ideological phenomena, including not only modernist movements themselves, but also the work of artists who do not completely fit into the framework of any movement (D. Joyce, M. Proust, F. Kafka and others).

The brightest and significant directions Symbolism, Acmeism and Futurism became Russian modernism.

SYMBOLISM - a non-realistic movement in art and literature from the 1870s to the 1920s, focused primarily on the artistic expression through symbol of intuitively comprehended entities and ideas. Symbolism made itself known in France in the 1860-1870s in the poetic works of A. Rimbaud, P. Verlaine, S. Mallarmé. Then, through poetry, symbolism connected itself not only with prose and drama, but also with other forms of art. The ancestor, founder, “father” of symbolism is considered French writer C. Baudelaire.

The worldview of symbolist artists is based on the idea of ​​the unknowability of the world and its laws. They considered the spiritual experience of man and the creative intuition of the artist to be the only “tool” for understanding the world.

Symbolism was the first to put forward the idea of ​​​​creating art, free from the task of depicting reality. Symbolists argued that the purpose of art is not to represent real world, which they considered secondary, but in the transmission of “higher reality.” They intended to achieve this with the help of a symbol. The symbol is an expression of the poet’s supersensible intuition, to whom in moments of insight the true essence of things is revealed. Symbolists developed a new poetic language that did not directly name the object, but hinted at its content through allegory, musicality, colors, and free verse.

Symbolism is the first and most significant of the modernist movements that arose in Russia. The first manifesto of Russian symbolism was the article by D. S. Merezhkovsky “On the causes of decline and new trends in modern Russian literature,” published in 1893. It identified three main elements of the “new art”: mystical content, symbolization and “expansion of artistic impressionability”.

Symbolists are usually divided into two groups, or movements:

1) “senior” symbolists (V. Bryusov, K. Balmont, D. Merezhkovsky, Z. Gippius, F. Sologub

and others), which debuted in the 1890s;

2) “younger” symbolists who began their creative activity in the 1900s and significantly updated the appearance of the movement (A. Blok, A. Bely, V. Ivanov and others).

It should be noted that the “senior” and “younger” symbolists were separated not so much by age as by the difference in worldviews and the direction of creativity.

Symbolists believed that art is, first of all, “ comprehension of the world in other, non-rational ways"(Bryusov). After all, only phenomena that are subject to the law of linear causality can be rationally comprehended, and such causality operates only in lower forms of life (empirical reality, everyday life). The symbolists were interested in the higher spheres of life (the area of ​​“absolute ideas” in terms of Plato or the “world soul”, according to V. Solovyov), not subject to rational knowledge. It is art that has the ability to penetrate into these spheres, and symbolic images with their endless polysemy are capable of reflecting the entire complexity of the world universe. The symbolists believed that the ability to comprehend the true, highest reality is given only to a select few who, in moments of inspired insight, are able to comprehend the “highest” truth, the absolute truth.

The image-symbol was considered by symbolists as more effective than artistic image, a tool that helps to “break through” the veil of everyday life (lower life) to a higher reality. A symbol differs from a realistic image in that it conveys not the objective essence of a phenomenon, but the poet’s own, individual idea of ​​the world. In addition, a symbol, as Russian symbolists understood it, is not an allegory, but, first of all, a certain image that requires a response from the reader. creative work. The symbol, as it were, connects the author and the reader - this is the revolution brought about by symbolism in art.

The image-symbol is fundamentally polysemantic and contains the prospect of limitless development of meanings. This feature of his was repeatedly emphasized by the symbolists themselves: “A symbol is only a true symbol when it is inexhaustible in its meaning” (Vyach. Ivanov); “The symbol is a window to infinity” (F. Sologub).

ACMEISM(from Greek act- the highest degree of something, blooming power, peak) - a modernist literary movement in Russian poetry of the 1910s. Representatives: S. Gorodetsky, early A. Akhmatova, JI. Gumilev, O. Mandelstam. The term “Acmeism” belongs to Gumilyov. The aesthetic program was formulated in the articles by Gumilyov “The Heritage of Symbolism and Acmeism”, Gorodetsky “Some Trends in Modern Russian Poetry” and Mandelstam “The Morning of Acmeism”.

Acmeism stood out from symbolism, criticizing its mystical aspirations towards the “unknowable”: “With the Acmeists, the rose again became good in itself, with its petals, smell and color, and not with its conceivable likenesses with mystical love or anything else” (Gorodetsky) . The Acmeists proclaimed the liberation of poetry from symbolist impulses towards the ideal, from polysemy and fluidity of images, complicated metaphors; they talked about the need to return to the material world, the object, the exact meaning of the word. Symbolism is based on rejection of reality, and the Acmeists believed that one should not abandon this world, one should look for some values ​​in it and capture them in their works, and do this with the help of precise and understandable images, and not vague symbols.

The Acmeist movement itself was small in number, did not last long - about two years (1913-1914) - and was associated with the “Workshop of Poets”. The “Workshop of Poets” was created in 1911 and at first united a fairly large number of people (not all of them later became involved in Acmeism). This organization was much more united than the scattered symbolist groups. At the “Workshop” meetings, poems were analyzed, problems of poetic mastery were solved, and methods for analyzing works were substantiated. The idea of ​​a new direction in poetry was first expressed by Kuzmin, although he himself was not included in the “Workshop”. In his article “On Beautiful Clarity,” Kuzmin anticipated many declarations of Acmeism. In January 1913, the first manifestos of Acmeism appeared. From this moment the existence of a new direction begins.

Acmeism proclaimed “beautiful clarity”, or clarism (from Lat. clarus- clear). The Acmeists called their movement Adamism, associating with the biblical Adam the idea of ​​a clear and direct view of the world. Acmeism preached a clear, “simple” poetic language, where words would directly name objects and declare their love for objectivity. Thus, Gumilyov called for looking not for “shaky words”, but for words “with a more stable content.” This principle was most consistently implemented in Akhmatova’s lyrics.

FUTURISM - one of the main avant-garde movements (avant-garde is an extreme manifestation of modernism) in European art of the early 20th century, which received greatest development in Italy and Russia.

In 1909, in Italy, the poet F. Marinetti published the “Manifesto of Futurism.” The main provisions of this manifesto: the rejection of traditional aesthetic values ​​and the experience of all previous literature, bold experiments in the field of literature and art. Marinetti names “courage, audacity, rebellion” as the main elements of futurist poetry. In 1912, Russian futurists V. Mayakovsky, A. Kruchenykh, and V. Khlebnikov created their manifesto “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste.” They also sought to break with traditional culture, welcomed literary experiments, and sought to find new means speech expressiveness(proclamation of a new free rhythm, loosening of syntax, destruction of punctuation marks). At the same time, Russian futurists rejected fascism and anarchism, which Marinetti declared in his manifestos, and turned mainly to aesthetic problems. They proclaimed a revolution of form, its independence from content (“it is not what is important, but how”) and the absolute freedom of poetic speech.

Futurism was a heterogeneous movement. Within its framework, four main groups or movements can be distinguished:

1) “Gilea”, which united the Cubo-Futurists (V. Khlebnikov, V. Mayakovsky, A. Kruchenykh and others);

2) “Association of Ego-Futurists” (I. Severyanin, I. Ignatiev and others);

3) “Mezzanine of Poetry” (V. Shershenevich, R. Ivnev);

4) “Centrifuge” (S. Bobrov, N. Aseev, B. Pasternak).

The most significant and influential group was “Gilea”: in fact, it was it that determined the face of Russian futurism. Its members released many collections: “The Judges’ Tank” (1910), “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste” (1912), “Dead Moon” (1913), “Took” (1915).

The futurists wrote in the name of the crowd man. At the heart of this movement was the feeling of “the inevitability of the collapse of old things” (Mayakovsky), the awareness of the birth of a “new humanity.” Artistic creativity, according to the futurists, should have become not an imitation, but a continuation of nature, which, through the creative will of man, creates “a new world, today’s, iron...” (Malevich). This determines the desire to destroy the “old” form, the desire for contrasts, and the attraction to colloquial speech. Relying on living spoken language, futurists were engaged in “word creation” (creating neologisms). Their works were distinguished by complex semantic and compositional shifts - the contrast of the comic and tragic, fantasy and lyricism.

Futurism began to disintegrate already in 1915-1916.

Socialist realism(socialist realism) - ideological method of artistic creativity used in art Soviet Union, and then in other socialist countries, which was introduced into artistic creativity by means of state policy, including censorship, and was responsible for solving the problems of building socialism.

It was approved in 1932 by the party authorities in literature and art.

Parallel to it there was unofficial art.

· artistic depiction of reality “accurately, in accordance with specific historical revolutionary developments.”

· harmonization of artistic creativity with the ideas of Marxism-Leninism, active involvement of workers in the construction of socialism, affirmation of the leading role of the Communist Party.

Lunacharsky was the first writer to lay its ideological foundation. Back in 1906, he introduced the concept of “proletarian realism” into use. By the twenties, in relation to this concept, he began to use the term “new social realism”, and in the early thirties he dedicated a cycle of programmatic and theoretical articles that were published in Izvestia.

The term “socialist realism” was first proposed by the Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the USSR SP I. Gronsky in the Literary Gazette on May 23, 1932. It arose in connection with the need to direct RAPP and the avant-garde to artistic development Soviet culture. Decisive in this regard was the recognition of the role of classical traditions and the understanding of the new qualities of realism. In 1932-1933 Gronsky and head. sector fiction The Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) V. Kirpotin vigorously promoted this term [ source not specified 530 days] .

At the 1st All-Union Congress of Soviet Writers in 1934, Maxim Gorky stated:

“Socialist realism affirms being as an act, as creativity, the goal of which is the continuous development of man’s most valuable individual abilities for the sake of his victory over the forces of nature, for the sake of his health and longevity, for the sake of the great happiness of living on the earth, which he, in accordance with the continuous growth of his needs, wants treat the whole as a beautiful home for humanity united in one family.”

The state needed to approve this method as the main one for better control over creative personalities and better propaganda of their policies. In the previous period, the twenties existed Soviet writers who sometimes took aggressive positions towards many outstanding writers. For example, RAPP, an organization of proletarian writers, was actively engaged in criticism of non-proletarian writers. RAPP consisted mainly of aspiring writers. During the creation of modern industry (years of industrialization) Soviet power What was needed was art that would raise the people to “deeds of labor.” The fine arts of the 1920s also presented a rather motley picture. Several groups emerged within it. The most significant group was the Association of Artists of the Revolution. They depicted today: the life of the Red Army soldiers, workers, peasants, leaders of the revolution and labor. They considered themselves the heirs of the “Itinerants”. They went to factories, mills, and Red Army barracks to directly observe the lives of their characters, to “sketch” it. It was they who became the main backbone of the artists of “socialist realism”. It was much harder for less traditional masters, in particular, members of the OST (Society of Easel Painters), which united young people who graduated from the first Soviet art university [ source not specified 530 days] .

Gorky returned from exile in a solemn ceremony and headed the specially created Union of Writers of the USSR, which included mainly writers and poets of Soviet orientation.

For the first time, the official definition of socialist realism was given in the Charter of the USSR SP, adopted at the First Congress of the SP:

Socialist realism, being the main method of Soviet fiction and literary criticism, requires from the artist a truthful, historically specific depiction of reality in its revolutionary development. Moreover, truthfulness and historical specificity artistic image reality must be combined with the task of ideological remodeling and education in the spirit of socialism.

This definition became the starting point for all further interpretations until the 80s.

« Socialist realism is a deeply vital, scientific and most advanced artistic method that developed as a result of the successes of socialist construction and the education of Soviet people in the spirit of communism. The principles of socialist realism ... were a further development of Lenin’s teaching on the partisanship of literature.” (Big Soviet encyclopedia, 1947 )

Lenin expressed the idea that art should stand on the side of the proletariat in the following way:

“Art belongs to the people. The deepest springs of art can be found among the broad class of working people... Art must be based on their feelings, thoughts and demands and must grow with them.”

Plan.

2. Artistic method.

Literary directions and trends. Literary schools.

4. Principles of artistic representation in literature.

The concept of the literary process. Periodization concepts literary process.

The literary process is the process of change in literature over time.

In Soviet literary criticism, the leading concept of literary development was the idea of ​​a change creative methods. The method was described as a way for the artist to reflect extraliterary reality. The history of literature was described as the consistent development of the realistic method. The main emphasis was on overcoming romanticism and on the formation of the highest form of realism - socialist realism.

A more consistent concept of the development of world literature was built by academician N.F. Conrad, who also defended the forward movement of literature. This movement was based not on a change in literary methods, but on the idea of ​​discovering man as the highest value (a humanistic idea). In his work “West and East,” Conrad came to the conclusion that the concepts of “Middle Ages” and “Renaissance” are universal for all literatures. The period of antiquity gives way to the Middle Ages, then the Renaissance, followed by modern times. In each subsequent period, literature focuses more and more on the depiction of man as such, and becomes more and more aware of the intrinsic value of the human personality.

The concept of Academician D.S. Likhachev is similar, according to whom the literature of the Russian Middle Ages developed in the direction of strengthening the personal principle. The great styles of the era (Romanesque style, Gothic style) were gradually to be replaced by the author's individual styles (Pushkin's style).

The most objective concept of Academician S.S. Averintsev, it gives a wide scope of literary life, including modernity. This concept is based on the idea of ​​reflexivity and traditionalism of culture. The scientist identifies three large periods in the history of literature:

1. Culture can be unreflective and traditional (the culture of antiquity, in Greece - up to the 5th century BC). Non-reflexivity means that literary phenomena are not comprehended, no literary theory, the authors do not reflect (do not analyze their creativity).

2. culture can be reflexive, but traditional (from the 5th century BC to the new era). During this period, rhetoric, grammar, and poetics (reflection on language, style, creativity) emerge. Literature was traditional, there was a stable system of genres.

3. The last period, which still lasts. Reflection is preserved, traditionality is broken. Writers reflect, but create new forms. The beginning was made by the genre of the novel.

Changes in the history of literature can be progressive, evolutionary, regressive, involutionary in nature.

Artistic method

The artistic method is a way of mastering and displaying the world, a set of basic creative principles for the figurative reflection of life. The method can be spoken of as the structure of the writer’s artistic thinking, which determines his approach to reality and its reconstruction in the light of a certain aesthetic ideal. The method is embodied in the content of the literary work. Through the method, we comprehend those creative principles thanks to which the writer reproduces reality: selection, evaluation, typification (generalization), artistic embodiment of characters, life phenomena in historical refraction. The method is manifested in the structure of thoughts and feelings of the heroes of a literary work, in the motivations for their behavior and actions, in the relationship of characters and events, in the correspondence of the life path and destinies of the characters to the socio-historical circumstances of the era.

The concept of “method” (from the gr. “path of research”) denotes “the general principle of the artist’s creative attitude to knowable reality, that is, its re-creation.” These are a kind of ways of understanding life that changed in different historical and literary eras. According to some scientists, the method underlies trends and directions, and represents that method of aesthetic exploration of reality that is inherent in the works of a certain direction. Method is an aesthetic and deeply meaningful category.

The problem of the method of depicting reality was first recognized in antiquity and was fully embodied in Aristotle’s work “Poetics” under the name “theory of imitation”. Imitation, according to Aristotle, is the basis of poetry and its goal is to recreate the world similar to the real one, or, more precisely, how it could be. The authority of this theory remained until the end of the 18th century, when the romantics proposed a different approach (also having its roots in antiquity, more precisely in Hellenism) - the re-creation of reality in accordance with the will of the author, and not with the laws of the “universe”. These two concepts, according to Soviet literary criticism of the mid-20th century, underlie two “types of creativity” - “realistic” and “romantic”, within which the “methods” of classicism, romanticism, different types of realism, and modernism fit.

Regarding the problem of the relationship between method and direction, it is necessary to take into account that method as a general principle of figurative reflection of life differs from direction as a historically specific phenomenon. Consequently, if this or that direction is historically unique, then the same method, as a broad category of the literary process, can be repeated in the works of writers of different times and peoples, and therefore of different directions and trends.

Literary directions and trends. Literary schools

Ks.A. Polevoy was the first in Russian criticism to apply the word “direction” to certain stages in the development of literature. In the article “On trends and parties in literature,” he called a direction “that internal striving of literature, often invisible to contemporaries, which gives character to all or at least very many of its works in the known given time... Its basis, in a general sense, is the idea of ​​the modern era.” For " real criticism" - N.G. Chernyshevsky, N.A. Dobrolyubov - the direction correlated with the ideological position of the writer or group of writers. In general, the term “direction” meant a variety of literary communities. But the main feature that unites them is that the direction captures the unity of the most general principles of the embodiment of artistic content, the commonality of the deep foundations of the artistic worldview. There is no set list of literary trends, since the development of literature is connected with the specifics of the historical, cultural, social life of society, national and regional features this or that literature. However, traditionally there are such trends as classicism, sentimentalism, romanticism, realism, symbolism, each of which is characterized by its own set of formal and content features.

Gradually, along with “direction”, the term “flow” comes into circulation, often used synonymously with “direction”. Thus, D.S. Merezhkovsky, in an extensive article “On the causes of the decline and new trends in modern Russian literature” (1893), writes that “between writers with different, sometimes opposite, temperaments, special mental currents, a special air are established, like between opposite poles, full of creative trends." Often “direction” is recognized as a generic concept in relation to “flow”.

The term “literary movement” usually refers to a group of writers connected by a common ideological position and artistic principles within the same direction or artistic movement. Thus, modernism is the general name of various groups in the art and literature of the 20th century, which distinguishes a departure from classical traditions, the search for new aesthetic principles, a new approach to the depiction of existence, includes such movements as impressionism, expressionism, surrealism, existentialism, acmeism , futurism, imagism, etc.

The belonging of artists to one direction or movement does not exclude deep differences in their creative personalities. In turn, in the individual creativity of writers, the features of various literary movements and movements may appear.

A movement is a smaller unit of the literary process, often within a movement, characterized by its existence in a certain historical period and, as a rule, localization in a certain literature. Often the community of artistic principles in a flow forms an “artistic system.” Yes, within French classicism There are two currents. One is based on the tradition of rationalistic philosophy of R. Descartes (“Cartesian rationalism”), which includes the works of P. Corneille, J. Racine, N. Boileau. Another movement, based primarily on the sensualist philosophy of P. Gassendi, expressed itself in the ideological principles of such writers as J. Lafontaine, J. B. Molière. In addition, both flows differ in the system used artistic means. In romanticism, two main movements are often distinguished - “progressive” and “conservative”, but there are other classifications.

Directions and currents should be distinguished from literary schools (and literary groups). A literary school is a small association of writers based on common artistic principles, formulated theoretically - in articles, manifestos, scientific and journalistic statements, formalized as “statutes” and “rules”. Often such an association of writers has a leader, the “head of the school” (“Shchedrin school”, poets of the “Nekrasov school”).

As a rule, writers who have created a number of literary phenomena with a high degree of commonality are recognized as belonging to the same school - even to the point of common themes, style, and language.

Unlike the movement, which is not always formalized by manifestos, declarations and other documents that reflect its basic principles, the school is almost always characterized by such speeches. What is important in it is not only the presence of common artistic principles shared by the writers, but also their theoretical awareness of their belonging to the school.

Many associations of writers, called schools, are named after the place of their existence, although the similarity of the artistic principles of the writers of such associations may not be so obvious. For example, the “Lake School,” named after the place where it arose (northwest England, the Lake District), consisted of romantic poets who did not agree with each other on everything.

The concept of “literary school” is primarily historical, not typological. In addition to the criteria of the unity of time and place of existence of the school, the presence of manifestos, declarations and similar artistic practice, literary circles are often literary groups united by a “leader” who has followers who successively develop or copy his artistic principles. Group of English Religious Poets early XVII century formed the Spencer School.

It should be noted that the literary process is not limited to the coexistence and struggle of literary groups, schools, movements and movements. To consider it in this way means to schematize the literary life of the era and to impoverish the history of literature. Directions, trends, schools are, in the words of V.M. Zhirmunsky, “not shelves or boxes”, “on which we “arrange” poets.” “If a poet, for example, is a representative of the era of romanticism, this does not mean that there cannot be realistic tendencies in his work.”

The literary process is a complex and diverse phenomenon, therefore one should operate with such categories as “flow” and “direction” with extreme caution. In addition to them, scientists use other terms when studying the literary process, for example style.

Style is traditionally included in the section “Theories of Literature.” The term “style” itself, when applied to literature, has a number of meanings: the style of the work; the writer’s creative style, or individual style (say, the style of poetry by N.A. Nekrasov); the style of a literary movement, movement, method (for example, the style of symbolism); style as a set of stable elements artistic form, determined by the general features of worldview, content, national traditions inherent in literature and art in a certain historical era (the style of Russian realism of the second half of the 19th century).

In a narrow sense, style is understood as a manner of writing, features of the poetic structure of a language (vocabulary, phraseology, figurative and expressive means, syntactic structures, etc.). In a broad sense, style is a concept used in many sciences: literary criticism, art criticism, linguistics, cultural studies, aesthetics. They talk about work style, behavior style, thinking style, leadership style, etc.

Style-forming factors in literature are ideological content, components of form that specifically express the content; This also includes the vision of the world, which is associated with the writer’s worldview, with his understanding of the essence of phenomena and man. Stylistic unity includes the structure of the work (composition), analysis of conflicts, their development in the plot, a system of images and ways of revealing characters, and the pathos of the work. Style, as the unifying and artistic-organizing principle of the entire work, even absorbs the method landscape sketches. All this is style in the broad sense of the word. The uniqueness of the method and style expresses the peculiarities of the literary direction and movement.

The characteristics of stylistic expression are used to judge literary hero(the attributes of its external appearance and form of behavior are taken into account), about the building’s belonging to a particular era in the development of architecture (Empire style, Gothic style, Art Nouveau style, etc.), about the specifics of the depiction of reality in the literature of a particular historical formation (in ancient Russian literature- the style of monumental medieval historicism, the epic style of the 11th-13th centuries, the expressive-emotional style of the 14th-15th centuries, the Baroque style of the second half of the 17th century, etc.). No one today will be surprised by the expressions “style of play”, “style of life”, “style of leadership”, “style of work”, “style of construction”, “style of furniture”, etc., and every time, along with a general cultural meaning, These stable formulas have a specific evaluative meaning (for example, “I prefer this style of clothing” - in contrast to others, etc.).

Style in literature is a functionally applied set of means of expression arising from knowledge of the general laws of reality, realized by the relationship of all elements of the poetics of a work in order to create a unique artistic impression.