Images of the main characters in a thunderstorm. Description and characteristics of the heroes of Alexander Ostrovsky’s story “The Thunderstorm”

The action of the play "The Thunderstorm" takes place in the fictional town of Kalinov, which is a collective image of all provincial towns of that time.
There are not so many main characters in the play “The Thunderstorm”; each one needs to be discussed separately.

Katerina is a young woman, married without love, “to someone else’s side,” God-fearing and pious. In her parents' home, Katerina grew up in love and care, prayed and enjoyed life. Marriage for her turned out to be a difficult test, which her meek soul resists. But, despite outward timidity and humility, passions boil in Katerina’s soul when she falls in love with someone else’s man.

Tikhon is Katerina’s husband, a kind and gentle man, he loves his wife, feels sorry for her, but, like everyone else at home, he obeys his mother. He does not dare to go against the will of “mama” throughout the play, just as he does not dare to openly tell his wife about his love, since his mother forbids this, so as not to spoil his wife.

Kabanikha is the widow of the landowner Kabanov, mother of Tikhon, mother-in-law of Katerina. A despotic woman, in whose power the whole house is, no one dares to take a step without her knowledge, fearing a curse. According to one of the characters in the play, Kudryash, Kabanikha is “a hypocrite, he gives to the poor and eats his family.” It is she who shows Tikhon and Katerina how to build their family life in the best traditions of Domostroy.

Varvara is Tikhon’s sister, an unmarried girl. Unlike his brother, he obeys his mother only for appearances; she herself secretly goes on dates at night, inciting Katerina to do the same. Her principle is that you can sin if no one sees, otherwise you will spend your whole life next to your mother.

Landowner Dikoy is an episodic character, but personifies the image of a “tyrant”, i.e. a person in power who is confident that money gives him the right to do whatever his heart desires.

Boris, Dikiy’s nephew, who came in the hope of getting his share of the inheritance, falls in love with Katerina, but cowardly runs away, abandoning the woman he seduced.

In addition, Kudryash, Dikiy’s clerk, takes part. Kuligin is a self-taught inventor, constantly trying to introduce something new into the life of a sleepy town, but is forced to ask Dikiy for money for inventions. The same, in turn, being a representative of the “fathers”, is confident in the uselessness of Kuligin’s undertakings.

All the names and surnames in the play are “talking”; they tell about the character of their “owners” better than any actions.

She herself vividly shows the confrontation between the “old people” and the “young people”. The first actively resist all kinds of innovations, complaining that young people have forgotten the orders of their ancestors and do not want to live “as they should.” The latter, in turn, are trying to free themselves from the oppression of parental orders, they understand that life moves forward and changes.

But not everyone decides to go against their parents’ will, some for fear of losing their inheritance. Some people are used to obeying their parents in everything.

Against the backdrop of blossoming tyranny and Domostroev’s covenants, the forbidden love of Katerina and Boris blossoms. The young people are drawn to each other, but Katerina is married, and Boris depends on his uncle for everything.

The difficult atmosphere of the city of Kalinov, the pressure of an evil mother-in-law, and the onset of a thunderstorm force Katerina, tormented by remorse for cheating on her husband, to confess everything publicly. Kabanikha is rejoicing - she turned out to be right when she advised Tikhon to keep his wife “strict.” Tikhon is afraid of his mother, but her advice to beat his wife so that she knows is unthinkable for him.

The explanation of Boris and Katerina further aggravates the situation of the unfortunate woman. Now she has to live away from her beloved, with a husband who knows about her betrayal, with his mother, who will now definitely harass her daughter-in-law. Katerina’s fear of God leads her to the idea that there is no point in living anymore, the woman throws herself off a cliff into the river.

Only after losing his beloved woman does Tikhon realize how much she meant to him. Now he will have to live his whole life with the understanding that his callousness and submission to his tyrant mother led to such an ending. The last words of the play are the words of Tikhon, spoken over the body of his dead wife: “Good for you, Katya! Why did I stay in the world to live and suffer!”

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Alexander Ostrovsky's play “The Thunderstorm” is a real legacy for future generations. Despite the fact that it was written almost two centuries ago, its plot touches on the pressing problems of our turbulent times. The same problems of daughter-in-law and mother-in-law, husband and wife, mother and children... The events of the work take place on the coast of a river called the Volga, in the fictional city of Kalinov. There, in this seemingly quiet place, a real drama develops, the fault of which is ordinary people. But to understand what happened, you need to get to know the characters in the play and determine the role that each of them plays in the work.

Local self-taught mechanic Kuligin

This hero appears from the very beginning of the play. He is a self-taught mechanic who acts as a tour guide of sorts. By nature, Kuligin is a kind person who is accustomed to acting in accordance with established rules. Speaking about others and assessing their morals, he is very accurate in his judgments. He constantly dreams of the common good, of a lightning rod, of a perpetu mobile, of honest work, but, alas, his cherished desires are not destined to come true.

Vanya Kudryash - Varya's beloved

This is a minor character whom the author portrayed as kind and sincere. Despite his simple appearance, Vanya is a fighter in life and always finishes what he starts. Any business in his hands goes wrong. By nature, Ivan is not a romantic, but a practitioner, from this point of view he looks at life.

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He is a strong, smart, well-built guy whom Varvara Kabanova loves. A bright and kind feeling arises between them, although in order to avoid scandals from Varvara’s mother, this relationship has to be carefully hidden.

Boris is Dikiy's nephew

Boris is the nephew of Savl Prokopyich the Wild, a powerful, cruel and greedy man. The author endowed this hero with a contradictory character, on the one hand, describing him as young, educated, well-read, fashionable, on the other – cowardly and weak-willed, who never learned to defend his own point of view despite external circumstances. Knowing that his inheritance is in the hands of Uncle Saul the Wild, Boris tries to please him in everything, despite reproaches and ridicule.

Having fallen in love with Katya Kabanova, who has a mutual feeling for this guy, the young man does not value this relationship, and at a time when the slightest problems arise, he does not try to protect the girl, but immediately backs down, fearing that their relationship will be made public.

Thus, we can conclude that Boris is not so much a positive as a negative character in Alexander Ostrovsky’s play “The Thunderstorm”.

Dikoy – representative of the “dark kingdom”

Savl Prokofievich Dikoy is a wealthy merchant who is the most respected and influential person in the city. However, he is picky, angry, ignorant and cruel. This set of negative qualities greatly outweighs the external significance of Dikiy, whose last name also speaks for itself - all his behavior is wild and unnatural.

It doesn’t matter to him what others think about this or that issue; Dikoy considers his own opinion to be the only correct one. He stops at nothing, brazenly taking away what he has acquired through back-breaking labor. This hero takes pleasure in quarreling and swearing with everyone. He shouts at his workers who come for their due salary, raises his voice at family members who get the most from the character of Savl Prokofich. Knowing that his nephew’s fate is in his hands, he abuses his powers in relation to Boris, because he is ready to fulfill any of his demands in order to receive an inheritance. Dikoy can only communicate as equals with Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova, who, surprisingly, understands his nature. Savl Prokopyich personifies the morals of a small provincial town. With the help of this image, the author wanted to show the reader the need for changes in the views and behavior of society at that time.

Kabanikha - the negative character of the play

The image of Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova is presented in the play as one of the most negative. This is a rich merchant's wife, a widow. A despotic and capricious woman, she keeps the whole house in fear, offending both her own son and daughter, and her daughter-in-law, who suffers the most. “You must do what your mother says,” she orders her weak-willed son Tikhon, and he obeys the demands of the oppressive parent. Achieving order down to the smallest detail, Kabanikha acts with violent methods, making everyone fear her. He won’t be afraid of you, and he won’t be afraid of me either. What kind of order will there be in the house?..” she is perplexed.

In addition, Marfa Ignatievna is a hypocritical and cold-blooded old woman who loves to read morals to her children, without doing what she herself advises. Kabanova is used to getting her way only with reproaches and threats; she does not know such feelings as love and compassion. She mistakenly believes that children should revere their parents so much that their opinions are not taken into account. Indirectly, Kabanova becomes the main reason for the terrible death of her daughter-in-law Katerina, but does not realize this.

Tikhon, son of Kabanova

There is such an expression as “mama’s boy”. It suits Tikhon Kabanov, the son of Marfa Ignatievna, perfectly.

From childhood, accustomed to living in complete submission to a strict mother, he grew up weak-willed and characterless.

This manifests itself throughout his life. Having no opinion of his own, Tikhon cannot make even the simplest decisions, in panic fear of the condemnation of his strict mother, who, without even realizing it, raised her son to be an infantile loser who would start nagging at the slightest danger - and the worst thing is, they lived with the conviction that such education is the only correct one.

We invite you to familiarize yourself with A. Ostrovsky’s play “The Thunderstorm”

Only once, at the end of the play, when a tragedy occurred with his wife Katerina, Tikhon exclaimed, reproaching his mother: “Mama, you ruined her! you, you, you...” And here it is shown that even a person driven into a dead end is capable of defending his position. It’s just a pity that he realized too late what a jewel and treasure his wife was for him.

Varvara - Tikhon's sister

Varvara Kabanova is Tikhon’s sister and daughter of Marfa Ignatievna. Getting acquainted with the play, the reader can notice what a contrast the brother and sister represent. She, unlike the lack of initiative Tikhon, is lively and courageous, able to make decisions on her own. Varya managed, unlike her brother, to adapt to the character of her overly demanding and wayward mother; I learned to lie, to be a hypocrite, to dodge where necessary, to ignore her orders.

To remove obstacles to meeting her loved one, Varvara simply changed the lock. Thus, she protected herself from unnecessary outbursts of her mother’s anger. As they say, the wolves are fed and the sheep are safe.

This girl is, firstly, practical, secondly, cheerful, thirdly, smart and insightful. In addition, she is the only one in the family who supports Katerina and gives her good advice. In the work, the attitude “do what you want, the main thing is that no one finds out anything” is realized in the image of Varvara.

Katerina is the main character of the play

In A. Ostrovsky's play "The Thunderstorm" the image of Katerina is key. This girl experiences a difficult fate, and, unfortunately, her life ends tragically. But to understand the character of the heroine, you need to follow the author’s storyline from the very beginning.

The only happy childhood for Katerina was when she, like a sponge, absorbed the good things that were instilled by her loving parents and went to church with great joy.

And then a storm struck in the girl’s life. She got married. Unfortunately, it was unsuccessful. For a weak-willed and spineless person, for whom mother’s orders are more important than normal and healthy relationships in his own family.

All dreams of a happy and strong family collapsed, life went downhill. The fierce mother-in-law Marfa Ignatievna began to act with the girl according to her already proven methods of violence and endless reproaches, which were unacceptable to Katerina. No matter how hard the daughter-in-law tried to smooth out the situation in her family, nothing worked. The mother-in-law continued to nag with or without reason, and the weak-willed husband still obeyed his mother.

Katerina with all her soul internally opposes such hypocritical and senseless behavior, this contradicts her bright and sincere nature, but the girl cannot resist the order established in the Kabanova family. She doesn’t love her husband, but she feels sorry for her, and this is not enough to create a strong family. And then Katerina indulges in feelings of love for another – Dikiy’s nephew, Boris. And from then on even bigger problems began - pangs of conscience that give no rest day or night, a constant question in the soul: “Should I admit my guilt?” “She’s shaking all over, as if she’s got a fever; so pale, rushing around the house, as if looking for something,” says her husband’s sister Varvara about Katerina’s condition. - Eyes like those of a madwoman! Just this morning I started crying and just kept crying. My fathers! What should I do with it?

And finally, Katerina takes a decisive step, telling her mother-in-law and husband about her sin towards Boris: “Mother! Tikhon! I am a sinner before God and before you! Wasn’t it me who swore to you that I wouldn’t look at anyone without you! Remember, remember! Do you know what I, dissolute, did without you? On the very first night I left home... And all ten nights I walked with Boris Grigorievich.”

After this, a real tragedy unfolds: reproaches and scolding from the mother-in-law, who incites her son to beat his daughter-in-law, unbearable mental pain and, finally, the fatal decision - to rush into the Volga. Alas, Katerina’s life was cut short at a young age. Some understand and do not condemn her for this act, some, on the contrary, believe that only a weak-willed person could commit suicide. But, be that as it may, Katerina will remain in the eyes of many readers a positive heroine, that is, the best of all the characters in the play.

We bring to your attention a list of the main characters of Ostrovsky’s play “The Thunderstorm”.

Savel Prokofievich Dick O th – merchant, a significant person in the city. A scolding, shrill man, this is how those who personally know him characterize him. He really doesn't like giving money. Whoever asks him for money, he certainly tries to scold him. He tyrannizes his nephew Boris, and is not going to pay him and his sister money from the inheritance.

Boris Grigorievich, his nephew, a young man, decently educated. He loves Katerina sincerely, with all his soul. But he is not able to decide anything on his own. There is no male initiative or strength in him. Goes with the flow. They sent him to Siberia, and he went, although in principle he could have refused. Boris admitted to Kuligin that he tolerated his uncle’s quirks for the sake of his sister, hoping that he would pay at least something from his grandmother’s will for her dowry.

Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova(Kabanikha), a rich merchant's wife, a widow - a tough, even cruel woman. He keeps the whole family under his thumb. He behaves piously in front of the people. Adheres to Domostroevsky customs in a form distorted in its concepts. But he tyrannizes his family for no reason.

Tikhon Ivanovich Kabanov, her son is a mama's boy. A quiet, downtrodden little man, unable to decide anything on his own. Tikhon loves his wife, but is afraid to show his feelings for her, so as not to anger his mother again. Living at home with his mother was unbearable for him, and he was glad to leave for 2 weeks. When Katerina repented, he asked for a wife, just not with her mother. He understood that for her sin, her mother would peck not only Katerina, but also him himself. He himself is ready to forgive his wife for this feeling for another. He beat her lightly, but only because his mother ordered him to. And only over the corpse of his wife does the mother reproach that it was she who ruined Katerina.

Katerina - Tikhon's wife. The main character of "Thunderstorm". She received a good, pious upbringing. God-fearing. Even the townspeople noticed that when she prayed, it was as if light emanated from her, she became so peaceful at the moment of prayer. Katerina admitted to Varvara that she secretly loved another man. Varvara arranged a date for Katerina, and for the entire 10 days while Tikhon was away, she met with her lover. Katerina understood that this was a grave sin, and therefore, at the first laziness upon arrival, she repented to her husband. She was pushed to repentance by a thunderstorm, an old half-crazed lady who frightened everyone and everything with fiery hell. She feels sorry for Boris and Tikhon, and blames only herself for everything that happened. At the end of the play, she throws herself into the pool and dies, although suicide is the most serious sin in Christianity.

Varvara – Tikhon's sister. A lively and cunning girl, unlike Tikhon, she does not bend in front of her mother. Her life credo: do whatever you want, as long as it’s safe and covered. Secretly from his mother, he meets with Kudryash at night. She also arranged a date between Katerina and Boris. At the end, when they began to lock her up, she runs away from the house with Kudryash.

Kuligin – tradesman, watchmaker, self-taught mechanic, looking for a perpetuum mobile. It is no coincidence that Ostrovsky gave this hero a surname similar to the famous mechanic - Kulibin.

Vanya Kudryash, - a young man, Dikov’s clerk, Varvara’s friend, a cheerful guy, cheerful, loves to sing.

Minor characters of "The Thunderstorm":

Shapkin, tradesman.

Feklusha, wanderer.

Glasha, the girl in Kabanova’s house, Glasha, hid all of Varvara’s tricks and supported her.

Lady with two footmen, an old woman of 70 years old, half-crazy - scares all the townspeople with the Last Judgment.

City dwellers of both sexes.

The events in A. N. Ostrovsky’s drama “The Thunderstorm” take place on the Volga coast, in the fictional city of Kalinov. The work provides a list of characters and their brief characteristics, but they are still not enough to better understand the world of each character and reveal the conflict of the play as a whole. There are not many main characters in Ostrovsky’s “The Thunderstorm”.

Katerina, a girl, the main character of the play. She is quite young, she was married off early. Katya was brought up exactly according to the traditions of house building: the main qualities of a wife were respect and humility

to your spouse. At first, Katya tried to love Tikhon, but she could not feel anything but pity for him. At the same time, the girl tried to support her husband, help him and not reproach him. Katerina can be called the most modest, but at the same time the most powerful character in “The Thunderstorm”. Indeed, Katya’s strength of character does not appear outwardly. At first glance, this girl is weak and silent, it seems as if she is easy to break. But this is not true at all. Katerina is the only one in the family who resists Kabanikha’s attacks.
She resists, and does not ignore them, like Varvara. The conflict is rather internal. After all, Kabanikha is afraid that Katya might influence her son, after which Tikhon will stop obeying his mother’s will.

Katya wants to fly and often compares herself to a bird. She is literally suffocating in Kalinov’s “dark kingdom”. Having fallen in love with a visiting young man, Katya created for herself an ideal image of love and possible liberation. Unfortunately, her ideas had little in common with reality. The girl's life ended tragically.

Ostrovsky in “The Thunderstorm” makes not only Katerina the main character. The image of Katya is contrasted with the image of Marfa Ignatievna. A woman who keeps her entire family in fear and tension does not command respect. Kabanikha is strong and despotic. Most likely, she took over the “reins of power” after the death of her husband. Although it is more likely that in her marriage Kabanikha was not distinguished by submissiveness. Katya, her daughter-in-law, suffered the most from her. It is Kabanikha who is indirectly responsible for the death of Katerina.

Varvara is the daughter of Kabanikha. Despite the fact that over so many years she has learned to be cunning and lie, the reader still sympathizes with her. Varvara is a good girl. Surprisingly, deception and cunning do not make her like the rest of the city's residents. She does as she pleases and lives as she pleases. Varvara is not afraid of her mother’s anger, since she is not an authority for her.

Tikhon Kabanov fully lives up to his name. He is quiet, weak, unnoticeable. Tikhon cannot protect his wife from his mother, since he himself is under the strong influence of Kabanikha. His rebellion ultimately proves to be the most significant. After all, it is the words, and not Varvara’s escape, that make readers think about the whole tragedy of the situation.

The author characterizes Kuligin as a self-taught mechanic. This character is a kind of tour guide.
In the first act, he seems to be taking us around Kalinov, talking about its morals, about the families that live here, about the social situation. Kuligin seems to know everything about everyone. His assessments of others are very accurate. Kuligin himself is a kind person who is used to living by established rules. He constantly dreams of the common good, of a perpetu mobile, of a lightning rod, of honest work. Unfortunately, his dreams are not destined to come true.

The Wild One has a clerk, Kudryash. This character is interesting because he is not afraid of the merchant and can tell him what he thinks about him. At the same time, Kudryash, just like Dikoy, tries to find benefit in everything. He can be described as a simple person.

Boris comes to Kalinov on business: he urgently needs to establish relations with Dikiy, because only in this case will he be able to receive the money legally bequeathed to him. However, neither Boris nor Dikoy even want to see each other. Initially, Boris seems to readers like Katya, honest and fair. In the last scenes this is refuted: Boris is unable to decide to take a serious step, to take responsibility, he simply runs away, leaving Katya alone.

One of the heroes of “The Thunderstorm” is the wanderer and the maid. Feklusha and Glasha are shown as typical inhabitants of the city of Kalinov. Their darkness and lack of education is truly amazing. Their judgments are absurd and their horizons are very narrow. Women judge morality and ethics according to some perverted, distorted concepts. “Moscow is now full of carnivals and games, but in the streets there is an indo roar and a groan. Why, Mother Marfa Ignatievna, they started harnessing a fiery serpent: everything, you see, for the sake of speed,” is how Feklusha speaks about progress and reforms, and the woman calls a car a “fiery serpent.” The concept of progress and culture is alien to such people, because it is convenient for them to live in an invented limited world of calm and regularity.

This article provides a brief description of the characters in the play “The Thunderstorm”; for a deeper understanding, we recommend that you read the thematic articles about each character in “The Thunderstorm” on our website.

History of writing

Inspired by the beauty of the Volga region and its endless expanses during a trip with his family to Kostroma in 1848, Ostrovsky began writing the play in July 1859, three months later he finished it and sent it to the St. Petersburg censorship court.

Having worked for several years in the office of the Moscow Conscientious Court, he knew well what the merchant class was like in Zamoskvorechye (the historical district of the capital, on the right bank of the Moscow River), more than once having encountered in his service what was going on behind the high fences of the merchant choirs , namely with cruelty, tyranny, ignorance and various superstitions, illegal transactions and scams, tears and suffering of others. The basis for the plot of the play was the tragic fate of the daughter-in-law in the wealthy merchant family of the Klykovs, which happened in reality: a young woman rushed into the Volga and drowned, unable to withstand oppression from her domineering mother-in-law, tired of her husband’s spinelessness and secret passion for a postal employee. Many believed that it was the stories from the life of the Kostroma merchants that became the prototype for the plot of the play written by Ostrovsky.

In November 1859, the play was performed on the stage of the Maly Academic Theater in Moscow, and in December of the same year at the Alexandrinsky Drama Theater in St. Petersburg.

Analysis of the work

Story line

At the center of the events described in the play is the wealthy merchant family of the Kabanovs, living in the fictional Volga city of Kalinov, a kind of peculiar and closed little world, symbolizing the general structure of the entire patriarchal Russian state. The Kabanov family consists of a powerful and cruel tyrant woman, and essentially the head of the family, a wealthy merchant and widow Marfa Ignatievna, her son, Tikhon Ivanovich, weak-willed and spineless against the backdrop of the difficult disposition of his mother, daughter Varvara, who learned by deception and cunning to resist her mother’s despotism , as well as Katerina’s daughter-in-law. A young woman, who grew up in a family where she was loved and pitied, suffers in the house of her unloved husband from his lack of will and the claims of her mother-in-law, having essentially lost her will and becoming a victim of Kabanikha’s cruelty and tyranny, left to the mercy of fate by her rag husband.

Out of hopelessness and despair, Katerina seeks consolation in her love for Boris Dikiy, who also loves her, but is afraid to disobey his uncle, the rich merchant Savel Prokofich Dikiy, because the financial situation of him and his sister depends on him. He secretly meets with Katerina, but at the last moment he betrays her and runs away, then, at the direction of his uncle, he leaves for Siberia.

Katerina, having been brought up in obedience and submission to her husband, tormented by her own sin, confesses everything to her husband in the presence of his mother. She makes her daughter-in-law’s life completely unbearable, and Katerina, suffering from unhappy love, reproaches of conscience and cruel persecution of the tyrant and despot Kabanikha, decides to end her torment, the only way in which she sees salvation is suicide. She throws herself off a cliff into the Volga and dies tragically.

Main characters

All the characters in the play are divided into two opposing camps, some (Kabanikha, her son and daughter, the merchant Dikoy and his nephew Boris, the maids Feklusha and Glasha) are representatives of the old, patriarchal way of life, others (Katerina, self-taught mechanic Kuligin) are representatives of the new, progressive.

A young woman, Katerina, the wife of Tikhon Kabanov, is the central character of the play. She was brought up in strict patriarchal rules, in accordance with the laws of the ancient Russian Domostroy: a wife must submit to her husband in everything, respect him, and fulfill all his demands. At first, Katerina tried with all her might to love her husband, to become a submissive and good wife for him, but due to his complete spinelessness and weakness of character, she can only feel pity for him.

Outwardly, she looks weak and silent, but in the depths of her soul there is enough willpower and perseverance to resist the tyranny of her mother-in-law, who is afraid that her daughter-in-law might change her son Tikhon and he will stop submitting to his mother’s will. Katerina is cramped and stuffy in the dark kingdom of life in Kalinov, she literally suffocates there and in her dreams she flies like a bird away from this terrible place for her.

Boris

Having fallen in love with a visiting young man, Boris, the nephew of a rich merchant and businessman, she creates in her head an image of an ideal lover and a real man, which is not at all true, breaks her heart and leads to a tragic ending.

In the play, the character of Katerina opposes not a specific person, her mother-in-law, but the entire patriarchal structure that existed at that time.

Kabanikha

Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova (Kabanikha), like the tyrant merchant Dikoy, who tortures and insults his relatives, does not pay wages and deceives his workers, are prominent representatives of the old, bourgeois way of life. They are distinguished by stupidity and ignorance, unjustified cruelty, rudeness and rudeness, complete rejection of any progressive changes in the ossified patriarchal way of life.

Tikhon

(Tikhon, in the illustration near Kabanikha - Marfa Ignatievna)

Tikhon Kabanov is characterized throughout the play as a quiet and weak-willed person, under the complete influence of his oppressive mother. Distinguished by his gentle character, he makes no attempts to protect his wife from her mother’s attacks.

At the end of the play, he finally breaks down and the author shows his rebellion against tyranny and despotism; it is his phrase at the end of the play that leads readers to a certain conclusion about the depth and tragedy of the current situation.

Features of compositional construction

(Fragment from a dramatic production)

The work begins with a description of the city on the Volga Kalinov, the image of which is a collective image of all Russian cities of that time. The landscape of the Volga expanses depicted in the play contrasts with the musty, dull and gloomy atmosphere of life in this city, which is emphasized by the dead isolation of the life of its inhabitants, their underdevelopment, dullness and wild lack of education. The author described the general state of city life as if before a thunderstorm, when the old, dilapidated way of life will be shaken, and new and progressive trends, like a gust of furious thunderstorm wind, will sweep away the outdated rules and prejudices that prevent people from living normally. The period of life of the residents of the city of Kalinov described in the play is precisely in a state when outwardly everything looks calm, but this is only the calm before the coming storm.

The genre of the play can be interpreted as a social drama, as well as a tragedy. The first is characterized by the use of a thorough description of living conditions, the maximum transfer of its “density,” as well as the alignment of characters. Readers' attention should be distributed among all participants in the production. The interpretation of the play as a tragedy presupposes its deeper meaning and thoroughness. If you see Katerina’s death as a consequence of her conflict with her mother-in-law, then she looks like a victim of a family conflict, and the entire unfolding action in the play seems petty and insignificant for a real tragedy. But if we consider the death of the main character as a conflict of a new, progressive time with a fading, old era, then her act is best interpreted in the heroic key characteristic of a tragic narrative.

The talented playwright Alexander Ostrovsky, from a social and everyday drama about the life of the merchant class, gradually creates a real tragedy, in which, with the help of a love-domestic conflict, he showed the onset of an epochal turning point taking place in the consciousness of the people. Ordinary people realize their awakening sense of self-worth, begin to have a new attitude towards the world around them, want to decide their own destinies and fearlessly express their will. This nascent desire comes into irreconcilable contradiction with the real patriarchal way of life. Katerina's fate acquires a social historical meaning, expressing the state of the people's consciousness at the turning point between two eras.

Alexander Ostrovsky, who noticed in time the doom of the decaying patriarchal foundations, wrote the play “The Thunderstorm” and opened the eyes of the entire Russian public to what was happening. He depicted the destruction of a familiar, outdated way of life, with the help of the ambiguous and figurative concept of a thunderstorm, which, gradually growing, will sweep away everything from its path and open the way to a new, better life.