Sections: Literature

Lesson Objectives:

• introduce the tragic fate of the writer and poet Varlam Shalamov; identify the features of the plot and poetics of "Kolyma Tales";
• develop the skills of literary analysis, the ability to conduct a dialogue;
• to form the civic position of high school students.

Equipment: portrait of V.Shalamov, multimedia presentation

During the classes

1. Stage of goal setting.

Music. "Requiem" by W. Mozart

Teacher(reading with music in the background)

To everyone who was branded by the fifty-eighth article,
who in a dream was surrounded by dogs, a fierce convoy,
who by court, without trial, by a special meeting
was doomed to a prison uniform to the grave,
who was betrothed by fate with shackles, thorns, chains
to them our tears and sorrow, our eternal memory! (T.Ruslov)

Today in the lesson we have to talk about political repressions in the Soviet Union, about the people who suffered from them, about the writer of amazing fate - Varlam Tikhonovich Shalamov - and his prose. Open your notebooks and write down the topic of today's lesson

(slide 1). At home you read the stories of Varlam Shalamov. What is our goal for today's lesson? (Students' answers: get acquainted with the work of V. Shalamov, his biography, comprehend his works).

Varlam Tikhonovich Shalamov spent almost 20 years in Soviet camps, survived, withstood and found the strength to write about it in the work "Kolyma Tales", some of which you managed to get acquainted with. How did you receive these stories? What surprised, amazed, outraged? (Student answers)

What is the mystery of "Kolyma Tales"? Why does the author himself consider his works "new prose"? These are the key questions of our lesson (slide 2).

2. Actualization of students' knowledge.

But in order to understand Shalamov's prose, one must have a good idea of ​​the historical events of those years.

Student's message "History of repressions in the USSR"

AI Solzhenitsyn said: "No Genghis Khan has destroyed so many peasants as our glorious Organs, led by the Party." Of course, all this could not touch the literary process. Let's remember some facts.

Student's message "Repression in Literature"(The following facts should be mentioned: Alexander Blok suffocated from the lack of air of freedom in 1921. Shot: Nikolai Gumilyov in 1921 on charges of a counter-revolutionary conspiracy, Boris Pilnyak in April 1938, Nikolai Klyuev and Sergei Klychkov in October 1937, Isaac Babel in January 1940. Osip Mandelstam died in a camp in 1938. Sergei Yesenin in 1925, Vladimir Mayakovsky in 1930, Marina Tsvetaeva in 1941 committed suicide, unable to withstand the duel with the totalitarian regime. Ivan Bunin and Zinaida Gippius died in exile , Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Igor Severyanin, Vyacheslav Ivanov, Konstantin Balmont, Iosif Brodsky, Alexander Galich. Anna Akhmatova, Mikhail Zoshchenko, Boris Pasternak were persecuted. Passed the Gulag Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Anatoly Zhigulin, Nikolai Zabolotsky, Yaroslav Smelyakov, Joseph Brodsky. In the House of Writers in Moscow there is a memorial plaque in memory of those writers who died in the war - 70 people. repressed by the exchanges, but then they realized that there would not be enough space. All walls will be painted.)

Teacher. Let's name one more name in this mournful list - V.T. Shalamov, one of those who set it as their task to survive and tell the truth. This theme also sounds in the works of A. Solzhenitsyn, and Yuri Dombrovsky, and Oleg Volkov, and Anatoly Zhigulin, and Lydia Chukovskaya, but the power of V. Shalamov's books is simply amazing (slide 3).

In the fate of Shalamov, two principles collided: on the one hand, his character, beliefs, on the other, the pressure of time, the state, which sought to destroy this person. His talent, his passionate thirst for justice. Fearlessness, readiness to prove the word by deed: All this was not only not in demand by time, but also became too dangerous for him.

3. Learning new material. Work in groups to study the biography of Varlam Shalamov.

Group work. (Students are divided into groups in advance).

On each table there are texts with a biography of V.T. Shalamov. Read, highlight the main milestones of the biography (with a marker), be ready to answer questions.

Questions:

1. Where and when was Shalamov born? What can be said about his family?
2. Where did V. Shalamov study?
3. When was V. Shalamov arrested and for what?
4. What was the verdict?
5. When and where did Shalamov serve his sentence?
6. When was Shalamov arrested again? What is the reason?
7. Why was his term extended in 1943?
8. When is Shalamov released from the camp? When will he return to Moscow?
9. In what year did he start working on Kolyma Tales?

(Answers to questions are accompanied by slides with photos)

Teacher: Varlam Shalamov died on January 17, 1982, having lost his hearing and sight, completely defenseless in the House of Invalids of the Litfond, having drunk the cup of non-recognition to the end during his lifetime.

• "Kolyma stories" - the main work of the writer. He gave 20 years to create them. The reader learned 137 stories collected in 5 collections:
• "Kolyma stories"
• "Left Coast"
• "Shovel Artist"
• "Resurrection of the Larch"
• "Glove, or KR-2"

4. Analysis of "Kolyma stories".

• What stories have you read? (Student answers)

Work in pairs.

Let's make a cluster with the word "Kolyma". Try to reflect in it your perception of the world of Kolyma, what feelings prevail in it? We work in pairs, we try to agree. Clusters are attached to the board and read out.

Let's turn to the story "Tombstone". Questions for analysis:

1. What is the impression of a story that begins with the words: "Everyone is dead:"? Everyone: who, why, how? (answers) Yes, these are people about whom Shalamov himself will say: "This is the fate of martyrs who were not, did not know how and did not become heroes." But they remained people in such conditions - and this means a lot. The writer shows this laconic, just one detail. The detail is very important in Shalamov's prose. Here is such, for example, a small detail: ": foreman Barbe is a comrade who helped me pull a large stone out of a narrow pit." The brigadier, who is usually an enemy in the camp, a murderer, is called a comrade. He helped the prisoner, but did not beat him. What opens up behind it? (With comradely relations, the plan was not carried out, because it could only be carried out under an inhuman, lethal load. Barbe was reported, and he died.)

2. Scary stories, creepy stories. What do people dream about on Christmas Eve? (answers) And here is the voice of Volodya Dobrovoltsev (pay attention to the surname): “- And I,” and his voice was calm and unhurried, “I would like to be a stump. A human stump, you know, without arms, without legs. Then I would have found I have the strength to spit in their faces for everything they do to us." And why does he want to be a stump?

3. What is the plot of the story? (Death). Death, non-existence is the artistic world in which the action of the story unfolds. And not only here. The fact of death precedes the beginning of the plot. Agree that this is unusual for Russian prose.

Let's work with the story "The Snake Charmer". Each group gets its own task. Group 1 - Read the beginning of the story, find words and phrases that affect the reader's feelings. What feelings arise? Group 2 - What "thin" and "thick" questions did you have while reading the story? Group 3 - What fragments of the story require reflection and reflection?

In the process of analyzing the story, we will definitely pay attention to those difficult questions that you have. Let's try to figure it out together.

• Why is the story called "The Snake Charmer"? Who can be considered a snake charmer?
• Why did Platonov agree to tell novels after all? Is it possible to condemn him?
• Is Platonov's consent to "squeeze novels" a sign of strength or weakness?
• Why did Platonov develop heart disease?
• What is the author's attitude to such a way to improve one's position? (Sharply negative)
• How is Senechka depicted? What does he personify?

(At first glance, it seems that the story is about the confrontation between the political and the thieves, but if you look deeper, then it is no accident that Platonov - the screenwriter-intellectual opposes the blatars, that spirituality opposes brute force. But there is another plan related to the theme "artist and power", "artist and society". "Squeezing novels" - this phrase from thieves' jargon is in itself a powerful satirical metaphor: such "squeezing" for the sake of the powerful of this world is an ancient and hard to get rid of feature of literature, Shalamov managed to show his negative attitude both "snakes" and "casters".)

The story "The last battle of Major Pugachev". Valery Esipov, a researcher of Shalamov's creativity, writes that "Shalamov did not write a single word just like that."

• What is this story about?
• Why does the author compare the arrests of the 1930s and 1940s at the beginning of the story? How did former front-line soldiers differ from other prisoners?
• Tell us about the fate of Major Pugachev. What is the fate of his comrades? How did the experience of the war affect them?
• How did the prisoners behave during the escape?
• Why were there no wounded prisoners in the hospital? Why was Soldatov treated?
• Why does the story end with the death of Pugachev?

What is the feeling after reading the story? How is the author's attitude towards the characters manifested? (The surname Pugachev speaks of the author's attitude towards the heroes, and the fact that the author constantly calls him by rank - major, emphasizing that he is a fighter who challenged the camp authorities, and the smile of the major when remembering his dead comrades before his own death. Shalamov will say about him - "a difficult male life", before his death he will give him a tasteless cranberry berry, repeat the words "best people" twice and remember his smile, experiencing the joy that a person has a spiritual height.)

Why did Shalamov, who claimed that there could be no successful escapes in Kolyma, glorified Major Pugachev? What is the feat of Major Pugachev? (The feat of Pugachev and his comrades is not that they defended their freedom with weapons in their hands, not that they turned their machine guns against the Soviet regime, not that they - every single one - preferred death to surrender. They became heroes because they refused to accept the system of thinking and feeling imposed on them. Realizing the camp as an extrahuman system, they refused to exist in it. Escape - from the camp to the taiga - from the Camp to the World - was undoubtedly a miracle of physical courage, but above all brave thought.)

Having written a fairy tale, very important for the writer personally, Shalamov deduces a new camp law - the law of the preservation of personality, answers the question of how to get out of this world of death. At that moment, when Shalamov set himself the task of "remembering and writing," he, like Pugachev and his comrades, fought according to his own rules - from a Prisoner he became a Writer, he transferred the battle with an extrahuman system to an alien camp and his own territory of culture.

Teacher: Guys, did you and I manage to get closer to unraveling the mystery of the Kolyma Tales? What features of Shalamov's prose, called "new prose", will we note?

(The secret of the "Kolyma Tales" is that, with all the negative things, the author managed to show that people remain people even in inhuman conditions, there is a way to fight this system - not to accept its rules, to defeat it with the power of art and harmony. Features of the "new prose" Shalamova: documentary, laconic narration, the presence of a detail-symbol.)

Let's try to make syncwines in groups on the topics: "Kolyma stories", "Man", "Varlam Shalamov", so that you can express your feelings after our lesson.

Homework: write a review of one of Shalamov's stories using the "criticism" pyramid; watch the film "Lenin's Testament".

Literature.

2. Valery Esipov. "Dispel this fog" (V. Shalamov's late prose: motivations and problems) // www.shalamov.ru/research/92/

3. N.L. Krupina, N.A. Sosnina. Complicity of time. - M., "Enlightenment", 1992

The theme of the tragic fate of a person in a totalitarian state in the "Kolyma stories" by V. Shalamov

I've been living in a cave for twenty years

Burning with a single dream

breaking free and moving

shoulders like Samson, I'll bring down

stone vaults

this dream.

V. Shalamov

The Stalin years are one of the tragic periods in the history of Russia. Numerous repressions, denunciations, executions, a heavy, oppressive atmosphere of non-freedom - these are just some of the signs of the life of a totalitarian state. The terrible, cruel machine of authoritarianism broke the fate of millions of people, their relatives and friends.

V. Shalamov is a witness and participant in those terrible events that a totalitarian country was going through. He went through both exile and Stalin's camps. Other thinking was severely persecuted by the authorities, and the writer had to pay too high a price for the desire to tell the truth. Varlam Tikhonovich summarized the experience taken from the camps in the collection "Kolymsky stories". "Kolyma Tales" is a monument to those whose lives were ruined for the sake of the cult of personality.

Showing in the stories the images of those convicted under the fifty-eighth, “political” article and the images of criminals who are also serving sentences in camps, Shalamov reveals many moral problems. Finding themselves in a critical life situation, people showed their true self. Among the prisoners there were traitors, and cowards, and scoundrels, and those who were "broken" by the new circumstances of life, and those who managed to preserve the human in themselves in inhuman conditions. The last one was the least.

The most terrible enemies, "enemies of the people", were political prisoners for the authorities. It was they who were in the camp in the most severe conditions. Criminals - thieves, murderers, robbers, whom the narrator ironically calls "friends of the people", paradoxically, aroused much more sympathy from the camp authorities. They had various indulgences, they could not go to work. They got away with a lot.

In the story “At the Show”, Shalamov shows a card game in which the personal belongings of the prisoners become the prize. The author draws images of Naumov's and Sevochka's criminals, for whom human life is worth nothing and who kill engineer Garkunov for a woolen sweater. The author's calm intonation, with which he ends his story, says that such camp scenes are a common, everyday occurrence.

The story “Night” shows how people blur the lines between good and bad, how the main goal became to survive on their own, no matter what the cost. Glebov and Bagretsov take off clothes from a dead man at night with the intention of obtaining bread and tobacco instead. In another story, the condemned Denisov with pleasure pulls footcloths from a dying, but still living comrade.

The life of the prisoners was unbearable, it was especially hard for them in severe frosts. The heroes of the story "Carpenters" Grigoriev and Potashnikov, intelligent people, in order to save their own lives, in order to spend at least one day in the warmth, go to deceit. They go to carpentry, not knowing how to do it, than they are saved from the bitter frost, they get a piece of bread and the right to warm themselves by the stove.

The hero of the story "Single measurement", a recent university student, exhausted by hunger, receives a single measurement. He is unable to complete this task completely, and his punishment for that is execution. The heroes of the story "Tombstone Word" were also severely punished. Weakened from hunger, they were forced to do overwork. For the request of foreman Dyukov to improve nutrition, the entire brigade was shot along with him.

The destructive influence of the totalitarian system on the human personality is very clearly demonstrated in the story "The Parcel". It is very rare for political prisoners to receive parcels. This is a great joy for each of them. But hunger and cold kill the human in man. The prisoners are robbing each other! “From hunger, our envy was dull and powerless,” says the story “Condensed Milk”.

The author also shows the brutality of the guards, who, having no sympathy for their neighbors, destroy the pitiful pieces of prisoners, break their bowlers, beat the condemned Efremov to death for stealing firewood.

The story "Rain" shows that the work of the "enemies of the people" takes place in unbearable conditions: waist-deep in the ground and under the incessant rain. For the slightest mistake, each of them is waiting for death. Great joy if someone cripple himself, and then, perhaps, he will be able to avoid hellish work.

Prisoners live in inhuman conditions: “In a barrack full of people, it was so crowded that you could sleep standing up ... The space under the bunks was packed with people to capacity, you had to wait to sit down, squat down, then lie down somewhere on a bunks, on a pole, on someone else's body - and fall asleep ... ".

Crippled souls, crippled destinies... “Everything inside was scorched, devastated, we didn't care,” sounds in the story Condensed Milk. In this story, the image of the “snitch” Shestakov arises, who, hoping to attract the narrator with a can of condensed milk, hopes to persuade him to escape, and then report it and receive a “reward”. Despite the extreme physical and moral exhaustion, the narrator finds the strength to figure out Shestakov's plan and deceive him. Not everyone, unfortunately, turned out to be so quick-witted. “They fled in a week, two were killed near the Black Keys, three were tried in a month.”

In the story "Major Pugachev's Last Fight", the author shows people whose spirit was not broken by either fascist concentration camps or Stalinist ones. “These were people with different skills, habits acquired during the war, with courage, the ability to take risks, who believed only in weapons. Commanders and soldiers, pilots and scouts,” the writer says about them. They make a daring and daring attempt to escape from the camp. The heroes realize that their salvation is impossible. But for a sip of freedom, they agree to give their lives.

“The Last Fight of Major Pugachev” clearly shows how the Motherland treated the people who fought for it and were guilty only of being captured by the Germans by the will of fate.

Varlam Shalamov - chronicler of the Kolyma camps. In 1962, he wrote to A. I. Solzhenitsyn: “Remember the most important thing: the camp is a negative school from the first to the last day for anyone. A man - neither the chief nor the prisoner, do not need to see him. But if you saw him, you must tell the truth, no matter how terrible it may be. For my part, I decided a long time ago that I would devote the rest of my life to this very truth.

Shalamov was true to his words. "Kolyma stories" became the pinnacle of his work.

LESSONS 1 - 2. V. SHALAMOV. "KOLYMA STORIES" OBJECTIVES: Analyzing the works of V. T. Shalamov, to answer the question: "What could a person oppose to this hellish colossus, grinding it with its teeth of evil?" Equipment: book exhibition: V. Shalamov. "Kolyma stories"; A. Solzhenitsyn. "The Gulag Archipelago"; O. Volkov. "Immersion in darkness"; recording of I. Talkov's song "Russia". DURING THE CLASSES. 1. Opening remarks Turning the pages of the works of V. Shalamov, A. Solzhenitsyn, O. Volkov, A. Zhigulin, we will feel the need to talk about the difficult, totalitarian time in our country. In many families, in the countryside and in the city, among the intelligentsia, workers and peasants, there were people who were sent to hard labor for many years for their political convictions, where many of them died from unbearable living conditions. Shalamov, Volkov, Zhigulin, Solzhenitsyn are writers who have drunk this cup to the full. “How do you get to this mysterious Archipelago? Airplanes fly there every hour, ships sail, trains thunder - but not a single inscription on them indicates the destination. Both ticket clerks and agents of Sovtourist and Intourist will be amazed if you ask for a ticket there. Neither the entire archipelago as a whole, nor one of its countless islets, they knew or heard. ... The Universe has as many centers as there are living beings in it. Each of us is the center of the universe, and the universe collapses when they hiss at you: "You are under arrest." If you are already under arrest, is there anything else that has survived this earthquake? What is an arrest? Arrest is an instantaneous, striking transfer, transfer, transfer from one state to another. Along the long crooked street of our life, we happily rushed or wandered unhappily past some kind of fences - rotten, wooden, adobe duvals, brick, concrete, cast-iron fences. We didn't think about what was behind them. We did not try to look beyond them with our eyes or mind - and that is where the Gulag country begins. Very close, two meters from us” (A. Solzhenitsyn, “The Gulag Archipelago”). The experience of Shalamov as a political prisoner is one of the most difficult: the work is inhumanly difficult - in a gold mine, and the term is extremely hard - seventeen years. Even among prisoners, Shalamov's fate is unusual. People who suffered from the Gulag admitted that Shalamov got much more. “Would I have withstood what Shalamov withstood? I'm not sure, I don't know. Because the depth of humiliation, deprivation that he had to endure in Kolyma ... of course, I did not have to. I have never been beaten, but Shalamov's eardrums were broken, ”wrote Oleg Vasilyevich Volkov. This terrible experience did not leave the writer all his life. “Closing his nose with a perfumed handkerchief, investigator Fedorov talked to me: “You see, you are accused of praising Hitler’s weapons. - What does it mean? - Well, the fact that you spoke approvingly of the German offensive. “I know next to nothing about it. I haven't seen newspapers for many years. Six years. - Well, that's not the point. You said that the Stakhanovite movement in the camp is a falsehood, a lie. - I said that this is ugliness, in my opinion, this is a distortion of the concept of "Stakhanovite". - Then you said that Bunin is a great Russian writer. – He is really a great Russian writer. For what I said, can I give time? 1 - It is possible. He is an emigrant, a vicious emigrant... You see how we treat you. Not a single rude word, no one beats you. No pressure ... "(V. T. Shalamov. "My process"). - What were they accused of, what was the hero of the story arrested for? What is an arrest? Here is how A. I. Solzhenitsyn answers this question: “... arrest: this is a blinding flash and blow, from which the present is immediately relegated to the past, and the impossible becomes a full-fledged present. This is a sharp night call, or a rude knock on the door. This is a brave entry into the indelible boots of operatives... This is breaking open, ripping open, throwing off the walls, throwing on the floor from cabinets, tables, shaking, tearing, scattering - and stuffing mountains on the floor, and a crunch under the boots! And nothing is sacred during a search! During the arrest of the locomotive engineer Inokhin, in his room on the table there was a coffin with a child who had just died. Lawyers threw the child on the floor, they searched in the coffin... And they shake the sick out of bed, and unbandage the bandages... In 1937, the institute of Dr. Kazakov was smashed. Vessels with lysates, invented by him, were broken by the "commission", although healed and healed cripples jumped around, and begged to keep the miraculous medicine. But according to the official version, lysates were considered poisons. So why weren't they kept at least as material evidence?! Arrests come in many different forms... You are arrested in the theatre, on the way to and from the store, at the train station, in a train car, in a taxi. Sometimes arrests even seem like a game - there is so much fiction, full energy in them ”(A.I. Solzhenitsyn.“ The Gulag Archipelago ”). - For what it was possible to get into the Archipelago? Listen to the voices of the terrible past ... (Students read fragments of documents: - Railway rank Gudkov: "I had records with Trotsky's speeches, and my wife reported." - Machinist, representative of the society of jokers: "Friends gathered on Saturdays with families and told jokes. .." Five years. Kolyma. Death ... - Misha Vygon - student of the Institute of Communications: "I wrote to Comrade Stalin about everything that I saw and heard in prison." For three years, Misha survived, insanely denying, renouncing his close comrades, survived executions. He himself became a shift supervisor at the same Partizan section, where all his comrades died and were destroyed. - Kostya and Nika. Fifteen-year-old Moscow schoolchildren who played football in a cell with a homemade rag ball "terrorists" who killed Khadzhyan. Many years later, it turned out that Khadzhyan was shot dead in his office by Beria. And the children who were accused of his murder - Kostya and Nika - died in Kolyma in 1938. They died, although no one really forced them to work ... They died from the cold ... A student reads a poem by V. Shalamov. Where is life? And I'm afraid to step forward, Even if with the rustle of a leaf To step, as if into a hole, into a black forest, She would let it slip, Where memory takes by the hand But behind her back is emptiness, And there is no heaven. But behind is silence. What do you feel in this poem? What marks the human and artistic memory of Shalamov? “Despite the terrible years spent in the mines, he retained an excellent memory. Shalamov draws the truth, seeks to restore to the smallest detail all the details of his stay in prison, does not soften the colors. – Shalamov depicts torture as inhuman conditions of existence, slavish overwork, the terror of criminals, hunger, cold, complete vulnerability to arbitrariness. The scrupulous memory of the writer captures the evil of the camps. Under the pen of the artist appears the truth about the experience. Students read an excerpt from Shalamov's letter to Pasternak. “The camp, for a long time, since 1929, has been called not a concentration camp, but a corrective labor camp (ITL), which, of course, does not change anything, is an extra link in the chain of lies. The first camp was opened in 1924 in Kholmogory, in the homeland of M.V. Lomonosov. It contained mainly participants in the Kronstadt rebellion (even numbers, because the odd ones were shot immediately after the suppression of the rebellion). In the period from 1924 to 1929 there was one camp - Solovetsky, i.e. SLON, with branches on the islands in Kem, Ukhta-Pechora and the Urals. Then they got a taste, and from 1929 the business began to grow rapidly. The "reforging" of the White Sea Canal began; Potma, then Dmitlag (Moscow - Volga), where in Dmitlag alone there were over 800,000 people. Then there were no more camps: Sevlag, Sevvostlag, Bamlag, Irkutlag. It was densely populated. ... White, slightly bluish haze of a sixty-degree winter night, an orchestra of silver pipes playing carcasses in front of a dead line of prisoners. The yellow light of huge gasoline torches drowning in the white haze; They read the lists of those who were shot for not fulfilling the norm ... ... The fugitive, who was caught in the taiga and shot by operatives ... chopped off his fingers of both hands - after all, they need to be printed - by morning he recovered and made his way to our hut. Then he was finally shot dead. ... Those who could not go to work were tied to drag sledges and the sleigh dragged him for two-three kilometers ... "The student reads an excerpt from B. Pasternak's poem "Soul": My soul, sadness With a sobbing lyre About everyone in my circle , Mourning them, You became a tomb You are selfish in our time Tortured alive. Embalming their bodies for conscience and fear, You stand as a grave urn, Dedicating a verse to them, Resting their ashes... - “All these are random pictures,” wrote Shalamov. - The main thing is not in them, but in the corruption of the mind and heart, when it becomes clearer day by day to the vast majority that, it turns out, it is possible to live without meat, without sugar, without clothes, without shoes, and most importantly without honor, duty, conscience, love! Everything is exposed, and this last exposure is terrible... After all, there has never been a single major construction site without prisoners - people whose life is an uninterrupted chain of humiliations. Time has successfully made a man forget that he is a man!” - That's about this and much more - "Kolyma stories" by Shalamov, which we'll talk about. 2. Analysis of stories. I recommended in advance to read for the lesson and summarize the content of Shalamov's stories “At Night”, “On the Show”, “The Snake Charmer”, “Major Pugachev's Last Fight”, “Best Praise”, “Shock Therapy”, “Apostle Pavel”. - Is it easy to save, not to lose yourself in the conditions described in the story "Night"? - Many of Shalamov's stories show how hunger, cold, constant beatings turn a person into a miserable creature. The desires of such people are dulled, limited to food, sympathy for someone else's grief is also dulled. Friendship is not formed in hunger and cold. - What feelings, for example, can the hero of the story "Single metering" have? A single measurement is a measurement of personal output. Former student Dugaev is given an impossible norm. He worked in such a way that "arms, shoulders, head hurt unbearably." But he still did not fulfill the norm (only 25%) and was shot. He is so exhausted and depressed that he has no feelings. He only “regretted that this last day of today had been tormented in vain.” – There were moments when the inflamed human brain continued to desperately resist gradual dying, dullness. Shalamov speaks about this in the story "Sentence". Shalamov's morality is the same for everyone, universal. It is for all time, and morality is only that which is for the benefit of man. There is no need to talk about any moral norms in the Gulag. What morality, if every minute you can be beaten for nothing, killed even without any reason. "NIGHT" 1954 - Briefly retell the plot of the story. (Two prisoners take off clothes from the dead to survive). - By what artistic means does the author draw his characters? (portrait - p. 11; there is a manner in the camp - p. 11). - How can you characterize the act of Bagretsov and Glebov in terms of morality? (as immoral) - What is the reason for the act? (a constant state of hunger, fear of not surviving, hence the act) - How can one morally evaluate this act? (disgrace, blasphemy) - Why did they choose this particular dead man? (p.12) (it was a newcomer) - Is it easy for the heroes to decide on such a thing? What was simple and clear for them? (p.11 - 12) (dig up clothes, sell, survive). The author shows that these people are still alive. - What unites Bagretsov and Glebov? (hope, desire to survive at any cost) - But these are no longer people, but mechanisms. (p. 12 √√) - Why is the story called "Night"? (p.13) (the phantom world of the night gives hope to survive, it is opposed to the real world of the day, which takes away this hope) Conclusion: a small hope to live one more day warmed and united people even in an immoral act. The moral principle (Glebov was a doctor) is completely suppressed before the cold, hunger, death. "AT THE PRESENTATION" (debt game) 1956 - Retell the plot of the story. (Sevochka and Naumov play cards. Naumov lost everything and began to play for a long time, but he has nothing of his own, and the debt must be submitted within an hour. The sweater of a person who does not give it voluntarily is given on credit, and he is killed). - Through what artistic means does the author introduce us to the life and life of prisoners? List. (description of the barracks, portrait characteristics, behavior of the heroes, their speech) - From the point of view. composition, what element is the description of the barrack? (p.5) (exposition) - What are the cards made of? What does it say? (p.5) (from the volume of V. Hugo, about lack of spirituality) - Read the portrait characteristics of the characters. Find key words in character descriptions. Sevochka (p. 6), Naumov (p. 7) - The game has begun. Through whose eyes are we watching it? (narrator) - What does Naumov lose to Sevochka? (costume, p.7) - By what moment, from the point of view. compositions, are we coming? (starting) 4 - What does the loser Naumov decide on? (for a presentation, p. 9.) - Where will he take the thing on credit? (p.9) - Who do we see now: a saint or a murderer looking for a victim? - Is the tension increasing? (yes) - What is the name of this compositional technique? (culmination) - Where is the highest point of tension: when Naumov is looking for a victim or Garkunov's words: "I won't take it off, only with skin"? Why didn't Garkunov take off his sweater? (p.10) (besides what the narrator says, this is also a fortress that connects Garkunov with another life, if he loses his sweater, he will die) - Which episode of the story serves as a denouement? (Murder of Garkunov, p. 10√√) This is the denouement, both physical and psychological. - Do you think the murderers will be punished? Why? Who is Garkunov? (No, Garkunov is an engineer, an enemy of the people, convicted under Art. 58, and the murderers are criminals who were encouraged by the chiefs of the camps, that is, there is mutual responsibility) “SNAKE CHARMER” 1954 Purpose: through artistic means to see forms of mockery of people. - Name the forms of bullying that occur in the story. (pushed in the back, pushed out into the light, raised at night, sent to sleep in a latrine (latrine), deprived of a name). Who is the clash between in the story? (This is a typical clash between criminals and political ones, according to Article 58) - Who is Fedechka? What is his status in the barracks? (p. 81√) (a fingernail, doing nothing - a form of life for criminals) - What was Fedechka daydreaming about? (p. 81 √√) - How does the speech characterize the hero? (he feels like a master, free in the life and death of these people) - Why does Platonov lose morality? (p.82√√) Having said: “... I can squeeze,” Platonov did not rise above the thieves, but descended to their level, thereby dooming himself to death, because. during the day he will work, and at night he will tell novels. - Has Platonov's position changed? Conclusion: in the camps there was an established system of bullying of those who were convicted under Article 58. Some of the scum crushed the best people, "helping" the state machine to grind the best that was. The student reads Shalamov's poem. If you manage, you will comfort That the ice of forest swamps And calm your sobs. Will never melt. Alas! Stronger hopes Under the black glass My memories. Swamps of ice Their raven protects Hidden warmth And he himself, I suppose, does not know The unspeakable word. “Alas! Stronger than hopes / My memories ... ”How do you understand these lines? How do you understand this poem? “The hopes of the prisoners may not be fulfilled. Most likely they won't come true. But the imprinted memory will remain. “Memories have power. They have experience... - Here is what Shalamov said in the story "The Train": "I was frightened by the terrible power of man - the desire and ability to forget. I saw that I was ready to forget, cross out, 20 years from my 5th life. And what years! And when I realized this, I defeated myself! I knew I wouldn't let my memory forget everything I saw!" Conclusion. V. Shalamov himself said that he conveyed in his work “... the truth about the struggle of man against the state machine. The truth of this struggle, the struggle for oneself, within oneself, outside oneself. Today we have touched this truth. And I hope we will keep it in our hearts... At home: pp. 313 - 315, a report on the life and work of V.M. Shukshin. Stories "Crank", "Cut", "Wolves", etc. 6

Consider Shalamov's collection, on which he worked from 1954 to 1962. Let's describe its brief content. "Kolyma Tales" is a collection, the plot of which is a description of the camp and prison life of the Gulag prisoners, their tragic destinies, similar to one another, in which chance rules. The author constantly focuses on hunger and satiety, painful dying and recovery, exhaustion, moral humiliation and degradation. You will learn more about the issues raised by Shalamov by reading the summary. "Kolyma stories" is a collection that is a reflection of what the author experienced and saw over the 17 years he spent in prison (1929-1931) and Kolyma (from 1937 to 1951). The photo of the author is presented below.

Gravestone

The author recalls his comrades from the camps. We will not list their names, as we are compiling a summary. "Kolyma stories" is a collection in which artistry and documentary are intertwined. However, all the murderers are given real names in the stories.

Continuing the story, the author describes how the prisoners died, what torments they experienced, talks about their hopes and behavior in "Auschwitz without ovens", as Shalamov called the Kolyma camps. Few managed to survive, but few survived and did not break morally.

"The Life of Engineer Kipreev"

Let us dwell on the following curious story, which we could not help but describe, making up a summary. "Kolyma Tales" is a collection in which the author, who has not sold or betrayed anyone, says that he has worked out a formula for protecting his own existence. It consists in the fact that a person can survive if he is ready to die at any moment, he can commit suicide. But later he realizes that he only built a comfortable shelter for himself, since it is not known what you will become at a decisive moment, whether you will have enough not only mental strength, but also physical.

Kipreev, an engineer-physicist arrested in 1938, not only was able to withstand the interrogation with a beating, but even attacked the investigator, as a result of which he was put in a punishment cell. But all the same, they are trying to get him to give false testimony, threatening to arrest his wife. Nevertheless, Kipreev continues to prove to everyone that he is not a slave, like all prisoners, but a man. Thanks to his talent (he fixed the broken one and found a way to restore burnt out light bulbs), this hero manages to avoid the most difficult work, but not always. It is only by a miracle that he survives, but the moral shock does not let him go.

"For the show"

Shalamov, who wrote the Kolyma Tales, a summary of which interests us, testifies that the camp corruption affected everyone to one degree or another. It was carried out in various forms. Let us describe in a few words one more work from the collection "Kolyma stories" - "On the show". A summary of his story is as follows.

Two thieves play cards. One loses and asks to play on credit. Exasperated at some point, he orders an unexpectedly imprisoned intellectual, who happened to be among the spectators, to hand over his sweater. He refuses. One of the thieves "finishes" him, and the thieves get the sweater anyway.

"At night"

We turn to the description of another work from the collection "Kolyma stories" - "At night". A brief summary of it, in our opinion, will also be interesting to the reader.

Two prisoners sneak to the grave. The body of their comrade was buried here in the morning. They take off the dead man's linen in order to exchange it tomorrow for tobacco or bread, or sell it. Disgust for the clothes of the deceased is replaced by the thought that perhaps tomorrow they will be able to smoke or eat a little more.

There are a lot of works in the collection "Kolyma stories". "Carpenters", the summary of which we have omitted, follows the story "Night". We invite you to familiarize yourself with it. The product is small in size. The format of one article, unfortunately, does not allow describing all the stories. Also, a very small work from the collection "Kolyma stories" - "Berries". A summary of the main and most interesting, in our opinion, stories is presented in this article.

"Single freeze"

Defined by the author as slave camp labor - another form of corruption. The prisoner, exhausted by him, cannot work out the norm, labor turns into torture and leads to slow death. Dugaev, the convict, is getting weaker and weaker because of the 16-hour working day. He pours, kaylit, carries. In the evening, the caretaker measures what he has done. The figure of 25%, named by the caretaker, seems very large to Dugaev. He has unbearable hands, head, aching calves. The prisoner does not even feel hunger anymore. Later, he is called to the investigator. He asks: "Name, surname, term, article." The soldiers take the prisoner every other day to a remote place surrounded by a fence with barbed wire. At night, the sound of tractors can be heard from here. Dugaev guesses why he was brought here, and understands that life is over. He regrets only that he suffered in vain for an extra day.

"Rain"

You can talk for a very long time about such a collection as Kolyma Tales. A summary of the chapters of the works is for informational purposes only. We bring to your attention the following story - "Rain".

"Sherri Brandy"

The poet-prisoner, who was considered the first poet of the 20th century in our country, is dying. He lies on the bunk, in the depths of their bottom row. The poet dies for a long time. Sometimes a thought comes to him, for example, that someone stole bread from him, which the poet put under his head. He is ready to seek, fight, swear... However, he no longer has the strength to do so. When a daily ration is put into his hand, he presses the bread to his mouth with all his strength, sucks it, tries to gnaw and tear with loose scurvy teeth. When a poet dies, he is not written off for another 2 days. During the distribution, the neighbors manage to get bread for him as if it were alive. They arrange for him to raise his hand like a puppet.

"Shock therapy"

Merzlyakov, one of the heroes of the collection "Kolmysk Stories", a summary of which we are considering, a convict of large build, understands that he is failing at general work. He falls, cannot get up and refuses to take the log. First, he is beaten by his own, then by the escorts. He is brought to the camp with lower back pain and a broken rib. After recovering, Merzlyakov does not stop complaining and pretends that he cannot straighten up. He does this in order to delay the discharge. He is sent to the surgical department of the central hospital, and then to the nervous one for research. Merzlyakov has a chance to be written off due to illness. He tries his best not to be exposed. But Pyotr Ivanovich, a doctor, himself a former convict, exposes him. Everything human in it displaces the professional. He spends the bulk of his time precisely exposing those who feign. Pyotr Ivanovich is looking forward to the effect that the case with Merzlyakov will produce. The doctor first makes him anesthetized, during which he manages to unbend Merzlyakov's body. A week later, the patient is prescribed shock therapy, after which he asks to be discharged himself.

"Typhoid Quarantine"

Andreev enters quarantine, having contracted typhus. The position of the patient compared to the work in the mines gives him a chance to survive, which he hardly hoped for. Then Andreev decides to stay here as long as possible, and then, perhaps, he will no longer be sent to the gold mines, where death, beatings, hunger. Andreev does not respond to the roll call before sending the recovered to work. He manages to hide in this way for quite a long time. The transit line is gradually emptying, and finally Andreev's turn comes. But now it seems to him that he has won the battle for life, and if now there will be dispatches, then only for local, close business trips. But when a truck with a group of prisoners who were unexpectedly given winter uniforms crosses the line separating long-distance and short-range business trips, Andreev realizes that fate has laughed at him.

In the photo below - on the house in Vologda, where Shalamov lived.

"Aortic Aneurysm"

In Shalamov's stories, illness and the hospital are an indispensable attribute of the plot. Ekaterina Glovatskaya, a prisoner, is taken to the hospital. This beauty immediately attracted Zaitsev, the doctor on duty. He knows that she is in a relationship with the convict Podshivalov, his acquaintance, who leads the local amateur art circle, the doctor still decides to try his luck. As usual, he begins with a medical examination of the patient, with auscultation of the heart. However, male interest is replaced by medical concern. In Glovatsky, he discovers This is a disease in which every careless movement can provoke death. The authorities, who made it a rule to separate lovers, once sent the girl to a penal female mine. The head of the hospital, after the doctor's report about her illness, is sure that these are the machinations of Podshivalov, who wants to detain his mistress. The girl is discharged, but she dies during loading, which Zaitsev warned about.

"Major Pugachev's last fight"

The author testifies that after the Great Patriotic War, prisoners began to arrive in the camps, who fought and went through captivity. These people are of a different temper: able to take risks, courageous. They only believe in weapons. Camp slavery did not corrupt them, they were not yet exhausted to the point of losing their will and strength. Their "guilt" was that these prisoners were captured or surrounded. It was clear to one of them, Major Pugachev, that they had been brought here to die. Then he gathers strong and determined, to match himself, prisoners who are ready to die or become free. Escape is prepared all winter. Pugachev realized that after surviving the winter, only those who managed to bypass the common work could escape. One by one, the participants in the conspiracy are moving into service. One of them becomes a cook, the other becomes a cult trader, the third repairs weapons for the guards.

One spring day, at 5 am, they knocked on the watch. The attendant admits the prisoner-cook, who, as usual, came for the keys to the pantry. The cook strangles him, and another prisoner changes into his uniform. The same thing happens with other attendants who returned a little later. Then everything happens according to Pugachev's plan. The conspirators burst into the security room and take possession of the weapon, shooting the guard on duty. They stock up on provisions and put on military uniforms, holding suddenly awakened fighters at gunpoint. Leaving the territory of the camp, they stop the truck on the highway, drop the driver off and drive until the gas runs out. Then they go to the taiga. Pugachev, waking up at night after many months of captivity, recalls how in 1944 he escaped from a German camp, crossed the front line, survived interrogation in a special department, after which he was accused of espionage and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He also recalls how emissaries of General Vlasov came to the German camp, who recruited Russians, convincing them that the captured soldiers for the Soviet regime were traitors to the Motherland. Then Pugachev did not believe them, but soon he himself was convinced of this. He looks lovingly at his comrades sleeping beside him. A little later, a hopeless battle ensues with the soldiers who surrounded the fugitives. Almost all of the prisoners die, except for one, who is cured after a severe wound in order to be shot. Only Pugachev manages to escape. He is hiding in a bear den, but he knows that they will find him too. He does not regret what he did. His last shot is to himself.

So, we examined the main stories from the collection, authored by Varlam Shalamov ("Kolyma stories"). The summary introduces the reader to the main events. You can read more about them on the pages of the work. The collection was first published in 1966 by Varlam Shalamov. "Kolyma Tales", a summary of which you now know, appeared on the pages of the New York edition of "New Journal".

In New York in 1966, only 4 stories were published. The following year, 1967, 26 stories by this author, mostly from the collection we are interested in, were translated into German in the city of Cologne. During his lifetime, Shalamov never published the collection "Kolyma Tales" in the USSR. The summary of all chapters, unfortunately, is not included in the format of one article, since there are a lot of stories in the collection. Therefore, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with the rest.

"Condensed milk"

In addition to those described above, we will tell about one more work from the collection "Kolyma Stories" - Its summary is as follows.

Shestakov, an acquaintance of the narrator, did not work at the mine in the face, since he was a geological engineer, and he was taken to the office. He met with the narrator and said that he wanted to take the workers and go to the Black Keys, to the sea. And although the latter understood that this was not feasible (the path to the sea is very long), he nevertheless agreed. The narrator reasoned that Shestakov probably wants to hand over all those who will participate in this. But the promised condensed milk (to overcome the path, it was necessary to eat) bribed him. Going to Shestakov's, he ate two cans of this delicacy. And then suddenly he said that he had changed his mind. A week later, other workers fled. Two of them were killed, three were tried a month later. And Shestakov was transferred to another mine.

We recommend reading other works in the original. Shalamov wrote Kolyma Tales very talentedly. The summary ("Berries", "Rain" and "Children's Pictures" we also recommend reading in the original) conveys only the plot. The author's style, artistic merits can only be appreciated by getting acquainted with the work itself.

Not included in the collection "Kolyma stories" "Sentence". We did not describe the summary of this story for this reason. However, this work is one of the most mysterious in Shalamov's work. Fans of his talent will be interested to get acquainted with him.

In his "Kolyma Tales" Shalamov deliberately builds on Solzhenitsyn's narrative. If "In one day ..." labor is spiritual liberation, then Shalamov's work is hard labor, "the camp was a place where they taught to hate physical labor, to hate labor in general."

And if for a moment the work of Shalamov’s hero may seem like “melody”, “music”, “symphony” (“Shovel Artist”), then in the next moment it is a cacophony, rattle and ragged rhythm, deceit and lies. For Varlam Shalamov, catharsis, i.e. the positive lesson of staying in the camps is impossible.

However, one should pay tribute to the 16 years of imprisonment of the writer, who wandered "from the hospital to the slaughter." Varlam Shalamov is in many ways Virgil, rolling his wheelbarrow through the circles of hell. (The documentary story "Conspiracy of Lawyers" is a vivid example of this). The writer was convicted under Article 58. and ended up in "criminal camps", where "household workers" and political prisoners were kept.

“... trolleys and wagons float away on a rope to a butara - to a washing device, where the soil is washed under a stream of water, and gold settles to the bottom of the deck.” "But that's none of your business." Butaryat (sprinkle the soil with spatulas) are not wheelbarrows. Fifty-eighth is not allowed close to gold.

The following phrase of the author is very symbolic: "... the wheelman does not see the wheel ... He must feel the wheel." Here Shalamov speaks about the specific work of a wheelbarrow driver. But the image should be understood much more broadly: a wheelbarrow driver is a person who does not see the wheel, he does not see the wheel - repression, but feels it great. He does not see those who set this wheel in motion, all the perpetrators of the feudal camp system of our age. Shalamov would like to tear the mask of uncertainty from everyone, by name. This "veil of the unknown" mask adheres to them, fuses with their skin. And the sooner this veil is broken, the better.

There is such a thing as “behind the text, offscreen characters” of a work (rock and chance in Nabokov, for example). They are never mentioned by Shalamov, but their presence is precisely “felt”. And we can only know the approximate number.

“The work of the brigadier is very carefully (officially) monitored ... by the caretaker. The superintendent is supervised by a senior superintendent, the senior superintendent is supervised by the foreman of the site, the superintendent is supervised by the head of the site, the head of the site is supervised by the chief engineer and head of the mine. I do not want to lead this hierarchy higher - it is extremely branched, diverse, and gives room for the imagination of any dogmatic or poetic inspiration.

After all, E.P. Berzin and I.V. Stalin did not work together. There were millions of those who agreed with the machine of slavery in the 20th century.

But who are they? Where to look for them? Later, answers to these questions can be found in the work of Sergei Dovlatov, who said that "Hell is ourselves."

* * *

Charles Francois Gounod believed that freedom is nothing but conscious and voluntary submission to immutable truths. These truths are most likely love, friendship, honor and truth. Based on this, we can say that the heroes of Shalamov still achieve this freedom in the story "The Last Battle of Major Pugachev" (all 12 fugitives achieve inner freedom at the cost of their lives).

But even Shalamov does not manage in stories with one black paint. The story "Injector" is a crumb of humor in the entire Kolyma epic. Once on the production site, an injector (a jet pump for supplying pressurized water to steam boilers) wore out and broke. The brigadier writes a report to the authorities - so they say, and so, the injector is out of working order, ”it is necessary either to correct this one or send a new one (the author retained the style of the letter). The chief’s response follows immediately: “If the prisoner Injector does not come to work the next day, then he should be placed in a punishment cell ... And keep him there as long as necessary ... Until he enters the labor rhythm.”