Bronze Horseman era. The Bronze Horseman (Monument to Peter I)

Having studied and analyzed the sources, we can say with certainty that the history of the appearance of the Bronze Horseman is not unambiguous. There are many versions and assumptions on this topic. In this paper, we will consider some aspects of the emergence and, in the future, the chronology of writing this work. mention of one literary history this story, which begins with the message “Where did Pushkin get the plot of The Bronze Horseman”, published by the critic and teacher A.P. Milyukov in the newspaper Son of the Fatherland in 1869; this text, subjected to stylistic revision, became part of the author's memoir, which appeared in 1872. According to Miliukov, at one time, during an exam in a women's educational institution, Count Mikhail Yuryevich Vielgorsky told him the following: “In 1812, when Napoleon was marching towards Moscow, the French corps of Marshal Oudinot, moving towards Polotsk, gave rise to fear for Petersburg. An alarm rose in the capital. Knowing, among other things, that Napoleon liked to take monuments out of the capitals, we began to fear that he would not take the monument of Peter the Great to Paris. Someone suggested, in case of serious danger, to remove the Falconev statue from its pedestal, put it on a ship and send it to one of the remote provinces. The sovereign approved this idea.

At this time, Prince Alexander Nikolaevich Golitsyn dreamed that he was going "with a report to the sovereign to Yelagin Island, along Bolshaya Millionnaya, in the direction from the Winter Palace." Suddenly, behind, “as if on Admiralteyskaya Square, there was a rumble, like the distant stomp of a horse. And in the houses I passed by, windows began to rattle, and the pavement itself seemed to oscillate. Then I turned around in horror. A few sazhens from me, in the gloomy light of early morning, galloped a huge rider on a gigantic horse, shaking the whole neighborhood with the clatter of his heavy hooves. I recognized this figure by its majestically raised head and its hand, commandingly extended in the air. That was our bronze Peter on his bronze horse.” Through Troitsky Bridge and Kamennoostrovsky Prospekt, bronze Peter galloped to the palace, and Golitsyn, who hurried after him, sees how Emperor Alexander (his face “was sad and preoccupied”) quickly approached the “royal horseman”. Exclaiming: “You condole about Russia!”, - Peter further said: “Do not be afraid! As long as I stand on a granite rock in front of the Neva, my beloved city has nothing to fear. Don't touch me - no enemy will touch me." And after these words the Horseman departed. “Count Vielgorsky added that Prince Golitsyn, at the next report to the sovereign, told him his wonderful dream. This story had such an effect on the emperor that he ordered the cancellation of all orders for the dispatch of the monument to Peter the Great from St. Petersburg. When this dream was subsequently retold to Pushkin, he was delighted and repeated for a long time: “... what poetry! What poetry!” He confessed to Count Vielgorsky that at the same time he began to think over the content of his "The Bronze Horseman", and although later he gave the poem a different idea and furnished it with different details, but for all that it is clear that interesting dream Prince Golitsyn served as the main basis of the story" [Ospovat, 1984: 238-239].

This story was reprinted several times in the publications of those years. Authors, narrators, eyewitnesses and even the text changed. But the essence remained unchanged. Whether this story is true is also hard to say. But many believe that if the events were actually true, then the legend has a right to exist.

According to many critics and literary critics, the idea of ​​Pushkin was the flood that occurred in St. Petersburg on November 7, 1824 - the strongest flood in the history of the city.

Pushkin lived for the third month in Mikhailovsky, exiled from Odessa "to a distant northern county." He really wants to return to St. Petersburg, as evidenced by numerous correspondence with his brother. Therefore, not having witnessed such a tragic moment in the city, he gets a little angry and immediately frivolously jokes on this topic in an appeal to the ladies of St. Petersburg. Somewhat later, having obviously read more detailed descriptions of the flood in St. Petersburg newspapers and in letters from relatives and friends, having heard the stories of eyewitnesses, Pushkin changed his initial opinion.

Probably, shortly after returning from exile to Moscow, and then to St. Petersburg, he acquired a book published in 1826 by the historian V.N. Berkha Berkh V.N. Detailed historical news about all the floods that were in St. Petersburg. - St. Petersburg, 1826; see present edition, p. 107., mentioned as the most important and first source of information in the "Preface" to the "Petersburg Tale". “Berch in his book reprinted an article published in Literary Leaflets as an eyewitness account. Pushkin obviously did not want to refer directly to the source in his poem, and Berch's reprint gave him a legitimate opportunity to do so; he limited himself to a deaf reference to “then magazines”, from which “details of the flood” were borrowed, thereby deflecting possible reproaches for inaccuracies, that he, not having witnessed the “flood”, invents its details” [Izmailov, 1930: 151-152].

Berch's book was undoubtedly taken with him by Pushkin on his 1833 trip to the "Pugachev" places and was before his eyes while working on the poem in Boldin.

At the very moment of Pushkin’s departure on the journey, “On August 17, 1833, when he, having left the dacha on the Black River, was supposed to cross the Neva, he became an eyewitness to the beginning flood, which almost forced him to return back and postpone the trip. The flood in St. Petersburg that day did not occur due to a change in the wind, but in those hours when Pushkin saw the Neva swollen, there was a fear that there would be a disaster no less than in 1824. Important, however, is the poet’s close attention to the rise of water in the river and his apprehension, his annoyance at the thought that he had “played off” this flood as well. This is another indicator that the theme of the flood had already been determined in his creative mind long before the start of work on The Bronze Horseman” [Izmailov, 1930: 152].

There is no doubt that the impression of the "Petersburg flood" and the reflections caused by it, the definition of it as a "public disaster", which struck with all its weight on the "people", on the poorest layer of the population of the capital - all this deeply sunk into the mind and feeling of the poet, sunk to be reflected in the Bronze Horseman nine years later.

On the way back from Orenburg and Uralsk, having arrived in Boldino on October 1, 1833, he immediately set about processing all the material he had written, as well as the material collected on the trip, while simultaneously engaging in many other creative endeavors, but primarily the poem "The Bronze Horseman".

The Petrine theme also had a great influence on Pushkin. However, Pushkin's interest in it arose only from the end of 1826. The reasons for this are manifold. In the lyceum years, interest in Peter was overshadowed by modern events - the Patriotic War of 1812 and European campaigns. Later, Karamzin's "History of the Russian State", published in 1818, determined for a long time the theme of Decembrist poetry. It was also reflected in the work of Pushkin. Much was written almost on the eve of the Decembrist uprising - an event that caused a deep reflection in the worldview and work of the poet. The events of December 14, 1825 and the investigation, trial and sentence of the Decembrist nobles that followed the defeat of the uprising, and finally the poet’s return from exile and his meeting with Nicholas I on September 8, 1826, forced Pushkin to reconsider a lot in his views on the past and present Russia. From that moment on, the theme of Peter can be traced in lyrics, poems, prose novels, journalism and criticism, memoirs, historical research, and more and more occupies his thoughts.

However, Pushkin's attitude towards Peter was ambiguous. “He outlined the conclusion about the two sides of Peter's activity, which fully expresses his thought, his concept of Peter's reign. For some, this is great and creative for those who enter into new era state, for others - heavy and even painful, which had to bear the brunt of new empire, including here not only the peasants, but also other "taxable" classes. In the view of Pushkin, this part includes the offspring of the old nobility, humiliated and, in the end, ruined by the Peter's reforms, which brought forward new people. The same phenomenon is represented by the hero of his poem Eugene in The Bronze Horseman.

"For understanding last work it is impossible not to bear in mind the above maxim, expressing with complete clarity Pushkin's twofold perception of the personality and work of Peter - the great creator and at the same time a merciless despot, who, according to young Pushkin, expressed many years before the work, “despised humanity, perhaps more than Napoleon.” [Izmailov, 1930: 164].

The image of his hero Yevgeny, Pushkin, as it were, tried on himself, because he himself was from an impoverished family with a large family that had to be supported. He himself writes about this: “Besides the salary determined for me by the generosity of His Majesty, I have no permanent income; meanwhile, life in the capital is expensive and with the multiplication of my family, expenses also increase ... ”Pushkin. Letters, vol. III, p. 594-597.

In December 1833, he handed over The Bronze Horseman to Nicholas I for censorship. The Tsar returned the poem with an indication of the amendments that needed to be corrected (he crossed out all definitions like “idol”, “idol” in relation to the monument to Peter), but Pushkin he refused to write the poem, but he also did not dare to publish it without permission. That is why, until the end of 1833, the "Petersburg story" was not known to anyone.

The severity of the censor was probably associated with the coincidence of the time of the appearance of Pushkin's poem and important event, which took place in St. Petersburg and is directly related to the monument to Peter I. “In 1834, work was completed on the opening of the famous monument -“ Alexandrian pillar". Back in August 1832, on palace square a huge rock appeared, delivered from Finland, from which the column was to be made. On August 30, 1834, that is, on the name day of Alexander I, a monument to the emperor, the Alexander Column, the tallest building in the world (47.5 meters against 46.5 meters of the Vendome Column in Paris), was opened. This event was given great ideological significance, most fully and clearly expressed by Zhukovsky: “What had to happen in Russia so that in such a city, such a meeting of the people, such an army could unite at the foot of such a column? .. There, on the banks of the Neva, a rock rises, wild and ugly, and on that rock a rider almost as huge as she herself; and this rider, having reached the height, besieged his mighty horse at the edge of the rapids; and Peter is written on this rock, and Catherine is next to him; and in view of this rock, another one has now been erected, incomparably larger, but no longer a wild mass thrown up from ugly stones, but a slender, majestic, artfully rounded column<…>and at its height it is no longer a transitory person, but an eternally shining angel, and under the cross of this angel that monster dies, which there, on a rock, half-crushed, wriggles under horse hooves<…>. And the angel crowning this column, does it not mean that the days of the fighting creature have passed for us<…>that the time has come to create peace; that Russia, having taken everything of its own, is safe from the outside. Inaccessible or fatal to the enemy, not fear, but the guardian of Europe that has become related to it, has now entered a new great period of one's existence, during the period of development of internal, firm legality, serene acquisition of all the treasures of the hostel ... "Zhukovsky V.A. "Memories of the celebration of August 30, 1834" - M .: Book on Demand, 2012. - 18 p. (republished St. Petersburg: type. N. Grech, censor. 1834). The monument to Peter I with a monument in the form of a wild rock and the monument to Alexander I with a monument in the form of a geometrically correct and even perfect column were opposed as symbols of two eras Russian life» [Abromovich, 1984: 112].

Nicholas I was familiar with Zhukovsky's reflections and agreed with the idea that in recent Russian history a clear line was drawn between two periods: war and peace.

Pushkin did not share these views, considered them far-fetched, and he was right. “Very soon it turned out that the Alexander Column is just a new monument that adorned the capital, and the Bronze Horseman is still its symbol, “the most wonderful miracle of wonderful Petersburg”<…>The Alexander Column became an object of ridicule” [Makogonenko, 1982: 157].

Not wanting to edit the poem, Pushkin published the Introduction to The Bronze Horseman in 1834. This is the only lifetime edition of the text of the poem; it did not arouse the attention of readers, as it looked like a hymn " military capital". But rumors began about some unpublished poem by Pushkin about St. Petersburg.

“In August 1836, Pushkin decided to publish The Bronze Horseman and made the necessary corrections for this. Why before that he did not even allow the thought of editing, and now he does it? Apparently, because he considered it necessary to inspire readers about himself, among whom an opinion appeared about the end of the Pushkin period of Russian literature" [Kunin, 1990: 543]

Contrary to this opinion, it was obviously the decision to publish The Bronze Horseman. piled on family problems, lack of money, dependence on the mercy of the sovereign - all this affected the morale of Pushkin. Therefore, the "Bronze Horseman" became a kind of challenge state system and all "well-wishers".

The Bronze Horseman was published in full after Pushkin's death in 1837 in the journal Sovremennik.

"The Bronze Horseman" by Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin (1799 - 1837) is a poem or a poetic story. In it, the poet combines philosophical, social and historical issues. "The Bronze Horseman" is, at the same time, an ode to the great Petersburg and its creator Peter I, and an attempt to determine the place common man in history, and reflections on the hierarchy of the world order.

History of creation

The Bronze Horseman, written like Eugene Onegin in iambic tetrameter, was Pushkin's last poem. Its creation dates back to 1833 and the poet's stay at the Boldino estate.

The poem was read by the chief censor Russian Empire Nicholas I and banned by him for publication. Nevertheless, in 1834, Pushkin published almost the entire poem in the Library for Reading, leaving out only the verses crossed out by the Emperor. The publication took place under the title “Petersburg. An excerpt from a poem.

AT original form The Bronze Horseman was published in 1904.

Description of the artwork

The introduction draws a majestic image of Peter I, who created a beautiful new city on the banks of the Neva - the pride of the Russian Empire. Pushkin calls him the best city world and sings of the greatness of St. Petersburg and its creator.

Eugene, an ordinary resident of St. Petersburg, a petty clerk. He is in love with the girl Parasha and is going to marry her. Parasha lives in wooden house on the outskirts of the city. When the historic flood of 1824 begins, their house is washed away first and the girl dies. The image of the flood was given by Pushkin with an eye to the historical evidence of the magazines of that time. The whole city is washed away, many dead. And only the monument to Peter proudly towers over St. Petersburg.

Eugene is crushed by what happened. In a terrible flood, he blames Peter, who built the city in such an inappropriate place. Having lost his mind, the young man rushes around the city until dawn, trying to escape from the persecution of the bronze horseman. In the morning he finds himself at the ruined house of his bride and dies there.

main characters

Evgeniy

The main character of the poem, Eugene, is not described by Pushkin with detailed accuracy. The poet writes about him "a citizen of the capital, what kind of darkness do you meet", emphasizing that his hero belongs to the type little man. Pushkin only stipulates that Eugene lives in Kolomna and traces his history from a once famous noble family, which has now lost its greatness and fortune.

Pushkin pays much more attention to inner world and aspirations of his hero. Eugene is hardworking and dreams of providing himself and his bride Parasha with his work decent life for many years.

The death of his beloved becomes an insurmountable test for Eugene and he loses his mind. Description of Pushkin insane young man full of pity and compassion. Despite the humiliation of the image, the poet shows to his hero human compassion and sees in his simple desires and their collapse a genuine tragedy.

The Bronze Horseman (monument to Peter I)

The second hero of the poem can be called the Bronze Horseman. The attitude towards Peter I as a personality of a world scale, a genius slips throughout the entire poem. In the introduction, Pushkin does not mention the name of the founder of St. Petersburg, calling Peter "he". Pushkin gives Peter the power to command the elements and fetter them with his own sovereign will. Transferring the action to a century ahead, Pushkin replaces the image of the Creator with the image of a copper statue, which "raised Russia with an iron bridle." In the author's attitude to Peter I, two points are observed: admiration for the will, courage, perseverance of the first Russian Emperor, as well as horror and impotence in front of this superman. Pushkin poses an important question here: how to define the mission of Peter I - the savior or the tyrant of Russia?

The work also contains another historical person- "the late emperor", that is, Alexander I. In his image, the author seeks to bring his poem closer to documentary.

Analysis of the work

The Bronze Horseman, despite its small scale (about 500 verses), combines several narrative plans at once. History and modernity, reality and fiction meet here, details privacy and documentaries.

The poem cannot be called historical. The image of Peter I is far from the image of a historical figure. Moreover, Pushkin sees in the Petrine era not so much the time of Peter's reign as its continuation into the future and the results in the modern world for him. The poet views the first Russian emperor through the prism of the recent flood of November 1824.

The flood and the events described in its connection form the main plan of the narrative, which can be called historical. It is based on documentary materials that Pushkin discusses in the Preface to the poem. The flood itself becomes the main plot of the conflict in the poem.

The conflict itself can be divided into two planes. The first of them is actual - this is the death of the protagonist's bride in the house demolished by water, as a result of which he goes crazy. More broadly, the conflict involves two sides, such as the city and the elements. In the introduction, Peter fetters the elements with his will, building the city of Petersburg in the swamps. In the main part of the poem, the element breaks out and sweeps away the city.

AT historical context exists fictional story, the center of which is a simple St. Petersburg resident Eugene. The rest of the inhabitants of the city are indistinguishable: they walk the streets, drown in the flood, indifferent to the suffering of Eugene in the second part of the poem. The description of the inhabitants of St. Petersburg and the ordinary course of his life, as well as the description of the flood, is very detailed and figurative. Here Pushkin demonstrates the true mastery of his poetic style and command of the language.

The events around Evgeny are described by Pushkin with a documentary area. The poet accurately mentions where the hero is at various moments of the action: Senate Square, Petrov Square, the outskirts of St. Petersburg. Such accuracy in relation to the details of the urban landscape allows us to call Pushkin's work one of the first urban poems in Russian literature.

There is another important plan in the work, which can be called mythological. In its center dominates the statue of Peter, which Eugene curses for the flood that has occurred and which is chasing the hero through the streets of the city. AT last episode the city moves from real space to conditional space, goes beyond reality.

An interesting thought slips through the poem at the moment the “late emperor” appears on the balcony, who is unable to cope with the elements that are destroying the city. Pushkin here reflects on the sphere of power of monarchs and those environments that are not subject to it.

The poem "The Bronze Horseman" by A.S. Pushkin presents a special dedication of the poet to Petersburg. Against the backdrop of the city, its history and modernity, the main events of the real part of the poem unfold, which are intertwined with the mythological scenes of the creation of the city and the image of the Bronze Horseman.

The poem "The Bronze Horseman" was written by Pushkin in Boldin in October 1833 and is considered the most perfect of his poems in terms of meaning, depth, complexity of content and writing talent, as it was written in the period of absolute heyday, at the top creative takeoff poet.
In 1824, on November 7, a severe flood occurred in St. Petersburg. At this time, Pushkin was in exile in Mikhailovsky. The poet was mainly worried about ordinary people who were in distress. The upper classes could not have suffered much from the flood, and they were not so worried about the problems of the poor. Apparently, this sad event remained deeply in the mind of the poet, because nine years later this theme was reflected in The Bronze Horseman.
In August 1833, Pushkin himself fell into the beginning flood on the Neva, and this could revive in him the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bcreating the "Petersburg Story" (as he called his poem).
In his work, Pushkin touched on two themes - "Peter's", about the personality and activities of Peter the Great, and "the theme of a petty hero", about a small person compared to a huge city, a tradesman.
The canvas of the poem "The Bronze Horseman" formed many lines of the poem "Yezersky", the main character of which has much in common with the hero of the "Horseman", in particular, landscapes, a description of the urban city and the general tone of the work were taken from the unfinished work. Main character - "insignificant person", unremarkable, not belonging to the St. Petersburg world.
Main creative work over the "Petersburg story" was made by Pushkin in about 26-27 days. While in Boldin, the poet almost did not indicate in his letters about his work on works, this was due to the unwillingness that his work be known in St. Petersburg before the circulation, and with the bad mood of the poet (this can be seen from his letters). Simultaneously with the "Horseman" the poet wrote "The History of Pugchev" and " captain's daughter", they were his main work. Fairy tales and poems, the poem "Angelo" and other works were also written at the same time.
Pushkin began to create the poem on October 6, 1833, by which time he had a completely clear plan for creating the work, the main lines and images. There are few drafts of the creation of the poem, because the poet almost immediately wrote in a clean copy, and the beginning of the poem was exactly taken from the first words in the drafts. The end of the introduction also included several revised lines from the "Fountain of Bakhchisaray". And in the future, many times in the poem there were lines from the unfinished "Jezersky", the poet decided not to finish the old work, but to include it in the "Horseman". When describing the flood, the poet used Bulgarin-Berkh's article, supplementing it with his own ideas and eyewitness accounts. Pushkin began to rewrite his poem in white, not yet finishing it - this is how the first white manuscript appeared. Subsequently, the poet supplemented, compressed, added, crossed out, and at the end created a very concise and very complex, rich in thought text of his "Petersburg Tale". The poet made the last edition of the poem already in St. Petersburg, at the end of November. Then he turned to Benckendorff with a request to submit to censorship (Pushkin's works were re-read by censors many times and very critically, including by the emperor's gendarmes). Censorship, and in particular, the emperor, who was Pushkin's personal censor, did not let The Bronze Horseman pass. Formally, there was no ban, but there were comments from the royal court that were quite equivalent to a ban, because a lot of political undertones were found in the poem, and this was a very big blow for the poet, for whom the "horseman" became one of the most important and expensive works.
Only in 1834 did Pushkin give an introduction to the poem to the "Library for Reading" for publication.
In 1836, the poet again wanted to publish his work and even made corrections to the poem. But he did not remove several aspects that Nikolai especially did not like, for example, the comparison of Moscow and St. Petersburg as old and new capitals. Pushkin did not want to follow the lead of censorship and, because of this, spoil the lines of the work that he created so reverently. So during his lifetime he never managed to print a poem.
The Bronze Horseman was published by Zhukovsky after the death of the poet, in Sovremennik in 1837.

The initiative to create a monument to Peter I belongs to Catherine II. It was on her orders that Prince Alexander Mikhailovich Golitsyn turned to the professors of the Paris Academy of Painting and Sculpture Diderot and Voltaire, whose opinion Catherine II fully trusted. Notable masters recommended for this work Etienne-Maurice Falconet, who worked at that time as the chief sculptor at porcelain factory. “There is an abyss of fine taste, intelligence and delicacy in him, and at the same time he is uncouth, stern, does not believe in anything. .. He does not know self-interest,” Diderot wrote about Falcon.

Etienne-Maurice Falcone always dreamed of monumental art and received an offer to create equestrian statue colossal size, agreed without hesitation. On September 6, 1766, he signed a contract in which the remuneration for the work was determined in the amount of 200 thousand livres, which was a fairly modest amount - other masters asked for much more. The 50-year-old master came to Russia with 17-year-old assistant Marie-Anne Collot.

Opinions about the appearance of the future sculpture were very different. Thus, Ivan Ivanovich Belskoy, President of the Imperial Academy of Arts, who supervised the creation of the monument, presented a sculpture of Peter I, standing in full height with a wand in hand. Catherine II saw the emperor sitting on a horse with a rod or scepter, and there were other suggestions. So, Diderot conceived a monument in the form of a fountain with allegorical figures, and the State Councilor Shtelin sent Belsky detailed description of his project, according to which Peter I was to appear surrounded by allegorical statues of Prudence and Diligence, Justice and Victory, which prop up the vices of Ignorance and Sloth, Deception and Envy. Falcone rejected the traditional image of the victorious monarch and refused to depict allegories. “My monument will be simple. There will be no Barbarism, no Love of the peoples, no personification of the People ... I will limit myself only to the statue of this hero, whom I do not interpret as either a great commander or a winner, although he, of course, was both. The personality of the creator, legislator, benefactor of his country is much higher, and this is what people need to show,” he wrote to Diderot.

Work on the monument to Peter I - The Bronze Horseman

Falcone created a sculpture model on the territory of the former temporary Winter Palace Elizabeth Petrovna from 1768 to 1770. From the imperial stables, two horses of the Oryol breed Kapriz and Brilliant were taken. Falcone made sketches, watching as a guards officer took off on a horse to the platform and put it on its hind legs. Falcone reworked the model of the head of Peter I several times, but never got the approval of Catherine II, and as a result, the head of the Bronze Horseman was successfully sculpted by Marie-Anne Collot. The face of Peter I turned out to be courageous and strong-willed, with a wide open eyes and illumined by deep thought. For this work, the girl was accepted as a member Russian Academy arts and Catherine II appointed her a lifetime pension of 10,000 livres. The snake under the horse's feet was made by the Russian sculptor Fyodor Gordeev.

A plaster model of the Bronze Horseman was made by 1778 and opinions about the work were mixed. If Diderot was satisfied, Catherine II did not like the arbitrarily chosen appearance of the monument.

Casting the Bronze Horseman

The sculpture was conceived on a colossal scale and the casters did not undertake this complex work. Foreign craftsmen demanded a lot of money for casting, and some frankly said that the casting would not succeed. Finally, a caster, a cannon maker Yemelyan Khailov, was found, who took up the casting of the Bronze Horseman. Together with Falcone, they selected the composition of the alloy and made samples. The difficulty was that the sculpture had three points of support and therefore the thickness of the walls of the front of the statue had to be small - no more than one centimeter.

During the first casting, the pipe through which the bronze was poured burst. In desperation, Falcone ran out of the workshop, but master Khailov did not lose his head, took off his coat and soaked it with water, smeared it with clay and applied it as a patch to the pipe. Risking his life, he prevented the fire, although he himself received burns to his hands and partially damaged his eyesight. The upper part of the Bronze Horseman was damaged anyway, it had to be cut down. Preparations for the new casting took another three years, but this time it was successful, and in honor of the successful completion of the work, the sculptor left the inscription in one of the folds of the cloak of Peter I: “Etienne Falcone, a Parisian of 1788, sculpted and cast.”

Installation of the Bronze Horseman

Falcone wanted to erect a monument on a plinth in the form of a wave, carved from a natural piece of rock. It was very difficult to find the right block with a height of 11.2 meters, and therefore an appeal was published in the St. Petersburg News newspaper to individuals who wanted to find a suitable piece of rock. And soon the peasant Semyon Vishnyakov responded, who had long noticed a suitable block near the village of Lakhta and informed the head of the prospecting work about this.

The stone, weighing about 1600 tons and called the Thunder-stone, was delivered first on a platform to the coast of the Gulf of Finland, then by water to the Senate Square. Thousands of people took part in the extraction and transportation of the stone. The stone was installed on a platform that moved along two parallel chutes, in which 30 balls made of copper alloy were placed. This operation was carried out in winter from November 15, 1769, when the ground was icy and on March 27, 1770 the stone was delivered to the coast of the Gulf of Finland. In the fall, the block was loaded onto a ship specially built by the master Grigory Korchebnikov, and on September 25, 1770, crowds of people met the Thunder-stone on the banks of the Neva near Senate Square.

In 1778, Falcone's relationship with Catherine II finally deteriorated and, together with Marie-Anne Collot, he was forced to leave for Paris.

The installation of the Bronze Horseman was led by Fyodor Gordeev, and on August 7, 1782, the grand opening of the monument took place, but its creator was never invited to this event. The military parade at the celebration was led by Prince Alexander Golitsyn, and Catherine II arrived along the Neva in a boat and climbed onto the balcony of the Senate building. The empress came out wearing a crown and purple and gave a sign to open the monument. To the sound of drumming, the linen fence from the monument fell and regiments of guards marched along the Neva embankment.

Monument Bronze Horseman

Falcone depicted the figure of Peter I in dynamics, on a rearing horse, and thereby wanted to show not a commander and a winner, but, first of all, a creator and legislator. We see the emperor in simple clothes, and instead of a rich saddle - an animal skin. Only the wreath of laurel crowning the head and the sword at the belt tell us about the winner and the commander. The location of the monument on the top of the rock indicates the difficulties Peter overcame, and the snake is a symbol of evil forces. The monument is unique in that it has only three points of support. On the pedestal there is an inscription "TO PETER the first EKATERINA second summer 1782", and on the other side the same text is indicated on Latin. The weight of the Bronze Horseman is eight tons, and the height is five meters.

Bronze Horseman - title

The name of the Bronze Horseman monument was later due to poem of the same name A.S. Pushkin, although in fact the monument is made of bronze.

Legends and Myths about the Bronze Horseman

• There is a legend that Peter I, being in a cheerful mood, decided to jump over the Neva on his beloved horse Lisette. He exclaimed: "All God's and mine" and jumped over the river. The second time he shouted the same words and was also on the other side. And for the third time he decided to jump over the Neva, but he made a reservation and said: “All mine and God’s” and was immediately punished - he turned to stone on Senate Square, in the place where the Bronze Horseman now stands
• They say that Peter I, who fell ill, was lying in a fever and fancied that the Swedes were advancing. He jumped on a horse and wanted to rush to the Neva against the enemy, but then a snake crawled out and wrapped around the horse's legs and stopped him, did not allow Peter I to jump into the water and die. So the Bronze Horseman stands in this place - a monument How the snake saved Peter I
• There are several myths and legends in which Peter I prophesies: "As long as I am in place, my city has nothing to fear." And indeed, the Bronze Horseman remained in his place during Patriotic War 1812 and during the Great Patriotic War. During the siege of Leningrad, it was sheathed with logs and boards, and bags of sand and earth were placed around it.
• Peter I points with his hand towards Sweden, and in the center of Stockholm there is a monument to Charles XII, Peter's opponent in the Northern War, left hand which is directed towards Russia

Interesting facts about the Bronze Horseman monument

• The transportation of the stone-pedestal was accompanied by difficulties and unforeseen circumstances, and often there were emergency situations. All of Europe followed that operation, and in honor of the delivery of the Thunder Stone to Senate Square A commemorative medal was issued with the inscription “It is like boldness. Genvarya, 20, 1770"
• Falcone conceived a monument without a fence, although the fence was nevertheless installed, but has not survived to this day. Now there are people who leave inscriptions on the monument and spoil the pedestal and the Bronze Horseman. It is possible that soon a fence will be installed around the Bronze Horseman
• In 1909 and 1976, the restoration of the Bronze Horseman was carried out. A recent gamma-ray survey showed that the frame of the sculpture is in good condition. Inside the monument was laid a capsule with a note on the restoration and a newspaper dated September 3, 1976

The Bronze Horseman in St. Petersburg - main symbol northern capital Newlyweds and numerous tourists come to Senate Square to admire one of the most famous sights of the city.

A. S. Pushkin's poem "The Bronze Horseman" combines both historical and social issues. This is the author's reflection on Peter the Great as a reformer, collection different opinions and assessments of his actions. This poem is one of his perfect compositions, having philosophical meaning. We offer for acquaintance brief analysis poems, the material can be used to work on literature lessons in grade 7.

Brief analysis

Year of writing– 1833

History of creation- During his "golden autumn", when Pushkin was forced to stay in the Boldin estate, the poet had a creative upsurge. In that "golden" time, the author created many brilliant works that made a great impression on both the public and critics. One of such works of the Boldino period was the poem "The Bronze Horseman".

Topic– The reign of Peter the Great, the attitude of society to his reforms – main topic"The Bronze Horseman"

Composition– The composition consists of a large introduction, it can be considered as a separate poem, and two parts, which deal with the main character, the devastating flood of 1824, and the meeting of the hero with the Bronze Horseman.

Genre- The genre of "The Bronze Horseman" is a poem.

Direction - Historical poem describing actual events, direction- realism.

History of creation

At the very beginning of the history of the creation of the poem, the writer was in the Boldin estate. He thought a lot about history Russian state, about its rulers and autocratic power. At that time, society was divided into two types of people - some fully supported the policy of Peter the Great, treated him with adoration, and the other type of people found in the great emperor similarities with evil spirit, considered him a fiend, and treated him accordingly.

The writer listened to different opinions about the reign of Peter, the result of his reflections and the collection of various information, was the poem "The Bronze Horseman", which completed his Boldino heyday of creativity, the year the poem was written was 1833.

Topic

In The Bronze Horseman, the analysis of the work displays one of the main topics- power and a small person. The author reflects on the rule of the state, on the collision of a small man with a huge colossus.

Myself the meaning of the name- "The Bronze Horseman" - contains the main idea of ​​the poetic work. The monument to Peter is made of bronze, but the author preferred another epithet, more ponderous and gloomy. So, through expressive artistic means, the poet describes a powerful state machine, for which the problems of small people suffering from the power of autocratic rule are indifferent.

In this poem, conflict between the little man and the authorities does not have its continuation, a person is so small for the state, when "the forest is cut down - the chips fly."

In different ways one can judge the role of one person in the fate of the state. In his introduction to the poem, the author characterizes Peter the Great as a man of amazing intelligence, far-sighted and decisive. Being in power, Peter looked far ahead, he thought about the future of Russia, about its power and invincibility. The actions of Peter the Great can be judged in different ways, accusing him of despotism and tyranny in relation to common people. It is impossible to justify the actions of a ruler who built power on the bones of people.

Composition

Pushkin's ingenious idea in the features of the composition of the poem serves as proof of the poet's creative skill. A large introduction dedicated to Peter the Great and the city he built can be read as an independent work.

The language of the poem has absorbed all genre originality emphasizing the attitude of the author to the events he describes. In the description of Peter and Petersburg, the language is pretentious, majestic, completely in harmony with the appearance of the emperor, great and powerful.

A completely different language is the story of a simple Eugene. narrative speech about the hero speaks in the usual language, reflects the essence of the "little man".

The greatest genius of Pushkin is clearly visible in this poem, it is all written in the same meter, but in different parts of the work, it sounds completely different. The two parts of the poem following the introduction can also be considered a separate work. These parts talk about ordinary person who lost his girlfriend in a flood.

Eugene blames the monument to Peter for this, implying in it the emperor himself - the autocrat. A person who dreams of simple human happiness has lost the meaning of life, having lost the most precious thing - he has lost his beloved girl, his future. It seems to Evgeny that the Bronze Horseman is chasing him. Eugene understands that the autocrat is cruel and ruthless. Crushed by grief, the young man goes crazy, and then dies, left without the meaning of life.

It can be concluded that in this way the author continues the theme of the “little man”, developed at that time in Russian literature. By this he proves how despotic government is in relation to the common people.

main characters

Genre

The work "The Bronze Horseman" belongs to the genre of a poetic poem with a realistic direction.

The poem is large-scale in its deep content, it includes both historical and philosophical problems. There is no epilogue in the poem, and the contradictions between the little man and the whole state remain open.