How Olga differed from other girls. Characteristics of Olga Ilyinskaya in the novel "Oblomov" - a description of the image and interesting facts
Roman I.A. Goncharov "Oblomov" reveals the problem of the social society of those times. In this work, the main characters could not deal with their own feelings, depriving themselves of the right to happiness. One of these heroines with an unfortunate fate will be discussed.
The image and characterization of Olga Ilyinskaya with quotes in the novel Oblomov will help to fully reveal her difficult character and better understand this woman.
Olga's appearance
It is difficult to call a young creature a beauty. The appearance of the girl is far from ideals and generally accepted standards.
"Olga in the strict sense was not a beauty ... But if she were turned into a statue, she would be a statue of grace and harmony."
Being small in stature, she managed to walk like a queen, with her head held high. The girl felt the breed, to become. She wasn't pretending to be better. She didn't flirt, she didn't fawn. It was as natural as possible in the manifestation of emotions and feelings. Everything in her was real, without a drop of falsehood and lies.
“In a rare girl you will meet such simplicity and natural freedom of sight, word, deed ... no lies, no tinsel, no intent!”.
A family
Olga was raised not by her parents, but by an aunt who replaced her father and mother. The girl remembered her mother from a portrait that hung in the living room. About her father, since he took her away from the estate at the age of five, she had no information. Becoming an orphan, the child was left to himself. The baby lacked support, care, warm words. The aunt was not up to her. She was too immersed in secular life, and she did not care about the suffering of her niece.
Education
Despite the eternal employment, the aunt was able to set aside time for the education of the growing niece. Olga was not one of those who are forced to sit down for lessons with a whip. She has always strived to gain new knowledge, constantly developing and moving forward in this direction. Books were an outlet, and music served as a source of inspiration. In addition to playing the piano, she sang beautifully. Her voice, though soft, was strong.
“From this pure, strong girlish voice, my heart beat, my nerves trembled, my eyes sparkled and swam with tears ...”
Character
Oddly enough, she loved solitude. Noisy companies, fun gatherings with friends are not about Olga. She did not seek to acquire new acquaintances, revealing her soul to strangers. Someone considered her too smart, others, on the contrary, narrow-minded.
“Some considered her close-minded, because wise maxims did not break from her tongue ...”
Not distinguished by talkativeness, she preferred to live in her shell. In that invented little world where it was good and calm. External calmness was strikingly different from the internal state of the soul. The girl always clearly knew what she wanted from life and tried to implement her plans.
“If she has any intention, then the matter will boil ..”
First love or acquaintance with Oblomov
First love came at the age of 20. The meeting was planned. Stolz brought Oblomov to Olga's aunt's house. Hearing the angelic voice of Oblomov, he realized that he was gone. The feeling turned out to be mutual. Since then, the meetings have become regular. Young people became interested in each other and began to think about living together.
How love changes a person
Love can change any person. Olga was no exception. She seemed to have wings behind her back from the overwhelming feelings. Everything in her seethed and seethed with the desire to turn the world upside down, changing it, making it better, cleaner. Olga's chosen one was a different field. Understanding the emotions and ambitions of a lover is too difficult a task. It was difficult for him to resist this volcano of passions, sweeping away everything in its path. He wanted to see in her a quiet, calm woman who devoted herself completely to home and family. Olga, on the contrary, wanted to shake up Ilya, change his inner world and his usual way of life.
“She dreamed of how“ she would order him to read the books ”that Stoltz had left, then read the newspapers every day and tell her the news, write letters to the village, finish the plan for arranging the estate, get ready to go abroad - in a word, he would not doze off with her; she will show him the goal, make him fall in love again with everything that he stopped loving.
First disappointment
Time passed, nothing changed. Everything remained in place. Olga knew perfectly well what she was doing, allowing the relationship to go too far. It was not in her nature to retreat. She continued to hope, sincerely believing that she could remake Oblomov, adjusting the ideal man in all respects to her model, but sooner or later any patience comes to an end.
Gap
She is tired of fighting. The girl was gnawed by doubts whether she had made a mistake by deciding to link her life with a weak-willed, weak person incapable of action. Sacrificing yourself all your life for love, why? She had already been treading water for too long, which was unusual for her. It's time to move on, but apparently alone.
"I thought that I would revive you, that you could still live for me - and you died a very long time ago."
This phrase became decisive before Olga put an end to her relationship with her beloved, as it seemed to her, ended so early.
Stolz: life jacket or attempt number two
He was always for her, first of all, a close friend, a mentor. She shared everything that was going on in her soul. Stolz always found time to support, lend a shoulder, making it clear that she was always there, and she could rely on him in any situation. They had common interests. Similar positions. They could well become one, which Andrey counted on. Licking emotional wounds after parting with Oblomov, Olga decided in Paris. In the city of love, where there is a place for hope, faith in the best. It was here that she met with Stolz.
Marriage. Trying to be happy.
Andrei surrounded with attention and care. She enjoyed courtship.
"Continuous, intelligent and passionate worship of a man like Stolz"
Restored injured, offended self-esteem. She was grateful to him. Gradually, the heart began to thaw. The woman felt that she was ready for a new relationship, that she was ripe for the family.
“She experienced happiness and could not determine where the boundaries were, what it was.”
Becoming a wife, for the first time she was able to understand what it means to be loved and to love.
A few years later
For several years the couple lived in a happy marriage. It seemed to Olga that it was in Stolz:
"Not blindly, but with consciousness, and her ideal of male perfection was embodied in him."
But life stuck. The woman is bored. The uniform rhythm of gray everyday life was stifling, not giving way to the accumulated energy. Olga lacked the hectic activities that she led with Ilya. She tried to attribute her state of mind to fatigue, depression, but the situation did not improve, heating up more and more. Andrei intuitively felt changes in mood, not understanding the true cause of his wife's depressed state. Did they make a mistake, and the attempt to become happy failed, but why?
Conclusion
Who is to blame for what happens to us at a particular stage of life. For the most part, we are ourselves. In the modern world, Olga would not be bored and not obsessed with problems. At that time, there were only a few women with a masculine character. They were not understood and not accepted in society. She alone would not have been able to change anything, but she herself was not ready to change, being selfish in her soul. Family life was not for her. She had to accept the situation or let go.
/ Dmitry Ivanovich Pisarev (1840-1868). Oblomov. Roman I. A. Goncharova/
The third remarkable personality brought out in Mr. Goncharov's novel is Olga Sergeevna Ilinskaya- represents the type of future woman, how she will be subsequently shaped by those ideas that in our time are trying to introduce into women's education. In this personality, which attracts to itself an inexpressible charm, but does not strike with any sharply outstanding virtues, two properties are especially remarkable, casting an original color on all its actions, words and movements. These two properties are rare in modern women and therefore especially dear in Olga; they are presented in Mr. Goncharov's novel with such artistic fidelity that it is hard not to believe them, it is hard to take Olga for an impossible ideal created by the poet's creative imagination. Naturalness and the presence of consciousness - that's what distinguishes Olga from ordinary women. From these two qualities follow truthfulness in words and deeds, the absence of coquetry, the desire for development, the ability to love simply and seriously, without cunning and tricks, the ability to sacrifice oneself to one’s feelings as much as not the laws of etiquette allow, but the voice of conscience and reason. The first two characters, discussed by us above, are presented already formed, and Mr. Goncharov only explains them to the reader, that is, he shows the conditions under the influence of which they were formed; as for Olga's character, it is formed before the eyes of the reader. The author first depicts her as almost a child, a girl gifted with a natural mind, who enjoyed some independence in her upbringing, but who did not experience any strong feelings, any excitement, unfamiliar with life, not accustomed to observing herself, analyzing the movements of her own soul. During this period of Olga's life, we see in her a rich, but untouched nature; she is not corrupted by the world, she does not know how to pretend, but she also did not have time to develop mental strength in herself, she did not have time to work out convictions for herself; she acts in obedience to the inclinations of a good soul, but acts instinctively; she follows the friendly advice of a developed person, but does not always criticize this advice, is carried away by authority and sometimes mentally refers to her boarding school friends.<...>
Experience and calm reflection could gradually lead Olga out of this period of instinctive drives and actions, her innate curiosity could lead her to further development through reading and serious studies; but the author chose a different, accelerated path for her. Olga fell in love, her soul was agitated, she came to know life, following the movements of her own feelings; the need to understand the state of her own soul made her change her mind a lot, and from this series of reflections and psychological observations she developed an independent view of her personality, her relations with other people, the relationship between feeling and duty, in a word, life in the broadest sense. G. Goncharov, by depicting Olga's character, by analyzing her development, showed in full force the educational influence of feeling. He notices its emergence, follows its development, and stops at each of its modifications in order to depict the influence that it has on the whole way of thinking of both actors. Olga fell in love by accident, without prior preparation; she did not create for herself an abstract ideal, under which many young ladies try to bring men they know, she did not dream of love, although, of course, she knew about the existence of this feeling.
She lived quietly, not trying to artificially arouse love in herself, not trying to see the hero of her future novel in every new face. Love came to her unexpectedly, unexpectedly, as any true feeling comes; this feeling imperceptibly crept into her soul and drew her own attention to itself when it had already received some development. When she noticed him, she began to ponder and measure words and deeds with her inner thought. This moment, when she became aware of the movements of her own soul, begins a new period in her development. Every woman experiences this moment, and the upheaval that then takes place in her whole being and begins to expose in her the presence of restrained feelings and concentrated thought, this upheaval is especially fully and artistically depicted in Mr. Goncharov's novel. For a woman like Olga, feeling could not long remain at the level of instinctive attraction; the desire to comprehend in her own eyes, to explain to herself everything that met her in life, awakened here with special force: a goal for feelings appeared, and a discussion of a beloved person appeared; this discussion determined the very goal.
Olga realized that she was stronger than the person she loves, and decided to elevate him, breathe energy into him, give him strength for life. A meaningful feeling became a duty in her eyes, and with full conviction she began to sacrifice to this duty some external decorum, for the violation of which the suspicious court of light is sincerely and unjustly pursued. Olga grows with her feelings; each scene that takes place between her and the person she loves adds a new trait to her character, with each scene the graceful image of the girl becomes more familiar to the reader, is outlined brighter and stands out more strongly from the general background of the picture.
We have sufficiently defined Olga's character to know that there could be no coquetry in her relationship to her beloved: the desire to lure a man, to make him her adorer, without feeling any feeling for him, seemed to her unforgivable, unworthy of an honest woman. In her treatment of the man whom she later fell in love with, at first soft, natural grace dominated, no calculated coquetry could act stronger than this genuine, artlessly simple treatment, but the fact is that on the part of Olga there was no desire to make this or that impression . Femininity and grace, which Mr. Goncharov knew how to put into her words and movements, are an integral part of her nature and therefore have a particularly charming effect on the reader. This femininity, this grace, grows stronger and more charming as the feeling develops in the breast of the girl; playfulness, childish carelessness are replaced in her features by an expression of quiet, thoughtful, almost solemn happiness.
Life opens before Olga, a world of thoughts and feelings about which she had no idea, and she goes forward, looking trustingly at her companion, but at the same time peering with timid curiosity at the sensations that crowd in her agitated soul. The feeling is growing; it becomes a need, a necessary condition of life, and meanwhile, and here, when the feeling reaches pathos, to the "lunaticism of love," in the words of Mr. Goncharov, and here Olga does not lose consciousness of moral duty and knows how to maintain a calm, reasonable, critical look at their duties, the personality of the loved one, their position and their actions in the future. The very strength of feeling gives her a clear view of things and maintains firmness in her. The fact is that feeling in such a pure and sublime nature does not descend to the degree of passion, does not cloud the mind, does not lead to such actions, from which one would later have to blush; such a feeling does not cease to be conscious, although sometimes it is so strong that it presses and threatens to destroy the organism. It instills energy into the soul of a girl, makes her break this or that law of etiquette; but this same feeling does not allow her to forget her real duty, protects her from infatuation, instills in her a conscious respect for the purity of her own personality, which is the guarantee of happiness for two people.
Olga, meanwhile, is going through a new phase of development: a sad moment of disappointment comes for her, and the mental suffering she experiences finally develops her character, gives her thoughts maturity, and informs her of life experience. Disappointment is often the fault of the disappointed person. A person who creates a fantastic world for himself will certainly, sooner or later, collide with real life and hurt himself the more painfully, the higher was the height to which his whimsical dream raised him. Whoever demands the impossible from life must be deceived in his hopes. Olga did not dream of impossible happiness: her hopes for the future were simple, her plans were feasible. She fell in love with an honest, intelligent and developed man, but weak, not used to living; she recognized his good and bad sides and decided to use all her efforts to warm him with the energy that she felt in herself. She thought that the power of love would revive him, instill in him the desire for activity and enable him to put to work the abilities that had dozed off from long inactivity.
Its purpose was highly moral; she was inspired by her true feeling. It could be achieved: there was no evidence to doubt success. Olga mistook the momentary outburst of feeling on the part of the person she loved for a real awakening of energy; she saw her power over him and hoped to lead him forward on the path of self-improvement. Could she not be carried away by her beautiful goal, could she not see quiet reasonable happiness ahead of her? And suddenly she notices that the momentarily excited energy is extinguished, that the struggle she has undertaken is hopeless, that the charming power of sleepy calm is stronger than its life-giving influence. What was she to do in such a case? Opinions are likely to be divided. Whoever admires the impetuous beauty of an unconscious feeling, without thinking about its consequences, will say: she had to remain true to the first movement of her heart and give her life to the one she once loved. But whoever sees in a feeling a guarantee of future happiness will look at things differently: hopeless love, useless for oneself and for a beloved object, has no meaning in the eyes of such a person; the beauty of such a feeling cannot excuse its lack of meaning.
Olga had to conquer herself, to break this feeling while there was still time: she had no right to ruin her life, to bring herself a useless sacrifice. Love becomes illegitimate when reason disapproves of it; to drown out the voice of reason means to give free rein to passion, animal instinct. Olga could not do this, and she had to suffer until a deceived feeling ached in her soul. She was saved in this case by the presence of consciousness, which we have already indicated above. The struggle of thought with the remnants of feeling, reinforced by fresh memories of past happiness, hardened Olga's spiritual strength. In a short time, she changed her mind and changed her mind as much as it does not happen to change her mind and feel over the course of many years of calm existence. She was finally prepared for life, and the past feeling she experienced and the suffering she experienced gave her the ability to understand and appreciate the true virtues of a person; they gave her the strength to love in a way she could not love before. Only a remarkable personality could inspire her with feelings, and in this feeling there was already no room for disappointment; the time of infatuation, the time of sleepwalking has passed irrevocably. Love could not more imperceptibly sneak into the soul, slipping away from the analysis of the mind for a time. In Olga's new feeling, everything was definite, clear and firm. Olga used to live by her mind, and her mind subjected everything to its analysis, presented new needs every day, sought satisfaction, food in everything that surrounded her.
Then Olga's development took only one more step forward. There is only a cursory indication of this step in Mr. Goncharov's novel. The position to which this new step led is not outlined. The fact is that neither quiet family happiness, nor mental and aesthetic pleasures could completely satisfy Olga. Pleasures never satisfy a strong, rich nature, incapable of falling asleep and losing energy: such a nature requires activity, labor with a reasonable goal, and only creativity can to some extent calm this dreary desire for something higher, unfamiliar, a desire that does not satisfy happy environment of everyday life. Olga reached this state of higher development. How she satisfied the needs awakened in her, the author does not tell us. But, recognizing in a woman the possibility and legitimacy of these higher aspirations, he obviously expresses his view on her appointment and on what is called in the community the emancipation of a woman. Olga's whole life and personality constitute a living protest against the dependence of a woman. This protest, of course, was not the main goal of the author, because true creativity does not impose practical goals on itself; but the more naturally this protest arose, the less it was prepared, the more artistic truth it contains, the more strongly it will affect the public consciousness.
Here are the three main characters of Oblomov. The other groups of personalities that make up the background of the picture and stand in the background are outlined with amazing clarity. It can be seen that the author did not neglect trifles for the main plot and, painting a picture of Russian life, dwelled on every detail with conscientious love. The widow Pshenitsyn, Zakhar, Tarantiev, Mukhoyarov, Anisya - all these are living people, all these are types that each of us has met in our lifetime.<...>
"Oblomov", in all likelihood, will constitute an era in the history of Russian literature, it reflects the life of Russian society in a certain period of its development. The names of Oblomov, Stolz, Olga will become household names. In a word, no matter how one considers Oblomov, whether as a whole or in separate parts, whether in relation to modern life or in terms of its absolute significance in the field of art, one way or another, one will always have to say that it is quite elegant, strictly considered and poetically beautiful work.<...>The depiction of a pure, conscious feeling, the determination of its influence on a person's personality and actions, the reproduction of the dominant disease of our time, Oblomovism - these are the main motives of the novel. If we remember, moreover, that every fine work has an educational influence, if we remember that a truly fine work is always moral, because it faithfully and simply depicts real life, then we must admit that reading books like Oblomov must be a necessary condition for any rational education. Moreover, it may be especially useful for girls to read this novel 3 . This reading, incomparably better than an abstract treatise on female virtue, will make clear to them the life and duties of a woman. One has only to think about Olga's personality, follow her actions, and, probably, more than one fruitful thought will be added to her head, more than one warm feeling will be planted in her heart. So, we think that every educated Russian woman or girl should read Oblomov, just as she should read all the capital works of our literature.
Characteristics of the hero
Olga Sergeevna Ilyinskaya - Oblomov's beloved, Stolz's wife, a bright and strong character.
“Olga in the strict sense was not a beauty ... But if she were turned into a statue, she would be a statue of grace and harmony”, “In a rare girl you will find such simplicity and natural freedom of sight, word, deed ... no lie, no tinsel, no intent !"
O. and Oblomov introduces Stolz. Ilya Ilyich is immediately captivated by the amazing voice of the girl. Listening to her magnificent "Casta diva", Oblomov falls more and more in love with O.
The heroine is self-confident, her mind requires constant work. Having fallen in love with Oblomov, she certainly wants to change him, raise him to her ideal, re-educate him. O. draws up a plan to "remake" Oblomov into an active, active person. “And she will do all this miracle ... She even trembled with proud, joyful awe; I considered it a lesson appointed from above. O. understands that in relations with Oblomov she has the main role, "the role of a guiding star." She was transformed along with Oblomov's changes, because these changes are the work of her hands. But the mind and soul of the heroine required further development, and Ilya Ilyich changed very slowly, reluctantly and lazily. O.'s feeling resembles rather the experience of re-educating Oblomov than sincere first love. She does not inform Oblomov that all affairs on her estate have been settled only in order to “follow to the end how love will make a revolution in his lazy soul ...” But, realizing that her life ideals will never converge with Oblomov’s ideals, O. breaks relationship with him: “... you are ready to coo all your life under the roof ... but I’m not like that: this is not enough for me, I need something else, but I don’t know what!” O. needs to feel that her chosen one is above her. But even Stolz, whom she will marry, does not succeed. "The deep abyss of her soul" haunts O. rest. She is doomed forever striving for development and a richer, spiritually rich life.
Olga Ilyinskaya is the culprit of some shake-up that Oblomov had to endure before plunging into his complete peace of Oblomovism (see the article Olga and Oblomov). Olga is presented in the book as a girl with willpower and an active mind. With Stolz, she has in common - the independence of nature and love for an active, full of movement and work of life. With Oblomov, she is brought together by a penchant for art, for general issues of life, and a love for nature. Being proud and active, Olga liked to set herself difficult tasks in life and achieve their implementation. One of these tasks was to revive Oblomov to a new life, to save him from Oblomovism, to introduce activity and living movement into his life. (See Olga Ilyinskaya's monologue in the novel Oblomov.)
Goncharov. Oblomov. Summary
At first, Olga's attempt was a success: having felt the charm of this smart and talented girl, Oblomov seems to be resurrected. He leaves his sofa, his dusty rooms, he is on his feet all day, wandering around with Olga, listening to music, making plans for a brighter future. But when the habits of a previous life take precedence over this attempt to revive, in Olga rationality turns out to be stronger than love for Oblomov. She writes him a letter in which she logically and in excellent literary form proves that she needs a life that is not the same as that possible with Oblomov, and breaks with him. The fact that Olga marries Stolz and lives happily with her rational and rather dry practical husband emphasizes the element of rationality in her nature.
"is the most striking and complex female character. Getting to know her as a young, just developing girl, the reader sees her gradual maturation and disclosure as a woman, mother, and independent person. At the same time, a complete characterization of the image of Olga in the novel "Oblomov" is possible only when working with quotations from the novel that convey the appearance and personality of the heroine as concisely as possible:
“If she were turned into a statue, she would be a statue of grace and harmony. The size of the head strictly corresponded to a somewhat high growth, the oval and dimensions of the face corresponded to the size of the head; all this, in turn, was in harmony with the shoulders, the shoulders - with the camp ... ".
When meeting with Olga, people always stopped for a moment "before this so strictly and deliberately, artistically created creature."
Olga received a good upbringing and education, understands the sciences and art, reads a lot and is in constant development, knowledge, achievement of new and new goals.
These features of hers were reflected in the appearance of the girl: “The lips are thin and mostly compressed: a sign of a thought constantly directed at something. The same presence of a speaking thought shone in the keen, always cheerful, piercing gaze of dark, gray-blue eyes, "and unevenly located thin eyebrows created a small crease on the forehead" in which something seemed to say, as if a thought rested there. Everything in her spoke of her own dignity, inner strength and beauty: “Olga walked with her head tilted slightly forward, so slender, nobly resting on a thin, proud neck; moved smoothly with her whole body, stepping lightly, almost imperceptibly.
Love for Oblomov
The image of Olga Ilyinskaya in Oblomov appears at the beginning of the novel as a still very young, little-knowing girl, looking at the world around her with wide open eyes and trying to cognize it in all its manifestations. The turning point, which became for Olga the transition from childish shyness and some embarrassment (as was the case when communicating with Stolz), was love for Oblomov. A wonderful, strong, inspiring feeling that flared up with lightning speed between lovers was doomed to parting, since Olga and Oblomov did not want to accept each other as they really are, cultivating in themselves a feeling for semi-ideal prototypes of real heroes.
For Ilyinskaya, love for Oblomov was not associated with the feminine tenderness, gentleness, acceptance and care that Oblomov expected from her, but with duty, the need to change the inner world of her lover, to make him a completely different person:
“She dreamed of how“ she would order him to read the books ”that Stoltz had left, then read the newspapers every day and tell her the news, write letters to the village, finish the plan for arranging the estate, get ready to go abroad - in a word, he would not doze off with her; she will show him the goal, make him fall in love again with everything that he stopped loving.
“And all this miracle will be done by her, so timid, silent, whom no one has obeyed until now, who has not yet begun to live!”
Olga's love for Oblomov was based on the selfishness and ambitions of the heroine. Moreover, her feelings for Ilya Ilyich can hardly be called true love - it was a fleeting love, a state of inspiration and rise in front of a new peak that she wanted to reach. For Ilyinskaya, Oblomov’s feelings were not really important, she wanted to make her own ideal out of him, so that she could then be proud of the fruits of her labors and, perhaps, remind him later that everything he had was due to Olga.