Instructions

Central characters plays are representatives of two Kalinov families. The head of the first family, the imperious and hypocritical bigot Kabanikha, tyrannizes the daughter of Varvara, the son of Tikhon and his wife Katerina. The head of the second family is the same domineering and tyrant Dikoy "holds in his fist" all his relatives, including his nephew Boris who came to him. Dikoy and Kabanikha are representatives of the old generation, which demands respect from the young, but the basis of their lives is hypocrisy and anger.

Varvara and Tikhon obey their mother, knowing her difficult character, and also quiet Boris curses favor with his uncle in the hope that he will leave him a part of the inheritance. However, pure Katerina refuses to pretend and be a hypocrite, a rebellion is brewing in her against the dictatorship of her mother-in-law and her husband's irresponsibility. Varvara teaches her to pretend and live for her own pleasure, but Katerina, as a whole person, is not capable of pretending either.

Tikhon leaves home on business, and Kabanikha publicly humiliates Katerina. The husband does not intercede for fear of his mother's anger. This becomes the "last straw" after which Katerina decides to rebel.

Varvara secretly from her mother meets with a local guy Kudryash. Noticing that Boris likes Katerina, she organizes them secret meeting... Katerina realizes that she loves Boris and does not resist her feelings. For her, their meetings are a sip fresh air, the freedom that she is so much about in the house of Kabanikha.

Meanwhile, Tikhon returns to the house. Katerina suffers from remorse and the inability to live with her husband further. No matter how Varvara advises her, she is not able to hide the truth. During a thunderstorm, Katerina's despair reaches such strength that she confesses her sin to her mother-in-law and husband in front of all the people.

After the confession, Katerina's life becomes unbearable: her mother-in-law denounces her, her husband, though, beats at the order of her mother. In addition, Varvara's daughter escapes from the house because of her mother's reproaches. The culprit of the scandal, Boris, is sent by his uncle Dikoy to Siberia. Katerina secretly meets with Boris and asks to take her with him, but the indecisive and weak Boris refuses her. Realizing that she has nowhere to go, Katerina rushes into the Volga and dies. Tikhon, having learned about the death of his wife, rebelled against his mother for the first time, but it was too late.

The heroes of the play, representatives of two families, divide Kalinov's life into “dark” and “light”. Dikoy and Kabanikha prefer hypocrisy, cruelty, servility and hypocrisy, and such characters as Tikhon, Varvara, Boris, due to their own weakness, cowardice and indecision, do not find the strength to resist and become involuntary accomplices and accomplices. Only Katerina, by virtue of her honest and integral character, is capable of shaking the world, it is not for nothing that the critic N. Dobrolyubov called her "a ray of light in the dark kingdom." Strength, and Katerina dies, because she remains alone. However, her rebellion does not remain fruitless and gives hope for further changes, for example, in her husband Tikhon.

The writer's personal drama is also connected with the writing of the play "The Thunderstorm". In the manuscript of the play, next to the famous monologue of Katerina: “And what dreams I dreamed, Varenka, what dreams! Or golden temples, or some extraordinary gardens, and everyone is singing invisible voices ... ", there is Ostrovsky's record:" I heard from LP about the same dream ... ". LP is the actress Lyubov Pavlovna Kositskaya, with whom the young playwright had a very difficult personal relationship: both had families. The husband of the actress was the artist of the Maly Theater I.M. Nikulin. And Alexander Nikolaevich also had a family: he cohabited with a commoner Agafya Ivanovna, with whom he had children in common (they all died in early age). Ostrovsky lived with Agafya Ivanovna for nearly twenty years.

It was Lyubov Pavlovna Kositskaya who served as the prototype for the image of the heroine of the play Katerina, she also became the first performer of the role.

Characters (edit)

• Savel Prokofich Dikoy, merchant, significant person in the town.
• Boris, his nephew, a young man, decently educated.
• Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova (Kabanikha), a rich merchant's wife, a widow.
• Tikhon Ivanovich Kabanov, her son.
• Katerina, the main character, the wife of Tikhon Kabanov.
• Barbara, sister of Tikhon.
• Kuligin, a tradesman, a self-taught mechanic looking for a perpetuum mobile.
• Vanya Kudryash, young man, clerk of Wild.
• Shapkin, tradesman.
• Feklusha, wanderer.
• Glasha, the girl in the house of Kabanikha.
• Lady with two footmen, an old woman of seventy, half-mad.
• Urban dwellers of both sexes.

First performances

On December 2, 1859, the performance was first staged at the Alexandrinsky Theater at the benefit performance of Linskoy in the role Boar; Wild- Burdin, Boris- Stepanov, Tikhon- Martynov, Katerina- Snetkova 3rd, Barbara- Levkeeva, Kuligin- Bison, Curly- Gorbunov, Feklusha- Gromova.

Criticism

The Thunderstorm became the subject of bitter controversy among critics in both the 19th and 20th centuries. In the 19th century, Nikolai Dobrolyubov (article "A ray of light in the dark kingdom"), Dmitry Pisarev (article "Motives of Russian drama") and Apollon Grigoriev wrote about it from opposite positions. In the XX century - Mikhail Lobanov (in the book "Ostrovsky", published in the series "ZhZL") and Vladimir Lakshin.

Adaptations

A number of operas have been written on the plot of The Thunderstorm (see The Thunderstorm (opera)): in 1867 by the composer V.N.Kashperov on a libretto of his own composition (the opera was staged in the same year in Moscow and St. - Leos Janacek (Katya Kabanova, staged in 1921, Brno), in 1940 by B. V. Asafiev on his own libretto, V. N. Trambitsky on the libretto by I. I. Keller, Italian composer Lodovico Rocca (Italian L'Uragano, 1952).

Write a review on the article "Thunderstorm (play)"

Notes (edit)

Excerpt from Thunderstorm (play)

“Your position is doubly awful, dear princess,” said m lle Bourienne after a little pause. - I understand that you could not and cannot think of yourself; but with my love for you I am obliged to do it ... Alpatych was with you? Did he talk to you about leaving? She asked.
Princess Marya did not answer. She did not understand where and who was to go. “Was it possible to do anything now, think about anything? Isn't it all the same? She didn't answer.
“Do you know, chere Marie,” said m lle Bourienne, “do you know that we are in danger, that we are surrounded by the French; driving is now dangerous. If we go, we will almost certainly be captured, and God knows ...
Princess Marya looked at her friend, not understanding what she was saying.
"Ah, if only anyone knew how all the same to me now," she said. - Of course, I would never want to leave him ... Alpatych told me something about leaving ... Talk to him, I can do nothing, I can not do anything and I do not want ...
- I spoke to him. He hopes we can leave tomorrow; but I think it would be better to stay here now, ”said m lle Bourienne. - Because, you see, chere Marie, it would be awful to get into the hands of soldiers or rioters on the road. - M lle Bourienne took out from her reticule an announcement on a non-Russian unusual paper of the French General Rameau that residents should not leave their homes, that they would be given due patronage by the French authorities, and submitted it to the princess.
“I think it’s better to go to this general,” said m lle Bourienne, “and I’m sure you will be given the respect you deserve.”
Princess Marya was reading the paper, and dry sobs twitched her face.
- Through whom did you get it? - she said.
“They probably learned that I’m a Frenchwoman by name,” said m lle Bourienne, blushing.
Princess Marya, paper in hand, got up from the window and with a pale face left the room and went to Prince Andrey's former study.
“Dunyasha, call Alpatych, Dronushka, someone to me,” said Princess Marya, “and tell Amalya Karlovna not to come in to me,” she added, hearing the voice of m lle Bourienne. - Hurry to go! Go faster! - said Princess Marya, horrified by the thought that she could remain in the power of the French.
“So that Prince Andrew knows that she is in the power of the French! So that she, the daughter of Prince Nikolai Andreich Bolkonsky, asked Mr. General Rameau to protect her and use his good deeds! - This thought terrified her, made her shudder, blush and feel fits of anger and pride that she had not yet experienced. Everything that was difficult and, most importantly, offensive in her position, vividly presented itself to her. “They, the French, will settle in this house; General Rameau will take over the office of Prince Andrew; will go through and read his letters and papers for fun. M lle Bourienne lui fera les honneurs de Bogucharovo. [Mademoiselle Burien will receive him with honors at Bogucharovo.] I will be given a room out of mercy; soldiers will ravage their father's fresh grave in order to remove crosses and stars from him; they will tell me about the victories over the Russians, they will pretend to express sympathy for my grief ... - thought Princess Mary not with her own thoughts, but feeling herself obliged to think for herself with the thoughts of her father and brother. For her personally, it was all the same wherever she stayed and whatever happened to her; but at the same time she felt herself a representative of her late father and Prince Andrew. She involuntarily thought them with thoughts and felt them with feelings. Whatever they said, what they would do now, she felt the need to do it. She went to Prince Andrey's study and, trying to imbue his thoughts, pondered her position.
The demands of life, which she considered destroyed with the death of her father, suddenly with a new, still unknown force arose before Princess Marya and seized her. Excited, red, she walked around the room, demanding to her now Alpatych, then Mikhail Ivanovich, then Tikhon, then Dron. Dunyasha, the nanny and all the girls could not say anything about the extent to which what was announced by m lle Bourienne was true. Alpatych was not at home: he went to his superiors. The summoned Mikhail Ivanovich, the architect, who appeared to Princess Marya with sleepy eyes, could not tell her anything. With exactly the same smile of agreement with which he was accustomed for fifteen years to answer, without expressing his opinion, to the addresses of the old prince, he answered the questions of Princess Marya, so that nothing definite could be deduced from his answers. The summoned old valet Tikhon, with a sunken and haggard face bearing the imprint of incurable grief, answered "I listen with" to all Princess Marya's questions and could hardly restrain himself from sobbing, looking at her.
Finally, the headman Dron entered the room and, bowing low to the princess, stopped at the lintel.
Princess Marya walked across the room and stopped opposite him.
“Dronushka,” said Princess Marya, who saw in him an undoubted friend, the same Dronushka who, from his annual trip to the fair in Vyazma, brought her every time and served his special gingerbread with a smile. “Dronushka, now, after our misfortune,” she began and fell silent, unable to speak further.
“We all walk under God,” he said with a sigh. They were silent.
- Dronushka, Alpatych has gone somewhere, I have no one to turn to. Are they telling me the truth that I can't even leave?
- Why don't you go, Your Excellency, you can go, - said Dron.
- I was told that it is dangerous from the enemy. Darling, I can’t do anything, I don’t understand anything, there’s no one with me. I definitely want to go at night or early tomorrow morning. - The drone was silent. He glanced from under his brows at Princess Marya.
- There are no horses, - he said, - I told Yakov Alpatych.
- Why not? - said the princess.
- Everything from divine punishment- said Dron. - What horses were, were dismantled for the troops, and what died, this is what year. Not to feed the horses, but not to die of hunger ourselves! And so they don't eat for three days. There is nothing, completely ruined.
Princess Marya listened attentively to what he said to her.
- Are the peasants ruined? Do they have no bread? She asked.
- They die of hunger, - said Dron, - not like carts ...
- Why didn't you say, Dronushka? Can't you help? I will do everything I can ... - It was strange for Princess Marya to think that now, at such a moment, when such grief filled her soul, there could be people rich and poor, and that the rich could not help the poor. She vaguely knew and heard that there is a master's bread and that it is given to peasants. She also knew that neither her brother nor her father would refuse the peasants in need; she was only afraid to make a mistake in her words about this distribution of bread to the peasants, which she wanted to dispose of. She was glad that she was presented with an excuse for caring, one for which she was not ashamed to forget her grief. She began to ask Dronushka for details about the needs of the peasants and about what is the master's in Bogucharov.

Creative history of "Thunderstorms"

Ostrovsky came to the artistic synthesis of the dark and light beginnings of merchant life in the Russian tragedy "The Thunderstorm" - the pinnacle of his mature creativity... The creation of "The Thunderstorm" was preceded by the playwright's expedition along the Upper Volga, undertaken on the instructions of the Naval Ministry in 1856-1857. She revived and revived in the memory of youthful impressions, when in 1848 Ostrovsky for the first time went with his household on an exciting journey to his father's homeland, to the Volga city of Kostroma and further, to the Shchelykovo estate acquired by his father. The result of this trip was Ostrovsky's diary, which reveals a lot in his perception of the life of provincial, Volga region Russia. The Ostrovskys set off on April 22, on the eve of Yegoriev's day. “It's springtime, holidays are frequent,” says Kupava to Tsar Berendey in “ spring tale"Ostrovsky" Snow Maiden ". The journey coincided with the most poetic time of the year in the life of a Russian. In the evenings, in ritual spring songs that sounded outside the outskirts, in groves and valleys, the peasants turned to birds, curly willows, white birches, and silk green grass. On Yegoryev's day, they walked around the fields, "called out to Yegoriy," asked him to keep the cattle from predatory animals. Following Yegoryev's day, there were the holidays of green Christmastide (Russian week), when they led round dances in the villages, arranged a game with burners, burned fires and jumped over the fire. The path of the Ostrovskys lasted a whole week and went through the ancient Russian cities: Pereslavl-Zalessky, Rostov, Yaroslavl, Kostroma. An inexhaustible source poetry opened for Ostrovsky Upper Volga region. “Merya begins from Pereyaslavl,” he writes in his diary, “the land, abundant in mountains and waters, and the people are tall, and beautiful, and smart, and frank, and obligatory, and a free mind, and a soul wide open. These are my beloved fellow countrymen, with whom I seem to get along well. Here you won't see a little bent man or a woman dressed as an owl, who continually bows and says: "But father, but father ..." buildings, and girls. We've got eight beauties on our way. " “On the meadow side, the views are amazing: what kind of villages, what kind of buildings, just like you are driving not across Russia, but along some the promised land". And now the Ostrovskys are in Kostroma. “We are standing on the steepest mountain, under our feet is the Volga, and on it ships are moving back and forth, now in sails, now in barge haulers, and one charming song haunts us irresistibly. Here comes the bark, and charming sounds are faintly audible from a distance; nearer and nearer, the song grows and poured, at last, at the top of its voice, then little by little it began to subside, and meanwhile another bark came up and the same song grew. And there is no end to this song ... And on the other side of the Volga, right opposite the city, there are two villages; and especially picturesque is one, from which the most curly grove stretches right up to the Volga, the sun at sunset climbed into it somehow miraculously, from the roots, and did many miracles. I was exhausted, looking at this ... Exhausted, I returned home and for a long, long time could not sleep. Some kind of despair took possession of me. Will the painful impressions of these five days be fruitless for me? " Such impressions could not be fruitless, but they defended for a long time and matured in the soul of the playwright and poet, before such masterpieces of his work as The Thunderstorm and then The Snow Maiden appeared. His friend S.V. Maksimov: “An artist with strong talent was not able to miss a favorable opportunity ... He continued to observe the characters and outlook of indigenous Russian people, hundreds of them came out to meet him ... The Volga gave Ostrovsky abundant food, showed him new themes for dramas and comedies and inspired him of them that constitute honor and pride domestic literature... From the veche, once free, Novgorod suburbs breathed of that transitional time when the heavy hand of Moscow fettered the old will and sent the governor in iron gauntlets on long, ragged paws. I dreamed of the poetic "Dream on the Volga", and the "voivode" Nechay Grigorievich Shalygin rose from the grave alive and active with his enemy, a free man, a runaway daredevil posad Roman Dubrovin, in all that truthful atmosphere of old Russia that only the Volga can represent, in at the same time, both a pious, and a robber, well-fed and little bread ... Outwardly beautiful Torzhok, jealously guarded its Novgorod antiquity until strange customs girlish freedom and strict seclusion of married, inspired Ostrovsky to a deeply poetic "Thunderstorm" with playful Barbara and artistically graceful Katerina. " For quite a long time, it was believed that Ostrovsky took the plot of "The Thunderstorm" from the life of the Kostroma merchants, which was based on the Klykov case, which was sensational in Kostroma at the end of 1859. Until the beginning of the 20th century, Kostroma residents proudly pointed to the place of Katerina's suicide - a gazebo at the end of a small boulevard, which in those years literally hung over the Volga. They also showed the house where she lived - next to the Church of the Assumption. And when "The Thunderstorm" was first staged on the stage of the Kostroma Theater, the artists made up "like the Klykovs".

Kostroma local historians later thoroughly examined the "Klykovskoe Delo" in the archives and, with documents in hand, came to the conclusion that this was the story that Ostrovsky used in his work on The Thunderstorm. The coincidences were almost literal. A.P. Klykova was married to a gloomy and unsociable merchant family of sixteen years old, consisting of old parents, a son and an unmarried daughter. The mistress of the house, stern and obstinate, depersonalized her husband and children with her despotism. She forced the young daughter-in-law to do any dirty work, refused her requests to see her relatives.

At the time of the drama, Klykova was nineteen years old. In the past, she was brought up in love and in the hall of the soul in her doted grandmother, she was cheerful, lively, cheerful. Now she found herself in an unkind and alien family. Her young husband, Klykov, a carefree and apathetic man, could not protect his wife from the oppression of his mother-in-law and treated them indifferently. The Klykovs had no children. And then another man, Maryin, an employee in the post office, stood in the way of the young woman. Suspicions began, scenes of jealousy. It ended with the fact that on November 10, 1859, the body of A.P. Klykova was found in the Volga. A long trial, which received wide publicity even outside the Kostroma province, and none of the Kostroma residents doubted that Ostrovsky used the materials of this case in the "Thunderstorm".

Many decades passed before Ostrovsky's researchers determined that The Thunderstorm was written before Klykova, the merchant from Kostroma, threw herself into the Volga. Ostrovsky began work on "The Thunderstorm" in June - July 1859 and finished on October 9 of the same year. The play was first published in the January 1860 issue of the Library for Reading magazine. The first performance of "The Thunderstorms" took place on November 16, 1859 at the Maly Theater, at the benefit performance of S.V. Vasiliev with L.P. Nikulina-Kositskaya as Katerina. The version about the Kostroma source of the "Groza" turned out to be far-fetched. However, the very fact amazing coincidence speaks volumes: he testifies to the sagacity of the national playwright, who caught the growing conflict between the old and the new in merchant life, a conflict in which Dobrolyubov saw "something refreshing and encouraging" theatrical figure S.A. Yuriev said: Ostrovsky did not write "Thunderstorm" ... Volga wrote "Thunderstorm". "

“On the instructions of His Imperial Highness, General-Admiral, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich, prominent Russian writers who already had travel experience and a taste for essay prose were sent to the country for new materials for the" Sea Collection ". They were supposed to study and describe folk crafts associated with the sea, lakes or rivers, the techniques of local shipbuilding and navigation, the state of domestic fishing and the very state of the waterways of Russia.

Ostrovsky got the Upper Volga from the source to Nizhny Novgorod. And he got down to business with enthusiasm. "

“In the ancient dispute of the Volga cities about which of them, by the will of Ostrovsky, was turned into Kalinov (the scene of the play" The Thunderstorm "), arguments in favor of Kineshma, Tver, Kostroma are most often heard. The disputants seemed to have forgotten about Rzhev, and meanwhile, Rzhev was clearly involved in the birth of the mysterious idea of ​​the "Thunderstorm"!

It is not known exactly where "The Thunderstorm" was written - at a dacha near Moscow or in the Trans-Volga Shchelykovo, but it was created with amazing speed, truly by inspiration, in a few months in 1859 ”.

“The year 1859 is hidden from the biographer of Ostrovsky by a thick veil. That year he did not keep a diary and, it seems, did not write letters at all ... But something can still be restored. "The Thunderstorm" was begun and written, as can be seen from the notes in the first act of the draft manuscript, July 19, July 24, July 28, July 29 - in the height of the summer of 1859. Ostrovsky does not regularly travel to Shchelykovo yet and, according to some reports, spends a hot summer near Moscow - in Davydovka or Ivankovo, where the actors of the Maly Theater and their literary friends settle in their dachas as a whole colony.

Friends of Ostrovsky often gathered at his home, and the talented, cheerful actress Kositskaya has always been the soul of society. Wonderful performer of Russians folk songs, the owner of a colorful speech, she attracted Ostrovsky not only as a charming woman, but also as a deep, perfect folk character... Kositskaya "drove insane" more than one Ostrovsky when she began to sing provocative or lyrical folk songs.

Listening to Kositskaya's stories about early years her life, the writer immediately drew attention to the poetic richness of her language, to the colorfulness and expressiveness of turns. In her "servile speech" (so contemptuously the Countess Rostopchina described Kositskaya's manner of speaking) Ostrovsky felt a fresh source for his creativity.

The meeting with Ostrovsky inspired Kositskaya. The tremendous success of the first production of the play "Don't Get in Your Sleigh, Don't Sit Down", chosen by Kositskaya for the benefit performance, opened the wide road for Ostrovsky's drama onto the stage.

Of the twenty-six original plays by Ostrovsky, staged in Moscow during the period from 1853 to the year of Kositskaya's death (1868), that is, for fifteen years, she participated in nine.

Life path, personality, stories of Kositskaya gave Ostrovsky rich material for creating the character of Katerina.

In October 1859, at the apartment of L.P. Kositskaya Ostrovsky read the play to the actors of the Maly Theater. The actors unanimously admired the composition, figuring out the roles for themselves. It was known that Ostrovsky had given Katerina to Kositskaya in advance. They predicted Borozdina for Varvara, Sadovsky for Dikiy, Sergei Vasiliev was to play Tikhon, Rykalov was to play Kabanikha.

But before rehearsing, the play must be censored. Ostrovsky himself went to Petersburg. Nordstrom read the drama as if there were no fiction, but a cipher proclamation. And he suspected that the late Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich had been brought out to Kabanikha. Ostrovsky dissuaded the frightened censor for a long time, saying that he could not give up the role of Kabanikha ...

The play was received from censorship a week before the premiere. However, in those days, playing a play from five rehearsals did not seem like a curiosity to anyone.

The main director was Ostrovsky. Under his leadership, the actors searched for the right intonations, coordinated the tempo and character of each scene. The premiere took place on November 16, 1859 ".

“The academic world of Russia rather quickly confirmed the high merits of the play: on September 25, 1860, the board of the Russian Academy of Sciences awarded the play“ Thunderstorm ”the Great Uvarov Prize (this prize was established by Count A. Uvarov, the founder of the Moscow Archaeological Society, to reward the most outstanding historical and dramatic works) ".

The genre of the play

The Thunderstorm was allowed by the dramatic censorship for performance in 1859, and published in January 1860. At the request of Ostrovsky's friends, the censor I. Nordstrem, who favored the playwright, presented The Thunderstorm as a play not socially accusatory, satirical, but loving -Household, without mentioning a word in his report either about Dick, or about Kuligin, or about Feklus.

In its most general formulation, the basic theme Thunderstorms can be defined as a clash between new trends and old traditions, between oppressed and comforters, between the desire of people to freely manifest their human rights, spiritual needs and the social and family order that prevailed in pre-reform Russia.

The Thunderstorms theme is organically linked to its conflicts. Conflict, constituting the basis of the plot of the drama is conflict between old social principles and new, progressive aspirations for equality, for the freedom of the human person... The main conflict - Katherine's with her environment - unites everyone else. It is joined by the conflicts of Kuligin with Dikim and Kabanikha, Kudryash with Dikim, Boris with Dikim, Varvara with Kabanikha, Tikhon with Kabanikha. The play is a true reflection public relations, interests and struggles of their time.

common topic"Thunderstorms" also involve a number of particular themes:

a) with the stories of Kuligin, the remarks of Kudryash and Boris, the actions of Dikiy and Kabanikha, Ostrovsky gives a detailed description of the material and legal situation of all strata of society of that era;

c) painting life, interests, hobbies and experiences actors"Thunderstorms", the author reproduces from different sides the social, family and everyday life of the merchant class and the bourgeoisie. Thus, the problem of social and family relations is highlighted. The position of women in the bourgeois-merchant environment is vividly outlined;

d) the background of life and the problems of that time are displayed. Heroes talk about important for their time social phenomena: about the emergence of the first railways, about cholera epidemics, about the development of commercial and industrial activities in Moscow, etc .;

e) along with socio-economic and living conditions, the author skillfully painted pictures of nature, different attitude to her actors.

So, in the words of Goncharov, in "The Thunderstorm" "the broad picture of national life and customs has settled down." Pre-reform Russia is represented in it by its socio-economic, cultural, moral, and family and everyday appearance.

3.K song composition

Exposition- pictures of the Volga expanse and stuffiness of Kalinov's mores (D. I, yavl. 1-4).

Tie- to the nagging of her mother-in-law, Katerina answers with dignity and amicably: “You mean me, mamma, you are saying this in vain. That with people, that without people I am all alone, I do not prove anything from myself. " The first collision (D. I, yavl. 5).

Next comes conflict development, a thunderstorm gathers twice in nature (D. I, yavl. 9). Katerina confesses to Varvara that she fell in love with Boris - and the prophecy of the old lady, a distant thunderclap; end of D. IV. A thundercloud crawls like a living, half-insane old woman threatens Katerina with death in a pool and hell.

First climax- Katerina confesses her sin and falls unconscious. But the thunderstorm never struck the city, only the pre-storm tension is felt.

Second climax- Katerina gives her last monologue when she says goodbye not to life, which is already intolerable, but with love: “My friend! My joy! Goodbye!" (D. V, yavl. 4).

Interchange- the suicide of Katerina, the shock of the inhabitants of the city, Tikhon, who is jealous deceased wife: “Good for you, Katya! And why did I stay to live and suffer! .. ”(D.V, yavl.7).

Output. By all indications of the genre, the play "The Thunderstorm" is a tragedy, since the conflict between the characters leads to tragic consequences... There are also elements of comic in the play (the tyrant Dikoy with his ridiculous, humiliating human dignity requirements, Feklusha's stories, Kalinovites' reasoning), which help to see the abyss ready to swallow Katerina and which Kuligin is trying unsuccessfully to illuminate with the light of reason, kindness and mercy. Ostrovsky himself called the play a drama, thereby emphasizing the widespread occurrence of the play's conflict, the everyday life of the events depicted in it.

The play "Thunderstorm", which by genre conceived as a comedy, was written by A.N.Ostrovsky in 1859. At first, the work did not imply a tragic outcome, but in the process of writing, in addition to the conflict of an individual personality, a socially accusatory orientation was clearly manifested. As Ostrovsky wrote the play "The Thunderstorm", summary on the actions we bring to your attention.

In contact with

Characteristics of the work

1. To which literary genre(story or story) belongs to the work "Thunderstorm"?
2. How many acts are there in the play "The Thunderstorm"?
3. Briefly: what formed the basis of the plot of the drama "The Thunderstorm"?

"The Thunderstorm" is a play in five acts, according to the author's definition - a drama, but with a genre originality:

• this is a tragedy, since the conflict situation leads to tragic consequences;
• are present comic elements(ignorant reasoning of the characters in the play);
• the drama of events is enhanced by the everyday routine of what is happening.

The place where the main actions of the play unfold was not chosen by Ostrovsky by chance. Kalinov town- this is collective image Volga towns and villages, the beauty of which was fascinated by the playwright.

But the splendor of the endless expanses of water, the discreet charm of nature cannot overshadow the cruelty, indifference, hypocrisy, ignorance and tyranny that reign behind the facades of elegant houses.

The work, as it is now customary to say, " based on true events". In the prosperous Moscow merchant family of the Klykovs, the daughter-in-law committed suicide by rushing into the Volga, unable to withstand reproaches and oppression from her mother-in-law, finding no protection from her husband and suffering from secret love to another man.

It is precisely this tragedy of actions that is main storyline works. However, if Ostrovsky had only limited himself to the vicissitudes in the life of a young woman, the composition would not have had such a resounding success and would not have caused such a resonance in society. Here is outlined and exposed conflict between old traditions and new trends, ignorance and progress, love of freedom and savagery of the philistine world.

Acquaintance with the characters of the work

The author wrote a story about dramatic events in the form of a play for stage performance. And any scenario begins with a description of the characters.

main characters

• Katerina is a young woman of pleasant appearance, God-fearing and meek disposition, with a quivering soul and pure thoughts. Daughter-in-law in the family of merchants Kabanovs.
• Boris, an educated young man who was brought up in a different environment, came to the maintenance and work of his uncle. Suffering from the surrounding reality. Secretly in love with Katerina.
• Kabanikha (Kabanova Marfa Ignatievna) is a wealthy widowed merchant. Powerful and oppressive woman, sanctimoniously covering up her tyranny by venerating elders.
• Tikhon Kabanov - Katerina's husband and Kabanikha's son - soft, weak-willed person completely subordinate to the will of the mother.

Characters

• Varvara is the sister of Tikhon, daughter of Kabanikha. A girl "on her own mind", living according to the principle "if only everything was sewn and covered." However, kind to Katherine.
• Kudryash is a Barbarian boyfriend.
• Dikoy Savel Prokofievich is an influential merchant in the city. Main character traits - rudeness, rudeness and bad manners, especially to subordinates.
• Kuligin is a local craftsman who dreams of bringing progressive ideas to the city.
• Feklusha is a wanderer dark and uneducated.
• The lady is a crazy old woman who sends curses to women.
• Glasha - the Kabanovs' maid.

Such a figurative concept as a thunderstorm plays an important role in the play - harbinger of the cleansing storm for some and God's warning for others.

Important! It should be remembered that the play was written by Ostrovsky in the pre-reform years (1861 - year). The spirit of enthusiasm reigned, expectations of cardinal changes, and it was at this time that the playwright wrote about the awakening of personality, in which Dobrolyubov would later see "something refreshing and encouraging."

For a more detailed acquaintance with the intricacies plot lines each action of Ostrovsky's play "The Thunderstorm", below is their summary.

Step 1

Volzhsky coast, public garden on foreground... Kuligin is delighted with the views. Kudryash and a friend are walking around unhurriedly. Muffled swearing of the Wild is heard, which does not surprise anyone - this is habitual phenomenon... This time he is scolding his nephew Boris. Kudryash condoles with the unenviable fate of a relative of the Wild, who is forced to endure the oppression of his uncle - a tyrant. He himself is one of the few who can rebuff a rude brute: “He is the word, and I am ten; spit, let it go. "

Abusive speech is heard more and more clearly - Savel Prokofievich and his nephew are approaching those present. Taking away his soul, screaming, Dikoy leaves. Boris explains the reason for his forced humility: he and his sister after the death of their parents left orphans... The grandmother in Kalinov wrote off the inheritance to her grandchildren upon reaching the age of majority, and they will get it on condition of respectful and respectful attitude towards uncle... Kuligin assures, they say, this is a utopia: no one will please the Wild. Boris sadly agrees: and so he works for his uncle for nothing, but there is no use. He is wild and stuffy in Kalinov - not at all such upbringing and education was given to his sister and Boris by their parents, who had previously lived in the capital of the capital.

Enter Feklusha with a townswoman. Praising the city's beauty, praising decency and virtue merchant class, noting the Kabanov family. After the departure of the women, Kuligin commemorates the glorified Kabanikha with an unkind word for her bigotry and domestic tyranny... He shares with Boris his thoughts on the invention of the "perpetum-mobile". They give a lot of money for a perpetual motion machine, which can be used for the benefit of society. But there are no funds for parts - this is such a vicious circle. Boris, left alone, sympathizes with Kuligin, but, remembering his unfortunate fate, also leaves the garden.

Kabanikha appears with his family: son Tikhon with his wife Katerina and Varvara Kabanova. The merchant's wife harasses her son with accusations in his excessive love for his wife and disrespect for his mother. The words are intended for Tikhon, but they are clearly directed against the daughter-in-law. Tikhon makes excuses in every possible way, wife tries to support him, which causes a storm of indignation in the mother-in-law and new wave accusations against Tikhon, they say, he cannot keep his wife in strictness, and he is not far from his lover.

After his mother leaves, Tikhon attacks Katerina, accusing her of reproaches Mother. Not wanting to listen to his wife's objections, he goes to Dikiy to pour vodka into his troubles.

Offended woman complains to her sister-in-law about difficult life with mother-in-law, recalls how well, cleanly and freely she lived with her mother: "in the summer I will go to the spring, wash, bring some water and that's it, water all the flowers in the house."

There was solid splendor - embroidery in gold, church prayers, stories of pilgrims.

Everything is wrong in husband's house... Katya confesses to Varvara that she is visited by evil, sinful thoughts, which she cannot drive away with any prayers. A in her heart she has thoughts about one person.

Then an abnormal lady appears, who shower the girls with curses, promising them hellish torments for their sinful beauty. Thunder is heard, a thunderstorm is approaching, and the girls hastily run away.

Step 2

Action 2 begins in the Kabanovs' house. Feklusha and Glasha settled down in the room. The wanderer, observing the work of the servant, tells the one that is happening in this world. And even though her story abounds in lies and ignorance Glasha listens attentively and with interest to Feklusha's tales, for her this is the only source of information.

Katerina and Varvara appear. They help equip Tikhon for a week-long business trip to another city. Feklusha has already left, Varvara sends the maid with her things to the horses. Katerina recalls a long childhood story when she ran to the river out of resentment at something, sailed away in a boat and then found her ten miles away. This indicates decisiveness of her character- despite the girl's meekness, she endures resentment for the time being. Varvara asks Katerina who is the person for whom her heart aches. This is Boris Grigorievich - nephew of Savel Prokofievich... Varya assures Katerina that a man also has feelings for a young woman, and after her husband's departure, arrange a meeting in love... The woman is frightened and decisively rejects this proposal.

Kabanikha and his son come in. She continues to give instructions to Tikhon how to behave in the city, what instructions to give to his wife in her absence: listen to the mother-in-law, do not contradict her in anything, do not sit as a lady without work, do not exchange glances with young guys. Tikhon, embarrassed, pronounces these orders after his mother. Then they are left alone. Katerina, as if anticipating trouble, asks Tikhon not to leave her alone or take her with him to the city. But Tikhon, exhausted by his mother's nagging, is glad to break free, at least briefly, at least for a while.

Farewell scene. Katerina hugs her husband, which displeases her mother-in-law, they say, she doesn't know how to say goodbye properly.

Then Kabanikha rants for a long time that after the departure of the old people - the last zealots of antiquity, it is not known how the white light will stand.

Left alone, Katya, instead of calming down, comes to a complete confusion and thoughts... No matter how much she burdened herself with work, her heart was out of place.

Here Varvara pushes her to meet with Boris. After changing the key to the garden gate, Varya hands it to Katerina. She tries to resist these actions, but then gives up.

Step 3

Kabanova and Feklusha on a bench in front of the merchant's house. They murmur about the vanity of life in big cities, rejoice in the silence and tranquility in their own town. Appears Wild, he is intoxicated. According to his habit, inflamed, he begins be rude to Kabanikhe, but she quickly upsets him. Dikoy excuses himself by the fact that the workers upset him in the morning, demanding payment, and to him this is that a knife is sharp in his heart. Having cooled down in conversation with Kabanikha, he leaves.

Boris has not seen Katerina for a long time and saddened this circumstance. Kuligin is standing next to him, thinking about the heavy share of the poor, who are not up to the beauties of nature - they are in need, but in work, and the rich have fenced in high fences with dogs, and they are thinking how to rob orphans and poor relatives. Curly and Barbara come up. They hug, kiss. The girl informs Boris about the upcoming meeting with Katerina and determines the place in the hollow.

At night, arriving at the meeting place, Boris meets Kudryash, who plays the guitar, and asks him to give him a seat, but Kudryash insists, arguing that this place has long been "warmed up" for meetings with his girlfriend.

Then Boris confesses that he has an appointment here with a married lady. Curly guess who in question and warns Boris, because married women are bonded.

Varvara comes and takes Kudryash away. Lovers are left alone.

Katerina tells Boris about the ruined honor, about God's punishment, but then they both surrender to the power of the senses... Ten days of her husband's absence pass in unity with his beloved.

Step 4

Partially destroyed gallery, its walls are painted with paintings Last judgment... Here people are hiding from the beginning of the rain. Kuligin begs Savel Prokofevich to make donations for the installation of a tower clock in the garden and a thunderbolt. Wild swears, calling names Kuligin an atheist, for a thunderstorm is God's punishment and no piece of iron can be saved from it.

After Tikhon returns home, Katerina is in complete disarray. Varvara tries to reason with her and teaches her not to show any kind. She herself has long become adept at tricks and deceptions. Not having achieved what she wanted, Varya reports to Boris about Katya's condition.

Thunder is heard. The Kabanov family comes out in full complement... Tikhon, noticing strange condition of the wife, jokingly asks her to repent of her sins. Noticing how Katerina turned pale, the sister interrupts her brother's joke. Boris approaches them. Katya on the verge of fainting... Varya gives a signal young man to leave.

Then the Lady appeared and began to frighten the young women for secret sins, and Katerina could not stand it - in a frenzy confesses to a secret relationship with another man throughout all ten days. Repentance scene the main character Is the culmination of the play.

Step 5

Again the Volga embankment, the city garden. It is getting dark. Tikhon approaches Kuligin, who is sitting on the bench. He crushed by Katerina's confession and sends to her address first wishes for a fierce death, then begins to pity her.

The boar at home sharpens her daughter-in-law like rust, Katya wordless and unrequited wanders through the house like a shadow. Everything is wrong in the Kabanov family, even Varya ran away with Kudryash from home.

But Tikhon hopes for a favorable outcome- after all, the lover, at the behest of his uncle, refers to Siberia for three whole years. Glasha comes and says that Katerina disappeared.

Katerina is alone, quietly wandering, talking to herself. She is already decided to give up my life even though it is a great sin. One thing holds her back - the desire to see her beloved at last and receive forgiveness from him for bringing misfortune on him. Boris comes to the call of his beloved. He is affectionate with her, says that he does not hold any grudge against her, but fate separates them, and he has no right to take someone else's wife with him. Katerina cries and asks Boris to give alms to the poor in commemoration of her soul on the way. Itself goes to the shore.

Kuligin, Kabanikha and Tikhon are watching the search for the missing Katerina. People with lanterns ransack the shore. Tikhon is confused by terrible assumptions, The boar accuses her daughter-in-law in the desire to attract attention. Voices from the coast are heard: "The woman threw herself into the water!" Tikhon tries to run there, but his mother does not let him, promising to curse. They bring the drowned woman. Katerina beautiful even after death... Kabanov blames the mother for the death of his wife.

Ostrovsky AN - Thunderstorm summary

Thunderstorm A. N. Ostrovsky (brief analysis)

The curtain

After the first staging of the play on the stage of the Maly Theater the audience was delighted, the press was full of laudatory notes, the plot of the drama amazed the sophisticated audience. Well-known critics did not fail to reflect the work in their reviews. So the critic Apollon Grigoriev, writing a letter to I.S. Turgenev, described the plot of the drama as “ exposing the tyranny of our lives and this is the significance of the author, his merit as an artist, this is the strength of his action on the masses ”.