The conflict in the play "Thunderstorm" (Ostrovsky A.)

Ministry of Education of the Republic of Belarus

educational institution

"Belarusian State Pedagogical University named after Maxim Tank"

Department of Russian and Foreign Literature

The peculiarity of conflicts in the drama of A.N. Ostrovsky "Thunderstorm"

Course work

2nd year student

Faculty of Russian Philology

Patorsky Leonid Anatolievich

Scientific adviser:

Karpushin Sergey Vladimirovich

Minsk 2006.

Introduction 3

History of creation, idea, heroes 5

Character, conflict and features of the stage

Actions 9

The relationship between the world and

Personality 11

The idea of ​​the doom of the "dark kingdom" 14

Katerina's protest 15

Features of the conflict 17

Conclusion 22

References 23

INTRODUCTION

In every dramatic work, the connection between composition, conflict and genre is very close, these three components of the work simply cannot but echo each other, and quite often, by denoting its genre definition, highlighted in small print on the title page, we guess not only the manifestation of form and plot resolution, and with it the ideological and thematic basis of the work, but also the main conflict that gives rise to these ideas. Sometimes the genre definition itself (in this case, often underlined by the author) may simply not correspond to the main traditions of genre division in literature. The fact that the genre definition of the author suddenly does not correspond to the form or content suggests that the conflict here is much deeper than the boundaries of one chosen genre dictate. If the writer deliberately emphasizes this discrepancy between form and content, then researchers and critics are faced with another mystery, the resolution of which is important for understanding the conflict, and, consequently, the idea of ​​the work. Gogol's "Dead Souls", not accidentally called a poem, can serve as a striking example. With his work N.V. Gogol, as it were, sums up the development of literature, forcing already existing genres honed to perfection to work in a new way, and the purpose of such work is to reveal a deeper conflict.

The pictures in the play "Thunderstorm", and the history of its creation reveals many similarities and differences in the comprehension of the formal and meaningful elements of the artistic fabric of the work. A.N. Ostrovsky did not sum up, did not synthesize new genres, however, the genre definition of "Thunderstorm" as an everyday social drama, given by himself, is not entirely accurate, and accordingly, one conflict lying on the surface is, in fact, replaced by another, deeper and more complex. The genre definition of A. Ostrovsky was only a tribute to the literary tradition. The conflict here is destined to play a completely different role.

Ostrovsky showed that even in the ossified world of Kalinov, a folk character of amazing beauty and strength can arise, faith in which - truly Kalinovskaya - is nevertheless based on love, on a free dream of justice, beauty, some kind of higher truth.

The purpose of the research work: analyze a work of art at the level of conflicts revealed in it.

Tasks: consider the system of conflictogens at the formal-content level of the organization of textual material; analyze the role of the main characters, their actions in the process of organizing a conflict situation.

Object of study: disclosure of the heuristic potential of social conflict within the framework of a work of art.

Subject of study: disclosure of the specifics of the manifestation of the social conflict in the plot-compositional and linguistic foundations of a work of art.

Research methods: psychological analysis of a work of art.

Predictive proposals for the development of the research object: There are a lot of issues to explore in The Storm drama. For a work, it is productive to study such problems as: the relationship between the “old” and “new” generation in the work; new views on the life of the "young" generation of Kalinov's people; the future of Kalinov and others.

Scientific novelty research work is determined by the nature of the material involved and the methods of its literary interpretation.

HISTORY OF CREATION, IDEA, HEROES

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky (1823-1886) - the great Russian playwright. Developing the traditions of the realistic dramaturgy of Griboedov, Pushkin, Gogol, with his work he completed the creation of Russian national dramaturgy, established realism on the Russian stage. His theater was the school of a number of generations of Russian actors.

There is a version that Ostrovsky wrote "Thunderstorm", being in love with a married actress of the Maly Theater Lyuba Kositskaya. It was for her that he wrote his Katerina, it was she who played her. However, the actress did not respond to the writer's fiery love - she loved another, who later brought her to poverty and early death. But then, in 1859, Lyubov Pavlovna played like her own destiny, lived with feelings understandable to her, creating the image of a young touching Katerina, who conquered even the emperor himself.

The play was written in 1859 during a period of social upheaval, when the foundations of serfdom were cracking, and a thunderstorm was gathering in the stuffy atmosphere of reality. Ostrovsky's play takes us to a merchant environment, where the house-building order was most stubbornly maintained. The inhabitants of a provincial town live a life closed and alien to public interests, in ignorance of what is going on in the world, in ignorance and indifference. The range of their interests is limited to household chores. Behind the outward calmness of life lie gloomy thoughts, the dark life of tyrants who do not recognize human dignity. Representatives of the "dark kingdom" are Wild and Boar. The first is the finished type of a tyrant merchant, whose meaning of life is to make capital by any means. Ostrovsky showed from life. The domineering and stern Kabanikha is an even more sinister and gloomy representative of the house-building. She strictly observes all the customs and orders of patriarchal antiquity, "eats" the household, breeds hypocrisy, bestowing gifts on the poor, does not tolerate the manifestation of personal will in anyone. Ostrovsky draws Kabanikha as a staunch defender of the foundations of the "dark kingdom". But even in her family, where everyone resignedly obeys her, she sees the awakening of something new, alien and hated by her. And Kabanikha bitterly complains, feeling how life is destroying her usual relationships: “They don’t know anything, there’s no order. They don’t know how to say goodbye. If the light stays on, I don't know. Well, it's good that I won't see anything." Beneath this humble complaint of Kabanikhi is misanthropy, inseparable from religious bigotry.

The Thunderstorm, published in 1860, was a kind of result of Ostrovsky's creative achievements. In it, more clearly than in all previous plays, both his satirical power and his ability to affirm the progressive tendencies that arise in life were revealed.

With the images of Dikoy, Kabanikh, Feklusha, a half-mad lady, the playwright showed that the social relations that dominated the life of that time were based on wild arbitrariness, despotism and cruel violence. Wild and Kabanikha, the richest people in the city of Kalinov, hold all power in their hands. They do whatever pleases them.

In the play The Thunderstorm, the playwright portrayed not only the deadening conditions of the dark kingdom, but also manifestations of deep hatred for them. The satirical denunciation naturally merged in this work with the affirmation of new forces growing in life, positive, bright, rising to fight for their human rights.

Ostrovsky put Katerina at the center of the drama "Thunderstorm" - a poetic nature, pure, open, a creator in essence of her strong character. She herself says about herself that she was born so hot. “If it gets too cold for me here, I don’t want to live here, I won’t, even if you cut me!” she says. “Everything here seems to be from under captivity.”

In the main character of the drama, the writer drew a new type - an original, integral, selfless Russian woman, who, with the determination of her protest, foreshadowed the end of the dark kingdom.

Katerina personifies the moral purity, spiritual beauty of a Russian woman, her desire for will, for freedom, her ability not only to endure, but also to defend her rights, her human dignity.

Dobrolyubov called Katerina a national, national character, “a bright ray in a dark kingdom,” meaning the effective expression in her of direct protest, the liberation aspirations of the masses. Pointing to the deep typicality of this image, to its national significance, the critic wrote that it represents "an artistic combination of homogeneous features that appear in different situations in Russian life, but serve as an expression of one idea."

The integrity, decisiveness of Katerina's character was expressed in the fact that she refused to obey the rules of the boar's house and preferred death to life in captivity. And this was not a manifestation of weakness, but of spiritual strength and courage, of ardent hatred of oppression and despotism. The heroine of Ostrovsky reflected in her feelings, in her actions, the spontaneous protest of the broad masses of the people against the hated conditions of the dark kingdom.

The leading images of "Thunderstorm" are revealed against a wide social background, organically included in the development of the action. In The Thunderstorm, secondary characters (Kuligin, Feklusha) do not directly participate in the development of the main plot intrigue, but they are necessary, they serve to embody the theme and idea of ​​the work and help the playwright to draw a multifaceted picture of Russian life in the play. Skillfully using the most diverse figurative means of the national language, Ostrovsky makes the speech of the characters in The Thunderstorm socially typical and at the same time distinctly individual, concrete, figurative, picturesque.

The playwright masterfully subjugates the composition of The Thunderstorm to the natural disclosure of the conflict underlying the play, reflecting the struggle between obsolete feudal morality and progressive aspirations for the manifestation of human rights. The action of "Thunderstorm", distinguished by epic breadth, is deeply dramatic, it continuously grows in its internal and external dynamism. Increasing the drama and theatricality of the play, Ostrovsky resorts to a contrasting image, to the parallelism between the experiences of the characters and phenomena occurring in nature (thunderstorm), to sharp turns in the development of the action, saturates the play with episodes of high emotional stress. This play, the action of which is carried out both on the street and on the square, is a work of enormous social scale, a distinct democratic ideology, deeply typical characters and high theatricality.

The most profound disclosure of the ideological meaning and artistic features of "Thunderstorm" was given by N.A. Dobrolyubov. Shortly before the appearance of The Thunderstorm, he published an article entitled "Dark Kingdom", in which he brilliantly interpreted Ostrovsky's work as a debunker of the dark kingdom of autocratic Russia, as a writer who had "a deep understanding of Russian life and a great ability to portray its essential aspects sharply and vividly."

The Thunderstorm served as new proof of the correctness of the propositions expressed by the revolutionary-democratic critic. Dobrolyubov explained that the nationality of The Thunderstorm, like all of Ostrovsky’s work, lies in the fact that his plays, showing the complex relationships prevailing in life with all their consequences, serve as “an echo of aspirations that require a better device”.

CHARACTER, CONFLICT AND FEATURES OF STAGE ACTION

Among the expanse of Russian nature, on the steep bank of the Volga, the city of Kalinov is spread. And beyond the Volga one can see villages, fields, forests. “The view is extraordinary! Beauty! The soul rejoices! Kuligin admires. It would seem that the life of the people of this city should be happy. However, it is not. There is a struggle between the new forces, the younger generation, and the obsolete social order and its defenders. The younger generation in the play is represented by Katerina, Varvara, Kudryash, Tikhon. Each of them opposes the "dark kingdom" in its own way, the main representatives of which are Kabanikha and Wild. The composition of "Thunderstorms" is based on a love drama. The plot of the action begins with Katerina's confession that she does not love Tikhon, but loves Boris. Katerina's love is dramatic, as she was raised in a religious family. Her feelings are in conflict with the views that she has been instilled with since childhood. Therefore, she considers her love for Boris a sin that she cannot overcome. Her suffering is aggravated by the fact that she is a truthful and sincere person: “I can’t deceive, I can’t hide anything.” Katerina's feeling does not cause well-being in anyone, only Barbara takes pity on her and tries to help her. However, Varvara offers Katerina help, which is unnatural for Katerina and only increases her suffering. Varvara, brought up in the Kabanikh family, learned to lie and dodge, seeing this as an opportunity to resist the oppression of her mother. Barbara lives by the principle: "do whatever you want, as long as it's sewn and covered." Her beloved Kudryash, who works for Diky, lives on the same principle. The image of the Wild shows the brute force of tyranny. Dikoy's speech is ignorant. He does not want to know anything about science, culture, inventions that improve life. Wild constantly fights, but only with those who are afraid of him or dependent on him financially. Households hide from him in attics and cellars, Boris, his nephew, endures his abuse, as he depends on him. Wild greedy. The meaning of his life is to acquire and increase his wealth. To do this, he does not hesitate to use any means. Having thousands, he feels his strength and brazenly demands universal respect and humility. However, in the guise of the Wild, despite all his militancy, there are features of the comic. The boar is the most sinister figure in the city. She observes obsolete orders and customs in the house, based on religious prejudices and Domostroy. She "eats" her sacrifice, "grinds like rusty iron." The speech of the imperious Kabanikh sounds like an order. Kabanikha is a spokesman for the ideas and principles of the "dark kingdom". She understands that some money does not give power yet, another indispensable condition is the obedience of those who do not have money. She wants to kill the domestic will, any ability to resist. Neither Tikhon nor Varvara dare to openly contradict her. However, they are not satisfied with the patriarchal order in the house. Varvara says: “What a hunt to dry something! At least die of longing ... ”She secretly meets with Curly and offers the same way to Katerina. It’s hard for Katerina to go for it, but she decides: “Come what may, and I will see Boris!” However, she cannot hide her love for a long time and decides to repent. Public repentance shows the depth of her suffering, moral greatness, determination and willpower. She says to Boris: “I was not afraid of sin for you, if I am afraid of human court.” But public repentance does not bring her relief. Katerina is left completely alone, she has nowhere to wait for support. The whole future life seems to her a continuous torment for the sin committed. Her position in the family becomes unbearable. In this state, Katerina could only rely on her loved one. But Boris could not be such a support. Financially dependent on the Wild, he obeys his will and leaves for the trading settlement of Kyakhta. What is left for Katherine? “Where to now? Go home?.. Live again? she asks herself. - No, no, don't, it's not good! And the people are disgusting to me, and the house is disgusting to me, and the walls are disgusting! .. I would die now ... ”The only way out that she finds is to rush into the Volga. Having experienced freedom and true happiness, she cannot come to terms with the oppression of the sinister Boar. All her inflexible nature rebelled against this, but she did not have the strength to resist this world in an unequal struggle. The death of Katerina is a spontaneous challenge to the "dark kingdom". It was in the intransigence and decisiveness of Katerina's protest that Dobrolyubov saw "shakyness and the near end of tyranny." Kudryash and Varvara flee to other lands, Tikhon regrets that he did not die with his wife: “It’s good for you. Katia! But why did I stay in the world and suffer ... "Dobrolyubov perceived the death of Katerina not only as "bitter", but also "pleasant": in her he saw "a protest brought to an end, proclaimed both under domestic torture, and over the abyss into which the poor woman threw herself.

THE PROBLEM OF RELATIONS BETWEEN THE WORLD AND THE PERSON

The author focuses on the crisis of the patriarchal world and patriarchal consciousness. But at the same time, the play turns out to be a hymn to a living soul that dared to boldly protest, to confront the petrified world. And this problem will be relevant at all times.

The classic "petrification" of characters is deeply in line with the entire system of the patriarchal world. This is his inability to change, his fierce resistance to everything that does not comply with his laws, enslaves everyone who is part of the circle of the patriarchal world, forms souls that are unable to exist outside of his vicious circle. It doesn't matter whether they like this life or not - they simply will not be able to live in another. The heroes of the play belong to the patriarchal world, and their blood connection with it, their subconscious dependence on it, is the hidden spring of the entire action of the play; a spring that forces the characters to make mostly "puppet" movements. The author constantly emphasizes them
lack of self-sufficiency, lack of self-sufficiency. The figurative system of the drama almost repeats the social and family model of the patriarchal world. The family and
family problems. The dominant of this small world is the eldest in the family, Marfa Ignatievna. Around her, family members are grouped at various distances - a daughter, a son, a daughter-in-law and almost disenfranchised residents of the house: Glasha and Feklusha. The same “alignment of forces” organizes the entire life of the city: in the center of Dikaya (and merchants of his level not mentioned in the play), on the periphery there are less and less important people who do not have money and
social position.

Kalinov fenced himself off from the world so firmly that for more than a century not a single breath of living life has penetrated the city. Look at Kalinov's "progressive and educator" Kuligin! This self-taught mechanic, whose love of science and passion for the public good puts him on the brink of foolishness in the eyes of others, is trying to invent a “perpeta mobile”: he, poor man, has not heard that the fundamental impossibility has long been proven in the big world creating a perpetual motion machine ... He enthusiastically recites the lines of Lomonosov and Derzhavin,
and he even writes poetry in their spirit... And he is taken aback: as if there was no Pushkin, no Griboyedov, no Lermontov, no Gogol, no Nekrasov! Archaism, living fossil - Kuligin. And his appeals, his ideas, his enlightening monologues about the well-known, about the long-discovered seem
Kalinovtsy with insane innovations, a daring shock to the foundations:

“D and k about y. Yes, what is a thunderstorm, in your opinion? A? Well, speak!

Kuligin. Electricity.

wild (stomping foot). What else there elestrichestvo! Well, how are you not a robber! A thunderstorm is sent to us as a punishment so that we feel, and you want to defend yourself with poles and some kind of goads, God forgive me. What are you, a Tatar, or what? Are you Tatar? A? Speak! Tatar?

Kuligin. Savel Prokofich, your degree, Derzhavin said:

I'm body in
I decay to dust

Mind thunders
I command.

Neither lightning rods, nor Lomonosov, nor a perpetual motion machine are needed by Kalinov: all this simply has no place in the patriarchal world. But what happens beyond its borders? The ocean rages there, the abysses open up there - in a word, "Satan rules the ball there." Unlike Tolstoy, who believed that the parallel and independent existence of two worlds is possible: the patriarchal, self-contained and unchanging, and the modern,
constantly changing, Ostrovsky saw their fundamental incompatibility, the doom of a frozen life incapable of renewal. Resisting the impending innovations that supplant him
“of all rapidly rushing life”, the patriarchal world generally refuses to notice this life, it creates around itself a special mythologized space in which - the only one - its gloomy, hostile isolation to everything else can be justified. The unimaginable is happening around Kalinov: there are falling from the sky
entire countries inhabited by bloodthirsty peoples: for example, Lithuania "fell on us from the sky ... and where there was some battle with it, mounds were poured there for memory." People “with dog heads” live there; there they make their
unrighteous court Mahnut Persian and Turkish Sultan Mahnut.

“There is nothing to do, we must submit! But when I have a million, then I will talk.” This million will give Kuligin to the trial "the right
demolition”, will be the strongest argument in his favor. In the meantime, there is no million, clever Kuligin "submits." Everyone submits, leading their quiet deceitful game: Varvara, Tikhon, dashing Curly, submits already tightened in
closed space Kalinova Boris. Katerina cannot submit.
Faith, degenerated in the patriarchal consciousness into an empty ritual, is alive in her, her sense of guilt and sin is primarily personal; she believes and repents with the ardor of the first Christians, not yet ossified in religious rituals.
And this personal perception of life, God, sin, duty takes Katerina out of the vicious circle and contrasts her with Kalinov's world. The Kalinovites saw in it a phenomenon much more alien than the city dweller Boris or
reciting Kuligin's poems. Therefore, Kalinov arranges a trial for Katerina.

In the brilliant sketch “Who are the judges?” V. Turbin subtly explores the theme of the trial in Groz: “Kuligin does not want to judge anyone. With a grin, the simple Varvara avoids the role of judge: “Why should I judge you? I have my sins."
But it is not for them to resist the mass psychosis that gripped Kalinov. And psychosis is kindled by two eccentrics flickering on the stage: a wanderer
Feklusha and the lady with footmen. Feklushin's stories about the Makhnuts and people with dog heads seem to Turbin to be the most important
element of the poetics of the play: "And they look at each other, as if in a mirror, two worlds: fantastic and real." And again we meet with a bunch of monsters, centaurs. True, this time their bizarre figures are only a background against which, according to the wanderer-wanderer, the righteousness of the judgment being performed here, in Kalinovo, stands out more clearly.

This court lurked in anticipation of the victim. And the sacrifice appears: in the peals of thunder, in the flashing of lightning, the natural, honest word of a sinner who yearns for cleansing is heard. And what happened next is all too well known. Somewhere in the realm of the Turkish and Persian Makhnuts, Katerina, perhaps, would have been pardoned; but she has no mercy in Kalinov.

Driven into the abyss, into the abyss by the all-pervading, all-overtaking
with the word of an amateur court, the sinner passes away: “It’s better in the pool ... Yes, hurry, hurry!”

THE IDEA OF THE DOOM OF THE "DARK KINGDOM"

The development of the action in The Thunderstorm gradually exposes the conflict of the drama. The power of the Boar and the Wild over others is still great. “But it’s a wonderful thing,” Dobrolyubov writes in the article “A Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom,” “the tyrants of Russian life begin, however, to feel some kind of discontent and fear, without knowing what and why ..., another life has grown, with other beginnings, and although it is far away, it is still not clearly visible, but it already gives itself a presentiment and sends bad visions to the dark arbitrariness of tyrants. Such is the "dark kingdom" - the embodiment of the whole system of life in tsarist Russia: the lack of rights of the people, arbitrariness, oppression of human dignity. Katerina, a poetic, dreamy, freedom-loving nature, enters this world of the Wild and Boars. The world of her feelings and moods was formed in her parents' house, where she was surrounded by the care and affection of her mother. In an atmosphere of hypocrisy and importunity, petty tutelage, the conflict between the "dark kingdom" and Katerina's spiritual world is gradually maturing. Katerina suffers only for the time being. “And if I get really sick of it here, then no force can hold me back. I’ll throw myself out the window, throw myself into the Volga, I don’t want to live here, so I won’t, even if you cut me!” she says. Finding no echo in the heart of a narrow-minded and downtrodden husband, her feelings turn to a person who is unlike everyone else. Love for Boris flared up with the force characteristic of such an impressionable nature as Katerina, it became the meaning of the heroine's life. Katerina comes into conflict not only with the environment, but also with herself. This is the tragedy of the position of the heroine. If the drama ended with a scene of repentance, it would show the invincibility of the "dark kingdom". But the drama ends with Katerina's moral victory both over the forces that fettered her freedom and over the dark representatives that fettered her will and mind. Katerina decides to commit suicide. The suicide of the heroine is a protest of a worthless life, to the dark forces of the house-building kingdom. If a woman, the most disenfranchised creature, and even in the dark, inert environment of the merchant class, can no longer put up with the yoke of "tyranny power", it means that among the destitute, downtrodden people, indignation is ripening, which should induce the people to a decisive struggle. For its time, when Russia experienced a period of tremendous social upsurge before the peasant reform, the drama "Thunderstorm" was of great importance. The image of Katerina belongs to the best images of women not only in the work of Ostrovsky, but also in all Russian and world fiction.

KATERINA'S PROTEST

The image of Katerina is the most striking image in Ostrovsky's play "Thunderstorm". Dobrolyubov, analyzing in detail the image of Katerina, called her "a ray of light in a dark kingdom." Katerina's life in her parents' house proceeded well and carelessly. Here she felt at ease. Katerina lived easily, carefree, joyfully. She loved her garden very much, in which she so often walked and admired the flowers. Later, telling Varvara about her life in her home, she says: “I lived, didn’t grieve about anything, like a bird in the wild. and I do."

Katerina differs from all representatives of the "dark kingdom" in the depth of her feelings, honesty, truthfulness, courage, determination. Being brought up in a good family, she retained all the beautiful features of the Russian character. This is a pure, sincere, hot nature, an open soul that does not know how to deceive. “I don’t know how to deceive; I can’t hide anything,” she says to Varvara, who claims that everything in their house is based on deception. The same Varvara calls our heroine some kind of "tricky", "wonderful". Katerina is a strong, determined, strong-willed person. From childhood she was capable of bold deeds. Telling Varvara about herself and emphasizing her hot nature, she says: "I was born so hot!" Katerina was very fond of nature, its beauty, Russian songs. Therefore, her speech - emotional, enthusiastic, musical, melodious - is imbued with high poetry and sometimes reminds us of a folk song.

Growing up in her own home, our heroine adopted all the centuries-old traditions of her family: obedience to elders, religiosity, obedience to customs. Katerina, who did not study anywhere, loved to listen to the stories of wanderers and pilgrims and perceived all their religious prejudices that poisoned her young life, forcing Katerina to perceive love for Boris as a terrible sin, from which she tries and cannot get away. Once in a new family, where everything is under the rule of a cruel, harsh, rude, despotic Kabanikh, Katerina does not find a sympathetic attitude towards herself. Dreamy, honest, sincere, friendly to people, Katerina takes the oppressive atmosphere of this house especially hard. Gradually, life in the house of Kabanikha, which constantly offends the human dignity of Katerina, becomes unbearable for the young woman. In her soul, a dull protest against the "dark kingdom" begins to emerge, which did not give her happiness, freedom and independence. This process develops... Katerina commits suicide. Thus, she proved her rightness, a moral victory over the "dark kingdom".

FEATURES OF THE CONFLICT IN THE PLAY

A conflict is a clash of two or more parties that do not coincide in their views, attitudes. There are several conflicts in Ostrovsky's play "Thunderstorm", but how to decide which one is the main one? In the era of sociologism in literary criticism, it was believed that social conflict was the most important thing in a play. Of course, if we see in the image of Katerina a reflection of the spontaneous protest of the masses against the shackling conditions of the "dark kingdom" and perceive the death of Katerina as the result of her collision with the tyrant mother-in-law, the genre of the play should be defined as a social and everyday drama. Drama is a work in which the public and personal aspirations of people, and sometimes their very lives, are threatened with destruction by external forces that do not depend on them. The play also contains a conflict of generations between Katerina and Kabanikha: the new always steps on the heels of the old, the old does not want to surrender to the new. But the play is much deeper than it might seem at first glance. After all, Katerina primarily struggles with herself, and not with Kabanikha, the conflict develops not around her, but in herself. Therefore, the play "Thunderstorm" can be defined as a tragedy. Tragedy is a work in which there is an insoluble conflict between the personal aspirations of the hero and the supra-personal laws of life that occur in the mind of the protagonist. In general, the play is very similar to an ancient tragedy: the choir is replaced by some extra-plot heroes, the denouement ends with the death of the protagonist, as in ancient tragedy. The death of Katerina is the result of a collision of two historical eras. Some of the characters in the play seem to differ in the time in which they live. For example: Kuligin is a man of the 18th century, he wants to invent a sundial, which was known in antiquity, or a perpetuum mobile, which is a hallmark of the Middle Ages, or a lightning rod. He himself reaches with his mind what has long been invented, and he only dreams about it. He quotes Lomonosov and Derzhavin - this is also a trait of a man of the 18th century. Boris is already an educator of the 19th century, an educated person. Katerina is the heroine of pre-Petrine times. The story about her childhood is a story about the ideal variant of patriarchal house-building relations. In this world of kings, only all-penetrating mutual love, a person does not separate himself from society. Katerina was brought up in such a way that she could not refuse moral and ethical laws, any violation of them is inevitable death. Katerina turns out to be, as it were, older than everyone in the city in her worldview, even older than Kabanikha, who remained as the last guardian of the house-building way in Kalinovo. After all, Kabanikha only pretends that everything is as it should be in her family: her daughter-in-law and her son are afraid and respected, Katerina is afraid of her husband, and she doesn’t care how everything really happens, only appearance is important for her. The main character finds herself in a world that she imagined in a completely different way, and the patriarchal way of life inside Katerina is being destroyed right before her eyes. In many ways, Varvara decides the fate of Katerina, inciting the latter to go on a date. Without Varvara, she would hardly have decided on this. Varvara refers to the youth of the city of Kalinov, which was formed at the turning point of patriarchal relations. Katerina, getting into a new environment for her, cannot get used to society, it is alien to her. For her, the ideal husband is a support, support, ruler. But Tikhon does not confirm Katerina's expectations, she is disappointed in him, and at this moment a new feeling is born - a feeling of personality, which takes the form of a feeling of love. This feeling for Katerina is a terrible sin. If she continued to live in a patriarchal world, then this feeling would not exist. Even if Tikhon showed his masculine will and simply took her with him, she would forget about Boris forever. The tragedy of Katerina is that she does not know how to be hypocritical and pretend like Kabanikha. The main character of the play, moral, with high moral requirements, does not know how to adapt to life. She could not live on, having once violated the laws of Domostroy. The feeling that originated in Katerina cannot be fully embodied in her, and she, not reconciling herself to what she has done, commits an even greater sin - suicide. The play "Thunderstorm" is the tragedy of the main character, in which the era of the turning point of patriarchal relations played an important role.

If we consider The Thunderstorm as a social drama, then the resulting conflict looks quite simple: it is, as it were, external, social; The audience's attention is equally distributed between the characters, all of them, like checkers on a board, play almost the same roles necessary to create a plot outline, they confuse and then, flickering and rearranging, as if in tags, help to resolve the intricate plot. If the system of characters is laid out in such a way that the conflict arises and is resolved, as it were, with the help of all the actors. Here we are dealing with a drama of an everyday nature, its conflict is simple and easy to guess. What happens in the Storm? A married woman, rather God-fearing, fell in love with another person, secretly meets with him, cheats on her husband. The only thing that worries her is her relationship with her mother-in-law, who is a representative of the “past century” and sacredly guards precisely the letter of the law, and not the content itself, speaking allegorically. Katerina, with such a layout of the conflict and such an understanding of it in the light of the genre definition of "Thunderstorm" as a social drama, is the personification of the new time, the "current century", and along with Tikhon, Varvara, Kudryash, she fights against the remnants of the past, against housing construction, against the very atmosphere stagnant of dead rules and orders, the personification of which is the pre-reform Kalinov. The main antagonists are also easily identified - Katerina and Kabanikha. In this spirit, many critics understood The Storm, and, in particular, N. A. Dobrolyubov. Here strong personalities collide, two antagonists, one of them must leave, and suddenly ... This seemingly doomed person turns out to be not the old Kabanikha with her archaic views on life, but the young, full of strength Katerina, surrounded by her like-minded people. What's the matter? What happened? The conflict between the old and the new, “the current century and the past century”, would seem to be resolved, but in a somewhat strange way. All this leads us to the idea that the conflict in the play is much deeper, more complex and subtle than it seems at first glance. Of course, a skillfully built storyline, a confrontation between two strong personalities - Katerina and Kabanikhi take place and give us the opportunity to observe a conflict of a social nature, reminiscent of any current television series. But a deeply hidden conflict is revealed here with a somewhat different reading of the play and a different genre definition, with a different interpretation of the plot of The Thunderstorm. The definition of the genre "Thunderstorms" and the understanding of the conflict as a social one, given by A. N. Ostrovsky, is here not only a tribute to tradition, but also, perhaps, the only possible option at that time. A. I. Zhuravleva explains this phenomenon in this way: “... the whole history of Russian drama that preceded Ostrovsky did not give examples of such a tragedy in which the heroes would be private individuals, and not historical figures, even legendary ones.” So, the genre definition of "Thunderstorm" with a different interpretation is tragedy, and tragedy, accordingly, implies a higher level of conflict than in drama. The contradiction is carried out not at the level of the system of characters, but at a more complex level. The conflict arises, first of all, in the mind of the hero, who is fighting with himself.

The history of tragedy goes far into the depths of centuries, but usually the actors, starting from the ancient tragedy, were historical figures. Suffice it to recall Antigone of Sophocles, who does not know what to do without violating her moral, internal moral principles (and by no means "external", synthesized state laws).

Such is the conflict with A. N. Ostrovsky, it is internal, moral, only it is experienced not by the tsar's daughter or a noble lady, but by a simple merchant's wife. Brought up on Christian morality and house building principles, she sees with horror their collapse not only around, but also inside herself, in her soul. Everything around her is collapsing, “time began to come in supplication,” says the wanderer Feklusha. The consciousness of her "sinfulness and at the same time the understanding that she is not to blame for anything and that she is not in her power to resist passion, brings her to an insoluble contradiction within herself.

Katerina cannot but love Tikhon - after all, this is how she betrays God in her soul, but nevertheless a terrible thing happens, and Katerina is not able to change anything. The conflict is not in the antagonism of Kabanikh and Katerina, who at first glance seeks the right to freedom of choice of feelings, the conflict lies in Katerina herself, who saw in such a struggle a crime against God and could not come to terms with it. And it is not Kabanikha who destroys Katerina, as Tikhon exclaims in the finale, perceiving everything that happens from the point of view of a man of modern times - Katerina is ruined by her own oppressive inconsistency of her feelings. But the understanding of Katerina's inner experiences is inaccessible to Tikhon, as well as to all other characters in the play. They seem to be relegated to the background, they serve only as a background, a decoration for the manifestation of Katerina's character, such as, for example, Wild or a lady. But in fact, one of the main characters, Boris, is generally characterized as "belonging more to the situation." All the characters seem to form a single whole - their disbelief, coupled with Kuligin's progressive worldview, acts as a kind of counterbalance to Katerina's fanatical faith. At the same time, Katerina's almost sectarian faith leads to an insoluble contradiction in her soul, while everyone else has long been reconciled with their conscience. This contradiction cannot be peacefully resolved, and Katerina is not able to compromise with herself.

Katerina is very different from all the other heroes, however, she is very similar to Kabanikha. Both fanatically believe, both are aware of the horror of Katerina's misdeed, but if Kabanikha guards the old, obsolete, Katerina also believes with all her heart, and for her all these tests are many times harder than for Kabanikha. Unable to withstand the state of uncertainty, Katerina sees a way out in repentance, but even this does not bring her relief. Repentance no longer plays a special role, retribution is inevitable, Katerina, like all true believers, is a fatalist and does not believe that anything can be changed. There is only one way to end the tragic conflict in the soul - to lose it, to deprive it of immortality, and Katerina commits the gravest sin - suicide.

So, we see that the culmination and denouement of this tragedy is dictated by the genre itself, and this is no longer a social drama with its external conflict. The play is built according to the laws of tragedy; genre, composition, plot - everything affects the conflict, making it subtle and multifaceted, deep and meaningful.

It can be said with confidence: "Thunderstorm" is, as it were, the beginning of the emergence of a new tradition and at the same time remains, due to the originality of the conflict, "a unique phenomenon in Russian literature of the 18th century."

CONCLUSION

Love is not only the most exalted feeling of a person, but also the most humane. Sometimes it lifts a person from the very depths of life, with all his shortcomings and imperfections, and leads to the snow-white heights of the spirit. And sometimes it is so huge that it can only find a tragic outcome. That is how, tragically, the life of the main character of the drama A.N. Ostrovsky "Thunderstorm". And in everything that happened, she blamed only herself, on no one, and not offended by anything. Her departure from life will probably be a bitter reproach to those who knew her and loved her, a reproach for their indecision, inability and even unwillingness to understand their loved ones.

The drama "Thunderstorm" can be called the tragedy of "hot heart". Everything in it is fanned by the breath of burning passion, everything is full of tragic contrasts and conflicts. All clashes of characters, feelings, interests are brought to an extreme, excluding compromises and reconciliation.

In the course of the study, we came to the conclusion that only a Russian person is able to love like that, is able to sacrifice like that, so seemingly submissively endure all hardships, while remaining himself, free, not a slave.

In his work, A.N. Ostrovsky showed the tragedy of women's fate in the conditions of a petty-bourgeois family that followed the precepts and traditions of house building. The writer showed how a cruel family makes a person capable of suicide out of a cheerful and naive girl,
that is, a person driven to an extreme degree of despair and disappointment in life.

Despite the fact that this work is more than 140 years old, it still remains largely modern. After all, in many families the women's lot remains as difficult as Katerina's.

LIST OF USED LITERATURE:

1. Anikin A.A. To the reading of the play by A.N. Ostrovsky "Thunderstorm". // Lit. in school - 1998. - No. 3

2. Gracheva I.V. Artistic detail in Ostrovsky's play "Thunderstorm". // Lit. in school - 2003. - No. 8

3. Dobrolyubov N.A. Collected works, in 3 volumes, vol. III

4. Zhuravleva A.I. "Thunderstorm" A.N. Ostrovsky. // Lit. in school - 1984 - No. 2

5. Zhuravleva A.I., Makeev M.S. Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky. - M.: Publishing House of Moscow. university 1998. - p. 35-56

6. Orlov P. Ostrovsky's drama "Thunderstorm" in the assessment of Dobrolyubov and Pisarev. // Lit. in school - 1967. - No. 3

7. Petrova S.M. History of Russian literature of the 19th century. - M.: Enlightenment. 1974. - from 225-241

8. Pisarev M.I. Thunderstorm. Drama A.N. Ostrovsky. "Wrap Sheet". 1860. - No. 20

9. Podrubnaya E.A. There is always room for achievement in life. // Rus. lang and lit. - 2000. - No. 5

10. Repina L.G. The theme of "Hot Heart" in the work of A.N. Ostrovsky. // Rus. lang and lit. - 2001. - No. 5

11. Fokin P.E. Thunderstorm in Thunderstorm. // Rus. speech. - 1985. - No. 2

ON THE. Dobrolyubov. Collected works, in 3 volumes, vol. III, p. 198.

ON THE. Dobrolyubov. Collected works, in 3 volumes, vol. III, p. 177

A.I. Zhuravleva

Conflict is the main driving force of a dramatic work. The conflict unfolds through the story and can be implemented on several different levels. Whether it's a confrontation of interests, characters or ideas, the conflict is resolved at the end of the work. The essence of the conflict can also be determined by the literary era (realism and postmodernism, for example, are characterized by different types of conflicts). In realism, the conflict will be hidden in the depiction of social turmoil and denunciation of the vices of society. For example, the article will consider the main conflict in Ostrovsky's play "Thunderstorm".
The work was written in 1859, a few years before the abolition of serfdom. Ostrovsky wanted to show how much society corrodes itself from the inside just because the way of life remains the same. Patriarchal orders hinder progress, while corruption and servility destroy the human element in a person. In the description of such an atmosphere lies the main conflict of the Thunderstorm.

So, as a rule, the conflict is realized at the level of characters. To do this, pairs or groups of characters must be identified. You should start with the most striking confrontation: the Katya-Kabanikha pair. These women had to live together by the will of circumstances. The Kabanov family is quite rich, Marfa Ignatievna herself is a widow. She raised a son and a daughter. The boar constantly manipulates her son, arranges scandals and tantrums. A woman believes that only her opinion has the right to exist, so everything must correspond to her ideas. She humiliates, insults other members of the family. Varvara gets the least because her daughter lies to her mother.

Katya was married early to Tikhon Kabanov, the son of Kabanikh. Katya naively believed that her life before marriage would not differ much from her new life, but the girl was wrong. Pure Katya is not able to understand how you can lie to your mother, as Varvara does, how you can hide your thoughts and feelings from someone, how you can not protect the right to your own opinion. The orders of this family are alien to her, but because of the patriarchal foundations that prevailed at that time, the girl had no choice.

Here the conflict is realized at the internal level. These characters are too different, but both women have the same strong character. Katerina resists the pernicious influence of Kabanikh. Marfa Ignatievna understands that she is faced with a strong rival who can "set" Tikhon against her mother, and this is not part of her plans.

In a pair of Boris - Katerina, a love conflict is realized. The girl falls in love with a young man who has arrived in the city. Boris seems to Katya like herself, unlike the others. Boris, like Katerina, is annoyed by the atmosphere of the city. They both do not like that everything here is built on fear and money. Feelings of young people flare up pretty quickly: one meeting was enough for them to fall in love with each other. Tikhon's departure allows the lovers to secretly meet and spend time together. Katya says that for the sake of Boris she commits a sin, but since she was not afraid of sin, then she is not afraid of condemnation from people. The girl does not understand why hide their meeting. She wanted to confess everything to her husband in order to be honest with Boris later, but the young man dissuades her from such an act. It is more convenient for Boris to meet in secret and not take responsibility. Of course they couldn't be together. Their love is tragic and fleeting. The situation takes an unexpected turn when Katya realizes that Boris is in fact the same as all the other residents: miserable and petty. And Boris does not try to deny it. After all, he came to the city only to establish relations with his uncle (only in this case he could receive an inheritance).

The Kuligin-Dikoi couple will help determine the main conflict in Ostrovsky's drama The Thunderstorm. Self-taught inventor and merchant. All power in the city seems to be concentrated in the hands of the Wild. He is rich, but he only thinks about increasing capital. He is not afraid of threats from the mayor, he deceives ordinary residents, steals from other merchants, drinks a lot. Wild constantly swears. In each of his remarks there was a place for insults. He believes that people who are below him on the social ladder are not worthy of talking to him, they deserve their miserable existence. Kuligin strives to help people, all his inventions should be of benefit to society. But he is poor, and there is no way to earn by honest labor. Kuligin knows about everything that happens in the city. "Cruel morals in our city." Kuligin cannot resist or fight this.

The main conflict of the drama "Thunderstorm" unfolds inside the main character. Katya understands how strong the gap between ideas and reality is. Katerina wants to be herself, free, light and clean. But in Kalinov it is impossible to live like that. In this struggle, she risks losing herself, giving up, not being able to withstand the onslaught of circumstances. Katya chooses between black and white, gray does not exist for her. The girl understands that she can live either the way she wants, or not live at all. The conflict ends with the death of the heroine. She could not commit violence against herself, kill herself in herself for the sake of social order.

There are several conflicts in the play "Thunderstorm". The main one is the confrontation between the individual and society. To this conflict is added the conflict of generations, the conflict of the old and the new. The conclusion suggests itself that an honest person cannot survive in a society of liars and hypocrites.

The definition of the main conflict of the play and the description of its participants can be used by students of grade 10 in essays on the topic "The main conflict in the play" Thunderstorm "by Ostrovsky."

Artwork test

A conflict is a clash of two or more sides that do not coincide in their views, attitudes. In Ostrovsky's play<Гроза>several conflicts, but how to decide which one is the main one? In the era of sociologism in literary criticism, it was believed that social conflict was the most important in a play. Of course, if we see in the image of Katerina a reflection of the spontaneous protest of the masses against the constraining conditions<темно-го царства>and to perceive the death of Katerina as the result of her clash with a self-indulgent mother-in-law, the genre of the play should be defined as a social drama. Drama is a work in which the public and personal aspirations of people, and sometimes their very lives, are threatened with death by external forces that do not depend on them. The play also contains a generational conflict between Katerina and Kabanikha: the new always comes on the heels of the old, the old does not want to give up copyright 2005 ALLSoch.ru to the new. But the play is much deeper than it might seem at first glance. After all, Katerina primarily struggles with herself, and not with Kabanikha, the conflict develops not around her, but in herself. Therefore the play<Гроза> can be defined as a tragedy. Tragedy is a work in which there is an insoluble conflict between the personal aspirations of the hero and the supra-personal laws of life that occur in the mind of the protagonist. In general, the play is very similar to an ancient tragedy: some extra-plot heroes replace the choir, the denouement ends with the death of the protagonist, as in ancient tragedy (except for the immortal Prometheus). The death of Katerina is the result of a collision of two historical epochs. Some heroes of the play seem to differ in the time in which they live. For example: Kuligin is a man of the 18th century, he wants to invent a sundial, which was known in antiquity, or a perpetuum mobile, which is a distinctive feature of the Middle Ages, or a lightning rod. He himself reaches with his mind what has long been invented, and he only dreams about it. He quotes Lomonosov and Derzhavin - this is also a trait of a man of the 18th century. Boris is already an educator of the 19th century, an educated person. Katerina is the heroine of pre-Petrine times. The story about her childhood is a story about the ideal version of patriarchal pre-Mostroy relations. In this world of kings, only all-penetrating mutual love, a person does not separate himself from society. Katerina was brought up in such a way that she could not refuse moral and moral laws, any violation of them is inevitable death. Katerina turns out to be, as it were, older than everyone in the city in her worldview, even older than Kabanikha, who remained as the last guardian of the house-building way in Kalinovo. After all, Kabanikha only pretends that everything is as it should be in her family: her daughter-in-law and her son are afraid and respected, Katerina is afraid of her husband, and she doesn’t care how everything really happens, only appearance is important for her. The main character finds herself in a world that she imagined in a completely different way, and the patriarchal way of life inside Katerina is being destroyed right before our eyes. In many ways, Varvara decides the fate of Katerina, inciting the latter to go on a date. Without Varvara, she would hardly have decided on this. Varvara belongs to the youth of the city of Kalinov, which was formed at the turning point of patriarchal relations. Katerina, getting into a new environment for her, cannot get used to society, it is alien to her. For her, the ideal husband is a support, support, ruler. But Tikhon does not confirm Katerina's expectations, she is disappointed in him, and at this moment a new feeling is born - a feeling of personality, which takes the form of a feeling of love. This feeling for Katerina is a terrible sin. If she continued to live in a patriarchal world, then this feeling would not exist. Even if Tikhon had shown his masculine will and simply taken her with him, she would have forgotten about Boris forever. The tragedy of Katerina is that she does not know how to be hypocritical and pretend like Kabanikha. The main character of the play, moral, with high moral requirements, does not know how to adapt to life. She could not live on, breaking the laws once<Домостроя>. The feeling that arose in Katerina cannot be fully embodied in her, and she, not resigning herself to what she has done, commits an even greater sin - suicide. The play<Гроза>- this is the tragedy of the main character, in which the era of the turning point of patriarchal relations played an important role.

(327 words) Alexander Ostrovsky was the founding father of the Russian Drama Theatre. He, like no one else, managed to portray the conflict that tears real life into different sides of the barricades, so his plays always touch the nerve. The drama "Thunderstorm" is one of such amazing works, which displays the contradictions that concern the whole society today.

Ostrovsky contrasted the brave heroine, uncompromising in her aspirations, with an inert, petrified representative of the older generation. On the scale of one family, there were fundamentally different women: Katerina personified the development and supremacy of natural feelings, Kabanikha - loyalty to tradition and all-conquering rationalism. The drama of the collision of these two worlds is not invented by the author. He used life material and depicted the fate of the real inhabitants of Zamoskvorechye. It is no coincidence that the main antagonists are women, this gives additional sharpness to the plot and again immerses the reader in reality. Quarrels and squabbles of the daughter-in-law and mother-in-law resonate in the soul of every family person. However, in the play the heroine is only the flesh and blood of two worldviews, which still underlie the conflict between fathers and children.

If the age and family contradictions of the heroines are understandable and natural, then their social confrontation is much deeper. Kabanikha is a representative of the old patriarchal merchant class with its prejudices, ignorance and philistine conventions. Her world is based on age-old traditions, cunning and calculation. Her morality is hypocrisy. Such is the collective image of the provincial merchant's wife - a representative of a class that gradually supplanted the less cohesive and more wasteful nobles. While the aristocracy was striving for a bird's-eye (spent hereditary wealth, but did not know how to make new ones), entrepreneurs saved up and grew stronger, becoming a new financial elite, which lacked one thing - authority. They acquired it through misalliances: they bought noble honors by entering into marriages. Tikhon did the same. However, Katerina was unable to integrate into the social reality of Kalinov, and this is quite expected: her origin rebelled. She saw the world based on ideals, but real family life in a rough and ignorant environment disappointed the sophisticated noblewoman, accustomed to sophistication and grace in everything that surrounded her. In her image, the nobility rebelled against the merchants, not wanting to give up their positions to the rich, but limited and stiff hypocrites who are pulling the country back.

Thus, the diverse conflict in Ostrovsky's drama "Thunderstorm" affects a wide range of social problems that have not been resolved to this day.

A. N. Ostrovsky was the successor and continuer of realistic traditions in Russian literature. In his works, the playwright reflected the reality of his time, the types and images characteristic of that time, showed the existing orders, their crisis and the contradictions that arose in connection with this in society. One of the brightest works of Ostrovsky is the tragedy “Thunderstorm”, in which the author raised the problem of the existence of a free individual in the conditions of a patriarchal domostroy society.

Dramatic works are always built on conflict, and in such an original, multifaceted play as The Thunderstorm, the nature of the problem raised, the abundance of characters and the complexity of the system of images determine the presence of several conflicts. The tragedy describes the life of the provincial Volga town of Kalinov, who lives according to not the best provisions of Domostroy. Kalinov's society is outdated and is going through a crisis, breakdown, as a result of which it is in itself conflict: the older generation (Dikoy, Kabanikha) teaches the younger (Boris, Tikhon, Varvara, Katerina), and does it in such an obvious, undisguised form that the whole city knows about relations in their families, although, for example, Kabanova prefers to tyrannize her neighbors not in public, but at home (as Kudryash says: “Well, at least she, at least, everything under the guise of piety, but this one (Dikay) broke loose!” ). The conflict of “fathers and children” is not the only one: disagreements arise both between representatives of the older generation (the conversation between Diky and Kabanikh, act three, phenomenon two), and among young people - for example, Varvara is annoyed by Tikhon’s downtroddenness and humility (“It’s boring for me to look - then on you,” she says). These petty contradictions keep society in a state of tension and irritation; conflicts in Kalinov's world are, in principle, static and do not have such a pronounced development as the main conflict of the tragedy - the conflict between the main character, Katerina, and Kalinov's society.

The beginning of this conflict can be considered Katerina's wedding and her move to the Kabanovs' house. From the usual environment of universal love, harmony, religiosity, the main character finds herself in an atmosphere of deceit, deceit, tyranny. Katerina is not like any of the members of this society: her spiritual directness and artlessness are opposed to the rough-simple resourcefulness of Barbara, the breadth, passion of nature - Tikhon's weakness and humility; sensitivity, subtlety, liveliness of perception of the surrounding world - to the stupid dogmatism of Kabanikh. Not accustomed to being limited in some way, Katerina yearns for inner freedom, but freedom here appears not as a conscious necessity, but as a spontaneous, unreasonable thirst for independence, the opportunity to give vent to her passion, and Katerina finds an outlet for her feelings in love for Boris. A conflict of feeling and duty arises in the soul of the main character: on the one hand, love captures her completely and requires spiritual food for development; on the other hand, for Katerina, who has absorbed the foundations of Christian teaching since childhood, it is strange even to think about the possibility of cheating on her husband.

In essence, the internal conflict is a consequence of the social one: the contradictions in Katerina's soul are caused by the discrepancy between her moral demands and the inability of the world around her to satisfy them. Tikhon's departure gives a sharp impetus to the development of an internal conflict: Katerina feels that the absence of her husband can serve as a reason for treason, she is afraid of her weakness and asks her husband to stay. In a conversation with Varvara, she describes her condition as follows: “It’s as if I’m standing over an abyss, and someone is pushing me there, but there’s nothing for me to hold on to.” But Tikhon leaves, and Kalinov's world begins to drag Katerina into the abyss of lies and deceit with renewed vigor. Varvara gives her the key - a symbol of sin, and Katerina already feels drawn into this dirty world, but does not find the strength to get out of it. Ten days of festivities with Boris fly by, and Tikhon, who returns, finds his wife changed: so pale, rushing around the house, as if looking for something. ” Katerina is tormented by her conscience: having outwardly accepted the laws of Kalinov society, cheating on her husband, lying to him and her mother-in-law, she has not changed internally, retaining moral principles, self-esteem in her soul. The culmination of the internal, and public conflict is the scene in the garden, when Katerina publicly confesses to treason, unable to restrain herself any longer, ready for anything. recognition and repentance in the eyes of the Kalinovites do not serve as mitigating factors, and Kabanikha, with new zeal, begins to tyrannize not only Kat Erin, but also Tikhon (for mistreatment of his wife). The inability to stay in this world full of misunderstanding and cruelty, terrible remorse, the departure of her beloved push Katerina to a terrible step, and the denouement of both conflicts was the suicide of the main character. The finale can be interpreted in different ways: N. A. Dobrolyubov, who called Katerina “a ray of light in a dark kingdom,” saw in her death a denial of the house-building laws of Kalinov’s society, which stifle any manifestation of sincere feeling. On the other hand, suicide is always the highest form of selfishness, because according to religious norms, sin can be atoned for only through prolonged suffering, prayers, and humility. Then Katerina had to stay in the Kabanovs' house, dutifully accept all the barbs and insults. But if we take into account the deep spiritual tragedy of the heroine, if we try to enter into her position, it becomes clear that the cruel society of the city of Kalinov left her no other way out and suicide - a natural outcome of the spiritual contradictions that tormented Katerina, internal conflict, as well as social impossibility the coexistence of a freedom-hungry individual and a deaf, patriarchal house-building society.

The contribution of A. N. Ostrovsky to Russian drama is invaluable: following the traditions of realism, he not only created a number of bright, colorful images, not only captured characteristic pictures, but also explored the psychological origins of conflicts in Russian society in the mid-19th century, and was also an innovator in stage solving the play: he expanded the scope of the action (in "Thunderstorm" - a garden, a ravine, a street, a square, etc.), widely used the landscape and mass scenes. The greatest creations of Ostrovsky, original and innovative, are included in the treasury of not only Russian, but also world literature.