FEMALE IMAGES OF A. N. OSTROVSKY'S PLAYS

Presented the material: Finished Essays

Two capacious artistic symbols define and emphasize the meaning of the play “The Thunderstorm”. The first is the powerful natural cataclysm mentioned in the title, which swept through not only nature, but also the human community, and shattered the heroine’s soul, exhausted from an excess of unclaimed reserves of love. The second is the great Volga River, into which the unfortunate woman threw herself, her cradle and her grave. The general meaning of these symbolic images is freedom. Freedom and love are the main things that were in Katerina’s character. She believed in God freely, in her own way, not under pressure, and she submitted to the authority of her elders in the same way. By her own free will she sinned, and when they refused her repentance, she punished herself. Moreover, suicide for a believer is a terrible sin, but Katerina agreed to it. Her impulse for freedom, for freedom, turned out to be stronger than the fear of torment beyond the grave, but, more likely, it was her hope in God’s mercy, for Katerina’s God, undoubtedly, is kindness and forgiveness incarnate.

Katerina - true tragic heroine. For the hero of a tragedy is always a violator of some order, a law. Although he subjectively does not want to violate anything, objectively his action turns out to be a violation. For this, he suffers punishment from a certain transpersonal force, which is often the hero of the tragedy himself. So is Katerina. She did not even think of protesting against the order and the world in which she lived (and what Dobrolyubov groundlessly attributed to her). But by freely surrendering to the feeling that first visited her, she violated the patriarchal peace and immobility of the surrounding world. She had no conflict with this world, with those around her. The cause of her death was internal conflict. The world of Russian patriarchal life (and Katerina is the highest, complete expression of the best, most poetic and living in this world) in Katerina exploded itself, from the inside, because freedom, that is, life itself, began to leave it.

In Ostrovsky's forty original plays, which covered contemporary life, there are practically no male heroes, that is, positive characters who occupy a central place. Instead of them, Ostrovsky's heroines are loving, suffering souls. Katerina Kabanova is just one of them. She is often compared to Larisa Ogudalova from Dowryless. There are reasons for this: love suffering, indifference and cruelty of others and, most importantly, death in the finale. But that's all. In fact, Katerina and Larisa are rather antipodes. Larisa does not have the main thing that Katerina has - integrity of character, the ability to act decisively, energetically, as N.A. Dobrolyubov said. In this sense, Larisa is certainly part of the world in which she lives. But the world of “The Dowry” is different from the one described in “The Thunderstorm”: in 1878, when the play appeared, capitalism was established in Russia. In “The Thunderstorm,” the merchant class is just becoming the bourgeoisie, traditional patriarchal relationships are becoming obsolete, dying, opportunities for a person like Katerina to express their aspirations for freedom are lost, deception and hypocrisy are established (Kabanikha, Varvara), which Katerina does not accept. Larisa is also a victim of deception and hypocrisy, but she has different life values, unthinkable for Katerina.
First of all, Larisa received a Europeanized upbringing and education. She is looking for sublimely beautiful love, striving for an elegantly beautiful life. For this, of course, she needs wealth. Of course, her fiancé Karandyshev is not a match for her in every way. But her idol, the embodiment of her ideals, the brilliant master Paratov, is even worse. Inexperience and adherence to destructive values ​​attract Larisa into his arms, like a butterfly flying towards a candle flame. A strong character, she does not possess the integrity of nature. It would seem that the educated and cultured Larisa should have expressed protest, unlike Katerina. But no, she shows weakness in every way. The weakness is not only in her decision to kill herself when everything collapsed and everything became hateful, but also in her reluctance to confront the norms of life that are deeply alien to her. Don't be a toy in someone else's dirty hands. Beautiful, as Karamzin said about his poor Liza (by the way, it’s not for nothing that Larisa dresses up in the second act as a shepherdess, the heroine, alas, of an unfulfilled idyll), soul and body, Larisa herself turns out to be an expression of the deceitfulness of the surrounding life, emptiness, spiritual coldness hiding behind a spectacular appearance shine.

Ostrovsky “The Thunderstorm” - essay “Themes of the “warm heart” and the “dark kingdom” in the drama by A. N. Ostrovsky “The Thunderstorm”"

In the work of A. N. Ostrovsky, the theme of the “warm heart” occupies a very important place. Constantly exposing the “dark kingdom,” the writer sought to establish high moral principles, tirelessly searching for forces that could resist the despotism, predation, and humiliation of human dignity that dominated society. In these searches, he primarily focused on representatives of the Russian people - kind, sympathetic people with moral fortitude and mental strength. And the most significant of the works of the great playwright, in which, according to Dobrolyubov, “Russian life and Russian strength are called upon... to a decisive cause...,” is the play “The Thunderstorm.” The satirical denunciation of representatives of the “dark kingdom” naturally merged in this work with the affirmation of new forces growing in life, positive, bright, decisively rising to fight for their human rights. The author embodied this vivid protest against the stifling reign of arbitrariness, violence, and permissiveness in the image of Katerina Kaanova, whom N. A. Dobrolyubov called “a bright ray in dark kingdom" In the image of his heroine, Ostrovsky portrayed a new type - an intelligent, selfless girl who risked rebelling against the world that she hated. In the surrounding “dead kingdom”, Katerina is alive. She needs the fullness of human feelings, she is aware of her right to love and happiness. Love for her is a dream, a wonderful world in which everything is light, spacious, airy. It is love that awakens new feelings and thoughts in her soul: “It’s as if I’m starting to live again,” says the girl. Katerina’s heart yearns for the light, for people; she does not want to submit; compromises are unacceptable to her. Her freedom-loving nature cannot and does not want to adapt to the world of oppression, suppression of natural human feelings and aspirations. She, who never forgets her moral duty, is alien to the principles and advice of other characters in the play. “Do what you want, as long as it’s sewn and covered,” Varvara convinces Katerina. Tikhon advises not to pay attention to Kabanikha’s words: “Well, let her speak, and you turn a deaf ear!” Boris, like Katya, is disgusted by the prevailing foundations of society, but he only exclaims in despair: “Oh, if only there was strength!” Katerina cannot submit, she cannot hide anything, and she does not want to; she does not agree to let insults fall on deaf ears. She has strength, so she can break out of the dark kingdom and become a ray of light.

In the play, Katerina is contrasted primarily with Kabanikha and Dikiy as typical representatives of the “dark kingdom.” Thanks to wealth, they hold all power in their hands. And they do whatever they please. Ostrovsky clearly showed how formidable and destructive the power of such people becomes. The cunning and evil Kabanova, the guardian of patriarchal foundations and ancient house-building orders, is an indisputable authority for her family, neighbors, and for the entire city. The despot and tyrant Dikoy keeps both his loved ones and his acquaintances in fear. In this world, “everything seems to be out of captivity.”

And the dark, frightened inhabitants have to submit. And how could it be otherwise in a world where they don’t read newspapers and magazines, in a city where there isn’t even a clock, and where they believe that Lithuania “fell from the sky on us”? The movement that happens around, “the noise, the running, the incessant driving” is disgusting to people like Kabanova, Dikoy and all those around them. And therefore, everything that does not resemble Kalinov’s way of life is declared by them to be unfaithful and sinful. Although in fact, it is precisely this way of life, this absence of action, thought, and movement forward that is abnormal, unnatural, and opposed to all living human needs. This world managed to leave its mark on Boris. A young, healthy, educated man, he is so enslaved by the thought of bequeathed money that he never thought about the real possibility of living by his own labor, earning his own living. And although there are sometimes glimpses of feeling in him, the ability for deep experiences, he is not able to resist trials. He sits in a tight cage from which he will never escape. Kuligin will not be able to escape from it, despite all his educational ideas and dreams. Faced with rudeness and threats, he retreats before the “quantity of the old force”: “There is nothing to do, we must submit!”

The “Dark Kingdom” is closed in on itself, it is frozen in immobility, existing outside of time and space. However, all this does not mean life, but death, therefore this world of wild and wild boars is doomed. And its representatives themselves realize this. Kabanikha became worried, frightened by the premonition of the onset of new times, which, in her opinion, must be delayed at all costs. And Feklusha is sure that “by all indications” the last times are coming. No matter how strong and durable this world may look, based on the seemingly unshakable foundations of the old regime, a thunderstorm is gathering over it. This thunderstorm was necessary so that everything could come to life and straighten out, so that breathing could become easier. And this thunderstorm broke out - it was Katerina’s decisive protest and her tragic death.

According to the Russian critic N.A. Dobrolyubov, “... the character of Katerina, as it is performed in The Thunderstorm, constitutes a step forward not only in Ostrovsky’s dramatic activity, but also in all of our literature.” The protest bursting from the chests of “the weakest and most patient” was for the critic direct evidence of the doom of the “dark kingdom.”

Female characters in the drama "The Thunderstorm"

Once Dobrolyubov called the main character of the drama “The Thunderstorm,” Katerina, “a ray of light in a dark kingdom.” Even earlier, analyzing Ostrovsky’s plays created in the first half of the 60s, “We’ll be our own people,” “Don’t sit in your own sleigh,” “Don’t live the way you want,” “Poverty is not a vice,” he determined and the very concept of the “dark kingdom” - for the critic, it was synonymous with the patriarchal way of life, which was preserved to the greatest extent among the Russian merchants. Katerina, according to Dobrolyubov, does not belong to the atom world and is completely opposed to it, and therefore, of all the female characters in the drama, and not only female ones, she is the only one who is a positive character. Dobrolyubov created a black and white picture of the “dark kingdom”, in which there is and cannot be anything positive or bright, and contrasted female characters with each other on the basis of their belonging or non-belonging to this world. But was Ostrovsky satisfied with such an interpretation, did he agree with the definition of the concept of “dark kingdom” and the opposition characters from Dobrolyubov’s point of view? I think that this point of view was a simplification of the picture that the playwright created.

Of the half a dozen female characters in “The Thunderstorm,” the characters in the foreground are undoubtedly those of Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova and her daughter-in-law Katerina. These are two main, largely opposite images that largely shape the reader and viewer’s view of the whole world, designated by Dobrolyubov as a dark kingdom. As you can see, Ostrovsky, unlike Dobrolyubov, does not take Katerina beyond the boundaries of the patriarchal world; moreover, she is unthinkable without him. Is it possible to imagine Katerina without a sincere and deep religious feeling, without her memories of parental home, in which, it seems, everything is the same as in the Kabanovs’ house, but what’s more, can you imagine her without her melodious song language? Katerina embodies poetic side patriarchal way of Russian life, best qualities Russian national character. But the people who surround her are terribly far from her in their spiritual properties, especially Kabanikha. It is worth comparing their words and actions. Kabanikha's speech is leisurely and monotonous, her movements are slow; living feelings awaken in her only when the conversation concerns the customs and orders of antiquity, which she fiercely defends. Kabanikha relies in everything on the authority of antiquity, which seems unshakable to her, and expects the same from those around her. It is a mistake to believe that Kabanikha, like Dikiy, belongs to the type of tyrants. Such a “tyrant couple” in a drama would be redundant, but Ostrovsky does not repeat himself, each of his images is artistically unique. Dikoy is psychologically much more primitive than Marfa Ignatievna; he more closely corresponds to the type of tyrant discovered by Ostrovsky in his early plays; Kabanova is much more difficult. None of her demands are dictated by her whim or caprice; it requires only strict adherence to the orders established by custom and traditions. These customs and traditions replace legal laws and dictate unshakable moral rules. Katerina has a similar attitude towards traditions, for her these customs and traditions, these rules are sacred, but in her speech and behavior there is no trace of Kabanikha’s deadness, she is very emotional, and she also perceives tradition emotionally, as something living and active. Katerina’s experiences and feelings are reflected not only in her words - this image is accompanied by numerous author’s remarks; regarding Kabanikha, Ostrovsky is much less verbose.

The main difference between Katerina and Kabanikha, the difference that takes them to different poles, is that following the traditions of antiquity for Katerina is a spiritual need, but for Kabanikha it is an attempt to find the necessary and only support in anticipation of the collapse of the patriarchal world. She does not think about the essence of the order that she protects; she has emptied the meaning and content from it, leaving only the form, thereby turning it into dogma. She turned the beautiful essence of ancient traditions and customs into a meaningless ritual, which made them unnatural. We can say that Kabanikha in “The Thunderstorm” (just like Dikoy) personifies a phenomenon characteristic of the crisis state of the patriarchal way of life, and not inherent in it initially. The deadening effect of boars and wild animals on living life It manifests itself with particular clarity precisely when life forms are deprived of their former content and are preserved as museum relics. Katerina represents the best qualities of patriarchal life in their pristine purity.

Thus, Katerina belongs to the patriarchal world - in its original meaning - to a much greater extent than Kabanikha, Dikoy and all the other characters in the drama. The artistic purpose of the latter is to outline the reasons for the doom of the patriarchal world as fully and comprehensively as possible. So, Varvara follows the line of least resistance - adapts to the situation, accepts the “rules of the game” in the “dark kingdom”, in which everything is built on deception and appearances. She learned to deceive and take advantage of opportunities; she, like Kabanikha, follows the principle: “do what you want, as long as it’s safe and covered.”

In Feklusha, this represents another aspect in the depiction of the dying patriarchal world: this is ignorance, the desire to explain the incomprehensible in one’s own way, and to explain in such a way that the superiority of one’s own is immediately revealed, that is, the superiority of the defended dogmas. Feklusha is a pitiful imitation of the ancient wanderers who once roamed Rus' and were disseminators of news, a source of wonderful tales and special spirituality. Feklush also needs the “dark kingdom” of the wild, but not for this: Glasha, the girl in Kabanova’s house, needs it in order to satisfy natural curiosity and brighten up the boredom of a monotonous life, Kabanikha - so that she has someone to complain about the disastrous changes and establish herself in its superiority over everything foreign. This image has become almost farcical, unable to evoke any positive emotions in the reader and viewer.

So, all female characters in the drama “The Thunderstorm” are given their place by the system of characters from the point of view of their correlation with the image of the “dark kingdom”; without any of them, this image would be incomplete or one-sided. Katerina represents his best side, the existence of which was not recognized or rejected by Dobrolyubov, Kabanikha, Varvara, Feklusha - types of characters that clearly manifest themselves at the stage of decomposition of any way of life as symptoms of its deep crisis. Not a single quality inherent in them is an organic feature of the patriarchal world. But this world has degenerated, patriarchal laws determine the relationships between people by inertia, this world is doomed, because it itself is killing all the best that it has created. He kills Katerina.

An essay about " Women's images Ostrovsky"

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky in his works revealed events taking place in the nineteenth century through female images. His heroines most often personify the prism through which a large number of conflicts, both social and public. Women in the plays appear to readers as living personifications of the era and the vices and ideals reigning in it. At the same time, as a rule, heroines are not ready to accept the injustice or dirt of society that is imposed on them by everyone around them. On the contrary, women are ready to fiercely defend their individuality, their own ideals and purity.
If you remember the play “The Thunderstorm” by A.N. Ostrovsky, it contains a large number of colorful female characters, each of which is unique and attractive to the reader in its own way. Katerina is a young girl, inspired by her ideals, who recently got married. In her mind, marriage was a great joy. She passionately wanted to become a wife and mother; for her this would be the greatest happiness. But when her dream came true and she married Tikhon, the harsh reality sobered her up. She does not feel those feelings of love for her husband that she was waiting for. But then Boris appears. In it, Katerina finds a response to her ardent feelings. Finally, what she had dreamed of happened. She met her love. However, the tragedy is that the heroine cannot be with him. Betrayal and remorse lead Katerina to despair. For the sake of love, she sacrificed her previously unshakable principles. But this did not give her happiness either. She sees no point in further existence, and decides to commit suicide.
Varvara appears completely different in the play “The Thunderstorm”. Her image is more resourceful, cunning and far-sighted. For her, marriage is not a sublime and romantic union of two loving hearts, but an excellent deal to get out from under the yoke of a tyrant mother who controls absolutely everything in the house. Varvara is the complete opposite of Katerina. In my opinion, these two images are placed so close to each other in the play specifically to show readers what could have become of Catherine if she had acted differently, more cunningly, and indulged all the whims and desires of Kabanikha. Thus, with such behavior, Catherine would turn into Varvara. This very thoughtful move is used by Ostrovsky not only in the play “The Thunderstorm”.
A slightly different situation is played out in the play "Dowry". In it the main character is Larisa Ogudalova. For her, marriage is also a successful deal that would ensure her a comfortable existence. Her fate is also not very successful. The man she loved abandoned her and disappeared in an unknown direction. Therefore, she decides to marry the first person who wooes her. It turns out that he is not a particularly rich tradesman Karandyshev. He is happy that Larisa finally responded to his advances with consent, because the hero has been trying to get her attention for a long time, but to no avail. The wedding should take place very soon, but all plans are disrupted by the arrival of Paratov, Larisa’s unhappy love. He gives her a lot of promises and hopes for a better future, which he has no intention of fulfilling. But the heroine trusts him again and succumbs to temptation. Karandyshev finds out about this and is going to take terrible revenge. Shooting his beloved girl Larisa ends both her and his own shame. She accepts death with gratitude, because it would be very difficult to survive such a shame.
So, Ostrovsky’s female images are very diverse, but one certainly cannot help but empathize with them and cannot help but admire them.

Two capacious artistic symbols define and emphasize the meaning of the play “The Thunderstorm”. The first is the powerful natural cataclysm mentioned in the title, which swept through not only nature, but also the human community, and shattered the heroine’s soul, exhausted from an excess of unclaimed reserves of love. The second is the great Volga River, into which the unfortunate woman threw herself, her cradle and her grave. The general meaning of these symbolic images is freedom. Freedom and love are the main things that were in Katerina’s character. She believed in God freely, in her own way, not under pressure, and she submitted to the authority of her elders in the same way. By her own free will she sinned, and when they refused her repentance, she punished herself. Moreover, suicide for a believer is a terrible sin, but Katerina agreed to it.

Her impulse for freedom, for freedom, turned out to be stronger than the fear of torment beyond the grave, but, more likely, it was her hope in God’s mercy, for Katerina’s God, undoubtedly, is kindness and forgiveness incarnate. Katerina is a truly tragic heroine. For the hero of a tragedy is always a violator of some order, a law.

Although he subjectively does not want to violate anything, objectively his action turns out to be a violation. For this, he suffers punishment from a certain transpersonal force, which is often the hero of the tragedy himself. So is Katerina. She did not even think of protesting against the order and the world in which she lived (and what Dobrolyubov groundlessly attributed to her). But by freely surrendering to the feeling that first visited her, she violated the patriarchal peace and immobility of the surrounding world. She had no conflict with this world, with those around her. The cause of her death was an internal conflict.

The world of Russian patriarchal life (and Katerina is the highest, complete expression of the best, most poetic and living in this world) in Katerina exploded itself, from the inside, because freedom, that is, life itself, began to leave it. In Ostrovsky's forty original plays, which covered contemporary life, there are practically no male heroes, that is, positive characters who occupy a central place. Instead of them, Ostrovsky's heroines are loving, suffering souls. Katerina Kabanova is just one of them. She is often compared to Larisa Ogudalova from Dowryless.

There are reasons for this: love suffering, indifference and cruelty of others and, most importantly, death in the finale. But that's all. In fact, Katerina and Larisa are rather antipodes.

Larisa does not have the main thing that Katerina has - integrity of character, the ability to act decisively, energetically, as N.A. Dobrolyubov said. In this sense, Larisa is certainly part of the world in which she lives. But the world of “The Dowry” is different from the one described in “The Thunderstorm”: in 1878, when the play appeared, capitalism was established in Russia. In “The Thunderstorm,” the merchant class is just becoming the bourgeoisie, traditional patriarchal relationships are becoming obsolete, dying, opportunities for a person like Katerina to express their aspirations for freedom are lost, deception and hypocrisy are established (Kabanikha, Varvara), which Katerina does not accept. Larisa is also a victim of deception and hypocrisy, but she has different life values, unthinkable for Katerina.

First of all, Larisa received a Europeanized upbringing and education. She is looking for sublimely beautiful love, striving for an elegantly beautiful life. For this, of course, she needs wealth. Of course, her fiancé Karandyshev is not a match for her in every way. But her idol, the embodiment of her ideals, the brilliant master Paratov, is even worse. Inexperience and adherence to destructive values ​​attract Larisa into his arms, like a butterfly flying towards a candle flame.

But she does not have a strong character or integrity of nature. It would seem that the educated and cultured Larisa should have expressed protest, unlike Katerina. But no, she shows weakness in every way.

The weakness is not only in her decision to kill herself when everything collapsed and everything became hateful, but also in her reluctance to confront the norms of life that are deeply alien to her. Don't be a toy in someone else's dirty hands. Beautiful, as Karamzin said about his poor Liza (by the way, it’s not for nothing that Larisa dresses up in the second act as a shepherdess, the heroine, alas, of an unfulfilled idyll), soul and body, Larisa herself turns out to be an expression of the deceitfulness of the surrounding life, emptiness, spiritual coldness hiding behind a spectacular appearance shine.

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky is a playwright who opened the world of merchants and clerks, judicial officials and traders, hitherto unknown to the Russian theater. But he is not only the creator of acute social dramas; he raised the problem of the inferior position of women in this world of capital, he created strong, original female characters, “not burdened with education,” but truthful and realistic.

In Ostrovsky’s plays, a wonderful gallery of Russian women has been created: from the selfish Lipochka Bolynova from the play “Our People – Let’s Be Numbered!”, the gentle and defenseless Katerina from “The Thunderstorm” to the impetuous and reckless Larisa Ogudalova from “The Dowry”. They are all different, all worthy of attention, but most of all, in my opinion, the playwright himself loved those of them who did not know how to defend themselves in this world, because they put their principles above all else. These are the heroines of “The Thunderstorm” and “Dowry”. Let's take a closer look at the characters of the heroines of these plays.

Katerina Kabanova is a contradictory and peculiar nature. She is God-fearing and rebellious at the same time. Raised in love, she grew up unprepared for the trials that await her beyond the threshold of her parents' home.

Remembering her childhood in her home, Katerina understands that her hope for happiness was not justified. She perceives life in her husband's family as bondage. Hypocrisy, hypocrisy and deceit reign in this house. But Varvara, who grew up in this family, adapted perfectly to its conditions. She teaches Katerina to lie and be self-willed, while maintaining a mask of piety. Katerina outwardly accepts the family’s lifestyle, but in her heart she protests. She does not want to sacrifice her honesty to “stolen” happiness. Having fallen in love with Boris, she does not hide it from others. “If I was not afraid of sin, will I be afraid of human judgment?” - she says to her beloved.

And at the same time, bondage was deeply embedded in her soul. Katerina will never be able to be truly free again. She is afraid even of what, at first glance, does not pose a danger. Katerina perceives an ordinary summer thunderstorm as a warning about God's punishment. But as long as the heroine loves and is loved, she is not afraid of anything. Both Tikhon and Boris, each in their own way, love and pity Katerina, but they are weak-willed and dependent on Kabanikha and Dikiy, so they cannot protect or give happiness to Katerina. Realizing this, the heroine decides to die. “I’m really exhausted! I don’t need anything, nothing is nice to me! But death does not come." A true Christian, Katerina still perceives suicide not as a sin, but as liberation from torment and suffering: “It will be easier for me. And I don’t even want to think about life. Live again. No, no, don’t…” Katerina sees the deep imperfection of this world, does not accept its rules, and therefore dies.

Larisa Ogudalova has a completely different character. She comes from an educated but poor family. To live well, her mother has to live an almost reprehensible lifestyle. It is noticeable that she is not averse to finding her daughter, if not a husband, then a rich landlord. Larisa is alien to this world of money that surrounds her. She seeks to escape from her environment, where the spirit of acquisitiveness reigns. Having fallen in love with Sergei Sergeevich Paratov, Larisa does not see the cynical and cruel nature behind the shiny shell.

She rushes about: on the one hand, she is ready to marry anyone who will take her away from a house that looks like a “gypsy camp” or a fair, where everything is bought and sold. On the other hand, she wants happiness with her loved one. But her lover betrays her, and even the failed groom Karandyshev looks at her as his property. “A thing... yes, a thing... I am a thing, not a person...” - Larisa understands. And now she wants to sell herself at a higher price. “Every thing has its own price... I am too, too expensive for you,” she answers Karandyshev. Larisa was looking for love, but everyone looks at her as if she is just a joke. I wanted to leave the “gypsy camp”, but I couldn’t. She is not capable of suicide, so the heroine perceives Karandyshev’s shot as deliverance from moral decline, from the hardships of life.

Ostrovsky showed that as long as there is no other way out for a woman in this world, she cannot find herself and be happy.

Thunderstorm and Volga: based on the drama by A. N. Ostrovsky “The Thunderstorm”

“The Thunderstorm” is one of the brightest works of A. N. Ostrovsky. The word “thunderstorm” has a huge meaning. A thunderstorm is not only a natural phenomenon; this is both misfortune (a thunderstorm broke overhead) and stormy changes (a storm, a storm will soon appear!).

The word “thunderstorm” is heard for the first time in the scene of farewell to Tikhon. He says: “For two weeks there will be no thunderstorm over me.” By “thunderstorm” he means his mother’s anger, a constant threat. “A thunderstorm is being sent to us as punishment,” Dikoy says to Kuligin. And this fear of retribution is inherent in all the characters in the play, even Katerina. She is religious and considers her love for Boris a great sin, but she can’t help herself.

The only one who was not afraid of thunderstorms was the self-taught mechanic Kuligin. He even tried to resist it natural phenomenon by building a lightning rod. However, this lightning rod did not help against the thunderstorm that nevertheless broke out over Katerina’s head...

But the thunderstorm is also a symbol of Katerina’s love for Boris, because there is something elemental in their relationship, just like in a thunderstorm. Katerina longed for love, and these impulses of her heart found a way out in her affection for Boris. The gradually accumulating charge of energy and feelings is finally resolved by a terrible denouement.

The Volga is an equally important symbol in the play. The vast distance of the Volga landscape is overwhelming with its beauty, harsh and powerful. Against its background, a person seems like a small insect, an insignificance compared to the vast, strong river. The beauty of nature has always influenced the souls and hearts of people, unless, of course, their soul is still alive and their heart has not hardened. So, Kuligin, a very soft, weak, but kind and sensitive person, all his life he could not get enough of the beauty of Mother Volga. Katerina, this one is pure and light soul, grew up on the banks of the Volga and loved it with all my heart.

Ostrovsky's attitude towards nature was one of the criteria for assessing humanity. Dikoy, Kabanikha and other obedient subjects of the “dark kingdom” are indifferent to the beauty of nature, deep down they are afraid of it. Yes, for Wild thunderstorm- This is God's punishment for sins.

In Ostrovsky, the landscape also complements the action. Thus, Katerina’s explanation with Boris takes place against the backdrop of a beautiful summer night, Katerina’s repentance occurs during a thunderstorm in a dilapidated church, where of all the frescoes only a picture of hell has survived.

At the moment of Katerina’s repentance, a thunderstorm broke out and it began to rain, cleansing and washing away all sins. But people are not so merciful: the Volga helped Katerina escape from an unbearable life among people, stopped torment and suffering, and gave her peace.

These strong images that tie the text of the drama together have general features. The Volga is a strong, free Russian river. A thunderstorm is a beautiful and violent natural phenomenon. These are huge symbols that combine many people’s ideas about the universe.

The main pagan gods were thunder gods. The Volga is the river of the free Stenka Razin, the Burlatsky, Cossack river. This tall characters, which elevate the characters in the drama. Before Ostrovsky, no one dared to do common man a tragic figure, and his semi-literate characters could be frowned upon by educated audiences. However, with the structure of the drama, the author was able to prove: high symbols are not only for nobles. Simple people, living in small towns, can also rise to real tragedy.

In comparison with many other plays, named with the words of Russian folk proverbs (“We are our own people,” “Simplicity is enough for every wise man”), which set one in a frivolous mood, the name of this drama immediately sets different conditions for the game.

“The Thunderstorm” is a genuine tragedy, comparable to the ancient one. Plays about merchants, the division of inheritance and profitable places tell about petty, insignificant people. We do not expect the text to tell a story about exploits and heroism. “Thunderstorm” is a completely different matter. Thunderstorm and Volga - misfortune and freedom - are the main themes of this drama.