In chapter Schools The question requires an excerpt from Pushkin’s poem “Poltava”, the moment of the beginning of the Battle of Poltava given by the author Yoerega Kireev the best answer is and; Cold bayonets hung down. Beloved sons of victory, The Swedes are rushing through the fire of the trenches; Worried, the cavalry flies; The infantry moves behind her and with its heavy firmness strengthens her desire. And the fatal battlefield thunders and burns here and there; But clearly the happiness of combat is already beginning to serve us. The squads repulsed by gunfire, getting in the way, fall to dust. Rosen leaves through the gorges; The ardent Schliepenbach surrenders. We are pressing the Swedes, army after army; The glory of their banners darkens, And the God of War, with the grace of Our every step, is sealed. Then, inspired from above, the sonorous voice of Peter was heard: “Get to work, with God! “Peter comes out of the tent, surrounded by a crowd of favorites. His eyes are shining. His face is terrible. The movements are fast. He is beautiful, He is all like God's thunderstorm. It's coming. They bring him a horse. A faithful horse is zealous and humble. Sensing the fatal fire, Trembling. He looks askance with his eyes And rushes in the dust of battle, Proud of his mighty rider. It's almost noon. The heat is blazing. Like a plowman, the battle rests. Cossacks are prancing here and there. Leveling up, shelves are built. The battle music is silent. On the hills the guns, hushed, interrupted their hungry roar. And so, echoing the plain, cheers rang out in the distance: The regiments saw Peter. And he rushed in front of the shelves, Powerful and joyful, like battle. He devoured the field with his eyes. Behind him, these chicks of Petrov's nest rushed in a crowd - In the changes of earthly lot, In the labors of power and war, His comrades, sons: And the noble Sheremetev, And Bruce, and Bour, and Repnin, And, the rootless darling of happiness, The semi-sovereign ruler. And before the blue ranks of His warlike squads, Carried by faithful servants, In a rocking chair, pale, motionless, Suffering from a wound, Charles appeared. The hero's leaders followed him. He quietly sank into thought. The embarrassed gaze depicted extraordinary excitement. It seemed that Karl was perplexed by the Desired Fight... Suddenly, with a weak wave of his hand, he moved his regiments towards the Russians. And with them the royal squads converged in the smoke in the middle of the plain: And the battle broke out, the Battle of Poltava! In the fire, under the red-hot hail, reflected by a living wall, Above the fallen formation, a fresh formation closes bayonets. Like a heavy cloud, detachments of flying cavalry, Reins, sounding sabers, Colliding, cutting from the shoulder. Throwing piles of bodies onto piles, cast-iron balls are jumping everywhere between them, striking, digging up dust and hissing in the blood. Swede, Russian - stabs, chops, cuts. Drumming, clicks, grinding, The thunder of guns, stomping, neighing, groaning, And death and hell on all sides. But the moment of victory is close, close. Hooray! we break; The Swedes are bending. O glorious hour! oh glorious view! Another pressure - and the enemy flees: And then the cavalry set off, Swords become dull with murder, And the whole steppe is covered with the fallen, Like a swarm of black locusts. Peter is feasting. And proud and clear, And his gaze is full of glory. And his royal feast is wonderful. At the shouts of his army, in his tent he treats his leaders, the leaders of strangers, and caresses the glorious captives, and raises a healthy cup for his teachers.
The east is burning with a new dawn. Already on the plain, guns are thundering across the hills. Crimson smoke rises in circles to the heavens towards the morning rays. The regiments closed their ranks. Arrows scattered in the bushes. The cannonballs are rolling, the pool is whistling
The east is burning with a new dawn. Already on the plain, guns are thundering across the hills. Crimson smoke rises in circles to the heavens towards the morning rays. The regiments closed their ranks. Arrows scattered in the bushes. The cannonballs are rolling, the pool is whistling
The east is burning with a new dawn. Already on the plain, guns are thundering across the hills. Crimson smoke rises in circles to the heavens towards the morning rays. The regiments closed their ranks. Arrows scattered in the bushes. Kate
The East is burning with a new dawn (Metaphor)
Don't these words seem strange to you? Why does A. S. Pushkin depict the sunrise as a fire? Word lit paints the bright colors of the sky, illuminated by the rays of the rising sun. This image is based on the similarity between the colors of dawn and fire; the sky is the color of a flame. Such a transfer of name from one object to another based on their similarity is called metaphor (from the Greek word metaphor- “transfer”) In A. S. Pushkin’s poem “Poltava” this metaphor receives a special symbolic meaning: the red dawn is perceived as an omen of a bloody battle.
Artists of words love to use metaphors; their use gives special expressiveness and emotionality to speech.
Metaphorization can be based on the similarity of the most diverse characteristics of objects: their color, shape, volume, purpose, etc. Metaphors built on the basis of the similarity of objects in color are especially often used when describing Nature: forests clad in scarlet and gold(A.S. Pushkin); In the smoky clouds the purple of a rose, the reflection of amber(A. A. Fet). The similarity of the shape of objects served as the basis for such metaphors: S. Yesenin called the branches of a birch silk braids, and admiring the winter dress of the tree, he wrote: On the fluffy branches, white fringed brushes blossomed like a snowy border.
Often a metaphor combines proximity in color and shape of compared objects. So, A. S. Pushkin sang poetic tears And silver dust fountain of the Bakhchisarai Palace, F. I. Tyutchev - ^ rain pearls after a spring thunderstorm. The similarity in the purpose of the compared objects is reflected in this image from “The Bronze Horseman”: Nature here destined us to cut a window into Europe(A.S. Pushkin).
Common features in the nature of the action and state create great opportunities for metaphorizing verbs. For example: The storm covers the sky with darkness, spinning snow whirlwinds; like a beastshe will howl Thatwill cry like a child (A.S. Pushkin).
The similarity in the temporal sequence of phenomena opens the way to such metaphorization: Now I have become more stingy in my desires, my life, or did I dream about you? As if I were a booming early springrode on a pink horse. Or also from S. Yesenin: A candle made of flesh wax will burn out with a golden flame, and a wooden clock of the moon will burn out.they will wheeze my twelfth hour.
It is not always possible to clearly determine what the similarity underlying the metaphor is. This is explained by the fact that objects, phenomena, and actions can come together not only on the basis of external similarity, but also by the commonality of the impression they make. This is, for example, the metaphorical use of the verb in an excerpt from “The Golden Rose” by K. Paustovsky: A writer is often surprised when some long and completely forgotten incident or some detail suddenlyblossom in his memory exactly when they are needed for work. Flowers bloom, delighting people with their beauty; the same joy is brought to the artist by a detail that comes to mind in time and is necessary for creativity.
Aristotle also noted that “to create good metaphors means to notice similarities.” The observant eye of an artist of words finds common features in a wide variety of objects. The unexpectedness of such comparisons gives the metaphor special expressiveness. So the artistic power of metaphors, one might say, is directly dependent on their freshness and novelty.
Some metaphors are often repeated in speech: Night quietly descended to the earth; Winter has wrapped everything in a white blanket etc. Having become widespread, such metaphors fade, their figurative meaning is erased. Not all metaphors are stylistically equivalent; not every metaphor plays an artistic role in speech.
When did a person come up with a name for a curved pipe - knee, he also used a metaphor. But the new meaning of the word that arose did not receive an aesthetic function; the purpose of transferring the name here is purely practical: to name the object. To do this, metaphors are used in which there is no artistic image. There are a lot of such (“dry”) metaphors in the language: a tail of parsley, a mustache of a grape, the bow of a ship, an eyeball, pine needles, table legs. New meanings of words developed as a result of such metaphorization are fixed in the language and listed in explanatory dictionaries. However, “dry” metaphors do not attract the attention of word artists, acting as ordinary names of objects, features, and phenomena.
Extended metaphors are of particular interest. They arise when one metaphor entails new ones that are related to it in meaning. For example: The golden grove dissuaded me with its cheerful birch tongue. Metaphor dissuaded“pulls” metaphors golden And birch tongue; the leaves first turn yellow and become gold, and then they fall and die; and since the bearer of action is the grove, then language her birch, cheerful.
Extended metaphors are a particularly vivid means of expressive speech. They were loved by S. Yesenin, V. Mayakovsky, A. Blok and other poets. Here are some examples of such metaphorization: A red rowan fire is burning in the garden, but it can’t warm anyone(S. Yesenin); Having deployed my troops in parade, I walk along the line front; The poems stand leaden-heavy, ready for both death and immortal glory; The poems froze, pressing the mouth of the aimed gaping titles to the muzzle(V. Mayakovsky). Sometimes poets expand metaphors into a whole poem. Such are, for example, the poems “Three Keys” by A. S. Pushkin, “The Cup of Life” by M. Yu. Lermontov and others.
Beginning writers often abuse metaphorization, and then the accumulation of tropes becomes the cause of stylistic imperfection of speech. When editing the manuscripts of young authors, M. Gorky very often drew attention to their unsuccessful artistic images: “A cluster of stars, dazzling and burning, like hundreds of suns";“After the day's heat, the earth was as hot as pot, just now kiln fired a skilled potter. But here in the heavenly oven The last logs have burned out. The sky froze and the burnt rang clay pot– Earth". Gorky remarks: “This is a bad show of words.” Among the editorial comments of M. Gorky, made in the margins of the manuscripts of novice writers, the following are interesting: against the phrase: “Our commander often jumps forward, shoots his eyes looking around and peering for a long time at the crumpled map” Alexey Maksimovich wrote: “This is what young ladies do, not commanders”; emphasizing the image “The sky trembles with teary eyes,” he asks: “Is it possible to imagine this? Wouldn’t it be better to just say something about the stars?”
The use of metaphors as a “decorating” or “ornamental” means usually indicates the writer’s inexperience and helplessness. Entering a period of creative maturity, writers very often critically evaluate their past passions for pretentious images. K. Paustovsky, for example, wrote about his early gymnasium poems.
The poems were bad - lush, elegant and, as it seemed to me then, quite beautiful. Now I have forgotten these verses. I remember only certain stanzas. For example, these:
Oh, pluck the flowers from the drooping stems!
Rain falls quietly on the fields.
And to the lands where the smoky scarlet autumn sunset burns,
And sadness for a loved one glitters like opals
Saadi On the pages of slow days...
Why sadness “glitters with opals” - I cannot explain this either then or now. I was simply fascinated by the very sound of words. I didn't think about the meaning.
The best Russian writers saw the highest dignity of artistic speech in noble simplicity, sincerity and truthfulness of descriptions. A. S. Pushkin, M. Yu. Lermontov, N. V. Gogol, N. A. Nekrasov, V. G. Korolenko, A. P. Chekhov, and others considered it necessary to avoid false pathos and mannerisms. “Simplicity,” wrote V. G. Belinsky, “is a necessary condition for a work of art, which in its essence denies any external decoration, any sophistication.”
However, the vicious desire to “speak beautifully” sometimes in our time prevents some authors from simply and clearly expressing their thoughts. It is enough to analyze the style of student works on literature to be convinced of the justice of such a reproach. The young man writes: “There is no corner of the earth where the name of Pushkin is not known, which will be carried from generation to generation." In another essay we read: “His works breathe reality which is revealed so completely that, while reading, he himself you plunge into that period.” Trying to express himself figuratively, one author states: “Life goes on flow in its own way" and another “even more expressively” remarks: “I got on the train and I went down the hard road of life.”
The inept use of metaphors makes the statement ambiguous and gives the speech an inappropriate comedy. So, they write: “Although Kabanikha couldn't digest it Katerina, this fragile flower that grew in the “dark kingdom” of evil, but she ate it day and night"; "Turgenev kills his hero at the end of the novel, giving him an infection in his wound on the finger"; “On the path of Maydannikov’s entry into the collective farm there were bulls." Such “metaphorical” use of words causes irreparable damage to the style, because the romantic image is debunked, the serious and sometimes tragic sound of speech is replaced by a comic one. So let the metaphors in your speech be only the source of its vivid imagery, emotionality and never become a reason for lowering the grade for the style of your essays!
All flags will visit us (Metonymy)
In one of the stories of A. N. Tolstoy you can read: The last visitors to the palace museum walked by in single file.– short fur coats, tunics, cotton jackets . Another reader will think: “What happens: short fur coats and padded jackets have grown legs and are they walking? What writers can’t come up with!” And indeed, in fiction you can find something different: "It's true that it's expensive"– sigh the red trousers (A.P. Chekhov); Mostscandalizes a faded coat with a dog collar: “She got in there herself, but doesn’t let others in”(A. Gladilin).
If we understood such phrases literally, we would have to imagine a strange picture: clothes come to life and not only walk, but also sigh, and even make scandals... However, we are not talking about short fur coats and coats, but about their owners, and the use of clothing names to denote people dressed appropriately is a special stylistic device that authors use to enhance the expressiveness of speech. This transfer of names is based on contiguity associations.
The transfer of a name from one object to another based on contiguity is called metonymy (from the Greek word metonymy, meaning "renaming").
Metonymy allows, for example, to construct a phrase like this: “How stupid are you, brother?”– said the telephone receiver reproachfully (V. Kozlov). We understand that the replica belongs to a person talking on the phone, although the feuilletonist said the telephone receiver.
Metonymic substitutions make it possible to formulate a thought more briefly. For example, omitting the verb get sick, often asked: What happened to your throat?(A.P. Chekhov); Has the head gone?(M, Gorky). Or they say this: Raisa's heart went away(A.N. Tolstoy). Etc.
When denoting time, metonymic replacements also allow you to express your thoughts extremely briefly: They haven't seenMoscow (I. S. Turgenev); Motherafter tea continued knitting(I. Bunin). If in such cases the author did not use metonymy, he would have to write: after a meeting in Moscow, after drinking tea.
Metonymy serves as a source of imagery. Let's remember Pushkin's lines: All flags will be visiting us. Through the mouth of Peter I, the poet predicted that the port city, built on the shores of the Gulf of Finland, would receive ships with flags of all countries of the world. And here is another well-known example of metonymy by A. S. Pushkin: Amber on the pipes of Constantinople,porcelain and bronze on the table, and, the joy of pampered feelings, perfumein cut crystal... Here the poet uses the name of materials to refer to objects made from them when describing the luxury that surrounded Onegin.
Of course, these textbook lines are far from exhausting the cases of metonymy in A.S. Pushkin. This trope underlies many of his great images. For example, A. S. Pushkin resorted to metonymy when depicting the “magical land” of theatrical life: The theater is already full;the boxes shine; stalls and chairs – everything is boiling; creating pictures of Russian life: ...And it’s a pity for the old woman’s winter, and,After seeing her off with pancakes and wine, we celebrate her wake with ice cream and ice . Pushkin has many similar examples of truly artistic use of the trope.
As a stylistic device, metonymy should be distinguished from metaphor. To transfer a name in a metaphor, the compared objects must be similar, but with metonymy there is no such similarity; the artist of the word relies only on the contiguity of objects. Another difference: a metaphor can easily be converted into a simile using words like, like, similar. For example, fringe of frost– frost like fringe, the pines whisper– The pines make noise as if they are whispering. Metonymy does not allow such a transformation.
With metonymy, objects and phenomena that receive the same name are connected by a variety of contiguity associations. The name of a place is used to designate the people who are there: The exuberant one rejoicesRome (M. Yu. Lermontov). The name of the vessel is used to mean the contents: Iate three plates (I. A. Krylov). The author's name replaces the title of his work: MourningChopin thundered at sunset(M. Svetlov). The names of distinctive features of people or objects are used instead of their usual names: Black tailcoats rushed apart and in heaps here and there(N.V. Gogol).
Of particular interest is the metonymy of adjectives. For example, A.S. Pushkin called one of the secular dandies: overstarched impudent. Of course, in terms of meaning, the definition can only be attributed to nouns that name some details of the toilet of a fashionable dandy, but in figurative speech such a transfer of the name is possible. There are many examples of such metonymy of adjectives in fiction: The white scent of daffodilshappy, white, spring smell (L.N. Tolstoy); Then a short old man camein amazed glasses (I. Bunin).
Metonymy can be found not only in works of art, but also in our everyday speech. We are speaking: The class is listening, there is no copper, I love Yesenin, I listened to Onegin. Don’t you sometimes have to answer “truncated” questions: Have you been to Ermolova?(meaning the Ermolova Theater); Is he studying in Frunze?(that is, at the Frunze School); Is the cashier working? And here are the same “truncated” messages: We met on potatoes; The whole ship came running; The Waltz Fantasy is performed by the House of Culture. Such metonymic transfers are possible only in oral speech. However, in essays, unsuccessful metonymic transfers of names give rise to annoying speech errors: “At this time, the writer created his “Mother”; "The hero decided to fly on crutches." Such “laconicism” in the expression of thoughts leads to inappropriate puns, and the reader cannot help but smile where the text requires a completely different reaction...
Some other paths are also very close to metonymy. A unique variety of it is represented by synecdoche, which consists of replacing the plural with a singular, using the name of a part instead of the whole, a particular instead of a general, and vice versa. For example, the expressiveness of an excerpt from A. T. Tvardovsky’s poem “Vasily Terkin” is built on the use of synecdoche:
To the east, through the smoke and soot,
From one prison deaf
Going home Europe.
The fluff of the feather beds is like a blizzard over her.
And on Russian soldier
French brother, British brother.
Polish brother and everything in a row
With friendship as if guilty,
But they look from the heart...
Here is a generic name Europe used instead of the names of the peoples inhabiting European countries; singular noun Russian soldier, French brother and others are replaced by their plural. Synecdoche enhances the expression of speech and gives it a deep generalizing meaning.
However, this trope can also cause speech errors. How to understand, for example, the following statement: “In our circle, a serious search is underway: the guys create interesting models. But we don’t have enough workers: we only have seven of them so far”?
Star speaks to star (Personification)
Under the pen of writers, the objects around us come to life: the sea breathes deeply; the waves run and caress towards the shore; the forest is warily silent; the grass whispers with the wind; lakes look into endless distances... And in one song they even sing about pointed spruce eyelashes above the blue eyes of the lakes! In this magical world of poetic images, according to F.I. Tyutchev, “there is a smile on everything, life in everything”! And we are ready to believe the poet that at that hour when the earth sleeps in a blue glow(as M. Yu. Lermontov wrote), the stars acquire the gift of speech...
All these transformations in works of art are due to a remarkable stylistic device - personification. Personification is the endowment of inanimate objects with various feelings, thoughts, actions, and speech. Here is how, for example, A. Gaidar uses this trope in the story “The Blue Cup”: Came running clouds everywhere.Surrounded They,caught Andclosed Sun. Butit stubbornlyburst out first into one hole, then into another. Finally,burst out and sparkled over the vast earth even hotter and brighter.
When personified, the described object can be externally likened to a person: Green hairstyle, girlish breasts, oh thin birch tree that looked into the pond?(S. Yesenin). Even more often, actions that are available only to humans are attributed to inanimate objects: Was torn autumnnight icy tears(A. A. Fet); Homethe cloud is stretching, just socry above her(A. A. Fet); And the flowering clusters of bird cherry trees were washed with leavestransom frames (B. Pasternak).
Writers especially often turn to personification when describing pictures of nature. S. Yesenin masterfully used this trope. The poet addressed the maple as a good old friend: Are you my fallen maple, icy maple, why are you standing bent over under the white snowstorm? Or what did you see? Or what did you hear? It’s as if you went out for a walk outside the village... In his poetry Dawn calls out to another; The willows are crying, the poplars are whispering; The bird cherry sleeps in a white cape; The wind groans, long and dull; Flowers say goodbye to me, bowing their heads lower; The linden trees beckon to us in vain, plunging our feet into the snowdrifts; The flood licked the mud with smoke. The month dropped the yellow reins; They knit lace over the forest in the yellow foam of the cloud. In a quiet slumber under the canopy I hear the whisper of the pine forest. In love with his native Russian nature, the poet wrote about birches with particular tenderness:
Green hairstyle,
Girlish breasts,
O thin birch tree,
Why did you look into the pond?
What does the wind whisper to you?
What is the sand ringing about?
Or do you want to braid branches
Are you a moon comb?
It is personification that creates the charm of many of S. Yesenin’s poetic images, by which we unmistakably recognize his style.
V. Mayakovsky’s personifications are very original. How not to remember his “meeting” and “conversation” with the sun: What have I done? I'm dead! The sun itself, spreading its ray-steps, walks towards me of its own free will into the field! In the works of V. Mayakovsky, this stylistic device was a means of emotionally intense and often dramatic sound of poetic speech: And on gray eyelashes– Yes!– on the eyelashes of frosty icicles there are tears from the eyes– Yes!– from the downcast eyes of drainpipes; The telegraph was hoarse from the mournful hum. Tears of snow from reddened eyelids. Personification also appears as a strong visual means in literary prose. For example, from K. Paustovsky:
I thought of it [the old village garden] as a living thing. He was silent and patiently waited for the time when I would go to the well late in the evening to get water for the kettle. Perhaps it was easier for him to endure this endless night when he heard the clanking of a bucket and the steps of a man.
Personification is widely used not only in literary texts. It is worth opening any issue of the newspaper, and you will see funny headlines based on personification: “The sun lights up the beacons”, “The ice track awaits”, “The match brought records”, “Reinforced concrete fell into the mines”... Publicists often turn to him to create emotionally expressive images. Thus, during the Great Patriotic War, A. N. Tolstoy wrote in the article “Moscow is threatened by an enemy,” addressing Russia: My homeland, you have had a difficult test, but you will come out of it with victory, because you are strong, you are young, you are kind, you carry goodness and beauty in your heart. You are all in hopes of a bright future, you are building it with your big hands, your best sons are dying for it. The technique of personification helped the writer create a majestic image of Russia, which bore on its shoulders all the hardships of the war and opened the path to peace and happiness for the people.
The sunset glowed at one hundred and forty suns (Hyperbole)
Of course, no one takes these words of V. Mayakovsky seriously, realizing that this is an exaggeration, but this image helps us imagine a sky of extraordinary brightness, illuminated by the setting sun.
A figurative expression that exaggerates the size, strength, or beauty of what is being described is called hyperbole. Hyperbolization is V. Mayakovsky’s favorite stylistic device. Let us recall, for example, these lines of his: Some houses are as long as a star, others– moon-length; baobabs to the sky; Whiter than the clouds of the herd, the most majestic of the sugar kings; Willie has gained a lot in his life– there's a whole forest of dust particles... Mayakovsky builds the imagery of his satirical works “Coward”, “Pillar”, “Suck-up”, “Bird of God” on hyperbole. The poet found a source of humor in hyperbolism, for example, here is one of his jokes: A yawn tears wider than the Gulf of Mexico...
The “king of hyperbole” in Russian prose was N.V. Gogol. Remember his description of the Dnieper? A rare bird will fly to the middle of the Dnieper; Wonderful air...moving an ocean of fragrances. And how much comedy there is in Gogol’s everyday hyperboles! U Ivan Nikiforovich... trousers in such high folds that if they were inflated, the entire yard with barns and buildings could be placed in them... ,
Russian writers loved to resort to hyperbolization as a means of ridicule. For example, F. M. Dostoevsky, parodying excited speech, lines up hyperboles: On the mere supposition of such a case, you would have touproot the hair from your head and let out streams ...what am I saying!rivers, lakes, seas, oceans of tears !
One cannot help but mention the stylistic device that is the opposite of hyperbole.
A figurative expression that understates the size, strength and significance of what is being described is called litta. For example: Tom Thumb. Litotes is also called an inverse hyperbola.
Hyperbole and litotes have a common basis - a deviation in one direction or another from an objective quantitative assessment of an object, phenomenon, or quality. Therefore, these two paths can be combined and intertwined in speech. For example, the content of the comic Russian song “Dunya the Slender Weaver” is built on these paths, in which it is sung that Dunya spun the tow for three hours, spun three threads, and these threads were thinner than a log, thicker than a knee...
Like other tropes, hyperbole and litotes can be general linguistic and individually authored. There are quite a few common linguistic hyperboles that we use in everyday speech: to wait for an eternity, on the edge of the earth, to dream all your life, high to the sky, to be scared to death, to be smothered in your arms, to love madly. Common linguistic litotes are also known: not a drop, the sea is knee-deep, a drop in the sea, just a stone's throw away, a sip of water, the cat cried etc. These hyperboles and litotes belong to the emotionally expressive means of language and are used in artistic speech. travel: Journey V country Logicians. Traveler's Reminder: 1. Study the map...
The international competition of ballet dancers and choreographers is held in Moscow every four years. Photo – Alexey Druzhinin
The International Competition of Ballet Dancers and Choreographers is held in Moscow every four years - and when it was first established, in 1969, the event became a competition for the entire ballet world.
It was a real Olympics, and they treated it like that: the Russian team was approved at the ministerial level, sent to training camps, and the best young artists came from all over the world.
At the first competition, ours and the French performed on equal terms (we had Baryshnikov!) - but from the next competition, politics began to put pressure on art, and the ministerial authorities explained to the jury that our people should win, and everyone else should stand one step lower.
The ancient European schools took offense and stopped coming (except for rare visits by lone adventurers). The competition has approached the 21st century as a competition between the countries of the former USSR (where Russian ballet is still taught), the Russian provinces (those dancers who are eager to go to the capitals and hope to appear in Moscow) and Asian countries, where there are many of our teachers.
This year, the Ministry of Culture decided to return the competition to global status and gave unprecedented amounts to the prize fund - two Grand Prix of 100 thousand dollars, first prizes of 30 thousand, then 25 thousand and 20 thousand. However, this did not in any way affect the composition of the competitors.
It turned out that for European ballet dancers money is not as important as the opportunity to be invited to theaters - and our theaters seem less and less attractive to them as a place to work. Asia is another matter: the Japanese, who grew up with a passionate love for our schools, are now working in our theaters from Petrozavodsk to Vladivostok, through Kazan, Yekaterinburg and Krasnoyarsk.
The first prize in duets at the current competition was won by a Japanese working in Kazan, Okawa Koya, and his partner Midori Terada took bronze. Careful, competent, able to use tricks effectively, but never taking unnecessary risks (our people at the competition often tried to do something super complicated and ended up making mistakes), the Japanese honestly earned their medals.
“Gold” in solo went to Evelina Godunova, who works in Seoul, and Bakhtiyar Adamzhan from Kazakhstan (there is a strong men’s school there). The best result among us - “silver” in a duet - was achieved by the Mariinsky soloist Ernest Latypov (born in Bishkek).
And only in the younger group the main medals went to Muscovites: “gold” in a duet for Denis Zakharov and in a solo for Mark Chino (the guy who has already been accepted into the Bolshoi is an artist by inheritance: his Japanese mother danced in the Russian Ballet near Moscow).
A fight with a shadow
One of the main heroines of the competition was Joy Womack - a girl who needed the award of the Moscow competition more than all the other artists. She is 23, she is a prima ballerina of the Kremlin Ballet. She dreamed of more - namely, the Big One.
An American from Beverly Hills, from her early youth she wanted to dance in Russian ballet. A ballerina as a symbol of the mysterious Russian soul, a ceremonial big style (where every gesture echoes throughout the multi-tiered theater), embroidered tutus, and not the tights familiar to American neoclassics.
At the age of 15, Womack came to study at the Moscow Academy - not for an internship, but “on a general basis” - and at 15 she uttered such texts that veterans of the Russian stage, who wanted to caulk all the doors to the theater from the pernicious influence of Western choreography, cried with emotion.
But she not only talked, she worked. I worked like hell, taught all these details and details that make up the style of the old classics. I believed that my work would reward me. And she was taken to the Bolshoi Theater. Hooray? Hooray. A year and a half later, she left there with a scandal.
In an interview with Izvestia, she accused the former ballet management of the theater of corruption and stated the amount that was allegedly demanded from her for career advancement. She didn't go to the police; the theater did not file a lawsuit for possible libel. The girl simply slammed the door and went to the much less prestigious Kremlin Ballet, where she was immediately given all the roles she wanted, and she performs them very well.
But this disappointment in the Bolshoi and the desire for revenge left such a clear imprint on the ballerina that her dancing changed. “Big style” is beautiful when it is calm; Womack lost her calm. She came to the competition to prove to all her former colleagues at the Bolshoi that she is wow! - and she went out to every dance with such an expression on her face that one could be scared of this grimace.
Tender Princess Aurora? Odalisque in love? More like a Valkyrie warrior. Pouring all her disappointment and all her hopes into the dance, she performed the fouette with such energy that, poor fellow, she could not resist and fell on her butt; the audience, which had previously watched this triumph of will with amazement, immediately, naturally, began to sympathize with her.
The jury also sympathized, allowing him into the second round. There she already danced without such mistakes, but with the same intonation. In the third round, I calmed down a little, remembered the elegance, the cantilena (in Kitri’s not the most suitable fighting game for this) - but the Womack who once shone on the Bolshoi stage with the simple-minded happiness of a dream come true was still not there.
Well. Just a diploma for participating in the competition. And you know what's the saddest thing? There were barely one and a half people from the Bolshoi in the hall - the theater is now in Japan, there is a large-scale tour (in fact, that’s why no one from the theater is taking part in the competition). Womack fought a ghost.
With a fish train from the Arkhangelsk forests
Well, in the 21st century it’s not quite like that, by train, but talent still appears in the country quite unexpectedly. One morning (and competitions for the younger group - from 14 to 18 years old - take place in the morning), a boy from Syktyvkar appears on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater. Name is Ivan Sorokin.
He is 14, his thinness makes him seem smaller. In Syktyvkar there is no ancient ballet school, a venerable tradition, there is an arts gymnasium, which is not even 10 years old. From the point of view of the capital’s ballet veterans, the guy studied “in the middle of nowhere.” But as soon as he started dancing, it was as if Mowgli spoke classical Latin.
Precise footwork, a sense of style, musicality - these days in Moscow a new ballet name was born, which will thunder throughout the world very soon. Ivan Sorokin entered the second round, danced there with the same breathtaking ease and clarity - and suddenly his name was not on the list of competitors in the third round.
The jury explained at a press conference: it turned out that the teenager and his teacher were so sure that he was unlikely to make it to the second round that they simply did not prepare a mandatory program for the third! And the possible winner dropped out of the competition. I took the train and went to Syktyvkar. But obviously, not for long: they are already ready to take him to complete his studies at both the Moscow Academy of Choreography and the St. Petersburg Academy of Russian Ballet. According to rumors, he chose St. Petersburg.
Drunkenness is a fight
Next to the ballet competition there was a choreography competition. There is only one round, in which each author must show two works. The first prize gives the laureate 30 thousand dollars, the second 25 thousand, the third - 20 thousand. There are three more incentive diplomas of 5 thousand each. Over the course of the day, the jury looked at more than 50 works, and at the end the ballet stars and choreographers sitting there looked like they had been fed cardboard.
If people came to the artistic competition from many countries (even if not the main ballet ones), then in the choreography competition two thirds of the participants were from Russia. Each participant was asked to present their choreography and was given a maximum of six minutes. Everyone at this time was trying to tell some kind of story (one girl was strangled on stage, one was stabbed to death, another guy was toiling around in a number called “Guilty”: he also clearly did something bad).
Many denounced the vices - especially Nikita Ivanov, in one of his numbers ("Friday") a disheveled office clerk danced with a large bottle, in another ("Power") three guys fought for an office chair: the one who occupied it at a particular moment pushed around others.
The resurrected Veuve Clicquot caressed her glass and looked like a woman with reduced social responsibility. One of the choreographers promoted the fresh idea that a woman is also a person (in the piece “The Thing” by Anna Gerus, the dancer pulled the ballerina out of the plastic wrap and really treated her like a thing).
Someone staged sketches for imitation: the “Moth” created by Alexander Mogilev hovered around a large lamp placed on the stage, Jonathan the Seagull (choreographed by Nina Madan) flew, waving his arms. Belarusian Dmitry Zalessky amazed everyone with his miniature “Dancing with a Friend”: on the stage there was a lady and two gentlemen (like an English tea party) and a large wooden dog.
The lady hugged the dog so passionately that it was clear that she preferred him to the two gentlemen. The audience in the stalls began to remember what could and could not be promoted from the stage.
It is not surprising that the main awards here were taken by foreigners: the first prize was shared by the Chilean Eduardo Zuniga, who made an elegant number to the music of the cult song Amor De Hombre and danced it himself (without any competitive pressure, with that relaxation that gives rise to associations with palm trees and sandy shore), and the Chinese Xiaochao Wen, who staged a rather skillfully constructed poem about overcoming life’s difficulties for himself and his girlfriend; he broke into traditional neoclassical vocabulary in sharp bursts, and there was a feeling that the couple, despite the smooth stage, were traveling through gullies.
In general, the choreographer competition showed that there are no young choreographers in the country. More precisely, there are no young choreographers interested in classical ballet. In modern dance, someone new is always born - but they are not welcome at this competition.
No one was awarded the Grand Prix among artists or choreographers, saving the state 200 thousand dollars. The rest of the awards were presented solemnly, in the presence of Vladimir Putin and the President of Brazil Michel Temer (his country also has a cult of Russian ballet, there is a Bolshoi Theater school and a large Brazilian team came to the competition; they took with them “silver” from the girls in the senior group, “bronze” "The boys have two diplomas in their junior year).
The next competition will be in 2021 - and if the Ministry of Culture has not yet lost the desire to return it to the status of the Olympics, work to attract future competitors must begin now.
Familiar from childhood: The East is burning with a new dawn opens the description of the Battle of Poltava itself in the poem by A.S. Pushkin POLTAVA
Let's take a closer look at this classic description of the battle!
Here I first present a complete fragment-by-fragment breakdown of this description in the poem.
The poem is quoted from the Internet publication (the text was verified by me with the 1986 edition (A.S. Pushkin, Works in three volumes, volume two, Moscow, publishing house Khud.literatura p.88-127)
Internet library of Alexey Komarov
1 fragment: 15 lines (57, 331, 402)
The east is burning with a new dawn.
Already on the plain, over the hills
The guns roar. The smoke is crimson
Rises in circles to the heavens
Towards the morning rays.
The regiments closed their ranks.
Arrows scattered in the bushes.
Cannonballs roll, bullets whistle;
Cold bayonets hung down.
Sons beloved victories,
The Swedes are rushing through the fire of the trenches;
Worried, the cavalry flies;
The infantry moves behind her
And with its heavy firmness
Her desire is strengthening.
2 fragment: 12 lines (49, 262, 322)
And the battlefield is fatal
It thunders and burns here and there,
But clearly the happiness is fighting
It's starting to serve us.
The squads repulsed by gunfire,
Interfering, they fall into dust.
Rosen leaves through the gorges;
Surrenders to the ardent Schliepenbach.
We are pressing the Swedes, army after army;
The glory of their banners is darkening,
And God fights with grace
Our every step is captured.
3 fragment: 14 lines (57, 313, 382)
Then inspired from above
Peter's voice rang out:
"Let's get to work, God bless you!" From the tent
Surrounded by a crowd of favorites,
Peter comes out. His eyes
They shine. His face is terrible.
The movements are fast. He is beautiful,
He's like God's thunderstorm.
It's coming. They bring him a horse.
A faithful horse is zealous and humble.
Feeling the fatal fire,
Trembling. He looks askance with his eyes
And rushes in the dust of battle,
Proud of the powerful rider.
4 fragment: 8 lines (30, 177, 215)
It's almost noon. The heat is blazing.
Like a plowman, the battle rests.
Cossacks are prancing here and there.
The shelves are built while leveling.
The battle music is silent.
On the hills the guns are subdued
They stopped their hungry roar.
And behold, announcing the plain
5 fragment: 14 lines (56, 302, 370)
Cheers rang out in the distance:
The regiments saw Peter.
And he rushed in front of the shelves,
Powerful and joyful, like battle.
He devoured the field with his eyes.
A crowd rushed after him
These chicks of Petrov's nest -
In the midst of earthly lot,
In the works of power and war
His comrades, sons:
And noble Sheremetev,
And Bruce, and Bour, and Repnin,
And, happiness, the rootless darling,
Semi-powerful ruler.
6 fragment: 15 lines (59, 332, 404)
And in front of the blue rows
Their warlike squads,
Carried by faithful servants,
In a rocking chair, pale, motionless,
Suffering from a wound, Karl appeared.
The hero's leaders followed him.
He quietly sank into thought.
He portrayed an embarrassed look
Extraordinary excitement.
It seemed that Karl was brought
The desired fight at a loss...
Suddenly with a weak wave of the hand
He moved his regiments against the Russians.
And with them the royal squads
They came together in the smoke in the middle of the plain:
7 fragment: 16 lines (71, 383, 470)
And the battle broke out, the Battle of Poltava!
In the fire, under the red-hot hail,
Reflected by a living wall,
Above the fallen system there is a fresh system
He closes his bayonets. A heavy cloud
Squads of flying cavalry,
With reins and sounding sabers,
When knocked down, they cut from the shoulder.
Throwing piles of bodies upon piles,
Cast iron balls everywhere
They jump between them, strike,
They dig up the ashes and hiss in the blood.
Swede, Russian - stabs, chops, cuts.
Drumming, clicks, grinding,
The thunder of guns, stomping, neighing, groaning,
And death and hell on all sides.
8 fragment: 16 lines (66, 340, 421)
Among anxiety and excitement
On the battle with the gaze of inspiration
The calm leaders look
The military movements are being watched,
Anticipate death and victory
And they talk in silence.
But near the Moscow Tsar
Who is this warrior with gray hair?
Two supported by Cossacks,
Heartfelt jealousy of grief,
He is the eye of an experienced hero
Looks at the excitement of the battle.
He won't jump on a horse,
Odrikh, an orphan in exile,
And the Cossacks to the cry of Paley
They won't attack from all sides!
9 fragment: 12 lines (50, 269, 329)
But why did his eyes sparkle?
And with anger, like the darkness of the night,
Has the old brow become covered?
What could outrage him?
Or, through the swearing smoke, he saw
Enemy Mazepa, and at this moment
I hated my summers
Disarmed old man?
Mazepa, deep in thought,
He looked at the battle, surrounded
A crowd of rebellious Cossacks,
Relatives, elders and Serdyuks.
10 fragment: 18 lines (80, 407, 503)
Suddenly a shot. The elder turned.
In Voinarovsky's hands
The musket barrel was still smoking.
Slain a few steps away,
The young Cossack was lying in blood,
And the horse, covered in foam and dust,
Sensing the will, he rushed wildly,
Hiding in the fiery distance.
The Cossack sought the hetman
Through the battle with a saber in hand,
With mad rage in his eyes.
The old man, having arrived, turned
To him with a question. But the Cossack
He was already dying. Extinguished vision
He also threatened the enemy of Russia;
The dead face was gloomy,
And the tender name of Mary
The tongue was still babbling a little.
11 fragment: 17 lines (78, 383, 477)
But the moment of victory is close, close.
Hooray! we break; The Swedes are bending.
O glorious hour! oh glorious view!
Another push and the enemy flees. 32
And then the cavalry set off,
Murder dulls swords,
And the whole steppe was covered with the fallen,
Like a swarm of black locusts.
Peter is feasting. Both proud and clear
And his gaze is full of glory.
And his royal feast is wonderful.
At the calls of his troops,
In his tent he treats
Our leaders, the leaders of others,
And caresses the glorious captives,
And for your teachers
The healthy cup is raised.
It is easy to notice that fragments 8-10 and the second half of the 11th (Peter Feasts) are not directly related to the description of the battle itself.
Thus, we can exclude these fragments, like fragments 3 and 5 describing the exit of Peter the Great and his demarche in front of the troops, from the description of the battle itself. Because these fragments actually describe certain moments external to the battle itself.
Of course, one can argue: Peter the Great demonstrated his personal presence to his troops and thereby inspired them to launch a victorious offensive. Above the battlefield, as Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy taught us in WAR AND PEACE, the SPIRIT hovers. Thus, the exit of Peter the Great is the appearance of that very SPIRIT... I will not argue with this approach. I will only point out that, as before, this has nothing to do with the actual armed conflict. If spirit alone were enough, then why all these armed forces?
The episode with the Cossack aiming at Mazepa also does not relate to the battle itself. A certain Cossack in love takes revenge on a successful rival while his comrades are engaged in a bloody battle. This poetic episode does not affect the picture of the battle itself, nor the course of the battle. The actual content of the Battle of Poltava is not revealed in any way in this episode.
I post the remaining material at our disposal below so that the reader can personally examine the picture of the Battle of Poltava based on the poem Poltava.
The east is burning with a new dawn.
Already on the plain, over the hills
The guns roar. The smoke is crimson
Rises in circles to the heavens
Towards the morning rays.
The regiments closed their ranks.
Arrows scattered in the bushes.
Cannonballs roll, bullets whistle;
Cold bayonets hung down.
Sons beloved victories,
Worried, the cavalry flies;
The infantry moves behind her
And with its heavy firmness
Her desire is strengthening.
And the battlefield is fatal
It thunders and burns here and there,
But clearly the happiness is fighting
It's starting to serve us.
The squads repulsed by gunfire,
Interfering, they fall into dust.
Rosen leaves through the gorges;
Surrenders to the ardent Schliepenbach.
The glory of their banners is darkening,
And God fights with grace
Our every step is captured.
"Let's get to work, God bless you!" From the tent
Surrounded by a crowd of favorites,
Peter comes out. His eyes
They shine. His face is terrible.
The movements are fast. He is beautiful,
He's like God's thunderstorm.
It's coming. They bring him a horse.
A faithful horse is zealous and humble.
Feeling the fatal fire,
Trembling. He looks askance with his eyes
And rushes in the dust of battle,
Proud of the powerful rider.
It's almost noon. The heat is blazing.
Like a plowman, the battle rests.
Cossacks are prancing here and there.
The shelves are built while leveling.
The battle music is silent.
On the hills the guns are subdued
They stopped their hungry roar.
And behold, announcing the plain
Cheers rang out in the distance:
The regiments saw Peter.
And he rushed in front of the shelves,
Powerful and joyful, like battle.
He devoured the field with his eyes.
A crowd rushed after him
These chicks of Petrov's nest -
In the midst of earthly lot,
In the works of power and war
His comrades, sons:
And noble Sheremetev,
And Bruce, and Bour, and Repnin,
And, happiness, the rootless darling,
Semi-powerful ruler.
And in front of the blue rows
Their warlike squads,
Carried by faithful servants,
In a rocking chair, pale, motionless,
Suffering from a wound, Karl appeared.
The hero's leaders followed him.
He quietly sank into thought.
He portrayed an embarrassed look
Extraordinary excitement.
It seemed that Karl was brought
The desired fight at a loss...
Suddenly with a weak wave of the hand
He moved his regiments against the Russians.
And with them the royal squads
They came together in the smoke in the middle of the plain:
Reflected by a living wall,
He closes his bayonets. A heavy cloud
Squads of flying cavalry,
With reins and sounding sabers,
When knocked down, they cut from the shoulder.
Throwing piles of bodies upon piles,
Cast iron balls everywhere
They jump between them, strike,
They dig up the ashes and hiss in the blood.
But the moment of victory is close, close.
Hooray! we break; The Swedes are bending.
O glorious hour! oh glorious view!
Another push and the enemy flees.
And then the cavalry set off,
Murder dulls swords,
And the whole steppe was covered with the fallen,
Like a swarm of black locusts.
It is easy to see that Alexander Sergeevich is stingy in his description of the battle.
Having given some general idea of the picture of the battle as if from the clouds, he dwells in detail on how the cannonballs fly into a living formation of people. But let me! All this took place on Senate Square and during the uprising of the Chernigov regiment!
Actually, only special inserts indicate that we are reading a description of the Poltava battle. There are few of them:
Complete fragment six - fifteen lines
And here are these wonderful lines:
Sons beloved victories,
The Swedes are rushing through the fire of the trenches;
Rosen leaves through the gorges;
Surrenders to the ardent Schliepenbach.
We are pressing the Swedes, army after army;
And the battle broke out, the Battle of Poltava!
Swede, Russian - stabs, chops, cuts.
Hooray! we break; The Swedes are bending.
Now we just have to highlight those lines that directly describe the battle.
And the battle broke out, the Battle of Poltava!
In the fire, under the red-hot hail,
Reflected by a living wall,
Above the fallen system there is a fresh system
He closes his bayonets. A heavy cloud
Squads of flying cavalry,
With reins and sounding sabers,
When knocked down, they cut from the shoulder.
Throwing piles of bodies upon piles,
Cast iron balls everywhere
They jump between them, strike,
They dig up the ashes and hiss in the blood.
Swede, Russian - stabs, chops, cuts.
Drumming, clicks, grinding,
The thunder of guns, stomping, neighing, groaning,
And death and hell on all sides.
Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin took care of us.
All you have to do is read these nuclear (every program must have a CORE!) sixteen lines. This, without a doubt, is an outstanding work by Alexander Sergeevich, known to every Soviet schoolchild from a young age.
If you were asked to talk about the Battle of Poltava, as a guide or historian, could you use this description?
Rather, it is a conveyance of the feelings of one of the eyewitnesses and direct participants in the battle. It remains only to find out how this battle fundamentally differs from dozens of other battles involving artillery, cavalry and infantry.
I have no complaints against the author of Poltava. He brilliantly depicted a person’s feelings from the terrible picture of the battle. But, alas, and this is quite obvious, Alexander Sergeevich did not depict the battle itself. It would be more accurate to say even this way: he depicted SOME battle, and was forced to insert a NAME into the description so that the reader would not doubt what kind of battle he was talking about. Hence the line: And the battle broke out. The Battle of Poltava!
To be continued.