The emergence of the Babid movement
Remark 1
The signing by the Qajars of a number of unequal treaties with Russia, Great Britain, France, Austria caused mass discontent in the country. The most noticeable manifestation of such discontent was the movement of Babids - radical Shiites, who founded a kind of religious sect in the early 1840s.
Its founder was the hereditary cotton merchant Ali Muhammad Shirazi. In 1844, he called himself the Bab - that is, the "Gate" through which the "hidden" 12th imam conveys his will to people, and in 1847 he proclaimed himself the long-awaited Mahdi, to whom, as a result of the transmigration of souls, the spiritual grace of all previous prophets passed and who finally came to earth to establish justice on it. The Bab outlined his ideas in the book "Bayan" ("Revelation"), which should become a new Holy Scripture instead of the obsolete Quran. Thus, claiming the Muslim nature of his creation, the Bab wrote the Bayan simultaneously in Persian and Arabic.
Remark 2
The foundation of the new ideology was the postulate that the orthodox Muslim laws and procedures, established by the Prophet Muhammad and codified by the Koran and Sharia, are already outdated and must be replaced by new ones.
Bab proposed to build the state structure of his state on the basis of the “sacred number” 19, which he derived from the Arabic word khair (“good, good”), since the literal record of this word in Arabic means the number 18, to which a unit was attached, which symbolized a single bearer of eternal life.
For propagating ideas that fundamentally contradicted the canons of orthodox Shiism, the newly-minted prophet was immediately arrested (1847) and imprisoned in the Maka fortress, but the arrest of the Bab only contributed to the radicalization of the movement. His associates moved from sermons to action. The Babids held a congress at which they announced the beginning of their statehood.
Babid rebellion
The Shah's government dispersed the congress of Babis. The answer to this action was an armed uprising, which began in September 1848. For eight months, the Shah's troops tried to suppress the uprising, but to no avail. In May 1849, the authorities offered the "rebels" an amnesty, life and freedom in the event of voluntary surrender. The Babis in the same month agreed to the surrender proposed by the authorities, but the Shah's troops treacherously destroyed them all.
A second Babid revolt broke out in June 1849. The government threw in a large punitive army with cannons, which literally pulverized the defenses of the "rebels", but the resistance did not subside. Only at the cost of heavy losses did the Qajar troops break the resistance. In December 1849, the surviving rebels were also promised Shah's forgiveness, and when they laid down their arms, they were all killed without exception.
Remark 3
Fearing to finally lose control over the situation in the country, the government turned to emergency measures. In July 1850, Baba, who had been imprisoned in 1847, was executed in Tabriz, depriving the rebels of their religious and political inspirer.
The uprising was crushed by mass terror, and the whole families of the Babids were burned alive. Now no one promised them anything - the rebellion was drowned in blood.
Strengthening centralization and reform
Remark 4
During the reign of Amir Nizam (1808 - 1852), noticeable changes took place in public life countries. Carrying out appropriate reforms, the government carefully tried to free the educational and judicial systems from the total control of the orthodox Shiite clergy.
In 1851, Persian-language newspapers began to appear in Iran, and in next year Tehran opened the first secular lyceum for children of the court nobility, where they taught history, geography, chemistry and medicine. Later, in line with the initiated reforms, a European-style military school was organized in the Iranian capital, where French instructors taught. The initiated reforms by inertia continued for a certain time after his death. In Iran, the construction of the first enterprises of the machine industry began.
However, the effectiveness of these innovations was scanty. Qajar Iran was steadily sinking into the swamp of semi-colonial enslavement. This process was accelerated by another military embarrassment - the defeat of England in the war.
Crisis and increasing dependency of Iran
The semi-colonial enslavement of Iran was completed by the financial and economic expansion of European countries, primarily Russia and Great Britain. The chronic lack of funds forced the Qajars to look for investors to develop the economy on any terms.
Remark 5
The Qajar state finally lost its economic and diplomatic sovereignty, and soon lost its financial independence. Deprived of funds, Nasser ad-Din Shah at the end of the 19th century. was forced to take loans at exorbitant interest from British and Russian financiers, who had previously deprived Iran of financial sovereignty.
The disintegration of the state was accompanied by the activation of separatist regimes in the provinces of the empire, where, together with foreigners, it was no longer the Shah's governors who ruled, but local officials, with whom the British and Russians, ignoring the Shah's government, concluded direct agreements on concessions, subsidies, and the organization of autonomous armed formations.
Formally, Iran retained its dependence, but only because Britain did not allow Iran to turn into a Russian colony, and Russia into a British one.
transitional era. By the end of the first third of the 19th century, Russian literature had achieved a lot. It no longer “caught up” with the European one, but developed in parallel with it, competing in some ways, inferior in some ways, and surpassing it in some ways. This will become especially clear in the 1870s and 1880s, when great Russian prose appears and the novels of Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy and Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky open up new artistic horizons for all world literature.
That is why in the second part of the textbook you will no longer find such titles of sections that were in part one: "The European cultural situation and ...". This very “and” lost any meaning in the era of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. Russian writers were no longer following the Europeans, but together with them. And from now on, we will talk about the works of the best European writers of that time, along with the main story about the work of domestic prose writers, poets, playwrights.
Ho - so often happens - a new rise in literature was preceded by a lull. Tense, like before a storm.
The main feature of the 1840s as a literary era is intermediateness, duality. The brightest poets and prose writers of the previous decade either passed away (Pushkin in 1837, Lermontov in 1841, Baratynsky in 1844) or, for various reasons, moved away from literary life.
Of the major writers of the 1830s, only Gogol remained in the center of attention of readers and critics. They argued about him, he was considered the founder of a special "Gogol trend" in Russian literature. However, after the triumphant publication in 1842 of the first volume of Dead Souls, Gogol did not publish major new works.
Disputes between Westerners and Slavophiles. The late 1830s and virtually the entire 1840s were marked by fierce controversy; writers split into ideologically hostile camps of Slavophiles and Westernizers. What ideas led to the emergence of these two camps? Let's try to figure it out.
By the mid-1840s, in the absence of undoubtedly major new literary names and events, the controversy about the historical fate of Russia was gaining more and more resonance. It dates back to 1836, when the "Philosophical letter" of the publicist Pyotr Yakovlevich Chaadaev was published in the Moscow magazine Teleskop. After the publication of the Philosophical Letter, the magazine was immediately closed, its publisher and censors were subjected to the strictest penalties, and Chaadaev was officially declared insane. Is it possible in a sound mind to talk about the fact that Russia is irreparably behind the European countries in the way of public life, in the field of spiritual culture? To many, this actually seemed impossible.
The cultural backwardness of Russia, according to Chaadaev, was largely the result of precisely those features of the domestic state, religious and private life that were considered to be its unshakable foundations: a peasant community, life removed from worldly worries Orthodox Church, long-term absence of secular bookishness, etc.
Everyone who was not indifferent to the past and future of Russia took part in the salon and family disputes about Chaadaev's "Letter". Gradually, two opposite points of view on the problem were formed.
According to one of them, all European countries are moving along a certain universal path, going through similar stages in the development of culture and statehood. And if we compare all existing civilizations, adhering to this approach, then Russia really lagged behind the advanced powers of the West. To remedy the situation, it was necessary to urgently turn to the European experience in all spheres of life: from the style of clothing and the education system of young people to state structure. Those who held these views were called Westerners.
Supporters of the opposite system of views, on the contrary, were convinced that there were no uniform laws for the development of different nation-states. According to them, European civilization has long exhausted its material and spiritual resources, the West is in a deep crisis. And vice versa, Russia, despite its apparent backwardness, has retained all the young forces of a healthy state body. Moreover, it is she who is destined to reveal to Europe, which is declining, new truths of spiritual rebirth. To do this, it is necessary to continue to preserve our originality in every possible way, and not rush after Western civilization, following the hasty appeals of a handful of metropolitan intellectuals who have long forgotten the Russian language and exchanged Russian dress for European clothes. Program value for the supporters of this point of view was the article by Alexei Stepanovich Khomyakov "On the old and the new" (1839). He contrasted Western individualism with Russian catholicity, communality, nationwide nature, when each person lovingly coordinates his actions, his decisions, his interests with the interests and actions of his compatriots. The followers of this system of views began to be called Slavophiles.
In the controversy between the Westernizers and the Slavophiles, the universal landmarks of Russian culture were revealed by themselves. The position of our country in the world, its geographical (and hence cultural) connection with Europe and Asia determined the originality of our national culture, the coexistence of opposite principles in it. Coexistence is not always peaceful, but inevitable. Between these often incompatible "truths", Europeanism and national identity, it is impossible to make the only "right" and final choice. After all, the Slavophiles sang not the real Russia of the middle of the 19th century, but the ideal Russia. But they criticized the real West with its real shortcomings. Their opponents, on the contrary, criticized the real Russia and praised the ideal West of their dreams. Both ideals are present in the cultural development of Russia to this day.
In the early 1840s, the disputes between Westerners and Slavophiles went beyond drawing rooms and salons to the pages of leading periodicals and began to be widely discussed in society. Initially, both influential trends in social thought were formed in the Mother See, in circles close to Moscow University, the oldest in Russia. The critic Vissarion Grigoryevich Belinsky, the publicist, prose writer and playwright Alexander Ivanovich Herzen, the poet Nikolai Platonovich Ogarev, the historian Timofei Nikolaevich Granovsky and others considered themselves Westerners ... Khomyakov, the brothers Ivan and Peter Kireevsky, Yuri Samarin, the brothers Konstantin and Ivan Aksakov, were Slavophiles, as well as other writers.
However, in the 1940s, especially after Herzen was exiled first to Vyatka for his anti-government publicistic speeches, then to Vladimir and Novgorod, and Belinsky moved to the banks of the Neva, Slavophilism and Westernism seemed to divide the spheres of influence between the two Russian capitals - the ancient and new. Moscow was considered a stronghold of Slavophilism, Petersburg - of Westernism.
Literary life of St. Petersburg in the 1840s. V. G. Belinsky and the journal "Domestic Notes". The cult of exclusivity, extraordinary ideas and actions, contempt for the everyday side of everyday life - all this determined the appearance of a person of the romantic era. And in the 40s, romantic impulses were replaced by practicality, a focus on earthly, often not at all sublime, everyday problems. Growing popularity natural sciences and engineering professions, journals increasingly published materials on the achievements of physiology and medicine, endless discussions were held in society about the proposed extensive construction of railways in Russia.
The center of the literary movement in the 40s finally moved from Moscow to St. Petersburg. In the capital of the empire, anti-romantic sentiments were more tangible, new periodicals were created here, and the number of readers grew. From a private occupation, a lofty vocation, the lot of geniuses and a narrow circle of enlightened readers, literature turned into a profession, moving closer in its social status to journalism, book publishing, and even the book trade. Literary activity Petersburg in the 1940s inevitably absorbed a whole range of “related professions” into its orbit: literary criticism, journalism, book printing ...
The most popular metropolitan literary magazine of the late 1830s - the first half of the 1840s was "Notes of the Fatherland", published by Andrei Alexandrovich Kraevsky. The authors of the journal paid much attention to the latest developments in literature and public life. Otechestvennye zapiski published poetry and prose by M. Yu. Lermontov and new works by V. F. Odoevsky. In 1839, V. G. Belinsky, at that time a popular Moscow critic, the author of articles about Pushkin and Gogol, was invited to the journal. In his last years in Moscow, Belinsky was an admirer of German philosophy, shared the opinions widespread in the Mother See about the lofty, ideal purpose of belles-lettres.
Such views contradicted Petersburg "practicalism". They assumed anti-Petersburg sentiments, a struggle with the capital's "trade direction" in literature. The main enemies of Belinsky and many of his Moscow associates were the publisher of the newspaper "Northern Bee" Faddey Bulgarin, the editors of the magazines "Son of the Fatherland" Nikolai Grech and "Library for Reading" Osip Senkovsky.
But having moved to St. Petersburg, Belinsky quickly became convinced that not only "reactionary", but practically all metropolitan writers treat their work as professionals. In other words, they are interested in large circulations and high fees. Such was the progressive publisher of Otechestvennye Zapiski, Kraevsky, and to an even greater extent, the young authors of his journal, Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov and Ivan Ivanovich Panaev. In the early 1940s, they left Otechestvennye Zapiski to pursue their own literary plans.
Belinsky became the main ideologist of the new publications of Panaev and Nekrasov, who took over the organizational and financial concerns and, naturally, received the bulk of the income. He had to say modern language, "rebuild", abandon Moscow idealism. He quickly adopted Petersburg practicality, a sense of reality. He fought for his new views just as fiercely as in the recent past he defended in Moscow journals high literature associated with eternal ideal values.
Almanac "Physiology of Petersburg": basic ideological and artistic principles. The two-volume "Physiology of St. Petersburg, compiled from the works of Russian writers, edited by N. Nekrasov" (1845), became the most noticeable phenomenon in the literature of the mid-40s. The main ideological and artistic principles of this edition were outlined by Belinsky in two title articles: "Introduction" and "Petersburg and Moscow".
Why physiology? Because it is this discipline that is able to describe a living organism without any mysticism, relying on natural science knowledge. Yes, all manifestations human life- from digestion to the finest feelings - can be interpreted as the movement of fluids, nerve impulses ... And any social phenomenon - from a single city to a state as a whole - can be likened to an organism whose life is reduced to the circulation of goods, the interaction of individual (professional, age groups) of the population ...
Why Petersburg? Because the capital is the most dynamically developing city Russian Empire. Here is the heart of the political and cultural life of the country, the center of science and art, the first railway in the country is about to be launched. A typical Petersburger lives at a much faster pace than a resident of any other city. He is preoccupied with his career, rushes to work every morning, reads a lot, lives in a modest apartment high-rise building(and not in a semi-village estate, like a resident of Moscow). At the same time, technical innovations inevitably lead to the stratification of the urban population, to the emergence of a large number of destitute ...
The task of the almanac "Physiology of Petersburg" went far beyond the usual boundaries of belles-lettres. A detailed depiction of the shortcomings of the capital's life in the most developed city of the empire was intended, first of all, to "reveal social ulcers", to draw the attention of society to the fate of the destitute Petersburgers. Ho, in addition, indirectly indicate the ways of an organized and systematic, purely practical resolution of urban problems and contradictions.
The ideologist of the almanac "Physiology of Petersburg" emphasized that the romantic era of literary geniuses was left behind. After all, each of them inevitably tried alone to comprehend the innermost secrets of being ("You are the king - live alone," Pushkin said about the artist-genius). The authors of the "Physiology of Petersburg" are "ordinary talents" capable of sacrificing personal ambitions for the sake of a common literary and social task. The fruits of their collective creativity will be clearer for readers and more useful for society as a whole.
Now we understand why among the authors of "Physiology of Petersburg" there are almost no recognized classics. In addition to Nekrasov, Belinsky and Panaev, only the creator of the famous " explanatory dictionary living Great Russian language" Vladimir Ivanovich Dal. Under the pseudonym "W. Lugansky" he wrote for the almanac essay "Petersburg janitor". And also - to a lesser extent - Dmitry Vladimirovich Grigorovich, author of the essays "Petersburg Organ Grinders" and "Lottery Ball". Later, he wrote the popular novels "Anton-Goremyka", "Gutta-percha Boy" and others.
Physiological essay: heroes and events. When we studied the Russian classics of the first half of the 19th century, we always paid attention to the same circumstance. Namely, the Russian writers of the Karamzin, Pushkin and Gogol generations had to take lessons from the best European writers of that time. For what? In order to learn how to portray the human personality, the human character in its individuality, uniqueness. Romanticism demanded this, the spirit of the times was felt in this. And now it was necessary to take the next step and connect the individual character of the hero with those social, everyday, financial circumstances that shaped this personality and this character.
The authors of The Physiology of Petersburg were real pioneers in this sense. The heroes and events of St. Petersburg life interested them not at all because of their originality, originality, originality, but - on the contrary - by their typicality, repetition. Any participant in the events depicted by them can be placed on a certain list of persons with a similar social fate.
For example, the janitor Grigory from Dahl's essay is one of the many villagers who are forced to look for work in a big city to support a large family. He feels quite comfortable in the guise of a janitor, never forgets the purpose of his stay on the banks of the Neva, and regularly sends money to his relatives. In ten years, he may return to his village in order to start a small trading business with the several hundred rubles earned (by the standards of that time - a significant amount).
But another janitor, Ivan, most likely, will move into a coachman or small merchants. He has nothing to do in the village - he is too accustomed to life in the capital, albeit devoid of special joys. The words "possibly", "most likely" we singled out not by chance. The author of a physiological essay very often describes events that do not occur directly before our eyes, but which can occur under certain external circumstances due to social reasons.
It turns out a strange picture - it is not people who act in the essays, but generalizations, types of Petersburgers. Like, look, reader: with people of such and such social type sometimes this is what happens, and sometimes this is what happens. That is why individual episodes from the lives of the heroes of the Physiology of Petersburg may be completely unrelated to each other.
So, the janitor Grigory, on occasion, easily expresses himself in the jargon of street thieves. However, the corresponding episode is not developed (as one might expect) into a detective story about the connection of a particular janitor with the St. Petersburg "underworld". The author immediately moves on to another possible short story from the life of a janitor. Moreover, without any connection with the interrupted story about the relationship of Grigory with the St. Petersburg pickpockets.
Physiological essay and romanticism. Many of the distinguishing features of the physiological essay were clear evidence of the anti-romantic pathos of the 1840s era. And the point is not only who is depicted (ordinary people, devoid of romantic exclusivity), but also how exactly the characters are depicted. Characters essays are described only from the outside, we "do not see" their mental anguish, "do not hear" the doubts and complaints poured out in internal monologues.
The writers of the Nekrasov galaxy seem to be telling us: in a person there is not and cannot be not only nothing romantically mysterious, but in general nothing actually internal, individually unique, impenetrable to x-ray beam social analysis. Literally everything in the human character is motivated by external, material causes, everything can be deduced from social conditions. This means that any person can be judged with exhaustive completeness on the basis of a list of his “personal data”: social origin, education, place of residence, material wealth, occupation, social circle ...
Writers from the circle of Nekrasov - Panaev - Belinsky soon after the publication of the almanac "Physiology of St. Petersburg" began to rank as a natural school. That is, to writers of a realistic (or, in other words, naturalistic) direction. However, the first to use this phrase in print was not Belinsky, but the sworn enemy of the Nekrasov circle, Thaddeus Bulgarin. In one of the issues of the newspaper "Northern Bee" for January 1846, Bulgarin wrote that "Mr. Nekrasov belongs to a new, i.e. natural, literary school, which claims that it must depict nature without cover.
Needless to say, Bulgarin put an exclusively negative meaning into the word "natural". In his opinion, Nekrasov and his comrades are abusing the public's unhealthy interest in forbidden ("naturalistic") details and areas of life, savoring the "low" sides of life in the capital, thereby contributing to a general decline in morals. There would be no portrayal of worthy, prosperous citizens, in the sweat of their faces for the benefit of the tsar and the fatherland!
Strange, but true: Belinsky not only did not reject the natural school's accusatory formula, but accepted it and approved it. True, the meaning of the definition of "natural" in his understanding has become completely different. Belinsky interpreted “naturalness” as naturalness, naturalness (the word “nature” is the Russian analogue of the Latin “nature”). And he contrasted it with the pretentious artificiality, the exquisite artificiality of the literary works of the publisher of the Northern Bee itself. He defined it as a "rhetorical" school, that is, far from natural, artificial.
Meanwhile, in the mid-1840s, Bulgarin himself was not at all alien to sketchy descriptiveness; he published a considerable number of sketches from the life of ordinary, unromantic people. The titles of Bulgarin's essays also often indicate public and professional groups of townspeople, which are discussed in the corresponding text: "Salopnitsa", "Vorozheya", "Cornet", "Night-Light Driver". Moreover, his essays were published before the famous "Physiology of Petersburg".
Bulgarin fought fiercely against Belinsky precisely because there was so much in common between their literary programs. Both insisted that modern literature should have a practical orientation, directly influence the social order. Russian life. In addition, it must be democratic, accessible to the widest readership. Another thing is that Bulgarin straightforwardly preached public good intentions, created images of emphatically positive heroes. And Nekrasov called for the elimination of those social diseases that the authors of "Physiology of Petersburg" personified in the gallery of humiliated and offended residents of the Russian capital. Nevertheless, behind the struggle between the two leading trends in Petersburg literature, we need to distinguish between the confrontation not just of ideological enemies, but also of competitors who tried to occupy the same niche in the literary process of the era.
Fight for Gogol. Literary debuts in 1847. Each literary movement seeks to assert its high status. And for the sake of this, he is looking for an authoritative predecessor, a founding father. Only Gogol, the author of The Government Inspector and Dead Souls, could be such in the 1940s. A writer exceptionally popular among writers of the most diverse persuasions: Slavophiles and Westernizers, Muscovites and Petersburgers.
For Belinsky, Gogol is primarily a satirist, depicting the poverty and inferiority of Russian life (the poem "Dead Souls"), ridiculing the vices of persons and classes (the comedy "The Government Inspector"), paying special attention to the image of the "little man" (the famous story "The Overcoat"). From here it seems to be a direct road to a natural school, at least Belinsky is sure of this. And everything would have been so if ... not for the position of Gogol himself, who at the beginning of 1847 published an unusual, confessional book "Selected passages from correspondence with friends" (we talked about it in the first part of the textbook).
It is easy to guess how the leaders of the St. Petersburg literary parties reacted to the change in Gogol's views. Belinsky wrote an open “Letter to Gogol”, which went from hand to hand, in which he furiously denounced the writer for betraying past ideals, for defending religious values that supposedly had long since become obsolete. One way or another, after "Selected Places ..." it became completely impossible to talk about Gogol as the leader and forerunner of the natural school.
Well, Bulgarin, of course, triumphed! Immediately after the appearance of Gogol's new book in bookstores, he wrote in Severnaya Pchela: "Praisers and extols of him acted insincerely, exposing him as the first Russian writer, the founder of a new school." Now, according to Bulgarin, "the former praisers have departed from him ... they began to blame their idol", and this is "a true triumph for the Northern Bee!"
So, in 1847, the "theoretical" battle for Gogol was lost by the Nekrasov circle. However, in the end, the direction of Nekrasov - Belinsky turned out to be an incommensurably more fruitful phenomenon in the history of Russian literature. Following the "writers of the middle hand", who made up the majority among the authors of "Physiology of Petersburg", the future classics of Russian literature Dostoevsky, Turgenev, Goncharov, Herzen began to cooperate with the founders of the natural school. significant events we have to talk.
After the success of "Physiology of Petersburg" and the "Petersburg Collection" published in 1846 (in which, by the way, the unknown writer Fyodor Dostoevsky made his debut with the novel "Poor People"), Nekrasov and Panaev decided to publish a magazine. The fact is that the preparation and publication of almanacs and collections required exorbitant efforts and costs: each time it was necessary to obtain official permission for publication anew, to “prepare” the reader for its appearance long before. An almanac, a collection are inevitably one-time, one-time events, therefore it is difficult to take full advantage of their success with the reader - it is not possible to publish an endless continuation of the “Physiology of Petersburg”!
Another thing is its own "thick" magazine, published every month, which has an easily recognizable list of permanent headings ("Literature", "Science and Art", "Criticism and Bibliography", etc.)! At the end of 1846, Nekrasov and Panaev purchased a magazine that was destined to become the most popular literary periodical in the middle of the 19th century. However, the past of this magazine was very loud. Sovremennik - and we are talking about him - was founded ten years ago by Pushkin, who, before his death in early 1837, managed to publish only four issues (or, as they said then, books) of his favorite brainchild.
After the death of the poet, the magazine formally passed to his heirs, and was published by Pushkin's friend, poet, critic, professor of St. Petersburg University Pyotr Pletnev. Sovremennik under Pletnev did not have a resounding success: the circulation was constantly decreasing, losses were growing.
And suddenly - a breakthrough! The new publishers of Sovremennik, during the first year of the new magazine's existence alone, published so many sensational works on its pages that we can only wonder: Ivan Goncharov's "Ordinary History", essays from Ivan Turgenev's Notes of a Hunter, novels by Dostoevsky and Grigorovich, Nekrasov's poems, Panaev's feuilletons, Belinsky's articles... And if we also mention the first complete edition of Herzen's novel “Who is to blame? ”, which was published as a separate book as an appendix to Sovremennik, then it seems to be safe to say that all Russian classics were nurtured in the editorial circle of Sovremennik.
It's all right, it's not. Indeed, there is no way to take away the professional insight of the founders of the natural school. Among the multitude of both beginners and those who already had a high reputation in the capital's writers, Nekrasov and Panaev unmistakably chose those who, in their opinion, followed the path of a natural school - and their protégés almost inevitably found themselves on the crest of success and glory in the future. However, the natural school for the most part had nothing to do with it.
The forties of the 19th century usher in a new era in literature. The work of writers is increasingly focused on the ideological side of works and on deep inner mental work associated with the search for the foundations of a worldview that could satisfy the thirst for truth and lofty ideals.
This intellectual movement was prepared by many important events in the historical life of Russia. Its origin dates back to the reign of Catherine (Novikov, Radishchev), then consistently and steadily continues in the period of the twenties and thirties, capturing an increasing area of spiritual interests.
The works of Pushkin and Gogol introduced the beauties of poetry, hidden in the depths of folk life. Historical and ethnographic studies penetrated deeper and deeper into this life, about which until now there were only vague and fantastic ideas, borrowed from alien sources and from patriotic wartime reports.
On the other hand, Western European literature increasingly enriched the awakening thought with whole revelations and opened up broad horizons. These were the general causes that led to the flourishing of literature in the forties.
The character of this period of Russian literature was directly influenced by the ideological movement which, as has been pointed out, manifested itself in the mid-thirties in the Moscow circles of young idealists. Many of the largest luminaries of the forties owe their first development to them. In these circles, the main ideas were born that laid the foundation for entire areas of Russian thought, the struggle of which revived Russian journalism for decades. , a strong ideological ferment was manifested in literary circles: they either converged on many common points, then diverged to directly hostile relations, until, finally, two bright literary trends were determined: Western, Petersburg, with Belinsky and Herzen at the head, which put at the head corner of the basis of Western European development, as an expression of universal ideals, and Slavophile, Moscow, represented by the brothers Kireevsky, Aksakov and Khomyakov, who tried to find out special ways historical development, corresponding to a well-defined spiritual type of a well-known nation or race, in this case Slavic (see Slavophilism). In their passion for wrestling, passionate by temperament, adherents of both directions very often went to extremes, then denying all the bright and healthy sides national life in the name of exalting the brilliant mental culture of the West, then trampling on the results worked out by European thought, in the name of unconditional admiration for the insignificant, sometimes even insignificant, but on the other hand national features of their historical life.
Nevertheless, during the period of the forties, this did not prevent both directions from converging on some basic, general and binding provisions for both, which had the most beneficial effect on the growth of public self-consciousness. This common thing that connected both warring groups was idealism, the most disinterested service to the idea, devotion to the interests of the people in the broadest sense of the word, no matter how differently the paths to achieving possible ideals were understood.
Of all the figures of the forties, the general mood was best expressed by one of the most powerful minds of that era - Herzen, in whose works the depth of the analytical mind was harmoniously combined with the poetic softness of sublime idealism. Without venturing into the realm of fantastic constructions, which the Slavophiles often indulged in, Herzen, however, recognized many real democratic foundations in Russian life (for example, the community).
Herzen deeply believed in the further development of the Russian community and at the same time analyzed the dark sides of Western European culture, which were completely ignored by pure Westerners. Thus, in the forties, literature for the first time put forward clearly expressed directions of social thought. She aspires to become an influential social force. Both warring trends, both Westernizing and Slavophile, with equal categoricalness set the tasks of civil service for literature.
With the advent of Gogol's The Inspector General and especially Dead Souls, a turning point occurs in Belinsky's activity, and he firmly establishes himself on the basis of a worldview, the main provisions of which have since formed the basis of all subsequent real critical school. Evaluation of literary works from the point of view of their social significance and the demand for artistic truth - these are the main provisions of the young real school, equally recognized as obligatory by both Westerners and Slavophiles. These same general propositions have become guiding principles for the young artistic forces, which, to a large extent, spiritual development were obliged to literary circles and which were subsequently destined to occupy a prominent position in Russian literature.
But not only in the development of general theoretical propositions was the characteristic side of the forties, but also in that intimate, mental work, in that spiritual process that most the best people 40s and which was reflected in a bright thread on most of the works of art of that time. The main roles in this spiritual process were played by the awareness of the horrors of serfdom, which the previous generation did not even approximately have, and spiritual split: on the one hand, lofty dreams and ideals, perceived from the greatest creatures human genius, on the other hand, a complete consciousness of impotence in the struggle even with ordinary everyday failures, corrosive, debilitating reflection, Hamletism. This spiritual split is the key to understanding almost all the outstanding works of the period 1840-1860.
The consciousness of social ulcers led to deep sympathy for the people enslaved for centuries, to the rehabilitation of their human personality, and at the same time of all the "humiliated and insulted", and was embodied in best creatures dedicated to folk life: in the village stories of Grigorovich, "Notes of a Hunter" by Turgenev, in the first songs of Nekrasov, in "Poor People" and "Notes from the House of the Dead" by Dostoevsky, in the first stories of Tolstoy, in "little people" and in the "dark kingdom " Ostrovsky and, finally, in the "Provincial Essays" Shchedrin. And all the spiritual chaos of the penitent, full of good impulses, but suffering from lack of will, tormented by reflection, the hero of the forties found expression in the creation of the most witty and deeply analyzed types of that time, such as those of Turgenev: Rudin, Lavretsky, Hamlet of the Shchigrovsky district; Tolstoy: Nekhlyudov, Olenin; Goncharov: Aduev Jr., Oblomov; Nekrasov: "Knight for an hour", Agarin (in "Sasha") and many others. The artists of the 40s reproduced this type in such diverse forms, devoted so much attention to it, that its creation must be considered one of the most characteristic phenomena of this period. In their further development, many mental features of this type served for some major writers as the basis for a whole worldview.
So, Turgenev in the article "Don Quixote and Hamlet" undoubtedly had this type in mind, giving his psyche a universal significance. And in L. Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, it turns into the type of "repentant nobleman", becomes an expression, as it were, of nationwide repentance for all historical sins and is almost identified with their own worldview, giving them the opportunity, on the basis of this repentance, to approach the analysis of modern social evils and to a peculiar their illumination and understanding. Subsequently, the same type of "repentant nobleman" had a significant influence on the formation of the characteristic aspects of the trend known as populism, which sought in merging with the common people and serving them a means to clear their conscience by "paying the debt to the people", and in his spiritual warehouse and forms of his life who saw the elements to create the future ideal order of life.
The merits of the writers of the 40s include their humane attitude towards women, inspired by Pushkin's Tatyana and the novels of Georges Sand. It found its most poetic expression both in the brilliant pages of Belinsky's criticism, and in artistic creations first Herzen ("Who is to blame", "Forty thief"), and then in the heroines of Turgenev's stories, which caused whole line imitators in the 60s and created a whole school of women writers (
Journalism of the 40s of the XIX century. was marked by an important step forward, and this is due primarily to the active participation of Belinsky in it.
Belinsky was the first, based on the real situation of the 40s, to seriously advance the principles of journalism. He perfectly studied and appreciated the experience of Karamzin, Pushkin and Polevoy - the most prominent journalists of the first third of the 19th century.
In the context of the growing contradictions of the serf way of life, the intensification of peasant revolts against the landowners more sharply than under the Decembrists, the question arose of the ways of further progress, the ways of Russia's development, the development of a correct revolutionary theory.
Under these conditions, such ideological currents as “official nationality” (M.P. Pogodin, S.P. Shvyrev), “Slavophiles” (I.V. and P.V. Kireevsky, A.S. Khomyakov, K. S. Aksakov and others), “Westerners” (V.P. Botkin, T.N. Granovsky). In the ranks of the "Westerners" a group of revolutionary democrats (Belinsky, Herzen) very soon emerged.
"Domestic notes" Kraevsky
Each trend sought to publish its own printed organs for the sake of presenting program provisions. Supporters of the "official nationality" were conservative: they did not want to change anything in life, only to strengthen the present, i.e. autocracy and orthodoxy. The Slavophiles, criticizing the many shortcomings of Russian life, tried to look for the ideal of a social order in the distant past, presented in an idealized form, defending the originality of Russia. The "Westerners" saw a model of social order in the peaceful development of European bourgeois relations. And only revolutionary democrats, desiring the Europeanization of Russia, did not stop at the bourgeois legal order, they strove for socialism, for a just society without exploitation and private property. However, under the conditions of the 40s, when it was still necessary to prepare a broad public opinion in favor of the abolition of serfdom, enlightenment and progress, “Westernizers-liberals and revolutionary democrats could cooperate together in such publications as the magazine "Domestic Notes". The journal Otechestvennye Zapiski, published since 1818 as historical, far from the topic of the day, found a new life in 1838 under the editorship of A.A. Kraevsky.
The magazine's initial success was built on opposition to the "Library for Reading". All those who suffered from the arrogance of Senkovsky and his allies in the triumvirate united around the new journal and entered into a competitive struggle with the semi-official and sometimes vulgar journalism that stood in the way of progress.
The main strength of the popularity of Otechestvennye Zapiski is associated with the name of Belinsky, who moved from Moscow to St. Petersburg and from 1839 began to actively collaborate in the journal as a literary critic and publicist. Under him, Kraevsky's encyclopedic journal acquired a clear direction, which was carried out through all departments of the journal, but primarily through the department of criticism and bibliography. The absence in Russia of other forms of manifestation of social activity predetermined in the 19th century. such is the significance of literature, literary criticism and bibliography. Soon such outstanding Russian writers and journalists as N.A. Nekrasov, A.I. Herzen, I.I. Panaev, N.P. Ogarev. M.Yu. Lermontov, I.S. Turgenev and other writers.
Gradually, the magazine becomes the mouthpiece of the struggle against serfdom, routine, stagnation, and Asiaticism. An important role here was played by the defense of the Gogol trend in literature as a trend of critical realism. No less important was the critical attitude towards idealism in the field of philosophy. Herzen's articles on philosophical questions "Amateurism in Science", "Letters on the Study of Nature", published in the journal, were highly appreciated by contemporaries as a defense of an advanced, materialistic worldview. Belinsky and Herzen interpret philosophy as the algebra of revolution.
Belinsky acts as an active polemicist against all opponents of progress, as well as against apologists for bourgeois relations, a polemic with the Slavophiles begins. Monuments of this struggle are Belinsky's articles "Pedant", "Paris Secrets", "An Answer to the "Moskvityanin"," annual reviews of literature, etc. Belinsky turned "Notes of the Fatherland" into a political platform for the struggle against serfdom, preparing public consciousness for the inevitability of the abolition of serfdom. Analyzing the works of Lermontov, Pushkin, Gogol, he built his own system of values in Russian literature, gave a deep interpretation of their work.
Belinsky's articles were imbued with ardent love for the motherland. The critic-publicist defends human dignity in people, enlightenment, high morality; preaches advanced art and literature. The critic works especially well in the genre of reviews. His articles, according to contemporaries, were read with greed. There were cases when young people bought the right to be the first to read a magazine with Belinsky's materials. Otechestvennye Zapiski soon became the most popular magazine. In 1846 they had 4,000 subscribers. In the conditions of the crisis of the feudal system, the journalism of Belinsky and Herzen, Nekrasov's poems were an important factor in public life, the struggle for progress, socialism.
However, Kraevsky's political caution and exploitative inclinations forced Belinsky, Nekrasov, Herzen and others to leave the journal in 1846.
"Contemporary" Nekrasov
In 1846, Nekrasov and Panaev acquired from P.A. Pletnev, the Sovremennik magazine, founded by Pushkin. Belinsky becomes the ideological leader of the journal. 1847-1848 - a short, but the most remarkable period in the journalistic and socio-political activities of Belinsky. It can be understood only in the light of the famous "Letter to Gogol" - the only work of Belinsky, written without regard to censorship and known for a long time only in handwritten copies. In this work, the publicist spoke out in defense of the civil significance of literature, against the feudal lords and the autocratic form of government, against the dogmas of the Orthodox Church. He proclaimed the abolition of serfdom, the abolition of corporal punishment and the introduction of elementary legality as the most important, urgent tasks of his country. The implementation of these requirements would ensure the progress of Russia. Belinsky evaluates the state of literature and journalism from these positions, and conducts polemics with everyone who hinders the country's social and social progress. His reviews of Russian literature for 1846 and 1847, articles on Gogol's last works ("Selected passages from correspondence with friends") became the manifesto of the progressive movement in Russia, although many writers did not agree with Belinsky's assessment of Gogol's "Selected passages from correspondence with friends". , seeing in this book the important religious and moral quest of the Russian writer.
After Belinsky left Otechestvennye Zapiski, Kraevsky's journal took a moderately liberal stance.
"Moskvityanin"
The emerging Slavophile journals also took a moderate position. They were published mainly in Moscow - "Moscow Observer", "Moskvityanin" and others. The largest of them "Moskvityanin" in the 40s he had a department of "Spiritual Eloquence", defended the national identity of Russia, published Serbian, Bulgarian, Czech authors. The leading role in it was played by the Aksakov brothers, Khomyakov, I. Kireevsky and others. Slavophiles tried to challenge Belinsky's views on Gogol's Dead Souls, his ideas about progress.
In the 1950s, the playwright N.A. Ostrovsky, original critic Ap.A. Grigoriev. An objective assessment of the merchants, the high moral qualities of the merchants, their wives and daughters, significantly complemented the usual negative picture of the life of this class.
Ap. Grigoriev (who later worked in the Dostoevsky brothers' magazines "Time" and "Epoch"), as a critic, did not join either Belinsky's camp or supporters of the aristocratic, aesthetic trend, believing that literature, art reflect life, convey the color and smell of the era, and criticism looking for a connection with reality in works of art. However, he did not consider progress to be an ideal, but patriarchal originality, the moral purity of heroes. Grigoriev was a penetrating interpreter of Ostrovsky's plays and the female images of Russian literature.
Later Slavophiles published several newspapers: "Rumor"(1857), "Sail" (1859), etc. Unfortunately, they were quickly closed by the government for opposing the life of the common people and gentlemen (K. Aksakov's article "The experience of synonyms: The public is the people" in the newspaper "Molva"), for the demand by the Slavophiles freedom of speech, publicity.
Review questions
1. What made Otechestvennye Zapiski the best magazine of the 1840s?
2. In what articles does VG Belinsky defend progress and Gogol's trend in literature?
3. By what means in Sovremennik N.A. Nekrasov, was the preparation of public consciousness for the abolition of serfdom?
4. Remember which magazines were marked by the participation of Slavophiles in the 1840s-1850s?
5. What was the controversy between the Slavophiles and V.G. Belinsky around "Dead Souls" by N.V. Gogol?
Chapter 8
JOURNALISM 1840s
§ 1. Ideological searches of the “epoch of consciousness”
Forties of the 19th century - one of the most interesting periods in the history of national journalism. This decade, outwardly not marked by any outstanding events, was a time of intense theoretical research, one of the key stages in the development of Russian social thought. The passionate devotion of the advanced Russian intelligentsia to the world of ideas and ideals, the selflessness of ideological quests created a special halo around this period and gave it special significance.
V. G. Belinsky called the 1840s "the era of consciousness." The specificity of the ideological life of these years was determined, first of all, by the process of decomposition of feudal-serf relations, the crisis state of the state system. This crisis manifested itself both in the economic and political life of society. There is an increase in the number of peasant uprisings against the landowners and, at the same time, an increase in political pressure from the autocratic state. The crisis of the feudal system in the forties became more and more evident in connection with the growth of capitalist relations within the feudal state. At this time, there is a rapid industrial development of the country, a revival of trade, an increase in the class of small producers. If in the area economic crisis had just begun to manifest itself, it showed itself most distinctly in the realm of ideological life.
In the forties of the XIX century. the activation of social thought led to the search for the most effective means of influencing the consciousness of contemporaries. Journalism has become such a medium. "Journals-
everything is from a geek in our time, ”Belinsky wrote during these years. "The magazine is everything, and ... nowhere in the world does it have such great and important significance as ours." At the same time, the position of the press was determined by the policy of the autocracy in relation to the mass media. According to the censorship charter of 1828, Russian journalism was deprived of the right not only to criticize, but also to discuss any actions of the government and persons in public service, even those at the lowest rungs of the class and bureaucratic ladder. To strengthen control over periodicals, the government used Section III. As part of the imperial office, it stood not only outside the general system of government institutions, but also, to a certain extent, much higher than them. In 1841-1842. in the III Division, in addition to the four existing ones, a fifth, censorship, expedition was organized. She was entrusted with the "supreme supervision" of periodicals. The expedition received an obligatory copy of all publications published in Russia, the officials of the 111th Department were members of each censorship committee, the number of which increased to twelve. Oversight of the press was officially included in the terms of reference of the political police. The control of the press has become widespread.
In one of the memorandums in the III Department of F. Bulgarin, a loyal publisher of the "Northern Bee", contains a gay curious evidence of the vise in which journalism of that time was. Bulgarin wrote: “For example, if I discovered that the baker was drunk and insulted a passing woman, I would gain enemies: 1) the Minister of the Interior. 2) Military governor-general. 3) Chief of Police. 4) Police chiefs. 5) Private bailiff. 6) Quarter warden. 7) City non-commissioned officer. Even Bulgarin, who can hardly be suspected of freethinking, expressed dissatisfaction with such a system of multi-stage control over the press.
“The system of hiding the truth,” as Bulgarin called the police-bureaucratic machine that controlled public opinion in autocratic Russia, was functioning properly. Realizing the growing influence of the press on the mindset in society, the government in these years continues to expand its spheres of influence in this area. One of them is the strengthening of the provincial press. Since 1838, in 41 provinces of Russia, "Gubernskiye Vedomosti" began to appear, which were of an official nature. Their content was strictly regulated. "Provincial Gazette" consisted of two parts - official and unofficial. The official printed orders and orders of the provincial governments, permitted by the government
information about state affairs - as a rule, a reprint from St. Petersburg newspapers, most often from the Northern Bee. In 1846, a circular was created regulating the content of the unofficial part of Vedomosti. Here, “based on the definition of the provincial government, the following news could be placed: 1) about emergencies in the province, 2) about market reference prices for various needs, 3) about the state of both state-owned and private significant factories and plants, 4) on invention and company formation privileges granted, 5) on ways to improve Agriculture and home economics, etc. The 22 paragraphs scrupulously list the topics that were allowed to cover provincial journalists. With such a system of government and gendarmerie control, the provincial statements of those years were, as a rule, mouthpieces of information of a government nature. In a secret circular order dated March 19, 1846, the chief of the gendarmes charged his subordinates with the obligation to have “unremitting monitoring of the provincial statements published in the provinces, reading them with attention, and to gain time to report directly to His Excellency the chief of the gendarme corps.” The very fact of encouraging publications in the provinces and close control over them testified that the tsarist government was aware of the importance of the press as a means of political influence on society. Proceeding from this, everything was done to slow down the development of private publishing activity and, conversely, to give scope to official publications. Departmental special editions were encouraged, mainly intended for a relatively narrow circle of readers, such as the Nouvellist, Musical Light, and also all kinds of Zapiski of various societies. In total, 53 publications were opened during the period from 1839 to 1848. Among them are 11 magazines, only 4 of which were of a literary and public nature: “Domestic Notes”, “Mayak”, “Moskvityanin”, “Finnish Vestnik”. The bulk of the publications, along with the "Provincial Gazette" were magazines, almanacs, collections. There were much fewer newspapers, and they, as a rule, were of a specialized nature. Only a few of them can be typologically attributed to literary public publications.
The government treated such publications with particular suspicion: it was they who enjoyed the greatest success with the reader. In the early 1840s, an attempt was made to paralyze the "harmful" influence of Otechestvennye Zapiski by creating two new social literary journals, Mayak (1840) and Moskvityanin (1841).
They were headed by S. A. Burachek and M. P. Pogodin - writers, whose way of thinking was in full accordance with the official ideology. The government had high hopes that they would be able to resist liberal and democratic ideas. But that did not happen. The journals were published at a low professional level, did not take into account the needs of readers, and were not topical. The circulation of these publications was small, and the public impact could not be compared with the journalism of the "Notes of the Fatherland". "Mayak" and "Moskvityanin" preached official patriotism, and often militant obscurantism.
At a difficult historical crossroads, after the suppression of the Decembrists, in front of the “frightened in thought”, according to N.P. Ogarev, the country faced the problem of understanding the ways of further development, the place of Russia among other peoples and states. Revolutionary events in Europe became the catalyst for this process. In the bizarre interweaving of theories, doctrines, political schemes in Russian society in the forties, the main ideological currents were determined - feudal, liberal and democratic. The concepts of official nationality, Westernism and Slavophilism, as well as the ideology of Russian democracy, are being formulated.
The basis of government ideology was the so-called theory of official nationality. Its main postulates were formulated back in the 1830s by the Minister of Public Education S. Uvarov. The very fact of the appearance of this theory and the support that the government gave it were logical. After the defeat of the Decembrist uprising, in connection with the strengthening of the liberation movement in Europe, the revolutionary events of the thirties in France, which shook the foundations of the Holy Alliance, the Russian government acutely felt the need for such an ideological system that could withstand both the fermentation of minds within the country and the influence social movement The West, and in particular France, where the word “revolution” hated by monarchs again flashed into the civil lexicon.
The establishment of a single ideological regime in the country was seen as a reliable means against the influence of the revolutionary ideas of the "West." Uvarov called Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality "truly Russian protective principles", which, as he wrote, were "the last anchor of our salvation and the surest guarantee of the strength and greatness of our fatherland ". The monarchical form of government, according to the concept, was declared the only one corresponding to the spirit of the Russian people, and serfdom - a natural state
loyal subjects; religion was called upon to sanctify these principles. "The task of theory is to subdue" stormy impulses towards the foreign, towards the unknown, towards the abstract in the vague realm of politics and philosophy, "to multiply, wherever possible, the number of mental dams."
At the other pole of public life in the forties, an opposite official ideology of Russian democracy was formed, which was distinguished by deep intolerance towards the feudal system, which hindered the development of the country, and the desire for a social reorganization of society. In the "great confrontation" of these ideologies, the ideological crisis of the feudal system was clearly revealed.
In the 1840s, liberal trends of Westernism and Slavophilism took shape. Despite the well-known conventionality of these terms, they quite accurately reflect the content and internal orientation of the ideological programs created by representatives of these trends. It should be noted that until the 1940s, Russian public thought, which was in opposition to the government, essentially did not know division, was to a certain extent homogeneous, despite the many shades within it.
Born by the crisis of the feudal system, the intensive search for ways to change the social system in the forties went in two directions. One section of Russian thinkers, the so-called Westerners, focused their main attention on the study of the historical experience of the West, the state structure of countries that are more developed economically and politically. The Russians were especially interested in France, which had experienced major revolutionary upheavals. The "Europeanization" of Russia, advocated by the Westerners, meant, first of all, the desire to include the country in a single process of world historical development.
Westerners were critical of serfdom, but the revolutionary nature of the transformations was alien to them. It is no coincidence that the final ideological demarcation in this camp occurred in the second half of the forties, when a revolutionary movement began in Europe. On the eve of the revolution, differences were clearly revealed between the liberal part of Westernism and its radical wing, headed by Belinsky and Herzen. Both Ge and others were focused on studying the historical experience of Europe. But the liberal part of Westernism was more interested in the problems of the state, cultural, economic development of Europe, which had embarked on the path of capitalist development. The ideologists of revolutionary democracy closely studied the social experience of Europe and, most carefully, the experience of the revolution.
Arising on the same axis of social tension as the Western
nichestvo, Slavophile trend in search of an ideal social order turned to the study of history, political system and spiritual life of pre-Petrine Russia. The Slavophiles put forward the thesis about the original path of the historical development of Russia. This originality, in their opinion, was given to it by the fact that Russia, which adopted Christianity from Byzantium, did not know conquests and therefore formed its own way of social life, inherent only to it, based on the Christian community. The Slavophiles, who focused their attention on the religious foundations of Russian life, were alien to the idea of the inevitability of revolutions and social upheavals. They rejected serfdom as a form of violence against a person, contrary to the spirit of Christian brotherhood. The criticism of serfdom by the Slavophils was sympathetically perceived by Belinsky and Herzen, but at the same time they subjected the theory of the Slavophils to sharp criticism for historical limitations and religious mysticism.
I [presence of three political forces in society, three ideological camps were reflected in the press. The following directions are determined in the publications of this time. First of all, these are numerous publications of the official direction, reflecting the ideological principles of the feudal state: magazines of ministries (Ministry of Internal Affairs, public education, state property), provincial journals, Severnaya pchela, government bulletins and the bulk of specialized publications. In addition, the press of this period reflected the processes associated with the development of bourgeois relations and realized in the ideology of liberalism, which united political forces opposed to the tsarist autocracy - Westerners and Slavophiles. The ideology of revolutionary democracy was formed on the left flank of this trend.
The process of political differentiation of society in the forties was most directly reflected in the press. As Belinsky wrote, “journal opinions divide the public into literary coterie.” The reader's attention to one or another press organ was determined primarily by its direction, and this direction, in turn, was determined by that. what ideological positions the publication preached.
However, it is impossible to imagine the matter as if there were press organs that "sterilely" clearly adhered to one or another ideological orientation. In terms of political qualities, the press of the forties was an extremely complex, colorful and contradictory phenomenon. Almost every publication experienced ideological fluctuations over the course of a decade. This happened, for example, with the Moskvityanin magazine. Created as an organ of the official idea
ology, in 1845 it passed into the hands of the Slavophiles and, under the editorship of P. V. Kireevsky, changed direction. This period did not last long, only three months. Then the magazine returned to its original positions of the official nationality. In 1843 there were changes in the direction of the official newspapers Moskovskie Vedomosti and Russky Invalid. Despite the fact that these newspapers were controlled by government agencies - Moscow University and the Ministry of War, respectively, they were rented by private individuals. E. F. Korsh became the editor of the unofficial part in Moskovskie Vedomosti, and A. A. Kraevsky became the editor of the Russian Invalid. Since that time, their content has been formed under the strong influence of the democratic journal Otechestvennye Zapiski. The same thing happened with the "Sankt-Peterburgskiye Vedomosti" in 1847, when A. N. Ochkin headed the newspaper.
The newspaper world of this period was not very diverse. The Russian reader still had a bad perception of the difference between a newspaper and a magazine. Defined since the 18th century. type of official newspaper like. for example, "Sankt-Peterburgskiye Vedomosti", was still firmly on its feet. A detachment of the official and semi-official press was represented by provincial journals and the semi-official "Northern Bee". Nevertheless, in the 1940s, some changes were observed both in the content model of newspapers and in the expansion of the typology of publications.
The type of “literary newspaper” that arose back in the early 1930s with the participation of A.S. Pushkin was finally approved in the 1940s. Literaturnaya Gazeta of that period became one of the leaders in the newspaper market and shared the democratic positions of Otechestvennye Zapiski.
Her creative biography consists of several periods, the most interesting of which were 1841-1845. At this time, I. A. Nekrasov actively collaborated in the newspaper, and in 1844-1845. - V. G. Belinsky, other authors of the Notes of the Fatherland were published. The social and literary position of the newspaper was clearly manifested in the controversy with the "Northern Bee" and other pro-government publications. The democratic press considered Bulgarin's publications as a means of disorienting the reader and constantly exposed their methods of influencing subscribers.
Approval of the principles of critical realism in literature, defense of the achievements of the "natural school" with its close attention to the tragedy of the individual in the conditions of an autocratic state, education of a thinking person who is critical of reality
reader - this is an incomplete list of issues raised by the newspaper.
The intensification of the controversy in Literaturnaya Gazeta with Bulgarin coincided with the campaign against the head of "reptilian" literature, which in 1842 and 1843. Belinsky was especially active in Otechestvennye Zapiski. In almost every article in the series "Literary and Journal Notes" he did not miss the opportunity to respond to the malicious attacks of the publisher of "Northern Bee" or comment on his opinion.
It was important for the progressive press to neutralize Bulgarin also because Gogol and Lermontov, i.e., writers whose work Belinsky associated with the development of a new method of literature - critical realism, were constantly criticized on the pages of his publications. The interpretation of Gogol's works is one of the main polemics of the forties. "Literaturnaya Gazeta" was in full solidarity with the position of "Notes of the Fatherland". It is characteristic that the main speeches of the newspaper about Gogol's work coincided in time with Belinsky's reviews in Otechestvennye Zapiski.
When Gogol's collected works were published at the end of 1842, Literaturnaya Gazeta hastened to immediately inform its readers about this. Commenting on this event, she called "wonderful" Gogol's story "The Overcoat" and the play "Marriage" for the first time published there. In the article, in a parodic form, all possible opinions of critics about Gogol's work were stated. And although not a single name was mentioned here, it was clear that the newspaper was fighting against the same targets as Belinsky: “In Moscow, they will begin to prove,” the reviewer ironically, “that Gogol is Aristophanes and Terence of the present century; others will refute this and show only that before and after Gogol there was not and will not be Russian literature; still others will find fault with typos and incorrect turns of language. “Finally, the fourth,” the author wrote, bearing in mind, of course, Bulgarin’s point of view, “will begin to prove that Gogol is a completely mediocre person, whom his friends glorify for dropping other satirical writers. Well, it will be a pure satire on Russian literature: where do we have these satirical writers who can be dropped and who could at least something to measure against Gogol.
For the purpose of controversy, Literaturnaya Gazeta used every hint. So, about Bulgarin, she caustically remarked: "He mixes the format with the size of the paper, and this is the same difference as in the works of Gogol and Bulgarin." The polemical meaning of this comparison will become clear if we keep in mind that Bulgarin repeatedly declared Gogol's lack of talent and argued that he could not be compared
even with such writers as Odoevsky and Sollogub, "who are taller than Mr. Gogol, like Chimboraso is taller than Pulkovo Mountain."
Along with the defense of Gogol against his false interpreters, the newspaper drew attention to the work of Lermontov. A review of Lermontov's "Poems" stated that the development of his talent "promised a lot of brilliant and imaginative". "Literaturnaya Gazeta" was one of the few Russian publications that reported the death of the poet. A message about this appeared in the 89th issue for 1841 under the heading "Literary and theatrical news". Apparently, for censorship reasons, the newspaper could not devote more space and attention to the death of the disgraced poet.
The performances of Literaturnaya Gazeta on issues of theatrical art are also of great interest. Let us name the main directions in which theatrical criticism developed on the pages of the newspaper. This is, firstly, a deep dissatisfaction with the theater repertoire, the desire to influence the formation of the aesthetic tastes of the viewer, to educate him in a critical attitude towards the entertainment theater that dominated then. Secondly, serious reflections on the specifics and purpose of dramatic genres, on the role of theatrical critic. Thirdly, the fight against the pseudo-patriotic works of the memorized Russian playwrights G. Obodovsky and N. Polevoy, the exposure of their anti-artistic essence.
In 1844 and 1845 in the newspaper, as already noted, Belinsky and Nekrasov collaborated most intensively. In the field of literary theory, Belinsky’s article “A Look at the Main Phenomena of Russian Literature in 1843”, published in the 1st and 2nd issues for 1844, and “On Parties in Literature” - in the 17th issue for 1845
Of great interest in Literaturnaya Gazeta was the Notes for Hosts section. It was led by A. I. Zablotsky-Desyatovsky, a well-known Russian economist, author of the famous article “On the Causes of Fluctuations in Bread Prices in Russia”, which was published in 1847 in Otechestvennye Zapiski and received an approving review from Belinsky. In 1845, in the 8th issue of the Literaturnaya Gazeta, an article signed by Nikifor Rabotyagin appeared under the title “On the current state of bread prices in different places Russia”, apparently written by Zablotsky, which can be considered a kind of preparation for a large journal article. The general democratic position of the newspaper was reflected even in such an insignificant, at first glance, subsection as "Kitchen". It was led by V. F. Odoevsky, who in the feuilleton
In some form, he ridiculed those whose "gastric functions are the main and only ones in life."
In 1845, a material appeared with the heading "Letters to Dr. Puf". In the first letter, the author, who called himself the dock of mountains Knuf, asked such questions, for example: “Tell me, why are there many, many people who have nothing to eat? What will your rich science give to the poor man who has chaff for his food? Teach me how to make consommé, salami, pudding or roast beef from chaff and water?” “... Do not forget,” the author warned, “that this is a very important subject. The poor, I think... make up the majority everywhere.” Allusions of this kind took on a social dimension, and the "Kitchen" section was just a kind of screen behind which topical thoughts were hidden.
In 1845, six weeks after the publication of F. Engels' book The Condition of the Working Class in England, the first Russian review of it appeared in the Literary Gazette, which indicated the publication's obvious interest in acute social problems.
The Moskovskiye Vedomosti newspaper changed direction from 1843, when E.F. Korsh became the editor. E. Korsh was friendly with Herzen, Granovsky, Ogarev and shared their views. Moskovskiye Vedomosti showed great interest in the study of social problems.
In particular, a lot of materials devoted to economic issues are published here. The issues of freedom of trade, tariff systems, scientific literature on economics were especially actively discussed. Moskovskiye Vedomosti became the initiator of controversy on these issues. At the same time, economic problems were considered together with social ones.
For example, the article “On the Future of Money”, published in 1846, can serve as a characteristic evidence. “Whoever has money,” it said, “he enjoys everything: honor, distinction, pleasure and peace. The rich man everywhere plays the main role, sets the tone, manages, orders. The poor means almost nothing or is only a thing that others use, deriving their own benefits from it. The article directly expressed the hope that such an order would be eliminated: "It is not possible to admit that the dominion of money and the perverse life resulting from it have before them an endless future."
The newspaper E. Korsh published sharp materials of an anti-serfdom nature, for example, "The Liberation of Negroes in the French Colonies." In an allegorical form, the article sounded demanding
the liberation of Russian peasants from serfdom, their position was directly compared with the slavery of Negroes.
This 1844 article attracted the attention of the censors, especially the following passage: “Slavery is against the laws of morality; it corrupts both master and slave; the former by giving him irresponsible, ceaselessly oppressive power over his slaves... the latter by likening him to cattle, replacing all rational activity with fear of the whip and blind obedience.” The chief of the gendarmes A. Orlov rightly found in it "a more extensive meaning and not related to only Negroes." The newspaper was warned, but despite this, in 1846, in the article “Slavery in the French Colonies”, these same thoughts were sharpened to the limit: “Slavery, which corrupts the masters and destroys the slaves, cannot be ennobled, but must be exterminated as as soon as possible."
In 1847, for the first time, an attempt was made to create a city newspaper. It was the Moscow City List. The newspaper lasted only one year. It came out 2 times a week and, judging by the content, intended to become a competitor to the leading newspaper of the country - Bulgarin's Northern Bee. The editor of the newspaper, V. Drashusov, made efforts to establish permanent information about the life of Moscow. In January 1847, the "Department of City Rumors" appeared, which soon gave way to others: "Trade Movement", "Spectacles and Amusements", "Announcements", "Moscow". But the newspaper failed to establish an information service.
The editors could not decide on the direction. The composition of the editorial staff was extremely varied. S. Shevyrev, M. Zagoskin, D. Veltman, writers and publicists of the official direction, published here, at the same time A. D. Galakhov, a regular author of Otechestvennye Zapiski, collaborated. The newspaper published an essay by A. I. Herzen "Station Edrovo". "physiological essays" by E. Grebenka, a writer of the "natural school", were published.
The inconsistency of the position of the Moscow City List can be illustrated by the following example. Starting from the 3rd issue, lectures by Professor of Moscow University S. Shevyrev "A General View of the History of Art and Poetry in Particular" were printed in it. In them, a lot of space was devoted to the fiction of the West. Western literature, according to the author, has become obsolete: "The mental personality of the West has ended its period."