Herman Naumovich Fein
Leo Tolstoy's novel "WAR and PEACE"
HOLISTIC ANALYSIS
From the teacher's work experience
Publishing house "Prosveshchenie" Moscow 1966
The electronic publication of the book was prepared in the summer of 2009 by students of the 10th grade of the Moscow Gymnasium in the Southwest No. 1543
By Alexandra Kostrikina, Maria Krasnoselskaya, Mikhail Solodov, Ivan Pavlov and Alexander Alergant.
The publication of the book on the Internet was authorized on August 6, 2009 by the author, G. N. Fein (Andreev).
If you notice any typos, please inform Vitaly Arnold by e mail vitar(at)1543.ru
TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface 3 A HOLISTIC ANALYSIS OF THE NOVEL Volume one 15
Part one 15
Part two 25
Part three 37 Volume Two 53
Part one 53
Part two 63
Part three 75
Part four 92
Part five 98 Volume three 111
Part one 132
Part two 151
Part three 189 Volume four 213
Part one 213
Part two 227
Part three 236
Part Four 249 Epilogue 263 Conclusion 373
Preface
The book offered to the literature teacher is a reflection of the experience of a holistic analysis of the novel "War and Peace" in high school.
Everything that is described here has been implemented in practice in a number of schools1
The author, speaking at seminars at the Moscow City Institute for Teacher Improvement, revealed the main techniques of a holistic analysis of" War and Peace " (as he imagines it).
Many teachers took advantage of these recommendations and subsequently responded to the high efficiency of those methods of work, which are described in the proposed book.
Therefore, we can already talk about a successful collective experiment.
A few words about the content of the book.
The author does not set out to show all the stages of work on the topic "Leo Tolstoy".
The study of the great epic, students move after consideration of issues such as the identity of Tolstoy, his ideas, the creative way (which is an organic part of the theme "the history of the novel "War and peace" 2).
It is hardly possible in less than five lessons to meet these three challenges, because without an understanding of the distinctive personality of the artist and thinker impossible deep insight into the complex structure of "War and peace".
When considering these problems, it is important to convey to the students Lenin's idea of Tolstoy's work as "a step forward in the artistic development of mankind".
Of course, young people who have already read Tolstoy's works intuitively felt that Tolstoy is, to use Lenin's words again, a "lump", "a seasoned human being".
It is the task of the teacher to make their intuitive feeling conscious, to help them penetrate into the depth of one of the greatest creations of the artistic thought of mankind.
The author of the proposed book is a supporter of the so called holistic analysis of a work of art in school.
We find examples of a holistic analysis in Russian classical criticism, and above all in the works of Belinsky (for example, in the article "The Hero of our Time").
In this kind of analysis, individual problems are not highlighted (the idea of the work, its artistic originality, the characters of the characters, etc.),— the work is considered following the author's thought, from page to page, from chapter to chapter.
Adhering to this method, we do not precede the study of "War and Peace" with any messages about the ideas of the novel or about the originality of its artistic form: students themselves must come to conclusions that the teacher pushes them with their questions.
The direction and methodology of the conversation with students about "War and Peace" constitute the content of the proposed book.
The book contains questions that were asked to schoolchildren, and the answers to these questions.
As the reader will notice, these questions are of varying degrees of difficulty.
Some of them must be answered by every student who has read the novel; others are only whiter students; others, perhaps, no student will answer, and then the decisive word belongs to the teacher.
Sometimes the teacher's answer to the question posed by him can and should grow into a small lecture.
Answers to questions that require reproducing the text of the novel are often given in the book in the form of quotations, as an ideal, but, of course, not a mandatory form of answer: students can answer more or less close to the text; however, the accuracy of the answer affects the assessment.
The book contains questions of both analytical and synthetic nature.
And if, when answering analytical questions, the first violin belongs to the student (although in some cases the teacher's speech is also necessary), then the teacher usually gives answers to synthetic questions.
When giving answers to these questions in the book, the author does not indicate which of them are answered by the teacher and which by the student: it depends on the composition of the class, on the degree of literary training of students.
The book is intended for teachers, and therefore not everything that is said in it should be directly used in the classroom.
For example, before analyzing the third volume, a review of the critical literature on "War and Peace"is given3.
The review is addressed, of course, to the teacher, although the teacher can also inform the class about certain considerations put forward in the critical literature on "War and Peace".
In general, the book should not be considered dogmatically.
Not to mention the fact that the author does not consider his proposed method of work to be the only possible one and does not reject the method of problem thematic analysis that has been in use for many years at school, he believes that it is absolutely not necessary to put exactly the questions that are given in the book, and to achieve exactly the answers that the author received in his classes (the moment of improvisation is absolutely necessary in class conversations).
The book reveals the work experience.
I would like this experience to interest the teacher, to encourage him to search for new methods of work.
The author not only offers certain questions and answers, but also recommends excerpts from the novel for reading in the classroom.
And again, the teacher, of course, can select other passages for reading or reciting in the classroom.
In order for the work on the text of the novel to take place rhythmically, students must read the chapters of the novel planned by the teacher by a certain date.
To do this, you need to give a schedule of the conversation in advance, even while working on the previous topic.
It is desirable that during the conversation the books of the student were closed.
Only in some cases, the teacher can offer to find a particular place of the novel.
It's not bad if all students get a grade for working on each volume of the novel.
The assessment is determined not only by the knowledge of the text, but also by the ability to give a correct and deep answer to the question posed.
During the conversation, it is important not to forget about the development of speech and logical thinking of students.
The author deliberately did not distribute the material of the book among the lessons, thereby giving each teacher the opportunity to plan the material in accordance with the specific conditions of his work.
The difficulties of a holistic analysis of "War and Peace" are, in particular, that students cannot read the novel at once and work on each volume is conducted somewhat in isolation, in isolation from subsequent volumes.
But Tolstoy's thought developed in a complex dialectical unity of the whole and the particular.
Just as in nature chance is a form of the manifestation of necessity, so in a work of art the particular is a form of the manifestation of the general.
The proposed system of work helps to avoid mistakes that are so common in our teaching of literature.
One of these mistakes is a naively realistic approach to a work of art.
The artist's creation is often presented in the classroom only as a more or less true mirror of life, moreover, understood by students quite primitively (which is inevitable at their age).
The writer has only the right to "reflect" or" display " reality.
They forget Mayakovsky's words that "literature is not a mirror (to be more precise: not only a mirror. — G. F.), reflecting the historical struggle, but a weapon of this struggle"4.
It is forgotten that Tolstoy did not "display" anything literally in "War and Peace" either ("I describe the events and feelings of people who never existed," - letter to A. A. Tolstoy, January 18, 1865 5; "Andrei Bolkonsky is nobody, like any person of a novelist..." - letter to L. I. Volkonskaya, May 3, 1865 6).
Of course, the artist reflects reality (it is not by chance that Lenin called Tolstoy "the mirror of the Russian revolution"), but he reflects it in a peculiar way, in accordance with the peculiarities of his social and artistic vision of the world.
And we call all the writers included in the program great, and sometimes we depict them in the form of theatrical costumers who dressed up ideas (content) in costumes in the style of the era (form).
The textbooks of literature to this day first understand "images", and then- "artistic features".
This division itself is a blatant violation of the doctrine of the unity of form and content.
"The form is essential.
The essence is formed, " 7 wrote V. I. Lenin.
In a holistic analysis of a work of art, the problems posed in it, its ideas are considered in an indissoluble unity with the artistic ways of expressing these problems and ideas.
Any idea (political, ethical, philosophical) becomes the idea of an artistic work only when it is understood poetically.
"Art," wrote Belinsky, " does not allow abstract philosophical, and even more so rational ideas.
It admits only poetic ideas; and a poetic idea is not a syllogism, not a dogma, not a rule— it is a living passion, it is pathos"8.
V. B. Shklovsky is right when he writes: "The connections, the interrelation of events are the basis of the artistic image"9.
To catch these connections, to understand this relationship, to penetrate into the originality of artistic thinking the writer's research, which is expressed precisely in the originality of these connections— is what is important for the reader, we must teach this in school.
It is time to finally agree that the writer is not an indifferent "chronicler" who only conveys the facts of reality in an artistic form, but an original, unique person who knows how to see the world in his own way and convey this vision to the reader in a figurative form.
Drawing the characters of the characters, the writer first of all strives to convince people with something, to make his understanding of life their property.
Reading the work, we get acquainted not only with Tatiana, Pechorin.
Bazarov, Bezukhon, but also with Pushkin, Lermontov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, with their understanding of people and life.
Tolstoy said: "After all, a writer is dear and necessary to us only to the extent that he reveals to us the inner work of his soul, it goes without saying, if this work is new, and not done before.
Whatever he writes... we are dear to the writer's work... this is the inner work of his soul."
With a holistic study of "War and Peace", we get the opportunity to follow this inner work of the soul of the creator of the novel.
"War and Peace" is a multifaceted work.
The most complex collisions, the most subtle associations, the coherence of all the elements of the narrative, descriptions and arguments all this makes it necessary to determine a single point of view, a single aspect, starting from which the teacher will analyze "War and Peace"with students in all lessons.
It is necessary to understand what conclusions the artist wanted to bring readers to, what he wanted to understand for himself and for people.
In the research, we can find many concepts of the main artistic idea of the novel.
Here is the opinion of V. B. Shklovsky: "The author is interested in the question of the degree of human freedom, the importance of national consciousness and the place of man in the general flow of history.
Natasha, Pierre, Anatole, Dolokhov, Timokhin pass through the novel not only as the heroes of the novel, but also as examples on which the essence of the historical process is learned"9*.
S. P. Bychkov writes: "The pathos of" War and Peace "is in the affirmation of the great love of life and the great love of the Russian people for the motherland" 10.
V. V. Ermilov analyzes "War and Peace" in the light of his thesis: the pathos of Tolstoy's work is "the affirmation of communication and unity of people and the denial of separation and separation"11.
The same idea was previously expressed by A.V. Lunacharsky, speaking about the artistic pathos of the novel: "The truth lies in the brotherhood of people, people should not fight with each other...
And all the actors [of the novel] show how a person approaches or departs from this truth..."
12
In such a serious publication as the academic "History of Russian Literature", the line between the concept of pathos and the concept of mood, emotional coloring is blurred.
The author of the article about Tolstoy writes :" If critical pathos prevails in the first volume, then poetic pathos prevails in the second...
We can say that the heroic pathos prevails in the third and fourth volumes of the novel"13.
And yet, despite all the nuances, and sometimes even fundamental differences, there is something in common in these concepts.
This general thing is essentially reduced to the diary entry of S. A. Tolstoy, to which Lev Nikolaevich said: "In order for a work to be good, you must love the main, basic idea in it.
So... in War and Peace, I loved the people's thought. "
14
This thought, this pathos brings together, cements two worlds that, according to Tolstoy, are in different spatial planes: the microcosm (the psyche of the heroes, their life, their ideological searches) and the macrocosm (the movements of peoples, collisions between them, the participation of so called great personalities in the historical process).
Tolstoy thinks of the people as something almost mystically just and pure, and the criterion for the moral assessment of a person is proximity to the popular world or remoteness from it.
15
The union in the title of the novel performs both opposing and connecting functions: war as a state of international, domestic political and even personal relations is opposite to the world (with I — as a community of people, from where the saying: "Death is red for peace", - and with I as the antithesis of war), and the warrior is connected with the world by causal dependence.
Here the main coupling of the novel is revealed.
It is necessary to proceed from it when analyzing "War and Peace".
The central event of the novel is the war of 1812.
The central figures are Kutuzov and Napoleon.
The attitude of the heroes of the novel to the Patriotic War determines their connection with Kutuzov, i.e. ultimately with the general, popular, or Napoleonic — egoistic, anti national principle; during the war, the personality fully reveals those qualities that were in potency or manifested in a less acute form in peaceful days.
Lies, hypocrisy, cruelty, selfishness, meanness, violence are associated with war, sincerity, purity, sincerity, the ability to renounce oneself, greatness are associated with peace.
Some heroes (Napoleon, Kuragin, Rastopchin, Berg, Drubetskoy, the nobility as a whole) are insignificant both during the war and in peacetime.
War is a natural state for them, because they are in a constant war for the assertion of their base "I" in life.
These are people of war, war is their element (the fact that many of them try to stay away from the battlefield does not change the situation).
But they cover their predatory thoughts with beautiful words, and therefore "tearing off all and every mask" becomes the decisive method by which Tolstoy creates these characters.
Other heroes (Kutuzov, Rostovs, Pierre, Bolkonskys, the people as a whole) perceive war as evil, terrible evil and, most importantly, unavoidable, like an attack by a predatory beast in the forest (let's recall Kutuzov's thoughts after Borodin about whether a fatal wound was inflicted on the beast).
Pierre, Kutuzov, Bolkonskys, Rostovs during the war merge with the general, with the people.
Their separate selves are pacified only by dissolving into this common.
But they come to unity with the people in different ways and not immediately.
And the nature of this unity is different for each of the characters.
Subtle psychological analysis (the disclosure of the spiritual world of the heroes in the development, in the struggle of often contradictory feelings, feelings and thoughts) is the main method of depicting this group of actors in the epic.
Thus, the main ("national") the idea of the novel evoked the antithesis as a compositional support of the work.
And it's not just about the episodes of the heroes ' meeting with people from the people, but also about the place that the people occupy in the life of these heroes.
The search for the truth of life leads Pierre to the people.
"To be like them (soldiers. — G. F.)" — that's what Pierre thinks about.
The best qualities of Prince Andrew's nature — kindness, sensitivity, tact, great intelligence, courage — are manifested during his communication with the soldiers, who call him "our prince", with Tushin.
Kutuzov is the bearer of the ideas of the people's war.
Tolstoy attributes to him a certain extra rational, intuitive understanding of the national element.
Tolstoy's strength lies in his ability to show how sensitive Kutuzov was to the "people's opinion".
The attitude of Kutuzov, on the one hand, and Berg, on the other hand, to the destruction of forage stocks and food warehouses by the retreating Russian army is characteristic.
The desire of the people not to leave anything to the enemy causes indignation of Berg, a supporter of waging war "according to the rules" (vol.3, part 2, ch. IV).
Kutuzov (chapter XV of the same part of the third volume) orders to throw into the fire an order forbidding soldiers to mow bread and cut wood in the landowners 'possessions:" Let them mow bread and burn firewood for health...
Without this it is impossible..."
This antithesis, this struggle of opinions about the methods of conducting war, runs through the entire third volume: people who do not understand the popular nature of war (Berg, Clausewitz, Beningsen, Barclay),- for waging war "according to the rules"; patriots whose heart bleeds at the sight of the suffering of the motherland (Kutuzov, Prince Andrey, Denisov),- for a nationwide merciless war against the invaders.
In the fourth volume, Tolstoy sums up this antithesis: in a philosophical digression, he justifies the rightness of the people who raised the "cudgel of the people's war" (part 3, chapter I).
Similarly, when Tolstoy describes the flight of the French from Russia, he contrasts people who seek to "overturn", "surround", "capture" the French at any cost (Alexander I, Miloradovich, Chichagov) with representatives of the people's war, carriers of the humane feelings of the people (Kutuzov, soldiers).
And again, the compositional conclusion of this antithesis is a philosophical digression in the fourth volume of the novel (part 4, chapter VI), where Tolstoy concludes: when the war has acquired a character alien to the people, the "representative of the people's war" has nothing to do.
Thus, the antitheses and the philosophical digressions that conclude them are the most important compositional links of the epic.
Especially striking in Tolstoy's novel is his ability to harmoniously combine the image of personal destinies and the fate of the people, everyday life and historical events.
Tolstoy's epics are multifaceted: from describing European events, he freely passes to describing the life of one regiment or family, to small everyday episodes, to a detailed description of the inner experiences of one hero.
However, the change of these plans does not lead to an internal fragmentation of the plot: Tolstoy's skill lies precisely in the fact that he skillfully seals everything with a single philosophical thought — the thought of a pure people's world, the opposite of the false egoistic world of "fragmented" people fighting with each other for their selfish interests.
This philosophical thought and the skill of translating it into artistic images should become clear to students as a result of analyzing the novel in the classroom.
Before proceeding to the analysis of the novel in the form of a conversation between a teacher and students, we recall that the class is not a "one actor theater", where the teacher acts as an actor, but students act as more or less interested spectators.
The degree of activity of schoolchildren is one of the most important criteria for the quality of the lesson.
1 At school No. 15 in Yalta, at school No. 490, at the school of working youth No. 134 and at special school No. 3 (with teaching a number of subjects in German) Moscow.
2 The teacher will find material on the history of the creation of the novel in the book by N. N. Ardens "The Creative path of L. N. Tolstoy" (Moscow, Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1962, pp. 131-155) and in the article by E. E. Seidenshnur " The History of writing and printing "War and Peace" (L. N. Tolstoy.
Complete collection of soch. in 90 tt., yub. ed., vol. 16).
3 This is explained by the fact that the most contradictory judgments are found in articles and studies that treat the problems of peace and war, the role of the individual in history, the historical authenticity of the novel — and all these problems are posed and solved by Tolstoy mainly in the last two volumes.
4 V. V. Mayakovsky.
Complete collection of works in 13 volumes, vol .
13. M., Goslitizdat, 1959, p. 65.
5 L. N. Tolstoy.
Complete collection of works in 90 volumes, yub.
ed., vol. 61, M., Goslitizdat, 1952, p.
70. (Further all references are given on this edition)
6 Ibid., p. 80.
7 V. I. Lenin.
Complete collection of works, vol. 29, p. 129.
8 V. G. Belinsky.
Complete collection of soch., vol.
7. M. L., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1955, p. 311.
9 V. Shklovsky.
Artistic prose.
Reflections and analysis.
M., "Soviet writer", 1961, p. 423.
9* V. Shklovsky.
Artistic prose.
Reflections and analysis.
M., "Soviet writer", 1961, p. 460.
10 p. Bychkov.
L. N. Tolstoy.
M., Goslitizdat, 1954, p. 137.
11 In.
Ermilov.
Tolstoy the artist and the novel "War and Peace".
Moscow, Goslitizdat, 1961, p. 3.
12 "L. N. Tolstoy in Russian Criticism" , Moscow, Goslitizdat, 1954, p. 520.
13 "History of Russian literature", vol .
IX, part 2.
Literature of the 70-80s.
M.-L., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1956, p. 496.
14 S. A. Tolstaya.
Diary.
1860-1891.
Moscow, 1928, p. 37.
15 See the very interesting remarks of Ya.
Bilinkis about the ambiguity of the word world (Ya.
Bilinkis.
About the work of Tolstoy. L., "Soviet writer", 1959, p. 225-226) and V. Ermilov's arguments about the content of the word war in the title of the novel (V. Ermilov.
Tolstoy the artist and the novel "War and Peace".
Moscow, Goslitizdat, 1961, p. 16–20).
Preface Continuation Conclusion
