Speaking names and surnames in Bulgakov's story "Heart of a Dog". What do these first and last names mean?
Signs
What is the meaning of the “speaking” names of the characters in the context of the story? Main character
The story is named Philip Philipovich Preobrazhensky. Philip" in Greek means "lover of horses", i.e. lover of riding horses, driving horses, hence - ruler. And “Philip Philipovich” is a doubly ruler who has a passion for political power
deep in the blood. The professor's surname - Preobrazhensky - is also symbolic. Preobrazhensky performs the operation in the afternoon of December 23, and the humanization of the dog is completed on the night of January 7, since the last mention of his canine appearance in the observation diary kept by Bormental’s assistant is dated January 6. Thus, the entire process of turning a dog into a human covers the period from December 24 to January 6, from Catholic to Orthodox Christmas Eve. A Transfiguration is taking place, but not the Lord's. The new man Sharikov is born on the night of January 6th to 7th - in Orthodox Christmas . But Poligraf Poligrafovich is not the incarnation of Christ, but the devil, who took his name in honor of a fictitious “saint” in the new Soviet “saints” that prescribe the celebration of Printer’s Day. Sharikov is, to some extent, a victim of printed products - books outlining Marxist dogmas, which Shvonder gave him to read. From there " new person
“I only came up with the thesis about primitive leveling - “take everything and divide it.” During his last quarrel with Preobrazhensky and Bormental, Sharikov’s connection with otherworldly forces is emphasized in every possible way: “Some unclean spirit possessed Poligraf Poligrafovich, obviously, death was already watching over him and fate stood behind him. Sharikov himself invited his death. He raised his left hand and showed Philip Philipovich a bitten pine cone with an unbearable cat smell. And then at the address of the dangerous Bormental, he took a revolver out of his pocket.” Shish is the standing “hair” on the devil’s head. Sharikov’s hair is the same: “coarse, like bushes in an uprooted field.” Armed with a revolver, Poligraf Poligrafovich is a unique illustration of the famous saying of the Italian thinker Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527): “All armed prophets have won, but the unarmed ones have perished.” Here Sharikov is a parody of V.I. Lenina, L.D. Trotsky and other Bolsheviks, who ensured the triumph of their teachings in Russia by military force. By the way, the three volumes of the posthumous biography of Trotsky, written by his follower Isaac Deutscher (1906-1967), were called: “The Armed Prophet”, “The Disarmed Prophet”, “The Expelled Prophet” (1954-1963). Bulgakov's hero is not a prophet of God, but of the devil.
Ivan Arnoldovich Bormental is Jewish by patronymic and surname. His surname "Bormenthal" consists of two parts: "Bormen-", which resembles "Bron-" from real name Trotsky (Bronstein), and “-tal”, in which there are “t” and “l”, i.e. initials of the pseudonym and name of L. Trotsky. The name from which Bormental's patronymic is derived - "Arnold" - ends with the letters "l" and "d", i.e., the initials of the first and patronymic L.D. Trotsky.
House manager Shvonder, a fierce and caustic opponent of Preobrazhensky, is L.B. Kamenev-Rozenfeld, Chairman of the Moscow City Council (hence the house manager). "Rosenfeld" in German means "field of roses", and "schwand" means "hillside". Bulgakov simultaneously hints at the semantic similarity of the words “field” and “hill” and at Kamenev’s political bias.
Two of Shvonder's companions are easily identified. Blonde in a hat - P.K. Sternberg (born 1865), prominent Bolshevik, party member since 1905, professor-astronomer. His mistress Vyazemskaya - V.N. Yakovleva (born 1884, 19 years difference), secretary of the Moscow Committee at that time, party member since 1904, etc. They met when Yakovleva was a student and Sternberg was a professor at Moscow University. She was very beautiful woman, a real Russian beauty. Such beauties were depicted on Vyazemsk gingerbread, hence her surname Vyazemskaya.
Subject of the work
At one time, M. Bulgakov’s satirical story caused a lot of talk. IN " Heart of a Dog» the heroes of the work are bright and memorable; the plot is fantasy mixed with reality and subtext in which one can openly read harsh criticism Soviet power. Therefore, the work was very popular in the 60s among dissidents, and in the 90s, after its official publication, it was even recognized as prophetic.
The theme of the tragedy of the Russian people is clearly visible in this work; in “Heart of a Dog” the main characters enter into an irreconcilable conflict with each other and will never understand each other. And, although the proletarians won in this confrontation, Bulgakov in the novel reveals to us the whole essence of the revolutionaries and their type of new man in the person of Sharikov, leading us to the idea that they will not create or do anything good.
There are only three main characters in “Heart of a Dog,” and the narrative is mainly told from Bormenthal’s diary and through the dog’s monologue.
Characteristics of the main characters
Sharikov
A character who appeared as a result of an operation from the mongrel Sharik. A transplant of the pituitary gland and gonads of the drunkard and rowdy Klim Chugunkin turned a sweet and friendly dog into Poligraf Poligrafych, a parasite and a hooligan.
Sharikov embodies all the negative traits of the new society: he spits on the floor, throws cigarette butts, does not know how to use the restroom and constantly swears. But this is not even the worst thing - Sharikov quickly learned to write denunciations and found a calling in killing his eternal enemies, cats. And while he deals only with cats, the author makes it clear that he will do the same with people who stand in his way.
Bulgakov saw this base power of the people and a threat to the entire society in the rudeness and narrow-mindedness with which the new revolutionary government resolves issues.
Professor Preobrazhensky
An experimenter who uses innovative developments in solving the problem of rejuvenation through organ transplantation. He is a famous world scientist, a respected surgeon, whose “speaking” surname gives him the right to experiment with nature.
I was used to living in grand style - servants, a house of seven rooms, luxurious dinners. His patients - former nobles and the highest revolutionary officials who patronize him.
Preobrazhensky is a respectable, successful and self-confident person. The professor, an opponent of any terror and Soviet power, calls them “idlers and idlers.” He considers affection the only way to communicate with living beings and denies the new government precisely for its radical methods and violence. His opinion: if people are accustomed to culture, then the devastation will disappear.
The rejuvenation operation yielded an unexpected result - the dog turned into a human. But the man turned out to be completely useless, uneducable and absorbing the worst. Philip Philipovich concludes that nature is not a field for experiments and he interfered with its laws in vain.
Dr. Bormental
Ivan Arnoldovich is completely and completely devoted to his teacher. At one time, Preobrazhensky took an active part in the fate of a half-starved student - he enrolled him in the department, and then took him on as an assistant.
The young doctor tried in every possible way to develop Sharikov culturally, and then completely moved in with the professor, as it became more and more difficult to cope with the new person.
The apotheosis was the denunciation that Sharikov wrote against the professor. At the climax, when Sharikov took out a revolver and was ready to use it, it was Bromenthal who showed firmness and toughness, while Preobrazhensky hesitated, not daring to kill his creation.
The positive characterization of the heroes of “Heart of a Dog” emphasizes how important honor and self-dignity are for the author. Bulgakov described himself and his doctor-relatives in many of the same traits as both doctors, and in many ways would have acted the same way as them.
Shvonder
The newly elected chairman of the house committee, who hates the professor as a class enemy. This is a schematic hero, without deep reasoning.
Shvonder completely bows to the new revolutionary government and its laws, and in Sharikov he sees not a person, but a new useful unit of society - he can buy textbooks and magazines, participate in meetings.
Sh. can be called Sharikov’s ideological mentor; he tells him about his rights in Preobrazhensky’s apartment and teaches him how to write denunciations. The chairman of the house committee, due to his narrow-mindedness and lack of education, always hesitates and gives in in conversations with the professor, but this makes him hate him even more.
Other heroes
The list of characters in the story would not be complete without two au pairs - Zina and Daria Petrovna. They recognize the superiority of the professor, and, like Bormenthal, are completely devoted to him and agree to commit a crime for the sake of their beloved master. They proved this at the time of the repeated operation to transform Sharikov into a dog, when they were on the side of the doctors and accurately followed all their instructions.
You have become acquainted with the characteristics of the heroes of Bulgakov’s “Heart of a Dog,” a fantastic satire that anticipated the collapse of Soviet power immediately after its emergence - the author, back in 1925, showed the whole essence of those revolutionaries and what they were capable of.
Work test
The work of Mikhail Bulgakov was initially destined for enchanting popularity throughout the world. You can talk about this quite freely, without fear of exaggeration - just visit, for example, the production of the play “Love Letters to Stalin”, authored by the Spaniard Juan Mayorga, or watch the foreign film “Heart of a Dog”, in which the role of Professor Preobrazhensky is played by Max von Zyudov. As for Bulgakov’s popularity in the post-Soviet space, it’s even inconvenient to talk about it: literally every young lady who considers herself a creative and spiritual person always mentions “The Master and Margarita” as one of her favorite books. We will not try to find the reasons for such a dizzying success Soviet writer. Here we are more interested in the consequences of Bulgakov’s popularity, and, as the most important of these, we can name the transformation of his literary heritage V " common place» world and, in particular, Russian culture. The accents that the author placed in his works have already dulled, and everyone has become accustomed to their sharp taste. It means that modern reader rarely sees anything new on the pages of Bulgakov’s prose. Martin Heidegger called this way of understanding reality “single-track thinking,” connecting this metaphor with the technocratic nature of society in recent decades. Instead of inquisitively following the truth in its ambiguity along winding paths, a person proudly drives past meanings and truths, rushing towards the only side of life that he is accustomed to seeing. But the peculiarity and value of truth lies in its ambiguity, which it tries in every possible way to level and discredit modern civilization with her practicality and ready-made answers to everything. This article is an attempt to touch upon an unusual side for the reader of Bulgakov’s story “The Heart of a Dog.”
But in order to talk about the unusual, you need to briefly define the familiar. Of course, the most popular and effective is the interpretation of the story as political satire. They say that Preobrazhensky and Bormental are the intelligentsia who allowed the mob to feel their human rights, and thereby handed over society to the power of this mob. Sometimes direct correspondences are made between the heroes of the story and Russian revolutionaries: Preobrazhensky - Lenin, Bormental - Trotsky, Sharikov - Stalin, etc. (An excellent example of this approach is the article by S. Ioffe). Of course, this approach has grounds, since the author himself expressed similar counter-revolutionary ideas in his other works, condemning the Bolsheviks’ attempt to equalize all classes of Russia. On the other side, artistic images, which Bulgakov uses, allow us to consider the events he described from a symbolic perspective. The central one story line the story - transformation - makes it possible to see in the text not only satire, but also a classic Western legend about alchemical work, the heroes of which are dressed in modern costumes for Bulgakov and bear names familiar to Russian ears, while remaining elements of the same symbolic system. The arguments given below will enable the reader to judge the validity of such a claim.
First of all, we should start with the main character - Professor Preobrazhensky. The surname of this man is at least ambiguous; it cleverly refers us both to the essential Transfiguration of Christ and to the external transformation carried out in the laboratory by alchemists. Indeed, in alchemical literature, the very image of Christ often replaced gold (also interpreted symbolically as the goal of the Work, and not as a specific metal), and the Transfiguration of Christ acted as a symbol of the transformation of a base metal into a noble one. However, it is known that many alchemists, seeking to make money and taking their treatises too literally, simply coated lead coins with an amalgam of gold and thus replaced the transformation of the spirit with the transformation of appearance. Russian word“heart” has not only an anatomical meaning, but initially means the “middle”, the semantic center - therefore the anatomical heart, as central authority body is called the “heart”. In this context, the forgery of unscrupulous alchemists retains its lead “heart” but still looks like gold. Here it is important to recall one of Dr. Bormental’s notes made during the “humanization” of Sharik: “From now on, the mysterious function of the pituitary gland - a cerebral appendage - has been explained. It defines the human form. Its hormones can be called the most important in the body - hormones of appearance. A new area opens up in science: without any retort of Faust, a homunculus was created. The surgeon's scalpel brought to life a new human unit. Professor Preobrazhensky, you are a creator!” . Already here there is a paralogism, an unconscious substitution of concepts: the appearance does not at all determine the essence of the creature, therefore Preobrazhensky actually superimposed the appearance of a man on the heart of a dog, without creating anything new, but only thus disguising a drunkard and troublemaker under the guise of a transformed dog (more on this later stated below). Moreover, Sharik turned into a man completely by accident, while the goal of Preobrazhensky’s experiment was to rejuvenate the experimental dog - however, at the same time, the accidental result of the work is presented as a great achievement: in this respect, the professor resembles Berthold Schwartz, who accidentally invented gunpowder in searching for the alchemical key to gold. So, the professor is not a creator at all.
Second important detail The above quote is a comparison of Preobrazhensky with Faust. It would seem that this comparison is made in the form of opposition, but this form does not change the essence artistic technique. Further in the text there is a direct comparison: “He (Preobrazhensky) burned the second cigar for a long time, completely chewing its end and, finally, completely alone, green-colored, like a gray-haired Faust, he exclaimed: by God, I think I’ll make up my mind.” Bulgakov seems to be constantly trying to quietly convince the reader that his professor is a modern Faust, who was also an alchemist and sorcerer.
In what the main problem Faust? The fact is that “two souls” live in his body: he “demands stars from the sky as a reward, and the best pleasures from the earth, and his soul will never be in peace, no matter what his search leads to,” the Lord tells Mephistopheles in the prologue of Goethe's tragedy. Translated into Christian terminology, Faustus is a fornicator. Fornication here must be understood broadly, as wandering of the spirit, as the inability to choose one’s own path and follow it. Heidegger was mentioned earlier with his metaphor of technocratic thinking as driving on a single track. By fornication we can understand the other extreme, which is also destructive for the human spirit: if one-track thinking is too definite and purposeful, then the movement of the fornicator has no limits at all, and therefore no path. For example, we can recall the image of the Will-o'-the-wisp from Goethe's Faust: a demonic light that lures travelers into swamps at night and leads Mephistopheles and Faust to the Brocken on Walpurgis Night. In fact, all life path Fausta is wandering from one extreme to another, from temptation to temptation: “I mastered theology, pored over philosophy, studied jurisprudence and studied medicine, but I, at the same time, was and remains a fool.” After all, it is with these words that the “Scene in the Gothic Room” begins, when the reader first meets Faust, who cannot find his path, his destiny, and therefore turns to magic and, as a result, sells it to the devil (by the way, who appeared to him in the form of a dog) soul. Faust's wanderings, his internal uncertainty (which is complemented by external rejuvenation - as if Bulgakov's professor tried) - this is the essence of his tragedy, which ends only with the death and salvation of the fornicator and warlock by the angels of God.
Professor Preobrazhensky, whose wanderings began after meeting with street dog, whom he brings home (exactly as Faust brings the poodle Mephistopheles), also cannot find his way, remaining the personification of spiritual fornication until the very end of the story. The highest expression of his wanderings is the dinner scene (when Sharik is still in the form of a dog). So, the professor says: “Food, Ivan Arnoldovich, is a tricky thing. You need to be able to eat, and just imagine, most people don’t know how to do this at all. You need to not only know what to eat, but also when and how. (Philip Philipovich shook his spoon meaningfully.) And what can I say? Yes, sir. If you care about your digestion, here’s some good advice: don’t talk about Bolshevism and medicine at dinner.” Literally immediately he notices that he is giving medical advice to his famulus Wagner-Bormenthal at dinner, and realizes: “Yes, sir. However, what am I! He himself started talking about medicine. Let's eat better." However, then Preobrazhensky hears the singing of Shvonder and his comrades, and begins to discuss the political situation in Russia, more and more scolding the Bolsheviks for the galoshes stolen during the revolution and for the devastation that is “in their heads.” What is the significance of this scene in the context of what was said earlier? It illustrates Professor Preobrazhensky’s inability to adhere to any one course, to behave in accordance with his own moral teachings. The dinner scene is a concentrated expression of the instability of Preobrazhensky's character, which he demonstrates throughout the story. For this reason, perhaps, the understanding of the story in terms of the collapse of the hopes of intellectual dreamers for the rise of other people to their level is not entirely justified - after all, Preobrazhensky initially knew and argued that equality between people does not exist. What could be more absurd: the old alchemist, who criticizes the Bolsheviks for the rise of the mob, is himself trying to turn a dog into a man. The grotesqueness of the situation shows the contradictory nature of the image of Transfiguration, which not only transforms, but itself is constantly transformed, while invariably remaining warm, if we use the symbolic language of Revelation from John the Theologian (Rev. 3:15-16).
It was said earlier that Preobrazhensky puts the appearance of a person on a dog’s heart, but by doing this he disguises precisely a worthless person under a completely tolerable dog. In such a fraudulently complex creature of alchemical transformation lies, in fact, the problem of the failure of the revolution in Russia - they are trying to ennoble the base metal, but the worst subjugates the best. Indeed, if we start again with the names that Bulgakov gives to his heroes, we will notice that Klim Chugunkin has a “metal” surname, moreover, cast iron is an obviously base metal, and not even an independent (naturally existing) metal, but an alloy of ferrous metals ; the name Sharik can be considered in connection with the top layer of gold, which covers the base metal, since etymologically the word “ball” is associated with paint; The word “ball” still retains the meaning of the upper layer, for example, in the Ukrainian language. So, although Preobrazhensky tried to transform Chugunkin with Sharik, it was Sharikov who adopted the essence of Chugunkin, and the rejuvenation operation failed, for “They also do not pour new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the bottles burst, and the wine flows out, and the bottles are lost, but new wine is poured into new bottles, and both are preserved” (Matthew 9:17; cf. Mark 2:22, Luke 5:37).
Having realized his mistake (“the whole horror is that he no longer has a dog’s, namely human heart"), the professor reverses the operation, removing Sharikov's human pituitary gland and seminal glands, thereby returning his test subject to a match between heart and appearance. The alchemist demonstrates the change in his views in a conversation with Bormenthal: “You can, of course, graft the pituitary gland of Spinoza or some other such devil and make an extremely high-standing dog out of him. But what the hell, one wonders. Please explain to me why it is necessary to artificially fabricate Spinoza, when any woman can give birth to him at any time. After all, Madame Lomonosova gave birth to this famous one in Kholmogory. Doctor, humanity itself takes care of this and, in an evolutionary order, every year, persistently singling out all kinds of scum from the masses, creates dozens of outstanding geniuses who adorn Earth". The mention of Spinoza here is no coincidence: Professor Preobrazhensky, as a result of alchemical transformations of his spirit, achieves an understanding of the world through the prism of the pantheistic philosophy of Benedict Spinoza. After unsuccessful attempts to fight nature, the professor understands its superiority over his scientific research as the superiority of the natural over the artificial.
Preobrazhensky admits that it is much wiser to entrust oneself to fate than to arbitrarily try to create philosophers out of dogs (and rejuvenate people themselves!), because a person is not able to change the spirit, “heart”, “fate” of another creature at his own will - a dog will always have a heart canine, the essence of the Other will always remain incomprehensible. The only possibility for a person to realize his freedom lies in the so-called alchemy of the spirit, but not the alchemy of the body, that is, in an internal transformation that cannot be achieved surgically, that is, by violence against nature. It’s funny to admit, but at the very beginning the inconsistent professor was talking about the same thing: “You can’t do anything with terror with an animal, no matter what stage of development it is at. This is what I have asserted, am asserting, and will continue to assert. They are in vain to think that terror will help them." Let us remember that the alchemist Preobrazhensky said this when he took Sharik into his apartment - with the sole purpose - to commit the greatest violence against nature. It is in this vein of the professor’s spiritual fornication that the novel ends. Sharik wakes up and, suffering from a headache, sees his “benefactor” again at work. “The dog saw terrible things. Hands in slippery gloves important person immersed it in a vessel, took out the brains - a stubborn man, persistent, always achieving something, cutting, examining, squinting and singing: “To the sacred banks of the Nile...”. Of course, Sharik woke up and could examine Preobrazhensky’s work not immediately after his operation, but after a while. This says one thing: despairing after an obvious failure, the persistent professor took up his task again. Professor Preobrazhensky never became “Christ”, “Gold” - he remained in the field of “small work” aimed at transforming “metals”, but not his own soul.
So the eternally insane transformer of the Universe continues, singing an aria from “Aida” (also a kind of reference to alchemical practices, because even the word “alchemy” itself comes from Greek name Egypt - “Kemet”, “the black land of the Nile Delta” - those same “sacred shores”), disfigure the world and make unnecessary revolutions, achieving nothing by doing so, repenting of mistakes and again returning to the beginning of their path. Professor Preobrazhensky is Ouroboros, the serpent who bites its own tail (and the tempting serpent, at the same time), a symbol of evil infinity, circulus vitiosus.
Interpreted through the prism of alchemical symbolism, the story partially loses its satirical character associated with specific historical events, while acquiring universal significance for the history of the wanderings of the human spirit. This reading of “Heart of a Dog” is especially relevant today, when World culture, having adopted a postmodernist guise, moved as far as possible from its metaphysical foundations, from its “heart,” and man, feeling himself the ruler of the technocratic world, similarly opposed himself to nature as much as possible. Humanity still, and even more than ever, needs spiritual Transformation, renunciation of violence towards the world, and wise humility. “Man intends to take upon himself dominion over the whole Earth... but is man, as man in his former being, ready to take this dominion?” - asks Heidegger. Bulgakov's answer is definitely negative. As the author of “Heart of a Dog,” who experienced the horrors himself, teaches us coups d'etat and senseless unrest, any violence, no matter what guise it takes, only creates evil, since a person who is not internally ready for transformation will always be suppressed by its formless and therefore destructive, destructive side. From here we can return to the satirical reading of the story, removed and now supplemented with metaphysical symbolism: Sharik turns into the drunkard Chugunkin, pre-revolutionary Russia becomes the main producer of Murti-Binga pills in the twentieth century, as Czeslaw Milosz subtly notes, and the Ecumenical Professor Preobrazhensky leads a new victim to his “obscene apartment” - and so on endlessly. This old “Faust” is not the Thrice Greatest Hermes, not the “divine transformer” (Deva Nahousha), but the greatest charlatan, another incarnation of Professor Woland, who came to Moscow to study the non-existent works of Herbert of Avrilak.
Immortal, cruel, powerful and indestructible, surrounded by his obedient retinue, the devil walks along the Moscow streets in exactly the same way as he walks through the Universe with God's connivance, confusing and tempting humanity, giving people what they, in their ignorance, crave and, perhaps, even repenting of his mistakes (as Dostoevsky’s devil does), but after a moment of weakness he again takes up his only business - the denial of divine creation. This is the metaphysical core of any violence, any revolution, any external transformations committed even with the most good purpose, because the gifts of the devil always carry within them the machinations of the Underworld.
LITERATURE
- Budge E. A. U. Residents of the Nile Valley / Transl. from English A. Davydova. M.: ZAO Tsentrpoligraf, 2009.
- Bible. Books of the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments - M.: Publication of the Moscow Patriarchate, 1993. - 1372 p. http://krotov.info/lib_sec/13_m/il/osh_2.htm
- Vasmer M. Etymological dictionary Russian language. In 4 vols. / Transl. with him. O. N. Trubacheva. M.: Progress, 1987.
- Heidegger M. What is called thinking / Transl. with him. E. Sagetdinova. M.: Territory of the Future, 2006.
- Shure E. Great Initiates: Essay on the Esotericism of Religions / Transl. from fr. E. Pisareva. Kaluga: Printing house of the Provincial Zemstvo Council, 1914.
_____________________________
Artamonov Alexander Alexandrovich
Starting my thoughts about Professor Preobrazhensky, the hero of the work “Heart of a Dog,” I would like to dwell a little on some facts of the biography of the author - Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov (05/15/1891 Kyiv - 03/10/1940, Moscow), Russian writer, theater playwright and director. All this is in order to draw some parallels that will largely unite the author and his imaginary hero.
A little about the author's biography
Bulgakov was born into the family of an associate professor at the Kyiv Theological Academy, but he himself soon became a student at the medical faculty of Kyiv University. During World War I he worked as a front-line doctor. In the spring of 1918, he returned to Kyiv, where he practiced as a private venereologist. IN civil war 1919 Bulgakov - military doctor of the Ukrainian military army, then the Armed Forces of southern Russia, the Red Cross, the Volunteer Army, etc. Having fallen ill with typhus in 1920, he was treated in Vladikavkaz, and after that his writing talent awoke. He will write to his cousin that he has finally understood: his job is to write.
Prototype of Professor Preobrazhensky
You can really compare Bulgakov with the prototype of the main character; they have too much in common. However, it is generally accepted that Preobrazhensky (the professor) as an image was copied from his uncle Mikhail Afanasyevich, a famous Moscow doctor, gynecologist
In 1926, the OGPU conducted a search of the writer, and as a result, the manuscripts of “The Heart of a Dog” and the diary were confiscated.
This story was dangerous for the writer because it became a satire on Soviet power 20-30s. The newly created class of the proletariat is represented here by heroes like the Shvonders and Sharikovs, who are absolutely far from the values of the destroyed tsarist Russia.
They are all opposed to Professor Preobrazhensky, whose quotes deserve special attention. This surgeon and scientist, who is a luminary Russian science, appears for the first time at the moment when in the story the dog, the future Sharikov, dies in a city gateway - hungry and cold, with a burnt side. The professor appears at the most painful hours for the dog. The dog’s thoughts “voice” Preobrazhensky as a cultured gentleman, with an intelligent beard and mustache, like those of French knights.
Experiment
Professor Preobrazhensky's main business is to treat people, to look for new ways to achieve longevity and effective means of rejuvenation. Of course, like any scientist, he could not live without experiments. He picks up the dog, and at the same time a plan is born in the doctor’s head: he decides to perform an operation to transplant the pituitary gland. He does this experiment on a dog in the hope of finding an effective method for gaining a “second youth.” However, the consequences of the operation were unexpected.
Over the course of several weeks, the dog, which was given the nickname Sharik, becomes a human and receives documents bearing the name Sharikov. Professor Preobrazhensky and his assistant Bormenthal are trying to instill in him worthy and noble human manners. However, their “education” does not bring any visible results.
Transformation into a human
Preobrazhensky expresses his opinion to assistant Ivan Arnoldovich Bormental: it is necessary to understand the horror that Sharikov no longer has a dog’s heart, but a human one, and “the lousiest of all those existing in nature.”
Bulgakov created a parody of socialist revolution, described the clash of two classes, in which Philip Philipovich Preobrazhensky is a professor and intellectual, and the working class is Sharikov and others like him.
The professor, like a real nobleman, accustomed to luxury, living in a 7-room apartment and every day eating various delicacies such as salmon, eels, turkey, roast beef, and washing it all down with cognac, vodka and wine, suddenly found himself in an unexpected situation. The unbridled and arrogant Sharikovs and Shvonders burst into his calm and proportionate aristocratic life.
House Committee
Shvonder is a separate example of the proletarian class; he and his company constitute the house committee in the house where Preobrazhensky, an experimental professor, lives. They, however, seriously began to fight him. But he is also not so simple, Professor Preobrazhensky’s monologue about the devastation in people’s heads suggests that the proletariat and its interests are simply hateful to him, and as long as he has the opportunity to devote himself to his favorite business (science), he will be indifferent to petty swindlers and swindlers like Shvondera.
But he enters into a serious struggle with his household member Sharikov. If Shvonder puts pressure purely outwardly, then you can’t so easily disown Sharikov, because it’s him - his product scientific activity and the creation of a failed experiment. Sharikov brings such chaos and destruction into his house that in two weeks the professor experienced more stress than in all his years.
Image
However, the image of Professor Preobrazhensky is very curious. No, he is by no means the embodiment of virtue. He, just like any person, has his own shortcomings, he is a rather selfish, narcissistic, vain, but a living and real person. Preobrazhensky became the image of a real intellectual, alone fighting the devastation brought by the Sharikov generation. Isn't this fact worthy of sympathy, respect and sympathy?
Time for revolution
The story “Heart of a Dog” shows the reality of the 20s of the twentieth century. Dirty streets are described, where signs are hung everywhere promising a bright future for people. An even more depressing mood is caused by bad, cold stormy weather and the homeless image of a dog, which, like most Soviet people of a new country under construction, literally survives and is in constant search of warmth and food.
It is in this chaos that Preobrazhensky, one of the few intellectuals who survived a dangerous and difficult time, appears - an aristocratic professor. The character Sharikov, still in his dog body, assessed him in his own way: that he “eats abundantly and does not steal, will not kick, and he himself is not afraid of anyone, because he is always full.”
Two sides
The image of Preobrazhensky is like a ray of light, like an island of stability, satiety and well-being in the terrible reality of the post-war years. He's actually nice. But many do not like a person who, in general, everything is going well, but for whom it is not enough to have seven rooms - he wants another one, an eighth, to make a library in it.
However, the house committee began an intensified struggle against the professor and wanted to take his apartment away from him. In the end, the proletarians did not manage to harm the professor, and therefore the reader could not help but rejoice at this fact.
But this is only one side of the coin of Preobrazhensky’s life, and if you delve deeper into the essence of the matter, you can see a not very attractive picture. The prosperity that Bulgakov’s main character, Professor Preobrazhensky, enjoys, it must be said, did not suddenly fall on his head and was not inherited from rich relatives. He made his wealth himself. And now he serves people who have received power into their hands, because now it is their time to enjoy all the benefits.
One of Preobrazhensky’s clients voices very interesting things: “No matter how much I steal, everything goes to female body, Abrau-Durso champagne and cancer necks." But the professor, despite all his high morality, intelligence and sensitivity, does not try to reason with his patient, re-educate him or express displeasure. He understands that he needs money to support his usual way of life without need: with all the necessary servants in the house, with a table filled with all sorts of dishes such as sausages not from Mosselprom or caviar spread on crispy fresh bread.
In the work, Professor Preobrazhensky uses a dog’s heart for his experiment. It's not because he loves animals that he picks exhausted dog, to feed or warm, but because in his head, as it seems to him, a brilliant, but monstrous plan for him had arisen. And further in the book this operation is described in detail, which only causes unpleasant emotions. As a result of the rejuvenation operation, the professor ends up with a “newborn” person in his hands. That is why it is not in vain that Bulgakov gives a telling surname and status to his hero - Preobrazhensky, a professor who implants the cerebellum of the repeat offender Klimka into the dog that came to him. This has borne fruit, such side effects The professor didn't expect it.
Professor Preobrazhensky's phrases contain thoughts about education, which, in his opinion, could make Sharikov a more or less acceptable member social society. But Sharikov was not given a chance. Preobrazhensky had no children, and he did not know the basics of pedagogy. Perhaps that is why his experiment did not go in the right direction.
And few people pay attention to Sharikov’s words that he, like a poor animal, was grabbed, striped and now they are abhorring him, but he, by the way, did not give his permission for the operation and can sue. And, what is most interesting, no one notices the truth behind his words.
Teacher and educator
Preobrazhensky became the first literature teacher for Sharikov, although he understood that learning to speak does not mean becoming a full-fledged person. He wanted to make a highly developed personality out of the beast. After all, the professor himself in the book is the standard of education and high culture and a supporter of old, pre-revolutionary mores. He very clearly defined his position, speaking about the ensuing devastation and the inability of the proletariat to cope with it. The professor believes that people should first of all be taught the most basic culture; he is sure that using brute force, nothing can be achieved in the world. He realizes that he has created a being with dead soul, and finds the only way out: to do the opposite operation, since his educational methods did not have an effect on Sharikov, because in a conversation with the maid Zina he noted: “You can’t fight anyone... You can influence a person and an animal only by suggestion.”
But the skills of demagoguery, as it turns out, are learned much easier and faster than the skills of creative activity. And Shvonder succeeds in raising Sharikov. He does not teach him grammar and mathematics, but begins immediately with the correspondence between Engels and Kautsky, as a result of which Sharikov, with his low level of development, despite the complexity of the topic, from which his “head was swollen,” came to the conclusion: “Take everything and share!” This idea of social justice was understood best of all by the people's power and the newly minted citizen Sharikov.
Professor Preobrazhensky: “Devastation in our heads”
It should be noted that “Heart of a Dog” shows from all sides the absurdity and madness of the new structure of society that arose after 1917. Professor Preobrazhensky understood this well. The character's quotes about the devastation in their heads are unique. He says that if a doctor, instead of performing operations, starts singing in chorus, he will be ruined. If he begins to urinate past the toilet, and all his servants do this, then devastation will begin in the restroom. Consequently, the devastation is not in the closets, but in the heads.
Famous quotes by Professor Preobrazhensky
In general, the book “Heart of a Dog” is a real quotation book. The professor’s main and vivid expressions were described in the text above, but there are several more that also deserve the reader’s attention and will be interesting for various reflections.
“He who is not in a hurry succeeds everywhere.”
- “Why was the carpet removed from the main staircase? What, Karl Marx forbids carpets on stairs?”
- “Humanity itself takes care of this and, in an evolutionary order, every year persistently creates dozens of outstanding geniuses from the mass of all kinds of scum that adorn the globe.”
- “What is this destruction of yours? An old woman with a stick? A witch who knocked out all the windows and put out all the lamps?”
to pages 2
The work of M. A. Bulgakov is the largest phenomenon of Russian fiction XX century. Its main theme can be considered the theme of “the tragedy of the Russian people.” The writer was a contemporary of all those tragic events that took place in Russia in the first half of our century. And M. A. Bulgakov’s most frank views on the fate of his country are expressed, in my opinion, in the story “The Heart of a Dog.” The story is based on a great experiment. The main character of the story, Professor Preobrazhensky, who represents the type of people closest to Bulgakov, the type of Russian intellectual, conceives a kind of competition with Nature itself. His experiment is fantastic: creating a new person by transplanting part of a human brain into a dog. Moreover, the story takes place on Christmas Eve, and the professor bears the name Preobrazhensky. And the experiment becomes a parody of Christmas, an anti-creation. But, alas, the scientist realizes the immorality of violence against the natural course of life too late. To create a new person, the scientist takes the pituitary gland of the “proletarian” - the alcoholic and parasite Klim Chugunkin. And this is the result the most complex operation an ugly, primitive creature appears, completely inheriting the “proletarian” essence of its “ancestor”. The first words he uttered were swearing, the first distinct word was “bourgeois.” And then - street expressions: “don’t push!”, “scoundrel”, “get off the bandwagon” and so on. A disgusting “man” appears vertically challenged and unsympathetic appearance. The monstrous homunculus, a man with a doglike disposition, the “basis” of which was a lumpen-proletarian, feels like the master of life; he is arrogant, swaggering, aggressive. The conflict between Professor Preobrazhensky, Bormenthal and the humanoid creature is absolutely inevitable. The life of the professor and the inhabitants of his apartment becomes a living hell. Despite the dissatisfaction of the owner of the house, Sharikov lives in his own way, primitively and stupidly: during the day he mostly sleeps in the kitchen, messes around, does all sorts of outrages, confident that “nowadays everyone has his own right” . Of course, it is not this scientific experiment in itself that Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov seeks to depict in his story. The story is based primarily on allegory. It's about not only about the scientist’s responsibility for his experiment, about the inability to see the consequences of his actions, about the huge difference between evolutionary changes and revolutionary invasion of life. The story “Heart of a Dog” contains the author’s extremely clear view of everything that is happening in the country. Everything that happened around was also perceived by M. A. Bulgakov as an experiment - huge in scale and more than dangerous. He saw that in Russia they were also trying to create a new type of person. A person who is proud of his ignorance, low origin, but who received enormous rights from the state. This is the kind of person who is suitable for new government, because he will put into the dirt those who are independent, smart, and high in spirit. M. A. Bulgakov considers the restructuring Russian life interference in the natural course of things, the consequences of which could be disastrous. But do those who conceived their experiment realize that it can also hit the “experimenters”? Do they understand that the revolution that took place in Russia was not the result of the natural development of society, and therefore can lead to consequences that no one can control? ? These are the questions, in my opinion, that M. A. Bulgakov poses in his work. In the story, Professor Preobrazhensky manages to return everything to its place: Sharikov again becomes an ordinary dog. Will we ever be able to correct all those mistakes, the results of which we are still experiencing?
