N in Gogol writer satirist message. Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol - writer - satirist Comedy “The Inspector General. The vital basis of the comedy "The Inspector General"

N.V.Gogol.

In 1852, after Gogol’s death, Nekrasov wrote a beautiful poem

a creation that can be an epigraph to Gogol’s entire work:

Feeding my chest with hatred,

Armed with satire,

He goes through a thorny path

With your punishing lyre.

These lines seem to give the exact definition of Gogo's satire.

Well, satire is an evil, sarcastic ridicule of not just general

human shortcomings, but also social vices. This is not a good laugh

sometimes “through tears invisible to the world,” because (and Gogol believed so)

it is the satirical ridicule of the negative in our lives that can serve

live for its correction. Laughter is a weapon, a sharp, military weapon, with

with whose help the writer struggled all his life with the “abominations of Russian action”

tweetability".

The great satirist began his creative journey with a description of everyday life,

morals and customs of Ukraine, dear to his heart, gradually moving on to the description

dignity of all vast Rus'. Nothing escaped the attentive eye

artist: neither the vulgarity and parasitism of the landowners, nor meanness and nothingness

the cruelty of the inhabitants. "Mirgorod", "Arabesque", "The Inspector General", "Marriage",

"The Nose", "Dead Souls" - a caustic satire on existing reality.

Gogol became the first of the Russian writers whose work received

the clearest reflection of the negative phenomena of life. Belinsky called Go-

Golya head of the new realistic school: "With the time of publication

"Mirgorod" and "The Inspector General" Russian literature took on a completely new

direction." The critic believed that "the perfect truth of life in stories

Gogol is closely connected with the simplicity of fiction. He doesn't flatter life, but

does not slander her; he is happy to bring out everything that is beautiful in her -

racial, human, and at the same time does not hide its ugly

The satirical writer, referring to the “shadow of little things”, to the “cold,

fragmented, everyday characters", must have a subtle feeling

your measure, artistic tact, passionate love for nature. Knowing about

difficult, harsh field of a satirical writer, Gogol still did not renounce

from him and became one, taking the following words as the motto of his work:

the son of his homeland could, in the conditions of Nikolaev Russia, dare to bring to

light of the bitter truth in order to promote the shattered creativity

the reduction of the feudal-serf system, thereby promoting the movement

Russia forward.

In "The Inspector General" Gogol "collected into one pile everything bad in Russia"

brought out a whole gallery of bribe takers, embezzlers, ignoramuses, fools, liars

and so on. Everything in The Inspector General is funny: the plot itself, when the first person of the city

mistakes for an auditor from the capital a idle talker, a man with an extraordinary

ease of thought", Khlestakov's transformation from the cowardly "elistra-

Tishki" into "general" (after all, those around him take him for the general-

la), the scene of Khlestakov’s lies, the scene of a declaration of love for two yes-

mom, and, of course, the denouement and the silent comedy scene.

Gogol did not bring out a “positive hero” in his comedy. Polo-

living principle in The Inspector General, which embodied the high moral

the writer’s personal and social ideal, which underlies his satire,

became “laughter,” the only “honest face” in comedy. It was laughter, pi-

sal Gogol, “who completely disappears from the bright nature of man...

because at its bottom there is an eternally flowing spring, which deepens

the object, makes something stand out brightly that would have slipped through without

the penetrating power of which the trifles and emptiness of life would not frighten so much

person."

Satirically depicting the nobility and bureaucratic society,

endlessly loves his native country and its people. Evil satire serves precisely

this great love. Condemning everything bad in the public and state

a way out in serf Rus'. Gogol writes with deep love about the people

de. There is no more accusatory satire here, only sadness about

some aspects of the life of the people generated by serfdom. Write-

I am optimistic and deeply believe in the bright future of Russia.

I would like to finish the work with the lines of Nekrasov:

They curse him from all sides,

And just seeing his corpse,

They will understand how much he has done

And how he loved while hating.

N.V. GOGOL IS THE GREAT SATIRIST.

Lesson objectives: recall the works of N.V. Gogol, studied in grades 5–7; conduct a comparative mini-analysis of prose fragments of the works of A. S. Pushkin, M. Yu. Lermontov and N. V. Gogol; teach to use vocabulary and constructions in the reader’s statement with the meaning of similarities and differences in the writer’s style, its originality; introduce the ideological concept and compositional features of the comedy “The Inspector General”.

During the classes

II. Communicate the topic and objectives of the lesson.

1. Introductory speech by the teacher.

I hope you guessed that, following Lermontov, we have to read N.V. Gogol. What if you try to compare Lermontov and Mr. Ogol? Isn’t it interesting to compare Gogol’s pages with Lermontov’s prose, and at the same time return to the prose of another brilliant master - A. S. Pushkin? I am sure that you have already noticed that there is no hard boundary between poetic and prose works: in prose we discover poetry every now and then, and in poetry sometimes we discover prose, not to mention the fact that the artist, created, it would seem, exclusively for poetry ( Pushkin and Lermontov!), suddenly turn to prose, and it is not inferior to his poetry, and the prose writer sometimes creates talented poetic works (this often happened with Turgenev!).

2. Quiz “Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol.”

So, the quiz “Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol”: find out the author and justify the ownership of the quoted fragment, name the work.

1) Reading a fragment of Gogol’s story “Nevsky Prospekt”.

- Who is this? Of course, Gogol! Gogol is immediately betrayed by the picturesqueness of the description, its careful detail, with the elaboration of every detail, right down to the watchman, covered with matting and climbing onto the ladder. Did you notice the spaciousness of the phrase and the complexity of the syntax? Try reading Gogol's phrase quickly! Nothing will work! Yes, Gogol needs to be read slowly, looking at the slightest detail of the picture, listening to every word! Have you noticed the writer’s predilection for adjectives and epithets?! What about the overall tone of the picture, its coloring? It is extremely clear, quite realistic, and at the same time light and shadows, a touch of “temptation” and mystery. Have you guessed which work of Gogol we are talking about? The city, and by no means a provincial one, is crowded, with a vigilant guard; “Police Bridge”, and if it’s a “bridge”, then it’s also a river... Before us is Gogol’s Petersburg, its “Nevsky Prospekt”!

“...he arrived in St. Petersburg, stayed in the Izmailovsky regiment...”

– Is there anything in common? Undoubtedly: both here and there - St. Petersburg. Just presented differently. What differences give a sharp originality to one page and another, immediately revealing the author?

How extensive and detailed Gogol's page is, so laconic and restrained is the narration in the work of the second author. Pay attention to the accuracy of place, time and the action itself (not so much how, what is it like, How many What And Where happened)! How does the author choose grammatical forms? He prefers nouns and verbs: objects and actions! Prose, restrained in style, laconic and dynamic: every phrase is an event, an action!

I hope you recognized the signs of Pushkin’s prose in “The Station Agent”?

3) And here is another fragment:

“...The most charming forehead was dazzlingly white and covered with hair as beautiful as agate. They curled like wonderful curls..."

Well, the generosity of verbal painting (the artist, when creating a portrait, does not spare paint!), combined with the extreme emotionality of the author’s speech and even its ornateness, with the writer’s frank admiration for the beauty revealed to him, betray Gogol. But what page of him, whose charm was captured so inspired by the artist? (This is also “Nevsky Prospekt”, a lovely stranger, after whom the artist Piskarev rushed, to his misfortune.)

4) And here is another meeting with a captivating young creature:

“...A girl of about fourteen came out from behind the partition and ran into the hallway. Her beauty struck me.”

The theme and subject of the image are the same: female beauty. But how differently it is conveyed! Instead of a dazzling “Gogol” portrait there is a calm, even narration, and at the same time the author does not hide his feelings, but his recognition is just as calm and laconic: “Her beauty amazed me,” and instead of enthusiastic intonations and epithets full of admiration (“wonderful curls") – a few details of the portrait and behavior (“lowered her big blue eyes”, “answered... without any timidity” - and that’s all!) in the same calm, narrative manner... Guessed it?

(“Stationmaster” by A.S. Pushkin.)

5) What do you say about this:

“The sun was already beginning to hide behind the snow ridge when I left for the Koishauri Valley...”

It would seem that the problem can be solved easily: the Caucasus betrays Lermontov! Although Pushkin also has Caucasian sketches - in the essay “Travel to Arzrum”. However, it is too whimsical and picturesque for Pushkin’s prose, rather close to Gogol’s with its tendency to intensify pictorial details, thicken colors, syntactic complexity and pathos. And if you also feel the threatening mystery of the mountain landscape, something magical in the “black gorge full of darkness” and in the river with its “snake” sparkle, the closeness to Gogol’s prose will become all the more certain. However, this is Lermontov, the beginning of Bela. It turns out how close he is to Gogol! But is it only him?

6) Do you remember this:

“The cross on the grave staggered, and a dried-up dead man quietly rose from it...”?

Where is this from:

“...At that moment someone else approached the gate and was about to enter... The room was full of dead people...”?

I’m glad that many people recognized Pushkin’s “Undertaker.”

3. Summarizing the results of the research quiz.

Perhaps we have the right to say that Gogol seemed to unite many of his contemporaries in his style; at the same time, his pages are sharply set off by the originality of other writers, even where we find a “Gogolian” beginning in them.

III. Work on a new topic.

1. Conversation.

– Do you like theater? Is he close to you? Are you interested?

– Do you know how a performance is created?

Here are a few key words (based on them, tell us about the birth of the play):

2. Dramatization (appearance 3, house I with Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky).

Now listen:

Bobchinsky. Emergency!

Dobchinsky. Unexpected news!

All. What? What's happened? (pp. 276–280, textbook).

3. Teacher (continuation of conversation).

Are you perplexed? Yes, it's Gogol! But, you see, it’s completely different, unknown to us yet. Gogol the playwright! How could it happen: after “Evenings...”, “Mirgorod”, Gogol creates not a story or a story, but... a play?

– Give a synonym for the word “play.” (Dramatic work.)

– How does a dramatic work differ from others, how do you define them in comparison with dramatic works?

Let's transfer the terminology that we are starting to get used to in our notebooks:

Literary works

What about plays and dramatic works? (Of course, they can be read, and are read, even engrossed! But still, dramatic works are created for the theater, for the stage.)

– What is the play?

Let's open any page of Gogol's play. They immediately noticed that the play had no narration or description, and almost no original text.

A dramatic work is the speech of the characters, the dialogues of the characters in the play, and sometimes, when the hero is left alone on stage, he has to pronounce monologues.

Write down the words-terms that we could not do without, explain their etymology and meaning.

So, Gogol and the theater. An unexpected discovery: it turns out that Gogol’s narrative pages are thoroughly scenic! It is no coincidence that Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov, a great writer of the 20th century, in love with Gogol’s work, created a brilliant play, dramatizing Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls,” and the Moscow Art Theater brilliantly stages this performance to this day.

Gogol and the theater... Isn't Gogol's path to drama connected with the circumstances of his life?

“A play truly lives only on stage,” Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol once remarked. It turns out that without a stage, without a theater, a play, without acquiring “real” life, may well die?

We involuntarily feel some kind of special relationship between Gogol and the theater, a kinship with it, a love for the stage, for the theater, for the actors...

Let’s open a kind of introduction to the comedy “The Inspector General”, let’s read only its title for now: “Characters and costumes. Notes for gentlemen actors."

Have you noticed how Gogol, breaking a ban that no playwright had violated before, allowed himself a lengthy and completely independent author’s text? Probably, the writer was so worried about the fate of his first dramatic work: what if it was played incorrectly, that he interfered in the preparation of the performance, in rehearsals, explaining the character of each character.

What is the address of this Gogol page? (“... for gentlemen actors”!)

Find another theatrical term and check its meaning in the dictionary. (Role - type of acting roles. A. reasoner.)

And finally, Gogol’s “gentlemen actors”!

What a pity that we know too little about the history of the theater, and it is difficult for us to imagine how the theater regulars loved to humiliate the actors, how despicable the acting title itself was. And suddenly: “... for gentlemen actors”!

Where does this reverence for the theater come from? n the need to feel like an actor, and certainly playing each character in turn, or a director? But it all starts from childhood! And the theater entered Gogol’s life just as poetry entered Pushkin’s soul - in infancy, “with the first concepts.” The serf theater, which glorified the estate of its neighbor, the landowner Troshchinsky, is the first unforgettable impressions of the future writer, his theatrical impressions. And then school years! A student of the Nezhin Lyceum, Gogol-Yanovsky felt an uncontrollable attraction to acting, to stage transformation, imagining himself on stage. How could he not infect his comrades with a plan that had long been matured in him and demanded implementation: to create his own theater at the lyceum! Gogol will forever remember his “premiere,” in which he participated both as a director and as an actor.

What play do you think Gogol and his “troupe” chose?

Fonvizinsky's "Undergrowth"! Fonvizin was Gogol's idol. Who do you think Gogol played in Fonvizin’s comedy? Mrs. Prostakova appeared before the audience! Do you want to know how Gogol’s venture ended both with the theater and with the role of Mrs. Prostakova? According to eyewitnesses, the premiere of the Lyceum Theater was a triumph, and the culprit of the success was Gogol, who talentedly staged the play and equally successfully and talentedly played Mrs. Prostakova.

Shouldn’t we “repeat” Gogol too? Shouldn't we transfer his experience to the comedy "The Inspector General"?

Homework: get acquainted with the textbook article “On the conception, writing and production of The Inspector General” (pp. 247–250); prepare an expressive reading for the roles of acts I and II of the comedy (distribute roles); individual task: a story about the theater and your theatrical impressions using special (theatrical) vocabulary: vestibule, foyer, auditorium, stalls, amphitheater, boxes, intermission; performance, premiere, director, acting troupe, composer, conductor, orchestra, musical introduction (introduction, prologue); watch with bated breath; listen to the actor’s voice, its intonation, peer into the faces of the performers; be transported into the world created on stage; have compassion, have difficulty holding back tears; laugh heartily; admire the art of the creators of the play.

Lesson 33

“THE AUDITOR”: THE FIRST AND SECOND ACTS.
KHLESTAKOV AND “MIRANGE INTRIGE” (YU. MANN)

Lesson objectives: introduce, comment and discuss the events and characters of acts I and II of the comedy; start working on drawing up a quotation plan; work on expressive reading by role.

During the classes

I. Organizational moment.

II. Checking homework.

1. Experiments in oral compositions (individual assignment).

– How did you feel creating your own work about the theater - or more precisely, about yourself in the theater?

– What was achieved relatively easily (if, of course, it was possible)?

- What caused the pain? Did you manage to overcome them?

2. Review of the first experiences of theatrical essays (reflections, free thoughts, as if alone with oneself).

– What hasn’t worked out yet?

3. Retelling of an article from the textbook “On the concept, production and writing of the “auditor”.

III. Work on a new topic.

1. The teacher's word.

So, isn’t it time for us to make a stop in the city where Skvoznik-Dmukhanovsky rules, and justice is administered by Lyapkin-Tyapkin, in company with policemen Ukhovertov, Svistunov and Derzhimorda, where Artemy Filippovich Strawberry is in charge of the hospitals, and the district doctor Christian Ivanovich Gibner heals the sick. ..

So, "The Inspector". Comedy in five acts.

“There’s no point in blaming the mirror, / if your face is crooked.” Popular proverb.

- What kind of auditor does an auditor have to be to end up in a comedy? And what kind of auditor is he after that?

And then there’s the epigraph: “There’s no point in blaming the mirror...”

Remember the epigraph to Pushkin’s “The Captain’s Daughter,” which also opens with a folk proverb. In Pushkin it is inviting and pathetic: “Take care of your honor from a young age,” in Gogol it is provoking and mocking: “mirror” and “face” reflected in it!

Not a single playwright has opened a play like this: so that nothing seems to have happened in it, but at the same time almost “everything” has already happened, happened, and this “everything” is the mood of the reader-spectator: he cannot help laughing at such a “mirror” and such a “face”.

Let's try to imagine what the “city fathers” would look like in your performance.

2. Reading by roles (I act, phenomenon 1).

3. Conversation about what you read.

– Who and how is depicted in Gogol? Such important and respectable “city fathers,” and suddenly only a few timid, incoherent words were able to utter, as if speechless: “How’s the auditor?” How pathetic and ridiculous this fear of officials is!

– What lines of Gogol’s characters in “The Inspector General” were immediately remembered and seemed especially successful and expressive? (“Like an auditor?”, “Here you go!”, “You’re not that, you’re not...”, about “sins,” about “war.”)

– How were these assumptions about the reason for the unexpected visit of the auditor met? (Of course, this is funny and stupid. But they are important, with knowledge of the matter, doing their best! Why? Yes, everyone wants to seem smarter and more knowledgeable than the other: well, isn’t it Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky?!)

“But it all started with basic fear.” Do Gogol's officials, and even the atmosphere of Act 1, change?

Let us recall once again the verbosity of the mayor and the ornateness of his first phrase, which opened the Gogol comedy “I invited you...”. He is official and significant, there is even some kind of solemnity in his tone and words, in the complexity of the phrase. Is it possible to suspect the mayor of cowardice based on this phrase (“unpleasant news: an auditor is coming to see us”), based on the way it was pronounced? No way! Although he, as a “smart person”, will not miss what “floats into his hands” and his “sins”!.. But with what dignity does he hold himself, while instilling fear in the officials? How did he do this? Please note that the mayor does not immediately inform the officials of the “unpleasant news”, but gradually, keeping silent about the most unpleasant and dangerous for now: having prepared his colleagues for the coming troubles and having heard their first perplexed questions, he reports the most alarming detail calmly, as if nothing had happened : “Inspector from St. Petersburg, incognito. And with a secret order."

How brilliantly Gogol “...starts” the comedy and constructs dialogues and individual lines, how important even subtle details are for him, right down to a single word or punctuation. This is how you should read Gogol, taking in the details of genius.

While reading, we not only hear, but also see any Gogol character. How? Whereby?

– Let us turn again to the text, to the episode of the mayor reading a letter: “Dear friend, godfather and virtue (mutters in a low voice, quickly running his eyes... significantly raises his finger up)” .

But Christian Ivanovich Gibner: makes a sound somewhat similar to the letter “i” and somewhat similar to “e”.

– So we discovered another secret of the play: even a dramatic work cannot do without the author’s word. Remarque- a kind of hint to the actor. “The Inspector General” is simply replete with remarks! They are very laconic, syntactically not related to the text and are not pronounced, but are only read in order to be played, and are enclosed in parentheses in the text of the play.

4. The first stage test of the comedy and its background.

– And now I would like to invite you to look at Gogol’s comedy through the eyes of the author: did he foresee how his contemporaries would greet his “The Government Inspector”?

Imagine: at the Maly Theater at the first performance of “The Inspector General” - not a single laugh (!), in the role of the mayor - the public’s favorite, the famous Mikhail Semenovich Shchepkin, and - deathly silence from the audience. The author rushes around behind the scenes, convinced that his comedy has failed. And as soon as, at the end of the 1st act, Shchepkin, who had not yet cooled down from the role, appeared before Gogol, the writer, almost crying, asked him: “Is it really a failure?” The actor responded with bewilderment: “Where did you get the idea, Nikolai Vasilyevich?” - “But no one laughed!” - Gogol said in confusion. “Yes, we didn’t laugh,” Shchepkin agreed, smiling. - so what? And how could they laugh if those sitting below are those who take bribes, and at the top (balcony, gallery, cheaper tickets) are those who give them.”

The events in Gogol’s comedy are so natural, believable, they are so everyday that one involuntarily wants to know: did such a case with officials who were deceived about the auditor really happen or did Gogol come up with it all?

Student's story about the history of comedy (homework).

Teacher's word.

Yes, Pushkin prompted Gogol to create “The Inspector General” by telling him a story that happened in a provincial town with his friend; It’s not difficult to imagine it from Gogol’s comedy, but Khlestakov has nothing to do with it. After all, finding himself in Khlestakov’s place, Pushkin’s friend behaved completely differently than Gogol’s hero: he hastened to leave the overly hospitable city, to escape from the embrace of hospitable officials.

Having given the plot to Gogol, Pushkin dreamed that his future creation would become a real holiday of laughter. With his comedy, Gogol ridiculed what we had become accustomed to for centuries, he ridiculed the familiar!

And again scenes from a comedy come to mind.

Recreation in an emotional and playful retelling scenes of an argument between the mayor and the judge about the fact that each of them takes bribes .

Teacher's conclusion.

Pay attention to how persistent the judge is in his ideas about a bribe, especially since he professes quite original views, which, like the rest of his views, “he arrived at on his own, with his own mind.”

But behind every bribe there is a person, the one to whom it is given, and Gogol’s comedy amazes with the large number of bribe takers!

The playwright reduced the bribe to comic absurdity, since bribe takers are absurd, insignificant, and ridiculous. So why do they please such a nonentity, a wicked little thing, Khlestakov, with bribes?

Because he is an important thing in the capital, which the officials did not doubt for a moment, an “auditor”, “and incognito”, and, moreover, “with a secret order”!

And gentlemen officials cannot, do not want to deprive themselves of the trade to which they are accustomed and which feeds them more than the civil service - to deprive themselves of a bribe!

What is going on in the city, why is a bribe so necessary?

How to present the city that the auditor is to examine?

Gogol coped with this task brilliantly: his characters suddenly began to talk with all their might, and their chatter immediately transports the reader to different “institutions” of the city - be it a court, a hospital or an “educational institution.”

5. Monologue statements by students about the court, hospital, school.

6. Analysis of Act II.

Teacher's word .

In Gogol’s “The Inspector General,” no matter what the new scene, there is certainly a climax!

Why are the officials and the city so funny? Just because it is impenetrably stupid, this city, however, does not doubt its “learning” and “wisdom”! That is why the mayor, the judge, Zemlyanika, and even the almost speechless Luka Lukich Khlopov are so fond of launching into thoughtful discussions. This is probably why the scene where Dobchinsky and Bobchinsky warm up the officials with their “version” about the mysterious “incognito” from St. Petersburg is so hilarious.

Gogol’s brilliant move: he put us, readers and viewers, in a position more advantageous than the one in which, by his own authorial will, the characters are: we know who Khlestakov is, but the mayor has “damned incognito” on his mind, and Almost a farce is playing out before us. Khlestakov and the mayor instill fear in each other, competing in both fear and servility. After all, they cannot understand each other, they resist, fight off each other - well, Khlestakov does not want to move to a new apartment, and the mayor pins all his hopes for mutual understanding with the auditor only on this.

7. Reading by roles (Act II, phenomenon 8).

– What do they agree on? On a bribe! She, damn it, made them related.

And then, between four walls, without witnesses (as it should be according to the “laws” of bribery), a bribe, and, of course, a larger one than asked, obviously “in debt,” their Excellency “screwed” Strawberry to Khlestakov, repeating the mayor ...

A significant event has happened: those who are accustomed to taking bribes are now just as accustomed to giving them! By the will of Gogol, the bribe-taker turned into a bribe-giver!

You have to stoop so low as to fork out for it yourself, and how!

IV. Summing up the lesson.

– Don’t you remember the beginning of the stage history of “The Inspector General”? Yes, Shchepkin’s explanation: why the audience didn’t laugh.

Gogol's comedy introduces a significant clarification into the thought of the great actor: if the audience was divided into those who take and those who give bribes, then Gogol's comedy united them: and those who take inevitably become givers! It is not so important whether the bureaucratic spectators of Gogol’s comedy experienced this on their own skin or were dismayed by the prospect that the writer suddenly opened up for them, turning an important person into a “fiend” - the opposite of what Khlestakov tried to do to himself: their reputation as Gogol’s laughter dealt an irreparable blow!

Homework: prepare an expressive reading based on the roles of Act III; Continue drawing up the quotation plan.

Lesson 34

"THE AUDITOR": THIRD ACT.
THE CITY OFFICER'S FAMILY

Literature teacher

Municipal educational institution "Secondary school No. 83", Barnaul

- satirist writer.

The vital basis of the comedy "The Inspector General".

Knowledge in the lesson: humor and satire as the basis of artistic style

During the classes.

I. Repetition. What works of Gogol do you know? What literary characters created by the writer do you remember? How do they attract your attention?

II. What biographical facts influenced the formation of his creative style?

Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol was born on March 20, 1809 in the town of Velikiye Sorochintsy, Mirgorod district, Poltava province. He was named Nicholas in honor of the miraculous icon of St. Nicholas, kept in the church of the village of Dikanka.

He spent his childhood years in his native estate Vasilievka (another name is Yanovshchina). The Gogols had over 1000 acres of land and about 400 serfs.

The writer's father, Vasily Afanasyevich Gogol-Yanovsky, served at the Little Russian Post Office, retired with the rank of collegiate assessor in 1805 and married Maria Ivanovna Kosyarovskaya, who came from a landowner family. The story of his marriage is interesting: as if the Mother of God appeared to him in a dream and pointed to a certain child. Later, he recognized this same child in Maria Ivanovna. In the early 20s, he became close friends with former Minister of Justice Dmitry Prokofievich Troshchinsky, who lived in the village of Kibintsy and set up a home theater here. Gogol was the director of this theater and an actor. For this theater he composed comedies in the Little Russian language.

Gogol's mother came from a landowner family. According to legend, she was the first beauty in the Poltava region. He married Vasily Afanasyevich at the age of fourteen. Her family life was the calmest, but Maria Ivanovna was distinguished by increased impressionability, religiosity and superstition. In addition to Nikolai, the family had five more children.

Initially, Gogol studied at the Poltava district school, and in 1821 he entered the newly founded Nizhyn Gymnasium of Higher Sciences. Gogol was a fairly average student, but distinguished himself in the gymnasium theater as an actor and decorator. He performs comic roles with particular success. The first literary experiments date back to the gymnasium period, for example, the satire “Something about Nezhin, or the law is not written for fools” (not preserved).

Most of all, however, Gogol is occupied by the thought of the state. service in the field of justice. After graduating from the gymnasium in December 1829, Gogol went to St. Petersburg. In his dreams, St. Petersburg was a magical land, where people enjoy all material and spiritual blessings, where they are waging a great struggle against evil - and suddenly, instead of all this, a dirty, uncomfortable, furnished room, worries about how to have a cheaper dinner, anxiety at the sight of How quickly the wallet, which seemed inexhaustible in Nizhyn, is being emptied.

Experiencing financial difficulties, unsuccessfully fussing about a place, Gogol made his first literary attempts: at the beginning of 1829, the poem “Italy” appeared, and in the spring of the same year, under the pseudonym V. Alov, Gogol published “an idyll in pictures, “Hanz Küchelgarten.” The poem caused harsh and mocking reviews. In his first years in St. Petersburg, Gogol changed many apartments. Zverkov's house probably did not become the happiest place for him. Hanz Küchelgarten was written around this time. But he burned his unsuccessful opus not here at all, but in a hotel room specially rented for this purpose.

At the end of 1829, he managed to decide to serve in the department of state economy and public buildings of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. His stay in the office caused Gogol deep disappointment in government service, but provided him with rich material for future works.

Over the years, “Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka” was published, which aroused universal admiration.

From 1831 to 1836, Gogol lived almost entirely in St. Petersburg. This time was the period of his most intense literary activity. In 1835 Gogol's collection Mirgorod was published. Critics were unanimous in their assessment of Gogol's talent, they especially singled out the story "Taras Bulba".

While working on stories, Gogol also tried his hand at drama. The theater seemed to him a great force of exceptional importance in public education. In 1835, The Inspector General was written, the plot of which was suggested by Pushkin. On April 19, 1836, the premiere of “The Inspector General” took place on the stage of the Alexandria Theater in St. Petersburg, which was attended by the author who approved the play for production and publication. For a copy of The Inspector General, presented to the Emperor, Gogol received a diamond ring.

Soon after the production of The Inspector General, hounded by the reactionary press, Gogol went abroad. In total, he lived there for twelve years. The writer lived in Germany, Switzerland, France, Austria, the Czech Republic, but most of all in Italy. Abroad, he writes his main book-poem “Dead Souls”, there he learns about the death of Pushkin.

In 1848, Gogol returned to Russia and settled in the house of Count Alexander Petrovich Tolstoy on Nikitsky Boulevard. There he occupied two rooms on the first floor: one served as a reception room, the other as an office, which connected through a door with the people's room. Here Gogol was looked after like a child, given complete freedom in everything. He didn't care about anything. Lunch, tea, dinner were served wherever ordered.

The writer's death followed on February 21, 1852 at about 8 o'clock in the morning. The day before, late in the evening, he said loudly: “Stairs, quickly, give me the stairs.”

Gogol's death still remains a mystery. To some extent, light is shed on the mysteries of Gogol’s biography by the story of the writer’s sister Olga Vasilyevna: “He was very afraid of the cold. The last time he left here, from Vasilyevka, with the intention of spending the winter in Rome, but he stopped by Moscow, where his friends began to beg him to stay, to live in Russia, and not to leave for Rome. My brother made a lot of excuses and kept repeating that frosts were harmful to him. And they made fun of him, assuring him that it all seemed so to him, that he would survive the winter in Russia just fine. We persuaded my brother. He stayed and died. Then my eldest son died. Then our old house became unbearable for us. There is a popular belief: if a contractor building a house becomes angry with the owner and if he “mortgages the house on his head,” then misfortunes will loom over that house. All the men in our family died. We decided that this house was cursed, and tore it down, and built a new one, although almost next to the old one, but still in a different place. And this strange phenomenon happened after the old house was destroyed. On the eve of Easter, the maid had a dream that the old house was intact, and there she saw many men who had already died, describing the appearance of even those whom she had never seen. Perhaps it was in the house that the reasons for the family's misfortunes lay. After the house was demolished, everything went well. Many children were born who lived long and were healthy. However, there was not the slightest sign of talent in them.”

In a strange way, Gogol probably foresaw his death. He always avoided meeting with the kindest and sweetest Moscow “doctor of the poor” Fyodor Petrovich Gaaz. However, on the night of New Year 1852, he accidentally met a doctor coming out of the rooms of the owner of the house where the writer lived. In his broken Russian, Haaz wished him with all his kind heart a new year that would grant him an eternal year. Indeed, the leap year of 1852 brought the writer together with eternity, just as his works remained in the eternal world history of literature.

Gogol was buried in the Donskoy Monastery. In 1931, Gogol's remains were moved to the Novodevichy cemetery.

III. In “An Actor's Confession” he explains why humor and satire became decisive in his work. What task did Gogol set for himself when starting to create the comedy “The Inspector General”?

Reading and discussion of the textbook article “The Great Satirist About Himself.” (Textbook-reader. Author-compiler. Mnemosyne. M. 2000).

IV. Gogol had his own ideas about the comedy genre.

What dramatic works (plays) have you read? What satirical works are you familiar with?

V. Drama as a type of literature.

VI. The teacher's word about the creation of "The Inspector General".

In October 1835, Pushkin handed over the plot of “The Inspector General” to Gogol, rough sketches appeared in December, the first edition appeared in 1836, and in total Gogol worked on the text of the comedy for 17 years. The text of 1842 is considered definitive.

Gogol dreamed of returning comedy to its lost meaning. The theater is a great school: it reads a live, useful lesson to a whole crowd at a time. The plot of the comedy is not original. Previously known plays: Kvitko-Osnovyanenko “A Visitor from the Capital, or Turmoil in a County Town” and Alexander Veltman “Provincial Actors”.

Gogol was accused of plagiarism, but the novelty of his play is that the person mistaken for an auditor did not intend to deceive anyone.

The theme of the comedy is taken from reality itself. The situation at that time was such that the governor was the complete owner of the province, and the mayor was the complete owner of the district city. Arbitrariness and unrest reigned everywhere. The only thing holding me back was the fear of the auditor from St. Petersburg. Gogol took an old theme (abuse of office) and created a work that turned out to be an indictment against the entire Russian statehood of Nicholas I.

Does the comedy theme sound modern?

The first production of the play was received ambiguously. The social significance of the play was not immediately understood. At the premiere on April 19, 1836 at the Alexandria Theater in St. Petersburg, Tsar Nicholas I was present, who was pleased with the performance: “Everyone got it here, and most of all I.”

How did it happen that, given such an assessment, the play saw the light of day? Apparently, at first it was approved personally by Nicholas I, who did not understand all its enormous revealing power. Most likely, Nicholas I believed that Gogol laughed at the ordinary towns and their life, which the tsar himself despised from his height. He did not understand the true meaning of The Inspector General. Bewilderment gripped the first spectators. Confusion turned into indignation. The officials did not want to recognize themselves. The general verdict: “This is an impossibility, slander and a farce.”

The satirical power of this work was such that Gogol incurred fierce attacks from reactionary circles. This and dissatisfaction with the St. Petersburg production, which reduced social comedy to the level of vaudeville, cause depression and departure abroad.

VII. Heroes of Gogol's comedy.

VIII. Gogol's laughter did a great job. He had enormous destructive power. He destroyed the legend about the inviolability of the feudal-landowner foundations, brought justice to them, and awakened faith in the possibility of a different, more perfect reality.

A satirical writer, turning to the “shadow of little things”, to “cold, fragmented, everyday characters,” must have a subtle sense of proportion, artistic tact, and a passionate love of nature. Knowing about the difficult, harsh field of a satirical writer, Gogol still did not renounce it and became one, taking the following words as the motto of his work: “Who, if not the author, should tell the holy truth.”