"House with a Mezzanine": hero and idea in Chekhov's world

Unlike "The Black Monk," this Chekhov story was never called "mysterious." All those who have written about him proceed from general premises and rely on similar observations. But - such is the objective complexity of Chekhov’s “transparent” poetics - a certain unity at the “input” nevertheless leads to significant differences at the “output”. * “House with a Mezzanine” is associated with the “theme of simplicity” (G. P. Berdnikov), defined as a story about failed love (B. F. Egorov, V. B. Kataev), connected to the consideration of the problem of small benefits and big deeds, internal rightness and hypocrisy, dogmatism and eternal quest (A. A. Belkin). The range of answers about the essence of the author’s position is equally wide: from the debunking of Lida (G. P. Berdnikov) to the idea of ​​“equal distribution” of Chekhov’s position associated with the concept of V. B. Kataev (“equal distribution does not allow us to see in the story the intention to blame one side and the other justify") and B.F. Egorov’s confessions about the lack of agreement and ambiguity of the text. Thus, the problems of the relationship between the hero and the idea in Chekhov’s world and the specifics of the author’s position are again objectively in the spotlight. However, they, of course, also include other aspects of Chekhov’s poetics (detail, leitmotif, principle of contrast and counterpoint), which will also be discussed.

* (See: Sobolev P.V. From observations on the composition of A.P. Chekhov’s story “House with a Mezzanine” // Uchen. zap. Leningr. ped. in-ta. 1958. T. 170. P. 231-252; Paperny 3. S. A. P. Chekhov. M. I960. pp. 138-151; Nazarenko V. Lida, Zhenya and Czech scholars... //Question. lit. 1963. No. 11. P. 124-141; Berdnikov G. P. A. P. Chekhov: Ideological and creative quests. M. 1970. P. 363-370; Belkin A. A. “House with a mezzanine” // Belkin A. A. Reading Dostoevsky and Chekhov. M. 1973. S. 230-264; Egorov B. F. The structure of the story “House with a Mezzanine” // In Chekhov’s creative laboratory. M. 1974. S. 253-269; Tsilevich L. M. The plot of Chekhov's story. Riga. 1976. pp. 147-160; Kataev V.B. Chekhov's prose: problems of interpretation. M. 1979. pp. 226-238; and etc.)

It is obvious that in "The House with a Mezzanine" there are two storylines: a "love plot" and an "ideological dispute"; A. A. Belkin defined them in his time, L. M. Tsilevich holds a similar opinion, and other researchers proceed from it, without always formulating it directly. Since the first storyline does not boil down to the artist’s love, but also includes his relationship with Lida, Belokurov, and a story about his lifestyle, it would be more accurately described as everyday. Thus, constructive basis The story turns out to be a correlation between everyday and ideological plots. * The first forms the plot basis of “The House with a Mezzanine”, the second grows on it, concentrating mainly in the third chapter. Let us first turn to the “ideological” plot in order to then find out how it is linked to the basis of the plot and included in the overall structure of the story.

* (For brevity, this word is sometimes used in the sense of “plot line,” although we proceed from the monologue of the plot in a literary work.)

The conflict between the main characters is clearly outlined at the beginning of the second chapter. Here, in the indirect speech of the narrator, a descriptive “silent” scene is given, which is then “voiced” and translated into dialogue: “She didn’t like me. She didn’t like me because I’m a landscape painter and don’t depict people’s needs in my paintings and that I , as it seemed to her, was indifferent to what she so strongly believed in... Outwardly, she did not in any way express her dislike for me, but I felt it and, sitting on the lower step of the terrace, felt irritated and said that I should treat men “not being a doctor means deceiving them and that it is easy to be a benefactor when you have two thousand dessiatines” (9.178).

And this dialogue, this ideological dispute, occupies the entire third chapter of the story, becoming its culmination. The positions of the parties are indicated very clearly. The heroine passionately and persistently protects hospitals, first aid kits, libraries - what she does every day. “In a dispute with the artist,” writes E. A. Polotskaya, commenting on the story in an academic collection of works, “Lida Volchaninova puts forward arguments that any zemstvo doctor or teacher who has found his calling in helping the rural poor has addressed” (9.493). This twenty-three-year-old girl is a devoted ideologist of “small things”. “The position of the artist is more difficult to determine,” continues E. A. Polotskaya. And further he refers to F.I. Evnin and V.B. Kataev, who compared some of the artist’s judgments with the views of the late Tolstoy in the treatise “So what should we do?” and the article "On Hunger". These parallels are important, but, as in the case of the sources of Kovrin's delirium in The Black Monk, they are probably not the only ones. The ideal of overcoming social barriers, a universal division of labor and a joint struggle against the main enemy of man - death, is strikingly reminiscent... of the philosophical and religious utopia of N. F. Fedorov, not yet made public, but known in the 90s in retellings and lists, which, between By the way, at this time Tolstoy also sympathized. * IN in this case for Chekhov, too, a certain type, a way of philosophizing, is probably important, and not its specific prototype.

* (See, for example: Fedorov N. F. Works. M. 1982. pp. 373-374. - In comparison with Tolstoy, everything is also not so simple. After all, the hero’s ironic mention of “books with pitiful instructions and jokes” can also be correlated with Tolstoy’s activities in the 80s and 90s.)

If we consider the dispute between the characters in the third chapter of “The House with a Mezzanine” in isolation, the artist seems to obviously lose in it. His hysterical: “And I don’t want to work and won’t... Nothing is needed, let the earth fall into tartar!” - looks much more vulnerable than the heroine’s confident judgment: “It’s easier to deny hospitals and schools than to treat and teach” (9.187).

However, it is important to separate the personal position of those arguing from the system of ideas that they preach. In the story, a pragmatist and a dreamer collide. Lida insists: something needs to be done Now. The artist offers a different picture of the “common cause”; he openly philosophizes And dreams. He denies not so much real medical centers and schools, but the hope for them as a way to solve all problems. He speaks from the position of utopia, knowing this very well himself. But poor Anna died today, “and if there had been a medical center nearby, she would have remained alive” - such an argument of the heroine may seem murderous, her opponent - a person almost consciously justifying social injustice. “It’s not important that Anna died...” But what could be more important?

But this statement is not at all as heartless and selfish as it may seem. After all, the artist’s utopia (like Fedorov’s!) includes faith: death for him ends only earthly existence. “She spoke to me about God, about eternal life, about the miraculous,” conversations with Zhenya are described in the chapter preceding the ideological duel. “And I, who did not admit that I and my imagination would perish forever after death, answered: “Yes, people are immortal,” “yes, eternal life awaits us”” (9.180). It is precisely and only for this reason that it does not matter to him that Anna died, but it is important and essential that Anna, the Moors and Pelagia live their earthly lives better, have time to think about the soul and engage in spiritual activity.

The ideological dispute in the third chapter remains unfinished not only because the disputants failed to convince each other. “Everyone in the village is sleeping... Both the innkeeper and the horse thieves are sleeping peacefully, and we, decent people, irritate each other and argue” (9.188). It is paradoxically oriented in relation to the position of the author. “This is perhaps the first time in the history of art when a writer’s beliefs are given to people of directly opposite directions. This has never happened before, but you can’t figure it out,” wrote A. A. Belkin. * Here we immediately habitually recall the words that are so popular today after the works of M. M. Bakhtin about the dialogical approach of Chekhov to his characters, analytical coverage of different points of view, ambivalence, etc. V. B. Kataev gravitates towards such a solution to the problem in his article and a book about Chekhov. ** The question, however, deserves to be returned to it again, because the logic of the connection between the hero and the idea in Chekhov’s world is truly unusual and at the same time very fundamental.

* (Belkin A. A. Decree. op. pp. 252-253.)

** (See: Kataev V.B. 1) Hero and idea in the world of Chekhov // Vesti. Moscow un-ta. 1968. No. 6. P. 35-47; 2) Chekhov's prose: problems of interpretation.)

In fact, it is difficult to talk about the author's preference for one or another system of ideas. At the ideological level of the plot, Chekhov’s position can be called dialogical, here the “pros” and “cons” are balanced, the debate is not closed. “In Chekhov’s artistic system, in the purely logical sphere of development of an idea, there is no completeness, logical continuity, exhaustion. This development does not give a dogmatically complete result,” A.P. Chudakov accurately notes. * But can the same be said about the everyday plot, about the attitude not to ideas, but to people who profess them? Even an unbiased reading of the story shows that it is not. The reader's sympathies for the narrator and his beloved and dislike for the beautiful, active heroine - no matter what literary scholars claim - are strictly “programmed” in a literary text. **It is important to understand how and why this is done.

* (Chudakov A.P. Chekhov's Poetics. M. 1971. P. 250.)

** (In 1985, in the ninth grade of one of the Leningrad schools (teacher A.V. Sukhikh), an experiment was conducted to test the initial perception of Chekhov's story. Of the 55 completed questionnaires, only one gave preference to the Chekhov heroine: “As I read the story, my attitude towards Lida did not change. I believe that every woman should have such a strong, unshakable character. I don’t know about others, as they read the story Lida I liked her. I was impressed by her passion and attitude to business" (Chekhov's story is understood here almost through the prism of modern debates about the "business woman"). In all other cases, the schoolchildren, of course, felt not equal distribution, but unidirectionality of the author's sympathies. Here are two typical answers: “Lida is stupid in her stubbornness, she is not inclined to understand people, because the main thing for her is her beliefs”; “The happiness of Misyus and the artist did not happen because Lida took on too much - to decide other people’s destinies. Lida - scary man"She is obsessed with her ideas and beliefs, she has power over her mother and sister and will stop at nothing to dictate her will.")

The hidden contrast between the Volchaninov sisters is indicated at the very beginning of the story, at the first meeting of the narrator with them. "And at the white stone gate that led from the yard into the field, at the old strong gate with lions, stood two girls. One of them, older, thin, pale, very beautiful, with a whole shock of brown hair on her head, with a small stubborn mouth, had a stern expression and barely paid attention to me; the other one, also thin and pale, with a large mouth and big eyes, looked at me in surprise as I passed by, said something in English, was embarrassed, and it seemed to me that these two sweet faces have been familiar to me for a long time" (9, 175). As in the development of an ideological plot, this silent plastic scene will subsequently be “voiced” in the story. Almost all the details of the short “double portrait” will gradually turn into leitmotif details, and it is they, as in other Chekhov texts, that will become the main characterizing and evaluative means. The beauty and stubborn forehead of the elder sister and the pallor and English language younger. But special meaning As the everyday plot develops, one contrasting detail acquires - sight.

At the first meeting, the older sister “barely paid attention” to the stranger, while the younger sister “looked at him in surprise.” The carelessness and disinterest of the gaze, on the one hand, and its intentness and openness, on the other, will gradually turn from external portrait details into internal psychological ones.

Here Lida comes to collect money for fire victims (her second appearance in the story): “Without looking at us, she very seriously and thoroughly told us...” (9.175). Here she was in an argument “she covered herself from me with a newspaper, as if not wanting to listen” (9.184). Finally, at the end of the story, the artist (and the reader) will not see her face at all, only her voice will be heard from behind closed door (9, 190).

The constant portrait gesture of the younger sister, the exact opposite - a surprised look - is also repeated several times, extended in time. “When I arrived, she saw me, blushed slightly, left the book and with animation, looking into my face with her big eyes, told me about what happened...” (9, 179). As I said, in this case it is no less important than the subject of conversation. A little further: “We picked mushrooms and talked, and when she asked about something, she came forward to see my face” (ibid.). Here again the gesture precedes the dialogue, it is more significant and deeper. “Sad eyes fixed on me” (9, 188) is one of the last impressions of the artist in the scene of declaration of love.

The matter, however, does not come down to just these details. The story contains two detailed comparisons that also require adequate reading. “Lida was never affectionate, she only talked about serious things; she lived her own special life and for her mother and sister she was the same sacred, slightly mysterious person as for the sailors the admiral who always sits in his cabin” (9, 181). The ironic mechanism of this comparison is clear: Lida’s alienation from those around her, even her closest ones, is emphasized. Another comparison at the beginning of the same second chapter turns out to be more complex and deeper. Immediately after the artist’s earlier words about the heroine’s dislike for him and his landscapes, his unexpected memory follows: “I remember when I was driving along the shore of Lake Baikal, I met a Buryat girl, in a shirt and pants made of blue daba, riding a horse; I asked at her place, would she sell me her pipe, and while we were talking, she looked with contempt at my European face and at my hat, and in one minute she got tired of talking to me, she whooped and galloped away. And Lida did the same but she despised the stranger in me" (9, 178). More is said here by image than by words, by the author - more than by the narrator-artist. In this case, not only the motive of contempt for “non-believers” and strangers is important, which is also constant for Lida (“... it was noticeable from her tone that she considered my reasoning insignificant and despised them,” the narrator notes during the argument - 9, 185), but also that contempt is almost physiological, fatal and thoughtless, based on complete inattention to the arguments of the opposite side. The Buryat woman despises the hero for his European face and hat. But if the hat can be removed, how can the face be changed? Let us also note in this fragment the meaningful “seemed”: “I, as it seemed to her, was indifferent to what she believed so strongly in.” The narrator, without falling into excuses and embellishment, carefully draws the line between the image that Lida creates and the real state of affairs.

To characterize the black and white world in which the heroine lives, some peripheral characters are also important. In Chekhov's world, in fact, there are no heroes who are outside the main conflict. On a narrow area short story and he simply cannot afford the story. For all the apparent naturalness, the illusion of a “seen life,” his narrative is strictly conceptual, systematic at all levels to a much greater extent than any of the previous classic novels or even short stories (for example, “Notes of a Hunter”). What place does the image of Belokurov occupy in the development of the plot? Is this character just part of the background, a kind of genre sketch, or is his role in the story more significant? A. A. Belkin and G. P. Berdnikov at one time wrote interestingly about him, without, however, detailing the topic. Meanwhile, the character of this hero seems to be directly related to the main conflict of the everyday plot.

Belokurov constantly walks around in an undershirt and an embroidered shirt, complains that he does not find sympathy from anyone, talks long and tediously about work, philosophizes and... does absolutely nothing. At the end of the story, 6-7 years after the events, the artist meets him unchanged: this is one of the obvious examples of the “man in a case” of advanced ideas. And this character, given in a frankly cartoonish manner, is repeatedly correlated with the main character. The dinner scene in the first chapter is written as if in the manner of “parallel editing”.

Lida: “...she spoke a lot and loudly - perhaps because she was used to speaking at school” (this “loudly” will also be repeated several times in the story).

Belokurov: “But my Pyotr Petrovich, who from his student days still had the habit of turning every conversation into an argument, spoke boringly, sluggishly and at length, with a clear desire to seem like an intelligent and progressive person.” “But” here not only contrasts the heroes. Despite all the differences between Lida’s enthusiasm and Belokurov’s phlegm, key definitions unite their speeches: a lot - long.

In the same second chapter there is a scene depicting Lida doing something about which she speaks so “a lot and loudly”: “At this time Lida had just returned from somewhere and, standing near the porch with a whip in her hands, slender, beautiful, illuminated by the sun, she ordered something to the worker. Hurrying and talking loudly, she received two or three sick people, then walked around the rooms with a businesslike, preoccupied look, opening first one cupboard, then another, went to the mezzanine; they were looking for her for a long time and called her to dinner, and she came she when we had already eaten the soup" (9.180). The only detail depicting the heroine’s case (she received two or three patients, while hurrying and talking loudly) is drowned in this long panorama in a stream of meaningless actions, business hype, designed for external effect: she returned - she ordered - she walked - she left - they were looking for - they called - came. What follows is a conciliatory comment from the narrator: “For some reason I remember and love all these details...” But it is important only for himself, the image here speaks more than the word, for the author’s characterization of the heroine the compositional “montage” correlation of Lida’s case is essential with Belokurov’s “case”: got up - walked around - drank beer - complained (9, 174); “he worked just as he said - slowly, always late, missing deadlines” (9.177). In the scene of lunch and reception of patients in a business beautiful girl Belokurov suddenly begins to appear.

There is another frankly “revealing” detail in “The House with a Mezzanine,” which may not be captured by modern perception. The spring carriage in which the heroine comes to collect fire victims also at first looks like an element of description. But literally on the next page he comes into contact with Belokurov’s story that Lida receives only 25 rubles a month and is proud that she lives at her own expense. Two years later, Chekhov would write a story about a real, poverty-stricken zemstvo teacher who lives on twenty-one rubles a month (9,341). And what will he call it? - "On the cart." The heroine's pride reveals large share hypocrisy or misunderstanding, just as in her service to the cause she relies on external effect.

The degree of “fit” of the heroine to her ideas, the correspondence of word and deed with the help of internal contrast is once again emphasized in the same scene of ideological dispute. Lida’s responsible judgment: “True, we are not saving humanity and, perhaps, we are mistaken in many ways, but we are doing what we can, and we are right. The highest and most sacred task of a cultured person is to serve our neighbors, and we are trying to serve, as we can. You don’t like it, but you can’t please everyone,” is accompanied by a short comment: “It’s true, Lida, it’s true,” said the mother. She was always timid in Lida’s presence and, while talking, looked at her anxiously, afraid to say what something superfluous or inappropriate, and she never contradicted her, but always agreed: it’s true, Lida, it’s true” (9.185).

A person who utters words about serving his neighbors views these neighbors as chess pieces that can be moved in in the right direction. A mother frightened to the point of impossibility, a sister's ruined happiness - this is what ideas turn into in the heroine's real behavior.

However, bringing together a ring of such reducing details and comparisons, do we have the right to see the author’s position behind them? After all, we have before us a form of narration from the first person, in which the consciousness of the narrator can make significant adjustments to what is depicted, which in the extreme can lead to a complete discrepancy between his assessments and the position of the author. For Chekhov, it seems, narration from an “anti-hero” and in general a fairy-tale style is uncharacteristic, almost impossible (cf. also “My Life”, “Lights”, “A Boring Story”). Its primary narrator is very close to the author (although, of course, not identical to him), their ethical criteria coincide. The combination of the voice of the author and the hero in one segment of text, noted by L. D. Usmanov, is possible only with such a narrator. *

* (See: Usmanov L. D. 1) The structure of the narrative in Chekhov the fiction writer // Questions of literature and style. Samarkand. 1969. pp. 15-16; 2) Artistic quests in Russian prose of the late 19th century. Tashkent. 1975. pp. 26-28.)

Let's imagine that the heroine is telling this story. We would see a “black and white” story about a slacker landscape painter who had an affair with his sister, and she urgently had to be rescued by sending her to her aunt in the Penza province. The artist becomes a narrator because he is able to embrace and understand (try to understand!) different points of view; among all the characters in the story, his view is the broadest and most universal.

His objectivity towards Lida is emphasized in every possible way, even emphasized.

“She was a lively, sincere, convinced girl, and it was interesting to listen to her...” (9, 177).

“This thin, beautiful, invariably stern girl with a small, gracefully outlined mouth...” (9, 178).

“Lida can only fall in love with a Zemstvo citizen who is as passionate as she is about hospitals and schools... Oh, for the sake of such a girl you can not only become a Zemstvo citizen, but even wear out iron shoes, as in a fairy tale” (9, 183).

Even at the end of the story, in the epilogue, the artist does not blame her, maintaining the same objectivity and calm intonation.

The artist says almost nothing about himself. Something flashes in the arguments and conversations of others. But even these few details give an idea of ​​the complex spiritual work, creating an image that differs from the straightforward portrait that the heroine paints.

The symptomatic slip at the beginning of the second chapter was already mentioned earlier: “I, as it seemed to her, was indifferent...” In reality, the situation is different. The interest and personality of the dispute in the third chapter confirms that the origins of the artist’s crisis lie in the area of ​​the same issues that concern Lida. “Doomed by fate to constant idleness...” (9.174). This phrase at the beginning of the story looks mysterious and can only be understood in relation to the ideological line of the plot, where the issue of art is also included in the dispute.

The artist is a landscape painter and probably talented. But he sees the terrible incommensurability and uselessness of art in the atmosphere of “hunger, cold, animal fear, masses of labor” - the village as it was under Rurik, and has remained so to this day. “Not a theorist and certainly not a dogmatist, the hero of “The House with a Mezzanine” is from the breed of those people... who are bored with life and who are “dissatisfied with themselves and with people” and are irritated because life in general is arranged incorrectly and unfairly and in particular the relations of the intelligentsia are false to the people, the place of the artist in society is false,” V. B. Kataev rightly notes. * His refusal to work, his hysterical breakdown is caused not by indifference, but, on the contrary, by a feeling of screaming contradictions of reality. The attempt to return to art (“I felt like writing again”) fades away and, apparently, never returns.

* (Kataev V.B. Chekhov's prose: problems of interpretation. P. 236.)

It is difficult to draw direct analogies in this case, but his rejection of art is reminiscent of the act of Garshinsky Ryabinin from the story “Artists,” a man who preferred direct practical activity to art. But even there, Garsha’s hero “did not succeed” (and yet he was engaged in the business that Lida is engaged in in Chekhov’s story). Chekhov's hero, enriched by the experience of the time that has passed since the 70s, considers schools to be one of the links in the “great chain” that entangles the people. His refusal to work is connected with this: a position not of complacency, but of despair.

In connection with the motive of idleness, the most noticeable gap appears between the position of the narrator and the author. “For me, a carefree person looking for an excuse for his constant idleness, these summer holiday mornings in our estates have always been unusually attractive. green Garden still damp from dew, all shining from the sun and seeming happy, when there is a smell of mignonette and oleander around the house, young people have just returned from church and are drinking tea in the garden, and when everyone is so nicely dressed and cheerful, and when you know that all these healthy, well-fed, beautiful people will do nothing all day long, then I want my whole life to be like this" (9.179). A. A. Belkin once drew attention to this fragment: "I find it difficult to say what it is: irony ? But the hero is so lyrically soulful that the ironically drawn picture seems sweet to him. But who is nice? Chekhov? An artist? Do not confuse Chekhov and the artist." * Of course, there is “lyrical insight” in him, but there is also an undoubted self-irony of the narrator. After all, after a few pages he will define his ideal in a completely different way: “The calling of every person in spiritual activity is in constant quest truth and meaning of life" (9.185). And what kind of spiritual activity is there in drinking tea and doing nothing?

* (Belkin A. A. Decree. op. P. 242.)

This is difficult to prove analytically, but it still seems that here the positions of the narrator and the author diverge to the greatest extent, the author distances himself from his hero in order to get closer to him again in the following pages.

The feeling of the crisis of art as a personal crisis, characteristic of the narrator’s consciousness, allows, in our opinion, to read the ending of the story more accurately. “Why didn’t the hero go for Zhenya to the Penza province so that he could marry her far from Lida?” - A. Skabichevsky was perplexed at one time. There is no hint of any answer in the story itself. But it can be hypothetically assumed. The everyday plot of “The House with a Mezzanine” is associated with a rendez-vous situation, a test of love, highly characteristic of Russian realism. Chekhov refers to her constantly: in the stories “Vera”, “On the Way”, shortly before “The House with a Mezzanine” - in “The Story of an Unknown Man”.

“Vladimir Ivanovich, if you yourself don’t believe in the matter, if you no longer think of returning to it, then why... why did you drag me from St. Petersburg? Why did you promise and why did you arouse crazy hopes in me?..” asks Zinaida Fedorovna of the main one hero. - When all these months I dreamed out loud, raved, admired my plans, rebuilt my life for new way, then why didn’t you tell me the truth, but were silent or encouraged with stories and behaved as if you completely sympathized with me? Why? What was this for?"

“It’s hard to admit to being bankrupt,” he justifies himself.” Unknown person". - Yes, I don’t believe it, I’m tired, lost heart... It’s hard to be sincere, it’s terribly hard, and I was silent" (8.205).

Missy, of course, is not Zinaida Fedorovna. She is more simple-minded and less demanding, although she is also concerned about “eternal” questions. “And she listened, believed and did not demand proof” (9.180). I haven’t asked for it yet! But there is something common in the feeling of the heroes. The artist's love is doomed because he has nothing to offer this girl, his house is destroyed, his faith is skepticism and constant self-doubt. Therefore, the loss of his beloved is perceived by him as a tragic inevitability, another blow of fate (remember the initial “doomed by fate”). “A sober, everyday mood took possession of me and I felt ashamed of everything I said at the Volchaninovs, and life continued to become boring” (9.190-191). Therefore, at the end of the story there are not curses and denunciations of someone, but piercing sadness and melancholy: “Misya, where are you?” The question does not imply a specific, “geographical” answer. He's talking about something else. Maybe about a passing life and impossible happiness.

Just as the character of Lida Volchaninova is largely “contracted” to an elusive, inattentive glance, there is a detail in the artist’s description that most clearly conveys his worldview (A. A. Belkin rightly drew attention to it). In the scene of the argument, the characters are conflictingly correlated literally in one phrase: “She looked up at me and smiled mockingly, and I continued, trying to catch your main idea... (italics mine. - I.S.)" (9.184). The main idea is not given as an axiom that does not require proof; work out, get there. The position of an artist is the position of a person who intensely peers into life, searching, capable of understanding someone else’s point of view and questioning his own. She is truly dialogical. His relationship with Lida (in the author’s perspective) is explained not by different views on the education of peasant children or art, but by much more general reasons.

“The House with a Mezzanine” was not written at all to discredit “small affairs” (Chekhov himself dealt with a lot of them), the story cannot be reduced to a lyrical love story. The internal theme of the story is in contrast two types of attitude to life, which exist beyond the boundaries of ideological dispute: intellectual despotism, turning into everyday despotism, and genuine understanding, penetration into the consciousness of another person. “The gift of penetration” is the main thing that separates Chekhov’s heroes or unites them. * In “The House with a Mezzanine,” Chekhov once again (let us recall, for example, Doctor Lvov from “Ivanov”) reminded us of the tragic consequences that a collision between a person and an idea leads to. Intellectual despotism and intolerance can be hidden under different masks and nevertheless must be identified and declassified. In a modest, apparently lyrical story, there is a foreshadowing of a problem, the true significance of which will be revealed only in the movement of history, when, under the cover of lofty words, the most terrible crimes could sometimes be committed. Chekhov states: what is important is not only the idea that the hero professes, not only the measure of his involvement in the idea, but its correlation with the interests of each individual, his personality.

* (Thus, the analysis confirms the subtle remark recently made in passing by E. A. Polotskaya: “If an idea can be equated with an action, then, applying, for example, this position to the “House with a Mezzanine”, in contrast to the artist Lida Volchaninova, instead of contrasting inactivity with active action (as is most often noted) it is easy to see the opposition of two different life positions" (Polotskaya E. A. Chekhov’s Poetics: Problems of Study // Chekhov and the Literature of Peoples Soviet Union. Yerevan. 1984. P. 169).)

At the level of everyday plot and ethical assessments, the author’s position is beyond doubt, the emphasis here is very clearly placed, the outline of the plot is complete, despite the open ending. However, the ideological plot remains open, it has its own logic and - ultimately - reveals the complementarity and relative invulnerability of opposing positions. This is the structure of many of Chekhov's novels and short stories ("Lights", "My Life", "A Boring Story"), two plots flow in parallel, one is checked by the other, but the idea is not exhausted by its bearer, but seems to lead an independent existence. The author's position with such a correlation of subjects turns out to be pulsating. The narrative distance between the author and the hero is constantly changing, and one of the tasks of reader activity is to identify the logic of such pulsating changes. Ways to change Chekhov's narrative position is one of the most pressing research problems. *

* (After the completion of this work, a book specially dedicated to Chekhov’s story appeared, many of the conclusions of which are close to the concept outlined: Bogdanov V. A. Labyrinth of Couplings M., 1986.)

(Artist's story)

I

It was 6-7 years ago, when I lived in one of the districts of the T-th province, on the estate of the landowner Belokurov, young man, who got up very early, wore undershirts, drank beer in the evenings and kept complaining to me that he did not find sympathy anywhere or from anyone. He lived in the garden in an outbuilding, and I lived in the old manor house, in a huge hall with columns, where there was no furniture except the wide sofa on which I slept, and also the table on which I played solitaire. Here, even in calm weather, something was humming in the old Amosov stoves, and during a thunderstorm the whole house shook and seemed to be cracking into pieces, and it was a little scary, especially at night, when all ten large windows suddenly illuminated by lightning. Doomed by fate to constant idleness, I did absolutely nothing. For hours at a time I looked out my windows at the sky, at the birds, at the alleys, read everything that was brought to me from the post office, and slept. Sometimes I left home and wandered somewhere until late in the evening. One day, returning home, I accidentally wandered into some unfamiliar estate. The sun was already hiding, and evening shadows stretched across the blooming rye. Two rows of old, closely planted, very tall fir trees stood like two solid walls, forming a gloomy, beautiful alley. I easily climbed over the fence and walked along this alley, sliding along the spruce needles that covered the ground here by an inch. It was quiet, dark, and only high on the peaks here and there a bright golden light trembled and shimmered like a rainbow in the spider’s webs. There was a strong, stuffy smell of pine needles. Then I turned into a long linden alley. And here too there is desolation and old age; Last year's leaves rustled sadly underfoot, and shadows hid between the trees in the twilight. To the right, in the old orchard, an oriole sang reluctantly, in a weak voice, probably also an old woman. But now the linden trees are gone; I walked past a white house with a terrace and a mezzanine, and in front of me suddenly unfolded a view of the manor's courtyard and a wide pond with a bathhouse, with a crowd of green willows, with a village on the other side, with a tall narrow bell tower on which a cross was burning, reflecting the setting sun. For a moment I felt the charm of something familiar, very familiar, as if I had already seen this same panorama once in childhood. And at the white stone gate that led from the yard to the field, at the old strong gate with lions, stood two girls. One of them, older, thin, pale, very beautiful, with a whole shock of brown hair on her head, with a small, stubborn mouth, had a stern expression and barely paid attention to me; the other, quite young - she was 17-18 years old, no more - also thin and pale, with a large mouth and big eyes, looked at me in surprise as I passed by, said something in English and became embarrassed , and it seemed to me that these two sweet faces had been familiar to me for a long time. And I returned home feeling as if I had had a good dream. Soon after this, one afternoon, when Belokurov and I were walking near the house, suddenly, rustling through the grass, a spring carriage in which one of those girls was sitting drove into the yard. It was the eldest. She came with a signature sheet to ask for fire victims. Without looking at us, she very seriously and in detail told us how many houses had burned down in the village of Siyanovo, how many men, women and children were left homeless, and what the fire-fighting committee, of which she was now a member, intended to do in the first stages. Having given us to sign, she hid the sheet and immediately began to say goodbye. “You have completely forgotten us, Pyotr Petrovich,” she said to Belokurov, giving him her hand. “Come, and if Monsieur N. (she said my last name) wants to see how admirers of his talent live and comes to us, then mom and I will be very glad.” I bowed. When she left, Pyotr Petrovich began to tell. This girl, according to him, was from a good family and her name was Lydia Volchaninova, and the estate in which she lived with her mother and sister, like the village on the other side of the pond, was called Shelkovka. Her father once occupied a prominent place in Moscow and died with the rank of Privy Councilor. Despite their good means, the Volchaninovs lived in the village all the time, summer and winter, and Lydia was a teacher at the zemstvo school in Shelkovka and received 25 rubles a month. She spent only this money on herself and was proud that she lived at her own expense. “An interesting family,” said Belokurov. “Perhaps we’ll go see them sometime.” They will be very happy to see you. One afternoon, on one of the holidays, we remembered the Volchaninovs and went to see them in Shelkovka. They, the mother and both daughters, were at home. My mother, Ekaterina Pavlovna, was once apparently beautiful, but now damp beyond her years, short of breath, sad, absent-minded, tried to keep me busy talking about painting. Having learned from my daughter that I might be coming to Shelkovka, she hastily recalled two or three of my landscapes that she had seen at exhibitions in Moscow, and now asked what I wanted to express in them. Lydia, or, as she was called at home, Lida, spoke more to Belokurov than to me. Serious, without smiling, she asked him why he did not serve in the zemstvo and why he had not yet been to a single zemstvo meeting. “It’s not good, Pyotr Petrovich,” she said reproachfully. - Not good. Ashamed. “It’s true, Lida, it’s true,” the mother agreed. - Not good. “Our entire district is in the hands of Balagin,” Lida continued, turning to me. “He himself is the chairman of the council, and he has distributed all the positions in the district to his nephews and sons-in-law and does what he wants. We have to fight. The youth must form a strong party, but you see what kind of youth we have. Shame on you, Pyotr Petrovich! The younger sister, Zhenya, was silent while they were talking about the zemstvo. She did not take part in serious conversations, the family did not yet consider her an adult and, like a little girl, they called her Misyus, because in childhood she called her that miss, your governess. All the time she looked at me with curiosity and, when I looked at the photographs in the album, she explained to me: “This is uncle... This is godfather,” and ran her finger over the portraits, and at that time, childishly, she touched me with her shoulder, and I saw closely her weak, undeveloped chest, thin shoulders, braid and thin body, tightly tied with a belt. We played croquet and lawn tennis, walked around the garden, drank tea, and then had a long dinner. After the huge empty hall with columns, I felt somehow at home in this small cozy house, in which there were no oleographs on the walls and you spoke to the servants, and everything seemed young and clean to me, thanks to the presence of Lida and Misyus, and everything breathed with decency. At dinner, Lida again talked with Belokurov about the zemstvo, about Balagin, about school libraries. She was a lively, sincere, convinced girl, and it was interesting to listen to her, although she spoke a lot and loudly - perhaps because she was used to speaking at school. But my Pyotr Petrovich, who from his student days still had the habit of turning every conversation into an argument, spoke boringly, sluggishly and at length, with a clear desire to seem like an intelligent and progressive person. Gesturing, he knocked over the gravy boat with his sleeve, and a large puddle formed on the tablecloth, but no one except me seemed to notice this. When we returned home it was dark and quiet. “Good upbringing is not that you don’t spill sauce on the tablecloth, but that you won’t notice if someone else does it,” Belokurov said and sighed. - Yes, a wonderful, intelligent family. I have fallen behind good people, oh, how I have fallen behind! And all the work, work! Affairs! He talked about how hard you have to work when you want to become an exemplary farmer. And I thought: what a heavy and lazy fellow he is! When he talked about something seriously, he would say “uh-uh” with tension, and he worked the same way as he spoke - slowly, always being late, missing deadlines. I had little faith in his businesslike nature, simply because the letters that I instructed him to send to the post office, he carried around in his pocket for weeks at a time. “The hardest thing,” he muttered, walking next to me, “the hardest thing is that you work and don’t find sympathy from anyone.” No sympathy!

The story “The House with a Mezzanine” (1896) is built on a principle tested in many works of Russian literature. The love story told in it is adjacent to heated ideological debates of the heroes - this was the case in Griboyedov’s “Woe from Wit”, in Turgenev’s “Fathers and Sons”. The dispute between the narrator-artist and Lida Volchaninova (in Chapter III of the story) concerns the most important social issues: “the existing order”, “existing conditions” in the country, the situation of the people, the attitude of the intelligentsia to this, the problem of “small affairs”, i.e. all possible assistance to the peasants... Eternal Russian disputes in every new era acquire their color and are renewed with renewed vigor.

Understanding the place of this dispute and its problems, as we will see, is really important, but first of all, we must not lose sight of the fact that this dispute is only part of the story about the failed love of the narrator-artist and a girl with a strange and sweet name Misyu.

The narrator-artist tells how he, as it seemed to him, was once happy; how happy he felt and how this love and feeling of happiness passed. But the story itself about failed love is included in a broader framework. It is important for the author that we find out what state the hero was in before he felt in love, and about the state he reached after losing Misya forever.

About the first of these states, the initial one, the narrator says: “I still felt hopelessly lonely and useless”; “alone, irritated, dissatisfied with himself and people.” It is from this state that the hero goes to love. And at the end of the story, after hopes for happiness have collapsed, he again returns to the first, original state: “... a sober, everyday mood took possession of me... and life continued to become boring.”

So, in the very general view The structure of the story's plot is as follows: the hero's departure from the state of hopelessness, loneliness, discontent in which he was, into love, and in the end - a return to his original state.

Love in “The House with a Mezzanine” arises so quickly and comes to an end so quickly that if you read inattentively, you can either not notice it at all, concentrating on the debate about the usefulness or uselessness of “small things”, or consider this artist’s love for Missus to be unreal and imaginary .

But suddenness, transience, fragility, mediocrity, and at the same time the special charm of the feeling described in “The House with a Mezzanine” become understandable, unless you approach the story with your own ideas about what should be (for example: love should be like this and proceed like this; or: the petty love of undistinguished people is insignificant), but try to penetrate into the logic of the author’s thought, reflected in the construction of the work, in its structure.

After all, love, or rather, falling in love with Misya, was for the hero, first of all, an escape from the “terrible” state of loneliness, “dissatisfaction with oneself and people” to comfort, warmth, mutual sympathy - everything that the Volchaninovs’ estate, their house with a mezzanine, became for him. At the same time, the hero-artist is such that he, of course, would not be content with just family happiness. For a person of this type, even if Lida had not interfered, family happiness (as for many heroes of Chekhov’s stories and plays) would have been short-lived and temporary peace and refuge, the starting point for the work of consciousness, “new thoughts”, he would have wanted to “escape” , especially since the story briefly mentions the potential shortcomings of Misyu.

But the hero of “The House with a Mezzanine” was not given a short period of family happiness. This is a story not about one of life's stereotypes - family happiness - deceiving the hero, but about happiness that failed. A sad, thoughtful theme of unfulfilled hopes and failed love runs through the entire story. (This motif is also heard in the descriptions: the sad rustle of last year’s leaves, a sad August night, the smell of approaching autumn, falling stars...)

Without going deeper into Chekhov's interpretation of the theme of love, we note that the story shows three unfulfilled personal happiness, three failed destinies - not only of the artist and Misya. Such is the fate of Belokurov, who is too lazy to fall in love and get married - he is much more comfortable cohabiting with a lady who “looks like a well-fed goose.” Such is the fate of Lida, who despises the thought of personal happiness and imagines herself to be the center public life in the county. And this similarity, this similarity excludes the possibility of seeing in the story an intention to blame one side and justify the other. It’s not “the environment is stuck” and it’s not “ evil people“(Lida, for example) are to blame. Rejecting such traditional explanations and motivations, Chekhov considers, individualizing, various shapes one phenomenon: people so easily overlook, miss life, they themselves refuse happiness, they themselves destroy the “lights” in their souls.

And, as often in other stories, short stories, plays, Chekhov endows his heroes, who are unable to correctly navigate reality and are unable to “make” their lives (such are each in their own way, the artist, Lida, and Belokurov), with a passion for solving the most common and significant problems. This time the debate turns to whether zemstvo activity is necessary, and - more broadly - about the relationship between the intelligentsia and the people. (Let us recall: zemstvo - since the 1860s, a form of public participation in solving local issues of healthcare, public education, road construction, permitted by the supreme power; hence - zemstvo schools, zemstvo hospitals, etc.)

What is the function of this dispute in the story?

Least of all, the meaning of the story can be reduced to finding someone’s rightness in the dispute conveyed in the third chapter. As once in “Fathers and Sons,” here ideological opponents collide. Unlike Turgenev’s novel, where one of the disputants was clearly inferior to his opponent (and this was a reflection of the balance of power in Russian society of the 60s), the dispute between Lida Volchaninova and the artist reflected equally strong and at the same time equally weak ideological and social positions .

Indeed, in his own way, the artist is right when he asserts that “patchwork” charitable activities, all these “first aid kits and libraries” do not change the essence of things, by and large, do not break that “great chain” that entangles the working rural people. In the accusatory intensity and aphoristic persuasiveness of his speeches, they resemble the content and style of Leo Tolstoy’s articles of these years (“I’ve already heard this,” says Lida in response to the artist’s speeches). True, the solution proposed by the artist is clearly unfeasible (let all the inhabitants of the earth agree to equally divide physical labor among themselves, and devote the freed time to spiritual activity), and this also repeats the utopian motives of Tolstoy’s teachings.

But isn’t Lida also right when she believes that a cultured person cannot sit idly by when millions are suffering nearby? After all, we know that Chekhov himself was involved in similar “small things” in his life. (Chekhov’s active humanism had such large-scale manifestations as, say, the census of convicts on Sakhalin or the organization of the erection of a monument to Peter I in his native Taganrog. But the writer did not shy away from more modest matters, such as free treatment of peasants, laying a local highway, building schools, loans to the hungry, etc.) How does all this agree with the fact that in “The House with a Mezzanine” tribute is paid to the energy, honesty and consistency of the knight of “small deeds” Lida Volchaninova, but this “subtle, beautiful, invariably strict girl” is not praised? “Serious”, “strict”, speaking “loudly” - these definitions are repeated in the story and emphasize Lida’s categorical nature, intolerance to objections, her confidence in possessing the only and universal truth.

The author strives to present both points of view as clearly as possible in the argument scene. The artist is no less categorical in his dispute with Lida than she is. The point is not in the views expressed in the dispute, but in the fact that the bearer of each of them claims to be absolutely right and superior to his opponent. The bearer of one point of view is absorbed in it, and the opponent is absorbed in his point of view; each of the disputants is confident in the monopoly of the “real” truth. The author, without offering his own solution to the problem under discussion, without leading his heroes to the acquisition of ultimate truths, convinces us of the impossibility of unconditionally accepting any of these positions.

Which is more correct? Change " existing conditions”, “the existing order” to a more just one, more consistent with the purpose of man? Or, without waiting for today's injustice to disappear, do at least something necessary and useful to those who are next to you?

While this is a verbal clash between two educated people(remember the famous definition of good upbringing contained in the story). But very soon - the story was written in 1896, less than ten years remained before the first Russian revolution - clashes will begin in Russia in which opponents will be intolerant and merciless. The dispute between the heroes of “The House with a Mezzanine” is, as it were, a distant harbinger of those splits in Russian society that the 20th century will bring.

But the question arises: is the topic of the dispute about “small matters” indifferent to the plot of “The House with a Mezzanine”? Let's do the following thought experiment: let's say that the heroes of the story argue not about small matters, but, let's say, about environmental problems or school teaching. Can we assume that in this case nothing will change, the love story for Misy will remain the same?

It would seem, yes: there is no direct connection between the theory of “small things” and destroyed love, the dispute ends in nothing, the participants in the dispute did not convince each other of anything, each of them, having expressed correct and incorrect considerations, remained unconvinced. But the substitution we suggested would be important for expressing the complex author’s position.

What was said in this dispute is relevant to the “correct formulation of the question” about why love did not take place. What was needed here was precisely this debate, with such a scope of issues, with such argumentation, and not any other. Indeed, in the dispute about “small things”, a lot becomes clear about the reasons for the initial and final “terrible” state of the artist, which was a contrasting background to the central state of falling in love in his story.

The fact is that an integral feature of this state is refusal to work and idleness. The motive of idleness, having arisen at the very beginning, passes, varying, through the first chapters and for a long time does not receive any explanation during the course of the story. We read that the hero is “doomed by fate to constant idleness”, that he must look for “justification for his constant idleness”, that he is ready to “walk like this idle and without purpose all day, all summer”, that the time he willingly spends time at the Volchaninovs’ estate, leaving “the impression of a long, long idle day.” The repetitions of the word “idleness,” of course, are designed to attract the reader’s attention, but for the time being nothing is said about the reasons for this very idleness and the entire initial psychological state. The hero is “doomed by fate” to him - that’s all.

And only in a dispute about “billions of people” who “live worse than animals” does he have an insight - a guess (after all, the hero does not set out to systematically analyze his worldview) about the original sources of dissatisfaction with himself, his work, reluctance to work and idleness: “When In such conditions, the life of an artist has no meaning, and the more talented he is, the stranger and more incomprehensible his role is, since in reality it turns out that he works for the amusement of a predatory, unclean animal, maintaining the existing order. And I don’t want to work, and I won’t...”

Not a theorist and certainly not a dogmatist, the hero of “The House with a Mezzanine” is from the breed of those people - Chekhov writes about them often - who are bored with life and who are “dissatisfied with themselves and with people” and irritated because life in general is arranged incorrectly, unfairly and falsely. the relationship of the intelligentsia to the people, the place of the artist in society in particular is false. Thus (of course, without undertaking to resolve the issues discussed by the characters) Chekhov makes the topic of the dispute by no means random, connecting this part of the story with strong and deep threads main story failed love.

Could things have turned out differently for the heroes of “The House with a Mezzanine”? Suppose the narrator began to fight for his love, rushed after Missus, and not far away is the Penza province, where she was sent... The artist is so persistent and persistent in verbal polemics, but he does not find the strength and desire to change his own life. Unexpected passion or the union of lovers makes Chekhov the subject of his stories about love. For him, a doctor and a writer, it is interesting and important how a general illness - the inability, the inability to build a life according to the laws of beauty and love - is complicated in each specific case. The questions that obsess the heroes remain, it is impossible to solve them or there is no solution at all, and the barely born love has melted away, remaining only in a memory.

This often happens in Chekhov’s works: each of the heroes is absorbed in himself, in his “truth”; they don't understand or hear each other. And at this time something significant, important, but fragile and defenseless is dying - barely awakened love (“House with a Mezzanine”), a beautiful garden (“The Cherry Orchard”)...

Subject: ideological meaning of the story by A.P. Chekhov's "House with a Mezzanine", 1896

Goals: find out the meaning of the story;

develop students' knowledge about heroes playing in life;

promote the development of moral qualities.

Equipment: IAD, where quotes from Chekhov’s stories appear, illustrations to the writer’s stories, statements by famous figures about the work and personality of the writer (at the teacher’s choice).

During the classes

Org moment.

Checking homework (two students read the answer to the question “What does it mean to “love yourself in art?”).

Teacher's opening speech.

Lika Mizinova and I. Levitan went to see Chekhov. On the ship, having heard that they were talking about Chekhov, “a young man in an undershirt and a big boots» (Bylim – Kolosovsky)

Did you recognize him? Why, an artist lives in his house. It was Bylim - Kolosovsky, an admirer of Chekhov's work, who became the prototype of the owner of the house, the landowner Belorukov. The scene of action of the heroes is the village of Bogimovo, no one doubts this. Chekhov's neighbor at Bogimov's dacha was famous artist A. A. Kiselyov, who was vacationing with three children: daughters Vera and Sasha and son Seryozha. Verochka was 17 years old, outwardly she corresponded to the image of Misyus created by Chekhov...

Expressive reading of the beginning of the story up to the words: “accidentally wandered into some unfamiliar estate...”

Pay attention, guys: a few sentences - and the plot is ready. This characteristic Chekhov's stories.

Let's talk about the two Volchaninov sisters. Let's start with Lida. What is her appearance like?

What does she constantly talk about and worry about?

Did you like Lida? Why?

How does the artist criticize the theory of “small things”? How did you understand this? (Discussion).

Where is the truth? Which one is right? What is a sense of life? Doing “small things”? Or set a great goal? Or live idly in protest, like Misyus and her mother?

Chekhov himself built hospitals, schools, treated people, helped them... It’s surprising that Lida, who causes antipathy, is doing exactly what Chekhov did all his life - “small things.”

Why does she, by doing so many necessary things, evoke negative feelings? (She is boring, everyday, fantastic, insensitive, ruthless).

And Zhenya? Why is her name Misyu? What impression did she make on you?

How does she fight for her love? (No way; at one word from my sister, I resignedly gave up the joy of first love). Look at the illustrations.

Did Lida really love the people so much? (Answers. Here is what A. Turkov answered this question: “the habit of commanding people, subordinating their will can manifest itself in a variety of areas of life. It finds “application” even in family, friendship, and love. It is clear, for example, that the true meaning Lida Volchaninova’s life is not to “serve her neighbors,” as she loudly puts it (“she spoke loudly and a lot”), but to have her neighbors serve as her object, material for what she considers a good deed, necessary, useful thing»).

Listening to the performance of a student who individually compared Chekhov’s story with M. Yu. Lermontov’s poem “Dream”.

How is Lida Volchaninova similar to Olga Ivanovna (“Jumping”)? (Yes, she also plays at love, at love for the people. Olga Ivanovna played at love for art - she ruined her husband, Lida Volchaninova ruined Misya’s love for the artist).

What is the point of the story? (Answers. The ideological meaning of the story comes down to making the reader think about real life. Write this down too).

Ratings.

Homework : read the works of A.P. Chekhov “Darling”, “Lady with a Dog”; individual assignments: 1) essay “Love is incompatible with everyday life” (based on the story “The Lady with the Dog”); 2) compare two films based on this story; think about what is unique about Chekhov’s stories.

The narrator (the narration is in the first person) recalls how six or seven years ago he lived on Belokurov’s estate in one of the districts of the T-th province. The owner “got up very early, walked around in a jacket, drank beer in the evenings and kept complaining to me that he didn’t find sympathy anywhere or from anyone.” The narrator is an artist, but in the summer he became so lazy that he wrote almost nothing. “Sometimes I left home and wandered around until late in the evening.” So he wandered into an unfamiliar estate. Near the gate stood two girls: one “older, thin, pale, very beautiful” and the second - “young - she was seventeen or eighteen years old, no more - also thin and pale, with a large mouth and big eyes.” For some reason, both faces seemed familiar for a long time. He came back feeling like he had a good dream.

Soon a stroller appeared on Belokurov’s estate, in which one of the girls, the eldest, was sitting. She came with a signature sheet to ask for money for the fire victims. Having signed the sheet, the narrator was invited to visit, as the girl put it, “how admirers of his talent live.” Belokurov said that her name is Lydia Volchaninova, she lives in the village of Shelkovka with her mother and sister. Her father once occupied a prominent place in Moscow and died with the rank of Privy Councilor. Despite their good means, the Volchaninovs lived in the village without a break; Lida worked as a teacher, receiving twenty-five rubles a month.

On one of the holidays they went to the Volchaninovs. Mother and daughters were at home. “Mother, Ekaterina Pavlovna, once apparently beautiful, but now damp beyond her years, short of breath, sad, absent-minded, tried to keep me busy talking about painting.” Lida told Belokurov that the chairman of the council, Balagan, “distributed all the positions in the district to his nephews and sons-in-law and does what he wants.” “The youth must form a strong party,” she said, “but you see what kind of youth we have. Shame on you, Pyotr Petrovich!” The younger sister Zhenya (Misyus, because in childhood she called her governess “Miss”) seemed like just a child. During lunch, Belokurov, gesturing, overturned a gravy boat with his sleeve, but no one except the narrator seemed to notice this. When they returned, Belokurov said: “Good education is not that you don’t spill sauce on the tablecloth, but that you don’t notice if someone else does it. Yes, a wonderful, intelligent family..."

The narrator began to visit the Volchaninovs. He liked Misyus, she also liked him. “We walked together, picked cherries for jam, rode in a boat. Or I wrote a sketch, and she stood nearby and looked with admiration.” He was especially attracted by the fact that in the eyes of the young provincial girl he looked like a talented artist, a famous person. Lida disliked him. She despised idleness and considered herself a working person. She did not like his landscapes because they did not show the people's needs. In turn, he did not like Lida. Once he started an argument with her and said that her charitable work with peasants was not only not beneficial, but also harmful. “You come to their aid with hospitals and schools, but this does not free them from their bonds, but, on the contrary, enslave them even more, since by introducing new prejudices into their lives, you increase the number of their needs, not to mention that they have to pay the zemstvo for books and, therefore, bend their backs more.” Lidin's authority was indisputable. Her mother and sister respected, but also feared her, who took upon herself the “male” leadership of the family.

Finally, the narrator confessed his love to Zhenya in the evening, when she accompanied him to the gates of the estate. She reciprocated, but immediately ran to tell her mother and sister everything. “We have no secrets from each other...” When the next day he came to the Volchaninovs, Lida dryly announced that Ekaterina Pavlovna and Zhenya had gone to her aunt, to the Penza province, and then, probably, to go abroad. On the way back, a boy caught up with him with a note from Misyus: “I told my sister everything, and she demands that I break up with you... I was unable to upset her with my disobedience. God will give you happiness, forgive me. If you knew how bitterly my mother and I cry!” He never saw the Volchaninovs again. Once on the way to Crimea, he met Belokurov in the carriage, and he said that Lida still lives in Shelkovka and teaches children. She managed to rally around her a “strong party” of young people, and in the last zemstvo elections they gave Balagin a ride. “About Zhenya, Belokurov only said that she did not live at home and was unknown where.” Gradually, the narrator begins to forget about the “house with a mezzanine”, about the Volchaninovs, and only in moments of loneliness does he remember them and: “... little by little, for some reason, it begins to seem to me that they are also remembering me, they are waiting for me and that we I'll meet you... Missy, where are you?

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