The genre of the work is Gorky at the bottom. M

Goals:

• Introduce students to stage fate plays "At the Bottom".
• Introduce the characters of the play into the setting and world.
• Determine the main conflict of the work - the clash of views and life positions of the inhabitants of the bottom.
• Show the tense atmosphere of the Kostylev flophouse with its endless disputes and quarrels; find out the reasons for the disunity of people at the bottom.
• Help schoolchildren understand the meaning of the author's remarks.

During the classes

I. introduction teachers.

The largest writers XIX centuries (A.S. Pushkin, N.V. Gogol, L.N. Tolstoy) acted as prose writers, playwrights, and publicists. The work of M. Gorky is also characterized by multi-genres. He entered literature with romantic and realistic stories. At the end of the 90s published the novel "Foma Gordeev", in which he reproduced a broad picture of Russian life, showing representatives of various social strata. In the early 900s he turned to drama and for several years acted as a playwright.

“The play, drama, comedy is the most difficult form of literature,” said M. Gorky.

At that time, the Moscow Art Theater enjoyed enormous popularity, opening a new page in the history of Russian theatrical art with its innovative productions of Chekhov's plays. In the winter of 1900, Gorky visited this theater for the first time; in the spring of the same year, while staying in Yalta visiting Chekhov, Gorky met artists who captivated him with the idea of ​​​​creating a play for them. The result of this acquaintance was the play "The Bourgeois" (1901) and the plays that followed it: "At the Lower Depths" (1902), "Summer Residents" (1904), "Children of the Sun" and "Barbarians" (1905)

Let us remember what is unique about drama as a type of literature (a student’s performance accompanied by a computer presentation).

1) Drama is for stage performances.

3) The text consists of monologues and dialogues characters.

4) The play is divided into actions (acts) and pictures (scenes).

5) During the break between actions, a certain amount of time may pass (a day, two, a month, six months:), and the location of the action may change.

6) The entire life process is not depicted in the drama; it goes on, as it were, behind the scenes; the author snatches from the flow of time the most significant, from his point of view, moments, and focuses the attention of the audience on them.

7) A special burden in the play falls on conflict- an acute clash between the heroes over a very significant issue. At the same time, there cannot be (extra) heroes in a drama - all heroes must be included in the conflict.

8) A dramatic work is preceded by poster- list of characters.

Gorky’s first plays showed that an innovative playwright had come to literature.

The content and issues of the plays were unusual, as were their characters - the revolutionary-minded proletarian, the inhabitants of the flophouse, and the conflict. Gorky acted as the creator of a new type of drama.

From the cycle of Gorky's dramatic works, the play "At the Depth" stands out for its depth of thought and perfection of construction. “It was the result of my almost 20 years of observations of the world of “former people”, to which I include not only wanderers, shelter dwellers and the “lumpen proletariat” in general, but also some of the intellectuals - “demagnetized”, disappointed, offended and humiliated by failures in life. I realized very early that these people were incurable,” wrote Gorky. He talked a lot and willingly about the tramps, their lives, the people who served as prototypes for this or that character.

Gorky worked hard and purposefully on the play “At the Lower Depths”. Even the list of titles that he successively gave to the play shows both the intensity of his search and even partly his direction:

• "Without Sun"
• "Nochlezhka"
• "In the lodging house"
• "Bottom"
• "At the bottom of life"
• "At the bottom"

Why "At the Bottom"? (The author did not highlight the location of the action - “night shelter”, not the nature of the conditions - “without sun”, “the bottom”, not even the social position - “at the bottom of life”. The final name combines all these names with the new one. where how, A what's happening at the bottom" (what?):souls. Unlike original names, emphasizing the tragic situation of tramps, the latter name is more capacious and polysemantic.)

The play received its final name on the theater poster of the Moscow Art Theater, on the stage of which the play premiered.

Already after the first reading of the play by Gorky himself at the apartment of the writer L. Andreev, it was clear that it would become an event. The censors did not allow the play to be presented for a long time. She erased the text, mutilated it, but still, yielding to public pressure, she allowed it to be played exclusively in Moscow and only to one Art Theater. The authorities considered the play boring and were sure of the failure of the performance, where on the stage instead of “beautiful life” there was dirt, darkness and poor, embittered people (sharps, tramps, prostitutes). The production, carried out by directors Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko, was a stunning success. The author was called more than 20 times!

Poster for the play "At the Bottom".

So, December 1902. Moscow Art Theater. First performance of the play.

There are many prominent writers, artists, artists, public figures, and famous critics in the public. Starring the most beloved, most prominent artists of the Moscow Art Theater: Stanislavsky (Satin), Moskvin (Luka), Kachalov (Baron), Knipper-Chekhova (Nastya), Luzhsky (Bubnov). The curtain opens...

II. A re-enactment of the beginning of the play prepared by class students.

III. Conversation.

Where did the viewer end up? When and where does the play take place? (In the shelter at the beginning of spring, in the morning.)

How is the scene of action depicted in the stage directions for Act 1, depicting the setting of the shelter? (The basement looks like a cave. There is dirt, soot, rags everywhere...)

- How are the characters positioned on stage?(Everywhere along the walls there are bunks. Thin partitions fence off Ash’s room. Apart from Kvashnya, Baron, Nastya, who live in the kitchen, no one has their own corner. Everything is on display in front of each other. A secluded place is only on the stove and behind the chintz canopy separating others the bed of dying Anna (by this she is already, as it were, separated from life.)

- How is the stage lit?(The light reaches the shelters from the basement window, as if looking for people among the basement inhabitants.)

- Why does the author describe the shelter in such detail in the stage directions preceding Act 1? Why is the remark so lengthy?(The playwright emphasizes the extreme poverty of the current existence of the “former”, the wretchedness of the human shelter.)

- The tragedy of the existence of the shelters and the depth of human fall are helped to feel by the remarks that give an idea of ​​the sounds of the shelter. What does the viewer hear?

Anna moans

Fidgeting and hysterically coughs Actor

Loud growls Satin

Fiercely jingles keys and creaks filing the tick

The Baron slurps, chewing black bread:

- What is the atmosphere of the shelter?(Noise, swearing. Endless arguments, quarrels. Hell, bitterness:)

- Why do quarrels arise so often?(Everyone lives in this basement as he wants. Everyone is preoccupied with their own problems. The characters don’t seem to hear each other. Words sound from different corners. Everyone present speaks at once, without waiting for an answer, weakly reacting to other people’s remarks, but everyone, almost not listening to others, he speaks about his own. Complete separation of people who find themselves under one roof.)

- Stability, the extremes of mutual alienation are conveyed in the form polylogue. What remarks emphasize the continuity of such “communication”, the feeling of time passing in a vicious circle, without beginning or end?

The curtain opens and the viewer hears the Baron's voice: "Further!". This is the first line of the play! It “creates a feeling of the inevitable passage of time, flowing in a vicious circle without beginning or end ". (B.A.Bialik. Gorky the playwright.)

Growls, without scaring anyone, Satin, who overslept after next intoxication.

Kvashnya continues conversation started behind the scenes with Kleshch, constantly shutting himself off from his terminally ill wife.

Baron habitually mocks Nastya, absorbing another shocker.

Actor is boring repeats the same thing: “My body is poisoned by alcohol: It’s harmful for me: breathing dust:

Anna begs for it to stop lasts "Every single day:".

Bubnov interrupts Satin: “I heard: a hundred times!"

Satin seems to sum it up: “: all our words are tired! I heard each of them: probably a thousand times:"

- In a stream of fragmentary remarks and altercations, words that have a symbolic sound are heard.

Bubnov: “And the threads are rotten:” - twice, while doing furrier business.

He’s talking about Nastya’s situation: “You’re superfluous everywhere: and all the people on earth are superfluous:”

What do these seemingly random remarks reveal?

(Phrases said on a specific occasion reveal the imaginary connections of the people gathered in the shelter, the “superfluity” of the unfortunate people).

IV. Teacher's word.

Already the first readers of the play “At the Lower Depths” drew attention not only to the novelty of its content, but also to the novelty of its form. Chekhov responded about the play as follows: “It is new and undoubtedly good.”

What is unusual about the form of the play “At the Lower Depths”? In what ways does Gorky deviate from the rules for creating dramatic works known to us from the plays we have read earlier?

2.No traditional plot : it unfolds not so much in “external” events as in dialogues (disputes), polylogues- they determine the development of the conflict.

3.In the play no main or secondary characters- everyone is important.

Let's look at the list of characters - poster.

V. Working with the play poster.

Why are the heroes presented differently: some by their first name and patronymic, others by their nickname or last name?

Why differently are Kostylev and Kleshch represented? (The list shows a certain hierarchy of the “bottom”. There are also “masters of life” here, however, they are not so different from the inhabitants of the shelter).

People in society are valued differently. A representative of any class, gender and age can find himself at the “bottom” of life. What do they have in common? (They are all renegades. All "former".)

VI. Mini quiz.

Remember which of the characters in the play was

• an official in the treasury chamber?
• guard at the dacha?
• telegraph operator?
• a mechanic?
• a furrier?
• an artist?

VII. Conversation.

How did these people get here? What brought them to the shelter? What is the backstory of each character?

Satin hit rock bottom after serving time in prison for murder (Act 1).

The Baron went bankrupt. Served in the treasury chamber, squandered money; for embezzlement of government money he went to prison, then ended up in a shelter (Act 4).

Kleshch lost his job, although he was an “honest worker” and “worked from an early age” (Act 1).

The actor once had a sonorous surname - Sverchkov-Zavolzhsky, but was not in the leading roles (he says that he played a gravedigger in Hamlet), he lived in poverty; He began to drink, seeing no way out, - he became an alcoholic, “drank away his soul” (Act 2). Weak at heart. The tick resists - the result is the same.

Fate Ashes predetermined already at birth: “I have been a thief since childhood.” "Son of a thief." There is no other way (act 2).

Which hero talks more about his fall than others? (Baron. Each stage of his life is marked by a certain costume. These disguises symbolize the gradual decline in social status.)

What reasons bring people to the “bottom”? (People are brought to the “bottom” by both subjective (laziness, meanness, dishonesty, weak character) and objective, social reasons (the life of society is poisoned, distorted).

What are the night shelters talking about? (What every person thinks about.)

Honor and conscience Faith in one’s strength, in one’s talent

People of the “bottom” are not villains, not monsters, not scoundrels. They are the same people as us, they just live in different conditions. This amazed the first viewers of the play and shocks new readers.

The characters talk and argue a lot. Their conversations are the subject of depiction in the play. The clash of ideas, life views, and the struggle of worldviews determine the main conflict of the play. This is typical for the genre philosophical dramas .

VIII. Homework.

Answer the following questions in writing:

1. One of the characters in the play, Satin, in a remark that concludes the second act, likens the night shelters to the dead: “Dead men don’t hear! Dead men don’t feel: Shout: roar: dead men don’t hear!..”
2. Can we say that the first act is conversations in "the kingdom of the dead" (G.D. Gachev)?
3. Or is the researcher right who believed that “Luke, having gone down into the basement, came not to the desert, but to people" (I.K. Kuzmichev), and before the arrival of Luke retained, to one degree or another, living human traits?

M. Gorky's play “At the Bottom” classified as social philosophical drama, which arose as a result of the author’s reflections on the social atmosphere of the early 20th century. The object of Gorky's observations was tramping – a common phenomenon for the specified time. It is no coincidence that most heroes "At the bottom" have their own prototypes, “spied” in Nizhny Novgorod, and the main (and new!) hero becomes tramp .

The problems of Gorky's play cover many current problems of his time, concerning the social structure of society and human psychology. The author directed all his attention to the people of the “bottom” and formed a group around his heroes problematic issues: Who are the people"bottom"? Why do they become like this? What makes it different or different from others? Do they have the opportunity to escape? and etc.

Despite the obvious sympathy and pity for his heroes, Gorky takes the position of a realistic depiction of their environment. The author does not wax poetic about the characters, clearly realizing their shortcomings.

At the center of the play there are two conflicts: the internal one (the conflict of “truths”) develops around Luka, the external one - around the clash between Ash and the Kostylevs. Internal conflict strays into a general philosophical conflict: the author poses the question “What people need it more– truth or compassion” and does not find a clear answer to it.

The characters in the play are not without their own stories, although they can be guessed from individual remarks. So, Kleshch is proud that he is a working man; deeply despises the inhabitants of the shelter and dreams of breaking out. The Baron talks about his nobility. Ash considers himself a hereditary thief. The world of “facts of life” - Kleshch, Baron, Ash, Satin, Bubnov is opposed by the world of the Kostylevs - the masters of life, shamelessly robbing their “visitors”. This world, despite its potential, is no less low and vile than the world of the “bottom”.

The general tone of life in the flophouse with its scandals, quarrels and fights change dramatically with the appearance of Luke. He sows illusions among people at the bottom, helps them by telling lies. Although, if you look closely, even before Luka, each of them escaped reality with an illusory fantasy: Kleshch goes to work, the Baron invents an aristocratic origin for himself, Nastya is “hovering” in the clouds romance novels etc. Luke’s role is in the materialization of these fantasies: he calms Anna with the “righteous land”, the Actor with a hospital for “organs”, etc. Luke sincerely believes in the existence inside each of his dejected interlocutors of faith in a better life and hope to escape from the world “ bottom." In fact, it turns out that Luka’s consoling speeches only complicated the heroes’ perception of reality, which led to many tragedies: the Actor hanged himself, Nastya was in despair, the Kostylevs dealt with Natasha and Ash.

The opposite point of view is represented by Satin with his “ man - that sounds proud! And " a person must be respected" He prefers not to delay the moment of meeting with the outside world by telling lies to his “comrades.”

Gorky, finding himself in the position of defending humanity even in people who have sunk to the bottom, is still skeptical about Luke’s truth, because as a result it did not save anyone. And only the “hardened” and “unbelievers” Baron, Bubnov and Satin easily endured the disappearance of their comforter.

Despite the cruelty of the reality described, Gorky showed in the play the indestructible human desire for the better, the craving for justice.

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Man - that's the truth!

M. Gorky

M. Gorky's multifaceted talent was clearly manifested in drama. In the play “At the Lower Depths,” Alexey Maksimovich revealed to readers and viewers a hitherto unknown layer of Russian life: aspirations, suffering, joy and hope “ former people", the inhabitants of the shelter. The author did it quite sternly and truthfully.

The drama “At the Bottom” poses and resolves philosophical questions: what is truth? do people need it? Is it possible to find happiness and peace in real life? Thrown out of active life, the inhabitants of the “bottom”, meanwhile, do not refuse to solve complex philosophical questions and life situations that reality poses to them. They try on different situations, trying to “surface” to the surface. Each of them wants to return to the world of “real people.”

The heroes are full of illusions about the temporary nature of their situation. And only Bubnov and Satin understand that there is no way out “from the bottom” - this is the lot of only the strong. Weak people need self-deception. They console themselves with the thought that sooner or later they will become full-fledged members of society. This hope in the shelters is actively supported by Luke, a wanderer who unexpectedly appeared among them. The old man finds the right tone with everyone: he consoles Anna with heavenly happiness after death. He persuades her that in the afterlife she will find peace that she has not felt before. Luka persuades Vaska Pepel to leave for Siberia. There is a place for strong and purposeful people. He calms Nastya down, believing in her stories about unearthly love. The actor is promised recovery from alcoholism in a special clinic. The most amazing thing about all this is that Luke lies disinterestedly. He takes pity on people, tries to give them hope as an incentive to live. But the old man's consolations lead to the opposite results. Anna dies, the Actor dies, Vaska Ashes goes to prison. It seems that through the mouth of Satin the author condemns Luke and refutes the conciliatory philosophy of the wanderer. “There are comforting lies, reconciling lies... Those who are weak at heart... and those who live on other people’s juices need lies... some are supported by it, others hide behind it... And who is their own master... who is independent and doesn’t eat someone else’s food - why would he lie? Lies are the religion of slaves and masters... Truth is the god of a free man!”

But Gorky is not so simple and straightforward; it allows readers and viewers to decide for themselves: are Luke needed in real life or are they evil? Another striking thing is that society’s attitude towards this character has changed over the years. If during the creation of the play “At the Lower Depths” Luka was almost negative hero, with his boundless compassion for people, then over time the attitude towards him changed.

In our cruel times, when a person feels lonely and useless to others, Luka received a “second life”, became almost positive hero. He feels sorry for the people living nearby, even if mechanically, without wasting his mental strength on it, but he finds time to listen to the suffering, instills hope in them, and this is already a lot.

The play “At the Bottom” is one of those few works that do not age over time, and each generation discovers in them thoughts that are in tune with their time, views, and life situations. This is the great power of the playwright’s talent, his ability to look into the future.

In the play "At the Lower Depths" one of the unique genres of Gorky's dramaturgy crystallized - the genre of the socio-philosophical play.

Most critics of pre-revolutionary times viewed “At the Bottom” as a static play, as a series of sketches of everyday life, internally unrelated scenes, as a naturalistic play, devoid of action, development, and dramatic conflicts.

In “At the Bottom,” Gorky develops, sharpens, and makes especially clear the principle characteristic of Chekhov’s dramaturgy...

When... Gorky wrote: “A play is made like a symphony: there is a main leitmotif and various variations, changes to it” (Letter to the LAPP Theater / Literary Newspaper. 1931. No. 53), then he could have had in mind his own dramatic experience . The play features several “themes,” ideological and thematic complexes that “absorb” well-known ideas and moods, character traits of the characters, their aspirations, ideals and actions, their relationships and destinies, and their individual clashes. No fate, no conflict can be traced holistically from beginning to end; they are outlined, as it were, in a dotted line, discontinuously, episodically, since they must enter into a certain thematic complex, participating in the development of the “theme”, in the solution of a socio-philosophical problem.<...>

The exhibition presents all the main problems that will be solved in the play; all its main themes appear in embryonic form. How to relate to the inhuman life of the disadvantaged and oppressed? Bear your cross patiently?

To soften the torment of others with compassion? Surrender to comforting illusions? Protest? Should everyone look for an active way out, say, in work? Different answers to these questions separate and in one way or another bring together the characters of the play, who are, as it were, in a state of anticipation. Luke's appearance sets everything in motion. He removes some, supports others, guides them, and gives justification for their aspirations. A practical test of various life attitudes begins.

6. Dramatic conflict of the play “At the Lower Depths”

Most critics viewed “At the Bottom” as a static play, as a series of sketches of everyday life, internally unrelated scenes, as a naturalistic play, devoid of action and the development of dramatic conflicts. In fact, in the play “At the Bottom” there is a deep internal dynamics, development... The linkage of lines, actions, scenes of the play is determined not by everyday or plot motivations, but by the development of socio-philosophical issues, the movement of themes, their struggle. That subtext, that undercurrent that V. Nemirovich-Danchenko and K. Stanislavsky discovered in Chekhov’s plays, acquires decisive importance in Gorky’s “The Lower Depths.” “Gorky depicts the consciousness of people at the bottom.” The plot unfolds not so much in external action as in the dialogues of the characters. It is the conversations of the night shelters that determine the development of the dramatic conflict.

It’s an amazing thing: the more the night shelters want to hide the real state of affairs from themselves, the more they take pleasure in catching others in lies. They take special pleasure in tormenting their fellow sufferers, trying to take away from them the last thing they have - illusion

What do we see? It turns out there is no one truth. And there are at least two truths - the truth of the “bottom” and the truth of the best in a person. Which truth wins in Gorky's play? At first glance, this is true “bottom”. None of the night shelters have a way out of this “dead end of existence.” None of the characters in the play get better - only worse. Anna dies, Kleshch finally “sinks” and gives up hope of escaping from the shelter, Tatar loses his arm, which means he also becomes unemployed, Natasha dies morally and perhaps physically, Vaska Pepel goes to prison, even the bailiff Medvedev becomes one of the shelters . The shelter accepts everyone and does not let anyone out, except for one person - the wanderer Luke, who entertained the unfortunate with fairy tales and then disappeared. The culmination of general disappointment is the death of the Actor, to whom it was Luke who inspired the vain hope of recovery and normal life

“The comforters of this series are the most intelligent, knowledgeable and eloquent. That's why they are the most harmful. This is exactly the kind of comforter that Luke should be in the play “At the Bottom,” but I, apparently, was not able to make him like that. “At the Lower Depths” is an outdated play and, perhaps, even harmful in our days” (Gorky, 1930s).

7. Images of Satin, Baron, Bubnov in the play “At the Lower Depths”

Gorky's play "At the Lower Depths" was written in 1902 for the troupe of the Moscow Art Public Theater. For a long time, Gorky could not find the exact title for the play. Initially it was called "Nochlezhka", then "Without the Sun" and, finally, "At the bottom". The name itself already has a huge meaning. People who have fallen to the bottom will never rise to the light, to a new life. The theme of the humiliated and insulted is not new in Russian literature. Let us remember Dostoevsky’s heroes, who also “have nowhere else to go.” Many similarities can be found in the heroes of Dostoevsky and Gorky: this is the same world of drunkards, thieves, prostitutes and pimps. Only he is shown even more terrifyingly and realistically by Gorky. In Gorky's play, the audience saw for the first time the unfamiliar world of the rejected. World drama has never known such a harsh, merciless truth about the life of the lower social classes, about their hopeless fate. Under the arches of the Kostylevo shelter there were people of very different characters and social status. Each of them is endowed with its own individual characteristics. Here is the worker Kleshch, dreaming of honest work, and Ashes, longing for a good life, and the Actor, completely absorbed in memories of his past glory, and Nastya, passionately striving for something big, true love. They all deserve a better fate. All the more tragic is their situation now. The people living in this cave-like basement are tragic victims of an ugly and cruel order, in which a person ceases to be human and is doomed to drag out a miserable existence. Gorky does not give a detailed account of the biographies of the characters in the play, but the few features that he reproduces perfectly reveal the author’s intention. In a few words the tragedy of Anna’s life’s fate is depicted. “I don’t remember when I was full,” she says. “I was shaking over every piece of bread... I was trembling all my life... I was tormented... so as not to eat anything else... All my life I walked around in rags... all my miserable life..." Worker Tick speaks about his hopeless lot: "There is no work... there is no strength... That's the truth, there's no refuge... I have to die... That's the truth!" The inhabitants of the “bottom” are thrown out of life due to the conditions prevailing in society. Man is left to his own devices. If he stumbles, gets out of the rut, he is threatened with “the bottom”, inevitable moral, and often physical death. Anna dies, the Actor commits suicide, and the rest are exhausted, disfigured by life to the last degree. And even here, in this scary world outcasts, the wolf laws of the “bottom” continue to operate. The figure of the hostel owner Kostylev, one of the “masters of life”, who is ready to squeeze the last penny even from his unfortunate and destitute guests, is disgusting. His wife Vasilisa is equally disgusting with her immorality. The terrible fate of the inhabitants of the shelter becomes especially obvious if we compare it with what a person is called to. Under the dark and gloomy arches of the lodging house, among the pitiful and crippled, unfortunate and homeless vagabonds, words about man, about his calling, about his strength and his beauty sound like a solemn hymn: “Man - that’s the truth! Everything is in man, everything is for man! There is only man, everything else is the work of his hands and his brain! Man! This sounds great! Proud words about what a person should be and what a person can be highlight even more sharply the picture of the actual situation of a person that the writer paints. And this contrast takes on a special meaning... Satin’s fiery monologue about man sounds somewhat unnatural in an atmosphere of impenetrable darkness, especially after Luka left, the Actor hanged himself, and Vaska Ashes was imprisoned. The writer himself felt this and explained it by the fact that in the play there should be a reasoner (an exponent of the author’s thoughts), but the heroes portrayed by Gorky can hardly be called exponents of anyone’s ideas at all. That is why Gorky puts his thoughts into the mouth of Satin, the most freedom-loving and fair character.

The author began writing the play in Nizhny Novgorod, where, according to the observation of Gorky’s contemporary, Rozov, there was the best and most convenient place for all sorts of rabble of people to gather... (I always believed that Gorky took the prototypes of the heroes in Nizhny, because he lived in this city and knew all your future heroes personally). This explains the realism of the characters, their complete resemblance to the originals.

Alexey Maksimovich Gorky explores the soul and characters of tramps from different positions, in different life situations, trying to understand who they are, what brought so many different people to the bottom of life. The author is trying to prove that the night shelters are ordinary people; they dream of happiness, know how to love, have compassion, and most importantly, they think.

In terms of genre, the play At the Bottom can be classified as philosophical, because from the lips of the characters we hear interesting conclusions, sometimes entire social theories. For example, the Baron is consoled by the fact that there is nothing to wait for... I don't expect anything! Everything has already... happened! It's over!.. Or Bubnov So I drank and I'm glad!

But the true talent for philosophizing is manifested in Satin, a former telegraph employee. He talks about good and evil, about conscience, about the purpose of man. Sometimes we feel that he is the author’s mouthpiece; there is no one else in the play who can speak so smoothly and intelligently. His phrase Man, it sounds proud! became winged.

But Satin justifies his position with these arguments. He is a kind of ideologist of the bottom, justifying its existence. Satin preaches contempt for moral values And where are they honor, conscience? On your feet, instead of boots you can’t put on either honor or conscience... The audience is amazed by the gambler and sharpie who talks about the truth, about justice, the imperfection of the world in which he himself is an outcast.

But all these philosophical quests of the hero are just a verbal duel with his antipode in worldview, with Luke. Satin's sober, sometimes cruel realism collides with the soft and flexible speeches of the wanderer. Luke fills the shelters with dreams and calls on them to be patient. In this respect, he is a truly Russian person, ready for compassion and humility. This type is deeply loved by Gorky himself. Luke does not receive any benefit from giving people hope; there is no self-interest in this. This is the need of his soul. A researcher of the work of Maxim Gorky, I. Novich, spoke about Luke this way... he consoles not from love for this life and the belief that it is good, but from capitulation to evil, reconciliation with it. For example, Luke assures Anna that a woman must endure her husband’s beatings. Be patient more! Everyone, my dear, is patient.

Having appeared unexpectedly, just as suddenly Luka disappears, revealing his potential in each inhabitant of the shelter. The heroes thought about life, injustice, their hopeless fate.

Only Bubnov and Satin have come to terms with their position as night shelters. Bubnov differs from Satin in that he considers man a worthless creature, and therefore worthy of a dirty life. People all live... like chips floating down a river... building a house... chips away...

Gorky shows that in an embittered and cruel world Only people who stand firmly on their feet, are aware of their position, and do not disdain anything can survive. The defenseless night shelters Baron, who lives in the past, Nastya, who replaces life with fantasies, perish in this world. Anna dies, the Actor commits suicide. He suddenly realizes the impossibility of his dream, the unreality of its implementation. Vaska Pepel, dreaming of a bright life, ends up in prison.

Luka, regardless of his will, becomes the culprit in the death of these not at all bad people; the inhabitants of the shelter do not need promises, but... specific actions that Luke is not capable of. He disappears, rather runs, thereby proving the inconsistency of his theory, the victory of reason over the dream. Thus, sinners disappear from the face of the righteous!

But Satin, like Luke, is no less responsible for the death of the Actor. After all, breaking the dream of a hospital for alcoholics, Satin breaks the last threads of the Actor’s hope that connect him with life.

Gorky wants to show that, relying only on his own strength, a person can get out of the bottom. A person can do anything... if only he wants to. But there are no such strong characters striving for freedom in the play.

In the work we see the tragedy of individuals, their physical and spiritual death. At the bottom, people lose their human dignity along with their surnames and names. Many night shelters have the nicknames Krivoy Zob, Tatar, and Actor.

How does Gorky the humanist approach the main problem of the work? Does he really recognize the insignificance of man, the baseness of his interests? No, the author believes in people who are not only strong, but also honest, hardworking, diligent. Such a person in the play is the locksmith Kleshch. He is the only bottom dweller who has a real chance of revival. Proud of his working title, Kleshch despises the rest of the night shelters. But gradually, under the influence of Satin’s speeches about the worthlessness of work, he loses self-confidence, giving up his hands in front of fate. In this case, it was no longer the crafty Luke, but Satin the tempter who suppressed hope in man. It turns out that, having different views on life positions, Satin and Luka equally push people to death.

Creating realistic characters, Gorky emphasizes everyday details, speaking a brilliant artist. The gloomy, rough and primitive existence fills the play with something ominous and oppressive, enhancing the feeling of the unreality of what is happening. The shelter, located below ground level, deprived of sunlight, somehow reminds the viewer of hell in which people die.

The scene is terrifying when dying Anna talking to Luka. This last conversation of hers is like a confession. But the conversation is interrupted by the screams of drunken gamblers and a gloomy prison song. It becomes strange to realize the frailty of human life, to neglect it, because even in the hour of death Anna is not given peace.

The author's remarks help us more fully imagine the characters in the play. Brief and clear, they contain descriptions of the heroes and help us reveal some aspects of their characters. In addition, in the prison song introduced into the narrative, a new, hidden meaning. The lines I want to be free, yes, eh!.. I can’t break the chain..., show that the bottom tenaciously holds its inhabitants, and the night shelters cannot escape from its embrace, no matter how hard they try.

The play is finished, but to the main questions of what is the truth of life and what a person should strive for, Gorky does not give an unambiguous answer, leaving it to us to decide. Satin's final phrase Eh... ruined the song... fool is ambiguous and makes you think. Who is the fool? The Hanged Actor or the Baron who brought the news about this. Time passes, people change, but, unfortunately, the theme of the bottom remains relevant today. Due to economic and political turmoil, more and more people are going to the bottom of life. Every day their ranks are replenished. Don't think that these are losers. No, many smart, decent, honest people go to the bottom. They strive to quickly leave this kingdom of darkness, to act in order to live a full life again. But poverty dictates its conditions to them. And gradually a person loses all his best moral qualities, preferring to surrender to chance.

With his play At the Depth, Gorky wanted to prove that only in struggle is the essence of life. When a person loses hope, stops dreaming, he loses faith in the future.

1st option

Beginning of the form

1. Determine the genre of the work “At the Bottom”:

B) Comedy

B) Tragedy

3. What does Kleshch dream about?

4.Who is Vasilisa trying to use to kill her husband?

B) Vaska Pepla

D) Bubnova

5.Who was Satin before he ended up in the shelter?

A) Theater actor

B) Sharpie

B) Cartuznik

D) telegraph operator

D) Landowner

6. Establish a correspondence between the characters of the play and the paths that brought them to the bottom of life.
CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY:
1) Satin; 2) Actor; 3) Bubnov; 4) Baron.

THE WAYS THAT LETTED THEM TO THE BOTTOM OF LIFE:
(A) left the workshop because of his wife’s betrayal and fear of her lover;
(B) having gone bankrupt, he went to serve in the “treasury chamber”, where he committed embezzlement;
(B) went to prison for killing a man who insulted his sister;
(D) The hero was ruined by his addiction to alcohol.

8. What does Nastya dream about?

A) About wealth

B) About a trip to Siberia

B) About the wedding with Kleshch

D) About eternal true love

D) About writing a novel about your life

2nd option

1.Indicate the surname of the Actor "by stage":

A) Sverchkov-Zadunaisky

B) Zavolzhtsev-Zadunaisky

B) Sverchkov-Primorsky

D) Petrov-Zadunaisky

D) Sverchkov-Zavolzhsky

3. How, after a conversation with Luka, the Actor decided to change his life. What is this connected with?

4. What does Luka advise Vaska Ash?

A) Go to Siberia and start new life

B) Marry Vasilisa

C) Kill Kostylev and take possession of his property

5. Three judgments are given about Satin and Luke. Which of these statements is(are) true?

(A) Satin and Luke are antipodes.
(B) Satin and Luke preach the same thing, only each has a different approach.
(B) Satin is the conductor of the author’s thoughts in the play, but Luke is not.

6. Establish a correspondence between the heroes of the play “At the Bottom” and their further destinies.

CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY: FURTHER FATE:
1) Vaska Ash (A) hard death
2) Actor (B) prison due to murder

3) Anna (B) suicide

1A,2B,3B 1B, 2A,3B 1B,2B,3A

7. What is the main dispute in M. Gorky’s play “At the Depths”?

A) Dispute about human destinies

B) Dispute about happiness

B) Dispute about truth and dreams

D) Dispute about great things

ANSWERS

Option 1:

option:

Statements B and C are true

The revival of the name of Maxim Gorky after reconsidering the place of his work in Russian literature and renaming everything that bore the name of this writer must definitely happen. It seems that the most famous play from Gorky’s dramatic heritage, “At the Depths,” will play a significant role in this. The genre of drama itself presupposes the relevance of the work in a society where there are many unresolved social problems, where people know what it’s like to spend the night and be homeless. M. Gorky's play “At the Lower Depths” is defined as a socio-philosophical drama. Drama

A work is determined by the presence in it of an acute conflict affecting a person’s relationship with the environment, with society. In addition, drama, as a rule, is characterized by a veiled author’s position. Although it may seem that the material of the play is too difficult to understand, the realism of the conflict and the absence of moralizing are truly the advantages of dramatic work. Gorky's play contains all of the above. It is interesting that “At the Lower Depths” is perhaps Gorky’s only book where there is no open didacticism, where the reader himself is invited to make a choice between two “truths of life” - the positions of Luke and Satin.

Among the features of the play, we will mention the presence in it of several conflicts expressed to varying degrees. Thus, the presence of people from different walks of life among the heroes determines the development of social conflict. However, it is not very dynamic, since the owners of the Kostylev shelter have a social status that is not much higher than that of its inhabitants. But there is one more facet to the social conflict in the play: each of the night shelters carries a lot of contradictions related to their place in society, each hero has his own social conflict within himself, which threw them to the “bottom” of life.

The development of a love conflict is connected with the relationship between Vaska Ash and Natasha, into which the claims for love of Vasilisa and her husband interfere. Vaska Pepel, without the slightest doubt, leaves Vasilisa, who cheated on her husband with him, for the sake of a truly high feeling for Natasha. The heroine seems to return the thief Vaska to the true life values, relationships with her certainly enrich him inner world and awaken dreams of an honest life. But the envy of the older sister prevents the successful outcome of this love story. The culmination is Vasilisa’s dirty and cruel revenge, and the denouement is the murder of Kostylev. Thus, the love conflict is resolved by the triumph of the disgusting Vasilisa and the defeat of two loving hearts. The author shows that there is no place for true feelings at the “bottom”.

The philosophical conflict in the drama is the main one; it affects, to one degree or another, all the characters in the work. Its development is provoked by the appearance of the wanderer Luke in the shelter, who brings a new view of the world to the inhabitants of the “bottom”. Two life positions come into conflict: a white lie and the truth without embellishment. What turns out to be more necessary for people? Luke preaches pity and compassion, he instills hope for a different possibility, better life. Those heroes who believed him began to dream again, make plans, and they had an incentive to live on. But the old man didn’t tell them about the difficulties that were inevitable on the path to a bright future. It seems to give impetus to the beginning of a new life, but the person must go further on his own, but will he have enough strength for this? Can illusions always become a support in difficulties? The antipodean hero Satin believes that pity humiliates a person; to live, a person needs the truth, no matter how cruel it may seem.

All philosophical thoughts in the play they are expressed by the characters in direct dialogues and monologues. From Luke’s lips it sounds: “It’s true, it’s not always because of a person’s illness... you can’t always cure a soul with the truth...”. Satin says: “Lies are the religion of slaves and masters... Truth is the god of a free man!” Yes, exclamations that “only man exists, everything else is the work of his hands and his brain” are very attractive to us! Human! It's great! It sounds... proud! Human! We must respect the person!” Author's position in the dramatic is hidden. Gorky does not directly evaluate the words of his heroes. True, in his other prose work, “The Life of Klim Samgin,” the author says that we love people for the good that we have done to them, and we do not love for the evil that we have brought to them. When a person is deceived, they hide something from him, they, of course, bring harm to him, since they are deprived of the right to information and, therefore, to an objectively made choice. From this point of view, Luke’s philosophy cannot be salutary; his pity and compassion are not identical to love for a person. But Satin is powerless to help the inhabitants of the shelter, since he has nothing to respect even himself, in fact, he does not see a person in himself, his words are not supported by action. This is the common tragedy of all heroes. Words and dreams hang in the air, unable to find support in the people themselves.

At the end of the drama, one murder and one suicide occur. But the author does not pass judgment on any of the life philosophies underlying the play. Rather, one can feel a general regret about the passivity and weakness of people who find themselves at the “bottom”, see their own guilt in what happened and realize the futility of helping someone who is not ready for it. The ambiguity and diversity of the play are associated with the depth of the problems raised. You can’t see Luka as a stupid “crafty” old man who lies all the time, but you can’t idealize his compassionate love. At the same time, Satin, at first glance, pronounces his monologue as if in delirium, phrases pop up in his inflamed brain, which he picked up from different places. But with his enthusiasm he is trying to infect the people, to rouse them to revolution. Although the substitution of values ​​is obvious in his words. And perhaps in this way Gorky warned us about the substitution of values ​​that has eternally existed in the revolution, which is its tragedy.

True drama is always modern. The relevance of the play “At the Bottom” will never die, in my opinion, because when reading or watching it on stage we think about the eternal problems of choosing our path. The current pathos of the work, in my opinion, is associated with the attempt of our entire society to rise from the “bottom”, to understand why some manage to get out, while others do not. Unfortunately, not everyone succeeds in the positive desire to raise their head. And some people don’t even try. It is too life philosophy. Thus, the vitality of the drama “At the Bottom” is due to its truthfulness.